June 30, 2022 (EIRNS)—In a pre-recorded video message, Russian President Vladimir Putin addressed the Tenth St. Petersburg International Legal Forum today, contrasting the “generally accepted principles of international law and the UN Charter,” which underlie an emerging multipolar system of international relations, with the “unjust unipolar model” based on an “order based on rules and other questionable concepts which try to control and direct global processes at their own discretion.” The U.S. is guilty of such conduct, Putin asserted, unable to accept that it is losing its supremacy on the world stage, even while advocating its own exceptionalism.
Rejecting the notion put forward by some radicals, that international law is being dismantled, Putin admits that undoubtedly “the system of international law needs to be further developed, but we should not confuse cause and effect. Crises happen not because the law is faulty, but because of attempts to replace law with dictate,” or when certain states or groups of states try to replace international standards with their own national jurisdiction. This, he stated, “is a deliberate refusal to follow essential legal principles—justice, conscientiousness, equality and humanity. These are not just legal ideals, but values that reflect the diversity of our civilization.”
The Russian President warned that the multipolar world of the 21st Century “is an irreversible process; it is happening before our eyes…this democratic, more just world order should be built on the basis of mutual respect and trust, and, of course, on the generally accepted principles of international law and the UN Charter.” In this new, multipolar world, there is no room for discrimination against states or people. Russia, therefore, “speaks for the practical realization of the pivotal international legal principle of the sovereign equality of states and the right of each state to pursue its own development model. I am confident that by consistently following international law and joining our efforts, it is possible to resolve the most difficult problems that the world is facing and to provide for the stable, sustainable and progressive development of all states.” Access to President Putin’s speech is here.
Aug. 9, 2022 (EIRNS)—The following interview with Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche was included in CGTN’s “World Today” podcast.
The World Today host began a segment: “Decoupling of the EU and Germany from China could cost Germany almost six times as much as Brexit. This is the finding of a scenario analysis conducted by the Info Institute on behalf of the Bavarian Industry Association. The report shows that automotive industry companies producing transportation equipment and manufacturers of machinery and equipment would be hurt the most if the decoupling happens.
So, for this and more on EU-China and Germany-China relations, let’s have Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the founder of the Schiller Institute, a Germany-based political and economic think tank. Thanks for joining us, Ms. Zepp-LaRouche.
HELGA ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Good day.
CGTN: Germany would face costs almost six times as high as Brexit if Germany and the European Union were to shut China out of their economies. What do you make of the projections?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I think it’s much worse, because as you have mentioned already, there is right now an effort to push Germany and all of Europe into a decoupling from Russia and China. This, in my view, would mean economic suicide. You already have an almost total decoupling from Russia that has led to an explosion of energy prices. You have hyperinflation going on, which is not due to anything having to do with Ukraine or Russia’s war with Ukraine. It has to do with the quantitative easing and pumping of money for many years. So, you have hyperinflation; you have an energy crisis. And now on top of that, if you also would decouple from China, the most important trading partner for Germany, this would mean economic suicide. I think this is something people should review and really step back away from, because it would lead to complete social chaos in Germany and Europe, with unpredictable consequences.
CGTN: The report said the biggest loser of a trade war with China would be the automotive industry, manufacturers of transport equipment and mechanical engineering which have had strong ties with China over the years. With the domestic argument for decoupling getting louder in Germany and the European Union, do we hear any voices from those industries?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, my personal experience in talking to many of those, is that the individual firms really want to stay in China, but they are being pressured by the banks with their credit policies, the financial sector, and that is all hanging together with Wall Street and the City of London. They have geopolitical motives to push this decoupling. I think if German industry wants to survive, and I really mean survive, because it’s an existential situation which most of them are in, they have to stand up and defend their own interests. They have to fight for the jobs of the people; they have to stand up for German interests and the common good of the people.
I think we are heading into an incredible social crisis in the coming weeks and months. The question is, will Germany economically survive this assault? It’s time for Germany to define its own interests and not be the instrument of NATO.
CGTN: Speaking of that, we heard from Volkswagen’s CEO, who defended [inaud] in China in Xinjiang. What do you make of this, because there are two different opinions nowadays? On the one hand, people say their insistence is only about profit and making money. On the other hand, people believe they see a different Xinjiang in China from the ones mirrored in the Western media. What’s your take?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, we had two members of the Schiller Institute traveling to Xinjiang and visiting many locations. And many diplomats from many countries also have traveled there to investigate the situation. What all of these people report is that China has brought development into one of the previously poorest areas, and given people jobs, bringing prosperity, infrastructure. So, a lot of people who turned from the Uighurs to terrorism before now have a perspective and a future, and have stopped being terrorists. I think to overcome terrorism through development is a much better method than throwing bombs and drones and having civilian casualties you don’t care about, like it happened so many times in Afghanistan or Iraq, where the United States conducted these things. I think people should not listen to this guy Adrian Zenz, who recently came out with a study. He’s a right-wing Christian fundamentalist who has very dubious beliefs, because he thinks that God gave him a mission to destroy China. All of this anti-Xinjiang propaganda is mainly based on this extremely dubious source. People should not fall for it.
CGTN: Given what we have been talking about, if you also ask a lot of experts in Germany, they suggest that companies should find more countries to reduce dependency on China. How do you look at this suggestion? Can China, as the top trading partner of Germany, be replaced at least in the short term?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: In the short term, for sure not, because the idea to diversify and have partnerships with so-called “like-minded democracies,” if you really look at it, it’s only the U.S., the British, the countries of the Five Eyes, Japan, New Zealand. But the overwhelming majority is going with China’s BRI. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the BRICS, most countries of the Global South want to have development. There is a revival of the spirit of Bandung, which is the Non-Aligned Movement. I think it would be complete suicide for countries like Germany that are very export-dependent to cut off these markets which are the future. The only growth which occurred in the recent period was in Asia, and not in the Atlantic sector. So, Germany should really redefine its own interest.
CGTN: Thank you very much. That’s Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the founder of the Schiller Institute, a Germany-based political and economic think tank.
Here is the link to the interview; this segment is with Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche: ④ Decoupling with China could cost Germany six times as much as Brexit, a study shows at 33:55 min.
Aug. 6, 2022 (EIRNS)–Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, met again on the sidelines of the ASEAN meeting in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on Aug. 5, their third meeting in the past 30 days, Lavrov noted; the two had consulted when they were in Bali for the G20 ministerial on July 7 and in Tashkent on July 28 for the SCO ministerial. There is nothing obligatory about their schedule; “every time we meet, we see that Russia and China have more issues to discuss and adopt practical decisions on,” Lavrov remarked in opening their meeting, the Russian Foreign Ministry reported.
Lavrov pointed to their common evaluation of “the arrogance” with which “the United States is using every available opportunity to strengthen its domination across the world…. The Americans are acting to suppress any manifestation of independence. In this spirit, they decided to turn Ukraine into a threat for the Russian Federation…. Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan is in keeping with this approach….
“I am sure that our strategic partnership is a motivating force behind the movement for the priority of international law over the `rules’ invented by the United States and its satellites. The matter concerns above all international law, beginning with the UN Charter and its fundamental principle of the sovereign equality of states. The United States is violating this principle everywhere every day. We must respond to that.” BangladeshBeyond has the full report.
In this regard, Lavrov cited in particular the “Group of Friends in Defense of the UN Charter” at the United Nations, a forum on which he said both China and Russia are working. “I regard it as a promising structure that should be expanded. We are confident that more countries will join in this work.”
Aug. 3 (EIRNS) – Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated yesterday that Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was “purely provocative. We see this, it is being recorded by all countries of the world. We stand in absolute solidarity with China here. Its sensitivity to this issue is understandable. It is justified. And instead of respecting this the US is choosing the path of confrontation. It doesn’t bode well,” the Kremlin spokesman said, adding that Washington’s decision is “only regrettable.”
Asked whether the Pelosi visit could lead to “global war,” Peskov said her visit was a “clear provocation,” but “I would suggest not to throw around words as serious [as ‘global war’]. That said, “underestimating the level of tension sparked by this visit” is not advisable either, he added.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, asked by journalists on Wednesday what was behind the Pelosi trip, stated: “It was the drive to prove to everyone their impunity and to act accordingly. ‘I do whatever I want’, something like that. I can hardly imagine any other reason to create a flashpoint out of thin air, despite knowing what it would mean for China.”
Aug. 1 (EIRNS)—This morning, the Sierra Leone-flagged cargo ship Razoni, carrying 26,000 tons of corn (maize), left the Ukrainian port of Odessa destined for Tripoli, Lebanon. It is the first ship to leave Odessa under the auspices of the UN/Turkey-brokered deal signed with Ukraine and with Russia on July 22 by which Ukrainian grains will be shipped to world markets. Turkey’s Defense Ministry announced today’s departure, reporting that the Razoni will arrive in Istanbul on Aug. 2 where it will be inspected before passing through the Bosphorus Strait and heading for its destination. It was escorted out of Odessa by Ukrainian ships.
TASS reports that the joint grain export coordination center, based in Istanbul, will use satellites to monitor the passage of ships. According to the Associated Press, there are 16 more dry cargo ships in Odessa in line to ship out under the program. Today’s departure was welcomed by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who said he hoped this would be first of many Ukrainian ships to leave the port carrying urgently needed grains to “bring much-needed stability and relief to global food security especially in the most fragile humanitarian contexts.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov welcomed this “very positive” development. “Let’s hope that all the agreements will be implemented from all sides and that the mechanism will work effectively,” TASS reported him as saying.
Uzbek President Urges: Engage With Afghanistan at Tashkent Conference —
July 28, 2022 (EIRNS)—A July 26-27 conference in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, brought together 100 delegations representing 30 countries, to discuss the current situation in Afghanistan and prospects for future development. The conference was convened by Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who has taken the lead in urging the international community to help stabilize Afghanistan economically and politically.
The members of the Afghan delegation who attended, led by acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, were reportedly upbeat and came with a message that their government had taken certain steps to comply with international requirements and that they now required Western investment. In this context they called for the U.S. and its Western allies to unfreeze the $9 billion in funds that were illegally seized from Afghanistan’s Central Bank in August of 2021 after the Taliban took power. Russia’s representative, Zamir Kubilov, called the West’s seizure of those funds “outright robbery,” TASS reported.
One proposal that is reportedly being discussed by U.S. and Swiss officials, and which has a bad stench to it, is the idea of setting up a special trust fund with the seized assets that would be managed by an international board—out of the control of the Afghan government. It would be modeled on the World Bank’s corrupt Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund, which threw around money on failed projects that did nothing to improve the lives of Afghan citizens, keeping the old, rotten structures in place. A careful investigation of this proposal is in order.
Speaking on behalf of President Mirziyoyev, presidential envoy Abdulaziz Kamilov delivered a forceful message. He warned that the international isolation of Afghanistan “shall inevitably lead to further deterioration of the humanitarian situation. It is important not to allow this, since the fate of millions is at stake.” The Afghan government has taken certain steps to improve the socioeconomic situation and establish friendly relations with neighboring countries and mutually-beneficial cooperation with the international community. “We must foster this and endorse these efforts,” Mirziyoyev said, while at the same time insisting that the international community’s conditions for formal diplomatic recognition—an inclusive government representing all layers of society with full respect for human rights–be met.
July 28 (EIRNS)—Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov culminated his four-nation African tour on July 27 in Addis Ababa with a thorough, broad-ranging briefing at the Russian embassy to the permanent representatives of the member countries of the 55-nation African Union and to the accredited diplomatic corps in Ethiopia. As he did in similar briefings in the three other nations he visited—Egypt, Uganda and the Republic of Congo—Lavrov cut through Western lies about how Russia had caused the global food and fertilizer shortage, explaining the role that sanctions played, but also hitting the “reckless policy of the Western countries on the so-called Green Transition, and all this has brought the price of fertilizers high, which of course affected the price of food.” Problems in the world food market actually started at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, he noted.
The Foreign Minister also went through a detailed history of the 2014 Maidan coup, the years-long assault by Kiev Nazis on the populations of the Donbas and the “red lines” that Russia had established, the crossing of which would force to respond.
Lavrov made clear that a new paradigm is emerging to replace the old “rules based order” –an order in which there is “no single criteria, no single principle except one. If I want something, you have to obey. If you don’t obey you will be punished.” He expressed the certainty that the overwhelming majority of the world’s countries don’t want to live “as if the colonial times came back.” They prefer to be independent, to rely on their own tradition, their history, and their old friends. They don’t wish to betray their old friends. That is clear, he said, in the fact that except for two or three developing countries, “no one else in Africa, Asia or Latin America joined the illegal American and European sanctions” against Russia.
Most normal countries, Lavrov said, want to be independent, want to choose their own development model, based on the will of their people. “Nobody wants to have enemies.”
Contrast this to NATO, he said, which as it just did at its Madrid meeting, “appoints enemies, they appoint the order in which they handle these enemies. Now Russia is the first, China is earmarked as the existential challenge for the long term.” Now, the West is trying to figure out how to confiscate Russian money, but “if they become irritated by somebody else tomorrow or the day after, they might do the same.” There is no rationality in the way the West operates, Lavrov emphasizes.
This is the context in which Lavrov suggested that reliance on the dollar as the instrument supporting the world economy “is not very promising,” and it’s not by accident that more and more countries are shifting to using alternative currencies, shifting to use national currencies more and more “and this process will be gaining momentum.” He cautioned that Russia isn’t proposing a revolution against the dollar and the U.S., but the point is that the U.S. has tossed out all principles of the free market, fair competition, sanctity of private property, presumption of innocence. “All these principles have been thrown down the drain.” They are now punishing Russia, he said, but warned that any other country that “irritates” them will be punished likewise. This is a full transcript of Minister Lavrov’s remarks and questions to him.
Found here is a segment of Helga Zepp-LaRouche’s interview with Ge Anna at CGTN World Today done July 25 in which Zepp-LaRouche insists on the immorality of sanctions for all countries. This segment was Tweeted out by Ms. Ge Anna which can be heard at the link.
In the longer interview with Ms. Ge Anna, Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche also takes up the multi-layered importance of the just concluded Russia-Ukraine grain deal which can be heard here in the second segment start minute 15:12″ to 26:58″ using the play button at the left.
July 11, 2022 (EIRNS)–Despite continued attacks by anti-Russian witch hunters, German ex-Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has kept his personal channel to Russian President Vladimir Putin open. As he told the Frankfurter Allgemeine news daily, he opposes the present government’s reluctance to talk to Russia: “Why are they focusing on the delivery of weapons? I do not believe in a military solution. The war can only be ended by negotiations. The fate of the soldiers and the Ukrainian civil population can only be eased by diplomatic negotiations.”
Schroeder said that he concludes from his meeting with President Putin in Moscow in March, that Russia is interested in a diplomatic solution. “How such a solution may look like, can, however, only be clarified in talks,” Schroeder said, adding that everything should be done by all sides “to prevent another escalation of the conflict.”
July 5, 2022 (EIRNS)–“We may be closer to a Cuban Missile Crisis-type situation than many think possible,” former Bundeswehr Chief of Staff and Chairman of the NATO Military Committee Gen. Harald Kujat warned in a June 12 assessment for Preussische Allgemeine Zeitung. “The difference being that the epicenter would not be in the Caribbean, but in Europe. So it is essentially in Europe’s interest to prevent a development of the Ukraine war that would expose us to this danger.”
How great is the danger? Kujat points to reports that Russia had simulated attacks using Iskander missiles (which can be armed with both conventional and nuclear warheads) from its Kaliningrad exclave. The practice launch was reported to have been a simulated launch at a military target in response to a nuclear attack.
“The message from the Russian Defense Ministry is apparently intended as another warning that the use of nuclear weapons is a realistic option for the Russian government,” he writes.
He warns that “the carefully safeguarded strategic stability between the two great powers [U.S. and Russia] does not mean that the risk of a nuclear war limited to Europe is eliminated. On the contrary: If the Russian leadership is of the opinion that the use of short-range nuclear missiles will not trigger a nuclear counterattack by the United States, the risk of a nuclear first use for Russia would be calculable. … [T]he former presidential adviser to Yeltsin and Putin, Sergey Karaganov, recently stated: ‘I also know from the history of American nuclear strategy that the United States will probably not defend Europe with nuclear weapons.'”
The potential for the threat is that the Ukraine conflict is not a Ukraine-Russian dispute, but a NATO-Russia conflict. Kujat warns that Western politicians are increasingly emphasizing that the arms deliveries are intended “not only for the defense of Ukraine, but also for Ukrainian victory over Russia.” He quotes U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin from late April saying that the United States “wants to see Russia weakened to the point where it can no longer do the things it did when it invaded Ukraine.”
“This is a significant change in the focus of U.S. strategy in the Ukraine war,” Kujat writes. “The center of gravity is no longer to support Ukraine in its defensive struggle, but to weaken Russia as a geopolitical rival.”
“However, the course of the war so far shows that there will be no military victor in this conflict. The rational consequence, therefore, is not to prolong the war by setting strategic goals further, but to end it through a negotiated peace. The appeal to seek a negotiated peace is also not a call for Ukraine to surrender. It is not even directed at Ukraine.
The main military players in this war are the United States and Russia. “There have been no negotiations between the two great powers since the war began. War has taken the place of diplomacy. It is the task of politics and an imperative of reason to end the suffering of Ukrainians and the destruction of the country and to prevent the war from slipping into a European catastrophe,” Kujat concludes. The full article is here (in German) and here in English machine translation.
