Ukraine turns to Turkey as Russia threatens full-scale war

 Submitted by: M Mulukin

Iran calls Natanz atomic site blackout ‘nuclear terrorism’.

Israel keeps on stalling Iran’s drive for a nuke – but that drive is still going strong;

12 April 2021

 Iran on Sunday described a blackout at its underground Natanz atomic facility an act of “nuclear terrorism,” raising regional tensions as world powers and Tehran continue to negotiate over its tattered nuclear deal.

While there was no immediate claim of responsibility, suspicion fell immediately on Israel, where its media nearly uniformly reported a devastating cyberattack orchestrated by the country caused the blackout.

The conviction is growing, reliable analysts note, that whatever Israel may throw at Iran’s nuclear program, sabotage, cyberwar, malware or even assassinations, including the death of its top scientist last year, the Iranians simply patch up the damage and get back on track.

Nine months after the Natanz centrifuge production hall was blown up, a larger, newer facility was sunk underground. It was there that, on Saturday, President Hassan Rouhani switched on new, advanced centrifuges for the accelerated enrichment of uranium to grades prohibited under the 2015 accord.

If Israel was responsible, it further heightens tensions between the two nations, already engaged in a shadow conflict across the wider Middle East. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who met Sunday with U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, has vowed to do everything in his power to stop the nuclear deal.

Western sources quoted in Israeli media said the attack, which was initially referred to as an “accident” by Iran, was carried out by the Mossad.

Details remained few about what happened early Sunday morning at the facility, which initially was described as a blackout caused by the electrical grid feeding its above-ground workshops and underground enrichment halls.

Ali Akbar Salehi,[pictured above] the American-educated head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, who once served as the country’s foreign minister, offered what appeared to be the harshest comments of his long career, which included the assassination of nuclear scientists a decade ago. Iran blames Israel for those killings as well.

He pledged to “seriously improve” his nation’s nuclear technology while working to lift international sanctions.

Salehi’s comments to state TV did not explain what happened at the facility, but his words suggested a serious disruption.

“While condemning this desperate move, the Islamic Republic of Iran emphasizes the need for a confrontation by the international bodies and the (International Atomic Energy Agency) against this nuclear terrorism,” Salehi said.

The IAEA, the United Nations’ body that monitors Tehran’s atomic program, earlier said it was aware of media reports about the incident at Natanz and had spoken with Iranian officials about it. The agency did not elaborate.

However, Natanz has been targeted by sabotage in the past. The Stuxnet computer virus, discovered in 2010 and widely believed to be a joint U.S.-Israeli creation, once disrupted and destroyed Iranian centrifuges at Natanz amid an earlier period of Western fears about Tehran’s program.

Will the cyberattack on Natanz finally draw Iran out of its self-protective self-restraint? That remains to be seen.

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Ukraine turns to Turkey as Russia threatens full-scale war .....

Ukrainian President Zelenskyy [L]meets Turkey’s

Erdogan at a time of heightened Russia-Ukraine

tensions.

April 12, 2021

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Istanbul over the weekend to mark the 10th anniversary of his country’s strategic partnership with Turkey and shore up support from his Black Sea neighbour as tensions escalate with Russia over Ukraine’s simmering war in Donbas.

“Turkey’s support for the restoration of our sovereignty and territorial integrity is extremely important,” Zelenskyy stated in a joint news conference with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Following a meeting with the Turkish leader, Zelenskyy tweeted, “We share common values with #Turkey, including human life and support.”

While Turkey spars with the United States and other Western European leaders over the purchase of the Russian-made S-400 missile system and the conflict in Syria, the aspiring NATO country of Ukraine has developed strong ties with Ankara.

Saturday’s visit marks the Ukrainian leader’s second trip to Turkey in less than six months.

In 2017, the countries created a passport-free travel zone and they are currently working on the implementation of a free-trade agreement, which leaders say will more than double the level of bilateral trade between them.

“The drifting away from the West discourse is very popular in European and US capitals. The West doesn’t want to see that there are really problematic areas in Turkish-Russian relations,” Bilgehan Ozturk, an analyst with the SETA Foundation, an Ankara-based think-tank seen as close to the Erdogan government, told Al Jazeera.

Ozturk said Russia’s annexation of Crimea was a game-changer for Ankara’s relations with Moscow and how it viewed the balance of power in the Black Sea.