it's ten pm right now here in moscow on r t tonight torture sexual abuse and vicious beatings a damning dossier claiming widespread abuse by british troops of hundreds of iraqi detainees is handed to the war crimes tribunals. pointless previously invasion of independent study reveals the n.s.a.'s real anti terror was significantly exaggerated by the white house. voting through the violence of gyptian is a deciding on the next constitution with fierce clashes with police as critics war yes result will further empower the army and. as we go through the lives of. the cape town it's no laughing matter francois landis' try to convince the country he's got

a grip on france's figures even those economic relaunch has been overshadowed by a fair patient. even she went to heaven when this is r.t. the top story this hour senior british politicians and military figures could become targets for the international criminal court for alleged war crimes committed by the country's troops in iraq two hundred fifty pages describing the widespread abuse of detainees amounted to torture and have been handed to the hague now the u.k. is fighting tooth and claw there to keep out of the tribunal as a london correspondent polyploid explained. up until now the international criminal court at the hague had mostly tried african dictators and tyrants but the i.c.c. has been asked to investigate thousands of allegations of war crimes committed by

british forces in iraq a two hundred and fifty page dossier presented by a human rights organization and a british law firm contains allegations of beatings of electrocution smoke executions and sexual assault committed by u.k. forces and according to the also as of this report the finger of blame extends to the very heart of the british government at the time so the head of the british army the former defense secretary and the former defense minister could face prosecution for what this dossier calls systemic war crimes there are many hundreds of cases where the people have been interviewed in the provided reports about this abuse and it varies from what people might think are. relatively mundane examples of abuse to really quite appalling physical they're put says that british military commanders knew that their forces were committing war

crimes and moreover that their civilians to perry as consciously ignored such information at their disposal but the case foreign secretary william hague has already firmly rejected the suggestion that those at the top here in westminster knew what was taking place on the ground in iraq we reject allegations of systematic abuse but whether all substantiated allegations of things going wrong these things have been or are being investigated that does not require references to the international criminal court the position of the british government has constantly been or we're doing enough the point of this is simply that they still haven't done enough there are right now. at the international criminal court two heads of state one of them the sitting head of state of kenya and the other the former head of state of called d'ivoire they're both on trial at the international criminal court not for getting their hands bloody they didn't do anything

themselves the people under their authority are people they should have control or committing the crimes so if it's good enough for the african countries it should be good enough for the u.k. to the international criminal court has come under increasing pressure to act against war crimes committed by western countries it's now up to the prosecutor at the i.c.c. to go through the claims of abuse and to decide whether to call high ranking british officials into the dock at the hague ali boy artsy london will door series the most detailed document ever submitted to the international criminal court regarding alleged war crimes by british forces some of the harrowing test music contains already been made public in the among the abuses reported up holding beatings electrocutions various types of sexual humiliation even rape family members of some inmates were also allegedly threatened by british troops and in at least one case actually a woman described after beating him severely the soldiers brought in his eight year

old son and it into another witness alleges that during interrogation soldiers threatened to rape his sister and the rest is elderly parents lindsey friends a colleague spoke to a legal advisor with one of the groups behind the report about their findings. evidence shows that it's not only about individual and single cases and incidents it's really a systematic pattern of reparative acts which appeared that finding in our report or communication to the i.c.c. . smores and single isolated incidents ok there have been a number of attempts to bring the u.k. military to account for its actions in iraq none of worked what makes you think this will fare any different what we documented many more cases than were submitted before to the international criminal court or to other courts. it's now is the time because the u.k. had ten years to investigate to prosecute the direct perpetrators but also the

higher ups. in the u.k. ten years and there are still hardly any prosecutions in that country so now it's simply the time that international courts have to step in. the dimension there is not a first major attempt to get the two outs of the alleged. seasonal website out to the value to read about a previous inquiry into allegations of british soldiers tortured detainees mutilated corpses and killed and the reaction we got to. this it was a national security agency the story should be widespread surveillance became public knowledge the white house let to defend preventing numerous terrorist plots they said but it seems that's not entirely the case by a long way is going to put the discovery. when edward snowden first revealed the u.s. government's indiscriminate collection of every american's phone data u.s. president barack obama defended the program insisting that dozens of threats around

the world have been a bit courtesy of the national security agency and i say chief general keith alexander claimed metadata collection has thwarted fifty four different terrorism related activities post nine eleven now unfortunately for the white house a new study shows that the numbers they're using well they've been slightly inflated because that analysis of two hundred and twenty five terrorism related cases in the u.s. since the september eleventh attack has found that the n.s.a.'s program has provided evidence for only one case and that the study by the national based nonprofit new american foundation has concluded the bulk collection of data by the n.s.a. has had no discernible impact on preventing acts of terrorism researchers found that in the majority of post nine eleven terrorism related cases tips or evidence actually came from traditional law enforcement and investigative methods now these

findings come as president obama is preparing to address the nation friday outlining his proposals to change intelligence operations and oversight geo political analyst eric draitser doesn't expect the president's promises to equate into significant action i think that the reality is that what we're looking at is a vast infrastructure with billions of dollars invested in it over the course of multiple decades so whatever obama might be able to say politically using whatever rhetorical cover he needs the reality is that the infrastructure is not going anywhere the scaling back is only going to be superficial because as we know the surveillance program itself is all pervasive it goes to hardware it goes to software it goes to the companies themselves the servers before the cables themselves so as i said it is a closed system that they've created. to say oh well i can scale back this system this is merely for public consumption just last month

a task force appointed by the president himself also concluded that the n.s.a.'s counterterrorism programs are not essential to preventing attacks reporting from new york growing up or down r.t. prison the law it's been spending the past couple of hours trying to explain himself to the must be the end of the country and even though it sees more personal domestic problems that's on everyone's minds right now the beleaguered french leaders say it is to convince people that he's also going to steal a country's debt ridden sluggish economy. now on friends for alarms headaches. and so just like this one i have no doubt this video clip mocks consol on's tax policies which are among the major reasons his become the least popular president in france as more than history. could hold out to move towards more together with belgium france's tax grab is the highest in the euro zone what to do but so much of the way for. the last two years french. talks as well and two thirds of the

country's population is clear cut so i don't suffer while eighty percent of their president's economic policy is misguided and inefficient gianluca is among those eighty percent an entrepreneur he was forced to close his business down after taxes became too big to bear. this is a vicious circle my business has stopped working which means i can to provide jobs for others and i can't pay taxes to my country to help its development it's like everything falls apart. the current taxation policy was part of the finance strategy chosen by the french government to fight economic crisis but almost two years later critics say it simply hasn't worked the country's credit rating has been caught the unemployment level all those table recently is at its highest in almost sixteen years and for twenty fourteen the european commission for costs just

zero point nine percent g.d.p. growth in france against one point seven percent in germany and two point two percent in britain people and businesses alike oh my god another tax and another it's not that they're too high but there are too many and a combination of all these taxes makes it really heavy taxes today really break an economy it seems that's also finally beginning to dawn on the country's leader examples of new rules all rules taxes big game having to have a. usually known for very optimistic speeches in his new year address council on sounded rather concerned. the economic crisis turned out to be longer and deeper than we could have predicted that. the socialist leader pledged some truly liberal changes such as cutting labor costs and public spending making people talk about a new or loaned and new hopes of the country's recovery but critics are still vocal

as they say long's plan is short on details and some are afraid it could simply be too little too late rif nationality from france. online tonight organic farmers in the u.s. again for themselves helpless against the g. giant monsanto it is called won't protect them from being sued over crop copyright even if they've been averse we've been sowing monsanto seeds online and later in this program well before we get a bus to the home where you don't belong we've got the story of thousands of latvians considered aliens in a land where they were born that report to. vote in egypt for yet another constitution's been marred by deadly violence with the muslim brotherhood claiming that at least eight people have been killed in clashes with police south of the capital securities and tense with more than two hundred thousand police officers on the streets but the massive deployments are failing to prevent attacks and skirmishes just before polling stations opened

a bomb went off in a cairo court slightly norma's injured the opponents of the latest constitution claim the document will cement the power of the military backed interim government well to report on the challenges of the perils facing egypt's latest lesson democracy. there was a bomb blast here in the capital in an area called babbar at a court room that was supposed to house all the ballots about particular area by the end of the day the explosion was so large that it managed to break the windows of the buildings adjacent to it however no one was injured nonetheless we have had violent break up across the country in particular benes week which is an office in egypt where we just heard that the brotherhood supporters and supporters of the ousted president mohamed morsy had taken to the streets and protest against the razor friend and that descended into street battles with the police there's also been violence in the way and we've also had reports of a big outbreak of street clashes between security forces and mizzen brotherhood

supporters and mohamed morsy supporters up in alexandria as well so really it's a very targeted day for the first day of this referendum and people here in egypt speaking to them they tell me they think it's going to get worse when you go onto the street. at the moment it seems to be overwhelmingly people are looking for a yes but there still is quite a hard core group of people who are saying i the no to the constitution or boycotting the people that have worried about this constitution say that it will only cement military powers over the next civilian president there are a few articles there in the constitution which basically say that military trials to trials for civilians will be allowed which allows the minute to control that little bit of the judiciary in addition which is the key change here the defense minister which at the moment is the de facto leader lead story general abdel fatah sisi his position will be protected for the next two terms of the president's office this is because the supreme council the armed forces will be allowed to say in the appointment say that's a big change that in addition the military budget will also remain secrets this is

a point of contention for a lot of activists and revolutionaries as well as human rights organizations who want to know what egypt's military who are currently running this country and spending their money on on top of that so the supporters of mohamed morsi just say the whole situation is illegitimate mohamed morsi they say is still president and therefore this constitution is not in void as his constitution two thousand and twelve should be in place true reporting from cairo there spoke to me as an expert on islamic movements he claims the proposed constitution only serves the interests of the army and corrupt political powers. the constitution represents the interests of those who were disaffected by the twenty five january two thousand and eleven revolution in egypt it's mainly the military and the corrupt business community associated with the military and some of those who lost in every single election that was conducted fairly since the ousting of president mubarak of the defunct

regime and therefore this constitution is just a one in a series of measures that are considered from a purely legal point of view to be illegal and illegitimate and many of the people who are probably all the people who go to the polling stations today will have to vote yes because those who were intending to vote no had already been intimidated having say we've made a few moments we'll hear why washington so reluctant to see iran among the participants the long awaited syria peace talks and weeks time.

speak your language. programs and documentaries in spanish matters to you. was a little tentative angle's story. here. the spanish find out more visit. logan britain america's patients with the syrian opposition members seems to be

wearing thin they're now set threatening to rethink their support if its main faction decides against attending next week's geneva peace talks with one of the potential player in the region whose participation is in the is a rather russian the u.n. urging to iran's president washington still sending mixed signals about that i spoke to hillary mann leverett she's an expert on iran and u.s. foreign policy says if washington truly wanted to solve the syrian crisis it would take a different approach. what it demonstrates is a real incoherence in strategy and policy coming out of washington out of london at a paris which seeks to somehow not just have a negotiation but to have essentially a table where syria just comes to surrender and that's not something serious going to do that's not something iran is going to support i don't think that's something that russia or the vast majority of countries around the world would support but that is essentially what washington london and paris are trying to do but it ends up being incoherent because it's just not possible when i was at the white house and the state department with the u.s.

government i negotiated with the current iranian foreign minister mohammad java as the reef over afghanistan we negotiated with the iranians with the russians very effectively choose to deal with the taliban in afghanistan so there's a real track record of the united states being able to work with with iran and with russia on a really difficult problem it doesn't make sense that the united states doesn't want to solicit iran's participation and work with iran on this issue. stories online from. britain go on the cover over the limit to on a website discover hopes to speed to get the green light to put the pedal to the metal plus the expulsion of the american journalist from russia since the cold war . prompted moscow to ban the south of the country.

genetically modified food as one another battle against american farmers the u.s. supreme court now says they firm can sue organic growers if they use it lab engineered crops even if it feels a bit advertently contaminated with monsanto materials we have written about g.m.o. he says the company's terrorizing farmers. the implications of this are huge because first of all monsanto lied in that statement to the supreme court the law brazenly by saying they never heard it never will sue farmers for inadvertant as the term is inadvertent. contamination of their fields but they have sued countless

farmers percy schmeiser a farmer in canada it is a example of monsanto has a team of lawyers that go out and terrorize farmers in the us and canada when the wind blows the seeds from a lot field across to nominate sort of feel that says ok you know you have to play . over someone's son his public image is arguably the worst in the world let's take a look at news what why the searches point to dozens of health risk connected with genetically modified food including chimerism premature deaths in animals that they tested on this is prompted a campaign and for g.m.o. products to be clearly labeled bookman centers was still refusing to do that the company's also setting aside billions of dollars every year to lobby for its interest is a big p.r. machine it's in fact as well become the world's single biggest seed producer. so the news tonight thailand's prime minister should know what and says she will not step down still that's despite a second day of mass protests to try and bring bangkok to a standstill tens of thousands of demonstrators are vowing to tighten their

blockade of main road government buildings while radical demonstrators are thought to be planning to storm the stock exchange the opposition accuses shinawatra trying to get her brother off corruption charges and put him back in power. libin skirmishes in northwest england as police moved in on anti fracking campaigners it thought several arrests were made at the site near manchester as protest has tried to prevent shale gas drilling of fears for people's health of the environment on monday the prime minister attempted to win over local authorities and the public by saying they could keep the tax paid by fracking firms. reports say security forces in bahrain vandalized the shiites trying during monday's anti-government protests the goal kingdom's main opposition party says the attack shows leaders on a more city towards the people since the beginning of the uprising in twenty eleven around forty religious sites are said to be targeted by security forces.

over two hundred people fleeing the violence in south sudan have drowned after a ferry sank in the white nile river it's thought the boat was overloaded at the time meantime the army's repel an attack from rebels trying to take over a key city in all producing upper nile state and heavy fighting is also continuing near the town of bor it's the largest under rebel control. imagine being an alien in your own country but it is the reality for nearly three hundred thousand people living in the small baltic country of latvia many of whom were born there as where their parents but they're still considered normal citizens nonetheless for scots spin speaking to some of them about what it's like when birthright means having few rights you guys when you mean it but at the moment non-citizens have limited rights we can't vote can't occupy government positions or be policeman or lawyers in november alexander invited un secretary general ban ki moon to latvia for

a congress on the issue the invite was politely declined. and you're going to do any of them there are around three hundred thousand of us and i'm one of them here's my passport it's an alien passport. when the soviet union collapsed latvia only gay full citizenship to people and their descendants who had lived in the country prior to nine hundred forty when it became a soviet republic that was around fifty two percent of the population everyone else was classed as a non-citizen today one in seven people are considered alien canady is one of those affected he was born in latvia and although his mother is latvian because his father moved to the country after nine hundred forty not it was denied citizenship he eventually went through the process of naturalization when he was twenty two years old how did it make you feel having to go through that process despite the fact is he saying you were born in this country well that your mother loves you

right and that's the same if she does that you feel good and if it doesn't feel a bit about insulted the process of naturalization attests noncitizens on their knowledge of latvian history culture and language many feel their hostages to history claiming the latvian government are using them to avenge the past but it's not just a moral issue it could also be economic benefits to ending this policy if that three hundred thousand people will be back into political and economical life will be very good feel for the country to united and to finally move on further because we always look back into history who are trying to go further into european union insecurities own and so on but we still had its turn back those fighting for their rights acknowledged they have a long way to go before they win the argument to say they're prepared to take their case step by step pull scott r.t. latvia. ten twenty five hundred ten twenty six moscow time thanks be with us for

breaking the set up after the break to explore internet freedom as well as media reference to airbrush the legacy of the late israeli prime minister ariel sharon about with more news in thirty four minutes that. because he doubted states is the big dog the only hyper power and the cultural driving force of globalization it takes a lot of flack i mean hey globalization means the whole world gets hollywood and hot dogs and not the other way around so let's take a break from the negativity and talk about something truly amazing about america and as a guy who lives in moscow i could say that the constitution of the united states is something truly amazing in russia there is constant talk about needing a new national idea

a new ideology or political theory or big changes to the russian constitution and so on and it's hard for people in america understand this but twice in the twentieth century the system that russians gave their lives for collapsed and the current constitution was written quickly after a period of violence and said collapse not after a glorious victory now you see why people here aren't exactly memorizing amendments and founding fathers quotes here in america there are debates between liberals and conservatives but almost everyone believes the constitution and it is america's greatest strength there is a national idea that is a sacred document with a list of rules as almost universally agreed upon everyone with half a brain on the street but sadly not in congress knows when something is against the constitution or should i see against america near universal belief in the constitution is actually something truly exceptional about america but that's just my opinion.

in the eyes of the. little.

well it's up everyone i'm abby martin this is breaking in the set saturday january eleventh marked the one year anniversary of the death of one of those brilliant innovators of our time aaron swartz and was a computer prodigy an internet activist who tragically took his own life at the age of twenty six c. aaron was facing thirty five years behind bars and was the subject of a merciless which by the department of justice for the crime of releasing information the footage that you're seeing shows aaron and during an mit electrical closet and downloading millions of academic articles from the online service j. store which he intended to release for free this video was used against him by prosecutors who felt he deserved more jail time than murderers and rapists so why did swartz do it well i didn't care about making himself wealthy from uploading the files he cared instead about internet freedom civil liberties and making information accessible to everyone else by their academic or financial.