by firearms if being armed made us safer in america we should be the safest nation on earth and we're clearly not the safest. yes. olympic fever sweeping sochi is the game is countdown to reach is one day to go the

torch relay on the final leg to launch the twenty second winter olympic games. a british couple accused of money laundering go to court to fight extradition to the u.s. telling our t. being forced from their home would be too much for them to bear. and they put it on the plane. to be canned. the worst recoiling is the syrian war reaches u.s. and u.k. shores with returning extremists openly making terror threats against their own countries for the first time. washington it weighs in on the ukrainian political crisis sending diplomats to mediate for a second time in less than two months. ten pm in moscow i match or is it good to have you with us after our top story this

hour after years of planning construction anticipation it's all coming together in sochi a day away from the official start of the olympics and thousands of spectators and visitors flooding the internet with their impressions from meeting the mascots to pose against. the olympic rings it's evident that the spirit of the game is in the air so the city itself brimming with athletes tourists and visitors joining from the olympic from all over the world to see the olympic flame on the final leg of its epic journey that's covered tens of thousands of kilometers from the bottom of the world's deepest lake to the top of europe's highest peak to the olympic capital now artie's martin and stands by with more. well off to one hundred and twenty two days the torch is finally here in the sochi area to arrive yesterday some more of the one hundred twenty three days will be complete at all make its way to the opening ceremony tomorrow night at the time will be fourteen minutes past eight of course to represent twenty four if you go back to two years ago we had the likes of

david beckham james bond and queen elizabeth the second he made appearances so everybody is really talking about who will be carrying the torch. earlier on today we had a lot of rough we had. the i.o.c. president he was also carrying the flame i also a surprise visitor from the likes of ban ki moon the general secretary of state for the united nations as well as famous russian actors and musicians and earlier on we caught up with the french figure skater brains you bet and this is what he had to say about the rising excitement here in the sochi area i feel good and everybody from the french team feels good everything is small you know. everything is close. close to. show we can go by war and there is not a big security so we feel we feel free and we feel confident but also the world famous tennis star maria sharapova added her comments on the

excitement surrounding the twenty fourteen winter olympics the same in the black sea the same day as you can drive up in our stance and the best slopes in the world . you know and really believe me and i am hope that everyone be able to experience this on. a course it's quite interesting to the fact that the games actually started today why is that well that's because there are twelve of you added since the vancouver games in twenty one of course everybody is talking about carrying the torch and who will win those magnificent medals that were unveiled to the various journalists yesterday and to talk about fortune telling let's speak to paul scott with. very interesting guest this is the moment to see his life changed forever abandoned by his mother in russia's far east the seal pup was weak with hunger and vulnerable to predators his chances of survival were slim at best. fast forward three years and his life is now transformed. what is the harm

of course the rather shy seal now stuff say that he was abandoned as a pup was rescued and then nurtured back to health care at the dolphinarium and for the course of the winter olympics he's going to be one of the animals who are going to be predicting supporting outcomes. is now fighting fit and hoping to make a splash with spectators during needs winter olympics. because he's already predicted a few football matches however he's not always correct only ninety nine percent of the time. paul the octopus was the first of his kind he made international headlines gere in his career as a sporting psychic correctly predicting a leaven out of thirteen football matches the staff in sochi hope. will have a similar success rate and also believe that after a difficult start in life could become

a favorite with the public. how do you avoid. a low. isn't a lone star fair also hoping that a number of their dolphins and even alters display psychic tendencies. so cheap. that our i learned center console with a sponsor orange for the sochi two thousand and fourteen torch relay team shared with us what he finds most inspirational about the tradition of carrying the torch . believe the most impressive piece every kid you see on the old every meet people through the plane and see the delight of the torch in their ice and how it can inspire them to rallies and support and that's really being supressed needles in the smallest of the kids here it's been said may sing us a small. home and we're sort of looking at the place i'm very very happy able to do so. not everyone though seems willing to embrace the olympic spirit just yet a number of journalists have been tweeting out the less savory aspects of the city

that they've come across but athletes telling a different story from admiring the view to praising what they say are top notch facilities we spoke with a number of journalists who were in sochi including one c.b.c. broadcaster douglas gallagher who told us that many issues he thinks are being overblown anytime you get big by throwing a limp to games in a city that really was very very small before before they decided that the olympic games are going to come here there's going to be one or two challenges a few of the hotels i didn't expect them to be finished but everyone in the area is working very very hard to fix these issues and everyone of course is also very very nice and very very helpful the problem is when you're not actually in the location when you just see a few photos tweeted perhaps over twitter and there's a few things people start to develop their ideas and when you put those things together kind of paints a picture of negativity but i think honestly from my experience here the negativity

is a little bit overblown and of course all the volunteers here have been absolutely fantastic working with us the foreign media and helping us and of course after to morrow when the opening ceremonies happening i think all of that will be behind us all the if attention hopefully will focus on the athletes and the sports as opposed to the living accommodations of journalists which in the end it is a privilege to come here and cover the games. round the clock on air and online stay with our tease olympic coverage from sochi bringing the highs and lows from the slopes entering for the winter games are t. international and our dedicated web site twenty fourteen dot r t v dot com for our coverage. of the g. twenty four this is the ultimate in the exhilarating feeling to. make of an island and the rest of. the sochi twenty four take. on the.

spirit of the games could offer the warring sides in syria some respite also russia urging all those involved in global conflicts especially syria to sign a so-called olympic truce and stop the violence at least for the period of the games and the situation in the conflict zone seems to worsen daily and its consequences being felt far and wide as hundreds of europeans who joined the fight in syria return home alarms being raised that they're bringing jihad with them a group of extremists with a british citizenship who are fighting in the middle eastern war zone now threaten to carry out terror attacks back in the u.k. already spreading the virus of extremist propaganda issuing posters urging people to join their cause among those targets public transport networks financial centers and not just the u.k. one of the pictures militant groups showing in front of the white house in washington ortiz laura smith has the story. these are the first direct threats as far as we know that we have seen that have come out of syria death threats to attack public transport to attack financial center. and this is an estimated

hundreds of britons that have joined jihad just repl groups in syria according to a couple of studies that have been done it's not just britain's although they are the most numerous there are around three hundred fifty according to these couple of studies that we found but there are also three hundred belgians more than two hundred each from france and germany and around about one hundred fifty fighters who've gone from the netherlands to syria this group that we're talking about in britain is a group called how we which is a british jihadist group faction in syria they've got this facebook page and they've issued these threats online mainly if you take a look at their facebook page which is quite a shocking thing actually. the post is that they have posted these motivational posters that we're talking about are accompanied by likes on facebook requests to be tagged by various people now this is coming

a. number of other developments for example u.s. intelligence saying is saying that it's received reports that al qaida has set up training camps in syria specifically to train fighters to return home to their own countries to perpetrate terror attacks in their own countries and u.k. intelligence authorities say they're taking these threats very seriously indeed your political commentator john why he thinks britain's policy missteps may have actually contributed to the rise of extremism in syria. this tunnel events is entirely predictable and i think they have to be taken seriously this is the fruits of a disastrous policy followed by the british government which they got to city over the last two years which has done nothing except so instability throw the region and with instability has grew and. the ideology of the interests of the british and sitting governments of the entire going to stick the

actually the same and that is to defeat this malign ideology because it is a clear and present danger not only to the sitting government and to the entire region but increasingly to the west and to people in the west french government is weighing plans to reform immigration policies meeting a wall of resistance with many saying proposals violate the national ideals and take a look at that issue and more after a short break. playing . the olympic spirit travels with the flame from its birthplace in greece. joining james brown for an elemental and epic journey around russia and beyond.

this is the media leave us so we need to be. part of the scene motions to cure. your party there's a goal. is that no one is asking with the guests that you deserve answers from. politic only of our team. fourteen minutes past the hour a british couple facing a battle to avoid extradition to the u.s.

caught in a legal tangle they tell artie's tears are so huge that they'd rather take their own lives than be taken away from their families one morning fourteen months ago a life changing knock on the door with two policeman from scotland yard and i said where i was soaring with stun them with come to arrest you and your husband since then they've been out on bail and are fighting extradition to the united states to await trial after claims from the dunham's former company in the u.s. that they have more than one million dollars in illegitimate expense claims something the couple say are without merit showing as evidence that they've gathered that some say they're not afraid of trial but their worst fear is being sent to the states is the possibility of being denied bail and spending years behind bars apart from one another simply waiting for their day in court if we were away from this country is. for very good chance he would have why we're confident we would win. because we are innocent that we would then be shipped

but there's no compensation and. wrongful acts for tyshan. can you imagine coming back to this country you know three or four years later no harm no money no job and you're now in you know sixty two sixty three years. and trying to rebuild your life controversy has long surrounded the u.s. u.k. extradition act of two thousand and three signed in the wake of nine eleven critics claim the agreement is biased against the u.k. if you're a u.s. citizen wanted by the u.k. government you have a higher standard of evidence that you need to provide in the u.s. and also as a u.s. citizen you have the opportunity to go to a u.s. court to plead your case and unfortunate for purchases since there is no such opportunity to have your evidence tested in the u.k. court before you were extradited and that's a basic unfairness to an independent review and twenty eleven found at the treaty

quote does not operate in an unbalanced manner but this contradicts findings of the parliament's joint committee in human rights which called for a renegotiation to ensure british citizens get the same protections as americans conservative m.p. who sits on the committee looked at nationalities of those extradited and found at thirty five britons have been sent to the us and steve thousand and four versus just five u.s. nationals who made the opposite journey that's seven times more but for every argument on this side of the atlantic a counter is thrown back the united states has never denied a request under the treaty whereas the united kingdom has to divulge the full requests from the united states if the relationship is in balance i would say it's imbalanced against the united states but that is little comfort to the dunham's and others like them who teeter on the edge of desperation knowing it's very lives at stake from the moment they put us on the plane. first opportunity rick and.

jess or sylvia r t london. when the virtual world steps into reality a new generation treatment for gunshot wounds stops bleeding in a couple of seconds of the scientists hoping it will replace all known battlefield treatments in the future head to our web site for more. also on the line if you thought we was a force for world peace i could be in good company as the president of euro why he's been nominated for a nobel prize for making his country the first to fully legalize marijuana read more of our. mass unrest in ukraine seems to me the country a popular destination for diplomats with the latest u.s. state department official now in kiev victoria nuland has met with the opposition and plans a similar meeting with the authorities to offer washington support in putting together a new government artie's marine important i reports. in less than two months u.s. assistant secretary of state of victoria nuland is making her second visit to ukraine where anti-government protesters have received the full support and backing

of washington but u.s. officials say this trip is aimed towards aiding the country in forming a new government and helping ukrainians fulfilled their democratic aspirations now back in december it was the stomachs of protesters that this movement help fill as she walked around independence square handing out now now for many this scene put an entirely new twist on international metally in recent years the u.s. has cemented its reputation in siding with anti-government opposition movements taking place in sovereign countries such as tunisia egypt libya and syria. put in the case of ukraine u.s. officials are actually flying over the atlantic to visit and possibly strategize with pro european union protesters a power play that critics say washington would condemn if the roles were reversed china or russia or any other great power or even

a regional power like iran came to the u.s. and was encouraging the protesters there would be a hue and cry from the american media like you'd never hear of before they would say why are these people interfering in our internal affairs but of course the united states sort of has a double standard because it often interferes in the affairs of other countries and thanks nothing about it in all fairness critics say the u.s. does sometimes show restraint when it comes to foreign conflicts for example in bahrain as brutal and deadly crackdowns against peaceful unarmed protesters have taken place the u.s. has a mind of its own business america has also respected its right to remain silent as saudi arabia recently enacted a new law allowing the kingdom to prosecute in jail anyone who exposes corruption or demands reform reporting from new york marina portland r.t. . one regular gas of protests around the world has been john mccain the u.s.

senator has been known to the ukrainian public since his first appearance at the so-called orange revolution a decade ago his interest in the post soviet space didn't in there are getting a welcoming hug from the president of georgia during its war with russia and here is a heart of the arab spring in cairo also lending a helping hand to the libya uprising and most recently visiting a syrian refugee camp in turkey serge a tree foreign affairs editor for chronicles magazine tells us how he sees the u.s. role in this situation with the united states so-called benevolent global hegemony there is no bold yeah but a new can the cranny of the world every spot of the world is a legitimate target for the newlands of this will. lead to the russian foreign ministry official coming to the united states or any other place in the world to be likewise so what time surprised by is that the ukrainian government having

made old sorts of concessions to the demonstrators and the opposition is allowing this sort of thing to happen the violent extremists in the street controlling. the decision making matrix the decision making calculus of the opposition leaders and that is a very warring development it means that the violent in the street is waving the political dog. turning now to some other stories making global headlines at least twenty two people killed forty five others wounded in a string of car bombings across baghdad police say explosives were hidden in parked cars in busy commercial areas of the iraqi capital wednesday multiple blasts claimed forty seven lives across iraq new groups have admitted to the strikes which come at a time of rising sunni militant activity and. transport chaos sweeping britain's capital for a second day with millions facing huge delays new workers strike in the london tubes with the stations out of action commuters have had to stay home or face

massive lines for buses and underground trains and overground trains rather unions declared strike over plans to close ticket offices and cut jobs in the underground . hundreds of people in the main march through the country's capital expressing anger against a gas deal between the government and french oil company total procession headed by nobel prize winner the commonwealth protesters chanted anticorruption the slogans experts say yemen's economy was severely hurt by a deal signed under the leadership of the country's former president. finally the news bulletin france planning to overhaul many of its immigration policies after the prime minister admitted that the system's failing a government report says the state should become more arab oriented but that's drawing fire from the opposition which feels it could put an end to french culture as we know it is going to have reports from power. the bar salute has been living in pairs for new you three decades step by step she's gone from getting a worker's permit to building a family business she changed her life to become

a part of french society a long time ago but agrees that the time for it to change has now come as well maybe this is normal it's the evolution of society the french prime minister recently published a government report proposing a shift in the country's migration policy specifically on integration cancelling the two thousand and four ban on muslims wearing veils in state schools proposing to start teaching immigrant children their language of origin and other measures that many find controversial. the report has parts about upholding people's roots and promoting the values of the republic not only is it contradictory that it undermines the secular nature of french society the report has sparked a wave of criticism with political rivals accusing the prime minister of undermining national values instead of promoting them or calling it a dangerous provocation that threatens the country's decades long migration policies it's estimated france officially received around two million immigrants

over the past ten years and what around two hundred thousand new. figures are continuing to grow with white this things like immigration and integration for a long time weren't always something for a society found tough to discuss almost. anyone with a french passport no matter where they came from originally is a citizen of the republic and even mentioning someone's foreign roots could be enough for a discrimination case in court friendship or a break. doesn't like groups of you know it is we are not in the same position as the. us they are used to dealing with a light in the communities in france we don't like this we want every citizen to be a part of the friendship of like another part of his community. it will take a lot of debate before any of the proposals are put into action and with such

strong opposition it's possible none of them will make it into the legal court but the report may be opening a pandora's box with signs of a growing desire to meet changes to migration policy that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago you were just going off. yesterday away from seeing the olympic flame era the launch of the winter games now let's take a look back at the globe spending journey the torch made to get to search. the building behind me become the center of start up companies from around the world come together to talk about the best way to new ideas. one of

the blots of all so well the global financial will take place. recently an online poll by the liberal dozhd t.v. channel that's rain in english has caused quite a storm of rage across the country how could a stupid online poll cause russia wide anger while they pose the question was defending living grad from the nazis worth it because retreat in their opinion could have saved hundreds of thousands of lives what is offensive from culture to culture differs a lot but from a russian perspective fighting to the bitter end to stop the german genocide machine was worth it this is basically like if a somewhat popular news outlet had a poll on martin luther king's birthday asking well slavery really that bad it was a poem for the economy but why would someone create this poll is because the people who wrote it are sick with the disease are types total self infatuation egoism and

greed in other words were a generation mean mean me these people could never imagine sacrificing the great and wonderful me for any cause sacrificed me to the. me i'd rather kiss their boots and learn german but it wasn't for millions of russians put their self interest as a distant second then all those great and wonderful me these would have been worked to death and shot a nazi death camp it pays to make a few sacrifices for society the fascist my opinion. it was supposed to be just another news or of course although admittedly for a special occasion it was one hundred twenty three days before the start of the

winter olympic games in sochi and i was in greece for the lighting of the olympic flame the ruins of olympia one of the most famous monuments of ancient greece the site of the very first olympic games. wet stones like this would have been part of the temple. the temple. stempel old. home week. off.

from. playing. well that was a rather surreal. definitely the way to stream i've had for a while. it was a memorable ceremony. although i'm pretty sure the high priestess never spoke to me . but was it should set follow the flame or something. or have a lot more of course based. on what's the top story this morning than the sochi twenty

pulteney olympic flame of the bride in moscow seven days after it was first in the ancient greek city of libya carried by russia's deputy prime minister dimitri call with ak the flame traveled in a small mountain to red square where president vladimir putin spoke of its meaning for the russian people i mean the olympic torch the symbol of the world's primary sports competition of peace and of friendship. but he has come to russia. there are many marks the start of the longest tools relay in a limb pick a story the flame good scrape this so many people have turned out to the start of the russian relay team it looks like a lot of fun out that is exactly on a minute. couldn't it. but it was the standard itself in an.