Military cooperation of Russia and Israel in the SAR Breaking News, 12th of December, 2018

The Pentagon spokesman announced that the American observation posts, located in Syria on the border with Turkey, built by an order from US Defense Secretary James Mattis, are needed, allegedly, to ensure the security of the Turkish ally from NATO, Interfax reported. The spokesman said that the United States intend to coordinate with Turkey on the questions of stabilization of the situation in Syria. However, the Turkish authorities have already warned the United States that they oppose the deployment of those posts on their border. Turkey considers those posts to be corridors for the delivery of weapons by the United States to the Kurdish armed groups that are being considered to be terrorist structures in Turkey.

The parliamentarians of the Lviv Regional Council announced their decision to name the year of 2019 as »the year of Stepan Bandera and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists» — TASS reports while referring to a statement from the press service of the Lviv Regional Council. The parliamentarians explained this decision with the 110th anniversary of Bandera and the 90th anniversary of the first congress of Ukrainian nationalists. According to the news agency »UNIAN» — the parliamentarians decided to send an official letter to the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, and the country’s Foreign Ministry with a request to close the Russian Consulate in the city of Lviv. The parliamentarians explained their initiative by the fact that such action would lead to «an improvement in the political situation in the region, and significantly reduce social tensions and provocations.»

The Ukrainian company Naftogaz intends to bring American courts to the court proceedings with Gazprom in order to get 2.6 billion dollars that the Ukrainian company was awarded by the Stockholm arbitration as per their demand. On 6th of December Naftogaz filed lawsuits in the courts of the North and South districts of Texas against »Gazprom Marketing & Trading», which is a part of the Gazprom group, and the consulting company »DeGolyer & MacNaughton», the leading auditor of oil and gas reserves. Both respondents are registered in Texas. Naftogaz asks to force them to provide the information and access to the documents which would help the Ukrainians in their lawsuit against Gazprom in the Netherlands, »Kommersant» reports. Since the beginning of the summer, Naftogaz has been trying to get $ 2.6 billion from Gazprom in accordance with the decision of the Stockholm arbitration.

On Tuesday, the US House of Representatives adopted a resolution urging the EU countries to abandon the construction of the »Nord Stream 2» gas pipeline, and to impose sanctions against this project. The document was adopted by a simplified procedure in the course of oral voting by the full composition of the lower house of Congress, TASS reports. The resolution is purely declarative in its nature. Its demands are optional. The document contains sharp criticism of the gas pipeline project. From the point of view of the congressmen — «Nord Stream — 2 is a significant step backwards in terms of European energy security and US interests». The congressmen call the US President Donald Trump to do everything possible “to support European energy security through diversification, and to reduce the EU’s dependence on Russia.”

Russian and Israeli militaries agreed to keep a cooperation between the Khmeimim airbase and the Israeli Air Force command center, the Russian Defense Ministry reported. The representatives of both countries spoke about the current security issues in the Middle East region and about the situation in Syria — TASS reports with a reference to the Russian Ministry of Defense. The militaries also discussed «the functioning of a direct communication channel between the Russian Khmeimim airbase and the Israeli Air Force command center in order to prevent dangerous incidents that threaten the lives of Russian and Israeli servicemen». The parties agreed to continue having such negotiations.