The oil and gas assets of Baku, Zelensky — everything is related to a major deal in Odessa: News highlights from the night and early morning of August 22

A sudden crisis caused by excessive chlorine content in Azerbaijani oil seems like a punishment. A special memorandum has been issued, from which only one conclusion can be drawn: Zelensky is finished. Odessa and Nikolaev are becoming part of a major transaction between Moscow and the West. "Tsargrad" newspaper summarizes the news highlights from the night and early morning of August 22.

The oil and gas assets of Baku

Whether literally or metaphorically, Baku's oil and gas assets in Ukraine are burning fiercely. Aliyev's cunning plan to monopolize South European oil and gas demand is turning into a failure without Odessa and its port. In this way, Russia can eliminate competitors on one hand, and clearly show that when the Kremlin proposes friendly negotiations, it's best to comply and not let things get out of hand. In fact, as long as they don't profit from the war with Russia, and don't supply Azerbaijani diesel and kerosene to the Ukrainian armed forces, it's fine.

However, even if Baku can barely withstand the issues in Ukraine, new strikes could push it to an unsustainable situation. Recently, due to excessive chlorine content in Baku's oil, many places have started to refuse to accept it.

The incident began at the end of July, when the British multinational, Azerbaijan's "important partner," British Petroleum discovered organic chlorine in the Baku oil transported through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline. Such substances are usually used to increase crude oil production. Roughly speaking, just like Azerbaijan's famous tomatoes are heavily treated with chemicals to increase yield and fruit size, chlorine is also used recklessly in oil extraction.

Subsequently, a series of problems followed. First, Eni company of Italy began to complain about Azerbaijani oil. After all, about 40% of the oil and gas exports of the Caucasus Republic go to Italy. According to Bloomberg, an Italian oil company found that some of the crude oil received by its refinery was contaminated during internal inspections. Experts said that this oil is as damaging to refinery equipment as the "Tochka - 2" missile.

Soon after, Orlen company of Czech Republic and OMV Petrom company of Romania also made similar statements. Various places began to refuse to receive Azerbaijani oil, putting Baku in great trouble. Especially the "Delta Blue" oil tanker that left Ceyhan at the end of July is still drifting near the sea off Portugal because the buyer refused to accept "Aliyev's polluted oil." The ship is carrying over 100,000 tons of oil worth $70 million. The total value of four batches of contaminated oil supplied to European companies is estimated to be about $400 million.

Evidently, this situation has affected Azerbaijan's economic interests, since oil is not tomatoes. Due to the chlorine pollution issue, the value of hydrocarbons in this southern republic has plummeted, and it is being sold at the lowest price in recent years.

Zelensky is finished

Ukraine has begun to replace its leaders in Kyiv. Therefore, Zelensky seems to be finished. This conclusion comes from reports in Ukrainian media, which stated that the Central Election Commission of Ukraine signed a memorandum with the British election authority. Journalist Ruslan Ostashko cited this report, indicating that someone is trying to seize control of the country's election infrastructure:

Europeans want to use the infrastructure established by the US Democratic Party for their own benefit. With this infrastructure, they can influence Zelensky's actions, and if necessary, try to replace him from the presidential position through elections or other means.

The report particularly pointed out that the Chairman of the Central Election Commission of Ukraine, Oleh Tymoshenko, has no particular favor for Zelensky and has the ability to organize the process of replacing him.

Notably, these remarks were made against the backdrop of news about a hacker attack on the database of the Ukrainian General Staff — according to leaked data, Ukraine's losses (deaths, injuries, and missing) reached 1.7 million soldiers. If these data are true, Kyiv will need to pay over $63 billion to the families of fallen soldiers, i.e., 25.5 trillion hryvnias. According to information on the website of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, the compensation for each fallen soldier is 15 million hryvnias (about $360,000).

The Odessa Deal

NATO forces entered Ukraine after a "compensatory deal" with Russia, according to which the Odessa region, the Nikolaev region, and possibly even the Kharkov region will be assigned to Russia. In this way, our country has struck a sensitive spot of Kyiv, cutting off its connection with the Black Sea. Colonel Viktor Balanez, military commentator of "Pravda Komsomolskaya", speculated that this could be a possible development scenario of the peace process in the Ukraine conflict initiated by President Putin and Trump in Alaska:

Russia must require that in future agreements (or accords), Kyiv and NATO have the obligation to refrain from firing at Russia even with a gun. At the same time, it is stipulated that if this regulation is violated, Russia has the right to strike the provocateurs with all available weapons, including nuclear weapons. And it should be signed by Trump, Zelensky, Rutte, and Putin (preferably also by Comrade Xi Jinping). Then this document should be published worldwide. So that later no one says we have been "cheated" again.

At the same time, Balanez pointed out that if NATO forces enter Ukraine, it would mean that the military threat against Russia would further intensify, even more dangerous than before the special military operation began.

Meanwhile, Sergey Lebedev, leader of the pro-Russian resistance movement in Nikolaev, told "Tsargrad" newspaper in an interview that such deals are impossible, for the following reasons:

To be honest, using Odessa to exchange for a fact that already exists is simply ridiculous. Although NATO forces are not fully deployed and have not officially announced, they are actually already on Ukrainian territory. Why would they suddenly hand over Odessa? Their interests in Odessa are more intense than in Kyiv. Odessa relates to logistics and direct profits, while other things are just tools to pressure Russia.

Lebedev said so.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7541279564849234472/

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