the. protesters across western ukraine surrounded storm local government buildings as rotting spreads from the capital. in kiev a brief truce between rodgers and security forces and as the government shows it is willing to make concessions to the opposition amid calls from the to hold an early election. syria's opposition says it will insist on a sans resignation and could drop out of the geneva two talks at any moment as the international peace conference continues in switzerland. who blows water is edward snowden is reportedly planning to ask russia for personal protection after receiving death threats of top stories.

this is not international law from our studio center here in moscow where midnight and ten pm in ukraine where rioting has spread to the west of the country with protests breaking into ministration buildings and in the capital kiev the opposition and the government and they're expected to announce the results of their talks. is that. but we've seen is groups of demonstrators and rioters across ukraine trying to. occupy or demonstrate outside of government buildings now in the in the cities. and. we have seen the main. local administration buildings being occupied by demonstrators now i was looking online and on twitter of accounts of

thousands of people involved also we've seen it on the local news here as well the scenes from then it's not just those two cities in the west of ukraine we're also hearing a fair of government offices being besieged all the at least the scenes of demonstrations so certainly the unrest in ukraine not limited to to the capital here in kiev now we are hearing from the government side that they are all ready to consider repealing or at least toning down the new measures new laws that were brought in to tackle the violence here in kiev and we've also heard from the prime minister. of who said that. he was he was ready to resign and his whole cabinet resign if the parliament here in ukraine decided they weren't up to the job now that's one of those things that's going to be up to discussions at

a special session of the ukrainian parliament that will be held next week that was announced by vice president dick the on a call which also for discussion. that session of parliament will be the possibility of holding of holding elections we've also been seeing a reaction to what's going on here in kiev from other afield from abroad the european union has been particularly vocal on thursday we heard from. mr but also the president of the european union he had a he held a phone conversation a phone call with. with ukrainian president viktor on a covert chin which he said he was deeply concerned that conversation is over to shoot him that there would not be no state of emergency called in ukraine and they was no plans at the moment to to involve the military. extra type of security services on the streets now he wasn't the only european leader to talk about ukraine the. head of the european parliament martin schulz said that he in

his opinion there has to be elections in ukraine immediately and he was calling for the ukrainian government to call those elections so the european union applying pressure making their voices heard of all over the subject of what continues to be a moment a standoff between rioters and riot police and a lot of talks going on between the various sides here in ukraine. people over there will radical groups are gaining momentum in the country they're spurred by those anti-government protests and the rioters appear to be well armed are online team has been taking a closer look at the gear that they've been using opposition fighters can be seen with helmets and shields and carry a wide array of weapons even built a catapult to hold over large distances and also a giant sling on top of that they have pneumatic and non lethal firearms well you can get all the specifics on the equipment right now at r.t. dot com well despite all this western governments have been placing the blame

solely on the authorities don't know mcadams's from the ron paul institute for peace and prosperity says their comments are not helping the situation. reason why the protesters if that's what they are to be called have become more radicalized it's because they've been encouraged all along by e.u. and american politicians who have been on the ground in the middle of the protests encouraging them and that's simply unprecedented it's unprecedented interference in the in the sovereign nation and it's all blamed on this new protest law this protest law is virtually identical to any law you would see here in the united states for example you're not allowed i'm here in d.c. you're not allowed to wear a mask at a protest in washington d.c. you're not allowed to erect a tent you saw what happened to the occupy protests violently torn down you're not allowed to have foreign funding of your political organization here in the u.s.

it's illegal in poland one of the most arrogant of the countries interfering in ukraine condemning this new law well if you libel a politician in poland you can go to jail for two years so there's an enormous amount of the parker see involved here well far right groups are at the core of the protests in ukraine and that make it clear that they do not favor peaceful resistance nationalists factions are insisting that the government will only listen to the language of force united states meanwhile has reiterated its threat to impose sanctions or let's get more than from the capitol in washington d.c. so no change of stance then lucy i don't know if she's ready to talk to me about the looks of things i am not so sure she can hear me lucy can hear me to the violence in lucy can hear and i can hear you yes right yeah we're on live now and now. the fact is that there doesn't seem to be much change in stance from the u.s. isn't it despite the fact that the ukrainian government has appeared to make some

sort of concession. well that's right i'm not much of a change in tone from the white house which has again threatened sanctions against ukraine if violence there. it's the white house spokesman jay carney have strongly condemned the fighting that had a rupture in kiev urging all sides of the conflict to move towards a peaceful resolution now pardon me adding an earlier statement made by the national security council spokesperson carney didn't blame ukraine's government for those tensions let's take a listen. now this increasing tension in ukraine is a direct consequence of the government failing to acknowledge that would give them a grievances of its people instead it is moved to weaken the foundations of ukraine's democracy by criminalizing peaceful protest and stripping civil society of political opponents of key democratic protections under the war. now carney also said that the u.s. wasn't in a position to ask the president of ukraine to step down but he did say washington wants ukraine to repeal harsh new anti protest laws that have sparked the latest

clashes now while sanctions are being considered by the white house no decision on that just yet the u.s. of course has revoked the visas of several ukrainian officials who were allegedly linked to violence in kiev earlier violence not the latest round now president obama himself staying silent on the recent developments however the u.s. isn't alone in pointing the finger of blame on the ukrainian government when it comes to the recent violence the finnish foreign minister said in an entry on his blog that the government bears responsibility if it continues to what he called deny the basic rights of its citizens despite the provocations of some protesters in the crowd this is on a blog post that he issued we also heard from the e.u. budget commissioner who said that while sanctions weren't being discussed the body will go beyond simply condemning the violence one possible option going after the bank accounts of certain all the dark some of the ruling party in ukraine. from a washington d.c. studios thank you very much indeed lucy. well the tactics used by ukrainian police

have come under criticism for the british police officer with experience control to the methods. minute it starts becoming violent one of the. men may have no option than to react sometimes in the way they did because once that situation does get out of control like that well they leave those two primary and thursday we can restore peace quickly in whatever way you can get the demonstrators moved to vote what. and then primary there the second part of the insist to do so as safely as possible for the public service decided then to the officers second so i think in a separate ways when you get back to environment to going to police officers in many ways it's not surprising that they haven't reacted as digitally as they have i mean it's not very nice. and indeed a lot of the police and get very artfully injected so well about human beings at

the end of the day you know they all strive however well equipped they are all well trained they are you know this is going to zorn analogy but it's sort of combat in the field face to face with some dangerous people many of whom are actually intent on causing them harm. we're closely following what's happening in kiev with peter oliver in the midst of all the trouble there and these are the live pictures from a nighttime care for the moment is right about ten past and at night we can see a police barricade there and they're facing a small group of protesters but we do know there are plenty of other protesters around various parts of the city at the moment and we're still waiting to see what the outcome of those talks are and that truce of course is over so those are the scenes at the moment for kerry to get more details on the turmoil there and a live stream of various scenes from the city on r.t. dot com with minute by minute updates.

the leading syrian opposition figure attending the geneva two peace talks has said his delegation will insist on assad's resignation and also warned it may back out of the negotiations at any time the u.n. mediator in syria had been trying to bring the country's warring rivals together for face to face talks let's cross live now to r.t. you got a piece going of is in switzerland so you go what more do you know about what's happening there the result of these talks we're hearing that the opposition that actually are not very keen. to carry on with these talks or they could indeed pull out. well the syrian opposition says that it's not ready to sit down at the same table to talk with the syrian authorities but they are nevertheless ready to continue the negotiations using un special envoy on syria lakhdar brahimi as the mediator so basically he'll be meeting separately with the rebels and with the syrian authorities and passing on information from one to another thus making this

dialogue possible and frankly this format was widely talked about before it's not coming as a surprise because. after all these years awful violence and so much from usual accusations even having them in the same building is already quite an achievement there of course the general for the international community is finally to get them at that same negotiations table but of course it is going to take time and the positive signal coming from the rebels is that they also say that only a political solution is possible and it is going to take a long time and this is only the first step and they've also said that they are now deciding whether or not they'll stay here in geneva entirely the same group which took part in the opening day of the conference back in montreaux. part of the group leave and they also say that they may back out of the talks at any moment but

this is really not the first time that we're hearing conditions or possibly mixed signals from the rebels since unlike syrian authorities who confirmed that they were going to take part of this conference a long time ago the rebels who are constantly changing their minds even twenty four hours prior to the start of the opening day of the conference in montreaux and it was quite an eventful day. the talks are still set to continue on friday for more about how the opening day was held over. forty nations present and around a thousand journalists hears this report. but the prime minister i'm sorry to. can you just read yourself if you live in new york i live in syria i have. to give you this. here in this forum the first day of the

conference was expected to be spent listening to formal statements instead it was the scene of bitter exchanges as the syrian opposition pressed on with its calls for president assad to step down thing that i said is the problem and i said i don't have a problem old any solution without. stepping down a change of power in damascus is something washington is pushing for as well bashar assad will not be part of that transition government but according to the u.n. secretary general of this is neither up to washington nor any other outside players to decide the seriousness of themselves had the primary responsibility to end the country determine their party to their system and future and start repeating their country while democracy is willing to discuss anything from commenting territory partial cease fire anything that is except assad's resignation it seems the parties

have a different understanding of the course of the talks indeed the only agree on the one thing that a political solution is the only way no one should. know one's trying to gloss this over that this is the beginning of a tough and complicated process more than forty countries and organizations and all suggest together how this must end. that it has to have an inclusive syria it's. still the statements were indeed emotional and there was mutual accusations that it was most important is that parties involved want direct talks to start as soon as. of those two because of the first round of negotiations mediated by the un arab league special envoy on syria is expected to last one week after nearly three years of extreme violence it isn't a surprise the two sides of the syrian conflict aren't getting along very well

frankly just getting them in the same building may already be considered a diplomatic breakthrough not to mention the talks which are scheduled to continue on friday europe is going off r t montreaux switzerland. despite the mutual hostility diplomats say that both syria's government and opposition forces have signaled that willingness to discuss ceasefire as prisoner swaps and the delivery of humanitarian aid and they say they hope in breaking the deadlock rests with the international mediators that's. they must understand that neither one of them is able to really sort of the game military victory over the other in the battlefield so they need to reach some sort of accommodation for one of the opposition cannot dictate it and say that i said can be a part of any. future syria and the syrian government cannot sort of lump everybody into. the basket of terrorists so each one of them must reach out and i believe

that they were laconically they can't this is going to take a great deal of time a great deal of attention and a great deal of goodwill on part of those who are advocating both sides well do stay in touch with developments at the peace talks as r.t. brings you in-depth coverage from geneva. we stay in switzerland to bring you another key global event that's underway there is business and political leaders address the world economic forum in davos among them iran's president rouhani who's pledged cooperation with his neighbors and the rest of the world the details on that story coming up plus all those off the break . the united states is a very good example here because in the early years they had a pretty strong genuine democracy that by now i would argue has degenerated into a system where money and power that much went down

a bit and then the deputy of the majority of the founding fathers of the united states would constantly say that they were not trying to instill democracy that he was more of all they wanted tops we institute. and they purposely designed to be institutions to as they put it exclude the majority from participation. right. first. and i think the true. reformers. instrument.

in which snowden has been getting an increasing number of death threats and is expected to also russian authorities to help protect him that whistleblowers whereabouts in russia are kept secret report has details of the addictive for the former n.s.a. contractor. despite his temporary residency in russia it's fair to assume that n.s.a. whistleblower edward snowden follows what's reported about him throughout the world however it's the recent death threats robert descriptive once published in u.s. media that is causing the thirty year old to request extra security and protection from russian law enforcement the website but speed quoted an anonymous u.s. intelligence officer describing how he would have assassinated snowden if he had the chance another unnamed pentagon official has been quoted saying he would have simply love to put

a bullet in snowden's head work he not restricted from killing an american snowden's lawyer says the former contractor is constantly accompanied by private guards but that may no longer be enough to ensure his security. we clearly understand that there is a serious danger for the life and health of edward snowden and n.s.a. intelligence officer says that it's easy to imagine a situation where he walks around moscow for example after doing his groceries and he accidentally bumps into someone then he suddenly. goes home and dies in the shower in his situation he has to think about his security snowden's attorney stresses that according to russian law a death threat carries criminal liability he also says the former contractor's refugee status makes him only entitled to ask the police for help in the meantime a new poll by pew research shows that while americans are still divided over the

benefits of snowden's n.s.a. leaks when it comes to just young americans ages eighteen to twenty nine years old the majority believe that snowden's leaks served the public's interest reporting from new york. r.t. . even though the white house and the. the government considers snowden to be almost and then be for some people he's a hero worthy of being or mood students of glasgow university of nominated him to be the rector which would make him their representative on the university's governing body caught up with one of those spearheading the bid the reason which shows edward snowden is because we know that he is a hero here's a brave man who rist a lot of things to let us that people know the extent of us media surveillance and intrusion into our private lives and we just want to show him that we appreciate what he's done and it is a clear message sent our to those who are monitoring us that we will not stand for

this and that we do not this we do not accept this kind of criminality it would be more symbolic than anything because he will be able to actually physically come to class go it will choose a representative. for him in situations where he cannot personally attend but his duties will be to hold the title of the rector of the university of glasgow we've had an overwhelmingly positive response of course we will do everything we can to make sure that this actually happens iran says it's ready to engage with neighboring countries and other world powers president rouhani has pledged came at the world economic forum in davos or is there. he is taking full advantage of the president of the country has hammered honey all the devils economic forum because it's incredibly timely for him we know that the six month interim deal struck between the six major powers has taken effect this week and the message from him is is open for business and i say it's certainly timely

because in the audience you've got two hundred fifty people the participants some of the richest people in the world eighty billionaires hey we got forty heads of state so he's speaking to the right people and it's the first time in ten years the iranian leader has come to this event and he is basically opening up the country to international investment he's worrying the likes of any tell you tell shell as well as exxon mobil throughout the day he wants to really drum up support for the oil industry that has been really suffering in the last two years because as they sanctions which will now be partially lifted thanks that interim deal that has been struck now he's got great expectations for his economy let's listen to the man himself. iran's economy has the potential to be among the world's top ten in the next three decades that's our long term goal which we're planning to achieve

through our social economic as well as domestic and foreign policy my government is pursuing ideals and economic development democracy and the improvement of iran's foreign relations and that's impossible without our international engagement now considering a run has one of the biggest if not the biggest oil and gas reserves in the world is a feasible a goal for the country in a way relationships between iran and the west are now warming up thanks the sanctions being partially lifted and investors are keen to get involved as well. business partner a formal oil tycoon mikhail khodorkovsky has been granted an early release by russia's you print called. free and. do so in just a matter of. this report. now but all negative is waiting for the official papers from the supreme court to visit leverage to the prison where he has been serving his sentence this supreme court has found out on that it is eligible for early

release and could go free at any moment the court also ruled that the time that limited has spent in prison in two thousand and four and two thousand and five before he was actually sentenced for the first you can scase was actually illegal and that was sort of a victory for pot on negative and that of course however on top of all of this the supreme court has actually upheld the earlier ruling which stipulated that he got paid seventeen billion that's about five hundred million dollars as reimbursement for the taxes that he hasn't paid this is exactly what he said he does not intend to do because he says it stipulates that he is innocent of that and that is also precisely the reason why we probably will not be seeing the former oil tycoon coming back to russia any time soon because the charges seventeen billion rubles was the reason why he said he is not going to come back to russia and will indeed

stay abroad in berlin or switzerland where he went to after being released at the end of december on presidential pardon. i'll be back with more news for in just over half an hour from now and next the latino national meet a woman who's come up with an unusual way of showing his support for whistleblowers at some worlds apart after the break.

recently facebook was ablaze with likes and shares about the twenty fourteen no pants subway ride this is a yearly event that has grown in popularity and spread way beyond its native new york to cities across the globe according to fox news and such a thousands of people ride the subway in their underwear as if it were a normal day what you're going to say is a prank collective the cause a scenes of chaos and joy in public places yeah i guess this is kind of funny i mean hey i like wackiness but think about the effort and propaganda takes to get thousands of people the world over to simultaneously do something and then with all that effort and all those thousands of participants all you do is walk around such a pants on this idea must've been created by some people with a pretty decadent lifestyle because how can you even think of organizing people for the goal of spreading joy when a lot of us can't even afford to put dinner on the table in the future could you

guys please try some pantless food donating or pencils recycling or maybe best of all and artist of all pencils job creating wackiness is fine but when you have the power of thousands of volunteer trousers. yours please use it responsibly and productively but that's just my opinion. alone welcome to worlds apart whistleblowing is all about pulling become first of governments wrongdoing and shock a big public within dissin travel ations well this is exactly what one irish adamic decided to do to draw attention to the fate of julian assange john edward snowden is a new calendar really is the best way to emphasize the integrity of whistle blowing

well to discuss that knowledge joined by dr dobson fuller herself dr fuller thank you very much for your time thank you for inviting me now the reason governments are so unhappy with missile blowers is essentially because they point to the fact that emperor has no clothes but i guess you decided to take this idea literally well yes i mean you are correct and indeed this theme of the calendar a tie is in a to whistleblowing in that it's about revealing the truth i worked as a model while i was writing my ph d. mainly as an art nude model for artists but also for photographers and that's why when i began to get very interested in whistleblowing when news revelations came out which were of course highly relevant to my line of work i began to think what can i do to actually have an impact as well on this situation to raise awareness but also to raise money for it and because i had quite a few photos and some of those photos had never been used in other projects i

decided i would donate this to this cause as it were and to try to raise money to support these organizations with those photos but this is not really an novel way of attracting attention i mean we have seen. everybody doing that from students to grammys so i guess at this point there's a risk of it being perceived not just an act of and distancing but simply as a prank i wonder if it doesn't trivialize the ordeal of whistleblowers who pay a very high price for what they did yes yes and i mean that is the first year it is something that we've seen everyone from grannies to you know the fireman's calendar you know oprah just put in these kind of new calendars and in fact that's where i got the idea i did think there are a lot of charities and a lot of good causes they do make new calendars to raise money for their cause and that's kind of what i saw it as a little bit of a tongue in cheek. kind of idea however i don't think it would be right to say that it should.