Ukraine pulls forces out of Crimea as Russia takes over military bases

Summary

Here is a summary of developments over the past 24 hours. 

• Ukraine is pulling its forces out of Crimea, acting president Oleksander Turchinov said on Monday, in the face of what he called "threats to the lives and health of our service personnel" and their families.

• It came after Russian troops took over a Ukrainian naval base in Feodosia, Crimea, one of the few military facilities still flying a Ukrainian flag.

• The G7 nations have suspended their 16-year collaboration with Russia until Moscow "changes course" over Ukraine and threatened intensified sanctions in the event of any Russian military moves in the region.

• In a move intended to underline Russian isolation, leaders from the US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Canada and Japan met in The Hague as the G7 for the first time since Russia was first brought into the group in 1998 to seal east-west co-operation.

• The joint statement, which is being called the 'Hague Declaration',said they would not attend a planned G8 summit in Sochi in June but would convene in Brussels instead. The group's foreign ministers would also boycott a planned meeting in Moscow in April.

• A bill providing economic assistance to Ukraine and imposing sanctions over Russia's seizure of Crimea cleared a procedural hurdle in the U.S. Senate on Monday, as backers attempted to win passage of the legislation.

• Nato's most senior military commander has said that Russia had amassed a large military force on Ukraine's eastern border, and warned that Moldova's separatist Trans-Dniester region could be the Kremlin's next target.

We are wrapping up the blog for now.

10.45pm GMT

Despite a stalled stalled US aid package for Ukraine finally beginning to emerge from Congress, a wider package which also includes further sanctions against Russia still faces an uphill struggle in the House of Representatives.

The Guardian's Dan Roberts reports that Republican senator John McCain warned that further delays would fuel a Russian perception that the US was not serious about helping Ukraine resist further territorial aggression.

McCain urged:

Pass this legislation as soon as possible and fight about less important issues later on. If we get hung up for another week because of our failure to act it sends exactly the wrong signals.

I believe [Putin] is watching carefully for the reaction of the West and how we are going to assist the Ukraine.

10.27pm GMT

A bill providing economic assistance to Ukraine and imposing sanctions over Russia's actions in Ukraine has cleared a procedural hurdle in theUS Senate, as backers attempted to win passage of the legislation later this week.

Reuters reports: 

By a vote of 78-17, the Senate laid the groundwork for debating a bill that would back a $1 billion loan guarantee for the government in Kiev, provide $150 million in aid for Ukraine and neighboring countries and require sanctions on Russians and Ukrainians responsible for corruption, human rights abuses or undermining stability in Ukraine.

The History Of Malaysia Defensive

History

Since Malaysia achieved its independence on August 31, 1957, the Ministry of Defence has been officially operated in a building located in Brockman Road (currently known as Dato' Onn Street), Kuala Lumpur. The office of the first Defence Minister, the late Tun Abdul Razak, who had served from 31 August 1957 until September 22, 1970, was also located here.

A few years later, the first Ministry of Defence building was built by the Federal Government at Jalan Padang Tembak, Kuala Lumpur to house the commander offices and Malaysian Armed Forces senior officers of all the three services. The building was constructed at a cost of RM 122,000.00 which was approved by then Defence Minister, Tun Abdul Razak on March 18, 1960.

In order to accommodate the increasing needs with the expansion of the armed forces towards the control of national security responsibility, a complex which consist of six blocks building as high as four-storey each was built in front of the Personnel Services Division office. The RM2 Million complex was opened by the Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman on 6 April 1967. Following of the British Government decision to withdraw their armies from this region after 1970, Malaysian Government has taken several steps, Ministry of Defence was required to reorganize Malaysian Armed Forces’ need of its expansion purposes.

Realizing this, the government has decided to build one new building for Ministry of Defence to accommodate all its agencies. Thus, on March 10, 1982, the foundations of the building had been launched by the Deputy Defence Minister, Dato' Abang Abu Bakar bin Datu Bandar Abang Haji Mustapha.

The new building of Ministry of Defence which is located at Jalan Padang Tembak, Kuala Lumpur, was built with the price of RM 144 million. The construction started in early 1982 and completed in the middle year 1985. The building as high as 20 storeys which is known as 'Defence building' provide office compartments and meeting rooms. Its surroundings which is known as Defence Building Complex also provide some of the facilities such as the tiered parking, auditorium, Surau, parade square, guard station, tower, computer room, 'helipad', cafeteria and others.

Ministry of Defence is led by Defence Minister and assisted by the Deputy Minister. Ministry of Defence organization contains two main services; civilian and Malaysian Armed Forces (MAF). The ministry is responsible towards the implementation of National Defence Policy and resources provided to the armed forces to defend the country.

Functions and Responsibilities

• Managing national defence.
• Implementing national defence policy as well as other government policies.
• Providing MAF management and administrative services.
• Managing the allocated resources for national defence.

Objective

Form competent k-Force with the ability to manage and operate sophisticated defence technology.

• Develop Malaysian Armed Forces (ATM) as an efficient defence headquarters in implementing combat duties.

• Increase defence technology support through R & D and industry development.

• Strengthen regional defence relationship.

List of Ministers of Defence

• Tun Abdul Razak (31 August 1957 - 22 September 1970) - First Minister of Defence
• Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud
• Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohammad
• Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (1986-1987)
• Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak (1990-1995, 1999-2008)
• Datuk Seri Dr. Ahmad Zahid Hamidi (2008-2013)
• Dato Seri Hishamuddin Tun Hussein (current Minister of Defence)

Malaysian plane saga highlights air defense gaps

(Reuters) - Whatever truly happened to missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370, its apparently unchallenged wanderings through Asian skies point to major gaps in regional - and perhaps wider - air defenses.6

More than a decade after al Qaeda hijackers turned airliners into weapons on September 11, 2001, a large commercial aircraft completely devoid of stealth features appeared to vanish with relative ease.

On Saturday, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak said authorities now believed the Boeing 777 flew for nearly seven hours after disappearing early on March 8. Either its crew or someone else on the plane disabled the on-board transponder civilian air traffic radar used to track it, investigators believe.

It appears to have first flown back across the South China Sea - an area of considerable geopolitical tension and military activity - before overflying northern Malaysia and then heading out towards India without any alarm being raised.

The reality, analysts and officials say, is that much of the airspace over water - and in many cases over land - lacks sophisticated or properly monitored radar coverage.

Analysts say the gaps in Southeast Asia's air defenses are likely to be mirrored in other parts of the developing world, and may be much greater in areas with considerably lower geopolitical tensions.

"Several nations will be embarrassed by how easy it is to trespass their airspace," said Air Vice Marshal Michael Harwood, a retired British Royal Air Force pilot and ex-defense attache to Washington DC. "Too many movies and Predator (unmanned military drone) feeds from Afghanistan have suckered people into thinking we know everything and see everything. You get what you pay for. And the world, by and large, does not pay."

"TOO EXPENSIVE"

Air traffic systems rely almost entirely on on-board transponders to detect and monitor aircraft. In this case, those systems appear to have been deactivated around the time the aircraft crossed from Malaysian to Vietnamese responsibility.

At the very least, the incident looks set to spark calls to make it impossible for those on board an aircraft to turn off its transponders and disappear.

Military systems, meanwhile, are often limited in their own coverage or just ignore aircraft they believe are on regular commercial flights. In some cases, they are simply switched off except during training and when a threat is expected.

That, one senior Indian official said, might explain why the Boeing 777 was not detected by installations on India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands, an archipelago which its planes were searching on Friday and Saturday, or elsewhere.

"We have many radar systems operating in this area, but nothing was picked up," Rear Admiral Sudhir Pillai, chief of staff of India's Andamans and Nicobar Command, told Reuters. "It's possible that the military radars were switched off as we operate on an 'as required' basis."

Separately, a defense source said that India did not keep its radar facilities operational at all times because of cost. Asked what the reason was, the source said: "Too expensive."

"SOMEONE ELSE'S PROBLEM"

Worries over revealing defense capabilities, some believe, may have slowed cooperation in the search for flight MH370, particularly between Malaysia and China. Beijing has poured military resources into the search, announcing it was deploying 10 surveillance satellites and multiple ships and aircraft. It has been critical of Malaysia's response.

While Malaysian military radar does appear to have detected the aircraft, there appear to have been no attempts to challenge it - or, indeed, any realization anything was amiss.

That apparent oversight, current and former officials and analysts say, is surprising. But the incident, they say, points to the relatively large gaps in global air surveillance and the limits of some military radar systems.

"It's hard to tell exactly why they did not notice it," says Elizabeth Quintana, senior research fellow for air power at the Royal United Services Institute in London. "It may have been that the aircraft was flying at low level or that the military operators were looking for other threats such as fast jets and felt that airliners were someone else's problem."

Current and former officials say that - hopefully, at least - such an incident would be detected much faster in North American or European airspace. There, military and civilian controllers monitor radar continuously on alert for possible hijacks or intruders.

The sudden failure of a transponder, they say, would itself prove a likely and dramatic cause for concern.

"I can't think of many situations in which one would actually need to switch them off," said one former Western official on condition of anonymity.

U.S. and NATO jets periodically scramble to intercept unidentified aircraft approaching their airspace, including a growing number of Russian long-range bombers.

In some other areas, it is simply not seen as worth maintaining a high level of alert - or radar coverage itself may not even exist.

"NOTHING MUCH HAPPENS AT NIGHT"

Investigators now say they believe MH370 may have turned either towards India and Central Asia or - perhaps more likely, given the lack of detection - taken a southern course towards the Antarctic. That would have been an effectively suicidal flight, the aircraft eventually running out of fuel and crashing.

The waters of the southern Indian Ocean and northern Southern Ocean are among the most remote on the planet, used by few ships and overflown by few aircraft.

Australian civilian radar extends only some 200 km (125 miles) from its coast, an Australian official said on condition of anonymity, although its air defense radar extends much further. Australia's military could not be reached for comment on Saturday and if it did detect a transponder-less aircraft heading south, there is no suggestion any alarm was raised.

U.S. military satellites monitor much of the globe, including some of the remotest oceans, looking primarily for early warning of any ballistic missile launch from a submarine or other vessel.

After the aircraft's initial disappearance a week ago, U.S. officials said their satellites had detected no signs of a mid-air explosion. It is unclear if such systems would have detected a crash landing in the southern Indian Ocean.

On India's Andaman Islands, a defense official told reporters he saw nothing unusual or out of place in the lack of permanent radar coverage. The threat in the area, he said, was much lower than on India's border with Pakistan where sophisticated radars are manned and online continuously.

At night in particular, he said, "nothing much happens".

"We have our radars, we use them, we train with them, but it's not a place where we have (much) to watch out for," he said. "My take is that this is a pretty peaceful place."

China, Malaysia To Hold Joint Military Drills

The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS George Washington (CVN 73), top, is seen underway with the Royal Malaysian Navy frigates RMN Jebat (FF 29) and RMN Lekiu (FF 30) during a transit of the Andaman Sea in 2012. China and Malaysia will hold their first-ever joint military exercises next year, the Southeast Asian nation's defense minister said Wednesday. (AFP)

KUALA LUMPUR — China and Malaysia will hold their first-ever joint military exercises next year, the Southeast Asian nation’s defense minister said Wednesday, despite their rival claims to the tense South China Sea.

The announcement by Hishammuddin Hussein, who is in Beijing to meet Chinese military leaders, follows a visit to Kuala Lumpur earlier this month by China’s President Xi Jinping, in which the two countries pledged closer ties.

“Malaysia and China are expected to launch our first joint exercise in 2014 after the Memorandum of Understanding on Defence Cooperation was signed in 2005,” Hishammuddin said in a statement sent to AFP.

The statement gave no details on the planned drills such as their location, scale, or which military branches would be involved.

A Malaysian defense ministry official confirmed they would be the first-ever drills between the two countries’ armed forces.

Hishammuddin, who met his counterpart Gen. Chang Wanquan in China, also said he invited Chang to visit the Malaysian naval base of Mawilla 2 in the South China Sea on the island of Borneo.

The visit would be aimed at launching a “direct-contact” relationship with China’s fleet in the South China Sea.

The resource-rich waterway has become a potential military flashpoint in recent years as Beijing has pressed its claim to nearly all of it.

Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan also have various claims — some overlapping — to the sea, a vital thoroughfare for world trade and shipping traffic.

The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), of which Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Vietnam are members, has sought to present a united front against China.

It was not immediately clear how Malaysia’s warming defense ties with China would be received in other ASEAN capitals.

While the Philippines and Vietnam have been involved in tense confrontations with China over the issue, Malaysia has sought to keep a lower profile in the dispute.

In recent years, China has become Malaysia’s top export market and a vital trade buffer against the world economic volatility, and their commerce and overall relationship has strengthened.

Xi’s visits to Indonesia and Malaysia and his attendance at a regional summit in Bali took on added significance after President Barack Obama canceled his own plans to visit due to the recent US government shutdown.

The episode symbolically highlighted the two giants’ rivalry for influence in the Asia-Pacific and raised questions over Washington’s promise to refocus its attention on the region.

China agreed this year to discuss with ASEAN an eventual binding set of rules to prevent accidental conflict at sea, but analysts say Beijing will never give up its territorial claims and they predict maritime tensions will continue to simmer.

GUNS GUNS GUNS

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PAUL WALKER CAR COLLECTIONS

Paul Walker's Car Shop Will Auction Off His Collection, But Won't Say Which Cars Were His

BY STIRLING MATHESON | MAY 2, 2014 | 1:57 PM | PERMALINK

Image via Campus Mercante

Paul Walker owned an exotic car shop that is now tasked with selling off his substantial car collection. Rather than doing the typical thing, which would be to publicize the hell out of this in order to use the deceased's name to command high prices, however, the shop will be selling all of the cars through third parties and is refusing to let anyone know that they were Walker's cars. 

TMZ reports that his estate feels that he wouldn't have wanted his name, or the press surrounding his accident, to be used in order to make an extra buck. We're happy that everybody involved is acting with dignity and respect.

FOR SALE!

Paul Walker's car collection is for sale

Bang Showbiz | 02 May, 2014 11:00

Paul Walker

Paul Walker's famous car collection - including BMWs, Audis, Mustangs and Porches, has gone on sale following his death last year.

The late actor's car and racing shop Always Evolving has teamed up with his estate to organise the sale of 30 luxury vehicles - including BMWs, Audis, Mustangs and Porsches - following his death last November, according to TMZ.com.

However, the star's estate have not used his name in connection with the sale as it is believed Walker wouldn't have wanted his profile to boost the prices of the cars.

All sales will be conducted through high-end brokers.

Walker died along with his friend Roger Rodas on November 30 after the Porsche Carrera GT they were travelling in crashed into a tree and burst into flames in California. 

The coroner listed speed as the lone reason for the fatal crash after investigators found no sign of mechanical fault.

Following his death, the Always Evolving shop - which was founded in 2012 by Paul and Roger - allegedly closed in December, but the firm's website is still in operation.

Walker's estate has been valued at $25 million and his daughter Meadow, 15, is set to inherit his entire fortune after he named her as the sole beneficiary in his will.

The late star also requested his father, Paul Walker Sr., supervise the transfer of his $25 million fortune to Meadow after he listed him as the executor of his estate in his will
.