Category Archives: Russia

One Sided Human Rights When it Comes to Gangs and Terrorists

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We continue to watch in horror and fear the deadly terror in Israel and Gaza and rightly so. It must be known however, these types of attacks and terror go far beyond the Middle East. There is an organization funded by the usual. George Soros but also other nefarious people and that is the Human Rights Watch. (travel over to Wikipedia and read their summary, it sounds great but the reality is not so much)

As we pray for the hostages to not only survive but to be released in Gaza, it is happening in other corners of the world including what the Russians have done to Ukrainian citizens and especially children and then there is Haiti and Africa. Human Rights Watch is not so into caring about those locations.

Let’s begin with Haiti as it is news to all of you. It was just a week ago that the Associated Press reported the following in part:

A heavily armed gang surrounded a hospital in Haiti on Wednesday, trapping women, children and newborns inside until police rescued them, according to the director of the medical center, who pleaded for help via social media. Ulysse said members of Haiti’s National Police force responded to his call for help and arrived with three armored trucks to evacuate 40 children and 70 patients to a private home in a safer part of the city. Among those delicately evacuated were children on oxygen, he said.

Ulysse identified those responsible as members of the Brooklyn gang, led by Gabriel Jean-Pierre, best known as “Ti Gabriel.” Jean-Pierre also is the leader of a powerful gang alliance known as G-Pep, one of two rival coalitions in Haiti.

The Brooklyn gang has some 200 members and controls certain communities within Cite Soleil, including Brooklyn. They are involved in extortion, hijacking of goods and general violence, according to a recent United Nations report. Earlier this year, at least 20 armed gang members burst into a hospital run by Doctors Without Borders and snatched a patient from an operating room. The criminals gained access after faking a life-threatening emergency, the organization said.

UN: Haitian Gangs Invading Central Haiti source and read more here

By the way, the United Nations actually has a permanent peacekeeping office in Haiti….so much for that, even while the United States is often encountering migrants fleeing from Haiti. Oh yes, Human Rights Watch is completely tied to policies from the United Nations also.

Now let’s move back over to Ukraine shall we?

CBS News reported only last week about 19,000 children kidnapped by Russian forces and the real numbers could be as high as 300,000 in total.

As an example:

Last October, Nikita was living in a boarding school for disabled children when the Russian authorities ordered all 86 kids there to be transferred deeper into Russian-controlled territory.

Polina (translated): I came home after work, I opened Instagram and there was a picture of my child– Nikita. With a caption, Russia is taking children.

Polina says the Russians played a cruel game of hide and seek – moving Nikita at least three times in eight months – including to an orphanage in Russia

Then The Guardian reported last March the following in part:

What do we know about the Ukrainian children taken by Russia?
The court’s pre-trial judges said there were “reasonable grounds to believe that each suspect bears responsibility for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population, and that of unlawful transfer of population from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, in prejudice of Ukrainian children”. The judges said they had chosen to unseal the names of the suspects in an effort to prevent further crimes.

Reports first emerged last spring that Ukrainian children in occupied territory were being taken to Russia, and even being adopted by Russian families. Russia has presented its actions as a humanitarian mission to save Ukrainian children from the war. But Ukraine has accused Russia of genocide and described its actions as a war crime.

Who are the children involved?
The alleged abductees include children taken from Ukrainian state institutions in the occupied areas, children whose parents had sent them to Russian-run “summer camps” from which they never returned, children whose parents were arrested by the Russian occupying authorities, and children who were orphaned by the fighting.

Where are the children from?
The vast majority of Ukrainian children taken by Russia are from occupied areas of southern and eastern Ukraine: Kherson region, Kharkiv region, Zaporizhzhia region, Donetsk and Luhansk region, as well as a small area of Mykolaiv region.

How many children have been taken?
Russia has admitted to holding at least 1,400 Ukrainian children it describes as orphans, though it said at least 2,000 had travelled to Russia unaccompanied. In addition, several hundred children from the occupied territories remain in Russia after they attended “re-education” camps with the consent of their parents but were then not returned.

What has happened to the orphans?
Since the invasion, at least 400 Ukrainian orphans have been adopted by Russian families, according to the Ukrainian Regional Center for Human Rights, which has calculated its figure from statements by the Russian state. Russia has said 1,000 more are waiting to be adopted.

Lvova-Belova, the Russian children’s commissioner, has herself described “adopting” a 15-year-old child from Mariupol, the south-eastern Ukrainian city that was devastated and occupied by Russian forces.

But many of these Ukrainian children have living relatives, who are often desperately searching for them. About 90% of Ukrainian children who were living in state care at the time of the invasion were “social orphans”, meaning they had relatives but those family members unable to take care of them.

How about China? Well they have an estimated 40,000 child slaves in Congo mining for cobalt and lithium for batteries, mostly for the EV industry. Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ) published a summary from a congressional hearing the exploitation of children in Africa for the economic and global agenda for China.

There is a foundation called Walk Free Foundation that studies modern day slavery and publishes an index. The estimate is 30 million people worldwide are living in modern day slavery from places such as India, China and Africa.

Bringing it closer to home, with the protests across America to Free Palestine, no one says enough about the fear from violence and theft for individuals and businesses with smash and grabs and now crash and grabs, meaning stolen cars are used to break into businesses.

So. exactly where are the leaders of any sort? Where is the Human Rights Watch? Where is the Department of Justice which by the way formed a legal team to work at the Hague for the International Criminal Court? How about Interpol and Red Notices or the FBI? How about the District Attorneys do some real work on car-jacking, human trafficking, the sex trade, migrant crime., cartel narcotic trafficking…and all the rest.

Where are the protectors if no one is above the law?

 

You Need to Know this about BRICS

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BRICS is a collection of countries that launched in 2010 to dominate the global economy. BRICS stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Just recently, a BRICS summit was held in Johannesburg to discuss the next mission and that is oil and the expansion of alternative currencies.

Russia's president Vladimir Putin speaks via video link during a press conference on the closing day of The Brics summit at the Sandton Convention Center on August 24, 2023

Getty Images  Vladimir Putin addressed the summit via a video link

Russian President Putin attending by video link since he is under arrest by the International Criminal Court for war crimes yet that has not stopped the emerging threat BRICS is about to impose on the global stage…control of at least 30% of the world’s oil industry.

Putin in his remarks states that Western powers with their ‘neo-liberalism’ pose a threat to traditional values in developing countries.

Several additional countries were extended an invitation to join BRICS and they include Saudi Arabita, Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. If these countries accept the invitation to join, collectively 30% of the world’s GDP would be under BRICS. China pushed the hardest for the expansion of the bloc as a way to counter Western dominance.

White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan attempted to play down the bloc’s expansion plans.

He said that due to Brics countries’ divergence of views on critical issues, he did not see it as “evolving into some kind of geo-political rival to the United States or anyone else”.

BBC posted in part by Sarang Shidore, director of the Global South programme at the Quincy Institute in Washington:

‘US can’t set all norms’

Nevertheless, the Brics expansion does represent a shift.

“No longer is it a world where the US can set all the norms, or drive all the institutions. There’s no question about that. But a replacement? No, I would say much more of a complementarity than a replacement that is on the horizon,” Mr Shidore added.

So for a group that says they all value and respect each other’s opinions, maybe no-one won or lost. It really was just a diplomatic gathering with some give and take.

***

President Biden does not take issue with any of this since he continues with his war on domestic oil production. He just blocked and restricted oil and gas development in the Gulf and millions of acres of land giving eco groups all they want.

Does this look like the United States has energy stability now or in the future?

Image

New composition of BRICS will control 80% of world oil production With the addition of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Iran to the BRICS, the Union will be able to control the lion’s share of the world’s oil production. The same goes for the sharp GDP growth of the new BRICS countries. It will amount to 30% of world GDP and exceed $30 trillion.

This is now a global oil cartel….oh add in OPEC.

 

 

Putin’s Meeting with Wagner Included 35 Others

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Primer:

BRUSSELS (AP) — Nearly 50,000 Russian men have died in the war in Ukraine, according to the first independent statistical analysis of Russia’s war dead.

Two independent Russian media outlets, Mediazona and Meduza, working with a data scientist from Germany’s Tübingen University, used Russian government data to shed light on one of Moscow’s closest-held secrets — the true human cost of its invasion of Ukraine.

To do so, they relied on a statistical concept popularized during the COVID-19 pandemic called excess mortality. Drawing on inheritance records and official mortality data, they estimated how many more men under age 50 died between February 2022 and May 2023 than normal.

*** So, then what was this meeting about that Putin invited 35 top people to attend? After 3 hours in this meeting, it was meant to show Putin maintains control…control of what remains unclear but the read outs from the meeting are scarce on details except that General Valery Gerasimov is keeping his position and title which was the main complaint of Prighozin. It could be however that his duties and responsibilities are diminished. Furthermore, due to the high casualty rate of injuries and death of Russian fighters, Moscow is turning to the Chechen Republic. Chechen fighters are some of the deadliest fighters known but have yet to appear on the battlefield. This is one to watch. Preparation of Jumping-off Ground for Russian Air Forces in Belarus ... (2 Russian bases in Belarus/source)

Next, NATO leadership, at least our own State Department and Department of Defense need to address Belarus and Lukashenko, the president of Belarus.

MEMRI is reporting:

On June 28, 2023, the Russian media outlet Vzglyad published an article titled “How To Manage The Legacy Of The Wagner Group” about the future of the Wagner Group mercenaries after the attempted mutiny that took place few days earlier.

As many Wagner group fighter are preparing to move to Belarus, Belarusian military expert Alexander Alesin told Vzglyad that these fighters may become instructors in the Belarus Army or may provide security for Belarusian workers in Africa.
On June 28, 2023, the Russian media outlet Vzglyad published an article titled “How To Manage The Legacy Of The Wagner Group” about the future of the Wagner Group mercenaries after the attempted mutiny that took place few days earlier.

As many Wagner group fighter are preparing to move to Belarus, Belarusian military expert Alexander Alesin told Vzglyad that these fighters may become instructors in the Belarus Army or may provide security for Belarusian workers in Africa.

Meanwhile, the other topic that should be part of major discussions at the NATO summit is Germany. Exactly what side is Chancellor Scholz on any way? German intelligence knew in advance?

 

… criticism came from the ranks of the center-left German Social Democratic Party (SPD), which is the primary political party behind the government of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. However, criticism also came from the Green Party —which also supports Scholz’s administration— and the center-right Free Democratic Party (FDP), which opposes Scholz’s government. The criticism intensified after June 28, when, during a live television interview, Chancellor Scholz appeared to confirm speculation that the BND had left his administration in the dark about the Wagner mutiny until it was too late.

Late last week, however, a joint investigation by two of Germany’s most respected public television broadcasters, the Hamburg-based NDR and the Cologne-based WDR, concluded that the BND had been far more informed about the Wagner mutiny than its critics have claimed. The investigation concluded that, not only did the BND have foreknowledge of the mutiny nearly a week before it materialized, but that it was able to listen-in to the frantic telephone conversations between Prigozhin and Belarussian President Lukashenko, as the latter tried to dissuade the Wagner leader from storming the Russian capital with his heavily armed band of mercenaries.

According to the NDR-WDR report, the BND had been able to hack into Wagner’s internal communications system up for over a year. However, its operation was betrayed by “Carsten L.”, a German intelligence officer who was arrested late last year for spying for Russia. However, the German spy service was able to continue to monitor the internal affairs of Wagner through other sources and had access to channels of information within Wagner in the months leading up to the mutiny. Thus, according to the report, the BND had “vague indications of an imminent uprising by Wagner” about a week prior to June 23. source and read more here. 

Cuba Agrees to Host Chinese Spy Base

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First there was a full-throated denial by Adm. Kirby from the White House Press Room that the story the Wall Street Journal reported was true. Then a couple of days later, Adm. Kirby walked it back and attempted in national security platitudes to explain why he initially denied the story. Then the White House decided to blame the Trump administration stating that China has had a base in Cuba since 2019. If that was true, then why would the Biden administration lift some sanctions on Cuba?

Well….no , under the Trump administration, that is not accurate either. Perhaps China only has had radar surveillance installation since 2018. but you can bet that since Russia has had a spy base in Cuba known as the Lourdes signals intelligence facility, they are not only collaborating but perhaps co-locating especially since Beijing and Moscow have nurtured a a friendly business relationship without limitations. However, no one is putting China and Cambodia in the conversation…that is right, China has a secret base there too, called the Ream Base. .Satellite imagery of Ream Naval Base from 5 February 2023, annotated to show the shape of the pier extension. Original image courtesy of BlackSky

 

Lourdes

Russia 'to reopen Lourdes spy base in Cuba' - BBC News 2014 source

Beyond the Wall Street Journal doing great work, then comes the Miami Herald with more.

The CIA and Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment. The Cuban government also pushed back against the initial WSJ report calling it “totally false and unfounded information” in a statement made by the Vice-minister of Foreign Affairs, Carlos Fernández de Cossío.

Regardless of Cuba’s sovereign rights in defense matters, the official said, Cuba rejects “any foreign military presence in Latin America and the Caribbean, including that of numerous United States military bases and troops, especially the military base that illegally occupies a portion of the national territory in the province of Guantánamo.” While China might be already collecting intelligence on the U.S. from its commercial facilities in the region, having a signals-intelligence facility “adds to China’s capabilities, especially in times of war,” said Evan Ellis, professor at the U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute, which monitors China’s relationship with Latin America and the Caribbean. “I think it telegraphs Chinese willingness in the current difficult environment between our two countries to take some of these bolder steps and their sense, with their growing military power and economic power and the perception of the U.S. democratic disarray, that they can take these steps that maybe a decade ago, they would not have risked,” Ellis said. “It’s not that big of a threshold that they’ve crossed, but it is significant,” he added.

The news follows intense speculation that Russia, not China, was planning to reopen its Soviet-era espionage base in Lourdes, a town near Havana, which it shut down in 2002. High-ranking Russian national security officials and diplomats have been traveling to the island recently and the two governments appear as close as ever, with Cuban leaders offering public support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But when publicly asked about reopening the Lourdes base during his trip to Havana in April, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov did not directly address the question. And despite several economic agreements recently announced by Russian and Cuban authorities, including land-lease deals, the news about a Chinese spy base speaks to the realities on the ground: The island is desperate for cash as its economy continues sinking. Russia had limited resources even before embarking on a war against Ukraine — and China can pay. On May 20, Cuba’s Interior Minister, Gen. Lázaro Alberto Álvarez Casas, met with China’s Minister of Public Security, Wang Xiaohong. “China stands ready to work with Cuba to implement the important consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries and deepen pragmatic cooperation in various fields, especially in law enforcement and security,” a Chinese government statement said.

The news about the spy base comes as the Biden administration has been taking steps to improve its strained relationship with China, which is considered the United States’ primary military and economic rival. At the same time, State Department officials and members of Congress have been raising concerns about China’s increased influence in Latin America and the Caribbean. China has become South America’s largest trading partner and has exploited the Biden administration’s reluctance to new trade deals and has inked a free trade agreement with Ecuador, while Uruguay and Panama are in line, U.S. Rep Maria Elvira Salazar, a Miami Republican, said during a congressional hearing she chaired on Wednesday. “That is very troublesome,” Salazar said, blaming the Biden administration for ignoring the pleas of allies in the region with conservative governments “to the benefit of our enemies.”

When asked by representative Warren Davidson, R-Ohio, why the United States has seemed to become “more passive” and allowed China to increase its influence in the Western Hemisphere, the State Department’s top diplomat for the region acknowledged the administration needs to act with a sense of urgency. “This is the most challenging moment I have seen in 30 years in our hemisphere, and we have to do everything that we can to help our neighbors and our partners around the region to succeed and resist these strategic competitors from outside,” Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs Brian Nichols said. The China deal also complicates U.S. policy towards Cuba.

The administration has lifted some restrictions on flights and remittances, resumed the family reunification program for Cubans and reestablished migration and law enforcement talks with the Cuban government. But it stopped short of easing other embargo restrictions and removing Cuba from the list of countries that sponsor terrorism, which the Cuban government had made a condition to improving relations. The cozying up to Russia and China indicates the Cuban government has chosen to seek further support from its longtime political and ideological allies rather than pursuing normalization of relations with the U.S. at a time Cuban authorities perceive their grip on power is at risk. Cuba is facing its worst economic crisis in decades and serious political challenges from a population that has taken to the streets to protest and demand regime change. Ebrahim Raeisi, the president of Iran, another major U.S. adversary, is set to travel to the island after visiting Venezuela and Nicaragua next week. The strategy suggests something else: The Cuban military is calling the shots on the island, not the civilian team led by Cuba’s handpicked president, Miguel Díaz-Canel. If true, the deal with China shows “Cuba’s desperation. It’s the same thing with Russian investors. Cuba is looking for cash where it can get it,” Ellis said. “Cuba also understands the limits of the Biden administration.

With the Republicans in control of the House in Washington, with Biden being more conservative, with a sense of lessons learned that the Obama opening was seen as ‘we gave up too much and receive too little from Cuba,’ there’s an understanding in Cuba that they’re not going to get much more out of Washington.” Latin America’s sharp turn to the left and the consolidation of power by Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela also gives Cuba confidence to do bolder things, Ellis said, while noticing that island has not gone that far as to sign military agreements with Russia or receive Russian weapons. Florida Republicans in Congress quickly reacted to the report on the China espionage base deal to highlight what they said is an increasing national security threat coming from Cuba. “The threat to America from Cuba isn’t just real, it is far worse than this,” Sen. Marco Rubio tweeted. “But to date, not only does the Biden White House not care, they have people who actually want to appease the regime.” “The Cuban regime is auctioning off land to the Russians, hosting the Iranians, and letting the Chinese open a base to spy on the U.S.,” Salazar tweeted. “Just 90 miles from our coast, the dictatorship has opened the door to our greatest enemies!” Later on Thursday, Rubio, who is the Vice Chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence and the committee’s chairman, Mark R. Warner (D-VA), issued a statement urging the Biden administration “to take steps to prevent this serious threat to our national security and sovereignty.” “We must be clear that it would be unacceptable for China to establish an intelligence facility within 100 miles of Florida and the United States, in an area also populated with key military installations and extensive maritime traffic,” they said.

Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article276215936.html#storylink=cpy

 

Antiquities Bust Highlights Trafficking of Cultural Heritage

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Low risk and high profits…

From Interpol in part:

Every June and December, we highlight the most wanted works of art through a poster that is distributed to countries.

50b_WOA-poster

The Soufan Center:

Police in Italy recently broke up a major international antiquities trafficking ring, seizing more than 3,500 ancient artifacts and arresting 21 people across multiple locations, in late May. The 21 detained suspects – 30 more remain at large – face charges that include criminal conspiracy, theft, and the illegal export of goods, according to a special unit dedicated to combatting the illicit trafficking of cultural property. The investigation by the Comando Carabinieri Tutela Patrimonio Culturale, also known as the Carabinieri “Art Squad,” began last fall and uncovered several sites in southern Italy associated with the trafficking ring, including illegal dig sites and operational bases. During raids on the locations, police found ancient ceramics, jewelry, miniatures, and hundreds of bronze, gold, and silver coins dating from the 4th century B.C. to the 3rd century A.D. According to the police, the items have “inestimable historical, artistic, and commercial value.” Authorities also recovered excavation tools as well as documentation of illicit transactions in Italy and abroad. The criminal operation involved illicit actors at almost every stage of the process, including grave diggers, “fencers” (individuals who knowingly buy the stolen art to resell for a profit), and exporters (who facilitate sales of illegally sourced relics to auction houses and buyers abroad). Italy has taken a leading role on the issue of cultural heritage trafficking in the United Nations and more broadly.

The operation, which has been heralded by the Carabinieri and Italy’s Minister of Culture as a resounding success, starkly displays not only the vulnerability of ancient Italian artifacts to traffickers, but also the financial incentives that drive illicit actors to exploit cultural heritage more broadly. The estimated worth of the transnational trade in cultural heritage trafficking ranges from several hundred million to billions of dollars annually, according to the U.S. Congressional Research Service. Confidentiality, challenges in documenting provenance, the use of intermediaries, and inconsistent due diligence practices all contribute to the illegal trade. Moreover, archaeological sites and artifacts in countries with armed conflict, such as Iraq and Syria, are particularly vulnerable to trafficking and exploitation, as the chaos of war can enable illicit actors, including terrorists, to illegally obtain, circumvent due diligence practices, and, ultimately, profit from the sale of antiquities abroad. Islamic State’s exploitation of cultural heritage has helped finance the group’s activities and strengthened its ties with transnational organized crime. In response to this threat, the UN Security Council unanimously voted to adopt Resolution 2347 in 2017, warning that any trade involving ISIS, Al Nusra Front, or Al-Qaeda affiliates could cons­­­titute financial support for sanctioned entities.

Beyond the financial incentive, illicit actors have targeted and exploited cultural heritage to further their agendas – either by validating their narratives or providing financial gain – and to marginalize and stigmatize communities. The 2001 destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban, the 2014 destruction of the Sukur cultural landscape in Nigeria by Boko Haram, Islamic State’s destruction of historical and cultural sites and works of art in Palmyra, Syria, and the destruction of mausoleums in Timbuktu, Mali, by Ansar Dine and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Mahgreb all exemplify how terrorist groups target cultural heritage to strengthen their narratives. In doing so, these groups may seek to destroy a community’s collective cultural identity by targeting sites that the attackers might deem idolatrous to validate their own narrative, or they may target sites that are an integral part of the cultural or religious life of the community to subjugate their victims. Under the Rome Statute, these actions constitute war crimes. They have been prosecuted as such by the International Criminal Court. In 2016­­, a case was brought against a member of Ansar Dine for intentionally directing attack against religious and historic buildings in Timbuktu. In post-conflict contexts, the destruction of cultural heritage can hinder post-conflict recovery and peacebuilding efforts.

Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine highlights the role that state actors can play in the destruction of cultural heritage, and how the tactic can be used to obliterate a community’s collective identity. As of May 31, 2023, the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) had verified that over 250 sites in Ukraine had been damaged, with over 150 partially or totally destroyed, since the beginning of the invasion. These sites include religious sites, museums, monuments, libraries, and an archive. A 2022 New York Times investigation previously identified 339 cultural sites that sustained substantial damage, both as collateral damage and as a result of intentional targeting by Russian soldiers or pro-Russian separatists. Ukraine’s minister of culture, Oleksandr Tkachenko, told reporters last fall that almost 40 museums in Ukraine have been looted of artifacts by Russian soldiers. One of the looted items, a 1,500-year-old tiara dating back to the rule of Attila the Hun, is one of the world’s rarest and most valuable artifacts. By targeting cultural heritage in the conflict, Moscow appears to be intentionally working to eliminate Ukrainian cultural identity. According to the UN Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights, Alexandra Xanthaki, the invasion’s aim has been not merely the capture of territory, but “a gradual destruction of a whole cultural life.” She also said that “one of the justifications of the war is that Ukrainians don’t have a distinct cultural identity.” Particularly since the lead-up to the war and in the year since, Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly called Ukrainian nationhood and culture a fiction, claiming the country is rightful Russian territory that was improperly given statehood during the Soviet era. Russian state media has published propaganda calling for Ukraine’s total elimination. The role of state actors in the destruction of cultural heritage further complicates protection efforts, as states have often facilitated prevention, advocacy, documentation, and transitional justice efforts, and, as UN Security Council Resolution 2347 stresses, have the primary responsibility to protect their cultural heritage.