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German factories counting on return of Russian gas – Bloomberg

RT | March 1, 2025

Key German industrial leaders have expressed their desire to see Russian gas return to Europe once a resolution to the Ukraine conflict is found, Bloomberg has reported.

Chemical and manufacturing sector representatives argue that affordable energy is crucial for Germany’s economy to recover, the agency wrote on Friday.

European gas prices surged after the Ukraine conflict escalated in 2022. Pipeline gas imports from Russia mostly ceased due to sanctions and the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines in 2022. Nevertheless, EU nations have still been buying record volumes of Russian LNG, the cost of which has nearly quadrupled in three years, according to Eurostat.

Christian Gunther, managing director of the Leuna chemical park, emphasized that bringing back Russian gas would be a logical step if peace is achieved. “We must ensure the damage caused by this conflict is repaired,” he told Bloomberg, adding that resuming deliveries “would be the logical consequence.”

In 2021, Russian pipeline gas accounted for 32% of the total demand of the EU and UK, while Germany relied on Russia for 55% of its consumption, according to the European Council and Statista. Since cutting ties with Russian energy, the EU has turned to expensive LNG imports, primarily from the US. The shift has driven natural gas prices on the continent to their highest levels in two years, prompting discussions in Brussels about price caps. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has warned that soaring energy costs could cripple the EU economy.

The EU’s latest sanctions package, introduced on Monday, tightens restrictions on Russian energy but stops short of banning LNG imports. Gunther earlier criticized Germany’s energy policy, pointing out the inconsistency of banning Russian pipeline gas while still importing LNG.

Bloomberg reported that Sven Schulze, the economy minister of German’s Saxony-Anhalt state, believes permanently excluding Russian gas “would be a mistake.”

US President Donald Trump has been urging Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky to negotiate a peace deal with Russia, warning that failure to do so could result in the loss of American support. On Friday, during a heated meeting at the Oval Office, Trump reportedly told Zelensky to leave the White House and return when he was ready to pursue peace.

Ukraine refused to extend its gas transit contract with Russia’s Gazprom beyond 2024, further reducing EU access to Russian pipeline gas. The only remaining supply flows through the TurkStream pipeline via Türkiye and Greece.

“We need peace to reopen pipelines, ensure supply security, and lower prices,” said Manuela Grieger, former chair of the workers union InfraLeuna, told Bloomberg. The EU has pledged to phase out Russian energy by 2027. Germany’s Economy Ministry insists that independence from Russian gas remains a priority for the country.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Israel pushes for six week ‘extension’ of Gaza ceasefire’s phase one

The Cradle | February 28, 2025

An Israeli delegation in Cairo is negotiating with mediators a potential extension for the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire agreement, according to Egyptian security officials cited by Reuters on 28 February.

“Hamas opposes the extension and insists on proceeding to the second phase of the deal as originally agreed,” the sources said. They added that Tel Aviv seeks to extend the first phase for another 42 days.

Israeli sources had previously told the British news outlet that Tel Aviv sought an extension and the release of three Israeli captives per week in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli prisons.

According to a military source cited by Times of Israel, Tel Aviv “still prioritizes dismantling Hamas’s ability as an authority in Gaza.”

Hamas released a statement on Friday confirming “its full commitment to implementing all the terms of the agreement in all its stages and details.”

“We call on the mediators, guarantors, and the international community to pressure the Zionist occupation to fully commit to its role in the agreement and immediately enter the second phase of it without any hesitation or evasion,” it added.

US envoy to the region, Steve Witkoff, is expected to travel to Israel on Sunday to negotiate an extension of the first phase of the ceasefire deal, which ends on 2 March. Tel Aviv has continuously delayed talks for phase two of the agreement.

Israel recently imposed new conditions on the Gaza ceasefire agreement, demanding a full disarmament of Hamas’s military wing.

According to reports, Israel is looking to violate the deal by maintaining its military presence along the Philadelphi Corridor on southern Gaza’s border with Egypt.

Israel’s Defense Minister, Israel Katz, said on Thursday that the corridor will remain “a buffer zone just as the case is in Lebanon and Syria.” Tel Aviv is also reportedly planning for a resumption of its brutal war against Gaza

A recent report by Haaretz says that “as far as [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu is concerned, there is no second stage” of the deal.

The report says Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer recently told Witkoff that Netanyahu’s plan is to secure the release of all captives in a single stage, and that Hamas will receive prisoners in exchange. Otherwise, “Israel will return to intense warfare” and reimplement a “version” of the Generals’ Plan – which saw the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from north Gaza, the killing of thousands, and the destruction of the Gaza health sector.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Euro-Med Monitor documents ‘shocking’ crimes, torture against Palestinian prisoners

Press TV – February 28, 2025

An independent Geneva-based human rights organization says the tragic and shocking health condition of the Palestinian prisoners recently freed under the multistage ceasefire agreement with Hamas shows the Tel Aviv regime’s “ongoing use of torture to terrorize and persecute” them.

The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said in a statement on Thursday that the traces of torture were evident on the prisoners’ frail bodies, reflecting the extent of the systematic crimes and inhumane treatment they endured, which exceeded all moral and legal boundaries.

“All evidence indicates that Israel continues to use torture as a weapon to intimidate and persecute prisoners and detainees and to break their will until the last moments of their detention,” the organization said.

The Switzerland-based group noted that its field team documented serious injuries among the prisoners and detainees, including amputations and severe swelling resulting from torture, in addition to extreme weakness and fatigue.

It added that the released prisoners revealed that they had been subjected to brutal beatings, abuse, and continuous threats right up to the last moments before their release, despite the lack of any specific charges against the majority of them.

The organization stressed that the brutal torture and deliberate medical neglect faced by prisoners and detainees have reached shocking levels that surpass all moral and legal limits.

It noted that Israel’s ongoing use of brutal torture and deliberate medical neglect against Palestinian prisoners and detainees proves its systematic intent to intimidate them and break their will.

The rights group emphasized that such actions constitute blatant war crimes and crimes against humanity, as reliable information has indicated the death of dozens of prisoners inside Israeli prisons and detention centers, while Israel continues to hide any data related to them.

It called on all concerned countries and organizations to take immediate and decisive action to stop these systematic crimes, underlining the need to intensify human rights and media efforts to highlight the suffering of Palestinian prisoners and detainees, and to work towards holding the occupiers accountable and forcing them to end these ongoing violations.

Israeli authorities released 641 Palestinian prisoners in the “Flood of Freedom” deal early on Thursday, as part of the ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreements with Hamas, after delaying their release for almost a week.

The physical status of the released prisoners showed that they had been deprived of adequate food throughout their detention, with testimonies confirming that they received minimal amounts of food, while some were denied food and sleep as a form of harsh and deliberate punishment.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture | , , , | Leave a comment

US State Department slashes USAID assistance to Ukraine – NBC

RT | Marh 1, 2025

The US State Department has terminated a US Agency for International Development (USAID) initiative for a large-scale effort to restore Ukraine’s energy grid, which has been severely damaged by Russian strikes, NBC News reported on Friday, citing sources.

USAID, Washington’s primary agency for funding political projects abroad, found itself in the crosshairs of President Donald Trump shortly after taking office, accusing it of corruption and inefficiency. He imposed a 90-day funding freeze on the agency and transferred oversight of its programs to the direct control of the State Department.

As part of the crackdown, the State Department not only stopped a USAID program that invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Ukraine’s power grid, but also sharply reduced the agency’s footprint in Ukraine, the network said.

Before the reported cuts, 64 American government employees and contractors were on the ground supporting the agency’s mission; now only eight are expected to remain, with the Trump administration placing the remaining USAID personnel on administrative leave and ordering all but “critical” staff to return to the US, NBC reported.

”It significantly undercuts this administration’s abilities to negotiate on the ceasefire, and it’d signal to Russia that we don’t care about Ukraine or our past investments,” a USAID official working on the Ukraine mission told the outlet, adding that the decision would significantly undermine the country’s economic resilience.

In 2024 alone, USAID allocated $825 million to support Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.

The move comes as Russia continues to carry out drone and missile strikes on Ukraine’s defense-linked energy infrastructure to undermine the country’s military effort, resulting in recurring rolling blackouts. Moscow insists that it never targets civilians.

The timing of the reported USAID pullout coincides with a meeting between Trump and Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky in the White House, in which the US president accused Zelensky of being ungrateful for the substantial aid provided to Kiev, and of being unwilling to negotiate an end to the conflict with Russia. As a result of the heated exchange between the two sides, an agreement granting the US rights to Ukraine’s natural resources as compensation for past aid was not signed.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Trump and Zelensky Clash in the Oval Office

By Prof. Glenn Diesen | February 28, 2025

The disastrous meeting between Trump and Zelensky demonstrates why sensitive diplomacy should be done behind closed doors and not in front of the public. At such press conferences, one speaks to both the leader of the other country and the public. Both Zelensky and Trump escalated the rhetoric as they were in front of the cameras to win over the public and not appear weak. The need to prioritise the public as the main audience is a wider problem for diplomacy as, for example, the Europeans have for three years refused to engage in basic diplomacy with Russia (that could have reduced the risk of nuclear war) because it can “legitimise” Putin in the eyes of the public. The immense focus on narrative control in international politics makes it even more important to defend diplomacy.

The Trump-Zelensky meeting was predictably sensitive, as the issue of security guarantees had not been resolved before the press conference. Subsequently, the press conference became a battleground to win over the public. The purpose of the meeting was to sign an agreement that would give the US significant control over Ukraine’s natural resources, yet the document prepared in advance was deliberately vague. Trump was confident that Zelensky would fall in line as the US enjoys overwhelming leverage, while Zelensky had hoped to pressure Trump into offering security guarantees in return for the resources.

A security guarantee would pull the US into a direct war with Russia if a future peace agreement broke down. Such a security guarantee would deter Russia from breaking the ceasefire, yet it would also incentivise Ukraine to restart the fighting as the US would then be pulled into the war on the side of Ukraine to assist with reconquering lost territories. A likely outcome would be World War III with a possible nuclear exchange.

The visits by Macron and Starmer in the days before Zelensky’s arrival were also intended to prevent the US from decoupling itself from the conflict by obtaining US security guarantees. Europe cannot send troops into Ukraine without the promise of a US military “backstop”. Macron and Starmer probably also wanted to shower Trump with flattery to warm him up before Zelensky visited with economic incentives to get the US entangled in the war. The appeal to Trump’s vanity and greed did not work, as Trump seems to recognise that the war has been lost and that nuclear war is a growing possibility in the absence of peace negotiations.

The positive outcome of this very undiplomatic confrontation is that Zelensky may abandon his delusions. The Biden administration and the Europeans have been stringing along Ukraine for more than a decade on a path to its destruction. Trump and Vance seemed genuinely bewildered that Zelensky would not change course as his country is obliterated. The Europeans’ promises of NATO membership, return of territories and ironclad security guarantees are presented as expressions of support, but in reality they are fantasies to uphold dangerous delusions. NATO lost the proxy war in Ukraine, and there are no good solutions left. However, this should not have been done in public.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Interview with Romanian Investigative Journalist, Iosefina Pascal

“People’s trust in public institutions has been destroyed”

Hungarian Conservative | February 15, 2025

Romania has been in a political crisis since the presidential elections were suspended at the end of last year. So far, the Constitutional Court of Romania has not presented any evidence to justify the act. Why do you think the elections were actually suspended?

Romania is in a deep political, social, and economic crisis. The causes are manifold, but the chaos was installed when the presidential elections were cancelled while the people were voting. Without a shred of evidence.

The people’s trust in public institutions has been destroyed. People lost faith in the justice system, which should have sanctioned this undemocratic decision. All of this destabilizes the country and serves hostile interests. In other words, both the so-called ‘judges’ of the Constitutional Court of Romania and the director of this coup, Klaus Iohannis, have served foreign interests rather than the national interest.

They cancelled the elections because none of the candidates from the governing coalition made it to the second round, as was indicated by most polls. They cancelled the elections because they realized that Romanians voted against this coalition, against the political establishment blindly subservient to the EU. They cancelled the elections because they wanted to set an example with Romania for the other EU states so they would not choose the ‘wrong candidate’.

Q: Do you think they will let Georgescu run again? If so, it wouldn’t make sense since who would let a candidate run again who supposedly, according to the Constitutional Court of your country, has had foreign interference?

Given the latest actions, described by some lawyers and analysts as political persecution launched against the collaborators and supporters of Călin Georgescu, it is clear that now they are trying to ‘produce’ evidence to justify the cancellation of the elections and the prohibition of Călin Georgescu’s candidacy.

Considering that I have proven in my investigations that several so-called judges of the Constitutional Court of Romania have worked for NGOs funded by Soros, anything is possible.

Given the people’s absolutely low trust level in the judicial system and public institutions, any scenario in which Georgescu is banned, arrested, or harassed with criminal investigations would only paint him as a martyr.

A scenario in which Călin Georgescu would not be allowed to run in the presidential elections would be an explosive one, again giving other countries the platform to ban candidates and parties simply because they pose a threat to the positions and businesses of the globalist political establishment.

Q: Iohannis resigned this week. Why do you think he did it now and not when it was his turn, or why didn’t he wait until the May elections?

Given the sudden disappearance of intelligence agency reports of alleged ‘foreign interference’ and ‘cyber attacks’ after the abrupt resignation of illegitimate President Klaus Iohannis, I am considering two options.

First, he resigned now because he needed time to actually hide those reports on which the illegal annulment of the elections was based. This was to prevent them from falling into the hands of the future President elected by the people and exposing his strategy of cancelling 9 million votes in December.

Second, he resigned now because he was about to be removed through a parliamentary procedure that was due to be approved on the day of his resignation, which would have meant he would lose all the financial benefits that a former president has, according to Romanian law.

In fact, both scenarios could be valid simultaneously.

Q: Do you think the Constitutional Court will reverse its decision and return to the second round that should have happened in the country?

Regardless of who else resigns, be it the Prime Minister or even the judges of the Constitutional Court, people need answers, and, more importantly, they want the second round of the elections to resume.

Technically and legally speaking, the Constitutional Court can reverse its own decision; it did so when it decided to annul the presidential elections, reversing its previous decision, which validated the first round of the elections. Will they do it? I don’t know. These judges have skeletons in their closets, as I said, and have total contempt for the people; Klaus Iohannis decorated them, interestingly enough, the day before he resigned. The conclusion is that they have been ‘rewarded’ for the chaos into which they have plunged Romania.

Q: In the last weeks you have been investigating the USAID scandal, which has affected Central and Eastern Europe and Romania. What did you find regarding Romania?

I’ve uncovered an extensive and well-coordinated network of so-called ‘independent’ NGOs and publications. This network had the same funding and the same goal. We’re talking about hundreds of millions of euros directly and illegally allocated by the European Commission and hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from USAID.

As for the European funding, this took the form of grants from the EU directly from taxpayers’ money to NGOs, mainstream publications and ‘independent’ publications. The goal was to promote left-wing globalist politics and to manipulate public opinion through the so-called fight against disinformation, especially during election campaigns, promoting gender ideology, combating any national and conservative values, and labelling conservative parties, journalists, publications, and activists as ‘Russia’s people’. The EU had developed a complex funding mechanism for these entities, which completely lacked transparency and operated under the cover of excessive bureaucracy. Therefore, my work to expose these matters in detail was titanic.

As for the entities funded by USAID, here we’re talking about a network consisting of several large NGOs that funded smaller NGOs with the same goals, including campaigning against sovereignist leaders like Trump, Orban, Georgescu, etc.

Q: In the course of these investigations, you have also looked at what the European Union does with its funds and found many subsidies to NGOs, journalists, international news agencies… What is the biggest scandal you have discovered?

The most serious case so far is that of the secret contract signed by Ursula von der Leyen, similar to the secret Pfizer contract, through which the European Commission awarded 130 million euros to a French advertising agency (involved in a corruption criminal case along with Emmanuel Macron) before the 2024 European Parliament elections. This French advertising agency was also involved in the 2019 campaign.

The 130 million euros it received were distributed to major media outlets and NGOs to promote the work of European bureaucrats in a favourable light and, more importantly, to stop any criticism and negative information about the EU.

In short, we have the first proof that we can no longer talk about independent media in the EU but about media mercenaries who run pieces for the highest bidder. And we are the ones who have been unknowingly funding these media mercenaries.

Iosefina Pascal is a 32-year-old, conservative Romanian investigative journalist. She works tirelessly and independently to get information in her country that the institutional media are keeping quiet. She started working as an independent online journalist in 2018 when the Soros-backed protests shook her country. Since 2020 she has been collaborating with various Romanian TV and radio stations.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption | , , | Leave a comment

The Holy Quadripartitus of Piffle is Exploding

Reviewing the Four Pillars of the Biden years

By John Leake | FOCAL POINTS | February 26, 2025

Back in September 2023, I posted a report about an American transgendered woman named Sarah Ashton-Cirillo who claimed to be a soldier and an official spokesman of the Ukrainian Territorial Defense Forces. She was in the news because of a publicized spat she had with then Senator JD Vance of Ohio, who has made an inquiry to determine is Sarah Ashton-Cirillo really is an official English language spokesman for the Ukrainian TDF. She really was.

Vance became aware of Ashton-Cirillo after he saw a video of the spokesman announcing that journalists who disseminate Russian propaganda will be hunted down and killed. In this video, she proclaims:

Next week, the teeth of the Russian devils will gnash ever harder, and their rabid mouths will foam in uncontrollable frenzy as the world will see a favorite Kremlin propagandist pay for their crimes. This puppet of Putin is only the first. Russia’s war criminal propagandists will all be hunted down and justice will be served.

In response to Senator Vance’s query, Ashton-Cirillo posted yet another video in which she proclaimed her support of the First Amendment, but hastened to add that reporting Russian propaganda was not protected by the First Amendment.

Back then I posed the question: Who adjudicates what is Russian propaganda and what is merely critical reporting of the Ukrainian government and its U.S. government supporters?

The question touched on something I have frequently written about on this Substack—namely, the strange rise of ORTHODOXY in recent years.

There are, we are told, certain major issues in which Orthodox—that is, official U.S. government and MSM representations—cannot be questioned or criticized. Those who do question these orthodoxies will be censored, censured, or—if Ashton-Cirillo has her way—hunted down and killed.

The top four orthodoxies back in 2023 were what I called the Holy Quadripartitus of Piffle. They were:

1). COVID-19 vaccines are saving mankind. Anyone who questions the safety and efficacy of the vaccines is guilty of heresy.

2). The U.S. proxy war in Ukraine is a sacred mission and no negotiated settlement with Russia shall be countenanced. Anyone who criticizes the Ukrainian and U.S. governments, and any attempt to understand the war from the Russian point of view, is guilty of heresy.

3). Human induced climate change will soon destroy the earth if trillions aren’t spent to overhaul our entire energy policy. Anyone who questions this proposition is guilty of heresy.

4). The concept of biological sex is a mere “construct.” Skilled surgeons and endocrinologists can transform a boy into a girl or vice versa. Anyone who questions this assertion is guilty of heresy.

As I noted back then, the Holy Quadripartitus of Piffle was an orthodoxy of fanatical, obscurantist insanity. I am pleased to report that, less than two years later, it appears that the doctrine is exploding.

March 1, 2025 Posted by | Russophobia, Video | | Leave a comment

Germany to combat ‘conspiracy theories’

RT | February 28, 2025

Germans who suspect that their relatives or friends have fallen for conspiracy theories can now seek official guidance, the Interior Ministry has announced. The government has launched a nationwide consultation center to combat “lies and disinformation.”

Known as the Advice Compass on Conspiracy Thinking, the service was launched on Thursday and is accessible online or by phone. According to the ministry, it aims to provide “the most tailored help and advice possible” for those seeking guidance.

The center offers consultations and can refer individuals to specialized agencies if necessary, according to Minister for Family Affairs Lisa Paus, without specifying which agencies will be involved.

Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said that an “open dialogue on equal terms” is often difficult with individuals deeply immersed in conspiracy beliefs. She hailed the initiative as “an important building block in the holistic fight against extremism and disinformation.”

Paus described conspiracy theories as “poison for our democracy” and a burden on families and colleagues. The Interior Ministry claimed that these beliefs can lead to extremist ideologies and incite violence, highlighting anti-Semitic conspiracies as a major concern.

The German authorities have been raising the alarm over the supposed rise of conspiracy theories. This trend is often linked to the Querdenker (lateral thinking) movement, which emerged during the Covid-19 pandemic to oppose lockdown measures and other government policies. Since then, Querdenker groups have organized protests against Germany’s foreign policy and weapons supplies to Kiev, which began in 2022 following the escalation of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.

Some factions have also called for “regionality, direct democracy, and limiting the power” of the federal government. Officials and media outlets often associate Querdenker groups with conspiracy theories and far-right organizations.

In 2021, the German domestic security agency (BfV) announced it would closely monitor some Querdenker groups, claiming that they could try to “delegitimize” the state and use legitimate protest to “provoke escalation.”

The announcement of the Advice Compass came just days after the right-wing Alternative for Germany party (AfD) secured second place in snap parliamentary elections, receiving 20.8% of the vote – a significant rise from the 10.4% they received in 2021. Despite the gains, the party remains ostracized by the other major political parties and is frequently labeled ‘far-right’ by officials and media.

February 28, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

The American perestroika is gaining momentum

By Vladimir Mashin – New Eastern Outlook – February 28, 2025

Only a month has passed since Trump’s inauguration, but the U.S. has witnessed a real revolution (some call it a ‘perestroika’ in reference to our country’s history).

Previous Democratic administrations tried in every possible way to impose new ‘transgender ideas’. Trump immediately stated that there are only two sexes (male and female), and not 32, as the media shouted. All government agencies, schools and educational institutions are being instructed with this information (15,000 transgender people are already mere steps away from being removed from the army, and all government benefits for such individuals have been cancelled.) The 47th President of the United States calls this a revolution of common sense.

The fusion of power and big capital is accelerating

The Republican Party has traditionally expressed the interests of America’s wealthiest strata, however, under Trump, this approach has outdone itself, with vigorous support for major corporations and oligarchs, and assistance to them through tax cuts.

In fulfilling his campaign promise of the absolute priority of American interests, Trump is imposing new trade tariffs on many countries, striving for balanced export and import relations.

It so happens that the vast majority of the media in the United States belongs to supporters of the Democratic Party. Therefore, many newspapers write that Trump’s actions are only leading to an increase in the wealth of billionaires and limit social spending for the poorest segments of the population (the press claims that there are 14 billionaires in Trump’s new cabinet, and the clearest evidence of this is the incredible wealth of the oligarch closest to him, Elon Musk).

The US media mentions that billionaire Peter Thiel, who has been preaching the idea of reducing social support for society for many years, is a kind of éminence grise of the new Republican government. It is notable that Vice President Vance considers him one of his most important mentors in life.

At the very end of the 20th century, Thiel and another billionaire, David Sacks, who was responsible for the fields of artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency in the Trump administration, wrote the book ‘The Diversity Myth’, where he sharply criticised the ideas of positive discrimination, political correctness and multiculturalism. 20 years later, in one of his essays, Thiel condemned the ‘green agenda’ that prevents science and technology from building a “bright future”.

Republicans have always accused Democrats of restricting freedom of the press by imposing solely their own point of view. It is noteworthy that Vice President Vance’s speech in Munich on February 14 shocked the Europeans, whom he reproached for not listening to the wishes of their people, instead looking to blame Russia and China as an excuse for their problems. “This was”, wrote Bloomberg on February 15, “an attack of unbridled rage in the name of freedom of speech, exposing the long-standing hostility that Donald Trump and his senior aides feel towards the European Union. They see the bloc as a symbol of big government that restricts the activities of American companies”.

These ideas are clearly reflected in the activities and statements of Elon Musk, and generally highlight the philosophy of ignoring rules for the sake of progress and innovation. This approach is shared by many Silicon Valley oligarchs.

To some extent, they express the views of the main figures of the Trump team, who are sceptical of traditional institutions, which, according to CNN on February 16, failed them during the years of inconclusive wars in the Middle East. This worldview clearly corresponds to Trump’s messages, including his stated reluctance to use the U.S. military abroad and his broader distrust of government agencies and the so-called ‘deep state’.

The United States is currently experiencing a historically unprecedented concentration of technological, financial and political power.

Trump is clearly in a hurry, especially considering the results of his first term as president, when the resistance of the deep state prevented him from realising his plans.

During the first month of the Trump administration, much has already changed in the United States and around the world. However, it is safe to say that the main battles are still ahead. The opposition to his course from the Democratic Party and European liberal hawks will not weaken.

Vladimir Mashin, political observer, Candidate of Historical Sciences

February 28, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Russia proposes resuming direct flights with US

RT | February 28, 2025

Moscow has proposed restoring direct air travel with the US as part of ongoing efforts to revive bilateral relations, according to a statement issued by the Russian Foreign Ministry on Friday following a new round of talks in Türkiye.

The US suspended flights and closed its airspace to Russian airlines in 2022, along with other Western nations, in response to the escalation of the Ukraine conflict. Since then, travelers have relied on connecting flights through hubs such as Istanbul and Dubai.

In response, Moscow banned flights from 36 ‘unfriendly nations’, including EU member states and Canada. This forced Western airlines to reroute flights, leading to higher fuel consumption and increased costs. Some European carriers have since criticized the EU’s sanctions on Moscow, citing “unfair” competition from Chinese airlines, which continue to freely cross Russian airspace.

According to the ministry, the Russian proposal to resume flights was made during a meeting with the US delegations in Istanbul on Thursday. The talks, which were aimed at mending the diplomatic rift that deepened under the previous administration, focused on reinstating regular operations at diplomatic missions and ensuring favorable conditions for their functioning.

Moscow described the Istanbul talks as “substantive,” with both sides agreeing to continue dialogue.

“Specifically, the US was invited to consider the possibility of restoring direct air services,” the Russian ministry stated.

Some experts, however, are skeptical about the possibility of an immediate resumption of direct flights between Russia and the US, pointing out that European airspace remains closed to Russian airlines, making direct routes challenging.

The meeting in Türkiye follows high-level talks in Saudi Arabia and a phone call between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump earlier in February. Trump has since signaled that Washington could lift the sanctions against Russia “at some point” as part of broader peace negotiations to resolve the Ukraine conflict.

February 28, 2025 Posted by | Economics | , , | Leave a comment

Three years on… Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine is vindicated

Strategic Culture Foundation | February 28, 2025

This week marks the third anniversary of Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine, launched on February 24, 2022.

Moscow has consistently explained the conflict in Ukraine to be a manifestation of a bigger geopolitical confrontation brought about by U.S. and NATO aggression using Ukraine as a proxy. That aggression was latent for decades going back to the end of the Second World War.

Russia’s emerging military victory against a NeoNazi regime armed to the teeth by an array of Western enemies has not just defeated a nefarious proxy war. It is demolishing the charade of supposed Western moral authority. This is an epoch-making watershed. It is significant that this event comes at a time when U.S. and Western global power is failing and flailing, and a new multipolar order is evolving, one where Russia’s international esteem and influence are increasing.

The United States, its European allies and the Western corporate-controlled news media have tried to depict Ukraine as an innocent victim of “unprovoked Russian aggression”.

Three years on, the Western narrative has collapsed in a pile of propaganda lies. The United States, under the new administration of President Donald Trump, has abandoned the erstwhile claims made against Russia. This week, the United States tabled a resolution at the United Nations Security Council which calls for peace in Ukraine and refrained from accusing Russia of aggression.

As many as one million Ukrainian soldiers have been killed over the past three years on the battlefield. Russia has not disclosed how many of its troops have died. Some estimates put the death toll at around 100,000.

The conflict in Ukraine is the biggest on the European continent since the end of World War II. It is a tragedy of epic proportion, especially given that the conflict could have been avoided by diplomacy.

The Trump administration is now pushing for peace negotiations with Russia. The American president has also acknowledged some of the “root causes” of the conflict, namely the provocative and unacceptable idea of Ukraine joining the NATO alliance advocated by his predecessor, and the longer-term threat posed by NATO’s expansion toward Russia’s borders since the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s.

In other words, the U.S. administration has now moved to a point for diplomacy that the previous Biden White House rejected.

It is important to recall that in the weeks before hostilities erupted at the end of February 2022, Moscow had presented a detailed and comprehensive proposal for a mutual security treaty between Russia and the U.S.-led NATO military alliance. That diplomatic initiative was dismissed by Washington and its European allies. The rejection of negotiations made the conflict and the ensuing death and destruction inevitable. That is a diabolical shame on the heads of the Western powers.

In our weekly editorial on February 25, 2022, it was stated: “Moscow had warned that if its reasonable security proposals were not reciprocated, then there would be ‘military-technical measures’. Having exhausted the initiative for dialogue and mutual respect, the next phase is the use of more ‘physical language’ to convey meaning to people who seem unresponsive to normal dialogue. It is the Western powers and their arrogant presumption of superiority that are responsible for the impasse and now the repercussions.”

Russia was fully justified in taking military action against NATO’s relentless threats. The conflict was never about merely Ukraine, it was about facing down the entire U.S.-led Western bloc and its incorrigible aggression towards Russia.

Again, in our editorial from three years ago we stated: “Russia has for years warned that U.S. and NATO aggression was posing a critical danger to international security and had to stop. The revoking of arms control treaties by the U.S. (the ABM, INF, Open Skies Treaty) and the expansion of missile threats near Russia’s borders were no longer tolerable. Ukraine is really just one element of the bigger picture. But this week, Russia has moved finally to stop the aggression. It is a historic watershed.”

This week, Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed hope that sanity and diplomacy may prevail under the Trump administration to negotiate a peace settlement in Ukraine. Putin also warned of the danger that diplomacy could be sabotaged by Western powers who would rather that their proxy war against Russia continues – no matter how many deaths it inflicts nor the risks of all-out nuclear war.

It is not clear if the Trump administration can be a reliable party. Trump this week extended economic sanctions on Russia for another year – which is not a good sign. Yes, he has expressed recognition of Russia’s deep concerns but this American president is fickle and mercurial. He seems prone to flip-flopping on his positions. Last week, he called Ukraine’s expired president, Vladimir Zelensky, a “dictator” (which is arguably correct). But this week, Trump denied the disparagement while inking a major mining deal with Zelensky in Washington.

Let’s not forget, too, that Trump during his first administration was complicit in instigating war when in 2019 he approved Javelin missiles to the Ukrainian regime – the first time the taboo of supplying lethal weapons was broken. Trump also ripped up the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the Open Skies Treaty, gravely provoking tensions with Russia.

Fair enough, this time around, Trump has, in a good way, upended relations with European allies by snubbing their involvement in peace talks with Russia. The rupture in the transatlantic alliance has cast a huge shadow of doubt that the NATO bloc can hold together after 76 years of existence.

At the very least, Trump has created a space for dialogue and potential peace. However, it remains to be seen if his administration delivers on resolving the systematic causes of conflict.

It could turn out that Washington is merely moving to save face for the United States from an embarrassing defeat in Ukraine, aiming to dump the costs on its European lackeys, rather than forging a genuine security treaty as demanded by Moscow.

Washington’s belated dropping of the narrative about “Russian aggression” proves that the narrative was baseless. The Western-backed war in Ukraine with hundreds of billions of dollars and euros has been fueled on lies and deception. That is monstrously criminal.

Russia launched its special military operation to protect the ethnic Russian population that had come under relentless, murderous attacks by the NATO-backed Kiev regime that the CIA had installed in the 2014 coup.

Russia has regained historic territories through referenda in Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions. Other historic territories are also up for reclaiming, including Kharkiv and Odessa, the port city founded by Russian empress Catherine the Great in the 18th century.

Russia will continue its military campaign to eradicate the Neo-Nazi regime in Kiev.

And Russia will ensure that the NATO bloc (if it continues to exist, which is doubtful at this time) never acquires a foothold in the rump Ukrainian territory. That includes rejecting any spurious notion by Britain and France of deploying “peacekeeping troops”.

The debacle among the U.S. and its European allies is proof of Russia’s vindication and why it was wholly justified in taking military action against NATO in Ukraine.

The enemies of Russia are in no position to trade. They have nothing to trade.

Russia’s vindication means there can be no shoddy deal – or compromises as Trump fancifully reckons. Russia is right to insist on all its demands for security and respect.

February 28, 2025 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish: Why the Five Eyes Alliance Should Be Dismantled

Sputnik – February 28, 2025

UK media have reported that senior Trump advisor Peter Navarro lobbied his boss to cut Canada out of the Five Eyes intel-sharing network. Navarro rejected the report. But given the harm the intel coalition has done to Trump, Americans and relations with allies, removing members or dismantling the organization wouldn’t be a bad idea. Here’s why.

In 2024, journalists Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger revealed that Barack Obama’s CIA chief had worked with Five Eyes partners to circumvent restrictions on domestic spying to illegally tap Trump’s 2016 campaign, targeting Trump himself and over two dozen of his associates.

In 2013, NSA contractor-turned whistleblower Edward Snowden exposed his former employer’s work with the Five Eyes using tools like PRISM and XKeyscore to engage in a global, unfathomably massive warrantless spying program targeting foreigners and Americans alike.

Besides ordinary people, the Snowden leaks revealed Five Eyes spying on non-Anglosphere allied countries’ leaders, including Chancellor Merkel of Germany and President Hollande of France.

The Five Eyes have also been linked to diplomatic crises between Western nations and the developing world, with the 2023-present spat between Canada and India over the extraterritorial killings of Sikh separatists accompanied by allegations of a Five Eyes plot to destabilize India.

In 2013, a scandal erupted in Australian-Indonesian relations after it was revealed that Canberra and its Five Eyes partners sought to tap the phones of Indonesia’s sitting president, his wife and other senior officials.

And the Five Eyes’ shady activity goes back much further than that, with the ECHELON surveillance program, launched in the early 1970s, ostensibly to monitor Eastern Bloc countries and the Soviet Union, actually engaging in the interception of communications worldwide.

In the late 1990s, it was revealed that ECHELON had been used by US corporations to spy on their European competitors.

Similar activity was uncovered by WikiLeaks in 2015, with Japanese officials and companies revealed to have been monitored by the NSA using Five Eyes during negotiations on the TPP trade pact.

February 28, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception | , , , , | Leave a comment

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