Russian President Vladimir Putin has compared the shelling of east Ukrainian towns and cities by Kiev's troops to actions carried out by the Nazis during World War II. “Sad as it might seem, this reminds me of the events of World War II, when the German Nazi occupants surrounded our cities, like Leningrad, and directly shelled those cities and their inhabitants,” Putin said on Friday, speak [...]

Ukraine’s military said on Monday it had pulled its forces back from defending a vital airport in the east against Russian tanks, as President Petro Poroshenko accused Moscow of “direct and open aggression”. The withdrawal from the civilian airport outside the city of Luhansk was the latest in a string of reverses for Ukrainian forces fighting pro-Russian separatists who Kiev says have th [...]

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has announced ceasefires before and was always the first to violate them, Spanish volunteer Ramiro Gomez, who fought in eastern Ukraine against the troops of the coup-imposed Kiev government, told RT. According to the European volunteer, this ceasefire is in effect a part of Poroshenko’s strategy: “to reorganize the [Ukrainian] army which is already a la [...]

An Amnesty International report has confirmed that war crimes including abductions, executions and extortion were committed by the Ukrainian Aidar battalion in Lugansk region, eastern Ukraine, an official from Russia's Foreign Ministry says. “The report confirms large-scale crimes, including war [crimes] made routinely and under the aegis of Ukrainian law enforcement agencies, by the leaders [...]

At least 2,593 people have been killed in eastern Ukraine since the start of the Kiev's military operation against anti-government forces there started in mid-April, according to a new estimate by the Office of the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights. The death toll includes civilians, members of the Ukrainian troops and also fighters in the anti-government forces. [...]

Barack Obama and David Cameron will urge NATO members to increase military spending at the alliance's summit in Wales, amid criticism that some countries are getting a "free ride", growing geopolitical tensions and Europe-wide austerity. The NATO summit, which kicks off later this week, will see Obama and Cameron urge European state leaders to protect their continent from amplifying threats by [...]

US and UK intelligence services have secret access points for German telecom companies’ internal networks, Der Spiegel reports, citing slides created in the NSA’s ‘Treasure Map’ program used to get near-real-time visualization of the global internet. The latest scandal continues to evolve around the US’ NSA and the British GCHQ, both of which appear to be able to eavesdrop on German g [...]

President Putin has called on the self-defense militias in Ukraine to provide Kiev's military units blocked in the east of the country with a safe humanitarian corridor to cross into Russia. “It is clear the militia has achieved a major success in intercepting Kiev’s military operation, which represents a grave danger to the population of Donbass and which has already led to the loss of man [...]

A mother who has taken flight with her son to prevent his circumcision could face a prison sentence if she fails have the boy undergo the procedure, a judge ruled, in a case that has become a rallying cry for ‘intactivists.’ The case, which began as a domestic dispute between Heather Hironimus and her husband, Dennis Nebus, over whether or not to circumcise their four-year-old son, has caug [...]

Russia's only reaction to NATO accusations of interfering militarily in Ukraine will be a consistent position of putting an end to bloodshed and establish dialogue between warring parties in Ukraine, Russia's FM said. No facts about Russian military being present on the territory of Ukraine have ever been presented, Sergey Lavrov pointed out, while speculation on the issue has been voiced repea [...]

The beleaguered Albuquerque Police Department in New Mexico has reached a deal with the Department of Justice to overhaul many of its practices. The reforms come amid protests fueled by the department fatally shooting nearly 30 people in four years. Sweeping in scope, the reforms involve new training and recruitment procedures and field supervision of officers, and will require the department t [...]

Vladimir Putin’s remark about “taking Kiev in two weeks” was taken out of context and its meaning was distorted, Moscow said, adding that it’s ready to publish the president’s conversation with the European Commission head. Moscow may reveal the full recording of the controversial phone call if European Commission president, Jose Manual Barroso, doesn’t object in the next two days, [...]

A favorite tactic to get Americans and Europeans ready for another war is to liken some foreign “enemy” to Hitler, no matter how ill-fitting or absurd the comparison. But once the Hitler slur is slung all rational debate ends, as Danny Schechter explains. The ISIS gang makes great enemies. They dress in black, wear Halloween masks, wave flags, act viciously, and cut off the heads of journal [...]

Marsha Coleman-Adebayo recently co-wrote “No Rights that a White Man is Bound to Respect” for Black Agenda Report. She will be speaking at a rally outside the Justice Department Wednesday afternoon “to call on the Attorney General to help secure justice for Michael Brown and the people of Ferguson, Missouri, as well as an overhaul of U.S. law enforcement tactics in order to stop police bruta [...]

The British government will press other European nations at a meeting in Brussels on Saturday to block Russia from using the SWIFT banking network, Bloomberg reported, in what could be a dramatic expansion of sanctions. The British government will press other European nations at a meeting in Brussels on Saturday to block Russia from using the SWIFT banking network, Bloomberg reported, in what c [...]

As the ceasefire in Ukraine gets off to a shaky start, the only way to rebuild the billions of dollars of damage in the nation's east is for the EU and Russia to work together, Lode Vanoust, former MP and deputy speaker of the Belgium parliament, told RT. First off, Kiev has now agreed to what appears to be a major concession, decentralization of power, which wasn’t even on the negotiating ta [...]

Official Washington draws the Ukraine crisis in black-and-white colors with Russian President Putin the bad guy and the U.S.-backed leaders in Kiev the good guys. But the reality is much more nuanced, with the American people consistently misled on key facts, writes Robert Parry. If you wonder how the world could stumble into World War III – much as it did into World War I a century ago – a [...]

Russian President Vladimir Putin has arrived in Minsk for talks with the leaders of the member states of the Eurasian Customs Union, Ukraine and representatives of the EU. Putin could also hold a bilateral meeting with Petro Poroshenko, the Kremlin said. Putin and Poroshenko greeted each other with a handshake as they met in the Belarusian capital at the start of talks on the Ukrainian crisis. [...]

Russian President Vladimir Putin has called on Kiev to start substantial talks on deescalating the crisis in eastern Ukraine. He added that it's an illusion to expect that the rebels would calmly watch their homes being destroyed. “We have agreed on a plan, so its realization must be pursued,” Putin told Channel 1 TV, adding that the Ukrainian government “must immediately start substantia [...]

Ukraine government and rebels blame each other for attack, which has killed evacuees trying to escape the conflict. Dozens of people, including women and children, were killed on Monday when a convoy carrying refugees was hit by rocket fire near the eastern city of Luhansk, a Ukrainian military spokesman said. [...]

Direct trade between India and Russia in rough diamonds is a diplomacy gem which was a Russian initiative buttressed by some quick decision-making by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The matter has been under discussion through the diplomatic channels between the two countries for quite some time and came up in a brief discussion between visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin and Modi during th [...]

Documents from the archive of whistleblower Edward Snowden reveal wide-scale spying against Turkey by America's NSA and Britain's GCHQ. They also show the US worked closely with Ankara to battle Kurdish separatists. On a December night in 2011, a terrible thing happened on Mount Cudi, near the Turkish-Iraqi border. One side described it as a massacre; the other called it an accident. [...]