1 Jun, 2023 15:22

Ukrainian soldier sentenced to life in prison

The supreme court of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) has sentenced a member of the Azov Battalion to life behind bars

A staff sergeant from the notorious, neo-Nazi Azov Battalion has been sentenced to life in prison by the supreme court of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR). Maxim Kondrashev was convicted on Wednesday ofkilling four civiliansas they attempted to flee the city of Mariupol last March.

He was found guilty of murdering two or more people, as well as the cruel treatment of civilians and the use of forbidden methods of warfare.

It was established during the trial that the soldier, along with several other troops, were standing guard at a crossroads in the vicinity of the Azovstal plant on March 2, 2022. Around 10pm, Kondrashev opened fire on a van after it failed to stop on his command. All four people inside the vehicle were killed as a result, three men and one woman.

According to the prosecutor’s office, the Ukrainian staff sergeant “clearly saw that behind the wheel and inside this van were civilians wearing civilian clothes.”

He was captured by Russian forces in mid-May of last year, court documents revealed.

Late last year, Russia’s Investigative Committee accused the Ukrainian military of obstructing the evacuation of civilians from Mariupol at the height of fighting there, which reportedlyresulted in more than 3,000 deaths.

According to Russian authorities, Kiev’s forces did not allow people to leave the besieged port city through humanitarian corridors that had been provided by Moscow.

Officials said at the time that criminal cases had been launched against multiple Ukrainian servicemembers and commanders, including General Valery Zaluzhny, the head of the country’s armed forces.

Ukraine, in turn, has accused Russia of killing civilians by indiscriminately shelling and bombarding Mariupol.

Fighting there broke out soon after Russian troops crossed the Ukrainian border in late February of last year. Kiev’s troops were holed up at the Azovstal industrial complex and agreed to surrender in mid-May.

https://www.rt.com/russia/577302-ukrainian-serviceman-life-prison-civilians-killed/

1 Jun, 2023 15:40

MEPs question Hungary’s ability to take over EU Council presidency

Budapest might not “credibly fulfill” tasks associated with the role, lawmakers said in a critical resolution

The European Parliament has passed a non-binding resolution calling into question Hungary’s ability to “credibly fulfill” its duties as president of the EU Council next year.MEPs accused Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s governmentof undermining the bloc’s fundamental values and failing to comply with EU law.

Hungary is scheduled to take over the six-month presidency in the second half of 2024 after Spain and Belgium have had their turn. While the position does not carry executive powers, it allows the leading country to set the agenda, draft compromise texts, organize votes on legislative files, and steer negotiations.

However, MEPs cast doubt over Budapest’s suitability for the role in a non-binding resolution, passed on Thursday with 442 votes in favor, 144 against and 33 abstentions.

The European Parliament “questions how Hungary will be able to credibly fulfill this task in 2024, in view of its non-compliance with EU law and the values enshrined in Article 2 (of the EU treaties), as well asthe principle of sincere cooperation,” the resolution reads. (who judges whether they are sincere?)

In their text, the MEPs went on to list a number of concerns they had regarding the state of democracy in Hungary, accusing it of lacking transparency, mismanaging EU funds, fraud, corruption and other violations.Lawmakers also statedthat there were“serious threats” against academic freedom and LGBTQ rights in the country.

Lawmakers have asked the EU Council to find a proper solution to the issue “as soon as possible” and suggested that “parliament could take appropriate measures if such a solution is not found.” The resolution did not specify what these solutions or measures could be, and did not mention canceling or postponing Hungary’s presidency.

Last year, the EU Parliament passed another non-binding resolution in which it declared that Hungary was no longer a fully functioning democracy and had instead become a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy.”

Judit Varga, Hungary’s minister of justice, has said her governmentwill not bow to pressure from MEPs, who she said were “constantly attacking the free elections of Hungary” and “didn’t respect the rule of law.”

Hungary has been at odds with Brussels in recent years, with tensions recently escalating over the crisis in Ukraine. Budapest has taken a neutral stance on the conflict andhas blocked NATO, of which it is a member, from using Hungarian territory for Western military aid transfers. It has also opposed anti-Russia sanctions and repeatedly held up EU attempts to approve financial aid for Kiev.

https://www.rt.com/news/577300-eu-parliament-hungary-presidency/

(Does anyone think the EU is going to break apart and fail due to the extreme corruption and being the mafia?)

1 Jun, 2023 16:20

US court bars student from wearing ‘two genders’ shirt

The Massachusetts seventh-grader’s school forbade him from wearing the shirt and a ‘censored’ version mocking its decision

AMassachusetts district court denieda request on Wednesday from the lawyers of a 12-year-old student seeking to exercise his free speech rights by wearing a t-shirt reading “there are only two genders.”

The US District Court for the District of Massachusetts in Bostonrefused to grant a temporary injunctionpreventing Nichols Middle School from restricting seventh grader Liam Morrison’s freedom to express his views on gender while the court considers its final decision.

“Liam’s not asking to literally wear whatever he wants, but he is asking to do what other students are already allowed to do, which is express their view on this topic in a non-disruptive manner,” Alliance Defending Freedom legal counsel Logan Spena told Fox News on Thursday.

“They claim that because Liam’s message is not inclusive, they can exclude it,” he continued. “What they don’t account for is how does their own speech and all the other speech they already permit impact Liam.”

The ADF and Massachusetts Family Institute sued Nichols Middle School and the town of Middleborough on Morrison’s behalf last month after Morrison was pulled out of gym class and ordered to remove the shirt in question on March 21. When he refused, his father was called to take him home.

School staff reportedly told the seventh-grader his shirt was “targeting a protected class” and created a “disruption to learning” because it was making some people feel “unsafe,” though he later told the Middleborough School Committee that “not one person” had expressed discomfortor upset when he wore the shirt to class. (KEK)

When Morrison protested the school’s censorship by wearing another shirt to class last month reading“there are only censored genders,”he was pulled out of class within minutes and ordered to remove it as well.

At a Middleborough School Committee meeting in April, Morrison questioned who the “protected class” was that his shirt had offended. “Are their feelings more important than my rights?” he asked, pointing out that he didn’t complain when the school hung “Pride flags and diversity posters” in the halls because “others have a right to their beliefs, just as I do.”

Nichols Middle School has stood behind its dress code, which prohibits messages on clothing that “state, imply, or depict hate speech or imagery that target groups based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, religious affiliation, or any other classification.”

The lawsuit argues that the school’s promotion of Pride month and other LGBTQ initiatives while barring Morrison from expressing his contrary views constitutes a violation of not only the First but the Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees equal protection under the law. The next hearing is scheduled for June 13.

(This is headed to the Supreme Court, and how does this District Court ignore the constitution, if it’s ignored for regular kids, it should be ignored for Trans or whatever freakish belief they have.)

https://www.rt.com/news/577305-massachusetts-court-gender-shirt-speech/

1 Jun, 2023 15:19

Russia should have launched Ukraine operation in 2014 – Lukashenko

Moscow and Minsk persisted with doomed diplomatic efforts for too long, the Belarusian president believes

The conflict in Ukraine started years ago and the “only mistake” that Russia and Belarus made was not resolving the issue sooner, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Thursday.

Speaking at a meeting of Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) security chiefs, Lukashenko stated that the Ukraine conflict began even before the 2014 Maidan coup in Kiev, which ousted the country’s democratically elected president, Viktor Yanukovich.

“I absolutely agree with President [Vladimir] Putin when he says that we did not start this war. It didn’t even start in 2014. It started well before 2014. We saw everything that happened here: the ‘brown’ coup that took place, and what Ukraine has been led into,” Lukashenko declared.

Hostilities were bound to break out sooner or later, the Belarusian leader claimed, adding thateven if Moscow had not launched its military operation a year ago, it would have been inevitable anyway– but on even worse terms for Russia and Belarus.

The “only mistake” made by the two countries was continuing their efforts to resolve the conflict through diplomacy, rather than launching military action sooner, Lukashenko insisted.

Everything was leading up to this. Probably the only mistake we made was that we did not resolve this issue in 2014-2015, when Ukraine had neither an army nor resolve.

According to Lukashenko, current Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky – as well as his predecessors Pyotr Poroshenko and Yanukovich –effectively did nothing to secure a “peaceful existence” for the country’s citizens. They “didn’t want war” but were apparently being pushed into it, Lukashenko alleged, adding that Kiev’s Western backers have openly admitted to using the drawn-out diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis merely as a stopgap to arm and train Ukraine’s military.

“They frankly admitted that they did everything to prepare Ukraine for a war with Russia,” Lukashenko claimed, referring to remarks by former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and ex-French President Francois Hollande. Both figures have said that the Minsk agreements, signed in 2014 and 2015 as a purported roadmap for peace in the formerly Ukrainian Donbass, were a means to buy time to build up Ukrainian forces.

https://www.rt.com/russia/577303-lukashenko-belarus-ukraine-operation/