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G7 leaders scaremonger over Iran’s nuclear programme, but WMDs aren’t their real concern

By Robert Inlakesh | RT | June 1, 2023

The G7’s concern over Iran’s nuclear programme parrots a decades-old WMD conspiracy theory, aimed at drumming up public support for anti-Iranian action that is really aimed at curtailing Tehran’s conventional weapons programme, regional alliances and the development of stronger ties with Moscow.

After the meeting between the Group of Seven (G7) leaders in May, a number of announcements were made on the trajectory of the alliance. Germany, France, the UK, the US, Japan, Canada, and the European Commission all agreed to take measures to reduce trade reliance on China. They also agreed to advance their commitment to Ukraine’s war budget, while pledging  to combat Iran’s influence in the Middle East. The agenda platform, set out from the Japanese city of Hiroshima, seeks to further exacerbate the schisms between major world and regional actors in the emerging multipolar order.

Tehran has long been the target of Western ire and sanctions, and until recently was locked in a rivalry with its Persian Gulf neighbor Saudi Arabia. However, as the US and its allies focus their efforts on combating Russia and China, this has presented opportunities for the less powerful Iran to survive under sanctions.

On May 17, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi signed a deal to finance the construction of an Iranian rail route that aims to supplement the international North-South Transport Corridor. It also emerged this month that 28 Russian energy companies plan to visit Iran, seeking to increase cooperation with and potentially help in advancing Iran’s oil and gas industry. These two developments add to the growing cooperation between the world’s two most sanctioned nations, both of which have proven themselves capable of finding alternatives to the West and circumventing the intended effects of its sanctions.

It is in this context that the conspiracy theories about Iran’s alleged pursuit of a nuclear weapon have emerged again in Western discourse. The G7’s draft communique on the issue expressed the nations’ concerns “about Iran’s unabated escalation of its nuclear programme,” while reiterating the “clear determination that Iran must never develop a nuclear weapon.” However, the assertions about Iran’s nuclear programme were also accompanied by the following sentence:

“We express our grave concern regarding Iran’s continued destabilising activities, including the transfer of missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVS) and related technologies to state and non-state actors.”

Western officials have a long track record of wrongly predicting Iran’s development of an atomic bomb, offering false speculation about when Iran will have one whenever a separate major issue pops up. Now that Russia-Iran ties are developing, Tehran-Riyadh rapprochement has been brokered by Beijing, and the sanctions have failed to bring about regime change, it seems there is a build-up to another push to condemn the Iranian government on an issue which the Western world can unite over.

Earlier in May, UK foreign secretary James Cleverly told Fox News that “preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon remains an absolute priority in UK foreign policy,” going on to say that Britain continues to work “very, very closely” with Germany, France and the US to impose sanctions on Iran. And no talk of Iranian nuclear weapons would be complete without an Israeli official chiming in. Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed that Tehran now has enough uranium for five nuclear weapons.

Since 1992, Israeli officials have been constantly making false claims and predictions on how long it will take for Iran to build a nuclear bomb, with former Israeli President Shimon Peres first warning the international community “that Iran would be armed with a nuclear bomb by 1999.” Back in January of 2021, former IDF chief Aviv Kochavi even made the claim that the nukes could be developed in “months, maybe even weeks.”

In reality, there is no proof that Iran has a secret nuclear weapons program, nor is there any evidence to suggest Tehran is seeking to develop the bomb, let alone use it. At this point, after the deadlines set by the countless predictions have passed, the current talk amounts to little more than a fact-free conspiracy theory. Thinking rationally about it, it would make no sense for Iran to use a nuclear weapon either, in the event that it actually is seeking one, especially not against Israel, as this could end up destroying the third-holiest site in the Islamic faith.

There are, however, a number of ways that Iran presents a clear and present threat to the West’s agenda in the Middle East. The first and most immediate threat comes through its defense industry. Iran now produces sophisticated drones and missiles that are capable of doing significant damage to NATO and Israeli forces in the Middle East, if need be. Additionally, Tehran has allies like Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Palestine, Ansarallah (the Houthis) in Yemen, Kataeb Hezbollah in Iraq, and many others, who remain powerful in their own given arenas.

Lastly, it is clear that Iran is now on track for a brighter future economically. It has managed to end its hostility with Saudi Arabia, and this has meant that their competition inside a range of Middle East nations has eased. These strides toward regional stability have been coupled with developing relations between Tehran and Moscow. Iran also agreed on a potential $400 billion deal with China, announced back in 2021, which at the very least opened the door for further cooperation and investment.

At a time when the US and its European allies are focusing heavily on combating both China and Russia, it is a great frustration to witness Iran, their top Middle East foe, come together with their enemies. This is why the issue of nuclear weapons has come up again. Not that Western nations, armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons themselves, are in any position to tell others what to do – but it is clear that the question of an imminent Iranian WMD is not a serious one.

Robert Inlakesh is a political analyst, journalist and documentary filmmaker currently based in London, UK. He has reported from and lived in the Palestinian territories and currently works with Quds News. Director of ‘Steal of the Century: Trump’s Palestine-Israel Catastrophe’.

June 3, 2023 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , | Leave a comment

Zionist Circles: Threats against Iran Disregard Mistaken US Withdrawal from Nuclear Deal

Al-Manar – June 2, 2023

The Zionist circles commented on the threats issued by some Israeli officials against Iran, stressing that they disregard the mistaken withdrawal of Trump’s administration from the deal.

It is worth noting that the Israeli threats came in light of the reports that indicate the rapid progress of the Iranian nuclear program and Washington’s endeavor to conclude a new deal with Tehran.

Israeli Channel 12 correspondent Nir Devori considered that intensifying threats is caused by the US tendency to strike a new nuclear deal with Iran away from the Zionist will.

The former Zionist prime minister Ehud Olmert noted that the Israeli failure occurred when Tel Aviv convinced Washington to withdraw from the deal, adding that reports confirmed Iran did not violate the pact.

Israeli circles also warned against an imminent rift between ‘Israel’ and the international community amid deep local crises.

June 3, 2023 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

US, UK disrupt peace efforts in Yemen

The Cradle | June 2, 2023

Washington and the UK have been continually disrupting peace negotiations in Yemen, informed sources in Sanaa were cited as saying in a report by Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar on 2 June.

“Washington and London are actively disrupting the Yemeni-Saudi political negotiations,” the newspaper wrote.

According to Al-Akhbar, the US and UK are trying to “obstruct all efforts that could lead to peace, and put among their first considerations the Israeli interest.”

This “Israeli interest” is the reason that Saudi Arabia has been “procrastinating” in the agreements it made with Sanaa, which include lifting all blockades and paying government employee salaries, Al-Akhbar said.

This, along with US and UK involvement, aim to keep Yemen in “a state of no war but no peace.”

Al-Akhbar’s sources were quoted as saying: “The political leadership in Yemen knows from the outset that … Riyadh is unable to abide by the terms of the agreement and … end the repercussions of the war due to the divergent regional interests.”

“The [coalition], as much as they agree on undermining Yemeni independence and sovereignty, they are in conflict with each other,” the sources added.

They went on to say that the Ansarallah resistance movement and the Sanaa government do not regret the political flexibility they showed during recent Omani-mediated talks with the kingdom. They warned, however, that time is not on the coalition’s side and that their military power has grown significantly.

The report goes on to explain how Saudi interests diverge from those of the UAE, the west, and Israel.

According to the Al-Akhbar report, Saudi Arabia has realized – despite its procrastination as a result of external pressure – that its interest lies in ending the war and withdrawing from “the Yemeni quagmire.”

However, the UAE wishes to maintain its occupation of Yemen’s ports and oilfields, as well as its occupation of the country’s waterways and particularly its islands, including the Socotra archipelago, which Abu Dhabi has been working in collaboration with Israel to transform into joint military and intelligence hubs. There have also been recent concerns over UAE-backed separatist ambitions in the south.

This also falls in line with the US and Israeli interest to maintain and bolster influence in the Red Sea.

The report adds that Israel is also particularly interested in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, which it considers a “vital artery” for trade with the east, and a key factor in strengthening influence in the Horn of Africa.

It concludes that the Israeli security establishment has significant concerns over Ansarallah’s capability to strike Israel with missiles.

June 3, 2023 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Iran, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman to form joint naval force under China auspices: Report

Press TV – June 2, 2023

A Qatari website has reported that Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman are to form a joint naval force under China’s auspices towards enhancing maritime security in the Persian Gulf.

Al-Jadid carried the report on Friday, saying China had already begun mediating negotiations among Tehran, Riyadh, and Abu Dhabi aimed at reinforcing maritime navigation’s safety in the strategic body of water.

Back in March, Beijing successfully mediated talks between Tehran and Riyadh that led to the Persian Gulf littoral states’ signing of a deal enabling the restoration of their diplomatic ties.

According to observers, the Persian Gulf states’ consent to Beijing’s mediation in such sensitive matters serves to indicate China’s growing influence in the region as opposed to Washington’s waning clout.

Since the 1979 victory of Iran’s Islamic Revolution, the Islamic Republic has invariably opposed foreign meddling and presence in the region, asserting that the regional issues have to be addressed by the regional players themselves.

The latest instance of the opposition came last Friday when the commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Navy categorically dismissed the US military’s presence in the Persian Gulf under the pretext of securing the maritime region.

Rear Admiral Alireza Tangsiri said only Iran and other regional countries would ensure the security of the Persian Gulf and there was no need for the US and other countries to be present in the waterway. “If we back down against the enemy, it will definitely dominate us and we have no choice but to stand and resist, which is the path to the victory of our nation,” he said.

UAE quits US-led naval force

The UAE has, meanwhile, announced quitting a United States-led naval force.

On Wednesday, the website of the Emirati foreign ministry said Abu Dhabi had withdrawn from the Joint Maritime Forces that operate in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf.

The ministry said the Emirates had decided to ditch the naval coalition following an extensive evaluation of its security needs.

Analysts say Abu Dhabi has chosen the withdrawal in line with its ambition to diversify its security relationships.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Federal Government Funds $4.7 Million Grant — Led by Merck Consultant — to Increase HPV Vaccine Uptake…

… By Improving How Providers ‘Announce’ the Vaccine

By Brenda Baletti, Ph.D. | The Defender | June 1, 2023

This is the first in a two-part series examining federal funding for behavior modification approaches to increase uptake among teens of the human papillomavirus vaccine.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is funding a scientist who also is a paid consultant for Merck to conduct research on how to increase teen uptake of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, documents obtained by Children’s Health Defense (CHD) via a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request revealed.

Merck manufactures Gardasil, the only HPV vaccine available in the U.S.

Documents show that the National Cancer Institute (NCI) at the HHS in 2021 awarded a $4.7 million, five-year grant to the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill.

The grant’s principal investigator, Noel Brewer, Ph.D., a psychologist and professor in the Department of Health Behavior at the UNC Gillings School of Public Health, consults for Merck and is also the recipient of commercial research grants from Merck, Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

The HHS grant builds on Brewer’s previous industry and HHS-funded research investigating different “research-tested interventions” intended to reshape the behavior of physicians and patients by “improving” the ways providers “announce” the vaccine to potential recipients, in order to get more teens to take the HPV vaccine.

The grant is focused on further developing “Announcement Approach Training,” which involves having providers skip the step of discussing with families in “open-ended conversation” whether or not they want their child vaccinated for HPV and instead “presume” the family wants the vaccine and announce the child will receive it as if it were a routine part of the office visit.

Brewer and others’ previous research has shown this method reduces the time a provider needs to spend talking with their patients and increases vaccine uptake.

Other projects funded by the grant consist of conducting randomized controlled trials to see how best to get clinics and clinicians to implement this approach to increase HPV vaccine uptake, according to the FOIA documents obtained by CHD.

One trial investigates how clinics can rework their “standing orders” — the protocols for all practitioners — to standardize how clinicians talk to their patients, for example, using the announcement approach, or to otherwise change the nature of doctor-patient interactions.

Another trial investigates how financial incentives affect providers’ willingness to strongly recommend the shots. A third trial tests whether training by “trusted messengers” works to better alter provider behavior.

The overall project will compare the effectiveness and cost of the different methods and model them in rural areas, which typically have lower HPV rates.

U.S. government awarded more than 50 grants worth $40 million to increase HPV vaccine uptake

The $4.7 million grant to UNC was by far the largest awarded by the HHS to increase HPV vaccine uptake, however, it was not the only one.

CHD’s search of USAspending.gov identified more than 50 grants totaling more than $40 million awarded by the HHS to universities, healthcare systems and departments of public health to increase HPV vaccine uptake.

Two of the smaller grants came from the U.S. Department of Defense rather than HHS.

All of the grants — awarded since 2009, with most awarded since 2016 — fund projects either to test or to implement different methods to change people’s behaviors at the community, provider and patient level with the goal of getting more young people to take the shot.

Some of the more recent grants also focused on increasing HPV uptake by combating “misinformation” on social media.

This approach to vaccine uptake is part of a larger turn in American healthcare toward applying lessons from behavioral economics, like “nudging” to healthcare.

“Nudging” figured prominently during the COVID-19 pandemic and was heavily utilized by governments and public health officials throughout the world to implement restrictions and countermeasures.

Economist Richard H. Thaler and legal scholar Cass R. Sunstein defined the concept in their bestselling 2008 book — “Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness” — as a method that “alters people’s behavior in a predictable way without forbidding any options or significantly changing their economic incentives.”

Thaler and Sunstein presented nudging as a technocratic solution for tricky policy issues involving a perceived need to encourage, in a “voluntary manner,” policies or measures that would otherwise be unpopular.

The strategy made its way into public health long before COVID-19, with Big Pharma, regulatory agencies and doctors applying this behavioral approach to the clinic, trying to “nudge” patients toward desired choices by changing the “choice architecture” they are operating in so that they would choose differently.

Providers directed to ‘presume’ families want the vaccine

Over the past several years, much research has been dedicated to studying how “nudge” strategies can be applied to vaccine uptake, particularly the COVID-19 vaccine.

A study posted in BMJ Global Health in 2021 called for further research into whether methods such as the “Announcement Approach” could effectively “nudge” people to take vaccines.

The documents related to the $4.7 million HHS grant obtained by CHD include detailed proposals for the randomized controlled trials in the “Improving Provider Announcement Communication Training” project, which investigates this approach.

The university webpage shows a total grant of $11.7 million, which appears to include administrative overhead costs.

The broader project is divided into four sub-projects, each led by a different faculty member with Brewer as the lead investigator.

Much of Brewer’s professional work is dedicated to increasing HPV vaccination uptake. He chairs the National HPV Roundtable, which brings together medical associations, nonprofits, health insurance providers and pharmaceutical companies, with funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to raise HPV vaccination rates.

He also advises the World Health Organization, the CDC and other organizations on “vaccine communication.”

Brewer is also a consultant who has served on different paid Merck HPV advisory boards since 2011 and has been a general consultant for the company since 2019.

According to his curriculum vitae, he has given numerous talks at Merck events on how to increase HPV vaccine uptake.

Merck awarded Brewer more than $500,000 in grant funding to study HPV vaccine uptake and he received more than $400,000 from Pfizer to study how trainings might improve physician perceptions and recommendations of the HPV vaccine. He has also received funding from GSK.

He is a member of HHS’s National Vaccine Advisory Committee working group on the HPV vaccine and his website says he was a paid advisor to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The FOIA documents included support letters from Brewer’s colleagues celebrating how Brewer had “already changed the national landscape for increasing HPV vaccination.”

Brewer and his colleague Melissa Gilkey, Ph.D., associate professor of Health Behavior, developed “Announcement Approach” training specifically for the HPV vaccine and in this project are conducting randomized controlled trials to determine how best to put the approach into practice.

The research premise is that provider recommendations are key to increasing uptake of the HPV vaccine, but that providers either don’t recommend the vaccine — in part because they know parents have doubts about it — or don’t use the most effective method, “presumptive recommendation,” rebranded here as Announcement Approach, to make their recommendation.

A “presumptive recommendation” is made when the provider does not offer the option of not taking the vaccine to the family, thereby limiting the landscape of available choices.

This method directs the provider to act as if the family has already decided to vaccinate their child — to “presume” they want to be vaccinated — rather than opening space for dialogue or conversation around the vaccine.

Brewer et al.’s previous research that found training doctors to give announcements rather than have conversations with their patients, where they might raise more questions, led to higher rates of vaccine uptake.

Brewer’s team found clinics that used the presumptive or announcement approach had a 5.4% increase in uptake and physicians had to spend 40% less time discussing the vaccine with families.

The grant documents provide an example of the announcement approach:

“Announcements should indicate that HPV vaccination is part of routine care …

“We recommend that announcements 1) note the child’s age to establish what follows as part of routine care; 2) say the child is due for several vaccinations (noting the diseases prevented, not the vaccine names); and 3) say that the child will receive vaccines today.

“An example of a presumptive announcement is, ‘Now that Sophia is 12, she is due for 3 vaccines. Today, she’ll get vaccines to prevent meningitis, HPV cancers, and whooping cough.’”

For “hesitant parents” who don’t submit to the HPV vaccination with the initial approach, the provider should “connect and counsel.”

To do this the provider:

“1) connects with the parent by showing empathy and confirming the parent’s main question without reinforcing misinformation; and

“2) counsels the parent using a research-tested message and encourages them to vaccinate today.”

According to the grant proposal, “Messages in the counsel step increase parents’ intentions to vaccinate in our prior randomized experiments (e.g, ‘This vaccine is one of the most studied medications on the market. The HPV vaccine is safe, just like the other vaccines given at this age.’)”

If parents decline same-day vaccination, the team member makes a note in the patient’s chart and addresses HPV vaccination at the next visit.

In an observational study, the “announcement” or presumptive method was associated with an increase in parental vaccine acceptance but also with reduced satisfaction in the clinical experience.

The participatory or conversational format — where providers offer the full range of options to patients and dialogue with them about it —showed the opposite pattern.

HPV vaccine generates profits for Merck and HHS, which funds the grant

Brewer receives research funding from both Merck and HHS/NCI, both of which stand to gain financially from increased HPV vaccine uptake.

Merck — the only producer of HPV vaccines in the U.S. since GSK pulled Cervarix from the U.S. market in 2016 — generates billions annually from Gardasil sales. It reported sales of $4 billion in 2020, despite the challenges of the pandemic.

Sales jumped to $5.7 billion in 2021. And with expanded production and global uptake, Merck anticipates “very strong sequential and year-over-year growth for Gardasil.”

The National Cancer Institute at the NIH developed the technology for the HPV vaccine and licensed it to Merck, which formulated its Gardasil vaccine and ran the clinical trials. The FDA granted Fast Track approval for Gardasil after only a six-month review process and it was licensed to Merck in 2006.

From 2007 through 2019, the HPV vaccine was among the NIH’s top four most commercially successful inventions, an assessment based on the royalties a product produces for the NIH.

The National Cancer Institute, which is housed in the HHS, receives the royalties from the Gardasil vaccine and is the agency funding the UNC study.

The inventors, who work for the NIH, also individually receive up to $150,000 per year for their patentable inventions, depending on how much the NIH receives in royalties.

It is unclear how much NIH receives from the HPV vaccine. A 2020 Government Accountability Office report found that the NIH had generated $2 billion in profits from 34 licensed drugs — with three drugs generating more than $100 million —  it created since 1991 and recommended that NIH ought to increase transparency around this process.

HPV vaccination, which requires multiple doses, was first recommended by the CDC for girls in 2006 and for boys in 2011. The CDC routinely recommends vaccination at ages 11-12 and says it can be started at age 9.

HPV infections may lead to the development of cervical cancer. However, most infections are benign and resolve on their own.

The UNC grant description states the HPV vaccine could prevent 32,100 cancers per year if it were administered at the target rate of 80% of the population.

But the efficacy of the vaccine is disputed.

Studying HPV vaccine efficacy for eliminating cervical cancer is challenging due to the long amount of time between infection and the development of cancer (mean time 23.5 years), lack of adequate informed consent, complexity between HPV infection and cervical cancer and the negative impact of girls’ sexual behavior, which may worsen the risks of cervical cancer.

In 2020, the CDC reported that about 75% of U.S. teens had gotten at least one dose in the two or three-dose HPV series, and about 59% had gotten the whole series — a rate that falls short of its goal of 80% coverage. That number dropped nearly 5% during the pandemic.

It also reported that uptake of the HPV vaccine is lower than that of other routinely recommended vaccines. A new study published May 23 in Pediatrics investigated why parents decide against the HPV vaccine for their children.

The study found that although uptake increased overall between 2010 and 2020, during that time, the number of parents citing “safety or side effects” as a reason for vaccine hesitancy increased by nearly 16% annually.

Since the Gardasil vaccine was introduced in 2006, numerous studies have linked it to debilitating autoimmune disorders, neurological side effects and other complications, prompting many families of injured children to file lawsuits alleging the company knew the vaccine could cause serious side effects, The Defender reported.

Until the COVID-19 vaccine became available, the FDA had received more adverse reaction reports related to Gardasil than any other vaccine in history.

The National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program has paid out over $70 million to people making claims regarding Gardasil. Merck now faces more than 80 complaints in federal court alleging that the HPV vaccine caused debilitating autoimmune complications. A judge consolidated 31 of these cases into a single bellwether pool, against Merck’s protest.

But Merck continues to work with national agencies to increase gardasil uptake. Merck’s researchers in March published a study in Pediatrics suggesting evidence shows that moving routine HPV vaccination to ages 9 to 10 may improve vaccination coverage rates.

Brenda Baletti Ph.D. is a reporter for The Defender. She wrote and taught about capitalism and politics for 10 years in the writing program at Duke University. She holds a Ph.D. in human geography from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master’s from the University of Texas at Austin.

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Deception | | Leave a comment

YouTube reverses ban on questioning 2020 US election

RT | June 2, 2023

Video platform YouTube has reversed its controversial ban on questioning the validity of the 2020 and other US election results, acknowledging in a Friday blog post that the policy could silence legitimate political speech.

Effective immediately, the platform said, “content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches occurred in the 2020 and other past US presidential elections” will no longer be removed.

Citing “today’s changed landscape,” the Alphabet subsidiary explained that “in the current environment, we find that while removing this content does curb some misinformation, it could also have the unintended effect curtailing political speech without meaningfully reducing the risk of violence or other real-world harm.”

YouTube explained its policies were aimed at two goals – “protecting our community, and providing a home for open discussion and debate” – and that those goals were not always aligned, admitting open debate was “core to a functioning democratic society.”

While the scrapped policy supposedly covered all past US elections, YouTube had appeared to focus its censorship on content questioning the 2020 results, ignoring or even promoting content that suggested the 2016 outcome was the result of Russian interference, especially if it came from establishment media outlets.

The platform acknowledged removing “tens of thousands” of videos due to the now-repealed ban on electoral fraud discussion. However, the blog post did not indicate if any of those videos would be restored or re-evaluated. While YouTube offers users whose content has been removed a chance to appeal the decision, critics claim the process is only for show and rarely if ever results in content being reinstated.

The platform also reminded users that the rest of its “election misinformation” policies still applied, meaning users could not post content designed to mislead voters about when, where, or how to vote or anything that might either discourage someone from voting or encourage someone to interfere with elections.

Freedom of speech has become a critical issue in the 2024 elections, with both Republican frontrunner Donald Trump and leading Republican challenger Ron DeSantis, as well as Democratic contender Robert F. Kennedy Jr., promising to take on Big Tech’s far-reaching censorship powers.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite | | Leave a comment

CIA Vets: FBI Withholds Damning Evidence on Bidens Prior to Presidential Election, Again

By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 01.06.2023

House Oversight Committee chairman James Comer moved to hold FBI Director Christopher Wray in criminal contempt of Congress on Tuesday after the agency refused to provide a subpoenaed document potentially implicating US President Joe Biden.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has refused to provide a form that “describes an alleged criminal scheme involving then-Vice President Biden and a foreign national relating to the exchange of money for policy decisions,” as per James Comer, R-Ky.

According to Larry Johnson, a veteran of the CIA and the State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism, the information in the FD-1023 form would require criminal charges to be filed against the incumbent president.

“It’s just that simple,” Johnson told Sputnik. “I think the evidence is conclusive that [Joe Biden and his son Hunter – Sputnik ] have been involved with bribery and with activities that are taking advantage of Biden’s position in government. It is corruption on a scale that is frankly astonishing. (…) [The FBI is] doing everything they can to try to cover for the president.”

What’s a FD-1023 Form?

Comer and his fellow lawmakers subpoenaed the FBI for the document in question last month. However, the bureau refused to provide it, claiming that a specific Justice Department policy “strictly limits when and how confidential human source information can be provided outside of the FBI.”

On May 30, acting assistant director of the FBI, Christopher Dunham, sent a letter to Comer, downplaying the significance of the document: “Investigative reports, such as an FD-1023, include leads and suspicions, not the conclusions of investigators based on fuller context, including information that may not be available to the confidential source.”

“That document is the record of somebody who is – of a source of an informant,” said Johnson. “That’s all it is, it’s a written account of someone’s testimony. So it is one piece of that. But apparently, it provides very specific facts about what the Bidens did. Joe Biden has become rich while being president. And I find it fascinating that the United States will always want to criticize or make claims about corruption in Russia, for example, when they’re guilty – the people of the United States – the Bidens are guilty of the very thing they accuse the others of.”

The very next day, on May 31, Wray held a phone conversation with Comer and Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and confirmed the existence of the aforementioned FD-1023 form. He further offered to provide the congressmen “an opportunity to review information responsive to the subpoena in a secure manner to accommodate the committee, while protecting the confidentiality and safety of sources,” as per the bureau’s statement.

“While Director Wray — after a month of refusing to even acknowledge that the form existed — has offered to allow us to see the documents in person at FBI headquarters, we have been clear that anything short of producing these documents to the House Oversight Committee is not in compliance with the subpoena,” Comer stated, adding that the Committee is ready to begin contempt of Congress proceedings.

Is the FBI Deliberately Delaying the Process?

Just hours after holding talks with Comer and Grassley, Wray “hopped” on the bureau’s jet and headed to the FBI’s Las Vegas field office to hold a meeting and attend a counterterrorism conference there, according to Just the News, an independent US media outlet founded by American investigative journalist John Solomon. The media outlet remarked that the trip allowed the FBI chief to escape “an increasingly hostile atmosphere” for himself in DC.

The FBI is interested in further delaying the congressional probe prior to the 2024 elections, believes former CIA station chief Philip Giraldi.

“The FBI works for Attorney General Merrick Garland who works for the president,” Giraldi told Sputnik. “The president will be badly damaged politically if the investigation is carried out diligently so it is on a slow schedule with no results out before next year’s election in all probability. Denying material to the House panel means that there will be procedural delays which will slow up the process even more.”

FBI and DoJ Have Record of Shielding Bidens

Sputnik’s interlocutors noted that the unfolding spat between GOP lawmakers and the FBI should be seen in a larger context of the Justice Department and bureau operatives hindering attempts to turn the spotlight on the Bidens’ potential wrongdoing.

“There is hard evidence of income from foreign sources that was not reported for tax purposes,” Giraldi said, referring to the ongoing Hunter Biden tax probe. “Also some evidence that Joe Biden took bribes from foreign governments and/or intelligence agencies to influence certain policies favorable to those governments. Whistleblowers inside the IRS have indicated that the FBI and attorney general have both been deliberately slowing down the investigative process, presumably to protect the president.”

In April, an IRS whistleblower came forward informing the US Congress about apparent violations during the Hunter Biden tax crimes investigation by the DOJ, citing “preferential treatment” and attempts to shield the first son.

He also alleged misleading statements to Congress by Attorney General Merrick Garland related to the probe. After that, the whistleblower’s team was abruptly suspended from the Hunter Biden investigation at the DoJ’s orders, as per IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel. According to the whistleblower, who turned out to be Gary Shapley, a 14-year IRS veteran, the expulsion could be nothing short of “retaliation.”

FBI agents facilitated the suppression of the New York Post’s Hunter “laptop from hell” story in October 2020 as his father, Joe Biden, ran for the presidency, according to Elon Musk’s Twitter Files expose.

In addition, 51 ex-top intelligence officials branded Hunter’s laptop from hell as “Russian disinformation” at the time. As it turned out in April, it was done at the request of then-Biden campaign top operative Antony Blinken, now serving as a secretary of state.

How Could FBI’s Doc Affect Biden’s 2024 Bid?

The unfolding row over the FD-1023 form replicates the circumstances of 2020, when Joe was amidst his presidential campaign.

“If the story will ever develop fully and appear in the mainstream media, which is unlikely, it could easily change the outcome of the 2024 election if Biden runs,” Giraldi suggested.

“I suspect the story will be played down by the media, however, and I would imagine Biden would not run again if he decides that he has been badly damaged.”

For his part, Johnson does not believe that Biden will be able to run.

“I think he will either decide not to run or may be removed from office before his term is out. So, I think there will be evidence coming out of the nature of this corruption that will be impossible to deny,” the former CIA analyst said.

Team Biden and their allies in the FBI and DoJ appear to have been doing “everything they can to try to obstruct justice,” Johnson noted. “That would be another charge that should be filed against them, they’re making sure that they’re not held accountable.”

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , , | Leave a comment

CIA hacked iPhones of diplomats in Russia – FSB

RT | June 1, 2023

The CIA installed malware on thousands of Apple phones used by Russian citizens and foreign diplomats working in the country, Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has claimed.

The FSB said on Thursday that a joint operation with the Federal Guard Service (FSO) had “uncover[ed] a surveillance operation by American intelligence agencies, carried out with the use of Apple’s mobile devices.”

An assessment of Russia’s telecom infrastructure revealed “anomalies” in the operations of some iPhones, caused by “a previously unknown malicious program that uses software vulnerabilities provided by the manufacturer,” a statement by the agency read.

Several thousand phones made by Apple were infected with the malware, according to the FSB.

Not only Russian citizens were targeted, but also “foreign phone numbers and subscribers that use SIM cards registered with diplomatic missions and embassies inside Russia, including countries from the NATO bloc and the post-Soviet space, as well Israel, Syria and China,” the agency said.

The discovery is more proof of the close cooperation between Apple and the US intelligence community, the FSB claimed, adding that “the declared policy of ensuring the privacy of personal data of Apple users has nothing to do with reality.”

The FSB also accused Apple of “providing the American intelligence services with a wide range of opportunities to survey any persons of interest to the White House, including their partners in anti-Russian activities, as well as their own citizens.”

In March, the Kommersant newspaper reported that members of the Russian presidential administration had been told to discard their iPhones. According to the paper, the step was taken due to concerns that advanced cyberwarfare tools, such as the Israeli Pegasus software, could allow Apple gadgets to be breached, despite the producer’s claims of their enhanced security features.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to comment on the report, but noted that Russian officials were in any case barred from using smartphones “for work purposes” due to the potential vulnerability of devices.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Deception | , , | Leave a comment

US Advocacy Group Releases Emails Challenging Biden’s Statements on Son’s Connections

Sputnik – 01.06.2023

US advocacy group America First Legal (AFL) has released a new package of emails that challenge US President Joe Biden’s prior statements that he knew nothing about his son Hunter’s ties with foreign business people.

The emails are dated from December 2009 to June 2010, the group said, adding that they had been provided by the National Archives at its request. They include emails sent by Hunter’s ex-business partner Eric Schwerin to top assistants of Joe Biden, then vice president in Barack Obama’s administration.

“Hunter’s business partner, Eric Schwerin, emailed the Office of the Vice President about a ‘China Lunch’ a couple of months before [former Chinese President Hu Jintao’s] official visit to the United States. Despite Joe Biden’s denial that he was aware of Hunter’s business dealings with China, the National Archives redacted this email because its ‘Release would disclose confidential advice between the President and his advisors, or between such advisors,'” AFL said.

Schwerin purportedly intended to secure an invitation for his colleague to a 2010 State Department dinner with high-ranking Chinese Communist Party officials.

Joe Biden has adamantly denied any knowledge of or involvement in any of his son’s business dealings as the Republicans in Congress are probing him over possible abuse of power.

Other emails indicate that Hunter Biden received confidential information from the vice-president’s office about a state visit to Africa in 2010.

“These records – which are only a small portion of the actual records that the National Archives possess – demonstrate for the American people, yet again, continued evidence of influence peddling and personal enrichment by the Biden family. The full extent has yet to be seen, but with each release, we are painting a fuller picture for the American people of the extent to which the Biden family business was intertwined with the official business of the United States,” America First Legal Vice President and General Counsel Gene Hamilton said.

In September 2020, a report by two US Republican senators revealed Hunter Biden and his associates were involved with foreign individuals in millions of dollars worth of questionable financial transactions. The transactions involved individuals with ties to the Chinese Communist Party and the wife of the former mayor of Moscow.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , | Leave a comment

State Department Defends “Disinformation” Grant That Funded Online Blacklists

By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | June 1, 2023

The State Department justified its funding of the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), an organization that provides blacklists of certain outlets for the purpose of demonetizing them.

In a letter sent in March, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) criticized the State Department for funding the GDI, and called for an investigation into the $100,000 grant the department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC) awarded GDI in 2021. In a response sent last week, the department said it did not regret funding the GDI.

The letter to Rep. Issa, authored by the assistant secretary of the bureau of legislative affairs Naz Durakoglu, stated that reports that the “State Department funding may have been used to fund GDI’s work in the United States” are inaccurate.

The letter continued to state that Issa’s letter “raises several important points concerning free speech and the principles of democracy, both of which are fundamental to the Department’s representation of U.S. foreign policy and promotion of American ideals abroad,” Washington Examiner reported.

Durakoglu argued that the grant “focused on countering foreign disinformation overseas and, consistent with the GEC’s mission, no domestic-focused activities were included in the scope of work.”

“Funding under the award could not be used for any other purpose,” the letter added.

“America’s foreign adversaries and competitors have wielded information manipulation as a tool of statecraft for decades,” Durakoglu wrote. “The comparatively recent proliferation of global information and communications technology accentuates a contemporary national security risk. The Department stands by the work of the GEC and the crucial role it plays in helping to ensure that foreign disinformation operations do not undermine the policies, security, or stability of the United States, its allies, and partners.”

Speaking to the Washington Examiner, Rep. Issa said: “It is disappointing but not surprising that the Biden State Department hasn’t come close to offering a suitable explanation or corrective action for its role in the censorship of individual Americans and established conservative media. Make no mistake: Congress isn’t done holding State accountable.”

The GEC missed a deadline to hand over documents related to the GDI and other groups to the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Congress is also considering whether or not to reauthorize the GEC in 2024. Last September, the State Department’s inspector general said that the GEC had failed to thwart foreign threats and failed to determine how foreign groups spent money provided by the US government.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance | | Leave a comment

FBI Refuses To Hand Over Communications About Twitter-Related Censorship

By Dan Frieth | Reclaim The Net | June 1, 2023

The FBI has refused to provide records of its communication with Twitter, related to policing misinformation.

In December, as part of the Twitter Files, journalist Matt Taibbi published several emails between FBI officials and Twitter that showed that the FBI repeatedly contacted Twitter to flag alleged misinformation. The FBI’s National Election Command Post (NECP) and the Foreign Influence Task Force were in close contact with Twitter over election misinformation, according to the emails obtained by Taibbi.

In light of the Twitter Files revelations, watchdog Protect the Public’s Trust filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for all records of communication between the FBI and Twitter from January 2020 to November 2022.

The FBI refused to respond to the request, claiming it “will neither confirm nor deny the existence” of the records.

“The mere acknowledgment of the existence of FBI records on third-party individuals could reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy,” the FBI told Protect the Public’s Trust.

“The FBI’s response to these requests is nothing short of bizarre,” Michael Chamberlain, director of Protect the Public’s Trust, told the Washington Examiner. “They twisted the substance of the requests and then asserted the right to deny acknowledging if records even exist based upon their mangled interpretation, and even though they have already admitted that the records exist.”

Chamberlain added that the lack of transparency from the FBI increases “suspicion about what the agency’s officials may have been involved in.”

The watchdog plans to appeal the FBI’s decision, arguing there is “tremendous public interest in knowing how the FBI interacted with Twitter, particularly with respect to suppressing speech by American citizens.”

“There is no substantial privacy interest in the entirety of the requested records,” the watchdog wrote in the appeal.

June 2, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Deception | , | Leave a comment

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