RT News - December 01 2022

Russian Foreign Minister warns countries could find themselves falling out of favour with the unipolar policies of the west. Sergey Lavrov had been speaking about the main security challenges facing Europe.

A Russian billionaire and cryptocurrency entrepreneur is killed in a helicopter crash. It's the third sudden death of a high-profile figure involved in digital currencies in recent weeks.

US lawmakers vote to approve a bill to prevent the strikes by railway workers. It comes after as the threatened action could bring damage to the economy worth 2 billion dollars a day.

On Wednesday, the German parliament adopted a resolution declaring the 1930s Soviet famine a “genocide” against the Ukrainian people. However, as the Russian Foreign Ministry pointed out, the document ignored the fact that a “terrible famine was running rampant not only in Ukraine, but across the entire nation, claiming millions of lives.”

President Xi Jinping and EU's Charles Michel have held talks. Pres. Xi was eager (and right) to say that the Ukraine conflict can only be solved with diplomacy and proper negotiations. There was also mention of new China sanctions.

Russia's ROSATOM will be expanding it's charitable work to develop education programmes in developing countries to help bring better access to good education across the world. A look at what ROSATOM is an what it does around the globe.
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Below: 1) China protests ‘flagrant violation’ by UK.
2) US and NATO directly involved in Ukraine conflict – Lavrov.
3) Belarus has deterred potential enemy attacks so far – Lukashenko.
4) Explosive package found in US Embassy in Madrid.
5) Kremlin hits back at Ukraine tribunal calls.
6) Scholz explains need for US warplanes

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via RT website 1 Dec, 2022 16:25

1) China protests ‘flagrant violation’ by UK.

Parliament delegation’s visit to Taiwan is “gross interference” in China’s internal affairs, says the embassy in London

The Chinese embassy in London has denounced a visit to Taiwan by the British Parliament’s Foreign Affairs committee, calling it a violation of the ‘One China’ principle in a statement issued on Thursday.

The House of Commons delegation went to Taipei “in disregard of China’s firm opposition,” the embassy said, adding that such a “flagrant violation of the one-China principle and a gross interference in China’s internal affairs” sends a “seriously wrong signal” to separatists on the island.

“Moves of the UK side that undermine China’s interests will be met with forceful responses from the Chinese side,” the embassy added, urging London to stop interfering in Beijing’s internal affairs.

The parliamentary delegation is led by the Conservative MP Alicia Kearns. Meeting with Taiwanese premier Su Tseng-chang on Thursday, Kearns invited him to visit London “to see more of our people and our culture and our communities and how we seek to represent our communities in parliament,” according to Reuters. The group is scheduled to meet with Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-Wen on Friday.

The British MPs are following in the footsteps of several American delegations that have visited the island, starting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in early August, in open defiance of China’s warnings. While London and Washington insist they still abide by the ‘One China’ policy enshrined in a series of communiques in Beijing, US lawmakers have been pushing for more weapons deliveries to Taiwan.

Former British PM Liz Truss openly called in April for a “global NATO” to arm the island the same way it was arming Ukraine, in the sole major foreign policy speech of her brief tenure.

Last week’s local elections in Taiwan delivered a stinging defeat to Tsai’s Democratic Progressive Party at the hands of the opposition Kuomintang, leading the president to resign as party leader.

The government in Beijing considers Taiwan part of China’s sovereign territory. Since 1949, however, the island has been ruled by the US-backed nationalists, who left the mainland after losing the civil war to the communists.
https://www.rt.com/news/567503-china-uk-taiwan-visit/
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1 Dec, 2022 15:07

2) US and NATO directly involved in Ukraine conflict – Lavrov

Washington not only supplies Kiev with weapons but is also training its troops, says the Russian Foreign Minister

The US and NATO are directly participating in the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a media conference on Thursday, accusing the West of seeking to completely destroy Russia.

Lavrov pointed out that Washington and its allies have essentially announced to the public that they are not just seeking Russia’s defeat on the battlefield but want it “destroyed altogether as a player.” There is even some discussion on how they could divide up Russian territories among themselves, the diplomat added.

“Don’t say that the US and NATO are not participating in this war. You are directly involved,” Lavrov stated, noting that the West is not only supplying Kiev with weapons, whose sole purpose is to kill Russians but is also actively training the Ukrainian military in countries like the UK, Germany, and Italy.

He added that aside from a significant number of mercenaries, there is also an ever-increasing number of Western instructors who are working directly on the ground in Ukraine and are showing troops how to fire the “trinkets” that are being supplied to the country.

According to a report by CNN, the Biden administration is currently considering a dramatic expansion of the training the US military provides Kiev. The plan could include instructing as many as 2,500 Ukrainian soldiers a month at a base in Germany, the channel claimed, citing multiple US officials.

Washington has already committed close to $20 billion in security assistance to Kiev since the beginning of the conflict in late February.

Last month, Moscow summoned the British Ambassador to Russia over claims that the UK had provided training to Ukrainian forces that attacked Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in Crimea in late October. The British Defence Ministry, however, has denied the allegations.
https://www.rt.com/news/567501-us-nato-ukraine-involved/
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you can watch the full press conference here via VK.com
https://vk.com/video/@rt_international?z=video-154921046_456249179%2Fclub154921046%2Fpl_-154921046_-2
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via RT website 1 Dec, 2022 16:11

3) Belarus has deterred potential enemy attacks so far – Lukashenko

The number of provocations near the country’s borders is growing, the Belarusian leader said

The situation around Belarus’ border is “tense” but the country has so far been able to deter a potential enemy from using force against it, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has said.

The country’s security agencies have registered an increase in the number of provocations near the Belarusian borders, he told a government meeting on defence issues on Thursday.

“Ukraine is trying to use any pretext to draw troops from NATO member states into the conflict” with Russia, he said.

The president pointed to the recent incident in the Polish village of Przewodow last month, where two people were killed by a missile that had crossed from Ukraine. Kiev and some media outlets immediately claimed that the projectile had been fired by Russian forces, but officials from Poland, the US and EU soon said it was most likely a Ukrainian air-defence missile.

Lukashenko also noted that some members of the Belarusian opposition, who had fled abroad, have been advocating a forceful regime change in the country, with some “extremists” among them even “openly calling for strikes at facilities inside our country.”

They’ve forgotten that their own relatives reside in Belarusian territory,” he said.

He said Western states are continuing to build up their military presence in countries neighbouring Belarus and increasing the intensity of their combat-training activities there.

All those developments lead to “an aggravation of the already tense military-political situation around our country and in the region as a whole,” he warned.

“So far we have been able to deter a potential adversary from using military force against Belarus,” the president said, adding that the country has to remain vigilant, “not to miss … signs that would indicate preparations for an aggression against our country.”

Belarus, an ally of Russia, has long been expressing concerns about what it sees as the threats emanating from the West and Ukraine. Belarusian troops aren’t taking part in the Ukrainian conflict, with Minsk saying that it has no aggressive intentions regarding its neighbor. However, Belarus has stressed its readiness to defend itself in the event of an attack.
https://www.rt.com/russia/567499-belarus-ukraine-lukashenko-attack/ ------ also see VK video link above, in which FM Lavrov says "no European security without Russia and Belarus .."
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via RT website 1 Dec, 2022 13:42

4) Explosive package found in US Embassy in Madrid

Reports suggest explosive used is similar to that in the five letter bombs sent to Ukrainian embassy and other targets in Spain

Spanish police on Thursday cordoned off the area around the US embassy in Madrid and activated anti-terrorist protocols after a letter bomb was delivered to the building, Spanish authorities say.

According to the Spanish Interior Ministry, police successfully detonated the package after evacuating nearby buildings. The ministry noted that there have been no reports of injuries related to the incident.

This comes after five letter bombs were sent to various targets across the country in the past two days, including to the Ukrainian embassy in Madrid, where one worker was injured on Wednesday after opening the package.

Spain’s deputy interior minister Rafael Perez explained on Thursday at a press conference that the shipments appeared to have been hand-made and were all sent in brown envelopes containing pyrotechnic material and an activation system inside. He pointed out that, according to preliminary analysis, the system within these packages is meant to cause a flare, but not an explosion. He suggested that the letters do not justify raising the terror-threat level in the country and has encouraged people to stay calm.

The packages, which Perez says were sent from within Spain, were discovered at the country's Defence Ministry, at a satellite centre at the Torrejón de Ardoz air base and at an arms factory in the north-eastern city of Zaragoza that makes grenade launchers being sent to Ukraine, according to a statement by Spanish authorities.

It was also revealed that Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez had received the same kind of package on November 24, which was subsequently disposed of by bomb-squad experts.

After Wednesday’s explosion at the Ukrainian Embassy, which left one worker with minor injuries, its foreign minister Dmitry Kuleba ordered that security be stepped up at all of Kiev's embassies around the world, and has asked Spanish authorities for a quick and thorough investigation into the incident.

A government official in the city of Zaragoza has said that both the factory and Ukrainian embassy packages had the same email address listed as the sender, according to AP. No further details were given.

Spain’s National Court has since announced that it has officially opened an investigation into the string of incidents, which it is treating as an act of terrorism.
https://www.rt.com/news/567490-explosive-package-found-us-embassy-spain/
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via RT website 1 Dec, 2022 15:36

5) Kremlin hits back at Ukraine tribunal calls

Moscow would reject any such measure organized by the West, presidential press-secretary Dmitry Peskov says

The West has no legal right to set up any courts to investigate and prosecute Russia over its conduct in Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said.

“As for attempts to launch some kind of tribunals, they would be illegitimate,” Peskov told journalists on Thursday, adding that any such body would “be rejected and condemned” by Moscow.

In her address on Wednesday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen proposed creating a special UN-backed court to probe what she described as Russia’s “horrific crimes” in Ukraine. The EU chief claimed that she was ready to work to achieve “the broadest international support possible” for such a tribunal.

Similar suggestions have been made by other Western and Ukrainian officials. Bloomberg reported a few months ago that The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) could start reviewing cases of alleged Russian crimes in Ukraine in late 2022 or early 2023.

Moscow denies Western accusations of war crimes during its military operations in Ukraine, insisting that the Russian forces aren’t targeting civilians.
https://www.rt.com/russia/567491-kremlin-tribunal-ukraine-peskov/
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via RT website 1 Dec, 2022 10:13

6) Scholz explains need for US warplanes

Buying F-35 fighter jets will allow Berlin keep up with NATO’s nuclear deterrence scheme, the chancellor said

Germany will speed up the procurement of US-made F-35 fighter jets to maintain its capability to deploy nuclear weapons as part of NATO’s shared deterrence, Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said. Russia perceives the global expansion of the US-led military bloc’s reach as a major threat.

Berlin needs to be able to deploy nuclear weapons as long as Russia has a nuclear arsenal, the German leader said on Wednesday at a Security Conference in Berlin. Anything short of that “would mean making us vulnerable to blackmail”, he added.

Scholz was referring to Western claims that Moscow was threatening to use nuclear weapons to gain the upper hand in the Ukraine conflict. Russian officials have rejected that narrative, saying its warnings were simply a reiteration of the country’s nuclear posture.

Russia’s position is that “any military confrontation between nuclear nations, even a conventional one, must be avoided” due to risks of escalation, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday during a strategic security event in Moscow.

“The fact that our Western partners… try to avoid this [approach] speaks volumes,” he added.

The German chancellor said his country would finalize a deal by the end of the year on procuring Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets, designed to launch nuclear bombs.

Currently, the only warplanes in the German fleet with that capability are Panavia Tornados, which the military seeks to replace with more modern aircraft. The Luftwaffe has some 90 of the jets, which were introduced in the 1980s and are due to be phased out between 2025 and 2030. Germany is reportedly considering a purchase of up to 35 F-35s under a €100 billion ($104bbn) rearmament program, which Chancellor Scholz announced earlier this year.

The inclusion of the American aircraft on the list of replacement candidates, which the German Defence Ministry reported to parliament in March, reversed a previous decision by the government of Chancellor Angela Merkel, which favoured the European Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jets.

Those aircraft, however, are not compatible with US-made B61 nuclear gravity bombs, so a complimentary purchase of Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet was being considered under both the Merkel and the Scholz governments.

Russia has long criticized NATO’s nuclear-sharing scheme as violating the spirit of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. By training countries such as Poland on how to deploy American nuclear weapons, Washington is destabilizing the balance of power in Europe, Moscow has argued.
https://www.rt.com/news/567468-germany-f34-procurement-nuclear/
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