Between 3,000 and 5,000 so-called ‘foreign fighters’ – EU citizens trained in Islamic state terror camps - have returned to Europe and pose a “completely new challenge,” according the continent’s top police chief. “Europe is currently facing the highest terror threat in more than in a decade,” Rob Wainwright, Europol’s director, told the Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung daily, war [...]

The US government has dropped all charges against Max Blumenthal, after arresting the journalist over a dubious 5-month-old warrant. But the Grayzone editor says the case is far from closed. Blumenthal was detained for nearly two days after police raided his Washington, DC home in October. The month-old warrant for his arrest listed the journalist as “armed and dangerous,” and police carrying [...]

After Donald Trump's sweeping victory in Nevada on Tuesday, the billionaire expressed optimism that what had been, until now, a grueling and jumbled Republican contest would be over sooner than expected. Trump, who trounced his opposition in Nevada with 46 percent of the vote, touted the [...]

Arguing that corporations essentially operate “outside of national rules of laws and societal codes of conduct”, the AI expert suggested that the AI “is not the bit that makes that happen, the bits that make that happen are already in place”. While the image of a malevolent artificial intelligence bent on exterminating mankind is an age-old trope in science fiction, one AI expert has argue [...]

The Obama administration, eager to assuage Saudi Arabia’s anger over the Iran nuclear deal and the failure to achieve “regime change” in Syria, has turned a blind eye to Riyadh’s savaging of Yemen, even though that is helping Al Qaeda militants expand their territory, writes Jonathan Marshall. For nearly a year, the Obama administration has turned a blind eye to the humanitarian catastr [...]

The US says that Iranian General Qassem Soleimani was plotting “imminent and sinister” attacks against its diplomats and military personnel. But when Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was pressed for evidence of this, he gave none. Soleimani, commander of the Iranian military’s Quds Force, was assassinated in a drone strike in Baghdad, Iraq, on Friday. [...]

German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel has attacked Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump saying he poses “a threat to peace” as well as “economic development.” In February, Trump criticized Chancellor Angela Merkel for her refugee policy. The German vice chancellor took aim at Trump and also right-wing politicians in Europe, saying they were all a threat to “social cohesion. [...]

BEIRUT (Sputnik) - Clashes between Lebanese anti-government protesters and law enforcement resumed near the parliament building in the capital Beirut on Saturday, with police resorting to tear gas and water cannons, a Sputnik correspondent reported from the scene. [...]

Imposing sanctions against Russian President Vladimir Putin is an "absurd" idea, Czech lawmaker Jiri Mastalka said. According to him, the initiative will bury the fragile peaceful process in Ukraine and Syria. "Imposing sanctions against a head of state would mean a deadlock in dialogue with Russia. [...]

A hospital built specifically to treat those infected with coronavirus is set to open in Wuhan, China. Astonishingly, the large medical facility was constructed in less than two weeks. The 25,000-square-meter Huoshenshan Hospital, one of two new facilities commissioned in response to the coronavirus outbreak, is scheduled to begin operations on Monday. The hospital is something of a marvel of en [...]

A new study from CardHub.com says credit card debt in the US has jumped by about $71 billion to $917.7 billion in 2015. The average American household with credit card debt now owes $7,879, which is the highest figure since the 2008 financial crisis. [...]

Global stock markets hit bear territory this week, with oil prices experiencing their biggest plunge since the 1991 Gulf War. Boom Bust is joined by Professor Richard Wolff of the Economic Update to discuss the ongoing oil crisis. He explains that the US, which wanted "energy independence," decided 10-20 years ago to go into the fracking business simply because it was profitable. [...]

A declassified email exchange between former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her adviser Sid Blumenthal shows that Clinton was up to her eyeballs in the Western conspiracy against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and his Pan-African "Gold Dinar" currency, F. William Engdahl narrates. [...]

Russia’s research center of virology and biotechnology, known as the Vector Institute, is testing multiple different vaccine prototypes against Covid-19 in a race to find a cure for the virus behind a global pandemic. This week, it “began immunogenicity studies in sensitive laboratory animals... of all developed vaccine prototypes,” said consumer watchdog agency Rospotrebnadzor in a state [...]

In his speech to the Cuban people in Havana, President Barack Obama declared, “I have come here to bury the last remnant of the Cold War in the Americas. … I’ve urged the people of the Americas to leave behind the ideological battles of the past.” But Obama made clear that his desire to end the decades-long US economic blockade of the island is not based on the fact that it constitutes [...]

While the European Union has failed to provide coordinated assistance to Italy in time to prevent the virus, Russia has filled in and dispatched military health workers, virologists and equipment to help the country handle the pandemic. A video went viral of an Italian man replacing a European Union flag with a Russian one, in a gesture of gratitude to Moscow for helping combat the corona [...]

Austria intends to send military to the Italian border to boost protection amid the refugee crisis, the country's defense minister said. Austria is planning to send soldiers to the border with Italy to enhance border protection amid a migrant inflow, Austrian Defense Minister Hans Peter Doskozil said Saturday. [...]

BERGAMO, Italy - Russian military personnel and Italian military nuclear, biological and chemical experts have jointly disinfected nursing homes in three settlements in Italy's Lombardy region, the Russian Defence Ministry announced on Saturday. "Russian military experts, together with the military personnel of the radiation, chemical and biological protection unit of the Italian armed forces disi [...]

Washington is behind the recently released offshore revelations known as the Panama Papers, WikiLeaks has claimed, saying that the attack was “produced” to target Russia and President Putin. On Wednesday, the international whistleblowing organization said on Twitter that the Panama Papers data leak was produced by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), "which targets [...]

Austrians will soon be able to walk with no restrictions and gather in groups of 10, as coronavirus measures will be gradually lifted starting next month. The easing of the self-isolation measures was announced by Health Minister Rudolf Anschober, who said that the spread of the novel coronavirus remains quite slow and the forecast for the upcoming month looks “very good.” He also said that th [...]

The Russian companies will be given a priority in the restoration of the country following the civil war, Syrian Prime Minister Wael Nader Halqi said Sunday as quoted by a Russian lawmaker. In March, Syrian President Bashar Assad said that Damascus would lean primarily on Russia, China and Iran in rebuilding the country after five years of destruction. [...]

American LNG exports are estimated to have dropped by around a half since January due to a collapse in demand which led to lack of storage space in overseas facilities. Buyers of US-extracted liquefied natural gas (LNG) may cancel up to 60 percent of July orders, as the energy industry is reeling from a global glut caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Bloomberg reports, citing a survey of [...]