The US and its allies could indeed witness a hydrogen bomb test over the Pacific, unless they stop devising military options against Pyongyang, a senior North Korean diplomat has warned. This, as the US Navy beefs up its presence ahead of Donald Trump's visit in the region.

Speaking on the sidelines of United Nations General Assembly last month, North Korean FM Ri Yong-ho said that if backed into a corner, Pyongyang could conduct "the most powerful detonation" of a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific Ocean. On Wednesday, Ri Yong Pil, a senior diplomat in North Korea's Foreign Ministry, told CNN that the minister's warning should be taken "literally" as tensions with Washington continue to rise.

"The foreign minister is very well aware of the intentions of our supreme leader, so I think you should take his words literally," Ri told the US news outlet, warning that Pyongyang "has always brought its words into action."

The Iraqi parliament is demanding to give a clear definition of a "freeze" on the results of Kurdish independence referendum, proposed earlier by Iraqi Kurdistan's government, Abbas Bayati, an Iraqi lawmaker and State of Law Coalition member, told Sputnik.

According to the lawmaker, the Iraqi parliament had not received any official proposals from the regional authorities yet, adding that he himself had learned about the initiative from media reports.

"Out of three points, two require clarification - the issue of freezing results of the referendum is uncertain and unclear for us. What does the freeze mean? Is it a complete renunciation of the referendum, or does it mean that after a certain period of time they will go back to the issue, if they want to? We believe that the referendum is over, it is in the past," Bayati said.

Today the Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) alleging the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign committee violated campaign finance law by failing to accurately disclose the purpose and recipient of payments for the dossier of research alleging connections between then-candidate Donald Trump and Russia. The CLC's complaint asserts that by effectively hiding these payments from public scrutiny the DNC and Clinton "undermined the vital public information role of campaign disclosures."

On October 24, The Washington Post revealed that the DNC and Hillary for America paid opposition research firm Fusion GPS to dig into Trump's Russia ties, but routed the money through the law firm Perkins Coie and described the purpose as "legal services" on their FEC reports rather than research. By law, campaign and party committees must disclose the reason money is spent and its recipient.

"By filing misleading reports, the DNC and Clinton campaign undermined the vital public information role of campaign disclosures," said Adav Noti, senior director, trial litigation and strategy at CLC, who previously served as the FEC's Associate General Counsel for Policy. "Voters need campaign disclosure laws to be enforced so they can hold candidates accountable for how they raise and spend money. The FEC must investigate this apparent violation and take appropriate action."

"Questions about who paid for this dossier are the subject of intense public interest, and this is precisely the information that FEC reports are supposed to provide," said Brendan Fischer, director, federal and FEC reform at CLC. "Payments by a campaign or party committee to an opposition research firm are legal, as long as those payments are accurately disclosed. But describing payments for opposition research as 'legal services' is entirely misleading and subverts the reporting requirements."

The US envoy to the UN, Nikki Haley, was evacuated from a UN refugee camp in South Sudan due to a demonstration against the country's president, US media outlets have reported.

Haley was at a UN-run camp for internally displaced persons when a protest against South Sudanese president Salva Kiir got out of hand, according to CBS News.

After Haley's departure, UN security guards fired tear gas to disperse a crowd of over 100 camp residents who were looting the offices of a charity, CBS reported citing an aid worker who wished to remain anonymous.

Haley has already moved on to the next stop in her Africa tour, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to US officials.

Senior ministers in Margaret Thatcher's government tried to cover up the contaminated blood scandal that led to the deaths of over 2,400 from AIDS and Hepatitis C, newly-released documents show.

The papers, uncovered by campaigner Jason Evans and published by Sky News, show how ministers sought to reduce any financial aid to the victims who received contaminated blood, while acknowledging they could not "in presentational terms" deny they were at fault.

More than 4,000 British hemophiliacs were given blood contaminated with Hepatitis C and HIV by the National Health Service (NHS) during the 1970s and 1980s. The UK attained the substance 'Factor VIII' from the US due to a shortage in blood products. The 'Factor VIII' blood was manufactured from multiple donors including sex workers, prisoners and habitual drug users, some of whom were paid for their contribution.

Exposed for the first time, a 1987 proposal to the Cabinet Home and Social Affairs Committee subcommittee on AIDS, written by Conservative Secretary of State for Social Security John Moore, advised how the government should respond to the unfolding scandal.

Touching on the Russian uranium deal, Steele dossier, Obama's administration, the Clinton campaign, opioids and relations inside the GOP, President Donald Trump held a rapid-fire news conference on the White House lawn before departing for Texas.

Trump is traveling to Dallas for a briefing on hurricane recovery efforts, before attending a roundtable with Republican donors Wednesday.

OBAMA'S WATERGATE

Trump called the Obama administration's approval of the 2010 sale of American uranium to a Russian-based company a "modern-age" Watergate.

"I think the uranium sale to Russia and the way it was done ‒ so underhanded with tremendous amounts of money being passed ‒ I actually think that's Watergate of the modern age," the president said.

We noted back in July that the only relevant "collusion with the Russians" during the 2016 election cycle was the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton smear campaign against Donald Trump:

Hillary Clinton campaign cut-out hires the (former?) British intelligence agent Steele to pay money to (former?) Russian intelligence agents and high-level Kremlin employees for dirt about Donald Trump. They deliver some fairy tales. The resulting dossier is peddled far and wide throughout Washington DC with the intent of damaging Trump.

There was never evidence that Steele indeed talked to any Russian, or really had contact with his claimed sources. He has been for years persona non grata in Moscow and could not visit the country.

Yesterday, our assertion that Clinton campaign cut-outs paid for the dossier, was finally confirmed: Clinton campaign, DNC paid for research that led to Russia dossier

Marc E. Elias, a lawyer representing the Clinton campaign and the DNC, retained Fusion GPS, a Washington firm, to conduct the research.
...
After that, Fusion GPS hired dossier author Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer with ties to the FBI and the U.S. intelligence community, according to those people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Told ya so ...

This past weekend, Venezuela failed to make $237 million in bond coupon payment, blaming "technical glitches" when in reality it simply did not have the money (or wish to part with it). Adding the $349 million in unpaid bond interest accumulated over the past month as of last Friday, that brings Caracas' unpaid bills to $586 million this month, just days before the nation must make a critical principal payment. And, as BofA sovereign debt analyst Jane Brauer writes, while the bank's base case assumption is that Venezuela will make its debt service payments this year, "the probability of a short term default has increased substantially with coupon delays" and it could come as soon as this Friday, when an $842 million PDVSA principal plus interest payment is due, and which unlike typical bond payments does not have a 30 day grace period but instead is followed by a second $1.1 billion PDVSA coupon on Nov 2, also without a 30 day grace period.

As Brauer writes, Venezuela has been in as similar situation of payment uncertainty in the recent past, with bond prices plummeting right before a big payment. For example, just before a big principal payment was due in April 2017 Venezuela received a $1bn loan from Russia just one week before the due date. At that time Ven 27s dropped 16% in a month (from $52 to $45) and recovered completely within a month. Ven 27 has fallen to $35, as Venezuela has demonstrated that it will be a challenge to make all payments on time. The difference between now and April is that coupon payment delays then came after, not before the payment.

Meanwhile, Venezuela has managed to redefine the concept of payment "on time" which now means "by the end of the grace period"

U.S. soldiers later killed in an ambush accompanying Nigerien security forces in early October may have given chase to Islamic State militants all the way to the Malian-Nigerien border, Nigerien military officials tell The New York Times.

U.S. officials denied the Nigerien account to The NYT, instead saying they became aware of ISIS militants presence in a border town and were later ambushed after a meeting with a local village elder. The circumstances leading up to the meeting are what remain in dispute, whether U.S. soldiers participated in chasing the militants or whether they simply became aware of them.

The ISIS group thought to be responsible is known as the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara and are led by Abu Walid al Sahrawi. Sahrawi has a long history with militant groups in Mali and at different times having associations with al-Qaida, running his own militia, and finally pledging allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi in May 2015.

As Syrian forces continue to crush pockets of terrorists in Deir ez-Zor, closing in on the last significant ISIS stronghold in the province, an RT Arabic crew traveling with the army reported of heavy clashes on the outskirts of Al-Mayadeen.

The RT crew embedded with the Syrian army witnessed a huge offensive against IS (Islamic State, formerly ISIS/ISIL) terrorists on the outskirts of Tabiyah and Huweijit Saqar, both located on the eastern bank of the Euphrates River.

In a matter of days, Syrian forces supported by Russian airpower have pushed ISIS fighters more than 15 kilometers to the east of Al-Mayadeen city which was liberated earlier this month.

As fighting on eastern front continues, battles on the southern front has also intensified, RT Arabic correspondent Wafa Shubruni reported. The Syrian command hopes to rout the last remaining ISIS stronghold in Deir ez-Zor Governorate in the city of Al-Bukamal, which lies near the border with Iraq.