Category Archives: European Union

Britain, European Union, National Security, Russia

Putin blasted by MI5 for ‘fog of lies’ over Salisbury

BRITAIN’S INTELLIGENCE SERVICE

Head of MI5: Andrew Parker

Intro: Andrew Parker speaks out for the first time since the Salisbury nerve agent attack

THE head of MI5, Britain’s intelligence service, has launched an excoriating attack on Russia, accusing Vladimir Putin’s regime of flagrant breaches of international law.

Andrew Parker used his first public speech outside of the UK by taking aim at the Russian president and his “aggressive and pernicious” agenda.

He told European security chiefs the Salisbury poisonings were a deliberate and malign act that could turn Russia into a “more isolated pariah”. He also launched a strident attack on the “fog of lies, half-truths and obfuscation” that pours out of Mr Putin’s propaganda machine.

Mr Parker’s speech in Berlin was the first time he has spoken publicly since the attempted assassination in Salisbury of former Russian agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, in March.

The attack, with the Novichok toxin, marked the first use of a nerve agent in Europe since the Second World War.

The MI5 director-general said that with an unrelenting international terrorist threat and rising state aggression, the UK and Europe need to work together more than ever.

His words are likely to have been interpreted as a warning to Brussels to agree a post-Brexit deal on security cooperation. That has been in growing doubt amid a row over whether Britain will still be allowed to participate in the EU’s multi-billion-pound Galileo global navigation satellite project. But Mr Parker reserved his toughest language for Russia, saying that Mr Putin’s government is pursuing an agenda through aggressive actions by its intelligence services.

He accused the Kremlin of flagrant breaches of international rules, warning that the Salisbury attack was a “deliberate and targeted malign activity”.

Britain’s security agencies are still trying to identify those individuals behind the attack. It is understood there are several persons of interest who are back in Moscow and may have been in the UK at the time of the poisoning.

Mr Parker, who has been head of the security service since 2013, also condemned the unprecedented level of Russian disinformation following the attack, saying it highlights the need “to shine a light through the fog of lies, half-truths and obfuscation that pours out of their propaganda machine”.

In the wake of the attack, Theresa May said “Kremlin-inspired” accounts were posting lies as “part of a wider effort to undermine the international system”.

Mr Parker did, however, praise the international response to the incident in his speech which was hosted by Germany’s BfV domestic intelligence service.

He noted that 28 European countries agreed to support the UK in expelling scores of Russian diplomats.

In 2017, Mrs May’s national security adviser, Mark Sedwill, said the threat from Moscow was worse than ever imagined. He warned that it was intensifying and diversifying.

 

MR Parker also told EU security leaders in Berlin that Internet giants have an “ethical responsibility” to prevent hostile states spreading a “torrent of lies” online. He said that “bare-faced lying” had become the “default mode” of the Russian state.

He added that there was a “great deal more” that could be done with internet providers to stop the exploitation of the web.

MI5’s director-general said Europe faced sustained hostile activity from states including Russia who he described as the “chief protagonist”.

In his speech, he said: “Age-old attempts at covert influence and propaganda have been supercharged in online disinformation, which can be churned out on a massive scale and at little cost. The aim is to sow doubt by flat denials of the truth, to dilute truth with falsehood, divert attention to fake stories, and do all they can to divide alliances.

“Bare-faced lying seems to be the default mode, coupled with ridicule of critics.”

The Russian state’s now well-practiced doctrine of blending media manipulation, social media disinformation and distortion with new and old forms of espionage, high levels of cyber-attacks, military force and criminal thuggery is what is meant these days by the term “hybrid threats”. Russia’s state media and representatives instigated at least 30 different so-called explanations of the Salisbury poisonings in their efforts to “mislead the world and their own people,” Mr Parker said.

One recent media survey found that two-thirds of social media output at the peak of the Salisbury attack came from Russian government-controlled accounts.

Last October, MI5’s chief said he wanted internet companies to do more to stop extremists using the “safe spaces” on the web to learn illicit techniques such as bomb-making.

This week’s keynote speech was the first time he has called on web giants to do far more. “We are committed to working with them as they look to fulfil their ethical responsibility to prevent terrorist, hostile state and criminal exploitation of internet carried services: shining a light on terrorists; taking down bomb-making instructions; warning the authorities about attempts to acquire explosives precursors.

“This matters and there is much more to do,” the director-general of MI5 said.

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European Union, Government, Iran, Middle East, Society, United Nations, United States

Trump condemned as US withdraws from Iran nuclear deal

IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL

Walking away: Donald Trump announcing that the US is withdrawing from the Iran deal.

DONALD TRUMP has faced global condemnation after the US pulled out of the Iran nuclear agreement.

As the President inflamed tensions in the already volatile region, Theresa May, Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel said his decision had been met with “regret and concern”.

In a joint statement, the French, British and German leaders said “the world was a safer place” because of the deal and pledged to remain committed to it.

But Mr Trump said he was walking away from the 2015 pact in order to stop a “nuclear bomb” being acquired by the “world’s leading state sponsor of terror”.

Announcing “powerful” sanctions for Iran, he claimed failing to withdraw from the agreement would lead to a nuclear arms race in the Middle East.

And he warned that, if Iran developed weapons, Tehran would have “bigger problems then it has ever had before.”

However, Iran’s president responded by saying that if negotiations failed over the nuclear deal, it would enrich uranium “more than before… in the next weeks”.

Mrs May, Mr Macron and Mrs Merkel – who each spoke to the President about the decision over the past few days – said they remained committed to the deal that was “important for our shared security”. They also urged Tehran “to show restraint in response” to the US decision.

In a much anticipated response from the White House, Mr Trump said: “If I allowed this deal to stand there would soon be a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. Everyone would want their weapons ready by the time Iran had theirs.

“We cannot prevent an Iranian nuclear bomb under the decaying and rotting structure of the current agreement. The Iran deal is defective at its core.

“In just a short period of time the world’s leading state sponsor of terror would be on the cusp of acquiring the world’s most dangerous weapons.”

Under the agreement, Iran had agreed to limit nuclear activities in return for easing economic sanctions. Tehran claimed at the time it had pursued only nuclear energy rather than weapons.

But Mr Trump said that, since the deal, “Iran’s bloody ambitions have grown only more brazen” and the pact “didn’t bring calm, it didn’t bring peace, and it never will”.

The President, who had committed to scrapping the deal during his election campaign, pointed out that Iran had boosted its military expenditure, supported terrorism and “caused havoc” throughout the Middle East and beyond.

He said that he had spoken to France, Germany, Britain and friends across the Middle East who were “unified” in their conviction that Iran must never deliver nuclear weapons. He added: “America will not be held hostage to nuclear blackmail.

“The US no longer makes empty threats. When I make promises I keep them.”

However, the President said he would be open to a new deal in future. Mr Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama, who signed the deal, said the “misguided” decision could even lead the US into war.

He said: “At a time when we are all rooting for diplomacy with North Korea to succeed, walking away… risks losing a deal that accomplished – with Iran – the very outcome that we are pursuing with the North Koreans.

“We all know the dangers of Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon.

“It could embolden an already dangerous regime; threaten our friends with destruction; pose unacceptable dangers to America’s own security; and trigger an arms race in the world’s most dangerous region.”

Iranian president Hassan Rouhani said there was a “short time” to negotiate with the countries remaining in the nuclear deal.

He told Iranian state media: “I have ordered Iran’s atomic organisation that wherever it is needed, we will start enriching uranium more than before.” The UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres said he was deeply concerned by the US decision, while the EU’s diplomatic chief Federica Mogherini said Brussels was “determined” to preserve the deal.

Tensions were already heightened after Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu announced that his nations spies had stolen thousands of files on Iran’s nuclear programme. He also said Israel would rather face a confrontation with Iran “now than later”.

 

THE 2015 nuclear deal was signed by Iran, the US, Britain, Russia, France, China and Germany.

The agreement lifted crippling economic sanctions on Iran in return for limitations to its nuclear energy programme, which many feared would be used to make a nuclear weapon.

Under the deal, Iran agreed to slash enrichment levels of uranium to prevent it reaching “weapons grade” and by redesigning a heavy-water nuclear facility it had been building so it would no longer be capable of producing plutonium suitable for a nuclear bomb.

Tehran also agreed not to engage in activities, including research and development, that it would need to develop a weapon.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was granted greater access and information to monitor Iran’s nuclear programme. It also had powers to investigate suspicious sites.

In return, the lifting of sanctions meant Iran gained access to more than $100billion in assets frozen overseas. It was also able to resume selling oil on international markets and use the global financial system for trade.

The agreement stated that any violation would lead to UN sanctions being put into place for ten years.

. See also Israel, Iran and the tinderbox of the Middle East

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Britain, European Union, Government, Russia, Society

Britain: Russia’s poison stockpile

SALISBURY ATTACK

BORIS JOHNSON has said that Russia has been “creating and stockpiling” the deadly nerve agent used in the Salisbury spy attack for a decade. This claim and accusation was immediately denounced as “drivel” by Vladimir Putin.

The Foreign Secretary said scientists had developed Novichok in breach of international chemical weapons conventions and researched how to use them to assassinate its enemies.

Mr Johnson’s blunt comments has heightened the war of words with Moscow over the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

Putin dismissed Johnson’s claims as “nonsense”, but said Moscow was willing to cooperate on the probe.

He said he found out about the attack from the media, adding: “The first thing that entered my head was that if it had been a military-grade nerve agent, the people would have died on the spot.

“Russia does not have such [nerve] agents. We destroyed all our chemical weapons under the supervision of international organisations, and we did it first, unlike some of our partners who promised to do it, but unfortunately did not keep their promises.

“We are ready to cooperate. We are ready to take part in the necessary investigations, but for that there needs to be a desire from the other side, and we don’t see that yet.

“I think any sensible person would understand that it would be rubbish, drivel, nonsense, for Russia to embark on such an escapade on the eve of a presidential election. It’s just unthinkable.”

Russia’s ambassador to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, even hinted the Salisbury nerve agent could have come from the UK military’s chemical weapons laboratory at Porton Down. The Foreign Secretary described Mr Chizhov’s response as a combination of “smug sarcasm and denial”, and said he was lying.

Inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) have today come to the UK to take samples of Novichok. The tests are expected to last for two weeks.

Mr Johnson insists that the British Government had given Russia “every opportunity” to come up with an explanation for how the nerve agent (manufactured in Russia) came to be in Britain.

“Their response has been a sort of mixture of smug sarcasm and denial, obfuscation and delay,” Mr Johnson said.

“In response to Mr Chizhov’s point about Russian stockpiles of chemical weapons: We actually had evidence within the last ten years that Russia has not only been investigating the delivery of nerve agents for the purposes of assassination, but it has also been creating and stockpiling Novichok.”

Two days ago, Russia announced it would expel 23 British diplomats, matching the number of Russian spies ordered to leave the UK. It also closed a consulate and barred the British Council from working in the country.

Mr Johnson has travelled to Brussels today to brief foreign ministers from across the European Union on the attack. He then held talks with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. The National Security Council will meet tomorrow to discuss the UK’s response. Mr Johnson suggested there would not be an immediate retaliation.

He said ministers were “hardening our borders” and ensuring the authorities pursued Russians who had “corruptly obtained their wealth”.

In interviews given by Mr Chizhov, he claimed that Mr Skripal had been “almost forgotten” in Russia.

“He has been living in Britain for eight years now. Before that – I think I should stress the point – he was officially pardoned by presidential decree.” He also claimed that because Yulia was a Russian citizen, the British authorities had violated “consular convention” by not allowing Russian officials access to her in hospital.

Russia had “no stockpiles whatsoever” of chemical weapons, he said. “Actually, Russia has stopped production of any chemical agents back in 1992. So, we cannot even talk about any chemical agents produced by Russia. All that have been produced previously was produced by the Soviet Union.”

Russia signed the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1992. The treaty – which aims to end the development, production, stockpiling and transfer of chemical weapons – is enforced by the OPCW.

In February last year, the OPCW presented Russia with a plague to mark the destruction of its declared stockpiles of chemical weapons.

. See also, Opinion: UK measures and sanctions on Russia still leaves us vulnerable

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