12 Apr, 2023 19:52

Kiev votes to honor Nazi official

The city’s mayor stopped the move, which would have seen a street renamed after a founder of the Ukrainian SS

Residents of Kiev have voted to rename a street in the Ukrainian capital after an infamous Nazi collaborator, the Jerusalem Post reported on Tuesday. Although city authorities were reportedly ready to approve the name change,Mayor Vitaly Klitschko canceled the measureafter Israel’s ambassador intervened.

As Ukrainian officials continue their campaign of removing monuments to Russian culture and history, the Kiev city council recently opened an online poll where residents could vote on a new name for Przhevalsky Street, which was named after the 19th-century Russian explorer Nikolay Przhevalsky.

The council gave the public a number of names to choose from, but, according to Ukrainian Jewish Committee Director Eduard Dolinsky, one clear favorite stood out: that of Nazi collaborator Vladimir Kubiyovich.

Kubiyovich received 31% of the vote, Dolinsky told the Jerusalem Post, with the next two options receiving 18% and 10%, respectively. Although voting was set to remain open until Saturday, Dolinsky said that the council would likely approve renaming the street in Kubiyovich’s honor.

A geographer by profession, Kubiyovich was a supporter of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) during the early days of the Second World War. TheOUN was led by Stepan Bandera, another Nazi collaboratorwho is widely revered in modern Ukraine. In 1943, Kubiyovich helped establish the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS, also known as the 1st Galician division.

Comprising predominantly Ukrainian volunteers from the Galicia region (which spans what is now southwestern Poland and western Ukraine), the division is known forcommitting atrocities against Poles and Jewsin the latter years of the war. As Soviet forces neared Poland in 1944,Kubiyovich fled to Germany and then to France, where he remained until his death in 1985.

Despite support for the measure in Kiev, Przhevalsky Street will not be renamed. After the publication of the Jerusalem Post’s article, Israel’s ambassador to Ukraine, Michael Brodsky, announced on Twitter that following a conversation with Mayor Klitschko, “this inappropriate initiative won’t go ahead.”

Kubiyovich is still honored with a plaque in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, whilemultiple streets and squaresthroughout Ukraine have beenrenamed after Banderasince the pro-Western revolution of 2014. Since the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine last February, countless photographs have emerged of Ukrainian soldiers wearing Nazi regalia, some of which were posted to social media by President Vladimir Zelensky, who is Jewish.

https://www.rt.com/russia/574618-kiev-rename-street-nazi/

12 Apr, 2023 19:18

Ukrainians question why they are fighting in Donbass town – Bild

Kiev's troops are "tense and worried" as Russia takes the upper hand in Artyomovsk, tabloid claims

Many Ukrainian soldiers are not convinced the town of Artyomovsk – which they call Bakhmut – is worth clinging to, as Russian forces are advancing street by street, the German outlet Bild reported on Wednesday.

“Bakhmut is hell,” wrote freelance journalist Jan Humin, who visited the town last week and wrote about one 28-year-old soldier who was badly injured. The armored ambulance refused to start, so the soldier from western Ukraine had to be evacuated by a jeep on a dirt road, dodging Russian artillery fire.

“The positive energy that surprises you everywhere in Ukraine, even when things are going badly, cannot be felt in Bakhmut,” Humin added. “Few soldiers feel like talking; while the sound of constant impacts is heard, they sit still and wait for what is to come.”

The Russians are “slowly but surely winning” theseven-month battlefor the town, with only two roads still connecting the “almost surrounded” Artyomovsk to the Ukrainian rear, according to Humin. The Russians are advancing street by street and “it seems only a matter of time” before they capture the town completely.

“The mood among themilitary is tense, focused, and worried. Many wonder what they are fighting for in Bakhmut. Is it really still worth defending this devastated city against the repeated attacks of the Russian armed forces,” the Bild correspondent added.

Russia’s interest in taking Artyomovsk is a matter of public record. The town is the linchpin of the Ukrainian army’s entire position in the Donbass, and taking it would allow further advance deep into Ukrainian-held territory, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said last month. Up the road from Artyomovsk lies Slavyansk, where the Donetsk People’s Republic rebellion against the US-backed coup government in Kiev began in 2014.

The Wagner Group private military company has taken point in the storming of Artyomovsk, enveloping the town to the north and the south while also fighting street by street, building by building, to take the urban area. On April 2, Wagner fighters captured the city administration building. Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin has claimed the fighting in Artyomovsk has “almost destroyed the Ukrainian army.”

The fighting has continued, however, as the government inKiev has continued to funnel men, ammunition and suppliesinto the shrinking salient. President Vladimir Zelensky has vowed tohold the town at all cost, even as his Western backers have warned that such efforts were depleting the forces intended for Ukraine’s “great spring counteroffensive.”

(Zelensky did say, ‘we’ll fight to the last Ukrainian’)

https://www.rt.com/russia/574620-bild-artyomovsk-bakhmut-hell/

12 Apr, 2023 18:13

US media outlet quits Twitter over label

State-funded NPR has announced it will boycott the platform after a label highlighted its government link

US state-affiliated media outlet NPR has decided to abandon its Twitter account in protest after the social media platform attached a label pointing out its reliance on government funding.

The broadcaster's chief executive John Lansing insisted thatboycotting Twitter will “protect NPR’s credibilityand its ability to produce journalism without a shadow of negativity,” the outlet reported on Wednesday. “The downside… doesn’t change that fact. I would never have our content go anywhere that would risk our credibility,” he insisted. (KEK they have no credibility, they hate the US and take money, how is that credible?Aren’t they part of the Freedom House program?)

The row began last week, whenTwitter labeled NPR as “US state-affiliated media.” The broadcaster pushed back, arguing that labeling it in the same way as state-affiliated media organizations from such countries as Russia and China was “unacceptable.” Twitter revised the disclaimer to “government-funded media.” Nevertheless, Elon Musk defended the original decision, saying NPR fit the definition of state-affiliated media.

NPR derives nearly 10% of its revenue from federal, state and local governments, according to US watchdog group InfluenceWatch. Much of that money is paid indirectly, through grants to local radio stations that license content from NPR. “Federal funding is essential to public radio’s service to the American public, and its continuation is critical for both stations and program producers, including NPR,” the outlet says on its own website.

As Fox News host Tucker Carlson points out, NPR downplays its government funding to the public while at the same time sending lobbyists to Washington every year to demand more taxpayer dollars. “NPR is the radio station of permanent Washington,” Carlson said last week. “That’s who pays for it, that’s who benefits from it.”

NPR has been accused of promoting establishment talking points and helping to manipulate the 2020 presidential election. Just weeks before voters went to the polls, the outlet joined with other legacy media organizations ignoring the New York Post’s bombshell report on alleged influence-peddling by then-candidate Joe Biden’s family.

A week later, NPR Managing Editor Terence Samuel defended the decision, saying, “We don’t want to waste our time on stories thatare not really stories, and we don’t want to waste the listeners’ and readers’ time on stories that are pure distractions.” (The Hunter Laptop from Hell)

Samuel was later promoted to executive editor. The messages on which the Post’s scoop were based, derived from a laptop abandoned by Biden’s son, were later confirmed as authentic by such outlets as the New York Times and Washington Post.

In recent weeks, NPR has published reports promoting gun ownership by transgender people and arguing that male athletes don’t have a physical advantage over their female counterparts. The broadcaster later issued a correction, acknowledging that scientific research shows that testosterone levels affect athletic performance.

https://www.rt.com/news/574619-npr-quits-twitter/

10 Apr, 2023 07:00

BBC riled by Twitter ‘government-funded’ label

The broadcaster insists that despite being financed by a mandatory fee, it’s not state-funded

Twitter CEO Elon Musk has ignited a feud with the BBC by labeling the British state broadcaster a “government funded media” organization. The organization has denied taking state money – an untrue statement – and its defenders claim that beingfunded by the British government differsfrom being funded by theBritish public. (The public’s taxes are given to the Gov and they fund BBC, they try the same stupid trick in the US)

In reality, the BBC does accept direct British government funding. For example,it's own websiteadmitted on Monday that it receives"£90million ($111 million) per yearfrom the government to support the BBC World Service."

In addition, it has also taken direct state cash(which included a 2015 grant of £289 million) from the UK's National Security Strategy and Strategic Defence and Security Review to strengthen London's global "soft power."

Twitter applied the label to the BBC’s main account earlier this week, after slapping US broadcaster NPR with a similar tag describing it as “US state-affiliated media.” While Twitter previously reserved such labels for foreign media outlets – likeRT and China’s CGTN, Musk said that applying it to NPR “seems accurate.”

NPR’s tag was changed to read “government-funded media” after an outcry from US liberals.

The BBC bristled at receiving the tag. “We are speaking to Twitter to resolve this issue as soon as possible,” the broadcaster said in a statement on Sunday. “The BBC is, andalways has been, independent. We are funded by the British public through the licence fee.” (This is too much….kek)

On Twitter, the BBC’s defenders pointed to the license fee as proof of the network’s independence. The BBC, Deadline reporter Jake Kanter argued, “is funded by the British public through a system known as the licence fee. The BBC’s operations and editorial decision-making are entirely independent of the government.”

However, commenters pointed out that the license fee “is a government tax in all but name.”

The BBC's apologists love referring to the license fee as a cover against criticism. The fact of the matter is, if you don't pay the license fee, agents start turning up at your door. It is a government tax in all but name. pic.twitter.com/bt9VSHfDGm

— Ben Kew 🏌️‍♂️ (@ben_kew) April 9, 2023

Set by the government, the fee is an annual payment of £159 ($197) owedby any household with a televisionor device capable of receiving television broadcasts. The BBC hires contractors to visit the homes of suspected evaders, and those who refuse to pay can be prosecuted by the broadcaster. Around 45,000 people per year are prosecuted for failing to pay the license, the Telegraph reported last month.

The UK’s Office for National Statistics classifies the fee as a tax, and the BBC as part of the “central government sector” of the UK economy.

Additionally, the broadcaster does actually receive direct government funding for BBC World Service. The TV license covers 75% of the service’s operational costs while the rest is directly paid for by the UK government to the tune of some £90 million ($111 million) per year. Last month, the service was also awarded a £20 million ($24 million) one-time payment to help “fight against the spread of disinformation around the world.”BBC World Serviceis predominantly aimed at non-UK audiences and broadcasts in over 40 languages.

The UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office is also the biggest funder of the BBC’s Media Action service, which additionally receives funding from the governments of the US, Canada, Norway, Sweden, the EU, the UN, as well as donors like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The service supplies two dozen developing countries with “information they can trust,” per the BBC’s own website.

While the BBC stated that it iseditorially independent(KEK), internal communications published by the Guardian last month showed that its editors asked reporters to avoid using the term “lockdown” when talking about the government’s response to the Coviid-19 pandemic, under direct order from the government. Furthermore, journalists were instructed to be more critical of the opposition Labour Party due to complaints from the government

https://www.rt.com/news/574619-npr-quits-twitter/

Musk DO MORE in the US!

12 Apr, 2023 17:41

US sanctions individuals in Hungary

The financial penalties target an investment bank and its executives in Budapest

The US has blacklisted a Russian-linked investment bank and three of its executives in Budapest. The sanctions come after Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban repeatedly claimed that the US and its allies are attempting to pressure his country into arming Ukraine.

The US Treasury Department announcedsanctions on 80 Russian-linkedindividuals and entities on Wednesday. Included on the list was the Budapest-based International Investment Bank and three of its current or former executives, two of whom are Russian and one Hungarian.

The International Investment Bank wasformed in 1970by several members of the former Warsaw Pact, and is managed today by officials from Cuba, Hungary, Mongolia, Russia, and Vietnam. Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Romania, and Slovakia pulled out of the bank last year after EU sanctions froze most of its funds.

In a statement, the Treasury Department described the bank as an outpost of Russia’s “intelligence presence in Europe,” and accused it of serving “as a mechanism for corruption and illicit finance, including sanctions violations.”

“Unlike other NATO allies previously engaged with this Russian entity,” US ambassador David Pressman told reporters in Budapest on Wednesday, “Hungary has dismissed the concerns of the United States government regarding the risks its continued presence poses to the alliance.”

The timing of the sanctions is noteworthy, coming a day after Hungary clinched a new gas deal with Russia. Hungarian and Russian officials also discussed an acceleration of the ongoing expansion of Hungary’s Paks nuclear power plant by Rosatom, Russa’s state atomic energy agency.

Orban has claimed that his country is being subjected to“constant pressure” from its NATO alliesto sever its energy links with Russia and step into the Ukrainian conflict on Kiev’s side.

Although a NATO member, Hungary has refused to supply Kiev with weapons or allow arms to enter Ukraine through its territory. Orban, meanwhile, has refused to back any EU sanctions that would cut it off from Russian gas, oil, or nuclear fuel.

“They want to drag us into the war through every possible means,” Orban told Swiss magazine Weltwoche last month. “So far, we have managed to resist.”

https://www.rt.com/news/574617-us-sanctions-hungary-bank/

12 Apr, 2023 19:35

Asian ally to loan artillery shells to US – media

South Korea has reportedly agreed to supply 500,000 rounds to help replenish US stockpiles amid the Ukraine conflict

South Korea has reportedly agreed to help ease Washington’s artillery supply shortfall, loaning 500,000 rounds of 155mm shells as the US ships out much of its own supplies to Ukraine.

The deal was signed last month and was structured as a loan, rather than a sale, to keep Seoul at arm’s length from providing military aid to Kiev amid its conflict with Russia, South Korea’s Dong-A Ilbo newspaper reported on Wednesday. The report, which cited unidentified “multiple government sources,” added that the loan was equivalent to about half the number of artillery shells the US sent to Ukraine last year and five times the number that South Korea sold to Washington in December.

Citing its policy against providing lethal military aid in active conflict zones, the South Korean government insisted that the US be designated as the “end user” of the 100,000 shells sold to Washington last year. By lending the latest batch of rounds, rather than selling them, Seoul sees less risk of the munitions being given to Ukraine without South Korea’s consent, Dong-A Ilbo said.

The agreement came together with South Korea’s government feeling pressure to “produce results” for its larger ally ahead of President Yoon Suk-yeol’s planned state visit to Washington later this month. In a worst-case scenario, the newspaper said, Russia might take retaliatory measures against South Korean citizens and businesses, but the unprecedented rental deal would enable Seoul to appease Moscow by asking the US to return the shells.

President Joe Biden’s administration began asking South Korea for more artillery rounds in February, according to the report. Considering the US-South Korean relationship, Seoul couldn’t ignore the US’ request. “It was not a situation where we could stick to our position” of refusing lethal aid to Kiev, another government official said.

NATO has warned thatUkraine is burning through ammunition at a rate “many times higher” than the pace at which the Western military bloc can produce new shells.

https://www.rt.com/news/574622-south-korea-artillery-loan-to-us/

Can the US be more humiliated, yep under Joe!

12 Apr, 2023 16:38

Zelensky and team stole at least $400 million of US aid – Seymour Hersh

Corruption in Ukraine may be on par with what was seen in Afghanistan, the investigative journalist claimed

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and his senior officials are skimming American taxpayer dollars by the hundreds of millions, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh claimed on Wednesday. The alleged grift evenincludes schemes involving trade with Russia itself.

Zelensky and his entourage embezzled at least $400 million from US funds meant for diesel procurement last year, Hersh claimed in a new article on Substack, citing a CIA estimate.

Kiev has allegedly beenbuying diesel fuel, which is essential for the war effort,from Russia itself– and in the process skimming large sums of US funds earmarked for diesel payments.

Reports had earlier surfaced about how oil products originating in Russia had made their way to Ukraine through Bulgaria and Latvia. The scheme involving the Baltic state, which was reported in detail by the Latvian television program Neka Personiga, may have violated the EU’s anti-Russian sanctions.

An expert cited by Hersh compared the level of corruption in Ukrainian procurement to what was seen in Afghanistan, when a US-backed government was in charge in Kabul. According to his sources, ministries in Kiev compete to set up front firms in order to export weapons and ammunition, with the relevant officials profiting from kickbacks. The US government, meanwhile, has stated that it has seen no evidence of Western-supplied weapons in Ukraine being diverted elsewhere.

Hersh cited an intelligence source who referred to the January meeting between Zelensky and CIA Director William Burns. The US official allegedly presented a list of35 generals and ministers known to the CIA to be corrupt. Senior Ukrainian officials also complained thatZelensky “was taking a larger shareof the skim money than was going to the generals,” the source explained, comparing the meeting to a scene from a 1950s mob movie.

Hersh contends that the Ukrainian leader’s response was to fire staff from the Cabinet of Ministers, regional administrations, and other parts of the Ukrainian government. Kiev claimed the move was part of its anti-corruption strategy. Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov, who became mired in a scandal over purchases of overpriced food for troops, was widely expected to be sacked at the time, but he survived the purge.

Hersh’s sourcesblamed Secretary of State Antony Blinkenand National SecurityAdviser Jake Sullivanfor the ongoing crisis in the US government, which allegedly suffers from discord between the White House and intelligence community. The two top foreign policy officials have shown “strident ideology and lack of political skill” over the Ukraine conflict, according to the sources.

https://www.rt.com/russia/574604-ukraine-zelensky-corruptlin-hersh/

Sorry but $400 million is a drop in bucket, they are got $112 Billion. These are real criminals that's just carrots to them.

6 hours ago

Rep. Matt Gaetz Exposes Big Pharma’s Role In School Shootings.

Gaetz goes there, finally!

https://rumble.com/embed/v2f78ju/?pub=4