Puppet MastersS

Airplane

What sanctions? France wants in on jetliner project with Russia and China


RT
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 15:01 UTC
Jetliner model
© Reuters/Wu Jin
French firms are planning to take part in a Russian-Chinese project to build a wide-body long-haul passenger airplane, according to Bertrand de Lacombe, Director of International Cooperation at French Civil Aviation Authority.

"France is interested in participating in the project together with Russia and China," Lacombe told journalists on the sidelines of the Russian-French Council for Economic, Financial, Industrial and Trade Issues (CEFIC).

According to the official, French producers are ready to bid for a tender that is currently being set by Russian and Chinese manufacturers. Lacombe didn't specify precisely what kind of contribution to development and production French enterprises are ready to make. However, he stressed that they can provide a wide range of opportunities, including producing engines and other principal parts.

"We already expressed our interest towards the project at China's Zhuhai Air Show in November," Lacombัƒ said. "They [Russian and Chinese partners] let us know that they are also interested in participation of French companies in this project."

Parties will cooperate in the project on a competitive basis if French suppliers meet economic and technical demands and are ready to work under sanctions, according to Ravil Khakimov, the head of the department of aviation sector at Russia's Ministry of Industry and Trade.

Comment: The art of the deal goes beyond sanctions' borders.

Read More...
Brick Wall

Prof: UN Migration Compact is threat to sovereignty of free member countries


Sputnik
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 17:05 UTC
UN Migration Conference
© AFP 2018 / FADEL SENNAA picture taken on December 9, 2018, shows the site of the UN Migration Conference in the Moroccan city of Marrakesh.
The UN Global Migration Compact will legalise illegal immigration and regularise rapid, unsustainable, mass migration. Sputnik spoke about this issue with Dr Waheed Uddin - a professor, consultant, former UN expert, author of books on infrastructure, and contributor to books on climate.

Sputnik: How could the UN migration pact resolve the migration crisis?

Dr Waheed Uddin: The migration of people due to non-political and non-ethnic/religious reasons is entirely an issue for the law makers and judicial process within the jurisdiction of each independent country. The UN migration pact is infringing on the governmental authority of each country according to the country's own constitution and policies.

The pact is not going to solve the overwhelming issue of unwanted migration on mass scale that is caused by poverty and ethnic suppression. These must be addressed by the government of each country itself and UN should provide expert help to provide guidance based best practices.
Read More...
Black Cat

Gowdy calls Comey an 'amnesiac with incredible hubris,' as hearing resumes on Hill

Greg Wilson
Fox News
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 16:43 UTC
James Comey
Former FBI Director James Comey
Former FBI Director James Comey is back on the Hill for an encore, after a controversial appearance more than a week ago in which he told lawmakers seeking answers over the FBI's handling of the Trump-Russia collusion probe some version of "I don't know" at least 245 times.

Comey is set to testify behind closed doors again Monday morning, before members of the House oversight and judiciary committees.

The prior Dec. 7 session left lame-duck Republican lawmakers fuming as Comey repeatedly said "I don't remember," "I don't know" and "I don't recall" when grilled about investigations Republicans believed were aimed at hurting President Trump. The questioning covered the FBI's probe of Hillary Clinton's email server and how a counter-intelligence investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election morphed into an all-encompassing probe of Trump's inner circle, including the obtaining of FISA warrants used to spy on American citizens.

Comment:

Read More...
Propaganda

Media have been reporting a false Yemen death toll for years - too 'lazy' to update it, says NGO


RT
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 16:48 UTC
yemen aid
© Reuters / Abduljabbar Zeyad
The body count from the conflict in Yemen surpassed 60,000 last week, according to an independent tally, yet mass media continue to cite old figures that heavily underestimate the devastation, an informed researcher has told RT.

More than 60,000 people have been killed in Yemen since January 2016, according to a new report by Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), which estimated that nearly half of those deaths occurred this year.

"From what we can see from the reporting at least, there has been quite a general lazy attitude in using, for instance, the 10,000 figure provided by the UN, the sole official figure since 2016. And still many newspapers and media outlets are using that, which significantly downplays the devastation," said Andrea Carboni, one of the researchers behind the report, who feels the crisis in Yemen has gone largely under-reported.

The death toll is likely to increase further, amid an ongoing battle for Yemen's port city of Hodeidah, despite a UN-brokered ceasefire. It was agreed between the Saudi-backed government of Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and the Houthi rebel group last Thursday, but the truce was pushed back at least until Tuesday, as warring parties refuse to honor it. According to reports, the Arab coalition launched new airstrikes on the port city on Sunday, while clashes continue to plague the region.


Comment: This is what Moon of Alabama wrote about the subject, back in October:
More reports about the true casualty numbers of the war on Yemen emerge. A year ago Moon of Alabama criticized the often quoted "10,000 dead" that the media continue to repeat as the official casualty count of the war:
Up to July 2017 the U.S.-Saudi coalition had flown more than 90,000 air-sorties over Yemen. Most of those will have involved weapon releases. Are we to believe that only 10,000 civilians have been killed by all these bombs and the additional artillery, sharpshooters and suicide attacks? That would be inconsistent even with western reports of the known mass incidents during the war. 100,000 dead civilians caused by the war so far is a more likely number than the never changing 10,000.
Since then the numbers increased due to continued fighting but even more due to the raging famine.

The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a group formerly associated with the University of Sussex, estimates that since March 2015, when the Saudis launched the war, 70,000 to 80,000 were killed due to combat. That estimate is conservative based on documented death as a result of fighting. The Save the Children NGO estimated in late 2017 that 50,000 children died that year for lack of food and from a ravaging Cholera epidemic.

The famine only increased since then. By the end of this year another 50,000 children will have died. The total number of dead caused by the war and blockade since March 2015 has thus likely exceeded the 200,000 mark.
We wonder how much the Saudis had to pay their 'influencers' in the Western media to repeat the 10,000 figure ad nauseam...

Read More...
Document

Joe Hoft: Flynn didn't lie to FBI - must have been coerced into guilty plea

Joe Hoft
Gateway Pundit
Sun, 16 Dec 2018 16:31 UTC
Michael Flynn
© azerbaycan24.comMichael Flynn
There is really almost no way that General Flynn lied to the FBI when being interrogated four days into the Trump Administration. There must be some reason for his guilty plea, but lying to the FBI is almost certainly not what he did.

General Mike Flynn was berated by the media in January 2017 for alleged illegal activities with Russians. The far-left media was in a frenzy about an article released by the Washington Post on January 12th based on classified information that was stolen and leaked to the press.

Later that January, only a few days after the Trump Administration moved into the White House, General Mike Flynn, the decorated war hero, was set up and interrogated in the White House.

As TGP previously reported in February 2018, according to Mike Cernovich, fired and corrupt former FBI Head Andrew McCabe altered far left FBI investigator Peter Strzok's 302 notes on his interview with General Flynn. And then McCabe destroyed the evidence.

In early May of 2018, Senator Grassley demanded the FBI and DOJ produce the transcript of Flynn's intercepted calls with Russian Ambassador Kislyak and the 302's by May 25th. The DOJ and FBI ignored him. They either refused to provide them or they were altered and deleted as previously noted.

Comment: The above is all speculation. But the fact remains that the Flynn set-up stinks to high heaven. The 'interview' (in which the FBI made sure Flynn did not have a lawyer present - compare that to Hillary Clinton's FBI interviews!) took place on January 24, 2017. The 302 write-up submitted in the case was not written until July 19, 2017, six months later.
FBI rules require that a 302 report be prepared within five days of an interview. Instead, Fox News reports that the 302 submitted to Judge Sullivan was dated July 19, 2017 and "specifically came from an interview with Strzok in which the Flynn encounter was discussed - and not the original Flynn interview." Worse still, this report was heavily redacted. One and a half pages were completely redacted.
Given the FBI's refusal to provide the actual write-up, we can hardly be blamed for suspecting a cover-up of some sort. If Mueller et al. are telling the truth, what do they have to hide?

Read More...
Rocket

Russia will have Avangard hypersonic missile systems ready to enter combat duty in 2019


Tass
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 02:51 UTC
Avangard hypersonic missile systems
© Press Service of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian FederationAvangard hypersonic missile systems
The Avangard is a strategic intercontinental ballistic missile system equipped with a hypersonic glide vehicle

First Avangard hypersonic missile systems will enter combat duty in 2019 at the Dombarovsky missile division based in the Orenburg Region in the south Urals, Strategic Missile Force Commander Colonel-General Sergei Karakayev said in an interview with Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper.

"First complexes are planned to be put on combat duty at the missile regiment of the Dombarosky division starting next year," Karakayev said.

The Avangard is a strategic intercontinental ballistic missile system equipped with a hypersonic glide vehicle. According to open sources, the 'breakthrough' weapon was developed by the Research and Production Association of Machine-Building (the town of Reutov, the Moscow Region) and was tested from 2004. The glide vehicle is capable of flying at hypersonic speed in the dense layers of the atmosphere, maneuvering by its flight path and its altitude and breaching any anti-missile defense.

Comment: Obviously Putin meant what he said in his address of last March. Russia does not want war, but if forced to defend herself she will not let attacks from the West go unanswered. This new bit of high-end weaponry is further proof of that.

Read More...
Binoculars

Interior Minister says Turkey won't let US prevent Ankara's military operation east of Euphrates in Syria


Sputnik
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 16:13 UTC
turkish military
© AP Photo / Emrah Gurel
Turkey will not let the United States prevent its military operation in the Syrian territories, east of the Euphrates River, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said on Monday.

"[The United States] has tried to hamper us in northern Iraq, it tried to hamper us in Afrin, [Syria]. And now, it will try to hamper us east of the Euphrates. Turkey did not let it happen back then and we will not let it happen this time," Soylu told reporters during a visit to the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, as quoted by the Anadolu news agency.

He pointed out that Turkey would overcome the possible international pressure on the country over the military operation east of the Euphrates.

"The US has thought that it could intimidate us by using the men it had nurtured. It tried to set an international encirclement but we have overcome it," Soylu added.

Comment: Erdogan claims Trump supports the operation:
"There is no more Islamic State [Daesh*] in Syria, it is used as a pretext. We will not permit the creation of a terrorist corridor there. Three operations have been carried out by us in Syria, now it is the turn Euphrates east bank. We have announced it officially, spoken on the phone with Trump and received a positive response," Erdogan said at a rally, broadcast by the NTV channel.
This comes amid the ongoing Khashoggi scandal, which Turkey is using as leverage over Saudi Arabia and MBS's ties to the U.S. and the Trump administration. It also comes with this: Turkish FM says Trump working to extradite terrorist mastermind Gulen

See also:

Read More...
Light Saber

Brexit exposes the British colonial mindset towards Ireland: 'The Irish should know their place'

Danielle Ryan
RT
Mon, 17 Dec 2018 14:44 UTC
Ireland brexit
© Reuters / Clodagh KilcoyneBanners by Anti-Brexit campaigners at the border town of Carrickcarnon in Ireland, October 8, 2016
Brexit watchers who are not informed on Irish history might recently have been fooled into believing that the 'Irish Question' is something new; some strictly Brexit-related conundrum. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, the 'Irish question' is a phrase that has been bandied about by the British ruling elite for hundreds of years to refer to the political challenges posed by its colonial entanglement on the island and the 'problem' of Irish nationalism and republicanism. In reality then, it is not so much an 'Irish' question as a British one.

When the Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998, it brought a fragile peace to Northern Ireland after decades of sectarian conflict. That conflict had stemmed from Britain's partition of the island nearly one-hundred years ago and the subsequent decades during which the Irish Catholic population were deprived of equal rights at the ballot box and in their daily lives. With the signing of the GFA, the Irish question was, in a sense - for both the media and political establishments - put to bed. But the Irish question has always been a light sleeper.

Comment: Indeed, Ireland appears to be in the driver's seat regarding Brexit, and it irks the British PTB no end. Part of Theresa May's endless waffling may be to avoid having to deal with the question of hard or soft borders between Ireland and Northern Ireland. A year ago the question seemed resolved.

Ireland, UK and Brussels reach Brexit agreement: No hard border for Northern Ireland, which effectively remains in EU

But now it's up in the air again: The Irish may just tell Britain to s*d off:

Read More...
Arrow Up

How the New Silk Roads are merging into Greater Eurasia

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times
Thu, 13 Dec 2018 12:11 UTC
China freight train
© Reuters / stringerPeople take pictures of the first freight train from Shenzhen to Minsk, capital of Belarus, that set out of Yantian Port in Shenzhen in May 2017.
The concept of Greater Eurasia has been discussed at the highest levels of Russian academia and policy-making for some time. This week the policy was presented at the Council of Ministers and looks set to be enshrined, without fanfare, as the main guideline of Russian foreign policy for the foreseeable future.

President Putin is unconditionally engaged to make it a success. Already at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum in 2016, Putin referred to an emerging "Eurasian partnership".

I was privileged over the past week to engage in excellent discussions in Moscow with some of the top Russian analysts and policymakers involved in advancing Greater Eurasia.

Three particularly stand out: Yaroslav Lissovolik, program director of the Valdai Discussion Club and an expert on the politics and economics of the Global South; Glenn Diesen, author of the seminal Russia's Geoeconomic Strategy for a Greater Eurasia; and the legendary Professor Sergey Karaganov, dean of the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs at the National Research University Higher School of Economics and honorary chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, who received me in his office for an off-the-record conversation.

Comment: See also:

Read More...
Bug

Clueless Hillary tells Americans: "If You don't support Democrats, go somewhere else"

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Fri, 14 Dec 2018 00:00 UTC
Hillary Clinton has a message for Bernie Bros, Democratic Socialists and other constituencies of the "Dirtbag Left".
Periscope Hillary
© YouTube/KJNGoing, going, going, going...
If you have a problem with the Democrats' agenda (which, as Tucker Carlson explained in an interview last week, has shifted away from empowering "working class" Americans to favoring globalism, militarism and big business) then go vote for somebody else.

Demonstrating that she clearly hasn't moved on from the embarrassment she suffered at the hands of Bernie Sanders, who nearly defeated her in the 2016 Democratic Primary after riding a wave of support for his socialist agenda (something that polls suggest is becoming increasingly popular with young Americans), Clinton lashed out during a recent interview at "progressives" who won't stop attacking Democrats from the left.
Read More...