US House Speaker John Boehner to visit Netanyahu - BBC News
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 Military Times |
Wargaming prepares to launch free 'World of Warships'
Military Times If you love "World of Tanks," wait until you see its soon-to-be-released counterpart of high seas combat. "World of Warships" is coming — and it is amazing. Officials with Wargaming.net, the parent company for both franchises — are staying tight ... |
 New York Post |
ISIS mission: Defence officials to provide update on combat operation
CBC.ca As the government prepares to put forward its proposal to "extend and expand" Canada's ongoing military mission in Iraq, Capt. Paul Forget of Canadian Joint Operations Command will provide an update on combat operations in support of the international ... IS Video Allegedly Shows 3 Kurdish Fighters BeheadedVoice of America ISIS behead three Peshmerga soldiers as a warning to their sworn enemies on ...Daily Mail Daesh claims beheading of three Iraqi Kurdish fightersgulfnews.com New York Post -Reuters all 101 news articles » |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Officials from the United States, Italy and Saudi Arabia met in Rome this week to coordinate plans to combat the financial activities of Islamic State militants, the U.S. Treasury said on Friday.
BBC News |
US House Speaker John Boehner to visit Netanyahu
BBC News Republicans have been highly critical of President Barack Obama over the deteriorating relationship with Israel. Mr Boehner's visit will take place in April, weeks after a clear election victory for Mr Netanyahu's Likud party. During the campaign, Mr Netanyahu ... Boehner Plans Israel Visit After Netanyahu Wins ElectionBloomberg First Draft | Boehner to Visit Israel at End of the MonthNew York Times House Speaker John Boehner to Visit Israel in Coming WeeksWall Street Journal USA TODAY -CBS News all 78 news articles » |
In a message uploaded to YouTube to mark the Iranian New Year celebration of Nowruz, US president Barack Obama appealed to the people of Iran to help bring about a peaceful diplomatic solution to the nation's nuclear talks. "We have to speak up for the future we seek," he implored. "This moment may not come again soon" Continue reading...
Future Russian Army: Anywhere in World in 7 Hoursby The European Union Times
In the future, a fleet of heavy transport aircraft will reportedly be capable of moving a strategic unit of 400 Armata tanks, with ammunition, to anywhere in the world. And probably at hypersonic speed, enabling Russia to mount a global military response.
According to a new design specification from the Military-Industrial Commission in Moscow, a transport aircraft, dubbed PAK TA, will fly at supersonic speeds (up to 2,000 km/h) and will boast an impressively high payload of up to 200 tons. It will also have a range of at least 7,000 kilometers.
The PAK TA program envisages 80 new cargo aircraft to be built by 2024. This means in a decade Russia’s Central Command will be able to place a battle-ready armored army anywhere, Expert Online reports, citing a source in the military who attended the closed meeting.
One of the main tasks of the new PAK TA is to transport Armata heavy missile tanks and other military hardware on the same platform, such as enhanced self-propelled artillery weapons systems, anti-aircraft missile complexes, tactical missile carriers, multiple launch missile systems, and anti-tank missile fighting vehicles.
The PAK TA freighters will be multilevel, with automated cargo loading and have the capability to airdrop hardware and personnel on any terrain.
A fleet of several dozen PAK TA air freighters will be able to lift 400 Armata heavy tanks, or 900 light armored vehicles, such as Sprut-SD airborne amphibious self-propelled tank destroyers.
Russia’s T-14 Armata Main Battle Tank.
“With the development of a network of military bases in the Middle East, Latin America and Southeast Asia, which is expected to be completed during the same time period (by 2024), it’s obvious that Russia is preparing for a full-scale military confrontation of transcontinental scale,” Expert Online says.
A source who attended the closed meeting of the Military-Industrial Commission told the media outlet on condition of anonymity that he was “shocked” by the demands of the military.
Sprut-SD airborne amphibious self-propelled tank destroyer.
According to the source, the PAK TA project has been ongoing for several years now and will eventually supplant the currently operating air freighters. But such a global mission statement for national military transport aviation has never been voiced before.
“It means for the first time we have the objective of creating an operational capability to airlift a full-fledged army to any desired place on the planet,” the source said. This means delivering a task force the size of the former NATO and the US troops in Iraq, in a matter of hours to any continent. “In the context of the current military doctrine that defies comprehension,” the source said.
The initial PAK TA specification entailed building subsonic air freighters with a conventional 900 km/h cruising speed and a moderate 4,500-kilometer range.
The program involves the creation of wide-body freighters, with payloads varying from 80 to 200 tons, to replace all existing Ilyushin and Antonov cargo aircraft.
The only operating aircraft with a comparable payload is the Antonov An-225 Mriya (up to 250 tons), but this is a one-off aircraft created specially for the Soviet Buran space shuttle program.
Last year, it was reported that future military air freighters will be developed by the Ilyushin Aviation Complex, with some experts saying the company may base designs on the Il-106 cargo plane (80 tons) project that won a government tender in the late 1980s, but was abandoned after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Now, with ambitious specifications and objectives, the PAK TA is a truly next-generation transport aircraft.
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French couple guilty of possessing stolen Picasso worksby Angelique Chrisafis in Paris
Pierre and Danielle Le Guennec given two-year suspended sentence over cache of 271 works that retiree claims artist gave him as gift for odd jobs
He had claimed the pile of sketches, drawings and “crumpled paper” was no more than a dull-looking gift that he left in a cardboard box in his garage for 40 years.
But Pierre Le Guennec, a retired electrician from the Côte d’Azur, and his wife, Danielle, were convicted on Friday of possessing stolen goods in the form of a staggering cache of 271 works byPablo Picasso. Pierre Le Guennec said the works had been a present to him from the painter after doing odd jobs on his estate.
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Anti-aircraft guns fire at planes over Yemen's Aden presidential compound-gov't ...
Reuters ADEN, March 20 (Reuters) - Anti-aircraft guns opened fire on planes above the presidential compound in the southern Yemeni city of Aden on Friday, witnesses and an aide to Yemen's President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi said. The witnesses said the planes ... and more » |
“Prepare For Nuclear War” Russia Warns Citizens As US Tanks Flood Into Europe by The European Union Times
A new Ministry of Defense (MoD) report circulating in the Kremlin today states that the Ministry of Civil Defence, Emergencies and Disaster Relief (MChS) has issued an order for all companies employers to prepare for nuclear war, while at the same time the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) has slammed the US for flooding Europe with tanks and armored vehicles.
According to this report, the MChS issued their order on 16 March to companies and employers to immediately provide their workers with radiation suits and gas masks as part of the “war orders” issued by President Putin. and which we had previously reported on.
With these “war orders” being necessitated after the uncovering of a United Kingdom plot to launch a nuclear first-strike against the Federation this week, a situation made even graver after the arrest Tuesday (17 March) of US Navy Captain Heather E. Cole for her failing to, likewise, launch American nuclear weapons against Russia on Monday (16 March) this report continues, the Kremlin remains “alarmed” that no one seems to be in charge of the United States anymore.
Raising this “state of alarm” even higher, this report says, was that Federal Security Service (FSB)Director Alexander Bortnikov has still been unable to contact President Barack Obama whom he had just met during a private White House visit a few weeks ago in Washington D.C. wherein the American leader stated he may not be able to stop this war.
With massive combat operations now existing in all of the Federations 9 time zones, the MoD further states in this report, the General Staff has ordered the immediate deployment to combat status of tens-of-thousands more troops bringing the number to over 80,000 now preparing for war.
The MoD further confirms in this report that the Federations strategic nuclear bombers have beenmobilized in Crimea and that Iskander nuclear missiles are now being deployed in the Kaliningradregion, which borders Poland and Lithuania, too.
Important to note, this MoD report says, are that the Federations military actions are solely in response to the aggressive war moves of the United States against Russia, which includestomorrows start of the US Army’s 1,100 mile armored column journey along the western border,dubbed “Dragoon Ride”, comprised of American troops from the 2nd Cavalry Regiment and the 12th Combat Aviation Brigade (providing air support).
Equally important note, this report continues, is that the threat against the Federations northern border with Norway, where thousands of Norwegian troops continue their “Joint Viking” deployment of armored vehicles and artillery against Russia, continues with no end in sight.
Most ominously, however, MoD experts in this report say, was President Obama’s order this week toimmediately deploy to Germany 800 tracked and wheeled vehicles, which when combined with the220 Abrams main battle tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles the US has sent to Eastern Europe, the 120 Abrams battle tanks and armored vehicles sent to Latvia, and the hundreds of other tanks and armored vehicles stuffed into Norwegian caves for a US Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB)…allwithin the past 8 months…the addition of these estimated 1,400 “vehicles of war” to Europe by theAmericans clearly show the deadly intentions of the West against Russia.
And to anyone doubting the intentions of the US in wanting to wage war against Russia, this report grimly reminds everyone, it was just 11 months ago that the Obama regime was trumpeting its removal from Europe of America’s last remaining battle tank on the continent, and as we can, in part, read as reported by the Stars and Stripes News Service on 19 April 2014:
“Amidst the still-ongoing crisis in Ukraine, the Obama administration is moving the last U.S. battle tanks from Germany and, thus, from Europe.At the same time, the Pentagon also is disbanding two of the U.S. Army’s heavy brigades in Germany. Last year, the 170th Infantry out of Baumholder disbanded, while the 172nd Separate Infantry Brigade at Grafenwöhr is in the process of doing the same.John Vandiver reports for Stars and Stripes, April 4, 2014, that the U.S. Army’s 69-year history of basing main battle tanks on German soil quietly ended last month when 22 Abrams tanks, a main feature of armored combat units throughout the Cold War, embarked for the U.S.On March 18, the remaining tanks were loaded up at the 21st Theater Sustainment Command’s (TSC) railhead in Kaiserslautern where they then made the journey to the shipping port in Bremerhaven, Germany. There they boarded a ship bound for South Carolina.“There is no [U.S.] tank on German soil. It’s a historic moment,” said 21st TSC spokesman Lt. Col. Wayne Marotto.”
As to why and how our world went from last April when no US battle tanks remained in Europe, to 11 months later when they continue to flood onto the continent in the hundreds and thousands, and in the face of a massive Russian military response, should be plain to see for anyone caring to.
Now all that remains to happen is the “planned” false flag incident forcing us all into a war very few will ever know the true reasons for, but which the majority of whom, sadly, will also become its casualties.
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The US president delivered a message to Iran’s people and leaders to mark the Iranian New Year, saying the coming weeks will be ‘critical’ to peaceful resolution
Barack Obama, in a message to Iran’s people and leaders on Thursday, said this year represented the “best opportunity in decades” to pursue a different relationship between their two countries.
Obama said nuclear talks between Iran and western powers had made progress but that gaps remained.
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday called on Iran's government to immediately release three detained Americans - Saeed Abedini, Amir Hekmati and Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian - and to help find Robert Levinson, an American who disappeared in Iran eight years ago, the White House said.
Pope Francis will have lunch on Saturday with some 90 inmates at a prison near Naples, including some that reportedly come from a ward housing gay, transgender and HIV-infected inmates.
Tv2000, a television network operated by Italy’s Catholic bishops, reports that lunch at the Giuseppe Salvia Detention Center was originally not on the schedule, but Pope Francis made a special request to dine with the inmates. A number of the estimated 100 prisoners are gay, transgender and/or infected with HIV, the report said.
The prisoners were chosen via raffle from the facility’s 1900 inmates, writes David Gibson, a top Vatican watcher at Religion News Service. Pope Francis intends to greet each prisoner after a short and simple meal, Vatican Radio reports.
Pope Francis has made caring for inmates a priority of his papacy. He washed the feet of Muslim and women prisoners weeks after his election as pope, and is planning to wash inmates feet again this upcoming Holy Thursday. Pope Francis on Friday also reiterated the Catholic Church’s position thatno crime deserves the death penalty. Capital punishment, he said, is “inadmissible, however serious the crime.”
The report of the lunch is also a reminder of the new tone and signature phrase of the Pope Francis papacy–“Who am I to judge?”–which was the Holy Father’s response to a question about homosexuality months after his election.
Read next: I’m Proud To Be a Transgender Catholic
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 Reuters |
Obama calls on Iran to immediately release detained Americans
Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday called on Iran's government to immediately release three detained Americans - Saeed Abedini, Amir Hekmati and Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian - and to help find Robert Levinson, ... Obama calls on Iran to release US citizensUSA TODAY Obama calls for return of Americans held in IranWashington Post Obama calls on Iran to release AmericansWashington Times Wall Street Journal (blog) -Yahoo News -Whitehouse.gov (press release) all 14 news articles » |
Supporters of rebel Houthi movement targeted by militants in capital Sana’a
Lion cubs turn into stars of Gaza family by AFP news agency
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Two lion cubs have become star members of a family living in a Gaza refugee camp as a result of the weak economy in the war-battered Palestinian territory. Duration: 01:10.
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Chinese firefighters had to rescue a woman trapped between the walls of two buildings, but CNN's David Molko reports this isn't the first such rescue.
Latest on wrong-way crash: Chaplain at police headquarters
seattlepi.com 11:20 A.M.. A New Jersey police captain says a chaplain and grief counselors are at police headquarters after an off-duty officer died and two others were left critically injured in a wrong-way crash in New York City. Linden police Capt. James Sarnicki says the ... and more » |
German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen threw her weight behind the idea of a European Union army, floated by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker earlier this month.
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 Kansas City Star |
ATF's first Senate-confirmed director resigns
Kansas City Star The first Senate-confirmed director for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is leaving the post after less than two years, the agency announced Friday. B. Todd Jones' resignation is effective March 31. After that, Deputy Director Thomas ... and more » |
From left, Hamid Karzai, the former president of Afghanistan; Ashraf Ghani, the current president; and Abdullah Abdullah, the Afghan government's chief executive officer, in Kabul on March 9.
One of the country’s most powerful businessmen says privatisation process was criminal conspiracy
One thing has become clear over the past few weeks. Something is seriously wrong in Moscow.
The Hill |
ATF chief steps down after bullet ban flap
The Hill The director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is stepping down, the oft-criticized agency announced Friday. The ATF announced Friday that Director B. Todd Jones is resigning at the end of the month “to pursue other ... and more » |
CBS News |
Feds open investigation into Aaron Schock
CBS News A federal official tells CBS News that the FBI and Department of Justice are investigating Rep. Aaron Schock's spending. The Associated Press reports that the government is convening a federal grand jury in Springfield, Illinois, and the FBI has begun issuing ... US Opens Criminal Inquiry of Resigning Illinois CongressmanABC News Source: DOJ has opened criminal probe of resigning Illinois congressmanFox News FBI, Feds Investigating Rep. SchockMyStateline.com 13WHAM-TV -USA TODAY all 328 news articles » |
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Ricky Jackson, the longest-held US prisoner to be cleared of a crime, says the repayment from Ohio state is "fantastic".
 Jerusalem Post Israel News |
'EU report urges sanctions against Israel over Jerusalem policies'
Jerusalem Post Israel News The report, which was leaked to the British newspaper 'Guardian,' comes just days after incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu handily won re-election. Palestinian men pray in front of the snow-covered Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem's Old City. EU: Jerusalem at dangerous boiling pointAl-Bawaba Leaked EU Report Harshly Condemns Israel, Urges Sanctions And Says Arab...FailedMessiah.com EU report: Jerusalem has reached 'dangerous boiling point'Haaretz Jewish Journal -International Middle East Media Center all 53 news articles » |
"The Law of the Jungle, which never orders anything without a reason, forbids every beast to eat Man."
Russia is “very unhappy” with the European economic sanctions being linked to the full implementation of a peace deal agreed in Minsk last month, a senior Russian official said.
 Christian Science Monitor |
Speaker Boehner to travel to Israel following Netanyahu reelection
Christian Science Monitor Speaker John Boehner, who announced his travel plans on Friday, angered the Obama administration when he invited Netanyahu to deliver a speech to Congress without consulting the White House. Republican leader John Boehner soon to visit IsraelFox News Latino First Draft | John Boehner to Visit Israel at End of the MonthNew York Times Boehner Plans Israel Visit After Netanyahu Wins ElectionBloomberg Washington Times -BBC News -Foreign Policy all 101 news articles » |
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The White House says violent extremism and Russian aggression in Ukraine are two of the greatest challenges to U.S. national security. And one place those threats converge is the Balkan region,...
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Scientists believe the Giant Whiptail stingray caught in Thailand could be the world's largest freshwater fish. . Report by Cara Legg.
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Army is sending a field artillery battalion of about 400 soldiers and multiple-launch rocket systems to South Korea, a move the Pentagon said on Friday was part of a reorganization of the service and unrelated to any tensions on the peninsula.
Fracking: US tightens rules for chemical disclosureby By MATTHEW DALY and JOSH LEDERMAN
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Obama administration said Friday it is requiring companies that drill for oil and natural gas on federal lands to disclose chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing operations, a controversial drilling technique that has sparked an ongoing boom in natural gas production across the country....
A British teenage Muslim convert convicted of planning to behead a soldier received a 22 year jail sentence, one of a growing string of plots across Europe targeting police and the military.
Doctor who performed first successful penis transplant inundated with requests from around the world to share his expertise
His fame does not yet that match of heart transplant pioneer Christiaan Barnard. But fellow South African André van der Merwe’s phone has hardly stopped ringing in the week since it was announced that he performed the world’s first successful penis transplant.
The urologist and his team at Stellenbosch University provided the organ to a 21-year-old whose penis had been amputated after a botched circumcision three years ago, enabling him to become sexually active and potentially father children.
Continue reading...5 Dead Babies Found in French Home by Sarah Begley
Police discovered five dead babies in a house in the south of France on Thursday after a man who lives there called to say he had found one corpse in a cooler bag. When law enforcement arrived and searched the house, they discovered the other four corpses in a large freezer.
The man’s wife was taken to the hospital to be examined, and a preliminary investigation suggests she may have recently given birth alone in the house, the New York Times reports. Neither the husband nor neighbors who had seen her recently seemed to know if she was pregnant. It’s unclear whether she is the mother of the children, and autopsies are underway to determine how the babies died.
The husband, a farmer, and wife, who works at a garden nursery, have two teenage daughters.
[NYT]
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The role of the media in whipping up the idea of Knox’s character as murderer or victim is lambasted by director Michael Winterbottom in The Face of an Angel, while he makes no argument for guilt or innocence
Next week, in Rome, Italy’s highest court will start considering a final appeal by Raffaele Sollecito and Amanda Knox against their re-conviction 14 months ago for the 2007 murder of English student, Meredith Kercher. Next week, in the UK, a film by director Michael Winterbottom, The Face of an Angel, will be released in cinemas, taking this notorious case as its inspiration.
It doesn’t seem at all comfortable, this juxtaposition of an ongoing process of justice against a cinematic confection. What’s really uncomfortable, however, is that Winterbottom’s fictionalised film, which includes a number of fantasy sequences, offers a much more truthful account of the case than the speculative contentions of investigators, both criminal and journalistic.
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Peru’s prime minister removed the head of the National Intelligence Service and other high-level officials, as allegations widened that the spy agency for years gathered information on a broad range of well-known people.
White House Antagonism Toward Netanyahu Growsby JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS
Despite Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s election victory, he is still out of the good graces of the Obama administration, which has had to reassess its policy toward Israel.
Even notorious kings deserve a dignified last resting place. Richard III’s reinterment is a proper gesture
It is more than half a millennium since King Richard III of England was killed at the battle of Bosworth in 1485. At the end of Shakespeare’s play, the victorious Earl of Richmond, soon to be Henry VII, stands amid the dead and orders his men: “Inter their bodies as becomes their births.” Yet the slain king, the last English monarch to die in battle, was not allowed such a dignity. His remains were hastily buried in a local chapel which was later demolished. Richard’s bones were not rediscovered until 2012. Finally, on Sunday, the last Plantagenet monarch will be carried to Leicester cathedral, ready for a reburial ceremony on Wednesday.
By coincidence, Spanish forensic scientists announced this week that they have rediscovered, in Madrid, the remains of Spain’s supreme literary master, Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote. Not all the bones have yet been definitively identified from many that were moved from the convent in which he was originally buried in 1616. But it would be surprising, when they are identified, if the great writer was not to be reburied in a place of honour so that admirers of the indomitable Knight of the Sad Countenance could pay their respects. How the Viennese must hope that somehow the remains of Mozart, lost in a common grave since 1791, could similarly come to light and become a place of musical pilgrimage.
Continue reading...You adore Prince Charles, America? Keep himby Catherine Bennett
Without his biscuits, homoeopathy and Madonna-like dancing, Britain will struggle. But perhaps it takes a greater nation to appreciate this perennialist sage
It is a measure of how little the heir to the throne is cherished at home that, until President Obama said that American people like British royals “much better than their own politicians”, some of us had barely registered that one of our princes was missing.
True, there has been some noise about a private jet Charles chartered for the trip (at an estimated cost of £250,000) so as to keep himself and his courtiers fresh on their latest ecological mission. But for the man who spent £255,000 on a jet to Nelson Mandela’s funeral and almost £20,000 on a round trip to Worcester, this was merely in character. What will make headlines is the day Charles and Camilla subject themselves to public transportation – if only because, as he said recently, we must “treat our planet like a sick patient”. And to be fair, he won’t be the first consultant to drive an Aston Martin.
Only his intimates were aware that the future king almost never needs the bathroom
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Experts cautiously welcome results of trial of antibody known as aducanumab, which appears to show benefit in patients given it in very earliest stage of disease
A new drug for Alzheimer’s appears to have shown some benefit in people who were given it in the very earliest stage of the disease, say scientists.
Experts were cautious about the results of the trial of an antibody known as aducanumab, which involved just 166 patients. But the dearth of drugs to halt or even slow the progress of dementia – of which Alzheimer’s is the most common type – means that any positive results will be greeted with enthusiasm.
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A French court Friday found Pablo Picasso’s former handyman and his wife guilty of possessing 271 stolen works from the artist and ordered the art trove be returned to the master’s heirs.
 Reuters |
US House Speaker Boehner to visit Israel
Reuters JERUSALEM/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - John Boehner, Republican speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives at the center of a political furor in Washington over relations with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, will visit Israel in coming weeks, ... Boehner Plans Trip To IsraelWSIU Republican leader John Boehner soon to visit IsraelFox News Latino Boehner Plans Israel Visit After Netanyahu Wins ElectionBloomberg BBC News -New York Times -Washington Post all 140 news articles » |
It was an awkward test for many Russian journalists. Last spring, their President tried to mislead them—and the rest of the world—by denying that he had sent troops to conquer Crimea. Even as they witnessed Russian forces sweeping that Ukrainian peninsula, reporters on the Kremlin’s payroll were obliged to go along with Vladimir Putin’s claims.
But a year later, the President came clean. In a documentary aired last weekend, he admitted ordering his troops to seize Crimea weeks before it was annexed into Russia on March 18, 2014.
“I told all my colleagues, there were four of them, that the situation in Ukraine has forced us to start working on returning Crimea to Russia,” Putin says in the film, recounting a late-night meeting with his security chiefs in late February 2014. “We can’t leave that territory and the people who live there at the mercy of fate.”
The confession didn’t leave any good options for Russian newsmen like Dmitri Kiselyov, who runs the Kremlin’s media conglomerate Rossiya Segodnya and hosts a prime-time news and analysis show on state TV. He could either admit to misleading viewers last year and, in effect, blame Putin for the deception, or he could deny that any deception had occurred.
Confronted this week with the dilemma, Kiselyov stuck to denials.
“Vladimir Putin never changed his position,” he told TIME on Wednesday at the headquarters of his media corporation in Moscow. “Look, he never said that our troops aren’t there, because we always had a base there,” Kiselyov said, referring to the Russian naval base in the Crimean city of Sevastopol. Pressed on the identity of the troops who had surrounded and in some cases besieged Ukrainian military bases in Crimea last March, Kiselyov said: “The troops surrounding them were local self-defense forces, but not Russian troops.”
It was an odd position to take. Although critics of the Kremlin have often accused Russian state media of distorting facts and misleading viewers, this is the first time that such a momentous distortion has been so clearly and demonstrably false, contradicting not only the version of events presented in most independent media but also out of sync with Putin’s own statements.
In early March 2014, Putin was asked during a press conference to identify the troops who were fanning out across Crimea, driving Russian military vehicles but wearing no identifying markers on their uniforms. “Why don’t you take a look at the post-Soviet states,” Putin answered, according to atranscript on the Kremlin website. “There are many uniforms there that are similar. You can go to a store and buy any kind of uniform.” The journalist persisted: Were they Russian soldiers or not?“Those were local self-defense units,” Putin said.
Compare that line to his confession in the documentary—which was titled, Crimea: Homeward Bound—and it is clear that Putin did change his position. Not only does the President admit in the film to ordering his security forces to take control of Crimea last spring, but he also claims to have overseen the operation personally. “Our advantage was that I was personally dealing with it,” he says.
This came on top of Putin’s admission last April, a month after the annexation, that “Russian servicemen did back the Crimean self-defense forces,” and that in doing so, they acted in “a civil but a decisive and professional manner.” Moreover, the dramatic re-enactments of the seizure of Crimea shown in the documentary this month clearly depict the invading troops as Russian military, not local self-defense units.
Yet Kiselyov still continues to deny that Russian troops ever intervened in Crimea. “They were near by, at the base,” he tells TIME. “If there had been a conflict there, they would have intervened. But they did not intervene.”
He is not the only senior figure in the Kremlin’s media empire to take this peculiar stance. Last fall, TIME put a similar round of questions to Margarita Simonyan, the editor in chief of RT, the state-funded television network that broadcasts around the world in English, Spanish and Arabic. She also stuck to the claims that Putin made in March of last year about the Russian troops in Crimea being local self-defense forces. Asked about the apparent change in Putin’s story after that, she replied, “He never said that we fooled you… He did not admit that earlier statements were untrue.”
Since the annexation of Crimea, a similar debate has been raging over the role that Russian troops have played in the war in eastern Ukraine, where more than 6,000 people have been killed amid fighting between Ukrainian military forces and Russia’s proxy militias. Even as Russian and foreign journalists have documented the presence of Russian military hardware and servicemen on those battlefields, Putin has repeatedly denied sending any of his forces to fight alongside Ukrainian separatists, which the Kremlin has also referred to as local self-defense forces.
Asked on Wednesday whether Putin might be similarly deceiving the public on this question, just as he did last year with the invasion of Crimea, Kiselyov replied that he was “100% sure” that there are no Russian troops in eastern Ukraine. And what if a year from now the President admits in another documentary that he did send his forces to fight in those regions? “So far that hasn’t happened,” Kiselyov said. But if it does, Russians shouldn’t expect their fourth estate to admit to spreading falsehoods. It is apparently easier to stick to their denials.
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Israel’s prime minister won re-election with a combination of belligerence and bigotry. His opposition to a Palestinian state is a stance the world should not accept
The result was not the worst of it. Indeed, buried in the detailed numbers of this week’s Israeli election were odd crumbs of consolation. No, what made Binyamin Netanyahu’s emphatic win so dispiriting were the depths he plumbed to secure victory.
He made two moves in his desperate, and ultimately successful, effort to woo back those Israeli rightists who had drifted from Likud into the hands of more minor nationalist parties. Netanyahu reassured them that they could forget the lip service of the past few years, the diplomatic niceties he had served up since returning as prime minister in 2009: there would be no Palestinian state on his watch.
Imagine if a US president warned the white electorate that black voters were heading to the polls in 'large numbers”'
I know of at least one European leader who now says privately that Netanyahu’s credibility is sho
Continue reading...After Netanyahu win, Palestinians vow to press case in international arena by William Booth, Hugh Naylor
RAMALLAH, West Bank — Following the reelection of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian leaders say they will press ahead with moves to isolate, embarrass and prosecute Israel in international arenas, as well as begin to implement a risky disengagement from decades-old security cooperation with Israel in the West Bank.Read full article >>
China's Foreign Ministry has welcomed the news that Russian President Vladimir Putin would visit Beijing to take part in celebrations in Beijing marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II
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 Lenta.ru |
У французского электрика отсудили более 200 картин Пикассо
Lenta.ru Французский суд обязал 75-летнего электрика Пьера Ле Геннека и его жену вернуть наследникам Пабло Пикассо более 200 работ художника, передают BBC News. Супругов признали виновными в сокрытии произведений и приговорили к двум годам лишения свободы условно. и другие » |
Afghan President Orders Full Probe of Blasphemy Killingby webdesk@voanews.com (Ayesha Tanzeem)
Afghanistan’s president ordered his Ministry of Interior Friday to launch a full investigation into the violent killing and burning of a woman accused of setting pages of a Quran on fire. A statement from the office of President Ashraf Ghani read: “No individual is allowed to make oneself a judge and use violence to punish others in degrading manners.” The statement also made clear that ensuring justice was the “duty of courts” and those taking the law into their own hands “will be dealt with strongly.” The incident happened Thursday in front of a Kabul mosque when 27-year-old Farkhunda allegedly burned pages of a Quran. Dozens of angry people beat her to death and set her body on fire. Local journalists called it the first incident of its kind in Kabul. Her parents told local media that she was mentally ill. Police arrested six people and Afghanistan’s Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah told reporters that the incident “was discussed in the national security council session” a few hours after it happened. The statement from the president’s office said that the president “also condemns in strong terms any action that causes disrespect to the Holy Quran and Islamic values.” The incident will also be separately investigated by a committee that will include religious scholars.
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Жители Крыма: украинцы или россияне? by Голос Америки
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Аннексия полуострова заставляет людей делать нелегкий выбор Originally published at - http://www.golos-ameriki.ru/media/video/who-are-the-citiz...
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From: Голос Америки
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| Time: 02:16 | More in News & Politics |
«Крымская весна»: кто виноват? by Голос Америки
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В Вашингтоне в годовщину присоединения Крыма обсудили причины российской агрессии в Украине Originally published...
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From: Голос Америки
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| Time: 02:41 | More in News & Politics |
Sanctions meant to punish Russia for snatching Crimea from Ukraine one year ago were supposed to hurt Russian business. And they did. Russian stocks, bonds and commodities had the worst performance in 2014 of those in any emerging market.
That was then. Now the picture is changing, with investors starting to favor Russia in 2015. The ruble, which became the world's most volatile currency last year after President Vladimir Putin's land grab, is stabilizing. The swings in its value narrowed this year more than any of the other 30 most-traded currencies.
Source: Bloomberg
Investors in Russian government securities denominated in rubles have earned the equivalent of 7 cents on the dollar so far this year, as measured by the Bloomberg Russia Local Sovereign Bond Index. In contrast, anyone holding similar government debt in emerging markets across-the-board has lost 1.1 percent in 2015.
The picture is even rosier for Russia's corporate bondholders; they've had a 7.3 percent total return in 2015, leading the gains in the index for emerging market corporate bonds compiled by Bloomberg. And while shareholders in the global emerging market stocks measured by the MSCI Emerging Market Index gained 1.7 percent this year, the 50 Russian stocks in the Micex index are up 11.9 percent -- better than the Standard & Poor's 500 or any other North American market.
The ruble's relative value helps explain why there are some signs of confidence in Russia. Although the ruble remains the most volatile of the 31 most-traded currencies this year, its swings are narrowing. This is visible in implied volatility, a measure of traders' bets on how much the currency's value will change day-to-day. After surging in late 2014 amid the widening Ukraine crisis, the ruble now is fluctuating the way it did in 2009.
Business also appears to be on the rebound. Some 78 percent of the Russian companies in the Micex index showed greater annual sales growth than their global peers, even though the shares of these Russian companies lagged behind their international competitors, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That's consistent with a two-year improvement in the relative value of Russian companies.
One possible reason for the growth? Sanctions. With foreign goods unavailable, Russians had to choose homegrown products and services.
For all the disruption caused by the sanctions, Russian companies represented in the Micex index are more profitable measured by Ebitda margins (earnings before taxes, depreciation and amortization) than the rest of the companies included in the global MSCI Emerging Market Index.
A number of Russian companies are outperforming their global peers. Magnit PJSC, which operates a chain of discount supermarkets with a market capitalization of $16 billion, is one worth noting. The retailer's one-year revenue growth was 31.66 percent, overwhelming the 0.87 percent increase in sales from its global competitors. Novatek OAO, a $22.8 billion independent producer of natural gas in western Siberia, is another. The company saw its sales increase 19.5 percent, compared with 0.76 percent from its global sector. And then there's Rosneft, a $41 billion international brand with production in western Siberia, Sakhalin, the North Caucasus and the Arctic, which reported an 18.26 percent annual sales growth when its international competitors disclosed a revenue increase of just 0.76 percent. By any conventional measure, the shares of these companies are cheap.
Source: Bloomberg
Are global investors optimistic about corporate Russia's continued resilience? It seems so. The shares outstanding of the largest U.S.-based exchange traded fund tracking Russian companies -- more than 90 percent of the companies in the ETF are Russian -- surged 5 percent so far this year. At the same time, an ETF that's a proxy for money flows into and out of Russian equity shows a 27 percent increase. Putin's Ukraine adventure has led to instability in the region and frayed relations with the West; what it hasn't destroyed is confidence in corporate Russia.
(With assistance from Shin Pei.)
(Updates description on chart of ruble's historical volatility.)
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Russia Rebounds, Despite Sanctions
Bloomberg View Now the picture is changing, with investors starting to favor Russia in 2015. The ruble, which became the world's most volatile currency last year after President Vladimir Putin's land grab, is stabilizing. The swings in its value narrowed this year ... Russia ETFs May Be Turning AroundETF Trends What's Next For Russian Stocks?Seeking Alpha (registration) all 10 news articles » |
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