Putin has mobilized…

(Reuters) – Federal prosecutors in New York unveiled criminal charges on Monday against three men for their alleged involvement in a spying scheme for Russia’s foreign intelligence service.

According to a criminal complaint, Evgeny Buryakov, Igor Sporyshev and Victor Podobnyy conspired in the United States to gather intelligence on behalf of Russia and to recruit New York City residents to help.

The conspiracy ran from 2012 to the present, and during that time, Buryakov worked at a bank, Sporyshev was a Russian trade representative, and Podobnyy was an attaché to Russia’s mission to the United Nations, the complaint said.

Buryakov was arrested on Monday in the Bronx borough of New York City, according to the office of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara for the Southern District of New York.

The status of the other defendants was unclear, and it was unclear whether the defendants had hired lawyers. *** Ah but read on it gets more chilling. Russian state owned media was used for cover. *** Security service of Ukraine has evidence of committing so-called militants. “DND” and Russian military crimes against humanity — against the peaceful population of Donbass. It said the head of the SBU Valentyn Nalyvaichenko during a briefing.  January 24th, an aggressor has committed a crime against humanity – Russian artillery Division shot the peaceful population of Mariupol with dostavlenoï from the territory of Russia especially dangerous artillery weapons, said the head of the SBU.

The direct instructions of Russian officers was carried out 5 bombardment of peaceful districts of the city, which stopped only after receiving information that the shelling goes OSCE mission.

As a result of the shelling of Mariupol Russian “Mortared” killed 30 and wounded more than 100 residents. The Russian battery, which was pounding, was near the village of Noname-on territory controlled by terrorists “DND”.

The attack was carried out by the artillery Division of the terrorist organization “DND” comprising 4 artillery batteries, armed TANK DESTROYER “Tulip” and “Grad” installations.   The fire was discovered by an officer of the RUSSIAN FEDERATION with the callsign of “Highlander”.  After the bombardment, artillery batteries were hidden in the village of Markìne, then the surviving Russian military and technology team that came from the southern military district of RUSSIAN FEDERATION, in order to hide crimes were bred on the territory of Russia by the FSB border service of the Russian Federation.

«SBU publishes so called password «Ryazan-Astrakhan “, followed on 24 January this year Russian border guards and military obscured on the territory of RF tools of crime – equipment, armament, Russian Gunners”,-told Nalivaychenko.

Further proof that the crime involved Russia, is to use during planning and committing the bombardment of Mariupol sophisticated satellite communication systems 5 generations of “Bêloz′or”, which are only in the Russian Federation.

The Foundation has presented evidence of involvement of Russian military in crime against the civilian population.

Apprehended by SBU koriguval′nik fire artillery terrorists Kirsanov, 1975, n., nicknamed “Gaìšnìk” said that the mass killing of civilians of Donbass was Russian artillery battery commanded by Russian officer with the callsign “Pepel”.

Have other members of the criminal group. Among them is a citizen of Ukraine Ponomarenko, 1977 Ph.d., nicknamed “Terrorist” is the leader of one of the gangs in the so-called. “army of novorossiya,” known in criminal circles recidivìst.

SBU Counterintelligence was intercepted by conversations that show that “Terrorist” appealed to the action “Peplu” with a request to carry out a bombardment using reactive artillery. After the adoption of the criminal mind and Russians the bloody crime scene, the results caused damage koriguval′nik Kirsanov reported first Russian soldiers, and then Ponomarenku in Donetsk.

After stepping up hostilities in Donbas in the second half of January 2015, more evidence of the participation of Russian citizens that militate against Ukraine. January 23, 2015 after confronting an armed attack on defensive positions of Ukrainian military were able to establish the identity of an enemy reconnaissance and diversionary groups was zneškodženij. It turned out to be a citizen of the RUSSIAN FEDERATION Emelyanov, 1974 n. Victim was dressed in camouflage clothing from ševronom “Maps kazačij Regiment with the Grand Don Vojska Donskogo IM. Platova. ”

Slavic mìs′krajonnim Court sentenced to 8 years imprisonment of a citizen of the Russian Federation Korčagìna Nikolay Viktorovich, 06.12.1974, n., for active participation in the activities of Russian illegal military formation of a terrorist organization “DND”.

The head of the SBU reported today that all the ambassadors who are working in Ukraine, including Russian, will be given the evidence base of the involvement of terrorists “DND” and the Russian military to commit crimes against humanity.

The security service operates on the principles of dokazovostì, humanity and humanity. In cooperation with other law enforcement authorities, we will continue to publish, with the permission of investigators, documentary evidence, facts and names, in order to stop the referral on our territory of Russian terrorists and diversantìv», – said the head of the SBU. *** NATO just held a meeting.  We have just held an extraordinary meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Commission. The meeting was held at Ukraine’s request.

We condemn the sharp escalation of violence along the ceasefire line in eastern Ukraine by Russia-backed separatists.

This comes at great human cost to civilians. We express our condolences to the Ukrainian people for these tragic losses. Thirty civilians were killed and around a hundred were injured in the attack launched on residential areas of Mariupol. The attack was launched from territory controlled by separatists backed by Russia. More here.

Saudi Kingdom/White House, Mutual Disdain

NBC News foreign correspondent Richard Engel dropped a rhetorical bomb on the Obama State Department this weekend when he revealed that late Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al Saud was no friend to President Barack Obama.

Engel was responding to the diplomatic statement delivered on behalf of the administration that included a passage reflecting on the “genuine and warm” friendship the president shared with the late king.

“One of the big ironies here is that President Obama, in his statement, said how close he was to King Abdullah… King Abdullah did not like President Obama. In fact, a lot of people I know that are quite close to the late King Abdullah said that the king could not stand President Obama. This close personal bond between the president and the late Saudi leader, I think, is people being polite at a time of a national funeral.”

Engel cited Obama’s unquestioning support of the “Arab Spring” movement as well as his abandonment of long-time US ally Egyptian President Mubarak as reasons why Abdullah was less-than-friendly with Obama. *** So, could this be the reason that the State Department has issues an essay contest for the now deceased King Abdullah? No joke, an essay contest? *** But who exactly is King Abdullah’s successor? King Salman is no moderate.                                                    

 

“In the Middle East, it’s nothing new: You create your own terrorists, then pretend you are fighting them,” said Ali al-Ahmed, a Saudi activist who runs the Institute for Gulf Affairs in Washington. “The Saudis didn’t even invent it, but they’re good at it.”

Ahmed said the Saudi government is “playing both sides” to give “the appearance that they are the good guys.”

“They get a lot of political traction out of it,” Ahmed said. “To the Americans, they are the guardians of safety, and no matter how horrible they are on human rights, the way they treat women and all that, they are the ones who are keeping things under control. Really, they are very clever.” *** What more do you need to know? Plenty. ***   Saudi Arabia’s New King Helped Fund Radical Terrorist Groups
Monarch tied to anti-Semitic Muslim clerics, funding of jihad

King Salman, Saudi Arabia’s newly crowned monarch, has a controversial history of helping to fund radical terror groups and has maintained ties with several anti-Semitic Muslim clerics known for advocating radical positions, according to reports and regional experts.

Salman, previously the country’s defense minister and deputy prime minister, was crowned king last week after his half-brother King Abdullah died at the age of 90.

While Abdullah served as a close U.S. ally and was considered a reformer by many, Saudi Arabia has long been criticized by human rights activists for its treatment of women and its enforcement of a strict interpretation of Islamic law.

President Barack Obama is scheduled to travel to the Saudi capital of Riyadh on Tuesday to pay respects to Abdullah and meet with Salman, who also has been seen as a moderate friend of the United States.

However, throughout his public career in government, Salman has embraced radical Muslim clerics and has been tied to the funding of radical groups in Afghanistan, as well as an organization found to be plotting attacks against America, according to various reports and information provided by David Weinberg, a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

In 2001, an international raid of the Saudi High Commission for Aid to Bosnia, which Salman founded in 1993, unearthed evidence of terrorist plots against America, according to separate exposés written by Dore Gold, an Israeli diplomat, and Robert Baer, a former CIA officer.

Salman is further accused by Baer of having “personally approved all important appointments and spending” at the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO), a controversial Saudi charity that was hit with sanctions following the attacks of September 11, 2001, for purportedly providing material support to al Qaeda.

Salman also has been reported to be responsible for sending millions of dollars to the radical mujahedeen that waged jihad in Afghanistan in the 1980s, according to Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer who is now director of the Brookings Intelligence Project.  “In the early years of the war—before the U.S. and the Kingdom ramped up their secret financial support for the anti-Soviet insurgency—this private Saudi funding was critical to the war effort,” according to Riedel. “At its peak, Salman was providing $25 million a month to the mujahedeen. He was also active in raising money for the Bosnian Muslims in the war with Serbia.”

Salman also has embraced radical Saudi clerics known for their hateful rhetoric against Israel and Jews.

Salman has worked closely with Saleh al-Moghamsy, who tweeted in August 2014 that “Allah only gathered Jews in the land of Palestine to destroy them.”

Al-Moghamsy also stated in a 2014 television interview that “the hatred of Jews toward Muslims is an eternal hatred.” He also claimed in 2012 that Osama bin Laden had died with more “sanctity and honor” than any infidel, or non-Muslim.

Despite this rhetoric, Salman has maintained close ties to al-Moghamsy.

Salman chairs the board of an organization run by al-Moghamsy and has sponsored the cleric’s public events, including a 2013 festival. Salman and al-Moghamsy were pictured many times together at that event, according to regional reports.

Al-Moghamsy also has been an adviser to two of Salman’s sons, one of whom posed for a selfie with the cleric in July.

Salman also has reached out to other hardline preachers, including Safar Hawali, a one-time mentor of Osama bin Laden who has called for non-Muslims to be expelled from Saudi Arabia.

In 2005, Salman called Hawali to inquire about his health and in 2010 praised him upon the release of a book.

While crown prince, Salman also made a point of phoning Aidh Abdullah al-Qarni, a Saudi author currently on the U.S. Terrorist Screening Center’s No Fly List who has praised Hamas and called Israelis “the brothers of apes and pigs.”

Additionally, Salman, in his role as crown prince, has recently visited Saudi Arabia’s grand mufti, the nation’s highest religious authority, who has asserted that 10 is an appropriate age of marriage for girls and called for the destruction of all churches in the Arabian Peninsula.

Weinberg, who has been tracking Salman closely, said that the new monarch is taking up his predecessor’s mantle of moderate reform.

“Just like King Abdullah tried to present himself as a reformer, some are trying to suggest that the new king, Salman, is a moderate who will continue his half-brother’s so-called progressive policies,” Weinberg said. “But just look at where Saudi Arabia is after Abdullah: people are being decapitated and flogged by the state in the streets.”  “Women are systematically oppressed by their own government, and the regime continues to propagate incitement and intolerance,” he continued. “Salman’s background funding mujahedeen abroad and embracing hateful clerics suggests that he is at best a political opportunist who will tolerate continued religious extremism, even if he does not hold such views himself.”

 

What you Need to Know About the Greek Elections

It was 2011 that Greece erupted in epic protests over economic conditions and government imposed austerity programs. Since that time, Greece has moved to recover yet that recovery has not proven effective. Chancellor Angela Merkel has threatened Greece with several conditions including removing Greece from the European Union.  Over the weekend, Greece completed their election cycle with the an anti-austerity party known as the Syriza party prevailing. It is important to know that Greece is in a tailspin as noted by the party that placed third in the number of votes. A very dangerous new contour is emerging in Greece and it is filtering through Europe, the Golden Dawn Party.

Extreme right party headed for 3rd place in Greek election

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — The specter of Neo-Nazism is no longer haunting Greece. It looks like it is here to stay.                               

 

The extreme right, anti-immigrant Golden Dawn party, which has Nazi roots, appears headed for a third-place finish in Sunday’s election. Its showing comes despite the fact that the party’s leader and most of its lawmakers are behind bars, facing charges of participating in a “criminal organization” accused of murders, brutal attacks on migrants and others, extortion and arson.

With more than 90 percent of the voting precincts reporting, Golden Dawn was receiving 6.3 percent of the vote, narrowly leading the centrist Potami (“River”) with 6.04 percent. Both parties exceeded the 3 percent minimum required to gain seats in the 300-member parliament — with each forecast to win 17 seats.

Its share of the vote doesn’t match the 9.39 percent it received in last June’s European Parliament election in which Golden Dawn also finished third. It also trails the 6.92 percent won in the previous national election, in June 2012.

But considering the exposure of a series of crimes allegedly committed by its members, including the Sept. 2013 murder of a leftist rapper, Pavlos Fyssas, the result obtained Sunday may be even more significant. This is no longer merely an angry protest vote, a one-off voters’ tiff with “corrupt politicians.” This is an established vote and a hardened electorate.

“They can no longer plead ignorance. They have dipped their hands in blood,” Communist lawmaker Liana Kanelli commented on Sunday’s result.

Golden Dawn leader Nikos Mihaloliakos and his top lieutenants were not free to campaign ahead of the election, since they were behind bars. They were free to stand as candidates because they have not yet gone to trial. Some of them, including Mihaloliakos, may soon be set free when their 18-month maximum pre-trial detention limit is reached.

In a taped statement Sunday, Mihaloliakos celebrated his party’s performance.

“We achieved this great victory despite the fact that we could not be guaranteed an equal and so-called democratic election as the regime likes to call it, shunned by all (media), facing mudslinging and slander from all sides … having to campaign through a payphone. We have a fresh mandate … everyone fought to keep Golden Dawn away and they lost. Golden Dawn won,” Mihalioliakos said in his taped message.             

In a further twist, if the radical left Syriza party, the winner of the election, fails to achieve an outright majority, a prospect still possible early Monday, it might fail to form a government and return the mandate, given to it by the President of the Republic. In that case, the second party takes up the mandate and, if it fails in turn, the third party does. The prospect of a handcuffed Mihaloliakos, escorted by police to meet the Greek president to be asked to try to form a government, sends jitters throughout the political class. And, if it gets the chance, Golden Dawn is certain to exploit the occasion for maximum effect to ridicule the democracy they despise and whose benefits they are trying to exploit. *** Syriza ran on a single issue: reversing Greece’s reforms, which had been the quid pro quo for the assistance Greece has received from the IMF, EC and ECB (known collectively as the “troika”) over the past several years. It is hard to see how Mr. Tsipras could change course dramatically and say that he is planning to honor Greece’s promises to the troika. Attention will now shift to the response of the troika to Syriza’s victory and its policy reversal.

Will the troika respond with a suspension of future assistance and a refusal to roll over existing subsidized debts? Judging from the statements of Mr. Draghi and European political leaders, it appears so. All current indications are that the troika will not accede to a reversal on Greek promises, which will mean an unavoidable Greek government default in a matter of two months. ECB refusal to roll over debt is also likely to produce a Greek banking crisis, as depositors recognize that the withdrawal of ECB assistance to Greece’s banks will mean that Greek banks will be unable to continue to operate at their current debt levels. In anticipation of the withdrawal of troika support, economic theory suggests that depositors should begin to run Greek banks preemptively. How much immediate pressure depositors bring to bear on Greek banks is hard to know.

Mr. Tsipras has said that he wants to stay in the euro zone, but if the troika refuses to continue sending money his way, then he is likely to have no choice but to suspend Greek banks’ convertibility into euros, default on Greek debt payments (more than three-quarters of which are owed to the troika), leave the euro zone to finance his deficits by printing a new domestic currency, and re-denominate bank deposits, loans and contractual wages into that new domestic currency (otherwise, mass insolvencies of borrowers, employers, and banks would result, as euro-denominated obligations will be much harder to fulfill). And if Greek depositors become sufficiently uneasy, Mr. Tsipras may not even have the chance to climb down from his pre-election rhetoric, even in the unlikely event that he comes to his senses; after all, once a run on the banks occurs, Greece could be forced out of the euro within a matter of hours rather than months.

Chechens in Syria, Joining Islamic State

Battle-hardened fighters are on the move from Chechnya to the Middle East. This is not a recent development however a new dynamic is underway. First there was Syria, now there is Islamic State and Abu Bakr al Baghdadi is happy to have new fighters.     

 

***  There may, in fact, be as many as four separate categories of Chechens in Syria — or even five, if an unconfirmed recent report that a detachment of the Chechen security forces is fighting in Aleppo on the side of Assad is indeed true.

The first category are the battle-hardened veterans of the North Caucasus insurgency. It has been suggested, but not proven, that Qatar and Saudi Arabia financed the recruitment of those experienced former insurgents because “the Chechens are regarded as the best of the jihadist fighters.” 

“The Guardian” profiled in September 2012 a brigade of fighters that included Chechens, together with fighters from Libya, Tajikistan, Turkey, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. The author of that article described the Chechen fighters as “older, taller, and stronger” than their comrades in arms, many of whom clearly lacked any previous combat experience. He further noted that the Chechens “carried their weapons with confidence and distanced themselves from the rest, moving around in a tight-knit unit-within-a-unit,” suggesting that many have been members of the North Caucasus insurgency.

The second category is Kists — members of Georgia’s Chechen minority from the Pankisi Gorge close to the Georgian-Chechen border. Two of the Chechen commanders in Syria, Abu Omar al-Chechen (the commander of the brigade profiled by “The Guardian”) and Saifullah, are reportedly from Pankisi.

One of those fighters from Pankisi, who gave his name as Abu Hamza, told a Western journalist two months ago that he was motivated to travel to Syria and join the opposition by video footage on the Internet of Syrian government forces killing innocent women and children. The Georgian-Russian border is so tightly controlled that it is far easier for the Kists to travel to Syria than to enter Chechnya to join the North Caucasus insurgency.

The third category is young Chechens from among the estimated 250,000 who left Chechnya since the beginning of the first war in 1994 and settled in Europe and elsewhere. Abu Hamza said most of the Chechens he encountered during the several months he spent in Syria were from this category.

Pro-Moscow Chechen Republic head Ramzan Kadyrov has confirmed that young Chechens from Europe are fighting in Syria. He claims some of them, from low-income families, were attracted by the prospect of “violence and looting,” while others were victims of a concerted effort by Western intelligence services to recruit fighters by means of jihadist websites. Last summer, Kadyrov had affirmed that if young Chechen refugees in Europe wanted to take up arms they would travel to the North Caucasus to join the insurgency.

The fourth category is young Chechens from the Chechen Republic who either abandoned their studies at Middle Eastern universities to fight in Syria or managed to leave Chechnya with the explicit aim of joining the Syrian opposition forces.  Kadyrov categorically denied last summer that any “Russian citizens from the Chechen Republic” were fighting in Syria. But over the past two months he has admitted on several occasions that Chechens from both Chechnya and the émigré community in Europe and Turkey had traveled to Syria to fight.

On May 6, Kadyrov implied that the latter category far outnumber the former: he said “a few” Chechens from Chechnya were fighting in Syria, and that “hundreds” from Europe and Turkey had been killed. Two weeks later, however, Kadyrov said “just a few” Chechens from Europe had been killed in the fighting.

The exodus of young men from Chechnya intent on fighting in Syria was discussed at a session of Chechnya’s Economic and Social Security Council on June 6. The website Kavkaz-Uzel quoted an unnamed member of that body as saying 29 Chechens have left Chechnya for Syria, seven of whom have been killed. That source did not specify a time frame. He did say, however, that those who left were mostly aged between 25 and 30, which contradicts Kadyrov’s repeated claims that the men in question are immature adolescents seduced by recruitment videos posted on the Internet.

The true number of Chechens who have headed to Syria to fight may be even larger. Kavkaz-Uzel quoted a representative of a local NGO as saying he knows of some 30 who have left, while an unnamed cleric suggested the true figure could run into dozens, or even hundreds. Predictably, the Chechen authorities are reportedly exerting pressure on the parents of those young men to persuade them to return to Chechnya.

Federal Security Service head Aleksandr Bortnikov told journalists earlier this month that some 200 militants from the Russian Federation are fighting on the side of the “terrorists” in Syria. He did not, unfortunately, give any indication how many are from which republic.

Last fall, the insurgency website Kavkaz Center reported that there were 150 fighters from the “Caucasus Emirate” in Syria, divided into four brigades. One of those brigades is from Kabardino-Balkaria. *** Shock Waves From Insurgency Commanders’ Defection To IS Felt Beyond North Caucasus    The decision late last year by several prominent North Caucasus insurgency commanders to retract their oath of allegiance to Caucasus Emirate leader Aliaskhab Kebekov (Sheikh Ali Abu-Mukhammad) and pledge loyalty to Islamic State (IS) leader Abu-Bakr al-Baghdadi has apparently engendered confusion and discord not only across the North Caucasus but within the Chechen diaspora community.

That at least is the message conveyed by Akhmad Umarov (nom de guerre Abu Khamza), the brother of Caucasus Emirate (IK) founder and leader Doku Umarov and the IK’s official representative abroad, in a 15-minute video address posted last week on Checheninfo.com, the website of the Chechen wing of the North Caucasus insurgency.

In that video footage, Umarov requests a statement of moral support from Kebekov and Emir Khamzat (Aslan Byutukayev), the commander of the Chechen insurgency wing, in response to what he terms the “groundless accusations” dreamed up against him by the pro-IS faction and the latter’s “childish” attempts to justify their actions.

He says it is “unacceptable” that those who do not obey Shari’a law “are trying to obstruct us in our work and spread discord,” and insists that those persons who do so, whether unwittingly, or at the behest of “enemies of Islam,” or in the hope of securing a comfortable post within the IS leadership, should be held responsible under Shari’a law, and will answer for their actions on Judgment Day.

Umarov appeals to Kebekov and Khamzat to explain why Chechen commanders are violating their oath of loyalty to Kebekov and their theological arguments for doing so. He says failure to clarify their arguments will only deepen the split between the two factions.

Umarov then presents his superiors with a choice: either to issue a statement of support for the stance adopted by the IK representation abroad with regard to the defections to IS that would make clear to all fighters from Chechnya and Daghestan that they should “abide by all demands that do not contradict the Koran and Sunna,” meaning remain loyal to Kebekov. Or, “if you have doubts about what we are saying and our sincerity, then we ask you to appoint new people to replace us and dismiss us from our posts. If you have faith and confidence in us, then we ask you to grant us additional powers to restore order and establish a strict and functional system in accordance with Shari’a law to address urgent questions which it is imperative to resolve — questions concerning religion, politics, and social, financial, and informational issues.”

Umarov then addresses Chechen fighters both in the Caucasus and beyond “who are trying to help the cause and to defend our religion and honor,” urging them to take a clear stance against the renegade faction. He says he can provide an explanation for what that faction “is saying behind our backs,” but does not say what those criticisms are.

With regard to Syria (he does not use the toponym “Sham” favored by the Chechens fighting there), Umarov affirms unequivocally that “any fighter who travels to Syria to take part in jihad there should understand that he will have to answer for that on Judgment Day. We appeal to you, especially to the young people of the Vilayat Nokhchiicho [Chechnya], to stay where you are. Your holy duty today is jihad in the Caucasus…to defend our land, the territory of the Caucasus Emirate,” from the “primary foe” in the person of the Kremlin regime and its apostate collaborators, meaning the pro-Moscow Chechen leadership.

Given that Umarov speaks in very general terms, it is impossible to assess the extent of support among IK fighters for IS and the magnitude of the threat that faction poses to the cohesion of the insurgency ranks. But his request for “additional powers” suggests he faces a serious challenge.

Since the statements of support for Baghdadi by six Chechen and Daghestani commanders last month, several insurgency commanders from Chechnya and Ingushetia who for reasons they do not specify are no longer in the Caucasus have reaffirmed their loyalty to Kebekov. So too has Emir Salim (Zalim Shebzukhov), commander of the Kabardino-Balkar-Karachai insurgency wing.

The Arms Race, Launched by Putin’s Threat

It is no secret that Putin has allied Russia with Iran. It is further no secret that Iran is near completion of their nuclear weapons program such that many countries are on Iran’s target list. Coordination and cooperation on nuclear warheads is no secret either but questions need to be asked least of which is who are those that are collaborating and to what end. As Putin finds himself at loggerheads with the West, following his invasion of the Ukraine, he has mentioned Russia’s 5,000 nuclear warheads on at least three occasions recently, and by all accounts, he wasn’t joking, for example, last Thursday night, when Putin was en route to a 50 nations summit, the annual Asia-Europe Meeting in Milan.

“He’s again threatened the West with nuclear weapons,” says John Besemeres, a Russia expert at the ANU. *** So why is this a dangerous topic that needs discussion?

US-Russian rift threatens security of nuclear material

More than two decades of cooperation in guarding weapons-grade stockpiles comes to an end, leaving the world ‘a more dangerous place’

One of the greatest boons brought to the world by the end of the Cold War was the agreement been the US and the countries of the former Soviet Union to cooperate in securing the USSR’s vast nuclear arsenal.

Under the 1991 Cooperative Threat Reduction agreement, better known as the Nunn-Lugar programme (after the two senators who persuaded Congress to pay for it) 900 intercontinental ballistic missiles were destroyed, and over 7600 warheads were deactivated. Some 250 tons of bomb-grade fissile material, scattered across the disintegrating superpower, was locked up and put under guard, so it could not be stolen and sold to the highest bidder. Tens of thousands of former Soviet nuclear weapons scientists and technicians were found jobs and salaries to help reduce the incentives to offer their expertise to rogue states and terrorists.

All in all, a pretty big deal, whose benefits will only be fully appreciated in their absence.

The spirit of cooperation that underpinned the programme has crumbled over recent years. Under Vladimir Putin’s leadership, Russia has increasingly bristled at the premise that it was unable to ensure the security of its own arsenal and fretted about Americans using the programme to spy on its nuclear secrets. In 2012, Moscow announced it would not extend Nunn-Lugar, but a replacement US-Russian bilateral nuclear security deal was cobbled together in its place a year later.

That deal, under the framework of the Multilateral Nuclear Environment Programme in Russia (MNEPR), was more limited. The US would not longer take part in the dismantling of weapons but would continue to assist safeguarding stocks of fissile plutonium and uranium.

Now, even that has fallen apart. In December, Congress voted to cut funding, in part because the Ukraine war, although unspent money in the programme could still have been used. A few days later however, as the Boston Globe reported, Russian officials broke the news to their American counterparts in a hotel overlooking Red Square that they were cutting off almost all cooperation.

As a result, no US-funded security work will be done at any Russian nuclear weapons sites nor will there be any joint security upgrades at any Russian facility where substantial amounts of weapons-usable nuclear material are stored.

Speaking by phone from the US, former Senator Sam Nunn, half of the Nunn-Lugar partnership that started the programme, said “the world is a less safe place because of this”.

There has been a race between cooperation and catastrophe, when you look at the possibility of catastrophic acts of terrorism. Cooperation has been running rapidly over the past twenty years, but this is a real setback…The Russians says they are going to spend resources to secure their materials and we have to hope they will. They have the expertise to do it, but they are under heavy economic pressure.

Matthew Bunn, a Harvard University professor and one of the world’s leading experts on the issue, said: “Nuclear security is dramatically better than it was in the 1990’s. The question now is how much those improvements will be sustained. Will there sufficient protection against insiders? Because all thefts up to now have been by insiders, not 20 guys coming in from the outside with guns blazing.”

Of the new US-Russian rift, Bunn said: It makes the world a more dangerous place. It will make it more likely there will be nuclear security incidents in the world’s biggest nuclear stockpile.   ***

Saudi nuclear weapons ‘on order’ from Pakistan

Saudi Arabia has invested in Pakistani nuclear weapons projects, and believes it could obtain atomic bombs at will, a variety of sources have told BBC Newsnight.

While the kingdom’s quest has often been set in the context of countering Iran’s atomic programme, it is now possible that the Saudis might be able to deploy such devices more quickly than the Islamic republic.

Earlier this year, a senior Nato decision maker told me that he had seen intelligence reporting that nuclear weapons made in Pakistan on behalf of Saudi Arabia are now sitting ready for delivery.

Last month Amos Yadlin, a former head of Israeli military intelligence, told a conference in Sweden that if Iran got the bomb, “the Saudis will not wait one month. They already paid for the bomb, they will go to Pakistan and bring what they need to bring.”

Since 2009, when King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia warned visiting US special envoy to the Middle East Dennis Ross that if Iran crossed the threshold, “we will get nuclear weapons”, the kingdom has sent the Americans numerous signals of its intentions.

Gary Samore served as President Barack Obama's WMD tsar

Gary Samore, until March 2013 President Barack Obama’s counter-proliferation adviser, has told Newsnight:

“I do think that the Saudis believe that they have some understanding with Pakistan that, in extremis, they would have claim to acquire nuclear weapons from Pakistan.”

“What did we think the Saudis were giving us all that money for? It wasn’t charity” Senior Pakistani official

The story of Saudi Arabia’s project – including the acquisition of missiles capable of delivering nuclear warheads over long ranges – goes back decades.

In the late 1980s they secretly bought dozens of CSS-2 ballistic missiles from China.

These rockets, considered by many experts too inaccurate for use as conventional weapons, were deployed 20 years ago.

This summer experts at defence publishers Jane’s reported the completion of a new Saudi CSS-2 base with missile launch rails aligned with Israel and Iran.

It has also been clear for many years that Saudi Arabia has given generous financial assistance to Pakistan’s defence sector, including, western experts allege, to its missile and nuclear labs.

Visits by the then Saudi defence minister Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz al Saud to the Pakistani nuclear research centre in 1999 and 2002 underlined the closeness of the defence relationship.

Defence publisher Jane’s revealed the existence of Saudi Arabia’s third and undisclosed intermediate-range ballistic missile site, approximately 200 km southwest of Riyadh

In its quest for a strategic deterrent against India, Pakistan co-operated closely with China which sold them missiles and provided the design for a nuclear warhead.

The Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan was accused by western intelligence agencies of selling atomic know-how and uranium enrichment centrifuges to Libya and North Korea.

AQ Khan is also believed to have passed the Chinese nuclear weapon design to those countries. This blueprint was for a device engineered to fit on the CSS-2 missile, i.e the same type sold to Saudi Arabia.

Because of this circumstantial evidence, allegations of a Saudi-Pakistani nuclear deal started to circulate even in the 1990s, but were denied by Saudi officials.

They noted that their country had signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and called for a nuclear-free Middle East, pointing to Israel’s possession of such weapons.

The fact that handing over atom bombs to a foreign government could create huge political difficulties for Pakistan, not least with the World Bank and other donors, added to scepticism about those early claims.

“The Saudis speak about Iran and nuclear matters very seriously. They don’t bluff on this issue”

In Eating the Grass, his semi-official history of the Pakistani nuclear program, Major General Feroz Hassan Khan wrote that Prince Sultan’s visits to Pakistan’s atomic labs were not proof of an agreement between the two countries. But he acknowledged, “Saudi Arabia provided generous financial support to Pakistan that enabled the nuclear program to continue.”

Whatever understandings did or did not exist between the two countries in the 1990s, it was around 2003 that the kingdom started serious strategic thinking about its changing security environment and the prospect of nuclear proliferation.

A paper leaked that year by senior Saudi officials mapped out three possible responses – to acquire their own nuclear weapons, to enter into an arrangement with another nuclear power to protect the kingdom, or to rely on the establishment of a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East.

It was around the same time, following the US invasion of Iraq, that serious strains in the US/Saudi relationship began to show themselves, says Gary Samore.

The Saudis resented the removal of Saddam Hussein, had long been unhappy about US policy on Israel, and were growing increasingly concerned about the Iranian nuclear program.

In the years that followed, diplomatic chatter about Saudi-Pakistani nuclear cooperation began to increase.

In 2007, the US mission in Riyadh noted they were being asked questions by Pakistani diplomats about US knowledge of “Saudi-Pakistani nuclear cooperation”.

The unnamed Pakistanis opined that “it is logical for the Saudis to step in as the physical ‘protector’” of the Arab world by seeking nuclear weapons, according to one of the State Department cables posted by Wikileaks.

By the end of that decade Saudi princes and officials were giving explicit warnings of their intention to acquire nuclear weapons if Iran did.

Having warned the Americans in private for years, last year Saudi officials in Riyadh escalated it to a public warning, telling a journalist from the Times “it would be completely unacceptable to have Iran with a nuclear capability and not the kingdom”.

But were these statements bluster, aimed at forcing a stronger US line on Iran, or were they evidence of a deliberate, long-term plan for a Saudi bomb? Both, is the answer I have received from former key officials.

One senior Pakistani, speaking on background terms, confirmed the broad nature of the deal – probably unwritten – his country had reached with the kingdom and asked rhetorically “what did we think the Saudis were giving us all that money for? It wasn’t charity.”

Another, a one-time intelligence officer from the same country, said he believed “the Pakistanis certainly maintain a certain number of warheads on the basis that if the Saudis were to ask for them at any given time they would immediately be transferred.”

As for the seriousness of the Saudi threat to make good on the deal, Simon Henderson, Director of the Global Gulf and Energy Policy Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told BBC Newsnight “the Saudis speak about Iran and nuclear matters very seriously. They don’t bluff on this issue.”

Talking to many serving and former officials about this over the past few months, the only real debate I have found is about how exactly the Saudi Arabians would redeem the bargain with Pakistan.

Some think it is a cash-and-carry deal for warheads, the first of those options sketched out by the Saudis back in 2003; others that it is the second, an arrangement under which Pakistani nuclear forces could be deployed in the kingdom.

Gary Samore, considering these questions at the centre of the US intelligence and policy web, at the White House until earlier this year, thinks that what he calls, “the Nato model”, is more likely.

However ,”I think just giving Saudi Arabia a handful of nuclear weapons would be a very provocative action”, says Gary Samore.

He adds: “I’ve always thought it was much more likely – the most likely option if Pakistan were to honour any agreement would be for be for Pakistan to send its own forces, its own troops armed with nuclear weapons and with delivery systems to be deployed in Saudi Arabia”.

This would give a big political advantage to Pakistan since it would allow them to deny that they had simply handed over the weapons, but implies a dual key system in which they would need to agree in order for ‘Saudi Arabian’ “nukes” to be launched.

Saudi Arabia mapOthers I have spoken to think this is not credible, since Saudi Arabia, which regards itself as the leader of the broader Sunni Islamic ‘ummah’ or community, would want complete control of its nuclear deterrent, particularly at this time of worsening sectarian confrontation with Shia Iran.

And it is Israeli information – that Saudi Arabia is now ready to take delivery of finished warheads for its long-range missiles – that informs some recent US and Nato intelligence reporting. Israel of course shares Saudi Arabia’s motive in wanting to worry the US into containing Iran.

Amos Yadlin declined to be interviewed for our BBC Newsnight report, but told me by email that “unlike other potential regional threats, the Saudi one is very credible and imminent.”

Even if this view is accurate there are many good reasons for Saudi Arabia to leave its nuclear warheads in Pakistan for the time being.

Doing so allows the kingdom to deny there are any on its soil. It avoids challenging Iran to cross the nuclear threshold in response, and it insulates Pakistan from the international opprobrium of being seen to operate an atomic cash-and-carry.

These assumptions though may not be safe for much longer. The US diplomatic thaw with Iran has touched deep insecurities in Riyadh, which fears that any deal to constrain the Islamic republic’s nuclear program would be ineffective.

Earlier this month the Saudi intelligence chief and former ambassador to Washington Prince Bandar announced that the kingdom would be distancing itself more from the US.

While investigating this, I have heard rumours on the diplomatic grapevine, that Pakistan has recently actually delivered Shaheen mobile ballistic missiles to Saudi Arabia, minus warheads.

These reports, still unconfirmed, would suggest an ability to deploy nuclear weapons in the kingdom, and mount them on an effective, modern, missile system more quickly than some analysts had previously imagined.

In Egypt, Saudi Arabia showed itself ready to step in with large-scale backing following the military overthrow of President Mohammed Morsi’s government.

There is a message here for Pakistan, of Riyadh being ready to replace US military assistance or World Bank loans, if standing with Saudi Arabia causes a country to lose them.

Newsnight contacted both the Pakistani and Saudi governments. The Pakistan Foreign Ministry has described our story as “speculative, mischievous and baseless”.

It adds: “Pakistan is a responsible nuclear weapon state with robust command and control structures and comprehensive export controls.”

The Saudi embassy in London has also issued a statement pointing out that the Kingdom is a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty and has worked for a nuclear free Middle East.

But it also points out that the UN’s “failure to make the Middle East a nuclear free zone is one of the reasons the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia rejected the offer of a seat on the UN Security Council”.

It says the Saudi Foreign Minister has stressed that this lack of international action “has put the region under the threat of a time bomb that cannot easily be defused by manoeuvring around it”.