2018 video report:
Central Colorado Mountains Cloud Seeding Program goal is to increase snowpack in the Upper Colorado River Basin
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Israel’s CRAZY offer to Iran: we’ll give you water, you give us your LAND
Vienna Opposes US Anti-Iran Sanctions That Affect Austria – President
Sputnik – 04.07.2018
VIENNA – Vienna regrets Washington’s decision to reimpose sanctions on Iran as these restrictions violate international law and affect Austria due to their extraterritorial nature, Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen said on Wednesday.
“Austria regrets the US pullout from the JCPOA. We also regret the US decision to reimpose sanctions on Iran. This does not concern the so-called primary sanctions against Iran, but the secondary sanctions which affect Austria, too. We believe that these secondary sanctions violate international law due to their extraterritorial nature,” Van der Bellen told reporters after his talks with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in Vienna.
The European Commission supports this position against the United States’ decisions related to the JCPOA, the Austrian president added.
Rouhani on Future of JCPOA
His Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani, in his turn, said that Tehran would remain in the deal, provided that the country is able to benefit from it.
“We will not withdraw from the JCPOA if we are able to benefit from it,” Rouhani said after talks with his Austrian counterpart Alexander Van der Bellen.
Rouhani specified that Iran would stay in the deal if the remaining signatories to the agreement manage to ensure Iran’s interests after the US pullout from the agreement.
The Iranian president also stressed that the remaining signatories to the JCPOA had demonstrated firm political will.
Rouhani is currently on his European trip aimed at discussing the future of the JCPOA after the US withdrawal with EU member states. On Monday and Tuesday, the Iranian president visited Switzerland, after which he arrived in Austria.
EU officials have repeatedly criticized the extraterritorial nature of sanctions imposed by the United States on the countries considered by Washington as its adversaries.
After the US withdrawal from the JCPOA, other signatories — Iran, China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, Germany, and the European Union – said they would abide by it. Moreover, EU leaders asked the United States to grant sanctions waivers to the bloc’s companies cooperating with Iran.
Germany’s AfD Party Passes Resolution to Lift EU Sanctions Against Syria
By Suliman Mulhem – Sputnik – July 4, 2018
The Alternative for Germany (AfD) Party is continuing its efforts to repatriate Syrian refugees, formally urging the German federal government and the EU to lift their debilitating economic sanctions against the Arab Republic.
Earlier this month at a party convention in Augsburg, AfD politicians passed a resolution calling for the lifting of EU economic sanctions against Syria in a bid to aid Damascus’ ongoing efforts to stabilize the entirety of the country and provide adequate public services, according to a party press release sent to Sputnik reporter Suliman Mulhem.
The resolution was submitted by Dr. Christian Blex and a number of other party officials who visited Syria in March to assess the situation on the ground for themselves.
Presenting the resolution at a party conference, Bundestag member Dr. Blex warned of the detrimental effects of the sanctions on the availability of healthcare for Syrians who decided to remain in their home country, especially those on low incomes and with limited resources to seek treatment abroad.
“They [the sanctions] target human beings who the European states allegedly want to protect. The EU sanctions against Syria are a cause of flight; its removal would even benefit Germany’s economy,” Dr. Blex said.
“We demand Germany be no longer complicit in the sanctions, which are an instrument of power against the current government. A prolongation of the suffering of the Syrian people to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad is incompatible with AfD-principles and not in the German national interest,” the resolution reads.
Moreover, the resolution called on the German government and the EU itself to reinstate diplomatic relations with Damascus to “find a solution which secures the country’s peaceful rebuilding process,” highlighting that rebuilding Syria and reviving its national economy is firmly in Germany’s interests, as it’s necessary for the repatriation of Syrian migrants.
AfD members also passed a resolution on July 1 condemning the tripartite aggression by the UK, US and France against Syria earlier this year as a “violation of international law.”
The coordinated strikes were carried in retaliation to an alleged chemical attack which was blamed on the Syrian government, despite Damascus staunchly denying any involvement and having no motive to carry out such an attack.
READ MORE:
EU Sanctions Have ‘Disastrous’ Effects on Syria’s Civilian Population – AfD MP
Russian Envoy to US Suggests Putin-Trump Summit May Herald New INF Treaty
Sputnik – 04.07.2018
WASHINGTON – The upcoming summit between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will allow for progress to be achieved in the areas of bilateral relations and global challenges, Russia’s Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said in an interview.
“I am sure that it is impossible to remove all obstacles out of the way of our mutual cooperation, but it goes without saying that there will be progress regarding bilateral relations as well as regional and global problems,” Antonov told RT in an interview that aired on Tuesday when asked about the forthcoming summit.
Antonov also said that if the United States treats Russia as an equal partner, Moscow and Washington can find a solution to every issue before them.
“I hope that in the very near future [as long as] I am here in Washington, DC we can get great results regarding our relations,” Antonov said.
The Russian ambassador also noted that there are excellent people-to-people, cultural and scientific relations between Russia and the United States.
“Our cooperation, you see it in space, in the Arctic, you see it in so many areas. We can work together. So it is up to us to decide whether we need each other or not,” Antonov said.
Russian Envoy to the US also epressed hope that a joint cybersecurity group would be established as a result of the upcoming summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
“I hope that at least a group on cybersecurity will be established as a result of the forthcoming summit between our two leaders,” Antonov told RT in an interview.
In July, after holding talks with Putin at the G20 Summit in Germany, Trump announced that Moscow and Washington would create a joint working group on cybersecurity to discourage any possible cyberattacks targeting elections, but abandoned the idea after sharp criticism from domestic critics.
From 2009 to 2013, the US and Russian governments actively cooperated on cybersecurity initiatives. However, the work was suspended in 2014 when bilateral relations deteriorated over the Ukraine crisis.
Moreover, Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump might begin a detailed discussion of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) and Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) during the forthcoming summit in Helsinki, Anatoly Antonov suggested in an interview with RT broadcaster.
“The Russian Federation is not in favor of arms race. We made it clear many times and Russian President Putin has confirmed it many times, and even while presenting our new models of modern arms he made it clear that we would like to invite the United States at the table of negotiations and it is high time for us to find solutions on various issues such as the New START treaty. What should we do with this treaty by the way? What should we do with the INF treaty… It seems to me that two presidents could have time to discuss strategical issues,” Antonov stated.
The ambassador added that further details regarding the issue might be then discussed by the foreign and defense ministers of the two countries.
The first bilateral agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union on strategic offensive reductions (START) was signed on July 31, 1991 with a duration of 15 years. Negotiations on a new START treaty began in May 2009, and the new agreement entered into force on February 5, 2011.
Under the treaty, the United States and Russia were to meet the treaty’s limits on strategic arms by February 5, 2018. Aggregate number of weapons on each side was not to exceed 700 deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and heavy bombers, 1550 warheads on the deployed ICBMs, SLBMs and heavy bombers, and 800 launchers.
The INF treaty was signed between the Soviet Union and the United States in December 1987 and required the parties to destroy their ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of between 500 and 5,500 kilometers (from 311 to 3,317 miles). The United States and Russia have repeatedly accused each other of violating the treaty.
Moscow and Washington are currently preparing for the first full-fledged meeting between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, scheduled for July 16 in Helsinki, Finland.
During the meeting, the US and Russian presidents are expected to discuss bilateral relations and various issues on the international agenda.
Iran will import goods only from countries that buy its oil – MP
RT | July 4, 2018
The Energy Committee of Iran has announced that Tehran will buy goods only from those nations which purchase Iranian oil. This follows the US demand from its allies to stop buying Iranian crude.
“We will carry out barter exchange of oil and goods, which means the purchase of goods will depend on the sale of oil,” representative of Iran’s Energy Committee Asadollah Karekhani told ILNA news agency.
“We want to inform our target markets and countries that buy oil from us that we’ll purchase goods from them only if they purchase our oil,” he said, noting that a working group is being formed on barter deals.
Last week, a senior US State Department official told reporters that Washington would try to convince its allies to completely stop buying oil from Iran by early November. Discussions are also being held with other countries, including China.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has warned that if the country’s crude oil exports were threatened, the rest of the Middle East’s would be as well.
“Assuming that Iran could become the only oil producer unable to export its oil is a wrong assumption … The United States will never be able to cut Iran’s oil revenues,” he said.
Iran is OPEC’s second-largest crude exporter with more than 2 million barrels a day.
Rouhani is currently in Europe to gather support ahead of a meeting later this week between Iran and the five global powers that are still party to the 2015 nuclear deal.
European Union extends economic sanctions against Russia
RT | June 29, 2018
EU leaders have extended economic penalties against Russia for six months until the end of January. The decision prolongs the ban on doing business with Russian banking and financial institutions and new energy projects.
“We had a very short discussion on Russia, Ukraine and the Minsk Agreements that led to a political decision to extend the sanctions for another six months,” an unnamed source in the EU Council told journalists in Brussels.
The decision came at the bloc’s summit and is expected to be confirmed in the coming days. According to the source, the move was triggered by French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who reportedly urged the leaders to prolong sanctions against Moscow due to the current state of implementation of the Minsk peace accord on Ukraine.
“It was said that there are no changes, so sanctions are prolonged, the sanctions regime remains unchanged,” the source added.
Meanwhile, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said that the renewal of the punitive measures against Russia should not be automatic. Italy has repeatedly voiced concerns over the sanctions, saying they were having a huge negative impact on Italian firms’ exports to Russia.
“We will reaffirm the principle that there should be nothing automatic about the renewal of sanctions,” the official told parliament. “We need to be very careful about this. Sanctions should be a means and not constitute an end.”
The penalties were initially introduced in 2014 over Moscow’s alleged involvement in the Ukraine crisis and its reunification with Crimea. Sanctions target Russia’s financial, energy and defense sectors, along with some government officials, businessmen and public figures.
The Kremlin responded by imposing an embargo on agricultural produce, food and raw materials on countries that imposed sanctions on Russia. Since then both sides have repeatedly broadened and extended the restrictive measures.
Hungary Accuses EU of ‘Double Standards’ Over Nord Stream 2
Sputnik – June 28, 2018
EU divisions and US sanctions threaten to delay the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to bring Russian gas to Europe.
The European Union applies double standards to Nord Stream 2, Hungarian Foreign and Foreign Trade Minister Peter Szijjarto told Sputnik.
“We are not part of the project, we can’t resist it. But I can say there are unacceptable double standards,” the minister said. According to him, the former South Stream project, which would increase the diversification of natural gas supplies for Central Europe has been “killed” by the EU.
“And now we don’t see any encouragement on the part of the European Commission. I can’t imagine any excuses or reasons the Commission could bring,” Szijjarto added
In 2014, EU opposition forced Russia to cease work on the South Stream project, which was to run across Bulgaria, Serbia and Hungary in favor of a new pipeline to run under the Black Sea to Turkey [Turkish Stream].
Nord Stream 2
Nord Stream 2, which is a joint venture of Russia’s Gazprom with France’s Engie, Austria’s OMV AG, UK-Dutch Royal Dutch Shell, and Germany’s Uniper and Wintershall, aims to deliver 55 billion cubic meters of Russian natural gas a year to the European Union across the Baltic Sea to Germany.
Building permits have already been issued by Germany, Finland and Sweden.
A similar permit by Denmark is still pending, but on Tuesday it was announced that the Danish government wants to delay the implementation of the project. According to Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, the idea needs to be discussed on a pan-European level.
Denmark’s decision came after the US State Department said it hoped that the EU would “independently” suspend the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline or “reformat” a Russian-proposed plan to this effect.
Some countries, above all Ukraine, who are afraid of losing revenues from Russian gas transit, are opposed to Nord Stream 2. The project is also facing opposition from the United States who has ambitious plans to export its LNG to Europe.
Russia has repeatedly urged its European partners not to perceive the Nord Stream pipeline as an instrument of influence. According to President Vladimir Putin, Moscow considers the project to be entirely economic.
Ever wonder where the 275 billion taxpayers money went that got poured down the EU carbon trading system hole?
By Tim Channon | Tallbloke’s Talkshop | June 28, 2018
Talkshop readers may remember a damning report by UBS about the billions of public money lost in the ETS carbon trading system. It calculated that if the money had been invested in modernising the European power generation fleet, CO2 could have been cut by 40% (and generate a huge number of high quality jobs). EU emissions rose 1.8% last year.
Despite all the recent turmoil over the UK steel industry and meetings in Brussels today, the reality is that the European Union has actually been subsidising the Chinese steel industry for years, in payments hidden amongst its efforts to combat Climate Change.
Using complex methods of carbon credits and carbon offsets, the EU devised rules on climate change ended up paying Chinese steel manufacturers billions to upgrade their steel mills and other energy intensive industry.
According to the analysis company, European Insights, almost €1.5 billion was paid to over 90 steel plants in China with the purpose of modernising them to consume less energy, and making the plants more efficient. Taken with the downturn in Chinese trade and the need for them to reduce world market prices to sell their product, the output of these mills has flooded onto the European market making steel products artificially cheap and endangering thousands of jobs in the UK. One plant alone, Anshan Iron and Steel, received a payment of €150 million to help pay for the installation of up to date equipment and replace the old inefficient Communist era machinery.
The money came from the EU’s self-claimed flagship Climate Directive, the Emission Trading System, and paid for by power and industrial companies in the EU who are, as part of their industry, emitters of carbon dioxide. This system forces big carbon emitters in Europe to buy carbon offsets, known as Certified Emission Reductions. They can buy these on the “carbon market” but companies in China, for example, who could show they intended to reduce their own levels of carbon emissions, would qualify.
The system then allowed Chinese steel producers to exploit a loophole that allowed their modernisation to be financed by the sale of these credits, as they received upfront payments of billions of Euros.
European installations that involve high energy consumption also can participate in this carbon trading market, but at a much lesser scale. Effectively around 12,000 European installations, including power stations and steel mills, were forced by the EU into subsidising Chinese industrial growth and development in a trade worth up to a total of €45 billion.
The Think Tank, European Insights, said: “These Chinese upgrades have now, sadly, assisted in record levels of Chinese steel production and are contributing to the low steel price that is endangering jobs in the UK. The system of carbon credit trading is highly complex, and we uncovered 91 individual steel mills in China that received funding of this nature. We estimate that the total paid to them was €1.4 billion.”
The EU approach to Climate Change is another example of the unintended consequences associated with policies made at an EU level. The initiative was well-meaning maybe, but failed totally to anticipate the consequences on world trade and impact on EU member states. Most damaging is that EU is also terribly slow to ameliorate the negative effects of its own policies.
The full report by European Insights can no longer be found here:
http://europeaninsights.org/carbon-credits-and-steel/
And you won’t find it on the wayback machine at Archive.org either
https://web.archive.org/web/20180628113838/http://europeaninsights.org?reqp=1&reqr=
US Sanctions May Force India Out of Iran’s Chabahar Port With China More Than Able to Fill This Gap
By Adam Garrie | EurasiaFuture | June 27, 2018
Iran’s Chabahar Port on the Gulf of Oman represents the crowning achievement of Indo-Iranian cooperation in recent decades. The port itself represents the centre of the wider North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC) which will link India to Russia and the wider north-western Eurasian space via Iran and Azerbaijan. While under Premier Narendra Modi, India has sought to sell NSTC as an alternative to China’s One Belt–One Road and in particular as rival to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor which links China to the wider Indian Ocean space via the Arabian Sea port at Gwadar, Iranian officials who themselves are eager participants in One Belt–One Road, have wisely distanced themselves from India’s zero-sum narrative on Chabahar and NSTC more widely.
Likewise, as Iranian relations with Pakistan continue to improve, it also remains clear that Iranian leaders are carefully avoiding being sucked into south Asia’s manifold rivalries by maintaining healthy ties with China, India and increasingly Pakistan simultaneously.
As it stands, Gwadar is a more substantial port vis-a-vis Chabahar in terms of its capacity and the fact that unlike the Indian built port in Iran, the Chinese built Gwadar is a Panamax deep water port. In this sense, both Gwadar and Chabahar could function together on the win-win model which would see some of the supplies shipped from China to Pakistan via Gwadar being routed on to Chabahar depending on their ultimate destination. Here one could see One Belt–One Road and the North South Transport Corridor functioning as integrated rather than as rival logistics networks – something that Pakistani officials recently spoke about with optimism.
Now though, India’s very presence in Chabahar may be impacted negatively as the US moves to sanction countries that conduct business with Iran. The US CAATSA sanctions aimed at Iran are back in the spotlight after the US withdrawal from the JPCOA (aka Iran nuclear deal) caused Washington to threaten many of its longstanding allies against conducting further business with Iran under the threat of so-called second party sanctions. These threats have most notably been aimed at the European Union, in spite of the fact that the bloc remains rhetorically adamant that it will continue to preserve the JCPOA without US involvement.
India has also come under threat of sanctions due to its healthy relationship with the Islamic Republic. The US has stated that it will sanction Indian companies who do business with Iran and this week, the US issued an even more specific threat to its Indian partner, stating that New Delhi will face sanctions if it continues to purchase Iranian oil.
Last month it was reported that international investors in Chabahar were beginning to show signs of nervousness in light of the new sanctions threats from Washington. As India is already facing tariffs on its exports to the United States while simultaneously cutting itself off from a would-be win-win Chinese partnership, India is scarcely in a position to economically leverage the United States which under Donald Trump has taken a merciless approach to conducting trade wars with allies as well as threatening partners with sanctions if they do business with countries including Russia, Iran and the DPRK (although this might soon change in the case of the DPRK).
This could mean that as the primary investor and operator of the Chabahar Port, India could find itself cut off from its own investment under the cloud of sanctions. If it comes to this and India is forced to either partially or even entirely withdraw from the Chabahar project, it would mean that Iran would seek a new international partner for the port.
The only realistic partner to take over Chabahar would be China, a nation with experience in port building and management, a country that has shown itself to be able to transact deals with Iran in spite of the attitude of Washington and a country that because of America’s own dependence on Chinese goods – is largely sanction proof for all practical purposes.
Not only could China help to revive the economic fortunes of Chabahar if India becomes frightened off due to threats from the United States, but China could actually help Chabahar to grow both infrastructurally and commercially by linking it into a uniformed trade route centred on the larger Gwadar port and existing One Belt–One Road lines of connectivity in the region. This would ultimately be a win-win for China, Iran and Pakistan.
If India were to abandon the underlying prejudices behind its zero-sum approach to antagonising both China and Pakistan, India could actually remain active in Chabahar as key player in a wider Sino-Iranian partnership which would necessarily also include Pakistan via CPEC. This could help to not only reduce tensions with India’s largest neighbours, but it could demonstrate that the only way for India to effectively leverage US threats of further tariffs and sanctions is by keeping at least one foot in China’s already open door.
However, given the attitude of the current Indian government, such a win-win model looks increasingly distant however theoretically attractive it might sound when analysed objectively. Because of this, the more likely scenario for Chabahar will be a short-term waiting game where India will see just how far the US is willing to punish its newfound south Asian partner due to its dealings with Iran.
If India’s involvement in Chabahar does come under a US financial attack, it is all but certain that India will minimise its involvement in the flagship project – thus paving the way for China to take over where India left off.
The choice for India therefore is three fold: New Delhi can simply hope for the best while possibly sweetening the deal by making concessions to the US over existing tariffs, India can bow out of Chabahar in order to possibly attain better trading relations with the US in the future or India can work with China to leverage the US over its anti-Iranian position.
At a time when the US is embracing unilateralism in its economic relations with the rest of the world – India must look realistically at its options, even if this means dropping its Sinophobic prejudices.
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From the Archives
Politicians lie
By Mazin Qumsiyeh | Popular Resistance | August 18, 2013
There is no way to say this truth nicely: Politicians lie. That includes Japanese, American, Egyptian, Israeli, and Palestinian politicians! Is there something more common sense than that? Yet, so many citizens around the world believe their own politicians or wistfully acknowledge lies but think it is part of the job needed to run things. They believe even when politicians contradict themselves blatantly. This phenomenon is rather remarkable. It is a dissonance and disconnect from reality that many seem oblivious to. It is very dangerous because it can lead to accepting rationales for going to war. These can be deadly wars that lead to millions of lives lost as happened in what was called World War 1 and WW2. Even when incredible and declassified evidence abound, politicians continue to lie and old mythologies refuse to die. Here are just a few of the countless lies told to us over the past few decades… continue
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- Study: Ocean Heating Rates From Thousands Of Years Ago ‘Dwarf’ Modern Ocean Heating Rates
- Climate Extremists Target, Attack Large-Scale Power Grid Infrastructure In Germany!
- New Study: Antarctic Ice Melt Has Contributed Less Than 1 Centimeter To Sea Level Rise In The Last 30 Years
