Tuesday, December 31, 2024
Crashed Azerbaijani Plane
Crashed Azerbaijani Plane Hit From Ground – President
The passenger jet that crashed in Kazakhstan earlier this week had been struck from the ground near the Russian city of Grozny, Azeri President Ilham Aliyev has claimed.
An Embraer 190, operating as Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243 from Baku to Grozny, diverted to Kazakhstan and crashed on Wednesday, killing 38 of the 67 people on board.
In a Sunday interview with the state-run broadcaster AzTV, Aliyev claimed that the aircraft “was damaged from the outside on Russian territory, near the city of Grozny, and almost got out of control.”
“We are also aware that our aircraft was rendered uncontrollable by electronic warfare means... In addition, the tail section of the plane was severely damaged by fire from the ground,” he said.
Aliyev noted that the exact circumstances of the crash would become known after the data from flight recorders is accessed. However, he insisted that the preliminary versions of the incident “are well founded and based on facts.”
— RT
Our Take: Last week, I covered a story about Ukraine using "kamikaze" drones to attack residential buildings in Kazan in what appeared to be "9/11 style" attacks. Kazan is a city that is over 750 miles away from the war front in Ukraine.
Now we have reports of drone attacks at the airport in Grozny, Chechnya, which is over 600 miles away from the front.
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How, exactly, does Ukraine possess the resources to conduct these long-range attacks, when it is fighting for its life one the home front? Why is it targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure?
The answer seems simple: The CIA.
The targets are arbitrary. As we noted last week, Kazan is the symbolic city for BRICS, as it was the site of this year's annual summit. Chechnya is where the Russian Special Forces are headquartered — Dagestan, to be precise. While Grozny is outside of Dagestan, it does house an important airport.
One must wonder the real objective of these attacks?
— GhostofBasedPatrickHenry
Who are you to rebuke Umno, Akmal ticks off LGE
Who are you to rebuke
Umno, Akmal ticks off
LGE
The Umno Youth chief says the upcoming rally to express solidarity with Najib Razak has nothing to do with the unity government.
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Akmal said the Jan 6 rally had “nothing to do with the unity government” and insisted it was only for the former Umno president.
“Who are you to rebuke us? Who are you to order Umno around?” he said in a video which was uploaded on Facebook.
Akmal also said should Lim continue to criticise Umno, more of the party’s members would take part in the rally.
“To my fellow members, he (Guan Eng) has started (speaking out), what are you waiting for?”
Earlier today, Lim, the DAP chairman, hit out at Umno for joining hands with PAS to hold a rally in solidarity with Najib.
The Bagan MP said the collaboration between the two parties would raise doubts about Umno’s sincerity in being a partner in the unity government led by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim.
“Umno must be aware that any joint event with PAS, an opposition party, will also raise doubts about Umno’s own political stability and its position in the unity government,” he said in a press conference.
However, Umno Supreme Council member Puad Zarkashi had since clarified that his party had planned for a rally long before PAS announced it was holding one.
PAS’s rally will be held on the same day that the Court of Appeal will hear Najib’s application for leave to adduce fresh evidence in his appeal to serve the remainder of his jail term under house arrest, which he claims was issued in a supplementary order to the pardons board’s Feb 2 announcement.
Over 200 busloads of Najib’s supporters are expected to attend the rally, comprising Umno and PAS members. Bersatu leaders are also expected to be in attendance.
Separately, Kelantan Umno chief Ahmad Jazlan Yaakub said there was no need for Lim to get antsy over the gathering by Umno members.
In a statement, Jazlan said the party would not prevent anyone from joining the rally.
“There’s no need for Guan Eng to be afraid of his own shadow.”
He also said that there was no political agenda behind PAS ordering its supporters to back Najib’s cause.
Shai-loks show themselves as MORE evil than Gestapo
al Jazeera:
Israel pounds north Gaza as seventh Palestinian freezes to death
Israel continues to block Gaza aid; heavy rains flood tent camps
- The United Nations has accused Israel of continuing to “systematically” hinder aid to Gaza as local authorities say a seventh forcibly displaced Palestinian has died of hypothermia amid plummeting temperatures.
- The family of Dr Hussam Abu Safia, the detained director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, has pleaded for his release as Palestinian authorities announce that five more detainees from Gaza have died in Israeli custody.
- Israeli forces have killed four Palestinians in an attack on besieged Jabalia in north Gaza after a day of bombings that killed at least 27 people across the Strip.
1997 crisis, Mahathir- Anwar feud and rise of ‘grand corruption’
1997 crisis, Mahathir-
Anwar feud and rise of ‘grand
corruption’
A new book tells of the Asian Financial Crisis destroying the governing political-corporate elites, leading to the growth of a new political-GLC web.
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However, the government’s subsequent vast ownership of businesses eventually led to a new form of grand corruption, Edmund Terence Gomez writes.
Gomez, an emeritus professor of Universiti Malaya, said prior to the financial crisis the corporate sector was “awash with different but interlaced political-business ties” which were led by different elites who solicited government concessions and resources.
And as political meddling in the corporate sector grew, these governing elites became more involved through their proxies and families, he said.
Privatised projects
One constant criticism in the early 1990s, Gomez observed, was the opaqueness surrounding the awarding of major privatised projects, with discussions between the governing elites and their closest allies taking place behind closed doors.
“This nexus between politics and business came to an abrupt halt when the AFC occurred in 1997,” Gomez writes in his book “Misgovernance: Grand Corruption in Malaysia”.
Gomez says many Umno-linked businessmen who had become corporate captains found themselves either mired in debt or bankrupt.
Bailouts at public expense
Some were bailed out “at the huge expense of the government”, as these were nationalised companies, he added.
However, the bailouts sparked criticism from Umno members asserting that the AFC debacle had been caused by rampant cronyism, collusion and nepotism.
Cataclysmic feud
The intense criticisms subsequently led to a “cataclysmic” feud that saw then party president Dr Mahathir Mohamad oust his deputy, Anwar Ibrahim. This in turn saw businessmen aligned to the would-be PKR president lose control of their corporate assets.
The fallout of the AFC didn’t end there.
Gomez wrote that numerous enterprises under politicians-in-business and well connected businessmen were brought under control of the government and classified as government-linked companies, or GLCs.
New political-GLC web
However, politicians in control of the government now found that they had direct control over a vast corporate base that could be abused to serve their political and economic interests, he said.
What subsequently emerged, according to Gomez, is a “political-GLC complex”, a nexus that has perpetuated, even exacerbated, cronyism, nepotism and abuse of power through the practice of selective patronage during the implementation of policies.
A different form of grand corruption has emerged, one that is so endemic that it has deeply undermined public trust in the governance of the government’s vast GLC ecosystem, he added.
“Misgovernance: Grand Corruption in Malaysia” is on sale at MPH and Kinokuniya, Eslite, Tsutaya and Gerakbudaya bookshops.
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