Multi-billion-euro gas pipeline project Nord Stream 2 was put on pause last year after the United States imposed sanctions against firms involved in its construction. The project’s operator said on Saturday that it was planning to resume “the pipe-laying work” this year. American sanctions will not stop the Nord Stream 2 project from being completed, which could happen by the middle [...]

The Trump administration has long been critical of the EU, especially Germany, over their support for the transnational pipeline project, which will boost the capacity of Russia to sell natural gas to Europe. Washington insists that the EU must instead buy more expensive LNG from the US or other countries. The European Commission has condemned the US plans to expand the sanctions on Nord [...]

By limiting access to China’s AI and rare earth metals, Beijing is responding to President Trump’s endless stream of sanctions. But this latest move is set to cause big problems for the companies that work with the US military. China’s announcement of new laws controlling the exports of ‘sensitive items’ in a way that mirrors the US Commerce Department’s ‘entity list’ is the [...]

Edward Snowden took to Twitter on Thursday to urge President Donald Trump to grant clemency to Julian Assange, prioritizing the WikiLeaks co-founder's case over even his own quest for a pardon on espionage charges. "Mr. President, if you grant only one act of clemency during your time in office, please: Free Julian Assange," Snowden tweeted. "You alone can save his life." [...]

President Trump spent $3 million for recounts in two Wisconsin counties after the election — but so far the end result is 132 more votes for Joe Biden. Those new votes, all from Milwaukee County, now add to Biden’s lead of nearly 20,600 votes in the state. A recount in Wisconsin’s largest county demanded by President Donald Trump’s election campaign ended on Friday with the pres [...]

The current administration actively supported the Venezuelan opposition figure, who orchestrated an unsuccessful coup attempt in 2018 and reportedly organised another one in 2019. Washington recognises Guaido as Venezuela's interim president and is pressuring the country with sanctions to force elected president, Nicolas Maduro to resign. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has stated tha [...]

The US Department of Justice has expanded rules governing executions to permit a wider rage of methods, including firing squads and electrocution, as five federal inmates are set to face the death penalty before Inauguration Day. The amended rule was entered into the Federal Register on Friday, permitting the government “greater flexibility” to carry out capital punishment using any metho [...]

Donald Trump has been a US president who has revelled in lies and obscenity. As we consider his legacy, his continued crass behaviour should make us ask how such a worthless person got the job in the first place. On November 23, Donald Trump finally agreed to begin the transition of power, but the way it was announced tells us a lot about him. Head of the General Services Administration Emil [...]

Washington’s desperate attempts to stop the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline linking Russia and Germany resemble mafia methods, senior German parliament member, Klaus Ernst, told RT, calling on the EU to fight back. “Their actions resemble those of a mafia,” Ernst told RT Deutsch on Wednesday, speaking about the renewed threats of US sanctions against the European companies [...]

While Pennsylvania officials announced Democrat Joe Biden as the winner of the presidential race in the state on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump has sought to overturn the results, accusing Democrats of election fraud and irregularities. Pennsylvania Judge Patricia McCullough has ruled that the state must halt "further action" on certification of the 2020 election results and set a he [...]

Washington already imposed sanctions on the Russian-German energy project late last year, tacking them on to the US National Defence Authorization Act. Now, a bipartisan group of lawmakers from both the House and Senate is reportedly looking to introduce additional restrictions against it before the end of the year. An influential group of German businesses has written a letter to Democra [...]

Russia's space agency Roscosmos may be hit with US sanctions for the first time ever, as a draft document reveals the Russian Ministry of Defense might become the subject of economic penalties from Washington. As well as Roscosmos, the proposed sanctions would also target Rosatom, the federal nuclear energy agency, as one of 28 organizations in the aviation, rocket, space, nuclear, instrument [...]

There is a battle in the halls of the European parliament to ensure that the latest report on fundamental rights references the US prosecution and attempted extradition of WikiLeaks founder and publisher Julian Assange. The EU's parliament will be voting on its latest report on fundamental rights, which also encompasses media freedom. The report on fundamental freedoms for 2018 - 2019 ori [...]

Donald Trump’s lack of input at the G20 summit made it easy to ignore him. While Joe Biden will play more of a role globally, the rest of the world should not look to him for leadership given the turmoil America is in at present. The 2020 G20 Riyadh summit took place over the weekend with participating nations discussing greater cooperation in fighting the Covid-19 pandemic, the global econ [...]

The US Supreme Court has declined to hear a case that Republicans hoped would disqualify late-arriving mail ballots in Pennsylvania. The Trump campaign still plans on taking another case to the court, claiming widespread fraud. More than 2.6 million mail ballots were cast in Pennsylvania this election. Voters mailing in their ballots broke heavily for Democratic candidate Joe Biden, with near [...]

President Donald Trump’s US government has on Sunday withdrawn from an international treaty that allows countries to monitor military hardware build-ups from afar, accusing Moscow – without evidence – of breaking its terms. The Open Skies Treaty was first considered by the US and the Soviet Union in the 1950s as a possible way to increase transparency around troop movements and the depl [...]

The repercussions of the new RCEP free-trade agreement between China and 14 other countries are huge. It creates a massive trading bloc in Asia that America, though its insular policies, will play no part in. This weekend, 15 Asia-Pacific nations came together to sign the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), a mammoth free-trade agreement that has been described as one of the  [...]

The US State Department has outlined a ‘Kennan-style’ China containment policy, which it hopes will help undercut its economic strength and maintain a Washington-led world order, a leaked paper has revealed. The 70-page document called “The Elements of the China Challenge” was prepared by the State Department's Office of Policy Planning and published by Axios on Tuesday. The plan goes [...]

A cancer charity created by presumed president-elect Joe Biden failed to allocate a single dollar for medical research, according to media reports, with most of the group’s cash going towards generous salaries. Federal tax filings reveal that the Biden Cancer Initiative, founded in 2017 by the former vice president and his wife Jill, did not distribute grants during its first two years of operat [...]

Joe Biden understands it is necessary to extend the New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia said in an interview with Sputnik. The possible change of the US administration, however, does not mean that the issues Moscow and Washington have in the disarmament area will be completely resolved, the diplomat said. [...]

This week, the top US diplomat announced fresh sanctions against four Chinese officials accused of “undermining Hong Kong’s autonomy,” and said that the Trump administration was “not finished yet” in increasing pressure on the Chinese “Marxist-Leninist monster.” The Global Times, a newspaper which is an offshoot of the Chinese Communist Party-affiliated People’s Daily, has [...]

Noam Chomsky warns that the Trump administration poses a unique threat to humanity, and its most reckless policies are receiving far too little attention. Noam Chomsky discusses the White House’s threats to the New START treaty, the last remaining accord limiting the US and Russia’s nuclear weapons arsenals; its latest round of crippling sanctions and threats against Iran; the bipartisan US re [...]