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      Blinken Jousts With China and Russia in United Nations Meeting

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      President Biden’s top diplomat said the United States would uphold international rules and “push back forcefully” against those who don’t, a sharp contrast to the Trump years.Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, meeting with counterparts from both China and Russia on Friday, said that the United States would “push back forcefully” against breakers of international rules, even as he acknowledged his own country’s violations under the Trump administration.Mr. Blinken’s counterparts, Foreign Ministers Wang Yi of China and Sergey V. Lavrov of Russia, took their own diplomatic swipes at the United States, accusing it of hypocrisy and of defining international rules in terms designed to assert Western dominance in the world.The exchanges came at a United Nations Security Council meeting, convened by China and held virtually via videoconference link, on the theme of multilateral cooperation against the pandemic, global warming and other common threats.It was in some ways a rematch between Mr. Blinken and Mr. Wang, who was part of a top Chinese delegation that brusquely lectured the United States at a meeting in Alaska two months ago. That unscripted confrontation was regarded heroically in China, where the government has stoked rising anti-Americanism and nationalism.Although the terms and tone used in the Friday meeting were more diplomatic, the differences were stark in the world views espoused by Mr. Blinken and his counterparts. Those differences suggested that the gridlock among the big powers of the Security Council would not ease anytime soon.The session was held the same week that Mr. Blinken, meeting with the foreign ministers of the Group of 7 nations in Britain, emphasized what he described as the importance of “defending democratic values and open societies” — a signal of the Biden administration’s intent to challenge China and Russia on human rights, disinformation and other issues that had been de-emphasized or ignored by the administration of President Donald J. Trump.In another clear signal from the Biden administration, Mr. Blinken also visited Ukraine, where he pledged support for its fight against a Russian-backed insurgency that has claimed 13,000 lives since 2014.Mr. Blinken asserted in his Security Council remarks that the United Nations remained a critical force for good in the world, responsible since its founding at the end of World War II for the most peaceful and prosperous era in modern history, but was now under severe threat.“Nationalism is resurgent, repression is rising, rivalries among countries are deepening — and attacks against the rules-based order are intensifying,” Mr. Blinken said. “Some question whether multilateral cooperation is still possible. The United States believes it is not only possible, but imperative.”Mr. Blinken said the United States would work with any country on the global threats presented by the coronavirus and climate change, “including those with whom we have serious differences.”At the same time, he said, in a clear warning to China and Russia, that the United State would “push back forcefully when we see countries undermine the international order, pretend that the rules we’ve all agreed to don’t exist, or simply violate them at will.”He did not lay out any new positions but clearly sought to emphasize that the Biden administration was committed to reversing the foreign-policy legacy of President Donald J. Trump, who frequently disparaged the United Nations and led the United States down what critics called a destructive, unilateral path.“I know that some of our actions in recent years have undermined the rules-based order and led others to question whether we are still committed to it,” Mr. Blinken said. “Rather than take our word for it, we ask the world to judge our commitment by our actions.”He enumerated how the Biden administration had rejoined the Paris Climate accord, halted Mr. Trump’s withdrawal from the World Health Organization and was seeking to rejoin the U.N. Human Rights Council.“We’re also taking steps, with great humility, to address the inequities and injustices in our own democracy,” he said. “We do so openly and transparently, for people around the world to see. Even when it’s ugly. Even when it’s painful.”Mr. Wang, whose country holds the rotating Security Council presidency for May, sought to depict China as a responsible global citizen that adhered to international law. Without mentioning the United States by name, he chided countries that he said had defined international rules as a “patent or privilege of the few.”He also declared that “no country should expect other countries to lose,” reflecting a Chinese accusation that the United States is seeking to suppress China’s ascendance — an accusation that Mr. Blinken and others have denied.Mr. Lavrov was more direct in his criticisms of the United States and its allies, describing Mr. Blinken’s references to a “rules-based order” as a guise for Western efforts to repress other countries.He was especially critical of the economic sanctions that the United States and European Union have imposed on Russia and others they disagree with, which Mr. Lavrov said were designed to “take opponents out of the game.” More

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      Blinken Will Visit Ukraine in Show of Support Against Russia

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      The secretary of state will first meet with British officials and other American allies in London.WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken will travel to Kyiv next week, a clear signal of the Biden administration’s support for Ukraine’s government against threats from Russia.In a statement announcing the trip, the State Department said Mr. Blinken would “reaffirm unwavering U.S. support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of Russia’s ongoing aggression.”Mr. Blinken will meet in Kyiv on Wednesday and Thursday with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, senior officials and civil society representatives. His visit will be preceded by a three-day stop in London.Mr. Blinken will be the most senior American official to visit Kyiv since Secretary of State Mike Pompeo traveled there in February 2020, soon after Congress impeached and acquitted President Donald J. Trump on charges that he abused his power by leveraging U.S. policy toward the country in an effort to incriminate Joseph R. Biden Jr., then a Democratic candidate for president, and his son, Hunter.As president, Mr. Biden has offered strong support for Ukraine against Moscow, which annexed Crimea in 2014 — an act the United States has never recognized — and fomented a Russian-backed separatist rebellion in the country’s east that has claimed more than 13,000 lives.But Russia has tested that support, intensifying its military intimidation of Ukraine this spring with a huge troop buildup along the countries’ shared border, which many analysts said could be a precursor to an invasion. Russia announced plans to withdraw many of those forces this month. But earlier this week, John F. Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, told reporters that it was “too soon to tell and to take at face value” Russia’s claim.Mr. Blinken will begin his trip with his first visit as secretary to London, the site of a Group of 7 foreign and development ministers’ meeting that will lay the groundwork for a gathering of the leaders of the Group of 7 countries in Cornwall in June.The State Department framed Mr. Blinken’s visit as part of a global defense of democracy that Mr. Biden, in an address to Congress and the nation on Wednesday night, called vital to countering the rise of authoritarian China. The State Department spokesman, Ned Price, said Mr. Blinken would be “discussing the democratic values that we share with our partners and allies within the G7.”The meeting of Group of 7 ministers, planned for Tuesday, will open with a session specifically devoted to China, Erica Barks-Ruggles, the senior official in the State Department’s Bureau of International Organization Affairs, said in a news briefing.Mr. Price added that the foreign ministers would also address the coronavirus pandemic and climate change, as well as issues including human rights, food security and gender equality.Joining the ministers from the Group of 7 countries — the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Canada — in London will be representatives from Australia, India, South Africa, South Korea and Brunei.Their attendance reflects a growing interest on the part of western nations to collaborate more closely with fellow democracies around the world as part of the broader competition with China and other countries exporting authoritarian values, including Russia.Officials from those nations will join ones from the Group of 7 for a discussion on Wednesday about open societies, including media freedom and combating disinformation, Ms. Barks-Ruggles added. Samantha Power, the administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, will join sessions on how to ensure a sustainable recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.During his stay in London from Monday to Wednesday, Mr. Blinken will meet with Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain and his foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, and take part in a wreath-laying ceremony at St. Paul’s Cathedral honoring soldiers killed in World War II.Even as Biden administration officials have stressed their support for Ukraine’s government, they have also pressured Kyiv to complete reforms within the country’s notoriously corrupt political system. The State Department said that would be a priority for Mr. Blinken, and that progress in that area “is key to securing Ukraine’s democratic institutions, economic prosperity and Euro-Atlantic future.”Briefing reporters on Thursday, Mr. Price said that the United States was “deeply concerned” by a recent move by Ukrainian cabinet ministers to replace the management of the country’s leading energy company, Naftogaz. Mr. Price called the actions “just the latest example of ignoring best practices and putting Ukraine’s hard-fought economic progress at risk.”The trip will be Mr. Blinken’s third overseas since taking office as in-person diplomacy slowly resumes even as the coronavirus ravages much of the world. This month, he visited Brussels and Kabul, and in March he traveled to Asia and then met with Chinese officials in Alaska. More

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      Biden Administration Says Russian Intelligence Obtained Trump Campaign Data

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      A Treasury Department document shed more light on links between the campaign and Russian spies.WASHINGTON — The Biden administration revealed on Thursday that a business associate of Trump campaign officials in 2016 provided campaign polling data to Russian intelligence services, the strongest evidence to date that Russian spies had penetrated the inner workings of the Trump campaign.The revelation, made public in a Treasury Department document announcing new sanctions against Russia, established for the first time that private meetings and communications between the campaign officials, Paul Manafort and Rick Gates, and their business associate were a direct pipeline from the campaign to Russian spies at a time when the Kremlin was engaged in a covert effort to sabotage the 2016 presidential election.Previous government investigations have identified the Trump aides’ associate, Konstantin V. Kilimnik, as a Russian intelligence operative, and Mr. Manafort’s decision to provide him with internal polling data was one of the mysteries that the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, sought to unravel during his two-year investigation into Russia’s election meddling.“During the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign, Kilimnik provided the Russian Intelligence Services with sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy,” the Treasury Department said in a news release. “Additionally, Kilimnik sought to promote the narrative that Ukraine, not Russia, had interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.”The Biden administration provided no supporting evidence to bolster the assessment that the Russian intelligence services obtained the polling data and campaign information. And the release shed no light on why Mr. Manafort and Mr. Gates gave polling data to Mr. Kilimnik, although previous government reports have indicated that Mr. Manafort thought Trump campaign strategy information could be a valuable commodity for future business deals with Kremlin-connected oligarchs.Having the polling data would have allowed Russia to better understand the Trump campaign strategy — including where the campaign was focusing resources — at a time when the Russian government was carrying out its own efforts to undermine Donald J. Trump’s opponent.Mr. Gates said in a statement on Thursday that the Treasury Department had failed to provide any evidence to back up its claim, adding that “the polling data passed periodically to Kilimnik at Paul Manafort’s direction was simplistic and outdated, never in real time.”“It was from both public and internal sources,” Mr. Gates said. “It was not massive binders full of demographics or deep research. It was ‘topline’ numbers and did not contain any strategic plans.”The new sanctions against Russia are in response to the Kremlin’s election interference, efforts to hack American government agencies and companies, and other acts of aggression against the United States.The sanctions now make it extremely difficult for Mr. Kilimnik, who was indicted by the Justice Department in 2018 on charges of obstruction of justice, to engage in financial transactions that may involve the United States.It is unclear how long American spy agencies have held the conclusion about Mr. Kilimnik. Senior Trump administration officials, fearing Mr. Trump’s wrath, repeatedly tried to keep from the public any information that seemed to show Mr. Trump’s affinity for Russia or its president, Vladimir V. Putin.Mr. Kilimnik had been a longtime business partner during Mr. Manafort’s time as a political consultant in Ukraine. In 2018, prosecutors for Mr. Mueller’s office announced that Mr. Kilimnik had “ties to Russian intelligence” and that Mr. Manafort had instructed Mr. Gates to pass the polling and campaign information to Mr. Kilimnik.The Senate Intelligence Committee went further last August in its bipartisan report that scrutinized the links between the Trump campaign and Russia — calling Mr. Kilimnik a “Russian intelligence officer.”The report contained several significant redactions that appeared related to Mr. Manafort and Mr. Kilimnik but said that Mr. Manafort’s willingness to share the information with him “represented a grave counterintelligence threat.”The report called the relationship between Mr. Manafort and Mr. Kilimnik “the single most direct tie between senior Trump campaign officials and the Russian intelligence services.”The Senate report portrayed a Trump campaign stacked with businessmen and other advisers who had little government experience and “presented attractive targets for foreign influence, creating notable counterintelligence vulnerabilities.”A New York Times article in 2017 said that there had been numerous interactions between the Trump campaign and Russian intelligence during the year before the election. F.B.I. officials had disputed the report, but both the Senate report and the Treasury Department document confirm the article’s findings.The assertion that it was Ukraine, not Russia, that sought to disrupt the 2016 election has long been both a Kremlin talking point and a claim by Mr. Trump that foreign actors tried to help his opponent, Hillary Clinton, rather than him.Mr. Trump’s obsession over Ukraine’s supposed role in the election was the impetus for a 2019 phone call with the Ukrainian president that was central to the first impeachment proceedings against Mr. Trump.Mr. Manafort was brought into the Trump campaign in March 2016, at a time when Mr. Trump had largely sewn up the Republican presidential nomination.Mr. Manafort and his longtime business associate, Mr. Gates, joined the Trump campaign after years of doing political consulting work in Ukraine, where they met Mr. Kilimnik, a Russian Army-trained linguist.The two men met with Mr. Kilimnik several times after joining the campaign, and in June 2016, Mr. Manafort became the Trump campaign chairman.Details about Mr. Manafort’s relationship with Mr. Kilimnik were revealed in 2018 as the government prosecuted Mr. Manafort and charged Mr. Kilimnik with obstruction of justice for trying to coach potential witnesses in the investigation.Mr. Kilimnik never came to the United States to face charges. He is wanted by the F.B.I., and the bureau is offering $250,000 for information that could lead to his arrest. More

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      in US Politics

      Biden to unveil Russia sanctions over SolarWinds hack and election meddling

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      The US is set to announce new sanctions against Russia as soon as Thursday in retaliation for Moscow’s elections interference, alleged bounties on US soldiers in Afghanistan, and cyber-espionage campaigns such as the SolarWinds hack, according to reports in US and international media.Ten Russian diplomatic officials are to be expelled from the US and up to 30 entities will be blacklisted, officials said, in the largest sanctions action against Russia of Joe Biden’s presidency.Additionally, the White House may issue an executive order barring US financial institutions from purchasing rouble bonds issued by Russia’s government, targeting the country’s sovereign debt and its broader economy. That could begin as soon as June, according to some reports.Q&AWhat was the SolarWinds hack?ShowIn early 2020, malicious code was sneaked into updates to a popular piece of software called Orion, made in the US by the company SolarWinds, which monitors the computer networks of businesses and governments for outages.That malware gave hackers remote access to an organisation’s networks so they could steal information. Among the most high-profile users of the software were US government departments including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the state department, and the justice department.Described by the Microsoft president, Brad Smith, as “the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen”, US intelligence agencies have accused Russia of launching the attack.SolarWinds, of Austin, Texas, provides network monitoring and other technical services to hundreds of thousands of organisations around the world, including most Fortune 500 companies and government agencies in North America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.Its compromised product, Orion, is a centralised monitoring tool that looks for problems in an organisation’s computer network, which means that breaking in gave the attackers a “God view” of those networks.Neither SolarWinds nor US cybersecurity authorities have publicly identified which organisations were breached. Just because a company or agency uses SolarWinds as a vendor does not necessarily mean it was vulnerable to the hack.Kari Paul and Martin BelamUnnamed officials told the New York Times the new sanctions were meant to cut deeper than previous attempts to punish Moscow for its attacks on US institutions and allies. Some Russian officials have laughed off being added to the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctions lists, comparing it to being elevated to an elite club. The threat of the ban on purchasing Russian debt has already depressed prices on the rouble and rouble-denominated OFZ treasury bonds.The sanctions will add tension to an already strained relationship between Russia and the US. Since last month, Moscow has been engaged in the largest troop buildup on its border with Ukraine since the 2014 annexation of Crimea, provoking fears of an invasion. Biden called Vladimir Putin on Tuesday to urge him to de-escalate tensions with Ukraine and proposed a summit in a third country. The Kremlin gave a frosty account of the telephone call, and did not say whether Putin had agreed to the meeting.Earlier this year, Biden had agreed with a reporter when asked if Putin was “a killer”. Those remarks were replayed widely on Russian television. Putin responded by wryly wishing Biden “good health”, which was seen as a nod to Biden’s age.The US president’s tough approach differs considerably from that of the Trump administration, which largely sought to avoid confronting Russia over a CIA assessment that Moscow had offered and paid bounties for foreign fighters to kill US troops in Afghanistan. Trump said he doubted the evidence behind the reports.He similarly sided with Putin over an FBI assessment that Russia had interfered in the 2016 elections during a summit in Helsinki two years later.The planned sanctions were said to be retaliation for Russian interference in the 2020 elections, during which US intelligence agencies concluded that the Kremlin had backed Trump over Biden.Sign up for the Guardian’s First Thing newsletterThe sanctions would also be a response to a massive and sophisticated cybersecurity breach against SolarWinds Corp that affected software used by US government agencies. The US has blamed Russia for the attack.Peskov this week said that “the hostility and unpredictability of America’s actions force us in general to be prepared for the worst scenarios”. More

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      in World Politics

      EU Concern Over Ukraine Is Not Enough

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      Hostilities between Ukraine and Russia reached an alarming level last week when further Russian troops were deployed on the Ukrainian border. Despite a statement from the Kremlin describing the act as “not threatening,” Kyiv accused Moscow of moving thousands of soldiers to its northern and eastern borders and on the Russian-annexed Crimean Peninsula to create an intimidating atmosphere in violation of the Minsk agreements and the ceasefire in the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine. The Russian Foreign Ministry claimed it is Kyiv and NATO countries that are increasing their armed forces in Ukraine and the Black Sea close to Russia’s borders. 

      Nevertheless, the Russian Federation is following its usual scheme and is ready to seize any opportunity that arises. There may be three possible reasons behind these new developments: 1) Moscow wants to send a message to the US administration after recent statements regarding President Vladimir Putin; 2) the Russians are seeking a pretext to install their “peacekeepers” in Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine; or 3) the Kremlin wants to use the water crisis in Crimea to intervene and build a corridor through the Donbass region.

      Assessing the Tensions Between Ukraine and Russia

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      There might be other drivers, such as the ongoing power struggle inside the Russian administration, despite the fact that Putin signed a law that would allow him to stay in office until 2036. A manufactured external threat to Russian citizens — Russian passports have been issued to many Ukrainians living in the two self-declared people’s republics of Donetsk and Luhansk — would help deflect attention from internal economic problems, which have only worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic.

      In February, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky shut down three television channels linked to Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk, which may have contributed to the latest tension. Not only does Medvedchuk have personal ties to Putin, but the stations have also broadcast pro-Russian propaganda to the Ukrainian people.

      In the end, the cause can be left to Kremlinologists to decipher. Yet what is clear is that Putin has proved to be ready to act whenever there is a chance, and he has plenty of opportunities to create an event to trigger action. Ultimately, it does not matter why. What matters is that other regional actors are now using peaceful means to prevent a further escalation between Russia and Ukraine.

      Is Dialogue Enough?

      The US and the European Union have declared their support for Kyiv. Josep Borrell, the EU foreign policy chief and vice-president of the European Commission, expressed concern over the latest developments. The European Parliament also released a statement in which it reiterates that Moscow must reduce tensions by ending its military buildup in and close to Ukrainian territory. This is certainly not enough, but what are the options?

      Embed from Getty Images

      Engaging in dialogue is fine, but it seems the meaning of it has been forgotten — that is, to listen to each other and try to understand. When there is an argument between parties, there should be a general assumption that the other person could be right. It is not sufficient to only listen in order to respond and get one’s own points across. It should also not be disregarded that there is a civil society in Russia. When there is a dispute with the Kremlin, it does not entail the whole population.

      What is important is that language matters, words become actions, and actions have consequences — and this could lead to a dangerous downward spiral. Nevertheless, there must also be some clear lines established. This tit-for-tat blame game that has dominated the discourse for decades has to stop. This is not a reasonable discussion. The demands by Zelensky to accelerate Ukraine’s membership in NATO are not helpful, but nor is a meeting between Russia, Germany and France on the situation in Ukraine without including representatives from Kyiv.

      Diplomatic relations among regional actors have been strained for years but deteriorated further over recent months. In February, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated in an interview about relations between Russia and the European Union that “if you want peace, be prepared for war.” In the current political climate, this sounds far more threatening than it might have a few months ago. At that time, the German Foreign Ministry rightly called the comments “disconcerting and incomprehensible,” though Lavrov is known for his controversial statements.

      Nevertheless, this has marked a new low in the EU–Russia relations, and it seems that things could get worse. Expelling diplomats of EU member states while Borrell, the top European diplomat, was in Moscow is just power play. Despite Lavrov being in office for 17 years, the European Union has never found a way to reach a consensus on how to respond to his actions. In 2004, Central and Eastern European countries had just joined the EU, which was and still is a big success, but the necessary reforms in the institutional setup to be able to handle Lavrov have still not been implemented.

      What is even worse, the lack of capabilities to anticipate consequences has forever been a weak point in Brussels. Negotiations for an association agreement between the EU and Ukraine effectively led to the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014. Politics is much more complicated and one action does not necessarily lead to a specific outcome, but there is certainly a possibility of a butterfly effect.

      Better Preparation

      In order to be better prepared, member states need to pool resources together and ultimately transfer sovereignty to the EU when it comes to foreign policy. Otherwise, the divide-and-conquer approach by Russia will continue. After a rather humiliating meeting with Lavrov in February, Borrell said, “As ever, it will be for member states to decide the next steps, and yes, these could include sanctions.” This is not a language that the Kremlin understands.

      The German government, for instance, has been reluctant when it comes to imposing sanctions. On the one hand, this is due to Berlin’s history with the Russian Federation, but to a lesser extent, it is because of the Nord Stream 2, a gas pipeline linking Russia and Germany via the Baltic Sea. Nevertheless, this would be an opportunity to act as the pipeline also threatens Ukraine’s energy supply and might open another opportunity to act for the Kremlin. Yet there is a very good argument against sanctions: They would hurt the general population in Russia, which would further alienate the people who, in turn, would rally around the flag.

      Nevertheless, there are other ways to respond, ideally targeting the circles close to the Kremlin. Suspending Russia from the SWIFT global financial network could also be an option; calls to do so first emerged in 2014 after Russia’s actions in Ukraine. Yet this might lead to a fragmentation of the international financial system; Russian authorities have already backed international use of its alternative payment network.

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      The biggest danger for the Putin regime would be if the majority of Russians understood that it is possible to live in a liberal democracy. This is why a closer relationship between Ukraine and the EU is so dangerous for the Kremlin. The current escalation is not about the expansion of Russia’s borders or preserving traditional values, as often spun by Russian media and Moscow. This is a facade that masks the fact that if people were given the possibility of improving their lives without the strongman in the Kremlin, the Putin system would become irrelevant.

      Sanctions on Russia will most likely not lead to this outcome. There will not be a democratic revolution on the streets — this can only be through a gradual process. The question is: Will Western democracy survive long enough to see that change coming in order to still be a model?

      Therefore, the EU has to send a clear and unified message to prevent further escalation and not only react or be taken by surprise, as was the case in 2014. Ideally, this would also strengthen transatlantic relations by finding a common approach to the evolving situation. After the EU’s top representatives suffered political embarrassment in Moscow and Ankara, it would be even more necessary to send a strong signal to Russia.

      Being concerned is not enough — neither by institutions in Brussels, nor by EU member states. There is a need to be better prepared for certain scenarios. Repeating the same mistakes will be unforgivable for the region and the future of the European Union itself.

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      Fair Observer Scoop: Putin Engineered the Blockage of the Suez Canal

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      MSNBC’s star journalist Rachel Maddow was ready to break the news but hesitated when certain insiders worried that, if the accusation was not borne out by verifiable facts, the reaction might further damage the reputation of a news organization whose ratings have been plummeting for the past two months. This lapse has enabled Fair Observer to provide the scoop that Maddow was on the verge of making before being pulled back by MSNBC’s marketing department. Maddow did mention a rumor that Russia could have been involved, warning that if this could be confirmed it would be seen as “a new variation in Putin’s playbook.” But with no substantial evidence to present or names to cite, she went on to focus on the lurid details of Representative Matt Gaetz’s sex scandal.

      Credible witnesses with access to the Kremlin have revealed to The Daily Devil’s Dictionary that the sandstorm credited with disturbing the navigation of the Ever Given — the Japanese container ship that ended up blocking the Suez Canal — was the result of a covert operation by Russia’s weather modification team. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aim was to damage the credibility of traditional trade routes, sowing doubt about the West’s ability to manage global commerce as the US prepares to disengage militarily from the Middle East. The message is clear. Russia is ready to mount similar operations in Syria, Iraq and even Egypt and Libya to further weaken the waning US influence in the region.

      Mohammed bin Salman’s Neom: A Case of Giga-Narcissism

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      But there is another dimension of this geopolitical struggle whose implications will stretch out over decades. Thanks to global warming, which the Russians officially blame the US for encouraging, Putin has been nourishing his plan to turn the increasingly navigable Arctic Ocean that stretches across Russia’s northern coastline into the obvious choice for most East-West trade. Thanks to the melting ice, Russia will soon be in a position to monitor and control as much as 60% of intercontinental trade in the decade to come.

      Fair Observer’s scoop resulted from a cryptic remark spoken by a Russian official and overheard by CNN’s correspondent at a lunch table at the Kremlin. One of Putin’s closest aides, Nikolai Stavrogin, sat down with the intention of explaining to New York Times reporter Shawn McDermott a major shift in geopolitical history that would soon become apparent. The past, he claimed, was being undone in front of our very eyes. When asked for a detailed explanation, Stavrogin leaned back in his chair and slowly articulated this enigmatic thought: “Ice melts and ships float. It is ever a given that when water evaporates stillness reigns.”

      Today’s Daily Devil’s Dictionary definition:

      Evaporate:

      A verb used alternatively to describe the transformation of water under the effect of heat and the fate of many news stories left in the hands of journalists who refuse to think below the surface

      Contextual Note

      CNN reporter Elizabeth Prynne, who was just near enough to overhear Stavrogin utter his enigmatic statement, noted the words “ever” and “given” in his arcane message and suspected the remark might have a deeper meaning. Convinced that it needed to be followed up, she asked her colleague at The NY Times for some background. The Times reporter told her that Stavrogin’s observation concerned climate change, a purely scientific matter. He had other matters to deal with and would refer this one to his scientific colleagues, always eager to speculate about the effects of global warming.

      Prynne began asking around what Stavrogin’s remark might mean. She mentioned it to a friend who happens to be a Fair Observer contributor, who then informed The Daily Devil’s Dictionary. We immediately understood that this did indeed refer to the phenomenon of global warming. But, as Prynne suspected, it concerned the geopolitical impact of climate change. Thanks to the ever more apparent annual Arctic thaw that has opened up previously inaccessible trade routes, Russia is certain to obtain a growing strategic advantage. 

      Thanks to another of our relations, we were then able to reach Stavrogin himself who, without offering any new details, confirmed that his remarks concerned an impending revolution in maritime commerce. He also dropped the telling hint that the Kremlin’s weather experts had the knowledge and expertise to cause the stranding of an oversized ship in the Suez Canal. He refused to confirm that the operation was actually carried out by the Russians, but his boast that they were capable of such an operation left no doubt in our minds.

      Historical Note

      Fair Observer is not in the business of seeking or publishing scoops. But when one lands in our lap, we will not hesitate to disseminate it, especially at this crucial moment of history on April 1, 2021. The Daily Devil’s Dictionary published one of the first warnings concerning the suspicious disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in early October 2018. We pointed to the nature and the probable author of the crime well before the mainstream news began reporting Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s possible involvement in Khashoggi’s disappearance.

      Embed from Getty Images

      We have now established the fact that Vladimir Putin effectively intervened in beaching the Ever Given, an incident that for a full week dramatically disturbed global trade by blocking the Suez Canal. This is a major story that neither MSNBC nor CNN have shown the temerity to reveal. Proud of our scoop, we find ourselves in the embarrassing position of having to backtrack on our own recent and repeated claims that The New York Times has been pathologically obsessed with blaming Russia for every crime and misdemeanor on the international stage, or even in domestic politics in the US. We hope the Gray Lady will accept our belated apologies.

      This incident that came to light through such indirect means tells us that, contrary to our own claims, The Times’ executive editor, Dean Baquet, was in the end justified in pursuing beyond reason the paper’s campaign against Russia. After what has now become clear about Putin’s intervention in the Suez Canal, what rational person could possibly doubt what The Times has been claiming for the past five years — that Putin colluded with Donald Trump and personally played the decisive role by tampering in the 2016 US presidential election to ensure the defeat of Hillary Clinton?

      It was barely a week ago that the sandstorm occurred leading to the blockage of the Suez Canal. Some will say that so soon after the event, with the facts still difficult to pin down, that this first day of April is not the appropriate time to claim the truth of such allegations. But we proudly proclaim that April 1 is a far more appropriate moment than the other 364 days of the years when MSNBC, The New York Times, CNN, The Washington Post and others have consistently pushed a similar story, and that for more than five years.

      *[Humorists have always been attracted to the temptation of reporting patently fake news on April Fools’ Day. In our turn, we have succumbed. Our apologies to MSNBC, CNN and The New York Times for doing what they would never dare to do: print news that isn’t true. As Jonathan Swift might describe it, they are the Houyhnhnms, who “cannot say a thing which is not” and we are the Yahoos, whom he describes as “restive and indocible, mischievous and malicious.” (Disclaimer: we have no legal connection to Yahoo!) Read more of The Daily Devil’s Dictionary on Fair Observer.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More