Podcasts about kremlin

France and Mali have been exchanging harsh words in recent weeks. The tension between the two usually close allies started to sour after Paris's decision to withdraw troops from the country. Now there are reports that the government in Bamako will turn to the Russian private security group Wagner to help maintain security. Wagner provide private soldiers in conflicts around the world, such as Central African Republic. Also, the Kremlin has recently sent in helicopters, weapons and ammunition to Mali. So, has Mali found an ally in Russia? Host: Alan Kasujja (@Kasujja) Guest: Beverly Ochieng (@BeverlyOchieng) #AfricaDaily

Photo:  Front-line Moscow. Barricade at the intersection of Balchug Street and Lubochny Lane. Built to protect the Kremlin under the leadership of engineer Pavel Andreevich Sokolov. Moscow warns of full lockdown. Felix Light @CBSNews @MoscowTimes HFN https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2021/10/20/moscow-will-go-into-full-lockdown-if-cases-dont-fall-government-order-a75355

GEORGE PAPADOPOULOS -&- SIMONA MANGIANTE PAPADOPOULOS join @TootsSweet & @JewelsJones1 on the Patriots In Tune Show - Patriots In Tune Show - Ep. # 471 -

POUTINE, LE MAÎTRE DU JEU – 17/10/21 ÉMISSION SPÉCIALE Invités FRANÇOIS CLEMENCEAU Rédacteur en chef international - « Le Journal du Dimanche » PHILIPPE DESSERTINE Directeur de l'institut de Haute Finance CLÉMENTINE FAUCONNIER Politologue spécialiste de la Russie Maîtresse de conférences en science politique - Université de Haute-Alsace LAURE MANDEVILLE Grand reporter - « Le Figaro » Ancienne correspondante en Russie Le Président américain Joe Biden l'a qualifié de “tueur” en mars dernier, un compliment qui lui a très vite été retourné. Une escalade verbale au parfum de guerre froide entre le président américain et Vladimir Poutine. Pourtant, le chef du Kremlin n'a jamais paru aussi fort : après 22 ans au pouvoir et une nouvelle victoire aux élections en septembre dernier, une révision constitutionnelle le rend désormais éligible jusqu'en 2036, et donc plus «tsarifié» que jamais. En deux décennies, Poutine a ainsi réussi à éliminer toute réelle concurrence politique autour de lui. Son seul adversaire sérieux, Alexeï Navalny, croupit dans une colonie pénitentiaire après avoir été empoisonné ; ses partisans sont arrêtés par milliers et les pressions occidentales n'y font rien. Porté par des médias aux ordres, Poutine reste soutenu, en apparence du moins, par 60 % de sa population, malgré la pandémie et une économie au ralenti. Sur la scène internationale, le maître du Kremlin multiplie les offensives : ingérences électorales, annexions territoriales, affaires d'espionnage, recours à des armes interdites … Poutine s'affranchit de toutes les règles et rien ne semble arrêter cet ancien espion qui rêve d'une Russie au centre du jeu, et vivant dans une paranoïa - alimentée par des services secrets devenus surpuissants - de l'ennemi aux portes du pays. En pleine actualité, la Russie de Poutine inquiète à différents niveaux. Gros exportateur de gaz, elle est accusée de chantage énergétique sur les Européens avec des prix qui bondissent à la veille de l'hiver. L'enjeu serait de contraindre l'Europe à s'engager sur des contrats de plusieurs années.Son rapprochement avec la Chine pose aussi question. Ces deux régimes autoritaires s'épaulent dans leur lecture commune des relations internationales. En France enfin, alors que la campagne pour la présidentielle démarre, l'éventualité d'une ingérence russe est redoutée par beaucoup. La question est en réalité de savoir jusqu'où Poutine est prêt à aller pour se maintenir au pouvoir. Quel est son pouvoir de nuisance au sein de nos démocraties occidentales, dont il est devenu le meilleur ennemi? Des questions que nous avons posées à ceux qui ont directement côtoyé Vladimir Poutine : Le porte-parole du Kremlin mais également François hollande ou l'actuel Ministre des affaires étrangères. A l'occasion d'une nouvelle soirée spéciale C dans l'air, Caroline Roux vous emmène à la rencontre d'un homme à sang froid et à la poigne de fer. Une personnalité rude et glaciale, ceinture noire de la diplomatie dans un monde digne des plus grands films d'espionnage. Des tranchées du Donbass aux pavés de la Place Rouge, en passant par les coulisses du parlement européen et les stades centrafricains, une plongée au cœur du système Poutine avec les meilleurs experts de C dans l'Air et la participation d'invités exceptionnels, interviewés par Caroline Roux. DIFFUSION : du lundi au samedi à 17h45 FORMAT : 40 minutes PRÉSENTATION : Caroline Roux DOCUMENTAIRE ÉCRIT par Barbara Stec & Marie Lorand RÉALISÉ par Marie Lorand ÉMISSION RÉALISÉE par Nicolas Ferraro PRODUCTION : France Télévisions / Maximal Productions Retrouvez C DANS L'AIR sur internet & les réseaux : INTERNET : francetv.fr FACEBOOK : https://www.facebook.com/Cdanslairf5 TWITTER : https://twitter.com/cdanslair INSTAGRAM : https://www.instagram.com/cdanslair/

Russia has passed 1,000 daily Covid-related deaths for the first time since the pandemic began. The Kremlin has blamed the number on people not taking up the vaccination. Only about a third of the nation has had the vaccine. Also in the programme: British politicians reflect on the murder of their colleague David Amess, and anti-government protesters take to the streets in Sudan. (Picture: Health workers escort a Covid-19 patient to a hospital in Moscow. CREDIT: EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV)

From December 24, 2016: Whatever the President-elect might say on the matter, the question of Russian interference in the presidential election is not going away: calls continue in the Senate for an investigation into the Kremlin's meddling, and the security firm Crowdstrike recently released new information linking one of the two entities responsible for the DNC hack with Russia's military intelligence agency. So how should the United States respond?In War on the Rocks, Evan Perkoski and Michael Poznansky recently reviewed the possibilities in their piece, "An Eye for an Eye: Deterring Russian Cyber Intrusions." They've also written on this issue before in a previous piece titled "Attribution and Secrecy in Cyber Intrusions." We brought them on the podcast to talk about what deterrence of Russian interference would look like and why it's necessary.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

It is an honor to welcome Larnelle Harris to the podcast. Larnelle has one of the biggest voices in Gospel music and has been singing for nearly 50 years. He's released 24 albums, been awarded 5 Grammy Awards, 11 Dove Awards, and numerous hall of fame inductions. Larnelle shares stories about digging wells in Malawi and singing in the Kremlin, using the tools and gifts God gave him. Larnelle Harris: Website, Facebook, and Twitter. And of course, on our page: Christian Music Archive. Christian Music Archive Links: Website, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube. The podcast and our website are made possible through the generous support of listeners like you. Visit Patreon to learn how you can support the work we do. **** Please be sure to check out Mercy, inc. and see how you can support them today! ****

In 1973: a final, top-secret mission was planned to go to the Moon. Three astronauts in a tiny spaceship, a quarter-million miles from home. A quarter-million miles from help. NASA is about to launch Apollo 18. While the mission has been billed as a scientific one, flight controller Kazimieras "Kaz" Zemeckis knows there is a darker objective. Intelligence has discovered a secret Soviet space station spying on America, and Apollo 18 may be the only chance to stop it But even as Kaz races to keep the NASA crew one step ahead of their Russian rivals, a deadly accident reveals that not everyone involved is quite who they were thought to be. With political stakes stretched to the breaking point, the White House and the Kremlin can only watch as their astronauts collide on the lunar surface, far beyond the reach of law or rescue. The Apollo Murders is a high-stakes thriller unlike any other. Chris Hadfield captures the fierce G-forces of launch, the frozen loneliness of space, and the fear of holding on to the outside of a spacecraft orbiting the Earth at 17,000 miles per hour as only someone who has experienced all of these things in real life can. We also discussed touring with David Bowie's band, the time he met Sir Arthur C. Clarke, his dream aviation 'hangar', and even aliens! I found him incredibly vulnerable, authentic, and honest. His thoughts on how best to lead life… and grapple with death plus his one regret in life. "An exceptional debut thriller and “exciting journey” into the dark heart of the Cold War and the space race from New York Times bestselling author and astronaut Chris Hadfield" (Andy Weir, author of The Martian and Project Hail Mary), past guest: https://youtu.be/JuoDANMASLc “Nail-biting . . . I couldn't put it down.” —James Cameron, writer and director of Avatar and Titanic “Not to be missed.” —Frederick Forsyth, author of The Day of the Jackal “An explosive thriller by a writer who has actually been to space . . . Strap in for the ride!” —Gregg Hurwitz, author of Orphan X Get the Apollo Murders here: https://amzn.to/3aCJLn7 LinkedIn Jobs is the best platform for finding the right candidate to join your business this fall. It's the largest marketplace for job seekers in the world, and it has great search features so that you can find candidates with any hard or soft skills that you need. And now, you can post a job for free. Just visit linkedin.com/impossible to post a job for free.  Audible is hands-down my favorite platform for consuming podcasts, fiction and nonfiction books! With an Audible membership, you can download titles and listen offline, anytime, anywhere. The Audible app is free and can be installed on all smartphones and tablets. You can listen across devices without losing your spot. Audible members don't have to worry about using their credits right away. You can keep your credits for up to a year—and use them to binge on a whole series if you'd like! And if you're not loving your selection, you can simply swap it for another.Start your free 30-day trial today:  Audible.com/impossible or text “impossible” to 500-500

Photo: View of one of Bröderna Nobel's limited company drilling rigs - for extraction of oil by pumping (Ausschöpfen). Balachani 1883 .. (More text can be found on the back of the photograph). The photograph is in red cardboard with the text - Pictures from some facilities within Nafta-Produktionsaktiebolag Bröderna Nobel. @Batchelorshow The Kremlin charge of Europe and China winter. H. J. Mackinder #FriendsofHistoryDebatingSociety https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-10-10/world-s-energy-chaos-turns-russia-into-top-emerging-market-pick?srnd=premium-europe&sref=5g4GmFHo

In conversation with Trudy Rubin, Worldview columnist, The Philadelphia Inquirer Known for her testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives during Donald Trump's 2019 impeachment hearings, Fiona Hill has more than 30 years of experience in foreign policy. The Robert Bosch Senior Fellow at the Center on the United States and Europe in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, she is a former National Security Council official and a former officer at the National Intelligence Council. Hill is the coauthor of Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin and The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold, and she has written extensively on strategic issues related to Eastern Europe and Central Asia. In There Is Nothing for You Here, she traces her path as the daughter of a coal miner in northern England to her service to three U.S. Presidents. Hill examines the desperation impacting American politics and shows why expanding opportunity is the only long-term hope for our democracy. Books provided by Uncle Bobbie's Coffee and Books (recorded 10/7/2021)

In the last few weeks, the Russian government has been turning up the heat on tech platforms in an escalation of its long-standing efforts to bring the internet under its control. First, Russia forced Apple and Google to remove an app from their app stores that would have helped voters select non-Kremlin-backed candidates in the country's recent parliamentary elections. Then, the government threatened to block YouTube within Russia if the platform refused to reinstate two German-language channels run by the state-backed outlet RT. And after we recorded this podcast, the Russian government announced that it would fine Facebook for not being quick enough in removing content that Russia identified as illegal.What's driving this latest offensive, and what does it mean for the future of the Russian internet? This week on Arbiters of Truth, our series on the online information ecosystem, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic spoke with Alina Polyakova, the president and CEO of the Center for European Policy Analysis, and Anastasiia Zlobina, the coordinator for Europe and Central Asia at Human Rights Watch. They explained what this crackdown means for social media platforms whose Russian employees might soon be at risk, the legal structures behind the Russian government's actions and what's motivating the Kremlin to extend its control over the internet.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

September 12th 1952: After a flurry of UFO sightings, a bright light streaks across the skies of Braxton County, West Virginia, coming to Earth on a hillside near the village of Flatwoods. Witnesses set out to investigate... and experience a terrifying encounter quite unlike anything else in the annals of the weird. An alien monster, an extraterrestrial robot, a bizarre military psy-op... or the world's scariest owl? Mike and Martin discuss. Support Talking till Dawn: patreon.com/talkingtilldawn Website: talkingtilldawn.com Twitter: @TalkingTill Email: talkingtilldawn@gmail.com References: The Braxton County Monster, by Frank Feschino Shoot Them Down, by Frank Feschino Flying Saucers from the Kremlin, by Nick Redfern

On this episode of Fault Lines, hosts Jamarl Thomas and Shane Stranahan talk about efforts to revive the Wooly Mammoth, the meeting between President Erdoğan and President Putin, the everlasting pushback against the reconciliation package, and censorship by Google and YouTube that Russia is taking exception to.Guests:George Church - American geneticist, molecular engineer, and chemist | Inside the Resurrections of Wooly MammothBen Lamm - CEO and serial technological engineer | Inside the Resurrections of Wooly MammothMark Sleboda - International Relations and Security Analyst | Turkey & Russia Negotiations, NY Missile TestKim Iversen - Independent journalist and host of the Kim Iversen Show | The Left Holds, Pelosi FoldsIn the first hour George Church and Ben Lamm joined the show to talk about their company's project to resurrect the wooly mammoth in the modern climate. They hope their efforts on arctic rewilding will help redirect the extinction timeline.In the second hour Fault Lines was joined by Mark Sleboda for a discussion on the rising tensions between Turkey's President Erdoğan and America's President Biden. Erodğan then took to talks with Russia to pit the nations against each other.In the third hour Kim Iversen joined the conversation to talk about the inability of the Democrats to pass the reconciliation package. Kim also talked about the conflict between Google and Russia after the tech giant kicked RT Germany off of YouTube.

We discuss a haunted house actor stabbing a boy, China banning cryptocurrency and smart watches.

GriftHorse will subscribe afflicted Android users to premium services they never knew they'd signed up for (and wouldn't want if they did). Facebook releases a static analysis tool it uses internally to check apps for security issues. Speculation about what put Group-IB's CEO in hot water with the Kremlin. A look from NSA about where the major nation-state cyberthreats currently stand. Malek Ben Salem from Accenture has thoughts on quantum security. Our guest is author and Wired editor at large Steven Levy joins us with insights on Facebook's internal research teams. And a short census of ransomware strains. For links to all of today's stories check out our CyberWire daily news briefing: https://www.thecyberwire.com/newsletters/daily-briefing/10/189

We've touched on spies but never before have we discussed Kremlin spy operations like this. Edward Lucas joins Olga and Mo to discuss how and why Russian intelligence operations pose a unique danger to democracy.    Edward Lucas is a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA). He was formerly a senior editor at The Economist. Lucas has covered Central and Eastern European affairs since 1986, writing, broadcasting, and speaking on the politics, economics, and security of the region. He is the author of four books: The New Cold War (2008, newly revised and republished); Deception (2011); The Snowden Operation (2014), and Cyberphobia (2015). Edward Lucas's Twitter: https://twitter.com/edwardlucas  Edward's Liberal Democrats Campaign Site for Cities of London & Westminster: https://www.edwardlucas.com/volunteer  KremlinFile.com Watch the Video Podcast on MeidasTouch's Facebook: https://facebook.com/watch/104614641200137/1560647640940478/   Olga's twitter: @OlgaNYC1211 Mo's twitter: @MoniqueCamarra Meidas Media + bunker crew BetterHelp Sponsor Discount: https://betterhelp.com/kremlinfile 

Thomas Graham, distinguished fellow at CFR, leads a conversation on constraining Putin's Russia. FASKIANOS: Welcome to today's session of the CFR Fall 2021 Academic Webinar Series. I'm Irina Faskianos, vice president of the National Program and Outreach here at CFR. Today's meeting is on the record, and the video and transcript will be available on our website CFR.org/academic if you would like to share it with your colleagues or classmates. As always, CFR takes no institutional positions on matters of policy. We are delighted to have Thomas Graham with us to talk about Putin's Russia. Mr. Graham is a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a senior advisor at Kissinger Associates, where he focuses on Russian and Eurasian affairs. He is cofounder of the Russian, East European, and Eurasian studies program at Yale University, and is also a research fellow at the MacMillan Center at Yale. He previously served as special assistant to President George W. Bush and senior director for Russia on the National Security Council staff from 2004 to 2007, and director for Russian affairs from 2002 to 2004. His résumé is very distinguished. I will just also say that he is a U.S. diplomat who served two tours of duty in Moscow, where he worked on political affairs. So, Mr. Graham, thanks very much for being with us today. I thought you could get us started by talking about the primary interests at stake in U.S.-Russia relations. GRAHAM: Great. Thank you very much, Irina, for that introduction, and it's a real pleasure to be with all of you here today. I want to start with three broad points that will frame the rest of our discussion. The first is that the problem that the United States faces is not simply with Putin; it is with Russia more generally speaking. The last seven years of very difficult, challenging adversarial relationship is really not an aberration in the history of the relationship between our two countries. In fact, from the moment the United States emerged as a major power on the global stage at the very end of the nineteenth century, we have had a rivalry with Russia. And the issues that divide us today are the ones that divided us 125, 150 years ago: We have opposing worldviews. We have different geopolitical interests. And clearly, we have different systems of values that inform our domestic political systems. This rivalry has intensified, ebbed and flowed during the twentieth century. But the effort we made at partnership after the breakup of the Soviet Union up until 2014, marked by the eruption of the crisis in Ukraine, is really the aberration in the history of relations between our two countries and one that was founded very much on the fact that Russia endured a period of strategic weakness. So the issue we have to deal with Russia and how we're going to deal with Russia well into the future, even after Putin departs—which he will, obviously, at some point, if only for biological reasons. The second point that I would make is that Russia is not going to go away. We hear a lot in the public debate in the United States about Russian decline, about the population/demographic problems it has, about its stagnating economy, and so forth. None of this is necessarily untrue, but I think it tends to exaggerate the problems that Russia faces. It ignores the problems that all other major countries face—including China, the United States, and many major European countries—but it also overlooks the very great strengths that Russia has had for decades that are going to make it a player and an important player on the global stage, nuclear weapons to begin with. We should never forget that Russia remains the only country that can destroy the United States as a functioning society in thirty minutes. Russia has the largest natural endowment of any country in the world, a country that can pretend to self-sufficiency and, in fact, is better placed than most other countries to deal with a breakdown in globalization in the decades to come if that, indeed, happens. It has a veto on the U.N. Security Council, which makes it an important player on issues of importance to the United States, and it has a talented population that has fostered a scientific community that, for example, is capable of taking advances in technology and developing the military applications from them. Just look at the strength that Russia exhibits in cyberspace, for example—again, a major challenge for the United States. So Russia is going to continue to be a challenge. One other thing that I should have mentioned here is that the Russian state throughout history and Putin's Russia today has demonstrated a keen ability to mobilize the resources of their own society for state purposes. So even if in relative terms they may be weaker and weakening vis-à-vis China and the United States, in some ways that political will, that ability to mobilize, allows Russia to play a much larger role than mere indicators of its economic size and population size would suggest. Now, Russia clashes with the United States across a whole range of issues, and as I said that is going to continue for some time. And this brings me to my third point: How we should think about American foreign policy, what our guidelines should be in dealing with Russia. And here there are three, I think, key elements to this. First, the United States needs to preserve strategic stability. We need to have that nuclear balance between us (sic) and the United States. This is an existential question. And as I already mentioned, Russia does have a tremendous nuclear capability. Second, the United States should seek to manage its competition with Russia responsibly. We want to avoid or reduce the risk of a direct military conflict that could escalate to the nuclear level. This is—also, I think, recognizes that the United States is not going to be able to compel Russia to capitulate on issues that are of interest to us, nor are we going to be able to radically change the way they think about their own national interests. So it's a competitive relationship and we need to manage that responsibly. And finally, given the complex world that we live in today—the very real transnational challenges we face: climate change, pandemic diseases, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction—the United States should seek, to the extent possible, ways to cooperate with Russia in dealing with these issues. We should recognize that Russia is not necessarily the only player nor necessarily the most important player in dealing with these challenges, but it does have a role to play along with other major powers in handling these transnational issues. So those, I think, are three sort of broad points that help set the stage for our discussion. Now let me turn sort of very briefly to the questions about U.S. policy. How do we deal with this Russia? What are sort of—the way we should think about American foreign policy? And here the point I would make is that we should think of the policy in terms of what I would call the three Ds: defense, deterrence, and dialogue. Now, defense and deterrence in many ways go together. If you have a very good defense, if you demonstrate an ability and willingness to defend your interests effectively and deliberately, then you tend to deter another power. They have less reason to want to attack you. But if deterrence fails, you very much need to be able to defend yourself—to disrupt Russian operations in cyberspace, for example, or disrupt military operations by the Russians that you find problematic in some way. So defense and deterrence go together, and we need to think about that. Now, you build these elements on a number of other things that we're all familiar with. A strong military—strong, capable military—is, obviously, an element of both defense and deterrence, and something that we have managed quite well in the past and I imagine will manage quite well going into the future. Cyber defenses are also an important element of constraining Russia on the global stage. Now, here the United States really has much room for improvement. We built our internet, our cyberspace largely for the accessibility, the ability to pass information from one entity to another, and we spent much less attention to the security of that system. As cyberspace has become more important to our socioeconomic and political lives, we really need to devote much more attention to cybersecurity, hardening our commuter—computer networks, for example, making sure we have strong passwords and so forth, something that I think we now recognize but we need to put a much greater effort into doing that. Third area of defense and deterrence is strong alliances. When we're thinking about Russia, this is clearly the transatlantic community, NATO, our relations with our other European partners. And here, we need to develop the types of military/defense cooperation that we need to demonstrate quite clearly that the United States, along with the rest of the NATO allies, is ready and prepared to meet its Article 5 guarantees to collective security should the Russians do something that is untoward in our neighborhood. And then, finally, and I think of increasing importance, is the question of national unity. National unity, national resilience, has really become a key element in defense and deterrence at this point. We need to demonstrate to the Russians that we have sufficient national unity to clearly identify what our interests are and pursue them on the international stage. One of Putin's close colleagues several years ago said that what Putin is doing is messing with the Americans' minds, and certainly we've seen that over the past several years. Putin hasn't sowed the discord in the United States, but he certainly has tried to exploit it for Russian purposes. And this is something that he's going to concentrate on in the future, in part because he recognizes the dangers of military confrontation with the United States. So great-power competition, from the Kremlin's standpoint, is going to move very, very quickly from the kinetic realm to the cyber realm, and we need to be able to deal with that. So building national unity at home, overcoming our polarization, is really perhaps one of the key steps in constraining Russia on the global stage. And then, finally, some very brief words about dialogue. We tend to downplay this in our national discussion. Many believe that diplomatic relations are—should not be branded as a reward for bad behavior. But I think if you look at this objectively, you'll see that diplomatic relations are very important as a way of defending and advancing our national concerns. It's a way that we can convey clearly to the Russians what our expectations are, what our goals are, what our redlines are, and the responses that we're capable of taking if Russia crosses them. At the same time, we can learn from the Russians what their goals are, what their motivations are, what their redlines are, and we can factor that into our own policy. This is a major element of managing the competition between our two countries responsibly. You'll see that we have begun to engage in negotiations and diplomacy with the Russians much more under President Biden than we did under President Trump. We've already launched strategic stability talks with the aim of coming up with a new concept of strategic stability that's adequate to the strategic environment of the present day and the near future. We've engaged in cybersecurity talks, which my understanding is have, in fact, had some success over the past several weeks. Where we, I think, have lagged is in the discussion of regional issues—Europe, Ukraine, the Middle East, for example. These are areas where there is still potential for conflict, and the United States and Russia ought to be sitting down and talking about these issues on a regular basis. So three Ds—defense, deterrence, and diplomacy or dialogue—are the ways that we should be thinking about our relationship with Russia. And obviously, we'll need to adjust each of these three elements to the specific issue at hand, whether it be in Europe, whether it be in the nuclear realm, cyberspace, and so forth. Now, with that as a way—by way of introduction, I am very pleased to entertain your questions. FASKIANOS: Tom, thanks very much for that terrific overview and analysis. We're going to go to all of you now for your questions. You can either raise your hand by clicking on the icon, and I will call on you, and you can tell us what institution you are with; or you can type your question in the Q&A box, although if you want to ask it you can raise your hand. We encourage that. And if you're typing your question, please let us know what college or university you're with. So I'm going to take the first raised-hand question from Babak Salimitari. And unmute yourself. Q: Can you guys hear me? GRAHAM: Yes. FASKIANOS: Yes. Q: Hello. I'm a third-year UCI student, economics. I have a question. I'm going to sound a bit like Sean Hannity here, so please forgive me, but I have a question about that Nord Stream 2 pipeline that you constantly hear on the news, and it just doesn't make that much sense for me of why this pipeline was allowed to be completed into the heart of Europe considering Russia's strength with natural gases and the leverage that they have over Europe with that pipeline. Why was that allowed to be completed? GRAHAM: Well, I think from the standpoint of the Biden administration this was a matter of what we call alliance management. Germany is clearly a key ally for the United States in Europe, and the Germans were very committed to the completion of that pipeline, starting with Chancellor Angela Merkel down through I think both the leading political parties and the German business community. So I think they made the decision for that. But let me step back because I'd like to challenge a lot of the assumptions about the Nord Stream 2 project here in the United States, which I think misconceive it, misframe the question, and tend to exaggerate the dangers that is poses. The first point that I would make is that Europe now and in the future will have and need Russian gas. It's taken a substantial amount in the past—in the past decades, and even as it moves forward towards a green revolution it will continue to take considerable amounts of Russian gas. It can't do without that gas. So the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, contrary to what you hear in the United States or at the U.S. Congress, I don't think poses an additional threat to Europe's energy security, no larger than the threat that was posed before that pipeline was completed. The Europeans, I think are aware of the problems that that poses, and they've taken steps over the past several years to integrate the gas—the gas distribution network in Europe, to build facilities to import liquified natural gas, all as a way of eroding the leverage that Gazprom might have had over energy markets in Europe. And that has been quite successful over the past—over the past several years. Now, I think, you know, the other issue that comes up in the discussion in the United States is Ukraine, because Nord Stream 2 clearly provides Russia with a way to import the gas into Europe and bypass Ukraine at the—at the same time. And Ukraine is going to suffer a significant loss in budgetary revenue because of the decline in transit fees that it gets from the transportation of Russian gas across its territory. You know, that is a problem, but there are ways of dealing with that: by helping Ukraine fill the budgetary gap, by helping Ukraine transition away from a reliance on gas to other forms of energy, of helping Ukraine develop the green-energy resources that will make it a much more important partner in the European energy equation than it is now. And then finally, you know, it strikes me as somewhat wrongheaded for Ukraine to put itself in a position where it is reliant on a country that is clearly a belligerent for a significant part of its federal revenue. So we need to think hard with the Ukrainians about how they deal with this issue, how they wean themselves off Russian transit fees, and then I think we have a situation where we can help Ukraine, we can manage the energy-security situation in Europe, we can reduce any leverage that Russia might have, and that Nord Stream 2 really doesn't pose a significant risk to the United States or our European allies over the long run. FASKIANOS: Thank you. We're going to take the next question from the written queue from Kenneth Mayers, who's at St Francis—sorry, that just popped away; oh, sorry—St. Francis College. Thinking beyond this triangular framework, what pathways and possibilities can be envisioned for a more positive dimension of working together in mutually, even globally, beneficial ways? GRAHAM: What triangular relationship are we talking about? FASKIANOS: His—thinking beyond this triangular framework and— GRAHAM: Oh, OK. So I think it's defense, deterrence, and diplomacy is the— FASKIANOS: Correct. GRAHAM: OK. Can you repeat the final part of the question, then? FASKIANOS: What pathways and possibilities can be envisioned for a more positive dimension of working together in mutually beneficial ways? GRAHAM: Well, there are a number of areas in which we can work together beneficially. If you think about proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, for example, the United States and Russia over the past two decades have played a major role in both securing weapons that were located in Russia, but also in securing highly-enriched uranium that was in Soviet-designed reactors throughout the former Soviet space. We have taken a lead together in setting down rules and procedures that reduce the risk of nuclear material—fissile material getting into the hands of terrorist organizations. And we have played a role together in trying to constrain the Iranian nuclear program. Russia played an instrumental role in the conclusion of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that we signed in 2015 that the Trump administration walked away with, but they will continue to play a role in constraining Iranians' nuclear ambitions going forward. And we've also worked in a cooperative fashion in dealing with the North Korean nuclear program. So there are areas in nonproliferation where the two countries can work together. On climate change, I mean, I think the big challenge for the United States is actually persuading Russia that climate change is a significant threat to their own security. They're slowly beginning to change that view, but as they come around to recognizing that they have to deal with climate change there are a number of areas where the two countries can cooperate. One of the things that climate is doing is melting the permafrost. That is destabilizing the foundation of much of Russia's energy infrastructure in areas where gas and oil are extracted for export abroad. The United States has dome technologies that the Russians might find of interest in stabilizing that infrastructure. They suffer from problems of Siberian fires—peat-bog fires, forest fires—an area that, obviously, is of concern to the United States as well. And there may be room for cooperation there, two. And then, finally, you know, the United States and Russia have two of the leading scientific communities in the entire world. We ought to be working together on ways that we can help mitigate the consequences of climate change going forward. So I see an array of areas where the two countries could cooperate, but that will depend on good diplomacy in Washington and a receptivity on the part of the Russians which we haven't seen quite yet. FASKIANOS: Thank you. Let's go next to Jeffrey Ko. You can unmute yourself. Thank you. Q: Hi. So I'm Jeffrey Ko. I'm an international relations master's student at Carnegie Mellon. And my question has to deal with these private military forces, and especially the Wagner Group. And so I would like to know, you know, how does this play into our security strategy regarding Russia in countries that have seen proxy warfare? And how does this—how difficult will it be to engage with Russia either diplomatically or militarily on the use of these gray-zone tactics, and specifically utilizing the Wagner Group as an informal branch of Russia's military? GRAHAM: Well, look, I mean, I do think that we need, one, to sit down and have a discussion with Russia about the use of these private military forces, particularly the Wagner firm, which has played a significant role in a number of conflicts across the globe in the Middle East, Africa, and in Latin America. But we also ought to help the countries that are of interest to us deal with the problems that the Wagner Group causes. You know, the United States had to deal with the Wagner Group in Syria during the Syrian civil war. You know, despite the fact that we had a deconfliction exercise with the Russians at that point, tried to prevent military conflicts between our two militaries operating in close proximity, when the Wagner forces violated those strictures and actually began to attack a U.S. facility, we had no hesitation about using the force that we had to basically obliterate that enemy. And the Wagner Group suffered casualties numbering in the hundreds, one to two hundred. I think the Russians got the message about that, that you don't—you don't mess with the United States military, certainly not while using a private military company like Wagner. You know, in places like Libya, where Wagner is quite active, I think the United States needs a major diplomatic effort to try to defuse the Libyan crisis. And part of the solution to that would be negotiating an agreement that calls for the withdrawal of all foreign military forces and certainly private military groups from Libyan territory, and lean on the Russians to carry that through. In any event, you know, this is not going to be an easy issue to resolve. I think we deal with this by—country by country, and we focus our attention on those countries where our national interests are greatest. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question from Jill Dougherty, who's at Georgetown University. The Putin administration appears to be hardening its control of Russia's society with the purpose of keeping Putin in power at least until 2036. Most recent example is the Duma elections that just took place. Will this crackdown domestically affect or damage U.S.-Russia relations? GRAHAM: Thank you, Jill. Always a good question and always a difficult question to answer. You know, I think the issue here is the extent to which the Biden administration wants to make the domestic political situation in Russia a key item on its agenda with Russia over the next—over the next few years. You know, my impression from the conversations I've had with people in the administration—in and around the administration is that President Biden is not going to focus on this. You know, his focus really is going to be China, and what he wants to do is maintain something of a status quo in the relationship with Russia. You will notice that the second round of sanctions that the United States levied with regard to the poisoning of Alexei Navalny, something that was mandated by U.S. law, were actually quite mild—much less extreme, much less punitive than the legislation allowed—I think a signal that the Biden administration was not going to let domestic political issues in Russia overwhelm the agenda that the United States has, which is going to be focused on strategic stability, cyber issues, and so forth. So my immediate reaction is that the Duma election is really not going to have a dramatic impact on the state of the relationship between our two countries. We accept the fact that Russia is an authoritarian system. It is becoming more authoritarian. We will continue to try to find ways to support those elements of civil society we can, but always being careful not to do it in ways that causes the Russian government to crack down even harder on those individuals. This is a very sort of difficult needle to thread for the United States, but I think that's the way we'll go and you won't see this as a major impediment to the improvement of relations—which, as we all know, are at a very low level at this point in any event. FASKIANOS: Great. Thank you. Let's go next to Sujay Utkarsh. Q: Hi, yeah. Can you hear me? GRAHAM: Yes. FASKIANOS: Yes. Q: Awesome. So, regarding the issue about cyber warfare, I was wondering if you can go into more detail about what advantages the Russians have in cyberspace and what the United States can do to compete with those advantages. GRAHAM: A good question and a difficult question for people outside the government to answer, since we're not privy to all the information about Russian cyber capabilities nor are we privy to the information about American cyber capabilities. Both countries cloak those programs in a great deal of secrecy. You know, it seemed to me that one of the advantages that perhaps Russia has is that it's a much more closed society than the United States. Now, I'm thinking simply in terms of the way societies can be disrupted through cyberspace. We're a much more open society. It's easier to access our internet. We are—just as I mentioned before, we are a polarized society right now. That allows Russia many avenues into our domestic political system in order to exacerbate the tensions between various elements in our society. The United States can't reply in the same way in dealing with Russia. You know, second, Russia, in building its own internet, its own cyberspace, has paid much more attention to security than the United States has. So, you know, I would presume that its computer systems are somewhat harder to penetrate than American systems are at this point, although another factor to take into account here is that much of the initial effort in building up cyberspace—the Web, the computer networks—in Russia was built with American technology. You know, the Googles, the Intels, and others played an instrumental role in providing those types of—that type of equipment to the Russians. So I wouldn't exaggerate how much stronger they are there. And then, finally, I think what is probably one of the strengths, if you want to call it that, is that Russia is probably a little more risk-prone in using its cyber tools than the United States is at this point, in part because we think as a society we're more vulnerable. And that does give Russia a slight advantage. That said, this shouldn't be a problem that's beyond the capability of the United States to manage if we put our minds to it. We have done a lot more over the past several years. We are getting better at this. And I think we'll continue to improve in time and with the appropriate programs, the appropriate education of American society. FASKIANOS: Thank you. The next question is a written one from Kim-Leigh Tursi, a third-year undergraduate at Temple University. Where do you see Russia in relation to the rise of China, and how does that affect how the U.S. might approach foreign policy toward Russia? GRAHAM: Well, you know, that's an important question, obviously one that a lot of people have focused on recently. You know, Russia and China have developed a very close working strategic relationship over the—over the past several years, but I think we should note that the Russian effort to rebuild its relations with China go back to the late Soviet period to overcome the disadvantages that then the Soviet Union felt they had because of the poor relationship with China and the ability of the United States to exploit that relationship to Moscow's detriment. So relations have been improving for the past twenty-five, thirty years; obviously, a dramatic acceleration in that improvement after 2014 and the breakdown in relations between Russia and the West. Now, there are a number of reasons for this alignment at this point. One, the two countries do share at a very general level a basic view of for—a basic dislike of what they see as American ambitions to dominate the global—the global security and economic environment. They don't like what they consider to be American hegemonic goals. Second, the economies seem to be complementary at this point. Russia does have a wealth of natural resources that the Chinese need to fuel their robust economic growth. You have similar domestic political systems. And all of this, I think, is reinforced by what appears to be a very good personal relationship between President Putin and President Xi Jinping. These two leaders have met dozens of times over the past five to seven years and have maintained, I think, very robust contact even during the—during the pandemic. So there are very good strategic reasons why these two countries enjoy good relations. They are going to step those up in the near term. The Russians are continuing to provide the Chinese with significant sophisticated military equipment. They've also undertaken to help the Chinese build an early warning system for ballistic missiles, and when that's completed it will make China only the third country in the world to have such a system along with Russia and the United States. Now, I would argue that this strategic alignment does pose something of a challenge to the United States. If you look at American foreign policy or American foreign policy tradition, one of the principles that has guided the United States since the end of the nineteenth century, certainly throughout the twentieth century, was that we needed to prevent the—any hostile country or coalition of hostile countries from dominating areas of great strategic importance, principally Europe, East Asia, and more recently the Middle East. A Russian-Chinese strategic alignment certainly increases the chances of China dominating East Asia. Depending on how close that relationship grows, it also could have significant impact on Europe and the way Europe relates to this Russian-Chinese bloc, and therefore to the United States as a whole. So we should have an interest in trying to sort of attenuate the relationship between the two countries. At a minimum, we shouldn't be pursuing a set of policies that would push Russia closer to China. Second, I think we ought to try to normalize our diplomatic relationship with the Russians. Not that we're necessarily going to agree on a—on a range of issues at this point, but we need to give the Russians a sense that they have other strategic options than China going forward—something that would, I think, enhance their bargaining position with the Chinese going forward and would complicate China's own strategic calculus, which would be to our advantage. I think we also should play on Russia's concerns about strategic autonomy, this idea that Russia needs to be an independent great power on the global stage, that it doesn't want to be the junior partner or overly dependent on any one country as a way, again, of attenuating the tie with China. The one thing that I don't think we can do is drive a wedge between those two countries, in part because of the strategic reasons that I've mentioned already that bring these two countries together. And any very crude, I think, effort to do that will actually be counterproductive. Both Beijing and Moscow will see through that, quite clearly, and that will only lead to a closing of the ranks between those two countries, which as I said is a strategic challenge for the United States going forward. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question from Holli Semetko, who's at Emory University. Polarization is something we must overcome, as you said, but those of us working on social media have some evidence to suggest that social media has fostered political polarization in the U.S. Yuri Milner, a Russian Israeli entrepreneur, invested in an early round of Facebook funding with help from VTB, a Russian state-controlled bank, as well as his investment in Jared Kushner's real estate firm. What is the level of FDI from Russia in the U.S. and do you see it as a threat to national security? GRAHAM: Well, look, I mean, the actual level of Russian FDI in the United States is quite small. You know, you have some few, I think, good examples of it—the one that you've mentioned with Yuri Milner, for example. There was some investment in a steel factory some years ago. But by and large, there hasn't been a significant amount of Russian foreign direct investment in the United States. I think our growing concerns about Russia have made us even more leery of allowing Russian investment, particularly in sectors that we consider critical to American national security. So I'm not deeply concerned about that going forward. I think we probably face a much greater challenge from the Chinese in that regard. Of course, you've seen efforts by the United States to deal more harshly or look more closely at Chinese investment in the United States over the past several years. Let me just make one sort of final point on social media since it's come up. You know, Russia is a problem. We need to pay attention to Russia in that space. But again, I don't think that we should exaggerate Russia's influence, nor should we focus simply on Russia as the problem in this area. There is a major problem with disinformation in social media in the United States, much of that propagated by sources within the United States, but there are a host of other countries that also will try to affect U.S. public opinion through their intrusions into American social media. You know, given our concerns about First Amendment rights, freedom of speech and so forth, you know, I think we have problems in sort of really clamping down on this. But what we need to do, certainly, is better educate the American public about how to deal with the information that crosses their electronic devices day in and day out. Americans need to be aware of how they can be manipulated, and they need to understand and know where they can go to find reliable information. Again, given the political polarization in our country today, this is a very real challenge and difficult one. But I think if we think long term about this problem, the key really is educating the American public. An educated American public is going to be the best defense against foreign countries, other hostile forces trying to use social media to undermine our national unity and exacerbate the politics of our country. FASKIANOS: Thank you. I'm going to take the next question from Eoin Wilson-Manion, who's raised his hand. Q: Hello. Can you hear me now? GRAHAM: Yes. FASKIANOS: Yes. Q: Awesome. Well, thank you. I just wanted to ask if you could touch a little bit more on Russia's presence in Syria and what that means for U.S. interests in Syria and I guess the larger Middle East. I'm Eoin from Carnegie Mellon University. Thanks very much. GRAHAM: Well, you know, the Russians entered Syria in 2015 militarily largely to save Assad from what they thought was imminent overthrow by what they considered a radical Islamic force, a group of terrorists that they thought would challenge Russian interests not only in Syria but would fuel extremist forces inside Russia itself, particularly in the North Caucasus but farther afield than that—even into Moscow, into areas that were Muslim-dominated inside Russia itself. So they had very good national security reasons for going in. Those ran—I mean, the Russian presence in Syria clearly has run counter to what the United States was trying to do at that point since we clearly aligned against Assad in favor of what we considered moderate reformist forces that were seeking a more sort of democratic future for Syria as part of this broader Arab Spring at that time. So there was a clear conflict at that point. You know, subsequently and in parallel with its continued presence in Syria, the Russians have extended their diplomatic—their diplomatic effort to other countries in the region. Russia enjoys a fairly robust diplomatic relationship with Israel, for example, that has been grounded in counterterrorism cooperation, for example. They have a sort of strange relationship, largely positive, with Turkey that they have pursued over the past several years. We know of the ties that they've had in Tehran, in Iran for some time. They have reached out to the Saudis and the Saudis have bought some military equipment from them. We see them in Egypt and Libya, for example. So they're a growing presence, a growing diplomatic presence in the Middle East, and this does pose some problems for the United States. From the middle of the 1970s onward, one of the basic thrusts of American foreign policy was to limit the role the Russians played in the Middle East. We sidelined them in the negotiations between the Arabs and the Israelis in the 1970s and in the 1980s. We limited their diplomatic contacts to countries that we considered critical partners and allies in that part of the world. Now I think the geopolitical situation has changed. Our own interest in the Middle East has diminished over time, in part because of the fracking revolution here in the United States. Gas and oil, we've got close to being independent in that area. We're not as dependent on the Middle East as we once were for energy sources. And also, as, you know, the Biden administration has been clear, we do want to pivot away from the Middle East and Europe to focus more of our energies on what we see as the rising and continuing strategic challenge posed by China. So I think that means that going forward the United States is going to have to deal with Russia in a different fashion in the Middle East than in the past. We're going to have to recognize them as a continuing presence. We're not going to be able to push them out, in part because we're not prepared to devote the resources to it. We have countries that are still important to us—Saudi Arabia, Israel for example—that do want a Russian presence in the Middle East. And so what we ought to do, it seems to me, is to begin that discussion about how we're going to manage the rivalry in the Middle East. Now, it's not all simply competition. There are areas for cooperation. We can cooperate in dealing with Iran, for example, the Iran nuclear dossier, as we have had in the past. Neither country has an interest in Iran developing nuclear weapons. Second, I think the two countries also would like to see a Middle East that's not dominated by a single regional power. So despite the fact that the Russians have worked together quite closely with the Iranians in Syria, they don't share Iranian ambitions elsewhere in the Middle East. And if you look at the diplomatic ties that the Russians have nurtured over the past with Turkey, with Israel, Saudi Arabia for example, none of these are friends of Iran, to put it mildly. So we can talk, I think, to the Russians of how our—you know, we can conduct ourselves so as to foster the development of a regional equilibrium in the Middle East that tends to stabilize that region, makes it less of a threat to either country, less of a threat to America's European allies, and use this as a basis for, again, sort of not escalating the tension in the region but moderating it in some ways that works to the long-term advantage of the United States. FASKIANOS: Next question from Michael Strmiska, who's a professor at Orange County Community College in New York state. Do you see any hope of persuading Russia to abandon its occupation of Crimea in the near term? Or do you think this is like the occupation of the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia after World War II, where a very long timespan was needed before any liberation was realistically possible? GRAHAM: Well, I guess my answer to those two questions would be yes and no, or no and yes. On Crimea, you know, I see no sort of near-term scenario that would lead to the Russians agreeing to the return of Crimea to Ukraine. Quite the contrary, Russia has taken steps since 2014 they continue at this point to further integrate Crimea into the Russian Federation politically, economically, socially, and so forth. The Russians have also built up their military presence in Crimea as a way of enhancing their domination or their influence in the greater Black Sea region. So I see no set of circumstances that would change that, certainly not in the—in the near term. And I think, you know, the Ukrainian effort to focus attention on Crimea is not going to, in fact, gain a great deal of traction with Europe nor with the United States going forward, though we will maintain the principled position of not recognizing Russia's incorporation or annexation of Crimea. You know, I don't think that the Crimean and Baltic situations are necessarily analogous. You know, in the Baltic states there was a significant indigenous element, governments in exile, that supported the independence of those countries. There was a fulcrum that the United States or a lever that the United States could use over time to continue pressure on the Soviets that eventually led to the independence of those countries as the Soviet Union broke down and ultimately collapsed at the end of the 1980s into 1991. I don't see any significant indigenous element in Crimea nor a movement of inhabitants of Crimea outside Crimea that wants Crimea to be returned to Ukraine. I think we need to remember that a significant part of the population in Ukraine is Russian military, retired Russian military, that feels quite comfortable in—within the Russian Federation at this point. So if I were being quite frank about this, although I think the United States should maintain its principled position and not recognize annexation of Crimea, I don't see anything over the long term, barring the collapse of Russia itself, that will change that situation and see Ukraine (sic; Crimea) reincorporated into the Ukrainian state. FASKIANOS: So there are a couple questions in the chat about Russia's economy: What is their economy like today? And what are the effects of the sanctions? And from Steve Shinkel at the Naval War College: How do you assess the tie between Russia's economy and being able to continue to modernize its military and ensure a stable economy? And will economic factors and Russia's demographic challenges be a future constraining factor? So if you could— GRAHAM: Yeah. No, no, just take the economy. Obviously, a big issue, and it will be a constraining factor. I mean, the Russian economy is stagnating and it has for some—for some time. They enjoyed—the Russian economy enjoyed a very rapid period of growth during President Putin's first presidential—two presidential terms in the 2000s, but since the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 Russia has run into very difficult economic times. In fact, it's never really recovered from that crisis. If you look at the past ten years, barely any growth in the Russian economy at all. If you look at the impact that that has had on Russians themselves, there's basically been no growth in real disposable income; rather, a decline over the past six or seven years. I think the Russians recognize that. The question is whether they can come up with a set of policies that actually will reverse that and that lead to a more robustly growing economy. Now, what the Kremlin has tried to do is not so much reform the economy—which I think is necessary if they're going to enjoy robust economic growth—as much as professionalize the economy; that is—that is, bring in a younger sort of cadre who are well educated, many of them educated in the West, who understand how modern economies function and can keep the economy stable at least at the macro level. And this is one of the reasons that Western sanctions have not had nearly the impact on Russian behavior that many had hoped for or anticipated back in 2014 when we began to turn repeatedly to this tool in response to Russian activities and operations against Ukraine. You know, it has had some impact. I think the IMF would say that it's probably taken a percentage point off—or, not a percentage point, but a tenth of a percentage point off of Russia's GDP growth over the past several years. That certainly hasn't been enough to change Russian behavior. But it hasn't been more, in fact, because the governors of the—of the central bank have dealt quite adeptly with that, and maintain said Russian macroeconomic stability and some sort of foundation for the economy to grow going forward. I imagine that's going to continue into the—into the future as well. So it is a constraining factor. Then I would end with what I—with a point that I made in my introduction. Russia does have a tremendous ability to mobilize its resources for state purposes, to extract what it needs from society at large to modernize the military, to maintain certainly Russia's defenses and also some capability to project power abroad. So I wouldn't write them off because of that. I think it's going—still going to be a serious power, but not nearly as great a challenge to the United States as if it, in fact, solved its demographic problems, its economic problems, and had a robustly growing economy, greater resources that it could devote to a whole range of things that would improve its standing on the global stage vis-à-vis the United States and vis-à-vis China. FASKIANOS: Well, with that we are at the end of our time. And I apologize to everybody. We had over twenty written questions still pending and raised hands. I'm sorry we couldn't get to all of you, but we do try to end on time. So, Thomas Graham, thank you very much for sharing your insights and analysis with us today. We appreciate it. And to all of you for your terrific questions and comments, we appreciate it. Our next Academic Webinar will be on Wednesday, October 6, at 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time. And we will focus on the Indo-Pacific with Dhruva Jaishankar, who is the executive director of the Observer Research Foundation America and nonresident fellow at the Lowy Institute. And in the meantime, I encourage you to follow CFR at @CFR_Academic and visit CFR.org, ForeignAffairs.com, and ThinkGlobalHealth.org for new research and analysis on global issues. So, Tom, thank you very much. GRAHAM: Thank you. Good luck to all of you. (END)

On this episode of Fault Lines, hosts Jamarl Thomas and Shane Stranahan talk about the reconciliation and infrastructure bill as a government shutdown looms, YouTube banning RT Germany and how the Russian government responded to this, and the shocking findings coming from the Senate hearing with high ranking US military personnel.Guests:Ted Rall - Political cartoonist and syndicated columnist | Reconciliation and Infrastructure Bill BetrayalIvan Klepov - Head of Online at RT Germany | YouTube Ban on RT Germany Caleb Maupin - Speaker, writer, journalist, political analyst, and author | Military Brass Congressional TestimonyIn the first hour Ted Rall joined the show to talk about the bickering within the Democrats, and how Nancy Pelosi may or may not be able to mend relationships to try and pass the $550 billion infrastructure bill.In the second hour Fault Lines was joined by Ivan Klepov for a discussion on YouTube banning the RT Germany channel on their platform seemingly unjustly. The Kremlin has stated that they will ban YouTube in Russia if YouTube does not reinstate RT on the platform.In the third hour Caleb Maupin joined the conversation to talk about the senate hearing with major US military personnel. Did General Mark Milley sell out President Biden for not listening to his recommendations of leaving 2,500 troops in Afghanistan?

This is Coronavirus 411, the latest COVID-19 info and new hotspots for September 29th, 2021. Pfizer has given the FDA research on the effectiveness of its vaccine in kids 5-11, but those shots may not come until November. First, Pfizer has to file its application, then U.S. regulators and public health officials review and consult with advisory committees. And all that takes time. Russia reported its highest Covid death toll in a single day yesterday with 852 coronavirus-related deaths in the past 24 hours. The Kremlin acknowledged some regions had seen an increase in cases. Less than 50 million Russians having received a first dose of a vaccine even though the country was first in the world to approve one. We should be cherishing healthcare workers but instead they're being attacked. So much so that they'll be issued panic buttons. This has happened in a Branson, Missouri hospital where assaults on workers tripled since the pandemic hit. Pushing the button immediately alerts security. Similar increases in hospital assaults have been reported around the country. An updated study on what the main reason was people who were previously reluctant to get vaccinated wound up changing their mind from the Kaiser Family Foundation. The top reasons, in order, were, someone they knew personally got sick or died, vaccines were required to participate in a desired activity, concerns about overwhelmed hospitals, the surge of cases due to Delta, and it was required as a condition of employment. He's one of the biggest, most well-known celebrities on the planet. So NBA superstar LeBron James might be able to inspire people to get vaccinated. But he won't. After months of initial reluctance, he confirmed yesterday he did get the vaccine. But he's not going to tell anyone else to do so, saying, "I don't feel I should get involved in what other people should do for their bodies and livelihoods.” In the United States cases were down 33%, deaths are up 12%, and hospitalizations are down 16% over 14 days. The 7-day average of new cases has been trending down since September 13. There are 9,822,645 active cases in the United States. With not all states reporting daily numbers, the five states with the greatest number of daily deaths per capita are Alabama, Alaska, Florida, South Carolina, and Oklahoma. The top 10 counties with the highest number of recent cases per capita according to The New York Times: Matanuska-Susitna Borough, AK. Cleburne, AL. Kodiak Island Borough, AK. Fairbanks North Star Borough, AK. Lewis, WV. Whitley, KY. Green, KY. Custer, MT. Letcher, KY. And Magoffin, KY. There have been at least 692,511 deaths in the U.S. recorded as Covid-related. The top 3 vaccinating states by percentage of population that's been fully vaccinated were all unchanged: Vermont at 69.3%, Connecticut at 68.5%, and Maine at 68.2%. The bottom 3 vaccinating states are West Virginia at 40.4%, Wyoming unchanged at 41.2%, and Idaho unchanged at 41.4%. The percentage of the U.S. that's been fully vaccinated is 55.4%. The 5 countries with the largest recent 24-hour increase in the number of fully vaccinated people: South Korea and Taiwan up 3%. And Oceana, Nepal, and India 2%. Globally, cases were down 20% and deaths were down 10% over 14 days, with the 7-day average trending down since August 27. There are 18,415,997 active cases around the world. The five countries with the most new cases: The United States 105,633. The U.K. 34,526. Turkey 28,892. India 21,901. And Russia 21,559. There have now been at least 4,763,415 deaths reported as Covid-related worldwide. For the latest updates, subscribe for free to Coronavirus 411 on your podcast app or ask your smart speaker to play the Coronavirus 411... See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

By removing a voting app from their app stores at the Kremlin's request, the tech giants have set a troubling new precedent.

On this edition of Parallax Views, earlier this year a curious new book was published dealing with the assassination of John F. Kennedy.  Co-written by R. James Woolsey, former Director of the CIA under President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1995, and Ion Mihai Pacepa, a former Romanian spy and a noted, high-ranking Eastern Bloc defect during the Cold War, Operation Dragon: Inside the Kremlin's Secret War Against America argues that the JFK assassination was the result of a plot involving the Soviet Union's Nikita Khrushchev and Cuba's Fidel Castro. Lee Harvey Oswald, the book claims, was instructed by Khrushchev to kill President Kennedy. According to Woolsey and Pacepa, Khrushchev actually called off the plot for fear that it might be discovered and lead right back to him as one of the perpetrators.  What Khrushchev did not count on, say Woolsey and Pacepa, is that Oswald would go rogue and carry out the assassination plot in spite of orders to the contrary. In other words, Operation Dragon alleges that President Kennedy's assassination was the result of nefarious Soviet treachery. Is Operation Dragon just another entry in dizzying array of theories positing an alternative to the Warren Commission Report's oft-contested findings concerning the fatal shooting of a sitting President of the United States in Dallas, TX on November 22nd, 1963? Perhaps. Then again, most books that challenge, in varying degrees, the official line on the Kennedy assassination aren't written by ex-CIA Directors. But the curiosity of the book's co-author, the aforementioned James Woolsey, penning a book dealing with the Kennedy assassination doesn't end with his status as the former highest-ranking official in the CIA. In addition to his tenure as DCIA, Woolsey served as U.S. Under Secretary of the Navy in the late 1970s and was involved in negotiations with the Soviet Union in the 1980s. In other words, he was in the thick of it, so to speak, during the Cold War. Most curiously of all, however, when it comes to Woolsey is his connections to the neoconservative foreign policy movement and his penchant for promoting various conspiratorial fears about foreign countries even prior to the publication of Operation Dragon. A member of the notoriously hawkish neocon think tank The Project for a New American Century (PNAC) before its dissolution in 2006, Woolsey has stoked fears that North Korea could use electromagnetic pulse (EMP) weapons against the United States and was also a notable proponent of the theory that al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's Iraq were involved in the Oklahoma City Bombing. Since the publication of Operation Dragon, Woolsey has appeared on the right-wing outlet Newsmax to promote his theory about the Kennedy assassination. This, combined with his neoconservative inclinations and conspiratorial musings that align quite well with the bolstering of a hawkish, pro-war agenda, raises the question of Woolsey's political motivations in promoting what The Daily Beast has referred to as a "QAnon-style spin" on the Kennedy assassination. Joining us to pushback against Woolsey's JFK assassination theory and place it within the context of his hawkish neocon history is returning guest James DiEugenio, the leading figure behind the website Kennedys and King, writer for the upcoming Oliver Stone documentary JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass, and author of such books as Destiny Betrayed: JFK, Cuba, and the Garrison Case, Reclaiming Parkland: Tom Hanks, Vincent Bugliosi, and the JFK Assassination in the New Hollywood, and The JFK Assassination. DiEugenio argues that not only is Woolsey's Kennedy assassination theory wrong, but that it is representative of a certain brand of foreign policy thinking in Washington, D.C. that sociologist C. Wright Mills would refer to as "crackpot realism". Before delving into Operation Dragon, however, Jim fills us in on the latest news concerning the fight to declassify and release the last of the JFK records. We discuss how President Trump, despite at times signaling to the contrary, helped keep the records declassified during his Presidency. Now said records and their review for declassification lay in the hands of President Joe Biden. Then we shift our attention to Operation Dragon and discuss the problems with the book's claims that theoretical physicist and "Father of the Atomic Bomb" J. Robert Oppenheimer and British Prime Minister Clement Attlee were secretly Soviet spies, the relationship between Woolsey's theories on the Kremlin and the paranoid "Monster Plot" of the CIA's James Jesus Angleton, a brief history of neoconservatism, Woolsey's neocon credentials, the relationship between the narrative of the Cold War promoted by Woolsey and the ideas of the far right-wing John Birch Society, James Angleton and the origins of the idea that Lee Harvey Oswald was a KGB agent or asset,, Operation Dragon as a retread of the narrative put forth in Edward Jay Epstein's 1992 book Legend: The Secret World of Lee Harvey Oswald, Norman Cousins and the quest for détente with Khrushchev's Soviet Union, French journalist Jean Daniel's meeting with Fidel Castro in Havana on the day of Kennedy's assassination , Kennedy and rapprochement negotiations with Cuba, Khrushchev and Castro's reactions to the assassination, why neither the Soviet Union or Cuba benefitted from Kennedy's assassination, former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Nitze's Cold War ideology and the rise of neoconservatism, neoconservatism as an ideology that has now slipped into both the Republican and Democratic Parties, "crackpot realism" in the killing of Gaddafi in Libya and the U.S. intervention in Assad's Syria, Barack Obama and the CIA's classified weapons supply and training program in Syria known as "Timber Sycamore", the Project for American Century's agenda, George HW Bush's comments calling the neocons "the crazies in the basement" of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, the notion that Henry Kissinger and Henry Kissinger were "soft" on Communism during the Cold War, neocons as constantly seeking pretexts for war, the late Russian studies scholar Stephen F. Cohen vs. Richard Pipes on the Soviet Union, Nixon and Kissinger as being to the right of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher on Mikhail Gorbachev, neocons and the Australia nuclear submarines deal as part of a geopolitical strategy against China, "Noble Lies" and the selling of wars, NATO's expansion and the lack of historical context provided by crackpot realism in foreign policy, Woolsey's book as a psyop, PNAC member Robert Kagan and his wife Victoria Nuland's involvement in U.S. foreign policy related to Ukraine, the neocon agenda as bankrupting the U.S. and destroying social programs vis-à-vis war spending, and, much, much more.

By now, we're familiar with voter suppression tactics, from long voting lines to voter ID laws. On this week's On the Media, hear how election subversion takes the anti-democratic playbook to the next level. Plus, how the Russian government is using bureaucracy to stifle elections — and the press.  1. Dan Hirschhorn [@Inky_Dan], assistant managing editor at The Philadelphia Inquirer, on why his paper won't use the word "audit" to describe the wave of partisan "election reviews." Listen. 2. Rick Hasen, [@rickhasen], professor of law and political science at the University of California Irvine, on why election subversion is such a dangerous threat to our democracy. Listen. 3. Tanya Lokot [@tanyalokot], media scholar and associate professor at the Dublin City University School of Communications, on why Google and Apple caved to the Kremlin on fair election technology. Listen. 4. OTM producer Molly Schwartz [@mollyfication] on the lives and trials of Russian journalists under siege, featuring: Sonya Groysman [@sonyagro], Russian journalist and podcaster; Joshua Yaffa [@yaffaesque] Moscow correspondent for The New Yorker; Tikhon Dzyadko [@tikhondzyadko], editor-in-chief of TV Rain; and Alexey Kovalyov [@Alexey__Kovalev], investigations editor at the news outlet Meduza. Listen.    

What does the Kremlin's crackdown ahead of the recent Duma elections tell us about the current domestic political situation in Russia? Russian opposition leader Dmitri Gudkov and Maria Snegovaya, post-doctoral fellow in political science at Virginia Tech University, join Andrea Kendall-Taylor and Jim Townsend to discuss how the shrinking space for civil society in Russia demonstrates Vladimir Putin's tightening grip over the country. Dmitri Gudkov is a Russian opposition politician and a former deputy for A Just Russia, from which he was expelled after being elected to the Opposition Coordination Council. In 2014, he was one of the four deputies that did not approve the annexation of Crimea. In the beginning of 2021, he announced that he intended to run for the Russian parliament again, but he was prohibited from doing so. Maria Snegovaya is a post-doctoral fellow in political science at Virginia Tech University and a visiting scholar at the Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies at George Washington University. Her research interests include party politics and political behavior, as well as Russia's domestic and foreign policy.

Our man in Moscow, Sergey Goryashko, reporter for BBC Russia, catches us up to speed on Russian politics, the rise of "Male State" and the foodie culture that is sweeping the Kremlin.

On this episode of Fault Lines, hosts Jamarl Thomas and Shane Stranahan talk about the results of the Duma election in Russia, the FDA committee not recommending boosters for the mass public, the growing migrant issue on America's southern border, how this issue started back in Haiti, and the Biden's goals with the United Nations General Assembly.Guests:Bryan MacDonald - Head of the Russia Desk at RT Online | Result of the Russia ElectionDr. Mikhail Kogan - Medical Director at the George Washington Center | FDA Committee Deem Booster Not Needed in Most CasesSusan Pai - Worked at the internationally recognized UCLA Brain Mapping Lab | Haitian Migrants On Texas BorderDanny Shaw - International affairs analyst and professor | Long Standing Causes of the Haitian MigrationMichelle Witte - Sputnik News analyst and host of Political Misfits | United Nations General AssemblyIn the first hour Bryan MacDonald joined the show to talk about how Russia has evolved politically as showcased in this election, but also the security Putin has in his position of power. We were also joined by Dr. Mikhail Kogan to talk about the results of the FDA committee finding the Pfizer Booster not necessary for most people. In the second hour Fault Lines was joined by Susan Pai for a discussion on the massive migrant issue on the Texas border and the failings of the current administration on this. Many migrants do not have an asylum case due to their attempted settling in Central and South America. We were also joined by Danny Shaw to talk about the problems in Haiti causing these mass migrations, as well as an update on the assassination of president Jovenel Moïse.In the third hour Michelle Witte joined the conversation to talk about the general assembly by the United Nations. Can Biden repair the relationships with foreign powers he has tattered so far in his presidency?

In the latest episode of Expert Opinions, a podcast from the Harriman Institute at Columbia University and Eurasianet, Masha Udensiva-Brenner interviews Kimberly Marten about her research on climate change in the Russian Arctic.

President Putin's United Russia won two thirds of seats in the lower house of parliament. The party's vote share was down four points on five years ago, and we hear about the new Russian parliament's main economic challenges from Chris Weafer, chief executive of the Moscow-based consultancy Macro Advisory. Also in the programme, ahead of elections this weekend, the BBC's Theo Leggett reports from Munich in Germany on what businesses hope for from the next Chancellor. A month after seizing power in Afghanistan, the Taliban have effectively banned women from working. We get reaction to the latest developments from Pashtana Durrani, who is a women's rights activist in the country. Plus, our regular workplace commentator Stephanie Hare explores the art of storytelling in the workplace. Today's edition is presented by Rahul Tandon, and produced by Clare Williamson and Russell Padmore.

The winner of Russia's elections was not in doubt. Vladimir Putin's party, United Russia, came out on top. But despite the ballot stuffing and repression, the opposition still managed to rattle the Kremlin. The Gates Foundation is America's biggest charitable foundation by far and a powerhouse in the world of public health. But its money could be better spent. And we read the tea leaves to explain why bugs are important for your brew. For full access to print, digital and audio editions of The Economist, subscribe here www.economist.com/intelligenceoffer See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The winner of Russia's elections was not in doubt. Vladimir Putin's party, United Russia, came out on top. But despite the ballot stuffing and repression, the opposition still managed to rattle the Kremlin. The Gates Foundation is America's biggest charitable foundation by far and a powerhouse in the world of public health. But its money could be better spent. And we read the tea leaves to explain why bugs are important for your brew. For full access to print, digital and audio editions of The Economist, subscribe here www.economist.com/intelligenceoffer See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

France is recalling its ambassadors from the US and Australia for consultations in protest after Australia abruptly ended a submarine contract in order to sign a new deal with the US and UK. The security deal is widely seen as an effort to counter China's influence in the contested South China Sea. Also the Russian election gets underway Google and Apple have removed a tactical voting app. Opposition activists have accused the tech giants of bowing to pressure from the Kremlin. We get reaction to the move from Leonid Volkov, who ran jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny's campaign in 2018. Plus the international traffic light system is being simplified in England, with double-vaccinated travellers no longer forced to take Covid's pre-departure tests from October. But will this help revive a flagrant travel industry in England? Travel writer Simon Calder tells us more. Plus the BBC's Rebecca Kesby finds out how scientists are using genetic material from wild plants to make agricultural crops more resilient to climate change. Throughout the programme Rahul Tandon is joined by Karen Percy a journalist based in Melbourne. Produced by Philippa Goodrich (Picture: US President Joe Biden, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Australia Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Picture credit: Getty Images.)

As the Russian election gets underway Google and Apple have removed a tactical voting app. Opposition activists have accused the tech giants of bowing to pressure from the Kremlin, and we get reaction to the move from Leonid Volkov, who ran jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny's campaign in 2018. Also in the programme, the BBC's Rebecca Kesby finds out how scientists are using genetic material from wild plants to make agricultural crops more resilient to climate change. Plus, we look back on the life of the British inventor, Sir Clive Sinclair, famous for developing the pioneering ZX Spectrum personal computer. Henrique Olifiers runs computer game development firm Bossa Studio, and gives us his perspective. Today's edition is presented by Mike Johnson, and produced by Lucy Burton, Deborah Weitzmann and Russell Newlove.

Polls open in Russia's three-day parliamentary election. Fourteen parties are taking part in the vote, which the Kremlin insists is fair. Also in the programme, the Austrian government is being sued for failing to stop covid spreading across Europe from an Apline ski resort and Sir Clive Sinclair, the creator of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum has died aged 81. (Picture: A man votes in the 2021 Russian parliamentary election Credit: Stanislav KrasilnikovTASS via Getty Images)

Today, our theme is "Kitchen." Sarah tells us about the murder of Ashley Zhao. Then, Caitlin shares the case of Christopher Denoyer.Beer #1: Neonic Sour Ale with Apple Pie Dreams from the Shop Beer Co.Beer #2: It's Nuts - Peanut Butter Shake IPA by Westbrook Brewing Co.Listener discretion is advised.TW: Child abuse, death of a childInstagram: @luminolpodTwitter: @luminolpodCheck out our website: www.luminolpod.comSend us a message luminolpod@gmail.comBe a beer sponsor!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/luminolpod)

In this week's PONARS Eurasia Podcast, Maria Lipman chats with Ben Noble and Nikolay Petrov about Russia's September 17-19 legislative elections, repressive measures against electoral challengers, and whether to expect anything other than preordained results.

Photo:. Moscow kreml, perhaps late 1700s. @Batchelorshow What is the advantage for the Kremlin in the US-China confrontation? H. J. Mackinder, International Relations.  #FriendsofHistoryDebatingSociety https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-xi-jinping-china-united-states-relationship/

In this episode of the Stratfor Essential Geopolitics podcast from RANE, Emily Donahue gets a briefing on the upcoming parliamentary elections in Russia from Stratfor Eurasia analyst, Matthew Orr. Russia holds parliamentary elections in September. This happens less than a month after Russian telecoms companies blocked "Navalny," a mobile app created by Alexei Navalny's inner circle to coordinate opposition votes, and amid the Kremlin's year-long campaign to repress opposition parties. Can the opposition survive?

This week's episode is devoted to the Texas state attack on reproductive rights and civil rights and its ramifications – not just for Texans, but for all Americans. This authoritarian attack codifies violent vigilantism, will inspire baseless reporting of citizens for political reasons, cultivates an atmosphere of vengeance and paranoia, and is backed by a Supreme Court packed with multiple corrupt justices installed by a career criminal Kremlin asset president. The Texas attack on reproductive rights is where theocrats, kleptocrats, authoritarians, white supremacists, misogynists, and secessionists all meet – much like they have in the Trump administration and its GOP backers. Texas is a hostage state, and we encourage you to support the Texans fighting back against their oppressive legislature. We are all Americans and we must support vulnerable Americans threatened by this abuse of power and corruption of law.

Putin in the past could claim to have won at least an honest plurality, if not an honest majority of votes given his approval. However, in the upcoming election this fall, in September, it looks like the Kremlin has so restricted political competition that it's going to be a difficult sell to the Russian public to show that these elections are even as legitimate as the elections held in 2016 or in 2011.Timothy FryeA full transcript is available at www.democracyparadox.com or a brief primer on personalism here.Timothy Frye is a Professor of Post-Soviet Foreign Policy at Columbia University and a research director at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow.Key Highlights IncludeIs Putin's popularity real?Why Russia holds elections at allDescription of Russia as a personalist autocracyHow autocracy shapes Russia's foreign policyWhat are the prospects for democratization in RussiaKey LinksWeak Strongman: The Limits of Power in Putin's Russia by Timothy FryeRussia's Weak Strongman: The Perilous Bargains That Keep Putin in Power by Timothy Frye in Foreign AffairsFollow Timothy Frye on Twitter @timothymfryeRelated ContentKathryn Stoner on Russia's Economy, Politics, and Foreign PolicyFreedom House: Sarah Repucci Assesses Freedom in the WorldMore from the PodcastMore InformationDemocracy GroupApes of the State created all MusicEmail the show at jkempf@democracyparadox.comFollow on Twitter @DemParadoxFollow on Instagram @democracyparadoxpodcast100 Books on Democracy

Photo: No known restrictions on publication. @Batchelorshow #AfterAfghanistan: Lessons learned; opportunities for Putin and the Kremlin.  H.J. Mackinder, International Relations https://www.newsweek.com/vladimir-putin-says-afghanistan-catastrophe-us-west-still-have-not-learned-1625810

Since 1994 Belarus has been ruled by Alexander Lukashenko, better known as Europe's last dictator. 2020 though brought a brand new wave of protests and Lukashenko's position in power has become somewhat shakey, and he is beginning to outlive his usefulness to the Kremlin. Will the Kremlin fight to keep him there, or place someone else on the throne? Is there a future for Belarus in the West?  On the panel this week - Scott Rauland (Fmr US Amb to Belarus) - Heather Conley (CSIS) - Steven Pifer (Fmr US Amb to Ukraine) Follow the show on @TheRedLinePod Follow Michael on @MikeHilliardAus For more info please visit - www.theredlinepodcast.com

PEUT-ON PARLER AVEC LES TALIBANS ? – 30/08/21 Invités PASCAL BONIFACE Directeur de l'IRIS (Institut de Relations Internationales et Stratégiques) ARMELLE CHARRIER Éditorialiste en politique internationale - « France 24 » SOLÈNE CHALVON-FIORITI - Grand reporter - Co-auteure du documentaire « Afghanistan : vivre en pays taliban » Général DOMINIQUE TRINQUAND Ancien chef de la mission militaire auprès de l'ONU L'aéroport de Kaboul à nouveau la cible d'une attaque. Des roquettes ont été tirées très tôt ce lundi matin au-dessus de la capitale afghane. Ces tirs ont été interceptés par le système de défense antimissile américain. C'est dans ce contexte de forte tension que les évacuations se poursuivent. A moins de 48 heures de la date butoir du retrait américain, il reste tout au plus 300 Américains à évacuer du pays, selon le secrétaire d'Etat des Etats-Unis Antony Blinken. "Nous travaillons sans relâche pour les sortir de là", a-t-il affirmé. A l'autre bout du monde, le sujet mobilise tout autant les esprits. Une réunion des membres permanents du Conseil de sécurité se tient aujourd'hui à l'ONU, à New York. La France et le Royaume-Uni vont y plaider la proposition du président français Emmanuel Macron de créer à Kaboul une "zone protégée" afin d'y mener des opérations humanitaires. Cette zone pourrait permettre à de nombreux Afghans toujours candidats au départ de quitter le pays. Si le Kremlin a accueilli favorablement cette proposition, elle a en revanche d'ores et déjà été rejetée par un porte-parole des talibans. Car les talibans, qui ont repris le pouvoir mi-août, après avoir déjà dirigé le pays entre 1996 et 2001, n'entendent pas se laisser dicter la marche à suivre en Afghanistan. Fondé en 1994, ce groupe islamiste fondamentaliste est issu d'école coraniques. Il s'agit à l'origine d'étudiants en théologie (talib signifiant « étudiant »), sunnites, qui ont combattu les Soviétiques en tant que moudjahidines (combattants pour le jihad) durant la guerre contre l'URSS, entre 1979 et 1989. Le mouvement est au départ essentiellement constitué de Pachtounes, l'ethnie majoritaire du pays. Férocement nationaliste, il a fait de la lutte contre l'envahisseur étranger l'une de ses principales sources de légitimité. Après avoir été longtemps dirigé par le tout puissant mollah Omar, mort aujourd'hui, le groupe est désormais structuré autour de plusieurs leaders. Parmi eux, le chef se nomme Haibatullah Akhundzada. Il a obtenu une promesse de loyauté de la part du le chef de l'organisation terroriste Al-Qaïda, ce qui lui apporte une grande légitimité. Mais il doit aussi compter avec Sirajuddin Haqqani, ou encore Abdul Ghani Baradar, cofondateur du mouvement aux côtés du mollah Omar. Au temps où ils régnaient sur le pays, les talibans ont imposé un islam très dur, avec une application rigoriste de la charia. Ils disent avoir changé. Mais difficile de les croire au regard, par exemple, de l'effacement des portraits de femmes dans les rues des villes. Emmanuel Macron était ce week-end en visite en Irak, où il s'est notamment rendu à Mossoul, au milieu des ruines de l'ancien bastion de l'organisation État islamique. Sur place, le chef de l'Etat a affiché sa volonté de maintenir une présence militaire française, si les Irakiens en exprimait le besoin. Et ce, y compris après le départ définitif des troupes américaines prévu le 31 décembre prochain. Il a promis que les forces spéciales resteraient pour lutter contre les terroristes. Au même moment, la France amorce le retrait partiel de ses forces au Sahel, alors que la force Takuba, coalition de forces spéciales européennes mise en place en juillet 2020, devrait prendre le relais. Comment se déroule les dernières opérations d'évacuation à l'aéroport de Kaboul ? Qui sont les talibans ? Ont-ils vraiment changé ? Qui sont leurs dirigeants ? Après le retrait américain, la présence française en Irak suffira-t-elle pour faire face à la menace terroriste dans le pays ? DIFFUSION : du lundi au samedi à 17h45 FORMAT : 65 minutes PRÉSENTATION : Caroline Roux - Axel de Tarlé REDIFFUSION : du lundi au vendredi vers 22h40 RÉALISATION : Nicolas Ferraro PRODUCTION : France Télévisions / Maximal Productions Retrouvez C DANS L'AIR sur internet & les réseaux : INTERNET : francetv.fr FACEBOOK : https://www.facebook.com/Cdanslairf5 TWITTER : https://twitter.com/cdanslair INSTAGRAM : https://www.instagram.com/cdanslair/

The Moscow–Washington hotline entered operation, providing a direct link between the Kremlin and the ...

Sometimes it's worth digging into what look like less important stories, to see what lessons the offer about the big picture developments, so I tackle three - who's likely to be the next ambassador to Cape Verde, why airfare hikes contribute to street violence, and why Naryshkin is now claiming to be a long-time mate of Putin's - and see what I can make of them.For those figures I threw out, the proportions of staff of different Presidential Administration departments estimated to be current or former security officers are:63% Security Council (SB) Secretariat 28% Foreign Policy Directorate (UVneshP)19% Expert Directorate (UE)71% Directorate for Interregional and Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries (UMKSZS),62% Directorate for Cross-Border Cooperation (UPS) For the share of one-to-one or one-to-few meetings with the President in 2019:1% Kostyukov (GRU)5% Zolotov (National Guard(5% Kolokoltsev (MVD)11% Naryshkin17% Bortnikov (FSB)23% Shoigu (MoD)29% Patrushev9% OtherYou can also follow my blog, In Moscow's Shadows, and become one of the podcast's supporting Patrons and gain question-asking rights and access to exclusive extra materials right here. 

A terrorist killed at least 170 people at the Afghan airport from which America's evacuation was taking place. America has subsequently boosted cooperation with the Taliban, including providing a list of people it is leaving behind, which one official described as a “kill list.” On top of that, America left the Taliban some $85 billion worth of armaments. As Afghanistan fell apart, German Chancellor Angela Merkel visited the Kremlin. A Ukrainian government source said she did a deal with Vladimir Putin: Putin will get the Taliban to prevent Afghan refugees flowing into Europe, and Germany will back down on Crimea. We also talk about more evidence of China's genocide against its Uyghur population, Israel's new prime minister visiting America's president, European nations building walls all around their borders, the Philippines' Duterte's power grab, and extreme weather in the U.S. withering the nation's crops. Links [00:40] Afghanistan Terrorist Attack (16 minutes) “Afghanistan: Chaos by Design” “Wolves in Wolves' Clothing: The Myth of a Friendly Taliban” [16:22] U.S. Leaves Armaments to Taliban (6 minutes) “The Most Dangerous Lie in History” from Great Again [22:47] Merkel Deal With Putin (8 minutes) “Germany and Russia's Secret War Against America” [31:12] China Genocide of Uyghurs (7 minutes) “'They Want the World to Bow Down to China'” “The Climax of Man's Rule Over Man” [38:33] Israel PM Visits U.S. (5 minutes) The King of the South [43:21] Europe's Border Walls (4 minutes) “Germany, Migrants and the Big Lie” [47:34] Duterte's Power Grab (3 minutes) “The New Strongman Age” “Rodrigo Duterte: Punisher of the Philippines” [50:35] U.S. Extreme Weather (5 minutes) Why 'Natural' Disasters? The Lion Has Roared

The fellas visit comedian and writer Kareem Rahma and his Russian-imported Sphynx cat, Kremlin, to learn how to slow the fuck down and revel in the inconveniences of New York life. In this two-part, vibes-heavy ep, the gang goes off on bidets and asshole upkeep; C*r*l*ne C*ll*w*y's Sn*ke O*l; pedicures; preventative testosterone; Bitcoin market psychology; abstaining from monetizing hobbies; identifying with the men of Sex and the City; and much, much more. UNLOCK all of Part B by subscribing to our Patreon at: www.patreon.com/dewydudes

On this episode of Fault Lines, hosts Jamarl Thomas and Shane Stranahan talk about the Crimea Platform Summit, the Russian perspective on the American withdrawal from Afghanistan, China's interests in the future of Afghanistan, the terrible showing by Sha'Carri Richardson, and the true sentiments of Kabul natives on the Taliban returning to power.Guests:Bryan MacDonald - Head of the Russia Desk at RT Online | Crimea Platform SummitCarl Zha - Host of the Silk and Steel Podcast | China in Bed With the Taliban?Ted Rall - Political cartoonist and syndicated columnist | How the US Let Down AfghanisIn the first hour Bryan MacDonald joined the show to talk about the Crimea Platform Summit, why it is or is not important, and why Russia opted not to attend. Bryan also talked about the Russian perspective on the American withdrawal from Afghanistan. In the second hour Fault Lines was joined by Carl Zha for a discussion on China's interests with the Taliban and Afghanistan. Does China want a stable nation under a Taliban government? Do they want a safe haven for terrorism to add pressure on the US? Is it a mix of both?In the third hour Ted Rall joined the conversation to talk about how the locals in Kabul wanted the Taliban back because of the corruption and lack of care the United States imposed in the city.

Olga and Mo welcome Bill Browder, who shares the story of Sergei Magnitsky's murder, his vow for justice against the Kremlin, and his rise to the top of Putin's kill list. Bill's Twitter: @Billbrowder  Bill's Website:  www.billbrowder.com Olga's twitter: @OlgaNYC1211  Mo's twitter: @MoniqueCamarra  @KremlinFile KremlinFile.com  Meidas Media + bunker crew

Perhaps no opera better reflects the questions and contradictions at the heart of Russian history than Modest Mussorgsky's historical epic Boris Godunov. Based on the play by Alexander Pushkin (considered by many to be one of Russia's greatest writers), it's a meditation on power and legitimacy, and a portrayal of a pivotal period in Russian history -- The Time of Troubles.  When Tsar Ivan the Terrible dies without an heir, Boris Godunov is elected tsar, casting doubt on his legitimacy. He rules well for a few years, but then all hell breaks loose, with a famine, a revolt, and a pretender claiming to be the real tsar. As his country's problems compound, Boris confronts his feelings of powerlessness in the monologue, “Dostig ja vïsshei vlasti.” Host Rhiannon Giddens and her guests explore the nature of power, the question of legitimacy, and how an opera can shine a light on a nation's past as well as its present. The Guests Bass René Pape (A.K.A. “The Black Diamond Bass”) has been singing the role of Boris Godunov for 15 years. Like many of the kings and rulers he's played on stage, he sees Boris as someone who has all of the power but none of the joy. In addition to his velvety voice, Pape is also known for his collection of rubber ducks, and even has one in his own image, the PapeDuck. Dr. Simon Morrison is a professor of music history at Princeton, specializing in Russian and Soviet music. He fell in love with Russian music when he was an undergraduate and wrote his dissertation on the life and work of Sergei Prokofiev. His most recent book is Bolshoi Confidential, a history of the Bolshoi Ballet, and he is currently writing a book on the history of the city of Moscow, which finds him studying 11th century documents written on birchbark. Dr. Shoshana Keller is a professor of Russian, Soviet, Eurasian, and modern Middle Eastern history at Hamilton College. She first became interested in Russia after getting to know the music of Shostakovich and Stravinsky while playing French horn as a kid, and she was fascinated by pictures of Russian onion domes in a social studies class. She loved the Russian language too, but found the grammar devilishly difficult and immersed herself in its history. She has written multiple books, and is working on an experimental mapping project of the nations in Kazakhstan

MeidasTouch is proud to bring you a sneak peek of our new original series, KREMLIN FILE. For more episodes, subscribe to KREMLIN FILE wherever you get podcasts. Hosted by renowned researcher Olga Lautman and political activist Monique Camarra, KREMLIN FILE takes audiences on a riveting journey through the rise of Putin and the spread of authoritarianism across the globe and into the Trump White House. Featuring interviews with Masha Gessen, Yuri Felshtinsky, Bill Browder, and Craig Unger, Season One dives head first into Putin's Russia and their ongoing active measures campaign around the world. New episodes drop Thursdays beginning August 5th 2021. Subscribe here or wherever you listen to podcasts for more episodes! Meidas Media + bunker crew ————————————— About this Episode: Masha Gessen, the rise of Putin Olga and Mo journey back to the 90's with Russian-born journalist Masha Gessen who describes their odd introduction to Vladimir Putin by way of Saint Petersburg and beyond https://www.KremlinFile.com Masha's twitter: @mashagessen Olga's twitter: @OlgaNYC1211 Mo's twitter: @MoniqueCamarra Meidas Media + bunker crew --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/support

A girl at summer camp tries to keep up with her sophisticated fellow campers, a writer loses a treasured pair of pants, a young man accused of stealing ends up living out of his car, and a writer lands in Moscow on the eve of a revolution. Hosted by The Moth's Artistic Director, Catherine Burns. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by The Moth and Jay Allison of Atlantic Public Media. Storytellers: Meg Wolitzer, Adam Gopnik, Matthew Dicks, and Andrew Solomon.