Ukraine LGBTQ Community Upset Over Russian Invasion

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The official Pride parade in Kyiv was canceled this year after a decade of hard-fought efforts for more acceptance of LGBTQ people.

Before Russia invaded, Ukraine – a largely religious nation with a long history of oppression against sexual and gender expression – had increasingly become a rare bright spot for LGBTQ rights and a sanctuary of sorts for Eastern Europe. Ex-Soviet LGBTQ individuals would travel to experience a gay nightclub scene, especially in larger cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Odesa, where they could feel safer to be open.

Now, what would have been the 10th anniversary of the Equality March in Kyiv this month was relocated to Poland because of the ongoing war. (Read more from “Ukraine LGBTQ Community Upset Over Russian Invasion” HERE)

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State Department Warns Russia: Attack on Lithuania Is Attack on U.S.

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A new Russian threat to target “the residents of Lithuania” has drawn a sharp reminder of the American pledge to fight alongside any NATO allies that might come under attack.

“Lithuania is a member of the NATO alliance,” State Department spokesman Ned Price emphasized. ”We stand by the commitments that we have made to the NATO alliance. That includes, of course, a commitment to Article 5: That is the bedrock of the NATO alliance.”

Price prefaced that warning with a dismissive remark about “Russian saber-rattling or Russian bluster.” The pairing would seem to reflect how unease about heightened military tensions around the war in Ukraine has been conditioned by the recognition that Russia is far likelier to use such threats for propaganda purposes than to risk a direct clash with the trans-Atlantic alliance.

“It seems like it’s partially a Russian influence operation or psyops a little bit,” a senior European official told the Washington Examiner. (Read more from “State Department Warns Russia: Attack on Lithuania Is Attack on U.S.” HERE)

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Pope Francis Resigning? Declining Health, Canceled Africa Trip Fuel Rumors

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Pope Francis’ recent health struggles, worsening mobility issues and canceled events have fueled rumors that the head of the Catholic Church is about to follow his predecessor into early retirement.

Francis, born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, was elected to the papacy in March 2013, after Pope Benedict XVI stepped down at age 85, becoming the first pontiff to do so since Gregory XII in 1415.

Now, some Vatican observers believe that the 85-year-old Francis could become the second — although the pope’s adviser has brushed off the chatter. . .

[H]is health has been in apparent decline, and for the past month Francis has been getting around in a wheelchair, or with the aid of a cane, because of knee pain.

The octogenarian prelate reportedly does not want to undergo surgery on his knee — and was quoted as telling bishops in May: “Rather than operate, I’ll resign.” (Read more from “Pope Francis Resigning? Declining Health, Canceled Africa Trip Fuel Rumors” HERE)

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Ukraine Moves to Restrict Russian Culture as War Rages On

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The Ukrainian parliament moved Sunday to further rid its country of Russian culture and influence, in a process referred to by some as “derussification,” by voting to pass a law that restricts certain Russian books and music in the country.

The law stops the printing of books by Russian citizens. There is an exception, however, if the Russian citizen is willing to give up their Russian passport and become a Ukraine citizen, then their books can still be printed. The ban also only applies to authors who held Russian citizenship after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

The law also restricts books from being imported into Ukraine. Now, books printed in Russia and Belarus can no longer be imported, and special permission is required for the importation of books in Russian from any other countries.

The Ukrainian parliament did not stop at just books – the parliament also passed a law that stops all music by post-1991 Russian citizens from being played by media outlets and on public transportation. The law also requires TV and radio stations to play more Ukrainian-language speech and music content. (Read more from “Ukraine Moves to Restrict Russian Culture as War Rages On” HERE)

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Russian TV Shows Video of U.S. Veterans Captured in Ukraine

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Russian state television showed video Friday of two U.S. military veterans who went missing last week while fighting in Ukraine, confirming that the men were taken captive and raising fears about their fate.

Alex Drueke and Andy Huynh, both from Alabama, were believed to be the first Americans captured by Russian forces since the war began on Feb. 24.

Drueke, speaking into the camera from what appeared to be an office, sent a message to his mother, concluding with a quick wink.

“Mom, I just want to let you know that I’m alive and I hope to be back home as soon as I can be. So, love Diesel for me. Love you.” Diesel is his dog, a mastiff.

His aunt, Dianna Shaw, said the video included both a key word and a gesture that Drueke and his mother had set up during one of his two tours in Iraq so she would know that it was indeed him and that he was OK. (Read more from “Russian TV Shows Video of U.S. Veterans Captured in Ukraine” HERE)

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Leaked Internal Audio From TikTok Shows U.S. User Data Accessed From China Despite Denials: Report

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TikTok employees based in China have repeatedly accessed sensitive data from U.S. users despite the company previously indicating that the information would only be accessed from inside the U.S.

The revelation was contained in a report from BuzzFeed News that highlighted various statements made from numerous employees over the course of more than 80 internal TikTok meetings.

The fear that U.S. officials have is that U.S. user data could be accessed by ByteDance, the Chinese parent company of TikTok, because Chinese companies are subjected to the rule of the Chinese Communist Party.

“The risk is that the government could force ByteDance to collect and turn over information as a form of ‘data espionage,’” the report said. “There is, however, another concern: that the soft power of the Chinese government could impact how ByteDance executives direct their American counterparts to adjust the levers of TikTok’s powerful ‘For You’ algorithm, which recommends videos to its more than 1 billion users. Sen. Ted Cruz, for instance, has called TikTok ‘a Trojan horse the Chinese Communist Party can use to influence what Americans see, hear, and ultimately think.’” (Read more from “Leaked Internal Audio From TikTok Shows U.S. User Data Accessed From China Despite Denials: Report” HERE)

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China Praises Cuba for Defending Uyghur Genocide

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The communist government of Cuba hijacked this week’s ongoing U.N. Human Rights Council session to deliver a statement, signed by 69 countries, in support of China’s genocide of Uyghur and other non-Han ethnic groups in occupied East Turkistan.

Cuba and China, in addition to several other dictatorships and human rights abusers, enjoy seats on the Council, regularly using them to undermine the mission of the Council by forcing it to focus on Israel or America. Under President Donald Trump, America vacated the Council in protest of the disproportionate representation that human rights abuses have on the U.N. body, but President Joe Biden reversed that decision, making America a participant in the Council’s activities.

The Council recently expelled Russia in response to the eight-year-old invasion of Ukraine, which is also on the Council, but has made no similar moves against Cuba, China, Venezuela, Qatar, and other serial human rights violators.

Cuba’s intervention to defend genocide at the Human Rights Council was a response to 47 countries, including the United States, issuing a statement on Tuesday directed at U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, who recently visited East Turkistan and concluded that the extensively documented Chinese concentration camp system had been dismantled and praised China’s atrocious human rights record. (Read more from “China Praises Cuba for Defending Uyghur Genocide” HERE)

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Putin Crony Suggests Ukraine Won’t Exist in 2 Years

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One of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest allies ominously suggested that Ukraine might not exist in two years’ time.

Dmitry Medvedev, former president and prime minister of the Russian Federation, who currently serves as deputy head of the country’s Security Council, took to his Telegram channel Wednesday to muse about Ukraine’s attempts to secure gas imports from its Western allies.

“I saw a report that Ukraine wants to receive from its overseas masters [liquified natural gas] as part of a land-lease plan with payment for delivery after 2 years,” Medvedev wrote. “Otherwise the country will freeze next winter.

“But here’s a question. Who said that after two years Ukraine will even exist on the world map?

“But it makes no difference to the Americans – they are so invested in their ‘anti-Russia’ project, that everything else is trivial to them.” (Read more from “Putin Crony Suggests Ukraine Won’t Exist in 2 Years” HERE)

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Eerie: China Reports Possible Alien Contact — Then Deletes It

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State-backed Science and Technology Daily in China reported that scientists found possible signals from aliens but deleted the reporting of the discovery soon after.

According to Chinese scientists, the country’s “Sky Eye” telescope detected what could be evidence of an alien civilization. The large telescope is in China’s southwestern Guizhou province and has a diameter of 1,640 feet.

The now-deleted report said that the scientists found “several cases of possible technological traces and extraterrestrial civilizations from outside the Earth.”

The report cited Zhang Tonjie, 52, who is the chief scientist of an extraterrestrial civilization search team co-founded by Beijing Normal University, the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the University of California, Berkeley. (Read more from “Eerie: China Reports Possible Alien Contact — Then Deletes It” HERE)

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Biden to World: Russia, Oil Sheiks, and China Control the U.S. Economy

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On Friday, after news broke that inflation again accelerated to reach a 40-year high of 8.6 percent, President Joe Biden turned America’s financial crisis into a national security one by telling the world that foreign leaders have near-total control over the U.S. economy.

Shortly after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released May’s price report, which in addition to reporting an 8.6 percent annual inflationary rate showed a full 1 percent increase last month, President Biden began the spin: “Today’s report underscores why I have made fighting inflation my top economic priority. While it is good to see critical ‘core’ inflation moderating, it is not coming down as sharply and as quickly as we must see. Putin’s price hike hit hard in May here and around the world: high gas prices at the pump, energy, and food prices accounted for around half of the monthly price increases.”

The president’s entire pitch struck a chord conflicting with reality. “Biden hasn’t made inflation his top economic priority,” noted Katie Pavlich soon after. “For months, his administration denied inflation was happening, saying it wouldn’t be an issue, before calling it temporary and transitory last summer.” And the skyrocketing inflation began before Russia’s January 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

The public has long known that Biden suffers from an acute case of blameuitis. But the president’s continued claims that Putin holds responsibility for our country’s accelerating inflationary rates, when coupled with Biden’s other actions and inactions, is not merely tone deaf, it is dangerous. While finger-pointing has long been a mainstay for politicians, the Biden administration’s messaging goes beyond shifting blame to conceding that foreign leaders can control the U.S. economy in Joe Biden’s America. (Read more from “Biden to World: Russia, Oil Sheiks, and China Control the U.S. Economy” HERE)

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