a huge fire in. paris bringing down the roof. officials though say the main part of the structure has been saved. france reels from the shock of the cathedral fire. is now in jail following politicians hold a media conference outside to show their support for a man they see as a hero look at the media's shock over the whistleblower. and human rights organizations. to the u.s. we spoke about his experience with the u.s.

administration has been mobilized now. in trying to silence. international human rights defenders. you are joining us this hour. a race against time to save the cathedral in paris a huge blaze has brought down the buildings and roof that have been preserved president claire the situation and national tragedy and pledged to restore the building is our correspondent with more details. we know the firefighters have been working throughout the evening trying to dampen down those flames we even heard that they had decided not to use aerial water bows is because they wanted to ensure

that that frame didn't collapse and it looks like those reports coming through now that they have been able to secure that so some incredible news that stephanie given people here some good some cheer in fact we've had people singing throughout the evening trying to keep their spirits up as they've been watching this fire unfold a jewel in the crown of not just paris but in wolf heritage went up in flames unfitting very. close to zero to france which is burning reduces zero to france's desert of paris she's with the first king was crone says really huge trauma is from and even some tree from certain century everything is disapproving and defy you know to today in twenty one century a little underbelly is a very beautiful symbolic of. our country enough our city of paris it's like

a monuments in the literary reason you tell you go and so that's a part of our culture and we are losing tonight and that's very sad for this but we still don't know what that damage is inside because when the fire is finally put out then we will see what's happening they'll start to assess that damage i do want to tell you a couple things that have also been happening tonight when news of this fire not spread out the church bells at certain churches across the city rang their bells in solidarity to show that they will all thinking i'm not dumb our lady as it is in english now we also know that there's some other good news is being coming through and this is what we saw earlier which looked like the fire fight is the. they were up with their lamps in two bell towers those iconic bell towers of not to the dam looking for anything that could be saved through industry and that a number of works of art have been rescued from this fire they are not damaged

that's incredibly good news in terms of the heritage to try and preserve that for not the dump and we also understand that the crown of thorns this was probably one of the most iconic and important relics that was contained in not that has also been rescued that is a relic that dates back to at least the fourth century although catholics believe that it was actually the crown of thrones that cheeses a war just before his crucifixion so an incredibly important relic to the catholic church here in france and it's considered indeed to be paris's own crown jewels of that crown of thorns as well as many works of art and of the relics have been saved by those firefighters who have been working tirelessly throughout the evening at this cathedral it's not just the building it's the heart of paris it was built all those years ago to represent paris being the economic the political and the

cultural heartbeat of france and it remains just that twelve million people visit it every year it's the most visited site in paris possibly one of the most visited sites across the world but what we do know is that restoration work that was underway to try and stop it crumbling unfortunately hasn't done anything to stop this majestic crown jewel of france this french gothic architecture and architecture superbly example going up in ashes tonight but that good news coming through in very much welcomed by the people here that it looks like the construction itself has been saved as well as a number of. works of art and import relics all have been rescued from the grips of that fire since the fire broke out around six in the afternoon local time crowds have been gathering near the not for dawn praying for the cathedral to be saved

local church officials are among those crowds. at the at the legal or somebody did you need to leave for us catholics it is a symbol of unity of vision on that it is a place that has seen the great historical event. since it had thirteenth century and it houses a holy relic statements like i fit a central sun which we were about to start or used to celebrations in iraq the pope the did your the world is sharing in francis shock the russian orthodox church called the fire atrocity for the whole christian world leaders of numerous countries have also expressed their condolences to the french nation. these horrible images of not to dawn on fire painful not true damas a symbol of france and of all european culture all thought so with all french

friends not your darm in flames a motion of the whole nation thought for all catholic and french people like our compassionate same sad tonight to see this part of us burn so horrible towards the massive fire at the notre dame cathedral in paris perhaps flying water tankers could be used to put it out must act quickly and following the not true for minute by minute not today on the prairie belongs to all humanity what a spectacle what horror i share the emotion of the french nation which is ours as well our lady of paris is our lady of all of europe we are all with paris today. the incident to notre dame is a catastrophe for france as well as for us being in europe frames a demotion eight hundred fifty years of history i could see a chip engine and sculpture it to we card to forget it france can counter mouse in order to recover the greatness of its heritage my thought so we the people of

france tonight and with the emergency services who are fighting the terrible blaze it not uncomfy drove. it up to them cathedral was built in the twelfth century and has seen multiple restoration projects over the years the latest one was started just this year after officials warn that the entire structure was crumbling and in danger of collapse the cathedral is one of the most popular tourist attractions in europe pulling in thirteen million visitors every year. wiki leaks co-founder julian assange is now in prison the head of a hearing next month for extradition to the united states. have spoken to the media outside the jail. door and embassy and last week's arrest. as the details. i'm outside belmarsh prison where julian assange is being held in custody is a category a prison in south east london now earlier today members of the german bundestag and

the european parliament were in front of the prison holding a press conference protesting against a scientist's arrest they believe it sets a dangerous precedent worldwide for journalists. journalists he's a whistleblower and needs international protection and not the criminal criminalization we recently he gave. truth he delivered to provide the truth to the public about the war crimes you rock and afghanistan and therefore he should be awarded to criminalise he said most of this into the night. his accusers as pure as he can be in prison for all their lives and it's not fair because we all want the now's the cases that corruption cases the right information to the site to people in the wrong now the spanish m.e.p. and a memorandum of the times talking to

a lawyer where she received an official invitation from the ecuadorian embassy to visit a songe on monday however this was of course not possible over the weekend we had there were many supporters hair right outside belmarsh prison carrying banners with the phrase don't shoot the messenger instead it's clearly in the sanchez arrest we've seen an outcry from an international audience regarding the central extradition to the united states. if anything though this made people more aware about the revelations of wiki leaks and about questioning people and political power but the people i spoke to earlier the jim and p's and the spanish i mean paid well they believe some kind of this information campaign is starting against this song and they're very concerned about the potential extradition haring to be held on may the second. debates over whether the we can leaks co-founder julian a song is a criminal or a journalist is continuing to heat up when the u.s.

in fact has done killing himself out of exchange with some politicians here is his firsthand account. well the house foreign affairs committee tweeted democrat eliot engels statement in support of julian assange just prosecutions saying he is in fact a tool of lattimer putin and the russian intelligence service know there's never been any evidence that proves let alone suggest a connection between we q leaks and the russian state or russian intelligence furthermore we could actually published embarrassing information not only about the united states and its allies but also about russia that we could be exposed file series revealed more than two hundred documents about russian surveillance contractors so i responded with a tweet saying angle statement is an endorsement of president trump attack on press freedom and i called it absolutely reprehensible now the house foreign affairs committee came back at me tweeting quote the first amendment protects free

expression even for russian propaganda outlets like the one you work for it doesn't protect criminals who weaponized stolen information and i thought this was revealing for a number of reasons assad just charged with allegedly helping chelsea manning log in to a department of defense computer under an alternate identity computer that manning already had access to not weaponized stolen information and that's a reference to publishing stolen or perhaps a leaked e-mails from the campaign to prove that the democratic primary was rigged in favor of hillary clinton and against bernie sanders but it also shows what many have argued that this charge is a thin veil for in the words of a guardian op ed to punish those who expose embarrassing secrets about its actions about the united states actions now on top of that assad has not yet been

extradited if he even will let alone tried in the united states and there are two men. it's in the u.s. constitution to talk about due process and there was a concept called innocent until proven guilty so the house foreign affairs committee has declared songes guilty for a crime that he's not even been tried for so this i think many would argue that this really reveals the true nature of his prosecution and we've seen many american politicians celebrating his arrest senator joe manchin even went as far as saying he's our property the property of the united states though a few like democratic presidential candidate told see gabbert have come out in his defense as has the american civil liberties union they've also criticize songes arrest but they have been in the minority. getting that much support in the media once hailed as a hero outlets now appear largely to have turned on him painting him as

a villain or guys the looks at what's behind his fall from grace. you want to see just how radically the media you turned on a songe from champion of the press to a leper an outcast all you need to do is watch saturday night live it's comedy but boy does it hit home. thanks to wiki leaks you can see how corrupt governments operate in the shadows and then lie to those who elect them thanks to facebook you can finally figure out which sex and the city character you are i've attacked u.s. military. because i'm an actor james bond supervillain and i'm one step away from destroying the god. because reality is entirely less funny what our songes faced a tidal wave of smear really ugly stuff a little over a decade ago the us military declared war on wiki leaks drop

a plan which was actually need a plan to discredit it and terrorize whistleblowers and it looks like they're winning. wiki leaks uses trust as a center of gravity by assuring insiders leakers and whistleblowers who pass information to wiki leaks personnel or who post information to the website that they will remain anonymous the identification exposure terminations employment criminal prosecution legal action against current or former insider is leakers or whistleblowers could potentially damage or destroy this center of gravity and deter others from considering similar actions from using the wiki leaks website back then at the turn of the decade as sanj was a hero how the pundits cheered his leaks exposing bush era war crimes exposing the elites corporations politicians how they loved him for it was outstanding

journalism their words he was given on or after on or including the economist's new media award back then we get leaks was news wiki leaks is an online news organization that specializes in publishing documents alleging government and corporate misconduct we invited judean a song editor in chief of wiki leaks and in pity. how times have changed what was news in two thousand and ten is enemy propaganda now journalistic hero or enemy agent asks the same economist neither reads the subtitle just a useful idiot who the economist awarded for his stellar journalism or take a magazine who gave their front cover to a songe in two thousand and ten now they run virtual hit pieces quoting and

headlining anyone that doesn't like a songe it seems be it hillary clinton or a judge that met him once and labeled him a narcissist gets much dirtier uglier out. outlets that have historically supported and cheered america's wars such as the atlantic put out feces packed hate mails or the equivalent of musingly enough the hack behind this story first calls out assad just permissibility with facts and almost immediately after says this artist tagline his question more and indeed one might inquire how it came to pass that the spin off of a kremlin propaganda organ and now registered foreign agent in the united states first arrived on the scene i stand ready to answer your inquiry unlike other networks and publications who all learned at the same time that might be leaving

the embassy we could leaks told everyone unlike them we took it seriously we went and documented what happened this is called journalism journalism like what i songe did when he exposed various war crimes he's a publisher buz he's a journalist he. and the material that he leaked we know from the pedestrian mails from the logs is real and credible and was published by mainstream organizations once it was released by wiki leaks the very news organizations that over many days over several decades outlets the documents that wiki leaks provided almost instantaneously once those documents route turned on assigned him so that rate prodding from the national security state so of course there was an effort to discredit and to carry out of very sustained and

unfortunately quite effective. character assassination of the shah assigned to isolate him and demonize him in the eyes of. at the end of the day come on we all know the exact moment these people turned against their former hero. maybe you're kind of picking up where julian a songe was before he went bad because we used to like you know we used to really be doing a good service and then something happened i guess is he. maybe as would turn to him basically into someone who was a russian. aide really yes yes of course he did he never did anything wrong she was perfect wasn't she. let us go back to our top story now fire is still raging at the not to dawn cathedral in paris and the roof of the twelfth century gothic landmark have collapsed these are

live pictures that we can show you by the way of the current state of affairs at the location the main structure though has been a stand has been preserved including the two towers it's one of the most prized architectural treasures in europe are the heart of french catholicism hundreds of firefighters are working at the scene and the paris fire commodity says they will keep going through the night to cool down the structure. wooden cross live now to fill a former firefighter from florida to get some more expert insight on this thanks for joining us good to have in the program today the fire has been burning for just about seven hours now just a bit over that judging by the latest pictures that are coming in how close do you think the crews are to finally putting putting it out. i believe that they're going to be there probably i would imagine anywhere from a to another twenty four hours they're going to take their time extinguish and try and preserve at the same time

they want to try and find the root of the fire which they obviously can't tell if it was arson yet most likely it was not i know that they were working on the lead in the stained glass windows and that involves soldering soldering you know can be one of the many. ways which the fire could have started. and president michaelmas praised the the work of the firefighters the professionalism in dealing this fire in particular saving the main part of that structure the two towers of particular obviously the spire itself has collapsed how would you assess the job they've done so far judging by what you've seen. well you can bet the ranch so to speak that the firefighters in paris they they went all out for this this is an iconic structure as we know has been standing in paris for over eight hundred years with that besides the stone it's all timber so within

minutes i mean they did a spectacular job from what from what i've seen i've been watching all day keeping the other towers wet so they'd be hard to catch fire when this fire fell you know it takes everyone's breath away but they're trying to preserve not only the structure but the priceless all works that are within the building i would say they did a tremendous job. if i bring as we do it's a bit of an export because as you say obviously there's not i've been battling the fire outside they've been going inside trying to rescue those those artworks the relics the icons that cetera i mean imagine presume that's quite a dangerous toss given the scale of the intensity of the fire we've seen at the location. yeah well a fire once it grabs and it spreads rapidly not only is it the visibility is bad as you can imagine smoke bankstown it's actually

a positive thing when the fire breaches the roof because it vents it it actually gives you more of the visibility within it but fire in buildings like that they will spread rapidly and what if i said to firefighters from what i can gather just from what i've seen they've done a tremendous job just to save the other two towers is an amazing accomplishment we are running out of time but just briefly the cause is unknown as yet investigators are looking into it do you think this could have been down to a lapse of safety regulations at the location or some other cause perhaps that was one of my first. my mind went right there what kind of fire suppression systems were set in place i mean it's a cathedral you know and it's iconic and you have tourists coming every day thousands of them you don't you know they want to keep the aesthetics of the building but while keeping fire safety is number one it's

a real tough balance i don't know the system that they had in place but i do know that a building that is eight hundred plus years old the timbers are dry and once they catch fire it spreads rapidly. all right phillips runs for firefighter joining us there from florida with his expert insight thanks for joining us good to be on the program today. a prominent palestinian activist has been prevented from flying to the u.s. from israel despite having a valid visa omar barghouti is the co-founder of movement to boycott israel and what it considers the jewish state's oppression of palestine we spoke to him to get his side of the story. i was. prevented from boarding a flight airport because under instructions from the u.s. consulate u.s. immigration have banned me from entering the u.s. despite having a valid visa and valid travel documents we see this as outsourcing it's

mccarthy antidemocratic repression against the b.d.s. movement for human rights in palestine to the united states the us administration has been mobilized now to do israel's bidding in trying to silence palestinian israeli and international human rights defenders who are active in this extremely important and very effective nonviolent b.d.s. movement or human rights groups have expressed outrage at washington's decision calling it the politicization of borders so far american authorities have refused to comment insisting all information relating to the case is confidential he was traveling to the u.s. to take part in a speaking tour of several prominent universities including panel discussions with policymakers and journalists as well. the co-founder co-founded the boycott divestment and sanctions movement known as b.d.s. that was back in two thousand and five now the aim of it is to call on the international community to stop supporting israel and its companies it also seeks

to return the west bank territory to palestinians and israel look uses the movement of being anti semitic dan dyker director of the jerusalem center for public affairs says the decision to deny barghouti entry was not arbitrary. i think that is the that's the argument that we're hearing all over the place is that this is what they call the shutting of mouse in the and the closing of free and the prohibiting prohibition of free speech but this is not the issue of omar barghouti all more barghouti from the united states' point of view is a foreign agent with terror links to the islamic jihad p f l p hamas and other designated terror organizations by the united states and europe so they don't like to have those types of terror linked individuals coming into the united states or to date overhauls of all u.s. states have introduced laws penalizing boycotts against israel earlier this year the senate passed the bill allowing states the time when it contracts with entities

which support the boycott movement of mobile duty again says this legislation comes from fear of the movement growing in popularity the u.s. supreme court ruled that boycotts for political social and economic change are considered free speech protected by the first amendment of the us constitution so all those twenty seven states are following israel's orders basically but they're violating their own u.s. constitution we will challenge that we are challenging that in u.s. courts a.c.l.u. is challenging at least if three states on their anti-democratic. laws and we think we will prevail and that struggle israel is trying to suppress b.d.s. from above by passing laws because it has miserably failed to stop the immense growth of the movement at the grassroots level among the trade unions churches women's groups energy groups and so on and so forth join us again in thirty minutes for the latest global news updates.

after the previous stage of my career was over everyone wondered what i was going to do next the hope the ball different clubs on one hand it is logical to signal from fields where everything is familiar on the other i wanted a new challenge and the fresh perspective from time used to surprising. or not if you think. i'm going to talk about football not three or else you can think i was going to go. by the way ways of the slide here. when lawmakers manufacture consent to instant of public wealth. when the ruling classes to

protect themselves. when the financial merry go round lifts only the one percent until. it's time to ignore middle of the room signal. to leave the room for the real news is really. one else to show it's seemed wrong when all rolls just don't hold. any gold yet to shape our disdain comes to advocate and in games from an equals betrayal. when so many find themselves worlds apart we choose to look for common ground. up.

hello and welcome to crossfire all things considered i'm peter lavelle on this edition of the program we discuss one in one issue only the fate of julian assange and the fate of journalism itself. talking astonishing i'm joined by my guests here in moscow is a very moreau he's the founder of the center of political strategic analysis trap and in france we cross with john laughlin he is

a lecturer in political philosophy at i says the catholic university of and.