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Taliban peace talks: 'A lot of progress' claims US envoy

Zarif Nazar
RFE/RL
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 12:23 UTC
Zalmay Khalilzad
© AFP/Wakil Kohsar
The special U.S. representative for Afghan peace and reconciliation, Zalmay Khalilzad
U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad has described the latest round of U.S.-Taliban peace talks as the "most productive" ever, telling RFE/RL that "a lot of progress" has been made. Khalilzad made the remarks in an interview with RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan on July 7 at the conclusion of the first day of an intra-Afghan dialogue in Qatar.

The two-day intra-Afghan dialogue marks the first time Afghan government officials have met for face-to-face talks with Taliban representatives -- although the Kabul officials traveled to the Doha gathering in a personal rather than official capacity. The Taliban previously refused to meet directly with any members of Afghanistan's government, calling them "Western puppets."

But the Taliban agreed to meet with individuals in the Afghan government who are part of an intra-Afghan delegation that also includes opposition politicians, women, and members of Afghan nongovernmental organizations.

Khalilzad told RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan after the conclusion of the July 7 meeting that U.S. and Taliban negotiators were now closer to reaching an agreement on four key issues. Those issues include the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan, a permanent cease-fire, a Taliban guarantee that Afghanistan will not be used as a base for attacks in other countries, and an intra-Afghan dialogue that leads to a political settlement.
Taliban Doha
© RFE/RL screenshot
Taliban attend peace talks in Doha, Qatar

Comment: See also:

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Nuke

Iran has exceeded uranium enrichment level set by JCPOA as Europe fails to resist US sanctions


RT
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 08:36 UTC
Bushehr power plant
© IRNA/Mohammad Babaie/Reuters
Nuclear power plant in Bushehr, Iran
Iran has officially surpassed the 3.67% uranium enrichment limit set by the 2015 nuclear deal, Reuters has reported, citing a spokesman for the country's nuclear agency.

Behrouz Kamalvandi said that Iran's new level of uranium enrichment was at 4.5%, and that Tehran would consider increasing this figure to 20% as a future measure if Europe continues to neglect its commitments under the JCPOA. He urged the deal's European signatories to act quickly before Iran took further steps to pull out from the accord.

Tehran announced on Sunday that it would exceed the cap mandated by the accord, warning it would further scale down its commitments under the deal if its European partners failed to honor the agreement. Under deal, known as the JCPOA, Iran agreed to limit its nuclear activities and to allow international inspections of its nuclear facilities, in exchange for sanctions relief.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif has argued that Iran is fully within its rights to increase its uranium enrichment, noting that a dispute resolution mechanism contained in the JCPOA allows Tehran to "cease performing its commitments" if the Islamic Republic believes any of the other signatories have failed to uphold their own side of the deal.

Comment: More from FRN: Pompeo's new anti-Iran sanctions
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded to the statement by Iranian authorities regarding the restart of uranium enrichment above 3.67%, as announced on July 7 by Abbas Arakchi, who is the Deputy Foreign Minister of Iran and the main negotiator for the Joint Comprehensive Action Plan (JCPOA) on the nuclear program. According to Pompeo, Washington will introduce new sanctions against Iran, despite Washington having been the party to cancel the deal, and increase its isolation.

"The Iranian nuclear weapon regime will pose an even greater danger to the world," the US secretary of state wrote on Twitter, threatening to respond to Iran's "expansion of its nuclear program" with new sanctions and further "isolation." According to Pompeo, it is necessary to return the "total ban on uranium enrichment" by Iran.

Abbas Arakchi said recently that the beginning of uranium enrichment was the second stage of reduction of Iran's obligations under the FIDD, and now it will occur every 60 days, if its participants do not adhere to the agreements reached. Arakchi also noted that although "the doors for diplomacy are still open," new initiatives are needed to resolve this situation.
From Tasmin News Agency: China blames US bullying for Iran's nuclear announcement
"The facts show that unilateral bullying has already become a worsening tumor," said Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang at a press briefing in Beijing, AFP reported. "The maximum pressure exerted by the US on Iran is the root cause of the Iranian nuclear crisis," he said.

President Hassan Rouhani had warned on Wednesday that the second step of reduction in Iran's commitments would take place on Sunday, saying, "On July 7, the level of (uranium) enrichment in Iran will not be 3.67 percent anymore, as we will abandon such a commitment and increase it (enrichment) to any amount that we need."

Iran maintains that the new measures are not designed to harm the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), but to save the accord by creating a balance in the commitments.

Last week, Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium exceeded 300 kg.
See also: Pompeo warns Iran: New 'sanctions and further isolation' for uranium enrichment (levels set by the JCPOA)

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Oil Well

More of the same? Blackouts halt Venezuelan oil refineries' operations in Paraguaná Peninsula, blamed on sabotage


Sputnik
Sun, 07 Jul 2019 16:04 UTC
PDVSA tank
© AP/Fernando Llano
The crisis-hit Latin American country has suffered a series of mass power outages since early March, which the government has blamed on the United States and the country's opposition, describing the blackouts as "sabotage attacks".

An apparent power outage has affected a crude oil refinery complex in north-west Venezuela on Saturday night, plunging a nearby community into darkness. The blackout halted Amuay and Cardon, two oil refineries located in the Paraguana Peninsula, Reuters reports citing sources within the state oil company PDVSA.

Amuay and Cardon are two of the three refineries of Venezuela's largest refinery complex, operated by PDSVA. While the company has not confirmed the news yet, photos of the blackout began making their way to social media.

Dario Tremont, a regional coordinator of the Voluntad Popular (Popular Will) opposition party, claimed that the blackout took place near midnight after the breakdown of the third turbine at Cardon refinery. ​Another user said the outage has affected the entire Paraguaná Peninsula. Purported photos from the scene show the refinery.

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Boat

Iranian DM Hatami: UK's seizure of Iranian oil tanker is 'maritime robbery'


RT
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 06:06 UTC
Grace 1
© Reuters/Jon Nazca
Grace 1, oil supertanker
Britain's seizure of an Iranian oil tanker off the coast of Gibraltar is unacceptable and tantamount to piracy, Defense Minister Amir Hatami has claimed.

In a speech broadcast live on state television on Monday, Hatami denounced the "threatening" actions taken by the Royal Marines, describing Britain's detention of the Iranian vessel as similar to "maritime robbery." He said that Iran would not tolerate such behavior. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman echoed Hatami's sentiments, describing the incident as a clear case of "piracy."

On Thursday, British marines and Gibraltar police seized 'Grace 1,' an Iranian super tanker, off the southern coast of the Iberian Peninsula. Gibraltar's Chief Minister Fabian Picardo claimed that the ship was transporting crude oil to Syria "in violation" of EU sanctions placed on Damascus. Tehran has denied the accusation, insisting that the ship's cargo was not destined for Syria.

Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Seyyed Abbas Araqchi said on Sunday that the British had no legal right to seize the tanker, and that Tehran hopes to resolve the issue through legal means.

A top commander of Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps suggested a different response to the incident, calling for a British ship to be seized in retaliation if the Iranian vessel is not released.

Comment: More from RT: Supertanker seizure is 'Piracy, pure and simple.'
Questioning the legality of the UK's move, Minister Zarif pointed out on Twitter that "Iran is neither a member of the EU nor subject to any European oil embargo". The strongly worded message comes amid an ongoing row over the unprecedented seizure by British Royal Marines. "Last I checked, EU was against extraterritoriality," he tweeted on Monday afternoon.

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Blackbox

Will Ukraine's parliamentary election reverse the Maidan putsch, drive Galicians from power?

John Helmer
johnhelmer.net
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 17:38 UTC
freeland zelensky
The US State Department, the Republican Party Institute and Igor Kolomoisky can't all be wrong about what the overwhelming majority of Ukrainian voters is thinking - that there is a civil war in the Ukraine which cannot be won by US arms, money, and putsches in Kiev.

The question to be decided on polling day, July 21, for the new Verkhovna Rada (parliament) is: which side in the war, the eastern Ukraine including Odessa, or the Galicians around Lviv in the west, will win power?

The answer already appeared in a May poll by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), and in the most recent June and July voter surveys by the local Ukrainian pollster Rating. A coalition of parties whose support is strongest in eastern Ukraine will control parliament and will back the new President, Volodymyr Zelensky (lead image, left), to negotiate terms with the breakaway governments of Donetsk and Lugansk (collectively, the Donbass), and with Moscow. On these polls, the Galician parties of western Ukraine will have no national party representation in parliament, no ministers nor high-ranking officials, and just a handful of constituency seats in Lviv, Brody and Ternopil.

Last week, the Galicians held their election rally in Toronto, where their faction is headed by Chrystia Freeland (lead image, right), Canada's foreign minister, with financing from the State Department through USAID, and from Victor Pinchuk, a Ukrainian steel oligarch, supported by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, a lobby group representing west Ukrainian refugees from the German Army's defeat in 1945. Freeland, a Galician by origin, and Kurt Volker, a German by origin and the State Department's Special Representative for Ukraine, gave the proceedings, entitled the Ukraine Reform Conference, an official government appearance. So did appearances and speeches by President Zelensky and a handful of Baltic state politicians.

But Toronto votes don't count. If the domestic Ukrainian vote follows the current Ukrainian and US polls, then Freeland's Galicians will be forced to retreat, just as her grandfather Michael Chomiak fled with the German Army as it was driven out of Ukraine and Poland by the Red Army. Chomiak ended up in Alberta, Canada. Freeland too. After July 21, the last retreat for the Galicians is Canada.

Comment: In related news, Zelensky has called on Putin for a face-to-face meeting:
In a July 8 video statement on Facebook, Zelenskiy said he was ready to hold talks with Putin in the Belarusian capital, Minsk.

"We need to talk? We do. Let us discuss who Crimea belongs to and who is not there in Donbas," Zelenskiy said, adding that he wanted the leaders of the United States, Germany, France, and the United Kingdom present at the talks.
...
Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters in Moscow that the Kremlin will consider Zelenskiy's call for talks with Putin, but added that he was "not prepared" to respond at the moment.

"First, we need to understand whether such a meeting has any prospects, and second, we need to understand what kind of new format is being offered," Peskov said.


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Chess

Venezuela's Guaido announces new talks with Maduro gov't


DW
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 00:00 UTC
Venezuela activist
The Norway-brokered talks aim "to establish a negotiation on the end of the dictatorship," the opposition leader said. Backed by Russia and China, socialist President Nicolas Maduro has refused to step down.

Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido on Sunday announced fresh talks with the government of President Nicolas Maduro.

Guaido, who declared himself acting president earlier this year, said the Norway-brokered talks aim "to establish a negotiation on the end of the dictatorship," referring to Maduro's regime.

"The Venezuelan people, our allies and the world's democracies recognize the need for a truly free and transparent electoral process that will allow us to surpass the crisis and build a productive future," he said.
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Jet2

Aging Sky Junk: US Air Force Rejects Proposal To Restart F-22 Raptor Production

Drago Bosnic
Fort Russ News
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 17:28 UTC
F-22 Raptor

F-22 Raptor
The United States Air Force published a report, according to which F-22 Raptor has become an aging design and that, sooner than later, it will not be competitive against evolving threats as nations like Russia and China continue to invest in new state-of-the-art technologies.

A 2017 Pentagon report to Congress detailing production retail costs for Lockheed Martin's F-22 Raptor show that reviving the powerful stealth air superiority fighter would be prohibitively expensive. Moreover, it would take so long to reconstitute the production line that it would not be until the mid to late 2020s before the first "new" F-22s would have flown. By that time, the F-22 would be obsolete, challenged by new and highly advanced Russian and Chinese capabilities.
"The timeline associated with pursuing F-22 production restart would see new F-22 deliveries starting in the mid-to-late 2020s," the Air Force report to Congress reads. "While the F-22 continues to remain the premier air superiority solution against the current threat, new production deliveries would start at a point where the F-22's capabilities will begin to be challenged by the advancing threats in the 2030 and beyond timeframe. F-22 production re-start would also directly compete against the resources necessary to pursue the Chief of Staff of the Air Force-signed Air Superiority 2030 (AS 2030) Enterprise Capability Collaboration Team (ECCT) Flight Plan, which addresses the critical capabilities required to persist, survive, and be lethal in the rapidly evolving-highly-contested Anti-Access/Area-Denial (A2/AD) threat-environment."
As it was explained in the report, the aging F-22 design will not be competitive against rapidly evolving adversaries coming from Russia (Su-57) and China (J-20).
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Jet1

Nein! Germany rejects Trump's call for ground troops in Syria to replace Americans


DW
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 17:02 UTC
ECR Tornado
Germany has rejected a US request for German ground troops to move into Syria.

German government spokesperson Steffen Seibert said on Monday that Germany would not increase its military presence in the country.

On Friday, the US had called for Germany to send ground troops into Syria.

"When I say that the government intends to continue with its ongoing measures in the framework of the anti-IS coalition, then that means no ground troops," Seibert said.

'Significant military contribution'

The German military currently provides reconnaissance jets, a refueling aircraft and other non-combat military assistance in the fight against IS.

Germany has "for years been making a significant and internationally acknowledged contribution" to fighting Islamic State, Seibert said.

The US has called for European countries, including the UK, France and Germany, to pledge more support to the fight against Islamic State.

Comment: See also:

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Chess

Syria: Is Turkey winding down its support of terror?

Steve Brown
The Duran
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 00:00 UTC
Syria destruction
Our report, 'Syria Boils Over While Iran Heats Up' covered the recent resurgence of Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) in its attempt to breakout from Idlib in the north, while the National Front for Liberation (NLF) has renewed attacks near Deir Ezzor. The NLF is primarily supported by Turkey. The renewed attacks by takfiri terror groups in the north and south have caused Russian security forces and local government forces to respond.

Commander Miraj Ural also known as Ali Kayali of the pro-government Popular Front for the Liberation of Iskenderun was seriously wounded in an attempted assassination attack on July 5th, the attack reportedly led by Captain Naji Mustafa of Ajabha Alwataniya Lil Tahrir of the NLF.

Ali Kayali is accused of war crimes, but according to local reports, Commander Ural has done much to prevent Turkish-sponsored terrorists (NLF) from maintaining their base in Latakia. While the temporary loss of Commander Ural may pose a minor setback for the Syrian government, the greater point is about the general outbreak of new hostilities in the northwest.

The concern is that HTS and NLF terror militias have been allowed to re-group and re-arm by Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, on behalf of the United States, Saudi Arabia and Israel, subsequent to an uneasy truce agreed for Idlib last year.
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Better Earth

Germany says it needs Nord Stream 2, denies being captive to Russian energy supplies


RT
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 16:45 UTC
baltic pipelay
© GLobal look Press / Nord Steram 2
The pipelay vessels in the Baltic Sea
The Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline is one of the ways for Germany to meet its growing energy demand, Economy Minister Peter Altmaier has said, rebuffing criticism that the project increases Russia's energy leverage on Berlin.

Germany will have an increased demand for natural gas, as the country is phasing out coal and nuclear power, the minister said in an interview to Bild shortly before his trip to the US - one of the most vocal critics of the Nord Stream 2 project.


Comment: That's the problem right there. Why phase out nuclear in the first place? It's cheaper and more efficient. But regardless of the motivation there, Altmaier is right: Germany needs more natural gas. Russia has it. So they're engaging in a mutually beneficial transaction. All the hysteria over the fact that it's Russia is just that: hysteria.


"We do not depend on Russia. It is about shortening delivery routes and creating new supply structures," Altmaier said. He added that the completion of the pipeline, designed to deliver Russian gas to Europe, serves the same purpose as building new terminals for American liquefied natural gas (LNG) in the country.

The statement came as the Nord Stream 2 received another barrage of criticism, this time from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). On Sunday, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly's committee adopted a resolution against the Nord Stream 2 and Turk Stream projects, labeling them a tool that Moscow could allegedly use for its political purposes.


Comment: Cue the pearl clutching.

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