As it happens this week, two opposing sets of high-profile announcements have come out from world leaders. One set is from France, where President Emmanuel Macron and U.S. President Joe Biden, on a state visit, are making a mockery of the occasion of the 80th anniversary of D-Day; they have announced new military backing to Ukraine “to stop Russia.” Each leader met with Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy, who also briefed the French National Assembly yesterday. Macron reiterated his intention to provide fighter jets and training on site in Ukraine. Biden announced a new $225 million arms shipment to Ukraine.
Announcements from Russia and China, on the other side, include new economic commitments with multiple Global Majority nations for remarkable projects for development. Today, the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) closed, after four days bringing 21,000 people together from 139 nations. The estimated total value of the 980 deals made comes to over $70 billion, many of which, whether “expensive” or modest, are transformational. In tandem, special meetings in Beijing took place this past week, concerning the worldwide Belt and Road Initiative. Consider certain new projects announced, by continent:
Africa. At the SPIEF this week, the West African nation of Guinea signed a memorandum of understanding with Russia’s nuclear power company Rosatom, to collaborate on stationing floating nuclear power plant units (FNPP) on its coast, whose electricity can lift up its 14 million people to a higher, new platform of life.
Asia. In Beijing on June 6, a deal was signed for the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan Railway, long discussed and finally agreed upon, which will provide a whole new degree of interconnectivity, not only for China and Central Asia, but also for Central Asia to Southwest Asia, Africa and Europe. The three nations’ Presidents watched the deal-signing by live video, each then describing the new horizons before them all. Uzbekistan’s President Sadyr Japarov said the new rail will serve 4 billion people, and reach into Southwest Asia, Europe, Africa. President Xi Jinping called it a landmark project of the Belt and Road Initiative.
South America. In Beijing, one of the ministerial members of the Brazil delegation attending the High Level Sino-Brazilian Cooperation Commission, raised the vision of a transcontinental railway to finally connect, overland, the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. More might be expected on this in November, when the Brazilian and Chinese leaders can meet on the sidelines of the G20 hosted by Brazil.
During SPIEF, Bolivian President Luis Arce concluded many new deals for his country, especially in the area of nuclear power. He summed up the outlook for the new spirit of development, telling RT in an interview yesterday, “We are convinced that multilateralism is the path, and that it inexorably will be the destiny followed by the planet.”
These updates taken together—the militaristic drive of the Western establishment and Global NATO, and the development drive of the non-NATO world, put us at the brink of unprecedented danger, at the same time we are at the brink of what can be spectacular advancement for all humanity. The core of the West, the Trans-Atlantic, is in economic and financial breakdown. The sane reaction of its leaders would be to break with the collapsing policies, and instead, join with the Global Majority in development. Today’s crises can all be resolved.
This is the perspective of the international conference this coming weekend, June 15-16, sponsored by the Schiller Institute, titled, “The World on the Brink: For a New Peace of Westphalia.”
Meantime, the danger is worsening by the hour, with conflicts escalating toward World War III. Today, during Biden’s stay in France, Ukraine fired five U.S. ATACMS into the People’s Republic of Lugansk, an entity of the Russian Federation territories since late 2022. What will happen tomorrow?
This is the time to speak out against this madness. It must stop. The enemy is exposed and vulnerable, even as it tries to silence voices of reason. On June 3, the U.S. State Department seized the passport of Scott Ritter, WMD expert and American anti-war spokesman, and blocked him from boarding a plane en route to the SPIEF in St. Petersburg. On June 6, yet another hit list was issued by the NATO so-called “anti-disinformation” network, centered in Ukraine, with funding and direction by the State Department’s U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
The Ukrainian “NGO,” Texty Data Journalism Agency, published an enemies list of 390 Americans and 76 organizations (all but a handful of those are also American) charged with “echoing Russian propaganda” and “contributing to political discordance within the decision-making establishment.” How? By calling for an end to the insanity of unending U.S. support for using Ukraine to wage war against Russia.
Scott Ritter, Helga Zepp-LaRouche, leader of the Schiller Institute, and others will be speaking at an emergency press conference June 12, from 1 to 3 pm (EDT) (hybrid—in person and by internet live-streamed) at the National Press Club in Washington D.C. Speak out. Spread the word in all ways. The event is titled, “The Danger of Nuclear War Is Real, and Must Be Stopped.”
