Free Republic

The first images to emerge from the ancient city of Palmyra after Syrian regime forces expelled Islamic State fighters have shown large swaths of destruction but also suggest that several important archaeological sites are intact. The extremist group had destroyed some of Palmyra’s most treasured artefacts, including the Temple of Bel and the Arch of Triumph. However, some of Palmyra’s ruins appear to have survived, including the Agora and the celebrated Roman theatre. [Maamoun] Abdelkarim, [Syria’s antiquities chief] said a team of archaeologists would go to Palmyra in the coming days to assess the damage to its monuments, and pledged...

The Syria government forces have regained control of historic area of Palmyra, Syrian brigadier-general said. "The Syrian army regained control of the historic town of Tadmur (Palmyra) with small weapons," a Syrian brigadier-general told Sputnik. Thus, he emphasized that the town was taken without air assistance. Palmyra has been under Daesh control since May 2015. The terrorist group has already destroyed part of the ancient city, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Behind the backs of some her closest European allies, Angela Merkel struck a deal with her Turkish counterpart that could very well end the influx of refugees - but at a very high price, including an extra €3bn in aid and a visa-free travel scheme. There are already signs that her new swashbuckling style has its costs. EU diplomats have been left bruised and angered by being cut out of her bilateral dealmaking and risk turning on her when the deal goes before another summit next week for final approval. Her own political allies at home on Tuesday hinted at...

Russian investigators arrested a nanny and charged her with murdering a young child in her care on Monday after local media broadcast footage of a woman brandishing a severed infant's head near a busy Moscow metro station. Moscow investigators said in a statement the unnamed nanny was from Central Asia and that she was undergoing psychiatric testing to see if she was mentally sound and understood the significance of the crime they said she had committed. Lifenews.ru, an online news portal with close contacts to the police, published video footage of a woman it identified as the nanny. Clad in...

The Australian government is tired of having unemployed people say they cannot take a job because it might interfere with their golf plans or dreams of becoming an actor. The government said it plans to tighten the rules on who qualifies for unemployment benefits to encourage a growing number of jobless - including some with creative excuses to stay off the job - to go to work. "Australia's income support system is there as a safety net for people who genuinely cannot find a job - not as an option for those who simply refuse to work," Australian Minister for...

After hours of public bashing by lawmakers in the session hall of Ukraine's parliament, Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk rose from his chair, visibly nervous. These were the last minutes before a no-confidence vote. But suddenly, Mustafa Nayyem, a well-known reformist legislator, saw a sight that must have chilled him to the bone. Moments before the vote, dozens of legislators from a range of parties suddenly left the session floor — they weren't going to vote against the government. Nayyem rushed to Twitter to warn the country: a backdoor deal had been reached, and the no-confidence vote would likely fail. But...

The Syrian army advanced toward the Turkish border on Monday in a major offensive backed by Russia and Iran that rebels say now threatens the future of their nearly five-year-old insurrection against President Bashar al-Assad. "Our whole existence is now threatened, not just losing more ground," said Abdul Rahim al-Najdawi from Liwa al-Tawheed, an insurgent group. "They are advancing and we are pulling back because in the face of such heavy aerial bombing we must minimize our losses." The Syrian military and its allies were almost five km (3 miles) from the rebel-held town of Tal Rafaat, which has brought...

The Syrian army and its allies have broken a three-year rebel siege of two Shi’ite towns [Nubul and Zahraa] in northwest Syria, government and rebel groups said on Wednesday, cutting off a main insurgent route to nearby Turkey. The two towns [...] are connected to the border by areas under the control of Kurdish militias. "Less than 3 km separate the regime from cutting all routes to opposition-held Aleppo," said Rami Abdulrahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said. "It did in three days what it failed to do in 3-1/2 years." Breaking the siege opens a direct...

The national debt hit $19 trillion for the first time ever on Friday, and came in at $19.012 trillion. It took a little more than 13 months for the debt to climb by $1 trillion. The national debt hit $18 trillion on Dec. 15, 2014. That's a slightly stepped-up pace compared to the last few $1 trillion mileposts. It took about 14 months for the debt to climb from $17 trillion to $18 trillion, and about the same amount of time to go from $16 trillion to $17 trillion. The federal government has been free to borrow as much as...

A record amount of snow has fallen this January in Moscow as the Agency of the city news "Moscow" learned from the Director General of the Moscow's and Moscow Region's Meteobureau Mr. Alexey Lyakhov. "An analysis of our last 50 years' records allows us to say that this January is the most snowy since the January of 1970 with its 100 cm of snow (39 3/8 inches). This January's total snowfall has already risen to 104 cm (41 inch) and the month isn't over yet, so the total can grow more. The 50 years average is 40-45 cm (15 3/4-17...

The Koch brothers are actually charging $0.50/bbl to take low grade oil at their Flint Hills Resources refining arm./ North Dakota Sour is a high-sulfur grade of crude and "is a small portion of the state's production, with less than 15,000 barrels a day coming out of the ground," Bloomberg notes, citing John Auers, executive vice president at Turner Mason & Co. in Dallas.

A political discussion club named "Double Donald Trump" may be opened in Moscow just across the street from the US embassy. The city news agency "Moskva" has a copy of the application form for registering this brand name. "The club is to be opened by some Russian Americans, who support Donald Trump's campaign for the US presidency. Mr. Trump knows about this and has taken the initiative positively. The club will provide meeting place for associates and will host political discussions. The opening date is this summer's beginning", said Mr. Anatoliy Aronov, the president of the "Pervaya Patentnaya Kompania" ["The...

A Russian bomber SU-34 attacked a building near the Syrian city of Raqqa where a rebel leaders' meeting was being held as the Russian Defense Ministry's spokesman Igor Konashenkov said. He pointed out that the headquarters were destroyed in result of the attack. According to his words, the intelligence on the meeting's place was provided by representatives of patriotic Syrian opposition forces. "We maintained a round-the-clock air-reconnaissance for two days in that area. After the rebel leaders' arrival at the place had been confirmed, a Su-34 performed an airstrike at the building. In the result of a direct hit with...

Today the Executive Board of the IMF reversed its "policy on not lending into arrears." IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said in a statement that “the IMF’s executive board met today and agreed to change the current policy on non-toleration of arrears to official creditors." Historically, the IMF has refused to lend to any country that has not serviced its debt to any sovereign. The IMF staff started contemplating a rule change in the spring of 2013 because nontraditional creditors, such as China, had started providing developing countries with large loans. The IMF intended to adopt a new policy in the...

Iraq's ruling alliance and powerful Shi'ite militias have urged Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to request Russian air strikes on Islamic State militants [...], members of the coalition and militias told Reuters. Growing pressure on Abadi to seek Russian support puts him in the delicate position of trying to appease his ruling coalition, as well as militias seen as a bulwark against Islamic State, while keeping strategic ally Washington on his side.Two members of parliament said the prime minister was under "tremendous pressure" from the ruling National Alliance to request Russian intervention. MPs and alliance members said an official request for...

On the outskirts of al-Omar oilfield in eastern Syria, with warplanes flying overhead, a line of trucks stretches for 6km. Some drivers wait for a month to fill up with crude.[...] This is the land of Isis, the jihadi organisation in control of swaths of Syrian and Iraqi territory. The trade in oil has been declared a prime target by the international military coalition fighting the group. And yet it goes on, undisturbed.[...] But more than a year after US President Barack Obama launched an international coalition to fight Isis, the bustling trade at al-Omar and at least eight other...

Moscow: The US declined to host a high-ranking Russian delegation on Syria and also refused to send its own mission to Moscow, Russia’s foreign minister said on Wednesday. On Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Washington of refusing to cooperate and share intelligence on Syria and said he was willing to send a high-profile delegation led by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to the United States. “Literally today, we got a reply,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, speaking in parliament. “We have been told that they can’t send a delegation to Moscow and they can’t host a delegation in Washington...

Israel will provide Russia with intelligence information about opposition sites in Syria to facilitate Moscow’s military operations, Channel 2TV has reported. The Israeli network said that a senior delegation of Russian army officials will arrive in Israel on Tuesday to coordinate the military cooperation. The delegation will be led by First Deputy Chief of General Staff General Nikolai Bogdanovsky, who will meet his Israeli counterpart, Major-General Yair Golan as well as senior officials in Israeli military intelligence, the air force and the Mossad. Channel 2 noted that the visit follows the meeting between Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian...

The Obama administration has ended the Pentagon’s $500 million program to train and equip Syrian rebels, administration officials said on Friday, in an acknowledgment that the beleaguered program had failed to produce any kind of ground combat forces capable of taking on the Islamic State in Syria. [...] [The Defense Secretary] Mr. Carter added, “I think you’ll be hearing from President Obama very shortly” on the program." [...] A senior Defense Department official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that a much smaller training center would be set up in Turkey instead, where a small group of “enablers”...

Hundreds of thousands of failed asylum seekers will be deported from Europe within weeks under secret plans leaked to The Times. Brussels will threaten to withdraw aid, trade deals and visa arrangements if countries such as Niger and Eritrea refuse to take back their economic migrants. The proposals also envisage EU states detaining thousands of migrants to prevent them from absconding to avoid deportation. More than 400,000 people who entered the EU in the first half of this year are expected to have their asylum claims rejected, posing a humanitarian and political challenge for EU leaders.