ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

A communique released following the G7 summit, which was released on June 7-8 in Canada, included a few interesting points about Russia as well as conflicts in Syria and Ukraine. The communique was signed by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe and British Prime Minister Theresa May. US President Donald Trump withdrew his signature from the communique at the very last moment accusing Trudeau of being “dishonest and weak”. So, what does the G7 minus Trump want from Russia and the participants of the conflict in Syria to build “ a more peaceful and secure world “? “… 13. We urge Russia to cease its destabilizing behaviour to undermine democratic systems and its support of the Syrian regime. We condemn the attack using a military-grade nerve agent in Salisbury, United Kingdom. We share and agree with the United Kingdom’s assessment

Illustrative image Written by  Evgeniy Satanovskiy ; Originally appeared in Russian on  vpk-news.ru Syria’s President Bashar Assad has paid a visit to Vladimir Putin in Sochi, with Ministers Lavrov and Shoygu also participating in the meetings. The parties expressed hope foreign forces would be withdrawn from Syria. It’s clear that the US will not leave Syria for as long as Assad or another pro-Russian politician is in power. With that in mind, one may speak of minimizing Western presence in Syria. But one should not expect Arab military contingents can replace the Americans in Syria, in spite of the hope expressed by US National Security Advisor John Bolton. Cairo rejected this option, Arab monarchies have adopted a wait-and-see attitude. Nobody in the Pentagon counts on their military potential, given its absence. The monarchies are instead to shoulder the costs of basing US forces and their allies, and also of creating independent of Damascus executive and military insti

While President Trump  insults his erstwhile foreign partners  in a colorful twitter tirade ahead of a G-7 (or rather, G-6+1) summit in Quebec, exposing the very real fragmentation of longtime western partnerships as the US cracks down on unfair foreign trade practices, a productive meeting between China’s “Emperor for Life” Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin has been completely overshadowed, as  Bloomberg  points out. The two leaders held their first meeting this year on Thursday ahead of the June 9 Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting  – an eight-member group led by China and Russia – which will be held in the port city of Qingdao. Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump Please tell Prime Minister Trudeau and President Macron that they are charging the U.S. massive tariffs and create non-monetary barriers. The EU trade surplus with the U.S. is $151 Billion, and Canada keeps our farmers and others out. Look forward to seeing them tomorrow. 00:0

Nasrallah during a televised speech marking the international Quds Day, Via al-Manar TV On June 8, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah vowed to keep his forces in Syria as long as Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad wants it there. Nasrallah also warned that Hezbollah will not withdraw from Syria in any other way, even if the world unites against it. “We’ll be present in Syria for as long as we’re wanted there, as long as the Syrian leadership needs us in the field … Even if the entire world unites to take us out of Syria – we won’t leave. We won’t leave until the Syrian leadership tells us,” Nasrallah said in a televised speech marking the international Quds Day, according to the Israeli Ynet News. During his speech, Nasrallah stressed that his party entered Syria in the first place to confront “a major conspiracy targeted against Syria’s people.” Hezbollah leader also called on Israel and its allies to admit that they had failed to overthrow the Syrian president and his gover

A screenshot from the video According to a video released by the Russian media outlet Rusvesna, some units of the Russian Military Police are still deployed in the Damascus region of Eastern Ghouta, which was fully liberated from militants earier this year. Military police units provide security and assist in keeping the law and order in the area. Syrian security forces, assisted by the Russians, are conducting a security operation in the area in order to crack down the remaining cells of militant groups, uncover hidden weapon depots and to remove IEDs and mines.

Members of the Ukrainian armed forces ride on armoured personnel carriers near Debaltseve, eastern Ukraine, February 12, 2015. Photo by Gleb Garanich/Reuters The recent military escalation in eastern Ukraine  has drawn attention of the UN Security Council (UNSC). The UNSC found the situation in the region very tense and adopted a statement on June 6 encouraging all parties in Ukraine to recommit to a 2015 peace agreement. The statement also expressed a “grave concern” at deteriorating situation in the Donbass  region, where the conflict is developing. All 15 UNSC members including the US and Russia agreed on the statement, which was the first pronouncement by the UNSC on Ukraine since January 2017. The UNSC condemned “continuous violations of the ceasefire regime, especially the use of heavy weapons prohibited by the Minsk agreements, responsible for tragic deaths, including among civilians. ” Last week, UN political chief Rosemary DiCarlo told the UNSC that “the relative

Russia’s MiG-31 with a Kinzhal hypersonic missile. Photo: Aleksandr Shukhov On June 7, Russian President Vladimir Putin announce that all the recently unveiled state-of-the-art Russian weapons will be put into service in time addign that some are already adopted. The announcement was made during his annual Q&A session in Moscow. “The hypersonic air-deployed Kinzhal system – the missile which can travel at 10 Mach speed – is already used by our troops in the South Federal District,” the president said. “A laser combat system is in service as well.” The hypersonic system Avangard and Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) will be put into service in 2019 and 2020 respectively. “I don’t think that any other country will develop such weapon [as Avangard]. Naturally, it will emerge at some point, but, as I’ve said already, it won’t bother us, since we already have it,” Putin added. He also revealed that an nuclear unmanned underwater vehicle and cruise missil

A photo from the site Pro-government forces have uncovered an ISIS training camp for children, according to a video released by the Russian state-run news agency Sputnik. The military training base has been found in the eastern part of the province of Hama. A damaged armored military Humvee was also spotted at the entrance. According to Sputnik’s report, the camp included everything necessary for military training – obstacle courses, battle practice grounds and classrooms. A similar training camp for children was discovered in southern Damascus after government forces had liberated the Yarmouk camp area from ISIS.