Kavkazcenter.com

BARACK OBAMA: ''I really despise Putin''

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:46:46 GMT

An influential American magazine, The New Yorker, published an article from the G8 summit, inspired by the mood of the meeting, which was reflected most clearly in a photo report by Buzzfeed.

Perhaps, it is this report that� prompted the author of the article "Obama, Putin Agree Never to Speak to Each Other Again" to conclude that American and Russian leaders despise each other. The New Yorker writes:

"The G8 summit ended today on a constructive note, with President Obama and Russia's Vladimir Putin reaching a broad agreement never to speak to each other again. "It's better this way," said Mr. Obama, frostily standing in the general vicinity of Mr. Putin for the last time ever. "We truly despise each other." "I couldn't agree more," said Mr. Putin, looking as though he had just smelled something bad. "My hatred of this man knows no bounds." According to the agreement, economic cooperation, cyber security, human rights, the war in Syria, and the New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft's missing Super Bowl ring are among thirty-seven different topics that the two men will never again discuss. Additionally, at all future summits, if either Mr. Obama or Mr. Putin enters a room the other man will be obligated to leave immediately. The two men reached agreement on an unprecedented number of points, including never contacting each other via telephone or e-mail and keeping a minimum of five hundred feet away from each other's residences. After signing the agreement, the two men shook hands for the final time and scowled bitterly for photographers". Meanwhile, the mood at the summit was commented on her twitter by the Moscow correspondent of The Guardian, Miriam Elder:

"Of course Obama doesn't like Putin. He's a social worker, and a social worker can't like a businessman", says The Guardian's longtime researcher.

Department of Monitoring
Kavkaz Center

Russia leads stifling democracy in Eurasia: Report

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 12:02:12 GMT

Democracy and civil society in Eurasia are increasingly under fire from autocratic rulers seeking to maintain their grasp on power in a quickly changing world, according to a new report by the US think-tank Freedom House.

Writing in its 2013 "Nations in Transit" report, the democracy and human rights watchdog found that leaders of Eurasian countries from Russia and Ukraine to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are "striking more vigorously at perceived adversaries" in response to the recent wave of political turmoil in the Middle East.

Russia, the report adds, served as a "vanguard and model" in 2012 in stifling civil society amid growing popular discontent. Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

Julian Assange: Google is an affiliate of the CIA

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 13:57:54 GMT

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has confirmed that Google is tied up in a conspiracy stretching up to the very highest levels of American government.

Addressing the 19th International Symposium on Electronic Art via live video link on Thursday, Mr. Assange said that Google was an American government echo.

For the first time, he described interactions with both Google and the State Department which was evidence of intimate relations between the organizations.

Mr. Assange met up with Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen, the young hotshot who is head of Google Ideas and a former high-ranking State Department apparatchik, along with Lisa Shields, a vice president at the Council on Foreign Relations, while under house arrest in the UK during 2011.

The group told Mr. Assange they wanted to interview him for Schmidt and Cohen's book (published this year), The New Digital Age: Re-shaping the Future of People, Nations and Business, but the WikiLeaks founder said they had a different motivation for their visit.

Mr. Assange said: "Google wants to ingratiate itself in the national security complex of the US and [establish] itself as a new geopolitical visionary. You might think this meeting is evidence that the big boys at Google are secretly on the side of WikiLeaks. That's not true; they have a much more complex agenda."

WikiLeaks published the transcript of their lengthy conversation earlier this year, but Mr. Assange has now described further interactions with the State Department for the first time.

Mr. Assange said that after the meeting, his team tried to contact Hilary Clinton. He said they managed to get through to her senior legal advisor. In a bid to confirm that the WikiLeaks caller was actually on Assange's staff, the State Department asked Shields to call them back and act as a secret backchannel.

Mr. Assange, who referred to himself in the third person throughout the keynote, said: "What had happened was that the Google guys - who are really kind of State Department guys - came and paid an unofficial State Department visit to Julian Assange and the WikiLeaks crew, while I was under house arrest, then went back and reported that information at the highest level."

Mr. Assange confirmed that Google and the State Department work closely together, with the ad giant doing stuff the government and CIA can't do.

"At this level of American society, it's all musical chairs," he added.

As evidence for this, Mr. Assange pointed to WikiLeaks cables which showed that the American spies were concerned that Google staff were running secret missions around the world, possibly at the behest of the US government.

Recent stories do show that Google is keen to win favor with senators and other power brokers.

Mr. Assange said that although Google had been corrupted by power. He added: "Google started out as part of Californian graduate school culture, which is a very nice, gentle, humane, somewhat naive and privileged culture around Berkeley in the Bay Area, which is pretty decent. Californians at that level are much like Australians, it's a pretty flat society.

"But as Google dealt with the big bad world, it leaned very heavily on the State Department and entered into its systems, so that there are very close interconnects, where you have a former advisor to Hilary Clinton and Condoleeza Rice [Jared Cohen] working as head of Google Ideas." Source: Agencies

Kavkaz Center

Daily Mail: Islam vs. Christianity: Future is with Islam!

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 18:10:05 GMT

The Daily Mail distributed a comparative photo essay of churches and mosques. At the conclusion of the newspaper, the Christian religion in Britain is becoming a part of its history, while the future is definitely with Islam: "Set aside the fact that our Queen is the Defender of the Christian Faith. Ignore the 26 Church of England bishops who sit in the House of Lords. Pay no attention to the 2011 Census that told us 33.2 million people in England and Wales describe themselves as Christians. For if you want a more telling insight into religion in the United Kingdom today, just look at these photographs. The story they tell is more revealing than any survey.
The photo on the left shows St Mary's Church in Cable Street while the photo on the right shows worshippers gathered for Friday midday prayers outside a nearby mosque in Spitalfields, both in East London
*** What they show are three acts of worship performed in the East End of London within a few hundred yards of each other at the end of last month. Two of the photos show Sunday morning services in the churches of St George-in-the-East on Cannon Street Road, and St Mary's on Cable Street. The third shows worshippers gathered for Friday midday prayers outside the nearby mosque on the Brune Street Estate in Spitalfields. The difference in numbers could hardly be more dramatic. At St George's, some 12 people have congregated to celebrate Holy Communion.
Empty pews: 18th-century parishioners crowded into St George-in-the-East hear John Wesley. Only 12 people attended the service

***
When the church was built in the early 18th century, it was designed to seat 1,230. Numbers are similar at St Mary's, opened in October 1849. Then, it could boast a congregation of 1,000. Today, as shown in the picture, the worshippers total just 20. While the two churches are nearly empty, the Brune Street Estate mosque has a different problem - overcrowding. The mosque itself is little more than a small room rented in a community centre, and it can hold only 100. However, on Fridays, those numbers swell to three to four times the room's capacity, so the worshippers spill out onto the street, where they take up around the same amount of space as the size of the near-empty St Mary's down the road.
Dwindling flock: St Mary's Cable Street in East London was built to hold 1,000 people. Today, the congregation numbers around 20

*** What these pictures suggest is that, on current trends, Christianity in this country is becoming a religion of the past, and Islam is one of the future. In the past ten years, there has been a decrease in people in England and Wales identifying as Christian, from 71.7 per cent to 59.3 per cent of the population. In the same period the number of Muslims in England and Wales has risen from 3 per cent of the population to 4.8 per cent - 2.7 million people. And Islam has age on its side. Whereas a half of British Muslims are under 25, almost a quarter of Christians are approaching their eighth decade. It is estimated that in just 20 years, there will be more active Muslims in this country than churchgoers - an idea which even half a century ago would have been utterly unthinkable. Many will conclude with a heavy heart that Christianity faces a permanent decline in Britain, its increasingly empty churches a monument to those centuries when the teachings of Christ governed the thoughts and deeds of the masses.
A study in devotion: The tiny mosque on the Brune Street Estate, Spitalfields, holds only 100 people, so the local Bangladeshi community throng the street for Friday midday prayers

*** On Sunday October 1, 1738, St George's was packed twice during the day to hear the great evangelist John Wesley, who then preached at the church for the following week explaining, as he put it, �the way of salvation to many who misunderstood what had been preached concerning it'. Today, there are no John Wesleys to fill up the pews. The church does its best, offering, for example, a monthly �Hot Potato Sunday', during which the few congregants can discuss the readings of the day over a baked potato. Canon Michael Ainsworth of St George's puts on a brave face when he says: �What we are saying now is it is not just a matter of numbers. It is about keeping faith with the city and hanging in there - being part of the community.' At St Mary's, meanwhile, Rev Peter McGeary cannot explain why the numbers are so low: �It's impossible to say, there are so many variables.' When he is asked if he tries to boost his congregations, he simply replies: �We are not a company, we are a church.' In contrast, there seems a remarkable energy attached to the mosque on Brune Street, which has been described as the �Mecca of the City'. Here, come rain or shine, members of the Bangladeshi community perform the Friday prayer of Jumma under the open sky. It is a communal act which will surely only grow in popularity. Sadly, that's not something that can be said of the two nearby churches, and unless they can reinvigorate their congregations they may finally end up being deconsecrated. When that happens, such large buildings will be attractive spaces for those who can fill them. One day, in a few decades, St George's may well again be packed with worshippers - but they will not be Christians". Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

Putin, Cameron blah blah blah Syria blah blah blah no change blah

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 03:25:47 GMT

The chief Russian dog Putin issued a blunt warning to the west tonight not to arm Syrian rebels who "eat the organs" of their enemies, writes The Guardian.

Following talks in Downing Street with Cameron, he said the brutal behaviour of the rebels was inconsistent with the "humanitarian and cultural values" of Europe. While he strongly defended the supply of arms by Moscow to the "legitimate" government of Assad, he stressed that he wanted to achieve a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

He believed the G8 summit, starting on Monday in Lough Erne in Northern Ireland, was "one of the most appropriate means" to seek an end to the conflict.

At a joint news conference, Cameron acknowledged there were big differences between them on who was to blame for the conflict but insisted they could be overcome.

Putin, who has made no secret of his opposition to Obama's plans to send arms to the rebels, was unsparing when he was asked about previous comments by Cameron that those who armed the regime had "the blood of the children of Syria" on their hands.

"The blood is on the hands of both parties. There is always a question as to who is to blame for that. One should hardly back those who kill their enemies and eat their organs," he said, referring to an incident when a rebel fighter was filmed taking a bite out of an organ he had cut out of the body of a dead Syrian soldier.

"It is hardly in relation to the humanitarian and cultural values Europe has been professing for centuries."

Putin has also reacted sceptically to evidence produced by Britain, France and the US that the regime has used chemical weapons - crossing Obama's "red line" for intervention.

Cameron has welcomed Obama's announcement, although he has yet to decide whether to follow the president's lead on supplying arms to the rebels.

However, he said Britain would continue to offer non-lethal support to what he called the genuine opposition, saying it was vital to bolster the democratic elements against the extremists.

"Yes, there are elements of the Syrian opposition that are deeply unsavoury, that are very dangerous, very extremist and I want nothing to do with them. I'd like them driven out of Syria - they're linked to al-Qaida," he said in an interview with Sky News's Murnaghan programme.

"But there are elements of the Syrian opposition who want to see a free democratic, pluralistic Syria that respects the rights of minorities including Christians, and we should be working with them - we are working with them.

"If we don't work with those elements of the Syrian opposition, then we can't be surprised if the only elements of the Syrian opposition that are getting, that are actually making any progress in Syria, are the ones that we don't approve of.

"After all, they are trying to defend their communities against appalling attacks, including, let's be clear, chemical weapon attacks. President Assad is now guilty of the most appalling crimes against his people - 90,000 people dead and some of them through the use of appalling chemical weapons." Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

NSA targeted Putin's puppet Medvedev at London G20 summit

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 22:28:38 GMT

American spies based in the UK intercepted the top-secret communications of the then Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, during his visit to Britain for the G20 summit in London, leaked documents reveal.

The details of the intercept were set out in a briefing prepared by the National Security Agency (NSA), America's biggest spy and eavesdropping organization, and shared with high-ranking officials from Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

The document, leaked by a defected NSA spy, Edward Snowden, shows the agency believed it might have discovered "a change in the way Russian leadership signals have been normally transmitted".

The disclosure underlines the importance of the US spy hub at RAF Menwith Hill in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, where hundreds of NSA analysts are based, working alongside liaison officers from GCHQ.

The document was drafted in August 2009, four months after the visit by Medvedev, who joined other world leaders in London, including Obama, for the event hosted by the British prime Brown.

Medvedev arrived in London on Wednesday 1 April and the NSA intercepted communications from his delegation the same day, according to the NSA paper, entitled: "Russian Leadership Communications in support of President Dmitry Medvedev at the G20 summit in London - Intercept at Menwith Hill station."

The document starts with two pictures of Medvedev smiling for the world's media alongside Brown and Obama in bilateral discussions before the main summit.

The report says: "This is an analysis of signal activity in support of President Dmitry Medvedev's visit to London. The report details a change in the way Russian leadership signals have been normally transmitted. The signal activity was found to be emanating from the Russian embassy in London and the communications are believed to be in support of the Russian president."

The NSA interception of the Russian leadership at G20 came hours after Obama and Medvedev had met for the first time. Relations between the two leaders had been smoothed in the runup to the summit with a series of phone calls and letters, with both men wanting to establish a trusting relationship to discuss the ongoing banking crisis and nuclear disarmament.

In the aftermath of their discussions on 1 April, the two men issued a joint communique saying they intended to "move further along the path of reducing and limiting strategic offensive arms in accordance with the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons".

A White House official who briefed journalists described the meeting as "a very successful first meeting focused on real issues". The official said it had been important for the men to be open about the issues on which they agreed and disagreed. Obama had stressed the need to be candid, the official noted.

While it has been widely known the two countries spy on each other, it is rare for either to be caught in the act; the latest disclosures will also be deeply embarrassing for the White House as Obama prepares to meet the Russian chief dog Putin, who succeeded Medvedev as president, in the margins of the G8 summit this week.

The two countries have long complained about the extent of each other's espionage activities, and tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats are common. A year after Obama met Medvedev, America claimed it had broken a highly sophisticated spy ring that carried out "deep cover" assignments in the US.

Putin was withering of the FBI-led operation: "I see that your police have let themselves go and put some people in jail, but I guess that is their job. I hope the positive trend that we have seen develop in our bilateral relations recently will not be harmed by these events." Last month, the Russians arrested an American in Moscow who they alleged was a CIA agent.

The new revelations underline the significance of RAF Menwith Hill and raise questions about its relationship to the British intelligence agencies, and who is responsible for overseeing it. The 560-acre site was leased to the Americans in 1954 and the NSA has had a large presence there since 1966.

It has often been described as the biggest surveillance and interception facility in the world, and has 33 distinct white "radomes" that house satellite dishes. An American base in all but name, it has British intelligence analysts seconded to work alongside NSA colleagues, though it is unclear how the two agencies obtain and share intelligence - and under whose legal authority they are working under. Source: The Guardian

Kavkaz Center

Letter to the Editor. C.I.A. and N.S.A. took responsibility for cyber-attack on Al Shamukh Forums and Al Fida Forum

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 12:30:36 GMT

Asslamu alaykum,

In your article about the cyber-attack against the Inspire magazine, just a note that the website that hosts it is Al Shamukh Forums and al Fida Forum, and not Ansar Al Mujahideen Forum, for it only spreads it sometimes even a day or two later than the original release.

JFK Department of Letters Kavkaz Center

Initiator of Magnitsky List fears for his life from the hands of Russian terrorists

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 03:17:56 GMT

Bill Browder, chief executive and founder of Hermitage Capital Markets, told CNBC the Russian government is apoplectic over sanctions imposed on Russian KGB regime officials that he has campaigned for, and if he gets assassinated, everyone would know who did it. The well-known critic of the Kremlin has been living in London since he was kicked out of Russia for accusing Russian tax officials of embezzlement, in 2007. Since then, he has repeatedly accused Russia of corruption and has been involved in a high-profile battle with the Russian state over the death of his lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who was investigating fraud among Russian officials. In April, Russia issued an arrest warrant against Browder on charges that he stole shares in gas giant Gazprom fifteen years ago and requested Interpol, the global police agency, to launch a manhunt for the investment banker.

Interpol refused the request but Browder said he feels under constant threat. "At the moment nothing keeps me protected...If I get assassinated, everyone will know who did it....It would effectively be a declaration of war with the West if they decide to kill me," he told CNBC in London. Browder's colleague Magnitsky was imprisoned and murdered by the KGB in a Moscow prison. Browder has since sought to bring the Russian state to trial over Magnitsky's death. His campaign has not fallen on deaf ears with the US signing the Magnitsky Act into law in December 2012. The Act prohibits Russian officials thought to be connected to the death of Magnitsky from entering the U.S and using its banking system, a factor that has enraged Russia, Browder said. "In December 2012, the Magnitsky Act was passed which imposes sanctions on Russian officials and in April 2013, they actually sanctioned 16 officials [on the US OFAC sanctions list] and the Russians are apoplectic because this is such a blow to their reputation." He said the Russian president had become the biggest oligarch since coming to power but that social unrest was intensifying. This week, thousands of protestors marched through Moscow calling for what they see as Putin's authoritarian rule and for the release of people considered political prisoners. Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

Russian thief-in-chief Putin stole a diamond ring

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 02:26:21 GMT

New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft revealed the real story behind a 2005 meeting with Putin, a Russian thief-in-chief, during which the Russian thug pocketed his Super Bowl ring, worth more than $ 25,000. Kraft, at the time, claimed the diamond-encrusted bauble was a gift, but he now admits Putin stole it, and the White House intervened when he demanded it back, reports The New York Post.

Kraft explained the incident happened while Sandy Weill and other business execs were in in the Russian occupied Sweden-Ingrian city of Nyen which the Russian invaders call St. Petersburg. "I took out the ring and showed it to Putin, and he put it on and he goes, �I can kill someone with this ring,' " Kraft told the crowd at Carnegie Hall's Medal of Excellence gala at the Waldorf-Astoria. "I put my hand out and he put it in his pocket, and three KGB guys got around him and walked out."

Kraft released a statement at the time, "Putin, a great and knowledgeable sports fan, was clearly taken with its uniqueness. I decided to give him the ring as a symbol of the respect and admiration that I have for the Russian people and [his] leadership.

But Kraft really wanted the 4.94-carat bauble back, he said Thursday, admitting he'd gotten a call from the George W. Bush-run White House, saying, "�It would really be in the best interest of US-Soviet relations if you meant to give the ring as a present."

But, Kraft said, "I really didn't want to. I had an emotional tie to the ring, it has my name on it. I don't want to see it on eBay. There was a pause on the other end of the line, and the voice repeated, �It would really be in the best interest if you meant to give the ring as a present.' " The ring is now reportedly kept in Putin's library in the Kremlin.

Also attending the event were Andre Tippett, Vince Wilfork, Jerod Mayo and Tom Brady, who told us of Tim Tebow joining the Patriots, "I think the more great players we have the better it's going to be for our team. I hope it turns out well because I've had a quite a lot of new guys . . . we'll see."

Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

Widow of Russian atomic terrorism victim condemns Putin's Downing St visit

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 13:18:15 GMT

The widow of the KGB murdered Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko has criticised David Cameron's decision to meet her husband' murderer Putin in Downing Street on Sunday, saying it is morally wrong to appease dictators, reports The Guardian.

She said she was disturbed by the prime minister's increasingly personal friendship with Russia's authoritarian president, and by Cameron's apparent willingness to forget about the killing of her husband by Putin in polonium poisoning in 2006.

"You can't avoid the question of my husband's death," she said. "Blair also sought good relations with Putin. It collapsed after a couple of years. Bush looked into Putin's eyes and made the same mistake. Cameron should know better. We know from history there is no point in appeasing dictators."

She added: "How can you have serious talks about security in Syria with a person who doesn't want you to provide justice following a polonium terror attack in central London? It was obviously Mr Putin himself who protected Lugovoi from extradition. I believe it is Putin who also decided that Lugovoi should become a Russian MP."

Alex Goldfarb, Litvinenko's close friend, said Cameron's wooing of Putin would ultimately lead to disaster. Of Sunday's Downing Street meeting, he said: "It's a license to kill, essentially. It means Putin has impunity to kill people in the center of London and then laugh at those who think there is something wrong about that." Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

British political police deported Putin's critic from UK-occupied Irish Ulster not to hurt Putin's feelings

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 19:53:26 GMT

An outspoken critic of Russian tyrant Putin has been prevented from addressing a major international conference in British-occupied Irish Ulster.

Russian democratic journalist Oksana Chelysheva was due to give a keynote address at the Poisonous Legacies event in Londonderry on Saturday but was stopped by British political police on arrival at Stansted Airport.

Conference organizer Paul O'Connor said the journalist, who has been openly critical of the Russian handling of the conflict in Chechnya, was detained for whole six hours before being sent back by British political police to her home in Finland where she has a political refugee status.

"She did not arrive as planned last night," said Mr O'Connor.

"Why wasn't she allowed in? We are asking the question why was an esteemed, award-winning journalist recognised by Amnesty International not allowed to enter the country?

"We will now have an empty chair where someone was supposed to be talking about the situation in Chechnya - it does not reflect well."

Bloody Putin is due to join the bloody leaders of the world's richest countries for the G8 summit in the UK-occupied Irish town of Co Fermanagh, Ulster, next week.

Chelysheva, who is a fierce enemy of truth published by the Kavkaz Center and supports the ban of our news agency by the KGB inside Russia in September 2011, being accused by some Russian human rights activists for working for the KGB, won Amnesty International's Special Award for Human Rights Journalism Under Threat in 2006, has been campaigning for a war crimes tribunal to deal with the Chechen conflict.

The Poisonous Legacies conference, organized by the Bloody Sunday Trust and the Pat Finucane Centre, will examine the impact of conflict and colonialism in various parts of the world, including the Middle East, Colombia, Argentina, Chechnya, Spain, Italy and Ireland.

It coincides with the third anniversary of the publication of the Saville Report into the killing of 13 civil rights marchers in Derry in January 1972 by members of the Parachute Regiment and is part of the Derry/Londonderry UK City of Culture 2013 program.

Source: Belfast Telegraph Kavkaz Center

U.S. vs. Al-Qaeda. C.I.A. and N.S.A. take responsibility for cyber-attack on Ansar Al-Mujahideen forum

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 11:21:58 GMT

According to the Washington Post citing its own sources, the staff of the American secret police agencies CIA and NSA attacked the online magazine Inspire - the official magazine of the Mujahideen of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

The magazine issue # 11 was attacked by US intelligence agencies 2 times: on May 14, and then its updated release on May 30. For censorship reasons, Washington Post did not mention the name of the information portal and writes only that it was "an online forum that hosted it". As previously reported by the Kavkaz Center which published this news for the first time back on June 5, it was an English-language popular Islamic portal Ansar Al-Mujahideen (http://ansar1.info/), as well as its Arabic-language version as-ansar.com.

The operation of Arabic-language version is now restored. The English one is still offline. The Islamic portal is hosted in Malaysia.

The aim of operation, according to US intelligence, was to disrupt the publication of the magazine and "sow confusion among the group's followers". It is to be noted that it is not prohibited to be a supporter of al-Qaeda, and therefore it is allowed by world democracy. Prohibited in the west is only be a member of Al Qaeda.

According to the newspaper, the Americans managed to disrupt at least one issue of Inspire - the US government hackers hacked the website and removed all the published articles.

It is reported that the attack on Inspire was carried out by the CIA and the NSA operatives, although there is no direct evidence of the involvement of these agencies in the attack. These agencies have refused to comment, thus indirectly confirming suspicions in cyber terrorist activities formally prohibited by the US law.

Sources of Washington Post write that this hacking operation is just a part of a large-scale campaign against the Internet activity of Al-Qaeda.

Newspaper sources report that the cyber attack on Ansar Al-Mujahideen has was carried out to ensure that Americans do not learn the truth about the murky Boston incident, in which the CIA accuses the Tsarnaev brothers. The sources of the newspaper told about anxiety and concern prevailing in the CIA. The first of them said:

- You can make it hard for them to distribute it, or you can mess with the content. And you can mess with the content in a way that is obvious or in ways that are not obvious. The second truth fighter, the source of the newspaper, in turn, said:

"The publication of the magazine is seen as a threat because it has a specific readership - a following. People will look for it, as opposed to something randomly posted. Two, it is very user-friendly. Inspire uses pictures and step-by-step diagrams, and that's a problem".
Department of Monitoring
Kavkaz Center

President of Lithuania accuses Russia of international terrorism

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 15:59:20 GMT

Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite said Tuesday in parliament in her annual report that "speaking about security, we must think not only of military, economic, energy, information and financial security, but also about the cybernetic one. The first public attack against Lithuania's Internet space may be compared with the manifestation of international terrorism.

"The first open attack on the Internet space in Lithuania is a serious warning about the need to strengthen our defensive capabilities. I would call such an attack a manifestation of international terrorism. Therefore, we must, above all, protect our own our state in all the spheres", said the head of state. She noted that it is not so easy to be an independent state in a world torn by geopolitical interests.

"Many things now again occur round Lithuania that are impossible to predict. The geopolitical situation also determines the direction of our foreign policy. Therefore important security signs for Lithuanians must registered not only by intelligence, but also by diplomatic radars", said the president. Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

Britain may be an Islamic nation within 20 years

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 02:52:01 GMT

Muslim population in Britain is growing so rapidly that Islam is predicted to overtake Christianity within the next 20 years. Combined with the growing secularization of native Britons, the Christian/Muslim ratio could tilt in favor of Islam even sooner than estimated, reports The Washington Times.

The overall population of England and Wales increased by 3.7 million people from 2001 to 2011, but the number of people who said they are Christians declined by 4.1 million and 6.4 million said they had no religion at all. Meanwhile, the Muslim population grew by 1.2 million. Christians had the oldest age profile in 2011 while Muslims had the youngest among all primary religious groups. Almost half of Muslims in Britain are under 25 and nearly 90% are less than 50 years old.

Another important factor in the study showed that Muslims are more diverse than Christians. More than 2/3rds of the British Muslim population comes from Asia with another 10% reported as Black/African/Caribbean/Black British In many churches throughout Great Britain the bulk of the congregation is over 60. Christians could become a minority within the next decade rather than the estimated 20 years.he U.K. will undergo a major change in national identity that will impact them culturally, politically, economically and religiously when the white British population becomes a minority. The ethnic transformation implicit in current trends would be a major and irreversible change in British society, unprecedented for at least a millennium. Deparment of Monitoring Kavkaz Center

Obama orders U.S. to draw up overseas target list for cyber-attacks

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 15:36:58 GMT

Barack Obama has ordered his senior national security and intelligence officials to draw up a list of potential overseas targets for US cyber-attacks, a top secret presidential directive obtained by the Guardian reveals. The 18-page Presidential Policy Directive 20, issued in October last year but never published, states that what it calls Offensive Cyber Effects Operations (OCEO) "can offer unique and unconventional capabilities to advance US national objectives around the world with little or no warning to the adversary or target and with potential effects ranging from subtle to severely damaging". It says the government will "identify potential targets of national importance where OCEO can offer a favorable balance of effectiveness and risk as compared with other instruments of national power". The directive also contemplates the possible use of cyber actions inside the US, though it specifies that no such domestic operations can be conducted without the prior order of the president, except in cases of emergency. The aim of the document was "to put in place tools and a framework to enable government to make decisions" on cyber actions, a senior administration official told the Guardian. The administration published some declassified talking points from the directive in January 2013, but those did not mention the stepping up of America's offensive capability and the drawing up of a target list. Obama's move to establish a potentially aggressive cyber warfare doctrine will heighten fears over the increasing militarization of the internet. The directive's publication comes as the president plans to confront his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping at a summit in California on Friday over alleged Chinese attacks on western targets. Even before the publication of the directive, Beijing had hit back against US criticism, with a senior official claiming to have "mountains of data" on American cyber-attacks he claimed were every bit as serious as those China was accused of having carried out against the US. Presidential Policy Directive 20 defines OCEO as "operations and related programs or activities ... conducted by or on behalf of the United States Government, in or through cyberspace, that are intended to enable or produce cyber effects outside United States government networks." Asked about the stepping up of US offensive capabilities outlined in the directive, a senior administration official said: "Once humans develop the capacity to build boats, we build navies. Once you build airplanes, we build air forces." The official added: "As a citizen, you expect your government to plan for scenarios. We're very interested in having a discussion with our international partners about what the appropriate boundaries are." The document includes caveats and precautions stating that all US cyber operations should conform to US and international law, and that any operations "reasonably likely to result in significant consequences require specific presidential approval". The document says that agencies should consider the consequences of any cyber-action. They include the impact on intelligence-gathering; the risk of retaliation; the impact on the stability and security of the internet itself; the balance of political risks versus gains; and the establishment of unwelcome norms of international behaviour. Among the possible "significant consequences" are loss of life; responsive actions against the US; damage to property; serious adverse foreign policy or economic impacts. The US is understood to have already participated in at least one major cyber attack, the use of the Stuxnet computer worm targeted on Iranian uranium enrichment centrifuges, the legality of which has been the subject of controversy. US reports citing high-level sources within the intelligence services said the US and Israel were responsible for the worm. In the presidential directive, the criteria for offensive cyber operations in the directive is not limited to retaliatory action but vaguely framed as advancing "US national objectives around the world". The revelation that the US is preparing a specific target list for offensive cyber-action is likely to reignite previously raised concerns of security researchers and academics, several of whom have warned that large-scale cyber operations could easily escalate into full-scale military conflict. Sean Lawson, assistant professor in the department of communication at the University of Utah, argues: "When militarist cyber rhetoric results in use of offensive cyber attack it is likely that those attacks will escalate into physical, kinetic uses of force." An intelligence source with extensive knowledge of the National Security Agency's systems told the Guardian the US complaints again China were hypocritical, because America had participated in offensive cyber operations and widespread hacking - breaking into foreign computer systems to mine information. Provided anonymity to speak critically about classified practices, the source said: "We hack everyone everywhere. We like to make a distinction between us and the others. But we are in almost every country in the world." The US likes to haul China before the international court of public opinion for "doing what we do every day", the source added. One of the unclassified points released by the administration in January stated: "It is our policy that we shall undertake the least action necessary to mitigate threats and that we will prioritize network defense and law enforcement as preferred courses of action." The full classified directive repeatedly emphasizes that all cyber-operations must be conducted in accordance with US law and only as a complement to diplomatic and military options. But it also makes clear how both offensive and defensive cyber operations are central to US strategy. Under the heading "Policy Reviews and Preparation", a section marked "TS/NF" - top secret/no foreign - states: "The secretary of defense, the DNI [Director of National Intelligence], and the director of the CIA ... shall prepare for approval by the president through the National Security Advisor a plan that identifies potential systems, processes and infrastructure against which the United States should establish and maintain OCEO capabilities..." The deadline for the plan is six months after the approval of the directive. The directive provides that any cyber-operations "intended or likely to produce cyber effects within the United States" require the approval of the president, except in the case of an "emergency cyber action". When such an emergency arises, several departments, including the department of defense, are authorized to conduct such domestic operations without presidential approval. Obama further authorized the use of offensive cyber attacks in foreign nations without their government's consent whenever "US national interests and equities" require such nonconsensual attacks. It expressly reserves the right to use cyber tactics as part of what it calls "anticipatory action taken against imminent threats". The directive makes multiple references to the use of offensive cyber attacks by the US military. It states several times that cyber operations are to be used only in conjunction with other national tools and within the confines of law. When the directive was first reported, lawyers with the Electronic Privacy Information Center filed a Freedom of Information Act request for it to be made public. The NSA, in a statement, refused to disclose the directive on the ground that it was classified. In January, the Pentagon announced a major expansion of its Cyber Command Unit, under the command of General Keith Alexander, who is also the director of the NSA. That unit is responsible for executing both offensive and defensive cyber operations. Earlier this year, the Pentagon publicly accused China for the first time of being behind attacks on the US. The Washington Post reported last month that Chinese hackers had gained access to the Pentagon's most advanced military programs. The director of national intelligence, James Clapper, identified cyber threats in general as the top national security threat. Obama officials have repeatedly cited the threat of cyber-attacks to advocate new legislation that would vest the US government with greater powers to monitor and control the internet as a means of guarding against such threats. One such bill currently pending in Congress, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (Cispa), has prompted serious concerns from privacy groups, who say that it would further erode online privacy while doing little to enhance cyber security. In a statement, Caitlin Hayden, national security council spokeswoman, said: "We have not seen the document the Guardian has obtained, as they did not share it with us. However, as we have already publicly acknowledged, last year the president signed a classified presidential directive relating to cyber operations, updating a similar directive dating back to 2004. This step is part of the administration's focus on cybersecurity as a top priority. The cyber threat has evolved, and we have new experiences to take into account. "This directive establishes principles and processes for the use of cyber operations so that cyber tools are integrated with the full array of national security tools we have at our disposal. It provides a whole-of-government approach consistent with the values that we promote domestically and internationally as we have previously articulated in the International Strategy for Cyberspace. "This directive will establish principles and processes that can enable more effective planning, development, and use of our capabilities. It enables us to be flexible, while also exercising restraint in dealing with the threats we face. It continues to be our policy that we shall undertake the least action necessary to mitigate threats and that we will prioritize network defense and law enforcement as the preferred courses of action. The procedures outlined in this directive are consistent with the US Constitution, including the president's role as commander in chief, and other applicable law and policies", writes the Guardian Department of Monitoring Kavkaz Center