Smurf-Herder
08-27-2009, 07:05 PM
These two stories have pretty muched stayed out of the news. But put together, it makes me wonder if Russia is planning something involving Iran and North korea.
Did Mossad hijack Russian ship to stop Iran arms shipment?
Was Israel's secret service behind the unexplained hijacking of a Russian freighter, to foil a secret attempt to ship cruise missiles to Iran?
The mystery surrounding the hijacking of a Russian freighter in July has taken a new twist with reports claiming the pirates were acting in league with the Mossad in order to halt a shipment of modern weapon systems hidden on board and destined for the Islamic republic.
While Israeli and Russian officials dismissed the reports, accounts published in the Russian media sounded more like a spy thriller than a commercial hijacking.
"There is something fishy about this whole story, no doubt about it," former deputy defense minister Ephraim Sneh told The Media Line. "But I can't comment further on this."
The Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta reported over the weekend that the vessel Arctic Sea had been carrying x-55 cruise missiles and S300 anti-aircraft rockets hidden in secret compartments among its cargo of timber and sawdust.
The eight hijackers originally claimed to be environmentalists when they boarded the ship in the Baltic Sea in Swedish waters on July 24. The Russian navy tracked it down three weeks later and recaptured it near the West African archipelago of Cape Verde on August 17, thousands of kilometers from its original destination of Algeria.
The hijackers were charged late on Friday with kidnapping and piracy, the Interfax news agency reported. Russian authorities have declined to revealing further information about the suspects' motives.
But Dmitri Rogozin, Russia's ambassador to NATO, said allegations that the Arctic Sea had been smuggling weapons were "fantasy" and "ridiculous."
Pravda's Web site reported that the ship had been smuggling cruise missiles to Iran on a well-worn path via Algeria, but a "power that has relations with Ukraine" had prevented this. Novaya Gazeta reported that the hijackers had been operating on behalf of the Mossad. It also reported that President Shimon Peres's visit to Moscow the day after the Russians recaptured the vessel had been motivated by an urgent request to his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, to refrain from arming Iran.
Israeli officials dismissed the reports as "classic conspiracy theories," but defense experts noted that Israel has a record of seizing foreign vessels carrying arms to its enemies.
"This appears as the classic conspiracy theory. I didn't see any evidence for it and so we aren't going to comment," said Yigal Palmor, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem.
A spokeswoman for Peres also dismissed the report, saying the visit had been planned long in advance.
Brig.-Gen. (res.) Shlomo Brom, a senior research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, did not rule out Israeli covert action against Iranian efforts to acquire nuclear arms, but doubted Israel would take action against Russian ships.
"It seems that it's full of mystery since everything surrounding Russia is mysterious. And if it's mysterious they dump it on Israel," he told The Media Line.
Brom, a retired senior intelligence officer, added he did not believe such an operation could enhance the Mossad's image since it appeared to be a failed hijacking.
Israel relies heavily on intelligence. Naval Intelligence monitors vessels together with other agencies in order to detect suspicious behavior of ships around the world. It was this way that Naval Intelligence was able to detect the PLO arms ship Karine A in 2002. Officers noticed its log was not entirely in keeping with a cargo ship and correlated the information with other intelligence to build a picture of an arms shipment in the making. The weapons had originated in Iran.
Israeli security agents routinely stage surprise at-sea boardings of ships headed to Israeli ports to search for terrorists, contraband and stowaways.
In March, Israeli forces reportedly struck a weapons convoy in Sudan, some 1,400 km. from the Jewish state. According to CBS, the weapons were intended for Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Nearly 40 people were killed in that attack.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1249418676474&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
(Note: Another story appeared in 2004, concerning Iran obtaining X-55 cruise missiles - nuclear capable with a 3000km range)
Russia deploys anti-missile defence unit near North Korea
Russia has placed an anti-missile defence system close to its border with North Korea, in an apparent sign of growing alarm in Moscow at Pyongyang's nuclear programme.
Russia's chief of army staff, General Nikolai Makarov, told reporters on a trip with President Dmitry Medvedev to Mongolia the military had deployed its S-400 anti-missile division, a state-of-the-art anti-aircraft system capable of shooting down short- and medium-range ballistic missiles.
The system, stationed in Russia's far east, would "guarantee" fragments from an errant North Korean missile would not fall on Russian territory, he said. "We are definitely concerned by the conditions under which tests are being carried out in North Korea, including nuclear devices," he added.
Russia shares a tiny border with North Korea in its Pacific far east, with the Russian naval port city of Vladivostok only 93 miles from North Korea. In 2006 an off-course North Korean missile reportedly plunged into Russian waters near the port of Nakhoda.
One analyst cast doubt on the general's comments, describing them as "baffling". Mikhail Barabanov, a Moscow-based defence analyst, said today there was no evidence that Russia had deployed its S-400 system in the far east. "Either the general was doing some sort of PR, or the journalists didn't understand what he was talking about," he said.
He conceded that the military may have transferred the radio-location system from the S-400 to the North Korean border to monitor the testing of missiles.
The Kremlin is vehemently opposed to the US's plans to site a ballistic missile defence system in central Europe – which Washington argues would protect the US and its allies from a rogue missile fired by Iran or North Korea. Moscow believes the system targets its nuclear arsenal.
Makarov's remarks indicate that Russia apparently shares the US's assessment of North Korea's nuclear threat, after the north's nuclear test in May and a series of launches of small- and medium-size missiles, which provoked international condemnation.
These concerns persist despite recent signs of a softer approach from the north and the release this month of two imprisoned US journalists who had inadvertently strayed across the North Korean border, after a visit to Pyongyang by the former US president Bill Clinton.
"North Korea's missile testing technique is pretty crude. You can't exclude the possibility that a missile could fall on Russia," Said Aminov, editor of the Anti-aircraft Defence Digest, a Russian website, said today. He added: "The far east is an extremely important region for the Russian Federation from both a political and military standpoint."
Russia is a member of the six-party disarmament group, which also includes China, Japan, North and South Korea and the US.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/27/russia-north-korea-nuclear-missile-defence
(Note: Doesn't it seem a little odd that Russia decides to do this after all this time - when we haven't heard anything nasty from North Korea in so long?)
Did Mossad hijack Russian ship to stop Iran arms shipment?
Was Israel's secret service behind the unexplained hijacking of a Russian freighter, to foil a secret attempt to ship cruise missiles to Iran?
The mystery surrounding the hijacking of a Russian freighter in July has taken a new twist with reports claiming the pirates were acting in league with the Mossad in order to halt a shipment of modern weapon systems hidden on board and destined for the Islamic republic.
While Israeli and Russian officials dismissed the reports, accounts published in the Russian media sounded more like a spy thriller than a commercial hijacking.
"There is something fishy about this whole story, no doubt about it," former deputy defense minister Ephraim Sneh told The Media Line. "But I can't comment further on this."
The Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta reported over the weekend that the vessel Arctic Sea had been carrying x-55 cruise missiles and S300 anti-aircraft rockets hidden in secret compartments among its cargo of timber and sawdust.
The eight hijackers originally claimed to be environmentalists when they boarded the ship in the Baltic Sea in Swedish waters on July 24. The Russian navy tracked it down three weeks later and recaptured it near the West African archipelago of Cape Verde on August 17, thousands of kilometers from its original destination of Algeria.
The hijackers were charged late on Friday with kidnapping and piracy, the Interfax news agency reported. Russian authorities have declined to revealing further information about the suspects' motives.
But Dmitri Rogozin, Russia's ambassador to NATO, said allegations that the Arctic Sea had been smuggling weapons were "fantasy" and "ridiculous."
Pravda's Web site reported that the ship had been smuggling cruise missiles to Iran on a well-worn path via Algeria, but a "power that has relations with Ukraine" had prevented this. Novaya Gazeta reported that the hijackers had been operating on behalf of the Mossad. It also reported that President Shimon Peres's visit to Moscow the day after the Russians recaptured the vessel had been motivated by an urgent request to his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, to refrain from arming Iran.
Israeli officials dismissed the reports as "classic conspiracy theories," but defense experts noted that Israel has a record of seizing foreign vessels carrying arms to its enemies.
"This appears as the classic conspiracy theory. I didn't see any evidence for it and so we aren't going to comment," said Yigal Palmor, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem.
A spokeswoman for Peres also dismissed the report, saying the visit had been planned long in advance.
Brig.-Gen. (res.) Shlomo Brom, a senior research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, did not rule out Israeli covert action against Iranian efforts to acquire nuclear arms, but doubted Israel would take action against Russian ships.
"It seems that it's full of mystery since everything surrounding Russia is mysterious. And if it's mysterious they dump it on Israel," he told The Media Line.
Brom, a retired senior intelligence officer, added he did not believe such an operation could enhance the Mossad's image since it appeared to be a failed hijacking.
Israel relies heavily on intelligence. Naval Intelligence monitors vessels together with other agencies in order to detect suspicious behavior of ships around the world. It was this way that Naval Intelligence was able to detect the PLO arms ship Karine A in 2002. Officers noticed its log was not entirely in keeping with a cargo ship and correlated the information with other intelligence to build a picture of an arms shipment in the making. The weapons had originated in Iran.
Israeli security agents routinely stage surprise at-sea boardings of ships headed to Israeli ports to search for terrorists, contraband and stowaways.
In March, Israeli forces reportedly struck a weapons convoy in Sudan, some 1,400 km. from the Jewish state. According to CBS, the weapons were intended for Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Nearly 40 people were killed in that attack.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1249418676474&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
(Note: Another story appeared in 2004, concerning Iran obtaining X-55 cruise missiles - nuclear capable with a 3000km range)
Russia deploys anti-missile defence unit near North Korea
Russia has placed an anti-missile defence system close to its border with North Korea, in an apparent sign of growing alarm in Moscow at Pyongyang's nuclear programme.
Russia's chief of army staff, General Nikolai Makarov, told reporters on a trip with President Dmitry Medvedev to Mongolia the military had deployed its S-400 anti-missile division, a state-of-the-art anti-aircraft system capable of shooting down short- and medium-range ballistic missiles.
The system, stationed in Russia's far east, would "guarantee" fragments from an errant North Korean missile would not fall on Russian territory, he said. "We are definitely concerned by the conditions under which tests are being carried out in North Korea, including nuclear devices," he added.
Russia shares a tiny border with North Korea in its Pacific far east, with the Russian naval port city of Vladivostok only 93 miles from North Korea. In 2006 an off-course North Korean missile reportedly plunged into Russian waters near the port of Nakhoda.
One analyst cast doubt on the general's comments, describing them as "baffling". Mikhail Barabanov, a Moscow-based defence analyst, said today there was no evidence that Russia had deployed its S-400 system in the far east. "Either the general was doing some sort of PR, or the journalists didn't understand what he was talking about," he said.
He conceded that the military may have transferred the radio-location system from the S-400 to the North Korean border to monitor the testing of missiles.
The Kremlin is vehemently opposed to the US's plans to site a ballistic missile defence system in central Europe – which Washington argues would protect the US and its allies from a rogue missile fired by Iran or North Korea. Moscow believes the system targets its nuclear arsenal.
Makarov's remarks indicate that Russia apparently shares the US's assessment of North Korea's nuclear threat, after the north's nuclear test in May and a series of launches of small- and medium-size missiles, which provoked international condemnation.
These concerns persist despite recent signs of a softer approach from the north and the release this month of two imprisoned US journalists who had inadvertently strayed across the North Korean border, after a visit to Pyongyang by the former US president Bill Clinton.
"North Korea's missile testing technique is pretty crude. You can't exclude the possibility that a missile could fall on Russia," Said Aminov, editor of the Anti-aircraft Defence Digest, a Russian website, said today. He added: "The far east is an extremely important region for the Russian Federation from both a political and military standpoint."
Russia is a member of the six-party disarmament group, which also includes China, Japan, North and South Korea and the US.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/27/russia-north-korea-nuclear-missile-defence
(Note: Doesn't it seem a little odd that Russia decides to do this after all this time - when we haven't heard anything nasty from North Korea in so long?)