around admits it's accidentally shooting down ukrainian passenger jet on wednesday thinking it was a cruise missile the country's president says it's not forgivable mistake iran's foreign minister claimed washington's adventurism for the tensions that led to the damning while the u.s. secretary of state is grilled by reporters so be killing of iran's top general and the german chancellor holds talks with a lot of the putin in moscow touching on issues from the iran crisis in libya to energy supplies to your box. i. think also torched in paris where riot police have resorted to take gas as a protest against pension reform gets out of. good

evening she's gone 9 o'clock here in moscow you're watching r.t. international now iran's president hassan rouhani has apologized to the people of ukraine for the accidental danning of the ukrainian passions your pain on wednesday earlier on saturday the senior commander of iran's elite military unit the islamic revolutionary guard accepted full responsibility for the tragedy he said the boeing 737 had been mistaken for a cruise missile. were not heard that the flight had been shot down i wish there was as i never wanted to witness such a terrible incident he added in their defense system operator had faulty communications and had just 10 seconds to make what he described as a bad decision the commander added that they had requested the establishment of

a no fly zone before the incident but it wasn't approved for some reason earlier surrounded me to its military unintentionally hit the jet despite days. denials of any involvement in the downing. discussed what happened with jacking the. we heard from ukraine's president vladimir selenski who said that he expects he expects iran's take full responsibility and for the investigation to continue without any obstruction earlier today we did hear from iran's president who promised just that and called the event in an forgivable mistake. the armed forces internal investigation has concluded that regrettably missiles fired you see human error coups the horrific crash of the ukrainian plane and the death of 176 innocent people investigations continue to identify and prosecute this great tragedy and unforgivable mistake now iran's president also promised compensation for the families of the victims and the country's supreme leader has called for the for the

findings of this investigation to be made public now earlier we also heard from iran's foreign minister who gave actually highlighted the nother reason for why this crisis took place assad preliminary conclusions of internal investigation biome forces human error at a time of crisis caused by us a venture is a movement to disaster profound regret apologies and condolences to all people to the families of victims until with affected nations give us a bit of background here what exactly is the foreign minister referring to oh well just last week a u.s. airstrike killed a high ranking high ranking could command. soleimani and that brought tensions in the region to a level that we haven't seen in decades this guy was considered a hero to many in iran as he was instrumental for the defeat of isis in syria so the government promised harsh retaliation for his death and that came in the form of several airstrikes against u.s.

military bases in iraq that happened just mere hours before this plane went down so at that time the iranian military was intice a painting some sort of possible u.s. response to those strikes which explains why they thought that this airliner could have been an enemy aircraft they said that it was approaching a military installation clearly tensions were very high are there other cases of countries shooting down planes by mistake yeah unfortunately when tensions are this high like you said accidents are more probable for example during the cold war in 1903 the soviet union mistakenly shot down korean. air flight 007 thinking it was a spy plane the plane went into soviet air space at the time that a u.s. reconnaissance mission was going on as well and in 1908 u.s. navy shot down an iranian airliner killing all 290 passengers because they thought it was in the rainy and fighter jet now at that time then vice president george

h.w. bush said he had nothing to apologize for and that he didn't care about the facts regarding the shooting of that plane down iran's admission of guilt has shaken the public mood in toronto some questioning why the government didn't come clean. with us to talk about unfortunately when i 1st heard about the plane crash it was said to be a technical issue with the announcement came without any preliminary investigation . around the world but now they've done the necessary investigation it was clarified that the plane was going to miss we've been really since this morning when we heard the news and we were all angry that people told this line it was you why didn't you get after our flights should have been cancelled and planes shouldn't have taken off from any air force and that just about all of the country was in a state of war and this mistake could have been made by any country america. made a similar mistake after a rom hit the u.s. bases we were in total readiness and that's what led to the mistake we have heard

opinion from various experts on this developing story. in times of war and the so called for go for unfortunately the reasonable rate there are yet able to pierce this fog unless the reason be conflicting mechanism so again 3 1 can talk about blame and responsibility or accountability the blame is iranian but the responsibility lies on other shoulders too so iranian defense systems were on alert and they were expecting attacks by us planes as stated in the armed forces the statement there have been reports that some hostile objects flying objects have been appearing on radar screens in some of some parts around the country so soon as they saw a plane coming to a sensitive i.r.g.c.

base they have you know rushed to and jumped to the tank luzhin and fired strategic at has become tactical blunders the strategy off by that regularly being ordered closing down the a.s.p.'s under extreme circumstances could have avoided this whole nagell whenever we have volodyovski in that you'll be and we had bound to have mentioned raised guns cog coolidge's ready to fight the good will be said that you wish me to be have to be the case and the big picture to how to do use this and that you on how to be escalated this i believe did on ian's have taken the 1st step in the initiation process of this horrible accident in which $176.00 people were lost was done by the american to have the video and say yes that is true. well amid the heightened tensions between the u.s.

and iran activists in london upheld an antiwar rally it was organized by the stop the war coalition and the campaign for nuclear disarmament demonstrators have denounced recent military actions in the middle east as an act of war they've marched through the streets of london converging on trafalgar square here among the slogans seen were no to nato no to trump a no to war on iran earlier the activists were addressed by the labor party to jeremy corbin a rival demonstration supporter from sanctions was also held nearby. now the u.s. secretary of state has held his had a hard time defending washington's decision to assassinate iran's top general during a news conference might pompei i struggle to explain what imminent threat was posed by the general salim army full of more pain as more. things got quite easy at the press conference where we saw mike pompei o the u.s. secretary of state speaking alongside stephen the new shin the secretary of

treasury and this comes just a week after the killing of iran's top general qassam solomonic and as the press asked questions got particularly tense mike pompei o seemed a little bit uncomfortable trying to answer the questions of journalists who just don't seem to buy his claim that the killing of solomonic was necessary to protect american lives let's take a listen to some of what went on if you have specific information about the internet and didn't have anything to do with our embassies. we had specific emanation information on an imminent threat and those threats from included attacks on the u.s. embassies what is your definition of the internet. this was going to happen in american lives were at risk the intelligence community is not flawless we we get it wrong in this case the intelligence community got it fundamentally right there was an imminent attack that was active plotting is that right now gone with sort of money gone threats are never going now it wasn't just

the journalists who don't exactly buy pompei as claims but american lawmakers also have their doubts we just saw in the u.s. house of representatives the lower house of the u.s. legislative branch a resolution was passed attempting to restore it to the activities of the trumpet ministration and trying to prevent them from further escalating tensions with the islamic republic of iran however these doubts about whether it was the right thing in order to kill qassam solomonic go well beyond legislators and journalists they actually go to the us public itself we have new poll results that have been conducted and it shows that basically 2 thirds of the u.s. public believes at this point that the country is less safe because of trump's decision to kill the top iranian general furthermore 69 percent. then to the u.s. public believes that iran is more likely to attack the usa as a result of trump's decisions 52 percent describe trump killings qassam solomonic

as reckless so a pretty solid opposition to trump's killing of qassam solomonic among american people themselves while at the press conference mike peo and steve minutia laid out basically what these new sanctions will include the new sanctions are targeting high level officials in iran basically preventing any business transactions with them but when explaining these new sanctions a mike bomb peo used some rather interesting language to lay out what he argued was the ultimate end game of the united states when it comes to iran president said we don't want war we want iran to behave with your noble mission the reason that the secretary treasurer this morning is to continue this campaign our strategic effort to get to run to behave in a way that doesn't continue their 40 year long effort to terrorize the world if you hear those words he refers to saying that he wants iran to be a quote normal country so essentially it seems the united states is ask

a lady threats and carrying out more sanctions with the goal of forcing the islamic republic to conduct itself in a manner that the united states considers to be normal not exactly clear what that means but until that happens there will be further activities and sanctions and threats and what not now many are hoping that the current situation is in a state of deescalation but at the same time people worry about what could happen next you know the sanctions still remain iran still has the capabilities we saw the recent strikes that took place so a lot of nervousness in the global community at the moment you know i think air is still on sanctions at this point but i will get around to that again despite the fact that we dodged a bullet about going to war with iran our last few days were still in the same set piece positions where we were before and. all these guys around the president can think of us how do we turn the screws more more pressure more and more in the end this is the next thing i can do

a lot of this of this remember is aimed at the europeans i think a lot of this is toward pressuring the europeans to side with the americans in this fall pressure campaign. meanwhile there is growing concern among iraqis that the country's becoming a battleground between the u.s. and iran thousands of people flooded the streets of baghdad on friday calling for and then to the presence of foreign military in the country. demonstrators waving iraqi flags chanted no to america no to around the moderates caretaker prime minister has demanded of us make preparations to pull all of its troops out of washington has made it plain is not intending to leave but rather state for good is more gas the it pulls up most of us are familiar with the situation you invite someone over to stay a while say a friend they stay and stay and stay you drop

a hint you know it's getting late kind of tired but they just don't get it america is a force for good in the middle east any delegation sent to iraq would be dedicated to discussing how to best recommit to our strategic partnership not to discuss troop withdrawal what complicates things is that your unwelcome guest is heavily armed and has a tendency to how do you put this kill your other guests you can't make this up americans kill an arabian general in iraq iran then shoots back a bunch of ballistic missiles in revenge out of iraq i mean these poor rocky guys they've done nothing and everyone's bombing them so you can understand if they're a little sick of it all and point to the door we want to restart the civil war again among the shia we don't want this to happen we are not

a battlefield between the usa and iran so whoever wants to heed the usa should do that outside of this country. all of these troops must leave because they have turned iraq into a battlefield it's astonishing the americans are saying no we don't care that you voted for us to leave we won't and just in case that wasn't enough of a slap in the face actually going to call morrow. their friends over there rock nato played and then you have a middle east you'll call they told me i said what a beautiful name nato personnel in the region tell you they supposed it was to be honest with you because this is an international problem today and they need to delegation is at the state department to discuss increasing netas role in the iraq situation is absurd it makes a joke a mockery of international law and simple decency and as does anything absurd has

the internet buzzing and that is a force for good in the middle east a new start a civil war to prove you need our protection given military forces the against the wishes of the people who live there is called occupation when we said we wanted to bring you democracy we did not mean you can't use it to make your own decisions iraq asks u.s. troops to leave the country but president pompei o refuses instead his state department issues a statement the 1st sentence reads america is a force for good in the middle east remember if you say i am so cool then you're not cool there's a lesson here i suppose you can't be friends with a superpower they'll call you a friend no patch on the head but when push comes to shove you're just another poor bombed out nation that's going to do as you're told the middle east right i'm

betting at one place clannish appear as if you gave us their reaction to increasingly difficult 3 way clash. the pretext is you know we're out fighting for isis and there are we don't want them to come back but this is completely fabricated excuses to be honest because this is that. it is it is that i shammed it is they are iraqi it is that it really is our holy spirit. and this is their and very completely you know i don't believe there is a chance of this i mean. unless you have to wonder to come back and won 2 climbers then this is the only the only way for those that say to come back. i'm going to pull out. here today actually i'm going to lose the lucian. problem this is all part of the ratcheting up trying to show that iran is the one line that state iran

is doing things which are not really in the interest of the public and you know usa is is is good for the world but really i would like to say that you know what mr. trump was saying that they took every week but i think what would be a really good titan is that ari and me islamic republic middle east without the usa there then all of the problems that we have will disappear and then we could get to some truthful conversation and having a narrative which has some bases and a logical basis to any communication. in other news there have been more protests against pension reforms in france rallies in paris and other french cities have been joined by members of yellow 1st protest movement in the capital things have turned violent with police resorting to take us. i was.

i. i i. was. i. according to a local a.p. you 950000 demonstrators gathered in paris. about government plans to raise the retirement age and to unify the pension system on friday the government and the states bill but said it was open to alternative id's unions they were continuing their strike action. watching our table have. in a cup and it's. in

the united states presidential candidates debate the future of the u.s. and the world. max kaiser and stacy herbert dig into the burning questions of this election cycle. every week. tax student debt trade wars corporate money universal basic. and more catch up with what's front running this sunday exclusively on r.t. . no one else seemed wrong why don't we all just don't all. get to shape out just being become educated and in gains from it equals betrayal. when so many find themselves worlds apart we choose to look

for common ground. and. hello again i'm glad merkel has been holding talks with vladimir putin in moscow it is the german chancellor's 1st visit to the russian capital in 5 years and one of the key topics discussed was of course the iran crisis. almost a 1000000000 euros russia around germany support a further implementation of a joint plan for deal with iran the iranians have the right to realign the support of european countries that promised to create a special mechanism independent of the dollar for trade with iran. as the site of iran's in aus to date was a big error and it's good news that those responsible have been named i think now

everything possible must be done to find a solution together with the countries whose citizens were on board that plane to clarify it all. the situation in iran was indeed in the spotlight during the meeting between angela merkel and vladimir putin even though this meeting mine the 1st one in the kremlin between the 2 when the past 5 years had been prearranged back in december so way before the tragic events in iran but these events they have brought into the spotlight the reality of a major conflict in the middle east as how it has been showcased so vividly by iran and the united states of america sold leaders talked about all sorts of things like syria like libya and vladimir putin has talked about what sort of consequences a war in the middle east could have not just for the countries involved not just for the middle east itself but also globally to believe look at us when you do i

hope very much that we will avoid large scale military conflicts in the middle east if it comes to that it will be a disaster not only for the region much but for the whole world. for instance where i'm a putin talked about the potential humanitarian repercussions and consequences of a conflict in the middle east because while a refugee flow from the middle east to the rest of the world could be catastrophic if anything if a war on the ground was to break out also talked extensively about libya and about the fact how the hostilities in that country should cease in fact lattimer putin has expressed hope. this could happen as early as tomorrow because this was what he agreed on this is what he discussed and agreed on with the turkish president again turkey obviously being a major powerhouse in the region but the middle east wasn't the only thing on the agenda another big point is the nord stream to gas pipelines

a gas pipeline currently under construction from russia into germany to provide the whole of europe with the russian with the russian gas it was a major it is i should say a major bone of contention between germany europe and the united states because washington sees that washington doesn't want this doesn't want to see this pipeline it doesn't want this pipeline to be built so it has for instance european countries european contract is under sanctions it has threatened them with sanctions and european contract has had to pull out in the face of this threat of lattimer putin has stressed that russia is able and will finish the construction of this pipeline only to show you just said that while the finish the end of construction will be delayed by a few months because of that but also angela merkel that she has stressed how important this project for germany and from her standpoint to the whole of europe to here's what she had to say about it. this is 1st and foremost an

economic project we consider it to be the right thing to do and after today's discussion with president putin i believe it's possible to complete north stream to despite those sanctions. the tone of the meeting was neutral positive i should say in fact angela merkel she repeated at least twice that it is better to talk to each other rather than about each other so this could be an indication that russia and germany could drift closer towards each other in the near future because donna proportionable thomas fassbender a journalist and former businessman does think that she should not take care of its own economic and geopolitical interests. both 'd participants at the press conference commented on north stream to signal that they seem to be very confident that with a certain delay of some months or maybe a maximum year they will manage to get this project close i think i would

interpret this whole effort this coming back of miss miss miss america after almost 5 years as well i wouldn't go as far as say mission of failure but in a way the fact is that over those 5 years the whole foreign policy international foreign policy philosophy has returned to a sort of riyadh politic to the taking care of the we realize asian of physical job graphical economic own interests mrs merkel clearly understood but she's been allowing this to go too far because occupying the moral grounds is nice but if you have no tools in your hand to get any more of mileage on the road you are not not really in a favorite position. that camera man who's contributed to work in iraq city was shot dead on friday his colleague a reporter from a local news agency was killed in the attack on cross that davis' body. there's

only about 2 reporters one correspondent for a local t.v. channel his name is ahmed abdul some odd and camera man who also contributed to our . gali both of the reporters were shot dead in their in their car by unknown gunmen as they were leaving the site of the protests in basra group order earlier that there are protests going on all across iraq and of course basra is just one of those places local reports suggest a reporter. from a gunshot wounds to the head right there at the scene meanwhile ghale was at stake in. to the last with soul humor seen as a gunshot wound to the body and that's where it he died of fortunately as well. like i said. works contributed to our t.

he filed a police to 30 reports for our channel and i believe that we can take a look at some of those reports right now. ah the old law of the law and the law of the night to the 'd the so far we've heard from the committee for protection all for journalists international ground station they've called for they've called on the iraqi authorities suit investigate this as soon as possible to find out who exactly wore those gunmen and so why those journalists not to die. unfortunately this is not the 1st time an artsy contributor size i have after working of course back in 27 seen on 25 year old

a syrian reporter. i could but also died after isis that's acting with the rocket fire and of course we talked quite a quite a lot about that so unfortunately in this day and age it's not safe for reporters to be working either poultice or in places soulful or in i doesn't matter where they you're at war or you are in the city and anything can really happen and of course i want to express condolences to the families to the loved ones off both of my double some odd and the cameramen suffer golly i was out on the cost of their speaking to a city that's how things are looking so far today more from us and often.

trump is a new yorker and he looks at the global picture and he sees the tension in the middle east he sees iran doing a dance with the there and then the neighbors and there's like you know what let's just cut to the chase this is take out a guy in iraq and we're going to get more money printing right away because i want to make my document this weekend why fuss around this is the new york way of doing things i said it when he 1st got elected it's like ave york around the white house and i've been in new york around the world i'm a new yorker you know i got to tell you i'm one of them. but if she warned you didn't i do the dishes at the bazemore in the. new speech and she me you. know when you. mean is i mean that you're that infantile ball.