Russian news

[lordtiberius]

I think all prisoners should be returned and a real truce enforced.  If Russia cannot abide a truce, then they shouldn't participate in SWIFT.

[Photo Guy]

Yes- that's a good idea that may or may not happen. My suggestion is about a strategy that can easily happen, and throw a spotlight on Russia's involvement while possibly rescuing a high-profile Ukrainian hero.

[jone]

I, for one, would deplore the removal of SWIFT from Russian banking systems.  As one who travels to Russia, I already  carry enough cash to complete the trip.  But here is where jone the tourist breaks with jone the businessman:

Russia uses SWIFT transactions to do money exchanges, to do exports and imports, to do any business communication with foreign countries. 

Always leave yourself an escape hatch when proposing war.  Eliminating SWIFT would be tantamount to closing the escape hatch and moving Russia into a no escape scenario.  It would lead to war.

This isn't 1940 when the US closed off the sale of oil products and scrap metal to Japan.

This isn't 1962 when the US surrounded CUBA with a blockade. 

This is 2015.  The vehicles of war are too swift and the decision making, particularly in the US, is too undependable/unpredictable to risk the fallout.

Give Ukraine weapons that can defeat the Russian army.  Let the Ukrainians fight for their own independence.  Make the cost in Russian bodies too high for the Russian people to bear.  But do not pull the pin out of the hand grenade by cutting off SWIFT.

[Photo Guy]

I agree.

[lordtiberius]

So giving TOW missile systems and A-10s (allocated by law but not delivered BTW) is less drastic than closing off the world's best money laundering network?

The Berlin Wall has been down for over 25 years.  The Russian has had 25 years to develop a normal economy and a civilized polity.  Instead we have the Tambov crime family, the FSB and the Ozero cooperative ripping off the working man that makes the Mexican seem enlightened. 

If I am wrong, please tell me why.

[fathertime]

I was browsing about the internet and found this little piece on the American company CISCO.  Apparently Cisco sold some equipment to Russia, and changed some names around to get around the sanctions...at least that is what is being investigated.  Cisco claims it was an honest mistake.   John 'my friends' McCain was/is preparing to jump up and down over this one...but Cisco did donate 1.3 million to his failed presidential campaign. 


http://finance.yahoo.com/news/sen-john-mccain-ciscos-behavior-214805927.html
Sen. John McCain: Cisco's behavior in Russia 'deserves further investigation'



A report published by Buzzfeed that implied Cisco was skirting economic sanctions against Russia when selling its technical equipment there has gotten the attention of Sen. John McCain.
McCain (R-AZ) chairs the Senate’s Armed Services Committee and has pressed for more U.S. action against Russia in response to its involvement in the Ukraine......


Fathertime!

[lordtiberius]

his failed presidential campaign. 

which one?

[JayH]

 

Always leave yourself an escape hatch when proposing war.  Eliminating SWIFT would be tantamount to closing the escape hatch and moving Russia into a no escape scenario.  It would lead to war.


Give Ukraine weapons that can defeat the Russian army.  Let the Ukrainians fight for their own independence.  Make the cost in Russian bodies too high for the Russian people to bear.  But do not pull the pin out of the hand grenade by cutting off SWIFT.

The problem with the namby pamby approach is the Russians interpret reasonableness as weakness.What they would understand is having a foot on their throat!
All this 21st century new age man stuff goes totally over Russians heads-you want their attention--send their military home in the tens of 1000's in body bags,destroy every piece of Russian military hardware in Ukraine(that  includes Crimea) and any even approaching the border-- that Russia will understand!
As for swift and other economic means--I would close Russia from the rest of the world. Impose every piece of pressure that can be placed on Russia-- and in particular focus on wealthy Russians and their assets.

What Putin has done is thumb his nose at the west-- and the only reason he is still there is the lack of serious action(the Namby Pamby approach) from the west.
This is a problem that can be solved NOW--but may not be possible in the future.

[Muzh]

Interesting research paper regarding fascists inducing hate crimes.


Systematic racist violence in Russia between ‘hate crime’ and ‘ethnic conflict’

Abstract


Racist violence in Russia has recently become a subject of interest to scholars and analysts of Russian politics. What are the similarities and differences between racist violence in Russia and the West? How does the level of Russian racist violence compare to other societies? Do racist hate groups in Russia have similar origins to groups in the West? This article considers these questions. I first demonstrate that Russia is indeed the most dangerous country in Europe for ethnic minorities, and argue that such violence is more ‘systematic’ (structured, ideologically coherent, patterned) than in other developed societies. The high level of violence against ethnic minorities in Russia is ‘over-determined’ by a combination of post-Soviet social and economic social changes, the brutalizing consequences of a long counter-insurgency campaign, and government passivity (and sometimes complicity) in the face of racist violence and hate speech. Thus, Russia’s systematic racist violence is analytically closer to outright ethnic conflict than to a form of criminal deviance that could aptly be termed ‘hate crime’

http://tcr.sagepub.com/content/19/2/239.abstract

[lordtiberius]

Interesting research paper regarding fascists inducing hate crimes.


Systematic racist violence in Russia between ‘hate crime’ and ‘ethnic conflict’



http://tcr.sagepub.com/content/19/2/239.abstract

Russia?  This reads like an expose on the Democrat party.

[mendeleyev]

PhotoGuy:

I hope we see lots of photos of them behind bars. And then I'd like to see a prisoner swap with the enemy, to free Nadia Savchenko.

+ 1.000.000!

[fathertime]

While browsing about the internet, I found this piece regarding Japan and Russia.  According to the headline, the US is chiding Japan, as it appears they would like to meet with Putin.   Looks like we (The USA) is applying some 'soft pressure' in insisting Japan stays onboard! 
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/05/22/national/politics-diplomacy/u-s-official-cautions-japan-seeking-closer-ties-russia/#.VWH3iPlVikp



U.S. official cautions Japan against seeking closer ties with Russia

WASHINGTON – A senior U.S. diplomat cautioned Japan on Thursday against seeking closer ties with Russia, given that both Washington and Tokyo have imposed sanctions on the country over its annexation last year of Crimea, southern Ukraine.


Daniel Russel, assistant secretary of state, told a news conference in Washington that he was confident that the Abe government is “committed to the principle of not pursuing business as usual (with Russia) under the current circumstances.”........


Fathertime!

[Muzh]

While browsing about the internet, I found this piece regarding Japan and Russia.  According to the headline, the US is chiding Japan, as it appears they would like to meet with Putin.   Looks like we (The USA) is applying some 'soft pressure' in insisting Japan stays onboard! 
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/05/22/national/politics-diplomacy/u-s-official-cautions-japan-seeking-closer-ties-russia/#.VWH3iPlVikp



U.S. official cautions Japan against seeking closer ties with Russia

WASHINGTON – A senior U.S. diplomat cautioned Japan on Thursday against seeking closer ties with Russia, given that both Washington and Tokyo have imposed sanctions on the country over its annexation last year of Crimea, southern Ukraine.


Daniel Russel, assistant secretary of state, told a news conference in Washington that he was confident that the Abe government is “committed to the principle of not pursuing business as usual (with Russia) under the current circumstances.”........


Fathertime!

Chiding???


As in "we will invade you if you do business with Russia?"


Oh my.


Or maybe, they are saying something that you hear pretty often on this site; "if it is too good to be true, it is."


Carry on with your casual browsing. 

[fathertime]

Chiding???


As in "we will invade you if you do business with Russia?"


Oh my.


Or maybe, they are saying something that you hear pretty often on this site; "if it is too good to be true, it is."

It seems to me that Japan really doesn't need our input regarding how they pursue their own foreign policy.  If they want to negotiate with Russia, should we stand in their way?   

Carry on with your casual browsing. 

That's it,now you have really done it, you're dead!   


Fathertime!   

[Muzh]

It seems to me that Japan really doesn't need our input regarding how they pursue their own foreign policy.  If they want to negotiate with Russia, should we stand in their way?   

Well, that's what trading partners do. 

That's it,now you have really done it, you're dead!   


Fathertime!

You gotta catch me first!! 

[AC]

Russia?  This reads like an expose on the Democrat party.

 

[Boethius]

Russian authorities are keen to use prison labour to drive down the costs of holding the 2018 World Cup.

The Russian prison service is backing a bid by Alexander Khinshtein, a lawmaker from the ruling United Russia party, to allow prisoners to be taken from their camps to work at factories, with a focus on driving down the costs of building materials for World Cup projects.

“It’ll help in the sense that there will be the opportunity to acquire building materials for a lower price, lower than there is currently on the market,” Khinshtein told The Associated Press. “And apart from that it’ll make it possible to get prisoners into work, which is very positive.”

Russian prison labour schemes have faced allegations that prisoners are routinely underpaid or forced to work long hours. In 2013, the then-imprisoned Pussy Riot band member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova went on hunger strike in protest at working conditions in her prison camp.

Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service has been working with Khinshtein to draw up the proposals, said the lawmaker, adding that they will be submitted to parliament soon.

The service declined to comment on the plan when contacted by the AP on Monday, but deputy director Alexander Rudy told the Kommersant business newspaper that his agency was keen to use prisoners for “tasks that, let’s say, wouldn’t appeal to the ordinary citizen.”

Workers’ rights are a hot-button issue for World Cup organizer FIFA, which is under pressure over the high rate of deaths among migrant workers in 2022 host nation Qatar.

Russia’s move toward prison labour comes at a time when the World Cup budget of 637.6 billion rubles ($12.7 billion) is under pressure after the ruble dropped in value compared to last year, making imported materials more expensive. The ruble has recovered much of its lost value this year, but is still worth around a third less against the dollar than at the start of 2014, before international sanctions and a drop in the price of oil dented the Russian economy.

Khinshtein said his plan to employ prisoners was “of course” an extension of the government’s policy of so-called import replacement, under which Russian-made production is expanded to fill the gap left by costly imports.

The workers would continue to live in their prison camps and would be transported to their place of work each day. A typical wage for a prisoner on such projects might be 15,000 rubles ($300) a month, Khinshtein said.

There are no plans as yet to employ prisoners on World Cup stadium construction sites, he added.

http://news.nationalpost.com/sports/soccer/russia-plans-to-use-prison-labour-to-cut-2018-world-cup-costs
 

[AkMike]

Has the 250 word rule been rescinded?   

[Boethius]

Not unless you have written permission from the source.

[Boethius]

Which was always the rule.

[Brasscasing]

Russia censors discussion of involvement in Ukraine

..."Russia has made it a crime to speak, write or broadcast about Russian troop losses in peacetime and about people co-operating with Russian foreign intelligence, in what critics said was a Kremlin attempt to stop all information about Moscow’s involvement in the war in Ukraine.

President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Thursday spelling out more than 20 additions to Russia’s state secrets law, including “information which reveals personnel losses in times of war and in peace time while a special operation is being conducted”.

The new censorship rules mean families of Russian soldiers killed fighting in Ukraine or activists researching Moscow’s clandestine campaign risk prison sentences of up to eight years"...

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/86fdcb96-0555-11e5-bb7d-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3bUX0TzGn

The inability of the Russian population to think for themselves has once again  placed them firmly under the yoke of yet another criminal tyrant.

Shame on the Russians for not standing up to this evil despot.

Shame on the civilized nations for allowing Putin's war of aggression in the first place.

Brass

[JayH]

These reports are not new--but now getting confirmation from different sources.
Considering it is now illegal to even talk about them in Russia--it illustrates the very determined effort of Putin to keep the Russian people in the dark (ages?) .



Russia Is Using Mobile Crematoriums to Hide Ukraine Dead

Russia is so desperate to hide its military involvement in Ukraine that it has brought in mobile crematoriums to destroy the bodies of its war dead, say U.S. lawmakers who traveled to the war-torn country this spring.

The U.S. and NATO have long maintained that thousands of Russian troops are fighting alongside separatists inside eastern Ukraine, and that the Russian government is obscuring not only the presence but also the deaths of its soldiers there. In March, NATO Deputy Secretary General Alexander Vershbow told a conference, "Russian leaders are less and less able to conceal the fact that Russian soldiers are fighting -- and dying -- in large numbers in eastern Ukraine."

Hence the extreme measures to get rid of the evidence. “The Russians are trying to hide their casualties by taking mobile crematoriums with them,” House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry told me. “They are trying to hide not only from the world but from the Russian people their involvement.”

Thornberry said he had seen evidence of the crematoriums from both U.S. and Ukrainian sources. He said he could not disclose details of classified information, but insisted that he believed the reports. “What we have heard from the Ukrainians, they are largely supported by U.S. intelligence and others,” he said

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-05-26/putin-burns-his-dead-to-hide-ukraine-aggression

[mendeleyev]

What makes the mobile crematoriums such a criminal idea is not only the destruction of evidence, but given that cremation is a sin for Orthodox believers, this practice is a vile trampling on the beliefs of many soldiers and their families.

The Orthodox faith does make exceptions for obvious things like fiery car crashes, homes burning, and acts of war. This however is not the case of a body incinerated by an explosion, but rather a manipulation to facilitate criminal deception. Shameful!

[JayH]

Another story worth reading with specific background details.This is the tragedy for ordinary Russians who are being sacrificed by Putins lunacy.



Killed in action in Ukraine - Putin’s secret funerals

Sergeant Leonid Kichatkin of the Russian 76th Airborne Division and Russian soldier Anton Tumanov died in August 2014 while fighting in eastern Ukraine. Their deaths amply demonstrate that Russian President Vladimir Putin's claim that there are no Russian troops in Ukraine is false.

Russia is sending soldiers across the border to reinforce Russian-backed separatist forces in Ukraine. Once in eastern Ukraine, these soldiers are no longer considered Russian; they are told to refer to themselves as local defense forces, aiding the separatists with additional manpower and equipment.

Russian authorities went to great lengths to cover up Kichatkin's death. Kichatkin lived with his wife, Oksana, and children in Pskov, Russia, where he was stationed. In late July 2014, Ukraine was close to defeating the separatist forces as it retook territory, but the separatists were suddenly reinvigorated. Kichatkin's unit was ordered into Ukraine, and it quickly stopped the Ukrainian counteroffensive.

http://www.newsweek.com/killed-action-ukraine-putins-secret-funerals-336762

[2tallbill]

Exclusive: Russia masses heavy firepower on border with Ukraine

Russia's army is massing troops and hundreds of pieces of weaponry including
mobile rocket launchers, tanks and artillery at a makeshift base near the border
with Ukraine, a Reuters reporter saw this week.

Many of the vehicles have number plates and identifying marks removed while
many of the servicemen had taken insignia off their fatigues. As such, they match
the appearance of some of the forces spotted in eastern Ukraine, which Kiev and
its Western allies allege are covert Russian detachments.

The scene at the base on the Kuzminsky firing range, around 50 km (30 miles)
from the border, offers some of the clearest evidence to date of what appeared
to be a concerted Russian military build-up in the area.

Earlier this month, NATO military commander General Philip Breedlove said he
believed the separatists were taking advantage of a ceasefire that came into
force in February to re-arm and prepare for a new offensive.

read all about it here

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/27/us-ukraine-crisis-russia-military-idUSKBN0OC2K820150527