Latest news with #Kremlin-friendly
American Military News
5 days ago
- Politics
- American Military News
Pro-Kremlin Media Hail Los Angeles Unrest As ‘Civil War'
This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission. Kremlin-friendly pundits and programs have been savoring every shot of protesters in Los Angeles this week, some proclaiming that the United States must be in midst of a new 'civil war.' Prominent state-run Rossia-1 TV host Vladimir Solovyov put it bluntly: 'I'm enjoying what I see.' He was not alone. 'Congratulations on the beginning of a civil war in the United States of America,' pro-Kremlin TV personality Sergei Mardan said. 'Unfortunately, I'm joking,' he added mirthlessly. Andrey Cherkasov of RFE/RL's Current Time surveyed the Kremlin-friendly media landscape over the past few days and found it rife with pronouncements of widespread pandemonium in the United States. 'In reality, the unrest in Los Angeles is limited to a small area,' Cherkasov said, 'but the propagandists describe it as a nationwide catastrophe.' The key scenes and images appearing so far are generally those of street demonstrations in the Los Angeles area, which were sparked by recent high-profile arrests of suspected undocumented immigrants by agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Locals have demanded an end to ICE raids and enforcement actions there, including Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. ICE said it arrested over 40 suspected undocumented migrants at a work site and another 77 people were reportedly arrested by ICE and federal partners across the greater L.A. area on June 6, which appeared to be the focus of the protests. 'This is a city of immigrants,' Bass said. 'This is a city that wants to help you get your legal status. This is a city that embraces everybody that is here, regardless of when you got here or where you came from.' Kremlin-friendly journalists have been airing a far more alarmist viewpoint — but at times are also gleeful. 'I can't help gloating over it all, I admit,' Mardan said on-air on Rossia-1. 'The worse it is for the United States, the better it is for us.' As Cherkasov pointed out, 'Cheering over unrest in the United States is standard fare for the Kremlin and Kremlin-friendly media.' The rhetoric is well-practiced and hardly new, he added. 'These outlets have, after all, come up with surveys that purportedly show America as their country's main adversary for the last 20 years.' Much of the pro-Putin coverage that depicts the Los Angeles area as 'apocalyptic,' Cherkasov said. But he noted that some broadcasters in the United States have been using similar language, at least some of the time. Viewers of CBS's Face the Nation heard reports with a voiceover that said: 'Chaos erupted in the Los Angeles area over the weekend following increased activity across the country by ICE.' But the Kremlin-aligned outlets have shown a passion for the most tabloid elements, Cherkasov said. 'Russian presenters are savoring every detail: flying rocks, smoke, and rubber bullets. Three he cited were succinct: 'Chaos in Los Angeles,' proclaimed Russia-1 TV, 'Fighting, violence, and provocations,' said a TVC host, and 'The tension is rising,' announced another Russia-1 TV presenter. Another usual angle in the Putin-approved media, Cherkasov said, was the invocation of Ukraine's Euromaidan protest movement, sparked a decade ago when pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych blocked progress toward EU membership. 'Just remember the Kyiv Maidan in 2014: It was a war zone,' said a commentator on Russia's Vesti FM. Suggesting deliberate conspiracies behind the Los Angeles demonstrations is also standard pro-Kremlin fare, said Cherkasov. 'The Kremlin has always tried to suggest there's foreign backing behind any civil protest.' So-called color revolutions are also said to be the work of US agents, he said, such as Georgia's 2003 Rose Revolution and Ukraine's 2004 Orange Revolution. As if on cue, a presenter on Russia's Channel 5 summed up the L.A. protests this way: 'All the elements of a color revolution are there.' Another, a guest on Solovyov's program, Solovyov Live, proclaimed, 'This did not happen spontaneously.' According to Western sources, since June 6, nearly 400 people have been arrested in Los Angeles, including 330 undocumented migrants and 157 people charged with assault and obstruction — including one charged with attempted murder of a police officer.
Daily Mirror
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Daily Mirror
Top Putin ally pushes childless couple social media ban so they have more sex
MP Mikhail Ivanov, 51, has suggested childless couple should be forced into "digital abstinence" - banning them from social media between 11pm and 2am - in the hopes it will help spark their passion for each other Childless Russian couples should be banned from accessing social media late at night in a bid to encourage them to have sex and start families, according to a pro-Putin politician. The madcap plan for 'digital abstinence' comes from the mind of Mikhail Ivanov, 51, a regional MP in region Bryansk which borders Ukraine. If the scheme is implemented, the Russian state would switch off the couples' access to social media each night from 11pm to 2am. This is the latest bizarre scheme to meet Vladimir Putin 's order to boost the flagging birth rate in Russia and help bring back 'strong Russian families'. 'If young people spend nights on their phones instead of paying attention to each other, then this is a road to nowhere,' said Ivanov, deputy head of the pro-dictator World Russian People's Council which seeks a return to the Kremlin's empire. 'Russia has always been famous for its strong families, and our task is to bring back this tradition. If this requires temporarily restricting access to entertainment content at a late hour, then this is not a large price to pay for the future of the nation.' He also wants psychologists to teach couples 'the importance of live communication and a conscious approach to creating a family'. Critics say the Russian population is plummeting because couples are against having children in the middle or a war, which has also killed an estimated 250,000 people. But Ivanov, married with children, believes social media is the problem. 'The Internet has become a new form of addiction that corrodes the foundations of the family,' he said. 'Young people, instead of communicating with each other, building relationships and thinking about children, spend hours scrolling through the feed, playing games or watching TV series. 'This is not just a bad habit, it is a threat to the demographic security of the country. We must create conditions in which couples will have an incentive to return to real communication and conscious parenting.' Meanwhile, a Kremlin-friendly MP has suggested giving workers one week's paid leave a year to procreate. An annual 'demographic week' would meet Putin's urgent demand to boost Russia's shrinking population level, according to Georgy Arapov, 25. 'For many citizens it would be a rare opportunity to stop, breathe out, recover from stress and come to that internal state that doctors and psychologists call optimal for making a decision to have a child,' said Arapov, Russia's youngest MP. Another scheme for a tax on childlessness has been proposed by the Russian Orthodox Church, aiming to stigmatise 'sick' men in their 40s who fail to father babies. This was proposed by pro-Putin archpriest and propagandist Andrei Tkachev, 55.
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'Not even capable of defeating Ukraine' — Orban questions Russia's ability to attack NATO
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has questioned Russia's ability to attack NATO countries, as it is not "even capable of defeating Ukraine," he said in an interview with French TV channel LCI on June 8. "The Russians are too weak for that," Orban said. "They're not even capable of defeating Ukraine, so they're incapable of really attacking NATO." Over three years into its full-scale war, Russia has failed to achieve Ukraine's surrender or at least the complete occupation of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, which was reportedly among the Kremlin's demands in Russia's first peace proposal in 2022. Russian troops have recently intensified their offensive, moving deeper into Sumy Oblast, as well as closing in on Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. Russian propaganda has for years insisted that NATO and its further expansion pose a threat to Moscow. The Kremlin has also claimed that Ukraine's ambition to join NATO was a major trigger for its invasion, although in 2014, when Moscow annexed Crimea and started the war in the Donbas region, Ukraine's chances and desires of joining the alliance were low. Orban, widely regarded as the European Union's most pro-Russian leader, said that it is not in the interests of the EU, including Hungary, to have "a direct conflict with Russia" or "a threat of war," so Ukraine must not join NATO. "Europe must be strengthened in the long term, and there must be a strategic agreement with Russia," Orban said, adding that sanctions against Russia are "destroying Hungary and the whole of Europe." Under the Orban regime, Hungary has become widely regarded as the most Kremlin-friendly state in the EU. Budapest has been blocking the opening of EU accession negotiation clusters with Kyiv and signaled further obstruction in recent weeks after Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) said it had uncovered a Hungarian spy network in western Ukraine. Orban also encouraged Hungarians to vote in a non-binding national poll on Ukraine's EU bid that the government launched in early March. The poll has garnered criticism for low turnout and manipulative questions, written to encourage citizens to reject Ukraine's accession. Read also: Key to Russia's potential defeat lies in its economy We've been working hard to bring you independent, locally-sourced news from Ukraine. Consider supporting the Kyiv Independent.
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First Post
04-06-2025
- Business
- First Post
EU allows Bulgaria to use euro from 2026, but wants it to 'fight corruption'
Bulgaria is set to adopt the euro as its official currency starting January 1 next year, becoming the 21st member of the eurozone and deepening its integration into the European Union amid regional instability read more A Protester holds a poster reading 'Preserve Bulgarian Lev. Win the battle!' during an anti-Euro protest in Sofia, Bulgaria on May 31, 2025. AP File Bulgaria is set to adopt the euro as its official currency starting January 1 next year, becoming the 21st member of the eurozone and deepening its integration into the European Union amid regional instability. According to a Politico report, the European Commission and the European Central Bank have approved the move, acknowledging Bulgaria's progress in meeting key economic requirements, despite ongoing concerns about money laundering and political corruption. 'The answer that we give to Bulgaria is yes,' Politico quoted Commission official Massimo Suardi as telling reporters in Brussels on Tuesday. However, 'there are a number of policy challenges Bulgaria still needs to tackle … related to the fight against corruption, judicial independence, and efficiency of the public administration, public procurement,' Suardi added. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'Joining the euro area is the best investment Bulgaria can make in its future,' European Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis told Politico on Thursday, adding that eurozone membership would benefit Bulgaria just as it has supported Latvia and the other Baltic states. 'Given the geopolitical situation in the region and Russia's war against Ukraine, the euro acts as a shield … Our savings are safe, the currency is stable and our countries have proven resilient in the face of consecutive economic shocks,' said Dombrovskis. He added that 'our economies and companies have benefited from the removal of currency conversion costs, increased price transparency, access to cheaper financing and greater interest from international investors.' The move binds one of the EU's poorest countries more tightly into the bloc's institutional structures at a time when Russia is exerting economic, political and even military pressure on its former eastern-bloc neighbors, leading some to flirt with a more Kremlin-friendly foreign policy. EU officials expect smooth approval of Bulgaria's eurozone entry, with no opposition anticipated when EU finance ministers vote on July 8. Bulgaria, home to 6.4 million people, pledged to adopt the euro back in 2007 but faced repeated delays due to unmet economic and legal standards. High inflation after the pandemic and the Ukraine war derailed previous bids for 2024 and 2025. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Now, with inflation averaging 2.7% and public debt at just 24.1% of GDP — second lowest in the EU — the country has met key criteria. European Commission official Suardi praised Bulgaria's flexible labour market and strong fiscal discipline, calling recent price rises 'temporary.' 'I wish to congratulate Bulgaria on its tremendous dedication to making the adjustments needed,' Politico quoted ECB Chief Economist Philip Lane as saying in a separate briefing. But concerns linger — inside the country and outside. On Saturday, thousands of people took to the streets in Bulgaria, calling on the government to preserve the lev, which has been the country's currency to date. As is usual during such transitions, there are fears that merchants and companies will use redenomination as an opportunity to raise prices, while increased trade with the rest of the bloc may also drag local prices higher. 'Ensuring price transparency and combating abusive price increases will require a special effort,' Dombrovskis warned, but noted that other countries that had made the same step had ultimately overcome any issues it created. In its report, the European Central Bank warned that Bulgaria must adopt sound policies alongside euro adoption to safeguard competitiveness and avoid unsustainable credit growth or broader economic imbalances. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD While Bulgaria continues to have the EU's lowest hourly labour costs, the ECB stressed that wage growth must align with productivity to maintain investor confidence and economic stability. With inputs from agencies
Yahoo
03-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Orban vows to 'do everything' to prevent Ukraine from joining EU
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban railed against Ukraine's future accession to the European Union in a social media post on June 3, promising to "do everything" to prevent Ukraine from joining the bloc. Under the Orban regime, Hungary has become widely regarded as the most Kremlin-friendly state in the EU. Budapest has been blocking the opening of EU accession negotiation clusters with Kyiv and signaled further obstruction in recent weeks after Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) said it had uncovered a Hungarian spy network in western Ukraine. In a Facebook post on June 3, Orban called EU expansion "a noble idea" but excoriated "the bureaucrats in Brussels" for promoting Ukraine's membership. "For Brussels, Ukrainian accession is a vital issue: political damage control and good business in the midst of a losing war," he wrote. Orban claimed that Kyiv's membership would hurt Hungarian interests and have economic drawbacks for Europe. "Ukraine would suck up every euro, forint and zloty that we have spent so far on strengthening European families, European farmers, and European industry. ... In 10 years, I would not be able to answer my conscience to myself, my grandchildren, or the country if I did not do everything now to protect Hungary and the European Union from the Brussels fever dream of Ukrainian accession." Orban encouraged Hungarians to vote in a non-binding national poll on Ukraine's EU bid that the government launched in early March. The poll has garnered criticism for low turnout and manipulative questions, written to encourage citizens to reject Ukraine's accession. Kyiv formally applied for EU membership in 2022 and began accession talks in June 2024. EU leaders have set 2030 as a tentative target date for Ukraine's potential entry. As a member state, Hungary holds veto power over each phase of the process. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on May 9 that while the EU would prefer to secure unanimous support, it has alternative plans if Hungary vetoes Ukraine's accession to the bloc. After the scandal regarding the alleged spy ring broke out in early May, Budapest announced it is suspending talks with Ukraine on "national minority rights," long presented by Hungary as the main roadblock in accession negotiations. Read also: 'Tattoos of war' — haunting portraits of Ukrainians' most painful wartime memories (Photos) We've been working hard to bring you independent, locally-sourced news from Ukraine. Consider supporting the Kyiv Independent.
