When sexual aids spontaneously burst into flame, one does not automatically assume it to be the work of Vladimir Putin. However, that is the prospect now being considered by Western security officials, who believe that two electric massagers which ignited in logistics hubs in Germany and the UK back in July were in fact part of a wider Russian sabotage operation. The European erotic gadget inferno was, they suspect, a “practice run” aimed at ultimately placing similar incendiary devices aboard cargo or even passenger aircraft flying to the US and Canada.
Russia
Report: Russia plotted to start fires on planes bound for Canada and the U.S.
Russia plotted to put incendiary devices aboard passenger aircraft bound for Canada and the U.S., The Wall Street Journal is reporting.
The newspaper said Western security officials “believe that two incendiary devices, shipped via DHL, were part of a covert Russian operation that ultimately aimed to start fires aboard cargo or passenger aircraft flying to the U.S. and Canada, as Moscow steps up a sabotage campaign against Washington and its allies.”
Iran sends short-range ballistic missiles to Russia, claims US and European officials
The new missiles are expected to help Russia further its efforts to destroy Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure, which President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said this week now involved 4,000 bombs a month across the country.
Russia Quashes Deadly Prison Mutiny by Islamist Inmates
Russian commandos quashed a mutiny at a southern Russian prison on Friday, killing the attackers and freeing their hostages, according to the local governor.
Inmates claiming to be motivated by radical Islam and armed with makeshift knives and an explosive vest briefly took control of Penal Colony No. 19 in the southern Volgograd region, according to videos posted on social media and verified by The New York Times. The Russian prison service said four guards had been killed and three injured in the attack.
Russia offers safe haven for people trying to escape Western liberal ideals
MOSCOW, August 19. /TASS/. Moscow will provide assistance to any foreigners who want to escape the neoliberal ideals being put forward in their countries and move to Russia, where traditional values reign supreme, according to a decree signed by President Vladimir Putin.
Under the document, such foreign nationals will have the right to apply for temporary residence in Russia “outside the quota approved by the Russian government and without providing documents confirming their knowledge of the Russian language, Russian history and basic laws.”
h/t Mauser
The Russian spies so deep undercover even their own children didn’t know who they were
When 11-year-old Sofia and her brother Gabriel, 8, stepped off the plane at Moscow’s Vnukuvo airport last Thursday, they were met by an unfamiliar balding man in a dark suit.
“Buenas noches,” he said, addressing them in Spanish, the language they spoke at home.
Surrounded by media, security and other functionaries, he embraced Sofia and her mother, handing them flowers and welcoming them to the Russian capital. It must have been a bewildering sight.
Later, according to the Kremlin, the children asked their parents who the man there to greet them on the red carpet had been. Vladimir Putin, they explained.
Russia to free Gershkovich and Whelan in major prisoner swap
Three US citizens imprisoned in Russia, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, are expected to be released on Thursday under a prisoner exchange deal.
Gershkovich, US Marine veteran Paul Whelan, and Russian-American radio journalist Alsu Kurmasheva will be released under the deal agreed by the Biden administration, a senior US official confirmed.
In total, the exchange will involve 24 prisoners held in Russia, the US, Germany and three other Western countries. The swap has not happened yet but is expected later on Thursday.
A Bugatti car, a first lady and the fake stories aimed at Americans
A network of Russia-based websites masquerading as local American newspapers is pumping out fake stories as part of an AI-powered operation that is increasingly targeting the US election, a BBC investigation can reveal.
A former Florida police officer who relocated to Moscow is one of the key figures behind it.
It would have been a bombshell report – if it were true.
Olena Zelenska, the first lady of Ukraine, allegedly bought a rare Bugatti Tourbillon sports car for 4.5m euros ($4.8m; £3.8m) while visiting Paris for D-Day commemorations in June. The source of the funds was supposedly American military aid money.
Putin dreams of Third Rome. It will be a Second Mecca
Six months after invading Ukraine in 2022, Putin signed a decree reinstating the Soviet-era “Mother Heroine” award, given to women with ten children. The first winner was Medni Kadyrova, wife of the Chechen dictator Ramzan Kadyrov. Who is he trying to fool?
In 1991, the Soviet Union had 120 mosques. Within twenty years, they built 8,000.
These are the numbers that make Vladimir Putin sleepless, together with the massacre against the churches and synagogue in Dagestan.
In the next 15 years, a very probable scenario will be one in which in the largest metropolitan areas of Russia – Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg – the majority of the population will be made up by the Muslim community.
Russia can no longer ignore the Islamist threat
Even by its own standards of wildness and restlessness, what happened in the Republic of Dagestan on Sunday stands among the most brazen atrocities in the Russian Federation since the Soviet Union’s collapse. Gunmen mounted what appear to have been coordinated attacks in Dagestan’s capital, Makhachkala, and the historic Caspian city of Derbent, targeting Orthodox churches and synagogues. They killed more than 20 people, including 15 police officers and an Orthodox priest. The Russian authorities immediately designated the attacks as acts of terrorism.
Putin and Kim Jong-un pledge ‘new multi-polar world’ at North Korea summit
Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un are sharing their “innermost thoughts” at a summit in North Korea, at which they have resolved to build “a new multi-polar world” and to unite against the US-led international order.
The two leaders will spend the day together in ceremonial events and face-to-face discussions during which they are expected to sign a “comprehensive strategic partnership treaty”. It will formalise a friendship which has already resulted in North Korean munitions being fired by Russian troops on the battlefields of Ukraine.
Russian forces end prison siege, kill ISIS hostage-takers
Russia’s special forces killed several men linked to the so-called “Islamic State” (IS) group who took two guards hostage at a detention center in the southern city of Rostov, Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service said Sunday.
“The criminals were eliminated,” Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service said in a statement, describing how a “special operation” had taken place to free the hostages.
“The employees who were being held hostage were released. They are uninjured,” the statement continued.
Russia to send combat vessels to Caribbean to project ‘global power’, US official says
Russia plans to send combat vessels into the Caribbean region this summer as part of naval exercises that will probably include port calls in Cuba and possibly stops in Venezuela, a senior US official said on Wednesday.
“As part of Russia’s regular military exercises, we anticipate that this summer, Russia will conduct heightened naval and air activity near the United States. These actions will culminate in a global Russian naval exercise this fall,” the official said.
The US does not see the move involving a relatively small number of vessels and planes as threatening, but the US Navy will monitor the exercises, the official told a small group of reporters.
h/t DS
When killers like Putin and Xi hint at nuclear annihilation, take heed
After a recent summit between new partners China and Russia, General Secretary Xi Jinping and Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin issued an odd one-sentence communique: “There can be no winners in a nuclear war and it should never be fought.”
No one would disagree, even though several officials of both hypocritical governments have previously threatened their neighbors with nuclear attacks.
But still, why did the two feel the need to issue such a terse statement — and why now?
What the China-Russia axis really means for the West
The marriage of convenience between Moscow and Beijing is a product of American decline.
The West has been sent into a wild panic by the prospect of a China-Russia alliance. Since last week, when Russian president Vladimir Putin brought a large, high-powered delegation to meet Chinese president Xi Jinping in Beijing, the Western media have been suffering from a neurotic spasm.