ukraine's president signs a law granting amnesty to those detained during riots in the country position front and seek more support from the west we get a lot of expert opinion on this shortly on r.t. to national. lack of lethal drugs is set to change the face of capital punishment in some us states seeing the return of gas chambers and firing squads. you know these are things that are also guaranteed pain to the public we hear from experts who describe what condemned prisoners will face when the old methods are back in action. we will support a unified afghanistan as it takes responsibility for its own future. the taliban in

the future well the peace process with the government of afghanistan. afghanistan faces a looming threat of the taliban's resurgence as carbon in washington wrangle over a post put out security deal to end the thirteen year war. ukraine's president has signed the lord he gives amnesty to all demonstrators detained during the riots in the country except those who committed serious crimes however for the amnesty to take effect the writers must stop their blockade of streets and government buildings now the protests as a being opposed to the law demanding a full pardon without any preconditions live now to examine the curious he's a political blogger joining us from london now what you expect the response to be from the protestors not just in throughout the country will they see this as

a compromise now. well they've already said that they don't see it as a compromise and that they want to they want their people completely released immediately and unconditionally and then they said that only then will they consider leaving the buildings that they are currently occupying so they don't accept this law they made it very clear that they won't accept this law and i'm sure that will be the position for the time being the one thing i would say is that i suspect that there is actually quite a lot of pressure within the protest movement to get some of these people released and if the government sticks to its position we might start seeing a modification of the opposition's position over time they've got fifteen days in which to decide. of course but one thing that has not happened is. has not stepped down and surely that is the main demand from the protesters until

that happens and the protests are going to carry on is he going to have to step down well well. i think it very much depends on him actually there are two ways out of this it seems to me well one is for him to step down and for the to be your elections in other words for him to capitulate completely to what the protestors are saying and demanding the other is for him to reassert he's also already we are perhaps beginning to see initial signs today that we that that might actually be happening the defense ministry issued a statement from the military which seemed to be saying that they basically support unit covert and the interior ministry also issued a fairly similar rather hardline statement today as well so we'll see but that would i create the situation with inflame the opposition and talk of the opposition is there really anyone to perhaps replace and obviously we've got elections next

year but is there really a coordinated united opposition of the moment. that was the reason to united opposition if we take the two mainstream parties the two the leaders of the leaders of those parties mr yeltsin you can mystically go there they have not been able to agree between which of the two leads to your position or who should be president the degree to which they control many of the people in the streets i think is very much open to question also it's quite clear that they don't control many of the people in the street the leader of one of the militant activist groups has now said that he wants to be involved in the negotiations with the government as well separately from the two main mainstream leaders now as to whether or not there would be in there would be sustained resistance if misty any code which went

initiated to crack down i don't know it depends how strong the crackdown is but i think it is important to say that the number of protesters involved across the entire country is probably not very large or i think might my own personal view or it would let me directly view is could be done all right well let me just quickly ask you clearly the u.s. secular state and the foreign policy chief of the e.u. do you see this as a credible opposition because they're going to be meeting them very soon what do you make of that meeting what's going to come out of her. well it's an attempt to legitimize the opposition to and in effect de legitimize the government if you remember mr azhar of the prime minister when he went to daddles when he was still prime minister he's invitation was disinvited and now we see opposition leaders being invited to the munich security conference instead the fact is however what

goes on in munich or washington or or wherever or brussels is one thing what go what happens in the ukraine is something completely different in it is in the ukraine itself where this issue will ultimately be decided and interesting yannick over which research control regardless of how it's done the u.s. will have to deal with in the exam effect so much a very good to talk to in this hour examine the curious legal expert there live in london thank you well as we've just been discussing the opposition leader is a seeking more support from the u.s. and the e.u. but with those riots now spreading wide across ukraine's west it seems unlikely further talks will bring any solutions are porous lir reports from one of the hot beds of the unrest. this is the regional administration building in even notes on cards skin western ukraine where at the till a week ago the regional governor had his office but as you can see just liking kiev's there's now

a giant barricade surrounding the building with snow tires and planks of wood radical and and he russian this is the heartland of nationalism where anti on a common sentiment runs deep and that's the way natalia and her comrades want to keep it the twenty nine year old entrepreneur has been here since the building was overthrown she says work can wait this is more important moolah which is supposed to have no president then to have you know call which but what the opposition as fragmented as it is that tully is the first to admit no yanna coverage could well mean an alkie whitney bishop along with the problem is that we don't have any person to replace him and we will need to take someone from their position which won't be easy the sentiments blown across central and western ukraine we regional offices are being picketed and seized by protesters i believe a group of right in radicals some wearing masks stormed the municipal building

chanting we have the power they used fire extinguishers and wooden sticks again at least i intended of the demonstrators set up barricades made a vehicle pass and sacks of snow they demanded police in the building was similar scenes played out in chick assy where protesters trying to set night to furniture they smashed windows and threw stones at security forces. the anger has moved even further westwards. engine of ski protests descend ukrainian hymns while ignoring the governor's attempts to disperse them. in a van or from coffs those now laying siege to the municipality building a forbidden in symbols or sentiments of the ruling party. they claim it goes against the will of the ukrainian people no one knows where the head of the administration is there are parts of this building that are still functioning for example the day to day running of the city but on a political level everything is come to

a standstill all this process might. lead store division of the country of course a result in some arab spring ups in the long term perspective i despite the criticism of hammett coverage these protesters have nothing better to offer policia r.t. even a front costs western ukraine. one ukrainian protester who had gone missing for more than a week has turned up alive dimitri block told claims he had been abducted and tortured while the police are already investigating his case he had to r.t. dot com for the latest news on that and the developments from kiev. gas chambers electric chairs following squads what seem to be

a thing of the polls could soon be making a comeback in parts of america lethal injection drugs used to carry out the death penalty are in short supply and lawmakers in some u.s. states are looking to return to the old methods some of which critics say verge on torture report not as more. in just the first month of twenty fourteen six executions have already been carried out on u.s. death row inmates however the shortage of drugs coupled with an increasing concern surrounding the efficiency of lethal in jackson has prompted lawmakers in some states to push for the reintroduction of long abandoned torturous methods in missouri some officials have raised the notion of rebuilding the state's gas chamber and also proposed making firing squads an option for executions death by gun has also been proposed as an option in wyoming meanwhile in virginia there's been a push to make electrocution an option so why are u.s. states now advocating to bring back these relics of the past in recent years

european drug makers have stopped selling their drugs to prisons because they say they don't want their products to be used to kill prisoners as a result many u.s. executions have been delayed in other cases the use of new drugs for lethal injection caused slow painful deaths lasting over twenty minutes richard dieter of the death penalty information center says old execution methods being advocated are prone to even more mistakes you can imagine with a firing squad you know someone stumbling and not only partly. leading it you know these are things that are also prone to to error to pain to to you know revulsion from the public and so states changed to protect the death penalty to lethal injection so to go back would certainly jeopardize their whole purpose of carrying to carry out executions some u.s. states already provide alternatives to lethal injection alabama arkansas florida

kentucky oklahoma south carolina tennessee and virginia it administer the electric chair if requested by the defendant delaware new hampshire and washington state allow inmates to choose hanging while arizona. legally allowed gas chamber executions as an alternative currently. the only enforceable execution in the us but if get their way somewhere down the line death by firing squad or electric chair. in america. as time ticks away before nato troops. the u.s. is growing increasingly frustrated with the country's government is still refusing to sign a security pact which would permit american soldiers to remain in the state because . of explains the absence of an agreement could leave the country vulnerable to

a major taliban resurgence. after thirteen years in afghanistan washington is counting down together with our allies we will complete our mission bear by the end of this year and america's longest war will finally be over. but ending a war isn't the same as winning one when it comes to afghanistan peace is far from certain and the past ten years there were not able to build the afghan security force forces to be able to face the challenges and this country and to be able in the future to confront the challenges and the taliban forces and the taliban fighters and al qaeda forces and the taliban have been active in the past two weeks alone the group has staged numerous attacks in kabul kandahar nimrods helmont and nanga har in fact ministry of interior incident reports reveal clashes with the taliban in a most of the eleven provinces bordering pakistan the group also controls several

districts in parwan just a short drive from the country's capital some provinces are believed to be controlled by shadow governments that answer directly to the taliban on that any what night the taliban run their area the district government is just there but there is no real security. and it could get worse a classified american intelligence assessment warns that the initial objective in afghanistan removing the taliban and disabling al qaeda as operations in the country could fail and that the taliban could return in full swing by twenty seventeen the u.s. wants some troops to remain in the country by the pentagon's logic the pursuit of terrorists is best based in the region same goes for u.s. drones and without american help the afghan army could collapse but the u.s. first needs the afghan president to sign off on a key security pact something he has been refusing to do so far. now our position continues to be that if we cannot conclude a bilateral security agreement promptly then we will be forced to initiate planning

for a post twenty fourteen future in which there would be no u.s. or nato troop presence in afghanistan there's also the issue of talking with the enemy the consensus seems to be that the afghan war could only end in a negotiated settlement with the taliban not a military victory but that's proven elusive the taliban are internally divided and the rift between kabul and washington has reportedly empowered hardline commanders who want to keep on fighting at the expense of those who support peace talks the u.s. war has succeeded in toppling the taliban regime and many afghans have seen their lives improve but those gains could easily be lost depending on who wins control over afghanistan a country that's once again could be up for grabs reporting in washington for our team i'm lucy catherine. president karzai is demanding washington enters peace talks with the taliban as a condition for signing the security deal jerry van dyke he's

a terrorism consultant in the former prisoner of the town of man says the u.s. is not able to contain the group which continues to bolster its ranks. it is a continuous war for over twenty years they have continued to fight some of them and since the american invasion in october two thousand and one they have if anything increased their their ability to attack their holding for the united states even with its search in two thousand and nine announced by president obama has not been able to really curtail the taliban they are as strong as ever as committed as ever and i think this is one reason why there is such difficulty throughout nato throughout the west figure out how to leave afghanistan what to do with the taliban. washington has spent billions waging the afghan war since two thousand and one it has cost the u.s. taxpayer just under eight hundred billion dollars and here are some bills still to

come every american soldiers serving in afghanistan this year will cost an average two point one million dollars more than seven billion dollars worth of equipment isn't going to be shipped back so will have to be destroyed then a new thirty four million dollar military h.q. is now unlikely to be used and therefore will need to be demolished well according to former british as a itself is a rich williams the u.s. drawdown means the afghan government will have no choice to to reach a deal with the taliban. president karzai and those who have seen with him as they approach these next elections. and his supporters and those who he is supporting in the elections need to do a deal with the taliban going forward in twenty fifteen the taliban in certain provinces the conflict provinces in the south certainly will be the dominant political element and as the president goes forward there's going to need to be an

accommodation with them so this is a political gesture and so yes he is taking risks with the lives of his own soldiers the afghan army and afghan police are all fighting hard at the moment in these conflict probably says yes he's taking risk there but it's for a higher purpose and the higher purpose is clearly some form of political solution with the taliban more news just ahead for you including our latest report from the olympic city of sochi stay with r.t. international. so we leave the. bush and secure. your party is it the. issues that no one is asking with to get they deserve answers from. politics. our team.

economic downturns in the final. days. and the rest. take everything. with. stalled talks accusations traded and endless demands made this sums up the process being played out in geneva with a virtual stalemate on the battlefield outside proxies far left to make the hard decisions and compromises to alleviate and then to finally end the civil war but do these outside powers have the political will.

when do these sorts of winter and picks reach top speed alone to sell us the athletes will be jumping into that ball place and on to their luzhin skeletons and then down the track at speeds of around one hundred and thirty kilometers an hour. say went to examine the icy road up close to. the olympic hopefuls in bumps lady and skeleton will be chasing the dream here at the sunday sliding center them. the movie cool runnings they use retelling of the true story of jamaica's bobsled team could perhaps resume jia in sunny soled shoes but i've always wondered how do they get the shape of the track to be the way it is i also how do they get it so smooth while i've already answered today and it takes one polit to actually solve

all of the shape of the track and i want that this big baby here comes into action what it does is it was floated like a vacuum machine so it was up all the food i often tried and then move it over the causes of frisson russia to have three up and slopes which help to slow speed and keep athletes sleep but competitors can still pluck up to one hundred and thirty kilometers an hour and get a tribal member takes a few called the truth and that you created convents i wasn't making my way all the way to win an olympic track without testing my carvings feels the same way i dig. and this is how we get the tracks native. well the kim jong il really isn't as easy as it looks so you really need men like being

a hero who know what they're doing have been trained to do what they're doing right now to actually carve out the ice now twenty seven of them including jamia how will we add during the olympics basically taking care of this entire tribe making sure that the bobsled and the sledge and competitions go exactly the way it is because the truck is too big to get through the narrow lanes it's done the old fashioned way with this new shovel and a broom. for russians speeding down snow reveals it is a form of going up and that's why this thing you can be called funky the russian way looks like summer day at the funky sliding center. and we've got some more reports from to buy and what's a giving you the best impression of the venues in and around the city of and big dreams just before the flame finally reaches sochi don't miss them in the next couple of days and of course online at r.t.

dot com. yes. how do you operate dealing. with was could be sports such. as we say was i'm not an olympic hockey player but much of this. week. my fire. management to the major u.k. nuclear reprocessing site all of many of its staff to stay home on friday. we reveal exactly what went wrong that may have given some workers an extra day off but it has startled many locals also like the last i know more than we think it's the sunni agency demanding disclosures on a new mysterious object on the martian surface but the space agency is simply calling a wrong. the geneva two peace talks between syria's government and the opposition have yielded no breakthrough so far

but have seen the two sides meeting face to face for the very first time the conference which aims to find a political solution to the bloody civil war is set to resume on the tenth of february well in a statement to the media the us syria envoy lakhdar brahimi of knowledge the slim but tangible progress so far sides have become used to sitting in the same room they have presented positions and listen to one another. is very slow indeed but the sides having gazed in an acceptable manner this is a very modest beginning but it is a beginning on which we can bridge the gap between the sides remain why there is no use pretending otherwise. nevertheless during our discussions i hope saw i observed a little bit of common ground perhaps more than the two sides themselves

realize or recognize. what happens if they for the moment i'll be back with a news team and just have a whole thing i would more for you know meantime larry king talks to the wrestler politician jesse ventura politicking is here in a few moments this is. take me out to the ballgame and take me through the metal detector so wait that's not how the song goes well as the country changes sadly so must the national pastime they settle mariners released a statement that they like all of the teams for twenty fifteen are setting up metal detectors to screen all fans entering their stadium for get visions of hot dogs and home runs now everyone will be able to tell their grandkids about how their bags got searched because they had metal buttons at company name stadium baseball

memories the team's management is also continuing their ban on bags larger than forty by forty by twenty centimeters because if you're going to stick an explosive device it had better be compact their body maybe i'm jumping the gun metal detectors can't touch your genitals or do a naked body scan they're probably the least intrusive coming form of security scan then again think about it they want to prevent some terrorist from blowing up a densely packed crowd of people in the stadium so the m l b wants teams to create densely packed lines of people outside the stadium before the game starts well these security measures really stop a psychotic terrorist murder nope but that's just my opinion. jesse ventura is going off the grid we want you to join him he's opinionated of course outspoken american original bucking the political system and doing it in a bare no go barred way yes even durham has

a lot of his mind that he's ready to own load so on this edition. of politicking. politicking jesse ventura on larry king ora t.v. has a new show featuring the former governor jesse ventura the show is called off the grid and that's exactly what jesse is doing he'll join me from his secret location and welcome to aura t.v. jesse good dad be aboard larry it's great to be here i can't believe that we did an interview probably a little over a year ago when you told me this is where i should be and lo and behold i've ended up here on or a t.v. it's fantastic and i'm indeed off the grid larry and will be moving around

constantly so they can never get a fix on me when i broadcast back into the united states ok we're going to turn off the grid in the next segment we're in a concentrated some politics in this obama's job approval rating is sitting around forty six percent does that surprise you well it not not really because having been an elected official you realize that whenever you make hard decisions you're going to get people angry at you a lot of people are one issue people so if you go against them whatever that particular issue might be all of a sudden they don't like you for the other nine things you might do good so you never do hold you know polls like that fluctuate like the wind larry they're going to go up and down depending on which way the political wind happens to be blowing how do you assess how he's doing. well i've been extremely disappointed in him because you know he ran to change their ass and benami change were the same country

we were under george bush we're still involved in these ridiculous wars we're still we've got everybody under surveillance and all american citizens seem to be potential terrorists that's why they're watching us i guess and that's an amazing thing too larry how can they do that when they do it with my money i don't want them watching me with my money oh gave president obama recently told the new yorker by the way in a fascinating article this is quote there's no doubt that there's some folks who just really dislike me because they don't like the idea of a black president the flipside is that there are some black folks and maybe some whites who really like mean giving me the benefit of the doubt because i'm black your reaction to that well i'm certain you know i'm certain it's true to some extent for me it's not i could care less black person white person

woman whoever runs the united states of america i will be critical of them i will also support them when it's there to support them and many things like that so. i don't necessarily put a lot of credence in that you have said that the n.s.a. leaker edward snowden who remains in russia on a temporary grant of asylum is your personal hero why. well he's not necessarily a personal hero but i think yours indeed a hero i can't say personal because i don't know him but to me he's a hero larry because he caught our government breaking the law and violating the constitution it took great courage to put himself on the line and make this wrong doing no one to the american people and we have every right to know it we have the right to know when our government violates our constitution and our bill of rights .