Washington officials are reportedly demanding that Turkey “destroy or return” its Russian-made S-400 air defense systems to get back in the good books and rejoin the F-35 fighter program – but Ankara has no intention of complying. [...]

Ousted Bolivian President Evo Morales said he has “zero doubt” that a mechanical failure that occurred on a helicopter he was traveling on last month was an “assassination attempt” and no accident. [...]

When Italy asked the world to help restore Venice after the worst flood in decades, some Russians didn’t waste time – donating one million euros in less than a day, the Italian ambassador to Russia has revealed. Italy's Pasquale Terracciano said that donations were made by “wealthy” individuals whose identities were not named. [...]

Thousands of supporters of deposed Bolivian President Evo Morales gathered in La Paz to demand the resignation of self-declared “interim” leader Jeanine Anez, where they squared off with riot police in hectic street clashes. Flying national and indigenous flags and chanting pro-Morales slogans, the protest march met a forceful police response in Bolivia's administrative capital on Wednesday, f [...]

The White House has long sought to take counter-measures against the Turkish-Russian deal and now it is reportedly clinging to a new chance to put a spoke in the wheel. US President Trump has offered his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan a set of economic inducements for better US-Turkey relations, according to The Washington Post. [...]

The exit of Lebanon PM Saad Hariri brings more unrest in a turbulent region, a loss of an ally to the US, as troops withdraw from Syria, there’s conflict with Iran and issues with Saudi Arabia. Trump needs a new pal in the region. [...]

On 29 September, General Nick Carter, chief of UK Defence Staff made an incendiary speech to the Cliveden Literary Festival. A number of his comments sparked widespread outcry – not least his suggestion the distinction between conflict and peace no longer existed, and Britain was effectively “at war”. [...]

The cottage industry of ‘experts’ predicting the inevitable demise of Russia for years is ignoring the hard evidence of progress such as the infrastructure projects that the West is unable or unwilling to undertake itself. [...]

Three decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall, one of the symbols of the Cold War, Europe remains divided because it chose confrontation over a common future, Willy Wimmer, Germany’s former State Secretary for Defense believes. [...]

Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden – who, back in the good old Obama administration days, lobbied for the arming of ‘moderate’ rebels in Syria – slammed Trump for downgrading the US military to an oilfield occupation force. “Leaving troops behind like [Trump’s] doing now – he says that what he wants to do is we’re going to occupy the oil fields and we’re going to take [...]

As Prime Minister Boris Johnson gears up for a snap election, his government made a surprise U-turn on shale gas extraction, citing public concerns and technological limits on predicting the impact of fracking on the environment. [...]

BEIRUT (Sputnik) - Lebanese banks resumed operations after a two-week break amid mass anti-government protests that broke out all over the country, a Sputnik correspondent reported from Beirut on Friday. The reopening of the banks was accompanied by long lines of people who wanted to get cash and make transactions and transfers. [...]

On Sunday President Trump announced that Baghdadi had been killed during the US-raid in Idlib. The number one terrorist was reportedly under the Pentagon's surveillance for quite some time before the conditions were ripe to eliminate him. The leader of the Daesh* terrorist group Abu Bakr Baghdadi was "the brainchild of the United States", and his elimination has not yet been confirmed, Russian For [...]

This comes amid US President Trump's announcement that the signing site of the 'phase one' trade deal with China would be announced 'soon'. A World Trade Organization’s arbitrator ruled Friday that China could impose $3.6 billion worth of tariffs on US goods over its unfair anti-dumping practices. [...]

Last month, WikiLeaks published the evidence and testimony provided by an Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) whistleblower who revealed that the watchdog appeared to have wilfully ignored data that the Syrian government did not stage a chemical attack in Douma, Syria in April 2018 in order to fit a convenient narrative. [...]

China has now more millionaires and unicorns than the US and the tech sector may be the next sphere where Beijing can leave Washington behind, investor Dan Collins told Max Keiser. Most people would assume that the number one city in the world to host tech start-ups is San Francisco, but Beijing was recently ranked as the world’s unicorn capital [...]

Maria Butina, a Russian gun activist who spent months in a US jail for failing to properly register as a foreign agent, has landed in Moscow. Her case sparked outcry in Russia and accusations of “prosecutorial overreach.” She has arrived in Sheremetyevo airport after a long flight from Miami, Florida on Saturday. [...]

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The Russian Defense Ministry published satellite intelligence images proving that oil from Syria was sent abroad under the guard of US servicemen before and after the defeat of the Daesh terrorists, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Saturday. [...]

The United States maintains nearly three dozen military bases in Germany, with troops stationed in the country since the end of the Second World War, and long after the end of the Cold War and the withdrawal of Soviet/Russian troops from the country in the early 1990s. [...]

Two Russian Tu-160 strategic bombers and other military aircraft have touched down in South Africa. The planes covered over 11 thousand kilometers to get there, staying in the air for more than 13 hours.  The two Tupolev Tu-160 strategic bombers landed at Waterkloof air force base in Tshwane on Wednesday. Russian Il-62 and An-124 military transport planes have also touched down. [...]

President Trump has been defending his purported withdrawal of US troops from Syria as a triumphant move to “bring our soldiers home”. He says it’s about delivering on his 2016 election promise to “end endless wars”. This is just trite electioneering from Trump. Already it is being admitted this week that the Pentagon is not actually bringing US troops home from Syria. Most of them are b [...]

Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan met in the Russian city of Sochi to discuss an array of issues, with the situation in Syria and the Turkish military operation there expected to be the main topic of their conversation. Russian President Vladimir Putin has stated that foreign forces that are currently deployed in Syria unlawfully must leave its territory. He added that Turkey shares this vis [...]