antti america is stripped of its capitol hill press credentials just weeks after it was pressured to register as a foreign agent in the united states. a little while. police piece of. the military commander slobodan dies after taking poison the war crimes court in the hague. so the white helmets are again in control to see that softer reporters without borders tried to cancel a press event that was critical of the syrian group the request was rejected as being an attack on free speech. very disappointing to see.

the kind of sense. thanks for joining us this hour my name is you're watching r.t. international. a congressional committee in the u.s. has just one vote because a creditor nation on capitol hill received the following letter informing the channel of the decision. this decision essentially prevents us from doing our work on capitol hill in washington d.c. congressional hearings with both the senate and the u.s. house of representatives take place on capitol hill and you're required to have accreditations to be able to attend those hearings and report on them and such this will limit and essentially prevent us from from attending those hearings and

continuing to do our work now this comes after r.t. america was pressured and basically forced to register under the u.s. foreign registrations act farah now after that happened the state department spokesperson heather nauert insists that we would be able to continue doing our jobs we wouldn't really be affected we would be able to continue functioning after we registered under this law take a listen to what she said when the united states tells someone to register under a foreign agent requirement we don't see impacts or affect the ability of them to report. news and information we just have to register it's a simple as that does impact our ability i have now received this letter informing me to that i have to give up my credentials in order to operate on capitol hill now the foreign agents registration act was first passed in one thousand nine hundred

thirty eight and it was an attempt to combat the influence of propaganda coming from nazi germany the law basically requires periodic disclosure of activities and the finances of those who have registered it's mainly applied to lobbyists now in the in the previous months r.t. has been under quite a bit of pressure you tube has removed our premium service on you tube google which operates and controls you tube removed us of our premium status twitter has also outlawed and prevented us from doing our advertising work we've seen numerous hearings in congress directly targeting are accusing us of different things the so a lot of pressure is being put on this network and it looks like another step has been taken making it harder for us to continue operating in the united states and doing our journalistic work reporting on events in the united states. the channels

editor in chief margarita simonyan has given her reaction to the withdrawal of aunty america's accreditation to all the self-righteous defendants of the freedom of speech who also ardently proclaimed on azziz journalistic work in the u.s. withdrawal of congressional credentials speaks much louder than and to plenty choose. just let you know we'll be getting some analysis and reaction to this story from media and legal analyst lionel coming up a little later this hour. on to other news former bosnian croat military commander slobodan prior act has died after taking poison at the war crimes court in the hague as the verdict was being read out at an appeals hearing he unexpectedly produced a small bottle and drank from it in front of the judge for more than zero zero zero . zero zero zero zero zero zero to stop police police adult.

order. has taken poison. dramatic scenes in the courtroom at the hague as the judge announced that slobodan play the former bosnian croat military commanders twenty year sentence for having taken part in war crimes would be upheld and he would be returned to the cells once the play act produced a small bottle from his jacket said that he was not a war criminal and drank from it we understood that he then collapsed into his chair the video feed cut out he was rushed to hospital and it was confirmed later that he died in a hospital yack had been convicted in twenty thirteen for his role in the destruction of the mob star bridge now the court of ruled that this caused disproportionate damage to the muslim civilian population in the region it was just

last week that the international criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia handed down a life sentence to ratko melodic the former bosnian serb military commander was convicted on charges of war crimes crimes against humanity and genocide and the appeal hearing of slobodan pray yack was actually going to be the final hearing involving the c.t.y. it's supposed to be wrapped up next month following eighty three convictions and sentences being handed down by the court since it was first started back in one thousand nine hundred three at the height of the conflict in the former yugoslavia in the time it has come in for criticism most notably for the handing down of sentences disproportionately to those from the bosnian serb side of the conflict. since they tribunals created back in one thousand nine hundred three

a total of one hundred sixty one people have been indicted for war crimes in the former yugoslavia a majority of those defendants ninety four were the tribunals been widely criticized for the way that hearings have been conducted and the trials of those dragged on for years even decades in fact that means that keith urban leaders including former president slobodan milosevic died in detention before verdicts were reached and in cases where people were acquitted will the relegations of political pressure political analysts john bosnich believe the purpose of the court was to set nations against each other the purpose of the court was to set these three brother nations against each other in perpetuity so that you could divide and conquer the region general probably was convicted had no chance of winning his appeal. i think he realized that it was a death sentence the man was in his seventy's twenty years imprisonment meant a death sentence in effect i'd like to point out that this man was primarily

convicted for blowing up a bridge and the bridge has since been reconstructed and if you went to the site you'd never know the difference but the same general and the muslim generals in the area as thickly cleansed one hundred percent of the serbs in that region and nobody was convicted for that crime so if you look at the three sides in the war. the grounds for conviction were were never fair. ok let's return to our top story now a u.s. congressional committees with dawn r.t. america's accreditation on capitol hill over the channel's foreign agent status i can bring in legal and media analyst lionel now to discuss this in more detail. could see again a lot. as we understand it this ruling fact it means now are two reporters a bound for more briefings on capitol hill what's your opinion of that. well i'm holding it in by hand sounds rather mccarthy like which is most

interesting and now it says that the rules of the galleries this is from the executive committee of the congressional radio and t.v. correspondents galleries the rules of the gallery state clearly that news credential may not be issued to any applicant employed by any foreign government or representative vero and it says in essence by rule the executive committee notified the senate rules and the withdraw all of our t.v. networks accreditation is effective immediately so they want to withdraw news credentials of our t.v. network by unanimous vote now here's the interesting aspect from the state department and i read heather nauert in october said in the fact that under u.s. law registration is simply triggered when an entity or an individual engages in

political activity where the united states tell someone to register q. to register as a foreign agent. the does it impact at all upon the ability of them to report news and information just to have them write history x. is simple does that well if it's as simple as that why must you according to this return your credentials to the senate sergeant at arms and be gone now come on you have got to be kidding this b.b.c. get one of these does algis there are c.c.-t.v. or whoever i mean do those individuals and if they don't get one why are they considered a foreign agent. now think about this and think about what this looks like think about what phish looks like to the world to the world you know they're always

talking about how does donald trump look like to the world what he tweets what does that look like to the world while i a proud member of my republic i asked the question how does this look like to the world in the nation's capital the bastion of free speech the first amendment where scores hundreds thousands of people from every conceivable form of press that there is they get a badge but are cheney oh oh oh no no vero foreign agent very different be gone now look i understand this all started when hillary clinton lost the election i understand it and i understand that they needed a scapegoat and i understand they had to blame somebody so russia came along right that's terrific. but this is just gone on to the point where it's becoming

absolutely ridiculous and may i add one more thing do you know how many people now cannot wait to watch r t have you ever thought about this with all due respect to this grand institution but a couple of years ago i had a hard time telling a lot of folks what r.t. was where is it why was it what does it stand for now the question i'm asking is how do i get it is it on my cable can i get it online because artie has been in the news in one way or another as this for britain fruit this outlaw roe good news organization and you know what happens in this country when you tell americans you can't do something for when you were a kid your parents said don't listen to that music now it's the hottest ticket in town so i don't understand who won the rationale behind this but more

importantly does anybody not see especially in the halls of congress. is that we're where we swear on the constitution where everybody is raising their hands always to the constitution and the spirit of the constitution where we're leaders and folks of politicians will about talking to reporters because of this freedom of the press but our t. go a step. jared out and tired old euro foreign agent i mean it is it's tragic it's tragic and i hope that president trump or heather nauert or somebody trying to clarify this because. everybody merely wants to know the truth and the last time i checked that's kind of what we were all about yeah you talked about the freedom of speech in the us which seems to

be more of us than any other country in the world i think you really can get away with a lot that even i sort of wonder sometimes are you allowed to say too much in america so the other great thing is you've got these organizations that protect freedom in the media so should we be anticipating them to step forward now bravely to defend r.t. . that is probably in the history of questions one of the greatest questions ever you would think that our journalism schools the columbia school of journalism and the pointer institute in all of these think tanks and all of these libertarian organizations added washington every other corner there's the cato institute and the heritage foundation a lesson that you would think there would be marching in the street what they do to the least of my brother and they do unto me to wax biblical for a moment you would think that people from all walks of life irrespective of whether

they agree with whatever the editorial policy is of r t i you would think and let me also just say this is the irony i have been in this business for thirty years next year and i have been on every television program talk radio satellite radio terrestrial radio local t.v. national t.v. senate t.v. you name it and i am telling you right now and i will swear on a stack of bibles or whatever you want that at no time has anyone ever from archie ever asked me what i was going to say what was my opinion what was my point of view or would you not say that would you lay off that do you know how many times that's happened what i've been on c.n.n. and this n.b.c. fox i talked to prepared to search does the public understand that when you go on

c.n.n. like i'm doing right now i got out of the car i walked in i said i start talking to you that say that's the pre-production that was it. if i don't want any other show i have to go through producers they're going to check things there is more free speech here there was more on filtered out unfettered edited on expurgated own firewalled free expansive and expressive speech on r.t. and then anything i have ever seen and the irony the irony the unmitigated sick irony that archie receives this letter basically say turn in your badge mr foreign agent we've gone and also hear somebody from the state department say oh no no no that's that's ok here's the left hand you're the right hand and neither of them know how to speak to each other this is tragic but in an ironic

way does more to bolster the viewership the interest the curiosity of r t then anything i have no ad campaign no billboards nothing compares to how many times you are in this this piece may i say very very quickly today we have a story involving a fellow named andy lack and you lack is the head of n.b.c. the you know that when he was the chief of the board of broadcast governors he compared isis and vocal harami to r.t. this isn't twenty fifteen i mean you there is no story about r.t. that is to put posterous if i read out stories and i made up most of them and asked people which of these is the fake r.t. news story nobody will believe it i mean if anybody if nobody knew this you would think this is this propaganda mill that just cranks out i don't know what i

mean that's it i don't want to make light out of it if it wasn't so tragic it would be. tragic lionel as always appreciate your frank and very interesting views and i'll just put it on record at this point you no longer watch your back because i wonder at what point they will come for you or for i but that's a conversation for another day legal and media analysts line of thinking. in other news the controversial white helmets group is again causing division and after reporters without borders urged the swiss press club to cancel a conference critical of the syrian activists the request was rejected by the head of the organization as modern day censorship. we were challenging our support for this conference with the name of our organization appearing on the list of media members return only dissociated ourselves from this event and do not wish to be

associated with the conference we invite you to abandon this project which will damage the image of this wrist press club it was very surprising and very disappointing to see the journalist association asking for the kind of censorship that was my first reaction and so i decided to reply writing your letter and asking them to respect the freedom of disputes constitution. well i guess they have who previously conducted his own investigation into the white helmets while he was on the ground in syria has more details now on what caused the split between the journalist organizations you can't talk about that imagine what will happen to your reputation said the journalist how far the profession has fallen when one of its biggest unions tries to censor a simple discussion we are accustomed to to get the pressures from everywhere in

the world and mainly from dictatorial. dictatorial countries but what which was very surprising was due to gets such pressures from a drama destroy association so it's the first time in the twenty years of the existence of this response that we received such demons from original nerdiest association which is supposed to support to to support the press freedom so far almost everything you've been told about the white helmets is stuff from their press releases and video productions not from locals or civilians no know from white helmet sponsors and p.r. agents that's great and all but let's at least hear from the people they say they're saving shows them helping the people but they only help the rebel fighters they really to those close to them the last thing they cared about was civilians.

whenever food aid was brought into the white helmets and the rebels would take it after themselves to give us nothing not even bread and he to us what there were many people buried alive helmets would come to save them and if they found civilians killed and they might not know that's a huge surprise what a shocker the white helmets aren't perfect who would have thought they were just regular people with their own shortcomings their own agenda. just like everyone else so why on earth would reporters without borders want to censor this absolutely obvious fact calling it russian propaganda i think it was the topic which was this disturbing. disguise i'm now having described. as an. organisation they cannot admit they were wrong and yes they

didn't even admit to here are the people who are criticizing the white tournaments has it was a taboo to speak about it that's impossible for a serious journalist or simply hardest person to admit such so it should be of your own for whatever reason it is taboo no one in the mainstream media or in western governments says anything remotely critical of the white helmets you remember ever hearing anything unflattering. reporters without borders has all but taken sides let's not forget in two thousand and sixteen they named a syrian rebel activist and the journalist of the year he is taunting syrian conscripts buried under rubble he says he wants them to taste a slow death the swiss press club has made the point not to judge for

me i cannot see myself in the mirror or if i am good big censorship or deciding you have the right to speak you have not the right to speak because you are representing the bab the supposed bad part and it is paid off they've received an outpouring of support internationally and they vowed to continue doing what they do. regardless of pressure i also received many people criticizing russia. for him so garry kasparov for business and some of our. criticism criticizing russia so i am open to everybody even to do people who are supporting russia and not going to be criticizing that's i think the goal of the real prescribe and not the politically correct.

association. excuse me independent journalist for nessa bailey took part in the white helmets panel which reporters without borders wanted to be canceled she spoke to us here at r.t. the propaganda that puts the white helmet up on to this extraordinary pedestal. is produced by their p.r. agencies by the countries that are funding them that are also fundamentalist organizations in syria. and try their own by their own proclamation of glory and humanity which is denali where the syrian people who have come into contact with the white knights describe themselves as nonsectarian impartial apolitical organization they cannot make that claim when they are consistently lobbying both politically and for military escalation inside syria.

the cryptocurrency bitcoin reached the record high of eleven thousand dollars on wednesday its value assault by a staggering thirteen hundred percent just since the start of this year so i discuss the risks and the appeal of investing in cryptocurrency with artie's financial guru max kaiser and economics professor steve king. it's such a huge right across encourage people looking at the ceiling i've got to be there the entry cost is certainly less than buying a house and having the house model appreciate so people are dogging in because the process is rausing but that's one of the definitions of the bubble because it's not a bubble the u.s. dollars in a bubble they feel that currency world is in a bubble stocks and bonds you could argue are in a bubble something that's not a bubble would be a big coin you've got the dollar that is crashing in a hyperinflationary crash against bitcoin. it's total somatics i mean a big point didn't exist you would be out of coal the still there and hyper inflationary the u.s.

still is maintaining its value it would be the right inflation right running about two percent per annum. corn is running at the moment at. which the die is increased ten percent in one day now that is in one week that means it will double in two weeks if it keeps up little before times for three weeks i tom's eccentric cetera it's like the old chessboard that simply concave on going and i disagree the people using it for a transaction of this this is the floor it's a brilliant why you can create increasing in value it's a store of value sure at the moment but you'd be a mad man to use the transactions you few use when i mention it doesn't like about a thousand big coin mechs and good luck to you but if you just let a salesman a bit twenty year ago to buy a house you could have bought an os seven hundred fifty thousand dollars house in san jose and i could buy a ten million dollar mansion in san jose you'd be a fool to buy anything and i'm hearing people refer to the now as not crypto currencies but critics are in series because they intend holding them until they die that is not money it's already the number twenty five biggest reserve currency

in the world it's adding it to the top ten it all said to be the biggest reserve currency in the world you've got sovereign wealth funds like abu dhabi now buying bitcoin you've got russia and china now and japan actively buying bitcoins because they see that the fia bubble is bursting and again the u.s. dollar. is collapsing against big point this is a paradigm shift so i can understand why joseph stiglitz came out today practically crying big fat tears he said oh my god the government's nonvolatile big quite probably survive well just take let's get out of the way you're an old guy old news they're no longer relevant and this is the new paradigm isn't there a really strong argument that it's being used speculatively as a store of value but actually where can you actually use a bit good isn't too many places in the come on the you can actually spend it and isn't there a danger when people realize that the pony can sell this story value it's being it's a there are hundreds of thousands of transactions now a day hundred thousand emergence accept it going to the real estate market being up

ended by bit going you can buy high end properties went big coin yachts and. properties and things of this nature are trickling down into the middle classes but again the timeline here has to be considered to travel from being a store of value to a means of exchange is going to take another few years mike's makes the point this is the future it's new technology and the centralised that's the key that's what people won't they don't want balan's they don't want government stealing the money when the children cash isn't this the future and what more importantly what people want even though you can boil those things with it you'd be immediate to buy those things now because if you wipe ten weeks you can botch washer as many or three times as many so it's a process to stabilise now my worry is when it stabilizes what will happen to that process i don't think it's going to necessarily reach the stratosphere at a hundred thousand dollars and then stay there if you get to the stage where the only returns you're getting out of big coin mounting of the transactions then i think the process to fall dramatically this could crash couldn't it what are the dangers for investors at this point you have gold as

a case study gold is used takes a lot of energy to produce gold gold is used as a means of exchange as well as a store of value it's been around for quite some time because it is gold to point out the motherlode it's still taking over the global finance in this way it's putting feet of money out of business and the bankers on wall street are running scared jamie dimon is literally. you know peeing in his pants at this point because he knows he's going to be out of a job in five years we don't need the jamie diamond of the world ripping us off we don't need wells fargo stealing money out of accounts we don't really just b.c. funding drug lords in mexico to the tune of billions of dollars we don't need those bad actors in society and because it gets rid of all those financial terrorists and it's about time somebody stood up and did battle because the government's not doing it the academics are doing it so we have big going to do it right have you with us here an international do stick around if you can my colleague don hawkins will be has been you brought up to date at the top of the hour.

hello and welcome to cross talk where all things considered i'm peter lavelle candidate trump was criticised for not having a coherent understanding of global affairs indeed he largely dismissed the foreign policy elites a year after his election in since his inauguration is there such a thing as a trump d. in view of the international system.