which the foreign policy establishment has not been willing to contemplate and part of the reason it's not been willing to contemplate it's easy to see is that all the came regime for ever and the kims never. never. on their from their part always cheating etc etc which is. not entirely true it is partly true not entirely true but just too many forces i think people in washington. in wall mindset confrontational attitude to north you station geopolitics with the thirty eighth parallel being that tripwire and it's not easy for many off them to come to terms with that you know what the peninsula could be just insulated from that whole geopolitical environment let's ask john because john that was his line of business for a while i mean what are the forces moving against this here and beyond because it's donald trump's idea but i mean the you know talk through the bureaucratic inertia

that you know that would be against this go ahead well i think i would disagree i think the currently the top leadership of the u.s. defense department is not against what trump is trying to do and we just saw that in syria we saw the d.o.d. weighed in and so we had symbolic strikes against syria rather than the more far reaching operation that some were advocating so. i think that we have to be a little bit careful here now i would take this back even a little bit before the axis of evil speech people forget that nuclear weapons were first deployed on the korean peninsula during the eisenhower administration and we had at one time nine hundred fifty nuclear tactical nuclear weapons in korea this

is this is now a de quite well we had seven thousand and western europe. anyway. president bush the elder who is now ill in the hospital was the was the one who decided to put an end to this this kind of madness and so we began withdrawing them but you know you don't have to explain the nuclear issue in terms of the evil nature of the north korean regime although perhaps the some of that that that can be part of the explanation it's really an action reaction sequence and we took the initial action and the north koreans then responded to it so i think the same dynamic can be used in the current circumstances and terms of confidence building measures and hopefully we can walk this back i agree completely that having. a progressive president and seoul is

a huge help and i think china and to russia can also help but. i think it's going to be really difficult to unravel this not which which we've tied ourselves up in the peninsula in these various asymmetries ok danielle i think this kind of leads to where i want to go in the program i mean i am sure that there is there's a sense that if if the u.s. in there's the perception of the u.s. backing down the perception of the u.s. . involved in a diplomatic process that would be deemed as a piece made here that would have a ricochet effect through all of the other in tangling alliances the u.s. has in the pacific is this part of the thinking there because it is john said you know to untie this or not here there is a huge ripple effect through the entire region go ahead daniel. this totally true totally true and would be a huge ripple effect in washington as well where all these countries have their

have their interests they have their they have their you know their little alliances japan most particularly russia and china as well so if you know. the north may be playing a kind of vietnamese game where they're trying to you know seek a closer alliance with the south in order to protect themselves against china so therefore that's certainly possible in china could be getting nervous as well and china has friends in washington and. i have to say the japanese wouldn't be very happy if it is with a unified strong powerful korean peninsula and so you know that they wouldn't there to hold the fence thinking would have to be rethought keep going daniel. and japan has tons of friends in washington also so so i think that we're going to see a huge ripple effect from the north northeastern northeast asia to washington d.c. as all pile on and you know and trump is on one hand trump has got great power as

a u.s. president but i think him politically he's very. yes he is really on the ropes it's a ferocious problem. so i don't know i doubt very much it's he'll be able to withstand these forces and i think that he will i'm pretty sure he is incapable of engaging in the same kind of grand gesture that kim jong un is willing to engage on you know let me go back to being you know he won the presidency he surprises it's all the time you know maybe it'll work this time i don't know i mean don't you think also it's just a mindset i mean north korea is this cartoonish evil character the axis of evil i mean it's so convenient and there's so many people that have made entire careers out of demonizing and i'm not i'm not siding with the north koreans or its leadership i don't do that kind of thing i i'm basically a realist when it comes to foreign policy so but i mean don't you think that's part

of the problem here is he is changing minds you know taking a fresh look and there isn't this really an amazing opportunity that we may never see again go ahead. oh absolutely absolutely this is as good an opportunity source the end of the korean war in. as since the end of the korean war to have a peace regime on the peninsula as well as since the denuclearization declaration and agreements of the early one thousand nine hundred to do during the nuclearization let me go out a little bit on a limb here and make two points you know with regard to denuclearize solution most people and i totally agree understand the views that this is going to be very difficult close to impossible he's not going to give it up i'm one of those feel very tiny minority but who believes that this is very doable and i can really give it up i could give john i did john is not in the same position as saddam hussein. but you had to go hide it that's why he developed it in the first place to trade away for security guarantees it seems logical to me exactly. exactly let me explain

that point also you know what is a nuclear weapon the focus of a nuclear weapon is to call unacceptable damage to the adversary he already can do unacceptable damage to their adversary by crushing seoul with this conventional guns and therefore a nuclear weapon over and above that is something that he can leverage and he can bargain and which is exactly what he is doing and therefore i would say that this is doable this is a great opportunity but what we have to do also is this cannot be a process which has sprung out over many years on a decade on its action for action with five hundred steps which then breaks down after twenty steps this has to be a big grand bargain account in a truncated where and then to define time period and i think it's doable let me go to look at let me go to john john you're on the negotiating team for the united states what would you tell your boss dollars trying to do in forty seconds go ahead

hey i what i would tell him to do is just have good vibes in the in the meeting apparently that was the case when pompei went there i think what. it's different this time around is that the negotiations are not being run through a bureaucratic process and a lot of people are criticizing trump on this score it's it's a crisis situation and people forget what we were talking about last fall we're talking about the imminent prospect of war on the peninsula so i think things are moving in a good direction i am concerned about the asymmetries. also we're going to have one possible drop out in this process prime minister abbay is in deep political trouble i'm not sure if he's going to be able to survive or not but yeah i think we just have to hope that the intercooler goes well ok and in a way moon isn't playing that is vance gentlemen we have run out of time and very

rarely do we end on a positive note many thanks to my guests in washington and in new york and thanks to our viewers for watching us here on c.n.n. and remember.

in july twenty seventh i am. a freelance journalist watching was on t.v. and militant shelling in syria. on a his sacrifice quality has established

a memorial they will recognize war reporters who often risk months with the sake of the truth and through them these you can submit to your published a video or a written form to a war. and no. maximizers financial survival guide. our two year president. yonks this is what happens to pensions in britain. you watch kaiser report. you know. you never know what's around the corner you never know what's in the pub you're going to walk into that excitement it's that not knowing that's where the adrenalin rush comes from.

and you need to move on to finish him and the extremes to all forms of. the violence is a part and it's almost a schizophrenia gang culture where you can do all these things and behave like badly. they're going to be full of course colorful all. possible more so for the last. funniest man infirmed. role. in the thought. i would roll or when the fire broke out i really did a cold i don't want to get. the meaning in reason is that at least if you don't and the involves it's constantly evolving the.

global. elite this whole over the slope. little over. donald trump ailes his beautiful friendship with the money well might crawl out an intimate meeting with the french president at the white house but keep disagreements between the two leaders really me. also coming up on the network of sophisticated tunnels used by militants. beneath the syrian city of. exclusive video. russia's defense ministry displayed a fragment of cruise missiles recovered after an assault by western countries.

it's a most of the smart missiles fired were intercepted by. defense system. is fighting for his life after being attacked by supporters of a tongue. in liverpool in northern. to roma funds have been arrested on suspicion of attempted. twenty four hour news live from moscow this is r.t. international. welcome to the program our top story donald trump ahs heaped praise on among you all mccraw another meeting in the white house the two presidents met to discuss topics such as syria iran nuclear deal but it's a touchy feely friendship that's all over the headlines.

thank. you. mr president the old saying what a great relationship we have and they're actually correct it's not fake news finally it's not great news so it's a great honor great honor that you're here but we do have a very special relationship and try to get that piece of. peace we have to make room for he is perfect so it is really it is really great to be with you and your special right now a lot of the basis of recent unity between donald trump and french president mccraw on has been the recent attack on syria france and the united states along with the u.k. cooperated in the recent airstrikes in syria now it seems pretty clear that mccrie on was hoping that this recent attack could kind of lay the basis for continued

cooperation between the united states and france kron has been referring to the united states as kind of a gerund turf contemporary multilateralism however when he brought this rhetoric up at the white house donald trump didn't seem quite eager to go along with it in the long run we need to bring peace to make sure that syria does not become an enemy in the region we have spent seven trillion dollars in the middle east and we've got nothing for it nothing less than nothing so far as i'm concerned that difference and striking rebuff from trump is a little bit of a blow jim a cron especially when he himself brags about the possibility that he had convinced donald trump to keep u.s. military forces in syria now donald trump says that that's not the case but micron has been insisting that it's him who is responsible for convincing trump to keep a military presence in syria trump later went on to underline the fact that the united states will be leaving syria as soon as they can as. syria's concerned i

would love to get out i'd love to bring our incredible warriors back home but when it came to the iran deal just an hour before the press conference donald trump and the french president they were both very adamant in their position it was a terrible deal should have never ever been made we could have made a good deal or a reasonable deal if the around it was a terrible deal we have to take it as a part of the broader picture which is security in the region it's insane it's ridiculous it should have never been made but we will be talking about it what we want to do is it contains iranian presence in the region and diesel fuel it's part of this fraud rather pick cannot get to be restarting anything they restart it they could have big problems bigger than they've ever had before and you can mark it down but after sitting down with the donald it seems the clown has changed his tune somewhat the people. in the panicle for

a number of months i've been saying that this was not a sufficient do you but it will enable us at least until twenty twenty five to have some control over the nuclear activities we therefore wish to work on a new deal with iran mr president you were saying that there was no plan b. that. he would deal with to be preserved no you were talking about a new deal with a boundary why did you change your mind. but basically when i said there was no plan b. i usually refer to the fact there is no plan it be it was about climate change rather than iran. or people what do you have i think that their option i don't see it. what is the what if scenario all your plan b. i don't have any plan b. for nuclear are you going to. thank you. thank you. thank you thank you

thank you the money some symbolism to the meeting by presenting president with a tree from a first world war battlefield the site of the two leaders planting it in the white house garden hunding twitter users plenty of ammunition. the poor young ones are and so is a great honor to take part there's a prison these veterans or they call witness trees that that lived through the war see around you have continued to grow.

living on the group of the world's largest advanced economies want to get a better picture of russia the g seven are planning to set up a special working group to study what they describe as moscow's malign behavior russia was out the top of the agenda at a gathering of the group's foreign ministers encounter that takes up the story of. the g seven a club of some of the world's leading industrialized nations tackling the planet's biggest problems from financial crises to military conflicts but it's also the g. eight minus russia and it seems they just can't help talking about the member that they kicked out last year was the focus of the g seven foreign and security ministers meetings in toronto the g seven foreign ministers are calling attention to so-called malign behavior by russia they're expected to look at ways to keep pressure on russia without imposing new sanctions for two days g. seven foreign and security ministers rub shoulders in toronto at an event with the

tagline building a more peaceful and secure world and apparently for that to happen first and foremost russia needs to be put in its place then things like war and world hunger can be addressed just like last year and the year before that and so on because. as you see in ukraine and russia's actions are the very reason for the g seven brussels summit this is now the second year in a row that the g. seven has met without russia another example of russia's isolation ukraine is the victim of russian aggression we must never forget that fact if i think about the position move about if you putin now he's you know he's talked to foreign he's the repeat of russia now this time around it included a whole laundry list of russia issues condemn russia's irresponsible and destabilizing behavior check demand such alleged actions cease immediately check agree that it is highly likely moscow poisoned sergei screwball and his daughter and that there's just no plausible alternative check and the acting u.s.

secretary of state one as far as to tell reporters that russia has to be a quote constructive partner in syria or be held accountable so to be fair they did manage to cover a lot of ground it just more often than not happened to be russia related let's just hope they can avoid getting too carried away with their plans but we decided was that we were going to set up a jew seven group that would look at russian malign behavior in all this money frustrations with cyber war whether it's this information assassination attempts whatever it happens to be and collectively try and call it out and the hostile it may not have reached its peak either this meeting was perhaps just a preview of what we can expect when the leaders of the g. seven countries come together in june to tackle the russian mess. as the final militants are purged from the syrian city of duma kilometers of underground tunnels used by the rebels have been revealed r t has exclusive video from the area that

shows the vast network of hell much more than just the necessities. well now they starve this they harass this they moved around in our blood as you see these tunnels are massive they make out his work on them as well as civilians that they wouldn't feed those who refused to work and you can see how big they are and how much they have in there is like a city beneath a city. we would be taken to the spot where the fighting would be and they would give as a matter fifteen minutes before it started they showed us how to act and whom to shoot the guy who told us what to do you would then disappear after that it all

depended on luck before the fighting they used to tell us about jihad these martyrs of jihad and about heroic death on the battlefield but other times they treated us like dogs.