Russia may be running out of oil — RT Business
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Oil production in Russia will inevitably decline by 2035 according to an Energy Ministry report seen by the Vedomosti business daily. The different scenarios predict an output drop from 1.2 percent up to 46 percent two decades from now.
The document, obtained by the newspaper and confirmed by a source in the ministry, says by 2035 existing oil fields will be able to provide Russia with less than half of today’s production of about 10.1 million barrels per day.
The shortfall should be met by increased production from proven reserves, according to projections by the Energy Ministry.
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In the best case for oil producers, short-term growth remains possible only until 2020, according to the report. After that, production will contract. The figures vary from 1.2 percent to 46 percent, depending on prices, taxation and whether or not anti-Russian sanctions will be in force.
A slight increase in production is possible only for smaller companies like Slavneft and Russneft, while the market leaders are facing the depletion of existing deposits. Added to an unfavorable tax environment, their production is set to fall by 39-61 percent.
To counter the decline in oil production, the Energy Ministry proposes giving private companies access to the Arctic shelf, to soften the tax regime and support for small and medium-sized independent companies.
The Ministry also suggests promoting the processing of high-sulfur and super viscous heavy oil with the introduction of preferential rates of excise duties on fuel produced from such oil.
At the same time, the production of gas condensate is projected to increase dramatically in 20 years from 37 to 74 percent.
On Wednesday, Brent benchmark was trading at $40.11 per barrel, slightly off this year's maximum of more than $41; US WTI crude was S36.81 per barrel.
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РБК |
СМИ узнали о решении ЕС продлить персональные санкции против России
РБК Постпреды стран Евросоюза согласовали продление индивидуальных санкций против граждан России, узнали ТАСС и «РИА Новости». По данным агентств, действия черного списка будет продлено на полгода. Постпреды 28 государств — членов Евросоюза решили продлить на ... Комитет постпредов стран ЕС согласовал продление санкций в отношении россиянИнтерфакс Источник: постпреды ЕС одобрили продление санкций против граждан РоссииГазета.Ru Постпреды ЕС единогласно одобрили продление санкций к российским гражданамМосковский комсомолец Аргументы и факты -Комсомольская правда -ИА REGNUM Все похожие статьи: 227 » |
Вести.Ru |
Австрия отказывается выдать России сына бывшего главы Башкирии
Росбалт.RU Суд Австрии отказался дать разрешение на экстрадицию в Россию экс-главы «Башнефти», сына первого президента Башкирии Муртазы Рахимова Урала Рахимова, который является одним из фигурантов уголовного дела о незаконной продаже акций компании. По словам судьи ... Суд в Австрии отказал в экстрадиции экс-главы "Башнефти" Рахимова в РФРИА Новости Австрия отказалась экстрадировать в Россию экс-главу "Башнефти"Нефть России Вена отказалась выдать Москве бывшего главу "Башнефти"Вести.Ru Ведомости -Forbes Россия Все похожие статьи: 84 » |
РИА Новости |
Политолог: прогноз Stratfor о новых войнах выглядит странновато
РИА Новости Основатель Stratfor Джордж Фридман предсказал конфликты в Восточной Европе и войну между Японией и США. Нагнетается обстановка, и это говорит о том, что у аналитического агентства очередной финансовый кризис, считает политолог Алексей Мартынов. Директор Института ... Ведущий американский аналитик советует готовиться к войнеИзвестия Прогноз на будущее от Stratfor: Готовьтесь к глобальной войнеПравда.Ру Глава Stratfor: «Готовьтесь к войне»EADaily НеваИнфо -Новости туризма Турции -Деловой Петербург Все похожие статьи: 129 » |
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Разведка Эстонии назвала Россию главным источником киберугроз
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US Holds Islamic State Agent Tied to Chemical Weaponsby webdesk@voanews.com (Jeff Seldin)
U.S. defense officials say an Islamic State operative captured by American special-operations forces is a key figure in the militant group's chemical-weapons program in Iraq, where new gas attacks by the terror group were reported Wednesday. The unidentified suspect's detention was announced last week, but his link to chemical weapons was not disclosed until now. The Islamic State agent was captured during raids in Iraq and Syria by a U.S. "expeditionary targeting force," assigned to gather intelligence and identify high-ranking IS leaders. Officials in Iraq told VOA Wednesday that Islamic State fighters fired rockets loaded with mustard gas, also known as sulfur mustard, into a town north of Baghdad late Tuesday and early Wednesday. Iraqi and Kurdish officials said dozens of civilians were injured by the attack on Taza Khurmatu, a town whose residents are mostly Shi'ite Muslim ethnic Turkmens. “The rockets spread a garlicky smell and caused nausea and vomiting," according to Soran Jalal, head of Taza Khurmatu’s civil defense office. He told VOA that investigators confirmed the weapons carried mustard gas. A commander in Kirkuk, the Kurdish population center north of Turkmen town, estimated about 30 people required hospital treatment. Lieutenant Muhammad Qadir told VOA at least five of the wounded had facial burns caused by chemical agents. Separately, a police official in Kirkuk, Brigadier General Sarhad Qadir, said it was determined the rockets were fired into Taza Khurmatu from territory controlled by the Islamic State group. U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told Congress a month ago that Islamic State has used chemical agents in both Iraq and Syria. CIA Director John Brennan later confirmed that IS had the ability to manufacture both chlorine and mustard gas. U.S. officials say Islamic State is still developing its chemical weapons program, so some reports about the terror group’s use of chemical weapons on the battlefield is “still largely about fear.” Islamic State fighters still find it easier to manufacture and use improvised explosive devices (IEDs) or to use suicide bombers to inflict casualties, according to the American officials. Correspondent Sharon Behn in Iraq and VOA reporters Rikar Hussein and Dlchad Anwar contributed to this report
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NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that Russia has made "numerous attempts" to intimidate its neighbors and split NATO, the RIA Novosti news agency reported Tuesday.
Russian officials conceded some problems with supplying S-300 missiles to Iran but maintained the deal was still in place, the Kommersant newspaper reported Wednesday.
At least three Russian citizens were wounded in a terrorist attack in Israel on Tuesday evening, as a Palestinian man went on a stabbing rampage near Tel Aviv's Jaffa Port, RIA Novosti reported, citing Israeli police.
The following is an excerpt from Paula Chertok’s East-West Blog:
Historian Andrei Zubov presents a powerful lecture on the roots of the Soviet mentality and the resurgence of Stalin so jarringly visible in Russia today. He reviews the history of Russia’s destructive leadership from the 20th century to the present, a leadership that has left a legacy of a broken people. He then discusses pathways to a new Russia through rebuilding civil society, decommunization, repatriation, and education.
Below is a full translation of the original Russian article appearing on the Open Russia website.
Sixty years ago at the XXth Congress of the CPSS [Communist Party of the Supreme Soviet], Nikita Khrushchev presented a report entitled “On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences,” officially ushering in the liberalization of the Communist regime. Historian Andrei Zubov explains what has changed as a result of de-Stalinization and what hasn’t, why Stalin is again viewed as justified, and how to melt the ice castle.
What Effect Did Khrushchev’s Secret Report of 1956 Have?
What occurred at the XX Congress was quite an unprecedented event not only in the Soviet Union, but throughout the world Communist movement. Because the main axial figure of the entire Communist movement supporting the Soviet Union was, of course, Stalin (even though there was another, Trotskyite movement). Stalin was Communism’s center and its very essence. It was his management methods, his attitude toward the individual, and his relation to the world that people all over the world with Communist views aligned themselves with – in China, in Europe and in Latin America, not to mention in the Soviet Union. The condemnation of Stalin, and for the first time revealing information of his crimes (almost exclusively against members of the Party – the repression after the XVII Congress of the CPSU (b), the ’48 “Leningrad Affair”) turned people’s heads upside down. Many people simply didn’t believe it. Others said that it was a provocation. Still others denounced Khrushchev and said he was a traitor to the cause of Communism. Of course those who had previously opposed Stalin or suffered under him were elated.
Actually, intelligent people had noticed this process to some extent even earlier. Indeed, the de-Stalinization process began with Stalin’s death – literally from his death in March 1953. From those very first days, Beria, then, after Beria’s overthrow, Malenkov and Khrushchev began the process of gradually releasing people from the camps, gradually improving the circumstances of people working in agriculture, the collective-farm peasants. They began easing censorship and stopped inflating the personality cult of Stalin. Even before Stalin had been buried, they said, enough is enough, we do not need all these incredible eulogies, these incredible recitations; let’s get to the business of nation-building. Smart people had already noticed that Stalin’s closest associates were not singing his praises as they did right up to his last day of life. Naturally, the case against Jewish doctors was halted as were many other matters.
1956 was both unexpected and expected for those who were well versed in the Moscow political kitchen.
What Changed and What Didn’t Change as a Result of De-Stalinization
How was de-Stalinization undertaken, and was it only superficial? Certainly it was not superficial. Yes, monuments were removed – this was very important. Stalin was tossed out of the mausoleum. This was also important. But much more important were the facts that were told about the serious crimes committed under Stalin. And a lot of people had been posthumously rehabilitated. These people had been condemned mostly by Article 58 as those who acted in a “hostile” manner (as spies, conspirators, terrorists) against the Soviet regime. A huge number of people who were killed by Stalin were rehabilitated, and those few who survived, were rehabilitated in life, and a lot of people returned. Despite all the incredible mistakes of Khrushchev, despite the fact that he too was a murderer and a criminal like Stalin – both in Ukraine and in Moscow – a huge number of people of that generation were grateful to him for having been given their freedom, those who were exonerated, those who returned from forced exile. And in general the era of total repression stopped at that time. Let us not forget that it was in 1951 that Stalin initiated a whole new round of repressions. He was clearly leading the country to a new 1937. People who had served all their time and those who had not, those who had been exiled, even those exiled nearby, within 101 kilometers of Moscow, they were all arrested again in 1951-52 and sent to Siberia, in very difficult conditions. Many were middle-aged, and, of course, this was a death sentence for them. Virtually everyone who did not die was immediately returned.
Khrushchev, himself a Stalin accomplice, his younger companion, was elbow-deep in blood himself. And, of course, Khrushchev didn’t admit everything.
Most of the talk was about the repression against the Communists because all the Communists, including Khrushchev, were shaking in their boots that they would be the next to enter the terrible meat grinder of terror.
All of the ordinary people who were killed, of which there were a thousand times more than the Communists – peasants, workers, intellectuals outside the party, priests, people of all religions – they simply were not remembered. The Holodomor was not remembered. Lenin’s repression was not remembered. The Red Terror of 1918-1921 was not remembered, neither were the first years of famine in 1921-22. It had all been forgotten. Only Stalin’s crimes and mainly those of 1937 were mentioned.
1937 has entered into our memory as a kind of image, as a symbol of crime. And this is a mistake. Even Solzhenitsyn spoke about this error: in fact, the terror of 1937 was just another round of terror which had begun in late 1917 and early 1918 under Lenin, and that mass terror ended only with the death of Stalin in 1953. Naturally, sometimes it was more severe and sometimes less, but it lasted the entire time. 1937 was important for the party bosses, for the directors because it was their heads that were rolling. Although it was not only their heads, in fact, the heads of ordinary people were rolling a hundred times more. But the bosses were naturally afraid for their own and remembered only their own. That is why they began by condemning only the terror.
Stalin was condemned as the man who destroyed the Party. This was the main point. Therefore, we settled the score with Stalin and that was that. We settled scores with Stalin’s henchmen such as Molotov not because he was Stalin’s henchman, but because he opposed Khrushchev. That is what he was primarily accused of, not that he participated in the cult of personality or Stalinist repression. Beria was charged with participating in repression, but by the summer of 1953, Beria was already in prison.
It is interesting that Stalin was the major figure in the life of the Soviet Party, and thus the condemnation of Stalin therefore meant a condemnation of his regime. But they did not go there. And so, almost immediately after the sacking of Khrushchev in 1964, under Brezhnev began the whitewashing of Stalin. It began slowly but grew greater and greater. Firstly, they said over and over that the party line had been correct in spite of the personality cult. This was the mantra of the Bolsheviks at the time. That is, everything was condemned, except the repression by the active Party bosses, the generals and so on. Secondly, it was under Brezhnev that talk gradually began of Stalin as an ambivalent figure, one with a negative and a positive side. And the positive side was first and foremost associated with the defense of the Soviet Union in the years 1941-45 and the victory in the Great Patriotic War.
The memory of the Great Patriotic War had already been uprooted even while Stalin was alive. In 1946 he ordered to stop celebrating Victory Day. Brezhnev resumed the celebration of Victory Day on its 20th anniversary in 1965. The victory was primarily a validation of the Party and Stalin as the one who lead to that victory. Completely suppressed was the fact that Stalin had actually been one of the main instigators of the war, both through the Comintern and then directly through the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939 when he became an ally of Hitler. Why has the term “Great Patriotic War” been foisted upon us? Because we have separated the war which began in Europe, September 1, 1939, in which Stalin was an ally of Hitler against the Western democracies, from the war that began when Hitler attacked Stalin, turning Stalin into an opponent of Hitler by virtue of which he became an ally of the Western democracies in the anti-Hitler coalition. For the Bolsheviks, Communists and the current government, it was important to forget about that first period; in Soviet times we talked about it hurriedly. The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was mentioned but the part about the division of spheres of influence in Eastern Europe remained a secret: The whole world knew, but it was not known in the Soviet Union.
If you look at history seriously, it is clear that the incredible sacrifices of World War II which the Soviet Union endured – 27.5-28 million people – was Stalin’s fault, not Hitler’s. Stalin conspired with Hitler and the war was unleashed as a result.
The aggressive policies of Stalin led to this war. Destruction of the generals of the Red Army led to the war being conducted ineptly, and because of this vast numbers of people died, vast expanses of the Soviet Union were occupied, and so on. And so the attitude towards the war became like a fetish in order to validate Stalin.
Why is Stalin Back in Fashion? Read the entire article on Paula Chertok’s East-West Blog.
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Russia warns North Korea over threats of nuclear strikeby Chad O'Carroll for NK News, part of the North Korea network
One of Pyongyang’s few remaining allies says country is in danger of creating legal grounds for international military intervention. NK News reports
Russia has warned North Korea that threats to deliver “preventive nuclear strikes” could create a legal basis for the use of military force against the country, suggesting that even Pyongyang’s few remaining friends are growing concerned about its increasingly confrontational stance.
The Russian foreign ministry statement, which follows a North Korean threat to “annihilate” the US and South Korea, also criticises Washington and Seoul for launching the largest joint military drills yet to be held on the peninsula.
Continue reading...Is Putin dragging the west into the next cold war?by Chaired by Mark Rice-Oxley, audio produced by Stuart Silver
Nato has accused Russia of undermining stability in Europe while the prime minister Dmitry Medvedev has warned of a new cold war. At a Guardian Live event, an expert panel discussed Putin’s ambitions and Russia’s shifting relationships
Many observers believe Russian military involvement in Syria has succeeded in propping up the Assad regime. In recent years, Putin’s intervention in Syria, the annexation of Crimea and incursions into Ukraine are bold and wilful policies which have alarmed the west.
Is Russia just protecting its national interests, or is it risking a “proxy war” with the US that might further destabilise the region? Is Putin achieving a geopolitical coup in the Middle East, seemingly outmanoeuvering the US, UK and France at every available opportunity?
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Russian hostility 'partly caused by west', claims former US defence head by Julian Borger World affairs editor
William Perry says US contempt toward Russia as ‘third-rate power’ after end of Cold War played a big role
The current level of hostility in US-Russian relations was caused in part by Washington’s contemptuous treatment of Moscow’s security concerns in the aftermath of the cold war, a former US defence secretary has said.
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The Guardian |
Why Ukraine needs Russia more than ever
The Guardian This sums up the core problem facing the Ukrainian economy. It is not corruption, a serious issue about which little can be done in the short term, but the ideologically driven choice to sever all ties with Russia, the country that has historically ... Ukrainian Pilot Denounces Her Trial in Russia as a FarceABC News Hunger-striking Ukrainian pilot could die before Russia sentences her: lawyerReuters Ukrainian military hero plans starvation instead of sitting in Russian prisonWashington Post all 173 news articles » |
The Guardian |
Russia warns North Korea over threats of nuclear strike
The Guardian Russia has warned North Korea that threats to deliver “preventive nuclear strikes” could create a legal basis for the use of military force against the country, suggesting that even Pyongyang's few remaining friends are growing concerned about its ... Russia condemns 'unprecedented' US-South Korea war-games for pressuring PyongyangRT Russia calls DPRK's threats to deliver preventive nuclear strikes absolutely impermissibleTASS Russia calls North Korea strike threats 'totally unacceptable' Channel News Asia all 2,239 Yahoo News all 2,210 news articles » |
The Hill (blog) |
Growing the next generation of Russia experts
The Hill (blog) The Pentagon's newest reassessment that Russia is a top national security threat comes on the heels of recent public discussions on the shortage of Russia experts in the U.S. government and the decline in funding for Russian studies. As a scholar ... |
Sputnik International |
US Concerned Russia-Iran Cooperation Turning Into Strategic Partnership
Sputnik International WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The United States is worried that Russia's operational collaboration with Iran in Syria is growing into a long-term strategic security partnership, Commander of US Central Command General Lloyd Austin said in congressional ... and more » |
Vox |
Russia's Communist Party is making a comeback — and it's bad news for Putin
Vox But in a sign of the growing divisions within the Russian elite and the rise of a new political generation, the KPRF is now becoming more outspoken and critical. Whether Putin was firing back in his comments against Lenin or simply made a blunder that ... In Russia, International Women's Day means flowers and flatteryCBC.ca Putin Praises Russian Women on International Women's DayThe Moscow Times (registration) all 25 news articles » |
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Business Insider |
Russia's plunging military budget exposes a huge contradiction in Putin's policies
Business Insider putin Reuters/Yuri KochetkovAn honor guard opens the door as Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) enters a hall to attend a meeting with members of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, October 1, ... Russia's Communist Party is making a comeback — and it's bad news for PutinVox International Women's Day 2016: Putin Hails Women as 'True Soul of Russia'Newsweek In Russia, International Women's Day means flowers and flatteryCBC.ca RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty all 22 news articles » |
Ex-ambassador: No-fly zone in Syria would test Russia
The Hill Russia has been carrying out airstrikes in support of Syrian President Bashar Assad. The Kremlin claims its main goal in Syria is to target the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), but U.S. officials say the strikes have mainly targeted opposition ... and more » |
Bloomberg |
Russia's Slushy Oil Freeze
Bloomberg Russia's oil bosses have signed up for a plan to freeze supply, or at least that was the message from a meeting they held with President Putin earlier this month. The latest numbers from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, released Tuesday ... |
Newsweek |
Ukraine and Turkey Launch Joint Naval Drill Amid Stand-Offs With Russia
Newsweek Soldier stands on Turkish Black Sea ship A soldier stands guard on the Turkish boat TCG Turgutreis in the port of Varna, March 9, 2015. NATO countries and Ukraine have carried out multiple drills around the Black Sea since Russia's annexation of Crimea ... |
Sydney Morning Herald |
Russia Threatens Invasion If North Korea Nuclear Rhetoric Continues
Daily Caller Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) and new North Korea Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) and new North Korea's Ambassador Kim Hyun-joon attend a ceremony to hand over credentials at the Kremlin in Moscow, November 19, 2014. Fears Russia, North Korea collaborating in 'crime against humanity'Sydney Morning Herald all 594 news articles » |
STRATFOR |
Russia's Evolving Role in the Caucasus
STRATFOR Despite its seemingly dominant position, Russia's regional clout has been seriously damaged since Ukraine's EuroMaidan uprising in 2014. The rebellion in Kiev not only caused Moscow to devote substantial military resources to Crimea and eastern Ukraine ... |
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RT |
Russia may be running out of oil
RT The document, obtained by the newspaper and confirmed by a source in the ministry, says by 2035 existing oil fields will be able to provide Russia with less than half of today's production of about 10.1 million barrels per day. The shortfall should be ... |
Two Russians Accused of Taking Drugby By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A world champion speedskater and a volleyball player are suspected of having taken meldonium — the same drug for which Maria Sharapova tested positive.
The Guardian |
America's former CIA chief: 'If we don't handle China well, it will be catastrophic'
The Guardian The only person to head both the CIA and the National Security Agency (NSA) now wonders if the US's preoccupation with terrorism he helped shape since 9/11 has caused the country's intelligence services to take their eye off more serious threats down ... Bush-era spymaster defends his recordgulfnews.com all 2 news articles » |
North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un issued his latest nuclear-program brag Wednesday, saying on state media that his country had developed a nuclear warhead.
According to South Korea's Yonhap News Agency, Mr. Kim made the remarks at a meeting with scientists and technicians shown on the North's official TV station.
...
FREMONT, Ohio (AP) - Police say a drone helped them track down an inmate shortly after he escaped from a northern Ohio jail.
Fremont detective Roger Oddo says the department had just finished its second day of training with the $4,000 drone when the call came about the escape Tuesday ...
The number of detainees released from the Guantanamo Bay prison who have reengaged in terrorism has doubled since July 2015, according to a new report issued by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI).
The report, which is published every six months, showed that as a greater number of detaineeswere freed by the Obama administration, more were suspected of turning back to terrorism and taking up arms in the fight against U.S. interests.
In July 2015, DNI flagged six former detainees who were believed to have rejoined the terror movement. One year later that estimate has increased to 12, as the Obama administration attempts to shut down the detention facility and relocate at least 60 remaining inmates onto U.S. soil.
A total of 118 out of 676 freed former detainees were confirmed of having reengaged in terrorist acts since 2009. Around 30 have been killed on the battlefield, while 25 have been taken back into custody. At least 63 remain at large, according to the DNI’s latest findings.
The U.S. intelligence community suspects that another 86 freed inmates have returned to terrorism. Of these 86, four have been killed, 17 have been taken back into custody, and 65 remain at large, the report states.
The recidivism rate for former detainees remains around 30 percent, according to Pentagon officials.
Since January 2009, at least seven of 144 freed detainees have been confirmed as returning to the battlefield, according to the DNI; the U.S. suspects that an additional 12 former inmates have reengaged in terrorism.
The Obama administration has pursued a policy to clear and free as many Gitmo inmates as possible. The administration has informed Congress that it will unilaterally take steps to shut down the prison even though this would violate U.S. law.
As many as 37 inmates have been released from Guantanamo since 2015, with 17 inmates released in January alone. Fewer than 100 inmates remain imprisoned at the facility.
The administration’s plan came under fire last month when it was discovered that al Qaeda’s new front manwas a former Gitmo detainee.
Ibrahim al Qosi, a former Gitmo inmate released to Sudan in 2012 by the Obama administration after he was cleared as a low-level risk, recently emerged as a top leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.), who has authored several laws blocking the transfer of detainees to the United States, told the Washington Free Beacon that the administration seemed apathetic about inmates who have been caught back on the battlefield.
When asked last month about Qosi’s return to terrorism, Secretary of State John Kerry responded that he was “not supposed to be doing that.”
“Secretary Kerry’s testimony that released prisoner Ibrahim al Qosi in Sudan is ‘not supposed to be doing that’ indicates that there is no plan for preventing terrorists from rejoining the fight to kill Americans,” Kirk told the Free Beacon.
The law currently requires the Obama administration to notify Congress 30 days before transferring any detainee to a foreign country. Kirk and other lawmakers have pursued additional measures to limit the amount of foreign aid disbursed to countries that accept inmates.
The post Intel: Twice as Many Former Gitmo Inmates Returning to Terrorism appeared first onWashington Free Beacon.
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Soldiers in the U.S. Army were subjected to a “white privilege” briefing last April during which they were advised that American society “attaches privilege to being white and male and heterosexual.”
Documents obtained from the Army through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request shed light on the diversity training briefing, which was given to 400 soldiers in the 67th Signal Battalion at Fort Gordon, Georgia, last year. While one slide from the PowerPoint presentation used in the briefing previously sparked outrage, the contents of the full “Power and Privilege” slideshow had not been publicly released until now.
The PowerPoint slides, which were obtained by the government watchdog group Judicial Watch, provide detailed insight into the so-called Equal Opportunity briefing delivered on April 2, 2015.
“Privilege exists when one group has something of value that is denied to others simply because of the groups they belong to, rather than because of anything they’ve done or failed to do. Privilege has become one of those loaded words we need to reclaim so that we can use it to name and illuminate the truth,” the slideshow read.
“Our society attaches privilege to being white and male and heterosexual regardless of your social class.”
“Imagine a school or a workplace where all kinds of people feel comfortable showing up … valued, accepted, supported, appreciated, respected, belonging,” the presentation continued. “Something very powerful keeps this from us. The truth of this powerful forces is everywhere, but we don’t know how to talk about it and so we act as though it doesn’t exist.”
The slideshow instructed the soldiers that such privilege results in a “yawning divide in levels of income, wealth, dignity, safety, health and quality of life [and] promotes fear, suspicion, discrimination, harassment, and violence.”
The presentation also featured a hypothetical story about a black woman to illustrate that the United States is “organized according to race.”
“Consider the ‘black woman’ in Africa who has not experienced white racism and does not identify herself as a ‘black woman.’ African, a woman, but not black. She only became ‘black’ when she came to the U.S. where privilege is organized according to race, where she is assigned to a social category that bears that name and she is treated differently as a result,” the slideshow read.
The slideshow instructed “privileged” soldiers to do something about the alleged problem.
“The trouble we’re in can’t be solved unless the ‘privileged’ make the problem of privilege their problem and do something about it. The fact that it’s so easy for me and other people in dominant groups not to do this is the single most powerful barrier to change,” the presentation concluded.
The new details of the diversity briefing come nearly a year after controversy first erupted over a slide used in the training that discussed “white privilege.” The slide, entitled “The luxury of obliviousness,” was posted on Facebook following the briefing and invited a slew of negative comments.
“Race privilege gives whites little reason to pay a lot of attention to African Americans or to how white privilege affects them. ‘To be white in America means not having to think about it,’” the slide, which was also among the documents obtained by Judicial Watch, read.
A spokesperson for the Army responded to the outrage last April by saying that the slide was inappropriately shown to soldiers and that the diversity briefing was not officially authorized.
“The unit [Equal Opportunity] instructor deviated from the authorized topic and content which was provided,” Army spokeswoman Capt. Lindsay Roman said at the time. “To prevent further instances, all unit instructors will receive additional training on the importance of following Army EO training requirements.”
The post U.S. Soldiers Taught That America Privileges White Male Heterosexuals appeared first onWashington Free Beacon.
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FBI quietly changes its privacy rules for accessing NSA data on Americans by Spencer Ackerman in New York
Exclusive: Classified revisions accepted by secret Fisa court affect NSA data involving Americans’ international emails, texts and phone calls
The FBI has quietly revised its privacy rules for searching data involving Americans’ international communications that was collected by the National Security Agency, US officials have confirmed to the Guardian.
The classified revisions were accepted by the secret US court that governs surveillance, during its annual recertification of the agencies’ broad surveillance powers. The new rules affect a set of powers colloquially known as Section 702, the portion of the law that authorizes the NSA’s sweeping “Prism” program to collect internet data. Section 702 falls under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (Fisa), and is a provision set to expire later this year.
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