Free Republic

For much of its history, Albania remained as shadowy and remote as the fictional Syldavia of the Tintin comics. Letters to Albania were sometimes returned from Albany, New York, with the postal direction “Try Europe.” The country came into existence only after 1912, with the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Its first ruler, King Zog, was hounded out by Mussolini when he invaded in 1939. Five years later, the Italians and their Nazi German allies were expelled in turn by the Albanian nationalist leader Enver Hoxha. A Muslim-born communist, Hoxha turned his Balkan fiefdom into a self-immolated model of Stalinist...

Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials appointed Sen. Mitch McConnell’s wife to multiple government positions, many of which partially overlapped with her two U.S. Cabinet posts, according to Chinese government and state media reports unearthed by the Daily Caller News Foundation. Elaine Chao, who married the Kentucky Republican in 1993, has held numerous U.S. government positions since the 1980s, including serving as Department of Labor (DOL) secretary throughout President George W. Bush’s tenure and as Department of Transportation (DOT) secretary during President Donald Trump’s first term. After resigning from the Trump administration in January 2021, Chao then served on the board...

American forces destroyed five Iranian oil tankers near Kharg Island and Jask on Tuesday as the US added military might to its economic squeeze of the Islamic Republic. US Central Command said in a statement that it carried out the strikes that downed five Iranian crude oil carriers in response to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) targeting of an American warship with ballistic missiles in the last two days. That US warship evaded the Iranian attacks and no American personnel were harmed, per CENTCOM. But the IRGC lost its crude oil carriers “M/T Kaviz, M/T Charminar, M/T Horizon 1,...

A federal agent's contemporaneous notes suggest he may have been documenting the very weapons pipeline his own government was running, Slain Border Patrol agent Brian Terry kept a diary showing he was tracking AK-47s at the border weeks before his 2010 murder exposed the Obama administration’s disastrous Fast and Furious gun-running scheme, according to excerpts from the journal obtained by Just the News. Terry's journal shows he stopped a shipment of AK-47s from entering the country just a month before he was murdered, according to his brother, Kent Terry. But his supervisors told him to allow the weapons to cross...

Public sentiment is turning against Zelensky amid corruption concerns and weariness with his rule. For most of his presidency and especially since Russia launched its full-scale war, Ukrainian voters have rallied around Volodymyr Zelensky as a pillar of national resilience and unity. That’s for good reason: But now, after more than seven years in office, four and a half years of war with Russia, and a series of scandals involving his leadership team and close friends, Zelensky appears to have lost the nation’s political support. Indeed, polling published in early August points to a major mood swing among Ukrainians, suggesting...

McAllen, Texas — Less than two weeks after the military first used a high-energy laser weapon system to down suspicious drones, military officials told CBS News there has been a roughly 75% decrease in the number of drones probing the southern border in the Rio Grande Valley. The system made its debut by taking down three drones on Aug. 25 and 26 after months of training, including an episode that caused the Federal Aviation Administration to briefly shut down El Paso's airport earlier this year. Since then, military officials told CBS News there is regular coordination with the FAA to...

More than 200 members of churches in Nepal's flood-hit Rasuwa and Nuwakot districts remain unaccounted for, while at least nine church buildings have been damaged following the devastating Bhote Koshi–Trishuli floods that struck the region on August 26. The catastrophic flooding came through the Bhote Koshi River from the Kerung area of China, causing widespread destruction across Rasuwa and downstream areas. Pastor Dr. Kiran Kumar Das, president of the National Churches Fellowship of Nepal (NCF Nepal), said that nine church buildings in the flood-affected districts of Rasuwa and Nuwakot have so far been damaged, while more than 200 church members...

The Brits’ simmering anger over mass migration is getting hotter than a tea kettle. Their fury spilled onto the beaches of Portsmouth on Sunday — complete with protesters in the water, blocked coaches, a major police response and even women arriving in kayaks to try to block roughly 140 immigrants from reaching shore. The extraordinary scenes unfolded at Eastney after a migrant boat was intercepted in the Solent off England's southern coast. https://x.com/GBPolitcs/status/2096695801028194313? It was not the typical Channel crossing ending at Dover. The vessel had reportedly traveled from the Normandy coast before reaching waters near Portsmouth, where Border Force,...

Canada and China held their Fifth Defence Coordination Dialogue in Canada on Friday, the first session of that channel since April 2018. Beijing’s defense ministry provided this anodyne announcement: “The two sides had a candid and in-depth exchange of views on international and regional issues of mutual interest, expressed willingness to strengthen practical exchanges and cooperation between the two militaries, and enhanced mutual understanding and trust.” Notably, Canada’s government-beholden media have not mentioned the meeting. https://x.com/cbcwatcher/status/2096915174376558702? "Why do Canadians always have to find out from foreign media? What other negotiations is Carney hiding? Even a major South Korean newspaper writes...

Defense Minister Israel Katz announced that he and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have directed the IDF to target senior Palestinian Authority officials in an “all-out war” on terrorism in the West Bank, should Israel identify a plan to launch an “October-7 style” attack on Israeli forces and Jewish settlements. “If the security apparatuses of the Palestinian Authority and the bodies associated with them launch, or we know for certain that they are about to launch, an October 7-style terrorist attack against forces and Jewish settlements, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I instructed the IDF to prepare to launch an all-out...

Retaliatory tariffs issued by Canada are set to hit some imports from the United States soon after midnight on Tuesday, intensifying a trade war between the longtime allies and risking an escalation from President Donald Trump.Levies as high as 50% will be applied to hundreds of U.S. products, ranging from aluminum foil to raincoats to cheese. U.S. elected officials in states bordering Canada, including Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, have warned the trade dispute will hurt local businesses and consumers.

AI recap... Trump’s main pointsIn the GB News interview with Bev Turner, President Donald Trump focused mainly on immigration, energy, Iran, the Russia–Ukraine war, Britain’s role in world affairs, artificial intelligence, and his criticism of several British and European leaders. The following recap covers the principal arguments he made in the interview, rather than independently verifying each claim.Britain’s two major problemsTrump said Britain faces two overriding problems: immigration and energy. He argued that the United Kingdom could become wealthy and energy-independent by making much greater use of oil and gas from the North Sea. In his view, Britain possesses a...

Key PointsU.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the Trump administration may never reach a deal to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.Wright’s comments suggest the administration may pursue its goal of preventing an Iranian nuclear weapon without reaching a negotiated nuclear agreement.Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf warned that future attacks on Iran would receive a “faster, heavier, and more painful” response. U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Sunday said the U.S. may not reach an elusive deal to constrain Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, as the U.S.-Iran conflict enters its seventh month.“There may not be a nuclear...

KYIV, Ukraine—Every few weeks, Svitlana Dvornikova leaves her home near the front line in Ukraine and travels to a rented luxury villa on the Mediterranean coast of France or Spain. She dons makeup, a wig, high heels and a pseudonym. Dvornikova isn’t there to escape the war. She travels abroad to stream solo shows to her one million subscribers..... ...Zhelezniak is now leading a push to legalize porn in Ukraine, arguing that doing so wouldn’t only help against corruption, but would raise up to $25 million a year in tax revenues.

During Poland’s 2025 presidential campaign, politicians began portraying Ukrainians in Poland as freeloaders straining the country’s public finances. This summer, Polish President Karol Nawrocki stripped his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, of Poland’s highest honor, the Order of the White Eagle, in reaction to Zelenskyy’s decision to name a military unit after the World War II-era Ukrainian Insurgent Army, or UPA. The group murdered tens of thousands of Poles during an ethnic-cleansing campaign in 1943-1945, although it also fought against the Soviet Union. The libertarian Confederation party denounced Ukrainians getting social welfare, while Gregorz Braun, the European Parliament member who leads...

"Seismic", "a socio-political earthquake", "a watershed moment for Germany". This was how political analysts and many media outlets described the stunning victory of the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in local elections in Germany on Sunday. Is that an exaggeration? Saxony-Anhalt is one of the smallest of massive Germany's 16 regions. It boasts a mere 1.7m out of 59m eligible voters nationwide. How significant can its political sentiments be, especially since the AfD narrowly failed to win an outright majority? The answer: very significant. The vote may have been regional but it impacts at national level. The AfD landslide...

The far-right Alternative for Germany party surged to a major victory in a regional election on Sunday, but fell a little short of winning a majority in its quest to form the country’s first far-right state government since World War II. The German far-right party AfD has taken a commanding lead in Sunday's Saxony-Anhalt vote, but could not secure enough seats to form a majority. Final results showed AfD receiving 43.8% of the vote, more than double its showing five years ago in the region of 2.1 million people west of Berlin. However, falling three seats short, with 39 lawmakers...

US special forces spent four months conducting a secret mine-clearing mission in the Strait of Hormuz in an attempt to open up the waterway, the Financial Times reported Sunday. Iran has said it placed mines in international and Omani waters following the outbreak of the war. The International Maritime Organization estimated in June that roughly 80 mines had been deployed along important shipping routes. The covert operation was carried out amid ongoing exchanges of strikes between the US and Iran in and around the Strait, according to people familiar with the mission. Navy SEAL divers worked with unmanned vessels, robots,...

Saudi Arabia and seven other Arab and Muslim countries on Sunday issued a joint statement rejecting any attempt to displace Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and reaffirming their support for the establishment of an independent, sovereign Palestinian state. The statement was signed by the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan and Indonesia. The countries strongly condemned statements made in Israel calling for the encouragement of Palestinian emigration from the Gaza Strip and warned against turning such ideas into government policy or practical measures on the ground. According to the statement, displacing Palestinians...

US special envoy Jared Kushner says next month’s Knesset election has made Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government act “a little irrational” when it comes to Gaza. “I think we agree with the Israelis on the end state for Gaza,” Kushner says at a press appearance during a visit to Kyiv, where he was taking part in negotiations over the war. “They just have crazy elections, and that makes them a little irrational in certain regards,” he adds.The US has been trying to advance the Board of Peace’s plan to decommission the weapons of Hamas and all other armed groups in...