On Wednesday, a foreign unit consisting of 70 people arrived in Stanitsa Luganskaya in eastern Ukraine, the official spokesman for LPR militias says

Ukraine's authorities are inviting foreign mercenaries to take part in the military operation in Donbass as part of Kiev forces, the official spokesman for militias of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic said on Thursday.

On Wednesday, a foreign unit consisting of 70 people arrived in Stanitsa Luganskaya in eastern Ukraine, Andrei Marochko said.

"The military speak a foreign language with each other, wear a black uniform and their faces are covered with a mask. These could be fighters of one of foreign private military companies," he was quoted by the LuganskInformCenter as saying.

Earlier this month while delivering a public lecture in Kiev, "The Challenges of an Ever-Changing World," former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made an inspiring remark for anyone who might have been thinking that life in Ukraine was bad:

"You should go to Liberia where the standard of living is much lower, and then you will be thankful."

Ironically, Forbes Ukraine reacted to this with a slightly perplexed analysis that nonetheless led to a conclusion of flawless logic: "Although Liberia has one of the weakest economies in the world, it lags only slightly behind Ukraine with respect to a number of macroeconomic parameters," and the magazine supported its argument with some anemic statistics (failing however to mention that Liberia's 85% unemployment rate is far worse than Ukraine's, even today).

International Military Review - Syria (Mar. 25)

The young man was part of a group of Mormon missionaries injured in Zavantem airport when he was caught up in his THIRD terrorist attack

A 19-year-old who was injured in the Brussels terror attacks yesterday had previously been in Boston and Paris when deadly bombings took place, according to his father.

Mason Wells was one of four Mormon missionaries caught up in the blasts in Zaventem airport yesterday, and escaped with a ruptured Achilles tendon, shrapnel injuries and burns, reports ABC news.

His father Chad told ABC that Mason was just a block away from the finish line of the 2013 Boston marathon, in which his mother was competing, when a bomb detonated and killed three people - as well as injuring over 260.

The teen, from Utah in the USA, was also in Paris on November 13 when a series of co-ordinated terrorist attacks devastated the city, killing 129 people.

Here are the five most important aspects of Donald Trump's speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, on Monday.

1 - Trump said he will "dismantle the disastrous deal with Iran."

My number one priority is to dismantle the disastrous deal with Iran. I have been in business a long time. I know deal-making and let me tell you, this deal is catastrophic - for America, for Israel, and for the whole Middle East.

However, he stopped short of pledging to immediately nix the international nuclear accord signed in Vienna last year. He stated at AIPAC that "at the very least, we must hold Iran accountable by restructuring the terms of the previous deal."

Channelling the sentiments of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump said Iran should suffer immediate consequences for likely violating U.N. Security Council resolution 2231 by conducting a series of ballistic missile tests in recent days. Netanyahu last week called for Western powers to take "immediate punitive steps" against Iran for the missile tests.

Trump stated:

The deal is silent on test missiles but those tests DO violate UN Security Council Resolutions. The problem is, no one has done anything about it. Which brings me to my next point - the utter weakness and incompetence of the United Nations.

A few weeks back NEO ran an article that revealed the doublespeak of western conflict resolution. A telling look at an NGO known as the International Crisis Group showed clearly the tangled web of control mechanisms in place to skew policy and to mislead the public. Today the "crisis" has migrated once again, from Syria back to a the chaos exerted onto the people of Libya, and a new "king-building process" there. Here's a candid look at western hegemony still hard at work.

When I cast Former Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, and International Crisis Group Trustee, Emma Bonino one of the handmaidens of chaos, there was no outcry from her PR people. The reasons for this are pretty simple. First, dignitaries like Ms. Bonino must appear far too busy and important to address every criticism. Secondly, the roles of such people are now irrefutable within the real of digital media. The mountain of circumstantial and prima fascia proof disruptors like George Soros - his associates such as; Baron Malloch-Brown, Madeleine Albright, Lord Jacob Rothschild, and the artist of the Russian Afghanistan mess, Zbigniew Brzezinksi are just some of the cadre of interested parties in today's foreign policy cataclysm. But their game is an old and well known contest for power and control. My focus this week has been more on the foot soldiers of this old-new-world-order, and their strategies to reshape nations. You've all been hearing about ISIL regrouping in war torn Libya, but I'll wager few reading this understand what is really going on there. For insight into how these people work, how they practice "double speak", this video just after Crimea began rejoining Russia sets the tone. In the clip from CNN, first Brzezinski, then Fullbright blame Putin for what was in effect perpetrated by the west.

The Syrian Army has reportedly taken control of a medieval castle on the hill overlooking the city of Palmyra as the government troops edge closer to reclaiming the historic site from Islamic State terrorists.

"The army units in cooperation with popular defense groups have taken control of the Tadmor [Palmyra] citadel after delivering significant losses to the terrorists," SANA news agency reported, citing a military source. The Syrian military began the storming of the Fakhr-al-Din al-Maani Castle, or Palmyra Castle, which was the last strategic height in the city held by the jihadists, on Friday morning.

The Syrian Army hasn't officially confirmed the recapture of Palmyra Castle, Ibrahim Isa, RT's stringer in Palmyra, said. "However, several units of the Syrian Army have managed to go in and break the defense line of the terrorists," he added, citing sources on the ground.

"From Tuesday to Thursday (March 22-24) the planes of the Russian Aerospace Forces carried out 41 sorties to support the advancing Syrian army and strike Islamic State (IS, Daesh, formerly ISIS/ISIL) militants in the area of Palmyra (Homs province)," Lieutenant General Sergey Kuralenko, head of the Russian ceasefire monitoring center, said on Friday.

"As a result of the actions of the Russian aviation, 146 terrorist facilities, including command centers, ammunition depots, artillery units, tanks and other vehicles, were destroyed," he added. Earlier on Friday, there were reports that the Syrian Army had taken control of a medieval castle situated on the hill overlooking the city of Palmyra. The 13th-century Fakhr-al-Din al-Maani Castle, or Palmyra Castle, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was the last strategic height in the city held by Islamic State fighters.

On March 14, Russia announced that it was withdrawing the majority of its forces from Syria, as the five-month operation nears its goals.

However, Deputy Defense Minister Nikolay Pankov stressed that Palmyra is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, formerly known for housing some of the best-preserved monuments of antiquity anywhere in the world. After capturing the historical landmark, the jihadists blew up the 2,000-year-old Temple of Bel, and the Arch of Triumph, and used the Roman-era amphitheater for filmed public executions.

If you believe many of the commentators and policy makers in Washington, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia is an expansionist on the march. He's had one great success after another: First, he annexed Crimea and fueled a destabilizing conflict in eastern Ukraine. Then he intervened in the Syrian civil war and rescued his client, the government of Bashar al-Assad, in its moment of need. Last month, Ashton B. Carter, the Secretary of Defense, indicated that he believed that Russia is the world's greatest threat to American national security, ahead of a nuclear-armed North Korea and the jihadists of the Islamic State.

This alarmism is counterproductive and largely wrong.

Three weeks into a partial truce, Russia has begun withdrawing most of its forces from Syria after Mr. Putin claimed that the military's goals there had been achieved. In Ukraine, a cease-fire has been in place for over six months with few changes to the country's situation. These realities underline the truth: Russia's objectives are limited. The United States should recognize and accept this, and — while it may be hard for some in Washington to imagine — work with Moscow when interests overlap.

In Syria, Russia has had two linked aims: making sure that the Syrian regime survives in some form and ensuring that Russia will play a key part in whatever peace process eventually brings an end to the civil war. Washington has now been forced to accept these Russian positions.

Press TV has interviewed Hussein al-Bukhaiti, a Yemeni activist and political commentator in Sana'a, about the US claiming that its warplanes have targeted a training camp of al-Qaeda-linked militants in Yemen. The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Walk us through what took place in Hadramawt Province.

Bukhaiti: We know that al-Qaeda has been in control of Hadramawt from the beginning of the Saudi-led coalition on Yemen and this coalition has never ever targeted any al-Qaeda training camps. They have seized all military bases in Abyan, in Shabwa, and as well in Hadramawt.

They were defeated by Ansarullah, the Houthis and the Popular Committees and the Yemeni army before the Saudi-led coalition which have brought them back to those areas and yesterday we saw this statement from the Pentagon, but let's be clear here that the US has been targeting al-Qaeda for the last six years in Yemen, it has not succeeded in defeating al-Qaeda. It has killed hundreds of civilians in Yemen, the US drones have killed those civilians, and those attacks are used as a recruitment effort or recruitment propaganda for al-Qaeda to recruit more fighters in their effort to seize many areas in Yemen.

And we hear that yesterday many Saudi outlets and surprisingly some independent outlets like Reuters have claimed that the Saudi-led coalition did target this and I think this statement, it came as a denial to those claims by the Saudi-led coalition media.