Liberal journalists rejoice as controversial British blogger Graham Phillips banned from Twitter
Graham Phillips © Facebook / Graham William Phillips
RT | November 21, 2018
Controversial British blogger Graham Phillips has had his Twitter account permanently suspended, prompting many liberal journalists who have been following his activities to rejoice.
According to Phillips – writing in a Facebook post – his account has been “permanently banned,” adding that Twitter has provided “no examples of the ‘hateful content’ they accuse me of.”
Philips’ often unconventional, always confrontational, practices have led to him being maligned by many of his peers.
After his apparent disappearance from Twitter his detractors were quick to post on the numerous other accusations against him. For example, the UK-based independent journalist and filmmaker Jake Hanrahan, who has worked for the BBC, Bellingcat, and The Guardian, has accused him of looting “a dead Ukraine soldier’s body.”
One such critic who has regularly targeted Phillips is Elliot Higgins, head of Bellingcat, a UK-based investigatory website linked to NATO. Higgins has tweeted his delight at the news.
Higgins had invariably sparred with Phillips over Twitter, namely over NATO’s funding for Bellingcat, a supposedly non-partisan organisation.
Meanwhile, the ‘gonzo’ journalist urged his fans to lobby Twitter’s administrators asking them to unlock the account of “an independent British journalist, telling the truth.” Some of his supporters decried the ban as an attack on freedom of speech, urging Twitter to reverse the decision.
The Russian-speaking blogger came to prominence during the conflict in eastern Ukraine, where he was often accused of bias towards the separatists.
In May 2014, Phillips was detained and interrogated by the Security Service of Ukraine, known as the SBU. His subsequent expulsion from the country has not stopped Phillips targeting the Ukrainian government and those he perceives as their supporters.
Most recently he got into an altercation with Ukraine’s ambassador to Austria Alexander Shcherba, Phillips filmed as the men exchanged insults.
Despite his controversies the apparent banning of Phillips, reportedly without stated reason, will come as a worry for those who fear Twitter is purging its platform of alternative voices. Twitter has drawn the ire of conservative media in recent months for a series of purges targeting online commentators and political figures such as Alex Jones and Louis Farrakhan, among others.
Twitter was contacted for comment but had not yet responded at the time of publication.
If click-bait headlines were an art, NYT’s op-ed would be a masterpiece
RT – November 16, 2018
Russia has been scheming for decades to splinter the West with civilization-shattering fake news, claims a shocking three-part film series published by the New York Times. The series was filed under ‘op-ed’ for a reason, however.
READ MORE: https://on.rt.com/9ipe
Russia Accused of Disrupting NATO Drills: Just Another Unfounded Allegation
By Andrei AKULOV | Strategic Culture Foundation | 16.11.2018
Finnish Prime Minister (PM) Juha Sipila has accused Russia of interfering with the Global Positioning System (GPS) in Finland’s Lapland region during the Trident Juncture-2018 NATO exercise. NATO fighter jets and surveillance aircraft landed and took off from the airport in Rovaniemi during that training event. In his weekly interview with the national public broadcasting company YLE Radio Suomi, the PM said the electronic interference was “almost certainly deliberate.” He thinks it is quite likely that Russia was behind the episode, which jeopardized civil aviation in addition to other concerns. An experienced pilot himself, Sipila said that the incident would be treated as a breach of Finnish airspace. Finland has launched an investigation into the matter. Foreign Minister Timo Soini has promised to provide a report to parliament about the alleged Russian jamming.
Norwegian authorities joined in to point a finger at Russia. “The jamming in the period between October 16th and November 7th came from Russian forces on Kola,” said Birgitte Frisch, Special Advisor in the Ministry of Defense. Danish aircraft were not affected but Danish Defense Minister Claus Hjord Frederiksen declared that Russia’s denials of involvement were not convincing. According to him, the GPS jamming incidents were another sign of Russia’s “aggressive” behavior toward neighboring countries. Nothing has been proven, but a Finnish investigation was launched after the accusations had already been made public.
No formal protests have been submitted. All the charges have been denied by Russia. It’s worth noting that neither the US Defense Department nor NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg were willing to comment. Is it conceivable that Russia’s alleged activities affected only the aircraft belonging to these two nations, especially since the American military was playing the biggest role in that exercise? Suppose Russia wanted to test its EW systems. How could the jamming exclude US aircraft and ships? All in all, over 30 countries took part in the training event, but only two of them complained. Were the others not subjected to jamming? If the jamming was so powerful, why were there no accidents? Can Finnish and Norwegian officials explain that? The fact that these very simple questions remain unanswered demonstrates how easy it is to hurl accusations without substantiating one’s claims.
Norway insists the interference came from the Kola Peninsula. The Russians’ best “tactical” electronic warfare (EW) systems, such as the Krasukha-4 or the aircraft-based Khibiny, cannot jam satellites. The state-of-the-art Porubschik EW system is carried by the Ilyushin Il-22PP aircraft. If it had been used, it would have been easy for NATO intelligence to have detected it.
It had to be a “strategic” system. Russia has at least two of them. One is the Samarkand, which has not been deployed as yet. The only system that could have jammed the NATO forces during the exercise would have been the Murmansk-BN. But it is positioned in Kaliningrad, not the Kola Peninsula. Besides, it’s really hard to explain why Russia would have done such a thing. Moscow does not stand to gain anything by jamming NATO GPS communications. The interference could have been caused by solar activity, which can be much more powerful than any conceivable EW system. That happens from time to time. But neither the Finnish nor the Norwegian authorities were willing to consider that possibility. And GPS positioning is normally less accurate in the polar regions anyway.
In 2016, Russia put forward a set of proposals to enhance security in Europe in general and in the Baltic Sea in particular, especially during military exercises. NATO refused to discuss them.
Thank God the Royal Norwegian Navy does not blame Russia for sinking its frigate Helge Ingstad, which hit a tanker during the drills. Many of the foreign servicemen who came to Norway to take part in Trident Juncture behaved badly and drank too much. Underdressed Slovenian soldiers nearly froze to death in Norway. Should Russia be blamed for that too? It has become a trend — Russia is blamed for whatever goes wrong, without any evidence to support such accusations. Those who put the blame on Russia for the glitches affecting the NATO military during these drills that were staged for the purpose of scaring Moscow to death need to do the right thing and provide some answers to these questions.
Austrian Ex-Colonel Accused of Espionage ‘Doesn’t Feel Like a Spy’ – Lawyer
Sputnik – November 14, 2018
The lawyer of the retired Austrian colonel, who is suspected of having passed secret information to Russia for 25 years, insists that his client could have never betrayed state secrets as he had no access to the classified data. According to the local outlet Kronen Zeitung, defender Michael Hofer welcomed the decision of the Salzburg State Court not to arrest the retired colonel.
“My client has assured me that he has not revealed any state secrets. He is very pleased with the decision of the court. He does not feel like a spy,” the lawyer told the media.
The judge dismissed the application for pre-trial detention, citing there’s no danger that the suspect flees. He is said to be optimally socially integrated and has an irreproachable profile. Court spokesman Peter Egger also stated that the accused man has no access to sensitive information anyway since he is retired. Besides, his communications are restricted.
According to the Salzburg prosecutor’s office, the suspect may be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison. The case against the retired officer, who is said to have spied for Moscow between the 1990s and the end of his careers, was made public last week following Kronen Zeitung’s report.
Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz confirmed that a 70-year-old retired Austrian colonel was suspected of spying for Moscow and demanded that Russia provide “transparent” information on the issue. The incident prompted the cancellation of an official visit of Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs Karin Kneissl to Russia.
Addressing the espionage case, Moscow protested to the Austrian Ambassador to Russia, calling the accusations baseless. In response, General-Secretary of the Austrian Interior Ministry Peter Goldgruber expressed hope that the incident would not undermine Austrian-Russian relations.
READ MORE:
UK Gave Austria Info on Ex-Colonel Suspected of Spying for Russia – Reports
AfD MP calls for an end to sanctions against Russia
Centre for Geopolitical Studies | November 10, 2018
Interview conducted by Dragana Trifkovic, Director of the Centre for Geopolitcal Studies with the MP of the German House of Representatives (Bundestag), Mr. Petr Bystron
Dear Mr. Bystron, recently we have met at the International Conference on the Development of Parliamentarism in Moscow recently. In front of representatives of Parliaments from all around the world, international experts and journalists you held a well-received speech, calling for an end to sanctions against Russia. Why?
I demanded an end to sanctions because they have not achieved anything except harming German business. There’s no point to maintaining these useless sanctions any longer.
The Russian-German relations are very complex. On the political agenda, they are burdened with the sanctions which the EU countries imposed to Russia, but on the other hand, Germany and Russia cooperate on a strategic project such as North Stream 2. How do you see the prospect of developing further relations between your country and Russia, and also how the United States relations towards the possibility of greater convergence between Germany and Russia?
Of course German companies are still trying to do business with Russia. The sanctions mainly hurt the meat and fruit exporters, as well as the machine tool industry. Exports dropped as much as 60% in the early days of sanctions in these sectors. Naturally, German businesses want to maintain their traditionally good contacts to Russia. North Stream 2 is just one example of this. But it’s no secret there is a lot of pressure from the United States to stop this project. There was a bipartisan initiative in the U.S. Senate in March supported by 39 Senators, urging the government to do everything it can it stop the pipeline. President Trump has come out against North Stream 2 as well.
I don’t think Germany should let itself be blackmailed by anyone, and should be free to get its energy supplies from wherever is best. Even during the Cold War, Russia was a reliable supplier of energy, and there’s no reason to think that will change.
At the Moscow conference, we discussed about the perspective of Eurointegration of Balkan countries that are not yet members of the EU. You represent the view that the EU has no perspective and that EU candidate countries do not have much to hope for. What are in your opinion the biggest problems in the EU, and are they solvable? What kind of future can expect the EU, and can the EU be reformed and become a functional community?
There are two problems here: First of all, the EU is in no state to accept new members right now, with all its problems. The EU is in a deep crisis and is fighting for its survival. The main example is Brexit, of course: The first nations are leaving the sinking ship. If the EU doesn’t undergo far-reaching and fundamental reform, it is doomed to failure. The Euro currency system is not sustainable in its present form.
These problems have been exacerbated by the migration crisis, which was caused by Angela Merkel’s completely unnecessary and undemocratic opening of the borders in 2015. In a precarious situation like this, it is completely irresponsible to think about expanding the EU even further, especially with candidates who are not able to meet the most basic standards for joining the Union.
We already saw what problems it causes to accept members who don’t meet the criteria or even cheated to get in, as in the case of Greece. The EU now faces huge problems with Greece, Romania and Bulgaria for this reason. These are countries which shouldn’t have been accepted to the EU in the first place. Accepting the West Balkan countries in these circumstances would be tantamount to suicide.
If there is any country from this region which would qualify for membership, both economically and culturally, it is Serbia. Countries like Albania and Macedonia have huge problems in regard to corruption and economic development. And then there’s the problem with Kosovo, which is not recognized as a country by several European nations, Russia or China, for example. That’s a very unstable situation.
The EU wants very much to expand their influence in the Balkans. However, given the current state of the EU, it’s not even advisable for Serbia to want to join the EU, when countries like the UK, Italy and Eastern Europe are moving away from the broken monstrosity in Brussels. Serbia should be glad it is not in the EU, and stand up squarely for its own national interests.
You are particularly interested in the problem of Kosovo and Metohija. The territory of the southern Serbian province since 1999 and the end of the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia is under occupation. The Western powers want to resolve the problem of Kosovo and Metohija outside the framework of international law and UN Security Council Resolution 1244. Negotiations on resolving this issue are underway in Brussels, although Serbia is not a member of the EU and this community has no basis to deal with this problem. How and where, in your opinion, should the issue of Kosovo and Metohija be solved?
Kosovo is a powder keg with no solution in sight. It will remain a problem for many years. I’m convinced the current situation can not be maintained. This territory was part of Serbia for centuries, and I am very sure it will belong to Serbia again in the long run. The EU protectorate in Kosovo will be short-lived.
How well in the German public do you know the facts about what is happening in Kosovo and Metohija and how the so-called democracy in this territory works? Are there known facts about violence against Serbs in the presence of international forces UMNIK, KFOR and EULEX? How well do you know the results of these international missions?
The problem began with the way the EU treated the UCK. We should not be supporting a terrorist organization aiming to break up a country. A group like this would be immediately outlawed if it were trying to break up Germany, for example, and they would all be locked up. In the case of Yugoslavia, the EU and Germany for some reason supported this terrorist group, which was a tragic mistake. We are very concerned about the current situation, the human rights violations and the ethnic cleansing of Serbs in Kosovo.
An entity like Kosovo – which I refuse to call a country – based on injustice and terror, is not viable in the long term, which is evidenced by the continued need for KFOR peacekeeping forces to keep this creation alive.
Recently has been an a discussion in the German Bundestag about the continuation of the mission of German soldiers in Kosovo. At KFOR, there are currently about 400 German soldiers in Kosovo. The Bundestag supported German soldiers remain in Kosovo, thanks to the votes of the ruling CDU / CSU and SPD and the Greens and Liberals (FDP). Alternative for Germany voted against it. How do you assess the mission of the German army in Kosovo and why did you vote against continuation of mission in Kosovo?
This is one of the paradoxes of German politics: That the first German combat mission since WW II was ordered by the formerly pacifist Green Party and their Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer under the Socialist Gerhard Schröder, and they continue to support the KFOR mission. The AfD does not believe in sending German troops to the Balkans, especially not to prop up an artificial entity like Kosovo.
The US supports the formation of the Kosovo Army, although this is contrary to Resolution 1244. German instructors train Albanians to become part of the official army. How is it possible to prevent the taking of illegal actions and violations of the international law by the Western countries?
This is a difficult question and will be a difficult process. But in countries like Germany and the USA, governments and policies can change, thank God. So Serbia needs to be very patient, continue to stand up for itself over the long haul, and reach out to allies and supporters who will see it the same way.
Have you personally, or a delegation from your party Alternative for Germany, visited Kosovo and Metohija? Is there an opportunity for you to do so in the coming period and to make sure of the state of democracy on the spot as well as to evaluate the results of the work of international missions, as well as the the German Bundeswehr?
That’s a good idea. We should definitely visit Serbia and Kosovo with an AfD delegation, to find out more about the situation on the ground. We have already been to Syria, for example, where the situation is completely different from the way it is portrayed in the Western mainstream media, so I’m sure visiting Kosovo would be very interesting.
Petr Bystron is the Speaker of the Alternative for Germany party (AfD)on the Foreign Policy Committee of the German Bundestag.He came to Germany in 1988 as a political refugee and joined the Euro-critical AfD in 2013. He was chair of the AfD for the State of Bavaria 2015-2018. Under his leadership the party reached the best tally of all states in West Germany in the federal elections 2017.
In 2018, he pushed to grant imprisoned British Islam critic Tommy Robinson political asylum in Germany, and filed criminal charges against migrant NGOs engaged in people-smuggling in the Mediterranean. He is a leading political publicist who has won several prizes for his writing and edited a book for University of Geneva with Polish Nobel Peace Prize winner Lech Wałęsa. He is currently one of the 10 most popular German politicians on social media.
We want to believe: ‘Russian hacking’ memo REVEALS how US intel pinned leaks to Kremlin
By Nebojsa Malic | RT | November 10, 2018
A newly-out memo containing the Obama admin’s talking points about “Russian hacking” in the 2016 election reveals how US spy agencies attributed email leaks to the Kremlin by saying it’s “consistent” with what they think Russia does.
The seven-page document was contained within the 49 pages published on Friday by BuzzFeed, which obtained them through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) inquiry from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) in late October. At the root of it is a November 29 letter by several Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee, asking then-President Barack Obama to declassify documents concerning “Russian Active Measures.”
The claim that Russia directly interfered in the 2016 US presidential elections – by first hacking the emails of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chair John Podesta, and then releasing them through DCLeaks, WikiLeaks and the hacker known as “Guccifer 2.0” – was all the rage in Washington at the time, as Democrats sought to explain the fact that Clinton just lost to Donald Trump.
Obama did not declassify the documents. Instead, he apparently instructed DNI James Clapper to respond to the senators. Moving at the speed of government, the ODNI responded on January 27 – a week after Trump’s inauguration – saying that their inquiry resulted in the January 6 release of the intelligence community assessment (ICA) on “Russian activities and intentions.”
This ended up as the infamous report making all sorts of claims and accusations but offering no evidence – and prominently featuring an annex about RT dating back from 2012.
The talking points memo sent by ODNI to the Senate Democrats has not been previously published. Reading through it, one is struck by the circular reasoning of the US “intelligence community” – or rather, Clapper’s hand-picked group of CIA, FBI and NSA people charged with coming up with the assessment.
The US intelligence community is “confident” that the Russian government was behind the “compromises” of emails, because their release is “consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts,” the talking points say. In other words, this fits what US spies believe are Russian objectives, therefore it had to be the Kremlin doing it!
“We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia’s senior-most officials could have authorized these activities,” the memo goes on to say. Again, inference based on assumption, not evidence.
Blaming Russia for the hack of the DNC and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCC) was based on “the forensic evidence identified by a private cyber-firm” – meaning CyberStrike, a DNC contractor led by Atlantic Council fellow Dmitry Alperovich – and the spies “own review and understanding of cyber activities by the Russian Government.”
In plain English, the evidence CrowdStrike gave the intelligence community fit its preconceived notions about Russian cyber operations, which sounds quite convenient.
Remember the accusations that several state election systems were also “hacked” by the Russians? Here is the ODNI, saying that they “are not definitively attributing the intrusions into state elections systems to the Russian Government.” But “the fact that they are consistent with Russian motivations and intent behind the DNC and DCCC intrusions, strongly suggests that Russia is responsible.”
Answering its own question whether Russia is trying to alter the outcome of the election, the ODNI says: “The Kremlin probably expects that publicity surrounding the disclosures will raise questions about the integrity of the election process and would undermine the legitimacy of the President-elect.”
At this point, any TV legal drama would have a charming courtroom lawyer shout out “Objection, speculation!” Except that passage is also a self-fulfilling prophecy. It wasn’t the disclosures of Democrat emails, however, that sowed doubts about the legitimacy of US elections, but rather the absurd conspiracy theory about Trump’s “collusion” with the Kremlin and “Russian hacking,” which the ODNI memo reveals was based on nothing more than the spies wanting to believe it was true.
US Midterm Election Results: Prospects for US-Russian Relations
By Arkady SAVITSKY | Strategic Culture Foundation | 09.11.2018
The midterm elections went largely as expected. Republicans strengthened their position in the Senate and lost their majority in the House. President Trump was not lucky enough to escape the traditional first-term midterm curse. But the expansion of majority control in the Senate is an important achievement. The party that controls the White House has typically lost Senate seats in midterm elections. That didn’t happen this time. What’s more, some staunchly anti-Trump Republicans are no longer there. For instance, two Republican representatives who have been critical of the president — Barbara Comstock and Mike Coffman — lost their races. Senators Bob Corker and Jeff Flake, other Trump critics, are retiring, which will bolster the president’s position inside the GOP congressional caucus. Control over the Senate gives the president a free hand in foreign policy and diminishes the possibility of impeachment to the point that it can no longer be a serious concern.
Since their blue wave was not completely beaten back, Democrats now have a chance to block every initiative put forward by the administration, such as the allocations for the fence to protect the border with Mexico and other steps aimed at curbing migration, the “giant tax cuts for Christmas” that will be offered to individual taxpayers to continue the tax-cutting trend, and the moves to bid a final farewell to Obamacare. A partial government shutdown over spending for the border wall is possible as early as December.
It is true that the Republicans’ failure to hold on to the House is nothing in comparison with what happened in 2010, when the Democrats lost 63 seats there. But a loss is always a loss. The speaker of the House is a very important position that will be used to promote the Democratic Party’s agenda. This could breathe new life into the House Democrats’ attacks against the president over his alleged ties to Russia.
All in all, things have taken a turn for the worse for President Trump and his administration — it is always better to have control over both houses than control over just one of them, even if that one has become stronger. Besides, Republicans lost their races for the governors’ offices in the Great Lakes region — Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — states where Donald Trump won two years ago. On the other hand, support for the president was evidently decisive for Senator Ted Cruze who won a surprisingly competitive Senate race in Texas. With the president’s help, GOP candidates won Senate seats in Indiana, Missouri, and North Dakota.
The results prove that Donald Trump is apparently much more popular than his opponents believed. Democrats won only a relatively small majority in the House. Despite all of the president’s verbal gaffes and missteps, he clearly has the support of a broad sector of American society. And now this is clear to everyone. By adopting a policy of total obstruction, Democratic lawmakers might be paying only lip service to their party. Many things could change during the next two years, but today Donald Trump is in a strong position to win a second term and lead the Republican Party to success in 2020. The strong economy improves his chances.
How does the outcome of the midterms impact US-Russian relations? Even before the election results were known, the State Department had issued a statement saying Russia was to face “more draconian” US sanctions over the alleged “Skripal poisoning.” It read, “Today, the department informed Congress we could not certify that the Russian Federation met the conditions.” The administration knows that anti-Russian, anti-Chinese, and anti-Iranian sentiments are running high in Congress, on both sides of the aisle. Several sanctions bills that will affect the Russian economy will soon be considered by Congress, including the Defending American Security from Kremlin Aggression Act, which proposes restrictions on both purchases by US citizens of Russia’s sovereign debt as well as investments in Russian energy projects. These rounds of sanctions will continue to mount.
With a Democratic majority in the House of Representatives, “Russiagate” will force the president to adopt a tougher stance toward Moscow. This calls into question the fate of a full-fledged Putin-Trump summit, at least prior to November 2020. It could lower the odds of any progress in arms control.
On the other hand, the president would not be putting himself in any danger by extending the New START Treaty or launching negotiations over a new strategic nuclear-arms agreement. The idea of renewing New START in 2021 seems to be fading, but no one would gain if arms control became a historical artifact. Democratic control of the House does not prevent Donald Trump from addressing this problem. With a Republican majority in the Senate, a new treaty has a good chance of being ratified. Extending New START will strengthen, not weaken, the president’s position.
No summit is needed for doing something as simple as reviving the forgotten 1972 Incidents at Sea Agreement or the 1989 Prevention of Dangerous Military Activities Agreement. The impasse in the talks on Ukraine does not prevent a dialog on Syria. The situation in Libya is clearly an urgent problem of mutual concern. The deterioration in the relationship does not rule out the possibility of maintaining unofficial contacts, including between groups of experts. If the two countries continue to cooperate in space, they can cooperate in other areas too. The president has his hands tied regarding domestic issues, but he enjoys even greater foreign-policy freedom than before. He could use it to boost his popularity before the 2020 presidential race. Lowering the threat of war is one sure way to gain more voters’ support.
75,000 Russian expats spying in London? Their handlers’ workload must be a nightmare!
By Simon Rite | RT | November 7, 2018
The true scale of the workload facing Russia’s foreign intelligence agents has been revealed by a London based think tank, which estimates half of all Russian expats in the British capital are spies or informants.
I’m no mathematician, but that seems like a hell of lot of work to get through. In essence, the report from the right-wing Henry Jackson Society – never one to exaggerate scant evidence to justify its existence – suggests that anywhere up to 75,000 Russians are providing intelligence to around 500 spy runners. The paperwork must be a nightmare and the lunches on expenses a massive drain on the Russian budget.
The Henry Jackson Society has collected quotes from all the usual suspects (in this report they’re called Russia-watchers) added in some facts that appear to be dug up from a Google news search, and titled its report ‘Putin Sees and Hears It All’. It’s the perfect subject for this kind of think tank, because they can say almost anything they want.
Before I saw this report, I thought it was unacceptable to attempt to incite suspicion towards an entire community. I thought that a professional organization might look at an outlandish claim that 50 percent of an entire group of people are involved in espionage and conclude that the estimate seems a little top heavy and not include it. I thought when including an estimate that could potentially inflame an already tense situation, at least the sources would be on the record, not anonymous, and there would be more than 16 of them. Well, this report has taught me a lot.
I’ve actually noticed signs of outrage in London’s Russian expat community following this airtight, not at all speculative report. If 50 percent of them are spies, that means 50 percent of them aren’t, and that half want to know what’s wrong with them – why haven’t they been chosen?
There are also signs of relief though, because in my experience, expat Russians have already adapted to the fact that everyone thinks they’re spies anyway, so this report actually offers some kind of relief – at least now only 50 percent of them pose a risk to the local population. A new kind of Russian roulette.
This is the line which is causing most of the fuss: “Perhaps reflecting the level of paranoia within London’s Russian community, interviewees and interlocutors suggested that anywhere between a quarter and a half of Russian expats were, or have been, informants.”
That phrase “Interviewees and interlocutors suggested,” certainly sounds like a legit source of information to include in a report which seeks to target 50 percent of an entire community, doesn’t it?
Vladimir Ashurkov, the Russian expat quoted in the report just before this line, actually responded after publication by saying that actually he thought it was probably closer to 5 percent. The one Russian expat named in the report disputed the claim. Author Dr. Andrew Foxall said on Twitter that Ashurkov was not one of the “interviewees and interlocutors” who suggested that half of all Russian expats are informants, only the unnamed anonymous ones did that. Again, seems legit.
I have a wide circle of Russian friends, all of them so far have told me how ridiculous they think this report is, but then, they would wouldn’t they?! All I can do is applaud their training and try not to let any state secrets slip in front of them.
Is there any advice on how to spot these foreign agents? The report says some “will be Russian nationals living openly in Britain under their real identities, but with few (if any) links to Russia’s intelligence and security agencies (so-called ‘non-official cover’). Yet more still will travel to the UK on short operational visits, either under their own names or with false identities, using standard immigration routes.”
So to paraphrase, suspect all Russians, even the ones just on holiday with no links to Russia’s security agencies.
Some argue that inciting this kind of suspicion towards any other group of people would be dismissed as xenophobia, in fact some Russians have suggested that, but they’re probably just spies aren’t they?
The true value in this report can be seen in Andrew Foxall’s defence of his findings online, where he admits he’s played fast and loose with his figures. He estimated that there are 150,000 Russians in London because that’s what a Guardian article said in 2014.
Foxall admitted that more recent official statistics say it’s more like 70,000. Whoever is funding this think tank (check that out, you’ll be amazed who it is) is paying its analysts to copy and paste from newspapers.
I have decided to put together a little report of my own, using this think tank’s own methods. I’ve asked five Russians living in London whether they are informants, they’ve all said no, so I estimate that this report from the Henry Jackson Society is bulls***. Full findings will be released soon.
US to impose ‘additional sanctions’ on Russia over Skripal poisoning claim
RT | November 6, 2018
Washington will move to impose additional sanctions against Russia, saying Moscow did not meet its demands by the deadline set by the US and accusing Moscow of a chemical attack against a former spy and his daughter in the UK.
“Today, the Department informed Congress we could not certify that the Russian Federation met the conditions required by the Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act of 1991,” spokeswoman Heather Nauert said on Tuesday. “We intend to proceed in accordance with the terms of the CBW Act, which directs the implementation of additional sanctions.”
Those sanctions may include downgrading diplomatic relations, banning the Russian national carrier Aeroflot from flying to the US, and cutting off nearly all imports and exports, already severely curtailed under a series of sanctions since 2014.
In August, the State Department sent Moscow a note claiming that Russia had violated the CBW Act by using “Novichok” nerve agent against Sergey Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury.
The Skripals were hospitalized in early March, and the British government accused Moscow of using the deadly toxin. The UK government has offered no evidence for its claims, but the US and a number of NATO countries took London’s word for it and expelled over 150 Russian diplomats. Russia has retaliated in kind.
Among the demands from Foggy Bottom was that Russia stop using chemical weapons and provide “reliable” assurances to the US it will not do so again, subject to verification by international inspectors. Moscow was given a three-month deadline to fulfill these conditions.
“Everyone who is at least a little bit familiar with the so-called Skripal case understands the absurdity of the statement contained in the official State Department document,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the time. Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said any further US sanctions could be considered a declaration of a trade war.
Russia says the last of its chemical weapons were destroyed in 2017, and that this was verified by international observers.
Norway Needs to Apologize, Explain Fabricated Bochkarev Arrest – Russian Embassy
Sputnik – 06.11.2018
Moscow is expecting explanations and apologies from the Norwegian authorities over the arrest of Russian citizen Mikhail Bochkarev in Oslo in September on fabricated espionage charges, the Russian Embassy in Norway said Tuesday.
“This provocation involves people who ordered it and those who carried it out. They must be held responsible. Russia is expecting serious explanations and apologies from the Norwegian side,” the embassy said in a statement on its Facebook blog.
On September 21, Mikail Bochkarev, a staff employee of the Russian upper house of parliament, was detained on espionage charges at the Gardermoen airport outside the capital, Oslo, following his participation in an IT conference in Norway’s parliament, arranged by the European Centre for Parliamentary Research and Documentation (ECPRD). He was later released and sent back to Russia.
Bochkarev told reporters waiting for him at the Moscow airport he had expected Norway to drop charges because he was innocent. He called accusations against him “baseless” and “absurd.”
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From the Archives
A sample of vaccine and injectable medication tragedies during my lifetime
This is what happens when you demand speedy production in an era of politicized regulation
By Meryl Nass, MD | February 12, 2022
All these tragedies have been due to failures of testing or failures in manufacturing processes. Most occurred before vaccine manufacturers were given virtually complete protection from liability in 1987.
With the duration of patent exclusivity determining how much new products earn, products are rushed to market as quickly as possible, most using a shortened path for FDA review. Recalls and market removals of approved products are much more common than they used to be. We can only expect more of these disasters in the future, especially if the products are mandated for everyone. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Albania’s Crisis: Rama, Israeli Investments and the Demand for Accountability
- Hezbollah Categorically Denies Syrian Accusations: We Aim at Confronting Israeli Enemy, Not Undermining Syria’s Stability
- Trump claims funding to Israel ending in 2026 as merger of Israeli–US armies looms
- Iran Weathering The Storm, But Saudi Arabia Is Sinking
- Sunk Ships Don’t Sail Home: Why Peace Won’t Save the Oil Market and War Will Wreck It
- No Cossacks at the gates, fix Italy instead – opposition leader to Meloni
- The Pits: Zelensky’s torture chamber network in the public eye
- Moscow mocks Kiev’s language hypocrisy exposed by ‘torture chamber’ scandal
- Military ‘torture chamber’ triggers new scandal in Kiev
- Algerian army launches second operation to clear French nuclear test sites
- If Americans Knew
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- No Tricks Zone
- Germany’s Green Energy Transition Becoming Increasingly Expensive…Another 6 Trillion Euros!
- Sudden Stratospheric Warming, Powerful El Niño Combination May Lead To Extreme Europe Cold, Energy Crisis!
- Two New Studies Find Thwaites Glacier Melt Cannot Be Driven By Human Activity Or A Warming Ocean
- E-Cars Reduce CO2 Emissions By Only 41% Compared To Internal Combustion Engine Vehicles
- Predictions Made By Renowned Climate Professor Over Past Decades Have Been Proven To Be Poor
- New Study Suggests Large Regions Of The Pacific Ocean Have Been Cooling For The Last 80 Years
- Germany’s Green Energy Debacle: High Energy Costs Force Kahla Porzellan to Close After 182 Years!
- New Study: 50 Years Of The Most Aggressive ‘Net Zero’ Policies Can Only Affect The Global Climate By 0.03°C
- US September “Heat” Was No Record…Many Records Set Decades Ago
- Latest European Green Energy Debacle; Portugal’s Largest Flagship Solar Park Insolvent!
