RT News - December 6th 2022 Late

RT reports from the scene of the latest indiscriminate, barbaric Ukrainian shelling of Russia's Donetsk where at least three people are killed after rockets hit the city centre.

In Northern Kosovo, explosions have been heard as demonstrations take place, ahead of elections. Report.

Russia becomes India's leading oil supplier for a second month in a row in defiance of Western pressure for more countries to join sanctions against Moscow's energy exports.

Hungary and other countries push for a review of sanctions on Russia "to allow the region to survive"

Journalists and rights experts demand justice for an Al Jazeera journalist shot dead by Israeli forces with a case against the IDF filed at the International Criminal Court.

The US government is considering an audit on the money given to Ukraine.

In Turkiye parliament, things got a little more animated than usual.
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below 1) ------ Moscow accuses Ukraine of ‘nuclear terrorism’
2) ------ US wants Ukraine to keep fighting – Blinken
3) YouTube censors RT Balkans
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via RT website 6 Dec, 2022 16:37

1) Russia’s defense minister claims that Kiev’s military has deliberately shelled the nuclear facility in Zaporozhye

Ukraine is resorting to dangerous tactics by deliberately targeting the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant on Russian territory, Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu has alleged.

Earlier, Moscow said it would not accept any security arrangement that would involve handing the facility over to a third party.

Addressing senior military officials on Tuesday, Shoigu accused the Ukrainian forces of firing 33 shells at the nuclear power plant over the past two weeks. The defense minister characterized these actions as nothing short of “nuclear terrorism.”

According to Shoigu, Kiev is deliberately seeking to make a nuclear disaster at the site seem likely.

“Our units are taking all [necessary] measures to ensure the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant’s safety,” Shoigu said.

Moscow has repeatedly made similar allegations against Kiev, with Ukrainian officials consistently denying they have targeted the power plant, and accusing Russia of the same.

On Monday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told RIA Novosti media outlet that “there can be no talk of any Russian withdrawal or transfer of control over the plant to some third party.” She insisted that the facility is on Russian territory and is fully controlled by the country’s authorities.

She went on to say that only Moscow “can ensure the physical and nuclear security” of the plant.

Zakharova’s comment came after International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi said on Friday that any deal for the protection of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant would involve the withdrawal of Russian weaponry from the premises.

Grossi told Italian journalists that he expects such an agreement will be reached “by the end of the year,” adding that Moscow is “not against an agreement and the principle of plant protection.”

The largest nuclear power facility in Europe, the Zaporozhye plant was taken over by Russian forces in early March, days after the Kremlin launched its military operation in Ukraine.

This autumn, four formerly Ukrainian territories, the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, were incorporated into Russia following referendums.

In October, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree proclaiming Russian ownership over the plant.
https://www.rt.com/russia/567781-moscow-accuse-ukraine-nuclear-terrorism/
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via RT website 6 Dec, 2022 15:10

2) ------ US wants Ukraine to keep fighting – Blinken

Negotiations now would lead to a “phony peace,” the secretary of state said

The US backs Ukraine’s goal of forcefully retaking territories that have voted to join Russia, and rejects the notion of a peace deal, at this time, Secretary of State Antony Blinken disclosed on Monday.

Speaking after a wave of Russian missile strikes took out Ukrainian military and infrastructure targets on Monday, Blinken told a Wall Street Journal summit that the US would continue to arm Ukraine and bankroll its economy until it could “take back territory that’s been seized from it since February 24th.”

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has vowed to retake the regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye, all of which voted to join the Russian Federation in September. Zelensky has also promised to seize Crimea, a historic part of Russia that voted to rejoin in 2014.

Asked whether it is “really realistic” to think that Ukraine could capture Crimea, Blinken did not answer directly. Instead he said that “fundamentally, Ukrainians are making the decisions about where they want to go, when they want to get there, how they want to do it.”

The US has committed around $68 billion to Ukraine this year, with the Biden administration asking Congress earlier this month to approve another $37.7 billion before January. President Joe Biden has promised to keep the aid flowing to Zelensky “for as long as it takes,” but a split has seemingly emerged in Washington between those pushing Ukraine to keep fighting – Biden and Blinken – and those suggesting that Kiev sue for peace. Top US General Mark Milley placed himself in the latter camp when he said last month that the probability of Ukraine retaking its pre-February territory “is not high, militarily.”

Blinken said on Monday that while the conflict “will end almost certainly with diplomacy,” a ceasefire that freezes the current battle lines would be “a phony peace.”
https://www.rt.com/news/567774-us-ukraine-keep-fighting/
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via RT website 5 Dec, 2022 23:36

3) ----- YouTube censors RT Balkans

The account of RT’s newest outlet was blocked less than three weeks after it launched

YouTube, the Google-owned video platform has blocked the channel of Belgrade-based RT Balkans. No explanation was given for Monday's move, which came about three weeks after the launch of the Serbian-language outlet in a region saturated by Western media coverage.

RT Balkans reported the ban on Monday evening, pointing out that the most recent video posted on the channel was their interview with the Russian ambassador to Serbia, Aleksandr Botsan-Kharchenko.

“Why are owners of the Western media space so afraid of RT’s Serbian-language reporting?” the outlet asked. “Their move mainly speaks about the lack of media freedom in the West, especially since the posts on your YouTube channel in no way violated the company’s rules of conduct.”

The Serbian-language news site was launched on November 15, with plans to begin TV broadcasts by 2024. It was able to open a YouTube account and post content even though the Google-owned platform had previously banned all “Russian” media.

Enacted in March, the ban followed demands by the EU to block RT and Sputnik channels in the bloc’s territory. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos in May, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki explained the platform had created a new policy regarding “verified violent events,” which puts “denial or trivialization” of the conflict in Ukraine in the same category as denying the Holocaust.

Meanwhile, YouTube continued to operate in Russia so that its citizens could have access to “independent news,” she said, adding that one of the lessons of the conflict in Ukraine is that “information can be weaponized.”

RT sued YouTube in May. In October, an arbitration court in Moscow ruled that video platform must unblock RT's accounts or face a daily fine of 100,000 rubles ($1,694), doubling every week. The same court had frozen Google’s assets in Russia, valued at 500 million rubles ($8.4 million), to ensure the verdict could be enforced.
https://www.rt.com/news/567727-rt-balkans-youtube-blocked/
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