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A crowd laughed at Russia's top diplomat when he said the Ukraine war "was launched against us." An audience member at India's G20 summit shouted "come on!" at Sergey Lavrov during the event. He was answering a question about Russia's energy strategy moving forward. Sergey Lavrov, Russia's top diplomat and a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, at a conference in India Thursday said that the war in Ukraine "was launched against us," prompting the crowd to erupt in laughter. Lavrov was a speaker at India's G20 Summit in New Delhi, leading a session that was part of a...

The war in Ukraine is at a stalemate, but that doesn’t mean it’s not changing. General David Petraeus predicts the war will look different this year with significant offensives likely staged by the two sides. Bergen: Who’s winning the war? Petraeus: It is not Russia. Russia has, after all, lost the Battles of Kyiv, Sumy, Chernihiv, and Kharkiv; failed to take the rest of Ukraine’s southern coast (not even getting through Mykolaiv, much less to the major port at Odesa). It has lost what it had gained in Kharkiv province. And it has had to withdraw its only forces west...

Avideo circulating on social media shows a group of women whose husbands died fighting for Vladimir Putin's forces in Ukraine expressing gratitude for receiving fur coats. This screen grab shows a group of women who reportedly received fur coats after their husbands died fighting for the Kremlin in the war in Ukraine. This screen grab shows a group of women who reportedly received fur coats after their husbands died fighting for the Kremlin in the war in Ukraine. © Via Telegram The clip was shared by the CHTD Telegram news channel which said the women were in Makiivka, in the...

Russian President Vladimir Putin could "disappear at any moment," sending Moscow into a civil conflict amid its floundering invasion of Ukraine, warned former commander Igor Girkin. Girkin, also known as Igor Strelkov, rose to prominence for his role in the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014. He has become increasingly critical of Kremlin leadership as its military struggles to achieve substantial military gains in Ukraine nearly a year after Putin launched the "special military operation." Although he supports the goals of the Russian military, he has recently offered grim assessments of the war for Putin. During a recent discussion, Girkin...

Oleg Matveychev said "ultra-patriots" could overthrow Putin over his army's performance. "The situation is not so critical yet, but 2023 will be very dangerous," Matveychev said. Oleg Matveychev — an MP with Russia's largest political party, United Russia, which backs Putin — said in an interview that the biggest threat to Putin is now supporters of the Ukraine war who are unhappy with the progress of the conflict, The Times of London reported. Matveychev said that "ultra-patriots" in the country will likely put forward a candidate to run against Putin in next year's presidential elections, when Putin is set to...

Aconsortium of political advocacy groups are pushing for an investigation into allegations that Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) has had staffers running her personal errands and performing sundry household tasks on the taxpayer dime. As first reported in December by The Daily Beast, Sinema aides are bound by a 37-page memo that lays out a very specific set of demands: the senator’s groceries are to be picked up promptly, her hour-long massages are to be booked weekly, and her internet service at home in D.C. must always be in working order. (If not, an assistant “should call Verizon to schedule a...

Kyle Rittenhouse, who skyrocketed to fame in right-wing circles after shooting and killing two protesters during a social rights march in 2020, is now facing a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the victim's father, according to PBS. The lawsuit was filed by John Huber, the father of one of the two victims, and also includes city officials and police officers. U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman dismissed motions from the city officials, police officers and Rittenhouse to dismiss the civil rights case in its entirety. Huber's lawsuit states that Rittenhouse conspired with police officers to intentionally cause harm to the protesters...

Israel is targeting the production of Iranian weapons that could be sent to Russia for use against Ukraine, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CNN in an interview aired on Wednesday. “Israel... acts in ways that I will not itemize here against Iran’s weapons productions, which are used against Ukraine,” Netanyahu said. Israel has already been active in working to thwart Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons, but in his conversation with CNN, he said that such efforts were also directed toward preventing the flow of Iranian weapons to Russia. “We are attacking not only Iran’s nuclear program – trying to...

President Joe Biden... is now reviving former President Barack Obama’s idea of adding yet one more racial category to our Balkanized nation and effectively turning Hispanics into a race, not an ethnicity. In a document from the Office of Management and Budget, published on Jan. 27 in the Federal Register, a working group of the U.S. Census Bureau proposes to create a category for people who can trace their origin to Middle East or North African (to be called MENA). Secondly, it proposes to collapse the current two questions on ethnicity and race into one.... The reason two questions have...

The former vice president added: "If the armed forces do not have the ability to conduct strategic offensive operations, then it is better not to try, especially outside your own country... People are dying senselessly, although the slogan is 'Defend Russia.' Where are they defending Russia? What are they dying for....? Who has the right to take a father away from his children? Who gave the right to take away sons from mothers and fathers? Nobody." During the same talk, Rutskoy took aim at Russian President Vladimir Putin, calling him a "laughingstock" for not carrying out certain military intentions, citing...

But Hodges is among military experts who believe that reclaiming Crimea is required for Ukraine's long-term survival. He told Britain's Channel 4 News last Wednesday that Crimea is the "decisive terrain" and that it should be isolated "with long range precision weapons." In his view, these would include F-16 jets and ATACMs (Army Tactical Missile Systems) and armed drones, which can "reach beyond the current HIMARS being used that could isolate Crimea" and "make Crimea untenable." The fate of Crimea as a deciding factor in the war in Ukraine continues to be debated amid speculation over whether it would be...