Has Trump's Bizarre Win, Enabled An Even More Aggressive Putin?

In the last couple of weeks, Putin allies have come to power-- with his help-- in Moldava, Bulgaria and the United States. (Yes, Obama completely failed to protect America from that menace... and now I'm worried that the brutal Russian dictator will turn Ed Snowden over to Trumpanzee the first time el Presidente Pepe The Frog needs a rabbit to pull out of a hat.) This morning the Financial Times reported about Putin's ties to the neo-Nazi far right in an increasingly fascist Hungary (whose leader, Viktor Orban, and Trump have already forged a bond). Last week, The Guardian reported that some Russian agents were expelled from Serbia-- Russia's traditional ally-- for trying to implement a coup in neighboring Montenegro-- a coup that would have cost the lives of Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Ðjukanović and Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić.

The plotters were allegedly going to dress in police uniforms to storm the Montenegrin parliament in Podgorica, shoot the prime minister, Milo Ðjukanović, and install a pro-Moscow party.

The Russian fingerprints on the October plot have heightened intrigue about Moscow’s ambitions in a part of Europe hitherto thought to be gravitating towards the EU’s orbit.

A group of 20 Serbians and Montenegrins, some of whom had fought with Moscow-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, were arrested in Podgorica, the Montenegrin capital. In Serbia, meanwhile, several Russian nationals suspected of coordinating the plot were caught with €120,000 and special forces uniforms.

According to the Belgrade daily, Danas, the Russians also had encryption equipment and were able to keep track of Đjukanović’s whereabouts.

Diplomatic sources told the Guardian the Belgrade government quietly deported the Russians after the intervention of the head of the Russian security council, Nikolai Patrushev, who flew to Belgrade on 26 October in an apparent effort to contain the scandal. The country’s interior minister, Nebojša Stefanović denied the government carried out any deportations connected to the plot.

A source close to the Belgrade government said Patrushev, a former FSB (federal security service) chief, apologised for what he characterised as a rogue operation that did not have the Kremlin’s sanction. In Moscow, a Security Council official told Tass that Patrushev “didn’t apologise to anyone, because there is nothing to apologise for.”

The Serbian government was further rattled three days after Patrushev’s visit when a cache of arms was found near the home of the prime minister, Aleksandar Vučić. The weapons were discovered at a junction where Vučić’s car would normally slow down on his way to the house.

Stefanović said there were “strong suspicions” that an organised crime gang had been hired to kill Vučić for €10m, but he would not specify who was behind the alleged plot, saying further investigation would show whether people “outside the region” were involved.

...Đjukanović has been instrumental in pulling his country to the verge of Nato membership-- an accession protocol was signed in May-- which has dashed Russian hopes of securing a naval foothold on the Adriatic. According to the Montenegrin press, Moscow lobbied hard in recent years for transit and maintenance facilities at the ports of Bar and Kotor.

The importance of such facilities was demonstrated late last month when the Russian carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov and its battle group was denied refuelling in European ports along their way to support the Russian military effort in Syria.

In Serbia, Vučić has been seeking a delicate balance between Nato and Russia, and the country’s armed forces have conducted military exercises with both, although far more frequently in recent years with Nato. Vučić has also refused to grant diplomatic status to Russian officials staffing a Serbian-Russian humanitarian centre established in the city of Niš in 2012, infuriating Moscow.

...Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for the Russian foreign ministry wrote on Facebook: “The publication in the Guardian with a link to ‘sources’ saying that Patrushev apologised for ‘Russian nationalists’ who had planned to kill the prime minister of Montenegro is a classic provocation aimed at spreading knowingly false information.

“I declare you “liars of the day”. You can sew your own hat.”

In an OpEd for Al Arabiya, Hisham Melhem asked the question about what a Trump presidency will mean for th Middle East, fretting that "given the paucity of President-elect Donald Trump’s clear views on the Middle East’s myriad crises and challenges, after a long campaign of contradictory positions and since he has not fully staffed his National Security team, it is difficult to analyze with great certainty how the 45th American president will deal with a rapidly changing region that has been accustomed to strong American leadership. The president-elect will soon realize that his outlandish claims and demands during the campaign, such as taking over the oil resources of countries where the US is engaged militarily or extracting protection money from other allies, are not feasible or realistic... Trump’s views on Middle Eastern crises and problems are vague," he continued, "incomplete or simplistic declarative sentences such as 'we will bomb the hell out of them.' However, he has stuck to few positions during the campaign and based on what he said and did not say, one can make some preliminary, tentative observations. Somewhat surprisingly, some of his views are in sync with the Obama administration. Mr. Trump, like President Obama, does not see the removal of the Assad regime as America’s first priority in Syria, but rather to continue the fight against ISIS until it ceases to be a 'governing' authority. One of the few consistent views of Mr. Trump during the campaign was his lavish praise of the leadership of Russian President Vladimir Putin, including in Syria, where he would like to collaborate with Russia to 'knock out ISIS together.'"

Melhem warms that Trump is ill-informed and his claims about "Russia, the Assad regime and Iran are carrying out joint military operations against ISIS" are just plain erroneous-- and Russian propaganda that no one but Trump and other Putin puppets seem to believe.

President-elect Trump shares President Obama’s refusal to get involved more deeply and militarily in the Middle East. President Obama is tired of the Middle East and has been critical of the Egyptian government’s violations of human rights and issues across the region. President Trump, on the other hand, wants to restore relations with Egypt including restoration of economic support. The initial studied welcome of Arab, Turkish and Israeli officials of the election of Mr. Trump is also due to the fact that Trump rarely spoke about the need to foster and support human rights and human dignity in the world, including the countries of the Middle East. The election of Mr. Trump, whose autocratic tendencies are well known and documented, has coincided with the rise of a confederacy of strong men and/or autocrats all over the world, including a number of them in western Europe, catapulted by populist movements and right wing parties and strong opposition to new immigrants and refugees from the Middle East, South Asia and Africa. President Putin is actively supporting this worrisome phenomenon and is familiar with the major players in it. Democracy as a system of governance is in a state of retreat. The silence of Mr. Trump during his campaign in the face of violations of human rights in Middle Eastern societies and beyond can only be welcomed by the autocrats who will not be subjected in the next four years to the usual cajoling and pressure that previous administrations imposed on America’s allies.

That’s in part what the Trump presidency means for the Middle East.

An awful truth we don't pay much attention to: "Social networking" sites like Facebook are being used to foment hatred and actual violence

In case you don't read Serbian, the crucial text of this poster, recently posted all around central Belgrade, is translated below.

by Ken

When it comes to Facebook and Atwitter and all those other newfangled social-networking-type websites, it could be that nobody on the planet knows less than I do -- with, always, the exception of Young Johnny McCranky, who's still on the far side of the mysteries of the Google. But from our friend Andy at the invaluable UK Gay News website, we've got a true stomach-churner of a story: Serbian hate groups have been using Facebook to foment violence, including death threats, against gays.

Even with the update at the top of the story, carrying the news that Facebook finally responded to terrified pleas and zapped the two immediately offending groups (and "others are being investigated," according to another UK Gay News report), this remains one scarifying story:

Please Protect Us, Serbian Gays Plead: Death Threats, Attacks Faced as Facebook Fails to Remove Two Hate Groups

NOTE: The two “gay hate” groups mentioned here have now been removed by Facebook - added December 27 at 18:00. Click HERE for report.

BELGRADE, December 25, 2008 – Please protect us. That is the plea tonight from gays and lesbian in Serbia to their government, the police and the wider world this holiday season.

The staff and contributors of the Serbian gay and lesbian website Querria Centre, are constantly receiving death threats and threats of physical violence, it emerged this evening.

“Every day threats are being sent to the website’s official email address to the effect that the website is going to be hacked, that we are sick people who should be treated, that all of us (LGBT population) should be killed,” said Predrag Azdejković, the editor of Queeria and one of the main targets.

“Such threats are also posted among the comments made on the website.”

BELGRADE, December 25, 2008 – Please protect us. That is the plea tonight from gays and lesbian in Serbia to their government, the police and the wider world this holiday season.

The staff and contributors of the Serbian gay and lesbian website Querria Centre, are constantly receiving death threats and threats of physical violence, it emerged this evening.

“Every day threats are being sent to the website’s official email address to the effect that the website is going to be hacked, that we are sick people who should be treated, that all of us (LGBT population) should be killed,” said Predrag Azdejković, the editor of Queeria and one of the main targets.

“Such threats are also posted among the comments made on the website.”

The report goes on to identify the two Facebook groups, adding, "Both are 'open groups.'"

Members of both groups are publicly advocating death threats to the activists at Queeria, whose photographs, Queeria say, are circulating among the members of both groups.

Additionally, the groups are advocating breaking and entering the Queeria Centre premises, as well as the homes of gay activists.

The groups suggest violence against all gays and lesbians population.

“A week ago," the report notes, "posters [reproduced above] were put up in the centre of Belgrade by the nationalist group, Naši (Ours), that said:

“While Serbs are being laid off, look who is being financed by Boris Tadić [the Serbian president] and the government of Serbia. The Serbian Ministry of Culture, within its remit for projects in the field of public information, has recently granted 256,500.00 dinars for the website of a faggots organization - Queeria Centre - which is promoting faggots’ rights and slandering the Serbian Orthodox Church in the most despicable way. Is this what the democrats had been promising before the elections? The association Naši.”.

To all of this, and a good deal of other steadily rising Serbian anti-gay hate-mongering, Predrag Azdejković says, “The police and the Public Attorney showed no reaction."

“It is our opinion that by keeping silent the national authorities of the Republic of Serbia support violence against the gay and lesbian population and activists of gay and lesbian rights groups, and thus provide homophobic forces in this country with an additional impetus,” he charged.

“We are asking national and international human rights NGOs to raise their voices in this case with similar vehemence like in cases when threats are directed to non-gay human rights activists."

What we all need to do: Be aware, spread the word, and raise a stink.

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