Free Republic

The Trump administration accused Russia on Thursday of engineering a series of cyberattacks that targeted American and European nuclear power plants and water and electric systems, and could have sabotaged or shut power plants off at will. United States officials and private security firms saw the attacks as a signal by Moscow that it could disrupt the West’s critical facilities in the event of a conflict. They said the strikes accelerated in late 2015, at the same time the Russian interference in the American election was underway. The attackers successfully had compromised some operators in North America and Europe by...

Russia has outlined new plans for a wartime government regime, the Izvestia newspaper reported Tuesday. The country's wartime strategy was fine-tuned following special military exercises, the newspaper wrote. In the event of war, local governments, regional branches of the Interior Ministry, Emergencies Ministry, the Federal Security Service (FSB), and much of the National Guard, will now report directly to the military. Previous plans had seen regional offices work independently and in partnership with local military forces, Izvestia wrote. The new command scheme is hoped to mobilize citizens, businesses and factories more effectively, as well as protect local industry from enemy...

The Russian government's cyber-espionage campaign against the American political system began more than a year ago and has been far more extensive than publicly disclosed, targeting hundreds of key people -- Republicans and Democrats alike -- whose work is considered strategically important to the Putin regime, official sources told NBC News. The targets over the past two years have included a Who's Who of Hillary Clinton associates from her State Department tenure, the Clinton Foundation and her presidential campaign, as well as top Republicans and staffers for Republican candidates for president. Starting in earnest in 2015, Russian hackers used sophisticated...

Russia warned the United States Saturday against carrying out any attacks on Syrian government forces, saying it would have repercussions across the Middle East as government forces captured a hill on the edge of the northern city of Aleppo under the cover of airstrikes. Meanwhile, airstrikes on Aleppo struck a hospital in the eastern rebel-held neighborhood of Sakhour on Saturday, putting it out of service, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordination Committees. They said at least one person was killed in the airstrike. Russian news agencies quoted Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova as...

Russia and Syria appeared to attack two more hospitals and a bakery in the already besieged eastern city of Aleppo on Wednesday, in an aggressive push to seize and starve the city—home to as many as 100,000 children—back into regime control. So how will the Obama administration respond to an increasingly provocative Russia? For now, it won’t. There is an unspoken understanding within the administration that despite the many provocations Russia has carried out in Syria, there will be no major American response, a position that increasingly is drawing the ire of top national security officials, three U.S. officials told...

Russia's justice ministry has branded Russia's only major private pollster a "foreign agent," a stigma that could lead to its closure. The ministry issued a statement Monday evening saying that the Levada polling agency has been listed as a "foreign agency" after a snap inspection found some irregularities. Following major protests against his rule in 2011 and 2012, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law that requires all NGOs receiving foreign funding and found to engage in vaguely defined "political activity" to register as "foreign agents." Those who fail to comply face fines and potential closure. Many organizations have said...

Trump has comfortable leads in the polls heading toward Super Tuesday, just five days away, and his campaign so far has weathered all kinds of bad news. After months of leading the pack, Trump seems immune to those who would challenge him on positions and statements that, for anyone else, should have proved disqualifying. That didn't stop Florida Sen. Marco Rubio from using the last debate before voters cast ballots on Tuesday in 12 states to directly challenge the billionaire. Rival Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, too, came for Trump, but from the right. It was clear that Rubio was pitching...

Turkish PM Ahmed Davutoglu said the government expects Russian tourists to come despite tensions between Ankara and Moscow, as shrinkage in the sector was "unexpected." Russia earlier urged tourists not to visit Turkey, citing security concerns. Speaking at a news conference on Monday, Davutoglu announced an action plan to provide support for the tourism industry, including an $87-million government grant and setting up a facility to allow travel firms to restructure their debts. "We believe Russian tourists will start coming back to Turkey," he was quoted as saying by the Daily Sabah, an English-language newspaper published in Turkey. Davutoglu added...

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is defending a campaign mailer that Iowa's secretary of state says misrepresents election law. The mailer bills itself as a "voting violation" notice and tells the recipient it's been sent due to "low expected voter turnout in your area." It then grades the recipient's voting history and that of several neighbors, citing public records. Cruz told reporters in Sioux City, Iowa, on Saturday that the mailing is "routine." He says he won't apologize

Istanbul (AFP) - It's an occasional but regular sighting in Istanbul. Out of the mist on the Bosphorus that divides Europe and Asia looms the hulk of a Russian warship purposefully making its way to the Mediterranean. Most likely the ship is part of Moscow's so-called "Syria Express", a key supply line for naval deliveries from its Black Sea ports to military operations backing the regime of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. Dozens of Russian warships, auxiliary naval cargo ships and sometimes even submarines have passed through the Bosphorus Strait, northbound and southbound. Every month since Russia stepped up operations...

The main point is, however, that Russia's 'conservative turn' since Putin's return to the Kremlin in March 2012 — widely deplored in the West as a creeping authoritarianism with roots only in the wiles of Putin's mind — may be closer to the world view of Russia's conservative and patriotic majority than most Western governments would care to admit. In foreign and economic policy, Russia's post-Soviet government may never have cleaved as close to the views of the majority as it does now. That's the view of Igor Okunev, a vice-dean at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, whom...

President Vladimir Putin has signed into law the bill allowing the Constitutional Court to overrule the decisions of international courts if such decisions contradict the principle of supremacy of the Russian Constitution. The new act published on the government website on Tuesday reads that the Constitutional Court will look into every decision of any intergovernmental body based on an international treaty and find if it matches the Russian Constitution and the rights and freedoms guaranteed by it. Upon such consideration the Constitutional Court can allow the decision to be executed in Russia, in full or in part, or ban its...

Russian President Vladimir Putin oversaw on Tuesday the launch of the second line of Russia's power link to Crimea which will allow to double Russian power supplies to the peninsula to 400 megawatts. Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, was plunged into darkness around three weeks ago after electricity pylons in southern Ukraine that carry the four lines that supply Crimea with the bulk of its power were blown up by unidentified people.

Two protesters have died in the south-eastern Turkish city of Diyarbakir in a clash between police and Kurdish demonstrators over a curfew imposed as part of a security crackdown. Police fired tear gas and water cannon at protesters at a march called by the main pro-Kurdish party, the HDP. A number of areas in the south-east have been put under curfew as security forces battle Kurdish militants.

Defenses on these machines can counter US-made TOW missiles The Fourth Division of the Syrian army has been equipped with at least 6 modern T-90MS Tagil tanks, provided by the Russian Federation. Their function is to help the Syrian Arab Army advance in the southern province of Aleppo. ... The T-90MS and its outstanding capability to destroy incoming TOW and M79 missiles appears to be perfect for a theater of war like the one in Syria. In 4 and a half years of conflict, more than 9,000 BGM-71E3B TOW and M79 anti-tank systems have been introduced in the country. Their...

Catholic World News Patriarch: Catholics and Russian Orthodox uphold ‘the same Gospel values’ December 04, 2015 The head of the Russian Orthodox Church met with two Catholic priests on December 2 and expressed appreciation for the work of the Catholic Church in Italy. Patriarch Kirill told the prior and administrator of Basilica of St. Nicholas in Bari that “Bari is a sacred place for Orthodox Christians like Mount Athos or holy sites in Palestine” and that “theologians discussing theological issues sitting at the table is one thing, but people contacting our brothers in the West, moreover at the holy site,...

Syrian man rails against Putin after airstrike on Aleppo bakery – video A bakery in the Syrian town of Aleppo is heavily damaged by aerial bombing on Wednesday. In footage from local media that has been verified by Reuters, a man holds up bread, and asks why a bakery was targeted. He blames Russian president Vladimir Putin, who agreed in September to begin airstrikes in support of Bashar al-Assad’s army

The Syrian Turkmen taking flight from Russian bombing By Nafiseh Kohnavard BBC Persian, on the Turkey-Syria border 4 December 2015 Since Russia began air strikes on the Turkmen mountains in north-west Syria last month, nearly 5,000 people from the country's ethnic Turkmen minority have fled their homes. Many have crossed the border into Turkey's Hatay province, their plight overshadowed by a diplomatic row between Turkey and Russia. Turkey has been open in offering support, with officials referring to the Turkmen brigades as "brothers" and insisting they are moderate. However reports suggest the brigades have close ties to the al-Qaeda-linked jihadist...

The Turkish opposition has given the country's leader a cold shower, telling President Erdogan to heat his palace with dung instead of gas after he stated that Turkish people are used to suffering and can do without Russian supplies.

The Prosecutor General's Office has recognized the US-Russia Foundation for Economic Advancement and the Rule of Law (USRF) as undesirable organization, banning Russian citizens and companies from any cooperation with it. Agency spokesperson Marina Gridneva told reporters on Friday that the decision to put the NGO on the list of undesirable foreign organizations was made after prosecutors had thoroughly studied its work on Russian territory. She also noted that USRF is headed by a US citizen who has been banned from entering Russia until 2025. USRF was registered in Russia in 2009 as an affiliate of the US group bearing...