president from reverses an obama era rule which required officials to disclose the number of civilian deaths from drugstores. washington councils the u.s. faces of seventy seven officials leading to the venezuelan president and the latest round of sanctions against iran. and desperate families who more tone yemen and children as young as three in exchange for food stamps according to a new report from the charity oxfam. this is one leader in the family i mean. they can marry you know their daughters and they can bring some dowry and dad just can't protect the political prime minister.

have you with us this evening this is an international. president trump has revoked and obama is a rule requiring u.s. intelligence to publicly report the number of civilians killed in drone strikes on the scale of more pronounced the story a new executive order from the white house is reducing the amount of transparency when it comes to u.s. drone strikes now the executive order basically roof vokes regulations made by the obama administration in twenty sixteen essentially the director of national intelligence will no longer be required to release information regarding unclassified u.s. strikes and the non civilian deaths that are associated with them and that would be in areas outside of active hostilities the pentagon will still have an obligation to report on civilian casualties in compliance with the national defense authorization. an active twenty eighteen and twenty nine scene that was very clear

in trump's executive order now this is certainly not the first time that donald trump has indicated frustration with the level of information related to military activities that has been made public with fighting wars and they're doing reports and releasing it to the public to the public because the enemy the enemy reaches reports a study every line of those reports should be part of the reports live to report. but they should be private reports it's also important to note that that we have a statement that is reportedly coming from a spokes person for the white house security council now it was given on the condition of anonymity it's being widely reported we cannot confirm it what it is saying is that apparently this was the activity of the the intent of this executive order is minimizing to the greatest extent possible civilian casualties and acknowledging the responsibility when they unfortunately occur during the military actions but the same time getting rid of what they're calling supreme flew us reporting and requirements that don't actually improve government transparency but

rather distract intelligence professionals from their primary mission the history of drone strikes is quite shocking there have been a number of rather tragic incidents that have taken place over the years. i'm joined on the line now by peace activists kathy kelly good to have you on kathy what would you think behind this decision by president truman why no longer feel the number of civilian deaths in drone strikes. i mean in the clip that you just shared president also said that there are three ports issued by the special inspector general in other countries to reconstruction or to be low. and when u.s.

people are under educated about the consequences of u.s. military strikes to kill civilians it doesn't enhance anybody's security in fact when other people feel enraged or just completely confused and frightened this is something u.s. people need to understand and if anything we need to understand a whole lot more i mean a imagine if it's a home in your neighborhood you didn't know why and where were the women where were the children killed and it was just demolished what do you think you might actually moving because it would seem safe and so within afghanistan for instance there are one million people displaced they're unemployed the numbers of people living on one dollar a day or less it's up to have the country twenty million people the united nations is reporting fifty work present so. is it proper to deny more information to the united states in

a country where democracy is supposedly big east on education will kathy trump sees that you know the argument that releasing the info to the public would actually help the enemy so they using security as an argument or is it just an excuse is it true do you think. well i think it's an excuse i think that they want to make sure that lockheed martin raytheon and bearing in other major defense contractors can can continue to sell the germans and to sell the weapons and the proliferation i mean mohamed bin sunland makes no secret of using united states surveillance assistance and remote warfare to fight their war in yemen and see how many civilians have died eighty seven thousand five hundred children have died of starvation and diseases to to correct results of that war this kind of proliferation all around the world arming people on both sides of issues some of

whom have nuclear weapons and thinking in india and pakistan today this is a very very foolish way forward is foolish and is dangerous in his erratic and sent predictable and all of those things don't contribute toward defense in so many countries that are friendly toward the united states but now to discipline the united states to encourage the united states but also use pretty diplomatic means to rein in the recklessness being shown by the camp administration but also by many. military stick groups within every administration. kathy good to speak to appreciate your time i guess this hour peace activists kathakali. the humanitarian crisis in yemen is deepening with every day that passes much of the country's population are on the brink of famine and some desperate families have even resorted to marrying off daughters some of the most youngest just three

years old in order to get food. my mother in law keeps beating me and when i run away back to my father's house my father beats me again for a new way i don't want to get married i just want to go back to school son family as they did think that i mean this is no one lee where they can make their daughters and they can bring some dowry and that just can't protect the whole families and also their extended members so it is really unfortunate. that this is going after some of them that they have received emergency support but you know you wouldn't support are also even limited so they wouldn't mind trying to weigh what are their immediate what and i mean so this is the one leaving the family i mean. it is very difficult to call family with this small little support and often the humid. day phase the safety or security concerns. are so aid also

we are not able to deliver aid on timely. according to the oxfam report girls in yemen and usually expected to consummate their marriage is that around the age of just eleven until then they live with their husbands and typically do the housework being forced into relationships in such a very early age is just one of the traumas faced by children in young according to humanitarian organizations yemen is one of the worst countries for children to live in more than eleven million are in need of eight was half a million suffer from malnutrition the director of oxfam's yemen office says that the current situation in the country simply catastrophic. what is really really. and even alarmed me that almost one third of the total population is basically ten million just at the brink of a mean and children are malnourished and we are all there were dead due to this all

yourself wire and conflict and also. that it was an eighteen cholera crisis that was the worst cholera persons in the century if. called any ministers are not provided trying to lead and even the faults even less than nonfunctional even for a day i mean importing the food will end the humanitarian mauritius there'll be much more protest situation. the u.k.'s departure from the european union is proving to be full of unknowns government doesn't seem to know the best way out and the british people don't know how europe's top brass even get their jobs according to a leading briggs it. i couldn't tell you who they are or what they do or how they came by their jobs or how they may be removed from office i have no idea how to kick those particular. well the use currently going through the process of choosing its

new heads for example the commission president is nominated by the e.u. council the candidate then approved by members of the parliament so we took six of paris and berlin to find out whether europeans are any more aware than. i think it will be an absolute something like that and yes i'm going to vote. never to vote. maybe two three he's done i see i don't have a clue about that. yes of course but. i don't know really. i think i will go to vote. of course it's important for me to take part in for a federal europe this year what do you go to court or you could have. i don't know i don't know what you have two or two but i don't know i don't know i am not sure for this date but i would go to vote the lectures on the twenty sixth of may and

i'm planning to vote. the u.s. is increasing pressure on the venezuelan government u.s. vice president mike pence announced seventy seven officials linked to president maduro will have the u.s. faces revoked after forty nine people were added to a sanctions blacklist on friday and he correspondent cohen has more. the u.s. is threatening to impose sanctions on foreign banks if they deal with the venezuelan government national security adviser john bolton issued a statement this morning saying quote the united states is putting four in the financial institutions on notice that they will face sanctions for being involved in facilitating illegitimate transactions that benefit nicolas maduro and his corrupt network he also said the u.s. is quote pursuing several economic new diplomatic and economic initiatives in support of that transition but he did not specify what they are and this comes a day after

a special envoy for venezuela elliott abrams threatened what he called secondary sanctions that would target third party countries saying that would quote depend on the combat the conduct of the regime over time the u.s. has also begun to increase pressure on cuba which it claims is controlling venezuelan president nicolas maduro the wrote in a tweet that the u.s. will continue to tighten financial restrictions on cuba's military and intelligence services the venezuelan authorities in turn have declared the german ambassador daniel crean or persona non-grata after what it called interference into its internal affairs he became the first european dip. amat to be expelled from the latin american state however during his tuesday address to the national assembly one goh i doat says it's not the german ambassador who is the real persona non-grata. everyone in venezuela knows who the persona non-grata is and he's the

only one who is known in the region in the world because in the old account with the two they recognize the venezuelan fight for democracy as a constitutional right and with duro responded by saying neither the opposition nor the united states wants to help venezuela and have their own interests like venezuela's natural resources russia's foreign minister sergei lavrov also condemn u.s. sanctions against those who support the duro saying quote it is another evidence that the american diplomacy is quickly losing that sense and its ability to use diplomatic instrument of their fears over military intervention the trumpet ministration used to say all options are on the table but abrams says the u.s. will use other ways to push for what he called democratic transition in venezuela nobody is talking about american military steps except the regime and the russians actually. i made it clear repeatedly our policy is as i just

stated diplomatic political economic financial pressure. moving toward a peaceful democratic transition in venezuela that's what we want we've just learned that the attempted delivery of so called humanitarian aid on the team did just bridge crossing at the border of colombia and venezuela nearly turned into a bloodbath according to a report in bloomberg news two hundred exiled soldiers were preparing to clear the way for the aid trucks but the plan was actually scrapped by the colombian government. and why do we also learned was planning to tour european capitals after finishing his tour of latin america but the united states told him to return to venezuela for fears that the that his movement was losing momentum so this

suggests that it's not go i don't know who's calling the shots so much but it's actually the white house by simply recognizing opposition need to wangle i don't know as an as well as interim president the u.s. seems to think it's succeeded already in effecting regime change with the state department going so far as to berate journalists who say otherwise we have noticed in news coverage that some outlets are incorrectly referring to one guy joe as the opposition leader or the self-proclaimed president neither is correct relying on venezuela's constitution one guy joe became interim president of venezuela on january twenty third millions of americans and more than fifty countries recognize one by doe as interim president of venezuela they get this from your complaining because you sort of part of the but you don't think he made a complaint pointing out just trying to correct well that's all it's like

a complaint simply weak he's the easy interim president well and we don't want to consider him to be the interim president as you say fifty other countries. recognize him as the interim president but they're all more than a hundred members of the nation so they're fifty countries is not even close that it's time to act in support of democracy and news coverage of calling them the legitimate leader the president is going to intelligent more functional but we don't want to feed into the rhetoric of the current their gender. in a similar vein u.s. senator marco rubio also tried to school the media lambaste thing c.n.n. for using the term self-proclaimed when referring to go i doze suppose it interim president see said the phrase was used by russia to undermine the constitutional legitimacy of why doe's claim rubio even jokingly hinted at a possible collusion between c.n.n.

and moscow so let's take a look and gauge the state of world opinion on the matter of those legitimacy so we've got fifty four countries recognizing him as the leader of venezuela the rest of the world either supports nicolas maduro is neutral or backs the opposition run national assembly but without recognizing. and tuesday with a part in a ceremony commemorating the sixth anniversary of the death of his predecessor. the duras rivaled why don't mess with public sector unions urging them to take strike action to help bring down the government. ok let's bring in max bloom of our now who is editor of the gray zone which you can find online at gray's own dot com good to have you on max and we just kind of outlined the first topic i think worth discussing the state department could play me journalists don't describe what i don't know in the way that they officially do do they have any right to tell use organizations how to form an opinion. well the state department definitely doesn't have the right to tell journalists how to refer to figures that

they've appointed as the leaders of other countries but apparently they're accustomed to journalists toeing their line and that's the way it had been until last week with one wydow the self-appointed war self declared i would say washington declared in term president of venezuela and now he's been demoted by c.n.n. and by much of the media who are now sort of seeing that the coup has fizzled out that quite oh controls nothing but the backseat of a motorcycle maybe it's a triumph motorcycle and he's returned triumphant in that respect and they are referring to him as the opposition leader he is. it's also worth mentioning that a new poll by premier shows that party is only supported by six percent of venezuelans nicolas maduro and the pay suv party are firmly in control of the streets in much of venezuela as well as government ministries and most countries in the world do not recognize quite as the leader contrary to marco rubio's fuzzy math

you know the facts don't seem to quite back up the fed to complete assessment of the u.s. government what the u.s. government can control is direct action they take and they've announced seventy seven officials connected to material having the u.s. visas revoked forty nine more people have been put on the blacklist is that going to be effective to any kind of change. well there was a private meeting today in washington held by the council of the americas which is heavily involved with the right wing lima group it's david rockefeller's corporate roundtable for latin america that's really pushing this coup in venezuela and they hosted one of the key trump officials tarik funny who's designing these sanctions to kind of introduce foreign policy elites in washington to the new agenda which is to sanction everyone from nicolas maduro on down to his pet dog and probably the local dog catcher as well seventy seven new officials having their visas revoked is not necessarily going to change the situation in venezuela however there is

a concern within the venezuelan foreign ministry that this could affect their ability to represent venezuela at the u.n. which is supposed to be a neutral body i don't know if that would be the case but it would be an unprecedented escalation from the u.s. and in an attempt to completely disrupt diplomacy and so i think that's the danger there u.s. national security advisor john bolton has warned foreign financial institutions of possible sanctions if they conduct transactions that benefit the government. is the reach of washington really that global that they actually could pull that off in this kind of form of some kind of global police. well i think we're going to watch you know a reshaping of the world order or an acceleration of the reshaping of the world order which we saw take shape around syria where us regime change plans were flouted in this case what the us is doing is attempting to prevent venezuela's

government from receiving assets from oil sales by establishing a separate treasury account that countries and companies that buy the oil have to pay into mcclatchy today reported that there is deep concern within the trumpet ministration in washington foreign policy circles that the longer i'm a door remains in power the more likely it is that he will find alternative means of receiving assets for oil sales and we're now seeing russia begin to assist venezuela in refining the crude oil the heavy crude oil that it had previously relied on u.s. refineries for so long stays in power i think the more likely it is that these kinds of sanctions will flounder but we'll just have to wait and see how far the u.s. is willing to go good to speak to but here in the thoughts of max blumenthal editor of the gray zone if you like that you can find out more gray zone dot com.

ok police in london of investigated a suspicious package left in an entrance to the houses of parliament nabih confirmed the object was not dangerous but tensions are still heightened at the moment after three letter bombs were sent to separate locations in the capital on tuesday auntie's has details this is just really the pats and of incidents we've seen in the u.k. over the last few days that incident being deemed suspicious and a false alarm but just yesterday we've seen reports of three packages containing explosive devices found city airport heathrow airport and also will salute train station now. please have deemed that those packages weren't aiming to kill but were. explosive they were upon being opened by staff at those locations they caught fire and it's thought that they planned these two of them had

stamps or some kind of indication that they were sent from ireland but police are keeping an open mind and they're not concluding in any way that this is linked to any irish groups or anything to do with the while now finish conflict there but of course that remains one of the possibilities and also two universities the university of glasgow up in scotland at the university of essex also having some of their buildings and faculties being evacuated as well as a result of suspicious items so all of these seemingly to come together we've heard from the mayor of london that can he says that authorities are treating them as a linked series and although again the motive is unknown but it will only really heighten the sense of security here we saw two years ago a number of terrorist attacks in the u.k. and ever since then the terror or the terror threat level has always remained at

a very high level with authorities saying that an imminent terrorist attack could be just around the corner at any point so this will do nothing to lessen those fears and also do nothing to ease the worries of so or storage fees here. the russian and syrian militaries of issued a statement accusing american forces in syria of de railing efforts to evacuate people from the infamous camp roof and breaks down the story dramatic humanitarian and security situation and a lot of the bun camp in southeastern syria has been constantly triggering numerous concerns from the russian side that blamed america that is currently controlling this fast area along the demilitarized zone. between syria and jordan for severe living conditions of the refugees inside the camp that were among other things reportedly openly threatened by jihad is that not only had managed to settle in

that camp believes not without some help from the u.s. military on the ground but also to take control over some territories and also over humanitarian aid traffic seeing the area basically taking people inside the camp hostage both moscow and washington officials have repeatedly confirmed in fact that indeed some former or current islam is probably manage their way out of one camp russia has constantly been calling on some kind of rescue vaccination operation to take people out of the zone supporting this idea with the polls show in that most of the people are willing to leave this area and has constantly been calling on america to join the effort by damascus to help improve rather than deteriorate the situation of syrians inside these zone according to different estimates it is right now home to around forty thousand people eighty percent of

them women and children and earlier on wednesday we heard the statement from russia's defense ministry saying that america remains deaf america does not want to support any evacuation and rescue efforts the american stationed in the all time for zone failed to take responsibility for ensuring a safe and unhindered passage of humanitarian convoys through the fifty five kilometers own they are controlling this is essentially derailed the implementation of a highly important humanitarian operation aimed at rescuing syrian citizens trapped in the rueben camp and while the sides of blaming each other for what's going on inside the ragavan camp in south east in syria. there we have to admit that poor people trapped there continue to suffer and their fate remains quite unclear and we've contacted the u.s. led operation inherent resolve for its response or that you know what they have to

say earlier washington insists that it is ready for coordinated efforts with the u.n. to organize safe passage for refugees from the book by income russia's efforts the white house claims do not meet security standards u.n. coordinator mohammed set of golf is there could be dangerous consequences if refugees aren't evacuated. we should divert from the political issue that the american have with the syrian government or with the syrian people and look at the human side aspect of the people living in the camps. they can't by law they should not you know the should not prevent any community you know system to their camps is not just the call it is the way they live in the camps you have a family of the normal ten people living in one tent with their mother and crew and children and one of the sad stories that also we came across where they came across two is the dead we don't have a place to bury them in any camps outside syria you will see

a similar disaster there with. the flooding and the suffering of the children on boats refugee camps we might expect disease and we all saw would be. would be harboring extremism because when you when you don't provide dignity and this is when you have extremism and you see the issue would be increasing using you know the children. as a power weapon to take revenge. for the escape room phenomenon that spread across the world has sparked anger in greece where one game reference the holocaust in particular is based on the story of german businessman oscar schindler who saved more than a thousand jews during the second world war games website say players have to assist schindler in saving innocent people after the public outrage though the company changed the name from schindler's list to secret agent the story though that wasn't altered and the jewish community in greece has condemned it all i wish

is for them to take a trip to auschwitz to sense even for a fraction of a second the terror of death in a german concentration camp only then can there be hope that they no longer move to debase human suffering. and we put up for debate where the games light banter a good way of raising awareness of history. i mean it's a disgrace that today people are even thinking to make. toys of games abodes. such a game is part of this rise of fundamentalism there are many people who graduate from high school and don't know about the holocaust or don't know about auschwitz don't know the story of oskar schindler which in itself i think is a tragedy because i think it's important that we always remember what happened there let's be frank and clear with ourselves i mean you really believe that to make such a game we make people aware more by the locals know they just make

them playing a game we go to any real feeling about the issue we have been witnessing is the witnessing the last unit has games of both today about till all the young people even young muslims that want to just to repeat what they saw during the game and some of them even left their home on went to syria to iraq to become terrorists so you don't know when you produce such a computer each to such a game what would be the output what would be the result from what i understand it was certainly not something that was encouraging anti-semitism or making light of the holocaust but instead was putting its the users of this experience into an atmosphere in which they were encouraged to save the lives of other people who are under.