Home » Posts tagged 'Russia' (Page 3)

Tag Archives: Russia

On President of the People’s Republic of China Xi Jinping’s invitation, President Vladimir Putin paid a state visit to China.

It is not a formal act, but a further step in strengthening economic, political, and military relations between the two countries.

China produces a third of the world’s manufacturing products, more than the United States, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and Britain combined.

After the major gas pipeline Nord Stream, which transported its gas to Europe, was interrupted by US-NATO military sabotage and the country was subjected to sanctions by the EU – Russia is supplying more and more gas and oil to China and imports from there the industrial products that it previously imported from Europe.

The strengthening of relations between the two countries is part of the BRICS: this intergovernmental organization — made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa — has extended to Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates. Several other countries want to join this international organization, chaired this year by Russia, which aims to create a multipolar world order alternative to the unipolar one of the West.

To maintain dominance in a changing world at all costs, the West resorts to war in a scenario that ranges from Europe to the Middle East and East Asia.

In his speech at the May 9th Parade for the 79th Anniversary of the Victory of the 1941-1945 Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany, President Putin describes this scenario as follows:

“Feeding revanchist sentiments, mocking history and trying to justify the current followers of Nazism is part of what is the common policy of the Western elites to fuel regional conflicts, inter-ethnic and inter-religious struggles and to contain the sovereign and independent centre of global development.”

Russia Confiscates €800 Million From Deutsche Bank, Unicredit And Commerzbank

May 21, 2024

Russia Confiscates €800 Million From Deutsche Bank, Unicredit And Commerzbank

After two years of being on the receiving end of a weaponized global reserve currency, getting booted from SWIFT, countless (toothless) sanctions and watching some $350 billion of its assets be frozen and soon confiscated, Moscow has had enough, and over the weekend the FT reported that a St Petersburg court seized around €800 million worth of assets belonging to three western banks – Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank and UniCredit.

The seizure marks one of the largest moves against western lenders since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine prompted most international lenders to withdraw or wind down their businesses in Russia. It comes after the ECB told Eurozone lenders with operations in the country to speed up their exit plans.

According to court documents, the court seized €463 million-worth of assets belonging to Italy’s UniCredit, equivalent to about 4.5% of its assets in the country, according to the latest financial statement from the bank’s main Russian subsidiary.

Frozen assets include shares in subsidiaries of UniCredit in Russia as well as stocks and funds it owned, according to the court decision that was dated May 16 and was published in the Russian registrar on Friday.

According to another decision on the same date, the court seized €238.6mn-worth of Deutsche Bank’s assets, including property and holdings in its accounts in Russia. The court also ruled that the bank cannot sell its business in Russia; it would already require the approval of Vladimir Putin to do so. The court agreed with Rukhimallians that the measures were necessary because the bank was “taking measures aimed at alienating its property in Russia”.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Biggest Risks of This Decade

May 20, 2024

The Biggest Risks of This Decade

Since the 2020 pandemic, many things have changed, but nothing more than geopolitics. Wars and clashes that used to be largely national have given way to more regional conflicts that threaten to upend the current world order. The Ukraine War and Israel-Iran conflicts have the potential to lead to world war.

The international arena once dominated by the United States has gradually changed into a more multipolar stage. China and India have grown in economic and military significance, and Russia and Iran have reasserted their influence. Rising world powers are increasingly challenging the over-extended leading power.

“The disintegration of the old order is visible everywhere…It is close to collapse.”

The Economist

Half of world’s nations feel that they are victims of economic and political inequality. A similar sentiment is found in the rising tide of populism—even in rich countries—because most people know that their economic situation has worsened in recent decades. At the core of both is the higher cost of energy and materials.

Figure 1 shows that oil price, inflation and interest rates rise and fall in tandem, and are considerably higher now than during the period before the Covid pandemic. The Ukraine War contributed to an energy shock that has moderated but oil prices have averaged nearly 60% higher after 2020 than they were in the six previous years. U.S. interest rates and inflation are more than three times higher.

Figure 1. U.S. inflation and oil price fell in 2023 but federal funds rate increased. Inflation was lower in Q1 2024, oil price rose and federal funds rate was marginally higher.
Source: St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank, EIA & Labyrinth Consulting Services, Inc.

French president Emmanuel Macron observed in 2022 that these changes are probably secular.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Great Ukraine Robbery Is Not Over Yet. Ron Paul

May 17, 2024

The Great Ukraine Robbery Is Not Over Yet. Ron Paul

The ink was barely dry on President Biden’s signature transferring another $61 billion to the black hole called Ukraine, when the mainstream media broke the news that this was not the parting shot in a failed US policy. The elites have no intention of shutting down this gravy train, which transports wealth from the middle and working class to the wealthy and connected class.

Reuters wrote right after the aid bill was passed that, “Ukraine’s $61 billion lifeline is not enough.” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell went on the Sunday shows after the bill was passed to say that $61 billion is “not a whole lot of money for us…” Well, that’s easy for him to say – after all it’s always easier to spend someone else’s money!

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, was far from grateful for the $170 billion we have shipped thus far to his country. In an interview with Foreign Policy magazine as the aid package was passed, Kuleba had the nerve to criticize the US for not producing weapons fast enough.

“If you cannot produce enough interceptors to help Ukraine win the war against the country that wants to destroy the world order, then how are you going to win in the war against perhaps an enemy who is stronger than Russia?”

How’s that for a “thank you”?

It may be understandable why the Ukrainians are frustrated. Most of this money is not going to help them fight Russia. US military aid to Ukraine has left our own stockpiles of weapons depleted, so the money is going to create new production lines to replace weapons already sent to Ukraine. It’s all about the US weapons industry. President Biden admitted as much when he said, “we are helping Ukraine while at the same time investing in our own industrial base.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Russia Orders UK Defense Attaché Out Of The Country In Tit-For-Tat

May 17, 2024

Russia Orders UK Defense Attaché Out Of The Country In Tit-For-Tat

Russia has hit back at the UK’s latest diplomatic moves against Moscow, on Thursday ordering the expulsion of the British defense attache from the country.

“The defense attaché at the British Embassy in Moscow, A. T. Coghill, has been declared persona non grata. He must leave the territory of the Russian Federation within a week,” Russia’s foreign ministry said.

It follows the UK first expelling Moscow’s defense attache from British soil earlier this month as he was accused of being “an undeclared military intelligence officer.” Russia blasted it as a lie, and its top diplomat overseeing military affairs was forced to leave.

The Kremlin is now threatening further diplomatic escalation while complaining about London’s “unfriendly,” “anti-Russian” and politically motivated recent actions.

The British government has of late quietly launched a pressure campaign on Russian diplomatic facilities and personnel in the UK, with Interior Minister James Cleverly recently briefing parliament that multiple Russian-owned properties will be downgraded from having diplomatic status and protections.

Cleverly alleged that Russian sites in Sussex as well as in London will see their diplomatic immunity removed. Cleverly told parliament that “we believe have been used for intelligence purposes.”

As we detailed this week, British intelligence has gone so far as to accuse Putin of plotting ‘physical attacks’ on British soil and NATO sites.

There have been a spate of new accusations of specific attacks on UK infrastructure being linked to Russia. For example The Telegraph writes that “Last week, a British man was charged with an arson attack in London and accused by prosecutors of working for Wagner Group, the Russian paramilitary organization.”

How Europe and Britain are getting ready for ‘WWIII’: Interactive graphic reveals how West will stop Putin unleashing Armageddon, with nukes at Russia’s doorstep, mass conscription at 18 and arms factories firing up

May 16, 2024

How Europe and Britain are getting ready for ‘WWIII’: Interactive graphic reveals how West will stop Putin unleashing Armageddon, with nukes at Russia’s doorstep, mass conscription at 18 and arms factories firing up

More than two years into the Ukraine war, Vladimir Putin has doubled down
UK and European allies are steeling their economies and armed forces for war

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 saw the horrors of a large-scale war darken Europe’s doorstep for the first time since the end of World War II.

For a short while, hope endured that a swift resolution to the conflict would materialise, but before long the prospect of a speedy diplomatic solution lay in tatters as Moscow’s drones and missiles continued to batter Ukraine’s cities.

Now more than two years into the conflict, Vladimir Putin has doubled down.

His forces have made noticeable gains on the frontlines in recent weeks as they pressure war-weary and ammo-starved Ukrainian defenders, and his decision to appoint civilian economist Andrei Belousov as defence minister suggests the Kremlin is committed to sustaining its war economy over the long run.

Meanwhile, the president’s long-serving and intensely loyal foreign minister Sergei Lavrov earlier this week challenged what Russia calls the ‘collective West’, declaring Moscow‘s troops are ready to meet NATO on the battlefield.

In light of the downward spiral of East-West relations – not to mention the alarming escalation of tensions further afield in the Middle East and Indo-Pacific – the UK and its European partners could soon be forced to contend with any number of major military threats.

As a result, many countries are reversing decades of peacetime policy to reignite their war engines. Others never stopped and are only consolidating efforts to ensure they are fit for conflict.

But there is little doubt that all Europe is now scrambling to prepare in anticipation of what may lie over the horizon.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Europe and the Middle East, Two Scenarios of the Same War

May 14, 2024

Europe and the Middle East, Two Scenarios of the Same War

On the Red Square in Moscow, on May 9, the Parade for the 79th Anniversary of the Victory of the 1941-1945 Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany took place.

More than 9,000 military personnel with 75 weapon systems including nuclear missiles on mobile launch pads participated. The political media mainstream described the Parade as a threatening force display against Europe and the entire West, erasing its historical significance and anything leading to the current war in Europe.

In the first place, history must be remembered.

The Soviet Union was attacked and invaded in 1941 by Nazi Germany with 201 divisions, including 5.5 million soldiers equal to 75% of all German troops, 3,500 tanks, and 5,000 aircraft, plus 37 divisions from satellite countries (including Italy).

The USSR had asked its allies – Great Britain and the United States – to open a second front in Europe, but they delayed it, aiming to unload Nazi power on the USSR to weaken it and thus have a dominant position at the end of the war.

The second front was opened with the Anglo-American landing in Normandy in 1944, by that time the Red Army and the Soviet partisans had defeated the German troops, dealing the decisive blow to Nazi Germany. The price paid by the Soviet Union was very high: around 27 million deaths, over half of them civilians, corresponding to 15% of the population (compared to 0.3% in the USA throughout the Second World War); around 5 million deported to Germany; over 1,700 cities and large population centres, 70 thousand villages devastated; 30 thousand factories destroyed.

In today’s war in Europe, Russia is facing not only Kyiv’s forces, formed and commanded by a political-military group of clear Nazi brand but with NATO under US command which uses these forces by equipping them with weapons capable of striking Russia…

…click on the aboe link to read the rest of the article…

Three Russian grain regions declare emergency over cold weather, frost damage

May 10, 2024

Three Russian grain regions declare emergency over cold weather, frost damage

MOSCOW, May 8 (Reuters) – Three of Russia’s key grain-growing areas declared a state of emergency on Wednesday, citing May frosts that have caused severe damage to crops and will reduce this year’s harvest.

The central regions of Lipetsk, Voronezh and Tambov all imposed emergency measures.

“The frosts that hit in early May led to catastrophic consequences,” Igor Artamonov, the governor of the Lipetsk region, said on the Telegram messaging app before signing the emergency decree.

“We must understand that this year’s harvest will be much smaller than the previous one.”

In neighbouring Voronezh, the regional agriculture ministry wrote on Telegram: “According to preliminary data, the area of dead or severely damaged crops has exceeded 265,000 hectares,” the regional agriculture ministry said on Telegram.

In Tambov, further east, Governor Maksim Yegorov signed a similar order, with his administration citing “early May frosts that have killed crops and damaged perennial plantings”.

All three regions are part of Russia’s fertile Black Earth region. Russia is one of the world’s top grain producers and exporters.

Besides grain, the regions produce crops such as potatoes, sunflowers, sugar beet and fruit. The statements did not make clear how each of these crops might be affected by the frost.

The Voronezh ministry said the damage stemmed from frost on the nights of May 3-4 and May 4-5, when the air temperature had fallen to -4.6 Celsius (23.7 Fahrenheit) and the soil temperature to -5C (23F).

It said declaring a state of emergency would enable farmers to “document the objective impossibility of achieving target indicators”, which they are obliged to hit in order to receive subsidies, and also to apply for insurance payments.

Authorities in Tambov said temperatures had dipped as low as -5 C on four nights. They said the regional agriculture ministry could apply to the government for subsidies.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Russia Launches Surprise Offensive In Kharkiv, Aims To Extend Border 10km Deep Into Ukraine

May 10, 2024

Russia Launches Surprise Offensive In Kharkiv, Aims To Extend Border 10km Deep Into Ukraine

Following several more cross-border attacks from Ukraine, including direct drone hits on Russian oil facilities over the past 48 hours, Russian forces have launched a surprise ground offensive which seeks to break through front lines in the northeastern Kharkiv border region on Friday.

“Russia launched a new wave of counteroffensive actions… Ukraine met them there with our troops, brigades, and artillery,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed of the new action in a briefing. “Now there is a fierce battle underway.”

Civilians have also been witnessed fleeing border areas in droves as heavy fighting ensues. Already Moscow forces have penetrated at least 1 kilometer deep in what’s being described as an effort to create a larger ‘buffer zone’ in order to help prevent Ukrainian attacks from reaching Russian territory.

Ukraine’s defense ministry said that the new offensive began at 5am local time with armored vehicles leading the charge of infantry troops in this major effort to effectively push the border itself deeper into Ukraine territory.

Kharkiv region on fire amid a major surprise Russian offensive:

But Ukraine defense officials have claimed, “As of now, these attacks have been repulsed; battles of varying intensity continue.”

The AFP has written, “If Moscow’s advances are confirmed, it would represent the Russian military’s largest land operation in the region since sending thousands of troops across the border in February 2022.”

Below: the center of Vovchansk after heavy fighting…

Heavy shelling is also taking place, especially in the vicinity of Vovchansk, which is a border town of a few thousand people but which had a pre-war population of 17,000. According to further unfolding details:

Kharkiv region’s governor said the length of the border and the settlements in it were a “grey zone” and confirmed active fighting taking place.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Ukraine War “Spins Out of Control”: Putin Is “Letting It Get Too Late:” to Turn Aside from Nuclear Armageddon

May 10, 2024

Ukraine War “Spins Out of Control”: Putin Is “Letting It Get Too Late:” to Turn Aside from Nuclear Armageddon

The Russian government including President Putin now publicly acknowledges that Western provocations are increasing in scope and seriousness and are spinning the Ukrainian conflict out of control.

The Russian government has stated that the American F-16 aircraft supplied to Ukraine by the idiotic governments of Denmark, Netherlands, Norway, and Belgium will “be treated as nuclear-capable weapons.”

Dmitry Medvedev, former President of Russia and currently deputy director of the Russian Security Council has declared the West’s leaders to be “infantile morons” whose ignorant arrogance is leading to their destruction.

Alarmed by the increasing likelihood of NATO and US soldiers deployed to Ukraine and by the British Foreign Secretary’s statement that there are no prohibitions on Ukraine’s use of the UK-provided long range missiles to strike deep into Russian territory, President Putin has ordered the Russian Ministry of Defense to conduct exercises to guarantee Russia’s ability to rapidly deploy battlefield nuclear weapons.

Medvedev stated that while the moronic French president speaks of “strategic ambiguity,” for Russia there is no ambiguity. Russia’s “response will not be in Ukraine. There will be no hiding on Capitol Hill, in the Elysee Palace or at 10 Downing Street.”

These developments confirm that I was correct that Putin’s never-ending conflict would permit ever increasing Western interventions until the situation spins out of control. As Putin has never enforced any of his many red lines that the West has crossed in Ukraine, the West no longer regards Russian warnings as meaningful. The warnings are welcomed and used as propaganda to further rouse Western populations to “the Russian threat.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

NATO’s Entry Into the Ukraine War?

May 9, 2024

NATO’s Entry Into the Ukraine War?

The war in Ukraine would have meant a return to the Cold War between Russia and the USA and a return to the Doctrine of Containment, the foundations of which were laid out by George F. Kennan in his essay “The sources of Soviet behavior”, published in the journal Foreign Affairs in 1947 and whose main ideas are summarized in the quote “Soviet power is impervious to the logic of reason but very sensitive to the logic of force”.

This would include the entry of Finland and Sweden into NATO military structures and the increase of military forces with four new battalions deployed on the European border with Russia and the Russian response to the installation of missiles in Belarus Iskander-M equipped with multi-purpose warheads as well as S-40 anti-aircraft missiles following the dynamics of the Cold War (action-reaction).

For their part, Russia would have installed in Kaliningrad the Iskander M missiles equipped with multi-purpose warheads as well as S-400 anti-aircraft missiles and in the event of NATO closing the exit of the Soviet enclave of Kaliningrad to the Baltic Sea, could be reissued the Kennedy-Khrushchev Missile Crisis (October, 1962) which would have as its epicenter Kaliningrad.

NATO’s Entry Into the Ukraine War?

With the US immersed in the electoral campaign for the November presidential elections, France, Poland and the United Kingdom would be the trident chosen by the globalists to implode the Ukrainian front next summer and provoke the subsequent entry of NATO into open conflict with Russia of a re-elected Putin until 2030.

Poland seeks to become a local player in the Eastern European hornet’s nest and extend its influence to the Ukrainian area by claiming its right to incorporate the Ukrainian region of Lviv on the Polish map, which was occupied by Poland from 1918 to 1939.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

West Fueling Global Conflicts, Trying To Topple Moscow, Putin Says On WW2 Victory Day

May 9, 2024

West Fueling Global Conflicts, Trying To Topple Moscow, Putin Says On WW2 Victory Day

As fully expected, Russian President Vladimir Putin struck a defiant tone in his speech at Moscow’s Red Square for the annual events commemorating Russia’s WW2 victory. Addressing thousands of soldiers in ceremonial attire, Putin accused the “arrogant” West of stoking conflict around the world.

“We know what the exorbitance of such ambitions leads to. Russia will do everything to prevent a global clash,” he said. “But at the same time, we will not allow anyone to threaten us. Our strategic forces are always in a state of combat readiness,” he stressed in reference to the country’s nuclear forces.

The 71-year-old leader hailed that “Victory Day unites all generations,” and vowed: “We are going forward relying on our centuries-old traditions and feel confident that together we will ensure a free and secure future of Russia.”

He called Victory Day “very emotional and poignant” as “Every family is honoring its heroes, looking at pictures with dear faces and remembering their relatives and how they fought.”

He contrasted the “heroes” – Russian troops fighting in Ukraine, with the West – which is “fueling regional conflicts, inter-ethnic and inter-religious strife and trying to contain sovereign and independent centers of global development.”

Present for the ceremony was nearly 10,000 Russian troops, including 1,000 who have fought inside Ukraine. According to AP correspondents, Putin underscored his ‘nuclear deterrent’ messaging by having nuke-capable missiles present:

Nuclear-capable Yars intercontinental ballistic missiles were pulled across Red Square, underscoring his message.

The Soviet Union lost about 27 million people in World War II, an estimate that many historians consider conservative, scarring virtually every family.

One theme which emerged from Putin’s speech is that the West has ignored and forgotten the immense sacrifice that Russians made in defeating the Nazis in WW2.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Great Ukraine Robbery is Not Over Yet

May 8, 2024

The Great Ukraine Robbery is Not Over Yet

Reuters wrote right after the aid bill was passed that, “Ukraine’s $61 billion lifeline is not enough.” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell went on the Sunday shows after the bill was passed to say that $61 billion is “not a whole lot of money for us…” Well, that’s easy for him to say – after all it’s always easier to spend someone else’s money!

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, was far from grateful for the $170 billion we have shipped thus far to his country. In an interview with Foreign Policy magazine as the aid package was passed, Kuleba had the nerve to criticize the US for not producing weapons fast enough. “If you cannot produce enough interceptors to help Ukraine win the war against the country that wants to destroy the world order, then how are you going to win in the war against perhaps an enemy who is stronger than Russia?”

How’s that for a “thank you”?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Dangerous and Chaotic Military Escalation: How will The Kremlin Respond to the EU/NATO’s “Total Hybrid War” Against Russia?

May 2, 2024

Dangerous and Chaotic Military Escalation: How will The Kremlin Respond to the EU/NATO’s “Total Hybrid War” Against Russia?

Russia is a big bite. In fact, it’s such a big bite that all of its enemies and invaders choked on it, while many have suffocated as a result, incapable of ever regaining their superpower status.

The political West has been the most stubborn in its attempts to subjugate the Eurasian giant.

However, it has never done so in such a united manner as is the case nowadays.

It can even be argued that the belligerent power pole is waging a sort of hybrid total war against Moscow. This aggression is as multifaceted as it could possibly be and it keeps escalating as the United States and its vassals and satellite states are simply refusing to acknowledge that Russia has red lines just like any other sovereign country. In fact, the US-led political West has not only completely ignored the Eurasian giant’s basic national security interests, but has actually been hurting them intentionally to provoke a more direct response from the Kremlin.

To that end, in the last 10-15 years, NATO and its geopolitical pendant, the European Union, established institutions tasked with conducting the aforementioned hybrid war against Russia. And just like the world’s most aggressive military alliance poses as a “defensive organization”, these institutions serve the purpose of “cyber and disinfo defense”. In reality, nothing could be further from true. Namely, NATO established what is officially known as Centers of Excellence (COEs) that are given various tasks. Officially, there are 28 of them, although, in reality, there could be several times more, particularly as the EU itself has similar institutions with overlapping responsibilities…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Ukrainian Drones Hit Major Rosneft Refinery in Russia

May 2, 2024

Ukrainian Drones Hit Major Rosneft Refinery in Russia

Just as Russia had started to bring back some refinery capacity damaged by Ukrainian drone attacks earlier this year, a new wave of drone attacks hit a major refinery owned by Rosneft, for a second time.

Rosneft’s Ryazan refinery southeast of Moscow caught fire after the overnight drone attack, an anonymous Ukrainian military source with knowledge of the situation told Bloomberg News on Wednesday.

The refinery in the region of Ryazan, whose main city of the same name is some 120 miles southeast of Moscow, was first attacked by drones in the middle of March. The first attack also led to a fire.

This year, Ukraine has stepped up attacks on oil refineries in Russia, which have reduced Russian refining capacity, and, reportedly, have the White House concerned about rising international prices.

The United States has repeatedly urged Ukraine to halt its drone attacks on Russian oil refineries due to Washington’s assessment that the strikes could lead to Russian retaliation and push up global oil prices, the Financial Times reported in March, citing sources familiar with the exchange.

As of mid-April, Russia had brought back online some oil refining units, reducing the capacity taken offline by Ukrainian drone hits to around 10%, from 14% at the end of March.

The refining capacity in Russia that was offline due to drone attacks was estimated by Reuters in mid-April at around 660,000 barrels per day (bpd), compared to 907,000 bpd offline at the end of March.

Russia said in early April it can repair all damaged units within two months.

Russia’s Energy Minister Nikolai Shulginov said that all damaged refineries in the country would be restarted by the beginning of June.

“Repairs are underway at the refineries. We plan to re-launch a number of refineries after repairs in April-May, possibly before the beginning of June,” Russian news agency Interfax quoted Shulginov as saying.

“All facilities that were damaged will be re-commissioned,” the minister added.

Tag Archives: Russia

Content

Post categories

Economic Links

Energy/Resource Links

Environmental Links

Geopolitical Links

Liberty Links

News Links

Other Links

Survival Skills

Post Archives by Category

Post navigation

Latest Posts