About Undercover Asia: CNA’s award-winning investigative series Undercover Asia uncovers the hard truths in the underbelly of Asia, and exposes the unintended fallout of change in the fast-moving continent.
Ngày 4/4, 32 ngoại trưởng NATO đã tổ chức lễ kỷ niệm 75 năm ngày ký kết Hiệp ước Bắc Đại Tây Dương tại Washington (4/4/1949). Vào thời điểm đó, cuộc đối đầu với Liên Xô thể hiện thông qua việc phong tỏa Berlin và ngày nay logic đối đầu với Nga rõ ràng đã quay trở lại. Để chuẩn bị, NATO muốn giành lại quyền kiểm soát việc hỗ trợ quân sự trực tiếp cho Ukraine.
Tổng Thư ký Jens Stoltenberg phát biểu trước cuộc họp các Bộ trưởng Ngoại giao NATO tại Brussels, ngày 3/4.Tiếp tục đọc “75 năm NATO”→
On 21 September, 2022, an IT specialist with the Austrian Raiffeisen Bank, Timur Izmailov, was leading a normal life in Moscow. Three weeks later Izmailov found himself serving as a soldier in Russia’s 27th motorized rifle brigade near the Ukrainian city of Svatove, when he was eventually killed by mortar fire. How does a 33-year-old techie make his way from his cubicle to the frontline of an unprovoked war in a neighbouring democratic state?
Timur’s journey began on 24 February, 2022, when President Vladimir Putin ordered the all-out military invasion of Ukraine in continuation of a war started in 2014. The response was immediate. The Ukrainian people and their leadership — with the support of the democratic allies — have defended themselves against armed aggression despite gross human rights violations.
Western sanctions imposed on Russia created an extremely hostile commercial environment for companies such as Raiffeisen to continue their operations in the aggressor state. Many international firms pulled out, announcing plans to leave or suspend activity in Russia. But many more international companies continue to operate and pay taxes, thus contributing to the occupation of Ukraine and undermining the financial support provided to Ukraine by their own governments.
On 21 September 2022, President Vladimir Putin issued the mobilization decree that obliged companies to immediately assist in conscripting soldiers and help equip the Russian army. The results of this piece of legislation were immediately felt by many, including Timur Izmailov. Raiffeisen’s attempts to shield their staff from the draft failed.
How do bank employees in other countries feel knowing this is happening to their colleagues in Russia? How does a client of Raiffeisen based in Vienna feel, knowing the employees of his bank might soon become soldiers sent to the battlefield to kill innocent civilians in Ukraine?
An additional stopover on the companies’ journey from compliance to complicity happened last July, when Putin signed a new law allowing the government to impose special economic measures to support “counter-terrorism and other operations outside of Russia”. Once introduced, such measures would require companies to provide goods and services in support of these operations and impose significant penalties for failing to do so. In accordance with the law of 7 October 2022, the Russian subsidiary of Raiffeisen Bank International is now obliged to provide loan payment holidays to the troops fighting in Ukraine. Moreover, the bank is required to write off the entire debt in case of a soldier’s death. This legal requirement concerns other financial institutions that still operate in Russia, namely Intesa Sanpaolo, OTP Bank, ING Bank, Credit Agricole, Citibank, Credit Europe Bank and UniCredit.
This loan relief scheme has already triggered criticism from Ukraine’s central bank, as well as from investors concerned about reputational impact. The requirement for banks to grant payment holidays to soldiers “illustrates the dangers of operating in jurisdictions where companies can…be forced into actions that go directly against their corporate values,” said Eric Christian Pederson of Nordea Asset Management. “We feel that it is right for companies to withdraw from Russia, given its unprovoked attack on Ukraine,” he added.
Châu Âu chìm trong khủng hoảng năng lượng. Các công ty châu Âu đang dần chuyển hướng sang Mỹ. Người Mỹ thì lợi dụng điều này để bán khí thiên nhiên hóa lỏng (LNG) cho châu Âu với giá cao.
Không còn lựa chọn nào khác, châu Âu đang bắt đầu xây dựng các bến cảng lớn để tiếp nhận hàng từ Mỹ. Thế nhưng, sau đó, Mỹ tuyên bố đình chỉ các dự án LNG và sẽ không cung cấp cho châu Âu trong những năm tới.
Tổng thống Mỹ Joe Biden ngày 26/1 công bố lệnh tạm dừng xây dựng các kho cảng xuất khẩu LNG mới. Theo dữ liệu do tổ chức quốc tế Cedigaz công bố, trong năm 2023, Mỹ là nước xuất khẩu LNG hàng đầu thế giới. Theo Nhà Trắng, khoảng một nửa lượng xuất khẩu LNG vào năm 2023 được xuất khẩu sang châu Âu, do lục địa này đã chấm dứt việc nhập khẩu khí đốt của Nga kể từ khi nổ ra cuộc xung đột tại Ukraine.
President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko attends the CSTO Collective Security Council meeting in Minsk, Belarus, 23 November 2023. [EPA-EFE/SERGY GUNEEV / KREMLIN / POOL]
Belarusian propaganda positions the EU as its main enemy, but several other features make it a unique case among its European neighbours.
*The author of this text remains anonymous due to fear of repercussions in their home country.
The most important and, at the same time, the most destructive peculiarity of disinformation in Belarus is strong Russian influence, which has deep historical roots and covers various spheres, from economy and culture to the military sector.
However, nowadays, Russian propaganda is helped by Belarusian colleagues who work to follow the same narrative.
This narrative includes turning EU countries into an economically and politically unstable military threat in the eyes of Belarusians while ignoring benefits and positives.
Kori Schake, a senior fellow and the director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss where the fighting in Ukraine is headed.
1.) The front lines of the war haven’t changed much since the start of the counteroffensive. Kori pointed to the difficulty of clearing deeply entrenched Russian troops sitting behind heavily mined front lines. She attributed Russia’s ability to fortify its defenses in part to the Joe Biden administration, whose “six months of slow dispersal of weapons to Ukraine gave the Russians time to dig in.” She also noted the incredible difficulty of clearing minefields, while adding “the Ukrainians are doing it methodically.”
Cuộc chiến ở Ukraine đặt ra mối đe dọa nghiêm trọng đối với an ninh lương thực toàn cầu. Nga và Ukraine, thường được coi là “vựa lúa mỳ” của thế giới, nằm trong số những nhà sản xuất và xuất khẩu ngũ cốc và hạt có dầu quan trọng nhất.
Là nạn nhân trực tiếp của sự gián đoạn trong chuỗi cung ứng toàn cầu, các quốc gia phụ thuộc nhiều nhất vào nhập khẩu nông sản từ Nga và Ukraine đang phải đối mặt với những khó khăn thực sự về nguồn cung thực phẩm.
Với “Lục địa Đen”, cuộc chiến ở Ukraine đã đe dọa trực tiếp tới an ninh lương thực.
Over 120 civil society groups gathered at the Civil Society Conference held on the eve of the 30th OSCE Ministerial Council, 29 November 2023. (OSCE) Photo details
SKOPJE, 29 November 2023 — Putting a stop to the war against Ukraine and strengthening civil society across the OSCE were at the heart of recommendations put forward by civil society representatives from across the OSCE region. The recommendations were handed over at the annual OSCE Parallel Civil Society Conference held in Skopje today.
The Civil Society Conference brought together more than 120 civil society representatives from across the OSCE region to discuss common recommendations from civil society to the OSCE leadership. One of the major outcomes of this year’s conference was the Skopje Declaration. The Declaration emphasised the need to end the war against Ukraine, strengthen civil society and hold participating States accountable for their human dimension commitments.
The Declaration was presented to the OSCE’s leadership, as well as to the organization’s 57 participating States on the eve of the 30th OSCE Ministerial Council.
“I am convinced that there is a clear and positive correlation between a strong, diverse and vibrant civil society on the one hand, and on the other the strength of democratic institutions, the rule of law and tolerant and inclusive communities,” emphasized the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Minister of Foreign Affairs of North Macedonia Bujar Osmani.
The Conference was also attended by OSCE Secretary General Helga Maria Schmid, by Matteo Mecacci, Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), Kairat Abdrakhmanov, OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities (HCNM) and Teresa Ribeiro, OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media (RFoM).
The Parallel Civil Society Conference is organized by the Civic Solidarity Platform. The Conference has taken place every year on the margins of the OSCE Ministerial Council since 2010, with the support of the OSCE Chairpersonship.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime is so desperate for recruits that Moscow is offering a sign-on bonus of 495,000 rubles, or about $5,200, to people in the neighboring country of Kazakhstan if they join the Russian army, Reuters reported on Thursday.
Kazakhstan is a former Soviet republic home to about 3.5 million ethnic Russians, who make up nearly 18% of the country’s population of about 19.5 million people.
The online recruitment ads feature the flags of Russia and Kazakhstan alongside the slogan “Shoulder to shoulder,” per Reuters. The posts offer the 495,000-ruble one-off payment, a monthly 190,000-ruble salary, and other benefits for those who ink a contract with the Russian military, per the news agency.
The ads lead to a website that offers people a chance to join the Russian army in the country’s far eastern Sakhalin region — where an organization set up by the local government is doing the recruitment, according to Reuters.
A new investigation by ICIJ and 68 media partners exposes the sprawling financial industry that has powered the Putin regime as it dominates its neighbors — and undermines the West.
n 2014, two senior officials of one of the biggest banks in Cyprus, RCB Ltd., visited Constantinos Petrides, a top aide to the country’s president. They weren’t there to talk banking. Instead, according to a Cyprus government investigation, the officials pressed Petrides to approve the citizenship application of a Russian national he said was under sanction by the European Union.
Petrides balked, and the meeting got heated.
“One of them almost accused me of being a traitor and harming relations between Cyprus and Russia because I didn’t want to naturalize a person,” Petrides told the investigators.
In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Presidential Press Office, firefighters work to extinguish a fire after the deadly Russian rocket attack that killed more than 40 people in the village of Hroza near Kharkiv, Ukraine, Thursday, Oct. 5, 2023. (Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP)
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In this photo provided by the Ukrainian Presidential Press Office, emergency workers search the victims of the deadly Russian rocket attack that killed more than 40 people in the village of Hroza near Kharkiv, Ukraine, Thursday, Oct. 5, 2023. (Ukrainian Police Press Office via AP)
A year ago, Russia stopped supplying gas to the EU through the Nord Stream pipeline to hurt the bloc for its overwhelming support for Ukraine. The weaponization of its gas supplies has ended up hurting Moscow more
Much has been said regarding the Russian defense network, and when you check them then there is no doubt that Russians have put a vast amount of effort to create them. At this point I can wholeheartedly recommend the maps which
has created to document them. But what many forget is that those are purely tactical elements which – detached from a overarching strategy – offer little.
ICIJ partners in Europe revealed the indirect trade routes used to mask the origins of Russian timber, which continues to flow into the EU despite being banned.
Russia was the EU’s fifth largest trading partner in 2021, exporting more than $3 billion worth of timber to the bloc.
Banned Russian timber is still being imported into the EU despite sanctions to curb timber revenue that helps finance Russia’s war in Ukraine, a new investigation by ICIJ partners in Europe has found.
Paper Trail Media, Der Spiegel, ZDF and others analyzed trade data to trace the pathway of banned wood through third countries, including China, Turkey, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
Russia is one of the world’s largest timber exporters, harboring more than a fifth of the world’s forested areas. In 2021, the country was the European Union’s fifth largest trading partner, exporting more than $3 billion worth of timber to the bloc that year, according to the European Commission.
When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, sanctions swiftly followed, including a total ban on Russian timber imports into the EU from July 2022. While direct trade between Russia and the EU was stymied, new global pathways emerged to traffic illicit wood into the bloc.
CVD 