Mission & Justice

Kim Gouz; 3/10/08

Bombs and warplanes aren’t the only controversial commodities that Russia has been transporting abroad. Just ask Russian newspaper reporter Yaroslava Tankova. Tankova went undercover to expose the work of Russia’s trafficking mafia. She joined a group of women and girls who were promised jobs as waitresses in Israel. Unfortunately, Tankova’s group won’t be found dishing up hummus on Tel Aviv beach. They were trafficked to Israel via Egypt by Bedouins to be sold as sex slaves. “One of the girls nearly died from sunstroke. Another was raped by an Arab guard. He used a plastic bag instead of a condom,” Tankova reports in the video. “We were treated like meat. One man hit me but the other guards intervened. They didn’t want the commodity spoiled before it was sold.”

(more…)

19/8/08; Tony Kevin served as an Australian diplomat in Moscow (1969-71), UN New York (1973-76), and as Australian Ambassador in Poland (1991-1994)

In diplomacy, it is usually a mistake to try to force resolution of a territorial dispute. The cure is often worse than the disease. Such is the case with the Georgian crisis. Reckless provocation by the Bush administration and its protégé ‘Rose Revolution’ anti-Russian Saakashvili government has led to a major realignment in the balance of power between post-communist Russia and the West. It is the most important event in East-West relations since the fall of Soviet Communism in 1990. In Georgia, Russia took on US-led attempted Western strategic encirclement, and won. There will be consequences all along Russia’s western and southern borderlands. Russia had given ample warning to Georgia that it would defend its interests in its ‘near abroad’. In Helsinki, the Finns understand that Russia expects bordering states — its security glacis — to be non-confrontational in their diplomacy and national security.

(more…)

15/8/08

International rights group Human Rights Watch said today it had evidence that Russian aircraft had dropped cluster bombs on Georgia, including the flashpoint city of Gori, killing at least 11 civilians. The New York-based non-governmental organisation said the dead included a Dutch journalist and that dozens more had been wounded. Human Rights Watch said its researchers had spoken to doctors and victims and had examined photographic evidence that led them to conclude cluster bombs had been used in Gori and the nearby town of Ruisi, south of South Ossetia.

(more…)

Editorial: 10/7/08

It is interesting that arguably the most bellicose of US presidents in recent times should now be accusing the Russians of bellicosity. But that is what the Bush administration has resorted to in response to the threat from Moscow that Russia will take “military measures” if Washington pressed ahead with its European missile shield based in the Czech Republic and Poland. Russia does not accept the American argument that the defensive missile installation is there to protect Europe from attack from a nuclear-armed Iran. Nor do many other defense analysts. The Kremlin sees that NATO — created to confront the old Soviet Union and its satellites — is now sitting on its Western borders and now the Georgian government is pressing ahead with its intention to join NATO.

(more…)