Fears of cover-up of vaccine caused deaths
Pathologist who said 30-40% of post-vaccine autopsies died of the vaccine went oddly silent and suddenly stopped carrying out autopsies
By Will Jones | The Daily Sceptic | May 31, 2022
If we are going to get to the bottom of whether and to what extent vaccines are contributing to the deaths of the vaccinated, autopsies are a crucial tool. So where are all the autopsies to help us answer these questions?
Back last summer, the Chief Pathologist at the University of Heidelberg, Dr. Peter Schirmacher, was pushing for many more autopsies of vaccinated people. His team had just finished conducting 40 autopsies of people who had died within two weeks of vaccination and concluded that 30-40% of them died from the vaccine.
Dr. Schirmacher warned of a high number of unreported deaths from vaccination and lamented that pathologists don’t notice most of the patients who die from a vaccination. The problem, he explained, is that vaccinated people do not usually die under clinical observation.
The doctor examining the corpse does not establish any context with the vaccination and certifies a natural death and the patient is buried. Or he certifies an unclear manner of death and the public prosecutor sees no third-party fault and releases the body for burial.
Dr. Schirmacher’s claims were dismissed at the time by Government scientists, but he stuck to his guns. “The colleagues are definitely wrong because they cannot judge this specific question competently,” he said. He clarified that he is in favour of the vaccines to fight Covid and has been vaccinated himself, but says the benefits and risks must be considered for each person. He argued in favour of “individual protection considerations” instead of quickly vaccinating everyone.
At the time, the Federal Association of German Pathologists was also pushing for more autopsies of vaccinated people. Johannes Friemann, head of the autopsy working group in the association, said this was the only way that connections between deaths and vaccinations could be ruled out or proven. The association had already in March 2021 sent a letter to Health Minister Jens Spahn requesting that German state governments instruct health authorities to order autopsies on site. Five months later, in August, this letter remained unanswered.
Following the reports in the media of his comments, Dr. Schirmacher fell oddly silent. Today, ten months later, no further autopsies by his group have been reported and no further calls for them have been heard. There are also no reports of autopsies being conducted specifically on those who died shortly after Covid vaccination in any other countries – save for the 15 done by Dr. Arne Burkhardt towards the end of 2021, which found “clear evidence of vaccine-induced autoimmune-like pathology in multiple organs” in 14 of 15 cases, but which were ignored by all health authorities and mainstream media.
Where are all the autopsies to investigate the role of vaccines in post-vaccine deaths, and why have Dr. Schirmacher and his colleagues gone quiet, after being so emphatic about the risks and the need?
This looks very much like a cover-up and a silencing. If it isn’t, then why don’t governments order autopsies to be carried out, to put the matter to rest? What have they got to hide?
Connecticut to hire “misinformation” expert who will urge social media sites to censor “false” posts
By Tom Parker | Reclaim The Net | May 31, 2022
Connecticut plans to pay a “misinformation” expert $150,000 per year to scour the internet for election content that they deem to be “false” and then urge social media platforms to flag or remove posts containing this information.
According to The New York Times, this misinformation expert will flag information that’s going viral, memes, and “emerging narratives.” They will also be instructed to look for this information on alt-tech platforms such as GETTR and Rumble.
Connecticut officials said they would prefer candidates that are fluent in English and Spanish so that they can target misinformation in both languages.
Connecticut is one of several Democrat-controlled states that are launching efforts to flag and censor misinformation in the run-up to the 2022 US midterm elections.
Colorado is redeploying a “Rapid Response Election Security Cyber Unit” that it created for the 2020 election. This unit is made up of three election security experts who will surveil the internet for election misinformation and report it to federal law enforcement.
And California’s office of the Secretary of State is working with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and academics to search for “patterns of misinformation across the internet.”
In addition to these flagging and censorship efforts, Colorado, Oregon, Idaho, and Arizona will also be spending millions of dollars on ad campaigns that push “accurate” election information.
Colorado’s Democratic Secretary of State, Jena Griswold, will head the Rapid Response Election Security Cyber Unit. She justified her team’s flagging of misinformation to federal law enforcement by claiming that “lies are being used to chip away at our fundamental freedoms.”
Connecticut’s Deputy Secretary of the State, Scott Bates, justified his state’s misinformation censorship program by insisting that the state needs to have “situational awareness by looking into all the incoming threats to the integrity of elections.”
Bates added: “Misinformation can erode people’s confidence in elections, and we view that as a critical threat to the democratic process.”
While representatives of these states are framing these programs as a way to boost confidence in elections and protect the democratic process, Tom Fitton, founder of the conservative, non-partisan educational foundation Judicial Watch, argued that these states are “setting up ‘Ministries of Truth’ to censor Americans.”
These programs are the latest of many online censorship initiatives pushed by politicians that raise First Amendment flags. Some other examples include the recently paused DHS “Disinformation Governance Board” which was launched with the intention of fighting “disinformation,” the Biden administration’s admission that it flags content for Facebook to censor, and Democrats working with Twitter to get tweets taken down.
Critics have argued that programs that involve public officials flagging speech for Big Tech platforms to censor violate the First Amendment because the government is coercing these private companies to censor on its behalf. However, courts have so far dismissed lawsuits that allege these public-private censorship initiatives violate the First Amendment.
A lawsuit that was filed in March and alleged that several of the Biden administration’s actions, including its admission that it flags content for Facebook to censor, violated the First Amendment was dismissed in May.
Journalist Alex Berenson’s December 2021 lawsuit, which accused Twitter of violating several laws when banning his account and alleged that the federal government coerced Twitter to deprive Berenson of his right to speak, was recently allowed to proceed but the First Amendment claim was dismissed.
Ukraine fires top official behind claims of Russian war crimes
Samizdat | May 31, 2022
Ukrainian lawmakers voted on Tuesday to remove the nation’s human rights commissioner, Lyudmila Denisova, from her post. The official has been accused of failing to perform duties and in particular of spreading unverified information about atrocities supposedly committed by Russian troops in Ukraine. Such actions only tarnished Ukraine’s image, MPs have argued.
A no-confidence resolution has been supported by 234 lawmakers out of 450 or 52% of the MPs in Verkhovnaya Rada, said Yaroslav Zheleznyak, a member of the Golos (‘Voice’) faction in the Ukrainian parliament. Denisova had previously been criticized, both by lawmakers and the Ukrainian media, over a purported failure to execute her duties, particularly amid the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
The ombudsperson had “hardly exercised her powers to organize humanitarian corridors” or prisoner exchanges, a Ukrainian MP, Pavlo Frolov, wrote in a Facebook post ahead of Tuesday’s vote. The human rights commissioner had barely shown “human rights activism” at all, he said, adding that Denisova’s duties eventually fell to Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk, who repeatedly sought to organize humanitarian corridors.
According to Frolov, the ombudswoman’s “inexplicable focus” on supposed sex crimes and “rape of minors in the occupied territories, which she could not substantiate with evidence” only harmed Ukraine. The MP has also accused Denisova of spending most of her time abroad as the conflict unfolded.
Instead of traveling to Russia specifically to negotiate prisoner exchanges, Denisova spent her time in the “warm and calm” cities of Europe, such as Davos, Vienna or Warsaw, Frolov said.
Earlier, a group of journalists, human rights activists and psychologists slammed Denisova over what they called breach of ethics, and accused her of turning the reports on the alleged sexual crimes committed by Russian troops into a “scandalous newsreel”-style publication.
Denisova herself, who served as Ukraine’s ombudsperson since 2018, said on Monday that she could face a vote of no confidence in the parliament, accusing the administration of President Volodymyr Zelensky of being behind the move. She has also claimed at that time that the procedure for her removal would violate Ukraine’s constitution. The human rights commissioner took up her post under Zelensky’s predecessor, Petro Poroshenko, who served as Ukraine’s president until May 2019.
In March, Russian ombudsperson Tatyana Moskalkova called on Denisova to stop the torture of Russian soldiers captured by Ukrainian forces. The Russian official cited reports on “cases of cruel and inhuman treatment of Russian soldiers in captivity in Ukraine” at that time. According to Moskalkova, Denisova told her that there could be “no agreements on that matter.”
On Tuesday, the head of the Russian presidential human rights council, Valery Fadeev, called on Denisova to be put on trial. “You cannot prove anything to a person whose profession is to lie,” he said, referring to the Ukrainian human rights commissioner.
Duque forces MNNA status on Colombia despite unpopularity of NATO
By Paul Antonopoulos | May 31, 2022
Colombian president Iván Duque announced on his social media that his country is officially a non-NATO strategic ally. With less than two months to go until the end of his government, the Colombian president will seemingly be replaced with a centre-left candidate, the first in the country’s history.
“We welcome the memorandum sent by US President Joe Biden and the Secretary of State, which formalizes the designation of Colombia as a strategic non-member ally of NATO. A decision that reaffirms the good ties in our bilateral relations,” Duque wrote on Twitter on May 23.
The South American country will now have privileges when it comes to accessing the US military industry and extensive financing for procurements. However, this action by Duque has not been welcomed by the Colombian opposition, who showed their rejection of the announcement and reiterated that it is just one more move by the current administration to try and bolster the presidential elections that will have its second round on June 19.
Sandra Ramírez, a senator for the opposition Commons Party, said: “Colombia as an extra ally of NATO does not benefit us at all. On the contrary, we join their interventionist and war policies. In addition, it goes against sovereignty, which in the end is the voice of the majority of Colombians, and which is anchored to the self-determination of the peoples.”
Ramírez highlights that it is a simple lobby on the part of Duque, who has always put his personal interests above Colombia. “Surely that’s what his advisers told him and that’s why he spent so much time lobbying and not governing. NATO represents a policy of war and here we want a policy of peace and social inclusion to prevail. With this agreement we will continue to be at the mercy of US interests, which we reject.”
With Gustavo Petro, founder of the centre-left Humane Colombia, leading the polls and expected to be the next president of the Latin American country, Ramírez says he must reverse Duque’s decision and leave the NATO program immediately to focus his energies on solving local problems instead.
Another Commons Party Senator, Carlos Antonio Lozada, says that according to his sources, “Petro will get out of any military agreement that ties us to the geopolitical interests of the United States, which would be aimed against strengthening regional integration.”
A Major Non-NATO Ally (MNNA) does not mean that in the event that Colombia suffers external aggression, the US will intercede to protect the country, as is the case with actual members states. In this way, Colombia’s only advantage is that it can gain access to American weapons – at a time when much of South America is moving towards the just as effective but far cheaper Russian and Chinese weaponry.
The process for Colombia’s MNNA status began on March 10 during the meeting between Duque and Biden at the White House. Colombia thus joined the list of 17 MNNA countries, being the third in Latin America after Brazil and Argentina. The other allies are Australia, Egypt, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Jordan, New Zealand, Thailand, Kuwait, Morocco, Pakistan, Bahrain, the Philippines, Afghanistan and Tunisia.
Colombia having MNNA status certainly makes the June 19 election all the more interesting, especially when considering this could be the country’s most historic election as for the first time a progressive candidate could be president of the country.
As Colombia has a central place for US policy in Latin America, the second round vote then holds an even greater importance for Washington, which closely observes events in the world’s leading cocaine-producing country.
For the South American country, a progressive government could mean more favorable conditions for the strengthening of Latin American integration. Colombia, with its first potential progressive president, could leave behind a foreign policy that looks exclusively at the US and be an active part of continental integration. But until then, the question remains whether Petro would engage in the task of reversing Colombia’s MNNA status.
Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.
Kremlin Responds to Claims Putin is Terminally Ill
By Paul Joseph Watson | Summit News | May 31, 2022
Russia has responded to claims that keep appearing in western media outlets, including those made by ‘peegate’ dossier author Christopher Steele, that Vladimir Putin is dying of a terminal illness.
Lurid assertions about Putin’s health appear to be part of a black propaganda campaign to deflate the ‘masculine’ image Putin tries to portray, given that they appear to be backed by no actual evidence whatsoever.
Indeed, the much vaunted ‘fact-checkers’ seem to be AWOL on this one.
The claims, which are almost always made by anonymous intelligence officials, include;
– Putin has Parkinson’s disease.
– Putin has dementia.
– Putin has blood cancer.
– Putin is suffering from “chemo brain”, a cognitive impairment caused by cancer treatment.
– Putin recently underwent major surgery.
– Putin is taking steroids to hide his symptoms.
– Putin is “constantly” being followed around by doctors.
– Putin is fooling the word by using “pre-recorded appearances.”
– Putin is using “body doubles” and “actors” to fulfil his public appearances.
– Putin’s health woes have weakened his grip on power, which is now tenuous.
– Putin may even be dead already but that it won’t be admitted for “months” to avoid a Kremlin coup.
Of course, no one knows the true state of Putin’s health because NATO-aligned spies and corporate media outlets will always seek to play up the most dire speculation in an effort to undermine the Russian president.
One insight into the veracity of such reports is that the claims are being amplified by British spy Christopher Steele, who infamously authored the dubious Trump dossier which has been roundly debunked.
The report, which was funded by Hillary Clinton’s campaign in an effort to get dirt on Trump, ludicrously claimed that Trump had visited Moscow to have women urinate on him.
“It was later revealed that Trump did not go to Russia when Steele claimed he did, and that Steele’s primary source for the document was based in the United States, not Russia. That source later personally debunked the “pee tape” allegation while speaking to the FBI,” writes Tom Pappert.
Even the New York Times was forced to acknowledge that Steele’s work has been “discredited,” so his claims on Putin’s health should be taken with a grain of salt.
Russia has now officially responded to the claims in the form of a statement made by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who stressed that Putin makes daily appearances in public.
“You can see him on TV screens, read, and listen to his speeches. I don’t think that a sane person can suspect any signs of an illness or ailment in this man,” said Lavrov.
“I’ll leave it on the conscience of those who disseminate such rumors despite daily opportunities for everyone to see how he and others look like,” he added.
Greek Opposition Demands Legal Clarification for Confiscation of Iranian Oil at US Behest
Samizdat | May 31, 2022
ATHENS – Greek largest opposition party, Coalition of the Radical Left – Progressive Alliance (SYRIZA), on Tuesday asked the Greek government to clarify the legal grounds for the confiscation of Iranian oil from a former Russian-flagged tanker at the request of the United States.
“What was the legal basis for the US request for legal assistance in confiscating oil from the tanker? Was the proposal of the [Greek] anti-money laundering authority to continue the detention of the Russian ship contrary [to the US request]? On what legal basis did the ship remain detained during the time between the cancellation of the original decision about its arrest by the anti-money laundering authority and the decision of the one-judge trial court of Chalcis to grant the US request?” the party said in a statement.
The party added that initially, the anti-money laundering authority decided not to confiscate Iranian oil or detain the tanker. US sanctions against Iran are not considered legal by the EU and Greece, the party noted.
The party also asked what actions had been taken for the immediate release of the crew, and why Greece did not receive significant support from the US, which initiated the process of confiscation.
Last Friday, Iran’s armed forces captured two Greek-flagged oil tankers — the Delta Poseidon and the Prudent Warrior — in Persian Gulf waters, reportedly in response to the seizure of the Iranian-flagged tanker Lana in Greek waters in mid-April on suspicion that it was avoiding EU sanctions. The US claimed that the vessel was carrying Iranian crude, subject to US sanctions, and requested that the cargo be handed over to it, despite later reports that it was a Russian-flagged tanker Pegas that had changed its ownership before entering Greek waters.
A World at War?
Biden lashes out against “enemies” as our country declines
BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • MAY 31, 2022
One recalls that when war fever surged demanding intervention by Imperial Britain in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877, a song became popular in the music halls which included “We don’t want to fight, But by Jingo if we do, We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men, we’ve got the money too.” If the refrain sounds familiar, it should as the United States has been experiencing extreme “jingoism” since 2001. Any rejection of the “rules based international order” established and policed by “leader of the free world” Washington has resulted in immediate punishment by sanctions followed by threats of military intervention. In some cases, as in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria, the actual armed intervention seeking regime change has been the end result. And it is all done to spread “freedom” and “democracy,” a claim that might be disputed by the millions of dead mostly Muslims who have had to suffer the consequences.
So the United States of America has been a country, like its best friend Israel, that seems to be perpetually at war… so what else is new? What’s new is that under President Joe Biden there has been zero diplomacy and almost reflexive reliance on wielding the “big stick.” To quote another bon mot from one of my favorite authors Raymond Chandler, creator of private eye Philip Marlowe, “… when in doubt, have two guys come through the door with guns.”
Don’t worry, Chandler’s two guys and many more like them are now in Ukraine under cover and in mufti training Ukrainians to use all the nifty Raytheon and Lockheed toys Uncle Joe has sent them. They are working together with the largely neocon advisers coaching Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is guarded by British and US special forces, on what to say and do during his increasingly strident international calls to widen the war. If they are successful and manage to sink another Russian ship or two using harpoon missiles, which Zelensky is threatening to do, the proxy US war with Russia could quickly become for real. Zelensky’s family meanwhile is reportedly safely ensconced in an $8 million villa in Israel. He also has a multi-million dollar villa property near Miami and another in Tuscany. Who would have thought that being president of the poorest country in Europe could bring such material rewards?
Australian journalist Caitlin Johnstone, who has a huge worldwide audience, opines that Biden is possibly the worst US president ever, worse even that his consistently denigrated predecessor and media punching bag Donald Trump. Her recent article succinctly addresses what makes Biden’s egregious failure both different and incredibly dangerous. She writes “Preventing nuclear war is a US president’s single most important job. It’s so important you shouldn’t even really have to talk about it, because it’s so self-evidently the number one priority. And this administration is just rolling the dice on nuclear conflict with increasing frequency every day. Even if humanity survives this standoff (and the one with China that’s next in line), Biden will still have been an unforgivably depraved president for allowing it to get this close. There’s no excuse whatsoever for just casually rolling the dice on all terrestrial life like this.”
Indeed, Joe Biden’s latest tricks include declaring that the US will go to war with China to protect Taiwan if Beijing should prove so bold as to want to take control of its wayward province. But the US established policy is to maintain “strategic ambiguity” about China/Taiwan, a diplomatic solution crafted in 1979 to help prevent any provocations by either party that would lead to the situation developing into a shooting war. Joe seems to have missed that point, if he ever understood it in the first place, and certainly his advisers appear to be no more savvy than he is, though the White House quickly issued a correction on the apparent gaffe in the form of a statement that automatic defense of Taiwan is not official policy. Yet.
But my favorite move by the Biden Administration, if one might be so bold as to suggest that it is actually capable of administering anything more kinetic than a hot dog stand, is the latest pander to Israel. The recent murder by military sharpshooter of Palestinian/American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh followed by a humiliating spectacle of police violence at the funeral as well as subsequently at a second Palestinian funeral, actually found some administration flunkies and congress critters calling for a full investigation by Israel. The Israeli government and army refused to do so and the White House has pretended that there is no longer anything to see or consider. Israeli Defense (sic) Minister Benny Gantz recently visited Washington but the issue of a murdered American was not even raised as top officials tried to outdo each other in expressing both their love for and fealty to the Jewish state, which Biden will soon be visiting. The US president will ignore the fact that Israel is celebrating his visit with its greatest eviction of Palestinian residents in twenty years.
That the United States has been a major source of money, weapons and political cover for Israel since 1967 if not before is indisputable, the result of corruption of America’s government at all levels by the groups and billionaires euphemistically described as the “Israel Lobby.” War criminal Israeli leaders like Ariel Sharon and Benjamin Netanyahu have boasted about their control over Congress and the White House as well as the media and every time Israel does something atrocious the only US response has been to give it more money. Israel would sorely love to have the United States fights its wars, most prominently by attacking Iran, but somehow that military intervention and regime change, apart from a number of assassinations, has not yet taken place.
But now all of that might be changing due to a combination of the Biden regime’s recklessness and Israel’s genuine contempt for the American people, who they have been parasitically feeding off of since their settler state was founded. The US has, for the first time, participated in a large-scale military exercise with Israel on May 18th which was designed to simulate an attack on Iran using American Air Force refueling planes to enhance the ability of Israel to keep its jets flying to maintain air superiority over the Persians. It was a war game in the most literal sense even though the tanker aircraft did not actually refuel any Israeli planes and it basically commits the United States to be a dedicated participant if the Israelis should throw the dice and chance on a military attack on Iran’s presumed nuclear and air defense sites.
I also smell a possible false flag if the exercise is repeated, as it surely will be. What if one of the US planes taking part in a future exercise were to be shot down in an incident staged by Israel that might plausibly be attributed to Iran? As the exercises will presumably take place over the Mediterranean Sea in the coastal waters part of which Israel has inter alia stolen from Gaza and controls, bringing Iran into the equation would be difficult but possible to manage with enough cleverness combined with hubris, which the Israelis have in plentiful supply. That Israel would without hesitation shed American blood if it were to advance its own perceived interests should not be doubted by anyone. Look only at the two Israel false flag attacks against the US, the Lavon bombing incident in 1954 and the bloody assault on the USS Liberty in 1967, which killed 34 American sailors and injured more than a hundred others in an attempt to sink the ship and kill all its crew. That is the Israel America has grown to love and nourish, a viper in one’s bosom, always willing to strike the body that feeds it.
But to return to Caitlin Johnstone’s observation, America is in deep trouble. Its economy is visibly sinking while standards of living are dropping and will decline further as military spending grows while both the increasingly “woke” educational system and industrial base are no longer competitive. We have a plausibly psychopathic government that is bringing us to the brink of war with several nuclear powers. What we Americans need is not another war, but rather an end to war, particular those wars that can somehow kill most or even all of us. Instead, help build pressure to wind down the Ukraine war through negotiations, stop feeding Zelensky with weapons and money. Leave China alone and stop being Israel’s patsy against Iran and inside Syria. Try to get along with competitors. It would indeed be a Brave New World, wouldn’t it? A country at peace with itself and working to benefit the American people – something that we have rarely seen since 1945.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
Russia comments on Ukrainian grain exports
Samizdat | May 31, 2022
Russia is not preventing ships from transporting grain out of Ukraine, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday, and Western claims to the contrary are part of a smear campaign that will do nothing to solve the global food crisis.
The only party actually preventing ships from using Ukrainian ports and exporting grain by sea is Ukraine itself, he added, because it deployed sea mines that have made navigation unsafe.
“If the demining problem is solved, then in the open sea… the Russian Navy will ensure unrestricted movement of ships to the Mediterranean,” Lavrov said during a press conference.
“Russia had made all the guarantees it could make a long time ago,” he added.
The foreign minister suggested that Western politicians who have expressed concerns over surging food prices should do something to address the problem. After all, Western sanctions have disrupted the logistical and financial infrastructure that Russia uses to export its own grain, he said.
“They should have some thought and decide what is more important to them: Milking publicity from the issue of food security or solving this problem.”
Lavrov was responding to criticism from the US and its allies, who claim that a Russian naval blockade is preventing grain exports from Ukraine. The Russian military says a corridor in the Black Sea is available for civilian traffic every day.
Finland to Build New Air Base in Lapland for Its F-35 Fighters
By Igor Kuznetsov | Samizdat | May 31, 2022
The first of the 64 US-made F-35 fighter jets that will arrive in Finland in 2026 will be placed at a new air base in Lapland, its northernmost county. Its construction will begin this year and will cost the Nordic country 150 million euros ($161 million), the national broadcaster Yle reported.
According to the commander of the Lapland air base, Colonel Tuukka Karjalainen, the location was chosen based on its proximity to Norway, a NATO member which already uses F-35s. As of now, Finland’s northernmost air force base, in Rovaniemi, stages regular training missions with the Swedish and Norwegian air forces. To begin with, the new base will receive two to six new aircraft.
“The hope is that this will create opportunities for cooperation and facilitate the implementation of the technology,” Tuukka Karjalainen told Yle. “We are very pleased. We are proud to be adopting new equipment. The jobs at the Lapland air base will certainly attract many,” he added.
According to Karjalainen, auxiliary buildings, fences and roads will be built by the end of this year. The main construction will begin in the first half of 2023. Over the past two years, the cost estimate has soared by tens of millions of euros, with Karjalainen blaming stricter technical requirements and increased prices.
Pilots, mechanics and maintenance personnel will be trained in the US. According to Karjalainen, 18 pilots and about 50 technicians will go to the US for training in 2025. Later, they themselves will train specialists in Finland.
The Finnish Air Forces announced the purchase of 64 Lockheed Martin F-35 multi-role fighters back in February in an 8.4 billion euro ($9 billion) deal with the US defence contractor. The new fighters will replace Finland’s ageing fleet of F-18 Hornets, which is planned to be phased out by 2030.
Previously, Finland’s neighbours Norway and Denmark opted to make the F-35 the backbone of their air forces, procuring 52 and 27 fighter jets respectively.
Was the Maidan Massacre a False Flag?
By Noah Carl | The Daily Sceptic | May 30, 2022
To understand the war in Ukraine, you have understand the events that led up to it. And no preceding event is more important than the toppling of Viktor Yanukovych’s government in February of 2014.
Officially known as the ‘Revolution of Dignity’, it was denounced by Vladimir Putin as an “unconstitutional coup”. And while most Western media stick to the official nomenclature, some prominent voices dissent. John Mearsheimer has referred to “the illegal overthrow of Ukraine’s democratically elected and pro-Russian president”, while George Friedman has described what happened as “the most blatant coup in history”.
A recap of the basic facts is in order.
In November of 2013, Yanukovych’s government suspended plans for signing an Association Agreement with the EU, and decided to renew talks with Russia. This decision sparked protests in Ukraine’s capital city, Kiev. By December, the number of protestors had reached the tens of thousands, and a permanent encampment had been established on Maidan square. Although most of the protesters were ordinary Ukrainians, far-right groups were also present.
Beginning in December, there were violent clashes between protesters and the police. On 23rd January, protestors succeeded in occupying various buildings around Maidan square. The situation came to a head on 18–20th February when protestors were fired upon by snipers, leaving scores dead and hundreds wounded. A dozen police offers were also killed in the clashes. From November 2013 to February 2014, 112 protestors and 18 police officers lost their lives; though most of the killings happened on 20th February.
On 21st February, Yanukovych signed an agreement with the parliamentary opposition calling for reforms and new elections. But the next day, he was impeached by the Ukrainian parliament. This impeachment process was in several respects unconstitutional, and Yanukovych declared he was still “the legitimate head of the Ukrainian state elected in a free vote by Ukrainian citizens”. However, he subsequently fled to Russia and a new government was formed.
The ‘Revolution of Dignity’ led immediately to Russia’s annexation of Crimea, and the outbreak of civil war in Donbas – so its geopolitical importance can hardly be overstated. Yet despite huge international attention, one question remains shrouded in mystery: who ordered snipers to fire at protestors on 18–20th February?
The ‘official’ narrative is that the snipers were from the Berkut – a special police unit loyal to Yanukovych. On the other hand, Russia has long maintained they were deployed by the Ukrainian far-right as part of a false flag operation to bring down Yanukovych’s government.
What is true is that more than eight years after the massacre – which took place amid a giant demonstration at the centre of Ukraine’s capital in front of dozens of television cameras – not a single person has been convicted. The perpetrators of one of the deadliest mass shootings in European history remain at large.
Why don’t we have an answer? Well, perhaps we do.
Away from the limelight, one Canadian academic has been poring over the evidence for the last eight years. And he’s convinced the ‘official’ narrative is wrong. Ivan Katchanovski (a political scientist at the University of Ottawa) believes the Maidan massacre was a false flag operation carried out by the Ukrainian far-right.
Professor Katchanovski cannot be dismissed as some fringe commenter or stooge of the Kremlin. He has published his arguments in scholarly books and journals, and has presented them at academic conferences. His latest article, which can be accessed for free, reviews all the evidence he’s collected to date – including witness testimonies, weapon ballistics and medical forensics. It’s based on hundreds of hours of footage of the Maidan massacre trials, as well as synchronised video segments of the massacre itself.
As Katchanovski explains, the ‘false flag theory’ first gained credence in March of 2014, when a phone call between two European officials was leaked online. During the call, the Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet tells the EU’s Catherine Ashton about a conversation he’d had with someone called Olga:
What was quite disturbing, the same Olga told, all the evidence shows that people who were killed by snipers from both sides among policemen and then people from the streets – that they were the same snipers, killing people from both sides. She also showed me some photos. She said that as medical doctor, she can, you know, say that it is the same handwriting, same type of bullets. And it’s really disturbing that now the new coalition, that they don’t want to investigate what exactly happened. So that there is now stronger and stronger understanding that behind snipers it was not Yanukovych but it was somebody from the new coalition.
‘Olga’ was later identified as Olga Bohomolets, a doctor who had treated wounded protestors on Maidan square. When quizzed by the press, she said she had not told Paet that somebody from the new coalition was behind the snipers. Likewise, the Estonian Foreign Ministry said, “We reject the claim that Paet was giving an assessment of the opposition’s involvement in the violence” (though they acknowledged the recording was authentic). It is still unclear why Paet would divulge such shocking revelations if he did not believe they had some basis in fact.
Aside from TV recordings and media reports, much of Katchanovski’s evidence comes from the trials of five Berkut police officers, who were charged with the murder of protestors on 20th February, 2014. Various other state actors, including Yanukovych himself, were also charged, but they were not brought to trial as they had already fled the country. (Recall that none of those put on trial were convicted.)
What, then, is Katchanovski’s evidence?
The majority of wounded protestors who testified at the trail said they were shot by snipers from Maidan-controlled buildings. Remarkably, even many witnesses for the prosecution said this. Their testimony is consistent with video footage of journalists and protestors pointing to snipers in buildings like the Hotel Ukraine, which were under Maidan control at the time.
Police snipers testified that they had been ordered to locate and neutralise snipers firing from Maidan-controlled buildings. And Yanukovych himself, who appeared at the trial via video-link, testified that he had received reports of snipers firing from those buildings.
Several Georgian ex-military personnel who testified at the trail actually confessed they were among the snipers, and had been given orders by specific Maidan leaders to fire upon the protestors. They also testified that they had witnessed other snipers shooting from Maidan-controlled buildings. By contrast, no police officers or other state actors confessed to having fired upon protestors.
In the majority of cases where wounded protestors testified that they had been shot by snipers from police-controlled areas, other evidence contradicted their testimony. For example, synchronized video segments showed the exact times they were hit did not coincide with the exact times police officers were discharging their weapons. Other videos showed that several protesters were killed before police officers had even taken up their positions.
Forensic examinations by government experts revealed that the majority of protestors were shot from the side or back, and from top to bottom, strongly suggesting they had been hit by snipers from Maidan-controlled buildings. Only one protestor had a horizontal entry wound. Experts also determined that several protestors were killed by bullets that did not match those used by the police.
An American architecture company created a 3D model of the killing of three protestors, which was used as evidence that those protestors were in fact killed by the police. (This 3D model was covered in a 2018 New York Times article.) However, the wound locations in the model did not match the wound locations from forensic medical examinations.
A screenshot from the video appendix to Katchanovski’s latest paper.
Aside from what Katchanovski calls “overwhelming evidence” that protestors were shot from Maidan-controlled buildings, he believes there was a cover-up by the post-Maidan authorities.
On 21st February, the Ukrainian parliament passed an amnesty law granting blanket immunity to Maidan protestors for serious crimes that had taken place during the protests. This law also prohibited investigation of the protestors for such crimes, and ordered that existing evidence be destroyed.
Two of the Berkut police officers who had been charged with murdering protestors were released by trial judges due to lack of evidence, suggesting the charges against them were trumped up. And all remaining defendants were released in a prisoner exchange within several months of the expected verdict.
Public statements made by various Maidan participants concerning the far-right’s involvement in the massacre were never investigated. One politician said she saw Maidan leaders bringing snipers into a building and then saw snipers firing from that building. Several activists said they witnessed snipers being evacuated by Maidan leaders. And another politician said that Maidan leaders had “arranged” the massacre.
There were unexplained reversals of testimony on the part of wounded Maidan protestors. Key pieces of evidence went missing or were destroyed. Several trees with bullet holes in them were cut down; all helmets and shields used by those who were shot disappeared, as did security camera footage from Maidan-controlled buildings.
Finally, two far-right politicians stated in separate interviews that a Western government official told them killings of a few protestors would not be enough for Western governments to stop recognising Yanukovych, and for that to happen the number of victims would need to be 100. The protesters who lost their lives subsequently became known as the “Heavenly Hundred”, even though some of those ‘hundred’ were not killed in the massacre itself (and in fact simply died of illness.)
On the basis of all the evidence he’s gathered, Katchanovski concludes that the Maidan massacre was “a false flag operation” which involved “elements of the Maidan leadership”.
If true, the implications are immense. It would mean the event that marked the turning point of Euromaidan – that set in motion Yanukovych’s removal from power – was in fact orchestrated by his political opponents. And aside from implicating those individuals in a brutal act of mass murder, it would remove any doubt that the that the ‘Revolution of Dignity’ was illegitimate.
Is it true?
I have been unable to track down any serious criticism of Katchanovski’s work, and when I reached out to him, he told me “there is no other scholarly study” that disputes his findings. What’s more, the political scientist Gordon Hahn reached similar conclusions in his book Ukraine Over the Edge: Russia, the West and the “New Cold War”.
So why haven’t Western governments shown more interest in investigating the massacre? I put this question to Katchanovski. He said that such an investigation would be “politically inconvenient” because it would “upend the narrative that the Western backed overthrow of the Ukrainian government in 2014 by the pro-Western Maidan opposition was peaceful and democratic”. He added that a definitive answer could be obtained by consulting relevant documents once they are declassified.
As I mentioned above, Katchanovski has published his arguments concerning the ‘false flag theory’ in scholarly books and journals, and has presented them at academic conferences. All the germane papers are available for free online. You might therefore expect for his work to have received significant media attention – particularly in the last few months.
Yet with the exception of a few ‘non-mainstream’ outlets, it hasn’t. Major Western media have ignored his studies “for political reasons”, he told me. This is despite the fact that Katchanovski’s other work on Ukraine (unrelated to the massacre) has received ample media attention, including from the Associated Press, Reuters and the Washington Post.
Katchanovski knows that certain media outlets are aware of his work because he’s brought it to their attention. Following the New York Times article on the 3D model of killings at Maidan, he sent a letter to the editor pointing out they had “misrepresented the wound locations”. But his letter wasn’t published. In another case, “Open Democracy accepted a popular version of my Maidan massacre study, but then did not publish it.” Katchanovski said he gave “long interviews concerning the Maidan massacre to several major TV and Radio networks” but “none of them were broadcast”. In every single case “there was no reason given”.
The only time Katchanovski’s work on the massacre has been put under the spotlight was in Oliver Stone’s 2019 documentary Revealing Ukraine. This film is available on Rumble, and the relevant segment begins at 20:00.
What about everything that’s happened since? In our email exchange, Katchanovski clarified that the Maidan massacre “does not justify the Russian invasion and other actions in Ukraine”. Equally, however, Russia’s invasion does not justify ignoring – in his words – “overwhelming and undeniable evidence” of Maidan snipers.
If others believe that Katchanovski is mistaken, they must come forward and present their arguments. In the meantime, I would strongly recommend reading his papers: they make a compelling case that what’s been labelled a “conspiracy theory” is, in fact, true.
Data shenanigans as Sweden misleads its public over vaccination-related mortality data
Health Advisory & Recovery Team | May 29, 2022
In December 2021 Norman Fenton, Martin Neil, Clare Craig, Josh Geutzkow, Joel Smalley, Scott McLachlan and Jonathan Engler published an article casting doubt on the vaccine efficacy implied by the UK’s official mortality statistics as they related to vaccination status, raising miscategorisation of vaccinated deaths soon after injection as unvaccinated as a possible significant factor.
The authors — as expected — were unable to publish this article in any mainstream journal, as anything which counters the government’s official position on anything related to the pandemic, especially vaccinations, has effectively been suppressed or censored throughout the last 2 years.
Despite repeated FOI requests by several parties, no UK government agency has ever released sufficiently granular data broken down into the necessary categories to permit any meaningful analysis of the extent (if any) of this miscategorisation issue.
Now, however, it appears that an FOI request to the Swedish Public Health Agency by 29 doctors and scientists has been successful in obtaining such data (for Sweden). They have written an article about it (in English) here.
The data is revelatory. It essentially shows that individuals dying within 2 weeks of vaccination have been classed and counted as unvaccinated. Incredibly, this applies to the 14 day period after the second as well as the first dose. The numbers involved are certainly non-trivial. In a substack blog, Jessica Rose has re-run the implied vaccine efficacy statistics in light of the new data categorizations.
In conclusion, the correct categorization turns the vaccine efficacy calculation totally on its head, suggesting a significantly increased risk of death in the vaccinated compared to the unvaccinated, rather than the vice-versa conclusion the authorities had originally touted. Whilst there is no age-breakdown, the magnitude of the reversal in the conclusions is nonetheless stark enough to conclude that there has been very serious and likely deliberate misrepresentation of what the mortality statistics truly imply about the efficacy of the vaccines against mortality.
One wonders how many other countries have played similar tricks with their data?
Post-script:
A further – anonymous – author has published an article claiming to build on Jessica Rose’s piece by calculating the mortality rates in the vaccinated and unvaccinated and comparing them to flu.
The author acknowledges the possible effect of age-confounding in the text, but in referring to it as having only a “slight” effect this understates its potential to interfere with his analysis; to draw the conclusions he /she does would in fact require a proper age breakdown of deaths month-by-month. However, if the analysis might lead to a misinterpretation of vaccine effectiveness because of the age bias then it is up to those with access to the data by age to refute the analysis.
The main take-away from the episode around this FOI is not that the vaccines are or are not efficacious (vs death), but rather that there has been a systematic miscategorization error which (1) seems likely to have been deliberate and (2) resulted in an extremely misleading picture of what the data suggests.
Such incidents – which now appear all too common in many countries – are likely to shatter the public’s trust in the institutions upon which we are supposed to rely.
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British Intel Tried to Make N Irish Gang ‘Shoot Up’ School, Documentary Claims
Sputnik – 23.02.2019
A new documentary, based on an interview with a self-confessed member of the Glennane Gang, gives some insights into allegations that British military intelligence was behind a shocking murder plot to cause the situation in Northern Ireland to “spiral out of control”.
In a documentary, Unquiet Graves: The Story of the Glennane Gang, John Weir, a former officer from the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), alleges that British intelligence tried to persuade paramilitary group Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) to attack a Catholic primary school at Belleeks in County Armagh.
Weir claimed that the UVF was urged to kill children and teachers in retaliation for the 1976 Kingsmill massacre, in which gunmen stopped a minibus carrying twelve workmen and shot them; only one person survived despite having been shot 18 times.
“The plan that was decided on was to shoot up a school in Belleeks”, he said, adding that the British intelligence plot was to make the situation in Northern Ireland “spiral out of control”. … continue
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Aletho News- Nima R. Alkhorshid: U.S. Military Bombs Multiple Targets on Iran’s Qeshm Island
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