Corruption index for 2024 among 180 countries :
82. Hungary /sinks - 2020:69
105. Ukrajine /improves 2020:117
141. Russia /lost case 2020:129
You understand now what brings EU help to Ukraine and russian influence to Hungary. Ukraine+EU will simply improve the fight against corruption :-)

Yes, you still can organize, fight & hope the regime will be destroyed in 2028 and the perpetrators prosecuted. In China you would have zero hope for change, there might never be a real freedom over there. I am trying to change the view angle & rise your fight spirit. You still have options in US.

No matter if it was FN Herstal testing new gear or just some charity, I applaud you Belgique friends. Now only convince your politicians to unblock the frozen russian assets for armament of Ukraine :-)

Ok, they may lock you, but if you are citizen / not deported, you still can hope for due process. In China you have guaranteed no due process, but the judge gets instructed what the sentence has to be from the single existing and all governing political party - the CCP. Difference is light years...

I am sympathetic for your anger and US under this administration may ignore also US law. But US is still light years away from Chinese dictatorship. I lived in wannabe communist dictatorship for 18 years & confess the parallel doesn't work. The trajectory is bad though and fight is necessary.

The genocidal, imperial, colonial russia must be dismantled like wall of Lego bricks, there is no other cure for this most dangerous illness of humanity. The people of this fake country of the fake history since 1917 have to be reeducated for decades to be allowed into civilized nations.

Right, DE suffered to cheap energy blindness towards russia & cheap labor blindness towards China. But all the policy was driven by russian agents like Schroeder, Merkel etc. You need to sum Stasi + agents among relocated russians of german origin (about 2Million since 1990) Total number is crazy.

Try to talk about the Tiananmen Massacre in Beijing and in Washington. You will learn the difference in maximum 5 minutes. Crazy if you cannot tell the difference yourself. Little bit critical thinking please.

Look Tim, I lived 18 yrs in Czechoslovakia occupied by russians. Me & many others with the experience know the russians lie constantly. The fake country with fake history at least since 1917 is based on lying propaganda. But I applaud you stick to journalism ethics, well done & thanks for your work.

Forced mobilization of Ukrainian citizens to war against UA (basically all living in Crimea before occupation) is war crime.

I say this from the day one of the war. Complete ban on export not only cytostatics, but even no single pill of aspirin. We can normalize relations only after they GTFO of Ukraine and pay reparations.

You would be far before Ukraine, because you have no laws/standards obstacle, UK could be a member tomorrow. But long term commitment to the common project would need to be demonstrated. Could a join referendum be reverted by leave one in the next election cycle? How predictable the parties are?

Russia’s economy roars like a bear, but scratch the surface and it’s paper-thin.
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Big simplification. Journalists used to have their ethics no matter who owned the media, they were the "4th" branch checking the balances. But people more and more buy and consume lies rather then truth, journalists had to adapt. People created Murdoch.

You suggest US supplied tanks to Boris Jelcin? Absolute nonsense. He faced coup suppressed it using tanks and later promoted Putin as his successor.

I like bsky very much. It is still small - x has 600M, tiktok 1.6B. No idea, how much of them in EU - I guess more than the 40M, Could bsky manage it? Just technically huge transition project. And there is European Mastodon. If EU bans service, then Eu suggests alternative.

agree, but we need EU social network - time, resources, resolution. And just one small thing - people have to adopt it.

I was impressed by the King Charles and the theater he organized to achieve something reasonable with the Trump. I read for years speculations on how he should be skipped for William to become the King. Charles proved it wrong. William would not be such a good player for now as the Charles is.

Since treason they committed in Kursk the US can't be trusted anymore. I know we have to play the game we trust them.

Hard to imagine for someone not involved how you make sure the FSB is not present in the meeting with HU & SK, maybe CY attendees. Or if there is a trust to them, what game they play at home and how you check for OPSEC breach within 27 agencies. Very paranoid situation.

Is it common you have international observers to secure fair elections in the US? If not, are there any plans to invite them for the Midterms? Thanks

unfortunately not fast enough. Many of them don't feel the pain yet = pressure on Put is not sufficient & financial flows are not properly dried

Art imitating life, years before it happened.

And here we are - hillbillies in the ascendency

It is not nice from them, they don't use the notepads for noticing the commands from dear leader. No North Korea level of the cult yet.

I guess the failed bond emission will be solved by printer of the CBR. I read they prepare bond in Juan, we will see if the Chinese are eager to burn some money in russia. From today's Ruskey conversation I got an impression that part of them may not feel any impact yet and are happy with the bonds.

I like this one very much. Nuclear armed Zimbabwean gas station on steroids!

That's I understood from your posts, they are unable to get cash by selling bonds. Putin will find a way how to socialize the war and pull more money from citizens. Will the Chinese not come and save them? I heard an analysis recently they can run the war for another 2-3 years at current rate.

this very long thread makes Bsky in my Firefox/Linux extremely slow. One second for typing one letter.

Could you please comment on data one Ruskey posted today: Russia has a very low budget deficit by global standards (around 3.5%), Russia's military spending is low 7-7.4% of GDP
Russia's public debt is low, at 16-20% of GDP.
(Recently I have seen 30% on military exp. for 2026)