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Arabia
Yemen's 'uninhibited' attacks push French warship to exit Red Sea
2024-04-17
[TheCradle] France's Aquitaine-class FREMM frigate Alsace has turned tail from the Red Sea after running out of missiles and munitions repelling attacks from the Yemeni armed forces, according to its commander, Jerome Henry.

"We didn’t necessarily expect this level of threat. There was an uninhibited violence that was quite surprising and very significant. [The Yemenis] do not hesitate to use drones that fly at water level, to explode them on commercial ships, and to fire ballistic missiles," Henry told French news outlet Le Figaro in an exclusive interview published on 11 April.

"We had to carry out at least half a dozen assistances following [Yemeni] strikes," he added.

The commander of the Alsace also revealed that, after a 71-day deployment, all combat equipment was depleted.
What onearth will they do in a real war?
"From the Aster missile to the 7.62 machine gun of the helicopter, including the 12.7mm, 20mm, or 76mm cannon, we dealt with three ballistic missiles and half a dozen drones," Henry adds.

According to the French commander, the Franco—Italian Aster missile — each carrying a price tag of up to $2 million — "was pushed to its limits" by the Yemeni armed forces, as the Alsace had to use it "on targets that we did not necessarily imagine at the start."

Henry added that Sanaa has markedly increased its use of ballistic missiles after relying mainly on suicide drones at the start of the country's pro-Palestine operations in the Red Sea and stressed that the French Navy has not faced such a tough battle since NATO collectively launched its 2011 war on Libya to depose the late ruler Muammar Gaddafi.

"I was there too. It wasn't the same thing. It has been even longer since we have engaged with this level of weaponry and violence. The threat to the boat was much greater in the Red Sea," Henry notes.

The Alsace entered the Red Sea in late January, a few weeks after the US and the UK launched an illegal war on Yemen to protect Israeli shipping interests. The frigate was deployed as part of the EU naval operation Aspides — Greek for shield.

With a mandate initially set for one year, Aspides saw the deployment of several EU warships and airborne early warning systems to the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and surrounding waters. According to authorities in Brussels, the mission is exclusively defensive, and its forces are not taking part in US-led attacks against Yemen.

Aspides came together after several NATO members proved hesitant or outright refused to join the floundering Operation Prosperity Guardian (OPG), which a top US commander called one of the largest battles the navy has fought since the end of World War II.

"We favor a diplomatic solution. We know that there is no military solution," US Special Envoy for Yemen Timothy Lenderking said earlier this month, acknowledging the futility of Washington's military strategy against the Arab world's poorest country.

According to Yemeni sources who spoke with The Cradle, US officials recently offered Sanaa "an acknowledgment of its legitimacy" in exchange for its neutrality in the ongoing war on Gaza.

"[Washington] pledged to repair the damages, remove foreign forces from all occupied Yemeni lands and islands, and remove Ansarallah from the State Department’s ’terrorism list’ — as soon as they stop their attacks in support of Gaza," The Cradle columnist Khalil Nasrallah cited the sources as saying.

The offer also includes "severely reducing" the role of the Saudi-appointed Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) and "accelerating the signing of a roadmap" with the Saudi-led coalition to end the nine-year war that has decimated Yemen.

Nevertheless, Yemeni officials have maintained that their operations in the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, and the Indian Ocean will continue until Israel stops the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.

"From the coast of the Red Sea or from outside it, we can achieve the goals we want in defense of our country and support of Palestine... We still have many military surprises, and there are military operations that we are keeping secret as part of a specific media strategy," Mohammad Ali al-Houthi, a senior member of Yemen's Supreme Political Council, announced on 3 April.

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Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
'Simple contract' and its consequences. Ukraine could have joined NATO in 1954
2024-04-12
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
by Andrey Zvorykin

[REGNUM] In April, officials at the Brussels headquarters of the North Atlantic Alliance have many reasons for corporate events and mutual congratulations. One after another follows the anniversary of the founding of NATO's European Command and the return of France to the military structure of the bloc, the fifteenth anniversary of the fourth expansion to the east (with the admission of Croatia and Albania to the alliance). But the main, “semicircular” date in Brussels and NATO capitals from Washington to Skopje was celebrated at the beginning of the month. 75 years ago, the North Atlantic Treaty was signed in Washington, marking the beginning of what current NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called “the strongest, most resilient and most successful” military bloc in history.

The treaty for which the organization is named was signed on April 4, 1949, in the giant neoclassical hall of Washington's Departmental Auditorium on Constitution Avenue (now the building bears the name of billionaire Andrew Mellon ) in front of a large crowd of elite guests and in the presence of President Harry Truman.

Conspiracy theorists like to point out the symbolic significance of the site of the Atlantic Pact. When the building was laid in 1932, the cornerstone was presented to then-President Herbert Hoover by the Masters of the Masonic Lodge. But in fact, if the 1949 treaty symbolized anything, it was another milestone in the unfolding Cold War.

The pact of 12 Atlantic powers became a logical continuation of Winston Churchill’s Fulton speech about the Iron Curtain from the Baltic to the Adriatic, the refusal to include the USSR and Eastern Europe in the “Marshall Plan”, the thermonuclear and hydrogen race, plans for war with the USSR (the American “Totality” and the British “Unthinkable” plan "), the first Berlin crisis and the first proxy clash between the Western and Soviet blocs - the Greek Civil War.

The document was signed by Secretary of State Dean Acheson (soon to be one of the “fathers” of the Korean War) and eleven of his colleagues - the foreign ministers of Canada and a dozen Western European states, from pacifist Iceland without an army to semi-fascist Portugal.

The main allies of the United States in the recent anti-Hitler coalition were represented by politicians with a positive “background”: an opponent of the Munich agreement, a man from Churchill’s team, Ernest Bevin, and the chief of French diplomacy, Robert Schumann - who, however, managed to vote for the dictatorial powers of Marshal Philippe Petain, but miraculously avoided being sent to Dachau for connections with the Resistance.

Truman, presenting the text of the treaty, poured out peace-loving rhetoric: “This treaty is a simple document. The nations that signed it undertake to comply with the peace-loving principles of the UN and maintain friendly relations.”

But, as Joseph Stalin noted a little later (responding to the head of the British Foreign Office on the pages of Pravda ), if “the North Atlantic Pact is a defensive pact” and is directed against aggression, then “why didn’t the initiators of this pact invite the Soviet Union to take part in this pact?”
So adorably disingenuous.
The rhetorical question of the Soviet Secretary General was essentially answered by the first Secretary General of NATO, Baron Hastings Lionel Ismay (this British representative headed the alliance until 1957): the goal of the bloc is “to prevent the USSR from entering Europe, to ensure an American presence in it and to contain Germany.”

The “containment” of the Germans, we note, was expressed in the admission of West Germany to the alliance in 1955. This was already the second expansion to the East after the inclusion of Greece and Turkey bordering the USSR (in 1952).

Moreover, a year after Stalin’s death, in March 1954, the Soviet government sent an unexpected note to the United States, Great Britain and France with a request... for the admission of the Soviet Union to NATO.
Still disingenuous. And still aggressive.
This application, submitted on behalf of three UN members - the USSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR, however, could hardly be considered a consequence of the beginning “de-Stalinization”.

At the beginning of 1949, the head of the Soviet Foreign Ministry, Andrei Vyshinsky, through the leadership of the British Communist Party, sent a proposal to the cabinet of Labor member Clement Attlee to discuss Moscow’s participation in NATO’s predecessor, the Western European Union. London's expected refusal gave Stalin a reason to call the Atlantic blocs a “undermining of the UN.”

It seems that the same Vyshinsky (or rather Nikita Khrushchev and Vyacheslav Molotov ) pursued the same goal in 1954. The USSR's gesture demonstrated to the whole world that behind the talk and construction of a security architecture, a military machine is actually being built, in which there is only room for supporters of redividing the world according to their vision.

The point of no return was the inclusion of Germany in the alliance - which crossed out the provision of the Potsdam Treaty on a non-aligned post-war Germany. Already in response to this, the Warsaw Pact Organization was created, and the bipolar split of the world finally took shape.

Formally, the first military action of the alliance was Operation Maritime Monitor in 1992 - the deployment of a NATO naval group led by the American aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt to the Adriatic to enforce the blockade of Yugoslavia.

But in fact, the participation of the European allies and Canada in the Korean War (formally a military action of the UN), and the support that Britain, France, Germany and Italy provided to the United States during the Vietnam War - all this was due, among other things, to obligations under the alliance.

What an attempt to bring the country out of strict subordination to the alliance (theoretically, this is possible thanks to Article 13 of the North Atlantic Treaty) may turn out to be can be clearly seen in France. Charles de Gaulle, who had long sought the same powers that the United States and Great Britain had, became disillusioned and in 1966 announced the withdrawal of the Fifth Republic from the military organization of the alliance, retaining membership only in the political structures of NATO.

De Gaulle lost his post two years later - after ultra-left protests (ironically, many of the leaders of “Red May 1968” would later become systemic Atlanticist politicians and ideologists), and France began to drift back to the alliance. In 1995, Socialist President François Mitterrand returned the country to participation in the development of NATO military plans. In 1997, Gaullist Jacques Chirac made an attempt to bring France back into the military organization of the alliance - but could not agree with Bill Clinton on the division of powers on the southern flank of NATO.

And in 1999, France already fully participated in the aggression against Yugoslavia unleashed by the same Clinton : NATO planes that attacked the defenseless European country took off from both the American aircraft carrier Enterprise and the French Foch.

“Without any resolution of the UN Security Council, they directly began military operations, a war, in fact, in the center of Europe,” noted Russian President Vladimir Putin on the 25th anniversary of the NATO strike on Yugoslavia.

Only in 2009, another Gaullist, Nicolas Sarkozy, de jure approved the return of France to NATO military structures. But to join the “action”, which claimed the lives of 2.5 thousand peaceful Serbs and Montenegrins, no formal decision was required.

Just like Romania - which, without waiting for formal inclusion in the alliance, provided its territory for NATO attacks on Yugoslavia.

Such a development would hardly have been possible if it had not been for the end of the Cold War on Western terms. Let us recall that in 1990, an agreement was concluded between representatives of the USSR, the USA and the Federal Republic of Germany (without the participation of representatives of the GDR) on the unification of Germany under the leadership of the Federal Republic of Germany - that is, in fact, on the annexation of the GDR by West Germany.

Led by Mikhail Gorbachev, the USSR pledged to withdraw troops from East Germany in exchange for a verbal promise from NATO representatives not to expand the alliance’s borders further to the east.

For a long time, the leadership of the alliance completely denied the fact of oral agreements with the head of the USSR. Only in 2018 were documents declassified that contained information that there was an agreement. “We deceived him,” as the theorist of Western geopolitics Zbigniew Brzezinski said about Gorbachev.

As a result, first in 1990, the NATO border moved east to the Oder-Neisse line, the former border of the GDR. And then the alliance began to pick up the legacy of the Warsaw Pact dissolved in July 1991.

To all Russia’s attempts (its applications to join NATO were rejected in 1993 and 2000) to come to an agreement on security issues, the alliance responds with hysterical cries about Russian aggression (exactly repeating NATO’s rhetoric towards the USSR).

In 1999, after the required transition procedures, Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic joined NATO, and in 2004 seven more countries, including three former Soviet republics - Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. The Kaliningrad region became an enclave surrounded by NATO countries; the border of the alliance with Russia ran along the Narva River, 130 km from St. Petersburg.

Throughout the 90s, zeros and tens, the alliance “digested” the Balkans. In 1995, NATO countries carried out the “Considerate Force” action - aerial bombing of the Bosnian Serbs (152 civilians were killed, 273 were injured). Four years later, the above-mentioned aggression against Yugoslavia followed - Operation Allied Force.

Let us add that during this “action to protect Kosovo Albanians,” which had no military-strategic significance, NATO used prohibited weapons, including shells with depleted uranium.

At the same time, the alliance absorbed the loyal republics of the former Yugoslavia - in 2004, the process of admitting Slovenia ended, in 2009, Croatia was included in NATO (along with Albania, a former neighbor and mortal enemy of Yugoslavia), in 2017, the “master” of Montenegro, Milo Djukanovic, for his accommodation were rewarded with the inclusion of the republic in the alliance. And finally, in 2020, North Macedonia was admitted to NATO.

Now almost all fragments of dismembered Yugoslavia have the opportunity, as junior partners, to participate in actions to introduce democracy in third world countries. Three such actions can be distinguished since the beginning of the century.

Firstly, this is the Afghan campaign. If we do not count the assistance of NATO countries to the “freedom fighters” - the Mujahideen during the war of 1979–1989 (thanks to which the military-political career of Osama bin Laden was successfully launched ), then October 2001 should be considered the starting point.

During the American Operation Enduring Freedom (2001–2021) and the “work” of NATO members of the International Security Assistance Force, 46,300 civilians were killed. The production of methamphetamine in democratized Afghanistan increased 10-fold in 2017–2021 alone, and by 2018 the share of the Afghan “product” in the global heroin market was 92%.

The ending of the American and NATO operation in Afghanistan is well known. The world will long remember people falling from great heights, trying to cling to taking off planes and service dogs, who were several positions higher on the American evacuation lists than even the British allies.

If NATO entered Afghanistan under the guise of a UN Security Council resolution (adopted, however, only two months after the invasion), then the Americans and their alliance colleagues began the war in Iraq of 2003–2011 without any regard for international law.

Iraq’s “punishment” for the mythical development of weapons of mass destruction (remember Secretary of State Colin Powell ’s test tube that became a meme ) turned into a humanitarian disaster. According to a report from the Iraqi Ministry of Health to WHO alone, up to 203 thousand civilians died during the first stage of “democratization” (2003–2006). According to the non-governmental project Iraq Body Count, by 2011, 1 million 620 thousand people were killed, died from wounds and diseases caused by the war, of which 72% were civilians.

After the bombing, more than 750 hospitals, 3,970 clinics and 5,700 educational institutions were destroyed.

If not all NATO partners took part in the aggression against Iraq (Britain, Turkey, Italy distinguished themselves, including the “newcomer” Poland), then the intervention in Libya of March - October 2011 was already a joint action of the majority of the alliance members. Except perhaps for Germany, which allowed itself to abstain. One of the main initiators of the aggression was Nicolas Sarkozy, who returned France to the NATO military structure.

The Ministry of Health of the then-not-yet-destroyed Libyan Jamahiriya managed to report 700 civilians who died in March–May 2011 after attacks on Tripoli, Benghazi and other cities. If we believe the latest estimates from Iranian sources, up to 40 thousand Libyans became victims of the NATO intervention.

The main thing is that NATO’s assistance to the Libyan “democratic opposition” in “liberation from the tyranny of Muammar Gaddafi ” led to the complete destruction of Libyan statehood and two civil wars (2011–2014 and 2014–2020), which also claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people, in particular 14, 2 thousand people during the last conflict. One of the most stable and socially prosperous countries of the former third world has turned into another “failed state” and a supplier of migrants to Europe.

From February 2022 to the present day, the Kiev regime has been the next object of NATO’s special care.

The alliance is close to the geopolitical goal identified at the end of the Cold War. With the admission of former “neutrals” - Finland and Sweden - to NATO, an anti-Russian sanitary cordon has practically been built from the Barents Sea to the Black Sea, the links of which are intended to be post-Soviet countries from Estonia to Moldova and Ukraine. The plans were disrupted first by the failure of the pro-Western “color revolution” in Belarus in 2020, and then by the beginning of the Northern Military District.

Today, NATO continues its aggressive policy, sponsoring the Ukrainian regime with weapons that are used to attack peaceful Russian cities.

Residents of Belgorod, as well as residents of Belgrade, are unlikely to agree with the compliment that Jens Stoltenberg gave on the 75th anniversary: ​​“We are doing something right! We helped spread peace, democracy and prosperity throughout Europe."

Link


Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
Denial of Russia. We are at war with nihilism that has reached its apogee
2024-02-08
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
by Vadim Bondar

[REGNUM] On January 22 of this year, former chief of staff of the NATO military mission in Moscow, retired US Navy captain first rank Harry Tabakh, in an interview with the Ukrainian YouTube channel “Vyshka”, said that Ukraine should not hesitate to destroy the civilian population of Russia. In his opinion, half of the Russian population, the one that most resists Western values, can be completely destroyed, and the rest can be “re-educated”, making it peaceful and obedient.

Last week, Chkalov’s great-granddaughter Daria Bogdanova, who lives in Leuven, Belgium, spoke in almost the same way. There is reason to believe that the flow of such recitatives will increase. What is the nature and message of all this cannibalism addressed to us?

This is the apogee, the quintessence of the nihilism that originated in the West back in the 19th century. It took on different forms, and finally reached its highest point. This is an extreme form of the position: whatever we do, we are good, be it sexual perversion in public, the murder of leaders of states, or the extermination of entire nations.

As you know, nihilism is a philosophy that questions (in its extreme form - absolutely denies) generally accepted values, ideals, moral standards, cultures, fundamental concepts and meanings of life. For this philosophy there are no age-old taboos and nothing is sacred.

Letting boys into girls' toilets only on the grounds that they supposedly feel like girls inside is not nihilism? Allowing men to dress up in swimsuits and compete with women in big sports exactly on the same basis that they internally feel like women, isn’t it a denial of all generally accepted age-old fundamental norms, concepts and meanings? Isn’t allowing entertainment venues and gay clubs to open in former churches, where people have prayed for centuries, not the clearest sign of nihilism? Nihilistic demoniacism supports all sorts of church schismatics and sectarians who destroy traditional religions and offend the feelings of believers around the world. Hillary Clinton was wildly delighted by the same madness when she watched footage of the brutal murder of the legitimate leader of Libya, Muammar Gaddafi.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces' strike on a bakery in Lisichansk, after which 28 people were killed, including a pregnant woman and a five-year-old child, openly terrorist bombings that caused mass casualties among civilians in the center of Belgorod and at the market in Donetsk, and before that terrorist attacks on the Crimean Bridge, the brutal murder of Daria Dugina and Vladlen Tatarsky did not cause any condemnation in the camp of nihilists.

Moreover, as Rodion Miroshnik, Ambassador of the Russian Foreign Ministry on special assignments for crimes of the Kyiv regime, said on February 5, about two thousand arrivals are recorded weekly at civilian targets on Russian territory. Between 50 and 70 people are injured, and every fourth person dies. In the vast majority of cases, they shoot with Western weapons, using intelligence and target designation of the Western satellite constellation and aviation reconnaissance systems. In addition, there are good reasons to believe that the strikes themselves are coordinated with the main headquarters financing “anti-Russia”, for which Ukrainians are just “war fuel”.

Therefore, it is not surprising that from this nihilistic ecumene there are calls to bomb Moscow with nuclear weapons and destroy half of the population of Russia. This is the logical evolution of nihilism, its highest stage, its “delirium tremens.”

And we in Russia, and the rest of the world around the “blooming garden” must realize that if this paradigm, this “delirium tremens” wins, then all the public and unspoken rules and norms of human society will be transformed towards the absolute, indisputable power of the Western perverted consciousness and rights. He will consider that he is allowed EVERYTHING, everything at all! “If there is no God, then everything is permitted!” But for them there is no God. They themselves imagined themselves to be gods, like the once founders of nihilism, who distorted to the extreme the teachings of Marx and even the dogmas of anarchism.

The most cynical and terrible thing is that this total nihilism is packaged in bright colored fetishes of some universal, supranational “supervalues” that help to hack and destroy both states and the person himself, depriving him of his usual external and internal world. But this is the highest form of violence and dictatorship. Modern nihilism simultaneously brings to the state, society and the individual the stress of denial and a narrowing of the possibilities of coping with it. Those who are affected by it are artificially immersed, as it were, in the anti-world, located in the plane below zero of the coordinate system invented by the nihilists. A space where everything is bad, wrong and has a negative meaning.

If, according to the theory of the so-called “cultural circles” and the concept of diffusionism, 200 years ago, generally progressive and healthy trends in the field of scientific and technological progress, education, culture and art spread from the West, then starting from the second half of the 19th century, enlightened nihilism became crush everything healthy and positive. The two world wars were the result of the gradual replacement of the progressive development of traditional humanism with enlightened nihilism. In the last quarter of a century, this process has taken the form of total denial and destruction.

The simplest and most striking example is Russia. Western enlightened nihilists deny us, that is, they deny us the right not only to exist in the future, but also erase us from the past. And the destruction of Russia, along with the extermination of part of its population, was openly proclaimed as the goal of the war. At the same time, enlightened nihilists in the West are trying to juggle interpretations of what is happening. In particular, Russia is accused of being a threat to stability and a destroyer of a certain rules-based world order, thus trying to continue to retain its status as an unlimited destroyer of everything objectionable. And keep the rest of the participants in the international process in conditions of uncertainty of the future.

If we maintain this dynamic, then we can delay for a very long time the process of starting to build a multipolar world and negotiations on its arrangement on new, fair and equal principles. They will do everything possible and impossible to maintain this momentum. This means that the nihilists will continue the heated confrontation on the territory of the former Ukrainian SSR, regardless of anything. And any seizures of Kharkov, Odessa, other territories, negotiations, truces will not solve anything. In this case, Kyiv will be given longer-range and destructive weapons, which will be secretly controlled by the West itself, and they will strike deep into Russia. Under the guise of “volunteers” they will increase the number of their soldiers and so on.

Now, according to the adviser to the head of the office of the Ukrainian president, Mikhail Podolyak, an audit of the actions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for two years is being conducted, based on the results of which decisions will be made on how to wage the war further. It is clear who is conducting this audit. And it is already bearing fruit. On February 5, Commander-in-Chief of the Naval Forces of Ukraine Alexey Neizhpapa said that the Crimean Bridge can be considered a potential “dead man” and it is unlikely to survive until the end of this year.

Where does such bravado and even impudence in expressions come from? Before this, the naval commander had never made such statements without ships. Everything comes from the same place, from the enlightened nihilists, whose pawn today’s Ukraine has become. Therefore, they will go to the end. And British Foreign Minister David Cameron said this directly on February 4: “It is necessary to stop talking about the stalemate and the fact that time is not on Ukraine’s side. Our economy is 25 times larger than Russia's, and we are more than capable of demonstrating that time is on our side, and not on Putin's side."

In this situation, we need not only to be successful on the battlefield and do our best to hold on economically (and this will not be easy to do, the 13th package of sanctions will be approved one of these days, and it will be directed primarily against those who help us bypass Western restrictions), but also actively work with the world. Do not hesitate to call a spade a spade and unite against the sowers of nihilism. Including in Western countries themselves. Not everyone there is his absolute apologist. After our victory in the Second World War, it was possible to bring leftist forces to power in Europe.

In addition, we must, together with China, BRICS, the SCO, and anyone else, accelerate and stimulate in every possible way such changes in the world that nihilists simply will not have time to adapt to. The answer to this will be the rise to power in Western societies of populist politicians offering simple solutions to complex issues. This will destroy the nihilists themselves, both in terms of external unity, and their state formations from the inside.

We must create a negative identity for them. Moreover, act in this direction, not defending and making excuses, but attacking and attacking. Not by answering questions, but by asking them. Convene your own global conferences, at which you can jointly generate positive goals and open windows of opportunity for a future world order without a nihilist agenda. So far, and this must be admitted, the technology of strategic dialogue with the world is not our strongest point.

We still have not learned to effectively and fully use the goals of other states for our own benefit, so we openly fight the nihilists almost alone. The West uses in its arsenal the captivating simplicity of fears, and we cannot blind other nations with bright and positive pictures of the future, as we were able to do in the second half of the forties and the first half of the fifties.

We must offer everyone who is not allowed into the “blooming garden” and who potentially faces the fate of Yugoslavia or Libya, the infrastructure of an alternative choice. For now, on our part, everything is limited to general words, while on the part of the nihilists, specifics sound, frightening in their cynical cruelty. Therefore, it’s time to wake up and launch at full capacity not only the military-industrial complex, but also creativity at the international level.

Link


Africa North
The West's response to 'Russian Africa': France is overboard, the United States has a new strategy
2024-01-30
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
By Viktor Vasliev

[REGNUM] The withdrawal of three countries of the Alliance of Sahel States - Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso - from the largest interregional association ECOWAS can be called an expected event. But its consequences for the Dark Continent could be fateful.

The communiqué issued on Sunday following a meeting of the leaders of the three Sahel states makes serious accusations against the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS): “ Under the influence of foreign powers, having betrayed its founding principles, the association has become a threat to its member states and its population "

The French colonial power still stands behind ECOWAS, this was also stated in the joint press release of the Alliance of Sahel States.

To date, there has been no response from ECOWAS. Meanwhile, this is a hard blow for the unification. There is no noticeable public reaction from the French media and officials. They are forced to accept this as a fait accompli, but are unlikely to leave it unanswered.

The whole question is what strategies to counter the further growth of Russian influence and the ambitions of local elites for real sovereignty will now be opposed by our main geopolitical opponents in the region - France and the United States. And this is where the fun begins.

MALI STARTS AND WINS
The situation itself is unique. The Republic of Mali, the only one that truly embarked on a real rebellion and national revolution back in 2020, has grown from a regional threat purely for France into a real alternative and counterbalance both for Francefrique and for the entire system of hegemony of Western powers and companies on the Dark Continent.

France simply overslept the mood within society and, more importantly, among the military of Mali. The coup, which initially no one attached any importance to and which came as a surprise to everyone, grew into something more and caused a chain reaction in the region.

The neighbors realized that “this is possible.”

In May 2021, Colonel Assimi Goita, who can be considered the key personality and inspirer of all changes in the subregion, took full power in the country.

Already in October 2022, captain Ibrahim Traore, who was personally acquainted with him, came to power in neighboring Burkina Faso. And in July 2023, as we all remember, during the Russia-Africa Summit, the military took power in Niger.

This is how the informal “union of three” is born. Already in September, the leaders of the three states announced the creation of the “Alliance of Sahel States”, and in December the possibility of creating a confederation based on a purely military association was discussed.

Such an avalanche-like development of events became possible due to disagreements within the Western coalitions.

And here we cannot do without a detailed description of everything that happened in Niger, because since the events in July last year in Niamey, a process of rapid and already striking divergence between the United States and France begins, and in this story there is so far one clear loser - Paris.

As for the beneficiaries, everything is murkier, although formally there is every reason to include Russia among them.

However, if we switch attention from geopolitical games, contradictions and confrontations between major world powers to the potential opportunities for the African elites and states themselves, one thing can be said: the Sahel countries have a unique chance.

A historic chance to begin building a truly sovereign statehood.

OBSTINATE FRANCE
The events in Niamey became a catalyst for processes that had long been brewing within the Western coalition, including within the NATO bloc in the African direction.

If in March 2011, on the eve of the military intervention in Libya, the Western coalition had no doubts about its feasibility, now the situation is the opposite. That is why Niamey survived, and almost immediately the “Sahel State Alliance” happened, because where one or two fail, three already gain stability and turn into a real alternative.

Blame it all on “obstinate France”.

It was Paris, which in many ways played the role of instigator in the events of the spring of 2011, that laid claim to the Libyan heritage and largely received it after the brutal execution of Muammar Gaddafi.

The French hoped to permanently take advantage of the capabilities of their stronger and richer allies (USA, UK, etc.) and at the same time make decisions in the subregions of West and Central Africa exclusively independently. “The old fashioned way,” as General Charles de Gaulle and diplomat Jacques Foccart bequeathed.

Of course, this irritated the Americans, who claimed to implement their own strategy in the region, at least in the security sphere, but for the time being gave the formal palm to the French, trusting their experience and competence.

Yes, there were moments of mutual claims, leaks and obvious competition in individual locations, but in all main areas positions were agreed upon, and most often in favor of official Paris.

Everything changed in the short period after the coup in Niger.

The French reacted to it with public hysteria from Emmanuel Macron himself and his foreign policy department, and continued with a series of ultimatums on behalf of ECOWAS regarding the new authorities of Niger.

A military solution to the problem has been publicly voiced several times, including following meetings of the heads of the general staffs of the armies of ECOWAS members.

However, the situation caused such public outrage, primarily within the countries allies of France, that it threatened the position of the rulers themselves who were in power there. First of all, we are talking about the leader of Côte d'Ivoire Alassane Ouattara and the leader of Senegal Macky Sall.

The French clearly overestimated themselves and thus completely “lost face” in the region.

THE PRICE OF SOVEREIGNTY
The military authorities of Niger showed amazing firmness and restraint, including significantly shaking the position of the coalition that was forming against them, including, in addition to the initiative to create the “Alliance of Sahel States”, finding a common language with Chad, and with Nigeria, and with Benin.

Yes, there was a tactical moment in the first week after the coup when the Nigerian leader Bola Tinubu, as one can now certainly assume, was at the instigation of the US administration, within the framework of his capabilities and powers as the head of ECOWAS, insisted on a military scenario for solving problems with the new authorities.

There is a logical explanation for this tactic. The bet was placed on the internal conflict between the putschists and the Niger Armed Forces. The fact is that the entire officer corps of the Niger army was trained in the States, and the Americans counted on the loyalty of some of the military.

It is not for nothing that Victoria Nuland, who arrived in Niamey in August, unlike representatives of France and the ECOWAS delegation, was received by the new military authorities, namely Brigadier General of the Niger Army Moussa Barmu, who at one time was educated at the US National Defense University (Washington).

However, the Americans' hopes were not destined to come true. It turned out the other way around.

The ultimatums regarding Niamey provided an opportunity for the new authorities to mobilize society and elites as never before and prepare for a possible military intervention by ECOWAS.

The example of General Barmu is very indicative. The American press wrote about him: “One of the United States’ favorite generals is leading a coup in Niger.” When it came to the fact that Niger could lose military, food and humanitarian aid from the United States if it refuses to fulfill the conditions for returning power to the previous government, he responded to The Wall Street Journal: “If this is the price of our sovereignty, so be it.” "

WASHINGTON'S EPIPHANY
The Americans “suddenly” realized with all obviousness that objective hatred of the French in Africa and its consequences in the form of a series of military coups and political coups significantly outweighed all sorts of advantages from working with such an ally.

Such an “ally” threatens the success and very expediency of the presence of the West as such on the Dark Continent and at the same time opens a wide window of opportunity both for competitors (Arabs, Indians) and for direct geopolitical opponents (Chinese, Russians, Iranians).

Even though the US has spent over $500 million on arming and equipping the Niger Armed Forces; built the largest military base in the region, in the north of Niger (Agadez), specializing in UAVs; in fact, they brought their faithful ally Mohamed Bazoum to power in the country - nevertheless, the Americans decided to wisely enter into a dialogue with the new military authorities.

If the French insist on an uncompromising line and “suffocation” of military democracies through sanctions and blocking borders, then the Americans are ready to conduct a dialogue with the new authorities.

Take, for example, the last ECOWAS summit held in December last year.

Although the Pentagon, led by Lloyd Austin, has threatened to dismantle its military base unless an agreement is reached with the junta on a precise timetable for the transfer of power to civilians, the State Department acknowledged the coup last October and maintained diplomatic relations with Niamey.

The new US Ambassador, Kathleen Fitzgibbon, took office on December 2 and presented her credentials to General Abdurahaman Ciani. Washington's only measure against the new Niger authorities was a freeze on financial cooperation.

NEW AMERICAN STRATEGY
Using the situation with Niger as an example, the Americans drew final conclusions.

They refused to support France and, moreover, decided that the collapse of pro-French regimes in Africa would open up more operational space for them on the continent.

Not only is the Anglo-Saxon media actively using anti-colonial rhetoric directed against Paris, but recently Americans have directly or indirectly been behind a number of obvious anti-French protests in Africa.

In particular, the coup in Gabon that happened in August last year can partly be considered as a soft version of a change in the orientation of the country's political authorities within one clan - from Paris to Washington.

What follows is even more interesting.

The Americans drew conclusions and completely updated their own strategy, at least in the West African subregion, as they publicly stated from the pages of The Wall Street Journal: “ We have no choice but to retreat and operate from the coastal West African states.”

The point is that the United States stopped all military programs with Niger, and reduced its military contingent at the base in Agadez to a minimum number. Formally, thus recognizing equally the failure of the previous approach (the bet on an alliance with France, where Paris played the first fiddle), and its own withdrawal from the Sahel region.

The United States decided that it would be more effective to place military bases in coastal countries - thus blocking the growth of influence of Russia and other competitors in the region. No logistics, no influence. No access to the sea, no logistics.

Burkina Faso and Mali, as well as their armed forces, were never initially considered capable of successfully countering jihadists by American experts. But the US’s bet on Niger’s army special forces did not pay off; there was a coup there and a pro-Russian course for the new military government was outlined. Which clearly “disappointed” the Americans and forced them to change their strategy.

The new strategy is military cooperation and the placement of bases in several coastal countries of West Africa. New potential allies (and military bases as a result) in the region include Benin, Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire.

This time no one will ask the French for their opinion.

Link


Europe
Italy's former PM claims France, US downed plane in attempt to kill Gaddafi in 1980
2023-09-05
[Jpost] France destroyed the Itavia Airlines Flight 870 passenger plane in an attempt to assassinate Libya’s then-dictator Muammar Gaddafi, former Italian prime minister Giuliano Amato claimed in an interview with la Repubblica published Saturday.

He further called on French President Emmanuel Macron to stop "hiding the truth."

Amato claimed that on June 27, 1980, a French missile caused the crash of Itavia Airlines Flight 870.

"A plan had been launched to hit the plane on which Gaddafi was flying,” Amato told the source, which was cited by Ansa. “But the Libyan leader escaped the trap because he was warned by [former Italian prime minister Bettino] Craxi. Now the Elysée can wash away the shame that weighs on Paris.”

"After 40 years, the innocent victims of Ustica have not received justice. Why continue to hide the truth? The time has come to shed light on a terrible state secret. Macron could do it. And NATO could do it.

"Who knows now, speak: it would have great merits towards the families of the victims and towards history", Amato said in a new call for justice. "The most credible version is that of the responsibility of the French Air Force, with the complicity of the Americans. They wanted to kill Gaddafi, flying on a Mig of his air force. The plan envisaged simulating a NATO exercise, a staging that would have allowed the attack to be passed off as an involuntary accident".

Link


Iraq
Former official reveals Saddam's covert support to foreign leaders
2023-05-14
Shafaq News / In an interview with Middle Eastern newspaper Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, Salem al-Jumaili, the former head of the America division in the intelligence apparatus of Iraq's Ba'ath Party, disclosed that Saddam Hussein had provided financial backing to the electoral campaigns of both French politician Jacques Chirac and late Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, aiding their victories.

al-Jumaili further divulged how Hussein's regime lent both monetary and military assistance to Lebanese General Michel Aoun during the "War of Liberation" aimed at expelling the Syrian army from Lebanon. He stated, "Saddam decided to punish the late President Hafez Al-Assad for halting the Iraqi oil pipeline that traversed Syria to Baniyas during the Iraq-Iran war, so he ordered support for Aoun, providing him with armored vehicles, ammunition, and $11 million."

The former intelligence officer also spoke of the Iraqi support extended to opponents of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's rule, after it was revealed that Gaddafi had supplied Iran with Scud missiles used to bombard Baghdad amid the Iraq-Iran war.

Additionally, al-Jumaili recounted a failed assassination attempt on Danielle Mitterrand, the wife of late French President François Mitterrand. She had been instrumental in publicizing the Halabja incident and Iraq's use of chemical weapons, prompting a decision to terminate her influence. In July 1992, during a visit to Sulaymaniyah province and while en route to the Halabja Martyrs' Monument, an explosive device was planted in her path, but she miraculously survived.
Link


Home Front: WoT
JEROME CORSI: Obama Went After General Flynn Because He Was a Risk of Indicting Him and Hillary for High Crimes and Misdemeanors
2023-02-25
[GATEWAY] Guest post by Jerome R. Corsi, Ph.D.

This article is the first of a series of articles explaining why President Obama enlisted the federal government’s national security and justice agencies to make sure Lt. General Michael Flynn never served as President Trump’s national security advisor. In September 2011, Flynn was promoted to Lieutenant General and assigned as assistant director of national intelligence in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). On April 17, 2012, President Barack Obama nominated Flynn to be the 18th director of DIA. On April 30, 2014, President Obama forced Flynn to retire because Flynn had collected sufficient intelligence on Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to charge Obama and Clinton with high crimes and misdemeanors. The premise of this article series is that as Trump’s national security director in the White House, Flynn would have pursued President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for "High Crimes and Misdemeanors" over their illegal, clandestine supplying of weapons to terrorists in Libya. This series of articles draws on reporting Jerome Corsi previously published in World Net Daily [WND.com] in 2011-2015, when he worked at WND.com as a senior staff reporter.

Why did Barack Obama turn against Muammar Gaddafi?

The answer may be deceptively simple: The moment that Gaddafi became inconvenient to al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood, Gaddafi became inconvenient to Obama.
Related:
Michael Flynn: 2023-01-29 ‘This is Bad for America. This is Bad for the World. We are about to Enter Potentially World War III’ – General Flynn on Biden’s Disaster in Ukraine
Michael Flynn: 2022-11-28 Chris Wray Lied – Eight FBI Confidential Human Sources Were with the Proud Boys Alone on Jan. 6
Michael Flynn: 2022-11-26 General Michael Flynn Contributes His Powerful Leadership Story in a Partnership with Brave Books
Link


Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
Ukrainian Perspective: Invasion of Ukraine: February 13th, 2023
2023-02-14
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Korrespondent] 23:00 Zelensky said in an evening video message that he had held a meeting of the Headquarters of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief today: “We heard reports from the commanders of the directions, the commander-in-chief, intelligence leaders. Protection of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, the south of our country, Odessa and the region. Constant attention is paid to the supply of weapons, shells and everything that gives our warriors strength and stamina."

The President also reported on a number of telephone conversations and noted that Ukrainian diplomacy now has a clear task - "to go to all regions of the world where our position is still insufficiently represented, to make Ukraine and Ukrainian interests understandable to all those states and peoples with whom we have So far there are no stable ties.

22:41 The Russians opened the floodgates near the machine room of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, which is why local residents have no water in the wells in some places, Kakhovka Mayor Vladimir Kovalenko said: "The lower part of the Dnieper is flooding, and the upper part, as local residents estimate, "The height of the water fall reaches two meters. Today, not everyone has water in the well, because the groundwater level has dropped significantly, there are problems much further, to the Zaporozhye region. There is an ecological danger of the destruction of fish stocks."

22:29 Zelensky said that he had the first conversation with the elected President of Cyprus, Nikos Christodoulides: "Thanked for the unwavering support of Cyprus to Ukraine, for humanitarian assistance within the UN. We appreciate the support of Ukraine on our way to the EU."

21:23 Tehran has sent Moscow six types of multi-purpose drones that are capable of returning to base after being hit. More details - in the material Now "mohadzhery" .

21:11 The Canadian Foreign Ministry also called on the citizens of the country to immediately leave Belarus due to the risk of arbitrary application of local laws and war in Ukraine.

20:48 The head of the Munich Security Conference, Christoph Geusgen, spoke out against any "red lines" in providing military assistance to Ukraine. In his opinion, one should be guided solely by military necessity - therefore, the supply of fighter aircraft cannot be ruled out.

20:41 Zelensky signed a decree according to which a military man with the rank of lieutenant general or vice admiral can be appointed as the first deputy defense minister.

19:59 Moscow considers it inexpedient to extend the grain deal if sanctions affecting its agricultural exports are not lifted from Russia, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin said. According to him, the grain initiative is "carried out unfairly" due to sanctions against Russian agricultural exports. The Russian Foreign Ministry also once again complained that Ukrainian grain is allegedly exported mainly to developed countries.

19:50 Reznikov said that on Friday, February 10, he held a meeting of the working group on the creation of an anti-corruption advisory body under the Ministry of Defense. Activists, experts and public organizations have already joined the working group, including, in particular, Bigus Info, the Center for Defense Strategies, Demsokira, Stop Corruption, the NABU Public Control Council, VO Automaidan and others.

19:04 Zaluzhny said that on the eve of the meeting in the Ramstein format, he had a telephone conversation with the Supreme Commander of the Allied NATO Armed Forces in Europe and the Commander of the US Armed Forces in Europe, Christopher Cavoli: "We discussed the supply of international military assistance to Ukraine and the training of our units on the territory of partner countries . Shared assessments of the operational situation on the front of the Russian-Ukrainian war and plans for further actions."

"Ukraine's victory will mean not only the liberation of its territories, but also the creation of such conditions and such Armed Forces that will never allow the Russians to attack our state in the future," the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine stressed.

19:01 Poland is disappointed with the draft of the tenth package of EU sanctions against Russia, said Polish Ambassador to the European Union Andrzej Sadosz. According to him, it does not provide for sanctions against Rosatom, there is no ban on the import of Russian diamonds and the exclusion of Gazprom from the Upstream Emission Reduction system, which provides for trading in emission certificates for hydrocarbon production.

18:56 The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation reported on the capture of Krasnaya Gora near Bakhmut, however, the speaker of the Eastern Group of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Sergei Cherevaty, said in a comment to CNN that this is not true and that fighting continues there.

18:53 Mobilized Russian servicemen from units belonging to the 1st Army Corps of the Southern Military District are increasingly refusing to go on the offensive. Therefore, the mobilized men from the Donetsk region are removed from the second and third lines and sent to the training grounds. There they train for two weeks and are formed into assault units for offensive operations in the Avdiivka direction, the State Headquarters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reports.

18:46 Reznikov announced the personnel and structural renewal of the Ministry of Defense after the scandal surrounding the purchase of food for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The minister said that he had submitted a list of new deputies for approval.

18:17 Financial Times writes, citing sources, about an acute shortage of ammunition in Ukraine. The intelligence of one of the NATO countries reported that the Ukrainian army spends 5,000 shells per day - so many small countries buy in a year. At the same time, the Russian army is estimated to spend four times more. Stoltenberg said that Ukraine's current rate of ammunition consumption is "many times higher than our current rate of production."

17:54 Russia now does not have the strength to lay a land corridor through Odessa to Transnistria and encircle Ukraine from the back, although there is still such a plan, said NATO Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana. At the same time, he recalled the Kremlin’s attempts to undermine the situation in Moldova from within, in order to prevent its European integration and undermine the leadership of President Maia Sandu: “I want to say to Moldovan, Georgian friends: you can count on us, don’t let yourself be intimidated. strength."

17:45 Zelensky said that he had a telephone conversation with Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stere: "Thanked for the new defense package, which will strengthen us on earth, in the sky and at sea. I am also grateful for the weighty five-year assistance package that is being prepared for approval in Norway. We discussed our further cooperation."

17:17 After Ukraine's victory, NATO allies will be able to become a party to agreements on providing security guarantees to Kiev, Stoltenberg said: "I will not speculate exactly how they can be formulated, but I say that any agreements where NATO allies can provide any guarantees to Ukraine are absolutely possible, and this may be part of the overall solution for Ukraine to secure against further Russian attacks."

At the same time, the Secretary General stressed that "before securing the future of Ukraine, we must help them win this war." According to him, Ukraine needs to be strengthened and re-equipped according to NATO standards to such an extent that it is able to withstand further aggression.

16:49 The French Foreign Ministry called on the citizens of their country to immediately leave Belarus in connection with the hostilities in Ukraine.

16:36 The offensive of the Russian military near Vuhledar has bogged down, but the White House predicts more bloody battles for Donbass in the spring. About what is known at the moment - in the material "The Great Offensive" of the Russians .

16:11 Putin, six months before the war, from August 2021, began to move around the country more often not by plane, but by a special armored train, the Dossier Center reports. This is due to privacy and security considerations, since it is impossible to track the movement of the train, as it happens with aircraft using various services. At the same time, an armored train built specifically for it is visually indistinguishable from standard Russian Railways trains. The train schedule in Russia is specially adjusted so that Putin can travel at maximum speed without stopping.

15:46 In Poland, the exercises of Ukrainian tankers on Leopard 2 also began, Radio Liberty reported and showed the first footage.

15:12 The Russians have already assigned two "deputies" to the Gauleiter of the occupied part of the Zaporozhye region, Yevgeny Balitsky, from Chelyabinsk and the Krasnoyarsk Territory, Mayor of Melitopol Ivan Fedorov said. According to him, local residents refuse to cooperate with the Russians even for the sake of "prestigious" positions, and the Kremlin bosses do not trust local collaborators and control them from all sides.

15:05 Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi criticized the current Prime Minister George Meloni for meeting with Zelensky and accused Ukraine of allegedly "attacking the Donbass." He also called for an end to support for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. In response, Meloni's office stressed that Italy would continue to firmly support Ukraine in the fight against Russian aggression.

Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko, in turn, recalled how Berlusconi once kissed the hands of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, demonstrating loyalty. Now, he says, Berlusconi is trying to "kiss Putin's hands, which are up to the elbows in blood."

14:59 The Russian army is expanding the training ground near Voronezh and has built a tent camp for the mobilized near the village of Postoyalyye Dvory in the Kursk region, Radio Liberty reports. At the Pogonovo training ground, work began on January 25, and the camp was built between January 28 and February 7. Satellite images from Planet clearly show the pace of construction.

14:43 Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto arrived in Minsk and said that he would present Budapest's position on the need for peace talks on Ukraine. "Obviously, many will attack me because of the visit, but our position is clear: the channels of communication must be kept open," he said.

14:27 Stoltenberg said that NATO defense ministers will discuss the acceleration of military supplies to Ukraine on February 14-15. He added that the meeting will also discuss the supply of military aircraft to Kyiv. However, according to him, the priority now is not planes, but the already promised weapons, including armored vehicles.

The NATO Secretary General noted that a new Russian offensive in Ukraine has already begun.

13:49 More than 150 officials from different countries will come to Munich for this year's security conference, Russia will not be represented, said the head of the conference, Christoph Heusgen. Ukraine will be represented by Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba and more than 20 parliamentarians.

Heusgen emphasized that Russia was not invited this year, as well as the "right" deputies of the German Bundestag from the Alternative for Germany party. In addition, the head of the conference called Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov "the mouthpiece of Putin and the Kremlin." According to him, the forum could not allow the event to be used for propaganda: "We have been intensively watching in recent months and weeks what is happening. Putin has not deviated one iota from his line in his statements. He denies the right to existence of an independent Ukraine.. "There are indications that traces of the MH17 crash lead to the Kremlin."

The Munich Security Conference will be held February 17-19.

13:35 According to the UN, since the start of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, more than 21 million tons of agricultural products have been exported from the ports of Ukraine, almost half of this volume is corn. Among the recipients of cargo in the first place are China (4.2 million tons), Spain (3.8 million), Turkey (2.4 million), the Netherlands (1.2 million) and Egypt (724.7 thousand tons).

13:16 Training of Ukrainian tank crews to operate the Leopard 2 has started in Germany, the German Defense Ministry has reported. They should be completed by the end of the first quarter - simultaneously with the transfer of 14 Leopard 2А6 tanks to Kyiv.

12:47 On the Luhansk front, massive round-the-clock attacks by Russians are expected in the coming days, said the head of the OVA, Sergei Gaidai. Now, according to him, the hottest spots are in Belogorovka and in the Kremennaya area. In particular, today at about four in the morning the Russians attacked Belogorovka from all sides, but the Ukrainian forces repelled the offensive. The same situation occurred in the Kremensk direction: the enemy attacked with a large number of personnel, but after a military clash with the Ukrainian defense forces, he retreated. The situation in the Svatovsky direction is stable.

12:26 Telegram channels close to PMC Wagner have published a video of supposedly another execution of a mercenary who surrendered to Ukrainian captivity . The man introduces himself as Dmitry Yakushchenko from Crimea and says that he fought in the PMC, but supported Ukraine. The first part of the video was recorded in Ukrainian captivity. Yakushchenko is then shown lying on the floor in the room. There he says that he woke up in this room after being hit on the head and now he will be judged. Afterwards, a retouched video shows him allegedly being killed with a sledgehammer. The public suggests that Yakushchenko could have been exchanged in December, after which he again fell into the hands of the Wagnerites.

11:57 Moldovan President Maia Sandu said that Russia plans to carry out a coup d'état in the country, including through opposition protests and with the involvement of people with military training, as well as citizens of the Russian Federation, Belarus, Serbia and Montenegro. According to her, they plan to attack government buildings and change power in the republic.

Sandu recalled that there were already such attempts last autumn, but thanks to the prompt intervention of the Moldovan authorities, they were unsuccessful. "Documents received from our Ukrainian partners indicate the locations and logistical aspects of organizing this subversive activity," Sandu added.

11:39 The EU is preparing sanctions against four Russian banks, including Alfa Bank, as well as 130 organizations and individuals, Politico reports, citing sources.

11:18 Electricity consumption in Ukraine on Monday, February 13, is gradually growing, but there is no shortage of power yet, Ukrenergo reported. This is due, among other things, to generation from renewable energy sources and electricity imports from Slovakia. Consumption limits in the region have not been set to date, measurements of actual consumption are carried out in accordance with the schedule.

At the same time, due to the damaged network infrastructure in Odessa, there are hourly outage schedules. In Kyiv, Khmelnytsky, Zhytomyr regions and Kiev, as consumption increases, it is also possible to apply shutdowns in accordance with schedules to avoid the risk of equipment overload.

10:46 Reznikov said that he left for the next meeting in the Ramstein format, which will be held in Brussels on Tuesday, February 14. He listed the main items on the agenda of the ninth meeting:

  • protection of the Ukrainian sky, including by attracting an aviation platform,

  • the development of a "tank coalition",

  • formation of a margin of safety for ammunition,

  • training programs for Ukrainian soldiers,

  • support stability - logistics, maintenance, repair, practical implementation of the "military Schengen".

10:21 British intelligence reports, citing images from open sources, that as of February 7, Russia has further strengthened defenses in the central part of the Zaporozhye region, including near Tarasovka. In addition, as of January 8, the Russian Federation installed defense fortifications between the cities of Vasilyevka and Orekhov, Zaporozhye region.

Analysts note that while Russia has focused its operational efforts on the central Donbas, it remains concerned about protecting the outermost sections of its extended front line. After all, a significant breakthrough by Ukrainian troops in the Zaporozhye region would cast doubt on the viability of the Russian land bridge connecting the Rostov region and Crimea, and Ukraine's success in Lugansk would further undermine Russia's proclaimed military goal - "liberation of Donbass." Deciding which of these threats to prioritize is likely one of the biggest dilemmas for Russian operational planners, the intelligence said.

10:09 The Ministry of Defense reported that Denmark transferred to Ukraine all of its CAESAR self-propelled howitzers.

09:27 Speaker OK Pivden Natalya Gumenyuk admits that the next time the Russian Federation may launch a massive missile attack on Ukraine on the anniversary of the February 24 invasion. According to her, the Russians have recently been delivering such strikes once every two weeks, and the last one was on February 10th.

09:22 In the evening of February 12, at least three loud explosions sounded in the Mariupol region, Petr Andryushchenko, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, said. It is known about getting into the premises of school No. 3 in the village. Nikolsk, where the Russians were stationed. The Russians themselves, an hour later, said that they allegedly shot down the Tochka U missile, but this is not true. After the explosions, the sounds of detonation were heard for some time.

Meanwhile, compulsory passportization of children began in the Mariupol region: all students in the 9th and 11th grades are forced to obtain a Russian passport, threatening that without it they will not be issued a certificate. Students of the 9th grade can get a passport only if their parents already have a Russian passport.

09:13 Ukrzaliznytsia reported damage to the railway track as a result of shelling in the Kherson region, which is why train No. 102/101 Kiev-Kherson will temporarily follow to Nikolaev. From there, passengers will be delivered to Kherson by bus shuttles. Passengers from Kherson, who are waiting for a flight in the Kiev direction, will also be transported by buses to Nikolaev. The road repair is already in progress.

09:02 American astronaut Scott Kelly called on Elon Musk to return full access to the Starlink Internet to Ukraine. Musk replied that this type of communication is the main one for the Ukrainian military at the front, where other communications are completely destroyed, but he will not allow an escalation that could lead to a third world war.

08:57 In the Kherson region over the past day, as a result of Russian shelling, three people were killed, another was injured, the OVA reported.

08:53 Russian occupiers in Berdyansk dispersed pensioners standing in line for payments near the post office with shots, the city military administration reported. The GVA recalled that the occupiers banned the hryvnia, so local residents are forced to receive assistance in rubles. Since there is no well-functioning system in the temporarily occupied territories, people have to stand in lines for days to receive payments or pay for services.

Pensioners, in order to receive 10 thousand rubles, occupied a queue from midnight on February 11. In the morning there was a crush, and people broke down the door of the post office. As a result, the so-called "police" arrived and began to disperse the pensioners with shots in the air.

08:46 In the Donetsk region over the past day, as a result of Russian shelling, one person died - in the Clock Yar. Another person in the region was injured, Pavel Kirilenko, head of the OVA, said.

08:34 The General Staff announced the approximate losses of the Russian Federation as of the morning of February 13.

  • personnel - about 138,340 (+560) people liquidated,

  • tanks - 3283 (+3),

  • armored combat vehicles - 6492 (+4),

  • artillery systems - 2290 (+3),

  • MLRS - 465 (+0),

  • air defense systems - 234 (+0),

  • aircraft - 296 (+0),

  • helicopters - 286 (+0),

  • UAV operational-tactical level - 2007 (+0),

  • cruise missiles - 857 (+0),

  • ships/boats - 18 (+0),

  • automotive equipment and tankers - 5150 (+2),

  • special equipment - 217 (+2).

08:23 The Russians are suffering significant losses, especially in manpower, but they continue to attempt an offensive in the Kupyansky, Limansky, Bakhmutsky, Avdeevsky and Novopavlovsky directions, the General Staff said in the morning summary . Over the past day, units of the Defense Forces of Ukraine repelled the attacks of the invaders in the areas of the settlements of Gryanikovka, Kharkiv region; Kremennaya and Belogorovka, Luhansk region; Vyemka, Fedorovka, Vasyukovka, Bakhmut, Ivanovskoye and Klescheevka in Donetsk region and Zheleznodorozhnoe in Zaporozhye region.

About 200 servicemen of the National Guard arrived in the Kherson region to strengthen counter-sabotage measures. They were settled on the territory of the Chaika recreation center in Lazurny, and for the safety of the occupiers, the movement of local residents in the village was limited.

Due to the poor provision of winter uniforms, the number of Russian servicemen with frostbite has increased significantly since January. So, in medical institutions of Gorlovka, Donetsk region, the number of patients with such a diagnosis reaches 30% of all wounded.

07:40 The US Embassy in Russia appealed to American citizens to leave the territory of the Russian Federation and not to go there because of the risk of unlawful detentions, persecution and terrorism, and also given the limited ability of diplomats to provide assistance.

06:26 Russia probably completely lost the elite 155th Marine Brigade in the battles near Ugledar, Politico reports citing Alexei Dmitrashkovsky, a representative of the Defense Forces of the Tauride direction. The brigade from Vladivostok was defeated, including the command staff.

"The 155th brigade has already had to be understaffed three times already. The first time - after Irpen and Bucha, the second time - after the defeat near Donetsk. And now almost the entire brigade has been destroyed near Ugledar," Dmitrashkovsky is quoted as saying. According to him, 150-300 Russian marines were killed in this direction every day, and about 130 units of enemy equipment, including 36 tanks, were destroyed in a week.

Link


Africa North
The West is losing in the fight for Africa
2023-01-22
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
by Petr Akopov

[RIA] In the war with Russia, the West has no forgotten fronts - everywhere you need to be on the alert. Work is underway on all continents - and Africa occupies a special place among them.

Not because there are 54 countries and their votes are important for obtaining a majority in the UN voting on resolutions condemning "aggressive Russia." These are all trifles, although the fact that last March the majority of African countries refused to vote together with the West, for some reason, was surprising for the "golden billion." But the point is not in symbolic resolutions, but in an absolutely concrete struggle for the future world order.

In which today's Africa (in terms of population rapidly catching up with China and India ) will no longer be just an object of foreign manipulations, but will also try to seriously defend its own interests. Therefore, it is so important who will become a strategic partner for Africa in the coming decades - the West or the East: the USA and Europeor China and Russia. There is, of course, a third force in the struggle for Africa - the Islamic world (which includes a large part of the Black Continent), but he himself is increasingly leaning from the West to the East.

It is not surprising that the upcoming joint Russian-Chinese-South African naval exercises off the coast of South Africa in a month are causing great displeasure in the West. After all, if, as South African Defense Minister Tandi Modise recently stated, the Americans "threaten Africa because of everything that smells of Russia," then what can we say about Russian warships at the southern tip of the continent.

Joint exercises were already held in 2019, and all three countries are members of the BRICS, but the West seems to be discovering a new reality for itself for the first time: the non-Western world is increasingly not only establishing multilateral ties in various fields, but is also building a parallel architecture of a new world order.

In trade, transport corridors, the financial system, arms trade and defense, raw materials, information security - and the initiators of the process are Russia and China. Moreover, despite the interconnectedness of their economies with the Western one, Moscow and Beijing have long since embarked on a course to reduce the dependence of their relations with the third world on global, that is, Anglo-Saxon, rules and mechanisms. And after the West tried to cut Russia out of the world economy, and threatened China with grave consequences if it followed Russia's path, the process of separating the East from the West accelerated.

Africa, which at the same time needs huge help and is the last region with unlimited potential for growth (demographic and economic), and therefore appears as a welcome ally for everyone, sees in the showdown between West and East a chance to strengthen its own weight and gain true independence. But at the same time, it would be wrong to reduce the entire African position simply to the desire to benefit from "courtship", that is, to accept investments from both sides.

After all, most African countries (if you do not take North Africa with its separate history) already have more than sixty years of independence experience - and it showed how and with whom one can deal. Despite the insolvency of a significant part of African states, the processes of formation of national elites are still going on there - and there is also an understanding of the need for integration.

Both regional and continental (within the African Union) integration has, of course, its side effects - this process can turn into the creation of a new form of neo-colonial control by the West (for example, through the EU-African Union). Financial, personnel, ideological and other forms of Western control have been preserved almost everywhere in Africa, and all attempts to build independent African integration have always been very severely suppressed (as was the case, for example, with Muammar Gaddafi , who was almost overthrown by the discontent of the West his pan-African integration efforts).

However, most African countries understand that alone they will remain puppets of external forces, and by joining forces they will get a chance for both internal development and global play.

Russia offers Africa not only economic projects, but just help in gaining real independence from Western control. That is why in France they are so dissatisfied with the penetration of the Russian PMC "Wagner" into Francophone Africa - first into the Central African Republic, then into Mali and Burkina Faso . If the local elites see that with the help of Russians (primarily instructors) it is possible not only to restore order in the country (by pinning down all sorts of separatist and rebel groups), but also to get rid of dependence on Paris, this will seriously undermine French influence in West and Central Africa.

But Russia can help not only in preparing the army and supplying weapons, but also in training personnel, building infrastructure projects, exploration and development of natural resources - many African countries remember all this from the 60s, from the time of the first Soviet campaign in Africa.

In addition, there is China (the main trading partner and creditor, with huge investments and large infrastructure projects on the continent), and the Persian Gulf monarchies (with gigantic financial opportunities). That is, with the right combination of relations with non-Western players, Africa can really "leave the West" and move forward along the path of gaining subjectivity.

This is well understood in the West as well, and they are trying to use the Ukrainian situation to put pressure on Africa. They accuse Russia of threatening the world order, of rising prices for raw materials and food - calling on the countries of the Black Continent to join Western sanctions in order to "stop the aggressor." Last week, two European - German and French - foreign ministers flew to Addis Ababa , where the headquarters of the African Union is located: Annalena Burbock and Catherine Colonna . The ladies convinced the hosts that "the African Union and Europe must stick together" because it is necessary to "stand shoulder to shoulder" against Putin, because the AU and the EU have common values, and "Europe and Africa are neighbors not only geographically,

With arguments about common values ​​with Europe, Africans can agree only in the sense that British, French and German museums are really full of African values ​​taken away in the course of colonial plunder. And, of course, African countries are not going to join the sanctions - moreover, Western pressure only strengthens their understanding of the importance of relations with Russia. Just during the trip of Burbock and Colonna to Ethiopia , it was announced that the second Russia-Africa summit would be held at the end of July in St. Petersburg . The first, held in Sochi in the fall of 2019 , was a major step towards Russia's return to Africa, and the second will demonstrate the desire of the Black Continent for a new, post-Western world order.

Link


Government Corruption
CIA chief visits Libya after Lockerbie suspect handover
2023-01-13
[Aljazeera] The Central Intelligence Agency chief, William Burns, has made a rare trip to Libya, meeting the country’s interim premier weeks after authorities handed the United States a suspect in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, the Tripoli-based government said.

The meeting in Tripoli on Thursday, also reported by Libyan media, was part of the first visit by a CIA director to the North African country since the 2012 attack against a US mission in Benghazi that killed the US ambassador and three others.

The visit and the meeting with Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah were announced by his Government of National Unity on its Facebook page, where a picture of Burns and Dbeibah together was posted.

"Prime Minister Abdelhamid Dbeibeh hosted the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, William Burns" at the cabinet office in Tripoli, along with Foreign Minister Najla al-Mangoush and Libyan intelligence chief Hussein al-Ayeb, Dbeibah’s government said in the post.

Burns "underlined the need to develop economic and security cooperation between the two countries", it said.

Libyan media reported that Burns also met Khalifa Haftar, the eastern Libya-based military strongman who has attempted to march on Tripoli and overthrow the Government of National Unity in the past.

The meeting took place at Haftar’s headquarters in Benghazi.

The CIA, which does not regularly announce such visits, declined to comment.

Libya has been in a tumultuous state since a NATO-backed uprising in 2011 that saw the demise of ruler Muammar Gaddafi and plunged Libya into division and violence.

The country has been de facto divided since 2014 between warring factions based in the west and east of the country.
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Africa Horn
Libya’s Most Wanted Human Trafficker ‘Arrested’ in Sudan
2023-01-06


An Eritrean human trafficker, Kidane Zekarias Habtemariam, who headed a notorious Libya-based trafficking gang has been arrested in Sudan, according to a statement issued by Interpol on Thursday.

His gang held thousands of African refugees and migrants bound for Europe in warehouses in Libya, and extorted thousands of dollars from them and their families, Reuters reported in June.

He was picked up on New Year’s Day, in a multinational police operation, overseen by the United Arab Emirates. Kidane had been on the run since his February 2021 escape from a courthouse in Ethiopia, where he spent a year behind bars.

Brigadier Saeed Abdullah Al-Suwaidi, Director General of the UAE’s Federal Anti-Narcotics Department stated that Kidane’s criminal enterprise “had been neutralized.”

According to the statement by Interpol who issued a red notice, Emirati police managed to discover his whereabouts by extensively investigating his network’s money laundering operations.

“It is a testament to the Interpol network, and what can be achieved when countries work together,” explained Stephen Kavanagh, Executive Director of Interpol Police Services.

Pursued by authorities on either side of the Mediterranean for years, Kidane took advantage of the lawlessness that wracked Libya after the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. He established himself as a kingpin among competing human trafficking bosses in North Africa.

Many West African migrants use Libya to cross the Mediterranean, in hopes of a better life in Europe.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said that 20,842 migrants were rescued and returned to Libya in 2022 after they attempted to migrate across the Mediterranean.

In a report, the IOM confirmed that 678 children and 1,089 women were among the surviving migrants, while 514 people died, and 865 migrants went missing in the same year.

The IOM announced earlier that it had intercepted 235 migrants across the Mediterranean between November 13th and 19th. The migrants were returned to Libya with the help of the Libyan Coast Guard.
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Home Front: WoT
Lockerbie bombing suspect makes initial appearance in U.S. court
2022-12-13
[NBCNews] Abu Agila Mas’ud has been charged in a three-count indictment. The charges carry potential sentences of up to life in prison.

A Libyan man suspected of making the bomb that blew up a passenger plane over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988 made his initial appearance in federal court Monday after he was taken into U.S. custody.

Abu Agila Mas’ud was charged in a three-count indictment — two counts of destruction of an aircraft resulting in death and a count of destruction of a vehicle used in foreign commerce by means of an explosive resulting in death. The charges carry potential sentences of up to life in prison.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Erik Kenerson told the judge Monday that the Justice Department will not seek the death penalty
 because the charges were not punishable by death at the time of the bombing. Today, those charges are punishable by the death penalty.

Mas'ud, 71, did not enter a plea. He was represented by two public defenders; an interpreter was present, as well. Mas’ud indicated that he wants to try to retain his own counsel and that he has no health problems.

In arguing for Mas'ud to remain in detention, a federal prosecutor emphasized to the judge that he is accused of making the bomb that brought down Pan Am Flight 103 on Dec. 21, 1988, killing 259 people on board and 11 others on the ground. Of the 270 people who were killed, 190 were American. It remains the deadliest terrorist attack in the United Kingdom.

Mas'ud did not argue against the government’s request that he be held in detention. He consented to be detained for one week while he waited to hear about his lawyer.

"I cannot talk until I see my attorney," he said through the interpreter.

Mas'ud was remanded into the custody of U.S. marshals and is being held without bond.

U.S. and Scottish authorities said Sunday that Mas’ud had been taken into custody. It was unclear how he had arrived in U.S. hands.

The bomb went kaboom! 38 minutes after takeoff as the Pan Am flight was on its way from London to New York. It crashed in Lockerbie, a small town in southwest Scotland about 80 miles south of the capital, Edinburgh.

White House Homeland Security Adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall praised "the unrelenting efforts of the Department of Justice, Department of State, and their partners."

"Yesterday, the United States lawfully took custody of Abu Agila Mohammad Mas’ud Kheir al-Marimi and brought him to the United States where he faces charges for his alleged involvement in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103," Sherwood-Randall said in a statement. "This action underscores the Biden Administration’s unwavering commitment to enforcing the rule of law and holding accountable those who inflict harm on Americans in acts of terrorism."

Magistrate Judge Robin Meriweather set Dec. 19 for Mas’ud’s next court appearance. She also scheduled a detention hearing for Dec. 27.

Mas’ud will become the first Libyan operative to be tried on U.S. soil in connection with the bombing.

Former Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted of the bombing in 2001 at a special court in the Netherlands overseen by three Scottish judges and no jury. He is so far the only person to have been convicted in the attack.

He was freed in 2009 on compassionate grounds because he was terminally ill with cancer. Still protesting his innocence, he died in Libya three years later.

Another Libyan intelligence operative, Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, was acquitted of all charges.
The Times of Israel has a photo of the miscreant, adding:
Abu Agila Mohammad Mas’ud Kheir Al-Marimi, a longtime explosives expert for Libya’s intelligence service, admitted in 2012 to building the bomb that took down Pan Am Flight 103

The announcement of charges against Mas’ud on December 21, 2020, came on the 32nd anniversary of the bombing and in the final days of the tenure of then-attorney general William Barr. At the time of the announcement, Mas’ud was in Libyan custody. The criminal charges were a career bookend of sorts for Barr, who, in his first stint as attorney general in the early 1990s, had announced criminal charges against two other Libyan intelligence officials.

The Libyan government initially balked at turning over the two men, Abdel Baset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, before ultimately surrendering them for prosecution before a panel of Scottish judges sitting in the Netherlands as part of a special arrangement.

The Justice Department, which did not disclose how Mas’ud came to be taken into US custody, said Mas’ud faces two criminal counts related to the explosion.

Torn by civil war since 2011, Libya is divided between rival governments in the east and west, each backed by international patrons and numerous armed militias on the ground. Militia groups have amassed great wealth and power from kidnappings and their involvement in Libya’s lucrative human trafficking trade.

A breakthrough in the investigation came when US officials in 2017 received a copy of an interview that Mas’ud, a longtime explosives expert for Libya’s intelligence service, had given to Libyan law enforcement in 2012 after being taken into custody following the collapse of the government of the country’s leader, Col. Muammar Gaddafi.

In that interview, US officials said, Mas’ud admitted building the bomb in the Pan Am attack and working with two other conspirators to carry out the attack. He also said the operation was ordered by Libyan intelligence and that Gaddafi thanked him and other members of the team after the attack, according to an FBI affidavit filed in the case.

That affidavit said Mas’ud told Libyan law enforcement that he flew to Malta to meet al-Megrahi and Fhimah. He handed Fhimah a medium-sized Samsonite suitcase containing a bomb, having already been instructed to set the timer so that the device would explode exactly 11 hours later, according to the document. He then flew to Tripoli, the FBI said.
Related:
Lockerbie: 2022-12-12 Good Morning
Lockerbie: 2022-12-12 Lockerbie bombing suspect in US custody two years after being charged
Lockerbie: 2022-12-11 Suspect in 1988 Pan Am 103 explosion that killed 270 people taken into custody by US
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