Germany to Close Airbase in Niger After Negotiations on Soldiers Immunity Fail – Reports
Sputnik – 07.07.2024
The German armed forces will give up its airbase in Niger, which was used as a military transport hub, by August 31, as the sides failed to extend the agreement concerning the base, German media reported on Saturday, citing the German Defense Ministry.
The talks broke down after the new Nigerien authorities had refused to grant German soldiers with immunity from prosecution, the NTV news outlet reported, citing a document the ministry had presented before the parliament.
Germany expects to withdraw its troops from the country by the end of August as well.
The German military has used the base in Niger’s capital, Niamey since 2013 as a supply center for its armed forces in neighboring Mali, which were stationed there as part of a UN peacekeeping mission.
Nigerien authorities, which took power in a military takeover in July 2023, have since then also terminated military agreements with France and the United States, which led to the French and US forces’ withdrawal from the country.
Ukraine asks West for submarines
RT | July 7, 2024
Ukraine needs Western submarines to bolster its military capabilities in the Black Sea, Navy chief Admiral Aleksey Neizhpapa, has said.
He argued that deploying underwater craft could strategically improve Ukraine’s positions across the Black Sea during the conflict with Russia.
“We are thinking about it, submarines are necessary for us, they should be part of the navy,” Neizhpapa said in an interview with journalist Natalya Moseychuk, posted on her YouTube channel on Saturday.
The head of the Ukrainian navy added that the country does not need large submarines, as “they are useless in the Black Sea.”
“Locating only near Odessa means having nothing, we should look further, spread the fleet throughout the Black Sea and use its entire area,” he said, expressing hope that Ukraine would turn “from a coastal state into a maritime power.”
Since the Russia-Ukraine conflict erupted in February 2022, Western states have supplied vast quantities of weapons to Kiev, while denying direct involvement in the hostilities. However, with the fighting well into its third year, there have been numerous reports of dwindling support, with delays in arms and ammunition deliveries.
Earlier this week, Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky said in an interview with Bloomberg that US weapons were taking too long to reach the country, despite Congress approving a $61 billion assistance package in April.
NATO diplomats told the agency that the US-led military bloc had agreed to provide at least €40 billion ($43 billion) in military aid for Ukraine per year, without specifying how long the aid would continue.
American Exceptionalism: US Foreign Policy Advisors Urge Resumption of Nuclear Testing
By John Miles – Sputnik – 07.07.2024
As of 2024 the United States is still the only country to have deployed nuclear weapons in a military setting, killing over 150,000 people in nuclear attacks in Japan as the country was on the brink of surrender amid an looming Russian attack.
Prominent figures in the United States national security establishment are pushing a resumption of nuclear weapons testing as the country continues to move towards weakening international arms control frameworks.
Former US national security advisor Robert O’Brien and George W. Bush State Department adviser Christian Whiton are among the foreign policy luminaries pushing the policy.
The Heritage Foundation think tank is also urging immediate nuclear testing if former President Donald Trump wins the White House this fall; the organization urged a remediation of “former Manhattan Project and Cold War nuclear material sites” in a recent policy blueprint, demonstrating the continued influence of neoconservative foreign policy advocacy in Republican Party politics.
The think tank also backed the development of “new nuclear weapons and naval nuclear reactors.” Spent fuel from US reactors has been used in depleted uranium weaponry that the United States has repeatedly deployed in theaters of war such as Iraq and NATO aggression in Serbia. Human rights groups have called for the weapons to be banned, noting their depraved use on civilian populations in Belgrade and Fallujah has continued to result in elevated rates of cancer and birth defects.
“Since 1992, the U.S. has refrained from explosive nuclear testing and opted for other techniques, including expert appraisals and sophisticated modeling generated by supercomputers, to calculate the efficacy of its long-term stockpile and its newer weapons,” wrote analyst Zeeshan Aleem.
“That policy has helped nudge other countries away from pursuing live testing,” he added.
The resumption of live testing could actually worsen US national security, some experts have claimed, because it would allow adversaries to directly observe the country’s nuclear capabilities during real-world trials.
“Resuming U.S. nuclear testing is technically and militarily unnecessary,” according to Daryl Kimball, the executive director of the Arms Control Association. “Moreover, it would lead to a global chain reaction of nuclear testing, raise global tensions, and blow apart global nonproliferation efforts at a time of heightened nuclear danger.”
The United States has frequently weakened international arms control efforts and has moved to end long standing agreements between the US and Russia in particular. The George W. Bush administration ended the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, while the Obama administration moved to install missile interception facilities in Romania.
The offensive NATO military alliance continued to expand during the Democratic president’s administration, absorbing Albania and Croatia in 2009.
“The reality is the United States has commandeered NATO in the European Union as a proxy army, and a slave economic force, and made Europe to be puppets and pawns of American foreign policy,” noted former US Army psychological warfare officer and US State Department counterterrorism analyst Scott Bennett. “The American government’s agenda – and specifically the banks, globalists and military-industrial complex, and the CIA have – all pursued an agenda to drive the break-up of Russia and the theft of its resources since 1990.”
Bennett noted that the United States’ shredding of arms control treaties has forced Moscow to prepare for the possibility of a nuclear war launched by an increasingly irrational and Russophobic West.
“It is precisely because the United States has become so untrustworthy and unstable and indeed deceitful in everything it says and does, and in every document it claims to sign and promise, it has forced President Putin to act in certain ways,” said the analyst.
“In order to preserve and protect Russia Putin understands he must have the flexibility and maneuverability to guarantee the West does not attempt to secretly undermine or exploit the vulnerabilities that Russia might have as a result of its futile hope in the United States being honorable.”
Orban Reveals Plans to Hold More Surprise Meetings Next Week After Recent Talks With Putin
Sputnik – 06.07.2024
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said that he is planning to hold several meetings next week that would be “equally surprising” as his recent talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Hungarian prime minister visited Russia on Friday to hold talks with Putin. Orban described his visit as a continuation of his “peace mission” after a visit to Kiev, which took place on Tuesday.
“I will have some meetings in the next week, which will be equally surprising,” Orban said in an interview with Swiss magazine Weltwoche out Saturday.
He added that these meetings would be kept from the public until the fact of his arrival, as it happened earlier during his visit to Moscow.
Orban also stated that he asked Russian President Vladimir Putin three questions during a meeting in Moscow, on Putin’s opinion concerning other countries’ peace proposals, on the possibility of a ceasefire prior to peace talks and what Europe’s security architecture might look like in the future.
“My first purpose was to put the questions directly, three questions basically,” Orban said.
The first question was about Moscow’s stance on existing peace initiatives and talks on the Ukrainian conflict that are held without Russia, the Hungarian prime minister said.
“He [Putin] said that it is obvious that real negotiations cannot happen without the involvement of both parties. So whatever they are doing without him, it means nothing. Which is quite logical anyway,” Orban said.
The second question referred to the possibility of a ceasefire before the actual start of negotiations, he said, adding that Putin had not agreed to that expecting that Kiev would try to take military advantage of such a ceasefire.
The third question was whether Russia had a vision of what a future security architecture of Europe would look like after the conflict, to which Putin answered that Moscow had a detailed plan on the issue, the Hungarian leader said.
Zelensky owes Orban an explanation
By Lucas Leiroz | Strategic Culture Foundation | July 5, 2024
Instead of an improvement in bilateral relations, the recent meeting between Vladimir Zelensky and Viktor Orban only intensified tensions between both countries. The Hungarian Prime Minister’s visit to Kiev appears to have been a kind of ultimatum for the Ukrainian regime to stop its irresponsible actions and accept a peace negotiation. Given Zelensky’s insistence on war, Hungary is expected to take increasingly tough actions to boycott military support for Ukraine within the Western organizations in which it is part (NATO and EU).
Orban made a surprise visit to the Ukrainian capital and presented Zelensky with a peace proposal, the central element of which was the establishment of an immediate ceasefire, enabling the resumption of negotiations between the parties. On the same day, the Ukrainian authorities rejected the Hungarian proposal, remaining firm in their desire to continue the war to the last consequences. Orban has repeatedly clarified that the West wants war with Russia, which will not benefit Europe at all and could lead to a major continental conflict. Zelensky and the entire Kiev Junta, however, are not aligned with European interests, preferring to obey American orders directly.
Orban’s words in Kiev can be seen as a genuine call for peace – while also sounding like a final warning. The Hungarian leader often tried to prevent the advance of Western military support to Ukraine, thus aiming to promote a de-escalation of the conflict. Due to its dissident stance in the EU, Hungary has suffered economic blackmail, boycotts and even attempts at color revolution. The country appears to be a target for NATO and EU strategists, even though it is a member of both groups.
The reasons why Hungary tries to de-escalate the war are many and go beyond the interest of avoiding a continental war. Orban is a conservative leader who has as one of his main political agendas the defense of Christianity and traditional values – a topic on which he sympathizes with the Russian Federation and is in total disagreement with Ukrainian woke Nazism. The West’s promotion of an anti-traditional cultural agenda has created significant tensions between Hungary and its partners, making the country actually isolated from other NATO and EU members.
One of the most important points for Orban’s skepticism towards Kiev, however, is the ethnic persecution promoted against Hungarian citizens in the western regions of Ukraine, mainly in Transcarpathia. Cities with an ethnic Hungarian majority have suffered from racist policies in a similar way to what Russians in Donbass have suffered since 2014. Just as the Russian language has been banned from being taught in schools and used in official documents, the Hungarian language is also being banned, affecting the ethnic and cultural identity of thousands of Hungarians.
One of the most shocking practices of the Kiev regime is the ethnic instrumentalization of forced recruitment policies. The Ukrainian armed forces constantly forcibly capture non-Ukrainian ethnic citizens from the country’s streets, sending them to the front lines without proper training, making death a mere matter of time. Ethnic Russians and Hungarians have been constantly recruited to certain death at the front, with local authorities trying to “spare” Ukrainian soldiers as much as possible.
During the Battle of Artymovsk (known in Ukraine as “Bakhmut”), several reports emerged from local observers denouncing the forced recruitment of hundreds of Hungarians from Transcarpathia. The battle became known as the “meat grinder”, due to the high rate of casualties among Ukrainian troops during clashes with the Russian private military company Wagner Group. Apparently, Kiev used the “meat grinder” as a tool to accelerate the process of ethnic cleansing in Transcarpathia, sending ethnic Hungarian citizens to certain death.
Hungary has repeatedly denounced the Kiev Junta’s racist policies against Hungarians who are under Ukrainian jurisdiction. The inaction of international organizations – mainly NATO and the EU, of which Hungary is a part – has only increased Hungarian impatience. Kiev has not changed its practices. Zelensky also did not use the last meeting with Orban to give him an “explanation” – if that is even possible – or at least promise to change his policies. So, given the certainty that Kiev will continue the war and the extermination of Hungarians, perhaps Orban’s peace proposal will become a true ultimatum.
Without any goodwill on Ukraine’s part, Orban now has no alternative but to actually do everything he can to thwart Kiev’s plans. It is possible that he will harden his positions within NATO and the EU, vetoing pro-Ukraine proposals even under economic blackmail. More than that, Orban could even launch a policy of seeking strategic partnerships with emerging countries, and discussions about leaving NATO and the EU will inevitably begin to advance on the Hungarian domestic scenario.
It is also necessary to remember that since 2022 there have been rumors that Hungary might eventually intervene militarily in Ukraine to stop ethnic cleansing in Transcarpathia. Even though these rumors have no proof so far, with Ukrainian insistence, it is possible that at some point there will be internal pressure in Hungary for these rumors to become reality.
Hungary is realizing, before all NATO and EU members, that membership in these organizations is a real trap. Orban does not seem willing to accept that his country become a victim of a continental war initiated by Ukraine, nor does he want to continue seeing his Hungarian compatriots dying in hostilities with Russia. He will certainly do everything possible to make the Hungarian future different from the Ukrainian one.
Corbyn triumphs over former party in UK election
RT | July 5, 2024
Former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn has retained his seat in the UK parliament after running as an independent in Thursday’s general election.
Corbyn won 24,120 votes in London’s Islington North constituency, comfortably ahead of Labour rival Praful Nargund, who received 16,873 votes. Turnout in the constituency was 67.5%, 4% less than in 2019, The Guardian reported on Friday.
The 75-year-old Corbyn has represented Islington North as an MP since 1983. A long-time advocate of Palestinian rights, he led Labour from 2015 to 2020, but was ousted from his position and suspended from the party over his response to allegations of anti-Semitism in the organization during his tenure.
Corbyn insisted that the claims were “dramatically overstated for political reasons,” while his supporters have argued that he was the victim of a smear campaign by party rivals due to his anti-austerity and anti-war stance.
Earlier this year, Corbyn’s successor as Labour leader, Keir Starmer, banned him from representing the party in the general election. He was officially expelled from Labour in May after announcing he would campaign as an independent.
After running against his former party and winning, Corbyn said that by electing him for the 11th time, the people of Islington North “have shown what kinder, gentler and more sensible, more inclusive politics can bring about.”
“I couldn’t be more proud of my constituency than I am tonight and proud of our team that brought this result,” he stressed.
Despite Nargund’s failure in Islington North, Labour has delivered a crushing defeat to the Conservatives, securing its first election victory since 2005 with an estimated 412 seats and a large parliamentary majority.
When asked what kind of prime minister Starmer would make, Corbyn replied: “Well, let’s see what happens.”
The manifesto put forward by the current Labour leader “is thin to put it mildly and doesn’t offer a serious economic alternative to what the Conservative government is doing. And so the demands on [Starmer] are going to be huge,” he argued.
“If you don’t give yourself space to increase spending on the desperate social needs… then I think there are going to be political problems. The demands from the people are going to be huge,” Corbyn warned.
The Bankers War in Ukraine – Part Seventeen of The Anglo-American War on Russia
Tales of the American Empire | July 4, 2024
Western corporate media and our corporate sponsored political leaders proclaim the war in Ukraine is about stopping Russian aggression. As this series has explained, this war was an American neocon effort to ignite a proxy war in Ukraine to destabilize and fragment Russia into smaller states that western corporations can control. This has failed horribly as Russia became stronger and more united than before war began. Even worse, the effort backfired after Russian efforts to make peace were rejected. Russia determined that it must conquer all of Ukraine to expel foreign troublemakers and protect itself, so its armies are slowly conquering all of Ukraine.
This has caused panic in the west since it had already taken control of Ukraine and began to exploit its vast resources. When war began, more farmland and factories were snatched up by western vulture capitalists at deep discounts as Ukrainian’s economy shut down and millions of Ukrainians fled aboard. Ukraine owes the west $300 billion that it can never repay unless it sells state assets, which is what the west wants. If Russia wins, none of this may be repaid and banks and governments will be forced to write off massive loans.
This explains the panic among western leaders who declare that Ukraine cannot be allowed to lose the war. Some now proclaim that NATO troops must be sent. Most citizens say that Ukraine is not worth World War III nor the death of hundreds of thousands of NATO soldiers, but their lords will lose billions of dollars!
________________________________
“All Wars are Bankers Wars”; YouTube; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hfEB…
Related Tale: “The Genocide Called World War I”; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psXYM…
“Disaster Capitalists Ready to Descend on Ukraine”; Jeremy Kuzmarov; Covert Action; January 31, 2024; https://covertactionmagazine.com/2024…
“Zelensky to sell Ukraine off to BlackRock, Goldman Sachs”; The Grayzone; January 30, 2023; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y32lO…
Related Tales: “The Anglo-American War on Russia”; https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list…
Is stopping World War Three the Donald’s ‘trump card’ for winning the White House?
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | July 4, 2024
Donald Trump seems to have hit on a winning plan for returning to the White House – by convincing voters he is the candidate to prevent World War Three.
The Republican candidate is lately pitching the importance of ending “the horrible war” in Ukraine to prevent the United States from sliding toward a nuclear conflagration with Russia.
Trump is slamming Democrat rival Joe Biden for fueling the conflict by recklessly supplying U.S. weapons that are provoking Russia and risking the start of World War Three. That’s true enough.
After Biden’s disastrous TV debate with Trump last week, the polls are showing Trump slightly pulling ahead. The Democrat campaign is in panic mode after the incumbent president’s shaky performance confirmed public misgivings about his deteriorating mental health.
Still, however, Trump has not capitalized on taking a decisive lead in the polls. The Republican is at most a couple of points ahead of Biden – even after the latter’s slow-motion car-crash TV debate.
Trump could pick up a lot of ballots among large numbers of undecided voters and propel his return to the White House by posing as the “anti-war candidate”.
At election rallies, the former president is touting his supposed ability to bring an immediate end to the war in Ukraine. Trump is saying he would cut off military aid to Ukraine and call on the Kiev regime to negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Trump is boasting that he could broker an immediate peace deal if he wins the election in November and implement a settlement even before his inauguration in the Oval Office in January 2025. Thereby preventing World War Three between the nuclear-armed U.S. and Russia.
That might seem like a sound campaign plan. A large majority of Americans – some 70 percent – want their government to find a diplomatic solution to the two-and-a-half-year war in Ukraine. This reflects public opposition to the perception of another endless American war and the growing apprehension over an escalation in the conflict between nuclear powers.
Astutely, Trump is tapping into those legitimate concerns.
On the other hand, Biden’s administration is pushing ahead with military support for the Kiev regime in a way that seems insanely reckless. This week, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced another $2.3 billion in military aid to Ukraine. Biden has said he will support Ukraine for as long as it takes and shows no sign of backing away from military confrontation. The president has approved the supply of longer-range missiles to Ukraine and given his permission to strike Russia.
The issue of war and peace – and without exaggeration the issue of world peace and survival of the planet – could be the one that wins the White House for Trump.
Biden does not have a reverse gear when it comes to his policy of supporting Ukraine in a futile war that it is losing badly and only provoking Russia.
Such madness is bound to be a vote loser and yet Biden and his administration appear to have no way back from the abyss. Combined with Biden’s appalling policy of supporting Israel – especially for younger American voters who would normally lean toward a Democrat – Trump could exploit the anxiety over Ukraine to his electoral advantage.
It’s not just about the danger of an all-out war with Russia. The American public is rightly incensed by the vast amounts of taxpayer money – over $100 billion at least – being shelled out for a corrupt regime in Kiev while so much public need is neglected at home.
The trouble is Trump’s lack of credibility. Ordinarily, a presidential candidate declaring his opposition to starting World War Three would be a clear winning platform, one would think.
Recall the first time Trump ran for the White House back in 2016 when he promised all sorts of splendid things about making America great again by stopping endless U.S. wars around the world and putting an end to “American carnage” at home.
Trump did not deliver then despite all his braggadocio about “draining the swamp”. During his presidency, Trump broke the taboo of supplying lethal weapons to Ukraine. In 2018, he approved sending $47 million worth of Javelin anti-tank missiles to the Kiev regime while it was attacking the ethnic Russian population in the former Ukrainian territory of Donbass. That military backing of the Kiev regime led to the current conflict after Moscow intervened in February 2022 to stop the merciless killing of the Russian population.
On Trump’s recent bragging about how he would quickly end the war in Ukraine, Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Vassily Nebenzia, dismissed it as empty “subjective” talk. That’s a diplomatic way of saying Trump hasn’t a clue about resolving the conflict.
Trump is all about the expedient winning of votes, not about winning genuine peace. The only way to create a peaceful resolution in Ukraine and elsewhere is for the U.S.-led NATO military bloc to scale back from Russia’s borders and eventually disband in conformity with international law. NATO is a self-appointed war machine to serve Western imperialist power and one that is in flagrant violation of the UN Charter and the upholding of international law. NATO exists to enforce U.S. power unilaterally without any respect for international law – despite the American and European rhetoric about “rules-based order”.
The war in Ukraine is but one symptom of the United States as a failing and frustrated imperialist power. Washington’s hostility towards Russia is consonant with its relentless belligerence towards China and its support for Israel’s genocide in a desperate bid to control the Middle East. Trump is on board with U.S. imperialist power projection against China and slavishly supporting the Israeli regime. His talk about criticizing NATO expenditures is just carping to get Europeans to pay more for the American protection racket. The only thing different from Biden is a superficial matter of style and a seemingly more reasonable view of the conflict in Ukraine.
Posing as a candidate to avert World War Three over Ukraine might be enough to get Trump back to the White House. It might work as an electioneering ploy. But it won’t change a damn thing about stopping U.S. imperialist violence and the constant threat to world peace that Washington and its NATO war machine engender. The Donald’s “trump card” for peace in Ukraine is another worthless deuce.
‘Doing Everything to Reelect Biden’: Duped Hillary Clinton Spills Cringy Details to Prankster Duo
By Svetlana Ekimenko – Sputnik – 03.07.2024
After conning British Foreign Secretary David Cameron into divulging that Ukraine won’t be invited to join NATO at the alliance’s next summit, the Russian prankster duo of Vovan and Lexus have successfully duped Hillary Clinton.
Despite her crushing defeat to Donald Trump in the 2016 US presidential elections, Hillary Clinton has adamantly refused to be put out to pasture or written off from big politics. Hence, her current bid to dabble in the ongoing proxy conflict in Ukraine.
It comes as no surprise that the former US Secretary of State eagerly accepted the offer to speak with ‘former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’. Little did she realize that she was divulging her political game regarding the US and Ukraine to the well-known Russian prankster duo, Vovan (Vladimir Kuznetsov) and Lexus (Alexey Stolyarov).
Clinton jumped right into the conversation, assuring ‘Poroshenko’ that US aid has been positioned to reach Ukraine “very quickly”.
At this point, her conversational partner lamented over another looming “threat”, in the face of presidential hopeful Donald Trump, who could “give us some problems” if elected, since he “hates Ukraine”, she piped up:
“You’re right. It is terrible. And I am doing everything I can to reelect President Biden. And I am very hopeful that that will be the outcome in November.”
Clinton took a swipe at Trump, calling him a “very dangerous candidate,” and said he would be “bad for the United States, as well as for the rest of the world, including Ukraine.”
But despite Joe Biden’s disastrous first debate against his main opponent, Clinton is confident that Trump will lose. Moreover, she appeared to indicate that Biden’s path to a second term should be paved with the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers. She assured that Washington would be “giving you the means you need to support yourself to try to not only hold the line but engage in an offensive. And then obviously many of us in this country will do everything we can to reelect President Biden.”
“The more that Ukraine could continue to demonstrate its resilience and its resolve and do what you’re doing on the battlefield, do what you’re doing in a very strong message to the rest of the world, […] go forward as best you can… the rest of us will do everything we can to continue supporting you, and to support President Biden,” reiterated Hillary Clinton.
Hillary also wholeheartedly “supports” Ukraine’s NATO membership aspirations, saying that “We are working very hard to persuade the Germans and the Americans to move on this. I don’t know what the final decision will be, but as you say, Rasmussen and Yermak, and others, are working very hard.” This was a reference to former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Zelensky’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak, who have been spearheading a working group to gain support for Kiev’s NATO bid across the alliance.
Clinton emphasized that “everyone has a stake in making sure that you are successful in pushing the Russians out as far as you can.”
‘Porshenko’ bantered at this point that “dictators didn’t learn their lesson after Gaddafi,” in a reference to the former Libyan leader ousted and killed in the wake of NATO’s bombardment of the North African country in 2011. During that time, as Barack Obama’s foreign policy chief, Hillary Clinton, she was the public figure of the project and had cackled with laughter during a TV interview after rebel forces backed by NATO had captured and brutally killed Muammar Gaddafi. Clinton famously quipped, “We came, we saw, he died!”
“Yeah, I think that’s true,” replied Clinton to the Poroshenko imposter.
Turning the conversation back to the “main threat” namely, Trump, the pranksters warned that “he will ask for money back, and it will be a disaster,” as he “wants to end the conflict on Russia’s terms.”
“He’s a very bad guy, as I know personally from having to run against him,” reiterated Hillary Clinton, and applauded an offer of help from the Ukrainian side to dig up some new dirt on Trump.
“Well, anything you can do to attack him, I’m all for it. Because he’s a very dangerous man,” reiterated Clinton.
She eagerly rounded off the conversation with “Slava, Ukraina” (“Glory to Ukraine”), a wartime fascist salute originally adopted by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), an infamous nationalist militant group that collaborated with the Nazis during World War II, and now widely used by Ukrainian paramilitary groups, promoted by the Kiev regime.
Russian nuclear power plant workers injured in Ukrainian attack – officials
RT | July 3, 2024
A Ukrainian attack on a substation used by the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant has injured eight employees of the facility, officials reported on Wednesday.
Kiev allegedly launched three quadcopter-type kamikaze drones at the Raduga facility in Energodar, the city hosting Europe’s largest nuclear power station. The injured workers were part of a crew that was repairing the damage caused by a previous Ukrainian attack, the statement claimed. At least one worker is said to be in a serious condition.
The initial strike on the Raduga substation happened two weeks ago and was confirmed by a monitoring mission of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN’s nuclear watchdog. Another site called Luch was hit in a separate strike.
Neither station is critical for the work of the nuclear power plant, but its secondary facilities depend on them for power supplies. The strike on Wednesday once again disrupted the grid after both Raduga transformers were damaged.
The IAEA has declined to attribute the attacks on substations in Energodar, but its chief, Rafael Grossi, has stressed that “whoever is behind this, it must stop.”
“Drone usage against the plant and its vicinity is becoming increasingly more frequent. This is completely unacceptable and it runs counter to the safety pillars and concrete principles which have been accepted unanimously,” the official said.
Last week, a reported Ukrainian artillery strike destroyed one of the automatic radiation monitoring posts near the nuclear site.
Energodar is located in Zaporozhye Region, which became part of Russia following a referendum in 2022. The power plant is operated by Russian personnel, although Kiev still claims sovereignty over the area.
Moscow has criticized the US and its allies for failing to pressure Ukraine to stop the military attacks on the plant, which pose the threat of a major environmental disaster.
Orban reveals Zelensky’s reaction to ceasefire proposal
RT | July 3, 2024
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky was not receptive to Budapest’s proposal to establish a temporary ceasefire with Russia, according to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who recently traveled to Kiev.
During his surprise visit on Tuesday, which was his first trip to Ukraine in over a decade, Orban proposed that Zelensky think about “whether it would be possible to take a break. To reach a ceasefire and start negotiations [with Russia] since a quick ceasefire could speed up these negotiations.”
Ahead of the trip, Orban stated that he hoped to explain to Zelensky that “time is running out and it is important to establish peace, as hundreds of soldiers are dying on the front every day and we do not see how a solution can be found on the battlefield.”
However, following his conversations with Zelensky, Orban told the Swiss Die Weltwoche news outlet, that the Ukrainian leader “had some doubts” about the ceasefire proposal and “didn’t like it very much.” He explained that Zelensky “had a bad experience in the past with ceasefires, which, in his opinion, did not benefit Ukraine” and because of this believed there were “limits” to what could be achieved.
While Zelensky himself has not yet commented on Hungary’s proposal, his deputy chief of staff, Igor Zhovka has stated that Ukraine is not interested in Orban’s proposal and claimed that a ceasefire “cannot be considered in isolation.”
Instead, Zhovka said that Kiev will continue to seek a resolution to the conflict based on Zelensky’s own ‘peace formula’. The ten-point program, initially floated in late 2022, calls for a complete withdrawal of Russian forces from territories Kiev claims as its own, reparation payments and an international war crime tribunal for Russia’s leadership.
Moscow has vehemently rejected Zelensky’s plan as a non-starter and has stressed that any peace talks with Kiev must be based on “realities on the ground.”
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin has presented his own set of terms for starting ceasefire talks, which include a full Ukrainian withdrawal from the regions that voted to be part of Russia, as well as legally binding guarantees that ensure Ukraine will never become a member of NATO.
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What is the Israeli Lobby in Australia Doing in Interfaith Dialogue?
By Ali Kazak | Dissident Voice | October 11, 2015
For years Israel and its lobby around the world have been trying to normalise their relations with Arabs and Muslims without solving the Palestine Question.
One of the methods they resorted to in the last few years is using human rights and community organizations such as interfaith dialogue and Multiculturalism to achieve this objective and to: isolate the Palestinians, marginalise the Palestine question, end Israel’s isolation, and prevent criticism of Israel, knowing that these organisations will be the first to stand against Israel’s violations, racial and religious discrimination.
The group responsible for this task in Australia is The Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC); its Director of International & Community Affairs, Jeremy Jones is in charge of lobbying religious community organizations, specifically Muslims and Christians. Consequently he convened the Faith Communities for Reconciliation, founding participant in the Australian Partnership of Religious Organisations and the Australian National Dialogue of Christians, Muslims & Jews.
AIJAC is a private political propaganda group. It is recognised as the main Israeli lobby in Australia. It coordinates its activities and works intimately with the Israeli embassy in Canberra and different institutions in Israel. It is privately funded by some Jewish businessmen. It monitors closely Australian politicians, the media, ethnic and religious groups, (especially Arabs and Muslims), unions and academics on their stands towards Israel and the Palestine question. … continue
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- Israel wants US to bomb more of Iran’s civilian structures (113,000 is not enough) – Not a ceasefire Day 173
- Ann Coulter Rips Into Fox News for Iran War Coverage
- Joe Kent Urges Americans To Call White House and Congress To Object To Sending Troops Into Iran
- DNC Resolution to Reject AIPAC Funding Puts Democratic Leaders in the Hot Seat
- Swedish foundation to build 400 schools as over 650,000 Gaza children remain without education for 2 years
- Israeli army admits photshopping image of slain Lebanese journalist
- This is how Israel is systematically killing health workers under the cover of war in Lebanon
- No Tricks Zone
- New Study Finds Warming Saves Lives…Cold Temperatures 12 Times More Deadly Than Excess Heat
- German Science Blog Accuses PIK Climate Institute Of Hallucinating Climate Tipping Points
- Devastating Assessment Of Comirnaty Vaccine By Former Senior Pfizer Europe Toxicologist
- New Study: CO2 Is ‘Effectively Negligible’ As An Explanatory Climate Change Factor Since 2000
- Former Pfizer Toxicologist Dr. Helmut Sterz Tells Bundestag Hearing Pfizer Vaccine Should Have Never Been Approved
- Energy Expert: Germany’s Nuclear Phaseout Was A “500 Billion Euro Mistake”
- New Research: South Australia’s Mid-Holocene Sea Surface Temperatures Were 4°C Warmer Than Today
- Storing Green Energy To Last Germany 10 Days Would Require A 60-Million Tonne Battery
- New Studies: UK Sea Levels Were 4 Meters Higher Than Today During The Mid-Holocene
- Destructive Green New Deal: German Energy And Metal Group Warns Of Drastic Crisis
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