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The head of the Central Bank of Ukraine Yakov Smoliy unexpectedly resigned and it happened in the period of the continuing emission of state bonds, the total amount of which is $ 1.75 million. Now Ukraine as a state once again faces bankruptcy. The fact is that Kyiv needs urgently to ensure the repayment of its debt to foreign creditors of several billion. Only this year Ukraine will have to refinance old loans in the amount of $ 17 billion, the maturity of which is about to expire. To this end, on Thursday, the Central Bank of Ukraine (NBU) through...

Svetlana Lokhova's life flipped upside down when she became ensnared in what she describes as a completely false narrative that she had recruited Michael Flynn to work with the Russian government. Lokhova, an immigrant from Russia to Britain who worked as an academic at the world-renowned Cambridge University, found herself facing allegations that she had been involved in an affair with Flynn. A new mother at the time, Lokhova described herself as "absolutely gobsmacked" by the allegations. She explained during an interview on the "John Solomon Reports" podcast that she met Flynn once in 2014 when he visited Cambridge while...

Our state informed OSCE about military potential being accumulated by Russia against Ukraine Ukrainian and American experts, as well as the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, warned that under the pretext of holding strategic exercises Kavkaz 2020, Russia may resort to a large-scale offensive against Ukraine. The other day, the Russian president signed a decree on conscription from the reserve "for military training" - without specific dates for this training. This only increased the likelihood of an offensive – behind the decree may be the attempt of the Russian leadership to conduct a covert mass mobilization for...

A video posted on Chinese microblogging website Weibo by the Russian embassy of a party held today to celebrate the 160th anniversary of Vladivostok sparked online outrage with Chinese diplomats, journalists and users referring to the city by its old name ‘Haishenwai’. Vladivostok which once used to be part of China’s Qing dynasty and was known as Haishenwai was annexed by the Russian empire in 1860 after China’s defeat by the British and the French in the Second Opium war. Reacting to Russian embassy’s tweet, Shen Shiwei, a journalist working with the state-owned broadcaster CGTN, tweeted: “This “tweet” of #Russian...

Speaking on "Face the Nation," former National Security Adviser John Bolton dismissed US President Donald Trump's claims that he wasn't briefed about intelligence suggesting that Russia commissioned Taliban-linked fighters to kill US soldiers, The Guardian reports. "All intelligence is distributed along the spectrum of uncertainty," Bolton said. "And this intelligence ... by the administration’s own admission, was deemed credible enough to give to our allies. So the notion that you only give the really completely 100% verified intelligence to the president would mean you give him almost nothing. And that’s just not the way the system works." Former National Security...

Friday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called President Donald Trump the “weakest” president in American history. Schumer said, “President Trump from day one has shown such weakness to Vladimir Putin that an autocratic power-grabbing man like him will constantly take advantage and he has been doing that through the years. Right now, with everything going on, with Russia being one of the biggest foes that we have, Trump calls for them joining the G-8, you know making the G7 a G8 and adding them in. When every other country says no way.”

North Korea on Saturday reiterated it has no immediate plans to resume nuclear negotiations with the United States unless Washington discards what it describes as “hostile” polices toward Pyongyang. The statement by North Korean First Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui came after President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, John Bolton, told reporters in New York Thursday that Trump might seek another summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as an “October surprise” ahead of the U.S. presidential election. South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who had lobbied hard to help set up the now-stalled negotiations between Washington and...

The final day of Russia’s week-long vote on overhauling its Constitution is ending with no surprises. Vladimir Putin, who was first elected president in 2000, has been all but handed the opportunity to remain in office until 2036. If that happens, the former KGB officer will overtake Josef Stalin as the country’s longest-serving leader. “All we have is Putin,” said Galina Morozova, 81, outside a polling station in central Moscow Wednesday afternoon after voting yes to the changes. “We have to make sure he stays in power.”

Kuwait's Al-Jarida newspaper on Friday reported that Israel was responsible for a Thursday "accident" at an Iranian nuclear facility in Natanz. It is believed that the Natanz facility is used to enrich uranium. According to the Al-Jarida report, the explosion was caused by an "Israeli cyber attack" which targeted the computers which control the pressure gauges inside gas containers. Tehran has allegedly lost 80% of the uranium hexafluoride gas it needs in order to enrich uranium. The report also claimed that Israel is responsible for the Parchin blast which occurred last week. On Thursday, Iran's state news agency IRNA published...

How a Great Power Falls Apart Decline Is Invisible From the Inside By Charles King June 30, 2020 https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russia-fsu/2020-06-30/how-great-power-falls-apart On November 11, 1980, a car filled with writers was making its way along a rain-slick highway to a conference in Madrid. The subject of the meeting was the human rights movement in the Soviet Union, and in the vehicle were some of the movement’s long-suffering activists: Vladimir Borisov and Viktor Fainberg, both of whom had endured horrific abuse in a Leningrad psychiatric hospital; the Tatar artist Gyuzel Makudinova, who had spent years in internal exile in Siberia; and her husband,...

Democrats, their liberal media, Never-Trump RINOs and Liz Cheney are very upset to hear Russia has been paying the Taliban to kill US soldiers in Afghanistan. They’re not doing a very good job. ** There were 22 US deaths in Afghanistan total in 2019. ** There have been 9 US deaths in Afghanistan so far this year. ** Compare that to the 496 deaths in 2010 and 412 deaths in 2011 under Obama!Facts matter.The Taliban also laughs at these latest reports. In a new report at The Daily Beast the Taliban admits Russia has been paying them for US...

A new report raises serious questions regarding what House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff knew about bounties allegedly paid by Russia to Taliban-linked terrorists for killing American soldiers, and when he knew it. Sources told the outlet that top committee staff for Schiff were briefed all the way back in February on intelligence about a Russian military intelligence unit covertly offering the bounties to militants. But the California Democrat “took no action in response,” the outlet reported, citing those sources. What has surfaced is an allegation that Schiff did exactly what he is accusing Trump of doing right now...

"""Schiff Learned Of Russian ‘Bounty’ Intelligence In February, Withheld Information From Congress, And Took No Action""" Top committee staff for Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, were briefed in February on intelligence about Russia offering the Taliban bounties in Afghanistan, but he took no action in response to the briefing, multiple intelligence sources familiar with the briefing told The Federalist. The intelligence was briefed to Schiff’s staff during a congressional delegation, or CODEL, trip to Afghanistan in February. Schiff, who has acknowledged President Donald Trump was never briefed on the so-called intelligence,...

Vladimir Putin is heading for victory in a referendum that could extend his rule until 2036 as Russia enters its final day of voting today. The Kremlin strongman would normally reach his term limit in 2024, but voters are set to back a plan to reset his tally to zero and allow him to run for two more terms. The package of constitutional changes would also increase Putin's powers to dissolve parliament and expand his influence over courts and prosecutors.

Senators aim to limit Trump's ability to remove troops from Germany BY JORDAIN CARNEY - 06/29/20 03:19 PM EDT A bipartisan group of senators is trying to place limits on President Trump's ability to remove troops from Germany unless the administration is able to meet a slew of requirements. The proposal, spearheaded by Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), would prohibit the administration from reducing the number of active-duty troops in Germany below 34,500 unless the Pentagon can certify to Congress that it is in the national security interest of the United States and would not negatively undermine European alliances or NATO....

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russians opened the door to Vladimir Putin staying in power until 2036 by voting overwhelmingly for constitutional changes that will allow him to run again for president twice, but critics said the outcome was falsified on an industrial scale. Official results published on Thursday, after 100% of ballots had been counted, showed that the former KGB officer who has ruled Russia for more than two decades as president or prime minister had easily won the right to run for two more six-year terms after the current one ends in 2024. That means Putin, 67, could rule until...

Radiation sensors in Stockholm have detected higher-than-usual but still harmless levels of isotopes produced by nuclear fission, probably from somewhere on or near the Baltic Sea, a body running a worldwide network of the sensors said on Friday. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) oversees a network of hundreds of monitoring stations that use seismic, hydroacoustic and other technology to check for a nuclear weapon test anywhere in the world. That technology can, however, be put to other uses as well. One of its stations scanning the air for radionuclides - telltale radioactive particles that can be carried long distances...

WASHINGTON—The National Security Agency strongly dissented from other intelligence agencies’ assessment that Russia paid bounties for the killing of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan, according to people familiar with the matter. The disclosure of the dissent by the NSA, which specializes in electronic eavesdropping, comes as the White House has played down the revelations, saying that the information wasn’t verified and that intelligence officials didn’t agree on it.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell flatly rejected on Tuesday the idea of Russia rejoining the Group of Seven (G7). President Donald Trump has suggested allowing Russia to be readmitted to the group of world leaders after it was ousted in 2014 after the annexation of Crimea.

Justice Department official Bruce Ohr is on Capitol Hill Tuesday, answering questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee behind closed doors, Fox News has learned. The former associate deputy attorney general is one of dozens of individuals the committee subpoenaed earlier this month as part of their investigation of the Russia probe and the FBI's abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in obtaining a warrant to conduct surveillance of former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. Ohr, who did not answer questions about his meeting while he was on his way to the committee, was a key contact inside the...