Author: Steven Sahiounie

China has been buying record volumes of Russian oil over the last couple of months, taking advantage of rock bottom prices for Russia’s flagship Urals grade combined with a collapse in demand in Europe. The volumes make for consecutive monthly records of Urals supply to China after they surpassed 1.2 million tonnes in January. They also provide a lifeline to Russian firms as they struggle to sell oil in Europe because the coronavirus has led to a deep fall in demand. At the same time, rival Saudi Arabia had been flooding customers with crude in a market share battle with…

Former Vice President Joe Biden has won Democratic presidential primaries in seven US states, gathering further momentum for the Democratic National Convention in August. His wins in Maryland, Montana, New Mexico, South Dakota, Indiana, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania as well as the District of Columbia on Tuesday push him closer to the 1,911 delegates he needs to capture the Democratic presidential nomination. He will also be the presumptive nominee at the Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee, which was rescheduled from July to August due to coronavirus concerns. “The country is crying out for leadership,” Biden said Tuesday in remarks released by…

Syria has lambasted the United States for practicing ‘economic terrorism,’ saying the new financial sanctions that Washington is due to impose this month will intensify the sufferings of the Syrian people. On Wednesday, an unnamed source with the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates denounced the so-called Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act – also known as the Caesar Act and expected to come into force in mid-June – as another form of terrorism which has shed the blood of Syrian civilians and ravaged their achievements, Syria’s official news agency SANA reported. “The Syrian Arab Republic strongly condemns the imposition of further sanctions on…

Venezuela says it plans to import more gasoline and additives from Iran after receiving five shipments of fuel from the Middle Eastern country in the face of US sanctions. The announcement by officials at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s office, quoted by price reporting agency Argus Media, came after Tehran said it would continue fuel shipments to Venezuela if Caracas requested more supplies. “Tehran yesterday offered to supply Venezuela with more gasoline and refinery additives. President Maduro very likely will accept the offer because we need the fuel,” one official said Tuesday. Other officials said the government will ask Iran for…

Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah popular defensive movement has denounced the recent so-called donor conference that was organized under the guise of collecting aid for the war-torn country as “an attempt for begging” by countries in the Saudi-led military coalition. Saudi Arabia co-hosted the virtual United Nations’ fundraising summit on Tuesday. The conference was reportedly attended by more than 100 countries. The kingdom and its allies have been waging a war on Yemen since March 2015 to return Riyadh’s favorite officials to power there. The war, which also has the support of the United States, has killed tens of thousands of Yemenis and…

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu says Libya’s eastern-based renegade military commander Khalifa Haftar will not manage to emerge victorious out of the ongoing conflict in the country. Ankara provides military support to the rival Government of National Accord (GNA) to fend off offensives by Haftar’s forces. “Taking back the coastline from Tripoli to Tunisia, recapturing international airports, and progress made from air and land operations shows essentially that Haftar cannot win this war,” Turkey’s official Anadolu news agency quoted Cavusoglu as saying in a televised interview on Wednesday. Haftar’s militias recently stepped up their attacks, but GNA forces – who are under the command…

The Minnesota Department of Human Rights (MDHR) has formally filed a racial discrimination charge against the Minneapolis Police Department in connection to the May 25 killing of George Floyd, an unarmed black man. The state governmental body’s release noted that the Minneapolis cops continued to kneel on the handcuffed 46-year-old and “did not respond to [Floyd’s] calls for help.” “This incident, and others similar to it since at least January 1, 2010 and continuing to the present, require investigation into whether the respondent’s training, policies, procedures, practices, including but not limited to use of force protocols and any corresponding implementation,…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator Rajab Rahil Abdul-Fadhil Al-Megrahi has filed a complaint on May 31 before the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights accusing the Libyan Minister of Interior of the Government of National Accord (GNA), Fathi Bashagha, of gouging out his eye with a spoon while he was being held at the Mitiga prison in 2019.    Al-Megrahi appeared in a video on social media reading the statement he brought to the court. He recalls in graphic detail his detention at the Mitiga prison near the airport in Tripoli during the summer of 2019.  He states he…

Steven Sahiounie, journalist and political commentator Muhammed Momtaz Al-Azhari, 23, was arrested by FBI agents on May 24 in Tampa, Florida.  The culmination of a federal sting-operation, he is being held in Pinellas County jail at the request of federal agents who accuse him of material support of the Islamic State, and scouting Florida targets for a planned mass shooting. Al-Azhari, an American citizen, had gone to Saudi Arabia in 2015 to join a terrorist group following Radical Islam, which is a political ideology and is neither a religion nor a sect.  He planned to go to Syria and fight…

The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump plans to sell 7,500 precision-guided bombs for approximately $500 million to Saudi Arabia, the Wall Street Journal reported this week. The Wall Street Journal quoted a source in the U.S. Congress as saying that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee received an initial notification of the supply and sales plan in mid-January. The source explained that if this deal is approved, Saudi Arabia will buy 7,500 “Paveway IV” precision guided bombs from Raytheon Technologies. The source added that the U.S. government will commit Raytheon Technologies to produce other…