President of Mexico Enrique Peña Nieto has canceled his trip to Washington, following US President Donald Trump's order to begin construction on the border wall between the two countries.

"This morning we have informed the White House that I will not attend the meeting scheduled for next Tuesday with the [President of the United States]," Nieto announced via Twitter.

The announcement follows Trump's tweet earlier on Thursday saying that "If Mexico is unwilling to pay for the badly needed wall, then it would be better to cancel the upcoming meeting."

Mexican officials were "stunned" by Trump's tweets, AP reported. Jorge Castaneda, former foreign minister (2000-2003), told local media that Nieto "has no other choice but to say 'I'm not going'."

On Wednesday, Trump signed executive orders to begin preparations for construction of the wall along the Mexican border - one of the new president's key promises from the electoral campaign.

Legislation paving the way for the government to start the Brexit process has been published, igniting months of intense parliamentary wrangling.

The bill allowing the government to trigger Article 50, the formal process for leaving the EU, has been published after the Supreme Court ruled parliament must have a say before Brexit proceedings begin.

The European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Act 2017 will give May the power to take Britain out of the EU.

It contains just two clauses. The first says: "The Prime Minister may notify, under Article 50(2) of the Treaty on European Union, the United Kingdom's intention to withdraw from the EU."

The second clause states that "this section has effect despite any provision made by or under the European Communities Act 1972 or any other enactment."

Demonstrating just how ideologically aligned with the Obama administration the entire US State Department was, moments ago the WaPo reported that "the entire senior level of management officials resigned Wednesday, part of an ongoing mass exodus of senior foreign service officers who don't want to stick around for the Trump era."

The mass resignation took place as Rex Tillerson was inside the State Department's headquarters in Foggy Bottom on Wednesday, taking meetings and getting the lay of the land.

According to WaPo's Josh Rogin who suddenly has no more senior level sources left at State:

"I reported Wednesday morning that the Trump team was narrowing its search for his No. 2, and that it was looking to replace the State Department's long-serving undersecretary for management, Patrick Kennedy. Kennedy, who has been in that job for nine years, was actively involved in the transition and was angling to keep that job under Tillerson, three State Department officials told me."

Then suddenly on Wednesday afternoon, Kennedy and three of his top officials resigned unexpectedly, four State Department officials confirmed. Assistant Secretary of State for Administration Joyce Anne Barr, Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs Michele Bond and Ambassador Gentry O. Smith, director of the Office of Foreign Missions, followed him out the door. All are career foreign service officers who have served under both Republican and Democratic administrations.

U.S. Treasury Secretary nominee Steven Mnuchin isn't jumping on the Republican bandwagon to audit the Fed.

"The Federal Reserve is organized with sufficient independence to conduct monetary policy and open market operations," Mnuchin responded to Senator Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat. "I endorse the increased transparency we have seen from the Federal Reserve Board over recent years."

The response appears to lean against legislation such as the Fed Oversight Reform and Modernization Act of 2015, or FORM Act, which was introduced in the House of Representatives but never became law, that would have subjected the central bank's monetary policy decisions to greater congressional scrutiny.

As a candidate, President Donald Trump took aim at the Federal Reserve for playing politics, challenging its legitimacy as an independent institution. He accused the central bank of keeping interest rates low to benefit Barack Obama's administration.

Mnuchin's comments are "certainly endorsing the principle, if not every current detail of the practice of Fed independence," said Lou Crandall, chief economist at Wrightson ICAP LLC in Jersey City, New Jersey. "He does not want to make waves at this stage."

Russian Su-24M attack aircraft, Su-35S fighter jets, as well as Turkish F-16 and F-4 multirole fighter aircraft.

As a result of joint airstrikes, three Daesh command centers and a number of terrorist strongholds have been destroyed.

"As a result of the joint operation, Russian aircraft destroyed three command posts and a communications facility, as well as several terrorists' fortified positions."

Since January 18, Russian and Turkish warplanes have destroyed some 60 terrorist targets. The Russian Aerospace Forces and the Turkish Air Force jointly launched airstrikes on Daesh targets on January 18, January 21 and January 26.

"As a result of the airstrikes near Al-Bab populated area in the province of Aleppo, 58 targets of Daesh terrorist group have been destroyed. Arms depots, fuel materials, as well as groups of militants with hardware have been destroyed."

After attacking Hillary Clinton for deleting emails from her private server, members of the Trump administration are using a private server for their own emails.

Senior members of President Donald Trump's administration have activated email accounts on the private Republican National Committee server, including Kellyanne Conway, Jared Kushner, Sean Spicer and Steve Bannon, Newsweek reported.

According to the Hatch Act, White House staff are allowed to use non-government emails to correspond about personal or partisan political activity. However, White House staff are prohibited from using private accounts to conduct government-related business without disclosing them.


During the 2016 election, Republicans repeatedly attacked former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for using a private email server and then wiping it clean after receiving a congressional subpoena.

Brexiteer professor Ted Malloch, who is likely to become the United States ambassador to the European Union, has predicted the looming failure of the single European currency.

In an interview with the BBC, Malloch predicts the euro "could collapse" in the next 18 months.

"I think it is a currency that is not only in demise but has a real problem and could in fact collapse in the coming year, year and a half...The one thing I would do in 2017 is short the euro," he told the British broadcaster.

A few days ago Al-Qaeda in Syria and the Salafist Takfiri group Ahrar al Sham produced a show claiming they were fighting each other. I fell for it and wrote:

The Turkish, Russian and Iranian governments had agreed on talks in Astana in Kazakhstan between delegations from "moderate" militant groups in Syria and the Syrian government. Ahrar al Sham, which ideologically borders between al-Qaeda and the "moderates", was also invited. It declined to take part in solidarity with the not invited designated terrorist group Jaish Fateh al-Sham (the former Nusra Front aka al-Qaeda in Syria).

Russia had suggested the talks with the intent of separating the "moderate" Takfiris under Turkish control from the designated "terrorist" Takfiris. The talks had no immediate results but still achieved their purpose. Shortly after the talks began al-Qaeda attacked Ahrar al Sham. After some on and off fighting al-Qaeda started yesterday to attack all "moderate" Takfiri groups in Idleb and Aleppo governate.

I was wrong. Ahrar did not fight with al-Qaeda, al-Qaeda did not attack it. As far as one can tell they coordinated their actions for the purpose of eliminating smaller "rebel" groups under the disguise of Takfiri infighting. Those smaller groups are led by local war lords and supported by Turkey and the CIA. They all had earlier cooperated with al-Qaeda, which provided the "storm troopers" for their attacks on Syrian government forces. They recently took part in the Astana talks while Ahrar declined in solidarity with al-Qaeda.

After two terms in the White House, I'm sure President Obama is enjoying his first few days off. But at age 55, I'm not sure he'll be ready to fully retire yet. Either way, he'll collect a pretty generous retirement package for his eight years of work. The presidential pension kicks in immediately and regardless of age.

By law, the annual amount is equal to the pay received by the head of an executive department, such as a Cabinet secretary. This year, the figure is $207,800. And it will probably continue rising every year because Cabinet secretaries have generally seen their salaries keep pace with changes in the Consumer Price Index.

It's kind of ironic, actually. At one point during his presidency, Obama said he wanted to cap the total value of regular Americans' tax-advantaged retirement accounts once they had the potential to produce more than $205,000 a year in income. Yet his own presidential pension will be worth more than that amount in just his first year out of the White House. And really, once we add in all the other benefits beyond the pure pension payments, things really start to add up.

Peter Thiel is a billionaire, the biggest Donald J. Trump supporter in Trump-hating Silicon Valley and, above all, someone who prides himself on doing the opposite of what everyone else is doing.

So it makes perfect sense that right after President Trump proclaimed in his inaugural address that "the bedrock of our politics will be a total allegiance to the United States of America," Mr. Thiel was revealed to be a citizen of a country on the other side of the world: New Zealand.

In these uncertain times, it is undoubtedly smart to have a backup country. But the news that one of the richest citizens of New Zealand is a naturalized American who was born in Germany set off an immediate furor in the island nation.

One question being asked was why Mr. Thiel became a New Zealander in 2011. Close behind that was how it happened.

If you like New Zealand enough to want to become a citizen, the country's Internal Affairs Department noted on Wednesday, one requirement is "to have been physically in New Zealand for a minimum of 1,350 days in the five years preceding the citizenship application." Another requirement is that you "continue to reside" there after becoming a citizen.

Mr. Thiel, 49, does not appear to have done either.