A crowd of at least 60,000 anti-austerity protesters in Manchester was chaperoned by snipers, who carefully watched over the march which had been staged to coincide with the Conservative Party conference held in the city. Activists at the march spotted several snipers along their route and were quick to report it on Twitter. Sharpshooters were seen on the top of several roofs in the city center, with one user, Ben Whittingham, posting an aerial photograph of one of the marksman.

"Just a police sniper on roof of Tory party conference, which resembles a prison," he tweeted. City police confirmed the activists' worst fears, but insisted that the snipers had been placed on the roofs "purely for observation" as they supported the security on the ground of the event.

"They are high up for that reason, to observe. And they [the guns] are used for their powerful sight, which is stronger than any pair of binoculars," a Greater Manchester Police (GMP) spokesperson told the Manchester Evening News.

"They are not there to shoot people," the spokesperson emphasized.

Western countries are using terrorism as an instrument of control, Syrian President Bashar Assad said in a recent interview. He also said that he is ready to step down if his departure is the solution to the four-year-long conflict.

"From the beginning it was clear to us that there were foreign hands behind terrorism in Syria," Assad said in interview with Iran's Habar TV.

President Assad thinks that the US-led coalition against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) is ineffective because the West does not want to defeat terrorist groups. In fact, it wants to preserve the balance between the warring sides to "perpetuate the process of erosion in Syria and Iraq and later other countries of the region, so that we all remain weak for decades and maybe generations."

"How can the United States and its allies fight terrorism or ISIS in Syria and Iraq while their closest allies in the government of Erdogan and Davutoglu are supporting terrorists and enabling them to cross the borders and bring weapons, money and volunteers through Turkey?" he asked.

Since the US-led coalition was formed, terrorism expanded geographically and its recruits multiplied, the Syrian president said.

"God willing it [Syria, Iran and Hezbollah] will be able to defeat terrorism which is a new instrument for subjugating the region," he stressed.

Unlike the US-led coalition, Russia together with Iran, Iraq and Syria have "great chances of success."

"It must succeed. Otherwise, the whole region, not only one or two countries, will be destroyed," Assad said.

Russia, as well the Soviet Union in the past, "[has] never tried to impose anything on Syria, especially in this crisis," he said stressing that, as opposed to the US, Russia is against interferences, hegemony and violations of the UN Charter.

'If my departure is the solution, I will never hesitate to do that'.

The entire free world wants terrorism defeated. Russia leads the effort to confront it head-on.

On October 3, Tass said Russian aircraft conducted over 60 sorties so far, bombing 50 ISIS targets, causing consternation in its ranks. National Defence Control Centre Col. General Andrey Kartapolov said, "aircraft have been taking off from the Hmeimim airbase (night and day), targeting the whole of Syria."

"In the past three days we have managed to disrupt the terrorists' infrastructure and to substantially degrade their combat capabilities. Intelligence reports say that militants are leaving the areas under their control."

"A bunker-busting BETAB-500 air bomb dropped from a Sukhoi Su-34 bomber near Raqqa has eliminated the command post of one of the terror groups, together with an underground storage facility for explosives and munitions."

A powerful precision electro-optical TV-guided KAB-500 air bomb was used against an ISIS location near Maarrat al-Numan, destroying its facilities, weapons, ammunition, fuel and equipment.

Photographic evidence showed major damage and destruction of ISIS targets struck. Drones maintain round-the-clock surveillance of their activities.

Three days into its bombing campaign in Syria, Russia on Friday at last targeted Islamic State positions, striking at the defacto capital of the terror organization and at least one other site.

The Russian strikes at the Islamic State came after two days in which its aircraft attacked locations belonging to other fighting groups opposed to Syrian President Bashar Assad, including CIA-supported rebels, sparking calls for the Obama administration to do something to protect fighters it had trained and equipped.

But President Barack Obama made clear that the U.S. had no plans to deepen its role in Syria.

"We're not going to make Syria into a proxy war between the United States and Russia," Obama said at a White House press conference. "That would be bad strategy on our part."

Russia tightly shut the sky over Syria for any aircraft, except its own

American military expert, a former Colonel of the U.S. army Jack Jacobs said that the United States can't interfere with Russians in Syria, as Russia de facto set up a no-fly zone, cutting off access to any aircraft with the help of air defense systems deployed on land and on ships of the Russian navy in the Mediterranean.

In the Saudi paper on Friday, October 2 appeared an interview with former U.S. Colonel Jack Jacobs, who announced that the United States can't stop the Russians in Syria, as Russia has set up a no-fly zone.. This means that any military aircraft entering the combat zone, may be immediately shot down as a threat to the Russian airspace forces.

American sources claim that the Russian Federation, with the assistance of deployed land-based air defense systems, have established a no-fly zone over the entire airspace of Syria, in addition the approaches to the Russian airbase in Latakia are also closed from the sea to a distance of 100-250 km from the coast by the Russian navy, now conducting exercises in the Mediterranean sea.

Thus, the U.S. and its allies can't even carry out the air reconnaissance of the Russian Federation forces.

Imagine a kid at school. An intimidating kid he is, packing a lot of muscle, used to getting his own way, and with no scruples about bullying other kids that stand in his way. His goal is to get everyone to acknowledge his authority and leadership over them, and he's not afraid to use any number of tactics to make this happen.

Sometimes he humiliates them. Sometimes he arm-twists them. Sometimes he threatens to take their money. Sometimes he gets other kids to fight his battles for him, promising them all sorts of perks. Sometimes he even tortures some folks, if need be. And if he sees anyone standing in his way, he has no hesitation in demonising them, making up all sorts of stories up about them, turning some of the other kids against them, before going in with his gang to sort them out.

Cut to another scene and the same kid is standing up in front of the whole school giving a speech. He starts by talking of the need to solve disputes using diplomacy. He speaks about the need to stand up to what he calls "strongmen" in the school. He berates some of the bigger boys for asserting themselves in ways that contravene the rules of the school. He speaks about spreading peace and moving away from what he calls the "old ways of conflict and coercion".

Warming to his theme he says that force alone cannot impose order, but he also mentions that of course he possesses massive force and will use it if necessary. He talks about the history of the school over the past few years, telling his audience about all the bad guys out there and what they've been up to. He's careful not to mention his own part in it though, but he does manage to praise himself for the great job he's been doing of keeping order.

On Thursday, Russian warplanes stationed in Syria attacked a terrorist training camp and a command center, taking it out with a precision strike launched form an altitude of over 5,000 meters, the Russian Defense Ministry reported.

The airstrike was one of a dozen conducted by Russia in Syria on Thursday during 18 sorties, Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov, the ministry spokesman, told journalists. Advanced Sukhoi Su-25 and Su-34s were used for strikes.

"The targeting systems of those planes allows for hitting ground targets with absolute precision, which was proven yesterday during combat missions targeting ISIS infrastructure," he said. "We can use this type of aircraft to deliver strikes anywhere in Syria."

Overnight, the Russian Air Force conducted 10 sorties and hit seven targets in Syria, Konashenkov said. Over the 24 hours the planes bombed a field camp in Aleppo province, a logistics center in Idlib province and a command point at a fortified facility in Hama province.

Not that they ever were, but they've finally decided to be honest about it. Which to be honest, is pretty scary.

From the Independent:

Human rights are no longer a "top priority" for the Government, Britain's most senior Foreign Office official has admitted, as ministers put resources into supporting trade deals ahead of tackling injustice in other parts of the world. In a remarkably frank admission to MPs, Sir Simon McDonald, Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Office, said that human rights no longer had the "profile" within his department that they had "in the past".

Yes, you read that right. Trade deals. You know like...

Forget the TPP - Wikileaks Releases Documents from the Equally Shady "Trade in Services Agreement," or TISA

And he added that the Conservatives' "prosperity agenda" was now "further up the list" of areas on which the department was concentrating its dwindling resources.

Last night human rights charities said Sir Simon's comments were as "astonishing as they were alarming" and described the change in focus as "deeply regrettable".

Sir Simon made his remarks to Mr Blunt's committee when he was questioned about how his department was prioritising resources. Asked whether human rights were now one of its "lower-priority activities", Sir Simon replied: "Well, answering as Permanent Secretary, I say that although it is one of the things we follow, it is not one of our top priorities." He added: "In a more constrained environment, the need to concentrate on Europe, Eastern Europe and Russia, and the Middle East has supplanted it to an extent."

So starting World War 3 is now the priority. Got it.

The following would be funny, if it weren't so incredibly sad. The United Nations' spiral into clownish insignificance continues unabated.

From the New York Times: GENEVA — In a U-turn at the United Nations Human Rights Council, Western governments dropped plans Wednesday for an international inquiry into human rights violations by all parties in the war in Yemen that has killed thousands of civilians in the last six months.

The change of direction came as the Netherlands withdrew the draft of a resolution it had prepared with support from a group of mainly Western countries that instructed the United Nations high commissioner for human rights to send experts to Yemen to investigate the conduct of the war.

That proposal was a follow-up to recommendations by the commissioner, Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein, who detailed in a report this month the heavy civilian loss of life inflicted not only by the relentless airstrikes of the military coalition led by Saudi Arabia but also by the indiscriminate shelling carried out by Houthi rebels.

But in the face of stiff resistance from Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners, and to the dismay of human rights groups, Western governments have accepted a resolution based on a Saudi text that lacks any reference to an independent, international inquiry.

"The result is a lost opportunity for the council and a huge victory for Saudi Arabia, protecting it from scrutiny over laws of war violations which will probably continue to be committed in Yemen," said Philippe Dam, deputy director of Human Rights Watch in Geneva.

British journalist Lindsey Hilsum argues that many Syrians hold Russian President Vladimir Putin for their friend and see Russians as saviors.

Residents in the Syrian cities of Tartous and Latakia believe that Russia's military operation against the ISIL terrorist group would bring the war in the country to an end, the British journalist wrote.

Moreover, they believe that the US is to blame for strengthening of the terrorists and their allies.

According to Hilsum, most people living in the territories under control of Syrian President Bashar-al-Assad say that they are ready to serve in the government army, but hope that the war will soon come to an end and that the military mobilization stops.

According to Hilsum, Syrians are welcoming the Russian military who started a operation in the country after Assad's official request.

"The Russians are the heroes of the hour. People greet the few foreigners who visit with a cheerful Russian "Dobry den!" and shout out their enthusiasm for President Putin, who they believe will deliver them from terrorism," Hilsum wrote in the Guardian.