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The Russia’s security services openly named the United States (US) intelligence agency’s station chief in Moscow to media on Friday in a rare breach of protocol that followed their capture of an alleged CIA agent who was working undercover at the US embassy.

The Russia announced this week that it had caught alleged agent Ryan Fogle as he prepared to recruit a member of the Russian security forces. Footage was aired showing him wearing a blond wig and his array of spying equipment including a compass and an old-fashioned mobile phone.

An unnamed representative of the Federal Security Bureau (FSB) security services told the Interfax news agency that back in 2011 the agency had “officially warned the CIA station chief in Moscow” over what it called “provocative recruiting moves towards Russian security services officers”, and threatened “reciprocal measures towards CIA officers.”

The report gave the full name of the alleged CIA chief of station in Moscow.

It also named another alleged CIA agent who had worked at the US embassy in Moscow, saying that he was declared persona non grata and left in January after he “carried out a similar action to Fogle.”

Kremlin-funded television channel RT on its website Friday cited an FSB operative as saying that “in the case with Fogle, the CIA crossed a red line and we had no choice but to react observing official procedures.”

The FSB agent told RT that the Russian security agency held a 2011 meeting with the CIA chief of station in Moscow.

RT also named the station chief although it gave a slightly different surname than Interfax.

“We decided to warn our American colleagues and ask them to stop these activities,” the FSB agent told RT.

“We hoped our American colleagues would hear us, given that we also presented to them precise information about CIA officers making recruitment attempts in Moscow and who exactly was doing that.”

Moscow sent dozen or more warships to patrol waters near its naval base in Syria, Wall Street Journal reports. New York Times adds improved Yakhont missiles also sent to Syria. Lavrov meets UN’s Ban Ki-moon in Russia

Ynet

Russia has sent a dozen or more warships to patrol waters near its naval base in Syria, a buildup that US and European officials see as a newly aggressive stance meant partly to warn the West and Israel not to intervene in Syria’s bloody civil war, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

On Thursday, Syria’s official news agency SANA reported that five Russian warships had crossed the Suez Canal and entered the Mediterranean Sea. A Russian Navy spokesperson said that this was the first time in decades that Pacific Ocean Russian warships sail in the area.

According to him, the Russian warships are heading to Cyprus. The Russian defense minister said: “The Russian Defense Ministry started setting up a special force of warships in the Mediterranean in order to protect Russia’s interests in the region.”

Meanwhile, the New York Times reported that Russia has sent advanced anti-ship cruise missiles to Syria. The missiles are apparently an improved version of the Yakhonts, which Russia has previously provided to Syria, and have been outfitted with an advanced radar that makes them more effective.

Also Friday, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said a proposed international conference on Syria should be held as soon as possible, but that no date had yet been agreed.

“We should not lose the momentum,” Ban said of a US-Russian proposal to bring the Syrian government and opposition representatives to a peace conference.

“There is a high expectation that this meeting should be held as soon as possible,” he said after talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Lavrov agreed. “The sooner the better,” Lavrov told the joint news conference with Ban, who was due to meet President Vladimir Putin later on Friday.

Lavrov reiterated Russia’s view that Iran should be invited to the conference, which could complicate its organization because of potential opposition from the West.

On Thursday, Lavrov announced that Russia would remain committed to previously signed arms deal “regarding agreements pertaining to aerial defense weapons.”

This marks a failure by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who traveled to Russia earlier this week with the aim of dissuading Moscow from going ahead with the sale of S-300 missiles.

According to Lavrov, Russia will not sign any new deal with the Syrian government, but is nonethless obligated to previous commitments.

Ynet’s defense analyst Ron Ben-Yishai explains that the main reason for the growing tensions in Israel’s north is Iranian and Syrian desire to bolster Hezbollah.

Tehran officials believe that by the end of 2013 either Israel and the US or both will decide for or against a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Iran hopes to deter the West from making mounting a military operation by threatening Israel’s hinterland.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey calls shipment of anti-ship missiles ‘ill-timed and very unfortunate.’ Rights group says obtained evidence of arbitrary detention and torture by Assad’s forces.

ed note–remember, criminals prefer unarmed victims. That is the whole reason for Dempsey’s statements.

Haaretz

A Russian shipment of anti-ship missiles to Syria could embolden President Bashar Assad’s forces and prolong the conflict, the top U.S. military officer said on Friday.

“It’s at the very least an unfortunate decision that will embolden the regime and prolong the suffering, so it’s ill-timed and very unfortunate,” General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon.

Dempsey said he was referring specifically to the anti-ship missiles sent by Russia. The missiles, called Yakhonts, are equipped with an advanced radar that renders them more effective, according to officials who spoke to The New York Times on condition of anonymity because they were discussing classified intelligence information.

Also on Friday, United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon voiced disappointment over Syria’s refusal to let UN inspectors enter the country to check reports about the use of chemical weapons.

“It is deplorable that the team could not visit Syria to do an investigation on the ground,” Ban said after talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in the Black Sea resort of Sochi.

Russia supports the UN investigation, said Lavrov, expressing hope that an agreement between Damascus and the UN would be found, the Interfax news agency reported.

The United States, Britain and Israel have said there is evidence that sarin gas has been used in Syria.

Russia, a key Syria ally, and the United States last week agreed to call for a peace conference to discuss an end to the 26-month conflict, which the UN refugee agency said Friday has sent at least 1.5 million Syrians fleeing the country.

Syria’s civil war will also be the focus of talks between Israeli officials and German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle who arrived in Tel Aviv Friday.

Meanwhile, the Human Rights Watch accused the Syrian government of arbitrarily detaining and torturing opponents in security buildings.

The New York-based group’s researchers found documents and evidence of the abuse when they visited the state security and military intelligence facilities in al-Raqqa in northern Syria late April after local armed opposition groups took control of the city.

“The documents, prison cells, interrogation rooms and torture devices we saw in the government’s security facilities are consistent with the torture former detainees have described to us since the beginning of the uprising in Syria,” the group’s deputy Middle East director, Nadim Houry, said.

In addition, The Wall Street Journal reported that Russia has dispatched a dozen or more warships to patrol waters near its naval base in Syria, as part of the European country’s newly aggressive stance that evidently seeks to deter the West and Israel from getting involved the crisis in Syria.

These reports come just days after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and asked him not to sell Syria anti-aircraft missiles.

‘IsraHell Has Right To Defend Itself’ Nazi She Declares

“We see that Syria is disintegrating and a weapons shipment is certainly not a positive development, it destabilizes the area,” Army Radio quoted Livni as saying in reaction to a New York Times report Friday that Russia has sent advanced antiship Yakhont cruise missiles to Syria.

She added: “Israel has a right to defend itself. Elaborating on this issue is ill-advised.”

According to the Times, quoting U.S. intelligence sources, the Yakhonts recently delivered to Syria are equipped with advanced radar, making them more effective than earlier batches sent by Russia to Syria.

“It enables the regime to deter foreign forces looking to supply the opposition from the sea, or from undertaking a more active role if a no-fly zone or shipping embargo were to be declared at some point,” said Nick Brown, editor in chief of IHS Jane’s International Defense Review. “It’s a real ship killer.”

Israel is believed to have carried out three strikes on Syria this year, targeting weapons transfers. On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flew to Russia to meet with President Vladimir Putin. Netanyahu reportedly asked Putin to prevent the supply to Syria of Russian S-300 air defense systems.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced Thursday that Russia would remain committed to “agreements pertaining to aerial defense weapons,” Ynet reported.

Russia has until now heeded U.S. and Israeli requests to delay delivery of the S-300 systems.

“The task force has successfully passed through the Suez Canal and entered the Mediterranean. It is the first time in decades that Pacific Fleet warships have entered this region,” the Pacific Fleet spokesman, Capt. First Rank Roman Martov told RIA Novosti.

The vessels are now heading to Cyprus and will make a port call in the city of Limassol, he added.

The group includes destroyer Admiral Panteleyev, two amphibious warfare ships Peresvet and Admiral Nevelskoi, as well as a tanker and a tugboat.

The ships left the Far-Eastern port city of Vladivostok on March 19 to join Russia’s Mediterranean task force, which currently consists of vessels from Northern, Baltic, and the Black Sea Fleets, including a large anti-submarine ship, a frigate and a Ropucha-II Class landing ship.

Russian Navy Commander Adm. Viktor Chirkov on Sunday announced plans for the Mediterranean task force and said that it may “possibly” be enlarged to include nuclear submarines.

“Overall, already from this year, we plan to have five or six warships and support vessels [in the Mediterranean Sea], which will be replaced on a rotating basis from each of the fleets – the Black Sea, Baltic, Northern and, in some cases, even the Pacific Fleet. Depending on the scope of assignments and their complexity, the number of warships in the task force may be increased,” Chirkov said, as quoted by RIA Novosti.

Russian submarines may be deployed in the region “in perspective,” the Navy Commander said, reminding that both nuclear and diesel submarines were present in the Soviet Union’s 5th Mediterranean Squadron.

“Everything will depend on the situation,” Chirkov said, also leaving the door open for missions in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. The task force will be “comprehensively trained” to meet situations that may arise in these regions too, he said.

The Russian Defense Ministry announced setting up a naval task force in the Mediterranean in April, while the country’s Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu has said a permanent naval task force was needed to defend Russia’s interests in the region.

The permanent fleet’s headquarters will be set up in the summer of 2013, although their actual location is yet to be announced.

The Mediterranean has recently become a hotspot of military muscle flexing as global powers seemingly vie for influence.

NATO has been staging major naval war games involving several countries, last October holding an exercise code-named Noble Mariner 12. Russia held its largest naval exercises in the region this January, with drills spanning both the Black and Mediterranean Seas. The media quickly linked both the NATO and Russian war games to the situation in Syria.

Another recent naval display, seen as provocative by Israel, was the deployment of the Iranian Navy’s 24th Fleet to patrol the Mediterranean and convey a “message of peace.” Since then, Israel has acquired its fifth Dolphin-class submarine allegedly capable of launching cruise missiles with nuclear warheads.

China has also been increasing its involvement in the area, with the country’s warships sailing through the Suez Canal, and several key ports of the region becoming partially China-owned.

Major naval groups serving in the Mediterranean Sea include NATO’s Standing Maritime Group 2, French Naval Action Force, and the US Navy 6th Fleet. The only Russian naval installation in the region has for decades been the maintenance facility in the Syrian city of Tartus.

New shipment of anti-ship missiles are equipped with advanced radar that makes them more potent, U.S. officials tell New York Times. Meanwhile, Russia sends a dozen warships to protect its naval base on Syria’s shores.

Haaretz

Russia has sent advanced anti-ship cruise missiles to Syria, The New York Times reported Thursday, citing American officials.

The officials stated that the move exemplifies the extent of Russia’s support for the Syrian government and its embattled leader, President Bashar Assad.

The missiles, called Yakhonts, are equipped with an advanced radar that renders them more effective, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing classified intelligence information.

Unlike the long-range surface-to-surface missiles that stand at the Assad regime’s disposal, the Yakhont anti-ship missile system allows the Syrian military to stand against potential efforts by international forces to impose a naval embargo or a no-fly zone on the country, or to carry out limited airstrikes in support of the Syrian opposition.

Syria’s new weaponry would “tend to push Western or allied naval activity further off the coast” and was “a signal of the Russian commitment to the Syrian government,” said Jeffrey White, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former senior American intelligence official.

In addition, The Wall Street Journal reported that Russia has dispatched a dozen or more warships to patrol waters near its naval base in Syria, as part of the European country’s newly aggressive stance that evidently seeks to deter the West and Israel from getting involved the crisis in Syria.

These reports come just days after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and asked him not to sell Syria anti-aircraft missiles.

Knesset Member Tzachi Hanegbi on Friday stressed that Israel has no interest in intervening in Syria’s civil war, but expressed hope that “the Russians understand that supplying missiles to what could be the most volatile and sensitive region in the world is not the solution.”

“The Russians are betting everything they have on the Assad card, and it’s unclear why,” Hanegbi said in an interview with Israel Radio.

According to the New York Times report, Syria had first ordered the Yakhont missiles from Russia in 2007, and received the first batteries – which did not include the advanced radar – in 2011. It initially ordered 72 missiles, 36 launchers and additional support equipment.

The missiles are 6.7 meters long and can reach a distance of 290 kilometers. Each missile has its own radar to help evade a ship’s defense system. The launchers are mobile, which makes them difficult to target.

NOVANEWS

An injured journalist is filmed and helped by his colleagues during clashes between riot police and May Day protesters in central Istanbul, May 1, 2013. (photo by REUTERS/Murad Sezer)

If US President Barack Obama brings up the controversial issue of freedom of speech tomorrow [May 16], at his meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the White House, it would be the most surprising news of all. Not only is the US administration facing its own flap over the seizure by the Justice Department last year of phone records at The Associated Press, the world’s most widely disseminated news service, Turkey has long been mired in issues of press freedom even as it espouses such values.

Wiretapping of media personalities and acquiring access to the privileged information of journalists is commonplace in Turkey. While no government is perfect in holding up the highest standards of press freedom, there are still major differences between civil rights and their implementation in Turkey and the United States. Even as the imperfections in the United States make the rest of the world question the sincerity of its democratic principles, Max Hoffman and Michael Werz of the Center for American Progress, question Turkey’s role as a “model” for the rest of the Muslim Arab world in transition to democracy in their new study, “Freedom of the Press and Expression in Turkey,” released on May 14.

“The sidelining of press freedom, minority rights and judicial reform now threatens to impact the joint strategic project being advanced by the United States and Turkey to establish secure and democratic governance in the region and foster economic growth,” they write. “The fact that Turkey has regressed on issues of press freedom and stalled on judicial reforms undermines the persuasive power of the Turkish democratic model in the wider region.” They also admit that Washington almost never makes this issue a priority in bilateral talks. “As such, US officials and policy analysts focused on defining a cooperative regional agenda. Questions surrounding Turkey’s ongoing democratization, including issues of press freedom and freedom of expression, were therefore often sidelined.”

This, however, has always been the case — meaning freedom of the media has never been a priority when state interests are involved. It was not really a major issue in the 1990s, when the military imposed strict media controls covering the fight against Kurdish terrorism. In fact, Erdogan often refers to this kind of military rule and the fight against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) as the two main obstacles to Turkey’s democratization and the freedom of the media. “The 2014 presidential elections may also reveal the extent to which the current controversies are the product of specific leadership personalities or a case of the familiar tools of power wielded by new hands,” Hoffman and Werz write.

Without getting into much detail, though, Hoffman and Werz provide an informative summary of all the challenges that a free press faces in Turkey — from imprisoned journalists to government pressure and media ownership — and propose some suggestions for correcting the system, as well as related laws to help build a freer atmosphere for the media and expression.

While theirs is not the first or the last analysis focusing on the growing concerns about freedom of the press in Turkey, the timing of its release just two days before Erdogan’s visit to the White House shows how Washington think tanks are focusing on this critical issue.

Obama and Erdogan may not even have time to talk about this issue as a good part of their discussion will focus on how to handle the Syrian civil war, and their differences may appear to be substantial. In a snapshot, Turkey is skeptical about giving a chance to the ideas that came out of the US-Russian led Geneva meeting between the Syrian opposition and Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Erdogan’s government — along with Qatar — prefers regime change in Syria. Surprisingly, even the Saudis are showing some restraint and siding with the more secular groups in the Syrian theater. In addition, Turkey wants the United States to impose a no-fly zone over Syria and provide lethal arms to the opposition. It would be a mistake to expect Obama to give Erdogan what he wants, but he still has to please Turkey so that their differences are not visible.

“Given the turmoil in the region,” write Hoffman and Werz, “Turkey cannot afford to come across as undemocratic or as cracking down on freedom of expression. The issue of press freedom is at the core of Turkey’s development as a modern democracy. Vigorous — and often controversial — internal debate is necessary to help reinforce Turkish leadership in the region and the strategic partnership with the United States.” They write: “The United States wants Turkey to be a capable and secure democratic partner with whom it can engage the broader Middle East, and therefore it should more clearly voice its concerns about the deterioration of press freedom and freedom of expression in the domestic political context.”

That said, Turkish authorities claim that the United States has no right to pass judgment on the practice of governmental restrictions on the press. Trying to rationalize the Turkish court’s order that brought heavy censorship and strict blackout to all kinds of visuals, audio and written publications of the terrorist attacks in Reyhanli on May 11, Deputy Prime Minister Huseyin Celik said, “Try to remember the September 11 attacks. There was such a situation in the US as well.”

There was, however, no court order that imposed censorship after 9/11 of the kind Celik refers to. Although it is unlikely that this issue of freedom expression and press freemdom will be addressed at the meeting between the two leaders, it would be best for US authorities to put these misguided comparisons into context and help build awareness in Turkey on these critical issues and prevent the spread of misinformation. The United States may not be the paragon of virtue on freedom of press issues, but Turkey’s press would be freer — and the Erdogan government more respectful of press freedom — if US rules and practices were applied.