slovakia's prime minister rejects calls to not use russia's sputnik the vaccine as the country's vaccination vaccine program gets out bogged down by politics. u.k. medical workers are outraged after the government offers them a pay rise of only one per cent. and the dream holiday turned nightmare we heard we hear from a passenger who was trapped on an italian cruise ship during the cold with outbreak which resulted in the deaths of 3 people. you know they refused to inform us that there were cases aboard the ship that they tested positive there was no suspicion but continued people they refused to give us information.

it's the top of the hour and you know what that means time to watch r.t. international i'm your host donald quarter welcome the prime minister of slovakia has defended his decision to acquire russia sputnik the coronavirus vaccine he's faced a wave of criticism after the country received its 1st delivery of the shot earlier my colleague zander farmer and taylor went through the story. over the past year we've heard time and time again that unity is needed in the fight against the coronavirus when it comes to frank scenes though it seems that our unity falls apart and while political shenanigans begin to fall his purchase of russia sputnik seen the latest of around 40 countries globally to do so has made very clear because the prime minister was forced to defend his decision to critics spoke out

saying they want to refund the vaccine will not go back to russia it will save lives in slovakia i would never give it up our countries a fundamental part of the european union but i cannot turn down a quality vaccine that will save our people because it's made in russia i'm not a murderer so why did the scenes all the sputnik the flying out for most go to the east of here on monday bring about such backlash well the russian vaccine has not been registered by the european union yet the approval process is in fact just beginning but as prime minister said he cannot in good conscience allow himself to stand by and wait for red tape because while his citizens are dying so widespread then is this criticism is it a couple of voices or is the really facing some sort of you know substantial revote here while the purchase of those 2000000 jobs has really put the government in disarray so 2 of the 4 parties who make up the ruling coalition have spoken out one

in fact has proposed a reshuffle of the entire cabinet the other said it might even leave the coalition meanwhile the foreign minister foreign affairs minister very diplomatically to clades the sputnik the is not just a frank scene but quote a tool of hybrid war so it puts people a titian's who all supposed to put the welfare of best citizens of what else are here 5 miles thing in trying to send back a vaccine that could save thousands of lives for its part looking at this point. to call in fighting said ok we'll take the axels back and we won't even ask for the compensation as per the contract and this is something that the slovakian pm actually wrote about specifically how expose the hypocrisy of his critics they have been seeing hybrid war jew political russian weapons all kinds of nonsense that we should be ashamed off when the russians came and offered to take the vaccine back with no repercussions everyone suddenly became quiet why couldn't the prime

minister just adopt a vaccine that had been approved then by the uighurs he decided to take this route and take sputnik fee and of course then we've seen all the arguments than she. well it's no secret tool that the european union is failing in its toss of vaccinating its 450000000 strong population its production is slow its rollout is even slow it's been such a p.r. and health disaster that brussels was even forced to publicly apologize so frustration desperation pushing. member states to look beyond the block for help and they're looking to russia so hungry has registered sputnik the slovakia to now . sound merino so ofter it's easy to approve of frank scenes what an aide that room is that the czech republic an all star also next in line so pretty appetite is growing as is a lack of faith in brussels as food brussels and the e.u.

which is obviously all about being a single cohesive union where everything is centralized all these individual member states splintering off and breaking ranks is actually quite humiliating and in a sign that it doesn't even really have faith in its own ability to handle this crisis on friday a spokesperson said that countries can independently acquire jobs approved by the bloc not whether they're from russia from china or wherever else so we're clearly seeing his shift within the e.u. member states starting to lose faith and confidence splintering from the union when it comes to fact scenes and this may to saugor in slovakia showing as we've seen from the very beginning that not even vaccines in the middle of a global pandemic are immune from being politicized meanwhile in south america the president of venezuela nicolas maduro and 1st lady cecilia flores have been inoculated with their 1st dose of so sputnik v the inaugural 100000 shots arrived

in the country last month and were given to the most vulnerable demographics as well as to medical workers footage of the presidential couple receiving the russian shot was broadcast on state television. a kick in the teeth that. what the british medical association is calling the government's proposed one per cent pay rise for health care workers unions say it undermines the value of those who quote kept the country alive during the crew cope with crisis now despite the u.k. national health service is set despite the u.k.'s national health service to set to receive an extra $500000000.00 pounds per year under the deal it would still likely result in a real term pay cut for staff as inflation in the u.k. is predicted to reach 1.5 percent this year it comes despite the government's repeated promises of rewarding frontline staff. our n.h.s. is the beating heart of this country but it is important that we support our really just want to see fantastic front line workers paid properly we absolutely want to.

reward n.h.s. stuff for what they've done i will be making sure that we fight to have that. reward i mean i guess the government would have to prioritize and i think nurses and the n.h.s. in general is something that we should prioritize at this moment and i do think they should probably receive more than one percent but it's a symbolic one percent you know what's that's not going to have any impact on the it just feels like a very it's like a very weak offer from the government it's not right you know there's always companies that made so much money off the back of that but those have been in the middle of it haven't done so well and it just is critically underfunded. you know the government can afford lots of other things you look at all the come trucks they've been given to their friends leading british nurses union has even set up a strike fund over the deal labor party leader care starmer has also dismissed the

proposal saying quote culvert heroes deserve better support but the british health secretary has defended the offer calling it affordable given covens devastating impact on economies we've got the opinions of a u.k. think tank and a nurse on the issue. but not least because one can say as nor as he got his consent or nothing that nazis have done and in each case for us and jane at all for this country joining the course of the pandemic we've already had 10 years if i stayed 80 and ask loys nor me not that i think you can imagine any. demoralized the tango and the same people of speech from government i think we had at least a small of an a hole that asked our government in clout for his had to be quite honest budget you might actually show. we are and the appreciation for his and pandemic unfortunately that was at next opportunity for the government i think it's fairly

understandable that public servants who are doing a really difficult job or a really difficult time would feel that they ought to be rewarded more fair to the u.k.'s a wealthy nation if we devalued our resources fairly i think there'd be a lot more to be ample sco for low paid workers and critical work as such the system gets a. more substantial pay rise it's not hard to find examples of how better more cold but. government administration or a fairer taxation system could find the money to give the nurses who've been literally saving lives keeping the country running through this period of more generous offer. in other news u.s. capitol police have requested that more than 2000 national guard troops remain in washington d.c. for another 2 months and with tensions remaining high after january riots the police authorities and the media seem intent on finding threats even when the

evidence doesn't always lead their taylor momsen explains. it is no exaggeration to say that there was serious panic in the lead up to march 4th a new threat against the u.s. capitol a possible militia plot to storm the capitol as early as tomorrow we are watching this threat stream the information social media other sources with respect to this particular day march 4th federal law enforcement is on full alert after warnings from intelligence officials that another attack on the u.s. capitol could be a minute preparations were serious hundreds of national guard patrolling the area capitol police released a statement on wednesday warning possible plot to breach the capitol by an unidentified militia group a local businesses have warned tenants about possible protests you might have gotten the impression watching me to your reports that u.s. officials were bracing for the purge as citizens rushed to get home before

commencement. we advise you to get off the streets as quickly as possible it will soon be a war there. so what happened when the fateful day finally arrived nothing what does it take to put the u.s. government on edge apparently just some lame internet rumors it all started with q. and a on conspiracy theorists on the internet they said that the inauguration of joe biden was a big false flag and that the pentagon was planning to install donald trump on march 4th the original inauguration date in u.s. history well obviously that did not happen now the main conspiracy theory of cuban on is the idea that a group of satanic blood drinking pedophiles have seized control of the u.s. government and media apparatus and that donald trump and his allies are waging a heroic covert war against them behind the scenes some of blame donald trump for not denouncing the militia groups and cuban on conspiracy theorists who rally

behind him you know the president has a responsibility to tell him to stand down this road. is credible it's real human on conspiracy theories and delusions aside joe biden won the election he has been inaugurated so why is the country still on edge and blaming the former president there were no violent actions or big protests on march 4th but law enforcement was on high alert the whole thing was taken very very seriously the department continues to work with all of them. and is based on the intelligence that we have the department has taken immediate steps to enhance our security posture and stuffing for a number of days to include much the fools the u.s. house of representatives even canceled their meeting later nancy pelosi insisted that the meeting was not canceled just moved to an earlier time if in fact there's any troublemakers around and it makes sense. i don't

think anybody should take any encouragement that because some troublemakers might show up and that we changed the whole schedule now we just moved in a few hours there's now a call to extend the national guard presence around the u.s. capitol just in case internet liberals have decided that a secret nazi conspiracy has taken over the republican party their proof the shape of the stage at sea-tac apocalyptic scenarios are now starting to become a regular aspect of american political discourse and i actually have a lot of conservative friends and a lot of populous conservative friends and a lot of trump supporters. and none of the had talked about this until the mainstream you brought it up rumors only cause panic if the rumors are given air by the right you know media i just think it's a justification to not put this in a position where they have to actually face the failures that they've had through

almost a month and a half of being you know people were talking about a $2000.00 check that's what they want. no one knows where their checks that i want to hear about that where the money or where the health care you know what's going on in our economy right now you know those are the things we don't see anyone once again holding biden accountable in the same way that we expected to be out accountable i promise you nobody going to the capitol. the day the media's been claiming this blood drinking satanic pedophiles secret cryptic nazi symbols false flag inaugurations all of this would make a great hollywood movie or a netflix mini series but in the real world america seems to have some pretty big problems like crumbling infrastructure unpopular wars and cultural polarization however our political discourse seems to be stuck in fantasyland caleb mop and artsy new york meanwhile coverage of donald trump's high profile return to the

media spotlight at the conservative political action conference has been rapidly disappearing from youtube ostensibly for making false claims about last year's election result on his podcast artie's ben swan asked a selection of guests for their take on the clampdown. governments and the public really have lost control of what's going on online it gets to a real scary place when every discussion has to be more about so who knows when in fact we need to actually have a broader discussion it's a fine line between. protecting and censoring and creating a bunch of members of society who can't have critical conversation of the future because they're afraid and not only might they be canceled just from from existing online or in an other ways but their whole lives could in fact their lives could be canceled if they if they step too far one way or the other when you read it in

a constitutional republic where free speech and the 1st amendment is protected it's the 1st amendment for a reason it's the most important because all the others don't matter if you can't talk about them for some reason we've just focused all of our aggression on donald trump and never really looked at those larger if you logical institutionalized norms that the united states is is based on what many trump is so significant and remember he was discounted in the beginning was that he was able to speak to people who feel like they have not been spoken to without donald trump in this part of the republican party would arguably should have shrunk but you see levels that would never win on this state local or national level ever again they should be thinking. they're watching r t international still ahead the holiday from hell we hear from a passenger who was trapped on an italian cruise ship during

a deadly cold outbreak more on that after the break. so there are 3 big events and in more than a fuse 3 which could not be predicted because they were ridiculous. because it was world war one because nobody really can see that what would happen if you deployed us old and machine guns on so i could call them machine guns because this was always done against school warriors for the. bribes my. friends your delusion no serious french politician would could ever ever accepted that somebody will likely be year to become leader of the country and it will deplete it was. going to come up the soviet union because again you know soledad it was. even

called. the soviets themselves. joined me every thursday on the alex simon show and i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. welcome back to the program french authorities are investigating manslaughter allegations against italy's costa cruises after 3 people died following a covert outbreak on one of their ships last year those aboard the coast of maggie claim they weren't told about suspected infections and were encouraged by the crew to use the ship's facilities charlotte dubinsky spoke to one of the passengers. sequoias yes the cruise was a chance to go with my son who was 5 years old to see

a magical world and discover the magic of the caribbean instead it was a nightmare i wondered how i would get out of this hell because if i didn't i was going to die stephanie dubois was one of thousands of holiday makers aboard the cost a magical last year when the covert pandemic hit for her and her then 5 year old son it was supposed to be a dream voyage instead passengers found themselves trapped or bored with little information or what was happening as the virus spread through the ship. if they refused to inform us that there were cases of covert aboard the ship that they had tested positive there was no suspicion but indeed there were ill people they refused to give us information and we got it from the media when we were near the coast and could get a signal they concealed it from us and they didn't let us protect ourselves they didn't protect us either health wise they didn't treat us very well and not at all

humanely but also the void had to put in place barrier measures which could have protected us and did you ask koester what measures they were putting in place to ensure that your health was the priority. attention increased very quickly we were in a state of tension and anguish which i just can't describe finally after a few days this virus spread strongly we asked them to cut the air conditioning and they refused we demanded that they open all the restaurants and all those outside so that people could escape the crews as soon as possible to avoid gatherings he refused to put in place all these measures the cruise ship was refused permission for passengers to disembark at several ports including only island of locks and week now these images show the situation of the island's authority told passengers that they had to stay confined to their cabins tensions were high and violence erupted. was was

was. was was. was was a year later and french investigators approving allegations including manslaughter aggravated to seat and in danger in the lives of others against italy's costa cruises over her model could be going team cases aboard that ship 3 passengers from the virus the company denies the accusations saying that it and the crew acted on the scant information that was available about the forests the toyman considering that at that time the situation was a valving rapidly and the ship's medical team acted on the basis of the vailable scientific information and full compliance with the instructions of the health authorities and in constant coordination with them but the lawyer who represents almost knowing 100 passengers in the complaint filed in france told r.t.

that that's not the case and you can see there was no more hand sanitizer it was replaced by water very clearly or it was either totally empty or didn't exist no security or health measures there were 3 restaurants and blood would be shut to there was only one open and there were $2300.00 passengers who came for lunch breakfast and dinner one after the other without health measures and he claims that the company was fully aware before setting sail that there were troubled waters ahead even loyal to holiday makers he said that they had questioned whether there would be a tally in passengers on board as at that time italy had become the latest hub for the virus costa he says assured them there would be no italians on board he said me they knew a week in advance that the cruise could not last so yes it's true it was a strain. situation knew the stuff just

a little in advance of the pandemic hence the concern of the french passengers to know if there were any italian passengers at this time it was a european country hit hard by covert and they wrote we have the emails and letters from coast which say no there will be no italian passengers yes they lied and they should have cancelled this cruise because they knew what could happen the passengers who have brought these complaints now have to wait to see if it will be taken for stephanie it's already been a long and tough journey but she's determined that costa cruises should be held responsible so it's able to ski off we'll. have another news denmark has stripped almost 100 syrian refugees of their residency permits saying that they should return home now that major parts of the country are considered safe it's the 1st european nation to make such a move we have made it clear to the syrian refugees that their residence but on the

distemper it can be withdrawn that protection is no longer needed the government says the 94 migrants will be sent to danish deportation camp spot won't be forced to leave from there in the hope that they'll want to go back to syria of their own accord the move is part of the ruling party's aim to have 0 asylum seekers applying for residency human rights groups have lashed out at the move saying it goes against people's rights to be prosecuted from for to be protected from persecution we got the thoughts on this from handle bachmann member of the alternative for germany party. lived to see their day i have no perspective and denmark. in my decide to go back to syria at least if they are not afraid of to a subtlety i think at this. point to distinguish different groups there are no dual syrians who fled from the assad regime they probably don't want to go back

to the audience who fled from us and for damages be an option and that might be also an option for dogs who would simply fled from the us who are because they were afraid of their life because. this. war has ended now and. might be safe enough for them to go back you have to deal with the government which is still in charge in syria even if. they have related human rights if they want to send syrians back there you have to do you move the syrian government because of out the agreement of the syrian government. pursued his policy. our meaning is opposition is keeping up the pressure attempting to force the country's prime minister to step down saturday was the 10th consecutive day of protests in the capital of year of on and it follows

a public faceoff between prime minister nicol passion jaan and the military artie's constantine roscoff was among the crowds. well the people of europe on have taken to the streets again to protest against the prime minister he called question on and they see that peace deal that he signed with his service john as a humiliating defeat have the opposition have been staging rallies like this one for over a week now demanding the incumbent prime minister to step down was another rally staged by the veterans in front of the army is the ministry of deep bands and better ones there i joined calls from the top military command for the resignation of nicole pasha now. we're here to support our friends our top army leaders who are now literally face and unconstitutional repression so we just want to mention that officers are shoulder to shoulder with their commanders no matter their own active duty or veterans polish support the. coals for the resignation of the prime

minister and moreover i consider that. the army is not a joke we are talking about the chief of staff of this country who is empowered with certain rights and responsibilities and becomes simply be removed all of a sudden just because someone woke up in a bad mood like what happened to his deputy now it all stems from the last year said a 6 week bloody war with which ended in a humiliating defeat as lot of people here say and armenia had to cede large swaths of its territory to you as areas and of course that's when he called based increasing calls for his resignation and all in all it's quite can see 2 ways it is unclear how other countries go he didn't overcome this even in the congo wing political turmoil. fashion brand who a staunch supporter of the black lives matter movement appears to be not so wolk

when it comes to its own employees human rights groups have accused the company of paying staff below the minimum wage and poor working conditions to. during the pandemic and despite promising to clean up its act the british retailer could now be banned in the united states. the evidence so full slate was quite compelling i think it will be a wake up call for british institutions about how they're handling more than slavery in the schools labor.

if you want to follow the details on that developing story make sure to check out our website r t dot com and follow us on twitter i'll be back with more news in just about half an hour and i hope to see you then.

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