The following is an exclusive interview with Russian Duma deputy, Yevgeny Fyodorov, a high-ranking conservative, nationalistic lawmaker in President Vladimir Putin’s United Russia Party. He has been Chairman of the Committee on Economic Policy of the State Duma and a member of the Advisory Council of the President of the Russian Federation. Below we discuss war with Ukraine, principles of sovereignty and geopolitics, the ongoing energy battle, the nuclear option, and the reestablishment of the Soviet sphere, all within the context of US ambition and Russian counter-strategy.
Default Editor Patrice de Bergeracpas
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Most people are unaware that in less than a decade, Microsoft, Google parent Alphabet, Meta (formerly Facebook) and Amazon have become by far the dominant users of the world’s undersea cables. Before 2012, their share was less than 10%. Today, that figure is about 66%.
And this is just the start. As the Wall Street Journal points out, in the next three years, they are on track to become the primary financiers and owners of the web of cables connecting the wealthiest and most bandwidth-hungry countries on the shores of both the Atlantic and the Pacific. By 2024, they will have an ownership stake in more than 30 long-distance undersea cables. In 2010, these companies had an ownership stake in only one – the Unity cable partly owned by Google, connecting Japan and the US.
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While China is building ports, rails, roads, and power plants across the continent, its Russian ally continues to dominate Europe’s energy market and is now just months away from opening its controversial Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline beneath the Baltic Sea, guaranteed to increase Moscow’s economic influence. As the massive pipeline project moved to completion last December, Russian President Putin intensified pressures on NATO with a roster of “extravagant” demands, including a formal guarantee that Ukraine not be admitted to the alliance, removal of all the military infrastructure installed in Eastern Europe since 1997, and a prohibition against future military activity in Central Asia.
In a power play not seen since Stalin and Mao joined forces in the 1950s, the alliance between Putin’s raw military force and Xi’s relentless economic pressure may indeed slowly be pulling Europe away from America. Complicating the U.S. position, Britain’s exit from the European Union cost Washington its most forceful advocate inside Brussels’ labyrinthine corridors of power.
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PEPE ESCOBAR—Raisi’s main theme is ‘resistance,’ and that was imprinted in all of his meetings. He duly emphasized the Afghan and Iraqi resistances: “In modern times, the concept of resistance plays a central role in deterrence equations.”
The Islamic Republic of Iran is all about that resistance: “In different historical periods of Iran’s development, whenever our nation has raised the banner of nationalism, independence, or scientific development, it has faced sanctions and pressures of the Iranian nation’s enemies,” Raisi emphasized.
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Are NATO and Russia on the brink of war over the Ukraine crisis? (Ex-UK ambassador to Russia) E1095
19 minutes readIn this episode of Going Underground, we speak to the former British ambassador to Russia, Sir Tony Brenton. He discusses the latest on the Ukraine crisis, the possibility of a Europe-wide war between NATO and Putin’s Russia, whether a last-minute breakthrough could be achieved by the US, NATO and Russia, the background of hostility between Russia and NATO, the alliance’s involvement in regime-change wars, its legacy, and much more.