in the stories that shaped the. winter games kick off in south korea but dozens of russian athletes have hopes dashed just hours before the opening ceremony as their appeals against the doping related ban are rejected. by the u.s. led coalition hit syrian pro-government forces reportedly killing nearly one hundred people the pentagon claims it was carried out to defend an american backed group. and republican lawmakers in the u.s. threatened to cut funding to a global cancer research program. because most widely used to be made by monsanto.

there it's eleven am on sunday here in moscow i'm calling. for the major stories covered here over the past seven days first off the winter olympics in south korea got underway on friday with a grand opening ceremony in the host city. and then the three thousand athletes from ninety two countries took part in that event however in the run up to the celebrations demonstrations and scuffles erupted outside the olympic arena people supporting peace between north and south korea had gathered for a rally while another group protesting north korea's participation in the games clashed with police.

despite the scuffles on the streets korean politicians are taking steps to find a solution to their long running conflict the south korean president says he's ready to accept an invitation to visit the north if certain conditions are met and this potentially sets up the first meeting between the countries in more than a decade the invitation was delivered by kim jong un's sister who's attending the winter olympics she's the first member of north korea's ruling family to visit the south since the one nine hundred fifty s. she met with president moon for three hours of talks and the games opening ceremony also hinted at a warming of relations with both teams marching together. while

the two koreas were able to march under a single flag russian competitors are under a neutral banner and the taking part is a limping athlete from russia all the way our team that's after the international olympic committee banned russia following a doping scandal now although the russian flag being forbidden by the i.o.c. it still found its way into the stadium more on that from. no russian flags at the opening ceremony nations parade chang the i.o.c. said some very strict rules and promised no excuses for anyone who'd violate them so who would have thought the russian tricolor would still make it into the ceremony all thanks to a blogger by korean t.v. just as team france were walking into the arena

a russian flag i can bob well while the zero eight our team were carrying the white a live big flag many russian flags flashed around the arena at the stands but it turned out that not only russians brought them there we spoke to one american fan who grabbed one too and i thought it would be nice to you know show a bit of support for them because they've basically worked for years for this moment to represent their countries and now they can't and so i was kind of trying to sort of you know help them feel at home i was trying to sort of send a message that they should be included because the olympics is for all countries i don't exactly know the particulars of the doping thing i don't know what the right decision is really i'm just trying to show a sense of unity i'm trying to kind of put the politics aside i'm trying to support these athletes because we know for a fact that these athletes are clean there's no doubt about it but then they are being punished for what others may or may not have done and so that's a collective guilt and i don't like collective guilt i think when you have all so

many verses of beth's athletes banned just before the games instead of you know just for the game so they can't appeal they don't actually have any they don't communicate directly what they did wrong but then all their best athletes are sort of banned i think that is too much to be a coincidence of the olympic dream of dozens of russian athletes was dashed just hours before the start of the games a last minute appeal from forty five to coaches against the ban preventing them from competing failed lawyers branded the decision sanctions in disguise. i have no words. i was hoping that gas would ruin our famer right now i don't know what to do i'm disappointed but of course i won't give up on sport and i still got a lot ahead of me i will compete and win medals for my country. until the very end we were hoping that this is you would go in our favor now i feel sadness and sorrow and i will compete in every competition i can do i have enough strength in the

opportunity to compete in the next limits and i will pretend that. i have no emotions left we had all or. you are just waiting for it is the only thing so just situations make you stronger emotionally. syria is calling on the u.n. to hold the u.s. led coalition to account for wednesday's airstrikes against pro-government forces the number of casualties has not yet been confirmed but some reports claim that up to one hundred people might have been killed the pentagon described the attack as a defensive move but russia's defense ministry says that the unit was engaged in an anti terror mission. and for every decision while carrying out an operation to locate and terminate an sleeper cell near form oil refinery a unit of pro-government forces were suddenly sholden in hit by airstrikes by the u.s. led coalition vis was overkill if the numbers are true i would see a demonstration of she have brute force perhaps you know to send perhaps the send

a message nevertheless the united states says that. it's in syria and it will defend itself and it has the right to defend itself in this instance syrian democratic forces acted in self-defense with support from the coalition to defeat an unprovoked attack by syrian forces in eastern syria if the situation is like how they describe that they were indeed attacks while fighting isis to make up the right to self defense well if you take them at face value you could think so but people they just killed were also fighting isis and recently they have been making much better progress against isis then the united states led coalition or their partner forces the the s.d.f. the syrian government has of course called all of this an act of aggression unwarranted and unjust but just for you information all of this happened in there

is or near a rich oil field and refinery conoco it's called it was liberated last year by the u.s. led coalition very quickly and fact. u.s. partner forces seem to have a knack for liberating areas with oil under them much quicker than they do those areas that don't have oil under them since since all the oil rich areas were taken in that order by the s.d.f. progress against isis seems to have dropped to a snail's pace but you know regardless here. america has said that it is in syria only to fight isis today isis has been all but defeated in syria but you don't see the pentagon packing its bags our military policy in syria has not changed our priority remains to defeat of isis whether it's in iraq or in syria that is our intent to defeat isis and not do anything more than that the united states will

maintain a military presence in syria focused on ensuring that isis cannot reemerge total withdrawal of american personnel at this time would restore assad who continue his brutal treatment against his own people to principal liberty the lack of a fundamental commitment to our agreement that is typical of current u.s. diplomacy including the reasons why the americans stay in syria rex tillerson peter he stated that the only goal in syria was the defeat of ice or now they've got far more ambitious plans with more of the most with the mixed messages here is the pentagon staying on general matters said that the united states will stay in syria will fight in syria for as long as the united states wants to fight in syria i mean that's you know pretty direct now you see how this might sound strange going to syria and the vital and while there you start killing syrians in syria in

self-defense. regional experts told us that with islamic state practically gone from syria washington is now targeting the government instead. they are not just in syria to fight there in. have been in syria for a long time because they want to throw aside as the space of feeds as it becomes clear that it is the syrian forces themselves at large would be to die age the priority of overthrowing assad begins to reassert itself in the pentagon and in the white house so i think that's really the answer the question is the overthrow of assad was always the protocol prone the reason why the americans were in syria the army in treating these groups intervening with air strikes and so on they were diverted from that by no with the possibility of a defeat of diet inside syria that policy that reassert itself this is coming had the end of

a long war the united states has taken is about twenty eight percent syrian territory and over fifty percent of its oil does this lead british in order to roll back you want to get rid of my side so i just i get it he wants that oil for himself there was a race only a few months ago to get those fields and he's proving undoubtedly under the pretext of biting isis the united states didn't think it was so the united states is trying to lay down the law here and not let anybody approach and as we know that turks threatened and mend it could take on the americans over there so the united states i think is very patients that both syria and turkey will begin to push america out to try to push americans out of northern syria but he likes. russia bid farewell to military pilot room on flip of on thursday made became a national hero after his plane was downed by militants in syria with more details

his medina cotton of. the funeral for a major roman filipe of who died tragically fighting in syria takes place here in his hometown of earlier we saw hundreds of people attending the memorial ceremony as family members friends his colleagues people who didn't know him all came to pay their last respects at the palace plane was shot down on saturday and the northwestern part of syria which is still controlled by the latest incarnation of the terrorist group oh no sra roman tried to stay in the air as long as he could he then managed to a jacket from the airplane only to find himself surrounded by terrorist the pilot of the plane supporting role months shared the details of their last communications his voice remained calm when i. get out of the movie yes i was the commander's reply and then he said so evenly as if it was something ordinary and on important i got hit hard the right. moving

south the left slowing down too and about twenty seconds later he added. then he ordered me to gain altitude of course i didn't do it to leave my command is the last thing i would do i always tried to have his back during flights and now i have to do it on the ground while he was fighting i stood there and made several attacks to vehicles that were getting close to the all of groups where room on touchdown i stayed until the fuel was extremely low i barely made it back to the airfield roman had waited for the terrorist to get closer to him and only after that he decided to detonate a grenade taking his own life but avoiding capture he even managed to shout this is for our lads what he did that russia's defense ministry released several facts about his life he left a wife and a four year old daughter behind he was an experienced pilot and it was not his

first time serving in syria he was part of a dozen successful military operations and he died as a hero fighting terrorists at the age of thirty three. the pilot's bravery has not gone unnoticed among other service personnel article this letter from a us veteran offering his support for his widow and child the man who wrote that letter steve siler has been sharing his thoughts on major philip of story he knew what it is chances were and he knew what he had to do. any knew it was never going to be captured and that's a decision he had to back. this very hard decision to make but. i salute a he did what he had to do and this was a personal decision. he he knew what could happen to him he knows what can happen to other troops. and what has happened to his

comrades these are very important people to you. when you do most anything for them . even risk your life he had to die like this. here. i wonder if i would be brave enough to do what he did. he was a he was a good shot you if you're watching the weekly from the u.s. may cut funding for a major cancer research program and i'll tell you why after the break. tens of billions hundreds of billions probably a trillion dollars of u.s. government subsidies the energy industry u.s. government can subsidize mining of big oil rather cryptic currencies and put those into while it's called american citizens give each have an automatic wallet tied to the social security account and they can get a daily and weekly or monthly air drop points that they can then you stick on the

list the government can easily do that. but it's in american interest to not see any russians die in terrorist attack as it is in russian interest to prevent any terrorist attacks in the united states or elsewhere in the world so i don't think there's any dispute on that in congress and i think maybe some of the posturing is frankly political as opposed to substantive. welcome back the biggest stories from the past seven days for you now and republican lawmakers in the united states threatening to cut aid to the world

health organizations comes to a research program it's off to the international agency for research on counsel said that america's most widely used weed killer is probably cost in the genic it's made by the agricultural giant monsanto and it strongly disagrees with the classification of it beside the research agency needs prevention activities and it helps shape international policy on tackling the disease but some u.s. lawmakers have cost doubt on its findings. unsubstantiated claims. why should receive any government funding in the future they're disputing the organizations findings regarding its leading herbicide called round up round up is made by month santo and it's the world's most widely used weed killer since the seventy's it's been sprayed on corn soybeans a cotton and other crops and republicans believe that the study was flawed and relied on cherry pick science accusing the agency of lack of transparency an anti

industry bias they say that it's quite a status designated as carcinogenic it will require manufacturers and retailers to warn workers and consumers and plus it'll increase costs and instill fear in the public some have disagreed with republicans it is important that we review the methods and tactics that industry has used to influence this administration and attack independent scientific organizations like the world health organization's international agency for research on cancer or i would like to say that fundamentally this hearing is about the ability of a public health agency to call a carcinogen a carcinogen even if that carcinogen makes a huge amount of money for powerful corporations according to the center for responsive politics monsanto lobbied more than four point three million dollars in twenty seventeen the environmental protection agency which is not an international organization concluded that the same ingredient does not cause cancer and i are

says that they've been under attack ever since they published their conclusions against life a state at the same time monsanto has been pushing against these findings through several different means and the company is seen as quite controversial not only in the u.s. but all over the world president micron promised in november that would be banned within three years and medically modified crops have been banned in over thirty five different countries but not banned in the u.s. international organizations have concluded that like this it could be cancerous so these lawmakers intentions. are quite unclear. three giants of social media were grilled on thursday by a panel of u.k. lawmakers over allegations of russian interference on their platforms during the breaks it vote but it seemed there was little if anything to back up those accusations. we looked at all advertisements with any connection to russia and we found no evidence of our services being used to interfere in the referendum a very small number of suspected research agency linked accounts forty nine such

accounts were active during the campaign which represents less than point normal some of the total number of accounts that these are very low level thinkers from now until we completed this investigates we won't know but what we haven't had this . information that's enabled us to target on a particular page or a particular phenomenon despite all their commitment enthusiasm and hard work spanning over a period of really several months when this inquiry kick started it seems like the u.k. parliamentary committee that's trying to find out the truth about a russian any brecht that meddling they seem to be really hitting a brick wall this week they travelled all the way to washington thousand thousands of miles presumably having spent thousands of pounds to get there and what they ended up with while questioning the executives of twitter you tube and facebook was just a frustration it seems and that was thick in the atmosphere investigative journalism

for instance as it led to suggestion that there are lots of campaigns going to have it looks like you haven't looked have you that's the thing you haven't looked this economy. going on in the horror well it seems who did look with twitter and what they said they found was that there were only forty nine accounts connected to russia during the time of the bracks it referendum again i'm no mathematician so correct me if i'm wrong perhaps but it seems that there is and this is really nothing to write home about given that twitter has hundreds of millions of accounts and despite the chair of this committee damian collins saying that his quote instinct tells him that the number should be higher that did not turn out to be the case so despite this goes chasing continuing in the committee keeping asking the executives to look harder it seems no fruitful results so far. so there's seemingly a huge appetite for this in the british media even though there's a little something to work with. let's take

a look at some of these headlines first one reads twitter has finally conceded that russian accounts tried to influence breaks it but there's only a passing mention to explain that the stories about a few dozen accounts are the same the headline from the times which admits the existence of so-called russia trolls the first paragraph then reveals there were only forty nine suspicious accounts one more example and you need to dig even deeper to find the actual numbers in this particular lengthy article radio talk show host john gaunt told us that the russia investigation might be a wild goose chase after all this is a farce these employees went all the way to washington to question do they understand how the internet works they could've got them on a skype call a question it's far soko an issue a waste of my taxpayers' money and it served very very annoying it's a joke they acted in almost kangaroo court fashion firing questions at you and

hardly waiting to listen to the answers you know or i don't think the british public care they know why people voted for let's just get over it and accept democracy. finally there was a crash course in political correctness for canada's prime minister on wednesday just to well known for his liberal views is now being called a sexist after he interrupted a woman to correct her language. i am a feminist being a felon in the feminism i. am getting there is a feeding. just. maternal love it is the love that going to change the future of mankind we like you to love what we like to think people kind not necessarily men.

and they would be similar to the men pretty good people going to look in the two hundred women. in. the it. man. people calling for. and that's the way he for the south thanks for watering keep across today's developments by checking us out on twitter . dot com i'll be back with more in about thirty minutes.

with lawmakers manufacture can be sentenced to public wealth. when the ruling class is to protect themselves. when the final merry go round to listen to the one percent. tonight we can all middle of the room see. the real news. here's what people have been saying about rejected a night with the senate it's full on awesome the only show i go out of my way to find you know really what it is that really packs a punch just leave yampa is the john oliver of hearty americans do the same we are apparently better than bluegrass. and see people you never heard of love redacted

tonight not the president of the world bank so they can go right many seriously send us an e-mail join me every thursday on the alex salmond chill and i'll be speaking to guests of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. selling you of the idea that dropping bombs brings police to the chickenhawk force made up by the battle of. the new socks credit tell you that because of the public by fallible supporters. that. you are not cool enough by their. deeds are the hawks that we are worth watching.

footage like this has become well known around the world. the second world war was a human tragedy that left millions dead or injured. but who ever wonders how life may have continued for the victims. they took out and volunteered for the front and was captured by the nazis he survived seventeen concentration camps and could barely move when he was eventually freed. but victor's story didn't end there. he went on to take home four gold and two silver medals for gymnastics from the one nine hundred fifty two and then big games. the first soviet olympic team was made up of seeds victims concentration camp prisoners and soldiers. through sport and they prove that the human spirit can achieve greatness even in times of the complete failure of humanity. this is the story of the soviet union's first and

then picked. after the creation of the u.s.s.r. in one nine hundred twenty two the country was politically socially and culturally isolated. it wasn't invited to take part in international events. the country lacked the resources to compete and needed to be completely rebuilt sports gulp it was. yes q misleading. in one nine hundred twenty the state decreed physical education to be an essential element in building a strong and healthy socialist society and it. can. act as a yack yack. of daily exercise became mandatory and the state invested heavily in free recreational facilities all over the country. that's what a big. feature is in aatish. greece what's the mood you messed with.

yet that's right. despite its emphasis on developing athletic skills for decades a continuing ideological confrontation kept the u.s.s.r. from participating in the olympics. the one nine hundred fifty two hell thinking games would be its first. one of those first soviet champions is girliness even a. once in the cycle has a phillip relative really colonia chris atrocious which can bring our lawsuit c.m.e. upon us from the visit if it does the water will fall on money but even though klaus attributive not hook up each by shred the sky the name with what a girl is not what the fed always does not equate the starving if you know what the uppity weakest of india will starve our good at that so that our thumble i'd never

have to get there but fortunate that over the body other where i sit your shirt or a cold beer on your chin with a menu that said at that well which boat are you going after an hour that will go when you have a. fatal crash old man and me a rogue. the minute you see us as a champion and as a labor of the eight hundred seventy two days siege of leningrad. police yell was due to water. when you were issued film a commercial for food will i were a lot you sheesh you need me beauty of blue well shoes nuber a warrior. when you hoard would be a few years of evolution but only on your going you.