Should based a policy based on realities to the people and leaders of iran the United States is ready to embrace peace with all who seek it. Also coming up tonight a war in the middle east is not the only threat this new year tonight a list of the biggest risks in 2020. Efforts to reverse Climate Change are not working. As the u. S. And china go their separate ways and technology will see a more explicit clash over National Security and global influence and values. Washington of beijing wont like it but europe will become more assertive 2020. 1 to our viewers on p. B. S. In the United States and all around the world well we begin the day with a major change in tone if not substance today u. S. President donald trump said that iran appears to be standing down in its confrontation with the United States and he delivered that message at the white house just hours after iran had launched a military a missile attack on military bases housing u. S. Troops in iraq iran originally claimed that at least 80 americans have been killed trump confirmed today that no american no iraqi lives were lost. A crucial and highly anticipated moment no americans were harmed in last nights attack by the iranian regime. We suffered. All of our soldiers are safe and orderly minimal damage was sustained at military bases donald trump confirming no troops were injured or killed in irans missile attack meant there was no need to escalate tensions between the 2 countries. Its all about the Iranian State television had earlier claimed missiles fired by irans forces had killed 80 u. S. Soldiers at the Ein Al Assad Air base in iraq. The attack was an act of revenge for the killing of top military commander general any the move has been widely welcomed across iran. Crowds chanting death to america as irans Supreme Leader ayatollah ali how many tell them their message has been delivered. Odd. A slight force delivered last night but what is important is that the seditious presence of america. In the region should be and it. Was the countrys foreign minister also spoke out. The. Said very clearly that if the United States takes any further action iran did respond accordingly and we would respond in a very harsh way but proportionately united stunnel trump and did promise further action but in form of economic sanctions military confrontation it appears has been averted for now. And for more now we want to bring in the german parliamentarian european hard he is also the Foreign Policy spokesman for the c. D. U. That the conservative party for the german chancellor Angela Merkel they started going to have you on the program today i want to get your read on what we have heard today from the u. S. President that basically in the span of 48 hours weve gone from in of the brink of war to things being ok. The biggest fear we had after the attack on this general on friday which was an unselfish america on a question of from iran against american troops in iraq the biggest fear was that this led to it might lead to the new escalation. Happy to hear from the u. S. President that he will not ansal the attacks the record as the missile attacks from that night from iran against american troops in iraq with new. Attacks from his side this says that probably we can and can hinder the u. S. Collation on a military base but im fortunately the 2 other negative effects of that boss had what happened on friday morning 1st the decision also your occupier meant to to ask the government to send out foreign troops from iraq and this is a live news a literary tea between iran government and you which parts of the people in iran and on to iran pro iranian people in iraq the those are the 2 negative effects still. Existing and this led to a situation that we are now weak are in iraq by supporting iraq than we were before friday and this is my position and. Unfortunately we have to debate that with our colleagues in the u. S. And other countries i know you had expected and more retaliation from iranian proxies such as hezbollah we have seen that do you think the i guess the decision that iraq is now too dangerous is that a decision that was made to hastily. No i think it was right to take out some of german troops. For a while out of the country we also thinking about to do it. Before intermediate time also now because we also have to some. Attacks on the facilities and. Training mission in iraq is very necessary for the country because the only chance we have is that iraq might become a prosperous and vital state with the capabilities to make sure its own security interest and also that what we have in mind. Terrorists to come come up again and we were successful on that way in the last years and hopefully we can continue that but we have to balance security questions towards this but it tickle. To go in and we will discuss this tomorrow in the Foreign Affairs committee of the dr witness talk and the defenses committee of the doj when this talk in extra meetings we arranged together with our 2 ministers what are you going to do just in terms of the u. S. President trying to say he wants more nato in the middle east and today he also said that the j. C. B. Away the Iran Nuclear Deal he now wants that once and for all to be history hes asking even more almost impossible things from the europeans isnt it. Unfortunately. The president is believing in a strategy of increasing pressure on iran where i think and also a lot of europeans infected will not be and might not be successful because what we need is a consensus between the 5 permanent members of the Security Council also including russia and china that strategy on the strategy. Against iran a question and iran. Capabilities to have a bomb a nuclear bomb and this is only possible on negotiations and not. Increasing pressure because russia will never accept that iran is doing Something Like a particular copper to copulation against towards us they will undergo probably. The pressure politic of the president and at the end of the day probably youre on well be able to have a nuclear bomb earlier than now with this. Bert in the hand which is better to have than 10 birds on the tree we dont have didnt have any thing better than this agreement yet and therefore we have to continue to negotiate on it i want you to take a listen to part of what the u. S. President said today about the nuclear deal take a listen the time has come for the United Kingdom germany france russia and china to recognize this reality they must now break away from the remnants of the iran deal who are j c p a way and we must all Work Together toward making a deal with the rand that makes the world a safer and more Peaceful Place i mean hes saying lets negotiate something new. The foreign minister here in germany is saying we have to stick with what we already have what do what does germany what de france the u. K. What do you have at your disposal to force or coerce iran to stick with this deal. The president makes a contradiction out of both he says a new negotiation and a new day lets not deal is not possible. As long as we have this as he c. P. O. And i didnt agree on that i think we can stay to the cheesy and negotiate on all the other crucial topics we have on the agenda was iran iran is not only planning to have a nuclear bomb they also developing me sides to transport those bombs they are sponsoring terror organizations all over the region they are sponsoring is a yemen ball they are attacking israel not only with lip service but also with missiles from hezbollah in lebanon and there are a lot of behavior of iran that cannot be accepted and true that im sure that also russia and china. Is not willing to accept a more aggressive and stronger iran therefore i see a chance to negotiate and i take i would like to take the president by its poets at the end of the quote you you took that we should try to have a new negotiations and a new deal and one of the premises for those this is not to skips the a monster probably to make it but im starting to this week there were reports that china has offered military assistance to iraq which is you know a change in the Power Dynamics in the middle east how do you see that and is there a is there a german plan is there a european plan to deal with an emerging chinese power in the middle east. Chinese china is doing that what really expected if theres a wreck you on Security Issues in the region and this probably might come up in case that u. S. Troops will be taken away from iraq then probably china is able to step into that vacuum as ive heard this was a high ranking delegation off the Chinese Government with the fob its the defense minister. Going. Presenting this this plan. But unfortunately i didnt see a chance for europe to replace us i would like to try and you attempt that probably together with us we can reach a continuation of that but we already do in the. Coalition and in this support fall for iraq we were on a good way and we should continue that we should creatures situation probably the Iraqi Government is accepting again for the american troops in the country and government can probably convince the parliament that under newsom stances it is better to have them in the country and then not ok is to youre going to hide the Foreign Policy spokesperson for the c. D. U. The conservative party of german chancellor Angela Merkel mr hart we appreciate your time tonight and your insights thank you very much goodbye and more than 170 people have died after a ukrainian passenger jet crashed in iran it calls for the crash is not yet known and the Ukraine International airlines jet was on its way from irans capital tehran last night to kiev graines president will be as alinsky has broken off a foreign visit to return to kiev because of the disaster the president says that ukraine will be sending a search and rescue team to iran tonight. A field of burning debris lights up the sky near tehran. The apparent remnants of the Ukraine InternationalAirlines Flight that crashed shortly after takeoff from the iranian capital. Iranian t. V. Stations are the 1st to broadcast images of the crash including this mobile phone video which appears to show the plane going down. Its daybreak that reveals the extent of the destruction and the human toll. The plane was carrying 167 passengers and 9 crew members from several Different Countries mainly iran and canada. Nobody survived all the passengers a day that. At the International Airport in kiev the arrivals board lists the flight that would never arrive. People here are distraught this man thinks his son was in fact on the plane with the father yes it was just. My son is a senior flight attendant. Iranian and ukrainian officials have both blamed mechanical problems for the crash but the airline says its still trying to determine the cause. A statement by Ukraine International airlines said the plane was one of the best in its fleet and that the aircraft had passed a safety check just 2 days earlier. As iranians mourn another tragedy ukraines president and others have warned against speculating about a potential link to the current flare up in iran u. S. Tensions however Current Events are very much on peoples minds. After well you know they didnt i was watching the news of the remains hitting us pieces with missiles after 10 minutes i heard a massive explosion and all the hoses started to shake there was fire everywhere at 1st i thought the americans have fired missiles and i went into the basement to take shelter so i did at times as any. And a few hours after the crash the Ukrainian Embassy in iran released a statement saying the crash was not a result of terrorism that statement was later redacted. As investigators search for answers a number of airlines have suspended flights over iranian airspace and on the ground emergency workers are getting on with the grim task of recovering the dead. 2020 is a typical. States parting ways in the technology sphere to social and political unrest in latin america and india to the challenges of a potentially contested us president ial election we see a mounting threat of Global Crisis the racial group has identified the top 10 risks of the. The Political Economic and environmental factors impacting the world in ways we havent seen for generations. Well it is that time of year again the geopolitical risk from Eurasia Group has published its annual list of top wrists for the new year its a forecast of the political dangers that are most likely to play out over the course of 2020 in 8th place on your region groups risk list that usually relevant today with iran and the u. S. Pulling back from the brink of a military clash Eurasia Group dubs the risk of the shia crescendo take a look. At u. S. Policy toward the major sea and that nations in the middle east is imploding that creates significant risks for regional stability including a lethal conflict with iran upper trash on oil prices and iraqi state that is either in irans orbit or failing and is syria used to moscow and to iran. And the talk about that risk and many more tonight im joined by muzzio armin o. B. D. Chief executive officer with Eurasia Group he joins me from new york its good to have you on the show the i want to ask you the events of the past few days that weve seen in the u. S. And iran. I mean does that force you when you look at the sheer crescendo does that mean we you need to maybe rename it the shia the menu window or the staccato i mean has it changed your forecast. But as you might imagine there was a hot debate about the name of that risk but id like to actually point out that in this report that we released on monday which would be after the soleimani assassination. Or killing but before the events of last night we actually identified. The fact that there will be no war with iran in 2020 as a red herring. We did not think contrary to popular belief that this is going to be. A risk that really implodes into the worst case now and we when we ranked this shii crescendo at number 8 there is a reason for that because we do not expect at the end of the day that neither side especially the u. S. President has the willingness to go to war with iran where new surprised at how quickly the conflict seemed just to dissipate you know 48 hours we had people talking about fears of a major conflagration and tonight we have the u. S. President tweeting that you know things look good. Well absolutely one has to be honest that the specific instances of geo Political Uncertainty especially policy uncertainty coming out of the us as well as the pace of events in the last few months in years have to spin anybodys head however we here at Eurasia Group focus on the structural underpinnings of these risks and when you look at that the alternate outcome was not a surprise to us as it was reflected there no risks and our red herrings the president clearly surprised the iranians who had been logged into as believe that the u. S. Was not going to at all retaliate after a few months ago that in response to iranian bombing of a refined hearing in saudi arabia the u. S. Did not respond that emboldened the iranians to take more and more aggressive measures at the margin they clearly miscalculated the president surprised them with a hit on so they money and what we saw happen over the last 24 hours was a very careful recalibration of their response recalibration thats a very good word we saw this past week reports that china has perhaps offered military assistance to iraq suggesting growing influence in the middle east for the chinese and that brings us to the risk in the china u. S. Ha war dynamic what do you see happening this year between these 2 powers. Well we think that the great decoupling that technologically and in terms of great power rivalry between us and china that we are witnessing happening today is probably the single largest geo Political Development in the last generation. This risk is not going to go away we certainly expect the decoupling to continue in 2020 and in fact metastasize and broaden beyond technology and beyond the specific sectors like 5 g. Example of wall way and quantum computing get beyond that to the entire tech sector frankly more and more seep into other areas like media telecommunication entertainment as well as Academic Research so this divided this the couple and this is here to stay there and Climate Change it is here to stay at least for a while what is your assessment in terms of our ability to take the steps that Scientists Say we have to take in order to prevent a Climate Change tragedy by the year 2100. Yes if as im sure your viewers know the paris treaty try to compel the body politic and the world to move towards a 2 percent warming at least to slow down the pace of warming to 2 degrees but right now were on track for 3 and a half degrees in a crease in temperature in the next few decades what we want to highlight by including this clash of increased demand for action with the imperatives of corporations as a top risk this year is that this is going to be an increasingly. Worrying development and something where corporations investors have to think seriously now and what were trying to do here is raise the flag. And make that case and was that weve got about one minute i want to ask you abou