It’s time for the US to “get out of ridiculous endless wars,” President Donald Trump said ahead of a withdrawal of US troops from border areas in northeastern Syrian as the Turkish military prepares for an anti-Kurdish incursion. [...]

It is an age-old statecraft technique to seek unity within a state by depicting an external enemy or threat. Russia is the bête noire again, as it was during the Cold War as part of the Soviet Union. But the truth is Western states are challenged by internal problems. Ironically, by denying their own internal democratic challenges, Western authorities are only hastening their institutional demis [...]

The yet-unconfirmed move would mark yet another blow to the framework of confidence building measures that were put in place in the immediate aftermath of the cold war. US President Donald Trump has moved to pull the United States out of the 1992 Treaty on Open Skies, one of the most comprehensive international agreements on transparency of military activities, according to the Wall Street Journal [...]

A documentary about a Syrian refugee in Germany, who happily lives on state handouts with his two wives and six kids, has angered many in the country where polygamy is against the law. The Spiegel TV film was aired over the weekend, telling the story of 32-year-old Ahmad A. who fled the fighting in Syria’s Aleppo back in 2015 with his large family, and found a safe haven in Schleswig-Holstein, n [...]

The Paris talks on Ukraine have enabled Putin and Zelensky to meet for the first time. But they have agreed only to kick the can down the road, to agree to disagree, while seeking progress on issues other than the war in Donbass. It would be difficult to exaggerate the weakness of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s position. He is a political novice facing perhaps the most experienced and [...]

If Western sanctions go as far as excluding Russia from the world wide web, the country's own internet is ready, according to the Russian presidential aide on the internet, German Klimenko. "Technically, we are ready for anything now,” he told NTV news channel. However, the shutdown will not be painless, Klimenko added. [...]

Those who lobbied to have George W. Bush and Tony Blair tried for their role in the Iraq War have finally got their wish. Though the verdict of the court carries no legal weight, its supporters believe its symbolic value is beyond doubt. The court in Malaysia where the trial took place may not have the power to convict, but the verdict against the former British and American leaders was unanimous. [...]

Representatives from the US, Britain, France, Saudi Arabia and Jordan reportedly met behind closed doors in Washington in January to draw up their new strategy for the Middle East. Ankara is alarmed by reports of about a secret plan to redraw the map of the Middle East and carve up Syria into zones of influence, former Turkish ambassador to France and Libya, Uluc Ozulker, has told Sputnik. [...]

It sounds almost unbelievable, but a number of US citizens are deciding to cash out of the elusive ‘American dream’ as they settle down in foreign places, such as Vietnam, where many of them were once loathed as invaders. Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia. For many Americans, those names invoke powerful memories and images of unspeakable violence, and perhaps the last places on earth to consider visitin [...]

Three countries agree with Britain that "it was highly likely that Russia was responsible for the attack." President Donald Trump has consistently refused to punish Russia for its attacks on the United States and around the world — but that changed somewhat today. [...]

Warsaw was liberated by Soviet forces 75 years ago today — and Polish officials have cloaked the pivotal event in myths ever since. Yet, newly-released historical documents help shed some light on the truth. Official Warsaw had no plans to celebrate this date — but it is not the first time that Poland has ignored the liberation of its state capital. Since the collapse of the Soviet Bloc in the [...]

If Russian natural gas exports to Italy stop, the country will have only 15 days before the emergency situation, according to La Stampa. What is the scale of European dependence on the Russian gas? Can the US replace it? In Italy, the share of Russian gas imports is about 37 percent. [...]

The embattled USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), flagship of the new Ford class of carriers which the US Navy plans to eventually replace its Enterprise- and Nimitz-class warships with, is currently years behind schedule, and facing a slew of issues which US lawmakers have complained seem to have no “end in sight.” A new report by the Pentagon’s Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT& [...]

Moscow won’t leave the provocative acts against Russian diplomats unanswered, the Foreign Ministry said, adding that several countries blindly copied the UK’s “hypocritical” stance on the Skripal case in the absence of evidence. The decision of a number of NATO and other European countries to expel Russian diplomats over the poisoning of the former double-agent Sergei Skripal amounts to a [...]

Earlier in the day, prosecutor in the MH17 case Thijs Berger said that the investigation into the 2014 downing of flight MH17 in eastern Ukraine had almost been completed and the materials will be handed over to the court by June. The Dutch court announced on Tuesday that the hearings on the MH17 crash have been postponed until 23 March. [...]

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has launched a blistering attack on Benjamin Netanyahu, calling his Israeli counterpart the “leader of a terrorist state” following the deadly shooting of protesters in Gaza. Erdogan made the comments at his party’s congress in southern Turkey. Addressing the event, the president slammed Netanyahu’s criticism of Turkey’s military operation in Syria. [...]

A Chinese citizen and US permanent resident infected with COVID-19 who flew from Los Angeles to Beijing on March 12 is accused of concealing her coronavirus symptoms and could face prison time as a result. According to reports, the woman, who has only been identified by her surname Li, became sick with symptoms consistent with the novel coronavirus while living in Massachusetts. After being denied [...]

The proposal for visa applicants to surrender 5 years of their social-media history will have a "huge impact" on travel to the US and could be "very damaging" for those seeking to come to America, an immigration attorney told RT. [...]

Austria will massively expand coronavirus testing in the coming days to locate and isolate infected people and avoid an Italian-like overload of its health system, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has said. The Alpine republic with a population of 8.8 million has tested around 28,400 people so far with nearly 4,900 cases and 28 deaths confirmed, Reuters reported. It was one of the first European countrie [...]

President Donald Trump warned Russia to “get ready” for missile strikes on Syria, in an off-the-cuff response on Wednesday morning to an alleged chemical weapons attack by Syrian government forces. The US leader tweeted: “Russia vows to shoot down any and all missiles fired at Syria. Get ready Russia, because they will be coming, nice and new and ‘smart!’ You shouldn’t be partners wi [...]

Lina Rubino, vice-secretary general of the Italian Supreme Court, has thanked doctors from Russia and other countries for their help in combating the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, in a video message shown at the virtual edition of the St. Petersburg International Legal Forum. “We, Italians, are already experiencing international solidarity. As you may know, Italy is currently enjoying the help of R [...]

Facebook's misuse of their users' biometric information could potentially amount to billions of dollars in damages after a federal judge greenlighted an Illinois class action suit against the firm’s facial recognition feature. Facebook violated an Illinois state law by improperly using their photo-scanning and facial recognition technologies and storing biometric data without their users' consen [...]