Russia has increased crude exports by almost five percent to 5.55 million barrels a day in the first half of the year compared to 2015. Analysts say exports may reach a record high this year.

The Russian Energy Ministry says output last month grew by 1.14 percent from a year earlier to 10,843 million barrels a day, with increases every month since July 2014. The ministry is predicting a 4.5-4.9 percent growth this year.

"If production remains steady, then it will likely be a record year for exports," said Christopher Haines, head of oil and gas at BMI Research, as cited by Bloomberg. "This should mean competition is strong, especially with Iran sending more oil into southern Europe."

In April, Russian crude exports jumped nine percent to their highest level in sixteen months. Overall, the country exported 20.3 million tons of crude that month.

Russia is ready to step up anti-terrorism coordination with Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region and elsewhere, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement Tuesday.

Condemning the recent terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia, the ministry expressed Moscow's readiness to "strengthen the coordination of anti-terrorism efforts with Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region and beyond."

There is no way of getting around this: According to Director James Comey (disclosure: a former colleague and longtime friend of mine), Hillary Clinton checked every box required for a felony violation of Section 793(f) of the federal penal code (Title 18): With lawful access to highly classified information she acted with gross negligence in removing and causing it to be removed it from its proper place of custody, and she transmitted it and caused it to be transmitted to others not authorized to have it, in patent violation of her trust. Director Comey even conceded that former Secretary Clinton was "extremely careless" and strongly suggested that her recklessness very likely led to communications (her own and those she corresponded with) being intercepted by foreign intelligence services.

Yet, Director Comey recommended against prosecution of the law violations he clearly found on the ground that there was no intent to harm the United States.

On Monday, July 5, suicide bombers blew themselves up in Qatif and Medina, several hours after Saudi security officers foiled an attack near the US Consulate in Jeddah. In Medina, a bomb exploded in the vicinity of a police post outside the Prophet's Mosque, killing four policemen and two civilians. In Qatif, two suicide bombers blew themselves up outside a Shiite Mosque. No casualties were reported.

The suicide attacks are specially alarming as they underline various basic and important points:

Attacking a Shiite mosque, a US entity, and a holy city are meant to embarrass the House of Saud. The attack on a Shiite mosque was meant to fuel sectarian violence, while the one in Medina specifically undercuts the Saudi family's claim to be the "custodians" or "protectors" of the two holy places - Mecca and Medina. The suicide attack couldn't be more counterproductive because it took place at a revered Muslim location during Ramadan, meaning the suicide bombers' religion is terrorism. That says why Iran, despite its political differences with Riyadh, was among the first to strongly condemn and respond to the attacks with outrage and horror.

Many aren't surprised that Saudi Arabia is now under attack, where even the holy sites are at the top of the target list for suicide bombers. The regime has a lot of explaining to do with regard to its "well-established" and "well-documented" links to ISIL and Al-Qaeda.

International commissions of Russia's and Italy's upper parliament houses will have their first joint meeting in early October in Moscow, a Russian senior lawmaker said on Tuesday.

"We have agreed with our colleagues in the Italian Senate to switch over from the regime of visit exchanges to the regime of join commissions meetings," Konstantin Kosachev, the chairman of the international committee of Russia's Federation Council upper parliament house, said after his visit to Rome. "A joint commissions meeting implies a one-or two-day session with a clearly defined and structured agenda of four to five blocks, with a rapporteur in each of them. It is important to consider the topics separately."

"The first such joint session will be held in Russia in early October. It will take place in Moscow. Apart from that, our Italian colleagues are supposed to visit one of Russian regions," Kosachev added.

The now-infamous whistleblowing website has published an archive of what is said to be over 1,200 of Hillary Clinton's private emails pertaining to the Iraq War. Julian Assange previously said that the release would be "enough to indict her."

On Monday, WikiLeaks tweeted a link to a search aggregate of 1,258 emails that Clinton wrote or received discussing US engagement in Iraq while she headed the State Department. The Iraq War email bundle is part of a trove of Clinton's correspondence that was released by the State Department in February, under the Freedom of Information Act.

In March, WikiLeaks launched a searchable archive consisting of 30,322 emails from Hillary Clinton's private email server that she used while serving as Secretary of State. The 50,547 pages of documents cover Clinton's correspondence from 30 June 2010 to 12 August 2014. Out of that number, 7,570 of the documents were sent by Hillary Clinton.

The use of private email for state-run business has become a thorn in the side of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. With Democratic convention just weeks away, the public eye is following a close watch of a potential grand jury indictment. This past weekend, the FBI spent more than three hours questioning Clinton about the email scandal, but as elections loom, the Bureau has yet to issue a report on its findings.

The terror proxies that the Central Intelligence Agency has furnished in Syria over the past five years no doubt smell a rat that Washington is about to sell them out.

In the last week, a wave of deadly bombings connected to al-Qaeda-linked extremists - from Bangladesh to Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia - has resulted in over 200 deaths.

The latest violence attributed to the radical Wahhabi terrorists saw suicide attacks in three Saudi cities on Monday, including Medina and Jeddah, where the target in the latter place was the US consulate building.

It seems no coincidence that the upsurge in international terror assaults, which has inflicted American deaths among the victims, followed quickly on reports that the Obama administration is moving to do a deal with Russia over Syria.

The Washington Post reported last week: "The Obama administration has proposed a new agreement on Syria to the Russian government that would deepen military cooperation between the two countries against some [sic] terrorists in exchange for Russia getting the Assad regime to stop bombing US-supported rebels."

Apparently, American solicitations for Russian cooperation has been ongoing for several weeks, perhaps even months. When the Saudi regime's leaders, including deputy crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (the king's son), were invited to the White House last month, it is most likely that this key US partner in the Middle East was briefed on the plan. The Saudis weren't pleased, as indicated by their call immediately following the White House meeting for an escalation of American military intervention in Syria, thus appearing to snub the Obama administration.

According to the Washington Post: "The crux of the deal is a US promise to join forces with the Russian air force to share targeting and coordinate an expanded bombing campaign against Jabhat al-Nusra [Al Nusra Front], al-Qaeda's branch in Syria, which is primarily fighting the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad."

The quid pro quo is that Russian and Syrian forces would halt their withering offensive on "US-backed rebels".

Of course, any distinction between "terrorists" and the palatable-sounding "rebels" is a fiction.

Arms dealers flood war-torn Middle East with weapons and then lobby EU to militarize borders against refugees—profiting from both ends of conflict

As Europe comes to terms with a Brexit vote fueled in large part by anti-immigrant hate-mongering, a new report exposes how war profiteers are influencing EU policy to make money from unending Middle East conflicts as well as the wave of refugees created by that same instability and violence.

The report (pdf), Border Wars: The Arms Dealers Profiting from Europe's Refugee Tragedy, released jointly by the European Stop Wapenhandel and Transnational Institute (TNI) on Monday, outlines arms traders' pursuit of profit in the 21st century's endless conflicts.

"There is one group of interests that have only benefited from the refugee crisis, and in particular from the European Union's investment in 'securing' its borders,'" the report finds. "They are the military and security companies that provide the equipment to border guards, the surveillance technology to monitor frontiers, and the IT infrastructure to track population movements."

The report shows that "far from being passive beneficiaries of EU largesse, these corporations are actively encouraging a growing securitization of Europe's borders, and willing to provide ever more draconian technologies to do this."

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed the law banning genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and production in Russia, excluding examinations and scientific researches. The law was passed by the State Duma (lower house of parliament) on June 24 and approved by the Federation Council (upper house) on June 29, 2016.

The law bans imports of GMOs aimed for releasing to the environment and GMO products to the territory of the Russian Federation. The document obliges importers of GMO products to a compulsory public registration.

The tourists are so scarce you can hear their footsteps clattering down the empty shopping street. Nearly a week after the deadly airport bombings, it is eerily quiet in Istanbul.

The magic of Turkey's biggest city has been seducing visitors for centuries, from its array of historic mosques and palaces to its stunning views over the sparkling Bosphorus.

But for people working in the once-thriving tourist trade, Tuesday's gun and suicide bomb spree represents one more nail in the coffin for an industry already reeling from a string of attacks this year. "It's disastrous," said Orhan Sonmez as he stood hopelessly offering tours of the Hagia Sophia, the cavernous former mosque and church that is now a museum. "All my life I've been a tour guide. Most of us have come to a turning point where we don't know if we can go on. It's tragic."

Restaurants sit empty in the Sultanahmet tourist district, and five-star hotel rooms can be booked for bargain prices.