Puppet MastersS


Stock Down

Senate Majority Leader will not bring TPP up for vote this year


RT
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 20:02 UTC
mitch mcconnell
© Jonathan Ernst / Reuters
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) may not be dead in the water, but it's struggling to stay afloat now that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) has said he's not willing to serve as its lifeguard.

McConnell said he will not bring the TPP up for a vote in the Senate this year.

"The current agreement, the Trans-Pacific [Partnership], which has some serious flaws, will not be acted upon this year,"McConnell said at the Kentucky State Farm Bureau breakfast on Thursday, The Hill reported.

The Obama administration's signature trade deal to establish regulations between a dozen countries in the Pacific Basin has been largely negotiated in secret. Its opponents say these regulations would undermine jobs in the US and work to the benefit of corporations rather than the 12 nations' workers.

McConnell wasn't willing to kill the deal completely, however, saying that it could see a vote in 2017 if some changes are made.

Comment: For more on the scary implication of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, see:

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Target

US sanctions threaten Russian-Indian oil deal


RT
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 10:00 UTC
Ruia, Sechin
© www.business-standard.comShashi Ruia of India, chairman and co-founder of Essar Group and Igor Sechin, Rosneft CEO.
US sanctions are threatening to derail Russian energy major Rosneft's acquisition of a 49 percent stake in India's Essar Oil, reports The Times of India. The deal was curtailed by the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, according to the daily.

In July 2014, the Department of the Treasury included Rosneft on the list of sanctioned Russian companies after Washington accused Moscow of involvement in the military conflict in Eastern Ukraine and of annexing Crimea.

Indian banks, which invested over $5 billion into Essar Oil and currently hold 17 percent, expressed concerns over the deal due to fears of the potential consequences. "We may have to review our exposure to Essar Oil if Rosneft comes on board," said a top banker with a state-run lender, as quoted by The Times of India.

However, Essar Oil will reportedly try to push the deal with Rosneft through, allowing the Russian company to enter the Indian energy market.

Comment: US sanctions are an attempt to jab at Russia's economic future, the bigger prize should it work.

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Attention

German FM Steinmeier calls for new arms deal with Russia, avoid accidental war


Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 00:00 UTC
Steinmeier
© TASSGerman Foreign Minister Frank-Waller Steinmeier
Germany's foreign minister is calling for a new arms control deal with Moscow as intensified military exercises by Russia and NATO have raised concerns that a war could inadvertently be triggered.

In an opinion piece in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper on August 26, Frank-Walter Steinmeier said that while Russia has since 2014 violated the bonds of trust built up over decades as well as basic principles of peace, "we must all be united in the desire to avoid a further twist in the escalating spiral."

A new arms control process would offer a "proven means for transparency, risk avoidance, and trust building," he said. "We want a structured dialogue with all partners who carry responsibility for the security of our continent," perhaps working through the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe [OSCE], he said. His comments follow an appeal by former NATO foreign and defense ministers on August 24 for an agreement with Russia on rules for handling unexpected military encounters.

Steinmeier drew some criticism in June for calling NATO's recent military exercises and moves to bolster forces in eastern Europe "saber-rattling and shrill war cries" that could worsen tensions with Russia.

Comment: Steinmeier, while thinking beyond the NATO/US box, has bought into blaming Russia for aggression, "violated bonds of trust." A new agreement, if fair and accurate, would be a step in the right direction, given the West honors the arrangement.

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Cell Phone

Apple security upgrades to counter alleged Israeli spyware attack on Arab activist, citizens update!


RT
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 00:39 UTC
apple phone
© www.forbes.com
A botched hack attempt using "sophisticated spyware package" allegedly tailored by an Israeli group on the iPhone of an Arab activist has triggered Apple to issue an "important" security update for its mobile operating system, iOS. The attackers tried to lure Ahmed Mansoor, a United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based human rights activist, with text messages embedding a suspicious link to "secrets" about detainees tortured in Arab jails.

Not a stranger to his government's crackdown, from imprisonment and travel bans to spying, Mansoor did not take the bait, but instead sent it to the Canada-based security lab. "It was a wise move," Citizen Lab said in a release. "Mansoor's unfortunate experiences are the gift that won't stop giving."

Citizen Lab partnered with a team of security researchers from Lookout to look into what indeed appeared to be yet another attack on Mansoor's digital communications. They believe it was UAE security agencies that attempted to bug Mansoor's iPhone.

The two teams found that the perpetrators targeted three critical iOS zero-day vulnerabilities, which they dubbed "Trident." Whoever was behind the order might have paid "hundreds of thousands of dollars" for each of the three zero-day exploits, Citizen Lab said, noting Apple's "widely renowned" security that even the FBI could not crack without help.

"Trident is used in a spyware product called Pegasus, which according to an investigation by Citizen Lab, is developed by an organization called NSO Group," researches from Lookout said. "Pegasus is highly advanced in its use of zero-days, obfuscation, encryption, and kernel-level exploitation." If Mansoor clicked on that link with "secrets," his iPhone would have been turned into a "sophisticated bugging device," and UAE security agencies would be able to turn on his iPhone's camera and microphone, record his and everything surrounding Mansoor.

Comment: Apple's IOS update

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Eye 2

Witness of 2013 Ghouta gas attack in Syria reveals who was responsible for the tragedy


Sputnik
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 17:14 UTC
ghouta chemical attack
© Sputnik/ Andrei Stenin
The chemical attack on Ghouta, Syria, took place in the early hours of August 21, 2013. The town was struck by rockets containing the chemical agent Sarin, killing innocent civilians. Iranian correspondent, Shemshadi Hassan, witnessed the attacks and spoke to Sputnik about the tragedy.

The Ghouta chemical attack left a death toll ranging from at least 281 people to 1,729. The attack was the deadliest use of chemical weapons since the Iran - Iraq War.

The witness of those events, the Iranian Radio and Television correspondent in Syria and Iraq, Shemshadi Hassan, spoke in an interview with Sputnik about who was responsible for the tragedy and what kind of information war surrounds the Ghouta attack.

"Even before the chemical weapons were used in Eastern Ghouta, a video appeared on the Internet showing how the terrorists were using gas to poison rabbits. Militants threatened that they would use this weapon to destroy the Syrian authorities, government's army and people, all those who support Assad," Hassan said.

Comment: See also: French General: Syrian government unlikely to be behind 2013 Ghouta chemical weapon attack

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Nuke

Mutual annihilation? Washington plays nuclear chicken now with China as well as Russia

F. William Engdahl
New Eastern Outlook
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 17:16 UTC
Chinese missles on parade
It seems it's not enough that US Defense Secretary Ash Carter and his generals engage in games of nuclear chicken with Russia by provocations in Ukraine, NATO maneuvers on Russia's borders and activation of highly-dangerous ballistic missile defense installations on Russia's perimeter. In the past months the Obama Administration has clearly also escalated tensions in the seas surrounding the Peoples' Republic of China—East China Sea with Japan and South China Sea with the Philippines—tensions which potentially could provoke a catastrophe. While both provocative operations could give the Pentagon budget a boost in times of budget austerity, they could easily detonate a preemptive nuclear strike by either China or Russia or by both. In the 21st Century such primitive behavior by the Obama Pentagon is not only inexcusable. It's mad.

Earlier I discussed in great detail the carefully-planned Washington provocation of China in the strategic South China Sea islands disputes, where the Obama Administration encouraged a Philippine government—then under US-crony Benigno Aquino—to escalate tensions over the barren Spratly Islands by unilaterally going ahead with arbitration in The Hague despite the fact it was not agreed to be arbitrated by Beijing, violation of the very definition of arbitration. It was a deliberately planned Washington ploy to provoke Beijing into rash reaction. To date, to its credit, China has instead pursued a series of diplomatic initiatives with ASEAN, as well as dialogue with a new, more reasonable Manila government under President Rodrigo Duterte, to defuse the manipulated US propaganda Hague decision.
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Rocket

Ouch: Yemen missiles hit facilities of Saudi oil giant Aramco


PressTV
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 16:37 UTC
Aramco oil refinery in Saudi Arabia
Yemeni forces have fired ballistic missiles at the facilities belonging to the Saudi state oil giant Aramco in the kingdom's southwest.

The retaliatory attack took place on Friday, hitting targets in Saudi Arabia's Jizan region and causing considerable damage to the Aramco facilities there, Yemen's al-Masirah television reported.

The Saudi military has been pounding Yemen since March last year to undermine Yemen's Houthi Ansarullah movement and to restore power to the former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh.
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Jet4

Serbia-Russia-Belarus to perform joint military exercise in November


b92
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 16:17 UTC
Slavic Brotherhood 2016
© mod.gov.rs
Representatives of the three countries' armed forces discussed preparations for the exercise at a meeting in Belgrade on Thursday.

Slavic Brotherhood 2016 will be performed as a trilateral exercise of the three countries' armed forces. It represents a continuation of the cooperation between the Russian Airborne Troops and the Serbian Army's Special Brigade started by the exercise SREM 2014, the Serbian Armed Forces said.

The delegation of the Serbian Army was led by the Deputy Chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant General Jovica Draganic. The Russian and Belarus delegations were led by Major General Oleg Olegovich Polguyev and Colonel Vyacheslav Viktorovich Gubski.
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Footprints

French government claims India submarine docs were stolen, not leaked


RT
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 16:41 UTC
submarine
© Bazuki Muhammad / Reuters
Documents containing detailed descriptions of key features of India's naval submarines were stolen from the French contractor that built them, a French government source says. Previous reports said the 22,400 pages of top-secret files had been leaked.

"It is not a leak, it is theft," the source told Reuters on Wednesday, adding that no negligence had been found on the part of French naval contractor DCNS "...but we have identified some dishonesty by an individual."

The source went on to state that the documents seem to have been stolen in 2011 by a former French employee who had been fired in India while providing training on the use of submarines.

He also said the documents were not classified and appear to have only focused on the operational elements of the submarines.

Both India and France opened investigations after a number of the documents were published on Wednesday by The Australian newspaper, which declined to reveal its source.
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Health

Russia invites Japan to join Aleppo humanitarian aid operation in Syria


Sputnik
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 11:40 UTC
Russia
© AFP 2016/ GEORGE OURFALIAN Japan is invited to join the Russia-led UN humanitarian operation in the crisis-torn Syrian city of Aleppo, the Russian Defense Ministry said Friday.

Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov met with Japanese Ambassador to Russia Toyohisa Kozuki earlier in the day, where the envoy was briefed on the preparations for the first 48-hour humanitarian pause in Aleppo. Antonov invited his Japanese counterparts to join the mission, the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Comment: See also: Russia ready to support weekly 48-hour humanitarian ceasefires in Aleppo

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