Månad: juli 2021

We welcome the leadership shown by President Biden and President Putin in their June 16 Joint Statement on Strategic Stability reaffirming the principle that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” We are encouraged that President Putin and President Xi affirmed the same principle in their June 28 Joint Statement.
This principle is fundamental to ensuring predictability, reducing the risk of armed conflicts and the threat of nuclear war. It provides a foundation for progress to reduce existential common risks, including on the climate and global public health. It is especially important as new technologies reduce decision time for leaders. Such a principle is also at the core of the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) whose Preamble recognises “the devastation that would be visited upon all mankind by a nuclear war and the consequent need to make every effort to avert the
danger of such a war and to take measures to safeguard the security of peoples”. Läs  uttalandet

Devi Itono, who heads the so-called military transition council that seized power in the April battle after the death of his father Idriss Dévi, promised to hold a “free and transparent” election within 18 months, but internationally. Warning process without any assistance It may take some time..

On Devi’s funeral day, Macron is in France “Unwavering” friends throw his weight behind Chad’s military junta, Devi Itono.  Läs artikel

[…] The paper outlines a lengthy series of measures for dealing with a host of domestic issues, from rising poverty and continued critical dependence on imported technology to the advent of green energy and the loss of the Soviet-era technological and educational edge. This certainly makes sense. Indeed, the recent Kremlin discovery of climate change as a top-tier issue is a hopeful sign that Russia is overcoming its former denial of the problem, along with inordinately exuberant expectations of the promise of global warming for a predominantly cold country. After all, the Kremlin’s earlier embrace of digitalization has given a major push to the spread of digital services across Russia. […]

Yet here, the strategy misses a key point at the root of Russia’s many economic and social problems: the widespread absence of any values, other than purely materialistic ones, among much of the country’s ruling elite. The paper mentions in passing the need to root out corruption, but the real issue is bigger by an order of magnitude. As each of President Putin’s annual phone-in sessions with the Russian people demonstrates—including the most recent one on June 30—Russia is governed by a class of people who are, for the most part, self-serving, and do not care at all for ordinary people or the country, instead focusing single-mindedly on making themselves rich on the job. Money—or rather Big Money—has become that group’s top value, and the most corrosive element in today’s Russia. Therein lies perhaps the biggest vulnerability of modern Russia. Läs artikel

Just nu levererar USA:s armé ett helt nytt vapensystem till Sverige: luftvärnssystemet Patriot. Det ska tas i bruk redan i slutet av året .

Patriot ersätter de amerikanska Hawk-robotar som Sverige köpte in för snart 60 år sedan, men som fortfarande ingår i krigsförbanden. Hawk-luftvärnet var byggt för att bekämpa attack- och bombflygplan som flög nära sina anfallsmål.

– Patriot är konstruerat för att operera ihop med andra Patriot-system. Så det är mycket enkelt att länka samman Patriot-systemen i olika länder, säger den amerikanske generalen Christopher Cavoli till DN när han besökte Gotland på tisdagen. Läs artikel

Om en krigssituation skulle uppstå i Östersjöregionen kommer Sverige att ligga illa till. Den förutsägelsen gjorde mångårige diplomaten och Moskvaambassadören Sven Hirdman i ett uppmärksammat Hotspot-samtal med Marco Strömberg nyligen. […]

Editor’s Note: On July 4, 1821, then-Secretary of State John Quincy Adams gave the following Independence Day speech.

And now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned philosophers of the elder world, the first observers of nutation and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and Shrapnel shells, should find their hearts disposed to enquire what has America done for the benefit of mankind?

Let our answer be this: America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government. America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous reciprocity.

She has uniformly spoken among them, though often to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal liberty, of equal justice, and of equal rights. Läs talet

Läs också presentation på den här sajten av Quincy Institute.

One of the main witnesses in Julian Assange’s extradition case has admitted he made false claims against Assange in exchange for immunity from prosecution, a bombshell revelation that could have a major impact on the WikiLeaks founder’s fate. Assange faces up to 175 years in prison if brought to the U.S., where he was indicted for violations of the Espionage Act related to the publication of classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes.

According to a new article in the Icelandic newspaper Stundin, the convicted hacker Sigurdur “Siggi” Thordarson falsely claimed he was a prominent WikiLeaks representative instructed by Assange to carry out hacking attacks, but he was in fact only tangentially involved with the organization. The article suggests the U.S. Justice Department collaborated with Thordarson to generate the indictment for Assange that was submitted to the British courts. “This is just the latest revelation to demonstrate why the U.S. case should be dropped,” says Jennifer Robinson, a human rights attorney who has been advising Assange and WikiLeaks since 2010. “The factual basis for this case has completely fallen apart.” Läs artikel

Kiev and several western powers have taken symbolic steps in recent years to assert Ukraine’s territorial integrity, conducting military exercises near or innocent passage operations through Black Sea waters claimed by Russia. The Kremlin has responded with increasing firmness to these sporadic incursions, which it calls “provocations.” Late last month, the Coast Guard and Black Sea fleet fired warning shots and dropped bombs in the path of the British Type 45 Destroyer HMS Defender to chase the warship away from Russia’s claimed territorial waters off the Crimean coast. Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a subsequent TV appearance that Russia’s military could have sunk the Defender without triggering a large-scale war because, in his words, the west knows it cannot win such a conflict.

Putin’s confidence may not be entirely misplaced. In the years following Crimea’s annexation, Russia has steadily built up its Black Sea Fleet. The fleet has received three modernized Guided Missile Frigates from the Admiral Grigorovich class, as well as a slew of diesel attack submarines from the improved Kilo (Project 636.3) series. These new warships are but one part of the drastic growth of Russian anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities in the Black Sea region, which also include a sprawling web of missile defenses operating out of Crimea. Yet another headache for NATO are Russia’s newest tactical weapons: the Tsirkon winged, hypersonic cruise missile curtails the ability of carrier strike groups (CSG’s) to project power deep into Russian territory, as does the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal air-launched ballistic missile. Läs artikel

Vi har fått svar på hva Norge bruker setet i Sikkerhetsrådet i FN til. Et sete som kostet skattebetalerne minst 100 millioner kroner.

Saken handler om problemet med å frakte våpen til Al-Nusra inn i Idib når  grensene mot Tyrkia er stengte.

Utenriksminister Ine Eriksen Søreide har påtatt seg drajobben med å hindre Russland i å legge ned veto i Sikkerhetsrådet  mot at våpen gjemt blant såkalt nødhjelp eller mat og medisiner som Søreide kaller det, skal fortsatt komme inn i Idlib fra Tyrkia. En tapt kamp. Men, for Søreide en viktig kamp for å vise at Norge bruker setet i Sikkerhetsrådet etter avtale. Läs artikel

[…] Etter tiden med Donald Trump har Stoltenberg brukt mye krefter på å utvikle og formidle en ny strategi for Nato. Strategien, som diskuteres av Nato denne uken, bærer navnet «Nato 2030». Slik han selv nylig formulerte det, er målet todelt:

Først «å avslutte vår største militære operasjon» i Afghanistan. Deretter «styrke vår evne til å møte økende global konkurranse.» Og det helt sentrale i strategien, det nye, er å trekke Kina inn som en «leder i et autoritært anslag mot den lovregulerte internasjonale orden».

For å samle støtte til denne vendingen har Stoltenberg de siste ukene i særlig grad uttrykt to synspunkter.

1. Det ene er at Kina, som innen 2030 trolig er verdens største økonomi, «har en væremåte som jeg mener er helt uakseptabel».
2. Det andre er, slik han sa til verdenspressen etter sitt møte med president Joe Biden, at «Kina ikke på noen måter deler våre verdier».

For en tillitsmann som jobber på vegne av 30 medlemsstater, er dette uvanlig kraftig lut. Det er en type glødende ordvalg diplomater sjelden bruker. På et vis kan man kanskje se det som en retorisk øvelse for å samle støtte. Läs artikel