Category: International Conflict

Jun 24, 2022.The U.S. has dropped a ghastly $146 billion on Afghanistan reconstruction in the last two decades and billions more continue to be spent, but the Biden administration is blocking federal auditors from conducting their congressionally mandated job of investigating where the money is going. For months the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has been trying to…

June 17, 2022. In a blow to press freedom, the United Kingdom has approved the extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States to face espionage charges related to the publication of classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes. Home Secretary Priti Patel signed off on the transfer after the U.K. Supreme Court denied Assange’s appeals earlier this year,…

June 15, 2022. Eva K Bartlett: RT had me on yesterday to discuss Ukraine’s kill list & my entry on it. I highlighted Canada’s cozy relationship with Ukraine, including with the Nazi battalions, Chrystia Freeland’s Nazi-collaborating grandpa , and why I feel safer living in Russia than I would were I back in Canada where Ukrainian nationalists & Nazi supporters…

2022-06-01. Russia is cutting off more gas supplies to Europe. On Tuesday, the state energy company Gazprom cut off some gas to the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. This came hours after the EU banned most Russian oil imports. (Democracy Now) Denmark Denmark’s largest energy company said Russia cut off its gas supply Wednesday because it refused to pay in rubles,…

2022-06-01. Calls are growing for the Pentagon to acknowledge that a U.S. drone strike on March 29, 2018, in Yemen mistakenly struck civilians. Adel Al Manthari was the only survivor of the drone strike, which killed his four cousins as they were driving a car across the village of Al Uqla. The Pentagon refuses to admit the men were civilians and…

May 27, 2022. A supposedly leaked document that has circulated widely on social networks, allegedly showing that a senior Russian general had instructed Russian soldiers to fabricate evidence of Ukrainian war crimes, appears to be a forgery. The Intercept Russian POWs shot in the leg by Ukrainian forces: Video French media documents war crimes by NATO-backed Ukrainian neo-Nazi militias: Wsws.org…

May 9, 2022. The future of Commerzbank’s business in Russia will depend, among other things, on Russia’s behavior and further sanctions, according to Handelsblatt report. Germany’s Commerzbank is preparing for more businesses to fail in Europe’s biggest economy amid high inflation and economic perils exacerbated by Russia’s war in Ukraine. The lender expects provisions for loan losses to rise as…

May 9, 2022. Brussels has shelved its plans to ban the EU shipping industry from carrying Russian crude as it struggles to push through its latest sanctions package because of anxiety among some member states about the economic impact of the measures. A proposal targeting shipping that was introduced last week has been dropped by the European Commission following hard…

May 7, 2022. The U.S. government wants $33 billion more for the War in Ukraine and is telling its people that Russia is a threat not only to Ukraine, but to Americans. The enormous aid package is twice the size of a provision approved by Congress last month. It would eclipse all the spending by the United States so far…

Two Russian oligarchs were found dead last week, within 48 hours of each other. They were found alongside their families in what investigators are labelling murder-suicides. Since the start of 2022, four other Russia-connected oligarchs have mysteriously died by suicide. Here is a list of the Russian oligarchs who have met a mysterious end in 2022 — so far, as…

Vladimir Putin announced last month that if “unfriendly countries” wanted to continue buying Russian natural gas, they would have to pay in rubles starting April 1. It seems not everyone believed he was serious. Would Russia really turn away profit by refusing payment in other currencies? Apparently so. Many media outlets are calling the move a ‘weaponization’ of the gas…

The Pentagon says the U.S. is monitoring events in the Eastern European country of Moldova after the breakaway republic of Transnistria bordering Ukraine said explosions over the past two days hit a radio center and a security headquarters. The reports of explosions prompted Moldova’s president to convene a meeting of the country’s security council as she vowed to prevent an…

Monero, traded as ticker XMR, seems to be the only cryptocurrency able to escape the solid downtrend lately and the approaching hard fork is not the only cause. While it is a definite motivator, there are at least four additional main reasons. The first is obviously the new trend in sanctions. 1. The sanctionsFirst, the west has essentially sanctioned anyone…

You don’t want to call sanctions a hoax because they legitimately put compliance pressure on our businesses and people. But do they put any pressure on the actual targets? It’s part of our news cycle and even our language to think so. After all, what is a “sanction” if not a punishment for breaking the rules? In a move that…

  On 29 March 2022, Australia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs (the Minister) designated 39 individuals, including a number of Russian individuals engaged in serious corruption and human rights abuses, using the new powers set out in the Magnitsky sanctions amendments. Targeted financial sanctions and travel bans will apply to these persons from 30 March 2022.  This is the first time…