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Russia Vows to Sell Missiles to Syria
MOSCOW – Russia announced Feb. 26 that it intended to fulfill its contract to supply Syria with cruise missiles despite the turmoil shaking the Arab world and Israel’s furious condemnation of the deal.
“The contract is in the implementation stage,” news agencies quoted Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov as saying.
Russia initially agreed to send a large shipment of anti-ship Yakhont cruise missiles to Syria in 2007 under the terms of a controversial deal that was only disclosed by Serdyukov in September 2010.
The revelation infuriated Israel and the United States and there had been speculation that Russia would decide to tear up the contract amid the current turmoil plaguing Read more…
‘Russian missiles could be passed on to Hezbollah’
Photo by: ASSOCIATED PRESS
Following Russia’s announcement that it will transfer missiles to Syria, Defense Ministry fears weapons could fall into “wrong hands.”
The Defense Ministry issued a statement Saturday regarding publications that Russia intends to complete a deal to transfer cruise missiles to Syria. “This deal was signed two years ago and has been in the process of implementation for some time, despite Israel’s appeals to Russia regarding the matter.”
Security officials warned that the Russian cruise missiles “are potentially dangerous weapons and they may come fall into the hands of Hezbollah, just as other weapons systems came from Syria.”
The announcement came after Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said that Russia would Read more…
China’s droughts nears worst in 200 years, adding pressure to world food prices
The recent unrest in the Middle East, which has been attributed, in part, to high food prices, gives us a warning of the type of global unrest that might result in future years if the climate continues to warm as expected. A hotter climate means more severe droughts will occur. We can expect an increasing number of unprecedented heat waves and droughts like the 2010 Russian drought in coming decades. This will significantly increase the odds of a world food emergency far worse than the 2007 – 2008 global food crisis. When we also consider the world’s expanding population and the possibility that peak oil will make fertilizers and agriculture much more expensive, we have the potential for a perfect storm of events aligning in the near future, with droughts made significantly worse by climate change contributing to events that will cause disruption of the global economy, intense political turmoil, and war. Read more…
Limited Nuclear War Could Deplete Ozone Layer, Increasing Radiation
By Chris Schneidmiller
WASHINGTON — A nuclear conflict involving as few as 100 weapons could produce long-term damage to the ozone layer, enabling higher than “extreme” levels of ultraviolet radiation to reach the Earth’s surface, new research indicates (see GSN, March 16, 2010).
(Feb. 24) – A 1971 French nuclear test at Mururoa Atoll. The ozone layer could sustain lasting harm from a nuclear exchange involving as few as 100 weapons, allowing increased levels of ultraviolet radiation to reach the Earth’s surface, according to new research (Getty Images).
Increased levels of UV radiation from the sun could persist for years, possibly with a drastic impact on humans and the environment, even thousands of miles from the area of the nuclear conflict.
“A regional nuclear exchange of 100 15-kiloton weapons … would produce unprecedented low-ozone columns over populated areas in conjunction with the coldest surface temperatures experienced in the last 1,000 years, and would likely result in a global nuclear famine,” according to a presentation delivered on Friday at a major science conference in Washington.
Today, there are five recognized nuclear powers — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States. India, Israel and Pakistan are all known or widely assumed to hold nuclear weapons, while North Korea has a Read more…
Russian military to purchase 600 planes, 100 ships
Associated Press
MOSCOW – Russian news agencies are citing Defense Ministry officials as saying the country will spend $650 billion to equip its dilapidated military with 600 new warplanes, 100 ships and 1,000 helicopters by 2020.
The agencies quote First Deputy Defense Minister Vladimir Popovkin as saying Thursday that the ambitious plan envisages eight new nuclear submarines and two Mistral aircraft carriers in addition to the two that Russian is buying from France.
The announcement comes during a large-scale streamlining of personnel in Russia’s bloated and poorly equipped armed forces. The unpopular reforms of Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov have seen as many as 200,000 officers lose their jobs and nine of every 10 army units disbanded.
FROM THE DESK OF PASTOR JOHN HAGEE
For the past few days the world has been watching the Middle East implode! The streets of the nation of Egypt have been packed with riots and bloodshed. The Administration of Mubarak is apparently coming to an end. From my sources of information, I believe the Muslim Brotherhood is now in the driver’s seat to determine the future of Egypt .
The American media, with the exception of FOX News, is presenting the Muslim Brotherhood as moderate and lovers of democracy. This is utter nonsense. This is the hysterical jabber of our State Department that once again has fumbled the ball in the Middle East .
Making a long story short; if the Egyptian drama works out like the Fall of the Shah in Iran in 1979 (and I think it will) there will be a person approved of the Muslim Brotherhood to become Egypt’s new leader. He will appear initially as a moderate and within a few weeks embrace Sharia which is the Islamic law that now governs Iran .
Israel will be surrounded by Read more…
Russia, Iran to Ink Medical Isotope Export Deal
An agreement is being finalized for Russia to export medical isotopes to Iran, the Russian state-owned nuclear firm Rosatom announced yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 22).
Israeli President Shimon Peres delivers a speech in Madrid today. Peres said the passage of two Iranian navy ships through the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean Sea showcased the potential threat of a nuclear-armed Iran (Javier Soriano/Getty Images).
A spokesman for the organization did not elaborate on the timing of the anticipated signing, RIA Novosti reported. Tehran’s need for molybdenum 99 and iodine 131 was addressed in talks between Iranian officials and Rosatom head Sergei Kiriyenko (RIA Novosti, Feb. 22).
The deal would involve transfers of each isotope from Russia to Iran every week, Interfax reported.
Under a 2009 bid put forward by the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran would have exchanged 1,200 kilograms of low-enriched uranium for material to fuel a medical isotope production reactor in Tehran. The Middle Eastern state ultimately rejected the plan worked out with France, Russia and the United States, which was aimed in part at deferring Iran’s ability to produce sufficient weapon material for a bomb long enough to more fully address U.S. and European concerns about Iranian enrichment activities. Tehran has insisted its atomic ambitions are strictly peaceful.
Iran since December has two rounds of talks with Germany and permanent U.N. Security Council member states Read more…
Russia to Impose Internet Controls Like China?
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| Russian Prime Minister Igor Sechin |
David Makarewicz, Contributing Writer
Activist Post
In a Wall Street Journal interview, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin has publicly accused Google executives of causing the Egyptian revolution by manipulating the energies of the people. Although he did not specifically address Internet freedom in Russia, these statements may signal growing concern among Russian hardliners about the Internet’s role in global unrest.
The Russian government does not control the Internet the way it controls other forms of media. However, analysts say there are close allies of Putin who would like to impose controls similar to China’s in order to silence the criticism of the Russian Read more…
Population, Food, Oil … Collision?
World population and growth
Factoring the net birth minus death rate in the world each year, the annual increase to world population is about 75 million people. The current world population is about 6,900,000,000, or 6.9 billion.
Annually, we add to the planet the equivalent population of any of the following scenarios,
- New York City (9 of them!)
- Los Angeles (20 of them!)
- Chicago (27 of them!)
- San Francisco (94 of them!)
- Boston (117 of them!)
- Unites States of America (25 percent of the country!)
When you think about it, this is a startling number. And that’s in just one Read more…
Rising world food prices may soon hit Africa hard, but could be a future boon
Damaged rice is seen in a paddy field destroyed by flood- waters near a village in Manmunai West in Batticaloa district, about 199 miles east of Colombo, Sri Lanka, on Jan. 26. The floods inundated rice paddies, and according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, at least 15.5 percent of the main annual rice harvest could be lost.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/Reuters
Johannesburg, South Africa
Global food prices reached a historic high last month, a fact that may cause even the most comfortable of Americans to cinch in their belts and cut back on spending.
But what about the world’s poor?
“Global food prices are rising to dangerous levels and threaten tens of millions of poor people around the world,” World Bank Group President Robert Zoellick said Tuesday as he announced the bank’s findings that about 44 million people in developing countries have been pushed into poverty since Read more…
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