■ Discarding Illusions, Ending Wars (Colonel (ret.) Douglas Macgregor, US Army)(08/06/23)

Ukraine has become a world leader in black-market trafficking, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has claimed | Russia's Foreign Ministry spokeswoman has alleged that members of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s administration are personally engaged in, and are covering up, the illicit export of human organs. ● In an article published on the Foreign Ministry's website, Maria Zakharova cited media reports suggesting that the organs of killed Ukrainian soldiers, such as hearts, kidneys and livers, have been appearing on some of the biggest marketplaces of the dark net, with prices starting at €5,000 ($5,500). One dealer allegedly claimed that it takes 48-60 hours to receive any desired organ in a medical box, with deliveries limited to EU countries. ● Zakharova noted that organs were also being traded offline, citing reports from June that representatives of a health ministry in a NATO country had struck a deal with some “private businessmen” who were assisted by Ukraine’s Health Ministry and Presidential Office to deliver a refrigerated train car full of human organs and body parts. According to the spokeswoman, organ trafficking in Ukraine has boomed since the authorities in Kiev passed a number of laws that “drastically simplified the work of transplant specialists in the country.” ● Specifically, Zakharova pointed to last year’s Law No. 5610, which exempted transplantation from value-added tax, and the December 2021 Law No. 5831, which removed the need to notarise the written consent or authenticate the signature of a living donor to give up their organs. ● In an explanatory note attached to the 2021 bill, Ukrainian lawmakers explained the simplification of the country’s organ transplant regulations by the need to increase the efficiency of the transplantation system, in order to save more lives. Additionally, Ukrainian law prohibits buying or selling human anatomical materials and bans the harvesting of organs from orphaned children, unidentified persons, or people who died in the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

■ Ukraine Leader in Black Market of Human Organ Trafficking - Russian Foreign Ministry (Sputnik News)

The Taliban* was hardly behind corrupt deals related to US military aid to Afghanistan, Moscow-based political analyst Alexander Knyazev told Sputnik. | US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) John Sopko has warned of “unanticipated consequences” from possible corruption pertaining to America’s hefty spending on Ukraine. SIGAR said that he was “not opposed to spending that” and he just wanted “to make sure it’s done correctly and there’s oversight.” Sopko especially warned about the risk of fueling graft, stressing that in Afghanistan, “corruption was the existential threat.” According to him, “it wasn’t the Taliban. It was corruption that did us in.” ● With the US spending a whopping $2.26 trillion on Afghanistan-related issues, such as the national army and security, within the above­-mentioned period, this huge sum finally didn’t help America prevent the Taliban from seizing power in the South Asian country in August 2021.

Syria's air defenses intercept Israeli airstrikes on the Damascus countryside. | A new act of Israeli aggression on Monday killed four Syrian Arab Army soldiers and wounded four others in the vicinity of Damascus as Syrian air defenses engaged the hostile targets. The air defenses of the Syrian Army engaged the hostile targets and intercepted some of them. The aggression "led to the martyrdom of four soldiers, wounded four others, and material damages were recorded." This is the third attack of this sort in the span of a month, and such acts of aggression are commonplace in Syria, with the Israeli occupation continuously violating the country's airspace. On July 19, the Israeli occupation carried out attacks on the outskirts of the Syrian capital of Damascus.