RT
Many Poles are “outraged to see young Ukrainian men in cafes,” the country’s defense chief has claimed Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz has said that Warsaw would be willing to “help” Kiev repatriate men of fighting age, an unspecified portion of some 950,000 Ukrainians granted temporary sanctuary in Poland. Earlier this week, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry banned all men between the age of 18 and 60 from getting or renewing their documents, including passports, at consular offices outside of the country. The Polish defense chief told the Polsat broadcaster on Wednesday that he was “not surprised” and supports Kiev’s move. “The Ukrainian authorities are doing everything to provide new soldiers to the front, because the needs are huge,” Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said. The Polish official said that Warsaw had previously offered to help Kiev track down those who dodge their “civic duty,” but noted that “the form of assistance depends on the Ukrainian side.” Read more “I think that many of our compatriots were and are outraged when they see young Ukrainian men in cafes and hear about how much effort it takes us to help Ukraine,” he added. Kosiniak-Kamysz also echoed Kiev’s official narrative that Ukrainians who could not avoid the draft have “justified grievances against their peers who have scattered around the world.” Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba claimed on Tuesday that the decision to strip Ukrainian men of their rights was “fair” and in line with the controversial military mobilization reforms, which President Vladimir Zelensky signed into law this month. Read more Zelensky’s reforms, set to come into force next month, will lower the draft age from 27 to 25, tighten exemptions and oblige all men, regardless of eligibility, to report to a conscription office to “update” their personal data. According to EU officials, an estimated 650,000 Ukrainian men of fighting age are living in the bloc. Kiev has identified that pool as a significant untapped source of manpower for the armed forces. However, asked in early April how many troops Kiev intended to mobilize, Zelensky dodged the question. Медиа: | ↑ |
Some 57% believe the US is spending “too much” on foreign aid, a new survey has shown Around a half of US voters believe that their country is needlessly wasting taxpayer dollars on supporting its foreign partners such as Israel and Ukraine, a new Rasmussen Reports poll has found. Overall, some 57% of respondents said that the US government is spending “too much” on foreign aid in general, according to a survey of 1,126 likely voters conducted on April 16-18. President Joe Biden signed a new $95 billion funding package on Wednesday, under which Ukraine is slated to receive $48bn in weapons and other assistance while another $23bn will be used to replenish the Pentagon’s depleted stocks. Even before the latest bonanza cleared procedural hurdles, some 47% said it was “too much,” while around 20% wanted Washington to spend even more cash. Read more As for US aid to Israel, some 49% of respondents said that $14 billion intended for West Jerusalem as part of the new package was either “about right” or “not enough.” A CBS News/YouGov survey, conducted earlier this month also showed waning public support for continuing to send weapons to Kiev. Just 53% of US adults believe their government should give military aid to Ukraine, down from 72% two years ago. Support for Ukraine aid was highest (72%) among Americans who believe the US has a “responsibility to promote democracy” across the world, that poll showed. Among those who see no such obligation for their country, only 28% believe Washington should give military aid to Ukraine. Медиа: | ↑ |
Kiev has stopped issuing documents to men of military age About 300 Ukrainians have blocked their consular office in Warsaw, demanding the passports they’ve been denied under Kiev’s new mobilization rules. Men between the age of 18 and 60 can no longer get any documents at consular offices outside Ukraine, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said earlier this week. Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba has confirmed he ordered the measure, intended to force refugees of fighting age to come back and get conscripted into the military. On Wednesday evening, several hundred Ukrainians locked down the ‘Document’ Passport Service Center in Warsaw, located at the Blue City shopping center. Earlier in the day, Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said that Warsaw would be willing to “help” Kiev repatriate men of fighting age, an unspecified portion of some 950,000 Ukrainians granted temporary sanctuary in Poland. Read more “I think many Poles are outraged when they see young Ukrainian men in hotels and cafes, and they hear how much effort we have to make to help Ukraine,” Kosiniak-Kamysz told the TV outlet Polsat News. About 4.3 million Ukrainians lived in EU countries as of January 2024, according to Eurostat estimates. Of that, some 860,000 were men of military age. The Ukrainian parliament voted on Wednesday to add 15,000 members to the state border guard, citing the spike in draft-dodgers trying to leave the country. After the expansion, the service will have 75,000 members, including 67,000 guards under arms. Медиа: | ↑ |
French president is reportedly considering former European Central Bank boss Mario Draghi as an alternative head of the Commission French President Emmanuel Macron is seeking to replace European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and is currently discussing options with other EU leaders, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing sources. Von der Leyen is now gearing up for elections in less than two months, seeking to secure another five-year term. Macron, who was one of the key figures behind elevating her into the top EU job, has been openly criticizing the President’s approach to running the EU Commission. “The commission presidency is there to defend the general interest, so it must not be over-politicized. Which, it has to be said, was not at all the case with this outgoing commission,” Macron said in Brussels last month. The French president has been in touch with other EU leaders over potential candidates to replace the incumbent to lead the commission, namely former Italian PM and European Central Bank president Mario Draghi, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with these discussions. Sources in Brussels, including those with von der Leyen’s office, have commented that it remains unclear whether Macron had been genuinely seeking to oust her or was merely putting pressure on in order to extract concessions from her in the future. Read more Macron, alongside then-German Chancellor Angela Merkel, were the key figures in 2019 behind fielding von der Leyen, then German Defense Minister, for the EU Commission presidential elections. Von der Leyen is still a clear favorite for the upcoming elections, given the fact that she is the main candidate for the center-right European People’s Party (EPP), which has the most seats at the European Parliament and is expected to further reinforce its positions during the polls in June. However, a candidate fielded by the EPP still requires backing from an absolute majority in parliament. The position of the incumbent EU president has been damaged by multiple high-profile scandals, with the latest erupting earlier this month when she found herself in a storm of criticism over giving fellow German MEP Markus Pieper the lucrative job of “special adviser,” with a reported salary of €17,000 a month. The appointment “has triggered questions about the transparency and impartiality of the nomination process” within the bloc, multiple senior officials, including the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, and Commissioner Thierry Breton, said jointly in a complaint to von der Leyen. The Commission, however, brushed off the allegations, stating it “has every confidence in the fact that the process took place in full compliance with procedures.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Brussels has objected to the “addictive” design of TikTok Lite The European Commission has opened a case against ByteDance, alleging that its TikTok Lite application might be dangerous to children and was launched without submitting the proper paperwork. TikTok Lite was first launched in 2019 in Asian test markets. The lighter version of the short video app made its debut in France and Spain last month. In a statement on Monday, the EC said ByteDance did so without complying with the EU Digital Services Act (DSA). “We suspect TikTok ‘Lite’ could be as toxic and addictive as cigarettes ‘light’,” said Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton, who is in charge of enforcing the DSA. According to the Commission, ByteDance did not file a “risk assessment report,” required by DSA of Very Large Online Platforms before launching any new functionalities such as TikTok Lite. The bureaucrats in Brussels are particularly concerned about the application’s “Task and Reward Program,” which lets users accumulate points for watching videos, following creators, inviting friends and so on. Read more ByteDance has said that TikTok Lite – including the rewards program – is not available to minors in the first place, and that it will continue discussions with the Commission on resolving the dispute. The company was given until Tuesday to submit the risk assessment report and until May 3 to come up with the other information requested by the EC. The bloc has threatened to fine the company up to 1% of its total annual income if it does not comply. This is the second EC probe into TikTok. The first, launched in February, is investigating whether ByteDance breached the DSA in regard to the protection of minors, advertising transparency, “data access for researchers”, and “risk management of addictive design and harmful content.” On Wednesday, US President Joe Biden signed into law the $95 billion foreign aid bill that included a proposal to force ByteDance to sell TikTok to an American owner within nine months. The company has said it would challenge the law in court as unconstitutional. Медиа: | ↑ |
President Biden personally approved the delivery, an anonymous official has said Washington secretly sent Kiev an unspecified number of longer-range ATACMS missiles last month, multiple US outlets reported on Wednesday, citing an anonymous US government official. The Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS), with a range up to 300 kilometers, were included in the $300-million package of military aid approved by President Joe Biden on March 12, according to the official, who spoke with Reuters, Politico and the New York Times, among others. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the source said that Ukraine used the missiles for the first time last Wednesday, targeting a Russian airfield about 165 kilometers (103 miles) from the front line. On the morning of April 17, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said his forces had attacked the airbase in Dzhankoy, Crimea. The Russian Defense Ministry has not commented on that claim. Zelensky has long clamored for longer-range missiles. According to the anonymous official cited in Reuters’ report, the Pentagon was initially opposed, but changed its mind after Russia used ballistic missiles allegedly supplied by North Korea and began targeting Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. “We warned Russia about those things,” the official said. “They renewed their targeting.” Read more Biden was advised to send the longer-range missiles by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Charles Q Brown, the official said. The ATACMS were acquired from Lockheed Martin, rather than from the Pentagon stockpiles, and paid for by the “savings” discovered in March, when several military contracts were reportedly delivered for less than the original bid value. According to the official, Biden instructed his aides to include the ATACMS in the package but to keep it secret, so as to preserve Ukraine’s “operational security and the element of surprise.” Ukraine first received mid-range ATACMS last September. The Russian military quickly began shooting them down, however, thwarting Zelensky’s plan to damage or destroy the Crimean Bridge. “This is yet another mistake on the part of the United States,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said last October, explaining that, had Washington refrained from sending the missiles, it could have later positioned itself as the “good guy” for its attempts to prevent needless casualties. With Russia upgrading its air defenses to intercept the ATACMS, their arrival will not have a major impact on combat operations, and will only “prolong the agony” of Ukraine, Putin explained. “That’s why it’s a mistake.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Washington is sacrificing lives of Ukrainians ‘for the sake of its greedy and insatiable defense industry,’ ambassador has said The US government has made its choice in favor of war, siding with evil and supporting fascism, the Russian ambassador to Washington Anatoly Antonov has said, in comments on the latest massive American military aid package for Ukraine. On Wednesday, US President Joe Biden signed a long-stalled $95-billion foreign-aid package, including $61 billion for Ukraine. Biden said the US would start sending weapons and military equipment to Ukraine “in the next few hours.” Washington is balancing on the brink of a direct clash between nuclear powers, Ambassador Antonov told reporters following the news. The development strikes a severe blow to prospects for a hypothetical revival of Russian-American relations in the future, Antonov believes. “For the sake of its greedy and insatiable defense industry, the [Biden] administration sacrifices the lives of ordinary people. With their decision, local politicians actually put an end to the fate of the entire state [of Ukraine], which is used as a ‘battering ram’ against Russia,” he stated. The high-ranking Russian diplomat accused the US administration of violating the UN Charter’s obligation to maintain ‘primary responsibility for international peace and security.’ “American aid will not save [Ukrainian President] Zelensky” he stressed, adding that any new weapons being sent by Washington to Kiev would be destroyed, and that the tasks and goals of Moscow’s military operation will be realized. READ MORE: Biden signs $95 bn foreign military spending bill The Kremlin has repeatedly warned that Washington’s lethal aid will not change the situation on the battlefield in Ukraine’s favor. According to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, the US government has effectively been funneling billions of dollars into its own defense industry through the aid scheme. Медиа: | ↑ |
The package, which contains assorted ammunition and hardware, comes after US President Joe Biden signed the long-stalled foreign aid bill The US Department of Defense has pledged a massive new $1 billion aid package for Kiev. The announcement comes shortly after President Joe Biden signed a long-stalled foreign aid bill on Wednesday, which includes $61 billion for Ukraine. The “significant new security assistance” package covers Ukraine’s “critical security and defense needs,” the Pentagon has said in a statement. The upcoming delivery includes assorted ammunition, namely 155mm and 105mm artillery shells, as well as 60mm mortar rounds, projectiles for HIMARS-family multiple rocket launchers, as well as various shoulder-mounted anti-tank launchers and small arms ammo. The package also provides anti-aircraft capabilities, namely shoulder-launched Stinger missiles. The delivery will not include any munitions for Patriot anti-aircraft systems, including instead ship-borne RIM-7 Sea Sparrow and air-launched AIM-9M Sidewinder anti-aircraft missiles. The munitions have been adapted during the conflict for use with Soviet-era ground-based anti-aircraft systems under the so-called FrankenSAM program. Read more Ukraine is set to receive an unspecified amount of combat hardware, including Bradley infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs), Humvees, and mine resistant ambush protected vehicles (MRAPs). The delivery also includes various anti-personnel and anti-tank mines, as well as “demolitions munitions for obstacle clearing.” The package also apparently hints at ongoing preparations for the long-promised delivery of F-16 jets to Ukraine, containing such points as unspecified “precision aerial munitions” and “airfield support equipment.” The package comes after US legislators adopted a massive $95-billion foreign aid package, that includes $61 billion for Ukraine, after months of debate in Congress. The bill was signed into law by Biden earlier in the day, with the president stating the deliveries of weapons and military equipment to Ukraine were set to resume “in the next few hours.” According to unnamed US officials cited by AP, however, some contents of the package will indeed arrive on the frontline in a matter of days, while other items listed in the Pentagon’s announcement could take longer. Медиа: | ↑ |
Canberra has refused to identify the religion or motives of seven persons taken into custody Seven people were detained in Sydney on Wednesday in a counter-terrorism operation involving over 400 local, state and federal law enforcement officers, Australian police have said. The raids were a follow-up to the stabbing of an Assyrian Christian bishop earlier this month, which the authorities classified as a terrorist incident. “From that initial incident, a number of associates were identified that we believe warranted further close attention and investigation,” New South Wales Police Deputy Commissioner David Hudson told reporters. The decision to carry out the raid was motivated by concerns that they “posed an unacceptable risk to the people of New South Wales, and our current, purely investigative strategies could not adequately ensure public safety,” Hudson added. Seven “juveniles” between the ages of 15 and 17 have been arrested as a result of the operation. Police have described them as adherents of a “religiously motivated violent extremist ideology,” which they declined to name. Five more minors are cooperating with the authorities and have not been detained. Read more The behavior of the youths led the authorities to believe “it was likely that an attack might ensue” and that police would be unable to prevent it, Hudson added. However, Deputy Commissioner Krissy Barrett of the Australian federal police said that they had “no evidence of specific locations, times, or targets of a violent act” at this time. Australian authorities grew concerned after the April 15 attack on Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel, an Assyrian Christian, in the Sydney suburb of Wakeley. The 16-year-old suspect was caught on a live stream entering the Christ the Good Shepherd church, approaching the bishop in the middle of the evening service then stabbing him repeatedly in the head and chest. Eyewitnesses reported that the suspect said he was avenging the bishop’s insults against “my Prophet,” suggesting that the assailant might be Muslim. Bishop Emmanuel has been critical of Islam in the past. However, the Australian authorities have refused to identify the suspect’s religion or motives. The government in Canberra has also tried to censor the video of the incident on platforms such as X (formerly Twitter) and Meta, calling it “gratuitous or offensive violence with a high degree of impact or detail.” Wakeley is the home of Australia’s largest community of Assyrian Christians, many of whom have fled conflicts in the Middle East. Медиа: | ↑ |
President Biden has signed a bill forcing the platform’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to divest ownership or face a ban US President Joe Biden has signed a new law that could potentially lead to TikTok being banned in the country. The legislation is part of a bill that includes over $95 billion in military aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. Under the new TikTok law, ByteDance - the platform’s Chinese owner - will have nine months to sell its business or it will be barred from US app stores. The bill will also bar it from controlling TikTok’s algorithm. The bill was approved by the US House of Representatives on Saturday and by the Senate on Tuesday. The legislation comes after a number of US officials expressed concerns that the app poses a risk to national security and could be used by Chinese authorities to obtain the private data of US citizens or influence their opinions by suppressing or promoting certain content on TikTok. Senate Commerce Committee Chairwoman Maria Cantwell stressed that “Congress is not acting to punish ByteDance, TikTok or any other individual company”; it is making the move to “prevent foreign adversaries from conducting espionage, surveillance, maligned operations, harming vulnerable Americans, our servicemen and women, and our US government personnel.” Read more TikTok has threatened to legally challenge the US government over the law. The company’s head of public policy for the Americas, Michael Beckerman, has described the bill as a violation of the First Amendment rights of the app’s 170 million users in the US and warned that the potential ban would also have “devastating consequences” for the nearly seven million businesses using the platform. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew posted a response to the new law, addressing the users of the platform. “Make no mistake, this is a ban. A ban on TikTok, a ban on you, and a ban on your voice... Rest assured, we aren’t going anywhere. We are confident that we will keep fighting for your rights in the courts. The facts and the Constitution are on our side, and we expect to prevail.” China has also blasted plans to ban TikTok in the US, describing such a move as “contrary to the principles of fair competition and international economic and trade rules” and accusing Washington of “bullying behavior” and “leveraging state power” against ByteDance. Some US lawmakers have also opposed the bill, calling it a “cure” that is “worse than the disease” and raising concerns that it would give the White House the power to ban other websites and apps. Elon Musk has also warned that the bill is “about censorship and government control,” while the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has denounced the legislation as “violating the free speech rights of millions of Americans” who use the platform daily. Медиа: | ↑ |
Tehran’s doctrine is based on a fatwa Islamic law, which unequivocally prohibits indiscriminate weapons of mass destruction In light of the direct conflict that broke out between Israel and Iran, rumors that the Islamic Republic could produce nuclear weapons began circulating again. In addition, just a few days ago Reuters and other media outlets quoted a senior commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) saying that Iran may review its nuclear doctrine following Israeli threats. The US, EU, and Israel have long feared that Iran may produce nuclear weapons, and have used this threat to justify their actions against the Islamic Republic. However, it is important to understand that Iran’s nuclear doctrine is based on a fatwa (a ruling based on Islamic law) issued by the country’s Supreme Leader. According to this fatwa, the production of nuclear weapons is a sin. However, Iran’s opponents do not believe in the sincerity of this ruling and, they suggest, it can be renounced at any time. Things are not that simpleOn April 17 and 18, the first Tehran International Conference on Disarmament and Non-Proliferation took place. The motto of this conference was “Nuclear energy for everyone, nuclear weapons for no one.” There, Ali Akbar Velayati, adviser to the Supreme Leader of Iran, read Ayatollah Khamenei’s message in front of officials and members of various international delegations and organizations. “All of you know that, in the absence of the Imam Mahdi, whose coming is expected by the Shiites, the Shiite legal system is based on the opinion of authoritative and highly competent experts in the field of Islamic law (which Iran’s decisions are based on). These religious scholars issue fatwas which clearly indicate whether any action is permissible or not. One [important] issue is the permissibility of the production and use of weapons of mass destruction (chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons) …”. Read more Ayatollah Khamenei had carefully analyzed the consequences of the use of nuclear weapons by the Americans in Japan as well as the use of chemical weapons against Iran during the Iran-Iraq war, and stated his position on this issue: “We believe that, besides nuclear weapons, other types of weapons of mass destruction, such as chemical and biological weapons, also pose a serious threat to humanity. The Iranian nation, which is itself a victim of chemical weapons, feels more than any other nation the danger that is caused by the production and stockpiling of such weapons, and is prepared to make use of all its facilities to counter such threats. We consider the use of such weapons as haraam [forbidden] and believe that it is everyone’s duty to make efforts to secure humanity against this great disaster.” In the period from 2010 to 2015, other religious authorities, such as ayatollahs Makarem Shirazi, Jafar Subhani, Noori-Hamedani, and Javadi Amoli, also issued fatwas that prohibited the production and use of weapons of mass destruction. But can the issued fatwas be changed or canceled? Can Iran’s position in this regard change? From a theological point of view, certainly not. Islamic law states clear reasons for this. Why Iran can’t produce nuclear weaponsNuclear weapons and the radiation which results from their use threaten the environment, causing the destruction of crops and the death of offspring. Verse 205 of Surah al-Baqarah says: “And when he goes away, he strives throughout the land to cause corruption therein and destroy crops and animals. And Allah does not like corruption.” The protection of the environment, the preservation of the life of living beings and plants is every Muslim’s obligation under Sharia, Islamic law. The production and stockpiling of nuclear weapons, even if they are never used, may endanger the lives of people on the planet as a result of human error. According to Islamic law, this is unacceptable. Islam believes that a victory must be achieved by reasonable, lawful, and humane means. As for the rules of warfare, Islam strictly prohibits the killing of civilians, women, children and the elderly, as well as attacks on civilian infrastructure. Read more Here are the main principles of warfare in Islam: First, there must be a clear division between military personnel and civilians. Secondly, civilians should not be targeted. Then, weapons that are used in the attack must correspond to the desired (military) goal. Appropriate weapons must be used to strike military targets. The fourth principle is the principle of necessity. The production, stockpiling, and use of nuclear weapons contradicts all four principles of warfare. Many hadiths, which are sayings or traditions of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, also prohibit harming nature and people who cannot defend themselves. For example, Ali ibn Abu Talib (cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad) said that the Prophet prohibited adding toxic substances to water – even to the enemy’s water sources – since this may harm civilians. Are there loopholes?Iran advocates agreements which would prohibit the production, proliferation, and stockpiling of weapons of mass destruction, and generally accedes to such treaties. Iranians can lay claim to remaining faithful to the signed agreements – unlike Americans, who signed a nuclear deal with Tehran under one president then unilaterally withdrew from it when the administration in the White House changed. Some people say that Iran is a Shiite country, and in Shia Islam there is a concept called taqiyya, which allows one to conceal one’s beliefs, convictions, etc. in the face of danger. Its critics say Iran covers up its aggressive intentions with false humane and religious principles. This idea is fundamentally wrong, since taqiyya concerns only the fact of protecting and preserving one’s religion – for example, if Muslims are in danger of being killed for their religious beliefs. Taqiyya is prohibited if humanity is in danger of being destroyed, or if it contributes to the spread of iniquity and unrest. Therefore, taqiyya is not applicable to the production of nuclear weapons. Based on Islamic law, the Supreme Leader of Iran made a definitive decision to ban the production and use of weapons of mass destruction. The US, Israel, and European countries know this very well. At the same time, Iran needs peaceful nuclear energy – and there is nothing dangerous or reprehensible about this. 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More than half of respondents said the rules laid down in the Quran take precedence, in their eyes The majority of Muslim schoolchildren in the German state of Lower Saxony view religious rules as more important than the law, a new study has found. More than a third of respondents also indicated that they condoned acts of violence against those who insult Islam. Germany has been the destination of choice for hundreds of thousands of migrants from Türkiye for decades. In 2015, then-chancellor Angela Merkel opened the borders to several million refugees and migrants, predominantly from Muslim nations such as Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Although the influx has since diminished, people continue to arrive in Germany by the thousands. According to estimates provided by the country’s interior ministry, there are over five million Muslims currently residing in the country, which translates to nearly 7% of the entire population. Read more In its report on Sunday, Bild, citing a study by the Lower Saxony Criminology Research Institute, reported that 67.8% of schoolchildren polled said that the “rules of the Quran are more important to me than the laws in Germany”; 45.8% said that Islamic theocratic rule is the best form of state government, with over half contending that it is only their religion that has answers to the “problems of our times.” According to the study’s findings, 35.3% suggested that insults directed at Islam and its prophet are reason enough for a violent attack. More than a fifth of respondents argued that the “threat to Islam posed by the Western world” justifies a violent response on the part of Muslims. The researchers surveyed a total of 8,539 people in Lower Saxony, including 300 Muslims. Bild pointed out that the findings thus cannot be extrapolated to the whole of Germany. Nevertheless, Christoph de Vries from Hamburg, who represents the opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in the German parliament, told the media outlet that the “study shows how deep the traces are that the political Islam has already left behind in Germany.” The lawmaker attributed the troubling trend to “systematic indoctrination,” adding that “multiculti has long since failed.” The secretary of education from the neighboring Schleswig-Holstein region, Karin Prien, also from the CDU party, warned that unless “democratic values” are better instilled into students, “social cohesion risks going into a skid.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Fake images are misinformation, Anthony Albanese claims Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has once again lashed out at social media, insisting the platforms should be accountable for the content that its users post. The PM’s remarks come in the wake of a spat with tech billionaire Elon Musk over the reluctance on the part of the Tesla and Space X tycoon to remove footage of the stabbing of a cleric from X (formerly Twitter). “Social media platforms have a responsibility to make sure that misinformation isn’t got out there,” Albanese told reporters on Wednesday. “I noticed today, for example, on the way up here, they’ve removed various sites that were up containing fake images of myself superimposed on other people,” the PM stated. “Social media has a responsibility to do the right thing here,” Albanese reiterated. On Wednesday, the country’s Shadow Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Birmingham called on social media companies to use their “immense technological power” to remove violent content from their platforms. The Australian government has been pushing a so-called misinformation bill, released as a draft last year. The new law would empower the Australian Communications and Media Authority to require online platforms to address content considered “false, misleading or deceptive, and where the provision of that content on the service is reasonably likely to cause or contribute to serious harm.” The bill was later withdrawn by the communications minister, Michelle Rowland, who promised “refinements,” including additional protections for freedom of speech, greater transparency, and “improved workability.” However, following the recent Sydney stabbings, Rowland indicated the bill would resurface. The government is yet to outline changes to the initial bill it will introduce to parliament. Read more The news has been met with opposition. “The PM has caused more division by shamelessly tying a violent video to his agenda to outlaw some types of speech. The basic principle is, if you don’t trust politicians, don’t give them the power to tell you what you can say,” National Party Senator Matt Canavan told Guardian Australia. He also claimed that the Albanese government was “struggling” due to the Prime Minister’s belief that the “biggest issue” in the country is misinformation. Musk mocked Albanese’s social media crackdown hours after his platform was again ordered to remove the content, which features last week’s non-fatal knife attack on an Assyrian bishop in a suburb of Sydney, and to remove it for users worldwide. Musk said the Australian court’s ruling to take down the footage meant that any country could control “the entire internet.” He also used a meme depicting a Wizard of Oz-style path to “freedom” leading to an X logo. Albanese, in turn, labeled Musk an “arrogant billionaire who thinks he’s above the law, but also above common decency.” Медиа: | ↑ |
The package includes $61 billion for Ukraine, with funds destined for purchase of weapons and military equipment US President Joe Biden signed a long-stalled $95-billion foreign aid package on Wednesday, after the Senate voted resoundingly to approve the funds for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. The package, including $61 billion for Ukraine, passed in a 79-18 vote on Tuesday evening, after both Republican and Democratic lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to end a filibuster and advance the measure. Biden praised congressional leaders and lawmakers for what he called an effort “to answer history’s call at this critical inflection point,” saying he would immediately begin the process of sending much-needed weaponry to Ukraine as early as this week. ”Congress has passed my legislation to strengthen our national security and send a message to the world about the power of American leadership: we stand resolutely for democracy and freedom, and against tyranny and oppression,” Biden stated. READ MORE: More weapons for Kiev won’t change battlefield dynamics – Kremlin The president told his Ukrainian counterpart Vladimir Zelensky in a phone call on Monday that weapons shipments would begin rapidly after the bill reaches the Oval Office for his signature. While the White House offered few details on the call, the Ukrainian leader claimed that Kiev would be receiving longer-range ATACMS missiles. The multibillion-dollar US aid package was requested by the White House months ago, but was only passed by the House of Representatives on Saturday, after Speaker Mike Johnson finally agreed to a vote. Read more The House also voted on Saturday to approve separate bills providing $26 billion in aid to Israel and $8 billion for Taiwan and other Indo-Pacific region allies. In addition, the emergency spending package includes $9 billion in humanitarian aid for civilians in Gaza and other war zones. Biden said the US would start sending weapons and military equipment to Ukraine “in the next few hours.” “We are going to begin sending equipment to Ukraine for air defense munitions, for artillery, for rocket systems and armored vehicles,” he stated, noting that the package's path to his desk was a difficult one, and “should have gotten there sooner.” The Pentagon has said weapons worth $1 billion are ready for immediate delivery to Ukraine. According to unnamed US officials, cited by the Associated Press, some of the arms will arrive on the frontline within days, but other items could take longer. The Kremlin has repeatedly warned that Washington’s lethal aid will not change the situation on the battlefield in Ukraine’s favor. According to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, the US government has effectively been funneling billions of dollars into its own military industrial complex through the aid scheme. Медиа: | ↑ |
Several people have been injured after the Household Cavalry lost control of their animals in the center of the city Several military horses have been caught after going on a rampage in London; onlookers say the animals threw their riders and went galloping through the streets. At least four people have been hospitalized in the wake of the incident. Social media users have been sharing images of the blood-covered thoroughbreds crashing into cars and buses. The incident occurred on Wednesday morning at 8:40am local time in the center of the British capital. Five horses belonging to the Household Cavalry were apparently spooked by noise coming from a construction site during their daily morning exercise on Horse Guards Parade, in Whitehall. According to the Daily Mail, a total of five people were injured during the nearly two-hour-long rampage that spanned almost ten kilometers through central London. Of the four people who have been hospitalized, three are believed to be soldiers. None of the people who were hurt are reported to have sustained any life-threatening injuries.
One eyewitness recalled seeing one of the riders “screaming in pain” after he fell off his steed as it struck a car near the Clermont Hotel on Buckingham Palace Road. “I saw a soldier falling down into the street after the horse ran into a car,” the witness told The Telegraph. “The man hit the floor hard, he was screaming in pain. You could see blood all over the parked car.” Photos and videos shared online also show one of the horses ramming into a double-decker bus and smashing its windshield; another was seen crashing into a black taxicab. The frightened animals continued to run through the streets covered in blood after apparently being cut by the broken glass. “They were running down the street at a very high speed. It was very scary,” another witness said, noting that “It’s rare to see horses stampeding down the street like that.” — Animal Welfare Watch (@AnimalWelfarewt) April 24, 2024 In some of the pictures, some members of the public could be seen trying to help calm down one of the shaken horses, whose legs could be seen covered in blood. READ MORE: Botswana threatens to ‘deport’ 20,000 elephants to Germany By 10:30am, Metropolitan Police reported that all of the horses had been caught and accounted for. After being transported to veterinary care via army horse boxes, all of the animals are reported to now be back at the army camp. “A number of military working horses became loose during routine exercise this morning. All of the horses have now been recovered and returned to camp,” an army spokesperson said in a statement, adding that the horses and personnel who were injured in the incident were “receiving the appropriate medical attention.” Медиа: | ↑ |
The Israeli prime minister has been an “obstacle” to the two-state solution with Palestine for years, Nancy Pelosi has said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is an obstacle to peace in Gaza and “should resign” from his position, former US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said. She made the remarks on Monday in an interview with Irish public broadcaster Raidio Teilifis Eireann (RTE) during her visit to the country. Pelosi criticized the Israeli leader’s response to the October 7 Hamas attack which saw Palestinian militants kill over 1,100 people on Israeli territory and take around 250 hostages. The former House speaker cited the recent resignation of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) intelligence chief Major General Aharon Haliva over the failure to prevent the attack, before pointing the finger at Netanyahu. “We recognize Israel’s right to protect itself. We reject the policy and the practice of Netanyahu – terrible. What could be worse than what he has done in response?” Pelosi told the outlet. “He should resign. He’s ultimately responsible,” she added. When asked if Netanyahu is a “block” to peace, Pelosi replied that “he has been for years,” adding that she doesn’t know whether the Israeli leader is “afraid of peace, incapable of peace, or just doesn’t want peace.” Read more She went on to argue that Netanyahu been an “obstacle to the two-state solution, I emphasize the word, ‘solution.’” Health authorities in Gaza have estimated that more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed amid Israel’s siege of the enclave, which has included extensive bombardment as well as a ground incursion. Earlier this month, Pelosi joined more than 30 US Congress members who signed a letter urging President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken to halt weapons transfers to Israel. The change of tune in Washington, Israel’s key ally, followed the killing of six aid workers from the World Central Kitchen humanitarian organization. The IDF targeted the group’s convoy in what it claimed to be a tragic mistake, despite the food supply mission being closely coordinated with the military. Meanwhile, the Senate approved on Tuesday a long-stalled $95 billion emergency spending bill which includes $26 billion in aid to Israel and $61 billion for Ukraine. Biden is expected to sign the bill into law shortly. Медиа: | ↑ |
The former president is at risk of being slapped with a short sentence for contempt of court The US Secret Service, which is tasked with protecting acting and former US presidents, is considering how to proceed if Donald Trump ends up behind bars, sources have told the New York Times. On Tuesday, Judge Juan Merchan withheld a decision on whether to hold Trump in contempt of court over alleged gag order violations at his trial. The hearings relate to felony charges of falsifying business records to hide the reimbursement of a hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election. It is not immediately clear when Merchan will announce a ruling. The NYT stressed in an article on Tuesday that the judge is likely to issue a warning or impose a fine before taking the “extreme step” of jailing the presumptive Republican presidential nominee for a month at a holding cell in the courthouse. Prosecutors, who claim that Trump attacked witnesses and other people associated with his case at least ten times on social media this month in violation of a gag order, are currently asking for a fine for the 77-year-old. Read more However, officials from the Secret Service and other law enforcement agencies held a meeting last week, focused on how to move and protect Trump if the judge eventually orders him to be put in the court’s holding cell, two people familiar with the matter told the paper. The issue of how to safely incarcerate the former president if the jury finds him guilty and he is sent to an actual prison “has yet to be addressed directly,” according to dozens of officials of various levels, who talked to the NYT. The paper stressed that if that happens, it will become a “daunting challenge” and a “logistical nightmare” for all agencies involved. Trump, who is the first ever acting or former US president to go on trial, could face up to 136 years in prison as a result of four criminal cases against him. According to the officials, if the former head of state is actually imprisoned, he would have to be held separately from other inmates, with all his food and other personal items undergoing screenings. In order to achieve this, a detail of agents would have to work 24/7, rotating in and out of the facility, they said. Firearms are strictly prohibited in US prisons, but those agents “would nonetheless be armed,” according to the sources. READ MORE: Man dies after setting himself on fire outside Trump trial (GRAPHIC VIDEOS) A spokesman for the Secret Service confirmed to the NYT that the agency guards former presidents, but declined to discuss any specific “protective operations.” Медиа: | ↑ |
The threat of a major war in the Middle East has passed because Tehran has decided to bide its time Iran has again threatened Israel with a harsh response to aggression by the Jewish state. Tehran's army and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps will ensure those who cross red lines regret it, Deputy Chief of the Army for Coordination, Habibollah Sayyari has warned. Israel, meanwhile, has refrained from speaking out against Tehran, instead focusing its political rhetoric on Hamas. In particular, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised to increase military and political pressure on the Palestinian group in the near future, in order to motivate it to release hostages, the Times of Israel reports. The good news is that there will be no Iran-Israel war. At least not at this stage. Tehran has chosen not to react vociferously to the Israeli air force’s retaliatory strike, dismissing all reports of the destruction of the radar protecting the Natanz nuclear centre as 'Zionist intrigue'. The bottom line is that we have two air raids attributed to Israel and one very large Iranian strike. In the latter case, everything was official and the Islamic Republic can therefore claim an entry in the Guinness Book of Records with an article on the largest number of UAVs and ballistic missiles involved in a single offensive operation. Incidentally, we do not know what the real effect of the large-scale attack was. Iran, like Israel, is carefully hides damage data. However, the political consequences of such events are far more important. And, as usual in the Middle East, a dozen seemingly unrelated problems have become intertwined. After the Iranian strike, for example, Western countries began to advise Israel not to react, though rumour has it that the Jewish State was negotiating for the right to launch a military operation in Rafah, the last Hamas stronghold in Gaza. Then in the end, it lost patience and responded. Read more The Iranians had options. The Ayatollahs could have said that Israel had again crossed all the red lines. This would have led to further escalation, but might have protected Hamas. But Iran, for its own reasons, ignored the Palestinians and reported through the press that nothing serious had happened. The reason for this peacefulness is probably that they envisaged a working alliance between Israel, Jordan and the Sunni monarchies of the Persian Gulf. This is precisely the nightmare that the Iranians have done their utmost to prevent. They even restored diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia in 2023. But apparently confrontation with the Shiites is more important to moderate Sunnis than dislike of the Jews. According to military analysts, if the Israeli Air Force did attack Iranian air defences, it means that they probably flew over Jordan or the Arabian Peninsula, and it is unlikely that this was done without the consent of the Hashemite Kingdom or the Saudis. As a result, the military alliance is not only defensive, which means that virtually all of Iran’s proxies in the region, including Hezbollah, the Houthis and the Shia militias in Iraq and Syria, are at risk. For now, however, this is all a hypothetical picture. A three-way alliance requires the normalisation of Israel's relations with Riyadh and, as part of the deal, the signing of a defence agreement with the US, as well as American-Israeli goodwill for the establishment of nuclear capability in Saudi Arabia. And all this has to happen before the end of June. Otherwise, Washington will not be able to get the relevant decisions through Congress because of the upcoming election. Obviously, the Iranians believe that further escalation will only accelerate the process described above. That is why they prefer to pretend that they are fighting for peace. The very peace for which no stone should be left unturned on this planet. But that will come later. This article was first published by Kommersant, translated and edited by the RT team Медиа: | ↑ |
China has criticized Washington’s decision to provide new military assistance to the self-governed island Washington’s latest decision to supply arms to Taiwan increases the risks faced by the self-governed island instead of bolstering its security, according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry. Taipei is set to get $8 billion in security assistance under a bill recently approved by the US Congress. The US decision to arm what it recognizes offficially as a part of China was met with resignation in Beiging, with Wang Wenbin, the spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, criticizing the decision during a press briefing on Wednesday. “It will only increase tensions and the risk of conflict across the Taiwan Strait, and will ultimately be an act of shooting oneself in the foot,” he warned. Congress approved $95 billion in foreign aid, most of it military, on Tuesday, with most of the spending related to Ukraine. President Joe Biden is set to sign the bill into law this week. Taiwan was the last refuge of nationalist forces during the Chinese civil war of the 1940s, and has since remained de facto independent from Beijing and allied with Washington. The One-China policy, which forms the core of its government’s relationship with Taiwan, states that there is only one Chinese national state. Read more Under the policy, Beijing seeks the peaceful reintegration of the island and the prevention of any attempt to declare it a sovereign nation, threatening the use of military force if necessary. China has claimed that some political forces in the US are encouraging Taipei to secede, and that the military support offered by Washington fuels separatist sentiments which are part of a US strategy to contain Beijing. Military ties with the US cannot “save the doomed fate of Taiwan independence,” Wang warned, urging Washington not to create new tensions in the region with its arms supplies. The rebuke coincided with the arrival of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in China for a three-day visit. According to Western media, one of his key goals is to put pressure on Beijing over its friendly relations with Moscow, and its decision to reject economic restrictions on Russia relating to the Ukraine crisis. “We see China sharing machine tools, semiconductors, other dual-use items that have helped Russia rebuild the defense industrial base,” Blinken stated last week after a G7 meeting. READ MORE: US denies submarine pact will trigger arms race The US is drafting measures to punish Chinese banks involved in such trade, and Blinken intends to use that threat as “diplomatic leverage” during the talks, according to the Wall Street Journal. Медиа: | ↑ |
Moscow ‘condones’ online scams that target the UK’s elderly, Ben Wallace has claimed The UK is facing certain forms of “unconventional warfare” waged by its enemies, potentially including Moscow-backed online scams that target the elderly, former British Secretary of Defence Ben Wallace has claimed. The Conservative MP, who resigned from the cabinet last August, told Sky News on Wednesday that the world today reminded him of the interwar periods during the last century. The situation, Wallace explained, is similar to “the 1930s, but with an added challenge of terrorism and a challenge of unconventional warfare.” As examples of the latter, he cited “disinformation campaigns, the enemies in this country using cyber to divide us, to rob from us, to spy on us, and to create frictions in our society.” When asked by host Kay Burley which nation posed the biggest threat to the UK, Wallace said it was Russia. READ MORE: Canadians are ‘target No.1’ for Ukrainian scammers – media ”Many of the big cyber-crime syndicates are based in Russia, curiously protected by the Russian state,” he claimed. “They are the ones robbing your granny and my parents with phishing emails. So, Russia is directly challenging us at all levels.” Earlier this month, British police reported busting a UK-founded international ring of scammers, which since 2021 alone has stolen from some 70,000 victims in the country. Thirty-seven people were arrested around the world in the LabHost case, the force reported. The statement didn’t mention Russia. Медиа: | ↑ |
NATO member Estonia is considering a new measure to ‘protect’ itself from Russia, its finance minister has told local media Growing defense costs would leave Estonia with no other option but to introduce a security tax in the coming years, the EU country’s Finance Minister Mart Vorklaev said on Tuesday. The Estonian government had already agreed to increase the nation’s defense budget to 3% of GDP between 2024 and 2027, up from 2.85% last year, and sharply up from NATO’s 2% threshold, as it seeks to counter a supposed threat from Russia. The former Soviet republic, which shares a 284-kilometer border with Russia, joined the EU and NATO in 2004. Vorklaev was commenting on an initiative by Estonian Defence Forces’ chief General Martin Herem, who earlier this week proposed increasing his country’s defense spending to 5% of GDP. According to Herem, this would enable Tallinn to buy €1.5 billion worth of ammunition to “deter Russia or destroy its infrastructure” in the event of an attack. Speaking to news outlet ERR, Minister Vorklaev said that when allocating 5% of GDP to defense, Estonia would have to introduce a broad-based security tax, adding, however, that the new tax would not be introduced until 2026. The proposal has already sparked criticism, with Vadim Belobrovtsev, a member of the Center Party parliamentary faction, saying he could not imagine where €1.5 billion could come from. Authorities should keep the national economy in focus and think about “how we get out of this economic hole,” the politician said. Read more Last year, the Baltic country’s GDP decreased by 3%, to €37.7 billion ($40.8 billion), data shared by Statistics Estonia shows. Estonia, along with Latvia and Lithuania, has been on the frontline of the West’s confrontation with Moscow since the beginning of the Ukraine conflict in 2022. Earlier this year, multiple senior officials from NATO member states, including the UK, Germany, and Estonia, alleged that Russia was planning an attack on the bloc within the next few years. Moscow has consistently denied the claims, with President Vladimir Putin insisting that Russia “has no interest … geopolitically, economically or militarily ... in waging war against NATO.” Медиа: | ↑ |
One country should not be able to censor the entire internet, the tech billionaire has argued Tech billionaire Elon Musk has insisted he will not comply with an Australian order to remove a video in which a priest was stabbed from his X (formerly Twitter) platform. The entrepreneur has been told to withdraw the content, which features a non-fatal knife attack on an Assyrian bishop, for users worldwide. The stabbing took place during a live-streamed sermon at a church in the suburbs of Sydney on April 15. Footage of the attack, which the Australian authorities have deemed to be terrorism, quickly garnered multiple views online and allegedly prompted heated protests near the crime scene. The following day, Australia’s eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, ordered X and Meta to delete the footage entirely from their social platforms within 24 hours, including for users outside the country. “Every minute counts, and the more this content is up there, the more it is reshared, the more the velocity and the virality continues and we need to stem that,” she argued. While Meta swiftly complied with the order, X said that it had only removed the video in Australia “pending a legal challenge.” Inman’s order for the clip to be brought down worldwide “was not within the scope of Australian law,” it argued. The company added that Canberra had threatened it with a daily fine of AUS$785,000 (US$510,000) over its reluctance to fulfill the demand. Read more On Monday, a federal court in Sydney ordered a temporary ban on the stabbing video for all X users, pending a hearing on a permanent ban on Wednesday. In its injunction against the platform, the eSafety Commission claimed that “geoblocking” of the footage by X was not enough due to the ability of the Australians to access it through VPN. On Tuesday, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese labeled Musk an “arrogant billionaire who thinks he’s above the law, but also above common decency.” Albanese claimed to ABC that the Tesla and SpaceX CEO was “out of touch” over his willingness to go to court in order to keep violent content online. Musk responded to Albanese a few hours later, explaining that “our concern is that if any country is allowed to censor content for all countries, which is what the Australian ‘eSafety Commissar’ is demanding, then what is to stop any country from controlling the entire Internet?” READ MORE: No Russian misinfo on X, but Western influence ops present – Musk He also shared a post revealing that X has now become the most downloaded app in Australia. “The Australian people want the truth. X is the only one standing up for their rights,” Musk wrote. Медиа: | ↑ |
The Netherlands’ most-wanted criminal was allowed out on bail due to an apparent judicial lapse A regional judge in Spain has released a presumed Moroccan mafia leader on bail, whom Dutch authorities suspect of having plotted to abduct or kill the heir apparent to the country's throne as well as the its acting prime minister, Mark Rutte. A lapse by a higher court has effectively allowed him to escape extradition, according to media reports. A Dutch citizen of Moroccan origin on Interpol’s most wanted list, Karim Bouyakhrichan was arrested in the Spanish city of Marbella in early January, after a years-long manhunt. The alleged crime kingpin became a high-priority target after his criminal organization threatened to kill Princess Catharina-Amalia, Princes of Orange and daughter of the Dutch King, Willem Alexander. Dutch security services have characterized Bouyakhrichan as the “most wanted and dangerous criminal in the Netherlands.” According to local media, the suspect also faced money laundering charges in Spain, which prompted the magistrate’s court in Marbella to remand him in custody. However, after the term elapsed within about a month, a Malaga provincial court released the supposed mafia boss on a €50,000 ($53,400) bail bond, on the condition that Bouyakhrichan hand in his passport and appear in court every 15 days. The last time Bouyakhrichan was seen was on April 1, with the media outlet SUR quoting unnamed sources as saying the suspected drug lord had since fled Spain. Read more SUR claimed the regional judge had made the decision to set the man free despite strong opposition from the prosecutor’s office. Local media outlets have described how the Provincial Court in Malaga declined to execute a Dutch extradition order, arguing that Bouyakhrichan first had to face money laundering charges in Spain. Amsterdam then reportedly filed a new, urgent request, with Spain’s High Court in Madrid acquiescing. However, according to the Cadena SER radio network, Judge Ismael Moreno for some reason neglected to issue a detention order that would have kept the suspected criminal boss behind bars, to secure his extradition to the Netherlands. Cadena SER quoted anonymous police sources as saying that the judge’s dubious decision had resulted in “five years of investigation thrown to the garbage.” Unnamed Dutch security sources have described the legal mix-up to the press as an “unforgivable error.” According to Politico, back in 2022 Dutch Princess Amalia had to be whisked away from her student campus after the authorities obtained credible evidence of the Moroccan mafia’s plans to either kidnap or murder her. Dutch outlet De Telegraaf has also alleged that caretaker Prime Minister Mark Rutte could be on Bouyakhrichan’s kill-list. Медиа: | ↑ |
Pyongyang’s international trade minister Yun Jong Ho is leading the delegation, the state-run KCNA news agency has reported A high-profile North Korean delegation is making a rare foreign visit to Iran, the state-run KCNA news agency has reported. The last time officials from Pyongyang made a publicly announced trip to Tehran was in 2019. A delegation headed by North Korea’s minister for external economic relations, Yun Jong Ho, departed for Iran by plane on Tuesday, according to the agency. KCNA did not reveal further details about the visit. In February, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent a congratulatory message to Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on the 45th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution. Kim expressed confidence that “the traditional relations of friendship and cooperation between our two countries forged on the road of joint struggle against imperialism will expand and develop in various fields.” US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said last Tuesday that Washington is “incredibly concerned” about alleged cooperation between Tehran and Pyongyang in nuclear and ballistic missile development. The two countries remain under harsh international sanctions over their weapons programs. Read more Last week, South Korea’s spy agency, the National Intelligence Service (NIS), said it is “keeping tabs on whether the North Korean technology was included in Iran’s ballistic missiles launched against Israel, given the North and Iran’s missile cooperation in the past.” On April 13, Tehran fired several hundred missiles and drones at military targets inside Israel, in response to an earlier strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, which left two generals and several other senior officers dead. Pyongyang has also faced accusations from the West that Palestinian armed group Hamas, which has ties with Iran, used North Korean weapons in its attack against Israel on October 7. At the time, KCNA rejected the claims as “a groundless and false rumor,” aimed to “shift the blame for the Middle East crisis caused by [the US] wrong hegemonic policy onto a third country.” READ MORE: US troubled by Russia’s ‘complete embrace’ of North Korea – senior diplomat North Korea and Iran have also been accused by the US and its allies of respectively providing artillery shells and drones to Russia amid the conflict with Ukraine. Pyongyang and Tehran have denied the claims, while Russia has insisted it relies on domestically produced weapons for its military operation. Медиа: | ↑ |
Authorities have warned of possible mud rains and respiratory health risks A massive dust storm blowing in from Africa has covered Athens and other Greek cities, tinting the sky yellow-orange, videos showed on Tuesday. According to meteorological services, the Sahara dust storm will be accompanied by mud rains, mostly in the northern and western parts of the country. The storm coincided with elevated spring temperatures, intensifying its impact, local weather reports stated. The winds are expected to shift direction westward on Wednesday, resulting in lower dust levels. “This is a phenomenon that occurs these months... it is usually accompanied by southerly winds and an increased temperature,” the director of research at the Institute for Environmental Research and Sustainable Development at the National Observatory, Dr. Kostas Lagouvardos told Athens-Macedonian News Agency. He described it as an “important environmental problem because it affects many people, especially when the concentrations are high on the ground.” READ MORE: Hot pink northern lights illuminate skies over Russia (VIDEO) Doctors are warning of increased risks to citizens, especially those with pre-existing respiratory conditions.
The Sahara sandstorm forced Libya to suspend air traffic on Monday and Tuesday. It was accompanied by winds reaching up to 70 km/h, according to the Libya Observer. Video broadcast by local media showed a runway covered in a thick layer of sand. Медиа: | ↑ |
The pathogen has been detected in 33 cattle herds in eight states, officials say Particles of bird flu have been found in samples of consumer milk in the US, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Tuesday, revealing the extent of an outbreak of the H5N1 strain of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI). The virus has previously been detected in raw milk, the agency wrote, adding that while “pasteurization is likely to inactivate the virus,” the process is not expected to fully remove the presence of viral particles. The FDA national survey further discovered traces of bird flu in “milk from affected animals, in the processing system, and on the shelves.” “To date, we have seen nothing that would change our assessment that the commercial milk supply is safe,” the agency claimed, insisting that if the testing process finds “genetic material” from the virus, this “does not mean that the sample contains an intact, infectious pathogen.” While the FDA insists there is no real concern about the safety of pasteurized dairy products, other agencies said produce from sick cows should not be on the shelves. “Only milk from healthy animals is authorized for distribution into interstate commerce for human consumption,” the National Milk Producers Federation wrote on its website. Read more Meanwhile, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has revealed that bird flu had been found in 33 herds of dairy cows in eight states as of Monday. Although Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza has been circulating for more than 20 years, its spread to bovine livestock is causing alarm, the Washington Post wrote on Tuesday. The concern “is that it’s showing up in a lot more samples, meaning the infection is more widespread in dairy herds than we thought,” a US public health official told the paper on the condition of anonymity. Both the USDA and the FDA have urged consumers to avoid drinking raw milk as the situation evolves. Further results are expected in the coming days and weeks, authorities said. Медиа: | ↑ |
Mitch McConnell has accused the journalist of “demonizing” Kiev The top-ranking Republican in the US Senate, Mitch McConnell, has claimed Tucker Carlson’s interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin convinced too many “rank-and-file Republicans” that spending billions of taxpayer dollars on arming Kiev against Moscow was harming Americans and wrecking the economy. As a new multibillion-dollar US aid package to Ukraine was clearing the last procedural hurdles on Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader McConnell attempted to pin the blame for months of delays on former Fox News anchor Carlson and former President Donald Trump. “I think the demonization of Ukraine began by Tucker Carlson, who in my opinion ended up where he should have been all along, which was interviewing Vladimir Putin,” McConnell told a press briefing. “He convinced a lot of rank-and-file Republicans that maybe this was a mistake,” he added, arguing that Trump’s “mixed views” on Ukraine aid further fueled confusion over the official narrative in Washington. “And then our nominee for president didn’t seem to want us to do anything at all,” McConnell claimed. “That took months to work our way through it.” Read more Carlson recorded a lengthy interview with Putin in February, a first by a Western reporter since the conflict with Ukraine began. The pair discussed the ongoing hostilities and Moscow’s standoff with NATO. The exchange went viral globally, garnering over 200 million views on X (formerly Twitter) alone, yet critics accused Carlson of not being confrontational enough with the Russian leader. The American journalist argued that most Western media outlets lie to their audiences, mainly by omission, and that the point of his interview was “to have more information brought to the West so people could make their own decisions.” “I reject the whole premise of the war in Ukraine from the American perspective,” Carlson said in February, looking back at his conversation with Putin. “There’s a war going on that is wrecking the US economy in a way and at a scale that people do not understand.” Read more US President Joe Biden requested additional cash for Ukraine last October after burning through $113 billion in previously approved spending bills. However, the request had been stalled until this week due to opposition from Republican lawmakers, who argued that Biden was merely prolonging Kiev’s conflict with Russia while offering no clear strategy for victory or a peace agreement. Most Republicans voted against the aid bill on Saturday, but House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) overrode his own party by enabling a vote and pushing it through with unanimous Democrat support. Медиа: | ↑ |
The Pentagon could send $1 billion in new aid to Kiev as soon as the US president authorizes a drawdown The Pentagon is reportedly ready to send up to $1 billion worth of weapons to Ukraine, once the long-delayed legislation to fund Kiev’s war effort against Moscow is signed by US President Joe Biden. The $95 billion foreign aid package, including $61 billion for Ukraine, was approved by a 79-18 Senate vote on Tuesday evening, after lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to end a filibuster and advance the measure. “I will sign this bill into law and address the American people as soon as it reaches my desk tomorrow so we can begin sending weapons and equipment to Ukraine this week,” Biden said in a statement after the vote. The new aid package will include air defense munitions and large amounts of artillery rounds, as well as armored vehicles and other weapons, several US officials told AP on Tuesday. According to the unnamed sources, some of the items on the list will be shipped “within days,” but others could take longer to deliver. Read more The Pentagon has neither confirmed nor denied the report of a new package ready to be shipped, but press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder told journalists on Tuesday that the US military is “doing everything we can to be poised to respond quickly.” “I think it’s a good assumption to expect that it’ll include air defense capabilities as well as artillery, ammunition,” Ryder said. “I will say again, that this security assistance package will be based on Ukraine’s most urgent needs.” Biden told his Ukrainian counterpart Vladimir Zelensky in a phone call on Monday that weapons shipments will begin rapidly after the bill reaches the Oval Office for his signature. While the White House offered few details on the call, the Ukrainian leader claimed that Kiev will receive longer-range ATACMS missiles. Read more The multibillion-dollar US aid package was requested by the White House months ago but was only passed by the House of Representatives on Saturday, after Speaker Mike Johnson agreed to a vote. Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu noted on Tuesday that American military assistance is intended to “prevent the collapse” of Ukrainian forces, but predicted that the money will not significantly impact the situation on the battlefield, since “most of the funding will go to US military production.” “The American authorities cynically state that Ukrainians will be dying in the fight with Russia for their interests,” Shoigu stated. Officials in both Washington and Kiev have argued that paying Ukraine to fight Russia is preferable to the US having to fight Moscow directly. Медиа: | ↑ |
The four-legged “dog” is equipped with a flamethrower Almost any American with about $10,000 to spare can now own a robot dog with a flamethrower mounted on its back, the Ohio-based company Throwflame has announced. The four-legged creature dubbed ‘Thermonator’ is actually a drone, controlled via a first-person-view (FPV) interface, with a battery life of up to one hour. Its ARC flamethrower has a range of 30 feet (10 meters), according to specifications released by the company. “Thermonator is the first-ever flamethrower-wielding robot dog,” the company said in a press release on Tuesday, when it started taking orders. The Thermonator appears to be based on the Unitree Go1, a smaller and lighter version of the Boston Dynamics’ famous ‘Spot’ robo-dog. Throwflame has listed its retail price as $9,420, with free shipping to any US state.
According to the company, flamethrowers are “federally unregulated and not even considered a firearm (ironic) by the [Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms].” Only two states have restrictions on flamethrowers; California requires a permit, while Maryland has outlawed them entirely. It is the buyer’s responsibility to make sure they obey local laws, Throwflame said. The Cleveland, Ohio-based company bills itself as “the oldest flamethrower manufacturer in the US” and claims its products are “built with pride by military veterans.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Described as a “psychological thriller,” the film promises a “detailed analysis” of the Russian leader’s life and mind The “world premiere” of a new biopic of Russian President Vladimir Putin featuring an AI-rendered central character has been announced by the Polish studio AIO. The film, which was first announced in May 2022 and is titled ‘Putin’, will be released in 35 countries on September 26, according to a statement issued via PR Leap. The English-language debut of Polish director Patryk Vega, also known as Besaleel, is reportedly the result of three years of filming and “pioneering AI technology.” The film claims to capture the “motives and actions of one of the most controversial figures in contemporary politics,” Vega said. A recently released 2.5-minute trailer, which includes AI-generated shots of an adult Putin wearing a diaper and taking part in martial arts, promises detailed analysis of the Russian leader’s life and psyche over 60 years. Viewers will be able to “get up close and personal” with the Russian leader’s story, touching on some of the “most intimate moments” of his life, it claims. “Inviting Putin to the studio for 20,000 shots wasn’t an option,” Vega said, adding that the archival materials available online didn’t allow for training a high-resolution deepfake model suitable for cinematic use. “As a result, after nearly two years of development, we’ve created our pioneering AI-driven technology, enabling us to craft the cinematic character without relying on a real human model.” The Polish director further claimed that his “production’s mission is to provide viewers with a ‘user manual’ for Putin, aiming to alleviate the fear and uncertainty that dominate today’s world.” READ MORE: German leader tells Putin he can’t quote legendary philosopher According to PR Leap, the movie was filmed in locations such as Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Syria, Jordan, and Poland. Vega is responsible for a string of homegrown box-office hits “characterized by grisly violence and glossy production values” including Pitbull, Mafia Women and Botoks, according to The Guardian. Медиа: | ↑ |
London plans to increase defense spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2030, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak says The UK is set to embark on the “biggest strengthening” of its national defense “in a generation” and plans to gradually increase defense spending to £87 billion (around $108 billion) annually by 2030, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has announced. Sunak made the remarks on Tuesday at a joint press conference with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg while on a visit to Poland. Sunak pledged to gradually increase Britain’s defense spending, promising to even surpass the NATO-targeted 2% of GDP by the end of the decade. Annual spending is expected to reach the £87 billion ($108 billion) mark in 2023, he said, constituting some 2.5% of Britain’s GDP. London is set to allocate additional long-term funding for ammunition production, Sunak stated, arguing that the Ukraine conflict has clearly shown the country needs deeper stockpiles should it find itself in a large-scale high-intensity war or even a global conflict. “We will put the UK’s own defense industry on a war footing. One of the central lessons of the war in Ukraine is that we need deeper stockpiles of munitions and for industry to be able to replenish them more quickly,” Sunak said. Read more “Today is a turning point for European security and a landmark moment in the defense of the United Kingdom. It is a generational investment in British security and British prosperity, which makes us safer at home and stronger abroad,” he stated, hailing the spending plan as the “biggest strengthening of our national defense in a generation.” The defense spending announcement comes as the UK, one of the top backers of Ukraine in its conflict with Russia, unveiled its biggest-ever military aid package for Kiev, valued at £500 million ($617 million). The “vital munitions” package will include more than 400 combat vehicles, 60 boats, and an undisclosed number of long-range Storm Shadow missiles. “Defending Ukraine against Russia’s brutal ambitions is vital for our security and for all of Europe,” Sunak alleged. “If [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is allowed to succeed in this war of aggression, he will not stop at the Polish border.” Speaking earlier in the day in Warsaw, however, the prime minister admitted that a large-scale conflict was not actually imminent and its danger should not be blown out of proportion. “We must not overstate the danger. We’re not on the brink of war, and nor do we seek it,” he acknowledged. Медиа: | ↑ |
The PLA has strong capabilities but the Americans have experience, an official has said If a conflict between Washington and Beijing broke out today, the more experienced American force would prevail but with significant casualties, a US military intelligence official has told reporters. The unnamed official gave a background briefing on Monday about threats facing the US military. He downplayed the Chinese H-20 stealth bomber, currently in development, as “probably nowhere near as good” as the American B-2 or the upcoming B-21 – while praising the Chinese J-20 fighter as “highly capable.” “The biggest… challenge for the Chinese side is actually not so much capability of actual systems, it’s more capability of personnel to effectively employ those systems at speed and at scale,” the official was quoted as saying by Defense One and Breaking Defense. While the US military has “a lot of experience fighting wars,” the Chinese “don’t really have anybody right now at all, in the [People’s Liberation Army] PLA, who’s actually been in a war.” Read more This relative inexperience would translate into the US winning a hypothetical war with China – although with large-scale losses – should one break out today, said the Defense One source. The Pentagon is proceeding with plans to modernize the US military because Chinese President Xi Jinping “almost certainly” believes a war with Washington is inevitable, noted the official. “I don’t want to rely on the Chinese not being good. Because we’re not going to know they’re not good until they’re shooting at us, and I don’t want to be in a position where I find out, ‘Oh, they actually are that good’. That’s a problem.” the official concluded. Discussions about Chinese capabilities in Washington have been taking place against the backdrop of a debate about the B-21 bomber program. In February, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall urged the government to commit to the program, arguing that for at least 20 years, China has been building a military “purpose-built to deter and defeat” the US. Earlier this month, however, Air Force chief of staff General David Allvin told the Senate that new developing technologies might complement the B-21, so the service might not end up getting 100 of the bombers as originally planned. The plane, intended to become operational by 2030, is still under development at Northrop Grumman. Медиа: | ↑ |
President Raisi has sent a pointed warning to West Jerusalem Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has threatened Israel with annihilation if it attempts to attack Iran again. Raisi arrived in Pakistan on Monday for a three-day visit. He addressed the recent tensions between Tehran and West Jerusalem at an event in Punjab on Tuesday. “If the Zionist regime once again makes a mistake and attacks the sacred land of Iran, the situation will be different, and it is not clear whether anything will remain of this regime,” the state news agency IRNA quoted Raisi as saying. Israel never officially acknowledged an April 1 airstrike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria that killed seven senior officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force. Tehran nevertheless retaliated on April 13, firing scores of drones and missiles at several targets in Israel. Iran has shrugged off a series of reported explosions near the city of Isfahan last Friday, which were rumored to be a response from Israel. West Jerusalem did not acknowledge the reported attack, while criticizing a cabinet minister who spoke about it out of turn. Tehran chose to ignore it rather than deliver the promised swift and severe reprisal. Read more The Islamic Republic has vowed on multiple occasions to wipe out, destroy or annihilate the “Zionist regime,” as it calls Israel. Speaking in Lahore on Tuesday, Raisi vowed to continue “honorably supporting the Palestinian resistance.” He also denounced the US and the collective West as “the greatest violators of human rights,” pointing to their support for the Israeli “genocide” in Gaza. So far, more than 34,000 Palestinians in the enclave have been killed in Israeli military operations. Israel declared war on Hamas after the October 7 raids by the Gaza-based Palestinian group that claimed the lives of an estimated 1,200 Israelis. Raisi has promised to boost Iranian trade with Pakistan to $10 billion annually. Relations between the two neighbors have been rocky since January, when Iran and Pakistan traded air and drone strikes aimed at “terrorist camps” in their respective territory. Медиа: | ↑ |
The AUKUS deal does not create any new nuclear states, a senior US diplomat has said The technology-sharing agreement between the US, the UK, and Australia, which will provide the latter with nuclear-propelled submarines, does not pose any threat of a regional arms race, a senior US official has claimed. Bonnie Jenkins, the Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, attempted to dispel concerns about the trilateral AUKUS scheme voiced by some Pacific nations during a briefing on Tuesday. The question about a possible arms race came from a Cambodian journalist, who said his nation, a close ally of China, was not happy about possible destabilization in the region. Jenkins responded that Washington wanted to assure other nations that the pact, sealed in 2021, was not meant “to create any kind of arms races.” “Australia is not going to become a nuclear weapons state and they’re not going to be able to use the nuclear-powered submarines to develop a nuclear weapon either, because if they tried to do that, the whole submarine would not work anymore,” she explained. Read more Concerns about the AUKUS deal expressed by other nations have not been limited to whether Australia could use the technologies to create nuclear weapons. Critics of the deal, including Russia, have suggested it is a way for the US to project additional military power in the Pacific. Last week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow is “deeply concerned” that the AUKUS arrangement is increasingly acquiring “the traits of a military bloc.” He accused Western nations of brinkmanship which has led to the world “balancing at the edge of a direct clash between nuclear states,” in a reference to the Ukraine conflict. READ MORE: Pacific nation reacts to Biden’s cannibalism quip Beijing also reiterated its own objections on Monday, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin saying that through AUKUS, Washington will violate the “purposes of the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty and create severe risks of nuclear proliferation.” Foreign Minister Wang Yi made a similar claim last week during a visit to Papua New Guinea, saying the region “should not be a playground for major powers.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Hundreds of bodies of women and the elderly and others with their hands tied, have reportedly been found in the aftermath of an Israeli raid UN rights chief Volker Turk said on Tuesday that he was “horrified” by the destruction of the Nasser and Al-Shifa medical facilities in Gaza by Israeli troops and reports of mass graves discovered there. Palestinian authorities reported finding scores of bodies in mass graves at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis this week after it was abandoned by the IDF. Bodies were also reported at the Al-Shifa site following an Israeli special forces operation. According to Gaza’s Hamas-run Civil Emergency Service, cited by Reuters, a total of 310 bodies had been found so far in one mass grave at the Nasser hospital, the main health facility in southern Gaza. Two other mass graves had reportedly been identified but not yet excavated. “We feel the need to raise the alarm because clearly there have been multiple bodies discovered,” said Turk, while addressing a UN briefing via a spokesperson. “Some of them had their hands tied, which of course indicates serious violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, and these need to be subjected to further investigations,” the UN human rights chief stated. The UN human rights office said it was working on corroborating Palestinian officials’ reports, claiming that some of the bodies were buried beneath piles of waste and included women and older people. Read more Israel says it was forced to battle inside hospitals because Hamas militants use the facilities as bases, an assertion that medical staff and the militant group itself deny. West Jerusalem reported that its forces killed around 200 militants at Al-Shifa and avoided harming any civilians. Turk also decried Israeli strikes on Gaza in recent days, which he said had killed mostly women and children. The UN rights chief once again warned Israel against a full-scale incursion into the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where some 1.4 million displaced Palestinians have sought refuge since the beginning of the Hamas-Israel conflict. The offensive could lead to “further atrocity crimes,” Turk cautioned. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu maintains that Israel cannot achieve its goal of “total victory” without launching an offensive on Rafah. The ongoing hostilities in Gaza were triggered by a Hamas incursion into southern Israel in October, in which some 1,200 people were killed and hundreds taken hostage. During the Israeli offense in response, at least 34,183 Palestinians have been killed and 77,143 injured, mostly women and children, according to the local health authorities. Thousands more bodies likely remain uncounted under the rubble across the devastated enclave, local authorities believe. Медиа: | ↑ |
Olaf Scholz has accused the Russian president of ‘poaching’ Immanuel Kant and misinterpreting his teachings German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has lashed out at Russian President Vladimir Putin for quoting iconic German philosopher Immanuel Kant. Speaking on Tuesday at an event marking the 300th anniversary of Kant’s birth, Scholz accused Putin of trying to “poach” the great thinker as well as misrepresenting his ideas. Kant was born in 1724 in Koenigsberg (present-day Kaliningrad), which belonged to the Kingdom of Prussia before later becoming part of the Russian Empire. The philosopher is famous for his work on ethics, aesthetics and philosophical ontology, and is considered one of the pillars of German classical philosophy. “Putin doesn’t have the slightest right to quote Kant, yet Putin’s regime remains committed to poaching Kant and his work at almost any cost,” Scholz said at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, as quoted by Die Zeit. Scholz said Russia’s role in the Ukraine conflict contradicts Kant’s fundamental teachings. He referred to Kant’s words on the interference of states in the affairs of other nations, and defended Kiev’s decision not to engage in peace talks with Moscow. He said Kant believed that forced treaties were not the way to reach ‘perpetual peace’ – a reference to one of Kant’s major works. Putin has been known to praise and quote Kant, even suggesting in 2013 that the philosopher should be made an official symbol of Kaliningrad Region. During a meeting with university students in Kaliningrad in January, Putin called Kant “one of the greatest thinkers of both his time and ours,” and said the philosopher’s call “to live by one’s own wits” is as relevant today as ever. Read more “A country must live by its own wits… This does not mean that we do not care about the interests of others... but we will never allow Russia’s interests to be neglected. In some countries, among our neighbors, this thesis has been forgotten. Many live by someone else’s wits. This will not bring them any good,” Putin stated. The administration of Kaliningrad Region responded to Scholz’s statement on Tuesday, saying no one has done more than Russia to “perpetuate the memory of the great philosopher and his teachings.” “Immanuel Kant died as a subject of the Russian crown. It seems to me that this, more than any words of all possible German politicians, shows the position of the great philosopher regarding Russia,” the governor’s press secretary, Dmitry Lyskov, said in a statement. Медиа: | ↑ |
Close ties with Moscow have granted Pyongyang a “luster of legitimacy” that it should not have, Jung Pak has said The recent rapprochement between Russia and North Korea could embolden Pyongyang to take a more risky approach in the global arena, a senior US diplomat has warned. Deputy Assistant Secretary Jung Pak, who serves as the State Department’s senior official for North Korea, told Bloomberg on Monday that Moscow’s “complete embrace” of North Korea could mean that the country would be more inclined to threaten its southern neighbor, export weapons abroad, and defy Washington’s calls to return to denuclearization talks. Pak claimed that the warming in the already-close ties between Moscow and Pyongyang had been spurred by North Korean arms shipments to Russia, which have allegedly been used in the Ukraine conflict. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has dismissed reports of such deliveries, saying they are not based on any evidence. This stance has been echoed by North Korean officials. According to the US official, Pyongyang has reaped numerous benefits from this cooperation, including economic assistance and high-profile meetings with Russian officials. Read more This could provide North Korea with a “luster of legitimacy that it does not deserve, and it should not have,” Pak said, adding that Washington was “concerned about what that might do to make Kim think that his leash is longer than it really is, and how that might figure into Kim’s risk calculus.” Pak also claimed that North Korea had benefited from Russia’s decision to veto a UN Security Council resolution to extend the role of a panel of experts monitoring Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons development last month. Peskov explained that the resolution was “no longer in our interests,” and that Moscow had objected to the “modalities” stipulated in the document. The US official also voiced concern that North Korea’s newfound veneer of legitimacy could entice “other bad actors” across the globe to purchase its weapons. “North Korea has had a long history of proliferation in the Middle East, Africa, [and] elsewhere. And we don’t want that to start blossoming into other proliferation relationships,” she said. While close ties between Russia and North Korea date back to the days of the Soviet Union, they recently picked up steam when President Vladimir Putin met with Kim Jong-un in Russia’s Far East last year to discuss bilateral relations and the international agenda. In recent weeks, North Korea has carried out numerous missile tests and ratcheted up its rhetoric against the West, denouncing what it called “reckless” drills by the US and South Korea in the region. Медиа: | ↑ |
A report has claimed Knauf was actively engaged in rebuilding the city which was heavily damaged in 2022 Building materials giant Knauf is under investigation following reports on its alleged involvement in the reconstruction of the city of Mariupol, the prosecutor’s office in the German city of Wurzburg told RIA Novosti. Earlier this month, German public outlet ARD claimed that some of the country's businesses, particularly Knauf, were engaged in the rebuilding of the Russian Black Sea coastal city which was heavily damaged during a siege in 2022. “It’s important to note that there is currently no initial suspicion of a crime required to initiate a pre-investigation check. Rather, it serves to clarify whether such an initial suspicion exists at all,” Tobias Kostuch, a spokesman for the prosecutor’s office told RIA Novosti on Monday. On the same day, Knauf announced it was exiting Russia in light of the “current developments” without providing a specific reason for the withdrawal. A global leader in plaster production, Knauf was one of the Western companies which refused to leave Russia after the Ukraine conflict started in 2022. Last November, Ukraine labeled the firm a “sponsor of war” calling it the “largest German investor in the construction industry in Russia.” The company employs more than 35,000 people around the world and has annual revenue of over $11 billion, according to Forbes. Read more Its founder Nicholas Knauf, who served as an honorary Russian consul for over two decades, called the Western sanctions on Russia “terrible.” However, he told ARD that he opposes Moscow’s military operation, and that his company complies with EU restrictions, only using its Russian branch to provide goods “exclusively for the Russian market.” The firm revealed it intends to “transfer the entire business in Russia, including raw material extraction, manufacturing, and sales to local management to preserve the jobs of more than 4,000 employees in the future.” The move is pending approval by Russian authorities, who have already been informed of the plans, according to deputy Trade and Industry Minister Viktor Evtukhov. Commenting on the firm’s decision to “transfer” its assets the minister referred to this word as “not appropriate.” “If for some reason a company leaves the jurisdiction of the Russian Federation, then a sale takes place. Another thing is that you can sell an asset for any price, but not more than 50% of its market value,” Evtukhov said. Under existing laws, firms leaving Russia are obligated to sell their Russian assets at a 50% discount and pay a mandatory contribution to the Russian budget, amounting to at least 10% of half the market value of the company’s assets in the country. Медиа: | ↑ |
The Grand Quadriga 2024 exercise in Lithuania is part of NATO’s Steadfast Defender 24 war games More than 3,000 German military personnel are taking part in the Grand Quadriga 2024 drills that kicked off in Lithuania on Tuesday. The maneuvers are part of the larger, months-long Steadfast Defender 24 series of NATO exercises that began in late January. Lithuania shares a border with Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave, as well as Moscow’s closest ally, Belarus. In a separate development earlier this month, Berlin deployed an advanced military team to the Baltic country as part of plans for a full-strength armor brigade permanently stationed there. Moscow has described the plans as a threat requiring “special measures” in response. The Grand Quadriga 2024 exercise is scheduled to wrap up in late May, and will involve 200 pieces of German military hardware, including Leopard tanks as well as Puma and Boxer infantry fighting vehicles. In a statement last Thursday, the Lithuanian military wrote that the “exercise is centered around moving two divisions from the Central European region to the Eastern.” Read more “Lithuanian units training side by side with the German participants will plan and execute operations,” the document read. The Bundeswehr revealed that its armored division would be transported by boat, rail and road to Lithuania, where it would “practice defense and counter-offensive [exercises] on the allied territory.” Several more military drills will also be taking place in Lithuania concurrently, including Saber Strike, Brave Griffin 2024/II and Thunder Strike – all of which are part of NATO’s Steadfast Defender 24. Hailed as the largest exercises that NATO has held in decades, the maneuvers will feature some 90,000 troops from all 32 member states, according to Supreme Allied Commander for Europe Christopher Cavoli. Some 1,100 combat vehicles, including 133 tanks and 533 infantry fighting vehicles, will be involved, as well as more than 50 naval vessels and 80 helicopters, drones and fighter jets. In January, General Cavoli said the drills would simulate an “emerging conflict scenario against a near-peer adversary,” covering thousands of kilometers all across Europe. Commenting on NATO’s war games in early March, the secretary of the Russian Security Council, Nikolay Patrushev, said they were “undoubtedly increasing tensions and destabilizing the situation in the world.” He claimed that a “scenario of an armed confrontation with Russia is being rehearsed.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Multiple demonstrators have been arrested outside NYU business school, authorities have said Dozens of pro-Palestinian protesters have gathered at New York University, with the rally later broken up by police who made a number of arrests, according to local officials and media reports. NYU spokesman John Beckman said the demonstration kicked off on Monday morning on Could Plaza in front of the Stern School of Business and some 50 people took part, adding that this happened “without authorization.” The officials at the institution put barriers in place to prevent anyone else from joining in “because the protests were already considerably disruptive of classes and other operations in schools around the plaza,” Beckman said.
According to CBS News, the rally appeared to be supported by some of the university’s students. It was also reportedly backed by several pro-Palestinian organizations which set up tents in the area. One of the demonstrators said, as quoted by the network, that the protesters wanted NYU to acknowledge that “there is a genocide happening and that there are Palestinian students that deserve to feel heard.”
Beckman said that while the university initially made no effort to clear the plaza, hoping to avoid violence, it “was deeply disturbed” when the outer perimeter was breached by additional protesters. Following this and what the spokesman called “disorderly, disruptive, and antagonizing behavior,” the university ordered those assembled to vacate the premises, and later called the police. The spokesman also said that there had been “intimidating chants” and reports of “several anti-Semitic incidents.”
“The police urged those on the plaza to leave peacefully, but ultimately made a number of arrests,” Beckman said. The New York Police Department confirmed to The Hill that arrests were made, but would not say how many. Videos circulating show a densely packed crowd near the university carrying placards, chanting pro-Palestinian slogans, and beating drums. Other clips show police officers appearing in riot gear, taking several people away in the thick of the protest. One video also showed several police buses slowly driving through the crowd. READ MORE: Pro-Palestinian protesters arrested at Yale University (VIDEOS) The NYU protest followed a similar rally at Columbia University and coincided with a demonstration at Yale University where at least 60 people were arrested. US campuses and universities have seen a surge of protests following the deadly attack on Israel by the Palestinian armed group Hamas in October. Israel’s relentless retaliatory assault on Gaza has caused unprecedented destruction in the enclave and left more than 34,000 people dead. Медиа: | ↑ |
The Malaysian Navy has confirmed that all on those board the two aircraft were killed Ten crew members from the Royal Malaysian Navy (TLDM) have died after their helicopters collided during a parade rehearsal on Tuesday morning. The two aircraft crashed at the Lumut TLDM naval base while carrying out a flyby ahead of a 90th anniversary celebration, the navy said in a statement. “All victims were confirmed dead on site and the remains were sent to TLDM Military Hospital for identification process,” the statement read, adding that an investigation had been launched into the cause of the incident. The two helicopters involved were an AgustaWestland AW139 helicopter and a lighter Eurocopter Fennec. One copter had seven crew on board, while the other had three. The AW139 crashed onto the steps of a stadium while the Fennec went down at the pool of the base’s sports complex, according to local newspaper Malaymail. The navy has called on the public to refrain from sharing videos and photos of the deceased to protect the sensitivity of the victims’ families.
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Pyongyang has held a large-scale “counterattack” drill North Korea has carried out a simulated nuclear counterattack against enemy targets personally observed by leader Kim Jong-un, state media reported on Tuesday. As part of the exercise, several “super-large” multiple rocket launchers fired a missile salvo towards an island in the Sea of Japan. Monday's drills came just days after Pyongyang claimed to have tested a new “super-large warhead” cruise missile and a new type of anti-aircraft missile. The US and South Korean air forces also continue to hold joint exercises on the peninsula. Pyongyang for the first time claims to have tested the country’s so-called “nuclear trigger” command and control system, as well as “[the] prompt counterattack capacity of the state nuclear force,” the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) wrote. Military units worked in a hypothetical scenario in which North Korea’s highest level nuclear crisis alarm is issued in response to an attack.  The salvo of missiles with simulated nuclear warheads “accurately” hit the island target some 352km away, KCNA stated. The North Korean leader expressed “great satisfaction” with the results of the exercise, it added.  The US, South Korea, and Japan have all condemned the launches as a threat to regional and international peace and security. The issue will be “on the agenda” when US Secretary of State Antony Blinken travels to China this week, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told the press on Monday. READ MORE: Japan and South Korea accuse North of missile launches Pyongyang has dubbed the drills a “clear warning signal” to its “enemies,” accusing them of running a “military confrontation racket.” Joint US and South Korean air force exercises, set to continue until April 26, have run a hundred sorties per day on average, while not even trying to conceal their “extremely provocative and aggressive nature,” KCNA claimed. Медиа: | ↑ |
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak promises more long-range missiles, dozens of boats, and hundreds of armored vehicles The UK has revealed plans to provide the largest package of British military assistance to Ukraine. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will officially unveil the new aid plan when he travels to Warsaw on Tuesday for talks with his Polish counterpart, Donald Tusk. The package is valued at £500 million ($617 million) and will include more than 400 vehicles, 60 boats, and an undisclosed number of long-range Storm Shadow missiles, Sunak’s office said in a statement, calling it the “largest-ever provision of vital munitions.” The announcement comes as the US is expected to approve a $61 billion military and aid package for Kiev. “Defending Ukraine against Russia’s brutal ambitions is vital for our security and for all of Europe,” Sunak claimed. “If Putin is allowed to succeed in this war of aggression, he will not stop at the Polish border.” Read more The latest round of weaponry will bring London’s military aid to Kiev to £3 billion this year alone. It will also include 1,600 strike and air defense missiles and nearly 4 million rounds of small arms ammunition. “Today’s package will help ensure Ukraine has what they need to take the fight to Russia,” Sunak said. “The United Kingdom will always play its part at the forefront of European security, defending our national interest and standing by our NATO allies.” The statement comes two days after the US House of Representatives approved a long-stalled emergency spending bill that includes $61 billion in additional Ukraine aid. US President Joe Biden pledged on Monday to quickly ramp up weapons shipments to Kiev once the spending legislation is approved by the Senate, which could happen as soon as Tuesday. Read more The administration of US President Joe Biden ran out of Ukraine funding earlier this year, after using up $113 billion in congressionally approved aid packages. Disruptions in support from Washington, by far Kiev’s biggest benefactor, led to ammunition shortages that were blamed for battlefield setbacks in recent months. Other NATO members and the EU responded by boosting their aid commitments, such as a €500 million package given by Germany last month. UK defense chief Grant Shapps hailed the fact that London was the first ally to give Ukraine long-range missiles and “modern” tanks. “Now, we are going even further,” he said in the statement. “We will never let the world forget the existential battle Ukraine is fighting, and with our enduring support, they will win.” He added that the latest round of aid will give Ukraine what it needs to push back Russian forces and “restore peace and stability in Europe.” READ MORE: Ukrainians believe $61bn US aid won’t stop Russia – FT Ukrainian leaders are reportedly less sanguine about the potential impact of additional Western weaponry. The $61 billion US aid bill – nearly 100 times the scale of the UK’s latest gift – is unlikely to “dramatically alter Kiev’s situation on the frontline,” the Financial Times reported on Monday, citing unidentified Ukrainian officials and military analysts. Медиа: | ↑ |
Beijing has dismissed the allegations as part of a smear campaign Three German nationals have been arrested on suspicion of spying for China, the Prosecutor General’s Office said on Monday. The authorities claim to have evidence of the accused passing German technologies on to Beijing in violation of the Foreign Trade Act. The Federal Court of Justice – Germany’s highest judicial body – issued warrants for the arrest of the three individuals identified only as Thomas R., Herwig F., and Ina F. last Wednesday. The defendants’ residences and workplaces were also searched as part of the ongoing probe. According to the German authorities, the accused are “strongly suspected” of having worked for a Chinese secret service at some time before June 2022. Thomas R. allegedly acted as the agent of an employee of the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS), seeking to obtain information on innovative German technologies that could have potential military use. The investigators claimed he made contact with a couple, Herwig F. and Ina F., who ran a company in Dusseldorf, serving as a point of contact with people from the German research and development industry. Read more The couple worked with a German university, allegedly “preparing a study for a Chinese contractual partner” on state-of-the-art machine parts used in engines for high-end ship such as combat vessels. “Behind the Chinese contractual partner was the MSS employee from whom Thomas R. received his orders,” the Prosecutor’s Office wrote on Monday, claiming they traced the funding back to the Chinese state. The suspects were in further negotiations about research projects at the time of their arrest, according to the authorities. Additionally, they allegedly purchased and transported a laser out of Germany into China, in violation of EU regulations on dual-use technologies. Beijing has firmly rejected claims of carrying out spy activities in Germany. “We call on the German side to stop exploiting the espionage allegation in order to politically manipulate the image of China and defame China,” the Chinese Embassy in Germany told Xinhua. Медиа: | ↑ |
The American president has vowed to quickly provide more weapons to Ukraine after the Senate passes an emergency spending bill US President Joe Biden has pledged to quickly ramp up military and economic aid to Ukraine once Senate lawmakers approve emergency spending legislation that was passed by the House on Saturday. The $95 billion funding package, including $61 billion for Ukraine, is reportedly expected to advance to a Senate vote on Tuesday. Biden assured Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky on Monday that aid shipments will begin rapidly after the bill clears the Senate and comes to the Oval Office for his signature. “President Biden shared that his administration will quickly provide significant new security assistance packages to meet Ukraine’s urgent battlefield and air-defense needs,” according to a White House readout of Monday’s phone call with Zelensky. The US leader also underscored Washington’s “lasting commitment to supporting Ukraine as it defends its freedom against Russian aggression.” Read more While the White House offered few details on Monday’s Biden-Zelensky call, the Ukrainian leader indicated that Kiev will be receiving longer-range missiles. The US previously provided a version of its ATACMS missiles with a striking distance capped at 165 kilometers, seeking to avoid escalations that could occur if Ukrainian forces struck targets deep in Russian territory. The new shipments will include missiles with a range of 300 kilometers, he said. Kiev and Washington also have started talks on a security cooperation agreement, Zelensky said, adding that the deal could be “truly exemplary.” Ukraine has already signed bilateral security agreements with several NATO members. These ten-year deals stop short of mutual defense commitments, but they pledge long-term military, economic, and political support for the former Soviet republic. Read more The Biden administration ran out of funding for Ukraine aid after burning through $113 billion in previously approved spending bills. The president’s request for additional funding had been stalled since last October because of opposition from Republican lawmakers, who argued that Biden was merely prolonging Kiev’s conflict with Russia while offering no clear strategy for victory or a peace agreement. Most Republicans voted against the aid bill on Saturday, but House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) overrode his own party by enabling a vote on the bill and pushing it through with unanimous Democrat support. The new US aid will help Ukraine “maintain financial stability, build back critical infrastructure following Russian attacks, and support reform as Ukraine moves forward on the path of Euro-Atlantic integration,” the White House said. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken raised eyebrows earlier this month, when he emphatically told reporters at a NATO briefing that Ukraine “will become a member” of the Western military bloc. Медиа: | ↑ |
The ex-adviser, who also worked with Hillary Clinton, has been accused of possessing indecent images and arranging commission of a sexual offense in the UK A former White House aide who advised then-President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on counterterrorism initiatives has reportedly been accused of committing child sex crimes in the UK. Rahamim ‘Rami’ Shy, 46, was arraigned on Friday in Luton Crown Court, near London. He faces charges of possessing indecent images of children and arranging the commission of a child sexual offense, according to local media reports. The New Jersey resident was arrested in late February and jailed at HMP Bedford pending court proceedings. Shy, who has not yet entered a plea to the charges, is scheduled for another court hearing in June, the Daily Mail reported. His case is slated to go to trial in August. Read more The defendant held multiple roles in the Obama administration, reportedly including coordination of the US government’s efforts to combat Taliban and Al-Qaeda terrorists. He was a senior adviser in the US Treasury Department from 2008 to 2014, working to disrupt terrorist financing and helping overseas allies impose sanctions on adversarial governments. He also advised the chiefs of staff at the Pentagon. Shy’s LinkedIn page, which has been deleted, said he advised the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. He studied at New York’s Columbia University and reportedly worked most recently at US banking giant Citigroup. A company spokesman told the Daily Mail that Shy was no longer a Citigroup employee. Медиа: | ↑ |
Pro-Palestinian students at Columbia have camped out in protest of Israel Columbia University in New York City decided to hold virtual classes on Monday, after a rabbi urged Jewish students to stay home because they were no longer safe. Hundreds of students were arrested last Thursday after setting up a ‘Gaza Solidarity Encampment’ on campus. A group of Jewish counter-protesters got into an altercation with the demonstrators on Saturday evening, prompting Rabbi Elie Buechler to send out the warning. “What we are witnessing in and around campus is terrible and tragic. The events of the last few days, especially last night, have made it clear that Columbia University’s Public Safety and the NYPD cannot guarantee Jewish students’ safety in the face of extreme antisemitism, and anarchy,” Buechler, the director of the Orthodox Union’s Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus (JLIC), said. “It deeply pains me to say that I would strongly recommend you return home as soon as possible and remain home until the reality in and around campus has dramatically improved. It is not our job as Jews to ensure our own safety on campus. No one should have to endure this level of hatred, let alone at school,” the rabbi continued in a post to the JLIC WhatsApp group. Read more With the Jewish holiday of Passover starting on Monday evening, the Ivy League school’s president, Minouche Shafik, announced that classes would shift to online learning if possible, “to de-escalate the rancor and give us all a chance to consider next steps.” While some US lawmakers have called for the police, National Guard, or even the military to break up the protest, Shafik said a “working group” at Columbia will try to resolve the crisis peacefully. “We should be able to do this ourselves,” Shafik said, urging “better adherence to our rules and effective enforcement mechanisms.” The encampment is the work of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, Jewish Voice for Peace, and Students for Justice in Palestine, who described it as a protest against the school’s “continued financial investment in corporations that profit from Israeli apartheid, genocide, and occupation in Palestine.” Read more When a group of around ten pro-Israel students attempted a counter-protest, one protester held a handmade sign describing them as the next target of Hamas, the Gaza-based group behind the October 7 attack on Israel that triggered the current conflict. “Columbia has lost its campus. Jewish students are no longer safe on campus,” David Lederer, one of the counter-protesters, told USA Today via email. The sophomore said the experience changed his mind about staying on campus. In a statement on Sunday, the White House denounced “calls for violence and physical intimidation targeting Jewish students and the Jewish community” adding that anti-Semitic language, “like any other language that is used to hurt and frighten people, is unacceptable and appropriate action will be taken.” Медиа: | ↑ |
West Jerusalem’s allegations triggered an exodus of Western money from a critical relief agency Israel gave no evidence to support its claims that UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) staffers aided Hamas’ October 7 attack on the Jewish state, an independent review commissioned by the UN has found. The Israeli government claimed in January that a dozen UNRWA employees took part in the attack, in which the militant group killed around 1,100 people in Israel and took around 250 hostages to Gaza. West Jerusalem also claimed that 190 UNRWA staffers provided intelligence and logistical support to the attackers, and allowed Hamas to use the agency’s facilities as safehouses. An independent committee led by former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna found no evidence to support these claims, according to a report published on Monday. “Israel made public claims that a significant number of UNRWA employees are members of terrorist organizations. However, Israel has yet to provide supporting evidence of this,” the report read. Read more In a separate report, three Nordic research groups assisting Colonna’s probe noted that “Israeli authorities have to date not provided any supporting evidence nor responded to letters from UNRWA in March, and again in April, requesting the names and supporting evidence that would enable UNRWA to open an investigation.” Colonna’s investigation found that UNRWA regularly shares lists of its employees with Israeli authorities, and that West Jerusalem has not raised any concerns about the agency’s staffing since 2011. UNRWA employs more than 30,000 people and provides food aid, healthcare, education, and social services to Palestinian refugees in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as those seeking asylum in neighboring countries. Over two million people “depend on it for their survival amidst one of the largest and most complex humanitarian crises in the world,” UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said at a briefing in February. Despite being unsubstantiated, Israel’s accusations caused 18 donor nations to withdraw funding from UNRWA. While a majority have since resumed support for the agency, six have kept their money on hold. Among them are the US, UK, and Germany. READ MORE: ‘Terror tunnel’ found under UN agency HQ – Israel While US intelligence agencies have expressed “low confidence” in Israel’s claims, Washington will maintain a freeze on UNRWA funding until next March. The US is UNRWA’s largest backer, and has donated $121 million to the agency since October 1. Prior to the funding suspension, another $300,000 had been set aside for the agency this year, according to the US State Department. Медиа: | ↑ |
The veto on Palestinian statehood and Israeli strikes on Iran are signs of irreversible decline in American soft power So-called Western values, especially those touted by the United States, have long revealed themselves to be hollow and contradictory. The country’s Declaration of Independence from Great Britain famously stated that “all men are created equal,” while instituting brutal chattel slavery on Africans and committing a horrific genocide against the Native people of the Americas. Yet, it could still be argued – in terms however trite – that the US was somehow on the right side of history at various junctures. Today, recent actions by the administration have shown that this is undeniably no longer the case. On Thursday, the US vetoed a draft UN Security Council resolution that would grant Palestine full UN membership despite Washington’s official position being in favor of the two-state solution. The US explained this decision by saying that Washington “continues to strongly support a two-state solution,” and that the “vote does not reflect opposition to Palestinian statehood but instead is an acknowledgment that it will only come from direct negotiations between the parties [who are currently at war].“ Most Arab countries, as well as major powers like Russia, have expressed dismay over the decision. Trita Parsi, founder of the National Iranian American Council and co-founder and executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said Washington had apparently lobbied its allies, Ecuador, Japan, and South Korea, so that the Biden administration would not have to veto the resolution. The states did not follow these orders. Washington failed to use its diplomatic weight to accomplish its face-saving goal before the UNSC, exposing its gradual loss of soft power. Read more Parsi also claims to have heard from a Western-friendly “senior Global South diplomat” that “whatever agonizing claim the US had to lead a self-appointed free world has died a very loud public death on the Security Council horseshoe tonight. You can't lead if you can't listen.” Indeed, the fact that the US has issued four vetoes on behalf of Israel over the past seven months despite both international and domestic public opinion clearly supporting an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the recognition of Palestinian statehood is remarkable. It shows that US leadership has been very publicly lambasted; additionally, it is clear that US “ironclad support” for Israel will not survive into the next generation because of the dismal state of public opinion, even just in the US itself. Also on Thursday, Israel launched strikes on Iran following Tehran’s retaliatory attack during the preceding week. That was done in response to Israel bombing the Iranian consulate building in Damascus earlier this month, killing several high-ranking Iranian military officials. Despite President Joe Biden working double time all week to avoid Israel escalating regional tensions and the fact that the administration had advance notice of Israel’s attacks, his government failed to prevent it. Additionally, Israel is reported to have also bombed Baghdad, Iraq against alleged members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) while the prime minister of Iraq is in Washington for a state visit. There are also unconfirmed reports, based on publicly available flight data, that an American military aerial refueling tanker aircraft was in western Iraq during the time of Israel’s attacks that day. It raises serious questions about whether Washington’s posture, stated as only helping Israel defensively, has quietly changed. Read more Now, the Middle East is closer to a regional war than ever as a result of failed American so-called leadership, and the contradictions between Washington’s words and deeds are mounting. Israel is reportedly demanding an expansion of its ground operation in Gaza to Rafah, the last holdout for Palestinians in the enclave, in exchange for not escalating toward a regional war. The chances of strategic miscalculations, given the number of actors, are immense. Yet, from the Iranian standpoint, it appears Tehran, whose attacks on Israel last week were largely performative, is playing down the attacks on its soil. This may provide a clear exit from the escalatory cycle – which would be consistent with the behavior of the current Iranian state over decades – if, indeed, the matter of the Damascus consulate bombing is “closed,” as official Iranian sources said. A massive win for both regional and global security, this would also reveal Iran, which the West defines as a “rogue state,” as evidently more responsible and forward-looking than the so-called world leader, the US. No matter how the situation in the Middle East unfolds, it is clear, once again, that American leadership has been abdicated. The wider global community is discussing the issue in Gaza at length to reach a pragmatic and attainable solution. Meanwhile, Washington refuses to listen to these pleas, will not hold the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accountable for its actions, and cannot formulate a coherent strategy that aligns with its own stated values. Медиа: | ↑ |
Poland has not yet decided to host American atomic bombs, Donald Tusk implied Polish President Andrzej Duda’s comments about hosting US nuclear weapons need clarification, the country's prime minister, Donald Tusk, has said. Duda had claimed in an interview with the outlet Fakt that his country would be ready if the US offered to situate nuclear weapons on its territory. Discussions with Washington about Warsaw potentially participating in the US “nuclear sharing program” were ongoing, he said, adding that nothing specific had been arranged. “I look forward to meeting the president about this. I would like to understand his intentions,” Tusk told reporters on Monday afternoon. He added that while he would like Poland to be as well-armed and prepared as possible, “I would also like any initiatives to be well prepared by the people in charge and for all of us to be convinced that’s what we want.” “This idea is very massive, I would say very serious,” said the prime minister. Tusk is the leader of Civic Platform, the senior partner in the current ruling coalition, which took power last December, unseating the Law and Justice (PiS) party that Duda came from, though is no longer formally affiliated with. The two have since often publicly disagreed on policy issues. Read more The US currently has gravity bombs deployed in five fellow NATO member states: Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Türkiye. Poland has made noises about joining the club for years. Should Warsaw and Washington actually go through with it, that would put the NATO nuclear arsenal right on the border of Russia’s Kaliningrad Region as well as Belarus, Russia’s key ally. “If our allies decide to deploy nuclear weapons as part of nuclear sharing also on our territory to strengthen the security of NATO’s eastern flank, we are ready for it,” Duda told Fakt. The statement was quickly condemned in Moscow, however. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia would “take all necessary countermeasures to ensure our security,” while Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova noted that the “relevant facilities” in Poland would “immediately be listed as legitimate targets in case of a direct military conflict with NATO.” Russia has repeatedly said it has never threatened to use its nuclear arsenal, and that a nuclear war must never be fought. Last month, however, President Vladimir Putin signaled that Moscow was ready for such a scenario “from the military and technical point of view.” Медиа: | ↑ |
A criminal migrant has won an appeal arguing that being sent back to Eritrea would jeopardize his mental health An Eritrean migrant in the UK who was convicted a decade ago of raping a teenage girl has been spared deportation after convincing a court that being sent back to his home country would damage his mental health. The child sex offender, whose identity has been kept secret by the UK government, won his legal appeal after arguing that he wouldn’t get treatment for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder if he were deported to Eritrea. Lawyers for the man also argued that he would likely be punished in his native country for evading compulsory military service, and would be a suicide risk, according to local media reports. The man was due to be deported after completing his prison term under a 2014 order. He was granted a reprieve despite a government security report finding that he would pose a “medium” risk to public safety if he were allowed to live freely in Britain. Read more “This man committed a serious criminal offense and should be nowhere near this country,” MP Nigel Mills told the Sun newspaper. “If he was concerned about losing mental health treatment or being arrested for fleeing the draft, he should have thought about that before he committed the crime.” The lawmaker argued that the Eritrean’s case is emblematic of a larger problem with the UK’s tribunal system, which he called “deeply out of touch with the rest of Britain.” A judge ruled last year that an illegal migrant from Gambia who attacked a woman in Scotland couldn’t be deported because he might not be given proper medical treatment back in West Africa. In another recent case, an Afghan migrant convicted of intentionally exposing his penis in public was granted refugee status in the UK after lawyers successfully argued that such behavior would “put him at high risk of physical violence” in his home nation. Anicet Mayela, an illegal Congolese migrant whose deportation was blocked by an airline cabin crew, pled guilty last week to raping a 15-year-old girl in Oxford, England. Mayela was reportedly a “poster boy” for anti-deportation activists and demonstrated outside a detention center wearing a sign saying, “Migrants are not criminals.” READ MORE: Migrant-loving Western leaders are at war with their own people
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If there is evidence that Moscow plans a march across Europe, Americans deserve to see it, congresswoman says US intelligence agencies should provide proof of the Russian expansionism they claim justifies a new $61 billion war chest for Ukraine, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) has insisted. The “proxy war” they are funding will inevitably end in defeat for Kiev, she claimed. Speaking on Monday in an interview with former White House aide Steve Bannon, Greene pushed back against claims that Russian forces will take Poland and continue “marching across Europe” if they are allowed to defeat Ukraine. She noted that US House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) only agreed to the $61 billion Ukraine aid bill, which was approved on Saturday, after hearing intelligence briefings hyping the Russian threat. “If the American people are going to have to pay for it, then show us this proof that was shown to Mike Johnson in the SCIF [sensitive compartment information facility],” Greene said. “Why is this classified information? If this is a real threat to all of Europe, if this is a threat to America and our national security, then roll out the presentation.” READ MORE: US House approves Ukraine aid bill The second-term lawmaker said Johnson received no such classified briefings on the US border crisis, which poses a real threat to the American people. “They don’t care about that,” she said. “They care about continuing the business model built on blood and murder and war in foreign countries, the business model that continues funding the military-industrial complex in order, supposedly, to create American jobs and build up the American economy.”
Greene reiterated her call to oust Johnson as speaker, saying Republican voters are so disgusted about the Ukraine bill that the party will lose control of the House in this year’s election if the current leadership remains in place. The White House’s emergency funding request for Kiev had been stalled since last fall because a majority of Republicans opposed it. Republican lawmakers voted against the legislation by a 112-101 margin on Saturday, but Johnson overrode his own party by allowing a vote and winning passage with unanimous Democrat support. Read more Johnson won praise from the Washington media for his reversal on Ukraine aid – CNN even likened him to Winston Churchill – while Greene came under attack for criticizing him. The New York Post put a picture of Greene on its Sunday cover with a Soviet ushanka superimposed on her head and a caption saying, “Nyet, Moscow Marjorie.” Greene insisted that congressional Republicans can’t win in the November election without the support of ‘America First’ voters. She added that sending more aid to Ukraine will only cause more bloodshed without changing the outcome of the conflict. “This just continues the war maybe a few more months, maybe to the end of the summer,” Greene said. “It doesn’t guarantee a Ukrainian victory because everyone knows they’re going to lose eventually. It just is a matter of when. But it does guarantee that more Ukrainian men will be slaughtered on the battlefield.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to destroy military sites near Tehran until Washington intervened, the newspaper has claimed Israeli leaders planned a “much more extensive counterstrike on Iran” after Tehran launched a drone and missile barrage on Israel last weekend, but were pressured to pare down the operation by the US and its allies, the New York Times reported on Monday. Israel targeted Iran with a handful of drones and air-launched missiles on Friday, according to US officials and anonymous Israeli sources who spoke to the newspaper. While Western officials believe that an Israeli missile hit an Iranian airbase, Tehran has only acknowledged being attacked with small quadcopter drones, with Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian describing the aircraft as “children’s toys” that were easily shot down. West Jerusalem initially intended a much wider wave of strikes targeting military sites across the country, including near Tehran, anonymous Israeli officials told the outlet. However, the US, UK, and Germany exerted “concerted diplomatic pressure” on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and forced him to settle for a more limited response, the officials said. Such a response “avoided significant damage, diminishing the likelihood of an escalation,” the New York Times reported. Read more The Israeli military has not commented on the report, and has stuck to its usual policy of refusing to confirm or deny strikes on foreign soil. The latest round of escalation between Israel and Iran began on April 1, when an Israeli airstrike allegedly hit the Iranian consulate in the Syrian capital of Damascus. The strike killed seven officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force, including two high-ranking generals. Tehran warned that it would retaliate, and two weeks later launched multiple waves of missiles and kamikaze drones at Israel. Most of the Iranian projectiles were intercepted, but with more than 300 drones fired, air defenses were overwhelmed and multiple missiles reached their target, damaging an Israeli air base. Netanyahu initially planned immediate retaliatory strikes, but was talked out of it during a phone call with US President Joe Biden, the New York Times reported last week. In both last week’s report and Monday’s, Israeli and American officials stressed that Washington wanted West Jerusalem to avoid provoking Iran into an escalating series of tit-for-tat strikes and counterstrikes. READ MORE: Iran’s supreme leader thanks armed forces for Israel attack The plan appears to have succeeded. “As long as there is no new adventurism by Israel against our interests, then we are not going to have any new reactions,” Amirabdollahian stated on Saturday. With some of Netanyahu’s hardline political allies criticizing the supposedly “lame” response, the officials who spoke to the New York Times insisted that the strikes demonstrated “the breadth and sophistication of Israel’s military arsenal,” the paper paraphrased. Медиа: | ↑ |
The students urged the university to divest from defense manufacturers involved in arming Israel Police on Monday moved in to disperse a pro-Palestinian encampment at Yale University in Connecticut, and arrested nearly 50 students in the operation. The protesters have been camping in Beinecke Plaza on the Yale University campus for three days and demanding the university break ties with military weapons manufacturers linked to Israel. The encampment was raided early in the morning beginning with police officers cordoning off the area and demanding the protesters disperse. While some of them opted to leave, others refused and were arrested and charged with misdemeanor trespassing. A total of 47 students have been arrested during the raid, a university spokesperson told the Yale Daily News college newspaper. “The university made the decision to arrest those individuals who would not leave the Plaza with the safety and security of the entire Yale community in mind and to allow access to university facilities by all members of our community,” the spokesperson explained, adding that Yale will now take disciplinary action against the arrested students.
However, the arrests have apparently not deterred the pro-Palestinian protesters, as more of them have shown up at the location after the raid. Some 300 protesters have blocked the intersection at the Plaza despite the heavy police presence remaining in the area, footage from the scene shows.
The morning raid on the camp was preceded by minor violence at the Plaza, with altercations between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian students reported. Namely, the editor-in-chief of the Yale Free Press, an independent campus publication, Sahar Tartak, claimed she was stabbed in her eye with a Palestinian flag. Tartak attributed the alleged assault to being “visibly Jewish,” yet the extent of her purported injuries remained unclear. Read more The effort to end the pro-Palestinian protest at Yale comes after more than 100 protesters were detained at Columbia University in New York last week during a similar protest. The Columbia campus was raided by the NYPD, which cleared out protesters and dismantled their camp. Those protesters have also been demanding their university divest from “companies complicit in genocide” and linked to arming Israel. The daughter of Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar was among the arrested during the protest on campus and ended up suspended from the university. The White House vowed to take action against pro-Palestinian protests, which have been going on at multiple college campuses amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza. The Biden administration slammed an “alarming surge of anti-Semitism” on campuses, vowing to aggressively implement its new strategy to protect the Jewish community. Медиа: | ↑ |
The US-led bloc is behaving as if ‘war psychosis’ has set in, FM Szijjarto has said The EU and NATO appear to be preparing for war, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Monday, referring to the posture of the two blocs on the Ukraine conflict. Much of the meeting of EU foreign and defense ministers in Luxembourg was devoted to sending more ammunition and weapons to Ukraine, Szijjarto noted. “Brussels is reacting to the increasingly deteriorating situation for Ukraine at the front by preparing for a world war,” he told Hungarian TV at a press conference afterward. According to Szijjarto, many leaders of NATO member states suffer from a sort of “war psychosis,” feeling as if they are already at war with Russia. He described the tone at the ministerial meeting as that of an army headquarters, where for hours “almost everyone was talking about how many units of what weapons and according to what schedule they are ready to supply to Ukraine” from stockpiles that are practically empty. “The question is why, if the strategy didn’t work before, should it work now?” Szijjarto said at the press conference, questioning the policy of arming Kiev. “We think that the supply of weapons only leads to a prolongation of the conflict and an increase in the risk of world war.” Read more Hungary believes that the worsening situation on the battlefield should motivate Ukraine to seek peace, whose terms would need to be discussed by both sides to make any sense. Kiev has recently tried to organize a “peace conference” in Switzerland, but without Russian participation. Szijjarto noted that Hungary has no intention of participating in EU or NATO efforts to coordinate sending more military assistance to Ukraine, though Budapest will face strong pressure from Brussels to do so. He also said that every peace-loving person in Europe is waiting for the US presidential elections in November and the victory of Donald Trump. The former president and presumptive Republican nominee has blamed the current US administration for fueling the Ukraine conflict and claimed he would stop it within days if elected. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has openly endorsed Trump’s presidential bid. Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that keeping Joe Biden in the White House would be the best outcome for Moscow’s interests. Медиа: | ↑ |
Berlin reportedly can’t deliver hundreds of promised MRAP personnel carriers due to red tape and a lack of documentation Germany has failed to deliver hundreds of MRAP personnel carriers to Ukraine as promised, Bild has claimed. Berlin has reportedly postponed delivery dates for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles several times due to documentation-related issues. Since the start of the military conflict between Kiev and Moscow in February 2022, Germany has gradually emerged as one of Ukraine’s top suppliers of military hardware and weapons. Assets donated to Ukraine by Berlin have included Leopard tanks and self-propelled howitzers. Russia has repeatedly stated that no amount of Western arms can change the course of the conflict, but such supplies unnecessarily increase the risk of a direct confrontation between NATO and Moscow. In its article on Monday, Bild alleged that the German government was planning to provide Ukraine with up to 400 MRAPs purchased from the German arms manufacturer FFG. The media outlet quoted a German Defense Ministry spokesperson confirming that Berlin would finance the $335 million contract, with the vehicles expected to arrive in Ukraine this year. Read more However, the actual delivery of the MRAPs has hit a snag, the article reported. According to a secret Defense Ministry document cited by Bild, the first 20 vehicles should have been provided to Kiev in January, followed by equal batches every month thereafter until October 2024. The Defense Ministry spokesperson reportedly told reporters that “so far no vehicles of this type have been delivered” to Ukraine. The media outlet claimed that the initial plans had been revised, with the first shipments presumably postponed until May, and then this deadline was once again put off to June. The article alleged that the delays were due to the fact that FGG does not actually produce MRAPs from scratch, but rather receives key parts, some of which are already mounted, from the US. The media outlet quoted anonymous sources within the Defense Ministry as attributing the supposed hold-up to “restrictive export licenses from the US to Germany.” Медиа: | ↑ |
The figure marks the sharpest year-on-year jump since 2009, according to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute Military spending is soaring across the globe, with particularly large increases recorded in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, according to a new report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) on Monday. Total global military expenditure was up 6.8% in real terms last year, reaching an all-time high of $2.4 trillion. The figure marks the steepest year-on-year increase since 2009, the report shows, with the top three spenders last year being the United States, China, and Russia. The US, which spends more on defense than any other nation, ramped up expenditure by 2.3% to $916 billion, representing 68% of total NATO military spending. China allocated an estimated $296 billion to its military in 2023. With an increase of 6% from 2022, the country accounted for half of total military spending across Asia and Oceania. The report indicated that the Ukraine conflict has led to an increase in spending not only by Kiev and Moscow, but also by “a whole host” of European countries. Russia’s outlays rose 24% to an estimated $109 billion in 2023, according to SIPRI. The country’s spending on its armed forces made up 16% of the total government budget and its military burden (military spending as a share of gross domestic product) was 5.9%. Ukraine was the eighth largest spender in 2023, after a surge of 51% to $64.8 billion. SIPRI noted that the country also received $35 billion in military aid, with most of it coming from the US, meaning the combined aid and spending equaled over nine tenths of Russia’s. Read more Ukraine’s defense expenditure equaled 37% of GDP and 58% of the government budget, SIPRI said, adding that the room for a further increase is now “very limited.” The study found that in 2023 NATO’s then 31 members accounted for $1.3 trillion, equal to 55% of the world’s military expenditure. In Europe, Poland had the largest increase by far, up by 75% to $31.6 billion. “For European NATO states, the past two years of war in Ukraine have fundamentally changed the security outlook,” said Lorenzo Scarazzato, a researcher with SIPRI’s Military Expenditure and Arms Production Programme. “This shift in threat perceptions is reflected in growing shares of GDP being directed towards military spending, with the NATO target of 2% increasingly being seen as a baseline rather than a threshold to reach.” The report also highlighted that geopolitical tensions in the Middle East have fueled the biggest defense spending increases of the past decade. Estimated regional military expenditure increased by 9% to $200 billion in 2023. Israel’s budget —the second largest in the region after Saudi Arabia—jumped by 24% to $27.5 billion last year, SIPRI concluded. Медиа: | ↑ |
Poland’s Andrzej Duda has contradicted Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who had claimed that Western Europe is heading for war There is no imminent threat of a military conflict breaking out in Europe, Polish President Andrzej Duda has said, contradicting the country’s prime minister. Late last month, Donald Tusk claimed that the continent was in a “pre-war era.” The prime minister argued at the time that “literally any scenario is possible.” Tusk also warned that “no one in Europe will be able to feel safe” if the West fails to provide Ukraine with enough weapons, allowing Russia to prevail in the conflict. When asked whether he shared the prime minister’s grim outlook during an interview with Poland’s Fakt media outlet on Monday, Duda replied in the negative. “If we act responsibly, and we are acting responsibly so far, there will never be a war, because we will always be powerful enough to not be worth attacking,” he said. According to the Polish president, credible deterrence helped the West to prevent the Cold War from turning into a military confrontation. He suggested that the West today should emulate this strategy by arming up. Read more He also said his country was ready to host the nuclear weapons of NATO allies as part of a sharing scheme within the bloc if such a decision were made. Earlier this month, UK Defense Secretary Grant Shapps echoed Tusk’s assessment, claiming that “we have moved from a post-war to a pre-war world.” He argued that the West needed to beef up its defense spending. EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell also subsequently stated that the “possibility of a high-intensity conventional war in Europe is no longer a fantasy.” Moscow has repeatedly denied having any intention of attacking NATO member states. Russian President Vladimir Putin has dismissed such claims as “nonsense,” suggesting that Kiev’s backers were using the supposed threat of a Russian attack to “extract additional expenses from people, to make them bear this burden [of funding Ukraine] on their shoulders.” Медиа: | ↑ |
General Aharon Haliva’s resignation is expected to be the first among many of the Jewish state’s top security brass after the October 7 attack The head of Israel’s military intelligence agency, Major General Aharon Haliva, has stepped down over the failure of his department to prevent the October 7 Hamas attack, the Jewish state’s military announced on Monday. Haliva’s resignation is expected to be the first of many among Israel’s top military brass following the deadly assault last year, which saw Palestinian militants break through border defenses in Gaza, killing over 1,100 people on Israeli territory and taking some 250 hostages. The Jewish state has since launched a relentless assault on Gaza, vowing to eliminate Hamas. “The intelligence directorate under my command did not live up to the task we were entrusted with. I carry that black day with me ever since, day after day, night after night. I will carry the horrible pain of the war with me forever,” Haliva wrote in his resignation letter. Following the October 7 attack, Haliva repeatedly acknowledged his blame in failing to prevent the assault, as did a number of other top Israeli military officials. His resignation was met with approval from Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid, who called it “justified and dignified.” He further claimed that it would be “appropriate” for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to similarly step down. Read more The Israeli leader has so far refused to accept direct responsibility for allowing the attack to unfold and has not indicated any intent to voluntarily resign over the failure. He has insisted that all investigations into accountability should be saved for when the war with Hamas is over. “This debacle will be investigated. Everyone will have to give answers, including me,” Netanyahu said following the attack. “The only thing that I intend to have resign is Hamas. We’re going to resign them to the dustbin of history.” So far, Gaza health authorities have estimated that more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed amid Israel’s siege of the enclave, which has included extensive bombardment as well as a ground incursion. Despite international criticism of Israel’s response, Netanyahu vowed over the weekend to increase military and diplomatic pressure on Hamas to free the remaining hostages, while threatening to “land additional and painful blows” against the Palestinian militants. Медиа: | ↑ |
The launchers that Warsaw does possess are under American control, the prime minister said Poland doesn’t have any US-made Patriot missile systems available to donate to Ukraine, unlike some other NATO nations, Prime Minister Donald Tusk stated on Monday. The long-range air defense system emerged this month as a priority item on Kiev’s wish list after Russia began targeting Ukrainian power stations with missile strikes in what it called retaliation for drone attacks on its oil infrastructure. After an EU summit last week, Germany promised to provide an additional Patriot battery, which costs over a billion dollars. Chancellor Olaf Scholz urged other NATO members to donate more Patriot systems to Kiev. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg suggested that members of the US-led military bloc should prioritize arming Ukraine over meeting their own defense obligations to the organization, when he discussed the situation with air defense systems last Wednesday. “We do not have such an option,” Tusk told journalists on Monday. The battery deployed near the city of Rzeszow “is under the control and disposal of the Americans” and protects southeastern Poland. Warsaw has no such systems to spare, according to the prime minister. Read more He touted Poland’s record of supporting Kiev against Moscow in other ways, calling it a job “done perfectly” and stating that there are many other weapons systems that can benefit Ukraine. Senior Ukrainian officials have criticized Western arms donors for failing to deliver enough Patriot systems to defend their country. President Vladimir Zelensky has said that Kiev needed at least six to seven units, while Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba has called out the US specifically, stating in an interview that “nobody in Ukraine would believe that the huge US Army doesn’t have at least one Patriot battery” to send. “Behind closed doors, I tell all of our partners: ‘My dears, anything you want. You want to lease them, so be it. You want them to protect your border, they will. Just give them [to us],’” Kuleba explained last week. READ MORE: Send more Patriots to Ukraine – Germany Moscow, which perceives the Ukraine conflict as a US-led proxy war against Russia, has warned that no amount of Western weaponry will change the outcome and that the arms supplies merely prolong the bloodshed and stand in the way of achieving peace. Медиа: | ↑ |
Despite ambitious plans to phase out Russian gas, the EU increased purchases in 2023, Reuters reported earlier this month The predominance of fossil fuels in global energy output is nearing its end, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has claimed, adding that his country aims to produce 80% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030. German industry had for decades relied on relatively inexpensive Russian gas, and to a lesser extent oil. However, following the start of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, energy imports from Moscow fell dramatically, adversely affecting the competitiveness of many German businesses. In 2020, the European Union unveiled its Green Deal strategy for the bloc to become climate-neutral by the middle of the century. Speaking at the opening ceremony of the Hanover trade fair on Sunday, Scholz said that the “era of fossil fuels is coming to an end.” German industry will have to reorganize its operations, but not all technological processes allow for swift decarbonization, according to the chancellor. Read more The German leader stated that “modern, highly-flexible and climate-friendly power plants” were currently being built across the country to replace traditional power sources. Scholz also said that Norway would provide Germany’s industry with “clean energy from wind and hydropower.” Eighty percent of the nation’s electricity is expected to come from renewables by 2030, including solar power and both onshore and offshore wind, he added. Scholz said the two years since the start of the Ukraine conflict have been “turnaround years” for Europe, allowing it to “address the necessary changes” to its energy supply. The EU aims to completely wean itself off Russian fossil fuels by 2027. Last Friday, however, the bloc’s Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators released a report warning against drastic reductions of imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Russia. In 2023, Russia emerged as the EU’s second-biggest LNG supplier after the US, accounting for 16% of the bloc’s imports. Earlier this month, Reuters cited calculations based on the EU’s trade statistics as showing that Brussels increased natural gas purchases from Russia in 2023. Медиа: | ↑ |
Moscow has previously warned that such a move would undermine “the legal foundations of European and international law” The EU is “close to a political agreement” on seizing the profits generated by Russia’s central bank reserves that remain frozen in connection with Ukraine-related sanctions, Belgian Finance Minister Vincent Van Peteghem said on Sunday. The West immobilized around $300 billion in assets belonging to the Russian central bank following the start of hostilities in February 2022, a move denounced by Moscow as “theft.” Around $280 billion of this sum is held in the EU, primarily in the Belgium-based depositary and clearing house Euroclear. While the US and UK have called for outright seizure of those funds, numerous reports suggest that EU countries are taking a more cautious approach, citing the lack of a legal basis for such a drastic move as well as fears of Russian retaliation. Meanwhile, EU officials have been mulling a plan to apply a windfall tax on the profits generated by the assets. According to Eurostat, the reserves frozen in the EU generated €4.4 billion ($4.7 billion) in interest income in 2023 alone. In March, a senior EU official projected, as quoted by Reuters, that €15-20 billion ($16-21 billion) would be generated in after-tax profits by 2027. Read more The same month, the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, proposed handing over 90% of those profits to the European Peace Facility to be used for procurement of arms for Ukraine. The rest would be transferred to EU budgets to support Kiev’s defense industry. Now, according to Peteghem, EU nations appear to be close to finding common ground on this plan. The minister said, as quoted by Bloomberg, that the first tax collection could take place as early as July 1. However, Politico reported last month that Hungary, Slovakia, Malta, and Luxembourg have challenged the idea of using the funds to aid Ukraine. While the first two countries are opposed to procuring weapons for Kiev altogether, the latter two have reportedly voiced misgivings about not being consulted on such a far-reaching plan. Moscow has vehemently denounced the West’s push to use its immobilized funds to support Ukraine. Commenting on Borrell’s proposal last month, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov warned that it could destroy “the legal foundations of European and international law.” He also noted that transferring the Russian funds to Kiev would tarnish the bloc’s image and cautioned that those advancing the EU’s plan “will be subject to legal prosecution for many decades to come.” Медиа: | ↑ |
A bill that would force China’s ByteDance to divest ownership of the popular app has been passed by the House of Representatives TikTok is reportedly planning to legally challenge the US government if it passes a law that would require the app’s Chinese parent company to divest its ownership or face a complete ban of the platform, Bloomberg reported on Monday. Over the weekend, the US House of Representatives tied the bill that could see TikTok banned to an emergency bill providing aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. The legislation ultimately passed by a vote of 360 to 58. If approved by the Senate, the app’s Chinese owner ByteDance would have nine months to sell its business or have it barred from US app stores. “This is an unprecedented deal worked out between the Republican speaker and President Biden,” Michael Beckerman, TikTok’s head of public policy for the Americas, told the company’s US staff in a memo seen by Bloomberg. “At the stage that the bill is signed, we will move to the courts for a legal challenge,” he reportedly wrote. Beckerman had previously insisted that the divest-or-ban demands on TikTok were a violation of the First Amendment rights of the app’s 170 million users in the US and that such legislation, if passed, would have “devastating consequences” for the nearly 7 million businesses using the platform. “This is the beginning, not the end of this long process,” the executive said in Saturday’s memo, vowing to “continue to fight.” China has also blasted the efforts to ban TikTok in the US, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin arguing that such a step would violate international trade rules. “[The bill] runs contrary to the principles of fair competition and international economic and trade rules,” Wang said last month, accusing the US of “bullying behavior” and of “leveraging state power” against ByteDance. Read more “When someone sees a good thing another person has and tries to take it for themselves, this is entirely the logic of a bandit,” he said. A number of American lawmakers have insisted for years that TikTok poses a “national security threat” due to its Chinese ownership, and have insisted on forcing it to sever ties with its parent company ByteDance. However, some in the US Congress have opposed the legislation targeting the Chinese app, with Republican Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky arguing that the “cure” presented in the bill is “worse than the disease,” as it would give the White House the power to ban other websites and apps. Billionaire and owner of X (formerly Twitter) Elon Musk has warned that the bill is “about censorship and government control,” while the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has denounced the legislation as “violating the free speech rights of millions of Americans” who use the platform daily. Медиа: | ↑ |
The apparent short-range weapons test comes days after Pyongyang claimed a successful trial of a new cruise missile warhead North Korea launched several ballistic missiles into the sea on Monday, according to officials in South Korea and Japan. Several projectiles that appeared to be short-range ballistic missiles were fired towards the Sea of Japan from the vicinity of Pyongyang and flew roughly 300km before splashing down, Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff reported. The military branded the incident “a clear provocation” threatening stability and security on the Korean Peninsula. The Japanese Defense Ministry likewise reported a ballistic missile fired from North Korea and landing off the coast outside of the country’s exclusive economic zone. The Coast Guard said it detected no damage, while the office of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida promised further updates, after analysis of available information is complete. Read more According to the South Korean news agency Yonhap, it was the fourth ballistic missile test by North Korea this year. In early April, Pyongyang fired what is believed to be a new type of a solid-propellant intermediate-range projectile that can potentially deploy a hypersonic glide vehicle. North Korean state media touted the new platform in mid-March. Last Friday, Pyongyang reported testing a new type of warhead for a cruise missile and a new anti-aircraft weapon. In January, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un announced a major policy shift when he stated that his government is no longer seeking peaceful reunification with the South, a goal that he described as misguided. He said that since Seoul considers itself an enemy of Pyongyang, the peoples governed by the two governments cannot be treated as separated parts of the same nation. READ MORE: US House speaker announces ‘new axis of evil’ The North says it needs advanced weapons systems to protect itself from a possible invasion by the US and its regional allies, including South Korea and Japan. Медиа: | ↑ |
Numerous districts are struggling with overstretched resources, the head of a local councils’ association has said Communities across Germany cannot take in more refugees, particularly those arriving from Ukraine, the president of a local councils’ association has told the Neue Osnabrucker Zeitung newspaper. Germany hosts an estimated 1.15 million Ukrainian refugees, the largest number in Europe, followed by Poland, the Czech Republic, and the UK, according to figures from the UN Refugee Agency dated from last month. While roughly two-thirds of Ukrainian refugees are employed in Poland and the Czech Republic, that number stands at only 20% in Germany, Deutsche Welle reported earlier this year. In an interview with Neue Osnabrucker Zeitung on Saturday, local councils’ association president Reinhard Sager, who is also a member of the opposition Christian Democratic Union party, warned that a “number of districts and communities are overstretched by legal and illegal migration.” “The integration of all the people is no longer possible,” he added. Read more Sager pointed out that the federal government has slashed funding for municipalities which are faced with formidable costs associated with migrant and refugee accommodation. “If the number of refugees doesn’t quickly decrease noticeably and enduringly, the problems will become ever bigger, and they will come back to bite,” Sager predicted. This could lead to growing support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AFD) party, he claimed. Sager demanded that Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government abolish the so-called citizen’s benefits currently granted to Ukrainian refugees, echoing statements made earlier this year by Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Soder. At present, Ukrainian nationals in Germany are entitled to more than €500 ($545) a month, and children between €357 and €471. This level of assistance is higher than the support provided to other categories of asylum seekers and refugees. “With all due solidarity, we pose the question to Ukraine whether so many people from the country attacked by Russia must come to us,” Sager stated. He emphasized that the southern German region of Baden-Wuerttemberg alone hosts twice as many Ukrainian refugees as France. Refugee camps could instead be established in western Ukraine, or Poland might be willing to take in more people with the EU’s support, Sager suggested. According to a poll in February, nearly 50% of respondents said the German government was giving Ukrainian refugees “too much support,” while more than half believed that efforts to integrate newcomers had failed. Another survey conducted on behalf of the broadcaster ZDF earlier this month showed that less than half of Germans want their government to send more military aid to Ukraine. A poll commissioned by FOCUS magazine last month revealed that 53% of respondents backed Pope Francis’ call for Ukraine to engage in peace negotiations with Russia without any preconditions. Медиа: | ↑ |
Papua New Guinea’s prime minister has downplayed the US president’s comments on his uncle’s presumed death in the country US President Joe Biden’s recent remarks in which he implied that his uncle was eaten by cannibals in Papua New Guinea during World War II were uncalled for, the prime minister of the Southwest Pacific nation has said. Last Wednesday, Biden recounted the story of Ambrose Finnegan, his mother’s brother, who is recorded by the US military as missing in action off New Guinea, after a plane he was on crashed in the Pacific Ocean, leaving only one survivor. According to the president, his uncle’s plane was shot down and his body was never found because “there were a lot of cannibals − for real − in that part of New Guinea.” “Sometimes you have loose moments,” Prime Minister James Marape said in an interview on Sunday, reacting to Biden’s remarks. He added that he has met with the US leader on four different occasions, and “he’s always had warm regards for Papua New Guinea” and never mentioned cannibalism. ”President Biden’s remarks may have been a slip of the tongue; however, my country does not deserve to be labeled as such,” Marape said. Read more Papua New Guinea was dragged into World War II, which was not its fight, the prime minister said. He urged Washington to help clean up PNG and the Solomon Islands, which are “littered with the remains of WWII, including human remains, plane wrecks, ship wrecks, tunnels and bombs,” which still pose a threat to people who live there. If this is done, then perhaps “the truth about missing servicemen like Ambrose Finnegan can be put to rest,” he suggested. The US is vying for influence in Papua New Guinea as it competes with China in the region. Last year, Washington signed a defense cooperation agreement with the island nation. Beijing reached a similar deal with the neighboring Solomon Islands. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Marape in the capital, Port Moresby on Sunday in an effort to foster better economic relations. Медиа: | ↑ |
Andrzej Duda has admitted he discussed the issue with Washington Poland is open to hosting US nuclear weapons amid the stand-off with Russia over Ukraine, President Andrzej Duda has said. In an interview with the Polish daily Fakt on Monday, the leader acknowledged that the issue of bringing US nukes to his country, much closer to Russian territory, “has been a topic of Polish-American talks for some time.” The US currently has nuclear weapons stationed in five fellow NATO members: Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Türkiye. “I have already talked about this several times,” Duda continued. “I must admit that when asked about it, I declared our readiness.” He argued that the reason for such a stance is that “Russia is increasingly militarizing” its exclave of Kaliningrad bordering Poland and Lithuania, adding that Moscow has also deployed its nuclear weapons in Belarus. Read more Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the decision to place tactical nuclear weapons in the neighboring state, which is also Moscow’s key ally, last year. At the time, he argued that the move had been triggered by Britain’s decision to supply Ukraine with depleted uranium ammunition. The president also pointed out that the US has kept nukes in Europe for decades. Duda further explained that “if our allies decide to deploy nuclear weapons as part of nuclear sharing also on our territory to strengthen the security of NATO’s eastern flank, we are ready for it.” He recalled that as a NATO member, Poland has certain obligations, and “in this respect, we simply implement a common policy.” In response to Duda’s statement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov noted that if the US does indeed place its nuclear weapons in Poland, the Russian military would “take all necessary countermeasures to ensure our security.” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in January that Moscow views the nuclear assets of the US, UK and France as a “single nuclear arsenal aimed at the Russian Federation,” since NATO had declared it the “main threat.” He added that Russia takes this reality into account in its nuclear policy. Moscow has repeatedly said that a nuclear war must never be fought, and that it has never threatened to use its atomic arsenal. Медиа: | ↑ |
The Biden administration will “aggressively” implement a new strategy to protect the Jewish community, it has announced The White House denounced an “alarming surge of anti-Semitism” at US college campuses in a statement on Sunday, against the backdrop of an escalating pro-Palestine protest at Columbia University in New York. More than 100 people have been arrested on or near the campus at Columbia since student demonstrations began on Wednesday. Protesters have set up scores of tents in front of the university, demanding that it boycott Israel-linked companies and publicly call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The death toll in the Palestinian enclave since the onset of the Israel-Hamas war on October 7 has topped 34,000, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. In a press release on Sunday, the White House condemned the alleged calls for violence against Jews in schools, communities, and online. “This blatant anti-Semitism is reprehensible and dangerous – and it has absolutely no place on college campuses, or anywhere in the country,” the statement said. The New York City Police Department has arrested 108 people for trespassing after they refused to leave the makeshift encampment at Columbia. Students were among those arrested, and received suspension notices from the university, Fox News reported. Read more Rabbi Elie Buechler confirmed to CNN that he had reached out to around 300 Jewish students, imploring them to avoid the campus while the protest continues. Universities in the US and elsewhere have come out in a show of solidarity with the protesters at Columbia. At Yale University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, students set up similar encampments, the Columbia Spectator college newspaper reported on Sunday. Student bodies at other institutions have also posted their support, including from the University of Melbourne, Bard College Berlin, Yale, and Harvard. The administration of US President Joe Biden has been supportive of West Jerusalem in its war against Hamas, following the militant group’s attack on Israel on October 7, which claimed more than 1,100 lives and saw scores of people taken hostage. In the run-up to the November US presidential election, some Democratic critics have condemned Biden’s continued backing of Israel, pointing to the ever-growing Palestinian death toll, Politico reported earlier this month. In particular, Biden’s team is said to be concerned about losing young and progressive pro-Palestine voters.
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Western advisers are stationed at embassies, the head of the US-led bloc has said NATO member states have military advisers stationed at their embassies in Ukraine, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has told MSNBC News. In an interview on Sunday, Stoltenberg was asked whether the US-led bloc is planning to send additional personnel to help Kiev in its fight against Russia. “There are no plans for any NATO combat presence in Ukraine. But, of course, several NATO allies have men and women in uniform at the embassies giving advice,” he said. The comments came after Pentagon spokesman Major General Pat Ryder told Politico that the US is considering deploying more advisers to its embassy in Kiev. According to the outlet, the personnel could be tasked with handling logistics and helping with the maintenance of US-supplied weapons systems. Read more Although French President Emmanuel Macron and several other European leaders have refused to rule out placing NATO boots on the ground in Ukraine in the future, the bloc has so far maintained that it is not a direct participant in the conflict. Stoltenberg hailed the $61 billion aid package for Kiev passed by the US House of Representatives on Saturday after months of stalling, but warned that the “delay has had real consequences” on the battlefield. “The Ukrainians have now for months been outgunned.” Read more The much-needed aid, which includes money for weapons for Ukraine, was stuck in the House for months due to political wrangling. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has complained that dwindling American aid has caused ammunition shortages on the front line, also warning that Kiev could be defeated if the delays continue. US President Joe Biden blamed the fall of the Donbass stronghold of Avdeevka to Russia in February on “congressional inaction.” Moscow has warned that deliveries of Western arms and equipment to Ukraine will not stop Russia from achieving its military goals, including the abandonment of Kiev’s plans to join NATO. Further deliveries from the West only “cause more Ukrainians to die because of the Kiev regime,” and make Western states a de facto party to the conflict, the Kremlin has stated. Медиа: | ↑ |
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that all proposals to reach a new hostage deal have been rejected by the militant group Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to increase pressure on Hamas and threatened to “land additional and painful blows” in an effort to have the remaining Israeli hostages held in Gaza released. Some 129 Israelis are believed to still be in captivity, following the incursion of Palestinian militants into the Jewish state on October 7, when over 1,100 people, mostly civilians, were killed and more than 200 were taken hostage. A short-lived truce in November last year saw 105 hostages released in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners, but further negotiations stalled over Hamas’ demands for a permanent ceasefire and complete withdrawal of Israeli forces, which Netanyahu dismissed as “delusional.” In a pre-Passover video message on Sunday, Netanyahu said that the absence of the hostages over the holiday would “only strengthen our determination to bring them back,” explaining that all Israeli proposals to secure the release of the hostages have been “rejected outright by Hamas.” Read more “Instead of retreating from its extreme positions, Hamas builds on division within us. It draws encouragement from the pressures directed at the Israeli government. As a result, it only tightens its conditions for the release of our hostages,” Netanyahu continued, in an apparent reference to anti-government protests calling for new elections and demanding that the authorities do more to reach a new hostage deal. “In the coming days, we will increase the military and diplomatic pressure on Hamas because this is the only way to free our hostages and achieve our victory,” he added. More than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed since the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched a bombing campaign followed by a ground invasion of Gaza, according to the latest figures provided by the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. READ MORE: Blinken reveals US stance on potential Israeli invasion of Rafah Netanyahu maintains that Israel cannot achieve its goal of “total victory” without launching an offensive on the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where around 1.4 million displaced Palestinians have sought refuge since the beginning of the war. The potential invasion of the densely populated city has caused alarm in the international community. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has warned of “terrible consequences” if Israel goes ahead with the plan. Медиа: | ↑ |
American troops have reportedly been targeted in the Middle East for the first time since February amid Israel-Iran tensions At least five rockets were fired at an American base in northeastern Syria, Reuters reported on Sunday, citing two unnamed Iraqi security officials. The projectiles were reportedly launched from the town of Zummar in northwestern Iraq. Reuters did not specify if there were any casualties. The Iraq-based group Kataib Hezbollah later released a statement saying that it had decided to resume attacks on US personnel. “What happened a short while ago is the beginning,” the group said, as quoted by the Jerusalem Post. Iranian-backed militias had halted their attacks against US military installations in the region in February, after Washington launched retaliatory airstrikes on dozens of targets in Iraq and Syria. Militants launched rockets and drones against US forces in the Middle East more than 150 times between last October, when the Israel-Hamas war started, and February, capped by an attack that killed three Americans and wounded 40 others at an outpost in Jordan. Sunday’s attack involved a rocket launcher mounted on a small truck, Reuters said. An Iraqi army officer said the truck caught fire in an explosion from unfired rockets and was apparently hit in an airstrike, possibly by US forces. The unidentified militants fled the area in another vehicle. Read more The incident came one day after a fatal blast at an Iraqi military command post north of Baghdad. The explosion reportedly killed one member of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) and injured eight other people. US and Israeli military officials both denied having any involvement in the blast. There were no drones or warplanes in the airspace around the command post at the time of the explosion, the Iraqi army said. The uptick in violence followed a week in which Iran and Israel traded largely ineffective aerial attacks on each other. Iran’s April 13 drone and missile launches against Israel were retaliation for the April 1 bombing of the Iranian consulate in Syria. The consulate attack killed 16 people, including two Iranian generals and five other officers. READ MORE: Is all-out war in the Middle East now inevitable? Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani returned home on Saturday from his trip to the US, where he met with President Joe Biden at the White House. He also made a stop in Michigan to meet with Arab American leaders. Медиа: | ↑ |
New Yorker Nate McMurray has celebrated passage of a Ukraine aid bill by wishing death to Donald Trump’s political movement A Democratic politician in New York has responded to Saturday’s passage of a long-stalled Ukraine aid bill in the US House of Representatives by condemning former President Donald Trump’s ‘MAGA’ political movement to death. “Slava Ukraine,” congressional candidate Nate McMurray posted on X (formerly Twitter) shortly after the House voted to approve $61 billion in additional funding for Kiev’s conflict with Russia. He added, “Die MAGA die. You lose.” Some Trump allies in Congress have opposed sending more weapons and money to Ukraine, arguing that Washington is merely prolonging the bloodshed while failing to address bigger priorities at home, such as the border crisis. Most Republicans voted against the emergency spending legislation on Saturday, but House Speaker Mike Johnson overrode his own party by pushing the Ukraine bill through with unanimous Democrat support. READ MORE: Trump wants to ‘kill his opposition’ – Hillary Clinton McMurray faced online backlash for his incendiary rhetoric. His post was ratioed, and X users suggested that he should be investigated for inciting violence. One observer asked, “You’re running for Congress and calling for half the country to be murdered? Weird flex, bro.” Another said, “This fascist literally just said, ‘Die Make America Great Again die.’”
McMurray, a lawyer who previously served as town supervisor in Grand Island, New York, is running for a House seat in the district previously represented by Brian Higgins, a Democrat who quit Congress in February. The candidate doubled down on his MAGA attack after the pushback, saying, “You can’t just starve extremism with silence; you’ve got to speak up and dish it out!” He added, “I’m never gonna physically hurt a soul, but I will hurt your feelings.” READ MORE: Trump wants to ‘kill his opposition’ – Hillary Clinton Use of the phrase ‘Slava Ukraine’ also raised some eyebrows. ‘Slava Ukraini’, meaning ‘Glory to Ukraine’, has a long and controversial history in the former Soviet republic. The slogan was originally used by Ukrainian nationalists, including those who collaborated with the Nazis during World War II, but has become a widespread patriotic chant since the 2014 overthrow of Kiev’s elected government. Медиа: | ↑ |
Intelligence agencies have creative ways of forcing politicians to do their bidding, the conservative journalist claimed Members of Congress consistently vote in favor of mass surveillance programs because they’re “terrified” that intelligence agencies will plant “kiddie porn” on their computers if they speak up, American journalist Tucker Carlson has claimed. Carlson appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast on Friday, hours before the US Senate voted to renew Section 702 of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Ostensibly created to allow intelligence agencies such as the FBI and CIA to surveil the communications of foreigners, Section 702 allows these agencies to access data ‘indirectly’ collected from millions of American citizens without a warrant. According to Carlson, a number of lawmakers actually opposed this renewal, but did not admit this publicly. “People don’t say that because they’re worried about being punished,” Carlson told Rogan. “They’re worried about someone putting kiddie porn on their computer. Members of Congress are terrified of the intel agencies. I’m not guessing at that. They’ve told me that, including people on the [intelligence] committee, including people who run the intel committee.” Read more “They’re afraid of the agencies,” he stated, adding: “That’s not compatible with democracy.” “It’s playing out in front of everyone, and no one cares and no one does anything about it,” Carlson continued. “I think the reason is because they’re threatened. And if you look at the committee chairmen who allowed this s**t to happen year after year… I know them. And they have all the things to hide. I know that for a fact.” Apart from the supposed threat of surreptitiously-planted child pornography, Carlson claimed that it’s “very common” for lawmakers to have “a drinking problem or a weird sex life,” which agencies could easily expose if these politicians refuse to do their bidding. Carlson is not the first influential conservative to claim that elected representatives are being blackmailed. Back in December, Tennessee Representative Tim Burchett, a Republican, suggested that his colleagues opposed a motion to release the names of notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein’s clients because they would have been implicated in sex crimes. READ MORE: Diddy knows too much – former rival Unnamed forces in Washington use “the old honey pot” to blackmail politicians and force them to “vote for crazy stuff,” he told conservative podcast host Benny Johnson at the time. A year earlier, a nude video of Rep. Madison Cawthorn was leaked a month after he claimed to have been invited to drug-fueled orgies by older members of Congress. Washington, he said at the time, is rife with “sexual perversion.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Enthusiasm has waned heading into the 2024 presidential election as majorities of Americans dislike both major-party candidates Americans are losing interest in this year’s US presidential election as both Democrat incumbent Joe Biden and Republican challenger Donald Trump alienate voters, a new NBC News poll has shown. The survey, released on Sunday, found that just 64% of US voters are “very interested” in the November election, compared with 77% at this point in the 2020 presidential race. Never before have NBC pollsters recorded lower voter interest at a point this late in an election cycle. Only 59% of voters were “very interested” in the upcoming election in March 2012, but the figure ticked up to 67% as the race heated up the following month. The historic lack of voter enthusiasm apparently reflects largely negative views about both major-party candidates. Only 38% of US voters hold a positive view of Biden, the NBC poll showed. The same percentage of voters – presumably a different swath of the electorate – have positive feelings about Trump. Read more “Americans don’t agree on much these days, but nothing unites the country more than voters’ desire to tune this election out,” said Democrat pollster Jeff Horwitt, who helped conduct the NBC survey. The poll results suggest that voter turnout will be relatively low in November, especially among young people, Republican pollster Bill McInturff said. Only 36% of voters under the age of 35 have a high level of interest in this year’s election. While 70% of Republicans and 65% of Democrats are very interested in the Biden-Trump rematch, just 48% of independents share their enthusiasm. The poll showed that Trump leads Biden by a margin of 46% to 44% in a hypothetical one-on-one contest. When third-party candidates are included, Biden leads Trump 39-37. That’s because Trump loses far more voters who would otherwise vote for him if the only other choice were Biden. READ MORE: Washington lives in denial over Putin’s victory while gaming its own elections NBC said 13% of voters favor independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Although Kennedy is a lifelong Democrat – his father was a Democrat presidential candidate, and his uncle was President John F. Kennedy Jr. – he’s viewed far more favorably by Republicans. While 40% of Republican voters have a positive view of Kennedy, just 16% of Democrats like him, the poll showed. Biden’s approval rating has risen by five percentage points, to 42%, since January, NBC said. However, McInturff noted that the incumbent’s rating is still lower at this point in the cycle than either of the two recent presidents who lost their reelection bids. Trump had a 46% approval rating at this point in 2020, he said, and George H.W. Bush had a 43% rating in April 1992. READ MORE: One in five Americans say political violence may be needed – poll Медиа: | ↑ |
South Korea has signed a framework agreement on economic cooperation with Kiev, including $2.1 billion in low-interest loans South Korea has followed through on its pledge to provide more aid to Ukraine, signing a framework agreement that clears the way to give Kiev $2.1 billion in low-interest loans to help shore up its finances. South Korean Finance Minister Choi Sang-mok and his Ukrainian counterpart, Sergey Marchenko, signed the deal on Friday in Washington, where both men had traveled to attend G7, IMF and World Bank meetings. Seoul previously gave Ukraine $200 million in humanitarian aid amid its conflict with Russia and promised to provide an additional $2.1 billion through long-term loans. “Friday’s agreement was meant to lay the legal foundation on credit assistance,” the South Korean Finance Ministry said on Sunday in a statement. “The two sides agreed to explore projects together that help Ukraine’s reconstruction and development.” Read more The deal comes at a time when Russian forces are making battlefield gains and Ukraine’s cash-strapped government is struggling to ramp up weapons production. Marchenko told G7 finance ministers that although Ukraine’s government has made progress in boosting its revenue and borrowing money domestically, “internal measures have only limited effect.” He added, “Ukraine’s financial needs in the conditions of full-scale war are significant, and international support continues to be vital.” South Korea has faced pressure from the US and other Western allies to boost its support for Ukraine, but it has sought to avoid raising tensions with Russia. Although Seoul has maintained an official policy of providing only non-lethal aid to Kiev – the country has a law against sending weapons to war zones – President Yoon Suk-yeol’s administration reportedly agreed to transfer over 300,000 artillery shells to Ukraine last year. The framework agreement with Ukraine calls for South Korea to start providing low-interest loans in 2025. US lawmakers passed a long-stalled Ukraine aid bill on Saturday. House Speaker Mike Johnson won more support for the legislation by reclassifying some of the nearly $61 billion that will be given to Kiev as loans that will supposedly be paid back at some point. READ MORE: No ‘unfriendly nations’ for Russia, only ‘unfriendly elites’ – Putin
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Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has praised the recent operation by saying it demonstrated the country’s resolve The latest attack on targets in Israel conducted by Iran’s armed forces has demonstrated the nation’s resolve, according to the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, as cited by IRNA news agency. Speaking with a group of military commanders in the capital, Tehran on Sunday, Khamenei thanked the country’s armed forces for ‘Operation True Promise’, and urged the officers to pursue military innovation. “Innovation in weapons and methods as well as knowledge of the enemy’s tactics must always be on the agenda,” he said. Khamenei also thanked the families of the commanders, as well as soldiers of all ranks and police, highlighting the burdens their wives and children face. Earlier this month, Tehran launched scores of drones and missiles at Israel, saying the attack was “punishment” for the bombing of the Iranian consulate in the Syrian capital, Damascus on April 1, killing 16 people, including two generals and several other senior officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force. READ MORE: Iran targeted with ‘children’s toys’ – FM Tehran blamed the attack on Israel, though West Jerusalem has neither confirmed nor denied its role in the bombing of the diplomatic mission. However, its responsibility was later hinted at by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who stated that Israel strikes its “enemies all over the Middle East.” The latest escalation occurred earlier this week, when media reports emerged that Israel had struck targets across Iran. Several explosions were reportedly heard in the Iranian city of Isfahan. The country’s foreign minister, Hossein Amirabdollahian, played down the significance of the attack, saying it was minor in scale and involved primitive hardware. Медиа: | ↑ |
One crew member was pulled from the Pacific Ocean and seven others are still missing after a training exercise went awry Two Japanese Navy patrol helicopters reportedly crashed in mid-air on Sunday, killing one crew member and sending seven others into the Pacific Ocean, who remain missing. The crash came just a year after ten Japanese soldiers died in a similar incident. The two Mitsubishi SH-60K helicopters were conducting anti-submarine training exercises on Saturday night near the remote Izu islands, around 500 kilometers south of Tokyo. Communication with one chopper was lost at around 10:38pm, and military personnel lost contact with the second around 25 minutes later, Japan’s NHK broadcaster reported. Rescuers dispatched to the scene “spotted what are believed to be part of the aircraft in the sea, and we believe that the two helicopters crashed,” Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara told reporters on Sunday. In a follow-up briefing, the minister confirmed that the body of one crew member had been recovered, and that the other seven were still missing. Read more “The flight recorders are being analyzed,” Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) Chief of Staff Ryo Sakai told reporters, adding that the crew of a third helicopter that took part in the exercise were being interviewed. The crash came just over a year after a UH-60JA helicopter operated by the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force crashed off Miyako Island, roughly halfway between the Japanese island of Okinawa and Taiwan. Ten soldiers died in the crash, and investigators never discovered whether the chopper plunged into the ocean due to a technical malfunction or pilot error. American forces in Japan have also suffered a string of air crashes in recent years. Eight US crew members were killed when their tilt-rotor V-22 Osprey aircraft crashed off the island of Yakushima in December, and five were injured when an Osprey crash-landed on a reef off Okinawa in 2016. Aside from the two crashes in Japan, the US has lost 11 Ospreys to accidents and malfunctions since 2007. Медиа: | ↑ |
Cannabis will be prohibited even in zones designated for lighting up, Bild has reported People smoking pot in German railway stations could be banned from the premises starting on June 1, the national railway operator, Deutsche Bahn (DB), told the tabloid Bild on Saturday. The move comes after the country legalized the use of recreational marijuana, including in some public places. The decision was aimed at ensuring public well-being and protecting minors, a DB spokeswoman told Bild. “We want to protect our passengers, particularly children and young people,” she said, adding that the existing law also prohibits smoking weed in pedestrian zones and near schools or playgrounds during the day. Under a law enacted in February, adults in Germany are allowed to possess up to 50 grams (1.7 ounce) of marijuana in private homes. In public spaces, the maximum is 25 grams. Public consumption of marijuana is generally allowed except for areas near schools and playgrounds and in sports facilities. Minors caught with cannabis will have to go through a drug-abuse prevention program under the existing rules. Read more DB security employees will start informing passengers next week about the upcoming ban, the operator’s spokeswoman told the paper. The company also plans to inform people through posters at each station warning that violations of the new rules could entail penalties, including being barred from the property. The penalties will be applied starting from June 1. Until then, employees will urge the travelers to refrain from consuming cannabis with “friendly requests and advice,” the spokeswoman said. Only medical consumption of marijuana will be permitted. Read more Smoking, including vaping, is also not permitted in the stations. Only about 400 railway terminals out of a total of 5,400 are outfitted with special smoking areas. Consumption of marijuana will be banned there as well, the paper reported. Around 20 million people use DB train stations every day, according to Bild. The government promoted the legalization of marijuana as a blow against the illegal drug trade. The intention was to create “an alternative to the black market,” German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach stated in February. The law came into force on April 1. Legalization of the recreational drug in Germany faced backlash from some medical professionals. “From our point of view, the law as it is written is a disaster,” Katja Seidel, a therapist at drug addiction center Tannenhof Berlin-Brandenburg told AFP in April. Professor Ray Walley from the Standing Committee of European Doctors also warned last year that “evidence shows that cannabis is an addictive drug with many hazards.” In April, he said that the changes in Germany would “increase use and health related harms, especially among youth.” Медиа: | ↑ |
The president’s latest blunder comes as a majority of Americans doubt his mental capacity for office US President Joe Biden has implored his supporters to choose “freedom over democracy,” in the latest of a long series of gaffes and verbal blunders. Conservative pundits have viewed the incident as more proof that the 81-year-old is unfit for office. Speaking at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Thursday, Biden rattled off a string of buzzwords as he asked voters whether they would choose him over former President Donald Trump in November’s presidential election. “Are you ready to choose unity over division? Dignity over demolition? Truth over lies? Are you ready to choose freedom over democracy? Because that’s America,” he exclaimed. Biden’s “freedom over democracy” line drew a mix of laughs and applause from the crowd, and ridicule from conservative pundits and influencers.
“When people were concerned about Ronald Reagan having cognitive decline near the end of his second term, it was nothing like this,” the Conservative Brief wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “Look in the mirror and ask yourself, truthfully, if this is the man you want in charge of our security, our economy, and our country for another four years?” Read more Biden has a long history of similar slip-ups, and was ridiculed for a 2019 campaign speech in which he declared: “We choose unity over division. We choose science over fiction. We choose truth over facts.” Republicans insist that Biden’s cognitive faculties are declining, and that this decline has accelerated over his three years in the White House. Video footage of the president shaking hands with imaginary people, getting lost when out in public, and telling reporters that he had just met with long-dead world leaders have served to bolster their case. In February, US Justice Department prosecutor Robert Hur opted not to charge Biden for mishandling classified documents, noting in a report that the president suffered extreme memory lapses and didn’t possess the “mental state of willfulness” needed to commit a crime. An Associated Press poll last month found that six out of ten American adults doubt Biden’s mental capacity to serve as president. Медиа: | ↑ |
The billionaire’s comments come in response to new funding for Kiev being approved by the House of Representatives The parties involved in the Ukraine conflict need to work on ways to bring it to a close, SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk proposed on Saturday. Responding to an X (formerly Twitter) post by fellow billionaire David Sachs, in which the latter commented on the House of Representatives approving a spending bill that includes a fresh $61 billion for Kiev, Musk noted that the conflict was turning into “a forever war.” “My biggest concern is that there is no exit strategy, just a forever war where kids die in trenches from artillery or charging machine guns and snipers through minefields,” Musk wrote. Musk did not elaborate on his position towards the aid bill itself this time, but in late March he noted that it “should be contingent on proper accounting of how [the funding] is used and a plan to resolve the conflict.” The billionaire has not explicitly taken sides during the Ukraine conflict. He did supply Kiev with free Starlink internet terminals and access to the satellite-based network but later refused to activate the service near the Russian port city of Sevastopol in Crimea over fears that Ukraine could use the technology to escalate the conflict by attacking Russia’s Black Sea Fleet with guided drones.
In February, Musk said the US should stop aiding Ukraine altogether as there was “no way in hell” Russia would lose the war. “This spending doesn’t help Ukraine. Prolonging the war doesn’t help Ukraine,” he stated at a forum on X Spaces. Last month, Musk also warned that the “real question” in the conflict now lies in how much territory Kiev will lose before it agrees to sit down to peace talks with Moscow. Russia has repeatedly said that it was open to peace negotiations if Ukraine accepts the “reality on the ground.” Moscow also warned that Western aid and weapons shipments to Ukraine only exacerbate and prolong the conflict. READ MORE: US Congress moves closer to approving Ukraine aid bill The US, meanwhile, is getting closer to approving another $61 billion for Kiev. After being passed by the House, the Ukraine aid bill is set to be voted on by the Senate later this week. Медиа: | ↑ |
The EU is worried that the move would breach international law and trigger a backlash, the outlet reports EU officials are reluctant to bow to US pressure and transfer frozen Russian assets to Ukraine, fearing that Moscow’s retaliation would be aimed primarily at the bloc rather than America, the Washington Post reported on Saturday. As part of unprecedented sanctions over the Ukraine conflict, Western countries have frozen around $300 billion in Russian assets in a move denounced by Moscow as “theft,” with many Western officials suggesting the money could be used to help Ukraine. The bulk of this sum is located in European countries, while the US only holds around $6 billion. In recent months, there have been several proposals on how to use this money to help Ukraine. While the US has pushed for the more hardline option of outright seizing the funds, the EU has proposed using the profits generated by the assets to help Ukraine. Another option under discussion is to use the assets as collateral to secure loans for Kiev. Read more According to the Post, EU officials are reluctant to confiscate the Russian assets due to concerns that the move “could breach international law, discourage investors from trusting the euro and invite Russian retaliation.” They have also pushed back against the US proposal to seize the funds as Europe holds most of the frozen assets, and “any Russian retaliation will probably fall on Europe, not the United States.” According to an unnamed US Treasury official, both the EU and US agree that “more needs to be done for Ukraine, but there is no consensus on specifics.” He added that “we’re thinking of the Russian sovereign assets as a sustainable medium-to-long-term solution for this funding problem.” The report comes as the US House of Representatives passed the Rebuilding Economic Prosperity and Opportunity for Ukrainians Act (REPO) on Saturday, which could allow the administration of US President Joe Biden to seize Russian assets in US banks and transfer them to Ukraine for reconstruction. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has warned that Russia will not leave the potential seizure unanswered, adding that the move could undermine the principle of the “inviolability of private… and state property,” as well as causing “irreparable damage to the US image.” Медиа: | ↑ |
The Senate is set to vote on additional support for Kiev on April 23 A date has been set for the US Senate to vote on an emergency spending bill that includes new funding for Ukraine, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) announced on Saturday. The upper chamber of the Congress will begin considering the legislation on Tuesday, April 23, with the final decision expected by the end of the week. Schumer praised the US House of Representatives for passing the bill after months of delays. Many Republican lawmakers previously refused to back the bill, tying their approval to demands for new funds to protect the country’s border with Mexico. The bill eventually passed by a vote of 311 to 112 on Saturday, with all Democrats and 101 Republicans voting in favor. “[The House] at long last approved desperately needed funding for Ukraine, for Israel, for the Indo-Pacific, and for humanitarian assistance… Our allies across the world have been waiting for this moment, and I assure them the Senate is on the path to pass the same bill soon,” Schumer said in a statement. The sweeping $95 billion package contains roughly $61 billion in financial assistance for Ukraine, including funds for the purchase of weapons and military equipment. The rest is allocated to Israel and Taiwan, among other priorities. After the measure is adopted by both chambers of Congress, it will need to be signed into law by US President Joe Biden. Since last year, Biden had been telling lawmakers to approve the package and blamed Ukraine’s battlefield setbacks on their failure to do so. He pledged to sign the bill without delay. “I urge the Senate to quickly send this package to my desk so that I can sign it into law and we can quickly send weapons and equipment to Ukraine to meet their urgent battlefield needs,” the president stated on Saturday. Read more Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said he was “grateful” to the House for passing the “vital” aid bill which, in his opinion, “will keep the war from expanding, [and] save thousands and thousands of lives.” Ukraine has suffered increasing shortages of ammunition and weaponry since Washington’s previous support package ran out earlier this year. Meanwhile, Russia warned that Western aid and especially weapons shipments to Ukraine will only exacerbate the conflict. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Saturday that the House vote will “further enrich the US and further ruin Ukraine,” while former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev stated it will inevitably prolong the fighting and “increase the number of victims of this war.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to make a decision soon regarding an ultra-orthodox Israeli military unit Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rebuked reported US plans to sanction an Israeli military unit composed primarily of ultra-Orthodox Jews which is under investigation for alleged human rights abuses against Palestinians. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected to announce sanctions on the Netzah Yehuda Battalion over alleged violations committed in the West Bank, US news site Axios wrote on Saturday, citing three anonymous US sources. In a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Saturday, Netanyahu condemned the idea of sanctioning the IDF, adding that he has been in touch with US officials to work against the potential decision. At a time when the IDF is “fighting terrorist monsters,” this intention is “the height of absurdity and a moral low,” he wrote, saying his government will act “by all means against these moves.” Read more The secretary of state was questioned on Israeli human rights violations in a press conference in Italy on Friday. “You’ll see results very soon. I’ve made determinations; you can expect to see them in the days ahead,” Blinken told journalists. He added that the US applies the Leahy Law “across the board,” and that it’s been gathering facts of the matter and analyzing them. The Leahy Law – named after its principal sponsor, Senator Patrick Leahy – prohibits the Departments of State and Defense from extending military assistance to foreign armies and law enforcement units that are proven to have flagrantly violated human rights. Should the sanctions go through, the unit will be banned from receiving any kind of US training or material assistance. According to one of Axios’ sources, the determination was based on incidents that occurred prior to the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel. One of the cases which brought attention to the unit was the 2022 death of 78-year-old Omar Assad, who was detained by Netzah Yehuda soldiers at a checkpoint in the West Bank, zip-tied, gagged, and left in a parking lot in the winter. An autopsy by three Palestinian physicians, noting injuries on his arms and legs, gave the cause of death as cardiac arrest from psychological stress resulting from physical violence, Israeli newspaper Haaretz said at the time. READ MORE: EU sanctions Israeli ‘extremists’ According to the newspaper, the unit was redeployed to the Golan Heights in Syria in January last year after a “relatively large number of incidents” in which soldiers were arrested for beating Palestinians. Медиа: | ↑ |
The platform says it has complied with an Australian eSafety order to remove posts on the attack Elon Musk’s social media platform X (formerly Twitter) has accused Australia’s eSafety commissioner of censorship, and vowed to contest in court an order to remove content related to the recent Sydney church stabbing. According to a statement issued by the social media giant on Saturday, the Australian online safety watchdog had demanded that the company “globally withhold these posts or face a daily fine of $785,000 AUD (about $500,000 USD).” On Monday, four people, including a bishop with a worldwide online following, were wounded in a knife attack at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in the district of Wakeley in Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was speaking during an evening service when a young man approached and lunged at him with a knife, repeatedly stabbing the bishop in the head and chest, while reportedly referring to insults against “my Prophet.” The incident – which also left two officers injured and was declared an act of terrorism by police – was captured on a church livestream and quickly circulated online. Read more Following the tragic event, the eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, issued a notice to X and Meta, ordering them to remove material that depicts “gratuitous or offensive violence with a high degree of impact or detail.” X hit back at the regulator, saying, “eSafety’s order was not within the scope of Australian law,” adding that the company complied with the directive “pending a legal challenge.” “While X respects the right of a country to enforce its laws within its jurisdiction, the eSafety Commissioner does not have the authority to dictate what content X’s users can see globally,” X’s Global Government Affairs team said in a statement. Elon Musk, the owner of X and free speech advocate, shared the post, saying, “The Australian censorship commissar is demanding *global* content bans!” While the eSafety commissioner’s office declined to comment on the statement, New South Wales Premier Chris Minns argued that the platform allowed “lies and rumors” about the stabbing to spread “like wildfire” but was not prepared to do anything when things went wrong. ”We have had enough, Sydney has had enough,” he said, calling for tougher regulations on social media platforms. Медиа: | ↑ |
The new advisers would help with logistics and weapons maintenance, Major General Pat Ryder has said The US is considering sending additional military advisers to its embassy in Kiev, Pentagon spokesperson Major General Pat Ryder told Politico magazine on Saturday. The troops would serve in non-combat roles, primarily supporting logistics, monitoring deliveries of US weapons, which Washington admits it often cannot trace once they arrive in Ukraine, and assisting with their maintenance. The news comes as the US House of Representatives passed a $61 billion aid bill on Saturday, with the Pentagon saying the package will include “things like air defense and artillery capabilities.” Although Ryder did not specify how many advisers would be sent to Kiev, citing “operational security and force protection reasons,” sources familiar with the matter told Politico that the number could be up to 60. The additional advisers could work at the Office of Defense Cooperation at the embassy, Ryder explained. Ukraine is struggling to regain the initiative on the battlefield in the wake of a failed counteroffensive last summer, as well as more recent losses exacerbated by a dwindling supply of foreign ammunition. Read more US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin recently admitted that “things on the battlefield begin to shift a bit in Russia’s favor,” with Kiev’s forces struggling “in terms of holding the line.” According to Politico, the advisers would be tasked with helping the Ukrainians with newly delivered equipment as the fighting is expected to intensify during the summer. Although President Joe Biden promised that American troops will not be sent to fight Russia in Ukraine, Moscow has warned that it considers the US and other NATO members de facto participants in the conflict. Russia has also criticized French President Emmanuel Macron and other European politicians who have said they cannot rule out deploying troops to Ukraine in the future. Russia maintains that no amount of foreign aid will change the course of the conflict or save Ukraine from defeat. Медиа: | ↑ |
The top US diplomat plans to threaten Beijing over weapons-related exports US Secretary of State Antony Blinken intends to warn Chinese officials of consequences for exporting materials to Russia with potential military applications, when he travels to Beijing on Wednesday. Blinken, who is scheduled to make stops in Beijing and Shanghai during a three-day trip to the People’s Republic of China (PRC), plans to meet with Foreign Minister Wang Yi. He will “reiterate deep concerns regarding the PRC’s support for Russia’s defense industrial base,” a US State Department spokesman told reporters. At issue are China’s exports of machine tools, microelectronics, optics, and other products that could be used to make weapons amid the conflict in Ukraine. US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen issued a similar warning when she visited China earlier this month. “The concern there is that through Chinese support, Russia has largely reconstituted its defense industrial base, which has an impact not just on the battlefield in Ukraine, but poses a larger threat, we believe, to broader European security,” the State Department spokesman said. “So that’s deeply concerning to us. We’ll express those concerns to China, and we will express our intent to have China curtail that support.” Read more The State Department has warned that it will take “further steps as necessary” to deter China from aiding Russia’s defense industry. “We’re committed to taking the steps necessary to defend our national interests, and we’re prepared to take steps when we believe necessary against firms that are taking steps in contravention to our interests and in ways that – as we’ve indicated here – severely undermine security in both Ukraine and Europe,” the spokesman said. Blinken raised the issue when he met with G7 leaders earlier this week in Italy. He will not specify the potential punishments during talks in Beijing, but new sanctions could target Chinese financial institutions, the Financial Times reported, citing unnamed people familiar with the matter. The US is being “very direct” about its concerns and will “hold China accountable” for its actions in providing dual-use technologies to Russia while trying to strengthen its ties with Europe, Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said. “What we’ve tried to underscore with European and Chinese interlocutors is that these dual objectives are inconsistent, and that we want China to think very carefully about the way forward.” READ MORE: Beijing criticizes proposed US sanctions Chinese officials have maintained a policy of neutrality on the Ukraine conflict and have insisted that Beijing is not selling weapons to Russia. They have bristled at the allegations of violating Western sanctions imposed on Moscow. “China regulates the export of dual-use articles in accordance with laws and regulations,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning told reporters earlier this week. “Relevant countries should not smear or attack the normal relations between China and Russia and should not harm the legitimate rights and interests of China and Chinese companies.” Медиа: | ↑ |
Cancelling sanctions relief and kicking out everyone else looks like a setup for an arranged marriage with Western oil giants Six months ago, high oil prices in America amid Western sanctions against Russian oil and gas sent the Biden administration scrambling for more supply that it could control – and ideally profit from. Washington couldn’t influence Russia and Saudi-led OPEC, or relent on the ideologically-driven sanctions idiocy, but it could at least maybe dial up or down the supply to mitigate domestic political fallout of any resulting price increases. So the White House considered the cards it could play, and offered Venezuela a deal to lift the American boot off its neck. It’s probably just a coincidence that the country happens to have the largest oil reserves on the planet – largely untapped. There’s also the added bonus of rapprochement to counter China and Russia’s advances in Washington’s backyard, or mitigating the influx of migrants from Venezuela to the US as a result of people fleeing a country struggling under a seemingly endless embargo. So Washington turned to the same Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro whom it indicted on “narcoterrorism” charges in 2020 – the same guy the US spent years delegitimizing by promoting another Venezuelan politician as the “real” president of the country. But instead of black-bagging him to collect the $15 million bounty they’re offering for information leading to his capture or conviction, the Americans made a deal with him. Read more Thanks to the US, Maduro had a few problems, but maybe those could go away, if he’d be willing to play ball with America on its own terms. American oil giant, Chevron, scored a license to pump Venezuelan oil in November 2022 – a month after the sanctions waiver was implemented – and in exchange, the US would unblock some of Caracas’ oil sale cash that had been confiscated as a result of US sanctions. Until now, the US simply allowed Venezuelan state oil giant Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) to export oil to the US market while invoking sanctions to seize its profits through PDVSA’s American subsidiary, Citgo, confiscating billions in Venezuelan oil revenue. Where did all that cash go? To fund Washington’s regime change puppets, back when the entire Western world was referring to handpicked Juan ‘Who?’ Guaido as the legitimate president of Venezuela. But since the Guaido project flamed out and Maduro was still in charge when the Ukraine conflict upended global oil markets through Western sanctions lunacy, the US sucked up any pride that it may have had left and said that it would let Venezuela get its hands on some of its own cash. Suddenly, Chevron was back plundering Venezuela’s black gold in exchange for Maduro promising to play nice in national elections. Just last month, Chevron announced a new drilling plan for Venezuela in a joint venture with PDVSA, with the goal of increasing output by 35% year-on-year by bringing new wells online. And a month before that, Chevron ramped drilling back up in the Orinoco Belt. Six months later, Washington has now let the sanctions waiver expire, and any temporary business licenses to operate in Venezuela along with it. Not that Chevron has much to worry about. The Biden administration has underscored that oil companies’ continued licensing would be considered on a case-by-case basis. Which sounds like a convenient way for Washington to keep the market for itself, or at least decide who gets access. Everyone else gets scared off by sanctions. Using sanctions as an instrument to control the global playing field isn’t new. It’s just getting harder to do amid increasing options as the rest of the world diversifies away from a Western-dominated global order. In February 2020, the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Russia’s Rosneft state oil company on accusations that it “brokered the sale and transport of Venezuelan crude oil” – something that the US will no doubt be cool with American competitors doing. “The United States is determined to prevent the looting of Venezuela’s oil assets by the corrupt Maduro regime,” then-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said, as the US was literally looting Venezuela’s oil assets and withholding the profits. Read more So what did Maduro do to give Washington an excuse to slap sanctions back on? Apparently it has to do with the disqualification of opposition candidate Maria Corina Machado from the presidential elections, set for July 2024. Disqualified by the Supreme Court for 15 years, Machado (whose candidacy has since been replaced by that of a former diplomat) is accused of involvement with “the corruption plot orchestrated by the usurper Juan Guaido,” and the marginalizing of the country which led to “dispossession of the companies and wealth of the Venezuelan people abroad, with the complicity of corrupt governments.” Machado did thank Israel for intervening in Venezuelan affairs by recognizing Guaido as the Western-selected interim president, and has argued in favor of the country’s National Assembly invoking an article that would allow it to authorize foreign missions inside Venezuela, arguing in favor of a “responsibility to protect” — the same provision that led to regime change in Libya under the slippery pretext of “humanitarian” intervention. Washington wants Venezuelan elections to be as democratic, free, and fair as its own. Which are super clean. Just ask former presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders, who was railroaded in the 2016 primary by the Democratic National Committee in collusion with the campaign of his rival, Senator and former First Lady Hillary Clinton, according to leaked documents posted online. Anything that Washington perceives to fall short of this stellar standard gives it an excuse to move the goalposts – once its own have had a chance to score some touchdowns. While democratic failings are cited, maybe the waiver cancellation now has more to do with the fact that US oil prices have fallen, production has skyrocketed at home, and domestic demand is now low. Perhaps Venezuela’s untapped oil potential was too much of a good thing, and there wasn’t any point in demanding that Maduro set a table for everyone to dine when he could just be having a romantic tête-à-tête – or more like an arranged marriage – with Washington’s favorites. The party’s over for everyone else and they’re now kindly being asked to leave before the cops (or OFAC) show up. Медиа: | ↑ |
Placing the former president in jail for violating a gag order would only increase his poll numbers, Mark Preston has claimed The possible arrest of former US President Donald Trump for violating his court-imposed gag order would trigger rioting and deal a potentially fatal blow to President Joe Biden’s re-election chances, CNN analyst Mark Preston warned on Friday. Trump is currently on trial in Manhattan for allegedly misreporting ‘hush-money’ payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels. Since last month, he has been forbidden from making public statements about Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg or the jurors working on the case, and from uttering anything that could interfere with the work of the court. Nevertheless, the former president has spoken to reporters outside the Manhattan courthouse every day this week, and Bragg’s team claims that he has already violated this gag order at least seven times. In one instance, Trump took to his Truth Social platform on Wednesday to share a quote from Fox News host Jesse Watters, who claimed that “undercover liberal activists” were “lying to the judge in order to get on the Trump jury.” Read more However, if the trial judge were to place Trump in a holding cell “for a few hours,” the end result would be “civil unrest across the country, certainly in some cities,” Preston said in a panel discussion with CNN host Jim Acosta. “And two, politically, if I’m the Biden campaign, I don’t want to necessarily see him in jail, because that’s just going to get people more inflamed and more fired up,” he added. The judge, Jaun Merchan, will hear arguments from the prosecution on Trump’s alleged violations of the gag order on Tuesday. “People are allowed to speak about me, and I have a gag order, just to show you how much more unfair it is,” Trump said outside the courthouse on Friday. The former president blasted the order as unconstitutional, telling reporters that it "has to come off.” Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee to challenge Biden in November’s presidential election. Despite the ongoing trial in Manhattan and three other criminal cases in the works, he is currently leading the incumbent in most polls by between one and ten points. Медиа: | ↑ |
The failed US presidential candidate has claimed that her former rival wants to be like Vladimir Putin and other “strongman leaders” Failed US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has claimed that Donald Trump, who defeated her in 2016, is a 'wannabe' strongman who aims to murder his political enemies. Speaking on Democrat activist Mark Elias' podcast posted on Friday, Clinton said American voters had underestimated how “dangerous” Trump would be as president. She likened Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee in this year’s US presidential election, to Russian President Vladimir Putin. “Putin does what [Trump] would like to do – kill his opposition, imprison his opposition, drive journalists and others into exile, rule without any check or balance,” Clinton said. “That’s what Trump really wants.” Ironically, Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have themselves long been accused by some conservatives of eliminating people who pose a threat to their power or wealth. Investigative journalist Danny Casolaro coined the conspiracist term “Clinton Body Count” in the late 1980s, in reference to the allegedly mysterious deaths of people with connections to the Clintons. Casolaro was found dead in a West Virginia hotel room in 1991 with his wrists slashed 10-12 times. His death was ruled a suicide. Read more Clinton also has made a habit of linking Trump to Russia and Putin. Her presidential campaign helped trigger allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 election by funding the since-discredited Steele dossier. She told Elias that Putin is just one of the US adversaries whom Trump would like to emulate, and that his other role models include Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. “We have to be very conscious of how he sees the world because in that world, he only sees strongman leaders,” Clinton said. “He sees Putin. He sees Xi. He sees Kim Jong-un in North Korea. Those are the people he is modeling himself after, and we’ve been down this road in our world history. We sure don’t want to go down that again.” Read more If Trump is elected president again, Clinton warned, “it will be like having a dictator. I don’t say that lightly. Go back and read Project 2025. They’re going to fire everybody. The person in the government who knows about what may be the next pandemic? ‘Get rid of him, he didn’t vote for me, or I don’t like the way he looks.’” She added: “It’s really important to think about what could happen to our world with Trump back in the White House – withdrawing us from NATO, not caring about what happens in Europe... the idea that he wants Ukraine to fail, the idea that he doesn’t want us to be able to surveil our enemies. I mean, this is a very scary prospect.” Clinton expressed optimism that Trump will not be able to defeat incumbent President Joe Biden in November because Democrats will be running the election in key states, including Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. READ MORE: Hillary Clinton claims Trump will turn US military on Americans Медиа: | ↑ |
The House has again passed legislation that would shut down the video-sharing platform if its Chinese owner doesn’t sell it The US House of Representatives has tied a law requiring Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok to be sold or banned, to emergency spending on the Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Hamas conflicts. The latest legislation targeting TikTok passed by a 360-58 House vote on Saturday. If approved it would give the video-sharing platform’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, nine months to sell the fast-growing business or risk having it barred from US app stores. House lawmakers passed a similar bill in March, saying TikTok was a “national security threat” because of its Chinese ownership. Supporters of the legislation are betting that by bundling it with several emergency spending bills passed on Saturday – including military aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan – they can force the Senate to approve it in an all-or-nothing vote. US President Joe Biden has said that he will sign the TikTok bill into law if it passes both houses of Congress. He and his Senate allies may be unable to resist approving the bundled security legislation after struggling for six months to win passage of additional Ukraine aid in the Republican-controlled House. Read more TikTok has lobbied against the legislation, saying it would trample the free-speech rights of its 170 million US users and harm the 7 million small businesses that rely on the platform. By combining the initiative with other bills, the House is “using the cover of important foreign and humanitarian assistance,” the company said. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) pushed through a wave of security-related bills on Saturday, including the various aid packages and legislation authorizing the Biden administration to liquidate seized Russian assets and give the proceeds to Ukraine. The aid bills provide funding for $95 billion in emergency spending, including $61 billion for Ukraine. The Ukraine bill passed by a margin of 311-112 as unanimous support from Democrat lawmakers enabled Johnson to override opposition in his own party. READ MORE: Trump comments on why he didn’t ban TikTok Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) called Saturday’s vote “despicable,” saying Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky had become “Mike Johnson’s puppet master.” She added, “Not only is Mike Johnson a traitor to our conference, he’s a traitor to our country.”
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Moscow’s forces have destroyed five US-made Abrams in Ukraine and damaged another three, the newspaper has claimed Expensive American M1 Abrams tanks delivered to Ukraine are increasingly falling prey to Russian drones that cost only a fraction as much, the New York Times reported on Saturday. Even “one of the most powerful symbols of American military might” is not invulnerable to the attacks, it said. At least five US-supplied tanks out of the 31 provided by Washington have already been destroyed by Russia, the media outlet said, adding that three others were “moderately damaged.” In most cases, the tanks have been destroyed by first-person-view (FPV) kamikaze drones, also known as loitering munitions. These drones are capable of maneuvering before hitting their targets. In at least one instance though, an Abrams tank was taken out in a duel against a Russian T-72B3 main battle tank. The Russian military has published upwards of a dozen clips, mostly taken from drones, showing the destruction of US-supplied equipment. Read more According to the NYT, the tanks turned out to be “more easily taken out by exploding drones than some officials and experts had initially assumed.” The media outlet cited Austrian historian and military expert Colonel Markus Reisner, who described the situation as “unbelievable.” The paper also described the Russian UAVs as “highly-accurate, low-cost tank killers.” The drones’ accuracy exceeds 90%, the NYT said, adding that they are also capable of hitting heavy armor in its weakest spots. The UAVs “can cost as little as $500,” the paper reported, and are capable of “taking out a $10 million Abrams tank.” The paper noted that there is no “easy, or single” way to defend a tank against a drone attack. US-made Abrams tanks made their long-expected appearance on the front line in late February amid the Ukrainian effort to halt advancing Russian troops after the capture of the Donbass city of Avdeevka. A batch of 31 M1 Abrams tanks was pledged to Kiev early last year, ahead of the ultimately disastrous Ukrainian counteroffensive. The delivery was made in full by mid-October, when the ill-fated push had already largely been exhausted. Медиа: | ↑ |
If Olaf Scholz wanted to send Taurus missiles to Kiev, he could find a “technological solution,” CEO Michael Schoellhorn has said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz could supply Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine without sending German military specialists to operate them, the head of Airbus’ defense division has told Der Spiegel. Scholz has insisted that the need for German personnel prevents him from sending the missiles to Kiev. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and his officials have been asking Berlin for Taurus missiles for almost a year, but Scholz has thus far refused to consider the request. Speaking to the news agency dpa in February, the chancellor claimed that German military technicians would have to be deployed to Ukraine to operate the air-launched missiles, making them active participants in the conflict with Russia. Airbus Defense and Space CEO Michael Schoellhorn believes that Scholz has no desire to give the missiles to Ukraine, and is using the need for German involvement as an excuse. “The chancellor has decided on the issue. His argument is political,” Schollhorn told Der Spiegel in an interview published on Saturday. Read more “If there was the will to deliver, technological solutions would be found to use the Taurus in Ukraine without German participation,” he continued. “But I can understand the political arguments.” Developed by Germany’s MBDA Deutschland and Sweden’s Saab Bofors Dynamics, the Taurus KEPD-350 is an air-launched cruise missile capable of carrying a 480kg warhead over a maximum distance of 500km. Armed with these missiles, Ukraine could launch strikes deeper into Russian territory than with British Storm Shadow or French SCALP-EG missiles, which have a maximum range of around 300km. MBDA Deutschland’s parent company is owned by Airbus, BAE Systems, and Leonardo. Kiev has specifically asked for Taurus missiles to strike the Crimean Bridge, one of several key transport links between the peninsula and the Russian mainland. In a conversation leaked in March, senior German military chiefs discussed how the missiles could be given to Ukraine for this purpose while concealing German involvement. However, if Ukraine were to take delivery of the missiles, its air force would struggle to launch them. At present, only five aircraft – the Panavia PA-200 Tornado, Eurofighter Typhoon EF-2000, and McDonnell Douglas EF-18A+ Hornet – are capable of carrying Taurus missiles. The Ukrainian military would either have to develop adapters to allow its Soviet-era MiG-29 and Su-24 aircraft to fire them, or lobby the West to provide aircraft capable of doing so. Медиа: | ↑ |
The Senate has passed a controversial bill that enables the FBI to surveil Americans without warrants The US Senate has expanded a law that enables the government to conduct warrantless surveillance of Americans under the guise of protecting them from foreign threats. The bill authorizing a two-year extension of the so-called Section 702 program of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) was approved by a 60-34 vote in the early morning hours of Saturday. President Joe Biden is expected to sign the legislation, renewing the spying tool after it expired at midnight on Saturday. Section 702 is ostensibly about surveilling the communications of foreigners for intelligence purposes, including detection of possible terrorist plots against the US. Many of the phone calls and messages that are tapped by Washington’s spying apparatus occur between foreigners and US citizens. Read more The FBI has accessed the 702 database of intercepted communications to investigate targeted Americans, such as Black Lives Matters activists, journalists, members of Congress, political donors, and possible participants in the January 2021 US Capitol riot. Such searches normally require investigators to secure a warrant, meaning a court has found probable cause to suspect that the targeted person has committed a crime. Critics of the program had demanded that reforms be made before renewing Section 702 to protect US citizens from unconstitutional spying. A 2023 investigation by the US FISA court found that the FBI had illegally used its surveillance powers against American citizens more than 278,000 times in a 12-month period. Congress voted down an amendment that would have required warrants for probes of communications involving Americans. “Section 702 has been abused under presidents from both political parties, and it has been used to unlawfully surveil the communications of Americans across the political spectrum,” said Kia Hamadanchy, senior policy counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union. “By expanding the government’s surveillance powers without adding a warrant requirement that would protect Americans, the House has voted to allow the intelligence agencies to violate the civil rights and liberties of Americans for years to come.” Read more Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) hailed the fact that the FISA program was reauthorized “in the nick of time,” just as it was expiring. Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida) said that failure to renew the spying powers could cause US officials to “miss a key piece of intelligence,” such as a threat to American troops stationed overseas or a potential terrorist attack. Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) lamented the fact that lawmakers declined to pass his amendments to the FISA bill, which would have enabled the government to continue spying on foreigners while protecting the civil liberties of Americans. His proposal was voted down by an 82-11 margin. “We could have ensured both constitutional rights and national security were protected,” Paul said. “Yet again, the Senate was asked to consider the question: ‘Can liberty be exchanged for security?’ And sadly, the majority of senators said, ‘Yes, it can.’”
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Lawmakers have authorized $61 billion to support Kiev in its conflict with Russia US lawmakers have passed an emergency bill granting more weapons and money to Ukraine. The bill, which grants Kiev a $61 billion war chest, had been stalled since last fall over concern that Washington was merely prolonging the conflict with Russia without offering a strategy for victory or a peace settlement. The Ukraine, Israel and Indo-Pacific bills will be combined into a $95 billion emergency spending package to enable quick passage by the Senate and final approval by Biden. Members of Congress cheered and waved Ukrainian flags as the votes were being counted, prompting an admonishment by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana). Johnson had blocked the legislation since last fall, given that most members of his party oppose prolonging the Ukraine conflict. Passed by a margin of 311-112 on Saturday, all Democrats and 101 Republicans voted in favor of the move. Asked on Thursday why he had dropped his opposition to the bill, putting himself at risk of being ousted as House speaker, Johnson told reporters, “History judges us for what we do. This is a critical time right now – a critical time on the world stage.” He tried to blunt opposition by labeling some of the Ukraine aid as loans. Biden’s administration ran out of Ukraine funding earlier this year, after burning through $113 billion in previously approved aid packages. With weapons shipments from its biggest benefactor disrupted, Kiev has suffered ammunition shortages in recent months. Biden has blamed Republican lawmakers for battlefield defeats -- including the fall of Avdeevka, a key Ukrainian stronghold, in February – saying “congressional inaction” led to “notable gains” by Russian forces. Read more The House also voted on Saturday to approve separate bills providing $26 billion in aid to Israel and $8 billion for Taiwan and other Indo-Pacific region allies. In addition, the emergency spending package includes $9 billion in humanitarian aid for civilians in Gaza and other war zones. Representative Al Green (D-Texas) told reporters that lawmakers were coming together in a bipartisan way to overcome “pro-Putin obstructionists,” suggesting that only agents of Russian President Vladimir Putin oppose funding the Ukraine conflict. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia), who has called for Johnson to be replaced as speaker, called Saturday’s vote “despicable.” She added, “We should be demanding peace, not funding the military industrial complex’s blood-money wars, fueled by dead bodies in Ukraine.” Медиа: | ↑ |
An activist prevented from crossing a street near a pro-Palestinian rally has accused the force of “victim blaming” The Metropolitan Police has issued not one, but two apologies over a video that surfaced online showing one of its officers telling a campaigner against anti-Semitism that he could not cross a road near a pro-Palestinian rally due to being “openly Jewish.” The incident happened last Saturday as tens of thousands gathered in London to demand a ceasefire in Gaza and urge the British government to stop arms sales to Israel. In the clip, a policeman was captured blocking the path of Gideon Falter, chief executive of the Campaign Against Antisemitism, who says he was returning from synagogue and was wearing a traditional Jewish kippah skull cap. “You are quite openly Jewish, this is a pro-Palestinian march, I’m not accusing you of anything, but I’m worried about the reaction to your presence,” the officer is heard telling Falter. Another officer in the footage told the activist that his presence in the area was “antagonizing.” Falter later claimed that he had no intention of staging a counter-protest, but was just going about his business. “Instead of addressing that threat of antisemitic violence, the Met’s policy instead seems to be that law-abiding Jewish Londoners should not be in the parts of London where these marches are taking place. In other words, that they are no-go zones for Jews,” he said. Read more A few days later, assistant police commissioner Matt Twist issued an apology on X (formerly Twitter), saying that the use of the phrase “openly Jewish” was “hugely regrettable.” At the same time, Twist said that there is a “new trend” of those opposing pro-Palestinian marches appearing along their route to show their stance, “knowing their presence is provocative.” However, Falter was dissatisfied with the apology and accused the force of “victim- blaming.” The Metropolitan Police then deleted the initial message and issued a new apology on Friday. It reiterated that the use of the term “openly Jewish” was “hugely regrettable.” The force also said that “in an effort to make a point about the policing of protest we have caused further offense. This was never our intention.” “Being Jewish is not a provocation. Jewish Londoners must be able to feel safe in this city. Our commitment to protecting the public extends to all communities across London,” the statement read. READ MORE: US blocks Palestine’s UN membership bid The death toll from Israel’s airstrikes and ground offensive in Gaza over the past six months has surpassed 34,000, according to the enclave’s health ministry. The campaign was launched in response to a raid into Israel by Palestinian armed group Hamas on October 7, in which at least 1,200 were killed and 250 taken hostage. Медиа: | ↑ |
Isra Hirsi has said she was suspended after police raided a demonstration at Columbia University Minnesota Representative Ilhan Omar’s daughter has been suspended from Columbia University for taking part in a pro-Palestinian demonstration on campus. The protest camp was raided by police on Thursday. Demonstrators set up around 50 tents in front of the New York university on Wednesday, demanding that college officials cut ties with Israel-linked companies and publicly call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The following day, university President Nemat Shafik summoned the New York Police Department to clear the camp, explaining in a letter to faculty that the protesters had “violated a long list of rules and policies.” Columbia University said that all of the arrested students had been suspended. At least three students were suspended, but not arrested. Among them was Isra Hirsi, Omar’s daughter. “I’m an organizer with CU Apartheid Divest,” Hirsi wrote on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday. “In my 3 years at Barnard College I have never been reprimanded or received any disciplinary warnings. I just received notice that i am 1 of 3 students suspended for standing in solidarity with Palestinians facing a genocide.” Read more “Those of us in Gaza Solidarity Encampment will not be intimidated. We will stand resolute until our demands are met,” she continued. “Our demands include divestment from companies complicit in genocide, transparency of Columbia’s investments and FULL amnesty for all students facing repression.” Hirsi is a sociology student at Barnard College, a private women’s liberal arts college run by Columbia University. CU Apartheid Divest is part of the wider BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement, which calls for the financial isolation of Israel over its treatment of the Palestinians. As suspension notices were handed out to Hirsi and her fellow Barnard students, Omar questioned Shafik at a congressional hearing on Thursday. Omar, who did not mention that her daughter was taking part in the protests, accused Shafik of throttling the free speech rights of pro-Palestinian students, while pro-Israeli lawmakers accused the president of failing to tackle an alleged rise in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. READ MORE: Google fires anti-Israel employees Omar, a Somalian refugee living in the US since 1995, is an ardent critic of Israel. Since Israel declared war on Hamas last October, she has repeatedly condemned the Jewish state’s “unconscionable brutality” toward the civilian population of Gaza, and lobbied President Joe Biden to press Israel toward a ceasefire. In 2019, Omar was accused by Jewish groups of anti-Semitism for suggesting that US support for Israel was “all about the Benjamins,” and for accusing Jewish Americans of harboring a “dual loyalty” to Israel. Медиа: | ↑ |
A new law seeks to make students immune to ideological “indoctrination” in colleges and universities Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has signed into state law a bill that would mandate curriculum about “the dangers and evils of Communism” for students starting in kindergarten. The legislation was signed on the anniversary of a botched US attempt to topple Cuban Communist leader Fidel Castro at the height of the Cold War. The law, which will take effect in July, requires all public schools to teach the history of Communism in an age-appropriate manner beginning in the 2026-2027 school year. Instruction about Communism must provide a history of the movement both at home and abroad and focus on its perceived atrocities abroad. It must also emphasize “the increasing threat of Communism in the United States and to our allies” in the 20th century, including events in China and the spread of red ideology in Latin America and Cuba, the new legislation states. One of the main goals of the curriculum is said to be to “prepare… students to withstand indoctrination of Communism at colleges and universities,” DeSantis’ office explained in a press release. Read more Touting the legislation, the governor stressed that “we will not allow our students to live in ignorance, nor be indoctrinated by Communist apologists in schools. To the contrary, we will ensure students in Florida are taught the truth about the evils and dangers of Communism.” According to State Education Commissioner Manny Diaz, the instruction about Communism will be “spread across the curriculum, K [kindergarten] through 12 [twelfth grade].” The new law came on the 63rd anniversary of the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, an attempted incursion on the south coast of Cuba by a Cuban exile force that was heavily backed by the US. The attempted military landing was a direct response to the revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power two years earlier. The attack, however, ended in disaster and had the effect of pushing Cuba closer to the Soviet Union and setting the stage for the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, which brought the world to the brink of nuclear war. In 1961, the administration of US President John Kennedy also authorized Operation Mongoose, a campaign of attacks on civilian facilities in Cuba and covert actions designed to undermine Castro’s government. Медиа: | ↑ |
The deceased was identified by police as Max Azzarello, a self-proclaimed “investigative researcher” from Florida A man who set himself on fire outside the New York City courthouse where former US President Donald Trump is being tried ended up dying of severe burns late on Friday, local media reported, citing the New York Police Department (NYPD). The man was identified as 37-year-old Max Azzarello from St. Augustine, Florida. The disturbing incident occurred on Friday afternoon, the fourth day of the trial in which Trump is defending himself against charges of illegally covering up so-called ‘hush-money’ payments to a porn star. Azzarello reportedly approached a group of Trump supporters gathered outside the courthouse and distributed pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories. He then doused himself in flammable liquid and set himself ablaze. The fire reportedly lasted around three minutes before being put out. Azzarello was then taken to a nearby hospital and was reportedly in critical condition upon arrival and died hours later. Four police officers reportedly sustained minor injuries from their exposure to the fire and were also hospitalized. Police said a bomb squad unit was deployed to search the area as a precaution. Azzarello’s motives for the self-immolation are being investigated. NYPD deputy commissioner Tarik Sheppard said he did not appear to be targeting Trump specifically or anyone else involved in the trial. Warning: extremely graphic content:
“Right now we are labelling him as sort of a conspiracy theorist, and we are going from there,” he stated at a press briefing. The pamphlets distributed by Azzarello included a link to a Substack account on which he identified himself as “an investigative researcher.” A manifesto allegedly written by Azzarello and posted on the website The Ponzi Papers said that his “extreme act of protest” was intended to draw attention to an “apocalyptic fascist world coup” being prepared by the US government and its allies. READ MORE: Jury selection begins in Trump hush-money trial According to the New York Post, citing police records, Azzarello had previously been arrested three times on charges that included criminal mischief and disturbing the peace. Police documents from his latest arrest in August of last year indicated that Azzarello was suicidal. Медиа: | ↑ |
Tehran’s top diplomat has refused to blame Israel for Friday’s attack on the country Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian has downplayed the significance of Friday’s drone attack on the country, saying that it was minor in scale and involved primitive hardware. The claims by some media outlets that explosions in the skies above the Iranian city of Isfahan, which hosts a major airbase, were a retaliatory strike by Israel are “not accurate,” Amirabdollahian said in an interview with NBC News on Saturday. “What happened last night was not a strike,” he insisted, adding that the attack involved just two or three small UAVs, which “were more like toys that our children play with, not drones.” The UAVs “took off from inside Iran, flew for a hundred meters and then they were struck by our air defense,” the minister added. Israel, which typically neither confirms nor denies operations on foreign soil, declined to comment on whether it was involved in the Isfahan attack. According to the Iranian foreign minister, Tehran is not planning any further actions against Israel. Read more “As long as there is no new adventurism by Israel against our interests, then we are not going to have any new reactions,” he explained. However, if the Israeli authorities continue taking provocative steps, “our response will be immediate and to the maximum and will cause them to regret it,” Amirabdollahian warned. In early April, a strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, which Tehran blamed on Israel, left two generals and several other senior officers dead. Tehran struck back last week by firing several hundred missiles and drones at military targets inside Israel. While Iranian officials dubbed the operation a “success,” the IDF claimed that most of the incoming munitions were shot down. Israel promised payback for the attack, while the US declared that it doesn’t want to see the conflict escalate. US President Joe Biden also reportedly urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to show restraint in an effort to avoid a further military escalation. The attack on Israeli territory was intended as “a warning,” Amirabdollahian said. “We could have hit Haifa and Tel Aviv,” but didn’t do so because targeting civilians is a “red line” for Tehran, he added. Israel blames Iran for what it claims is its involvement in the Hamas attack on October 7, in which at least 1,200 were killed and 250 taken hostage. Tehran doesn’t deny having contacts with Hamas, but insists that it had no prior knowledge of the raid. READ MORE: Musk weighs in on Israel’s strike on Iran The death toll from Israel’s airstrikes and ground offensive in Gaza over the past six months has surpassed 34,000, according to the enclave’s health ministry. Медиа: | ↑ |
The new Army Information Support Force will contribute to “competitiveness in modern warfare,” the Chinese leader has said Chinese leader Xi Jinping has announced a major revamp of the military, creating a new Army Information Support Force which will be responsible for dealing with hybrid warfare. The announcement was made at a ceremony in Beijing on Friday. Xi stated that China must prioritize the development of its military in the modern era, as well as enhancing its capabilities through reform, science, and new talent. The Chinese leader described the newly created wing of the army as a ‘strategic force’ that will provide indispensable support for coordinating and using information system networks. “It will play a crucial role in advancing the Chinese military’s high-quality development and competitiveness in modern warfare,” he said, according to the Chinese government’s website. General Bi Yi was appointed commander of the new military branch, with General Li Wei appointed as political commissar. In the People’s Liberation Army, commissars serve as second-in-command and are largely responsible for administrative tasks and political education. Read more Xi also noted that it is important to “adhere to information-led and joint victory, smooth information links, integrated information resources,” as well as strengthening information protection. Meanwhile, Beijing dissolved its Strategic Support Force, which was created in 2015 to enhance China’s expertise in space, cyber, political, and electronic warfare, and help it fight in “informationized conflicts.” Commenting on the reforms, Defense Ministry spokesman Wu Qian said China now has four military services – the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Rocket Force, and four arms – the Aerospace Force, Cyberspace Force, Information Support Force, and Joint Logistics Support Force. The military reform, which was described by Bloomberg as the largest since 2015, follows the dismissal of nine senior military officers from parliament in December, including four who had served in the Rocket Force. This also comes after former defense chief Li Shangfu was sacked in October. Beijing offered no explanation for these reshuffles, but Western media reports indicated that Li was under investigation for alleged corruption. China has consistently taken steps to bolster its military capabilities amid its rivalry with the US, which has only intensified in recent years due to the stand-off over Taiwan. While China considers the self-governed island to be part of its sovereign territory, Washington has approved sales of military equipment to Taipei, with President Joe Biden pledging to defend it in case of an incursion by Beijing. Медиа: | ↑ |
