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Fri, 05 Nov 2021
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Monkey Wrench

Stench of CIA: Food and fuel ships coming to Venezuela are being sabotaged

State oil company PDVSA's gas station
© Reuters / Ivan Alvarado
State oil company PDVSA's gas station in Caracas
Ships carrying food and fuel intended for Venezuela have been sabotaged to prevent them from reaching their destination, President Nicolas Maduro has said, labeling the acts "torture to the economic body of the country."

Vessels carrying food "were sabotaged and did not leave the ports where they were going to leave," said Maduro during Monday's meeting with party leaders in Caracas. He added that ten boats carrying fuel were also sabotaged.

At a meeting of the United Socialist Party which leads, Maduro also drew a link between the alleged acts of sabotage at sea and the international sanctions against Venezuela, spearheaded by US administration.

During the last 5 months of imperial aggression, we have endured financial persecutions, sabotage and coup skirmishes," Maduro tweeted from his English-language Twitter account.

Comment: Sabotage of a targeted country's infrastructure is a classic tactic made by the CIA, especially in Venezuela: See also:


People

'Unaccompanied minor' age assessments based on appearance for migrants ruled unlawful in UK

UK migrants
© Philippe Huguen/AFP/Getty Images
Asylum seeker age assessments based on physical appearance and outward behaviour are unlawful, UK judges have said.

Government guidelines allowing authorities to treat such migrants as adults if their physical appearance and/or demeanour "very strongly suggests that they are significantly over 18 years of age" are not legitimate and risk "children being unlawfully detained", according to a new ruling.

Asserting that assessing the age of a person based on their appearance and demeanour was "an inexact science", judges ruled by two to one on Thursday that the Home Office guidelines should be scrapped.

Lord Justice Underhill said: "In the absence of guidance as to the width of the margin of error there is inevitably a real risk that immigration officers will place too much trust in their own assessment that a particular young person is 'significantly' over 18."

Comment: So, adult migrants can identify as children and be accepted as such just because they say so. This will no doubt stir resentment and distrust among UK citizens, which seems to be the underlying purpose.


Newspaper

Witch-hunt: Democrats claim victory as Trump gets battered in court

pelosi impeach Trump
President Trump took a beating in federal court last week, losing a pair of lawsuits aimed at hindering House Democrats' investigations into him and his administration.

The decisions indicated that Trump will ultimately lose the fights: Both judges in the subpoena cases issued their rulings swiftly and decisively, underscoring the weakness of Trump's legal arguments.

The lawsuits were likely intended as Trump's attempt to delay Congress from being able to obtain the documents, taking advantage of the slow pace of the court system while keeping an eye on getting the cases up to the Supreme Court.

Gift

China's Huawei plans to promote smart cities in Africa

Eko Atlantic City in Nigeria 1
© ekopearltowers.com
Eko Atlantic City in Nigeria
The world's second largest continent, Africa, is experiencing one of the fastest urbanization rates globally and Huawei wants to be a part of it, according to Adam Lane, senior director of public affairs at Huawei Technologies.

He told Xinhua News that Huawei is keen to boost environmental sustainability on the continent. African cities can adopt modern technology in the area of water and energy use, communications, security and safety improvement, explained Lane.

"Huawei is currently in talks with a number of African cities to promote the concept of smart cities," he said during the Business Leaders Dialogue in Nairobi, Kenya.

Blue Planet

More Chinese medical supplies arrive in Venezuela as part of bilateral agreement

china venezuela medical
© Reuters
Chinese medical shipments to Venezuela
As part of a bilateral agreement, several shipments have made their way to the South American country since the end of March.

A total of 69 tons of medicines and health supplies sent from the People's Republic of China arrived Monday in Venezuela, adding up to the previous 200 tons that have been sent in the past.

The first similar shipment the Bolivarian Republic received from China, sent on March 29, consisting of 65 tons of medicine - while this delivery was mislabeled as 'military' support to the Government of the Bolivarian Republic. On May 13 and 16, respectively 71 and 64 more tons were sent.

Comment: If it wasn't clear enough already, events unfolding on the world stage continue to show those countries that can be relied upon: Also check out SOTT radio's: NewsReal: US Regime Change Operation in Venezuela - This Time It's Legit?


Arrow Up

"Obstinate, deaf and contemptuous": Macron failed 'personally' in EU election - Official

macron
© Sputnik / Alexei Vitvitsky
The second place of the alliance backing French President Emmanuel Macron in the European Parliament election is a "personal defeat" for the French leader, Thierry Mariani, the number three on the list of the winning National Rally (RN), told Sputnik.

"During three months the government has used all the administrative resources to win this election ... We are very satisfied with the result that puts us on top. And even if the gap is small, it's a personal defeat for the president who engaged completely in this election", Mariani said.

Mariani stressed that a president who got so invested in the election campaign but failed to come first should "drive conclusions by either stepping down... or by organizing another legislative election, or at least by changing his politics."

Comment: It's a similar story throughout Europe: European Parliament Elections 2019: Big Wins For Nationalist Parties in The UK, France, And Italy

See also: And check out SOTT radio's:


Attention

Serbian troops on high alert after Kosovo's forces raid Serb-populated regions

Serbia Kosovo
© Al Jazeera
Serbia ordered its troops to full alert on May 28 after heavily armed Kosovo police had entered Serb-populated regions of the former Serbian province and made several arrests in the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija (northern Kosovo).

Serbia's state TV reported that shots were heard and tear gas was used as Kosovo's special police "burst into" one of the villages with armored vehicles early in the morning. The Kosovo force involved in the tension reportedly includes at least 73 vehicles.

The region involved in the tensions is located on the contact line between the area controlled by Serbia and Kosovo forces. It is 90 percent populated by Serbs, who refuse to be part of the self-proclamed Republic of Kosovo.

The municipality of Zubin Potok is reportedly one of the places of tensions. Locals are reportedly building a kind of barricades to prevent Kosovo forces vehicles from moving through the area.

Comment: Al Jazeera reports:
President Hashim Thaci called on the ethnic Serb minority to remain calm and support the police, saying the fight against organised crime would speed up the country's process towards integration with the West.

"Those involved in illegal activities will go behind bars," he wrote on his Facebook page, adding that the police operation was not targeting ethnicities.

Kosovo authorities said at least two policemen were injured during the action.

Serbian government official Marko Djuric said the Kosovo police action is designed to intimidate and expel Serbs from Kosovo and presents "not only a threat to stability but the most direct threat to peace".

Any Serbian armed incursion in Kosovo would mean a direct clash with NATO peacekeepers there.

State TV also reported that a meeting of the country's top security body is under way following the tensions. The report said Vucic will speak in parliament later on Tuesday about the developments.

Serbia lost control over Kosovo after a NATO intervention in 1999 that stopped a bloody Serb crackdown against Kosovo Albanian separatists and civilians.

Serbia does not recognise Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence.

On Monday, Vucic warned of renewed clashes in Kosovo if a negotiated "compromise" solution for Serbia's predominantly ethnic Albanian former province is not found soon.
See also:


Bad Guys

White Helmets hospital found stocked with German-made medical supplies

White Helmets
© SANA
This picture, provided by Syria’s official news agency SANA, shows medical equipment recovered from a field hospital belonging to the so-called civil defense group White Helmets, which Syrian government forces discovered in the town of Qal'at al-Madiq, western Syria, on May 27, 2019.
Damascus and Moscow have repeatedly accused the White Helmets, a self-styled humanitarian rescue group, of staging several provocations involving chemical weapons to justify potential foreign interventions and the presence of foreign forces in Syria.

The Syrian Army has found medical equipment supplies, some of them German-made, in a field hospital thought to belong to the White Helmets, SANA reports.

The Syrian news agency cited unnamed local sources as saying that the discovery was made in the western Hama province town of Qal'at al-Madiq earlier on Monday.

Comment: Throughout the Western-led war on Syria evidence has emerged repeatedly that an inexcusable quantity of weapons and medical supplies used by the terrorists have come from sources in the West and Israel:


Chess

Huawei CEO says he is against punishing Apple for Trump's 5G purge

huawei CEO Xi Jinping
© Reuters / Matthew Lloyd
Chinese President Xi Jinping (L) is shown around the offices of Huawei Technologies Co Ltd by Ren Zhengfei, president of Huawei, in London, Britain October 21, 2015
Huawei's founder has said that US President Donald Trump's crackdown on the Chinese telecom giant is due to it being more advanced than its competitors, adding that he would not welcome a tit-for-tat against Apple.

Ren Zhengfei, founder and CEO of Huawei, told Bloomberg in an interview on Sunday that he would be strongly opposed to targeting Apple in retaliation against Washington's onslaught on his own company, despite Apple being Huawei's main competitor in the smartphone market.

"Apple is my teacher, it advanced in front of us. As a student, why should I oppose my teacher? I would never do it," Ren said, adding that he doubts that Beijing would drag the US company into the ongoing trade row.

Nuke

Russia & China are beating US in the 'nuclear race'

nuclear plant silo
While nuclear power plants in the US are retiring as they face stiff cost competition from cheap and abundant natural gas, America has also been struggling to keep its leadership on the global nuclear power market.

The United States must protect its longstanding leadership on nuclear energy globally, Senators Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) wrote in an op-ed to CNBC.

The US lawmakers believe that reviving nuclear energy in the US and developing new and advanced reactors will raise the share of clean energy generation in America on the one hand, and reestablish US leadership on the global market, on the other.