the stories that shaped the week here in r.t. the developers of russia's vaccine signed an official memorandum of cooperation with astra zeneca they hope that combining their vaccines will improve efficacy also become a new more contagious strain of code that has been detected in england causing panic worldwide with more than 40 countries banning arrivals from the u.k. and clemency for killers for whistleblowers dozens of pardons from donald trump thinks she spilled the beans on american war crimes doing mercenaries hanged guilty of the mass murder of civilians in iraq. so that there is no justification or rocky blood as we call her miscible and has no significant cost. we hold that

there will be just god willing your blood all not just disappear the iraqi government must act soon as possible. and a victory or defeat while the u.k. prime minister celebrates in the story breaks it daily across the english channel the european union's chief negotiator describes it as a lose lose situation. like good afternoon the latest developments and look back at what's been happening over the last 7 days to you watching the weekly here on r.t. international now the pharma giant astra zeneca and russia's institute of started clinical trials of a joint coronavirus vaccine it combines elements of jabs developed individually by the 2 sides astra zeneca see explained why they decided to join forces with the russians we have to. main goal of the 1st one this.

health care professionals doctors and nurses to use 11 vaccine all the old girl for the 1st injection and a 2nd to make the our life simpler and the 2nd goal is to hope pretty get better if you just say when you combine 2 different vaccines i don't think companies are competing against each other everybody is racing against the virus we would need many many vaccines because there is no one single company. produced and of x. and probably employer world and some of these vaccines have to be easy to use and they have to be chipped because the law of middle income countries cannot afford the expensive extra we are on the period of the disease when the whole world goes on its growth rate of it so we are. around the world orations astra zeneca and mother produces what you call you or something because we just need the war to gather and international operation. or think you meant

a cog well we spoke more about this with 2 experts from the u.k. a poor hunter is a medicine professor while peter smith is an epidemiologist they explained why the scientific cooperation between britain and russia is significant and one of the problems with the. i don't know virus the vaccines like the sputnik 5 and the oxford is that there's always a risk that you can develop immunity to the area rather than to the targets which is what you're wanting for now if you actually makes these 2 that seem so that you maybe give one vaccine to start and then the other 134 weeks later then you. get over this problem of developing impunity to the carriers that direst and i think there's quite a lot of evidence that actually does work like that but and people have shown this works in other ever. so to me the compound elation of the sputnik and the ox so

that's there's any current that see could well improve its efficacy a lot greater than the individual but it seems apart now the problem with both him and biotech back scenes is that they are they were caught of a street culture which is going to make it very difficult to deliver in many parts of the world where as both the oxford and the the russian vaccine have a much more except of all cold trying in terms of being delivering being able to very many parts of the world we also i spoke with the director of russia's gammell a institute and he told us how their vaccine differs from the of this. we developed a vaccine from the start of receiving funding to registration really quite quickly in 5 months the main reason is that for 25 years or more we have been developing at the gum alay institute

a technological platform on which this vaccine preparation can be made we already had a wealth of experience not only the technology of how to do it but before that to get even were possible concentrations of when you were all the dosages needed to obtain an optimal revenue response with minimal side effects or. the safety of the vaccine has been fully proven on a very similar vaccine or not identical in against not only of all of viruses but also the mers coronavirus so when we were working against we were able to use around 70 percent of an existing element that was one of the indicators by which the effectiveness of the vaccine is most easily measured in this is the presence of until bodies and what if we proceed from lots of experimental data in a similar vaccine against all of this protective immunity laster to work for we simply didn't have a longer observation period which would be to bridge the pfizer vaccine needs if you transfer and minus 70 degrees and yours at minus 23 rate one that's in the 3

minus 18 for now i'm not some months down the line and i hope that we'll be able to amend the registration certificate so that this vaccine can be stored not at minus 14 or to the household refrigerator temperature of 2. the side effects do to force you out of action maybe a rash headache or muscle discomforts and i think the most noticeable effect is maybe your temperature going up to 38 degrees for today. did you take the vaccine yourself yesterday on march 30th very long with all my employees and you're still alive not just a lie even looked pretty active which needed my 14 year old daughter so you violated your own instructions against vaccinating children that's outrageous you were a secure your entire family for the sake of getting vaccines and i wasn't going to kill them but prove that the vaccine is completely safe. what is the difference between the oxford vaccine that is astra zeneca and the game. there are

a lot of differences but they're not significant oxford and astra zeneca went from my point of view the only classical part of working against pathogens is our colleagues applied all the rules for creating influenza vaccines to the creation of a vaccine against 19 and it seems to me that epidemiological features of this disease pathogen written were not white accurately calculate the people at pfizer also understand this and have made great efforts to modify the r.n.a. so that it would not be recognized as far as i understand but it by protecting it. but i'm not sure where the my colleagues most to solve all the problems on a large scale is. putting the questions there now meanwhile the european union has launched a cross border vaccination program against hey you can see the 1st jobs being administered under the european road latin it does come after the block authorized by bank saying according to the head of the european commission is being delivered

to all 27 member states well the block is secured contracts with several drug companies on shipments of more than 2 people. that is double what is needed for the whole population to get inoculated i also this week the world health organization raised the alarm over a new highly contagious strain it was 1st registered in the u.k. and has since spread across europe and much of the world. well 16 countries have not confirmed cases of the new coronavirus variant after it 1st emerged in the u.k. spread to europe and then reach the middle east asia and also the strike on saturday just attacked it in the western hemisphere today with canada reporting its 1st case while the discovery of the new strain did prompt many countries to adopt

stricter measures and more than 40 countries have now banned all arrivals from the u.k. and europe time services from england to the continent have also been suspended that left hundreds of people stranded in airports and train stations over christmas while the travel ban also left more than 4000 lorries stranded for days at the british port and things got moving again only on thursday but hundreds of drive is a still waiting to cross the border one point tensions to over the ban lead to scuffles with police. i. i know a lot of people was parking on the forecourts just to get there and obviously using their facilities that toilets. within the 1st day the clothes side clothes just

moves on and close it down to anybody using the toilets no one you talking one public toilet i mean. thousands of people in the child is going to be a problem. sort of station side there it guy i am here and what shall i do not a lot that i can't and i mean blanked out to me and i have to look at. i mean like dad and i and then i guess i'm going down the route back and i don't think that. restrictions have been imposed within the u.k. team to combat a surge in infections and while the british government has said that stricter measures are necessary journalist and broadcaster neil clark believes that the crisis has been mismanaged the fact of the matter is that this so-called use throat was known about in september we had scientists writing about it discussing it in september and yet the health secretary only in the us is this just

a few days before christmas why didn't he make an announcement about this in september why didn't he get up in september those big it up now so it was over the good of all what was going to happen and it's also to link up with the other main story we'll get to what the british government is trying to terrify is in iraqi w m d start about this terrible strain but of course our closest trading partners are going to say wow you're sorry we're going to block flights going to stop people coming in from britain if what you say is true british government said it why should we have british people coming over to our countries and of course we got the chaos of the whole issue about the about the french blockade etcetera coming in so it really is a total disaster really and disaster is the responsibility of the british government. now mercy for mercenaries but whistleblowers can go whistle on trump issue dozens of pardons this week but not for defenders of freedom of speech like gina sergeant edward snowden instead the outgoing u.s.

president set off alarm bells at the united nations by giving clemency to 4 former contracts is of the blackwater private military company they were jailed for their involvement in the mass killing of civilians in iraq. no wonder if. there were dead bodies everywhere are losing the argument going to be with you people and so are among the dead bodies on the street that's an. old mill 7 years old and. i. i. iraq's foreign ministries condemned the decision saying it didn't take into account

the seriousness of the crime and also said to the move isn't in line with the commitments to human rights and justice declared by washington baghdad said it would urge the u.s. to reconsider the people of iraq also responded angrily to the part. when my i said that i was here there is no justification iraqi blood has become per miscible and has no significance one day will pay the price because iraqi blogs does not spill easily. good enough we hope that there will be justice god willing of their blood will not just disappear the wreckage government must act as soon as possible because the course of us is asleep the infamous black widow company citizens and this was when we started and today we hear they've been released from the personal rulers of president truman to make it once like the u.s. doesn't cannot spilled a rocky blood cool on the united nations the international cannot some and human

rights organizations which have to intervene immediately on condemning these killings voting there has been widespread outrage about the trump administration's decision to grant clemency to some members of the blackwater military contracting company these were guards who were employed by blackwater who killed civilians in iraq paul slow evan liberty and dustin herd were convicted for manslaughter and the individual nicholas slotting who opened fire and 1st started shooting into the crowd of iraqi civilians he was convicted of 1st degree murder and now the white house letting all of them off they will no longer be in prison serving their sentences they have been pardoned this is the feeling of the white house about why they made this decision when the convoy attempted to establish a blockade outside the green zone the situation turned violent which resulted in the unfortunate deaths and injuries of iraqi civilians further prosecutors recently disclosed more than 10 years after the incident that the lead iraqi investigator

who prosecutors relied heavily on so very far that there were no exigent victims and to collect evidence may have had ties to insurgent groups himself now at this point there is widespread. outrage this seems like the trump administration is almost approving of the killing of iraqi civilians 2 children were among the 14 people in the crowd who died as a result of their gunfire but at this point people are also looking at the fact that trumps education secretary betsy to vos is the sister of the founder of blackwater erik prince now there's also been a lot of outrage about who is not on the list of trump's pardons so the names that were missing that many were optimistic and hopeful about were julian a son john edward snowden these prominent whistleblowers had many people calling for the trump white house to grant them clemency among those who called for them were not just activists and advocates of civil liberties and for the protection of

whistleblowers but also representatives of the united nations take a listen if president trump is true as well yes i think the least you could do is to end the suffering the purity the songs to pardon him this man has for be enough for the interest of the public and will donald trump since you're given pardons to people please consider pardoning those who at great personal sacrifice expose the deception and criminality of those in the deep state now trump still has time to grant a pardon to edward snowden and to julian a son she can grant clemency up until the moment he leaves office he could do it at the very very last minute however the number of people that were pardoned today and the information about who they are seems to have many pessimistic many of the activists supporting the whistleblowers feel like this indicates the trumpet ministration is moving in a very different direction with its clemency. when reporting that you're watching on t.v. to national we'll continue our review of the week just after the break. so

what we've got to do is identify the threats that we have it's crazy to confront cation let it be an arms race. spearing dramatic development only mostly i'm going to resist i don't see how that strategy will be successful very critical time to sit down and talk. the world is driven by shaped by.

the day or thinks. we dare to ask. him back to the weekly now on thursday the u.k. and the european union reached a landmark trade deal after 4 years of wrangling the chief breaks it negotiated described the u.k. . as a lose lose however prime minister boris johnson was. the feast. full of fish by the way and i believe it will be the basis of a happy and successful and stable partnership with our friends in the e.u.

for years to come. yeah. there is no winner and brax it's a lose lose situation to separate especially in the world as it is today england the united kingdom has chosen to be solitary rather than stand together ok let's look quickly then a tie with the u.k. and the e.u. will cooperate from january the 1st these are some of the key points that will be no tariffs on each other's goods no limits on trading new border checks have been agreed on to you while the u.k. has pulled out of the long running your asthma student exchange game between universities politicians will return to westminster to vote on this deal on december 30th although it is fully expected to go through now shortly after the deal was announced the scottish 1st minister nicola sturgeon said that britain has lost more than its gained from breaks it and that scotland now has to decide on its future as quote an independent european nation meanwhile the deal has triggered

mixed feelings among scots and other brits i think it makes it feel to be because of a past couple weeks so should be just so much hype that misinformation and media fatigue because it's been going on for so long i hate breaks and i think it's completely retrograde step i think the feeling of being part of a multinational international. i word looking community i think has been drops in a fantastic i didn't support break so i didn't pull the brakes a i have really guides to not be part of you know petty boy it does make me nervous to think how about when i get to visit the european cities and you know friends i have to live in speed and in france and other parts of europe it would be a disaster if there had been no deal so very peaceful but there is a to this is i suppose for some people a big christmas present it's just i think if i was really to believe this year i think we will see a return to the troubles or was it st louis. extremely disappointing. and naive

shortsighted government. for their own short sighted aims. as a rule such turmoil practice of the saying this country is dreadful they're. very very sorry i think it's really. funny going up to these years but it sort of begs the question as to whether this arrangement is going to be better than the original you have before we have the european union now while boris johnson's christmas wish may have come true it has been overshadowed by a tough year of borders and also economic woes sask taylor looks back at the last 12 months it was almost as if he wanted to become a meme we have so much to look forward to in 2020 it's hard to pin down which one of 2020 stretches he meant the end that's bright said negotiations food shortages coronavirus close borders economic collapse felt like you know sending your. friends in your presence and

a book home grinch who stole christmas. yet i feel like christmas has been thrown off and if you think you might be like remember this the prime minister has. been so while it's about a man who wanted to be remembered as the one who got brecht's it done 4 years of preparation for a cause he believed in thompson was set up for trial and he even promised back in january that it was up and ready all but done we had ended a debate has run for 3 years some would say 47 years i would even mention the name of the control the soup. except to say that it begins with billions receding the past behind us well be rose from the past and a haunted bar as for 11 months that's how long it took to negotiate a deal a deal that has followed the tos claims could be resolved over a cup of tea 11 months the brink of no deal a nation of disappointed impatient angry people but boris still gave himself

a pat on the back we've taken back control of our laws and our destiny we've taken back control of every jot and tittle of regulation in a way that is complete and unfettered who's going to tell him then that this celebration might be a party for one it sounds like the british team have dropped the ball before the line no wonder they want a christmas eve announcement to hide the fisheries sell out today amidst all the debate and details of the trade deal one fundamental truth remains that at a time of global insecurity we're no longer part of one of history's greatest and most noble project bringing nations together to build peace out of the ruins of war . this is a disastrous brags that outcome for a scottish farmer it's and like all other aspects of bracks it for students cortlandt against our will it wasn't just brussels that proved to be bogus on doing

fresh from a caribbean holiday and still on a post-election high in the new year boris johnson didn't seem too concerned about a never heard of before virus his message was clear don't exaggerate when barry is a going 'd up. and when there is a risk that new diseases such as corona virus will trigger a panic while it was a pretty quick descent from facts to this. but it's hard not to panic when the person who's supposed to be meeting you flip flops and utahns his way through a crisis to the point his own ministers don't know the rules so make it absolutely clear which is that it is.

the guy who let me i will absolutely get back to christmas won't be cancelled actually christmas is off schools are reopening actually you know they're not we're lifting the knocked out actually stay at home little wonder then that confusion on exhaust peroration grew i'm a bit confused because you know it's like things are very very quick and we don't get that much information about what's going on and then suddenly build a new school down we don't know what to do so nobody can use and they seem to only cannot who's devoted 48 hours so it's so confusing i don't even remember my parents live. there with it so i am allowed to go to youtube but i don't know if i'm really about to be going through. here is what you did was it a case of bad timing for bojo was 2020 the year you just couldn't shine no matter what or was it the man himself who failed to meet one thing's for sure for bars

johnson it's been not a hell of a year but rather a year from how. can we stay with you because argentina officially approved russia's sputnik the jab for emergency use on wednesday with officials from both countries saying that the vaccine would be distributed within days. 300000 doses of the vaccine on argentinian territory these will be distributed in all of the provinces and we will work side by side with the leadership of buenos aires to start mass vaccination. or isn't helping urging tina which is one of the 1st countries in latin america to receive the russian drudging as we're seeing russia a friend and we. were held there a vaccine that helps to save the lives of millions of argentine. plane carrying argentina's 1st batch did arrive in buenos aires on thursday and moscow will provide enough doses for up to 10000000 people early this month the argentine

president himself expressed confidence in the russian vaccine and promised that he would be the 1st to take. in argentina some raised doubts about the quality of russian science to clear everyone's downswings 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 you're meeting. and members of the united states space force were finally given a name this week one year after the branch of the armed forces was created or though some do you think that it could have been a bit more original. soldiers sailors airmen marines and guardians will be defending.

thank. our set off the bomb. i'll be back what i just. read.

back again with more stories in a batter half an asteroid. tax rises financial survival stacey southfield let's say i'm the troika. of the fight wall street fraud thank you for. the story 6 that's right. debt slavery. americans love buying homes. this was a fundamental part of how our political leadership and our country at large understood

the bargain you get a hoe and then you know rebel right that's the things you don't revolt if you have a stake in the system. really interesting to dial it back and think about the longer deeper history housings men in the united states not just that question of the american dream but the bigger question of who the dream is for. you and it's going to the whole nation would have come to something more because. of the.