crisis staffan de mistura was speaking at a meeting with the russian foreign minister sergei lavrov what that happened last week. it's not helped i start to feel cheap engineer but. in spite of what we may think we'll say it depletes. needs to be relaunched said a gay lover of fun stuff and to mr were matched in moscow following talks over the ongoing situation in syria the un asked special envoy to syria seven day mr murray said that it is very important now to lower not only the a military town show now but political as well now you've just heard that he said that the risks and airstrikes conducted by the u.s. france and the u. of kate did not help to deescalate the situation there but the countries which conducted those these strikes hit us like a different view on the subject saying that these talks were unnecessary and just to fight. we had reached the point where the strike have become

indispensable to be able to return credibility to our communities and words should be action was taken to alleviate humanitarian suffering in syria by degrading the regime's chemical weapons capability and deterring its use of these weapons the airstrikes were conducted in response to claims of an l.n.h. chemical weapons attack on the syrian city of too much even before the official investigation of the organization for the pocket bishan of chemical weapons even started now the us said that it could not wait for the official results and decided to bomb syria on reports on intelligence that could not be revealed to russia's denies that such an attack took place and speaking to a media today sergey lover of used harsher rhetoric than the u.n. special envoy to syria and he said that this was not only an attack on syria but on the peace process and the whole group or the three countries the u.s. the u.k.

and france have not only bombed the madrid chemical facilities in syria. the geneva peace process after this meeting in moscow demister were a is now going to be rainy and capital at the moment he is conducting quite an intensive round of international meetings aiming at relaunching peace talks in syria. following the what how much for those who want to chemical attack in syria the u.s. led military strikes on the country on saturday that's despite promising to pull american troops out of syria and remove the u.s. from the conflict altogether just before the attacks now there are reports of a new so-called arab force being assembled in the event of a u.s. withdrawal what does it has more to leave the state it's a tough one. i want to get out i want to bring our troops back home i want to start rebuilding our nation we are in syria fight isis and that is our mission and the

mission isn't over and we're going to complete that mission america says it wants out of syria but not before its goals are accomplished which could take a while and get real dirty what do you do well that's what friends are for we have asked our partners to take greater responsibility for securing their home region saudi arabia it seems has volunteered for the difficult task of sending troops to sit on oil fields in eastern syria apparently saudi arabia has been volunteering pretty hard and pretty long we're in discussions with the us and have been since the beginning of the syrian crisis about sending forces into syria now here's the thing those arab troops would have to be trained the u.s. could do it but no not off the what happened last time all the last times

the iraqi forces just showed no will to fight. they were not outnumbered by in fact they vastly outnumbered the opposing force and yet they failed to fight they withdrew from the site we have an issue with the will of the iraqis to fight i saw and defend themselves so if the pentagon doesn't want to get involved there's conveniently a third option erik prince mercenaries and soldier of fortune extraordinaire the founder of blackwater yes the blackwater the infamous private military company who is operations in iraq resulted in it being banned from the country only to really. and a new name but i never heard that. there

were dead bodies everywhere in the city college but it's going to be with the people inside among the dead bodies lying in the street that's. the middle of seventy years old. prince was out of sight for a while before resurfacing and the trump whom he donated a quarter of a million dollars to prince says officials in the middle east have already

contacted him about assembling a force for syria and with john bolton as the new national security advisor one of the most radically militant hawks in washington no one's going to care about prince's shady past john bolton is here we just had a big. it's a win win if you are unwilling to occupy a hostile desert in a country that doesn't want you there well privatized it give your buddies a chance to make a quick buck after all isn't that what friends are for finally this hour u.s. democrats have followed suit average trump russia collusion we'll have that story and more just when we come back in a few moments. we

are still living with a lot of conflicting does the situation. the problem between saudi arabia and iran no good american president is the language to withdraw and. we heard that the so did already to go to. so we. do feel the reason the situation is very very dangerous. the way the system should work is that every stock bond security underwritten by wall street or any bank in america one percent should be carved out and put into social security so that americans whether they have jobs as minimum wage workers or whether they're c.e.o.'s all across the spectrum everyone gets to participate in this thing called the american economy because if you don't all these stocks are not part of the american economy.

with about twenty international u.s. democratic policy has followed a multi-billion dollar suit against almost every figure in the russia donald trump collusion probe the party claims trumps campaign conspired with the russian government its nationals as well as wiki leaks the democrats. now the democratic party has gone out on a limb here and their lawsuit targets not only the russian government but the trump campaign wiki leaks and even a pop singer who is supposedly connected to the trump camp jamie that they all work together to influence the u.s. presidential election now democrats claim a russian intelligence service hacked into the d.n.c. is too cute or penetrated it's going systems and x. rated tens of thousands of documents e-mails to further russian interests and the

like problems and apparently trump gleefully welcomed russia's help those are their words and then they say that julian a song founder of wiki leaks host of the documents because he supposedly shared their goal of damaging the democratic party and claim to this is just part of the multitude of investigations five in total into alleged russian collusion and it all started with the intelligence report that came out in january twenty seventh that claims that president clinton ordered and influenced campaign to undermine faith in american democracy and none have any success or found any evidence so far so this seems to be the next chapter in the democratic party's state against the trunk campaign russia but this time they're looking for compensation for damages inflicted upon the d.n.c. so we're just going to have to see what happens when. we spoke out it's illegal and media analyst mano he's. successful or will be successful rather in

a court of law. there's a couple of things are about this complaint being of a lawyer looking at this notice that first of all it is a there is no connection of the says we say it is a series of narratives a story about here a name here jared cushier roger stone cold luzhin they use. no evidence of guilt if a judge does not dismiss this i will be shot this is. this is a waste of time and it shows how desperate and how pathetic the d.n.c. are still still not able to to resolve daily grief counseling they do professional help not a lot. you can government setting up a special russia task force comprising senior m.p.'s that will perceiver that will counter perceived threats from moscow this comes amid the current diplomatic spat between the two countries over the poisoning of

a former double agent his daughter ortiz the deal to do has the beatles this committee consists of very high profile u.k. politicians and at the helm of that committee is the chairman of the foreign affairs committee and his name is tom took in heart now he has not minced his words about a lot of mir putin in fact what he said is that the u.k. must target everybody who supports the russian president and his gangster regime during his interview he obviously sounded like he wasn't a fan of mr putin but he did mention someone that he was a fan of and that was the saudi prince mohammed bin solomon the big change actually is there where he's trying to change the economy he's trying to bring women and young people into employment is trying to radically so this is really something quite impressive in a separate interview took a hard talked about his career path and his aspirations and he described a number of roles that he feels that he would be ok at including the job of the pm

so it is. here's that he wasn't particularly fussy about what future lies ahead for him would it be great to be pm yep it would be great to be foreign secretary fantastic would be great to be defense secretary wonderful would it be great to be a minister of any kind yes on a more serious note now the tensions between russia and the u.k. have been exacerbated by the script poisoning london is insisting that moscow is behind the attack moscow is denying any involvement at all and asking u.k. for firm proof as to why they are suggesting that russia is indeed behind those attacks so the accusations are continuing from the u.k. side and now that this new committee has been set up we can only see that those diplomatic relationships are probably going to go downhill even further commenting on the outs with the russian ambassador to the u.k. alexander you're given course said the two countries need to find

a way of working together what i can promise you i am rooted to come to this group . all the questions and maybe i'll convince them to develop economically politically religions. the only use the influence on the british government. to be formally. i mean while german business is a looking to be excluded from the latest american sanctions binding corporation with russian companies according to reports chancellor merkel will discuss the exclusions in her upcoming visit to the united states on friday the german government spokesman said that such trade restrictions harm all sides he also called for fair trade conditions for all countries we discussed the issue with russia's finance minister. since we are going to lose the latest economic restrictions have a negative impact not only on russia and russia but partners as well will help the

germany will manage to persuade our american partners to make exemptions from the pretty harsh sanctions put in our companies which i also hope that the economic approach will prevail over political motives in the proportion that's. another maybe relics of the space race but they're still of huge interest to the you tube generation a group of which risk the rest by breaking into the baikonur cosmodrome in kazakhstan to take a look into the past. and . mitch.

daniels. we now have some breaking news here all naughty north korea has agreed to stop all missile tests and shut down its nuclear test site with immediate effect and that's according to a statement just released by the country's news agency the cia and a denouncement was apparently made by the north korean leader kim jong il a policy meeting also praised nuclear scientists for their work at that meeting as well what the big news of course that given the upcoming goshi ages between the u.s. leader donald trump and communal moon we'll bring you all the latest updates on that story in the next hour with my colleague potus who is joining you in just around thirty minutes time.

in july twenty seventh team hunted up a freelance journalist working with a. militant showing in syria. the owner his second focus has established a memorial they will recognize will reporters who often risk the months with the sake of the truth and through that peace you can submit to your published works in a video or written form go to a war zone t. don't comb into know. los angeles the city of luxury and fame but also an alarming number of people living in the streets. the simple fact in l.a. is there's just not enough shelter even if people on the streets right now decided to come in there's nowhere to come in and it's been a struggle. and this man found his own response of the problem and constructed

dozens of tiny homes for people in need of shelter when you have nothing and nowhere to go. you know having some ideas may as well be a castle but do the authorities accept such solution. be house on a city parking space is not a solution your car or someone monitoring the site otherwise it will be a free for all there a better alternative to end the homelessness crisis. level hostility on the idea that dropping bombs brings police to the chicken hawks forcing you to fight the battles going. to new socks credit tell you that every gossip the public but also for the day. off the bat doesn't tell you on the cool enough to buy their product. all the hawks that

we all are worth watching. if you go through history of mankind it's been cruel and destructive over and over again and some our cities have come back and many are quite beautiful and wonderful places. if you look in the middle east and places like syria it's it's i agree with you it's totally depressed. and i wish the political issues involved with it could be resolved but i think until that is there's very little hope that the saudis will be able to turn the tide.

hello and welcome to crossfire where all things are considered i'm peter lavelle u.s. president donald trump says he wants american troops to leave syria the foreign policy blob surrounding him says differently so what are exactly washington's goals in syria partition war for war sake or a means to sticking it to iran and russia all or poorly thought out options. talking syria i'm joined by my guess and washington he's an independent investigative journalist and historian as well as author of manufactured crisis the untold story of the iran nucular scare and london we have danny makki he is a syria commentator and co-founder of syrian digital media group and in doha we cross the mohammed show how he is

a professor of conflict resolution at george mason university and author of what is an lightman continuity a rupture in the wake. the arab uprisings origin of the cross talk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i always appreciate dan let me go to you because i know you just came back from syria so you have a good feel for the lay of the land here you know i asked in my in my introduction just exactly what do you think washington's goals are because i guess it depends on who you ask in washington these days go ahead danny. absolutely i mean washington has really had nothing of a coherent strategic policy in syria for many years it's not just now and we've had four five years of of washington saying that one to take the lead from behind and not not really understanding exactly where it's going with this strategy and this is been really really shown by the last events of over one hundred u.s. tomahawk missiles striking different syrian military targets while i was in damascus for that matter and at the end of the day three or four hours later you've

got. to within syria and jubilation in the streets because they know washington will not achieve their policy of regime change and that this is purely a symbolic slash limited strike on different military targets but it doesn't come with the package there is no package at the moment there is no clear consensus over what the u.s. wants to do in syria it's just bits and pieces. it in but if you read between the alliance what you've got is an administration where you sense a lot of people want to leave the want to leave syria from really doesn't know what he wants it's all up in the air and if i was america's allies at the moment in the region especially saudi arabia i would be very worried over what the u.s. wants to do in syria you know guaranteed or maybe this is by design because there is no real reason for the united states to be in syria actually it is there illegally under international law i also said in my introduction is this just

a means of policy wedge a tool to stick it to iran and the russians well at one level you could say that it's all of the above because there are people within the national security bureaucracy who holds those those goals but at the same time you know there has been as danny just said no coherent strategy there's been no agreement on what u.s. policy should be what u.s. strategy. should be for many years and you know beginning with the original decision to intervene on behalf of the armed opposition to to assad back in two thousand and eleven when the president himself when president obama knew very well that he didn't really want to do it he felt that this was getting into another sort of afghanistan type intervention which could not turn out well

he made that argument we know repeatedly over the next couple of years and at the same time you had hillary clinton and david petraeus and others in his administration pushing for a much more aggressive policy that's been the pattern now for years now today you have trump as everyone knows really expressing repeatedly the desire to get out of syria and to to have a very strict time limit on the war against isis and the military saying no we can't do that and others in the administration clearly not in sympathy with it and so there's a there's a kind of uncertainty about how that's going to play out but if you look at it in the larger picture of geopolitics you know that basically the president united states and the president of russia are both not interested in

having a war continue in syria and i think that that ultimately is going to play a big role in how this plays out in the next year let's see how this plays out mohamed let me go to you in doha it seems to me one of the reasons why the u.s. is staying there first of all doesn't like the current condition in it wants to be a power broker it wants to be part of some kind of settlement and it will in all the are always in it wants to make sure it's a settlement that it wants so. still kind of hedging its bad bets for regime change i'm sure that there is pressure on from the saudis and the israelis to stay there as well but aid at all ties together is it is really incoherent and we have these situations where we have these false far as i'm concerned it was a false flag operation this. chemical weapons attack i mean i guess a lot of the regional players have to be very worried about what the u.s.

is going to do because it doesn't know what it wants to do go ahead in doha. while apparently there have been mixed signals coming from the wash the white house in particular on the thing that is no disagreement the president from lacks a coherent strategy or a after the attack plan how to sustain the prisons or how to sustain the impact of u.s. foreign policy in the middle east could all of the region the recent homes in damascus have been ridiculed because he would raise the expectations very high by them in the red lie to the red line of his this is obama in two thousand and thirteen so far i think trump has trouble himself in the very same obama and the luck of fictive in lack

of effectiveness on the field has turned the united states into a joke now and i think now the iranians are smiling in this hour with a bewildered and also most of the governments here are asking what's next and i think this is a sixty four thousand dollar question yes and i will add one more perplexity to all this danny is turkey ok the u.s. won't it won't let it won't cut the kurds loose this drives the. works mad ok and i have said repeatedly. there the turks are in syria legally under international law however i do understand their concern and i can see from their position about their security issues visa v the kurds i understand it i don't necessarily agree with it but really is that what it stake here not only is there ambiguity coming from washington there is a very serious danger to nato unity and you know it is being played out on the

ground and i you know talking about red lines i don't see the turks backing down at all go ahead danny. the turks won't back down and not for one primary reason they say they believe that they have some sort of historic right to the north of syria and they've been led that way through the actions of the united states of america that if you look at the situation now between turkey and turkey in northern syria you've got the start of another very very very long war i don't think that this will end anytime soon and what the u.s. has got out of all of this is actually that it's a very weak ally the moment one of its allies faces a problem or faces danger the u.s. just ups and leaves and pretend like nothing has happened and the kurds have only went to the russians and gone to a serb because they feel that the u.s. has betrayed them because the u.s. just left them they love turkey to literally eat up all of this kurdish territory in the north of syria now what we're seeing in the whole country which is very

different to how the previous situation was is it's a war of periphery is now if you look at it the only areas where there's conflict and there's tension is border areas you know between syria and syria and iraq syria and lebanon syria and jordan the sense in the center of the country has been retaken because of the russian intervention in two thousand and fifteen and now we go back to the huge intervention without russia intervening we wouldn't have the situation of the other eight and the us only acting out of envy because they want to be in russia's position you know russia today russia so over the over the previous weeks has brokered a number of agreements for rebels to leave areas around damascus and call a moment while the u.s. is looking on words striking one of two military targets in a very vague attack which which ultimately didn't really get into the area how to chemicals weapons chemical weapons ability those strikes would not have affected it because they essentially gave them a week's notice by posting it on twitter so this is the way the u.s.

is running its war these days. and this is something he said he would never ever. her do one of his first press conferences he said i will never tell you what i'm going to do and then he telegraphs it but garrett he did that on purpose because he knows he's painted himself into a corner and his advisors are making sure that he doesn't have any maneuver room so that's why you throw these these missiles out and we heard a dozen different versions about how many of them made their target how many were shot down how many and didn't work ok i don't know ok but the american version doesn't stand up to much scrutiny from what i can tell go ahead garrett it was just political theater it wasn't actually a military strike it was political theater garrett i couldn't i couldn't agree more on that point and you know if you actually read the the the morning briefing that was given at the pentagon after the night that the strikes took place

it was an amazing performance in the sense that you know the people doing the briefing absolutely would not answer a question that's not you know that had to do with for example you know with you know did did you actually do any air sampling to find out if you know when you hit this supposedly a place where they were making chemical weapons there was any pop problem of fact ing the air of the people surrounding it and it's clear that they hadn't done it and that they couldn't basically say what the consequences were of the target they hit and i think that what that means is that they really didn't have any information on the course was if they swear that i produce hearing this let me jump in here let me let me jump in here we've got to go to a hard break in after out of heart break we'll continue our discussion on syria stay with our city.