Russia may have averted war between North Korea and the United States.

Valentina Matvienko, the Chairwoman of the Russian Federation Council, the upper house of Russia's Federal Assembly, has for the first time, confirmed to journalists that in early October of this year, the government of North Korea wrote a formal letter to Russia stating that Pyongyang was prepared to launch a nuclear strike on the United States.

Seeing as this statement came shortly after Donald Trump's infamous threat to "destroy" North Korea during an insulting UN speech where he referred to Kim Jong-un as "rocket man", it appears that North Korea's promise to "visit rockets to the US mainland" made days later at the UN, were serious.

It has also emerged that Russia informed the US of the North Korean position which caused the US to tone down its rhetoric on North Korea, upon learning that North Korea in fact meant what it said.

A western intelligence source has claimed to the BBC that Iran is building a new permanent military base in Syria just to the south of Damascus.

This came as Israel claimed it will not tolerate an Iranian military base in Syria as the country borders the Zionist entity.

"Israel will not let that happen," he said in September.

While US sanctions on Moscow prevent its firms from teaming up with Russia, other foreign companies will "inevitably" fill the gaps in the Russian market, Vladimir Putin warns. The Russian leader, however, holds out hope for "balanced" bilateral relations.

"By banning ExxonMobil from working in our Arctic, [the US] only deprived it from an interesting, promising project, that could have boosted the US economy and created more jobs in the US, bringing in revenues and taxes," the Russian president told reporters on Saturday at a press conference at the APEC summit in Vietnam. Adding that the oil giant is just one case among others, Putin warned: "Your [US companies'] place will be taken over by rivals. It is inevitable in the modern world."

No visit to China would be complete without seeing the Great Wall, which is exactly how first lady Melania Trump wrapped her first-ever trip to Asia. Stopping before she went to the top, Trump spoke exclusively with CNN about her six-day tour of the region, specifically how she felt seeing her first lady counterparts in Japan, South Korea and China.

"We had a great time, it was nice to see them again," said Trump of Akie Abe of Japan, Madam Kim Jung-sook of South Korea and Madam Peng Liyuan of China."They were in the United States before and we have a great relationship with all three of them," she said.

Venezuelan democracy is firmly on the path toward protagonist democracy as the main feature of its political system.

The governing United Socialist Party of Venezuela recently obtained a resounding electoral victory for state governorship. The election was called by the National Electoral Council at the instance of the National Constituent Assembly. Soon after, the opposition group Democratic Unity Coalition seemed to be in disarray. Enrique Capriles of the Justice First party, for example, resigned from the MUD coalition questioning Henry Ramos Allup of the Democratic Action party who in turn expelled the four AD governors who dared to be sworn-in in front of the ANC in acceptance of the election results.

Russia's parliament warned on Friday some U.S. and other foreign media could be declared "foreign agents" and obliged to regularly declare full details of their funding, finances and staffing.

Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of the State Duma, said parliament could back legislation as early as next week in response to what lawmakers view as U.S. pressure on Russian media.

"Possible restrictions will be the same as those taken by the United States," Interfax news agency quoted him as saying.

He said some U.S. media in Russia were trying to turn U.S. public opinion against Moscow.

There are two myths which are deeply imprinted in the minds of most US Americans which are extremely dangerous and which can result in a war with Russia.

• The first myth is the myth of the US military superiority.
• The second myth is the myth about the US invulnerability.

I believe that it is therefore crucial to debunk these myths before they end up costing us millions of lives and untold suffering.

In my latest piece for the Unz Review I discussed the reasons why the US armed forces are nowhere nearly as advanced as the US propaganda machine would have us believe. And even though the article was a discussion of Russian military technologies I only gave one example, in passing, of Russian military technologies by comparing the T-50 PAKFA to the US F-35 (if you want to truly get a feel for the F-35 disaster, please read this and this). First, I am generally reluctant to focus on weapons systems because I strongly believe that, in the vast majority of real-world wars, tactics are far more important than technologies. Second, Andrei Martyanov, an expert on Russian military issues and naval warfare, has recently written two excellent pieces on Russian military technologies (see here and here) which gave many more examples (check out Martyanov's blog). Having read some of the comments posted under Martyanov's and my articles, I think that it is important, crucial, in fact, to drive home the message to those who still are thoroughly trained by the propaganda machine to instantly dismiss any notion of US vulnerability or, even more so, technological inferiority. I am under no illusion about the capability of those who still watch the idiot box to be woken out of their lethargic stupor by the warnings of Paul Craig Roberts, William Engdal, Dmitrii Orlov, Andrei Martyanov or myself. But I also think that we have to keep trying, because the war party (the Neocon Uniparty) is apparently trying really hard to trigger a conflict with Russia. So what I propose to do today is to connect the notions of "war with Russia" and "immediate and personal suffering" by showing that if Russia is attacked two of the most sacred symbols of the USA, aircraft carriers and the US mainland itself, would be immediately attacked and destroyed.

Allegations of links between Russia and Donald Trump's former campaign manager were fabricated by the US President's opponents as a weapon against him, Vladimir Putin has claimed.

Reports Mr Putin's relatives had been in contact with the Trump administration were untrue, the Russian President told a briefing at the end of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Vietnam.

He described claims of any Kremlin interference in the US election as "absurd".

The moment that Democrats and Globalists have been dreading has finally occurred, The President of the United States of America, Donald J. Trump has finally met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and together the pair has vowed to unite and destroy ISIS.

The brazen and charismatic President Trump made an agreement with the idolized Vladimir Putin in order to completely annihilate ISIS inside of Syria once and for all.


In a show of unity both Washington and Moscow agree that there is no military solution to the conflict and both countries expressed a commitment to Damascus' sovereignty

The U.S. is betting on the default of Venezuela affecting its financial credibility and hampering its debt repayments.

While continuing the commercial and financial embargo and the systematic attack on PDVSA, it was revealed at the start of November that imports of Venezuelan oil to the United States this year have declined to 56 percent compared to last year.

This multi-pronged attack that this state industry is facing as the main foreign exchange earner of the country, has been run by a network of internal allies, many of whom have been detained by the Public Prosecutor's Office in recent months. This was after the former Attorney General Luisa Ortega Diaz became a key factor in allowing the continuity of these mafias to operate within the company.