Free Republic

Brainchild of the KGB As Ion Mihai Pacepa, onetime director of the Romanian espionage service (DIE), later explained, the PLO was conceived at a time when the KGB was creating “liberation front” organizations throughout the Third world. Others included the National Liberation Army of Bolivia, created in 1964 with help from Ernesto “Che” Guevara, and the National Liberation Army of Colombia, created in 1965 with help from Fidel Castro. But the PLO was the KGB’s most enduring achievement. In 1964, the first PLO Council, consisting of 422 Palestinian representatives handpicked by the KGB, approved the Soviet blueprint for a Palestinian...

A Russian military victory in Ukraine would cost Europe twice as much as a Ukrainian victory, according to a new study by Corisk and the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs published on Nov. 25. Under the first scenario proposed by the researchers, Moscow's forces would continue their incremental advance and push westward toward the Dnipro River. As a result of their military victories, the Kremlin would force Ukraine to accept a negotiated settlement on terms beneficial to Moscow. According to the report, such an outcome would amount to a Russian partial victory, giving the Kremlin influence over Ukraine's political and...

"They will make great citizens over time"...Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina regarding Afghans... The US Immigration and Naturalization Service deciding to suspend all asylum decisions... US President Donald Trump with a message aimed at Honduras where voters select a new president... leaked news is that US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth ordered a second strike...kill two crew members who survived... President Trump on social media this afternoon saying... An oil tanker heading towards southern Russia in the Black Sea exploded... Three Israel soliders detained for questioning...deaths of two Palestinian terror suspects... A recall of 6,000 European Airbus A320 airliners......

Volodymyr Zelensky, in the next phase of talks to end the war in Ukraine, intends to draw a red line at the most contentious issue on the table: the Russian demand for Ukraine’s sovereign territory. As long as he remains the nation’s president, Zelensky will not agree to give up land in exchange for peace, Ukraine’s chief negotiator, Andriy Yermak, told me today in an exclusive interview. “Not a single sane person today would sign a document to give up territory,” said Yermak, who has served as Zelensky’s chief of staff, lead negotiator, and closest aide throughout the full-scale war...

Donald Tusk emphasized that the European Union would not be able to impose anything on Warsaw on this issueMOSCOW, November 26. /TASS/. The European Union cannot impose its court decision on recognizing same-sex marriage on Poland, Prime Minister Donald Tusk told a cabinet meeting. "I would like to reassure everyone - the European Union will not be able to impose anything on us on this issue (an EU Court decision on recognition of same-sex marriages in other countries of the union - TASS)," Tusk said as broadcast on the social media of the office of the head of government. He...

2008: "Crimea is not disputed territory of Ukraine, and the issues of Russian speakers are internal issues of Ukraine." 2013: "Russia certainly doesn't plan to send troops into Ukraine." 2014: "After the annexation of Crimea, Russia doesn't plan to further divide Ukraine." 2019: "It's nonsense that Russia plans to attack anyone in future." 2022: "Russia's Special Military Operation does not involve the occupation of Ukrainian territories," and "Russia has acquired new territories during the Special Military Operation." 2023: "The conflict in Ukraine is not a territorial conflict—we have plenty of own territories." 2024: "Anyone who wants Russia to give up...

When Obama administration officials manufactured U.S. intelligence tying Donald Trump to Moscow following his stunning 2016 victory, they had no idea Trump’s own political appointees would help them undermine Trump’s presidency – and his chances of reelection in 2020. RCI’s review of recently declassified documents and exclusive interviews with former Trump officials reveals for the first time how key members of Trump’s cabinet and other appointees during his first term shrouded the previous administration’s machinations and either deliberately or inadvertently misled the public into thinking the fake Russiagate intelligence was real. Former Special Counsel John Durham, former National Security Adviser...

No further Nato expansion. Occupied Ukrainian territory recognised as Russian, including by the US. No prosecution for Russia for war crimes. These are some of the clauses – part of a ‘surrender document’, brokered by Donald Trump – that Ukraine is facing after almost four years of war. Buried in the middle of the 28-point ‘peace blueprint’ being hammered out between the US and Russia, clause 14 stands out like a flashing sign. It offers up $100 billion in frozen Russian assets – repackaged as a fund for reconstruction, with the US pocketing half the profits. Meanwhile, Russia would be...

In May 2025, the authorities in Moscow unveiled a life-size bas‑relief sculpture of Josef Stalin in the Taganskaya metro station. The next month, a statue of Lenin was pulled down in Osh, Kyrgyzstan. Between these two symbolic acts lies Kazakhstan, caught in a tug-of-war over the memory of Soviet-era repression. Tensions have sharpened since the war in Ukraine. In the background, Putin has accelerated the rehabilitation of Stalin, architect of the gulag archipelago. His busts are reappearing across Russia. Volgograd’s airport has been renamed “Stalingrad.” In occupied Melitopol, a new statue of the dictator was erected. “We’re witnessing a broad...

Kirill Dmitriev — Vladmir Putin’s special envoy and head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund — is suddenly ubiquitous. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has been largely quiet since his maximalist negotiating approach with Team Trump failed. Moscow, presumably largely guided by Lavrov, after winning a concession on Tomahawk missiles, opted to continue Putin’s hardline demands for ending the war in Ukraine ahead of the proposed Trump-Putin summit in Budapest. NATO would have to admit that it was the root cause of the war. Kyiv would have to cede all of the Donbas, and the Armed Forces of Ukraine would...

Sergei Lavrov has been sidelined by Vladimir Putin after his failure to organise a summit with Donald Trump in Budapest, according to reports. The Russian daily Kommersant, a privately owned pro-Kremlin outlet, said that Russia’s long-time foreign minister was “deliberately absent” from a key security council meeting earlier this week. The 76-year-old will also no longer represent Moscow at the upcoming G20 summit, which is scheduled for November 22 and 23 in Johannesburg. Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s spokesman, did not give any explanation for Mr Lavrov’s absence from the key summit, which will be attended instead by Maxim Oreshkin, Putin’s deputy...

Kirill Dmitriev — Vladmir Putin’s special envoy and head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund — is suddenly ubiquitous. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has been largely quiet since his maximalist negotiating approach with Team Trump failed. Moscow, presumably largely guided by Lavrov, after winning a concession on Tomahawk missiles, opted to continue Putin’s hardline demands for ending the war in Ukraine ahead of the proposed Trump-Putin summit in Budapest. NATO would have to admit that it was the root cause of the war. Kyiv would have to cede all of the Donbas, and the Armed Forces of Ukraine would...

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says the sky is the limit when it comes to military and technical cooperation with Iran, adding Russia is currently meeting Iran’s needs. The top diplomat made the comment when asked, at a press conference, whether Russia was supplying Iran with S-400 missile systems and Sukhoi Su-35 fighter jets. Iran and Russia officially started to implement a 20-year comprehensive strategic partnership treaty nearly a month ago, signaling a significant step towards deepening bilateral ties between the two countries. Under the treaty signed in January 2025, Russia and Iran are committed to helping each other counter...

Russia's foreign ministry denounced on Saturday "excessive military force" by the United States in the Caribbean Sea deployed as part of a drive against drug trafficking and reaffirmed its support for Venezuela's leaders. "We firmly denounce the use of excessive military force in carrying out actions in anti-drugs operations," foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said in a commentary on her ministry's website. "Such actions are in violation of both U.S. domestic legislation ... and the norms of international law." (snip) In her comments, Zakharova said Russia "confirms our firm support for the Venezuelan leadership in defending its national sovereignty."

President Donald Trump announced that he has ordered the United States to resume nuclear weapons testing "immediately," saying he directed the Department of War to match other nations’ programs. He called the move a necessary step to maintain global parity. Trump wrote in a Truth Social post Wednesday night: "The United States has more Nuclear Weapons than any other country. This was accomplished, including a complete update and renovation of existing weapons, during my First Term in office." "Because of the tremendous destructive power, I HATED to do it, but had no choice! Russia is second, and China is a...

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that his country’s military successfully tested a massive nuclear-torpedo dubbed the Poseidon capable of leveling coastal cities with 1,600-foot high radioactive tsunamis. The despot, while enjoying tea with wounded Russian soldiers at a hospital in Moscow Wednesday, said the underwater bomb was launched from a submarine the day before and was a “huge success.” “For the first time, we managed not only to launch it with a launch engine from a carrier submarine, but also to launch the nuclear power unit on which this device passed a certain amount of time,” Putin said.

Russian soldiers have advanced further into the city of Pokrovsk, threatening not only to take the city, but to complete a larger encirclement of the surrounding area, as independent analysts and commanders report a serious deterioration of the Ukrainian position in the area

Russia has successfully tested a nuclear-capable, nuclear-powered underwater drone, President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday, defying US President Donald Trump's warnings with Moscow's second test of a new nuclear weapons system in just a few days. Putin on Sunday oversaw a test of another advanced nuclear-capable weapon -- the Burevestnik cruise missile, which he said had an "unlimited range". Trump called that exercise not "appropriate". "Yesterday, another test was conducted for another prospective system -- the unmanned underwater device 'Poseidon,' also equipped with a nuclear power unit," Putin said in televised remarks while visiting a military hospital treating Russian soldiers wounded...

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that his country’s military successfully tested a massive nuclear-torpedo dubbed the Poseidon capable of leveling coastal cities with 1,600-foot high radioactive tsunamis. The despot, while enjoying tea with wounded Russian soldiers at a hospital in Moscow Wednesday, said the underwater bomb was launched from a submarine the day before and was a “huge success.” “For the first time, we managed not only to launch it with a launch engine from a carrier submarine, but also to launch the nuclear power unit on which this device passed a certain amount of time,” Putin said. “There is...

Kirill Dmitriev, the Kremlin’s top economic envoy, arrived in the United States with holes in his sails and no wind to push him forward. He was a man on a desperate mission. A phone call between Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, and Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, had not gone well. The meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, expected to take place within two weeks, was shelved. The US president had finally lost patience with his Russian counterpart’s refusal to support a ceasefire in Ukraine. On Wednesday, he slapped Moscow’s largest oil firms with crippling sanctions. With...