Monthly Archives: July 2020

LONDON Russia sought to meddle in the 2014 Scottish referendum and intelligence agencies should produce an assessment of potential interference in the Brexit referendum, a report by the British parliaments intelligence and security committee said.

There has been credible open source commentary suggesting that Russia undertook influence campaigns in relation to the Scottish independence referendum in 2014, the report, which was finished in March 2019, said.

The report was leaked ahead of its publication time by the Guido Fawkes website. Russia has repeatedly denied meddling in the West, casting the United States and Britain as gripped by anti-Russian hysteria.

When discussing the EU referendum, the U.K. parliamentary report is heavily redacted.

In response to our request for written evidence at the outset of the Inquiry, MI5 initially provided just six lines of text. It stated that ***, before referring to academic studies, the redacted version reads.

It is nonetheless the Committees view that the U.K. Intelligence Community should produce an analogous assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU referendum and that an unclassified summary of it be published, the report said.

Read the rest here:

Russia meddled in Scottish vote, but unclear on Brexit: UK parliamentary report - The Japan Times

The Government failed to fully assess the impact Russian state-run media and troll accounts could have had on the EU referendum, the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) has found.

In its report on Tuesday, the committee said open source studies had pointed to the prevalence of anti-EU or pro-Brexit stories on the RT and Sputnik news networks as evidence of Russian attempts to influence the process.

But the ISC said it was surprising that such material may not have been fully taken into account by the Government and security agencies prior to the referendum in 2016.

Both RT and Sputnik are funded by the Russian state.

In a heavily redacted report, the committee said it was only when Russia carried out a hack and leak operation against the Democratic National Committee in the US, where emails were made public one month after the EU referendum, that the Government belatedly realised the threat posed.

Had the relevant parts of the intelligence community conducted a similar threat assessment prior to the referendum, it is inconceivable that they would not have reached the same conclusion as to Russian intent, which might then have led them to take action to protect the process, the committee said.

Intelligence agencies had the capabilities to stand on the shoulders of open source coverage and look behind suspicious anti-EU social media bot and troll accounts to uncover their operators, the ISC said.

The committee which scrutinises the work of Britains spies said MI5 initially replied with just six lines of text when it sought to establish if there was intelligence built on the open source studies.

The written evidence provided to us appeared to suggest that HMG had not seen or sought evidence of successful interference in UK democratic processes or any activity that has had a material impact on an election, for example influencing results, the committee said.

The ISCs report found the Government did not properly consider whether Moscow could interfere in the Brexit referendum until after the event.

And while the Government said there was no evidence of successful Russian interference in the vote, the ISC suggested that there was no proper investigation.

Following the reports publication, Guy Verhofstadt, chief Brexit negotiator for the European Parliament, tweeted: Brexit was always a gift to Putin because it weakened the European Union & left Britain divided, isolated. The #RussiaReport shows just how many questions remain unanswered.

Liberal Democrat acting leader Sir Ed Davey accused Boris Johnson of refusing a cross-party call to launch an inquiry because he is worried about what it might find.

This is a green light for Russia to interfere with our democracy in future, knowing there will be no consequences, he tweeted.

Meanwhile, Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage tweeted that some serious apologies were due, claiming there was no evidence of Russian interference.

Read more:

Impact of Russian media and 'troll' accounts on Brexit vote 'not fully assessed' - expressandstar.com

Well, I think we can see why Boris Johnson was worried about the Intelligence and Security Committee report. Even with redactions, it is utterly damning, not just of him and this government, but of the actions and inactions of the two Prime Ministers he helped remove, David Cameron and Theresa May.

National security is right up there in the list of responsibilities of a Prime Minister. They have played fast and loose with it, putting their own and their partys interests before the national interest. They didnt want to look for Russian interference in our democracy because they knew they would find it. And for Johnson in particular, who got to the top on the back of a Brexit long seen by the Russians as an important strategic goal, that was a stone best left unturned. Far better to spend his time raising money for the Tory Party by playing tennis with oligarchs and their wives than look into how the millions from the Putin kleptocracy might be undermining our democratic processes.

The report was shocking, but also unsurprising, for it is all of a piece with his character and his record. In the interest of his own ambitions, he has allowed our politics, for all its faults admired and respected around the world, to be corrupted.

Some of you will be aware of the so-called Nolan Principles, drawn up by Lord Nolan at John Majors request after the so-called cash for questions affair in 1994.Honesty. Openness. Integrity. Transparency. Accountability. Selflessness. Leadership by example.

Johnson and Co break one or all of those every day of the week. It used to be a resigning offence to lie at the despatch box. Johnson cant get through a PMQs without transgressing on that one. The Patel bullying. The unexplained Johnson holidays. The Jenrick/Desmond affair. The hounding out of senior civil servants to be replaced by cronies. The awarding of multi million contracts to friends and family without a proper tendering process. If this was an emerging market in Africa, we would be dusting off the banana republic clichs of Johnsons journalist past.And plenty of the Nolan seven have been breached by the governments handling of the Russia Report, which had to be dragged kicking and screaming into daylight.

As the committee members were addressing the press conference, Russia and China will have been laughing at a country in decline. America, due to its current Adminstration, where America First means just that, and where Donald Trump has drunk the Putin Kool-Aid, is indifferent. Europe, the third real global power, is bemused. All of them, however, are united in seeing the UK as a country that has chosen its own decline. Johnson as Prime Minister, and Brexit as his governments main priority, are two very large symbols of that.

At the weekend the BBC played some of the best moments of the London 2012 Olympic Games. I found I couldnt watch. It was just too sad, too depressing to recall the mood of the country then, and to look at Britain today. Whatever the opposite of the Olympic spirit may be, that is what we have now.

Those were two of our best weeks in living memory and then came another two with the best attended and most lauded Paralympic Games of all time. It truly was a wonderful time to be alive, and to be British. The nation felt as united as I can recall it, as happy too. The image projected to the world was one of a country that was competent, confident, at ease with itself.All that has gone.

The Games were a success for British organisation and also for British politics. They were secured and developed under one government, that of Tony Blair and Chancellor Gordon Brown, and delivered under another, led by David Cameron and George Osborne. Unlike Prime Minister Johnson, who casts any and all critics and opponents to one side, Prime Minister Cameron made sure that Tessa Jowell, Labours Olympics minister, remained centrally involved and the whole operation became an all party success. Johnson, then Mayor of London, added to the gaiety of the nation, and the strength of his own profile, with a series of photo stunts, most memorably on a zip wire.

Now he is Prime Minister, we have gone from internationalist to nationalist. From outward looking to inward looking. From open and welcoming to closed. A source of respect and fascination back then, increasingly today seen as rather eccentric and frankly a bit disturbed. And all pointing to a dramatic decline in relevance, and therefore power.

Boris Johnson is a thread running through the whole sorry story. London Mayor at the time of London 2012. The chief beneficiary of David Camerons catastrophic decision to call a referendum which Johnson exploited to win the fight for a Brexit he never really believed in, but which successfully ensured Camerons demise and Johnsons elevation to Foreign Secretary under Theresa May. Diplomats describe him as the least informed and least wanting to be informed Foreign Secretary of all time. He was more interested in undermining Mrs May who, eventually, made way for him. He secured the position he had always coveted. Then he landed the general election he wanted fighting for Brexit and against Corbyn and he was home and dry.

But after a year in office, what has he achieved? Got Brexit done? Up to a point, in that we are out, but the future remains uncertain and the form of Brexit about to be foisted upon us bears no relation whatever to the many shades of Brexit that were promised, either at the Take Back Control referendum or the Get Brexit Done election.

The most ardent Brexiteers will have looked on at the recent EU Summit, seeing the wrangles and the disagreements over the economic revival plans, and enjoyed a feeling of schadenfreude. But they reached a deal among 27 countries, something the UK has so far failed properly to do over Brexit, despite Johnsons election claims to have an oven-ready deal. Also, step back a bit from the nationalism and the jingoism, study the waves lapping round the geopolitical waters, and the sense of splendid isolation so beloved by ideological Brexiteers is not one that should give us any comfort at all.

At a time of genuine concern for the future of the world, we have lost strength, and though it might not seem like that from a still all too UK-centric media, that is how the rest of the world sees it. We have lost allies and we have lost clout. At a time of grave economic uncertainty, we are leaving the biggest and most successful single market in the world, and ministers rejoice in securing trade deals with countries at the other end of the world that will not even begin to fill the gap.

Coronavirus will be used by the government to try to explain away any and all problems ahead: economic, political, social and cultural. But the path was set by Brexit before any of us knew our Covid from our Cummings. The course was of British isolation and exceptionalism. It is the bed we made with the Brexit vote and with the failure to secure a second referendum on the outcome of the negotiations. Now we have to lie in that bed.Every government on the planet believes it means decline for the UK.

Meanwhile, the Johnson/Gove/Cummings axis has near unbridled power and appears determined to use it to drive through changes that were never specifically offered, or fought for at the ballot box. Any and all institutions are up for grabs, from the civil service to the BBC, the military and the security services, the independent judiciary, schools that Gove and Cummings damaged badly enough when the former was in charge of our schools. Now Cummings wants to do more.

Johnson has the majority and many of the MPs on his side feel they owe their place in large part to him. So he does as he pleases. It can only endure however if it works for the country. Eventually he will need to show he can govern as well as campaign. Thus far the signs are not good. He has failed on his big ideological challenge, Brexit, which now more than ever is exposed as a fraud. He has failed on his big crisis challenge Covid. And now we know he has failed on one of the main responsibilities as Prime Minister national security. He wont last. The only question is how much irreparable damage he does to the UK while he is there.

See the original post here:

Brexit, PM Johnson, the Russia Report evidence of Britain in decline - TheArticle

When parliamentary committees produce reports with recommendations, the government is obliged to publish a considered response, explaining whether or not the recommendations are being accepted. This can take months, and generally responses are a bit waffly. Because a recommendation is an implicit criticism, instead of saying no, governments prefer to say not necessary, because we are already doing X, Y and Z.

But today we got the official response (pdf) to the ISC report within an hour or so of it being published. And it was more blunt than these documents normally are. Here are eight claims or recommendations in the report that have been rejected by the government.

1 - The government has rejected the ISCs call for an inquiry into Russian interference in the Brexit referendum. See 11.38am for the full quotes.

2 - The government has rejected claims it badly underestimated the threat from Russia. The committee said:

Until recently the government had badly underestimated the Russian threat and the response it required.

In response, the government said:

The government has long recognised there is an enduring and significant threat posed by Russia to the UK and its allies, including conventional military capabilities, disinformation, illicit finance, influence operations, and cyber-attacks. As such, Russia remains a top national security priority for the government.

3 - The government does not accept that responsibility for countering the threat from Russia is unnecessarily complicated. Referring to how responsibility is allocated, the committee said:

There are a number of unnecessarily complicated wiring diagrams that do not provide the clear lines of accountability that are needed.

But the government said:

There is a clear line of accountability for HMGs policy on Russia: the Russia and Ukraine NSIG [national security implemention group] reports to the national security adviser and to ministers on the national security council. Ultimate ministerial oversight is provided by the prime minister.

4 - The government does not accept that MI5 needs to work more closely with the police on the threat from Russia. The committee said:

It is our view that while MI5 already works with the police regional counter-terrorism units (which have responsibility for hostile state activity) there is scope for them to work more closely together in this area.

But the government said:

MI5 has already developed closer working with police and Home Office partners in tackling the threat posed by hostile state activity, including working together closely on a number of hostile state activity cases.

It cited the response to the Salisbury novichok attack as a good example.

5 - The government rejected claims it needed better channels of communication with Russia. The committee said these were needed to reduce the risk of miscommunication and escalation of hostilities. The government said channels of communication were in place.

6 - The government refused to commit to giving the Electoral Commission more powers. The committee said:

We have already questioned whether the Electoral Commission has sufficient powers to ensure the security of democratic processes where hostile state threats are involved: if it is to tackle foreign interference then it must be given the necessary legislative powers.

But the government said:

The government notes the committees comments on the Electoral Commission and we continue to consider the recommendations from the Electoral Commission itself to enhance their powers. The commission has civil sanctioning powers that apply to referendums and elections. More serious criminal matters can and are referred to the police, and then considered by a court of law.

(Many Brexiters in government would rather abolish the Electoral Commission than give it extra powers. It is one of their least favourite government bodies, not least because of its investigation into Vote Leave.)

7 - The government refused to commit to toughening the Sanctions Act. The committee said:

The NCA also underlined that there are several ways in which the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 is too restrictive. The NCA outlined changes they would wish to see to the legislation:

- including serious and organised crime as grounds for introducing sanctions; and

- providing for closed material proceedings to protect sensitive intelligence in the granting of, and any appeal against, sanctions (the special immigration appeals commission procedures offer a useful model for this).

But the government said the act already had relevant provisions that would allow for sanctions in the interests of national security, in the interests of international peace and security and to further a foreign policy objective of the government.

8 - The government rejected claims it had unreasonably delayed publication of the report. The ISC delivered the report to No 10 in time for it to be published before last years general election. In its news release the committee said that it was a matter of great regret that the report was not published in November, and at the press conference the Labour MP and committee member Kevan Jones said the excuses given by No 10 for the delay were untrue. (See 11.22am.) No 10 has denied this. (See 2.42pm.)

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Government rejects ISC's call for inquiry into Russian interference in Brexit referendum live news - The Guardian

They have played an unglamorous but essential role in business for almost a century. Now a shortage of wooden pallets is threatening to derail Britain's cross-border trade with the European Union after Brexit.

From January, wooden pallets moving goods between the U.K. and EU will need to comply with ISPM-15 -- an international rule that requires them to be baked to 56 degrees Celsius for at least 30 minutes to prevent the spread of pests and diseases.

In a letter to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs last month, the head of the U.K.'s Timber Packaging and Pallet Confederation warned that Britain won't have enough that comply with the rule -- and the coronavirus has hampered efforts to plug the shortfall.

"It is even more unlikely the 1st January, 2021 compliance date will be met," John Dye, the lobby group's president, wrote in the June 7 letter. "There has been a lot of progress made by our pragmatic industry, but there is still a lot more to come along."

The shortage adds to a growing list of obstacles that businesses engaged in cross-border trade will face after Britain's final parting with the EU at the year-end. Firms are already grappling with how to produce customs declarations for the first time in three decades, while they also face the prospect of their truck movements being policed by an as yet untested government IT system.

According to Dye, as many as 100 million pallets move between the U.K. and EU each year. So far, they haven't needed to comply with ISPM-15 because movements between EU member states are exempt -- something that will come to an end when the post-Brexit transition period ends on Dec. 31.

Pallet makers in both the U.K. and EU have been trying to ramp up production, but their efforts have been hit by the pandemic, Dye said. Installations of new kilns to heat-treat pallets were badly delayed by the virus, he said.

"It has slowed things up," Dye said by telephone. "We were very disappointed the government didn't ask for an extension to cover the six months we lost," he said, referring to the U.K.'s decision not to extend the transition period.

Asked whether the U.K. government believes it will have an adequate supply of ISPM-15 compliant pallets ready for Jan. 1, DEFRA didn't give a direct answer.

"Treatment capacity for wooden pallets has increased," the department said in a statement. "We are working closely with industry to help ensure a sufficient stock of compliant pallets in time for January."

The ISPM-15 requirement will apply to goods moving in both directions. In a 206-page document outlining its plans for the border after Brexit released last week, the British government said imports may be subject to checks for compliance with the standard.

Dye, who is also the technical & industry affairs director at Scott Pallets, said he hopes the EU won't enforce the rule strictly because the bloc, too, has a shortage of compliant pallets. But he still tells customers that they can't be certain the EU will go easy on the U.K.

"They might be stopped," he said of the pallets. "It's quite frustrating when politicians are playing with people's businesses."

View post:

The wrong kind of pallets threatens border trouble after Brexit - San Antonio Express-News

Tuesday, July 21, 2020 5:41 a.m. EDT by Thomson Reuters

By Elizabeth Piper and William James

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's government failed to find out whether Russia meddled in the 2016 referendum on membership of the EU, a parliamentary report released on Tuesday said, saying the intelligence services should investigate and make their findings public.

The long-anticipated report by parliament's intelligence and security committee found that Russia had tried to influence a separate referendum in 2014 when voters in Scotland rejected independence.

But it said the committee was unable to determine whether Russia had attempted to influence the European Union referendum, which led to Britain's exit from the bloc this year.

When asked for evidence on suspected Russian meddling in the vote, Britain's main domestic intelligence agency MI5 produced just six lines of text, the committee said.

"It is nonetheless the Committee's view that the UK Intelligence Community should produce an analogous assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU referendum and that an unclassified summary of it be published," it said in the report, which was produced more than a year ago and shelved until now.

The government of Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who came to power as one of the leading figures in the victorious campaign to leave the EU, rejected the call for a further review. A spokesman for Johnson said the prime minister was confident the referendum result to leave the EU was fair.

The report cast Russia as a hostile power which posed a significant threat to Britain and the West across a range of fronts, from espionage and cyber to election meddling and laundering dirty money.

"It appears that Russia considers the UK one of its top Western intelligence targets," the report said.

It said there were open source indications that Russia had sought to influence the Brexit campaign. But hard evidence had not been produced.

"The key point is ... they had not sought even to ask that question and that is at the heart of this report," Stewart Hosie, a Scottish National Party member of the committee, told reporters.

British foreign minister Dominic Raab rejected claims that the government had avoided investigating Russia.

"We have a long period recognising the enduring and significant threat posed by Russia," he said. "We are not for a second complacent."

Russia has repeatedly denied meddling in the West, casting the United States and Britain as gripped by anti-Russian hysteria.

"Russia has never interfered in the electoral processes of any country in the world - not the United States, not Britain, nor any other countries," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova cast the report as "Russophobia in a fake frame".

RUSSIAN MEDDLING AND MONEY

Relations between London and Moscow plunged to post-Cold War lows after Britain blamed Russia for poisoning former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with a nerve agent in the English city of Salisbury.

Last week, the British government said it believed Russian actors had tried to meddle in last year's general election, which was held after the report published on Tuesday was finished.

When discussing the EU referendum, the report is heavily redacted and there was a classified annex that was not published.

The committee also cast Russia as a source of corrupt money that had been welcomed in London, the world's premier international financial capital.

"The UK welcomed Russian money, and few questions - if any - were asked about the provenance of this considerable wealth," the report said. "The UK has been viewed as a particularly favourable destination for Russian oligarchs and their money."

"It offered ideal mechanisms by which illicit finance could be recycled through what has been referred to as the London 'laundromat'," the report said.

(Additional reporting by Alexander Marrow in Moscow; Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Sarah Young, Paul Sandle and Peter Graff)

See the original post here:

UK government failed to determine whether Russia meddled in Brexit vote: report - WTVB News

By AFP

LONDON:The British government should properly investigate any Russian interference in the 2016 Brexit referendum after failing to look into it despite past evidence of Kremlin meddling, a parliamentary report said Tuesday.

It said oligarchs with links to Russian President Vladimir Putin used their wealth for 'extending patronage and building influence across a wide sphere of the British establishment'.

"There should have been an assessment of Russian interference in the referendum. And there must now be one, and the public must be told the results of that assessment," intelligence and security committee member Kevan Jones said.

The report said it could not point to specific evidence of Russian meddling in the 2016 vote on Britain's EU membership and a 2014 poll on Scotland's independence from the United Kingdom, which the "no" camp won by 55 per cent to 45 per cent.

But Jones said this happened because the UK government "actively avoided asking the question".

"No one wanted to touch it with a 10-foot pole," Jones said.

"In brief, Russian influence in the UK is the new normal, and there are a lot of Russians with very close links to Putin who are well integrated into the UK business and social scene, and accepted because of their wealth," the report said.

"This level of integration - in 'Londongrad' in particular - means that any measures now being taken by the Government are not preventative but rather constitute damage limitation."

"Londongrad" is widely viewed as a central part of London that is a haven for Russian oligarchs, who invest in luxury properties in prestigious areas such as Chelsea.

The report's release has been delayed for months, leading to accusations for the opposition that Prime Minister Boris Johnson wanted to suppress it.

He came to head the government a year ago, after replacing his Conservative party predecessor Theresa May, who became prime minister immediately after the Brexit vote.

See the article here:

'UK govt should probe any Russian interference in 2016 Brexit poll' - The New Indian Express

Sen ODonoghue is the chief executive officer of the Killybegs Fishermens Organisation, the largest producers body of its type in Ireland.

ODonoghue previously worked at the Irish agriculture and fisheries ministries, as well as the national seafood agency, Bord Iascaigh Mhra (BIM). He served on the board of the European Association of Producer Organisations for a decade and is a noted expert in the workings of the European Unions Common Fisheries Policy.

ODonoghue talked to SeafoodSource about falling prices due to a COVID-related collapse in demand, the fishing impacts of Brexit, and explained his opinion as to why there shouldnt be a cut to fuel subsidies at the ongoing World Trade Organization talks on ending harmful subsidies in the global fisheries sector. He also discussed the dispute between fishermen and the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority (SFPA) over the method of weighing stocks landed by Irish trawlers.

SeafoodSource: Did the weighing issue you had with the SFPA get sorted out, or are the legal proceedings going ahead?

ODonoghue: We are hoping to get a solution with the SFPA in terms of accurate weighing at the pier side. We are not against weighing on the pier. What we cant accept is weighing of water as fish. We have been working with them [SFPA] very closely in terms of putting in the same flowscale system that exists in the factories which is very accurate putting that on the pier. We are in a very advanced stage of doing that. And if the SFPA signs off on it, then we have solved it there wont be an issue between us.

In terms of the legal proceedings, I am not prepared to comment, but we want that solution as quickly as possible. They are only requesting us in terms of the legal monitoring requirements on them as a control authority of an E.U. member. That is 5 percent of landed and 7.5 percent of a species has to be weighed.

SeafoodSource: You said in May that prices your members were getting for their catch had dropped on average between 50 and 70 percent as a result of the coronavirus crisis. Has the situation improved?

ODonoghue: We were very impacted in April, May, and part of June. Now, prices are down 25 to 35 percent on where they were pre-COVID. This is very worrying. Its not just us; I am in close contact with our European colleagues, but because we are export-oriented, the impact is greater. In our markets like Spain and Italy and the U.K. and China, they were all in lockdown and European markets have not come back to where they were.

SeafoodSource: Have you been able to divert any of your products into other markets, like Asia?

ODonoghue: Our Asian market mainly relates to shellfish and some pelagics. Our mackerel and blue whiting seasons were almost complete when COVID hit. But we are very worried about what happens in the autumn. Our African market is very impacted by lower oil prices, which might be welcome for fishing [fuel] but not for demand in our key markets, like Nigeria.

SeafoodSource: Are you more optimistic or worried about a Brexit fisheries solution?

ODonoghue: We are at a difficult stage. We know now for definite there will be no extension [to the transition period], so its do or die come 31 December. We are concerned that if the whole trade negotiations collapse and theres no deal, [it will be] an unmitigated disaster for the Irish fishing industry and will also impact on the U.K. fishing industry even worse. There will be six meetings [between British and E.U. negotiators] in July and August, with the last one on 17 August. Its absolutely critical for us that the mandate which the E.U. gave [chief Brexit negotiator] Michel Barnier was that fisheries has to be linked to the wider trade negotiations. Barnier has made clear that if there is no fisheries agreement, there will be no trade agreement. Linking these is so important because in 11 of the 12 key areas for discussion, the E.U. has the upper hand. If you have the upper hand on 11 of the 12, then surely you can negotiate on fisheries. [But] assuming theres no give on the E.U. side, the key thing we want is the existing sharing arrangement is maintained. [Ireland] shares a huge number of stocks with the U.K. We cant have negotiations every year on access and quotas.

SeafoodSource: Similar to that kind of negotiations that takes place at the E.U. level every year?

ODonoghue: What we discuss every year is scientific advice but the share of the stocks was decided in 1983. Each nations percentage share doesnt change every year. The U.K. wants a Norway-style deal with the E.U., but we dont discuss every year a sharing arrangement with Norway. This was decided in 1996.

SeafoodSource: There is a new agriculture and fisheries minister in Ireland. How would you like to see him approach his job?

ODonoghue: We have given him our three priorities for discussion: Brexit, a post-COVID reboot for Irish fisheries, and the program for government. There is a whole marine section in the program for government and we want to go through that with him. We do support the program, as there are key things in there about Brexit and COVID, but the important thing will be to implement them.

SeafoodSource: Ireland and Spain were both the target of much criticism this year for allegedly pushing for quota levels beyond scientifically advised levels. Is this criticism fair?

ODonoghue: Neither fair nor accurate. There are totally ignoring that TAC [total allowable catch] and quota system of the E.U. In the E.U. part of the Northeast Atlantic [where Ireland fishes] 99 percent of stocks will be fished at sustainable levels in 2020. They say because we [Ireland] have 21 percent of the mackerel stock, we are 21 percent of the problem. Because Iceland and Russia are fishing beyond sustainable yields, we are presented as being 21 percent of the problem.

SeafoodSource: So there is no sustainability problem in E.U. waters?

ODonoghue: We are not talking about the Mediteranean or the Black Sea, they are a different kettle of fish. But 99 percent of stocks in the Northeast Atlantic are sustainable.

SeafoodSource: Do you think there are overcapacity issues in the European fleet?

ODonoghue: There is a definitional problem. At the moment, the capacity figures related to gross tonnage and power. But its not about capacity or power rather, its about if you have sufficient access to quota to be viable. We need to look at each fleet and the size and the target of that fleet. Do they have access to sufficient quota to be viable? If not, then we have to start introducing decommissioning.

SeafoodSource: How do you view the ongoing talks at the WTO on ending what's termed as harmful subsidies to fisheries?

ODonoghue: I am totally opposed to subsidies that increase capacity, provided were defining capacity properly. But as for fuel, we dont support the removal of the fuel subsidy, as this would make our fleets unviable. If you remove the fuel subsidy and increased carbon tax to EUR 100 [USD 114] per ton [as proposed by Irish government], then overnight, you go to a situation where fuel is six times what you pay now. European fleets cant survive in that scenario and wed become even more dependent on imports.

SeafoodSource:How do you end overfishing?

ODonoghue: You focus on IUU [illegal, unreported, and unregulated] fishing. Most of the international waters have bodies controlling them. The E.U. has been at the forefront on IUU, [and] the industry has really been behind the E.U. on this, because it affects our markets big-time.

SeafoodSource: Many of those international bodies under-resourced and ineffective in policing IUU fishing. What do you do about that?

ODonoghue: Yes. But thats where the E.U. has to come in and has been coming in to strengthen those bodies. [By] bringing [them] in under the law of the sea.

Photo courtesy ofSen ODonoghue

Originally posted here:

Sen O'Donoghue: Brexit and COVID threatening future of commercial fishing in Ireland - SeafoodSource

Russia considers the UK one of its top Western intelligence targets, according to a long-awaited report into Russian interference in UK politics published by Britains parliament on Tuesday, also criticizing the government for failing to investigate charges that Russia influenced the 2016 Brexit referendum.

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The report, compiled by parliaments powerful Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC), questioned: whether Government took its eye off the ball on Russia, finds that they underestimated the response required to the Russian threat and are still playing catch up.

In a press release summarizing the report, the ISC said: Russian influence in the UK is the new normal. Successive Governments have welcomed the oligarchs and their money with open arms, providing them with a means of recycling illicit finance through the London laundromat, and connections at the highest levels with access to UK companies and political figures.

This, in turn, led to an industry of enablers, including lawyers, accountants, and estate agents who were wittingly or unwittingly de facto agents of the Russian state.

[The] UK is clearly a target for Russian disinformation. While the mechanics of our paper-based voting system are largely sound, we cannot be complacent about a hostile state taking deliberate action with the aim of influencing our democratic processes, the press release warned.

Yet the defence of those democratic processes has appeared something of a hot potato, with no one organisation considering itself to be in the lead, or apparently willing to conduct an assessment of such interference. This must change, it added.

The committee called on social media to take action and remove hostile state material, as well as calling for greater international cooperation, perhaps looking to its US allies: We need other countries to step up with the UK and attach a cost to Putins actions.

The report was blunt about the threat Russia poses to the UK.

The UK is one of Russias top Western intelligence targets: particularly given the UKs firm stance against recent Russian aggression and the UK-led international response to the 2018 Salisbury attack, it said, referring to the poison attack on SergeiSkripal, a former Russian double agent living in the UK, and his daughter.

Russias intelligence services are disproportionately large and powerful and, given the lack of rule of law, are able to act without constraint. The fusion between state, business, and serious and organised crime provides further weight and leverage: Russia is able to pose an all-encompassing security threat which is fuelled by paranoia about the West and a desire to be seen as a resurgent great power, it said.

Russia is a highly capable cyber actor, employing organised crime groups to supplement its cyber skills. Russia carries out malicious cyber activity in order to assert itself aggressively for example, attempting to interfere in other countries elections.

In the face of detailed accusations by Western spy agencies, Russia has denied interfering in other countries elections.

It has been clear for some time that Russia under Putin has moved from potential partner to established threat, fundamentally unwilling to adhere to international law, the report said.

The [London] murder of Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 and the annexation of Crimea in 2014 were stark indicators of this. We, therefore, question whether the Government took its eye off the ball because of its focus on counter-terrorism: it was the opinion of the Committee that until recently the Government had badly underestimated the response required to the Russian threat and is still playing catch up.

Russia poses a tough intelligence challenge and our intelligence agencies must have the tools they need to tackle it.

The report confirmed that there was credible evidence that Russia attempted to influence the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, and that this should have served as a wake-up call.

On the hot topic of Brexit, the report said: There have been widespread allegations that Russia sought to influence voters in the 2016 referendum on the UKs membership of the EU: studies have pointed to the preponderance of pro-Brexit or anti-EU stories on [Russian news outlets] RT and Sputnik, and the use of bots and trolls, as evidence.

The actual impact of such attempts on the result itself would be difficult if not impossible to prove.

The report went on to say that the Government was slow to recognise the existence of the threat.

It was only after Russias hacking of the Democratic National Party in the 2016 US presidential election that the UK understood the threat it faced, when it should have been seen as early as 2014.

As a result, the Government did not take action to protect the UKs process in 2016, the report said. In our view, there must be an analogous assessment of Russian interference in the EU referendum.

The report criticized the illogical intelligence services for their unwillingness to examine Russian interference in the Brexit referendum, in stark contrast with US intelligence and congressional investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election.

Stewart Hosie, a member of the committee, said the government did not know if Russia influenced the Brexit referendum because they did not want to know and actively avoided any effort to look into the issue.

There has been no assessment of Russian interference in the EU referendum and this goes back to nobody wanting to touch the issue with a 10-foot pole, he told a news conference.

There should have been an assessment of Russian interference in the EU referendum and there must now be one, and the public must be told the results of that assessment.

Tobias Ellwood, the chair of parliaments Defence Select Committee, told Sky News: Were actually now seeing the new modern battlefield in play. This is what happens subversion, disinformation, interference in elections.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been widely criticized for delaying publication of the report, despite it being ready for publication since before the last election.

Shadow Foreign Secretary Lisa Nandy said: It is extraordinary that the prime minister, Boris Johnson, took the political decision last October ahead of the general election to block the publication of this important report that systematically goes through the threat Russia poses to the UKs national security.

The report is very clear that the government has underestimated the response required to Russia and it is imperative we learn the lessons from the mistakes that have been made.

By Karim El-Bar

More:

From Brexit To Scottish Referendum, Russia Aggressively Interfering In UK Domestic Politics - EurAsian Times

PUBLISHED: 13:04 21 July 2020 | UPDATED: 17:01 21 July 2020

Many thought Boris Johnson was given an easy ride when he spoke to the new Times Radio. Picture: PA

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There have been calls for Boris Johnson to ensure there is a full assessment of Brexit interference into the Brexit vote before the transition period ends.

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Almost four years after its creation The New European goes from strength to strength across print and online, offering a pro-European perspective on Brexit and reporting on the political response to the coronavirus outbreak, climate change and international politics. But we can only continue to grow with your support.

Liberal Democrat leadership contender Layla Moran has written to Boris Johnson demanding he set out a clear timeline for the intelligence agencies to publish an assessment into Russian interference in the EU referendum.

The MP insisted that an assessment should be published before the transition period comes to an end on 31 December 2020.

It comes after the Intelligence and Security Committees Russia Report recommended that the UK intelligence community produce a full assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU referendum alongside an unclassified summary.

The committee said it had not been provided with any post-referendum assessment of Russian attempts at interference.

It added: Even if the conclusion of any such assessment were that there was minimal interference, this would nonetheless represent a helpful reassurance to the public that the UKs democratic processes had remained relatively safe.

Downing Street has said that it has seen no evidence of successful interference in the EU Referendum.

But it added that where new information emerges, the government will always consider the most appropriate use of any intelligence it develops or receives, including whether it is appropriate to make this public.Moran said that the governments claim that an assessment is not needed given there is no evidence of interference was putting the cart before the horse.

She said the government cannot expect to find evidence if it has not properly looked for it.

She explained: This damning report shows the government turned a blind eye to potential Russian interference in the EU referendum.

The intelligence services must now carry out a full assessment of this threat to our democratic process as soon as possible.

Boris Johnson should set out a clear timeline for the intelligence services to publish a full this assessment. Given the urgency of the situation and the potential implications for the countrys future, this should be before the end of the transition period.

It would be doubly damaging to our democracy if the UK crashed out with no deal before the extent of Russian interference in the referendum had been properly assessed.

It comes as the Scottish Tories called for an inquiry into Russian interference into the independence referendum.

Layla Morans letter to Boris Johnson

Dear Prime Minister,

The Russia Report published today shows the government has vastly underestimated the threat posed by Russia to our democracy. As recommended, the UK intelligence community must now produce a full assessment of potential Russian interference in the EU referendum and publish an unclassified summary.

The government claims in its response to the Russia Report that is has seen no evidence of successful interference in the EU Referendum and that a retrospective assessment is not necessary. However, this is putting the cart before the horse. The government cannot expect to find evidence if it has not properly looked for it.

I am urging you to now set out a clear timeline for this assessment to take place, and to ensure it happens as soon as possible. Given the major implications for the UK democratic process, this assessment should be produced before the end of the transition period on 31 December 2020. It would be doubly damaging to our democracy if the UK crashed out with no deal before the extent of Russian interference in the referendum had been properly assessed.

The US intelligence community produced an assessment into allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election within two months. The UK intelligence community should surely be able to produce an assessment within a similar timeline.

If the government are serious about tackling disinformation, they must also get a grip. It is simply unacceptable that no one organisation within government recognises itself as having an overall lead on defending the UKs democratic processes and discourse. I therefore urge you to also introduce a nationwide awareness and education campaign to build resilience to the fake and extreme narratives present in divisive disinformation campaigns.

Yours sincerely,

Layla Moran

Almost four years after its creation The New European goes from strength to strength across print and online, offering a pro-European perspective on Brexit and reporting on the political response to the coronavirus outbreak, climate change and international politics. But we can only rebalance the right wing extremes of much of the UK national press with your support. If you value what we are doing, you can help us by making a contribution to the cost of our journalism.

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Calls for investigation into Russian interference in Brexit before end of transition period - The New European