Ukraine’s ‘Great Game’ surfaces in Transcaucasia

BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | JULY 19, 2022

If the metaphor of the “Great Game” can be applied to the Ukrainian crisis, with the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) at it core, it has begun causing reverberations across the entire Eurasian space. The great game lurking in the shade in the Caucasus and Central Asian regions in recent years is visibly accelerating.

Ukraine’s ‘Great Game’ surfaces in Transcaucasia

Guess the CIA has quite a few regime changes, ahead?! Or maybe they’ll leave it to the NED’s color revolutions?! 🤷🏼‍♀️

‘EU may cut financial aid to Ukraine’

The funds promised to Ukraine by the EU have been delayed due to concerns over the bloc’s own economic troubles and infighting in Brussels, Bloomberg reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the discussions.

‘EU may cut financial aid to Ukraine’

H/T: THE NEW DARK AGE

Related:

EU Stalls on Ukraine Aid as Fears Spike of Gas Crisis at Home

The European Commission also committed in May to finance the bulk of the reconstruction of the country, which could amount to $750 billion, according to Ukrainian government estimates. That could prove an even thornier debate for the EU as there’s no agreement over how to raise the funds. The commission’s offer scared some member states, wary of the massive effort required to rebuild the country and potential corruption issues, people familiar with the discussion said.

EU economy commissioner Paolo Gentiloni told ministers during the closed-door meeting that national governments need to ensure that the economic response to the war’s fallout is strong enough to avoid the risk of fatigue among Europeans, an EU official said. Gentiloni told reporters on Thursday that governments have a “duty” to mitigate the impact of higher prices, in particular of the energy bills, on the poor.

Trying to ward off any more protests, huh?! 🤷🏼‍♀️

Indo-Pacific power dynamic in radical shift

The joint air patrol over the waters of the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea on Monday by an air task force composed of Russian Tu-95MS capable of carrying nuclear weapons and Chinese H-6K strategic bombers couldn’t have been a knee-jerk reaction to US President Joe Biden’s Asia tour, leave alone his provocative remarks conjuring up an apocalyptic US-China war over Taiwan.

Indo-Pacific power dynamic in radical shift

More Oil From U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve Heads To Europe

More Oil From U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve Heads To Europe

Meanwhile, U.S. crude [oil] is flowing to Europe at rates never seen before.

Two cargoes of high-sulfur crude from the U.S. strategic reserve are headed to Italy and the Netherlands, according to tanker-tracking data and sources briefed by Bloomberg. The tankers have loaded crude at terminals connected to storage caverns of the SPR in Texas and Louisiana.

According to Matt Smith, oil analyst at commodity data firm Kpler, these would not be the last crude exports out of the U.S. SPR to Europe.

In April, some 1.6 million barrels of U.S. crude from the strategic reserve made its way to Europe, Smith told Bloomberg, adding: “That’s the largest amount of SPR crude that’s been shipped to the continent based on historical monthly data.”