RT advertises itself as reporting the news that matters. On many levels (with some notable exceptions, such as human-indiced climate change) this is justified as the western corporate media tells lies about the conflict in the Ukraine and is silent about issues ranging from energy decline in Britain and France to protests against GE and Monsanto.

Here is my own summing up of the headlines based on watching RT this morning.

Looking at the headlines

Listening to the news program on RT gave me an idea of a new way to cover some of the most important news:

First, the Ukraine:

Ukraine is building up to a presidential vote while violence continues to escalate in the Slavyansk and Donetsk regionss. 3 foreign journalists have been killed, presumably in crossfire while the news is coming through the wires that the 3 Russian journalists being “investigated for terrorism” have been released and flown back to Moscow

Accroding to RT these are the most important contenders:

Dmitro Yarosh – Right Sector (Right Sector), (neo nazi and anti-oligarch)
Oleg Tyangnibok – neo-fascist “Svoboda Party', anti-semite
Yulia Tymoshenko – corrupt oligarch and ultra-nationalist who wants to 'nuke Russia' and supports accession to the EU,
Pyotr Poroshenko- 'the chocolate king', the oligarch favoured by the West, favouring 'economic integration' - most likely, given outside interference, to win.

What stopped me in my tracks was an interview with Theodore Karasik from

the UN Sec General's office who said that the situation in Ukraine is complicated and is starting, in the long-term to resemble Syria; is mult-dimensional and complicated, with numerous groups fighting for power. He referred to the 'fascist question' and stated it was a mistake for Obama to 'support these groups'.

Global March: Protests around

world against Monsanto

Meanwhile there are protests all around the world against genetic engineering and corporate criminal, Monsanto.

No doubt these will go unreported by the corporate media.

RT reports that whole range of diseases – hepatic, renal, pancreatic and reproductive, such as:

immune system alternations
cancer risk
allergies
childhood learning difficulties,

while toxins that help to grow the crops have been found in the urine of pregnant women.

All of this was accurately predicted back at the end of the 90's when I was researching this subject for a submission to a Royal Commission in NZ that ignored all the evidence and essentially embraced GE and recommended to 'make progress carefully'

Essentially the GE genie is out of the bottle; voices of reason were ignored and we will have to live with the consequences.

Running Dry: UK fossil fuel reserves to end in 5yrs

RT talks of a report in Britain from the Sustainability ... that states that Britain only has 2-3 years of oil and gas reserves left - and that is only if Scotland doesn't vote for independence and take North Sea Oil with it.

The RT piece says that Middle Eastern countries have hundreds of years of oil left, while Russia has one hundred years of gas.

It has to be constantly pointed out that reserves are meaningless - it is the reserves of easily- available oil and gas that is important ('the low-hanging fruit'). Once production has peaked it becomes more and more expensive and less economic to produce and as my friend Rice Farmer pointed out "there's no telling when a resource that is economic today will suddenly become uneconomic"

In any case, Britain, France and other west European countries are already basket- cases and even seem to determined (through their polices toward Russia and the Ukraine) not to see gas supplies continue from Russia.

Their nazi friends in the Ukraine will see to that, possibly by blowing up pipelines as the civil war they fomented in their backyard intensifies.

Meanwhile Britain insists on shooting itself in the foot in another area -

Putin: Prince Charles' Hitler remark unacceptable, unroyal behavior

From the sublime to the ridiculous - Prince Charles has been playing 'foot-in-mouth' by referring to Vladimir Putin as "Hitler' ignoring his family's very real ties to the actual Adolf Hitler. I have studiously ignore this - but here is Putin's response.

BBC version HERE

Credit Upgrade? Austerity-stricken Greece still struggling

Greece has disappeared off the radar for most of us as the situation everywhere else deteriorates.

We are told that Greece is due for a credit upgrade, but this report from RT shows how ordinary Greeks are continuing to struggle.

Well done, RT, for keeping this in the public eye.

With a recent credit upgrade there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel for the struggling Greek economy. But so far there's little change for the austerity-stricken Greek people. Unemployment remains the highest in Europe, with more than half the country's youth out of work. Some are now fleeing the cities in search of a better life - only to discover things aren't any brighter in the countryside, as Marina Kosareva reports.

Economic Forum in St Persburg

Meanwhile Russia, on the heals of its landmark gas deal with China is justifiably feeling pretty optimistic as American and EU-led sanctions against Russia start to backfire and even present some opportunites.

The greatest opportunity is that Russia starts to look eastwards and undermines the dominance of the 'almighty dollar' in its trading relations with China - and then India, Iran and other countries. The Europeans might even come knocking at the door as they realise what they have lost

Putin: Isolating Russia is not possible

Meanwhile a confident Vladimir Putin has given a press conference in his own St. Petersburg -

Putin: We object to certain countries twisting intl law to justify

actions

Meanwhile here is some other news off the RT newswire