borring since the beginning of the year there have been at least four at least four chlorine based chemical weapons attacks in syria our secretary of state teller sen just said that russia bears the responsibility for this given your earlier promises to rein in chemical weapons attacks in syria your response. just because of talk when you my conclude that firstly we have nothing to do with this and secondly we demand a full investigation and for crimes returned to iraq or pleas and at least bury the bodies still lying in the rubble following the massive reads on residential areas of putin's remarks follow the liberation of syria's rock are mentioned there from mysore by the u.s. led coalition it came at an extremely high cost to civilians though some sources from the campaign may have resulted in almost two thousand civilian deaths the u.s. also has been criticized over its liberation campaign in iraq's mosul where the

death toll is feared to have been killed but the western rhetoric over losses in eastern go to compared to mosul is stunningly different. by the escalation of strikes me humanitarian disaster systematic targeting of civilians this is how on our ongoing slaughter of trap civilians it's about the practice of the syrian government as well and we call on them as including russia to ensure that this violence stops.

in iraq and in syria people are much more accepting that because it's clear their city being liberated they understand what they were suffering civilians will get caught in the crossfire civilians will get hurt civilians will get killed if you want to liberate your towns and cities it comes at a price and avoidable part of war and commanders have to press on despite their responsibility for civilian casualties in iraq and syria lies with isis we are the good guys and munition people on the battlefield the difference. give them space to get on britain's home secretary is once again called for police to be allowed time to probe the poisoning of former russian spy service screwball and his daughter there are over two hundred fifty counterterrorism police from eight.

counterterrorism units involved there's over two hundred witnesses involved and there's over two hundred forty pieces of evidence so we need to give the police and all the investigative parts around them the space to get on with that. the statement followed a cabinet meeting on the nerve agent attack in the southern city of soulsby on sunday the army's been deployed to help police in the investigation and the removal of contaminated vehicles on the road also confirmed that both russians remain in critical condition. now after the surprise announcement of face to face talks between donald trump and north korea's kim jong un mixed messages are emerging from washington this meeting won't take place without trying to create actions that match the promises that have been made by north korea we're ready to have the first meeting without precondition was just made. unless

we talk about the weather if you will so some washington is being consistent in its policy on north korea with potential progress being made to kill them open takes a look at who deserves the credit they both love political drama big weapons and nuclear buttons but now it appears that little rocket man kim is ready to meet with donald the doe target their words not mine and surprisingly trump has agreed and the administration is all too clear about who they consider to be the winner of this battle of the bruisers what we know is that the mash maximum pressure campaign has clearly been effective for the first time in a long time the united states is actually having conversations from a position of strength not a position of weakness like the one that north korea finds itself in due to the maximum pressure campaign now the white house has every reason to think so after all they just slapped new sanctions on north korea they pressured the world to halt

all trade with pyongyang and they fired almost every weapon in the english language arsenal all aimed at stopping kim with donald trump's so-called hard power we can have men men rocket men sick puppy shooting rockets all over the place we will have no choice but to totally destroy north korea but is trump the real winner here after every tongue lashing he received from the oval office kim fired back with his own retorts furthermore kaman gauged in diplomacy master class with south korea engaging in negotiations and even securing the unified team korea at the recent winter olympics is now all set to sit down with donald trump it will be unprecedented the first time in history now at this point it's quite an achievement for kim jong un let's ask new yorkers what they think who's the real winner of this upcoming meeting i think it's a win for north korea korea because they definitely approached about the issue and

. our president trump was being very i say amateur about the situation so i think since the north korean president took the first step then i think it makes everything better he was trying to make a step for peace you know the good on times part because he's the first president i believe to meet with the north korean leader it was better probably smells career than it is for usa so absolutely a victory for kim jong un this is an individual who has been the leader of his country for now i guess seven years but has been completely isolated he's never much another. world leader it leads to a whole host of unanswered questions and risks that the american president is offering what kim jong un wants most on the front end of a process where we haven't yet achieved what we want most which is the north korea's denuclearization so while everyone is going nuclear over

a meeting that could potentially turn the tide of this crisis it's starting to look like kim might be the winner of this round table mop and artsy new york that's come the u.s. media makes new claims about just how russia may have meddled in the twenty sixteen presidential election details after the break. but hopes to do something to. put themselves on the line. they did accept or reject . so when you want to be president. some want to. let you go. this is what. real people are. interested in the. join me every thursday on the alec simon show and i'll be speaking to guest on the

world of politics score business i'm show business i'll see you then. problems that were baked into the cake of the american experience where there was this race is never one way it's hard coded in the american d.n.a. violence ultraviolence it's part of the american d.n.a. these are severe problems in the soul. welcome back a former police officer in the u.s. state of north carolina has been charged with assaulting a black man accused of jaywalking now this incident happened last august and was captured on the officer in questions both thirty three year old johnny rush was on his way home and two officers stopped to and accused him of crossing an empty

street illegally obvious a critic can later be seen punching and tasering rush a most warn you may find this video coming up disturbing. i've heard what. i. was like it was leaked six months after the incident and actually occurred to police brutality activist michelle gross says the police department's refusal to walk on the video until it was leaked is alarming the video was held by the police department all this time and all of this time they could have taken action against officer hickman an officer or gary and they chose not to you know supervisors look at that footage right away early so supposed to and clearly he had no fear of any

kinds of accountability related to that conduct this must be standard operating procedure in that particular police department and frankly it is in men. police departments these videos must always be made public we have no way to monitor police conduct and to understand how our police are operating if we can't watch those videos that they themselves collect on their own activities their police department has condemned the office's actions saying that they are quote contrary to the progress we have made in the last several years in proving community trust but the incident is just the latest in a series of police brutality cases that have been captured by body comes over the past three years. to the.

good. understanding. i brought. her. she. couldn't get out of. her one of the. high i thought oh my.

gosh. as the investigation into alleged russian meddling in the twenty six thousand u.s. presidential election rattles on the u.s. media keeps digging around trying to unearth the tools that delivered donald trump to the white house it is done of explains many tried many failed but the folks at c.n.n. have finally done it undeniable proof of how the russians convince some sixty million people to vote trump and twenty sixteen and drum roll please. it's this game c.n.n. has learned russian created in release this anti hillary clinton video game you heard me right it's a video game they actually named it it's called hill tendo according to c.n.n.

the game featured three levels first you had to help hillary clinton delete as many e-mails as you can a nod to the scandal over her handling of classified information which had been meiring her companion for months then you are supposed to assist the presidential nominee to collect money from some arab states evading the bombs at the same time and the final challenge to throw the u.s. constitution as far as possible a silly game that could be written by a programming suffer more during their bathroom breaks doesn't take much to sway an average american voter or at least that's what c.n.n. appears to believe and you know what it shows just how far russians are willing to go to meddle in our domestic affairs but for the sake of argument let's break down the numbers this game was reportedly played some nineteen thousand times even in the best case scenario if every game counts for

a new person who was to vote and actually showed up at the polls this not even two hundred ths of a percent is the share of voters the game no one's ever heard of until a few days ago. oh may have swayed but direct influence was only part of the ploy claim to c.n.n. apparently developers called trad gamers behavior and then target them with specific ads on social media something that according to those networks themselves was almost nonexistent comments on facebook faceplant at the investigation. the funny thing is the game touched on the points of everything she has done wrong and c.n.n. is reporting like it's a bad thing some amazing reports in a c.n.n. you found a video game about a presidential candidate a game designed to reflect the way she lives and it took you years after the election to get your reporter out pulitzer material lol yeah that's what did at c.n.n.

this game that nobody ever heard of totally swayed voters in wisconsin but you know after theories of pokémon meddling and dumpster diving for evidence so we thought we'd come take a look at it this report somehow begins to sound plausible. and of r.t. . getting a warm welcome isn't always a pleasant experience and especially if it's in the form of an unwanted hug as one california senator learned the hard way. you know no notice that your behavior has been on

a welcomed their wills committee also instructs you not to initiate hugs. all my life a hug has been my way of greeting friends and colleagues it just won't been kindness and a reflection of my keepers. i'm off to hug some people i'll be back with more nice and often. the new global economic war is unfolding in the realm of education the right to education is being supplanted by the right to access education loans higher education is becoming just another product that can be bullish and sold just not just about education anymore it's also about running a business where you could no mobiles at the regime could it's also not true kind of funny really couldn't you. want is the place of students in this business model

before college i was born now i'm running stream or higher education for the new global economic war. told me it's so also not accepted will a bed wetter than russia and all that and us is deciding maybe of what german companies or european companies are investing in all which infrastructure we are building in true many or and injure up i think that's a true. and it's a european this.

time afshin rattansi we're going underground in a week where the boss of britain's foreign affairs select committee has countenance the banning of this t.v. station in the united kingdom coming up in the show another syrian government chemical attack in ghouta this week even as defacto rebel commander saudi crown prince mohammed bin solomon was lunching with the queen or just more propaganda we speak to top chemical weapons expert mit's professor theodore postol and forty eight hours ahead of the un security council meeting on syria and as u.k. media ignores the ongoing battle for alfred the founder of the u.s. institute for public accuracy norman solomon tells us of tragic nato media complicity in a war that has killed or displaced millions laugh from the headlines this week and said some toxic allegations against moscow on how some women have been starving themselves out of britain all this and more coming up in today's going underground

a first let's go straight to britain's labor leader jeremy coleman current favorite to replace theresa may as prime minister who down to this week's visit to britain by a saudi prince the prime minister is due to meet crown prince mohammed bin solomon the ruler of saudi arabia despite much talk of reform there's been a sharp increase in the arrest and detention of dissidents torture of prisoners is common human rights defenders routinely sentenced to lengthy prison terms unfair trials and executions of widespread as amnesty international. firms as she makes her arms sales pitch will she also call on the crown prince to hold the shocking abuse of human rights in saudi arabia according to raise amazed how the arabia is actually saving lives labor that ventures from such entry positions shouting shame can i just say to those but anxious that the link that we have with saudi arabia is historic it is an important one i do to say it has saved the lives of potentially

hundreds of people. but has saudi arabia saved hundreds and britain corbet and said there was a secret report on saudi involvement in terror here in the u.k. the government is of course still suppressing a report into the funding of extremism which allegedly found evidence of saudi funding going to terrorist groups here in the u.k. thus threatening our security when will that report come out theresa may said it couldn't be published it would reply that corwin's home secretary anyway had the report but corbin wanted answers on other questions to a humanitarian disaster is now taking place in yemen million his face starvation six hundred thousand children have cholera because of the saudi led bombing campaign and to block a. six hundred thousand children with cholera is something that i think everyone in

this house should take seriously. germany has suspended arms sales to saudi arabia but british arms sales of sharply increased and british military advisers are directing the wall it cannot be right that her government this is big aid cannot be right that her government is true looting in what the united nations sais is evidence of war crimes drazen may said britain was giving aid and gauge when worked and. to argue that the real problem called injured address was his own shadow foreign secretary emily thornberry he seems to be a top with a what's with the shadow foreign secretary once again this morning said the arms industry is not something i'm seeking to undermine as long as it's within its national know and went on to say that she thought the u.k. can sell arms to any country as long as a use within the north mind you thornberry has slammed this week's visit it was in

marked contrast to a previous de facto proof saudi statements on syria she has been quick to imply that syria used chemical weapons against so-called rebels seeking regime change in damascus and as the saudi prince lunched with the british queen then we have two more reports of syrian government chemical attacks there was soon discounted even in mainstream media those chemical weapons attacks allegations more generally and they are routinely broadcast as fact on media and nato nations joining me now is professor emeritus of science technology and international security at the massachusetts institute of technology theodore postol who has cast doubt on media certainty about syrian government chemical attacks on can shake and in the suburbs of damascus professor mosul thanks so much for coming on going underground even this week as as the queen was welcoming the prince from saudi arabia the mainstream state mandated b.b.c. corrected or appeared to correct a suspected report of a suspected chemical attack in ghouta in the suburbs of damascus people finally

starting to apply more scrutiny to these media reports of chemical attacks it's extraordinary how inaccurate reporting has been and. i should say before i say any more i am a big advocate for the press and its role. in our democracy and i'm totally in despair over the way the press in the west has behaved in the united states and i have to say also the u.k. you must surely welcome though that. your defense secretary mattis is admission that there is no evidence of sarin gas used by the syrian army i think. general mattis is a man of great intelligence and integrity and he's in a difficult position he's working for president is not always. carefully thought out as general mattis is but i take his comments to indicate that he

understands that there is no crime mary information about this attack from actually u.s. intelligence or other national intelligence sources you're questioning donald trump's reaction to these things because it was his national security adviser general mcmaster who often absa confidence in a chemical attack that was belatedly used as a justification for a tomahawk cruise missile attack on syria well i think you may be referring to this . extremely unprofessional note that was issued but that was claimed to be some kind of white house intelligence report issued on april eleventh the u.s. attacked. air base on april seventh and april eleventh supposedly the national security council released this intelligence report that you could see as you read it that it was amateurish and that the people who wrote it were not even

knowledgeable enough to fake the intelligence report it was really remarkable suddenly politicians here jeremy quinn's labor party and members of parliament that learn the government here routinely say that there indeed have been chemical attacks of course the pulitzer prize winning journalist says he's used some of your information why do you think that what interested in or are present is on c.n.n. and the b.b.c. here in britain in the work of an emeritus professor from mit in the recent past i think when i. done work that tends to have findings that support the ongoing rhetoric. tends to get covered and that's just not covered when and when it raises questions about the ongoing rhetoric i had this issue in two thousand and thirteen this came up quite dramatically with the new york times i was working on this question of the mass nerve agent attack that occurred in ghouta on aug

twenty one two thousand and thirteen that was a real attack i mean we don't know how many people were killed and injured but we do know it was real attack and. my colleague richard lloyd and i were studying the debris from you know that it was photographed or videotaped and we all of a sudden realize that the munition had delivered the saron was completely different from what everybody including the new york times thought it was the new york times picked up our analysis and published it immediately and the analysis basically showed that the munition carried maybe fifty eight leaders five zero leaders of sarin then after that story was covered we started analyzing the characteristics of the munition new york times claimed that they had

long lines that they had constructed and they could show that the munitions had been launched from some a some syrian base military base about sixteen or seventeen kilometers from guta well inside government controlled them ask us into into good and we showed the range of the munition could not possibly be more than two kilometers but we couldn't get the new york times to cover them at all they handed haud and finally they pay. a small article in a lower and lower page of back page eight reporting this as if it were incidental it's not incidental it changed completely the understanding of what might have happened in fairness to the tools because in new york times they did print something i understand that the guardian which on another attack we're talking khan yunis. i've attacked you personally have said that the o.p.c.

w the official chemical weapons the u.n. organization is debunked all your theories and and that you have been accusing their reporters of being isis supporters and the guardian haven't published as i understand any anything from you to rebut their claims there is a columnist there is a name a month ago and. he fancies himself a scientist but he doesn't ever talk about science in this column i should say we like george will be on this program he said that the get go on oh i i would i would actually let me suggest that you have monbiot and me on the program love to do that we certainly do but go on anyway. so he makes these accusations against me and he makes a claim about they my somehow being a sympathizer to isis and he has no idea what he's talking about he talks about the o.p.c. w. report this is the u.n.

report and the fact of the matter is that report has serious problems and the russians have raised questions about those serious problems and without saying that i'm a supporter of the russians or not i can say that the arguments that the russians have made are completely correct but the o.p.c. w. report does not use scientific methodology properly to reach its conclusions and i have been through that report and i and incidentally there is no way mr mungo could have been through that report and. say what he says ok did to be tehran it is tourism is disgrace defense secretary michael fallon went as far as saying russia will responsibility by proxy for civilian deaths caused by poison gas worth johnson the foreign secretary here and your secular state rex tillerson they have said there have been chemical attacks how do you characterize the use of science and technology and its use in the service of national security well i can tell you because we know what the o.p.c. w.

report says there's a relatively detailed report and the report basically repeat it repeats the kinds of technical nonsense that delon cat has been putting out and that technical nonsense has been repeated by human rights watch and also by the new york times and so for example the new york times has a video how russia you know finessed or or somehow misrepresented what happened consequent this chemical attack and the nickel for two thousand and seventeen and that video contains all of the data that you need to show that the video is a totally false statement let me give you an example it shows before and after satellite photographs of alleged bomb damage from from the attack on able for.