Russia on Monday refused to return three Ukrainian ships seized in the Black Sea on Sunday during a confrontation in which Ukraine said the Russians fired upon its vessels and injured six sailors.
The naval conflict this weekend between Russia and Ukraine was not a sudden development. Pressure has been building between the two nations for a long time, arguably even before Ukraine broke away from the disintegrating Soviet Union in 1991.
Russia alarmed the world on Sunday by reportedly seizing Ukrainian vessels in the Sea of Azov, attacking Ukrainian assets and blocking some of its most important port cities through its illegal command of the Crimean peninsula.
The head of Russian oil company Rosneft, Igor Sechin, traveled to Venezuela this week for meetings with socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro to complain about delayed oil shipments designed to repay loans, Reuters reported Sunday.
China’s ambassador to Tehran told Iranian officials on Sunday that Beijing is seeking a role in ending the Yemen war, potentially using its status as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council to take action to settle the dispute.
The Polish government is resisting the single European Army being pushed by Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron, and the EU’s chief bureaucrats, implying concern that it is alienating the continent’s security relationship with the United States of America.
In an attempt to hold Facebook accountable for the Cambridge Analytica data breach scandal, the U.K. Parliament has seized a cache of internal Facebook documents from an American software executive visiting the country for business.
Contents: Russia attacks Ukraine’s navy and blockades Ukraine’s ports at Kerch Strait; Russia confirms the attack on the Ukrainian ships
Dropping U.S. support for the Saudi war in Yemen might make politicians in Washington feel good about taking a stand for human rights. Yet doing so would also mean surrendering Yemen to Iranian control.
The Ukrainian president will ask his parliament to consider enacting martial law after three Ukrainian navy ships were fired upon and captured in the Black Sea on Sunday.
Russia and Ukraine traded accusations over an incident at sea Sunday near the disputed Crimean Peninsula, increasing tensions between both countries and prompting Moscow to block passage through the Kerch Strait.
Contents: Socialist Venezuela oil production in ‘free fall’ as infrastructure collapses; Russia rebukes Venezuela for non-payment
A French farmer who was attacked by a knife-wielding man yelling “Allahu Ackbar” has complained that the prosecution in the case has not treated the crime as terrorism despite the attacker also being on France’s terror watch list.
A new underwater pipeline connecting Israel’s natural gas reserves to Greece, Italy, and Cyprus will eventually give all of Europe a new source of energy to challenge traditional suppliers in Russia and the Middle East.
The Israeli military’s Commando Brigade launched a large-scale exercise this week to practice fighting the Hamas terror group in the Gaza Strip and the Hezbollah terrorist militia in Lebanon simultaneously, the army said Saturday. The drill is continuing into this week.
DAMASCUS, Syria — At least 50 civilians were being treated Saturday following a suspected poison gas attack by Syrian rebel groups on the government-held Aleppo city in the country’s north, according to reports in Syrian state media.
The Islamic State affiliate in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has seized a weapons shipment that included a number of Kornet missiles, the Russian-made advanced anti-tank laser-guided weapon system.
Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi called the Trump administration’s latest memorandum asking the Supreme Court to hear cases on the administration’s transgender military policy “cowardly” and “disgusting.”
U.S. Solicitor General Noel Francisco petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday to bypass two federal appeals courts and render a final decision on President Donald Trump’s military transgender policy by summer 2019.
More than 60 percent of the world’s population of more than 7.5 billion reside in countries where the right to religious freedom is obstructed or denied. An estimated 505 million Christians face persecution for following their faith, a Catholic NGO Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) report indicated this week.
A terrorist attack Friday against the Chinese consulate in Pakistan’s Karachi region reportedly killed two policemen, two civilians, and the three attackers.
Contents: Maldives can’t determine how much money it owes to China; Constitutional crisis continues in Sri Lanka over China-India competition
TEL AVIV – An extremely rare stone weight inscribed with a word from the Hebrew Bible dating back 3,000 years was discovered by archaeologists near the Western Wall.
An angry mob killed a man in Munaje, Malawi this week after he was implicated in the death of another individual by practicing “witchcraft,” local media reported.
Reps. Ro Khanna (D-CA) and Ken Buck (R-CO) agree that Congress should weigh in on the deployment of American troops across 17 different nations.
Beijing announced an “action plan” this week for monitoring residents’ behavior, adding that the city expects to have its social credit system fully implemented by the end of 2020.
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte blocked the military from enforcing a 2016 ruling declaring China’s presence in Philippine waters illegal, the nation’s Defense Secretary told reporters on Friday.
American airstrikes launched over the last three days have “degraded” the East Africa-based al-Qaeda wing al-Shabaab, killing 50 jihadis in Somalia days after the United Nations determined the group is expanding and remains the top threat facing African nation, the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) revealed.
Italian luxury apparel company Dolce & Gabbana posted a videotaped apology on Chinese social media on Friday apologizing for an ad many of their Chinese customers denounced as racist.
China’s state-run Global Times on Thursday denied what it called “vague accusations” of Chinese interference in this weekend’s Taiwanese elections. The election will be closely watched as a measure of President Tsai Ing-wen’s political strength and Taiwan’s ability to resist intense pressure from mainland China.
The U.S.-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria are ready for dialogue with Turkey, which has demanded their removal despite their key role in fighting the Islamic State (ISIS), a spokesperson for the militia group declared Thursday.
Unsalaried Cuban doctors in Brazil, now forced to return home after the Castro regime canceled an exchange program following demands by President-elect Jair Bolsonaro to pay the medical professionals a full salary, told Brazilian news outlets this week they have no interest in returning home.
A report from the U.S. Trade Representative’s (USTR) office released this week found that China has failed to fundamentally alter its market-distorting trade practices.
Former National Security Agency (NSA) director Gen. Michael Hayden (Ret.) was hospitalized this week after suffering a stroke, according to his namesake center.
President Donald Trump has endured blistering criticism from the media and from his political opponents in both parties over his statement earlier this week expressing support for Saudi Arabia, even in the wake of the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. Rep.
It is far better to have a leader that recognizes and accepts the world as it is in all its cruelties, and works with allies – even authoritarian ones – against common foes, than to be led by men and women who prefer the posture of morality at the expense of security.
The U.S. government is urging allied nations to avoid using telecommunications equipment from China’s Huawei Technologies Company, even though some of those countries have already made large purchases of Huawei equipment, according to a report published Friday.
The U.S. envoy to a meeting of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) accused Iran on Thursday of developing banned chemical weapons and failing to disclose its activities as required by the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention.
More details have been revealed about a child bride from South Sudan who was sold through Facebook, which the social network only took action on two weeks after the auction post had been made. The girl, now 17, is reportedly the man’s ninth wife.
Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping will visit Panama next week in a bid to expand his regime’s growing influence over the Americas, China’s foreign ministry announced on Friday.
