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Russia preps for WWIII against US...or maybe not...Hegelian Dialectic?

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March 27, 2024, 12:55:24 pm Mark says: Shocked Shocked Shocked Shocked  When Hamas spokesman Abu Ubaida began a speech marking the 100th day of the war in Gaza, one confounding yet eye-opening proclamation escaped the headlines. Listing the motives for the Palestinian militant group's Oct. 7 massacre in Israel, he accused Jews of "bringing red cows" to the Holy Land.
December 31, 2022, 10:08:58 am NilsFor1611 says: blessings
August 08, 2018, 02:38:10 am suzytr says: Hello, any good churches in the Sacto, CA area, also looking in Reno NV, thanks in advance and God Bless you Smiley
January 29, 2018, 01:21:57 am Christian40 says: It will be interesting to see what happens this year Israel being 70 years as a modern nation may 14 2018
October 17, 2017, 01:25:20 am Christian40 says: It is good to type Mark is here again!  Smiley
October 16, 2017, 03:28:18 am Christian40 says: anyone else thinking that time is accelerating now? it seems im doing days in shorter time now is time being affected in some way?
September 24, 2017, 10:45:16 pm Psalm 51:17 says: The specific rule pertaining to the national anthem is found on pages A62-63 of the league rulebook. It states: “The National Anthem must be played prior to every NFL game, and all players must be on the sideline for the National Anthem. “During the National Anthem, players on the field and bench area should stand at attention, face the flag, hold helmets in their left hand, and refrain from talking. The home team should ensure that the American flag is in good condition. It should be pointed out to players and coaches that we continue to be judged by the public in this area of respect for the flag and our country. Failure to be on the field by the start of the National Anthem may result in discipline, such as fines, suspensions, and/or the forfeiture of draft choice(s) for violations of the above, including first offenses.”
September 20, 2017, 04:32:32 am Christian40 says: "The most popular Hepatitis B vaccine is nothing short of a witch’s brew including aluminum, formaldehyde, yeast, amino acids, and soy. Aluminum is a known neurotoxin that destroys cellular metabolism and function. Hundreds of studies link to the ravaging effects of aluminum. The other proteins and formaldehyde serve to activate the immune system and open up the blood-brain barrier. This is NOT a good thing."
http://www.naturalnews.com/2017-08-11-new-fda-approved-hepatitis-b-vaccine-found-to-increase-heart-attack-risk-by-700.html
September 19, 2017, 03:59:21 am Christian40 says: bbc international did a video about there street preaching they are good witnesses
September 14, 2017, 08:06:04 am Psalm 51:17 says: bro Mark Hunter on YT has some good, edifying stuff too.
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Author Topic: Russia preps for WWIII against US...or maybe not...Hegelian Dialectic?  (Read 42463 times)
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« Reply #330 on: May 19, 2014, 06:20:19 am »

Ukraine crisis: Putin orders troops back from border

Russia's President Vladimir Putin has ordered troops near Ukraine's border to withdraw, the Kremlin says. Units in the Rostov, Belgorod and Bryansk regions should return to their permanent bases, a statement said. Russia has made similar statements in the past, only for Nato to report no change.   


http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-27467807
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« Reply #331 on: May 19, 2014, 01:17:24 pm »

For awhile, I had my doubts about Gog/Magog being Russia(or any other end times prophecy country) - the more I read these news items lately, the more I'm changing my mind and shedding my doubts...

Ezekiel 39:9  And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years:
Eze 39:10  So that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall burn the weapons with fire: and they shall spoil those that spoiled them, and rob those that robbed them, saith the Lord GOD.


This can't obviously happen after Jesus Christ's 1000 year mil reign, right?

Revelation 21:1  And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.
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« Reply #332 on: May 19, 2014, 01:34:13 pm »

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-19/putin-seeks-400-billion-gas-deal-as-ukraine-speeds-china-pivot.html?cmpid=yhoo
5/19/14
Putin Seeks $400 Billion Gas Deal as Ukraine Speeds China Pivot

Russia President Vladimir Putin arrives in China today with the Ukraine crisis as a new incentive to broker a $400 billion natural-gas deal with his Asian neighbor.

Russia has been in talks for over 10 years to lock in China as a new customer for its vast reserves of the fuel in Siberia. The stumbling block has been price, but with Putin facing trade and financial sanctions from the U.S. and European Union after he annexed Crimea from Ukraine, a deal is seen as probable.

“We expect the Sino-Russia gas deal to be finally ratified during President Putin’s visit and the pricing terms will not be too demanding for China,” said Simon Powell, head of oil and gas research as CLSA Ltd. in Hong Kong.

OAO Gazprom (OGZD), the world’s largest natural gas producer, aims to sign a contract with China National Petroleum Corp. during the visit, Russian executives and officials have said. China, Russia’s largest trading partner with $94.5 billion of business last year, was the only country in the United Nations Security Council not to censure Putin’s actions in Ukraine.

A final deal on price is likely to be made by Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping at a meeting in Shanghai today. Most other elements of an agreement are in place, according to Gazprom.

“We are just one digit away,” Chief Executive Officer Alexey Miller said on Russian state television before flying to Beijing for a meeting with CNPC Chairman Zhou Jiping on May 17. “There’s just one issue, which is the so-called P-zero, or basic starting price in the formula.”
False Starts

Gazprom plans to build a $22 billion pipeline to China able to carry as much as 38 billion cubic meters (1.34 trillion cubic feet) annually after years of false starts. The company may begin supplies in 2019 to 2020, Russia Energy Minister Alexander Novak said in March.

That amount of gas is almost a quarter of China’s current consumption and about 10 percent of its estimated demand by 2020, said Gordon Kwan, head of oil and gas research at Nomura International Hong Kong Ltd.

For Gazprom, it is about 20 percent of gas sales in Europe, the company’s largest export market.

The deal has been delayed because Russia wanted to use sales contracts in EU as a benchmark price, while China proposed a lower price, based on its imports from central Asia.

Gazprom’s average price in Europe was $380.5 per 1,000 cubic meters last year. CLSA forecasts a price for Russia’s gas of $9.50 to $10 per 1,000 cubic feet ($335 to $350 per 1,000 cubic meters) delivered to the Chinese border.

Field Development

That target, worth almost $400 billion over a 30-year contract, compares with the $10 per thousand cubic fee China pays for imports from Turkmenistan and is substantially lower than liquefied natural gas at about $15, Powell said.

“Better to sign a contract at a relatively low price now, than not to sign it all,” said Ekaterina Rodina, an oil and gas analyst at VTB Bank (VTBR) in Moscow. “Especially if China agrees to provide prepayments or loans, which Gazprom could use in pipeline construction and field development.”

The crisis in Ukraine will make Russia’s government want to do a deal to persuade Europe and the U.S. that sanctions won’t hold back Russia’s economy, said Chris Weafer, a founder of Macro Advisory in Moscow.

“The Kremlin is keen to show both the European Union politicians, western companies and the domestic audience that it is not restrained by the the threat of sanctions and has plenty of energy and trade partnership options with China,” Weafer said.

Supply Sources

Liu Weijiang, CNPC’s Beijing-based spokesman, and Sergei Kupriyanov, Gazprom’s spokesman, both declined to comment.

“If the Russia-China gas deal isn’t signed in the near-term, the window of opportunity may be closing fast as other supply sources enter the market,” said Xizhou Zhou, director of China Energy at IHS Inc., a consultant.

LNG projects in Australia will begin operation next year, making global gas supply “much more abundant,” according to Zhou. Gazprom’s proposed pipeline exports to China may well have to compete with LNG terminals being built in Russia.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be in China at the same time as Putin. All will attend the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia in Shanghai, Foreign Affairs Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang said.
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« Reply #333 on: May 20, 2014, 09:36:28 am »

Russian Prime Minister: We Are 'Approaching a Second Cold War'


Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev says that "we are slowly but surely approaching a second cold war." He also said that U.S. President Barack Obama could be "more tactful politically" and that he's disappointed in some of the decisions Obama has made.

"Yes, I believe that President Obama could be more tactful politically when discussing these issues. Some decisions taken by the US Administration are disappointing. We have indeed done a lot for Russian-US relations. I believe doing so was right. The agreements that we reached with America were useful. And I'm very sorry that everything that has been achieved is now being eliminated by these decisions. Basically, we are slowly but surely approaching a second cold war that nobody needs. Why am I saying this? Because a competent politician knows how to make reserved, careful, subtle, wise and intelligent decisions, which, I believe, Mr Obama succeeded at for a while. But what is being done now, unfortunately, proves that the US Administration has run out of these resources. And the United States is one of the parties to suffer from this," Medvedev said, according to excerpts of a partial transcript provided by Bloomberg Television.

Medvedev made the comments in an interview with Bloomberg Television:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/russian-prime-minster-we-are-approaching-second-cold-war_793385.html
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« Reply #334 on: May 21, 2014, 04:07:00 pm »

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/russia-agrees-to-supply-china-with-natural-gas-2014-05-21?siteid=bigcharts&dist=bigcharts
 May 21, 2014, 1:41 p.m. EDT
Russia agrees to supply China with natural gas

 BEIJING--Moscow and Beijing signed a contract to supply China with hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian natural gas, in a long-stalled deal that could give Russian President Vladimir Putin a boost as his relations with the West have sharply soured.

The two sides were circumspect about many of the details, raising questions from some analysts about whether they will have to negotiate further before China can tap Russian natural-gas supplies to meet its growing energy needs.

China would become Russia’s No. 2 gas market, behind Germany, under the deal and tighten ties between the two countries, as they seek a way to counterbalance U.S. influence in the world. Mr. Putin signed the accord with Chinese President Xi Jinping while on a symbolically significant two-day visit to Shanghai.

Mr. Putin will return to Moscow with a concrete symbol of progress on his promise to deepen Russia’s relationship with emerging markets in Asia. The crisis over Crimea has left Moscow estranged from the U.S. and Europe, which has added urgency for Mr. Putin to seal the gas deal with China.

“This will be the biggest construction project in the world for the next four years, without exaggeration,” Mr. Putin told reporters. The deal also called for at least $75 billion in spending on pipelines and other infrastructure on both sides of the Russia-China border.

The deal was struck on Wednesday between the countries’ largest respective state-controlled energy companies--China National Petroleum Corp. and OAO Gazprom. Under the agreement, Russia will supply 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year to China, equal to more than one-fifth of Chinese gas consumption last year.

Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller told Russian media the two sides had signed a contract worth $400 billion over its 30-year life. “This is Gazprom’s biggest contract. We don’t have a contract like this with any other company,” Mr. Miller said, according to Russian news agencies.

It isn’t clear how hard a bargain China drove, or how much Russia might have given up, to clinch the deal. Mr. Miller said the price of gas under the deal is a commercial secret. Gazprom said the deal included a pricing formula linked to crude oil and that it carried mutually beneficial terms.

The lack of details left doubts among some experts, though. “The question is, what is the starting price and the basis for implementing the formula?” said Michal Meidan, an independent consultant in energy geopolitics. “If this is still open, there is scope for more haggling. This is a political deal that seems to meet China’s conditions but leaves it open for further disagreements.”

“Strategic benefits of the deal, however, outweigh the financial issues because China is a large market,” said Ildar Davletshin, oil and gas analyst at Renaissance Capital.

Alexei Pushkov, a senior Russian parliamentarian from the ruling United Russia party, wrote on his Twitter account: “The 30-year gas contract with China is of strategic significance. B. Obama should give up his policy of isolating Russia: It won’t work,” he said, referring to U.S. President Barack Obama.
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« Reply #335 on: May 22, 2014, 10:24:04 am »

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/chinese-russian-gas-deal-upends-135900480.html
5/22/14
Chinese-Russian Gas Deal Upends World Order

In an abrupt and unexpected about face, Russia and China inked a $400 billion gas deal that marks Moscow’s biggest pivot east to signals the emergence of a new Sino-Russian partnership years in the making.

The timing of the deal came as a shock to many in the international community - both sides seemed to walk away from the deal over a pricing dispute. That’s what makes Wednesday’s announcement so bizarre; according to reports, China ended up paying closer to what Russia wanted for the energy, which will be shipped into China through a pipeline in Siberia. What happened on Tuesday remains a mystery.

"Through mutual compromise we managed to reach not only acceptable, but rather satisfactory, terms on this contract for both sides. Both sides were in the end pleased by the compromise reached on price and other terms," Russian President Vladimir Putin said when announcing the deal.

The precise details of the deal were not disclosed. But experts speculate that one of the reasons that China was willing to pay more for fuel was environmental.

“This higher price level reflects China’s willingness to pay more for cleaner fuel, consistent with its efforts on domestic gas price reform to accommodate rising supply costs,”
IHS Energy, a firm that analyzes the energy industry, said in a commentary on the deal.

The importance of this deal cannot be understated. It essentially upends the dynamics of global power and marks a significant departure from the post-Cold War order. Here are three ways the Russia-China deal changes international affairs:

1. Russia no longer has to rely on Europe to fill its coffers. European payments for Russian gas currently amount to about 40 percent of Russian state budget. This meant that Russia has to play nice with Europe in order to pay its bills.

This deal makes the European energy market far less important to Moscow.

“Gazprom [Russia’s state-controlled energy company] is under increasing geopolitical and competitive pressure to diversify its market toward the East, while China’s gas market remains supply constrained as demand continues to surge,” IHS energy noted.

2. European institutions and opinion now matter much less to Russia. That’s bad news for Eastern European countries like Latvia and Estonia, countries that border Russia and have large Russian speaking populations.

Russia’s actions in Ukraine show that it’s not afraid to exert its influence in neighboring countries. Until this deal was signed, Europe could keep Russia in check with the subtle threat of not paying its gas bills. Russia’s decreased reliance on Europe frees it to act as it pleases in countries that Moscow believes to be in its sphere of influence.

3. China makes a commitment toward cleaner energy. The Chinese environment is a disaster. One of the main reasons for China’s environmental problems is air pollution caused by unclean sources of energy that fueled China’s economic rise.

The fact that China is willing to pay more for cleaner energy suggests that Beijing, at the very least, is acknowledging environmental problems. It also shows that Chinese leaders are willing to spend more in an effort to improve the situation.

Yesterday, many experts and journalists (including me) speculated that the failure to secure a gas deal would chasten Russia. Today, China and Russia have turned international affairs on its head.

Once again, it appears as if Russian President Vladimir Putin is one step ahead of us all.
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« Reply #336 on: May 23, 2014, 07:36:47 am »

Who Needs The United States? Not Russia And China

Russia and China have just signed what is being called "the gas deal of the century", and the two countries are discussing moving away from the U.S. dollar and using their own currencies to trade with one another.  This has huge implications for the future of the U.S. economy, but the mainstream media in the United States is being strangely quiet about all of this.  For example, I searched CNN's website to see if I could find something about this gas deal between Russia and China and I did not find anything.  But I did find links to "top stories" entitled "Celebs who went faux red" and "Adorable kid tugs on Obama's ear".  Is it any wonder why the mainstream media is dying?  If a particular story does not fit their agenda, they will simply ignore it.  But the truth is that this new agreement between Russia and China is huge.  It could end up fundamentally changing the global financial system, and not in a way that would be beneficial for the United States.

(Read More....) http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/who-needs-the-united-states-not-russia-and-china
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« Reply #337 on: May 23, 2014, 09:15:43 am »

Who Needs The United States? Not Russia And China

Russia and China have just signed what is being called "the gas deal of the century", and the two countries are discussing moving away from the U.S. dollar and using their own currencies to trade with one another.  This has huge implications for the future of the U.S. economy, but the mainstream media in the United States is being strangely quiet about all of this.  For example, I searched CNN's website to see if I could find something about this gas deal between Russia and China and I did not find anything.  But I did find links to "top stories" entitled "Celebs who went faux red" and "Adorable kid tugs on Obama's ear".  Is it any wonder why the mainstream media is dying?  If a particular story does not fit their agenda, they will simply ignore it.  But the truth is that this new agreement between Russia and China is huge.  It could end up fundamentally changing the global financial system, and not in a way that would be beneficial for the United States.

(Read More....) http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/who-needs-the-united-states-not-russia-and-china

Like I was saying above - for awhile, I had my doubts about Russia being this end times Gog/Magog - but in light of recent events in recent months, those doubts have all but shed from me.

Yes - Gog/Magog in Ezekiel 38-39 and Revelation 20 are DIFFERENT, why? B/c look at the DIFFERENT DISPENSATIONS in both passages! It's always important to divide the word of truth!

2Timothy 2:15  Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

And for further proof, FWIW - look how much the MSM is covering up what's going on in Russia/The Ukraine - for example, after this "missing" Malaysian flight started to wear off(and their hands were forced to start reporting on Russia), they subsequently manufactured this nonsense "fallout" from the LA Clippers owner(whose comments came off of a PRIVATE cell phone call. And they continue to go overboard reporting on this nonsense story).
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« Reply #338 on: May 23, 2014, 02:27:56 pm »

China and Russia Agree to Contain the United States
Chriss Street

In what appears to be an effort to undermine the United States sanctions against Russia, China indicated to its state-owned Xinhua news agency that the government will agree during Russian President Putin’s May 20-21st visit to Shanghai to invest $18.46 billion in the Crimea. The amount of the investment is highly symbolic, since it exceeds the $17 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan to the Ukraine. The Chinese action is part of a series of retaliatory responses to President Obama’s Asian trip in April that was dubbed by Asian media as the “China containment tour.”  China and Russia are seeking to develop their own enhanced relationship to strategically contain the United States.

Geopolitical expert Ian Bremmer of the Eurasia Group told the Business Insider blog, China is “the big winner from the Ukraine crisis -- everybody wants to work with them.”

He added, “I’d say not only are they ignoring U.S./E.U. sanctions, they’re actually taking advantage of them.”  Beijing perceived U.S. President Obama’s late April trip to four Asian countries as an effort by the United States to interfere in their regional affairs. The President declared in Japan that a group of islands, claimed by both Japan and China, were covered by America’s security treaty with Japan. He followed up a few days later in the Philippines by inking of a 10-year agreement to increase U.S. forces there.

In direct retaliation to Obama’s actions, the Chinese military and state-controlled oil monopoly, CNOCC, moved a deep-water drilling rig to a spot just 120 miles off the coast of Vietnam on July 3rd. Vietnam claims the area as their territorial waters and the Chinese drilling site is in an oil exploration block where Vietnam’s state-owned oil monopoly and America’s ExxonMobil have discovered vast oil and gas reserves. The move sparked state-sponsored anti-Chinese riots across Vietnam that caused 27 deaths and at least 100 people wounded.   

In what seems like a counter-retaliation, the U.S. Justice Department announced the indictment of five Chinese military hackers on May 19th. According to Bremmer, “The biggest structural problem between the U.S. and China is that the two countries are at war with each other over cyber.” Bremmer added: “the confrontation is surely growing. And this is an indication.”

Stratfor Global Intelligence reported that China will sign a memorandum of understanding with Russia on a 30-year natural gas supply deal.  But China also intends to start negotiations on the financing and feasibility of various Crimean projects, including, building a bridge across the Kerch Strait to connect the Crimea and Russian mainland, expanding Crimean ports, constructing solar power facilities, and creating special economic zones for manufacturing.  Russia will portray the investments as demonstration of solidarity with the Chinese and as international acceptance of Russia’s right to annex the Crimea.

President Putin said after his first day of negotiations with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping that the two countries have agreed to coordinate foreign policy steps more closely. “We have common priorities both on the global and regional scale.” Adding that Russia and China see eye-to-eye on most issues, have lots of plans and are determined to put them into practice.

By combining China’s financial strength with Russia’s military strength, both nations can demonstrate to the world that they cannot easily contained by the United States and its allies. The initiative leverages China’s capability to make aggressive moves against the interests of nearby countries -- much like Russia is doing in Ukraine.   

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/05/china_and_russia_agree_to_contain_the_united_states.html
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« Reply #339 on: May 26, 2014, 06:19:58 am »

Ukrainians back Poroshenko to find way out of crisis

Petro Poroshenko, a billionaire chocolate manufacturer, claimed the Ukrainian presidency with an emphatic election victory on Sunday, taking on a fraught mission to quell pro-Russian rebels and steer his fragile nation closer to the West.

A veteran survivor of Ukraine’s feuding political class who threw his weight and money behind the revolt that brought down his Moscow-backed predecessor three months ago, the burly 48-year-old won 55 percent in exit polls on a first-round ballot marred by the reality that millions were unable to vote in the troubled eastern regions.

Results will not be announced until Monday but runner-up Yulia Tymoshenko, on 13 percent, made clear she would concede, sparing the country a tense three weeks until a runoff round.

Poroshenko, known as the “Chocolate King”, has no time to lose to make good on pledges to end “war” with separatists in the Russian-speaking east, negotiate a stable new relationship with Moscow and rescue an economy sapped by months of chaos and 23 years of post-Soviet mismanagement and chronic corruption.

The size of his victory reflects in part Ukrainians rallying behind the front-runner in the hope of ending a political vacuum that Russian President Vladimir Putin has exploited to annex the Crimea peninsula and offer solidarity, and maybe more, to rebels in the east who want to break with Kiev and accept Russian rule.

“He has taken a heavy burden on his shoulders,” said Larisa, a schoolteacher who was among crowds watching the results on Kiev’s Independence Square, where pro-Western “EuroMaidan” protests ended in February in bloodshed that prompted President Viktor Yanukovich to flee to Russia. “I just want all of this to be over,” she added. “I think that’s what everybody wants.”

In the eastern Donbass coalfield, where militants ensured polling stations were closed to some 10 percent of the national electorate, rebels scoffed at the “fascist junta” and announced a plan to “cleanse” their “people’s republic” of “enemy troops”. A minister in Kiev said in turn its forces would renew their “anti-terrorist operation” after a truce during the polling.

More than 20 people were killed in the region last week.

EAST-WEST CONUNDRUM

Claiming a popular mandate for a resumption of efforts to bind the nation of 45 million into association with the European Union – a drive that triggered the whole crisis six months ago – Poroshenko said he was ready to negotiate with Putin and called Russia a vital partner. He insisted Crimea must be returned.

Yet it remains unclear how the tycoon can square the circle of turning firmly westward as long as Russia, Ukraine’s major market and vital energy supplier, seems determined to maintain a hold over the second most populous ex-Soviet republic, occupying a vast swathe of the borderlands between East and West.

Nor is it clear that Poroshenko has new answers to resolving the uprising in the industrial east, given the weakness of his forces and the threat of Russian military intervention – a threat that has raised fears of a new Cold War, or worse, and has been met by only tentative U.S. and EU economic sanctions.

Declaring that his first trip would be to the Donbass – though quite when is unclear given that it may take some time to be formally sworn in – Poroshenko said he was ready to negotiate with anyone, and to offer the kind of regional autonomy, Russian language rights and budgetary powers that many want in the east.

“To people who have taken up arms but are not using them, we are ready to give amnesty,” he told a news conference at which he fielded questions in a fluent mix of Ukrainian, Russian and English. “As for those who are killing, they are terrorists and no country in the world conducts negotiations with terrorists.”

Poroshenko can be sure of a welcome from the European Union and United States – President Barack Obama hailed the election as a step toward restoring Ukrainian unity. But although Putin told an international audience at the weekend that he was ready to work with a new Ukrainian administration, Russia may use the gaps in the election in the east to question its legitimacy.

A senior member of Putin’s party, deputy parliamentary speaker Sergei Neverov, gave a taste of that when he wrote on Facebook: “It is hard to recognize the legitimacy of elections when tanks and artillery are wiping out civilians and a third of the population is driven to the polling stations at gunpoint.”

He ridiculed Western leaders for endorsing the vote.

In a statement, Obama did not preempt the results by naming Poroshenko but he praised Ukrainians for turning out to vote despite the threats. He called the election “another important step forward in the efforts of the Ukrainian government to unify the country and reach out to all of its citizens to ensure their concerns are addressed and aspirations met”.

It was Yanukovich’s last-minute decision to shun a proffered free trade and economic support package from the EU in November that sparked the protests that led to his downfall. Moscow had threatened to bar Ukrainian imports and cut off gas supplies if Yanukovich, whose power base was in the east, signed the deal.

EXPERIENCE HAND

Poroshenko is hardly a new face in Ukrainian politics, having served in a cabinet under Yanukovich and also under previous governments led by Yanukovich’s foes. This breadth of experience has given him a reputation as a pragmatist capable of bridging Ukraine’s divide between supporters and foes of Moscow.

A former national security council chief, foreign minister and trade minister, he was a strong backer of the protests that toppled Yanukovich and is thus acceptable to many in the “Maidan” movement who have kept their tented camp in the capital to keep pressure on the new leaders to honor their promises.

Constitutional changes since Yanukovich’s fall will leave Poroshenko with less power than his predecessor. He will share duties with Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk and parliament.

Poroshenko, who has worked closely with the liberal Yatseniuk in recent months, said there should be a parliamentary election before the end of the year – though he also said that it should not take place before conflict in the east was over.

Poroshenko and former prime minister Tymoshenko traded accusations of corruption when both were in government following the “Orange Revolution” of 2004-05 that thwarted Yanukovich’s first bid for the presidency. But many voters saw him as less culpable than many in Ukraine of enriching himself illegally.

Where many “oligarchs” across the former Soviet Union took control of huge, formerly state-owned assets in the 1990s, many credit Poroshenko with building his Roshen confectionery empire himself. His other interests include a major TV news channel.

“He’s a serious person who built up his business himself,” said Olga Netreba, 54, a civil servant in the industrial city of Dnipropetrovsk who said she had voted for him. “He knows economics and I think he didn’t steal his money but earned it.

“I expect that with him Ukraine will be in Europe, that we will finally start getting towards Europe, so that living standards rise and Ukraine never returns to dictatorship.”

Many people in the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, home to close to 15 percent of the population, said they were frustrated at being unable to vote as polling station staff stayed home out of fear or found themselves attacked by pro-Russian militants.

Separatists claimed overwhelming support for a break with Kiev after makeshift referendums held two weeks ago. But polls before violence began that has cost dozens of lives suggested a majority wanted to remain in Ukraine, even if they complained of misrule from Kiev and feared anti-Russian bigotry among Ukrainian ultranationalists involved in the Maidan uprising.

“I don’t think much of Kiev or the people’s republic,” said Ivan, 25, a security guard in the Donbass capital Donetsk. “Both sides say they want to bring order but it looks like neither can do it really. I don’t think the election will change a thing.

“Someone first has to end this war – and I don’t know who.”

http://www.srnnews.com/ukrainians-back-poroshenko-to-find-way-out-of-crisis-2/
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« Reply #340 on: May 26, 2014, 02:09:29 pm »

Ukraine launches airstrike, paratroops against rebel-held Donetsk airport, security spokesmen say - @Reuters

Quote
A minister in Kiev said in turn its forces would renew their “anti-terrorist operation” after a truce during the polling.

Ukraine's Poroshenko says he backs the continuation of 'anti-terrorist operation' in east Ukraine but needs to be more effective - @Reuters
http://www.breakingnews.com/topic/ukraine-protests-over-eu-agreement-delay/

Sustained gunfire heard, smoke seen around Ukraine's Donetsk international airport, witnesses say - @Reuters

Ukraine launches airstrike, paratroops against rebel-held Donetsk airport, security spokesmen say - @Reuters

3 Ukrainian helicopter gunships mount heavy attack on the rebel-held international airport terminal at Donetsk, Ukraine, firing rockets and cannon and throwing out decoy flares as militants shot at them from the ground - @Reuters

Thick black smoke still billowing up from Donetsk, Ukraine, airport; gunfire to south and north of train station has ceased - via @ChristopherJM




Russia urges Ukraine to halt what it called a military operation against its own people; calls on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to investigate clashes with pro-Russian separatists in the eastern city of Donetsk - @Reuters

Remeber when Obama first took office? No DRONE strikes in Pakistan?

Death toll of Obama’s Drone Campaign 5 Years Later: 2,400
http://www.juancole.com/2014/01/obamas-campaign-later.html

Five years ago, on January 23 2009, a CIA drone flattened a house in Pakistan’s tribal regions. It was the third day of Barack Obama’s presidency, and this was the new commander-in-chief’s first covert drone strike.
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« Reply #341 on: May 27, 2014, 05:31:57 am »

Ukraine rebels say '29 or 30' dead on their side in government offensive near Donetsk, city mayor says total death toll is 40 since Monday - @Reuters

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« Reply #342 on: May 27, 2014, 09:28:08 am »

Ukraine orders pro-Russian rebels out of Donetsk with threat of 'precision weaponry'

Kiev has ordered pro-Russian rebels occupying buildings in the eastern city of Donetsk to flee or face "precision weaponry," a Ukrainian government spokesman told Fox News.

The Ukrainian government said the pro-Russia separatist militants in Donetsk have until 4 p.m. local time to leave the buildings they are occupying.

A spokesman with Ukraine's "anti-terror operation" said that if the rebels do not leave the buildings, those targets would be "hit with precision weaponry."

Fox News also confirmed from another source that Ukraine may use military action Tuesday against the pro-Russian rebels on the same day Ukrainian President-elect Petro Poroshenko said in an interview that the military operation in Donetsk would be over in "a matter of hours."

Pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine claim that at least 30 of their colleagues have been killed after a day of heavy fighting in the city of Donetsk that included airstrikes against insurgents who attempted to seize the city's airport.

A rebel fighter, who wouldn't give his name because of security concerns, told the Associated Press outside a hospital in Donetsk that 30 bodies of his fellow insurgents were delivered there.

He said the truck carrying the bodies was still parked outside the hospital, waiting for explosives experts to check it for any unexploded ordnance.

Early Tuesday, a group of unidentified men stormed Donetsk's main ice-hockey arena, which was to host the 2015 world championships, and set it ablaze, according to the mayor's office.

In the neighboring Luhansk region, the Ukrainian Border Guards Service said that its officers engaged in a gunbattle with a group of gunmen who were trying to break through the border from Russia. It said one intruder was wounded and the border guards seized several vehicles loaded with Kalashnikov assault rifles, rocket grenade launchers and explosives.

Speaking at a televised government session on Tuesday, Vitaly Yarema, a deputy prime minister in the interim cabinet, said the "anti-terrorist operation" in eastern Ukraine will go on "until all the militants are annihilated."

Donetsk, a city of 1 million, was engulfed by warfare Monday, when rebels moved to seize the airport, Ukraine's second largest, and were repelled by government forces using combat jets and helicopter gunships.

A bombardment of the airport reportedly began shortly after noon local time, and black smoke could be seen rising from buildings following the sounds of shelling.

Vladislav Seleznyov, a spokesman for Kiev's anti-terrorist operation, wrote on his Facebook account that the military presented an ultimatum earlier this afternoon to unknown armed men who had occupied the airport to lay down the arms. The airstrikes began when the insurgents did not comply.

Officials closed the airport, and police shut nearby streets for traffic. The city mayor went on television advising residents to stay at home.

The battles in Donetsk came just as billionaire candy magnate Petro Poroshenko claimed victory in Sunday's presidential vote. Poroshenko has vowed to negotiate a peaceful end to an insurgency in the east, where rebels have seized government offices and fought Ukrainian troops for more than a month.

Poroshenko described the separatists as "Somali pirates," saying that arms should be used against "killers and terrorists," but he also indicated that he wants a quick end to the military operation in the east.

"The anti-terrorist operation cannot and should not last two or three months," he said. "It should and will last hours."

Poroshenko, known for his pragmatism, supports building strong ties with Europe but also has stressed the importance of mending relations with Moscow. Upon claiming victory, he said his first step as president would be to visit the east.

He said he hoped Russia would support his efforts to bring stability and that he wanted to hold talks with Moscow.

Russia welcomed his intention to engage in talks with people in the east and said it would be ready to work with Poroshenko.

Poroshenko is yet to be sworn in and the date for his inauguration hasn't yet been set. The interim government, meanwhile, pledged to press ahead with the operation against insurgents, which has angered local residents, many of whom see the authorities in Kiev as nationalists bent on repressing Russian speakers in the east.

Russia has denied accusations by the Ukrainian interim government and the West that it has fomented the insurgency in the east. Russian President Vladimir Putin has stonewalled the insurgents' appeal to join Russia and welcomed the Ukrainian presidential election in an apparent bid to de-escalate tensions with the West, which has plunged to a post-Cold War low after Russia's annexation of Crimea.

But Russia has kept pushing for Ukraine to decentralize its government, which would give more power to regions, including those in the east, and wants Kiev to withdraw its troops from the area.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/05/27/pro-russia-ukraine-rebels-claim-30-dead-in-fighting-at-donetsk/
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« Reply #343 on: May 27, 2014, 01:51:56 pm »

Soros Admits Responsibility for Coup and Mass Murder in Ukraine
Color revolution collaboration began soon after engineered fall of Soviet Union


George Soros told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria over the weekend he is responsible for establishing a foundation in Ukraine that ultimately contributed to the overthrow of the country’s elected leader and the installation of a junta handpicked by the State Department.

“First on Ukraine, one of the things that many people recognized about you was that you during the revolutions of 1989 funded a lot of dissident activities, civil society groups in eastern Europe and Poland, the Czech Republic. Are you doing similar things in Ukraine?” Zakaria asked Soros.

“Well, I set up a foundation in Ukraine before Ukraine became independent of Russia. And the foundation has been functioning ever since and played an important part in events now,” Soros responded.

It is well-known, although forbidden for the establishment media to mention, that Soros worked closely with USAID, the National Endowment for Democracy (now doing work formerly assigned to the CIA), the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, the Freedom House, and the Albert Einstein Institute to initiate a series of color revolutions in Eastern Europe and Central Asia following the engineered collapse of the Soviet Union.

“Many of the participants in Kiev’s ‘EuroMaidan’ demonstrations were members of Soros-funded NGOs and/or were trained by the same NGOs in the many workshops and conferences sponsored by Soros’ International Renaissance Foundation (IRF), and his various Open Society institutes and foundations. The IRF, founded and funded by Soros, boasts that it has given ‘more than any other donor organization’ to ‘democratic transformation’ of Ukraine,” writes William F. Jasper.

This transformation led to fascist ultra-nationalists controlling Ukraine’s security services. In April it was announced Andriy Parubiy and other coup leaders were working with the FBI and CIA to defeat and murder separatists opposed to the junta government installed by Victoria Nuland and the State Department. Parubiy is the founder of a national socialist party in Ukraine and currently the boss of the country’s National Security and Defense Council.

Now that the billionaire “chocolate king” Petro Poroshenko is president of Ukraine, the effort to wipe out all opposition in eastern Ukraine will pick up steam. Poroshenko is a near perfect choice for the globalists and EU apparatchiks. He sat on the Council of the National Bank of Ukraine and collaborated with the IMF, Wall Street and the European Commission.

Poroshenko and the February coup leaders are now killing civilians in Donetsk as the effort continues to dislodge and eradicate “pro-Russian militants” and “terrorists,” i.e., armed resistance fighters going up against Right Sector enforcers possibly accompanied by American mercenaries with the help of the CIA. Civilians are also victims in “rebel”-held Slovyansk and neighboring Kramatorsk as retaliation against resistance to the junta in Kyiv intensifies.

The military response with its overly fascist character, including the terrorist torching of a trade union building in Odessa by “pro-regime rioters” (i.e., Right Sector paramilitaries), can be directly attributed to the activism of George Soros and the hands-on approach of the U.S. State Department, various NGOs (which are, in fact, government and Wall Street fronts), and USAID, NED, and the malattributed “Freedom House,” etc.

Following the murder and expulsion of those opposed to the IMF lording over the government and the people of Ukraine, Russia can expect further provocation, especially now that it has stepped away from supporting the resistance. The financial elite and their EU collaborators are determined to diminish and ultimately eliminate any challenge by Russia and the BRICS as these countries move to counter the neoliberal financial agenda.

“The buildup of NATO air and ground forces along the borders of Russia in eastern Europe and President Barack Obama’s American power-influencing trip to Asia have a single purpose,” Wayne Madsen wrote earlier this month. “The seen and unseen forces who dictate policy to their political puppets in Washington, London, Paris, Brussels, Berlin, and other vassal capital cities have decided to smash BRICS – the emergent financial power bloc encompassing Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.”

http://www.infowars.com/soros-admits-responsibility-for-coup-and-mass-murder-in-ukraine/
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« Reply #344 on: May 29, 2014, 05:13:01 am »

Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan agree to create Eurasian Economic Union to further boost ties - @AP
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« Reply #345 on: May 29, 2014, 06:55:59 am »

Rebels Kill 14 Downing Ukraine Chopper as Russia Sees War

Pro-Russian rebels downed a military helicopter in eastern Ukraine, killing 13 troops and a general, as an aide to President Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. of pushing the world toward war through proxies in Kiev.

Insurgents shot down an Mi-8 transport chopper with a shoulder-fired missile amid heavy fighting in Slovyansk, 100 miles (160 kilometers) from the Russian border, Speaker Oleksandr Turchynov told lawmakers in parliament in Kiev today.

Russia called for unspecified “emergency” measures to halt the violence in eastern Ukraine after separatists suffered the heaviest casualties of their campaign. “There’s no excuse” for military action, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier by phone yesterday, according to the ministry’s website.

Ukraine stepped up air patrols over Donetsk yesterday as a convoy of pro-Russian rebels moved through the eastern city with an anti-aircraft gun in tow, regrouping after dozens were killed in a government operation to retake the main airport.

President-elect Petro Poroshenko has vowed to wipe out the insurgents and re-establish order after winning office May 25. He’s faced with trying to stabilize an economy the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development expects to shrink 7 percent this year while reclaiming swaths of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions captured by pro-Russian militias.
‘World War’

An economic adviser to Putin, Sergei Glazyev, said the U.S. controls the new Ukrainian government and is seeking to start a “third world war.”

“This can’t be called anything but madness -- the bombing of cities, airports, escalation of unmotivated violence against their own people,” Glazyev told reporters today in the Kazakh capital Astana, where he’s traveling with the Russian president.

Russia has reduced the number of soldiers stationed on its border with Ukraine to about 20,000 from about 50,000, the press service of Ukraine’s border guards said yesterday. The Russian troops are leaving behind military assets, suggesting they may return, the service said, without being more specific.

Even so, a “threatening, capable” Russian force remains “poised along the Ukrainian border,” Colonel Steve Warren, a spokesman for the Pentagon, told reporters yesterday.
No Thanks

The Foreign Ministry in Moscow said yesterday that Russia is being asked for humanitarian aid by people in eastern Ukraine affected by the conflict. Russia wants Ukraine’s help delivering supplies across the border and expects “the fastest possible answer,” the ministry said on its website.

Ukraine said thanks, but no thanks.

“This is another element of propaganda,” Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said. It may also be a “a hidden attempt to help Russian terrorists who are now in a difficult position,” the ministry said in an e-mailed statement today.

Putin, who has repeatedly denied aiding the insurgency, told Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in a phone call on May 27 that Ukraine’s military operations must stop.

“Russia’s goal was and is to keep Ukraine so unstable that we accept everything that the Russians want,” Poroshenko said in an interview with German newspaper Bild that was published yesterday. “I have no doubt that Putin can end the fighting with his direct influence.”
Gas Dispute

As the violence continued, Ukraine stopped short of accepting an EU proposal to reach a debt and price deal for natural gas from Russia and avert a threatened shutoff. Russia, the world’s largest supplier of the fuel, has twice cut gas flows to Ukraine since Putin came to power in 2000, leading to shortages throughout Europe.

Under the EU plan, Ukraine’s state energy company, NAK Naftogaz Ukrainy, would pay Russian gas exporter OAO Gazprom (GAZP) $2 billion by May 30 and a further $500 million by June 7. That would partially cover Ukraine’s outstanding debt, which Gazprom Chief Executive Officer Alexey Miller said yesterday will reach $5.2 billion by June 7.

Ukraine’s government is “ready to clean the bill” and “pay the arrears,” Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said in Berlin yesterday. The country is seeking a market-based price of $250-$350 per 1,000 cubic meters, he said.

Gazprom raised the price it charges Ukraine, which relies on the Russian exporter for half of its gas, by 81 percent to $486 per 1,000 cubic meters after Kremlin-backed President Viktor Yanukovych fled the country in February.
No Light

About 15 percent of Europe’s gas supply flows from Russia through Ukraine, which is counting on $17 billion from the International Monetary Fund to avoid bankruptcy.

Talks between EU, Russian and Ukrainian officials to break the deadlock will resume in Berlin tomorrow, Olga Golants, a spokeswoman for Russia’s Energy Ministry, said by phone.

The lack of progress is threatening to escalate into a full-blown crisis, “undermining the sustainability of Russian gas transit to the EU through Ukraine,” Alexander Kornilov, an energy analyst at Alfa Bank in Moscow, said in an e-mailed note.

“Ukraine’s position indicates that the light at the end of the tunnel in Russia-Ukraine-EU gas discussions is still very far away,” Kornilov said.

EU leaders meeting in Brussels on May 27 decided to put off further sanctions on Russia after Putin showed a willingness to work with Ukraine’s new leader and pulled back some troops.
Sanctions ‘Reminder’

“The possibility of de-escalation is here, finally,” French President Francois Hollande told reporters after the summit ended. “But we still need this strict reminder.”

In their final statement, the leaders said the EU was working on “possible targeted measures” and agreed “to continue preparations” in case further steps are needed.

Since Putin annexed Ukraine’s southern Crimea region in March, the EU has blacklisted 83 Russian and Ukrainian officials and two companies.

President Barack Obama, who has imposed U.S. sanctions on people close to Putin, including Glazyev, the economic adviser, called Poroshenko May 27 to congratulate him on his victory and offer “the full support of the United States,” according to a White House statement.

The U.S. leader plans to meet with Poroshenko during his trip to Europe next week, Obama told NPR News in an interview scheduled to air today. He told the radio network he expects to discuss Crimea with Poroshenko during their meeting.

Poroshenko said after his victory that government forces won’t quit until separatists are completely defeated.

“They won’t last two or three months,” the president-elect said. “They’ll last a few hours.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-28/russia-urges-emergency-steps-over-ukraine-after-rebel-losses.html
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« Reply #346 on: May 29, 2014, 06:58:17 am »

Quote
Poroshenko said after his victory that government forces won’t quit until separatists are completely defeated.

“They won’t last two or three months,” the president-elect said. “They’ll last a few hours.”

This Candy guy is freaking delusional. Who does he think is going to help him? Obama isnt going to go to war over his country, and neither will Europe. Sanctions are the best hes going to get, and Putin is starting to get a little mad about the whole affair. Heck Russia has completely went around all of the US and Europe and formed even stronger ties to the rest of the world. tools....
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« Reply #347 on: May 30, 2014, 02:59:55 pm »

This Candy guy is freaking delusional. Who does he think is going to help him? Obama isnt going to go to war over his country, and neither will Europe. Sanctions are the best hes going to get, and Putin is starting to get a little mad about the whole affair. Heck Russia has completely went around all of the US and Europe and formed even stronger ties to the rest of the world. tools....

And little do they know they're walking right into bible prophecy. Read Ezekiel 38-39(again) this morning, and this prophecy is NOT the same as the Gog/Magog prophecy in Rev 20(which takes place at the end of Jesus' 1000 year mil reign on earth). Again, divide the word of truth - different dispensations.

Ezekiel 39:6  And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
Eze 39:7  So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
Eze 39:8  Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.


Eze 39:27  When I have brought them again from the people, and gathered them out of their enemies' lands, and am sanctified in them in the sight of many nations;
Eze 39:28  Then shall they know that I am the LORD their God, which caused them to be led into captivity among the heathen: but I have gathered them unto their own land, and have left none of them any more there.
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« Reply #348 on: June 02, 2014, 04:08:12 pm »

http://news.yahoo.com/77-000-foreign-banks-share-tax-irs-150031064--finance.html
77,000 foreign banks to share tax info with IRS
6/2/14

WASHINGTON (AP) — It will soon get a lot harder to use overseas accounts to hide income and assets from the Internal Revenue Service.

More than 77,000 foreign banks, investment funds and other financial institutions have agreed to share information about U.S. account holders with the IRS as part of a crackdown on offshore tax evasion, the Treasury Department announced Monday.

The list includes 515 Russian financial institutions. Russian banks had to apply directly to the IRS because the U.S. broke off negotiations with the Russian government over an information-sharing agreement because of Russia's actions in Ukraine.

Nearly 70 countries have agreed to share information from their banks as part of a U.S. law that targets Americans hiding assets overseas. Participating countries include the world's financial giants, as well as many places where Americans have traditionally hid assets, including Switzerland, the Cayman Islands and the Bahamas.

Starting in March 2015, these financial institutions have agreed to supply the IRS with names, account numbers and balances for accounts controlled by U.S. taxpayers.

Under the law, foreign banks that don't agree to share information with the IRS face steep penalties when doing business in the U.S. The law requires American banks to withhold 30 percent of certain payments to foreign banks that don't participate in the program — a significant price for access to the world's largest economy.

The 2010 law is known as FATCA, which stands for the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. It was designed to encourage — some say force — foreign financial institutions to share information about U.S. account holders with the IRS, making it more difficult for Americans to use overseas accounts to evade U.S. taxes.

"The strong international support for FATCA is clear, and this success will help us in our goal of stopping tax evasion and narrowing the tax gap," said Robert Stack, deputy assistant treasury secretary for international tax affairs.

Under the law, U.S. banks that fail to withhold the tax would be liable for it themselves, a powerful incentive to comply. U.S. banks are scheduled to start withholding 30 percent of interest and dividend payments in July, though recent guidance from the Treasury Department gives U.S. banks some leeway on timing as they gear up their systems.

The withholding applies to stocks and bonds, including U.S. Treasurys. Some previously owned securities would be exempt from the withholding, but in general, previously owned stocks would not.


Private investors who use foreign financial institutions to facilitate trades also face the withholding penalty. Those private investors could later apply to the IRS for refunds, but the inconvenience would be enormous.

Treasury released the list of complying banks on Monday so American financial institutions will know it is OK to send them payments without withholding the tax. Treasury is expected to update the list next month, after another push to complete information-sharing agreements.

"I think having 77,000 on this first list is a pretty big success," said Denise Hintzke of Deloitte Tax LLP. "It appears to me that people are taking it pretty seriously and intend to comply."

Banks in many countries are prevented by local privacy laws from sharing account information with foreign governments. To get around these restrictions, the Treasury Department has been negotiating agreements in which foreign governments will collect the information from their banks and then share it with U.S. authorities.

Russia was negotiating one of these agreements when the U.S. broke off talks in March. Nevertheless, 515 Russian financial institutions applied to the IRS directly and have been accepted into the program. More could apply in the coming weeks.
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« Reply #349 on: June 03, 2014, 04:56:58 am »

US is reviewing its military presence in Europe as a result of Russia's intervention in Ukraine, the White House says - @Reuters

Obama will call on Congress to support a 'European Reassurance Initiative' of up to $1 billion to increase US military rotations on the continent, White House says - @Reuters


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« Reply #350 on: June 03, 2014, 06:30:49 am »

And little do they know they're walking right into bible prophecy. Read Ezekiel 38-39(again) this morning, and this prophecy is NOT the same as the Gog/Magog prophecy in Rev 20(which takes place at the end of Jesus' 1000 year mil reign on earth). Again, divide the word of truth - different dispensations.

Ezekiel 39:6  And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
Eze 39:7  So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
Eze 39:8  Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.


Eze 39:27  When I have brought them again from the people, and gathered them out of their enemies' lands, and am sanctified in them in the sight of many nations;
Eze 39:28  Then shall they know that I am the LORD their God, which caused them to be led into captivity among the heathen: but I have gathered them unto their own land, and have left none of them any more there.


See, I'm very conflicted on this issue. It says that Israel dwells in "unwalled villages" and "dwells safely" when Gog/Magog occurs. Is Israel dwelling in unwalled villages now? No. Are they dwelling safely now? I'd say no, they have to face the constant threat of attacks by Palestinians and other neighbors. And during the ToJT, it'll be even worse (hence the name of the period).

Whereas we KNOW they will dwell safely in the millennial kingdom. Also, they end the exact same way, and it uses similar imagery to show the sheer number of invaders in both sections. If I had to say when it happens, I'd say after the millennium.

I don't see different dispensations when I read Ezekiel 38-39 and Rev 20. Now I could be wrong, and I am conflicted, but after the millennium is my stance at the moment.
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« Reply #351 on: June 04, 2014, 02:31:08 pm »

Putin looks east to bolster ties with North Korea
http://news.yahoo.com/putin-looks-east-bolster-ties-north-korea-055659457.html
6/4/14

TOKYO (AP) — Angry with the West's response over Ukraine and eager to diversify its options, Russia is moving rapidly to bolster ties with North Korea in a diplomatic nose-thumbing that could complicate the U.S.-led effort to squeeze Pyongyang into giving up its nuclear weapons program.

Russia's proactive strategy in Asia, which also involves cozying up to China and has been dubbed "Putin's Pivot," began years ago as Moscow's answer to Washington's much-touted alliance-building and rebalancing of its military forces in the Pacific. But it has gained a new sense of urgency since the unrest in Ukraine — and Pyongyang is already getting a big windfall with high-level political exchanges and promises from Russia of trade and development projects.

Moscow's overtures to North Korea reflect both a defensive distancing from the EU and Washington because of their sanctions over Ukraine and a broader, long-term effort by Russia to strengthen its hand in Asia by building political alliances, expanding energy exports and developing Russian regions in Siberia and the Far East.

For North Korea, the timing couldn't be better.

Since the demise of the Soviet Union and the largesse it banked on as a member of the communist bloc, the North has been struggling to keep its economy afloat and has depended heavily on trade and assistance from ally China. Sanctions over its nuclear and missile programs have further isolated the country, and Pyongyang has long feared it could become too beholden to Beijing.

Better ties with Russia could provide a much needed economic boost, a counterbalance against Chinese influence and a potentially useful wedge against the West in international forums — and particularly in the U.S.-led effort to isolate Pyongyang over its development of nuclear weapons.

"By strengthening its relationship with North Korea, Russia is trying to enhance its bargaining position vis-ŕ-vis the United States and Japan," said Narushige Michishita, a North Korea and Asia security expert at Japan's National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies. Michishita added that showing Washington he will not be cowed by the sanctions was "one of the most important factors" why Putin is wooing Pyongyang now.

Moscow remains wary of having a nuclear-armed North Korea on its border. But over the past few months it has courted the North with various economic projects, political exchanges and a vote in the Duma, the top Russian legislative body, to write off nearly $10 billion in debt held over from the Soviet era.

It has pledged to reinvest $1 billion that Pyongyang still owes into a trans-Siberian railway through North Korea to South Korea — a project that is still in the very early stages. That, together with a pipeline, would allow Russia to export gas and electricity to South Korea.

Michishita noted that the same day the United Nations' General Assembly passed a resolution condemning Russia's annexation of Crimea, Russia and North Korea were busy signing an economic trade cooperation pact.

The warming began around July last year, but it has accelerated as Moscow's antagonism with the West has grown.

Moscow sent a relatively low-ranking representative to the 60th anniversary of the end of fighting in the Korean War that month. But since then, it has hosted North Korea's head of state at the opening of the Olympic Games in Sochi and, in March, sent its minister in charge of Far East development to Pyongyang.

A three-day visit in April by Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Trutnev, who is also the presidential envoy for Russia's far eastern federal district, marked the "culmination of a new phase in Russian-North Korean relations taking shape — a sort of renaissance if you will," Alexander Vorontsov, a North Korea expert at the Russia Academy of Sciences, wrote recently on the influential 38 North blog.

"It is still an open question whether the current crisis in Ukraine will result in any more substantial shifts in Russian policy toward North Korea, particularly in dealing with the nuclear and missile issues," Vorontsov said in his blog post. "With the West increasing pressure on Russia as a result of differences over Ukraine, the very fact that Moscow and Pyongyang are subject to U.S. sanctions will objectively draw them together, as well as with China."

Since 2003, a series of multilateral talks have been one of the primary means of pressuring North Korea to denuclearize and to coordinate policy between the six main countries involved — China, Russia, the United States, Japan and North and South Korea.

Though still seen as one of the best tools the international community has to pressure Pyongyang on the nuclear issue, the talks were fraught from the start because of the North's unwillingness to back down and the lack of a unified stance among the five other nations.

With North Korea showing no signs of giving up its nuclear option, some analysts believe a widening rift between Russia and the U.S. could weaken future six-party talks.

"North Korea's motivations and actions are driven by the leadership's perceptions, world view, and ideology," said Seoul-based analyst Daniel Pinkston, of the International Crisis Group. "That remains the same. As long as the leadership is wedded to son'gun (Military First) ideology, they will not denuclearize before the rest of the world does. And that's exactly what their government and media say repeatedly."

Michishita, the Japanese security expert, said the Moscow-Pyongyang thaw could just muddy the waters.

"North Korea will not denuclearize anyway," he said. "A better relationship with Russia might be a positive factor for North Korea in coming back to the six-party talks. But North Korea will certainly try to use it to enhance its position vis-ŕ-vis not only the United States and Japan, but also China."
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« Reply #352 on: June 04, 2014, 02:33:07 pm »

Rebels seize 3 government bases in eastern Ukraine @AP
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« Reply #353 on: June 07, 2014, 12:14:39 pm »

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-27745278
6/7/14
Ukraine's Poroshenko sworn in and sets out peace plan

Petro Poroshenko promised to commit himself to ''guarding the sovereignty and independence of Ukraine''

Petro Poroshenko has been sworn in as president of Ukraine, setting out a plan to bring peace to the conflict-torn east of the country.

The 48-year-old tycoon, who won the 25 May election, offered political concessions to people in the east and said he did not want war or revenge.

But he also said he had told Russia's president that Crimea, which Moscow has annexed, would "always be Ukrainian".

Some separatists dismissed the speech, saying they would "never surrender".

Russia's ambassador said the address was a "promising declaration of intent".

Mikhail Zurabov, who attended the inauguration, said Ukraine should end its military operation in the east, provided that militias called a ceasefire and allowed humanitarian access.

Petro Poroshenko called on all who had engaged in armed action to ''lay down their arms''

Kiev says Moscow is backing armed militants in the eastern Donbass area, an accusation that Russia denies.

Clashes continued in some eastern areas on Saturday, with reports of the army shelling the rebel stronghold of Sloviansk and of shooting further south in Mariupol.

'Huge sacrifice'

Mr Poroshenko was inaugurated in the presence of dozens of foreign dignitaries - including US Vice-President Joe Biden - in parliament in the capital Kiev.

Mr Poroshenko, the owner of the Roshen chocolates group, laid out a programme for ending the crisis that included an offer of early regional elections in the east and a decentralisation of power to the regional administrations.

He said: "I don't want war. I don't want revenge, despite the huge sacrifice of the Ukrainian people."
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« Reply #354 on: June 12, 2014, 05:40:09 am »

Pro-Russian Separatists Are Flying the Confederate Flag. Why?

The self-proclaimed leaders of the so-called people's republic of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine are taking some tips from the U.S., but in a way that most people will not find palatable: They adopted a modified version of the Confederate Flag. It holds no meaning in Eastern Europe, so to whom are these Russian-backed fighters trying to appeal?



The Moscow Times reports:

    The flag of the unrecognized Novorossia ["New Russia"] confederation is not entirely identical to the banner of the Army of Northern Virginia, as it lacks stars. …

    But otherwise, it is the same as the Confederate flag, a blue diagonal cross bordered with white on a red background. General Lee would have been proud.

    The pro-Russian rebels, known for their dislike of all things American, do not take direct inspiration from the U.S. secession movement or fear the implications of separatist bad luck that their flag entails. …

    The official news website of the separatist People's Republic of Donetsk, part of Novorossia, on May 31 credited Ukrainian political analyst Mikhail Pavliv with creating the "official banner" of the self-proclaimed territory.

    Yet, Pavliv, a support of the insurgency, told The Moscow Times he had simply stumbled upon the flag online somewhere.

It doesn't make much sense that anti-Americans, who already have their own Russo-centric images, would start waving this loaded American artifact. For comparison, wouldn't it be weird if instead of calling themselves "the State of Jefferson," the breakaway group in California picked up a name from 1860s Russia opposition politics and called themselves "the State of Mikhail Bakunin"? Transplanted foreign symbols just wouldn't resonate with locals, and Russia has long seen itself as above the racial tensions of America embodied in the Southern banner.

Now, there have been a few incidents of Europeans waving the rebel flag as a banner of anti-tyranny, such as at the fall of the Berlin Wall and, in fact, when pro-Western Ukrainians deposed their corrupt, pro-Russian president earlier this year. But, again, this separatist movement is anti-Western.

The insurgents, by their own admission, don't know jack about Dixie and certainly aren't defending its heritage. A lot of them are just Chechen mercenaries, not history buffs. On the other hand, Moscow has a surprisingly effective propaganda machine that does know history and does direct itself at the U.S.

Americans, for many reasons, are divided about the conflict in Ukraine. There are some who are wary of stopping the spread of Russian oppression because they're more afraid of the U.S.'s imperialist tendencies. Some of those Americans are sympathetic to Vladimir Putin and praise his conservative manliness. Some of those Americans identify positively with the Confederate Flag and see Russia as a cultural ally. Does anyone hear a dog whistle?

Here's a video of the bizarre matchup.


http://reason.com/blog/2014/06/11/pro-russian-separatists-are-flying-the-c
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« Reply #355 on: June 12, 2014, 05:42:24 am »

Russian Bombers Fly Within 50 Miles of California Coast...
http://freebeacon.com/national-security/russian-bombers-fly-within-50-miles-of-california-coast/

Young Russians yearn for glory days of Soviet Union...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/young-russians-yearn-for-the-glory-days-of-the-soviet-union--despite-not-having-experienced-it-9530379.html
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« Reply #356 on: June 12, 2014, 07:10:19 am »

Russia Is Doing It – Russia Is Actually Abandoning The Dollar

The Russians are actually making a move against the petrodollar.  It appears that they are quite serious about their de-dollarization strategy.  The largest natural gas producer on the planet, Gazprom, has signed agreements with some of their biggest customers to switch payments for natural gas from U.S. dollars to euros.  And Gazprom would have never done this without the full approval of the Russian government, because the Russian government holds a majority stake in Gazprom.  There hasn't been a word about this from the big mainstream news networks in the United States, but this is huge.  When you are talking about Gazprom, you are talking about a company that is absolutely massive.  It is one of the largest companies in the entire world and it makes up 8 percent of Russian GDP all by itself.  It holds 18 percent of the natural gas reserves of the entire planet, and it is also a very large oil producer.  So for Gazprom to make a move like this is extremely significant.

When Barack Obama decided to slap some meaningless economic sanctions on Russia a while back, he probably figured that the world would forget about them after a few news cycles.

But the Russians do not forget, and they certainly do not forgive.

At this point the Russians are turning their back on the United States, and that includes the U.S. dollar.

What you are about to read is absolutely stunning, and yet you have not heard about it from any major U.S. news source.  But what Gazprom is now doing has the potential to really shake up the global financial landscape.  The following is an excerpt from a news report by the ITAR-TASS news agency...

    Gazprom Neft had signed additional agreements with consumers on a possible switch from dollars to euros for payments under contracts, the oil company's head Alexander Dyukov told a press conference.

    "Additional agreements of Gazprom Neft on the possibility to switch contracts from dollars to euros are signed. With Belarus, payments in roubles are agreed on," he said.

    Dyukov said nine of ten consumers had agreed to switch to euros.

And Gazprom is not the only big company in Russia that is moving away from the U.S. dollar.

According to RT, other large Russian corporations are moving to other currencies as well...

    Russia will start settling more contracts in Asian currencies, especially the yuan, in order to lessen its dependence on the dollar market, and because of Western-led sanctions that could freeze funds at any moment.

    “Over the last few weeks there has been a significant interest in the market from large Russian corporations to start using various products in renminbi and other Asian currencies, and to set up accounts in Asian locations,” Pavel Teplukhin, head of Deutsche Bank in Russia, told the Financial Times, which was published in an article on Sunday.

    Diversifying trade accounts from dollars to the Chinese yuan and other Asian currencies such as the Hong Kong dollar and Singapore dollar has been a part of Russia’s pivot towards Asian as tension with Europe and the US remain strained over Russia’s action in Ukraine.

And according to Zero Hedge, "expanding the use of non-dollar currencies" is one of the main things that major Russian banks are working on right now...

    Andrei Kostin, chief executive of state bank VTB, said that expanding the use of non-dollar currencies was one of the bank’s “main tasks”. “Given the extent of our bilateral trade with China, developing the use of settlements in roubles and yuan [renminbi] is a priority on the agenda, and so we are working on it now,” he told Russia’s President Vladimir Putin during a briefing. “Since May, we have been carrying out this work.”

    “There is nothing wrong with Russia trying to reduce its dependency on the dollar, actually it is an entirely reasonable thing to do,” said the Russia head of another large European bank. He added that Russia’s large exposure to the dollar subjects it to more market volatility in times of crisis. “There is no reason why you have to settle trade you do with Japan in dollars,” he said.

The entire country is undergoing a major financial conversion.

This is just staggering.

Meanwhile, Russians have been pulling money out of U.S. banks at an unprecedented pace...

    So in March, without waiting for the sanction spiral to kick in, Russians yanked their moolah out of US banks. Deposits by Russians in US banks suddenly plunged from $21.6 billion to $8.4 billion. They yanked out 61% of their deposits in just one month! They'd learned their lesson in Cyprus the hard way: get your money out while you still can before it gets confiscated.

For those that don't think that all of this could hurt the U.S. economy or the U.S. financial system, you really need to go back and read my previous article entitled "De-Dollarization: Russia Is On The Verge Of Dealing A Massive Blow To The Petrodollar".  The truth is that the U.S. economic system is extremely dependent on the financial behavior of the rest of the globe.

Because nearly everyone else around the rest of the planet uses our currency to trade with one another, that keeps the value of the U.S. dollar artificially high and it keeps our borrowing costs artificially low.

As Russia abandons the U.S. dollar that will hurt, but if other nations start following suit that could eventually cause a financial avalanche.

What we are witnessing right now is just a turning point.

The effects won't be felt right away.  So don't expect this to cause financial disaster next week or next month.

But this is definitely another element in the "perfect storm" that is starting to brew for the U.S. economy.

Yes, we have been living in a temporary bubble of false stability for a few years.  However, the long-term outlook has not gotten any better.  In fact, the long-term trends that are destroying our economic and financial foundations just continue to get even worse.

So enjoy the "good times" while you still can.

They certainly will not last too much longer.

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/russia-is-doing-it-russia-is-actually-abandoning-the-dollar
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« Reply #357 on: June 14, 2014, 03:30:11 am »

Russia Sent Tanks to Separatists in Ukraine, U.S. Says

The State Department said Friday that Russia had sent tanks and other heavy weapons to separatists in Ukraine, supporting accusations Thursday by the Ukrainian government.

A convoy of three T-64 tanks, several BM-21 multiple rocket launchers and other military vehicles crossed the border near the Ukrainian town of Snizhne, State Department officials said. The Ukrainian Army reported Friday that it had destroyed two of the tanks and several other vehicles in the convoy.

“This is unacceptable,” said Marie Harf, the deputy State Department spokeswoman. “A failure by Russia to de-escalate this situation will lead to additional costs.”

Overnight Friday, separatists using antiaircraft and heavy machine guns fired on a military transport plane as it was landing in Luhansk, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry said. It did not give details of casualties, but offered condolences to family members of the victims. News reports said the plane was carrying as many as 49 military personnel.

Earlier, a Western official said that intelligence about the movement of the tanks and other weapons into Ukraine was shared on Friday with NATO allies. Secretary of State John Kerry complained this week about the flow of Russian arms to separatists in Ukraine in a phone call to Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister.

The spokesman for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, Dmitry S. Peskov, said Friday that a Ukrainian armored personnel carrier had crossed into Russia for unclear reasons and was abandoned there. The Russian state news agency reported that the Russian border service said the occupants had then fled back to Ukraine

At the meeting of the Group of 7 nations last week, President Obama warned Mr. Putin that the West would impose “additional costs” on Russia if its provocations were to continue.

The T-64 is an obsolescent tank no longer in active use by Russian forces, but still stored in southwest Russia.

“Russia will claim these tanks were taken from Ukrainian forces, but no Ukrainian tank units have been operating in that area,” the State Department said Friday. “We are confident that these tanks came from Russia.”

“We also have information that Russia has accumulated multiple rocket launchers at this same deployment site in southwest Russia, and these rocket launchers also recently departed,” the State Department added. “Internet video has shown what we believe to be these same rocket launchers traveling through Luhansk.”

Even before the State Department’s statement, Ukraine was having one of its better days Friday in eastern Ukraine, with government forces winning control of the port of Mariupol, the second-largest city in the separatist region of Donetsk.

The Ukrainian assault in Mariupol left five pro-Russian militants dead and four Ukrainian soldiers wounded, and ended with the hoisting of a Ukrainian flag at City Hall as the military routed the last separatists from the city’s administration buildings.

In Friday’s confrontation, videos posted online showed Ukrainian soldiers standing over captives who were lying face down with hands clenched behind their heads. The videos also showed soldiers displaying trophies of the battle — captured orange-and-black ribbons and shoulder patches of a pro-Russian group, the Russian Orthodox Army — and speaking with prisoners freed from the occupied buildings.
Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story
Continue reading the main story

In that pro-Ukrainian forces — volunteer patrols of factory workers, a Ukrainian nationalist battalion called Azov and the Ukrainian military — had controlled most of Mariupol for weeks, the action was as much a propaganda victory as a military one.

In fighting near Slovyansk, a Grad ground-to-ground rocket of the sort said to be in the weapons convoy from Russia killed one person and wounded several others. Residents said the rocket went off course and hit a vegetable market in the village of Dobroyepole.

Over the long term, Ukraine, with its far larger though badly equipped and poorly trained army, has more forces, and it is unclear how long the separatists can hold out without more support from Russia. That is something Moscow cannot offer openly without risking more severe Western sanctions.

The result is misdirection and sleight of hand, and a conflict of endless puzzles and mind games.

The daytime journey of the three tanks through eastern Ukraine, which was filmed in multiple videos and witnessed by Western reporters, could not have been more obvious, and yet the convoy was too small to serve a military purpose. Was it a warning?

A rebel leader, Denis Pushilin, told Russian state TV on Friday that the separatists had tanks but that it was “improper to ask” where they got them.

Russia ratcheted up the economic pressure on Ukraine on Friday in their dispute over natural gas supplies and prices. The state-run energy giant Gazprom said Kiev had to pay its debts for previous deliveries before further negotiations over gas prices.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/14/world/europe/ukraine-claims-full-control-of-port-city-of-mariupol.html
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« Reply #358 on: June 14, 2014, 11:11:59 am »

Ukraine: 49 dead as rebels down military plane

Pro-Russia separatists shot down a Ukrainian military transport plane Saturday, killing all 49 crew and troops aboard in a bloody escalation of the conflict in the country's restive east.

It was a bitter setback for the Ukrainian forces, which have struggled to suppress an armed insurgency by foes of the new government. And it came only a week after Ukraine's new president, billionaire candy magnate Petro Poroshenko, spoke about a peace plan in his inaugural address.

Yet the deadliest single incident in the four-month-old conflict suggested the two sides were still far apart in their demands and talk of de-escalating the conflict remained premature.

The loss of the plane "will refocus attention on the fact that Russia does not seem to be doing very much to moderate the insurgency (or) the cross-border resupply of separatists," said Timothy Ash, an analyst at Standard Bank PLC.

The United States, meanwhile, rejected Russia's statements that it was not arming the separatists, saying Russia clearly had sent tanks and rocket launchers to the rebels, making sure the unmarked tanks were of a type not currently being used by Russian forces.

Nine crew and 40 troops were aboard the Il-76 when it went down early Saturday as it approached the airport at Luhansk, the Ukrainian prosecutor general's office said. The Russian-built Il-76 is a four-engine jet used to transport heavy gear and people.

Luhansk is in eastern Ukraine near the border with Russia, an area where separatists have seized government buildings and declared independence after holding disputed referendums. Ukrainian forces still control the Luhansk airport, however.

Defense Ministry spokesman Bohdan Senyk said the rebels used anti-aircraft guns and a heavy machine gun to down the plane, while the prosecutor general's office mentioned an anti-aircraft missile.

The plane's tail section lay with other pieces of scorched wreckage in a field near the village of Novohannivka, 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of Luhansk. An AP reporter saw a dozen or more armed separatists inspecting the crash site.

The death toll Saturday exceeded the 46 who died after a fire and shootings in Odessa on May 2 and the 12 troops who died May 29 when rebels shot down a helicopter near the eastern city of Slovyansk.

The Kiev government has accused Russia of permitting three tanks to cross the border into eastern Ukraine, where they were used by rebels. Russia denies supplying the separatists.

In Washington, the U.S. State Department said Russia had stockpiled both tanks and weapons for the rebels at a depot in southwest Russia.

"Separatists in eastern Ukraine have acquired heavy weapons and military equipment from Russia, including Russian tanks and multiple rocket launchers," U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said in a statement. "Russia will claim these tanks were taken from Ukrainian forces, but no Ukrainian tank units have been operating in that area. We are confident that these tanks came from Russia."

NATO released images on Saturday that it said showed recent Russian tank movements near the border.

The tanks seen in Ukraine, NATO said, "do not bear markings or camouflage paint like those used by the Ukrainian military. In fact, they do not have markings at all, which is reminiscent of tactics used by Russian elements that were involved in destabilizing Crimea."

Tensions between Ukraine and Russia escalated in February after pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych was driven from office by protesters who wanted closer ties with the European Union and an end to the country's endemic corruption.

Russia then seized and annexed Ukraine's Black Sea peninsula of Crimea after a disputed referendum. The U.S. and Europe rejected the annexation and responded with financial sanctions targeting individual officials they deemed to have played a role. They have held off on widening the sanctions to the Russian economy but have not ruled that out.

"Comments from U.S. officials are now quite specific, and I would expect the focus to return to sanctions next week," said Ash, the analyst.

Poroshenko met with Russian President Vladimir Putin at D-Day anniversary ceremonies in France and there were reports Russia might take steps to tighten control over its border. Russia says Russian citizens fighting with the Ukrainian separatists are volunteers who went on their own.

Before Saturday's incident, the Ukrainian health ministry said at least 270 people had died in clashes between government forces and armed separatists.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20140614/eu--ukraine-58b2dea484.html
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« Reply #359 on: June 16, 2014, 11:06:01 am »

http://news.yahoo.com/russia-cuts-gas-supply-ukraine-tensions-soar-150440109--finance.html
Russia cuts gas supply to Ukraine as tensions soar
6/16/14

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia cut gas supplies to Ukraine on Monday after negotiators failed to reach a deal on Ukraine's unpaid gas bills and future gas prices amid deep tensions between the two neighbors over eastern Ukraine.

The decision provoked strong words from both sides but does not immediately affect the crucial flow of Russian gas to Europe. Ukraine itself has enough reserves to last until December, according to the chief of Ukraine's state gas company Naftogaz.

Still, the Russian move could disrupt Europe's long-term energy supplies if the issue is not resolved, analysts said. Previous gas disputes left Ukraine and some Balkan nations shivering for nearly two weeks in the dead of winter.

The gas conflict is part of a wider dispute over whether Ukraine aligns itself with Russia or with the 28-nation European Union. It comes in the midst of a crisis in relations following Russia's annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in March. Ukraine accuses Russia of supporting an armed separatist insurgency in its eastern regions, which Russia denies.

Ukraine, one of the most energy inefficient countries in Europe, has been chronically behind on payments for the Russian natural gas needed to heat its homes and fuel its industries. In addition, Russia had been giving its neighbor cut-rate sweetheart deals on gas for various political reasons, a practice that came to a halt April 1.

Russia had demanded a payment of $1.95 billion by Monday for past-due bills. At talks over the weekend in Kiev, Ukraine was ready to accept a compromise of paying $1 billion now and more later, but Russia didn't accept the offer, the European Commission said.

Sergei Kupriyanov, spokesman for the Russian gas giant Gazprom, said since Ukraine missed the deadline, from now on it had to pay in advance. Yet that's a nearly impossible demand for the cash-strapped nation, which is fighting an insurgency and investigating possibly billions lost to corruption under its former pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych.

Europe gets about 30 percent of its gas from Russia, and about half of that goes through the pipelines across Ukraine. In 2013, Ukraine imported nearly 26 billion cubic meters of gas from Russia, just over half of its annual consumption.

Kupriyanov said Russian gas supplies for Europe will continue as planned and warned Ukraine to make sure they reach European customers.

Analyst Tim Ash at Standard Bank PLC said Ukraine could in theory simply take what it wants, since gas in the pipeline is intermingled. That would result in a shortage in gas to Europe that could hinder the buildup of stored gas ahead of the critical winter heating season.

"This is unlikely to bring a short-term hit to gas supply in Europe, but it will build up problems for the winter unless a deal is reached quickly," he said in an email.

Bulgaria, Slovakia and Hungary get 80 percent or more of their gas from Russia, while Poland, Austria and Slovenia get around 60 percent.

At a news conference in Moscow, Alexei Miller, the CEO of Gazprom, berated the Ukrainian government, saying it scoffed at compromise and was deliberately turning commercial negotiations into a political discourse.

"Ukraine will get as much gas as it pays for," Miller said Monday. "The risks to the (gas) transit are there and they're significant."

He said in order to prevent serious disruptions to supplies in winter, Ukraine needs to pump in gas to its underground storages before mid-October. The current amount of gas in storage is not enough for Europe to last through the winter, he said.

In Kiev, Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk angrily rejected the Russian position, putting Gazprom's move on par with the annexation of Crimea and the pro-Russia insurgency in eastern Ukraine.

"We won't subsidize Gazprom," he said. "Ukrainians will not take $5 billion per year (out of their pockets) to let Russia spend this money on weapons, tanks and planes to bomb Ukrainian territory."

Gazprom had tolerated the late payments but now says Ukraine owes a total of $4.458 billion for gas from last year and this year.

In December, Russia offered Yanukovych a discounted price of $268.50 per thousand cubic meters after he backed out of an economic and political agreement with the EU. But Russia annulled all price discounts after Yanukovych was chased from power in February following months of protests, raising the gas price to $485 per thousand cubic meters starting April 1.

Russia has offered a future price of $385, the price that Ukraine was paying until December, but Kiev has insisted on a lower price. Miller scoffed at that demand, saying it was significantly below European market prices.

In Moscow, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, at a meeting with the Gazprom chief and other officials, called the Ukrainian position "absurd" and said it amounted to blackmail over the pipelines.

Ukraine's energy minister, Yuriy Prodan, said Ukraine was prepared for the Russian cutoff.

"We are providing reliable transit of gas and supplies to domestic consumers," he said, adding that Ukraine could do that because of lower seasonal demand and previously stored gas.

In a related case, Gazprom announced Monday that it is suing Ukraine's Naftogaz in an international court for the $4.5 billion. Naftogaz said it has also filed a suit against Gazprom, seeking a "fair and market-based price" for gas, as well as a $6 billion repayment for what it said were overpayments for gas from 2010.

EU spokeswoman Sabine Berger said EU energy commissioner Guenther Oettinger remained committed to helping broker a deal between Kiev and Moscow.

One reason for EU involvement is the current state of Ukrainian gas reserves. Berger said they now stand at around 13.5 billion cubic meters but need to be at 18-20 billion cubic meters at the end of the summer for Europe to have enough gas this winter.

Berger said the EU was working toward a deal that could allow shipments of gas to Ukraine via Slovakia.

Ukrainian consumers, however, will be facing higher prices no matter what Russia does. Previous governments had sold gas to consumers at about a fifth of what Naftogaz pays for it — leaving little incentive to conserve and saddling the government with huge deficits.

Ukraine's new government is in the process of raising domestic gas prices, a condition of its $17 billion bailout loan from the International Monetary Fund.
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