Original published Aug 7, 2017

This affair is a huge scandal. It involves the current president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, and his son Michał. Donald Tusk presents himself as a politician who cares very much about the rule of law in Poland. When he was Poland’s prime minister, however, he ignored information given to him by the Chief of the Internal Security Agency and the President of the National Bank of Poland. They both warned him that his son was involved in a Ponzi scheme called Amber Gold.

The case is being investigated by the Polish government, which set up a special Inquiry Committee. Of course, Donald Tusk is denying all the accusations, but at the same time he is criticizing Warsaw for failing to enforce democracy and the rule of law. The question is whether Donald Tusk is not acting in self-defence and aiming at toppling the government, which set up the Inquiry Committee on the Amber Gold.

Poland’s former prime minister and currently the president of the European Council is still the spiritual leader of the political opposition in his own country and is doing his best to earn much respect in Brussels. People in Poland think he is Angela Merkel’s man, which is why he was promoted so high in the EU structures. The average Western European probably believes that Donald Tusk has been given this high-ranking post as a reward for his contribution to establishing the rule of law in Poland. The average Western European probably does not know that Donald Tusk’s Civic Platform party experienced a resounding defeat in the parliamentary election just a few months after his transfer to Brussels. The Polish people say that the promotion of the Polish prime minister may have been a helping hand extended to him by Angela Merkel, who thus paid him for his obedience and saved him from the verdict of the voters and, (who knows?) the verdict of the court of law (see below).

Currently, Donald Tusk seems to be taking steps against his own country in retaliation for the fact that the new government has set up a committee to investigate his and his son’s participation in the largest fraud of the recent years. Contrarily to his pledge of impartiality and neutrality towards all 28 member states,” Donald Tusk seizes every opportunity to attack and rebuke Poland. In 2016/2017, when for almost two months the Polish parliament was occupied by the opposition, Tusk threatened Poland with legal consequences for the 2017 budget that had been passed allegedly in violation of the regulations. Poland’s former prime minister put a pressure on the Polish authorities exactly at the time when the government’s opponents held protests in Warsaw, which means that Donald Tusk for all practical purposes was supporting an attempted coup d’etat and did his best to create bad press in the West for his own country. Continue reading →

Russia is the favourite scapegoat for the Western establishment when it comes to its own failures. Ever since Brexit and Trump’s victory, the Western elite has regularly tried to link citizen discontent to “Russian disinformation“, “hackers” or “trolls“, instead of looking at its own policies. While in the US this took the form of a witch hunt against the Trump administration, in the EU it has taken the form of a “proscription list” of the media that are not enthusiastic enough with the idea of a conflict with the Eastern neighbour. Under the official purpose of countering “disinformation coming from Russia”, the EU External Action has created a “disinformation review“with weekly updates on “fake news” and the websites that post them.

The EUAS officially branded researchers and journalists as fraudulent, unpatriotic and dishonest without any notification. There is a small disclaimer on the list that states that ”disinformation review cannot be considered an official EU position”. Yet it was created by the European Council, is part of the ”diplomatic service” of the EU, hence funded by it, uses its symbols and institutional addresses. So, it is part of the EU and yet does not represent its official position? The statement seems to have been made for the express purpose of dishonestly dismissing concerns raised by citizens. Continue reading →

For many the new President of the US is a controversial figure. His firm declarations related to focusing on American interest are a source of fear among superpower’s allies. At the same time his tenure isn’t free from actions based on ideas. The world is wondering: is Donald Trump a continuator of George W. Bush’s neoconservative diplomacy or rather an author of its own doctrine founded on the realist school of international relations. For all of us it would be better, if the second option were the actual one.

Both perspectives are considerably different. Though both stress the importance of national interest, the neocons are driven by a number of ideas. The opponents blame them for believing that the US should remain “a world sheriff”, who keeps a close eye on international order and reacts when anyone violates international norms. The neocons consider it necessary for America to show its power constantly so that others respect its dominance. They also are interested in intervening in faraway lands, even if its not in the administration’s vital interests. That’s the thing that makes them similar to the so-called liberal hawks. Continue reading →

The US announces a set of far-reaching sanctions against European companies that are doing business with Russia. These sanctions forced American jurisdiction on Europe, and is an attack on the sovereignty of European countries. These sanctions will have consequences for European companies, citizens and politics because European countries import 25% of their, 30% of their oil and 35% of their gas from Russia. The announced measures are the beginning of a trade war, Germany’s Minister for Economic Affairs Brigitte Zyries warned. In the Gefira (subscriber’s version) we already warned that a trade war is broadly supported by the US establishment.
On July 26, 2017, the House of Representatives accepted the bill that imposes new sanctions on Russia. Earlier, on June 15 that same year, Senate almost unanimously passed the new act, which forbids cooperation with Russia in the field of natural gas and crude oil extraction technologies and is thus aimed at not only Russian but also Western companies which cooperate with the former, and these include Gazprom, British-Dutch Royal Dutch Shell, German Uniper, Austrian OMV, French Engie (dawne GDF Suez), German Wintershall, all of which participate in the Nord Stream 2 project and again Gazprom, Wintershall, Engie as well as German E.ON and Dutch Gasunie, which are engaged in the earlier Nord Stream. The same measures will threaten the Zohr gas field project in Egypt (where Rosnieft has 30%, Italian ENI 60% , and British BP 10% shares), the development of the Sakhalin liquefied gas plant (Gazprom and Shell), the Blue Stream trans-Black Sea gas pipeline project from Russia to Turkey (ENI and Gazpromu) and the project of building the LNG terminal in the Gulf of Finland (Gazprom and Shell), as well as the project of importing to the European Union the Shah Deniz natural gas field in Azerbaijan (Lukoil and BP).The stakes are high. Continue reading →

The United States is signaling that it is going to limit its military presence in countries far away. Maybe Donald Trump listened to those realists who have suggested for a long time that America can uphold its superpower status only if it focuses on offshore balancing strategy. No matter what the intentions really are, the US government’s declarations result in redefining foreign policies of Asian states. The limitation of American presence changes the regional distribution of power, and forces other actors to assess their alliances and to search for new partners who might be an asset in case of conflict.

Changes in the balance of power in Asia
Until the US leaves Asia, the balance is preserved. The limitation of involvement suggested by Washington results in a search for new allies by all states in the region in order to level the capabilities. America’s withdrawal gives new opportunities to China, which can extend its sphere of influence and endanger Russia and India. However, the military threat won’t appear instantly. We’ll probably witness an increase in economic penetration. The economic imperialism resulting in power maximization may be the indicator of growing revisionism understood as a policy aimed at bringing down the actual status quo in Asia and establishing a new order. Continue reading →

There’s some sort of collective cognitive dissonance in Italy about the migrant crisis. Both politicians and mainstream media, right or left, “globalist” or “populist” put the blame on the other European countries and their alleged lack of solidarity for not wanting to redistribute the 180’000 migrants Italy took last year. It isn’t just the fault of the Visegrad Group. Since the European meeting in Tallin, the Italian government received the “Non” of French President, motivating his answer with the argument that 80% of the arrivals are economic migrants,the politically correct term for illegals that should be repatriated, the “No” of Spain, the “Nein” of Austria and so on.

The opinion of the European Commission is unchanged, Italy should speed up returns, with the supplemental aid from the EU itself.

So while solidarity isn’t really lacking, the media and politicians, regardless of their persuasion, began screaming “Europe has forsaken us”, “They left us alone”. As if Italy were facing a natural calamity and were not responsible for what is going on. Reality could not be more different.

The “populist” party Movimento 5 Stelle almost got it. They founda video where Emma Bonino, former Minister for Foreign Affaris, admitted that Italian governments had agreed that everyone rescued by Frontex should be brought to Italy. So the beans are spilt: all the migrants were being shipped to Italy because… the Italian government decided so. It may be that the then Prime Minister Matteo Renzi traded flexibility on the Italian budged with the European Commission in exchange for taking in all the migrants rescued in Italian and international waters by Frontex. Continue reading →