June 18, 2010 — Contents

FRIDAY JUNE 18 CONTENTS

(1)  EDITORIAL:  Humiliation in Bulgaria

(2) EDITORIAL:  Chaos in Kyrgzystan

(3) EDITORIAL:  Disaster in South Korea

(4)  Whither Putin and Medvedev?

(5)  CARTOON

NOTE:  For Russian speakers, Boris Nemtsov has issued yet another acidic report condemning the performance of the Putin regime. We are hard at work on an English translation.  Putin’s Gestapo has already moved against the work, seizing 100,000 copies planned for distribution in Petersurg.  If Nemtsov is not a serious threat to Putin, why adopt Nazi tactics? Seems like he’s far more dangerous than the cowards in the Kremlin would like to admit.

40 responses to “June 18, 2010 — Contents

  1. Peace in the Caucasus update: “the last 50-70 bandits” (ever since 2006) allegedly killed several times over only in 2010:

    FSB Says 240 Rebels Killed in 5 Months

    http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/fsb-says-240-rebels-killed-in-5-months/408338.html

    [FSB chief] Bortnikov praised the FSB for its efforts to destroy terrorist infrastructure. “But I want to stress that work in this direction only yields positive results when we really feel the support of the local population,” he said

  2. Magas was busted and Buryatskiy had hole made in his head. And the lower ranks were most probably taken with them. Of course I cannot expect you to view these developments well. ;-)

  3. Nobody cares about Nemtsov, he’s a total loser. He might condemn Putin but when Nemtsov was in the government Russia was far worse off than it is now. That’s fact, he failed, deal with it.

    • Actually, the FACT is that Nemtsov was famous throughout Russia for doing a GREAT job as mayor of Niznhy Novgorod, and he was only in national government for a short period with little power.

      If nobody cared about his writing, why did the Kremlin block it from bookstores? What was it afraid of? In fact, if he’s so insignificant, why do YOU bother to comment about him?

      Please stop lying. If you can’t, at least try to do it a little better, otherwise it’s just embarrassing.

      And none of what you say, of course, which is only an childish personal smear, points to ANY inaccuracy in the linked-to material. Yawn. Gosh, you’re boring. Do you really imagine you’re less of a loser than Nemtsov?

      • Please, you stop lying. Nemtsov was very “famous” as governor of Nizhny Novgorod district (not mayor of Niznhy Novgorod — you’re lying here) for stealing millions of credits jointly with his friend, banker Brevnov, and later on, for illegal prisoning Nemtsov’s competitor for governor election, Andrej Kliment’ev (who won the election and the next day after that the election results were canceled and Kliment’jev was labeled as a criminal and arrested).

    • Francis Smyth-Beresford

      Actually, you’re both right. As mayor of Nizhny Novgorod, Boris Mentsov’s “free-market capitalism” experiment was indeed a rousing success. Far from being jealous of him because of it, the Yeltsin government considered running him as a presidential candidate.

      The trouble is, he began to think of himself as if he WERE the president-elect, and made himself as unpopular in Russia (as witnessed by his dismal share of the vote) as he became popular in the west as the dissident flavour of the month.

      If the Kremlin truly thought he was a serious worry, they’d whack him, right? Isn’t that what they do with everyone who poses a serious challenge to Putin’s authoritarian rule? So if he’s still alive, and he is, he’s obviously not much of a concern to the Kremlin.

      In his attempt to get elected mayor of Sochi for the Olympics, he polled something like 13%. He couldn’t get elected mayor of his home town. He didn’t win, and the ones who didn’t win are the losers. So Leos Tomicek is right as well.

      • If the Kremlin were not afraid of Nemtsov, they would not have engaged in massive vote fraud in Sochi, you lying ignoramus, to keep him from winning. Your suggestion that Russian elections are clean is the last straw, you are now banned from commenting on this blog any further. Vaya con Dios, psycho.

        Unlike Politkovskaya, Nemtsov has very successfully raised his profile at a very high level in the US, including meeting with high officials in Washington and being repeatedly published in the Western press. He’s a hard target, not so easy for the Kremlin to kill him.

        Your dementia is disturbing. We suggest you need serious psychiatric help.

        • So FSB, you are saying that the government should not spend any money during an election year on repairing infrastructure, schools, pensions etc?

          How compassionate of you.

          Besides, as the OSCE report clearly stated, the Georgian elections were far better than any elections held by any of it’s neighbors, especially Russia.

          Instituting democracy takes time and effort, an effort the Georgians are willing to make, unlike Russia which is progressing in the other direction.

          Also, Georgian Media Centre is pro opposition is not mentioned by you, and is an example of media feedom, also not mentioned by you, and is able to criticise the current administration in a way that would result in murdered journalists, also not mentioned by you, should give you an example of why Georgia is light years ahead of neo-fascist Russia on the road to truly representative democracy.

          In addition, most Georgians refused to vote for the opposition in the municipal elections because of the visits of leading opposition members to Russia, and their snuggling up to Putin.

          No fraud was required for the opposition to take a severe beating.

          As the election observers said, the election was a fair reflection of the will of the voters.

        • And meanwhile in Russia……

          Free Press in North Caucasus Continues to Deteriorate

          nformation in Russia’s North Caucasus republics is tightly controlled by the state and the threats to independent media there continue to grow, according to prominent Russian journalist Fatima Tlisova.

          In a talk at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington, D.C., on June 15, Tlisova, who once served as editor in chief of the Russian Regnum News Agency, discussed her most recent travels in the North Caucasus and illustrated the decline of independent Russian media through eight cases of state repression.

          “Reporters in the North Caucasus fear for their lives,” Tlisova said.

          Tlisova’s account closely tracks with the findings of international organizations that measure press freedoms around the world. Over the last decade, Reporters Without Borders has found that press freedoms in Russia have steadily declined, with 2009 marking Russia’s worst year. In its “Press Freedom Index,” Reporters Without Borders now ranks Russia alongside nations like Sudan, Belarus, and Libya.

          Freedom House also ranks Russia’s media as “not free.”

          Tlisova put those findings in context, painting a portrait of the Russian state’s methods for suppressing independent news coverage and dissenting opinion. She claimed that Moscow and local governments in Russia work to “marginalize and alienate” independent journalists; that Russia maintains a system of “judicial repression and harassment”; that Russia upholds a regime of Internet censorship; that the Russian security and intelligence apparatus compels cooperation with the authorities under threat of death; and that the Russian government passively accepts the murder of dissident journalists.

          Although these conditions exist throughout Russia, Tlisova focused on the conflict-ridden North Caucasus as the center of Russia’s clampdown on the press.

          Highlighting the most egregious cases of oppression, Tlisova discussed the unresolved murders of journalists Natalya Estemirova and Magomed Yevloyev. Yevloyev, the owner of an independent North Caucasus news website, Ingushetia.ru, was murdered while in police custody in August 2008, an event that the OSCE deemed an “assassination.”

          Yevloyev was a prominent critic of the pro-Kremlin president of the Russian republic of Ingushetia, Murat Zyazikov. Although President Dmitri Medvedev removed Zyazikov and Ingushetia’s interior minister from office two months after the incident, the Russian courts have failed to secure the conviction of anyone affiliated with the murder.

          Estemirova, whose 2009 murder was linked by many within Russia to pro-government paramilitary groups, was a renowned human rights activist associated with the Russian human rights organization Memorial. At the time of her death, Estemirova was investigating alleged cases of killings, kidnappings, and torture in Chechnya committed by the Russian military and associated paramilitary groups.

          Oleg Panfilov, another of the reporters profiled by Tlisova, is a former RFE/RL and AP correspondent and longtime critic of the Russian government’s restrictive media policies in the North Caucasus. Panfilov was forced to leave Russia in 2009 after declaring that “people in Russia are now afraid of expressing their ideas publicly.” He has taken up residence in Georgia, where he directs a Russian-language channel aimed at the North Caucasus.

          Valery Dzutsev, now a Muskie Fellow at the University of Maryland, raised Russian and international attention with critical stories on the North Caucasus during his time at the Institute of War and Peace Reporting (IWPR). Tlisova detailed how the Russian government pinned allegations of tax evasion on Dzutsev in an attempt to silence his activities.

          Zurab Markhiev, another IWPR reporter in the North Caucasus, was given the choice by FSB agents of either collaborating with the FSB’s intelligence-gathering efforts or being killed.

          http://www.rferl.org/archive/Watchdog/latest/646/646.html

          • @killings, kidnappings, and torture in Chechnya committed by the Russian military and associated paramilitary groups.

            …called “security forces”.

            For many years there’s actually now relatively little activity by the regular military (army), besides the GRU special forces and occasionally artillery, tanks and helicopters being called up for support. There’s much more from the paramilitary of the “security forces”: MVD (police, Internal Troops, OMON, special forces) and the FSB (Border Guards, special forces).

            Speaking of the Internal Troops (VV) branch of the MVD:

            http://rt.com/prime-time/2010-06-10/casualties-interior-ministry-caucasus.html

            Russia’s Ministry of Interior has for the first time revealed the extent of its casualties in the North Caucasus.

            According to its own estimations, 2,984 officers were killed and another 9,000 wounded since 1988 in combat operations in the North Caucasus, comprising Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan.

            The figures relate to Russia’s internal troops subordinate to the Ministry of Interior, whose role is to assist the police during internal conflicts and mass raids within Russia.

            Until now, there have been only periodic reports about internal troops’ losses.

            The ministry says the chance that drastic figures will go down is slight. In April 2009, the counter-terrorist operation in Chechnya was officially called off but in March 2010, Minister of Interior Rashid Nurgaliev announced that the number of internal troops in the region would not be reduced because the situation still remains “complex” – in 2009, for example, internal troops killed 230 terrorists.

  4. Putin is not a fascist, yeah right…..

    Police seize 100,000 anti-Vladimir Putin books

    Russian police seized 100,000 copies of a book critical of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin that activists planned to hand out at the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum.

    Copies of ‘Putin. The Results. 10 Years on’, written by opposition politicians Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir Milov were “intended for participants of the forum”, starting Thursday, according to Olga Kurnosova, head of the city’s branch of the opposition United Civic Front, said.
    The reasons for the seizure “are not very clear”, she said.

    The book, which has a total print-run of one million copies, aims to “tell the truth about the real results of the leadership of Putin and the tandem”, Mr Nemtsov, a former deputy prime minister, wrote in his blog on Monday.
    Mr Putin served two terms as president from 2000 onwards before being elected as prime minister. He is still viewed as Russia’s strongest political figure in a power tandem with his ally President Dmitry Medvedev.
    Earlier this month, Mr Putin said that he supported opposition protests as long as they were within the law.
    “Without a normal democratic development this country will have no future,” he said at a televised meeting with prominent arts figures.
    Mr Nemtsov presented the book about Mr Putin in Moscow on Monday. Last year he published a similar book about Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov, who won a libel case and forced him to retract a statement about corruption in the city hall.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/7833181/Police-seize-100000-anti-Vladimir-Putin-books.html

    • As Obama said about Palin, you may put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig.

      Rephrasing, you can put lipstick on Nemtsov, he’s still a total loser, no matter how many copies of his manuscripts he’ll print out. NOBODY in Russia will vote for him except marginal liberasts like himself.

      LA RUSSOPHOBE RESPONDS:

      You have NO IDEA how many people would vote for Nemtsov or Kasyanov or Kasparov BECAUSE THEY’VE NEVER BEEN ALLOWED TO RUN, you mindless gorilla. If they are losers, WHY PREVENT THEM FROM RUNNING?

      Think about it, ape.

      • I DO HAVE such an idea as I live in this country and you ugly emigre “American” semite lady have no idea what is happening here. Nemtsov tried to bring his party (Pravoe delo) to Duma several years ago, but he couldn’t even pass the min 4 % threshold. Then, his party has broken and disappeared. Loooooser Nemtsov, everybody jokes about him as a liberast and dermokrat. The same is Kasparov etc. No way for them to be elected in the next 50 years.

        • Of course, good old Russian antisemitism rears its head again.

          Truly Russians are the inheritors of both Stalin and Hitler.

          They would be so proud….

  5. sascha_hero Germany

    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sascha29/message/631

    Heavy fighting in Chechnya,at least 34 people killed!!!

  6. Thanks sascha:

    I know you think that heavy fighting will solve problems. Also I admit the the Russians are rotten.

    My question is: What is your ultimate objective??

    In the 2nd world war everybody in Europe fought to get rid of Hitler. Yes this left the Russians alive and wsll, but at least Hitler was gone.

    Sascha???? Is there anyplace where Islam lives in peace and harmony????

  7. sascha_hero Germany

    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sascha29/message/632

    Ron,without any resistance to the brutal dictator Kadyrov the whole chechen people will collapse.Armed resistance against Kadyrov is absolutely necessary.You cannot fight a bloody dictator with press-releases and court-complains,please be realistic,Ron.

    I don´t want to talk about Hitler.Hitler and the Second World War are history,i am a man,who is looking to the future.Today almost the entire “Western World” is united in the NATO and this is very important!

    My objective? Ron,i saw how the russians slaughtered 300.000 chechen civilians and as a result i am supporting the chechen rebels,where is your problem??? Are you supporting genocide???

    Islam is living peacefully in many countries,not in every country there is a war at the moment.Although i am an ethnic german,pro-american and not a muslim,i would like to defend the muslims in part,because today we have to see,that in most wars the muslims are defending themselves and not attacking others!
    Some examples???
    -North Caucasus
    -Palestine
    -Kashmir
    -Afghanistan
    -Iraq

    etc……

  8. Fourteen killed in Russia’s Dagestan region

    Four police and ten gunmen were killed Wednesday, investigators said, in clashes in Russia’s Dagestan region in the North Caucasus where the Kremlin is struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency.

    All of the policemen and six militants were killed in an exchange of gunfire that erupted after gunmen in a house near the city of Derbent on the Caspian Sea refused to surrender their weapons, the federal Investigative Committee said.

    Four officers were also wounded in the fighting.

    In a separate incident, four militants were killed and a policeman injured in the center of Derbent overnight, local investigators said.

    Read more:

    http://www.kyivpost.com/news/russia/detail/69914/#ixzz0r7zLERwH

  9. sascha — For a minute there I thought you were giving an excellant response.

    Then you added in Palestine and Afghanistan???

    Again you are talking endless war. Islam must always be fighting someone and if there is no handy enemy Islam will invent one. And if one cannot be invented Islamic peoples will fight each other.

    Except for Iraq, where people seems to be trying to compromise with each other, all Islam knows to do is hate. You can not possibly believe Allah intended for it to be this way.

    • voce della ragione

      Sascha,

      Why did you have to mention Palestine and Afghanistan to Ron???

      The dream of Ron and some Americans like him is to see the might on the Islamic Jihad terrorize and destroy Russian people. They are having wet dreams about terror and terrorism against Russians. But you want to also terrorize Americans and Israelis, and Ron doesn’t want that. He thinks that only Russians should be exterminated by terrorism.

      So, be a wise boy: just talk about slaughtering only Russians for the time being, and let Ron and his ilk help you accomplish your goals.

      And once you accomplish your goal of destroying Russia – that’s when you go on to your next goal: destroying USA and Israel.

      One goal at a time. And use your stupid and gullible future victims as your temporary allies. Divide and conquer! And may all the Infidels be exterminated, and the green flag of Islam fly high over the entire World! Inch Allah!

      • Hello Voice Of Retardation,

        Whats with the name change? Been banned for lying again?

        BTW, the biggest supporter of Islamic terrorism is Russia, they supply the weapons that are used by Hamas, Hezbollah, the Taliban, and are happy to supply regimes like Syria and Iran with (relatively) modern weapons systems that are bought with one objective only, the destruction of Israel.

    • Ron,

      Don’t mind Sasha, he’s crazy. Posters here usually ignore him (and his death threats), just like we ignore RTR et consortes (Dima now, previously Photophobe).

      Sasha, go the near east, strap some frag ‘nades to yourself and blow up Putin or something. That’s a seriously friendly advice. (From “pro-russian scum”.)

  10. sascha_hero Germany

    most of you here are pro-russian scum,for your support of the genocide in Chechnya you will receive a one-way ticket to hell,i promise it to you,you unhuman garbage.

  11. I thought I was engaging in rational argument and her I am on the way to hell. I expect my share of the girls there and no virgins please.

    • Not only do I like your sense of humor Ron, but your logic also makes sense. I mean why break in a mustang, when you can enjoy the pleasure of ‘riding’ an already trained one.

      About the 72 virgins? has the thought ever crossed your mind that they may not be “girls”, but instead ‘boys’.

  12. It is not just shale gas — It is also shale oil!!!

    http://nohotair.typepad.co.uk/no_hot_air/

    June 12, 2010
    Niobrara Oil Shale

    A horizontal well drilled by Houston-based EOG, formerly Enron Oil and Gas, surpassed normal oil production by 1,000 barrels of oil in just one day. That one well was producing 1,770 barrels per day, which to those in the Weld oil and gas industry was “staggering,” said Bill Crews, a landman with Crews & Zeren LLC, an oil and gas title and contract consulting company in Greeley.

  13. sascha:

    Just a couple more points. Some time back some christians forced some Russian children and their teachers out of a school and did something to them!!

    Yikes I had that wrong. It wasn’t christians at all was it?? It was just good old peaceful Islam.

    And now you complain when the Russians work you over with artillery?? What did you expect???

    • Ron,

      I’m afraid you’re simply uninformed about this incident.

      http://www.waynakh.com/eng/2009/10/remembering-beslan-a-crime-against-humanity/

      I thought you would know better, but well.

    • FLIGHTS OF THE “BUMBLEBEES”

      Who and how used flame throwers in Beslan when freeing hostages?

      Up until “Novaya Gazeta” passed the discovered flame throwers to the parliamentary commission on investigation of the terrorist act in Beslan, the Office of Public Prosecutor insisted that flame throwers were not used. Then the Prosecutor has admitted that they were used but declared that the school did not burn down because of them. They are trying to convince us that flame throwers kill only terrorists, not hostages.

      On Tuesday July 12th, at a briefing in Vladikavkaz, the Assistant to the Public Prosecutor on YUFO Nikolay Shepel has unequivocally declared: during the storming of the Beslan school, soldiers of the 58-th army and special troops of FSB used tanks and flame throwers “Shmel” (Bumblebee). Some sources of mass media considered this statement sensational, and others, including some of the most authoritative newspapers such as “Kommersant”, “Moscovskii Komsomolets”, radio station “Mayak”, a broadcasting company of NTV, etc., have interpreted Shepel’s words as just their opposite. According to their versions, the assistant to the public prosecutor has stated that flame throwers were not used.

      What is interesting is that in the next couple of days, the above-mentioned media sources did not announce any refutations of such inexact citing of the public prosecutor about the application of a weapon of such unselective character (Flame throwers are classified as such by the third report of the convention on the prohibition or restriction of application of certain kinds of weapons that leave no chance of survival or have unselective action, since October 10th, 1980 and accordingly forbids the government, which ratified this report, to use flame throwers against military or civilians).

      Despite Shepel’s tongue-twist, the main point of his statement was extremely clear. Here is the exact quote: “I’d like to say that we appoint and lead the examination of the Military Academy of Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection which has precisely said that RPO-А is not a weapon of incendiary action. And all the talk of a weapon forbidden by international contracts and conventions should be swept aside. In addition, for the accuracy of the investigation, a “Shmel” was fired into a dry wooden building, and the building was completely destroyed. Here is a photo. But the building did not light on fire. It did not ignite because, experts say, that in order to receive skin burn or for an object to ignite, it is necessary for a fire to last anywhere from 3 to 5 seconds. Shmel – and its explosion, has a ring of fire with a diameter of 6-7 meters, it moves for only 0.3 to 0.5 seconds. That is ten times quicker”.

      To the journalists’ direct question on whether flame throwers were applied or not, Shepel responded:

      “Certainly. We did not deny that flame throwers were used. From the very beginning. Moreover, more precisely, flame throwers are not called RPO-А, so-called “Shmels”. Here, if it will be necessary, I will tell you the opinion of the experts. I once again repeat that Shmels do not have incendiary action. Thermobarometric action. That is when oxygen burns and there is a kind of a vacuum; it collapses, and the person dies. But only RPO-А’s were used”.

      To the question on whether tanks were used:

      “We also spoke about this. Nobody is denying that tanks were used. We have witnesses to testify about it, and commanders of the 58-th army. Tanks were applied to force out the insurgents who barricaded themselves inside. As you know, we lost many members of the Special Task Force, and it was impossible to take them. And tanks were used when there were already no hostages inside the school”.

      READ REST AT:

      http://www.pravdabeslana.ru/shmel.htm

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