Petroleum demand will rise despite push for renewables: OPEC chief
Press TV – February 22, 2025
Secretary General of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) says that petroleum demand will continue to increase in the coming decades despite a global move toward renewable energies.
In an interview with the Iranian Oil Ministry’s news service Shana, published on Saturday, Haitham al-Ghais said that the OPEC believes that oil and gas will continue to be the key element in the global energy trends even after 2050, the year in which many countries have pledged to phase out the use of fossil fuels as part of the so-called net zero campaign.
Ghais said that demand for oil and gas will fall in Europe in the coming decades while it will remain almost flat in the United States.
However, he said that the rest of the world will see a rise in petroleum demand as many countries in Asia and Africa will need hydrocarbon resources to meet their economic growth targets.
“… the unrealistic sense that was given to people about oil demand dropping by 75 million barrels per day by 2050, which we believe is really unrealistic,” he said.
The OPEC chief said that some European governments that are seriously opposed to the increasing consumption of fossil fuels have resumed using oil, gas and even coal to respond to their energy needs.
“… we believe that the problem is the net zero scenario, and it is quite dangerous actually, because it has, unfortunately, caused many governments to be misled into putting into place policies that have become much more expensive for their consumers.
Electronic Intifada director’s violent arrest and MI6 infiltration into ‘neutral’ Switzerland
By Kit Klarenberg | Press TV | February 22, 2025
On January 25th, prominent Palestinian-American journalist and activist Ali Abunimah, co-founder of the Electronic Intifada website, was violently arrested by undercover operatives in Switzerland, en route to a speaking event.
He proceeded to spend three days and two nights in jail completely cut off from the outside world, during which he was interrogated by local defense ministry intelligence apparatchiks without access to a lawyer or even being informed why he was being imprisoned.
Abunimah was then deported in the manner of a dangerous, violent criminal.
Abunimah’s ordeal caused widespread outcry, not least due to Switzerland being the oldest ‘neutral’ state in the world. Such is Bern’s apparently indomitable commitment to this principle, that it initially refused to join the UN lest its neutrality be compromised, only becoming a member in September 2022, following a public referendum.
Moreover, the country routinely scores highly – if not highest – in Western human rights rankings, and has provided a safe haven for foreign journalists and human rights activists fleeing repression.
Abunimah’s flagrantly political persecution and ruthless treatment, undoubtedly motivated by his indefatigable solidarity with Palestine, stands at total odds with Swiss neutrality.
So too Bern’s secret, little-known involvement in Operation Gladio. Under the auspices of this monstrous Cold War connivance, the CIA and MI6 constructed underground shadow armies of fascist paramilitaries that wreaked havoc across Europe, carrying out false flag terror attacks, robberies, and assassinations to discredit the left, install right-wing governments, and justify crackdowns on dissent.
Switzerland’s Gladio unit was known as Projekt-26, the numerals referring to the country’s separate cantons. Its existence was uncovered in November 1990, as a result of an unrelated Swiss parliamentary investigation triggered months earlier.
This probe was launched after it was revealed local security services had kept detailed secret files on 900,000 citizens, almost one-seventh of the country’s total population, throughout the Cold War.
The inquiry found during the same period, P-26 operated “outside political control”, and specifically targeted “domestic subversion”. Its membership ran to around 400, with “most” being “experts” in “weapons, telecommunications and psychological warfare.”
The unit moreover “maintained a network of mostly underground installations throughout Switzerland,” and was commanded by “a private citizen who could mobilize the force without consulting [the] army or government.”
Parliamentarians also concluded that P-26 “cooperated with an unidentified NATO country.”
It was some time before that “NATO country” was confirmed to be Britain. Subsequent investigations shed significant light on London’s mephitic relationship with P-26, and the unit’s role within the wider Operation Gladio conspiracy.
Much remains unknown about the extent of its activities, and will most certainly never emerge. But while P-26 was officially disbanded after its public exposure, the recent persecution of Abunimah strongly suggests MI6 continues to exert unseen influence over Switzerland’s politics, intelligence, military and security apparatus today.
‘A Scandal’
Discovery of P-26 prompted a dedicated inquiry into Switzerland’s “stay behind” network, overseen by local judge Pierre Cornu. It was not until April 2018 that a truncated version of his 100-page-long report was released, in French.
No English translation has emerged since, and a dedicated multi-page section on P-26’s relationship with US and British intelligence is wholly redacted.
Still, the report acknowledged the unit’s operatives were trained in Britain – Gladio’s secret “headquarters” – and remained in regular, covert contact with London’s embassy in Bern.
Oddly, a 13-page summary of Cornu’s report, published in September 1991, was far more revealing. It noted that British intelligence “collaborated closely” with P-26, “regularly” tutoring its militants in “combat, communications, and sabotage” on its home soil. British advisers – likely SAS fighters – also visited secret military sites in Switzerland.
Numerous formal agreements were signed between the clandestine organization and London, the last being inked in 1987. These covered training, and supply of weapons and other equipment.
Describing collaboration between British intelligence and P-26 as “intense”, the summary was deeply scathing of this cloak-and-dagger bond, describing it as wholly lacking “political or legal legitimacy” or oversight, and thus “intolerable” from a democratic perspective.
Until P-26’s November 1990 exposure, elected Swiss officials were purportedly completely unaware of the unit’s existence, let alone its operations. “It is alarming [MI6] knew more about P-26 than the Swiss government did,” the summary appraised.
P-26 was moreover backed by P-27, a private foreign-sponsored spying agency, partly funded by an elite Swiss army intelligence unit. The latter was responsible for monitoring and building up files on “suspect persons” within the country, including; “leftists”; “bill stickers”, Jehovah’s Witnesses, citizens with “abnormal tendencies”; and anti-nuclear demonstrators.
To what purpose this information was put isn’t clear. Many documents detailing the activities of both P-26 and P-27 and the pair’s coordination with British intelligence, apparently couldn’t be located while Cornu conducted his investigation.
Obfuscating the picture even further, in February 2018 it was confirmed 27 separate folders and dossiers amassed during Cornu’s probe had since mysteriously vanished.
Local suspicions this trove was deliberately misplaced or outright destroyed to prevent embarrassing disclosures about “neutral” Switzerland’s relationship with US and British intelligence, and NATO, emerging abound to this day.
At the time, Josef Lang, a left-leaning former Swiss lawmaker and historian, who had long called for the Cornu report to be released in unredacted form, declared:
“There are three possibilities: the papers were shredded, hidden, or lost, in that order of likelihood. But even if the most innocent option is the case, that’s also a scandal.”
‘Clandestine Networks’
The unsolved murder of Herbert Alboth amply reinforces the conclusion that shadowy elements within and without Switzerland were sure that certain facts about the country’s involvement with Operation Gladio would never be known.
A senior intelligence operative who commanded the “stay behind” unit during the early 1970s, in March 1990 Alboth secretly wrote to then-Defence Minister Kaspar Villiger, promising that “as an insider” he could reveal “the whole truth” about P-26. This was right when Swiss parliamentarians began investigating the secret maintenance of files on “subversives”.
Alboth never had an opportunity to testify. A month later, he was found dead in his Bern apartment, having been repeatedly stabbed in the stomach with his own military bayonet.
Contemporary media reports noted a series of indecipherable characters were scrawled on his chest in felt pen, leaving police “puzzled”.
Strewn around his home were photographs of senior P-26 members, “stay behind” training course documents, “exercise plans of a conspiratorial character,” and the names and addresses of fellow Swiss spies.
On November 22nd, 1990, one day after P-26 was formally dissolved, the European Parliament passed a resolution on Operation Gladio.
It called for the then-European Community, and all its member states, to conduct official investigations “into the nature, structure, aims and all other aspects of these clandestine organizations or any splinter groups, their use for illegal interference in the internal political affairs of the countries concerned,” their involvement in “serious cases of terrorism and crime,” and “collusion” with Western spying agencies.
The resolution warned:
“These organizations operated and continue to operate completely outside the law since they are not subject to any parliamentary control and frequently those holding the highest government and constitutional posts are kept in the dark as to these matters… For over 40 years [Operation Gladio] has escaped all democratic controls and has been run by the secret services of the states concerned in collaboration with NATO… Such clandestine networks may have interfered illegally in the internal political affairs of member states or may still do so.”
Yet, outside formal inquiries in Belgium, Italy, and Switzerland, nothing of substance subsequently materialized. Today, we are left to ponder whether Gladio’s constellation of European “stay behind” armies was ever truly demobilized, and if British intelligence still directs the activities of foreign security and spying agencies under the noses of elected governments.
Given London’s intimate, active complicity in the Gaza genocide and ever-ratcheting war on Palestine solidarity at home, Abunimah is an obvious target for the MI6 spy agency.
So too Richard Medhurst, a British-born, Vienna-residing independent journalist arrested upon arrival at London’s Heathrow airport in August 2024 on uncertain “counter-terror” charges.
On February 3rd, Austrian police and intelligence operatives ransacked his home and studio, confiscating many of his possessions, including all his journalistic materials and tools, before detaining and questioning him for hours.
Believing this to be no coincidence, Medhurst asked the officers if London had ordered the raid. An officer replied, “No, Britain doesn’t talk to us.”
Coincidentally, Austria is another ostensibly “neutral” country in which MI6 was embroiled in Operation Gladio. Following World War II, British intelligence armed and trained a local “stay behind” cell comprised of thousands of former SS personnel and Neo-Nazis.
Innocently named the Austrian Association of Hiking, Sports and Society, like its Swiss counterpart, the unit operated with such secrecy that “only very, very highly positioned politicians” were aware.
For his part, Medhurst is absolutely convinced London is behind his persecution:
“Some of these Austrian accusations are very similar to the British ones… I think it’s being coordinated with Britain… British police seized a Graphene OS device from me and [it’s] very unlikely they’d be able to crack it… I suppose that’s why Britain asked the Austrians to raid me, grab anything they could find and go on this massive fishing expedition,” he said.
“The warrant even mentions my arrest in London to try and bolster their case.”
US to propose own UN resolution on Russia-Ukraine conflict
Press TV – February 22, 2025
For the first time since the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine in 2022, the US has refused to cosponsor a United Nations General Assembly resolution put forward by Europe and Kiev, saying it will instead propose its own resolution.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote on his X account that on February 24 (the anniversary of the Russia-Ukraine war) his country will submit to the UNGA a resolution on the settlement of the issue.
“The US will propose to the United Nations a landmark resolution the entire UN membership should support in order to chart a path to peace.”
A statement from the US State Department attached to the announcement said that US President Donald Trump is seeking “a resolution to the conflict that would ensure long-term peace.”
According to the US State Department, the resolution is consistent with Trump’s position, and with the principle of peaceful settlement of disputes enshrined in the UN Charter.
According to media reports, the language of the resolution has been significantly softened towards Russia compared to the wording used in earlier documents.
For the first time since the start of the military operation, the resolution does not describe Russia as the original aggressor.
The text of the document expresses grief over the tragic conflict and calls for a speedy end to it.
It “reaffirms the urgent need to end the war this year and redouble diplomatic efforts to reduce the risks of further escalation and achieve a comprehensive, just and lasting peace on the Ukraine.”
In response to years of military and political provocations by the US and European countries, Russia began its special military operation in Ukraine in 2022.
Russia has managed to gain control of a fifth of Ukraine and has been slowly advancing in the east for months. Ukraine’s military, supported by the US and European countries, grapples with manpower shortages and tries to hold a chunk of territory in western Russia.
Russia has demanded an end to the West’s military and political provocations on its borders and Ukraine’s permanent neutrality under any peace deal. Ukraine on the other hand has demanded Russia’s withdrawal from the captured lands and wants NATO membership.
The End of College Vaccine Mandates
By Lucia Sinatra | Brownstone Institute | February 18, 2025
With one stroke of his pen, President Trump accomplished what we have been fighting for over the last 4 years – an end to college and university Covid-19 vaccine mandates. He signed an executive order to halt federal funding to all schools, including colleges and universities, that still impose Covid-19 vaccine mandates on students. While there are only 15 colleges and universities left mandating these shots, the magnitude of his message to higher education leaders should not be underestimated.
Covid-19 vaccine mandates on healthy young adults were never based on scientific data or sound reasoning, but they were harshly implemented nonetheless. These policies coerced a captive population of students to choose between abandonment of their college programs and dreams for the future or complying with decisions over bodily autonomy made by the “experts.”
Beginning in the spring of 2021, colleges and universities mandated students to take shots that never protected against infection or transmission of Covid-19. These mandates were imposed with the mantra that injections were the best way to “protect our community” from severe illness and death – a claim that proved false by the summer of 2021 just prior to mandated compliance for fall 2021 enrollment.
In fact, colleges that never had Covid-19 vaccine mandates had less infections and have no recorded history of severe illnesses or death among their campus communities as compared to colleges that did. It was easy to analyze these data using the colleges’ own Covid infection and vaccination rate dashboards until most of them scrubbed the dashboards from their college websites.
Over 1,000 colleges announced Covid vaccine mandates by the summer of 2021. After a concerted campaign by No College Mandates and other advocacy groups, by the spring of 2022, colleges had slowly begun dropping them. By the summer of 2023, very few colleges imposed the mandates on faculty and staff, but students were still required to comply.
Until this executive order, which tasked our new Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., to develop a plan to end these coercive policies, our nation’s entire academic apparatus seemed perfectly fine with the continued application of these mandates on students. For example, at CSU Dominguez Hills and CSU Cal Poly Humboldt, only residential students are required to show proof of Covid vaccination prior to enrollment. At Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Swarthmore Colleges only students are required to take Covid vaccines. No other members of the college community must comply.
Coercive and mandatory policies such as these alerted many of us to the fact that student health was not at the forefront of administrators’ concerns. Somehow, they perpetuated the draconian notion that only students were to blame for spreading the SARS-CoV-2 virus and that only students must comply to put an end to the pandemic. College leaders knew such strategies were incoherent and illogical, yet they persisted almost entirely unchallenged.
From the very start, many of us lost trust in the hypocrisy of such inconsistencies. It was downright crazy for students to have to put up with such nonsense and risk injury from taking novel and needless medical treatments in the name of “protecting the community.” This is why we refused to stop shining a light on the injustice of it all.
It is with deep gratitude to President Trump and his team for keeping his promise and ending all federal funding to colleges and universities that continue these unnecessary and dangerous Covid-19 vaccine policies. There was zero science or reasoning to support them, and this new executive order might just prevent similar dictates from ever happening again.
But our work is far from done.
Healthcare students are still being forced to choose between their dreams and their autonomy to access hospitals and clinical facilities. To graduate, healthcare students must complete their clinical rotations, and hospitals and clinical facilities have required that these students take updated Covid vaccines even when faculty and staff no longer must comply. There is zero rationale for this patently retaliatory discrepancy.
In Florida, it is against the law for any “a business entity [to] require any person to provide any documentation certifying vaccination…or postinfection recovery from COVID-19, or require a COVID-19 test, to gain access to, entry upon, or service from the business operations in this state or as a condition of contracting, hiring, promotion, or continued employment with the business entity.”
When I called the University of Florida Nursing Program a few weeks ago, however, I was told students are required to receive updated Covid vaccines to complete clinical programs with some providers. Making matters worse, some colleges smugly refuse to disclose these requirements to prospective or even enrolled students, often leaving them to learn about them in the final year of their program.
Ironically, but perhaps not unexpectedly, UF Nursing posted on X just last week that there is a nationwide nursing shortage including in the State of Florida. It blows my mind that those who determine policies affecting the training of our nation’s nurses were somehow unaware that their coercive and nonsensical policies would likely lead to such shortages. After No College Mandates drew attention to this on X, UF Nursing deleted the post.
In Montana, there is a similar problem. Montana law prohibits discrimination based on Covid vaccine status yet the Emergency Medical Technician program at Helena College still requires students to take Covid vaccines to enroll.
I have reached out to representatives in both states to report the college programs that are not following state law because if there is anything I have learned over the past several years, colleges and universities will get away with these discriminatory and punitive policies for as long as they can until someone steps in to put an end to them.
It is uncertain what will happen to healthcare majors whose colleges and universities no longer require injections to enroll but whose clinical partner assignments are still requiring them to complete clinical rotations to graduate. So, while President Trump took a huge step forward to end federal funding to colleges and universities that perpetuate unscientific and unreasonable Covid vaccination, it is not nearly enough to end the coercive policies at partner facilities when the unreasonable and unconstitutional mandates remain for many healthcare students who need to complete clinical rotations at those facilities.
I would be remiss if I failed to mention that there are legislative efforts in at least 9 states* to completely ban mRNA shots. Such efforts promise to stop remaining Covid vaccine mandates dead in their tracks. Until we see those efforts make more progress, we will keep pressuring healthcare programs to end partnerships with hospitals and clinics when those facilities require students to receive Covid injections, and we will keep working with state representatives to hold clinical partners accountable for refusing to follow state law.
It is long overdue that our nation’s healthcare academies leave our healthcare students alone to make their own private decisions over what medical measures to take so they can pursue their dreams and help heal our very sick nation.
*On February 15, 2024, the Idaho Senate blocked the vote to ban mRNA vaccines so as of right now Bill S1036 is dead, and Idaho should no longer be on the map of 9 states.
Lucia Sinatra is a recovering corporate securities attorney. After becoming a mother, Lucia turned her attention to fighting inequities in public schools in California for students with learning disabilities. She co-founded NoCollegeMandates.com to help fight college vaccine mandates.
New HHS Secretary Curtails US Government Role as Drug Promoter
By Adam Dick | Peace and Prosperity Blog | February 21, 2025
It has been commonplace for so long that most Americans cannot remember a time before the United States government was out running public relations campaigns urging Americans to take this or that vaccine or other pharmaceutical industry product. Now, an early action by new US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. suggests this practice may be coming to an end.
Helen Branswell reported Thursday at STAT News that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) “was ordered to shelve promotions it developed for a variety of vaccines, including a ‘Wild to Mild’ advertising campaign urging people to get vaccinated against flu” and that the CDC was informed that Kennedy “wanted advertisements that promote the idea of ‘informed consent’ in vaccine decision-making instead.”
What a major change — a transition from being a pharmaceutical company product promoter to being a promoter of, as Branswell describes informed consent in her article, “the principle that people should be notified of all the risks, as well as benefits, of any medical intervention they receive or any drug they are prescribed.”
This is a good early step by Kennedy. It clarifies a new orientation placing focus on advancing information and choice instead of pushing product. If Kennedy continues on this course, he can accomplish major advancement for health and freedom in America as his appointment suggested would be possible.
VP JD Vance Criticizes European Censorship, Calls for Free Speech as Basis for US-Europe Alliances at CPAC
Vance warns European allies that censorship threatens the foundation of Western alliances
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | February 21, 2025
At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Thursday, Vice President JD Vance sharpened his criticism of America’s European allies while issuing a strong warning against censorship. His speech, which kicked off the three-day gathering, echoed the assertive stance he took at the Munich Security Conference last week.
Vance took aim at one of America’s closest international partners, highlighting growing ideological rifts over free speech. He criticized restrictive online censorship laws in the European Union, arguing that such measures could drive a wedge between the US and its allies under President Trump’s leadership.
“We’re going to continue to have important alliances with Europe, but I really do think the strength of those alliances is going to depend on whether we take our societies in the right direction,” Vance stated.
“You have to allow free speech to debate this stuff,” Vance declared, emphasizing the importance of open discussion on controversial issues, particularly immigration. “You have to stop doing things to the populations of the world. You’ve gotta give the populations of the world the opportunity to speak up and say, no more of this BS.”
The Vice President did not hold back in his criticism of the previous US administration, stating, “The Biden administration did more to destroy free speech, not just in the United States, but also in Europe, than any administration in American history.”
Vance also took direct aim at Germany, highlighting the contradiction of American taxpayers funding the country’s defense while its government cracks down on free expression. “Germany’s entire defense is subsidized by the American taxpayer,” he said. “Do you think the American taxpayer is gonna stand for that if you get thrown in jail in Germany for posting a mean tweet? Of course, they’re not.”
The Vice President framed his argument in terms of shared values, asserting that true alliances are built on a foundation of democratic freedoms. “You do not have shared values if you’re jailing people for saying we should close down our border,” he warned. “You don’t have shared values if you cancel elections because you don’t like the result. You do not have shared values if you’re so afraid of your own people that you silence them and shut them up.”
His message resonated with conservative leaders attending CPAC’s international summit, where discussions focused on resisting censorship and preserving national sovereignty.
Vance closed with a call for unity among Western nations based on principles of democracy and free speech. “Let’s have shared values. Let’s defend democracy. Let’s have free expression, not just in the United States, but all over the Western world. That is the path to strong alliances in Europe.” His words were met with enthusiastic applause from the CPAC audience.
Covert Crusade: Washington’s $600m digital war on Iran
By Kit Klarenberg | The Cradle | February 21, 2025
Earlier this month, The Cradle exposed how in 2023, the US State Department’s shadowy Near East Regional Democracy (NERD) fund earmarked $55 million to stoke unrest in Iran during the following year’s elections.
This was part of a wider US campaign of interference designed to disrupt and destabilize the Islamic Republic. As that investigation noted, details on where this money goes – and who benefits – are strictly confidential as a matter of policy. Still, there are clues in the public domain pointing to at least some recipients.
Regime change by another name
As a US Congressional Research Service report records, due to hostile US–Iran relations, and Tehran’s well-founded view of NERD “as a means of financing regime change,” its programs rely on “third-country training” as well as “online training and media content.”
The report further confirms that despite NERD being Washington’s primary “foreign assistance channel” for projects targeting Iran, “activities, grantees, [and] beneficiaries” are not advertised “due to the security risks posed by the Iranian government.” It continues:
“NERD was created in 2009 as a ‘line item for Iran democracy’ but was not (and is still not) technically Iran-specific … For 2024, the Biden Administration requested $65 million for NERD … to ‘foster a vibrant civil society, increase the free flow of information, and promote the exercise of human rights,’ including at least $16.75 million for internet freedom.”
What was unstated in the report is that NERD represents a simple rebranding of the Iran Democracy Fund, created by former president George W. Bush in 2006 with the explicit goal of toppling the Islamic Republic.
The initiative was ostensibly shut down under Barack Obama three years later, eliciting bitter condemnation from much of the western media, neoconservative pundits, and lawmakers. However, as the BBC acknowledged at the time, the move was in fact “welcomed by Iranian human rights and pro-democracy activists”:
“These US funds are going to people who have very little to do with the real struggle for democracy in Iran and our civil society activists never received such funds,” a Tehran-based human rights lawyer told the British state broadcaster. “The end to this program will have no impact on our activities whatsoever.”
Internet interference
In reality, the program never ended – it was merely repackaged. White House officials maintained the fiction that NERD was focused on democratization rather than regime change, a claim undermined by a June 2011 New York Times exposé.
That investigation revealed the Obama administration’s so-called “Internet Freedom” initiative aimed to “deploy ‘shadow’ internet and mobile phone systems dissidents can use to communicate outside the reach of governments in countries like Iran, Syria, and Libya.”
In other words, Washington sought to build a covert legion of regime change operatives in Tehran, and provide them with the technology to coordinate in secret. It is clear from the Congressional report’s marked reference to “internet freedom” that these machinations continue today.
Moreover, as a 2020 report by the DC-based Project on Middle East Democracy noted, organizations genuinely committed to advancing Iranian rights still steer well clear of NERD. An anonymous NGO worker described its “style” as “aggressive.” Another implied NERD is engaged in deeply dirty work:
“We choose not to apply for NERD grants because we do not want to get pulled into [anything] crazy.”
‘Non-Iranian’
The same year, the Financial Times (FT) reported how NERD efforts had become turbocharged under US President Donald Trump’s administration, explicitly to facilitate and encourage “anti-Tehran protests.”
This included “providing apps, servers, and other technology to help people communicate, visit banned websites, install anti-tracking software,” and more in the Islamic Republic, in order to offer “Iranians more options on how they communicate with each other and the outside world.”
Curiously, while portraying Iran as a digital prison, the FT admitted that major western social networks remain accessible in the country, and Iranians can easily view western media. As usual, recipients of NERD funds remained unnamed – except for Psiphon, a VPN provider long-associated with discredited exiled Iranian opposition figures and, by then, controlled by the Open Technology Fund (OTF). The FT estimated that just three million Iranians used Psiphon, less than four percent of the population.
OTF was an “Internet Freedom” product – one of its board members has openly admitted the Fund’s agenda is “regime change.”
Fast forward to September 2024; as former US president Joe Biden’s administration was seeking increased funds for NERD – mere months after the $55 million invested the previous year failed to produce desired mass unrest and upheaval around that year’s elections in Iran – a White House meeting was convened with major tech giants, encouraging them to offer more “digital bandwidth” for OTF-bankrolled apps and tools.
As fund chief Laura Cunningham explained, a “sizeable chunk” of OTF’s budget was taken up by the cost of hosting all the network traffic generated by its vast array of digital destabilization apps, which included Signal and Tor.
While OTF sought to support “additional users” of these products, it lacked resources to keep up with “surging demand.” What came of this meeting, which was attended by representatives of Amazon, Cloudflare, Google, and Microsoft, is not clear.
Yet, if further “digital bandwidth” was granted to OTF, it is clear the Trump administration’s “pause” in overseas aid funding has thrown all NERD’s meddling efforts in Iran into total – and potentially permanent – disarray.
A 27 January report in the Saudi-funded, anti-Islamic Republic Iran International quoted numerous anonymous beneficiaries of US financing bemoaning how grantees, including foreign-run Persian-language media outlets and organizations documenting purported “abuses” to keep the Islamic Republic “accountable,” had been abruptly shuttered.
An anonymous “human rights activist” told the outlet Washington’s freeze on aid spending “(will) impose restrictions on projects that address human rights violations or investigate governmental and military corruption which have impacted Iran’s economy and social conditions in favor of foreign terrorist activities and money laundering.”
They said “several non-Iranian American institutions [emphasis added] have been using these funds to investigate corruption and money laundering.” Now though, “these organizations will be forced to halt their activities.”
‘Severe implications’
US-supplied Virtual Private Network (VPN) services also loomed large among the malign resources impacted by the aid “pause.” A nameless “activist” told Iran International that 20 million Iranians used such tools “to bypass Tehran’s internet curbs.”
The outlet further quoted an article published by Human Rights Activists in Iran, a US-funded NGO not based in the Islamic Republic, but Virginia, near the CIA’s Langley headquarters: “In today’s Iran, the internet has no meaning without VPNs.”
Such dire warnings were echoed by Ahmad Ahmadian, head of California-based tech firm Holistic Resilience, which “aims to advance internet freedom and privacy by developing and researching censorship circumvention.”
An Iranian expat and alumni of Tehran University, Ahmadian warned major US tech firms “may not be willing or able to continue their support for providing anti-censorship tools” without government support. Such remarks highlight how these supposedly popular resources lack grassroots backing or financing, being wholly dependent on Washington’s sponsorship to operate:
“The leadership of the US government has been crucial in urging big tech companies to provide public services. Without the encouragement of the US government, these companies wouldn’t take the initiative on their own.”
Other unnamed activists further warned Iran International, “the consequences of Trump’s executive order will not remain limited to internet censorship circumvention tools.” They believe that if NERD’s activities “do not receive an exemption within the next month” – by the end of February – “they will either collapse entirely or be deeply curtailed.”
One declared, “the impact of this freeze might not be immediately noticeable, but its severe implications will become evident over time.”
Meanwhile, “internet experts” cautioned that “even if US aid starts again” after the 90-day pause, “the damage is irreversible since many people … might never fully return to using US-backed secure services.”
As The Cradle noted on 11 February, Washington’s forced withdrawal from meddling in Iran could create fresh opportunities for genuine diplomatic engagement between the two long-time adversaries. But another possibility looms: after spending $600 million over a decade with little success, the US may simply be preparing to test out new, potentially more malign regime-change strategies.
Is It Foreign Aid or Covert Action?

By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • February 21, 2025
There has been considerable controversy surrounding the Trump administration decision to cutback on government agencies that are ostensibly committed to charitable, educational and other nation building activities both overseas and in the United States. This spending, amounting to scores of billions of dollars, has helped produce budget deficits that ballooned in the twenty-first century, largely due to the surge in overseas activity that occurred after the trauma of 9/11 when the United States decided that it had to serve as policeman for the rest of the world to make itself safe. As the US is now verging on bankruptcy due to its unsustainable debts, the second incarnation of the Trump Administration has focused on cutting budgets in areas that it considers to be enemy occupied, often meaning “woke” or institutionally allied to the Democrats. Social programs as well as the bloated defense department spending were considered to be suitable targets so starting during the first week in February, the White House brought down the hammer when it went after a number of government agencies, inter alia calling for huge cuts in Pentagon spending and the complete elimination of the Education Department.
The White House also shut down the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), firing nearly all of its 10,000 employees, reportedly leaving only little more than 600 employees in place to assist in the shutting down or downsizing of facilities in the US and in foreign countries. Also, about 800 awards and contracts that are administered through USAID were reportedly being canceled. There have reportedly been some judicial delays in the firings due to the complexity of removing thousands of employees and families from overseas offices and housing, though the pause is likely to be only temporary.
Tax dollars are traditionally used corruptly to fund projects and policies dear to the hearts of politicians, which is why Ron Paul and others have called for sweeping audits, including of the Federal Reserve system and the Pentagon in particular. This hidden spending is particularly difficult to identify if the program is somehow linked to foreign policy and/or national security, which have traditionally been protected from scrutiny by denying nearly all public access to sensitive information based on the “need to know” principle to safeguard sources and vulnerable activities.
USAID was founded in 1961 during the John F. Kennedy administration to unite several foreign assistance organizations and programs under one agency. At first it was seriously intended to be a mechanism for the US to aid in health, disaster relief, socioeconomic development, environmental protection, democratic governance and education. Its focus, however, eventually became to guide development in parts of the world that suffered from what were considered to be dysfunctional governments and institutions in terms of American interests. USAID has always been funded by the federal government and its upper management has worked closely with the Department of State, to which it is technically accountable, and the intelligence agencies in particular. Its budget in 2023 was $43 billion. Trump’s reduction in force (RIF) of USAID has been accompanied by a shake-up in its management, its remaining responsibilities now being in the hands of the Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has considerable experience in special agency management after having served on the Board of the National Endowment for Democracy’s (NED) Republican subsidiary component, the International Republican Institute (IRI). NED, which operates extensively overseas, has also been stripped of funding by Trump.
The dismantling of USAID does not necessarily mean the organization will completely go away, it will just be much reduced and under new management. It will likely have a new mission, though no one is at this point sure what that will mean. And USAID and NED are not alone as the presidential memo has called for a halt to the funding of all the government components that are dependent on taxpayer generated funds to provide what is perhaps euphemistically referred to as “foreign aid.” USAID and NED do have humanitarian projects, i.e. feeding the hungry, but they are primarily politically driven. The NED component IRI puts it this way on its website “Our mission at IRI—advancing democracy worldwide—is a battle with many fronts. I am proud to say that IRI is supportive of every endeavor that will bring freedom to more people. We have made progress in our mission by giving hope to those who wish to protest on a city street, run for office, or cast a ballot.”
So the aid organizations overtly have a political role, but how does it translate in practice and does it extend to playing favorites with the US media and political parties? Trump has put it another way, declaring that USAID leaders were “radical left lunatics.” This is what he claims on his website Truth Social:
“LOOKS LIKE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS HAVE BEEN STOLEN AT USAID, AND OTHER AGENCIES, MUCH OF IT GOING TO THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA AS A ‘PAYOFF’ FOR CREATING GOOD STORIES ABOUT THE DEMOCRATS. THE LEFT WING ‘RAG,’ KNOWN AS ‘POLITICO,’ SEEMS TO HAVE RECEIVED $8,000,000. Did the New York Times receive money??? Who else did??? THIS COULD BE THE BIGGEST SCANDAL OF THEM ALL, PERHAPS THE BIGGEST IN HISTORY! THE DEMOCRATS CAN’T HIDE FROM THIS ONE. TOO BIG, TOO DIRTY!”
There are, in fact, credible reports that the 2019 impeachment of Trump was driven by the actions and disinformation coming from CIA, FBI and USAID operatives, so it is plausible to assume that Trump is now settling scores. Beyond that, USAID and NED are both notorious for their roles in the business of covertly supporting opposition political parties worldwide and assisting in regime change. Billionaire philanthropist George Soros, through his network of organizations, received $260 milllion from USAID for funneling funds to non-governmental-organizations (NGOs) connected with Soros’ Open Society Foundations, which are known for advocating for radical policies and regime changes globally. Soros is also a Democratic Party favorite and major fund raiser, having recently received at a White House ceremony the honor of the Presidential Medal of Freedom presented in absentia to his son Alex from outgoing President Joe Biden.
As a result, both USAID and NED have been banned from foreign countries, including Russia, due to their meddling in local politics. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who was often a target of USAID activity, immediately thanked Trump for his decision to cancel USAID. Both USAID and NED were deeply involved in Eastern Europe. Former Acting Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland has revealed that the aid agencies were deeply engaged in the multiple source $5 billion dollar multiyear US “investment” in Ukraine that culminated in regime change in 2013 and led to the current war with Russia. In government circles it has frequently been asserted that USAID and NED and other such organizations now do what the CIA used to do routinely in terms of regime change between its founding and the 1990s.
One might suggest that recent US governments, operating through their various subsidiaries like USAID and NED have been funding just about everything to control a world community in line with American interests. Mainstream media worldwide that is directly or indirectly funded reportedly includes journalists, news outlets, and activist NGOs and sites – and that’s just through USAID. That would appear to include Reuters, Associated Press, BBC, The Guardian, NBC, CNN, NPR, NYT, Politico, PBS, The Financial Times, The Atlantic, The Daily Telegraph, as well as much more media in the developing world. The anti-China hysteria media “ecosystem” currently depends on US government funding, and is already complaining about the impending shutdown of USAID support. To cite only one example of how it is packaged, Reuters news service has received millions in funding from the US government specifically for “active social engineering.”
Labor unions are also funded by USAID which is also behind the recent political unrest in Slovakia. It has also paid for multiple coup attempts in Venezuela, funded high profile trips for Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky to improve his image and popularity, and funded al-Qaeda linked groups in Syria to successfully overthrow the government in Damascus. Going back to Trump’s first term of office, it is interesting to observe that most of the “aid” to opposition parties to overthrow Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela was delivered during 2019, so Trump, guided by hardliners John Bolton and Mike Pompeo, was not at that time shy about regime change. In fact, Voice Of America (VOA), which often served as a CIA mouthpiece, even reported that Trump had tripled aid to opposition figure Juan Guaido to $56 million. Those asking themselves why Trump has now decided to “oppose” the very semi-covert agency that he’s also been using for regime change have a point, but it might be appropriate to see the shakeup as a warning against government information, law enforcement and intelligence agencies again becoming tools of the Democratic Party politicians.
Defenders of USAID are arguing that the agency is being maligned, that in addition to its political profile it is heavily engaged in promoting health and wellness worldwide. The head of USAID under Joe Biden was the highly controversial and very much “woke” Samantha Power, who claims somewhat disingenuously that the agency budget of $38 billion in 2023 included something like $20 billion in spending that should appropriately be described as humanitarian. Those who are the recipients of the programs, mostly in the third world, will consequently suffer from the defunding of aid. If that is actually so, it perhaps would make sense to roll such programs into a mechanism that would not be tied to regime change and corruption of local governments and media.
There is some question even in Congress concerning whether there will be a new centralized aid agency and what it will be called or do now that it has been reduced in size and will likely have a tiny budget relative to what it once enjoyed. It is early days and the answer to that question will likely emerge before too long, but it should be pointed out that at no point has Rubio or anyone else in the Trump administration actually condemned aggressive US engagement abroad or claimed they will bring it to an end. The State Department has even officially said the only goal is to ensure the good things that USAID did will continue by “advancing American interests abroad.” Given some of the recent aggressive positions taken by the Trump Administration over Gaza, Panama, Canada, Mexico, Iran and Greenland as well as the tendency on the part of its top officials to increase pressure on perceived adversaries, it may be that the US isn’t changing course at all. It quite plausibly might be doubling down, and organizations like USAID and NED, even if their names, roles and leadership change, will likely be integral to that process.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
Serbian president slams USAID for inciting regime change, demands journalist say how much money his outlet received
By Liz Heflin | Remix News | February 21, 2025
Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić told “Epilogue” viewers on TV Insider that U.S. President Donald Trump directly mentioned Serbia as a place where USAID wanted a regime change, reports Blic.
“Someone was only waiting for additional tragedies, meanwhile preparing different types of scenarios for some new riots and for some new attacks on the state. And that is nothing new, and it can be seen through the words of President Donald Trump. Donald Trump directly mentioned Serbia yesterday, the president of the United States of America directly mentioned Serbia as a place where they wanted a political change of government. Those who received American money to overthrow the government,” said Vučić in the Epilogue show on TV Insider.
In July of last year, the government of Serbia issued a joint statement with USAID regarding $18 million of new funds for a “development partnership,” and outlets have pointed out that the government has thanked the U.S. for such money in the past.
The July statement noted that the new “funds will be used, among other things, to improve public procurement procedures in Serbia, improve access to justice for citizens, improve environmental protection and energy security, promote a stronger media environment, improvement of economic opportunities for vulnerable groups, as well as for greater competitiveness of the Serbian economy.”
Vučić admitted during his TV interview that money has been received and used, but primarily for “senseless projects that were supposed to cover the eyes,” while the real intent of most funding was to overthrow the government. Asked about the “many videos” of himself and other officials thanking USAID for funding projects, Vučić said that “when someone gives you 1,000 euros, it is up to you to still politely say ‘thank you.’”
He then indicated that money was spent on equipping Serbian courts with various recording devices, microphones and many other things. But far larger amounts were being handed to NGOs such as Trag and CRTA.
“In the last four years, there were 400 million (dinar), of which not even 10 million went to the state. Everything went your way for the non-governmental sector,” said Vučić.
Oddly, in April of 2024, a few months before USAID’s additional $18 million was announced, Trag and CRTA jointly announced a USAID competition for grants under what they called a “Mobilization Fund program.”
“Trag Foundation and CRTA, with the financial support of the American Agency for International Development (USAID), invite you to apply for the competition for the Mobilization Fund program.”
Listed activities that could receive grants included: “local community development, human rights, anti-discrimination, women’s rights and women’s empowerment, youth empowerment, inclusion, solidarity economy, environmental protection, socio-economic development, rule of law, accountability of public institutions, fight against corruption, urbanism and public spaces and all others in which activists recognize challenges.”
Former prime minister and president of the National Assembly of Serbia Ana Brnabic has been called out as well for her gratitude in the past for USAID funds that had presumably “improved” the country. Now, with Trump in office, she is changing her tune, saying the “investigative media outlets” financed by USAID had systematically harmed Serbia, according to Tanjug.
“In the past 10-11 years, they have been implying that anyone who engages in politics is, in a way, corrupt or wants to be corrupt. That has made it impossible for the many quality people who wanted to help, or were perhaps helping from the background all the time, to get involved as state secretaries or ministers because they would, in fact, immediately be targeted by various media such as Krik,” Brnabic said on Pink TV.
Brnabic further let the cat out of the bag, noting there is no such thing as independent media, which merely implies reliance on U.S. money from special interest groups.
“You can see that those media outlets and the people working there were quite dependent. It is just that they were dependent on the American administration and, to make things worse, not on a U.S. administration elected by American citizens, but on what is referred to as the deep state,” Brnabic said.
According to Tanjug, Serbia will further investigate the spending of USAID funds if the U.S. asks.
Regarding the media portal Kric, mentioned above. President Vučić had a recent spat with one of its journalists who tried, again, to corner Vučić with supposed information on his brother at the opening of the International Tourism Fair in Belgrade.
The journalist said that Andrej Vučić’s name was brought up in recorded messages, indicating he held power over state contracts in Novi Sad and also regarding police appointments.
Vučić called the allegations “a notorious lie,” reiterated his brother holds no political office, and then turned on the journalist, asking, “I am interested in you answering the question of how much money you received from USAID, how much from NED? How much money did these two criminal organizations, both one and the other, transfer to you? How much, as the American president and one of the most famous secular, one might say, businessmen, Elon Musk, who calls these criminal organizations? How much money did they give you for this?
Making fun of the allegations from third parties, Vučić said, “Many people also write that I told them I would jump from the Smilovica lookout, but I haven’t jumped yet.” He then pointed out that, on the other hand, the funding Kric has received from the U.S. is a fact.
The journalist then accused the president of targeting journalists, again, to which Vučić replied: “How can I target you? I’m just asking how much money you received.”
The United States has reportedly given $937 million to Serbia since 2001. Although the USAID site is no longer online, a Google search still shows entries, with one for Serbia saying this money was meant for “economic and democratic development.”

