i'm. striving for gold canada surges to the top of the olympic table while russia celebrates some bronze breakthroughs artie's standing by in our sought jihad quarters right in the heart of the winter games. aid workers in syria struggle to evacuate people from the rebel held city of sas the ceasefire is briefly renewed that's while the turmoil in the country send shock waves to neighboring lebanon helping al qaeda gain strength. and your interview with the inability to deal with. shocking revelations as our t.v. is a radical stronghold where jihadist fighters are trying to battle the assad government in syria. and property shopping a british town puts its houses on sale with the starting price of just one pound

find out what's the catch. you're watching are to international live from moscow islands in france thanks for joining me. athletes in song are busy bagging medals as the winter games and today four with canada now leading the race let's cross live now to our tees headquarters at the center of the olympics and you see now is there and he says so there's also been some breakthroughs for russia. there hasn't do the competitions gathering pace and every day bringing new reasons for celebration here in sochi russia has scored itself a first picking up a bronze in the store track speed skating and this victory is courtesy of former south korean athlete victor on russia had high hopes for him and he didn't let his

adoptive country down but there's plenty more ahead today day for biafra long figure skating lose and snowboarding let's go to andrew farmer to find out what we should be watching in the mountain cluster andrew heading up to where you are to watch the snowboard half might today but what else should we be watching give us some of your expert guidance. well there's plenty going on in fact action has already started in the women's curling are the russians taking on the americans after beating the danger yesterday the matches are coming thick and fast and that's because teams have to play a staggering nine matches in a bid just to reach the semi finals it is a taxing she is also physically a very demanding sport far more than you might think is the russian skate told us. that it may look very easy but actually there was a study which showed that our girls sweep two three kilometers in one game and we can have three or sometimes even four games in one day the sheet is forty five

metres long and the energy you expend sweeping this distance equals the energy runners use in a one hundred meter dash and of course sweeping is the most difficult job it involves all your muscles if you don't believe me take a regular mob or a broom and try sweeping hard for forty five meters it's very tough. but also today will get another glimpse of the figure skating stars maksim trying coffin thirty one of they've already won gold in the team event but they are the favorites in the pairs which begins today it's also worth saying they already world and european champions despite only being together for three years and despite. seems famous attempt to say how they managed to achieve all this success in such a huge time just maybe they should in the start. i was familiar with some of what seems traits my is a very exciting news gemini and lexeme is

a libra so we get along just fine. when we first started skating together i told a chant of that's more than half of what people say about my personality is probably true as told me she could get along with pretty much anyone. whatever people say about my or someone else's personality figure skating is a sport and what matters is the result doesn't matter what my personality is like some would say about a coach for example he's insufferable the most important thing is my training in my performance and the medals i win who cares if i'm a difficult person. yeah well i'm sure everybody will continue to love them if they continue to win the medals a couple of other names to look out for today nikita crew called the defending olympic champion in the cross country skiing and also. he's going for her second medal in the women's final so you. know we will certainly be watching close farmer live from the mountain cluster now the winter

olympics in sochi have been making headlines around the globe but not necessarily all about the competition many news outlets have set the alarms ringing over the alleged terror threats despite russia's unprecedented security operation dubbed as the most extensive in the game's history that's also not forget the never ending tales about the shoddy hotels and bad organization or very few missed the opportunity to deliver horror stories about the rounding up and killing of stray dogs while the russian president has dismissed such coverage as an echo of the cold war. oh no hello during the cold war era there was the so-called containment policy that's what it was called it was the policy and practice of containing the soviet union's development unfortunately as we see now occasionally there are throwbacks to these policies every so often so when russia demonstrates a positive development it's clear that the appearance of new powerful players and

competitors in genders some fear in areas such as the economy politics and security crisis attempts to contain russia emerge here are there including with this olympic project. around the wording how high finals is one of the most anticipated medal events of the day the slopes are a battleground for the athletes now but are promising to become a popular tourist destination after the games we send our teams martin andrews to the sochi mountain cluster to test the pies. what goes up must come down there's no better way to see the beautiful caucuses mountains consuming down the slopes take in the breathtaking scenery and marvel in the vast resorts and facilities they now have here as you know the famous phrase when in rome so it's on with the boots and off to the slopes at krasnaya polyana a totally transformed area head of this month's and the big opening this is just

beautiful it's been fun we came up skiing the other day a couple days off between work and sochi and adler and corky all came together nicely when we got here is a little and then end up in a couple days a hammer it out it's really cool since snowboarding inception as an established winter sport it's developed various styles each with its own specialized equipment and technique snowboarding and he became a winter sport in one thousand nine hundred eighty eight ranging from the stunts of freestyle to the fast pace racing of slope style used for both recreation and professional snowboarding it's my first time and it's not as easy as it looks but it's a little bit confusing as i've been told that i'm left footed even though i'm right handed i said in the same three position was pushed forward and the first foot that i fell on was the direction i should go if you wish me luck. there are around one hundred thousand risk of fractures worldwide among snowboarders each year i'm not

going to be a statistic to me and my instructor says he can teach someone to be a recreational snowboarder in one or two days with the ability to use all lifts perform controlled link turns control speed and direction and stop confidently something i'm having trouble with the slopes are busy now with locals and visitors from all over the world but what's the future of the region after the olympics i think it will be best through the. summer times because. all because objects. connected in the one large groups of people of all ages come here to the slopes fifty kilometers from the black sea coast the perfect way to exercise and to stay youthful. slopes and salty grates i'm enjoying them but i'm trying not to go too far so i don't get knocked down it's risky at my age but she's not known for its alpine skiing or snowboarding and might not be very

good at it but it's an activity that's on the rise and as the professional snowboarders with various of them pick medals on this very mountain it seems that some of us were not born to such winter to tease not to down trees. well i'm looking forward to watching the men's halfpipe snowboarding finals and we'll keep you updated on everything happening out sochi winter games reporting from the heart of the olympics back to you in moscow. thank you and he said now i keeping abreast of the olympics in our saatchi studio now and don't forget about tech not our twitter feed where you can see the whole lineup the roll out of the special olympic this special line up rather for the games in the last section and we've got all the sports events sorted in order with all the latest tweets and pictures from the athletes themselves and russia's women hockey players hope there will be more ups than downs coming up showing their excitement from an elevator at

the games for all the latest action from salt to follow our team on twitter. and right here on arts he will of course bring be bringing you the news and pictures as well as comments on the sporting victories of saatchi twenty fourteen. twenty four jean-paul was the week ultimate in the exhilarating winter well it's an honor to be in germany and you say no way i'm a kevin zero in on the rest of our little take news team for sochi twenty two total take. on. humanitarian agencies are evacuating people from the besieged syrian city of almost as a ceasefire between the government and the opposition is extended for another three days peace talks resumed in geneva this week to try and end the war that's plunged the region into chaos neighboring lebanon is one of the country's worst affected with not only be deadly violence but also a radical ideology that's spilling over the border parties where if a national report on the shocking revelations on who's joining the rebels from

across the syrian border. is the syrian conflict rages on neighboring lebanon faces a dramatic increase in sectarian violence in january alone for kabul killed dozens in beirut and the town of had a mill next to the syrian border the targets were a shia areas controlled by hizbullah lebanon's most influential force which also supports syrian president bashar assad we traveled to the northern city of tripoli a sunni stronghold vehemently oppose in his bella. corns. it's part of. his bill is military involvement in syria is believed to have given damascus the upper hand in the battle of god and has deeply angered assad's enemies do you think we're going to see more explosions like this water.

anything i can do for sunni brothers anything i can do for syrian brothers i will do anything i can do for these people suffering from injustice i will do. and is. the kind of affiliated a new survey front claimed responsibility for those recent deadly bombings just days before a man calling himself and al qaida commander announced via you tube that the group had put down roots in lebanon people we've met her on the ground deny belonging to either of these groups but don't hide the fact that they share their views. no there is no al qaeda as an organization anymore but al qaeda as an idiology and it doesn't need money to spread it spreads by itself everywhere in the world not only in lebannon but in america britain serbia here radical ideas of

bread from a young age fighters here colin card has bin laden a teacher and their fight jihad went twenty three year old med returned from syria where he joined the free syrian army he continued his jihad here in lebanon and. target the district where she'll leave tripoli is divided into sunni and shia parts ironically by the street called syria two years ago we filmed on that street by street in the city of tripoli separates the white and sunni neighborhoods in this part of not running like a murderer between those who support the syrian president and his regime and those who want him out today we can't get. cashews sometimes oh. who do you fight against who is your enemy i much it would be my fight against the infidels those who don't carry the flag of far lebanon is probably the war spillover of the syrian conflict and while the world is hoping for peace to come

back to that middle east country war seems to only spread further on. people here seem to be used to seeing fighters carry sniper rifles through busy markets they tell us everybody here has a weapon and is ready to fight. come to these camps outside she will be every day to look at told us that it doesn't take well you know someone who's here experience becomes a real fighter. a week's training and you are in for a life time of obedience broke three rules for those who want to become one i deem you have to forget about money and be ready to die or to be arrested and to accept that no one will take care of you or your family let jihadi flags on the walls weapons on the floor this is the life of a true fighter it's tough and the rules are strict it was harsh the yard who

introduced himself as a tripoli sunni leader says many youths are willing to join. me. from now until i grow up i'm ready to defend myself i'm ready to kill our whites and syrian army and your agent killed for. the about the. years and while the syrian conflict expands a legion of fighters on to these deadly weapons and an even deadlier ideology is on the rise refuel from lebanon on the ground in syria al qaeda fighters have captured the town of man in central syria human rights activists say at least forty civilians were killed in the attack more than half of the dead were said to be women and children publisher of trans journal gerald. says kirby radical ideology is more difficult than ending fighting on the ground. so who is this out

qaeda is al qaeda the guy that that prime minister tony blair and president bush said that saddam hussein had ties to or is it the al qaeda that weren't that dangerous or diehard al qaeda or or dangerous islamicists so we don't really know who these people are but from what i see and from what i know from what i read in forward i learn these are just disparate gangs of murderers and criminals it's a moral issue not out a military issue and that's the only way it's going to be solved. coming up on r t we remember the legacy of internet freedom fighter aaron swartz. young man took his life just over a year ago after facing an intense legal battle against the government congress still deaf to cost reform its measures of prosecution. i mean likely to see any

sort of counter-revolution preserving maybe even a charcoal gender roles the islamic religion is one very powerful force towards maintaining traditional marriages and. just as they become more western liberalism. becomes powerful and we have to sort of. civilization currently on a collision course. but they are feeling that the location of the voice still remember. how to do it

well there's of the text and said let's stop this storm we might think you know my people. charged with espionage and facing death threats back home whistleblower edward snowden escaped the u.s. to continue his battle against the system but for one young man the fight for information transparency came to a tragic and facing a standoff with the government intern and activist aaron swartz took his own life just over a year ago now are his gun it should you can reports on why it's some say the young man was driven to the adage. aaron swartz could have been a millionaire living now in silicon valley when he was just fourteen aaron helped launch the first artist says feeds which deliver web content arun by the time he

turned nineteen his company had merged with take a look at it which would become one of the most popular websites in the world but money was not his ultimate goal aaron went on to champion of free internet it's common sense and it's the foundation of our constitution the government is constrained by having someone else check off to make sure they're not abusing their power aaron became a political activist calling for others to join this isn't something playing out on stage somewhere where giants fight each other and you get to sit and watch popcorn this is a fight you can join in right so if you're going to demand progress dot org and sign up we have actions every week there are bills that are coming up that could crack down on internet freedom there are companies trying to abuse their power and it's up to all of us to stop them aaron swartz drew the f.b.i.'s attention in two thousand and eight when he downloaded and released about three million federal court documents from a restricted service the government did not press charges because the documents

were in fact public he was arrested in two thousand and eleven for downloading academic articles from a subscription based research website at his university with the intention to make them available to the public. although none of what he downloaded was classified prosecutors wanted to put him in jail for thirty five years when he saw all of his wealth gone and he recognized his parents were going to have to mortgage their house so he could afford a lawyer to fight a government treated him as if he were nine eleven terrorists as if it as if what he was doing was threatening the infrastructure of the united states when he saw that he recognized how how incredibly difficult that fight was going to be of course he was depressed at the age of twenty six aaron swartz took his own life. this was somebody who was pushed to the edge by what i think of as a kind of bullying by our government it was several months after aaron's death that

edward snowden blew the whistle on the government's widespread snooping showing that while the government wants everyone to be open and transparent it can go with lentulus li after someone who fully embrace the idea of transparency and accessibility of information like aaron swartz that in washington i'm going to check on our team. civil liberties advocates are pushing for congress to reform the anti hacking law the government used to pursue smart parker hagan's from the electronic frontier foundation foundations that there's still a lot to be done before politicians realize such relentless prosecution is unacceptable unfortunately the government has and hasn't changed its perception here there's been there was a proposal last year in the us legislature called erin's law that would address some of the biggest concerns that we have. parents lost still has an advance to the point where it works past or where it can be cited and in fact received before as those two to make our computer private life even harsher and so that's something

that we need to keep working on i'd still really politicians who don't have a great grasp of how technology works understand that this kind of persecution isn't acceptable. burn after reading or destroy after seeing newly released e-mail shows that right now fifty two thousand eleven raid that killed osama bin laden top u.s. commanders ordered the destruction of all the photos of his corpse check out why the rush for secrecy and r.t. dot com. almost like the pigeon post united arab emirates is to become the first ever country to carry out delivery services with drones read all about it at r.t. dot com. right to see. first street. and i think the true.

on our reporters were very. instrumental. to be in the middle. is it possible to pick up a house for less than the price of a cup of tea while amazingly in the u.k. that's become a reality but our tiscali boyko reports now on what's behind the pound land fairy tale. one pound sterling doesn't buy you much nowadays but in stoke on trent lucky locals have managed to grab the ultimate bargain a house it's part of a sell off of rundown properties in a deprived part of the city at this sort of apply just sort of to the blue really because i was saving up for a mortgage and things anyway which when you run to me is probably hard. but yes it is quite a shock but you know i actually did go out which actually great for us because we

have repelled. the snag many of the properties have stood abandoned for years after the closure of the city ceramic factories the area started to decline the roof sleeping every negative thing that you keep in mind just into properties all of the magnet for those behaviors the workers of the patreas which is only walking distance who are all living here and then what happened was as the potteries factories started closing down people had to move forward so the communities start to disperse or this area is deprived it's riddled with antisocial behavior like drug abuse crime and squatting but the local councils say that the one pound scheme and the new owners moving in should help to create a sense of community and turn the area around. applicants have to be locals first time buyers and earning less than forty thousand pounds per year to avoid

entrepreneurial property developers from taking advantage of the author homeowners have to commit to staying in the houses for at least ten years so this is what one pound will buy you on century street in stoke on trent now on top of that one pound owners have to commit to boring thirty thousand pounds from the local council for the renovations and work has already started on transforming these abundant shells and turning them into brand new properties and through hey can see what they're going. look like before the scheme came along like many britons gavin couldn't afford a deposit for a house and was paying more in rent then he will be in loan repayments to the council in ten years' time i'll be more free with how. many people can get up to ten years with a housing crisis leaving millions struggling to get on to the ladder many will now be crossing their fingers hoping they'll get a similar chance in their parts of town. auti stoke on trent.

now require some other global news making headlines in iraq a suicide bombing instructor accidentally blew himself up in his own car bomb killing twenty one of his students after hearing the explosion security forces rushed to the area and arrested more than a dozen suspected militants seven car bombs as well as explosive belts were found on the site the militants supposedly belonged to an extremist sunni group which recently cut its ties with al qaeda. thousands of protesters are back on the streets of bosnia after the prime minister refused to step down they vowed to continue their demonstration every day until the premier resigned more than three hundred were injured last week during clashes fueled by high unemployment corruption and poor living conditions. pakistan a suicide bomber ran into the home of a pro-government tribal elder and blew himself up killing four women police said the blast also injured five others in

a separate incident militants in the country's south west attacked and destroyed three gas pipelines cutting supplies to the nation's most populous province. and breaking banks in london as the river thames reaches record high levels homes in waterlogged towns are being evacuated and thousands of lives are brisk several gauges installed along the river in the one nine hundred eighty s. are showing their highest ever levels but there's been severe criticism at the official response despite the government announcing last week more than one hundred million pounds in extra funding for emergency work. i'll be back with more news about thirty minutes time but up next our team takes you on a cruise see bone chilling arctic frontier aboard one of russia's nuclear powered icebreakers.

there's a new game we like to play you see a game with no added sovereignty e.j. made to a book that puts me on my knees you call it master and servant we call alex and simon with this sort of independence you need servitude alex why be yet another nation on the chain gang when you can be the first on the block to change. in early september biotic northern sea is a busy maritime highway. full of russia's nuclear powered

icebreakers or at sea clearing a path for shipping. the crews here have a saying when you're in the arctic you have the whole world your feet. through follows russia's northern boundaries offering the shortest passage between europe and asia passing through seven northern cities. well then three hundred by horns.

the nuclear time you leave. judge will. spend four months patrolling the northern sea route despite passing through ten times and the crew will never adjust the ship's clock it's quite likely they'll never pull into a bullet either the will the crew jealous. morning good morning yes it lana your beautiful well done don't forget your hat. to point has ruined my hair now. and the captain and the first officer said here they don't like holes in their bread the stuff i have to put more bread out because the navigate is sit here and they eat a lot.