🔹The secretary general of the Asian Clearing Union (ACU) Farhad Morsali, said Iran’s 🇮🇷 financial messaging system SEPAM has been accepted by ACU members as an internal financial messaging system. It will take six months for the union’s own messaging system to be ready, and in the meantime, the members should replace SWIFT with SEPAM, for which Iran will charge a fee.

🔹It was recently discovered that all banks of Russia and over 100 banks in 13 other countries have been connected to Irans SEPAM. The Russian 🇷🇺 system for the transfer of financial messages, SPFS, has been linked with Iran’s SEPAM and the messages between the two systems are sent on the basis of the SWIFT standards.

🔹Last month at the ACU summit, the regional banking bloc seeks easier clearing of payments between its member states, & have agreed to launch a system that will rival the SWIFT international payment network. The main objective of the ACU are to facilitate payments among member countries for eligible transactions.

🔹Currently, the members of ACU are the central banks of Iran 🇮🇷, India 🇮🇳, Bangladesh 🇧🇩, Bhutan 🇧🇹, Maldives 🇲🇻, Nepal 🇳🇵, Pakistan 🇵🇰, Sri Lanka 🇱🇰, and Myanmar🇲🇲. Four other observer members are Russia 🇷🇺, Belarus 🇧🇾, Afghanistan 🇦🇫 and representatives of the Islamic Development Bank.

Video source- RT (archived from last month)

🔹Russia 🇷🇺 and Algeria 🇩🇿 are set to deepen military cooperation, as a declaration was signed by the Russian and Algerian Presidents Vladimir Putin and Abdelmadjid Tebboune. President Tebboune is on a state visit in Moscow. President Putin considers it important to expand the practice of mutual settlements in national currencies with Algeria. Tebboune mentioned to Putin that Algeria's accession to the BRICS 🇧🇷🇷🇺🇮🇳🇨🇳🇿🇦 is a priority as Algiers applied to join in 2022.

🔹Both countries have agreed to comprehensively develop cooperation in the trade and economic sphere and signed a declaration of deepened strategic partnership. They have agreed to develop direct contacts between banks of the countries and promote the transition to payments in national currencies. Both presidents will speak at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum on June 16th.

🔹Russian 🇷🇺 Economic Development Minister Maxim Reshetnikov said Moscow was considering the possibility of signing a free trade agreement with Algeria. Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin at a meeting with the Algerian president said they welcome Algeria's interest in expanding cooperation with the Eurasian Economic Union.

🔹Both countries are working within multilateral formats in particular OPEC+ and Gas Exporting Countries Forum towards stability in global energy 🛢markets. Algeria 🇩🇿 will receive the status of a non-permanent member of the UN 🇺🇳 Security Council starting next year. Russia and Algeria will also enhance the exchange of intelligence in the fight against terrorism and extremism.

Video source - KremlinNews, IntelRepublic & RTIndia.

🔹Bangladesh 🇧🇩 Foreign Minister A.K. Abdul Momen reveals the country's aspirations of becoming a BRICS member. He revealed this after a meeting between Bangladesh's Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and South African 🇿🇦 President Cyril Ramaphosa in Geneva🇨🇭. Bangladesh is already a member of the BRICS New Development Bank since 2021.

🔹PM 🇧🇩 Hasina will attend the BRICS leaders’ summit scheduled to take place in South Africa in August. However, Bangladesh is not presently a Dialogue Partner as other BRICS member applicants such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and UAE. The country will use this move to diversify foreign relations and reduce the dominance of the US and the US dollar.

🔹Washington 🇺🇸 previously warned it would slap visa ✈️ restrictions on Bangladeshi citizens who undermine the democratic election process at home. The US is the largest importer of Bangladeshi products, importing $8.3 billion worth of goods in 2021 & US companies are among the largest foreign investors in the Muslim-majority country.

Last reported on this channel:

💠 Bangladesh's 🇧🇩 ministry of commerce looks at the possibility of using the Indian rupee instead of the US dollar with India 🇮🇳. Both countries reached a deal that will see a small part of their bilateral trade transactions settled in their own currencies

💠 Bangladesh is set to make loan repayments in Chinese 🇨🇳 yuan for its nuclear power plant being built by Russia

🔹Iran's 🇮🇷 President Ebrahim Raeisi has completed his tour of three Latin American countries, Venezuela, Nicaragua & Cuba.

Venezuela 🇻🇪:
🔹Iran and Venezuela plans to increase the volume of bilateral trade to 10 then 20 billion dollars. The countries signed signed a total of 19 cooperation agreements and MoU's mainly in the the fields of communication technology, energy, insurance, marine transportation, higher education, agriculture, medicine, culture and mines. CEO of Iran’s second largest car 🚗 manufacturer Saipa said Iran will supply 200,000 cars to Venezuela under a five-year deal.

Nicaragua 🇳🇮:
🔹Three cooperation agreements were signed by high-level delegations from Iran and Nicaragua covering areas of cooperation including trade, economy and health.. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega dedicated several minutes of a speech to General Qassem Soleimani, who was assassinated by Yankee imperialism when he was fighting against terrorism,” Ortega said, after which the two leaders observed a minute of silence for the general. (Nicaragua is under US 🇺🇸 sanctions for its human rights records)

Cuba 🇨🇺:
🔹Iran and Cuba signed 🖋six cooperation documents aimed at enhancing economic, trade and cultural ties. The agreements also entail comprehensive cooperation in foreign relations, political consultations, the exchange of information, and communications and technology. Both countries plan in the future to activate a Joint Commission of Economic Cooperation.

Video source- PressTV

🔹UAE 🇦🇪 President Sheikh Mohamed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan met with Russian 🇷🇺 Vladimir Putin at the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in St. Petersburg, Russia. President Al Nahyan has reinforced the importance of communication and dialogue to support regional and international stability and peace.

🔹The two leaders discussed the longstanding relations as part of the UAE-Russia strategic partnership framework. The UAE working visit was led by a delegation of high ranking advisors, gov't ministers and diplomats. President 🇷🇺 Putin thanked the UAE president for his efforts in mediating at least one sensitive prisoner exchange between Russia and Ukraine 🇺🇦.

🔹The UAE 🇦🇪, like Saudi Arabia 🇸🇦, is a member of the OPEC+ oil alliance and has not joined Western sanctions against Moscow. The UAE continues to support all efforts aimed at reaching a political solution through dialogue & diplomacy.

🔹The SPIEF underscored Moscow’s pivot towards Asia and countries in the Global South, as over 130 nations and 17,000 delegates took part, despite the boycott by Western countries for a second consecutive year. The main theme of this year’s forum was “sovereign development” in a bid to boost domestic industries and stimulate local investment.

🔹The US 🇺🇸, UK 🇬🇧 & EU 🇪🇺 threatened countries who decided to send delegations to SPIEF. Nations were threatened that they would face consequences, that the next… package of sanctions is just around the corner and that everyone should think twice before participating in events on the territory of Russia.

Video source- Crux, RT, Pepe UK

🔹Pakistan 🇵🇰 and Russia 🇷🇺 agreed to further deepen and diversify their bilateral cooperation after the fifth round of Pakistan-Russia Bilateral Political Consultations was held in Islamabad. This month, Pakistan received its first shipment of 95,000 metric tonnes of Russian crude 🛢 oil under an agreement signed between the two countries in April.

🔹Islamabad's Minister of State for Petroleum Musadik Malik, did not disclose the commercial details of the deal, including pricing or the discount from Russia, but said, the “payment was made in the Chinese Renminbi. The purchase of the shipment is a trial run to judge financial and technical feasibility, while all the tests and trials had been done, which found that the Russian crude was fit to refine and market locally.

🔹Recently a decision was made to allow barter trade with other sanctioned neighbouring countries, Afghanistan 🇦🇫, Iran 🇮🇷, and Russia 🇷🇺, which would ease Pakistan's difficulties in meeting its energy import bill and also boost exports. Pakistan, the world’s fifth most populous country, is reeling under a severe economic crisis, resulting in a shortage of foreign currency to pay for fuel imports.

🔹N.B. “China 🇨🇳 and Pakistan 🇵🇰 have a currency swap agreement to facilitate trade in local currencies. As bilateral trade between the two countries grows and new projects are launched under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the two countries have agreed to the use of yuan and Pakistani rupees for financial transactions,”

Video source - PressTV & Firstpost

Copper update: Copper prices hit a seven-week high 📈 today and is trading around $8,675/metric ton.

🔹Copper available to the market in London Metal Exchange 🇬🇧 approved warehouses fell to the lowest 📉 level since October 2021 after large amounts of inventory were earmarked to leave the LME system. There is a fresh cancellation of warrants (documents that confer ownership). This indicates only an intention to take delivery of metal.

🔹Iran 🇮🇷 has discovered a new copper deposit 🪨 that is believed to be the largest such reserve in the Middle East and North Africa region. The porphyry copper deposit discovered in Sarcheshmeh, Kerman contains an estimate of 3 billion metric tons of copper ore with a purity of 42%. Porphyry deposits are large, low-grade metal ore bodies that are formed from hydrothermal fluids derived from an underlying magma reservoir.

🔹The Norwegian 🇳🇴 gov't opened the door for deep-sea mining in its waters, despite opposition from environmental groups. The focus will be on seabed crusts on the country’s continental shelf. The target crusts contain copper, zinc and cobalt, as well as some rare-earth elements.

🔹The Rio Tinto Group 🇦🇺 intends to invest about $920 million at its Kennecott copper operations in Utah 🇺🇸 as part of a plan to increase its supply in North America.

🔹Chile's 🇨🇱 passed a bill increasing taxation on large copper mining ⛏. A maximum effective tax rate is 46.5% of the operating profit for those companies that produce more than 80,000 metric tons of fine copper.

💠 In Feb. this channel posted that a copper deficit is set to inundate global markets throughout 2023, fueled by increasingly challenged South American supply streams and higher demand pressures.

Video source - EMG Advisors

Food Security Update USA 🇺🇸/Canada 🇨🇦:

🔹The cost of farm equipment continues to soar, especially the ones that are one or two decades old with fewer microchips. The second-hand market for large and small tractors 🚜 and combines is hot due to supply chain issues of procuring a new tractor as farmers are ditching new high-tech tractors with higher capital and maintenance costs.

🔹Jefferies scraped used equipment website shows large farm equipment was up 13% year-over-year in June, while small farm equipment ⚙️ was up 11.4%. Demand remains strong in the used combine market, with list prices continuing to push to new all-time highs. The average list price for combines was up 42.5% YoY, with the number of total listings up 27.4% YoY.

🔹The Association of Equipment Manufacturers data show combine harvesters having continued growth in North America. US 🇺🇸 combine harvester sales are up 68.3% YoY. In Canada 🇨🇦 combines gained 📈 68.3% for the month, and 107.7% for the year.

🔹At auctions, in some cases, dealers are paying more than they should for used equipment, to satisfy their customers as there is a shortage from manufacturers 🏭 on new equipment of that type such as skid loaders and vertical tillage. The delayed delivery of new combines has made the market flush with late-model, low-hour machines. For the first time, used combines are more expensive than new combines.

🔹The next biggest threat is interest rates. The cost to hold equipment inventory on the lot is through the roof. The floorplan interest cost for a $500,000 combine at a 7% interest rate is $97.22 per day. The profit margin is quickly eaten up at this rate. At some point in the future, a scenario for a big selloff of used combines is possible.

Gold update:
🔹China 🇨🇳 has increased its gold reserves for a seventh consecutive month, with an addition of approximately 16 tons in May.

🔹The IMF demands that the gov't of Ghana 🇬🇭 make full disclosure of it's ongoing gold for oil trade deals if it wants the IMF to fulfil a $3 billion Extended Credit Facility programme.

🔹Iran 🇮🇷 has ramped up its imports of gold (3.262 metric tons in the past 6months) amid efforts by the country to offset the impacts of US 🇺🇸 sanctions on its economy.

🔹The UAE 🇦🇪 imported 75.7 tonnes of Russian gold worth $4.3 billion in the 12 months post March 2022, up from just 1.3 tonnes during 2021. The UAE, China and Türkiye 🇹🇷 accounted for 99.8% of Russian 🇷🇺gold exports.

🔹India 🇮🇳 - If local gold prices continue to rise, recycled bullion sales are expected to jump more than 20% and match the previous high of 119.5 tons set in 2019.

🔹Gold giant Newmont has declared force majeure on deliveries of metal products from its Peñasquito mine in Mexico 🇲🇽 due to an ongoing strike where workers are demanding a larger share of the mine's profits.

🔹Rumours continue of mystery gold buyers driving up the price, speculation points to the Central Banks of Russia & China 🇨🇳.

Video source - Sean Foo

🔹Irish Member 🇮🇪 of the European Parliament, Mick Wallace breaks silence on Ukrainian agricultural land being expropriated via schemes by Western hedge funds such as Blackrock and facilitated through Ukrainian oligarchs and Western financial institutions (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development & the European 🇪🇺 Investment Bank). His microphone was cut as he was completing his sentence "what are the working class Ukrainians dying for...?".

🔹An MoU between Ukraine 🇺🇦 and BlackRock on the creation of the Ukrainian Development Fund formalises the processes of transferring the country's main assets under the multinational's control. BlackRock also holds large stakes in Ukrainian companies Metinvest, DTEK, Naftogaz, Ukrzaliznytsia, Ukravtodor and Ukrenergo.

🔹Ukraine's budget deficit is being covered by EU 🇪🇺 and IMF assistance and the state is already pre-bankrupt by all accounts. An active sale of property to Blackrock and others are in motion before state bankruptcy. Cargill, Dupont and Bayer (formerly Monsanto), have bought 17 million hectares of Ukrainian agricultural 🚜 land. (the whole of Italy 🇮🇹 has 16.7 million hectares of agricultural land).

🔹Even billions of dollars of US military aid to Ukraine 🇺🇦 is predatory debt paving the way to theft of Ukraine’s assets. Under Clause (3) of the Lend-Lease Act of 2022: "Any loan or lease of defense articles to the Government of Ukraine under paragraph (1) shall be subject to all applicable laws concerning the return of and reimbursement 💵 and repayment...".

🔹A number of large US 🇺🇸pension funds, foundations and university endowments are also invested in Ukrainian land through NCH Capital – a US-based private equity fund, which is the fifth largest landholder in the country. President Zelenskyy put the land reform into law in 2020 against the will of the vast majority of the population who feared it would exacerbate corruption and reinforce control by powerful interests in the agricultural sector.

🔹Kenyan 🇰🇪 President William Ruto described the global lending system as "unfair, punitive and not giving everybody a fair chance", while he attended a two-day summit in Paris 🇫🇷. French president Emmanuel Macron's high-stakes climate financing summit hit a snag as leaders from the Global South seek tangible change.

🔹Macron 🇫🇷 proposed tax on shipping 🚢 emissions reportedly gained support, and could be addressed at the International Maritime Organisation meeting next month. But more comprehensive tax proposals – ranging from taxes on polluters and fossil fuel 🛢companies to financial transactions were discretely parked.

🔹Ruto said: "We are tired of this story" painting Africans as "victims of climate change" who are "looking for favours" and "complaining". "We do not want to look for help. We want to participate in the solution,". Ruto 🇰🇪 wants to attract private investment more than development aid for his eastern African nation, but he is also calling for reform of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

Last reported on this channel:

💠 President Ruto encouraged traders in African states to use the Afreximbank (African Export Import Bank) trade mechanism that allows trade between each other in goods and services, where the remaining balance is settled in local currencies.

💠 Kenyan 🇰🇪 gov't starts making purchases of oil using Kenyan shillings so oil brokers will not hoard dollars.

💠 India has given approval for opening a special rupee vostro account with Kenya for facilitating international trade in the Indian 🇮🇳 rupee.

💠 Saudi 🇸🇦 Aramco to supply petroleum products in Kenya for 6 months on credit, due to Kenya's shortage of US dollars.

Video source - Simon Ateba

🔹The Netherlands 🇳🇱 is set to shut down its Groningen gas fields on Oct. 1, leaving it on stand-by in case of an exceptionally cold winter. As of October 2024, the gas fields will be closed permanently and dismantled. The reason given was resulting tremors (earthquakes) related to drilling. Groningen, which still holds massive reserves of natural gas, supplied gas to 98% of the Dutch population as of 2019.

🔹Europe’s LNG 🚢 imports surpassed those coming to the continent via pipelines for the first time. Pipeline gas imports last year were about 151 billion cubic meters, compared with 232 billion a year earlier 📉. The 35% year-on-year drop contrasts with LNG imports, which increased 📈 to 170 billion cubic meters in 2022 from 108 billion a year earlier. Europe was a premium market (paying higher prices), which helped lure more LNG to its shores.

🔹Europe faces a cut-off of piped Russian 🇷🇺 natural gas that transits Ukraine in 2024 as Kiev 🇺🇦 does not plan to renew a five-year transit contract with Gazprom first signed in 2019. Ukraine has secured $7 billion dollars 💵 in transit fees from Russia on this contract.

🔹There is another option if the contract is not renewed, but is highly unlikely given present circumstances. Gazprom 🇷🇺 could technically still send gas through Ukraine by booking capacity through auctions that its gas transmission system operator is obliged to hold, under European 🇪🇺 rules.

🔹European gas prices surged to more than 10 times their normal level in 2022, reaching the equivalent of almost $600 a barrel in oil terms, but have since fallen sharply 📉. The benchmark TTF contract is back to about €40 per megawatt hour — down almost 90% from its peak last August.

Video source - Bloomberg, CGTN, University of Chicago.

🔹Siemens Energy shares previously fell 🔻36% (June 23rd) after the co. withdrew its fiscal 2023 profit guidance after it was discovered that components in wind turbines made by its subsidiary Siemens Gamesa are wearing out faster than expected. Its shares remain down🔻35% over the past 5 days as of June 27th and has dropped 🔻 39% for the past 30 days.

🔹The creaky components ⚙️, which affect 15% to 30% of the installed onshore fleet, will be expensive to fix. Management thinks the cost could run upward of 💶 €1 billion, ($1.09 billion), effectively wiping out more than a third of the profit the co. is expected to make doing maintenance on wind turbines it has already installed. Meanwhile, offshore turbines aren’t meeting their productivity targets due to rising material costs 📈 and manufacturing delays.

🔹Wind-turbine makers rely on the servicing side 🛠 of their business to generate steady earnings. But contracts guaranteeing a certain amount of uptime are turning out to be costly. Factually, wind generation is more expensive than we are being told and the performance of wind turbines tends to deteriorate with age.

🔹Siemens Energy and other manufacturers have given warranties on performance that won’t be met because of higher failure rates. Warranties have a limited period, often 5 to 8 years, but the higher failure rates will affect performance over the remainder of the life of the wind farms. Current energy policies in the West are based on foundations of sand – naïve optimism reinforced by enthusiastic lobbying divorced from engineering reality.

🔹Amid the wind energy turmoil, Sweden 🇸🇪 is now looking to build more nuclear reactors 🏭 after its parliament formally abandoned its 100% renewable energy target of meeting net-zero by 2045. The decision implicitly acknowledges the low quality of unstable wind and solar. Meanwhile, France 🇫🇷 is planning to hike it's wind energy higher above the target of 40 GW to align with the EU’s 2030 climate goal.

Video source- Bloomberg

The de-industrialisation of Germany 🇩🇪- Part 8:

🔹Textile company Hofer Spinnerei Neuhof files for bankruptcy after 125 years of spinning mill 👕operations.

🔹One of the country's largest mail order 📦 co.'s, Klingel, from Pforzheim, existing since 1923 is insolvent.

🔹Glass manufacturer Weck GmbH & Co of Dortmund is bankrupt after 120 years in operation.

🔹Germany’s central bank may need a bailout to cover losses on the debt 💶 it hoovered up as part of it's massive €650bn bond-buying programme from the ECB.

🔹Heads of the Employers’ Association in North Rhine-Westphalia are worried the nation is at a dangerous point and is dissatisfied with the gov't after Germany slipped into a technical recession. Almost one-third of German medium-sized Mittelstand 🏭 firms are thinking about transferring production and jobs abroad.

🔹 Germany's business climate index dropped 📉 to 88.5 this month from 91.5 in May.

🔹German exports of motor vehicles and engines to China 🇨🇳 plunged by 26% Y-o-Y in Q1 2023.

Previous parts on the de-industrialisation of Germany 🇩🇪:

💠 Part 7 - May '23 - 300-year-old traditional slaughterhouse Röhrs Butchery 🥩 filed for bankruptcy along with 2 other century old business.

💠 Part 6 - Mar '23 - Eisenwerk Erla ⚒ of Saxony, files for bankruptcy after more than 600 years of existence. Other century old businesses go bankrupt.

💠 Part 5 - Feb. '23 & Part 4 - Jan. '23 - Year starts with a slew of bankruptcies of co.'s in operation for over 100 years.

💠 Part 3 - Nov. '22 - CEO of the Federation of German Industries 🏭 said 1 in 4 German co.'s is considering moving production to other countries.

💠 Part 2 - Nov. '22 & Part 1 - Oct. '22 - Manufacturers after existing for over a century shut down.

Video source- Afd in English.

🔹Over 328 arrests in France 🇫🇷 after the 3rd night of protests post the fatal police shooting of a teenager in a Paris suburb. Some 40,000 law enforcement officers were deployed nationwide on Thursday June 29th, to quell potential violence, including about 5,000 in the capital and its inner suburbs. Firefighters 🚒 ask Parisians to only call for emergencies.

🔹The unrest comes after a 17-year-old driver was shot and killed by a police officer during a traffic check in Nanterre on Tuesday morning. The officer 👮‍♂️ was detained on suspicion of manslaughter amid an ongoing investigation into the incident. Police stations, schools and town halls are set on fire 🔥 or attacked along with reports of looting. Much of the unrest has been centred in the capital Paris 🇫🇷.

🔹The 17-year-old who died has been identified only as Nahel. His mother is Algerian and father Moroccan. He was known to police for previous incidents in which he failed to comply with traffic stops. Nahel died from a single shot through his left arm and chest. President Macron faces criticism for attending an Elton John concert 🎉 during the protests.

🔹Police spotted him driving a Mercedes on a bus lane in Nanterre on the western outskirts of Paris. They attempted to pull him over at a red light 🚦using sirens and lights, but Nahel disobeyed and committed several traffic offences. Tuesday's killing was the third fatal shooting during traffic stops in France so far in 2023, down from a record 13 last year.

🔹Ethiopia's 🇪🇹 Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Meles Alem confirms the country's BRICS 🇧🇷🇷🇺🇮🇳🇨🇳🇿🇦 membership application."We have applied for membership and we expect BRICS to give us a positive response to the request we have made". "As a country that has been a founding member of global institutions like the African Union and the UN, and as we seek to guarantee our national interests, it is important to join blocs like BRICS".

🔹With the second-largest population in Africa, Ethiopia 🇪🇹 sees an opportunity to tap into the benefits of BRICS membership. Though its current economy ranks 59th globally (IMF data), Ethiopia's rapid growth and sizable population make it an appealing contender for the bloc.

June 2023 BRICS developments reported on this channel:

💠 Bangladesh 🇧🇩 plants to join BRICS & will attend the BRICS leaders’ summit scheduled to take place in South Africa in August.

💠 Algerian 🇩🇿 President A. Tebboune met Russian President V. Putin and mentioned that Algeria's accession to the BRICS bloc is a priority as Algiers applied to join in 2022.

💠 Honduras 🇭🇳 formally requested to join the New Development Bank of the BRICS group.

💠 Egypt 🇪🇬 applied to join the BRICS bloc.

💠 The BRICS Ministers of Foreign Affairs met in Cape Town, South Africa on June 1st for a BRICS summit.

Video source - TVC News Nigeria, AfricaNews, Africa Diaspora News.

🔹EU 🇪🇺 Commission President U. von der Leyen has disregarded the European Central Bank fears that confiscating the proceeds of frozen Russian assets would damage the euro or financial markets. This has raised concerns in Global South countries whether their sovereign assets in Western jurisdictions are safe from such counterparty risks and violation of international laws governing private property rights.

🔹The assets seized would likely generate about 3 billion euros 💶, each year. Several major global banks are concerned that appropriating Russian 🇷🇺 assets could cause Moscow to retaliate against their remaining interests in the country. One executive said his bank is opposed in principle to confiscation by the EU.

🔹The EU's action undermines ‘Lex Mercatoria’ (Latin – ‘Merchant Law’). The autonomous legal order of international economic relations for trade & rules for settling disputes. The West has now destroyed, how money & currencies function in relationship to trade & private property rights.

🔹The EU 🇪🇺 plans so far, falls short of seizing the underlying assets themselves. The EU has been looking into the 'legal' options (non-existent) to confiscate Russia’s assets frozen under sanctions. However, the sovereign assets of the Russian 🇷🇺 Central Bank belong to the citizens of the Russian Federation, not specific individuals.

🔹Legal experts view the EU's actions as constituting to “theft twice over”, first by seizing the money in the first place, and then preventing Russia from collecting its due interest. Such theft blatantly violates the UN's Charter and the laws of war, noting if they can do this to Russia they can do it to any citizens’ assets.

🔹Apart from Germany's 🇩🇪 de-industrialisation, capital flight from the country is an early indicator that investors are safe-guarding their assets from jurisdictions engaging in piracy. In 2022, $132 billion more direct investment flowed away, than investments made in Germany.

🔹French 🇫🇷 police have reportedly seized weapons supplied by the West to Ukraine from rebels participating in French riots. Gendarmes found two modified large-calibre rifles from Accuracy International, which were supplied to Ukraine last summer. Videos from various sources show rioters armed with military grade weapons despite France being known for its strict gun control laws, with ownership of military grade weapons banned completely.

🔹Last December, the EU dismissed warnings when Nigerian 🇳🇬 President Muhammadu Buhari urged heads of neighbouring African states 🇧🇯 🇹🇩 🇳🇪 🇨🇫 to take independent action against Western arms smuggling from Ukraine. Boko Haram & ISIS terrorists in Africa were receiving weapons from Ukraine through the black market.

🔹In October 2022, Finland 🇫🇮 began warning of weapons sent to Ukraine making their way to different countries criminal gangs. USA's CBS retracted a report on Aug 7th, that 70% of weapon deliveries to Ukraine 🇺🇦 end up in a black hole of corruption. Also a USA-made stinger from Ukraine was detained in Germany.

🔹Some of these weapons in the footage may have also come from a looted gun shop in the southern French 🇫🇷 city of Marseille and police stations that were broken into.

🔹This week, the French 🇫🇷 gov't have begun censoring social media platforms to prevent videos of protestors firing weapons from surfacing as corporate media downplays the reality of events. Various sources on Telegram have published scenes of this armed violence (video).

🔹Last July, this channel warned about weapons from 🇺🇸🇬🇧🇪🇺 NATO countries to Ukraine being purchased on the dark web (pics in original post) at huge discounts. We also drew reference to two Caesar self-propelled howitzers ($7 million each) sold by Ukrainians to Russia 🇷🇺 for $120,000 though an intermediary.