6 Apr, 2022 14:35

HomeRussia & FSU

US sanctions Russian PM and Putin’s ‘adult children’

Citing ‘atrocities’ in Ukraine, US has embargoed more Russian officials and their families

Citing “atrocities in Ukraine, including in Bucha,” the US on Wednesday rolled out new sanctions against the “Putin regime” and Russian banks, companies and government officials – as well as their family members.

"Today, the United States, with the G7 and the European Union, will continue to impose severe and immediate economic costs on the Putin regime for its atrocities in Ukraine, including in Bucha. We will document and share information on these atrocities and use all appropriate mechanisms to hold accountable those responsible," the White House said.

President Vladimir Putin’s "adult children" and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s wife and daughter were among the Russians listed in the latest round of “full blocking sanctions,”which the White House says intend to impose “severe and immediate costs” on Moscow. Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin and former President Dmitry Medvedev were likewise sanctioned, for their membership on the Russian Security Council.

As part of Wednesday’s sanctions, any assets of Sberbank and Alfa Bank “touching” the US financial system have also been blocked, and any Americans banned from doing business with them.

The White House also said that US President Joe Biden will sign an executive order Thursday prohibiting any investment in Russia by Americans wherever they are, to “further isolate Russia from the global economy” and “ensure the enduring weakening of the Russian Federation’s global competitiveness.”

Also on Thursday, the US Treasury will announce the list of “critical major Russian state-owned enterprises,” in order to ban any Americans from doing business with them and freeze their assets subject to US jurisdiction.

The US is also trying to force Russia to default on its sovereign debt, having banned Moscow earlier this week from using funds under US jurisdiction to make payments. The White House said Moscow will now have to “choose between draining its available funds to make debt payments or default.”

Earlier on Wednesday, Medvedev compared the embargoes against Russia to a medieval inquisition, with the US and its “European servants” needing no evidence to accuse Moscow of “witchcraft,” and the accused getting no due process or the right to counsel. The former president and PM noted that the US, UK and Europe still had functioning courts that could “correct a mistake of the inquisitorial process” and that Russia intends to contest the sanctions that way.

Ukraine has accused Russia of killing hundreds of civilians in the town of Bucha, near Kiev. Moscow has denied blame, accused Kiev of staging a “provocation,” and called for an international investigation into the incident.

https://www.rt.com/russia/553410-us-unveils-new-sanctions/

Trump has to come back soon.

6 Apr, 2022 13:41

Russia warns against ‘games’ around its Western exclave

Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko hopes that “common sense” will not allow Europe to blockade Kaliningrad

Moscow has cautioned neighboring European countries against the closure of their borders with Russia and Belarus pointing out that such a scenario would mean the blockade of Russia’s westernmost exclave Kaliningrad.

Earlier this week Latvian and Lithuanian officials made statements regarding the possible closure of their borders with Russia and Belarus in response to Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine.

On Wednesday, commenting on the matter, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko expressed hope that “common sense” would prevent the Europeans from “playing with fire.” Such a measure would deprive Kaliningrad residents of the opportunity to reach Russia’s main territory by land.

“I very much hope that common sense in Europe will not allow any games to be played around Kaliningrad. I think many people understand that this is playing with fire,” the deputy minister told the media.

On Tuesday, Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks said that the Baltic states could close their land borders with Russia and Belarus but only if all three Baltic states make a collective decision.

Pabriks was echoing a statement of the foreign minister of neighboring Lithuania – a country which borders only Russia’s westernmost exclave Kaliningrad and, unlike Latvia and Estonia, does not have a common border with country’s main territory.

According to Gabrielius Landsbergis, a “European or regional solution” is needed for border closure.

On March 31, the Ukrainian Ambassador to Poland Andrey Deschitsa revealed that his country was involved in ongoing negotiations with Warsaw about closing the border between Poland and Belarus.

Poland and Baltic countries were known for their hard line against Russia even before Moscow’s offensive against Ukraine. Following the launch of the “special military operation” these countries have constantly called on their partners to strengthen sanctions on Moscow and have taken their own measures in this regard. Two weeks ago, Poland expelled 45 Russian diplomats, who Warsaw said were involved in intelligence operations threatening the security of Poland and its allies.

Lithuania was the first EU country to announce that it had “completely abandoned” Russian gas, and the first to expel a Russian ambassador. Both Lithuania and Latvia announced on Monday that they plan to downgrade their diplomatic relations with Moscow.

Russia attacked its neighbor in late February, following Ukraine’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements signed in 2014, and Russia’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German and French brokered protocols had been designed to regularize the status of those regions within the Ukrainian state.

Russia has now demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.

https://www.rt.com/russia/553384-kaliningrad-borders-warning-russia/

6 Apr, 2022 14:13

French voters could strike a major blow to globalism

After Emmanuel Macron picked globalism over his country’s interests for five years, his main rival Marine Le Pen is drawing closer

The French are headed to the polls this Sunday, April 10 for the first of two rounds in the country’s presidential election. No longer about ‘right v left’, the contest pits the establishment globalist straightjacket against true democracy and independence. The result has the potential to not just cause a political earthquake in France, but in all of Europe, dealing a major blow to the “rules-based” order of globalists. But will French voters seize the occasion?

There’s a long-standing view that Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally candidacy could never win against an establishment candidate – in this case, incumbent President Emmanuel Macron.

Traditionally, voters interested in the social safety net for which Le Pen advocates typically turn instead to the far left. Meanwhile, those seeking better state protection from ever-creeping globalist exploitation have traditionally backed the establishment candidate on the more conventional right, who advocates in favor of free market and limited government while tossing a bone to far-right protectionists by nonetheless promising to reel in globalization. They never, ever do.

Current French President Emmanuel Macron came to power in 2017 by positioning himself as the candidate of “intelligent globalization.” Despite having served under Socialist President Francois Hollande as minister of the economy, industry and digital affairs, the fact of having left that job to prepare for his first presidential run allowed Macron to position himself as a ‘neither right nor left’, non-establishment candidate. He mounted his own party, cobbling together a coalition of establishment figures from both the right and left, which created the illusion of anti-establishment unconventionality.

Macron even told the Financial Times in April 2020 that globalization “was reaching the end of its cycle, it was undermining democracy.” Yet, when push came to shove and words became actions, he fully tied France with every multilateral initiative imaginable.

He had five years to tip the scale by taking positions for the sole benefit of French citizens, instead of blindly following US-led positions against Russia, Iran, China and other traditional American ‘foes’. Macron’s lack of leadership has undermined the ability of French industry to make bilateral decisions in its own best interests while increasing the cost of daily living for the average French citizen. Now, at the end of his term, Macron is stuck trying to convince the French that they’re better off now than before he took office.

Macron also had a choice of how to manage the Covid crisis. Unsurprisingly, once again, he chose globalism. He doubled down on measures that resulted in French workers losing their livelihood due to Covid-19 jab mandates. Advised by big-box global private consulting firms amid the sanitary crisis at a cost of billions of euro in public funds, according to a French senate report, Macron favored the approach adopted by virtually the entire Western establishment. And while we don’t know the details of these private consulting contracts or what happened behind closed doors and business confidentiality agreements, we nonetheless can attest to the end result: jab passes tied to digital identification which can be imposed anytime and anywhere at Macron’s whim under a never-ending “state of emergency.”

Such firms of global reach, which employ former high-level officials and represent both multinational and government clients, are in a position to set up entire government systems for the benefit of their private-sector clients at the expense of taxpayers. Imagine for example, a Big Pharma client’s jab tied to a Big Tech client’s digital ID, made mandatory within a globally harmonized taxpayer-funded system.

Under Macron, these unaccountable facilitators and benefactors of globalization firmly attached themselves to the public purse like it was an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Macron has failed to set out an independent path for France in every crisis that the country has faced. And now the French are paying a direct price for it – which would explain why some polls now show Marine Le Pen within striking distance of Macron in the second round of voting on April 24….

https://www.rt.com/news/553399-france-presidential-election-macron/

https://twitter.com/PapiTrumpo/status/1511726095099633665?s=20&t=V1TSDrc_0uIDnBWIPls_pQ

More Receipts Show Depth Of Biden Family Profiteering With Foreign Enemies

Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin released new documents on Monday indicating that President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden and his brother James Biden were extensively involved with and profited from business deals with companies that operate on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and other corrupt regimes.

These new findings support what Grassley and Johnson both documented in their 2020 investigation into the Biden family’s corruption, but they have yet to catch due attention from the corporate media.

“These new records support the findings in our reports from last Congress in September and November 2020 — reports that the liberal media and our Democratic colleagues said were Russian disinformation,” Grassley said in his address to the Senate floor on Monday. “Forget the facts, forget the evidence, forget investigative journalism. The liberal media wanted to provide cover for then-candidate Joe Biden. They did whatever they could to smear our investigation.”

Much of the blame for this lack of attention, Johnson added in his floor speech, lies with their Democrat colleagues and the former intelligence officials who penned the sham letter claiming that information discovered on Hunter’s abandoned laptop was Russian disinformation.

“By casting doubt on evidence of the Bidens’ corrupt practices, these former intelligence officials interfered in the 2020 election to a far greater extent than Russia could have ever hoped to achieve,” Johnson said. “Their willing accomplices in the press amplified this disinformation letter and by doing so were equally guilty of egregious election interference.”

The Bidens Profited from CCP-Linked Business

Grassley and Johnson previously established that the Bidens were deeply involved with an energy company controlled by the CCP. As a result, that company, CEFC, funneled millions to Hunter to offer legal representation to the “spy chief of China,” Dr. Patrick Ho Chi-Ping. The same month that money was transferred to Hunter’s company Owasco through a middleman company, Ho was arrested for corruption and bribery.

Ho contacted James when he was arrested, but new documents released by the Republican senators show that Joe Biden’s brother, too, is guilty of receiving vaguely attributed funds from some of communist China’s biggest players.

Combined, James and Hunter’s companies received upwards of $4.8 million from CEFC, “an arm of the Chinese government,” between August 2017 and September 2018. James’s company Lion Hall Group alone received $1.4 million from CEFC via at least 20 wire transfers from Hunter’s company Owasco, something The Washington Post only recently admitted.

In addition to receiving money from CEFC, Hunter and James both profited off of numerous deals with CCP oligarchs and operated companies that shelled out tens of thousands of dollars to communist-connected businesses.

James was named a manager at Hunter’s company Hudson West Three in August 2017. At the time, the agreement designated $100,000 to Hunter and $65,000 to James every month. This lucrative deal was made possible after Northern International, a company with deep connections to communist China partner and CEFC founder Ye Jianming, wired $5 million to Hudson West Three that same month.

At the same time that Hunter’s company Hudson West Three was making payments to a CCP-controlled company, Hunter and James were also receiving wire payments with thousands of dollars. Recently released receipts show Owasco was entitled to several $165,000 wires from Hudson West Three in January of 2018. James’s company The Lion Hall Group also received nearly $18,000 from Hudson West Three the same month that several CEFC wire payments were made….

Long article good read and receipts

https://thefederalist.com/2022/04/06/gop-senators-release-more-receipts-showing-the-depths-of-biden-family-profiteering-with-foreign-enemies/

Mollie is really intelligent and funny!

https://twitter.com/MZHemingway/status/1511719109351940105?s=20&t=U6FpgGzgRvmjaCL5gM8hQA

I really wonder if leftists are pro pedophillia or just opposing the conservative population. Id more believe the first statement

https://twitter.com/MZHemingway/status/1511719109351940105?s=20&t=U6FpgGzgRvmjaCL5gM8hQA