9 November 2013 — Strategic Culture Foundation
NATO, Russia – BMD in Europe Remains to be Bone of Contention (I)
09.11.2013 | 00:00 | Andrei AKULOV
On October 28 Romanian President Traian Basesku, Romania’s Minister of Defense Mircea Dusa, US Under-Secretary of Defense for Policy James Miller, James Syring, director of the US Missile Defence Agency, and NATO Deputy Secretary-General Alexander Vershbow attended the groundbreaking ceremony held on the territory of Deveselu military facility, a former air base located at 180 kilometers east of Bucharest, the Romania’s capital. The move confirms that Romania has become one of Washington’s main security partners in Europe…
EU Goes East: Political Offer for Economic Colonisation
08.11.2013 | 00:00 | Hannes HOFBAUER
…In the case of six Eastern member states of the EaP the integration idea gives priority to the strong Western Global players over relatively week Eastern competitors… What can Kyiv expect from signing the Association Agreement with Brussels? 27 pages of the written agenda of the EU-Ukraine Cooperation Council in June 2013 make it evident: the preparations for the Association Agreement do not function at eye level, the text shows a clear submission of Ukraine’s whole legislation and a political, social and military adaption to EU’s guidelines… The chapter «Economic cooperation» shows that Brussels also wants to interfere in inner politics from financial to social affairs… In ordinary language: monetary policy is going to be controlled by the ECB, and social policy is submitted to the restrictive regime of austerity packages… Energy co-operation in Brussels’ words consists of two main points: abolishment of state subsidies for electricity and gas «to ensure full payments» and «integration of the united power system of the Ukraine into the Union of Central European electricity networks»… These are the corner pillars of the EU enlargement project, interfering in all possible spheres of national and local politics and economics…
US Sanctions and Iranian Nuclear Program
08.11.2013 | 00:00 | Nikolai BOBKIN
The next round of Geneva talks between Tehran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany – the group of six powers (the P5 + 1 group) – has been launched in Geneva on November 7-8… Tehran sees the uplifting of sanctions as the first step on the way of tackling the nuclear problem while the economic damage is estimated to be 3-5 billion dollars per month. There are four United Nations Security Council resolutions in force which impose sanctions against Iran. Besides, there are sanctions in effect that have been imposed unilaterally by the United States, the step to be followed by the European Union. Russia finds these measures illegitimate and damaging to the negotiation process… In recent days a number of leading Jewish groups, including AIPAC, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and the Jewish Federations of North America, have reiterated support for advancing through Congress new and enhanced Iran sanctions…
Untouchable Banks: The End of the Easy Life (II)
07.11.2013 | 00:00 | Valentin KATASONOV
While at first the main target of prosecution on charges of discreditable mortgage practices was Bank of America, which was traditionally one of the top five, if not the top three banks on Wall Street, in autumn 2013 JPMorgan Chase topped the black list. Among Wall Street banks it has consistently occupied first place in assets (currently 2.3 trillion dollars). JPMorgan Chase will pay the U.S. government 13 billion dollars in exchange for dropping the investigation into the bank’s activities in the mortgage field. An agreement to this effect was reached by the bank’s management and the U.S. Department of Justice. This is an absolute record for compensations received by the U.S. government from a private business…
Murdered French Journalists in Mali Haunt Hollande’s Military Adventurism
07.11.2013 | 00:00 | Finian CUNNINGHAM
The bodies of two French journalists murdered in Mali were flown back to France this week – signalling a macabre blowback for President Francois Hollande and his interventionist military policy in Africa… Ghislaine DuPont (57) and her 55-year-old colleague Claude Verlon were senior correspondents for national broadcaster Radio France Internationale (RFI). They were kidnapped last Saturday by armed men while on assignment in the northern Malian town of Kidal… The French government denies that it paid a ransom of $26 million to secure the release of the hostages. But there are strong suspicions that the French authorities did indeed facilitate a secret payment for the men’s freedom, along with their employer, the French nuclear energy company, Areva…
An Independent Scotland: A Poke in the «Five Eyes»
06.11.2013 | 00:00 | Wayne MADSEN
September 18, 2014 could either ensure that the United Kingdom remains a virtual U.S. intelligence «Trojan horse» inside the European Union or could herald a radical shakeup of America’s «Five Eyes» signals intelligence alliance. On a Thursday in September, Scottish citizens will go to the polls to vote «Yes» or «No» on a simple referendum question: «Should Scotland be an Independent Country?» The referendum was worked out in an agreement between Scotland’s Scottish Nationalist Party First Minister Alexander Salmond and British Prime Minister David Cameron…
Maastricht Treaty – Twenty Years in Force
06.11.2013 | 00:00 | Pyotr ISKENDEROV
The Maastricht Treaty (formally, the Treaty on European Union or TEU) came into force on November 1, 1993 to create the European Union, the common political system of United Europe and the single European currency – the euro… Is it not something we face today looking at the financial relationship between the North and the South? Or interethnic and interstate contradictions within the triangle Hungary – Romania – Slovakia?.. It brings it near to the prospect of a real confrontation flaring up within the «United Europe»…
Untouchable Banks: The End of the Easy Life (I)
05.11.2013 | 00:00 | Valentin KATASONOV
The largest banks of Wall Street, the London City and other financial centers of the West have always been considered «Too Big to Fail». Such big-name banks were categorized as «untouchables», «sacred cows» which were destined to exist forever. And that is not surprising; the demise of any one of the «sacred cows» of the banking world could plunge not only one country, but the entire world into the depths of crisis. After all, the «sacred cows» existed outside of the so-called market economy, with its fierce competition, high risks, bankruptcies and defaults. They lived their lives in the oases of «banking socialism»…
The House that Uncle Sam Built is Developing Cracks
05.11.2013 | 00:00 | Yuri BARANCHIK
…The house that Uncle Sam built is developing serious cracks in a number of directions: there is growing conflict in America’s relations with the majority of its allies; the possibility of US military intervention in international crisis situations without a UN mandate is tapering off; the US economy, which is built on the completely unbacked dollar, is being perceived as a threat to the global economy; the mood of protest is intensifying in the US itself, and there are large enclaves appearing in a number of major cities in which legitimate power is, essentially, no longer valid; and signs are increasing that there is a schism in America’s ruling elite…
US Flags Still Burnt in Iran
04.11.2013 | 00:00 | Nikolai BOBKIN
Made in Poland, or the Desecrators of Memory
04.11.2013 | 00:00 | Nikolai MALISHEVSKI
In late October the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) handed down a decision on the «Katyn case» in favor of Russia; its final ruling on the complaint of the Poles’ relatives was that Russia did not violate the European Convention on Human Rights in the Katyn case. On the eve of the ECHR decision, which makes it impossible to further politicize the topic of Katyn, a scandal broke out surrounding the erecting of a «sculpture» in Gdansk of a soldier in a helmet with a star on it raping a pregnant woman with the barrel of a gun in her mouth…
Georgia after the Presidential Elections
03.11.2013 | 00:00 | Guram SHARIA
…As a result of Georgia’s presidential elections, the country’s power structure, which is almost entirely dominated by pro-Western parties, has become firmly established. Although approximately half of the country’s population is disappointed with the Georgian government’s pro-Western orientation, this «Eurasian segment» of the electorate, as it is sometimes called, still does not have its own influential representatives in parliament. The prospect of improving Russian-Georgian relations remains questionable…
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