Month: April 2022

What led to leader Imran Khan’s downfall in Pakistan?

Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party lost the support of coalition allies, denying a majority he needed to defeat a no-confidence vote.

Imran Khan’s tumultuous term as prime minister of Pakistan has ended, following weeks of high political drama and days of constitutional chaos.

The Supreme Court’s landmark verdict late on Thursday restored a parliament that Khan had sought to disband and mandated a vote of no confidence that he sought to avoid.

Ukraine War: The Moral Corruption of Germany’s Political Elite

Questions are being belatedly asked — and grudgingly answered — about many aspects of Merkel’s failed Russia policy, including her decisions to block Ukraine’s prospective membership of NATO, gut the German military, undermine the transatlantic alliance, and institutionalize Germany’s overdependence on Russian energy supplies.

The responsibility for Germany’s failed Russia policy goes far beyond Merkel: German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and a large cross section of Germany’s business, media and political elite have supported — and continue to support — pro-Russia (as well as pro-China and pro-Iran) policies that sacrifice democracy, human rights, and the rule of law on the altar of financial gain.

Imran Khan’s Fall: Political and Security Implications for Pakistan

How did the political crisis escalate?

The Pakistani parliament voted no confidence in Prime Minister Imran Khan in the early hours of 10 April, in a culmination of tensions that had been building for some time. Khan’s main opponents, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N) and Bilawal Bhutto Zardari’s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), had long insisted that his victory in the 2018 general elections was the result of military interference. But beyond that shared belief, the two parties differed over ways to oppose Khan’s government; the PPP called for a no-trust vote in the federal parliament while the PML-N vacillated, opting at times to resign from the legislature and at other times to take to the streets in protest. The Khan government brought its two rivals together by consistently targeting their top leadership through a flawed accountability process overseen by the controversial National Accountability Bureau. Meanwhile, public anger at the government was growing because of soaring inflation and governance failures. Politicisation of the bureaucracy and interference in policing deprived citizens of basis services and security. The prospect of unrest was real. Yet when the opposition agreed on a common goal, ousting Khan through constitutional means – a no-trust vote in parliament – it posed a far bigger threat to the prime minister’s survival in office.

Iran’s Future Not Dependent on Success of Nuclear Deal, Khamenei Says

Iran’s future should not be dependent on the success or failure of negotiations to revive the nuclear agreement with the world powers, the country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told senior officials on Tuesday, according to state television. Khamenei said that the negotiations, reported to be stalled for the last month over a few remaining issues on which both Iran and the United States blame the other side for intransigence, “are progressing well,” but added that the officials “absolutely do not wait for nuclear negotiations in planning for the country and move forward.” He also called on his country’s negotiators to remain steadfast in “resisting America’s excessive demands.” Some of Iran’s demands include removing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from the US terror list and an American promise that there will be no repeat of former US President Donald Trump’s 2018 withdrawal from the deal.

US Wages Financial War on Russia

The latest developments, including:
– How US declared financial war on Russia
– The US Dollar as a weapon
– How 9/11 gave the US government power to wage financial war
– Key architects of US/EU financial war
– Russia’s debt default
– Turkish drones in Ukraine
– The truth of Bucha’s atrocities

Russia’s Success in Syria’s Civil War Doesn’t Mean Much for Its Chances in Vast, United Ukraine

As Russia appoints a veteran of the war in Syria as its overall military commander in Ukraine, who is expected imminently to launch an offensive in the Donbas industrial area, pundits ask if the tactics that proved successful in Syria could now be employed in Ukraine.

The new appointee is General Alexander Dvornikov, who was sent to Syria in September 2015 when Russia intervened directly in the war to stop a rebel offensive backed by Saudi Arabia which was making ground against the forces of President Bashar al-Assad.

Russian International Affairs Council Director Kortunov: Within Russia, Two Fundamentally Incompatible Approaches To Ending The War Are Contending

Andrey Kortunov the director-general of the Russian International Affairs Council admitted in an interview to Sky News that the launch of Russia’s military operation caught him by surprise. “I was shocked because for a long time, I thought that a military operation was not feasible. It was not plausible.”[1] In an article posted on the RIAC website, Kortunov listed the negative effects of the invasion:

Chinese Pundit And Military Expert Song Zhongping: The Bucha Massacre Was Staged By The Ukrainians

Popular Chinese military scholar and TV host Song Zhongping said in a video he uploaded to the Chinese short video sharing platform Douyin on April 4, 2022 that the massacre in Bucha, Ukraine was staged by the Ukrainian government, and that there is video evidence showing some of the dead bodies standing up. Like much of China’s domestic media, Song’s claims echo Russian propaganda about the massacre, even though the Chinese government has not openly expressed support for Russia.

U.S., India Take Steps to Increase Cooperation, Ties Between 2 Largest Democracies

U.S. and Indian leaders took steps today to deepen the cooperation and ties between the two largest democracies in the world.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken hosted their Indian counterparts, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh and Minister of External Affairs S. Jaishankar for the fourth Ministerial Dialogue between the two countries.