EU Faces Migrant Backlash After Sanctioning Belarus

In June 2020 Moon of Alabama reported of a planned color revolution in Belarus. During the election in August 2020 the predicted color revolution attempt indeed happened and we predicted that it would fail. By August 15 it was clear that Belarus had found an agreement with Russia that would destroy the color revolution attempt and remove any danger from the country. Ten days later the NATO lobby Atlantic Council acknowledged that the color revolution attempt had failed and bemoaned that it had been too peaceful.

The 'west' was outraged about its failure to bring President Lukashenko down. It sanctioned the country but soon things settled down. The exiled opposition tried to keep unrest in Belarus going but had no success. No new sanctions would be imposed if nothing else happened.

In May 2021 a mysterious bomb threat against a Ryanair plane flying over Belarus necessitated the emergency landing of the plane in Minsk. When the passengers left the plane and passed through passport control two of them were found to have arrest warrants open against them. They were both lower level actors within the exile opposition.

The exiled opposition and 'western' media falsely claimed that Belarus had hijacked the plane. That was certainly not the case. Belarus handled the bomb threat against the plane by the book and it was the Ryanair pilot who had decided to land in Minsk after he had talked with his airline.

The 'west' ignored that reality and went with the fake 'state sponsored hijacking' story the exiled opposition tried to sell. It raised further sanction against Belarus. It told its airlines to stop flying over Belarus and it prohibited Belavia, the state owned airline of Belarus, from landing in 'western' cities even though Belavia was in no way involved in the Ryanair case.

That was bad news for Belavia and for the many people working for it:

Cont. reading: EU Faces Migrant Backlash After Sanctioning Belarus

Thoughts On Three Issues - Putin On Europe's Gas Crisis, Iran Talks, Lebanon Shooting

Natural gas prices in Europe exploded last week after reports of too low inventory of natural gas for the upcoming winter. Claims were made that Russia had caused the price increase. But even the BBC finds that this is not the case:

Russia's own gas storage is also down.

Adeline Van Houtte, a Europe analyst at the Economist's Intelligence Unit, says: "Currently, the Russian domestic gas market remains tight, with output already near its peak and winter is looming... limiting gas export capacity."

There are several other factors affecting the situation in Europe, such as:

• cold weather at the start of 2021 depleting stocks
• rising prices in spring and summer put traders off buying to sell later in the year
• limited supply from Norway because of maintenance issues
• reduction in other energy sources such as wind power
• growing demand for gas elsewhere in the world

The 'liberalization' of European gas markets by the EU has also led to more speculation. It was one of the many mistakes made in European energy policy.

Yesterday Russia's president Vladimir Putin held a remarkable speech about energy supply to Europe and pointed out some of its weaknesses:

Over the past 10 years, the share of renewable energy sources in the European energy balance has skyrocketed, which, on the face of it, appears to be a good thing – and they are now playing a significant and noticeable part. What can you say? It is a good thing any way you look at it.

However, this sector is notorious for erratic power generation. It requires large reserve capacities. In the event of major generation failures, primarily due to bad weather, this reserve is simply not large enough to cover the demand.

This is exactly what happened this year, when, due to a decrease in wind farm generation, there was a shortage of electricity on the European market. Prices soared, which triggered a spike in natural gas prices on the spot market.

Importantly, gas consumption is seasonal. Its reserves are traditionally replenished in the summer to meet the winter demand. However, this year, even after a cold winter in Europe, many countries chose not to do so, relying on spot gas supplies and the “invisible hand” of the market, but a spike in demand has sent prices even higher.

To reiterate, the rise in natural gas prices in Europe stemmed from shortages of electricity, not the other way around. There is no need to lay the blame on other people, which is what some of our partners are trying to do. Occasionally, you get stunned by what is being said on this account, as if these people do not know the numbers – I will say more about this later – as if they do not see the reality and are just covering up their own mistakes. Systemic flaws have been gradually introduced in European energy over the past decade, which led to a major market crisis in Europe.

As a reminder, when nuclear and natural gas-based generation were the leading energy sources, there were no such crises, and there were no grounds for them.

Europe, especially as it wants to change its road traffic from hydrocarbon to electric driven, will need more basic electric generation capacity. The only 'green' way to achieve that in sufficient size is by nuclear energy.

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The Biden administrations finally recognizes that its 'Iran policy is failing.

Blinken says US is prepared to turn to 'other options' if nuclear diplomacy with Iran fails

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that if diplomatic talks with Iran fail, the United States "is prepared to turn to other options" to prevent the country from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Iran does not want to obtain nuclear weapons.

The diplomatic talks with Iran will fail only if the Biden administration fails to return to the nuclear deal and does not lift the sanctions imposed on Iran by the Trump administration. The sole problem is that Biden wants more concessions from Iran than it had given under the JCPOA agreement.

It is funny then to hear Blinken talk of 'other options' when everyone knows that the U.S. does not have any. Any U.S. attack on Iran's nuclear installations will invite a strong military response. A war with Iran would destroy Israel and whatever is left of the U.S. position in the Middle East. Obama had recognized that. Trump had recognized that. It is high time for Biden to recognize that too and to act accordingly.

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This morning followers of Hizbullah and Amal in Lebanon protested against a judge who is tasked with investigating last years enormous explosion in Beirut's harbor. The judge seems to steer the investigation against Hizbullah even as other groups were responsible for the ammonium nitrate storage that has caused the disaster.

During this mornings demonstration snipers from the fascist Lebanese Forces militia opened fire on the protesters. Six were killed and several were wounded. All of them were Shia followers of Amal and Hizbullah. But reading 'western' media, here the Guardian, you would not learn that this was a very one-sided affair:

Five people have died in armed clashes that broke out in Beirut during a protest demanding an end to a judicial investigation into last year’s massive blast in the city’s port.

The Lebanese interior ministry confirmed the deaths, and gunfire reportedly wounded more than a dozen other people. The deployment of soldiers failed to stem the violence, which took on a sectarian tone. The fighting happened near a civil war-era frontline in which militias from Maronite Christian and Shia Muslim blocs have previously clashed.

The assault on the protesters happen just as U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland is visiting Lebanon. Given her direct involvement in the 2014 Maidan coup which also saw sniper fire against protesters it seems unlikely that this is just a coincidence.

Open Thread 2021-79

News & views ...

Why Do Editors Seek 'Dark Sides' Of China?

There seems to be an inflationary fascination with supposedly 'dark sides' of China:

• Is there a dark side to China’s high-speed rail network?
  SCMP, Oct 10, 2021
• Toxic '996' work culture, China's dark side of labour exploitation
  Sify, Oct 8 , 2021
• The dark side of marital leadership: Evidence from China
  Science Direct, Oct 2021
• CHINA'S $28 TRILLION PROBLEM: 'The dark side of Asia's debt'
  Business Insider, Jul 26, 2021
• Dead puppies and kittens in crates reveal the dark side of China’s mystery box trade
  7news, Jun 1, 2021
• For Canadians, Two Michaels' Ordeal Exposed 'Dark Side of China'
  Voice of America, Mar 24, 2021
• Dark side of China’s organised crime crackdown revealed in private lender case
  SCMP, Mar 23, 2021
• Smile for the camera: the dark side of China's emotion-recognition tech
  Guardian, Mar 3, 2021
• Dealing with China’s Turn to the Dark Side
  Quadrant, Dec 14, 2020
• Inkstone Explains: The dark side of China’s food delivery boom
  Inkstone, Sep 15, 2020
• The Dark Side of China’s Idol Economies
  Jing, Mar 6, 2020
• Coronavirus crisis reveals the dark side of China's success
  Nikkei Asia, Feb 6, 2020
• The Dark Side of China’s Deep Ties With South Africa
  China Uncensored Jan 3, 2020
• The Dark Side of China: The Evolution of a Global Cyber Power
  Intsights, 2020
• The Dark Side of Labor in China
  U Denver, 2020
• ‘Dark side’ of the US-China trade war
  Asia Times, Nov 26, 2019
• The dark side of China’s pet boom
  China Dialogue, Nov 13, 2019
• The Dark Side to China's Smart Cities: Everyone's Being Watched
  OZY, Jun 11, 2019
• The dark side of China’s latest rebound
  Asia Times, Apr 19, 2019
• Chinese Probe Uncovers New Mystery on the Dark Side of the Moon
  Live Science, Feb 1, 2019

The 'dark sides' of China meme did not only start after China had send the goddess Chang'e and Yutu the jade rabbit to the far side of the moon to look for the elixir of life.

There are quite a number of previous occurrences.

Cont. reading: Why Do Editors Seek 'Dark Sides' Of China?

The MoA Week In Review - OT 2021-078

Last week's posts at Moon of Alabama:

• Oct 4 - U.S. Government Provides Another Trove Of Offshore Papers Of People It Dislikes
  Related:
  - Pandora Papers: Every US state-funded exposé on the lavish lives of elites is about Russia & Putin, even when he’s not mentioned - RT
  - Czech PM Andrej Babis loses close election amid Pandora Papers scandal - UPI

• Oct 5 - CIA Laments About Loss Of Spies In Russia And Elsewhere
  Related:
  - CIA will focus on China with new mission center - CNN

• Oct 7 - How The 'China is a Threat' Fake News Cycle Works
  Related:
  - What Biden’s Top China Theorist Gets Wrong - Lawfare Blog
  - The US cannot defend Taiwan, and China knows it - Scott Ritter / RT
  - Starting a Fire’: U.S. and China Enter Dangerous Territory Over Taiwan - NYT

• Oct 9 - The U.S. Wants Back Into Afghanistan
  Related:
  - Taliban say they won’t work with US to contain Islamic State - AP
  - U.S. holds first direct talks with Taliban since withdrawal - Washington Post

> Placing Deputy CIA Director David Cohen at the head of the U.S. team, which also includes the State Department’s deputy Afghanistan envoy, Tom West, and a representative from the U.S. Agency for International Development, was intended to emphasize that point and to lead to discussions on terrorism. <

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Other issues:

Cont. reading: The MoA Week In Review - OT 2021-078

The U.S. Wants Back Into Afghanistan

Just six weeks after leaving Afghanistan the U.S. wants to get back in:

A U.S. delegation will meet with senior Taliban representatives in Doha on Saturday and Sunday in their first face-to-face meeting at a senior level since Washington pulled its troops from Afghanistan and the hardline group took over the country, two senior administration officials told Reuters.

The high-level U.S. delegation will include officials from the State Department, USAID and the U.S. intelligence community, will press the Taliban to ensure continued safe passage for U.S. citizens and others out of Afghanistan and to release kidnapped U.S. citizen Mark Frerichs, the officials said.

That U.S. intelligence officials take part points to an effort to get an agreement on a long term and significantly sized CIA presence in the country. Such a station would target China and to a lesser degree Russia. The Taliban had previously rejected such a request (or at least had put some strong conditions on it which the U.S. did not fulfill.)

For a normal CIA presence in Afghanistan the U.S. could of course simply reopen its embassy as the Taliban had asked it to do. But that is something the Biden administration does not want to do as it would give the Taliban international legitimacy:

“This meeting is not about granting recognition or conferring legitimacy. We remain clear that any legitimacy must be earned through the Taliban’s own actions. They need to establish a sustained track record,” the official said.

The Taliban want the U.S. to release the frozen reserves of the Afghan central bank. They need money to feed their country. There also seem to be some open points with regards to the previous agreement which included secret annexes:

Cont. reading: The U.S. Wants Back Into Afghanistan

How The 'China is a Threat' Fake News Cycle Works

Here is a nice example how the U.S. keeps certain issues in the news and thereby propagandizes its people against its perceived enemies.

On Friday several news agencies and outlets falsely claimed that Chinese airplanes had 'intruded Taiwan's airspace'. In fact the planes had crossed into an imaginative air 'identification zone' hundreds of miles from Taiwan.

As the fake news died down someone in the White House, Pentagon or Congress thought about how to revive the theme to strengthen anti-Chinese sentiment.

"A: Is there something that is not secret and that we can hand to some scribe that allows for another 'China threat' news cycle?"

"B: Hmm. How about our troops in Taiwan?"

"A: Good idea. That will do."

So A, B and maybe also C called up a Wall Street Journal scribe and proceeded. Here is the result:

WSJ News Exclusive - U.S. Troops Have Been Deployed in Taiwan for at Least a Year
Small presence of Americans secretly training local forces marks concern over China’s yearslong military buildup and recent moves

WASHINGTON—A U.S. special-operations unit and a contingent of Marines have been secretly operating in Taiwan to train military forces there, U.S. officials said, part of efforts to shore up the island’s defenses as concern regarding potential Chinese aggression mounts.

About two dozen members of U.S. special-operations and support troops are conducting training for small units of Taiwan’s ground forces, the officials said. The U.S. Marines are working with local maritime forces on small-boat training. The American forces have been operating in Taiwan for at least a year, the officials said.

The U.S. special-operations deployment is a sign of concern within the Pentagon over Taiwan’s tactical capabilities in light of Beijing’s yearslong military buildup and recent threatening moves against the island.

Taiwan and U.S. officials have expressed alarm over nearly 150 flights near Taiwan in the past week by Chinese military aircraft. The Chinese aircraft have included ...

There follow in total 1200 words of general 'China is a threat' sentiment.

There is one problem though. The deployment of some troops, including special forces, in Taiwan is neither a secret nor new nor newsworthy.

Cont. reading: How The 'China is a Threat' Fake News Cycle Works

Open Thread 2021-77

CIA Laments About Loss Of Spies In Russia And Elsewhere

The CIA's counterintelligence unit was recently sufficiently shocked to send a 'hair on fire' letter to its case officers all over the world.

The New York Times reports today (emphasis added):

Captured, Killed or Compromised: C.I.A. Admits to Losing Dozens of Informants

WASHINGTON — Top American counterintelligence officials warned every C.I.A. station and base around the world last week about troubling numbers of informants recruited from other countries to spy for the United States being captured or killed, people familiar with the matter said.

The message, in an unusual top secret cable, said that the C.I.A.’s counterintelligence mission center had looked at dozens of cases in the last several years involving foreign informants who had been killed, arrested or most likely compromised. Although brief, the cable laid out the specific number of agents executed by rival intelligence agencies — a closely held detail that counterintelligence officials typically do not share in such cables.

The cable highlighted the struggle the spy agency is having as it works to recruit spies around the world in difficult operating environments. In recent years, adversarial intelligence services in countries such as Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan have been hunting down the C.I.A.’s sources and in some cases turning them into double agents.

I know of no organization that would send this kind of letter out of the blue and without immediate cause. 'Hair on fire' letters are usually send after some recent incident happened that had relative grave consequences. So what had happened immediately before this letter went out? I can only think of one recent incident.

A week back, on September 29, this news item made the rounds:

Cont. reading: CIA Laments About Loss Of Spies In Russia And Elsewhere

U.S. Government Provides Another Trove Of Offshore Papers Of People It Dislikes

So there is another 'leak' of papers about tax saving offshore investments by people the U.S. doesn't like:

The secret deals and hidden assets of some of the world’s richest and most powerful people have been revealed in the biggest trove of leaked offshore data in history.

Branded the Pandora papers, the cache includes 11.9m files from companies hired by wealthy clients to create offshore structures and trusts in tax havens such as Panama, Dubai, Monaco, Switzerland and the Cayman Islands.
...
The files were leaked to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) in Washington. It shared access to the leaked data with select media partners including the Guardian, BBC Panorama, Le Monde and the Washington Post. More than 600 journalists have sifted through the files as part of a massive global investigation.

The Pandora papers represent the latest – and largest in terms of data volume – in a series of major leaks of financial data that have convulsed the offshore world since 2013.

The papers are said to come from a total of 14 offshore providers of legal vehicles which allow people to hide their money and to avoid tax payments.

There is however not hint of how these papers were acquired. Who had gained access to them? How? What was the chain of custody for these? Are these the complete files of those 14 companies or were some removed before publishing? Which ones? Are all of those files authenticated and verified or is some forged material mixed in between them?

Unfortunately none of the reports about the 'leak' I have read has covered those questions.

But there are at least two big hints that these 'Pandora papers' are, like the 'Panama papers' five years ago, and the 'Paradise papers' four years ago, part of an 'information operation' by the usual 5-eyes suspects, the secret services of the U.S., UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

On June 3 2021 the White House held a Background Press Call by Senior Administration Officials on the Fight Against Corruption:

Cont. reading: U.S. Government Provides Another Trove Of Offshore Papers Of People It Dislikes