NATO leaders launched Sunday the first phase of a US-led missile shield for Europe, risking the wrath of Russia which has threatened to deploy rockets to EU borders in response.

A NATO official told AFP that US President Barack Obama and his allies "just decided" at a Chicago summit to put a US warship armed with interceptors in the Mediterranean and a Turkey-based radar system under NATO command in a German base.

The alliance insists the shield is not aimed at Russia and aims to knock out missiles that could be launched by enemies such as Iran, but Moscow fears that the system will also serve to neutralize its nuclear deterrent.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev warned Thursday military intervention in the affairs of sovereign states could lead to war, even nuclear war.

Based on past aggressive competitive commercial tactics employed by the alliance of American corporations, the U.S. Intelligence Community, and the Pentagon, aviation experts in Asia are wondering aloud whether the recent crash of the new Sukhoi Super Jet 100 in Indonesia was the result of high-stakes industrial sabotage engineered to protect Boeing’s lucrative commercial and military aviation market in Asia at the expense of a resurgent Russian aviation industry…

It’s safe to say that foreign policy was not the strong suit of this year’s contenders for the GOP presidential nomination. Rick Perry labeled the Turkish government “Islamic terrorists.” Newt Gingrich referred to Palestinians as “invented” people. Herman Cain called Uzbekistan “Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan” and memorably blanked when asked what he thought of NATO’s incursion into Libya. Michele Bachmann pledged to close the US embassy in Iran, which hasn’t existed since 1980. Rick Santorum gave a major foreign policy speech at a Jelly Belly factory in California.

Yet though the candidates and their views were often hard to take seriously, their statements on foreign policy reflected a more disturbing trend in the GOP. Despite facing a war-weary public, the candidates—with the exception of Ron Paul, an antiwar libertarian, and Jon Huntsman, a moderate internationalist—positioned themselves as unapologetic war hawks.

Russia says it is prepared to use "destructive force pre-emptively" if the US goes ahead with controversial plans for a missile defence system based in Central Europe.

According to NATO’s plans, which are to be discussed at the summit in Chicago in May, the countries of the former USSR, which surround Russia, must play the role of an “anaconda ring” pressing Russia and pushing it farther from its navigation routes: the Baltic States would block the access to the Baltic Sea, the scale of Russia’s presence on the Black Sea depends on Ukraine and Georgia; on land the Western direction would be blocked by Moldova and Ukraine and by Muscovites’ eternal opponent, which is Poland.

Russia on Thursday joined the United States and the European Union in expressing concern over Israel’s decision to legalise three settler outposts in West Bank.

The first joint air exercise, Viper Javelin 2005, occurred the year after Bulgaria joined NATO and the year before the U.S.-Bulgarian Defense Cooperation Agreement was signed, replicating a similar agreement with neighboring Romania the year before.

The pact allowed the Pentagon to station as many as 2,500 troops at four military facilities in Bulgaria: The Graf Ignatievo and Besmer air bases, the Novo Selo Training Range and the Aitos Logistics Center.

In 2009 the U.S. armed forces publication Stars and Stripes disclosed that the Pentagon was spending $110 million to "build new military bases" in Bulgaria and Romania.

Russia’s Micex-RTS Exchange resumed trading on its indexes as of 9:50 p.m. in Moscow, according to a statement on the bourse’s website.

Trading data from 5:41 p.m. on will be restored and the main session of trading will close at 10:20 p.m., the statement said.

23.04.2012 20:26
The technical suspension of trading to be extended

The situation has been recognized as an emergency. Further actions will be announced shortly.

For further information, please contact the Public Relations Department at (495) 363-3232.

Airborne troops from Russia and the Untied States would hold joint anti-terror drills in the U.S. state of Colorado between May 24 and 31, spokesman of the Russian Defense Ministry Col. Alexander Kucherenko said on Thursday.

According to the spokesman, it will be the first time that the Russian airborne forces have held exercises with the U.S. airborne forces on the U.S. territory.

"According to the exercise scenario, soldiers of the two countries will hold a tactical airborne operation, including the reconnaissance of imaginary terrorists' camp and a raid," Kucherenko said.

As the international community warily waits to see whether Kofi Annan’s ceasefire plan is going to work in Syria, Lebanese International University professor Jamal Wakim believes the West has still not given up its intention to topple President Bashar Al-Assad.

A ground-breaking Russian nuclear space-travel propulsion system will be ready by 2017 and will power a ship capable of long-haul interplanetary missions by 2025, giving Russia a head start in the outer-space race.

The megawatt-class nuclear drive will function for up to three years and produce 100-150 kilowatts of energy at normal capacity.

Moscow has expressed its concerns to Washington over U.S. plans to ship weapons to the Georgian contingent in the International Assistance Force in Afghanistan, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesmen Alexander Lukashevich said.

Any military cooperation with Georgia may entail serious consequences for the world and for regional security, he said.

"Russia has drawn the attention of the U.S. Department of State on many occasions to the increasingly frequent visits by U.S. warships to Georgian ports, including warships equipped with Aegis combat systems," he said.

Politico reports that Medvedev shot back at Romney today at a press conference in Seoul, South Korea:

“I always get very cautious when I see a country resort to phrasings such as ‘No. 1 enemy.’ It is very reminiscent of Hollywood in a certain period of history,” Medvedev said, through a translator, at the nuclear security summit in Seoul, South Korea. [...]

“My other advice is to check their clocks from time to time,” Medvedev said Tuesday. “It is 2012, not the mid-1970s. No matter what party a candidate represents, he has to take the current state of affairs into account.”

Russian politicians reacted with anger on Tuesday after U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said Russia is the United States' “number one geopolitical foe.”

Romney's statement reflects the position of those who want to impose U.S. hegemony, said the head of the Duma's Foreign Affairs Committee, Alexei Pushkov.

“These same charges and these same characterizations, we have heard from them or from those around them," Pushkov said. "This is not surprising. Among Romney's top foreign policy advisers we can see the same neo-conservatives who directly influenced the development of U.S. foreign policy under Bush,” he said.

Mitt Romney said today that Russia - not Iran or North Korea - is the United States' "number one geopolitical foe," adding that Russia "always stands up for the world's worst actors."

A Russian banker is in a coma today after being shot in a suspected assassination in London.

German Gorbuntsov, an exile in Britain, is in a critical condition in hospital, after being shot several times near his luxury apartment.

The 45-year-old's friends fear a contract bid possibly originating in war-ravaged Chechnya was made to silence him as a witness in a high profile attempted murder case in Moscow.

The data on the planned US antimissile system in Europe handed over to Russia is “useless and irrelevant” according to reports. After the failure to strike a deal with Washington, Moscow plans to expose details of the row to the general public.

The United States handed out info on capabilities of the interceptor missiles it plans to deploy in Eastern Europe as part of its antimissile shield last week in the latest bid to convince Russia that the system will not compromise its security.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has rejected reports claiming that Russian warships visited Syrian ports.

Lavrov said that such "fairytales" are aimed at disrupting the mission of UN-Arab League Special Envoy Kofi Annan. He also added that a Russian tanker had recently entered Tartus, Syria’s port city on the Mediterranean Sea, as part of an international anti-piracy mission.

The violation of Lebanese airspace by the Israeli Air Force is unacceptable, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday after a meeting with his Lebanese counterpart.

Aircraft of the Israeli air force regularly cross into Lebanese territory, regardless of numerous UN warnings to stop airspace violations. Such actions are in breach of the UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which brokered a ceasefire in the 2006 Israeli-Lebanese conflict.

"We consider violating this resolution unacceptable, especially as far as respect for Lebanon’s sovereignty and airspace is concerned. Regrettably this is a regular violation by the Israeli air force,” Lavrov said.

Furthermore, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense, the crew of Iman consists solely of "civilian personnel, which is being guarded." That may or may not be the case, but has not stopped ABC from blasting, minutes ago, a headline that "Russian anti-terror troops arrive in Syria" a development that a "United Nations Security Council source told ABC News was "a bomb" certain to have serious repercussions."

Russia's Defense Ministry says one of the navy's support ships has called at the Syrian port of Tartus.

The ministry said Monday that the navy's Iman oil tanker arrived at Tartus 10 days ago on a mission to assist Russian navy ships on anti-piracy patrols in the Gulf of Aden.

Informed diplomatic sources have reported to the Wayne Madsen Report (WMR) that Bahrain, representing the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), offered Russia a bribe of $5 billion if it did not use its veto in the Security Council to defeat an Arab League-sponsored resolution calling for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down. In the February 4 vote on the resolution, Russia, along with China, used their vetos to shoot down the resolution.

The Cold Response 2012 exercise taking place in Northern Norway on the border to Russia is a provocation and a sign of NATO wanting to strengthen its geopolitical and diplomatic efforts with military might, two Russian military experts say.

The largest military exercise in Norway in ten years’ time is now taking place in Mid-Troms and involves 16,000 soldiers from 15 countries. The exercise includes the largest-ever live firing drill held on Norwegian territory.

Washington and its minions have been warned. Before last Sunday's election, Putin even advertised his road map The essentials; no war on Syria; no war on Iran; no "humanitarian bombing" or fomenting "color revolutions" - all bundled into a new concept, "illegal instruments of soft power". For Putin, a Washington-engineered New World Order is a no-go. What rules is "the time-honored principle of state sovereignty".

As predicted - the Western media and US State Department-funded "opposition" inside Russia have called Vladimir Putin's landslide victory a "fraud." It was stated on Thursday March 1, that the Western media had "already determined how Russia's elections will unfold, creating the pretext in the minds of impressionable viewers to justify the unrest the US is undoubtedly planning."

In the spirit of recognizing mobs of terrorists as legitimate national governments before a sovereign nation’s true leadership is murdered by US-led NATO operations, as was the case in Libya, the Western media is already decrying Russia’s upcoming elections as “rigged” before they’ve even taken place. Leading the preemptive media coverage is Foreign Policy (FP) magazine featuring an article by Freedom House president David Kramer and Freedom House vice president, Christopher Walker.

The giveaway of 8 American Alaskan islands and vast resource-rich seabeds to the Russians is underway by the U.S. State Department in the guise of an agreement on a maritime boundary
between Alaska and Siberia.

In the mid-1970s countries adopted the concept of exclusive economic zones (EEZ) and fishery conservation zones extending 200 nautical miles from their coastlines. If two countries
are within 400 miles of each other, they need to negotiate a division of the seabeds by a "maritime boundary". It is usually some variation of an equidistant line between the two coastlines. For the U.S. this has been necessary vis-a-vis Canada, Mexico, Cuba, Russia, among others.

Under Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Russia has found common ground with Washington - on shipping war supplies to Afghanistan, halting the sale of anti-aircraft missiles to Iran and joining the World Trade Organization.

With Prime Minister Vladimir Putin leading all polls prior to Sunday’s presidential vote, though, the question of how Russia’s foreign policy would change under his return to the presidency is coming into focus.

In a 7,500-word foreign policy essay released Monday, the prime minister is promising a Russia with sharper elbows that vigorously pushes back against the West and forces it to take Moscow’s views into account.

Russian and Ukrainian intelligence services have foiled terrorist plans to assassinate Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Russia’s most-wanted terrorist Doku Umarov is thought to be behind the plot.

­The internationally-wanted criminals detained in Ukrainian city of Odessa confessed they had intended to assassinate Putin. The attack was supposed to be carried out in Moscow right after the presidential elections of March 4.

"The battle for Russia continues, the victory will be ours," Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin cried out to tens thousands of supporters at a rally in Moscow on Thursday, quoting also from a poem by Mikhail Lermontov about the crucial Russian battle against Napoleon in 1812.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is expected to
be elected Russia’s new president with two-thirds of the vote,
reversing a drop in popularity following December’s fraud-tainted
parliamentary election, according to a leading independent poll
published Friday.

I did not like to hear our race called sheep, and said I did not think they were.

"Still, it is true, lamb," said Satan. "Look at you in war -- what mutton you are, and how ridiculous!"

"In war? How?"

Russia's armed forces would be within their full rights to use nuclear weapons if any threats to the integrity of the country arise, Russian General Staff head Nikolay Makarov said Wednesday.

"Of course, we are not preparing to fight against NATO; we don't have those kinds of goals or tasks. But it is clearly written in our doctrine when we are within our rights to use nuclear weapons. In this case we would use them," Makarov said in an interview on radio station Ekho Moskvy, RIA-Novosti reported.

Russia will place several new S-400 Triumf air defense systems near its borders in 2012, Air Force Commander Alexander Zelin said.

“The Russian Armed Forces will receive several S-400 air defense systems this year,” Zelin told RIA Novosti on Monday. “This time they will be deployed in air defense units guarding [Russia’s] border regions.”

The Russian Chief of Staff, General Nikolai Makarov, today warned the US against stationing Aegis-equipped ships in the Black and northern seas.

Gen. Makarov pointed out that deployment of Aegis combat system’s elements in these seas “posed a threat” to Russia and forced Moscow to take retaliatory steps to eliminate it. He also stressed that these would be measures of last resort since they required “additional expenses.”

Israeli officials squirmed in embarrassment on Friday over Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s ringing endorsement of Russia’s contested parliamentary elections as “free and democratic.”

The third largest faction in the European Parliament has called for a freeze on contacts with the Russian State Duma until Russia holds "free and fair parliamentary elections."

Inna Novikova, the editor-in-chief of Pravda.Ru, had her account hacked on February 4th at night. An hour later, according to Facebook regulations, Inna indicated three friends, who could confirm her identity. Afterwards, she sent the adequate form to retrieve access to her Facebook account. The three friends - German Klimenko, Sergey Demensky and Marina Yudenich - sent the required confirmation codes immediately.

Afterwards, Facebook asked to provide a photo of the ID. The photo was sent too. In accordance with Facebook policies in such cases, accounts can be restored within 24 hours.

To be on the safe side, two well-known Facebook Russia bloggers called Ekaterina Skorobogatova to verify the information personally.

Russia will build a reliable aerospace defense system to effectively counter NATO missile threats, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said yesterday.

Rogozin, recently appointed as a deputy prime minister to oversee Russia’s defense industry, said on his Twitter account that the global security conference being held in Munich had failed to come to a compromise on creating a European missile defense system.

Rogozin quoted NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen as saying NATO would continue “to develop a missile defense system because we feel a strong responsibility to protect our populations effectively against the missile threat.”

Do you see how it works now? Do you see why we are always at war? Do you understand that as long as private central bankers control the economies of nations that wars murdering millions of innocents are inevitable?

To maintain power, Mikheil Saakashvili may involved in a war against Iran, says ex-Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze.

"I do not rule out that Saakashvili to keep his seat can turn to a military campaign against Iran that would be a disaster for our country," he said, stressing that the issue could be the subject of future negotiations between Saakashvili and U.S. President Barack Obama in the Oval Office on January 30.

"An anti-Iranian campaign should not be conducted on the territory of Georgia," said Shevardnadze.

Nathaniel Rothschild says sauna with Lord Mandelson was purely pleasure, not business.

A newspaper is reporting that Russia has signed a contract to sell combat jets to Syria in a show of support for President Bashar Assad’s regime.

Russia has accused the United States and NATO of large-scale violations of human rights during the military operation in Libya, including the deliberate murder of its leader Muammar Gaddafi and the killing of hundreds of civilians.

The NATO forces “made the overthrow and murder of the Colonel their main goal,” said the Russian Foreign Ministry in its first report on the state of human rights in the world.

Citing unnamed sources, the report said the order to liquidate Qadhafi was given to U.S., French and British commandos. The Russian Foreign Ministry details numerous instances of mass killings of hundreds of civilians and destruction of infrastructure in NATO bombing raids in Libya.

As US aircraft carrier groups gather in the Arabian Sea, a showdown between Iran and the West is rumbling on. If a war erupts, this will be another upshot of the US pursuit of absolute national security.

Mainstream forces in Washington are trying to sell a ludicrous standpoint to the American people: that it is worthwhile to bear financial costs and even lose some lives to confront lurking dangers to US security in the Middle East.

This is not a rational analysis, but rather a pious belief in US politics. With an appetite for national security causes, the US becomes increasingly meticulous in eliminating potential challenges.

NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen Thursday urged Russia to refrain from building up its military near the alliance’s borders, saying it was a concern for the 28-nation organization.

Rasmussen questioned Russian moves to bolster its forces in its Kaliningrad territory, which borders NATO members Lithuania and Poland, both part of Moscow’s Cold War-era stamping ground.

“These Russian statements are of course a matter of concern for NATO allies,” he told reporters in Lithuania’s capital Vilnius. “It is a complete waste of Russian financial resources, because it is a buildup of offensive military capacities directed against an artificial enemy, an enemy that doesn’t exist,” he said.

EU IRAN OIL EMBARGO SAID TO BE LIKELY DELAYED BY SIX MONTHS

Why? Because the world slowly realized that the potential surge in oil prices would tip a world already on the verge of a recession even deeper into economic contraction. Not rocket science, but certainly something the US president apparently has been unable to comprehend, especially if hoping that he would merely transfer exports from Iran to his close ally Saudi Arabia which would cement its European market monopoly even further. Or, perhaps, someone just explained to Obama that Embargo in January + QE3 in March = No Reelection...

“Iran is our close neighbor, just south of the Caucasus. Should anything happen to Iran, should Iran get drawn into any political or military hardships, this will be a direct threat to our national security,” stressed Rogozin.

The Russian Defense Ministry announces plans for extensive new early-warning radar system as talks with US and NATO over the controversial European missile defense system hit the wall.

The announcement by the comes on the heels of President Dmitry Medvedev’s pledge to fortify national defense.

In addition to a newly inaugurated radar system located in Kaliningrad, several more radar stations will be placed on combat duty in 2012, Alexei Zolotukhin, an official with the Russian Defense Ministry press service for Aerospace Defense Troops, told reporters on Sunday.

Washington clearly wants ‘finito’ with Russia’s Putin as in basta! Or as they said in Egypt last spring, Kefaya–enough! Hillary Clinton and friends have apparently decided Russia’s prospective next president, Vladimir Putin, is a major obstacle to their plans. Few however understand why. Russia today, in tandem with China and to a significant degree Iran, form the spine, however shaky, of the only effective global axis of resistance to a world dominated by one sole superpower.

A large Russian naval flotilla led by an aircraft carrier has docked in the Syrian port of Tartus in what Damascus state media hailed on Sunday as a show of solidarity by close ally Moscow.

Human rights abuses by the U.S. government, including violations of the law of war and disproportionate use of force, are “far from the ideals declared by Washington,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry said.

The idea to separate Siberia and annex the territory to the United States of America has been engrossing the minds of Siberian separatists for a long time already. Surprisingly, or maybe not, they find the support from across the ocean.

A massive fire engulfed a Russian nuclear submarine at an Arctic shipyard Thursday, but there has been no radiation leak, or injuries, officials said.

The fire at the Yekaterinburg nuclear submarine occurred while it was in dock for repairs at the Roslyakovo shipyard in the Murmansk region, said Irina Gretskaya, a spokeswoman for the Emergencies Ministry’s branch in the area.

The Russian military has successfully test-launched two intercontinental nuclear-capable missiles, the defence ministry said.

It appears that Global financial oligarchs, obsessed with erasing national sovereignty world wide, like George Soros and others are instigating another revolution in Russia under the veil of "free and fair democracy".

On December 24, 2011 a second opposition rally was held in Moscow, with an estimated 28 to 120 thousand protesters, over the alleged "vote-rigging" that occurred on the December 4th election, won by Putin's United Russia party.

As reported by Reuters, the Russian novelist Boris Akunin asked protesters from a large stage. "Do you want Putin to return to the presidency?" Whistling and jeering, protesters chanted: "No!" [1]

96 km (59 miles) E of Kyzyl, Russia
336 km (208 miles) NE of Ulaangom, Mongolia
361 km (224 miles) ESE of Abakan, Russia
3744 km (2326 miles) ENE of MOSCOW, Russia

Russian warships that have reached waters off Syria in recent days were carrying, among other things, Russian technical advisors who will help the Syrians set up an array of S-300 missiles Damascus has received in recent weeks, a report in the London-based Arabic language Al Quds-Al Arabi said Thursday. Citing sources in Syria and Russia, the paper said that Moscow sees a Western attack on Syria as a “red line” that it will not tolerate.

There is no change of America’s position on AMD deployment in Europe, so if this continues Russia will have to withdraw from the START treaty, warned Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister in an exclusive interview to RT.

­Sergey Ryabkov heads the Russian side of the US-Russia working group that deals with issues of global security, arms control, missile defense, etc.

Russia’s envoy to NATO Dmitry Rogozin says the US seems to be surrounding Russia with military installations “like an anaconda”. Ryabkov confirmed that Moscow never made it a secret that it is definitely disturbed because of the instability created by the American plans to deploy anti-missile assets in Europe and other parts of the world.

Russia’s Vladimir Putin implicated Washington today in the killing of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi and launched a tirade against Senator John McCain in an extraordinary attack on US policies.

The Russian premier used his annual televised phone-in to unleash the type of no-holds-barred attack that characterised his 2000-2008 term as president and threatens to shadow his expected return to the Kremlin in March polls.

The US Congress decision which forbids the presidential administration from passing over to Russia any data concerning the AMD system without the consent of the Congress will force Moscow to resort to reciprocal measures, says Russia’s envoy to NATO.

“Taking this into account, I believe that we will have to put into practice the measures announced by the president in his statement on November 25 to the full extent.”

Last month, President Dmitry Medvedev stated that that Russia would deploy Iskander ballistic missiles in the Kaliningrad Region unless a compromise is reached on the European missile defense project, which Moscow sees as a direct threat to its national security.

The Russian atomic agency Rosatom, however, said sodium-22 is exclusively used for medical and scientific research and does not have a high radiation level. Rosatom contradicted the custom agency's claim that the material can only come from a nuclear reactor.

Vladimir Putin has lashed out at John McCain over his threats that the PM may face same fate as the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. The Russian premier speculated that the US senator has been traumatized by his POW experience.

Putin presented his version of how Gaddafi was killed, and it allocates a dubious place for NATO in the scenario.

“All the world saw him being killed, all bloodied. Is that democracy? And who did it? Drones, including American ones, delivered a strike on his motorcade. Then commandos, who were not supposed to be there, brought in so-called opposition and militants. And killed him without trial,” Putin explained.

I take it that the Obama Administration is taking all this Russian Spring talk seriously. They pumped millions into the Egyptian elections and now they see a weakened Putin caught flat-footed by the large response(most likely hired force) so it is time to take advantage. Most Russians pawned their freedom for scarce security long ago so any anger directed at United Russia is temporary at best.

The U.S. administration is in talks with Congress on the establishment of a new organization supporting NGOs in Russia, Philip Gordon, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, said on Wednesday, December 14.

Standard and Poor’s has raised ratings on 8 Russian banks under its new ratings procedure designed to provide a more accurate estimate of their financial capability.

S&P reconsidered ratings of 18 Russian banks. The only top ten Russian bank to see a change in its long-term rating is Alfa bank. It has been raised from BB- to BB, and the outlook is now ‘stable’ from ‘positive’.

As the evidence begins to mount pointing the accusing finger at the increasingly illegitimate corporate-financier occupiers of the West’s governments as having built up Russian opposition movements and being behind the current unrest filling Russia’s streets, the corporate media has already started to rewrite events as they unfold.

Revelations about email transactions between the US State Department and the Russian election watchdog Golos prior to Russia's parliamentary elections threaten to bring the reset to a grinding halt.

Before a single vote was cast in the parliamentary elections, a string of incidents indicated that foreign governments were already exerting influence over the election process.

Golos, an independent watchdog that has been monitoring elections in Russia for 10 years, was fined 30,000 rubles ($1,000) last week by a Moscow court for publishing “election-related opinion polls and research” after a deadline for publishing such material had passed (it is illegal in Russia to publish such information five days or less before an election).

Protests against election fraud are beginning in Russia, the first in a planned wave of nationwide demonstrations testing Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his party.

Protest leaders predict Saturday will bring the largest show of public anger in the country since the collapse of the Soviet Union 20 years ago.

The centerpiece is to be a massive rally in Moscow, where more than 30,000 people are expected. But protests have been called for more than 70 other cities in the sprawling country.

The United States called Friday on both Russian authorities and protesters to remain peaceful as opponents of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin prepared major weekend demonstrations against his rule.

Putin has angrily accused the United States of inciting the protests after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton raised concerns about the fairness of parliamentary elections that Putin’s party won but with a reduced majority.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said that the United States supported the right to peaceful protest in Russia as it does “anywhere in the world.”

Russian news website Life News has published emails it claims show correspondence between the US State Dept. and the Russian election watchdog Golos discussing payments for work done to discredit the results of Russia’s parliamentary vote.

­Life News says it has come into the possession of 60 megabytes of Golos' private online correspondence. According to Life News, they are letters sent and received by Golos Executive Chief Lilya Shibanova and her deputy Grigory Melkonyants. Judging by the documents published on the site, the group which claimed to be independent was actually funded in order to defend the interests of US State Department.

Speaking today at a press conference in Brussels, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton rehashed the same claims about the NATO missile shield that haven’t been convincing Russia for the past decade, while insisting they will “press forward” on the scheme.

“This is not directed at Russia, it is not about Russia. It is frankly about Iran,” insisted Clinton. Such claims have not convinced Russia, which couldn’t help but notice that the bulk of the system is being built outside of Iran’s missile range, and much of it is positioned along the Russian frontier in eastern Europe.

Should a "revolution" take place, the primary target of shock will be Russia itself. The worst nightmare would be the disintegration of the Russian Federation. This is the result the West most desires to see most.

Russian society does not want to undergo this nightmare again. This concern has partly resulted from Putin's lasting authority. The unity United Russia can bring to this country is limited, but unity under democracy is not that convincing either. The painful lessons of the past will make Russians more reluctant to give up their trust in strongman politics to its democratic peers.

Moscow was uncommonly tense Wednesday, with tens of thousands of riot police patrolling the streets and helicopters buzzing overhead, while opposition leaders promised more flash-mob-type demonstrations to protest alleged official vote-rigging in last weekend's bitterly contested Duma elections.

Russian countermeasures to NATO's ballistic missile defense system would be a waste of money because they would be aimed at an "artificial enemy," NATO's top official said Wednesday.

Although NATO says it needs the system to defend from possible threats from the Middle East and that it can't pose a threat to Russia's own nuclear deterrent, Moscow sees the plans as a security challenge.

Vladimir Putin has accused the United States of orchestrating public unrest on Russia’s streets after last Sunday’s disputed parliamentary election in a Cold War-style outburst certain to damage US-Russia relations.

In his first comments on three days of anti-Kremlin protests, the Russian prime minister alleged that Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, had deliberately encouraged his political opponents to take to the streets in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

“She sent a signal to some activists inside the country,” Mr Putin told a meeting of his supporters. “They got the message and started active work with the support of the US state department.”

Hillary Clinton has refused to back down in a row with Vladimir Putin after the Russian prime minister accused her of deliberately encouraging his political opponents to take to the streets in Moscow and St Petersburg.

Russia’s prime minister, Vladimir Putin, has acccused foreign governments of funding Russia’s political opposition, whom he compared to Judas Iscariot, in a throwback to cold war-era rhetoric that was a hallmark of his time as president.

With parliamentary elections on December 4, Mr Putin has been seeking to buttress the sagging popularity of United Russia, the ruling party which controls two-thirds of the state duma, or lower house of parliament.

Casting the regime’s opponents as paid stooges of the west is a tried and tested Soviet-era propaganda ploy, one that has worked predictably in the past by playing on the widespread fear that the west secretly seeks to control Russia.

The Russian electoral authorities found that Golos had violated Russia's election laws by publishing polls in the "quiet period" immediately preceding parliamentary elections and fined the organization just under $1,000 for the violation. Russian lawmakers have also accused Golos and several other political opposition friendly NGOs of receiving funding from foreign sources for their political activities, which would be against Russian law (as foreign funding of US elections would be against US law).

What would Americans say if they found their polling stations and certain political parties entirely infiltrated by Chinese money, Chinese observers, and Chinese-backed candidates promoting China's interests in an AMERICAN election? The answer ranges from incarceration, to trials featuring charges ranging from fraud, to sedition and even treason with sentences ranging from decades to life in prison, perhaps even death, as well as possible military action for what could easily be considered an act of war.

Following the Pakistani government’s recent decision to shut down NATO supply lines into Afghanistan indefinitely, Russian officials upped the ante by subtly threatening to close off northern routes for the occupation if the U.S.-led military alliance refuses to back down on a proposed missile defense system in Europe. According to analysts, such a move by Russia at this point would either spark a new war or force a rapid withdrawal of supply-starved Western forces from the region.

Earlier this year John McCain openly said of the unrest his IRI had helped fund in Egypt, “I would be a little less cocky in the Kremlin with my KGB cronies today if I were Vladimir Putin. I would be a little less secure in the seaside resort [of] President Hu and a few men who govern and decide the fate of 1.3 billion people.”

He said the Native corporation was asking the Coast Guard on Monday if the Healy, the nation's only functioning ice breaker, could remain in Alaska waters to make sure the tanker gets to Nome. The Healy is scheduled to return to Seattle just before Christmas.

Russian voters have dealt Vladimir Putin’s ruling party a heavy blow by cutting its parliamentary majority in an election that showed growing unease with his domination of the country as he prepares to reclaim the presidency.

Incomplete results showed Putin’s United Russia was struggling even to win 50 percent of the votes in Sunday’s election, compared with more than 64 percent four years ago. Opposition parties said even that outcome was inflated by fraud.

Many voters, fed up with widespread corruption, refer to United Russia as the party of swindlers and thieves and resent the huge gap between the rich and poor. Some fear Putin’s return to the presidency may herald economic and political stagnation.

The First Deputy Speaker of the Russian Federation Council (the parliament’s upper house) Alexander Torshin says that Russia must closely watch the situation in Kosovo and help ethnic Serbs who are being persecuted by the Kosovo authorities.

Yars mobile systems carrying RS-24 intercontinental ballistic missiles were recently put on combat duty with the Teikovo Missile Division in central Russia.

Nine years have already passed since an indescribable crime against humanity, the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, was systematically begun. Now in its ninth year [1926], a government exists which calls itself a worker-and-peasant government—but not one true worker or farmer has ever sat on it. For nine years, torture has been used in the name of democra­cy as an official instrument of the state. And in the name of socialism millions of upright individu­als have been murdered, put to death through starvation, or banished from home and hearth to every distant part of the globe.

In the name of the proletariat the Russian people has been subjugated by rank foreigners, their speech has been silenced, and their bodies sent—to the cheers of the [Jewish] Third International — into mass graves.

During the Cold War, the ability of both sides—the Warsaw Pact and NATO—to mutually annihilate one another, had led to a nuclear stalemate dubbed by military strategists, MAD—Mutually Assured Destruction. It was scary but, in a bizarre sense, more stable than what Washington now pursues relentlessly with its Ballistic Missile Defense in Europe, Asia and globally in unilateral pursuit of US nuclear primacy. MAD was based on the prospect of mutual nuclear annihilation with no decisive advantage for either side; it led to a world in which nuclear war had been ‘unthinkable.’ Now, the US was pursuing the possibility of nuclear war as ‘thinkable.’

Military source confirms delivery of missiles, according to an AFP report; second official says missiles will protect Syria from 'possible attack from the sea.'

Russia has launched a military partnership project with its Cold War ally Cuba, amid rising tensions over US plans to deploy an anti-missile system in Europe.

Russian contractors are to supply production equipment for manufacturing 6.52-mm rifle rounds, Kommersant daily reports. Cuban arms plant called Comandante Ernesto Che Guevara will also receive a license and technology for recycling used ammo.

Russia has announced plans to pursue talks with Iran and China about a global missile shield.

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev has told his country’s armed forces to consider possible measures to counter NATO and U.S. missile shields.

Russia has announced that if the U.S. and NATO insist on continuing their missile shield plans despite Russian opposition, it will aim its missiles at European missile shields.

Russia has turned on a new incoming missile early warning system in its westernmost region in response to US plans for a missile shield in Europe.

President Dmitry Medvedev ordered the system to be activated on a visit to the radar unit in Kaliningrad, a Baltic region bordering EU countries.

The unit is equipped with the new Voronezh-DM radar system.

Mr Medvedev has warned Russian missiles could be deployed on the EU's borders if the shield is installed.

Moscow is deploying warships at its base in the Syrian port of Tartus. The long-planned mission comes, providentially, at the very moment when it could help prevent a potential conflict in the strategically important Middle Eastern country.

News of Russia’s naval deployment in Tartus came shortly after the US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George HW Bush anchored off Syria, along with additional naval vessels. The US battle group is to remain in the Mediterranean, allegedly to conduct maritime security operations and support missions as part of Operations Enduring Freedom and New Dawn. The US 6th Fleet is also patrolling the area, Interfax reports.

The Seven Step Mainstream Media Country Destruction Guide

1. First, they start by targeting a country ripe for “Regime Change”, and brand it a “rogue state”; then...

2. They arm, train, finance local terrorist groups through CIA, MI6, Mossad, Al-Qaeda (a CIA operation), drug cartels (often CIA operations) and call them “freedom fighters”; then...

3. As mock UN Security Council Resolutions are staged that rain death and destruction upon millions of civilians, they call it “UN sanctions to protect civilians”; then...

4. They spread flagrant lies through their “newsrooms” and paid journalists, and call it "the international community’s concerns expressed by prestigious spokespeople and analysts…” then…

Iran poses no threat to the United States, Russia said Tuesday, rebuffing a key argument of President Barack Obama on whether to go ahead with a European missile shield bitterly opposed by Moscow.

A Russian newsreader who was reported to have given U.S. President Barack Obama the finger while on air was dismissed on Thursday.

Award-winning REN TV presenter Tatiana Limanova made the gesture while reading Obama's name during a November 14 item on the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference. Online footage of the incident has since gone viral.

But REN TV said Limanova's gesture was not aimed at Obama, but was rather a response to her “editorial staff” colleagues, who were standing off camera and trying to distract her, for a joke. It was not, REN TV stressed in a statement, "linked to the item being presented by Limanova.”

Limanova said she did not know she was on camera when she made the gesture, an explanation that failed to impress the REN TV bosses.

Moscow is deploying warships at its base in the Syrian port of Tartus. The long-planned mission comes, providentially, at the very moment when it could help prevent a potential conflict in the strategically important Middle Eastern country.

The Russian battle group will consist of three vessels led by the heavy aircraft-carrying missile cruiser, Admiral Kuznetsov.

We now know what those six Russian warships that reportedly entered Syrian territorial waters last week were carrying. Aside from representing a show of strength to discourage NATO powers from launching a military attack, on board were Russian technical experts ready to help Damascus set up a sophisticated missile defense system sold to them by Moscow.

Market participants continue to be surprised by gold’s continuing weakness and some are even questioning gold’s safe haven status. However, the fundamentals of broad based global physical demand remain very sound as evidenced by the central bank gold buying data today.

Russia bought 19.5 metric tons of gold in October bringing their total gold reserves to 871.1 tons according to IMF data released today.

Cutting straight to the chase - in a nationally televised appearance by Russian president Dmitry Medvedev: "in response to what the Russian believes is an active incursion and a potential act of eventual aggression on behalf of NATO countries in Eastern Europe (and hence the US), he he said the following (7 minutes in): "First, I am instructing the Defense Ministry to immediately put the missile attack early warning radar station in Kaliningrad on combat alert. Second, protective cover of Russia's strategic nuclear weapons, will be reinforced as a priority measure under the programme to develop out air and space defenses.

Tyler pointed out yesterday and today that the risk of a Syrian war is quickly rising.

I want to amplify on three aspects of this issue:

(1) a war against Syria was planned 10 years ago

(2) the American people don't want a new war and

(3) Russia and China may strongly react against such a war

The United States said Tuesday it would no longer provide data to Russia on conventional weapons and troops in Europe, citing non-compliance by Moscow with a two-decade old treaty that governed the information exchange.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told reporters the United States will cease to observe the provisions of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE).

"This is an issue that we've been working on ever since the Russians withdrew," Nuland told reporters.

"After four years of Russian non-implementation and after repeated efforts... to save the treaty, we think it's important to take some counter-measures vis-a-vis Russia," she said.

The US will now no longer accept Russian inspection of its bases.

Colonialism and subsequent occupation of land has had a parasitical effect since the dawn of civilisation. The effect of a foreign object inside a human body creates the same trauma and has same effect as that of colonialism. The human body, with natural abilities, tries to fight off the foreign object. When it fails, the object becomes a parasite.

So does the colonial power, a parasite on the land it feeds and thrives on. The ultimate victim is the occupied host land and its people. It dries up, almost like a twig in the hot sun. The human brain, too, denied of its freedom to think and act by the parasitical entity, suffers a long time till the colonial power is eliminated.

Russian General Nikolai Makarov said NATO’s eastward expansion meant the risk of Russia being dragged into conflicts had ‘risen sharply’. General Makarov is the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia , the highest military post of the Russian armed forces.

Many Eastern European countries which used to be part of the Warsaw Pact, a former Soviet sphere of influence, have since joined NATO, an issue which irritated Russia. Russia believes NATO is ganging up with these countries to encircle its western border.

The General said: ‘The possibility of local armed conflicts along nearly the whole border has increased dramatically. In certain conditions, I do not rule out local and regional armed conflicts developing into a large-scale war, including using nuclear weapons.’

Three ex-Soviet states were Friday to agree the first steps towards creating a Eurasian economic union, a project backed by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to bind closer the former USSR.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his Kazakhstan and Belarus counterparts Nursultan Nazarbayev and Alexander Lukashenko were to sign a declaration on further economic integration at a summit in Moscow, the Kremlin said in a statement

Russian warships have entered Syrian territorial waters in an aggressive move designed to prevent any NATO-led attack on the country under the guise of a “humanitarian intervention”.

Russia is facing a heightened risk of being drawn into conflicts at its borders that have the potential of turning nuclear, the nation’s top military officer said Thursday.

Gen. Nikolai Makarov, chief of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces, cautioned over NATO’s expansion eastward and warned that the risks for Russia to be pulled into local conflicts have “risen sharply.”

On 14 November South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo stated, "Hundreds of North Korean scientists and engineers are working at about 10 nuclear and missile facilities in Iran, including Natanz, The North Koreans are apparently rotated every six months." Russian technicians also remain at Iran’s first nuclear electrical energy facility, Bushehr. So, any aerial strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities could result in significant numbers of dead Russian and North Korean specialists as “collateral damage,” with all the diplomatic uncertainties that might ensue from Moscow and Pyongyang as the body bags start arriving home.

He noted that the IAEA claims the report was developed based on documents which were submitted by another country.

"We urge the IAEA to name 'another country' so that we could investigate the case," Lavrov said.

IMF's Managing Director Christine Lagarde urged the Russian administration not to increase the public spending. Lagarde said that she was giving only friendly pieces of advice to Russia and added that she had received the Order of Friendship from the Russian administration.

According to her, public spending was not a very healthy phenomenon, especially before the elections. However, it is clear that Lagarde was not talking about the spending connected with the elections only. The IMF's chairwoman does not like the payments to weakly protected layers of the population, the increase of spending on defense and law-enforcement bodies. Aside from that, Christine Lagarde is concerned about the fundamental reorganization of Russia's entire road infrastructure.

Russia on Wednesday vehemently criticised a U.N. nuclear watchdog report saying Iran appeared to have worked on designing an atom bomb, saying it contained no new evidence and was being used to undercut efforts to reach a diplomatic solution, reports Reuters.

Sharpening opposition to any new sanctions against Iran in the U.N. Security Council, where Russia has veto power, senior diplomats said further punitive measures would be "destructive" and urged a revival of talks between Tehran and global powers.

The Russian remarks came during a visit by a senior Iranian official for talks on the programme which Tehran says is peaceful but the United States and its allies fear is aimed at developing the capability to build atomic weapons.

"A military operation against Iran could have grave consequences," Chairman of the Russian Parliamentary Committee for International Affairs Konstantin Kosachev told reporters on Thursday.

An air strike on Busher would be accompanied by attacks on antiaircraft defense bases and airfields. The Iranian airfield in Busher, as well as Shiraz, Abadan and Omidie would almost certainly come under attack.

Since the 1979 Iranian revolution and the downfall of the US Puppet Ruler the Shah, Iran has been an Islamic state. In that interval of time, 1979 to the present, Iran has not invaded anyone. Not once.

Military action against Iran would be a "very serious mistake fraught with unpredictable consequences", Russia's foreign minister has warned.