Lithuania notifies UN of withdrawal from landmine ban treaty
VILNIUS, June 27 (Reuters) - Lithuania has notified the United Nations it is leaving the treaty banning anti-personnel landmines, its foreign minister posted on X on Friday.
The country will no longer be bound by the treaty six months after the notification.
Parliaments of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland and Poland - all NATO and EU members bordering Russia - have approved withdrawal of their countries from the treaty, citing the increased military danger from their neighbour.
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Spectator
40 minutes ago
- Spectator
Mikhail Khodorkovsky: ‘The West isn't ready for Putin's hybrid war'
Mikhail Khodorkovsky is sounding the alarm. The end of the war in Ukraine, whenever it comes, won't mean the end of Vladimir Putin, he says – nor the Russian threat to the West. Moscow, he says, has never been very good at demobilising restless, traumatised soldiers. 'There is a 600,000-strong group that took part in the fighting. The question for Putin is: 'What to do with this group?'. Khodorkovsky fears that he knows the answer. 'These tensions will naturally arise after two or three years,' he says. 'And then Putin's way of thinking kicks into gear. And Putin's mentality? He has already relieved such points of tension four times [during his rule] by starting a war. This is his modus operandi. Not because there are no other options, but because for him this is a habitual model of behaviour.' Putin's is a cult of personality, Khodorkovsky explains, not ideology Khodorkovsky, formerly an oligarch and the wealthiest man in Russia, now an opposition activist and ex-political prisoner living in exile in London, is far from the only person concerned that Europe is unprepared to deal with the ongoing threat Russia will pose over the coming years. At the Nato summit in the Hague last week, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Putin could be ready to attack a member of the alliance in five years' time. 'We believe that, starting from 2030, Putin can have significantly greater capabilities.' Warnings that Russia could launch an attack on a Nato country – most likely one of the Baltic states – have been gathering pace in recent months. The timelines vary, but the consensus is the same: Ukraine won't be the last invasion Putin tries to mount. Putin, Khodorkovsky warns, is already waging a 'hybrid war' against the West. In the years since the invasion of Ukraine, Europe has seen a dramatic surge in Russia-affiliated acts of sabotage: exploding DHL packages, arson attacks carried out on energy substations and warehouses – and even potentially on properties belonging to Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Many of the saboteurs in these cases aren't Russian, seemingly hired unknowingly by the GRU – Russia's foreign intelligence branch – through the internet. This model, Khodorkovsky says, 'is beautiful in its danger'. He compares it to the augmented reality game Pokemon Go, in which players complete virtual challenges, capturing, training and fighting Pokemon, in the real world. 'The GRU took this model and began to give such tasks to all sorts of idiots who, for very little money, do God knows what.' This type of warfare won't end when the last Russian soldier puts down his gun in Ukraine, Khodorkovsky says. 'And I do not know how ready the West is for this.' I met Khodorkovsky at his offices in central London: at 61 he's short in stature, with greying, close-cropped hair and sharp eyes behind silver-rimmed glasses. For someone who speaks with a great deal of authority, he is mild-mannered and surprisingly humble. 'I am not a politician,' he insists. 'A politician is, after all, a person who fights for power.' At various points in our discussion, he reaches for other labels to describe himself: first 'a public figure', then, rather ambiguously, a 'fairly effective manager'. 'Of course,' he concedes, 'I have an idea of how I would like to see Russia in the future.' He is the author of How to Slay a Dragon: Building a New Russia After Putin, which he once described as a 'detailed breakdown of the steps that can lead us to that bright future'. In 2017, he also launched the Dossier Centre, a non-profit investigative outfit which tracks the criminal activity of Kremlin associates. Khodorkovsky knows what he's talking about when it comes to Putin. A former economic advisor to Boris Yeltsin, he remembers being informed in the late 90s that his boss was lining up the young director of the FSB – Russia's domestic intelligence service – to become the country's prime minister, and eventually his successor as president. 'If we had understood what all this would lead to, then we probably would have been up in arms. But we couldn't sense that then.' Soon enough, Khodorkovsky – by then, amongst other things, owner of the multimillion-dollar oil and gas company Yukos – began meeting with Putin personally. 'When I first met him, he made a very pleasant impression on me. He certainly does a good job in that sense, a truly talented person. That is, when you start communicating with him, you feel that you're on the same wavelength.' The honeymoon wasn't to last. In February 2003, Khodorkovsky fell foul of Russia's president. At a televised meeting with business leaders at the Kremlin, Khodorkovsky – by some reports now well on his way to becoming the world's richest man – dared to challenge Putin on the full scale of systemic corruption in the country. 'This is when,' Khodorkovsky says matter-of-factly, 'all the fun began'. Eight months later, Khodorkovsky was arrested on charges of fraud and tax evasion. The Kremlin froze shares in Yukos, dissolving much of Khodorkovsky's wealth with its subsequent collapse. A eight-year jail sentence followed in 2005, before he was subjected to a second trial in 2009 on charges of embezzlement and sentenced to a further 14 years in prison. Khodorkovsky has always maintained that the charges against him were politically motivated – indeed, his experiences fit the pattern of what would soon become widely recognised as the playbook by which Putin punishes his critics. In 2013, Putin unexpectedly pardoned Khodorkovsky, freeing him that December. He left Russia, spending a year in Zurich while his children finished school, before settling in London in 2015. 'London, for me as a person who was born and raised in Moscow, is more familiar,' he explains. But a presidential pardon didn't mean he was free from the Kremlin. Men he suspects were 'Putin's jokesters' would harass him: 'They would stand here opposite the office, take pictures, brazenly follow me from home to work.' Some, he says, would even try and film him using drones. The police did what they could, but it was only after the war in Ukraine broke out that the harassment really stopped: the British government's expulsion of many Russian diplomats effectively dismantled the Kremlin's network of goons. The prospect of an end to the war in Ukraine currently seems further away than ever. Donald Trump's administration has been keen to thaw relations with the Kremlin, raising concerns among Ukraine's other allies over whether Putin will ever face a reckoning for his illegal invasion. And yet, even the Russian president won't be able to live forever. 'Who will replace Putin, no one can tell you that today. But it is certain that his initial replacement will come from within his entourage,' Khodorkovsky says. 'But then it is clear that the probability that the new person will preserve Putin's power structure is simply zero.' Putin's is a cult of personality, he explains, not ideology. This will make his regime difficult to continue after his death. The West will then face a choice of whether to bring Russia in from the cold, or push it further into China's arms, he adds. The next decade will be pivotal for Russia, Khodorkovsky believes. It will, he says, almost certainly involve some kind of 'violent confrontation'. But what of him? Does Khodorkovsky hope to see his homeland again? 'Without a doubt, I certainly want to have the opportunity, but what I will be ready to do depends on time.' He adds, 'Revolutionary changes, and they will at the very least themes of revolution – these are still the business of the young.'
Scotsman
2 hours ago
- Scotsman
SNP's policy of 'unarmed' Armed Forces is sheer madness
Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... As the UK yesterday marked Armed Forces Day – described as 'a chance to show your support' for the men and women in the military – SNP ministers will hopefully have been reflecting on their spectacularly bizarre stance on defence spending. While the nationalists have long opposed nuclear weapons, they are not a pacifist party. They support membership of Nato, pledging an independent Scotland would be a 'reliable and dedicated international partner' like Denmark and Norway. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad They also say our domestic defence industry 'will not just be welcome in an independent Scotland but will be a vital part of our ability to have a defence capability that matches an Independent Scotland's needs and threats' and criticise the UK Government for 'a failure to meet Scotland's specific defence needs'. Ukraine needs munitions and so does the British Army (Picture: Sergey Shestak) | AFP via Getty Images 'Russian threat is very real' So it is all the more difficult to understand why it is a 'long-standing position' of the SNP that government funding should not be provided for the 'direct manufacture of munitions'. So, for example, Scottish Enterprise and the Scottish National Investment Bank do not invest in companies that make weapons. Former SNP defence spokesperson Stewart McDonald has now rightly criticised the ban as 'a stupid policy' and called for a new debate. His comments followed a hint by John Swinney that the party's stance could change as 'we are living in a very different context today' and 'the Russian threat is very real'. However a Scottish Government source explained ministers were struggling with how to 'manage' the issue within the party. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad But, with the UK set to increase defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP, now is not the time to tip-toe around the subject. Not only is the manufacturing of munitions and weapons vital to defend this country and to help Ukraine fight off the Russian invasion, it is also a major economic opportunity.
Times
2 hours ago
- Times
How prepared is Ireland for the knock-on effects of a future war?
Ireland's decision to sign up to the European Union's €150 billion weapons fund was greeted with typical fanfare last Friday when it was announced by Simon Harris. The move, the tanaiste said, would allow Ireland and other countries to streamline the procurement of arms and defence systems. 'I am determined to provide for the development of a full spectrum of Defence Force capabilities that will bring Ireland in line with other similar-sized European countries,' Harris added. Europe is embarking on a mass rearmament because of the worsening security situation on its eastern borders and across the globe. The bloc announced the creation of a €150 billion fund called Security Action for Europe (Safe) in response to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the fact that America is no longer a reliable guarantor of European security as it turns its focus instead towards China, where the communist regime is building one of the largest militaries in the world. Defence spending across the EU is surging, with Nato members last week pledging to allocate 5 per cent of their GDP to defence amid rising fears of a potential war on the continent. This marks a sharp increase from last year, when only 23 of the alliance's 32 members were meeting the existing 2 per cent target. For its part, Ireland will spend €1.35 billion on defence this year, up €100 million on 2024, but amounting to only about 0.2 per cent of GDP. Is this enough given Ireland's vulnerability and stated position of neutrality? And is the country prepared for a coming war? The answer to both, in short, is no. Friday's announcement came amid ongoing government efforts to formulate strategies to address a worsening security landscape, compounded by decades of underinvestment in defence. The coalition has also struggled to educate an electorate that often conflates neutrality with protection, overlooking the state's inability to defend itself. Few Irish people think about serving their country by joining the military. The government and the military have promised but failed to revitalise the reserve Defence Forces. It is difficult to exaggerate the scale of the polycrisis facing the tanaiste, who is also the defence minister. Harris faces inertia in both the Department of Defence and the military, which is struggling on almost every front. And like militaries across Europe, the Defence Forces struggle to recruit and keep staff and even to put patrol vessels out to sea. Some of these patrol vessels are confined to port for months. • Alex Massie: It's time Ireland started to pay for its defence As of May 31, there were 7,468 Irish military personnel compared with 9,480 in 2010. Numbers within the Defence Forces have fallen nearly every year between 2010 and 2024. The Air Corps has no combat jets but does have maritime patrol aircraft. The Naval Service has a fleet of vessels but does not have the staff to put all but a few to sea. Crucially, the government and the general staff of the Defence Forces are not battle-hardened. They have no real experience of dealing with a conventional or hybrid attack. There is no single scenario for the outbreak of war in Europe but it could begin with a Russian attack on the continent's eastern borders, though it is more likely to be hybrid in nature with the Kremlin using terrorist groups, cyberattacks and sabotage to try to upturn European society or provide an excuse to take action. However, it could also involve an attack on a weak state such as Ireland, whose isolated location on the EU's western border in the north Atlantic makes it vulnerable. Neutral countries have no protection in war. • 'Ireland must recruit tech workers to counter Russia cyber threat' 'The Atlantic was and will always be challenged by Russia's north Atlantic fleet. If the UK currently feels threatened by Russia, why should we think Ireland is not?' said Riho Terras, an Estonian member of the European parliament and a former military officer. 'If Russia keeps on rearming at its current pace, pretty soon Europe and Nato will not have the ability to handle it. The Kremlin looks for weak spots. It's hard to understand why Ireland thinks it won't be impacted. Europe really does need to stop figure-skating when Putin is playing ice hockey,' Terras added. If a conventional attack were to occur under a dubious pretext, Ireland would be forced to seek assistance from other EU states and Nato as it does not have any capability to defend itself. Before Friday's announcement, the government was already trying to rearm the Defence Forces but struggling to make progress. It has announced the acquisition of sonar and primary radar systems, but this is not new technology and will also take years to become operational. 'We are spending €60 million on new technology we should have bought decades ago. The new maritime patrol aircraft we bought for €250 million have no anti-submarine kits because the department didn't like the sound of anti- submarine warfare equipment,' one retired military officer said. 'The sonar system we have bought has to be towed on a ship but we cannot put naval vessels out to sea. 'It's akin to the gardai celebrating getting flashing blue lights and sirens attached to patrol cars when they have no drivers. Nothing makes any sense,' the source added. 'If war breaks out and Russian submarines are entering our waters to sabotage undersea cables or attack Britain, we are powerless to do anything. This is very similar to the years leading up to the Second World War. We are not at the back of the queue to acquire military equipment — we are not even in the queue.' Like many other announcements on defence, the decision potentially to use the EU Safe fund to acquire arms and military equipment may turn out to be unnecessary. Money is not the issue with increasing Ireland's preparedness; it is decision-making. Ireland's acquisition of new sonar and primary radar was made without EU funding. A decade ago, Ireland signed a similar memorandum of understanding to allow for joint procurement with Britain but did not use it. Terras warned that the Safe programme might not even work. 'No EU country has to use it. If large and important countries like Germany don't use it, Spain and the rest of them won't either. It's a loan facility for those who need it,' he said. The announcement by Harris came amid government moves to restructure oversight of defence. It has announced the formation of a ministerial group, a revamped national security committee and the rebranding of the National Security Analysis Centre (NSAC), set up six years ago to advise the taoiseach on national security. The new group is chaired by Micheál Martin, the taoiseach. Harris attends, as does Jim O'Callaghan, the minister for justice, along with the secretaries-general of the relevant departments, the garda commissioner and the chief of staff of the Defence Forces. It is scheduled to meet every quarter, while the national security committee can meet on a more frequent basis. But many familiar with these entities describe them as 'old wine in new bottles'. The NSAC is widely considered to have been an abject failure. Various iterations of the national security committee took no action to stop the expansion of the Russian embassy when it sought planning permission, essentially to build a spy base in Dublin. Others point out how no action was taken when Russia's intelligence services managed to recruit an agent, codenamed Cobalt, inside the Oireachtas, who still remains in place. Neither Martin, Harris nor O'Callaghan have any real understanding of Russia and its determination to undermine the EU for strategic purposes. Harris is also struggling to overhaul the Department of Defence, though he has been credited with making decisions and pushing ahead with investment projects, often in the face of bureaucratic inertia. 'Harris is making decisions and he's getting projects across the line but he's struggling with the department and the military. He's making the right decisions when something is put in front of him but he's one man trying to reform a dysfunctional system,' one insider said. There are other problems that illustrate Ireland's unreadiness for war in Europe, according to Eoin McNamara, a defence researcher at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. 'There are now long queues to buy military equipment around Europe, such is the demand because Russia is rearming at exponential speed,' he said. 'Time is not on Ireland's side. Decisions are not being made fast enough. Most countries, if they can't find an ideal defence system, are going for the second-best option, but Ireland isn't doing this.' Unlike other EU states, Ireland has failed to nurture a defence industry, though it urgently needs one. The government and the military have yet to demonstrate any novel thinking in terms of how to use new technologies to defend its citizens. 'Ireland is a small country that needs to think more about technological solutions to defend itself,' said McNamara who noted how Ukraine had shown the world how a country could defend itself through its own resources. Ukrainian-manufactured drones have inflicted the majority of casualties on the battlefield. 'Defence is a driver of innovation. Within Ireland, we could do something similar here and build a fantastic industry around defence technology. We need to recognise what's happening as an opportunity,' said Fintan Buckley of Ubotica Technologies, an Irish defence company specialising in artificial intelligence platforms for satellites. Ubotica's Space:AI system can detect, classify and track vessels, even those operating off the grid, to provide maritime situational awareness from space to seafloor. 'The initial response by the government to what's happening has been about getting more boots on the ground and more boats out to sea, but long term it needs to think about how we embrace technology to provide security to protect our critical infrastructure,' Buckley said. 'We need to foster a closer relationship between our Defence Forces and industry to help foster new technologies. We do this in other industries but we need to do the same with defence.' However, many experts believe that Ireland's greatest security vulnerability — one that arguably leaves it more exposed than its European neighbours — is that Russia, after years of intelligence-gathering in the state, already knows all of the above.
