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Germany squandering billions on Israel’s Arrow-3 missile defence system

MEMO | June 10, 2023

Germany squandering almost 4 billion euros ($4.30 billion) on Israel’s Arrow-3 missile defense system is a prime example of financial mismanagement. Astonishingly, the government plans to request advance payments of up to 560 million euros from lawmakers, revealing a complete disregard for responsible spending. The Arrow-3 system, supposedly designed to intercept ballistic missiles outside the earth’s atmosphere, is nothing more than an overpriced addition to Israel’s already extensive missile defense arsenal.

Despite its lofty claims, the Arrow-3 merely serves as the extravagant crown jewel of Israel’s defense array, spanning from the unnecessary short-range rocket interception capabilities of Iron Dome to the extravagant long-range missile destruction capabilities of Arrow-3. Germany’s acquisition of this system showcases a distorted sense of priorities and a blatant waste of taxpayers’ hard-earned money.

The government aims to finalize a government-to-government deal with Israel by the end of the year, leaving little room for rational decision-making or exploring alternative, more sensible options. Astonishingly, the procurement documents prepared for parliament reveal that Germany will forfeit part or all of its advance payments if the deal falls through, essentially guaranteeing compensation to Israel for costs they may incur. This reckless arrangement further burdens German taxpayers and highlights the government’s lack of fiscal prudence.

Even more concerning is the fact that Germany’s air force is expected to take delivery of the Arrow-3 system, now costing a staggering one billion euros more than initially planned, by the fourth quarter of 2025. Such an inflated expenditure raises serious questions about the government’s judgment and its ability to allocate funds responsibly.

It is worth noting that Germany’s justification for this extravagant purchase, using Russia’s conflict in Ukraine to argue for a shortage of ground-based air defense systems, is nothing more than a flimsy pretext. While medium-layer defense systems like Raytheon’s Patriot units or the more recent IRIS-T system provide sufficient coverage, Germany’s decision to acquire the Arrow-3 demonstrates a foolish preoccupation with unnecessary high-layer defense.

By indulging in such a costly acquisition, Germany jeopardizes the allocation of funds for crucial areas such as infrastructure, social programs, and economic development. The government’s skewed priorities raise serious concerns about its commitment to the well-being of its citizens and the prudent management of public resources.

June 10, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

China’s criticism of America’s ‘piecemeal crisis management’ in Palestine is based on international law

By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | June 6, 2023

Remarks on 24 May by China’s Ambassador to the UN on the situation in Occupied Palestine were impeccable in terms of their consistency with international law. Compared with the position of the US, which perceives the UN and the Security Council in particular as a vehicle to defend Israeli interests, the Chinese political discourse reflects a legal stance based on a deep understanding of the realities on the ground.

Articulating Beijing’s thinking during a Security Council “Briefing on the Situation in the Middle East, including the Palestine Question”, Ambassador Geng Shuang did not mince his words. He spoke forcefully about the “irreplaceable” need for a “comprehensive and just solution” that is based on ending Israel’s “provocations” in Jerusalem and respect for the right of “Muslim worshippers” as well as the “custodianship of Jordan” in the occupied city’s holy sites.

Widening the context of the reasons behind the latest violence in Palestine, and the 9 May Israeli attack on Gaza, Geng went on to state a position that both Tel Aviv and Washington find totally objectionable. He condemned unapologetically the “illegal expansion of [Israeli Jewish] settlements” in Occupied Palestine and Israel’s “unilateral action”, urging Tel Aviv to “immediately halt” all of its illegal activities. The Chinese ambassador then proceeded to discuss issues that have been relatively ignored, including “the plight of the Palestinian refugees”.

In doing so, Geng has enunciated his country’s political vision regarding a just solution in Palestine, one that is predicated on ending the Israeli occupation, halting Tel Aviv’s expansionist policies, and respecting the rights of the Palestinian people.

Is this a new position, though?

While it is true that China’s policies on Palestine and Israel have historically been consistent with international law, in recent years it has attempted to tailor a more “balanced” position, one that does not impede growing trade with Israel, particularly in the area of advanced microchip technology.

However, Chinese-Israeli affinity was motivated by more than trade. Since its official launch, China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has served as the cornerstone of Beijing’s global outlook. The massive project involves nearly 150 countries and aims to connect Asia with Europe and Africa via land and maritime networks. Due to its location on the Mediterranean Sea, Israel’s strategic importance to China which, for years, has been keen on gaining access to Israeli ports, has thus doubled. Predictably, such ambitions have been of great concern to Washington, whose naval vessels often dock in the port city of Haifa.

Washington has repeatedly cautioned Tel Aviv against its growing close relationship with Beijing. The then US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo went as far as warning Israel in March 2019 that, until Tel Aviv re-evaluates its cooperation with China, America could reduce “intelligence sharing and co-location of security facilities.”

Appreciating fully China’s current and potential global power, Israel has laboured to find a balance that would allow it to maintain its “special relationship” with the US, while financially and strategically benefiting from its closeness to Beijing. Israel’s balancing act has encouraged China to translate its growing economic relationship with the Middle East into a political and diplomatic investment as well.

For example, in 2017, China put into motion a peace plan — formulated initially in 2013 — called the Four-Point Proposal. The plan offered Chinese mediation as a substitute for US bias and, ultimately, the failed “peace process”. The Palestinian leadership welcomed China’s involvement, while Israel refused to engage, causing embarrassment to a government that insists on respect and recognition of its rising importance in every arena.

If balancing acts in geopolitics were possible back then, the Russia-Ukraine war has brought it all to a sudden end. The new geopolitical reality can be expressed in the words of former Italian diplomat Stefano Stefanini. The former ambassador to NATO wrote in an article in La Stampa that the “international balancing act is over” and “there are no safety nets.” Ironically, Stefanini made this point in reference to Italy’s need to choose between the West and China. The same logic can also be applied to Israel and China.

Soon after China succeeded in brokering a landmark deal between Saudi Arabia and Iran on 6 April, it again floated the idea of mediating between Palestine and Israel. China’s new Foreign Minister, Qin Gang, reportedly consulted with both sides on “steps to resume peace talks”. Yet again, the Palestinians accepted while Israel ignored the subject.

This partly explains China’s frustration with Israel, and also with the US. As China’s former ambassador to Washington (2021-23), Qin must be familiar with the inherent US bias towards Israel. This was expressed succinctly by Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hua Chunying during the latest Israeli war on Gaza: “The United States should realise that the lives of Palestinian Muslims are equally precious,” he said on 14 May.

A simple analysis of China’s language regarding the situation in Palestine clarifies that Beijing sees a direct link between the US and the continued conflict; or at the very least the failure to find a just solution. This assertion can also be gleaned from Ambassador Geng’s most recent Security Council remarks, where he criticised “piecemeal crisis management”, a direct reference to US diplomacy in the Middle East, while offering a Chinese alternative based on a “comprehensive and just solution”.

Equally important is that the Chinese position seems to be linked intrinsically to that of Arab countries. The more that Palestine takes centre stage in Arab political discourse, the greater emphasis the issue receives in China’s foreign policy agenda.

In the recent Arab Summit held in Jeddah, Arab governments agreed to prioritise Palestine as the central Arab cause. Allies with great and growing economic interests in the region, such as China, took notice immediately.

All of this must not suggest that China will be severing its ties with Israel. However, it certainly indicates that Beijing remains committed to its principled stance on Palestine, as it has been over the decades.

The relationship between China and Israel will soon face the litmus test of US pressure and ultimatums. Considering Washington’s unparalleled importance to Israel on the one hand, and the Arab-Muslim world’s significance to China on the other, the future is easy to foresee. Nevertheless, judging by China’s political discourse on Palestine — situated solidly within international and humanitarian law — it seems that Beijing has already decided what to do.

June 7, 2023 Posted by | Economics | , , , , | Leave a comment

‘Give War a Chance’ – A ‘War That Even Pacifists Can Get Behind’

By Alastair Crooke | Strategic Culture Foundation | June 5, 2023

More than a year into Russia’s Special Operation, the initial burst of European excitement at western push-back on Russia has dissipated. The mood instead has turned to “existential dread, a nagging suspicion that [western] civilisation may destroy itself”, Professor Helen Thompson writes.

For an instant, a euphoria had coalesced around the putative projection of the EU as a world power; as a key actor, about to compete on a world scale. Initially, events seemed to play to Europe’s conviction of its market powers: Europe was going to bring down a major power – Russia – by financial coup d’état alone. The EU felt ‘six feet tall’.

It seemed at the time a galvanising moment: “The war re-forged a long-dormant Manichaean framing of existential conflict between Russia and the West, assuming ontological, apocalyptic dimensions. In the spiritual fires of the war, the myth of the ‘West’ was rebaptised”, Arta Moeini suggests.

After the initial disappointment at the lack of a ‘quick kill’, the hope persisted – that if only the sanctions were given more time, and made more all-embracing, then Russia surely would ultimately collapse. That hope has turned to dust. And the reality of what Europe has done to itself has begun to dawn – hence Professor Thomson’s dire warning:

“Those who assume that the political world can be reconstructed by the efforts of human Will, have never before had to bet so heavily on technology over [fossil] energy – as the driver of our material advancement”.

For the Euro-Atlanticists however, what Ukraine seemed to offer – finally – was validation for their yearning to centralise power in the EU, sufficiently, to merit a place at the ‘top table’ with the U.S., as partners in playing the Great Game.

Ukraine, for better or worse, underlined Europe’s profound military dependence on Washington – and on NATO.

More particularly, the Ukraine conflict seemed to open the prospect for consolidating the strange metamorphosis of NATO from military alliance to an enlightened, Progressive, peace alliance! As Timothy Garton Ash effused in the Guardian in 2002, “NATO has become a European peace movement” where one could watch “John Lennon meet George Bush”.

The Ukraine war is portrayed, in this vein, as the “war­ that even former pacifists can get behind. All its proponents seemed to be singing is “Give War a Chance””.

Lily Lynch, a Belgrade-based writer, argues that,

“… especially in the past 12 months, telegenic female leaders such as the Finnish Prime Minister, Sanna Marin, German Foreign Minister, Annalena Baerbock, and Estonian Prime Minister, Kaja Kallas, have increasingly served as the spokespersons of enlightened militarism in Europe … ”

“No political party in Europe better exemplifies the shift from militant pacifism to ardent pro-war Atlanticism than the German Greens. Most of the original Greens had been radicals during the student protests of 1968 … But as the founding members entered middle age, fissures began to appear in the party – that would one day tear it apart”.

“Kosovo then changed everything: The 78-day NATO bombing of what remained of Yugoslavia in 1999, ostensibly to halt war crimes committed by Serbian security forces in Kosovo, would forever transform the German Greens. NATO for the Greens became an active military compact concerned with spreading and defending values such as human rights, democracy, peace, and freedom – well beyond the borders of its member states”.

A few years later, in 2002, an EU functionary (Robert Cooper) could envisage Europe as a new ‘liberal imperialism’. The ‘new’ was that Europe eschewed hard military power, in favour of weaponising both a controlled ‘narrative’ and controlled participation in its market. He advocated for ‘a new age of empire’, in which Western powers no longer would have to follow international law in their dealings with ‘old fashioned’ states; they could use military force independently of the United Nations; and could impose protectorates to replace regimes which ‘misgovern’.

The German Greens’ Foreign Minister, Annalena Baerbock, has continued with this metamorphosis, scolding countries with traditions of military neutrality, and imploring them to join NATO. She has invoked Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s line: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor”. And the European Left has been utterly captivated. Major parties have abandoned military neutrality and opposition to war – and now champion NATO. It is a stunning reversal.

All this may have been music to the ears of the Euro-élites anxious for the EU to rise to Great Power status, but this soft-power European Leviathan was wholly underpinned by the unstated (but essential) assumption that NATO ‘had Europe’s back’. This naturally implied that the EU had to tie itself ever closer to NATO – and therefore to the U.S. which controls NATO.

But the flip-side to this Atlanticist aspiration – as President Emmanuel Macron noted – is its inexorable logic that Europeans simply end by becoming American vassals. Macron was trying rather, to rally Europe towards the coming ‘age of empires’, hoping to position Europe as a ‘third pole’ in a concert of empires.

The Atlanticists were duly enraged by Macron’s remarks (which nonetheless drew support of other EU states). It could even seem (to furious Atlanticists) that Macron actually was channelling General de Gaulle who had called NATO a “false pretence” designed to “disguise America’s chokehold over Europe”.

There are however, two related schisms that flowed out from this ‘re-imagined’ NATO: Firstly, it exposed the reality of internal European rivalries and divergent interests, precisely because the NATO lead in the Ukraine conflict sets the interests of the Central East European hawks wanting ‘more America, and more war on Russia’ up and against that of the original EU western axis which wants wanting strategic autonomy (i.e. less ‘America’, and a quick end to the conflict).

Secondly, it would be predominantly the western economies that would have to bankroll the costs and divert their manufacturing capacity towards military logistic chains. The economic price, non-military de-industrialisation and high inflation, potentially, could be enough to break Europe – economically.

The prospect of a pan-European cohesive identity might be both ontologically appealing – and be seen to be an ‘appropriate accessory’ to an aspiring ‘world actor’ – yet such identity becomes caricature when mosaic Europe is transformed into an abstract de-territorialised identity that reduces people to their most abstract.

Paradoxically, the Ukraine war – far from consolidating the EU ‘identity’, as first imagined – has fractured it under the stresses of the concerted effort to weaken and collapse Russia.

Secondly, as Arta Moeini, the director of the Institute for Peace and Diplomacy, has observed:

“The American push for NATO expansion since 1991 has enlarged the alliance by adding a host of faultline states from Central and Eastern Europe. The strategy, which began with the Clinton administration but was fully championed by the George W. Bush administration, was to create a decidedly pro-American pillar on the continent, centred on Warsaw – which would force an eastward shift in the alliance’s centre of gravity away from the traditional Franco-German axis”.

“By using NATO enlargement to weaken the old power centres in Europe that might have occasionally stood up to [Washington] such as in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, Washington ensured a more compliant Europe in the short-term. The upshot, however, was the formation of a 31-member behemoth with deep asymmetries of power and low compatibility of interests” – that is much weaker and more vulnerable – than it believes itself to be”.

Here is the key: “the EU is much weaker than it believes itself to be”. The outset of the conflict was defined by a cast of mind entranced by the notion of Europe as a ‘mover and shaker’ in world affairs, and mesmerised by Europe’s post-war prosperity.

EU leaders convinced themselves that this prosperity had bequeathed it the clout and the economic depth to contemplate war – and to weather its reversals – with panglossian sanguinity. It has produced rather, the converse: It has put its project in jeopardy.

In John Raply and Peter Heather’s The Imperial Life Cycle, the authors explain the cycle:

“Empires grow rich and powerful and attain supremacy through the economic exploitation of their colonial periphery. But in the process, they inadvertently spur the economic development of that same periphery, until it can roll back and ultimately displace its overlord”.

Europe’s prosperity in this post-war era, thus was not so much one of its own making, but drew benefit from the tail-end of accumulations hewn from an earlier cycle – now reversed.

“The fastest-growing economies in the world are now all in the old periphery; the worst-performing economies are disproportionately in the West. These are the economic trends that have created our present landscape of superpower conflict — most saliently between America and China”.

America may think of itself as exempt from the European colonial mould, yet fundamentally, its model is

“an updated cultural-political glue that we might call “neoliberalism, NATO and denim”, which follows in the timeless imperial mould: The great wave of decolonisation that followed WW2 was meant to end that. But the Bretton Woods system, which created a trading regime that favoured industrial over primary producers and enshrined the dollar as the global reserve currency – ensured that the net flow of financial resources continued to move from developing countries to developed ones. Even when the economies of the newly-independent states grew, those of the G7 economies and their partners grew more”.

A once-mighty empire is now challenged and feels embattled. Taken aback by the refusal of so many developing countries to join with isolating Russia, the West is now waking up to the reality of the emerging, polycentric and fluid global order. These trends are set to continue. The danger is that economically weakened and in crisis, western countries attempt to re-appropriate western triumphalism, yet lack the economic strength and depth, so to do:

“In the Roman Empire, peripheral states developed the political and military capacity to end Roman domination by force… The Roman Empire might have survived – had it not weakened itself with wars of choice – on its ascendant Persian rival”.

The final ‘transgressive’ thought goes to Tom Luongo: “Allowing the West to keep thinking they can win – is the ultimate form of grinding out a superior opponent”.

June 5, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

Birthgap – Childless World Part 1

Birthgap | 2021

As an alternative Part 1 can be watched on our Birthgap.org site for free without any risk of ads appearing here: https://www.birthgap.org/share/ZmFIdj…

** Featured at the Chelsea Film Festival, 2021 **

The era of ultra-low birthrates has begun. But why are people having so few children these days? And what are the consequences ? Come on a journey of discovery across 24 countries to find the reason and also the future consequences for young and old alike.

This is Part 1 of Birthgap – Childless World.

(c) Birthgap.org

June 3, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Timeless or most popular, Video | Leave a comment

Saudi Arabia set to join BRICS’ New Development Bank

By Ahmed Adel | May 31, 2023

The strengthening of ties between the BRICS bank and Saudi Arabia, the world’s second-largest oil producer, is undesirable for the West as it again signals another advancement in the de-dollarisation of the global economy. In the last week of May, Saudi Arabia held talks to join BRICS’ New Development Bank as its ninth member, a decision that is not only economic but also with political motive.

Saudi Arabia’s benefit from joining the NDB is clear, given the potential for increased trade, especially Saudi exports. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is one of the world’s largest oil suppliers, and BRICS countries produce many different goods. Therefore, such cooperation can be considered mutually beneficial. Saudi membership in the NDB will expand the internal market of the BRICS countries, which means opening new opportunities for economic development in these countries.

As Bloomberg reported on May 30: “The New Development Bank, the lender created by the BRICS group of nations, will widen its membership as it seeks to boost its capital and counter the influence of Western-dominated multilateral banks.”

Saudi Arabia is the biggest economy in the region, and its neighbour, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), is already a member of the NDB. At the same time, Saudi Arabia has also expressed interest in joining BRICS. The BRICS summit in South Africa in August will discuss expanding the grouping, which could open the path for the Arab country to join.

“In the Middle East, we attach great importance to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and are currently engaged in a qualified dialogue with them,” the NDB told the Financial Times in a statement.

Talks with Saudi Arabia come as the NDB prepares to formally evaluate its funding options, which were questioned after the West imposed sanctions on Russia following the launch of its special military operation in Ukraine.

Membership will likely be granted as it would strengthen Saudi Arabia’s bonds with BRICS countries, especially when the country is pursuing closer relations with all powers, particularly China. Chinese President Xi Jinping hailed a “new era” in the countries’ ties when he visited Saudi Arabia in 2022. Most importantly, Beijing in March brokered a historic agreement between Saudi Arabia and Iran to resume diplomatic relations, something which irked Washington.

The NDB has lent $33 billion to more than 96 projects in the five founding members — Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa — but the bank has expanded its membership to include the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Bangladesh. Although Egypt and Bangladesh represent major emerging markets and economies, Saudi Arabia, like the UAE, would represent another rich shareholder in the NDB.

“[Fundraising options are] the most important thing at the moment,” said Ashwani Muthoo, director-general of the NDB’s independent evaluation office, which was established last year.

Muthoo declined to comment on the Saudi accession talks but said the board wanted to examine alternative instruments and currencies to bring in resources, something that Saudi Arabia can offer.

It is recalled that Mikhail Mishustin said on a visit to China in May that Moscow saw “one of the bank’s main goals” as defending the bloc from “illegitimate sanctions from the collective West”. This fact interests Saudi Arabia as it breaks from servitude to the US to become a sovereign Middle/Regional power instead.

It is recalled that China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin said in October 2022 that BRICS leaders agreed on expanding the bloc and expressed support for the discussion on the standards and procedures of expansion. Wang also noted that China would work with other BRICS members to jointly advance the expansion process so that more partners will join the BRICS family.

By being first accepted into the NDB, Saudi Arabia’s path to joining BRICS would be opened. As said, Saudi Arabia will likely join the NDB as the banks have a strong will to expand their membership, which will signal the Arab country’s eventual accession into the bloc.

Dilma Rousseff, the bank’s president, said at the NDB’s annual meeting in Shanghai on May 30, “The world is going through a transformation process and it’s not about one currency against any another one. NDB will continue seeking funds in the dollar market but also in the Asian market.”

The fact that the NDB is comprised of the most powerful and richest countries outside of the Western bloc has Washington concerned as it poses the greatest challenge to dollar hegemony. With the current level of the NDB project funding in local currencies at 22%, the bank is well on course to meet its goal of 30% by 2026. This percentage will only continue to grow as the years pass, and the addition of Saudi Arabia will contribute to this effort. Thus, the Middle Eastern country will actively participate in de-dollarisation.

Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.

May 31, 2023 Posted by | Economics | , | Leave a comment

Sandu targets media freedom in Moldova with new censorship institution

By Ahmed Adel | May 30, 2023

President Maia Sandu announced during a press briefing that a new tax-payer-funded institution intended to supervise and limit press freedom in Moldova would be established. Amid the economic meltdown in the country, Sandu is trying to control the media narrative while also attacking Russia.

“The best antidote against the information war is the development of citizens’ resistance to the real facts. Today I am announcing the legislative initiative to create an institution to combat propaganda and defend citizens from manipulation. I will propose to the Parliament the creation of the National Center for Information Defense and Combating Propaganda, called Patriot. The institution will have two basic responsibilities: to transmit truthful information to citizens and to identify, evaluate and combat disinformation,” Sandu said on May 29.

According to the president, the legislation initiative will be sent to the Parliament by the end of June.

“I know that this announcement will stir the hornet’s nest working against the Republic of Moldova. They will invoke the right to freedom of expression. But this right cannot be a screen for lying and intoxication. I have confidence in the Republic of Moldova, I am sure that we have a chance to build a European state, I want the citizens to have confidence in the Republic of Moldova,” Sandu added.

Her ambition to limit Russian-friendly media to impose a Western narrative monopoly in a dictatorial manner comes as the EU steps up its support for Moldova. 46 EU and European leaders will be in Chisinau on June 1 to offer financial and political solidarity with Moldova and show strength against Russia.

French President Emmanuel Macron initially envisaged the European Political Community (EPC) as a platform for unity across the wider European front. The EPC will meet for the second time in Chisinau, only eight months after its inaugural meeting. The meeting brings together the leaders of the 27 EU member states and Ukraine, Turkey, the UK, and other countries in the Balkans, but not Russia or Belarus.

Security and energy supplies, which have been part-funded by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), are expected to be at the top of the agenda. The EBRD invested €525 million in Moldova in 2022, accounting for 4% of its GDP. The investment comes as Moldova struggles with high inflation and the economic repercussions of the war in neighbouring Ukraine, in addition to problems in Transnistria, a breakaway region and post-Soviet conflict zone with a majority Slavic (Russian-Ukrainian) population.

To assist Sandu’s ambition to sever Russian-Moldovan ties, the EU will provide financial muscle with the help of the EBRD and an €87 million EU contribution to so-called non-military logistical aid. This aid will include a mission in Chisinau, which will staff up to 50 officials. Opening on May 30, the office aims to build Moldova’s resilience against disinformation and cyber-attacks, with support at strategic and technical levels.

Sandu is expected to use the EPC summit to push for quicker EU access, which she claims is the only guarantee against becoming Russia’s next target, even though no such ambitions exist.

“We do believe that Russia will continue to be a big source of instability for the years to come and we need to protect ourselves,” said Sandu, on the sidelines of a Council of Europe summit in Iceland earlier in May. “We do believe that this [EU membership] is a realistic project for us and we are looking forward to see this happening as soon as possible.”

Although accession could take years to achieve, Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia won official candidate status to join the EU. For this reason, Sandu is taking advantage of heightened Russophobia in the West to project it in Moldova, which has a high level of Russophilia. However, this path of serving Western interests to oppose Russia is significantly affecting the economy.

In May, Moldovan Prime Minister Dorin Recean said that before the Ukraine war, his country was 100% dependent on Russia for its gas, but “Today Moldova can exist with absolutely no natural gas or electricity from Russia.”

Moldova is currently struggling to deal with the spillover effects of the war in Ukraine, which has significantly impacted households, the economy, and public finances. The war also oversees a considerable drop in Moldova’s GDP due to the disruptions in trade, remittances, and the energy crisis. Therefore, ordinary Moldovans suffer despite Recean’s boasting of cutting Russian gas.

As Valeriu Ostalep, former diplomat and ex-Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration for Moldova, said: “Sandu and her Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) are involved completely in the Western geopolitics of the region; they just copy and paste the West’s rhetoric. It would not be a problem (to take) a position like that, but Sandu and PAS have lost the connection to the real problems of Moldova and the population. They are concentrated exclusively on the ‘fight against Russia’.”

“So we have total support by the West for Sandu and PAS and a complete disaster in the realities on the ground in Moldova, including the growing disdain of the population against Sandu and PAS,” he added.

By establishing Patriot, Sandu attempts to control the media narrative and criticism against her government by inadvertently targeting Russophile media. In fact, for Sandu’s supposed defence of liberalism and universalism, it is proven beyond doubt that these are not values that she defends but only buzzwords used to secure funding and support from the West.

Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.

May 30, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics, Full Spectrum Dominance, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

American Officials Erase US Role in Empowering Their New Number One Enemy China

By Conor Gallagher – naked capitalism – May 28, 2023 

As Washington increasingly inflates the China threat, a few pieces of sly propaganda to sell that conflict are coming more into focus. Recent speeches devoted to China by key figures in the Biden administration largely rested on falsehoods that conveniently erase decades of mistakes by the American elite and therefore shift all the blame onto China.

Both Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and national security advisor Jake Sullivan recently engaged in this rewriting of history that claims the Chinese stole American jobs and similarly that Beijing nefariously took control of the “clean” energy industry and will now use its position to coerce other nations, potentially slowing climate action.

One can see why it’s an attractive talking point for DC officials as it helps sell the conflict to working class Americans and environmentalists, but it’s simply not true.

The blame for American industry (green or not) relocating to China was caused by the greed of American elites who reaped massive profits in the process. Now they claim taking on China will bring back jobs and help tackle climate change. Nevermind that much of the American industry now being relocated out of China is going to other “low-cost” countries or that the US war machine is the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter.

How are Yellen and Sullivan portraying the US as an innocent bystander that never could have foreseen the loss of US manufacturing to China?

Here’s Yellen speaking on April 20 at the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies:

Over the past few decades, China has experienced an impressive economic rise. Between 1980 and 2010, China’s economy grew by an average of 10 percent per year. This led to a truly remarkable feat: the rise of hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. China’s rapid catch-up growth was fueled by its opening-up to global trade and pursuit of market reforms. … China has long used government support to help its firms gain market share at the expense of foreign competitors.

…The actions of China’s government have had dramatic implications for the location of global manufacturing activity. And they have harmed workers and firms in the U.S. and around the world…. China’s unfair economic practices have resulted in the over-concentration of the production of critical goods inside China.

And here’s Sullivan in his big speech about the new US international economic policy  speaking at the Brookings Institution last month:

The so-called “China shock” that hit pockets of our domestic manufacturing industry especially hard—with large and long-lasting impacts—wasn’t adequately anticipated and wasn’t adequately addressed as it unfolded.

First off, to the point of government support. China no doubt provides subsidies for firms largely in fields deemed strategic. The US also does so (see: Inflation Reduction Act, oil, agriculture, auto, etc.).

No doubt that China has bent and broken WTO rules, but that was working just fine for US officials until it wasn’t. Now that officials like Sullivan have woken up to the fact that offshoring everything to China was a disastrous long-term security plan, they say it’s Beijing’s fault for the “China shock.” But contrary to Sullivan’s claim such an outcome couldn’t have been foreseen, it was “adequately anticipated.” Here’s a piece from the New York Times back in 2000 titled “Unions March Against China Trade Deal”:

Thousands of steelworkers, truck drivers, auto workers and other union members rallied on Capitol Hill and swept through the halls of Congress today in a show of muscle intended to block a trade agreement with China.

Their message, conveyed by union leaders and rank-and-file members who came from as far away as Michigan and Nebraska, was that trade was working for American corporations but not for American workers.

… [the union members] said, they are only opposing a deal with a country that does not respect workers’ rights and would stop at nothing, in their view, to steal the jobs that are the backbone of the American middle class.

It was obvious at the time what was happening; the real story is well-known, but just to recap: it was American elites’ greed that caused the American working class to lose 3.7 million decent paying jobs from 2001-2018.

Matt Stoller and Lukas Kunce tell the story from a national security perspective in a 2019 piece at The American Conservative. Using old US telecom equipment company Lucent Technologies as a starting point. In 1996, AT&T spun off Bell Labs into Lucent, which began to buy up companies in an effort to keep its stock price high. Lucent also lended money to risky startups who would then buy Lucent equipment. Then came the dot-com bust, and the company, already dealing with accounting scandals, began massive layoffs. But that wasn’t the end of the story. Stoller and Kunce write:

In the early 2000s, the telecom equipment market began to recover from the recession. Lucent’s new strategy, as Mottl put it, was to seek “margin” by offshoring production to China, continuing layoffs of American workers and hiring abroad. At first, it was the simpler parts of the telecom equipment, the boxes and assembly, but soon contract manufacturers in China were making virtually all of it. American telecom capacity would never return.

Lucent didn’t recover its former position. Chinese entrants, subsidized heavily by the Chinese state and using Western technology, underpriced Western companies. American policymakers, unconcerned with industrial capacity, allowed Chinese companies to capture market share despite the predatory subsidies and stolen technology. In 2006, French telecom equipment maker Alcatel bought Lucent, signifying the end of American control of Bell Labs. Today, Huawei, with state backing, dominates the market.

The erosion of much of the American industrial and defense industrial base proceeded like Lucent. First, in the 1980s and 1990s, Wall Street financiers focused on short-term profits, market power, and executive pay-outs over core competencies like research and production, often rolling an industry up into a monopoly producer. Then, in the 2000s, they offshored production to the lowest cost producer. This finance-centric approach opened the door to the Chinese government’s ability to strategically pick off industrial capacity by subsidizing its producers. Hand over cash to Wall Street, and China could get the American crown jewels.

Can you blame Beijing? If the US wants to sell off their industry, wouldn’t it be crazy not to take it? The fact is the Chinese used the system Washington built against them, and now the likes of Sullivan and Yellen cry foul.

Long Yongtu, China’s chief negotiator for WTO accession has defended Beijing’s role in the country’s economy, saying “when we promised to adopt a market economy, we made it absolutely clear that it would be a socialist market economy.”

The loss of US manufacturing decimated the country’s research capacity. It means the US relies on components made in China for aircraft carriers and submarines. It means a trillion dollars in defense spending helps enrich China – the very country which is supposedly behind the increased defense spending in the first place.

Of course, Yellen and Sullivan admit no mistakes by the US ruling class. It was impossible to know this would happen, they say, despite warnings at the time that this very situation would arise.

Not surprisingly, when Politico did a 20-year-anniversary story on China’s accession to the WTO, most US lawmakers didn’t want to talk about their vote to normalize trade relations with China in 2000 (which paved the way to the WTO).

But four American “experts” who did the planning and negotiating of the normalization of trade ties with China have zero regrets. That’s hardly surprising as it seems the number one qualification to become an expert is the ability to never admit being wrong. It also probably didn’t hurt that all these experts were rewarded with better positions and often cashed in afterwards.

***

Yellen and Sullivan also play up how confronting China is part of their newfound focus on minerals critical for a green economy, but what they’re really doing is disguising another lack of foresight by American elites. Sullivan says critical minerals are “the backbone of the clean-energy future” and that “clean-energy supply chains are at risk of being weaponized in the same way as oil in the 1970s, or natural gas in Europe in 2022.”

Many of these minerals are controlled by China and are also critical for the US defense industry. Who could have foreseen? Here’s another tidbit from that 2000 New York Times article:

In an effort to counter the unions’ message, the administration released a Commerce Department study showing that every state would benefit from increased trade with China. And Gen. Colin L. Powell, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, endorsed the agreement, saying that among its other benefits it would be in the nation’s security interests.

How has that worked out? Well, it’s now unclear. As Army Technology points out:

The US Department of the Interior released a list of 35 minerals it deems essential to the economic and national security in 2018 (updated in 2022), amongst them many REEs. The problem for the US is that the local production of these materials is hugely limited.

The extent of reliance on imports varies from mineral to mineral. Beryllium is mainly used to create lightweight material used in fighter jets, lithium is essential for modern battery production and tin is used in electronics, including soldier semiconductors, a sector that is projected to reach a value of $17.5bn by 2030.

Whereas the US produces some of the minerals mentioned above, it entirely relies on China and other countries for many other supplies. Cerium is used in batteries and in most devices with a screen and magnets forged from neodymium and samarium are impervious to extreme temperatures that are used in fighter jet fin actuators, missile guidance, control systems, aircraft and tank motors, satellite communications and radar and sonar systems.

Here again, it was the US that moved rare earth and other mineral processing to China, that sold off mining operations to Chinese companies, and reaped the rewards for doing so. As Stoller and Kunce describe:

In the 1970s and 1980s, the Defense Department invested in the development of a technology to use what are known as rare-earth magnets. The investment was so successful that General Motors engineers, using Pentagon grants, succeeded in creating a rare earth magnet that is now essential for nearly every high-tech piece of military equipment in the U.S. inventory, from smart bombs and fighter jets to lasers and communications devices. The benefit of DARPA’s investment wasn’t restricted to the military. The magnets make cell phones and modern commercial electronics possible.

China recognized the value of these magnets early on. Chinese Premier Deng Xiaoping famously said in 1992 that “The Middle East has oil, China has rare earth,” to underscore the importance of a rare earth strategy he adopted for China. Part of that strategy was to take control of the industry by manipulating the motivations of Wall Street.

Two of Xiaoping’s sons-in-law approached investment banker Archibald Cox, Jr. in the mid-1990s to use his hedge fund as a front for their companies to buy the U.S. rare-earth magnet enterprise. They were successful, purchasing and then moving the factory, the Indiana jobs, the patents, and the expertise to China. This was not the only big move, as Cox later moved into a $12 million luxury New York residence. The result is remarkably similar to Huawei: the United States has entirely divested of a technology and market it created and dominated just 30 years ago. China has a near-complete monopoly on rare earth elements, and the U.S. military, according to U.S. government studies, is now 100 percent reliant upon China for the resources to produce its advanced weapon systems.

And now as the US presses the situation in Taiwan and enacts chip controls (and pressures other countries to do the same), how is China considering retaliating? From Nikkei Asia:

China is considering prohibiting exports of certain rare-earth magnet technology in a move that would counter the U.S.’s advantage in the high-tech arena.

Japan specializes in making high-performance magnets from rare earths while the U.S. produces products that use the magnets… Washington has since moved to forge a rare-earth supply chain on U.S. soil. China’s share of all rare earths produced globally dropped to roughly 70% last year from about 90% a decade earlier, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

At the same time, China still holds a tight grip on processing rare earths. Most rare earths extracted in the U.S. go to China for refining before being shipped back to the U.S.

The CHIPS Act and the Inflation Reduction Act have added roughly 77,000 jobs so far, according to Jack Conness who does a neat job tracking the investments. That’s still a far cry from the 3.7 million jobs sent to China from 2001 to 2018, and it doesn’t look like many more will be returning despite the push to move production out of China as ties deteriorate. There’s the problem of automation, which FiveThirtyEight noted back in 2016:

 Because of rising wages in China, the need for shorter supply chains and other factors, a small but growing group of companies are shifting production back to the U.S. But the factories they build here are heavily automated, employing a small fraction of the workers they would have a generation ago.

And there’s always the pesky issue of American workers asking for decent wages. Both Yellen and Sullivan waxed on about “friendshoring” – relocating from China to friendly countries, which also happen to be low-wage. This is evidence of more short term thinking and prioritizing profits. Recall that China was initially thought of as friendly, and the selling point was that gifting it American industry would only make it friendlier.

Companies from China are already out in front of the friendshoring trend and are increasingly setting up shop in Mexico in order to be closer to their biggest market in the US.

Sullivan and Yellen don’t touch on that or just how difficult this reorganizing of supply chains will be. A 2020 Bank of America study found that it would cost American and European  firms $1 trillion over five years to shift all the export-related manufacturing that is not intended for Chinese consumption out of China.

Additionally, China remains the main player in East Asian production networks, which makes manufacturing electronics products, for example, without Chinese parts and components increasingly unrealistic. Meanwhile, the US is still the largest source of inward foreign direct investment flows into ASEAN. From The Diplomat :

These different roles played by the U.S. and China in the East Asian economic system are a result of the distinct fundamentals of their domestic economies. China has pursued a production – and investment – based growth model in the past few decades, while the United States is a post-industrial, heavily financialized economy, sustained by high consumption and its central position in the global financial order. These fundamentals will prove to be harder to shape than unilaterally altering trade policies.

On the one hand, this means that attempts at isolating China are limited by the economic realities. “Friend-shoring,” “nearshoring,” and newfound industrial policies in the United States (and Europe) could very well lead to the diversification of U.S. imports, lessen the perceived national security risks associated with import dependence, and provide economic benefits to ASEAN countries by shifting some manufacturing activity from China to Southeast Asia. However, these policies are unlikely to fundamentally challenge China’s central position in regional trade and production networks in the mid-term. As Apple’s struggles in diversifying the production of the iPhone show, China-centered production networks are not easy to replicate in other countries, as Chinese logistics and suppliers possess significant advantages.

With that in mind, it’s likely this ends up as another situation similar to the purchasing of Russian oil via India:

May 29, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Economics, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Government report claims pandemic as a precedent for ‘environmental’ policy

Lockdowns show behavioural restrictions are possible with the right messaging, a political disease we have yet to learn the extent of

eugyppius: a plague chronicle | May 22, 2023

The Advisory Council on the Environment is a body of experts convened by the Federal Republic of Germany to advise the state on matters of environmental policy. I’m grateful to @tomdabassman on Twitter for drawing attention to their recent and deeply creepy 200-page report on “The obligation of policymakers: Facilitating environmentally friendly behaviour.” It abounds in remarkable and revealing statements, and I’ve spent a good part of the day studying it for a longer post that I hope to write in the coming weeks.

For now, I want to draw your attention to the introduction, which is bad enough. Its authors depart from the premise that the state currently lacks “policy measures … targeting environmentally relevant behaviour,” and join others in affirming that it is the job of the state to nudge individual decisions in the right direction. Tellingly, both the pandemic and the sanctions-induced European energy crisis play a very large role in their thinking:

Although the key environmental crises, such as loss of biodiversity and climate change, are less directly visible and tangible than the energy crisis and the pandemic, environmental policymakers can learn from the sometimes painful but also important experiences of recent years: Behavioural changes in the population can be a part of the solution to crises such as these, and it is possible to adopt and implement policies aimed at changing behaviours.

For example, Germany introduced a series of measures in mid-2022 to alleviate the energy crisis … These measures targeted the behaviour of citizens. In addition to general calls to save energy, building owners were obliged to optimise their heating systems, employees had to accept lower room temperatures at work and it was forbidden to heat private swimming pools …. Earlier, Germany imposed far-reaching pandemic measures to contain the spread of Corona. For example, since 2020, the stated adopted and imposed various lockdowns and social contact limitations. Both highlight the contribution of behavioural changes, whether in energy consumption or social behaviour, to the project of combating a collective problem …

The aforementioned measures doubtless demanded a lot from people and in the specifics of the necessary extent of the restrictions, they proved controversial, as also in their unequal impact on different social groups. Nevertheless, the two crises show that political measures to carefully restrict the behaviour of citizens are possible if the threat is correspondingly great and the importance of the protected good – in these examples, health and energy – is recognised. The state has succeeded (even if not in every individual case) in devising measures such that they achieve their goal while maintaining proportionality. It is also clearly possible for these policies to be designed and communicated in such a way that the majority support them.

Emphasis mine. All of this speaks for itself, and I don’t have much to add, except to observe that the only way for restrictions to be “communicated” such that “the majority support them,” is by renewed forays into state media-fuelled mass panic and hysteria. Corona has taught our rulers that a great deal more is possible than they ever imagined, and they will spend the coming years exploring the limits.

May 28, 2023 Posted by | Deception, Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | , | Leave a comment

Phasing out petrol and diesel cars is just pie in the sky

By Roger J Arthur | TCW Defending Freedom | May 25, 2023

How many people, I wonder, have thought about the sheer quantity of raw material required to deliver Net Zero by the end of this century, let alone by 2050? How many are aware that Tesla alone may consume most of the associated raw materials in the world to make a few million electric vehicles (EVs)? Tesla are making around a million a year but more than 1,500million internal combustion engine (ICE) cars will need to be replaced in the great renewables utopia. Will there will be enough minerals and other raw materials to go round to allow ICE cars to be phased out by 2035 and for Net Nero to be delivered by 2050?

The key materials range from copper to rarer metals such as lithium, the refinement of which involves the release of CO2.

One specialist study reports that by 2050 Europe’s plans for producing clean energy technologies will require annually 4.5million tonnes of aluminium (an increase of 33 per cent on today’s use), 1.5million tonnes of copper (35 per cent), 800,000 tonnes of lithium (3,500 per cent), 400,000 tonnes of nickel (100 per cent), 300,000 tonnes of zinc (10 to 15 per cent), 200,000 tonnes of silicon (45 per cent), 60,000 tonnes of cobalt (330 per cent) and 3,000 tonnes of the rare earths metals neodymium, dysprosium and praseodymium (700-2,600 per cent). And currently the primary sources are in Russia and China.

Global copper production alone (unsurprisingly given the huge government subsidies behind renewable technology) has risen from around 16million tonnes in 2010 to more than 22million tonnes in 2022. Renewable energy plant requires on average eight to 12 times more copper than fossil-based power generation, and EVs three to four times more copper than ICE vehicles.

Perhaps the most challenging demand is for lithium, used to make batteries, including those in electric vehicles (EVs) which each take 63kg. So around 95million tonnes of lithium will be needed to make batteries for 1,500 million EVs globally. But only 130,000 tonnes came from mines in 2022, at which rate it would take more than 700 years to make enough batteries. If those EV batteries have to be replaced on average every ten years (assuming no increase in the number of EVs) the continuing demand will average around 9.5million tonnes pa, which is around 70 times the current rate of mining.

On that basis alone, the plan to replace ICE cars by 2035, 12 years hence, is pie in the sky.

The possible use of sodium-ion batteries is being explored but it is inconceivable that development will be complete or that sodium mines will be producing at the capacity needed by 2035.

Another alternative would be the use of hydrogen engines, which Toyota and others are pursuing, assuming that there will be enough H2 available. But the government plans to bring only 10,000MW of H2 production onstream during the 2030s, when the grid system alone will need several times that to keep the lights on when there is little sun or wind. A doubled maximum demand capacity will also be needed to carry the load of 300,000 new EV chargers in service stations on the strategic road network, plus 10million heat pumps.

If there are 30 petrol pumps per service station and it takes around ten times longer to charge an EV battery than to fill an ICE car, then 300 chargers (probably at 100kW each) would be needed per station. That would require a local grid substation capacity of 30MW, enough to supply a town of 30,000.

So the UK’s 2035 target for phasing out ICE cars looks unachievable because we will have neither the materials, the money nor the skilled resources needed to deliver Net Zero this century. Legislating to phase out ICE cars before affordable alternatives were available is not the way to run a country. Destruction of our ICE-making capacity will take us back to a pre-industrial era.

What prize might we miss out on by failing to eliminate the UK’s 0.00048 ppm contribution to current CO2 levels at a cost of over £5trillion, or over £200,000 per household? It would take 3,000 years for the UK to add 1.6ppm (the average annual rise over 60 years) to current CO2 levels. Bear in mind that the greenhouse gas impact of each ppm rise declines rapidly, and that the sun is the main driver of the 97 per cent of natural CO2 emissions.

Without a referendum, we are being subjected to taxation without representation. The government won’t risk giving us a choice and causing them to have to stand up against the UN, IEA and WEF. Sadly, none of the mainstream parties has the backbone to confront these issues.

All are happy, too, to accept the horrific exploitation and abuse of children in Congolese cobalt mines (and no doubt in other countries too), sacrificed to the ‘clean’ energy revolution.

May 28, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

Iraq unveils $17bn infrastructure project linking West Asia to Europe

The Cradle | May 27, 2023

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani on 27 May unveiled a $17 billion infrastructure project to link West Asia and Europe and make Iraq a regional transportation hub.

Once finished, the “Route of Development” project would run the length of the nation, reaching 1,200 kilometers from Turkiye’s northern border to the Persian Gulf in the south.

The project was announced by Sudani during a meeting with transport ministry representatives from Iran, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkiye, and the UAE.

“We see this project as a pillar of a sustainable non-oil economy, a link that serves Iraq’s neighbors and the region, and a contribution to economic integration efforts,” he said.

While more negotiations are needed, the Iraqi parliament’s transport committee stated that any country that desires “will be able to carry out part of the project,” adding that the project may be finished in “three to five years.”

“The Route of Development will boost interdependence between the countries of the region,” Turkiye’s ambassador to Baghdad, Ali Riza Guney, said, without specifying what role his country will play in the initiative.

Sudani has prioritized the repair of the country’s road network as well as the upgrade of its aging energy infrastructure.

On 25 May, Iraq’s Oil Minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani announced that Saudi Aramco is seeking to invest in Iraq’s Crutch gas field and expand its capacity to 400 million cubic feet.

Additionally, in February, the Iraqi government signed an agreement with the UAE firm Crescent Petroleum to develop two gas fields in northeastern Diyala governorate to supply local power plants.

The UAE’s private upstream oil and gas company disclosed that the Gilabat-Qumar and Khashim gas fields are expected to produce seven million cubic meters within an 18-month span.

In recent months, Baghdad has bolstered its efforts to increase its relations with Gulf states. On 19 February, Iraq and Saudi Arabia signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to share sensitive intelligence and deepen security cooperation, marking the first time the two nations have signed a security pact since 1983.

May 28, 2023 Posted by | Economics | , , | Leave a comment

The EU has no leadership, only NGOs and think tanks telling it what to do, says Hungarian minister

MAGYAR HÍRLAP | May 26, 2023

No one has the courage and aptitude to lead Europe today, meaning there is no political leadership in the European Union, especially in the European Commission, said Hungarian Justice Minister Judit Varga at a Budapest conference on Thursday.

“In the European Union today, it is non-governmental organizations (NGOs), foundations and think tanks that tell Europe how to run Europe, according to the will of their own leaders,” she said.

“Recently, for asymmetric reasons, a crisis of confidence has arisen between the EU leadership and the Hungarian government. This is because the Hungarian government, unlike the EU institutions, says what it thinks and does what it says,” she added.

Varga said Europe is stumbling around the stage of history as a clumsy sideshow, drifting from crisis to crisis, and since the migration crisis, it has been trying to make policy in a way that is completely divorced from the real needs of its citizens. She said the institutional system also failed during the Covid crisis and then shot itself in the foot with sanctions against Russia after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

She warned that immigration is a crisis that still affects Europe and continues to cost the Hungarian budget heavily.

“At the same time, by defending Europe, we have to constantly fight the judgments and proceedings of the European Court of Justice,” she said. “Waiting for yet another slap in the face instead of any good deed, that is the fate of Hungary.”

Varga noted that during the coronavirus crisis, the EU made deals regarding vaccines, and yet those text messages have never been produced, referring to the murky case involving EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

“We make no secret of the fact that we want to hold the functioning of the institutions in the European Union accountable in terms of the rule of law. Let’s talk about whether the European Commission, the European Parliament, the European institutions are respecting the rules, whether the rule of law is working in the institutions,” said the minister.

On the issue of the Hungarian EU presidency, the European Parliament has no say in this, the minister said, stressing that more than 10 years ago, a unanimous European Council decision had established the order of the member states, which can only be changed by unanimity. The presidency is not only a right but also an obligation, and the opposition will not achieve anything by such an attempt, but it could do enormous damage.

According to the minister, the European Parliament wants to block Hungary’s EU presidency precisely because it fears that Hungary will take stock of the dysfunctional state of EU institutions.

May 26, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Economics, Militarism, Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

Major oil producer fears ‘apocalyptic’ impact of Russia sanctions

RT | May 26, 2023

The stability of oil supplies from Kazakhstan to the global market relies on transit through Russia, the country’s ambassador to the US, Yerzhan Ashikbayev, has stated. He added that any disruption to flows caused by sanctions could trigger a dire scenario.

“We proceed from the mutual interest of all parties, the interest in the stability of the global market, in the stability of supplies. This is vital both for the functioning of our [Kazakh] economy and for the entire global economy,” the envoy told RIA Novosti on Thursday on the sidelines of the Trans-Caspian Forum in Washington.

When asked whether he sees any risk that sanctions could make it difficult or impossible for Kazakhstan to transit oil, the diplomat described it as “some kind of apocalyptic scenario.”

Kazakhstan supplies oil to the global market via one of the world’s largest pipelines, the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC).

A multinational project, the CPC involves Russia, Kazakhstan and a consortium of leading oil companies. The pipeline system mainly collects crude from the large oil fields of western Kazakhstan, but also from Russia. Its total capacity is over 1 million barrels of oil per day, which is 2.3% of global seaborne crude trade.

The CPC delivers around 1.2 million barrels of crude oil daily from Kazakhstan to Europe, and for subsequent shipment to the US. The pipeline’s operations were interrupted last year by storm damage to equipment at a Black Sea terminal, with the disruption sparking concerns of a global supply crisis.

According to Ashikbayev, the CPC remains an important project for Kazakhstan, accounting for 80% of the country’s crude oil exports.

Kazakhstan has strengthened its oil and gas ties with Russia despite the threat of secondary sanctions from the US and EU.

May 26, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

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