british drugs giant astra zeneca agrees to cooperate with the makers of russia's sputnik job to study the effectiveness of combining their respective coronavirus sex scenes. also this hour the international criminal court drops a probe into alleged war crimes by u.k. forces in iraq despite having quote a reasonable basis to believe that the atrocities actually took place. in the by russia gates hello china gates with u.s. intel chiefs bringing in beijing the greatest threat to washington today and the sign of spy scandal unfolds. and as the u.s. struggles with the pandemic and its economic consequences the nation's billionaires have increased their wealth by more than

a trillion dollars some big enough to cover immediate relief bill our guests get their teeth into the issue. except that they see already of the system being out of control so that it's just one of the. large corporations are offering people were rescued from each and every government policies which never have to be so heavy and. you're watching aren't international bring you your live news update from our studio here in moscow welcome to the program. russian and british scientists are ready to put their heads together and their vaccines to tackle the coronavirus pandemic britain's astra zeneca said in a statement that it's ready to work with the developers of russia's sputnik. today

we announce a clinical trial program to assess safety and immunogenicity of combination of these a d 1222 developed by astra zeneca and oxford university and sputnik v. developed by russian research institute i think it is quite important that this river hear from both sides and we hear about this huge corporation between the developer is of the bridge swedish and the russian drug at the time you have to understand of global covered 1000 vaccine raise and both sides believe everybody will only benefit from that. they have a problem very vaccines efficacy isn't high enough this should be improved we have 2 different add a new viruses they will take one of them and use it as a booster collaboration with the gamma layer research institute is important to explore the potential of vaccine combinations and looking synergies in protection and accessibility through a portfolio approach the head of russia's investment fund the company responsible for foreign distribution of rushes of vaccine also believes this is

a breakthrough collaboration this unique example of cooperation between scientists from different countries will play a crucial role in achieving the final victory over the pandemic astra zeneca its decision to conduct clinical trials using one of the 2 sputnik viveca says to improve the effectiveness of its own vaccine is an important step towards joining forces in the fight against the virus and astra zeneca says that they are going to start enroll in adults aged 18 years and older very very soon on your own friday we heard what mr putin's spokesperson the middle school of saying that competition is a very good thing of course but not when it comes to vaccine aimed at protecting the world these processes he believes should not be politicized and i think this is a very good example of what he meant these collaborations between us and again sputnik the so we have this unique cooperation how did developers come to the agreement actually it was the russian initiative and they made this offer after

interim earlier results of astra zeneca clinical trials were announced showing that the drug is safe and has an overall efficacy of 70 percent in protecting against covered 19 if you remember the rush is vaccine is over 95 percent efficient and $42.00 days after the 1st shot it is a 2 shot vaccine i think this is where the idea of combining these 2 vaccines came from and meanwhile mass vaccination here in russia is in full swing and most is about to launch a huge factory able to produce 10000000 doses of sputnik the month. earlier i spoke with simon clark a microbiologist at the u.k. is a reading university is so global cooperation is vital during the pandemic i wish that it could know what they're doing and wouldn't accept unless they thought it was a real deal something that bay should do more data that is produced on any vaccine

doesn't matter where it would do so by who is a good thing and it provided of course the data there is positive then it could only. quell any public fears that people might have about actually people need to come together and find a way of getting those things that work maybe to work better or to be able to produce them more quickly or in greater amounts that's what's important now meanwhile the president of argentina has given a thumbs up to russia's coronavirus vaccine alberto fernando's said that once the drug is approved by the country's medical regulator he would be the 1st person in the country to receive the sputnik the jab adding that he had no doubts about its quality and when a similar in argentina some raised doubts about the quality of russian science the russian gamelan institute has several nobel prizes among its staff of scientists to everyone's downswings sputnik vs here in argentina i will be the 1st one to take

that vaccine because i have no doubt about the quality of the vaccine argentina has been badly hit by the pandemic with nearly $1500000.00 cases and a total of more than $40000.00 deaths remains the 2nd worst hit country in latin america after brazil the argentine president has confirmed the country has signed a deal with russia on sputnik the supplies high risk groups in the country will be 1st in line for the job the country's president says they're buying anough doses to vaccinate 10000000 people you know most have political power. we would be able to counter the nuff theresa's defection 18000000 argentinians between january and february 1st a batch of 600000 doses to vaccinate 300000 people before the end of the year by january will have enough vaccines for 5000000 people and by february we'll have enough vaccines to reach the 10000000 people with.

the international criminal court has dropped a probe into alleged war crimes by u.k. armed forces and iraq that's despite the prosecutor having quote a reasonable basis to believe that offenses took place the court explained this decision by pointing to the fact that the u.k. and vesta gated the matter itself although investigations into more than $3000.00 cases resulted in no prosecutions takes a closer look and of story after 6 years of what was called a preliminary examination of allegations of war crimes by the u.k. moultrie in iraq the international criminal court says it's not going to proceed and so just before calling the british justice system one of the best in the world this is the way you case proud defense secretary reacts their statement today indicates our efforts to pursue justice were allegations have been found that i'm pleased that work we have done and continues to do in improving the quality and

assurances around investigations has been recognised by the international criminal court what i suggest though is reading beyond the 1st 2 lines of what the i.c.c. prosecutor ruled it will only take a few seconds to get to the part that says the office has previously filed and today confirmed that there is a reasonable basis to believe members of the british armed forces are responsible for the following. i'll continue reading out bits from pretty much every paragraph one after another

civilian supervisory and military command fail or contributed to the commission of crimes against detainees the initial response of the british army and theater at the time of the alleged offenses was inadequate not a single case being submitted for prosecution to date a result that has deprived the victims of justice i could keep going but it's already clear that these conclusions sound like they're from a different report not from one that leads to a major case being dropped or a senior cabinet member bragging about an amazing justice system the judgment is it is a travesty given the actual content of the report which not only says. reasonable evidence of all sorts of systematic violence against people in the british. during the iraq war but it also makes clear that sounds about the cage and not

one of those cases has been prosecuted and all they can say at the same time on the record can say the same time that it has been no shield to be no cover up what i recommend is that people read the report itself it's an indictment of the british army it's enjoyment of the british justice system and it's also in a strange way an indictment of the international criminal court it sounds however if that's the way things are in the world of international criminal law london tick the boxes by launching domestic probes and the i.c.c. couldn't prove any seal doing. or deliberate covering up so the rest is out of the tribunals jurisdiction which only makes you wonder following up on the i.c.c. zone statement does it all mean the iraqi victims will never get justice the u.k. government has repeatedly shown precious little interest in investigating and prosecuting atrocities committed abroad by british troops the prosecutor's decision

to close a u.k. inquiry will doubtless fuel perceptions and an ugly double standard in justice one approach to powerful states and quite another for those with less clout the news from the i.c.c. comes as london pushes for a controversial overseas operations bill it's supposed to quote unquote protect british troops in overseas conflicts from big safe says litigation and repeat investigations critics though say it would allow more offenders to escape the law the overseas operations bill will do nothing to address the issue of repeat investigations of u.k. armed forces personnel list will do is make arifin cases like the death of iraqi national even more difficult to prosecute. the u.k. would also be violating numerous human rights treaties by not ensuring abuses are properly dealt with but even without the bill as we now know the international criminal court has pulled the brakes on probing the british military earlier when

the court was going to look into potential abuses by the us troops in war zones washington simply paid back by sanctioning senior staff members at the i.c.c. what if after that the tribunal just didn't want to go too far with investigating uncle sam's number one in iraq well there's no way of knowing. top u.s. politicians are calling for heads to roll after a member of the u.s. intelligence committee was targeted by a suspected chinese spy it comes as a u.s. intel chief identified beijing as washington's number one adversary. so trumps out and the russia gate thing is slamming shut behind him because there's a new scare story in town china you know it doesn't take long to dig up dirt in a town like washington q us democrat representative eric swalwell until now move

well this crist so far the evidence is on contradicted that the president used taxpayer dollars to ask the ukrainians to help with an election this time around it's his links to a suspected chinese spy causing a stink not least because and this is awkward he sits on the house intelligence committee not the only shall be removed from the intel he should be removed from congress as well yes house minority leader kevin mccarthy there spotted an opportunity to claim his 1st victim so the background in a nutshell swalwell hod a chinese national called fang fagged in his early political career and this person quickly started raising suspicions within the intel community he got rid of her but has recently refused to answer whether he slept with her which probably means yes but before we burn mr swalwell at the stake at sea we're out might have to join him once this chinese witch hunt really gains momentum got

a feel for mitch mcconnell he survived the title most good image but can he now survive the fact that is wife secretary of transportation elaine chao is from one of china's most prominent political families that would be one hell of a honey trap and you and jean shall have served on the board of the holding company for china's teach to build in a state owned enterprise that makes shapes for the chinese military. is also on the board at the bank of china at top lender to the ship builder remember also the former speaker of the house john boehner aka the original orange man is there is the high. republicans actually give john boehner a harder time than they give me. which means orange really is the new black. these days the former speaker of the house just happens to be a low b. is for a certain people's republic of china is this guy aggie purdy chief security officer

who are way the u.s. is ready for china on a number of issues and they want to hurt wall way to hurt china the very afraid of the competition between china and the u.s. so they're focusing on hurting while way before getting professionally agri for you our way for a living and you purdy was a member of the white house stuff team that helped draft the u.s. national strategy to secure cyberspace this is just the tip of the iceberg therefore the head of u.s. intelligence has declared open season on beijing calling it threat number one. if i could communicate one thing to the american people it is that the people's republic of china poses the greatest threat to america today and the greatest threat to democracy and freedom worldwide since world war 2 what they might find is that there aren't many politicians left who don't have links to this new enemy because

they used to be friends weaning is getting hard to keep up. still back home while millions of americans have been struggling to make ends meet during the pandemic hundreds of the country's billionaires have been making huge sums of money they felt after the short break. which was the point that would find. an atmosphere highly active geology and. the border of its interior it could. be of those for my own is just far beyond our wildest imagination.

welcome back more americans have now died of coed than were lost fighting and world war 2 the death toll is now close to 300000 while the total number of cases is over

15000000 the pandemic may be the country's worst crisis in decades but that hasn't stopped the rich from getting richer and the worth of american billionaires has soared by one trillion dollars since march according to a new report as tens of millions of americans suffer from the health and economic reva just over these pandemic a few 100 billionaires to their massive fortunes they are pandemic profits are so immense that america's billionaires could pay for a major covert relieve bill and still not lose a dime of their provider its reaches the updraft of wealth to the billionaire class is disturbing at a time when millions face eviction destitution and loss billionaires are extracting wealth at a time when essential work is pushed into the vajra line of fire. the campaign group americans for tax fairness found that the extra wealth accumulated by billionaires during the pandemic would be enough to dish out $3000.00 to every

single american that's roughly equal to the entire amount spent by the federal government on health care in 2019 and merely 4 times more than the stimulus payments made earlier this year to $159000000.00 americans the report included $651.00 billionaires and we can take a look at just a few of them the wealthiest of course being jeff bezos who is now worth over $180000000000.00 which is more than the g.d.p. of iraq musk's wealth grew almost 6 fold during the pandemic while mark zuckerberg almost doubled his both must are worth more than $100000000000.00 now our guess debated profiting from a pandemic. this is capitalism on government life support and the side effect of that is to make those who own shares the overwhelming bulk being owned by the richest people even richer and while everybody else is in trouble in the way that they blame capitalism for destroying the poor and and creating great

inequality these government policies do exactly that we have lockdowns crushing small medium businesses we have stayed home orders which drove people into an unemployment largely virtual existence we don't wait a month for policy which drove a crisis in financial markets i always love these kinds of analyses is it the government has a day or 6 not going to the drops from the government there's nothing naive here the government isn't doing something then as a result the government is itself the result of the way this society works which puts enormous wealth and therefore political power in the hands of a very small number of people who turn out to have a government policy that makes them richer this burst of new wealth is just as purely a product of government policy and was unnecessary you know the unintended consequences of lockdowns and such and in this case they call them non-pharmaceutical interventions but there's also capacity limits on businesses are going to be almost

the opposite of what we're hoping for the draconian policies they've increased the gap. between the rich and poor that created new controversies of wealth this tremendous consolidation going on right now let me be clear here we could have been prepared for this virus the way other countries where we could have handled it better the way other countries than it's a pathetic sad story of a system spinning out of control so that it's unjust inequality keeps getting worse we have a monopoly in this country that it for a century we have 2 parties we don't allow 2 businesses that dominate most of our industries but we allow these 2 parties to dominate our politics that's very convenient for the computer they. the class of corporate directors who donate the bulk of the money to both of them will pull the strings from both of the bodies and you can't really have a monopoly without government help because innovation never stops you have you would you need to have a monopoly as richard said is you need government controls you need artificial

controls like patents and like copyright and all that sort of thing health care is a perfect example of that's a business and it's a sector which is super regulated. and it therefore you have entrenched interests there and for that reason we shouldn't be surprised that those costs are rising rising rising and you know 2 jujube with no end in sight i mean i think that is. what one of the one of those maybe maybe the picture perfect examples of what happens when government gets up to its neck in an industry to think of this is a government policy is strange the beneficiary ear our corporations they are aberrate with 4 industries doctors hospitals the bison drug makers and the insurers they've got us by the throat we have to pay those prices that they control yes peter is right they use the government to cement their monopoly as monopolists always had but the impetus the desire that need to control the market to squeeze more profits that's what drives the government to do what they do in support of

these interests trying to maximize the money they can squeeze out of our health care if you look at these lockdowns how many people i mean if you think of people locked in home people with nothing to do stores being closed what was keeping people alive what was keeping people fed was keeping people's minds saying right facebook google amazon netflix things like that those no service providers and as many of the businesses to me is but large corporations are offering people some some sort of refuge from these heavy handed government policies which never had to be so heavy handed. in members have stressed the need to develop a coordinated approach to vaccine certificates a common new approach to vaccination certificates is likely to reinforce the public health response and member states and the trust of citizens and the vaccination effort electronic vaccination certificates would show whether a traveler has been immunized against corona virus before crossing borders the

system was a key part of the south discussions on how the block is going to lift pandemic restrictions over the coming year at the world health organization advised against forcing anyone to take vaccines we heard from its representative. we generally it finds not to make it meant daintree it's much better people want to be vaccinated if you have a mandate or a system it's much difficult to much more difficult that you join sure on that everybody gets the exit interview because people are then become frightened that there's no reason to be fight no something like this which is a little. scientific a neutral car or when i say sion now it's like you know when i say should we do get criticized but we also have knows if they have been some politicize ation of the response and we do ask the quality well certainly we have been concerned and have been warning against sexy nationalism for a long time and again that's why entire

a little while ago scientists were working on developing the vaccines we were working on stitching up the facility the kovacs facility and talking with all the different countries to join that. we want to see the changes we will see big improvements in 2021 if we keep doing what we must do if we all will play out part continue with the garbage health measures continue with the tracking and tracing finding every case bringing in the numbers down sweeping the numbers of infections down and as we increase the vaccination the virus will have no way to go and we will we. would auto us crops a joint military exercises with beijing last year it was doing washington's bidding that's according to classified documents revealed by a canadian news network the trudeau government planned to invite chinese troops to

train in ontario just months after 2 canadians were arrested in china the chinese military contingent was expected to study comedian cold weather military tactics classified documents obtained by rebel news show that a training of twas eventually cancelled at the request of the us state department. we were cool for example the back in december department of national defense and canadian forces looking to cancel the people's liberation army participation in the winter survival training following their request from the d.o.d. to do so that winter survival training will not take place this winter the security consensus originated primarily from the u.s. we do not have a record of other 5 countries expressing this consensus to canada the documents also suggest the exercise was cancelled directly by canadian armed forces bypassing triggers a liberal government where a squabble affairs candidate to comment on the situation earlier experts told us why canada's top officials might want to seek better relations with china. the

relationship between canada and china is. reasonably good so as world history will this exercise trend in 2090 might as well be an event well planned from a larger share of the g. point of view i'm not surprised at all for the pressure of us on canada in fact it's not just canada even the u.k. australia new zealand they always say if pressure these countries are long acting like an independent countries with independent foreign policies from the actions of prince trudeau canada is clearly much more inclined towards the pressure. from the united states i'm not surprised that they're that the united states is putting pressure on canada. regards to its relations with china and someone

decided that it was not in cantor's interest and that is the more unusual part is how that the military if these reports are correct managed to supersede the prime minister that is perhaps the more interesting question to ask and of course i don't have any answers for that who does but this is it looks like a case of insubordination canada's long term success will rely more on china than it will perhaps on the united states that's a wrap up of the day's top news for now but don't forget you can always find us on many of your favorite subtle media platforms like twitter and instagram absent reports. morsel speer was mean sure you read of those lists nissho to show you just what

that also has been. but so the publisher didn't must draw a cord of it in that you will quote them in the us want to quickly sing months along. when you last and then but if it's all profit in you must say you're another one at the core of them but they were all at the least most of them there for stage door then you must at those legit want to keep the most of them there will still put it on you or your thumb with a sham doing what all the money. is like god only. that in the us those days i need some i would put in that would know more than the buddhists. in january there may be a new american president but what gone change is washington stance towards iran is military conflict inevitable what is the value of diplomacy if one site fails for

reprieves what are iran's. join me every thursday on the alex salmond show and i'll be speaking to guests of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. problem drugs don't always come from unscrupulous dealers but from pharmacies to in every state in the united states we've seen a very sharp increase in the number of people seeking treatment for addiction to prescription opioids oids invaded america under the banner of medicine persisted with the pain but as of trying to wean him off though she did go separate dose after dose after dose and really became his drug dealer so who's to blame patients doctors manufacturers or the government.