was. right. thank you thank god. since foreign office is funding a secret operation of russian complaints across europe that's according to documents exposed by hacker group anonymous names of those involved in the contest in that way also being revealed. yellow vest fuel prices spread out across france as a man wearing one of the government's threatens to blow up a petrol station. replying to a tough question at the top level events and right russia's foreign minister heads

back to the double standards of some states to fight for human rights around the world. in. the boat. which is a. lie from the russian capital we are watching international. we starts with bombshell documents released by the anonymous hacker group they appear to show the u.k. government's leading a massive operation to control politics and public opinion creating what anonymous calls a large scale secret service across europe. joins neil harvey in the studio with the story. group anonymous they're saying. got their hands on

a trove of classified documents they see directly from the u.k. foreign office according to the leaked the u.k. has been funding an operation that prompted public opinion makers to promote anti russian narratives on social media or by planting planting stories in the press the british government has apparently been running those since twenty fifteen through proxy organizations it's called the operation integrity initiative now this initiative is not confined to just the u.k. you can see the map here for example it shows the already active cells if i may say so and they're really almost all across europe looks like a ground an expensive operation house is supposed to fight what what is so called russian descent from asia and it is that it's expansive it as in all major powerhouses of europe but the key to understanding this is who they work with they say it's policy makers opinion shapers and so on and so forth and they are formed into clusters according to the documents this network has

a very concrete structure influences are divided into clusters based on the geography of their activities there's a u.k. one for instance featuring dozens of names but most prominently perhaps outspoken critics of russia and the right hand man of the russian opposition figure alexina valley all who is allegedly coordinated through concealed contacts inside british embassies now a very important detail here neal is that yes this operation does have a budget but we do not know whether or not the people mentioned in these cluster lists so to speak get even a penny out of the budget because well the documents that have been published by anonymous they shed no light when it comes to that so for all we know for all it's worth the people mentioned they could be in it without even knowing that the are being property and by the you can buy the u.k. government directly. ok just how influential do we consider this operation any

particular case is being highlighted well the most illustrated example is the example of the spanish class it seems to be the most powerful at least judging by the documents and they conducted a so-called one claw operation in spain of course but joe banner was seeking to become director of the country's department of homeland security but this statement made him to pro russian for the integrity initiative what country has everything we like we've achieved nothing by provoking russia a comment by likely new national security direct to burn us so yes that statement was what client london's richard beautiful machinery into action and he was put on the bad guys list so it's all started with tweets like these in an attempt to discredit banus by members of the cluster it not only makes pain look really bad it's a real danger for the contrary in europe as a whole when realising that without any effort he has just got one of his

affiliates in government with full access to our security and defense policy is. but that was just the beginning it didn't take long for headlines to follow the online phase the initial phase also anonymous say that they obtained screenshots from the whatsapp conversation quite bluntly called the hash tag nope and this is one of these screenshots and it kind of does shed light as to how the whole thing was coordinated with powerful people within the ruling socialist party are making pressure to stop this this meaning the nomination of us so what the essentially try to do was to convince the spanish prime minister from the u.k. the guy he wanted to take one of the top jobs in spain was no good you was to pro russian and as a justifiable cause for you they presented the public opinion they themselves

tailored to how they wanted at least that's the narrative of the anonymous saying is in the documents of course we couldn't really very find them independently although we did reach out to the u.k. government but guess what apparently the spanish cluster succeeded and. i mean well historically. that did not get the position as the director of homeland security in spain so if that's not meddling in foreign countries affairs then what is. we as the u.k. foreign office to comment we're yet to receive a response but it tells another media outlets that information about the project is publicly available and that it welcomes any publicity it gets meanwhile a source that russia's foreign ministry told us that they're looking at the documents and i'm not surprised that you case carrying out such activities we also got quite a response from one of the people featured in the documents released by anonymous. the documents prove no such thing i have not been paid by the institute but i

applaud their work in dealing with the checketts regimes punishes information and influence operations the kremlin is losing russia bullying neighboring countries and murdering its critics why don't you investigate that the real risks of phobia instead of trying to smear people who are trying to resist the kleptocratic xenophobic incompetent hoodlums who make your wonderful country into an international pariah and if discuss the issue with security analyst and former u.k. army officer chelsea bridge. what struck me was the sheer speed in which this influence operation was able to swing into action in real time not just in organizing or rather influencing media coverage but actually through twitter and other social media very rapidly. mobilizing resources in order to change minister appointments even in other countries when you look at the timeline of that operation it was just just

a few hours from when the operation was launched to when the operation succeeded is there a gray area on whether they're actually doing anything wrong here because the the pushing in opinion but everybody's entitled to an opinion are they in it would be up to using the spanish case would be up to the spanish officials to take everything on board before finally deciding who to appoint. yes you're absolutely right and it's certainly no problem with anybody expressing any opinion so long as it's lawful doesn't. facilitate or violence and so on but what we've got here is it hidden influence actually these are not genuine opinions or if they are genuine news they're being pushed and given prominence because they are backed including by funding from organizations such as u.k. government and the funding of backing so often of course the whole point of a covert operation is not disclosed and so that gives the impression that these are genuine popular feelings when in fact they have been orchestrated by generous funding and important figures into in this case the u.k. government. francois except for another weekend of protests against the

government's feel price hike salad to bensky is in the port city of cali forests where thousands were rallying on friday evening. playing carol it's getting a little rowdy no as you can see the yellow vest protesters have taken over vis a section all of the roads they are now completely in control of it and trying to stop the traffic from coming through the police at the moment are remaining a further back what they owe in maintaining a close watch on this situation you can hear that the mergers are choosing their horns in support for this movement which is now in its seventh day by a hundred to two hundred you have are supporters all saying that they won't see the resignation of president mark on and they want there to be a complete change in the first break here in fronts just how to look at them some

of them while do the excitement as they feel that the momentum of this movement is still building official figures suggest only between five and six thousand people were out in protest on friday but people say that's because many people are at work and they can't be out to the protest every day but saturday is expected to be another big pinch point in terms of the protests will between thirty and forty thousand people are expected to attend a big protest emit paris for the moment it looks like things are heating up paying the last few notes that have been barely a huge number of schools she's between the police and the protest is and yet again it seems like the heat is on as this protest goes into the several flights into the eighth day charlotte do you not see.

a string of deadly violence has rocks pakistan some twenty five people were killed in a suicide bombing at a crowded festival in markets in the northwest region. but there was not the answer those. who can. do so. in a separate attacks three gunmen try to storm the chinese consulate in the southern city of karachi during that incident two police officers and all three of the attackers were killed the following video captured the moments the gunfire started near the consulate. the presence of the pollution is going to force very much remember on book germs gone where there were more of them were

a terrorist to arbitrary who's going. to use her good word. vote of boost or there was a reaction by a boxer the security forces earn more stop the girl is richer the probably people who are good her own bill are all sort of poor for suggesting the global form of remember the difficulty for those of all to be girl extreme your quote all members of the johnny gosch will be one member's bill all through. violence also flared in neighboring afghanistan at least twenty six people were killed in the round fifty wounded in a suicide blast at a mosque near an army based in coursed province that's according to security officials all those killed were believed to have been working for the national security forces this have comes to read days after another suicide bombing at a gathering of religious scholars that doesn't stat. the german chancellor has been railing against nationalist politics in calling on

a new countries to surrender their sovereignty to brussels we'll have more on that in just a few moments. that the. british government and the british establishment and mrs smith and mrs mrs may have looks themselves up into his studio about circles no deal just so he is incredibly mislead as i just said in so doing they've allowed the european union to impose completely draco union on the u.k. which we've lost anyway. i think that i would want to go fast but inside i'm i'm dockside i think. going down to your backside that you

can improve yourself. but it's also better than joe but i really believe that. bottom that we show our side that the story and the band. can be shown i would like. to. welcome back to us with the end of head chancellorship now on the horizon germany's angela merkel is becoming increasingly vocal and have rejection of nationalists politics on friday she called on a member states to accept that they must state sovereignty to brussels to the nation states should i would say must be prepared to give up their sovereignty but of course in an orderly manner. earlier in the week merkel also launched

a stinking attack on several countries opposing the un migration agreement she called their rejection of the deal which aims to establish international norms for the treatment of migrants nationalist in its purest form among those that were rejected australia hungry and is. to discuss this further we're joined by george samueli a senior research fellow at the london metropolitan university georgia very welcome to the program so what is behind merkel's internationalist drove in her increasingly rejection of nationalist politics. what i think merkel is now very much thinking about her legacy i mean she's really at the very end of her chancellorship i don't think she's going to last till two thousand and twenty one because you know she's really a lame duck now and once the new leader of the c.d.u. is in place i think it will be great pressure for her to depart so she's really

wants now to be seen as this. trans national figure. beyond nationalism beyond narrow self-interest global this figure for probably she's also thinking about her future career holding some one of these big international bureaucrat jobs so. this is really about all they go see about post chancellor career so is the fact that she has only two will three years left in power in polls and perhaps. yes and i don't think that she will serve this because the c.d.u. is doing so poorly electorally and everyone's really tired of her and they're going to be looking towards the new cd you leadership so you're in theory she says she's going to be there till twenty twenty one i don't think so i think she'll be out

probably within the next six months and i think then she will want to have one of these big international. fat salary jobs too you see her through the twilight years so i think that you know she's thinking along those lines but you know to be fur i mean i think that you know she i think she probably does believe that nationalism is a terrible thing a national selfishness is a terrible thing the problem is that her policy of helped generate nationalism because the. migration policy was something that she cooked up by herself and then inflicted this on the rest of europe and the european countries really had had no say in the formulation of this policy and they had to pay the price and you know it was her policies that helped fuel the nationalism that she's now so a gas. but given that we live in an increasingly interconnected world is

nationalism becoming an outmoded concept would you say. i don't think so because it's clear that national identity is something that is of crucial importance to. many peoples and what the immigration debate has highlighted it is that it will that people are terrified of losing their national identity their sense of who they are the sense of a kind of historic people and you see this very strongly in the case of hungary and poland who are they are very proud of history they're proud of their identity proud of their language and their culture and that's something that they're not willing to give up and you know or a lot of talk about. living in a you know global world you know transnational values and so on people aren't

buying it and so you know merkel and her friends all you know the various international get together the she attends maybe they don't care about those things an awful lot of people do an awful lot of people in europe do shitty you countries except a loss of sovereignty then. well in theory they they have to accept a certain amount of loss of sovereignty i mean they have join this economic union there is an internal market there's a costumes union. but ultimately the e.u. can only work as. a state of comprising nation states. or basically the hunger ariens ongoing to just simply join a common state with the germans the remaining ones are going to join the common state of the guerin's so certain amount of sovereignity obviously you have to cede

but you can't see that on the issues that really matter and that's what merkel. don't seem to understand they just simply say oh you've got to do is we tell you where we might. on certain issues but we want other issues and you can rail on the rant and rave about accepting migrants but if we think that migrants are rooms are in some ways a hampering of our national potential and the you know the sense of who we are then the nations of europe are just not going to accept it and they use been paralyzed davis such issues such as the migrant crisis they've been lots of different opinions about this but wouldn't ceding more powers to brussels how pain perhaps providing a more united way for it. well i don't think so because then the other countries are just not going to accept it i

mean the hungary for instance has been threatened and could jolt and yelled that and bullied and everything means all but the kitchen sink has been thrown around very and the hunger and sand budging they're not going to accept more migrants so you can do that you can try to. concentrate more power in brussels but you can't force this on nations that don't want it all that you're going to have all that's going to happen is that more countries are going to follow the lead of the united kingdom and just walk out i mean because i think we're all on the issue of migration i think a number of nations will just simply walk out i mean so you can you you can threaten them and bully them but they will not. see the on this issue and you know once we've seen what happened in the u.k. so i think that you know. it may well be that the british have blazed the trail for

others are i don't think it's a very good idea to start putting more and more pressure on. my guest george samueli senior research fellow at london metropolitan university thank you. russia's foreign minister has been answering some challenging questions in rome on a way to face it to the mediterranean dialogues events in the italian capital. house the latest thirty lavrov was much more outspoken than he usually is at his regular press conferences and the audience right in this building was all yours and it seemed that they view russia as a power that can give direct orders to the syrian government wants to mention of heavy states. and imprison thousands of their own populations what's the rationale of keeping these kind of states if you are obsessed with human rights and don't give a damn about the stability of countries if you don't give

a damn boat the right to life which is a human right but. not to mention the going to can social rights then i'm afraid you are one side of the conversation actually took a real it talian twist when the whole thing started comparing international lay sions with those that he has and his family when my wife weapons to be a russian it is an argument with me she often sees the media you don't respect me you know there is another russian saying. you are. afraid of me then you respect me if you have some concerns normal polite people raise direct question look good i don't like what they could this is what i you know can you explain this. i mean this if you have

a problem with suspicion regarding your wife. i mean you are skilled you read the right. way you don't go to the media and don't know so. well you can shed light on the exact language that is used by officials announced by regular house former secretary of state rex tillerson when accusations are thrown at russia you know yourself that you did that's that's a i'm not joking this is what rex tillerson told me after i asked him to elaborate on his statement that they have undeniable facts that we muddled was not that he left and said but ask your special services they know what they mean. on saturday say gala for us will be in portugal syria and ukraine a topic set to be on the table we'll be bringing you the very latest from that.

tourists in the kassam capital boss alone no longer a safe that's the message on leaflets being handed out by local police amid a spike in the city's crime rates over the last year some three thousand leaflets have been given to tourists in seven languages including english french and italian the leaflets include tips on how to avoid becoming a victim of crime. currently there are some sixteen thousand five hundred offices in the area but the force says it needs around two thousand more place personnel and their supporters took to the streets back in october protesting against the catalan interior minister.

was officials say the crime rate has skyrocketed nineteen percent on last year to levels not seen since the eighty's however some tourists and local residents think the situation isn't up. when i came this was one factor that was new in one man's hand that if i'm not sick you are late that is why i'm getting such a big bag instead to put in all my comfort food aside by trying to other parts of the world and it feels pretty scifi outside all the place in the world you know if i'm going to get rid of one hundred percent crime i just tell people to and be careful and don't keep their bibles in their pockets as if you know i haven't come across anything the should meet me feet uncomfortable and see i'm a sandal i feel super secure obviously i take care of my personal belongings but

it's a quad cities safe you can walk at night i don't feel like something bad will happen to me i'm so watching osteen's national label nice and hossa now. on top of the.

statistic from a couple excel came out the child the wealth and income gap around the world in different countries and then there's there's the us there's there's france and then there's the u.k. it's like wow incredible spread between this concentration and then you've got the royalist the people there in the tory party who soap. the queen whose whole point of bragg's it was to support the clean ok so. listen a moron a policy to cause you trouble poverty breaks it's all about supporting the queen and getting rid of the world contacts. nobody could see coming that false confessions would be that profile in this population a problem for converts. any interrogations out there what you'll see is threat

promise threat promise threat lie a lie a lie the process of interrogation is designed to put people in just that frame of mind make the most comfortable make them want to get out and don't take no for an answer don't accept their denials she said therefore which. sat on the statement that i would be home by that time the next day there's a culture on accountability and police officers know that they can engage in misconduct that has nothing to do with all their crime. and.

hello and welcome to cross talk we're all things considered i'm peter lavelle future historians may look back at donald trump's handling of the murder of jamal khashoggi as a case study of the lack of leadership and outright following his reasons for giving the saudis or rather the crown prince a free pass simply don't make sense why because it's all. about iran. talking trump and saudi arabia i'm joined by my guest ahmed with the into around he's a professor of political science at the university of tehran in london we have jonathan steele he's an international affairs commentator and in leeds we have shockey he is a senior lecturer in middle east politics at the university of bradford all right gentlemen crosstalk rules in effect.