US Pledges Millions Seized from Russian Oligarch in Latest Ukraine Aid Package

US Pledges Millions Seized from Russian Oligarch in Latest Ukraine Aid Package

Attorney General Merrick Garland promises this will not be the last time Kiev will be provided with “forfeited Russian funds.” While visiting Kyiv on Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced another pledge of funds to Ukraine worth $1 billion in military and other financial aid. Included in that sum is $5.4 million in seized assets belonging to a Russian oligarch and this will go toward veterans’ services. Blinken declared “those who have enabled Putin’s war of aggression should pay for it.” This is the first time sanctioned Russian oligarchs’ assets will be included in an...

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Report: Ukraine’s Growing Assassination Program

Report: Ukraine’s Growing Assassination Program

Kiev’s own “Mossad” is shooting, hanging, blowing up, and poisoning dozens of targets in occupied Ukraine as well as the Russian mainland itself. Ukraine’s domestic security service (SBU) has an elite ancillary known as the fifth counter-intelligence directorate, which has taken a central role in “counter-Russia operations” specializing in “wet work” or assassinations, according to a report in The Economist. The report discusses the killing of Yevhen Yunakov, the former mayor of Velykyi Burluk in the Khariv region, after he had been targeted as a “collaborator” with Moscow. Yunakov was...

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Iran, US Prisoner Swap and Funds Release Imminent in Qatari-Mediated Deal

Iran, US Prisoner Swap and Funds Release Imminent in Qatari-Mediated Deal

As the result of a deal made possible by at least eight rounds of shuttle diplomacy mediated by Doha, the US and Iran may soon be conducting a prisoner swap. This agreement will additionally see $6 billion in previously frozen funds belonging to Iran transferred to banks in Qatar, where that money will be spent on food and medicine, according to eight Iranian and other sources speaking with Reuters. On August 10, Tehran released four American citizens from prison into house arrest, where they joined a fifth. At least three of them had been accused of spying and cooperating with Washington....

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China, Philippine Vessels in Stand-Off in South China Sea

China, Philippine Vessels in Stand-Off in South China Sea

China and the Philippines have engaged in another stand-off near the Second Thomas Shoal, a reef in the South China Sea’s disputed Spratly Islands. This comes as Washington is building up its military presence in the Philippines and elsewhere in the region, eyeing a future war with Beijing. Last month, during a tense confrontation, Chinese Coast Guard ships fired a water cannon at Philippine boats attempting to re-supply a World War II era tank-landing ship. The BRP Sierra Madre, grounded on the reef in 1999, is used by Manilla as a base of operations and to assert its claims. In a more...

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ICC Lead Prosecutor: We Will Prosecute Cyber ‘War Crimes’

ICC Lead Prosecutor: We Will Prosecute Cyber ‘War Crimes’

In an article published last month in Foreign Policy Analytics, Karim Khan - the lead prosecutor at the International Criminal Court (ICC), based in the Hague - declared that his office will now be investigating and potentially prosecuting “war crimes” committed in cyberspace. This comes after Joe Biden ordered his administration to begin sharing evidence of alleged Russian war crimes committed in Ukraine with the ICC. Khan wrote that his office will investigate cyber crimes that possibly violate the Rome Statute. “Cyber warfare does not play out in the abstract. Rather, it can have a...

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US Carries Out ICBM Test Amid Tensions with North Korea and Russia

US Carries Out ICBM Test Amid Tensions with North Korea and Russia

The US Air Force and Space Force jointly launched an unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) on Wednesday, amidst increased tensions with Pyongyang and Moscow. Air Force Global Strike Command carried out the test firing from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. “These test launches demonstrate the readiness of [US] nuclear forces and provide confidence in the lethality and effectiveness of the nation’s nuclear deterrent,” said Space Launch Delta 30 vice commander Col. Bryan Titus. A day earlier, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan threatened Pyongyang...

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Watchdog: Cluster Bomb Deaths in Ukraine Are Highest in the World

Watchdog: Cluster Bomb Deaths in Ukraine Are Highest in the World

As the proxy war in Ukraine continues raging, people are being killed and wounded by cluster bombs at a higher rate than anywhere else in the world including Syria, according to the Cluster Munition Coalition. The coalition - which is a network of non-governmental organizations that support banning the controversial weapons - released an annual report showing 2022 was the deadliest year on record globally for cluster bomb related killings. Cluster bombs open up in the air and scatter scores of small bomblets and submunitions across large target areas, these often kill non-combatants for...

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Ukraine Defense Minister Resigns Amid Military Graft and Corruption Scandals

Ukraine Defense Minister Resigns Amid Military Graft and Corruption Scandals

Amidst a deluge of corruption scandals, particularly with regards to military graft, Ukraine’s Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov resigned on Monday. President Volodymyr Zelensky announced he will be replaced a day earlier. This comes as some US lawmakers have cited graft as a reason to impose limits on military and financial aid to Kiev for its war with Moscow. Zelensky has come under pressure from the West to ensure “Ukrainian officials were not siphoning off some of the billions of dollars in aid that was flowing into [Kiev],” according to the New York Times. Last week, National Security...

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