cleo comments

These weapons come from NATO countries, so they should be sent to the ICC.

The weapons should be sent to the ICC? Pardon?

I take it you mean the people making/providing/using the weapons.

Targeting a military target in wartime is not a war crime.

a factory that makes optical equipment for Russia's security forces

It's just a book, a collection of paper and ink.

If the protestors want to burn books that are the property of other people, then that's a problem, but if they are burning books that they legally own, it's no one's business but their own.

They're doing it to protest; reacting to their actions simply gives their protest power. Ignore them, and they will go away. Surely they have better things to spend their money on than books to burn to no effect at all.

Same goes for flags, pictures and effigies.

Russia targeted MILITARY sites, not 'critical infrastructure',

Makes a change, dunit?

But they still managed to display their true nature:

Russia said it had captured the settlement of Novoselivske in northeastern Ukraine, ....

Footage from the Russian army showed Novoselivske completely destroyed, with white smoke billowing over crumbling buildings.

That village (population in Feb 2022 736, current population 0) was 'critical infrastructure' for its residents until the nutcase in the kremlin launched his Special Orc Operation.

cheerleading for more death is not going to change the reality on the ground

You've lost me. How is asking russia to go home and stop killing people 'cheerleading for more death'?

 Europe needs peace, Germany needs peace, NATO needs peace, Ukraine needs peace AND Russia needs peace.

And the easiest, simplest, fastest, most common-sense path to that peace?

Russia Go Home.

Stop invading neighbours, stop abducting children, stop destroying homes, hospitals and schools, stop trying to steal land.

And to make things nice and tidy, make sure there are no misunderstandings - sent Vlad to the Hague.

Yeah, a 6k Shiba is either a young pup or badly emaciated. My boy is a touch over 15k, granted on the larger side but the vet tells me he's just big for his breed, not overweight.

The jerk should be charged with irresponsible animal husbandry (letting the dog wander outside alone, at least twice), animal cruelty and assaulting a police officer.

And banned from ever owning an animal again.

I used to read the reviews, but the last couple of items I ordered from Amazon came with a 'gift card'; give the product a glowing 5-star review, and they send you an amazon gift card worth ¥2,000.

In each case I gave the product 2 stars and explained in the review that the 'gift' made it impossible for me to give a better review, though the product itself was quite satisfactory.

Neither review has been posted.

the people here are suffering

I must have missed the news reports of Japanese citizens being bombed out of their homes, of Japanese children being abducted by the bus load to be brainwashed into little Russians, of Japanese being threatened with massive flooding, chemical attacks and nuclear bombs/exploding nuclear power plants. I can’t find on the map the 20% of Japanese sovereign land being overrun by criminal conscripts and turned into minefields, no mention of Japanese ports being blown up with missiles, of prosthetic limbs being the new must-have.

Yes, the cost of living is going up in Japan, some people are having trouble making ends meet, the daily circumstances of ordinary people can and should be improved.

But let’s just keep things in perspective.

More than happy to have a portion of my taxes go to helping people who really need help, and putting down the thugs who are trying to destroy them.

If Vlad is allowed to have his way in Ukraine, he won’t stop there.

I got rammed by a white-banded triggerfish (15 cm in length) twice on a recent trip to Okinawa. (Seems I intruded on its breeding space) Hurt like hell. Would not like to be rammed by a dolphin!

It's just a book. Bits of paper covered in ink.

The ones doing the burning are doing it expressly to upset the faithful.

If the faithful have faith in their faith, can assert that it's much more than mere words on a page, then there is no need to get upset and they can just look on in distain and pity at the burners, who are now wasting their time, money and energy in a meaningless act.

Take the lead out of their pencil, as it were.

There are much more pressing matters to get all upset about, surely.

an official at the ministry said the test had been "difficult" and explained that it "cannot be concluded that students' English ability has fallen."

Then what on earth was the point of the test???

stop the "make English FUN" thinking! Unless of course you do the EXACT same for Japanese, Science, Math and Social Studies too! (Try telling a math teacher to "make your classes fun and entertaining" Play more "games" and sing and dance in math class! )

Yes and No.

All study should ideally be fun, ie interesting and stimulating, making the child want to know more.

That doesn't mean games and singing and dancing, in any subject; it means making the lesson satisfying.

I did it myself, and my kids speak English.

It's not hard. Just don't speak Japanese with them, and read them lots of books. Show them western media.

Yup, same here (except back in the day before the Internet and streaming, videos and English books costing a mint and having to be ordered from the UK, it was expensive!) I never spoke (still never speak) anything but English to my kids and by the time they entered kindergarten their English was as good as if not better than their Japanese, which was par for a Japanese kid of the same age.

Most monolingual Japanese parents aren't able to do that, of course.

Both my kids found school English lessons boring in the extreme.

The ‘Crimean bridges’ are not civilian targets. Moscow uses them for transporting troops, equipment and ammo. They are legitimate military targets.

As for ‘killing the parents in front of their child’, what was a civilian family doing in a war zone in the middle of the night? Note that the attack on the Kersh Bridge was at three in the morning , to minimize casualties.

wasnt saying who is right or wrong

No need to be coy; why not state clearly that it is WRONG to invade a neighbour, wreck his land and steal his kids; and it is RIGHT to do everything possible to push the invader back where he came from.

what Zelensky was boasting he was about to do to Russian speaking Ukrainians

What was Zelensky boasting he was about to do to Russian-speaking Ukrainians? You do know that Zelensky himself is a Russian-speaking Ukrainian?

What you're saying, ffs, is when a bully beats you up and takes your dinner money, on no account should you try to stop him hitting you, or hit him back; instead, roll over, give him your bus money too, and hope he doesn't kick you as he takes your dog, bike and shoes as 'recompense' for scraping his knuckles on your chin.

Every death and injury, every damaged or destroyed building in this war is the fault of none other than tzar Vlad the Despicable.

He will get what's coming to him.

Earth will cease to exist in a billion years or so.

Seriously, you're worried about what might happen a billion years in the future? When we're on the brink of making the planet unfit for human habitation within the next century or so?

Reading the article made me feel ill.

This barbaric practice should be stopped immediately.

As Fighto! says, you simply do not eat your best friend.

Fortunately man has a lot of time to master long distance space travel and figure out how to bio-engineer worlds to make them livable for humans.

Maybe we need to start by figuring out how not to make the planet we have unlivable for humans.

Along the way man may very well find themselves face to face with other forms of life, perhaps intelligent life 

Any truly intelligent life we encounter will do the intelligent thing and make sure the human race does not expand to pollute other planets.

Still cannot understand why people are condoning unsportsmanlike like behaviour. It’s intolerable showing a total lack of respect.

Have you watched the video? It's the russian who displayed unsportsmanlike behaviour and a lack of respect.

Her behaviour was not the offering of a handshake.

She lost the match, and went into a self-centred, wrist-flicking sulk.

If you watch the video, it's clear that Kharlan offered to tap blades, which, as Ed Kaihatsu points out, is a covid-friendly acceptable alternative to the handshake. There was nothing at all 'menacing' about it.

The russian on the other hand, far from offering a handshake, kinda flopped her left hand (a handshake is with the right hand) about in front of her, with her elbow tucked into her side, and then held it against the front of her body. If someone performed a manoeuvre like that in front of me, I would not assume they were offering a handshake.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mH0FxQG6r_8

Having a tantrum after a 15-7 defeat is hardly the epitome of sportsmanship. Poor loser. (Like Putin).

Barbaric to hang someone for 31 grams of heroin

Barbaric to hang someone.

For anything.

Who decided that it would be 'rebel held Syria' both before and after the American invasion, but never 'rebel held Ukraine', and always 'Russian occupied Ukraine' after the Russian intervention?

The Syrian war began with Syrians fighting Syrians, hence those rebelling against the government forces are 'rebels', regardless of who joins in later. Check your dictionary.

The war in Ukraine began when russia sent troops and arms into the country and used military force, with the help of a few malcontents, to occupy territory, hence 'russian occupied territory'.

Personally I prefer to call it 'temporarily occupied territory'.

maybe they have better to ask americans

Maybe they have better ask moscovite criminal conscripts to go the h3ll home then there won't be any more cluster bombs?

 the EU will assist in exporting majority of Ukranian agriculture produce ( not only grain ) by other routes

And those other routes are much more expensive than the sea route. So the grain will end up costing more.

we say hey, their culture/society

Surely the culture/society can sort itself out, without some group of out-of-touch bearded weirdos (they get uncontrollably turned on by the sight of women's hair, and think people without a penis are incapable of deciding for themselves how they want to live their lives) laying down the law about actions and practices that do not cause any harm to others.

Tens of thousands of breadwinners forced out of employment, half a population held under a righteous bigoted and perverted thumb.

The Taliban are a bunch of frustrated incels. Women scare them.

Russia's military might start targeting civilian shipping in the Black Sea, 

Does an attack on a ship registered in a NATO country count the same as an attack on that country?

If the woman had an abortion just before she was to give birth

No woman ever went through 8 or 9 months of pregnancy and then decided on a whim, 'Nah, don't want it'. Insane idea.

And even if she did, no doctor who wanted to keep his license would abort a viable baby.

'Corpse abandonment' is the coverall charge they hold her on while they determine if and how she killed the baby.

If they didn’t keep jamming the drones and just let them hit their targets, no civilian buildings would be hit.

Hey welcome to the team! 

glad to see that can now clearly admit that not everything that is hit in Ukraine was the intended target

Not too strong on sarc, are we?

this was a natural thing, not man-made

According to the article it’s caused by agricultural runoff - man made - and warming oceans due to climate change - man made.

We really need to up our game. There is no Planet B.

And if there were, it probably wouldn’t take us long to ruin it.

This was certainly an instance where deadly force would have been totally justified.

Well the stabber was arrested without a shot being fired, which means there was no need for deadly force, which means that deadly force would not have been justified at all; though depending on how wildly the stabber was waving the knives around, it may have been understandable for an officer to fire.

Then he would have the next week filled up with having to write reports explaining why he felt the need to fire his weapon.

any aggression against Russia's neighbor and close ally Belarus would be considered an attack on Russia.

That sounds an awful lot like the gist of Article 5.

I thought Vladdyboy objected strongly to NATO practices? But it’s OK for him to do the same?

The cognitive dissonance is strong with this one.

“A new DOD OIG report states potentially millions of dollars worth of weapons have being stolen & resold by Ukrainians, including grenade launchers”

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2023/07/20/weapons-sent-ukraine-were-danger-of-falling-criminal-hands-watchdog-warned.html

Quotes from the report, to which Blacklabel fails to give a link (not surprising, really, I doubt he bothered reading past the headline):

Last year, a Russian-led organized crime group in Ukraine was able to obtain weapons shipped to the country for the war effort 

a group of volunteer Ukrainian battalion members stole more than 60 rifles and nearly 1,000 rounds of ammunition

The schemes were disrupted by Ukraine's security service

in late June 2022, the Ukrainian security service, or SBU, broke up a crime group controlled by an "unspecified Russian official" whose members joined a volunteer battalion using forged identity documents and then procured weapons