Ukraine tried to kill Putin with night-time drone attack on Kremlin, accuses Russia

Russia accused Ukraine on Wednesday of attacking the Kremlin with drones overnight in an attempt to kill President Vladimir Putin - the most serious allegation that Moscow has levelled at Kyiv in more than 14 months of war, reports Reuters.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy promptly denied any Ukrainian involvement, telling a press conference in Helsinki: "We don't attack Putin, or Moscow, we fight on our territory."

A senior Ukrainian presidential official said the incident instead suggested Moscow was preparing a major terrorist provocation.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington had not been able to validate the reported attack, and that Russian assertions should be taken with a very large shaker of salt.

Russia reserved the right to retaliate, Putin's office said, and Russian hardliners demanded swift retribution against Zelenskiy himself.

"Two uncrewed aerial vehicles were aimed at the Kremlin. As a result of timely actions taken by the military and special services with the use of radar warfare systems, the devices were put out of action," the presidency said in a statement.

"We regard these actions as a planned terrorist act and an attempt on the president's life, carried out on the eve of Victory Day, the May 9 Parade, at which the presence of foreign guests is also planned ...

"The Russian side reserves the right to take retaliatory measures where and when it sees fit."

Baza, a Telegram channel with links to Russia's law enforcement agencies, posted a video showing a flying object approaching the dome of the Kremlin Senate building overlooking Red Square - site of next Tuesday's Victory Day parade - and exploding in an intense burst of light just before reaching it.

Two similar videos posted on social media showed two objects flying on the same trajectory towards the dome, with the clock on the Kremlin's Spassky Tower reading 2:27 and 2:43. The first seemed to be destroyed with little more than a puff of smoke, the second appeared to leave blazing wreckage on the dome.

Reuters checks on the time and location indicated that the videos could be authentic, although it was not clear how Ukraine, if it were involved, could seriously have expected to kill Putin with a drone strike on the Kremlin - a huge, historic walled citadel in the heart of Moscow.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said in comments sent to Reuters, "In my opinion, it is absolutely obvious that both 'reports about an attack on the Kremlin' and simultaneously the supposed detention of Ukrainian saboteurs in Crimea ... clearly indicate the preparation of a large-scale terrorist provocation by Russia in the coming days."

The powerful speaker of the lower house of Russia's parliament, Vyacheslav Volodin, demanded the use of weapons capable of stopping and destroying the Kyiv terrorist regime.

Former president Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy head of Russia's Security Council, said the incident leaves us no option but to physically eliminate Zelenskiy and his clique.

A British expert on Russia, Mark Galeotti, said it was unlikely that the alleged attack had targeted Putin, who notoriously rarely goes to the Kremlin, let alone stays there overnight.

"If we presume it was a Ukrainian attack," Galeotti tweeted, "Consider it a performative strike, a demonstration of capability and a declaration of intent, 'don't think Moscow is safe.'"

The presidential administration said fragments of the drones had been scattered on the territory of the Kremlin complex but there were no casualties or material damage.

The RIA news agency said Putin had not been in the Kremlin at the time, and was working on Wednesday at his Novo Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow.

Victory Day is a major public holiday commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War Two, and a chance for Putin to rally Russians behind what he calls his special military operation in Ukraine.

Russia marks the occasion with a huge military parade on Red Square, for which seating has already been erected.

The state news agency TASS said the parade - for which the Kremlin last week announced tighter security - would still go ahead.

Before the drone attack was announced, some 10 hours after the event, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said the city had introduced an immediate ban on unauthorized drone flights.

Russia has accused Ukraine of numerous cross-border attacks since the start of the war, including strikes in December on an air base deep inside Russian territory that houses strategic bomber planes equipped to carry nuclear weapons. In February, a drone crashed in Kolomna, about 110 km (70 miles) from the centre of Moscow.

Ukraine typically declines to claim responsibility for attacks on Russia or Russian-annexed Crimea, though Kyiv officials have frequently celebrated such attacks with cryptic or mocking remarks.

 

NATO to open Japan office for deepening Indo-Pacific engagement

Nikkei Asia reports, NATO is planning to open a liaison office in Tokyo, the first of its kind in Asia. The station will allow the military alliance to conduct periodic consultations with Japan and key partners in the region such as South Korea, Australia and New Zealand as China emerges as a new challenge, alongside its traditional focus on Russia.

NATO and Japan will also upgrade their cooperation, aiming to sign an Individually Tailored Partnership Program (ITPP) before the NATO Summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11-12. The two sides will deepen collaboration in tackling cyber threats, coordinate stances on emerging and disruptive technologies, and exchange notes on fighting disinformation.

The idea of opening a liaison office was first discussed between Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg during the latter's visit to Tokyo at the end of January. In mid-April, the alliance circulated a draft proposal among its 31 members.

The proposal is to open a one-person liaison office in Tokyo next year. Whether the Japanese side provides the office space or if NATO funds the station is still under negotiation. NATO has similar liaison offices at the United Nations in New York, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe in Vienna, as well as in Georgia, Ukraine, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moldova and Kuwait.

In many cases the host nation offers office space for NATO. If Tokyo provides the funding for a Western military alliance to have a foothold in Japan, it would symbolize a new phase in defense cooperation.

The intent to deepen cooperation is mutual. Japan plans to create an independent mission to NATO, separating it from the Embassy in Belgium, where it is currently based. A new ambassador will be dispatched, to relieve the NATO duties of Ambassador to Belgium Masahiro Mikami. Kishida told Stoltenberg of the plans at the January meeting.

Officials hope that the NATO-Japan signing of the ITPP would create momentum leading up to the Vilnius summit. The gathering is expected to be attended by the leaders of Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand -- like last year -- signaling NATO's deeper engagement with the Indo-Pacific.

Last June, Kishida, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and then-New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern attended the NATO Summit in Madrid. Known as the Asia-Pacific partners (AP4) of NATO, they held a meeting on the sidelines.

Danish Ambassador to Japan Peter Taksoe-Jensen told Nikkei Asia in a phone interview that a NATO liaison office would be the first of its kind in the Indo-Pacific and more than just symbolic. "It would be a very visible, real way to strengthen the relations between Japan and NATO," he said.

The Danish Embassy acts as the contact-point embassy of the alliance in Japan and is coordinating with the member states in Tokyo regarding NATO-Japan collaboration.

Taksoe-Jensen noted that the geopolitical landscape has changed drastically since NATO issued its previous Strategic Concept in 2010.

"At the time, Russia was considered a potential partner and there was no mention of China. In 2022, at the Madrid Summit, allied leaders decided that Russia was no longer a partner but a foe, and that there was also an acknowledgment that China's rise would and could have an impact on trans-European security," he said.

"This is why it is important for NATO to keep up relations with our partners in this region." The envoy said that the liaison office would also reach out to other important actors in the region such as India and ASEAN countries.

Taksoe-Jensen said NATO-Japan cooperation, going forward, will focus on challenges that transcend regions, such as cyber threats, disruptive technology and disinformation activities.

This cooperation, Nikkei has learned, will be formalized in the coming weeks, when NATO and Japan will launch the ITPP to lay out cooperation on fields such as cybersecurity, disinformation and space. It will be an upgrade from the Individual Partnership and Cooperation Program (IPCP) that the two sides signed in 2014.

"There will also be a look at interoperability," Taksoe-Jensen said, regarding how NATO and Japanese forces work together in different areas. But he said it was "a step too far at the moment" to consider the two sides to bolster regional deterrence together.

Michito Tsuruoka, an associate professor at Keio University, said that the war in Ukraine has changed the way NATO sees China. "In addition to the problems China poses by itself, a new dimension has been added: that of China as a supporter of Russia. This now becomes directly related to Europe's security."

Stoltenberg repeatedly mentioned the danger of China and Russia collaborating during his trip to Japan, Tsuruoka told Nikkei Asia.

Tsuruoka said that NATO having a foothold in Tokyo would have a significant meaning for Japan. "It means that when NATO looks at Asia, including China, it will be doing so through Tokyo's prism. When the representative sends back information to NATO headquarters, it will always be via Tokyo."

NATO spokesperson Oana Lungescu stressed Japan's importance in a statement to Nikkei on Wednesday.

"Among NATO's partners, none is closer or more capable than Japan," Lungescu said. "We share the same values, interests and concerns, including supporting Ukraine and addressing the security challenges posed by authoritarian regimes, and our partnership is getting stronger."

She noted long-standing cooperation between NATO and Japan, as demonstrated by Stoltenberg's visit to Japan at the start of the year and the Japanese foreign minister's participation at the meeting of NATO foreign ministers in April.

"The Secretary General has also invited the Prime Minister of Japan, as well as the leaders of our other Indo-Pacific partners, to the Vilnius Summit in July," Lungescu said.

"As to plans to open a liaison office in Japan, we won't go into the details of ongoing deliberations among NATO allies, but in general, NATO has offices and liaison arrangements with a number of international organizations and partner countries, and allies regularly assess those liaison arrangements to ensure that they best serve the needs of both NATO and our partners," she said.

 

Israel discussing direct Haj flights to Saudia

Israel voiced hope on Wednesday that Saudi authorities would admit direct flights for its Muslim citizens who want to make the Haj pilgrimage, which takes place next month, in what would mark another step toward normalizing relations.

Saudi Arabia signalled approval for Israel's US-sponsored forging of ties with Gulf neighbours United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in 2020 but has held off on following suit, saying Palestinian goals for statehood should be addressed first.

Any such prospects have been further clouded, however, by Riyadh's strains with US President Joe Biden, its recent fence-mending with regional rival Iran - a foe of Israel - and the rise of Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-right Israeli government.

Netanyahu's centrist predecessor, Yair Lapid, said on March 10 that, as prime minister last year, he secured Saudi consent for what would be the first direct Haj flights from Israel, some 18% of whose population is Muslim.

Riyadh has not offered confirmation.

Asked whether the direct flights would happen for next month's pilgrimage to the holy Saudi city of Mecca, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said a request had been submitted.

"This issue is under discussion. I cannot tell you if there is any progress," he said in an interview with Israel's Army Radio. "But with that, I am optimistic that we can advance peace with Saudi Arabia."

The Biden administration last June predicted there would be direct charter flights from Israel to Saudi Arabia for the Haj. But a senior US official briefed on the matter told Reuters on Wednesday that it was unclear if the flights would go ahead.

Muslims from Israel and the Palestinian territories currently travel to Mecca through third-party countries, which can spell additional expense and bother.

Saudi Arabia has been allowing Israeli airlines to overfly it to UAE and Bahrain since 2020, a corridor that it and next-door Oman have since expanded to include other destinations.

 

Iran seizes second oil tanker in a week in Gulf

Iran has seized a second oil tanker in a week on Wednesday in Gulf waters, the US Navy said, the latest escalation in a series of seizures or attacks on commercial vessels in Gulf waters since 2019, reports Reuters.

The Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet of the US Navy said the Panama-flagged oil tanker Niovi was seized by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN) at 0220 GMT while passing through the narrow Strait of Hormuz.

In Iran's first response, Tehran's prosecutor announced the oil tanker was seized on a judicial order following a complaint by a plaintiff, the judiciary's Mizan news agency said. No further details were provided.

The incident comes after Iran on Thursday seized a Marshall Islands-flagged oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman called the Advantage Sweet. That tanker is being held by Iranian authorities in Bandar Abbas, the Marshall Islands flag registry said on Tuesday.

Maritime security firm Ambrey has said it believed the Advantage Sweet's seizure by Iran was in response to a recent seizure via a court order by the United States of an oil cargo aboard the Marshall Islands tanker Suez Rajan.

The Niovi oil tanker seized on Wednesday had been travelling from Dubai toward the UAE's Fujairah port when it was forced by IRGCN boats to change course towards Iranian territorial waters, the Navy said.

The Niovi last reported its position at 0231 GMT on Wednesday off the coast of Oman in the Strait of Hormuz with Fujairah as its destination, Refinitiv ship tracking data showed.

According to the International Maritime Organization shipping database, the Niovi's owner is Grand Financing Co, and the ship is managed by Greece-based Smart Tankers.

About a fifth of the world's crude oil and oil products passes through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow choke point between Iran and Oman, according to data from analytics firm Vortexa.

"Heightened military activity and geopolitical tensions in these regions continue to pose serious threats to commercial vessels," the Marshall Islands flag registry said in an advisory on Tuesday.

"Associated with these threats is the potential for miscalculation or misidentification, which could lead to aggressive actions."

Since 2019, there have been a series of attacks on shipping in the strategic Gulf waters at times of tension between the United States and Iran.

Indirect talks between Tehran and Washington to revive Iran's 2015 nuclear pact with world powers have stalled since September over a range of issues, including the Islamic Republic's violent crackdown on popular protests, Tehran's sale of drones to Russia and acceleration of its nuclear program.

 

Iranian president in Damascus for first visit since Syrian war began

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi landed in Damascus on Wednesday for talks with his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad, Syrian state media reported, in the first visit by an Iranian head of state since war broke out in Syria in 2011.

With military and economic support from both Iran and Russia, Assad regained control of most of Syria from rebels that were backed by regional countries now seeking dialogue with him.

Raisi's visit comes as Iran and regional rival Saudi Arabia rebuild ties after years of tensions. Arab nations which had isolated Syria over its crackdown against protests in 2011 are developing a roadmap to end the 12-year war and reintegrate Syria into the Arab fold.

Speaking to pro-Iran broadcaster al-Mayadeen on the eve of his visit, Raisi said the trip would consolidate and develop ties with Syria and other allies, including Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, which also intervened in Syria on Assad's behalf.

Iranian and Syrian flags lined the airport road on Wednesday in preparation for the arrival of Raisi and his accompanying delegation, which includes Iran's ministers of oil, defence, foreign affairs and telecommunications.

Syrian state media said a number of agreements would be signed during the two-day visit.

Tehran has already supplied Assad's government with credit lines and won lucrative business contracts in the telecoms and mining industries, among others.

In parallel, it has become even more entrenched militarily. An Israeli rocket strike on Damascus in February killed Iranian military experts and Tehran has used the flow of aid in the aftermath of the deadly Feb. earthquake to bring in arms.

Assad has never publicly acknowledged that Iranian forces have operated on his behalf in Syria's civil war, saying Tehran has only military advisers on the ground.

 

Iran successfully tests aircraft engine made by Iranian parts

On Monday, Iranian industrial specialists tested an airplane engine with great success which was made of domestically-made parts.

In honor of International Workers’ Day, President Ebrahim Raisi visited the Iranian energy and infrastructure company MAPNA.

The power component and engine management system of the airplane were put to the test during the visit by the specialists of MAPNA, renowned as the largest Iranian contractor for steam, gas, combined cycle, and renewable power plants.

The reverse engineering process was used by the domestic experts at MAPNA to completely develop and produce the engine and its control system.

The president also went to a display of technical advances in a number of industries, including water industry, oil and gas production, train transportation, aircraft engines, and the production of renewable and thermal energy.

The president also saw the exhibition’s high-tech F-class Iranian gas turbine and the domestic MAP 24 locomotive.

Raisi also went to the MAP24 locomotive, a product made by the MAPNA Group’s experts.

During his visit, the president emphasized the need of satisfying the country’s locomotive needs with a focus on local manufacture, as well as utilizing the capability of this company’s locomotive training center.

Raisi then toured the electric vehicle drive system, which included buses, passenger cars, and freight vehicles developed and manufactured by MAPNA Group.

 

Proxy war in Ukraine an imperialist adventure

I am pleased to share with readers an article by Finian Cunningham stating that the proxy war in Ukraine is an imperialist adventure that has been financially ruinous, has destroyed Ukraine, and is driving a dangerous all-out war with Russia and China that could turn into a nuclear Armageddon.

It has become patently obvious to the world that the conflict in Ukraine is a dirty and desperate geopolitical confrontation, despite massive Western media efforts to portray it as something else more noble – the usual charade of chivalry and virtue to disguise naked Western imperialism.

The death and destruction in Ukraine is nothing but a proxy war by the United States and its NATO partners to defeat Russia in a strategic gambit. But the unspoken objective does not end with Russia. The US and its Western imperialist lackeys are driven to push for confrontation with China too.

As if taking on Russia is not reckless enough! The Western powers want to double down on their warmongering with China. This is all because the underlying impetus is for Washington and its Western minions to promote US-led dominance of the global order. Russia and China are the main obstacles to that path of would-be dominance, and hence we see this manic drive for aggression stemming from Washington, the executive power of the Western order.

It should be obvious that while the U.S.-led NATO axis has stoked the war in Ukraine to calamitous heights, this same axis is wantonly inciting tensions with China. This observation alone should be enough to condemn the criminality of Western powers.

This week saw the NATO powers deliver depleted uranium weapons to the Kiev regime, while the United States announced that it would be docking submarine nuclear warheads in South Korea, a move that infuriated China which pointed out that Washington was violating decades-old commitments to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.

Of course, such perverse provocation is par for the course as far as Washington is concerned. It is done deliberately in a conscious effort to exacerbate tensions and escalate militarism.

Peace and security are anathemas to the US and its minions whose whole ideological raison d’être is to aggravate war to gratify corporate capitalist addiction – a system that is increasingly bankrupt and dysfunctional, and hence the insane desperation for craving war-fixes.

In a scathing speech to the United Nations Security Council this week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov asserted that the conflict in Ukraine cannot be properly resolved without an understanding of the geopolitical context. In other words, the war in the former Soviet republic which erupted last February has bigger causes than what the Western powers and their compliant news media would try to pretend otherwise.

These are some of the laughable claims made by Washington and its allies. One only has to consider the decades of total trashing of the UN Charter and democratic principles by the United States and its rogue partners in their pursuit of criminal wars to realize that their virtue-signaling over Ukraine is a vile joke.

Lavrov’s address to the Security Council was a stunning rebuke of the hypocrisy and criminality of the United States, Britain, France, Germany and other NATO powers, as well as the European Union.

His speech was akin to the scene in the classic old movie The Wizard of Oz when the curtain was pulled back on the buffoonish villain for all to see.

Any objective observer would agree with the Russian foreign minister’s excoriating survey of modern history and why the war in Ukraine has tragically manifested. Lamentably, if we fail to understand history and the real causes of conflicts, then we are condemned to repeat the horrors.

Western leaders have at times revealed the bigger geopolitical agenda with their own misspoken arrogant words. US President Joe Biden had previously blurted out a call for regime change in Moscow while his senior aides, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin, have succumbed to the intoxication of their narcissism and hubris by saying that the purpose of the war in Ukraine is the defeat of Russia.

Other NATO senior figures, such as the stupid, conceited Polish leaders and their Baltic buddies, have also come out and stated that the war’s ulterior agenda is to vanquish Russia. The fascist skeletons of their Nazi-collusion past have resurrected their deathly rattles, uncontrollably.

As Lavrov’s address to the Security Council intimates, the systematic violation of the UN Charter by the United States and its Western partners is a deplorable continuation of the Nazi fascism and imperialist barbarism that was supposed to have been defeated in World War Two. The culmination of the constant, unbridled Western imperialist criminality and its state terrorism is the current war in Ukraine and the growing aggression toward China over Taiwan as a pretext.

In all of this, woefully, the Western public has been flagrantly lied to by their governments and media as to the real nature of the war in Ukraine. American and European citizens have been bilked for hundreds of billions of dollars to prop up a Nazi regime in Kiev whose function is to act as a NATO spear-tip against Russia, and ultimately China when the NATO powers feel they are done with Ukraine, the latter is a futile ambition, as is becoming increasingly evident.

Journalists and antiwar activists in the West who highlight the malfeasance over Ukraine are sacked, vilified, censored, or sanctioned into poverty, or even imprisoned.

Nevertheless, the Western public and the rest of the world are increasingly becoming aware of the odious charade. By definition, charades are inevitably untenable.

The Global South – the majority of the 193 nations at the UN – has had it with Western capitalist hegemony and its outrageous neocolonialist privileges.

The incremental dumping of the US dollar as an international reserve currency for trade is a testament to the historic shift towards a multipolar order in defiance of Western unipolar elitism.

The nations of Africa, Latin America and Asia understand that the US-led NATO war in Ukraine is a desperate last-ditch bid to preserve an imperialist global order which should have been eradicated after World War Two with the establishment of the United Nations, but which, regrettably, was not.

The root cause of imperialism is the AngloAmerican-led Western capitalist order. The end of World War Two, as with World War One, was but a pause in the historical killing machine.

It is now increasingly evident in the light of leaked documents from the Pentagon that the war in Ukraine is a disaster. The Kiev regime is facing defeat at the hands of superior Russian forces even though that regime has been flooded with weapons by the United States and NATO. Great expectations of a Ukrainian victory that were widely predicted by Western leaders and media have been shown to be empty, contemptible lies.

The side-show of this war is a gargantuan racket. Western arms companies have raked in unprecedented profits, while the NATO-backed cabal in Kiev has skimmed off hundreds of millions of dollars. This is the same Kiev regime that is burning down Orthodox Christian churches, exterminating the Russian language, lionizing World War Two Nazi criminals, and locking up any critical opposition and media.

The main takeaway is the lies that the United States and Western lackeys, including the entire media industry, have been telling about the proxy war in Ukraine. This war is an imperialist adventure that has been financially ruinous, has destroyed Ukraine, and is driving a dangerous all-out war with Russia and China that could turn into a nuclear armageddon.

We should not be surprised by such blatant lying and deception. President Joe Biden and his administration have been telling barefaced lies to conceal the corruption oozing out of Biden’s own family. Biden and his son Hunter have exploited Ukraine since the CIA-backed coup in Kiev in 2014 for personal enrichment. The president has even reportedly got his senior aides to do his bidding to censor intelligence agencies and media from revealing to the public the corruption at the heart of his family.

The lies that Biden and his administration tell about personal corruption are indelibly coupled with the lies told about the proxy war in Ukraine.

It is increasingly clear that the American public, the European public, and the rest of the world have been duped in multiple ways. The phony war in Ukraine is exposing the deep, stinking well of corruption in this White House.