Månad: augusti 2023

Tidskriften Kvartal bryter troligen mot lagen. Det är utmärkt. Fler borde följa efter.

Lagbrottet består i att Kvartal öppet trotsar Rådets Förordning (EU) 2022/350 av den 1 mars 2022, en svensk lag. Underrubriken till rådsförordningen säger vad det handlar om: ”om ändring av förordning (EU) nr 833/2014 om restriktiva åtgärder mot bakgrund av Rysslands åtgärder som destabiliserar situationen i Ukraina.”[…]

Strafframen för brott mot sanktionsförordningen är fyra års fängelse. Fast ”mindre överträdelser” medför inte straffansvar. Möjligen faller Kvartals notiser under den kategorin trots att de förmedlas med viss regelbundenhet. I så fall har Kvartal funnit ett kryphål som andra medier kan lära av, som att det är fritt fram att förmedla förbjudet innehåll med färre än till exempel 527 tecken som i exemplet nedanför.

Men det kan också finnas andra förklaringar till att Kvartal ännu inte har lagförts:

Förordningen blev beslutad med svenskt bifall i EUs ministerråd. Om Sverige hade röstat nej hade lagen inte blivit av eftersom sanktionsbeslut i EU enbart kan tas med enstämmighet. Resultatet är en pinsamhet som strider mot Tryckfrihetsförordningens censurförbud. Bättre då att låtsas som att den inte existerar. Läs artikel

Den 16 maj 2022 beslutade Sveriges Riksdag att vi skulle ansöka om medlemsskap i Nato. Det mest naturliga för Sveriges dominerande medieorgan vid den här tidpunkten hade varit att reagera på den rekordartat korta behandlingen – den parlamentariska rapporten fick riksdagen tre dagar före beslutet – och att mana till debatt i ämnet. […]

Men istället för att manifestera oberoende gentemot stat och myndigheter, lade sig public service platt på rygg efter det framstressade riksdagsbeslutet och började skildra det eventuella Natomedlemskapet som en dragkamp mellan Turkiets president Recep Tayyip Erdogan och dåvarande statsminister Magdalena Andersson; senare Ulf Kristersson.

När svenska medborgare,i brist på den debatt som aldrig tilläts uppstå, var i behov av svar på frågor om och konsekvenser av ett eventuellt Nato-medlemskap – då började public service istället springa statens ärenden; ogenerat skildras sedan dess Nato-processen i SVT och SR som antingen ”framsteg” eller ”bakslag” för Sverige. Det gäller såväl i rubriker som i enskilda journalisters förhållningssätt vid intervjuer. Läs artikel

For Finnish officials and other national security professionals, Russia’s full-scale assault and Finland’s ensuing NATO bid were career-defining events. Carrying out a doctrinal change amid a tense security situation was a formidable and high-stakes task, which was further compounded by unprecedented media attention. Fortunately, the conditions for Finnish accession ultimately proved favourable. The Alliance welcomed Finland with open arms, Russia was either incapable or unwilling to retaliate, and, importantly, the accession united Finns across the political spectrum. […]

My views on the potential change in Finnish foreign policy were cautious. As a young student and scholar, I strongly advocated for Finland’s NATO membership. When I got older, my zeal for the cause somewhat flagged. Helsinki had built an extensive network of defence partnerships concentrating on territorial defence, and maintained strong national military capabilities. Russia had also become more aggressive and unpredictable. In a nutshell, although I thought that militarily it would make sense to join the Alliance, I was also of the opinion that membership in the Alliance was not worth exposing the country to severe security risks. In the early weeks of 2022, I was – without a doubt – in the wait-and-see camp. Läs artikel

Greece filed a complaint to NATO’s chief Jens Stoltenberg on Wednesday after the Ankara-based Allied Land Command (LANDCOM) praised Turkey on social media for its victory against Greece in a war in 1922.

Particularly, LANDCOM wished a “happy Victory and Turkish Armed Forces Day to our host nation […] On this very special day, we would like to express our gratitude to Türkiye for their hospitality as our hosts here at LANDCOM”.

“Since joining NATO in 1952, Türkiye has participated in multiple operations and exercises and has always demonstrated the great professionalism and tenacity of its soldiers,” LANDCOM added.

The post refers to the 1919-1922 Greek-Turkish war, where Greek troops were forced to retreat amid massive military and human losses. Läs artikel

Nyligen var personal från F 7 vid Örland flygbas i Norge för att delta i övningen Arctic Fighter Meet. Det är en övning där svenska, finska och norska stridsflyg övar tillsammans på klassisk kurvstrid, så kallad ”dog fighting”, det vill säga stridsmoment där ett flygplan ställs mot ett annat. […]

Arctic Fighter Meet är en del av nordiska samarbetet och övningar likt dessa gör även att personalen från de olika länderna kommer närmare varandra på ett personligt plan, att känna varandra väl är viktigt berättar ”Spicer”.  Läs pressmeddelande

The Hungarian government has long done its homework on Sweden’s NATO membership application, having submitted the Swedish ratification document to parliament last year. MEPs will have the opportunity to decide when to vote on the issue at the autumn plenary session, starting in September, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó told Turkish television channel TRT World.

He underlined that so far it has not been possible to settle the political disputes with Stockholm, adding that he regrets Hungary has become a target and victim of this international political discourse that is “determined by criticisms and judgments” which interferes in Hungarian domestic politics.

Most recently, this was discussed during Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to Budapest on August 20, but Péter Szijjártó also frequently talks with his Turkish counterpart, Hakan Fidan, about the issue. As a NATO ally, Hungary takes Turkey’s interests and position into account, as a military-defense alliance must be based on trust, the minister stressed. Just like Hungary, Turkey will discuss Sweden’s membership in the autumn parliamentary session as well. Läs artikel

General James B. Hecker commander of NATO’s Allied Air Command (AIRCOM) and the US Air Force Europe (USAFE) is visiting Iceland. Hecker met with Thórdís Kolbrún Reykfjörd Gylfadóttir, Minister for Foreign Affairs, where they discussed the war in Ukraine, NATOs enhanced deterrence and defence in the importance of Iceland for maintaining situational awareness in the North-Atlantic. […]

”This has been a fruitful visit to Iceland, a founding member of NATO a long-standing Ally of the United States,” said General Hecker.  ”It has been valuable to see the extent of NATO infrastructure that is operated by the Iceland, such as the remote NATO Radar and Communication Sites, which form an important contribution to air domain situational awareness in a strategically important region. I have also had the pleasure of visiting the B2 Bomber. We are grateful to our Icelandic partners for enabling this deployment, and to the professional Icelandic Coast Guard that provides host nation support in Keflavik.” Läs artikel

In Rewriting Histories of the Use of Force: The Narrative of ‘Indifference’, Agatha Verdebout takes aim at the ostensible agreement among legal scholars that in the 19th century – the ‘golden age of positivism’ – international law neither prohibited nor authorized the use of armed force between states. Paradoxically, the consensus on this ‘theory of indifference’ stands in marked contrast with the endless contemporary debates on the interpretation of the rules on the use of force under the Charter of the United Nations (UN Charter) […]

The condemnation by the UN General Assembly of Russia’s large-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 – with 141 votes in favour and only five states voting against – rather confirms that there is no place for such discourse in today’s international legal order and that any cross-border military action must fit within one of the narrow categories for permissible use of force provided for in the Charter framework. One could also refer to the wholesale rejection of preventive self-defence against ‘non-imminent’ threats as an indication that the ad bellum rules have grown more ‘determinate’ and far less ‘self-judging’ compared to the 19th century. By way of illustration, explaining why the USA had not invoked the right of self-defence at the time of the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, then US Legal Adviser Abram Chayes noted that such a claim would have made the recourse to force essentially a question for unilateral national determination and would have excluded any possibility of meaningful review. The International Court of Justice, for its part, has similarly emphasized that Article 51 of the UN Charter ‘does not allow the use of force by a State to protect perceived security interests beyond’ its strict confines. Läs artikel 

On Wednesday, August 23, India became the fourth nation on the moon and the first nation to land on the moon´s south pole. Behind the complicated autonomous soft landing is a researcher, Avijit Banerjee, at Luleå University of Technology (LTU) in Northern Sweden.

Avijit Banerjee has for three years been the leader of the research focus on space autonomy within the Robotics and AI group at LTU. There he was working with the autonomous soft landing for the lunar lander, Chandrayaan-3, that landed on the rim of Shackleton Crater on the moon.

”Of course, I am very happy and honored that my solution for autonomous and safe soft landing on the moon has been implemented on board the lunar lander by the team of the Indian Space Organization, ISRO, for their lunar exploration mission Chandrayaan-3,” says Avijit Banerjee to North Sweden Business.

Space autonomy is the new challenge in space research, with the goal of completing next-generation space missions, and Luleå University of Technology states that they aims to be at the forefront. Läs artikel