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South Korea signs free-trade agreement with Britain in preparation for Brexit


The Korea Herald
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 17:34 UTC
South Korean Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee
© AFP
South Korean Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee
South Korea signed a free trade agreement (FTA) with Britain on Thursday, a step to help maintain the continuity of their trade and economic ties even after London's departure from the European Union (EU).

There have been concerns that South Korean exporters may no longer enjoy the benefits under the existing South Korea-EU FTA when Britain leaves the world's single largest economic bloc without agreeing on post-Brexit conditions.

In London, South Korean Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee and her British counterpart Elizabeth Truss vowed to maintain mutual benefits under the Seoul-Brussels FTA that took effect in July 2011.

"South Korea will make thorough preparations and take actions to help local companies maintain their trade and investment free from the uncertainties, including Brexit," Yoo said.

Seoul plans to finalize the remaining procedures, including winning the parliament's ratification, before the end of October when Britain is scheduled to depart from the world's single largest economic bloc.

The two countries also agreed to revise the FTA within two years to update terms of the deal, according to the ministry.

Comment: See also:

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USA

Great Firewall of Westernia: YouTube (Google) follows Twitter and Facebook with mass censorship of Chinese accounts criticizing HK protests

Helen Buyniski
RT
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 17:28 UTC
hong kong protesters american flag
© Reuters / Kim Kyung-Hoon
YouTube has disabled 210 channels for posting content related to the Hong Kong protests "in a coordinated manner," following in the footsteps of Facebook and Twitter in restricting its arbitrary censorship to pro-China accounts.


Comment: It's not that they're 'pro-China' necessarily; it's that they're reporting objectively on the manipulated situation in Hong Kong. The Empire won't allow it; there must be violent revolution in China.


"Channels in this network behaved in a coordinated manner while uploading videos related to the ongoing protests in Hong Kong," Google threat analyst Shane Huntley claimed in a blog post on Thursday, adding that the Google team's "discovery" was "consistent with recent observations and actions related to China announced by Facebook and Twitter."

Translation? The channels were "sowing political discord" on behalf of the Chinese government, and had to be stopped. How did Google know it was the Chinese nefariously attempting to poison the minds against the protesters? The "use of VPNs" and "other methods of disguise" - widespread in the era of mass surveillance - was all the proof required to wipe the channels out of existence.

Twitter got the anti-China censorship ball rolling earlier this week, in perhaps the first-ever social media preemptive strike "proactively" deplatforming hundreds of thousands of accounts for the capital crime of "sowing discord." Their crimes included "undermining the legitimacy and political positions of the protest movement on the ground." One could argue that the protests themselves are a form of political discord, but resistance is futile when charged with such an inchoate offense.

None of the social media platforms have ever defined what exactly constitutes "attempting to sow discord," though a common thread running through the mass deplatformings of the past year suggests it involves posting in support of a government the US doesn't like - whether Russia, Iran, Venezuela, or China.

Comment: Throughout the internet era, petabytes have been written about China's evil firewall of censorship.

Who's totalitarian now?

See also:

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MIB

Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne: "National Security State was weaponized"

Ian Schwartz
RealClearPolitics
Thu, 22 Aug 2019 16:27 UTC
Patrick Byrne/Maria Butina
© Overstock.com/Justice Integrity Project
Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne • Maria Butina
Comey involved in conspiracy

Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne talks to CNN's Chris Cuomo about being approached by the FBI to have contact with Russian national Maria Butina and the involvement of higher-ups in the bureau. Byrne predicted more whistleblowers will come forward and that then-FBI Director James Comey knew what was happening.

Byrne continually referred to those involved with the conspiracy as "X, Y, and Z." Byrne revealed that Mr. Z is former FBI Director James Comey in his interview with Cuomo.

Comment: A more complete clip of Byrne's CNN interview was posted on Twitter:


And the second part of the CNN interview:


If even part of Byrne's story is true, it seems Butina fell into the lap of those looking to control the outcome of the 2016 election. Another piece to be manipulated, just as Carter Page and George Papadopoulos were targeted. Patrick Byrne, as a libertarian, puts his money where his mouth is:

Overstock CEO holds 3 months of food, $10 million in gold for employees in preparation for the next collapse

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Bullseye

DPRK Foreign Minister: Pompeo is the "diehard toxin" of US diplomacy


KCNA Watch
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 17:22 UTC
NK FM Ri Yong-ho
© TIME
North Korea Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho, UN General Assembly
Foreign Minister of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea Ri Yong Ho made public the following statement Friday:

U.S. State Secretary Pompeo, when interviewed by a U.S. newspaper Wednesday, said if north Korea does not set out to denuclearize itself, the U.S. will maintain the strongest sanctions in history to make it confirm that the denuclearization is the right way.

Just as a saying goes "A crow never becomes whiter for often washing", he is the diehard toxin of the U.S. diplomacy.

On April 24 he cited what he called a "lane change" in an interview with the U.S. media only to be snubbed.

Nothing decent can be expected from Pompeo, a man subject to strong censure from many countries for adopting the most wicked methods of the Central Intelligence Agency as diplomatic means in every part of the world. But what arouses concerns is a string of senseless remarks made by the man heading the U.S. negotiation team at a time when the DPRK-U.S. dialogue is high on the agenda.

There is a proverb saying "Sow the wind and reap the whirlwind". Now that he made rhetoric about the DPRK without elementary obligation as a human being, losing his face as the diplomatic boss of a country, I can not but respond to it in kind.

Comment: North Koreans come up with the best insults. It's doubtful anyone will be able to top John "Defective Human Product" Bolton anytime soon, for instance.

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Star of David

Report: Israel preparing to join Saudis in attacking Houthis in Yemen - because Iran


PressTV
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 17:16 UTC
Israeli Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter
© AFP
An Israeli Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter takes part in a military exercise at the Hatzerim base in the Negev desert on June 27, 2019.
The Israeli military is planning to attack Yemen's Houthi Ansarullah movement, a new report says, a move that is claimed to be part of the Tel Aviv regime's attempts to ensure the group never comes in contact with Iran.

The Kuwaiti newspaper al-Jaridah said Thursday that Israel was gearing up to pound targets of the Ansarullah and Lebanon's Hezbollah resistance movement in Yemen, near the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb separating the Red Sea from the Gulf of Aden.

The report claimed that the Israeli spy agency Mossad as well as the regime's Military Intelligence were specifically looking for alleged attempts to deliver weapons from Iran.

It further claimed that some of the Houthis' drones and missiles had been transferred to Iraq instead in an alleged attempt to mislead the Israeli military, which is said to be behind a series of bombings that have targeted Iraqi popular mobilization forces, Hashd al-Sha'abi, over the past weeks.

According to al-Jarida and some Iraqi experts, the attacks on the group's ammunition depots across Iraq have been carried out by Israel.

Comment: Indeed. How DID they do it?!

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Flashlight

Foot in mouth? VIDEO shows Boris 'gaffe' was really part of Macron joke


RT
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 16:55 UTC
bojo footstool
© Christophe Petit Tesson/Pool via REUTERS
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson invoked the wrath of the Twitterati after appearing to disrespect France's Emmanuel Macron. However, video of the key moment shows that people jumped to the wrong conclusion.

The MSM denunciations of Johnson's apparent bad behavior came thick and fast as the well-timed snap was strewn across social media Thursday.

A picture may be worth a thousand words (or retweets perhaps) but in this instance the critical context was missing, as video of the alleged 'gaffe' shows.

Indeed, one political correspondent even suggested that Boris' apparent boorishness was actually in response to a joke the French leader had made.
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War Whore

This is What Gloating Looks Like... NY Times Distorts War-Torn Syria

Finian Cunningham
RT
Thu, 22 Aug 2019 16:48 UTC
syria destruction
© AFP / Delil SOULEIMAN
A supposed survey of war-torn Syria by America's so-called "newspaper of record" was not merely shoddy journalism; it was a cynical attempt to rewrite the history of the eight-year war.

The meandering report of more than 2,700 words was headlined: "What 'Victory' Looks Like: A Journey Through Shattered Syria." It would have been more accurate to have used the title, "What Gloating Looks Like."

Even the sly way the word 'victory' is put in quotation marks indicates, from the outset, the insidious purpose of the article. To pour scorn on how Syria and its people have in actual fact defeated a foreign-sponsored criminal war for regime change. The regime-change plot goes back to at least 2005 as this old CNN interview clumsily admits.

With mawkish words, the New York Times reporters effect to lament the rubble and grief among the Syrian population. But all the while, the implication conveyed is that President Bashar Assad "presided over the destruction."
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Yoda

Putin orders 'exhaustive' response to US missile test, says Washington worked to breach INF


RT
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 16:42 UTC
missile
© Global Look Press/U.S. Navy
The Russian Armed Forces will scrutinize a recent cruise missile test, conducted by the US after ditching the landmark INF Treaty, and examine reciprocal measures. However, Moscow says it is not aiming for an arms race.

President Vladimir Putin has ordered the Defense Ministry and other bodies to "study the level of threat posed by these US actions and take exhaustive measures to prepare a symmetrical response."

Putin was speaking just days after the US military test-fired a ground version of Tomahawk cruise missile that travelled about 500km (310 miles) before hitting a mock target.

The type of weapon, fired from a universal Mk-41 launch system in California, was banned under the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty which the US formally withdrew from on August 2.
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Chess

Empire first! Trump backs off plan to slash foreign 'aid' (bribe money) as Swamp dwellers dig in heels


RFE/RL
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 16:35 UTC
trump
Facing criticism from Republicans and Democrats, U.S. President Donald Trump has backed off a plan to slash some $4 billion in foreign aid already approved by lawmakers.

U.S. news agencies on August 22 quoted unnamed senior administration officials and a Democratic congressional aide as confirming the White House had decided not to go forward with the planned cuts.

U.S. officials on August 7 said Trump had frozen foreign-aid funding until the White House Office of Management and Budget could review any money that hadn't been spent for the fiscal year ending September 30.

The freeze would have impacted 10 bank accounts overseen by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the State Department, a senior administration official told RFE/RL.

Comment: Yes it would be harmful to their 'national security', but what they mean by 'national security' is maintaining global empire.

A Pakistani space initiative? LOL! That money goes towards keeping Pakistan 'on-side' and a festering sore in south Asia... in the form of bribes to local politicians and warlords.

See also: State Department cuts Pakistan's handouts by $440 million, but Islamic state still receives billion$ from US taxpayers

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Handcuffs

Modi declares 'New India' tightening noose on corruption, former FM arrested for money laundering


RT
Fri, 23 Aug 2019 11:59 UTC
india FM
© AFP / PAL PILLAI
FILE PHOTO: Palaniappan Chidambaram
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday asserted that the resounding mandate of 2019 Lok Sabha polls was not just for a government, but for building a 'New India' that focuses on ease of doing business while ensuring ease of living.

Addressing Indian community at the UNESCO headquarters here after inaugurating a memorial in honour of the victims of two Air India crashes in France in the 1950s and 1960s, Prime Minister Modi said in 'new India' action is being taken against corruption, nepotism, loot of people's money, terrorism.

"In 'New India', the way in which action is being taken against corruption, nepotism, loot of people's money, terrorism, this has never happened before. Within 75 days of the new government coming to power, we took many strong decisions," PM Modi said.

Comment: RT reports:
Indian special forces have raided the house of former finance minister Palaniappan Chidambaram to arrest him on charges of corruption and money laundering.

Shortly after Chidambaram returned home from a press conference at Congress Party headquarters, a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) team scaled the wall of his Jor Bagh residence in New Delhi to detain the 73-year-old politician.

The dramatic scenes televised across Indian media showed CBI officers jumping over the locked gate to let the main force inside, while another team entered the house from the back door. The senior Congress leader, accused of clearing foreign investments in exchange for bribes when he was finance minister, was then driven away in a CBI vehicle amid spirited protests outside his house.

CBI and Enforcement Directorate (which investigates financial crimes) officers have been scouting Chidambaram's house since Tuesday, the day the politician went missing after the High Court rejected his plea seeking protection from arrest. Earlier, the Enforcement Directorate issued a lookout notice against him seeking his detention and effectively preventing the politician from fleeing abroad.

At the press conference, the former finance minister denied any wrongdoing and claimed that he was "not hiding from the law" but rather "seeking protection of the law."

Chidambaram is accused of facilitating Foreign Investment Promotion Board clearance to the INX Media company in 2007 when he was the Finance Minister for Manmohan Singh's government. Investigators allege that his son Karti received kickbacks after INX Media secured funds equivalent to roughly $41 million.



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