ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

GREGORY WILPERT, TRNN: Welcome to the Real News Network. I’’m Gregory Wilpert, coming to you from Quito, Ecuador. Britain’’s referendum in favor of leaving, or exiting, the European Union, the Brexit referendum, as the results are known, won with 52 percent of the vote on Thursday, June 23, stunning Europe’s political establishment. One of the issues that has raised concern for many is that what does the Brexit mean for Britain’’s and Europe’’s economy and politics. This was one of the main topics leading up to the referendum, but a lot of disinformation [reigned] in the discussion. With us to discuss the economic and political context of the Brexit is Michael Hudson. He is a research professor of economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, and author of Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Destroy the Global Economy. Also, he is an economics adviser to several governments, including Greece, Iceland, Latvia, and China. He joins us right now from New York City

By The Saker Listening to the imperial media one might be excused for thinking that nothing dramatic is happening in the Ukraine and that the crisis has basically leveled off in some way. Well, why not? They just had recent elections and, apparently, that went well, Russia is still showing her usual bad will and threatening behavior towards Europe, but at least Putin was forced to release the Ukrainian Jeanne d’Arc (aka Nadezhda Savchenko), and there is hope that the united front of the EU and NATO will eventually force Putin to stop his aggression against the Ukraine and to comply with the Minsk Agreements. Oh, and the Ukrainian National Bank has announced, I kid you not, a return to growth (by 0.1%) for the first quarter of the year. Alas, the disconnect between this kind of nonsense and reality is total. Yes, elections did take place, but they were anything but free, the neo-Nazis are now more influential than ever and the fact that Putin did agree to exchange Savchenko for 2

Russian President Vladimir Putin has received a letter in which his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan apologized for the death of the pilot who was killed when a Russian jet was downed over the Syrian-Turkish border last November, the Kremlin said. Erdogan expressed readiness to restore relations with Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday. The incident involving the downing of the Russian Su-24 bomber led to the worst deterioration of Turkish-Russian relations in recent history, with Russia describing it as a “stab in the back.” “The head of the Turkish state expressed his deep sympathy and condolences to the relatives of the deceased Russian pilot and said ‘sorry,’” Peskov said. In his letter, Erdogan called Russia “a friend and a strategic partner” of Ankara, with whom the Turkish authorities would not want to spoil relations. “We never had a desire or a deliberate intention to down an aircraft belonging to Russia,” the letter read, according to a statement pu

By Peter Koenig BREXIT is the best thing that has happened not only for the Brits – but for all of Europe – and potentially for the world in the last 30-some years – which were beset by Washington Consensus demagoguery, by ever more flagrant globalization towards a New World Order, under which the elite knows no scruples in decimating countries and continents – enslaving entire people – to get what they want, striving for Full Spectrum Dominance. The current inflexible and un-solidary EU is a direct result of this drive. The BREXIT vote may break the stranglehold of Washington on Europe. The BREXIT vote may be the first step in a new dynamic of a EUREXIT from Washington’s dominance, from NATO, from the wars and conflicts sustaining the US corporate profit bulldozer, from the threat of a corporate enslavement by the looming TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership), from sanctions against Russia – from the sheer prohibition of building up what makes most sense for the future

By John Pilger The majority vote by Britons to leave the European Union was an act of raw democracy. Millions of ordinary people refused to be bullied, intimidated and dismissed with open contempt by their presumed betters in the major parties, the leaders of the business and banking oligarchy and the media. This was, in great part, a vote by those angered and demoralised by the sheer arrogance of the apologists for the "remain" campaign and the dismemberment of a socially just civil life in Britain. The last bastion of the historic reforms of 1945, the National Health Service, has been so subverted by Tory and Labour-supported privateers it is fighting for its life. A forewarning came when the Treasurer, George Osborne, the embodiment of both Britain's ancient regime and the banking mafia in Europe, threatened to cut £30 billion from public services if people voted the wrong way; it was blackmail on a shocking scale. Immigration was exploited in the campaign with consumm

WASHINGTON: Jordanian intelligence officials stole millions of dollars of weapons that the CIA and Saudi Arabia had supplied for Syrian rebels, then sold them on the black market, The New York Times and Al Jazeera reported. The military equipment had been shipped into Jordan as part of the Central Intelligence Agency's secret program to train and equip moderate Syrian rebels to fight troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad. Citing unnamed American and Jordanian officials, the Times and Al Jazeera reported Sunday that some of these weapons were used in a November shooting at a police training facility in Amman. Two American contractors, two Jordanians and one South African were gunned down in the attack. The Times and Al Jazeera said the FBI has been investigating the case for months. The stolen weapons include Kalashnikov assault rifles, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades and the black market is newly awash with arms, the reports said. Investigators aren't sure what ha

By Pepe Escobar So what started as a gamble by David Cameron on an outlet for domestic British discontent, to be used as a lever to bargain with Brussels for a few more favors, has metastasized into an astonishing political earthquake about the dis-integration of the European Union. The irrepressibly mediocre Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, posing as a “historian”, had warned that Brexit, “could be the beginning of the destruction of not only the EU but Western political civilization in its entirety”. That’s foolish. Brexit proved that it’s immigration, stupid. And once again, it’s the economy, stupid (although the British neoliberal establishment never paid attention). But serious bets can be made the EU system in Brussels won’t learn anything from the shock therapy – and won’t reform itself. There will be rationalizations that after all the UK was always classically whiny, obtrusive and demanding special privileges when dealing with the EU. As for “Western political

Mass Shooting at German Cinema, At Least 25 Injured An armed man has opened fire at a cinema complex in western Germany, injuring at least 25 people. Local media reported that between 20 and 50 people were wounded after the armed man opened fire and then barricaded himself inside the Kinoplex cinema in Viernheim town, near Frankfurt. German Special Forces teams arrived at the scene of the incident. German police are heading to the scene of a mass shooting in Viernheim town, near Frankfurt, on June 23, 2016. Germany's interior minister has been quoted by local media as saying that the gunman was shot and killed during the commando operation to arrest him, British daily The Telegraph reported. Faz newsaper said that the hostage situation has now ended and that there is "no further danger," citing police sources. Earlier, Christiane Kobus, a German police spokesman, confirmed that a "threat situation" was underway but did not give further details. Police in Germany