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Maduro claims advisor responsible for coup attempt in Venezuela is a CIA agent

Paul Antonopoulos
Fort Russ News
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 16:57 UTC
ivan Simonovis venezuela cia
© CNN Espanol
The ex-commissar of the Caracas Metropolitan Police, Ivan Simonovis met with Elliott Abrams June 27, 2019
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro described the former adviser Iván Simonovis as a murderer and was blamed for the violence that occurred during the 2002 coup against Hugo Chavez.

Maduro said the former adviser had always been an agent of the US Central Intelligence Agency.

"The assassin [Ivan] Simonovis was received as a hero in Washington, as a CIA agent who has been his whole life, he is a murderer, a criminal, a murderous murderer [...]," Maduro said.

Simonovis was under house arrest, from which he escaped on 16 May last. The former aide spoke about the escape plan to escape his home, where he served the prison sentence.
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Yoda

UN torture rapporteur talks to RT about op-ed on Assange rejected by MSM: 'Not high on news agenda'


RT
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 16:20 UTC
nils melzer chris hedges RT interview
© RT
The UN rapporteur on torture told RT about the fanciful excuses Western media used to avoid publishing his damning op-ed on the extreme pressure Julian Assange was exposed to - despite covering every wild allegation against him.

A host of reputed Western media outlets turned a deaf ear to Nils Melzer and his op-ed in which he said Julian Assange was exposed to enormous psychological trauma and isolation while in the Ecuadorian Embassy, and afterwards in the UK high-security prison.
Some of them said it wasn't high enough on their news agenda, some of them said it wasn't within their core area of interest.



Comment: So press freedom and the protection of journalists is not a "core interest" of these outlets? That pretty much tells one everything about the true nature of the Western media


Comment: Chris Hedges interviews Nils Melzer on June 9, 2019 just after his visit with Julian Assange in Belmarsh Prison:



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Chess

Iran says alternative sanctions-busting payment system with EU is operational


RT
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 16:28 UTC
iran mural
© AFP / Atta Kenare
A mural painting in Tehran
The European financial settlement mechanism (INSTEX), aimed at circumventing US sanctions against Iran, is working and transactions are already happening, according to Iran's JCPOA envoy.

The payments mechanism was established by the European Union to keep trading with Tehran despite US sanctions in order to keep the nuclear deal with Iran alive.

The US re-imposed sanctions against the Islamic Republic following Washington's withdrawal from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

The US has been mounting pressure on Iran and anyone breaking its sanctions against the country, threatening to punish any company that continues doing business with the Islamic Republic, including the purchasing of Iranian oil.
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Eye 1

Orwell's 1984 no longer reads like fiction. It's the reality of our times

Robert Bridge
RT
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 16:06 UTC
1984
© Getty Images / gremlin
70 years ago, the British writer George Orwell captured the essence of technology in its ability to shape our destinies in his seminal work, 1984. The tragedy of our times is that we have failed to heed his warning.

No matter how many times I read 1984, the feeling of total helplessness and despair that weaves itself throughout Orwell's masterpiece never fails to take me by surprise. Although usually referred to as a 'dystopian futuristic novel', it is actually a horror story on a scale far greater than anything that has emerged from the minds of prolific writers like Stephen King or Dean Koontz. The reason is simple. The nightmare world that the protagonist Winston Smith inhabits, a place called Oceania, is all too easily imaginable. Man, as opposed to some imaginary clown or demon, is the evil monster.

In the very first pages of the book, Orwell demonstrates an uncanny ability to foresee future trends in technology. Describing the protagonist Winston Smith's frugal London flat, he mentions an instrument called a 'telescreen', which sounds strikingly similar to the handheld 'smartphone' that is enthusiastically used by billions of people around the world today.
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Cult

#Resistance 101: Leaked internal document exposes Google encouraging employees to protest - provides the approved slogans


RT
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 14:51 UTC
protest against google
© Reuters / Jeenah Moon
An exhaustive "how-to" guide for Google employees who'd like to protest but don't know how has been leaked by Project Veritas, further destroying the company's claims it is apolitical after the leak of an incriminating video.

Titled "The Beginner's Guide to Protesting (#GooglersUnite)," the document instructs burgeoning activists in everything from protest chants to proper protesting attire. Its stated purpose is to "ensure that everyone feels comfortable and pumped about Resist@Google.com marches/protests" - suggesting that such activism was not only encouraged by Google but also backed by the company, using company resources.

While it's unclear how extensively the document was circulated inside Google, the use of company email to organize protests and the fact that ready-to-print protest signs were stored on company servers appear to directly contradict Google's protestations that the company is ideologically neutral. It clearly refers to multiple protests - employees are advised to "debrief afterwards with resist@google.com" to discuss what could be "improved for next time."

Comment: Love him or hate him James O'Keefe's Project Veritas is performing an important civic services in bringing to light the real views of various members of the elite to light, namely a deep, abiding contempt for the general public. That would be you. Some examples See the full Project Veritas Google expose at the bottom of this article, before it gets taken down again.

Why did YouTube competitor Vimeo also ban Project Veritas' Google expose?

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Attention

Memo to Trump: Trading out Bolton for Tulsi would be a smart move

Patrick J. Buchanan
buchanan.org
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 14:42 UTC
tulsi gabbard
"For too long our leaders have failed us, taking us into one regime change war after the next, leading us into a new Cold War and arms race, costing us trillions of our hard-earned tax payer dollars and countless lives. This insanity must end."

Donald Trump, circa 2016?

Nope. That denunciation of John Bolton interventionism came from Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii during Wednesday night's Democratic debate. At 38, she was the youngest candidate on stage.

Gabbard proceeded to rip both the "president and his chickenhawk cabinet (who) have led us to the brink of war with Iran."

In a fiery exchange, Congressman Tim Ryan of Ohio countered that America cannot disengage from Afghanistan: "When we weren't in there they started flying planes into our buildings."
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Yoda

Putin Interview with FT: 'Liberal Idea' Failed the West, Elites Forgot About People

Lionel Barber, Henry Foy and Alex Barker
Financial Times
Thu, 27 Jun 2019 19:41 UTC
putin
© Sputnik/Mikhail Klimentyev/Kremlin via REUTERS
Vladimir Putin has trumpeted the growth of national populist movements in Europe and America, crowing that liberalism is spent as an ideological force.

In an FT interview in the Kremlin on the eve of the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, the Russian president said "the liberal idea" had "outlived its purpose" as the public turned against immigration, open borders and multiculturalism. Mr Putin's evisceration of liberalism - the dominant western ideology since the end of the second world war in 1945 - chimes with anti-establishment leaders from US president Donald Trump to Hungary's Viktor Orban, Matteo Salvini in Italy, and the Brexit insurgency in the UK.

"[Liberals] cannot simply dictate anything to anyone just like they have been attempting to do over the recent decades," he said. Mr Putin branded Chancellor Angela Merkel's decision to admit more than 1m refugees to Germany, mainly from war-ravaged Syria, as a "cardinal mistake".

Comment: You can read the full transcript of the interview on the Kremlin's website.

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Arrow Up

Russia-India-China will be the big G20 hit

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 11:47 UTC
Putin Modi
© AFP / Grigory Sysoev / Sputnik
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (left) hug during their meeting before a session of the Heads of State Council of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.
It all started with the Vladimir Putin-Xi Jinping summit in Moscow on June 5. Far from a mere bilateral, this meeting upgraded the Eurasian integration process to another level. The Russian and Chinese presidents discussed everything from the progressive interconnection of the New Silk Roads with the Eurasia Economic Union, especially in and around Central Asia, to their concerted strategy for the Korean Peninsula.

A particular theme stood out: They discussed how the connecting role of Persia in the Ancient Silk Road is about to be replicated by Iran in the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). And that is non-negotiable. Especially after the Russia-China strategic partnership, less than a month before the Moscow summit, offered explicit support for Tehran signaling that regime change simply won't be accepted, diplomatic sources say.

Putin and Xi solidified the roadmap at the St Petersburg Economic Forum. And the Greater Eurasia interconnection continued to be woven immediately after at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Bishkek, with two essential interlocutors: India, a fellow BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and SCO member, and SCO observer Iran.

Comment: See also:

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Eye 1

Why Tulsi Gabbard was the only Democrat asked a negative question at the debate

Michael Tracey
The Federalist
Fri, 28 Jun 2019 10:16 UTC
tulsi gabbard democratic debate
Only one presidential candidate on the debate stage last night received an overtly negative question, and that was Tulsi Gabbard. Although she's already painstakingly addressed the anti-LGBT comments she made as a teenager, and explained how her accumulation of new life experiences caused her to shed views taught to her during childhood, Chuck Todd nevertheless saw fit to bring that up issue in front of a national audience being exposed to her for the first time.

The moderators didn't raise any other candidates' past "liabilities," although plenty of them have what one might consider "baggage," yet they chose to devise a specific question for Gabbard based on comments she made more than 15 years ago, well before she underwent the political and personal evolution that now forms the philosophical foundation for her campaign.

It's nothing new for NBC News, however, which on the day of her formal announcement speech in February published a pathetic hit piece claiming that Gabbard was supported by the nefarious Russian "botnet," using analysis derived from the discredited "cybersecurity firm" New Knowledge. The article was confabulated nonsense and said more about the editors and reporters who produced it than Gabbard, who obviously bears no responsibility for what unknown foreign trolls may do online.
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Snakes in Suits

Will Washington's elites give détente with Russia a chance when Trump meets Putin at G-20?

Stephen F. Cohen
The Nation
Wed, 26 Jun 2019 14:23 UTC
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin
© AP / Jorge Silva
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin talk at the APEC Summit in Danang, Vietnam, November 11, 2017.
The Trump-Putin meeting in Japan is crucial for both leaders-and for the world.

Despite determined attempts in Washington to sabotage such a "summit," as I reported previously, President Trump and Russian President Putin are still scheduled to meet at the G-20 gathering in Japan this week. Iran will be at the top of their agenda. The Trump administration seems determined to wage cold, possibly even hot, war against the Islamic Republic, while for Moscow, as emphasized by the Kremlin's national security adviser, Nikolai Patrushev, on June 25, "Iran has been and will be an ally and partner of ours."

Indeed, the importance of Iran (along with China) to Russia can hardly be overstated. Among other reasons, as the West's military alliance encroaches ever more along Russia's western borders, Iran is a large, vital non-NATO neighbor. Still more, Tehran has done nothing to incite Russia's own millions of Muslim citizens against Moscow. Well before Trump, powerful forces in Washington have long sought to project Iran as America's primary enemy in the Middle East, but for Moscow it is a necessary "ally and partner."

In normal political circumstances, Trump and Putin could probably diminish any potential US-Russian conflict over Iran-and the one still brewing in Syria as well. But both leaders come to the summit with related political problems at home. For Trump, they are the unproven but persistent allegations of "Russiagate." For Putin, they are economic.
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