Sanctions against Russia will backfire and actually benefit the economy, President Vladimir Putin has said. His comments follow US President Obama's threat that the White House has prepared a third round of sanctions.

"Over-reliance can lead to a loss of sovereignty," Putin said at a media forum in St. Petersburg on Thursday.

Western-led sanctions have several advantages for Russia, the President said.

The threat of real economic sanctions is already helping boost domestic businesses, bringing more offshore funds back to Russia, and giving policymakers the push they need to establish a domestic payment system. Similar to what Prime Minister Medvedev said last week, sanctions will only make Russia stronger.

De-offshorization has long been a priority of the Kremlin, and Western-led sanctions only help this cause.

Russians with Western-held assets worry their funds could be frozen at any moment, which gives incentives to keep money domestically and pay taxes into the Russian budget, and not an offshore tax haven. An estimated $111 billion of Russian money, or 20 percent of the country's exports, is "lost" offshore,

Policymakers are also encouraging businesses to list their companies in Russia, and not abroad, to shield themselves from sanctions.

"[The aim of public education is not] to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence. . . . Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim . . . is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to put down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States..." - Henry Mencken, American Journalist (April 1924)

How do you persuade a nation of relatively freedom-loving individuals to march in lock step with a police state? You start by convincing them that they're in danger, and only the government can protect them. Keep them keyed up with constant danger alerts, and the occasional terrorist incident, whether real or staged.

Distract them with wall-to-wall news coverage about sinking ships, disappearing planes and pseudo-celebrities spouting racist diatribes. Use blockbuster movies, reality shows and violent video games to hype them up on military tactics, and then while they're distracted and numb to all that is taking place around them, indoctrinate their young people to your way of thinking, relying primarily on the public schools and popular culture.

After all, public education the world over has always been the vehicle for statist propaganda of one sort or another, whether it's religion, militarism, democracy or totalitarianism, and America is no exception. In fact, today's public schools, far from being bastions of free speech, are merely microcosms of the world beyond the schoolhouse gates, and increasingly, it's a world hostile to freedom.

As I show in my book A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, within America's public schools can be found almost every aspect of the American police state that plagues those of us on the "outside": metal detectors, surveillance cameras, militarized police, drug-sniffing dogs, tasers, cyber-surveillance, random searches, the list goes on. Whether it takes the form of draconian zero tolerance policies, overreaching anti-bullying statutes, police officers charged with tasering and arresting so-called unruly children, standardized testing with its emphasis on rote answers, political correctness, or the extensive surveillance systems cropping up in schools all over the country, young people in America are first in line to be indoctrinated into compliant citizens of the new American police state.

Recently there have been a spate of free speech controversies, from Phil Robertson's temporary suspension from Duck Dynasty for comments made on homosexuality and race, to the resignation of Firefox CEO Brandon Eich over a political donation made six years ago in support of traditional marriage, to the revocation of an honorary degree and cancellation of a commencement speech to be delivered by human rights activist and Muslim apostate Hirsi Ali at Brandeis University for critical statements on Islam.

But Americans can take heart that they are not subjected to the stringent speech laws of Great Britain, where an event transpired this past weekend that takes the cake when it comes to censorship.

Paul Weston, a member of the GB Liberty Party, and current candidate for the South East England constituency of the European Union Parliament, delivered a speech in Winchester, a part of his constituency, in which he quoted from Winston Churchill's 1899 book, "The River War: An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan." In particular, Weston quoted Churchill on the topic of Islam. As a result of his speech (and his refusal to stop speaking), Weston was arrested.

Here is the passage that Weston quoted from Churchill's book on the steps of Winchester Guildhall during the afternoon of April 26th, while addressing a group of passers-by on the street via megaphone.

Plastic surgery that transformed his appearance and countless incredible operations have established Jacob ("Yakuba") Cohen as a legendary spy who operated in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran and Egypt. A testimony he gave before he died sheds new light on his story.

The burial plot at the cemetery of Kibbutz Alonim in northern Israel is situated at the heart of a pastoral thicket: in the last days of winter, only feeble sun rays penetrate through the tree branches. The tranquility, interrupted only by the chirping of birds, does not betray the fact that under this tombstone lies one of the most tempestuous and fascinating spies in the history of Israeli intelligence: Jacob "Yakuba" Cohen.

The story of Yakuba is not widely known to the general public, but within the intelligence community he is a true legend. Generally, the glory of spies normally involves a paradox: the more successful the spy is, the higher the chances that his activity will remain shrouded in secrecy and unknown to the general public, even after his or her death. The better known spies are those whose operations had been exposed, namely - those who were "blown".

Yakuba Cohen was born in 1924 in the Nahalat-Zion neighborhood of Jerusalem, to a Jewish family of Persian origins. He had 12 brothers and sisters, and his father, a Bible and Hebrew teacher, was very strict about everyone in the household speaking Hebrew. Young Yakuba spent a lot of his time playing with the children of the nearby Arab village of Sheik-Bader, absorbing their language and culture. The village sheik was a friend of Yakuba's grandfather and in those days relations between Jews and their Arab neighbors were good. However, pursuant to the hostilities of 1936-37, the picture changed somewhat. "One day, in 1936, while I was working during the summer holiday in the Montefiore neighborhood, I saw three Arabs passing through a nearby field and a Jew walking in the opposite direction. They proceeded to stab him to death and as I watched the entire incident, I screamed my head off," Yakuba recounted about an incident that had a profound effect on him as a child.

Announcing its third annual Free the Press campaign to highlight censorship and oppression of journalists "around the world," the US State Department made clear it doesn't consider press freedom issues in the United States the same way it does abroad.

The aim of the third annual Free the Press campaign is to focus attention on "journalists or media outlets that are censored, attacked, threatened, or otherwise harassed because of their reporting."

But, apparently, the US' own crackdown on journalists, particularly those involved in whistleblowing, is a completely "separate category" to be highlighted by such an event, as Jen Psaki, the spokesperson for the US State Department made clear.

"We highlight, as we often do, where we see issues with media freedom around the world," Psaki told Matthew Lee of the Associated Press, who asked if she believes there are some problems with press freedom in the US that should be discussed as well.

"Otherwise harassed?" Lee asked. "Does that include those who may have been targeted, harassed, imprisoned, or otherwise, whatever, by the United States Government?"

Energy-pinched Ukraine has reached a deal to start reverse gas flows from Central European neighbors via an unused pipeline to Slovakia. Starting from October, Ukraine will import 3.2 billion cubic meters of gas.

Ukraine and Slovakia signed a memorandum of intent in Bratislava on Monday. The European Commission said the cooperation between Slovakia and Ukraine is a "win-win for both parties".

"It shows the EU's strong commitment in support of Ukraine's energy sector, which is also reflected in the economic and financial package the Union has swiftly provided for Ukraine in the past weeks. I would like to thank Energy Commissioner Oettinger and his team, who played a central role in paving the way for today's agreement," Jose Barroso, President of the European Commission, who attended the ceremony, said in a statement.

By next spring, deliveries from Vojany, Slovakia to the western Ukrainian city of Uzhorod could reach 10 billion cubic meters, the amount European Commissioner for Energy Gunter Oettinger requested.

Deliveries from Slovakia could satisfy up to 20 percent of Ukraine's natural gas demand, which in 2013 was 55 billion cubic meters.

New round of Western sanction against Russia will target seven individuals and 17 companies. They are meant to affect Moscow's stance over the ongoing Ukrainian crisis.

The individuals listed by the US Department of Treasury on Monday include Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak, chair of the parliamentary commission on Foreign Affairs, Aleksey Pushkov, chief of presidential office, Vyacheslav Volodin, and Igor Sechin, the head of Rosneft oil company.

The list of sanctioned companies, which Washington believes to be "linked to Putin's inner circle," includes several banks, construction and transport companies.

The Volga Group, an investment vehicle that manages assets on behalf of the businessman, Gennady Timchenko, and SMP Bank, whose main shareholders were affected by the previous set of US sanctions, are among those to face restrictive measures.

Oil and gas engineering company, Stroytransgaz, and one of Russia's biggest rail transporters of oil, Transoil, are also among the companies affected by the sanctions.

The Pentagon has wasted a billion dollars' worth of ammunition because its inventory reporting system isn't up to scratch, with inaccurate accounting and no effective information sharing mechanism in place to point out vast unused reserves of ammunition.

Somehow the bullets and missiles that could still be used end up in a pile slated for destruction, and because a single weapons arsenal database has still not been worked out, an estimated $1.2 billion pile of ammo will go down the drain. So says a Government Accountability Office report obtained by USA Today.

The development of the database has been in the works for years, but different services have their own information systems, which to this day can't share that information directly. The only department that has adopted a new system by the Pentagon is the Army. The Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps are all using outdated ones.

Democrat Senator and Chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Tom Carper told USA Today that "there is a huge opportunity to save millions, if not billions of dollars if the [Pentagon] can make some common-sense improvements to how it manages ammunition."

The mayor of the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkov, Gennady Kernes, has been shot in the back, the city council's press service reports. He is currently in serious condition in one of the city's hospitals.

Kernes was shot while cycling on a road in the north of the city, Yury Sidorenko, of the mayor's press service, told RT.

"They shot him in the back from the forest," Kernes's friend Yury Sapronov said. "The injury is serious. His lung is pierced and his liver pierced all the way through."

The mayor was taken to the local hospital at about 11:30 am (8:30 GMT) local time.

Following an operation that lasted two hours, Valery Boyko, the surgeon who was treating Kernes, called his condition serious as his diaphragm had been injured. He also said that his interior organs have been damaged and he will remain in serious condition for at least several days.

Boyko said that the doctors had stopped the bleeding, but that Kernes is currently unconscious.

An Egyptian court has sentenced to death 683 supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi, including one of his Muslim Brotherhood movement leaders, Mohamed Badie.

The same court reversed 492 of the 529 death sentences it passed in March, replacing the capital punishment for most convicts to life in prison, Egyptian media reported.

Chaos here in Minya as families learn 37 sentenced to death the rest life in prison #Egypt pic.twitter.com/06HpSrRS9Q

- Bel Trew - بل ترو (@Beltrew) April 28, 2014

The new sentences passed on Muslim Brotherhood members came over charges relating to an attack on a police station last year.

The deadly attack on August 14 in the city of Minya, where the trial was held, came on a day of violent clashes between Morsi supporters and Egyptian security troops.