tv Headline News RT August 22, 2017 3:00pm-3:30pm EDT
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send us an e-mail. the u.n. voices deep concern over reports the dozens of civilians have been killed in the u.s. led bombing raids in the syrian city of rock car some reports say seventy eight civilians have been killed there by coalition strikes in just the last twenty four hours. get out of afghanistan we will also expand our for american armed forces donald trump now does a complete u. turn on his repeated pledge to quit afghanistan now is vowing to expand the military operation with no plans yet for withdrawal. four suspects in last week's barcelona terrorist attacks appearing course it's
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revealed that an even bigger assault was being planned to go to the town where the terrorist cell was based. good evening and welcome my name is neil harvey you are watching r.t. international we'll start with breaking news for you because the united nations has expressed concern over reports of dozens of civilians being killed in coalition air strikes in the last twenty four hours in the syrian city of rock are serious news agency claimed seventy eight people were killed there on tuesday and earlier the u.n. has already condemned the deaths of forty civilians reportedly killed by coalition airstrikes in iraq on sunday. humanitarian colleagues tell us they're deeply concerned by unconfirmed reports of
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a high number of civilians killed by air strike in iraq a city over the last twenty four hours in recent days and weeks scores of civilians have reportedly been killed or injured in iraq juda air strikes and shelling and up to twenty five thousand people remain trapped in the city ok let's hear more on this story now can cross to auntie correspondent greg as the if he's in iraq for morale and what else has the u.n. spokesperson had to say well you know it's serious when not even the u.n. can stay silent on the matter any longer look at out frequently they're talking about the civilian deaths and suffering in iraq and we know of course u.n. officials are often held hostage to political interests but in this case not even they can ignore all these reports this deluge of reports detailing massive indian deaths and suffering inside raca which was i says the fact that the capital in
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syria if indeed these are confirmed all of these reports it would mark a doc new milestone in the syrian civil war. these attacks if confirmed are shocking reminder that civilians continue to bear the brunt of the conflict in many parts of syria. just to bring everyone up to speed raca as it was capital in syria is very symbolic of the u. u.s. coalition as well as its allies in syria on the ground the s.d.f. they've besieged for months now and slowly making progress dislodging isis from the city but a tremendous course not a week goes by without new reports of an ass strike going wrong another house being hit and killing dozens of civilians with more buried under the rubble of course
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reminded of what happened in mosul and the rent discourse that civilians that paid for the city's liberation this talk of up to twenty thousand civilians killed during the liberation of mosul and indeed that the united states kept on apologizing saying it was worried about the civilian deaths that took them seriously yet the airstrikes never ended and that is now beginning again in a thought of which is an area eighty kilometers west of mosul where the u.s. led coalition the iraqi military have now launched another operation to clear the area of isis which has held it for three years there leveling tremendous firepower as strikes tag jets many cells and in the midst of that hello forty thousand civilians according to u.n. reports food is scarce as is medicine drinking water even is a luxury in civilians trying to get out of that trying to flee there's no doubt
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that isis that will be defeated but the question is at what cost. so correspond to rank as they have in erbil in iraq reporting that thank you. now as the united nations warns about new mass flows of refugees from telefonica which one i was talking about a moment ago there are fears refugee camps there will simply be unable to cope with this latest influx people at the camps say the conditions there are already atrocious. but it is difficult there is no air conditioning there is no food we leave the room and food the transit soon to salute is normal in a neutral. people are in chaos everything in our life is destroyed this is my mother she couldn't walk so i put her over my shoulder and we walked like that for thirteen hours but now we are here and we have nothing that we don't know we don't
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know where they will take us we don't know walter fetus. egland who is also secretary general of the norwegian refugee council says that his organization is ready to help and he added that civilians in water and cities both in syria and iraq are facing several threats they include both terrorist attacks and their strikes they know we rescue council we are in the first line really of reception of billions from our conditions are horrific forty five degrees celcius mid day people have to go through long areas from. you know control these people are really caught in a horrific crossfire urban warfare and especially air raids are always massively risking civilian casualties
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a total disaster that is how donald trump as a presidential candidate denounced the u.s. military campaign in afghanistan he played the lead america out if you became president but now he's flip flopping on that promise he's actually expanding what's already there. ghana's stand is a total and complete disaster let's get with it get out of afghanistan we will also expand authority for american armed forces to target the terrorist and criminal networks. trump cards regularly slammed barack obama's approach to afghanistan the been called on him to get smart trump also insisted on a speedy withdrawal repeating that it was time for american soldiers to come home he added obama's financial support for afghanistan was a waste of money but that was all before he was elected as america's latest president some a noted it's almost as if he's become a an entirely different person than the commander in chief also gave no deadlines
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for any final withdrawal from the war when it came to the question of just how many more soldiers would be going has said he will keep that a secret for now is administration there has hinted at a boost in we also want the nato allies to throw in more troops and money into the pot we will ask our nato allies and global partners to support our new strategy with additional troop and funding increases in line with their own we are confident they will and u.s. allies have been reacting to trim statement the german foreign minister stressed that the us should be coordinating their afghan policy with the european union to avoid a new surge of afghan migrants into europe former congressman ron paul says the deeper the u.s. gets involved in the country the more attacks america will face on its freedom. so he changes the words and makes it sound like the world will come apart if we don't continue to be the world's policeman and we as libertarians believe it's the
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opposite we think the more that we're involved over there there's less likely we will have peace in the more attacks there will be on our personal liberties here at home so i think there's going to be perpetual war nobody knows exactly who the enemy is nobody will know when it is ended but i think trump has been maybe a little bit more up front that his goal isn't to get done in six months or a year it looks like he's planning to be there for the long term and trump says that we should be killing more people in afghanistan and i think that is a recipe for disaster it's going to be very costly so i think it will finally end in our empire well and when we run out of money and that's maybe not in the too distant future trump has some gut instincts but so far he hasn't been able to stick to them so he is seen as a flip flopper which i think politically is
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a bad position to be i think it's strange that the europeans have been quite willing to do what we tell them to do and but i do think it makes them more vulnerable you know why should the europeans feel safer if we go and like we have you know participate in a coup and change the leadership of ukraine that doesn't help the europeans a consequence of this mass migration although we have some problems with that it's nothing like what europe is. putting up with and literally tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands coming from the middle east but from the wars that we have literally encouraging got involved in whether it's afghanistan or syria or iran. and libya people are coming in there are invade they're literally invading your. with taliban has responded to donald trump statement warning him he'd simply waste soldiers by sending them to afghanistan we've also heard from locals who say that
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war can't solve the problem and that in the end only more lives will be lost. on the how to who are is not the solution here in the stone when the us sense of the going to stand the result was bombing civilians children and women as it were when a parishioner was carried out if pale i'm not going to when they came here who lost everything why send more troops over here when they will come to kill us. with a new announcement on u.s. strategy in afghanistan comes amid a shake up in donald trump in a circle he's on the fire chief strategist the ban and he was the latest to head for the exit at a scale of more pain of course now the president's foreign policy decisions with his new team could surprise the very people who voted him into office. so you want to be an american president what gets you aleck to is it pledges of more wars or the opposite we've been moving from one reckless intervention to another kinda
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libya syria irak iran this destructive cycle bad decisions we cannot be the policeman of the world polls show that promises of peace were key for trump voters more than half of americans said they would prefer that the next president curb u.s. involvement in military conflicts and trump isn't the only president to have gotten the job writing hopes of peace but as we confront a vicious adversary that abides by no rules. i believe the united states of america must remain a standard bearer in the conduct of war. that is what makes us different from those whom we fight you got it they even gave obama the nobel peace prize preemptively but by the time he left office he had droned bombed and intervened even more than his predecessor many hoped that the donald would make a difference however it looks like he may be set on a similar track with words of love being replaced by war and i don't order
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a targeted new jersey strike or if you can see who we are sending an armada very powerful we have submarines very powerful we have many options for venezuela including a possible military option north korea best not make it work threats to the united states. they will be met with fire and fury. life the world has never see but thinking out of policy is pretty far from a one man job here are some of the people who help think out and develop trump strategy you know the one that got him elected well they're all gone except for one meanwhile the white house routinely invites people who have a pretty clear interest for wars to go on people voted for trump because they knew hillary clinton was a warmonger and that she had wanted to destabilize the middle east as she did with
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libya the people in charge of the white house are now jared kushner trump gary gary cohen h.r. mcmaster paul deuce are all very pro-war people and those are trumps close advisors i think that most people who support trump hope that he'll keep to his promises but they do recognize that all of his closest advisors are now opposed to the agenda that got trampled elected yes the new team trump isn't exactly made up of peace mongers and it's pretty far from the vision that americans voted for caleb oppen r.t. new york. let's bring in mike randy now he's a human rights activist and the coeditor of the web site b s news michael good evening to you donald trump as we know he's doing the opposite of what he said he would do expanding military presence in afghanistan also interestingly there isn't a time frame for ending this war and he suggested that in the past that have been
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bad psychologically for for the u.s. troops knowing that they were had to when by a certain time what you make of what he's outlined. well i mean this obviously there's no end in that that suits the neocon generals perfectly well. but his policy away split flood maybe he's this is in tradition with all u.s. presidents going back to the jimmy carter not in seventy nine they've all intervened in or interfered with the the running of afghanistan whether it be overtly or covertly. whether it's full fledged intervention and military attack or arming jihadist groups like the much i mean so it's no surprise to me the neo cons and the military industrial establishment overjoyed about this because it means that their their baby that war in afghanistan unwinnable so far sixteen year war in afghanistan will continue and it may continue for decades the cia is also
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overjoyed because they're black up by black ops budget which is tied obviously to the exponential growth in opium production in afghanistan which is fueling the heroin epidemic across the west that's now secured for another possibly twenty who knows fifty years. so the so he's jumped straight back into this one piece rather than anything but clearing it off and clearing it he's dumped into the swamp and people now can see his true colors if they couldn't already after the indiscriminate bombing of syria recently but so yeah this is it's not surprising to me it's not going to win it's not going to succeed at all if there is an insurgency in afghanistan for the moment it's because of the military occupation i mean we should remember that nato forces never left there. whether it be president bush or president obama so this is a continuation of long tell policy. the taliban have responded that they say things are going to get much worse they're going to be more political casualties they've
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said we're going to see an increase in violence an increase in casualties. yes i believe so and it won't just be the taliban though they'll be isis they'll be fueling what will probably become a full fledged civil war in the country. isis have been pushed out of syria and pushed out of iraq they need somewhere to go because as a proxy army they suit the pentagon perfectly well and they used extensively throughout the world and if you look back in past past conflicts not only for the fight the the soviet empire in afghanistan but they were deployed over in the balkans and they've been deployed recently in in places was into these years so having a proxy army that you can call upon is really useful they're going to need some kind of place somewhere in a country that doesn't have much to belittle and so afghanistan is the likely place that's been the place in line seventy nine and ninety nine throughout the 1980's. so i think that things are going to get worse for the people of afghanistan especially civilians we're going to see far more casualties there i mean who knows
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how many have been killed in the last sixteen years but things are going to improve at all for the for the civilians of afghanistan and i think the country in general is going to continue to spiral out of control. one part of this policy the kind of also makes sense with regards to the. establishment over in america and the west in general is this part of a wider economic war against russia iran and china china was doing great economic toys with countries in northern africa and and also in afghanistan so been put to paper put to an end because of the interventions in the regime change operations in north africa libya and all the economic ties that china was developing with afghanistan and now all of risk so the one trillion dollars worth of rich minimal resources under the ground in afghanistan probably isn't going to get developed and it is going to benefit the people of the country so i mean again that's all part of
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the u.s. strategy towards its perceived enemies like good speeches always might roundy human rights activists coeditor of the online site b s nice. next the north korean diplomat says that preparations are complete for a strike on the u.s. territory of guam if america quote will not accents a blow comes as the country state television has been airing a warning over u.s. south korea war games which have started on the peninsula unbundle year clues has options and no one can vouch that these huge forces concentrated in south korea will not turn to actual your now that military tensions have reached give a speech on the korean peninsula of the current eleven day drills involved fifty thousand korean troops and seventeen and a half thousand u.s. troops computer programs are also being used to simulate war prior to those exercises even south korea's defense ministry admitted concern that the drills could trigger a missile launch by the northern neighbor the recent grad possibility that north
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korea will carry out strategic or local provocations to protest the latest u.n. sanctions and the year of g. exercises. bring in author and human rights attorney eric surat king joins me on the line now eric do you think the u.s. is provoking north korea by conducting these military exercises in the current tensions. yes i mean this is a situation that goes on a couple times a year but right now we're at such a crucial point that we need to step back and suspend these war games and not do anything to provoke the situation and what we've demonstrated through our actions again and again is a lack of creativity a lack of courage if you will by president trump and the administration and prior administrations to get creative on the korean peninsula so when you run
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tens of thousands of troops up and down your border simulating an invasion shooting off live weapons you are demonstrating a situation that's putting fuel on the fire and ends up in a very precarious place for all concerned ok your sixty state rex tillerson has just made comments on the latest developments have a listen to what he said. i think it is worth noting that we have had no missile launches or provocative acts on the part of north korea since the unanimous adoption of your security council resolution and i want to take note of that what it knowledge of. i'm. pleased to see that the regime in pyongyang has has certainly do a straight of some level restraint. i mean if you look at the words coming from north korea if america does not act sensibly might say that that's slightly toned
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down from some of the previous threats to listen seems to be taking out that way do you think that we are going to see a deescalation or. well unfortunately the secretary isn't running the show really and we've seen that over and over again that there are other people stepping up and making ballistic comments president trump included so realistically it is there is this flow the question is do we at this point take advantage of it do we step forward and say let's sit at the table let's have formal relations with you so that we can recognize your right to exist and we what's happened in the media is they've left off the back end of kim jong un's statements even where he said we will not negotiate our nukes unless the u.s.
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and its nuclear posture and hostile policy we've got to jump on those comments we've got to sit down and talk and schedule those situations so that we can make real change and i call upon president trump to show courage to be the great negotiator he claims he can be and sit down and have the courage it takes to talk talk and talk until you get a resolution that has not happened in over sixty years in this conflict do you think that north korea would actually follow through on its threats and launch a missile attack on guam. you know it's so hard they've said the things that are unfortunate and are threatening and violate international law when you threaten these kind of attacks. i don't think that they're going to create a situation where they fire on and create
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a war on the korean peninsula everyone knows that it'll lead to hundreds of thousands of deaths within the first forty eight hours so militarism is just not a solution on either side and it's going to take courage for someone in this tug of war to let go of the rope and sit down and get in the shoes of the other person apply mediation techniques listen. understand where they're coming from and then when you do that you understand why they behave fear the united states why they may fear attacks and why in the north we are fearful of bombs and attacks and everything else this is a very volatile situation but it is an opportunity if you seize the opportunity and you go in and you negotiate there is no military option and to pretend there is on either side is child's play and it is time that we start acting like adults on
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the korean peninsula and set up a policy by where you sit down and you recognize people's right to exist you set up a non-hostile policy you have a peace treaty instead of a temporary armistice agreement to end a sixty three year standoff and we move forward in that regard but there are many reasons that interfere with that and there is a lot of weapons that are purchased south korea's one the largest importers of weapons from the united states in the world a peaceful korea doesn't always serve the interests north south china the u.s. but let's get the international community behind president moon and his sunshine policies he's proposing that's a big step in the u.s. needs to get onboard. in his view. into the news now four suspects in thursday's barcelona target attack appeared in
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court on tuesday one of the lead to the salience admitted that a bigger attack was being planned and it was on the city's iconic so good out of familiar church is attacker who drove a car into pedestrians at the last of them restore a hot spot last week was found and killed on monday and this is the catalan police released footage of the raids conducted in the spanish town of ripple for the barcelona attack suspects lived overseas searched several apartments and numerous gas canisters were found two of the suspects have confirmed that a report their mom was the mastermind behind the attacks the court heard marmont planned to blow himself up with a bomb vest according to spanish media reports on his correspondent peter oliver is in the town for us. as the investigation continues into who was behind last week's terror attacks that took place in spain that investigation is focusing in on this small town just to the north about an hour and a half's drive to the north of baal solo and they pull is where it's understood
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that the terrorist cell was put together and radicalized and it's believed that that radicalization was carried out by abdel baccy and now he's understood to have been the a man who was operating out of a mosque based in the building just behind me he did how they criminal past he was sent to prison back in twenty ten for a number of years for being involved in the dealing of the imports of hasheesh from his native morocco into spain and it's during that time in prison that we understand that he became radicalized himself he may well according to some reports have been in contact with some of those who were currently it was serving time who were involved in the two thousand and four madrid bombing which killed one hundred and ninety two people which al qaeda took responsibility for what we are piecing together from the investigators as they give us bits of information is that this
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was the hub for a group of twelve a number of dead some cotton with those that are in court and those in custody that we're hoping to get more information out of what we know so far is that they were all local they were all relatively young we know they played football together they they were some went to a local institutes and study together but they all had one thing in common and that was contact with. this particular mosque and that's where the investigation is focusing because this is a very small very quiet town in the foothills of the pyrenees mountains but it seems that this was the by prisoner nest that was able to raise up a group of people and radicalize them in order to strike and attack. on the surrounding area killing so many. a glimpse into the future of warfare has been unveiled at a military hardware in moscow talking about a small gun which makes its own decision on whether to pull the trigger.
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