Russia has seized three Ukrainian military vessels violating its territory near Russia's newly completed Crimean Bridge. The incident is a clear provocation carried out by Kiev and possibly engineered by Kiev's Western sponsors - particularly those in Washington and London.

Ukrainian military vessels are in fact permitted to pass from the Black Sea into the Sea of Azov provided they notify Russian authorities beforehand. The Sea of Azov - according to a joint agreement signed by Kiev and Moscow in 2003 - is considered internal waters of both Ukraine and Russia.

With the completion of the Crimean Bridge connecting Russian Crimea to the rest of Russian territory across the Strait of Kerch, security measures have understandably increased.

Member states of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) increased the share settlements in local currencies to 70 percent in the first half of 2018, First Deputy Chief of the Russian Government Staff Sergey Prikhodko said on Tuesday.

"In the first six months of the current year, the share of settlements in national currencies between the members of the EEU exceeded 70 percent," he said prior to a visit by Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.

"The further growth of the figure will be achieved via ensuring macroeconomic and financial stability, creating of a common financial market, and harmonization of legislative control over the financial sector," Prikhodko added.

According to the top official, the bulk of the settlements in local currencies accounts for trade with Russia and is implemented via rubles. Opportunities for increasing the share of such settlements mainly depend on developing trade ties between the member countries of the alliance, he said.

Despite the Russian Defence Ministry's clarifications, Western media are still racking their brain over the Su-57 fifth-generation jets' mission in Syria. Speaking to Sputnik, political observers of Syrian origin shed light on the message the Russian-made Su-57, S-300 and S-400 have sent to the US and Israel in the Arab Republic.

The Russian Su-57 fifth-generation stealth fighters have once again become the focus of special attention following the release of unique footage of the aircraft's mission in Syria and Zvezda TV channel's new video featuring a pair of Sukhoi Su-57 performing a synchronized landing.

Sputnik reached out to political observers of Syrian origin Ghassan Kadi and Christopher Assad, asking them to share their views on what message the much-discussed stealth aircraft sends to the US-led coalition in Syria.

The Su-57 Manoeuvres in Syria

On 1 March, 2018, the Russian Ministry of Defence (MoD) confirmed that the Su-57 jets had been tested in Syria, specifying that the mission had taken place in February 2018. Having noted that Su-57 crews had made over 10 sorties in Syria, the ministry elaborated that the mission was "carried out in order to prove announced possibilities of the newest aircraft in real combat environment."

On 19 November, the MoD released footage of the Su-57's manoeuvres in the Syrian Arab Republic, prompting a lively discussion in the American media. The Drive's Joseph Trevithick raised the question as to what other tasks the Su-57 crews conducted in the Arab Republic during their "absurdly short trip to Syria."

According to Kadi, besides accomplishing the tasks voiced by the MoD, the jets could go to Syria "to taunt the US radar system in Syria, and they succeeded in evading detection." He remarked that "this is the kind of news that the US is not prepared to divulge, and one that the Russian MoD does not need to publicize over and beyond the knowledge of the 'American partner'."

Where should the Sunni Islamist fighters of Idlib go? Since their money and their weapons come from the Sunni Gulf, and since their Wahhabi Sunni faith was inspired by the very same creed which governs the Saudi monarchy, what better location for their future welfare than one of Saudi Arabia's vast sandpits?

The Saudis are going to get away with it. Muhammad bin Salman, too. They may pay a price - we'll travel in that direction later - but they remain the "vision of light" against Iran's "vision of darkness", in the words of Saudi Arabia's ever more egregious foreign minister.

We are all, alas, making the same old Middle East mistake: of thinking that the bad guys will get overthrown or punished for their murders and transgressions and that the good guys (whoever they may be) will come out on top.

No evidence has surfaced indicating that President Trump colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election. Still, two years later, the president's opponents insist the truth is out there and they know where - in the memory banks and computer files of Trump's former associates who have struck deals to cooperate with Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

But people with direct knowledge of the situation say the premise of that speculation is false: It's highly unlikely that these associates possess proof of collusion and are singing about it to Mueller. "It's wishful thinking by Trump haters," said a former Trump campaign official who has been the subject of investigation.

Mueller has obtained guilty pleas from four ex-Trump advisers - Michael Flynn, George Papadopoulos, Paul Manafort and Rick Gates - for crimes unrelated to election espionage. Facing the prospect of a lengthy prison sentence, each had strong incentives to turn on the president.

So, too, do other Trump associates reportedly caught in Mueller's crosshairs - Carter Page, Roger Stone and the president's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, who has pleaded guilty to crimes referred by Mueller's office to federal attorneys in Manhattan for prosecution.

Mueller has clamped down on leaks from his office, so it is hard to determine exactly what he has extracted from the witnesses. Nevertheless, substantial information gleaned from various sources by RealClearInvestigations and other news outlets suggests that Trump's former associates have not provided the smoking gun of collusion. As emboldened Democrats promise to step up their own Russia investigations when they take over the House in January, here is what we know so far about each case.

US President Donald Trump will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin at this week's G20 summit in Buenos Aires. Trump will not, however, meet with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

In a schedule full of meetings with world leaders, Trump is pencilled in to talk with Putin, National Security Advisor John Bolton told reporters on Tuesday. Explaining the absence of a meeting with bin Salman, Bolton simply said that Trump's schedule is "full to overflowing."

Trump's meeting with Putin looks set to build on the leaders' summit in Helsinki this summer, with many of the same issues on the table. According to Bolton, the two leaders will discuss "security issues, arms control, and regional issues, including the Middle East." The recent flare-up of tensions between Russia and Ukraine is "sure" to be discussed, he added.

What could be more noteworthy, however, is the lack of a meeting with the Saudi Crown Prince. The murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi has strained relations between Riyadh and much of the world, and has focused attention on Trump's insistence on standing by the Saudis, despite calls for sanctions from lawmakers in the US.

The German government has deceived the public, the leader of the nation's populist opposition party told Breitbart London, as internal documents from the Federal Foreign Office reveal that Angela Merkel's government has been the main architect of the controversial UN migrant pact.

The document, which was highlighted by populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) MP Petr Bystron and can be downloaded from the German government's website, shows the Federal Foreign Office taking credit for the UN migrant pact, claiming they had worked on the agreement as early as 2016.

According to the Foreign Office, the German government has been behind both the Global Compact on Refugees and the Global Compact on Migration, saying that while neither are legally binding they were both designed to be "politically binding."

Corrupt officials at German consulates in some Middle Eastern states have been collaborating with people smugglers and literally selling forged visas to migrants seeking to come to Germany as refugees, Der Spiegel revealed.

The corrupt schemes "have been run smoothly [by employees] in the visa centers of many German diplomatic missions abroad," and the Middle East in particular, German Der Spiegel weekly reported, calling the consulates an "Achilles heel" in the fight against people smuggling. The paper also calls the local employees a "weak spot" of German visa departments, as it is they who usually work with people smugglers.

A German consulate in Iraq's northern city of Erbil was particularly involved in one such fraudulent scheme, according to the paper's investigation. Local human traffickers offered to get their clients visas through corrupt consulate officials without the need for an approval by the visa and registration department in Germany. A false document, which could allow a would-be asylum seeker to legally enter Germany as part of a refugee reception program, cost between $3,000 and $13,000.

The shady scheme reportedly ran smoothly between August and December 2017 until finally came to the attention of Foreign Ministry officials. The forgers managed to sell some two dozen visas over this period, Der Spiegel says, adding that the real number of such cases might be much greater.

President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday continued his tirade against bishops and other Catholic officials, saying that Filipinos do not have to go to church to pay for "idiots." During a speech in Davao City, Duterte suggested that people should instead build their own chapels at home.

"You build a chapel on your own house and pray there. You don't have to go to the church to pay for these idiots," Duterte said at the groundbreaking ceremony of the Davao City Bulk Water Supply Project.

The President added Catholic beliefs are "archaic" and that the Church's teachings do not apply in present time.

"The Catholic church, pati si Bishop David sa Caloocan (are) clinging on to a belief which was 3,000 years ago," Duterte said. "Ang mga tao noon, nomads. What do they know about the world today? Tapos pasundin mo 'yung pinapasulat niyo," he added. [Translation: The people back then were nomads. What do they know about the world today? And then you'r e going to make people follow your teachings.]

Duterte was referring to Caloocan Bishop Pablo Virgilio David, who recently slammed the President's allegations that bishops were stealing and "asking for contributions." Caloocan Bishop Pablo Virgilio David earlier said he has reason to believe the President was referring to him, since he is "the only Bishop 'David' in the CBCP (Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines)."

The Justice Department said Monday it is not required under the law to reveal whether WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been charged in a sealed case, even after an accidental filing in an unrelated case said he had been accused of a crime.

The argument came in response to a Nov. 16 lawsuit by the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press. That group is seeking to unseal the government's possible charges against Assange that appeared to be revealed accidentally.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Gordon Kromberg said in a court filing Monday that the Justice Department will neither confirm nor deny whether such charges exist because "neither the First Amendment nor the common law require that the government provide such a confirmation or denial." Because the possible charges have not been made public, Kromberg said, Assange has either not been charged or the charges are under seal.

"In either event, the government is not required to publicly acknowledge which of those two possibilities happens to be the case with respect to any individual. Because that is precisely what the plaintiff's application seeks with respect to Julian Assange, it should be denied," the filing said.