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Canada could be following signals from NATO of a shift in policy toward the eastern European country, said Katchanovski. At a recent NATO summit, leaders welcomed a “deeper” relationship with Ukraine but did not include the country in a list of those “that aspire to join the alliance.”
The use of the satellite, which Poroshenko had asked the Harper government for in order to beef up Kyiv’s battle intelligence against Russian-backed separatists, also proved controversial last year.
Good question. The US did give them some fancy counter battery radars so maybe they're trying to change the capabilities of the Ukrops. Lessen them. The radars were tactical, the satellite intel was strategic.
Yesterday two columns of the Orthodox sacred procession of Eastern and Western parts of Ukraine met in Kiev, celebrating the day of Christianization of Russia.
A bad day for authorities I'd guess - a reminder of cultural and religious connection to Russia and desire to remember these roots in both parts of Ukraine have been manifested by these people, in spite of all the propaganda of "new, European non-Russian Ukraine."
The newly leaked emails reveal a clandestine network of Western agitators around the NATO military chief, whose presence fueled the conflict in Ukraine. Many allies found in Breedlove's alarmist public statements about alleged large Russian troop movements cause for concern early on. Earlier this year, the general was assuring the world that US European Command was "deterring Russia now and preparing to fight and win if necessary."
The emails document for the first time the questionable sources from whom Breedlove was getting his information. He had exaggerated Russian activities in eastern Ukraine with the overt goal of delivering weapons to Kiev.
The general and his likeminded colleagues perceived US President Barack Obama, the commander-in-chief of all American forces, as well as German Chancellor Angela Merkel as obstacles. Obama and Merkel were being "politically naive & counter-productive" in their calls for de-escalation, according to Phillip Karber, a central figure in Breedlove's network who was feeding information from Ukraine to the general.
Breedlove sought counsel from some very prominent people, his emails show. Among them were Wesley Clark, Breedlove's predecessor at NATO, Victoria Nuland, the assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs at the State Department, and Geoffrey Pyatt, the US ambassador to Kiev.
One name that kept popping up was Phillip Karber, an adjunct assistant professor at Georgetown University in Washington DC and president of the Potomac Foundation, a conservative think tank founded by the former defense contractor BDM. By its own account, the foundation has helped eastern European countries prepare their accession into NATO. Now the Ukrainian parliament and the government in Kiev were asking Karber for help.
...
Karber's emails constantly made it sound as though the apocalypse was only a few weeks away. "The front is now everywhere," he told Breedlove in an email at the beginning of 2015, adding that Russian agents and their proxies "have begun launching a series of terrorist attacks, assassinations, kidnappings and infrastructure bombings," in an effort to destabilize Kiev and other Ukrainian cities.
At times, Karber's missives read like prose. In one, he wrote about the 2014 Christmas celebrations he had spent together with Dnipro-1, the ultranationalist volunteer battalion. "The toasts and vodka flow, the women sing the Ukrainian national anthem -- no one has a dry eye."
Karber had only good things to report about the unit, which had already been discredited as a private oligarch army. He wrote that the staff and volunteers were dominated by middle class people and that there was a large professional staff that was even "working on the holiday." Breedlove responded that these insights were "quietly finding their way into the right places."
...
In fact, Karber is a highly controversial figure. During the 1980s, the longtime BDM employee, was counted among the fiercest Cold War hawks. Back in 1985, he warned of an impending Soviet attack on the basis of documents he had translated incorrectly.
He also blundered during the Ukraine crisis after sending photos to US Senator James Inhofe, claiming to show Russian units in Ukraine. Inhofe released the photos publicly, but it quickly emerged that one had originated from the 2008 war in Georgia.
By November 10, 2014, at the latest, Breedlove must have recognized that his informant was on thin ice. That's when Karber reported that the separatists were boasting they had a tactical nuclear warhead for the 2S4 mortar. Karber himself described the news as "weird," but also added that "there is a lot of 'crazy' things going on" in Ukraine.
The reasons that Breedlove continued to rely on Karber despite such false reports remain unclear. Was he willing to pay any price for weapons deliveries? Or did he have other motives? The emails illustrate the degree to which Breedlove and his fellow campaigners feared that Congress might reduce the number of US troops in Europe.
Karber confirmed the authenticity of the leaked email correspondence. Regarding the questions about the accuracy of his reports, he told SPIEGEL that, "like any information derived from direct observation at the front during the 'fog of war,' it is partial, time sensitive, and perceived through a personal perspective." Looking back with the advantage of hindsight and a more comprehensive perspective, "I believe that I was right more than wrong," Karber writes, "but certainly not perfect." He adds that, "in 170 days at the front, I never once met a German military or official directly observing the conflict."
Assassination attempt on President of Lugansk Republic
Ukraine Rebel Leader Igor Plotnitsky Injured In Car Blast
World | Agence France-Presse | Updated: August 06, 2016 17:30 IST
KIEV, UKRAINE: The leader of a self-proclaimed separatist republic in eastern Ukraine was injured in a suspected car bombing today, local media reported.
Igor Plotnitsky, the head of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, "was wounded this morning as a result of a powerful explosion that occurred near his car," the official pro-Russian rebels' news agency said.
Assassination attempt on President of Lugansk Republic
Ukraine Rebel Leader Igor Plotnitsky Injured In Car Blast
World | Agence France-Presse | Updated: August 06, 2016 17:30 IST
KIEV, UKRAINE: The leader of a self-proclaimed separatist republic in eastern Ukraine was injured in a suspected car bombing today, local media reported.
Igor Plotnitsky, the head of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, "was wounded this morning as a result of a powerful explosion that occurred near his car," the official pro-Russian rebels' news agency said.
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