♪ >> this is "bbc newsnight." funding for this presentation is made possible by the freeman foundation of new york, stowe, vermont, and honolulu. newman's own foundation. and union bank. >> at union bank, our relationship managers work hard to know your business. offering specialized solutions and capital to help you meet your growth objectives. we offer expertise and tailored solutions for small businesses and major corporations. what can we do for you?

>> and now, "bbc newsnight." >> struggles started one year ago this week, but the assad regime still holds all the power. and it calls for intervention in during the anti-government fighters, we ask of the opposition is simply too divided to succeed. the regime, as far as we can see, remains, while its enemies are often divided or uncertain. a deadly rampage by a renegade u.s. soldier. koran earnings, and anti-western protests and violence. can a to really say that afghanistan is on track? >> and the principle dancer and britain oppose a royal ballet at just age 19 and why he made a leap for artistic freedom. >> you just want to start fresh.

♪ >> hello. it is a year since the start of the syrian uprising, a struggle that daley seems more bitter and entrenched. both sets of made big sacrifices, upwards of 8000 people have perished so far, according to the u.n. the drive for international diplomatic consensus continues. debate between the opposition's 4 and france over whether to send arms into syria. even among those who oppose president assad, such issues are not clear-cut. we will here from two of them shortly. first, tim looks at why the regime is proving so resistant. >> a year on, the images of anger and grief in syria have barely changed.

this is how the longest of the arab uprising took off, 12 months and perhaps 10,000 deaths ago, in the town of deraa. the spark was a demonstration demanding the release of young people arrested for scribbling anti-regime graffiti. soon, they were burying fellow protesters shot by troops. it was the first case of state- sponsored brutality that would target even children. this is evidence of how this 15- year-old from deraa was tortured in detention. his arm broken, teeth knocked out, before his dead body was finally returned weeks later to his parents. >> he had two drill holes in his hand and a fracture. his pelvis had five bullets, a total of 11 bullets not including the new drill holes.

when i brought him home to his mother, she cannot identify him. were it not for a childhood injury. >> it has fuelled the of rising as thousands of turned out to do and not just freedom but justice and increasingly vengeance. from deraa, the uprising spread to duma near domestics and -- near damascus and then to other towns. last summer, troops besieged one town, killed scores in hamaa. by january, rebel fighters were in other damascus' suburbs. but they were driven out of there and out of homs, the scene of the worst violence in the last few weeks. a year on, how come president assad is still in power? the rebellion has spread, showing remarkable resilience in of bravery. it has required some arms and

defecting soldiers. much of the arab world, as well as the west, backs and politically, and sanctions have helped. but it is not enough, because the regime, as far as we can see, remains united and ruthless. while its enemies, the opposition leaders and their foreign backers, are often divided or uncertain. most protesters i met recently in syria were desperate for any form of foreign assistance. arms, supplies, no-fly zones, protected humanitarian corridor. but with the outside world unwilling to intervene, there still hopelessly outgunned by the forces. and president assad has played on the country's religious divide. christians form a large mired note -- minority in largely sunni muslim syria.

the allied community the president belongs to and there is another non-sunni sect. some believe the opposition would target them if assad fell. in damascus where life usually looks pretty normal, it is hard to know whether people really fear the opposition or just the regime. but for whatever reason, most still are not joining the revolution. >> a lot of syrians believe that this level of violence is temporary. and that the government will go out of this and of the country will go out of this. even though bruised is still intact. >> president assad certainly seems to think the violence is temporary. and as the opposition stands, he might even still be in power in a year's time, fighting what he will regard as a containable civil conflict. tim hugh reporting. my colleague family has been speaking to two syrian opposition activists. danny, who has been in homs

until recently. and an academic doctor, a member of the opposition group building the syrian state. >> danny, the what the outside world to be harming the opposition now? >> yes, of course. that is the only way for us to defend ourselves. i see what goes on in my home town. at two areas which are not protected by the free syrian army. the assata army went in there, stabbed the civilians, raped the children, and killed the children. all the other areas are protected. >> where should those arms come from? you have taken moves to ask for help, right? >> the arms would be coming from outside, from europe, america, the ewing, turkey, lebanon. i do not know. i am not a politician. i am a guy that is living in syria. i have been there since the beginning of the revolution. >> you talked to a senator, joe lieberman. >> i talked to a senator, joe

lieberman. it said they will not give us the arms but there will be intervention soon. of course, this is all talk. they should have been here ever eight months. we have seen no actions. >> at some point, you have got to say this has been going on a year. whenever arguments you had about not army opposition has got to reach a turning point, hasn't it? >> actually not. to the contrary. because since army the opposition started, the death toll increase. it is the area where the free syrian army was based. we have seen significant death tolls. the area where the free syrian army claimed it was protecting civilians but failing to protect them. it withdrew from those areas of the left of the civilians to be massacred by this regime. most of syria is still under control of the regime. the regime is strong militarily. we're concerned about people like danny.

we want people to live. we do not want the young people to die in front of such a brutal regime. we need them. this is a battle for democracy. the road does not go through farming. >> the point is, you're on the cusp or you can say you have already entered civil war in some places like homs. are you worried you'll lose even more members of your family? >> no, you do not understand something. we're already losing members of our family. we are being tortured by the army. the women have been raped and a kidnapped in the streets. how are we to protect ourselves. ? this theory was protected by the army. there were bombarding the whole area. is in the better than coming in and stabbing us and killing us? i would rather be shot by a gun and to be killed then be tortured. >> you are describing a massacre of the innocent. >> most of the members of my group are all inside syria and they're against the army. the majority of the syrians are against the army. >> no, i am sorry about that.

>> they know this regime. in a how brutal it is. they know what it means to confronted by arms. they are concerned about their safety. syria has what it takes to enter full-scale civil war. >> the extraordinary thing is, you can debate the question of arms, but the regime does not look unstable. and it does not look divided. and of the opposition does. >> the regime is divided, by the way. the divisions and the opposition are not weakening the regime or making it stronger, i am sorry. we should not overestimate the opposition. there's no opposition in syria. we do not have institutions like here. their only famous writers and professors who openly criticized the regime. however, it is the international community that is divided. if they come to international consensus and one solution for syria, this year in a position -- right now, they are not. >> russia is starting to change

its rhetoric? >> no, russia will not change their opinion. one more thing i want to put on the table. anyone who says we do not want in the region, we do not want arms in syria, go there for one month and see the massacres, pick up pieces of bodies from the street. then say that. see women being raped by 12 men a day. then say we do not want arms. we are being massacred and no one is doing anything about this. where are the human beings in the world? >> it is there regime that are killing. free syrian army. the regime is a brutal, but this is not the way to go. >> everyone wants arms. that is with the one from inside. >> lanie to end it there. thank you to both of you. >> nato forces will stick to their troop reduction plan in afghanistan. that was the message from president obama and britain's prime minister david cameron when they met in washington this week. they also said that security was

still approving despite a rampage by a u.s. soldier that left 16 afghan civilians dead. the burning thekorans at an american air base, and the violent protests that followed both. with president karzai calling for nato troops to return to base and the taliban suspending tenanted negotiations with the u.s., the end game for the nato mission is looking increasingly flawed. -> to the and so it's of koran burning has been added the injury of this district in southern afghanistan. 16 people, nine children, killed in the rampage by an american who commanders suggest was a deranged loner. it complicates the search for a dignified exit from afghanistan. riots following the burning of copies of the koran have claimed dozens of lives. perhaps produced a more serious crisis even than the murders.

because as attacks on western mentors have been increased, the afghan government has saw to ban on foreign bodyguards. the withdrawal of advisers from ministers and the halting of much development work. >> the karzai administration is rife with corruption. one of the ways of improving the afghan government performance was really by the presence of the international community, being able to deter corruption and encourage better performance. certainly, without the ability to get onto the ground caused both by the deteriorating security situation and also a reliance on, often not reliable afghan security guards, it becomes very difficult over the remaining year and a half or so. >> there are more big issues lurking as nato tries to move into the background. from talking to the taliban to relations with pakistan and fighting corruption in kabul's

ministries. but despite that, the u.s. and afghan government are trying to negotiate a framework that would allow american troops to stay in the country beyond the handover of security in 2014. the karzai government may not be strong enough to stand of foreign help, which why the budget which is why they're still seeking lot for military aid. but before nato can get to the post with a drawl state, that pull out its of must happen without looking like a shambles. >> the problems with the afghan government, the way in which corruption has demanded huge problem, the role of pakistan's government on not getting down on insurgents and charis, these key problems are still there. i think they do cast some doubt on the likely success of the mission. i still think we have a better than 50/50 chance of some moderate, acceptable, minimal standard of success being achieved or at least defeat being avoided. >> but whatever happens to the

speed of withdrawal and the difficult relationship of president karzai, nato's leaders are committed to winding down their combat deployments. the people here had already suffered for many years of fighting in their districts. it was a taliban stronghold and few supported the americans, even before the killings. but the ripple effect of what happened are now being felt, not least in nato capitals, the pessimism grows about afghanistan. >> well, my colleague jeremy has been speaking to the former u.n. deputy ambassador to afghanistan. the former british defense secretary. and foreign policy writer. >> lottery achieving by being there? >> well, i think we achieved quite a lot. >> what are we achieving now? >> i think we're giving the afghans the prospect of being a constant and capable of looking after their own security.

quite frankly, they would not have done that if we were not there. we have denied that space to al qaeda, which has been significant. but i think the priority now has to be to complete the mission. >> to get out? >> well, we are going to get out. >> so we can get out? >> there was never an intention or plan in 2005 or beyond for us to be there forever. the point was to support the new government in kabul and give them the means to defend themselves so they can make sure that al qaeda and his supporters do not come back. >> peter, what you think will happen if there were to be a change of policy and the americans, a predominately americans and their allies, were to decide to leave now? >> first, the united states and its allies would save a lot of money. the united states spends $117 billion in afghanistan in 2011. and they might be able to devote more resources to the countries where al qaeda is a threat,

because it is not a threat in afghanistan. but it is an issue in pakistan, somalia, yemen, among other places. and what would happen in afghanistan? and do not think the situation in afghanistan would look any different. the problem in afghanistan is that we have a counterinsurgency strategy that is not working and cannot work, because it depends on having a reliable partner and the corrupt, ineffective, and lms -- eligible government of hamid karzai is not such a partner. the strategy is simply not working and there is no prospect of making it work. >> from where you sit, what is being achieved for the tens of billions -- those young lives? >> not a lot, but a bit. one of those things is to get rid of al qaeda more or less from afghanistan. one is to persuade pakistan that

it needs to try and do something about its wild west, if you like, it's wild frontier. but not a lot. >> is anything achieved by staying there? >> i think still a bit but not for very much longer. it would be those two things. he described the karzai government marvelously. i think the interesting is the case for how bad it is. i guess you could say that by staying there, it gives it a bit more time to try and do a deal with the taliban and achieve the kind of stability, and it gives american more time to the pressure on pakistan. >> it is terrible. there seems widespread consensus on these sort of government. you may say it is their only government, but the sort of government that there is in afghanistan now. that is not a great thing to have died for, is that? >> the afghan government has been marred in corruption. they have not been liable

partners for much of the time we have been involved in this campaign. that has restricted the ability to make the progress we would have liked to have done. it is complicated operation. there is only one government in afghanistan. we have no other option. but i think there is, you know, still a job to be done there. i believe that very strongly. i think it is wrightwood peter is saying, that the terrorist threat from al qaeda and those organizations are much more diverse. we have to focus on that, too. if we were to sort of rewrite history and say that we should not have gone to afghanistan, there has been no gain from the mission, i think we really will be standing history on its head. >> what did you think the afghan proposition, the afghan operation, has done to the way that western powers regard the rest of the world of the way the rest of the world regards nato? >> well, first, the afghan war i think was justified in its 2001,

but the mission was more or less accomplished at the end of 2001. that is to say the taliban and al qaeda were out of afghanistan. we then changed the mission in a very ambitious effort to create a centralized afghan government in a country that had never known a centralized government. that was one of the most diverse countries in the world, both ethnically and geographically. and we have been investing half a trillion dollars in that effort with no success for the reasons that have been set. namely, we do not have a reliable partner. we can wish that the karzai government was more reliable, but it is not. your strategy depends on a reliable partner and there is not one, it is not going to work. what is the larger lesson? it is that when you engage in ambitious nation-building exercises, as in afghanistan and iraq, you are undertaking

something that you probably cannot accomplish. when you engage in intervention, that probably only works when you have a more limited agenda which is to support the agendas of your partners on the ground. that is what work in libya and costs of both. >> what you think has been the legacy of this operation? >> it has made a to look like an organization that picks the wrong wars to fight. not an organization that cannot win wars, but that makes big misjudgments. and now, one that is much less likely to go to war at all. >> john, what do you think has been the legacy of the afghan war? >> too early to tell. i did we have had some success on the ground. i think we have made a difference in terms of protecting the u.k. from the threat of terrorism. but this war against this kind of terrorism is going to go on. it is not over yet. it will not be over when we come

out of afghanistan either. >> thank you. >> finally, he is the young kids are many compared to nureyev and baryshnikov. the prodigy who at 19 became the youngest ever principle dancer and britain oppose the royal ballet. but sergei polunin shot to the dance world in january when he suddenly walked out of the prestigious role. he returned to the london stage this week with a new company. he talked to stephen smith about why he stepped out. ♪ >> rehearsing in a taut guy and a t-shirt, the tattoo-sporting ballet star who had the world and is highly prized feet, only to turn his back on it. sergei polunin, whom we found rehearsing for a new show, sensationally quit the royal ballet where he was the youngest ever principle dancer at the tender age of 19. in his first television

interview since that dramatic exit, sergei polunin, with his friend and collaborator, began by discussing whether he still has an appetite for dance. >> how was that for you? you do not like rehearsing very much, do you? >> he has, it is not my favorite thing to do. >> is it like athletes you read about, they hate training? it can only really get involved when it is the big occasion. >> the only time you enjoy your profession, communicating with people. it is like you learn a lot and you practice a lot, for months maybe. and it is like nine hours a day. so when you're finally on stage, especially when it is finished, you have so much adrenalin, so much joy. ♪

>> sergei polunin said it had been his dream to become principle dancer with the royal ballet. so what went wrong? >> i and a way -- in a way, i did feel like the artist in me was dying a little bit. and i was not giving as much of myself and putting as much creativity into it as i could, as i should, because i have it in me. so you have to explore those things, and alleges it dies. if you do not give freedom. >> was that the issue? it sounds as though you're more

happy now and you have more freedom now? >> i cannot say i am happier now. i am is still finding my, like, what i am going to do. i am going to explore different directions. ♪ and i did not feel so comfortable and i stopped being involved as a person and an artist, and that is not something i want. i do not want to have family. i do not want to have a flight. i destroyed in away everything i had. >> you felt that you had to destroy what you had, that you worked so hard for before you could move on and find yourself again. >> basically, yes. almost like a delete button and you just want to start fresh. ♪

>> i gather you quite like a tattoo? >> yes, one on my wrist. they are all random. i do not plan them. i have maybe 11. quite a lot. what i like about the tattoo it place is the atmosphere. it is like a lot of kind of friends, a lot of normal people there. it is just fine. >> do you think you will still be dancing in four or five years' time? >> at the moment, i do not think i will, not in six years, but i would love to achieve something else in a different profession. because once you achieve something, you just want to move on. >> that was sergei polunin.

and that is all for this week. from all of us, goodbye. >> make sense of international news at bbc.com/news. >> funding for this presentation is made possible by the freeman foundation of new york, stowe, vermont, and honolulu. newman's own foundation. and union bank. >> at union bank, our relationship managers work hard to know your business. offering specialized solutions in capital to help you meet your growth objectives. we offer expertise and tailored solutions for small businesses and major corporations. what can we do for you?

>> "bbc newsnight" was presented by kcet stocks fell on worries that china might...

announcer: the new pbs for ipad app. you'll never know what you'll find. [dog barks] announcer: available now in the app store.