In this interview on Going Underground, Afshin Rattansi speaks to ex-US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s chief of staff and retired US Army Colonel, Lawrence Wilkerson.
The rest of the big five need to match Moscow’s commitment to avoiding nuclear war, the Foreign Ministry insists. Moscow is “strictly and consistently” guided by the principle that a nuclear war can never be won and should never be fought, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday, calling on other atomic powers to “demonstrate in practice” their own commitment to this.
The lab team behind the mutant variant was accused of “playing with fire.” Scientists at Boston University claim to have created a new variant of Covid-19 with an 80% mortality rate, by combining the highly-transmissible Omicron variant of the coronavirus with the original Wuhan strain. The research, which echoes experiments thought to have created the virus in the first place, has caused outrage.
On this episode of Going Underground, Afshin Rattansi speaks to Australian journalist and filmmaker John Pilger about the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban. Pilger demonstrates a really solid grip on history here, rendering almost irrelevant most other discussions of recent events in Afghanistan. He describes the US military as a killing machine and discusses why the Afghanistan war must be viewed through the lens of Western imperialism, the scale of civilian casualties, and destruction of Afghanistan by NATO countries, how the US created today’s situation by supporting Afghan jihadist forces against the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War, the social progress and progressive reform lost to history with the fall of the Soviet-backed PDPA government in Afghanistan, and much more! Pilger also discusses the anniversary of the Pinochet coup in Chile and the trial of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Previously published as First they came for Julian (2/11/20) | RT, Renegade Inc.
Attacks on human rights and freedom of speech are at the center of the Julian Assange extradition case, so why has the press coverage been so minimal?
The case may split opinion, but punishing Assange and others for bringing to public attention serious violations by our governments is averting our attention away from the bigger picture.
In the embedded video, below, journalist Richard Medhurst joins host Ross Ashcroft to discuss.
Our version of capitalism is something the narcissistic writer Ayn Rand would have adored, but in a headlong rush to hyper-individualism, have we chosen freedom of the individual over the survival of our species…
Host Ross Ashcroft is joined by economist and author, Professor Steve Keen to discuss why coronavirus has closed capitalism.
Hot-head President Erdogan seems to be threatening a full-scale invasion of Syria, which would risk major conflict between Russia and the United States. Erdogan is obsessed with the idea of heading up a new Ottoman Empire. These ambitions and Turkey's geographical location make him susceptible to manipulation by restless world powers with a variety of geopolitical interests in the region. We republish this article from https://www.rt.com/news/481179-erdogan-idlib-operation-imminent/ where it first appeared on 19 Feb, 2020 09:14.
A new Turkish military incursion into Syria’s Idlib governorate has been planned and may start at any moment, President Recep Erdogan has warned, ramping up a tense standoff with Damascus.
Ankara will not “leave Idlib to the Assad regime and its backers,” Erdogan vowed, referring to the Syrian government and, apparently, to Russia and Iran. Speaking to lawmakers on Wednesday, he said his words were “a final warning.”
The Turkish president also said negotiations with Russia over Idlib have so far failed to meet Ankara’s demands. He said he wanted the province to be safe for Turkey, “no matter the cost.”
The northwestern Syrian province bordering Turkey is the last major stronghold of anti-government forces in the protracted civil war. Ankara backs some of the armed groups in the area, but there is also a strong presence of jihadists, who have no interest in a peaceful resolution of the conflict. Under an agreement with Russia, Turkey is supposed to use its leverage in Idlib to curb violence and prevent attacks on other parts of Syria.
The arrangement never fully worked, with Damascus regularly complaining about cross-border militant attacks. Its response was to gradually take control over some parts of the province, forcing jihadists to retreat. Since last month the advancements put Syrian troops in direct opposition to Turkish forces, which have been deployed in Idlib to monitor the situation. At least two clashes between them have resulted in casualties among the Turks, angering Ankara.
Moscow is mediating in the situation to prevent it from boiling over into a major confrontation. Erdogan has demanded that Damascus pull back its forces from Idlib and threatened to use the Turkish army to force a retreat if necessary.
The otherwise informative and insightful News With Rick Sanchez bulletin of 11 October trivialised attempts by the the U.S government to enforce its immigration laws. This is in contrast with the treatment of illegal immigration by Mike Papontonio, presenter of RT's America's Lawyer in Corporations defend DACA: Don’t deport our cheap labor! (10/10/19) its most recent weekly episode. (Both programs are embedded within this article.)
Near the end of RT America's News with Rick Sanchez, the usually insightful and informative presenter, Rick Sanchez, together with Lee Camp, the presenter of Redacted Tonight spoke mockingly of how the U.S. Secretary for Homeland Security Kevin MacAleenan was confronted by a group of pro-refugee protestors at Georgetown:
Lee Camp: I talk about how the Secretary for Homeland Security Kevin MacAleenan, went to speak at Georgetown and protestors stood up - protesters unhappy with the way we are treating immigrants at the border - migrants, refugees, and they shouted him down and he tried many times to speak -probably lasted about seven minutes and eventually just left. And for, that's my Super Bowl. I was sitting there with my phone there in the one hand.
Rick Sanchez: Yes!
Lee Camp: I was having a blast.
Rick Sanchez: It seemed to me when I was watching that Video that he probably could have challenged them a little bit and said "Let's talk about this." He exited real early. I think he's a bit of a wuss. I don't know.
Lee Camp: (laughs)
Rick Sanchez: Because we all know that a guy who just came to the United States not long ago and is making minimum wage. (raises his hand, shakes and points to Lee Camp) He's the problem!
Lee Camp: Yes!
Rick Sanchez: He's why America's in its downfall!
…
The full 28 minute episode is embedded below.
In contrast, on 10 October, one day prior to this, Mike Papantonio, presenter of America's Lawyer, presented in the episode, Corporations defend DACA: Don’t deport our cheap labor! a sober and informed discussion of how many large U.S. corporations use cheaper labour from the migrants that U.S. Secretary for Homeland Security Kevin MacAleenan was trying to stop from illegally entering the United States to undercut the wage and working conditions ofthe United States' current workforce. That video is also embedded below.
RT's Redacted Tonight, hosted by Lee Camp, has, for years effectively spoken up against the crimes and lies of the ruling elites of the United States and its allies, with parody, humour as well as sound and insightful reporting. One exception to this is Redacted Tonight's ill-considered and strident advocacy for immigrant rights. In the latest episode of 12 October 2019, Lee Camp has taken this much further and has clearly violated one basic principle of investigative journalism. He has unashamedly applauded the censorship of view opposed to mass immigration and the enforcement of the United States' immigration laws. As he explains in the video, he considers this view to be so odious that 'refugee rights' advocates are entitled to silence them at public meetings such as Secretary for Homeland Security Kevin MacAleenan was, as shown in the video footage of the meeting at Georgetown University. As far as I am aware, MacAleenan's 'repugnant' views are supported by the overwhelming majority of United Staes' citizens.
The following is Trump official shut down, class solidarity from the rich, attack drones the 12 October episode of RT's Redacted Tonight.
The episode starts off with the host Lee Camp celebrating the way that Secretary for Homeland Security Kevin MacAleenan was shouted down by crown of refugee and immigrant advocates at a public meeting at Georgetown University. Camp describes Kevin MacAleenan as "a piece of shit" and a "sack of garbage".
Later on, he says, "I think it's very important that we as citizens of this fine nation give him a chance to tell us about all the wonderful things he does you know maybe he'll tell us how he he can fit a child in a small Tupperware container and maybe maybe he'll let us know how to best teach he'll let us know how to best teach Border Patrol agents to be so very racist …"
However MacAleen was not given a chance to explain the U.S. government's immigration laws, border control policies and why the government felt them to be necessary. Each time he tried to speak, he was shouted down by the crowd.
Eventually, Kevin MacAleenan gave up and left without being able to put his case to the meeting - an outcome which Lee Camp applauded.
Russia is preparing itself to be disconnected from the World Wide Web. The Lower House of Parliament passed in the first reading a law ensuring the security of the Russian part of the internet. The bill envisions the ‘Runet’ – the Russian segment of the internet – being able to operate independently from the rest of the world in case of global malfunctions or deliberate internet disconnection. The measures to ensure internet stability include the creation of a national DNS system that stores all of the domain names and corresponding IP numbers. (Article first published at RT on 13 February 2019.)
The bill envisions the ‘Runet’ – the Russian segment of the internet – being able to operate independently from the rest of the world in case of global malfunctions or deliberate internet disconnection. The measures to ensure internet stability include the creation of a national DNS system that stores all of the domain names and corresponding IP numbers.
The new legislation was drafted in response to the new US cyber strategy that accuses Russia, along with China, Iran, and North Korea, of using cyber tools to “undermine” its economy and democracy. It also threatens dire consequences for anyone conducting cyber activity against the US.
The autonomous system would ensure that Russia doesn’t face a total internet shutdown if relations with the West completely collapse and the US goes as far as cutting off Russian IP addresses from the World Wide Web.
Back in 2012, then-US President Barack Obama signed an executive order allowing him to take control of all communications on American soil, including those crucial for the normal operation of the internet.
The US National Security Agency actually caused a three-day internet blackout in Syria in November 2012, whistleblower Edward Snowden told Wired magazine. NSA hackers accidently ‘bricked’ one of the core routers while trying to install spyware on it.
(Article first published on RT at on 3 July 2018.) A senior Russian diplomat has told reporters that the country has everything to launch its own independent internet, but added that this would be done only if things go completely sour due to the efforts of “Western partners”.
“There are technical, financial, intellectual and all the rest necessary resources for this, but I don’t think that anyone really wants this,” the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department for New Challenges and Threats, Ilya Rogachev, said in comments with TASS.
“The primary thing that could lead to such outcome is the policy of our Western partners, in particular the imposing of double standards. If they continue to impose double standards then we can start talking about creating a parallel internet in Russia, as a sort of a worst-case scenario,” the diplomat added.
Russia to launch ‘independent internet’ for BRICS nations - report Russia to launch ‘independent internet’ for BRICS nations - report
In November 2017 the top Russian advisory body – the Security Council - asked the country’s government to develop an independent internet infrastructure for BRICS bloc (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), which would continue to work in the event of global internet malfunctions. According to Russian mass media, President Vladimir Putin personally set a deadline of August 1, 2018 for the completion of the task.
One of the council members described the main reason behind the project as “the increased capabilities of Western nations to conduct offensive operations in the informational space as well as the increased readiness to exercise these capabilities pose a serious threat to Russia’s security.”
Majority of Russians support ‘own internet’ for BRICS nations Majority of Russians support ‘own internet’ for BRICS nations
In March, the then-presidential aide on the internet issues, German Klimenko, told the press that Russia was ready to run its own isolated internet in case the Western sanctions lead to isolating the country from the world wide web. However, the official noted that the shutdown would not be painless.
The Russian segment of the internet, intended especially for civil servants, is already working, Klimenko noted. He also reminded people that Russia, like China and the United States, has its own search engines, social networks and advertising.
“The internet is being regulated in all countries and Russia is no exception. However, extreme options like North Korean or Cuba are not our choice,” he said.
The Syrian Kurds have asked Syria to help them because Turkey is threatening them. President Erdogan treats them as an extension of the Kurds in Turkey who want independence from Turkey. During the main part of the war in Syria (which seems to be tailing off now) the Kurds fought the Takfiri rebels. The United States, which supplied a lot of the so-called rebels including ISIS (indirectly at least) at times appeared to support Kurdish independence, using them as a lever against the Syrian Government. The Kurds had been offered control of their own department by the Syrian Government, but not actual independent state status. The US rewarded a Kurdish independence movement against Syria, although it is not clear that all Kurds in Syria really wanted this. The region also contains substantial minorities of Arabs and others whom a separate Kurdish state might not have suited. Until Russia intervened in the war (at the invitation of the Syrian Government) it looked like the United States backed terrorists were going to tear the country apart. The UN and NATO and its allies, including Australia, all supported this with a policy of removing President Assad and splitting Syria into many little states. The western public and corporate media provided propaganda to support this. Western readers were given no critical comparison with the prior destruction of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, states destroyed by the same kind of tactics. YouTube gave great comfort to these lies when it suddenly removed all of the Syrian Presidency's interviews, claiming some breach of advertising. [Suddenly some of them are back, as the wind is changing.] Since the insurgency began in 2011, Turkey provided a covert base for terrorists to attack Syria from. After Russia intervened with the invitation of Syria, the US, which was an illegal and unwelcome presence in Syria, tried to get Turkey to support it. As it was also promoting the idea of the Kurds having an independent state, Turkey's support could never be relied on. Turkey could always align itself with the Russians, although, in the end, it seemed to prefer to be independent and it has its own ambitions to dominate the region. By outing the murder of the journalist, Kashoggi, in the Saudi Embassy in Turkey, Turkey has made itself look a bit respectable, but it is not inconceivable that Erdogan is supporting the ruling elite in Saudi Arabia against the Crown Prince, for strategic purposes. No-one really knows. Whilst Turkey is not a Wahabist state, Erdogan is a leader in the Muslim Brotherhood, which wants to establish a new Muslim caliphate in the Middle East and much of Europe. Syria is a multi-religion state which includes many Christians and it does not support a Muslim caliphate. This editorial is by Sheila Newman and James Sinnamon, candobetter editors. We have republished the following report on the state of the war in Syria from RT.
Republishing from RT at https://www.rt.com/news/447572-syrian-forces-enter-manbij/.
Damascus says it has deployed troops to the city of Manbij, the focal point of a tense standoff between Kurds and Turkey, as the government continues attempts to reassert control over the strategic border area in Syria’s north.
The Kurdish YPG militia on Friday called on Damascus to secure Manbij, located close to the border with Turkey. Ankara earlier said it plans to conduct an “anti-terrorist operation” around the city, with the YPG being the target.
In response, Damascus said its troops were already in the north and raised the flag in the “area of Manbij.” In a statement from the general staff broadcast by the Syrian media, the top brass said their army was determined to “crush terrorism and defeat all invaders and occupiers” as well as to provide security for all Syrian citizens.
Also on rt.com
Kurdish YPG calls on Syrian government to protect Manbij from Turkish attack
Just how far-reaching the Syrian deployment is and if it’s taking place at all is yet to be confirmed by other sources, as is the Syrian Army troops’ arrival in the city proper.
Skeptical over the statement from Damascus, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called the “flag-raising” a “psychological action.” He, however, acknowledged that there would be no need for the Turkish Army op in Manbij if the Kurds pull out of the city.
Meanwhile, Turkey-backed militants opposed to both the government and the Kurds said they were moving fighters towards Manbij and were prepared to start an operation there, if necessary.
Damascus is trying to assert full control over Syrian territory, a goal that remains elusive despite significant progress over the year. Among the contested zones are the province of Idlib, some Kurdish-controlled areas and a region on the border with Jordan, where a US military outpost is located.
The Kurds and the central government have remained mostly neutral towards each other over the years of the conflict and occasionally allied against jihadist groups. The Manbij maneuver does not make them immediate allies, but with Kurds de facto asking protection from the Syrian government, Damascus now seems in a stronger position to negotiate the degree of autonomy the Kurds would have after the political transition in the country. They currently control large swaths of territory east of Euphrates River, which is rich in oil, and crude revenues would be crucial for Syria’s post-war reconstruction.
Also on rt.com
Arab states are making nice with Assad’s Syria. Will the West follow suit?
Manbij became the focus of tense war of words earlier this month, after Erdogan said he was prepared to order a new “anti-terrorist operation” targeting the Kurds. He said the move was necessary because the US failed to make the YPG remove their fighters from the area, despite promises to do so.
The US, a key ally of the Kurds for the past several years, has meanwhile decided to withdraw its troops from Kurd-controlled areas in Syria, including Manbij. The withdrawal promises to be a game-changer for Kurds, who relied on American backing for protection against Turkey, but it is also yet to happen.
Ankara has amassed a fighting force near its southern border over the past few weeks but stopped short of launching the promised offensive. Turkey sees all Kurdish militias as an extension of its domestic Kurdish insurgency and attacked them repeatedly in both Syria and Iraq.
The situation is to be discussed on Saturday by top Turkish and Russian officials at a meeting in Moscow. Russia, a backer of Damascus in its fight against jihadist groups, said the deployment in Manbij may be a good sign that stabilization of Syria is progressing. But a spokesman for the Kremlin indicated that the outcome would depend on how the talks in Moscow unfold.
Russia claims that The White Helmets, a group paid by foreign governments, is preparing yet another chemical weapon scenario in an attempt to falsely implicate the Syrian Government. The United States Government has been simultaneously threatening to attack Syria if there is any sign of a chemical attack - such as the false flag one being prepared by the White Helmets, which have received many millions of funding from US-NATO countries.[1] The article below claims that the filming has already begun, using and abusing orphans.
(Article first published 12 September 2018 at https://www.rt.com/news/438282-white-helmets-film-chemical-attacks/
The White Helmets have shot at least nine videos intended to serve as proof in accusations that the Syrian government conducted a chemical weapon attack using chlorine against civilians in Idlib, the Russian military claims.
READ MORE: Filming of staged chemical attack in Idlib, Syria begins – Russian MoD
A number of Middle Eastern TV channels and a regional affiliate of a US broadcaster “have shot nine videos, in Jisr al-Shughur city in Idlib province, of a staged chemical attack” that will be blamed on the Syrian government, the Russian Reconciliation Center In Syria said in a statement on Wednesday.
All videos show activists from the White Helmets group, which purportedly provides assistance to civilians, the statement claims.
The Russian military details that on September 11, the White Helmets and terrorists from Tahrir al-Sham (commonly known as Al-Qaeda in Syria) held a meeting following the filming process, in which they selected two out of nine videos for future transfer to the United Nations and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). The remaining videos are to be used for propaganda on social media networks due to the poor quality, the military claims.
At the same time, since September 9, the White Helmets have been staging rehearsals of an alleged chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun, Russian officials say in the same statement, claiming that the rehearsals feature up to 30 civilians, including a dozen children aged 8-12.
Further claims by the Russian military indicate the White Helmets, along with the terrorists, are preparing an “actual use of poisonous chorine-based substances” on the people participating in the filming of the fake videos.
On-the-scene preparations of places for explosions of toxic substances is carried out by members of Hurras al-Din terrorist group (or the Guardians of Religion Organization, which is affiliated with Al-Qaeda), the statement claims.
The militants have selected 22 children and their parents from several villages in the Aleppo governorate who will play parts in staging fake chemical weapon attacks.
Another group of children is comprised of orphans kidnapped from refugee camps, who are meant to be used for the footage of death scenes. It is currently kept in one of the buildings of the Ikab prison controlled by Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist group.
Signs of activities to prepare staged chemical weapon attacks were reported in Kafir-Zait, the military claims, also naming two villages where toxic chemicals have been delivered to stage provocations.
Apparently Trump froze their funding in 2018, see below from #cite_ref-pri-20180504_79-0">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Helmets_(Syrian_Civil_War)#cite_ref-pri-20180504_79-0.
The White Helmets receives charitable funding from the United States, the United Kingdom, and other western governments.#cite_note-scd-partners-63">[63] Initially the United Kingdom Foreign and Commonwealth Office was the largest single source of funding through Mayday Rescue Foundation.#cite_note-telegraph-20150927-64">[64] As of 2016, SCD state they are also partly funded through Chemonics, a U.S. based private international development company.#cite_note-scd-partners-63">[63] Funders now include the Canadian government Peace and Stabilization Operations Program,#cite_note-canada-20161206-61">[61] the Danish government,#cite_note-65">[65]#cite_note-reliefweb-20161205-66">[66] the German government,#cite_note-mayday-RFQ160816-67">[67] the Japan International Cooperation Agency,#cite_note-arkgroupdmcc-training-20">[20]#cite_note-maydayrescue-donors-68">[68] the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs.#cite_note-69">[69]#cite_note-nltimes-20161122-70">[70] the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs,#cite_note-stuff-20161026-71">[71] the United States Agency for International Development (USAID)#cite_note-usaid-20160527-46">[46] and the United Kingdom Conflict, Stability and Security Fund (CSSF).#cite_note-72">[72] USAID have contributed at least $23 million from 2013 to March 2016.#cite_note-73">[73]#cite_note-74">[74] The British government had provided £15 million of funding between 2012 and November 2015,#cite_note-govuk-assistance-75">[75] increased to £32 million by October 2016.#cite_note-hansard-20161102-76">[76] As of 31 March 2018, the British government had provided £38.4m in aid to the White Helmets.#cite_note-theguardian-20180510-77">[77] The SCD has also received individual donations online to their Hero Fund, which provides treatment for wounded volunteers and supports their families.#cite_note-78">[78] In March 2017, the organization was reported to be operating on a budget of about $26 million.#cite_note-WPOscarwin-9">[9]
In April 2018 the Trump administration suspended the funding of the White Helmets as part of a wider suspension of the funding of stabilization projects in Syria while the U.S. reassesses its role in Syria. The U.S. had provided more than $33 million to support the group since 2013.#cite_note-pri-20180504-79">[79]#cite_note-cbsnews-20180503-34">[34] On 14 June 2018, the Trump administration authorised USAID and the United States Department of State to release approximately $6.6 million in aid to be shared between the group and the UN's International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism in Syria.#cite_note-80">[80]
FILE PHOTO. Aftermath of an alleged chemical weapons attack in Eastern Ghouta in April 2018. © White Helmets / Reuters
Footage, meant to serve as proof that the Syrian government has conducted a chemical weapons attack in Idlib, Syria, is to be handed to global news outlets by the end of Tuesday, the Russian military claims.
Several Middle East TV channels and a US news channel have been sent to Jisr al-Shughur in Syria’s Idlib Governorate to produce the footage needed for the provocation, a statement by the Russian Center for Syrian Reconciliation said. It added the intelligence came from local residents of Jisr al-Shughur.
“All the footage of the staged provocation in Jisr al-Shughur is to be delivered to the newsrooms of TV channels, which are to broadcast it after its publication on social media,” the statement claimed.
It also said that an Islamist group was provided with two canisters of a “chlorine-based chemical” for the purpose of the operation.
The Russian military said the footage would include scenes of White Helmets operatives treating supposed victims of an apparent barrel bomb chemical weapon attack by Damascus.
Moscow has repeatedly warned that a false flag chemical weapon attack was being prepared in Idlib, giving the US and its allies justification to attack Syrian government forces. Senior US officials have threatened Damascus with retaliation if it uses chemical weapons in Idlib and even preemptively assigned the blame for any such attack to the government.
Speaking at the UN security Council meeting on Tuesday, Russia’s Ambassador Vassily Nebenzya, stressed that Damascus did not possess any chemical weaponry to begin with. Any incident with such weaponry would only benefit the militants, fighting Syria’s government.
“The false-flag attack by the adversaries of Damascus, who count on foreign armed support, is very possible. We have irrefutable evidence of preparations [for it],” the official stated.
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Haiti, battered by natural disasters, is reeling from a scandal around the revelations of abuse by international aid workers. How will it affect the humanitarian efforts of NGOs and the UN in the country? We ask Ezili Danto, Haitian human rights lawyer.
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Sophie Shevardnadze: Ezili Danto, Haitian human rights lawyer, welcome. It’s really great to have you on our programme. Lots to talk about. The latest scandal in Haiti is over Oxfam employees engaging in sexual exploitation in the country. The Haitian government has suspended the work of the UK charity. Oxfam has apologised, started an investigation and fired those responsible - what more could they do right now?
Ezili Danto: Well, I think, Oxfam is just sort of a symptom of the problem because Haiti is under occupation. And these NGOs are there masturbating on this pain that has been imposed upon us because of imperialism. What else could they do? They could actually leave Haiti.
SS: Ok, we are going to go case by case. But because Oxfam is the latest case I would like to focus on them in the beginning. I mean, it only takes one scandal to ruin the reputation of a charity - accusations stick and people start thinking that the whole organisation is rotten. After the scandal broke out, Oxfam’s CEO said that everything the organisation tried to say or do just ‘fuelled the fire’ of public opinion - it’s like no matter what they say, it won’t come out right. Do they really deserve to be battered further?
ED: Yes, we’re talking about children, we’re talking about post-earthquake. I mean, look at the situation, Sophie, we’re talking about the 2010 catastrophic, apocalyptic earthquake that killed over 310 thousand Haitians, that made over 2 million Haitians homeless. And then you have this army of NGOs coming in, that’s where Oxfam comes in with a director who has been recycled in different other NGOs as a sexually immoral person. I mean, he was in Liberia and fired by a British NGO in 2004, and then he was recruited by Oxfam. It’s so nasty what he was doing - Caligula sex, bestiality, these orgies with people who had lost everything and were looking at these charity organisation as folks who had come to help them.
SS: As their saviors?
ED: Yes, as their saviors. And this is just not Oxfam. We had the UN doing the same thing. So you have a culture of foreigners coming in…
SS: We are going to talk about the UN further down in our interview. Only the UK division of Oxfam has been banned - other Oxfam workers are still in Haiti; does that mean that the country actually needs Oxfam here and just found a temporary scapegoat in the UK division?
ED: As I said, you know, we, Haitians, haven’t been hurt. This is not about Oxfam. This is about the underage children who were used by this NGO, who are now being blared about in headlines as prostitutes. What happens when you’re fifteen years old and your mother just died, five of your brothers just died? And instead of helping you with the donation dollars which is paying these men’s salary, that’s been given by citizens of the world who care about what happened, these men held orgy sex with animals with these children. What can happen to them? I’m a human rights lawyer who spent the last 24 years of my life since 1994 exposing that the charitable-industrial complex and the military industrial complex are about colonialism, that they are in Haiti as a smokescreen while the Western corporatocracy takes our resources out. You’re talking to a Haitian woman, you’re not talking to an NGO person…
SS: I know, it’s very emotional, I do realise that. But as a journalist I need to make sure that I cover all sides. So bare with me ‘cause I’m going to ask you these questions and I need your answers.
ED: Sure.
SS: The Guardian wrote that foreigners pay more money to sex workers, a lot more than the locals. I know it sounds gross, but in some way could these encounters have been voluntary - so locals may have a role in this too, not just Oxfam? Could that be a possibility as well?
ED: Well, Oxfam is an NGO which is a non-governmental organisation which is given its accreditation by the United Nations. The United Nations has a policy against having sex with your beneficiaries, so does Oxfam. We’re talking about a situation when you’re asking me who’s the victim. We are talking about underage folks here. This man that we are talking about, Roland, has a history of having sex in places paid by donation dollars. He started out in Liberia and he was dismissed for having sex with local people including underage children. And, you know, as a human rights lawyer I’m actually concerned. Sex with underage children is paedophilia, it’s a crime. We’re not talking about anything else. Yes, there’s prostitution. But, as you know, whenever the military come into a space the level of sexual abuse and prostitution goes up at least 15%. Is that really what the UN and their NGOs are supposed to be doing in Haiti? Are they supposed to be fiduciaries that are giving this position as philanthropist and humanitarian not to bring up the level of prostitution in Haiti but to help Haiti develop and provide help at a time of crisis - I mean, an apocalyptic crisis when everything has fallen down? So, no, I reject the idea that the Haitian women and men who were victims of Oxfam are to be blamed for anything that has happened with regards to that because you’re talking about a differential in power. We’re talking about underage girls. And we aren’t talking about underage girls or underage boys. We’re talking about a crime. The age of maturity in Haiti is 18. So although the media wants to make these underage children prostitutes who really is the whore here? Who really is the criminal here?
SS: The Haitian parliament has learned that the majority of abuse cases don’t get reported. Oxfam actually has been reporting requirements in place, their stats are transparent - other agencies don’t have those requirements, so do you have any information about their transgressions?
ED: I had the Free Haiti Movement which I founded in 2004 when the United Nations lent its uniforms to this occupation where this humanitarian front is covering up the corporate plunder of Haiti riches. I had something like the Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network which was founded in 1994, 24 years ago. The purpose was to institutionalise the rule of law and to protect and defend the cultural, human and economic rights of Haitians living at home and abroad. Now the question you’re asking me - is there reporting requirement with regards to NGOs and what they’re doing in Haiti? The NGOs do whatever they want in Haiti. Remember there’s a level of racism… When you’re under occupation and these NGOs come in they’re making so much money than, let’s say, a native Haitian lawyer in Haiti who’s going to fight on behalf of, let’s say, the victims. So you’re talking about a disparity of power. You’re talking about the idea that these white folks like Oxfam’s director who was fired … I think, Oxfam let three executives resign and they fired four others for gross misconduct. But they never reported to the Haitian government that says it’s a crime to have sex with minors. They never reported that, so they concealed it and they continue to conceal what was going on. Up until now, 8 years later we hear about it.
SS: So, now the Haitian president, after an investigation, is calling the Oxfam affair “the tip of the iceberg”. But on the other hand, can the Haitian government really afford to poke into other aid groups besides Oxfam - the President mentioned investigating Medecins sans Frontieres and other NGOs. What if more organisations are suspended, can they manage without them? Can Haiti do without NGOs altogether?
ED: You know, I want your audience to hear me when I say this. You can’t develop a country with charity. You cannot. The charities are there in Haiti to assist with the symptoms of the problem, not the root of the problem of Haiti. These are symptoms like when you have no clean water, no healthcare, no infrastructure - those are all symptoms of the greater problem in Haiti. And that greater problem is imperialism. That greater problem is debt dependency and domination that Haiti has to deal with since it became the first free republic ruled by black people since 1804. So we’ve had to deal with this imperialism that comes in and takes our resources. So here’s the answer for your audience to understand - it’s not charities, it’s not these NGOs, it’s not Oxfam. You take someone’s agency away when you bring in foreigners and you have these foreigners give you public services like clean water and healthcare. They are not accountable, that’s why you have the problem of Oxfam. That’s why you have a larger problem of the UN troops and their sex rings and cholera that has got into Haiti, and all of the travesties that we’ve had to suffer directly since 2004 when the UN came in. The UN came in after the United States, France and Canada and other Western powers ousted through the Bush regime change in 2004 the democratically elected president of Haiti which I used to represent. So we’re talking about the UN and the charitable workers who come in to cover that this is an occupation. Because if it was acknowledged openly that this is a humanitarian front to occupation then the public of these various nations would oppose it. But if you say “Haiti needs charity, look at these Haitians and all their problems” and you say these things all the time - this is what they say about Haiti - we’re the poorest country is the Western hemisphere…
SS: Why you, guys, just can’t kick them out? I don’t understand - it’s not like they are there by force and someone is certainly inviting them. Why can’t you be just like “we don’t need you by”? What is the problem?
ED: As I said, the UN came in in 2004 after the United States, France and Canada and their deep state CIA agents helped take down the democratically elected president. What we have in Haiti right now is an occupation, a military occupation with the UN serving as proxy military.
SS: Are you saying that your government is in conspiracy with the United Nations? Because no organisation including the United Nations can’t be on a territory of a country without a consensus of the government of that country.
ED: Absolutely. After the earthquake we had Bill and Hillary Clinton essentially take over Haiti and take over the aid to Haiti. You know, there’s 13.3 billion...
SS: Why do you think they are so interested in Haiti? Why such an interest on behalf of the Clintons to your country?
ED: I am so happy you asked - because Haiti lies between two nations that the United States wants to become client states that they dislike and haven’t fallen in line with the Manifest Destiny in the Monroe doctrine and so on: that’s Cuba and Venezuela. We are right in between. We’re the weakest link in that horse shoe. This is what we say at the Haitian Lawyers Leadership which I lead - we say that the United Nations forces in Haiti are the AFRICOM on the Western hemisphere. They are the U.S. western military arm training Latin American and Central American soldiers on behalf of the Western powers and they use Haiti as a training ground. That’s number one. Number two: Haiti has massive oil. The head of Venezuelan oil is in Haiti’s water. In terms of riches, they say now, Haiti has 20 billion in gold. Haitian geologists say, it’s a hundred billion in gold. During the earthquake Bill and Hillary Clinton put in through fake elections - and you can see this, just google it - Michel Martelly who is a former carnival singer. If you look at the emails from Hillary and Bill Clinton, they show you that they created this fake election. And now in 2017 we have this new President Jovenel Moïse. Jovenel Moïse was handpicked by Michel Martelly who was put into office by Bill and Hillary Clinton under the Obama administration.
SS: Ezili, the other aid groups and UN agencies always stress that they are doing a lot of good that outstrips the bad that happens. But good rarely makes for a hot news story, it always goes unnoticed. So all the good work they could be doing (because I’m sure they are doing something good) - emergency aid, medication, shelters, supplies, etc. – will that always be outweighed by bad behaviour, by the scandals, by the overall problem of the occupation that you’re talking about?
ED: Yes.
SS: Ok, so no matter what they do, even if sometimes they’re actually reaching out helping people that’s also an undeniable fact?
ED: As I said before, Sophie, no matter how good the intentions of these NGOs are - some of the charitable-industrial complex folks are not predators - no matter what their intentions are we are talking about an occupation. We’re talking about imperialism, we’re talking about the people of Haiti being disenfranchised by fake elections run by the United States and its European allies right now on behalf of the United Nations.
SS: But I just want to ask you about the technicality - does the humanitarian aid that they bring into your country actually reach people on the ground? Those who really need it - do they get it?
ED: I think, the figures were 13.3 billion dollars that was raised after the earthquake. And they said that less than 1% of that went to the Haitian government, most of that money went back to the donors to their hands. Most of this aid is in donors’ hands to bring employment to their people.
SS: To make money out of it? Is that what you’re saying?
ED: To bring employment to people like Roland… whatever his name is, the head of Oxfam person. I think, you know that foreign aid cripples most African nations. I think you already know that statistics say that the World Bank puts out a lot of loans. But the corporate plunder is greater than the aid that they give to the black nations or to the Global South. Those are facts.
SS: A lot of people feel the same. I spoke to Afghanistan’s former president and he thinks the same way too. He feels like the foreign aid in the long run is ruining his country because it never comes with no strings attached. So, you know this rapper, I’m sure you know because he ran for your country’s president, Wyclef Jean, his charity is reported to have spent 25% of money donated on expenses - like travel, conferences, accommodations and salaries. How can people who want to help donate be sure their money goes where it has to? You don’t necessarily need to be part of the UN or Medecins sans Frontieres or other NGO to want to help, right? There are a lot of philanthropists who want to help. You know, you’re sitting in your house, you watching, there’s an earthquake, you want to donate money. How do you make sure that it gets where it has to be?
ED: Right. You see, I’m still thinking that we are having a wrong conversation here. Charity cannot develop a nation. It cannot give it infrastructure, healthcare, it can only allow for dependency. And you mentioned one charity which is Wyclef Jean. You know, Wyclef Jean is like a tiny little bit, so small compared to the Clinton Global Initiative and the big NGOs and what they are doing in Haiti. The Red Cross raised half a billion dollars after the earthquake in Haiti and only built seven homes and left no infrastructure. We need clean water, just basic clean water that they could have given us with that 13.3 billion dollars that was raised because the UN in 2010, as you know, brought cholera to us which has killed over 10 thousand Haitians and made sick more than, they say, a million, I say, three million Haitians. So we don’t even have clean water. So what do these 42 thousand NGOs have to show, except the fact that they are used as a smokescreen for media to focus on...
SS: Alright, I wasn’t referring to NGOs right now. I was just talking about the people who want to help. Do I understand you correctly that your message to my audience is that anyone who’s watching TV and there are calls to help Haiti, and they shouldn’t? Is that what you’re saying?
ED: Yes, what I’m saying is that Haiti cannot be developed by charity. If anyone wants to help Haiti you need to help us get rid of the U.S. occupation hidden by UN mercenary guns, fake aid, fake election, fake charity. That’s what we want as Haitians. For instance, after the earthquake we started my organisation The Ezili Network because we were not getting any help, because people were given dirty water by the NGOs. We started a programme Zili Dlo which gives clean water. It’s a very tiny project but it’s Haiti-led, Haiti-run and it transfers skills to Haitians without middlemen. Those are type of project that people who are interested in helping Haiti can do - assist indigenous Haiti-led, Haiti capacity-building organisation, not an organisation that’s building up capacity of NGOs.
SS: Alright, it’s was a really interesting insight to hear from you, Ezili. Thanks for this interview, I’ve never heard someone speak so passionately about the country, the way you speak about your country. I wish you all the best in your future endeavors. We were talking to the Haitian human right lawyer Ezili Danto about the UN and other groups’ humanitarian efforts in Haiti and why they’ve drawn so much criticism.
ED: Thank you.
Interview begins around 9.40 minutes into the show.Gung-ho interviewer, Bart Chilton, apparently hoping to recommend investing in Australian stocks, found out that Australia's economy is about as diverse as Uganda's and Ethiopia's, that it consists of holes and houses, and that Australian governments have stupidly marketised energy, making costs too high for Australian manufactures. "Energy and telecommunications are both being disastrously mishandled." Banks and mines dominate the Australian stock exchange, which reminds Keen of when they dominated the Japanese stock exchange - just before the 1990 bubble burst, with no important banks situated in Japan anymore. Our stock market is trivial compared to our bond market. Dr Keen also mentions the , which is worth a look.
Oksana Boyko (pictured right) in US vs UN? Ft. Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations her Worlds Apart interview of Sunday 24 June, generally discussed how the United Nations should handle conflicts between the United States and Russia its two most powerful members . The discussion included at least two issues which are of concern to this site, candobetter.net : 1. Border control in the United States and Europe, and 2. Syria.
Antonio Guterres attempted to put all the arguments by proponents of open borders and they were all effectively rebutted by Oksana Boyko. At one point in the discussion, after she stated that the United States as well as European countries, have the right to control their borders Oksana was accused of listening to Fox News, that is the station which features Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and other outspoken advocates for the effective control of the United States border with Mexico. The video, embedded below, is easily worth the 28 minutes of your time required to watch it.
Later in the program Oksana Boyko put to Antonio Guterres that the United Nations should oppose the United Sates' schemes to partition Syria and preserve Syria's territorial integrity. [1]
[1] The partitioning of Syria is also supported by the group Australians for Kurdistan. The group absurdly maintains that, with up to 20 U.S. military bases in Syria's Kurdistan (acccording to RT on 1 Mar 2018 and other sources) the YPG (an acronym for "People's Protection Units") is building a communist or anarchist society which is also a beacon of women's liberation. The convenor of "Australians for Kurdistan" is John Tully. In Hitler of the Middle East (6/2/18) | Tasmanian Times, ostensibly an attack on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Tully smears the popularly elected President of Syria, as "the Syrian dictator". Nowhere in his writings does Tully show any concern for the fate of Syria, including the 80,000 soldiers of the Syrian Arab Army, amongst the 400,000 citizens of Syria, who have been killed in the war against Syria since March 2011 in which which Erdogan has been complicit. That would come far closer to justifying Tully's emotive likening of Erdogan to Hitler than any of his actions against Kurdish secessionists in recent years.
The embedded video is from Occupational hazards? Daniel Ayalon, former deputy foreign minister of Israel, the 21 June Episode of RT's World's Apart In that program presenter Oksana Boyko (pictured left) interviews Daniel Ayalon (pictured right) about Israel's recent aerial bombardments of pro-Syrian-government forces inside Syria.
Oksana Boyko successfully challenged most, but not all, of Ayalon's lies and distortions.
Ayalon's supposed justification for Israel's violation of international law is that they were only attacking Iranians and Lebanese Hezbollah who were supposedly there, not to help defend Syria against tens of thousands of terrorist invaders, but to attack Israel.
Oksana Boyko, however, pointed out that Iran and Hezbollah only intervened in Syria after many years of war against Syria by terrorist proxies of the United States and its allies.
Given that, by one estimate, 400,000 Syrians including 80,000 soldiers have died in that conflict since March 2011, the actual and potential consequences of that conflict for Israel are trivial in comparison. It's unfortunate that Oksano Boyko did not provide those figures.
Ayalon pushed the Big Lie, long ago refuted, that the war in Syria was a sectarian conflict between Sunni Islam and Shiite Islam.
Ayalon also claimed that Israel is the only democracy in the region, ignoring the fact that all elections held in recent years in Syria, particularly the Presidential election of 7 June 2014 in which 88.7% the 73.42% of eligible Syrian voters who voted, voted for President Bashar al-Assad, were verified by International observers. In Syria, unlike in Israel, where Palestinians are excluded, all residents - Sunni, Shiite and Alawite Muslims, Christians, Jews, Kurds, Armenians and others, are entited to vote.
No viewer aware of the facts about Israel can be left in any doubt that the criminality of Ayalon and the country he represents has not diminished since Israeli warplanes sank the USS Liberty in 1967 killing 34 crew members in an attempt to provide the United states with a pretext to join Israel in its war against Egypt, Syria and Jordan.
Russian and Iranian English television broadcasters need to issue invitations to Teresa May, Boris Johnson, Niki Haley, Macron, Donald Trump et al, to defend their aggressive stances against Russia, Syria, and Iran,” says candobetter.net’s James Sinnamon. Unbelievable accusations against sovereign states are issuing from the governments of the United States, Australia, the UK and Europe. We are talking about the lines run by US-NATO on the Scripal spy poisonings and the so-called chemical weapons attack in Ghouta, which they have refused in the UN to investigate on the ground. Despite the total implausibility of these stories, the western corporate press, which includes ABC Australia and SBS, promote them uncritically. Yet the purpose of these stories is to provide excuses for war. The only beneficiary of the promotion of war is the military-industrial-media complex. The only thing working against this complex is the alternative media, which happens also to include English programs run by Iran’s Press TV Iran and Russia RT. Why are these programs so popular, especially RT? It is because they appeal to intellectuals because they are so much more complex and nuanced than the frustratingly illogical confabulations that pass for mainstream news in the Anglosphere. Press TV Iran’s The Debate is an especially robust forum.
In a stunning abuse of power, one of the main theatres of initial promotion is the United Nations. The US ambassador, Niki Haley, continues to make outlandish claims in the bullying style of her predecessor, Samantha Power. It is like watching gangster molls with airs, who do not realise that they are being live-broadcast as they threaten plans to assassinate or otherwise remove presidents, invade countries, and bomb cities, all based on totally fabricated enemy ‘profiles’ of popular elected leaders as bad guys. In fact, if war-profits were not a consideration, you would be reminded of jealous children in a playground bullying their more popular colleagues.
The major threats to modern civilisation: war, overpopulation, overconsumption, and energy resources scarcity. For a few years ago after the fall of the Soviet Union, war seemed a remote pastime, carried out between small tribal states, but then it began to metastacize from former Yugoslavia, to Afghanistan, to Iraq, then to Libya. Next was Syria and, at the same time, Ukraine. It is like watching the events leading up to the First World War. If you didn’t look at the regional oil and gas interests and rival hegemonies for countries that would afford access to them, then the whole thing seemed inexplicable. Even so, many people whose lives and lifestyles are not yet threatened, just cannot believe that people who have power would do such harm, apparently just out of ego and a desire for even more money.
James Sinnamon (the man who built Candobetter.net) suggests that PressTV Iran and RT could be still more effective, if they issued invitations to the leaders making accusations, to defend these on PressTV Iran and RT.
“I think that Russia, Iran and other nations, who are defending countries like Syria from military aggression, as a matter of urgency, could use their newsmedia - Russia's RT and Sputnik and Iran's PressTV even more effectively.
Perhaps those who conduct debates and interviews on Press TV Iran - Marcia Hashemi and Waqar Rizvi - and Russia's Oksana Boyko, Afshin Rattansi, [1] Sophie Shevardnadze and others - could, prominently and repeatedly, issue standing invitations to the likes of Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Nikki Haley et al., or their delegated spokespersons, to put their views on their programs and have those views discussed and debated.
Surely, if Theresa May et al. are so confident that they are speaking the truth, they would jump at the opportunity to show, to the audiences of RT and PressTV, how the views presented by those stations are wrong?Of course, I don't expect that Theresa May et al. will acccept. If they don't RT and PressTV should include their names in lists, displayed prominently on their sites, of all Western political leaders who have declined to appear on RT and PressTV.
Given that hundreds of thousands have already been killed by military aggression, just since the Gulf War of 1991, and that the stakes for humanity are so high if this pattern is not stopped, I see know of no reason for the managers of RT and PressTV to pull any punches from now on.”
Sinnamon adds that, Afshin Rattansi, of Going Underground, leads the way to some extent because he is always issuing invitations to his detractors to appear on "Going Underground". If those who declined to be interviewed by Mr Rattansi were prominently listed, his impact would be even greater.
The article by Robert Bridge, quoted and linked to inside, speculates on obesity being a factor in the United States' poor performance in the PyeongChang olympic games. It includes a graph of order of obesity in OECD countries. Australia is the fifth highest obesity country. Japan is the lowest. My money is on high fructose additions to our diets, such as corn-syrup. Dr Lustig University of California San Francisco, Division of Pediatric Endocrinology, has been putting this message out for some time in fascinating scientific videos, including, "Fat Chance" and "The skinny on obesity." I have embedded "Fat chance" in the quoted material from the article inside.
Now that the Olympic torch in PyeongChang has been extinguished and the athletes and fans have gone home, the US is wrestling with its worst performance in 20 years. Could obesity rates be taking a toll on US athletic performance? On the surface, Team USA’s total haul of 23 medals, which included nine golds, seems rather respectable. It put the United States in fourth place, behind Norway, Germany and Canada. But not everyone went home satisfied, and least of all the US Olympic Committee, which had predicted US athletes would win at least 37 medals. Not only were the Americans bested by three countries which, combined, make up just one-third of the US population (Norway, which won 39 gold medals in PyeongChang, has just 5.2 million people), it was their worst performance since the 1998 Nagano Games. The situation looks even more troubling when we consider that the US fielded 242 athletes at PyeongChang, the largest-ever delegation in the history of the Winter Games.
The US has been spending wads of cash in an effort to get the most from its athletes. The amount forked over to Winter sports in the years 2015-16 increased by nearly six percent from the previous Olympic 2011-2012 cycle, AP reported. Alas, all that extra cash has produced little in way of gold. Since the 2010 Vancouver Games, America’s total medal haul in the Winter Games has been on the decline (37, 28 and 23, respectively).
“We have this amazing depth. We have these incredible medalists,” Alan Ashley, US chief of sport performance told reporters following the closing ceremony. He then ventured the question: “How do we continue to compete even at a higher level and give them what they need going forward?”
What is the source of this decline? Since it does not seem related to a lack of funding, or a shortage of potential athletes, could there be particular sociocultural reasons at play, for example particular health factors? As was already acknowledged by the US government back in 2012, when it partnered with Olympic and Paralympic athletes to get more than 1.7 million children involved in sports through Michelle Obama’s "Let's Move!" initiative, obesity is a serious issue that is only getting worse.
A recent study put out by the OECD predicts that by the year 2030, almost 50 percent of Americans will be considered as clinically obese. In 13 states, that number could actually exceed 60 percent.
While there seems to be little research to date on the subject, a 2016 policy paper put out by the American Development Model (ADM) in cooperation with the US Olympics Committee (USOC) suggests that America’s sporting officials are aware of the problem when it warned: “The percentage of obese children ages 6-11 increased from 7 percent in 1980 to 18 percent in 2010. Among children ages 12 to 19, that figure grew from 5 percent to 18 percent.” The paper goes on to detail how parents, schools and sporting clubs can alter their lifestyles and dietary choices to become better athletes.
Read more at https://www.rt.com/op-ed/420669-obesity-usa-olympics-pyeongchang/
We live in increasingly 'interesting' times. US Journalists and government employees are afraid to criticise their government's outrageously authoritarian move against one media outlet, because they are afraid of being harassed themselves. According to the US Department of Justice, RT is an agent of a foreign, even hostile, power. All the while, the United States Department Of Justice refuses to explain why this is the case or even cite what laws RT may have broken. But something else is in play: critics warn RT is a test case for a wider campaign of media suppression. The UK is following suit, with parliamentarians attacking journalists who write against its illegal foreign wars, because they are afraid of being pursued one day for war crimes. Julian Assange has rightly described Australia as being governed by Washington, so we Australians had better look out and stand up and defend RT and anyone who writes a different point of view.
CrossTalking with Lee Stranahan, Rocky Anderson and Marcus Papadopoulos.
In Syrian Girl's Facebook Ban Linked to Russia-gate Twitter Purge? - an Exclusive Interview (30/9/17) | Russia Insider, Charles Bausman reported that Facebook had blocked SyrianGirl's account after she had criticised Kurds.
Syrian Girl, the Australian activist, Youtuber, and social media powerhouse, tweeted on Thursday evening (EST) that her Facebook account has been blocked for her exposure of fraud during the Kurdistan referendum. She had 75,000 followers.
She also has 70,000 followers on Twitter, and 75,000 subscribers to her excellent Youtube channel.
She gave Russia Insider (RI) an exclusive interview on Friday, explaining that Facebook acted without warning, (which is unusual - usually they give people a chance to correct whatever is upsetting the censors), and so far have not responded to emails.
She speculated that perhaps her page had been caught up in the anti-Russian Twitter / Facebook purge currently unfolding. (Twitter removed 200 Russian accounts that targeted Facebook during election - USA Today)
…
This of course follows the evidence-free beat-up that alleged Russian interference somehow caused American voters to elect Russia's allegedly favourite candidate Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton the chosen favourite of the American corporate elite, including Zuckerberg himself.
As revealed by Julian Assange of Wikileaks, "Zuckerberg Colluded with Hillary Clinton Campaign":
Mark Zuckerberg's claims this week that Facebook was fair to Donald Trump during the 2016 election just took another serious blow.
The Facebook founder and CEO personally met with Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman John Podesta a year before the 2016 election, according to an email released by Wikileaks.
The news comes a day after Wikileaks' Julian Assange dropped a bomb onto the heads of Zuckerberg and Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, alleging they colluded with Hillary Clinton's 2016 election campaign.
Assange Tweeted Thursday, linking the emails sent back and forth between John Podesta and Sandberg which reveal Sandberg wanted Clinton to win "badly." Assange said the women met privately numerous times during Clinton's campaign.
Assange included one email from Sandberg to Podesta, Clinton's campaign manager, which is particularly damaging in which the Facebook executive pledged to help elect Clinton.
This outrageous attempt at thought control and censoring of political information by Zuckerberg, as well as Google, YouTube and Twitter, shows that in a true democracy, the news media upon which we all depend, must be taken out of the hands of the corporate owners and placed in the hands of the people.
Alternatively, rival newsmedia and social media that are run transparently, and with a charter to promote a free contest of ideas, should be established.
This could easily be done with public funds and with popular support within purportedly democratic countries like Australia, France, Germany and the UK. Should this not occur, then alternatives could be set up. One such alternative is the community-owned minds.com.
Another alternative is for sovereign countries like Russia and Iran, which are independent of United States' hegemony, set up their own alternatives to Google, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. If they were also run transparently and with a charter to promote a free contest of ideas, they would very quickly draw away much of the current audiences of Google, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Such an initiative would surely cost those countries only a fraction of what they are currently obliged to spend on defence.
In fact, Russia has already set up Yandex an alternative to Google. Hopfeully, Yandex will soon be expanded to include more in English. Hopefully, also, other alternatives to Google, Facebook, and Twitter will soon be established.
Over time their need for defence expenditure would be greatly reduced as more and more people in Western countries are able to see through the lies of the corporate newsmedia. We could well see the end of war altogether.
See also: "Russia Threatens to Ban Facebook" (2/10/17) | Russia Insider by Tyler Durden – Russia demands data of Russian citizens be kept on servers physically located in Russia, @caityjohnstone/the-push-to-fight-foreign-propaganda-is-the-same-as-government-book-burning-bba16a128835">"The push to 'Fight Foreign Propaganda' is the same as government book burning" (28/9/17) | Medium by Caitlin Johnstone.
While the freefall of oil prices seems to have stopped for now, the inevitable rise of energy demand from developing economies may turn the current overflow into a critical shortage. How long before oil becomes a treasured resource in major demand again? And with new technology coming into play, how will the energy market affect our lives in the coming decades – will it fuel growth or new conflicts? Former Executive Director of the International Energy Agency Nobuo Tanaka is on SophieCo.
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Sophie Shevardnadze: Nobuo Tanaka, the former Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, great to have you on our show. Welcome. So, in response to the low oil prices, what we’re seeing right now is companies are canceling new projects, investment is stalling, infrastructure is not being updated. The International Energy Agency says oil projects are at the lowest level in over 70 years. Right? So what I’m wondering - now we’re seeing an oversupply of oil, but without development, should we be bracing for a global shortage instead?
Nobuo Tanaka: Well, if the investment is declining these consecutive years, possible for the third year in this year, if that’s the case, the capacity will not increase as much to the level of the demand in the future. When economic growth is happening in emerging economies, we’re going to have a shortage. So the IEA is very concerned that low oil price is signaling the wrong idea for the investors in the energy sector. And almost all energy sector may have a small level of capacity increase for the future.
SS: Just lately OPEC dominance on the oil market was offset by the US shale oil production - and despite lower oil prices, the US shale oil production is still going strong.
NT: That’s true.
SS:Has OPEC - and Saudi Arabia - have sort of lost control of the oil market?
NT: Well this is interesting situation. Suddenly Saudi Arabia challenged the shale from the Unites States - how resilient it is. So Saudi kept the share of the market or in some level of the production and the price collapsed. So the shale started declining in 2015-2016. But thanks to the demand coming up and also OPEC countries together with non-OPEC like Russia tried to reduce the production from early this year. So the price is coming up. Now that shale production is recovering. So it is kind of testing the resilience and how far the price can go down to stop the shale production or not. This is a very new situation, nobody knows how strong, how resilient the shale is. So, you know, in a sense, the shale production is challenging OPEC policy. So OPEC is changing their policies, shale is changing. This is a kind of interesting area.
SS: So it’s interesting to see what the new reality is going to be, because we see the U.S. shale and OPEC officials meeting recently at the recent OPEC meeting. How do you think they are going to coexist? U.S. shale and OPEC? Or is there another battle in the cards?
NT: Well, the shale is increasing probably for some decades but not more than that, because shale development is a new technology and new potentials, but gas may continue longer, but shale oil may not stay forever. While the OPEC countries especially in the Middle East have huge resources. And definitely this is a short-term or a mid-term situation, not going forever, so Russia has huge potential and also Russia and Middle East have shale potential also. But you don’t need to, I mean, OPEC countries, Russia are not necessary to invest into the shale even though there’s the resources.
SS:Because they have so much resources...
NT: Exactly - conventional crude. So this is a kind of coexistence of different technologies in a different location in a similar market, so we will see.
SS:But for those countries, like the United States, who are still big on shale production, questions remain about the safety of shale oil and gas extraction.
NT: Environmental impact…
SS:Fracking has been proven to cause minor earthquakes, water pollution - so the environmental damage is absolutely undeniable. The question is are we going to ignore this damage and go for the profit?
NT: Yea, that’s a very good point. Certainly we cannot ignore the negative impacts by the development for the environment or safety issue. So the shale companies must invest for a much stronger or safer way of development and also prepare to stop the environmental pollution. So the cost of shale will increase by doing so. So by doing so the shale is getting less competitive technology.
SS: You know, I was thinking about this lately with oil resources slowly shrinking, you’d expect countries who are rich in those resources would be very well off. But then, you know you look at Venezuela, you look at South Sudan, you look at Gaza Strip, you look at Nigeria - and these countries are completely torn apart and they’re very poor. So it makes you wonder - is having oil or gas reserves a blessing or it’s actually not that good for a developing country?
NT: Well, some people say - “the resource curse”, because of the rich energy resources like oil, gas. If the country is not using the revenue for better purposes like reinvesting into the oil field or technologies or education of the people or the new industries, the country may suffer - if the location of the revenue is not in a good way. Just spending or wastefully consuming more, by controlling the price of oil lower in the domestic market rather than the wholesale market in the global, then you are just wasting the very important resources you are given by the God. So it’s a matter of the policy - how you spend wisely the revenue for the improvement of the future generation of the country. So this is a tough competition. Some of the producer countries like Norway or United Arab Emirates, even though they are small but they reserve some part of the revenue for investing for the future. This is a very clever way of using the huge revenues.
SS: But a vital resource like oil is a perfect conflict-starter, especially if you take into consideration that the population is growing and the resource in itself is shrinking do you feel like we’re going to see more wars break over it? And where geographically? South China Sea? Maybe Latin America?
NT: Yeah, sometimes the energy or the resources were the reason for wars, for conflict before in history. It is inevitable that for the sake of economic growth resources are very important, but now technologies make it very different - the energy situation now. The renewable sources like solar,wind are everywhere, nuclear power is very popular among emerging economies, even energy conservation is a very good way to increase security or efficiency. So with these new technologies some countries, even the Saudi Aramco is concerned that the decline in demand of petroleum may come sooner than later. Because peak concept is applied to the supply side, but the demand peak may come earlier, because I still remember the very interesting quote of the Saudi oil ministry Zaki Yamani, who said ‘The stone age was not over because we ran out of stones, so the oil age may disappear even though there's plenty of oil’. Because of the new technologies, the new energy resources...So, how to invest into the different new technologies is very important thing for the governments, oil producers should do.
SS: So you feel like the demand for oil may disappear while it’s still there?
NT: I think so. When will it happen? This is a very interesting question - I was asked this question in a very interesting way by Saudi Aramco. I said maybe it’s before 2030. Because in 2030 China will peak out the carbon dioxide emission in the COP 21, that means they will reduce consumption of coal, but probably oil also. If the largest consumer of oil will stop increasing the use of oil, this could be the peak demand of oil. Of course there are many emerging economies like india, African countries, some other Asian economies will continue to use for sure.
SS: You’re right because China has rolled out a plan to have a fifth of its car sales electric by 2025. And then alongside China you have India who wants to go fully electric by 2035. So you wonder what’s going to happen to the energy market, right? Because they are the biggest consumers.
NT: So I don’t know when, but we have to prepare for the situation like that. Consumer countries, as well as producer countries we have to prepare for the risk that these kind of big changes may happen in the energy market in the future.
SS: But you know, if things go according to your scenario, you’re wondering why people are looking for places to dig and drill. For instance, with the industry barely recovering from the oil slump, we see America drilling in the Arctic, Norway - in the Barents sea. And in places like the Arctic resources aren’t very easy to extract and it’s very expensive...
NT: Costs are very high.
SS: What’s the point? Why turn to the Arctic for oil?
NT: This is an interesting question. Yes, Arctic oil in a very deep sea area could be much more costly than conventional oil. The technology may make a breakthrough, even for oil, or even for coal - like these fossil fuels can be cleaner in the future. So that kind of technology together with the new development of the difficult areas - it all depends on the prices. Because if carbon prices get high enough to make the oil economies greener, it may be profitable to invest the big amount of money, the high costs for the difficult places, because the carbon price is so high that it legitimises the investment.
SS: I wanna ask you about climate change - you’ve touched upon it. Do you feel like climate change can actually unfreeze more energy resources in the North and maybe offset some of the shortage in the South?
NT: There’s some good part of the climate change in the future, you’re right.
SS:But then would it offset some shortage in the South, or not?
NT: Well, the Southern part - some of the small nations may suffer because of the sea level may go up. What does it mean for the consumption of energy or growth is another tricky question. So, yea, it may help, you’re right, it may help for more demand coming in the Southern part if you develop the Northern hemisphere or Arctic by cheaper costs - that’s also true. Yes, it’s also true. But there’s a change of cost by the climate change mitigation, new technologies may pave the wave new potential in the Arctic, that is also true.
SS: I want to touch upon another very important topic - despite the fact that ISIS is being bombed by half of the world, it’s being attacked on the ground on all sides, it still manages to sell oil and make money off it. I don’t understand how, but can the International Energy Agency do something about it? Somebody has to be buying that oil it’s selling?
NT: That is an interesting question. You know, they sell the oil -
SS: And somebody buys it.
NT: This is the problem, right. So it is a matter of political coalition - how we can isolate ISIS. Somebody’s not really doing their share.
SS: So it’s in someone’s interest?
NT: Yea.
SS:Do you think people higher up in a…
NT: I don’t know, this is a very tricky question.
SS: Have you thought about it?
NT: Well, you know, how could this kind of thing happen is very political question, but probably the political alliance surrounding ISIS is not enough. Is it a government that is controlling all private sector or somebody else is doing this, who knows. Because we don’t have any proof so we cannot say. You’re right, if this is really happening this is really unfortunate.
SS:But then you know oil’s black market is not just ISIS and ISIS selling and making money off illicit oil sales -- it’s stolen by drug lords in Mexico, pirates in Nigeria, Libyan smugglers etc. So when you think about it illicit oil is sold everywhere from Latin America to Western Europe, costing the industry billions and billions of dollars. Can a black market of an industry as big as the oil industry ever be defeated?
NT: Well, I don’t know. I don’t have the facts to make a comment. But you know the black market exists anywhere. If government has not enough control over the situation or if there is not enough coalition or regulation among the country. So we need a strong political will to stop that, otherwise, you know, it does exist.
SS: There was a research by Ernst & Young that says that more than half of the illicit oil dealings are actually related to corrupt officials. So I'm just wondering, is the oil industry corrupt beyond hope?
NT: I cannot generalise, there are always corrupt officials anywhere. So is the oil industry corrupt by this kind of custom? Or is it only oil industry? Or any other industries are not corrupt?
SS: It’s just very - It screams out because there's just so much money in it and there's so much conflict over it, so...
NT: Yeah well...
SS: Because the oil industry is not supposed to be something illegal. I mean you can combat drug trafficking to start with with something illegal. The oil industry is supposed to be: I sell and you pay me, we're both in profit. And then you have this other part of it: more than half of illicit oil sales are due to corrupt officials. So it just makes you wonder how corrupt is it really?
NT: How corrupt they are - we don't have any tests. You know... this governance of the government issue is very important and this is more the choice of the people, democracy, or a way the international community works. So if there are so many corrupt -- corruption happening, certainly this makes the kind of let's say detriment to anybody's let's say situation. I think this is a matter of definite political will: how can we manage this situation. And is it an industry issue, is that a government issue? It's both. We have to work out if we have to set a target and make international rules around them, and if we don't abide, the penalty should be there. But rules must be clear, what we have to do. Otherwise just complaining will not lead us anywhere.
SS:Mr. Tanaka, I know you are a strong advocate of Asian rising giants - like China and India - to be admitted to the International Energy Agency. So both of these countries consume an enormous amount of energy, why haven’t they been admitted already?
NT: When I was executive director, I invited China and India to join IEA. They are interested in it, so they come to learn what we are doing. So it's a matter of learning process. They learn about energy efficiency, clean coal technologies which China and India needs very much. They learn about strategic stockpiles of oil policy - how to do that, went to use it. So they learn a lot. So gradually they’re cooperating even without membership. So now they became so-called associate members. So it's a process of joining. When they come to learn enough I think they have to join, but the problem is the current statutory agreement requires the members to be the members of the OECD first to become a member of the IEA. But China or India are not interested in joining OECD, because OECD is a rich man's club.
SS: But if they're not admitted to the IEA then they'll just create their own structure. And who needs that fragmentation?
NT: We have to separate this OECD membership and IEA membership first. So this is what IEA members should do first and offer China or India to be full members to the IEA. Otherwise they may not come in.
SS:You also said that for a better energy management Russia should be readmitted to the G8. How would that help stabilise world energy flow? I mean isn't G20 already enough?
NT: G20 is focusing more on financial stability. It was created during the time of the Lehman shock or the very financial crisis, so it is representing macroeconomy or financial market situation, banking etc. They do sometimes energy, but energy is not really the focal point of the G20, so I think G7 or G8 with Russia may be a kind of forum to discuss the energy issues more. Of course why not Saudi Arabia why no one other major energy players to join, this is always the question raised. In energy issues the major players are the United States, Russia and China, India, of course as a consumer there. So we have to have some new configuration to discuss the energy issue. So G7+ or some kind of new format may be necessary
SS:Europe up to now still relies heavily on Russian gas, but plans to build a pipeline from Russia to Germany have met resistance among some of the EU members. EU officials are actually saying that this project - the Nord Stream 2 - is destabilising the EU economy and coming in the way of the union’s unity. The way I see it - Europe needs Russian gas because it relies on it, we would be more than happy to sell it to them, so why undermine a perfectly good beneficial - mutually beneficial energy deal with some political tensions?
NT: Yeah, geopolitics is inevitable, it’s happening in many places in many situations so we cannot solve that quickly, but still Europe is importing 30% of their oil and 30% of their gas from Russia, right? And Russia is a very stable supplier of gas and oil to Europe. Russia needs to diversify the target countries to Asia. So you are exporting to China or Asian countries, so it's a matter of diversification. So for Russia diversification of the demand countries is necessary. For Europe or for importing countries, like Japan, we need to diversify our sources. Europe wants to diversify more to other countries but Japan needs more diversification from Middle East, so we need more Russian gas, Russian oil. So it's a matter of degree - what situation the countries are put in.
SS: Mr. Tanaka, thank you so much for this interview. We wish you all the best.
NT: Thank you very much for having me.
"We deny completely the use of any chemical or toxic material in Khan Sheikhoun town today and the army has not used nor will use in any place or time, neither in past or in future," the Syrian army has said in a statement. The Syrian Air Force has destroyed a warehouse in Idlib province where chemical weapons were being produced and stockpiled before being shipped to Iraq, Russia’s Defense Ministry spokesman said. The strike, which was launched midday Tuesday, targeted a major rebel ammunition depot east of the town of Khan Sheikhoun, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Major-General Igor Konashenkov said in a statement. The warehouse was used to both produce and store shells containing toxic gas, Konashenkov said. The shells were delivered to Iraq and repeatedly used there, he added, pointing out that both Iraq and international organizations have confirmed the use of such weapons by militants. [First published by RT at https://www.rt.com/news/383522-syria-idlib-warehouse-strike-chemical/]
The Syrian Air Force has destroyed a warehouse in Idlib province where chemical weapons were being produced and stockpiled before being shipped to Iraq, Russia’s Defense Ministry spokesman said.
The strike, which was launched midday Tuesday, targeted a major rebel ammunition depot east of the town of Khan Sheikhoun, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Major-General Igor Konashenkov said in a statement.
The warehouse was used to both produce and store shells containing toxic gas, Konashenkov said. The shells were delivered to Iraq and repeatedly used there, he added, pointing out that both Iraq and international organizations have confirmed the use of such weapons by militants.
READ MORE: Intl monitoring body & West ignoring reports of ‘chemical attack’ in Mosul – Russian MoD
The same chemical munitions were used by militants in Aleppo, where Russian military experts took samples in late 2016, Konashenkov said.
The Defense Ministry has confirmed this information as “fully objective and verified,” Konashenkov added.
According to the statement, Khan Sheikhoun civilians, who recently suffered a chemical attack, displayed identical symptoms to those of Aleppo chemical attack victims.
READ MORE: Syria hands over evidence of mustard gas attack by rebels on civilians to OPCW (VIDEO)
Hasan Haj Ali, commander of the Free Idlib Army rebel group, rejected Russia’s version of the incident, saying the rebels had no military positions in the area.
“Everyone saw the plane while it was bombing with gas,” he told Reuters.
“Likewise, all the civilians in the area know that there are no military positions there, or places for the manufacture [of weapons]. The various factions of the opposition are not capable of producing these substances,” he added.
At least 58 people, including 11 children, reportedly died and scores were injured after a hospital in Khan Sheikhoun was targeted in a suspected gas attack on Tuesday morning, Reuters reported, citing medics and rebel activists. Soon after a missile allegedly hit the facility, people started showing symptoms of chemical poisoning, such as choking and fainting.
The victims were reportedly also seen with foam coming out of their mouths. While the major Syrian opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, and other pro-rebel groups put the blame on the attack onto President Bashar Assad’s government, the Syrian military dismissed all allegations as propaganda by the rebels.
"We deny completely the use of any chemical or toxic material in Khan Sheikhoun town today and the army has not used nor will use in any place or time, neither in past or in future," the Syrian army said in a statement.
The Russian military stated it did not carry out any airstrike in the area either.
However, EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini, commenting on the incident, was quick to point to the Syrian government as a culprit, saying that it bears responsibility for the “awful” attack.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson echoed Mogherini, accusing the Syrian government of perpetrating the attack calling it “brutal, unabashed barbarism.” He argued, that besides the Syrian authorities, Iran and Russia should also bear “moral responsibility” for it.
What makes Steve Bannon tick and is the corporate media and Soros-funded 'activists' right to portray him as a monster? Video inside.
During the recent United States' presidential election campaign almost the entire mainstream was heavily biased against Donald Trump, and in favour of Hillary Clinton. Surprisingly, given Hillary Clinton's repeated claim that Donald Trump was a puppet of Vladimir Putin, the Russian news service RT America was also strongly biased against Donald Trump. Whilst it would be wrong to conclude from this that Clinton was actually Putin's puppet, rather than Trump, how was it possible for a Russian taxpayer-funded news service to act against Russia's own interests by promoting the russophobic Clinton?
Presenters Tyrel Ventura and Tabetha Wallace and their guest, Ed Schultz, presenter of RT America's news service, were savagely critical of Donald Trump in their show Now on to election night: 3rd and final debate with Ed Schultz (21/10/16). Guest, Ed Schultz, predicted that Donald Trump would lose. Whilst I thought, as did many American voters, that Donald Trump clearly won the third Presidential election debate, as well as the second, all three in that discussion on Watching the hawks agreed that he had lost that debate. (There was a small facade of criticism of Clinton from Schultz and Ventura, possibly because they may well have understood that failure to see some fault in Clinton could have caused their credibility to suffer too much.)
Also mirroring the mainstream media's 'reporting' and commentary, the rest of RT America spent nearly all of its coverage of the election attacking the alleged bigotry, racism, xenophobia, and temperamentalism of Donald Trump, whilst omitting discussion of the substantial policies, both domestic and international, that were at stake, and ignoring the mountain of evidence that should have damned Hillary Clinton years ago.
That evidence includes Hillary Clinton's complicity, since 1990, in the deaths of hundreds of thousands in Central Asia, the Middle East and the former republics of Yugoslavia, plus the cover-up of sexual misconduct and rape allegations against her husband, the former United States' President, Bill Clinton.
RT America programs, which, in this way, also sided with Clinton, include News with Ed Schultz, Lee Camp's 'comedy' show Redacted Tonight and Watching the Hawks.
In an example of Redacted Tonight,"Trump cabinet is horrifying, get rid of Electoral College, and TPP is dead," (19/11/16), the promotional summary states:
In this week's episode of Redacted Tonight, Lee Camp covers the latest news on Trump’s cabinet, which already has people panicking. What should we fear most about Trump's cabinet picks? Is he really draining the swamp?
In what seems like an attempt to cover their tracks following Donald Trump's victory, Ed Schultz and the producers of Watching the Hawks now appear to be backing away from the pro-Clinton bias they displayed during the election campaign. However, Redacted Tonight and The Big Picture continue their savage attacks on Donald Trump. Post-election examples of this in The Big Picture include: Why Trump's cabinet is a basket of deplorables (21/10/16) and Will Tulsi Gabbard go from Bernie to Trump?.
Comments after the second show listed above include:
"Is Thom channeling George Soros now? Honestly, he used to have quite an amusing program due to allowing some intelligent and witty right wingers on his panel. Now it is all straight propaganda for the faux left."
"Yep. The show is embarrassing."
"comic-relief?"
"RT should bin 'The Big Picture'. The episode with Lawson and Badawi was truly awful. If we wanted to listen to all this rabid globalist propaganda we could tune in to any of the mainstream media news channels. RT should be presenting the benefits of a MULTI-POLAR globe, not pushing the narratives of the American globalisers. What next? Is RT planning on promoting the Democrats view that the US should punish Russia for existing?"
Quite possibly Thom Hartmann and Lee Camp are banking that the various moves now underway in America to overturn Donald Trump's victory and declare Hillary Clinton President will succeed and restore some of their credibility.
The Russian government set up RT back in 2005. It recognised that it had failed to challenge the Western mainstream media's narrative about the former Yugoslav republic of Serbia. The lack of any strong media to challenge those western media lies then had permitted the United States and its European allies to bomb that country and overthrow its government in 1999.
Since then, RT and other national news services such as Iran's PressTV have helped to counter the Western mainstream media's lying narrative on Libya, Syria, Ukraine, and Yemen. Perhaps in part, consequently, the United States' and its allies' regime-change plans for Syria and Yemen have yet to succeed. These plans have also to contend with the support of the Russian air force, the Lebanese Hezbollah movement and Iran for Syria, along with the resilience of the Syrian people themselves.
RT should not rest on its laurels, however. Its success invites subversion. The apparent (failed) attempt by RT America to make Hillary Clinton President of the United States illustrates that RT America should be thoroughly overhauled with new journalists and a charter that requires RT America to give both sides of the story wherever that story is seriously disputed.
The same comment applies, of course, to the mainstream western media.
The above article was adapted from a comment posted by 'Don't Get Fooled Again' beneath an article worth reading, Trump's Media Summit Was a 'F−−−ing Firing Squad' (22/11/16) by Emily Smith and Daniel Happer | Information Clearing House.
"The world has seen nothing more barbaric in modern history than Iraq and Libya done the Washington way.” (Russian Foreign Ministry's spokesperson Maria Zakharova). The original source of this article is at https://www.rt.com/news/360662-zakharova-power-barbarism-spat/
The US envoy to the UN, who recently called Russia's actions in Syria “barbarism,” is hypocritical, because nothing in modern history is more barbaric than what the US has done in Iraq and Libya, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson said in a fiery rebuke.
The American envoy to the UN, Samantha Power, blasted Russia on Sunday at a Security Council meeting, accusing Moscow of civilian deaths in Aleppo in the wake of the collapse of the ceasefire negotiated by the US and Russia.
"What Russia is sponsoring and doing is not counter-terrorism, it is barbarism," the US diplomat said in reference to the renewed hostilities in Syria.
She delivered an emotional speech, accusing Russia and Syria of attacks on aid workers, civilian infrastructure and residential areas, while omitting the fact that armed groups – including Al-Qaeda offshoot Al-Nusra Front – are in control of large parts of Aleppo and are using its population as human shields.
The use of the term 'barbarism' by the American envoy drew sarcastic remarks from Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova.
“Historically speaking... a barbarian is someone not belonging to an empire, and we have only one of those today,” she noted on her Facebook page.
“As for the imagery... the world has seen nothing more barbaric in modern history than Iraq and Libya done the Washington way.”
Zakharova believes that Power's remarks were meant to draw attention from the American attack on Syrian troops near Deir ez-Zor, which happened amid the ceasefire and almost resulted in the Syrian Army's positions being overrun by the terrorist group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), which the US is supposedly seeking to eradicate.
Moscow blames the US for the failed truce, saying it was incapable of reining in rebel groups who would not commit to it, and would not agree to designating them as legitimate targets for counter-attacks.
Power, who received her current appointment in 2013, was among the most vocal supporters of the concept of “humanitarian interventionalism” – the use of military force on humanitarian grounds.
The invasion of Saddam Hussein's Iraq and the toppling of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya are both examples of such actions. In both cases, interventions meant to prevent human suffering actually caused huge tragedies in the long run.
We are asked by the United States to believe that the murder by the US Airforce of 80 soldiers in the Syrian Arab Army (the army of the elected Syrian government) was simply a 'mistake'. It seems more likely that the US is trying every trick in the book to stuff up all attempts at peace in the region. Is their ultimate aim is to wipe the Middle East clean of any organised peoples, stuff up Russia (using NATO/EU which they are desperately trying to prop up) and take over the petroleum assets? Whilst the US is an uninvited and illegal presence in Syria (whereas Russia is invited) it is also, with cooperation from the Saudis, keeping the price of oil down (by flooding the market with short-term fracking products) to assist promotion of instability in the oil-dependent states in the Middle East and South America/Central America, which the US hopes also to take over. The only hope here is for a Trump win because Hillary will only keep all this going, whereas he has made noises about keeping the US nose out of other peoples' business. As to whether all the American troops and commanders and allies in the Middle East and Syria are in on this, it is possible that they are not, as the following article from RT suggests, which makes the whole thing even more shocking. The following videoed interview and article were published as breaking news on RT news on 17 September at https://www.rt.com/op-edge/359690-us-syria-airstrike-unlikely-unintentional/.
Annie Machon is a former intelligence officer for MI5, the UK Security Service, who resigned in the late 1990s to blow the whistle on the spies’ incompetence and crimes with her ex-partner, David Shayler. Drawing on her varied experiences, she is now a public speaker, writer, media pundit, international tour and event organiser, political campaigner, and PR consultant. She is also now the Director of LEAP, Europe. She has a rare perspective both on the inner workings of governments, intelligence agencies and the media, as well as the wider implications for the need for increased openness and accountability in both public and private sectors.
‘Unbelievable’ that US strike on Syrian army was mistake – fmr MI5 agent
The US must cooperate with Russia on intelligence matters in Syria, former MI5 agent Annie Machon told RT, expressing doubt over Washington’s explanation for the “unintentional” raid which killed over 60 Syrian soldiers on ISIS’ frontline.
“Russia has better human intelligence on the ground because it is cooperating, it is working with the Syrian authorities. So they have access to proper human intelligence, which is much better than the Americans tend to use, which is satellite surveillance and electronic surveillance,” Machon said.
Cooperation with Russians is “vital” in Syria because of the ever-changing battlefield situation on the ground, which US forces cannot grasp from the air, as they are not working with the government in Damascus. Without this cooperation, Machon fears, the ceasefire achieved by both sides on Monday could falter without securing its main objective.
Commenting on the actual US strikes which killed at least 62 Syrian soldiers and wounded around 100 others near the eastern city of Deir ez-Zor, on the front line of the struggle against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), Machon hinted that Washington’s decision to attack Syrian forces was likely premeditated.
“I find it slightly unbelievable that the Americans could hit this target thinking this was ISIS when in fact ISIS is laying siege to the city. And the Syrian forces for years now have been known to be holed up in that city. So it seems just strange that the Americans are just saying it was a bit of a mistake,” Machon told RT.
The former MI5 agent pointed out that Russian role in Syria is clear while the US policymakers are “divided” over their objectives in Syria.
READ More: ‘Kill Russians and Iranians, threaten Assad,’ says ex-CIA chief backing Clinton
“We have some of the military that say they really need to go after ISIS, that that is the threat to the whole West. They want to work with Russia. Yet there is still this hawkish, neocon political approach which really just still wants to get rid of Assad for other strategic reasons, like supporting the regional American allies like Qatar and Saudi Arabia in the Middle East.”
Machon recalled a PBS interview last month during which former CIA deputy director Michael Morell who told host Charlie Rose that Damascus – as well as Iran and Russia – should “pay a big price” in term of casualties in Syria. Ahead of the US presidential election, Machon wondered if Saturday’s strikes stemmed from Morell’s views, who is a strong supporter of Hillary Clinton.
“He [Morell] was advocating the bombing of Assad, not to kill him, to scare him. So I’m wondering if there are elements within the US power structure that are actually going ahead ... [with] this sort of plan and bombing Assad’s military forces to scare him, to scare the Russians, to just try to make the point. And they are actually carrying this out already, rather than it just being a wish list from the former acting [deputy] director of the CIA.”
Another interpretation of the reasons behind the US strikes on Syrian army positions, Machon believes, could be to “reassure the so-called moderates,” who are funded and trained by the US, that Washington still supports them.
“So if indeed this was a planned air strike and it was indeed there to reassure the so-called moderate groups, that would make sense,” she explained.
If that is the case, Machon says that “Americans are dealing with fire” because the so-called moderate rebels often defect to Jihadist groups along with the military hardware provided by the US to fight against American forces and interests on the ground.
People who have complained to me of poor coverage by the Australian media of the underlying reasons for Britain's exit from the EU will enjoy these shows. They report on various aspects, including the possibility of preventing the privatisation of British hospitals and mining, the ability to try to end Britain's live transport of domestic animals for thousands of kms, the ability to stop fracking, the desirability of a decrease in house prices, the reasons why people outside the big cities voted against the EU, and mass immigration in an economy where unemployment is already high and numbers are an issue.
"It's panic stations amongst the ruling elites." On Sputnik's Referendum Special, George Galloway, interviews journalist Selina Scott, who sums up the EU as undemocratic, noting that the British have no ability to affect decisions on fracking, live transport or anything else of note. He also interviews a very traditional Alex Graham, former president of the RMT union, who believes that trade unions have lost confidence in their ability to defend members’ rights and an exit from the EU could bring back control. Either way, both our guests agree the Brexit vote was in part a rejection by the working class of the prevailing neoliberal orthodoxy and they came to the studio to explain why.
In "Brexit Special: Are we living in a Disunited Kingdom?", Afshin Rattansi of Going Underground, does not shy from putting the positives of Britain's referendum outcome, including more affordable housing. He interviews Alex Salmond, former First Minister of the Scottish National Party about the implications of Brexit for another Scottish referendum, asks Conservative MP, David Davies if Brexit could be the end of the UK and hears from a former Labour home secretary, Yvette Cooper, who thinks a break-up of Britain could spell the end of her party, and from former coalition business secretary Sir Vince Cable, on the day his former boss resigned.
Crosstalk's debate on Brexit covers quite a field as usual..
In The Big Picture, journalist Thom Hartman, usually very defensive on the goods of immigration, gets out of that groove on this occasion and gives good time to the valid negatives, also citing some erudite sources on the matter.
The Keiser Report does its own wild but substantial analysis of Brexit, coming down hard on the high house prices and the arcane self-justifications of the elites and mainstream press. "Max and Stacy are joined from New York City by Mitch Feierstein of PlanetPonzi.com to dissect the economic, monetary and financial consequences of the ‘shocking’ Brexit vote - Britain votes to leave the European Union. The Keiser Report team look closer at the market sell off and ask if it’s part of a wider market weakness set in motion months ago, then examine the role of the media, much as in the rise of Donald Trump, in simply failing to understand the ‘disposable’ voters left behind by globalization. Mitch shows a chart proving that the biggest pound sterling sell-off was actually in 2008 and the currency has never really recovered since then. Finally, they look at the opportunities presented by panic selling."
In Sophie and Co Sophie Shevardnadze interviews Ken Livingstone, former mayor of London and Labor Party veteran, who pushes a globalist agenda on immigration and economics, but she keeps at him, revealing the inconsistencies.
A young pro-Brexit Franco-German speaks up. On France2's Friday 24 June 8pm program, Marie Drucker interviews Charlotte Kude, 25 years old of GermanFrench nationality and a parliamentary employee with the EU. Supposedly the young were among the pro-EU majority, but Charlotte became a spokesperson for the "Vote Leave" side. She is very happy about the Brexit win. "The British are not rejecting Europeans, they are rejecting the obsolete system (...). They were hoping to send a message to the political project and also in the hope that the EU would wake up to the welfare of all those that still remain members.
A chasm between bureaucrats and citizens: This young woman became a eurosckeptic through her experience in the European Parlement. "I was struck by the chasm beween the lifestyle of the bureaucrats in Brussels and that of European citizens. (...) More than 10,000 [among the Brussels bureaucrats] are paid more than the British Primeminister, for example. They don't pay taxes; they can drink, eat, travel with all expenses paid. And, in my opinion, that's what's contributing to the bubble they are living in which must eventually explode." [1]
[1] Original french summary of the interview: Charlotte Kude, 25 ans, est une assistante parlementaire franco-allemande. Surtout, elle est pour la sortie du Royaume-Uni de l'UE et est ainsi devenue porte-parole du mouvement "Vote Leave". Elle se réjouit donc du succès du Brexit. "Ce ne sont pas les Européens que les Britanniques rejettent, c'est bien le système politique obsolète qu'ils rejettent.(...) C'est le projet politique auxquels ils ont souhaité envoyé un message, et dans l'espoir aussi que l'Union européenne se réveille pour le bien-être de tous ceux qui y sont encore".
Un fossé entre bureaucrates et citoyens
La jeune femme est devenue eurosceptique par son expérience au Parlement européen. "J'ai été vraiment interpellée par le fossé entre le train de vie des bureaucrates à Bruxelles et celui des citoyens européens. (...) Il y en a plus de 10 000 qui sont payés plus que le Premier ministre britannique par exemple, ils ne payent pas d'impôts, ils peuvent boire, manger, voyager tous frais payés. Et ça, à mon sens, ça entretient cette bulle qui va finir par imploser"."
This video is of an interview by RT with Marine Le Pen, leader of the French Front National, on the problems of the European Union for itself and for Europe. As usual she goes directly to the point, displaying her characteristic piercing wit. We have included much of RT's article below the video, in the absence of a transcript. The original article and video were published here: https://www.rt.com/news/343715-eu-collapsing-france-lepen/
RT ARTICLE: The EU is on the brink of collapse, as two of its main “pillars” are “crumbling” despite the billions of euros spent on keeping the structure from falling, far-right French leader Marine Le Pen told RT, adding that the union would fail if France left it.
“I believe that the European Union is in the process of collapsing on itself for one simple reason. The two pillars on which it’s founded – Schengen and the euro – are in the process of crumbling,” Le Pen told Marie De Douhet of RT France in an exclusive interview. “So they’re in a sort of mad downward spiral in which they’re capable of anything today to try and keep this building standing.”
The leader of France’s hard-right Front National party believes the collapse is not a matter of “if” but “when,” saying the EU “shines from the light of a dead star” while its leaders are struggling to play for time “at the cost of billions trying to hold this structure up.”
As a “revealing” piece of evidence supporting her opinion, Le Pen cited one of Brussels’ recent punitive measures.
“The threat of condemnation of countries which do not accept migrants – a €250,000 fine for each migrant not taken in – is in itself revealing,” Le Pen said.
The European Commission unveiled plans earlier in May to impose a penalty of around €250,000 per rejected refugee on countries that refuse to share the burden of Europe’s migrant crisis.
For countries such as Poland, which is adamantly opposed to taking in refugees, the new compulsory measure would result in a fine of over €1 billion ($1.1 billion), given its existing quota of 6,500 people.
“The threats, the blackmail, now used systematically by the European Union is, above all, a gigantic problem of weakness,” Le Pen said.
Commenting on the migrant crisis, Le Pen said the EU is using immigrants as a tool to drive down labor costs across the 28-country bloc.
READ MORE: Human traffickers exploit EU migrant crisis to increase child smuggling – EU report
“That’s why the European Union supports tens of millions of immigrants in the coming years which will come onto the European Union labor market to push down wages,” she said. “So, in fact they have betrayed, if you like, the working class.”
Marine Le Pen has been a vocal supporter of the UK leaving the European Union, a move that the National Front hopes would inspire a similar “Frexit” campaign.
According to a March poll, 53 percent of French citizens surveyed would like to hold a Brexit-like referendum on France’s membership in the EU.
When asked if she feared any consequences for a “Frexit,” or Brussels’ retribution if it should go through, Le Pen said, “If France leaves the European Union, the European Union no longer exists.”
The leader of France’s hard-right Front National party believes the collapse is not a matter of “if” but “when,” saying the EU “shines from the light of a dead star” while its leaders are struggling to play for time “at the cost of billions trying to hold this structure up.”
As a “revealing” piece of evidence supporting her opinion, Le Pen cited one of Brussels’ recent punitive measures.
“The threat of condemnation of countries which do not accept migrants – a €250,000 fine for each migrant not taken in – is in itself revealing,” Le Pen said.
The European Commission unveiled plans earlier in May to impose a penalty of around €250,000 per rejected refugee on countries that refuse to share the burden of Europe’s migrant crisis.
For countries such as Poland, which is adamantly opposed to taking in refugees, the new compulsory measure would result in a fine of over €1 billion ($1.1 billion), given its existing quota of 6,500 people.
“The threats, the blackmail, now used systematically by the European Union is, above all, a gigantic problem of weakness,” Le Pen said.
Commenting on the migrant crisis, Le Pen said the EU is using immigrants as a tool to drive down labor costs across the 28-country bloc.
READ MORE: Human traffickers exploit EU migrant crisis to increase child smuggling – EU report
“That’s why the European Union supports tens of millions of immigrants in the coming years which will come onto the European Union labor market to push down wages,” she said. “So, in fact they have betrayed, if you like, the working class.”
Marine Le Pen has been a vocal supporter of the UK leaving the European Union, a move that the National Front hopes would inspire a similar “Frexit” campaign.
According to a March poll, 53 percent of French citizens surveyed would like to hold a Brexit-like referendum on France’s membership in the EU.
When asked if she feared any consequences for a “Frexit,” or Brussels’ retribution if it should go through, Le Pen said, “If France leaves the European Union, the European Union no longer exists.”
For people who follow French politics, France's entry into NATO was a frank change of politics. France had previously maintained an independent interest in the Middle East and tended to align away from Israel. France's involvement in recent NATO 'interventions' in Syria seemed uncharacteristically naive. In this stand-out interview, Yvan Blot, a former Gaullist parliamentarian, and closely associated with Sarkosy, when President, says that he did not agree with joining NATO. He says that French conservatives tend to be friends with Russia, in part because of business interests, and that socialist governments tend to have strained relations with Russia, since Mitterand. This interview is one of those where the person interviewed has a lot of experience and an unusually wide and historical perspective. This video transcript was first published on Sophie & Co on RT on 8 Mar, 2016 .
Russia's military pullout out of Syria came as a surprise to most Western nations. That, and a successful though fragile ceasefire inside Syria between Assad and the rebels, have shifted the balance on the global chessboard. Europe is struggling with the refugee flow, desperate enough to negotiate a blackmail-style deal with Turkey. As people are growing tired of the unpopular measures taken by Brussels, the upcoming elections in France, the EU's major player, may change the stakes in diplomacy as well. In this rapidly changing situation will the attitude towards Russia change? Does the West even need to carry out such a policy? And what role is NATO playing in the rift between Russia and the nations of Europe? We ask a prominent French politician, close friend of ex-President Nicolas Sarkozy. Yvan Blot is on Sophie&Co today.
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Sophie Shevarnadze: Yvan Blot, French scholar and politician, close to former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, author of “Putin’s Russia”, welcome to the show, it’s great to have you with us, sir.
Yvan Blot: Thank you for inviting me.
SS: So, from the latest, Russian troops are being pulled out of Syria, so we have the peace talks that are somewhat in progress right now. Truce is setting on the battlefield - do you think that Russian withdrawal, this move to pull out troops, will actually help the peace process, help de-escalate the situation, or will those who don’t want to find a compromise be emboldened by this move?
YB: It was a surprize in France to hear that Russian troops are leaving Syria, but I think it’s a good thing for the peace process, naturally.
SS: Why?
YB: It shows clearly that big powers want to seize the war and because Russia attacked the Islamist movement in Syria, some people would think that Russia wants to be in the East, and would invade, like America invaded Iraq.
SS: Make it it’s sphere of influence, basically.
YB: So we have a proof it’s not the case.
SS: How do you think the West will react to Russia’s move? Will West’s attitude towards Russia change after the withdrawal of the troops.
YB: I think, probably, Mr. Obama was informed about this decision, President Putin’s decision, so I think, normally, the West would have a good reaction, because if Washington agrees, the rest of the Western countries will agree, because America is the leader of the Western coalition in Syria.
SS: French economy minister, Emmanuel Macron, proclaimed that France is actually supporting the end of anti-Russian sanctions, but all of the EU members have to be OK with that. Except France we have Hungary, we have Greece, we have Italy who do not want to extend, to renew the sanctions. What do you think will happen? Will their voices be heard? Is it possible to actually go against the EU will and not renew the sanctions individually?
YB: It’s difficult to say. I know that business circles in France are against the sanctions, they want to get rid of the sanctions, and there’s a big discussion, private discussion, between the government and the business circles. I think, Mr. Hollande is not really in favor of sanctions, but he has to take into account the American position, naturally, and for that reason, it’s difficult to say what he will do, because if for him the American pressure is too strong, he will say: “We continue the sanctions”.
SS: So it’s really more the American pressure than the fact that all EU members have to be OK with not renewing the sanctions?
YB: It’s another reason, I would say. Nothing forbids France to get rid of the sanctions if France wanted to. I think, with somebody with character, as was General De Gaulle, we would stop the sanctions, whatever the consequences. Our President is an intelligent man, but I’m not sure he wants to have these difficult relations with Washington, so I’m not sure France will be very independent in that…
SS: You often talk about America’s influence over Europe, and you have mentioned that these are American sanctions more than European sanctions… I mean, you really believe that America’s influence over Europe is so big that it can actually pressure Europe into imposing sanctions on Russia?
YB: Yes, I have examples. For instance, we have a big bank, BNP Paribas, who had to pay enormous sums to the American Treasury because they made business with Iran, for instance. I know it was the same for Mistral, for instance. The American government told the French government, in private, naturally, that if we give Mistrals, these warships, to Russia, the sum that bank, BNP Paribas, must pay will be much higher and, at the same time, they say that American judges are completely independent. I don’t think this is the case. There are contacts between the judges and the American government. I have some experience with this. Western countries always say that their judges are completely independent, but it’s not the case if it is a question which touches national interests. For little private conflicts the judges are independent, but it’s linked with politics, the government says “I hope you will give good sanctions against this bank”, for instance.
SS: So you think if Europe, on a larger scale, was to reset relations with Russia, then America will actually torpedo it or sabotage it?
YB: The strategy of America was clearly explained in the book by Mr.Brzezinski, “The Big Chessboard”. In this book, Mr.Brzezinski says: “The problem of America is the competition with Eurasia.” Eurasia - that is to say Europe, Russia and China and India, perhaps - and he says: “If all these countries are against us, it’s going to be terrible for us, we are not the first power in the world, so we have to divide Eurasia, to colonize Western Europe, to survey China and Russia. For us it makes really a problem, and the best thing would be to have weaker Russia and to organize conflict with Ukraine”. It was written 10 years ago, and now you see the implementation of this strategy. I think it is an American strategy.
SS: But I want to talk about Europe’s position - why do you think it’s stuck in this choice between partnership with Russia and partnership with NATO. It seems like it’s one or the other - why? Why is it stuck in this position?
YB: First, NATO has no reason to survive, because NATO was created, in the beginning, to fight against communism and against Soviet Union. There’s no longer a Soviet Union. It would have been logical to destroy NATO and to create a new order for defence and security issues, new organisation, probably, and probably without the U.S.. It was not the case, naturally, and major part of our political leaders have strong personal links with American government, it’s a fact.
SS: You think there’s no reason for NATO to survive, you’ve also said that America’s influence on Europe is in large done through NATO - now, former French PM Dominique de Villepin.
has proposed, once again, pulling France out of the NATO military command structure. Do you think it’s a good idea, do you think France should pull out? Is it even possible?
YB: I think he’s right. I know him very personally, I think he’s right. It is technically completely possible, because we have a big industry of armaments, we have nuclear forces, so France can be independent.
SS: So why are you with NATO then? Is it just, like, symbolic, is it a question of French pride and prestige?
YB: It was a discussion between me and President Sarkozy about this, because I didn’t agree with him. It was Sarkozy who…
SS: Returned France to NATO.
YB: And he said: “We are in the same family”, his argument was “the same family, we have the same values”. Perhaps we have the same values, but since, perhaps, 10 years, all French presidents ask Americans to have one commander-in-chief of NATO. There are three staffs in NATO: for North of Europe, for Center of Europe and for South. France wanted to have the general-in-chief of the South, and the American said “No, no, no”. They said “No” to Mitterrand, they said “No” to Chirac, and they said “No” to Sarkozy. But, in spite of this Sarkozy said that it doesn’t matter, “we will integrate into it”, but I’m not sure it was a good idea.
SS: So, if France is part of the same family, as the NATO members, then why did the president Francois Hollande, after the horrible terrorist attacks, actually called on its fellow EU allies to help fight terrorism, help France, and not the NATO members?
YB: Politically, the EU is more important in France than the NATO. We don’t speak very much about NATO. But EU, yes, because it’s the same currency, it’s same economic policy, and so on. For that reason Mr. Hollande wants always to have good relations with the members of the EU, but in the future, I don’t know what we will have because it’s possible - it’s not sure, but it’s possible - that the UK leaves the EU.
SS: So, you have studied Russian for many years, you’ve wrote a book that’s called “Putin’s Russia”. It decries a lot of myths about Putin, it also argues against looking at Russia as if it was still a Soviet Union. Are there are lot of people in the French establishment who share your view on Russia?
YB: There are part of the establishment.
SS: What’s the ratio?
YB: Partly, it’s a question of generation. Older people in France very often think that Russia is always a Soviet Union, older people. But with younger people, it’s not the case at all. So, younger people in general are much more in favor of cooperation with Russia, even within the government, or within the Parliament, and this situation, I think, it’s improving for the future cooperation between France and Russia.
SS: But, French government mostly consists of young people, so you would think that they don’t really remember the Soviet Union, yet they are for the sanctions and they still decry Putin as a dictator…
YB: Yes, the French government is socialist, you know. It is a socialist tradition in France to have bad relations with Russia, I must say, because after the WWII, the Americans gave a lot of money to socialist party to fight against the Communist Party in France. For that reason, Socialist party had always very good links with America. Especially now, they have very good links with ms. Clinton, for instance. Ms. Clinton said once, I think she didn’t want to say this, but she said it to Juppe, “Mr. President Juppe” - but a journalist told her: “But he’s not President!” - he was PM, but he wasn’t a President - “Oh yes, I am sorry, I made a mistake” - but in fact, she would like to have Mr. Juppe as partner for future.
SS: We’ll talk about the Presidential elections that are coming up. So you have part of French establishment that is very anti-Russian, and you have part of it that’s very pro-Russian.
YB: Especially, business circles.
SS: So which side will prevail?
YB: In the short run, it’s, perhaps, the anti-Russians who are rather mainstream, especially in the media, but I think in the longer run, it would be completely different. You have only to look at the geography - it’s very difficult for Western Europe not to have a special links with Russia, because it’s the same continent, in fact. So, I think it’s artificial - this fight against Russia. In fact, the majority of people who come from France to Russia can see it’s not a dictatorship. I was, in the past, in the Soviet Union, and in my hotel, I could read some Russian papers in English - there was no criticism against Mr. Brezhnev, for instance, or of the Soviet government. But now you can read articles against Mr. Putin - so it’s very clear, there’s more freedom than before.
SS: So you have Presidential election coming up, right around the corner. Former President Nicolas Sarkozy was in Russia, you’re close to him, I believe you’re his friend. If his party wins the vote, do you think there will be a rapprochement between Russia and France?
YB: I’m sure.
SS: Really?
YB: Sarkozy always told me he wanted to have good relations with Mr. Putin. He has, I think personal good relations, and he thinks it’s very necessary, because Sarkozy is linked with business circles very much, much more than the socialists, and he wants to have better relations with Russia because they want to expand trade with Russia in every sectors of the economy. I think with Sarkozy the relations would be better, I’m sure, and even if we would have some tensions with the U.S.. We had tensions already in the past, with Sarkozy, when he went to mingle with Georgian war, for instance, Washington was not very happy about this. But he did it.
SS: Do you think he will run for Presidency again? What do you think? In your personal opinion?
YB: I think so, except, if he has such bad polls, he could perhaps say: “It’s over, it’s not possible”, but except in that extreme situation - we cannot know exactly the future so much early - I think he will be a candidate. He wants to be a candidate.
SS: But do you think the French are ready to choose again between Hollande and Sarkozy?
YB: Frankly, I’m not sure, because part of the French people would prefer to have new personalities, probably.
SS: It’s been 2 years since the Crimean referendum, pro-Russian referendum, and you have said that it’s impossible to reverse the Crimean situation. The EU however, is saying that the control over the peninsula needs to be given back to Ukraine. President Poroshenko is ordering Ukraine’s military to focus on Crimea, you have Kiev that is getting military aid from the U.S. - I mean, it does seem like the West cannot come to terms with that. Do you think that'll ever happen? When?
YB: I think Crimea will be Russian in the future. It’s not possible to change that. In France, we are not in a good place to think against it, because we made exactly the same with Mayotte in Africa, you know it’s some islands which form a Comorrean state and when they got their independence, one island said “We want to be French”, and this island is French. For that reason, France was condemned by the UNGA, we were condemned by the African Assembly of Nations, and it doesn’t change anything. We had no sanctions, because we are friends with the U.S.
SS: But we have sanctions, so if the Crimean situation is irreversible, and the sanctions are linked to the Crimean situation, does that mean that the sanctions against Russia are here to stay forever?
YB: It is a U.S. position now, with President Obama, but you cannot see future. I’m not sure, for instance, Mr. Trump, I think, perhaps, he would lift the sanctions, I’m not sure that he’s in favor of the sanctions. He’s like everybody, in general, in business circles - they don’t like sanctions. They think politicians mingling with economics is not a good thing, it’s better to be separated. With ms. Clinton, perhaps, we would have the same sanctions. So we have to wait for the American elections.
SS: Maybe, even harsher sanctions with ms. Clinton. So, let’s talk about the EU situation. The EU isn’t aligned in its relations with Russia, it has the migrant crisis, there’s the financial problem in the Eurozone, there’s terrorism problem - a serious problem. So, if countries weren’t obliged to follow one common EU policy, do you think they would be able to deal with these issues better, individually?
YB: I’m not sure. For instance a lot of people say because we are in the EU we could have more opportunity for economic growth, but it’s not in fact the case. Switzerland or Norway are not in the EU, and their economy is much better. I’m not sure the Euro, for instance, is a good thing for French economy. Probably, it’s a good thing for German economy, but we have not the same competitiveness to have the same money - I’m not sure it’s a good idea. A lot of economists, professors of economics - I am the professor of economics - we think the Euro is not a good idea, probably, a symbolic or a political idea, but from an economic point of view, it’s probably a mistake.
SS: So Britain is planning to have a referendum this summer on the EU exit, and according to the survey that’s been conducted by the university of Edinburgh, majority of France wants to have the same referendum. What do you think? Could the British experience set an example to follow for other members?
YB: Probably. It’s a reason for why a Commission in Brussels is a bit frightened of this situation, because if the UK leaves European Union, other countries could do the same and could be encouraged to make the same move. Perhaps, the Scandinavian countries who are very linked with the UK, perhaps, Czech Republic…
SS: Well, you have France, you have Sweden, Spain, Germany - they all want EU membership referendum. I’m not saying that they want to leave the EU, but they want to have the right to vote for it. Do you think they should be able?
YB: The people want to be consulted on this sort of issue, and one of the big problems with the EU is that it is not democratic at all. It was built not to be democratic. The power in Brussels is not in the hands of the Council of ministers and is not in the Parliament. I was for 10 years in the EU Parliament, I can tell you that all the power, in fact, is in the Commission. It’s a government of civil servants, who have no responsibility towards different countries, and they do what they want, and for that reason, more and more people are against this sort of technician government, which is not a democratic government. I think it was a mistake at the beginning of the European Union, to create this super-Comission above all. So, it doesn’t mean we have to get rid completely with the EU, but perhaps it is necessary to re-write the treaty to suppress this Commission in Brussels, it was a bad idea. It would be Europe, naturally, if we did that. Why not?
SS: So, you have said that you are worried about the massive flow of refugees into Europe, but do you feel like, maybe, Europe has a moral obligation or responsibility to accommodate these refugees from the Middle East. I mean, are European policies partly to blame for wars that are causing this mass exodus? I mean, intervention in Libya produced a failed state right on border of Europe, you know.
YB: You are right. I think there are some governments that have a responsibility because of the disorder they created in the MidEast, and it was one of the causes of the movement of refugees towards Europe. But the public opinion is really against it, and so, if you are in democracy, you have to take into account the opinion of the people. I think it’s necessary to have more peace, naturally, in the Middle East - that’s one of the questions, but otherwise, it’s necessary, really, to control our borders which is not the case, because we have created this Schengen area, and the Schengen area is not very well protected against illegal immigrants, and that’s really a problem. You must add to this problem the fact that among the refugees, it’s possible that you have some terrorists. Our Secret Service is persuaded it is the case, I must say.
SS: Yvan Blot, thank you very much for this interesting interview. We were talking to Yvan Blot, French politician, who used to sit in the French and the European Parliament's, past terrorism advisor to the French government, author of “Putin’s Russia”, talking about seemingly dead end of West’s relations with Russia and the future of Europe. That’s it for this edition of SophieCo, I will see you next time.
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