Corruption, disinformation, warnings about assassinations: What to make of the latest Biden Ukraine links claims
By Tarik Cyril Amar | RT | January 12, 2024
At first it feels like a blast from the past but it’s really about the present and future: Journalist Simona Mangiante Papadopoulos has released a long interview with former Ukrainian MP Andrey Derkach. In which Derkach makes allegations about corruption in the US and Ukraine. In particular about the American President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
With regard to graft, while the various allegations (by no means only Derkach’s) and ongoing investigations are complex, in essence several simple questions are at stake: Did the current president’s son, Hunter Biden, sell his services as a Washington influence-peddler by using the “brand” (as one witness, Devon Archer, has put it) of his father’s connections (as then vice-president under Barack Obama)? And, potentially even more disturbingly, did the elder Biden himself profit from such influence-peddling? Finally, most disconcerting of all, did the current president use his leverage as Obama’s point-man on Ukraine to shield his son and, possibly, himself from investigations in Ukraine? Including by bringing down Ukrainian chief prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who got too close to the truth about Hunter Biden’s shady role in the Ukrainian Burisma gas company?
In sum, did the highest-ranking American official, charged with overseeing (among other things) Kiev’s putative “fight against corruption,” make things even worse by injecting a strong dose of US-establishment corruption into Washington’s newest client state? And, if so, could that two-sided entanglement have left a legacy, including of compromising actions, that has been influencing America’s reckless and failing (even on its own misconceived terms) proxy war policy in Ukraine?
Full disclosure: I happen to believe that the answer to all these questions is yes. Which is depressing, since it means that decisions, costing many human lives and making our shared global politics very dangerous, have been influenced by corrupt motives reminiscent of the world of organized crime.
But we do not know, yet. It is certain that Hunter Biden, a textbook failed-son and pampered heir, used his dad’s name to cash in, to the tune of (at the very east) $7.5 million. That much even the pro-Biden Washington Post had to admit (while revealing its bias with the packaging of the story, which accuses Republicans of “hyping” the numbers). As to whether Joe Biden himself also got a share and how all of this affected his policy on Ukraine – compelling proof, as opposed to plausible conjecture, is not available. At least at this point. But the Republicans, for their own selfish yet, politically, perfectly normal reasons, are digging for it through an impeachment inquiry into the current president’s record.
This is the background against which Derkach has now spoken up. Make no mistake: There will be attempts to dismiss all of this as – yes, you guessed it – the beginning of BIG BAD RUSSIAN MEDDLING in the 2024 presidential elections. In fact, they have already started. Frankly, yawn: Let’s not be distracted.
Such attempts will inevitably seek to make use of Mangiante Papadopoulos’ and Derkach’s own records. Mangiante Papadopoulos is a journalist and the wife of the former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos. As such (though, to be precise, still his girlfriend at the time), she was questioned by the FBI in 2017, during the hot phase of the neo-McCarthyite campaign commonly known under the misleading label “Russiagate.”
Misleading because it was not really about Russia, but about the American Democrats’ foul-play attempt to undermine the reality of Donald Trump’s victory in 2016. (which was really down to Trump’s gifts as a populist and the Democrats’ arrogant decision to try and ram down the country’s throat the unelectably unappealing and politically terrifying candidacy of Hillary Clinton.)
“Russiagate” was, in reality, Russia Rage, a mix of Centrist and Liberal conspiracy theory-mongering and mass hysteria. The true scandal was that a sizable part of the US political and media establishment further ruined what was left of any working relationship with Russia, and undermined the American public’s faith in a legitimate election result. (No, Trump was not the first one to do so in 2020/21: The roots of the January 6 riot in Washington are deeply bipartisan.)
Derkach came to international attention a few years later, with respect to Trump’s successor. A Russian-Ukrainian businessman and politician (who is open about receiving elite Russian intelligence training in the early 1990s), American and Ukrainian officials have accused him of playing an important role in “meddling” in the election of 2020, specifically by helping undermine Biden’s reputation. Derkach released recordings of what he claimed were conversations between then-vice-president Biden and then-Ukrainian president Pyotr Poroshenko that, critics argued, pointed to illicit dealings. (Ironically enough, for a while these revelations were welcomed by the team of Poroshenko’s successor Vladimir Zelensky because they embarrassed his opponent.)
Derkach has also been accused of – and in Ukraine formally charged with – working for Russian intelligence and with treason. No wonder he fled the country in 2022 and now lives in exile in Belarus. The 56-year-old is, in sum, a very ambiguous figure whose statements should be treated with caution.
Yet they should not be dismissed wholesale. Simply branding anything inconvenient to the American Democrats and their media clique as “information warfare” or “Russian meddling” is how “Russiagate” has done so much damage. That was, after all, the manner in which the authentic and very relevant news about the compromising data on Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop was suppressed before his father’s election. If the evidence pointing to corruption (and revolting personal depravity) had been allowed to be subjected to ordinary scrutiny and public debate – as it certainly would have been if it had concerned a member of the Trump family – the chances of Biden senior would have suffered.
Derkach is a complicated source; Mangiante Papadopoulos has also been accused of promoting Russia’s interests. (But then, frankly, who hasn’t?) But the question among adult observers is not who may be interested in a given piece of information seeing the light of day. Because here’s a little secret: As long as the information is of any political relevance at all, there’s always someone interested (as, by the way, Derkach openly admits in the interview, as far as his case is concerned). And here’s another one: That doesn’t mean that a given piece of information is untrue (“disinformation,” as we have been trained to say now). And finally: Remember, interests are involved not only in revealing, but also in hiding facts. Or, indeed, in pooh-poohing inconvenient revelations as nothing but propaganda.
So, what to make of what Derkach has had to say now? In the interview, which is almost an hour long, he makes many detailed statements, involving a large number of specified persons, especially in Ukraine. Let’s try to focus on key aspects and look at three of his most striking allegations one by one.
First, Derkach states that the Ukrainian authorities started going after him in earnest, including by extra-legal and life-threatening means, when (or because?) US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told them to resolve that Derkach problem. The interview is somewhat ambiguous: Is Derkach saying that Blinken himself gave, in essence, an order to use criminal methods or that Blinken – Henry II/Thomas Becket-style – “merely” called for someone to somehow rid his president of that turbulent Ukrainian?
Either way, it would have been a highly incriminating and tawdry act on Blinken’s part. But it would be naive to consider the current Secretary of State incapable of stooping so low. We are, after all, talking about the man who, during Biden’s election campaign, played a devious behind-the-scenes role in organizing the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Back then, by mobilizing the American intelligence community to, once again, serve party-political purposes, Blinken helped Biden win and, in the long term, further shredded what’s left of American establishment credibility. (Not to mention that, currently, Blinken is displaying his absolute legal nihilism in stunning fashion by shielding Israel’s genocidal attack on Gaza.)
Secondly, Derkach also maintains that former Ukrainian chief prosecutor Viktor Shokin, who lost his job for going after a Biden (or was it even two of them?), is in danger of assassination and should receive help to leave Ukraine. What makes this claim sound improbable is the fact that Shokin is still alive. What makes it plausible is the fact that there has already been at least one attempt on his life, although that took place years ago when he was still in office: As a matter of fact, for Shokin, losing his job may have made losing his life less likely.
Third, Derkach claims that, inside Ukraine, a large bribe linked to the fallout from the Burisma affair has been turned into funding for the Ukrainian intelligence services, in particular for assassinations in Russia and the attack on the Nord Stream gas pipelines. Can he prove this specific connection, namely that precisely that dirty money was used for this dark purpose? Maybe, maybe not. Yet there is no doubt that Ukraine’s military intelligence service in particular has organized assassinations. Indeed, some Western media have quite openly sung its praises for this, such as The Economist.
As regards Nord Stream, after an initial period of plainly silly Western disinformation absurdly trying to point the finger at Russia (anyone remember that?), it is now fashionable to blame it all on Ukraine, as if the latter could have acted without NATO permission and assistance. So, here as well Derkach gets a grade of ‘at least partly true’; and his allegation about how some of these activities have been financed cannot be dismissed as implausible either.
Let’s return, however, to the biggest issue at stake here: the Bidens. And let’s note a simple but generally overlooked fact: They are amazingly good at lowering expectations. They and their media allies are engaged in an ongoing, largely successful operation of shifting US baselines even farther down: In a normal country, there simply should not be an endless, partisan struggle over whether and how much money exactly went to the current president personally. In a normal country, the fact that, at the very least, Joe Biden has long tolerated, facilitated (to one extent or the other) and, finally, defended and shielded the screamingly unethical behavior of his son, should be more than enough to have forced him to resign.
Tarik Cyril Amar is a historian from Germany working at Koç University, Istanbul, on Russia, Ukraine, and Eastern Europe, the history of World War II, the cultural Cold War, and the politics of memory.
Former Ukrainian chief prosecutor ‘fired’ for Biden could be assassinated – ex-MP
Viktor Shokin has dirt on the US president’s family and Kiev is using him as a bargaining chip, Andrey Derkach has claimed
Viktor Shokin in February 2015, after his appointment as Prosecutor General. © Vladimir Shtanko / Anadolu Agency / Getty Images
RT | January 11, 2024
The former Prosecutor General of Ukraine, Viktor Shokin, who was famously sacked by then-President Pyotr Poroshenko under pressure from US President Joe Biden, is being used by the current government in Kiev as a bargaining chip with Washington, controversial former MP Andrey Derkach has claimed in an interview.
Biden had Poroshenko sack Shokin in 2016, when he was vice president in the Obama administration, threatening to withhold a $1 billion loan unless his demands were met. The now-incumbent US president claimed that the Ukrainian prosecutor was corrupt, but also bragged about getting rid of the man. Critics of Biden have alleged that he used his office to derail an investigation into the gas firm Burisma, which infamously retained his son Hunter on a well-paid board position during his father’s tenure as Obama’s VP.
Derkach made his explosive claims in an interview recorded in Minsk, Belarus, with Italian-US journalist Simona Mangiante, published on Wednesday on X (formerly Twitter).
“Shokin is now a hostage on Ukrainian territory. As far as I know, he is not allowed to leave Ukraine. He is under the total control of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU),” he claimed.
President Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the US side, and President Vladimir Zelensky and his chief-of-staff Andrey Yermak on the Ukrainian side, are interested in information possessed by Shokin, according to Derkach.
He claimed that last October Shokin had contacts with two attorneys “working with the US Congress,” Jake Greenberg and Clark Abourisk. The SBU “recorded those conversations, where Shokin told the Congress about real criminal acts of Blinken and Biden, and about the corruption of the Biden family.”
The former official said he’d been tipped off about the surveillance by sources inside the SBU. Derkach is an intelligence officer by background and served in the Ukrainian agency before being elected to parliament.
He claimed that his sources had told him that “the question of liquidating Mr Shokin on the territory of Ukraine is under consideration.” He urged the US Congress to ensure the man’s safety and extraction from his home country.
Derkach spoke in Russian throughout the hour-long interview and touched on a number of sensitive aspects of US-Ukraine relations, including those he’d been personally involved in.
He was the official that published in 2020 what he claimed to be recordings of conversations that Biden and Poroshenko had in 2015-2016. In the interview this week he claimed that at the time he was acting with the blessing of Zelensky’s office, which was seeking to discredit the former president.
Washington branded Derkach a Russian agent in 2022 and indicted him for allegedly interfering in the 2020 US presidential elections. Last year, Ukraine accused him of treason, also claiming he was working for Moscow. Zelensky stripped him of his Ukrainian citizenship in January 2023.
Derkach has denied the accusations and claims in the interview that the Ukrainian charges against him were brought after Kiev failed to dispose of him by other means, on a direct request from Antony Blinken.
‘I Don’t Recall’: Fauci Unable to Answer Key Questions in Pandemic Probe
By Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D. | The Defender | January 9, 2024
On the first day of a two-day closed-door interview before the U.S. House of Representatives Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic Monday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID), frequently evaded questions about gain-of-function research and the government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chairman Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), in a statement following Monday’s interview, said, “Dr. Fauci’s testimony today uncovered drastic and systemic failures in America’s public health systems” and that Fauci “had no idea what was happening under his own jurisdiction at NIAID.”
According to The Hill, Fauci offered “his expertise on preparing for potential outbreaks in the future.” But according to The Washington Times, he “couldn’t remember many details about his advocacy of lockdowns, his flip-flopping on mask mandates and his decision to allow government funding of gain-of-function research in China that might have led to the pandemic.”
Fauci “claimed he ‘did not recall’ pertinent COVID-19 information or conversations more than 100 times,” and “profusely defended his previous congressional testimony where he stated the National Institutes of Health (NIH) did not fund gain-of-function research in Wuhan,” according to the subcommittee statement.
Fauci also “repeatedly played semantics with the definition of gain-of-function in an attempt to avoid conceding that NIH funded potentially dangerous research in China,” the subcommittee stated.
Responding to Monday’s testimony, Rutgers University molecular biologist Richard Ebright, Ph.D., a frequent critic of gain-of-function research, told The Defender :
“Fauci repeatedly and flagrantly violated U.S. government policies implemented to protect the public from lab-generated pandemics. He lied — brazenly — to Congress about his policy violations in three Senate hearings in 2021-2022. He lied — brazenly — to Congress about his policy violations again yesterday.”
Investigative journalist Paul D. Thacker, who has documented attempts by Fauci and other government officials, federal agencies and leading scientists to cover up the U.S. government’s role in funding gain-of-function research in China, told The Defender he was not surprised by Fauci’s stance.
“As I documented over two years ago, Anthony Fauci has lied about funding gain-of-function research in Wuhan. That’s fine. People in Washington lie all the time,” Thacker said.
“But when he lied during a congressional hearing, wagging his finger at Senator [Rand] Paul … I knew immediately he had broken the law. His lies about this pandemic have been documented in multiple media outlets and I hope he is eventually prosecuted,” he added.
Francis Boyle, J.D., Ph.D., professor of international law at the University of Illinois and a bioweapons expert who drafted the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989, told The Defender Fauci should be prosecuted.
“Fauci knew exactly what was going on at the Wuhan BSL4 [biosafety level 4] and the University of North Carolina BSL3 — he was paying for it,” Boyle said. “He has repeatedly perjured himself in testimony before Congress. This is just more of the same.” … Full article
The Definition of Insanity
AARP: “Keep getting boosters even though previous ones didn’t work.”
BY JOHN LEAKE | COURAGEOUS DISCOURSE | JANUARY 9, 2024
This morning someone sent me a link to Alex Berenson’s post about the AARP advising its nearly 38 million members to get another COVID-19 booster shot, even if they have already had five boosters.
This prompted me to visit AARP’s website, which features an entire category of content titled Scams & Fraud—that is, warnings to older people about all the predators out there who wish to manipulate and deceive them in order to steal their money.
Under the category Caregiving is posted an articled titled COVID-19 Nursing Home Deaths Climb Ahead of Expected Winter Surge.
The article laments that nursing home residents and staff have lost interest in getting the latest booster, and suggests this is a likely explanation for why COVID-19 mortality in nursing homes has risen in recent months as we head into winter.
The author, Emily Paulin, does NOT mention the common experience of older people repeatedly falling ill with COVID-19 even after receiving multiple boosters. She also doesn’t mention a word about TREATING nursing home residents who fall ill with COVID-19. Four years after this mess began, an AARP writer about nursing home policy still has nothing to say about treating the illness.
Reading this article reminded me of a Joe Rogan podcast I watched yesterday in which his guest—an earnest and callow young man who says “like” every fourth word—asserts the following two propositions:
1). Most popular sports were conceived and developed to give men an advantage over women. For example, in basketball, “the way the ball moves” gives biological males an advantage.
2). Biological males who receive gender reassignment procedures to become women have NO advantage over women in sports.
The same kind of insanity is also evident among the foreign policy crowd that continues to advocate the war in Ukraine. No matter how many hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians are run into the meat grinder of Russian defensive positions in the eastern part of the country, these lunatics continue to insist that the Ukrainians KEEP DOING THIS until they get their desired result.
All of the above is further evidence of the mental illness underlying what I call the Holy Quadripartitus of Piffle:
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. Indeed, as Ukraine’s American, transgender military spokeswoman asserted back in September, journalists who question this article of faith should be hunted down and killed.
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.
For my part, I have lost all patience with people who subscribe to the Holy Quadripartitus of Piffle. In my view, they have become indistinguishable from sleep-deprived children. There is no sense in trying to have a conversation or reason with them. I can only hope that their insane assertions and conduct will ultimately be rejected by the great majority of adults in the United States and the rest of the world.
CDC study concludes most young children hospitalized for COVID were unvaccinated — after enrolling 7 times as many unvaxed kids in study
By Angelo DePalma, Ph.D. and Karl Jablonowski, Ph.D. | The Defender | January 9, 2024
A U.S. government-sponsored study published late last month in The Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal reported that most young children hospitalized for acute COVID-19 had not received an mRNA COVID-19 vaccination and were sicker to begin with than vaccinated children.
The authors’ conclusions are true on the surface, but their analysis ignored that more than 7 times as many unvaccinated as vaccinated children were enrolled in their study.
Only 4.5% of trial subjects completed primary COVID series
Investigators led by Laura Zambrano, Ph.D., a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention epidemiologist, recruited 597 children ages 8 months through under age 5 hospitalized for COVID-19 at 28 U.S. pediatric hospitals between Sept. 20, 2022, and May 31, 2023.
Unvaccinated subjects outnumbered subjects who had received at least one COVID-19 shot by 528 to 69, a more than 7-fold difference.
Children were grouped by demographic factors such as race, sex and geographic location, vaccination status (no vaccine, incomplete vaccine series or fully vaccinated) and underlying non-COVID-19 illnesses, or comorbidities.
Only 4.5% of the subjects had completed their primary COVID-19 vaccination series and 7% had received at least one dose.
Cases varied widely in severity, with 174 (29.1% of all subjects) admitted to intensive care and 75 progressing to life-threatening illness.
Fifty-one (8.5% of all subjects) required life support via invasive mechanical ventilation, and three required extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, a life-support treatment involving a heart-lung machine.
Based on results from both vaccinated and unvaccinated groups, infants 8 months to under age 2 were more vulnerable to serious outcomes than children ages 2 to 4 years.
For example, the youngest subjects had more life-threatening illnesses and the greatest need for high-level respiratory support involving vasoactive infusions — intravenous treatments to maintain normal blood pressure and heart rate. Yet they also had shorter hospital stays.
Investigators concluded that most children hospitalized for COVID-19, including most children with underlying medical conditions, were unvaccinated. On that basis, they called for “strategies to reduce barriers to vaccine access among young children.”
Researchers tested kids for COVID but not other respiratory infections
Zambrano et al. also compared the Pfizer mRNA shot to the Moderna product. They found that children who took the Moderna product were somewhat more likely to experience a serious outcome, however, the numbers from both groups were small and the authors did not subject them to statistical analysis.
Based on their analysis they also calculated and reported, in their “results” section, that mRNA COVID-19 vaccines were 40% effective in reducing serious outcomes. However, in their discussion (several sections later), they admitted that “vaccine coverage in this population was too low to evaluate vaccine effectiveness.”
There were two notable limitations to the Zambrano study. Even though the researchers recruited children who were only partially vaccinated the study’s design excluded children who had received any vaccination fewer than 14 days before hospital admission. Therefore no short-term post-vaccination adverse events were included.
Another limitation was that children were tested for COVID-19 but not for all possible respiratory infections, meaning “it is possible that RSV [respiratory syncytial virus], human metapneumovirus or other respiratory viral co-detections influenced disease severity.”
Media parroted authors’ conclusions
U.S. media (for example here and here) picked up on the Zambrano paper and repeated its conclusion that most hospitalized COVID-19 pediatric patients were unvaccinated — ignoring that the study included more than 7 times as many unvaccinated as vaccinated subjects.
A deeper dive into the data reveals the extent of this error and the discrepancies between what Zambrano et al. reported and what they saw.
Tables 1 and 2 illustrate what the authors got wrong.
These calculations say nothing about the relative outcomes for vaccinated and unvaccinated children because Zambrano et al. either did not perform the relevant calculation — number of cases in each group divided by the number of subjects — or chose not to report the results it generated.
Instead of presenting the number of subjects experiencing the indicated outcome as a percentage of vaccinated or unvaccinated groups, they reported them as a percentage of all subjects experiencing that outcome. Since there were 7 times as many unvaccinated as vaccinated subjects, this approach all but guaranteed the numbers among the unvaxed would be higher.
Here’s an analogy: In a hypothetical study comparing 10 coffee drinkers to 100 abstainers, five drinkers and 10 abstainers reported feeling nervous. Using Zambrano’s logic, 67% of people feeling nervous were abstainers, and just 33% drank coffee. This “proves,” according to Zambrano’s logic, that not drinking coffee doubles (67% vs. 33%) the risk of getting the jitters.
The correct way to view this data is that 10 in 100 abstainers, or 10%, felt jittery but 5 in 10 (50%) of coffee drinkers felt jittery, and that drinking coffee raises the risk of nervousness fivefold (50% vs. 10%).
Table 2 uses the same raw data as Table 1. But instead of reporting vaccinated and unvaccinated data as a percentage of all data, it first calculates the occurrence of these conditions or outcomes in each group and compares the inter-group differences.
Hospital stays were also on average one day shorter for the unvaccinated. The only area where unvaccinated children faired slightly worse was in underlying cardiac issues, but the authors did not address this small difference in their discussion.
Previous study used same tactic
A study preceding the Zambrano paper by three weeks used the same tactic to arrive at the same conclusion.
Tannis et al. compared many of the same outcomes as Zambrano in 6,337 unvaccinated and 281 vaccinated children ages 6 months to under 5 years.
All subjects had visited emergency departments for acute respiratory illness from July 2022 to September 2023.
By coincidence, Tannis also calculated vaccine effectiveness to be 40%.
Table 3 presents data from Tannis et al. with percentages reported by Tannis (Tannis %) and the actual values (Actual %).
Vaccinated children were also 68.3% more likely to harbor HCoV, an endemic coronavirus, than the unvaccinated. Similar to SARS-CoV-2 (the COVID-19 virus), HCoV can cause serious illness in immunocompromised individuals and the elderly.
Angelo DePalma, Ph.D., is a science reporter/editor for The Defender.
Karl Jablonowski, Ph.D., holds a master’s degree in computer science and a doctorate in biomedical and health informatics. He practices data science by asking questions of databases that can reveal population-based adverse outcomes of medical interventions.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
Oman seizes drones headed for ‘pro-UAE factions’ in Yemen
MEMO | January 10, 2024
The customs authorities in Oman intercepted a shipment of drones yesterday, which were concealed on a truck from the UAE heading for Yemen. The discovery was made at the Hafeet crossing on the border between the two Gulf states.
“The Directorate General of Customs seized a truck at the Hafeet crossing loaded with wireless drones coming by transit system from the United Arab Emirates heading to the Republic of Yemen,” said the customs authorities.
“Customs inspectors were able to discover the shipments that were hidden professionally in places specially prepared for smuggling them in the truck. The concerned authorities began investigating the case in order to complete the rest of the legal procedures against the suspects.”
According to the Sanaa-based Yemen Press Agency, citing informed sources, the drones were destined for UAE-backed factions in southern Yemen, most likely the separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC).
The outlet noted that some observers speculate that the US may be using the UAE-backed proxies to turn international public opinion against the Houthi-led Yemeni forces by targeting merchant ships. The latter have been targeting Israel-linked vessels, or those heading for the occupation state through the Red Sea, because of Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza.
London, Paris and Kiev break arms control regime with recent cruise missile deliveries
By Drago Bosnic | January 10, 2024
On January 9, Avia.pro reported that the Kiev regime is expecting a “significant strengthening of their arsenal thanks to supplies from France”. Citing Le Figaro as its primary source, the report claims that France plans to send at least 85 SCALP-EG air-launched, long-range cruise missiles. The missiles are the French iteration of the “Storm Shadow”, a UK design that has been used by the Neo-Nazi junta since at least May last year. Various sources indicate that there are approximately 50 French-made SCALP-EG missiles in its arsenal, while it’s extremely likely there are even more of the UK-made “Storm Shadow” ones. The Kiev regime itself has been bragging about the supposed effectiveness of these weapons, although the Russian military is claiming it has managed to adapt most of its air defenses to both versions of the missile.
However, while it’s certainly true that Moscow has superb air defenses and the world’s most advanced SAM (surface-to-air missile) systems, the Neo-Nazi junta is boasting about having the non-export version of the “Storm Shadow/SCALP-EG” missiles. Namely, the United Kingdom, France, Ukraine and over 30 other countries are members of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), a multilateral export control regime that limits the proliferation of missiles and related technologies that could ease their development and manufacturing. MTCR came into force in 1987, when the political West was terrified of the prospect of having second-to-none Soviet missile technologies proliferate to other countries. This would’ve made it impossible for the belligerent power pole to conduct its endless wars of aggression.
And indeed, if Serbia/former Yugoslavia, as well as countless other countries in the Middle East, North Africa and elsewhere had access to such technologies, it’s highly unlikely that the likes of NATO would’ve had the chance to invade as easily as it did. Officially, the MTCR seeks to limit the export of missiles and weapons that would be capable of delivering a warhead of at least 500 kg to a range of at least 300 km. This also refers to any hardware, software and other technologies that could aid in the development of such weapon systems. However, in essence, the MTCR is only disguised as an arms control agreement that supposedly seeks to “ensure peace”. In reality, the political West honors such agreements only when it suits it geopolitically and militarily, after which it’s rejected as allegedly “unnecessary”.
Both the United States and NATO as a whole have a history of unilaterally breaking international arms control treaties that prevent large-scale conflicts. The MTCR is no different in this regard, as it already served its purpose, so now it’s more of an obstacle than a geopolitical asset. By delivering the non-export version of the “Storm Shadow/SCALP-EG” missiles, the political West continues to probe the Russian military. This move will certainly result in a significant strengthening of the Neo-Nazi junta’s long-range strike capabilities. By creating an additional threat to Russian military infrastructure in the regions around Ukraine, NATO is seeking to disrupt the special military operation (SMO) as much as possible. Officially, this is done with minimal direct participation in order to avoid implicating the political West.
However, in reality, military specialists from various NATO member states have been in Ukraine for years, making sure that the Kiev regime forces can stay as functional as possible against a technologically superior opponent. This is an obvious red line for Moscow and there are a number of ways in which it can respond to such escalation. Admittedly, there’s very little Russia can do to prevent the delivery of such weapons to the Neo-Nazi junta. On the other hand, although the Kiev regime is desperate to keep the global spotlight on itself only, Ukraine is certainly not the world’s sole geopolitical hotspot. There are numerous other places where the Western neocolonialist system can be damaged beyond repair or even destroyed entirely. Russia could simply use NATO’s MTCR violations to arm its allies around the world.
By delivering weapons previously banned by the MTCR, Moscow would not only strengthen the standing of its many partners, particularly the new members of the growing BRICS+ framework, but it would also hurt the political West’s neocolonialist ambitions and, by extension, its extremely exploitative economic system. This is particularly true in Africa, where countries like France and the UK are still maintaining their (neo)colonial empires through all sorts of direct and indirect meddling. By limiting their space for geopolitical maneuver, Moscow could make it impossible to maintain these leftover (neo)colonialist structures and hurt the long-term interests of NATO’s foremost powers. This is perhaps best seen in countries like Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, among others in Africa, as well as Latin America and South Asia.
It should be noted that the UK and France are not the only Western countries that are violating or close to violating the MTCR. Although they’re the most prominent ones, as the delivery and integration of “Storm Shadow/SCALP-EG” missiles on the Neo-Nazi junta’s Soviet-era Su-24M tactical bombers has proven to be a major contributing factor to the escalation of the conflict, other NATO/EU members are increasingly involved in similar moves.
What’s more, when the political West talks about sending certain weapons, it usually means they’ve already been delivered. The Kiev regime has been pushing for the deliveries of a similar German-Swedish weapon, the 500 km range “Taurus” missile. Although Berlin’s official position is that it supposedly “doesn’t want the conflict to escalate”, its resurgent “Drang nach Osten” ambitions speak for themselves.
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.
Spectacularly Shabby and Sordid Corruption
“Atlanta Trump Prosecutor Accused Of Secret, Disqualifying Romance With DA Fani Willis”
Fani Willis hired Nathan Wade at a steep premium to what she was paying other prosecutors in her office, the filing alleges (Atlanta News First )
BY JOHN LEAKE | COURAGEOUS DISCOURSE | JANUARY 9, 2024
ZeroHedge just reported allegations pertaining to the Trump prosecution in Atlanta—allegations that seem too spectacularly shabby and sordid to be true. Indeed, even a satirical novelist as zany as Carl Hiaasen would probably hesitate to make up such a ridiculous farce.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis hired her secret lover to serve as special prosecutor in the Georgia racketeering case against Donald Trump and 18 other defendants, according to a Monday filing on behalf of Mike Roman, a defendant who led election day operations for the 2020 Trump campaign:
“[T]he district attorney and the special prosecutor have been engaged in an improper, clandestine personal relationship during the pendency of this case, which has resulted in the special prosecutor, and, in turn, the district attorney, profiting significantly from this prosecution at the expense of the taxpayers.”
The prosecutor is Nathan Wade, a private attorney in the midst of a divorce who “has little to no experience trying felony cases, much less complex RICO actions,” according to the 127-page filing which seeks to have the charges against Roman dropped and both Willis and Wade disqualified from further participation in the case.
According to the complaint, Wade has raked in at least $653,000 and upwards of $1 million for handling the high-profile case. By virtue of their relationship, that pile of taxpayer money benefits Willis, as they’ve traveled together to Florida, the Caribbean and Napa Valley, California, adding that Wade has also bought tickets for the pair to travel on Norwegian and Royal Caribbean cruise ships.
In addition to his $250 hourly rate, Wade has also billed Fulton County for thousands of dollars in air travel and hotel stays, according to invoices attached to the filing. He categorized them as interview and research trips.
The filing also alleges that Willis contracted with Wade without proper approval, as such a move requires a vote by the Fulton County Board of Commissioners. Roman’s lawyer, Ashleigh Merchant tells the Wall Street Journal her search of board meeting minutes found no indication his appointment was ever discussed, much less voted upon.
Can this story be true? Perusing the 127-page filing, I came across the following statement:
The Court may well be wondering, and for good reason, “How do you know this?” and “Why does it matter?”
How Do We Know This?
- Open records requests to Fulton County reveal that the district attorney did not obtain county approval to appoint the special prosecutor. Why would the district attorney not obtain this approval prior to appointing the special prosecutor?
- The special prosecutor has admitted his oath was not filed prior to his work on this case. Why would the special prosecutor not just file the oath, a simple administrative task for a lawyer?
- The special prosecutor is seeking a divorce in Cobb County and sought successfully to seal those records, hiding them from public view. Why would a private citizen such as the special prosecutor shield filings related to his income and spending from public view? While the filings in the divorce case are sealed by Court order (the legality of which is open to question), information obtained outside of court filings indicates that the district attorney and special prosecutor have traveled personally together to such places as Napa Valley, Florida and the Caribbean and the special prosecutor has purchased tickets for both of them to travel on both the Norweigan and Royal Carribean cruise lines. Traveling together to such places as Washington, D.C. or New York City might make sense for work purposes in light of other pending litigation, but what work purpose could only be served by travel to these traditional vacation destinations?
- The district attorney and the special prosecutor have been seen in private together in and about the Atlanta area and believed to have co-habited in some form or fashion at a location owned by neither of them.
- Sources close to both the special prosecutor and the district attorney have confirmed they had an ongoing, personal relationship during the pendency of the special prosecutor’s divorce proceedings.
- According to these sources, the personal relationship between the district attorney and the special prosecutor began before this prosecution was initiated and before the district attorney appointed the special prosecutor.
- Undersigned counsel knows the special prosecutor and has researched his litigation experience. That research reveals that the special prosecutor has never tried a felony RICO case. The State of Georgia and the City of Atlanta has several lawyers who specialize in the prosecuting and defending RICO cases. Despite having access to these resources, why would the district attorney, instead, appoint someone who has never tried a felony RICO case, particularly in a case with such national significance as this one?
- The special prosecutor, based on his lack of experience in this type of felony, would not be qualified under Fulton County’s standards to be appointed to represent any defendant in this case given the complexity of the charges. If the special prosecutor is not qualified to defend this case under Fulton County’s standards, then how is he qualified to prosecute the case? Is that why the district attorney did not seek approval for his appointment? If so, why did she seek to appoint an unqualified lawyer without approval to preside over this prosecution?
- Since being appointed as special prosecutor, the special prosecutor has been paid an estimated almost $1,000,000.00 in legal fees. Of course, additional fees would be expected when private counsel is hired, but that would assume they are not in a relationship with the district attorney and they were qualified to do the work they were hired to do.
- The special prosecutor’s fees have been lucrative in comparison by any reasonable measure. The district attorney’s yearly salary, including state and county supplements, is $ 198,266.66 and the total annual budget for the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office for fiscal year 2022 was $31,541,968.00. The district attorney lobbied for additional money from Fulton County to hire lawyers and staff to clear the backlog after Covid. Why didn’t she use that money to hire qualified in-house staff to try this case? Why did she, instead, use that money to retain the special prosecutor?
Click on the following link to read the full report.
Atlanta Trump Prosecutor Accused Of Secret, Disqualifying Romance With DA Fani Willis
Facebook and YouTube Censored Victims of AstraZeneca COVID Vaccine
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | January 8, 2024
Those who have experienced serious health issues following their Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid vaccination are raising more concerns about censorship on social media platforms. These individuals, who consider themselves victims of the vaccine, report that their attempts to share their experiences and symptoms online are being stifled.
Among these is a father of two who suffered a life-altering blood clot, leading to permanent brain damage, after receiving the vaccine in spring 2021. He is currently pursuing legal action against AstraZeneca in the High Court in London. Similarly, a lawsuit has been filed by the husband of a woman who tragically died following her vaccination.
Others who believe they have suffered adverse reactions to the jab, yet are not involved in any legal battles, have expressed frustration over the suppression of their voices on platforms like Facebook.
They claim that they are being pushed towards using cryptic language and self-censorship to evade group shutdowns, as reported by the Telegraph.
UK CV Family, a private Facebook group founded by Charlet Crichton, serves as a support network for over 1,000 members who feel they have been harmed or bereaved by the Covid vaccines. Crichton, who experienced a severe reaction to the AstraZeneca vaccine, had to abandon her 13-year-long Sports Therapy business due to prolonged bed rest. The group, which was established in November 2021, has earned the status of core-participant in the Covid Inquiry, allowing members like Crichton, who claims to have suffered myocarditis post-vaccination, to testify in the inquiry.
Crichton revealed that her comments had been blocked to prevent misuse, and she even faced a temporary ban from Meta for allegedly not meeting their standards.
She also noted that some members have experienced shadow banning, where their posts are obscured from public view.
Further, YouTube attempted to censor a video featuring lawyers discussing vaccines at the Covid Inquiry, citing a breach of their medical misinformation policy. A video of Stephen Bowie, a Scottish Vaccine Injury Group member who suffered a spinal stroke and blood clots post-vaccination, received a similar warning.
New Polish Chapter in CIA’s Nord Stream Cover Story Signals Growing US-EU Split
By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 08.01.2024
European investigators probing the September 2022 attack on the Nord Stream pipeline network have told US business media that Polish officials have refused to cooperate with an international investigation into the incident. But the report is just another attempt to divert attention from Washington’s role in the blasts, a Russian observer says.
Polish officials have dragged their feet in providing any useful info related to the movement of individuals suspected of plotting and carrying out the 2022 attack on the Nord Stream pipeline network and have generally refused to cooperate, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, citing unnamed ‘European investigators’ looking into the case.
Some European officials are reportedly considering appealing directly to the office of newly elected Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk for help in investigating the sabotage attack, with investigators expressing “suspicions” over Warsaw’s “role and motives” amid the lack of cooperation from the previous government.
The new ‘Polish chapter’ in the CIA-inspired cover story diverting attention from evidence of the US’s central role in the Nord Stream attack comes after more than a year of meticulous attempts to pin the blame on Ukrainians – first in the form of a shadowy amateur group of operatives without connections to any governments, and then to claims that the sabotage was coordinated by Ukrainian special operations colonel Roman Chervinsky, who is now conveniently rotting in a Kiev jail.
The narrative, crafted by US and German media after revelations last year by Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh that US Navy divers planted explosives on the pipelines under the cover of a NATO drill, claimed that the Ukrainian operatives rented a yacht from a Poland-based, Ukrainian-owned company and proceeded to place explosives on the pipeline infrastructure – situated some 80 and 110 meters underwater in the Baltic Sea.
New Narrative to Distract From Mounting EU-US Tensions
Speaking to Sputnik and asked to comment on why the WSJ piece was published now, Russian political analyst Peter Kolchin explained that it’s designed to reinforce the US narrative about foreign actors’ involvement in the Nord Stream attack, particularly as Europe continues to face the economic consequences resulting from the unprecedented act of sabotage against another NATO country’s infrastructure.
“The United States is currently suffering one diplomatic defeat after another. In the face of problems in the Middle East, in the face of a defeat in Ukraine, it’s very important for Washington to consolidate the entire NATO bloc,” the observer explained. The attack on Nord Stream “is a very difficult topic for the bloc, because factually, the destruction of this infrastructure significantly weakened Europe’s economic capabilities and left it dependent on the US energy sector. Now, Europe is forced to buy American gas and to incur huge costs because of it,” Kolchin noted.
How huge? According to a recent Sputnik review of Eurostat data, EU countries have had to pay some €185 billion ($202 billion US) extra on natural gas over the past 20 months after being cut off – by choice or by force, from cheap Russian pipeline gas. Between early 2022 and late 2023, the bloc spent more on natural gas purchases than it did over the entire eight-year period between 2013 and 2021.
Consisting of four pipelines stretching from Russia to northeastern Germany along the bottom of the Baltic Sea, Nord Stream singlehandedly had the capability to provide Europe with up to 110 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas per year, equivalent to more than a quarter of the bloc’s 412 bcm consumption in 2021. The September 2022 attack on the infrastructure, combined with Polish and Ukrainian moves to close the taps to Russian gas, have left TurkStream and ship-based LPG the only means for Russian gas to get to EU countries.
The Nord Stream “problem” isn’t going anywhere, Kolchin believes. “Both in Europe and the United States, the mainstream publications and politicians are asking questions about it.” Therefore, “it’s important for Washington to give the public some more or less plausible scenario” regarding the attack.
“Of course, for many months now Washington has been attempting to shift all responsibility onto Ukraine. Here, the appearance of publications in US media adding credibility to a role played by Warsaw is only part of this big campaign. The United States is trying to shift responsibility from itself onto others, in this case Warsaw,” the observer said.
“Poland, which no longer enjoys agency, cannot oppose the will of the United States, and is being forced to accept what Washington is trying to pin on them,” even if in reality, “it has been noted more than once and at the highest levels that the involvement of the United States in the terrorist attack on Nord Stream is obvious,” Kolchin said.
President Putin commented on Washington’s suspected role in the Nord Stream attack at his year-end press conference last month, dismissing European complaints about Russia ‘turning off the taps’ of energy supplies to the region by pointing out that “it wasn’t us that blew up… Nord Stream,” but “most likely the US, or someone at their suggestion.”
Nevertheless, Washington will continue to push its policy line on the Nord Stream incident, regardless of what the evidence, and elementary logic, say, Kolchin believes.
America’s “methodical” approach is particularly important in light of growing splits in the North Atlantic alliance as Washington continues to ride roughshod over Europe’s basic interests, the observer noted.
“Let’s be honest, it’s difficult in principle to speak of any kind of trust within the alliance. And this is largely connected with the Nord Stream events. European countries understand who is responsible, but have very reluctantly been forced to swallow this harsh reality,” the observer summed up.
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From the Archives
The New Baghdad Pact
By Dr Bouthaina Shaaban | February 23, 2017
A recently declassified CIA document prepared in 1983, and released on 20 January 2017, shows that the United States had at the time encouraged Saddam Hussein to attack Syria, which would have led to a vicious conflict between the two countries, thus draining their resources.
The report, which was then prepared by CIA officer Graham Fuller, indicates that the US tried adamantly to convince Saddam to attack Syria under any pretense available, in order to get the two most powerful countries in the Arab East to destroy each other, turning their attention away from the Arab-Israeli conflict. … continue
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