Russian Ministry of Defense:

Security system of the Russian Khmeimim air base and Russian Naval CSS point in the city of Tartus successfully warded off a terrorist attack with massive application of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) through the night of 5th - 6th January, 2018.

As evening fell, the Russia air defence forces detected 13 unidentified small-size air targets at a significant distance approaching the Russian military bases.

Ten assault drones were approaching the Khmeimim air base, and another three - the CSS point in Tartus.

Six small-size air targets were intercepted and taken under control by the Russian EW units. Three of them were landed on the controlled area outside the base, and another three UAVs exploded as they touched the ground.

Seven UAVs were eliminated by the Pantsir-S anti-aircraft missile complexes operated by the Russian air defence units on 24-hours alert.

The Russian bases did not suffer any casualties or damages.

The Khmeimim air base and Russian Naval CSS point in Tartus are functioning on a scheduled basis.

Currently, the Russian military experts are analyzing the construction, technical filling and improvised explosives of the captured UAVs.

The Ecuadorian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) says they have granted naturalization to Julian Assange. The reaction of the MFA comes one day after Quito reportedly granted an ID card to Assange.

The passport could obtain his first step to obtaining diplomatic immunity, as Ecuador wants to resolve Assange's indefinite embassy stay. The WikiLeaks founder has been holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy for five years.

The UK Foreign Office reportedly rejected a request from Quito to grant the whistle-blower diplomatic status. The passport was reportedly granted to him on December 12.

Ecuador's foreign minister Guillaume Long, says the country is seeking a "dignified and just" solution with the UK government over Assange's case. He added that Assange will not leave Ecuador's embassy while there are no security guarantees.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein made a startling admission when asked why she released the Fusion GPS transcripts on Tuesday without first informing Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) ahead of time.

"I meant to tell him, and I didn't have a chance to tell him, and that concerns me," Feinstein told CNN Congressional correspondent Manu Raju, adding "I just got pressured, and I didn't do it."

The US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) has released over 400 ISIS terrorists from imprisonement, the Syrian Organization for Human Rights (SOHR) claimed.

The SOHR reported that they were Syrian members of the terrorist group who came "from Deir Ezzor and Al-Hasakah countryside. These members returned to the villages from which they came. After they were arrested, they were questioned for weeks. Members of the organization intended to surrender to the SDF in the contact areas held between them. The last of which was the surrender of more than 40 members of ISIS to the forces of the "Al-Jazeera Storm" Operation, in late 2017, during the violent fighting which took place in the east of the Euphrates River, in the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor, where they were carried by vehicles of the SDF towards areas in the northern countryside of Deir Ezzor. The vehicles were watched as they carried them towards Al-Hasakah province through the north of Deir Ezzor."

Earlier this week Democrat Senator Dianne Feinstein broke rank with her Congressional committee peers to unilaterally release the entire transcript of Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson's testimony to the US Senate.

The transcript release prompted Donald Trump's personal attorney Michael Cohen to file a pair of lawsuits on Tuesday against Buzzfeed and Fusion GPS.

Well, that didn't take long. Just five days into 2018, and the American fake news industry is already up and running, churning out tasteless whoppers faster than Burger King.

Wired magazine has joined the greasy ranks of other Western mythmakers now fueling a black wave of anti-Russia hysteria by mass-producing a never-ending unsubstantiated claims and outright lies against the Kremlin.

The article begins with a doomsday scenario involving some "terrorist organization or nefarious nation" making the reckless decision to cut the undersea fiber optic cables that connect people across the world. So out of all the numerous diabolical groups that now populate the planet, who did Wired nominate as the most likely to pull off such a wanton act of sabotage? Yes, you got it. Putin's Russia.

The obvious question for any rational thinking person is: Why would Russia do such a thing? Because, according to Wired, the Russian Navy has been "repeatedly caught snooping near the cables" that run along the entire expanse of the North Atlantic Ocean. Wired conveniently fails to remind its readers, however, that any country with a naval force would be forced to pass these lines on numerous occasions in the course of its travels. But acknowledging as much would be putting facts before fiction, and of course we can't have that.

Russia has an important role in the restoration of Iraq and Russian companies could help with the investment process on the Iraqi market, Iraqi government spokesman Saad Hadithi told Sputnik.

"Russia is an important state in the international community and it has an active role in the preparation of the restoration of the stability [in Iraq] and the support of the Iraqi government's rebuilding efforts. Russian companies could also help with the investment process on the Iraqi market," Hadithi said.

The government's spokesman noted that the Russian companies could also participate in the conference of Iraq's sponsors, which is scheduled to take place in Kuwait on February 12-14. According to Hadithi, Iraq has discussed the list of participants with Kuwait, but the organizing country was the one sending out invitations.

Terrorists have acquired advanced drone technologies and are now capable of launching attacks all over the world, the Russian Defense Ministry has warned, following an assault on Russian bases in Syria.

The threat of terrorists using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for attacks is not an unlikely scenario, as they attempted to use them to launch a strike in Syria against Russia's Khmeimim Airbase and a port site in Tartus, the head of the UAV department of the Russian General Staff, Major General Aleksandr Novikov, said.

He went on to say that the technical assessment of the combat drones used in the January 6 attack showed "emergence of a real threat of the UAV use for terrorist purposes anywhere in the world." The major general also called on the international community to "take relevant measures to combat" this danger.

A response to Joseph Biden, Jr. and Michael Carpenter's article in Foreign Affairs Magazine, Part I

The first week in December I received an e-mail from Foreign Affairs magazine with a featured article attached, "How to Stand Up to the Kremlin," by Joseph Biden, Jr., and Michael Carpenter. "The Team" at Foreign Affairs [FA] told me to enjoy it and please share it. I began reading it, but pretty soon it looked a lot like a typical anti-Russian propaganda piece, and I lost interest. Then when I checked my Facebook page I was greeted with a post from a FB friend on my "wall" with this same article attached asking me to please write a blog in response. Since the "friend" was my wife, I decided to at least post back a brief response to a few of the "misleading" points in the article and gave a vague promise to perhaps respond at some point with a blog. A couple of other "friends" joined in with comments assuring me I needed to give a full response. I don't really enjoy writing political blogs as much as I do the personal ones. For one thing it takes more work to dig up specific references. I often make notes on small cards to myself while reading such things, but I'm not very disciplined about where I keep these. So my "research" is actually searching every nook for where I put my notes. Second, as I have indicated before, my time in the academic world was not in contemporary politics or Russian history. It is my avocation, but my vocation as an academic was in another field. Then I received another e-mail from FA the next week, however, proclaiming how proud they were of this "breakout" piece. Furthermore, if I wanted to read more by their "brilliant writers" I could subscribe now at a reduced rate. I decided to respond to this breakout piece. (To read the article go here)

First, the article sets forth the transition from the Communism of the USSR in a very positive-even glowing-manner. I will give the full quote here:

After the Cold War, Western democracy became the model of choice for postcommunist countries in central and eastern Europe. Guided by the enlightened hands of NATO [5] and the EU, many of those countries boldly embarked on the transition from dictatorship to democracy. Remarkably, most succeeded. Post-Soviet Russia also had an opportunity to reinvent itself. Many in Europe and the United States hoped that by integrating Russia into international organizations (such as the Council of Europe, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund), they could help Russia become a responsible member of the rules-based international order and develop a domestic constituency for democratic reforms. Many Russians also dreamed of creating a democratic, stable, and prosperous Russia. But that dream is now more distant than at any time since the Cold War ended.

In newly revealed court documents, federal prosecutors say indicted democratic Sen. Nathaniel T. Oaks admitted to taking cash payments and trips to Vegas in exchange for official business.

The Baltimore Sun reported on Friday that the new revelations emerged in a recently filed court document in the ongoing criminal case against Sen. Oaks. A trial for Sen. Oaks is set for mid-April, where he faces charges of bribery and obstruction of justice. So far, Sen. Oaks has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Sen. Oaks, a Baltimore Democrat, has a long history of corruption in Maryland politics. He was a member of the House of Delegates from 1983 to 1989 when he forfeited his seat after being convicted of stealing from his campaign. In 1994, Sen. Oaks was reelected, as fraud and politicians in Baltimore are one of the same. Recently, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan appointed Sen. Oaks to the State Senate when Lisa Gladden fell ill.