moscow lambaste berlin for failing to provide any evidence for germany's claim that russian opposition figure have. was poisoned with a chemical nerve agent. if there was any data he would work with them there is no data there are only statements amounting to megaphone diplomacy. also this hour the u.s. says it won't take part in an international cooperate of effort to develop a covert vaccine because it's led by the world health organization. and washington has imposed sanctions on senior officials at the international criminal court after it started cropping alleged u.s. war crimes.

you're watching r t international coming to you straight from the russian capital 247 welcome to the program this hour. moscow says that it fails to understand what prompted berlin to claim that russian opposition leader and expand on it was poisoned by a nerve agent a spokesperson dmitri peskov also revealed that the russian president and german chancellor haven't discussed the issue on wednesday berlin announced it had found traces of never choke on the volley meanwhile the president of belarus has claimed that the country's security forces have intercepted a call which cast doubt on berlin's poisoning allegations. we have intercepted a call as we understand between warsaw and berlin that clearly sounds it's all a full sophistication. didn't take place. they have done it to discourage putin from interfering in the internal affairs of belarus. the kremlin

says it has no details on the claims as of yet and they have not been verified the german chancellor angela merkel also spoke about the case on. thursday your offer has the details. well i'm glad merkel speaking here in live alongside the swedish prime minister stefan levin briefly touching on alexina vile me and saying how germany would respond to russia depended on russia right now and how it responds to those allegations that came out on wednesday as it stands moscow is far from happy with at the moment in the way that that announcement on wednesday was made what we've heard from the fact that a press conference was called before the russian ambassador had been summoned to the foreign office before. being told that this was going to be this announcement was going to be made. of the russian ambassador said that once he was summoned to

the the foreign ministry he wasn't given any facts about the allegations being made now the kremlin spokes person to me to the press golf has said on thursday essentially they can't comment on what they haven't seen in relation to the the evidence to back up the claims that alexei navalny was poisoned using a novel nerve agent while the foreign ministry in moscow has accused berlin of what it called make a phone diplomacy. i would be very cautious when talking about any accusations against russia in this case after all there is no valid reason to make any we hope that we will be able to determine what happened and why we are interested in that we want it and we need the information from germany for that matter if there was any data we would work with that there is no data there are only statements amounting to megaphone diplomacy because their view is by foreign ministry attacks many were waiting to hear what the doctor has to see the doctors in syria there.

and provided facts and data that's not something we see here is the why of why would be poisonous. raising a lot of questions in russia we've heard from the heads of russia's foreign intelligence service who said that the situation regarding the family raises more questions than it does and says the statements coming out of raising more questions than they do answers he also said that the tests carried out in russia were there as far as he was going sir and the kremlin spokesperson to be to the press corps of also saying that he's far from sure who would benefit it all from poisoning alexina valley. i can't answer the question of who would benefit from the poisoning i don't think anybody would benefit from it the tool. the german foreign minister heiko muss on wednesday said that day at demanding answers and they're looking to russia for those answers it's an informant soon it is obvious that one of the leading

opposition figures in russia has been poisoned especially iceland were 3 of the armed forces came to a clear conclusion that alex enough money was poisoned with a substance from the know which a group he's the victim for crime someone tried to shut him up. we demand an investigation into the poisoning of alex he now while we condemn this boy's name and in the near future will hold consultations and how you can adequately respond to it would depend on russia's response to the case chancellor merkel has said that the eyes of the world are looking at the alexei navalny case right now alongside her on thursday speaking in the chancery was stefan live in the swedish prime minister he called for a full investigation into find they out what happened to mr de lay that's followed on from similar calls from british prime minister boris johnson for. on the line the e.u. commission president also the french prime minister as well all saying that there

needs to be a full investigation in condemning what's being alleged by germany as the poisoning of legs in the valley we've also heard on thursday. a from the senior spokesperson for the of e.u. foreign affairs that's peter no he said that the readiness of moscow to cooperate had pleased the foreign office so far also said that an investigation should be conducted by moscow during that press briefing he wrapped up was asked a question about spiritual sanctions against russia from the european union over the election of on the case he said that any sanctions were down the line from now that there needed to be an investigation 1st it was up to moscow to carry out that investigation and then anything further would be discussed once they had those results the global chemical weapons watchdog the o.p.c. w. has said the alleged poisoning of them on the is of grave concern and that they're

monitoring the situation as after several western politicians called for sanctions against russia are just modest they have digs deeper into the allegations. no we choke again they say the north korea's talks and that is heaped infamy on russia over talks a group of toxins by the way with slightly different variations of liquid gas powder one of the deadliest substances known to man rebel solves bre the huge operation launched there hundreds of people in full hazmat gear everyone afraid of exposure and here is apparently exposed to this movie variation which by the way couldn't. become airborne at room temperature and he's flying on a jet where he feels sick scores of people crammed together and no one doubts reports feeling the thing including the people he was with. a laboratory examined alexina found these biological fluids the study was carried

out with an american aspect trimeter which contains $240000.00 standard sets of substances that correspond to the electronic database of the u.s. national institute of standards and technology no liquids organic phosphorus compounds or drugs that inhibit colonists were detected and no traces of other unknown substances were found. or gonna force 1st compounds are highly toxic substances and as a rule it's impossible to use them just to poison a single person if there had been any interaction with this substance on the eve of the flight or during the flight then any accompanying persons were certainly have shown symptoms of poisoning that did not happen if the germans had got clear evidence of. something like perhaps being used they should give that information over to the russians and the russians. that didn't happen with scruples and were sold and i doubt whether or happen again and there's many questions like you know he was on the airplane and then he landed why isn't anybody else i mean again

another echo of the scruple case as far as i can see we need some transparency here . before we start escalating this into any kind of sanctions trade war or god help any kind of military conflict there are a lot of questions now speculation and rumors and thinks this is a time to wait to let investigators collect the facts unless you want to use the moment the confusion the hysteria the anger to tear up russian german ties to stop a pipeline for example putin's regime is inhuman as the case of novell me and the support for a game show what's required is a clear and to tough response that putin understands north stream too must be put up for debate anything less would only be a confirmation for him. the obvious murder attempt by the mafia like structures of

the kremlin can no longer just worry us it must have real consequences that is why a very clear answer is needed here north stream to is nothing that we can promote together with russia hope the north stream to pipeline to hold the russians accountable germany says it will share its lab results and 5 dinners with e.u. nations and get this nato new response to russia's offers of a legal assistance that medical corp russia will learn that the value they have been poisoned not from the german government but from the news if they miss to justify some previously prepared response measures that have already been agreed on it becomes clear why they're deploying megaphone diplomacy substituting normal corporation with an information campaign public appeals to the e.u. and they too and reference to the c.w. whenever such a thing which is such a diplomatic reaching the hazards they always have to us. who is

benefiting who does something was benefiting and we have as we have already heard this equation there are heavy forces would god want a closer relationship between russia and germany specially according to north korea to project but where also that the that you have to ask what could the russian government benefit of such a thing with this whole and politicians there was no danger for the russian government that it would be an election they're already talking about sanctions guilty by default which is remarkable given the circumstances so the russian government out of the blue decides to poison an opposition politician who has been after the kremlin for years using one of the world's deadliest. substances which russia has said repeatedly it doesn't have to do this improbable and highly stupid

thing and in these survives it he goes to a russian hospital where the doctors do everything to save his life get him stable and they succeed the russian government which just apparently tried to kill this fellow greenlights a private jet to said him to one of europe's best clinics to get help his body apparently for evidence locker treats he banned substances so far that it's the best version. we're joined live by international affairs commentator marc gasol marker you're very welcome to the program now as we just heard from our correspondent he was pointing out to some of the apparent contradictions in this case for example why the kremlin would have allowed not all need to be airlifted to an elite hospital in berlin if they were really trying to kill him surely these are questions that need to be addressed. absolutely i mean for the russians

this is got something very suspicious about it throughout and such a high profile example of all that something associated with the russians i know but chuck the alleged claim about it it's it's all specks of a story to me i mean. striking a call saying i once said that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and there are extraordinary claims that the russian government would on its own territory do engage in a high profile killing with a characteristic attributed poison as it were only one of its own citizens and then spend the rest of the next year defending itself against such a charge and that is an absolutely absurd. contention i mean also really if they if i'm going with circumstantial evidence points the other way if for example. there really was a use or called the compound they called it nicknamed naughty chalk on the plane

and should never on the plane would have been infected or in danger of being infected the hospital where he was held would have been in germany would it be now in the lockdown with high security and all kind of sterilization measures going on we haven't heard any of this and i don't believe any of this is not happening yet so on the 2nd special evidence indicates this is a trumped up story. since the news of the no we talked diagnosis broke yesterday there's been a huge focus on the north stream to pipeline several top german politicians are calling for it to be scrapped at this time even though germany has already invested billions in it and it's almost completed at this point do you think these 2 things really should be construed together. well i did say that last week and i'm beginning to increasingly think that there is a decision that's been made here and that this situation is that germany abandoned and i hope i'm wrong but it looks like it needs this is behaving for all the world like journeys looking for

a high profile excuse to withdraw from that in effect to surrender to american pressure because the americans have got their colonies right between germany and russia in a belt going down from north to south and he sensually well north more stream to the us is it goes around that line of american control and americans don't want anything to go around them it has to go through them they want to have the veto they've got a military blockade in that area they want to maintain the energy broke a blockade in the area and say i really feel that a decision may well have been made full journey to surrender to american pressure but look strong at the same time and that's why it has to be made to seem as if it's a german decision to withdrawal from him too so i'm concerned for the future of the project given what's happening right now but i think germany should be concerned as well because the short term though they are bound to be massive penalty closes in the contract if it pulls out all the old stream too and in the long term germany

will be tying itself to so-called freedom gas the l. and g. well the americans will go up american controlled supplies and there will be not much left of german independence or a german claim to be a world power when it is absolutely going to give in and become a satellite of the us going forward that's the danger really for germany and perhaps for europe as well because competition in energy terms and a wide variety is applied is a basic principle of the old well suppose to be the e.u. policy and it seems to be going down the plughole here. it comes as no surprise that comparisons are being made with the script case in salisbury 2 years ago but of course that happened in the u.k. whereas this was an alleged attack on a russian citizen on russian soil is this really a security concern for the entire western world enough that germany needs to bring nato into it when i say it isn't but what it does have is it has those 2. elements involved me and not the chalk which would be no i did lately so it has

a high profile a function in terms of just you find changes of policy there is no security concern here whatsoever as you say because it's on russian territory to a russian citizen there may be a moral and ethical impulse if it really had happened as was claimed for all the others to voice their opposition but the fact that with no evidence and the mood of the state of not sharing evidence moment evidence to be shed to the effect of this alleged poison with the russians as always it's a claim of blame and what the west opposed to believe what these western sources the same ones who get weapons of mass destruction are saying now about weapons of individual poisoning and i don't i personally don't believe they are i feel we shouldn't be believing this stuff until they give us a horse into every tension basis to take a view at the moment they say it's a secret we can't tell you we'll just believe us well no we don't believe them they've they've been wrong too many times deliberately before and i believe that

they are deliberately concocting the story in the western capital crime out in washington i have to say as a way of pressuring germany to abandon the history on wednesday angela merkel said that someone was trying to silence novell nea but he has been politically active for over 10 years now he has videos that get millions of views on you tube why would someone want to silence him now after all this time. well there's 2 things would they want to silence or not they didn't care for 10 years they haven't cared enough to silence him now they suddenly want to for some reason and secondly where they too want to silence and they want to silence even the most high profile private profile imaginable way. in order to bring out a major diplomatic and political fallout and consequence upon themselves i think the answer to both those questions is no the russian government has no reason to want a silence in a no reason to want to silence and in high profile poisoning they're full of both those reasons i'd say the government over russia is innocent of the charge however

that doesn't mean the other governments don't have as i say a powerful motivation in presenting the russians as being so beastly as to deserve further sanctions and the only further sanction probably available is the one that's north of europe now running through the water tools germany from russia. you're talking about sanctions earlier we're talking about the nord stream to pipeline project how far could this escalate to well i think it's as i say my my my position is that this is about and always has been about this whole affair has been about north stream too and it's about escalating things to the point where that is abandoned and it's about they're doing that in a way that saves germany germany face merkel's face and unable the u.s. to maintain its energy and military dominance over all of eastern europe and germany as well fall for them all to basically plate to the to the u.s. to to washington's to but that's not good for europe apart from the fact that the

l. and g. might be bought from the americans we more expensive the implications of total german american control all those countries is not good for all sovereign europe or europe that's trying to be so room. international affairs commentator marco gas i thank you for your time and your comments. but trump administration has said the u.s. will redirect funds it previously owed to the world health organization to other health programs this comes 2 months after washington pulled out of the w.h.o. accusing it of being controlled by china meanwhile the u.s. has ruled out taking part in a global effort to develop a crowbar specs seen as karl popper reports the united states will not be joining international efforts to produce the exact same due to political concerns so many see this as yet another blow to health diplomacy the united states will continue to engage our international partners to ensure we defeat this virus but we will not be

constrained by multilateral organizations influenced by the corrupt well told balkanization and china the global banks senior should have known as oh that x. is co-lead by the world shelf organization 170 different countries are participating the goal is to get global distribution for several different vaccines after they've been licensed and approved by the end of 2021 the world health organization has repeatedly warned about the dangers of global just unity and yet a pandemic warning about the need to oppose vaccine nationalism and above all national unity and global solidarity are essential. this virus thrives when we are divided. when we are united we can defeat it when a successful new vaccine is found there will be greater demand then there is supply . excess the mind and competition for supply he's already creating bucks

emotionalism and risk of price gouging relations between the united states and the world health organization has been strained for quite some time despite his praise for the organization at the beginning of the pandemic donald trump made. and pulled the united states out of the global watch dark because they have failed to make the requested and greatly needed reforms we will be today terminating our relationship with the world health organization and redirecting those funds to other worldwide and deserving urgent global public health needs latest decision united states should not participate in global efforts for a vaccine that raised a storm of criticism or ologists and politicians have spoken out saying that the united states is essentially shooting itself in the court. trumps go it alone strategy has already given us the highest death toll in the world at his inaugural

he spoke of american college and now seems to term and to make it a reality america 1st doesn't apply to pandemics viruses don't observe national borders if anyone is at risk we all are refusing to cooperate with other countries on vaccines will kill people this latest decision from the united states pull out of global vaccine efforts may be seen as just the latest example of donald trump's ambitious america 1st policies however i comes to a situation like this it might not be wise to put pride in politics over your population and with martin artsy new york. washington has imposed sanctions on senior officials at the international criminal court secretary of state my compost as the i.c.c. is corrupt and has no authority. the international criminal court a thoroughly broken and corrupted institution. the united states has never ratified

the rome statute that created the court and we will not tolerate is illegitimate have to subject americans to its jurisdiction. washington d.c. is unhappy with the i.c.c. is current investigation into alleged u.s. war crimes in afghanistan a court is also investigating america's close ally israel over possible crimes related to jewish settlements in the west bank and east jerusalem other the us nor israel belong to the i.c.c. and the court has condemned the sanctions. these coercive facts directed at an international judicial institution and its civil servants around president did and constitute serious attacks against the court and the rule of law or more generally secretary of state pompei as announcement today marks a stunning perversion of u.s. sanctions devised to penalize rights abuses and kleptocrats to persecute those tasked with prosecuting international crimes the trumpet ministration has twisted

the sanctions to obstruct justice not only for certain war crimes victims but for atrocity victims anywhere looking to the international criminal court for justice. human rights lawyer dan kadlec says international law should apply to all countries with no exceptions to the u.s. for many. pairs taking the position that because it has the mightiest military in the world. it doesn't have to be. to international war. it's above international and i think trump is just frankly taking that to its logical the united states's been a pose to the international criminal or it leashed as to the extent that the i.c.c. could prosecute western countries from the very beginning and now trouble

sanctioning it because it wants to investigate u.s. war crimes in afghanistan and israeli were crimes in the past and it would be fair . for other countries say look us you know what's good for the goose is good for the gander international it doesn't apply to you it doesn't apply to me. a pregnant woman in the australian state of victoria has been arrested and handcuffed in front of her children for allegedly inciting an illegal protest please came to the house of 28 year old zoe bueller after the woman shared a facebook post calling for people to protest against local. measures wasn't bringing any fight you are sure you are right. you are right there can you say that . tell you just say to take the price down like recently. police have defended the arrests saying the officers acted appropriately although

they admitted that the optics of arresting someone who is pregnant are terrible so bueller will be tried in court in january she was among 4 people who were detained for inciting an upcoming anti lockdown protest in the state more than 80 others have been given official warnings police are stressing that public rallies would ruin the entire lock down strategy in the country. we share the frustration that is shared by the whole community but the police here is that. leaving behind a protest under the current conditions it's absolutely not dark coming into the city and on them on all the hard work and sacrifice is putting. those majority of laura bush citizens we heard from getting in there a police director at australia's institute of public affairs he says sees no justification for the way the police behaved. this is not the way a free society should operate this is not the way a democratic society should operate this is really really scary even if zoe had

broken the lord even if it was worthwhile to have that law enforced they must mean better why is the doing of doing of them what the police did on the video that we've seen they could have just charged her on summons without actually even going to harm at all it seems like this wasn't just about enforcing the law it was actually about intimidating people people who are speaking out against the government what i am afraid of is that the suit will become the norm or is pattern of behavior in victoria the laws that are made not by the parliament but by government bureaucrats and enforced in extremely unfair and traumatic was arjen i want to see another emergency declared like these in victoria or anywhere in australia again. google and apple have announced a new covert 19 contact tracing system which will run on your smartphone their ideas to help users find out when they come into contact with an infected person and the tools are integrated into the i o. s. and android operating system so there's no need to download an app as the next step

in our work with public health authorities on exposure notifications we're making it easier and faster for them to use the exposure notification system without the need for them to build and maintain an app. the new system called exposure notifications express will work like a notification tool a uses blue to signals from smart phones that have opted in if someone tests positive for cocaine 1000 push notifications will be sent out to other phones and forming users that they might have been exposed however there are fears that now the new updates may pose a threat to people's privacy we asked people in new york city what they thought. plan a good idea again it's invading privacy and if it's just another form of china check that. i know you care about your privacy buy you care about other people you know it's you know for the benefit of the success of the city you're going to feel like apple and google probably could use it for profit but like in the case of call of it i think it would probably be helpful and i just don't feel comfortable with big

brother knowing everything that i do you know it's that that's the 1st step to controlling people you know what we've got to do we get to do to get this virus under control. we spoke with josh poem the co-founder of the messaging and social networking service saif he says the new system could and that misleading people it is small amounts of data it's being transmitted but i think what's more important to focus on here is not the size or the amount of data entry into it but the intentional use that exists there and even if you trust your public health officials know system isn't my biggest concern or 1st to transparency in users into the service you know there were during any potential privacy concerns i still have some issues where i'm not entirely sure this is something that's going to be social essentially what this is doing is increasing the rate at which we can.