Log in or Sign up

main

side

curve

In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Senate Russia: its impact on the world, its invasion of Ukraine, and its future

Discussion in 'Community' started by Ghost, Sep 24, 2011.

Page 26 of 399

SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

(Reuters) - Two more gas turbines appear to have been delivered to Russian-controlled Crimea, according to two Reuters reporters who saw the equipment at the port of Feodosia, potentially deepening a row over sanctions compliance in which Germany's Siemens has become embroiled.

Reuters has no independent confirmation the equipment on the dock was Siemens-made turbines. It comprised four cylindrical objects, several meters long, and covered with blue and gray tarpaulins.

Their dimensions and shape match publicly-available photographs of Siemens gas turbine systems, which each consist of two major components: the turbine itself and a generator.

Siemens said earlier this week that at least two of a total of four turbines it sold to Russian state firm Technopromexport had been delivered to Crimea against its wishes and without its knowledge. Russia seized the region from Ukraine in 2014 and it is now subject to European sanctions on energy technology.

The German company filed a lawsuit against Technopromexport in Moscow on Tuesday requiring it to return the turbines to their original destination, Taman, Munich-based spokesman Wolfram Trost said.

Taman, in southern Russia, is not subject to sanctions.

On Wednesday, Yashar Azad, a spokesman for Siemens at its Bavarian headquarters, said the company was still trying to establish all the facts, including the location of the two other turbines and had nothing to add to its previous statements.

Technopromexport, the Russian state company building the Crimean power plants, and Russia's energy ministry, declined to comment.

Asked if the pieces of equipment at the port were Siemens turbines, a government official in Crimea told Reuters: "Come on, we can't talk about that. You understand: sanctions, Siemens."

"Of course, this whole story is going to come out, but let it come out without us," said this source, who did not want to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue.

If the equipment seen by Reuters reporters at the quayside in Feodosia are Siemens-made, it would show that Russia is pressing ahead with its plan despite the Siemens lawsuit and a warning this week from the German government that the use of Siemens turbines in Crimea could harm future German investment in Russia.

The turbines affair has shone a harsh spotlight on how serious the European Union, its member states, and European companies are about enforcing the sanctions, imposed on Russia after it annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014.

Siemens said on Monday it did everything possible to ensure compliance with sanctions.
Click to expand...

More: Exclusive: Russia appears to deliver more turbines to Crimea - Reuters witnesses | Reuters

SergeyX2017, Jul 12, 2017

#626
Dark Ferus Chosen One

Registered:

Jul 29, 2016

Putin's unique ideology was described on CNN as consisting of social conservatism and narionalism, and reminded me very much of Nazi Germany. I think Russia along with North Korea and Syrianis a fascist rather than a communist state for those reasons, though not much further to the right.
From what I can tell, Putin seems to be blackmailing Trump, and has something on him. Perhaps he interfered with the election in order to secure his puppet. Trump seems to be more Russia friendly than Hillary probably would be.

Dark Ferus, Jul 13, 2017

#627

SergeyX2017 likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Emperor Ferus said: ↑

Putin's unique ideology was described on CNN as consisting of social conservatism and narionalism, and reminded me very much of Nazi Germany. I think Russia along with North Korea and Syrianis a fascist rather than a communist state for those reasons, though not much further to the right.
From what I can tell, Putin seems to be blackmailing Trump, and has something on him. Perhaps he interfered with the election in order to secure his puppet. Trump seems to be more Russia friendly than Hillary probably would be.
Click to expand...

Russia certainly hasn't been Communist for decades Putin is an ultra-nationalist capitalist cleptocrat, backed by Orthodox Christian religious zealotry...

He is also mentally wacky, IMHO

I mean, look at this: About three days ago, Putin was caught on video with an unknown woman in his car

He was visiting the great Valaam Monastery at the time, met with Patriarch Kirill, paid respects to some holy relics there

I guess he decided to drive up himself behind the wheel. He does that, sometimes.

But now, everyone is curious, who the heck is that lady in the back seat???

Dmitry Peskov, his press secretary when reporters asked him about this at a briefing in the Kremlin, said simply it must have been a member of Putin's security detail, and left it at that.

Yeah, one problem with that, Mitya: nobody ever heard of a female agent at the FSO, Russia's Secret Service

I suppose, in theory, it's not IMPOSSIBLE.

After all, there are tens of thousands of women in the military now, including deadly snipers

in police too, even in the anti riot units

there is even a female firefighter, and I mean A female firefighter, only one known in the whole country, Anna Shpenova, in St. Petersburg

So, yeah, there are plenty of women in traditionally male jobs like that, today.

Not, however, in FSO, that anyone is aware of.

There have never been female agents seen on any detail of any of the bigwigs, ever...

And, the woman in the video certainly does not seem to be dressed like an agent. Suit or whatever. She seems to be carrying a purse, for example.

Not to mention, Putin himself opening the door for HER. This is completely against Russian culture, if she were one of his underlings, FSO agent or any kind of aid or assistant. Boss does not open doors for his inferiors. Period. Not how a Russian boss acts. You open door for boss, not the other way around.

And how she points her finger at him during their brief conversation... No regular woman would dare point at Putin that way lol

No... This is a very, very special woman indeed, whoever she may be.

He certainly acted towards her the way a Russian man would act to HIS woman, his wife or long term lover, at least.

Open door, escort her from the car.

In this case, seems he saw, or she saw and pointed out, hence the finger, that there is a camera

and he quickly slammed the door back shut again, before more of her could be seen...

My opinion? (And not only mine)

A Kremlin wedding is indeed coming. The public is being prepped. And this was a DELIBERATE leak, as part of that.

After all, if Putin didn't want this video out, all he had to really do, is order his FSO men to chase down the guy with the camera and make him delete the footage (and, probably, take him to some dungeon and kill him and make sure the body is never found...)

In fact, if he and the FSO didn't want this filmed, the camera dude wouldn't have even been there in the first place. There would be a total security perimeter. And nobody would dare try to violate that. If FSO says "no cameras", there would be no cameras... Or else (dungeon, slit throat, body in the river; as I said).

This was a little staged theater, yes sir... lol

Putin is finally getting remarried... Heh... Wonder who will be the super lucky bride? Alina, I suppose?

Or, someone else entirely...?

Who knows...

What a bloody nutcase though... Why keep your family life so damned secret, play these insane games with the people, that it takes an Oliver Stone interview for your subjects to learn you have ****ing grandchildren?
Putin Reveals He Has Grandchildren in Oliver Stone's TV Special
Vladimir Putin reveals he is a grandfather in controversial Oliver Stone documentary | The Independent

I mean, who does that? You have to be mentally unbalanced to behave this way. Seriously...

SergeyX2017, Jul 15, 2017

#628

gezvader28, Emperor Ferus and Violent Violet Menace like this.
gezvader28 Chosen One

Registered:

Mar 22, 2003

Sergey - you certainly put a lot of effort into your posts !

btw - how do they know it was a woman in the back ?

gezvader28, Jul 16, 2017

#629

SergeyX2017 likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

gezvader28 said: ↑

Sergey - you certainly put a lot of effort into your posts !

btw - how do they know it was a woman in the back ?
Click to expand...

It looks like a woman, in a skirt and with a purse. To most of us, anyway. But, who knows lol

Anyway, here is another great example of the endemic corruption in the Russian justice system.

Elena Khakhaleva, a local judge (head of the district court) in Krasnodar, a big city in Southern Russia

is the talk of the Russian-speaking blogosphere, after recently throwing her daughter Sophia a $2 million party for her wedding

20,000,000 rubles (about $340,000) was spent on flowers alone.

Galich Hall, the biggest, plushiest local banquet/concert venue, was rented out for the occasion

Russian pop star Vera Brezhneva entertained the guests

Other celebrities also appeared and mingled with the crowd, such as the famous singer Valeriy Meladze

Keep in mind, because of widespread internet piracy, which makes it hard to make legitimate earnings from selling one's music and such; for most Russian celebs, aside from concerts for singers and roles for actors; private party appearances are their second, and for some - main source of income. They charge very, very handily for them. The bigger and more famous you are, the more you charge. And Meladze, for example, is very big indeed.

Something else also, this particular judge is hated by many people in Krasnodar region, especially around Sochi, because, before the Olympics in 2014, she was the one who, responsible for that area back then, signed off on eviction orders that saw families thrown out by force from their homes, which were then demolished, to clear space for construction of the Olympic venues

And, like most Russian judges, she is corrupt as hell.

There are also crooked cops and judges in the West, I know, stuff happens everywhere.

But, at least here, they have to hide it, live in fear of consequences.

In Russia, there pretty much are NO consequences anymore, as long as you share your profits with your superiors and don't cross anyone more powerful than you. You can openly FLAUNT your ill gotten wealth like this... And most people don't even bother protesting this. They are used to it all now. Those who do speak out, are called traitors and such, accused of being paid by America to start trouble, and whatnot... And I mean, by fellow citizens, not just the government propaganda...

SergeyX2017, Jul 16, 2017

#630

Violent Violet Menace likes this.
gezvader28 Chosen One

Registered:

Mar 22, 2003

I know I shouldn't say it , but it sounds great ! I mean it just seems like it was written to be the new big tv drama :
Corruption
Millionaires
Sex
Political families
Gangsters
Pop Princesses
etc.

is it because they had such austere lives throughout most of the 20th century and now they're kinda going Babylonian / decadent crazy ? with all the new money coming in ?

gezvader28, Jul 17, 2017

#631

SergeyX2017 likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

gezvader28 said: ↑

I know I shouldn't say it , but it sounds great ! I mean it just seems like it was written to be the new big tv drama :
Corruption
Millionaires
Sex
Political families
Gangsters
Pop Princesses
etc.

is it because they had such austere lives throughout most of the 20th century and now they're kinda going Babylonian / decadent crazy ? with all the new money coming in ?
Click to expand...

It started in the 90s. Indeed, all this new stuff began coming in, after Communism went away. Foreign technology, appliances, electronics. Sony TVs were sold right out the back of trucks in Moscow, you have no idea. My dad got us one. For months after, I remember they would have friends over for parties and such, and everyone would gape at that thing. A Sony. A real bloody Sony. That was huge back then. You are absolutely right, people long used to constant shortages or even outright lack of many things back in Soviet Union became crazed from the sudden new abundance...

With privatization and such, a new class of rich people emerged, who had grabbed up factories or mines or whatever. "New Russians", they were called, "Novye Russkie".

The greediest, sleeziest, nastiest people made their way to the top back then. My own parents got kinda wealthy, because they had some connections in the government. But not at that New Russian level. You had to have powerful friends not just in government, but in the mafia too, people to protect you. Because it was often very violent back then, people were routinely killed over business. Still are, actually. In many regions farther from Moscow, they are still living in the 90s there...

I remember one episode, when some business rival was threatening my parents. They were into delivery of various items, mostly - purchased items from stores. He told them not to deliver to certain neighborhoods. They told him to go to hell. He had his gangster friends beat up one of their couriers. Put the guy in a coma, bastards... Well, did my parents call the police? No. Mom called a friend of hers, Uncle Nikolai, very close friend of our family. He was a big businessman from Solntsevo, a rough, tough Moscow suburb, also the home of Russia's most powerful mafia group, the Solntsevskaya Bratva, which, today, have about 5,000 men on the streets of Solntsevo alone (!); and majority of Russian mafia gangs outside the former USSR, in Europe and USA, claim affiliation with them too. Very scary people

Well, long story short, mom complained to Uncle Nikolai, who, I guess, talked to his friends in Solntsevo. And that other guy's mafia buddies must have then got a call from there that, you go after so and so (my parents) again, we'll cut you all into pieces and feed you to the wolves. And that was that Nobody bothered them again, ever...

The criminals, the thugs took over back then, and continue their hold...

And then, of course, there are the religious nutcases, the Orthodox Church. A mafia all of their own, squashing any especially foreign rivals and competors without mercy. Today, their chosen target are the Jehovah's Witnesses:

Russia's Supreme Court has ordered the disbanding of the Jehovah's Witnesses on Russian territory.

The ban came into effect after the court rejected an appeal by the religious group against a ruling in April which declared it to be extremist.

The justice ministry had argued that the group distributed pamphlets which incited hatred against other groups.

The group described the ruling as the end of religious freedom in Russia.

The denomination says it has 175,000 members in Russia - a country where it was persecuted during the Stalin era.

An estimated eight million people worldwide are part of the Christian-based movement, best known for going door-to-door looking for new converts.

The ruling means that the group's headquarters near St Petersburg and 395 local chapters will close.

It will be required to hand over all its properties, known as Kingdom Halls, to the Russian government.

The group's Russia spokesman, Yaroslav Sivulsky, said that "religious freedom in Russia is over".

"There were no real facts of any extremism on part of Jehovah's Witnesses. It's all about bad literature and intolerance. Now anyone who studies the Bible can be jailed," he said, quoted by Newsweek magazine.

One pamphlet distributed by the group quoted the novelist Leo Tolstoy as describing the doctrine of the Russian Orthodox Church as superstition and sorcery.

Officials have accused the religion of destroying families, propagating hatred and endangering lives. The Church had also joined calls for a ban.

The Jehovah's Witnesses group was founded in the United States in the 19th century.

They take most of the Bible literally and refuse blood transfusions. They are not seen by traditional Christian Churches as a mainstream denomination.

During Joseph Stalin's reign of terror in the Soviet Union it was outlawed and thousands of members were deported to Siberia. Other Christian groups were also persecuted.

As the Soviet Union collapsed, there was a revival of Christianity in Russia and the ban on Jehovah's Witnesses was lifted in 1991. But attitudes hardened again and in 2004 it was accused of recruiting children and preventing believers from accepting medical assistance.

Human rights group Sova has argued that an "official repressive campaign" has been conducted against the movement for years and many of their members have been physically attacked.

The Jehovah's Witnesses are expected to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, but Russia may well ignore any verdict in their favour.
Click to expand...

Russia Jehovah's Witnesses banned after they lose appeal - BBC News

Also: Jehovah's Witnesses Ban Appeal Rejected by Russia's Supreme Court, Allowing Government to Seize Worship Halls

About 5 days ago, in Surazh, Bryansk region, police arrested a woman from "Near Abroad" (that is - from another neighboring ex-Soviet republic, likely either Belarus or Ukraine, both of them border this region) for pestering and bothering locals, by going around knocking on people's doors and, allegedly, trying to convince them to join the JWs. She will have to pay a fine of 40,000 rubles (about $680): ?*??????? ????????? ??????????? ??????????? «?????????? ??????»

Then, there is this recent story from Crimea: Jehovah's Witness in Crimea 'ordered to renounce faith to be drafted into Russian army' | The Independent

And I have not found any updates about this fellow so far: JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES IN RUSSIA: DANISH CITIZEN FACES UP TO 10 YEARS IN PRISON AFTER BIBLE READING

I've read also of an arson of a JW building in the Urals somewhere. Bloody nationalist vigilantes getting involved too, awesome...

Mormon missionaries are also having to adapt, they cannot even call themselves "missionaries" anymore, they are "volunteers" now, at best, the American ones especially keeping their heads down: Mormonism's Russia dilemma: How to grow a fledgling faith with missionaries who can't do missionary work. | The Salt Lake Tribune

I do believe the ultimate goal is to squeeze these American denominations out of Russia entirely...

The Orthodox Church detests all Western Christianity, consider Baptists and Catholics heathens and heretics; let alone these ones... lol

SergeyX2017, Jul 17, 2017

#632

Violent Violet Menace and gezvader28 like this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny and a prominent former commander of Russia-backed separatists sparred over patriotism and the war in Ukraine in a debate that stoked widespread discussion and criticism among political players and watchers after it was announced last week.

Navalny drew censure from some in the liberal political camp for agreeing to the July 20 debate against Igor Girkin, a key figure in the early stages of the war between Kyiv’s forces and Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Known widely by the nom de guerre “Strelkov,” Girkin has previously said that self-declared separatist authorities in eastern Ukraine executed individuals accused of looting. Documents uncovered by U.S. journalists in eastern Ukraine indicate Girkin signed off on at least three executions.

The debate, which was broadcast on Navalny’s YouTube channel and an Internet TV channel affiliated with Strelkov, came amid Navalny’s bid to run in next year’s presidential election, which is expected to hand President Vladimir Putin another six-year term.

It revealed little new about Navalny's positions on Putin’s government, the battle against corruption, and Western sanctions against Russia over its actions in Ukraine, which the opposition leader says should target Putin’s inner circle but not the broader Russian economy.

But the debate did give a wider platform for Girkin, an ultranationalist and reactionary with a penchant for war reenactments who has become increasingly critical of Putin since leaving eastern Ukraine in August 2014.

Girkin accused Putin in the debate of insufficient support for Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, whose war with Kyiv’s forces has killed more than 10,000 people since April 2014. He said Navalny, like Putin, would “betray” Russia’s interests in the region as well if he came to power.

Girkin once famously said that he, not Putin, was “the one who pulled the trigger of war," and Navalny accused him in the debate of starting a conflict that has drained Russia of resources.

“The war that you started is an expensive thing that destroyed the Russian economy,” Navalny said, adding that a 2015 cease-fire and peace deal known as the Minsk agreements is the only mechanism for resolving the conflict.

Kyiv, the United States, the EU, and NATO accuse Russia of backing the separatists in eastern Ukraine with weapons, cash, and soldiers. Russia denies involvement in the fighting despite substantial evidence of such support.

Girkin and Navalny, who repeatedly argued over who is more patriotic, did find common ground on Putin's government: Both called it a corrupt and “oligarchic” system.

'Officer's Honor'

Anyone hoping that Girkin might use the debate to shed light on Russia’s role in the conflict was likely left disappointed. He repeated his earlier account that he was forced out of eastern Ukraine under certain conditions that he declined to reveal.

Citing an “officer’s honor,” he also declined to elaborate on how the separatists were financed, saying only that weapons were taken from Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula after it was seized by Russia in early 2014.

Navalny made good on his pledge ahead of the debate to ask Girkin who was responsible for shooting down a passenger jet over separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine in July 2014, an incident in which all 298 people aboard were killed.

“I can’t make any other comments. I didn’t take part in the investigation, and I’m not interested in it,” Girkin said, while also repeating his claim that the separatists did not have weapons capable of shooting down the Malaysia Airlines plane.

A Dutch-led international investigation concluded in September 2016 that a Russian-made Buk missile system used to shoot the airliner had been brought into Ukraine from Russia shortly before the plane’s downing and then quickly spirited back to Russia afterward. The investigation said the missile was fired from a field in separatist-held territory.

Russia has repeatedly sought to cast doubt on evidence of its involvement in the downing of the plane.

'War Criminal'

Girkin publicly challenged Navalny to a debate earlier this month. After accepting the offer, Navalny drew criticism from some Russian liberals and opposition activists who said he should not engage with a “war criminal.”

"Only a state prosecutor in court should hold a dialogue and discussion with him," Boris Vishnevsky, a veteran liberal politician and local St. Petersburg lawmaker, said in an interview with RFE/RL last week.

Russian photographer Yevgeny Feldman, who has traveled around Russia with Navalny to document the opposition leader’s presidential bid, also criticized Navalny’s decision.

"I can understand holding a discussion with politicians who have even the craziest of views. I can’t understand debating someone who executes the unarmed," Feldman wrote on Twitter.

Asked by the debate's moderator, prominent journalist Mikhail Zygar, whether Girkin is a "war criminal," Navalny said that is for a court to decide.

Vishenevsky and others suggested Navalny’s motive for participating was to attract support from Russian nationalists, a base that he has previously flirted with, including by participating in an annual rally of ultranationalists in Moscow several years ago.

Navalny said prior to the debate that he agreed to square off against Girkin because he wanted to demonstrate that his political positions are "truly patriotic."

Zygar at times seemed disappointed with the event.

The author of a well-respected book on Putin’s Kremlin, Zygar said he was not impressed with the first round of the discussion, about corruption.

Before the closing comments, he said: “It wasn’t much of a show.”
Click to expand...

Navalny Clashes With Ex-Commander Of Russia-Backed Separatists

It was interesting to watch them testily argue over which one of them is the bigger, real Russian nationalist.

Western media, today, likes to present Navalny as this progressive, liberal anti-Putin.

But Russia and Russian politics are very different from the West. Even the majority of actual liberals in Russia, for example, would never endorse something like gay marriage. Plenty of Russian liberals, including Navalny, spout xenophobic and racist crap about ethnic minorities, especially migrants from Central Asia and Caucasus, accusing them of high crime rates, that they are all drug dealers, and all kinds of other bs...

You can't get away from the fact that Navalny had, for years, regularly attended the ultranationalist, white supremacist, neo Nazi annual "Russian March" in Moscow, walked under the black, yellow, and white Royal Tricolor of the Romanov Dynasty, which is the flag of the far right in Russia today

He was close to Dmitry Demushkin back then

among others.

He later distanced himself from the nationalists, after moving closer with the pro-Western liberals.

But, yesterday, at the debate, he did attempt to, subtly, throw his old nationalist cred at Strelkov, after the latter questioned his nationalism and patriotism. I stood up to defend the Russian people way back then, said Navalny, and what did you do?

Strelkov put him down, reminding him that he had fought in Chechnya back in the 90s

and before that - in Transnistria

And also Yugoslavia and other places. While Navalny was busy goofing off in college

"I defended the Russian people and their interests, and not only with my mouth." ("Unlike you", he left unsaid lol)

He also asked why Navalny hadn't spoken out in support of Demushkin, when he was recently jailed for two years by the government

and of other nationalist leaders Putin has thrown behind bars, such as Alexander Belov-Potkin

Navalny responded that he, in fact, constantly voices support for ALL political prisoners, nationalists and anyone else, and freeing those people is one of the reasons he is fighting for the Presidency.

In fact, he did, certainly, rail against one of his own supporters (who happens to be a nationalist) being sentenced to 2.5 years couple days ago, after participating in the March protests: Navalny Protester Sentenced to 2.5 Years in Prison

Strelkov, meanwhile, really showed himself as an extremist, a fanatic, who dreams of uniting "all the Russian people", meaning, in his grand vision, Russia would have to invade and annex all of Belarus, half of Ukraine, as well as the Northern provinces of Kazakhstan, which also have overwhelmingly ethnic Russian populations... If it were up to him, Strelkov would ignote a huge cataclysmic war...

And he tried to, in Ukraine where he made himself the commander of all the rebel militias

But the Russian government betrayed him, he says. He sees the current leaders of DNR and LNR as nothing more than some local criminals and thugs. He is not wrong, Igor Plotnitsky, head of LNR today, certainly is known to have substantial ties in the mafia in both Ukraine and Russia lol

He also swears he did not post any online messages celebrating, or even announcing the shootdown of MH-17. Says he has never in his life used Twitter or any other social networks

Nobody can really understand the point of this whole debate...

I mean, Navalny is trying to press the government to allow him to run in the Presidential Election next year. Great. He is a potential candidate.

So... Why debate Strelkov, who is not a candidate in anything???

For Strelkov himself, the reasons are easy enough to see.

He is doing okay, back in Russia. Trying to start a new life.

Even got married, couple years ago, to some girl from Rostov, for 3rd time in his life

Last thing he wants (and something the government is probably indeed considering), is to be scapegoated for the MH-17 thing. If that investigation goes far enough, it may become convenient for Putin to just say Strelkov had the missiles and ordered the strike on the plane and he, alone, is responsible. And then arrest him and hand him off to the Dutch or the Australians or the ****ing Malaysians, whoever wants him the most.

To prevent this, Strelkov needs to maintain as high a profile of himself as he possibly can. Keep his face on TV and in the papers and keep people talking about him. Make it more difficult, politically, for the Kremlin to just disown and disavow him

It has been working so far lol

But, the question is, what is in this for Navalny??? Trying to attract the nationalist vote, admittedly a BIG block in Russia? But, not all nationalists like Strelkov, many, in fact, do NOT. Some (who support Putin and the separatist republics in Ukraine) see him as a coward who ran away from the fight over there, deserted his comrades. Others, mainly the Pan-Slavists, who support Ukraine as a brother nation, see him as a fratricidal war criminal...

So... I don't see how associating with Strelkov would help Navalny attract that much nationalist support either...

Just, weird, that he would do this, now...

Meanwhile:

Germany’s flagship manufacturing firm Siemens has suspended cooperation with Russian state companies following reports that its electricity turbines were delivered to Crimea, in violation of European Union sanctions.

In an online statement published Friday, Siemens said Russia had “illegally moved to Crimea against clear contractual agreements” four gas turbines the firm delivered for a project on the Russian mainland in Taman.

Siemens said it is pressing charges against the Russian contractor, Technopromexport (TPE).

The German company also said it is suspending deliveries of power generation equipment to Russian state companies, terminating a license agreement with Russian companies for the supply of equipment for power stations, and divesting a minority interest in the Russian company, Interautomatika.

The Reuters news agency reported several weeks ago that Siemens-made turbines had been used in the construction of two power plants on the Crimean peninsula, which was annexed by Russia in March 2014. The power plants are seen as crucial to reduce Crimea’s dependence on power supplies from Ukraine.

Reuters said at the time the delivery might have taken place without Siemens’ knowledge, which the company has since confirmed.

Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday declined to comment on Siemens' announcement.

"This is a matter for the companies involved, and dialogue and cooperation will continue along those lines," he said.
Click to expand...

Siemens Cuts Ties With Russian State Companies Over Crimea Breach

Again, 2018 Presidential Election coming up. For Putin - more important to fulfil all the promises he made to the people in Crimea; than any commitments with Siemens...

Also, an interesting article about the pizza business in Russia: Global pizza brands battle for Russia's far-flung regions

SergeyX2017, Jul 21, 2017

#633

Violent Violet Menace likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

MOSCOW - Russia's General Staff says it has deployed military police to monitor the cease-fire in a safe zone in the eastern suburbs of Syria's Damascus.

The zone is one of four proposed in a plan approved in May by Russia, Iran, which supports Syrian President Bashar Assad, and Turkey, which backs rebels fighting his forces. Under the Russian plan, Assad's air force would halt flights over designated areas across the war-torn country.

Col. Gen. Sergei Rudskoi told a news conference Monday that Russia set up two check-points and four monitoring posts in the area known as eastern Ghouta. The Russian Defence Ministry last week said that the Syrian government and the opposition reached an agreement on the boundaries of the zone, several days after bombardment and airstrikes in the area.
Click to expand...

Russia deploys military police at 'safe zone' in Syria | CTV News

Israeli media also notes that the Russians have set up a post near the Golan Heights too, with Israel informed about it in advance: Russian military police deploy close to Israel's Golan Heights to monitor safe zones - Arab-Israeli Conflict - Jerusalem Post

And here, today, some Syrians, allegedly rebels, surrender themselves to Russian troops with MP sleeve identification in northern Hama area, who, apparently, run this joint checkpoint with Assad's army

Pictures: More rebels surrender to Syrian Army in north Hama

Also, a Russian news broadcast earlier today shows MP troops at what the lady says are safe zone checkpoints together with Syrian army

While the checkpoints are "joint", it is implied quite plainly that the Russians are the ones in charge, the Syrian troops - subordinate to them.

I wonder if this has anything to do with Trump's shutting off the CIA support to the rebels. A deal: Russia steps up to secure Syria (and they, instead of the US, get to shoulder all the costs of that), and the US stop supporting forces opposed to them there.

Syria is an even bigger and more complex mess than Iraq. I can totally understand Trump wanting someone else to sort it out lol

SergeyX2017, Jul 25, 2017

#634
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Respects to all Navy vets of any country today, it Navy Day in Russia.

Big parade in St. Petersburg, full video

Large anti-submarine destroyer "Vice-Admiral Kulakov"

My uncle served on this ship, years ago...

Massive nuclear-powered battle-cruiser "Peter the Great", largest and mightiest warship on Earth, aside from aircraft carriers, the flagship of the Russian Navy (yes, NOT the carrier Kuznetsov; Russians actually don't have the respect for carriers, the way Americans do)

And huge nuclear sub "Dmitry Donskoi" (last of the Soviet Typhoons, remember Red October?)

Also, two Chinese warships, including the destroyer Hefei, visited St. Petersburg today and took part in the parade, they are in the big video, right before "Peter the Great". The Chinese ships had been out in the Baltic earlier, in joint drills with the Russian Navy, for first time ever.

SergeyX2017, Jul 30, 2017

#635
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

MOSCOW, July 31. /TASS/. On July 31, American rock musician Marilyn Manson will stage a concert in Moscow’s Stadium club, the club’s press service said.

Manson is currently on tour in support of his new album called Heaven Upside Down. After the Moscow gig, he will perform in Ukraine, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, France, the United States, Sweden, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Austria, Italy and the United Kingdom.

In the summer of 2014, Manson’s shows in Moscow and the Siberian city of Novosibirsk were cancelled. His performance at the Park Live festival at VDNKh in Moscow was called off due to a bomb scare while some Orthodox Christian activists protested against his concert in Novosibirsk lambasting him for allegedly promoting homosexuality. However, Novosibirsk Mayor Anatoly Lokot said that according to prosecutors there was nothing wrong with Manson’s songs. Since the show was scheduled during the festival of City Day, when municipal services and law enforcement officials were going to have their hands full with keeping order during the local celebrations, the concert had to be postponed. In the end, the city administration put forward other dates for the concert but the singer’s management said he was unable to perform in Novosibirsk on suggested days.

Marilyn Manson is musician Brian Hugh Warner’s stage name formed by juxtaposing the names of the US actress Marilyn Monroe and notorious murderer Charles Manson. In 1989, Warner founded an industrial rock band Marilyn Manson which has so far released nine studio albums and received a number of music awards including four Grammys.
Click to expand...

TASS: Society & Culture - Renowned American rocker Marilyn Manson to stage concert in Moscow

Manson had some great adventures in Russia back in 2014.

Lots of Orthodox believers didn't want this "satanic sodomite" to come "corrupt our children", as the ladies' sign says

There were such protests all over the place.

In Novosibirsk, however, the "protest" consisted of a large group of young tough guys, apparently Orthodox nationalists, who came and blocked the entrance to the venue

After some Manson fans attempted to push past the Orthodox hoodlums, and fights broke out, the authorities placated the Orthodox and shut it all down, for everyone's safety.

At least the Mayor Anatoly Lokot

spoke out against them. I commend him for that. Takes balls in Russia these days, to openly say something against the Church, even if he couldn't do anything about it anyway... Lokot, of course, is a Communist, loyal member of the Party, as that red flag on his desk attests. Life long Communist, in fact, was in the Communist youth groups as a teen, back in the USSR... He is an atheist and hates the Church, like most Commies, though is powerless against them, as things stand.

In Moscow, meanwhile, someone (likely other outraged Orthodox) phoned in a bomb threat to disrupt the big concert there.

Later, Orthodox "activists" chased Manson and his musicians from the concert venue, here is Manson running

to their bus

Obscenities and raw eggs were hurled at them the whole time.

Leading those ones was Dmitry Enteo, a notorious Orthodox radical

Enteo and his goons have violently disrupted gay rights demonstrations; forcibly took over the stage at a theater play they felt insulted the Orthodox Christian faith (beating up an actor who confronted them), stormed and trashed abortion clinics on several occasions, and ran amoc in a museum which also dared put up an exhibition that offended the Church, vandalizing and destroying numerous exhibits. Oh, and they also physically attacked people at a Pastafarian protest march. Among other things. Nice guys, in short lol

Gonna be very interesting to see what happens now. There is even more of a nationalistic and anti-Western climate in Russia these days... Manson is kind of foolish for going back there, honestly...

SergeyX2017, Jul 31, 2017

#636

gezvader28 and Violent Violet Menace like this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

The daughter of President Vladimir Putin's long-serving spokesman has become something of a social media star thanks to her continuous stream of glamorous selfies on Instagram.

So Liza Peskova's decision to visit a run-down shipyard in the disputed territory of Crimea was bound to cause a splash.

Images of Ms Peskova - immaculately dressed - touring the drab, industrial surroundings drew a lot of attention, and a fair amount of mockery, on Russian social media.

In a recent post she said she had been informed that the yard in Sevastopol was experiencing serious difficulties, and had decided to visit at the request of staff.

She had recently told her more than 50,000 followers of the "great happiness" it brings her to "have the opportunity to at least slightly improve the world by helping people".

During the visit, she reportedly discussed staffing problems at the yard, and the need to attract younger people to the ship-building industry.

"I am impressed by the diversity of nature, the beauty of the souls of people worried about their enterprise and the uniqueness of the geographical location of the region," she wrote.

But not everyone seemed impressed by her interest in the shipping industry.

One Twitter user said: "The circus with 19-year-old daughter of Peskova, summoned from Paris to solve the problems of a ship-building yard, is a cynical mockery by the Kremlin over the people."

Popular blogger Rustem Adagamov tweeted: "Peskova is solving the problems of the Sevastopol ship-building yard in a dress created by a fashion house in Grozny".

Others wondered why she was sent to help the plant. "Is there no-one in Russia, apart from Peskov's daughter, to send to the ship-building yard in Crimea? The nepotism in power circles is driving me nuts," wrote another commentator.

Click to expand...

http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-40813502

Dmitry Peskov is Vladimir Putin's press secretary

He is known for his affinity for very expensive watches, which he collects like some folks collect postal stamps or something

Also, back in 2015, he and his new wife, the gorgeous figure skater Tatyana Navka, purchased a mansion at Rublyovka, the most elite suburb of Moscow, their Beverly Hills or whatever, for about $7,800,000

So, yeah, being Putin's spokesman pays a heck of a lot better than Spicer or Scaramucci's job lol

His mustache has its own Twitter account, which often mocks the government lol

"Sandy" is what his name translates from Russian, btw.

Back in 2014, I am not sure it was a joke or something, but Peskov, on his own, real Twitter page, issued an actual denial of this

"My mustache does not, in fact, have own Twitter. Please pass around this information." Guy does have a sense of humor... Though, I heard that if they don;t find a way to shut down that page soon enough, Putin may even order him to shave that thing off, he is getting damn tired of the insolence hehe

Anyway, Peskov's most prized possession, however, more dear to him that his watches, mansion, the new trophy wife, or even his 'stache; is his oldest daughter from previous marriage, Elizaveta, now 19

Liza Peskova first stepped out into (and completely dazzled) Moscow's high society at 17, at the 2015 debutante ball, where she was, by far, the most desired young lady

At the ball, she met Yuri Mesheryakov, son of a billionaire, one of Putin's oligarchs

They are now engaged to be married soon, and it will be, it is said, perhaps the grandest wedding in modern Russia

(and that's saying a lot, in a country where a simple corrupt local judge can throw a $2 million wedding for her daughter, see previous post in this thread lol)

I think those two are lucky. They, at least, seem really, genuinely heads-over-heels in love, and very happy with one another. These debutante balls don't always work out that way. These young people from rich and powerful families get paired up, thrown together, and nobody gives a damn about who YOU are, its all about who your parents are. You could end up coupled with and engaged to someone you can't stand, someone who, say, sweats all the time, and stinks, and has awful breath too, and you can;t bloody stand them; but have to marry them, because that is what your parents want, because it provides some financial or political advantage to the family... Lots of nasty, loveless marriages come out of these things... Normal kids from regular, poor Russian families are more free this way, they can date and sleep around with whoever they please, at least lol

Anyway, back to Liza. The girl seems to be being groomed for much bigger things than just marriage. She is already getting involved in national politics.

She has used her social media to criticize some aspects of Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin's plans to renovate the city's downtown core

Interestingly, Sobyanin heeded her advice (mainly about widening sidewalks in some areas). Some say, that was actually the Kremlin itself subtly voicing its wishes to Sobyanin, through Liza and her online posts lol

She is also engaging in an online war of words with the ultraconservative St. Petersburg politician Vitaly Milonov (the author of the gay propaganda laws, among other things), over his ongoing proposal to restrict internet access for children under 14, which Liza thinks is insane and has openly said as much, online and on TV.

And, recently, she visited Chechnya, danced with Ramzan Kadyrov at his palace

and was given a tour of their grand mosque

(not a word about the extrajudicial executions and such, and the anti-gay purges going on over there, of course lol)

And right now, today, she is in Crimea, with a whole delegation of Russian businessmen, on a mission, supposedly to identify industries and fields for economic development.

Earlier today, visiting that shipbuilding factory to "improve their communications with the government", believe it or not

haha

I'd like to see Ivanka Trump stroll around a filthy shipyard in a beautiful long dress (designed by Kadyrov's daughter, btw), and come back out flawless, not a stain on her. Now THAT takes skills! lol

Later, she went riding around on the sea on a nice boat

She used to go to France a lot: her mom, Peskov's previous wife, is married now to some rich French guy. Liza would keep on jetting between Moscow and Paris all the time, I believe she even studied there, in France, for a bit.

But she is all patriotic now, and seems to be staying in Russia for good.

She has lots of fans. Yes, some people despise her, like all the elites. But she is too damn hot for many not to love her

Many guys "follow" her Instagram for the bikini pics alone

hehe

I believe she is now an important part of the Kremlin's outreach to youth. She may be an overprivileged, entitled rich brat; but she is also young, social media savvy, and, again, has great sex appeal to attract the kids with, if not much else lol They follow her on Instagram and Twitter and such, and she pushes propaganda on them between the lines and the photos... Ingenious, really, in an evil, twisted way...

SergeyX2017, Aug 3, 2017

#637

Violent Violet Menace likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

(Reuters) - The European Union on Friday imposed sanctions on three more Russians, including Deputy Energy Minister Andrei Cherezov, and three Russian companies over the delivery of Siemens' turbines to Moscow-annexed Crimea.

The EU first introduced sanctions on Russia after the 2014 military takeover of the Black Sea peninsula from Kiev, and stepped them up repeatedly as Moscow then backed separatist unrest in the east of Ukraine.

The latest tightening comes in response to the delivery of Siemens' (SIEGn.DE) gas turbines to Crimea in violation of EU sanctions, which bar doing business there since the annexation that has not been internationally recognized.

Siemens says it has evidence that all four turbines it delivered for a project in southern Russia had been illegally moved to Crimea.

The Kremlin spokesman declined to comment earlier on Friday.

After the EU announced the move, the state RIA news agency quoted Vladimir Dzhabarov, a deputy head of the international affairs committee of Russia's upper house of parliament, as saying Siemens operations in Russia may be curbed in response.

The EU also said the blacklisted companies include Siemens' two Russian contractors that moved the turbines.

EU's 28 states must be unanimous to go ahead with sanctions and diplomatic sources said Italy's opposition meant a fourth name had to be dropped from the initial German proposal.

Diplomats in Brussels said the Russian energy ministry official is involved in bilateral cooperation with Italy and has since escaped being sanctioned. The Italian representation in Brussels did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Other EU sanctions on Russia target its energy, financial and arms sectors. The latest additions complement a blacklist that already contains 150 people and 37 entities subject to an asset freeze and a travel ban over the turmoil in Ukraine.

More than three years of coordinated EU and U.S. sanctions, however, have not forced a change of hand in Moscow, which vows to never give back Crimea and still supports the armed conflict in east Ukraine which has killed more than 10,000 people.

(Additional reporting by POlina Devitt in Moscow, Writing by Gabriela Baczynska, Editing by Angus MacSwan)
Click to expand...

Russian deputy minister blacklisted in new EU sanctions over Siemens turbines to Crimea

Many regular Russians are thrilled about this, based on online comments. People had wanted the rich bastards, the "elites", banned from owning properties and assets and travelling abroad altogether for many years. Now, it's finally happening lol

SergeyX2017, Aug 4, 2017

#638
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Ukrainian prosecutors had begun legal proceedings against the German techno band Scooter, and it faces significant legal consequences for performing at a festival in Crimea on August 4, the Ukrainian ambassador to Germany said.

Ukrainian envoy Andriy Melnyk said on Facebook and in an interview with the Funke Mediengruppe newspaper chain that the band's decision to enter Crimea, which Russia annexed illegally in 2014, was "not only a scandal, but also a crime with serious legal consequences."

The band appeared at the ZBFest rock festival in Balaklava.

"This isn't some minor infraction, but a serious crime that will be punished," Melnyk told the newspaper chain.

Ukrainian prosecutors said the band's members were warned against going to Crimea and could face up to eight years in prison.

"Such illegal actions committed by foreign citizens and world celebrities, who can...influence the opinion of their fans, impede Ukraine's efforts towards restoring its territorial integrity," the prosecutor's office said.

Scooter front man H.P. Baxxte said last month the band was going to Crimea to perform music for its fans there, not engage in politics.

No comment was immediately available from the band on the prosecutor's charges.
Click to expand...

Ukraine Takes Legal Action Against German Band Over Crimea Concert

Ukraine should really stop embarrassing themselves... Nobody cares about their prosecutors. Try acting with dignity, for once...

SergeyX2017, Aug 4, 2017

#639
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Most of what I write about Russia here tends to be negative.

Here, for a change, are a few good things happening there today and recently:

The Moscow City Court on Tuesday canceled plans to deport the gay Uzbek journalist Khudoberdi Nurmatov, following outcry from human rights defenders.

Nurmatov, who writes under the pen name Ali Feruz for the investigative Novaya Gazeta newspaper, was detained in early August. The Basmanny Court recently ruled he would be deported to his native Uzbekistan for violating migration rules.

The move caused alarm among human rights defenders who argued Nurmatov was facing almost certain imprisonment in Uzbekistan, where homosexuality is a punishable offense. The journalist reportedly attempted to commit suicide while in detention.

Last week, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) said it would be illegal for Nurmatov to be deported, until the Court had reviewed his case.

The Moscow Court on Tuesday cited the ruling as influencing its decision to halt Nurmatov’s deportation, the RBC news outlet reported from the courtroom. In the meantime, Nurmatov will be held in Moscow's Sakharovo special detention center for foreign citizens, RBC reports.

The Moscow court's decision was not a given. According to a Russian law passed in 2015, the country’s Constitutional Court is allowed to overturn ECHR rulings.

Moscow police detained Nurmatov on Aug. 1 during a routine document check near the Novaya Gazeta newspaper’s office.

Nurmatov, who has no official identity documents since 2012, had applied for asylum in Russia, but his request was refused.
Click to expand...

Russian Court Overturns Order to Deport Gay Journalist to Uzbekistan

Nurmatov was born in Russia, btw. Had his mother, at least, been ethnic Russian (regardless if a Russian citizen herself), he'd have received citizenship by birth, automatically. In fact, any child born to a Russian woman anywhere in the world is entitled automatically to Russian citizenship.

Here is a family of a Syrian father and Russian mother, who were evacuated to Moscow by the Russian Emergencies Ministry, allowed in because mom is Russian, and the boys are also considered such by extension

Dozens of such families have been repatriated from Syria, Yemen, Palestine...

But, in this case, both his parents are Uzbeks, so, he was born and remained a citizen of Uzbekistan. And a gay on top of that. Twice undesirable, in the eyes of most Russian nationalists...

But, at least he is not gonna be deported. For now.

And, a well known leftwing opposition leader has been released from prison:

A left-wing activist convicted for organizing mass anti-Kremlin protests in 2012 was released on Tuesday after serving out his term.

Left Front leader Sergei Udaltsov, who was accused of plotting mass riots across Russia, spent 4.5 years in a penal colony in the Tambov region in central Russia after being denied parole in March 2016.

In a Facebook post announcing the news of Udaltsov’s release, his wife Anastasia described him as “full of optimism and positive emotions."

He plans to hold a news conference on Wednesday in Moscow.

Udaltsov was convicted alongside Leonid Razvozzhayev in July 2014 for organizing mass protests on the eve of Vladimir Putin’s inauguration. The May 6, 2012, protest resulted in violent clashes between protesters and riot police and dozens were later charged in a string of cases known as the Bolotnaya case.

Human rights activists have denounced the cases as politically motivated.
Click to expand...

Udaltsov Walks Free After More Than 4 Years of Jail for Anti-Kremlin Protests

Udaltsov led the Left Front, a radical, dissident alternative to the mainstream Communist Party

In 2012, after being one of the main leaders of the huge protests against Putin's return to the Presidency, he was arrested at home by masked FSB agents

He was accused of extremism, plotting a coup to overthrow the government and seize power for himself. Spent the years since then at a prison camp in Siberia.

Now, they let him out. His movement is pretty much dead now. With his criminal record, he can't participate in any election. He is no longer a threat, basically. A crushed, broken man, even if he hasn't completely given up (we'll see what he has to say at that conference, if it happens...)

This is another way Putin neutralizes opponents, other than simply killing them outright...

But, at least he is free, finally

And, Pussy Riot are back!

Members of the band were detained in Siberia during the weekend, protesting the imprisonment on trumped up "terrorism" charges of a Ukrainian man from Crimea who is locked up for, basically, refusing to accept Russian rule

Pussy Riot political protest duo detained in Siberia

Also, Russia and Canada had a good old hockey brawl, and in Sochi, no less

When it comes to hockey rivalries, Canada versus Russia has never been lacking ill will.

The time of year doesn’t seem to matter, either.

On Monday, as Team Canada faced Team Russia at the Sochi Hockey Open, a line brawl broke out near the Canadian bench, resulting in fight majors for Canada’s Justin Azevedo and Russia’s Mikhail Grigorenko.

Despite holding a decisive 36-22 edge in shots on goal, Canada lost to Russia 3-2 and will finish the preliminary round at 1-1.

Canada’s men’s national team, coached by former Canucks bench boss Willie Desjardins, has a number of tournament competitions, including the Sochi Hockey Open, lined up between now and the end of December prior to the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang.

Up next for the Canadian contingent, according to Hockey Canada, is the Tournament of Nikolai Puchkov from Aug. 14-17 in St. Petersburg.

“These first two events allow us to continue a player evaluation process that began last season with our Deutschland Cup and Spengler Cup teams,” said vice-president of hockey operations and national men’s teams Scott Salmond, per Hockey Canada.

“We will continue to look at the best available players to us – these two tournaments being the next opportunity to see some of the talent we can select from.”
Click to expand...

Video: Line brawl breaks out between Canada and Russia at Sochi Hockey Open - ProHockeyTalk

And that's the secondary Russian team too, I understand. No big names. I am sure Ovechkin, for one, wishes he was there, dude lives for this kind of thing lol

Man, I had no idea there are so many international hockey tournaments these days... Two in Russia alone. Jesus... How the hell did they pick out players 40 years ago, I wonder???

Putin was in Abkhazia today, meeting with their President Raul Khadjimba

PITSUNDA, Georgia (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia on Tuesday and assured it of Moscow's military support, an act of defiance to Western governments that have condemned Russia's backing for the separatists.

Abkhazia and another Georgian region, South Ossetia, threw off Tbilisi's control in fighting in the early 1990s. Putin has stepped up military, economic and political support for the separatist regions in the past few years.
Putin arrived in Abkhazia's Black Sea resort of Pitsunda a week after U.S. Vice-President Mike Pence visited Tbilisi and issued a condemnation of the Russian presence on Georgian territory.

At a meeting with Raul Khadzhimba, leader of the separatist administration, Putin said Moscow was committed to building up a joint Russian-Abkhaz military contingent to ensure the security of people in Abkhazia.

"The most important thing is that we have entirely special relations with Abkhazia," Putin said at the meeting.

"We reliably guarantee the security, self-sufficiency and independence of Abkhazia. I am sure that will continue to be the case."

Putin's visit coincided with the ninth anniversary of a flare-up in fighting in South Ossetia, which led to Russia sending in troops and also recognizing both South Ossetia and Abkhazia as sovereign states. Most other countries still consider them part of Georgia.

Russia said it had to act in 2008 to defend civilians in both entities from Georgian military attacks. Western governments say Russia fomented the separatist conflicts to frustrate Georgia's drive to join NATO and the European Union.

Speaking to Reuters after laying flowers on the graves of Georgian soldiers who died in 2008, Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili said: "Today, while grieving about the losses we have had during this tragedy, we see the president of the Russian Federation visiting Georgian Abkhazia."

He said Putin's visit was "a violation of international law and trying to legitimize the historical injustice that the Russian Federation committed against Georgia".

A NATO spokesman said Putin's trip should have been agreed with the Georgian authorities beforehand.

"President Putin's visit to the Abkhazia region of Georgia — on the ninth anniversary of the armed conflict — is detrimental to international efforts to find a peaceful and negotiated settlement," the spokesman said in an emailed statement.
Click to expand...

Putin vows continued Russian support for Georgia's rebel Abkhazia

Russia is definitely expanding its control over Abkhazia.

All Russian citizens in Abkhazia (which is most of the population, today, pretty much every Abkhazian has a Russian passport now) will, from now on, have access to Russian health insurance:

At Putin’s meeting, the Russian and Abkhazian health ministers signed an agreement to extend Russian government health insurance to Russian citizens living in Abkhazia. Effectively, all residents of Abkhazia can obtain Russian citizenship.
Click to expand...

NATO criticizes Putin visit to disputed Georgia territory - POLITICO

Russian health ministry has already announced it is opening offices in Abkhazia where people can come apply for and receive their insurance documents

https://ria.ru/amp/society/20170808/1500024868.html

The customs and border enforcement arrangements will also change, if not disappear altogether, I am hearing. Basically, Abkhazia is indeed being further integrated (or annexed, if you will lol) into Russia, today.

Meanwhile, some interesting stuff about Russian Twitter bots:

Political activists have discovered that bots and trolls linked to Russia are seeking to influence US politics yet again, in the hopes of pressuring the House Speaker Paul Ryan to resign.

The Alliance for Securing Democracy, a transatlantic project run by former US national security officials and funded by nonpartisan American public policy think tank German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF), has observed an unusual spike in activity on Twitter over the last 48 hours.

Twitter accounts known to be Russian-linked bots have been spamming the hashtag #ResignPaulRyan, causing it to surge in popularity. Meanwhile, Ryan toured flood-damaged areas in Wisconsin and tried to allay concerns of Republican voters.
Click to expand...

More: Russian Twitter bots troll Speaker of the House of Representatives Paul Ryan

Meanwhile, a "super-fan" whom Trump personally Tweeted thanks to on Saturday, might, in fact, also be a Russian bot: The curious case of ‘Nicole Mincey,’ the Trump fan who may actually be a bot

And, finally, a supermarket employee attacks 10 year old boy in the suburbs of Moscow today, supposedly because he was on his skateboard inside the store

Kept coming after him, until other, grown up customers intervened and dragged her away from the kid...

Most people online support the kid. So did the store management: the woman has been fired; and they gave the boy a new skateboard (I guess she broke his one in the confrontation...) and a big bag of candy, as compensation for it all; though his parents reportedly are still threatening to sue them...

Some, though, think the boy may have provoked the employee, by riding around the store on his board and generally being disrespectful, as too many Russian youth sadly are, these days...

Who knows...

This Russian supermarket chain, Pyatyorochka, has a bad reputation in general, especially in and around Moscow (they have stores all over the country). There have been violent incidents with their security guards.

This young man

had his spinal cord damaged earlier this year by a Pyatyorochka plainclothes undercover security guard putting him into an arm bar/choke-hold, after accusing him of shoplifting

Last year, a Pyatyorochka guard in St. Petersburg was accused of shoving this old babushka to the ground outside a store last year

It actually sparked a wider violent disturbance, as other men, passers by, in turn attacked the guard and another guard came to his colleague's defense and a big fight erupted. One of the guards was stabbed in the melee, as I recall. Police ended up arresting a bunch of people, in the end, on both sides. Russians actually do not appreciate mistreatment and physical abuse of elderly citizens, funnily enough... Go figure lol

Also last year, this man says four security guards at a Moscow Pyatyorochka attacked him and beat him bloody after he forgot to pay for a bottle of juice and carried it outside the store

And in 2015, this boy was apparently hit with a Taser/stun stick by a Pyatyorochka security guard whop accused him of stealing ice cream

The man was arrested. The case sparked accusations of racism from the Roma/Gypsy community, of whom boy is from, because they are sadly often stereotyped as thieves, although most are perfectly good people...

Basically, something needs to be done about that whole damn chain IMHO

That's all for Russia news for today. Enjoy

SergeyX2017, Aug 8, 2017

#640

Violent Violet Menace likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Two stories I read this weak:

1.) This old man, Alexander Ditter, 67, was never rich to begin with. He is a military vet, living off his army pension and whatever he can earn doing odd jobs; he is raising his granddaughter, Katya, 7, on his own, since his son is in prison and her mom, his daughter in law, died in childbirth. And then, crooked local officials there, in Krasnoyarsk, Siberia, went and demolished his house, because an equally crooked, greedy developer paid them off to make space for his project.

So, now, they live in an abandoned old bus, in the middle of a God damned dump site!

http://ngs24.ru/news/more/50948351/

2.) This one shocked me:

Mother in heart-rending nationwide appeal to find loving mother and father she can trust to raise her boy when she is gone.

Svetlana Maximova, 26, knows she doesn't have long to live.

'I try not to look in the mirror, I'm constantly losing my hair and weight,' she said. 'I can get paralysed any moment now.'

Her only goal left is to find a good family for her beloved son Artem, who is thankfully clear of the HIV virus, but has no idea his mother is soon to die.

'I feel worse and worse every day,' she said. 'I want to find a normal family for my child.

'I want to be sure that my son will get everything he needs - toys and studies and as he grows up, his new parents can give him all that I will not be able to.'

She candidly confessed: 'There were several times when I wished I could take just as many pills as possible. But when I hear the voice of my son, all this changes.'

Svetlana, from the village of Ubor-Kiret in the southern Siberian republic of Buryatia, went on a 1st Channel TV show to tell her sad story - and appeal for parents to come forward who will care for Artem.

The show is hosted by Yulia Baranovskaya, ex-partner of Russian football star Andrei Arshavin, and Alexander Gordon.

Yulia told viewers that at first dying Svetlana's request might seem 'weird' but asked viewers to hear her out.

While Svetlana has relatives, neither she - nor they - believe they are suitable to raise the child when she is gone.

Meanwhile, Artem is unaware of the tragic earthquake coming in his life.

'When I grow up, I will have my own house. I will live there with my mama,' he tells viewers.

'Nobody knows how much time I have left, maybe a month, perhaps a year,' said Svetlana. 'Medication doesn't helping me anymore.

'The only thing I want now is a normal family for my son. I often cry at nights when my son can't see me; I need to gather all my strength to keep going.

'It helps me to lie down next to my son, and then a new day comes.

'Every month I spend about 10 days in hospital.

'Because of HIV, other diseases attack me.

'My heart is aching, some days it is hard to breath, sometimes my muscles get weak and I can hardly hold a spoon. I can drop a glass of water trying to drink.

'When I feel very bad I just lie down, and Artem comes to me, asks how I am feel and if we should call Aunt Lyuba - this is our paramedic.

'But she can hardly help, only with pain relief if necessary.'

This anguished mother admits that she is trying to prepare her loving son for life after she is gone, agonising as this is.

'Sometimes I ask Artem: 'What if one day I have to go away and can't take you with me?'

'He asks: 'Why?'

'And I say that one day you will grow up a bit and know.'

In tears, she said: 'I try to deal with Artem in a way so he is not too much attached to me as his mother.'

Svetlana Maximova. Picture: Channel 1

Svetlana has known for nine years about her HIV infection.

It is not clear how she caught the disease which she found out about at 17.

She still manages to grow vegetables to supplement the tiny allowances on which they live.

'Artem and I eat at home only once a day. I often go to my neighbour Galina for tea and I take Artem with me.'

In her mind, she has the experience of her own blighted childhood, and desperately hopes that despite her coming death, her boy can avoid a miserable fate.

She wants him to be raised in a real family, not an orphanage.

When she was ten, her father killed her mother, hiding the body in the forest, she said, explaining how she was orphaned.

'We found my mama's body under a pine tree, behind the cemetery.

'Police investigators said even a dog would have found it hard to find her.

'Then the police took my father away.'

The TV show found Viktor Chernyak, Artem's missing father. Picture: Channel 1

Neighbour Galina said: 'Sveta (Svetlana) cries a lot now.

'She worries very much what will happen next to her Artem; he feels her so well, he knows exactly when she is unwell.

'He prefers to stay with her rather than to go and play with other children.

'I wouldn't mind taking him at all, although I have six kids of my own.

'But nobody will allow us. They will say I only want money.'

The TV show found Viktor Chernyak, Artem's missing father.

Despite him not being officially recognised as such, a DNA test for the show proved his paternity.

But he appears unsuitable to raise the child, and admitted the authorities would 'never allow' it.
Click to expand...

'I'm dying soon of AIDS: please be parents to my 5 year old son'

HIV is at epidemic levels there: On the front lines of Russia's 'staggering' HIV epidemic - CNN.com

People with HIV are discriminated against. In 2014, for example, they were banned from adopting children: Russia: HIV-Infected Individuals Cannot Adopt Children | Global Legal Monitor

And there is discrimination in employment too: Rights groups and labor unions oppose Russian government's plan to require HIV and hepatitis testing for new pilots and aviation staff

It all just makes me so angry... This is what Putin calls a "great world power"? Really?

SergeyX2017, Aug 18, 2017

#641
Alpha-Red Chosen One

Registered:

Apr 25, 2004

Well Trump seems to think he's making America great. Hitler thought he was making Germany great. So you're not alone.

Alpha-Red, Aug 19, 2017

#642

SergeyX2017 and Juliet316 like this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

New push to ban abortion, led, of course, by the Orthodox Church

A gold-plated icon of the Virgin Mary watches over their prayer. At an Orthodox church on the outskirts of Moscow, the worshippers light candles during a midnight service. Some of them are wearing bright green T-shirts or pins, all with the same logo. It shows two hands holding an embryo, seemingly protecting it, and the words "For Life." Those gathered here tonight are praying for an end to abortions in Russia.

Their midnight service rounds off the first full day of "For Life's" eighth annual "International Festival for Social Techniques to Protect Family Values" in Moscow. The group has now collected one million signatures calling for an abortion ban in Russia. And they plan to hand over their petition to Russian President Vladimir Putin himself. One of the signatories is the head of the Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill.

"During the festival we are praying to end abortions. That is our main goal, our main grievance. And what we are putting all our strength into," Anastasia Meshennikova, the movement's Moscow coordinator, explains at the festival. "We are also praying to be a united, tight-knit team, a peaceful and good-natured one," she adds.

A Russia-wide movement

One hundred sixty anti-abortion groups from across Russia are part of the "For Life" movement. The activists say there are around 300 anti-abortion groups in the country. Most of those assembled here today are Orthodox Christians, even if they say religion is not a prerequisite for volunteering. The festival's program includes lectures, training sessions and meetings with representatives of European pro-life groups from Spain, Serbia and Italy. "For Life's" volunteers and staff believe that life begins at conception. Many at the event have brought their children, who play with the green and white balloons hung on the hotel's banisters while they wait for their parents. The stairs leading up to the conference rooms are decorated with the pictures and names of small children who "could have not existed."

Along with their push for signatures, "For Life" does charity work to support mothers who decide to have children. They distribute food and clothing to poor families and run homes for young mothers in difficult social situations - if they decide not to have an abortion. The movement says their work has "saved" 6,907 children since 2015.

Still, the activists believe an abortion ban is necessary. "We understand that when there is a law that convinces and disciplines people. That's why we think there needs to be legislation," Meshennikova insists. "And if people who are united by one idea can do so much, how much could we do with the support of the government?"

Ongoing debate

The Russian government has already shown its support for the group's anti-abortion cause. Last year, when the head of the Orthodox Church signed the movement's petition, the Russian children's rights commissioner, Anna Kuznetsova, spoke out in favor of excluding abortion from state health insurance.

Anastasia Meshennikova and her cohorts pray for an end to abortion

Earlier this month, the cabinet announced a plan called "Developing a healthy way of life." One of its aims is to lower abortion rates by 30 percent in the next eight years. In order to achieve the goal, the government will launch an advertising campaign against abortion starting in March 2018.

So far, however, the idea of a full abortion ban - or of excluding the procedure from compulsory state health insurance - has not gained much traction. The Russian parliament rejected a bill to ban abortion in 2015. Russian Health Minister Veronica Skortsova has said that excluding abortion from compulsory health insurance would endanger women's health.

Common solution for pregnancy

But the debate doesn't seem to be going away. Along with the growing influence of Russia's Orthodox Church on politics, Russia's abortion statistics are likely a factor in this. The country still has one of the highest abortion rates in the world. There were over 800,000 abortions in 2016, down from nearly 850,000 the year before, according to government statistics. Around 23 abortions per 1,000 women were carried out in 2015. In Germany, by comparison, 5.6 abortions per 1,000 women were carried out the same year.

Soviet Russia was the first country worldwide to legalize abortions, in 1920. The procedure remained common even when abortion was banned under Josef Stalin from 1936 to 1955. Condoms were known as "galoshi," or rubber boots, and hormonal contraceptives only became available in the 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union.

Hormonal contraception is often expensive and not "widely available," says reproductive health expert and gynecologist Liubov Erofeeva, director of the Russian Association for Population and Development.

Essentially "our population is faced with the choice of condoms or interrupted sex. Those are not dependable methods at all. And that is why we have such a high number of unwanted pregnancies and abortions."

Battle for Russia's babies

In Russia, the push to lower abortion rates is often seen as part of a "patriotic battle" to improve birth rates in Russia. Here at "For Life's" festival, a dramatic quote from Russian President Vladimir Putin towers over the proceedings: "The question of demography is essential. Either we will exist - or we will not."

The movement is using the government's approach to its advantage, as "For Life" director Sergei Chesnokov explains. "We know that for the volunteers in our movement, the most important thing is the life of a child before it is born. […] But for the government the most important thing is the birth rate. That's why we talk to the government using demographic language, using scientific arguments."

It seems to be working. Chesnokov says his group's activities are mainly financed by private donors, with the church often calling for support for them. But some individual programs are financed by government grants. A 2015 agreement between the Russian Orthodox Church and the health ministry has allowed psychologists paid by anti-abortion organizations to work in state health clinics, distributing information and convincing women not to carry out the procedure in consultations. There are 200 "For Life" psychologists in clinics in Moscow alone, according to one of the movement's activists.

Russians want abortion status quo

But banning abortion isn't widely popular. A recent poll by the independent Levada Center shows that only two percent of those surveyed were in favor of a full ban and seven percent thought that abortions that weren't medically necessary should be banned. Fifty-nine percent believe the government should let people decide for themselves.

Liubov Erofeeva is skeptical about claims that restricting abortion will lead to more births. "Statistics in all the countries of the world prove that the two sets of data aren’t connected," she says. "And by banning abortions we are not getting rid of them. People won't renounce them. They will simply be driven into the underground."

Only sex education classes and government-funded contraception can actually lower abortion rates, Erofeeva says. And even then "I can't say that [abortions] will disappear; they haven’t disappeared anywhere."

Erofeeva thinks the push for a ban is doomed to fail, though she hasn't entirely ruled it out.

"I don't want to believe it could happen. Highly professional people, who have dedicated a lot of their life to protecting reproductive rights, work in the ministry of health. They are hardly likely to take measures that are known to be damaging to women's health - and an abortion ban is a damaging measure."
Click to expand...

Russian anti-abortion group fights and prays for ban | Europe | DW | 23.08.2017

Mrs. Erofeeva, in my opinion, is unwise to underestimate these people.

The fact is that, they not only have been engaged in their campaign for awhile now, and are committed to it and have thoroughly planned it all out. But they have, actually, SUCCEEDED already, on a small scale, in Abkhazia.

Abkhazia officially banned abortion in April last year, it was even amended into the Republic's Constitution: THE ABKHAZIAN CONSTITUTION NOW OFFICIALLY BANS ABORTIONS

It is a well known fact in Abkhazia (where there are many devout Orthodox believers), that groups tied to the Russian Church, including the one mentioned in the DW article above, helped push that through.

The regional parliament of Chechnya began, at that time, also proceedings to ban abortion in their republic:

In December 2015, the parliament of the partially-recognized, Russian-backed state of Abkhazia in the South Caucasus quietly passed a bill outlawing abortion. On February 9, that bill was signed into law. Days later, news broke that the parliament in Chechnya, a region in the Russian North Caucasus, was considering a similar proposal.
Click to expand...

Russian Orthodox Church Anti-Abortion Movement Extends Its Grip to Chechnya and Abkhazia

I believe it was passed, with Ramzan Kadyrov's personal support, and abortions are indeed outlawed in Chechnya now.

Just recently, in July, another North Caucasian Republic neighboring Chechnya, Dagestan, had demonstrations where people demanded a ban on abortion, organized by the region's own health ministry: Protesters demand abortion ban in Daghestan

What this shows me is that the Orthodox activists are working with likeminded people among the Muslims, to get rid of abortion countrywide, in both Orthodox/Slavic and Muslim regions.

The national Muslim spiritual leadership has repeatedly vowed to support the Orthodox Church in this struggle of theirs

Interestingly enough, both Buddhist and Jewish leaders have chosen to simply distance themselves from all this, for now lol

Yaroslavl region temporarily banned abortions for a day, on January 11th this year, on the initiative of the Church, "in memory of the slaughtered babies of Bethlehem": https://www.znak.com/2017-01-11/v_yaroslavskoy_oblasti_po_iniciative_rpc_na_sutki_zapretili_aborty

First ever such event. But will be an annual event now.

While in Novgorod oblast, every April there is a "week without abortions" for six years now: http://kasp.3s3s.ru/material.php?id=595BB5ACF307A

Gradually, they will push, region by region. Same strategy as how they got the countrywide anti gay laws passed already.

There will be resistance though. Abkhazia is a tiny place with 250,000 people, majority of them rural, with women unused to speaking out against their husbands, let alone their society.

Russia, for all of its own misogynistic crap, has plenty of fierce feminists and such ready to fight this, as they rose to fight previous anti-abortion initiatives

When men start getting pregnant, abortion will become an indisputable right That's what her poster says

They won;t take this thing laying down either, I am certain lol

We shall see what happens. It will be a hell of a fight, that's for sure.

SergeyX2017, Aug 23, 2017

#643
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Jehovah's Witnesses are banned in Russia. That doesn't stop them from worshipping.

In Putin’s Russia, Jehovah’s Witnesses are labeled “extremists” and accused of being American spies. Still, they keep their faith alive.

Updated by Tara Isabella Burton on August 24, 2017 9:40 am

Jehovah’s Witnesses keep food on the table when they gather so they can claim they are meeting for a meal or party when police come.

MOSCOW — “Stay in the car,” Yuri says. He looks out the window, up at the grey Soviet-era tower block we’re idling outside. An old woman is staring out the window. “She’s looking at us. She’s suspicious.”

Eugeny and his wife, Lyudmilla, have already gone inside. But Yuri (who, like everyone quoted in this article, has asked to be identified by first name only for security reasons) is worried that entering as a group will attract attention. Attention means somebody might call the police. And when you’re a Jehovah’s Witness in Russia — labeled by the government as a member of an “extremist” sect, the same designation they use for neo-Nazis and ISIS members — dealing with the police is the last thing you need.

Eight million Christians around the world self-identify as Jehovah’s Witnesses. Their worship is characterized by frequent public proselytizing. In April, Russia’s Supreme Court ruled that the faith of an estimated 175,000 Russians violates the country’s anti-extremist statutes.

An appeal was refused late last month, continuingyears of state-sponsored persecution of Jehovah’s Witnesses as a religious group. Police frequently raid Jehovah’s Witness services — both in private homes and in Kingdom Halls — and, according to members, turn a blind eye to discriminatory civilian violence. Yuri recalls one instance where a “sister” — as Jehovah’s Witnesses refer to female members of their community — was beaten and threatened with a gun by another woman while out preaching, only for the police to dismiss her as a “cult member” and a thief when they finally arrived. But since the most recent Supreme Court ruling, Yuri says, things have gotten worse.

“We’re on their radar at all times,” says Yuri, an affable man in his 50s who apologizes, frequently, for his near-perfect English, which he taught himself through the internet. Their largest Kingdom Hall, located in a northern suburb of Moscow, lies empty, the entrance marked with caution tape, after the building’s owner deemed it too risky to let Jehovah’s Witnesses use.

Still, the community has developed a strategy to keep its faith and worship alive. They enter the building in twos and threes to avoid attracting attention. They mix up the homes they use, to keep it difficult for government forces or potential harassers to track. They set a table laden with food, which, during the Saturday worship session I attended in July, goes entirely untouched. It’s there so that if police arrive, they can claim that they’re simply gathering for a party. And, Yuri tells me, they always keep a few bottles of vodka on hand. If the police come, he says, they can down it quickly. The police will smell their breath, notice their inebriation, and believe that they’re been carousing, not worshipping.

Today, about 20 Witnesses gather in this Moscow suburb. They are roughly split evenly by gender, and a mix of ages. Nearly all follow the lesson on their tablets or phones, using specialized apps. (Importing physical copies of the Jehovah’s Witness Bible is also forbidden.)

Yuri’s wife, Alla, helpfully translates the verses from Russian to English for me on her phone. They pray for the wisdom of their rulers, reading verses from the Book of Daniel about faith in times of turmoil. They affirm Jehovah — their rendering of the term for the Judeo-Christian God — as lord of the universe. From time to time Yuri and his friend Eugeny, a wide-eyed bald man fond of speaking with his hands, ask questions of the flock, calling on members of the community to help interpret the Bible.

The worship service, which runs about 90 minutes, is a muted affair. After all, they can no longer sing during services in people’s homes, lest the sound attract the suspicion of neighbors.

But it is, Yuri says, the best they can do.
Click to expand...

More: Jehovah's Witnesses are banned in Russia. That doesn't stop them from worshipping.

Crazy... Imagine, living like this, skulking around meeting in secret, like fugitives or, indeed, spies, constantly working to evade attention and suspicion... just to worship God the way you want...

Their version of the Bible was indeed just banned: Russia Bans Jehovah's Witnesses' Translation Of Bible

Majority of Russians support the crackdown on the JWs: Poll Shows Majority Of Russians Support Ban On Jehovah's Witnesses

There has already been vigilante violence, some JW members even had their home set on fire by arsonists: Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia Have House Burned Down, Worship Halls Liquidated While Preparing Ban Appeal

Some JWs have already left the country because of this...

Ironically, in June, Putin bestowed the Family Glory medal, an annual award for parents with many children, on a JW family, perhaps unaware who they are:

'Extremists' In The Kremlin: Jehovah's Witnesses Honored By Putin As 'Model Family'

lol

A Danish citizen was arrested in an FSB raud on a JW congregation in Oryol in May: FSB Agents Raid Jehovah's Witnesses Service In Central Russia; Danish Man Arrested

A court ordered his continued detention in late July: Oryol Court Extends Imprisonment of Dennis Christensen

As far as I am aware, he is still being held. His wife, a Russian citizen, continues fighting for his release...

Also, a prominent Russian musician and member of the JW faith has defected to exile in the US over this: Prominent Russian Punk Rocker Defects To U.S. Over Jehovah's Witnesses Ban

SergeyX2017, Aug 24, 2017

#644
heels1785 Skywalker Saga + JCC Manager / Finally Won A Draft Staff Member Manager

Registered:

Dec 10, 2003

Russian ambassador to Sudan found dead this morning in a his swimming pool, symptoms of a heart attack - fourth Russian diplomat to perish in 9 months - UN, India, and a senior diplomat in Greece previously died. Not including the Ambassador to Turkey who was murdered.

Currently doesn't look like anything more than older/unhealthy men passing away from heart attacks and illness. Sergey, any suspicion that it is something else?

heels1785 , Aug 24, 2017

#645

SergeyX2017 likes this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

heels1785 said: ↑

Russian ambassador to Sudan found dead this morning in a his swimming pool, symptoms of a heart attack - fourth Russian diplomat to perish in 9 months - UN, India, and a senior diplomat in Greece previously died. Not including the Ambassador to Turkey who was murdered.

Currently doesn't look like anything more than older/unhealthy men passing away from heart attacks and illness. Sergey, any suspicion that it is something else?
Click to expand...

Not as far as I am aware.

The diplomat died while swimming in the pool of his residence, according to state broadcaster Russia 24.
Shirinskiy manifested symptoms of an acute heart attack, embassy staff told the state broadcaster.

Click to expand...

Ambassador to Sudan is fourth Russian diplomat to die since January

God knows a heart attack is easily "arranged", these days, by FSB or SVR or GRU; or any opposing secret agencies, CIA or whoever, if they were striking out at Russia that way. But... This guy was in bloody Sudan. Not a terribly important posting, in geopolitical terms lol

SergeyX2017, Aug 24, 2017

#646

Juliet316 and heels1785 like this.
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Russia and Ukraine’s battle over Crimean heritage heats up

While Putin referred to a Black Sea archeological site as “Russia’s Mecca”, Ukraine enlists the help of Interpol to recover “stolen” paintings

by Sophia Kishkovsky | 25 August 2017

Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the Tauric Chersonese State Historical Archaeological Museum and Reserve in August 2017 (Photo: Kremlin)

The struggle between Russia and Ukraine over Crimea’s arts and culture heritage has recently ramped up, with Russian President Vladimir Putin this month proposing that Tauric Chersonese, a Unesco World Heritage site in Crimea, be promoted as “Russia’s Mecca”.

The ancient Hellenic site on the Black Sea, on the outskirts of the modern city of Sevastopol, is where Prince Vladimir of Kiev is believed to have been baptised in the tenth century, so it is culturally significant to both Russia and Ukraine.

The ancient city of Tauric Chersonese and its chora, dating from the 5th century BC to 14th century AD (Photo: C. Williams © The Institute of Classical Archaeology — The University of Texas at Austin)

Putin makes a regular pilgrimage to the site. “It should become a Russian Mecca of a kind,” he told a group of officials, scholars and cultural leaders during a visit to Chersonese on 18 August. “The point is not just that Prince Vladimir was baptised here; what is more important is that afterwards the Russian state started to become centralised.”

Tauric Chersonese was listed by Unesco as a World Heritage site in 2013, when Crimea was still part of Ukraine. Since Russia’s annexation of the penninsula is not recognised by most UN member states, it is still listed as a Ukrainian site.

And earlier this month, archaeologists working in Crimea uncovered a trove of jewellery which has been compared in quality to a collection of Scythian gold that both Russia and Ukraine have laid claim to. Those 565 objects were lent by four Crimean museum to the Allard Pierson Museum in Amsterdam just as the annexation took place. After the show closed, a legal battle arose over where the cultural property belonged and a Dutch court ruled that they should be returned to Kiev, not Crimea. The region’s museums have appealed the decision.

A new legal wrangle also erupted this month over a cache of around 50 18th- and 19th-century paintings by artists including Ivan Aivazovsky, Ivan Shishkin, and Isaak Levitan from the State Museum Fund of Ukraine, that were “illegally transferred to the Simferopol Art Museum in March 2014”, according to a press statement from the Prosecutor's Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea. The works were recently put on Interpol’s wanted list of stolen art and are estimated to have a combined value of $1.3m.

The political stalemate, meanwhile, has left the region’s heritage sites in limbo. Alexander Kuznetsov, the Ambassador and Permanent Delegate of Russia to Unesco told local media in July that “Crimea has been totally cut off from the work of Unesco, although those people who had previously, when the peninsula was part of Ukraine, cooperated with this organisation, have remained in place. Right now all contacts with them have been halted since it is thought that continuing communication would be an indirect recognition of Russia’s sovereignty over Crimea. They categorically refuse any contacts.”

At the same time, Ukraine parted with another kind of heritage. At the same time American cities were grappling over what to do with their Confederate monuments, the Ukrainian government announced that all 1,320 Lenin statues across the country had come down along with other Communist relics, in a movement to clear away Soviet symbols that gained speed during the 2014 Euromaidan revolution. Communist symbols remain, however, in areas of Eastern Ukraine, which are controlled by pro-Russian rebels.
Click to expand...

Russia and Ukraine’s battle over Crimean heritage heats up

I wish they would not put politics over history, all the sides there. Chersonese is a wonderful ancient site that needs to be preserved.

Unfortunately, UNESCO is indeed bowing to the West and thus neglecting it, right now.

And the new Russian authorities in Crimea, in turn, are also bowing, to the Russian Orthodox Church, handing the control of the site over to them.

It is a holy place for the Orthodox too, as the article says, that is Vladimir I, the first Orthodox ruler of ancient Kievan Rus (ancestor state of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus) was baptized by the Greeks to Orthodox Christianity, 1000 years ago, and he later brought all of Rus to Christianity, which is why St. Vladimir Cathedral was later built there, near the ruins

It is a huge pilgrimage site.

Russia and Ukraine are now haggling over Vladimir and his legacy, with each asserting he belongs to them. A monument to Vladimir has stood in Kiev since the 19th century, I believe.

Last year, Putin had one built in Moscow, near the Kremlin, designed specifically to be bigger and more imposing than Kiev's lol

Many Putinist patriots even play on the name, one now sees at their demonstrations some praising holy Orthodox Russia, "From Vladimir to Vladimir"

Now, many historians and archaeologists worry that the Chuch, in an effort to bring and accommodate more pilgrims to St. Vladimir's, will not protect the ancient ruins, and the pilgrims will trample all over them, causing irreparable damage. Putin's remarks about turning the place into an Orthodox Mecca are only adding to the anxiety, as you can imagine...

SergeyX2017, Aug 25, 2017

#647
SergeyX2017 Jedi Knight

Registered:

Jan 14, 2017

Alex and Tim Vavilov

Tracey Lee Ann Foley—the real Tracey Lee Ann Foley—was born at Montreal General Hospital on Sept. 14, 1962, a Friday. Gorgeous and blue-eyed (seven pounds, three ounces), she was the first child of newlyweds Edward and Pauline Foley. “It was an amazing day, pretty exciting,” Ed remembers, all these decades later. “We were a young family just getting started.”

Back then, the Foleys rented an apartment in the Montreal suburb of Hampstead. John Diefenbaker was prime minister, John F. Kennedy was the U.S. president, and on the radio, the number-one song in both countries was Sherry by the Four Seasons. The captain of the hometown Canadiens was a 31-year-old centre named Jean Béliveau.

Seven weeks after she was born, Tracey woke up with a spiking fever. Her mother phoned their doctor and, as doctors did in those days, he drove straight over, medical bag in tow. It was Halloween, a detail forever seared in the Foleys’ minds. “He gave her an antibiotic,” Pauline recalls. “By the time he got back to his office, she had died.”

The culprit was meningococcal meningitis. In hindsight, Tracey didn’t stand a chance. “She died so suddenly,” says Pauline, now 81. “It came on within hours and she was gone. She was perfectly healthy up until then.” Just days earlier, baby Tracey had smiled at her mom for the first time. “You wonder: ‘Oh my heavens, how could anybody go through that?’ ” Pauline continues. “Somehow, you’re given that extra strength.”

The Foleys were blessed with two more children, a boy and a girl, and in 1971 the family left Quebec for Toronto, where Ed launched his own recruitment firm. After the kids grew up, the couple moved to a midtown condominium, ideal for their retirement years. In the master bedroom, amid so many family photographs, are two small pictures of their first daughter. “She is always here,” says Ed, 82.

Ed was standing in that same bedroom on June 29, 2010, getting dressed for a treadmill run at the gym downstairs. Pauline was in the kitchen, eating breakfast with her morning newspaper. The top story on the front page that Tuesday was the stuff of Hollywood scripts: the FBI had busted a group of deep-cover Russian spies operating on U.S. soil—including some who had stolen the identities of dead Canadian children. Pauline froze as she read one of the names: Tracey Lee Ann Foley.

“It was devastating,” she tells Maclean’s, speaking publicly, along with her husband, about the case for the first time. By then, their daughter had been gone for nearly 48 years. “It made me very angry because our privacy was invaded, along with hers.”

Pauline rushed to the bedroom to show Ed the article. “To see her name printed there really shook me up,” he says. “You feel violated.”

Nine hundred kilometres away, at a townhouse near Boston, two other “Foleys” were deep in their own state of shock: the Canadian-born sons of the fake Tracey Foley and her fellow-spy husband, Donald Heathfield, whose bogus ID was also stolen from a dead Montreal infant. Alexander Foley was 16 when the story hit, and his older brother, Timothy, had just turned 20. They could do nothing but watch as FBI agents burst in and handcuffed their parents. As Tim later recounted in a sworn affidavit: “I was shocked in ways words cannot describe.”

Up until that moment, the brothers insist, they had no idea their mother and father were undercover Russian “illegals” deployed by the KGB in the late 1980s, first to Canada, then to America—or that their parents’ real names were Elena Vavilova and Andrey Bezrukov. The sons had no clue, in other words, that their surname since birth was a fraud, swiped from a dead baby girl and passed on to them.

If the details read like an episode of The Americans, the Emmy-nominated FX television show, there’s good reason: the series, about a Soviet spy couple and the secrets they hide from their U.S.-born children, was inspired by the same FBI bust that exposed Tim and Alex’s mom and dad. But here is the true-life subplot you won’t see on TV: a years-long court battle over whether the kids should have to pay for their parents’ crimes with their Canadian citizenship.

Although both brothers were born in Toronto, immigration officials concluded (after the spy ring was revealed) that the boys were never Canadian to begin with because their mother and father were “employees of a foreign government,” making the kids ineligible for status under the Citizenship Act. In June, however, the Federal Court of Appeal ruled otherwise, ordering Ottawa to reinstate Alex’s citizenship (his case is furthest along) and propelling the bizarre saga back into the headlines. “[T]he sins of parents ought not to be visited upon children without clear authorization by law,” the judgment reads.

What happens next is in the hands of the Trudeau government, which has until Sept. 20 to decide whether to pursue an appeal at the Supreme Court. A spokeswoman for the federal immigration department would only say that officials are “carefully reviewing” the June ruling.

Like all the great espionage thrillers, there is one more twist: CSIS, Canada’s spy agency, has told Immigration that Tim, the eldest brother, did indeed know the truth about his parents’ double lives—and that he pledged to follow in their footsteps. According to CSIS, Tim had been “sworn in” by the SVR, the KGB’s post-Soviet successor, by the time the FBI showed up. (Tim adamantly denies the allegation, saying in his affidavit that “no evidence of my involvement has ever been presented.”)

Sitting in their Toronto living room, Ed and Pauline Foley aren’t sure what to believe. Tracey has been dead now for nearly 55 years. “I don’t have an axe to grind with the two kids; it’s not their fault they were born here,” Ed says. “But I can be very frank with you: I have absolutely no sympathy for the sons and am certainly against them getting citizenship. They should sue their parents.”
Click to expand...

Much more: The Russian spies who raised us

Also: Why the Vavilov children - the sons of Russian spies - qualify as Canadian

According to the first article, the spy couple have been well rewarded for their long undercover career, with lucrative, well paid jobs at Russia's biggest corporations:

Andrey Bezrukov is now a senior adviser at Rosneft, a major Russian oil company; he is also a university professor who writes and lectures on U.S. public policy. He is still married to Elena Vavilova, who works as an adviser at Moscow-based Norilsk Nickel.
Click to expand...

Can't imagine what it must have been like for the two young lads, their entire lives turned upside down:

In those dizzying days right after the bust, Alex continued to believe the FBI had the wrong people behind bars. How could his Canadian parents possibly be someone else? Only when he and Tim flew to Russia—where officials met them at the airport, carrying old photos of Andrey Bezrukov and Elena Vavilova—did reality finally set in. The boys even met a grandmother they didn’t know they had.
Click to expand...

Now, according to the article, one is working in Asia, other - studying at a university in Europe.

And, I must ask, who is paying for that? His parents, with SVR's money? Or even the agency itself?

The boys claim to be fully Canadian at heart:

As a kid, Tim even won a competition organized by the Canadian consulate in Boston for promoting “Canadian values” of cultural integration. “I am first and foremost Canadian,” he wrote in his affidavit. “I have lived for 20 years believing that I was Canadian and I still believe I am Canadian. Nothing can change that.”
Click to expand...

Yet at least one was apparently aware of who his parents really were and, moreover, himself was initiated into the SVR and expressed loyalty to Russia:

Although it was Alex who won his case, the judgment, if left standing, would surely apply to Tim—who, according to CSIS, knew about his parents’ covert activities and had been “sworn in” by the SVR prior to their arrests. What CSIS revealed to immigration bureaucrats appears to be the first official confirmation of a bombshell Wall Street Journal report published in 2012, which claimed that Tim had agreed to return to his parents’ homeland to begin formal espionage training. During one conversation with his parents, the article claimed, the eldest son “stood up and saluted ‘Mother Russia.’ ”
Click to expand...

I am not sure about this one... On one side, I agree that children should not be forced to answer and pay for the sins (and crimes) of their parents.

On other side... This is the KGB (and its modern offspring SVR and FSB) we are talking about. There is no such thing as a "former" KGB agent.

The people who worked in that organization (and this continues today in both SVR and FSB) have always been, first of all, deliberately picked for exceptional "ideological reliability", that is - loyalty back then to KGB, Communist Party, and USSR; today - FSB/SVR, Putin, and Russian Federation. You join the agency as a young man or woman, and then it runs your whole life. And I ain't joking about that.

The agency, I have read, even arranges your marriage for you!

When you want to get married, you make an application to a special department, and it finds and presents you a list of candidates for husband or wife, all fellow agents who had made similar applications, of equal ideological reliability, who it feels are suitable for you.

You, at least, get to choose the one you want to meet in person lol

The agency ensures total loyalty of their employees through this total control of them.

And the agents chosen for the long term undercover assignments in America and elsewhere in the West, the 'illegals' and 'sleepers', are exceptionally loyal and ideologically reliable, put through all kinds of covert tests to ensure this.

Their patriotism and loyalty to the agency has to, in many ways, border on the fanatical, to make them resistant to all the pleasures of Western life, which could otherwise erode their loyalty and turn them against the Motherland...

Even if they had to pretend to be good Canadians the whole time, at least in public, God knows how such people raised those boys, what went on in their home?

What if those kids are, in fact, brainwashed Putinists? What if they've been secretly taught to hate the West, at home, for years? And are themselves now training to follow in their parents' footsteps? SVR, like the old KGB, is also a dynastic organization: many agents, if not most, inherited their status from parents and grandparents and great-grandparents...

It is impossible to know. That's the problem...

Gonna be very interesting to see how this case develops...

SergeyX2017, Aug 30, 2017

#648

(You must log in or sign up to reply here.)

Page 26 of 399