Friday 29th of November 2024
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irretrievably cynical and corrupt...

putin

 

The cables portray Mr. Putin as enjoying supremacy over all other Russian public figures, yet undermined by the very nature of the post-Soviet country he helped build.

Even a man with his formidable will and intellect is shown beholden to intractable larger forces, including an inefficient economy and an unmanageable bureaucracy that often ignores his edicts.

In language candid and bald, the cables reveal an assessment of Mr. Putin’s Russia as highly centralized, occasionally brutal and all but irretrievably cynical and corrupt. The Kremlin, by this description, lies at the center of a constellation of official and quasi-official rackets.

Throughout the internal correspondence between the American Embassy and Washington, the American diplomats in Moscow painted a Russia in which public stewardship was barely tended to and history was distorted. The Kremlin displays scant ability or inclination to reform what one cable characterized as a “modern brand of authoritarianism” accepted with resignation by the ruled.

Moreover, the cables reveal the limits of American influence within Russia and an evident dearth of diplomatic sources. The internal correspondence repeatedly reflected the analyses of an embassy whose staff was narrowly contained and had almost no access to Mr. Putin’s inner circle.

In reporting to Washington, diplomats often summarized impressions from meetings not with Russian officials, but with Western colleagues or business executives. The impressions of a largely well-known cadre of Russian journalists, opposition politicians and research institute regulars rounded out many cables, with insights resembling what was published in liberal Russian newspapers and on Web sites.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/02/world/europe/02wikileaks-russia.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print

bugging putin...

Outright distrustful relations between the Kremlin and the Soviet Union’s former vassals were also evident in the records. At an appearance in Washington in 2009, Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski of Poland said that American forces would be welcome in Poland “to protect against Russian aggression.”

The comment, unwelcomed by Russia and the United States alike, ignited a minor flare-up. In a cable after Mr. Sikorski’s appearance, the American Embassy said that Poland had established a Bureau of European Security, which “Polish diplomats jokingly refer to as the ‘Office of Threats from the East.’ ”

The back-channel quip eventually provided insight into the diplomatic climate in Moscow. A Polish official, formerly posted to Moscow, noted that Russia’s Foreign Ministry “threw this moniker back at him during a meeting.”

He told his American colleagues that the “only way” that Russia’s Foreign Ministry could have known of the nickname “was to have been listening in on his phone conversations with Warsaw” — a clear suggestion that his office in Russia had been bugged.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/02/world/europe/02wikileaks-russia.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print

And Gus would suggest that the Yanks may have helped the bugging...

Russia and Qatar have been

Russia and Qatar have been chosen to host the 2018 and 2022 World Cup finals respectively after a secret ballot of Fifa's 22 executive members in Zurich.

Russia was selected ahead of co-bidders Spain-Portugal and Holland-Belgium and England, which won only two votes.

Qatar defeated bids from South Korea, Japan, Australia and the United States.

"You have entrusted us with the Fifa World Cup for 2018 and I can promise you will never regret it," said Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov.

Russia received nine votes in the first round of voting and an outright majority of 13 in the second round, while Qatar obtained an outright majority of 14 in the fourth round of voting for 2022.

It is the first time that either Russia or Qatar has been chosen as host nation for the World Cup.

"Let us make history together," Shuvalov added.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/9250612.stm

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Obviously the US view that Russia is corrupt did have (not have) an effect on the FIFA judges... And of course Qatar has a HUGE population of about 1.4 million...

thanks for the futbol...

Russian PM Vladimir Putin has thanked Fifa "from the bottom of my heart" for choosing Russia to be the host of the 2018 World Cup.

Arriving in Zurich, Mr Putin said the competition would be held to the highest standards.

He said it had been a "difficult decision" not to come for the result earlier in the day.

He did so out of respect for Fifa members who, he said, had been under unacceptable and unjustified pressure.

A recent investigation by the BBC's Panorama programme, which was broadcast on Monday, accused three executive committee members of accepting payments and alleged Fifa vice-president Jack Warner attempted to supply ticket touts.

Russia was selected as 2018 host ahead of co-bidders Spain-Portugal, Holland-Belgium and England. Qatar won the 2022 bid.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-11902018

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polishing our brains with bullshit

The US and Nato have drawn up plans to defend the Baltic nations against Russia, latest US diplomatic cables disclosed by Wikileaks show.

The cables, published in the Guardian, reveal plans to expand existing plans to defend Poland to include Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Wikileaks is releasing hundreds of diplomatic cables, angering the US.

...


The latest leaked documents show that in January this year, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton apparently signed a confidential cable saying allies in Nato had agreed to expand the contingency plan to defend Poland, to include the Baltic states.

The nine Nato divisions involved would be American, British, German and Polish, the Guardian says, citing information leaked to Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

The cables say the military plans should not be discussed publicly as it might lead to an unnecessary increase in Nato-Russia tensions.

BBC World Affairs correspondent Peter Biles says the documents should be seen against the background of Washington's efforts to "reset" its relations with Russia and improve co-operation.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11933089

Putin must be smiling... The cat is out of the bag... I bet my bottom debt against two bars of chocolate that Putin knew that already... But the public at large, here and in the US, would be asleep or caught in the torpor of Ms Clinton rabbiting on voice — polishing our brains with bullshit... See toon at top...