full of systemic deficiencies at the u.n. security council russia slams a probe into but. do not underestimate. and do not try and donald trump sends a doll corning to north korea on his asia trip or is now in china where he's pushing beijing to take a tougher stance against pyongyang. chaos in council lonia as a general strike brings the area to a halt almost fifty he wrote a blog post the region in protest over the jailing of a letter the country's deputy envoy to the un addressed moscow's concerns to the

security council. is the work of existing international structures the school revealed systemic deficiencies as regards to chemical weapons reports the results of their investigation of. the substances are deeply disappointing the report issued two weeks ago concluded assad's government was behind the attack which left more than eighty dead it also stated the sarin gas used can be traced to government stockpiles the mandate of the investigation expires in a week both moscow and washington are calling for its extension but on different terms as caleb maupin explains. the russian ambassador spoke to the meeting of the un security council and he was less than enthusiastic about the report he pointed out to many problems with the report in many aspects of the way the investigation was done relying on third parties as being rather on satisfactory studies the.

investigators carried out their work remotely the report of a missions inconsistency is in discrepancies of very mediocre quality there's a question as the samples collected. and whether they're from syria it is unclear how the sarin most transports of their. visit to iraq would be crucial to proof of sarin and define who's responsible for that in other words it was the judy so far in the south well immediately after hearing the report from the o.p.c. w. we heard from nikki haley the u.s. ambassador to the united nations now when she spoke she praised the gem of the organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons the o.p.c. w for their report and then she went on to urge the council to pass a new resolution prolonging their work investigating chemical weapons in syria the gym's report not only identifies those behind the chemical attack it also explains

how it reached its conclusion it makes note of any irregularities it found in the information obtained from the investigation many developments are in the works others talk of a new resolution russia and china working together with the united states to draft a new resolution but as of yet it's not clear what's next for the o.p.c. w or the joint investigative mechanism as they continue their work in syria earlier russian military experts presented better own conclusions saying the attack could not have been carried out by a syrian jets as none were within range although no fragments from an aerial bomb were found russian explosives experts maintain an improvised device and been used which had been placed on a pavement at the time of the attack the west was quick to point the finger at damascus long before any official findings were really. the head of the joint investigation said even if experts had visited the site of the attack it would have

changed nothing in their findings and conclusions they also said the body takes great care to ensure its methodology is technically sound well that's not the view of an investigative journalist rick stirling they've got a very shaky conclusion and even their report indicates that the number of various irregularities that is. only an understatement the report it's a knowledge that there were fifty seven victims transported to five different hospitals before the attack even happened. so how do you have a big floor happens they acknowledge in the report that they cannot confirm that there were syrian chair over a country who are at the time of the incident which nobody zero showing syrian jets the syrian air force says they were not going to take you and they were attacked another town and actually that u.s. radar tracking couldn't burps that the syrian jet fighters has no closer than five

kilometers from conficker so in addition to that any investigation an essential component of it is looking at motives who has a motive for a chemical weapons incident in syria obviously it's the opposition and the syrian government has every motive to prevent or never to have that happen. saudi arabia has detained dozens of royal thick as and ministers and what it's calling phase one of an anti-corruption push. these arrests do not represent the start but the completion of phase one of our anti-corruption push eleven princes four ministers and many ex ministers were detained by the saudi anti corruption body the us presidency expressed his approval for the controversial move despite the fact one of his former business partners was reportedly among those detained with more details his aunties jacqueline. riyadh's ritz carlton became the impromptu site and luxurious prison for some of saudi arabia's most wealthy and

powerful over the weekend it was a serious fall from grace for those rounded up including princes ministers and business people who had to make do with sleeping on the floor in the five star hotel. it's all part of an unprecedented anti-corruption purge decreed by the king and put into motion by thirty two year old prince mohammad the sweeping arrests are thought to be the young saudi heirs gamble to stamp out political rivals and clear his way to power and on that way he is ready to shatter decades of royal traditions by breaking saudi arabia's addiction to oil we will not have it to be at the mercy of commodity price volatility or external markets we have developed a case of oil addiction in saudi arabia and his rise to power principal home it has also forged a close relationship with the trump administration. so

it perhaps came as no surprise when trump gave his backing to the so-called corruption purge on twitter i have great confidence in king salmon and the crown prince of saudi arabia they know exactly what they are doing. some of those they are harshly treating have been milking that country for years so who exactly is as donald trump claims milking saudi arabia dry one person is sixty two year old prince all what we've been told all an internationally known businessman holding shares and several u.s. companies like apple twitter citigroup and time warner funding early enough trump himself has ties to bin talal who reportedly helped bail out the tycoon turned president twice in the ninety's but the relationship seemingly fell apart in two thousand and fifteen you are a disgrace not only to the g.o.p.

but to all america withdraw from the us presidential race as you will never win don't be prince our will lead to lower ones to control us politicians with daddy's money can do it when i get elected apparently that doesn't always apply to saudis pouring money into america trump is now pleading for the gulf states national oil company to float its shares on the new york stock exchange so while term criticizes those arrested for milking saudi arabia it would seem the us president has nothing against milking riyadh's coffers to fill washington's. the skies this further now across live to speak to independent political analyst pepe escobar thank you for joining us on the program now what do you think of be behind this sudden and unexpected anticorruption drive. no it's not an expected effect to trump and the only the only sing that he said that applies is that crown prince mohammed bin solomon which we call n.b.s. knows exactly what he's doing which is an old style purge or what i call the night

of the saudi long knives where he got to read of any potential. high profile contender against he is one man rule don't forget saudi arabia has they don't have an independent judiciary they don't have freedom of expression they don't have a credible opposition and that in fact king solomon is not ruling who's ruling exactly m.b.'s so a field days before in fact two weeks before the night of the long knives there was a famous a doubles in the desert conference where the new. ground prince in fact and the new leadership was splitting the future of saudi arabia as envisioned twenty thirty which implies a lot of investment or a high profile especially american investors we're talking about larry flink we're

talking about stephen schwarzman and a few days later jarrett was in riyadh where his bone ding and he has been bonding very closely with the crown prince the next the there was the night of the long knives trump said that our own call a share should be flowed the new york stock exchange what i get from some my best sources would they have been doing business deals with the house of saud for decades in fact is that the the underlying narrative is the deal between jarrett kirschner and m.b.'s personally that trump has kept his hands off in this whole matter and please explain crucial could be bailed out in these difficulties in u.s. visa v. . the food was six six six fifth avenue property in manhattan so this is personal to use this involves a new foreign policy that is very complex and anti-god especially untag and izing

iran and lebanon which is the second part of our discussion the big question is what's going to alan was going to happen next do you think that that declining war between the royals could escalate after the crown prince is actions and if so how. it is a skeleton absolutely it has already escalated because in the middle of all this melee when we have the jail at the riyadh ritz carlton. lebanese prime minister saad gooing own saudi television reading a declaration written by the saudis and the abdicating from his post of prime minister in lebanon which is completely absurd and the president of live in a show and said no we don't buy that we tried to intervene intermediation with france the brits jordan egypt it didn't work and now they're expecting how do you do to go back to lebanon so this is ratcheting up an intimidation of lebanon because for the m.b.'s ground there is

a direct conflation between hezbollah and the lebanese government so i've talked to a lot of the best middle east political analysts there are your agree the next step is saudi arabia retching up war against lebanon and this is a very very serious development ok independent political analyst pepe escobar thank you for your time. and the u.s. and north korea have traded insults again pyongyang is called trump the lunatic old man before adding washington's not fit to act as a judge of human rights and it's not the president trying to squash north korea as a hell that no one deserves during his stop in seoul as part of his asian tour he also issued a stark warning to the hermit state. when i say to the north do not underestimate us and do not try every step you take down this dark path increases the perot you say as president trump is now in china for the next

a much anticipated leg of his trip the visit has already proved truthful it's being reported that the u.s. and china have signed some twenty trade deals worth nine billion dollars the chinese side has dubbed them a warm up before a big a ceremony on thursday artists american looks back at trump and she's previous meeting. as donald trump arrives in china on his five nation asia tour it's now the chinese president's turn to roll out the red carpet just six months ago the chinese leader came to washington and the two hit it off bonding over chocolate cake but trump couldn't help but be a bit theatrical during the dinner topping the magnificent dessert with a show of washington's military might we had the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake that you've ever seen and president she was enjoying it so what happens is i said we've just launched fifty nine missiles heading to iraq and what were you

headed to syria yes heading toward syria trump loves his weapons so much he thinks they're the solution to every problem and when the threat is as serious as north korea all the other countries in the region must be armed to the teeth and prepared to respond well that's the idea he's been trying to sell on his asia trip so far in both japan and south korea prime minister the band is going to be purchasing massive amounts of military equipment as he should south korea will be ordering billions of dollars of that equipment we make the best military equipment by far we make the greatest military equipment in the world the f. thirty five fighter which is the greatest in the world the greatest in the world missiles of many different kinds whether it's planes whether it's missiles we make the best the greatest military equipment by far in the world you purchasing it from the united states. thank you very much.

now trump is counting on the chinese president to back him up as he puts pressure on pyongyang president where we will be tomorrow china has been very helpful we'll find out how helpful so on but he really has been very very helpful well it's often said that diplomacy is merely seduction in another guys so the question is will trump's efforts to seduce the chinese leader carry over and will he be able to strike a sweet deal for the u.s. so america on r.t.e. washington d.c. . more of the day's stories still to come after this short break stay with us.

in terms of foreign policy donald trump is already earned himself the title the low expectations president this title is now being put to the test during his tour of asia because the u.s. a status quo power in the asia pacific region. boils challenging china.

welcome back now a general strike is bringing castle lonia to a halt as pro independence activists blocked key roads and stop trains in major cities in protest of the jailing of regional leaders madrid accuses them of rebellion and sedition and deems the council and declaration of independence illegal schools of roads have been blocked by protests in barcelona police clashed with demonstrators as officers tried to remove them from the motorway protesters also cut off the regional routes through connecting spain to france drona train station hundreds of protesters broke through a police cordon. russia's

investigative committees rejected claims the country had been running and a labyrinth state sponsored dumping program is that the world anti-doping agency have provided no proof to back the findings of a report by canadian lawyer richard mclaren on his mortality ever reports. well they carried out an extensive in-depth investigation involving more than seven hundred athletes their coaches various medical personnel and they question them about the allegations in the mclaren report and a number of them they rejected firstly they rejected the claim that some of the samples was switched and this claim was made in the mclaren report it said it said that some of them are normal or some of the samples indicating that perhaps they were mixed with salt and distilled water in order to hide banned chemical substances in the samples while the investigators stage their own experiments and

they found that depending on how intensely an athlete trained what he had drunk his unique physiological exchange process as well many samples could be found as anomalous the second claim that they rejected was that the urine sample bottles themselves were tampered with were opened them manufactured by a swiss company and they're made to be incredibly difficult to open if not impossible to open and close without leaving any sort of mark and back in march there was an experiment that investigation which found that these a urine bottles can't be opened without damaging the integrity of the bottles themselves or even destroying them so that claim doesn't fly either the other claim that they rejected was that there was a state sponsored massive national doping program in russia investigators say the

evidence that they have is that there is no evidence the mclaren report hasn't offered any of them mass stooping to stop but the investigators did say that they don't deny that there may have been individual cases of athletes using banned substances but those seven hundred questioned many of them said that. they did indeed buy performance enhancing drugs which they believed to be illegal from grigori he's the former head of the russian anti doping agency on whose testimony much of the mclaren report was was made and here's what they had to say matthew that's what caught our doping while taking the drugs i'd bought from roche and give it said the tests would always been negative if we used these drugs later took them off me and never gave them back my athletes was disqualified for two years even though we deny using prohibited drugs later i remembered i bought some drugs from rob chink of during the testing period now i suspect the drugs he sold me were

banned. allegedly claim the athletes that these were illegal substances but after doping test they were marked as positives nevertheless grigori watching of himself investigators claim they have this phone call on record on tape he called the current head of the russian anti-doping agency and offered money a bribe in return for a database of all russian athletes doping results. it was concluded that flushing who is now in the u.s. and works with professor mclaren telephoned a former side to her and asked her to sell him the database of russian athletes test results so the former senator had told russian investigators about this and now the committee has records of their conversations earlier this month of course two russian athletes skiers both were banned for life from competing in the olympics due to positive result in doping tests but the questions being asked here

now is that if the why are athletes already being banned for life. such by complaints about students praying to loudly in the library and using the bathrooms to wash their feet well in a statement hamburg university's president said certain events had raised the question. as to how to deal with religion in study research and everyday life at the university the statement goes on to say the new approach came after consultation with experts from various fields of study well the new code at the university bantam religious celebrations on site and says rituals should not disrupt the students wearing religious symbols though it is permitted lest they impede communication we spoke with students at the university who had mixed reactions but if we see class seats of religious freedom is permitted i think this statement is clear for everyone and this should be in doubt it's basically on my

side regarding the full body covering i don't really stand by it in my opinion it's a restriction for women and often it can be a question for christian. personally i don't think it's problematic to wear a full covering because i think there is the other extreme where younger women or young students shows far too much skin a muslim living in germany in a christian democratic country and i think it's good that i'm able to practice my religion the university says it's against any discrimination chairman of the vice bond an academy for integration series are they believe they each case should be addressed separately. the aim of this contest context is that. to bring religious activities just in one small room out of the real life of the students what religion is for those students who are christian jewish

or muslim is one part of that identity so if this is one part of the identity thief . to have it also in the normal life i think the right way to handle this situation is to have more india look to talk really with those people. were there are misunderstandings with what you get in touch and share your views on the day stories by following us on facebook and twitter and join me again in about half an hour for the latest headlines. i'm going to let you go and i did it which. i didn't.

either yes. here's what people have been saying about rejected in the sixty's full on awesome the only show i go out of my way to launch you know what it is that really packs a punch at least yampa is the john oliver of archie america's going to say we are apparently better than the blues. that said i see people you have never heard of love went back to the night i'm president of the world bank page on the right he sent us an email. to.

apply for many clubs over the years so i know the gaming sorry guys. the ball 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 kill you narrowness and spending two hundred twenty million and one player. it's an experience like nothing else not to because i want to share what i think of what i know about the beautiful guy great so one more chance with. the base this minute. when the francis is broadcast around the world in washington d.c.

coming up power plays in saudi arabia the palace heard as dozens of. princes business layer leaders and current and former ministers of government are arrested the crown prince says it's only the beginning on top of that renewed tensions with iran we're going to dig into the effects on oil prices and the paradise papers what's the fallout when you hide money overseas to avoid taxes and then you're caught out we've got more details the dirt and more pending troubles for the big names exposed and finally my guess conservative t.v. and radio host steve malzberg sound off the fight is on between republicans and democrats on the fine print tax reform stand by right now.

president donald trump winds his way through asia on a five country tour topping his agenda is striking down the nuclear threat from north korea on the third day of his trip in a joint press conference with south korean president moved in he said efforts to put pressure on the north korean regime has been successful as for what's next he likes to play his cards a little close to the vest and that he wants to north korea to come to the table here in the south korean leader discussed amending the free trade agreement between the u.s. and south korea which came into force back in two thousand and twelve five years later after the ink is dried the total trade between the countries has totaled out and one hundred forty four point six billion dollars but the u.s. trade deficit hit seventeen billion. the philippines has ramped up efforts to establish a greater military presence in the disputed waters of the south china sea it is

constructing beach ramps and other military infrastructure on t two island the largest of the spratly islands china and several other southeast asian nations are at odds over control of the territory in the maritime corridor which sees more than three trillion dollars worth of goods pass through every year to observe greater dominance the chinese have built islands and even snapped up those considered either international or controlled by other countries brunei malaysia the philippines taiwan and vietnam have responded in kind building islands and military installments of their own satellite images now show china's vessels surrounding t two president trump has pushed for u.s. military presence in the south china sea to keep the waters open to trade. well from denial to now right defiance by many people named in the paradise papers the

latest tax evasion data leak are addressing the allegations that they're not contributing their fair share to government coffers the documents show that some of the world's wealthiest.