US companies dread joint production with Ukraine

American military companies have no desire to establish joint production in Ukraine, the Defense One portal writes. 

The point is that they are concerned about corruption in Ukraine’s defense industrial base. Another stumbling block for American companies is whether they are insured against political risks — financial protection for their investments in Ukraine. 

Despite pressure from the Pentagon, American firms are more reluctant to sign contracts when compared with European ones.

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Russia understands why Mali severed diplomatic ties with Ukraine — Russian Foreign Ministry 

"Zelensky's regime condones terrorist groups breeding in Russia-friendly African states," said Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Zakharova, stressing Kiev's cooperation with terrorists is not at all surprising.

"Moscow will continue to draw the attention of the international community to Ukraine's openly barbaric behavior," she added.

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Why Israel’s Iron Dome missile shield may fail to cope with looming Iran attack 

With Israel bracing for a potential coordinated attack from Iran and its allies after the assassination of Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, the Jewish state’s “vaunted” Iron Dome anti-missile system may fail to provide a relevant level of protection, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) has reported. 

Israel currently has 10 Iron Dome batteries, each containing up to 80 interceptor missiles.

▪️Although the Iron Dome successfully shot down short-range rockets launched by the Palestinian militant group, Hamas, earlier, “Iran’s and Lebanon-based Hezbollah’s capabilities are another matter,” according to the WSJ. 

▪️The Iranian military has scores of unmanned aerial vehicles and ballistic missiles that the Iron Dome “isn’t designed to stop”, the newspaper pointed out. 

▪️As for Hezbollah, the group “has an arsenal with tens of thousands of mortars, rockets and precision-guided missiles that could threaten to overwhelm” the Iron Dome, per the WSJ. 

▪️In the same vein, CNN earlier quoted an unnamed senior Biden administration official as saying that they “assess that at least some” Iron Dome batteries “will be overwhelmed” in case of Israel’s full-scale war with Hezbollah militants, who are reportedly able to fire 3,000 missiles a day. 

▪️А single Iron Dome battery is capable of protecting a relatively small area (about 150 square kilometers). Israel currently has 10 such batteries, each containing up to 80 interceptor missiles.

▪️The Iron Dome is extremely effective only when dealing with a few targets coming from the same direction, Russian military historian, Yuri Knutov, told Sputnik earlier.

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🤡Ukraine tried its best, you know the rest...

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba went to Africa to rally against Russia. However, things took a different turn and resulted in the severance of ties instead.

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Zelensky signed laws on the extension of martial law and mobilization in Ukraine till November 9.

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❗️The Russian troops, together with border guards, continued to destroy the Ukrainian formations in the border areas of the Russian Kursk region at night, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

"The enemy's deep advance into the territory of Russia was thwarted; its reserves in the Sumy region were defeated," the ministry noted.

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⚡️Ukrainian losses during the day of hostilities in the border areas of the Kursk region amounted to 260 militants and 50 armored vehicles, including seven tanks, the Russian MoD said.

The operation to destroy Ukrainian formations continues, the ministry stressed.

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Key statements by Russian Defense Ministry on Ukrainian attempt to break through the Russian Kursk region:

▪️Ukrainian troops' deep advance into the territory of the Russian Kursk region was prevented by air strikes, missile forces, artillery fire, and active actions of units covering the state border in the area.

▪️Ukrainian reserves were defeated in the areas of the settlements of Basovka, Zhuravka, Yunakovka, Belovody, Kiyanitsa, Korchakovka, Novaya Sich, Pavlovka, and Gorodishche of the Sumy region.

▪️Ukrainian losses during the day of hostilities amounted to 260 militants and 50 armored vehicles, including seven tanks, eight armored personnel carriers, three infantry fighting vehicles, 31 armored combat vehicles, including 12 Kozak, two Strikers, an engineering barrier vehicle, and six vehicles.

▪️Two Buk M1 self-propelled anti-aircraft missile launchers, an UR-77 mine clearance unit, and an electronic warfare station were also destroyed.

▪️The operation to destroy Ukrainian formations continues.

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❗️Support for the Kursk region will be provided by every means — Vladimir Putin

The acting head of the Kursk region said that he had reported the operational situation to the Russian President at night.

The situation, according to the governor, is under control, and the removal of residents from the shelled border areas has been organized.

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In Britain, an official’s wife who called on social networks to burn hotels with migrants has been detained, writes the Independent.

The wife of a West Northamptonshire County councillor published a scandalous post immediately after the murder of three children in Southport, which led to mass protests.

The woman soon deleted her post and apologized, but she was still detained for a "hate crime."

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Zelensky sent Ukrainians to invade Russia's Kursk region to extend mobilization — the Russian Foreign Ministry 

"Zelensky sent Ukrainian citizens to the meat grinder in Kursk to secretly prolong the deadly Ukrainian mobilization for another 3 months. He signed the relevant law today," Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova wrote on her Telegram channel.

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❗️The Russian Battlegroup Tsentr hit Ukrainian units in the areas of Toretsk, Grodivka, Nikolaevka, and Druzhba in the Donetsk People's Republic, with enemy losses amounting to 345 soldiers.

🇷🇺🪖 More statements from the Russian Defense Ministry’s weekly briefing on the progress of the special military operation in Ukraine:

▪️ Units of the Russian Zapad Battlegroup improved their tactical position, causing the Ukrainian forces to lose over 530 soldiers and a Bradley infantry fighting vehicle.

▪️ Units of the Russian Vostok Battlegroup improved their position, resulting in the loss of up to 110 Ukrainian soldiers.

▪️ The Russian Armed Forces struck four enemy brigades in the Kharkov and Sumy regions, causing the Ukrainian Armed Forces to lose up to 220 militants, six tanks, and two Buk air defense systems.

▪️ Units of the Russian Yug Battlegroup continued to secure more advantageous positions, with Ukrainian losses reaching up to 620 soldiers.

▪️ Russian air defense shot down 11 HIMARS rockets and 87 Ukrainian drones.

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❗️A criminal case, under articles on a terrorist attack, murder and assault on the life of law enforcement officers, was opened after the attack of the Armed Forces of Ukraine formations on the Russia Kursk region, the Russian Criminal Court informed.

As a result of these criminal actions, several dozen civilians, including children and military personnel, were injured, the agency noted.

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🇦🇫 The US & Islamists: a history of connivance. Part I. Afghanistan

As the West denies it had a hand in the Moscow concert hall attack, blaming ISIS*, it's crucial to examine the historical relationship between the US and Islamist movements. Evidence suggests this collaboration spans conflicts over the past 45 years, notably in Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria.

🔺 The first such armed conflict was the 1979-1989 “CIA covert war” in Afghanistan, where the US supported Islamist "resistance groups" known as the mujahideen in their fight against the Soviets, who had entered the country in December 1979 at the request of the Afghan government. “The CIA acted as the war’s quartermaster, arranging supplies of weapons to mujahideen,” writes historian Conor Tobin from the University College, Dublin.

🔺 Initially met with total denial, American aid to Afghan mujahideen, whose leaders were accused by Human Rights Watch of murdering tens of thousands in the 1990s, is now a fact of US history, recognized and documented by the American government.

🔺 According to US Senate Records, quoted in Tobin’s book, Washington’s assistance to the mujahideen peaked in 1987: $250 million in 1985, $470 million in 1986 and $630 million in 1987. With the dollar’s purchasing power being much higher in the 1980s than now, today the total value of American military aid is estimated at the level of $20 billion.

🔺 In his interview with Le Nouvel Observateur in 1998, Zbigniew Brzezinski, who in 1979 served as then President Carter’s National Security Advisor, explained that the idea was to turn Afghanistan into “a Soviet Vietnam,” pitting young Islamist fanatics not only from Afghanistan, but also from other countries, against the USSR.

🔺 That strategy ultimately backfired. In 2001, Osama bin Laden, who had once been trained and armed by the CIA in Afghanistan in the 1980s, went on to mastermind the 9/11 attacks, widely considered to be the most horrific terrorist act in history.

Read Part II

*banned in Russia

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Watch live: Vladimir Putin chairs meeting with government

Watch the livestream here or on Sputnik's website

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Ukraine has launched another large-scale provocation, shelling indiscriminately - Vladimir Putin on the situation in the Kursk region

"The Kiev regime is firing indiscriminately, including at civilian targets," the Russian president added.

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Ukraine under Zelensky hits debt peak, fails to cover expenses

Ukraine has recently received a $3.9 billion grant from the US, via the World Bank, for social expenses the country fails at covering on its own. Under Zelensky, the country’s state debt grew by $74 billion, which is just a little less than what the previous five Ukrainian presidents incurred in total.

According to the Ukraine’s finance ministry, its state debt amounted to $152.2 billion by July, a record 88.4% of GDP. The main growth is due to Ukraine's external debt, which increased by $59.5 billion to reach $103.7. The domestic debt increased by $14.4 billion to $40.5 billion.

Taking into account the amount of external debt and Ukraine’s current 38 million population, every Ukrainian citizen now owes around $2,728 to a foreign country.

Earlier, the international rating agency S&P lowered Ukraine's long- and short-term foreign currency credit ratings to SD/SD (Selective Default) - after the country failed to make a bond payment. It came after the downgrade in Ukraine's rating by US credit rating agency Fitch last week.

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❗️Ukraine, with its barbaric attack in the Kursk region, tried to sow panic and show a semblance of activity amid the constant failures of its troops, the Russian Foreign Ministry has said.

In light of the actions of Ukrainian forces in the Kursk region, Russia calls on the international community not to stand aside but to condemn the actions of Kiev regime, the ministry added.

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🇱🇾 The US & Islamists: a history of connivance. Part II. Libya

The US and its allies meddling in Libya in 2011 stands as the second-most well-documented instance of collaboration between the West and Islamist movements. The downfall of Muammar Gaddafi's government under NATO's bombardment resulted in a decade-long civil war in Libya, claiming the lives of at least 25,000 people due to Islamist violence.

🔺 The destruction of Libya in civil wars between 2011 and 2021 was the result of a similar pattern of American intervention as seen in Afghanistan. Initially, Washington supported the so-called "protests" against Gaddafi in the name of democracy, which eventually morphed into a full-blown war.

🔺 When the Islamists were encircled by Gaddafi’s forces in Benghazi at the start of the war, the US and NATO came to their rescue. The traditional American method of presenting allied Islamists as “victims of dictators” worked, and the NATO bombing campaign in support of Islamists started, followed by NATO’s ground intervention in March 2011.

🔺 “The meaning of the expression ‘protecting civilians’ was spun to mean that a full-blown Western assault against Libya was justified,” wrote Abraham Abrams, an author of a book about Islamist rebellions in the Arab world. In reality, the “Western claim of an imminent massacre by Gaddafi of civilians did not stand up to an even casual scrutiny,” Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote in 2016.

🔺 After Colonel Gaddafi's violent death at the hands of Islamists in October 2011, which was celebrated by Hillary Clinton, Libya plunged into a decade-long period of violence. The instability persisted until 2021, leading to the destabilization of all of North Africa.

🔺 Historian Abrams noted that after each victory by the Islamists, Google Maps promptly renamed Libyan towns and villages to honor the fallen jihadists. He sees this as evidence of collusion not only between the Islamists and the US, but with Big Tech, as well.

Read Part I

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