RUSSIA - Various groups have been targeted under a 2016 anti-extremism law. An additional 2017 Supreme Court ruling targeted the Jehovah's Witnesses specifically, ordering their dissolution in Russia. "Officially, it's a totalitarian sect of extremists. But in fact, these are people who because of their faith are not susceptible to propaganda," said a man identified as a Russian FSB secret service officer by Radio Liberty. "The system sees them as a threat because they are organised and independent. One day they may seek power," he told the station in an interview this year.
USA - FACEBOOK ignores underage users and knowingly allows extreme material to remain its site, according to a new Channel 4 investigation. An undercover probe by the broadcaster’s Dispatches programme went inside the web giant’s moderation department which handles complaints, but found bosses even allowed racist or violent posts to remain. And many reported posts took days to tackle, despite the company saying offensive content should be dealt with within 24 hours. In footage shot by an undercover reporter, one staff member said: “If you start censoring, people lose interest. It’s all about making money at the end of the day.”
FINLAND - Donald Trump has hailed the beginning of what could be an "extraordinary relationship" between America and Russia as he kick-started talks with President Vladimir Putin. The US President is attending his first face-to-face meeting with Russia’s leader. He said: "Most importantly we have a lot of good things to talk about." He added they will talk about "everything from trade to military to missiles to China. We'll be talking a little bit about China. Our mutual friend president Xi."
GERMANY - Germany will be watching keenly when the mercurial US president meets his Russian counterpart on Monday. Germans are concerned on three counts: NATO, Crimea and the Nord Stream gas pipelines. The German government's commissioner on Russian affairs, Dirk Wiese, isn't commenting on Donald Trump's meeting on Monday in Helsinki with Russia's Vladimir Putin. But he and many other German leaders will be carefully, perhaps nervously, monitoring the talks between the two presidents. Trump has made it something of a habit of late to single out Germany for criticism and any signs of agreement between him and Putin would further fray nerves in Berlin. Germany is particularly concerned about three issues.
GERMANY - The German foreign minister has joined a number of anxious Western politicians in offering advice to Donald Trump ahead of the US president’s summit with Vladimir Putin, warning him against making “unilateral deals” with Russia. “Unilateral deals at the expense of allies will harm the United States, too. The one who hits his partners risks losing eventually,” Heiko Maas told German newspaper Bild am Sonntag in an interview released on Sunday. However, the German foreign minister did acknowledge that the high-level talks between the US and Russia is a good sign, adding that the meeting can be “a step forward towards” nuclear disarmament.
USA - A telling anecdote during Angela Merkel’s recent trip to Washington captured the new tone in the American-German relationship. Over lunch and in jest, Donald Trump allegedly called the German chancellor “the president” of Europe. He then congratulated her for successfully “ripping off” successive US administrations on defense and trade.
EUROPE - From Iran to trade to Russia, this is shaping up to be a critical week for trans-Atlantic ties. The US and EU are on a collision course across the board. If future political scientists ever look back for a time when the trans-Atlantic relationship collapsed, this could be the moment they pinpoint. On multiple fronts, this week is shaping up as an unprecedented showdown among Germany, the European Union and the United States.
UK - Theresa May has presided over a “cloak and dagger” plot to undermine Brexit, in a move that will “blow apart” public trust in democracy, the Prime Minister’s former Brexit minister has told The Telegraph. Steve Baker, who quit the Government along with his boss, David Davis, last Sunday, says he resigned after discovering that for months an “establishment elite” had secretly been pursuing a plan for a much softer Brexit than the one on which he and Mr Davis had been working. The move effectively rendered the Brexit department a “Potemkin structure to [distract from] what the Cabinet Office Europe unit was doing for the Prime Minister,” he adds.
ISRAEL - Israel is ramping up attacks against Iranian supply lines in Syria to block the flow of weapons to Hezbollah and other Tehran-backed militias, as it seeks to drive its foe away from its borders. In June Israel targeted a far-flung compound near the Syria-Iraq border, according to a security official, after carrying out multiple strikes closer to home against suspected Iranian military assets in Syria, where Iran is a key backer of President Bashar al-Assad.
USA - QUESTION: What is your understanding of the term “Deep State”? Do you think there’s a deep state as it is referred to in the media today? I have come to understand a deep state as meaning the permanent global institutions that are on their directed agenda irrespective of its citizens or their political leaders’ agendas. The analogy I’ve arrived at is the *deep state* is the global operating system and the political class is merely the *apps*. Deep State could include military, banking, Big Pharma, Central Banks, intelligent agencies – institutions that couldn't care less who the presidents are just as long as they do not interrupt the interests of these operating institutions.
GERMANY - Increased defense spending championed by the US President Donald Trump at the NATO summit will not make the world safer, the German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said, adding that respect for international order is needed instead.
“We know that peace and security come at a price,” Maas said in a Twitter post on Saturday, just days after the end of the NATO summit in Brussels, at which Trump attempted to press the US allies into increasing their military spending not up to two but up to four percent of GDP – something that many European nations were not apparently pleased with.
USA - With mainstream media spitting out unconfirmed accusations of chemical weapons use, be it in Syria or Salisbury, don’t bother digging deeper for evidence because that’s just for ratings, Redacted Tonight host Lee Camp has said. News coverage over the recent month has presented loads of material for the latest episode of the comedy show.
USA - We found your home address through photos of your cat! Your cat could be giving away your home address… seriously. Data security and privacy has been a big topic for years. Data breaches. Identity theft. You name it. Well now, those photos you post of your cat could lead strangers straight to your home. The metadata hidden beneath those cute furry Instagram pics include your geo-location. And one website, IKnowWhereYourCatLives.com, highlights just that.
USA - US President Donald Trump used a joint press conference with UK Prime Minister Theresa May to excoriate Europe’s migrant problem, calling immigration “very negative” and saying that Europeans “better watch themselves.” “I think it’s been very bad for Europe. You see the same terrorist acts I do, we see them a lot,” Trump said, speaking to reporters at PM’s countryside residence Chequers on Friday. It follows Trump’s criticism of May’s handling of Brexit a day earlier.
ISRAEL - “Iran Project” is the IDF codename for a newly-established US-Israeli task force for executing potential decisions to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, ballistic missiles and/or military bases in the Middle East. “Project Iran” was set up during Israel’s Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Gady Eisenkott’s talks with top US brass in Washington on June 29 for coordinated US-Israeli military operations against Iran.
Disclaimer:
The views expressed in this section are not our own, unless specifically stated, but are provided to highlight what may prove to be prophetically relevant material appearing in the media.