Vladimir Putin has announced Russia will not lift a ban on grain exports before next year’s harvest, extending the embargo for another year, sparking fears over a global food shortage.

The Russian prime minister said that it was “necessary to note that we will only be able to consider lifting the grain export ban after next year’s harvest ... and we have clarity on the balances”.

---Comment---

Russia has leaders who put Russia first, second, and third. - kdtroxel

Forest fires have flared up again in Russia, this time in the south, forcing hundreds of people to leave their homes. 20 villages in the region of Volgograd have been affected so far. Temperatures here have topped 40 degrees celsius in recent days.

This is a local disaster with potentially global consequences.

Officials now say Russia’s embargo on the export of wheat will not be lifted before next year’s harvest.

"There would have been no aggression and blood if not the rearmament of Georgia two years ago; we had been telling this to our partners, including to our European friends; and everyone kept silence; and how did it all ended? It led up to the war. This rearmament continues today," Putin said.

This is Russia's escape clause in the flawed 6-point ceasefire agreement which Sarkozy screwed up while he was so busy looking in the mirror at himself on the world stage.

Despite Israel's objections, Russia will not cancel its sale of advanced missiles to Syria, the Kremlin announced on Sunday.

Haaretz reported on Friday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had asked his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to cancel the sale of long-range surface-to-sea cruise missiles to the Syrian Army

Press TV
Iran has begun loading its first nuclear power plant in the southern city of Bushehr with fuel in an effort to provide the country with nuclear-generated electricity. Nuclear fuel is being transferred to the Bushehr reactor under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency and senior officials from Iran and Russia.

Iran's first nuclear power plant, which is located in the southern port city of Bushehr, is scheduled to be loaded with nuclear fuel on Saturday.

Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Director Ali Akbar Salehi and Russian Federal Atomic Energy Agency Director Sergei Kiriyenko will be attending the inaugural ceremony of the Bushehr nuclear power plant.

Nuclear fuel will be transferred to the Bushehr reactor under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The startup of the plant will mark an important step in Iran's efforts to produce nuclear electricity, and it is expected that Iranians will be using nuclear-generated electricity two or three months after the launch.

Putin's heritage: Russia waking up and purging itself

(San Francisco) – Russia is burning down this summer. The smoke is engulfing Moscow and the European Union. Embassies are emptying.

What’s the deal?

Thousands of forest fires are burning all over Russia. More importantly, the nuclear weapons factories and reactors around Mayak and the former Soviet Union’s Uranium Project are going up in smoke. The smoke is toxic and radioactive in every possible sense of the words.

This documentary interrogates the notion that Osama Bin Laden single-handedly runs the pervasive Al Qaeda terrorist network by examining its inception, its links to Western intelligence, the double agents and fictitious characters that populate its ranks, and the fraudulent ways the Al Qaeda myth is propagated in the controlled corporate media.

This installment of the documentary goes into Zbigniew Brzezinski, Operation Cyclone, the ISI-CIA-MAK-US government funding circle and CIA connections to Osama Bin Laden.

We will transport South a large group of the capital's residents, about 1,600, who are in the health risk group so that they can be able to breath and receive medical attention," Luzhkov stated during a meeting with Russia's Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin.

In addition, in just days, 10,000 children, some of whom need medical attention, will travel to Bulgaria, not only during their summer break, but in September and October as well to Moscow's own pioneer camp in Kamchiya, on Bulgaria's Black Sea coast, according to the Mayor.

By Samira Quraishy

As Russia prepares to deliver fuel for Iran’s nuclear reactors, it is worth casting a reviewer’s eye over the potential for further conflict in the Middle East. In one corner we have the Zionist state of Israel and its somewhat reluctant – although faithful-ally, the United States. In the other corner we have Iran, Lebanon and Syria and their various proxies.

EVACUATE NOW!: This is Not a Drill
August 15, 2010 posted by Bob Nichols
REUTERS / Denis Sinyakov - Forest fires hit areas remaining radioactive since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.
Thousands of forest fires are burning all over Russia. More importantly, the nuclear weapons factories and reactors around Mayak and the former Soviet Union’s Uranium Project are going up in smoke. The smoke is toxic and radioactive in every possible sense of the words.
As of 8/15/2010 all personnel in Russia and the European Union are advised to evacuate immediately. I repeat. This is not a drill. If you can’t leave, get your kids out. It may be too late already.

Russia has imposed a ban on grain exports until the end of the year, after a severe drought and a spate of wildfires devastated crops.

Russia is one of the world's biggest producers of wheat, barley and rye, and the ban is likely to see bread prices rise in places like the Middle East.

The measures are designed to keep domestic food prices under control.

The 1,000 sq km around the Mayak bomb factory is one of the most contaminated areas on Earth because the Mayak Uranium Project manufactured the most poisonous substances on Earth for the most lethal weapons on Earth.

Manufacturing thermonuclear weapons is a really nasty business. As far as Weapons of Mass Destruction goes, there are the real McCoy.

As of 8/15/2010 all personnel in Russia and the European Union are advised to evacuate immediately. I repeat. This is not a drill. If you can’t leave, get your kids out. It may be too late already.

As fires wreck Russia's harvests and poor countries brace for shortages, it's boom time for Kansas farmers.

Russia says it will undertake a key step next week towards starting up a reactor at Iran's first nuclear power station.

Russia's state atomic corporation, which is building the plant, said engineers will begin loading the Bushehr reactor with fuel.

However, it could be six months before the reactor is fully operational.

Russia has been helping build the plant since the mid-1990s, amid tensions over Iran's nuclear programme.

Russia is mounting extra patrols to fight wildfires in a region hit by nuclear fallout from Chernobyl, amid fears that radiation could spread.

Crews put out several fires in Bryansk, the emergencies ministry said, amid concern that wind or fire could whip up radioactive particles in the soil.

Officials say they are assessing the danger and there is no cause for panic.

Fires have swept through western Russia for a week, although officials say many are now under control.

The area engulfed by fires has halved, with 92,000 hectares (350 sq miles) now affected, compared to Tuesday's figure of 174,000 hectares.

"It's a bad day for biodiversity," said Cary Fowler, director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, which has for months been trying to raise awareness of the dire situation at the decades-old collection. The collection of plants was started in 1926 by the father of seed banking, revered Russian geneticist Nikolai Vavilov. "Unless somebody intervenes, we're going to stand there at the gates and watch the bulldozers destroy thousands of varieties that are growing in a collection that dates back to 1926," Fowler told The Scientist.

The Scientist's emails to both the Russian Ministry of Economic Development and the housing development foundation were not answered before publication.

Fires have scorched forests contaminated with radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, a Russian forestry official said on Wednesday, but it was unclear what danger the smoke from such wildfires could pose.

By Kaveh L Afrasiabi – (CASMII | Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention)

The United States and Iran have reached a critical juncture, facing the alternative of further tension and escalating conflict spiraling toward military confrontation, or dialogue, diplomatic engagement and reciprocal compromise.

In light of the recent slew of sanctions after sanctions imposed by the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, Canada, Australia and others, it seems that chariots are blazing down the fork in the road toward more conflict. However, there is a glimmer of hope for a diplomatic solution in the form of a “double swap”.

CONTINUE:

http://mycatbirdseat.com/2010/08/us-iran-double-swap-points-to-peace/

Smoke Cloud Covers Moscow - Authorities Warn of Radioactive Cloud
By ThirdAge News Staff
Posted August 6, 2010 8:28 PM
And it could get much worse: Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu warned Friday that the fires in the Bryansk region might send into the air radioactive contamination locked in soil devastated by the Chernobyl nuclear reactor accident of 1986."If a fire appears there, the radioactive particles could fly away with the smoke and a new polluted area could appear," he said.

Radiation, plague, and fires: foreign embassies urgently evacuate staff from Russia
Publication time: 7 August 2010, 13:52
A hasty evacuation of diplomatic staff from foreign embassies, like a stampede, began in Moscow. Many embassies are trying to hide the evacuation for political reasons. Mass evacuation of the embassies of Canada and Poland was officially reported at night on August 7.

Russian defense spending will increase by 60 percent, to more than 2 trillion rubles ($66.3 million) by 2013 from 1.264 trillion ($42 million) in 2010, a leading Russian business daily said on Friday.

To quote Mr. Rivero, quoting the War Party, "Yee-haa, we got the cold war back!!

Tehran has obtained four S-300 surface-to-air missiles, the Iranian news agency Fars has said. Two missiles were purchased from Belarus and two others from another unspecified source, it added.

According to Fars, the semiofficial news agency, Tehran’s possession of the missiles was revealed last year by Al-Menar TV. Iranian government officials never denied the report.

S-300s can track targets and fire at aircraft, cruise missiles and ballistic missile warheads 120 kilometers away, and are able to simultaneously engage up to 100 targets. Israel fears the possible delivery of the systems to Iran would change “the balance of forces” in the region. Analysts say Tehran may use the S-300 in case of a military strike against the country.

WASHINGTON — The United States should immediately impose sanctions on Russia and China under a US law that punishes major investments in Iran's energy sector, a senior US lawmaker said Monday.

"It's time to implement our sanctions laws and demonstrate to Russia and China that there are consequences for abetting Tehran and flouting US sanctions," Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said in a statement.

FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)

SUBJECT: War With Iran

War talk

We write to alert you to the likelihood that Israel will attack Iran as early as this month. This would likely lead to a wider war.

Israel’s leaders would calculate that once the battle is joined, it will be politically untenable for you to give anything less than unstinting support to Israel, no matter how the war started, and that U.S. troops and weaponry would flow freely. Wider war could eventually result in destruction of the state of Israel.

This can be stopped, but only if you move quickly to pre-empt an Israeli attack by publicly condemning such a move before it happens.

The sanctions imposed recently against Iran by the United Nations, and later separately by the US Congress, have one thing in common. Both were driven by the US at the instigation of Israel.

But they are also, I believe, generally misunderstood. Sanctions are normally intended to alter the behavior of the country being sanctioned — to punish it for what it is doing, to keep it from continuing practices or policies others find objectionable, or both.

And overtly, that is the function of these sanctions. But that is not their actual purpose.

The United States believes Russia is not fully complying with international pacts involving chemical and biological weapons, although Moscow has settled most questions about violations of a nuclear arms treaty with the United States, according to a State Department report to be made public Wednesday.

Monday, July 26, 2010
SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Black Sea challenge by U.S. set to keep Russia on edge
Romania is ready to accept deployment of 20 SM-3 anti-ballistic missile units, currently installed on American naval vessels with the Aegis Combat System. These missiles could later be replaced with the more advanced terminal high altitude area defense (THAAD) missiles. They will also be deployed in Bulgaria.
Meanwhile, it has become more likely that the X-band radar system, which the U.S. originally planned to install in the Czech Republic, will be set up in Israel.

Where the US claims its presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is only temporary the massive infrastructures established in these countries in the form of military bases belies this claim. They are not dispensing “Enduring Freedom” but an enduring presence and Afghanistan and Iraq are only the most recent franchises in a global network of over 700 US military bases.

Imperialism is a very expensive game and has left America the most indebted country in the world. It is fighting foreign wars with borrowed money on borrowed time. It then becomes necessary to defray the costs of this cretinous extravagance by coercing allies, namely NATO, into being the whores of US imperialism all too willing to cough up cash and lives in a sorely corrupted cause for despicable motives.

As a result of Pollard’s spying, 110 C.I.A. operatives lost their lives. In addition, a reported 1,600 prime American assets were lost due to this Israeli espionage. Americans have yet to be told the true extent of this loss.

For the first time since conceding to the UN Security Council sanctions against Iran, Russia says negotiations with Tehran should be renewed as soon as possible.

"This is what we see as the main aim of the UN Security Council resolution. If diplomacy loses this chance, then this will be a collective failure of all the international community," Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Monday.

The Communist government that was in power then kept silent about this accident. In Kiev, they forced people to take part in their preciously stupid labor day parade and it was then that ordinary people began hearing the news of the accident from foreign radio stations and relatives of those who died. The real panic began 7-10 days after accident. Those who were exposed to the exceedingly high levels of nuclear radiation in the first 10 days when it was still a state secret, including unsuspecting visitors to the area, either died or have serious health problems.

The same thing that happened in the Soviet Union could happen to America, because the zionist/communist Jews of Russia are the same people as the Neocon/fascists in American politics. They are out to kill us all, or enslave us in order to gain total global dominance for themselves, and their cult of death based on their sacred Talmud.. (Not giving any credence to the first five books of the Bible "The Torah", as we were taught in Sunday school.)

This video is over an hour long.. This is what happens when these people control things. You could not be in the communist party's upper ranks unless you were a Jewish zionist.. It's the same thing in America.. You can't be in politics unless you are a zionist... and it helps to be Jewish.

Don't tell me it can't happen in America..

It seems to me that we fought the Cold War by nuking, mostly, OURSELVES!

Missing: Israel-South Africa nuclear testing in 1979? http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/israel/nuke-test.htm

Translation from Russian

Anna Chapman (Anna Chapman) - one of the 11 arrested in U.S. on charges of spying for Russia - in 2007-2008 worked in the division of the Belgian bank Fortis - KIT Fortis Investments, said on Thursday, local media reported. - served as vice president of KIT Fortis Investments, established in 2006, and was responsible for sales in Russia of foreign securities.

Here are presented her photo spread in which she Soc. networks and the end of a brief version of the history for those too lazy to Google on this subject:)

===

Are people so stupid to fall for the Russian spy claim? Probably. Mostly ... they are ignorant rednecks.

WARNING TO ANYONE IN THE US THAT IS ORIGINALLY FROM A FOREIGN NATION:

Christopher King argues that Russia under the leadership of President Dmitriy Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has enormous potential for setting a course toward a positive future with Europe.

An Ontario family caught up in a global espionage drama wants answers from the Canadian government amid fears they'll now have trouble traveling abroad — or might even get a late-night visit from Russian spies.

Brampton resident David Heathfield said Tuesday he'd like to hear from authorities in Ottawa after his dead brother's name turned up in U.S. court files about an alleged spy ring run from Moscow.

===

The details sound like a script for a CSI Miami episode where everything is solved all too easily.
Is this really just another elaborate Russia bashing scheme?

Suspect Anna Chapman, a demure divorced 28-year-old who said she founded an online real estate company worth $2 million.

Spy on me any day :-)

Israel agreed to sell South Africa nuclear weapons.

More than that, it makes any aid America gives Israel illegal. If Israel is nuclear, which is now official, and in violation of international treaties, just as with Iraq and Iran, then America has to demand inspections and disarmament. There is no choice. This is the law. Law for Iran, law for Iraq is also law for Israel. Israel has expected this day for years.

Gazprom Neft Seeks Expansion Into Cuba, Iran
30 June 2010
Reuters
Gazprom Neft is looking to expand its foreign operations into oil-rich Cuba and Iran, which are both hindered by trade sanctions, CEO Alexander Dyukov said Tuesday.
The company is actively seeking to increase its resource base to meet an ambitious oil output goal of 100,000 million metric tons a year by 2020, up from about 60,000 million.
"Gazprom Neft wants to join Petronas' project in Cuba," Dyukov said during the company's annual shareholders' meeting.

Only a few days after Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Obama went to Ray's Hell Burger to bond and eat some dead animals, 10 Russian spies are arrested.

The alleged "deep-cover" spies are accused of working for the SVR, the Russian Federation version of the CIA. Mikhail Fradkov, director of the SVR, reports directly to Mr. Medvedev. {more}

Their job, according to the court papers in the case, was "to search and develop ties in policymaking circles" in the United States.

Each of the 10 was charged with conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison on conviction.

Nahida the Exiled Palestinian
If Palestinians were to comply and abide by the rules of the game as defined by the colonial “super-powers” the sheer word “Palestine” would have disappeared by now. There would be no mention of us anywhere, and yet we achieved already so much. We have more than ever the strength to resist, to dream and to force our way to expose and defeat the criminal Zionist project.

Belarus will suspend Russian transit gas deliveries to Europe after Moscow cut supplies in a dispute over debts, President Alexander Lukashenko says.

Mr Lukashenko said the neighbours were facing a "gas war" and he would resume supplies only when Belarus got $260m (£176m) in outstanding transit fees.

Earlier, Russia cut gas supplies to Belarus by 30% after Belarus failed to settle debts of $200m (£135m).

The dispute has the potential to affect 6.25% of gas consumption by the EU.

ANALYZING STAGED WORLD CONFLICT

In 2006, North Korea exploded a plutonium based nuclear weapon, an unsuccessful test of either a “found” nuke in poor repair, or something poorly designed. America had predicted that they were at least five years from this capability, we always hear the same story, everyone is five years from having nuclear weapons. On May 25th, 2009, North Korea exploded its second bomb, its first clearly identifiable nuclear weapon, a “Hiroshima sized” bomb, tiny by US standards. What we didn’t say is that the signature of this bomb had been seen before.

Russia will "always hate" U.S. missile defenses because it cannot match them, but that should not stand in the way of ratifying a new U.S.-Russian nuclear arms treaty, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Thursday.

Christopher King questions the US-South Korean accusation that North Korea sank the South Korean corvette the Cheonan in March this year. He says the lack of evidence linking Pyongyang to the sinking, coupled with the history of US deceptions in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, makes it more likely that the Cheonan was sank by the US or South Koreans, accidentally or deliberately.

Iran threatens to retaliate if ships are inspected
Saturday, Jun 12, 2010
Dubai: Isolated by the world community over its controversial nuclear programme, Iran yesterday warned that it plans to inspect ships in the Arabian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for any action against its own ships following the latest United Nations (UN) nuclear sanctions.
"We will inspect several of their ships in return for one ship they would inspect," Ebrahimi said. The Iranian official's warning came as Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said in France that Moscow will freeze a delivery of surface-to-air missiles to Iran.
An official in President Nicolas Sarkozy's office said that Putin had confirmed the delivery would be frozen, following talks between the two men.

Two years ago a joke was being circulated on the Runet that a heroin producer has recognized its distributor’s independence. It was about Afghanistan, which was to the first to recognize the independence of the Serbian province of Kosovo which had illegally separated from Yugoslavia.

Kosovo has since become a transit point for drugs, channelled from Asia to Europe.

According to a Canadian detective, the Albanian drug mafia operates with the connivance of the United States, and that US diplomats prevent the detention in Kosovo of notorious drug traffickers. The Canadian detective also confirmed that Kosovo’s current Prime Minister Hashim Thaci leads the biggest Albanian mafia clan.

Less than 24 hours after the Russian Foreign Ministry insisted that the long-delayed sale of the S-300 missile defense system to Iran was still on track and that the UN Security council sanctions did not apply to the defensive missiles.

Today, Russia has reversed that position entirely, and the Kremlin says that the sanctions actually do forbid the sale. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin insists that the sale has been frozen.

RUSSIA said yesterday that the new UN sanctions did not forbid the delivery of S-300 air-defence missiles to Iran.

Israel and the United States have urged Russia not to supply the missile systems, which would substantially increase Iran's defence capability. Russia agreed to sell the missiles in 2007, but has not yet delivered them.

Russian foreign ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said the UN resolution did not apply to air-defence systems, with the exception of shoulder-fired missiles.

Mikhail Dmitriyev, head of the Federal Service for Military-Technical Co-operation, which oversees arms trade, also said the new UN resolution would not affect the S-300 deal.

EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia (EUMM) said it was "concerned" about reports of recent incidents in the Gali district of Abkhazia, which had resulted in the deaths of three local officials, injuries to others, various detentions and reports of some homes being set on fire.

"This is a rapidly changing situation and the details remain unclear," EUMM said in a statement on June 7. "Restraint is needed to ensure that the confidence of the local population is not harmed and stability not endangered."

WE CAN KILL ANYONE, ANYWHERE

NO REASON NEEDED, WE ARE TERRORISTS

LINK TO USS LIBERTY RADIO WITH GUESTS JEFF GATES AND GORDON DUFF
Report: Autopsy shows Gaza activists were shot 30 times
Nine Turkish activists killed in an Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound ship, including one with U.S. citizenship, were shot a total of 30 times and five died of gunshot wounds to the head, Britain’s Guardian newspaper says.

ISRAELI “COMMANDOS” EXECUTED PEACE ACTIVISTS, MOSTLY WITH SHOTS TO THE BACK OF THE HEAD AT POINT BLANK RANGE, WHILE PRISONERS WERE KNEELING, ACCORDING TO A REPORT FROM AN ISRAELI PAPER, BASED ON AUTOPOSY RESULTS

December 2009 issue of Culture Wars magazine – Ken Freeland

The hegemonic influence of Zionist-Israeli forces over America’s foreign policy, particularly Middle East policy, is a phenomenon without historical precedent. While right-wing radicals, with their focus on patriotism and constitutional values, set off early alarms about this perceived foreign domination,the Left pretty much slept through its insidious ascent to power. [...]
Continue Reading

http://mycatbirdseat.com/2010/06/review-of-zionism-militarism-and-the-...

Amy Goodman

Global Condemnation of Israeli Armed Attack on Gaza-Bound Freedom Flotilla: At Least 10 Dead, Hundreds Remain in Detention.

By Ray McGovern

A chief lesson to learn from President Barack Obama’s recent unwillingness to stand up to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Likud Lobby is that such timidity can get people killed.

Casualty figures are still arriving in the wake of Israel’s Sunday night-Monday morning commando attack on an unarmed flotilla trying to bring relief supplies to the 1.5 million Palestinians crowded into Gaza. Already, at least nine civilian passengers are reported killed, and dozens wounded.

By Mary Rizzo

Today I do not only want to speak to my dear people but to all of humanity.

I want to call to the conscience and hearts and minds of the whole of humanity, I would like to share courageously my feelings.

Yesterday, in the darkest moment of the night two bloody attacks occurred.

The first of them was the terrorist attack against our military troop at the Iskenderun Naval Base. In this malicious, vicious attack six of our soldiers died, and they have become martyrs. Seven of our soldiers have been injured.

The second, at dawn in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea, the heart of humanity has taken one of her heaviest wounds in history. The aid ships, from the humanitarian heart, these flowing aid ships have been hindered with guns, by violence, despotism.

On May 24, 2010, the Guardian (U.K.) published a highly confidential document released by the South African government. The 1975 document reveals a secret military agreement signed by Shimon Peres, Israel’s Foreign Minister at the time (and today Israel’s President) and South Africa’s Defense Minister P. W. Botha. Israel offered to sell the apartheid regime, weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear, chemical and conventional weaponry to destroy and defeat the million person African resistance movement.

A chilling report circulating in the Kremlin today states that President Medvedev and Chinese President Hu have issued an “urgent warning” to the United States that says if the Americans allow an Israeli nuclear attack upon Iran, “World War will be our response”.

By Juan Cole

Ahmadinejad went on to warn President Barack Obama of the US that the Tehran Declaration represents a “historic opportunity for him” should he genuinely want “change,” — an opportunity to begin respecting the rights of other nations and to abandon wrong and inhumane policies, treating other countries instead with justice and fairness.

The Iranian newspaper Tabnak reports that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in a speech on Wednesday, took a hard line with Russia and also pressured the US to accept the deal brokered by Turkey and Brazil on Iranian low enriched uranium (the “Tehran Declaration.”)

"Russia expressed its readiness to actively support the advancement of the process of negotiation aimed at resolving the situation surrounding the Iranian nuclear program," the statement said.

MOSCOW (AFP) – Russia will not support efforts to punish North Korea for sinking a South Korean warship until it is fully convinced Pyongyang was behind the incident, a foreign ministry spokesman said Thursday.

"We need to receive 100 percent proof of North Korea's role in the sinking of the corvette," the spokesman, Igor Lyakin-Frolov, was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.

"Our specialists are currently studying the materials of the investigation. We need to draw our own conclusions about what happened. Everything will depend on the situation and the body of evidence."

THE ART OF KEEPING AMERICA AT RISK FOR FUN AND PROFIT

This week, newspapers around the world received reports and signed documents from South Africa. The reports said that, in 1975, Israel agreed to sell South Africa nuclear weapons. South Africa then released an arms agreement signed by current Israeli President Shimon Peres. This is the document “heard round the world.”

Bilateral relations between Iran and Georgia are entering [a] "new stage" and Tbilisi hopes ties will further deepen, Nino Kalandadze, the Georgian deputy foreign minister, said on May 22.

"Georgia is highly grateful to the Iranian authorities’ policy towards Georgia, which we deem as very reasonable and which involves unconditional support to Georgia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity," the Georgian Deputy Foreign Minister said.

Georgia and Iran are getting all "pally-pally" all of a sudden. Nothing to do with Georgia getting the cold shoulder from the Obama administration, I suppose?

Harsher sanctions on Iran will not prevent Russia from fulfilling its obligation and selling the S-300 missile system to Tehran, a senior Russian parliamentarian said Friday.

Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Mikhail Margelov said the latest sanctions proposal does not pertain to agreements signed with Iran in the past.

The head of a parliamentary foreign affairs committee was quoted on Friday as saying that sanctions on Iran being discussed by world powers would not stop Russia from delivering S-300 surface to air missiles to Tehran.

Russia's top nuclear official says that work on Iran's first nuclear plant is on schedule and the reactor will start operation by August.

Rosatom chief Sergei Kiriyenko said Thursday that possible international sanctions being drawn up against Iran will not impede the launching of the reactor in Bushehr.

Work on the plant began over 35 years ago by a German company that eventually abandoned the project after the Islamic revolution in 1979.

A video of the plane crash which killed the president of Poland apparently shows survivors being shot.

The video, which is being circulated on the internet, has fuelled conspiracy theories about the accident.

It purports to show film of armed Russian-speaking men killing passengers minutes after the crash which killed Lech Kaczynski and dozens of members of the Polish government and military elite.

The grainy, blurred footage - on which sounds like that of gun shots are heard - has been dismissed as a 'malicious hoax' by a Russian aviation expert.

DAMASCUS // The Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, yesterday criticised the United States for not doing enough to foster peace in the Middle East, warning that the regional situation was "dangerous" and could slip out of control.

After two days of talks in Damascus with the Syrian president, Bashar Assad, Mr Medvedev said Moscow was prepared to step in and take a more prominent role in bringing about a deal between warring factions.

He also met Khaled Meshaal, the exiled leader of the Palestinian Islamic movement Hamas. Russia and Syria maintain close links to the group, which is considered a terrorist organisation by the US, despite winning elections in Gaza in 2006.

Syria and Russia have discussed nuclear energy co-operation as Moscow seeks to boost its position in a region dominated by the US, Israel's principal ally.

Speaking after talks with Syria's president, Bashar al-Assad, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said today that Russia could build reactors in Syria, but gave no further details. Assad told reporters they had discussed "oil and gas co-operation, as well as constructing conventional or nuclear-powered electricity stations".

Russia invited British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and other heads of state to attend today's celebrations - the biggest ever. But with Mr Brown unable to attend because of the election, the Foreign Office suggested Prince Charles instead.

This digitally enhanced video does a good job at showing the activity on the ground minutes after the crash of the Polish presidential plane in Russia. Audio translated by a collaborative Facebook effort of Russian, Polish and English native speakers. The revelations are stunning.

Hunting, shooting and fishing with Vladimir Putin, Russia's man of action
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin takes measurements of a polar bear, which was anaesthetised, during a visit to a research institute at the Franz Josef Land archipelago in the Arctic Ocean...

Georgia “triggered off the war” with heavy artillery attack on Tskhinvali in August, 2008, however, this attack was not an isolated event, but a culminating point of years of mounting tensions and all sides bear responsibility, Heidi Tagliavini, who led EU-funded fact-finding mission into causes of the war, said on April 28.

Russia has started the annual Days of Defence against Environmental Hazards from the 15th of April to the 5th of June with the announcement of sensational results of an independent work of research. Scientists have proved that Genetically Modified Organisms are harmful for mammals. The researchers discovered that animals that eat GM foodstuffs lose their ability to reproduce. Campbell hamsters that have a fast reproduction rate were fed for two years with ordinary soya beans, which are widely used in agriculture and those contain different percentages of GM organisms. Another group of hamsters, the control group, was fed with pure soya, which was found with great difficulty in Serbia because 95 percent of soya in the world is transgenic.

Saakashvili has previously denied any involvement or foreknowledge of the fictitious documentary depicting an invasion of Georgia by Russia, which included a report that the President himself had been killed. The documentary was aired by Imedi TV and it caused widespread panic in the country, drew international condemnation for using clips of various figureheads which were over-dubbed with false transcripts in Georgian.

The airing of the documentary also contributed to the deaths of three people.

From Wikipedia...

Iranian Admiral Seid Mahmud Musavi stated recently that Iran has launched (a) super-modern military vessel in the Caspian Sea. He said that the Iranian fleet has high combat ability in both the Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulf.

Sounds like a lot of fire-power in place but Iran & Russia have by far the largest military fleets. Probably a good few US missiles pointing out to sea there too, to protect their oil & gas.

Veterans of World War II who sang war songs at a free concert last year have now been told that they must pay fees to copyright holders. A collections society says they are owed money since the veterans sang the songs in public. The controversy has prompted an announcement in Russia’s parliament.