The US State Department has begun requiring visa applicants to submit five years’ worth of social media history, threatening “serious immigration consequences” for those who attempt to conceal their accounts. [...]

As the United States and Europe embark on an increasingly hawkish policy towards China, Beijing has moved to welcome the formation of an alliance with Russia to counter NATO. Speaking at the 95th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party last month, Xi Jinping delivered what Western analysts are calling an "incendiary speech" in which he called for a military union with Russia [...]

Some Norwegian politicians believe the uncertainty surrounding the price of the US F-35 fighter jets, the new backbone of the country's air force, is “absurd”. To settle an ongoing dispute surrounding the cost of F-35s once and for all, the Norwegian parliament's control and constitutional committee has asked Defence Minister Frank Bakke-Jensen to name the price for the fighter jets based on t [...]

Ukraine's Foreign Ministry's is talking about filing a lawsuit against Russia over suspected violations of international maritime law in Crimea. In response, Crimean authorities suggest that maybe it's time they file charges of their own against Kiev from when the peninsula was part of Ukraine for what they say amounts to "20 years of plunder." [...]

A Venezuelan Su-30 fighter “aggressively shadowed” an American spy plane over the Caribbean Sea, the US military said, claiming the jet was at an “unsafe distance” and blaming Russia for its “irresponsible” support for Caracas. [...]

As pressure again builds on President Obama to attack Syria and press a new Cold War with Russia, the extraordinary events of three years ago after a sarin attack near Damascus are worth revisiting, says ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern. Three years ago, when a reluctant President Barack Obama was about to launch an attack on Syria, supposedly in retaliation for President Bashar al-Assad crossing a [...]

The Philippines will never allow the US to deploy nuclear weapons on its soil to counter China’s growing influence in the region, President Duterte declared, slamming Washington’s untrustworthiness even in small arms deals. [...]

Austria needs an “effective law banning political Islam,” said Heinz-Christian Strache, the head of the Austrian far-right Freedom Party (FPO), adding that the Alpine country should also stop accepting new migrants and refugees. [...]

Trump-bashing is nothing unusual at CNN, but when a guest told Brian Stelter that the president “may be responsible for many more million deaths” than the worst dictators of the 20th Century, even the host was left red-faced. [...]

The breakdown of relations with Russia is a key foreign policy blunder committed by the Obama administration and it will go down in history as such, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has said. In fact “US-Russia relations completely fell apart by the end of the second term of the Obama administration,” Medvedev said in a Facebook post. [...]

The devastating blitz on Saudi Arabia’s oil industry has led to a flurry of accusations from US officials blaming Iran. The reason for the finger-pointing is simple: Washington’s spectacular failure to protect its Saudi ally. [...]

Royal Navy whistleblower William McNeilly leaked details about a number of serious test fire issues aboard Britain’s Trident nuclear submarine fleet a whole year before the June 2016 misfire that sent a missile careening towards the US. [...]

Under development since 2012, the 20+ tonne stealthy flying wing design began rigorous military testing earlier this year. The Sukhoi S-70 Okhotnik heavy unmanned combat aerial vehicle may one day become a full-fledged replacement for all sorts of combat aircraft, including the latest generation of Russian fighter jets, Izvestia has reported, citing the military and a military aircraft specialist [...]

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has accused the US of building a “permanent” arms depot in his country, warning President Donald Trump that such moves jeopardizes the security treaty between them. [...]

A new survey from consultancy McKinsey & Co has found that a majority of banks globally may not be economically viable because their returns on equity aren’t keeping pace with costs. The study looked at 1,000 banks in developed and emerging countries and found that just over a third had made a return on capital of just 1.6 percent over the past three years. This compares to returns of j [...]

NAPOLITANO: "Yes, Donald Trump has a very strong case. The best case the Democrats have is some people were disaffected to Mrs. Clinton when they read the snarky e-mails of her staff. But what Donald Trump is talking about is there is no evidence that the Russian government did something that affected the outcome of this election. He’s absolutely correct when he says that." [...]

WhatsApp is a “Trojan horse” exploited to snoop on millions of users naive enough to believe that the Facebook-owned messenger differs from its parent company, long beset by privacy scandals, Telegram founder Pavel Durov said. [...]

A report published by leading consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) points to a significant tectonic shift in the global economy in the years leading up to 2050 - China will supplant the US as the world's largest, and Russia will rise to supremacy in Europe. The report, The Long View, ranks 32 countries based on their projected 2050 GDP by Purchasing Power Parity, finding China's GDP w [...]

Allseas, a Swiss-Dutch company laying the Nord Stream 2 pipeline off the Danish coast, has announced it is suspending its work and will pull out of the project after being faced with an avalanche of sanctions by the US. The company, which operates two vessels installing deep-sea pipes for Nord Stream 2 on the bottom of the Baltic Sea, released its statement just before US President Donald Trump si [...]

The world's first man in space Yuri Gagarin was born 83 years ago, on March 9, 1934. Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin became the first man in outer space when the Vostok-1 spacecraft with the Soviet cosmonaut on board was launched from the Baikonur space center on April 12, 1961, at 6:07 AM local time, marking a new era in human history.  Yuri Gagarin's Birthday First woman in space Valentina [...]

Earlier, Gen. (ret.) Ben Hodges, former commander of US Army Europe, suggested that Russia’s historical claims to Crimea were “false and unacceptable” because the peninsula became part of Russia only during the reign of Catherine the Great. Alexei Pushkov, an outspoken Russian senator known for his commentaries on foreign affairs, has responded to Gen. Hodges remarks about the status of the [...]

Maria Zakharova, Russia's Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, has stated on a national TV show that Obama will go down in history as one of the most evil Presidents and Administrations. We can only agree, that something along the lines of the Nuremburg trials for the Neocons would be most appropriate.  Russia: Obama was most evil President Russian FM spokesperson in tears: Russians do not wa [...]