Free Republic

Islamic State claim 'not accurate' - Russia Russia’s transport minister Maksim Sokolov has said that the claim Islamic State militants brought down the plane “can’t be considered accurate”. Shadi Bushra, reporting for the Guardian in Cairo, has also spoken to Mohamed Samir, Egypt’s army spokesman, who also refuted the claim. They can put out whatever statements they want but there is no proof at this point that terrorists were responsible for this plane crash. We will know the true reasons when the civil aviation authority in coordination with Russian authorities completes its investigation. But the army sees no authenticity to...

One point we’ve been particularly keen on driving home since the beginning of Russian airstrikes in Syria is that The Kremlin’s move to step in on behalf of Bashar al-Assad along with Vladimir Putin’s open “invitation” to Washington with regard to joining forces in the fight against terrorism effectively let the cat out of the proverbial bag. That is, it simply wasn’t possible for the US to explain why the Pentagon refused to partner with the Russians without admitting that i) the government views Assad, Russia, and Iran as a greater threat than ISIS, and ii) Washington and its regional...

Beheaded bodies of Syria anti-IS activist, friend found in Turkey: group . AFP 2 hours ago Beirut (AFP) - The beheaded bodies of a Syrian activist opposed to the Islamic State group and a friend were found early Friday in the southern Turkish city of Sanliurfa, his colleagues said. Ibrahim Abdul Qader, 20, and Fares Hamadi "were found beheaded at the friend's house this morning," Abu Mohammad, a founder of the activist's "Raqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently" group, told AFP via the Internet. RBSS, which documents abuses in areas under IS control in Syria, accused the jihadist organisation of the...

Agreement Reached to Restart Syria Peace Talks and Seek Cease-Fire By DAVID E. SANGEROCT. 30, 2015 VIENNA — Secretary of State John Kerry said on Friday that a group of nations with opposing stakes in the Syrian war had agreed to “explore the modalities of a nationwide cease-fire” and had asked the United Nations to oversee the rewriting of the country’s constitution and then new elections. The announcement, which Mr. Kerry made with his Russian counterpart and adversary in the broadening war in Syria, Foreign Minister Sergey V. Lavrov, represented the first time all the major outside participants in a...

Russia's Defense Ministry says the military has conducted a series of ballistic and cruise missile launches from various sites across Russia in the latest demonstration of the nation's resurgent military might. The ministry said Friday's exercise involved launches from ground sites, sea and air in what appeared to be one of the largest such maneuvers this year.

Most people in the English-speaking parts of the world missed Putin's speech at the Valdai conference in Sochi a few days ago, and, chances are, those of you who have heard of the speech didn't get a chance to read it, and missed its importance. (For your convenience, I am pasting in the full transcript of his speech below.) Western media did their best to ignore it or to twist its meaning. Regardless of what you think or don't think of Putin (like the sun and the moon, he does not exist for you to cultivate an opinion) this is...

Hungarian PM Viktor Orban isn’t exactly pro-migrant. In fact, he’s gone out of his way to let Europe know that when it comes to accommodating the hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers fleeing the war-torn Mid-East, Budapest isn’t interested. Here's what happened when refugees dared to test Orban's resolve when it comes to defending the country's newly constructed, razor wire anti-migrant fence: As we’ve documented extensively, Hungary’s move to close off its borders with Croatia and Serbia has triggered a veritable Balkan border battle wherein no one can quite figure out the best way to divert hundreds of thousands of...

"My answer is simple: I will not put American boots on the ground in Syria." If you like your boots-free Syria, you can keep your boots-free Syria. The White House reversed course today and announced that the Obama administration would be deploying special forces troops and military advisers to Syria. The new White House policy directly contradicts multiple promises personally made by President Barack Obama in 2013 that he would not put combat boots on the ground in Syria.

The U.S. will send a small number of U.S. special operations forces into Syria as part of a shift in its strategy against ISIS, officials said Friday. A senior administration official confirmed that President Barack Obama has authorized a contingent of less than 50 special operations forces to deploy into northern Syria. "We have been focused on intensifying elements of our strategy that have been working, while also moving away from elements of our approach that have proven less effective," the official explained. The White House was expected to announce the decision later Friday.

On this Jacki Daily show she speaks with Jackie Stewart of EnergyInDepth Ohio about AntiFracking groups. She is also joined by Bud Weinstein, Associate Director, Maguire Energy Institute on his most recent article "Cheap energy is reviving manufacturing in America's industrial heartland." Lastly she is joined by Anastasia Shcherbakova, Clinical Assistant Professor Director at the University of Texas.

World | Thu Oct 29, 2015 7:52am EDT Russian media take climate cue from skeptical Putin MOSCOW | By Andrey Kuzmin ...snip... But the Russian public heard little mention of climate change, because media coverage across state-controlled television stations and print media all but ignored it. On national TV, the villains were locals who routinely but carelessly burn off tall grasses every year, and the sometimes incompetent crews struggling to put the fires out. ...snip... The president believes that "there is no global warming, that this is a fraud to restrain the industrial development of several countries including Russia," says...

A Syrian man who was suspended from Penn State for violating the student code of conduct last week after a university investigation of sexual assault allegations against him is suing the school. The 21-year-old engineering student, identified in court filings as John Doe, says Penn State's new model for handling such complaints violated his right to due process. Doe says the university's decision to suspend him for two semesters has left him at risk of losing his student visa and being deported to his war-torn homeland. His complaint, filed in federal court in Harrisburg this week, asks for reinstatement as...

The Pentagon conceded Wednesday that U.S. troops are in combat in Iraq after days of dancing around the characterization following the first death of U.S. service member in the campaign against ISIS. "We're in combat," Army Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters Wednesday. "I mean, of course, this is a combat zone. There's a war going on in Iraq, if folks haven't noticed. And we're here and it's all around us."

Red Cross personnel on the ground in Syria have not reported any 'airstrikes' allegedly delivered by Russian jets on civilian targets including hospitals, the medical charity’s top executive told RT. Since Moscow started its air campaign in Syria on September 30, Western media have been publishing reports that Russian jets are targeting civilians. Last week, Russia was accused of bombing a number of hospitals in Syria, an allegation flatly denied by the Russian Defense Ministry. Dominik Stillhart, director of operations at the International Committee of the Red Cross, which has people on the ground in Syria, told RT he is...

The change in rhetoric (and apparent shift in strategy) comes just days after the US seemingly prepared the public for what might be coming by releasing helmet cam footage of what Washington says was a raid on an ISIS prison by Delta Force (accompanied by the Peshmerga). 70 prisoners were allegedly freed although not before the US suffered its first combat death in Iraq since 2011. The timing of the video is suspect, to say the least. It came just days after Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joe Dunford visited Iraqi PM Haider al-Abadi in an effort to dissuade Baghdad...

Russian fighter jets have carried out 71 sorties and hit 118 terrorist targets in Syria's provinces of Idlib, Homs, Hama, Aleppo, Damascus and Latakia over the past 24 hours, the Russian Defense Ministry said Wednesday. "Russian air group's aircraft in the Syrian Arab Republic have conducted 71 sorties and hit 118 terrorist targets in Idlib, Homs, Hama, Aleppo, Damascus and Latakia in the past 24 hours," the Russian Defense Ministry's spokesman said.

Time to get out your AGW hypocrisy meters. AGW, of course, stands for anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming. And the hypocrisy meters are about to ring off the charts, as the AGW alarmists descend in droves on Paris for COP 21 (21st Conference Of Parties), the United Nations’ much-ballyhooed climate summit, set to take place November 30-December 11. It happens every time: the millionaires, billionaires, and “public servants” — Prince Charles, Al Gore, Ted Turner, Richard Branson, Hollywood celebs, presidents, prime ministers, etc. — swoosh into the confab in their tax-payer provided jets, or their own private Learjets and Gulfstreams, to...

Embarrassingly, some Western media are parroting unverified narratives regarding Russian warplanes "intentionally" attacking medical facilities in Syria, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher Tony Cartalucci underscores, adding that the allegations have no credible evidence underpinning them. Some Western media outlets have no scruples about citing unverified information regarding Russia's military operation in Syria spread by US-backed NGOs such as the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights or the Syrian-American Medical Society (SAMS), Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher Tony Cartalucci stresses. Cartalucci narrated that on October 21, AFP media broke the news about an alleged Russian strike against a "field hospital" in northwestern Syria that resulted in...

Syrian rebels loyal to the Al Qaeda terror organization, released the second edition of its English-language magazine, “Al Risalah,” Sunday. The rebels, who identify with the Nusra Front (NF), Al Qaeda’s local branch, leaked the magazine onto the social media sphere using the group’s official Twitter account, which has still not been removed. The cover of the magazine reads, “Victory loves preparation,” and shows a jihadi wearing army gear with his face covered, holding two guns. Contents of the magazine include an interview with an Australian jihadi, ads for shotguns, a call to join the Nusra Front instead of the...

Lebanese security forces are interrogating a Saudi prince on charges of carrying drugs on his private plane after they allegedly retrieved 2 tons of narcotics from the aircraft, local media reported. Abd al-Muhsen bin Walid bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud was detained on Monday in Beirut's Rafik Hariri International Airport. The prince was about to conduct a flight on his private plane to Saudi Arabia. Lebanese TV station Al Mayadeen also said that 40 packages of drugs, weighing 2 tons in total, were confiscated. The prince was arrested and taken in for questioning along with four other people.