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The CIA is overseeing a secret intensive training program in the U.S. for elite Ukrainian special operations forces and other intelligence personnel, according to five former intelligence and national security officials familiar with the initiative. The program, which started in 2015, is based at an undisclosed facility in the Southern U.S., according to some of those officials. The CIA-trained forces could soon play a critical role on Ukraine’s eastern border, where Russian troops have massed in what many fear is preparation for an invasion. The U.S. and Russia started security talks earlier this week in Geneva but have failed thus...

MINSK. Aug 9 (Interfax) - The Russian Armed Forces will be deployed to Belarus in the event of the threat of a "new world war," Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Monday. "If necessary, there will be more than just a base. All the Russian Armed Forces will be deployed here, if necessary. In case of the danger of unleashing a new world war. That's all," Lukashenko said. He noted that there are often concerns from the West about the possible deployment of Russian troops to Belarus. "Why are you so worried that we'll have a Russian base? If we...

Thousands of troops from Russia and the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan recently participated in joint military exercises along the Afghanistan border to prepare against possible spillover violence from the northern Afghan provinces where the Taliban and the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) are fueling deteriorating security conditions, Khaama Press (KP) reported Thursday. U.S. and Afghan defense officials have accused Russia of lending support to the Afghan Taliban, which has been fighting a war against U.S.-NATO-led forces since 2001. Now, it appears the terrorist group is threatening Central Asian countries like Tajikistan with close ties to Russia that border Afghanistan. KP reveals,...

A recent transferring of Russian military equipment to the Ukrainian border attracted a lot of attention in social media. InformNapalm volunteers also have been tracking new videos and locating them on the map, trying to determine the purpose of such activity of Russian troops near the border with Ukraine. [VIDEO-1 AT LINK] On April 8, DFRLab [https://medium.com/dfrlab/minskmonitor-russian-fighting-vehicles-appear-at-border-2b647a4b4135] published an investigation that analyzed two videos. Geolocation in the investigation was done precisely, so we will not dwell on it. We will look at the additional details that have not been brought up in the DFRLab investigation. [VIDEO-2 AT LINK] From the...

Full Title: Putin sends troops to Russia's border with North Korea after China also sends soldiers to its boundary over fears Trump will attack Kim Jong-un, sparking a tidal wave of refugees Vladimir Putin is sending troops and equipment to Russia's border with North Korea over fears the US is preparing to attack Kim Jong-un. The Russian President fears there will be a huge exodus of North Korean refugees if his American counterpart, Donald Trump, launches military action against Pyongyang.

A Syrian-bound Russian military plane carrying 92 people including Red Army Choir members crashed in the Black Sea minutes after taking off from Sochi. The Tu-154 model plane, which belonged to the Russian defense ministry, crashed shortly after take-off from the southern city of Adler at 5.40am (2.40am GMT). There were no survivors. Four bodies have been recovered off the coast of the resort city of Sochi, as a frantic search operation continued to find the missing. Viktor Ozerov, head of the defence affairs committee at the upper house of Russian parliament, said he 'totally excluded' terrorism as a possible...

Relatives and loved ones of those who were on board the fatal Russian flight en route to Syria shared their memories of those who died in the Sochi plane crash on Sunday. A woman named Yulia Galkina posted a photograph of a man on board a plane on Russian social network VKontakte, and wrote, "my boy... my love... my life... you are the best on Earth!!! I've always told you this ..rest in peace!!" The man with his thumb up was Aleksandr Shtuko, who performed in the choir of the Alexandrov Ensemble. He was one of the 64 members of...

Rescue helicopters have discovered debris in the Black Sea from a Russian military transport plane which went off radar en route to Syria. Most of the passengers on the Tu-154 were members of the famous Alexandrov Ensemble army choir. According to the latest information, the Tupolev transport plane had 92 people on board, including 84 passengers and eight crew members. It went missing over the Black Sea at 2:40 GMT shortly after refueling at an airport near Sochi. Most of the passengers on board were members of the Alexandrov Ensemble, the official choir of the Russian Armed Forces, the Russian...

Syrian state TV showed footage of ambulances and a long line of green buses leaving eastern Aleppo. BBC producer Riam Dalati says the first convoy has now arrived at a "handover point" in rebel-held areas to the west. Russia's defence ministry has said buses are taking the injured, civilians and rebel fighters to the neighbouring province of Idlib, most of which is controlled by a powerful rebel alliance that includes the jihadist group Jabhat Fateh al-Sham. The chief of the Russian military's General Staff, Gen Valery Gerasimov, told a news briefing: "A humanitarian corridor has been created for the evacuation...

A Russian military helicopter has been shot down by rebels in Syria killing all five people on board, it has been revealed. The aircraft, carrying three crew and two officers, crashed down in the Idlib province in north western Syria on its way home to a Russian airbase. Gruesome pictures have since emerged showing what is believed to be the body of a Russian pilot being dragged through the dirt and loaded on to a truck. It comes as mystery surrounded the discovery in the wreckage of an identification card showing a picture of a blonde woman. The image was...

The fearless officer was directing Russian airstrikes at Islamic State targets near the ancient city of Palmyra in Syria when he was surrounded by terrorists. Not prepared to go down without a fight, he ordered military officials to drop bombs on his location and died in the blast. A spokesperson for the Russian military said: "An officer of Russian special operations forces was killed near Palmyra while carrying out a special task to direct Russian airstrikes at Islamic State group targets." "The officer was carrying out a combat task in Palmyra area for a week, identifying crucial IS targets and...

Over 1,000 terrorists laid down arms and surrendered to the Syrian authorities over the past 24 hours in Daraa, the Syrian local sources also confirmed. The militants also turned over their cache of ammo to the authorities, both sources added. The development came after President Bashar al-Assad in a televised address in July pardoned all soldiers who have fled the army, saying that his words served as a general decree to relevant officials. Hundreds of gunmen have been laying down their weapons and turning themselves in to authorities in areas across the country.

Over 1,000 Militants Surrender To Syrian Army In Last 24 Hours The development came after President Bashar al-Assad in a televised address in July pardoned all soldiers who have fled the army, saying that his words served as a general decree to relevant officials. Hundreds of foreign-backed militants surrendered to the government troops in the province of Daraa, Syria's National Reconciliation Committee announced on Monday. Hundreds of foreign-backed militants surrendered to the government troops in the province of Daraa, Syria’s National Reconciliation Committee announced on Monday. Over 1,000 terrorists laid down arms and surrendered to the Syrian authorities over the...

Ukraine said on Saturday it had headed off an attempt by Russia to send troops into Ukraine under the guise of peacekeepers with the aim of provoking a large-scale military conflict, a statement Moscow dismissed as a "fairy tale". A senior aide to Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko said a large Russian military convoy had been heading for the border on Friday under a supposed agreement with the Red Cross, but had stopped after an appeal by Kiev to Russia.

Two Russian naval warships passed through Turkey's Canakkale (Dardanelles) Strait, an Anadolu Agency correspondent reported on Sunday. The two ships, named "Novocherkassk" and "Georgiy Pobedonosets", were accompanied by Turkish coast guard boats during their crossings.

TRANSLATION In Slovyansk, Crimean "Green Men" Captured Journalists Sunday, April 13, 2014, 00:46 In Slovyansk, "green men" like those seen at the beginning of the Russian occupation of Crimea, captured Hromadske TV and Lenta.ru journalists and forbade them to work in the town, highlighting events under control of the region's Ministry of Internal Affairs and other protests. This was reported to Ukrayinska Pravda by the journalists themselves. According to the journalists, the armed men in Slovyansk who took the regional Ministry of Internal Affairs, Donetsk Oblast office in Slovyansk, captured them as soon as they approached the territory of the...

According to dire warnings from U.S. military and intelligence officials, Russian President Vladimir Putin, fresh from his daring annexation of Ukraine’s strategic Crimean Peninsula, has concentrated tens of thousands of his forces on the border with Ukraine. We [NBC News] went to look for ourselves.

Nearly 100,000 Russian forces have massed on Ukraine's border, a top Ukrainian defense official told an American audience Thursday, giving a number far higher than US military estimates. "Almost 100,000 soldiers are stationed on the borders of Ukraine and in the direction ... of Kharkiv, Donetsk," Andriy Parubiy, chairman of Ukraine's national security council, said via a webcast from Kiev. "Russian troops are not in Crimea only, they are along all Ukrainian borders. They're in the south, they're in the east and in the north," Parubiy said.

Latin America, long considered off-limits for Russian military outposts because of its proximity to Washington, is rapidly becoming the latest region targeted for Moscow’s expanding reach. As the Kremlin was secretly planning its invasion of Ukraine in late February, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu announced Moscow’s plan to establish a permanent military presence in Latin America, including naval visits to ports in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. Russia is also asking those countries to allow long-range bombers to refuel at their air bases.

SEVASTOPOL, UKRAINE - Dozens of military trucks transporting heavily armed soldiers rumbled over Crimea's rutted roads Saturday as Russia reinforced its armed presence on the disputed peninsula in the Black Sea. Moscow's foreign minister ruled out any dialogue with Ukraine's new authorities, whom he dismissed as the puppets of extremists. The Russians have denied their armed forces are active in Crimea, but an Associated Press reporter trailed one military convoy Saturday afternoon from 40 kilometres west of Feodosia to a military airfield at Gvardeiskoe north of Simferopol, over which a Russian flag flew. Some of the army green vehicles had...