In Search of Big Bucks: Zelensky Zips Over to Washington

©Photo : Telegram / Zelensky Official

Throwing good money after bad is never a sound political strategy, especially at a time when the US public is feeling the strain of an economy in crisis.

The one thing every observer of US domestic politics must concede is that Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi know how to work Congress. For four decades, Biden walked the halls of the US Senate, strong-arming colleagues to line up votes for legislation, with Pelosi team-tagging in the House of Representatives. In the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi did the same thing. Now, as president and House speaker, respectively, Biden and Pelosi pulled out all the stops to get one last piece of legislation across the finish line—the passage of an additional $45 billion in assistance for Ukraine.

To avoid the potential hurdles that would have to be negotiated trying to get a Republican-controlled House of Representatives to pass legislation authorizing more aid to Ukraine in the coming year, Biden and Pelosi conspired to push through a massive package in the final days of the lame duck session of Pelosi’s tenure as speaker.

But there was the chance that such an effort would be seen by many in Congress for what it was— a naked political maneuver designed to obviate the will of the US people who had voted to impanel a new Congress less disposed to freely dispensing treasure in support of a cause — Ukraine — which by all accounts appears to be on the ropes. Throwing good money after bad is never a sound political strategy, especially at a time when the American public is feeling the strain of an economy in crisis.

Enter, stage right, Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine and the US' most powerful propogandist when it comes to getting the US Congress to open its purse.

Previously, Ukraine’s beleaguered president was dispatched to the frontlines, where he handed out medals and received a flag signed by the “heroes of Bakhmut.” Zelensky then boarded a US Air Force plane, which whisked him off to Washington, DC where, on cue, he met with President Biden in the White House (and gave him a medal from one of the “heroes”), and addressed a joint session of Congress, handing Pelosi the autographed flag.

Nancy Pelosi alluded to the precedent of Winston Churchill as Zelensky spoke to Congress. But let there be no doubt—“Ukraine is alive and kicking” will not be carved alongside any pantheon inscribed with the words of the former British Prime Minister. Indeed, in a year’s time, no one will remember anything about Zelensky’s speech; its content was as vacuous as the cause it purported to support. Zelensky’s Washington visit was little more than empty gestures and empty words offered up as window dressing for the grift that is the more than $100 billion in aid earmarked over the course of the past year for Ukraine.

Lest anyone lose sight of what was actually transpiring in Washington DC during Zelensky’s visit. Ponder the following: it had nothing to do with providing Ukraine with the weapons it claims to need to successfully wage war against Russia. Nothing on Zelensky’s so-called “Christmas list” was funded by Congress—no M-1 Abrams tanks, no F-16 fighters, no long-range artillery rockets, no additional Patriot surface-to-air missile batteries.

The US government was playing to a domestic audience, which means that the perception of military assistance is more important than giving Ukraine what it believes it needs. The standard US excuses—the advanced tanks and aircraft are too difficult to maintain, that the Ukrainian soldier is better off with old Soviet-era weaponry than the modern western equivalent—is mooted by the fact that the current formula guiding military assistance has failed. Russia has stabilized the situation on the battlefield and is preparing to seize the initiative, a reality that obviates the tens of billions of dollars of military assistance that has been dispatched to Ukraine. The current package, except for a single Patriot missile battery, is simply more of the same, virtually guaranteeing that Ukraine will continue to lose this conflict going forward.

This, of course, appears to be an outcome the US is willing to accept. US policy appears to be geared toward the concept of, to paraphrase US Senator Lyndsey Graham, letting Ukraine fight to the last Ukrainian, so long as Russia pays a heavy price in the process. This is known to Ukraine, and yet Zelensky still came to Washington, DC.

That a Ukrainian leader would debase himself to the point of so eagerly serving as a political puppet on the US domestic political scene speaks volumes about the reality of how far Ukraine has fallen in the past year. The tragedy is that, far from helping Ukraine prevail in its war with Russia, the US aid will only guarantee the further destruction of the Ukrainian nation and its people.

Polygamist 'Prophet' Who Wed Underage Girls Arrested by Authorities

Having been caught transporting underage girls in an unventilated trailer, the self-proclaimed "prophet" has since pleaded guilty to charges of child abuse, with his followers claiming that the accusations brought against their leader are false.

Police bodycam footage of the arrest of a self-styled “prophet” with a penchant for polygamy has emerged on social media this week.

The arrest, which took place on August 28 in Arizona, was thrust into the media spotlight this month due to the filing of federal court documents that shed light on the matter.

Samuel Bateman is a former member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), an offshoot of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints commonly known as the Mormon Church.

Having parted ways with the former sect, Bateman formed his own group and proclaimed himself a prophet in 2019.

Having taken at least 20 wives, many of them underage girls, Bateman “orchestrated sexual acts involving minors and gave wives as gifts to his male followers,” according to a federal affidavit cited by media.

Deputies arrested Bateman in the city of Flagstaff in Arizona, after authorities discovered that he was driving several underage girls in an unventilated trailer. Bateman has since pleaded not guilty to state child abuse charges and federal charges of tampering with evidence, with his followers claiming that the accusations brought by federal authorities are false.

Three of Bateman’s wives have also been charged with kidnapping and impeding a foreseeable prosecution after eight girls associated with the “prophet’s” group escaped from state custody in Arizona to be found in Washington state.

Tucker Carlson's emotion to Zelensky

Fox News host Tucker Carlson. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Volodymyr Zelensky's uplifting speech to US Democrat lawmakers this week, Not so for Tucker Carlson. Tucker Carlson launches a diatribe that put schoolyard sadists everywhere to shame. “No one's ever addressed the United States Congress in a T-shirt before,” he seethed, slamming Zelensky as a “strip club” manager whose presence was “embarrassing” to “the greatest country on Earth.”

Carlson’s attack on Zelensky, whose olive green garb was meant to dramatize his country’s wartime plight, has sparked outrage because of its demeaning quality at a time of extraordinary duress for the Ukrainian people. But this episode deserves a deeper look than Carlson’s adolescent belittling usually merits.

Carlson’s rant carried a more hateful edge than usual, a kind of shrill fury. Perhaps that’s because Zelensky’s presence before Congress was far more humiliating to Carlson and his ideological comrades than to anyone else: It demonstrated how badly they misjudged Ukraine’s will to resist Russian conquest and the durability of the U.S. commitment to our beleaguered ally.

This represents the failure of a worldview, a strain of far-right authoritarian populism, that goes well beyond Ukraine. A whole lot of things have happened that, in Carlson’s mental universe, were not supposed to happen.

In his diatribe, Carlson depicted Zelensky as little more than a sleazy street thug who had come to “demand money” from Congress, telling his audience that the lawmakers “love him much more than they love you.” He exaggerated Ukraine’s conditions for ending the war, depicting Ukraine as the unreasonable party.

Carlson has long insisted that Ukrainians are “pawns” in the United States’ quest for “regime change” in Russia, predicting our warmongering would trigger nuclear catastrophe. He has trivialized the invasion as a faraway “border dispute,” and has scoffed that Democrats are hypnotizing Americans into feeling “hate” for Russia.

Carlson’s obvious bet has been that voters wouldn’t care about the conflict and would see little virtue in U.S. military aid to Ukraine. Lawmakers would ultimately abandon the cause.

But Zelensky’s appearance itself forcefully repudiated all of this. It demonstrated that Ukrainian resistance is driven by its people’s own extraordinarily courageous commitment to self rule. It showed that U.S. support for Ukraine is unwavering. It displayed the success of President Biden’s careful balance, which has enabled Ukraine to regain substantial ground while avoiding direct U.S. escalation, refuting Carlson’s predictions otherwise.

There is an ideology behind all that wrongness, and Carlson has clearly laid it out. It tells Americans that Democratic elites prioritize Ukraine’s border over our own — they love Zelensky more than they love you. This conflation of the two borders, a widespread right-wing populist trope, encourages Americans to turn inward in multiple ways, washing our hands of responsibility for international allies and desperate migrants alike.

This worldview also rails against elite wokeness. Carlson frequently tells viewers that the same elites who want people to hate Russia and are obliterating the southern border are also brainwashing kids with anti-White racism.

As Cathy Young writes at the Bulwark, right-wing populist distaste for Zelensky is driven partly by Ukraine’s desire for integration with the liberal, secular, internationalism-minded West. That through-line links attacks on elite wokeness, pro-Ukraine sentiment and receptiveness to migration.

As a political argument, all this has proved pretty impotent.

Just before the midterm elections, Carlson wrongly predicted a “humiliating repudiation” for Democrats. Importantly, Carlson based this in part on Democrats’ wokeness and border policies, hubristically certain that voters would reject both.

Carlson’s show also promoted 18 GOP candidates who went on to lose, as tallied by Matthew Gertz of Media Matters. And while Carlson backed Ohio Sen.-elect J.D. Vance, he also hawked Arizona Senate candidate Blake Masters as “the future of the GOP.” That’s almost certainly because Masters’s demonization of migrants (including ads featuring machine-gun fire at the border) was peerless. But Masters lost by 5 points — in a border state.

Outside our borders, Carlson also lionized Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro as one of the great illiberal populist hopes of the Western Hemisphere. This year, Bolsonaro was ousted after one term. (To be fair, Carlson was able to celebrate a hard right victory — in Ital.)

And Carlson has been ham-handed in his efforts to counter the House committee investigating Donald Trump’s insurrection with his own propaganda, even smearing the committee as “Stalinist.” He used similar language about the FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

All this also reflects Carlson’s broader dogma: The elites who obsess about Ukraine’s border and are brainwashing kids are also wielding the “deep state” against Trump and his supporters (which is supposed to discredit elites’ devotion to the Western liberal democratic project). But the revelations in the committee’s final report are utterly damning, and they’re heavily based on Republican witnesses. The Mar-a-Lago search produced devastating evidence and courts have validated it. All this is advancing the rule of law, no matter how hard Carlson tries to lie that away. None of this should prompt liberal overconfidence. Future electoral losses are inevitable. Cultural liberals need a proactive case against charges of wokeness. The war will grind on. Trump may still evade accountability. Carlson-style politics is being wielded effectively by a certain presidential aspirant in Florida who is crouched in the wings. But a year ago one couldn’t have predicted that Carlson’s brand of politics would be repudiated in so many ways. If that prompts a bit of, dare we say, Carlson-grade smugness from his critics, well, it’s well deserved.

Pakistan Taliban claim suicide blast that killed officer in Islamabad

Security officials and rescue workers gather at the site of a bomb explosion, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Friday, Dec. 23, 2022. A powerful car bomb detonated near a residential area in the capital Islamabad on Friday, killing some people, police said, raising fears that militants have a presence in one of the country's safest cities. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed) The Associated Press

The Pakistan Taliban claimed a suicide attack that killed at least one police officer Friday in the country’s capital, the first such attack in the city for years.

Islamabad has largely been spared the low-level attacks carried out in Pakistan’s megacities of Lahore and Karachi, and also along the border areas near Afghanistan.

Senior police official Sohail Zafar Chattha said officers had been following a suspicious taxi occupied by a male driver and a woman passenger when he detonated a device inside the car.

“They were stopped and the long-haired man was asked to come out,” Chattha said at the scene.

“He came out, but quickly went back inside and pressed a button that blew up the car.”

He said the fate of the passenger was not certain, but a policeman was confirmed dead and six people were wounded — including four officers.

Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) later claimed responsibility for the blast, saying the attack “on the enemies of Islam” was in retaliation for the recent killing of a senior member.

The group, which is separate from the Afghan Taliban but with a similar hard-line Islamist ideology, called off a stop-start cease-fire with the government in November.

Hajji Mohammad Saeed, 60, a retired government official living in the neighborhood where the attack happened, said authorities should end all negotiations with the TTP.

“They are taking advantage of this dialogue and causing violence.”

Pakistan was for a time plagued with almost daily bomb blasts across the country, but security vastly improved after a military crackdown that began in 2016.

Violence against security officials has risen in the northwestern border areas with Afghanistan over the past year — blamed on militant groups linked to the Pakistan Taliban.

Earlier this week, Pakistani defense minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif called for a fresh security operation against the TTP after suspected militants being held at a police station overpowered their captors and held them hostage for three days.

“Terrorism is on the rise again,” he said.

“There’s a spillover effect from the situation in Afghanistan and that’s affecting Pakistan, we have to launch this operation.”

Suicide bombing in Islamabad kills 2 suspects and policeman

A powerful car bomb detonated in a residential area in Pakistan's capital on Friday, killing two suspected militants and an officer, police said, raising fears that militants have a presence in one of the country’s safest cities.

At least three police officers and seven passersby were wounded in the bombing in Islamabad. The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the explosion.

Friday's bombing happened 15 kilometers (about 9 miles) from the garrison city of Rawalpindi, home of the military and government spy agencies.

Police said in a statement that the blast happened when police officers spotted the car near a checkpoint and ordered the driver to halt for routine checking. Instead of stopping, its driver detonated explosives hidden inside. The driver who Pakistani Taliban claim was one of their fighters and a female passenger in the car were killed, Suhail Zafar Chattha, the deputy police chief in Islamabad told reporters at the scene.

TV footage showed a burning car as police officers cordoned off the area.

Residents said they saw policemen on motorcycles chasing a car and ordering a man inside the vehicle to come out.

Chattha confirmed that account, saying the suspect blew up the explosive-laden vehicle after being surrounded by police. He said the militants might have killed scores of people if they had managed to detonate the car bomb at another site in the city.

Senior police and government officials later attended the funeral of the slain police officer Adeel Hussain. Pakistan’s Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah Khan also paid glowing tributes to Hussain and recommended a prestigious posthumous award for his bravery and for saving innocent lives.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif condemned the bombing and thanked the police.

“Police officers stopped the terrorists by sacrificing their blood and the nation salutes its brave men," Sharif said in a statement.

Mohammad Khalid Khurasani, the spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban or TTP, said in a statement one of the group's militants carried out the suicide attack to avenge the killing of a senior leader. Abdul Wali, widely known as Omar Khalid Khurasani, was killed in a roadside bombing in August in Afghanistan’s Paktika province. His death was a heavy blow to the militant group, who blamed Pakistani intelligence agents for the killing without offering any evidence or elaborating.

Pakistani Taliban have stepped up attacks on security forces since November, when they unilaterally ended a monthslong cease-fire with the country's government.

The latest violence comes days after several Pakistani Taliban detainees overpowered their guards at a counterterrorism center in northwestern Pakistan, snatching police weapons and taking three officers hostage.

On Tuesday, Pakistan’s special forces raided the detention center, triggering an intense shootout in which the military later said 25 detainees linked to the Pakistani Taliban were killed in Bannu, a district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and part of a former tribal region.

Three troops and at least three hostages were killed in that incident.

The government has since stepped up security across the country, based on intelligence reports that the TTP had dispatched fighters to carry out attacks at public places and police stations.

The Pakistani Taliban are separate but allied with the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in neighboring Afghanistan last year as U.S. and NATO troops withdrew after 20 years of war. Since then, top TTP leaders and fighters have been hiding in Afghanistan.

Kremlin Has No Information About Zelensky's New 'Peace Plan'

© Alexander Scherbak/TASS

The Kremlin is unaware of Ukraine’s alleged preparation of a peace plan, while Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s recent statements about a peaceful solution are detached from reality, the Russian presidential spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters on Friday.

When asked whether the Kremlin has heard about Ukraine preparing a "peace formula," he said, "No, we know nothing about that." And yet, "we have heard President Zelensky’s statements about various steps,... about a peace plan. However, everything President Zelensky has said so far is out of touch with reality, which cannot be ignored," the Kremlin spokesman emphasized.

On Thursday, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing US and European sources, that authorities in Ukraine were working on proposals for a "peace formula" that may be made public next February. According to the newspaper, Zelensky’s team has a 10-point peace formula in the works.

Earlier, the Ukrainian leader told a joint meeting of Congress following his talks with US President Joe Biden that the two had discussed Kiev’s proposals to settle the Ukrainian conflict. According to Zelensky, Biden supported Ukraine’s initiative to hold a global peace summit to discuss these proposals.

At the same time, the spokesman noted there are no plans no preliminary contacts regarding a possible meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart Joe Biden. On Thursday, US press reported, citing Ukrainian and European diplomats, that Zelensky's administration had been finalizing 10-point "peace formula" initially mentioned at the G20 summit in Bali and would likely present it in late February, one year after the beginning of the Russian special military operation.

Ban on Gazprom Gas Purchase

Peskov also noted that restrictions for Gazprom on the purchase of gas from joint ventures with European companies are not a response to the introduction of an oil price cap, but to the actions of unfriendly countries.

"No, this is a decision that is not related to this European innovation (gas price cap). This is, in fact, a response to the actions of a number of unfriendly countries," Peskov said.

Earlier in the day, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a decree, according to which Gazprom is restricted from buying gas from joint ventures with OMV and Wintershall, with which the company produces gas at the Urengoy and Yuzhno-Russkoye fields, if the amount of obligations exceeds the limit set by the government.

The EU, together with Britain and the US, sanctioned Russia after Moscow launched its special operation in Ukraine in February. In December, the EU also joined the G7 decision to set a price cap on Russian oil at $60 per barrel.

So far, the sanctions have disrupted global supply chains and aggravated issues on international fuel markets, leading to an energy crisis and soaring inflation in Europe.

Russia Ready to Cut Oil Production in Response to Oil Price Cap, Deputy Prime Minister Says

The European Union's $60 per barrel price cap on Russian oil went into effect on December 5, along with a ban on seaborne exports.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak has stated that Moscow stands ready to reduce oil production as a response measure to the fuel price cap introduced by the EU and G7 members. According to him, the output could be slashed by up to 7% in early 2023.

Novak added that in retaliation, Russia plans to ban the supply of oil and petroleum products to countries and legal entities that require compliance with the price cap in contracts.

“Therefore, we are ready to reduce partial production, and at the beginning of next year we may have a reduction of somewhere by 500-700 thousand barrels per day. This is about 5-7% for us,” he said. The Russian Deputy Prime Minister noted that even though "this volume is insignificant, such risks exist."

He also said that oil production in Russia will increase by 2% and oil refining will increase by 5%, but that the gas output will decrease by 18-20% by the end of 2022.

"By the end of the year in the oil industry, we will even have a 2% increase in production to 535 million tons compared to last year. We will produce about 5% more petroleum products than last year," Novak pointed out.

"There is a partial decrease in the gas industry, about 18-20%. Nevertheless, our gas industry will produce 671 billion cubic meters of gas this year. This is also a large volume, of which about 470 billion cubic meters will go to the domestic market," he added.

The statement comes after Russia’s President Vladimir Putin told reporters on Thursday that he would sign a decree on retaliatory measures to the cap on Russian oil prices early next week, in what he described as precautionary measures.

The EU’s $60 per barrel price cap on Russian oil, which went into effect on December 5, will be reviewed every two months to remain at 5% below the International Energy Agency benchmark. The G7 nations and Australia also capped Russian oil exports at $60 per barrel.

Moscow lambasted the price cap as an attempt to manipulate “the basic principles of free markets,” warning that Russia won't sell oil to those countries that adopt the cap.

Gelombang Tinggi Kapal Bagan Tenggelam di Perairan Tanggamus Seluruh Awak Selamat

ABK Kapal Bagan KM RHN ditemukan selamat di Perairan Putih Doh Kecamatan Limau Kabupaten Tanggamus, Jumat (23/12)/Basarnas Lampung

Ombak dan gelombang tinggi menerjang satu kapal bagan KM RHN, lalu tenggelam di Perairan Tanggamus, Lampung. Semua awak kapal selamat berenang ke pantai.

Setelah sempat hilang kontak selama beberapa jam, seluruh ABK Kapal Bagan KM RHN ditemukan selamat di Perairan Putih Doh Kecamatan Limau Kabupaten Tanggamus, hari Jumat, 23/12/2022.

Koordinator Pos SAR Tanggamus Hendra Wahyu mengatakan, satu ABK Kapal Bagan KM RHN menghubungi Kepala Pekon Tanjung Jaya tentang cuaca Perairan Putih Doh sangat ekstrem dengan gelombang tinggi disertai angin kencang, hari Kamis, 22/12/2022, pukul 20.00 WIB.

Menurut Hendra, kapal yang tenggelam adalah KM RHN yang merupakan kapal bagan nelayan dengan awak kapal sebanyak sembilan orang.

Setelah mendapatkan informasi tersebut, kata Hendra, Sadiwan mencoba menghubungi kembali ABK tersebut, namun sampai dengan pukul 21.30 WIB, ABK tersebut tidak bisa dihubungi. Sehingga Sadiwan melaporkan kejadian tersebut ke Pos SAR Tanggamus.

Menindaklanjuti info tersebut Basarnas Lampung mengerahkan personil Pos SAR Tanggamus untuk menuju lokasi kejadian dan melaksanakan Operasi SAR.

Selain itu Basarnas Lampung juga berkoordinasi dengan instansi terkait mulai dari Polair Polres Tanggamus, Pos AL Tanggamus, Dinas Perikanan Tanggamus, dan Pekon Tanjung Jaya.

Pukul Pukul 23.30 WIB Tim tiba di Polsek Cukuh Balak dan langsung melakukan koordinasi dengan unsur terkait. Hasil koordinasi diperoleh informasi bahwa jumlah POB (Person On Board) KM RHN berjumlah 9 orang.

Akibat kondisi cuaca buruk dan ketinggian ombak sekitar 2,5 - 4 meter dan disertai angin kencang, pencarian tidak memungkinkan melakukan pencarian pada malam hari. Namun Tim SAR terus melakukan koordinasi dgn warga di Pulau Tabuan dan pesisir Perairan Putih Doh.

Pukul 01.30 Wib Tim Sar Gabungan terima info dari nelayan Desa Rilau bahwa 9 POB berhasil ditemukan dalam keadaan selamat di Desa Way Rilau, Kecamatan Cukuh Balak.

Korban tersebut berhasil menyelamatkan diri saat kapal mereka tenggelam setelah diterjang ombak besar, seluruh ABK berenang dengan cara berkelompok dan terbawa arus ke arah pantai Desa Way Rilau.

Setelah sampai di tepi pantai, mereka dilihat oleh nelayan yang melintas, kemudian nelayan tersebut langsung menghubungi pihak keluarga. Tim Sar gabungan kemudian berangkat menuju lokasi ditemukannya korban dan korban sampai di rumah pukul 03.00 WIB.

Hendra mengungkapkan, 9 awal kapal tersebut, selamat setelah berenang secara berkelompok ke arah pantai.

"Alhamdulillah seluruh ABK KM RHN ditemukan selamat oleh para nelayan di Desa Way Rilau, Kecamatan Cukuh Balak, sekitar pukul 01.30 WIB," kata Hendra.

"Kondisi cuaca sangat ekstrim, gelombang tinggi, disertai angin kencang," beber Hendra.

Kepala Pekon Tanjung Raya kemudian menghubungi kembali awak kapal itu, tetapi tidak bisa dihubungi sama sekali.

"Sempat lost contact," beber Hendra.

Pencarian sempat dilakukan namun terkendala cuaca, sehingga Tim SAR menghentikan penelusuran.

Hendra mengungkapkan, 9 awak kapal ditemukan selamat di Desa Way Rilau.

"Kita evakuasi para korban ke pekon mereka," kata Hendra.

"Kami mengimbau kepada masyarakat yang akan melakukan kegiatan di perairan agar selalu memperhatikan prakiraan cuaca dari BMKG dan selalu melengkapi peralatan keselamatan dalam beraktivitas," kata Hendra.

Iranian foreign ministry condemns Zelensky’s ‘rude remarks’ during US visit

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nasser Kanaani
©Iranian Foreign Ministry via AP

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nasser Kanaani condemned Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s "rude remarks" with regard to the Islamic Republic, made during his address to the US Congress.

According to the statement, Kanaani "condemned the Ukrainian president’s repeated accusations and rude remarks against the Islamic Republic of Iran at the US Congress."

"He once again stressed that the Islamic Republic of Iran has not supplied any military hardware to any side for use in Ukraine," the statement says.

"Iran has always respected the territorial integrity of all countries including Ukraine," the ministry said. "Mr. Zelensky had better know that Iran’s strategic patience over such unfounded accusations is not endless."

"Kanaani also advised the Ukrainian president to draw a lesson from the fate of some other political leaders who contented themselves with the US support," it said.

On December 21, Zelensky spent several hours in Washington at Biden’s invitation. He met with the US president and the leadership of the US Congress and delivered a speech there. Ahead of Zelensky's visit the US announced a new military aid package totaling $1.85 billion. For the first time, it included a battery of the Patriot air defense system (the truck-mounted launcher, radar and control station).

In August, the Washington Post published a report alleging that Iran has been sending drones to Russia. The report was later followed by similar claims by the US administration. Moscow and Tehran have repeatedly rejected allegations of Russia’s use of Iranian drones in Ukraine Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov deemed such reports as bogus stories and assured that the Russian Army used Russian-made drones.

DPRK shows readiness to ‘respond with nukes to nuclear weapons’ — KCNA

Pyongyang’s November test of the Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile, which, according to the Japanese Defense Ministry, has a range of up to 15,000 km, displayed DPRK’s readiness "to respond with nuclear weapons to nuclear weapons," the Korean Central News Agency said in a commentary published on its website.

According to KCNA, this year has become a "milestone" thanks to the successes in the reinforcement of DPRK’s defense capability. The mentioned achievements include the military parade in April and the "cementing of its irreversible nuclear power status" following the adoption of the nuclear weapons use policy during the DPRK Supreme People’s Assembly session in September.

The list also includes the numerous missile tests in September and October, which confirmed the "combat efficiency of the nuclear forces and their ability to carry out real warfare," including the exercise that imitated the launch of a "missile with a tactical nuclear warhead" from an underwater platform installed in a reservoir. Back then, a number of experts noted that Pyongang was demonstrating the resilience of its launching platforms in case of an enemy strike, displaying its ability to launch missiles from various platforms.

KCNA also noted the successful trial connected to the development of a military satellite, and a test of a high-thrust solid fuel missile engine with thrust vector nozzle, which, as Tokyo believes, may indicate plans for the development of a solid fuel ICBM.

The news agency also pointed out that North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un attended the Hwasong-17 launch "with his beloved daughter and spouse," which "touched the heartstrings of the servicemen and the people." The appearance of Kim Jong-Un’s daughter at the trials became a sensation and attracted the attention of the global media.

Japan repeatedly pointed to the rapid development of the DPRK’s nuclear program. In its updated national security strategy, Tokyo noted that Pyongyang now poses an even greater threat to Japan than before because of that. This basic Japanese document provides for a response with counterstrikes on a potential enemy’s territory, but rules out any preemptive strikes.

DPRK: Russians ‘most resilient people’ able to protect country without foreign aid

Russians are "the most resilient people" that can defend their own country without external military aid, a North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman said Friday, commenting on media reports about the alleged shipments of ammunition from the DPRK to Russia.

"I would like to say that the people of Russia are the most resilient, and have the will and ability to ensure the country’s security and territorial integrity without military assistance from anyone," the diplomat affirmed.

He slammed Japanese media reports about the alleged ammunition supplies as a lie, adding that such deals never happened.

"The DPRK’s principal position regarding the ‘weapons deals’ with Russia, which never happened, has not changed," the diplomat said, according to KCNA.

Meanwhile, the diplomat drew the international community’s attention to the weapons shipments from the US, which "brought bloodshed and destruction to Ukraine."

Earlier on Thursday, John Kirby, the Coordinator for Strategic Communications at the National Security Council in the White House, claimed that North Korea shipped weapons to the Wagner PMC and new shipments are being planned. Meanwhile, UN Secretary General Spokesman Stephane Dujarric said that the United Nations does not have such information.

The Russian side repeatedly underscored that it does not require foreign supplies for the special military operation in Ukraine because its national military-industrial complex meets all the requirements.