well. swedish prosecutors say they will reopen an investigation into a rape allegation made against wiki leaks co-founder julian assange and will seek his extradition from the u.k. . the u.s. secretary of state cancels a visit to moscow and heads to brussels instead to discuss iran's threat to read on its nuclear deal commitments from peers next stop will be russia or tehran it will also feature high on the agenda. i mean growing concerns over civilian deaths

from u.s. drone strikes to the pentagon developed what's been dubbed a mutant ninja missile it's a weapon with spinning blade mostly more accurate than existing technology. you're watching are changing national bring your live news update from our studio here in moscow welcome to the program. prosecutors in sweden have reopened an investigation into a rape allegation against wiki leaks co-founder julian a song swedish authorities had dropped the case in 2017 we go live now to polly boycott from london with more on this development. why is this coming out now. well these allegations date back to 2010 and the investigation into them was dropped in 2017 swedish prosecutors were unable to go ahead with the investigation

while a songe was essentially stuck inside london's ecuadorian embassy but when swedish prosecutors dropped the investigation they said that it could be reopened if the situation allowed so when a sondre was dragged out of london's ecuadorian embassy last month the woman that had made the allegations against him said that she would like the case to be reopened and that's precisely what has happened stockholm has requested julian assange has extradition to sweden take a listen to what the prosecutor had to say at a press conference a little bit earlier on. the news from the mine new circumstances have brought about the need to revise or previous decision after reviewing the current state of diploma near investigation my assessment is that there are still grounds to suspect the mysterious songe committed rape. now the statute of limitations on this case

expires in 2020 so there isn't much time for the swedish authorities to act of course a sun jewel star has a u.s. extradition request hanging over his head at the moment so there is kind of a legal model in place here and a pity is that only the home secretary is able to decide which of these cases should take precedence and sort of potentially allow the more pressing swedish case to be prioritized and it looks now that it's going to be a political decision as to where a song potentially is extradited to fast technically he can be sent to sweden and the u.s. can then sort of update its extradition request and request that he be extradited over to the u.s. from sweden but the u.k. would have to give sweden permission to extradite assange to the u.s.

as songes legal team would be able to challenge every one of those moves so we're looking at once again down the barrel of a very lengthy legal battle with 3 different jurisdictions in place now in asuncion has always rejected all the allegations the swedish allegations against him he's always said that he sought refuge in london's ecuadorian embassy not because he was afraid of being questioned in sweden but because he was always concerned that the swedish case was simply a pretext for a more serious u.s. extradition request where he could face serious charges for his publishing activities and we published the iraq war logs which are there is no government sort of diplomatic and military files they were deeply embarrassing to washington there's now that new tourist video. collateral damage which shows appears to show u.s. soldier. is killing iraqi civilians the wiki leaks editor kristen crafts and says

that this investigation has been dropped before that confident it could be dropped again and his son just team now is saying will this swedish case being reopened is an opportunity for julian assange to clear his name but the news today now means that we have 3 different jurisdictions 3 different countries involved in this a songe legal saga he's wanted in washington he's wanted in stockholm and in the meantime he's in prison here in the u.k. serving out his 50 week sentence for skipping bail back in 2012 political reporting live from london thank you for me bringing us the latest. for more on this or not joined by former ambassador and human rights advocate craig marie thank you for joining us on the program how unexpected was this decision coming from the swedish authorities. i think it was always quite

likely and i should say i think it's a decision to be welcomed because the alternative was for this accusation to be left hanging in the air which wouldn't be good for anybody in especially would not be good for julian because he would never have the opportunity to clear the way this calumny so i think you know this is not a number all can develop today and how likely do you think it is that the science will be extradited to sweden. well the swedish prosecutors now finally have to make up their mind because it's really nothing left to look at the police have had 7 years to investigate this they've interviewed all the witnesses they looked at any physical evidence interviewed you'd be in a sense 2 years ago in the ecuadorian embassy and they could have done that much earlier if they do agreed earlier to take up his invitation to do so. so really

what they've said is that the opening the case they have now to decide whether they are charging or not. the idea that he's still still going to persist with going for $12.00 over me and allegations is now nonsense that they have to now decide whether or not they're going to charge my own view is that it's very likely that a sensible prosecutor will decide there is insufficient evidence to charge in this case but we will see how about those 4. either way julian assange is looking at possible extradition to sweden possible extradition to the u.s. over a conspiracy charge which case will the u.k. prioritize. it's very difficult to know as far as i can judge it appears to be legally up to the home secretary to decide it doesn't seem to be any any way of forcing him to decide one way or the other in my own view. the swedish case do end up going to extradition requests the sweetest

case should be per ties there seem 3 very good reason for that the 1st is that obviously. is the more serious allegation. the 2nd is that the swedes were 1st if you like you know these allegations of those years before 6 or 7 years before the extradition request from the united states and the 3rd one was that the european extradition the european invest what is a very important multilateral treaty much more important than the discredited u.k. u.s. by about to the extradition treaty craig murry former you can boss there and human rights advocate thank you for joining us on the program today. thank. you a secretary of state mike pompei or has arrived in brussels for talks on iran but this e.u. counterparts just minutes before his flight he cancelled what was to be an informal visit to moscow that he intends to go to russia on tuesday for

a scheduled meeting with president vladimir it change a plan comes after tehran threatened to renege on its commitments under the iran's nuclear deal before setting off for brussels pump gave an interview in which he outlined the u.s. position towards the country. iran is the major destabilizing in influence in the middle east and we aim to fix that our aim is not war our aim is a change in the behavior. of the iranian leadership we hope the iranian people will get what they finally want what they did so richly deserved it wasn't expected but he's picked the right day to change these plans at the last minute because in brussels the foreign affairs council of the european union a meeting that means that all 28 member states foreign ministers are going to be in one place in one room as well as federica mockery need a high representative for foreign affairs of the e.u. basically the e.u. foreign minister all going to be in the same place at the same time we will be here

all day with a busy agenda so we'll see julian day and if we manage to arrange a meeting he's always welcome obviously but that i'm not precise planted at the moment as we continue to fully support the nuclear deal with iran as full implementation of it we agree with other e.u. states the nuclear deal is necessary for us security and it's gong to prevent iran from obtaining nuclear weapons well last week iran announced that it would not honor all of the aspects of the $2015.00 nuclear deal it came a year after the united states unilaterally pulled itself out of the deal in wealth wholeheartedly now following the u.s. is pull out of the agreement well the european union castigated them absolutely slammed washington for doing this saying that put at risk all of these months and months of work that went into getting the deal over the line back in 2015 of course when iran announced last week that they were intending to pull out of some parts of

the deal that also prompted well some discord within parts of the european union with some members then turning on iran and launching criticism at them iran has agreed to vital compliance measures if they break that deal and there will be consequences in terms of how european powers react so we urge the iranians to think very long and hard before they break. the end today nothing could be worse than iran leavin the agreement there are new sanctions today from europe because iran has so far always respected the commitments it has undertaken this commitment and not respected the question of considering the decision last week by to iran puts the european union in a pretty difficult position because they've been so strong in their backing for iran since the united states pulled out but what we've been hearing since that decision was made by iran what we've been hearing from the iranian president hassan

rouhani is that they don't want to pull out of the deal in total because that would essentially play into washington's hands the united states wanted to pull out of the g c p a way in order to make iran withdraw from a deal the day after so the u.s. would be able to refer the case to the u.n. security council to ease the burden on the shoulders of the u.s. to redouble and ratcheting up the pressure on iran iran did not fall into this trap so my pompei o heads to brussels the secretary of state will hold meetings we expect with the foreign affairs council of the european union to discuss iran further spare a thought though for those journalists that do travel with mr pompei or this is the 2nd last minute change of destination they face that is many weeks last week he was supposed to be heading here to berlin for a talk with angela merkel they took off from helsinki and at the last minute well the journalists were told you not going to they ended up in baghdad to talk about iran last week this week he's heading to brussels for more talks on iran on tuesday

though he will head to russia he'll be meeting president vladimir putin and foreign minister sergey lavrov in sochi i think we can just about expect that iran will be on the schedule for talks there he's in brussels on monday though we're expecting some information to come out throughout the day we'll be keeping you updated as information comes out of brussels of course here at r.t. . we now go back to our top story of swedish prosecutors reopening an investigation into a rape allegation against wiki leaks co-founder join a songe to get live reaction on the story we cross live to wiki leaks editor in chief chris and welcome to the program thank you for joining us now how unexpected was this decision for joy and and what does it mean for his case right now. well i have gotten accustomed to not to. be surprised by any event when it comes

to julian assange and this ready case. this was something that we were praising as for it. is this a good prosecutor will know is. it a case of the premier literary investigation into an allegation julian assange has always been ready and willing to cooperate with the swedish investigation throughout the years and i assume that he will welcome this opportunity to ready clear his name and. get this matter over ready and done with. and what are these grounds for the allegations do you know if any evidence has been provided by the authorities. well it so happens that. which is very unusual in the case with sweden and. most other countries that the documents pertaining to the investigation have been leaked out from the sweetest police or the prosecutor's

office so it's a readily away level to people online so everybody can basically take a look and know that and. have not come to some include conclusion whether it's fair to categorize and use that word rape in the what is described there we know from text messages that. came from the women and wall that they were railroaded by the police according to their own words that they never wanted this to go to this. go ready this far. there are many of the normal ptes in this highly critical politicized process which pertain to julian's push issue and. worldwide. the crown prosecution service in the u.k. was in the driver's seat in this pays it seems according to the e-mails that were obtained sort of freedom of information requests. e-mails that were deleted to on

the the u.k. side but a little tain from sweden they show that this weekend wanted to close this case as early as 2013 when we closed the case was closed in 2810 originally and again in 2017 and now a 3rd attempt is being made so does that make it in your opinion that it's possible that there was a lot of political pressure on sweden to pursue this case. of course there is political pressure it's obvious and it has surfaced we've seen that in the media. and everything that pertains to julia stiles these days is politicized highly politicized the handling of the affair by the swedish authorities have been highly criticized by the united nations. committee and. it is very hard to see that that he has an opportunity to install to a fair trial in sweden in the u.k.

or in the united states especially because that is exactly what these are all pertains to. and onward extraditions united states to face trial for publishing the truth do you think that is possible that a song to actually be extradited to sweden. well as we heard on from the press conference earlier this morning it is up to the ready united kingdom to decide whether they actually diet him to the united states or the or to sweden. so the u.k. authorities are involved that the swedish prosecutor also says that it will be the matter for the united kingdom with ortiz to decide whether he will be onward lee extradited from sweden to that is it's. was probably means and current political atmosphere a basically a rubber stamp we are fighting here in india it's a an indictment and prosecution before

a secret jury in the united states or publishing truthful information that's the heart of the matter. if it does come down to what the u.k. authorities decide is best how likely do you think which case will they prioritize . no idea well how they will or will but they will decide but let me be absolutely clear about this it will be a political decision 1st and foremost justice. is long gone from that entity when it comes to julian assange yes no justice at all. we all know that as large went and sought refuge in the ecuadorian embassy because he feared extradition to sweden meant extradition to the us in the end stockholm get some for us how likely is he to end up getting into washington's hands later on. when i was referring to the worst of the swedish prosecutor who basically said that it was the u.k. authorities would have to consent to it. let's not forget sweden doesn't have

a. totally. good history when it comes to cooperation with the. u.s. u.s. authorities or the most disgraceful rendition for example out of stock called where a refugee was thrown into the hands of the cia and onto organization plane and stroll into egypt where he faced torture so. anything can happen to. the wiki leaks editor in chief kristen happens and thank you so much for your time and your unique insight on the story you. the pentagon is said to have developed a secret weapon it's a missile with spinning blades nicknamed the ninja bomb intended to reduce civilian casualties in drone strikes it's designed to be more accurate than explosives are to scale up and reports. drone warfare has long been part of the u.s.

government's war on terror and it's gotten ugly on more than one occasion. killing people by these drones basically sitting on a screen and eliminating people. dehumanizing them treating them. as if you know from some other planet not giving them a basic right of proving their innocence i mean that it violates norms of justice on top of that it's all classified so leaking the methodology behind what human rights groups have called a method for extrajudicial executions can get you in a lot of trouble for daniel hale an n.s.a.

officer and now suspected whistleblower that could mean up to 15 years in jail that echoes chelsea manning say she's just recently been released from jail for refusing to testify before a grand jury but she could return soon as she's already got another subpoena now to be fair u.s. leaders have long talked about their deep conviction over civilian deaths the architecture of the legal texture around the use of drone strikes or other committed strikes wasn't as precise as it should have been and there's no doubt that civilians were killed but shouldn't have but. i think that over the last several years we have worked very hard to avoid and prevent those kinds of tragedies from taking place apparently it was us president barack obama who ordered the creation of a new missile device that would increase the percentage in accuracy of these predator drone strikes and minimize civilian casualties it's apparently called the

ninja bomb now it may be the pentagon's worst kept secret they have not officially confirmed it but so far several military officials have said that it's being used it's argued that the new missile might enhance the image of the united states in the countries that are already subject to u.s. military drone strike operations unlike a regular missile it doesn't explode instead it deploys 6 below. lades that fanned out of its casing moments before impact blades are so sharp they can cut through vehicles and slice their target into pieces so we've got blades flinging through the air in order to reduce civilian casualties sounds plausible enough apparently the new ninja bomb has already been used in iraq libya syria somalia and yemen now the mastermind behind the suicide bombing on the u.s.s. cole back in the year 2000 was apparently taken out by a ninja bomb in january according to pentagon reports so is this new missile the answer will it improve the image of the drone strike program in the eyes of the

american public what do you think of the drone strike program. ok with it i know nothing about it it's pretty awful actually we have this thing now called a ninja bomb and what it is is it and when it detonates it sends blades through the air and the idea is this will minimize civilian casualties we can pick the terrorist we want to kill send the ninja bomb and fewer civilians will be killed you know that the blades killed. terrorists and not the civilians it doesn't seem like that you can target maybe specific people with that seems like you'll just. spread out a lot of. a lot of damage i think that's also did a pretty good program them limit civilian casualties you're going to do not that's not happening i think if somebody suggested that that. i had i don't think that is even real i don't think it really. will reduce civilian casualties i think this is a. pretty sickly propaganda whatever you want to put it that way to make people

feel that there is a kinder gentler way of killing people when in fact this is through sasa nation which. you want a declaration of human rights i think this is some way of trying to placate the public in the united states and probably remorse or around the world with the technology is right now the kind of perception that they're talking about. this essentially you know possible and the notion of assassination whether precise or generalized is still totally unacceptable we have asked the pentagon to comment on the reports and i'll let you know when we get a reply. u.s. president donald trump wants attorney general william barr to begin investigating the front runner for the democratic presidential nomination joe biden that's over his alleged meddling in ukrainian political affairs something biden did not as democrats say trump is just trying to get rid of

a strong opponent it goes down of picks up the story. he is an american politician of such scale that he might even get a holywood produced bio pic appearing in theaters his son is an entrepreneur doing business with other countries and some people suspect that the father of political shotgun is using his reputation of fire power to make sure his sons business doesn't sail into choppy waters this is what you may have heard in the news for years about donald trump and his son trump jr yet now it's the story about trump's 2020 democratic rival joe biden and his son he has already got a trump trademarked nickname and in fact has been on the president's mind for a while one of the democrats. said that he he sleepy person. said that he heard from

a lot of foreign leaders and they want him to be president of course they do so they could continue to rip of the united states and. i said general can we give kids. i felt like joe biden to but this time it's more than just junior school style name calling because trump suspects biden pulled quite a number of diplomatic leavers to have a prosecutor who was making his son's business difficult fired outrageous behavior if it had happened in america and perhaps even worse though since all of the above allegedly happened in another country in ukraine in fact before announcing his presidential ambitions biden gave plenty of reason for speculation. a commitment from poroshenko they would take action against the state prosecutor and

they did. not get the hugo or i so you know i guess. bill you know i'm going to be leaving here i think it was about 6 hours i looked as i'm reading that 6 hours that the prosecutor is not fired you're not getting the money oh son of a. house fire trump almost sent his lawyer rudy giuliani to ukraine to investigate but giuliani canceled this trip because the fallout was ferocious explain to me why biden shouldn't be investigated if his son got millions from a russian loving crooked ukrainian only gold while he was vice president and point man for ukraine ukrainians are investigating and your fellow dems are interfering election is 70 months away let's get now and when i say ferocious i mean for roche us. it is highly unethical for the president's personal lawyer to tell me what visuals from

a foreign government to see if they can influence somehow the upcoming presidential election we've had enough of that we will do everything we can up to the breaking of the wall it's a very it's a but trail of democracy to work with other countries to affect our elections it's just a flat out betrayal. to donald trump and his ties his campaign's ties to the russians were going to investigations i mean an investigation with a snapshot of prosecutor donald trump is either going to be impeached by the congress or impeached at the ballot box the fact that you may not be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt occurred criminal conspiracy doesn't mean that there's an absence of evidence of a crime seriously mr president old you horses stop this persecution it's funny though the democrats never seem to like it when the tables turn even if there is hard you know hard feeling of it and that something could be very foul here

after all they conducted this. false investigation for the last 2 years costing taxpayers millions and millions of dollars really just abusing this president has family why would the democrats not now say that if there's an allegation of a possible president out in front of an election why would the democrats not want that followed through and why would they even want to nominate somebody who look this suspicious to me they should be the ones calling for the investigation and the scandal shows the intensity of america's political desire for justice while trump must go down by you can get a pass after all is a true ones favorite ground. that's our global news update for this hour but don't forget you can always had to our website are 2 dot com the details on all those stories and many more.

hello and welcome to crossfire we're all things are considered people about donald trump as foreign policy is on steroids and the game is called forced regime change and like a flu that won't go away russia gate appears to have a life even if you're down. cross talking some real news i'm joined by my guest here in moscow dimitri but he's a political analyst we spoke to international and in france we have john laughlin he is a lecturer in political philosophy at isis the catholic university then d. or a german cross-talk rules in effect that means he can jump in anytime you want let me go to john 1st in france i came across a wonderful article most of his articles are wonderful. by pat buchanan titled all

of the world's.