Canceled US Joint Exercises in Africa Shows Washington’s Influence Abroad Slipping
Sputnik – 28.01.2024
Retired CIA intelligence officer and State Department official Larry Johnson told Sputnik the move may be related to internal pressure not to work alongside “troops associated with coup governments.”
The United States military leadership has scrapped plans to hold joint exercises with several African states such as Sudan, Mali, Niger, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Burkina Faso.
According to the Washington Post, the Pentagon’s change of plans was, “at least in part,” the result of US Democrats pressuring the Biden administration to bar “troops associated with coup governments” from participating in US-led military exercises.
Exercises such as these are usually planned many months in advance, so the decision to scrap these plans means “there’s an issue with the governments that were supposed to participate,” said retired CIA intelligence officer and State Department official Larry Johnson.
Describing the military exercises’ cancellation as a “significant” development, Johnson told Sputnik that this move by the Pentagon may have also been prompted by the decision of the host African governments not to participate.
“In any event, I think what it does signify is that US influence over other countries, its ability to basically tell countries what to do and compel countries to follow US policy, is slipping, that the US influence in areas like Africa is growing weaker, not stronger,” he remarked.
Johnson also suggested that the decision by Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso to withdraw from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) may be related to this development, considering that ECOWAS is primarily regarded as an entity “under Western influence.”
According to him, the fact that these countries chose to part ways with ECOWAS and pursue “bilateral agreements among themselves” does seem like signs of them “distancing themselves from US control.”
Red Sea Crisis Is Opportunity for U.S. to Weaken Europe & China
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | January 28, 2024
The Red Sea conflict is intensifying as is the impact on commercial shipping and the global economy, according to shipping news reports.
One might think that common sense would prevail here to solve the conflict diplomatically and quickly. If a ceasefire was called in Gaza to stop the horrendous slaughter of Palestinian civilians by Israel then that would end the restrictions imposed on shipping by Yemen.
Yemeni leaders have unequivocally said so. End the genocide and we will end the interdiction on shipping.
The moral imperative to immediately end the appalling suffering in Gaza is therefore a straightforward – not to say absolutely necessary – way to restore normal navigation through the Red Sea and for wider peace in the region. It’s not a dilemma. It’s not a conundrum. And it’s inexcusable to prevaricate.
The United States has the power to end the Israeli genocide. But the Biden administration has refused to exert its control over the Netanyahu regime.
Washington has opted to escalate the military aggression in the Red Sea by launching at least eight waves of air strikes since January 11 on Yemen – the poorest nation in the Arab region, having already suffered a genocidal war at the hands of the U.S. and Britain supporting Saudi Arabia’s aggression between 2015 and 2022.
The Yemenis have in turn defiantly warned that their operations to interdict shipping will continue until the genocidal siege on Gaza has ended.
Biden even admits that the military action to deter the Yemenis is limited in achieving its supposed objectives.
So, why continue to aggravate the situation and escalate potential conflict across the region? Not only will bombing Yemen not work, but it is also inflaming violence across the Middle East and risking a head-on confrontation with Iran which is allied with the Yemenis.
As Iranian Professor Mohammad Marandi points out in our interview this week a big incentive for the U.S. and its Israeli ally is to blow up the region as a reckless and nefarious way to conceal how disastrous the defeat in Gaza is for the Americans and their Israeli client regime.
But there may be more to it. Another incentive for taking a militarized response to the Red Sea crisis is the strategic gain that this gives the United States with regard to Europe and China.
The Red Sea shipping restrictions are hitting the European and Chinese trade most acutely. American economic interests are relatively unaffected.
It is estimated that about 60 percent of China’s exports to Europe are shipped through the Red Sea, according to the Washington DC-based Middle East Institute.
Put another way, Eurostat figures indicate that 20 percent of all EU imports come from Asia via the Red Sea.
Inevitably, the longer the insecurity and hostilities persist in the Red Sea, the worse will be the damage to Europe-China trade and their economies.
Reuters reports that China is urging Iran to rein in the actions of the Ansar Allah and Yemeni armed forces in the Red Sea. That indicates how severe the impasse is impacting Chinese trade with Europe.
The Europeans meanwhile seem oblivious to the damage that the United States’ policy is inflicting on their economies. The Europeans have meekly gone along with Washington’s militarized aggression against Yemen.
It is a long-term and deeply coveted goal for Washington to cleave European trade and political relations with China. China has become the European Union’s top trading partner, surpassing the United States in that historic role.
During recent Democrat and Republican administrations, Washington has vigorously sought to undermine European-Chinese relations. The Americans have reacted testily to any trade and investment pacts signed between the two.
The Red Sea crisis is thus a handy opportunity for the United States to kill two birds with one stone.
By ramping up the shipping problems through militarizing the conditions, the U.S. can weaken the economies of Europe and China while also sticking a very big wedge between the two.
In short-term American imperial calculation that is a tantalizing gain. The U.S. consolidates its hegemonic control over the weaker European allies while damaging China’s economic power.
This short-term zero-sum thinking by the American imperial planners is of course self-defeating in the long term from the far-reaching deterioration in the global economy and international peace and security. But long-term thinking about the common global good is not a priority for U.S. capitalist imperialism. One might even say they are fundamentally in opposition.
There is a close analogy here to the Ukraine crisis. Washington has pursued hostilities with Russia as a way to undermine European-Russian trade and their wider cultural and political relations. Washington calculates that such antagonism will bolster its hegemonic ambitions. The ideologically slavish European leaders have gone along with that policy even though it has resulted in an economic and security disaster for Europe.
The European leaders are either too stupid or too brainwashed to assess what is going on and how they are being manipulated by Washington for its selfish strategic interests.
If the European regimes had any independence or integrity they would not have gone down the path of conflict with Russia in Ukraine. But as it is, they have been had by Uncle Sam – big time. What’s more, they don’t seem to realize or even care.
Likewise, the same fate of shooting themselves in the foot is occurring over the Middle East crisis. The Europeans are backing a genocide in Gaza in deference to U.S. imperialist interests and the Israeli regime. That has rebounded with the Red Sea crisis that is set to hammer EU-China trade. Rather than seeking to resolve the conflict diplomatically, the Europeans are making it worse and in the process damaging their own international standing and strategic interests.
No wonder the Americans ultimately treat their European vassals with contempt. Because they are utterly spineless and clueless.
Here’s why the ICJ ruling on genocide is a crushing defeat for Israel
The Hague-based court has not called for a ceasefire and has no enforcement power, but its decision is resounding nonetheless
By Tarik Cyril Amar | RT | January 28, 2024
The United Nations’ International Court of Justice (ICJ) has ruled on the case that South Africa had brought against Israel. Those who mistake realism for simplistic materialism – the ‘it’s only there if I can touch it’ variety – may underestimate the significance of that ruling. In reality, it is historic. Here’s why.
First, and most importantly, the court has ruled against Israel. South Africa’s well-prepared brief was over 80 pages long, closely argued, and very detailed. But its gist was simple: It had applied to the ICJ – which only handles cases between countries, not individuals – to find that Israel is committing genocide in its attack on Gaza, thereby infringing on fundamental Palestinian rights as brutally as possible.
Such a finding always takes years. For now, at this preliminary stage, South Africa’s immediate request was for the judges to decide that there is, in essence, a high enough probability of this genocide taking place to do two things: First, continue the case (instead of dismissing it) and, secondly, issue an injunction (in this context called “preliminary measures”) ordering Israel to abstain from its genocidal actions so that the rights of its Palestinian victims receive due protection.
The court has done both, with a majority of 15 to 2. One of the two judges dissenting is from Israel. Those voting, in effect, against Tel Aviv included even the president of the court, from the US, and the judge from Germany, a country that has taken a self-damagingly pro-Israel line. As to the Israeli pseudo-argument claiming ‘self-defense,’ the court rightly ignored it. (Occupying powers simply do not have that right regarding occupied entities under international law. Period.)
This is a clear victory for South Africa – and for Palestine and Palestinians – and a crushing defeat for Israel, as even Kenneth Roth, head of thoroughly pro-Western Human Rights Watch recognizes with commendable clarity.
It is true that the ICJ has no power to enforce its rulings. That would have to come through the UN Security Council, where the US is protecting Israel, whatever it does, including genocide. Yet there are good reasons why representatives of Israel have reacted with statements so arrogant and aggressive that they only further damage Tel Aviv’s badly damaged international standing:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for instance, has displayed his legal nihilism by dismissing as “outrageous” the closely reasoned finding of the court, at which Israel had every opportunity to argue its case. Israel’s far-right Minister of National Security, convicted racist and terrorist supporter Itamar Ben-Gvir, has derided the ruling with an X post simply saying: “Hague schmague.”
And, of course, as always, everyone not toeing Israel’s line is smeared as an “antisemite”: The ICJ is now joining the UN, the World Health Organization and, by now, almost everyone and everything outside the ideological bubble of Zionism on the list of those slandered in this manner.
Notwithstanding the ICJ’s lack of an army to compel Tel Aviv to obey the law, these outbursts of rage betray great fear. You may ask why. After all, the one thing the ICJ did not do was order a ceasefire. Some commenters have focused on that fact, to argue – gleefully on the side of Israel and its allies, with great disappointment on the side of Israel’s victims, opponents, and critics – that this vitiates the ruling.
They are wrong. As, for instance, the Palestinian legal expert Nimer Sultany (based at the London School of Oriental and Asian Studies) has explained, a direct ceasefire order was always unlikely. There are several reasons for that: The ICJ cannot issue such an order to Hamas, so issuing one to Israel alone would have been difficult in principle and, by the way, would also have provided ammunition for Israeli propaganda. Since only the UN Security Council could give teeth to the ICJ’s ruling, trying to decree such a one-sided ceasefire would have made it easier for the US to sabotage the Council by discrediting the court’s ruling as biased. Although it was consistent for South Africa to ask for a ceasefire at the ICJ, the best institution to order one is still the Security Council. And it is plausible to interpret the specific demands that the ICJ has made of Israel as practicable only under an official or de-facto ceasefire. Indeed, Arab countries are now, it seems, gearing up to take that position and use the court’s ruling to demand a ceasefire at the Security Council. This may very well fail again, but even that failure will serve to weaken the position of the US, Israel’s vital sponsor.
Beyond the issue of the ceasefire, there are other – and, from an Israeli perspective, probably more frightening – factors. For even if the US keeps shielding Israel, this is a bigger world. Western governments and politicians that have supported Tel Aviv unconditionally – with arms, diplomatic and public-relations cover, and by repressing Israel’s critics – will feel a chill: The UN Genocide Convention and the Rome Statute don’t just condemn perpetrating a genocide but also not preventing or being complicit in one.
With the ICJ now having confirmed at the very least that genocide is probable enough to merit a case and require immediate action, Joe Biden, Antony Blinken, Ursula von der Leyen, Olaf Scholz, Rishi Sunak, Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron, Annalena Baerbock, to name only a few, should start worrying: While the ICJ does not go after individuals, the International Criminal Court (ICC) does. Despite dragging its feet as much as it could, it is now especially likely to be compelled to open a full-fledged investigation.
In addition, cases can also be brought under national jurisdictions. All of this will take years. But it could end very badly for hubris-addled Western politicians who never imagined that such charges could escape their control (where they serve as politicized tools to go after African leaders and geopolitical opponents) and become their very own, potentially life-changing problem. In sum, the cost of siding with Israel has gone up. Not all but most politicians are solid opportunists. Tel Aviv will find it harder to mobilize its friends.
It is true that some Western governments and leaders, for instance, Canada or Rishi Sunak, have hurried to show their disdain for international law by attacking the ICJ’s ruling. But there’s an element of desperate bravado, of whistling in a darkening forest. And there’s a Catch-22 as well: Because, the more representatives of the West display their arrogance, the more they alienate the world. They may think that they are relieving Israel’s isolation. In reality, they are joining it on its downward trajectory: They are showing, once again, that their touted “rules-based order” is the opposite of the equal rule of international law for all.
Non-Western powers like China and Russia that have long resisted the hypocrisy of that ‘rules-based order’ and are not complicit in Israel’s atrocities, are earning global good will and geopolitical advantage. Hence, their positions and strategy will be confirmed by the ICJ ruling. This, as well, will weaken Israel further in the international arena.
If the world is bigger than the US or the West, it also contains much more than politics in the narrow sense of the term. In the realm of narratives, this is also a harsh setback for Israel and its supporters: Those who arrogantly dismissed the South African case as baseless or “a mockery,” for instance in The Economist, are now paying with their credibility. Their value as weapons in Israel’s struggle for global public opinion is reduced.
Last but not least, the domains of politics and narratives intersect, of course, with that of war: It is inevitable that those fighting Israel with arms will feel encouraged, and rightly so. For forces such as the Palestinian Resistance, the Ansar Allah (Houthi) movement de facto ruling Yemen, Hezbollah, and Iran, this ICJ ruling coincides with Israel’s military failure in Gaza: For while its troops have massacred civilians (and obsessively recorded proud evidence of their crimes that is now coming to haunt them), they are far from either “eradicating Hamas” (the putative war aim) or freeing the hostages by force. Seeing that Israel’s international isolation is getting worse, its opponents will have ever less reason to give up.
This, in short, was a great setback for Israel. Its political model, combining apartheid, militarism, and a might-makes-right outlook, is not ‘working’ any longer, not even on its own terms. The future is not predictable. That Israel will be in worsening trouble is.
Tarik Cyril Amar is a historian from Germany working at Koç University, Istanbul.
MAGA and Progressive Lawmakers Unite to Lambast Biden’s Attacks on Houthis
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 28.01.2024
US representatives and senators of all stripes have subjected the president to sharp criticism over his strikes in Yemen.
US President Joe Biden’s recent air strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen have provoked cross-party criticism in Congress.
Representatives Cori Bush (D-Mo.), Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), Marjorie Taylor Green (R-Ga.), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), as well as other 12 House Democrats and six Republicans, have joined ranks to express “serious concerns” about the “unauthorized” strikes.
“We believe the US’ unauthorized strikes in Yemen violate the Constitution and US statute,” wrote the lawmakers, arguing that Congress has the sole power to declare war and authorize military action.
Addressing Biden himself, they continued: “We urge your Administration to seek authorization from Congress before involving the US in another conflict in the Middle East, potentially provoking Iran-backed militias that may threaten US military service members already in the region, and risking escalation of a wider regional war,” the letter said, as quoted by Axios.
Since January 12, the US and its allies have been carrying out strikes with cruise missiles and precision-guided bombs against the Houthis in Yemen.
The US-led coalition has conducted 11 strikes against the Shiite militia so far in response to the Houthis targeting Israel-linked vessels in the Red Sea in a bid to force Tel Aviv to halt military actions against Palestinians in Gaza.
Earlier this week, another bipartisan group of senators questioned Washington’s effort to protect foreign ships in the Red Sea.
“As Commander-in-Chief, you have the power and responsibility to defend the United States under Article II of the Constitution,” a letter signed by Senators Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Todd Young (R-Ind.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) said. “However, most vessels transiting through the Red Sea are not US ships, which raises questions about the extent to which these authorities can be exercised.”
Commenting on the strikes on Yemen targets, the lawmakers drew attention to the fact that “there is no current congressional authorization for offensive US military action against the Houthis.”
“[U]nless there is a need to repel a sudden attack, the Constitution requires that the United States not engage in military action absent of a favorable vote of Congress,” the lawmakers insisted.
While non-interventionists on both sides of the US political aisle are urging Biden to show restraint, the hawks are chastising the president for not doing enough against the Yemen Shiite group.
For his part, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) lambasted the president for “failing to sufficiently exercise the authority he has.”
“[Biden’s] played whack-a-mole against warehouses and launch sites, but left the terrorists’ air defenses and command-and-control facilities intact,” argued McConnell.
McConnell highlighted the 2002 authorization for the use of military force (AUMF) that empowered then-US President George W. Bush to kick off the Iraq War. In 2023, US lawmakers sought to strip US presidents of the AUMF; however, the legislative measure got stuck in the US Congress.
Not only US lawmakers but also right- and left-wing American scholars have recently warned the Biden administration against escalating tensions in the Middle East.
They particularly argued that the cost of the global trade disruption caused by the Red Sea crisis would be far less than the cost of the US operations against Yemen, especially given the risk of a clash with Iran, which traditionally supported Shiite militias in the small Middle Eastern state. A larger regional war is looming, they warned.
Pentagon contradicts White House about US troop presence in Yemen
The Cradle | January 28, 2024
US defense officials claim they have no boots on the ground in Yemen, despite a recent acknowledgement that US forces are indeed present in the war-torn Gulf state, a 27 January report from The Intercept shows.
On 17 January, a journalist asked US Defense Department press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder if he could give assurances that the US had no troops on the ground in Yemen. Ryder responded, “I’m not aware of any U.S. forces on the ground.”
However, the White House reported to Congress on 7 December that “A small number of United States military personnel are deployed to Yemen to conduct operations against al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula and ISIS.”
Erik Sperling, the executive director of Just Foreign Policy, who worked on Yemen as a Capitol Hill staffer, told The Intercept it is possible Brig. Gen. Ryder “is trying to skirt the question to avoid greater scrutiny.”
Pentagon officials also deny that the US is at war with Yemen despite bombing it.
“We don’t think that we are at war,” Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said on 18 January. “We don’t want to see a regional war.”
One journalist in the press briefing responded, saying, “We’ve bombed them five times now … if this isn’t war, what is war?”
This month, the US began a new bombing campaign against Yemen, which is now primarily governed by the Ansarallah resistance movement. With US and UK backing, Saudi Arabia and the UAE fought a war against Ansarallah between 2015 and 2022.
This month’s US bombing campaign came after Ansarallah-led Yemeni forces began attacking Israeli-linked shipping vessels in the Red Sea. Ansarallah wishes to stop the Israeli military campaign on Gaza, which has killed over 26,000 Palestinians and is widely viewed as constituting genocide.
But as the US bombing campaign in Yemen began, “defense officials suddenly became more reticent about the American military presence in Yemen,” The Intercept noted.
Though US officials claim their forces are in Yemen to fight Al-Qaeda-linked groups, a BBC investigation released on 22 January revealed that the UAE, a close US ally, has hired Al-Qaeda militants to fight for the Southern Transitional Council (STC), the Emirati-backed government in sparsely populated eastern Yemen.
A whistleblower cited in the investigation provided the BBC with “a document with 11 names of former Al-Qaeda members now working in the STC,” among them former high-ranking operatives of the extremist group.
Nasser al-Shiba, a former high-ranking Al-Qaeda member, is now the commander of the of the STC’s armed units, several sources told the BBC.
Lawsuit Filed Against Biden, Blinken, and Austin’s Complicity in Gaza Genocide
Al-Manar | January 27, 2024
The Center for Constitutional Rights in America (CCR) has filed a lawsuit accusing President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin of being “complicit in the crimes of genocide committed by `Israel` in the Gaza Strip.”
On Friday, a federal court in Oakland, California, held a hearing to consider this lawsuit, which Judge Jeffrey White described as the most challenging case for the court.
Legal representatives for Biden, Blinken, Austin, and the Center for Constitutional Rights were present at the hearing session. Attorneys, activists, and medical professionals from Gaza provided testimonies, elucidating the adversities faced by Palestinians in the Strip.
According to media reports, the plaintiffs emphasized in their pleadings that the current US administration is allegedly contravening the 1948 Genocide Convention by supplying weaponry to the Zionist entity. Conversely, the defense asserted that the court lacks jurisdiction to adjudicate on this matter.
The Center for Constitutional Rights in the United States, focusing on civil liberties, initiated a civil lawsuit against Biden, Blinken, and Austin last November. This legal action was taken on behalf of Palestinian organizations, Palestinians in Gaza, and American citizens with relatives in the Strip.
The plaintiffs allege that Biden and his ministers failed to leverage their substantial influence to set conditions or limits on Zionist aggression against Gaza.
US, UK jets bomb Yemen’s main oil export terminal
The Cradle | January 27, 2024
Yemen’s Al-Masirah TV reported on 27 January that US and UK warplanes bombed the port of Ras Issa, the country’s main oil export terminal, located in Hodeidah province.
The news followed an announcement by the US Central Command (CENTCOM), which claimed: “On Jan. 27 at approximately 3:45 a.m. (Sanaa time), US Central Command Forces conducted a strike against a Houthi anti-ship missile aimed into the Red Sea and which was prepared to launch. US Forces identified the missile in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen.”
No casualties have been reported from the latest US-led aggression on Yemen.
The attack came a few hours after the country’s armed forces carried out a successful operation against the Marshall Islands-flagged and UK-linked Martin Luanda oil tanker in the Gulf of Aden, setting the vessel on fire.
No deaths or injuries were reported among the crew as a US navy ship was providing assistance, CENTCOM said.
The attack on the oil tanker was described as “a victory for the oppression of the Palestinian people, and a response to the US-UK aggression against Yemen” by armed forces spokesman Brigadier General Yahya Saree.
Singapore-based multinational commodity trading company Transfigura confirmed the Martin Luanda was operated on its behalf and that it was carrying Russian naphtha “bought below the price cap in line with G7 sanctions.”
“We are aware of reports that the M/V Marlin Luanda, a Marshall Islands-flagged tanker, has sustained damage from an attack in the Gulf of Aden. Current reports suggest no casualties, and nearby coalition vessels are on the scene,” a UK government spokesperson said following the attack.
Shortly after the attack, the Free Spirit vessel, chartered by Swiss-based Dutch multinational energy and commodity trading company Vitol to carry crude oil, did a U-turn before reaching the Gulf of Aden, according to data from LSEG Shipping Research.
Although US, UK, and Israeli-linked vessels are being forced to avoid the Red Sea altogether thanks to Sanaa’s pro-Palestine operations, Saudi and Chinese shipments are continuing to transit the vital waterway unimpeded.
US ambassador makes threat to Hungary
David Pressman, U.S. ambassador to Hungary, attends the LGBTQ Pride parade in Budapest, 15 July 2023 © Getty Images / Marton Monus
RT | January 27, 2024
The US has the power to pressure Hungary if it does not adjust its foreign policy towards the EU, NATO and Russia, American ambassador to Budapest, Davis Pressman, said.
In an interview published in the Financial Times on Friday, Pressman laid out a laundry list of complaints about Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, including his defiant stance on the Russia-Ukraine conflict and attitude towards Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“When you look at Hungary’s foreign policy, whether it be suggesting raising questions about Ukraine’s EU accession, stymying efforts to provide financial support to Ukraine, meeting with Vladimir Putin, resisting efforts to diversify off of Russian energy, resisting sustained efforts to close Kremlin platforms inside of Hungary, all of these have something in common,” the diplomat said. “And it’s something that is leaving Hungary more isolated from its partners within Nato and its partners within the EU.”
Pressman went on to insist that Orban’s “policy choices, without question, are helpful to Putin.” He added that the US has the means of coercing Hungary.
“We absolutely have leverage, that is true. And we’re prepared to use our leverage.”
Unlike many NATO members, Hungary has refused to send weapons to Ukraine and has barred the alliance from using its territory to provide military aid to Kiev. Orban also opposed certain economic sanctions on Russia. Last month, Hungary vetoed an additional €50 billion ($55 billion) in EU funding for Ukraine.
Budapest has maintained that no foreign pressure can prompt it to abandon national interests. “No one can tell us from the outside how to lead our lives within our own borders. Whether it is a foreign citizen, or even a foreign ambassador, their opinion is irrelevant for us,” Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said last year, as quoted by local media.
US promised to seize Russian assets – Kiev
RT | January 27, 2024
The US assured Kiev that the Russian assets that remain frozen in the West are going to be seized and used to rebuild Ukraine after the conflict, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denis Shmygal has said.
The US, EU, and their allies blocked some $300 billion of Russian central bank assets as part of sanctions in response to Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine. Around $200 billion of that money is held in the EU.
Politico reported on Thursday that it asked Shmygal if he was concerned that US funding for the Kiev government would come to a complete stop if Donald Trump won the presidential election in November and returned to the White House for his second term.
”We have all the assurances from the US about long-term support for Ukraine – for example, the seizure of Russian assets to fund the Ukrainian recovery,” he claimed.
On Wednesday, a US Senate committee approved the “Rebuilding Economic Prosperity and Opportunity (REPO) for Ukrainians Act,” which should help pave the way for such a move by Washington. If it passes both houses and is signed into law by President Joe Biden, Washington could seize the Russian central bank assets, using such a measure against a country that it’s not directly at war with for the first time in history.
Reuters reported this week, citing a senior official in Brussels, that the EU will be unlikely to join the US in confiscating the Russian funds as there’s no agreement on such a step between the bloc’s member-states.
Earlier in January, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov warned that Moscow would respond to a possible seizure of its assets by the West, inducing tit-for-tat measures.
Previously, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that the confiscation of Russian funds would amount to “outright theft” by the West. He told reporters that it would undermine the trust in the US and EU financial systems around the globe.
Shmygal also stated that Kiev is “working hard with the administration of President Biden and with Congress to have support for 2024.” As for the continuation of the aid in 2025, “we’ll see how conditions develop,” he stressed.
”I believe that any president of the US will support our fight for civilized values, our mutual values,” the Ukrainian PM said.
The US has provided Ukraine with around $111 billion in economic and military support amid the conflict with Russia. But the flow of funds subsided dramatically in recent months as Republican lawmakers continue to resist attempts by the White House to push through another $60 billion in assistance for Kiev.
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The Maidan Killings and the False-Flag Case
By Freddie Ponton | 21st Century Wire | September 5, 2026
Before the killings that helped bring down Ukraine’s president in February 2014, American diplomats were discussing who should enter its government. In a leaked telephone call, senior State Department official Victoria Nuland told US ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt, “I think Yats is the guy,” referring to opposition leader Arseniy Yatseniuk. Washington had clear preferences and was working to advance them. Later that month, Yatseniuk became prime minister.
Ivan Katchanovski’s The Maidan Massacre in Ukraine examines the violence that preceded that transfer of power. Drawing on television footage, witness testimony, forensic examinations and Ukrainian court proceedings, he argues that elements of the opposition shot protesters and police in a false-flag operation. His case centres on evidence of protesters being shot from opposition-controlled locations, including Hotel Ukraina, overlooking the killing ground. … continue
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