q america the u.k. and france launch an assault on syria in response to an alleged chemical attack in eastern guta the strikes were carried out without un approval and just hours before international investigators are right to the sea. russia's foreign minister says the kind of poison surrogate script powell and his daughter works pose to in the u.k. may have been missed identified as after a new report from an independent lab in switzerland. and tensions run high near the french city of lot where squatters and police have clashed throughout the week over forced evictions. as you can see behind us to see our exit and the police have come into another satisfied this is a point where. a couple of dozen people were trying to hold off as you can see the police are pushing the white.

a warm welcome you're watching the weekly here on r.t. international all the latest news headlines and around the the stories that have shaped the week our top story this hour in the early hours of saturday morning american british and french forces pounded syria with missiles and air strikes the attack came in response to allegations that the syrian government had used chemical weapons against civilians claims which an international watchdog is yet to investigate. i. well as for donald trump in his first tweet after

the attack he thanked the u.s. allies and said the results could not have been better trun called the strikes that perfectly executed last despite syrian russian military saying most of the missiles had been intercepted by defense systems. a perfectly executed strike if we've learned one thing from trump's tenure so far it's that he feels he can do as he pleases this week strikes on syria are a textbook example of how far this can go to batter a sovereign country with over a hundred retaliate three missiles in response to a chemical attack you'd have to be a hundred percent sure that that attack happened instead america's conviction was built basically on online video and sources this conclusion is based on descriptions of the attack in multiple media sources the reported symptoms experienced by victims videos and images showing to assess to barrel bombs from the

attack and reliable information indicating coordination between syrian military officials before the attack while my colleague kendall anian and i have learned today that the u.s. now has blood and urine samples from some of the victims of this attack in syria last weekend and that those samples according to u.s. officials tested positive for chemicals toxin samples verified witness and victim accounts provided by a u.n. backed chemical organization would have served as rock solid proof but trump apparently figured why bother launching the strikes just hours before the your p.c. w. probe on the ground was sure jule to start experts abound to proceed with the investigation anyway but in the face of the strikes they are presented with an additional challenge now holding up the very relevance of the probe another obligation for an attack of this kind u.n. approval but that's not a chapter of international law for trump just

a nuisance does my duty to remind member states that there is an obligation but equally when dealing with methods of peace and security. to act consistently with the charge that of united nations and with international law in general the un charter is very clear on these issues but even with the un brushed aside the us congress has to give the green light for the attack on paper it turns out the defense secretary has promised to run the decision with the lawmakers was empty it is hard to find a legal justification for that military strike in syria absent congressional approval so whatever you decide to do i would hope you would include the legislative branch we will be reporting to congress and finally allies in ideal circumstances they'd be rallying on mars beside washington unleashing their joint erath on the enemy this time most u.s.

partners while giving their verbal support have sought to avoid complicity we must say as we tell you and so always have that if we need a long term solution to the syrian crisis we not only need to respond to crimes but first of all work towards peace germany will not take part in possible north reaction i want to make it clear again that there are no decisions between c. and supported this that everything is being done to send a signal that this use of chemical weapons is not acceptable none of the formal boxes checked but the mission is accomplished and ignoring all the legalities and almost deliberately rushing headlong into war trump has once again shown the only right way is his way. but cheney a senator richard black told us that congress if asked would never have approved a strike on syria the congress would not want once the people had an opportunity to

to have a voice there is no way that they would have approved an attack on syria if you tried to prosecute syria for this in a legitimate court of law you could never get a conviction i will tell you i'm a prosecutor we do not know whether chemicals were used or whether this was just a fabrication and if they were used we have no earthly idea who used them. but we do know just logically there was no motive what ever for syria to do it first of all they had conquered jaish al islam in duma they were leaving they were finished their war of words in the battle for duma was over and so the idea that at that precise point. gas would be fired as is is childishly absurd. russia slams the u.s.

led strikes on syria as an act of aggression and called a u.n. security council meeting at the meeting mosco proposed a draft resolution calling for members to condemn the attack as a violation of international law it also demanded the u.s. and its allies to cease their aggression against syria and provide conditions for an o.p.c. w. investigation but off the hated encounter the draft was quashed. the latter is what you're going to chose to ignore all calls for sanity you have nothing but disdain for the un charter and the security council which you're using and you're a list of names the un charter wasn't conceived to protect criminals and our action absolutely corresponds to the values proclaimed charter the us and its allies continue to show slates and neglect of international law i will take no lessons mr president in international law from russia you don't trip or security council seriously if you don't work to its guidelines i don't talk to you and you don't

consult the time for talk did last night the united states is blocked and. when our president drawn a red line our president in forces the red line. it is limited to shoot small. constantin huge. aircraft said mark me sorrow and a nuclear weapons arsenal now we also know that their disdain for international we are prepared to sustain this pressure if the syrian regime is foolish enough to test our will but did you choose no this is how you want international affairs to be conducted this is hooliganism not mine a religion is a while since we are talking about major nuclear powers. people around the world express that anger at the actions of the us aand its allies hundreds marched in france germany and america to denounce the strikes against syria and the united

states has no right to send their friends over to syria and i like i have no right to tell you if you can just take it any country that was after the airstrikes launched i couldn't i couldn't bear the pain i was feeling and i couldn't just sit silently in my house knowing all that was happening and we can and must stop mccraw what else should we do in parliament he doesn't listen to anybody we only have this way to intervene. we've heard from the director of the ron paul institute daniel mcadams here questions the logik conducting the strikes. well it's really a matter of simple logic if if indeed that was the case why not wait for an investigative body to com if the u.s. has known it for a long time this was a chemical weapons facility why not notify the your piece you do have in the first place and most of all if this was a factory producing chemical weapons and you want to punish assad for allegedly

using chemical weapons why would you hit a chemical weapons factory and dispersed all of the stair and gas or whatever they have manufactured there along to the first of all your population are you not it was just you were it was a sort of do and. russia's foreign minister says the type of poison a former double agent and his daughter were exposed to in the u.k. last month may have been misidentified so again laughter of science at the recent findings of an independence whistler burra tree that analyzed samples from the sea and a recent development at the swiss lab says it's down to the o.p.c. w. to have the final say. eventually it got in the bushes this is more consistent with the use of the poisonous substance be said none of these facts and nothing at all about it was mentioned in the final report which was presented to its executive board we request that the a p c w explain why such information and the conclusion the spears laboratory was emitted from the final report now the bees that

a nerve agent is an incapacitating toxin developed by the us military back in the one nine hundred fifty s. it's a harmful crystalline powder which may cause confusion difficulty seeing and disorientation or bases that it has never been manufactured in russia or the soviet union however the u.k. was quick to blame russia for the attack on the script pals naming the navi chalk nerve agent which was initially developed in the soviet union the international chemical weapons watchdog the i.p.c. w. confirmed those findings to well correspondent lourdes garcia takes a closer look now it's the allegations being leveled at russia there was no trial no discussion no evidence no proof there was only judgement and punishment is highly likely that russia was responsible we do hold russia culpable culpable culpable for the attempted murder the pundits needed even less the name nuvi chalk

sounds russian means russia did it but establish that it is not a chalk and that is by definition of the translation of the name which means newcomer part of the program in the soviet union in the late seventy's and eighty's the points made there are a lot of questions to ask of this whole mess but over the last few weeks we've interviewed dozens of chemists experts and military specialists and hear their biggest gripes. the new nerve agents a new she crit they haven't been so in decades here they are exerts from the books and studies and valuable to the public neither the formula know the chemicals any more russian than itself for years now researchers have published studies

and theses on the nuvi chocks which there are dozens and dozens of many developed in different countries there's just one good book in twenty zero seven the us or the published a paper on numerous chemical compounds we were interested because of the toxicity we all thought united them under the system there are more than sixty compounds here and they've all been indexed since then these formulas or some of them have appeared in various publications constantly you simply cannot say they are secret. there's more to it if you suspect a potential adverse arena has made a new discovery you have to do the same in order to study the new substance and make antidotes it's true to say that russia is not the only country being able to sympathize a few grams of know each other in the late ninety's all intelligence services in the west worked on so i'm not surprised that in france in

a new king in the united states you have this kind of information that could explain this speed in which the product was identified and there's a whole lot of nerve agents to go around with more being discovered undeclared nerve agents. in four months and it's a country and there are many discovers the properties of a new chemical structure it's that city a chemical weapons potential they must immediately according to the convention veges certain it would be obviously w but no country does so. and it really isn't as difficult as it may sound if it's really an overture we're dealing with it's not a real problem to synthesize that kind of nerve agent or the mystery components are easily available on the open market any specialist in organic chemistry would be able to make it though every expert we talked to said that you need serious

expertise and substantial funding to make a pure nerve agent. and of course you can't make this in any basement the chemicals are highly toxic and the lab has to be well equipped with ventilation the talks of acacia equipment every lead can synthesize this but there are twenty or thirty labs that counter. the argument that there is no alternative explanation because only russia has made new rich ox sales. britain's decision to classify almost every aspect of what happened and the investigation as called the room and mail running but there are tidbits that have leaked out tidbits that have the scientists.