Puppet MastersS


Arrow Up

Syria, Tunisia restore diplomatic ties after decade with appointment of new ambassador in Damascus


Fox News
Wed, 12 Apr 2023 08:23 UTC
Syrian embassy
© File/APSyrian Embassy in Tunisia
Syria will reopen its embassy in Tunisia after the North African country announced the appointment of a new ambassador to Damascus, Syrian state media reported Wednesday.

Tunisia has become the latest Arab state to reestablish diplomatic ties with Syria, after cutting off relations a decade ago.

The move by Tunisian President Kais Saied to appoint a new ambassador was immediately approved and reciprocated by the Syrian government, a joint statement from the two countries' foreign ministries read, according to Syrian state news agency SANA.

The announcement is the latest step in a regional trend of rapprochement with the war-torn country, which has picked up pace since the deadly Feb. 6 earthquake in Syria and Turkey and the Chinese-brokered reestablishment of ties between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Comment: Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia is holding talks with Syria with great progress:
Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad has completed a breakthrough visit to Saudi Arabia, the first such trip since Riyadh cut diplomatic relations with Damascus in 2012. In a joint press statement issued after the visit Saudi Arabia endorsed Syrian unity and integrity, condemned terrorism, and backed a political solution to the 12-year war.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud had invited his Syrian colleague to Jeddah to discuss "efforts to find a political solution to the Syrian crisis that preserves Syria's unity, security, stability, Arab identity, and territorial integrity while also serving the interests of its brotherly people," according to the statement cited by the state news agencies of both countries.

Prince Faisal and Dr. Mekdad agreed on the need to address humanitarian issues and allow aid "to reach all areas of Syria," establish conditions for the return of refugees and displaced people, and "stabilize the situation in the entire Syrian territories."

The two sides also committed to enhancing security and "combating terrorism in all its forms," and agreed on the need to "support the institutions of the Syrian state to extend its control over its territories to end the presence of armed militias and external interference in the Syrian internal affairs."

Parts of northern Syria are currently under control of Turkish-backed militants, while the area northeast of the Euphrates River is held by US-backed Kurdish militias. Several hundred US troops are also in the country in violation of international law, controlling most of the Syrian oil wells.

The two foreign ministers also discussed steps needed to reach "a comprehensive political settlement of the Syrian crisis," so the country could return to the "Arab fold," their joint statement said.

Damascus and Riyadh have begun the procedures needed to resume air travel and consular services between the two countries, while Syria thanked Saudi Arabia for the humanitarian aid provided after the catastrophic earthquakes in February. Much of the aid to Syria has been impeded by the US-imposed 'Caesar' sanctions against Damascus.

Saudi Arabia cut diplomatic ties with Syria in February 2012, joining the US in backing the militants that sought to overthrow President Bashar Assad. With the backing of Russia and Iran, the government in Damascus eventually prevailed over the collection of rebel militias that included terrorists affiliated with Al-Qaeda and Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS).

Rumors that Riyadh was preparing to reverse course began to circulate last month, shortly after China mediated an agreement between Saudi Arabia and Iran to normalize relations. Since then, the kingdom has also launched peace talks to end the eight-year conflict in Yemen.


Read More...
Shamrock

On Joe Biden's woke conquest of Ireland

Brendan O'Neill
spiked
Thu, 13 Apr 2023 18:01 UTC
joe biden Taoiseach Leo Varadkar ireland
© REUTERS/Clodagh KilcoyneFILE PHOTO: US President Joe Biden meets with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar at Farmleigh House, in Dublin.
The president is using his Irish identity to bully Brexit Britain.

Power often wears the mask of weakness in the 21st century. Think of those strapping, angry 'transwomen' who cry victimhood even as they harass real women. Or privileged students in the luxury surrounds of Oxford or Yale heaping pressure on hapless administrators to decolonise the curriculum so that they might be spared the pain of reading Shakespeare, Chaucer and other long-dead white men. Or Hillary Clinton depicting herself as a victim of sexism even as she wielded her extraordinary power to brand half her compatriots as deplorables. Julie Burchill calls them 'cry-bullies' - a 'hideous hybrid of victim and victor, weeper and walloper'.

Now there's President Biden, the most powerful cry-bully in the world. He's taken the grievance machine global. He speaks of his historic pain even as he impresses his imperial power across the Earth. Witness his visit to Ireland. He's hyping up his status as a descendent of the poor Irish who fled Famine-era Ireland on coffin ships (the 'cry' bit) in order that he might add some identitarian weight to his bossing around of Britain and Ireland in the here and now (the 'bully' bit). He poses as a victim of imperialism - his ancestors fled the auld country 'because of what the Brits had been doing', he once said - even as he engages in imperialism. Behold the weaponisaton of 'Oirishness', the deployment of that self-pitying identity to the cause of fortifying American power in the world.
Read More...
Star of David

UN papers: Israel has weaponised food to force Palestinians to abandon Right to Return, other rights


Middle East Monitor
Fri, 14 Apr 2023 17:38 UTC
gaza soup line children israel weaponize food
© Ali Jadallah/Anadolu AgencyChildren wait for taking the soup distributed for people in need by a charity in Gaza on March 24, 2023
The UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food has published two papers in which it is said that food has been weaponised by Israel in order to force Palestinians to abandon their legitimate rights. The papers were prepared by the Arab Group for the Protection of Nature (APN) and detail the nature, degree and impact of Israeli violence on Jordanian and Palestinian food systems.

In the paper on the situation, as it affects the Palestinians, the various tactics adopted by the Israeli occupation to use food as a weapon are described. The intention is to make the Palestinians dependent on Israel for food as well as force them to give up their rights. These tactics include "systematically uprooting trees, preventing Palestinians from accessing their lands, and then illegally confiscating fallow lands, in addition to routinely poisoning Palestinian water and soil."

Comment: What will it take to rein in the rabid dog, as Israel likes to portray itself. BDS is effective. Why would Israel put so much work into attacking the movement?







Read More...
Display

The WEF wants to monitor your brainwaves to "raise productivity" and to "fight crime"


Vigilant Citizen
Wed, 15 Feb 2023 00:00 UTC
the battle for your brain
I do not understand why this presentation at the 2023 Davos Meeting did not receive widespread media coverage. The technology it promotes has the potential to reduce humans to literal mental slaves - and I'm 0% exaggerating here.

Using "wearable technology", the WEF would like to see employers and governments monitor brainwave activity to "raise productivity" and to "fight crime". And there's already talk of using brain implants that could further decode "complex thoughts".

The examples shown during that presentation are nothing less than chilling and, the fact that the WEF says that this is something we "need to embrace as a society" is nothing less than insane.

Read More...
Bullseye

Hungary's PM calls US main adversary, leaked CIA documents claim

Phil McCausland
NBC News
Wed, 12 Apr 2023 19:20 UTC
VOrban
© Denes Erdos/APFILE PHOTO: Hungarian PM Viktor Orban. Hungary, a U.S. ally, is a member of NATO and the European Union, but Viktor Orbán has strengthened ties with Russia and China.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán called the U.S. a main adversary of his right-wing political party during a meeting with associates, a move that could lead to more friction between Washington and Budapest, according to a CIA assessment in a U.S. document that was among those recently leaked and posted online.

Orbán allegedly made the comment during a Feb. 22 "political strategy session," the leaked document said, citing the U.S. Embassy in Budapest. The CIA said the inclusion of the U.S. in Orbán's "list of top three adversaries constitutes an escalation of the level of anti-American rhetoric in his discourse," according to the document.
Read More...
Pirates

Fears of banking collapse prompts Bank of England to update deposit insurance scheme

Miles Brignall
The Guardian
Thu, 13 Apr 2023 15:59 UTC
northern rock
© Alessia Pierdomenico/ReutersUp until the 2007 collapse of Northern Rock, the financial services compensation scheme only promised to repay 80% of the first £35,000 held in a failed bank or building society.
When Andrew Bailey revealed in a speech that the Bank of England was working on updating Britain's deposit insurance guarantee scheme, which gives government protection on savings up to £85,000 in the event of a bank run, it was with one eye on the recent shocks, and the other on events from 15 years ago.

Northern Rock, Bradford & Bingley, and Icesave may sound like names from another era, but the memory of what happened in 2007 and 2008 still reverberates around the Bank's Threadneedle Street offices to this day.

The recent collapse of Credit Suisse and Silicon Valley Bank has brought back some very unhappy memories - situations that central bankers do not wish to find themselves in again.

Comment: The 2008 crash had another impact on citizens: life expectancy for the country's poorest began to fall a few years afterwards, and that began to accelerate with the lockdowns and experimental injection roll out.

Read More...
Biohazard

Best of the Web: China urges US to clarify military-biological activities following Russian Parliamentary report exposing plans for 'universal genetically-altered bioweapon'


Press TV
Thu, 13 Apr 2023 07:14 UTC
wang wenbin
FILE PHOTO: Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin. In a statement, the group accused the country of human rights abuses and affirmed its support for Taiwan.
China has called on the United States to fulfill its international obligations and offer clarifications on its military-biological activities at home and abroad, amid reports about Washington's military biological program in Ukraine.

A spokesman for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Wang Wenbing, said on Wednesday that Washington has so far failed to provide a convincing explanation for its military-biological activities, and has obstructed multilateral negotiations to establish a verification mechanism for the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC).

"We once again urge the US to earnestly live up to its international obligations, make comprehensive clarification and receive verification on its military-biological activities both within and outside the country," Wang said.

Comment: See also: And check out SOTT radio's:

Read More...
Vader

Best of the Web: The latest bizarre chapter of "War on Drugs": US Special Forces train drug cartel enforcers linked to rape, torture and decapitation of victims

Zach El Parece
Covert Action Magazine
Thu, 13 Apr 2023 19:44 UTC
US special forces mexico drug cartel
© Business InsiderU.S. Special Forces in Mexico.
Cártel Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG) has become one of the most feared paramilitaries in Mexico over the last decade. Images of the group have become the standard depiction of the Mexican cartel writ large. Their propaganda videos often feature groups of masked men bristling with enough small arms to make them formidable against even conventional armies.

In an interview aired on Mexico's Telemundo network in May 2019, a former CJNG soldier described his experience at a training camp and claimed that the cartel employed U.S. special operations forces (SOF) to train their recruits. According to the former sicario assassin: there were Marines, there were Navy from the United States, there were Delta Force, there was everything there."
Read More...
Bad Guys

CIA director concedes US power is waning


RT
Thu, 13 Apr 2023 20:57 UTC
William Burns
© Getty Images / Kevin DietschCentral Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director William Burns
The dominant global role of the US can no longer be guaranteed as the country is witnessing a time of change "that comes along a couple of times a century," CIA Director Bill Burns has claimed.

Speaking at the Baker Institute earlier this week, Burns said that although Washington "still has a better hand to play than any of our rivals," it is "no longer the only big kid on the geopolitical block and our position at the head of the table isn't guaranteed."

The CIA chief pointed to growing ties between China and Russia, which he argued will present a "formidable challenge" for his agency for years to come. According to Burns, Beijing is "not content to only have a seat at the table; it wants to run the table," while Russia is seeking to "upend the table altogether."

Burns, who served as the US ambassador to Moscow under George W. Bush, condemned Russia's military operation in Ukraine, calling it an act of "brutish aggression."

He claimed the CIA has provided "good intelligence" that has "helped the Ukrainians defend themselves" and cemented "a strong coalition in support of Ukraine."

Burns added that Kiev's long-anticipated spring offensive would feature "strong material and intelligence support from the US and our allies."

The spy chief claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin is "not serious about negotiations" on a peaceful resolution to the conflict, and suggested that only Ukrainian progress on the battlefield was "likely to shape prospects for diplomacy."
Read More...
Handcuffs

Trump's arrest exposes America's Soros-style (in)justice system

Tony Cox
RT
Wed, 12 Apr 2023 13:03 UTC
Trump et all
© Ed Jones/AFPFormer US President Donald Trump makes his way inside the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse in New York on April 4, 2023.
Manhattan's district attorney has focused his prosecutorial energies on Bad Orange Man and victims instead of criminals...

Alvin Bragg, the New York City district attorney who made a name for himself by arresting Donald Trump, waxed triumphantly about his effort to take down the former president. You see, the Manhattan prosecutor said, no one is above the law in the "business capital of the world."

Bragg told reporters last week, following Trump's arraignment on 34 criminal charge:
"We today uphold our solemn responsibility to ensure that everyone stands equal before the law. No amount of money and no amount of power changes that enduring American principle."
So as Bragg tells it, the patriotic decision to prosecute Trump was all about equal justice under the law. Never mind that Bragg campaigned for office by pledging to prosecute the locally hated ex-president in a county where Joe Biden won 86.8% of votes in the 2020 presidential election. And never mind that Bragg's 2021 campaign for the Manhattan DA job was bankrolled largely by billionaire activist George Soros, the biggest donor to Democratic Party candidates and causes.

That's right, Bragg says his case is legally and ethically righteous. However, a closer look at the indictment reveals that the charges he filed are so legally dubious that only a Manhattan jury of Trump haters might buy his story. He's prosecuting Trump for allegedly falsifying business records six years ago, and he's bypassing the two-year statute of limitations on such misdemeanors by elevating the charges to felonies. To make that possible under New York's criminal code, he's claiming the offenses were committed to cover up violations of election laws when Trump was running for president in 2016.
Read More...