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Wall Street

US disapproves UK joining Beijing's World Bank


Sputnik
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 13:59 UTC
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© REUTERS/ Takaki Yajima
After pressuring Australia into passing up the opportunity last year, the White House expressed its disapproval of the UK's application to become a founding member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, a rival for Washington-based financial institutions.

The US government has expressed disapproval of the UK's decision to become a founding member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank [AIIB]; it is the first member of the G7 to apply to join the organization, which will be formally established by the end of 2015 and have its headquarters in Beijing.

"As the first major Western country to apply to become a prospective member of the AIIB, the UK will join discussions later this month with other founding members to agree the Bank's prospective Articles of Agreement, setting out the governance and accountability arrangements that underpin the AIIB's operating practices," said the UK Treasury in a statement on Wednesday.
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Arrow Up

The West's plan to drop Russia from SWIFT hilariously backfires

Simon Black
Sovereign Man
Wed, 11 Mar 2015 07:33 UTC
Putin Giggling
© onrgaia's/Photobucket
If Vladimir Putin is remotely capable of laughter (the jury is out on that one...) then he's probably doing so right now.

Russia is once again Arch-Enemy of the United States. It's like living through a really bad James Bond movie, complete with cartoonish villains.

And for the last several months, the US government has been doing everything it can to torpedo the Russian economy, as well as Vladimir Putin's standing within his own country.

The economic nuclear option is to kick Russia out of the international banking system. And the US government has been vociferously pushing for this.

Specifically, the US government wants to kick Russia out of SWIFT, short for the Society of Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications.

That's a mouthful. But SWIFT is an important component in the global banking system because it lays the foundation for banks to communicate and transfer funds with one another.

It's a network protocol of sorts. Whenever a bank in Pakistan does business with a bank in Portugal, the funds will clear through the SWIFT network.

According to the SWIFT itself, they link over 9,000 financial institutions worldwide in over 200 countries, which transact 15 million times per day.

Bottom line, being part of SWIFT is critical to conducting business with the rest of the world. And if Russia gets kicked out of SWIFT, it would be a disaster.
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Dollar

IMF Ukraine $17.5B bailout links to "reform" and impoverishment of the Ukrainian population

Eric Zuesse
Global Research
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 00:00 UTC
IMF horse
© twitter.com
Ukraine will receive total loans of 40 billion dollars from international tax money. For this purpose, Ukraine will carry out "reforms" especially such demands as that the social system be dismantled and privatization [selloff of government assets in order to repay the loans] be performed. The Kiev government is very pleased with the 'help'. A native of the US, Ukraine's Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko wants to buy weapons with the money. European banks are relieved because Kiev, for the time being, is able to meet its debt service.

Angela Merkel and IMF chief Christine Lagarde rejoiced in Berlin on Wednesday, because, in their view, Ukraine is on the right track.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has fully approved its new loan package of 17.5 billion for Ukraine. This approval from the IMF Board of the four-year loan program was announced in Berlin on Wednesday by the IMF's head Christine Lagarde. She said that the loan will help to stabilize the economic situation in Ukraine as quickly as possible. At the same time Ukraine will launch far-reaching reforms to restore robust growth and improve the living conditions of the population, she promises.

"Ukraine has fulfilled all conditions for this loan program, "Lagarde said in Berlin after a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) and the heads of other global financial and economic organizations. The newly approved plan will pay Ukraine ten billion dollars in the first year.

Comment: They've raped. They've pillaged. And now they are all aplunder! Let's see what Putin does with this.

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Telephone

Concerned Hawaii residents discuss Trans Pacific Partnership


bigislandvideonews.com
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 04:49 UTC
HILO - A community forum was held in Hilo Wednesday night on the subject of the Trans-Pacific Partnership - a proposed regional regulatory and investment treaty involving twelve countries throughout the Asia-Pacific region currently in negotiations. This week, those negotiations are reportedly being conducted, behind closed doors, at the posh Waikoloa resorts. It was a great opportunity for those opposed to the TPP to speak out.
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© bigislandvideonews.comJuliet Begley, Americans for Democratic Action, Hawaii Island
Jim Albertini of the Malu 'Aina Center For Non-violent Education & Action helped organize the forum.

Comment: WikiLeaks: Updated Secret Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP)

The Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement that would strip governments of the power to regulate transnational corporate activities, is another dirty corporate tactic to dominate the world:

Under Cover of Darkness, an International Corporate Coup Is Underway
With the direct participation of 600 corporations and shocking levels of secrecy, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) is rushing to complete the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Branded as a trade agreement (yawn) by its corporate proponents, TPP largely has evaded public and congressional scrutiny since negotiations were launched in 2008 by the George W. Bush administration.

But trade is the least of it. Only two of TPP's 26 chapters actually have to do with trade. The rest is about new enforceable corporate rights and privileges and constraints on government regulation. This includes new extensions of price-raising drug patent monopolies, corporate rights to attack government drug formulary pricing plans, safeguards to facilitate job offshoring and new corporate controls over natural resources.

Also included are severe limits on government regulation of financial services, zoning and land use, product and food safety, energy and other essential services, tobacco, and more. The copyright chapter poses many of the threats to Internet freedom of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), which was stalled in Congress under intense public pressure.

The proposed pact is so invasive of domestic policy space that it would even limit how governments can spend tax dollars. Buy America and other Buy Local procurement preferences used to reinvest our tax dollars in the American economy would be banned and sweat-free, human rights or environmental conditions on government contracts would be subject to challenge in closed-door foreign tribunals.


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Eye 1

Ex-DEA agent claims he was told by superiors to avoid drug busts in wealthy neighborhoods


Sputnik
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 20:47 UTC
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© Flickr/ U.S. Coast Guard photo by Petty Officer 2nd Class Rob Simpson.
It's all about the race.That's what a former special agent with the Drug Enforcement Agency says in explosive new comments about how the US is handling the so-called "war on drugs" and why wealthier people are treated differently than the poor and working class.

"We were jumping on guys in the middle of the night, all of that. Swooping down on folks all across the country, using these sorts of attack tactics that we went out on, that you would use in Vietnam, or some kind of war-torn zone. And there wasn't very many black guys in my position," says Matthew Fogg in an interview with Brave New Films for a documentary about racial disparities in drug enforcement.

"So when I would go into the war room, where we were setting up all of our drug and gun and addiction task force determining what cities we were going to hit, I would notice that most of the time it always appeared to be urban areas."

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R2-D2

Iceland drops bid for EU membership


Sputnik
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 20:16 UTC
Image
© Flickr/ Olya Sanakoev
According to Agence France-Presse, Iceland is reportedly dropping its bid for membership in the European Union.

A statement released by Foreign Minister Gunnar Bragi Sveinsson informed the European Union Commission of his country's decision to annul their application.

The announcement follows pledges made in 2013 after the election of a new eurosceptic government.

Iceland applied for EU membership in 2009, but earlier this year, the Icelandic prime minister said that his country would withdraw its application. The nation is already a member of the European Economic Area, which allows for free movement of persons and goods through other European Union member states.

"Participating in EU talks isn't really valid anymore," Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson said earlier this year, according to Reykjavik Grapevine magazine. "Both due to changes in the European Union and because it's not in line with the policies of the ruling government to accept everything that the last government was willing to accept. Because of that, we're back at square one."

Comment: It's hard to blame Iceland for wanting out of an organization that is merely a tool for the U.S. to use to manipulate countries into giving up their sovereignty. Plus, Iceland has probably been paying attention to the way the EU-backed sanctions against Russia have gone on to hurt European countries. With all that has transpired recently, it looks like a smart move for Iceland to slowly back away from the EU.

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Star of David

Bye-bye Bibi - Polls show Netanyahu facing defeat in Israeli elections


Sputnik
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 20:10 UTC
Image
© AP Photo/ Gali Tibbon, Pool
The latest poll numbers coming out of Israel don't look good for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

With less than week for the pivotal Israeli elections, polls show Netanyahu's conservative Likud Party losing ground to the centrist Zionist Union Party after weeks of being in a dead heat.

Most surveys are predicting that the Zionist Union could win up to 24 seats in the Israeli parliament, compared to Likud's 21. If current trends continue, Israel will have a new prime minister come March 17th and would form a coalition government. Labour Party leader Issac Herzog would become prime minister for the first two years of the four-year term, then Zionist Union leader Tzipi Livni would take over the remaining two years.

Netanyahu is on the defensive, saying that a loss by Likud would put the country's security at risk.

"If the gap between the Likud and Labor continues to grow, a week from now Herzog and Livni will become the prime ministers of Israel in rotation, with the backing of the Arab parties," Netanyahu told the Jerusalem Post in a wide-ranging interview with the paper that is editorially friendly to the prime minister.

"That will cause such a monumental shift in policy that it is a danger, and anyone who wants to stop it has to vote Likud to narrow the gap. Yes, there will be pressures to withdraw to the (pre-) 1967 lines and divide Jerusalem. Yes, there will be pressures to relinquish our opposition to the Iranian (nuclear arms) deal. There is no privilege now to vote for other parties."

Comment: Bibi is at least going to go down using the same tired fear tactics that he only knows.

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Yoda

Russia press secretary answers Putin illness rumors - 'His handshakes break hands'


RT
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 19:39 UTC
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© Press Service of the Russian President
Vladimir Putin's press secretary has dismissed reports that the Russian president is ill as rumors, adding that the news itself could be a result of "spring madness" among some reporters.

"No need to worry, everything is all right. He has working meetings all the time, only not all of these meetings are public," Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday in an interview with Echo of Moscow radio. He added that the president is "absolutely healthy" and that "his handshake is so strong he breaks hands with it."

Shortly before the radio interview Peskov dismissed the rumors of Putin's possible illness in an interview with TASS.

"As soon as the sun appears in spring, when the smell of spring is in the air, some people suffer from crises. ... Some have hallucinations about the government dissolution and some cannot see Putin on television for several days," he said. "We have a calm attitude to such crises and keep answering all questions in a patient manner."

News of Putin's alleged health problems was initially circulated by Reuters in a report about the postponement of the president's visit to Kazakhstan.
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Bulb

UK Party Leader Farage: "We poked Russian bear with a stick, unsurprisingly Putin reacted"


RT
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:56 UTC
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© Reuters / Vincent KesslerLeader of Britain's UK Independence Party (UKIP) and member of the European Parliament (MEP) Nigel Farage
Britain's Nigel Farage launched a stinging attack on the idea of an EU army to counter Russia. The UKIP leader also placed some of the blame for the Ukraine crisis on EU expansion.

The notion of building up an EU army to counter Russia was the brainchild of European Commissioner Jean-Claude Juncker. Farage quickly noted that the idea is already happening, despite many European leaders being against it.

He pointed to a conversation he had with Nick Clegg - leader of the Liberal Democrats and the UK's deputy prime minister - a year ago, during which both men agreed that the idea of a European army was a dangerous fantasy.

Farage then cited examples of the European Defense Agency, EU battle groups, an EU Navy operation against pirates off the coast of Somalia, and article 28 of the Lisbon Treaty, which provides for collective EU defense.

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Stormtrooper

EU plan to create a separate army leaves NATO not amused


RT
Wed, 11 Mar 2015 16:54 UTC
Image
© Reuters / Kacper Pempel
NATO says a plan by the European Union to create its own army would be ineffective. The military alliance's secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, says the EU should make sure everything they do is complimentary to NATO and avoid duplication.

Stoltenberg told a press briefing in Belgium that he would welcome an increased investment by European nations in defense, but this should be channeled towards NATO, adding that "duplication would be inefficient. It's important to avoid duplication and I urge Europe to make sure that everything they do is complementary to the NATO alliance," he said, Reuters reported.


Comment: "duplication would be inefficient..." just like this article so far!!!


The idea of creating an EU army to counter the perceived threat from Russia was the brainchild of European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, who spoke of his ideas to a German newspaper on Sunday. "An army like this would help us to better coordinate our foreign and defense policies, and to collectively take on Europe's responsibilities in the world," the European Commission he said in an interview to Germany's Welt am Sonntag newspaper.


Comment: It is interesting that this idea has emerged and is gaining speed as a counterbalance to Russia and the US. The EU already has battle groups that are manned on a rotational basis as a rapid reaction force. This, however, is a far cry from a funded centralized EU army armed with the same capability of national institutionalized armed forces. What the take-away message may be is that the EU is reacting adversely to the US Lord of the World monopoly on calling the shots, are sick of stooges like Breedlove muddying the waters and complicating negotiations, and is feeling non-autonomous and ineffective. Obviously the US wants to push the war agenda as far as it possibly can, as it is the only deflection from more pressing problems at home, the financial solution it needs to remain viable, and its false belief in its self-aggrandizing "exceptionalism." The EU is caught in the middle and is looking for any way out while not cutting off its NATO nose in the process, as in "being inefficient by duplication."
See also:
NATO lies and provocations: Splitting up the Atlantic Alliance

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