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"Our American partners did not consult with Russia [regarding the 'safe zones']. It is their sovereign decision," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a conference call with reporters on Thursday.
He noted the importance of considering all the possible outcomes of taking such a step.
"It's important to make sure that this does not further aggravate the situation with refugees. Evidently, all the possible consequences should be taken into account," the spokesman said.
© Joshua Roberts / ReutersFormer U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright
Former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has expressed her readiness to "register as Muslim" in solidarity, responding to reports that President Donald Trump plans to legally force all America's Muslims to register their religious identity.
"I was raised Catholic, became Episcopalian and found out later my family was Jewish. I stand ready to register as Muslim in #solidarity," 79-year-old Albright tweeted on Wednesday. Eager to express her thoughts further, she also wrote that "America must remain open to people of all faiths and backgrounds."
Having forged an exemplary career in the US government as a politician and diplomat, Albright herself is an immigrant, born Marie Jana Korbelová in the Czech Republic, which her Twitter account proudly declares.
© Sergei Ilnitsky / ReutersRussian President Vladimir Putin
Why? Because Putin "has been working assiduously not just to delegitimize American democracy by interfering with the election but to destabilize Europe and weaken if not destroy NATO, which he blames for the Soviet Union's collapse." And based on what Trump has been saying about the alliance and the E.U., it appears that, as of noon on Friday, Putin has a co-thinker in the White House.
The 30 minute oeuvre is a work of comic genius, and really lays bare how disgracefully the BBC descends, from time to time, into raw propaganda and flat-out lying.
You don't need to watch the whole thing, which is a little bit like pulling teeth, rather just check out this quite entertaining 4 minute overview prepared for Russian TV news viewers.
© Khalil Ashawi / ReutersAhrar al-Sham Islamic Movement rebel fighters
The merger aims to fight back against an assault on the groups by a larger, hard-line jihadist group, a statement cited by Reuters said, warning that any attack on its members would be tantamount to "a declaration of war."
Ahrar al-Sham is a conservative Sunni militant group, which last December joined the nationwide ceasefire between the opposition militants and the Syrian government. Five smaller rebel factions announced they had joined its ranks.
© David Moir / ReutersCrew from HMS Vengeance, a British Royal Navy Vanguard class Trident Ballistic Missile Submarine
"The aim of such statements and of staging a show by escorting our ships, is to distract the British taxpayers from the real state in which the Royal Navy is," Defense Minister Igor Konashenkov said.
"First, the Russian military fleet doesn't need senseless escort services - they know their navigating channel and course,"the minister added.
Comment: After displaying extinction-event levels of incompetence the 'Royal Navy' has no room to mock anyone!
Further reading: Trident cover-up: Whisteblower reveals he witnessed 4 unreported missile test failures, warned govt over a year before June misfire
© Ezra Acayan / ReutersPhilippine President Rodrigo Duterte
Despite a slowdown in the fourth quarter, the country's GDP grew 6.8 percent last year, according to data from the Philippine Statistics Authority.
The annual growth was the fastest since 2013, according to the government.
"Our economy remains robust and is growing at a healthy and steady pace," said Economic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia.
As for the fourth quarter last year, GDP slowed down to 6.6 percent from seven percent in the previous one due to a decline in agriculture and services.
The industrial sector showed the fastest growth at 7.6 percent from October through December, up from 6.5 percent in the same period the previous year.
Household consumption grew 6.3 percent in the fourth quarter compared to the same period the year earlier with business investment up 15 percent.
According to the Statistics Office, trade, manufacturing, real estate, renting and business activities were among the major drivers.
This may come as a surprise to casual observers who have been convinced by the Mainstream Media that the region is only awash with religious radicalism, which while certainly true, doesn't fully encapsulate the whole picture of all the extremism that's active there nowadays. One of the more unexpected outcomes of the 2011 theater-wide Color Revolutions popularly known as the "Arab Spring" has been that armed "Neo-Marxist" Kurdish militias eventually ended up going on the offensive against the Syrian, Turkish, and Iranian governments, each for their own purportedly separate 'reasons' but in reality as part of a US-backed coordinated plan for geopolitically reengineering the Mideast.
© Sputnik/Yevgeniy Biyatov
This is the first time that Facebook has ever blocked the content of any media outlet from appearing on the service. No other news outlet has been punished by Facebook in a manner like this.
Comment: While Trump's Muslim registration plan certainly has great negative potential - depending on how its implemented - one thing is for sure: It is the very neoconservative policies and pathological drive to destroy that Former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is largely responsible for supporting - that has helped create the problems we are seeing in Iraq, and elsewhere today. That she would suggest she would convert to Islam out of some sense of solidarity to Muslims is a cynical and abhorrent political ploy to ramp up the anti-Trump sentiment in the U.S. Nothing more.
And who can forget this gem of compassion: