According to Gen. Philip Breedlove, Vladimir Putin's efforts have allowed Moscow to create a potent military force in the country.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's efforts have allowed Moscow to create a potent military force in the country, NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe Gen. Philip Breedlove said.

"I look at the capabilities and the capacities that Mr. Putin is creating in his military force... As you know he has been investing strongly now in his military for over five years. He has created a very potent land force. You have seen his air forces in Syria recently and he has exercised that and he has also got into the long-range precision strike capabilities both from his ships and his submarines," Breedlove told the Estonian ETV television channel on Monday.

Russia is currently implementing a large-scale rearmament program, announced in 2010, to modernize 70-percent of its military hardware by 2020. The total modernization program cost is estimated to reach about 20 trillion rubles (some $291 billion at current exchange rates).

Washington seems to agree with Russia that the Syrian people should decide whether President Bashar Assad remains in power. During a briefing, US State Department spokesperson Mark Toner said it is up to the Syrian people to decide the future government.

Russia has been pushing the notion for years that the only people who should decide President Assad's future are the Syrian people themselves. Now it seems as if Washington may have changed its tune, having originally been unwilling to accept any idea of Assad staying in power, regardless of the wishes of the Syrian population.

"We believe that a political process that reflects the desires and will of the Syrian people is what should ultimately decide the future leadership and the future government of Syria," Toner said during a briefing on Monday.

He also agreed that there has been an increased amount of cooperation between Washington and Moscow regarding Syria.

With 28 killings in 2015, the US is the only country in the Americas and among OSCE members to be on the list of top executioners published by Amnesty International, coming right after Saudi Arabia, Iran and Pakistan.

At least 1,634 people were put to death in 25 countries in 2015, Amnesty International said. Saudi Arabia, Iran and Pakistan account for nearly 90 percent of those.

The US, it appears, had more executions than Iraq last year - 28 in six states: Texas (13), Missouri (6), Georgia (5), Florida (2), Oklahoma (1) and Virginia (1).

Last year, at least 2,851 people were under sentence of death in America, including 746 in California, 389 in Florida, 250 in Texas, 185 in Alabama and 181 in Pennsylvania, according to the report.

"While the 2015 figure was the lowest number of executions recorded in a single year since 1991, the decrease was in part linked to legal challenges that resulted in the revision of lethal injection protocols or problems faced by states in obtaining lethal injection chemicals," the human rights watchdog explained.

Thirty-two US states still retain the death sentence. Texas carried out almost half of all executions in 2015.

The state of Virginia carried out its first execution since 2013, while two states - Arizona and Ohio - had to put executions on hold because of issues concerning lethal injections.

"The USA continued to use the death penalty in ways that contravene international law and standards, including on people with mental and intellectual disabilities," Amnesty said in its annual report on the use of capital punishment.

Amnesty cited the case of Warren Hill, who was executed by the state of Georgia despite the fact that all experts who had assessed him, including those provided by the state, agreed that he had an intellectual disability. "His execution amounted to the arbitrary deprivation of life in violation of Article 6 of the ICCPR [the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights], to which the USA is a state party," Amnesty said.

Russia's proposal to include Kurds in Geneva Syrian talks was vetoed by the UN Security Council's Western members, UN envoy Vitaly Churkin reported, saying this contradicts UN resolutions on Syrian reconciliation and ignores calls for inclusive talks.

Churkin warned that if the Syrian Kurds do not participate in the peace process, international efforts to bring peace to Syria could be undermined. "We are concerned that the Syrian Kurds, historically woven into the social fabric of the country, still have not been invited to the Geneva talks," he said, pointing out that by not inviting the Kurds, the West is violating the spirit of inclusiveness for the Syrian talks in the UN Security Council resolutions on Syria. The diplomat also slammed the actions of the non-permanent member Ukraine, whose opposition to the Russian draft "added its destructive share" to the final decision.

The UN's blocking of the participation of the Syrian Kurds in peace talks has been made "in order to please several regional players," the Russian Foreign Ministry has said. "This stance can't but provoke deep regret, all the more because it is at odds with the decisions of the International Syria Support Group and the UN Security Council resolution 2254," a statement from the ministry read. "It is evident that this has been done to please some of the regional players, for which ambitions are more important than the real stabilization of the situation in Syria," the statement added.

Russia will "insist on Kurdish participation in the next round of the Syrian talks," and this participation is essential, the Russian side believes.

Translated by Ollie Richardson for Fort Russ.

You brought it upon yourselves.

Yesterday's Panamanian crib notes immediately received a fitting answer. Guys who are receiving grants from Soros Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation, their owners, and other interested parties were thinking that they were taking part in a hunt for the beast. Well, well. This time they were made to play ping-pong, but they didn't even notice it. So naive are they... They scattered the documents around 80 countries and 400 paid journalists to deducted names and addresses. Well, at least one of them was from the CBP (Foreign Intelligence Service) and a couple hundred from the GRU...And they've got their punishment, not them, of course, but their owners.

The Russian President said that he has decided to declassify many archival documents, and that he will sign the decree today. And it was signed. Here.

And he quietly added: "This, as far as I know, according to the information from archive agencies, concerns the period from 1930 to 1989. In these documents there are cases, excuse me, of snitches as well as the innocently repressed, with very interesting names, some documents will surprise society..."

In fact, what is happening is a test for society and the President. He passed an exam for the "leader of the nation", and society - for the "superpower". I have no doubt, personally, of the result. And also no doubt on the number of political cadavers that will appear soon in stupid Europe, which thought that she was taking part in the hunt for the beast, whilst the ambush was prepared for her.

This is it. This is the end. My sources in Aleppo tell me it is going to be the end of the rats in the province. I can confirm that thousands of troops are pouring into the area southwest of the city with a variety of soldiers some of them wearing the insignia of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, Hizbollah, Russia and even Chechnya. Putin and Khamenei have made the decision that the cease fire will not produce any results until the Turk-British-supported rodents are driven out of all Syria. This was a decision made during the last 7 days as it became clear Nusra/Alqaeda was making preparations to retake Highway 5 at Tal Al-'Ays by bringing forward large numbers of trucks, armored cars, pickups with 23mm cannons, various calibers of artillery and newly-acquired anti-aircraft missiles obtained from Saudi Arabia and manufactured in the United States and France. The joint operation is called "OPERATION FIRE FROM HELL". It will begin in less than 24 hours and my source tells me that thousands of citizens are leaving homes in areas controlled by the terrorists because they know the devastation will be complete.

Russia's fifth generation T-50 fighter jet is a multi-role plane capable of resolving an array of special tactical tasks, according to Givi Dzhandzhgava, head of the Ramenskoye Instrument Design Bureau.

In an interview with the Russian network Zvezda, Givi Dzhandzhgava, head and chief designer of the Ramenskoye Instrument Design Bureau, touted the Russian fifth generation T-50 fighter jet, also known as the PAK FA, as a sophisticated plane capable of solving a whole array of special tasks.

"PAK FA is a multi-purpose aircraft, which can, in addition to winning air superiority, solve a spate of tactical tasks. Thanks to its stealth characteristics, the T-50 will be able to penetrate deep into the enemy territory and conduct pinpoint strikes," Dzhandzhgava said.

Asked about feasibility of the PAK FA being armed with cruise missiles, he said that "sometimes it is necessary to destroy a target during subsequent strikes rather than the first one, something that you will be unable to fulfill with help of a cruise missile."

Chief of the General Staff of the Austrian Armed Forces, Lt. Gen. Othmar Commenda said that Russia for Austria is much closer than other great powers.

The Austrian Armed Forces are ready to develop cooperation with Russia, despite recommendations of other world powers, the Chief of the General Staff of the Austrian Armed Forces, Lt. Gen. Othmar Commenda said Wednesday.

Commenda arrived in Moscow on Tuesday with the high-level Austrian delegation led by President Heinz Fischer.

"I'm not going to follow the guidance and obey someone's orders with whom to communicate and do not communicate. It is the reason why I wanted to visit you," Commenda told the head of Russia's General Staff, Gen. Valery Gerasimov, expressing gratitude for the invitation to visit Russia.

Earlier today, for the first time we got a glimpse into some of the American names allegedly contained in the "Panama Papers", largest ever leak. "Some", not all, and "allegedly" because as we said yesterday, "one can't help but wonder: why not do a Wikileaks type data dump, one which reveals if not all the 2.6 terabytes of data due to security concerns, then at least the identities of these 441 US-based clients. After all, with the rest of the world has already been extensively shamed, it's only fair to open US books as well."

The exact same question appeared in an interview conducted between Wired magazine and the director of the organization that released the Panama Papers, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, or ICIJ, Gerard Ryle.

Since the April 4th, we all have been enjoying the "revelations" coming from OCCRD, an organization funded by the George Soros' Open Society Foundation and the USAID, a front for C.I.A. operations and operatives. In brief, they claim that people known to President Putin personally shifted $2bln though some offshore shell companies to avoid sanctions on financial translations with Russia that were imposed by Obama regime.

For several years we have witnessing a frantic search for the "Putin's fortune" in banks and companies around the world. In 2014 it was estimated $400bln. In 2015 it shrunk to $40bln. This year, it's meager $2bln they are now talking about.

What all of these American and European small time neo-liberal crooks don't understand is that Vladimir Putin thanks to his work to restore Russia has already become a figure comparable to Saint Vladimir and Peter the Great. We don't need to wait for centuries to recognize his place in history.

The West refuses to understand that Vladimir Putin has already taken everything in Russia, but not in terms of money or wealth, but in terms of responsibility.