This post was originally published on The Asian Age | Home.
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Russia fired 74 — mainly cruise — missiles Friday, 60 of which were shot down by anti-aircraft defences, according to the Ukrainian army
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Web Desk:
According to the national media, the largest free-standing cylindrical aquarium in the world and home to 1,500 tropical fish burst open Friday (December 16) and flooded the Radisson Blu hotel and nearby streets in the German capital.
The massive aquarium stood 46 ft (14 meters) tall and contained over a million liters of water, and was the centerpiece attraction of the Radisson Blu hotel foyer in the DomAquaree leisure complex in Berlin.
The 1,500 fish from the aquarium died, said a spokesperson for Union Investment, which manages the real estate fund that owns the property.
Photo Courtesy: Twitter The Berlin Police reported “incredible maritime damage”, and two people were injured by glass shards. Debris from the shattering flooded out onto the streets along with over 100 varieties of marine life.
Efforts are underway to rescue fish from several smaller tanks that were near the AquaDom and that escaped destruction but have been subjected to power cuts in the building, he said.
Around 350 people who had been staying at the hotel in the complex were asked to pack their belongings and leave the building.
Photo Courtesy: Twitter Emergency services shut a major road next to the complex that leads from Alexanderplatz toward the Brandenburg Gate due to the large volume of water that had flooded out of the building.
A spokesperson for the fire brigade told Reuters it was still unclear what had caused the AquaDom aquarium to burst.
The post Huge aquarium in Berlin bursts, spilling1500 fish first appeared on VOSA.
This post was originally published on VOSA.
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Russia’s war against Ukraine has had devastating consequences for the country’s economy and society, writes Michael Pröbsting.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Pictured: Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Russian state-funded media organization RT.
Written by: Aidan Jonah
Note: Any bolded text is emphasis added by this author.
Emails obtained by The Canada Files through ATIP requests reveal that the Canadian Radio and Television Commission was pressured by the Canadian government into fast tracking a decision to ban RT and RT France from broadcasting in Canada.
The CRTC is meant to be an institution that is arms-length, from Canada’s federal government, making independent decisions. International equivalents including the US’ Federal Communications Commission and the UK’s Ofcom. The CRTC is empowered to monitor licenses under the Broadcasting Act and Telecommunications Act; to deliver on the goals of these acts. You can appeal a CRTC decision in one of two ways: submit an appeal to the Federal Court of Appeals, or “submit [a] petition to the Governor in Council (aka Cabinet) regarding a CRTC decision ‘issuing, amending or renewing a licence’”.
In a 1977 Supreme Court case (Capital Cities Comm. v. C.R.T.C.) judges noted that “The CRTC is not an agent or arm of the Canadian Government.” A 2022 Canadian government press release states that the “CRTC is an independent regulator”. The Canadian government’s behaviour, and the CRTC’s subservience, indicate otherwise.
From hesitant to gung-ho, Canadian government pressure yields rapid CRTC mentality change
The CRTC initially hesitated to commit to review of RT’s broadcasting status on February 24, 2022, the day when Russia began its Special Military Operation in Ukraine. CRTC staff noted that “Foreign channels are authorized for in order to increase the diversity of voices and content in Canada”, while emphasizing that “the CRTC is an independent public authority”.
Stations are normally only reviewed for compliance when their license comes up for renewal or a formal legal complaint is filed. Canadian government and CRTC statements, along with Canadian news media articles include no reference to a legal complaint being filed, while RT and RT France’s licenses weren’t up for renewal in the near future. The ways for members of the general public to prompt a compliance review for RT and RT France were not used.
Yet, on February 28, 2022, the CRTC had already completed a draft Notice of Conclusion for potentially banning RT from broadcasting in Canada. At 9:21am that day, a redacted person emailed another redacted person with the subject line “We have some advice for you on the RT file.” That day, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau demanded that the CRTC start the process of reviewing RT’s license. Trudeau stated that “such misinformation [RT coverage] will not be allowed to spread in Canada,” yet also said that “we recognize the CRTC is an independent body.”
When Rogers, Telus, Bell and Shaw removed RT from their television lineups between February 27-28, Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez, tweeted that “I commend Bell for removing RT”, and ‘Russia has been conducting warfare in Ukraine since 2014, and information warfare across the world.’” The Heritage Ministry administers the CRTC’s responsibilities given to it by the Canadian parliament.
What was a smooth moving provess to draft a Notice of Consultation would suddenly proceed at a rapid pace after Trudeau’s demand and Minister Rodriguez’s comments. Email communications after 7pm on February 28 showcase that all of a sudden, there is pressure from an individual whose name is redacted, to get the notice of consultation out by 11am the next day.
On March 1 at 2:34pm, a CRTC staff member states that “We have been instructed to publish ASAP.” Who they are being pressured by is not stated.
At 3:30pm, a staff member states “we are under a very tight deadline to get this doc ready by tomorrow morning”. At 6:15pm, another staff member states in an email forwarding a draft NoC to CRTC chairman Ian Scott, “Due to the urgency of the file and the lateness of the hour, I felt it best to send it up now.”
On March 2 at 2:42am, a CRTC staff member received a strange email from an email which is redacted, 14 days before CRTC officially blocked RT from broadcasting in Canada.
“Dear honourable members of the Leadership Team of the CRTC!
We applaud the decision to remove RT from the Canadian television cable…
We urge CRTC to take immediate measures to stop further [banning RTR Planeta] the distribution of Putin’s propaganda in Canada.”At 7:06am, a staff member states “The NoC is looking great. Thank you to everyone for the ridiculously quick turnaround on this!”
At 9:03am, another staff member states that “This is the first time in all my years in that we’ve written a DNO before we’ve received the order/application.” The significant pressure being placed on CRTC by unnamed forces should be obvious for all to see.
At 3:44pm, another staff member states that they “understand the obligation to stay neutral with the visual [used for the NoC launch].”
At 5:52pm, an email confirms that the NoC has been completed. Before the CRTC can even launch the NoC to the general public, they are sent a copy of a publicly released Order in Council from the Privy Council Office compelling them to hold a hearing on RT and RT French’s ability to broadcast in Canada, within two weeks. This letter was sent to the CRTC, “on recommendation of” Canada’s heritage minister Pablo Rodriguez. To be blocked from broadcasting in Canada, RT and RT French had to be removed from the List of non-Canadian programming services stations authorized for distribution.
CRTC said in internal communications that the NoC released on March 3 was “in response to this request [from the Privy Council of Canada]. However, an email sent by a redacted CRTC employee at 8:03pm that night, further proves that the CRTC was producing the NoC before the PCO’s request: “I gather you will be updating the NoC”.
TCF reached out to Minister Rodriguez’s office and the Privy Council Office’s media centre to both seek comment from and ask questions to Rodriguez and Clerk of the Privy Council, Janice Charette, but received no reply from either.
The CRTC’s Notice of Consultation was publicly released on March 3, 2022, a day after the government formally demands CRTC hold a hearing on this front, making the consultation period meaningless and a farce. On March 16, 2022, CRTC removed RT from List of non-Canadian programming services stations authorized for distribution. The CRTC’s Notice of Consultation included a preliminary view, that includes this paragraph: “The Commission is of the preliminary view that RT’s programming may not be consistent with the Commissions’s broadcasting regulations, in particular, the abuse comment provisions such as those set out in Section 5 of the Television Broadcasting Regulations 1987,”
This writer reached out to RT for comment; Anna Belkina, RT’s Deputy Editor-in-Chief said they were never consulted before being banned from broadcasting in Canada.
CRTC’s Manager of Media Relations, Patricia Valladao, confirmed that the CRTC never reached out to RT for consultations, instead stating that “RT was free to comment on our public notice of consultation, which was a public consultation.”
To follow up, Valladao was asked if the CRTC made RT aware that they should be responding to the NoC. The CRTC nor Valladao has responded to this question. The CRTC’s March 3 preliminary view was written without even consulting RT.
TCF also reached out to CRTC Chair Ian Scott with questions and a request for comment, but received no reply. TCF has filed complaints to The Office of the Information Commissioner of Canada after CRTC and the Privy Council Office failed to meet their own extended deadline for two ATIP requests about communications between them and internal discussions between March 3 to March 18, 2022. TCF will do a follow-up article if these government agencies, who already are nearly two months late in their responses, do provide one.
In this case, the Canadian government stomped all over the initial attempts of a supposedly “arms-length” government agency to engage in due process over the question of whether a state-funded TV station from a nation Canada hasn’t formally declared war on, can continue to broadcast. This pressure produced a dramatic change in rhetoric and mentality from the CRTC, once instructions came from up above. Canada’s government wouldn’t even give CRTC a chance to go through its typical process, so the government could score political points.ATIPs used for this story:
Editor’s note: The Canada Files is the country’s only news outlet focused on Canadian foreign policy. We’ve provided critical investigations & hard-hitting analysis on Canadian foreign policy since 2019, and need your support. The Canada Files has just begun a fundraising campaign!
$4000 CAD per month is TCF’s goal for this fundraising campaign, up from $1073 CAD per month in support at present.
Please consider setting up a monthly or annual donation through Donorbox.
Aidan Jonah is the Editor-in-Chief of The Canada Files, a socialist, anti-imperialist news outlet founded in 2019. Jonah has broken numerous stories, including how the Canadian Armed Forces trained neo-Nazi “journalist” Roman Protasevich while he was with the Azov Battalion, and how a CIA front group (the NED) funded the group (URAP) which drove the “Uyghur genocide” vote in parliament to pass this February. Jonah recently wrote a report for the 48th session of the UN Human Rights Council, held in September 2021.
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This post was originally published on Articles – The Canada Files.
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How utterly fitting that it should happen at this time. The Qatar FIFA World Cup is coming to a close, a tournament nakedly bought by a state keen to be a standard bearer, not merely of the Arab world, but the world of shameless sportswashing. Despite being criticised for its human rights record, its laws against sexual minorities and its shabby treatment of migrant labourers, Doha will be delighted at yet another tournament passing without effectual criticism.The tournament has certainly seen a number of converts to Qatar’s increasingly large tent of the uncritical. The French President Emmanuel Macron, for one, is telling us that “sport shouldn’t be politicised.”
In Europe, however, we see the tentacles of Qatar’s footballing gambit and the range of its influence. The European Parliament has come under a thick cloud of suspicion for receiving bribes and incentives for allegedly fostering a positive image of the Gulf state. Nothing concentrates the undecided mind quite like a large wad of cash.
The most notable scalp of an ongoing investigation into alleged illicit lobbying activities has been the European Parliament Vice-President Eva Kaili, whose December 9 arrest sent a chill through Strasbourg and Brussels. The next day, she was suspended from her vice-presidential role, and charged with corruption. Expulsions duly followed from the parliament’s Socialists and Democrats Group, and the Greek Pasok party.
Kaili was one of four suspects charged after Belgian investigators found 1.5 million euros spread across two homes and a suitcase. The latter, located in a Brussels hotel room, is said to have had 750,000 euros; cash worth 600,000 euros and 150,000 euros were found at the home of one suspect and at the flat of an MEP, respectively. The now former vice-president’s innocence has been declared through her lawyer, who claimed to have “no idea if any money was found or how much was found” at his client’s flat.
The other suspects, all Italian nationals, include Kaili’s partner and parliamentary assistant, Francesco Giorgi; former MEP Pier Antonio Panzeri, who heads the human rights group Fight Impunity; and Niccolò Figa-Talamanca, who steers the lobby group No Peace Without Justice.
Doha has certainly done much to convince European counterparts that criticisms are being addressed. In September 2021, an MEP delegation met Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al Thani, and found much merit to claimed reforms. Marc Tarabella, vice-chair of the delegation for relations with the Arab Peninsula and chair of the Sport intergroup in the European parliament, claimed that Qatar valued “the EU inputs” and had demonstrated “that the country is willing to work together to achieve the outcome for workers.”
With the football tournament in full swing, Tarabella was also effusive in praising Qatar for becoming “a good example to follow for the other countries in the neighbourhood.” Last month, Kaili was also happy to concur in a speech to fellow parliamentarians that had a pungent smell of connivance. “The World Cup in Qatar is proof, actually, of how sports diplomacy can achieve a historical transformation of a country with reforms that inspired the Arab world.”
In self-praise, Kaili claimed that she had been “alone” in stating that Qatar was “a frontrunner in labour rights, abolishing kafala and [introducing a] minimum wage.” In reading from the pro-Doha script, she reproached critics for bullying and accusing all who talk to Qatari officials as engaging in corruption. “We can promote our values, but we do not have the moral right for lectures to get cheap media attention.”
Tarabella’s involvement was sufficient to pique the interest of Belgian police, who raided the home of the socialist Belgian MEP on December 10, seizing computer equipment along the way. “I have absolutely nothing to hide and I will answer all the questions of the investigators, that goes without saying, if that can help them shed light on this affair,” he stated. “The justice system is going through its process of information gathering and investigating, which I find completely appropriate.”
The rippling effects of Qatar’s purchasing influence are also being felt in other European states. The French financial prosecutor’s office is mulling over corruption charges relating to the award of the tournament to Qatar and any role played by French officials in that venture. Other political figures, such as National Assembly member Alexis Corbière, have openly claimed that “many lobbyists” had approached him to alter his views of the World Cup as a “social, ecological and democratic aberration.”
Indignation and shock are never good indicators of sincerity and accuracy. Parliamentary leader Roberta Metsola is sounding like a witchfinder in search of scapegoats rather than a doctor on the hunt for a diagnosis. “European democracy is under attack and our free and democratic societies are under attack.”
How this is so is not made clear, though it is evident about the reach of Qatar’s sports washing prowess. Metsola also promises that, “There will be no impunity, there will be no sweeping under the carpet.” That will surely depend on the scale of what is found – and the size of the carpet able to accommodate the findings.
- Image credit: Anadolu Agency.
The post Corrupting the European Parliament: Qatar’s Sports Diplomacy first appeared on Dissident Voice.This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.
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European parliament due to vote on Thursday on resolution calling for release of Bahraini activist
A senior MEP is facing questions over trips to Bahrain and his support for a “one-sided” resolution on a political prisoner from that country that echoes the talking points of the authoritarian Gulf state.
Tomáš Zdechovský, a centre-right Czech MEP, who chairs the European parliament’s Bahrain friendship group, was found by the Guardian to have made an undeclared visit to the country in April 2022, where he met Bahrain’s chamber of commerce.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
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Dignitaries attend the annual Service of Remembrance for the Public Service at the Legislative Building on Nov. 9, 2022. (Gillian Massie/980 CJME)
Written by: Morrigan Johnson
Heroes or mercenaries?
On November 8, 2022, Saskatchewan (a Canadian province) Premier Scott Moe told CBC that Joseph Hildebrand, a recently fallen Canadian man who died in Ukraine, is a “true Saskatchewan hero.” Moe continued to say “…Canada must ensure Ukraine defeats Russia and rises again as a free, independent, prosperous nation.” This military activity is not legal however, nor is any role Canada officially plays, responsible.
In April 2022, the Hamilton Spectator reported that wealthy philanthropists are helping to facilitate the recruitment and training of Canadians to fight Ukraine’s war through the International Legion of the Defence of Ukraine. Ken Stone’s previous article for The Canada Files explained how these Canadians are mercenaries, and recruiting them is a violation of Canada’s Foreign Enlistment Act. War should not be waged by the terms of the rich and the markets, they ought to be waged justly, in defense of nations and states. Currently the official activity of Canadian Armed Forces in Ukraine has been actively training these Ukrainian forces, but not engaged directly in combat. Operation UNIFIER has gained attention for embroiling Canada’s military in training neo-Nazi extremism.
There are two levels of law that are relevant to illegal recruitment of Canadian mercenaries.
Canadian Law
The Canadian Criminal Code contains the Foreign Enlistment Act 1985, originally passed in 1937 around the time of the Mackenzie-Papineau Brigade. The original law outlined the Canadian government’s refusal to combat fascism in Europe, erasing and criminalizing Canadians who aided the Spanish Popular Front against fascism. From its inception it was arbitrary in its vision.
It essentially criminalizes the activity we see in the present period. Ironically, when Ukrainian neo-Nazis need Canadian mercenaries in the contemporary international crisis the law is not enforced. The law appears to apply for some, but not for others. Other unpunished violations include Canadians that helped carry out the Palestinian Nakba, to present day Israeli IDF recruitment to enforce the apartheid of Palestine.
The Canadian Criminal Code is the weaker of the two law examples, interchangeably in the code mentioning ‘any foreign state’ on the grounds of recruiting is criminal, while actually enlisting to actively fight is found in violation only if it is against a ‘friendly state’. But what is a friendly state? And who gets to decide this?
The law is still applicable on recruitment despite its arbitrary shortcoming in other clauses. Legitimate wars would entail the constitutional defense of nations and states to employ the service of Canada’s Armed Forces, which should be the key discernment to make from those who recruit mercenaries.
Foreign Enlistment Act: Recruiting
11(1) Any person who, within Canada, recruits or otherwise induces any person or body of persons to enlist or to accept any commission or engagement in the armed forces of any foreign state or other armed forces operating in that state is guilty of an offense.
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to the action of foreign consular or diplomatic officers or agents in enlisting persons who are nationals of the countries they represent and not Canadian nationals, in conformity with the regulations of the Governor in Council.
International Law
The UN holds a convention relevant to our Canadian contexts, The International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries. Canada however, is not a signatory to this international convention, therefore not bound by international law, despite having a domestic law for the same purpose.
We might consider this International law the stronger legal mechanism. We might consider, why are undeveloped and developing countries held to a higher standard of international peace and conflict than Canada is? And when war is being waged illegitimately, how do other laws concern us in the embroilment in other violations that are normally chargeable against states, for example, with war crimes?
Canadian independent journalist Eva Bartlett, covering Ukraine’s war crimes in the Donbass, remains on a kill list for simply documenting Ukraine’s war crimes. The ruling powers in Canada, along with corporate media, have not advocated for her safety, let alone the crimes her reporting has raised. International law cannot charge individuals, but crimes of nations or states at scale, therefore Canada’s deepening embroilment falls into new forms of quasi illegality, if mercenaries are not obligated to a state.
One might argue that this is why the convention exists in the first place, to stem loopholes of quasi legality, and limits of international bodies of governance. It is important to note that Canada ought to sign the convention: International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries.
The Mercenaries Convention records in its preamble the conviction that its adoption will contribute to the eradication of these nefarious activities and thereby to the observance of the purposes and principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations.
Important clauses to note:
Article 1 sets out the critical definition of a mercenary,
(a) Is specially recruited locally or abroad in order to fight in an armed conflict;
Articles 2, 3 and 4 establish individual criminal responsibility for certain conduct involving mercenary activity (called here “Convention offences”). Recruiting, using, financing or training mercenaries (article 2)
Privatized delusion, financialization, and decline
What this means is that Canadian recruitment activity, by Canadian law, is criminal. And in principle to International laws, would make Canada chargeable in the International Criminal Court for the recruiting, financing and training of mercenaries, if Canada was bound as a signatory.
Canadian wealth holders, like Chris Ecklund, are demonstrating the privatization of military activity abroad, without the government providing proper oversight, as the powerful are concerned with laws only when it suits their political interests. Wars are now being waged on private terms enabled through markets, and other forces, cheered by the ruling powers of state such as the Saskatchewan Premier. From last spring, approximately 500 Canadians have been recruited as mercenaries, approximately 1250 have reached out to the embassy, and many more since then. By the summer, Russia estimated that 162 Canadians had been killed.
This follows no realistic or principled international strategy, as the war will drag on, potentially until the very last Ukrainian is exhausted. Canada subverts diplomacy through information campaigns, particularly through Global Affairs Canada, while expending an untold amount of funding both, private, and public, being sent to Ukraine for military purposes. The Canadian government has already contributed $2 billion dollars of public funds directly to the war. Combined sources and uses of contributions are approximately more than $5 billion to Ukraine from Canada.
On October 28, 2022, the Canadian government chose to further financialize the war through the International Monetary Fund. This was done by providing Canadian investors Ukraine Sovereignty Bonds, at 3.3 per cent interest, loaning to Ukraine’s war.
This move means bond buyers will profit through interest, embroiling Ukraine into debt, making the war even more profitable to Canada and the international financial system.
The international reputation of Canada is a matter of cognitive dissonance and delusion, dreaming of human rights and an “international rules based order”, starkly incompatible with its own declining reality.
Editor’s note: The Canada Files is the country’s only news outlet focused on Canadian foreign policy. We’ve provided critical investigations & hard-hitting analysis on Canadian foreign policy since 2019, and need your support. The Canada Files has just begun a fundraising campaign!
$4000 CAD per month is TCF’s goal for this fundraising campaign, up from $1073 CAD per month in support at present.
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Morrigan Johnson is an anti-imperialist writer based in Calgary, Alberta.
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Group says Moroccan and Spanish police failed to provide even basic first aid for hours after deadly crush at enclave
The “widespread use of unlawful force” by Moroccan and Spanish authorities contributed to the deaths of at least 37 people who perished during a mass storming of the border fence between Morocco and Spain’s north African enclave of Melilla in June, according to a report.
The Amnesty International report also accuses Moroccan and Spanish police of failing to provide even basic first aid to those injured in the crush as they were left “in the full glare of the sun for up to eight hours”. It says Moroccan authorities prioritised moving corpses and treating security officials above the needs of injured migrants and refugees.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
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Maksym Butkevytch, a well-known Ukrainian journalist, human rights defender and pacifist, is being held as a prisoner of war, after the capture of his Ukrainian army platoon by Russian occupying forces in June. Isabelle Merminod and Tim Baster report.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is generating debate amongst southern Europe’s pacifist and progressive forces, who all turned out for a massive anti-war protest in Rome last month, reports Dick Nichols.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Western Australia has deepened relationships with its potential European hydrogen customers, undertaking a new trilateral study to fast track renewable hydrogen exports to the Netherlands and Germany. The study, which will focus on the Oakajee Strategic Industrial Area (OSIA), was announced by Innovation Commissioner for Green Hydrogen at Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education (BMBF) and…
The post WA prepares for hydrogen exports to Europe appeared first on InnovationAus.com.
This post was originally published on InnovationAus.com.
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Negotiations to end Russia’s war in Ukraine must be aimed at achieving a lasting and just peace. Federico Fuentes reports.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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The logo of FTX, the US cryptocurrency exchange that spectacularly collapsed in November, imposed in front of a Ukraine flag. Sam-Bankman Fried’s face is sumperimposed on top. Image credit: The Grayzone.
Written by: Kit Klarenberg
On November 18, 2022, it was announced that the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTTP) had been forced to write off a US$95-million investment in FTX, the cryptocurrency exchange which spectacularly collapsed over the initial weeks of November.
The OTTP is one of many institutions to have lost vast sums by placing its faith in Sam Bankman-Fried, the company’s well-connected 30-year-old founder. Typically, a pension fund – particularly one managing the savings of public sector employees – would be averse to investing in such a risky, under-regulated sector as cryptocurrency.
However, the FTX chief came highly recommended by much of the US media, and high-ranking Democratic party politicians. Now, these same voices are rushing to demand official investigations into the crypto industry, and condemn the cult of personality surrounding Bankman-Fried. These same elements predictably refuse to acknowledge their own pivotal role in creating the crisis, and losing everyday citizens and established institutions significant sums of money.
FTX and the “Aid for Ukraine” cryptocurrency portal
The plot thickens every day. It’s increasingly clear that all Bankman-Fried’s commercial ventures were fundamentally fraudulent. Bloomberg has revealed US prosecutors opened investigations into FTX months before its collapse, and speculation abounds as to whether the company was in reality a crooked means by which to raise funds for Democratic candidates and campaigns.
Yet, the mainstream media has remained almost entirely silent on a newsworthy component of FTX’s recent history. Namely, its central involvement in Aid for Ukraine, an online portal soliciting cryptocurrency donations for Ukraine’s war effort.
First publicized in mid-March, the resource – a joint venture between FTX and Ukraine’s Digital Transformation Ministry, pledged to “turn bitcoin into bullets, bandages and other war materiel.” Under the agreement’s auspices, FTX would receive funds in various crypto coins, then convert the sums to fiat currency, for use by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense.
By April 6, 2022, Aid for Ukraine – then a single page of the Ukrainian government’s website – was updated to claim $60 million had been raised so far. This figure has remained unchanged ever since, even when the portal was spun off into an identical website, on November 1st – mere days before the FTX crisis erupted.
Figures connected to “Aid for Ukraine” seek to distance themselves from FTX
A November 20, 2022, Mashable article sought to debunk the “right-wing conspiracy theory” that sums raised by FTX for Kiev were funneled to the US Democratic party. In the article, Sergey Vasylchuk, co-initiator of Aid for Ukraine and CEO of Everstake, which oversaw and validated cryptocurrency donations made via the resource, dismissed suggestions the move to a dedicated site was motivated by insider foreknowledge of FTX’s rapidly impending collapse.
Rather, he claimed “unprecedented attacks” on the Ukrainian government’s website – “probably” from Russia – encouraged his team to “move to a separate domain” and “get control.” The coincidence was simply “bad timing.”
Vasylchuk went on to determinedly diminish the role of Bankman-Fried and FTX in Aid for Ukraine, claiming the exchange was responsible for converting just $1.5 million in crypto donations in the operation’s initial days, and only then because local financial systems were being suspended due to martial law. Once lifted, FTX “was no longer integral to the program,” and alternative means of turning bitcoin et al into fiat currency were used.
This raises the obvious question of why Aid for Ukraine’s website featured multiple references to FTX’s central involvement, the company’s logo, and a quote from Bankman-Fried as late as November 15, four days after FTX filed for bankruptcy.
However, a far more pressing riddle is why a standalone Aid for Ukraine website was created at all, rather than the page being shut down outright in response to purported cyberattacks. This is especially relevant since crypto advocates and government officials involved in the initiative are rigidly sticking to the line that it ceased all fundraising in March, and $60 million represents the total it raised.
That figure is in itself questionable, given Aid for Ukraine initially reported on April 1 it had raised “over $70 million” – references to which were subsequently removed from its webpage – but moreover, publicly-accessible blockchain records related to the assorted cryptocurrency keys used by Aid for Ukraine clearly show a great many millions flowing in its direction since April 1.
What this money has been spent on isn’t clear. Officially, of the $60 million, $45,103,538 was reportedly spent between March 14 to April 14, 2022. Then $9,470,084 was spent over the next three months, leaving $5.5 million left over to this day. Such apparent frugality is somewhat difficult to square with Ukraine reportedly burning through $100 million in crypto donations between just February 24 to March 9, 2022.
Ukraine Blockchain Association president Michael Chobanian has declared that no cryptocurrency donated to Aid for Ukraine was ever held by FTX. Even if true, this wasn’t the case for another crypto fundraising venture for Ukraine in which Bankman-Fried was also involved.
On March 5, 2022, the Kiev School of Economics announced its Washington DC-based “charitable foundation” had acquired FTX wallets, allowing the organization to convert cryptocurrency donations into humanitarian aid. How much was raised via this arrangement has never been disclosed, although the target sums sought have steadily increased over time, to $50 million today.
Bankman-Fried and FTX Corruption costs Ontario teachers millions
FTX’s bookkeeping system was secretly equipped with a “back door” that could only be accessed by Bankman-Fried. It allowed him to funnel customer cash out of the company’s exchange without the transactions being known by fellow staffers, or cropping up on an auditor’s radar. This surely accounts for how potentially billions held with FTX have gone unaccountably missing.
It was just one corrupt component in a business empire criminal from top-to-bottom. An initial review of FTX’s finances by the company’s newly-court-appointed CEO identified “a complete failure of corporate controls” and “complete absence of trustworthy financial information.”
At FTX, internal payment requests were submitted via chat app with messages set to promptly disappear, and approved using personalized emojis. The company had no in-house accounting department, recruited its auditor via Facebook’s Metaverse, and may have “employed” fictitious people to facilitate embezzlement. It was also connected to at least 134 separate “affiliated” companies based in the Bahamas and other offshore territories, which have now likewise filed for bankruptcy.
At least some of those affiliates will have almost inevitably been used for the purposes of money laundering and tax evasion. Ukraine is no stranger to either practice – prior to February 24, it was routinely branded the most corrupt country in Europe. President Volodomyr Zelensky – who ran on an anti-oligarch platform – was exposed in the October 2021 Pandora Papers as having established a network of offshore firms to conceal his assets, and purchase lavish properties overseas.
Yet, we are to believe Aid for Ukraine was the single enterprise in which Bankman-Fried was engaged prior to his downfall that was above board, and about which critical questions shouldn’t be asked. One might hope that innocent bystanders affected by FTX’s collapse will press for answers on this, and other dubious matters related to the company. As one of the world’s largest institutional investors, the OTTP is suitably influential to play that role.
Yet, the response of most individuals and organizations that previously boasted of deep and cohering ties to FTX, and Bankman-Fried, to the company’s disintegration has been to conduct hasty cleanup operations, and carry on as if nothing has happened.
Ordinary teachers in Ontario are just one set of FTX victims among thousands. Their pension plan lost $95 million USD because of FTX’s corruption. As so many powerful actors have a vested interest in maintaining a coverup, the prospect of any truth about what FTX was actually up to in Ukraine and elsewhere becomes vanishingly thin.
Editor’s note: The Canada Files is the country’s only news outlet focused on Canadian foreign policy. We’ve provided critical investigations & hard-hitting analysis on Canadian foreign policy since 2019, and need your support. The Canada Files has just begun a fundraising campaign!
$4000 CAD per month is TCF’s goal for this fundraising campaign, up from $691 CAD per month in support at present.
Please consider setting up a monthly or annual donation through Donorbox.
Kit Klarenberg is a member of The Canada Files’ Advisory Board. An investigative journalist whose work explores the role of intelligence services in shaping politics and perceptions, he leads The Grayzone’s British division, is a chief contributor to The Scrum, and has written for The Cradle, Declassified UK, Electronic Intifada, MintPress and ShadowProof.
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3 Mins Read
France-based vegan meat brand Umiami has announced the acquisition of a Unilever factory to begin production of its “vegetable meat made in France.”
Umiami says the 14,000 m2 factory, located in Duppigheim near Strasbourg, will begin production in mid-2023 and bring 65 jobs to the region with as many as 200 as it ramps up production. The acquisition comes after Umiami’s $30 million Series A funding round last spring and the opening of its R&D Center in Ile-de-France.
France’s Grand-Est region will support the project with €3 million in funding to help with the factory renovation. Umiami will also receive €7.4 million from the State to complete the financing for the site.
Could meat-loving France become the biggest producer of plant-based meat?
The site was formerly a production factory for Unilever’s Knorr brand. Umiami says once it’s updated, it will be the first factory in the world capable of producing any type of plant-based meat or fish at that scale level. It says it will be able to produce 7,500 tons per year initially, moving to upwards of 22,000 tons of whole-cut meat.
Umiami’s whole cut meat | Courtesy “
All the local authorities welcomed us with extraordinary professionalism and enthusiasm, underlining the sacred union of all political sides to promote local economic and industrial dynamism,” Tristan Maurel, Umiami’s co-founder and CEO, said in a statement. “The industrial know-how of the region and the strategic positioning at the heart of Europe convinced us that Alsace was conducive to our development. We are delighted to be able to contribute to local job creation and national food sovereignty by establishing ourselves in Duppigheim.”
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The products we offer are based on totally innovative technology. They must be perfect both for the taste pleasure and for their nutritional qualities and the regularity of the quality over time. The transition to industrial production could not support the slightest deviation. We tweaked it for months in our pilot plant for a result we can be proud of
,” said Reechad Benyahia, Umiami’s Chief Operating Officer.Umiami says its plant-based meat mimics meat “in every way” from taste and texture to color and juiciness. Its hallmark is umisation — a proprietary tech that allows it to produce whole-cut meat and fish with vegetable fibers serving up a texture similar to animal meat. The company says its vegan meat has passed muster with its native French consumers historically known for eschewing plant-based alternatives to meat and dairy.
France embraces plant-based food
Palates are changing in France as consumers become more interested in sustainability, a move being championed by the French government. The country has taken a firm stance on protecting its biggest export, French wine, by moving the industry toward more sustainable practices. It’s aiming for 100 percent compliance before mid-century.
Gourmey Foie Gras | Courtesy Food is not far behind. While the French still consume large amounts of animal products, sustainable alternatives are taking a foothold.
In October, Paris-based cultivated meat company Gourmey closed an oversubscribed €48 million Series A. In February, French supermarket chain Carrefour opened what it says is the first vegan butcher counter in the meat-loving country.
Precision fermentation cheese recently saw a boost, too. In September, Paris-based Nutropy announced it has raised €2 million in a pre-seed funding round for its novel precision fermented cheese expected to launch by 2025.
The post Umiami’s Unilever Factory Takeover Will Put French Vegan Meat on the Global Map appeared first on Green Queen.
This post was originally published on Green Queen.
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3 Mins Read
The European Commission is proposing a bloc-wide plan for tackling plastic waste that could reduce emissions and save resources.
Could the E.U. ban plastic? It’s possible with the proposed rules from the European Commission aimed at tackling single-use plastic. Part of the European Green Deal’s Circular Economy Action Plan, the objective is to normalize sustainable products as well as respond to specific demands of Europeans for more sustainable product solutions.
The E.U.’s plastic waste problem
Under the proposed rules, all 27 E.U. members would be required to reduce plastic packaging waste by 5 percent by 2030, moving to 15 percent by 2040 compared to 2018 levels. According to the Commission, packaging waste accounts for 36 percent of municipal solid waste.
Photo by Adam Navarro on Unsplash “The new rules aim to stop this trend,” the Commission says on its website. “For consumers, they will ensure reusable packaging options, get rid of unnecessary packaging, limit overpackaging, and provide clear labels to support correct recycling. For the industry, they will create new business opportunities, especially for smaller companies, decrease the need for virgin materials, boosting Europe’s recycling capacity as well as making Europe less dependent on primary resources and external suppliers. They will put the packaging sector on track for climate neutrality by 2050.”
A separate law would increase the use of biobased, compostable, and biodegradable alternatives to plastic. It also aims to clarify which plastics are environmentally beneficial and how they should be designed and disposed of.
There are three main objectives of the proposed revision to the E.U. legislation on Packaging and Packaging Waste: prevent packaging waste, boost closed-loop recycling, and reduce the overall need for primary natural resources.
According to the Commission, reusable and refillable packaging options have declined over the last twenty years. Under the proposed rule, companies would be required to offer a certain percentage of their products in reusable or refillable packaging.
The legislation would also standardize packaging formats and require clear labeling on reusable packaging.
Banning usual suspects
Notably, some packaging will be banned entirely under the proposed rule including any single-use packaging for food or drinks when consumed in restaurants. It would also ban single-use packaging on fruits and vegetables, single-use shampoo and body care product bottles, as well as other miniature items common in hotel rooms.
Photo by Eduardo Soares on Unsplash “The way goods are packaged can and should be done a lot better,” said the European Commission executive vice-president Frans Timmermans. “Such overpacking is a nuisance to us and is increasingly damaging to our environment.”
The Commission says the proposal could have a big impact on the E.U.’s emissions. If it were implemented, it would reduce emissions from packaging by 43 million tons—nearly 20 million tons less than without the legislation. It would also decrease water use by more than one million cubic meters and bring down costs related to environmental damaging by more than €6.4 billion compared to a baseline for the same time frame.
“We want more packaging to be reusable, because we cannot recycle ourselves out of a growing stream of waste,” Timmermans said. “And reusable packaging in a well-functioning reuse system is better for the environment than single-use options.”
The post Proposed E.U. Rule Could Reduce Plastic Waste Emissions By 43 Million Tons appeared first on Green Queen.
This post was originally published on Green Queen.
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Salah Hamouri expected to be deported after decision on grounds of ‘breach of allegiance’ to state
Israel has stripped a prominent Palestinian-French human rights lawyer of his Jerusalem residency and is expected to deport him to France, a legal first that sets a dangerous precedent for other Palestinians with dual nationality in the contested city.
Salah Hamouri, 37, had his Jerusalem residency revoked in October 2021 on the grounds of a “breach of allegiance” to the Israeli state, based on secret evidence. Israel alleges he is a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which is designated as a terrorist organisation by Israel’s western allies.
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Musk sparked controversy by proposing peace deal involving re-running under UN supervision referendums in Moscow-occupied Ukrainian regions
This post was originally published on The Asian Age | Home.
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NATO has doubled down on its determination to eventually add Ukraine to its membership, renewing its 2008 commitment to that goal in a meeting between the foreign ministers of the alliance in Bucharest, Romania this past Tuesday.
Antiwar’s Dave DeCamp writes:
The Romanian city was where NATO initially made the promise to Ukraine back in 2008, and at the time, US officials acknowledged that attempting to bring the country into the alliance could spark a war in the region.
“We made the decision in Bucharest in 2008 at the summit,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Tuesday. “I was there … representing Norway as Prime Minister. I remember very well the decisions. We stand by those decisions. NATO’s door is open.”
In a joint statement, the NATO foreign ministers, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, said that they “reaffirm” the decisions that were made at the 2008 Bucharest summit.
NATO Doubles Down on Pledge to Eventually Admit Ukraine
NATO foreign ministers are holding a summit in Bucharest, where the alliance first made the promise in 2008
by Dave DeCamp@DecampDave #NATO #Ukraine #Russia https://t.co/mYqG1JHCQM pic.twitter.com/pU0uTHbv9u— Antiwar.com (@Antiwarcom) November 29, 2022
It has become fashionable among the mainstream western commentariat to claim that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had nothing to do with NATO expansion, but as recently explained by Philippe Lemoine for the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology, that’s a completely false narrative that requires snipping past comments made by Putin out of the context in which they were made. Many western experts warned for years in advance that NATO expansion would lead to a conflict like the one we’re seeing today, and they were of course correct.
The recent push to expand NATO in Ukraine along with nations like Finland and Sweden as justified by “Russian aggression” is a good example of what professor Richard Sakwa has called the “fateful geographical paradox: that NATO exists to manage the risks created by its existence.” As the late scholar on US-Russia relations Stephen Cohen explained years before the Ukraine crisis erupted in 2014, Moscow sees NATO as an “American sphere of influence,” and the expansion of NATO and NATO influence as expansion of that sphere. It reacts to this with hostility just as the US would react to China or Russia building up aggressive military alliances on its borders, and arguably with vastly more restraint than the US would.
Other future examples of Sakwa’s fateful geographical paradox are likely to include the push to reconfigure NATO into an alliance dedicated to “restraining” China, which of course means halting China’s rise on the world stage and working to constrict, balkanize and usurp it. A recent Financial Times article titled “Washington steps up pressure on European allies to harden China stance” gives new detail to this agenda:
The US is pushing European allies to take a harder stance towards Beijing as it tries to leverage its leadership on Ukraine to gain more support from Nato countries for its efforts to counter China in the Indo-Pacific.
According to people briefed on conversations between the US and its Nato allies, Washington has in recent weeks lobbied members of the transatlantic alliance to toughen up their language on China and to start working on concrete action to restrain Beijing.
US president Joe Biden identified countering China as his main foreign policy goal at the start of his administration, but his efforts have been complicated by the focus on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.
But with Russian president Vladimir Putin’s invasion in its 10th month, Washington was making a concerted effort to push China back up Nato’s agenda, the people said.
A defensive alliance doesn't look to pick fights with a country on a different continent. This is some classic mission creep from NATO – or, more accurately, Washington.https://t.co/UWNsPuSXlD
— Branko Marcetic (@BMarchetich) November 29, 2022
The “North Atlantic” Treaty Organization added China to its security concerns for the very first time this past June, and ever since it’s seen a mad push from Washington to ramp up aggressions against Beijing. Another Financial Times article titled “Nato holds first dedicated talks on China threat to Taiwan” details a meeting between alliance members this past September:
They also discussed how Nato should make Beijing aware of the potential ramifications of any military action — a debate that has gained significance following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine amid questions about whether the west was tough enough in its warnings to Moscow.
The US has been urging allies, particularly in Europe, to focus more on the threat to Taiwan, as concerns mount that Chinese president Xi Jinping may order the use of force against the island.
Senior US military officers and officials have floated several possible timelines for military action, with some eager to increase the sense of urgency to ensure Washington and its allies are prepared.
Some are noticing that Washington’s eagerness to “increase the sense of urgency” on this front can easily wind up having a provocative effect which serves as a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Bonnie Glaser, director of the Asia program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, told Bloomberg a month ago that Washington’s haste to prepare everyone for another major conflict could “end up provoking the war that we seek to deter.”
“NATO should be renamed ASFP: the Alliance for Self Fulfilling Prophecies,” tweeted commentator Arnaud Bertrand of the alliance’s discussions about Taiwan.
“A defensive alliance doesn’t look to pick fights with a country on a different continent,” tweeted Jacobin’s Branko Marcetic. “This is some classic mission creep from NATO – or, more accurately, Washington.”
"Nato holds first dedicated talks on China threat to Taiwan"
NATO should be renamed ASFP: the Alliance for Self Fulfilling Prophecies…https://t.co/yU6OSiRhuu
— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) November 30, 2022
When you ignore all the empty narrative fluff and really boil it down to the raw language of actual behavior, NATO’s existence really does seem to be premised on the circular reasoning that without NATO there’d be nobody to protect the world from the consequences of NATO’s actions. It goes out of its way to threaten powerful nations and then justifies its existence by their responses to those threats. It’s a self-licking ice cream cone, or, if you prefer, a self-licking boot.
And this is all happening as news comes out that European nations are beginning to notice they’re bearing a lot more of the cost of Washington’s proxy warfare in Ukraine than the US is, while the US reaps all the profits. In an article titled “Europe accuses US of profiting from war,” Politico reports:
Top European officials are furious with Joe Biden’s administration and now accuse the Americans of making a fortune from the war, while EU countries suffer.
“The fact is, if you look at it soberly, the country that is most profiting from this war is the U.S. because they are selling more gas and at higher prices, and because they are selling more weapons,” one senior official told POLITICO.
The explosive comments — backed in public and private by officials, diplomats and ministers elsewhere — follow mounting anger in Europe over American subsidies that threaten to wreck European industry.
"Is Washington still our ally or not?”
The "geopolitical Commission" and official Brussels as a whole is apparently only learning now what critics have been saying since the beginning: America has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests.https://t.co/WFEBTdq9r2
— Clare Daly (@ClareDalyMEP) November 30, 2022
Washington is taking extreme risks and angering allies at this time because it’s getting to do-or-die time as far as preserving US unipolar hegemony is concerned. As Antiwar’s Ted Snider explains in a recent article, the US proxy war in Ukraine has never really been about Ukraine, and hasn’t even ultimately been about Russia. In the long run this standoff has always been about China, and about the desperate campaign of the US empire to preserve its unrivaled domination of this planet.
“The war in Ukraine has always been about larger US goals,” writes Snider. “It has always been about the American ambition to maintain a unipolar world in which they were the sole polar power at the center and top of the world.”
“Events in Ukraine in 2014 marked the end of the unipolar world of American hegemony,” Snider says. “Russia drew the line and asserted itself as a new pole in a multipolar world order. That is why the war is ‘bigger than Ukraine,’ in the words of the State Department. It is bigger than Ukraine because, in the eyes of Washington, it is the battle for US hegemony.”
“If Ukraine is about Russia, Russia is about China,” Snider writes. “The ‘Russia Problem’ has always been that it is impossible to confront China if China has Russia: it is not desirable to fight both superpowers at once. So, if the long-term goal is to prevent a challenge to the US led unipolar world from China, Russia first needs to be weakened.”
Snider quotes Lyle Goldstein, a visiting professor at Brown University, who says that “In order to maintain its hegemonic position, the US supports Ukraine to wage hybrid warfare against Russia…The purpose is to hit Russia, contain Europe, kidnap ‘allies,’ and threaten China.”
It Was Never About Ukraine
by Ted Sniderhttps://t.co/I8Khc5AGEA pic.twitter.com/VE3Ha6I9hG— Antiwar.com (@Antiwarcom) November 23, 2022
As the world becomes more multipolar and securing total control looks less and less likely, the empire is fighting more and more like a boxer in the later rounds who’s been down on the scorecards the entire fight: taking more risks, throwing wild haymakers, preferring the possibility of a knockout loss over the certainty of losing a decision.
We’re at the most dangerous point in humanity’s abusive relationship with US unipolar domination, for the same reason the most dangerous point in a battered wife’s life is right when she’s trying to escape. The empire is willing to do terrible and risky things to retain control. “If I can’t have you no one can” is a line that can be said to a wife, or to the world.
The importance of opposing these megalomaniacs, and their games of nuclear chicken, has never been higher.
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This post was originally published on Caitlin Johnstone.
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Turkey has struck more than 90 villages and towns in North East Syria since November 19, reports Susan Price. Meanwhile, international voices of condemnation are growing.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Fine particle air pollution led to 238,000 premature deaths in the European Union (EU) in 2020, the bloc’s environmental watchdog said on Thursday 24 November – a slight rise from the previous year.
The European Environment Agency (EEA) said that across the EU in 2020:
exposure to concentrations of fine particulate matter above the 2021 World Health Organization guideline level resulted in 238,000 premature deaths.
That was slightly more than those recorded in 2019 in the EU, despite a fall in emissions due to coronavirus (Covid-19). Fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, is a term for fine particulates that are typically the by-product of car exhausts or coal-fired power plants. Their tiny size enables them to travel deep into the respiratory tract, worsening the risk of bronchitis, asthma and lung disease.
Premature deaths
Also in 2020, exposure to nitrogen dioxide (NO2) above the World Health Organisation’s (WHO’s) recommended threshold led to 49,000 premature deaths in the EU, the EEA said. Acute exposure to ozone (O3) caused 24,000 people to die early. The agency said:
When comparing 2020 to 2019, the number of premature deaths attributable to air pollution increased for PM2.5 but decreased for NO2 and O3.
For PM 2.5, falls in concentrations were counteracted by an increase in deaths due to the pandemic.
The coronavirus pandemic led to the deaths of some people already living with diseases related to air pollution.
The EU wants to slash premature deaths related to fine particulate matter pollution by 55 percent in 2030 compared to 2005 levels. Overall, the rate for EU countries in 2020 was 45 percent lower than in 2005. The agency also said:
If this rate of decline is maintained, the EU will reach the aforementioned zero pollution action plan target before 2030.
According to the WHO, air pollution causes seven million premature deaths per year worldwide, putting it on par with smoking or poor diets.
UK perspective
In the UK, however, there are further complications for cutting down levels of air pollution. As the Canary’s Tracy Keeling reported earlier this month, environmental charity ClientEarth noted that:
the World Health Organization (WHO) overhauled its pollution guidelines in 2021. The WHO said that it set the current limit to protect the public from the health impacts of NO2, which epidemiological studies have shown to include “bronchitis in asthmatic children” and lower “lung function growth”.
However, these guidelines aren’t used in the UK:
The environmental charity said that the UK’s current legal limit for this gas is four times higher than the WHO guidelines. Its analysis showed that this places all 43 air pollution zones above the annual level the WHO recommends.
As part of the UK’s exit from the EU, the government is attempting to see through the Retained EU Law (Reform and Revocation) Bill. As we reported earlier:
Regulations that would previously have been covered by our membership in the EU will now need to be covered by our own legislation.
Katy Nield, a lawyer for ClientEarth, said:
Instead of putting forward plans to get to grips with this public health crisis, ministers are presenting a deeply worrying Bill in Parliament which could rip out the legal protections in our statute book.
Featured image by Unsplash/Daniel Moqvist
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
This post was originally published on Canary.
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Nataliya Levytska is deputy chairperson of the Independent Mineworkers Union of Ukraine. She is in Australia for the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) World Congress, where she spoke to Chloe DS about the situation of Ukrainian trade unions.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Guterres’ remarks come in the backdrop of the recent Shraddha Walker murder case that has shocked India with its brutal details
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After Turkey carried out intense air strikes on North and East Syria and Northern Iraq in the early hours of November 20, protests took place in several different European cities.
[Video: Firat News Agency.]
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Soon after arriving in Oslo, my taxi zigzagged through the city’s well-organized streets and state-of-the-art infrastructure. Large billboards advertised the world’s leading brands in fashion, cars, and perfumes. Amid all the expressions of wealth and plenty, an electronic sign by a bus stop flashed the images of poor looking African children needing help.
Over the years, Norway has served as a relatively good model of meaningful humanitarian and medical aid. This is especially true if compared to other self-serving western countries, where aid is often linked to direct political and military interests. Still, the public humiliation of poor, hungry and diseased Africa is still disquieting.
The same images and TV ads are omnipresent everywhere in the West. The actual tangible value of such charity aside, campaigns to help poor Africa do more than perpetuate a stereotype, they also mask the actual responsibility of why natural resource-rich Africa remains poor, and why the supposed generosity of the West over the decades has done little to achieve a paradigm shift in terms of the Continent’s economic health and prosperity.
News from Africa is almost always grim. A recent ‘Save the Children’ report sums up Africa’s woes in alarming numbers: 150 million children in East and Southern Africa are facing the double threat of grinding poverty and the disastrous impact of climate change. The greatest harm affects the children population in South Sudan, with 87 percent, followed by Mozambique (80 percent), then Madagascar (73 percent).
The bad news from Africa, illustrated in the Save the Children report, was released soon after another report, this time by the World Bank, indicating that the international community’s hope to end extreme poverty by 2030 will not be met.
Consequently, by 2030, around 574 million people, estimated at 7 percent of the world’s total population, will continue to live in extreme poverty, relying on about two dollars a day.
Sub-Saharan Africa currently serves as the epicenter of global extreme poverty. The rate of extreme poverty in that region is about 35 percent, representing 60 percent of all extreme poverty anywhere in the world.
The World Bank suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Russia-Ukraine war are the main catalysts behind the grim estimates.
Growing global inflation and the slow growth of large economies in Asia are also culprits.
But what these reports don’t tell us, and what images of starving African children don’t convey is that much of Africa’s poverty is linked to the ongoing exploitation of the continent by its former – or current – colonial masters.
This is not to suggest that African nations have no agency of their own, in contributing to their worsening situation or in challenging intervention and exploitation. Without a united front and major change in geopolitical global balances, pushing back against neocolonialism is not an easy feat.
The Russia-Ukraine war and the global rivalry between Russia and China, on the one hand, and western countries on the other have encouraged some African leaders to speak out against the exploitation of Africa, and the use of Africa as a political fodder for global conflicts. The food crisis has been at the center of this fight.
In the late October Dakar International Forum on Peace and Security, some African leaders resisted pressure from western diplomats to toe the West’s line on the war in Ukraine.
Ironically, French minister of state Chrysoula Zacharopoulou sought “solidarity from Africa”, alleging that Russia poses an “existential threat” to Europe.
Though France continues to effectively control the currencies, thus economies of 14 different African countries – mostly in West Africa – Zacharopoulou declared that “Russia is solely responsible for this economic, energy and food crisis.”
President of Senegal, Macky Sall was one of several African leaders and top diplomats who challenged the duplicitous and polarizing language.
“This is 2022, this is no longer the colonial period… so countries, even if they are poor, have equal dignity. Their problems have to be handled with respect,” he said.
It is this coveted ‘respect’ by the West that Africa lacks. The US and Europe simply expect African nations to abandon their neutral approach to global conflicts and join the West’s continued campaign for global dominance.
But why should Africa, one of the richest and most exploited continents, obey the West’s diktats?
The West’s insincerity is glaring. Its double standard didn’t escape African leaders, including Nigeria’s former president Mahamadou Issoufou. “It’s shocking for Africans to see the billions that have rained down on Ukraine while attention has been diverted from the situation in the Sahel (region),” he said in Dakar.
Following the elevated political discourse emanating from African leaders and intellectuals gives one hope that the supposedly ‘poor’ Continent is plotting an escape from the grip of western domination, though many variables would have to work in their favor to make this happen.
Africa’s existent wealth alone can fuel global growth for many years to come. But the beneficiaries of this wealth should be Africa’s sons and daughters, not the deep pockets of the West’s wealthy classes. Indeed, the time has come that Africa’s children are not paraded as charity cases in Europe, a notion that only feeds into the long-distorted power relations between Africa and the West.
The post Liberating Africa from Poverty Requires Changing Power Relations with the West first appeared on Dissident Voice.
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As I report on the aftermath of Russian occupation, there is a new sense that what once seemed impossible can be achieved
- Nataliya Gumenyuk is a Ukrainian journalist and author
At Liberty Square in Kherson, residents gather, trying to find wifi near the temporary wireless internet towers and charging points. There is limited phone connection and no internet to read the news and find out what is going on outside this recently liberated region. During their withdrawal after nine months of occupation, Russian forces blew up the TV tower and the power grid, so there is no electricity to charge devices either.
Yet the mood is celebratory in the square today, as locals wave Ukrainian flags and banners marking the liberation. It has been seven days since Ukrainian troops re-entered the city, but Ukrainian soldiers, police, social services, foreign reporters and anyone who has arrived from outside the city are still greeted warmly.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
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Germany latest to end peacekeeping mission as operations prove unable to stop Islamic extremist insurgency
Thousands of international troops are withdrawing from Mali amid surging violence, growing Russian influence and an acute humanitarian crisis.
On Wednesday Germany became the latest country to end its participation in the UN peacekeeping mission in the unstable west African country. Earlier this week, British officials said that 300 British soldiers sent in 2020 to join the United Nations force would be returning earlier than planned.
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Nilüfer Koç from the Kurdish National Congress spoke at the Ecosocialism 2022 conference about the popular uprising in Iran, war in Ukraine and Rojava Revolution. Alex Bainbridge and Susan Price report.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
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Ukrainian and Polish trade unions are calling on the International Trade Union Confederation to expel the pro-war Russian Federation of Trade Unions, reports Federico Fuentes.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
