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Philippines' President Marcos open to buying Russian fuel, proposes new Myanmar approach

Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos
© REUTERS/Leah MillisPhilippines President Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos, Jr takes part in a bilateral meeting with US President Joe Biden in New York, New York, on Sep 22, 2022.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr on Wednesday said his nation may need to turn to Russia to fulfil its fuel needs amid rising global energy prices, bucking pressure from Western allies for countries to shun Moscow.

Speaking to the Manila Overseas Press Club, Marcos, who is also agriculture minister, said the Philippines may also deal with Russia for supply of fertiliser.

"We take we take a very balanced view because the truth of the matter is, we may have to deal with Russia for fuel, for fertilizer," said Marcos.

The Philippines like many countries is grappling with soaring inflation, due to supply woes fanned by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The Philippines, a US defence ally, has not imposed any sanctions on Russia.

Arrow Down

Berlin denounces Washington's 'astronomical' profiteering

Habeck
© Getty Images/picture alliance/ContributorGerman Economy Minister Robert Habeck
The US and other "friendly" gas-supplier states have been profiting from the worsening energy crisis in the EU, Germany's Economy Minister Robert Habeck said on Wednesday in an interview with the regional paper NOZ translated by NBC News.

When it comes to assisting its energy-pressed allies in Europe, Halback called for more solidarity from Washington:
"Some countries, including friendly ones, sometimes achieve astronomical prices [for their gas]. Of course, that brings with it problems that we have to talk about. The United States contacted us when oil prices shot up, and the national oil reserves in Europe were tapped as a result. I think such solidarity would also be good for curbing gas prices.

"The EU should pool its market power and orchestrate smart and synchronized purchasing behavior ... so that individual EU countries do not outbid each other and drive up world market prices."

Comment: How tight is the noose around Europe's neck? Not tight enough says Washington.


No Entry

Kiev wants to make new Russian city 'unlivable' - top official

Energodar
© Stringer/Anadolu/Getty ImagesCity of Energodar
Ukrainian troops are carrying out artillery strikes on Energodar in Zaporozhye Region, one of the four provinces newly incorporated into Russia, acting Governor Yevgeny Balitsky said on Wednesday, accusing Kiev of trying make to life unbearable for residents. He told Russian television on Wednesday:
"The enemy has focused the shelling on our [gas-fired] power plant to derail our preparations for the winter season, and to demonstrate that the authorities are not capable of heating the city. Kiev intends to destroy the infrastructure and make [Energodar] unlivable. The Ukrainian government wants to regain control over the region, but does not want the people living in it to remain."
In the past 24 hours there have been over 40 artillery strikes on and around the city, with some of the shelling conducted in a chaotic manner, Balitsky said.

Comment: Revenge has its price for which Biden is eager to pay.


Oil Well

"OPEC's action is testimony to a staggering US geopolitical and geoeconomic error"

OPEC
© Anadolu Agency
Yesterday was all about oil, geopolitics, and geostrategic errors; and, in the background, domestic politics, accepting past errors, and trying to make amends for them. Ironically, it all happened on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, which back in 1973 jump-started a Middle East war, and then the energy crisis that led to the collapse of the post-WW2 Western political-economy model, and ushered in global neoliberalism.

OPEC+ lined up with Russia to slash output by 2m barrels a day from November and through 2023, pushing energy prices up, and seeing a slew of calls for oil to again top $100 in the near future. That was as US gasoline inventory data dropped 4.7m barrels to the lowest level since November 2014 despite apparent demand destruction.

The White House response was furious. The official statement said President Biden was "disappointed by the short-sighted decision" to cut production. The White House Press Secretary accused OPEC+ of "aligning with Russia". Off the record the response was probably blunter given such a cut had been flagged as a "hostile act". Yet Saudi Arabia's message to the White House also couldn't have been blunter.

Bullseye

German police call Nord Stream blasts 'targeted sabotage' - Spiegel

LNG term.
© David Hecker/Getty ImagesLNG terminal under construction in Wilhelmshaven, Germany
German police believe that state actors were likely behind the recent explosions on the Russian Nord Stream natural gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea, and are warning that more attacks on energy infrastructure might follow, Der Spiegel reported on Wednesday.

The German magazine cited a letter it obtained, sent by the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) to industry representatives. The document described the breaches in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines as "targeted sabotage" and suggested that the perpetrators were likely agents of an unidentified country. The agency cited the "high complexity" of the operation's preparation and execution.

Three of the four strings of the Nord Stream pipelines were ruptured last week, with deliberate sabotage widely accepted as the most likely scenario.

The BKA also believes further action, "in a quantitatively and, potentially, qualitatively increased form," may be in the making, Spiegel reported. The law enforcement agency named crucial energy infrastructure such as offshore terminals for liquefied natural gas (LNG), wind turbines, power lines and undersea internet cables as possible targets.

Comment: What is Germany's next move? Call out the perpetrators or obedience to the masters? For Biden, Germany is a pawn - a calculated means to an end.


Attention

The coming energy lockdowns: Lights out on Western prosperity?

Ursula von der Leyen
European Union Intends To ‘Flatten The Curve’ For Electricity Use
The winds of autumnal change carry an ominous pre-winter chill for Europeans: General Winter is amassing to march his icy-troops into every household...

The current "energy crisis" facing the European Member States is the idiotic consequence of a pulpy nose in the hand severed from the face. Guided and cajoled by an American hand gripping the wrist, the European Union (and others) have finally brought the knife to their own faces. Britain and the United Kingdom have proven equally self-spiteful, and have similarly hacked at their own noses to express their Russian-focused spite; and other 'a-world-away' Anglophonic Western nations (Australia, New Zealand, Canada), have also taken up such a knife with a similar lock-step intent to slash and bleed their peoples: a hindsight mirror will someday reveal the magnitude of the West's self-mutilation.

Basically, the Western World, especially the Five Eye Nations, are deliberately being collapsed into energy poverty, and the vast societal and financial destruction that such a reality portends.

Life ends without energy; pertinently, current lifestyles, endeavours and lives can be beggared and controlled by a manufactured energy scarcity. Indeed, to "reset," any human industrial and commercial nexus-system (the current state of modern industrialised human life), the power needs to be turned off.

Once the darkness ends, and the electricity-circuits are eventually "reset," the one with the hand on the switch commanding, "Let there be light," will be the sole technocratic god: ironically, the very Dark Ones behind the coming rolling power outages. And with a flick of a switch, that god will demand subservience, submission and sacrifice — lest the golden switch be flicked off again, and again, and again...

Global energy lockdowns are coming — that is the plan. The excuse for 'rolling blackouts' will be the illusion of "energy scarcity."

Attention

Europe faces deindustrialization and social unrest - Belgian PM

De Croo
© Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto/Getty ImagesBelgium PM Alexander De Croo
Europe could soon face a significant reduction in industrial activity and social unrest unless something is done to lower energy prices before winter sets in, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo has warned.

In an interview with the Financial Times published on Thursday, he said that unless there was an intervention in the gas markets, "we are risking massive deindustrialization of the European continent and the long-term consequences that might actually be very deep."

De Croo insisted on a multi-layered approach to the gas crisis, which he says should include a hard price cap on Russian natural gas, negotiations with suppliers such as Norway and Algeria, and a "dynamic" limit on the price of liquefied natural gas (LNG), which he suggests could be set slightly above prices in the US or Asia to ensure continued flows to Europe.

The Belgian leader also warned that governments must be "prudent" not only to counter soaring inflation, which stems from high energy prices, but also tackle the risk of social unrest that comes with it. De Croo told the FT:
"Our populations are getting invoices which are completely insane. At some point, it will snap. I understand that people are angry . . . people don't have the means to pay it."

Comment: What has not been acknowledged? Europe did this to itself.


Control Panel

Russia ready to send gas to EU via Nord Stream 2 — Moscow

Nord Stream, pipeline
© Getty Images / picture alliance / Contributor
Russia is able to supply gas to Europe through a string of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that that was not damaged by the recent explosions, according to Deputy Prime Minister Aleksander Novak.

The energy official described the blasts on the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines as deliberate.

"Unfortunately, due to sabotage, one string [of Nord Stream 2] was damaged, and an examination is required to make further decisions on the fate of the string," Novak was quoted as saying by RIA Novosti news agency.

"As for the second string, it is ready, fully built, and if the necessary legal decisions are made by our European colleagues regarding the certification and removal of restrictions, I think Russia could provide appropriate supplies through this string of the gas pipeline in a short time," he said.

The Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines abruptly lost pressure on September 26, following a series of powerful underwater explosions off the Danish island of Bornholm. The incident caused massive gas leaks, with large volumes entering the sea. The ruptures are widely considered to be the result of sabotage, carried out by an unknown party.

Comment: Looks like gas is back on tap!


Laptop

Be careful what you post: How Facebook and the US government have united against Americans with the 'wrong' views

Facebook, spying, social media surveillance
© Omar Marques / SOPA Images / LightRocket via Getty ImagesFILE PHOTO.
It's been revealed by sources within the US Department of Justice that direct messages sent through Facebook by American users, along with public postings, have been rigorously monitored, and reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) if they express anti-government, anti-authority views, or if they question the legitimacy of the November 2020 presidential election's outcome.

Witch hunt on the web

Under the terms of a secret collaboration agreement with the FBI, a Facebook staffer has, over the past 19 months, been red-flagging content they consider to be "subversive" and immediately transmitting it to the Bureau's domestic terrorism operational unit, without the FBI having filed a single subpoena - outside the established US legal process, without probable cause, and in breach of the First Amendment, in other words.

Just as shockingly, these intercepted communications were then provided as leads and tips to FBI field offices across the US, which in turn secured subpoenas in order to officially obtain the private conversations that they already possessed, and thus cover up the fact the material had been obtained extra-legally. Facebook invariably complied with these subpoenas, and would send back "gigabytes of data and photos" within an hour, suggesting the content sought was already packaged and awaiting legal confirmation before distribution.

It is uncertain quite how many users were flagged, but it's abundantly clear a specific type of person was of interest to the FBI - "red-blooded" conservative right-wingers, many of whom supported the right to bear arms. No one connected to Antifa, BLM or any other left-wing group was ever informed on.

It seems not a single Facebook user snitched upon for daring to be possessed of troublesome political opinions was ever arrested, or prosecuted, for their wrongthink, even though some were reportedly subject to covert surveillance and other forms of intrusion and harassment. Their views were consistently found to not translate to criminality or violence - their words were simply brutal condemnations of Biden's election and presidency, and aggressive calls for protests.

Comment: This really should come as no surprise to anyone with two brain cells to rub together. However, the longer the process goes on the less Facebook, Zuckerberg, and US spook agencies can hide the truth everyone knows but is not allowed to acknowledge.


Light Saber

Serbia livid over latest anti-Russia sanctions

Aleksandar Vulin
© Global Look Press / MOD RussiaSerbian Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin
Brussels is only concerned with "revenge against free nations," Serbian Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin said

The Serbian government has slammed the latest package of EU sanctions targeting Russia's oil exports, describing it as the "first EU sanctions package" against Serbia.

Restrictions on the maritime transportation of Russian oil would make it too expensive for Serbia and severely hit the nation's economy, government officials said on Thursday. In a scathing statement, Serbian Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin called the EU "the place of our future humiliation and suffering."

Belgrade will now be "forced to buy more expensive Iraqi oil and thus lose hundreds of millions of euro," he argued, accusing neighboring Croatia, which is an EU member state, of lobbying for the new measures.

Comment: The pressure on Serbia is of longstanding, with the bribe of EU membership on the table, but Serbia still remembers the horror of NATO's 1999 bombing campaign. It will stiffen their spine even more to resist the Empire just as Russia is.