Ukrainian Broadcaster Drops Oliver Stone’s Documentary After Threats to Staff & Grenade Attack

Corruption is Everywhere in Ukraine - Truth and free-speech be damned

Damage is seen on the facade of the building of Ukrainian 112 TV channel in Kiev, Ukraine. July 13, 2019.

© Reuters / Gleb Garanich

TV channel 112 Ukraine has canceled its planned broadcast of Oliver Stone’s documentary ‘Revealing Ukraine’ after its office was attacked with a grenade launcher, a protest was held outside and employees received threats.

On top of the attack, the channel says it’s been enduring censorship and threats ever since it announced plans to broadcast the documentary. Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Yury Lutsenko lashed out at the channel, threatening it with prosecution should it air Stone’s film. The outlet’s editorial board was forced to recommend the broadcast be canceled.

“Taking into account these recommendations and the inability to fully protect the rights of journalists in the event of sanctions against the TV channel, the team of 112 Ukraine decided to cancel the film broadcast,” 112 Ukraine said on its website on Monday. 

The board said the decision was reached over increasing worries for the lives of the Channel’s journalists. It harshly criticized Ukraine’s authorities for their “extremely unsatisfactory” actions in defending the journalists and the fundamental right to freedom of speech in the country, warning it will ask international organizations for assistance if the situation does not change in the near future.

Earlier, 112 Ukraine had already pleaded with international press freedom watchdogs, the European Union and Ukraine’s law enforcement for protection, repeatedly claiming it had received threats from radical nationalists who oppose the сhannel’s editorial policy. Over the weekend, right-wing organizations staged a rally outside its headquarters, while some employees received personal messages with threats. On the night of July 13, the channel’s office was attacked by two unknown assailants with a grenade launcher. Nobody was hurt in the incident, although the blast caused damage inside the office. A criminal case was launched following the attack.

The film that has sparked the controversy is a documentary produced by Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone and directed by Ukrainian-American director Igor Lopatenok. It details the political crisis and armed conflict in Ukraine that broke out in 2014 and features an exclusive interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The film’s narrative doesn’t fit the one preferred by Kiev today and the decision to air the documentary faced harsh criticism.

‘Revealing Ukraine’ is to be shown in some 70 countries worldwide in the coming days.

But not in the country that needs to see it the most. The oligarchs are still in control.

Anglican Church of Canada Rejects Same-Sex Marriage Approvals in Vote

'There's a lot of grief right now among the delegates,'

says church's communication director

Maryse Zeidler · CBC News 

Some delegates were visibly upset when the motion to change the Anglican Church of Canada's

marriage canon wasn't passed on Friday night. (Anglican Church of Canada)

An Anglican Church of Canada vote to approve same-sex marriage failed to pass at its general assembly in Vancouver on Friday night. 

The motion would have amended the church's marriage canon to remove references to the sacrament being a union between a man and a woman — effectively allowing same-sex marriage.

The motion had to be approved through two rounds of votes. The first vote took place three years ago at the church's last general assembly, called a synod, in Richmond Hill, Ont., and the second reading was held late Friday evening.

Church rules require motions to be passed by a two-thirds majority from its three groups of delegates: the laity, clergy and bishops. On Friday, the requirement for the motion did not meet the threshold among the bishops.

Lay voters and members of the clergy were more than two-thirds in favour of the motion.

Meghan Kilty, the church's director of communications, says the vote has prompted strong reactions from many members and clergy.

"There's a lot of grief right now among the delegates," she said over the phone Saturday morning.

Kilty says many dioceses have been performing same-sex marriages since the 2016 vote. For example, she says, Toronto bishop Kevin Robertson was married to his husband in 2018 at St. James Cathedral. 

An Anglican Church of Canada vote on Friday night failed to pass a motion that would effectively

allow same-sex marriage. (Anglican Church of Canada)

Many intend to continue performing same-sex marriages, Kilty says, as there is still debate as to whether the church specifically prohibits it or not.

The church did pass a resolution to recognize that each diocese may respond to the issue of same-sex marriage in a way that best suits its theological understanding and practice.

Kilty says she expects the matter will continue to be debated throughout the synod, which lasts until Tuesday. 

Many of the church's dioceses have posted messages on social media acknowledging how devastating the results of the vote were to many of its members. 

But there seems to be little concern about how God would react except among the bishops.

Unfortunately, this story doesn't make clear whether the motion can be revived in the next synod, or whether they have to start over and win two consecutive votes.

The issue of gay rights and same sex marriage has divided the Anglican church around the world.

Also on Friday, the leader of the Anglican Church of Canada apologized for its "cultural and spiritual arrogance" that caused harm to Indigenous Peoples. 

Big Tech ‘Indenture Entire Populations into Servitude’ to Corporations & Govts – Snowden

Tech giants such as Google or Facebook store vast amounts of personal data for their own gain but they are also “happy to hand over” this data to governments, making people vulnerable to persecution, Edward Snowden warned.

Any person can pretty much be sure that “everything you've done, everything you've typed into their search box, everything you have clicked on, everything you've liked” is duly recorded and stored in the enormous databanks of the big tech corporations, the NSA whistleblower said addressing the UK Open Rights Group Conference (ORGCON19) in London via a video link from Moscow.

“Your communications, as they happen largely today, don't actually take place between you and the person that you are talking to. They happen between you and Facebook, who then provides a copy of it to the person you are talking to, or you and Gmail, who then gives a copy of it to the person that you are talking to and every time these transactions occur through these service providers, they keep a record of it.”

The corporations do that primarily to advance their own financial and economic interests, yet they seek to not only “better their class” but also to “better their state” and are, thus, more than happy to share the data they obtained with governments, which, in turn, make a use of it in its mass surveillance programs, Snowden warned.

“We see that governments increasingly care less and less about compliance, and care more and more about power,” he said, adding that the governmental security structures, which were supposedly created to protect the people against the threat of terrorism, are in fact used against pretty much anyone from critically-minded journalists and dissidents to immigrants and minorities.

The corporations, which now virtually control the most part of internet communications, have been long abusing their position of power, forcing people into relations one would never “meaningfully consent to” while staying largely unaccountable.

The law simply has not caught up to the fact that a technological corporation now can indenture entire populations into servitude to the corporate good, rather than to individual or public good.

His warnings came soon after Facebook agreed to give French authorities data on hate speech suspects. Earlier, the tech giant’s lawyer openly stated that the social network’s users do not actually have any privacy at all when it comes to their personal data.

Yet, the whistleblower added a portion of optimism to his otherwise grim speech by saying that the people are waking up to this situation and “that things are going to get better” because of the efforts of people who are not indifferent to this issue.

Snowden has been living in a self-imposed exile in Russia ever since he exposed the NSA’s vast surveillance network back in 2013, bringing to light information about the US security agency’s mass surveillance activities targeting millions of Americans as well as foreign leaders. He has been charged with espionage by Washington and faces arrest if he were to return home.

Ukrainian Channel Attacked with Grenade Launcher Ahead of Broadcasting Oliver Stone’s Documentary

FILE PHOTO. A crate with RPG-7 rocket-propelled grenades. ©Sputnik / Igor Zarembo

The office of a Ukrainian TV (News) channel, which has been complaining about threats coming from nationalists over its editorial policy, was attacked overnight with a grenade launcher.

The building of 112 Ukraine was damaged on Friday night by a grenade apparently fired from a single-shot launcher. Two people reportedly drove by the premises, fired the explosive at the big logo of the channel on the building wall and fled the scene, leaving the used launcher tube behind.

Nobody was hurt in the incident, although the blast was strong enough to cause some damage inside, according to the channel. 

Kiev police said they were investigating the attack as a terrorist act, but are yet to make any arrests in the case or identify the motive behind it. The channel called on Ukrainian authorities to act and stop criminals attacking it and announced it will ramp up security at the office.

The outlet earlier asked for protection by international press freedom organizations, the European Union and Ukraine’s law enforcement, saying it received numerous threats from radical nationalists. The reported surge may have been triggered by the decision to air the documentary ‘Revealing Ukraine’ by Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone.

The film details the political crisis and armed conflict in Ukraine and features, among other things, exclusive interviews with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian politician Victor Medvedchuk, who has close ties with the owner of 112 Ukraine.

It fails to follow the narrative about the conflict preferred by the current government in Kiev, so the decision was harshly criticized in the country. Prosecutor General Yury Lutsenko even threatened the channel with prosecution.

“I declare this: any attempts … to demonstrate the Russian propagandist film, which Medvedchuk’s channel is advertising, will result in punishment,” the top official said in a video address.

The actual owner of the channel, Taras Kozak, called the night grenade attack “the latest threat to independent media” and accused the Ukrainian authorities of dereliction of duty to protect journalists.

The documentary is scheduled to be aired next Tuesday.

Changing Gender for Perks? RT Hears Opinions on Trans Population Growth in UK Jails

And here's one more opinion for good measure

FILE PHOTO A prison in Rochester, Britain. January 2014. © Reuters / Peter Macdiarmid

With a growing number of prisoners identifying as transgender in Britain, the authorities worry that some inmates may be doing so in order to gain privileges. RT heard different takes on the issue.

There are currently up to 1,500 inmates who identify as transgender in England and Wales, according to the Chief Inspector of Prisons. That’s four times the national average in Britain.

Does that mean that transgenders a 4 times as likely to be criminals?

The authorities are now concerned that some male prisoners may choose to identify as transwomen in order to receive special perks like showering alone, having separate cells, or applying for transfer to female prisons.

The concerns were also fueled by the high-profile case of transgender inmate Karen White (6th story on link), who sexually assaulted two women last year after transferring to a female prison. Several months later, the first separate prison wing for transgender inmates was opened in Britain.

Human rights activist Peter Tatchell believes there is a way to protect both transgender inmates and female prisoners, making sure “they are comfortable and not threatened.”

We need to be aware of a tiny minority who may do bad things. But that does not mean to say that we should, therefore, generalize and adopt a kneejerk reaction to limit the rights of transgender people.

No, I like the knee-jerk reaction, myself. I think transgenders should get no special privileges until they have had reconstructive surgery. In other words - threaten to cut their wiener off and see if they still want to be trans.

But lawyer and columnist Luke Gittos argues that inmates tend to exploit the system for privileges, as “a lot of them, frankly, have nothing to lose in doing so.”

See, my plan gives them something to lose!

We need to make sure we’re robust in our treatment of this, and don’t allow ourselves to take all claims of transgenderism at face value, especially when it comes to prisoners in a male estate who stand to make material gains from doing so.

Finnish Study Finds ‘Practically No’ Evidence for Man-Made Climate Change - Japanese Study Confirms

©  Reuters / Charles Platiau

A new study conducted by a Finnish research team has found little evidence to support the idea of man-made climate change. The results of the study were soon corroborated by researchers in Japan.

In a paper published late last month, entitled ‘No experimental evidence for the significant anthropogenic climate change’, a team of scientists at Turku University in Finland determined that current climate models fail to take into account the effects of cloud coverage on global temperatures, causing them to overestimate the impact of human-generated greenhouse gasses.

Models used by official bodies such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) “cannot compute correctly the natural component included in the observed global temperature,” the study said, adding that “a strong negative feedback of the clouds is missing” in the models.

Adjusting for the cloud coverage factor and accounting for greenhouse gas emissions, the researchers found that mankind is simply not having much of an effect on the Earth’s temperature.

If we pay attention to the fact that only a small part of the increased CO2 concentration is anthropogenic, we have to recognize that the anthropogenic climate change does not exist in practice.

The study’s authors make a hard distinction between the type of model favored by climate scientists at the IPCC and genuine evidence, stating “We do not consider computational results as experimental evidence,” noting that the models often yield contradictory conclusions.

And yet, so many 'scientists' do consider computer models to be evidence, when really they are mostly the imagination of the model's creator. And they are almost always wrong. So why are they accepted as evidence?

Given the evidence presented in the study, the Finnish team rounded out the paper by concluding “we have practically no anthropogenic climate change,” adding that “the low clouds control mainly the global temperature.”

The results sharply cut against claims put forward by many environmentalists, including US lawmakers such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who argue not only that climate change is an immediate threat to the planet, but that it is largely a man-made phenomenon. Ocasio-Cortez, better known as ‘AOC’, has proposed a ‘Green New Deal’ to address the supposedly dire threat.

Japanese researchers at the University of Kobe arrived at similar results as the Turku team, finding in a paper published in early July that cloud coverage may create an “umbrella effect” that could alter temperatures in ways not captured by current modeling.

Why are Britons Becoming Less Tolerant of Gay Sex? Hint: It’s Not Due to Christians like Rees-Mogg

The pendulum is beginning to swing back on PCMadness

This is the second column in two days I've posted from Igor Ogorodnev.

His analysis of social attitudes is brilliant and well worth reading.

By Igor Ogorodnev

Gay pride in London and Muslim worshippers in Baitul Futuh mosque in the same city.

©  REUTERS/HENRY NICHOLLS;  REUTERS/Peter Nicholls

Acceptance of gay sex and pre-marital relationships has fallen for the first time in decades in the UK, but the media is insistent on blaming the wrong people for intolerance.

The annual British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey has found that 74 percent believe that sex before marriage is “not wrong at all,” a percentage point less than last year, and 66 percent of adults say the same about same-sex relationships (a 2% drop). While the declines are marginal and the numbers remain near historic peaks, the last time Britain grew less tolerant of homosexuals was during the AIDS panic of the late 1980s, and researchers state that openness has “plateaued” after years of rapid growth.

If in doubt, blame Brexit

The left-of-center media took no time to identify the reasons: the Guardian’s article on the subject features “Ukip, the Brexit party and the European Research Group (ERG) of Conservative MPs,” Arlene Foster of Northern Ireland’s DUP, “senior Conservative politicians including Andrea Leadsom and Esther McVey” and singles out Jacob Rees-Mogg, even though he doesn’t actually oppose same-sex relationships. In any case, one is left wondering why millions of Britons are suddenly taking their social cues from a Catholic father-of-six raised in a stately home by his devoted nanny. The Independent goes through much of the same list, throwing Theresa May and Boris Johnson into the mix, while on Sky News an LGBT activist said that Brexit had “emboldened” social conservatives.

©  BSA Survey

A more sophisticated thesis claims there is a backlash against the rapid progress of LGBT rights and other liberal causes that have become visible everywhere from shop fronts to street parades to politicians’ lapels, and sites that have left comments on are full of opinions from those claiming to be sick of alternative lifestyles “rammed down their throats.” As recently as 2012, fewer than half of Britons told the same survey that there was nothing wrong with homosexual relationships, so perhaps some of the defections to the rainbow flag may have been fleeting.

‘Non-Christians’

But the more obvious answer appears to be hiding in plain sight, in black and white, in the survey itself.

For example, fewer Catholics (82 percent) believe that premarital sex is “rarely wrong” or “not wrong at all” compared to those who do not follow any religion (93 percent). But the real social conservatives are not the old or the Christians, but a grouping of “Non-Christians” only 35 percent of whom believe that sex before marriage is acceptable.

©  BSA Survey

The picture is likely the same for same-sex relationships, though for reasons unknown the survey withholds a detailed breakdown of who exactly is against gay sex. But using the figures of 2016, which are available, only 30 percent of those non-Christians make allowances for LGBT couples – with acceptance rates 20 to 30 percent lower than Christian denominations, and even further behind atheists. Even if that number has improved against the overall trend, the group likely remains laggards. When LGBT advocates talk of a hardened rump that won’t fall in with other social trends, this is who they should mean.

So, who are these statistically interesting outliers? In the majority of cases, Muslims, with significantly smaller Hindu, Sikh and Jewish groups.

Using data from the BSA survey itself, the proportion of Muslims has doubled in the past decade alone from 3 to 6 percent. Government statistics estimate that there are over 3.3 million Muslims in the UK, more than twice as many as in 2001, with the real number thought to be higher as many migrants are not counted in such figures.

It might not seem like a lot, but if this group is radically different in its social attitudes it is enough to put a dent in the steady line of progress for tolerance, as it grows proportionally bigger.

Growing concerns

Other than the specific example of parents in Birmingham schools protesting against a new pro-LGBT curriculum, there is no acknowledgement of the impact of Muslims as such, or of their changing demographics on overall British attitudes in any of the reports. Similarly, the Independent writer talks about “an atmosphere of hostility creeping into our lives” and complains that he has “been subjected to a huge number of homophobic comments recently and several friends of mine have been assaulted or attacked” but doesn’t reveal who is behind these aggressive acts in London, a city with the highest “non-Christian” population.

It is understandable that liberal outlets prefer not to turn homophobia and social conservatism into social stigmas for the Islamic, Hindu or Sikh minorities, their political allies in theory and fellow Labour voters in practice. But with the number of Muslims predicted to as much as treble in three decades, it may be counter-productive for social liberals to scapegoat some phantom Christian fundamentalists from the past, while averting their eyes from the source of real intolerance of the present.

By Igor Ogorodnev

Igor Ogorodnev is a Russian-British journalist, who has worked at RT since 2007 as a correspondent, editor and writer.