Crimea continues. Russia asking crimea to vote to join its federation. Whether its about talks or sanctions, the russians are still very voping. The United Nations is asking venezuela for permission to send in independent observers. The occupation is using motorcycle gangs to break up demonstrations. Any escalation of conflict results in the Ukrainian Team leading. They have chosen not to send a delegation. Ecigarettes. Its a substitute nicotine deliver system. Ecigarette use by middle and High School Students more than doubled. Its increasing rapidly. Person massed armed men in camouflage uniforms stopped European Military observers from entering the country for the second straight day and russian ships called on ukraineenians to surrender. We need to secede. I dont want to live with fascists. The crimean Prime Minister told al jazeera there is no invasion. We accept the help people coming from trowz join our defense units. Terms of occupation or invasion, there is no russian army. Vote by crimeans to break away for crimea to be absorbed into russia in a matter of weeks. We are now joined by Al Jazeera America correspondent Jennifer Glasse. From sevastopol. Glad to have you back on the show, european observers turned away, that vote that may lead to crimea breaking away from ukraine. We have heard by a lot of crimeans, that they support breaking away to russia. Is that the majority opinion . Antonio, interestingly, until a couple of days ago they werent really talking about secession. Support. They whomed the troops when they came in here on sunday and now that they are emboldened and have that power we see a lot of political moves. Here in sevastopol, the town council seems to predetermine the outcome of the vote. The Crimean Parliament has done the same, moving towards russia. We see crimean politicians moving towards moscow where they got a warm welcome. There are people who are not happy antonio that crimea could become part of russia and that least of all the Crimean Tatars i spoke to them today, they are going to boycott referendum. It shows that somehow they endorse the referendum and of course you have about 15 of ethnic ukrainians very concerned about that referendum, they may here. You have reported that flights from sevastopol to kiev are now leaving from the International Terminal not the domestic terminal. Does this look more and more like a done deal that crimea is going to end up part of russia . It is a smart move to try to create a fact on the ground. But the simferopol airport is a very, very small airport. Were not talking about anything like the kennedy airport. They are maybe 100 feet apart. Its such a small airport they dont even have luggage trolleys yet. It does make a point that the flights to kiev do leave from the International Terminal. They are trying to make the point on the ground. This. If the referendum goes the way that the prorussians would like it to and the people here vote to become part of russia, then of course, there are a lot of things that have to be changed. Customs, taxes, borders, how is that going to work . What happens to the Ukrainian Military here . Right now those sailors are blockaded on barracks, ships, in the harbors. The officers say if their Commanding Officers tell them to change theyll do what they say. But you know, kiev is saying they are not going to recognize this referendum that is totally illegal, and it is unlikely that the minister of defense is going to tell the soldiers here to stand down. There are so many questions, antonio. Al Jazeera America correspondent Jennifer Glasse in sevastopol, thank you very much. For more were joined by Katherine Stoner, Deputy Director and Senior Research scholar at the center of democracy at stanford university. Were also joined by yorg forbrig, German Marshall Fund of the United States. He joins us from berlin. And david road, a contributor, he it is good to have you all with us. David, ukraine says 30,000 troops are now in crimea. 43 International Observers were turned away not allowed to get into crimea. We saw the truck at a went into the air base that controls the air space in that area and we saw earlier this week how a un envoy was sent away. Is putin escalating rather than deescalating . I think the issue here is putin is escalating but in his mind he is not escalating. The two minds seem to be talking past each other. Putin believes the uprising in kiev was a western backed situation and not the will of the people and it is his opinion its to block the warm water are port. So far, the steps of the white house are not resolving the crisis and its unclear what comes next. I know you quote Katherine Stoner as saying much of what putin says is happening in ukraine as propaganda. Katherine, former u. S. Ambassador michael fall says chances are slim that diplomacy will work. Supporting crimeas vote to join the Russian Federation on twitter, if russian government endorses crimea, will they endorse more republics in the Russian Federation . He is basically saying that speunt a hypocrite putin is a hypocrite, that all is fine in crimea for crimea to determine what it wants but it wont allow chem chemp ya chechnya or anyone else to do it. Wants to rebuild the ussr. Does very a policy of soft annexation where he wants to grow russia into a bigger stronger country maybe not as big as the soviet union but significant . A couple of things here. I think using the term soviet union is kind of confusing. When you think of the soviet union you should think of communism at the same time. And that was a very specific political and Economic System and thats definitely not the system that putin would like to impose within russia proper or within former soviet republics like ukraine or georgia or moldova, et cetera. That said, he does and has openly said he has this policy the eurasian union, perhaps a lose Political Union of some former soviet states. But before they were soviet states of course they were really territories of the russian empire. So i think speaking of brzinski, elements of what putin thinks of natural allies or the National Russian empire. So to russians in the Foreign Ministry to mr. Putin and average russians it is a perfectly natural and reasonable thing to do and its simply making more formal what they think exists de facto anyway. Yerg i want to go to you and talk about sanctions. U. S. And canada are talking a big game on sacks sanctions. There are 28 sovereign countries that have to agree in europe on what they want to do. Is there any chance that the west will have one voice on russia . Well, i think it is emerging. What we saw coming out of the eu summit yesterday was basically a threestaged approach. The first stage implement now, is basic to basically diplomacy yet another chance. And today within the very limited time frame this is now for the time for russian side also to move in the direction of a political solution. Should that fail, the second stage would be measured targeted sacks against some of those in the russian heerp, especially who are leadership who are responsible for the implementation, and the third step, should these two first steps not succeed in deescalating the situation, would then be economic sanctions. Now, economic sanctions are something that is always very difficult to agree on here in europe. That said, there seems to be a majority of countries at the moment already that are supporting a tougher line and the imposition of sanctions against russia with the exception of two or three harnlger countries. Theres larger countries. Theres obviously the united kingdom, we heard what the impact might have on the city of london and the Financial Sector there and theres obviously germany which is traditionally very, very cautious when it comes to sanctions. David, as you wrote, you saw the ukraine as the biggest geopolitical challenge since the cold war. Do you think any of this is going to work . It is not clear at this point. Actually there was a former Deputy National security advisor jim jeffrey, who dealt with the crisis in 2008, he saw this as a major geopolitical crisis, he thinks china is watching this. In the fall china declared an air defense zone across thousands of miles of the pacific and demanded that any aircraft across the zone register with the chinese. Economic and political zones controlled by china and russia and the u. S. , it does undermine the postcold war system. The u. S. Undermined it, they say, without the Security Councils blessing. This is a different situation, you have Russian Troops without insignias, very questionable, occupying this territory. What happened in georgia when the soviet union, i keep making that mistake, when russia went into georgia. Freudian slip, antonio. He writes that the georgia response was par for the course for brussels, talking about the European Union, it was a particularly tepid response, it reminded him of the soviets czechoslovakia. Do you think thats whats happening now . There are some pretty thick ties now between russia and europe. And in particular economic ties. And so earlier, was mentioned the potential impact on the london Financial Sector in particular. So the british Financial Sector russia. Thats because there are so many rich russians would own property, who own assets in england there. That wasnt the case in 1968 of course so slightly different situation in that respect. With respect to germany, they get a lot of natural gas, actually the bulk of natural gas, probably the majority from russia. So again theyre a little hamstrung in terms of how far they can go. And yorg, what about european businesses and even american businesses, russia is threatening to retaliate if we impose sanctions. How much would it hurt the European Union . Not nearly as hard as the russians are trying to portray to us. Let me add to professor stoners extent remarks, germany is the country im most familiar with. In german trade, German Foreign trade, russia stands for 4 of our volume. We are exporting less to russia than we are ex porting to poland. 4 is a fairly meeker figure, doesnt represent a major partner. Russia not the el is not the elephant in trading as it is paid out to be. Sparse energy sources, europe imports 40 of its pharmaceutical gas from russia. 40 natural gas from russia represents 7 of the Energy Production in germany. 7 is again not an overwhelming figure. In turn for the Russian Federation, oil and gas exports to europe represents about 70 of state revenue. If there were sanctions then very clearly there would be a bigger fallout on the russian side than in the european side. In that context katherine, do you think putin would be able to be reasoned with . Im not sure he fully understands he understands a lot about how the russian economy works. He has been quite sophisticated about it, and he understands oil and gas the best. So it would be hard to believe that he would not be cognizant of that fact that this would negatively affect the russian economy. The way this is all being presented in russia, colleagues that i know well and i think of as relatively progressive, the way this is all presented is that its really bandits and far right nationals in ukraine that are taking over ukraine and we are supporting them and we dont understand the situation so they must do this to protect their own national interests, and even ukrainian people from themselves basically. So i do think yorg is right about all those bad things that will happen to the ukrainian economy, could potentially put in front of mr. Putin. The question is who does it. You agree . I do. And actually, told me before that the polls in russia show 60 Popular Support for what putin is doing. He has iron control of the media there and hes going to keep using that. Hes really kind of i think over the last decade outmaneuvered the west in terms of using the sales to europe of gas to strengthen the economy there and he has really taken firm control of the media. So we are sort of flatfooded here. But the question is does he understand this, nationalism is a powerful force and he is under pressure to follow through in ukraine and not back down. Appreciate you all joining us tonight. Turning now to the turmoil in venezuela where the death toll has riz ton at least 20 since protest against the government of nicholas mad ro, a protestor killed on thursday. Meanwhile, Human Rights Commission is and inning right. For more im joined by paul beban. Paul, good to see you. Tonight . Well once again toint as you and i have antonio, as you and i have been talking all week, it is another tense night after very serious deadly violence last night. We were hearing reports of three dead. Alta mira, deadly clashes took part in another part of town, near the patadi barrio. We were at that building today where residents told Us National Guardsmen stormed building, came in followed by members of the collectivos, paramilitary groups is the best description, often armed and supported 50 the government to intimidate the opposition, intimidate protesters, stormed into the building, torched a car. Not sure what else happened but thats the part of town where at least two people were killed. Very intense clashes continuing here in caracas. While this is going on in the capitol you have done reporting in San Cristobal in the andes, where the protests began. What are you reporting there . We are reporting this out, it is hard to confirm. Mountain western part of the country, sources are telling us one of the main power plants to San Cristobal has been cut, many people are living in the dark, they are seeing tanks and an increase in the number of National Guard troops. They are saying that people are beginning to flee the city, fleeing and going to an impromptu camp, where people from other parts of the western section of the country, from valencia, a city where government jets have been buzzing the city in the wake of these more intense protests. If we can confirm these reports it would certainly indicate that in the west of the country dire. When you are talking about people fleeing a city, it starts to conjure up the specter of Something Like civil war and that, obviously, very scary. Three former latin America President s, actually four former latin american president s, including oscar arias, have issued a statement accusing maduro of oppression, mean while foreign ministe ministers from around the country are planning to meet. Is there any indication that the maduro government will take part . From given their tone over the past weekend, it seems very unlikely on the anniversary of hugo chavez chavezs death, mao announced the expelling of the ambassador. The oas offering a mission that was flatly recorrected by the maduro government. Hard to understand how any other Foreign Government would be welcomed, they said it is our business, not anyone elses business, we can take care of it. Are you expecting the same large demonstrations as were last weekend . We are expecting, and given the sense things are ratcheting up rather than cooling down, it is safe to say we will probably see large protests over the clashes. There is really no sense here antonio that there is any kind of dialogue beginning to open up. The two sides are not talking to each other. The maduro government accuses the protesters of being saboteurs, illegal. We have seen some things in crak a caracas, as nothing more than mob violence. There are divisions within the protest movement. We have spoken to students who are calling for a more peaceful nonviolent approach but so far that isnt trick ethnic some of those out there who simply want to do damage. A real tragedy going on in many different ways. Paul beban from caracas, thank you. Coming up, an emotionally new video from save the children brings the Syrian Crisis home. And hermella aregawi is tracking social media. Whats happening. Join the conversation on at which time ajconsiderthis. And our on google and facebook. What is this place . Where are we . This is where we bring together the Fastest Internet and the best in entertainment. We call it the x1 entertainment operating system. It looks like the future we must have encountered a temporal vortex. Further analytics are necessary. Beam us up. Thats my phone. Hey. [ female announcer ] the x1 entertainment operating system, only from xfinity. Tv and internet together like never before. The carnage continues in syrias civil war in adults and children. This video emerged,. Eafter three years of fighting, many people in the world have turned away from this horrible story. Which is why, save the children, has marked this conflict, as a way its happening in britain instead of syria. Happy birthday to you. Make a wish. Have you done your homework . Datay happy birthday to you make a wish, darling for more im joined from washington, d. C. By michael klausen. The