YouTube is now adding fact checks to videos that question climate change, BuzzFeed News has confirmed, as a part of its ongoing effort to combat the rampant misinformation and conspiratorial fodder on its platform.

On July 9, the company added a blurb of text underneath some videos about climate change, which provided a scientifically accurate explainer. The text comes from the Wikipedia entry for global warming and states that "multiple lines of scientific evidence show that the climate system is warming."

This new feature follows YouTube's announcement in March that it would place descriptions from Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica next to videos on topics that spur conspiracy theories, such as the moon landing and the Oklahoma City bombing. In doing the same for climate videos, the company seems to be wading into more fraught and complex intellectual territory.

A prominent UN adviser has been exposed by Newsweek as the man at the center of a 14-month-long investigation into sexual abuse. The report accuses him of making repeated unwanted advances towards younger men.

Last December, UN Women, the agency responsible for women's empowerment and equality, published a low-key statement mentioning that an investigation had been opened into an unnamed official. The Newsweek report now claims that the man is India-born Ravi Karkara, who worked as senior adviser to the former deputy executive director of UN Women, Lakshmi Puri, until recently.

Karkara remains on leave while collecting full pay. Meanwhile, several officials have been putting pressure on the organization to complete the probe and reform its internal practices.

According to Newsweek, which spoke to several lawyers and activists familiar with the case, as well as to one of the alleged victims, "the sexual misconduct accusations against Karkara include touching or grabbing a subordinate's genitals in a hotel room, using work devices to send pornography and follow-up questions to male subordinates, creating a climate of sexual innuendo and obscene gestures in the workplace, and using his position and access as leverage to initiate sexual encounters." They concern "at least seven or eight men" who have admitted being subject of unsolicited attention.

If you want to see identity politics on display in all of its deranged glory, check out this tweet from The Hill:

"Openly gay Dem wins House primary, would be first Native American woman elected to Congress."

The Washington Post had something similar for its headline:

"Democrats pick gay, Native American nominee in Kansas 3rd."

Let's leave aside the fact that Elizabeth Warren is already the first Native American woman elected to Congress. The larger point is that the woman's actual name is left out of the tweet and the headline to make room for a long series of labels. Unintentionally, The Hill and the Post have illustrated the great irony of identity politics: it deprives you of identity.

As the Syrian Army moves closer to regaining control over the last remaining militant-occupied areas, a growing number of refugees are returning to begin rebuilding their lives. RT asked some of them why they are coming home.

Between January and October of last year, 700,000 Syrians returned home from abroad, according to UN data.

One man who's already moved back to Aleppo told RT that normality was returning to the city as infrastructure and utilities were being repaired after more than seven years of civil war.

"We opened a shop here," he said, upon his family's return to the city. "Thank God the electricity is back and life went back to normal again."

Another man making the trip from Lebanon by bus said they're thinking of moving back because it's become safer.

Germany treated more than 100 soldiers from Ukraine since 2014 but doesn't know if they served in the army or in neo-Nazi-linked paramilitaries. Some were filmed doing Nazi salutes on stretchers and sporting far-right logos.

The federal government "doesn't have information" on whether the treated Ukrainians were part of the Ukrainian army or paramilitary groups linked to neo-Nazi and far-right fighters, such as the notorious Azov Battalion, head of the parliamentary Defense Committee Wolfgang Hellmich wrote, responding to an inquiry by Alexander Neu from the Left Party.

Hellmich's letter, obtained by RT Deutsch, details that 112 Ukrainian fighters were airlifted and treated in Germany since the conflict in eastern Ukraine began in 2014. It also confirms that all transportation and medical costs were covered by the German side.

Saudi Arabia is selling off Canadian securities in response to Ottawa's criticism of the arrest of a female activist, the Financial Times reports. Riyadh says it's ready to take the step despite possible financial losses.

According to the newspaper, Saudi Arabia's overseas asset managers were told to dump Canadian equities, bonds and cash holdings "no matter the cost." Saudi Arabia is not a major investor in Canada, according to the FT source, but the Kingdom wants to send a strong signal to authorities in Ottawa.

The diplomatic rift between the two countries began after Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland demanded the release from prison of Saudi women's rights activist Samar Badawi, who has family in Canada.

Living in constant fear, hiding from shelling with her children and no way out - a Russian woman who was sentenced to prison for being part of a terrorist group after following her ISIS husband to Syria shared her story with RT.

In February this year, Zagidat Abakarova from the Republic of Dagestan in southeastern Russia received an eight-year jail sentence for joining an illegal armed group. However, she won't actually go to jail until her youngest child turns 14. The girl is currently one year old.

Speaking to RT's Madina Kochenova, Zagidat recalled the story of her life, which has been turned upside down ever since she traveled to Syria. "I was 29 when I left [Russia], I went to Turkey first with my husband, I never thought I would end up there [in Syria]," the woman, who is now 33, admitted to RT.

I live in France where from the avenue of the Champs Elysées to the tractors covered with flags in the alfalfa fields of Normandy, the French celebrated their victory at the World Cup held in Russia. The world event gave Russia the opportunity to show its good side and to my happy surprise, even English journalists stressed how well organized the Cup was and everyone reported on how open and welcoming the Russian people were. How much the Russians seem to long for recognition and sympathy; visitors praised the food, the lodgings, the cleanliness and the good timing of everything. The two problems seemed to be the huge distances to cover and the Russian language. The world seemed to discover that Russia is a real country full of ordinary likeable people, not the evil empire full of clones.

I also live in my own little corner of internet. Through this small window, I try to find the truth because the mainstream media, while vociferously denouncing fake news, always tells the same story and the only difference between journalists at best is a slight change in wording - like so many actors giving their own take on the same script. I look for truth through debate and contradicting views. So, in the usual way of this alternative media, an email sends me a link: look at this before it is taken down! The link is a 2-hour long documentary entitled: The Magnitsky Act, Behind the scenes. It is like being handed a Russian novel. You have to be brave enough to delve into a long, involved, intricate storyline full of unexpected twists and especially full of ambiguous characters none of whom, unlike American fiction, entirely fit the categories of good and bad - although some seem definitely much worse than others.

Plastic surgery has been popular in American and Western culture for decades, but the latest trend in industry reflects technology and social media's influence on body image issues.

According to a paper recently published in JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery by researchers from the Department of Dermatology at the Boston University School of Medicine, the fastest growing request in plastic surgeons' offices is to look more like the images produced by Snapchat filters. Snapchat, a popular messaging app, offers filters that can smooth out the skin and nose, enlarge the eyes, and make the lips appear fuller. The authors of the paper, titled "Selfies-Living in the Era of Filtered Photographs," say these filters "can take a toll on one's self esteem, make one feel inadequate for not looking a certain way in the real world, and may even act as a trigger and lead to body dysmorphic disorder (BDD)."

An Israeli soldier who shot dead a Palestinian teen for throwing a rock at his car in 2015 is being promoted to commander of one of Israel Defence Force's (IDF) main infantry brigades.

The promotion of Colonel Yisrael Shomer to Nahal Brigade commander was confirmed by the IDF as part of a series of personnel changes, Haaretz reports.

Shomer was filmed shooting dead 17-year-old Muhammad Ali-Kosba after he threw a rock at the soldier's vehicle near the West Bank village of Al-Ram on July 3, 2015.

CCTV footage of the killing was shared online by Israeli human rights group B'Tselem, who condemned the shooting as unlawful and sent the footage to the Military Police Investigations Unit.