and so it shows that there is anger and frustration among the nato members with russia because these allegations are not new this is a string of actions by russia that is outraging the nato allies and they also the british also say that russia is working with international hecho organizations and this is an orchestration attempt to undermine western democracies and international organizations so with the accusations and counter-accusations flying around it feels like there's not much room for dialogue how do you see this playing out. but the diplomatic relations between russia and the nato members have soured over the last year is over the recent years and they are at a very low point it's hard to imagine how they can get any lower off the poisoning the poisoning of a russian spy in great britain in march diplomats very exposed intelligence officers they expelled on both sides so there's not much much left what can be done although the american minister of defense mr met has said that russia has to pay a prize they can of course you know and install more sanctions against russia but

the smiles and friendly handshakes at the start of nato summit of defense ministers were overshadowedby the news of a possible cyber attack by russian agents in the netherlands. nato allies expressed their solidarity with the decision by the dutch and the british governments to call out russia on its plate and attempt to undermine international law and international institutions dutch authorities announced today they had foiled a cyber attack on the organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons the dutch defense ministry said it expelled for russian nationals after they were caught spying at the chemical weapons watchdog but the defense ministers had other things to talk about as well national defense budgets were on the agenda with the us still pushing for other members to up their military spending but the term was less strident than recently as spending has gone up it is clear we are making progress this will be the fourth consecutive year of rising the fans spending but we still have a long way to go nato is investing and he's keen to show the world what it's doing with tha

nato has been holding its largest military exercises since the end of the cold war it's mainly taking place in norway and all twenty nine nato member states plus finland and sweden are involved the vast security operation is called pride and juncture it will stretch into parts of the north atlantic and the baltic sea it's taken months to get everything in position now fifty thousand troops and support personnel two hundred fifty aircraft sixty five naval vessels and up to ten thousand military vehicles are now in the region moscow has called the maneuvers quote and anti russian exercise to. accompany the troops and tanks. why. i know. blowing up obstacles. and building bridges in just a few minutes two capabilities that the german army is bringing to try to juncture . but i've these old school skills still needed in times of hybrid warfare and cyber attacks as a result after the ukraine crisis we saw that it is more important to change back from stability operations to higher terms of awful provisions of what we see and as an interest to move larger formations and heavy equipment and

very often between the european union and nato. need to we have.to see the role of the prominent role of the united states of america and the united states they have the capacity to to make pressure on the other members of nato in order to go in in that direction and when they talk about dupion union i talk about to the. do kind of a propaganda that european union deed in new crane through the high representative for reforming policy which was lady catherine ashton when she went to my then square with the european flag to promote a dupion union but that was an email you opinion a wrong behavior because european union should say to any county that members we do not close the door so that if the counter is respect to the parade it was this but we will not make insurance in the internal affairs of the county in order to promote european union and to seduce the counter towards the rupee has specially when the hero has no intentional following up on that and actually accepting the country into the european union ukraine is now facing presidential electi

back then it was three nato countries now we have all the twenty nine nato countries plus sweden which is not an imminent member of nato to finland and also jordan and representatives from the ukraine in georgia is also going to participate i mean this is. not something special you know it's a it's the largest military exercise in or it ever what is the worry are we just sort of the amount we just saw our correspondent graphically outlining the huge disparity between the difference between what nato spends on its military and what russia spends on the military it way way far apart what's nato so worried about. how that's a good question and i think that there is to give a political struggle between the united states and russia going on you know and we smaller nations within nato are caught in this game that's that's you know the way i see it. normally it's also if you go back to the eighty's you know the cold war a typical thing would be that norway spends on defense per capita are about to say mess with finland and denmark now where we are spending twice as much next years at two thou

is also a good opportunity to show that nato is preparing for counter tags on russia because nato now is seeing these russian the thames as a kind of a military aggression we heard comments there from the nicer secretary at general have other nato members been reacting well old native members have their own allegations the brits issued a report the united states indicted. other russians in other related cases but also no way australia switzerland came forward with allegations so this is the attempt to show a worldwide alliance against these alleged russian attacks and of course as you mentioned russia is denying all these cases a russian spokeswoman said today it's all pure fantasy. russia is already suffering from sanctions imposed on it for its actions in ukraine. i wonder where this can go from here. well nato and also the united states certainly considering a fresh round of sanctions against individuals from the russian military secret service and also maybe more expulsions of russian diplomats but the relations between the western countries are russia's a solo you can how dimensi

what does it mean today to join nato to join nato means for some countries this is an insurance policy but on the other side in may be part of nato means to have some benefits to an econo in benefits financial benefits also the fact that the county can rent some bases to the united states that would pay for this the western policy during the cold war was based on the notion of ideological income and compatibility with the soviet union there was a strong ideological factor there do you think russia ideologically also sees itself at odds with the west no i think that there is a different approach to life that is different culture. what is russia nowadays is russia. a democracy as we may consider any other western european country probably not to and russia that is a special democracy the school like this very often my opinion is that. the western european counties and nato counters they tended to emphasize the danger to rational represents in order to create an enemy that would use the five new further actions toward that that kind of me if somebody knows or russia. are we sure that of r

phil: we heard comments from the nato secretary-general. how have other nato members been reacting? reporter: all nato members have their own allegations. the brits have issued a report in the united states indicted seven other russians in other related cases. also norway, australia, switzerland came forward with their own allegations. this is the attempt to show world -- a worldwide alliance against these alleged russian attacks. and as you mention, russia is denying all of these cases. a russian spokeswoman said to may -- said today it is all fantasy. phil: russia is suffering for sanctions imposed on its actions in ukraine. i wonder where this can go from here. reporter: nato and the united states are considering a fresh round of sanctions against individuals from the russian military secret service and call for more expulsion of russian diplomats. but the relations between russia and the other countries are so low, you can hardly imagine they would getting lower. if you add tensions between the u.s. and russia in syria and if you add the new law that russian missiles deployed he

also coming up nato was launched joint exercises in northern europe with military hardware and tens of thousands of troops from all twenty nine member countries russia says the overs are and anti russian exercise but are they really preparing for a twenty first century conflict. and do have you had to hunt doris to find out why so many feel threatened and are fleeing that country for the u.s. even as president trying to tighten the u.s. southern border. i'm so misconducts good to have you with us a court in pakistan has freed a christian woman sentenced to death by hanging for blasphemy a mother of four r.c.m.p. was condemned to death in two thousand and ten she was the first woman in the country to receive a death sentence for insulting islam her cases caused widespread outrage among both human rights groups and hard line islamists extra security forces were deployed in the capital after islamists threatened violence upon her release. let's get more on the story with. asia also a baby has been fighting for her life for nearly a decade now tell us more about her story well it's been a

yeah i mean these are the biggest nato till things the cold war and they chris why does nato not see them as aggressive. well i think the argument would be that they are an alliance that is in response to aggression in for and against ukraine in crimea we know the argument i think the russians would come back and see and point to nato nato expansion but i think the other thing that's quite worrying about this these exercises are about a conventional war you know you take for instance the united kingdom we know we have two big aircraft carriers launch which can only be used in a conventional war a naval war i mean if we are seriously talking about a build up towards some coke conventional confrontation between the west and russia if this is serious that would be such a frightening prospect and really is not talked about so the other element i have to add into this of course is we are seeing something when you call war between the rest and russia and that's being used to obscure the fact of these exercises the need to build up and so on and obscure the fact that russia may have somethi

nato on the air on another hand. both sides still blame one another for what happened but do you think internally at least has there been any revaluation of what happened in ukraine why it happened and what are the potential conflict this is what we try. we try to discuss because you know your opinion what is very interesting is what provoked the crisis will be mainly there was a movement in a crane there was a movement to the beginning of the new millennium it was the orange revolution a movement the. leading the count to two words of the west. but then there was a one year who called visual selective the game of. words or that was a new position of the majority of the koreans but then i saw news that the european union. had a wrong behavior it would be nice an international going to zeeshan this should be a neutral international games while it is hard to be neutral when you. fear your neighbor but. one interesting thing you said was the. european union was on that path for many years the european union it wasn't th

it's a remarkable cycle nato builds up its forces. responds by building up its own which nato then calls russian aggression and uses it to justify stationing more tanks or troops near russia. and repeat it's not really had real i think he said provoke a she missed it. trying to look back at it typical nato drills we had of the thirty's in the eighty's the typical would be that we had ten thousand participants now we've got more than fifty one thousand it's a game of political struggle between the united states and russia are going on all very impressive this far as military escalations go but what with all these war games this propaganda militant rhetoric and collapsing arms treaties one can only wonder how long can we go on like this and much more we can escalate the for a stupid decision or an accident puts a spark to this treaty. proud. to north africa now where at least nine people have been injured in a suicide bomb attack in tunis is capital eight of them are police officers and one is a civilian a woman detonated herself in fro

also coming up nato has launched a joint exercises in northern europe with military hardware and tens of thousands of troops from all twenty nine member countries russia says that even new versions are an empty russian exercise but are they truly a preparation for twenty first century conflict and one hundred eighty two metres high it is the tallest statue in the world but india's three hundred fifteen million euro statue of unity inaugurated today and so park in anything but a symbol of togetherness. i'm sorry kelly welcome to the program a court in pakistan has freed a christian woman sentenced to death by hanging for blasphemy i see a baby condemned to death in two thousand and ten was the first woman in the country to receive a death sentence for insulting islam her case has caused widespread outrage among both human rights groups and hardline islamist extra security forces were deployed in the capital after islamists threatened violence upon her release. there dines now by shuttle shams from asia for more on this so we know i think he has been fighting for her life for nearly a d

nato stages joint military exercises in northern europe involving troops on hardware from all twenty nine member states moscow just scraps the war games as a russian exercise so is the alliance ready for twenty first century conflict. welcome to the program a court in pakistan has freed a christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy well the baby was condemned to hang in twenty ten for insulting islam prophet mohammad since today's ruling thousands of islamist activists have blocked roads and ransacked government property in protest with one group even calling for the deaths of the judges overturn the sentence. she has spent most of the past eight years in a prison cell in solitary confinement. bibi has always maintained her innocence the christian farm worker and mother of two was convicted in two thousand and ten of blasphemy she was accused of insulting the prophet mohammed after muslim women from her village objected to her drinking water from their shared class because she was christian bibi then became the first woman to be sentenced to death by hanging under pakistan's con

it's very much both of those things nato wants to show russia that if it dares to dip its toe into nato territory that all twenty nine allies would rush to that spot that they can get there and that they have the force once they get there to hold off any threat but the other thing we need to be very much aware of and you saw some of that in lars this piece is that there's a very high tech threat from russia you've got the cyber attacks you've got the possible jamming of all of these very advanced weapon systems that nato is now testing so they've got to do both and one nato officials told me that russia is testing them on every level so you've got to very much worry about your soldiers on the ground as well as your drones in the air and we know that the russian response has been swift they've called this an antique russian exercise russia itself plans to test military navy missiles also starting tomorrow off the coast of norway is this an escalation of tension terry well russia is right to think that this is this is aimed at russian capabilities even though nato very very stoically says

democrats sidelined by chance a macro he's now hotly tipped to take over her job also on the program nato stages joint military exercises in northern europe involving troops and hardware from all twenty nine member states moscow describes the event as an anti russian exercise so is the alliance ready for a twenty first century conflict. pakistan's top court frees a christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy but islamists want assy have been returned to jail and the judges who freed her dad. i'm still gail welcome to the program. has been badly today since anglo-american and she would stand down as leader of her party and not seek a further was germany's chancellor the race to succeed a heated up today as one of her longstanding critics launched his leadership campaign frederick metz says he can't unite a divided party. meet chancellor merkel's old rival the man she once ousted is back to challenge her it's evolved to get the c.d.u. needs a fresh start and renewal. c.d.u. needs a forward thinking political discussion and i believe that means the c.d.u. has to be clear about its core

i went to nato, my first meeting . i have been a supreme allied commander before in europe, i knew many of the people on the staff, many of the principals sitting around the table from my previous days, and i assumed when i went there i would lose some rapport with nations' representatives who represented their own nations interests. when i said there was no way i and ask back to america american parents to care more about the freedoms that european children enjoy then european parents did, that they were going to have to pay a modicum for the best defense in the world, and what is that? 2%. only leaves 98% for everything else. what we can draw from the renaissance and the lightman to survive in this world we have to recognize after 2014 especially things began changing and it was no longer the same europe that it was before putin began his adventures and terrorists began shooting up the streets of paris , brussels and elsewhere. i expected to lose report. i did not. -- rapport. i did not. i learned this when i sat beh

figure out whether or not this is worth the nato and you membership so this is the nato chief who says i welcome b.s. the vote in this referendum i urge all political leaders and parties to engage constructively and responsibly to seize this historic opportunity nato's doors open but all the national procedures have to be completed he though got a response from someone online who's a bit skeptical says are you serious that macedonia referendum is invalid as less than fifty percent voted you're talking about respecting all national procedures how about you respect that the referendum is not a historic opportunity but a massive failure so why and i actually want to go back to you with this because keeping in mind your position that there was a majority of the people who did vote who want this there are still many people in your country who don't and of course the prime minister has to represent all of them how will your party and your government go about making sure that you have these people on board. well first of all our next step is to talk and discuss with all the m.p.'s in the parl

nato was not a liberal institution it was to fight the cold war. and for security reasons. and not liberal in a certain sense. but the fact is virtually everything they did was designed for the soviet union. >> so it's hard to see what's been driven by realism. . >> and with that response for afghanistan with that desire from democracy was that trailing reason when you go to afghanistan with a massive attack on the homeland but how do you know, with that liberal impulse? . >> different people have different motives. >> with that bush doctrine more generally there is no question that in large part to deal with the terrorism problem but that saddam was joined at the hip with terrorist so i agree completely that's the reason we went into iraq but we went to iraq with the thought in mind to solve that problem to turn iraq and its neighbors into liberal democracies and that proliferation problem a liberal solution but a good realist like me like the balance of power so really you're asking for trouble. and i used to argue during the cold war. everybody the national security esta

it's a remarkable cycle nato builds up its forces. responds by building up its own we catch nato then calls russian aggression and uses it to justify stationing more tanks more troops near russia. and repeat its part of the confrontation of politics against russia. and maybe the future also against china but any case we need these actions to agree need is a product of common security of design a man and a friendly relation to russia. since ninety percent always. discussion in europe above the aggressive us and always other countries. russia because it's. all very impressive this far as military escalations go but what with all these war games the propaganda militant rhetoric and collapsing arms treaties one can only wonder how long can we go on like this much more we can escalate the for his stupid decision or an accident puts a spark to this trillion dollar a powder keg. from war to. nuclear threats there's a lot going on in the world these days to get people concerned but it turns out the biggest food for people in the united states

i like nato. nato is fine. but we shouldn't be paying almost the entire cost of nato

belgrade is no longer an enemy of the west twenty years after nato bombed serbia the country is on a path towards the e.u. and cooperating with the transatlantic dream but the question of the breakaway province of kosovo is still unresolved will it keep the old country from ever integrating into europe against serbia managed to become a part of the west. still keeping traditional tony's. present which is welcome to moscow great to have you on our program it's a first very pleased very pleased to be here. i enjoy spending my time. so you're here discussing a lot of things with good you seek his support and advise on costello you just came from the meeting with president putin what he had why we. discussed all important issues on. the political scene in the western balkans and the entire region of south east southeast europe and also we discussed i discussed or. you shoes or political economic and just one sentence to you was to say that. we do have better and better economic relationship and. our trade exchange rates right trade turnover is growing last two or it was. just three perce

it's a remarkable cycle nato builds up its forces. responds by building up its own which nato then calls russian aggression and uses it to justify stationing more tanks more troops near russia. and repeat it's not really had real i think it's their problem cation isn't it. try to look back at it typical nato drills we had it is thirty's in the eighty's the typical would be that we had ten thousand participants now we've got more than fifty one thousand it's a game of political struggle between the united states and russia are going on all very impressive this far as military escalations go but what with all these war games this propaganda militant rhetoric and collapsing arms treaties one can only wonder how long can we go on like this and much more we can escalate the for a stupid decision or an accident puts a spark to this trillion dollar powder keg. still to come on r.t. japan's under fire from the un for relocating families in the fukushima radiation saying the details up next. when lawmakers manufacture consent to public wealth.

it's a remarkable cycle nato builds up its forces moscow responds by building up its own we catch nato then calls russian aggression and uses it to justify stationing more tanks more troops near russia. and repeat part of the confrontation of politics against russia. and maybe the future also against china but in any case we don't need these actions will be needed is a product of common security of design a manned and a friendly relations with russia. since ninety percent always. gotten in europe above aggressive and always other. think russia. all very impressive this far as military escalations go but what with all these war games this propaganda militant rhetoric and collapsing arms treaties one can only wonder how long can we go on like this much more we can escalate the for a stupid decision or an accident puts a spark to this truly in dollar powder keg. german voters have told her another blow to chancellor merkel with both parties in a governing coalition on course to suffer heavy losses in sunday's state election has said there's been a surge in support both for the green party

so we created nato. nato was not a liberal institution. nato was created to fight the cold war. and in fact, less of the institutions were created, including the eu, were largely created for security reasons. this is not to say that they are not also, liberal in a certain sense. in fact, institutions can be both realist and liberal at the time. the fact is that during the cold war, virtually everything we did was designed to deal with the soviet union. and so, though similar cases where is hard to tell how much of the strategy is being driven by realism and with the patina of liberal hegemony. for purposes of argument, post 9/11 strategy that we talk about say that the response in afghanistan and the response in iraq however, misplaced it was, was driven, not by the desire for democracy was kind of the trailing reason and that really, we went to afghanistan because it was the source and the location of this massive attack on the homeland and we thought we had to go in and clean it up. i'm wondering if, how'd you know, how can you tell when these policies are driven by liberalism

considered i'm peter lavelle as the trumpet ministration pulls out of a key arms control agreement nato conducts a massive exercise in the arctic is a new front being opened up and it seems the saudis will get away with murder after all. real news i'm joined by my guest here in moscow mark sloboda he's an international affairs and security analyst we also have these and he is a professor at the higher school of economics as well as author of the u.k. of western civilization and resurgence of russia and we have earl rescues and he is the executive vice president of the eurasia. effect i mean if you can jump in anytime i want i want to talk about the continue to fall out from the i.m.f. treaty that the trump administration is withdrawing from i think it's a significant story the foreign policy blog seems to agree with us for a change or maybe they're going to we're going with them also i want to talk about these nato exercises which i don't think are getting enough western coverage in the media be it's a significant event and with the withdrawal from the i.n.f. treaty and these exercises

nato has a welcomed the results of the referendum here's a look now at the possible changes ahead for macedonia. the republic of macedonia a balkan state in southern europe that could be about to go through a small name change it's a vote that's grabbed the attention of europe's powerhouse and even u.s. officials and it's all down to one word north the change would bring an end to a twenty seven year long to speak with greece it's concerned about historical and territorial claims as it has a province called macedonia previously the territory of the macedonian state until the beginning of the twentieth century simple on paper but is it really. referendum ballots pose just one albeit double barreled question whether the macedonian people want to join nato and the u. and in turn support an agreement with greece to change the country's name to north macedonia. so it comes down to some in the country's desire to join the alliances after previous attempts have been blocked by greece this time its neighbor seems to have found a bargaining chip for macedonia as a session to nato but there are

nato launches joint exercises in northern europe with military hardware and troops from all twenty nine members moscow says maneuvers are an anti russian exercise but is the alliance really ready for a twenty first century conflict. plus it's a one hundred eighty two meters high in the new tallest statue in the world but india's three hundred fifty million euro statue of unity has so far been anything but a symbol of togetherness a look at the controversy surrounding its inauguration. and you have to honduras to find out why so many people there fear for their lives and are fleeing for the u.s. that's despite president trump tightening america southern border. i'm sumi so much going to thank you for joining us a court in pakistan has freed a christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy i see a baby was condemned to hand in two thousand and ten for insulting islam as prophet mohammed now since a ruling thousands of islamist activists have blocked roads and ransacked government property in protest and one hardline group called for death to the judges who overturned the sentence. she h

because, when the world changes, nato has to change. aid of an ally under attack by sea, road and rail. a british military convoy travelling across the channel through germany, denmark and sweden before arriving in norway. today, nato forces combined to carry out a simulated assault on an enemy position with landing craft backed by naval and air power. nato insists this is not evidence of a new cold war. but the reality is the alliance is relearning the same military skills that were used during that era. and while the enemy in this scenario is meant to be fictitious, it is no secret that this is happening amid rising tensions with russia. moscow has already responded, calling this an anti—russia exercise. but it follows hard on the heels of russia's own biggest war games — vostok — which moscow says involved 300,000 troops. nato insists its exercise is not a provocation, taking place hundreds of miles away from norway's border with russia. but it wants to send a message that the alliance is ready to defend any ally. jonathan beale, bbc

and what this is a victim against the most macedonians do not want to join nato or the you essentially with this referendum with protecting macedonia centuries old name and the identity history and traditions of the macedonian people our party is against nato an e.u. membership and this referendum is simply a question of the highest national interest western influence is huge here in the last ten to fifteen days we've been visited by brussels and washington's highest political and diplomatic representatives but we can't be and our will is unbreakable macedonians they want to change the name of the state and they don't want to join nato. but across the border to the south protesters have rallied in the greek port city of as well which is in the province of macedonia in greece they were seen waving green flags demonstrating against the referendum a politics professor at the university of macedonia in greece told us the referendum has been a setback for those looking to exert influence over the wider can which. has free. will that be made by the european union and the us should the baby.

verbal arrangement although there is a statement done by nato plus o.b. news and serves after brussels agreement we made also in brussels that there were two preconditions if someone would like to bring let's say machine guns to the north of course or one and the most important precondition was still ease the consent of local syrup community they didn't ask him. any single sort of about saying yes to the visit of the tree and it's not about his visit it's about weaponry his people were using. and that was another publication and they wanted you know to show that they were in charge that they can do it whenever they want and whatever they want of course to frighten the serbs was again that's what they wanted to do and they didn't and the other precondition was consent of nato we don't know what it was doing but if there was a cause of need there was not fulfilled. and that's a cumulative precondition. number one. which was consent of sore people serbian people and they didn't have it at all that's why we needed to react otherwise they can conquer north of