marydejevsky
@marydejevsky
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columnist for , former correspondent in moscow, paris, washington &, btw, not russian by birth or heritage. mod.langs @lmhoxford
london
Joined April 2014
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Over recent weeks of
#UkraineCrisis
, i’ve heard so many whoppers & misreadings from Western side, I’m tweeting 5 of the biggest falsehoods and 5 of the most damaging misreads. here are the falsehoods:
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rather suspect some ppl, incl
@CraigMurrayOrg
,
#Assange
, might beg to differ
never been so grateful to live in a country where we can question & mock & criticise our political leaders without consequence, never ever take this for granted
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N.B.this is St Petersburg,
#Putin
's home city. Protest like this may be repressed for a while, but it can mark a generation
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Russia used hundreds of fake accounts to tweet about Brexit, data shows
this, deeply buried in report, 'About 78% of the tweets came after the Brexit vote on 23 June 2016'
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the pro-war consensus is weakening... now is the time for everyone who believes in a diplomatic solution to the conflict to speak out — and to put pressure on their leaders to stop the madness.
Will America end Zelenskyy's dream?
@UnHerd
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falsehood 3. ‘Russia took the Donbass’ - retweeted by
@shashj
,
@TheEconomist
and others 22/1/22
No. If it had, there would have been no war there for past 8 years.
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Surprised
@BBCNews
citing only
#Russia
as likely perpetrator of
#Nordstream
#NordStream2
sabotage. Others, incl
#Poland
MEP
@radeksikorski
, crediting
#USA
. US not mentioned by BBC. Why not?
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misread 3. Russia’s annexation of
#Crimea
2014 fits a ‘pattern of Russian aggression’. No, it was a response to a unique set of circumstances . The overthrow of elected govt in Kyiv & fear a West-leaning Ukrainian govt would pass Russia’s lease on
#Sevastopol
Naval base to
@NATO
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was prepared to give
#whitehelmets
guy benefit of doubt
#bbcr4today
- until he started spouting
#skripals
and other stuff irrelevant to his cause, but straight out of
#UK
govt playbook
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falsehood 4.
#Russia
timed 2008
#Georgia
war to get cover from
#Beijing
Olympics i.e. parallel w/ today -
@MathieuBoulegue
,
@ChathamHouse
,
@TheBFPG
& others.
No,
#Russia
was responding; timing was Georgia's. EU report
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falsehood 2. ‘Invading Ukraine is something he /
#Putin
/ has been wanting to do for some time’ -
@TomTugendhat
,
@CommonsForeign
, interview on
@SkyNews
No evidence for this whatever
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misread 2. ‘The collapse of the Soviet Union was the biggest catastrophe of the 20th century’ =
#Putin
wants to recreate Sovt Union. No: he meant domestic dislocation. also said: ‘He who does not regret passing of USSR has no heart; he who wants to restore it has no head.’
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misread 4. Russia is unique in seeing a buffer zone or sphere of influence as necessary for national security.
Really? What was the
#Cuba
missile crisis all about? Or US interventions in Central America? Or US 2020 attempt at regime-change in Venezuela?
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Ofcom finds RT (Russia Today) broke broadcasting rules on impartiality...
any chance Ofcom might look at
#bbc
& other
#msm
reporting over same post-
#Salisbury
#skripals
period? - via:
@pressgazette
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misread 5. ‘Putin - I can take Kyiv in 2 weeks if I want’ - taken as proof of Putin’s aggressive intentions after 2014
#Crimea
.
Correct: ‘I could take Kyiv in 2 weeks if I wanted /i.e. but I don’t’/ = evidence for no territorial ambitions in Ukraine.
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& misreadings.
1. Putin’s essay saying
#Russia
,
#Ukraine
'one people ('kin'?) means he wants to take Ukraine into Russia - most recently
@BWallaceMP
, but many others.
No. Same essay says ‘Respect’ for those choosing own path. Putin on record as recognising independent Ukraine
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'conspiracy theories'? Given
@Nato
statements, deployments & military assistance to
#Ukraine
, this could have been an entirely valid perception as seen from
#Kremlin
.
Less than a minute into his speech, Putin turns to conspiracy theories about NATO plotting to attack Russia through Ukraine nazis.
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note, too, ref to 'a slippery operation known as Bellingcat, which far too many journalists and politicians treat with wide-eyed indulgence, as if it was a brave independent enterprise'.
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what also emerges from this ensemble is how uniform & controlled the West's official message has been. No wonder dissenters haven't had a look in.
Watch Matt Orfalea Bitch Slap Those Who Said The Ukraine Invasion Was "Not About NATO", by
@caitoz
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Maybe only point ever where I agree w/ Lord Frost. Also a feminist issue. The private car gives women freedom, safer transport & far more convenience/time saving if travelling w/ small children or less mobile ppl. n.b.women bear most caring responsibilities.
Lord Frost arguing against attacks on the most convenient, speedy, comfortable mode of transport: the car.
For many people outside the metropolitan elite inner circles it is also the most important and necessary.
Sadly, it may be too little too late for far too many.
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some thoughts on
#KerchBridge
& response
1. there was no way
#Russia
was going to leave attack on bridge unavenged (which is why, as I understood,
#Kyiv
's allies warned against it, tho maybe that changed)
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Some news for
@EmmanuelMacron
- I've just been in part of the 'global South' - & they're not interested
#UkraineRussiaWar
. it's not their fight.
Let's get to work right away, together with the countries of the Global South, on laying the groundwork for peace in Ukraine. United, we will be stronger.
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alas, like so many,
@IainDale
falls into the trap - or willingly toes the propaganda line - that equates a preference for diplomacy over weapons supplies w/ apologising for
#Putin
. That is a slur, and it is not true.
#US
,
#UK
,
@Nato
risk helping
#Ukraine
destroy itself
Utterly shameful from you, Mary. I thought your days of being a Putin apologist had gone. It appears not. There's only one person escalating this war and that is Putin. Ukraine is fighting for its independence and we are supporting it. I am proud of that. Shame on you.
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Why do
@BBCNews
#Newsnight
#r4today
etc give airtime to such discredited & ill-informed individuals as Gen - pointless Afghan 'surge' - David Petraeus, Lord - failed
#UK
ambassador in
#DC
- Darroch & Chris - ex-MI6, dubious anti-Trump dossier - Steele?
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7. & those of us calling for West to encourage diplomacy rather than fuelling conflict have been branded 1938-style 'appeasers',
#Russlandversteher
,
#Putiin
apologists, etc etc. Does everyone else want all-out war in Europe?
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maybe it's just me, but don't understand why, given mega problems facing UK, Labour govt has picked quarrel w/ pensioners over sum that goes nowhere near plugging hole in finances, & now wants to ban smoking in pub gardens. why alienate so many ppl so soon for so little gain?
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dear overburdened
#NHS
, today u have used a phone appt to say the same appt was cancelled; txted a letter w/ a new appointmt in April. txted a 2nd letter w/ another appt 30 mins before the last, & now txted a 3rd letter - cancelling it!
not a v productive day's work
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strange how you can publish this in the heart of mainstream USA, but would have great difficulty getting equivalent forum in UK
Ukraine’s Kursk offensive is a huge strategic error
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ah, the wonderful world of the elite, ever willing to go on sacrificing lives & livelihoods of others against the better judgement of their own ppl. Democracy, anyone?
#UkraineRussiaWar
There’s no peace deal to be made with Putin.
The growing feeling in Europe that the war must end as soon as possible is misguided and would be a betrayal of Ukraine. Read my latest
@thetimes
column here:
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dare say he might also have taken opportunity to remind her that it is
#UK
that has 'disappeared'
#skripals
. why so little curiosity here as to where they are now?
A frosty-looking Theresa May meets Vladimir Putin for one-to-one talks, their first since former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned in Salisbury last year
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He generally is. Just that he rarely gets a mainstream platform except at election time.
In front of a challenging audience
@jeremycorbyn
was authoritative, polite and engaged...impressive.
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Russia's plan to roll-out coronavirus vaccine could encourage the virus to mutate, experts warn
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so there,
@XRebellionUK
Two years before they came to power, Berlin Nazis successfully disrupted screenings of the anti-war film All Quiet on the Western Front, and it was banned.
We must resist any group that thinks it has the right to decide what we see or read.
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wherever you see/hear the phrase 'the
@BBC
has learnt' your first question should be 'where from?' & your second question should be 'why now?'
NEW - Salisbury poisoning suspects 'linked to Czech blast' - a trail of evidence links the 2014 explosion, and an attempted poisoning in Bulgaria, to a unit of Russian military intelligence - the GRU - the BBC has learnt.
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something that's bothered me from the start of
#UkraineRussiaWar
is the seeming relish of so many Western analysts in charting
#Russia
losses &
#Ukraine
'hits', as tho it's a virtual game w/ no cost in real lives - & so it goes on
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wonder how long BBC Verify will survive. Will it be quietly phased out? After mega fanfare at start, it's mentioned less now, but has dozens of reporters allocated to it
Great that this is coming from BBC Verify, the British state broadcaster's fancy new fact checking division. Led by
@MariannaSpring
, who lied on her CV to get work years ago:
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good heavens, the sainted
@bellingcat
, who would have thought it? see my
Grayzone: Reuters, BBC, and Bellingcat participated in covert UK Foreign Office-funded programs to “weaken Russia,” leaked docs reveal
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Do wish
#Newsnight
would stop trying to be player in
#US
politics. Not
@bbcnews
role, not interesting, not relevant. Just 'investigation' for sake of 'investigation' (into 6 Jan
#Capitol
violence)
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and we go around the world preaching democracy....
In effect, new MPs are being elected day by day now, as, amid huge secrecy, small cabals of party bigwigs pick candidates for safe seats
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bravo. as a white person, felt i couldn't say this.
'To make a like-for-like equation between Britain and America is untrue, potentially inflammatory and crassly propagandistic.' Britain’s race pain is not the same as America’s
@UnHerd
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short answer: no.
longer answer: 'Officials admit that there is currently little evidence of large-scale attempts to spread disinformation directly related to this week's vote.'
BBC News - Is Russia trying to sway the European elections?
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'ample evidence'?? the UK official version underwent significant modifications in the early months, spun further by a TV 'faction' film. The Skripals have been 'disappeared'. Plenty of questions to ask.
@marydejevsky
UK published ample evidence around Skripal case and you continue to give credence to Russian conspiracy theories around that case. So let's have some honesty over how such inquiries would be treated by you.
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really hate the gung-ho fantasy 'gotcha' tone of all this. Real ppl are being killed on both sides. This is macho war-gamery at its worst
#UkraineRussiaWar
And the first ever combat kill of a Kilo class. Tom Clancy would be proud.
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hard not to feel that, far from sleepwalking into war, the West's political leaders are marching towards it wide awake, while leaving their populations without the knowledge or means to stop them
#UkraineRussiaWar
At this point it is dangerously disingenuous to continue to pretend that this is a proxy war — or that Ukraine may have conducted the strikes in question without full US support.
My latest:
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'What more pressure can be exerted on
#Russia
to persuade them to get the
#graindeal
shipments back on track?'
#r4today
Er, how about not bombing their ships?
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Q - Is the West escalating the Ukraine war?
@UnHerd
A - of course it is. Why are so few people prepared to acknowledge this?
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'If Ukraine fails, the European way of life fails' - sorry, but this is just not true. The dividing line between east & west reverts to where it was pre-2014. That is a tragedy for
#Ukraine
, but it's not the end of European way of life
"If Ukraine fails, the European way of life fails. This is a conflict in the geographical heart of Europe and there is no appetite [in Ukraine] for any concessions"
@Orysiaua
(
@CHUkraineForum
) on the anniversary of Russia's invasion.
Watch in full:
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wonder how much inconvenient
#UkraineRussiaWar
news has been stifled in this way
The D-Notice: Very British State Censorship via
@scheer_post
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if you think this is a satisfactory response to my argument, suggest you read my review again - carefully
What is the point of Bellingcat?
@UnHerd
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Yes, but where were
@BBCNews
,
#UK
MSM, when reporting truth could have made a difference?
They were/are keeping ppl like me off airwaves &/or slandering us as 'shills' for
#Kremlin
. By calling for diplomacy, we were trying to save Ukrainian lives.
Ukraine loses men mounting >8% of total force minimum - BBC
70,000 dead and as many as 120,000 injured. It is a staggering figure, from an armed forces estimated at only half a million strong.
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Striking how many principled western opponents of
#clusterbombs
suddenly find they are not so wicked after all, if used by 'our side'. & We wonder why
#BRICS
etc talk about double standards
#UkraineRussiaWar
️
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Pernicious attempt here to brand as
#conspiracytheorists
those who rightly challenge suspect official narratives e.g. re
#skripals
#whitehelmets
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No. Stalin's famine killed millions of Russians & Kazakhs, too. It stemmed primarily from ideological, not ethnic, considerations. Forced collectivisation of agriculture
Watching Mr Jones tonight on BBC 2 about the atrocities caused under Stalin in Ukraine.
Makes me think it’s about time the United Kingdom joins the US, Germany and the European Parliament - to name a few - in recognising The Holodomor as genocide.
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an articulate exposition of an argument that is ill-conceived & dangerous in almost every point
Ukraine is fighting for all of us. Now Europe must fight too | Simon Tisdall
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street lighting in london, incl in centre, is dire. far worse than most european capitals, & there are lobbies trying to dim it further, as 'light pollution'. i'm all for seeing more stars, but there needs to be more street lighting than less.
@Future_Cities
I have no objection to the demo. But agree, I do object to telling men to stay indoors. Btw I once helped organise a
#ReclaimTheStreets
demo a million years ago, and we worked hard to persuade men to attend. We were demanding street lighting btw and eventually we won.
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isn't it time for the west
@NATO
#US
#UK
etc to stop fuelling this war with weapons and start trying to do something, anything, to stop the carnage?
#UkraineRussiaWar
The cost of the war in Ukraine has risen to $600bn
#Russia
#Ukraine
#UkraineWar
#RussiaUkraineWar
#bne
#EmergingMarkets
#sanctions
#bne
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The Conversation About Ukraine Is Cracking Apart - What government officials are saying in public, and private, is fascinating—and full of contradictions.
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because 1. british &
#US
intelligence helped lead us into
#iraq
war on a false premise and against british interests, and 2. it is outrageous to slur reasonable & responsible scepticism as tantamount to treachery
Pathetic and predictable. From Salisbury to the Middle East, why can he never bring himself to back British allies, British intelligence or British interests?
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Exactly. This is the concise, admirably documented, reference book anyone trying to challenge dominant - & wrong - narrative needs in their armoury
I only heard about this short, devastating book a few days ago and know nothing of its author. But everyone should try to get hold of and read its urgent, well-researched arguments.
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"For its first two years, the Integrity Initiative was funded by private individuals ..." such as??
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one problem is that 'stay at home, protect the nhs' etc was so effective that anything else is interpreted as 'don't stay at home, imperil the nhs, kill people.... '
Wrote a heartfelt essay/blog for
@SpecCoffeeHouse
on my fears about how 'new normal' might mean accepting less freedom.
We need to be wary of how lockdown safety/liberty stand-off could create a dangerous long-term cultural climate of a less free society:
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meanwhile those of us dissenters who might be described as on fringe of elites are slandered as 'shills for Putin', kept off airwaves, & excluded from conversation
#UkraineRussiaWar
An overwhelming majority of Western citizens don’t support NATO’s proxy war in Ukraine — and even less so, it follows, all-out war with Russia. So what are our elites doing? Escalating military support for Ukraine — and pushing for WW3. In the name of democracy, of course.
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The longer I watch this, the more I wonder why on earth we -
#UK
- are training
#Ukrainians
to be soldiers, not peace-makers.
They aren't soldiers, but they're preparing for battle.
Stacey Dooley: Ready For War? is on
@bbciplayer
now 👉
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there are good arguments for neutrality - & Ukraine, which had neutrality enshrined in its post-Soviet constitution - might have been better advised to stick with it
Indeed. Looks like the Danubian basin is going neutralist, with various shades and varieties of philo-putinism: ambiguous Austria 🇦🇹, brazen Hungary 🇭🇺 and now Slovakia 🇸🇰
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I find this horrific, & all the more so for the upbeat gloss - amputees 'even more motivated' etc. No. These are ppl whose lives & lives of whose families have been changed forever. It's a tragedy, & why UK, US should be pressing for diplomacy, not more war
#UkraineRussiaWar
Ukraine may now have more amputees than Britain had in the First World War. George Grylls finds them even more motivated than before
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No,
@bill_emmott
,
@ClarkeMicah
is right. This is not 'plain fact'. In signing
#Minsk
accords,
#Putin
accepted independent
#Ukraine
, as he has done thro'out his presidency. Also recognised
#Ukraine
's right to determine own future in his in/famous 2021 essay. Read it. Properly.
@ClarkeMicah
@mikewatso
Well I would never expect better of you
@ClarkeMicah
. But to obsess in this public way about whether a paraphrase of an absolutely plain fact has been tied to a specific quote is beyond absurd. Over and out
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really hate way some ppl far from frontline argue simplistically for tanks for Ukraine so it can beat
#Russia
, when only certainty is not victory but ever more
#Ukrainian
death & destruction
@SkyNews
press review
#UkraineRussiaWar
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remember, everyone, this is at best
#faction
, at worst
#fiction
. latest stage in official
#UK
mythologising of
#skripals
#salisbury
TV tonight: The Salisbury Poisonings begin to unfurl
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So
#Norway
(
@NATO
) takes
@BBCkatyaadler
on 'exclusive' trip to see
#NordstreamSabotage
damage & all she reports is their spin on need to secure undersea cables etc B/c? B/c 'they're keeping intelligence v close to their chests'. You bet they are. Who did it?
#UkraineRussiaWar
️
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Western media never seem to understand that
#Russia
actions are more often reactions to actions taken by others
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Compare & contrast reporting of 100 dead in
#Syria
bomb w/ 50 dead in
#Ukraine
missile strike. One for journalism school.
#justsaying
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so labour is at its weakest, is it,
#DavidMiliband
, with the Corbyn effect giving it biggest grass-roots membership of any party in Europe?
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but... awful lot of political capital now lost by both Starmer & Gray: his decision to appoint her calls into question his judgement in host of ways; her move direct from Civil Service called into question her impartiality in previous jobs & by implication that of Civil Service
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Keir Starmer’s ruthlessness and unsentimentality is like nothing I’ve encountered in decades of reporting on the brutal world of British politics.
It was transparently obvious that the centre of his government had been dysfunctional
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they might as well hold the whole thing in secret - which would be a lot quicker, & have the advantage of honesty: that the truth
#Skripals
is a lot murkier than the official
@GOVUK
version & will not be allowed to come out
this 'inquiry' is already a travesty. it won't start until earliest 11/24;
@GOVUK
is keeping all docs from
#DawnSturgess
family; much (most?) docs will be redacted & much (most?) 'evidence' will be heard in 'closed' session. glasnost UK-style
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Can we make peace w/
#Putin
?
#UkraineRussiaWar
Well, you can't make peace w/
#Putin
w/out trying to understand Putin & why he went to war. I was approached to take part - then disinvited.... That's why this angle is missing
Watch
#CommonGround
live: As Ukrainian cities face a renewed Russian bombardment,
@trevorptweets
and his guests debate whether we can make peace with Putin
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sermon on upholding rules-based international order from
@VP
@MunSecConf
no mention of Serbia, Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan... let alone Vietnam, Cambodia, Central America.
does no one understand how this looks from 'global South'?
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