I do apologise for the break in articles. Exacerbating the problems of leading an itinerant life, I have suffered a series of remarkable thefts, including of phone, wallet, money and passport, which have caused me a huge amount of disruption.
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Apology not required. Strength to you, Craig. Dark forces are operating everywhere.
Bless you Craig. The Devil wouldn’t be attacking you so hard if there wasn’t something valuable inside you. Thieves don’t break into empty houses.
I very much doubt you were a random target. Do you think HM Gov will issue you with a replacement passport? Very convenient not to, then leave you hamstrung in some foreign airport lounge for years.
Sorry to hear of your troubles.
I had noted that there was a hiatus in your writings (but had only thought that you were taking some rest).
Now we know – wishing you restoration to a normal life a.s.a.p.
Good grief, Craig – you seem to have had a most remarkable run of bad luck!
A cynic might well suspect an organised attempt to get you down, or at the very least slow you down.
If you kept a running tally of all the things stolen, confiscated or “going missing”, evidence of uninvited guests having paid a visit during your absence, curious misfortunes and encounters – that would make quite a blog entry in itself.
Haven’t upset any agencies known for less than above-board and/or vindictive behaviour recently, have you …? Please be careful.
Mr. Murray, I wish you stay safe.
Will you please comment on Navalny’s death?
No later than last year, Mr Navalny was sentenced to a jail sentence of 19 years
His premature demise saved him 18 years of harsh prison incarceration. Who can tell whether this is not a blessing in disguise?
Would you feel the same if Julia Assange were to die in Belmarsh? It would spare him years, decades, in a US ‘supermax’ prison.
Not an apt comparison:
Assange is neither a US citizen nor guilty of any crime in America. Whatever the hegemon’s desire for global jurisdiction may dictate.
Navalny was a foreign agent guilty of real crimes in Russia, who also had established drug & health issues. Whose utility as an asset was now limited but could serves as a useful narrative martyr.
No doubt he’ll be used as a rhetorical cudgel, to try and whip up more Ukraine aid etc, I doubt it’ll rouse anyone. Inside Russia or in the West.
After all the “what-about” of Gonzalo Lira is both a handy and more apt political/brutal regime caused death, to an American by Ukraine in that case
Can’t see how his untimely death suits Putin in the run-up to an election?
Navalny was, to all intents and purposes, politically neutralised by his long sentence and exile. His death just creates awkward questions for Putin.
Could it be another case of the scenario Henry Kissinger’s wise words described – “It may be dangerous to be America’s enemy, but to be America’s friend is fatal.” The only thing more dangerous than working with the CIA is becoming a liability?
Facing a sentence like that, in that bleak location, would anyone blame him if he’d decided to turn informant on his Western contacts?
Sick conjecture? It’s no worse than all the Western politicians and pundits who’ve leapt up to declare ‘no doubt’ it’s a State murder, before the circumstances are even known.
I’m open-minded btw, but if the Russian state did carry it out, well the timing is odd, to say the least.
Back in March 2018, the Skripals were allegedly poisoned literally weeks before the last Russian Presidential election vote. Allowing Western reporters to put Putin on the spot. Now, in 2024, before another Presidential vote, in March, an equally awkward set of questions arise regarding Navalny.
And where is your proof on Navalny ? If you doubt that his death would arouse a modicum of interest, I would refer you to the Presidents of Poland and Latvia, as well as the outrage from as far away as Japan and Australia.
Navalny may have been many things to many people. But he was a brave man willing to stand up to a dictator and accept the consequences of his actions. Navalny might have died of natural causes exacerbated by his treatment in a Siberian penal colony. However I agree that the knee jerk MSM reports are screaming murder which has not been proved, or may never be.
He was also a racist and an extreme nationalist. Nowadays, that seems essential to becoming a “hero” in the eyes of the West. His death does nothing to aid Russia, but it is very handy for the West, which can continue its hysterical attacks on Mr Putin and distract attention from the military collapse in the Ukraine and the appalling behaviour of primary US ally Israel. Oh, and Mr Assange, of course. By the way, I notice he is persistently called “the” opposition to Mr Putin. He appears actually to be a minor player in Russia itself, where the main opposition party is, I understand, the Communists.
@Bramble
Appalling thing to say, and may he RIP, but he likely had become expendable due to his long prison sentence – assets no longer in play can become more useful dead than alive; if their death damages and discredits the real target. Look how his death is being sensationally reported in the West – that’s coordinated. Say hypothetically speaking, he was poisoned(?) and Russia authorities ‘truthfully’ state they didn’t carry it out, who would believe them?
@ Bramble:
You said it yourself: various regimes issued predictable statements, in a predictable manner with predictable content.
All of whom said sweet bugger all about Assange, Gonzalo Lira and the proportionally far more people outright murdered in Bandera’s name in Ukraine the past ten years.
Or if they did say anything, hmm, gave Kiev – shall we say – strong benefit of the doubt. To say the least.
Seriously, do you think damn near anyone in Japan (of all places) knows anything about Navalny’s true political background? To even have a worthwhile, thoughtful opinion rather than self-indulgent sanctimonious moralising?
You think any mainstream NATO outlet would report the truth even if they got irrefutable proof of a natural death?
Brass tacks: Navalny started out as an opportunistic ethno-fascist, became an opportunistic liberal, then he became the “Russian Juan Guaido”. That didn’t work either.
Whatever he said about Putin, true or false, his motivations weren’t pure – and motives do matter!
Wrapping up here, I’ll give NATO/US vassal statements about Navalny’s death the same level heartfelt consideration I feel about their statements about Netanyahu’s inalienable right to genocide Gaza, in order to stay out prison on corruption charges.
Who’s Julia?
Beside spelling, you might want to learn about irony
So that’s what happened to Ms Skripal!
“ The inmate A.A. Navalny started to feel unwell after a walk and almost immediately lost consciousness at correctional facility No. 3 on Feb. 16,” the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district prison service said.
“Medical staff arrived immediately, an ambulance was called. None of the resuscitation efforts yielded positive results,” it added.
Navalny’s exiled spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh said she could not confirm the prison service’s announcement until his lawyer visits the IK-3 prison colony in the settlement of Kharp, where the activist was being held. “
According to a Russian official source.
Who gains from Putin being discredited as a cold-blooded killer of his opponents before the Presidential vote?
It’s unlikely to fan a revolution across Russia, but many in the West would welcome that outcome. Much as they cheered on the short-lived Yevgeny Prigozhin putsch.
Maybe I’m just too cynical?
The Guardian had an article today by Gaby Hinsliff warning us all of the dangers in succumbing to conspiracy theories. Her main target was those prepared to give credibility to the notion that Israel allowed the October 7 attacks to take place.
Since the main headline story is now about how Putin has killed Navalny, which would indeed be a conspiracy, I notice that article has been since buried.
They can’t stop online questioning and conjecture, nor should they try to.
Much of what these people decry as dangerous conspiracy theories amount to unanswered questions and conjecture. If conspiracy theories gain traction in a society, it’s a reflection of how the mainstream media are failing in their duty to provide fearless investigative reporting that gets to the truth, and being trusted to do so. The rise of conspiracies reflects a weakening of public trust in the press’ ability to fulfil its historic role of holding power to account.
One of the unintended consequences of the powerful overreaching by trying to control the MSM narrative.
However much evidence is presented to the likes of Gaby Hinsliff et al – that wild conspiracies do actually exist, they’ll still deny the possibility, so indoctrinated are they in the belief authorities can’t lie.
Remember when Ukraine’s security services tried to frame Russia for the assassination of Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko? We had Boris Johnson and other Western leaders taking to Twitter to condemn the brutal assassination by evil Kremlin hitmen.
Had Ukraine got away with that, how insane would it seem, and how much condemnation would head the way of someone claiming it was staged and Babchenko is in fact alive and well? Someone should pose that question to the likes of Hinsliff and Ms ‘goody two-shoes’ Mariana Spring.
One can’t be cynical enough these days, Goose, sadly.
Marianna Trench is certainly a disinformation agent of British Security Services as a vehicle for targeting “younger” users of social media to misdirect them.
Not so goody two-shoes when ambushing folk with an entourage and film crew. Then making sure a dubious “victim” takes a court action out against an investigative journalist.
I’m sure whether Navalny had heart failure or was killed the timing only serves opponents of Russia. As in timing of the Skripal fiasco.
Re. Navalny, in the temporary absence of Craig, there is another ex ambassador (to Russia 2004-2008), Tony Brenton. He was on Newsnight 16th Feb saying that Putin wouldn’t have wanted Navalny to die at this critical time (Ukrains $billions and House of Reps vote) and didn’t kill him. When pushed he said it was probably natural causes but left enough of a pause to give the impression he might think others did it (Ukraine and/or USA). See
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001wcwm/newsnight-alexei-navalny-dies-in-jail
at 17min 29 seconds
Also this clip from 2021 is helpful:
https://www.channel4.com/news/the-russians-do-not-want-navalny-to-die-says-former-uk-ambassador-to-russia 2min 42 seconds in.
Ex ambassador Tony Brenton is now Sir Tony Brenton KCMG. Sir Craig Murray would sound nice, maybe Sir Kier Starmer would be so kind as to do the honours..
Like others Craig, I find it hard to believe this remarkable set of coincidences, are actually, such. I think you yourself has observed the slow but inexorable movement towards totalitarianism we are experiencing. But take heart, as I know you will, that many others stand with you.
The UK government would not welcome the presence of Craig Murray inside the country when a decision is made in respect of Julian Assange. It would appear that Craig will indeed be unable to enter the UK.
However, to be optimistic, it may be that the decision regarding Assange will be in his favour and that the authorities will be spared Craig Murray being vindicated as he speaks to media outside the hearing.
Good enough you still have your laptop this time.
All the rest can be replaced.
Masses of sympathy. You have been undergoing a series of trials that put one in mind of Job – and with your usual patience and good humour.
Nil carborundum!
Abite puer muscas
It’s almost like these events were meant to disrupt your articles. God (or Satan) works in mysterious ways …
Sorry to hear that Craig, or should I say read it. Planned thefts by those that want to cause you grief and know who you are communicating with, or just opportunistic thieves? Hmm… the former fits better I think.
As it’s a setback to you, so this looks like a setback for Assange:
“Dame Victoria Sharp has been announced as the High Court judge who will next week rule on Julian Assange’s bid to stop his extradition to the US.”
https://www.declassifieduk.org/the-tory-appointee-holding-julian-assanges-life-in-her-hands/
This raises the question: Is Dame Sharp soft enough?
She must certainly understand that if Australia threatens the US to cancel their subs order and transfer it to France, the UK must stay on the safe side of commerce and decline extradition.
A small setback for the special relationship, a giant leap for Global Britain !
Australia. Too little too late, just some showboating by the USA’s latest vassals.
All the time Assange has been locked up and persecuted you said nothing. Now, less than a month to go and finally you stand up for one of your citizens. Cruel and unusual, damn you.
Sharp is thoroughly plugged in to the Establishment, and can surely be relied on to make the decision that the psychopaths who rule the UK want.
Townsman.
My sentiments exactly, it now looks like a foregone conclusion that Assange an innocent man, who has spent five years in Belmarsh prison without charge, is to be handed over to a third party country, where his demise will be assured.
On a slightly lighter note the City of Rome had made Julian Assange an honoury citizen.
All paths lead to Rum
So his an HONORARY citizen. Good
Hi RoS, read the attached declassified article before coming on here, frankly, it caused my heart to somewhat sink. Just when you thought Arbuthnot was bad, along comes this piece of work, whose family connections are a bit of an eye opener and confirm that she is “establishment” through & through, not dissimilar to Blackpool Rock. Still, I can only hope that other, hidden influences are brought to bear and things turn out well for Julian, but one thing does seem to be a racing certainty is that they don’t want Craig anywhere near the place. 🙁
Sounds like they are out to get you?
Hopefully, they will never get Craig Murray. We love our Host.
He is no Navalny!
He can ride German trains and get robbed,
He can sleep in the Hague and get frozen,
But it’s all in the game.
His wallet may be stolen, but not your donations.
We can’t wait til we get Part 2 of State Secrecy. Let’s have now please, lest it also gets stolen.
WTF? Again!
Sincere sympathy.
That’s awful, Craig. Where did these thefts occur? As a marked and possibly targeted person, maybe you need a ‘bagman’ to keep an eye on your belongings. Anyway, the authorities can hardly refuse you a replacement passport. Chris Hedges is in London and will doubtless be reporting next week from as close as he can get to the extradition hearing.
Actually, I believe they can.
I’m not a lawyer, but AFAIK the legal position is as follows:
The government cannot prevent a citizen who is not the subject of legal proceedings from leaving the country – with or without a passport. But they have no obligation to provide a document (e.g. passport) which is needed to enter some other country.
Without a passport, you can buy a boat and travel to any part of the world you want … you just can’t land anywhere.
I’m open to correction from a lawyer familiar with this part of the law.
Strength to you Craig.
My sympathies to Mr Murray, getting your wallet along with, cards, ID’s & phone etc nicked. Is at best a pain in the arse.
RE: Navalny, full multiple section Wikipedia page on his death. Mass-MSM-media barrage from usual suspects, saying what you’d expect them to say.
In the creepy multinational, multi-outlet synchronised, repedtitive chorus. That I’ve come to expect from the “rules-based democratic Western free-press”.
Just saying…
Sorry to read this, Craig. Bon courage!
I note that Biden is very focussed on Navalny’s death and that Navalny’s wife is unsure whether to believe it is true. It is a concept to distract from Rafah, and test alliances, as a piece of theatre, perhaps the way he telephoned his assassins after the novichok poisoning that saw him treated in Germany, before returning to Russia. The inventor of novichok lives near New York though, we know, and was interviewed at his gate when the Skripals event occurred. Where are they, by the way?
For a more nuanced view I prefer Reuters
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/who-was-alexei-navalny-what-did-he-say-russia-putin-death-2024-02-16/
Sorry to hear about the thefts. Orchestrated?
Re: Julian Assange case, my request to observe proceedings refused today.
“Request for access from outside England and Wales refused. No sufficient reason given as to why it would be in the interests of justice to grant remote access from outside England and Wales.
Kind regards.
Ruth Ogunsiji
Administrative Court List Office”
This was my reasoning which I put together from your comments and other people’s comments on your blog:
“I wish to observe the proceedings, in the interests of open justice, at a public hearing.
Since it is the UK government which is extraditing Julian Assange under a UK–USA extradition treaty, not an England and Wales–USA extradition treaty, and Scotland being part of the UK, Scots should also be allowed to observe these proceedings along with people based in England and Wales.
“It is not merely of some importance but is of fundamental importance that justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done”. Lord Hewart”
Stitch up.
Manifestly and absurdly unjust
The press outrage about Navalny is in stark contrast to the silence about Assange, who is being slowly murdered. In both cases the motive is revenge, and the reason is paranoia. What we `westerners` are told is democracy, is minimal to absent. Putin and Zelensky are both absolute monarchs playing the sport of kings, probably as surrogates, as ever. The East Germans were horrified to find the abandoned Stasi files about each citizen, but I am sure that the `security` information on every one of us is of much greater depth, and of much less significance. The constant thieving, Craig, is on the level of a Tintin adventure, but it must be most concerning to you and yours. But, best wishes as you have taken on a heavy burden — truth.
Yesterday Ukraine attacked the Russian city of Belgorod. The shopping center and stadium were destroyed. At the stadium, a grandmother was walking with a stroller, which was hit by shrapnel and one-year-old baby, Valentina was killed in it
I wish once in my life to see the fury of the Western media over the death of Russian children from Ukrainian shells. Not even saying that this is a vanishingly small chance of getting Biden’s attention.
So this is the timing of Navalny’s demise, the test for allies not to flinch from Biden’s intent, the end of Palestine, and the border breached to Russian civilian casualties. We are ashamed of our governments turning away from peaceful negotiations.
I tell you as frankly as possible – I, like many people here in Russia, have given up hope. This happened about 6-7 years ago, according to my personal feelings.
People here, by inertia, continued to believe for some time that they just needed to convey the truth, and then people in the West would suddenly understand how many lies they were being told about us.
But now it’s not just late, but very, very late.
The wall of lies is very high and very strong and has been installed for too long. It has already been part of the natural landscape for more than a couple of generations.
No collapse of the USSR, changes in economic systems, political regimes, or changes in borders can bring us closer to each other.
Anything that happens here is met with hostility there, in your world. And now we also mirror your behaviour and, instead of admiring the achievements of Western civilization, we meet the news and actions with hostility.
There will be a mother of all wars soon.
And in the West there will be elections. Many good people protest their governments. In Israel half a million protested before October 7th. In the UK freedom of speech is not yet fatal, unlike for Darya Dugova in Russia, and tens of journalists in Gaza directly targeted, but RT has been taken off our screens, and mainstream media is tightly coordinated while the arms companies are being generously funded. There are rewards to be fought over, but so much of what is happening seems to have no defence agenda, just gain as purpose. So we are all rudderless, unable to steer our governments towards a more humanitarian agenda.
But there will be elections, even though many politicians can be guided by lobbyists with their own agendas. There will be elections and rule of law is the one great universal standard we must adhere to.
Sometimes it’s worth bearing in mind that whilst the least likeable parties in both West and East are often wrong on many things, sometimes they also call it right.
So, for example, when Putin calls out Nordstream 2, he is very likely correct that it was America.
But another example is when the CIA was warning at the start of this war that Russia would invade Ukraine, many of us didn’t take them seriously because Russia had been continually amassing similar numbers of troops and machinery in the border since before the 2014 invasion of Crimea. And yet the CIA was right – but it wasn’t the CIA driving those tanks over the border into Ukraine.
In seeking to blame the other “side”, we often forget that both “sides” have agency.
Tatyana,
George Kennan, the American architect of the Cold War spoke to the point you make:-
” Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial establishment would have to go on, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. “
A couple of other memorable Kennan quotations:
“We have about 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world-benefaction”.
– George Kennan (secret US State Department memo, 1948)
“There is, let me assure you, nothing in nature more egocentric than embattled democracy. It soon becomes the victim of its own propaganda. It then tends to attach to its own cause an absolute value which distorts its own vision … Its enemy becomes the embodiment of all evil. Its own side is the centre of all virtue”.
– George Kennan (Reith Lectures 1957)
The British ruling classes have always hated Russia. They were quite happy cosying up to Nazi Germany right up to the point where the Germans and the Russians signed a non-aggression pact. Then the Germans became the enemy. We declared war on them because our rulers realised they no longer had any hope of getting them to go to war with Russia.
Ironically, of course, the Germans tore up the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact and went to war with Russia anyway, but by then it was too late.
Let’s not forget the fall of Avdeevka. Syrski apparently issued an order to abandon the town, although some commentators think he did so only because he already knew the Ukrainian soldiers were running away and wanted to put the headlong retreat in the best PR light.
Even the most hardline Western media are publishing that news unvarnished, as there isn’t much spin anyone can put on it. Except that they all blame the lack of further immense supplies of weapons and munitions.
As this is probably the most important Russian victory of the whole SMO so far, it’s understandable that Navalny would be thrown under the bus to get at least a little anti-Russian publicity. Judging by John Helmer’s revelations of the number and quantity of dangerous drugs Navalny was found to have taken when he was examined in Germany before his latest imprisonment, it’s amazing he survived as long as he has.
https://johnhelmer.net/navalny-s-courtroom-wager-biomedical-and-drugs-evidence-and-article-275-of-the-russian-criminal-code/
https://johnhelmer.net/hair-raising-new-evidence-berlin-hospital-test-reveals-alexei-navalnys-lithium-and-benzo-addiction-his-german-doctors-are-covering-up-tropicamide-poisoning-also-hidden/
https://johnhelmer.net/german-doctor-treating-alexei-navalny-makes-new-disclosures/
According to Genocide Joe, Putin is responsible for Navalny’s death. I wonder who will be responsible for Assange’s death? And what about all those Palestinians? Or Gonzalo Lira, or Qasem Soleimani. Those in glass houses …
[ /s ]
[ /s … ]
Putin, duh! What a silly imagination you have to be wondering that, Stevie Boy, how terribly naïve you are! Who else would be responsible but the former KGB operator, the one who put on his diving suit and blew up his own country’s pipeline?
He is the mastermind, the one who pulls all the strings, whose army follows his lead with winning strategies such as shelling their own nuclear reactors, bombing themselves, and flooding their own occupied territory, lest we forget, all while he personally organises and leads coups in countries like Niger at the same time, and even against himself.
And the Palestinians in particular—surely you are joking, Stevie Boy? Everyone knows Putin controls Hamas, that motley old band of wily Roadrunners who have mistakenly blown up their own country with booby traps and missile misfires, as everyone in-the-know who’s listened to Israel’s ICJ hearing is aware—a terrible tragedy for which we must not forget to condemn Hamas.
I’m losing track of everything Putin is behind. I need to start taking notes, it’s too hard to remember all their propaganda without any. I can’t even remember how many Putins there are ever since the Ukrainian intelligence stories about Putin actually being three doppelgangers with the real one being dead and replaced by them or in a bunker, as now I read somewhere recently from someone, allegedly a Russian dissident, that the number of Putins is actually two. It has become some sort of algebraic equation to try to solve for the number of Putins.
I think there’s a sour Russian joke on this theme:
That they should nuke Israel, because they’ll be retroactively blamed for the Holocaust at some point anyway.
Interesting point Urban Fox: Churchill knew full well about the Katyn Massacre but didn’t give a shit.
look up “Bengal Famine, 1943”. erased from the British story of WW2 for 80 years.
Zoot: aye just like it was a “famine” in Ireland. If it’s anthropogenic and deliberately perpetuated, that’s genocidal.
“I’m losing track of everything that Putin is behind” – Emma M
“ And when the Foreign Office find a Treaty’s gone astray,
Or the Admiralty lose some plans and drawings by the way,
There may be a scrap of paper in the hall or on the stair—
But it’s useless to investigate—Macavity’s not there!
And when the loss has been disclosed, the Secret Service say:
It must have been Macavity!’—but he’s a mile away.
You’ll be sure to find him resting, or a-licking of his thumb;
Or engaged in doing complicated long division sums.
Macavity, Macavity, there’s no one like Macavity,
There never was a Cat of such deceitfulness and suavity.
He always has an alibi, and one or two to spare:
At whatever time the deed took place—MACAVITY WASN’T THERE !
And they say that all the Cats whose wicked deeds are widely known
(I might mention Mungojerrie, I might mention Griddlebone)
Are nothing more than agents for the Cat who all the time
Just controls their operations: the Napoleon of Crime! “
Macavity: The Mystery Cat T S Eliot
The poem is a fair bit longer Emma M but you surely would agree that “Macavity: The Mystery Cat” fits Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin to a tee.
And Darya Dugova, an investigative journalist whose car was blown up, whose father had just put on his Facebook how proud he was of her that she had reached number one on the West’s list for ‘sanctions’. Our media pretended her father was the real target, diminishing her achievements in exposing corruption. Something similar happened in Malta. Silencing those who expose wrongdoing has become business as usual for the powerful, so Assange has done well to survive as long as he has. His film is on general release in Australia and is being widely praised. Truth matters.
I too heard about the Belgorod attack Tatiana and understand that brutal revenge is being exacted in the imminent collapse in the former fortress of Avdievka, where the Azovs were sent to save the day, then promptly turned and ran away ! On a more humane note, I seriously hope the poor Ukie conscripts snatched off the streets and sent to the grinder get a chance to surrender as that’s their only chance of survival.
It’s a tragic waste of life. Condolences to their loved ones. It’s criminal, the lack of respect for all human life, shown when in the UK Media when Russian or Palestinian life is harmed, or violently stolen.
Thank you so much, Cabbage Patch, for saying your condolences first.
I rarely meet this on the Internet. Looks like people print this or that, clever words, witty words, but not paying attention we are taking about killed baby.
Russians love their kids too. Thank you again.
https://youtu.be/wHylQRVN2Qs
@Tatyana
There is no great wave of hatred for Russia or Russians in Western Europe. Pro-Ukraine demos are sparsely attended compared to pro-Palestine (Gaza) rallies. Most people are just sad about the continuing war and the fact two countries – Ukraine and Russia – so similar in culture, language and shared history, couldn’t resolve this amicably. I have little doubt that Ukraine has been used by the US and UK to damage Russia, as part of a wider geopolitical strategy. Ukraine’s consistently hardline negotiating positions would have been completely untenable without the US/UK promise of continued rolling military and financial aid.
If the Americans see themselves as the only real global superpower then the British elite are desperate to be viewed as equal partners, after the loss of empire. And in many ways we are; the UK has tremendous soft-power influence and colonial outposts, along with supportive military power that’s not insignificant.
The British ruling elite like to see themselves as the brain to the US’s military brawn. FVEYs, NATO and various bases, e.g. the listening base at Seeb, Oman; the disputed Diego Garcia base that the US have commandeered; most recently Cyprus – due to proximity to Gaza. These give the UK genuine clout as a vital cog in the US hegemonic bogus ‘rules based’ global order.
The British people (i.e. those commenting here) don’t really have any input in shaping our foreign policy, designated friends or foes, or foreign policy priorities and objectives – and it’s not debated seriously in or outside of parliament. MPs are expected to default to unquestioning pro-US, pro-NATO…basically default Atlanticism. One of the reasons Corbyn was seen as unacceptable was he is a known opponent of much of these historically long-established foreign policy orthodoxies.
At the next UK election we’ll be presented with a narrow choice that’s little different from the choice offered to Russian voters in the upcoming presidential election. This incarnation of the Labour party are more like tag-team partners of the Tories, rather than an opposing team.
The public are sensing the behind-the-scenes stitch-up masquerading as a democracy, resulting in huge voter apathy. In recent by-elections – that Labour won – the turnout was 37% and they only garnered 17% of the total electorate of said constituency. Hardly a show of great enthusiasm from the electorate after 14 years of the same awful party being in power. This sense of being a fake democracy, has also given rise in recent years to the likes of Corbyn, Trump and other outsiders, as the public try to shake democracy free.
“ the US/UK promise of continued rolling military and financial aid.”
Goose, you made me think of Britain’s treaty with Poland in 1939, which guaranteed alliance and support regardless of Polish behaviour. An unconditional alliance of the sort Britain seldom, if ever, enters into. It seemed to preclude diplomacy back in 1939 – the attitude seems similar as regards Ukraine – why negotiate when support is guaranteed?
Take heart. I have been the target of very many similar crimes, mainly abroad but also here in the United States, and it CAN get better.
Blimey, Craig, you will be disbelieving that the IDF are “The most moral army in the world” next!
The MSM never laugh when any Israeli Spokesperson says that, but it could be a presenter’s internal response to what they know to be lies.
Similar to no-one asking who has farted in the lift? The act has happened but it would be bad manners to talk about it. So, the lift doors open and then it is talked about as soon as they leave the stinking place. Not the greatest analogy, yet I will guess that once the studio cameras stop filming then a more honest discussion takes place ‘Off the record’ of course.
We may not like the MSM and their mouthpieces, but they are not that stupid. Most are – not all. It’s got to be stressful to know that you are being constantly lied to and that you have to pass on those lies to the watching public, despite not actually believing them personally. This is what currently passes for the Freedom of the Media and current ‘Western Democratic Values’.
We have had (as usual) the BBC lead story about a Russian ‘dissident who has died’ in a Russian jail (hint, hint). I think he has been in jail for around four years, so that’s quite a long time to get your revenge, possibly.
According to the BBC Navalny was phoning his wife from jail a lot (a lot more than Julian Assange can do!) only a month ago – so for a ‘Draconian’ ‘Repressive’ State then that seems a bit woke, as they say, to let him have a phone.
What the BBC fail to tell the viewers is that Navalny is one of the characters who emerged post-Yeltsin, where Yeltsin chose who could be an Oligarch and who couldn’t. (Perhaps he was happier then – I don’t know.)
Putin becomes President and he chooses his Oligarchs and takes the former Yeltsin Oligarchs’ loot and power. A dirty business, is politics and money – in Russia, as it is in the US and any other ‘Freedom Loving’ Democracy.
I don’t know for a fact why or how Navalny died, but I can tell you for a fact that the AUKUS media will stick to the official line that he was killed by the Evil Russian President in one way or another, even if there is no proof. See Israeli reports as a monitor of a belief detector and Palestine reports as lie detector, until proven.
I’m not sure, but I can’t remember whether Gaza was mentioned but I do know that Prince Harry and his good lady wife were somewhere on a ski slope.
All I can say is that if Julian Assange dies in a similar circumstances – and I sincerely hope not (in the UK or the US) – that Steve Rosenberg and his acolytes in the Western MSM obligingly say that his death was caused by two Oppressive States. A reminder for Steve and his mates – and by the way, I am not saying that Putin is an angel (he is a pro capitalist Russian Nationalist Oligarch himself), but unlike Rishi Sunak he is an elected Oligarch.
Keir Starmer can give the old Oligarchy a try if he gets in, but the bad news is: in order to become an Oligarch you need to have pinched/swindled and siphoned off a lot of ordinary people’s savings/land and property, and have privatised a lot of State assets and and State money, and handed the proceeds of the swindles to yourself and your mates, to become one.
So, Putin is not much different than most of the Tory Party donors, on that basis. In fact, the USUK/EU /Zelensky and his Oligarch masters are exactly the same as Putin with one caveat: Putin is not a fan of the US, but all the other countries are.
If Nigel Farage is reading this, I would advise him not to even try to become a British Oligarch. His future employment may come from Polishing the handle of President Trumps’ Big Front Door. Johnson will provide the Brasso. His.
“So, Putin is not much different than most of the Tory Party donors, on that basis”
Bingo.
Would it be worth lodging a formal asylum application in Switzerland?
Sorry to hear about this ridiculous sustained attack – I hope the bastards get their karma!
When you replace your phone, it might be worth considering a handset on which you can put something like GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, or divestOS.
OT and my apologies but I don’t think that Navalny’s murder by the Putin regime should pass unnoticed.
https://youtu.be/2V4i_0EIl50?si=giNyUALQzrOGDV04
RIP.
What a miserable cunt Putin is.
Pass unnoticed? Not in the western MSM I am reading.
Any evidence regarding the ‘murder’ will be welcomed by the ICC, so don’t hang about.
Using the female pudenda as the ultimate insult says more about the deliverer than the recipient.
David, my reference to a murderous dictator as a cunt is indeed disrespectful to women and I stand corrected.
Putin is a murderous shit with my apologies to human waste.
Big of you to apologise, JK. You don’t get much of that on here.
This is probably a hopeless request, but what, apart from the |US and UK government-controlled media-that-never-lies-to-us, is your source for your allegation that Putin had Navalny murdered? Then perhaps you could share your thoughts on why they should do something that benefits them not at all, but benefits their opponents, both inside and outside Russia, greatly?
Bit of a blow and no coincidence, it shows the petty vindictiveness of the fascist state.
Russia is not much of a fascist state if it still holds elections and even allows the Communist Party to stand in opposition. In fact the CP remains the main opposition.
At the moment Russian troops are attacking the remnants of what was the Azov Battalion, a self-styled fascist grouping within the Ukrainian state apparatus.
Despite Russia being in armed conflict with Ukraine, there has been no round up/deportation of Ukrainian people or indeed nationals of hostile states within the country.
Poor show for a fascist state.
” the CP remains the main opposition. ”
Despite which they pulled in less than 12% of the votes at the last election amongst widespread accusations of fraud and rigging. They also support the war in Ukraine so are tolerated; for the time being.
If Russia is determined to destroy fascists, they should get their own house in order first: outfits like RIM and the Rusich Group are not just tolerated, but apparently encouraged.
https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/if-russia-serious-about-de-nazification-it-should-start-home
According to the UN over 19,500 Ukrainian children have been deported by Russian forces and some estimates put the real number as ten times that.
https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15395.doc.htm#:~:text=Since%20February%202022%2C%20the%20Russian,as%20young%20as%204%20months.
Russia might be making a poor show of being a fascist state, but they’re doing their best.
your own government is abetting the brutal *murder* and starvation of tens of thousands of Palestinian children.
Well now.
The Putin regime is committing brutal *murder* of tens of thousands of Ukrainian men, women and children.
Whataboutery cuts both ways.
But tankies gotta be tankies.
only an abject bootlicker or rabid neocon pretends to be more outraged by what a distant foreign government is doing than what western governments are doing to the vulnerable, unprotected souls of Gaza. American and European politicians and media have pulled the rug out from under you: nobody will ever again entertain your empty posturing about Russia (if anyone ever did).
Zoot said ” pretends to be more outraged by what a distant foreign government is doing than what western governments are doing to the vulnerable, unprotected souls of Gaza.”
Kinda reminds me of Chamberlain at Munich. Faraway regimes are nicer, as it were….
All violent, brutal, despotic, undemocratic regimes are despicable.
That’s Netanyahu and that’s Putin.
Putin is an existential danger to Europe while Netanyahu is an existential danger to Palestinians.
Presumably you condemn and reject *both*?
No?
I was referring to Washington, Brussels, London and Berlin. they know very well that Netanyahu is committing genocide and are continuing to supply him with more bombs so that he can escalate it.
they responded to the ICJ ruling by withdrawing food from a people already suffering famine.
@ JK Redux.
Comparing the death in battle of hundreds of thousands of military age Ukrainian men. Of varying states of armament, training and leadership. From expendable cannon-fodder to real troops.
With a tiny fraction of that number of civilans, in targeted strikes on military & dual-use infrastructure over the course of two years.
And the Russian evacuation of “officially Ukrainian” (actually Russian) women & children, overwhelmingly from the cities of Donesk & Lugansk.
To what Israel has done, is doing and will do in the Gaza Strip. Is an inherently mental, deceptive or intentionally bad faith *s**t-post*.
It’s certainly *not* an argument, an opinion, a statement nor even whataboutism.
It also denies any agency or responsiblty on the part of a Ukrainian regime (and it’s patrons), which openly wanted to emulate Operation Storm. I.E the modern Croatian fascist solution to their “Serbian problem”.
Thank you for playing.
Well said, Zoot
And, as for JK redux ( above ),
If you have your head up your arse, may i suggest that your vision may be slightly impaired.
JK redux, both Mr Netanyahu and Mr Putin have been democratically elected. You may prefer to imagine that Mr Netanyahu is “undemocratic”, but the truth is that he was chosen as PM by as democratic an election system as you will find in the West. That does imply that it is the whole body of Israeli voters who bear responsibility for the genocide he is conducting, but it is the truth.
As for Mr Putin, he is carrying out the will of the Russian people. His approval ratings are far, far above those of any Western leader – and about three times those of Messrs Biden and Sunak.
JK redux, the Russian armed forces (not “the Putin regime”) have been carrying out a deliberately moderate military operation with the absolute minimum of violence, to denazify and disarm Ukraine and oblige it to adopt a policy of neutrality.
Certainly tens of thousands – actually hundreds of thousands – of Ukrainian soldiers and neo-Nazi militants have been killed, and many more injured. Since the Kiev junta started conscripting women and sending them into battle, a few of them have been killed.
Not one of those deaths was “murder” or anything of the sort. They were deaths in combat, and the responsibility for them lies wholly with NATO and the Western governments that set out in 2014 to destroy the Russian government and society so that they could plunder Russia’s resources.
Two years ago, the Russians commenced their special military operation using an absolute minimum of surgical violence, in the hope that the Ukrainian junta would be overthrown and the matter settled quickly. But the West kept doubling down, sending more and more weapons and munitions to Kiev and continually pressing the junta to fight. So the Russians, most reluctantly, had no option but to ramp up the pressure gradually until today it has become almost like a full-out war. Not quite, because if it were the Russians could kill all the Ukrainian leaders overnight and end it.
“Putin is an existential danger to Europe…”
Absolutely not, JK redux. Russia (not Mr Putin alone) is no danger at all to Europe, although in the last few years European governments – for some mystifying reason doing the bidding of Washington with utter indifference to their own national interests – have harmed their own countries very seriously in a futile attempt to hurt Russia. Today Russia’s economy is doing very well, while the European economies – and the UK’s – are in recession and heading for what used to be called (in a more honest time) depression.
There is not the slightest reason why Russia should wish to attack Europe or to take a square inch of its territory. (Ukraine is not part of Europe any more than Russia is, and has been an integral part of Russia for centuries until Lenin, Stalin, Obama, and the heirs of Bandera began to stir up trouble).
Russian soldiers have invaded Western Europe a few times: after the French invasion of 1812, when Napoleon’s men burned Moscow; and after the Nazi invasion of 1941-5, which killed at least 27 million Soviet citizens. They have rarely, if ever, entered Western Europe except in self-defence.
Russia is the largest nation in the world – nearly twice the size of the USA, Canada, or China, and four times the size of the EU – and is one of the very few countries that is completely self-sufficient. It can trade, and is very willing to do so, but it does not need to. It has vast natural resources of every kind – which is why greedy elites in the West want to conquer it – and is still slightly underpopulated compared to the ideal. More territory is the last thing it needs, apart from the conquered populations of crazy, aggressive, irrational racists that would come with it.
” the Russian armed forces (not “the Putin regime”) have been carrying out a deliberately moderate military operation with the absolute minimum of violence, ”
and yet,
” tens of thousands – actually hundreds of thousands – of Ukrainian soldiers and neo-Nazi militants have been killed, ”
Not to mention a bare minimum of 16,500 civilians. I suppose they were all ‘neo-Nazi militants’ as well.
The bare faced contradiction there obviously escaped your notice.
Absolute minimum of violence my arse. Pathetic attempt to explain the lack of progress.
no Russia has not committed the murder of tens of thousands of Ukrainian citizens. this is no better than Cold War propaganda.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/21/more-than-10000-civilians-killed-in-ukraine-since-russia-invasion-un-says
How long do you think you can hide behind that denial?
“How long do you think you can hide behind that denial?”
Forever, I expect. I am not sure if you are being deliberately disingenuous or whether you genuinely can’t realise the difference between the deaths of civilians caught up in a war and deliberate attacks on non-military targets for the sole purpose of killing civilians (Dresden, Belgorod), but I can assure you there is one.
That report says Ukrainian children were imported, not deported and I read the actual report. They were removed from a war zone into a non war zone (the figures are a guess by the way), and many were removed from orphanages. The report only found one person who said their child was taken against their wishes and this is at a time when it is illegal for a Ukrainian to go to Russia (under Ukrainian law). This is what forms the basis of the ICCs cultural genocide charge and frankly, it’s politicisation of a UN body. Putin, as can most Western leaders be accused of many things and should be charged but that one is garbage.
The Putin regime invades Ukraine (thereby making it a “war zone”) and “imports” Ukrainian children to Russia.
For their safety of course.
And that’s OK?
Wow.
Let’s say I break into your house (thereby making it unsafe for your children) and take them to my safe house far away.
I suppose that would be OK too?
That’s pretty flexible mental gymnastics.
“That’s pretty flexible mental gymnastics.”
Well you got that bit right.
It doesn’t take mental gymnastics to realise children shouldn’t be in a warzone..It does though to then call it genocide to remove them, even the hazy ‘cultural genocide’ variety. To be clear on the term, the majority of people in Donbass consider themselves ethnically Russian and many have family in Russia. Cultural genocide is what occurred in the colonies such as the Australians taking aboriginal children from their families and raising them ‘properly’, or the Americans doing the same with the Native American children to raise them Christian. That is not what is happening here and even the report the UN is referencing does not claim it is. There is a good argument to be made however that Ukraine has committed cultural genocide post 2014 with the raft of discriminatory measures they past into law regarding the language and culture that the people in East Ukraine can speak or learn but it is not an argument your are going to read in a western newspaper. Only a fool would believe the ‘unprovoked war’ nonsense that our media is spouting and whilst I have no idea what the actual reason for Putin’s invasion was, I can think of about 10 reasons of the top of my head. No invasion of a country is justified but the double standards the West displays is sickening. The UK is currently bombing Iraq, Afghanistan and Lybia to ‘get at Iran’…Bombing a country is a hostile act, regardless of what colour it’s occupants are yet one is being portrayed as ‘an evil madman’ and the other as ‘defence of democracy’…Some people need to grow up and start to form their own opinions because the only thing you will be soon fed by the western media is shite.
“Let’s say I break into your house (thereby making it unsafe for your children) and take them to my safe house far away.
I suppose that would be OK too?”
Yes, so long as you had their parents’ consent.
“Despite which they pulled in less than 12% of the votes at the last election”
Against what percentage of the votes for Navalny? Was he not supposed to be a leading opposition figure, if not THE leading opposition figure?
“amongst widespread accusations of fraud and rigging.”
By whom? Anyone can make accusations. Doesn’t mean they have any substance. Someone could accuse you of being a pro-goverment shill, but I am sure you wouldn’t want anyone to think that made you one in any way, shape or form.
JK redux
“Putin is an existential danger to Europe”
That sound like it was issued by a NATO random troll generator tbh.
Ask Ukrainians and Georgians what they think.
Or indeed ask Finns, Estonians or Poles whether they see Putin as a threat.
People can see threats everywhere doesnt make them real.
Mass media saturation gaslighting ops can whip up anything you want these days.
A Russkiy cruise missile hitting a Ukrainian apartment building is not an imaginary threat.
Russian cruise missiles hit their targets, usually within a few feet of where they are aimed. Ukrainian apartment buildings are never Russian targets unless they are being used exclusively to house Ukrainian soldiers or foreign mercenaries, or as military bases.
From time to time apartment buildings and other civilian structures are hit by Ukrainian SAMs that are either well past their use-by dates or incompetently launched.
And of course Ukrainian soldiers and Nazis have been deliberately bombarding the centre of Donetsk ever since 2014, doing their very best to kill as many civilians as they can. They have even descended to using cluster munitions (supplied by the West) for that purpose. That is the very best reason to celebrate the capture of Avdeevka, which is where many of those missiles and shells were fired from.
One hopes that those responsible will be identified, indicted, tried properly and condignly punished.
A lot of Russian cruise missiles aren’t even accurate to within a few feet. Especially the older types of anti-ship missiles they’ve been forced to use against land targets. Some types of rocket have no guidance system at all. Both sides have been using Soviet era cluster munitions since the start of the conflict.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VlP5Gzpc0I
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/06/ukraine-hundreds-killed-in-relentless-russian-shelling-of-kharkiv-new-investigation/#:~:text=During%20an%20extensive%20investigation%2C%20Amnesty,because%20of%20their%20indiscriminate%20effects.
You know the big difference between Soviet design cluster weapons that the Russians are still using and their modern US equivalent? The latter have a failure rate which is ten times less.
“a failure rate which is ten times less”
Does this mean these fascinating objects are ten times more effective at blowing the limbs off inquisitive kids?
“A Russkiy cruise missile hitting a Ukrainian apartment building is not an imaginary threat.”
How many Ukranian apartment buildings are there in Finland, Estonia or Poland?
” Does this mean these fascinating objects are ten times more effective at blowing the limbs off inquisitive kids? ”
Possibly not the way you think. It’s the ones that fail to explode on impact that are likely to be picked up later by inquisitive children. People are still getting killed and maimed by unexploded ordnance in Vietnam.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/07/28/russia/syria-widespread-new-cluster-munition-use
Failure rates of 30-40% have been reported compared to 3% for the modern US types.
“Possibly not the way you think. It’s the ones that fail to explode on impact that are likely to be picked up later by inquisitive children.”
Why would they explode when picked up by an inquisitive child if they didn’t explode on impact, unless that was the idea?
Ask the Finns and Estonians what grandpa did in WW2.
Ask the Poles not to be salty & paranoid about Russia ever.
Maybe even, boldly ask if the official media output of those nations, is as truthful and reflective of *real* public opinion as our own.
Hmm?
Ask Ossetians what they think of Georgia. Ask Donbassians and Crimeans what they think of Ukraine.
Then perhaps you won’t ask Ukrainians or Georgians what they think about Russia, as it would be quite obvious.
L – logic.
Cause and effect, trigger and consequence, initial and subsequent, time sequence.
That means you simply cannot jump in the middle of the unfolding process and begin to draw your own conclusions (which are undoubtedly seen as highly valuable in a narrow circle of your acquaintances) without being branded a dumbass.
“..ask the Finns..” JK redux
There was no referendum in Finland concerning the country joining NATO so we don’t know if the people of Finland agree with the info your ESP powers have produced, do we? Do you mentally connect with each individual Finn or to a composite mental entity that somehow reflects the will of the Finnish people? I have met a few random bams who have claimed similar abilities of mind-reading but never on the scale of a whole nation! Have you been “special” all your life?
The threat to Europe is the MIC and the moral nulls who own the shares of the defence contractors – the Merchants of Death. Putin is a long way away, if he is a problem, he is a problem for Russians.
The proximate enemy for Europe is oligarchy. There is a country in Europe called Britain and the oligarch who leads that country was not elected! A dodgy election or no election, which would you prefer? These oligarchs want war because they make more cash than peace can provide. They have been manufacturing these crisis for over a hundred years and Putin is the new “ Hitler” as Nasser was the “Hitler on the Nile” in 1956 and Hussein the “Hitler in Baghdad” in 2003
Unless we change the record, the song will remain the same.
Opinion poll put Finnish support for joining NATO at 78% with only 8% opposed. This a complete reversal of their previous attitude. Throughout the Cold War the Finns firmly believed that diplomacy was the best option but the unprovoked and illegal 2022 invasion of Ukraine has shown how fallacious that approach now is.
No referendum is no referendum – the decision was mandated – democracy Finnish style.
However one views the situation in the far north – it might have been wise for the Finnish establishment to have engaged the citizenry as regards this issue – a few opinion polls don’t constitute engaging the voters.
As I recall the politician who was at the helm to push this accession through, lost office shortly afterwards, after posting vids of herself off her nut on coke on Tiktok. Hardly the best “look” in my opinion, to legitimise the decisions she made while in office. But don’t worry for this unemployed Finnish politician, T Blair has given her a job at his “foundation”
NATO is the sales demonstration force for the MIC – seeking conflict in the name of profit – Gulf War, Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Ukraine, Syria, we are talking trillions and trillions – for the shareholders to get more cash we must have blood – lots of it.
“Opinion poll put Finnish support for joining NATO at 78% with only 8% opposed.”
Yeah, why have a referendum and ask the whole nation and risk not getting the answer you want (cough, Brexit, cough), when you can just ask a few thousand people and make sure that you do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahgjEjJkZks
Indeed, ask them. It’s high time someone did ask them – no one has so far – least of all their own governments.
Would *you* ask the Russians, Abkhaz and Ossetians.
What *they* think about Bandera and Gamsakhurdia respectively, or their idealogical heirs and successors?
I’d bet you wouldn’t.
JKRedux
“Putin is an existential danger to Europe”
Really? You go around worrying about this? Lets assume you are correct: What did you expect? Western arms killing russians in Ukraine in the thousands, What if russian arms killed thousands of western soldier, you think the west would not consider Russia a threat then?
Ukraine – as its name, “borderland” makes clear – has been a peripheral part of Russia for centuries, and was actually the heart of the first Russian nation about the time of King Alfred of Wessex (England not having come into existence yet). Kievan Rus flourished about 900 years before the USA was founded by a bunch of mainly British colonists who rebelled against their mother country.
Georgia was also a part of the Russian Empire and then the USSR, before it was allowed to become independent in 1991. Russia has never threatened that independence, even in 2008 when it was forced to launch a lightning invasion to avert Georgian attempts to subjugate small independent territories whose integrity Russia had guaranteed. On that occasion the Russians quickly defeated the Georgian armed forces and pulled out in a few weeks.
Thanks to determined and well-funded efforts by NATO and other Western organisations, Georgia and Ukraine became extremely hostile to Russia. When Georgia resorted to violence, Russia slapped it down quickly and then left the country. Ukraine’s resort to violence was on a vastly greater scale, and it has taken correspondingly longer to deal with. In the end, nothing recognisable as Ukraine is likely to survive.
Terrible development
US planning to send bombs to Israel – WSJ
Reported deliberations over shipments come as West Jerusalem says it is preparing a new offensive in Gaza
https://swentr.site/news/592582-us-send-bombs-israel/
The US do not even care anymore, even the warnings by the ICJ they rebuffed – they are complicit in this genocide but they know no one is going to stop them. .
I see that the truth deniers are bashing Tucker Carleson for saying that leaders have been tacking out people since the year dot. Didnt Obama brag that he was pretty good at killing people?
Sorry to read about the host’s added difficulties, as the title says “Life”. Sorry also to read about the premature death of Navalny, which fits the description of some sort of stroke as happened to an elderly relative of mine recently with another friend in the process of recovering from a stroke. Also “life”.
Gobsmacked, but really should not be at the ferocity of the propaganda blitz that has resulted, BBC being prominent in spinning as many conspiracy theories as they can about the death. Current web page headlines have one headline about “riots” as a result of the news and another about the muted reaction of the Russian media implying this as a sign of cover up. Yesterday I heard Luke Harding on BBC radio spinning his conspiracy theories and phantasies about Putin along with a Russian ex-pat writer living in London.
Russian media which I have read simply report the facts as they know them and await further information from the investigations. A few have links to articles as to why he landed up where he was having been accused and found guilty of several acts of fraud, libel, embezzlement etc over the years. His initial imprisonment was on the same basis as that of Julian Assange-skipping bail.
How true or contrived these charges were are difficult to tell from all the spin, but I suspect the underlying reason is that he was acting as a CIA stooge all along, and the “funds” in at least some of the cases involved CIA and CIA proxy funding. That of course would be regarded as a conspiracy theory by our media. Strange that those who accuse others of holding conspiracy theories never think the same about their own. That’s “life” as we experience it today too I guess.
A “stroke”?
In the unlikely event that you are correct perhaps if this youngish man had not been locked up in Siberia on trumped up charges his vascular health would have benefited.
For fucks sake.
JD-R: “For fucks sake.”
So this is what got you all het up, writing about 50 posts in one day and taking on all-comers again – the suspicious death of one man.
Did you notice that, between today and last time you graced this site with your presence, at least 30,000 Palestinians have been massacred, more than half of them children, and nearly all of them civilians? And about four times that number wounded, and the rest bombed and starving? No? Or just not worthy enough for you to get worked up about it?
FFS indeed.
Glenn.
If Gaza is the only topc that we are permitted to discuss here then fair enough.
But of course it isn’t.
Millions have died in the DRC and tens/hundreds of thousands have died and are dying in the Sudanese Civil War.
Not much discussion here about either I think.
We all choose what issues we focus on…
I give primacy to the war in Ukraine and also pay attention to Gaza. To my shame I give little attention to the African wars.
(Of course Navalny’s murder is part of the pattern of behaviour shown by the murderous Putin regime.)
Others will have different priorities.
The death of one person is a tragedy, the death of 30,000 people is a statistic, JK redux?
As a cause célèbre Navalny is not prime material, unless of course you consider his actual political views irrelevant. After having watched footage of some of his political activity in Russia, marches and whatnot, I was not impressed with the views he espoused nor the company he kept. I don’t wish death on anyone but there are more worthy subjects to focus my attention on.
He was a “player” – not true of the Palestinian civilians being murdered in their tens of thousands over the last few months, The death of thousands of innocent kids is surely more worthy of our concern than a compromised political figure?
You, jk redux, are jumping from one issue to the other as if they are all important to you, only to come back to your pet hate: Russia and its elected leader. And you are spamming the issue here with an artificial debate over and above the issue at hand: that of the theft of Craig’s property, phone, money and passport (maybe something he should keep on his body at all times).
My condolences to the relatives grieving about little Victoria, killed by Ukraine at an innocent age. Ukraine who has exported over 200,000 of its citizens to the UK to safety, to be looked after whilst 1 million children in this country are living in deep poverty and are mostly hungry.
At the same time a vicious press is attacking people who come here in unsafe dinghies, putting their own life’s on the line, for daring to run away from bombed countries, with bombs mainly supplied by us in Western countries.
I hope Craig can find a way of getting access to this trial via another establishment judge.
I don’t think that JK Redux will ever realise how much of propaganda he has consumed in his mind – years and years worth of malfeasance and NATO expansion has engrained it into his thickish skull.
Youngish man? You don’t even know what you’re talking about!
here I have to apologise to my moral principles, to the audience and to all human values of this world for saying what should not be said about a dead person
Navalny’s disparaging nickname in Russia is (I’m sorry) сисян. This word describes in a rather mocking and humiliating manner some errr…. features of its anatomy. Actually, (I’m sorry) it says that he has (I’m sorry) err… female type breasts.
This name appeared after he published his beach photos. My point is that a prominent belly is quite common in men, but drooping female-type breasts definitely indicate serious health problems.
ugh, sorry
Well, since I have already allowed myself a moral failure, let me continue today. I hope tomorrow morning I won’t have too much remorse, since today is Saturday and I’m treating myself to beer, and I can easily blame the alcohol.
The combination of the words ‘youth’ and ‘Navalny’ is invariably associated with its main audience – schoolchildren. As a mother of a teenager, I can guarantee this. I saw an interview of Dud and Navalny and there he, as we say, “got into the ass without lubrication” in order to pass as ‘our guy’ among teenagers. He even said he plays Counterstrike or Minecraft, sort of 🙂
All his activities clearly target young people. Encouraging them to go to protests, he released a video that romanticizes the image of a protester and all this psychological crap that makes teenagers want to be part of it.
But the most disgusting thing is that he said – if you are detained by the police at the meeting, I promise to file a claim with the ECHR and guarantee that you will receive 10 thousand euros in compensation. Teenagers spread this news through their TikToks and other social networks, of course in a somewhat distorted form. Like ‘get the police to detain you and Navalny will pay you 10 thousand euros’.
We not only had mass protests, but also many provocations towards the police, and many Western media described the evil police of Russia throwing teenagers into prison. It all ended with a decree prohibiting minors from participating in protests without parents or trustees.
By the way, somewhere here is my translation of a report about such a protest in my city. I remember exactly that there were young people planning to attack a policeman.
Thanks beer for making this posting possible 😁
I apologise again, can I please give a couple of links, to back what I have posted above? Just in case someone may say I’m a liar.
It’s in Russian, still it’s a proof
https://pikabu.ru/story/pomyanem_11139494
https://pikabu.ru/story/sisyan_vse_zhalet_ne_budu_11139725
Thank you and have you all good weekend.
Interesting also how the media, western politicians have suddenly woke up. Apparently was Navalny’s life more valued than 32000 actually murdered palestinians which west keeps mum about.
It is tragicomedy spectacle to watch the west embracing this Navalny, from what I understand he is not really popular at all in Russia:
The Levada Center also conducted another survey, which was released on the April 6, 2017, showing Navalny’s recognition among the Russian population at 55%. Out of all voters, 2% would “definitely” and 7% “perhaps” vote for him in the presidential election.[11]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2018_Russian_presidential_election
Only 19 percent of Russians approved of Navalny’s work and 56 percent disapproved of what he did, according to a February 2021 survey by the Moscow-based Levada Center polling organisation.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/16/obit-navalny-putins-archenemy-and-anti-corruption-champion
Still western minds somehow make up these fantasies about him that he was some real contender to the russian state. It is amazing how dumbed-down and ignorant westerners of the world.
“It is tragicomedy spectacle to watch the west embracing this Navalny, from what I understand he is not really popular at all in Russia…”
It’s because he was so unpopular in Russia that the “West” embraced him.
Judging by the demonstrations in Russia (and the mass violent arrests) he’s apparently not universally unpopular.
Pears
Typical flawed logic.
Russia is a nation of 150 million, you believe some thousands protesting for Navaly represent millions?
something like 200 people is now “mass arrests”. meanwhile people get arrested in the UK for carrying a blank sign.
– ” you believe some thousands protesting for Navaly represent millions? ”
It proves he’s not universally unpopular. Do you feel that the thousands who turn out for pro-Palestinian protests every weekend represent millions more who can’t be there?
– ” something like 200 people is now “mass arrests” ”
Well, yes. At least you recognise it’s happening.
– ” meanwhile people get arrested in the UK for carrying a blank sign. ”
Threatened with arrest. I guess you’ll want to condemn the Russian authorities for actually arresting a woman for an identical incident back in 2022.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/anti-monarchy-protest-russia-police-b2166183.html
Pears
I did not say he have (had) zero supporters, I said the supporters are small in numbers compared to the people who do not support him – especially compared to Putin:
Do you approve of the activities of Vladimir Putin as the president (prime minister) of Russia?
https://www.statista.com/statistics/896181/putin-approval-rating-russia/
Hah,
“G7 foreign ministers observe a minute’s silence for Navalny”
https://www.reuters.com/world/g7-foreign-ministers-observe-minutes-silence-navalny-2024-02-17/
But the actual ongoing acts on genocide in Gaza is OK?? No silent minute then (well unless it is for Israeli victims)! In which mental state do these G7 politicians live in?! It is like impossible to “reach” them. They are too deep into their own delusions and double-standards.
I signed up to The Spectator about a year ago (three free articles a month) so I could check out some article or other that came up when I was researching something (probably Putin/Ukraine related, I can’t remember), and I get emails from them on a daily basis, most of which I just delete straight away. But I just had to open the one I received today, as the main article was about Navalny. Put it this way, if the PTB tried to (supposedly) kill you, would you then (after ending up in Germany) return to Russia afterwards? I mean REALLY, what did you and your family and friends and supporters think was gonna happen?! That said, the whole Novichok thing was of course a falsehood, concocted and designed to act as further proof that Putin/Russia was responsible for the (alleged) Salisbury Poisonings. And it was for that reason that he ended up in prison and then ended up dead.
Anyway, it was interesting to read the Spectator article and the mental gymnastics the author performs trying to explain away stuff: I would copy and paste a few passages from it, but having initially read it when checking my email on my phone earlier, when I opened it again on my laptop to do so it’s just showing the headline and the first few lines, and I must have used up my three free articles. In fact thinking about it, I used them all up this morning, because there was one – really nasty – article about Greta Thunberg entitled The sinister Transformation of Greata Thunberg, oh, right, because she is supporting the Palestinians in Gaza, and another article entitled The problem with the ‘paraglider girls’ ruling, which along with the other two articles reminded me just how totally fascist the folks at The Spectator are.
Anyway, Caitlin Johnstone makes the comparison between the reaction to Navalny by the MSM et al and Julian Assange in her latest post:
‘Crocodile Tears Over Navalny While Ignoring Assange’
https://caityjohnstone.medium.com/crocodile-tears-over-navalny-while-ignoring-assange-6c2cdc5cb0a3
And the following from Tony Greenstein in relation to today’s big demo in London is yet again fascists at work (I just checked his blog thinking it would be on there and I could post a link to it, but its not, and was just an email that he sent out in the early hours of this morning:
:Complaint to the Metropolitan Police About Their Racism, Islamaphobia and Anti-Semitism
I am attaching and copying a petition that I would like Jewish people only to sign making clear their feelings about the Police’s racist assumptions that all British Jews support Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Please distribute.
We the undersigned, being Jewish, wish to support a complaint against the Metropolitan Police, for their racist and anti-Semitic assumption that all Britain’s Jews support Israel’s genocidal attacks on Gaza.
We further believe that the decision of the Metropolitan Police to delay the starting time of the March Against Genocide in Gaza on 17 Feb. 24 from 12.00 to 1.30 pm ‘to accommodate an event at a synagogue along the route’ is Islamaphobic, based as it is on the assumption that the large numbers of Muslims taking part pose a threat to Jews worshipping in congregations nearby.
This decision rests upon the assumption that there is something inherently anti-Semitic about supporting the Palestinians and that anti-Zionism equals anti-Semitism.
The Met’s decision ignores the fact that many thousands of British Jews have already taken part in such marches without feeling threatened in any way. Indeed the march has started from Marble Arch on at least 2 occasions without any anti-Semitic incident.
We are tired of the Police’s racist and anti-Semitic assumption that to be Jewish is to support Zionism and Israel’s racist treatment of the Palestinians. There are many thousands of Jews who are active in the Palestine solidarity movement and we resent your assumptions to the contrary.