almost half a million people protest in catalonia as madrid decides to impose direct rule dismissed key officials and call for a regional election. has been under scrutiny with the u.k.'s foreign secretary boris johnson. the times newspaper and the european think tank all slamming this channel and insulting our guests. pentagon hales the liberation of the syrian city of rock from islamic state by u.s. backed opposition forces in the city has been left in ruins.

broadcasting a lot of direct it is r t international i'm sean thomas really glad to have you with us. hundreds of thousands of people have been on the streets of catalonia expressing their support of or opposition to the movement for independence that follows madrid's decision to impose direct rule and strip the local government of its powers of spanish government is also calling for a regional election within six months on leaders have branded the move a coup. but you have this measure we are going to implement has a lot to do with the goal of holding an election in catalonia the region will have to hold an election within six months but mine tension is to hold it as soon as we recover. a lot of us but what about the spanish government has carried out the worst attack against scotland institutions and residents since the orders of the

military dictator francisco franco we. were hawaii in a greatly irresponsible act christ all boundaries been asking and in fact a coup d'etat to ask a democratically elected government. the transfer of power to madrid and the dismissing of officials alleged to have broken the law expected to be approved by the senate within days and while the kettle on parliament will not be dissolved it will now be stripped of its capacity to elect a president. protests continue in the streets of wasilla and across the region of council anya now people that gathered here in this area of the city earlier well they were against the independence and many of them were from different union shops the region now they came here this sunday with their families and with their friends they brought flags shelfs spain and they were shouting slogans including out of a spine you know which means

a long live spain at the same time on saturday we saw tans of thousands of other a protester is that also a ticket to the streets of boston lawn and they were supporting independence and they were supporting the results of the referendum that took place on the first of october now all these people now feel that they are. it will in no way stuck in a state of limbo and at least for the next six months now we managed to speak to some of them here in the streets of barcelona and of course it's nonsense that the capital of the region wants to become independent it's about territorial unity formed in the roman times spanish unity is worth fighting for against the nonsensical actions of the council on board was eat me though we've come here to honor and express respect to the spanish on forces because they're insulted and blamed in catalonia the children of the civil god and national police offices are told in school that their father to reduce the spanish constitution does not forsee

any referendum because it's illegal and most of all it doesn't foresee a referendum to break up spain for centuries spain was one it won't break up to do the will of criminals poesy differing mood among people industries and a lot of uncertainty really old this shows a deep crisis that the region is at the moment and it is indeed the biggest constitutional crisis this country has seen in decades now many believe that the inability to really go. ways out of the situation between the spanish government and the local catalan officials at last to this particular situation to this crisis now spanish government gave the catcher leader up until last thursday to back away from proclaiming independence out or to be ready to face the possibility of a direct rule coming from a treat. catalan as sore it is to kept confirming the independence however at the

same time they're also kept suspending the declaration of independence and all these allowed to the events of saturday when the spanish government and nouns that it isn't vote king article one fifty five of the constitution for the first time avar and this measure can only be applied if the regional government does not comply with the obligations of the constitution so now spanish prime minister calling for a snap elections to take place in this region within the next six months he is also calling for the dismissal of the local government asked the local government allowed to this crisis but important detail is that all these measures should first be approved by the majority of the spanish senate but nonetheless what we're witnessing here is a big crisis not only a constitutional crisis but also a crisis within the the nation within the catalan people we spoke to thomas harrington a professor of iberia news studies he says exerting this kind of pressure in

a democratic country is not legitimate. what is the role of the force in elective democracies in the twenty first century. i think the consensus on the shuttle and side is a very strong one and i can't imagine that the people who are rightfully elected in the september two thousand and fifteen elections going along with a new election after the government that they were elected to form part of is is overthrown by the several of our days and i think president bush among makes a very compelling find when he says well if this can be done to us what other things can be done to other people if you're going to sit by and let it happen throughout the week madrid has been tightening its grip over catalonia last monday to independence leaders were arrested for the roles they played in organizing the referendum one of them is the leader of the of the line national assembly the other is the president of an organization that promotes the cuddle on language and

culture since then barcelona has seen even bigger demonstrations uniting hundreds of thousands of people to thank. we were out was. was. shot. was. back a ways i'm going to pick that up sock one of us has. was let us and now take a look at how spain has been cracking down on catalonia has pushed for independence

. to those in charge in the government who are the protagonist in this challenge to our coexistence i ask them to cease illegal activities they should abandon their objective.

need we are now applying article one five five because no government at all in a democratic country can accept that the law be ignored violated or changed and this has all happened under false criteria and they impose that criteria on everybody else. hot on the heels of catalonia referendum to break away two major at talian regions have finished voting for greater autonomy on sunday the regions leaders explained how they see this start. we want to overcome the inability of europe just solve problems and face up to them by offering a new dimension but we wanted more united stronger europe one that takes into account the specifics of territories this is what can be simply called the regional . page of history will be written in any case village so will be the city before we want to initiate this in amount of this democratic i'm compatible with in

line with the constitution. these are the areas first referendums of their kind and with more than fifty percent turnout in veneto the vote is considered valid although the votes are non-binding meaning they won't change any powers they are expected to send a signal from locals unhappy at having to subside subsidise rather poorer parts of the country a referendum on greater autonomy has been much anticipated in both regions for more than sixteen years now. and bharti are two of italy's economic powerhouses together both regions account for almost a third of italy's g.d.p. and almost a quarter of the nation's electorate they are home went to top tourism and industry hotspots including milan and venice we spoke to university of milan politics professor marco but sunny he believes history has been made. we are witnessing for the very first time people that go to the polls oscon or

negotiate on our behalf more autonomy we just want more autonomy we want more of our money you know regions never happened before why the wall members were just fiscal slaves of the rest of the country so we're failing two people the nations and. and a for the very first time i say no we don't like it it's going to be a big change it's going to just put the issue all that north back into the political discussion so first right now it's a call from all our autonomy that is we want to keep more of a money on this it's not clear from the legal point of view or constitutional point to be how it's going to happen but from the symbolic point of view it was incredible you know more i guess tonight more than sixty percent of the whole gamut to people maybe forty five fifty percent of the lombards will have voted for that so that's really

a very clear sign in national politics. islamic states self-proclaimed capital of rock i was liberated this week but there was a heavy price to pay that story in other news after a short break watching the weekly art international. in case you're new to the game this is how it works in our economy is built around quite recent operations from washington to washington post media the media. voters elect me to run this country business because. you must it's not business as usual it's business like it's never been done before. local blogs sell you on the idea that dropping bombs brings peace to the chicken hawks forcing you to fight the battles they are going to. produce talk spread

a tell you that celebrity gossip and public life styles are the most important they . tell you think you are not cool enough to buy their product. these are the hawks that we along with all the walking. are welcome back to watching the weekly here on our two international now our channel has faced a week of intense scrutiny with of the channel coming under sustained attack for what critics call its kremlin propaganda on tuesday auckland's explains. ati has been in the spotlight for a while under fire from government officials the media even think tanks here are

some recent highlights. boris johnson led the charge in the u.k. house of commons with an attack on opposition m.p.'s who have appeared on this channel if you study the output of of russia today it is a scandal it is a scandal that members of the party opposite are continuing to to validate to validate and to meet. that kind of propaganda by going on those programs but some of his fierce criticism the foreign secretary of peers to have missed out a bit of important information his own conservative colleagues have also appeared as guests on the shuttle as well as someone closer to home his own father stanley johnson was interviewed by going on the ground i was the afshin rattansi just last month. the times newspaper claims there are

now calls by the labor party for off the u.k. media watchdog to investigate artie's advertising campaign on the london underground they even contacted us for our take on the matter later saying our press office refused to comment except we did two questions do you wish to respond to this complaint which advertising agency created the adverts for r t what were they made in house. high probably not much point in responding to a complaint to an authority that does not regulate out of two advertising the out campaign was developed in-house by the other team and fully proved by all u.k. vendettas we are glad to say many in the u.k. are engaging with our advertising understood thanks for swift response.

and it gets better one thing tank recently completed the mom of the task of compiling a list of all the thousands of guests who've appeared on our shows ever from politicians and journalists to academics and thirty's and even groups them into categories and then dismisses them as useful idiots many people in europe and the us including politicians and of the persons of influence continue to exhibit troubling naivety about artie's political agenda these useful idiots remain oblivious to r.t.c. intentions and b.c.'s legitimacy by granting interviews on the shows and news casts so only useful idiot list john mccain one of the most vocal critics of russia even film director rob reiner gets a mention in the celebrity section he's now part of an organization called the committee to investigate russia as not to mention u.s. senator and former presidential candidate bernie sanders as well as none other than

the current american president donald trump i guess that's finally the smoking gun of russian election influence former first lady michelle obama gets a mention although her name only appears in the program description she was never an actual guest check in the episode would have confirmed this back to boris johnson himself he is listed on the reports official guest list taken from web site descriptions for the comedy show news thing well they may want to double check that one as well its power in say three boris johnson boris welcome. are we going to get a chance to fight the spanish before america and russia killer so. to brittany's. portion of the report is sponsored by george soros as well as the u.k. and u.s. embassies in the czech republic it certainly spares no criticism of those giving interviews on this channel. we

decided to ask some of our guests whether that were mentioned in the list of useful idiots what they think about of that description. development is somehow trash it gets more and more aggressive across europe the political debates and one of these games they are playing. they are destroying the reputation of politicians they don't like i don't think that it's fair to say that we are simply here is russian stooges i am not anti russian but sometimes i'm quite critical of russia over syria and over the detention of political prisoners like eldad and others. you know of course everybody has their agendas but i think he has certainly not tried to constrain my expression or the expression of many other people i know i work with a network we speak our mind and we're critical of the west when it's appropriate and were critical of russia when it's appropriate. the reality is there is

a dissident voice in the u.k. the only very rarely gets any time in the mainstream media. is the only place that has been providing a regular platform for what used to be dissident voices in the u.k. but now much more mainstream voice. this week at the pentagon confirmed a victory of four coalition led kurdish troops fighting islamic state in the syrian city of raka the defense department hailed the operation as a significant breakthrough. we're having great success against what was once known as the core caliphate iraq in syria and now we're actually in the beginning i think the emphasis stage and watch for the caliphate is morocco. however the latest pictures from morocco show that to despite the victory it is now a virtual ghost town of the destruction you see here was caused by eisel militia shelling and coalition air strikes aid agencies also say

a huge effort will be needed to end of the city's humanitarian crisis eisel claimed rocka as it's a defacto capital in two thousand and fourteen the first major offensive against the terrorists there began two years later it used to be one of syria's largest cities but now it is mainly in ruins. recently called nation after us is well ready to demolish the whole building to attack one member of i say they have no problem killing civilians. we ran from death and any human being would be afraid the sound of the planes makes us afraid they were shelling the civilians destroying buildings and houses rakhal was

destroyed by a coalition aircraft only ten percent hit their targets the rest hit civilians. the un estimates that's an average of twenty seven people are being killed in iraq every day. and they seem to be no real escape for these civilians their level of suffering friends relatives family of the children it's actually. it's just i get it. would be humanitarian relief teams are only now beginning to arrive there has been a destruction of the larger supply their political mission of food because of course the area was under siege for such a long time there is a severe lack of medical services medical care hospitals that are functioning

a severe lack of lot of course and so there is a massive massive humanitarian need on the ground. members of the u.s. led coalition have already pledged millions in humanitarian help to iraq but this has prompted questions from russia's defense ministry which has provided aid to other liberated syrian cities what is this rush of western countries to finance rucka alone seems only one thing remains to quickly cover the tricks of the booming of the u.s. and the coalition which buried thousands of civilians liberated from in the ruins of rocco. the french parliament has adopted a controversial counter-terror bill giving increased powers to security services the new law is it drawing wide scale criticism from rights advocates who fear it will curb civil liberties police who will now have even greater powers to search homes without a warrant and conduct stop and search operations on the streets of law also lets

authorities wiretap communications more including phones and e-mail places of worship suspected of promoting extremism may also be temporarily shut down the architect of the law is president himself he says this is an alternative to the current state of emergency which has already been extended six times. the anti terror draft law on the reinforcement of internal security has been adopted by a parliamentary majority and it will come into power in november the first when the state of emergency expires the state of emergency was effect however we've seen in recent months that unfortunately doesn't protect us from the reality of certain tax because any state of emergency can protect us in totally reduce the threat now frances state of emergency is due to be lifted at the beginning of next month first issued following the terrorist attacks in paris in two thousand and fifteen but

many fear the new move encroaches on even more basic freedoms we gauge reaction on the streets of paris. no i don't agree with it and i'm sure we can do things differently i don't think it is the way to solve the problem of terrorism as opposed to leave them on the i think it when you look for something they have real reasons for doing so me personally am not against it. but i really don't think it will help to fight any terrorists it will only harm personal freedoms and i believe it is designed more to control the people and only the more your point i think we were to have the means to control people there are already laws in place we know we're under control and i phones are being monitored if they will now be able to get into our apartments i do believe the goal is fighting terror earlier the u.n. also slammed the anti terror bill it warned of the measures if implemented would limit freedoms in french society political analyst dan glazebrook warns that

without policy changes the new law will not be enough don't deal with the root causes which is the brutal foreign policy on the one hand and then the alienation of entire communities due to your systematic institutional discrimination and racism on the other hand if you're not going to deal with those even the most vicious police state will not be able to stop. being some people who decide to lash out unfortunately you're never going to be able to keep your population one hundred percent safe because your whole foreign policy is about setting fire to two other countries that doesn't for me i'll be back in about thirty four minutes with a full look at your news international it was.

i played for many clubs over the years so i know that. football isn't only about what happens on the pitch for the final school it's about the passion from the fans it's the age of the super money. and spending twenty million. it's an experience like nothing else because i want to share what i know about the beautiful guy great so.

we're here in southern russia attending the ball by discussion club and our topic is u.s. russia relations and the state of the world. is still exist. ricos treated as one. and i knew a lot of. the island is controlled by the us government and some craven dependants. there are many times. being about on a bike doesn't work either way but i mean to sort of i mean overtaking a gamer and. still many do wish to join the u.s. hundreds more leave every day. on time along the funny.

beings. with the country at a crossroads anger on the island is on the rise. my . girl. was a bit of. well at the kind of mushy finality and i don't let the auto about how much more i'd let her be honest and the half of the fish emily i shall get a letter i learned to whom i had that the. story. so so so much so much so it.

was before this was a useful to you. they've been nice and friendly document sentencing. the one with the family. just obviously unfolding. and one had. the bottle in which was set up yes it's enough to be out of. the bomb by the. double how that would be. to say that i learned. that the woman is model and have a young son how. i don't know. but there's a little how that i'm sure.