Tag: EU

Hungary breaks ranks with EU

Hajra, magyarok! Hajra Magyarorszag! Hungary has broken ranks with the European Union and may it’s spirited defiance continue.

Not long ago Hungary was being toasted in the West for opening its border with Austria to East Germans. This bold move led to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

But Western elites are not happy with the independently minded Budapest any longer. But bullying Hungary does not make many headlines because it’s so-called “democratic” Westerners doing the bullying.

The Hungarian parliament approved a law to build the South Stream gas pipeline from Russia without the approval of the European Union, and the ruling Fidesz Party largely ignoring enraged foreign owned banks and energy companies.

The refusal of Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Fidesz to join the new US and EU Cold War against Russia has been met with anger and rage in Washington and Brussels.

Hungarian officials have been banned from entering the US, while the European Commission is trying to pressure the authorities on South Stream with legal action against the Hungarian government for its law restricting the rights of foreigners to buy agricultural land.

Viktor Orban is a nationalist and a conservative but that doesn’t really matter. Only obsequious servility to Uncle Sam and the Euro-elites matter, all in the name of “freedom” and “democracy.”

Fidesz returned to power in 2010. The previous Socialist administration was hugely popular in the West because it played lapdog to Washington and Brussels and the international banks, even taking out an unnecessary IMF loan.

Fidesz and its coalition allies, the Christian Democratic People’s Party, (KDNP) rather introduced a $855m bank tax, the highest in Europe, leaving the financial elite foaming at the mouth.

Orban clashed with the IMF too, with his government rejecting new loan terms in 2012, and paying off early a loan taken out by the previous government, to reduce interest payments.

Russia is Hungary’s third biggest trading partner and ties between the two countries have strengthened in the last couple of years, to the consternation of western Russophobes. In April, a deal was struck for Moscow to loan Hungary €10 billion to help upgrade its nuclear plant at Paks.

Orban’s policy of improving trade and business links with Russia, while staying a member of the EU and NATO, has however been put under increasing strain by the new hostile policy towards Moscow from Washington and Brussels.

Orban also spoke up for rights of the 200,000 strong Hungarian community living in Ukraine.”Ukraine can neither be stable, nor democratic, if it does not give its minorities, including Hungarians, their due. That is dual citizenship, collective rights and autonomy.”

Hungary’s Ambassador was immediately summoned to the Foreign Ministry in Kiev. Donald Tusk, Prime Minister of Poland – the US’s most obedient servant in Eastern Europe – quickly called Orban’s comments “unfortunate and disturbing” in order to impress his masters. Little did it matter that it was strictly none of Tusk’s business.

In August, Orban accurately described the sanctions policy of the West towards Russia as like “shooting oneself in the foot.”

In October, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto also questioned the sanctions on Russia, revealing that his country is losing 50 million forints a day due to the policy.

Hungary has made its position clear, but for daring to question EU and US policy, and for its rapprochement with Moscow, the country has been punished.

It’s democratically elected civilian government which enjoys high levels of public support, has ludicrously – and obscenely – been likened to military governments which have massacred their opponents. “From Hungary to Egypt, endless regulations and overt intimidation increasingly target civil society,” declared US President Barack Obama in September.

Last month there was another salvo fired at Hungary – it was announced that the US had banned six unnamed Hungarian government officials from entering America, citing concerns over corruption- without the US providing any proof of the corruption.

“At a certain point, the situation, if it continues this way, will deteriorate to the extent where it is impossible to work together as an ally,” warned the Charge D’Affaires of the US Embassy in Budapest, Andre Goodfriend.

The failure to provide any evidence, understandably caused outrage in Hungary. “The government of Hungary is somewhat baffled at the events that have unfolded because this is not the way friends deal with issues,” said Janos Lazar, Orban‘s chief of staff.

“I am inclined to think that it is a punishment for the fact that we talk to Russia,” said Gabor Stier, the head foreign policy editor of the leading Hungarian newspaper Magyar Nemzet.

“America thinks that we are corrupt, but we are a sovereign state, and it is our business. Many people in the United States do not like that Viktor Orban is very independent…..Corruption is just an excuse.”

The 2013 Corruption Perceptions Index compiled by Transparency International, reveals that Latvia, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria and Bosnia-Herzegovina are all below Hungary, as indeed is Italy. Yet it’s Hungarian officials that the US is banning.

‘Is Hungary, the EU’s only dictatorship?’ asked Bloomberg View in April. The BBC ran a hostile piece on Orban and Fidesz in October entitled ‘Cracks Emerge in leading party’.

The piece looked forward to the end of Fidesz rule.

While earlier this week, the New York Times published an OpEd by Kati Marton, whose late husband Richard Holbrooke, was a leading US diplomat, entitled ‘Hungary’s Authoritarian Descent’.

You’d never guess that the Hungarian government wasn’t the flavor of the month in the West would you?

Will Hungary be the next country to be the target of a US/EU sponsored regime change?

Attacks on Orban and his government are sure to intensify but the more the West attacks, the more popular Orban becomes as the defender of Hungary’s national interests.

Hungary gave the West everything it wanted in 1989, and its “reformist” leadership was richly rewarded. But it seems that for the West it’s never enough.

 

Soros suggests conflict to settle scores with Russia

George Soros warned the European Union on Tuesday in Düsseldorf to unite against Russia or face dissolution.

Soros, one of the world’s richest men and a tireless critic of Russia, warned that the European Union could dissolve and unravel if the 28-countries do not find a common response against Russia.

Speaking on Tuesday in Düsseldorf at a dinner sponsored by Handelsblatt, Mr. Soros, an 84-year-old Hungarian-American who survived the Holocaust said the future of the EU hangs in the balance.

The sanctions have hurt Russian and European trade, and have led to a slowdown of economic growth on the Continent. In Germany, some business and political leaders are now calling on political leaders to abandon the folly based on a complete lack of evidence of Russia’s involvement in the MH17 Malaysian air disaster in Ukraine.

The call is growing ever louder for taking up dialogue with Russia instead.

In a new book released this month, the former German chancellor, Helmut Kohl, who oversaw his country’s reunification 25 years ago and negotiated the withdrawal of Russian forces, takes aim at Ms. Merkel and European leaders for policies he said are isolating Russia.

In an interview with Gabor Steingart, the Handelsblatt publisher and the son of a Hungarian emigrant to Germany, Soros however urged Europeans to “stop” Russia’s “expansion by force”.

Russia has not used force nor has it occupied any foreign country recently, but Mr. Soros seemed undeterred by facts. He described the current status of Crimea decided at the polling booths, as an example of Russia “reasserting its military hegemony”.

NATO, rather – with the help of the US – has been training special forces to attack the Russian minority in the eastern part of Ukraine in a concerted ethnic cleansing campaign to support a US-sponsored colour revolution.

The son of Jewish parents in Budapest, Mr. Soros survived the Nazi occupation and left the Hungarian capital and Soviet control in 1947 as a 17-year-old for Britain, where he attended the London School of Economics before emigrating to the United States.

Western economic sanctions against Russia, which are limiting the ability of Russian businesses to obtain financing on the global market, are a necessary evil, Mr. Soros said. He lauded the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, for supporting EU penalties.

“I think Angela Merkel has proven herself to be a true European stateswoman in recognizing the danger that Putin represents,” Mr. Soros said.

Oligarchs, vastly underrepresenting Russian Orthodox citizens, are also unhappy with the Kremlin’s scrutiny and sending their families abroad and preparing for their own exits, he said.

Mr. Soros suggested that Europe needed to resort to violence to settle scores with Russia.

 

Georgia resignations trouble US

The United States is concerned about a series of resignations and dismissals in the Georgian government, TASS reported.

The US hopes Georgia will maintain its course towards Euro-Atlantic future, US Department of State’s spokesperson Jen Psaki said in a written statement circulated on Wednesday.

“The United States notes with concern the Georgian Prime Minister’s dismissal of Defense Minister Alasania and his deputy ministers, and the subsequent resignations of State Minister for Euro-Atlantic Integration Petriashvili and Foreign Minister Panjikidze and her deputy ministers,” the spokesperson said.

“We have greatly appreciated the work of these ministers in service to their country and in partnership with the United States,” Psaki said in a statement.

The dismissal of Defense Minister Irakly Alasania triggered a split in the ruling party coalition and the government of Georgia. On Wednesday, Our Georgia-Free Democrats, the party he founded, announced its withdrawal from the ruling Georgian Dream coalition.

Prior to that, Petriashvili and Panjikidze, who are also members of Our Georgia-Free Democrats, announced their resignation.

Merkel warns UK could exit EU over immigration policy

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel has signaled she would rather see the UK leave the EU than compromise the free movement of immigrants, German magazine Der Spiegel reported.

The UK is nearing a “point of no return,” as British Prime Minister David Cameron attempts to renegotiate the terms of the country’s EU membership targeting the freedom of movement, Merkel reportedly said.

According to the 2011 census, 579,000 Poles reside in the UK, making up under 1% of the UK population.

This tiny white minority receive enormous attention from British rightwing media and politicians, who prefer black immigrants from Africa, Muslim immigrants from Pakistan and worship the legacy of Nelson Mandela.

David Cameron’s comments that Polish migrants are taking advantage of UK benefits has sparked much anger in Poland. Poles became the target of violence and political attacks.

The prime minister, Donald Tusk, and the opposition leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynski (whose party sits alongside UK Conservatives in a European parliamentary group) immediately announced that they would veto any changes in EU migration rules.

The large numbers of Polish and Czech immigrants that arrived throughout the last decade did not run the British economy into the ground.

A 2013 report from the Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration found that European Union immigrants contributed more to the economy than they collected in benefits, contrary to native-born citizens.

On the whole, Polish immigrants were younger and more highly skilled than average citizens, and the majority found work in the UK.

Britain’s reaction to the Romanian and Bulgarian immigrants has been particularly strong for a number of historical and political reasons.

This was Merkel’s first hint that the UK’s exit from the union is a possibility, according to German media.

Cameron earlier said he wants to renegotiate the country’s EU membership before going through with a referendum on the subject, with the European principle of freedom of movement “at the very heart of my renegotiation strategy for Europe.”

Merkel has stressed that her support for UK membership could be reversed, if Cameron pursues migration reform.

Cameron has extended the EU laws “to their limits,” trying to turn away unemployed migrants and seeking deportation of those unable to make ends meet after three months, according to the report.

Earlier in October, the former European Commission (EC) president Jose Manuel Barroso stated that freedom of movement is an essential principle of the EU, and any plan by Britain to cap the number of migrants through the limitation of national insurance numbers would be illegal under EU law.

With next year’s general election on the horizon, British politicians are talking tougher on the issue of migrant workers. It will be the first election since the anti-immigration Independence Party (UKIP) emerged as a serious political player.

The latest opinion poll revealed that support for UKIP has reached a record high following Brussels’ recent effort to levy a mammoth £1.7 billion ($2.7 billion) extra charge on Britain. Cameron has been forced to adjust his policies to win back public support.

Cameron announced plans to reduce the number of low skilled migrant workers coming to the UK from other EU countries by limiting the number of national insurance numbers given to them.

In the recent policy shift, he said EU migrants could now only claim benefits for a maximum of three months, down from six.

These legislative changes, which apply to child tax credit, child benefits and job seeker’s allowance, will be implemented in November.

Cameron is likely to make a speech on immigration policies before Christmas, according to media reports.

Meanwhile, the EC says it endorses the principle of free movement within the EU, where citizens have the right to work and live in all member states.

EU lifts trade sanctions against Zim

The European Union lifted trade sanctions against Zimbabwe on Thursday and will resume development and finance cooperation with the country.

EU ambassador to Zimbabwe Philippe Van Damme told journalists on Thursday that direct aid will resume this weekend, when part of the sanctions imposed on the Zimbabwean government over alleged rights abuses expire.

“The EU Council confirms that appropriate measures will indeed be lifted this weekend,” he said, adding that the EU’s development aid will target health, agriculture and governance.

“We have reached a very important stage in the normalisation of our relations with Zimbabwe,” Van Damme said.

“We can now fully engage on development policies of this government. We have to find ways to rebuild trust. Let’s move forward towards normalisation of relations,” he said, while warning that change will not happen overnight.

“It will take time to rebuild trust.”

The EU, however, kept sanctions against President Mugabe, his wife Grace and several members of his party and service chiefs.

Meanwhile the president on Thursday defended his wife’s nomination to lead the powerful women’s wing of the ruling Zanu-PF, as the campaign to succeed him intensifies ahead of a crucial party congress.

“Why are some people so much opposed to it?” said Mugabe to hundreds of supporters who had gathered at the party’s headquarters to back him and his wife.

His wife has shaken up the race to succeed her husband, who has ruled Zimbabwe for close to 34 years since independence, by hinting she could run for higher office and lashing out at possible rivals.

“In the constitution of the party there is no where where it is written that the president’s wife cannot be a leader in the party,” Mugabe said.

The 90-year-old president said he was puzzled that some party supporters were opposed to Grace’s nomination when his late first wife Sally once held the same position in the 1980s.

Source: Fin24/AFP

Russian planes everywhere: UK media hypes intercept

Most media reports based on the NATO statement failed to mention that the Russian planes did not cross any borders and remained within international airspace in every mentioned case

Two Royal Air Force jets reportedly threatened to shoot down a Latvian cargo plane, rushing at supersonic speeds to intercept it, after the plane failed to respond to air traffic control over Kent in Southern England and sent authorities into panic mode.

Russian planes everywhere

The excitement surrounding the intercept – apparently based on post-9/11 terrorist attack fears – came amid a heightened terror alert in the UK at the time of the allied military campaign against the Islamic State.

Media reports mirrored the panic frenzy triggered by the incident, but in a peculiar way: first saying that the cargo plane was “Russian” and then switching to a “Russian-made” reference, RT reported.

Both takes were wrong: the Antonov design bureau, the producer of An-26 planes, is a Ukrainian company founded in Soviet times, and the plane in question belonged to a Latvian-registered company, ironically called RAF-Avia.

However, the British media seemingly capitalized on the latest NATO reports of “unusual” increased activity of Russian military aircrafts over the Atlantic and the Black Sea.

NATO stated that it has intercepted four groups of Russian planes since Tuesday. “These sizeable Russian flights represent an unusual level of air activity over European airspace,” the alliance said.

Most media reports based on the NATO statement failed to mention that the Russian planes did not cross any borders and remained within international airspace in every mentioned case.

“I am instructed by Her Majesty’s Government of the United Kingdom to warn you that, if you do not respond immediately to my orders, you will be shot down,” radioed one of the jets, according to an audio recording circulating in UK media.

The incident occurred at about 5pm local time after the Latvian Antonov An-26 aircraft failed to make contact with air traffic controllers.

British Typhoons were tasked with intercepting the cargo plane. “To fulfill their quick reaction role, they were cleared to travel at supersonic speed,” an RAF spokesperson said, adding that the speed explains the loud noise people heard in the air.

Many locals took to Twitter, describing how their houses shook after the loud bangs.

Communications with the civilian pilots were restored only after the jets intercepted the plane.

The Latvian plane was then escorted to London’s Stansted Airport at around 5:20 pm “All three people who were on board have been spoken to by police,” AP quoted Essex Police spokeswoman Emma Thomas as saying. “It was established that everything was in order and the reason for the short loss of communication was due to a change in airspace.

 

NATO a threat to the security of its members, the world

NATO lives in some weird fantasy world. It reminds me of the Warsaw Pact

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization poses a threat to its members by involving them in interventions based on pretty flimsy evidence, Patrick Armstrong, former political counselor at the Canadian Embassy in Moscow told RT.

The new NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has made his first policy speech.

RT: The face of NATO has changed. Is this a chance for the politics to change?

Patrick Armstrong: Let me suggest what Stoltenberg should have said if he wanted to show that NATO was seriously discussing events. He might have said, and this should have been on the agenda at the recent meeting: “Mr. Kerry, a year ago you were telling us that you were absolutely certain that the Syrian government was using chemical weapons and that we had go bomb it. Today you are now telling us that we should go bomb the people that last year we would have been supporting. Please explain, discuss.” We all saw the photos of the militia cavorting in the US embassy swimming-pool in Tripoli. “Was armed NATO’s intervention in Libya a good idea or bad idea? Discuss.” A month ago we learned that the Kosovo Liberation Army that we supported -indeed we gave the entire country to it 15 years ago – was in fact a pretty nasty, criminal organization. Discuss. In conclusion, Mr. Stoltenberg, that would seem to me that based on past practice, NATO’s interventions appears to have made things worse, have detracted from the security of its members, and were based on pretty flimsy evidence. Discuss that, Mr. General Secretary, rather than blithering on about how wonderful NATO is.

RT: Why exactly does NATO see Russia as a threat? And how is that possible when at the same time the alliance is announcing such a buildup?

PA: The latest sentiment coming out of NATO is that Russia is doing terrible things on NATO’s doorstep. And NATO’s doorstep keeps moving… Speaking as a member of the country that had a great deal to do with the creation of NATO, NATO is in fact a very great threat to the security of Canada let alone its other members and the rest of the world. It keeps getting us involved in these wars for reasons that turn out to be not as solid as we were told. Why Russia? I don’t know. Maybe NATO is about being anti-Russia.

RT: The new alliance leader claimed that NATO troops are leaving Afghanistan a more stable a secure place when statistic shows the exact opposite. Is this conscious denial of the situation?

PA: NATO lives in some weird fantasy world. It reminds me of the Warsaw Pact. At some level they must know that every word they say is a lie and yet they keep on saying that. I honestly don’t know what is going on. I supported NATO back in the days of the Cold War. But at the moment it is just this destructive like a juggernaut, this huge vehicle rolls on crushing, and smashing, and destroying.

‘EU foreign policy prisoner to US threats’

The EU is trapped between anti-Russian members and threats to European companies

EU foreign policy has become a prisoner of the United States, trapped and forced to impose and maintain sanctions against Russia, prominent French economist Jacques Sapir told RIA Novosti Wednesday.

“The EU at first had no intention of moving to a sanctions regime as harsh as the US. But, the US trick was to let the threat of a possible move by the US against any EU company, doing business with Russia in US dollars hovering,” Sapir said.

Then, the EU ended up trapped between on one hand some EU countries (Poland and the Baltic countries) that are deeply anti-Russian and possible US threats against EU companies if they did not abide US sanctions. We could consider that EU foreign policy has been successfully captured by the United States.”

Late Tuesday, permanent representatives to the European Union decided against altering the existing sanctions regime against Russia.
Jacques Sapir explained that “it would be extremely difficult to cancel the sanctions “at least before a delay of 6 months.”

“To do that, the EU would have to build a “consensus” and if Poland and the Baltic countries don’t agree, sanctions could not be cancelled. But, we have to remind ourselves that the sanctions were put in place for 6 months. Once we reach this deadline (by early January 2015) the situation could evolve in another direction,” Sapir told RIA Novosti.

Sapir noted that “the sanctions process against Russia is the only way the EU could be seen to react to Russian policies on Crimea and Ukraine.” But the fact of using sanctions and “that European sanctions were, at first, only cosmetic” demonstrates the weakness of the European Union in facing the United States.

The European Union and the United States have imposed sanctions on Russia over its alleged involvement in the Ukrainian crisis, a claim Moscow has repeatedly denied.

The latest round of sanctions came into effect on September 12, targeting Russian defense companies, alongside the country’s largest banks, energy companies and certain high profile individuals.

Sweden officially recognizes state of Palestine

The decision, which has drawn the ire of Israel, comes unexpectedly early

The Swedish government became the first E.U. member to officially recognize the state of Palestine on Thursday.

Newly elected Prime Minister Stefan Lofven first announced the move at his swearing-in ceremony on Oct. 3, but he was not expected to follow through so soon, writes the Israeli daily Haaretz.

“Some will claim that today’s decision comes too early. I’m rather afraid it’s too late,” writes Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom in the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter. “The past year, we’ve seen how the peace negotiations once again have halted, how decisions on new settlements on occupied Palestinian land have obstructed a two-state solution and how violence has returned to Gaza.”

Wallstrom writes that the recognition aims to support moderate forces among the Palestinians, make future negotiations more equal and give young Palestinians hope of a peaceful solution to the conflict.

Israel has publicly protested the move, which some believe is feeding unrealistic Palestinian expectations of working out a resolution with the international community but without involving Israel, writes the Jerusalem Post.

A total of 134 other countries recognized Palestine before Sweden. Hungary, Poland and Slovakia all did so before joining the E.U.

Those fighting for Palestine – currently Hamas – are labeled as “terrorists” by Israel.

“EU members confirmed in 2009 their readiness to recognize the state of Palestine when it was appropriate,” Wallstrom said.

“We are now ready to take the lead. We hope this can show the way for others.”

She added that the fact that the Palestinians don’t have full control of their land or have fixed borders should not be an obstacle to international recognition.

A vote at the UN General Assembly in 2012 secured a de facto Palestinian statehood, although a ‘yes’ vote from most EU members is still pending. While Sweden is the first EU member in Western Europe to have recognized the state, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Malta, Romania, Poland and the Czech Republic have already done so.

Iceland – the only non-EU member in the pack, has also recognized the Palestinian state.

‘The goal of sanctions is a color revolution in Russia’

The goal of Western economic sanctions is a “color revolution” in Russia, Russian Academy of Sciences presidium member, academician Yevgeny Primakov is convinced. He told TASS in a jubilee interview of conspiracy theories around oil prices, the U-turn of Russia’s economy to the East and the role of informal diplomacy in conditions of a political crisis. On October 29, Yevgeny Primakov, who consecutively headed the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), the Foreign Ministry and the government, turns 85.

– How large-scale can the influence of reciprocal sanctions be on the global policy and economy?

– I can’t agree with the term “reciprocal sanctions”. The sanctions imposed by the United States and their allies against Russia are one thing. And response measures taken by Russia are quite another thing. The aim of anti-Russian economic sanctions is to weaken Russia, corner us, put into practice the idea of a “color revolution” in our country. The response measures that in their scale are not comparable to anti-Russian sanctions are mainly aimed to create an atmosphere that does not favor escalation of sanctions imposed by the West. Of course, in such a situation, a signal is sent to relevant departments and businesses on the required support for the domestic producer in order to loosen our dependence on imports, especially in the food sphere.

Economic sanctions without a relevant decision of the UN Security Council are a measure that contradicts global processes – both economic ones aimed to develop interaction in the interests of all countries, and political ones who solve the problems of creating various systems of counteraction to the real threats to the security of the modern world.

– Has escalation of the conflict discredited the leading institutions of international economic cooperation – the World Trade Organization, the World Bank and the IMF? Do they require transformation?

– The development of the conflict imposed on us by the United States directly contradicts the principles that underlie the WTO, the World Bank and the IMF, but it does not mean that Russia should quit these institutions of international economic cooperation. Even in conditions of the changed global situation, Russia does not accept a course for self-isolation.

– Does the role of informal diplomacy grow in conditions of political contradictions? In particular, do you think that representatives of big business of Russia, the US and the EU will contribute to rapprochement of political positions of the countries involved in the confrontation?

– Informal diplomacy is especially important now, including at the level of Russian, American and European businesses, interested, it seems, not in destruction but in creation, in development, first of all, of economic cooperation.

– Has China retained the status of the United States’ arch geopolitical rival against the cool-off in Russian-US relations? Or is it now Russia?

– As far as economics is concerned, in the context of the existing inter-dependence of the United States and China their competition is unlikely to fade into the background, particularly so now, that the Chinese economy has taken first place. At the same time, I do not believe that one should project this situation to the worsening of relations between the United States and Russia, which by no means signifies that Russia positions itself as the United States’ main geopolitical rival.

‘Keep sanctions, Putin is winning’

Vladimir Putin has outmaneuvered his opponents and humiliated Ukraine by continuing to back pro-Russian separatists and flouting a cease-fire, making it crucial that sanctions on Russia remain firm, France’s ambassador to the U.S. said.

The Russian president “has won because we were not ready to die for Ukraine, while apparently he was,” Ambassador Gerard Araud said yesterday at a Bloomberg Government breakfast in Washington… Echoing the view of other European envoys in Washington, Araud expressed concern that the Ukraine conflict has hit an impasse, leaving Putin the winner by default.

Poroshenko is “kneeling in front of Putin with the cord around his neck and saying, ‘You know, you have won,’” and Putin is still not backing down, Araud said.

While many observers have called Putin a geopolitical chess player, he said, the Russian leader is more a “poker player really, putting all the money on the table, saying, ‘Do the same,’ and of course we blink. We don’t do the same.”

The economic sanctions against Russia must stay in place to prevent Putin from going further, said Araud, who moved to Washington in September after serving as the French ambassador to the United Nations.

“Whatever we decide is a disaster for us,” Araud said, again expressing his personal view. On one side, he said, lies France’s credibility as an arms supplier who delivers on contracts, and on the other, the difficulty of delivering a weapons system to Putin, who might use it against Ukraine or a European ally.

Araud concludes – rather ominously – and far too honestly for a paid-up member of the European elite:

“The question is there on the table: When is Putin going to stop?” Araud said. “That’s the reason that we need to keep the sanctions” because, “let’s be frank, it’s more or less the only weapon that we have. We are not going to send our soldiers in Ukraine. It does not make sense to send weapons to the Ukrainians, because the Ukrainians would be defeated real easily, so it will only prolong the war” and lead to a “still bigger Russian victory.”

The various oligarch controlled parties seem to have won a strong victory against the various Nazi parties in the elections being held by the junta currently: 44% vs 16%, but the official and final results will only be known on Wednesday.

Source: Bloomberg

Guinean attacked ‘for having ebola’

A Guinean woman has been attacked in a bus in Rome by angry passengers who told her she was infected by Ebola and had to get off the bus, Italian media reports. She was taken to hospital suffering from multiple bruises.

Fataomata Sompare, 26, was about to get off the bus on Monday, said Il Messaggero, an Italian newspaper, as cited by the Local.

A teenage girl who was on the bus with her friends saw Sompare and began accusing her of having the deadly virus. Then some of the teen’s relatives started beating the woman.

“They told me that I had Ebola and that I had to get off the bus,” said Sompare, who has been living in Italy for four years.

People at a bus stop near Grotte Celoni Metro station in the east of the city managed to save the woman, who suffered multiple bruises after being beaten by passengers. The police arrived and she was taken to hospital.

The incident was reported to public prosecutors by Sompare’s lawyer.

“[She is] a victim of racism, which is now rampant in this city,” the Sompare’s partner Alessandro Corbelli told Il Messaggero. He added that the incident was “shameful” and she had been attacked “only because she’s black.”

The incident is not the only example of Ebola hysteria in recent days. In the US, Ebola-phobic parents sent a Maine teacher on mandatory leave after he returned from Dallas, where first victim of the virus in the country died. In Mississippi, parents pulled their kids out of school because of the principal’s trip to Zambia.

The death toll from the Ebola virus has reached 4,877 people for far, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

According to the UN health body, 9,936 people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, the three countries worst-affected by the virus, have contracted the disease.

Source: RT

In the hope that Washington hears

In an interview today with Politika, a Serbian newspaper, Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, said that it is futile and dangerous for the US and its European puppets to blackmail Russia and that the Exceptional Nation and its vassals should consider the risks that are inherent in aggressive disputes between countries heavily armed with nuclear weapons.

Putin noted that Obama took a hostile attitude toward Russia in Obama’s UN speech to the General Assembly on September 24 when Obama declared Russia to be one of the three threats to the world along with the Islamic State and ebola.

President Putin said that unilateral and punitive actions taken against Russia can provoke a crisis, and that if Washington’s purpose is to”isolate our country, it is an absurd and illusory goal.”

Here are some of President Putin’s direct quotes:

“How can we talk about de-escalation in Ukraine while the decisions on new sanctions are introduced almost simultaneously with the agreements on the peace process?”

“Together with the sanctions against entire sectors of our economy, this approach can be called nothing but hostile.”

“We hope that our partners will realize the futility of attempts to blackmail Russia and remember what consequences discord between major nuclear powers could bring for strategic stability.”

If we don’t all die from nuclear blasts, radiation, and nuclear winter, it will be because of the humanity and common sense–both of which are missing in Washington–of the President of Russia.

Look around you. The economies and stock markets of Western civilization are in retreat. Stupid and incompetent public authorities have brought ebola into America. And what is Washington doing? The energies of the Exceptional Government are focused on combating the Islamic State, a creature created by Washington itself, and on demonizing Russia.

Has any country, anywhere on the fact of the earth, at any period of history been so totally misruled as the United States?

Americans need to understand that their government is not merely incompetent and immoral, but that it is evil. Washington hides behind moral language but is itself devoid of moral conscience. There is no evil of which Washington is incapable. Those who support Washington support evil.

Paul Craig Roberts served as an Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan Administration. He was associate editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal and columnist for Business Week and the Scripps Howard News Service. In 1992 he received the Warren Brookes Award for Excellence in Journalism. In 1993 the Forbes Media Guide ranked him as one of the top seven journalists in the United States. He is also chairman of The Institute for Political Economy.

Following the hated white colonialists

White colonialism has spawned a stampede of black immigrants to Europe as hundreds of migrants attempted again to cross the Spanish border into the EU.

Over 200 immigrants attempted to cross the border fence between Morocco and the Spanish enclave of Melilla for the second time in 24 hours on Wednesday. Around 100 of them remained on the fence or in no-man’s land between the two fences.

The incident occurred at around 6:30am, while other small groups of immigrants attempted to cross at other points across the border.

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