Free Republic

Moscow (AsiaNews) - The Russian Ministry for Justice has proposed amendments to the law on "Freedom of Conscience and Religious Organizations" that, if adopted, will introduce stronger restrictions on the activities of Evangelicals in the country. The community is on alert: If the proposal becomes law, among other things the evangelicals can no longer pray freely without a permit and people with a “criminal record” will not be allowed become members of their communities. The latter condition, which also concerns other religious groups because it would clear the path for state interference in the individual freedom of conscience. The document...

November 4, 2009: Russian defense officials announced that the failed Bulava ballistic missile test last July, was due to a defect in the first stage steering system. This was fixed, and another test will take place before the end of the month. So far, the Bulava has been test fired eleven times. Only one of those tests was an unqualified success, and six were absolute failures. But the Russian government insists that development will continue, and succeed. The inept development of the new Bulava SLBM (Sea Launched Ballistic Missile) for the new Boeri class SSBN (nuclear submarine carrying SLBMs) has...

TBILISI -- The chairman of Georgia's opposition Labor Party is in Washington to discuss Georgian-U.S.-Russian relations and the recognition of Kosovo and Georgia's breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, RFE/RL's Georgian and Russian services report. Labor Party Secretary-General Joseph Shatberashvili told RFE/RL that the main goal of Shalva Natelashvili's visit to Washington is "to start a dialogue with Moscow and Washington� on Moscow’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and Washington’s recognition of Kosovo. Shatberashvili says that Labor Party leaders believe that if Washington would revoke its recognition of Kosovo's independence it would cause Russia to reconsider its decision...

Russian defense officials announced that the failed Bulava ballistic missile test last July, was due to a defect in the first stage steering system. This was fixed, and another test will take place before the end of the month. So far, the Bulava has been test fired eleven times. Only one of those tests was an unqualified success, and six were absolute failures. But the Russian government insists that development will continue, and succeed. The inept development of the new Bulava SLBM (Sea Launched Ballistic Missile) for the new Boeri class SSBN (nuclear submarine carrying SLBMs) has become a growing...

Cold War: The White House has announced our absence at ceremonies marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Meanwhile, Russia has been practicing a nuclear invasion of an abandoned Poland. The Berlin Wall has been a famous backdrop for American presidents sounding the battle cry of liberty in the struggle against tyranny. It was there that John F. Kennedy expressed our solidarity with the encircled residents of that outpost of freedom with his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner." And it was there that Ronald Reagan, with a defiant "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall," voiced our...

The 20th anniversary of the 1989 East European revolutions has re-opened contentious debate over who won the Cold War and what caused Soviet communism to disintegrate so rapidly in its final years. The fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 was a symbolic milestone, heralding the break-up of the Soviet Union two years later. Looking back, many people directly involved are still asking: Was Soviet communism defeated? Was it overthrown? Or did it simply collapse from within? The rapid succession of events which marked the end of the Cold War is not in dispute. Poland's historic roundtable talks between...

China interested in Russian hydrocarbons; Russia aims to reduce its dependence on European energy markets. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's visit to Beijing earlier this month yielded commercial deals worth $3.5 billion and a sweeping framework for bilateral energy cooperation. China's interest in Russian hydrocarbons is motivated by a desire to meet growing demand and diversify import sources. Russia stands to gain from reducing its dependence on European energy markets and using exports to China to develop Russia's Far East. Oil integration. Earlier this year, the China Development Bank (CDB) provided Russian energy companies Rosneft and Transneft with a $25...

Former Israeli double agent shot dead near Putin's office Shabtai Kalmanovich, a former Israeli double agent who penetrated Golda Meir's government on behalf of the KGB, has been shot dead in Moscow. By Andrew Osborn in Moscow and Adrian Blomfield in Jerusalem Published: 7:00AM GMT 03 Nov 2009 Kalmanovich, who later became a prominent businessman and allegedly had links with the Russian mafia, died after an unidentified gunman fired at least 20 shots into his chauffeur-driven Mercedes Benz. Mr Kalmanovich's driver was seriously wounded in the incident. /snip After becoming an Israeli citizen, he joined the Israeli Labour Party, was...

Russia has provoked outrage in Poland by simulating an air and sea attack on the country during military exercises. The armed forces are said to have carried out "war games" in which nuclear missiles were fired and troops practised an amphibious landing on the country's coast. Documents obtained by Wprost, one of Poland's leading news magazines, said the exercise was carried out in conjunction with soldiers from Belarus. The manoeuvres are thought to have been held in September and involved about 13,000 Russian and Belarusian troops. Poland, which has strained relations with both countries, was cast as the "potential aggressor"....

Russia’s Eternal Military-Industrial Kolkhoz 03 November 2009 By Alexander Golts It seems that professional observers of Russia’s endless political antics have something new to add to their list. People have long ceased to be amazed by the fact that Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has a habit of meddling in Russia’s military affairs, national security and foreign policy — all of which belong to the constitutional domain of President Dmitry Medvedev. But the president has unexpectedly stuck his nose into an area that had previously belonged to Putin alone. Last week, Medvedev visited the NPO Mashinostroyenia missile design bureau in Reutov,...

SNIPPET: "Lula and Chavez have established a "strategic relationship," and recently agreed upon a joint Brazilian-Venezuelan oil venture worth billions of dollars. Lula and Chavez have joined with Daniel Ortega, the returned Nicaraguan Marxist dictator, to form an anti-U.S. Latin American military alliance - all with Russian assistance - funded by the region's abundant oil reserves. Brazil is engaged in its own arms build-up and Lula is determined that Brazil will become at least a first-rate regional power. Unfortunately, Lula is establishing Brazil as an anti-American military power by aligning with nations hostile or potentially hostile to the U.S. Lula...

Capitalism and democracy have lost popularity in the former Soviet republics of Eastern and Central Europe, where many people felt better off economically under communism, a poll showed Monday. Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, research by the Pew Research Center showed the percentage of people approving of democracy was markedly lower in the former Soviet bloc compared to a similar 1991 poll.

<p>Gunmen shot dead a former KGB spy in his car a few hundred yards from the office of Vladimir Putin.</p> <p>More than 20 shots were fired at the Mercedes of Shabtai von Kalmanovic — who had embarked on a career promoting sports teams and music concerts.</p>

The Afghanistan commander warned his political master that “Our soldiers are not to blame. They’ve fought incredibly bravely in adverse conditions… [But] without a lot more men, this war will continue for a very, very long time.” This wasn’t an exchange between Gen. Stanley McChrystal, U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and President Obama at last Friday’s White House strategy meeting, but it could portend a future meeting. Rather, the speaker was Gen. Sergei Akhromeyev, the commander of the Soviet armed forces, testifying before the Soviet Union’s Politburo in 1986 to explain why 110,000 Russian soldiers were losing in Afghanistan. Russian generals...

Malaysia admitted that it is getting rid of its MiG-29 fighters because the aircraft are too expensive to maintain. It costs about $5 million a year, per aircraft, to keep them in flying condition. Three years ago, Malaysia bought two more MiG-29s, in addition to the 18 it got in the 1990s. Two of those were lost due to accidents. Malaysia has since ordered 18 Su-30 fighters, and will apparently order more to replace the MiG-29s. Malaysia also bought eight F-18Ds in the 1990s, and is getting rid of those as well. Russia has offered better prices on maintenance contracts...

One of the most extraordinary episodes in the intellectual history of the twentieth century—if, indeed, something that lasted half a century or more can properly be called an episode—is the moral and sometimes material support given by much of the western intelligentsia to the Soviet tyranny, a tyranny that made all previous tyrannies seem relaxed, liberal, and almost amateurish by comparison. Men who found the slightest circumscription of their own freedom intolerable raised hosannas to the most systematic and concerted abrogation of personal liberty yet attempted; many were those who strained at gnats to swallow a camel.No doubt the explanation...

Russia 'simulates' nuclear attack on Poland Russia has provoked outrage in Poland by simulating an air and sea attack on the country during military exercises. By Matthew Day in Warsaw Published: 4:37PM GMT 01 Nov 2009 The armed forces are said to have carried out "war games" in which nuclear missiles were fired and troops practised an amphibious landing on the country's coast. Documents obtained by Wprost, one of Poland's leading news magazines, said the exercise was carried out in conjunction with soldiers from Belarus. The manoeuvres are thought to have been held in September and involved about 13,000 Russian...

The armed forces are said to have carried out "war games" in which nuclear missiles were fired and troops practised an amphibious landing on the country's coast. Documents obtained by Wprost, one of Poland's leading news magazines, said the exercise was carried out in conjunction with soldiers from Belarus. The manoeuvres are thought to have been held in September and involved about 13,000 Russian and Belarusian troops. The documents state the exercises, code-named "West", were officially classified as "defensive" but many of the operations appeared to have an offensive nature. more...

MOSCOW – Moscow plans to buy a French amphibious assault ship, the first such purchase from a NATO country, as the Kremlin seeks to reaffirm Russia's global reach, a Russian news agency reported Saturday. The Defense Ministry also plans to license the production of four more ships of the Mistral class in Russia under the guidance of French engineers, Navy Admiral Oleg Burtsev was quoted by RIA Novosti as saying. A Mistral ship is capable of carrying more than a dozen helicopters along with dozens of tanks and other armored vehicles and is fit for missions intended to project Russian...

While Russian admirals have been talking about building six aircraft carriers in the next decade, the president of Russia has recently ordered them to concentrate on smaller ships for the Black and Baltic Seas. The Black Sea fleet has been continually declining since the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. That decline is the result of new countries (like Ukraine and Georgia) inheriting old Soviet ships and bases. That was the dissolution deal. Whatever Soviet weapons or bases were normally were, belonged to one of the 14 new nations. Most of Russia’s high seas ships were based in northern Russia (the...

Russia is planning extensive research to help uphold its claim to the energy-rich Arctic Sea shelf, which the country believes is an extension of the Eurasian continent, an official says.At a conference in Moscow Friday, Andrei Smirnov of the state-run company Atomflot said Russia is planning icebreaker missions in the Arctic over the next three years to conduct a detailed geological analysis of the seabed.The mission will kick off with an atomic-powered icebreaker and a research ship travelling to the Arctic next summer, Smirnov said.

(See all these news nuggets and more by clicking the excerpt link below): 1. BBC News: “Darwin Teaching ‘Divides Opinion’” Darwinism is a controversial topic, and many believe creation should be taught in the classroom. But why is that news? 2. ScienceDaily: “Junk DNA Mechanism that Prevents Two Species from Reproducing Discovered” Has the U.S. government finally supported creationist research? Alas, no, but the results of a National Institutes of Health study fit squarely within the young-earth creation framework. 3. PhysOrg: “Charles Darwin Really Did Have Advanced Ideas about the Origin of Life” Charles Darwin was convinced that life’s origin...

The Obama administration's un-American attempt to vilify Fox News only increased the network's popularity. But this White House debacle can't be judged in isolation: There's a global leftwing assault on the freedom of information. Intense leftist sentiment in most of the international media isn't enough. Extremists seek total control. The one thing leftists just can't bear is criticism. (Mass murder's fine, but don't stray from the party line.) As early as the French Revolution, the left grasped that a free press is inherently subversive to its doctrines. The Obama administration's aborted Fox hunt simply aligned our government with the hounds...

Top Russian mobster Ivankov dies October 10, 2009 One of Russia's most notorious mafia kingpins, Vyacheslav Ivankov, known by his nickname of Yaponchik, or Little Japanese, has died in Moscow after suffering serious injuries in an assassination attempt in July. "Investigators have received official confirmation from a Moscow clinic of the death of Vyacheslav Ivankov," the Investigative Committee of the General Prosecutor's Office said in a statement on Friday. Ivankov was shot in the stomach as he left a glitzy Thai restaurant in Moscow on July 28. The shot was fired by a sniper who hid 70 metres away in...

MOSCOW — Russia’s president, Dmitri A. Medvedev, warned Friday that Russians had lost their sense of horror over Stalin’s purges, and called for the construction of museums and memorial centers devoted to the atrocities, as well as further efforts to unearth and identify the dead. Mr. Medvedev made the comments on his video blog, on the occasion of a holiday devoted to the memory of victims of repression. He warned that revisionist historians risked glossing over the darker passages of the Soviet past, citing a poll that showed that 90 percent of young people could not name victims of the...

In early October, the Russian Deputy Minister of Defense Vladimir Popovkin announced the decision to take two heavy nuclear-powered missile cruisers (TAKR) out of conservation and restore them to the active fleet. This decision coming just one year after the Petr Velikii (Peter the Great), the fourth ship of its class and the only one then in service, set out on a long-range cruise that took it from Severomorsk, the home port of the Northern Fleet to the Mediterranean, Caribbean, South Atlantic, and the Indian Oceans. On this voyage, which lasted from September 22, 2008, to March 10, 2009, the...

According to security researchers, computer servers at the government institutions of Poland suffered a well-synchronized cyber attack, which was allegedly launched by Russian sources in September 2009. The details of this attack on the Polish government are not yet revealed, as reported by the daily Rzeczpospolita. The attack took place in the beginning of September, a particularly intense moment, near about Westerplatte visit of Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. The purpose of his visit was to commemorate the outburst of the Second World War, as reported by NATIONAL on October 11, 2009. Meanwhile, security experts informed that generally botnets are...

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras – Deposed President Manuel Zelaya and his opponents have agreed to a U.S.-brokered deal that he said will return him to power four months after a coup shook faith in Latin America's young democracies. The power-sharing agreement reached late Thursday calls for Congress to decide whether to reinstate the leftist Zelaya. While the legislature backed his June 28 ouster, congressional leaders have since said they won't stand in the way of an agreement that ends Honduras' diplomatic isolation and legitimizes presidential elections planned for Nov. 29. Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Thomas Shannon said Friday that the two...

SNIPPET: The Supreme Court of Tatarstan found 12 activists of the Kazan division of the international terrorist organization Islamic Liberation Party (Hizb ut-Tahrir) guilty of extremism. "Seven men, including Tajik citizen Dzhurayev and six Russians, have received four to eight years in a penal colony," court press secretary Natalya Loseva told Interfax. Four other Kazan residents have received suspended sentences of three years and six months to five years in prison." SNIPPET: ""The accomplice Gimaliyev was found insane and is exempt from criminal liability. He will be forcibly treated," Loseva said."

On October 8 Nikolai Patrushev, the Secretary of the Russian Security Council and the former Director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), signaled planned changes to the country’s nuclear doctrine. He explained in Novosibirsk that this will be reflected in the new military doctrine titled: “The New Face of the Russian Armed Forces until 2030,” currently being developed by the General Staff and expected to be approved by the end of the year. “In respect to the possibility of preventive or nuclear strikes we will formulate some provisions that will be somewhat different from those contained in the current doctrine,”...

In the deepening international stand-off over Iran's nuclear program, the Islamic Republic's quest for advanced air- and missile defense technologies could play a decisive role. "For years now, Tehran has been working hard to acquire sophisticated Russian antiaircraft missiles that would make it far tougher for Israeli planes to stage a successful attack on Iranian nuclear facilities," Christian Caryl wrote on October 2nd in the online edition of Foreign Policy magazine. That system is the S-300, an advanced interceptor array believed to be superior to the U.S. Patriot. Russia signed a deal to deliver units of the S-300 to Iran...

BRUSSELS, October 28 (RIA Novosti) - Russia could supply helicopters for NATO-led operations in Afghanistan, an executive at the state hi-tech corporation Russian Technology said on Wednesday. "We are prepared on commercial terms to provide the NATO coalition forces with helicopters of different types," the company's deputy general director, Dmitry Shugayev, told reporters. Shugayev said the coalition forces were experiencing helicopter shortages in Afghanistan. He also said Russia could train crews for the helicopters. In June, Russia and NATO agreed to restart cooperation on security issues, frozen after Russia fought a brief war with ex-Soviet Georgia in August 2008. Russia's...

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has proclaimed victory in his battle with the West, claiming he has compelled the US and its allies to 'co-operate' with Iran's nuclear programme. As Iran's nuclear negotiator handed in the country's response to a proposed deal to process its enriched uranium stocks abroad, Mr Ahmadinejad hailed a change in Western policy from "confrontation to co-operation". "We welcome fuel exchange, nuclear co-operation, building of power plants and reactors and we are ready to co-operate," he said in a speech shown live on state television. But he said he would not retreat "one iota" in his demand that...

Quote: October 27, 2009 MAYBE MULLAH OMAR IS SIMPLY AFRAID OF THE CHINESE Vahid Brown has the lowdown on the dustup between al-Qaida Core and the Afghan Taliban Posted on 27 October 2009 @ 13:11 GMT

Libya plans to purchase over 20 warplanes from Russia. Moscow and Tripoli are currently in talks about the package of contracts, Interfax reports. The documents can be signed at the end of 2009 or in the beginning of 2010. The deal is evaluated at $1 billion. “Libya plans to purchase 12 or 15 Su-35 multipurpose jets, four Su-30 and six Yak-130 trainer aircraft,� a source told the news agency. “Technically, many contracts have been elaborated well, and are ready to be signed. We only need to regulate financial issues,� the source said.

'Father of Su-27' Simonov: F-15 hater Mikhail Petrovich Simonov, designer of the iconic Su-27 Flanker, realized after the 1977 first flight that the T-10 prototype was a dog, a fact he explained to the aviation minister in Moscow. "'It's a good thing, Petrovich, that today is not 1937," the minister replied. That is one of the incredible anecdotes sprinkled throughout a Simonov feature published today in the London Telegraph. The article is a must read for anyone even slightly curious about aviation history. For example, we learn the lead designer's delightfully Russian reaction to Simonov's proposed solution to the T-10's...

Negligent medical personnel of a hospital in Omsk, Russia, caused mass blindness to hospital patients. During surgeries, the doctors infected the patients’ eyes, making 13 people blind. According to Rosbalt news agency, lawyers of the affected patients are pessimistic. They do not think that it will be possible to hold the health professionals accountable...

Russia could supply helicopters for NATO-led operations in Afghanistan, an executive at the state hi-tech corporation Russian Technology said on Wednesday.

The More They Know Darwin, The Less They Want Darwin-Only Indoctrination According to an international poll released by the British Council, the majority of Americans — 60% — support teaching alternatives to evolution in the science classroom. The percentage is the same for Britons, despite the fact that both countries have been inundated with pro-Darwin media coverage in this super-mega Darwin Year. Of course, the British media reporting this are chagrined. Britain is the birthplace of Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution, and the official-sounding British Council, the UK group behind the “Darwin Now” campaign that commissioned the Ipsos...

If world powers are not successful in efforts to contain the Iranian nuclear threat, an Israeli strike on Iran could become a reality, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said during a visit to Beirut, the Daily Telegraph reported Monday. The French foreign minister suggested that time was indeed short for a solution to the Iranian threat. "There is the time that Israel will offer us before reacting, because Israel will react as soon as they know clearly that there is a threat." "Israel will not tolerate an Iranian bomb. We know that, all of us," said Kouchner, adding that for...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran wants major amendments within the framework of a U.N. nuclear fuel deal which it broadly accepts, state media said, a move that could unravel the plan and expose Tehran to the threat of harsher sanctions. The European Union's foreign policy chief said on Tuesday there was no need to rework the U.N. draft and he and France's foreign minister suggested Tehran would rekindle demands for tougher international sanctions if it tried to undo the plan. Among the central planks of the plan opposed by Iran -- but requested by the West to cut the risk of...

MOSCOW -- Russia is not ready to agree to a proposed new round of arms control talks that were to begin after a deal is reached on extending the START 1 nuclear treaty, a U.S. nuclear expert said Tuesday. The comments by former U.S. diplomat Richard Burt came after discussions in Moscow between Russian foreign ministry officials and representatives of Global Zero, a nongovernment nuclear disarmament group that includes more than 200 political leaders and military officials from around the world. "I think it's fair to say they're not ready to commit to a new

Russia setting, US rising in Indian air force Josy Joseph / DNA Russia’s eclipse and the US’ rise in the Indian military will soon stand out in the air force’s transport division. Sources said the government is moving in to seal yet another government-to-government deal with the US for a military purchase. They are ordering ten C-17 Globemaster transport aircraft. The deal is worth over $2 billion (Rs10,000 crore). When inducted, C-17 Globemaster would replace the Russian-made IL-76 as the biggest transport aircraft of India. C-17, a Boeing product, can carry almost 80,000 kg, against IL-76’s 50,000 kg. Sources said...

Conservatives like Dick Cheney just don't get it: It's not that the president is “dithering” while Americans are dying in Afghanistan; it's that the president has other “wars of necessity” to fight, simultaneously, and he can't be everywhere at once. Take, for instance, the president's Cairo pledge, back in June, to help correct “under-investment” in Muslim nations. Last Friday Obama announced that the U.S. Overseas Private Investment Corporation would commit between $25 million and $150 million to fund investment “throughout Asia, the Middle East and Africa.” This president is politically aware of the U.S.'s 10 percent unemployment rate, but he...

Russia’s new military doctrine, which is to come into force in 2010, has provoked a heated debate, first of all because it stipulates preemptive nuclear strikes. Moreover, it says that nuclear weapons may also be used in local conflicts in case of critical threats to Russia’s national security. The wording has encouraged some people to say that Russia intends to use nuclear weapons in conflicts with its closest neighbors – former Soviet republics. A critical threat to Russia’s national security can come from different types of conflicts, including a large-scale war with a block of countries, or a hypothetical territorial...

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev criticised on Monday the pace of military-industrial modernisation, saying it is affecting the quality of Russian weapons and harming national prestige. "Considerable funds have been invested over the past few years to develop the military-industrial complex. So far the results are mediocre," Medvedev said on Russian television. "Unfortunately we carry on filling in holes and the objectives for technological modernisation have not been achieved," the Russian president added. "The quality of military production for the Russian army and foreign exports is causing justified concern from clients," added Industry Minister Viktor Khristenko, speaking at a meeting on...

Ecology: The administration creates the mother of all protected habitats for a species whose numbers have increased since Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth." It's our hopes for energy independence that are drowning. When filmmaker Phelim McAleer, whose documentary "Not Evil Just Wrong" takes apart the myths of global warming, got to ask Gore a question at the annual conference of the Society of Environmental Journalists, McAleer brought up the nine critical errors in Gore's film "An Inconvenient Truth." A British court two years ago listed them and said they must be righted before the film could be shown in schools...

In the Caucasus Mountains along Russia's southern fringe, a hidden war is escalating. Moscow says it's battling militant Islam in the tiny republic of Ingushetia. But people here say hundreds of innocent civilians are being tortured and murdered. REPORTER: He says, "We can no longer walk. "Our teeth have been broken, our jaws are broken. "We desperately need some help." They say they live in terror of a Russian security apparatus out of control. We arrived in Nazran, the largest town in the mainly Muslim Russian Republic of Ingushetia. We were taken to a house, where we were met by...

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On three fronts — South Korean trade, Ukrainian/Russian diplomacy and Afghan war fighting — the Obama administration is being increasingly pressured by unfolding events to shed ideology and rationalizations and come quickly to a realistic analysis of world events and their consequences. In each of these cases, in the absence of very prompt United States policy decisions and actions, we shall incur long-term irreversible economic, geopolitical or national security harm. I will discuss the Afghan war decision in a future column.