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I, for one, neither consent to, nor praise Putin's actions/dealings, in any way, shape or form.Quote:
Originally Posted by Klondyke
However, I do have an abiding respect for the man,...due to his (no-nonsense) Presidential demeanour,...
together with his quiet, intelligent manner of representing the Russian people,...before the global community.
^My contact with Russian citizens is obviously limited. Speaking less Russian that Thai.
All I can report is what little I have had with Russians, in Thailand, have reinforced my understanding that they are behind him 100%.
They're the ones looking to launder money through condos you fool.Quote:
Originally Posted by OhOh
:)
Harry, Ant, Stroller, and a few others are a goldmine of clever comebacks and funny insults. :biggthumpup:
This thread is absolutely bonkers. Between the "Putin is a Just God" bunch and the more rational realpolitik posters, it's entertainment at a fine level.
:chitown:
Indeed,...A spot on observation :smilie_clap:Quote:
Originally Posted by Agent_Smith
Russia shifts $100bn of its reserves into yuan, yen & euro in a great dollar dump
10 Jan, 2019
https://teakdoor.com/images/smilies1/You_Rock_Emoticon.gif
The Central Bank of Russia has moved further away from reliance on the US dollar and has axed its share in the country’s foreign reserves to a historic low, transferring about $100 billion into euro, Japanese yen and Chinese yuan.
The share of the US currency in Russia’s international reserves portfolio has dramatically decreased in just three months between March and June 2018, from 43.7 percent to a new low of 21.9 percent, according to the Central Bank’s latest quarterly report, which is issued with a six-month lag.
The money pulled from the dollar reserves was redistributed to increase the share of the euro to 32 percent and the share of Chinese yuan to 14.7 percent. Another 14.7 percent of the portfolio was invested in other currencies, including the British pound (6.3 percent), Japanese yen (4.5 percent), as well as Canadian (2.3 percent) and Australian (1 percent) dollars.
The Central Bank's total assets in foreign currencies and gold increased by $40.4 billion from July 2017 to June 2018, reaching $458.1 billion.
Russia began its unprecedented dumping of US Treasury bonds in April and May of last year, amid a rise in tensions between the United States and Russia. The massive $81 billion spring sell-off coincided with the US’s sanctioning of Russian businessmen, companies and government officials.
The Kremlin has openly stated that American sanctions and pressure are forcing Russia to find alternative settlement currencies to the US dollar to ensure the security of the country’s economy. Other countries, such as China and Iran, are also pursuing steps to challenge the greenback’s dominance in global trade.
https://www.rt.com/business/448441-r...s-dollar-dump/
Hell ya hi is a leader of a dominating country (even some wont recognize that)and presents himself as such.Quote:
Originally Posted by TuskegeeBen
Not sure about "leader", "owner" is probably a better word.Quote:
Originally Posted by global
https://www.jta.org/2014/03/11/globa...ve-or-politics
Quote:
“Putin may be good for Jews, but he’s bad for Russia,” said Michael Edelstein, a lecturer at Moscow State University and a journalist for the L’chaim Jewish newspaper.
Serbia: Putin given hero's welcome in Belgrade
(almost like recently Trump was welcome in London) :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_co...;v=ngOeR5vMg8A
Lavrov’s statement following talks with Foreign Minister of Japan
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s statement and answers to media questions at a news conference following talks with Foreign Minister of Japan Taro Kono, Moscow, January 14, 2019
"Ladies and gentlemen,
We have concluded lengthy talks with Foreign Minister of Japan Taro Kono concerning the instructions from Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister of Japan Shinzo Abe on expediting the work on a peace treaty based on the 1956 Soviet-Japanese Joint Declaration.
As proposed by our Japanese colleagues, we agreed that we will not hold a joint news conference today. And so I thought it necessary to say a few words about what happened today. Foreign Minister Taro Kono will hold a briefing later tonight.
As I have already said, based on the instructions from our leaders, we discussed the work on a peace treaty based on the 1956 Declaration. I do not want to deny that there are substantial differences. Initially, our positions were diametrically opposed, as we have said multiple times. Our leaders’ political will, which is to fully normalise the relationship between Russia and Japan, is prompting us to intensify this dialogue.
Today we have reaffirmed our readiness to work on the basis of the 1956 Declaration, which means, above all, the immutability of the very first step – the full recognition by our Japanese neighbours of the outcome of World War II, including the Russian Federation’s sovereignty over all the islands of the South Kuril Ridge. Moreover, it is codified in the UN Charter and in numerous documents that were signed at the end of World War II, in particular on September 2, 1945 and in a number of subsequent documents. This is our basic position and without a step in this direction it is very difficult to count on any progress on other issues.
We have pointed out to our friends from Japan the fact that sovereignty over the islands is not subject to discussion. This is the territory of the Russian Federation. We also pointed out that in Japan’s legislation; these islands are designated as “northern territories,” which, of course, is unacceptable for the Russian Federation.
We asked a series of questions about how our Japanese colleagues are planning to work toward overcoming this particular problem and how the Japanese domestic legislation issues will be addressed, because in this case, it is not about interfering in internal affairs, but about legislation regulating issues that our Japanese colleagues would like to discuss and, probably, resolve with the Russian Federation. We are at the very beginning of the road.
We have a common understanding that it is necessary to drastically improve the quality of our relations to discuss the most difficult issues. In general, our relations are on the rise – there is development in the trade, economic, investment and cultural spheres. A cross year project is currently underway between Russia and Japan, which arouses a keen and lively interest among our citizens and among the residents of the Japanese islands. About five hundred events have been held, and more are planned. However, one can do immeasurably more than what is being done now in the economy and especially in investment. The agreement reached a couple of years ago between the President of Russia and the Prime Minister of Japan on the organisation of joint economic activity in the South Kuril Islands is being implemented, but on a very unimpressive scale. Five projects are planned, but not anywhere near breakthrough areas. We also pointed this out to our Japanese colleagues today and agreed that more ambitious projects would be worked out through the relevant agencies so that the joint economic activity would be more tangible.
We also touched on a number of major agreements that have been under discussion for many years and have not been implemented still. In particular, there is a need to begin formal negotiations on a preferential agreement on the trade in services and investment; consultations on expanding the scope of the Intergovernmental Agreement on cooperation in the peaceful use of nuclear energy; an agreement on the exploration and use of outer space for peaceful purposes; an agreement between the Russian Federation and Japan on social security, and naturally on removing obstacles to visa-free travel.
We told our colleagues that in recent years Russia has offered many initiatives aimed either at liberalising the travel regime for various groups such as business people, tourists, participants in sports and cultural exchanges, or even introducing visa-free travel. This is our global goal. We believe there is no reason why Russia and Japan cannot introduce visa-free travel and begin, for example, with visa-free trips for residents of Sakhalin and Hokkaido.
The third area in which we should seriously upgrade our cooperation is foreign policy, international cooperation.
Today we analysed the positions of our countries on key global and regional issues. We noted that our positions in the UN do not always coincide, or rather do not coincide in most cases. I am referring to Japan’s voting on Russia’s initiatives. This does not reflect the level of trust that President of Russia Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister of Japan Shinzo Abe want to achieve.
We agreed that our deputies, as envisaged by the agreement of our leaders to step up work on the peace treaty on the basis of the 1956 Declaration, will continue detailed contacts to clarify each other’s positions. By the next meeting of President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, which is due later this month, we will report on the implementation of their instructions.
One more important aspect that I must mention concerns security cooperation. The 1956 Declaration was signed when Japan did not have a military alliance treaty with the US. The treaty was signed in 1960, after which our Japanese colleagues departed from the 1956 Declaration. Now that we are resuming talks on the basis of this declaration, we must consider the drastic change that has taken place in Japan’s military alliances since then. At today’s talks we devoted attention to the US efforts to develop a global missile defence system in Japan with a view to militarising that part of the world and also to the actions that the US formally justifies by citing the need to neutralise the North Korean nuclear threat. In reality, these actions are creating security risks for Russia and China.
I tried to give a brief account of the range of issues (we discussed them in much more detail), that our Japanese friends and we should study, clear up and try to reach a mutually acceptable approach on, for each of them. I am sure that such qualitative improvement of our cooperation, reaching the level of a trust-based partnership, will help us achieve the goals set by President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Let me recall that they spoke in favour of seeking a solution to the peace treaty problem that will be unanimously supported by the people of our countries. This is a very difficult task but we are patient and willing to move toward a common understanding."
Questions and answers, on the statement, are here:Lavrov?s statement following talks with Foreign Minister of Japan | The Vineyard of the Saker
So is he gonna give them the Kurils back?
HAHAHAHA I'm fucking joking of course.
Russia cuts foreign debt to decade low while boosting national reserves
https://teakdoor.com/attachment.php?a...id=26464&stc=1
"Russia’s external debt has fallen by $64.4 billion or 12.4 percent from the beginning of last year, amounting to $453.7 billion as of January 1, 2019 – the lowest level since April 2009, according to Central Bank of Russia data.
All institutional sectors dropped their debts last year, the Central Bank of Russia announced on Monday, adding that other sectors contributed “the most to the country’s external debt contraction,” reducing their indebtedness by $32.3 billion.
The foreign debt has been dropping since mid-2014, when it reached its peak of around $733 billion in the wake US and EU sanctions. Since then, Russia managed to reduce debt by nearly $280 billion to reach the ten year minimum. In the fourth quarter of 2018 alone, the external debt was reportedly reduced by more than $16 billion or some 3.5 percent.
According to macro-statistical data, total external debt payments of non-financial institutions, including principal and interest, in the fourth quarter of 2018 and in the first quarter of 2019 will total $21.8 and $10.7 billion respectively.
The regulator said that Russia is expected to repay more than $4.8 billion in debt of 40 of the largest non-financial corporate borrowers in the first quarter of 2019. $800 million dollars is expected to be paid off in January, $772 million in February, and $3.3 billion in March.
Earlier this year, the Central Bank reported that foreign exchange reserves surged for the third consecutive year, boosted by 8.3 percent over the 12 months as of the beginning of 2019. Reserves saw growth of over $468 billion from $432 billion at the beginning of last January.
Moscow has been consistently eliminating its reliance on the greenback. The Central Bank’s latest quarterly report shows Russia has significantly cut the share of the US currency in foreign reserves to a historic low after it converted nearly $100 billion to euros, the Japanese yen and the Chinese yuan."
https://www.rt.com/business/449394-r...-debt-minumum/
A country reducing it's debts, now there's a reason to hate it's leader.
Could probably do it a lot quicker if he gave back all the money he's nicked.Quote:
Originally Posted by OhOh
Russia interested in peace treaty with Japan on basis of 1956 Declaration – Putin
Published time: 22 Jan, 2019
Russia has confirmed interest in signing a peace treaty with Japan on the basis of the joint declaration of the Soviet Union and Japan of 1956, President Vladimir Putin said after talks with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Moscow on Tuesday.
“Naturally, we discussed the outlook for concluding a peace treaty,” Putin said. He also said it is possible to increase the turnover between the two states to $30 billon. Now it stands at $18 billion. The Japanese PM said that the two leaders agreed to develop cooperation between the defense ministries.
https://www.rt.com/newsline/449433-r...-treaty-japan/
One presumes the Pacific islands, loosely referred to as "Japan", lacks the legal and moral authority to make such decisions itself and must bend it's knee to it's foreign Emperor, for guidance.
The Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the United States and Japan (日本国とアメリカ合衆国との間の相互協力及び安全保障条約 Nihon-koku to Amerika-gasshūkoku to no Aida no Sōgo Kyōryoku oyobi Anzen Hoshō Jōyaku), also known in Japan as Anpo jōyaku (安保条約) or just Anpo (安保) for short,[1] was first signed in 1954
Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security Between the United States and Japan
Article IV
This Treaty shall expire whenever in the opinion of the Governments of the United States of America and Japan there shall have come into force such United Nations arrangements or such alternative individual or collective security dispositions as will satisfactorily provide for the maintenance by the United Nations or otherwise of international peace and security in the Japan Area.
Well we know baldy orange cunto will do whatever Vlad tells him to. So no Kurils for the nips.Quote:
Originally Posted by OhOh
harry, you conspiracy theorist extraordinaire :rofl:
X2. he is a blind man and you cannot help ignorance. You can educate stupid but that's where it ends. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Dragonfly
So smartarse, you reckon Vlad will give them their islands back do you?Quote:
Originally Posted by global
oh shutup with your self-righteous silly outrage, when you fully support murders and wars perpetuated by othersQuote:
Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
He surely is not so generous like some other country (please no names here) who is giving islands back to the original population. Even those islands they never had owned, however, ruled anyway...Quote:
Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
I'm sure the aborigines could spend all their countries money wiser than the immigrants, forced or otherwise.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Russia has suspended its obligations under the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, one day after the United States made a similar announcement.
Putin met in Moscow on February 2 with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu to discuss Russia's reaction to the long-expected U.S. move.
"We will do as follows," Putin said during the meeting. "We will come up with a tit-for-tat response. Our American partners have announced the suspension of their participation in the treaty, so we will suspend as well."
Putin ordered Lavrov not to begin any new INF talks with the United States, saying Moscow will wait to see if Washington responds to any of Russia's earlier proposals on saving the agreement.
"Over the past several years, we have seen that our partners do not support our initiatives," Putin said. "On the contrary, they are constantly looking for certain pretexts to dismantle the global security system."
Meanwhile, he said the Defense Ministry will begin developing new nuclear-capable missiles, including supersonic ones.
He added that Russia should avoid being drawn into a new and costly arms race and said Moscow would not deploy any new weapons unless the United States did so first.
Lavrov said he believes the U.S. suspension of the INF Treaty jeopardizes other arms-control agreements, including the New START pact, which is set to expire in 2021.
Lavrov also accused the United States of violating the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) by participating in nuclear-weapons exercises with NATO-member countries that are not among the five nuclear-armed states under the NPT.
"That is an outright violation of the Nonproliferation Treaty," Lavrov told Putin.
The foreign minister also said Washington had "lost any interest" in the possibility of joining the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).
Earlier in the day, Konstantin Kosachyov, chairman of the Federation Council's International Relations Committee, said Washington had "taken another step toward [the world's] destruction."
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the U.S. withdrawal from the INF Treaty was part of "the strategy of the United States to get out of its international legal obligations in different areas."
Moscow's reaction comes after U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that as a result of what he called years of Russian violations, Washington would no longer abide by the key Cold War-era arms-control pact.
"For years, Russia has violated terms of the INF Treaty without remorse," Pompeo said in a news briefing. "To this day, Russia remains in material breach of obligations."
"The United States will therefore suspend its obligations under the INF Treaty effective February 2," Pompeo said.
"We will provide Russia and the other treaty parties with formal notice that the United States is withdrawing from the INF Treaty effective in six months, pursuant to Article 15 of the treaty."
The INF Treaty was signed in 1987 and bans the development, production, and deployment of ground-launched cruise or ballistic missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,500 kilometers. The agreement was the first of its kind to eliminate an entire class of missiles.
Pompeo told reporters in Washington that the United States remained open to arms-control negotiations with Russia.
U.S. President Donald Trump issued a written statement saying that "we will not remain constrained by its terms while Russia misrepresents its actions. We cannot be the only country in the world unilaterally bound by this treaty, or any other."
Moscow denies it has violated the treaty and has called on Washington to offer proof of its allegations. Foreign Minister Lavrov on February 2 countered that Washington had violated the treaty by developing combat drones with similar characteristics to the banned ground-based missiles. Putin said U.S. tests of missile-defense weapons also violated the INF agreement.
U.S. officials have expressed concerns that China, which is not party to the INF, has gained a military advantage in Asia by deploying large numbers of missiles with ranges banned by the treaty.
Beijing on February 2 urged Moscow and Washington to come together to preserve the treaty.
"China opposes the United States' move to denounce the treaty and urges the U.S. and Russia to properly settle the differences through efficient dialogues," a Chinese Foreign Ministry statement said.
NATO allies issued a statement saying they "fully support" the U.S. decision to withdraw from the INF Treaty.
"All NATO allies support the U.S. decision today to start the withdrawal process, but it will take six months before that process is completed," NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told the Associated Press.
"We continue, therefore, to call on Russia to come back into compliance and fully respect the INF Treaty,” he added.
The United Nations secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, said he hoped Moscow and Washington use the six-month period to reach a new agreement.
"We have seen the announcement they made today," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. "The secretary-general hopes that the parties will use these six months to resolve their differences. The INF is a very important part of arms-control architecture."
The U.S. action has been expected for months and was virtually assured after last-ditch talks in Beijing on January 31 between Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and U.S. Undersecretary of State Andrea Thompson ended without agreement.
Washington and NATO accuse Russia of breaching the treaty by developing the 9M729 cruise missile, also known as the SSC-8.
The United States first publicly accused Moscow of violating the INF Treaty in 2014. After several years of fruitless talks, Washington began stepping up its rhetoric in late 2017, publicly identifying the missile in question and asserting that Russia had moved beyond testing and had begun deploying the systems.
https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-blast.../29746714.html
Why the dangerous Mr. Putin has been threatening them all the time? Now, they have to scrap few more billions for developments of the new missiles. Then, no money left again for the Wall...
(and all the gold of Venezuela has already left either...)
The Russians are winning in the missile game, silly Americans don't know what they are doing, as usual :)
This is what you can do when you have friendly dictators in charge of your neighbours.
And of course...Quote:
The president of Belarus has said the country is ready to unite with long-time ally Russia, raising the prospect of Moscow absorbing the eastern European dictatorship on the borders of Poland and Lithuania.
https://www.newsweek.com/russia-bela...shenko-1333800Quote:
Putin’s presidential term will end in 2024, and the current constitution prevents him for running again. It has been suggested that he could bypass these restrictions by creating a new nation through a union with Belarus.
^Why not to make it like another "friendly coup" general (who was never accused of power abuse and liquidating his oponents - unlike other coup general...):
Egypt's Sisi set to dramatically extend presidency, despite previously pledging no changes to constitution
Egyptian lawmakers are pushing ahead for a change to the country's constitution that would enable Sisi to stay in power until 2034. Currently, the former armed forces chief is due to stand down after completing two four-year terms in 2022.
Just last week, a parliamentary committee in Cairo approved proposed constitutional amendments that would increase presidential terms from four to six years and essentially reset the clock, allowing Sisi two additional terms.
https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/...g?v=1522327111
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/12/egyp...stitution.html
One supposes what with the general acceptance of ignoring international laws, treaties and their own constitutions any country's leader can always jump on the bandwagon with no consequences.
Doesn't apply when you write your own constitution and get your lackeys to rubber stamp it.Quote:
Originally Posted by OhOh
Others (please no names here) again do have a constitution (200 years old - they name it differently, don't they?), however, what does it mean? (even the old man Dershowitz is outraged about that)
Or not having one at all. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
You're correct. If one person can rewrite it as he wishes, you might as well not have one.Quote:
Originally Posted by OhOh
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s answers to media questions on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, Munich, February 16, 2019
https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/...t1550387-1.jpg
"Question: Does the common position of most European countries on the recognition of the self-proclaimed President Juan Guaido indicate that the current norms of international law are no longer operating? Was Venezuela mentioned in your conversations with your colleagues, and if so, in what context?
Sergey Lavrov: Venezuela was among the issues discussed with almost all of the partners I had bilateral meetings with (about twenty).
We view the position of the United States and those European countries that have put forward an ultimatum to the legitimate President as manifestations of the very trend that we have already spoken about more than once – when Western countries realise that it is difficult to impose their unilateral agenda on others in a multipolar format, they begin to look for ways to bypass universal institutions such as the UN. They are trying to replace the very essence of international law with certain invented arrangements which they call the “rules-based order.” It is now firmly established in their vocabulary. If guided by the international law, in particular, the UN Charter, the Venezuelan crisis would qualify as that country’s internal affair and the international community would be obliged to urge Venezuelans to find a solution themselves. Uruguay, Mexico, the Caribbean Community countries, Russia, China, Iran, Bolivia and many others have supported this. Yet, this interpretation apparently does not fit with the plan already conceived for the Venezuelan state. Therefore, instead of applying international law and the UN Charter, they put forward some rules they want to use to solve this problem, forcing the legally-elected President to agree to early elections. At the same time, Juan Guaido has been proclaimed acting president by external players, again in accordance with the rules invented by the West.
I would say the lawless nature of everything that is happening is obvious even to my Western European colleagues, who were reluctant to discuss this topic.
Question: Today, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has supported Nord Stream 2. It seems that despite charges that it is a political move, Ms Merkel is ready to go against the “players” in Germany’s economic and energy spheres. In your opinion, will Germany manage to keep its position? Will the pressure intensify?
Sergey Lavrov: Where Nord Stream 2 is concerned, I did not hear from my German counterpart Heiko Maas anything that would signal a change in Germany’s position in favour of this purely economic, commercial project.
I have derived the same impression from today’s early breakfast that Heiko Maas and I went to as part of the meeting of Russian and German business leaders.
Question: Yesterday, Senator Lindsey Graham told the session that President Donald Trump was going to establish a buffer zone in northern Syria with the help of European allies. What is Russia’s position on this matter?
Sergey Lavrov: I find it hard to comment on Mr Graham or anyone else’s statements regarding President Trump’s intention to create buffer zones in northern Syria. The US leader has announced that they are withdrawing from Syria. Later his staff declared that this was not quite so: they might be pulling out but not entirely; perhaps they would be replaced there by some private military company, or the French, or the British…
In my opinion, everyone should be guided by the agreements developed within the Astana format. The participants at the Sochi meeting discussed security both on the eastern bank of the Euphrates and on the Turkey-Syria border, among other things. All the presidents agreed that there was the 1998 Adana Agreement between Syria and Turkey, whereby security cooperation principles were established for use on their joint border, the principles of which are in force to this day. Among other things, they provide for joint actions against terrorist threats. This is what I would advise you to be guided by.
I think that various plans by countries having no legitimate right to be in Syria, the more so plans to involve even more illegitimate players, do not help the matter.
Question: A BBC producer has published the results of a six-month investigation, saying that he can prove without a doubt that the Douma Hospital scene was staged. In other words, the West is coming around to see that provocations have been staged against Russia and the Syrian government. What do you think about this? Is it true that the West is coming to see the truth and is changing its attitude?
Sergey Lavrov: I think the West knew this from the very beginning, because it were certain Western countries that staged these provocations, including with the help of the notorious White Helmets, a presumably humanitarian organisation that is headed by a former MI-6 agent.
By the way, our Western colleagues have not resettled all of their wards from Jordan yet. They have asked Jordan to shelter the White Helmets for some time, but the deadline is long past and they are still in Jordan. They have probably seen whom they have given shelter to and that these guys, if they are resettled in the West, can potentially act in Western countries the way they had been trained to act. I think that those of our Western partners who were not involved in these provocations are aware of the absurdity of the accusations.
It is good that there are honest journalists in this world. By the way, he [the BBC producer] did not say that no chemical substances were used in Douma. He says he “can prove without a doubt” that sarin was not used in Douma. This is true. As for the possible use of chlorine, he proposed waiting for the OPCW to prove chlorine or otherwise. Regrettably, the OPCW’s investigation is taking suspiciously long. First of all, it took a long time to convince its experts to visit the suspected attack site, and now they have spent months there investigating it.
The UK journalist has pointed out clearly that the investigation of the Douma Hospital footage shows that the scene was staged. In fact, our military also said that the militants could use chlorine for a provocation. It should be clear to everyone that the hospital scene was staged. It is notable that what the [Western] journalist has said so openly, is being frowned upon in the West.
Question: Have you harmonised positions at a meeting with Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono? What are the biggest obstacles standing in the way of signing a peace treaty? Can they be removed in time for the G20 summit?
Sergey Lavrov: We in Russia do not set any deadlines for this. We calmly explain to our Japanese colleagues that nothing of this kind can be planned. We want to proceed from the 1956 Declaration, just as our leaders agreed in Singapore at the end of last year. This implies that the first step must be to sign a peace treaty. According to the Russian stand, which is public knowledge, this means that there is no alternative for our Japanese neighbours’ recognition of the results of WWII, including Russia’s sovereignty over all the Kuril Islands, including the four islands of the Lesser Kuril Chain.
We have agreed on the steps we would take next. We have deputies who are responsible for this between ministerial meetings, as instructed by President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. They will hold talks in the next few weeks. Based on the outcome of this meeting, we will set the date for a ministerial meeting in Japan.
At the same time, we maintain dialogue at the level of first deputy ministers. Their next meeting is scheduled to take place on April 2. In addition to this, our deputy ministers will meet to discuss regional security and our mutual concerns about threats in Northeast Asia.
Question: Mr Lavrov, today German Chancellor Angela Merkel also spoke in favour of the Minsk Agreements. When and on what terms would it be reasonable to resume the talks in the Normandy format at the level of foreign ministers or at the top level?
Sergey Lavrov: Contact in the Normandy format continues at the expert level, although these efforts could be described as middling. We believe that first we need to achieve what the leaders agreed on earlier. Recently Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavel Klimkin announced that Ukraine supports the Normandy format but the meetings must be more productive. This is exactly what we have been saying. For over two years, Kiev has been sabotaging the leaders’ decisions that were made in October 2016 in Berlin.
The decisions are well known: to withdraw forces and equipment from three towns where the Ukrainians demand a complete ceasefire for a week before they start to withdraw. The OSCE has already recorded 55 ceasefires lasting one week and longer. But the Ukrainians turn a deaf ear to these statements and claim that they “heard gunshots.”
The second agreement is the notorious Steinmeier formula meaning that the law on Donbass’ special status must temporarily come into effect on the election day in Donbass and permanently on the day when the OSCE publishes its final report stating that the election took place, was honest and just. Ukraine is not supporting this clear agreement between the leaders either in the Contact Group or at the Normandy format expert level. Ukraine refuses to sign the respective document that would drive the Minsk Agreements forward.
In the bigger picture, I have already mentioned that the West is pushing a course for replacing international law with alleged rules that order should be based on. We have already had to deal with this new order. God forbid.
The Minsk Agreements were approved by a UNSC resolution hence becoming part of international law. Kiev does not want to fulfill them. Then US Special Representative for Ukraine Kurt Volker tried to persuade us and everybody else that the process needs to be set in motion by coming up with rules instead of an international legal act in the form of a UNSC resolution. The rules state that it is not Kiev, Donetsk and Lugansk that should be in charge of the election (as is stated in the Minsk Agreements) but the UN. For this to happen, the first measure must be to send 20,000 to 30,000 troops and heavy arms to that part of Donbass, close the perimeter of the DPR and the LPR, disperse the militia and administrative bodies, bring in the UN police, set up a UN administration and only then fulfill the Minsk Agreements. I don’t have to explain the difference between this approach and what was agreed upon.
As the President said, we cannot expect any positive developments from Kiev until the Ukrainian presidential election. By the way, some say that nothing will radically change in the Ukrainian leadership’s position until the parliamentary elections.
Question: This year marks five years since we returned to Russia. We are marking the fifth anniversary of the Crimean Spring and reviewing our integration into Russia. What can you tell us about the diplomatic work?
Sergey Lavrov: Our diplomatic work consists first of all in making our partners understand reality. Not much is required for that; just go there and see everything with your own eyes, like when the representatives from public organisations and political parties from Europe went for the referendum on their own initiative. It is true that there were no official OSCE missions, but there were a lot of foreigners who saw everything first hand. They saw it and said it was impossible to fake anything. So we are eager to persuade anyone who is preoccupied with Crimea to go there and see if allegations of a human rights nightmare or a humanitarian crisis are true.
A cathedral mosque is being built in Simferopol for the first time in Crimean history. This did not happen under Soviet rule nor during the years when Crimea was part of Ukraine. We have been accused of discriminating against Crimean Tatars even though the Crimean Tatar language has become an official language, another thing that didn’t happen under Ukraine.
We welcome everyone there. However, many people ask about entering Crimea from Ukraine. We answer that in this case there is nothing to discuss because it means that they are not interested in life in Crimea but in politicising the issue. They want to show through their itinerary that they do not recognise the Crimean people’s choice.
Another practical aspect which comes to mind now is visa discrimination of Russian citizens living in Crimea because they are deprived of the right to get Schengen visas. Yesterday I met with Federica Mogherini, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and other EU representatives to discuss this. This is pure discrimination for political reasons, a punishment for the free exercise of choice. Our colleagues have no argument against this, they look down and avoid the discussion. We will continue working on this and we will invite more international events to be held in Crimea.
Question: During the conference today it was mentioned that you are the most experienced participant in the Munich forum. We would like to know your opinion of this conference, since you have seen so many events like this. Is it easier now to come to agreement with partners on coordinated decisions or are participants’ attitudes towards Russia different this year?
Sergey Lavrov: We would even like to be a little more isolated because our talks lasted non-stop, over two dozen meetings. Our entire delegation was extremely busy. All of our discussions were constructive, even with politicians who at various times, when they speak in the European Parliament or at other venues, have expressed hard opinions about Russia. Everyone assured us that they want to normalise relations with Russia. But apparently they are guided by collusion and follow a policy charted by the EU under pressure from the aggressive Russophobic minority.
We patiently explain our willingness to resume relations on an equal basis and at a rate and to a degree that will suit our partners. We do not hold a grudge against anyone; we have simply understood as to whom we can rely on in developing our country and whom we cannot, including cases when someone decides to punish us for something else, like the Crimean Spring. But I’ll repeat that they do not respond in any way when I remind them that a few days after the coup, which was carried out by the opposition whom they supported, in violation of the guarantees given by France, Germany and Poland that there would be no backsliding on the agreements with Viktor Yanukovych, one of the Maidan leaders Dmitry Yarosh said that a Russian in Crimea would never think or talk in Ukrainian, nor would he respect Shukhevych, Bandera or any other neo-Nazis or their accomplices. So a Russian living in Crimea, as this Maidan leader who was very popular and influential at that time used to say, should either be eliminated or evicted. Those declarations and the “friendship trains” carrying armed thugs that he later sent to Crimea and the attempted attack on the Supreme Council of Crimea building caused an outburst of indignation from the Crimean people. When we explain all this and say that those people were responding to a racist threat, we get no response. I believe that indeed there are people who are ashamed of this attitude. But nothing can be done about it.Regarding the conference in general, the audience are more eager to listen. Patience always pays off. We are patient people, strategically as well. Still, there is another issue which had an effect on the overall atmosphere. It was reflected in a distributed report called The Great Puzzle. Supposedly, the puzzle is coming apart because there is no one to pick up the pieces. We can feel the confusion caused by what is going on, both concerning the threats to the world trade system and its openness that emerge almost on a daily basis, and unilateral enforcement measures and attempts to expand one jurisdiction’s laws exterritorialy to other countries. Certainly, Washington’s policy to disrupt the system of international arms control treaties also adds to the feeling of confusion.
Everybody understands that this situation does not require an “anti-policy.” It is important to call all reasonable parties together and sit down at a table and find formats where all the main players can be represented. In this respect, the G20 discussions will be very indicative. It will be interesting to see all this turn into specific documents and viewpoints. Official bodies will be working there, in Japan. Here we have political analysts or public officials in a private capacity."
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov?s answers to media questions on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, Munich, February 16, 2019 - News - The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation
He's right there, especially as they have a habit of killing them.Quote:
It is good that there are honest journalists in this world
How ingenious, that on any situation somebody (please no names here) has got a clue...
THE LORD updated his democratically, elected politicians at a recent meeting. Mainly on economic issues, but militarily as well.
One item was the Russian response to ameristan unilaterally scrapping the INF treaty.
His announcement, that as ameristan has placed, illegally by the now defunct INF, missile launchers adjacent Russian borders, Russian military will target the launch, operational and control systems themselves. These sites, in Europe, Asia and ameristan which have operational, logistic and political decision making roles, will be targeted by existing and future Russian systems, to achieve the same 5 to 10 minute flight time.
"The Aegis Ashore system, being capable of launching land-based, nuclear tipped, cruise missiles, was outlawed by the agreed INF Treaty.
“There’s no real objection, it’s just this damn process,” a House Armed Services Committee staffer told me. “You guys [at the Pentagon] have been studying this for over a year.”
“For the love of God, people, you went through this process [already],” the staffer continued. “We decided it was okay to sell the Japanese Aegis ships.” Those warships can not only do missile defense, they can also hunt submarines, sink hostile vessels, and launch Tomahawk cruise missiles hundreds of miles inland."
https://breakingdefense.com/2015/07/...ief-from-land/
BGM-109A Tomahawk Land Attack Missile - Nuclear (TLAM-N) with a W80 thermonuclear weapon. Retired from service sometime between 2010 and 2013. Reports from early 2018 state that the U.S. Navy is considering (re)introducing a (yet unknown type of) nuclear-tipped cruise missile into service"
UGM BGM RGM-109 Tomahawk land attack cruise missile TLAM
https://teakdoor.com/attachment.php?a...id=28412&stc=1
As per normal by western MSM, Russia is being accused of ratcheting up threats to "peaceful" regimes.
Putin’s Self-Defense Warning Twisted as ‘Unacceptable Threat’ to US
https://teakdoor.com/attachment.php?a...id=28411&stc=1
"With stupendous double-think, Western news media claimed this week that Russian President Vladimir Putin was “threatening” the United States and its NATO allies with nuclear missiles.
The New York Times accused the Russian leader of “nuclear saber-rattling” while Radio Free Europe headlined: ‘Putin threatens to target the US with missiles’. Many other news outlets conveyed the same depiction of Russia somehow escalating bellicose tensions, based on Putin’s annual state-of-the-nation address this week.
Buried beneath the sensational headlines was a little more context that hints at the gross distortion being propagated by the Western media.
The New York Times disdained Putin was speaking with an “aggressive tone” and “doubling down on threats against the United States”.
The Times then went on to report: “President Vladimir Putin used his state-of-the-nation address to make some of his most explicit threats yet to start a nuclear arms race with the US after [sic] the Trump administration said this month that America was withdrawing from a landmark arms control treaty.”
Obliquely, but crucially, what the Western media coyly admit is that Putin’s remarks this week on deploying new missiles systems are in response to Washington’s decision to unilaterally abandon the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.
In other words, decisions have consequences. But for the Western media, they seem to be only preoccupied by consequences.
Furthermore, the Washington Post added somewhere lurking in the bowels of its coverage: “Putin emphasized that Russia will only respond if the United States makes the first move.”
That is, if the US instals short- and medium-range missiles in Europe then Russia will take symmetrical measures to target America territory and that of its NATO allies.
Radio Free Europe even breezily reported Putin as saying, “we don’t want confrontation” and added: “Putin said Russia wanted friendly relations with the United States and remained open for arms control talks with Washington.”
So, Western media are correctly – albeit coyly – noting that the Russian leader is acting in response to actions taken by Washington, and that he is explicitly appealing for friendly relations instead of confrontation. And yet the headlines were all screaming that Putin was “threatening the US”.
This willful distortion is reprehensibly adding to already dangerous international tensions. It is also a baleful failure to accurately determine which party is actually responsible for the brooding confrontational climate. Russia is being blamed for “threatening” the US and its allies when the reality is the reverse: it is the US that is unleashing the dangers of nuclear conflict, as even the Western media obliquely admit.
The Trump administration’s decision to walk away – unilaterally – from the 1987 INF Treaty is the key here. The US side claims that Russia has violated the treaty with its development of a land-launched cruise missile within the banned range of 500-5,500 kilometers. Moscow counters that the 9M729 (also known as SSC-8) missile has an operating range below the lower limit banned by the INF. Last month, in an unprecedented move, the Russian ministry of defense publicly disclosed the missile’s flight specifications at a press conference. Moscow points out that the US has not provided substantiating details to back up its claims that Russia is in breach of the treaty.
For its part, Russia accuses the US side of violating the INF treaty by already installing missile systems in Romania and Poland which can deploy offensive cruise warheads as well as performing as anti-missile systems. The US says its Aegis Ashore system is solely defensive.
However, rather than negotiating through the claims and counter-claims, it is the US side which decided to terminate its participation in the INF Treaty – just like it did with the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty back in 2002 under President GW Bush.
The abandonment of a second major arms control accord is solely the responsibility of the US. The third remaining treaty, New START, is also at risk from redundancy by Washington.
With the INF now being trashed, the US has freed itself to potentially deploy additional missile systems in Europe right on Russia’s borders. The eastward expansion of NATO over the past three decades means that US nuclear weapons could be deployed with a strike capability on Moscow within 10-12 minutes, not hours as with strategic warheads.
President Putin this week noted that Washington has not indicated if it will refrain from installing medium-range nuclear missiles in Europe.
But the Russian leader emphatically specified the condition that “if” the US does embark on such a threatening deployment then Russia will take “symmetrical measures”. He warned that new hypersonic and submarine-launched missiles will be deployed to match the 10-12 minute flight time that the US could poise against Moscow. The Russian weapons will target European launch sites for the US missiles as well as “decision-making centers” in American territory.
Of course, such a dramatic proximity of nuclear capability is extremely alarming and deplorable. The risk of error is manifold greater in such a scenario in a way that far exceeds the Cold War decades. Putin noted that the scenario recalls the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 when the world almost witnessed a nuclear war. The reference point is apt for today’s predicament. The Soviet Union deployed nuclear missiles in Cuba in 1962 after the US installed ballistic missiles in Turkey the year before in 1961. Again, as now, it is the US side that is initiating the dynamics of provocation.
Any objective observer can see that it is the US that is continually upping the ante for nuclear war. The jettisoning of the ABM is now followed by the US discarding the INF based on dubious, unverified claims. Russia in fact views the ulterior rationale of the US as covertly wanting to free itself from the arms controls restriction in order to exert threatening pressure on Moscow for geopolitical goals: those goals may include forcing Russia to be compliant with American foreign policy interests, or opening up Russia’s natural resources to American capital exploitation, and so on.
Putin’s remarks this week are clearly consistent with Russia’s defensive doctrine for using nuclear forces. Moscow is patently stating that it will take “reciprocal steps” if Washington follows through on its offensive trajectory. Yet Western media invert the situation to portray Russia as “threatening” the US. This is analogous to a gang marauding outside a home. Then the mob ringleader announces that projectiles are to be readied to lob over the garden wall. The homeowner shouts out: just try it and we’ll shoot your henchmen. Nobody in their right mind could fault the homeowner. It’s called self-defense.
But in Russia’s case, self-defense is twisted by dutiful, brainwashed Western news media as “unacceptable threat”."
https://www.strategic-culture.org/ne...eat-to-us.html
Only in Putin's Russia: A respected information security analyst is charged with crimes to cover up the fact that Russian state intelligence routinely protects hackers so that it can use them and their TTPs. A key witness is a criminal who the analyst helped to convict and jail.
Quote:
The top secret treason trial of a cybercrime analyst wrapped up this week after months of testimony behind the closed doors of a Moscow military court, with prosecutors reportedly demanding 20 years in a penal colony for the crime of allegedly snitching on Russian cybercriminals to American investigators. A verdict is expected on February 27.
Ruslan Stoyanov is a one-time cybercop who went on to head the computer incidents investigation team at the cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab. He stood trial with Col. Sergei Mikhailov, who was second in command in the cybercrime division of Russia’s federal security service, the FSB, until December 2016, when his fellow agents ended an internal meeting by abruptly shoving a black bag over his head and dragging him off to prison.
The men are accused of passing confidential material from a 2010 cybercrime and spam investigation to an analyst at a U.S. security firm. But the trial ended without the court hearing from a key figure in the prosecution’s theory: the analyst herself, who says the Russian military appears to be on the verge of convicting Stoyanov for treason he didn’t commit.
“I formally requested to testify, and they said no,” said Kimberly Zenz, a veteran cybercrime threat analyst who was caught up in the Russian intrigue while working for Verisign’s iDefense threat intelligence division. “You’d think the opportunity to interrogate a ‘spy’ would be exciting for them, but they don’t even bother to pretend.”
The treason case has been closely watched, if seldom observed, since the high-profile arrests in the final days of 2016. The entire matter is considered a state secret in Russia, and with few hard details to go on initial speculation linked the arrests to Russia’s election interference campaign.
Over time, a clear and consistent account of the case has emerged from court leaks and people connected to the events. And it turns out the charges have nothing to do with election interference. Instead they’re uniquely a product of Vladimir Putin’s kleptocratic justice system: the defendants are on trial because eight years ago they allegedly shared confidential documents about a convicted Russian cybercriminal with an American colleague.
Stoyanov’s arrest shocked the computer security community. The Kaspersky analyst is well respected internationally, and has no obvious connection to the swamp of corruption and backstabbing synonymous with Russia’s intelligence agencies. But in a country that routinely protects its criminal hackers, and sometimes conscripts them into state service, cross-border cooperation can evidently amount to high treason.
“Things are going very badly,” said Zenz, a longtime friend of Stoyanov. “Ruslan is an honest guy, he’s a good guy. He does not deserve this.”
The treason charges are rooted in allegations first leveled against Stoyanov and other defendants in 2010 by one of the Russian cybercriminals they were tracking: Pavel Vrublevsky, founder of the credit card payment processor ChronoPay.
Vrublevsky is notorious for, among other things, allegedly running a black market pharmaceutical business that hired hackers and spammers to send billions of marketing emails. His misadventures have been chronicled in some detail over the years by independent journalist Brian Krebs, who wrote a book about Vrublevsky called Spam Nation.
In 2013, a Russian court sentenced Vrublevsky to two and a half years in prison for ordering a sustained denial-of-service attack against a competing payment processor, an attack that shut down e-ticket sales for the airline Aeroflot for two weeks. Vrublevsky was granted early release after serving one and a half years.
To this day, Vrublevsky insists on his innocence. He blames his legal woes on the FSB officer who led the case, and says that same officer colluded for years with outside security researchers to smear and scapegoat him. In his account, it’s all part of an American conspiracy to paint Russia as a hotbed of global cybercrime. (Note: Russia is a hotbed of global cybercrime).
Today that conspiracy theory is at the root of the remarkable treason prosecution. In its broad strokes, Vrublevsky believes that defendant Sergey Mikhaylov, while serving as the deputy chief of the FSB’s anti-cybercrime unit, routinely passed confidential information from the FSB’s ChronoPay probe to the corporate cybercrime analyst Kimberly Zenz.
That’s where Ruslan Stoyanov enters the theory. Stoyanov worked in the Ministry of Interior's cybercrime unit from 2000 to 2006, when he left to begin a cybersecurity startup. He no longer had access to government secrets, but he was a mutual friend of both Zenz and Mikhaylov, the FSB colonel. Vrublevsky has a hunch that Stoyanov served as a middleman in the information transfer.
The information passed to Zenz, he said, informed a series of damning iDefense reports that Zenz wrote about the Russian cybercrime landscape in general, and ChronoPay and Vrublevsky in particular.
Acquired by Accenture in 2017, iDefense was an early player in what today is called the “threat intelligence” marketplace. The firm’s business model involved monitoring cybercrime groups and tracking security vulnerabilities, then producing detailed reports for its clients—largely Fortune 500 companies and the finance industry, as well as U.S. government agencies.
Zenz worked as an analyst at iDefense for a decade beginning in 2006, about a year after it was acquired by Verisign. She specialized in Russian hacker groups, and divided her time between her home in Northern Virginia, where iDefense was based, and a rented apartment in Moscow.
Zenz freely admits a longtime friendship with Stoyanov. “If you deal with Russian cybercrime he was the guy,” she said. “Everybody knows Ruslan.” She showed him around when he visited the States for a week, and, yes, she did frequently discuss Russian cybercriminals with him, including Vrublevsky. But he was out of government service and had no access to secret information, she said. In that respect Stoyanov was no different from any other smart, informed computer security analyst, except that he happened to be Russian. “I asked him all about it, but I didn’t ask him for any material, any secrets,” she told the Daily Beast.
She said it’s understandable that Vrublevsky would harbor some resentment for her. She considered him a significant figure in the world of Russian cybercrime, and made no secret of it. “I talked publicly about him in conferences, so he was very aware that I was out there,” she said. “I was publicly trying to get him arrested, so he’s not wrong. That’s what I wanted.”
But she’s dismayed that the case has swept in Stoyanov, who she’s known for over 10 years. On multiple occasions, she said, she tried to lure Stoyanov into taking a job with her at iDefense, and he always rebuffed her. “He turned down multiple opportunities to make much more money as an anti-cybercrime rockstar in the West because he wanted to serve his country,” she said. “And all of that is being used against him and it’s just wrong.”
Even taking Vrublevsky’s allegations as true, they sound less like espionage and more like the kind of cross-border information-sharing routinely practiced among national law enforcement agencies. But Vrublevsky has more. Much more. He feels strongly that Zenz’s iDefense position was just a cover story for her real job as an undercover spy. ”We investigated Kimberly and saw clear signs of CIA affiliation,” he said. That evidence of Zenz’s double life includes her home address in Virginia. “She lived in the same village where CIA is—McLean,” Vrublevsky noted.
Vrublevsky presumably said the same thing during the three hours of testimony he gave recently in the secret treason trial of Mikhaylov and Vrublevsky—he can’t confirm that because the details of his testimony are also considered a Russian state secret.
To that stew of alleged information-sharing and suspicious street addresses, prosecutors have sprinkled new specifics of their own atop Vrublevsky’s original claims, according to press reports and accounts of people involved in the trial. They charge that the defendants didn’t just share information with Zenz and possibly other Americans, but that they passed along government documents, for which they were collectively paid an astounding $10 million.
The key thread, as alleged by prosecutors, conveniently weaves through three of the defendants back in 2010. That’s when Mikhaylov allegedly loaded up a CD with confidential material from the ChronoPay probe, then gave that CD to his subordinate, Dmitry Dokuchaev, who in turn gave it to Ruslan Stoyanov. Stoyanov allegedly brought the disk with him when he attended Microsoft’s invitation-only Digital Crimes Consortium conference in Montreal, Canada, where he supposedly slipped the disk to Zenz.
Zenz calls this claim ludicrous, and late last year she made a bold offer to the panel of military judges overseeing the trial. From her new home in Germany—she took a new job and left Russia in 2016—she wrote a letter asking to testify at the treason trial. In the letter she affirmed that she didn’t receive documents, on CD or in any other fashion, from her friend Stoyanov, nor did she see him pass a disk to anyone else at the Montreal event. “I was literally with him all day at that conference,” she said. “I was with him all day every day and he didn’t give anyone a CD.”
Zenz wrote the court that she wanted to testify at the trial—a gutsy move for an American now regarded a cunning spymaster by the Russian government. “I requested the option to testify at the embassy here because it’s a lot safer and you’re allowed to do that in the court system there,” she said. “But if I had to, I’d go. I had a big fight with my husband over it.”
To her surprise, the military judges ignored the letter, and she says they also rejected a request from Stoyanov’s lawyer to call Zenz as a witness. “Instead, the main witness is a Russian criminal convicted of breaking Russian laws in Russia, and coincidentally the accused happen to be the people who put him in jail for those crimes,” she said.
Zenz thinks the entire case is a manifestation of infighting between different units of the FSB, and between the FSB and the Russian military intelligence unit, the GRU. Stoyanov himself has cast the prosecution as payback, because he’d been stirring up trouble by criticizing the FSB’s practice of granting effective immunity to hackers willing to do some espionage on the side. “The essence of the deal is that the state gets access to the technologies and information of ‘cyberthieves,’ in exchange for allowing them to steal abroad with impunity,” he wrote in a letterfrom jail made public in 2017.
Ironically, one of Stoyanov’s co-defendants, a black hat hacker turned FSB officer named Dmitry Dokuchaev, has been indicted in the U.S. for doing just that—allegedly letting a well-known hacker go free in exchange for a massive hack into Yahoo that was useful to the FSB’s domestic spying. Dokuchaev and another co-defendant have taken plea deals in the treason case.
Vrublevsky says he finds it “weird” that prosecutors want the 20 year maximum for Stoyanov. “While I am not aware of case details I find it hard to believe that Ruslan indeed was such a self-motivated betrayer,” he said. And he can’t explain why the conspiracy he’s been complaining about since 2010 is suddenly being taken so seriously by the Russian government.
“Nobody knows why they took so long,” Vrublevsky said. “It’s the biggest mystery of them all.”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/kremli...o-go-to-moscow
the US does the same, if you had any inside on security intelligence
so your point is? :rofl:
FTFY.Quote:
Originally Posted by OhOh