EU Refuses Support to Hungary, Slovakia on Russian Oil Transit Dispute With Ukraine
Sputnik – 25.07.2024
The European Union has denied its support to Hungary and Slovakia after they sought to force Ukraine to restore Russian oil transit to the bloc, the Financial Times reported citing sources familiar with the matter.
EU Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis told the FT that Brussels would need more time to gather evidence and assess the legal situation. Eleven of the EU nations attending a meeting of trade officials on Wednesday backed his stance and none took the side of Budapest and Bratislava, diplomats told the FT.
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Monday that Hungary and Slovakia had asked the European Commission to launch consultations with Ukraine after it stopped the transit of oil through the Druzhba pipeline. Szijjarto also said that Hungary would not approve the allocation of 6.5 billion euros ($7 billion) for arms sent to Ukraine through the European Peace Facility until the issue was resolved.
Ukraine’s trade agreement reportedly contains a clause that provides for the possibility of suspending oil transit. An EU diplomat was quoted as saying by FT that disruption in Russian oil supplies would have a “huge impact” on the central European nation.
Last week, Szijjarto said that Ukraine stopped the transit of Lukoil’s oil. The Slovak Economy Ministry confirmed that the country was no longer receiving oil from the Russian oil giant, which was sanctioned by Ukraine. Slovakia’s Slovnaft refinery imports Russian crude from another supplier, but the country is discussing the current situation with Ukraine.
People must agree to give up freedoms for survival – Kiev’s ex-top general

Valery Zaluzhny. © Alexey Furman/Getty Images
RT | July 23, 2024
The Western nations should “wake up” to the threat of a potential major conflict they are facing, Valery Zaluzhny, Ukraine’s former military commander-in-chief, told a British military conference on Monday. The governments should make sure their nations are ready to “mobilize” and sacrifice their liberties in the name of what he called “survival” if such a conflict does break out, said Zaluzhny, who in May became Kiev’s ambassador to London.
Readiness for a war “should be considered as a huge set of measures” that covers all fields of state activity, the former general told the Land Warfare Conference 2024 hosted by the Royal United Services Institute. “Modern wars… are total,” he said, adding that “they require efforts… of society as a whole.”
Waging a war means that a state has to use all its “resources,” including “economics, finance, population and allies,” Zaluzhny stated, in a speech that he published in full on social media. “Society must agree to temporarily give up a range of freedoms for the sake of survival.”
The ex-general also claimed that what he called “the war for freedom in one country” in an apparent reference to Kiev’s standoff against Moscow “should become the policy of survival” for other nations.
In his speech, Zaluzhny claimed that “the very existence of Russia is already a threat.” He also referred to Moscow as an “eternal enemy” engaged in “the primordial struggle” with Kiev.
The military commander-turned-envoy also stated that the ongoing conflict would determine the future of wars for decades to come and called it a “war of the transitional period” that would set new rules of warfare. He also repeatedly spoke about the growing role of technologies on the battlefield but did not mention any specific ones, except for unmanned systems.
According to Zaluzhny, Ukraine had “already invented a way to fight and win against stronger armies in the 21st century.” He still admitted that Kiev cannot “scale up” its supposedly innovative warfare solutions but its backers in the West “have resources but … no applied and practical field to test them.” The former general then called on the West to work “together” with Ukraine to “effectively use the resource.” A failure to do so would mean that “we will all die,” he claimed.
Zaluzhny, who had served as the country’s military commander-in-chief since 2021, was dismissed by Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky in February after a massive counteroffensive that ended up in a major failure for Kiev. Some media reported at that time that Zelensky also viewed the veteran general as a political rival. In May, Zaluzhny was relieved from active service and appointed an ambassador to the UK.
What Is Joe Biden’s Legacy?

By Oleg Burunov – Sputnik – 22.07.2024
Biden announced he is dropping out of the 2024 presidential race on July 21. It came amid calls by prominent Democrats and donors to withdraw following his performance in last month’s debate against former President Donald Trump.
In a statement on his decision to withdraw from the 2024 presidential race, President Joe Biden also reflected on the results of his four years in office, claiming that the US has built the “strongest economy in the world.”
He touted efforts to expand what he described as “affordable healthcare to a record number of Americans,” also arguing that his administration allegedly provided “critically needed care to a million veterans exposed to toxic substances.”
Is It So, Joe?
First and foremost, the US economic meltdown shows no signs of abating, with 36% of Americans recently surveyed by Pew Research rating the national economy as “poor”. Add to this the fact that America’s state debt, which now stands at nearly $34.4 trillion, is rising by $1 trillion about every 100 days.
Also, the US migration crisis persists as new data by the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reveals a significant surge in illegal border crossings, with more than 205,000 apprehensions in June alone, pushing the total for fiscal year 2024 to 2.5 million.
Drug overdose, meanwhile, remains one of the leading causes of injury death in adults in the US and has risen over the past several years. Overdoses specifically pertain to synthetic opioids (fentanyl) and stimulants (cocaine and methamphetamine), according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.
Biden’s Foreign Policy Track Record
The Ukraine crisis is in full swing, as the Biden administration continues to add fuel to the fire by providing the Kiev regime with military supplies despite Russia’s repeated warnings that such assistance would only prolong the standoff.
Separately, the Gaza war is still in place despite Biden’s much-hyped plan to help clinch a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. The US president last month said that the Gaza war must end now and Israel must not occupy the Palestinian enclave after the end of hostilities – another statement that apparently fell on the Jewish state’s deaf ears.
As a cherry on the top, Biden failed to deliver on his promise to restore the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, with the Vienna talks on the matter finally coming to a standstill.
From Clinton Fraud to Trump-Zelensky Call: Recalling CrowdStrike’s Shady Politics Amid IT Outage
By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 20.07.2024
A sloppy update to software made by US cybersecurity giant CrowdStrike has taken PCs and servers used by airlines, railways, banks, broadcasters and even medical facilities around the world offline. For anyone following US politics over the past decade or so, the company’s name should be eerily familiar.
CrowdStrike is making global headlines (and causing global headaches) this week after an update released Friday morning afflicted thousands of corporate machines running Microsoft products with the infamous blue screen of death error.
While the company has already put out a fix, the buggy update is expected to cause billions of dollars and hours in lost productivity, and experts say it may take “weeks” for businesses and governments worldwide to fully recover.
But behind the company’s reputation as a major provider of endpoint security products is the odd routineness of its name popping up in US politics.
During the 2016 US presidential election, the Clinton campaign asked none other than CrowdStrike for help investigating the hack attack against the Democratic National Committee – which had revealed embarrassing info about the party’s efforts to rig the nomination process in Mrs. Clinton’s favor.
CrowdStrike’s probe gave rise to the very first claims that Russia was behind the DNC hack, and the company provided its “forensic evidence and analysis” to the FBI, starting the ball rolling on the Russiagate conspiracy theory that Donald Trump was colluding with Russia to “steal” the election.
CrowdStrike executive Shawn Henry admitted under oath in congressional testimony in 2017 that the company had no “concrete evidence” to back up its “Russian hackers” story, but by that point it was too late, and Trump would spend virtually the entirety of his term in office dogged by the “collusion” claims.
CrowdStrike’s name also came up in the infamous 2019 phone call between Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky, with the then-US president asking Zelensky to “do us a favor” and “find out what happened” with CrowdStrike’s server, which Trump said was in Ukraine. The Trump team was convinced that CrowdStrike planted evidence on the DNC server to frame Russia while covering up Ukraine’s own efforts to “weaken the Trump bandwagon” during the 2016 race. Democratic politicians and anti-Trump media dismissed the president’s suspicions as groundless.
The Trump-Zelensky phone call, in which he also asked Kiev to look into then former vice president Joe Biden’s role in firing of a prosecutor probing his son Hunter Biden’s alleged corrupt activities while working for Ukrainian energy company Burisma, wound up sparking the first Trump impeachment in 2019.
CrowdStrike was also one a handful of firms tapped by the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency in 2021 to work out a ‘whole-of-nation’ cyber defense plan. The initiative has been criticized as an attempt to strengthen the US intelligence and Big Tech’s surveillance powers using cybersecurity as a cover.
The same year, CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz blamed Russian hackers for the 2020 SolarWinds hack attack on the US Federal Government, but curiously admitted the company had no information of its own “to corroborate that finding.”
‘PR Nightmare’
“The PR aspect is of course a nightmare for CrowdStrike,” veteran independent cybersecurity expert Lars Hilse told Sputnik, commenting on Friday’s outage and the impact it’s had on the company’s image and stock price.
CrowdStrike’s market cap plunged by $12.5 billion, and its CEO George Kurtz saw over $320 million shaved from his personal fortune. The company stock’s price fell from about $343 to $302 per share, signaling that about 12 percent of the company’s market value has been wiped out.
Interestingly, not everyone in the company came out of the outage in the red, with Chief Security Officer Shawn Henry selling off 4,000 shares of CrowdStrike Holdings’ common stock on July 15 for $371.32 per share, or $1.49 million total, according to Security and Exchange Commission data.
Hilse says the main “lesson” from the CrowdStrike mess will be the demand that cybersecurity companies improve testing before rolling out critical updates – something especially important if they’re done as “a single update being pushed to a plethora of customers running cloud-based solutions, including those responsible for the flawless operation of critical infrastructure like airports, banks, etc.”
“With increasing reliance on technology comes exponentially increasing impact on society if these technologies fail, whether through a deliberate/targeted attack, or a faulty piece of software, like in this case,” Hilse emphasized.
Russian cybersecurity specialist Alexei Lukatskiy told Sputnik Russia has been able to dodge the CrowdStrike bullet thanks to strong homegrown cybersecurity companies. Friday’s outages thus serve as another important “lesson” for Russia, which has been “gradually switching away from products by foreign vendors to Russian ones,” that it’s on the right track, he said.
Another important takeaway, according to Lukatskiy, is the modern world’s increasingly critical level of dependence on computers. “IT has penetrated into a wide array of different areas, and the owners of companies working in critical industries must understand all the consequences and evaluate the unacceptable events that may occur due to the seeming failure of an ordinary computer…,” he said.
Recall that CrowdStrike Lied About DNC Server “Hack” in 2016
By John Leake | Courageous Discourse™ | July 20, 2024
second I saw the news yesterday that computers all over the world had been taken down—causing widespread disruptions to travel, medical care and an array of businesses—I couldn’t help wondering if it was an implicit reminder of how dependent we are on global computer systems, and therefore how vulnerable we are.
Then I saw the outage was purportedly traced to CrowdStrike—the same Austin-based cybersecurity hired by the DNC in 2016 to investigate the alleged “hack” of its server. The security breach resulted in the leak of incredibly embarrassing e-mails revealing John Podesta, Hillary Clinton, and DNC leadership performing all manner of Machiavellian machinations.
Back then, when I read the Wikileaks e-mails, I immediately wondered, “How are these villains going to change the subject from the content of their e-mails to something else? What misdirection trick are they going to pull?”
Enter CrowdStrike, which the DNC hired to do a forensic cybersecurity analysis of the DNC server. Shortly thereafter, CrowdStrike claimed that Russian agents had hacked it.
It didn’t matter that there was no evidence of this, as CrowdStrike President Shawn Henry admitted under oath in a declassified December 2017 interview before the House Intelligence Committee. The lying mainstream media still ran with the story that became Russian Collusion HOAX—the biggest fraud of the decade.
Even though former NSA Technical Director, William Binney, tried to tell anyone who would listen that the leak must have resulted from a DNC insider who downloaded the e-mails onto a storage device, no major mainstream media outlet would listen to him.
I wondered about Binney’s concept on a DNC insider when I researched the mysterious death of DNC insider Seth Rich (An Extraordinary Unsolved Murder in Washington D.C.) shortly before the accusation of Russian hacking was made.
Did Rich—who was apparently disaffected with the DNC because of its shabby treatment of Bernie Sanders—reveal to someone that he knew that the leak was not the result of an external hack, thereby prompting the perception that he could easily debunk the Russian-Collusion Hoax if he weren’t silenced forever?
Now, less than one week after whoever is running this country allowed a would-be assassin to climb onto a roof and take a shot at Donald Trump on a stage 400 feet away, we are told that CrowdStrike’s defective update to its security software knocked out global IT systems.
It seems to me that CrowdStrike should be viewed with grave suspicion and that businesses should be asking if it is prudent to have CrowdStrike software running on their computer systems.
Ukrainian language rejected by children in Russian-majority regions
By Lucas Leiroz | July 18, 2024
The forced imposition of the Ukrainian language in regions with a non-Ukrainian ethnic majority appears to be failing. There has been a decline in the use of the Ukrainian language in the country’s schools, according to a report recently published by the Kiev media. The case clearly shows how, despite the use of force and violence, the neo-Nazi regime will have great difficulty in imposing its cultural agenda in the country’s remote regions.
Since 2014, the official use of Russian and other non-Ukrainian languages has been sharply reduced. The de-Russification measures were further intensified after the start of the special military operation, when the Kiev regime received a “carte blanche” by Western sponsors to commit all sorts of crimes, including ethnic and cultural genocide, an almost total ban on the Russian language and literature having happened since then.
However, despite efforts to eradicate the cultural and linguistic identity of ethnic Russians, the rejection of the Ukrainian language has been increasing throughout the country. A recent survey by the State Service for the Quality of Education showed that in the 2023/2024 academic year, only 74% of students stated that Ukrainian was their mother language. The previous year, the figure was 91%, which shows that there has been a significant drop in the number of children who identify as native speakers of Ukrainian.
Moreover, the drop is not limited to children. Similar data were also revealed in surveys of parents (93% to 82%) and teachers (94% to 86%). In practice, it is possible to say that there is a massive decline in the use of the Ukrainian language, with all the efforts of the neo-Nazi government to assimilate other ethnic groups having failed.
New statistics indicate that currently less than 40% of children in the country use Ukrainian exclusively in their informal activities. The figures naturally vary according to Ukraine’s geography, with more Ukrainian speakers in the western regions, where there are fewer ethnic Russians. Around 17% of children speak Ukrainian in the east of the country, while around 74% speak this language in the west.
It is important to remember that, in addition to Russian, other non-Ukrainian languages are used in the country by ethnic minorities, who are also suffering the impacts of cultural genocide policies. This is the case of the Hungarian language, for example, which is used in the Transcarpathian region, where Hungarians currently live in a situation similar to that of Russians in Donbass, being victims of apartheid-like measures. Despite all the persecution, however, these ethnic minorities refuse to abandon their cultural identity and continue to speak their languages.
This scenario in Ukraine was already expected by some experts. Implementing measures of ethnic and cultural cleansing is not easy. People affected by the measures tend to react by using their language even more intensely, as an act of political activism to preserve their cultural heritage. Amid the current conflict situation, some Russian families in Ukraine see the use of their native language as the last chance to preserve their identity amid the Russophobic madness that the authorities want to impose on all citizens.
In addition, there are basic sociological issues that explain the continued use of the Russian language. The authorities have no way of monitoring which language is being used in informal and family activities. Ethnic Russian citizens use their native language to engage in unofficial sociability, rejecting the Ukrainian language during casual conversations in shopping malls, in churches and other places.
With the survey data revealed, it is possible that Kiev will increase its repressive measures against Russian speakers even further from now on. The total banning of this language throughout the country remains one of the main goals of the neo-Nazi regime. Knowing the failure of the efforts so far, it is very likely that the violence will be intensified in an act of desperation to make the cultural genocide successful.
However, any action in this direction is likely to fail. Kiev will only further expand social and ethnic tensions, polarizing Russians and Ukrainians within the country and generating a crisis of instability that could seriously affect the regime’s mobilization plans during this war. Destroying an ethnic and cultural identity is not easy and Kiev will certainly not succeed, given the current Ukrainian state’s inability to maintain full control over what happens in the country.
Lucas Leiroz, member of the BRICS Journalists Association, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert.
You can follow Lucas on X (formerly Twitter) and Telegram.
Scholz orders closure of one of the opposition’s largest media networks after interview with Zakharova
By Ricardo Nuno Costa – New Eastern Outlook – 17.07.2024
On 16 July, Jürgen Elsässer (67) woke up startled at 6 a.m., opened the door of his house while still in his dressing gown, and in front of him were dozens of police officers, some with their faces covered, heavily armed, in a surreal image befitting any authoritarian state. However, it was in Brandenburg, on the outskirts of Berlin, in the Germany of the tragicomic Scholz government, aka the ‘Traffic Light’ coalition.
The police were about to raid his house, while more than 200 federal and Brandenburg state agents were deployed to carry out further searches in eight other houses and offices in the region. Other raids were carried out in the states of Saxony, Hesse and Saxony-Anhalt, ordered by Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD), who had ordered Compact to be closed by decree as an ‘association’, when it was legally a publishing house. She also banned any activity by the audiovisual company that produced Compact’s content, such as its YouTube, Facebook and Instagram accounts.
The minister later explained that Compact ‘incites hatred against Jews, against people with a history of migration and against our parliamentary democracy in an indescribable way’. According to the Ministry, the legal basis is the Law on Associations, according to which organisations that are directed against the free and democratic basic order can also be banned.
‘The ban shows that we are also taking action against intellectual arsonists who are fuelling a climate of hatred and violence against refugees and migrants and who want to bypass our democratic state,’ the minister explained. “Our message is very clear: we will not allow ethnicity to define who belongs in Germany and who does not. Our rule of law protects all those who are harassed because of their faith, their origin, the colour of their skin or even their democratic position.”
As early as 2022, the German intelligence services (BND) considered that Compact, ‘as a multimedia company, conveys anti-democratic positions in society and against human dignity’, and since then, it has been classified as far-right by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and under suspicion.
Interviewed by journalists during the police search of the house where he lives with his wife and partner in the company, Elsässer said that ‘in 14 years of existence there has not been a single criminal charge against his magazine’, which is why he was surprised by the minister’s announcement. He also said that he was in contact with his lawyer to defend his rights and jokingly imitated Donald Trump with his fist raised saying that he was ‘ready for a fight’.
Mixed reactions in the press
While journalists from the mainstream media are refusing to give this episode its due importance, others have seen the government’s unusual decision as a clear warning sign. Opinions were divided between the established media and the few journalists still struggling to report, and the internet was abuzz with the event. The tag #Compact was the main topic on German Twitter throughout the day, and Germans and foreigners alike made the Scholz government’s persecution of the media viral. Germany is under the scrutiny of international public opinion for the worst reasons.
Elsässer complains that this is ‘the biggest attack on press freedom in Germany since the 1962 Spiegel Magazine scandal’. At that time, it was discovered that the Adenauer government wanted to silence several journalists by illegal means for political reasons. When this was discovered, Defence Minister Franz Josef Strauß and two state secretaries had to resign. However, not even then was a troublesome media outlet banned, as it is now with his case. Elsässer says that only in the GDR and during National Socialism were things like this scene.
The metamorphosis of Elsässer, the current standard-holder of Germany’s ‘new right’
Jürgen Elsässer is a long-time political activist. With a degree in history and a short career as a teacher, he started out in the far-left anti-German movement in the 1970s, wrote books with a strong anti-national slant, worked on the editorial boards of various left-wing publications such as Junge Welt, Neues Deutschland, he collaborated with Der Freitag and the Jüdische Allgemeine and was editor-in-chief of Konkret magazine, until after disagreements with other elements, he founded Compact magazine in 2010, with the idea of bringing together the best of the left and the right in a transversal front (‘Querfront’), based on national sovereignty, the multipolar world and the rejection of the EU and NATO.
In 2017, with the demonstrations against Merkel’s open-door immigration policy, he joined forces with the leader of the AfD in Thuringia, Björn Höcke, considered a quasi-neo-Nazi, and Martin Sellner, leader of Austria’s Identity Movement. Since then, the magazine has become a major reference point for the so-called ‘new right’ and Elsässer has become one of the central figures in the German nationalist spectrum.
His political proposal and trajectory are controversial and very heterodox. He clearly calls for the ‘remigration’ of non-European foreigners, makes claims to Polish territories, likes to provoke his opponents, has aligned himself with openly Islamophobic elements such as Michael Stürzenberger or the PEGIDA movement, has played on the edge, but always within the rules of the game. At least until today.
Elsässer is an experienced figure, with a huge culture and a large archive of articles and books written, where he has changed his mind, or at least his appearance. He says that he hasn’t changed at all, that he remains in the same political position as he was 40 years ago.
He worked for the Die Linke parliamentary group as a member of the BND enquiry committee in the Bundestag. He is an insightful expert on geopolitical issues. In 2012, he was received by then president Mahmoud Ahmedinejad in Tehran, together with a German entourage. About that trip to Iran, he said he enjoyed everything, only missing a good cold beer, like the good German he claims to be. He recently teamed up with Maximilian Krah, the AfD’s European frontrunner, who advocates a Germany that guarantees its status as a pole in the multipolar world that has already been born and is taking its first steps.
A quality magazine
Compact magazine was the centrepiece of the network that included audiovisual channels, the organisation of events, conferences, the publishing and sale of books and Compact TV, with its YouTube channel, which recently reached one million views a day.
Over the years, you could say that the magazine has moved to the right. In 2014, it dedicated a cover to Netanyahu, in which it accused him of perpetrating a ‘Genocide in Gaza’, then shifted its focus to criticising immigration, especially of Islamic origin. Later articles were also read against Hamas. With the pandemic, it took a clear stance against the government, the pharmaceutical industry and the accusation of a biological warfare conspiracy by the great powers of the West.
With Russia’s entry into Ukraine, it advocated dialogue with Moscow and the resumption of Russian energy. It was one of the few media outlets to do an exhaustive report on the Nord Stream attacks, to which it devoted almost an entire issue. In its December 2023 issue, it details how an extremely powerful Zionist sect with global reach, currently in the Israeli government, is planning an eschatological end-of-times war with catastrophic consequences for the whole world.
The absence of the Compact has already been felt since the arrival of the ‘Traffic Light’ government. Heavy pressure on distributors led to the magazine disappearing from petrol stations, supermarkets, newsagents and bookshops. Little by little, it was confined to subscribers. It was one of the few magazines where you could read good geopolitical articles.
The German typhoon
The magazine ban is just one more of the government’s decisions that threaten to divide German society, but it doesn’t seem to bother the establishment, either in the government or in the opposition on the traditional right.
Brandenburg’s Interior Minister Michael Stübgen (CDU) welcomed the federal government’s move. Stübgen accused the magazine of spreading ‘Russian war propaganda and conspiracy theories against the democratic order’. He also said that ‘this platform of enemies of democracy has only one goal, which is the destruction of our liberal society’.
In a comment on social media, historian Hermann Ploppa, identified with the left wing and linked to the famous alternative politics portal Apolut, confesses that ‘the Compact is not to my liking. A lot of it is simply disgusting. But there is no violation of the law. It’s also clear that the Compact ban is the opening fanfare to suppress the inconvenient media. That’s why we shouldn’t stand idly by. WE ARE NEXT.”
Across the party spectrum, only the AfD criticised the magazine ban. The party’s leaders, Tino Chrupalla and Alice Weidel, jointly announced on Tuesday that it was a ‘serious blow to press freedom’. ‘The banning of a media organisation means the denial of discourse and diversity of opinion.’ According to the far-right party, the interior minister is abusing her powers to ‘suppress critical information’.
Sahra Wagenknecht’s BSW had not commented on the Compact ban at the time of writing. Wagenknecht has been on the cover of the magazine on more than one occasion. In its December 2022 issue, she was described as ‘The best chancellor: A candidate for left and right’. The relationship between Elsässer and Wagenknecht goes back to the 90s. In 1996, a still communist Elsässer interviewed his comrade Wagenknecht, long before he became one of the main ideologues of the new ‘Querfront’ between the ‘left of labour and the right of values’, an enterprise for which he has called on Wagenknecht to participate on several occasions in recent times.
The Zakharova interview
If the move against Compact magazine didn’t come without warning, it did coincide with the interview with Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, conducted two days earlier by Compact’s Moscow correspondent Hansjörg Müller and broadcast on the magazine’s website and YouTube channel.
With hundreds of thousands of hits on the first day on the website and more than 250,000 on YouTube, Zakharova ridiculed the “traffic light” government in the one-and-a-half hour interview. She sharply criticised the policies of Scholz, Baerbock and the sanctions, which not only destroy relations between Berlin and Moscow, but also harm Germany’s own interests, all at the behest of “third-party interests”.
The Russian spokeswoman also alluded to the problem of immigration in Germany, which she said had geopolitical origins, with Berlin playing a subservient role to “US and British operations in the Middle East and Southern Africa”, which are causing the migratory chaos that is burdening Europe.
She also spoke about Germany’s obligations under the 1999 2+4 Treaty, the murky role of the German authorities in the case of Navalny’s alleged poisoning in 2020, the pandemic, vaccines and the announced abolition of paper money in Europe, the Federal Reserve, the destruction of Nord Stream, and much more. All in all, a fascinating interview, highly recommended, and very uncomfortable for Western liberal elites, especially Germans.
It’s clear that, once again, the German government is acting in accordance with the Washington Consensus, because the magazine in question was clearly in favour of peace between Germany and Russia, was gaining public influence and threatening several pillars on which Germany’s structure has rested since 1945. The fact that this doesn’t please many people is understandable, but it doesn’t make it an illegal outlet. Mrs Faeser’s decision sets a serious precedent, foreshadowing difficult days ahead for free information in Germany and Europe. Having found no illegality, the German government had to use two paragraphs of a law on associations to ban a publishing house because it was inconvenient. It’s all food for thought.
Ricardo Nuno Costa ‒ geopolitical expert, writer, columnist, and editor-in-chief of geopol.pt.
MEPs want Hungary stripped of voting rights
RT | July 16, 2024
Scores of European Parliament members have called on Brussels to punish Hungary after its prime minister, Viktor Orban, allegedly abused the bloc’s rotating presidency by launching his Ukraine “peace mission,” Politico reported on Tuesday.
The outlet published a letter signed by 93 MEPs and addressed to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Council President Charles Michel, and European Parliament chief Roberta Metsola.
The signatories accused Orban of causing “significant damage by exploiting and abusing the role of the [EU] Council Presidency,” which Hungary assumed earlier this month. The focus of their ire was Orban’s “peace mission” which involved recent visits to Ukraine, Russia, China, and the US.
“Orban deliberately left the impression that he was acting on behalf of the entire European Union,” the letter claimed, despite the leader stressing that he was acting in his capacity as head of the Hungarian government before flying to Moscow earlier this month. MEPs said their assertion was “clearly evidenced” by the fact that senior EU officials had stressed that Orban did not represent the bloc “in any form” during his trips.
The Hungarian leader “is actively pursuing a policy agenda which is contrary to common EU positions,” and “this cannot be allowed to continue,” the MEPs said. They have urged the EU leadership to launch so-called Article 7 proceedings against Hungary.
Widely considered a “nuclear option,” the article allows suspension of voting rights of a member state. The punishment is necessary “since practice has shown that mere verbal condemnations of this situation have no effect,” the letter said.
Hungary has criticized EU policy since hostilities between Ukraine and Russia broke out in February 2022. According to Budapest, Western economic sanctions imposed against Moscow have seriously damaged European economies, while the supply of weapons to Kiev has led to the continuation of hostilities instead of their end. Orban has urged a ceasefire and a negotiated resolution of the crisis, which his critics call a pro-Russian stance.
Orban has detailed his vision of resolving the conflict in a letter to Michel, the European Council president, his office confirmed on Monday. His plan reportedly includes making concessions to Russia in terms of NATO’s expansion in Europe, which Moscow has called one of the key triggers of the confrontation.
Michel has said Brussels should “be smart” about its reaction to Orban’s diplomatic activities, claiming that EU unity could otherwise be seriously damaged.
Ukrainian children still speaking Russian – regulator
RT | July 12, 2024
Ukrainian children don’t know their official state language well enough because they’re still using Russian in their daily lives, Kiev’s Commissioner for the Protection of the State Language Taras Kremin has complained, urging citizens to report violations of language restrictions.
The commissioner said there are also many violations being recorded in the sphere of education, as well as on the internet and in the service industry. He cited a recent study that suggested one-third of children in some Ukrainian regions prefer to speak Russian.
“A child outside of school uses services, visits shopping and catering establishments, sees external advertising and signboards in non-state language, hears non-state at home,” Kremin wrote on Facebook on Thursday.
He suggested that many schoolchildren were therefore prone to bilingualism and do not have sufficient knowledge of the Ukrainian language.
Kremin said Kiev should strengthen control over compliance with the law on state language, which defines Ukrainian as the only language approved for education, and called on citizens to be more involved in recording and reporting violations of the law.
Since gaining its independence in 1991, Ukraine has largely been a bilingual nation, with most citizens able to speak or understand both Russian and Ukrainian, particularly in the eastern half of the country. After the 2014 US-backed coup in Kiev, however, Ukraine’s new authorities abolished Russian as an official regional language and have adopted policies aimed at suppressing and outlawing it, arguing that it represents a threat to national unity and security.
In 2019, the Ukrainian parliament passed a law requiring Ukrainian to be used exclusively in nearly all aspects of public life, including education, entertainment, politics, business and the service industry, obliging all Ukrainian citizens to know the language. It also requires that 90% of TV and film content produced in the country be made in Ukrainian. From July 17, the use of the Russian language in Ukrainian media will be virtually outlawed, Kremen has said.
This forced Ukrainization was one of the reasons why Russian-speaking residents living in the east of the country rejected the post-coup authorities in Kiev in 2014. Many of these regions, namely the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, have since joined Russia after overwhelmingly voting to do so in public referendums in 2022.
Kremin, however, has denied that the term ‘Russian-speaking’ could be applied to any Ukrainian citizens, stating in an interview last year that the word is a “marker introduced by Russian ideology,” and declaring that “everyone in the country must have command of the Ukrainian language.”
EU suspends accession process of ex-Soviet republic
RT | July 8, 2024
The European Union has suspended the process of Georgia’s accession to the bloc, the EU’s ambassador to the former Soviet republic, Pavel Gerchinsky, told the Russian media on Tuesday. A €30 million ($32.5 million) payment allocated to the Georgian Defense Ministry has also reportedly been frozen.
The envoy cited Tbilisi’s controversial ‘foreign agent’ law as the reason behind the move. After the legislation was adopted last month, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned Georgia that its potential accession to the bloc was in jeopardy.
Formally titled the Transparency of Foreign Influence Act, the new law requires NGOs, media outlets, and individuals who receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as entities “promoting the interests of a foreign power” and to disclose their donors. Those who fail to comply will face fines of up to $9,500. The bill came into force despite opposition protests and a veto by Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili.
“The intentions of the current Georgian government are unclear to EU leaders. The Transparency of Foreign Influence Act is clearly a step backwards. […] Also, the anti-Western, anti-European rhetoric is completely incompatible with the declared goal of joining the European Union. Unfortunately, as of now Georgia’s accession to the European Union has been suspended,” Gerchinsky said, as quoted by RIA Novosti.
While opponents of the law have described it as at attack on democracy and “Russian” because Moscow has similar legislation, its supporters have noted it is similar to what numerous Western nations, including the US, have in place.
Borrell said last month that Georgia will not progress with its EU accession unless its government changes its policies.
Georgia will hold parliamentary elections in October, and Gerchinsky expressed hope that a new government in Tbilisi, “whatever it may be,” will again “begin serious work” toward EU integration.
The former Soviet republic applied for EU membership in March 2022, shortly after the start of the Ukraine conflict. In May of last year, the European Council agreed to allocate €30 million to boost Georgia’s defense sector. The European Council granted Tbilisi candidate status last December.
US Provides $2 Billion Military Aid Package to Warsaw

By Connor Freeman | The Libertarian Institute | July 8, 2024
Washington is providing its NATO ally Poland with a second $2 billion foreign military financing (FMF) package in less than a year, Breaking Defense reports. In recent weeks, Warsaw has given Kiev a green light to use Polish-provided weapons to strike the Russian mainland as well as signed a bilateral military pact with Ukraine, agreeing to shoot down some Russian missiles.
A State Department official boasted to the outlet of how the two FMF loans are benefiting the US arms industry as well as strengthening the Washington-led bloc embroiled in its Ukraine proxy war with Moscow. “It’s impressive that it hasn’t even been a year and they [Poland] are moving out pretty quickly… We’re happy with the process. We see it as a success. We’re happy that they’ve been able to move out quickly — not only does it help NATO, it helps the US defense industry as well, the US economy. So, we’re definitely happy with the process.”
As with typical FMF loans, the funds furnished by the State Department to a foreign government must be spent on American-made weaponry and equipment. What makes this loan unique, however, is instead of a grant to purchase arms, this loan includes interest which Warsaw must repay. The US is putting up $60 million to guarantee the loan and cover initial fees. The official said details regarding how the funds will be spent, on what kinds of weapons, will not be shared during this week’s NATO summit. Instead, he insisted the Poles “[have] a list of things they want to achieve” and said to expect future announcements.
The official noted the previous FMF loan, issued last September, has either been totally spent or is earmarked for purchases including four aerostat-based early warning systems which accounts for approximately half the first loan. The unusual loan-based structure allows “the interagency to get FMF funding to foreign allies without needing to wait on the appropriations process,” the outlet notes, adding Congress extended the authority to issue these loans through the end of the 2025 fiscal year.
Asked if other countries will receive such loans, the official answered “We are looking at it, and there are other countries that remain competitive… The reason you’re seeing Poland is, of course, the situation with the ongoing war in Ukraine. They’re ready to move out.” The official emphasized that talks with multiple countries are ongoing, while repeatedly praising Warsaw’s high military spending and deeming Poland “the tip of the spear on this for us right now.”
The State Department stated “Poland is a leader in NATO, currently spending four percent of GDP on defense, the highest in the Alliance. Poland hosts thousands of U.S. and Allied forces, including U.S. V Corps Headquarters (Forward) in Poznan.” The US has roughly 10,000 troops stationed in Poland. Since Russian forces invaded Ukraine, Warsaw has announced plans to buy a myriad of American arms including Abrams tanks, Black Hawk and Apache helicopters, HIMARS rocket launchers. Poland is seeking more Patriot air defense batteries as well.
This latest financial and military infusion comes after Ukraine and Poland signed a bilateral military pact this week which includes a mechanism for Warsaw to shoot down Russian missiles and drones. This provision entails the potential to provoke a NATO-Russia war, something Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has long sought.
During a joint presser with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Monday, Zelensky declared “We are especially grateful for the special arrangements, and this is reflected in the security agreement. It provides for the development of a mechanism to shoot down [by Poland] Russian missiles and drones fired in the airspace of Ukraine in the direction of Poland.”
In November 2022, after a Ukrainian air defense missile killed two people in Poland, Zelensky and his top advisors said it was a Russian strike and demanded NATO take action. “Hitting NATO territory with missiles. … This is a Russian missile attack on collective security! This is a really significant escalation. Action is needed,” Zelensky railed in a video address.
This assessment was completely at odds with those made by the US, Poland, and NATO which determined the Polish casualties were not the result of a Russian missile strike. At the time, a diplomat from a NATO member state told Financial Times “The Ukrainians are destroying [our] confidence in them. Nobody is blaming Ukraine and they are openly lying. This is more destructive than the missile.”





