New Dynamic with Iran and Russia

Posted on March 15, 2016March 15, 2016 by Denise Simon

Iran shows underground ballistic missile launch base

IHS: Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has provided additional insight into how its underground ballistic missile launch bases work by allowing a TV news crew to film inside one such facility.

The news crew also filmed a ballistic missile being launched from the underground facility. This footage showed terrain that IHS Jane’s has been able to match to a base just south of the city of Jam in Bushehr province.

Broadcast by Islamic Republic of Iran News Network (IRINN) on 8 March, the footage showed a Qiam ballistic missile erected inside a large launch chamber with a circular aperture at the top and a flame trench below to manage the missile’s exhaust in the confined space. The launch chamber was sealed from the rest of the underground facility by large blast doors.

The Qiam appeared to be on a version of the erector-launcher mechanism carried by Iran’s mobile ballistic missile launchers.

There was no overhead gantry for loading the missiles inside the launch chamber and the erector-launcher appeared to have small wheels and hydraulic stabilisers, suggesting it is loaded elsewhere in the facility and then wheeled into the launch chamber. The hydraulic stabilisers are presumably lowered once it is over the fire trench to fix it in position for the launch.

This would allow a higher rate of fire than if a static system was used, as missiles could be prepared on multiple erector-launchers that are wheeled in and out of the chamber for the launches.

Satellite imagery of the Jam facility suggests it has two underground launch chambers that are 190 m from each other.

If all the IRINN footage was filmed at the same location, then the Jam facility also supports mobile transporter-erector-launchers (TELs).

Dozens of missiles could be seen stored in tunnels, including longer-range Ghadr types that are too tall to erect inside the underground launch chamber.

A showdown in the future may be coming that puts the United States at odds versus Iran and Russia. Iran and Russia have a new plan for an oil and gas swap.

Iran urges progress on oil and gas swap with Russia

Zanganeh also told the ISNA that his country’s oil exports will rise to 2 million bpd in the month ending March 20, a slight increase from February’s 1.75 million bpd.

“Iran made it clear that it only intends to sign up to the oil production cap once it has reached a production level of 4 million barrels a day”, analysts at Commerzbank AG led by Eugen Weinberg said in a report.

An expected downturn in Us crude oil production through 2016 helped push crude oil prices higher last week, sending Brent above $40 per barrel for the first time this year. Not too long. It’s now ramped up production to somewhere between 2.8 million barrels per day and 3.5 million barrels per day.

Even with the proposed freeze, continuously high production means global output still exceeds demand by at least 1 million barrels per day (bpd).

Both crude and Brent oil have tumbled again after the killed all hopes in joining Saudi Arabia, Russia, Qatar, and Venezuela to freeze oil production.

CENTCOM commander warns of Russia-Iran alliance

IHS: There are signs that Iran and Russia are forging a strategic partnership that threatens to further destabilise the Middle East, according to General Lloyd Austin, the commander of US Central Command (CENTCOM).

Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) announced on 8 March that it had launched two Ghadr ballistic missiles during its ‘Eqtedar-e Velayat’ exercise. The move was the latest showing the IRGC has no intention of slowing its missile programmes after the nuclear deal was signed last year. Source: Fars News Agency

In his testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee on 8 March, Gen Austin said, “Russia’s co-operation with Iran appears to be expanding beyond near-term co-ordination for operations in Syria and is moving towards an emerging strategic partnership.” He described “a more traditional security co-operation arrangement” between Russia and Iran is “cause for significant concern”.

Gen Austin said Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad would “certainly not be in power today were it not for the robust support” provided by Russia and Iran.

While he recognised that the Russians have tipped the balance in favour of Assad, he noted that they might be failing to achieve their objectives in Syria. “My assumption is they wanted to make a substantial difference as fast as possible and transition to something else very quickly. They have not been able to do that and I think they are finding out that this could go on for some time,” he said.

He outlined the wider implications of Moscow’s support for an alliance that includes Iran, the Syrian government, and the Lebanese group Hizbullah. “Russia’s involvement in Syria exacerbates sectarian tensions as it appears they are supporting the Shiite states against the Sunnis,” he said.

He described Iran as still having “hegemonic ambitions” in the region despite the implementation of the nuclear deal agreed last year and called it a greater mid- to long-term threat than the Islamic State group.

As evidence of the emerging Iran-Russia strategic partnership, Gen Austin said there are already “indications of high-end weapon sales and economic co-operation between the two countries”.

The only defence deal that has been announced so far is Iran’s order of Russian S-300 long-range air defence systems, but Iranian officials have expressed interest in Su-30SM multirole fighters and there have been reports that Iran may also want T-90 tanks, helicopters, and the Bastion-P coastal anti-ship missile system.

Putin: Mission Achieved in Syria, AH not so much

Posted on March 14, 2016March 14, 2016 by Denise Simon

But but but: Putin orders withdrawal from Syria after being told of Gulf States decision to ship anti-aircraft systems to rebels over west objections. Furthermore, Russia’s S-400 will stay in Syria and Tartous Naval base will continue been developed and expanded. Putin needs permanent access and routes in the Mediterranean.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has confirmed that Moscow will begin withdrawal of Russian forces from Syria.

On Monday, President Putin indicated that the Kremlin will start withdrawing its main forces in Syria, saying that the military has largely achieved its objectives.

“I think that the task that was assigned to the Ministry of Defense and the armed forces as a whole has achieved its goal, and so I order the defense minister to start tomorrow withdrawing the main part of our military factions from the Syrian Arab Republic,” President Putin said during a meeting with the Russian Defense and Foreign Ministries, according to RIA Novosti.

The withdrawal will begin on Tuesday.

“With the participation of the Russian military…the Syrian armed forces and patriotic Syrian forces have been able to achieve a fundamental turnaround in the fight against international terrorism and have taken the initiative in almost all respects,” the Russian president said.

“There has been a significant turning point in the fight against terrorism,” Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said.

Putin expressed hope that this decision will encourage all parties involved in the Syrian conflict to pursue a peaceful resolution.

“I ask the ministry of foreign affairs to intensify the participation of the Russian Federation in the organization of the peace process towards a solution to the Syrian crisis,” Putin said.

Moscow will, however, maintain a military presence in Syria, and a deadline for complete withdrawal has not yet been announced. Putin also indicated that Russian forces will remain at the port of Tartus and Hmeymim airbase in Latakia.

“Our bases of operations — our naval base in Tartus and our air base at Hmeymim — will operate as usual. They should be protected from land, sea, and air,” Putin said. “That part of our military group has traditionally been in Syria over the course of many years, and today will have to perform a very important function in monitoring the ceasefire and creating conditions for the peace process.”

According to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, Russia has informed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad of the decision. A statement from Assad’s office stresses that the Kremlin has nonetheless pledged to continue its support for Syria in “confronting terrorism.”

Assad also recognized the “professionalism, courage and heroism” of Russian Army soldiers and officers.

During the phone call, both Assad and Putin agreed that the ceasefire has led to significant reduction in bloodshed, and the humanitarian situation has improved.

“The sides expressed shared opinion that the implementation of the ceasefire in Syria has helped to sharply reduce the bloodshed and to improve the humanitarian situation in the country,” the Kremlin press service said in a statement.

Assad also expressed hope that peace talks in Geneva will lead to concrete results, and stressed the need for a political process in Syria.

Earlier on Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Moscow’s anti-terrorist air campaign created the conditions for political process on Syrian reconciliation.

Germany: Anti-Immigrant Party Growing

Posted on March 14, 2016March 14, 2016 by Denise Simon

This has been building since 2014 and gained real traction in 2015.

USAToday: Far-right protests were held in more than a dozen other nations in Europe on Saturday including the Czech Republic, France, Poland and the Netherlands. The marches and demonstrations were part of a coordinated attempt by PEGIDA and like-minded groups to hold a so-called European Action Day. Riot police clashed with protesters at several of the rallies including in Calais, France, where police used tear gas to disperse crowds. Ten people were arrested.

The synchronized demonstrations came as the number of Syrian refugees assembled on Turkey’s border jumped to 35,000, according to Reuters.

The latest exodus is a result of a renewed offensive by Syria’s President Bashar Assad to retake ground controlled by opposition groups near the city of Aleppo, previously a valued commercial center.

Turkey refuses to open the border. It already hosts over 2.5 million Syrian refugees.

German anti-immigration party makes gains in local elections amid refugee crisis

FNC: A nationalist, anti-migration party powered into three German state legislatures in elections Sunday held amid divisions over Chancellor Angela Merkel’s liberal approach to the refugee crisis. Merkel’s conservatives lost to center-left rivals in two states they had hoped to win.

The elections in the prosperous southwestern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, neighboring Rhineland-Palatinate and relatively poor Saxony-Anhalt in the ex-communist east were the first major political test since Germany registered nearly 1.1 million people as asylum-seekers last year.

The three-year-old Alternative for Germany, or AfD — which has campaigned against Merkel’s open-borders approach — easily entered all three legislatures.

AfD won 15.1 percent of the vote in Baden-Wuerttemberg and 12.6 percent in Rhineland-Palatinate, official results showed. It finished second in Saxony-Anhalt with some 24 percent, according to projections by ARD and ZDF television with most districts counted.

“We are seeing above all in these elections that voters are turning away in large numbers from the big established parties and voting for our party,” AfD leader Frauke Petry said.

They “expect us finally to be the opposition that there hasn’t been in the German parliament and some state parliaments,” she added.

There were uncomfortable results both for Merkel’s conservative Christian Democratic Union and their partners in the national government, the center-left Social Democrats. The traditional rivals are Germany’s two biggest parties.

“The democratic center in our country has not become stronger, but smaller, and I think we must all take that seriously,” said Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, the Social Democrats’ leader.

Merkel’s party kept its status as strongest party in Saxony-Anhalt. It had hoped to beat left-leaning Green governor Winfried Kretschmann in Baden-Wuerttemberg, a traditional stronghold that the CDU ran for decades until 2011. It also hoped to oust Social Democrat governor Malu Dreyer from the governor’s office in Rhineland-Palatinate.

However, the CDU finished several percentage points behind the popular incumbents’ parties in both states and dropped 12 percentage points to a record-low result in Baden-Wuerttemberg, with 27 percent support. Its performance in Rhineland-Palatinate, with 31.8 percent, was also a record low.

The Social Democrats suffered large losses in both Baden-Wuerttemberg and Saxony-Anhalt, where they were the junior partners in the outgoing governments, finishing behind AfD.

Other parties won’t share power with AfD, but its presence will complicate their coalition-building efforts.

In all three states, the results were set to leave the outgoing coalition governments without a majority — forcing regional leaders into what could be time-consuming negotiations with new, unusual partners. Merkel’s CDU still has a long-shot chance of forming an untried three-way alliance to win the Baden-Wuerttemberg governor’s office.

Germany’s next national election is due in late 2017. While Sunday’s results will likely generate new tensions, Merkel herself should be secure: she has put many state-level setbacks behind her in the past, and there’s no long-term successor or figurehead for any rebellion in sight.

A top official with Merkel’s party called for it to stay on its course in the refugee crisis. CDU general secretary Peter Tauber pointed to recent polls indicating that her popularity is rebounding and added: “this shows that it is good if the CDU sticks to this course, saying that we need time to master this big challenge.”

Merkel insisted last year that “we will manage” the challenge of integrating refugees. While her government has moved to tighten asylum rules, she still insists on a pan-European solution to the refugee crisis, ignoring demands from some conservative allies for a national cap on the number of refugees.

AfD’s strong performance will boost its hopes of entering the national parliament next year. It entered five state legislatures and the European Parliament in its initial guise as a primarily anti-euro party before splitting and then rebounding in the refugee crisis.

The CDU may have been hurt by an attempt by its candidates in Baden-Wuerttemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate to put cautious distance between themselves and Merkel’s refugee policies, which may simply have created the impression of disunity. The party slipped in polls there over recent weeks.

The two last month called for Germany to impose daily refugee quotas — something Merkel opposes but which neighboring Austria has since put in place. Separately, Merkel’s conservative allies in Bavaria have attacked her approach for months, demanding an annual refugee cap.

Center-left incumbents Kretschmann and Dreyer often sounded more enthusiastic about Merkel’s refugee policy than their conservative challengers.

“The result hopefully will be that the CDU and (their Bavarian allies) will realize that this permanent quarreling doesn’t help them,” Vice Chancellor Gabriel said.

Putin Whacked a Defector in a DC Hotel?

Posted on March 10, 2016March 10, 2016 by Denise Simon

InquisitR: Metropolitan Police Officer Sean Hickman said officers were called to the Dupont Circle Hotel at close to 11:30 a.m. on Thursday and found a man dead. The Russian embassy in Washington confirmed that man was Mikhail Lesin.

A Russian embassy spokesperson told Sputnik, another Russian state-run news outlet, about Lesin’s sudden death.

“Our consular officials had an opportunity to confirm that the Russian national who passed away in DC is indeed Mikhail Lesin. Out of respect to the privacy and sensitivity of the matter we are not at liberty to disclose any other information, and would ask you to refer all further requests to his family and the law enforcement officials.”

Mikhail Lesin is recognized with creating the English-language news network Russia Today. Now known as RT, and backed by the Russian government, the network “provides an alternative perspective on major global events, and acquaints an international audience with the Russian viewpoint,” according to its website.

Last year, one U.S. lawmaker claimed Mikhail Lesin “led the Kremlin’s efforts to censor Russia’s independent television outlets.”

Former Putin Aide, Found in Washington, Died From Blows to Head

NYT: Washington — A former close aide to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia who was found dead in a hotel room in the Dupont Circle neighborhood in November died of blunt force injuries to the head, the chief medical examiner’s office here said on Thursday. Russian state media had reported that the aide, Mikhail Y. Lesin, died in the hotel of a heart attack.

A member of Mr. Lesin’s family who reportedly spoke with RIA Novosti, the state news agency, also said in November that Mr. Lesin had died of a heart attack.

On Thursday the medical examiner’s office said that Mr. Lesin’s body showed signs of blunt force injury not only to the head but to the neck and torso, as well as upper and lower extremities. The medical examiner’s office did not explain the timing of the announcement, although officials said that findings often take 60 to 90 days.

The matter remains the subject of a police investigation here. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Department, Lt. Sean Conboy, declined on Thursday to provide additional comment. Andrew Ames, a spokesman for the F.B.I. in Washington, also had no comment.

The death of Mr. Lesin, who was 59, had prompted no shortage of speculation here and in Russia in recent months.

Mr. Lesin’s body was found in a hotel room with no signs of life at about 11:30 a.m. on Nov. 5.

Lesin was once a political leader, a media advertising executive and an inside advisor to Putin. He was head of communications for the Russian Federation and Minister of Press under Putin.

In 2011, Lesin moved from Russia to Beverly Hills where he has connections at Warner Brothers. He did in fact return to Russia in 2013 where he led the marketing. propaganda and media for Gazprom an oil infrastructure of which Putin has ownership.

On December 3, 2014, Assistant Attorney General Peter J. Kadzik replied to Senator Wicker’s letter by stating the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have been referred for appropriate disposition of Mikhail Lesin and “similarly situated Russian individuals and companies with assets in the United States that may be in violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the Anti-Money Laundering Statutes.” The properties are located at

$13.8 million house of 1,200 square metres (13,000 sq ft) at 10 Beverly Park, Beverly Hills, California
$9 million house of 980 square metres (10,500 sq ft) at 321 Bristol Avenue, Brentwood, Los Angeles, California
$5.6 million house of 630 square metres (6,800 sq ft) in Beverly Park, Los Angeles, California
$4.3 million house along Mulholland Drive at 13327 Java Drive, Beverly Hills, California
$3.995 million house of 570 square metres (6,100 sq ft) in Palisades Highlands, Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California
It’s unclear if the FBI ever initiated a probe into this matter yet given the results of the autopsy…..other investigations are likely now underway.

Hey John Kerry Read the Genocide Convention

Posted on March 10, 2016March 10, 2016 by Denise Simon

The Genocide Convention, it IS a Treaty:

Article 2 of the convention defines genocide as

…any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

— Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 2

Article 3 defines the crimes that can be punished under the convention:

(a) Genocide;

(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;

(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;

(d) Attempt to commit genocide;

(e) Complicity in genocide.

— Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 3

In part from CNS: “I will make a decision on it as soon as I have that additional evaluation and we will proceed forward from there,” Kerry said.

Kerry was responding to a question put to him by Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R.-Neb.), who is the sponsor of a resolution that would declare on behalf of Congress that it is in fact genocide. The Knights of Columbus and In Defense of Christians are sponsoring an online petition asking Kerry to “declare that Christians, along with Yazidis and other minorities, are targets on ongoing genocide.”

Feb 25, 2016 – Congressman Rohrabacher slams Secretary of State John Kerry with the truth. Many Americans are proud in supporting Israel while ignoring the slaughter of innocent Christians in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Egypt. They are deaf to the cries of Christians in SE Ukraine (Donbass). They ignore the resurrection of Christianity in Russia. Is America still a Christian nation? If so, then why won’t they defend Christians around the world?

Report details ISIS atrocities against Christians, presses State for ‘genocide’ label

FNC: Holding a bloody shirt he carries with him to remember the Islamic State’s crimes against Iraqi Christians, Douglas Bazi described for a Washington audience Thursday how he’s suffered at ISIS’ hands: He was kidnapped, had his teeth bashed in with a hammer and watched as his church was bombed.

“There is not ‘life’ in Iraq,” Bazi said, noting his congregation has been targeted so often it is called the “church of the martyrs, or the church of the blood.”

Bazi joined Middle Eastern Christian leaders and human rights advocates from the Knights of Columbus on Thursday as the group, along with In Defense of Christians (IDC), released a powerful and comprehensive report they say makes the case that the terror campaign against Christians and other minorities in Syria, Iraq and other parts of the Middle East can only be called one thing: genocide.

The report, along with the personal accounts conveyed at the National Press Club in Washington on Thursday, put even more pressure on the Obama administration to officially label the atrocities as genocide.

The State Department and White House so far have not done so, but are facing a congressionally mandated March 17 deadline to make a decision.

“We are forgotten, and we are alone,” Bazi, a former ISIS hostage and now a priest at an Irbil refugee camp, lamented.

Bazi was joined by Irbil-based Dankha Joola, who pointed out that of the 2 million Christians who lived in Iraq before the war, fewer than 300,000 reside there today — many victims of killings and kidnappings, others forced to leave their homes by radicals, Al Qaeda, and now ISIS.

Carl Anderson, head of the Knights of Columbus, which produced the 278-page document with IDC, hopes this report will help advance their cause.

*** Christian population in the Middle East

*** Map of Christian Persecution in the Middle East

“The evidence contained in this report as well as the evidence relied upon by the European Parliament fully support — I would suggest compel — the conclusion that reasonable grounds exist to believe the crime of genocide has been committed,” Anderson said.

The report lists 1,131 Iraqi Christians killed between 2003 and June 9, 2014, including where they were killed and when. It also incorporates 24 pages of witness statements collected between February and March of this year, and nearly 200 documented attacks — including destruction of property, sexual assaults, enslavement, torture, imprisonment and killing — in Iraq, Syria and North Africa. Also included is a documenting of attacks on 125 Iraqi churches from 2003 to 2014.

The report also features a legal brief arguing that the crimes committed rise to the level of the Genocide Convention Implementation Act of 1987, and the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

The European Parliament in February already declared that genocide is taking place in the Middle East against Christians, Yazidis and other ethnic and religious minorities at the hands of the Islamic State.

“While we believe this to be the most comprehensive report on this subject to date, covering incidents in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt and Yemen, we continue to receive new reports and new evidence,” Anderson said Thursday. But with new reports pouring in every day, he cautioned: “It may only be the tip of the iceberg.”

There have been widespread reports of crucifixions, beheadings and kidnappings, with women and girls forced into marriages with ISIS fighters, or sold into sexual slavery. In Syria, Christians once accounted for 10 percent of the population, but today their numbers have declined to an estimated 1 million or less. Last summer, ISIS kidnapped nearly 300 Christians from Syrian villages and later ransomed them back for $100,000 per person. The money was raised by the Assyrian Christian diaspora.

On March 4, gunmen stormed a Catholic retirement home in Yemen and gunned down 16 people, including four Indian nuns affiliated with the order established by Mother Teresa. According to reports, the city of Aden where the attack occured has seen its Christian population flee.

While groups like the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic organization, press the administration to make the genocide designation, Congress is applying similar pressure.

There are bills with strong bipartisan support in both the House and Senate expressing the sense of Congress that those who commit or support violence against Christians and other ethnic minorities including Yazidis, Turkmen and Kurds for ethnic or religious reasons are committing genocide.

When pressed, Secretary of State John Kerry said in a recent House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing that “you have to get facts from the ground, more than just anecdotal.”

The Knights of Columbus say they were asked to conduct Thursday’s report by David Saperstein, ambassador at-large for religious freedom at the State Department, to give the administration the evidence “on the ground,” and hopes it will clarify matters in Foggy Bottom.

When asked on March 1 why the administration has yet to make the determination, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the word genocide “involves a very specific legal determination that has, at this point, not been reached.”

Advocates say this report proves the legal thresholds have been met, and then some.

“We think the legal question is met and I would reiterate that what is required by the statute is a finding of probable cause, which is not beyond a shadow of a doubt, it that there are reasonable grounds to believe that this crime has occurred and is occurring,” said Anderson, “and I think the facts in this report establish, compellingly, that there are reasonable grounds to believe this crime is being committed.”

The State Department did not return a request for comment, though administration officials have said they recognize and will work to address the violence against Christians and other groups regardless of the words used to describe it.

At least three presidential cadidates — Sens. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz on the Republican side, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the Democratic side — have called on the administration to designate this as a ‘genocide.’