My father was a Jew, says nationalist Zhirinovsky
By Ben Aris in MoscowVLADIMIR ZHIRINOVSKY, one of Russia's most virulent ultra-nationalists, has announced for the first time that his father was Jewish, it was reported yesterday.
During an interview on Israel's Russian-language radio station Reka, Mr. Zhirinovsky said that his father's side of the family were Polish Jews but he had "no connection" to them, as they had all died in the Holocaust.
The leader of the Liberal Democratic party and a Duma deputy, Mr Zhirinovsky has always played up his image as an anti-Semite.
He once threw flowerpots at Jews outside a Paris hotel who were protesting about his presence there, and in April he refused to stand for a minute's silence in the Duma for Holocaust victims...
The Electronic Telegraph (UK), 4 July 2001
Russian politician spews anti-Semitic rhetoric again MOSCOW (AP) -- In his most direct anti-Semitic statements yet, ultranationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky blamed Jews on Wednesday for starting World War II and provoking the Holocaust.
The politician's anti-Semitic comments have drawn international condemnation for years, but Wednesday's remarks in an hourlong address to reporters were some of his least subtle.
"The essence of the conflict around the Jewish people is that when their number grows too much in some country, war breaks out there," said Zhirinovsky, who leads the third-largest faction in the Russian parliament's lower house.
"That happened in Germany ... where there were too many Jews," he declared...
"You will always find Jews where war is raging, because they realize that money flows where blood is spilled," he said...
He also accused Jews of taking Russian women abroad for prostitution, selling healthy Russian children and transplant organs to the West and robbing Russia of its gold, diamonds and other assets...
Vladimir Zhirinovsky Vladimir Zhirinovsky's Liberal Democratic Party of Russia has put more effort into explaining its foreign policy position than any other party, publishing a 63-page pamphlet on the subject entitled Spitting on the West. In it, Zhirinovsky argues that Russia should focus on North-South relations rather than on East-West ties. He also suggests a new division of the globe into spheres of interest among the great powers and insists that Iraq is a key strategic ally for Russia.
Taken from http://www.cs.indiana.edu/~dmiguse/Russian/vzbio.html
Zhirinovsky set aside campaign activities in order to be in Iraq during an October 15, 1995, referendum on Saddam Hussein's presidency. Hussein greeted the LDPR leader at the airport, and Zhirinovsky later claimed that he came "to support the democratic process" in Iraq (Hussein gained more than 99.9% support in the referendum). (Earlier, during the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, Zhirinovsky sent several volunteers from the group known as "Falcons of Zhirinovsky" to Iraq to help Saddam survive the "Desert Storm".)
Russian Communist Chief Arrives in Baghdad BAGHDAD, Nov 27, 1997 (Reuters) - Russian Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov arrived in Baghdad on Thursday on a three-day visit to expand ties with Iraq's ruling Baath party, the official Iraqi news agency INA reported.
Zyuganov expressed his admiration of his excellency President Saddam Hussein and hoped the visit would contribute to deepening relations of struggle between the Russian Communist Party and the Arab Baath Socialist Party,'' INA said.
The Russian Communist Party and the State Duma lower chamber as well as the Russian people will continue to work for the lifting of the unfair embargo on the friendly Iraqi people,'' INA said, quoting Zyuganov.
Last June, the State Duma passed a draft bill proposed by ultra-nationalists headed by Vladimir Zhirinovsky calling on the Kremlin to ignore international sanctions against Baghdad. But Russia's upper chamber of parliament rejected the draft.
Last week Russia brokered a deal with Baghdad under which American members of U.N. arms inspection teams were allowed to resume activities in Iraq. In return Russia promised to work seriously for the lifting of the embargo on Iraq.
Baghdad owes Moscow billions of dollars in Soviet-era debts and Russian officials have argued for lifting stringent oil sanctions against Iraq, imposed by the United Nations after Iraqi troops invaded neighbouring Kuwait in 1990.
Iraq signed a multi-billion oil deal with Russia in March allowing Russian firms to develop seven to eight billion barrels of reserves in Iraq's southern Qurna oilfield. REUTERS
Primakov Allegedly Bribed by Saddam U.S. intelligence has information that Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov, an old acquaintance of Iraq's President Saddam Hussein, accepted an $800,000 payment from the Iraqi government in 1997, presumably in return for Russian assistance with strategic weapons technologies, according to an article in the April 5 issue of the New Yorker magazine.
Russian Premier Said to Get $800,000By Kathy Sawyer, Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 29, 1999; Page A08"This is rock solid -- like John Gotti ordering a whack on the telephone. Ironclad," investigative reporter Seymour M. Hersh quotes an American intelligence source as saying.
The source was describing what he said was an electronically monitored bank transfer between Tariq Aziz, Iraq's deputy prime minister, and Primakov, then foreign minister. U.S. intelligence learned of the exchange in November 1997 from a British intercept, Hersh says.
"There was a wire transfer to an account" traceable to Primakov "of eight hundred thousand dollars," Hersh quotes a second official as saying, adding that the official assessed the intelligence as top quality...
Some experts responded skeptically to the report on similar grounds. "It doesn't ring true," said a U.S. arms control official. He has seen no such intelligence reports, he said, but added that does not mean they do not exist.
John Pike of the Federation of American Scientists said, "Given Primakov's familiarity with [intelligence] trade craft, I'd have some difficulty believing that he would accept a personal gratuity of such a trivial amount of money -- that's chump change! -- and that he would do so in a way that would be so easily detected"...
Primakov has had ties to Saddam Hussein since the late 1960s, when Primakov was Middle East correspondent for Pravda and the Iraqi leader was chief of intelligence in Baghdad...
© Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company
[Update December 1, 2007
I quote Angus Reid Global Scan below, which reported dated on May 4, 2006 that Zhirinovsky was off to a good start in the next Russian Presidential election (March 2008):
"Two Russian politicians are tied in a prospective presidential election, according to a poll by the Yury Levada Analytical Center. 18 per cent of respondents would vote for Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) Vladimir Zhirinovsky, and 18 per cent would support first deputy prime minister Dmitry Medvedev."http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/11761
As per a more recent poll, Angus Reid Global Monitor reported, in January 2007, that the front runner is Deputy prime minister Dmitry Medvedev. Vladimir Zhirinovsky was at this point in third place with 14 per cent, tied with Communist Party (KPRF) leader Gennady Zyuganov.
http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/a_third_of_russians_back_medveded_in_2008/I'm not expecting Zhirinovsky to win because I feel that he would better enter Iraq as something other than the Russian President. Of concern to me is the new (pro-Putin and pro-Primakov) United Russia Party; it now controls Russia, and appears as anold-school KGB organ. Wikipedia has this to say:
"United Russia...is a political party in the Russian Federation which usually labels itself centrist. It backs the President, Vladimir Putin. It was founded in April 2001 as a merger between Yuriy Luzhkov's, Yevgeny Primakov's and Mintimer Shaeymiev's Fatherland - All Russia party, and the Unity Party of Russia, led by Sergei Shoigu and Alexander Karelin...In the 2003 parliamentary elections it polled 37% of the party vote. As of January 2005 it controls 305 seats out of 450, which gives it a Constitutional majority."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Russia
Putin has become popular and is predicted to be in control of the nation until at least 2016; it is said that he will run again, and become President, in 2012. In he meantime, between 2008 and 2012, he is to lead the nation through puppets that he and his Party will install, one of them becoming President. One of these puppets might also become the Biblical Gog, so be ready, keep watching, and tell all your circle of beloved believers if indeed you agree with me that this could be it. End Update
]
RUSSIA AND IRAQ IN 60 BN. DEAL--August 20, 2002
10-year contract to include oil, gas, transports and communications
The Iraqi Foreign Ministry has announced that a 60bn. USD contract is to be signed in the coming weeks between Moscow and Baghdad. The aid deal will not violate UN sanctions on Iraq.The deal was announced in Moscow by Iraqi Ambassador Abbas Khalaf, who claimed that the deal would be signed within the next couple of weeks. The contract will involve the modernisation of the Soviet-built infrastructure in Iraq, covering transports, telecommunications, communications, oil and gas exploration.
Ambassador Khalaf applauded Russia’s great role in a settlement around Iraq and the traditional friendly nature of relations between the two countries. Western sources have claimed that this deal is a warning that Moscow will take a firm stand against military action against Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath regime. Abbas Khalaf referred to the fact in his statement: America’s aggressive statements against Iraq aroused a negative reaction in Russia.
Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY
PRAVDA.Ru
(REUTERS) Russia confirmed on Sunday it was set to sign a $40 billion economic and trade cooperation agreement with Iraq in a move that could complicate Washington's plans to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
A top Russian official confirmed the deal was being prepared despite concerns expressed by the Bush administration, which has made ousting Saddam a top priority and is seeking to build international support for a possible attack on Iraq...
While Russian firms are among the top buyers of Iraqi crude, buying annually oil worth $5 billion, most of their most promising deals remain frozen by U.N. sanctions. Russia's top oil firm LUKOIL signed a $4 billion deal in 1997, but has so far been unable to start work...
After the Washington Post published news of the planned Russia-Iraq deal on Saturday, U.S. officials, keen to sidestep a public clash with Moscow, said Russia should bear in mind its obligations under U.N. Security Council resolutions...
An agreement with Iraq, part of Mr. Bush's "axis of evil" of states accused of seeking weapons of mass destruction, could add to disagreements which have marred Moscow and Washington's friendship over the past months.
The two sides, which saw their relations blossom after the September 11 attacks, have already publicly disagreed over Moscow's plans to boost nuclear cooperation with Iran, also part of the "axis"...
A deal between Moscow and Baghdad, heavy in political significance, could make it even harder for Washington to gather national and international sceptics behind an attack.
Moscow has said it will oppose any military action against Iraq, calling instead for new diplomatic efforts to eliminate fears over weapons of mass destruction...
© MMII Reuters Limited. All Rights Reserved.
Russia Seeks 'Diplomatic Solution' to Iraqi Crisis Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Saltanov said on Thursday in Baghdad that Russia is committed to finding a "diplomatic solution" to the Iraqi crisis, the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) reported..."to ensure Iraq's national unity, territorial integrity and sovereignty," INA reported.
PEOPLES DAILY--Jan. 13, 2003For his part, [Iraqi vice-president] Ramadan promised that Iraq gives Russian companies the priority in its current and future contracts and projects...
Upon arrival at Baghdad's Saddam International Airport, Saltanov told reporters the delegation members "are here to seize any chance to achieve and find a diplomatic and peaceful solution to the Iraq issue and to avoid military scenarios."
By Associated Press, March 23, 2003 WASHINGTON (AP) The State Department protested Sunday that Russian companies sold sensitive military equipment to Iraq in the run-up to U.S.-led war against Saddam Hussein's regime.
One Russian firm is helping the Iraqi military deploy electronic jamming equipment against U.S. planes and bombs, while two other Russian firms have sold antitank missiles and thousands of night-vision goggles in violation of United Nations sanctions, The Washington Post reported in Sunday editions.
The State Department said it had raised the issue with senior levels of the Russian government a number of times, particularly over the past two weeks because the equipment could pose a direct threat to coalition forces. Moscow's response has been unsatisfactory, the State Department said.
The Post identified two of the firms as KBP Tula and Aviaconversiya, a Moscow-based company, saying that KBP supplied antitank guided missiles and Aviaconversiya provided the jamming devices...
The U.S. government last year imposed sanctions on KBP for allegedly selling antitank weapons to Syria. KBP's laser-guided Kornet-E anti-tank missiles are designed to destroy armored vehicles and tanks at a distance of up to 6,000 yards.
[Update February 2007 -- "Ultranationalist Russian lawmaker Vladimir Zhirinovsky on Monday denied wrongdoing under the U.N. oil-for-food program in Iraq, saying he never received money from Baghdad...Zhirinovsky was responding to a U.S. Senate report alleging that he was among Russian officials and politicians who received millions of dollars in oil allocations from Saddam's government in return for their support in ending U.N. sanctions against Iraq."
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/5/16/151946.shtml End Update]