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According to US media reports in October 2017, an employee from the National Security Agency (NSA) elite hacking unit lost some of the agency's espionage tools after storing them on his home computer in 2015. The media jumped to blame Kaspersky Lab and the Kremlin.

Following the reports, the company conducted an internal investigation and stumbled upon an incident dating back to 2014. At the time, Kaspersky Lab was investigating the activities of the Equation Group - a powerful group of hackers that later was identified as an arm of the NSA.

As part of Kaspersky's investigation, it analyzed information received from a computer of an unidentified user, who is alleged to be the security service employee in question. It turned out that the user installed pirated software containing Equation malware, then "scanned the computer multiple times," which resulted in antivirus software detecting suspicious files, including a 7z archive.

"The archive itself was detected as malicious and submitted to Kaspersky Lab for analysis, where it was processed by one of the analysts. Upon processing, the archive was found to contain multiple malware samples and source code for what appeared to be Equation malware," the company's October statement explained.

The analyst then reported the matter directly to Eugene Kaspersky, who ordered the company's copy of the code to be destroyed.

On Thursday, Kaspersky Lab issued another statement concerning this incident following a more extensive investigation. The results of the investigation showed that the computer in question was infected with several types of malware in addition to the one created by Equation. Some of this malware provided access to the data on this computer to an "unknown number of third parties."

In particular, the computer was infected with backdoor malware called Mokes, which is also known as Smoke Bot and Smoke Loader. It is operated by an organization called Zhou Lou, based in China.

The White House has described the strategy as "principled realism" because it "acknowledges the central role of power in international politics, affirms that strong and sovereign states are the best hope for a peaceful world, and clearly defines our national interests," but also "grounded in advancing American principles, which spreads peace and prosperity around the globe."

In the actual speech, Trump called China and Russia "rival powers" that "challenge American influence, values and wealth," but said that he was planning to work with them while putting American interests first.

Next on the list are regional "dictators that spread terror, threaten their neighbors, and pursue weapons of mass destruction" followed by "jihadist terrorists" and transnational criminal organizations.

To protect the US, Trump will "target threats at their source" and "confront threats before they ever reach our borders."

"I believe the 'Deep State' actors rushed this National Security Review to completion in order to use it as a tool to dominate the foreign policy of President Trump," the senator told RT. "I believe that President Trump views Russia and China as economic competitors - not as enemies," he added.

At the same time the document "drastically reverses Donald Trump's campaign promises to normalize relations with Russia, work with the Syrian government, limit US involvement to defeating ISIS [Islamic State, IS], and downplaying our relations with NATO."

"The US national security strategy is aimed exclusively at the restoration of American hegemony and the line for building a monopolar world" -- head of the lower house committee for international relations, MP Leonid Slutsky (LDPR)

"The tone of this document leaves no doubt about the fact that the United States is not content with the changes that have taken place in the world over the past years and that it intends to reverse these changes and restore the latest version of Pax Americana as a supposedly-just new world order. What the US means by stability is its control over the domestic and foreign policy of other nations" -- head of the upper house foreign affairs committee, Senator Konstantin Kosachev

"We urge the United States to stop deliberately distorting China's strategic intentions, and abandon outdated concepts such as a Cold War mentality and a zero-sum game, otherwise it will only harm everyone," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the Chinese embassy in the US said it is "completely selfish" for Washington to put its interest above others, warning that such an approach "will only lead to isolation." The Chinese mission also accused the US of "self-contradictory rhetoric" that diminishes the countries' cooperation.

"On the one hand, the US government claims that it is attempting to build a great partnership with China. On the other hand, it labels China as a rival. The self-contradictory rhetoric of the US betrays the truth that China and the US are becoming increasingly interdependent and have growing intertwined interests," the embassy said in a statement.

"For China and the United States, cooperation leads to win-win outcomes, while confrontation can only lead to a lose-lose situation," the diplomatic mission added, calling the US "to abandon its outdated zero-sum thinking" and "engage in win-win cooperation."

"Looking through [the strategy], particularly those parts concerning our country, one can see the imperial nature of the document, as well as persistent unwillingness to abandon the idea of a unipolar world and accept a multipolar world," he said. Peskov stressed that Moscow strongly disagrees with Washington's stance towards Russia expressed in the document, which designates the country as a threat to US security. And yet, there are some positive signs too.

"[The strategy] has some positive moments, particularly those regarding cooperation with Russia in fields corresponding to the US interests. It is totally in line with our approach, voiced by [President Putin], because Moscow is also seeking cooperation with the United States in areas which are beneficial for us, and depending on how far our US counterparts are ready to go," President Vladimir Putin's press secretary said. When asked about "a perfect example of US-Russia cooperation," Peskov mentioned the recent exchange of information between the two countries' special services, which made it possible to thwart terrorist attacks in St. Petersburg and "helped save many lives."

The new US national security strategy is a long document with "rather impressive" wording "which needs to be thoroughly assessed" by relevant Russian agencies, the presidential spokesman said.
...
While China allegedly "seeks to displace the United States in the Indo-Pacific region, expand the reaches of its state-driven economic model, and reorder the region in its favor," Russia seeks to "restore its great power status and establish spheres of influence near its borders. The intentions of both nations are not necessarily fixed," the document added.

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An investigation by the Israeli military into the death of a paraplegic Palestinian man cleared Israeli troops of wrongdoing on Monday, saying it found "no moral or professional failures" in the incident.

Palestinian health officials say Ibrahim Abu Thraya, 29, was shot in the head while demonstrating last week along Gaza's border with Israel, an area that has experienced repeated unrest since President Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital this month.

Abu Thraya's death has become a rallying cry among Palestinians against Trump's move, which upended decades of U.S. foreign policy and countered an international consensus that the fate of Jerusalem should be determined in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

The military said Friday's protest was "extremely violent," with protesters hurling stones, burning tires and explosive devices at troops. In its findings Monday, it said no live fire was aimed at Abu Thraya and it was impossible to determine the cause of death. The military said it has repeatedly requested details about Abu Thraya's injuries and will examine them if they are received. The military did not disclose from whom it had requested details.

Abu Thraya, who had previously worked as a fisherman, lost his legs in an Israeli airstrike during a 2008 war between Israel and Hamas. According to relatives, he was assisting in the evacuation of people after an earlier airstrike when he was struck. He had since used a wheelchair.

Itedal Abu Thraya, Ibrahim's mother, questioned the military's self-investigation and said her son posed no threat.

"He was only holding a flag, not an explosive belt or a bomb," she said. "I do not trust them or their investigations."

Israeli military investigations have drawn criticism from rights groups and Palestinians who charge that they are not independent or effective, citing a low indictment rate. The military insists the system works.

"The lethal use of firearms should only be employed as the last resort, when strictly unavoidable, in order to protect life. However, as far as we can see, there is nothing whatsoever to suggest that Ibrahim Abu Thuraya was posing an imminent threat of death or serious injury when he was killed.

"Given his severe disability, which must have been clearly visible to those who shot him, his killing is incomprehensible - a truly shocking and wanton act."
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The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said in a statement: "No live fire was aimed at Abu Thuraya. It is impossible to determine whether Abu Thuraya was injured as a result of riot dispersal means or what caused his death."

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Brussels is opening legal pathways for migrants "who want to come" says European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker, declaring that Europe has a "clear need" for mass migration from Africa.

Speaking ahead of the EU-Africa summit this week, where leaders of EU and African nations will meet to discuss migration, he told Deusche Well that "if we don't offer legal ways of emigrating to Europe, and immigrating within Europe, we will be lost.

"If those who come - who are, generally speaking, the poor and needy - are no longer able to enter the house of Europe through the front door, they'll keep making their way in through the back windows."

Claiming that the continent "will clearly need immigration in the coming decades", he said EU nations "have to provide [Africans] who want to come, and are able to come, and whose situation makes it possible for them to come, with legal paths to get to Europe".

Asked by the German public broadcaster why there is "so much resistance" in Europe to the question of open borders with the third world, and why the EU has not yet "succeeded" in foisting mass immigration on countries across the continent, Juncker said Brussels has "told the member-states of their responsibility".

State sovereignty is apparently dead in the EU.

"We will see what the member-states do about it," he said, proclaiming mass immigration to be a "great challenge of our age" and hinting that countries in Europe will come around to taking the same view as the European Commission.

The former prime minister of Luxembourg denied DW's suggestion that "fear is overcoming reason" with regards to mass migration, pointing to developments such as the EU Parliament's recent adoption of changes to the bloc's asylum system which would permanently force third world migrants upon unwilling nations.

"Now it's up to the member-states to follow the path of wisdom," said Juncker in the interview, where he cryptically hinted there are plans for Europe and Africa to become more interlinked.

"Africa is not a continent that will become part of our history tomorrow. Africa has always been a part of history," he told interviewer Max Hofmann. "Certain Europeans just didn't see it that way."

The Commission president also remarked that "populists" are "dangerous", but argued that it is "far more dangerous" when mainstream parties adopt "harmful proposals" to cut migration from outside Europe, and other conservative policies.

"If the traditional parties follow the populists, they become populist themselves, which is a phenomenon we are already seeing in some EU countries," he said.

"No, we should not be afraid of the populists; we should embrace those they are fighting."

In the interview, Juncker did not expand on why Europe has a "clear need" for mass migration from the world's poorest and most turbulent nations, but other EU figures have previously stated that the continent needs millions of third world migrants so as to combat an "ageing population".

In making this calculation, it is unclear as to whether the European Commission has thought about the fact that migrants also get older, or the effect of an ever-expanding population on the continent's emissions, or if it has considered the impact of automation - at a time when experts warn millions of jobs will be taken by robots in the coming years.

In addition, recent research from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) found nothing to support the assertion that economies are harmed by ageing populations.

"There is no evidence of a negative relationship between ageing and GDP per capita," academics wrote in a paper entitled 'Secular Stagnation? The Effect of Aging on Economic Growth in the Age of Automation'.

"On the contrary, the relationship is significantly positive in many specifications," it adds.

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