the russian foreign minister warns moscow is ready to end ties with the european union if it imposes new sanctions on key sectors of the economy we don't want to distance ourselves from the international community but we need to be ready for this if you want peace prepare to war. a member of the world health organization just back from the krona virus epicenter in china tells us that humans probably did not catch the virus directly from bats but from other animals instead. and outrage in france grows over american values supposedly being forced on the country as the renowned paris opera val's to diversify performances after complaints from black dancers we get reaction. i think there's a kind of release in a sense of the intellectual process where they say well we're going to copy and

paste and they come and they tell us how wrong we. are broadcasting live direct from our studios in moscow this is art international i'm john thomas certainly glad to have you with us now the russian foreign minister has warned that moscow is ready to break ties with the e.u. if it imposes new sanctions that harm key sectors of the economy. you're just saying that we're ready to do this if we see once again like we've seen numerous times before the brussels imposes sanctions that pose restore economy specifically to the most sensitive six's once again we don't want to distance ourselves from the international community but we need to be ready for this if you want a piece prepared for. well it is a pretty straightforward message especially coming from a veteran diplomat which certainly allows. of certainly is but here the russian

foreign minister rather showing his hand he's explaining what will happen if the e.u. decides to follow through with a plan to impose new sanctions and if these sanctions are crippling to any of the key sectors of russia's economy world this is what will happen but again moscow has already confirmed that it will not initiate the process and will only react to what the e.u. will do this frustration it stems from from his meeting with the use foreign policy chief joseph burrell and even moscow some about a week ago sergei lavrov clarified moscow's and reiterated moscow's position that the if these swap at the swapping of the suspended sentence for a real one for lex in a valley it's an internal matter but at the same time joe's a burrell called on russia to release the kremlin critic and world saying that this case is politically motivated is politically charged and according to. the e.u.

diplomats in including jobs are borel they are being strong armed into a tough into an unreasonably tough position on russia and essentially they are stripped the ability and the opportunity to do their job of diplomacy or goodness knows where you're. sure to travel to us knowing the complicated situation many were against his visit and publicly declared that he shouldn't come to russia until we quote behavior not only e.u. foreign policy chief brill but also his predecessors do not have the capacity to negotiate the whole you point of view was focused on the idea that we could turn this novell me into a political prisoner with their russian state laws and they need to be respected as for human rights i reminded mr burrell that we've long shown readiness to hold a constructive dialogue based firstly and secondly not on the unilateral basis. and from the very get go joseph burrell was put in a very tough conditions by his e.u. counterpart. because there were critics who were saying that he should visit

prussia at all but when he came back from that visit just all hell broke loose they did the diplomats in the e.u. parliament they didn't mince any words moscow to be used the visit of high representative bordello to you merely aid and offend the european union your ill executed a visit you know only a shame to european citizens you also helps putin and tyrants dressin people who are real and the on the other hand made a fool of himself last week you must go wake up call that finally prompted you member states and yourselves to to adopt a more realistic and principled russian foreign policy and to move toward sanctions finally among others. of human rights fairly under sanctions least and to suspension of stream to. european and she security police but this quiet car plowed quiet of condemnation it was interrupted by and i wish member of

the european parliament who pointed out that as she sees it the the only reason that election of only gets so much attention is because he was jailed in russia and that the e.u. is using him simply as a political pretext to slap more sanctions on moscow i must be as anybody else to stand up for anybody's rights including the 1000 east but let's be honest about this and he's got to finish this i'm seeing the current racist and maybe 4 percent of the support and we wouldn't be discussing him after all if he'd been arrested anywhere else other than in russia so made the following point as well he said that russia is already independent of him militarily so russia does not rely on anybody or russia is in arms expects its exporting arms and basically saying that russia should do the same thing but with its economy. if anybody decides to impose more

sanctions and cripple some crucial economic sphere of russia then you should just wave goodbye and say well if you're closing this door we won't we won't be standing there knocking. political analyst to gilbert doctorow believes a tit for tat strategy could lead to enormous economic damage on both sides. here which. to suggest typically in. russia's economic existence as they did was the west which i mean access. to iran where i could see the drastic. order for action economics taken by russia when he was given the war. so you actions that have long been destroyed among the national. the west and

western your. all the destruction of or energy security we did in the air is getting used to frustrate. the north to project which those the remind you can be answered. or it was risky because the russians could turn off the capsule forms so it could be shipped out here can cause enormous to both sides but it can lead us. to do it. now a member of the world health organization team just back from china has told r.t. that it probably was not bats that passed corona virus on to humans he says that even if the disease originated in bats it was likely transferred to humans through other animals scientist vladimir dead cough has been investigating the source of the pandemic in the chinese city of.

we know from past epidemics for example sars cove and mares cove that bats are the source of the epidemic moreover they contain genetic cells close to the ones that caused the pandemic but we also know that the transmission of the virus did not occur directly from the bat the previous time sars was transferred from a civet cat merce from a camel so there must be some other intermediate animal it is the most likely have participated on our knowledge. of the virus was 1st detected in the city in december 2019 the team says its initial findings debunk claims that the disease originated in the laboratory however the u.s. thinks beijing is hiding facts from the experts. science needs to lead us out of this pandemic and in preventing the next one geo political battling has already

made that path harder it's time to trust in the global systems we set up after world war 2 and give them a chance china gave them very controlled and limited access and got a report that was inconclusive and supports narrative we asked me a dead calf about how much access his team had in he says that beijing has been transparent. how successful was our mission i believe that we have fulfilled our program this was only the 1st part of our investigation and we didn't expect to determine the origin of the pandemic already w.h.o. team and chinese specialists work together as scientists it was something like a huge conference where we shared opinions and information analyzed scientific literature that already exists discussed hypotheses and assessed possibilities i see no reason for the chinese side to hide anything they probably didn't do that

because in the scientific world it is very difficult to conceal something information could be hidden from the public but it is more difficult if it's people who really understand the issue. there are 2 hypotheses about how the virus appeared the 1st is that the virus may have been induced the suspicions have already been refuted says we're not even considering this the 2nd is that a natural virus came from the lab we were at the institute of observing the work with viruses and concluded that everything meets safety standards and leakage could not have occurred this lab is far enough from the market if there was a leak we'd see signs of it there for such a leak is practically impossible we looked at hypotheses in the probability category it's likely that the virus came from space so it's impossible.

for french intellectuals are stepping up their attack on what they call american values they claim fashionable leftist ideas imported from the us have no place in france and say they pose a threat to french society although these warnings are not particularly new for the country and have been raised before by the president and other officials. those the certain social science theories entirely imported from the united states with the problems which i respect and which exist but which is just added to. there is a battle to wage against an intellectual matrix from american university. some national thinkers blame the u.s. for france's massive protests against police brutality similar to america's black lives matter movement america's me to campaign on awareness about sexual abuse it has also gained traction with french feminists are too shallow dubinsky explains the transatlantic headache. french intellectuals and politicians are said to be up

in arms over the cancelled culture ideology seeping over from the united states and spoiling the french way of life and i think there's a kind of laziness of the intellectual process where they say well we're going to copy and paste and they come and they tell us how wrong we are black lives mark 2 are examples of movements that flew over the atlantic and spread their wings here now that's led to debates over race gender preferences crackdown on islam is still going on is asians and demands for the country to fess up to its colonial past they come and they tell us that we all racist. phobic about our universal values on nothing. quite frankly i mean this is a combination of incredulity and noise noise i wouldn't even say anger because

we don't think it's rather that europe has existed for a long time. i think we can live without american chris cruel theory for a few few years and it seems the french should really had enough of council culture so when the director of the paris opera issues it diktats saying that he wanted to diversify staff and black face the editor in chief of one of france's biggest daily papers. issue making works of art disappear echoes the cancel culture which has been a national sport for america and aims to wipe off the map culture and creators symbolizing the domination of the white male and the oppression of minorities some say this problem it's deeper it's a threat to its political identity is a threat to the republic and to french democracy and to the functioning of the state it's not a matter of cultural identity i do. you think that there is

a big threat to civilized life and obviously freedom of speech and so on by these kinds of movements while imposing ideas on race inequality feels for many a little bit rich coming from the u.s. considering the state to race relations in america right now it doesn't look like there are solutions works so well so i'm not sure we need them really but the other thing is that there's this whole speech discussion about how colonialists it is to impose a different culture on the unsuspecting populations and the french are saying well you are imposing something that may or may not work for your country but it's not working for france i mean oh after all isn't the whole point of freedom of speech also having some respect for the point of view of others what is actionable in this room is the idea that instead of having a discussion or

a debate or even an argument about it that should be should somehow become sold and so we are dealing i'm sorry to say this it sounds rather rude but we are dealing with the difference between intelligence and stupidity it's just stupid to talk like that of course we can all disagree about napoleon or any other historical figure but that's what makes this civilization that is what civilization is there's a claim that this fight comes from a small frightened republic that's in decline but isn't it just possible that perhaps france a country with a long proud tradition of intellectual debate the country where the unlighted movement was birthed is perhaps still ahead of the curve well at least compared to america and for now it appears that the left culture just isn't cutting the must it in france so let's even ski. paris. the paris opera is promising

a radical rethink. of its approach to diversity but not everybody is ready to see the classics get in the 21st century reboot as we discuss after a short break stay with us and. join me every thursday on the alex i'm unsure when i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. go to define the word reality something like this the state of things as they actually do exist as opposed to an idealist state or notional idea of them to say the least this is a philosophical definition let's throw in politics is there one political reality can and should one be enforced when this in the end produced

a ministry of truth. the reason for doing this study and the reason it's. those controversial and still important is that it demonstrates the power of social situations and playing roles that can lead healthy good ordinary people to do really bad takes. and welcome back this is our team international now facebook's privacy policies are in question once again the platform has disclosed it cooperated with us law enforcement sharing private data of those who took part in the riot on capitol hill on january 6th. we were monitoring this out in real time and made appropriate

referrals to law enforcement this includes helping them identify people who posted photos of themselves from the scene even after the attack was over we're continuing to share more information with law enforcement in response to valid legal requests as they continue their investigation number one snitch in america big brother is facebook surreal farce well the storming of the capitol building last month has so far resulted in charges against a reported $221.00 people if found guilty they could face up to 20 years in prison democratic officials have dubbed the offenders domestic terrorists the f.b.i. as a task of identifying offenders was aided by more than 2 100000 photos and videos mostly from social media. and it has not all gone without consequences for facebook the tech giant has lost more than $30000000000.00 of market value as investors have been spooked by the platform's coziness with the feds the f.b.i.

has revealed it is giving users personal messages from the platform in order to trace suspected capital rioters analysts and commentator earl rasmussen thinks innocent people could have been caught up in this week. a lot of people don't realize i mean a lot of your clicks on facebook your data is wide open the other thing is that. facebook changes your policy and what may have been acceptable. 6 months ago may not today and and they may come back and go oh you did this and that's against our policy so we're betting for most people i would say hundreds of thousands of people really did nothing illegal whatsoever there you had if you had some absolutely but but the majority of people in fact some people that are being turned in and turned over investigator were not in the capital they were perhaps on a couple of grounds but that's completely equally well until recently completely

legal and open and public space so there was really no violation of any type of wall whatsoever but we kind of twisted that and interpret it differently and facebook seems to be and i would gather other social media platforms are turning over extensive amount of information and probably you've probably got a lot of business probably review of a lot of c.c.t.v. drone footage is or other types of video information is probably being looked at as well the paris opera is suffering a diversity scandal after black performers complained about almost entirely white casts and also the use of blackface in performances the organizations artistic director agrees. we're not here promoting a climate of censorship or dictatorial actions in the leadership the whole point of this initiative is we want to put on opera and ballet by 21st century artists for

21st century audiences. the pledge to hire more people of color is part of a $66.00 page report by the theatre the artistic director was also quoted by the newspaper warning that some performances would disappear from the repertoire if they are deemed insensitive but the plans have sparked condemnation from traditional commentators in french media and from nationalist politician marie le pen here is some of the reaction we've been hearing. this year is really political correctness gone mad because they actually do have 5 bloc ballet dancers in there so i really don't know what the people who are calling for change here are all worried about we have some talented people here who are forced to leave france to express that the one where this is a huge problem and what alex underneath is saying now is he's take he's taking the problem to the roof that's mean that in the recruitment he's changing the way a for a critic meant cripple and it's

a very new thing in france because we know that this is a very elitist what you should do in every case is pick the best person for the job the most talented the most skilled person for the roles the parasol they have their ballet school and they've changed their admissions procedure to let people in from ethnic minorities and black people to come in and as they come in through the system they're actually going up into the opera so this is already happening and hopefully that those people that come through will be selected because they are talented and skilled we need of course 'd the best dancer to be in but before that we need to open the door the thing is to did the door close for the and the minority this is the right reality is to have the most talented people in this new director for example what he's doing he's a low black man so for example to have the dress who much with the color of that set lots of because a lot of young dancer west pushed away just because they didn't fit to do to do white tour we can say we need to adapt the density of the people who own and was

wondering about that the whole debate here is that they're actually talking about reducing the repertoire and changing the kind of performances they put on because some people have chosen to be offended about things that have been there's been no problem with for decades or centuries the region of the classic is the right this is the origin but we have to say that france and england and u.k. and germany and do you. today in 2021 it's not the same problems. our friends all the u.k. and to population in europe is different to i wouldn't agree at all i do think that we need to change performances in the way that they've been written this is a conservative opera house conservative company it is there to put on classical performances they shouldn't be changed just because a few people this year decide they should be changed in a certain way what will happen in 20 years time 50 years time someone else might

come along and say oh well we need to change them again and again and again look they should stick to the classical way it should have been done the way that they've always been done that's what audiences want and that's what they should be sticking to. portugal could stay in coded lockdown until easter and health officials get their way the country's infection rate has slowed but it still registered a high daily death toll one nurse we heard from says the system was coping better until this latest spike in cases. but i mean. the situation is still very difficult and we have more patients hospitalized in intensive care than the total number of beds we had prepared to make it is a huge difference from the 1st wave we were less prepared for the 1st wave we didn't have the supplies available fortunately at the time we anticipated it would get worse so we did not have the same type of pressure on our health services during this way we have the supplies we have the knowledge but we were completely

overwhelmed by the number of cases reaching us and we lack human resources. since the start of the pandemic the country has recorded almost 780000 coronavirus cases and nearly 15000 deaths health workers say they are still struggling to cope with the number of covert patients in intensive care. but my biggest personal concern is feeling that we were not able to do everything our health workers are very competent but they are immensely tired i see it in my colleagues colleagues who are tired and need holidays breaks and calmer shifts what motivates me right now is knowing that we are making a difference and to be able to achieve positive things in this moment to know that it is possible these nurses these doctors these assistance and these technicians have a very important mission to fulfill and they are fulfilling it and all together we can overcome this adversity. and the world health organization is still

recommending the astra zeneca vaccine despite trials showing a limited protection against new mutations of the virus south africa which has registered a particularly virulent new strain of the disease has suspended its role out of the shot over the issue now a national study from the u.k. based pharma giants job had only a 22 percent efficacy against the new variant and it has raised questions over whether the vaccine should also be distributed in other countries south africa has already switched to the pfizer and johnson and johnson shots the head of south africa's advisory committee on code vaccines broke down the country's priorities in tackling the virus. the promiscuous meantime we do need to protect our health care workers who need to be taken with a vaccine which we know does have a track record previn trial record on preventing serious disease with the

new variant. so that story and we just screen the use of this is in one of the important things of course you want to look at is does s. has any. provision series from fiction also it was nation level in fiction with a new variant because it really don't have data on i think it's really unfortunate this particular variant has got a mutation at a very critical part of ours the part of the part of the ones we just need to for the virus to establish in fiction as a particular attention or to particular position which is of course because the virus is not the trick and now it's a selection drawn just for it describes the effect of previous infection and the vaccine. 32 minutes and 20 seconds that's when i'm going to be back with another full and fresh look to news that starts internationally that's.

why the pandemic no certainly no borders. nationalities. is a word we talk about certainly we took a backseat. to. judging . comedy classes so it is the same things. we can do better we should. everyone is contributing it's your own way but we also know that this crisis will not go on forever the challenge is great with the response has been masked so many good people are helping us. it makes us feel very proud that we are in it together. a dark industry comes to life in los angeles every night. dozens of women sells

their bodies on the street many of them under-age. los angeles police reveal a taste of their daily challenge no if you're going to exploit our child here in los angeles there we're going to come out and see officers going undercover as 6 workers and customers to fight 6 trades. must not conflate all elites with corruption there are many bureaucrats and many public servants that are failing in a tree army know what civil duties and if anything must be associated with the new order that comes up that many of the success stories in. the one. intelligent leaders and yes movements tell you no people or the corrupt elites on the other side look we will give you

a fair chance and we will give you an honorable exit from the system if you let your peers which are cleaner and which have no blood on their hands come in and manage this with us. thank. you just so stupid there's nothing. for me. as i have. nobody. to hear what makes. money.