Greece is open to the possibility of becoming a member of the BRICS group of developing nations as part of the BRICS New Development Bank (NDB), Greek Deputy Defense Minister Kostas Isychos told Sputnik.

In May, Russia invited Greece to become an NDB member, with discussions on Athens' membership in the bank expected to take place at the July 9-10 BRICS summit in the Russian city of Ufa.

"Greece has also been invited to become a BRICS member within the Development Bank of the BRICS. We are still open to that," Isychos, who is also the co-chair of the Russian-Greek Intergovernmental Committee, said.

According to him, Greece has always been in favor of good European-Russian relations and of European-Eurasian relations. Athens is currently in talks over joining the BRICS bank with the group's members.

Lost in a Roman wilderness of pain
And all the children are insane

- The End, The Doors

It goes without saying that we rarely get an accurate representation of reality in the corporate media, which is, after all, what independent media exists for. Last Sunday Joe Quinn and I interviewed a very ordinary couple with a very extraordinary tale: businesspeople James and Joanne Moriarty and how they escaped from capture by Al Qaeda terrorists during the 2011 'Libyan revolution'. Listening to James and Joanne tell their story, it was impossible not to be struck by the significance, for every human being on this planet, of the problem of psychopaths in positions of power.

The Moriartys present three powerful motivating factors for the destruction of Libya by Western powers and their internationalist financiers:

• thwarting Gaddafi's plan to establish a gold-backed currency, to ultimately serve as a pan-African currency and thereby economically unite African nations and free them from Western imperialism;
• the US desire to establish AFRICOM (military control of Africa to ward off Chinese investment)
• an alleged $7 trillion lawsuit, on behalf of all participating African countries, at Gaddafi's instigation, to sue for damages incurred from broken treaties with European countries during their "colonial era".

So far from "freeing the Libyan people from a dictator", the NATO bombardment of Libya in 2011 was about the maintenance of US and EU domination over Africa.

But what really comes across in this riveting interview with the Moriartys is the utter recklessness displayed in Libya (and elsewhere, for that matter) by both NATO and the 'rebel' forces, as well as the relish with which they demonstrably enjoyed tearing the entire country apart. These demented animals have access to unparalleled hi-tech weaponry and vehicles, enabling them to 'achieve feats of destruction' that before only 'the gods' could perform. Their handiwork is psychopathy writ large, the nihilistic culmination of Western civilization, and the glorious - for them - embrace of the destructive principle.

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New Yorkers may soon be unable to smoke in their own homes, as New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is pressing landlords and developers to prohibit residents from lighting up inside apartments.


This comes as part of the de Blasio administration's efforts to reduce smoking citywide. It recently released a "sustainability blueprint" that outlined the initiative, which involves paying four health advocacy groups $9,000 each to get apartment complexes to ban smoking, reported the New York Post.

City health officials emphasized that the initiative is voluntary, but the same blueprint, titled "One New York: The Plan for a Strong and Just City," also said that de Blasio is moving towards legislation that would require apartment buildings to create a smoking policy and "disclose it to residents and prospective residents."

"Everyone benefits from smoke-free housing. Residents enjoy breathing cleaner, healthier air in their homes ... while owners see reductions in property damage and turnover costs," a Health Department spokesman said to the Post.

Andre Fursov is a historian and a specialist in shadow global elites

Andre Phephelov, host: Hello, this is Andre Phephelov in Den TV studio. We are joined by historian Andre Fursov. The subject is World War. Everyone talks about the world being on the verge of WWIII, from housewives to intellectuals. Many different factors point at it. And the main factor is the factor of uncertainty. No one knows what's coming. And the most apocalyptic scenario is being painted of an epic slaughter which will resolve the knot of irreconcilable differences. We can built many models of the beginning of this process. Do you agree that this stage is approaching?

Andre Fursov: It is not approaching, it is already here. The problem is our view of a world war depends on how we define a world war. They say: "Generals always prepare for the old war". The thing is that in mass consciousness, even in the consciousness of professionals, a view of war is based on the last war. Everyone thinks it must look like WWI or WWII. The problem is the world war phenomenon is not limited by these two wars. World wars are a characteristic trait of a capitalist era, because capitalism is the only global system, and wars for the hegemony in the capitalist system always had a global character, related to breaking out of Europe, colonies etc.

We can identify three types of world wars in the history of a capitalist system.

• First type is the sum of local conflicts, the 30-year war lead by the Hapsburgs and their coalition on the one side, and on the other side - by the coalition financed by Holland.

• Second type: Anglo-French wars, two rounds: the 7 year war of 1756-63 and the Napoleonic wars. By the way, if we add the 7-year and the Napoleonic wars, we will also have a 30-year war, but stretched in time.

• And finally the third type - First and Second World wars, although I agree with those experts who say that it was a big 30-year European war from 1914 to 1945, because if we take the period between 1918 and 1938 (because WWII began on September 28, 1938 with a Munich pact), these 20 years have been saturated with wars, it is a continuum.

So we are dealing with 30-year world wars, some of which are stretched in time, and others last as the 30-year long WWI.

A UN Security Council resolution would contribute to healing the wounds in the Balkans still plagued by the memories of the bloody wars in the 1990s if it condemns Western powers for their part in Yugoslavia's breakdown along with war crimes, Serbian politician Vladimir Krsljanin said.

"Not a single atrocity on the territory of former Yugoslavia in 1991-1999 and later on the lands occupied by NATO was committed without the British and other Western security services playing a key role," Krsljanin of the People's Movement of Serbia said in an article.

The remarks came after Britain decided to draft a UNSC resolution to mark the 20th anniversary of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre in Bosnia, which saw approximately 8,000 Muslim men and boys killed. Serbia is against the document saying it would only cause "tension, friction and further destabilize" the Balkans.

"The only resolution capable of making things better in the region ... should condemn all war crimes and their perpetrators, as well as commemorate the innocent victims. It should also decry unlawful policies of the Western countries, which led to the breakup of Yugoslavia with the help of NATO, secret services, the Hague Tribunal, terrorism, drug traffickers, national and religious extremists of every stripe and color," Krsljanin pointed out.

Such a document would surely be vetoed by Britain, France and the United States, the politician added.

As part of its rapid land grab, the self-proclaimed Islamic State terrorist group has, for the first time, made significant inroads into Afghanistan, wresting control of a sizeable chunk of Nangarhar province away from the Taliban.

Earlier this month, a band of mysterious fighters pushed through Taliban-controlled territory in eastern Afghanistan. According to witnesses speaking to Reuters, hundreds of insurgents rode through Nangarhar province, burning Taliban opium fields as they went.

This new band of insurgents fought under the banner of the self-proclaimed Islamic State terror group.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras allows the Greek people to decide their own fate via a democratic referendum. That's enough to send the troika - the European Central Bank (ECB), the European Commission (EC), and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) - into a paroxysm of rage. Here, in a nutshell, is everything one needs to know about the EU "dream".

Tsipras is, of course, right; he had to call a referendum because the troika had delivered "an ultimatum towards Greek democracy and the Greek people." Indeed, "an ultimatum at odds with the founding principles and values of Europe."

But why? Because the apparently so sophisticated politico-economic web of European "institutions" - the EC, the Eurogroup, the ECB - had to come up with a serious political decision; and due, essentially, to their nasty mix of greed and incompetence, they were incapable of making it.

At least EU citizens now start to get the picture on who their enemy is: the non-transparent "institutions" who supposedly represent them.

The - so far — 240 billion euro bailout of Greece (which featured Greece being used to launder bailouts of French and German banks) has yielded a whole national economy shrinking by over 25%; widespread unemployment; and poverty soaring to unprecedented levels. And for the EU "institutions" - plus the IMF - there was never any Plan B; it was the euro-austerity way - a sort of economic Shock and Awe — or the (desperation) highway. The pretext was to "save the euro". What makes it even more absurd is that Germany simply couldn't care less if Greece defaults and a Grexit is inevitable.

And even though the EU operates in practice as a clumsy, reactionary behemoth, the puzzling spectacle remains of otherwise reputable intellectuals, such as Jurgen Habermas, denouncing the Syriza party as "nationalistic" and praising former Goldman Sachs golden boy, ECB president Mario Draghi.

Paul Joseph Watson, a commentator for the sell-out 'alternative' media network Infowars, has gone full Sean Hannity in a new video released today (posted above).

In his customary dead-eyes-yelling-at-the-camera speaking style, Watson declares Islam a "violent ideology" that requires a "reformation" to do away with its alleged inherent flaws. He cites the discredited fraud and neocon operative Ayaan Hirsi Ali as a prime choice to lead this new "reformation."

The entire Western edifice rests on lies. There is no other foundation. Just lies.

This makes truth an enemy. Enemies have to be suppressed, and thus truth has to be suppressed.

Truth comes from foreign news sources, such as RT, and from Internet sites, such as this one.

Thus, Washington and its vassals are busy at work closing down independent media.

Washington and its vassals have redefined propaganda. Truth is propaganda if it is told by countries, such as Russia and China, that have independent foreign policies.

The Ukrainian crisis can be viewed as being composed of several interconnected factors, from the civil war to rampant corruption, and the wider geopolitical ramifications of American confrontation with Russia. Another relatively overlooked factor is the ongoing conflict over Ukraine's natural resources.

Of particular interest to transnational corporations and their puppet local oligarchs is the 'black earth' of Ukraine. Black earth or 'Chernozem' is found in two major zones on earth, one of which encompasses sections of Moldova, Russia and Ukraine. Black earth is characterized by its very high fertility and, consequently, its capacity for producing a high agricultural output.

International corporations have long been utilizing loopholes and political lobbying in order to overturn a Ukrainian moratorium on land sales to foreigners. By leasing numerous parcels of land these companies anticipate both the Ukrainian government's desperation for money and the EU obligations to force open a goldmine of agricultural exploitation.