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On Tuesday night, President Trump made his case for attacking Iran. #Perhaps we ought to ask ourselves if an attack on Iran is prudent or desirable.#In his address, Trump argued that Iran was in the process of developing intercontinental ballistic missiles to hit the United States. This assertion is farcical and risible. Iran simply has no ability to hit the United States, and even if it did, the doctrine of classical deterrence would come into play. The United States and the Soviet Union had thousands of nuclear-armed ICBMs targeted at each other for decades yet never engaged in direct conflict....

"Cuban border guards did what they had to do in this situation," Dmitry Peskov, a spokesperson for Russian President Vladimir Putin, told reporters on Thursday morning, according to the Russian state news outlet RIA Novosti. In a statement on Wednesday night, the interior ministry said the 10 people aboard the speedboat were "Cuban residents of the United States," who were allegedly armed with weapons and "intended to carry out an infiltration for terrorist purposes." Those on board the U.S-registered speedboat, which had been reported stolen in Florida, allegedly opened fire on Cuban border guard troops as they approached the boat...

Hungary will deploy soldiers and equipment to protect key energy infrastructure amid what Prime Minister Viktor Orban described as a potential Ukrainian threat, he said on Feb. 25, escalating tensions tied to disrupted Russian oil transit....

Russia says it has handed over the remains of 1,000 soldiers to Ukraine and has received the bodies of 35 Russian soldiers in return. Vladimir Medinsky, a top aide of Russian President Vladimir Putin, announced the exchange of bodies in a short announcement on Telegram. He gave no details, but included an image showing bodies being unloaded from a truck. Hours later, Ukraine said it had received 1,000 bodies which, "according to prior information from the Russian side, may belong to Ukrainian defenders".

India will likely continue buying Russian oil as the U.S. Supreme Court's verdict outlawing President Donald Trump's import tariffs has constrained his trade policy options, analysts said. "I do expect that India will maintain a healthy relationship with Russia, including on energy," Sarang Shidore, director of the Global South Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft told CNBC's Inside India. He added that India could reduce its Russian oil purchases but is unlikely to stop completely. According to energy data provider Kpler, India has imported 1.16 million barrel per day (mbd) of Russian oil so far in February, lower...

hirty-five years ago, American political scientist Francis Fukuyama made a name for himself by advancing the proposition that the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union promised the ascendency and universalization of so-called Western liberal democracy. As a Marxist-Hegelian who saw the progression of history as an evolutionary process with a natural and predetermined conclusion, Fukuyama envisioned Western-styled liberalism as both “the endpoint of mankind’s ideological evolution” and “the final form of human government.” Expecting all human struggles to barrel toward a state of imminent equilibrium and future peace, Fukuyama stated out loud what many...

Russia accused Ukraine on Tuesday of trying to obtain a nuclear weapon with help from Britain and France, an allegation Kyiv called an absurd lie. A French foreign ministry spokesperson said the allegation was "blatant disinformation". A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said: "There's no truth to this." Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has previously criticised Kyiv's decision to give up its former Soviet nuclear arsenal in the 1990s without obtaining proper, binding security guarantees. But Kyiv has said it does not seek to re-acquire nuclear weapons, and respects all international treaties. NUCLEAR THREATSIn a statement published on the...

KYIV, Ukraine, and MOSCOW — When the Kremlin launched its all-out invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the assumption in Moscow, and much of the West, was that Russian forces would take the country in a matter of days. Instead, what the Kremlin calls a "special military operation" has become the biggest land war in Europe since World War II and has lasted longer than the Soviet army's fight against Nazi Germany. Russia's war on Ukraine is a grinding war of attrition. Ukraine has managed to hold a much larger army to minimal gains while adjusting to a life under constant...

"This is the proportional response that Russia has the right to," the Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman stressedMOSCOW, February 24. /TASS/. A nuclear strike on targets in Ukraine, as well as in France and the United Kingdom, would be considered lawful and justified in the event that London and Paris provide Kiev with nuclear capabilities, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev said on Max, commenting on Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service’s (SVR) reports about such plans by the two European countries. According to Medvedev, this information "radically changes the situation." "This is a direct transfer of nuclear weapons to a...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a plea to Donald Trump on Monday, telling CNN he wants the US president “to stay on our side.” Speaking at the Presidential Palace in Kyiv on the eve of the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Zelensky said the United States is far too big and too important to walk away from the conflict. And he hopes that Trump, during his State of the Union address Tuesday, will back Ukraine as it fights back against the Russia of President Vladimir Putin. “They have to stay with … a democratic country which is...

Ukraine has regained control of 400 square kilometres of territory, including eight settlements, along a section of the southern frontline since the end of January, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi has said. Syrskyi's statement on Monday did not make clear how much of the newly secured territory had previously been under Russian control and how much lay in "grey zone" areas not firmly held by either side. The rare battlefield gains in the southeastern Dnipropetrovsk region stand in contrast to the broader trend of slow and costly Russian advances across the frontlines over the past two and a half years, as the...

Ukraine is outmatched by Russian forces and requires significantly more infantry and weapons if it hopes to win the war, according to military intelligence and independent battlefield monitors. Although Moscow is paying an extraordinary price for comparatively minimal gains, western officials believe the country can sustain at least another year of war at the current rate of attrition. On Tuesday it will be four years since Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. After months of incremental advances, it appears to be on the verge of capturing a series of strategic locations in Ukraine’s so-called “fortress belt” and is expanding...

When Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine surpassed 1,418 days last month, it officially exceeded a historic milestone — the same span of time it took Moscow to defeat Nazi Germany in World War II. And unlike the Red Army that pushed all the way to Berlin eight decades ago in what it called the Great Patriotic War, Russia’s 4-year-old, all-out invasion of its neighbor is still struggling to fully capture Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland. After Moscow failed to seize the capital of Kyiv and install a puppet government in February 2022, the conflict turned into trench warfare with tremendous cost....

Europe faces parallel challenges that policymakers have yet to connect: a pressing military recruitment shortage and an ongoing migration challenge. While politicians wring their hands over both issues separately, an opportunity has been hiding in plain sight. European countries should create a pathway to citizenship for immigrants willing to serve in their armed forces. Europe’s manpower crisis is real. According to recent defense reporting, in 2025 Germany’s Bundeswehr saw recruiting continue to fall behind targets, despite recruitment campaigns. The United Kingdom continues to fall short of its annual recruitment goal, with more service members leaving than joining. France, Italy, and...

The UK’s defence secretary, John Healey, has written in the Sunday Telegraph saying he wants to deploy British troops to Ukraine as it would signal an end to Russia’s war, days before the fourth anniversary of the full-scale invasion. Here is an extract from what he wrote There is no heavier burden on any defence secretary or any government than committing our armed forces on operations. I want to be the defence secretary who deploys British troops to Ukraine – because this will mean that this war is finally over. It will mean we have negotiated peace in Ukraine. And...

To avoid It Kiev must resume oil transit through the Druzhba pipeline, Robert Fico saidPRAGUE, February 21. /TASS/. Slovakia will suspend electricity supplies to Ukraine from February 23 if Kiev does not resume oil transit through the Druzhba pipeline, Prime Minister Robert Fico said. "Slovakia is a proud and sovereign country, and I am a proud and sovereign Slovak. If oil supplies to Slovakia are not resumed on Monday, I will ask SEPS to stop supplying electricity to Ukraine," Fico wrote on Facebook (banned in Russia, owned by Meta Corporation, recognized as extremist in Russia). According to the prime minister,...

Poland's withdrawal from landmine ban convention threatens escalation — Russian MFA "Beyond weakening the Convention itself, these steps could set off a domino effect, with other countries following suit," Maria Zakharova said MOSCOW, February 20. /TASS/. Warsaw's withdrawal from the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention could trigger a "domino effect" and escalate tensions in Europe, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a comment. "The consequences of such actions will soon become apparent. Beyond weakening the Convention itself, these steps could set off a domino effect, with other countries following suit," the diplomat said. "At the same time, some EU...

Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson says that the UK and its allies should deploy non-combat troops to Ukraine right now, to "flip a switch" in Russian President Vladimir Putin's head. Speaking exclusively to Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg alongside the former head of the military, Adm Sir Tony Radakin, Johnson said troops should be sent to peaceful regions in non-fighting roles. He said: "If we can have a plan for boots on the ground after the war, after Putin has condescended to have a ceasefire, then why not do it now?" The UK government is currently working with its allies to...

Drawing on more than 100 interviews with senior intelligence officials and other insiders in multiple countries, this exclusive account details how the US and Britain uncovered Vladimir Putin’s plans to invade, and why most of Europe – including the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy – dismissed them. As the fourth anniversary of the invasion approaches and the world enters a new period of geopolitical uncertainty, Europe’s politicians and spy services continue to draw lessons from the failures of 2022. The phone call William Burns had travelled halfway around the world to speak with Vladimir Putin, but in the end he had...

Hungary will block a 90-billion-euro ($106 billion) EU loan for Ukraine until it resumes oil shipments to the country via the Druzhba pipeline, its foreign minister said on Friday after Budapest said it would tap strategic reserves to tackle a shortage. Hungary and Slovakia, which have the only remaining refineries in the European Union using Russian oil through Druzhba, have been trying to secure supply since flows were halted on January 27 following what Ukraine said was a Russian drone attack that damaged pipeline infrastructure. Both countries have blamed Ukraine for the delay in restarting the flows for political reasons.