Friday, September 16, 2022
The ships are being sold.
August 24, 2022
The Axioma was impounded by the Gibraltar authorities in March after JPMorgan said its alleged owner Dmitry Pumpyansky had reneged on the terms of a $20 million loan.
The 72.5-meter vessel was auctioned by the Gibraltar Admiralty Court through a system of closed bids to be sent electronically by midday on Tuesday, a court spokesman said. The court added that 63 bids had been submitted for consideration, with the selection process expected to take 10 to 14 days.
There was an "unexpected late surge by prospective buyers" around the world for the vessel, Nigel Hollyer, broker to the Admiralty Marshal of the Supreme Court of Gibraltar who led the auction, told the Guardian newspaper last week....
The top manager at Russia's Corporation (click here) for the Development of the Far East and the Arctic (KRDV), Ivan Pechorin, has been found dead after media reports said last weekend that he fell out of a motorboat in the Sea of Japan close to the city of Vladivostok.
The KRDV said in a statement that Pechorin's body was found on September 12.
Pechorin's death is the latest in a string of mysterious deaths among Russian executives to occur shortly before or after Russia's ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
In early September, LUKoil, Russia's largest private oil company and one of the few corporate voices to oppose to the Kremlin's war in Ukraine, said its chairman, Ravil Maganov, had died in Moscow following a "serious illness," while local media reports said the 67-year-old tycoon had plunged to his death from a hospital window.
In May, Russian media reported that a former top manager of LUKoil, Aleksandr Subbotin, was found dead in the basement of a house in the town of Mytishchi near Moscow....
...A former top manager Aleksandr Subbotin was found dead in the basement of a residence in a Moscow suburb in May.
Russian news reports said the house belonged to a self-styled healer, Shaman Magua, who practised purification rites.
Magua testified that Subbotin came to his house under the influence of alcohol and drugs and demanded that the healer, whose real name is Aleksei Pindurin, performs a healing ritual for hangover symptoms....
...Only a month before the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, a top executive of the gas company Gazprom was found dead in his cottage near St Petersburg.
Leonid Shulman, 60, was found in the bathroom of the house with slashed wrists, local news reported, citing a source.
According to the police authorities, a suicide note was allegedly found next to his body, in which he recounted his suffering after a leg injury -- which Gazprom claimed caused him to take a leave of absence.
The version has been questioned after the Warsaw Institue think tank stated that Shulman, who was the head of the transport service at Gazprom Invest, was involved in a possible corruption case at the Russian gas giant.
The morning after Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February, Alexander Tyulyakov, 65, a senior executive of Gazproms's Corporate Security, died at his home in the same village as Shulman. According to the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta, his body was found hanged in the garage.
The same newspaper quoted an unnamed law enforcement source as saying that Gazprom's own security unit arrived at the scene of the suicide at the same time as the police and was also investigating the death.
One of two deaths that have taken place abroad is that of Mikhail Watford, who lived with his family in the UK. On 28 February, the Ukrainian-born 66-year-old oil and gas magnate, who also built a property empire in London, was found dead at his home in Surrey.
Watford's cause of death was determined as death by hanging, but his wife and children, who were at home at the time, were unharmed. UK authorities were treating Watford's death as unexplained but not suspicious....
...In March, the bodies of Russian billionaire Vasily Melnikov and his family were found in his luxury flat in Nizhny Novgorod, a city in western Russia.
Melnikov had made his fortune working for one of the medical companies affected by Western sanctions.
According to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, Melnikov, along with his 41-year-old wife and two young children, aged 10 and 4 respectively, died of stab wounds. The murder weapon was allegedly found at the scene of the crime.
The newspaper reported that the oligarch had killed his family before committing suicide, although neighbours and other relatives disagreed with the official version....
...The latest case has taken place in Spain, more specifically in Lloret de Mar, where Russian oligarch Sergei Protosenya, 55, was found dead along with two other family members on 19 April.
The former head of the gas giant Novatek, with a personal worth of €400 million, was found hanged, along with those of his wife and daughter, who were stabbed to death in the family villa.
What was initially classified by the police as a double homicide followed by Protosenya's suicide was later categorically denied by his son.
Several family friends have also come out in public to state that Protosenya is, in fact, the third victim of a "staged suicide" and that the oligarch would have been incapable of murdering his family....
...Just a day before the death of Protosenya and his family, the body of Russian oligarch Vladislav Avayev was found in his Moscow flat, along with the bodies of his wife and 13-year-old daughter. His daughter Anastasia, 26, was the one who discovered the crime scene.
Russian state-owned news agency TASS quoted a source close to law enforcement as saying that preliminary evidence pointed to Avayev -- former advisor to Putin and former vice-president of Gazprombank -- killing his wife and daughter and then committing suicide.
A pistol was found in the oligarch's hand, and the flat was locked from the inside....
...On 2 May, Andrei Krukovsky, the 37-year-old director of a Sochi ski resort owned by the gas giant, died after allegedly falling off a cliff while hiking near the Achipse fortress, the scenic area's landmark monument.
“The general manager of the Krasnaya Polyana resort, Andrei Alekseevich Krukovsky, tragically passed away. He loved the mountains and found peace there,” TASS news agency reported.
The Krasnaya Polyana is one of the most popular ski venues in Russia and was a part of the Olympic complex during the 2014 Sochi Winter Games.
And on 4 July, multi-millionaire businessman Yuri Voronov was found in the swimming pool at his home in the affluent Vyborgsky neighbourhood of St Petersburg with a gunshot wound to his head.
The police retrieved a handgun at the scene, while bullet casings were found at the bottom of the pool, local media reported....
...In October 2021, a Russian diplomat was found dead after he fell from a window of the Russian embassy in Berlin, Der Spiegel reported.
The unidentified man was a second secretary at the embassy, but German intelligence sources told the newspaper they suspected he was an undercover officer with Russia's FSB.
Investigative outlet Bellingcat said it used open-source data to identify the man as Kirill Zhalo, the son of General Alexey Zhalo, deputy director of the FSB's Second Service, responsible for dealing with internal political threats for the Kremlin.
In December of the same year, the founder of nationalist blog Sputnik and Pogrom Yegor Prosvirnin died after falling out of a window of a Moscow apartment building.
Prosvirnin's naked body was found next to a knife and a gas canister after shouts and yelling were heard from his apartment, local media reported....
...And on 14 August, Dan Rapoport, Latvian-American investment banker and outspoken Putin critic who had just left Ukraine after the Russian invasion, was found dead in front of a luxury apartment building in Washington DC.
Police say they were not treating Rapoport's death as suspicious, the Washington-based Politico reported, but the case remains under investigation.
Rapoport became rich while in Moscow before falling out of favour with the Kremlin, mostly due to his support for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, according to reports.
In 2017, Rapoport's then-business partner, Sergei Tkachenko, also fell to his death from his Moscow apartment's window....
Madrid - $75-million superyacht (click here) linked to a sanctioned Russian steel billionaire was auctioned on Tuesday in Gibraltar, court sources said, in what is understood to be the first sale of its kind since Russia invaded Ukraine in February.
The Axioma was impounded by the Gibraltar authorities in March after JPMorgan said its alleged owner Dmitry Pumpyansky had reneged on the terms of a $20 million loan.
There was an "unexpected late surge by prospective buyers" around the world for the vessel, Nigel Hollyer, broker to the Admiralty Marshal of the Supreme Court of Gibraltar who led the auction, told the Guardian newspaper last week....
Unrelated? LUKoil is having a very turbulent year for executives. There is something to be said for capitalism under the governance of democracy.
September 14, 2022
The top manager at Russia's Corporation (click here) for the Development of the Far East and the Arctic (KRDV), Ivan Pechorin, has been found dead after media reports said last weekend that he fell out of a motorboat in the Sea of Japan close to the city of Vladivostok.
The KRDV said in a statement that Pechorin's body was found on September 12.
Pechorin's death is the latest in a string of mysterious deaths among Russian executives to occur shortly before or after Russia's ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
In early September, LUKoil, Russia's largest private oil company and one of the few corporate voices to oppose to the Kremlin's war in Ukraine, said its chairman, Ravil Maganov, had died in Moscow following a "serious illness," while local media reports said the 67-year-old tycoon had plunged to his death from a hospital window.
In May, Russian media reported that a former top manager of LUKoil, Aleksandr Subbotin, was found dead in the basement of a house in the town of Mytishchi near Moscow....
I doubt a person would fall from a hospital window. Jumped or pushed or encouraged to jump might be closer to the truth. Normally, jumping from hospital buildings occurs when it is on fire. Why was he in the hospital? He thought he was safe? Oh, under the influence of alcohol and drugs. Well. That explains everything, doesn't it? Oh, more like heart failure. Right. Suicide with a knife? Really? Oh, "staged suicide." That is more believable. All these folks are Russian speaking people, right? A little gun violence seems to be at work as well. Falling off a mountain side? Falling off the side of a mountain is not suicide, okay? It just isn't. Who would go through all that trouble to die? First climb the mountain and then walk to a cliff and fall off. That seems like wrong. Okay? This guy loved nature and he went into nature to commit suicide. I would expect the opposite. I would expect he would find peace in the mountains and return home refreshed to face the day no matter what Putin had in mind for his life. Okay? I don't believe ANY of these deaths were suicide. Falling out an open window doesn't happen either. No one goes into a high rise building to enjoy the view so much they simply fall out of the window. I don't buy that one either.
And of all these murders. Dan Rapoport's murder is not being investigated. He just showed up dead in front of a ritzy hotel. That happens everyday, right? It is just one of those, oops, there goes another Russian billionaire kind of death. Well, I don't buy it! He knew and wanted Alexei Navalny to lead Russia. THAT IS A CLUE!
...The news of Pechorin's death (click here) came less than two weeks after the chairman of the board of Russia's largest private oil company, Ravil Maganov, died in what Russian news agencies cited as an accidental fall from a hospital window.
Initially, a statement by his company Lukoil said Maganov “passed away after a severe illness” on 1 September but did not give further details....
14 September 2022
By Aleksandar Brezar and David Mac Dougall
Initially, a statement by his company Lukoil said Maganov “passed away after a severe illness” on 1 September but did not give further details....
...Maganov appeared to have fallen from a sixth-story window, the reports said. Some sources claimed he tripped and fell while smoking, stating a pack of cigarettes was found by the window. The news site RBK also said police were investigating the possibility of suicide....
Russian news reports said the house belonged to a self-styled healer, Shaman Magua, who practised purification rites.
Magua testified that Subbotin came to his house under the influence of alcohol and drugs and demanded that the healer, whose real name is Aleksei Pindurin, performs a healing ritual for hangover symptoms....
Leonid Shulman, 60, was found in the bathroom of the house with slashed wrists, local news reported, citing a source.
According to the police authorities, a suicide note was allegedly found next to his body, in which he recounted his suffering after a leg injury -- which Gazprom claimed caused him to take a leave of absence.
The version has been questioned after the Warsaw Institue think tank stated that Shulman, who was the head of the transport service at Gazprom Invest, was involved in a possible corruption case at the Russian gas giant.
The morning after Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February, Alexander Tyulyakov, 65, a senior executive of Gazproms's Corporate Security, died at his home in the same village as Shulman. According to the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta, his body was found hanged in the garage.
The same newspaper quoted an unnamed law enforcement source as saying that Gazprom's own security unit arrived at the scene of the suicide at the same time as the police and was also investigating the death.
One of two deaths that have taken place abroad is that of Mikhail Watford, who lived with his family in the UK. On 28 February, the Ukrainian-born 66-year-old oil and gas magnate, who also built a property empire in London, was found dead at his home in Surrey.
Watford's cause of death was determined as death by hanging, but his wife and children, who were at home at the time, were unharmed. UK authorities were treating Watford's death as unexplained but not suspicious....
Melnikov had made his fortune working for one of the medical companies affected by Western sanctions.
According to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, Melnikov, along with his 41-year-old wife and two young children, aged 10 and 4 respectively, died of stab wounds. The murder weapon was allegedly found at the scene of the crime.
The newspaper reported that the oligarch had killed his family before committing suicide, although neighbours and other relatives disagreed with the official version....
The former head of the gas giant Novatek, with a personal worth of €400 million, was found hanged, along with those of his wife and daughter, who were stabbed to death in the family villa.
What was initially classified by the police as a double homicide followed by Protosenya's suicide was later categorically denied by his son.
Several family friends have also come out in public to state that Protosenya is, in fact, the third victim of a "staged suicide" and that the oligarch would have been incapable of murdering his family....
Russian state-owned news agency TASS quoted a source close to law enforcement as saying that preliminary evidence pointed to Avayev -- former advisor to Putin and former vice-president of Gazprombank -- killing his wife and daughter and then committing suicide.
A pistol was found in the oligarch's hand, and the flat was locked from the inside....
...On 2 May, Andrei Krukovsky, the 37-year-old director of a Sochi ski resort owned by the gas giant, died after allegedly falling off a cliff while hiking near the Achipse fortress, the scenic area's landmark monument.
“The general manager of the Krasnaya Polyana resort, Andrei Alekseevich Krukovsky, tragically passed away. He loved the mountains and found peace there,” TASS news agency reported.
The Krasnaya Polyana is one of the most popular ski venues in Russia and was a part of the Olympic complex during the 2014 Sochi Winter Games.
And on 4 July, multi-millionaire businessman Yuri Voronov was found in the swimming pool at his home in the affluent Vyborgsky neighbourhood of St Petersburg with a gunshot wound to his head.
The police retrieved a handgun at the scene, while bullet casings were found at the bottom of the pool, local media reported....
The unidentified man was a second secretary at the embassy, but German intelligence sources told the newspaper they suspected he was an undercover officer with Russia's FSB.
Investigative outlet Bellingcat said it used open-source data to identify the man as Kirill Zhalo, the son of General Alexey Zhalo, deputy director of the FSB's Second Service, responsible for dealing with internal political threats for the Kremlin.
In December of the same year, the founder of nationalist blog Sputnik and Pogrom Yegor Prosvirnin died after falling out of a window of a Moscow apartment building.
Prosvirnin's naked body was found next to a knife and a gas canister after shouts and yelling were heard from his apartment, local media reported....
Police say they were not treating Rapoport's death as suspicious, the Washington-based Politico reported, but the case remains under investigation.
Rapoport became rich while in Moscow before falling out of favour with the Kremlin, mostly due to his support for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, according to reports.
In 2017, Rapoport's then-business partner, Sergei Tkachenko, also fell to his death from his Moscow apartment's window....
Vladimir Putin is afraid of his critics. All these deaths were of people with a voice in business and government. If enough of his critics were able to raise enough awareness to Putin's war deeds there might be an overthrow of the Putin regime in Moscow. Putin silences his critics. That is what he does. There are poisonings in Europe to confirm that.
None of these people died because they were distressed. They were all murdered. There needs to be open ended UNSOLVED murders of these cases, especially in Washington, DC. How it is an influential citizen of Russia simply shows up dead in front of a hotel in Washington, DC? I guess Putin wanted to make it plain no one can hide from his power. I would think in Washington, DC with mysterious deaths of Russian speaking people turning up everywhere, there would be at least a warning about the potential and an offer to provide some sort of protection.
These people hang in the balance of peace. They are vulnerable and while loyal to Russia, it is not plain to anyone they are loyal to Putin. One of the peace initiatives of USA policy is the encouragement of human rights and women's rights and girl's rights and prosperity for businesses that operate under the flag of global peace. These people should be at least on a list of vulnerable Russian speaking people by the FBI and/or CIA. They aren't operating as spies to injure the Free World, quite the contrary, they want enough global peace to make money. They should at least have the opportunity to know that the Free World knows their life is in danger.
All these very suspicious deaths need to be listed in the Free World as open ended unsolved murders. Please, let's find these Russian speaking people some dignity out of the wrath of Putin.
There is plenty evidence of Russia's status as guilty of state sponsored terrorism, but, now is not the time.
Russia (click here) is now six months into its long-feared full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began on 24 February when Vladimir Putin announced his “special military operation” in a televised address to his citizens.
Ukraine’s cities have been under attack ever since, with the locals putting up a courageous resistance at street level to ensure the conquest is far from the formality Mr Putin and the Russian military appear to have assumed it would be.
As the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, leads by example from the streets of the capital Kyiv, tirelessly rallying the international community for support, his troops are holding back Russia’s armed forces as best they can....
Izium, Ukraine - The hundreds of graves (click here) had been cut into the sandy soil of a pine forest, isolated and unexamined for months. A chilly wind blew through the tree branches. Police officers spoke in hushed tones. And newly dug up bodies lay all about on the forest floor.
Ukrainian investigators on Friday began exhuming hundreds of bodies found after Russian forces fled the city of Izium in disarray last weekend. It was the first step in what officials said would be a painstaking process of figuring out how people had died during a three-week siege of their city and the six months of Russian occupation that followed.
The site consisted of around 445 individual graves and one mass grave where soldiers appeared to have been buried. Some had died when a Russian airstrike leveled an apartment building in March, residents said. “Here are my neighbors and friends,” said Serhiy Shtanko, 33.
Among the bodies already exhumed were a family — a mother, father, daughter and two grandparents — killed in Russian bombardments in the spring, Ukrainian officials said....
...He refused and was released, he said. But only a short time later, the Russians were at his door again. This time, they took him along with his wife and 15-year-old son to the basement.
“They tied our hands and put bags on our heads,” said Andriy, who, along with another resident interviewed by The New York Times, asked that only his first name be used for fear of reprisals. “For two days, they didn’t allow us to go anywhere, not even to the toilet, and gave us no food. They tortured me again, but I didn’t confess. After a week they saw it was useless and let us go.”
Andriy’s account, which could not immediately be verified, fits with a pattern of Russian abuses described by residents of the city who remained during the months of Russian occupation. It is also supported by the well-documented behavior of Russian forces during their brief occupation of areas outside Kyiv and other northern cities and testimony by witnesses who have fled still-occupied parts of Ukraine....
I agree with the US Senate bill to name Russia a country that sponsors terrorism, but, the current price to pay for that designation is high and the world's global food supply would be at risk in making that designation. There is no guarantee that Russia will back down from committing these crimes, but, they are all well documented. It would be wrong to inflict further pain and strife on the world due to Russia's unexpected war into Ukraine.
If Russia backs away from the grain deal there is plenty of reason to apply the terrorist label to Russia.
The USA Senate bill is correct, but lacks balance in recognition of the current state of hunger caused by Russia.
August 18, 2022
By Alexander Ward
Currently, President Maduro is romancing OPEC to bring income to Venezuela.
Kuwait, June 14 (QNA) - HH Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Hamad Al-Sabah (click here) held an official talks session on Tuesday with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro Moros, who is currently visiting Kuwait.
During the session, bilateral relations were discussed, as well as ways to enhance and develop them in various fields, in addition to a number of issues of common concern.
September 15, 2022
By Timothy Gardner
The United States (click here) continues to recognize the authority of the democratically elected 2015 National Assembly as the last remaining democratic institution and Juan Guaidó as Venezuela’s interim president. We welcome the agreement reached to extend the authority of the National Assembly elected in 2015 and of interim President Guaidó as its president.
The United States supports the Venezuelan people in their desire for a peaceful restoration of democracy through free and fair elections. The Maduro regime’s pattern of political repression, rampant human rights abuses, as well as severe restrictions on political and civil society actors and freedom of expression have robbed the Venezuelan people of democratic self-determination. We support the efforts of the Unitary Platform and other actors to establish democratic order and rule of law in Venezuela....
...The exodus of Venezuelans (click here) fleeing repression and shortages of food, medicine, and medical supplies represents the largest migration crisis in recent Latin American history. Difficulty accessing legal status in other countries and economic hardship as a result of measures to curb the spread of Covid-19 have led approximately 130,000 to return since March 2020. Returnees are subject to abuse upon arrival.
Persistent concerns include brutal policing practices, poor prison conditions, impunity for human rights violations, lack of judicial independence, and harassment of human rights defenders and independent media....
Don't make the mistake that this interest in OPEC is about the Venezuelan people, it is not. This is about power and Russia and Venezuela's potential strike against the USA. While some of any oil and gas proceeds will find it's way to the people, the intention of the Maduro regime is seeking power in the Western Hemisphere.
By Timothy Gardner
Washington - A U.S. State Department official (click here) put pressure on Venezuela leader Nicolas Maduro in a congressional hearing on Thursday, threatening more sanctions if talks with the opposition on resolving the country's long-running political and economic crisis are not renewed.
The talks between Maduro and opposition leader Juan Guaido were last held in Mexico City last year, but yielded little.
The Biden administration recognizes Guaido as Venezuela's legitimate president, having rejected Maduro's 2018 re-election as a sham. Maduro, a socialist, remains in power in the OPEC nation despite tough U.S. sanctions on it oil industry....
The talks between Maduro and opposition leader Juan Guaido were last held in Mexico City last year, but yielded little.
The Biden administration recognizes Guaido as Venezuela's legitimate president, having rejected Maduro's 2018 re-election as a sham. Maduro, a socialist, remains in power in the OPEC nation despite tough U.S. sanctions on it oil industry....
February 4, 2019
By Max Fisher
Venezuela’s crisis (click here) has raised questions that could determine the country’s future — and that a far-off news reader could be forgiven for finding confusing.
Juan Guaidó, the opposition leader, has declared that President Nicolás Maduro is illegitimate and has asserted himself as Venezuela’s interim president.
So who is the legitimate leader, how can we tell and who gets to decide?
The United States and several countries in Latin America and Europe have recognized Mr. Guaidó as the rightful leader, and he has called on the military to withdraw its support for Mr. Maduro.
But would elevating Mr. Guaidó constitute a democratic transition or a coup?
The answers to these questions, though urgently important, are not at all straightforward. Here is some help in trying to think them through....
Juan Guaidó, the opposition leader, has declared that President Nicolás Maduro is illegitimate and has asserted himself as Venezuela’s interim president.
So who is the legitimate leader, how can we tell and who gets to decide?
The United States and several countries in Latin America and Europe have recognized Mr. Guaidó as the rightful leader, and he has called on the military to withdraw its support for Mr. Maduro.
But would elevating Mr. Guaidó constitute a democratic transition or a coup?
The answers to these questions, though urgently important, are not at all straightforward. Here is some help in trying to think them through....
January 4, 2022
The United States (click here) continues to recognize the authority of the democratically elected 2015 National Assembly as the last remaining democratic institution and Juan Guaidó as Venezuela’s interim president. We welcome the agreement reached to extend the authority of the National Assembly elected in 2015 and of interim President Guaidó as its president.
The United States supports the Venezuelan people in their desire for a peaceful restoration of democracy through free and fair elections. The Maduro regime’s pattern of political repression, rampant human rights abuses, as well as severe restrictions on political and civil society actors and freedom of expression have robbed the Venezuelan people of democratic self-determination. We support the efforts of the Unitary Platform and other actors to establish democratic order and rule of law in Venezuela....
The military coup by Maduro is lasting years. It never allowed a change in leadership to Juan Guaido. The most recent elections saw the defeat of the oppositional party in most of the elections held. That is not a free and fair election as the oppositional party has either fled the country or is jailed.
Persistent concerns include brutal policing practices, poor prison conditions, impunity for human rights violations, lack of judicial independence, and harassment of human rights defenders and independent media....
...Intelligence and security forces have detained and tortured military personnel accused of plotting against the government. Authorities have tortured various detainees for information about alleged conspiracies. To determine the whereabouts of some suspects, authorities have detained and tortured family members.
During several crackdowns since 2014, Venezuelan security forces and colectivos have attacked demonstrations. Security forces have shot demonstrators at point-blank range with riot-control munitions, brutally beaten people who offered no resistance, and staged violent raids on apartment buildings.
Of more than 15,500 people arrested since 2014 in connection with protests—including demonstrators, bystanders, and people taken from their homes without warrants—some 9,255 had been conditionally released as of September 2020 but remained subject to prosecution. A total of 870 had been prosecuted by military courts....
During several crackdowns since 2014, Venezuelan security forces and colectivos have attacked demonstrations. Security forces have shot demonstrators at point-blank range with riot-control munitions, brutally beaten people who offered no resistance, and staged violent raids on apartment buildings.
Of more than 15,500 people arrested since 2014 in connection with protests—including demonstrators, bystanders, and people taken from their homes without warrants—some 9,255 had been conditionally released as of September 2020 but remained subject to prosecution. A total of 870 had been prosecuted by military courts....
There is simply no way possible to recognize the Maduro regime as the legitimate president of Venezuela. A continued military coup is the only legitimate statement anyone can make about Maduro's leadership.
Venezuela’s political opposition (click here) must rebuild and reflect on its strategy after suffering a heavy defeat in weekend elections, leader Juan Guaido has said, calling for unity among the fragmented movement’s leadership.
The opposition broke a nearly four-year election boycott to take part in mayoral and gubernatorial votes on Sunday, but paid for its failure to put up single candidates against President Nicolas Maduro’s ruling United Socialist Party (PSUV).
Opposition candidates won in only three out of 23 states, while Maduro’s allies won 18 governorships, according to updated election results published by the National Electoral Council (CNE) on Monday.
Maduro’s ruling party and its allies were well-positioned to claim the final two states, while a PSUV candidate also took the mayor’s office in the capital of Caracas. The President on Sunday welcomed the results of the vote as an “impressive” victory that “must be celebrated”....
November 22, 2021
Venezuela’s political opposition (click here) must rebuild and reflect on its strategy after suffering a heavy defeat in weekend elections, leader Juan Guaido has said, calling for unity among the fragmented movement’s leadership.
The opposition broke a nearly four-year election boycott to take part in mayoral and gubernatorial votes on Sunday, but paid for its failure to put up single candidates against President Nicolas Maduro’s ruling United Socialist Party (PSUV).
Opposition candidates won in only three out of 23 states, while Maduro’s allies won 18 governorships, according to updated election results published by the National Electoral Council (CNE) on Monday.
Maduro’s ruling party and its allies were well-positioned to claim the final two states, while a PSUV candidate also took the mayor’s office in the capital of Caracas. The President on Sunday welcomed the results of the vote as an “impressive” victory that “must be celebrated”....
I think this was a brilliant idea by Governor Baker.
It isn't as though DeSantis called and said, "Hey, Chuck, I need you to take a some immigrants off my hands."
The children will need to begin school to keep up with their classmates. All will have to receive physical exams and COVID vaccines.
September 16, 2022
Baker praised residents and officials on Martha’s Vineyard for taking care of the nearly 50 migrants after their unexpected arrival on Wednesday but said the island lacks the resources to house the migrants for the long-term.
At Joint Base Cape Cod, the migrants will be given dormitory-style housing, food and services, Baker said. Families will be given separate housing....
It is almost guaranteed the immigrants will be filing for asylum.
People continue to leave Venezuela (click here) to escape violence, insecurity and threats as well as lack of food, medicine and essential services. With over 6 million Venezuelan refugees and migrants worldwide, the vast majority in countries within Latin America and the Caribbean, this has become the second-largest external displacement crisis in the world.
Children, women and men continue to leave Venezuela for neighbouring countries and beyond due to the ongoing political, human rights and socio-economic developments in their country. Many arrive scared, tired and in dire need of assistance....
Under the guise of containing the spread of COVID-19, (click here) the policy known as Title 42 has resulted in the summary expulsion of thousands of asylum seekers and has become a centerpiece of U.S. border policy since 2020. The policy is a failure from every angle. Denounced by public health experts, immigration, and human rights advocates alike, it continues to inflict immeasurable harm on vulnerable people seeking safety. By foreclosing legal pathways to people seeking asylum, it has produced record levels of “recidivism” – repeat, irregular crossings – among migrants who have no option but to attempt entry without inspection. Though the Biden administration finally acknowledged the need to end Title 42, they dragged their feet for too long, and have not fought hard enough to stop the deadly expulsion from continuing, relying on specious public health justification when convenient and on baseless border control rationale when politically helpful. Both excuses have been debunked. Now, we must contend with the resulting humanitarian disaster, and the Biden administration must do more to defend and implement its decision to finally end Title 42....
The Title does allow for refusing people for asylum in the case of a health emergency, HOWEVER, the people are not to be sent back to the place that caused them to flee in the first place.
In other words, the Texas and Florida Governors don't know what to do and do not want to shoulder the cost themselves so they are sending the immigrants around to other states. The Venezuelans coming to the USA are in fear for their lives. Sending them directly back to Venezuela to prohibited by Title 42. It would be sending them back to face the same danger they left.
Title 42 recognizes asylum as a legitimate form of immigration, however, in the case of a health emergency the people can be refused asylum, but, another country that harbors no danger to the immigrants must be contacted and travel arranged. Title 42 does protect human life.
Nowhere does Title 42 recognize the right by any state to shuttle people around by any means of transportation to other states. Title 42 is about a health emergency. Title 42 assumes the health emergency exists in all 50 states and USA territories, so to simply shuttle the immigrants around is actually increasing the health emergency. An example would be a person infected with COVID-19 that arrived at the southern border to the USA. That person would then bring the virus to the transportation vehicle and to the place where disembarkation took place as well as all those along the way. In sequestering the immigrants to the point where they entered the USA is to contain the virus. Containing the virus is good public policy.
The states receiving the immigrants for political purposes (click here) can sue Florida and/or Texas for endangering the public and not finding suitable countries to place them. Florida and Texas are in violation of Title 42 and the USA Attorney for these states need to examine whether or not the Governors can be prosecuted for their violations.
Washington - U.S. Senator Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), (click here) Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today delivered the following opening remarks at this morning’s full Committee hearing entitled “Assessing U.S. Policy Towards Venezuela.” Testifying before the Committee were Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Assistant Administrator for the Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean Marcela Escobari.
“Venezuela is the epicenter of the second largest refugee and migration crisis in the world. The Maduro regime has overseen the collapse of the economy—taking down with it the country’s entire education and healthcare systems,” Chairman Menendez said, underscoring the regime’s crimes against humanity and invitation to Russian, Cuban, Iranian, and Chinese governments into the country. “So as we review United States policy towards Venezuela, we must reckon with how—in the span of a generation—a trusted democratic partner has become a mafia state. A criminal enterprise that uses brute force to cling to power.”
Continued Menendez: “Now, I want to be clear that this Committee believes in diplomacy. And Congress has long supported – and continues to support – a negotiated solution to Venezuela’s crisis. But a one-sided deal with a regime that kidnaps American citizens to increase its leverage is simply unacceptable. Unilateral concessions to a leader that tortures his political opponents is unacceptable. It’s not the path towards a successful negotiation. And it’s something the Biden administration—as well as newly elected leaders across Latin America—should keep in mind. Because given Maduro’s track record – given that he makes Al Capone look tame – there can be no return to normalcy with his regime.”...
Americans need to remember Venezuela's administration under Nicolas Maduro is a Russian sanctioned regime. Venezuela is hostile to the Western Hemisphere and is a national security threat to the USA in a near border war potential.
What could Maduro ever expect from an American that has done nothing but good works for humanity and feel in love with a woman he met? He has committed no crimes yet Maduro holds him as a political hostage in Venezuela.
September 16, 2022
By Michael Wilner and Antonio Maria Delgado
...Her son, Osman Khan, a 24 year-old U.S. citizen, (click here) had been working remotely for months from the small city of Bucaramanga in Colombia, living with a college friend after graduating from the University of Central Florida. Around Christmas, Khan told his sister that he had started dating a girl there, and that the relationship was getting serious. But he did not mention that he planned on crossing the Colombian border to visit her family in Venezuela.
On the night of Jan. 17, Valdes says the anonymous group sent her a video showing Khan apprehended in a nondescript office. They sent her voice messages of Khan pleading for help.
The group initially asked Valdes for $1,200 to secure Khan’s freedom. On the advice of friends and family, she negotiated them down to $600, to send his captors a message that they could not ask for more. She transferred the funds. They asked for more anyway. Huddling with family in her Winter Garden home, Valdes decided to act. “One of the phone numbers that called me had a picture on the profile,” Valdes told McClatchy, sharing Khan’s story publicly for the first time. “My family and I began investigating on our own. We started going through social media in Venezuela, looking through pictures, searching for names.”...
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