In the last months, the diplomatic relation between Russian and the United States has become tense and unstable, mainly because Russia and China vetoed the U.N. intervention on Syria. This really angered the United States, but Vladimir Putin’s recent election to the Russian presidency has not helped to solve the problem and calm things down.

Russia is the U.S.’ 20th largest trading partner in goods. The goods trade between the two countries is reported as $42.9 billion USD in total. U.S. exports to Russia were $8.3 billion dollars. U.S. goods imports from Russia totaled $34.6 billion last year. Compared to China, Russia is a small economic partner to the United States, but a very important one in other areas.

In the 19th century, Russia sold Alaska to the United States. Russia also supported the U.S. during the civil war. In fact, the 19th  century was a golden period for U.S.-Russian diplomatic relations. But the  20th century told us a completely different story. It witnessed the worst  case scenario in the diplomatic relations between the two countries: the Cold War, which was a mainly political conflict between the Soviet Union, a union of countries in which Russia was the biggest, and the United States. Even though the Cold War was going on, the U.S. and Soviet astronauts went to space together in the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz mission.

The Soviet Union didn’t last forever, ending in 1991. After this, relations between the two countries got better, but, like with every country, there are a lot of aspects in which both governments do not agree. This is completely normal considering both countries come from two totally different backgrounds.

Vladimir Putin returned to the Russian presidency in March, which will definitely affect the good relations that President Obama had with his precursor, Dmitri Medvedev, who was in power from 2008 to 2012. Medvedev even declared once that “these were perhaps the best three years of relations between Russia and the United States over the last decade.”

But now Putin, a former K.G.B officer, is back on the game. The man became President for the first time in 2000 and remained so until 2008 when he gave power to his chosen one, Medvedev. Yet, most analysts agree he never stopped ruling.

The first problems between the U.S. and Russia have already reappeared, and the Syria issue has been the trigger. The State Secretary Hillary Clinton accused Putin in June of shipping attack helicopters to Syria that President al-Assad could use to continue with his massacre of civilians. The Russian government responded that they only have sent weapons that can be used for self-defense.

But the problematic relations between both countries really started in February, when Russia and China vetoed the United Nations’ action on Syria. This action caused fury on the other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council. The U.S. ambassador Susan Rice told CNN that “those that have blocked potentially the last effort to resolve this peacefully … will have any future blood spill on their hands.”

But President Obama made an announcement in June to try to calm things down. After a meeting with President Putin, he expressed the tensions can be solved although they have disagreements. Concerning the Syria issue he declared that President Putin agreed that a political process should be created in Syria in order to avoid a civil war.

Image Courtesy of  World Economic Forum

The article The Changing Relationship Between US and Russia appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.

Brazil Supreme Court decision to reject extradition for the Italian ex terrorist Cesare Battisti could have heavy consequences on diplomatic relations between Italy and Brazil.

The sentence passed by the Brazilian Court just confirmed the decision of December 2010 of the former President Luiz Inàcio Lula da Silva, who announced on his last effective day as president his refusal to extradite Battisti.

Franco Frattini, Italy’s foreign minister, has defined the sentence of release shameful, and he said it was like “a slap in the face of the whole democratic world that fights terrorism”. The fist reaction of Italy was the recall of its ambassador in Brasilia Gherardo La Francesca, to discuss and study in depth the judicial bilateral agreements between the two countries, and to decide the steps to take to reverse the decision.

“What we have failed to achieve through the national judicial route we can achieve through the international judicial route,” declared the Foreign Minister announcing Italy’s intention to appeal to The Hague International Court of Justice. Also Italian President Giorgio Napolitano, and other Italian officials and politicians, condemned and criticized the Brazilian Supreme Court decision.

Brazilian former President Lula da Silva, cancelled his official visit to Italy this week, to avoid possible protests and disorders. During the Beach Volley World Championship, which is now taking place in Italy, a group of Italian protesters threw oranges at the Brazilian national team players, as a sign of disappointment for the decision on Battisti’s case.

Cesare Battisti, member of the Italian far-left militant group, Armed Proletarians for Communism (PAC) during the turbulent period of the so-called “anni di piombo” (years of lead), has been convicted of four murders committed in the ‘70s and sentenced to life imprisonment by the Italian Court. He escaped from Italy in 1981, after the first sentence for participation in armed group, first to France and later to Mexico, where he devoted himself to the writer activity. He returned to France in 1990 where he spent several years as a free man until 2004, when after the French government decided to arrest him and extradite him, he escaped to Brazil. There he was arrested in 2007, and in 2009 Brazilian government granted him the status of political refugee, until their final decision and subsequent release on 9^th of June.

During all the years he was in hiding, Battisti always denied having committed any of the murders he was charged with. His defending counsels challenge the decision of the Italian Court, asserting that there isn’t any proof of Battisti’s guilt, and that the sentence was based only on the declarations of Pietro Mutti, a militant of PAC who accused his fellow PAC member in order to obtain a penalty reduction for himself. Many intellectuals, writers, journalists, politicians and NGOs’ representatives in several countries supported and still support Cesare Battisti.

On the contrary, the relatives of the victims and some politicians in Italy now express outrage and push to reverse the decision of the Brazilian Court. Meanwhile in Rome the protests goes on; vice-minister of transports Roberto Castelli, refused to sign the air transports bilateral agreement with Brazil, as “a sign of protest towards a country which showed no respect for Italy,” he said.

The relations between the two countries seem to be deteriorating more and more as a result of the Battisti Case’s conclusion.

The article Italy and Brazil Relations Deteriorated for Italian Terrorist’s Release appeared first on The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People!.