Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team told a U.S. judge on Saturday that President Donald Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort "repeatedly and brazenly" broke the law, and argued he did not deserve leniency at sentencing.

The recommendation from Mueller, who is investigating Russia's role in the 2016 U.S. election and whether Trump's campaign conspired with Moscow, increases the likelihood that Manafort will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

Manafort pleaded guilty in a federal court in Washington last September to conspiracy against the United States - a charge that includes a range of conduct from money laundering to unregistered lobbying - and conspiracy to obstruct justice for attempts to tamper with witnesses.

He can be sentenced up to five years for each count, for a statutory maximum of 10 years.

While Mueller did not recommend a specific sentence he portrayed Manafort as a "hardened" criminal who was at risk of repeating criminal behavior if released from prison.

Earlier this month, Fox News cited two US officials as saying that the Trump administration had finalised the Mideast peace plan, dubbed the "Deal of the Century".

Israeli Education Minister Naftali Bennett claimed on Sunday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump were planning to establish a Palestinian state in the West Bank and divide Jerusalem "a day or two after election day" on 9 April.

"Netanyahu and President Trump have agreed to come out with the plan to establish a Palestinian state on 90 percent [of the West Bank]. They've agreed not to present the plan before election day so that it doesn't hurt Netanyahu, but a day or two after election day the plan will be presented, and will include the division of Jerusalem", Bennett, who heads the New Right party, said at a cabinet meeting.


In order to implement such a peace plan, Netanyahu would turn to the centrist Blue and White party of Benny Gantz in hopes to form a national unity coalition, Bennett went on to say.

"[Blue and White no. 2 Yair] Lapid and Gantz will join [the Likud-led government] and establish a 'national peace government'", he said, adding that the only way to stop that is a "strong and authentic New Right".

Netanyahu was quick to react to the claims, dismissing them as "unfounded":

"It's natural that he is stressed and he's a bit confused. It's obvious that small parties do all sorts of strange things during the election, including saying things that are unfounded".

French Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Sunday that Germany should ease its strict arms export rules for countries outside the European Union to strengthen the defense industry.

France has complained that joint arms manufacturing projects are being stalled by Berlin's refusal to authorize future arms export licenses to Saudi Arabia, a major buyer.

It has not formally banned previously approved deals but has urged industry to refrain from such shipments for now.

A top FBI official admitted to Congressional investigators last year that the agency had contacts within the Trump campaign as part of operation "Crossfire Hurricane," which sounds a lot like FBI "informant" Stefan Halper - a former Oxford University professor who was paid over $1 million by the Obama Department of Defense between 2012 and 2018, with nearly half of it surrounding the 2016 US election.

According to portions of transcripts published on Tuesday by the Epoch Times of a Aug. 31, 2018 deposition by Trisha Anderson, the FBI relied on sources who "already had campaign contacts" in order to surveil the Trump team.

"To my knowledge, the FBI did not place anybody within a campaign but, rather, relied upon its network of sources, some of whom already had campaign contacts, including the source that has been discussed in the media at some length beyond Christopher Steele," said Anderson - who was the #2 attorney at the FBI's Office of General Counsel, and had extensive involvement with the Trump counterintelligence investigation.

Back in 2015, when the British parliament was deciding on the country's participation in a US-coalition it allowed the use of its air forces in the Arab state, but never authorised boots on the ground.

The UK Ministry of Defence has confirmed that its Special Air Service (SAS) have been participating in operations against Daesh* in Syria, The Sunday Times reported citing results a freedom of information request. The request was made in light of the death of SAS soldier, Sergeant Matt Tonroe in Syria in 2018.

According to the media, the wording "British forces embedded in the armed forces of other nations operate as if they were the host nation's personnel" justified the presence of British special forces in Syria, while officially the UK never sanctioned ground operations.

As a well-known adage holds: "To the victor go the spoils." But it might well add: "Meanwhile, the losers go to the gallows."

This is the logic of victor's justice. It is the logic of the Treaty of Versailles, which demanded unpayable reparations from the vanquished German nation. It is the logic of the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, where perpetrators of war crimes pronounced judgement on the war crimes of the defeated. It is the logic of Abu Ghraib, where the US military tortured and killed its enemy captives.

Throughout human history, victorious nations have gone too far in exacting revenge from their defeated foes. The entire notion of "international law"-from the Geneva Conventions to the International Law Commission to the International Criminal Court-has been sold to the public as a check against this unfortunate tendency to impose victor's justice on the fallen. But just as history is written by the winners, so, too, is justice decided by the victors, and the case of the International Criminal Court is the prime example of that.

Think of international war crimes in the recent era and what comes to mind? America's wars of aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan based on premeditated lies about weapons of mass destruction and 9/11? The indefinite detention of captives at Camp X-ray, Guantanamo, or other military prisons that resulted from those illegal wars? Israel's use of white phosphorous in its 2009 massacre of civilians in Gaza? Saudi Arabia's campaign of genocide in Yemen (made possible by Uncle Sam's unwavering support)?

Well, let's compare that list of violations of international law to the list of "situations" that the International Criminal Court has investigated since its formation in 2003. Notice anything? Like how not a single one of those glaring war crimes we just noted are anywhere on the list? Or how every single one of those investigations (save one) targeted an African conflict?

No justice for Afghanistan. No justice for Iraq. No justice for Palestine. No justice for Yemen. No justice for any victims of any Western-allied aggression. Make no mistake: These "omissions" are not by accident but by design.

The most recent demonstration of this fact-as if another demonstration were needed-came late last month when senior ICC judge Christoph Flügge resigned in disgust over American meddling with the court's activities. Actually, "meddling" is the way many of the headline writers chose to frame America's interference with the ICC, but that word doesn't quite do justice to the situation, if you'll pardon the pun.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has not ruled out that an offensive against terrorists in Syria's Idlib province could be launched because all other options to secure the area have proved fruitless and armed groups have only strengthened their positions in the region.

"We are moving in this direction. We have never wanted a military operation [in Idlib] and we have been working to avoid it because we know that any kind of military action in Idlib would turn into a catastrophe. However, other approaches have failed, while the Nusra Front has come to control even more [of the province's] territory", Zarif said in an interview with the Swiss newspaper Basler Zeitung, published on 22 February.

The statement comes after Bouthaina Shaaban, a political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar Assad, said earlier the same day that Damascus had decided to regain control over Idlib province and was already discussing the time frame and ways to implement that decision.

An Iranian submarine successfully carried out its first cruise missile deep-sea launch during a naval drill in the nation's southern waters. The maneuvers came as US aircraft carriers returned to the region after a long absence.

A light Ghadir-class submarine fired an anti-ship cruise missile from underwater for the first time on Sunday, the Iranian Navy commander, Rear Admiral Hossein Khanzadi, told local media, adding that the missile had successfully hit its target.

It happened during the ongoing large-scale naval drill, 'Veleyat-97'. The war games are taking place in the area from the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz to the Sea of Oman and the northern parts of the Indian Ocean. The navy fired numerous cruise missiles from ships and coastal ground-based systems during the exercise. Tehran used the drill to showcase its newest frigate, 'Sahand,' and its Fateh-class submarines that military officials say can also carry cruise missiles.

Venezuela's self-proclaimed interim leader has 'formally' requested that his international partners consider 'all options' necessary to depose Maduro, as he now heads to the Lima Group summit to meet US Vice President Mike Pence.

"The events of today oblige me to take a decision - to propose formally to the international community that we should keep open all options for the liberation of our homeland, which is fighting and will continue to fight," Juan Guaido tweeted Saturday evening.

Following the chaotic and failed attempt by the opposition to forcefully bring convoys of USAID supplies into Venezuela, US-backed "interim president" Guaido vowed to attend the Lima Group summit in Bogota, apparently to discuss a course of further action with the countries that have supported his claim to power.

In a number of previous articles on military cooperation between the USA and South Korea we have tackled the problem of reaching agreement on Seoul's contribution to the expenses involved in maintaining the US military presence in South Korea. These expenses include the salaries of South Korean staff working in US bases, as well as material and technical support for the US's military facilities in the country.

With the previous five-year agreement on the financing of the US's military presence in South Korea due to expire on December 31, 2018, the two countries started discussing the terms of the new agreement on March 7, 2018. By the end of the year there had been 10 rounds of talks, but Donald Trump's repeated demands that the US's ally should pay a greater share of the expenses related to its own security prevented the two sides from reaching a consensus.

Initially the USA had sought to increase South Korea's contribution to $1.6 billion, almost double the existing amount. The demand was then reduced to $1.4 billion, and then again to approximately $1.25 billion a year, which is still almost one and a half times the previous contribution of $860 million, or 960 billion won, which amount was indexed to inflation. The negotiations involved a clash of two different "red lines": 1 trillion won is, for South Korea, something of a psychological threshold, while $1 billion, for the US, is also more than simply a sum of money.

Washington also demanded that Seoul cover the cost of military expansion on the Korean peninsula, in the event that strategic armament became necessary.

In addition, while South Korea was aiming to conclude a new agreement for a term from three to five years, the USA insisted on a one-year term.