Despite Russia's shock announcement that it is scaling down anti-terror operations in Syria, the Syrian Arab Army continues advancing across eastern Syria towards the Iraqi border. In the meantime, Russia has new problems 'closer to home', with NATO building up forces along its border, Kiev building up forces along the Donbass contact line, and clashes breaking out between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces in the Caucasus.

This week on Behind the Headlines, we discussed these latest developments on the global stage, along with the dodgy EU-Turkey refugee deal that threatens increasing chaos in Greece, and the ongoing fallout from the Brussels Bombings.

This show aired live on the Sott Radio Network from 12pm-1.30pm EST / 5-6.30pm UTC / 6-7.30pm CET on Sunday April 4th, 2016.

Running Time: 01:30:28

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On the night of September 17, 1961, the second Secretary General of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjold, was flying to a meeting in Northern Rhodesia to negotiate a possible resolution to the conflict in the newly independent Republic of the Congo. His flight never reached his final destination. The next day, the site of its crash was discovered just miles from the airport. 15 passengers, including Hammarskjold, were dead, and the only survivor died soon after. Written off as the result of pilot error by the official Rhodesian inquiry, the UN's own investigation did not come to any definite conclusions. Now, over 50 years later, new evidence has come to light that raises the distinct possibility that Hammarskjold's plane was attacked. The publication of Dr. Susan Williams's book Who Killed Hammarskjold? prompted an independent commission and UN resolutions aimed at finding the truth, but some major powers - the U.S. and UK - are blocking access to key documents.

On this episode of the Truth Perspective, we discussed this evidence, Secretary General Hammarskjold, the circumstances of his death, and why it matters today. Joining us was Dr. Henning Melber, Director Emeritus and Senior Advisor of the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation in Uppsala; Senior Advisor to the Nordic Africa Institute; Extraordinary Professor at the Department of Political Sciences/University of Pretoria and the Centre for Africa Studies at the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein; and Senior Research Fellow with the Institute for Commonwealth Studies at the University of London. He has published several books, including Peace Diplomacy, Global Justice and International Agency: Rethinking Human Security and Ethics in the Spirit of Dag Hammarskjöld.

Running Time: 02:04:51

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The recent liberation of Syria's Palmyra (a UNESCO world Heritage site) by the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and allies is an important victory for numerous reasons. Not only does it send yet another message to the different Western-backed terrorist factions (which Syria has been fighting for the past five years) that they will eventually fall, but it also sends a message to the West and their gang of anti-Syrian states and actors - who have been fuelling this savage war on a sovereign Syria - that Syria and Syrians remain resilient, the SAA and allies remain relentless in their fight against terrorism, and that Syria's political allies continue to support her.

Further, the victory once again dispels the myth of "Assad's army brutalizing the people": footage from inside the liberated city of Palmyra shows residents praising President al-Assad and praising the Syrian Arab Army (a reported 200 of whom were killed in the battle to liberate Palmyra), much like footage from the liberated villages of Nubl and al-Zahra'a earlier this year, and every area, in fact, which the army has secured.

Today on the Health and Wellness show, we connected the "don'ts" in recent health news, and talked about what you can do to keep your health, wellness, and sanity. Between governmental control on medicine, environmental pollution, vaccines, the state of food, and many other things, we have plenty of issues to battle to keep our heads on straight. However, it is possible to approach the seemingly insane world with rationality and personal responsibility for your own state of health. As always, Zoya joined us with a pet health segment about the absurdity of vegetarian diets for your pet dogs and cats. Tune in weekly on Fridays on the SOTT Radio Network!

Running Time: 01:53:52

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Here's the transcript of the show:

Over the last few months, I have been following up on the many claims made by the Tobacco Control Lobby regarding the dangerous effects of tobacco smoking. My investigations led me to the conclusion that almost everything being presented as evidence for tobacco's deleterious effects is junk science. I have also discovered just how many authoritarian followers are out there and just how hate filled and vicious they can be when their core doctrines on the dangers of smoking and secondhand smoke are challenged.

What is junk science?

According to YourDictionary.com junk science is "A cluster of assertions, publications, and experts that have the appearance, but not the actuality, of a scientific specialty." A more detailed discussion follows here:

The problem ... is that defining a "finding" as junk science relies on our having a "clear and unproblematic understanding of what science is, and just as importantly what it is not". We might think we do. It approximates to that observation-hypothesis-prediction-experiment-new-observation-amendment-(peer review)-theory cycle with which we are all fairly familiar. But, many things we call science, such as experiments that cannot be repeated independently, the LHC [Large Hadron Collider] experiments, large-scale clinical trials, climate modelling etc., do not fit and cannot even be forced to fit this cycle. Moreover, of the many thousands of scientific papers out there that comprise the scientific literature, very few, but for some worthy exceptions, are ever repeated by other scientists.

In reality, observation studies married with statistics, or flawed clinical studies using animals with a predisposition to cancer, are being used to prove whatever the research sponsor wants to prove. It's junk science. All that is required is to tweak the questionnaire, fiddle with the statistical models, bias the clinical tests and you can have the answer you want. But only so long as that answer is politically correct. Try to use this method to prove something held to be "bad" or "wrong" in the minds of the Public Health Sector, and all hell will break loose.

Hello ordinary people of the world! How are you? Are you awake? Are you watching what's going on on your planet? Or have you given up already? It's actually very important to stay alert to global events, and we don't just mean taking note of what Western political talking heads say. We mean taking careful note of what's actually happening in the world, and noticing when what happens appears to directly contradict what your political leaders say.

Specifically today, we'd like to know if any of you have noticed that the ancient city of Palmyra in Syria has been liberated by the Syrian army. And if you have noticed, do you understand what it means?

You may recall hearing that ISIS had taken control of Palmyra last year, and of the significant fears that the jihadis might destroy much of the impressive Roman ruins there. As part of the West's "Christian" historical heritage, you might have thought that the threat of a gang of extremist Muslims destroying those ruins would provide lots of motivation for Western governments to move in to rout the infidels and protect the city.

Bizarrely however, not only did Western governments largely ignore the capture of Palmyra, the general response of US and European politicians to the impressive advance of ISIS across Syria and Iraq over the last 2 years has been to engage in lots of hand-wringing and issue warnings of the dire threat that these grotesque caricatures of Muslims pose to you and your children. We think it's fair to say that the general impression given to Western populations was that, despite their military bases, long-term presence in the Middle East and vast military machines, there was nothing NATO countries could do to impede the march of the jihadis.

But if you recall, the US and its allies had no problem delivering 'shock and awe' to Iraq and then occupying the country for 10 years with hundreds of thousands of US troops and mercenaries, yet we are asked to believe that Western powers were completely impotent in the face of a relatively small band of cutthroats as they rampaged across Syria, killing and maiming Syrians and sending millions fleeing towards Europe in the process.

You'll agree, that narrative is a little difficult to swallow.

So it really is a bit perplexing to realize that all it took was 6 months of Russian bombing of ISIS targets in Syria and direct support for the Syrian army in its fight for national sovereignty to render ISIS no longer a significant military threat in Syria or Iraq, for 500 towns and villages to be liberated - including Palmyra - and a peace process - largely put in motion by Russia - to be established.

After months of "anti-terror" raids, tension, and media hype, terror has come to Brussels, Belgium. Following the same script used for over a decade, this latest attack features all the tropes: drills, prior knowledge, intelligence warnings, and suspects previously known to police and intelligence. But is Brussels really the den of extremists the media has been telling us it is? Actually, yes, but the real terrorists aren't Muslims. On this episode of the Truth Perspective we discussed the details of this latest attack, the bigger context of Western-backed and Western-created terrorism, and what our response should be to tragic events like this.

Broadcasting from deep in the heart of the American Empire, join your hosts Harrison Koehli and Elan Martin, and fellow SOTT editors, as they discuss everything from current events and the latest machinations and manipulations of the global elite to history, science, and religion, and how it all fits together. The Truth Perspective is brought to you by the SOTT Radio Network on SOTT.net, your one-stop source for independent, unbiased, alternative news and commentary on world events.

Live every Saturday at 2 p.m. Eastern Time.

Running Time: 01:39:53

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Physicians and scientists have known about the placebo effect for well over 50 years. Studies have shown that placebos -- dummy or sugar pills-- are just as effective as medication with active ingredients. Yet the mainstream study of placebos as a first line treatment gets little attention. Today on the Health and Wellness Show we talked about the placebo effect and take it a step further. Do humans have an inner pharmacy that can be tapped into at will? What if you can become your own placebo and experience healing through the power of your mind alone? Can you change your genetic expression through thoughts? And if this is possible, how does it work? Joining us, as always, was Zoya with a pet health segment on placebos and pets.

Running Time: 01:55:39

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Here's the transcript of the show:

Two news stories caught my eye yesterday in the media coverage of Tuesday's attacks in Brussels. The first was a Newsmax TV report featuring former NYC Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik giving his proposed strategy to defeat Daesh and stop future terrorist attacks. If the name Kerik rings a bell, it's because he commanded New York's police during 9/11. But more on that below; here's what wisdom he had to impart:

"They [Belgian intelligence] didn't have enough intel to figure out who they [the 'terrorists'] were, where they were, what they were doing — and this is in the aftermath of taking down the mastermind of the Paris attacks. ... The key is intelligence. Our state, local and federal authorities have to be communicating. We have to be working with those abroad."

Thanks, Bernie, for that remarkable insight. (Hey, at least it's better than Killary's plan to defeat ISIS by defeating ISIS.)

The second story was the report that one of the suspects in the attack at Brussels' Zaventem Airport, Ibrahim El Bakraoui, left a 'suicide letter' or rudimentary 'will' on a computer that was subsequently found in a trash can during a raid by Brussels police in the Schaerbeek neighborhood. The note allegedly said: "I don't know what to do, hunted everywhere, no longer safe" and "I don't want to end up in a cell next to him [i.e. Salah Abdeslam, presumably]." The street in which they found the laptop allegedly was also where police found an unexploded bomb, an ISIS flag and bomb-making materials.

The aviation and general security services firm ICTS handles security operations at Brussels airport, the scene of a bomb attack yesterday morning.

ICTS was established in 1982 by former members of Shin Bet, Israel's internal security agency and El Al airline security agents, and has a major presence around the world in airport security including operations in the Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Japan and Russia. ICTS uses the security system employed in Israel, whereby passengers are profiled to assess the degree to which they pose a potential threat on the basis of a number of indicators, including age, name, origin and behavior during questioning.

Chairman of the Supervisory Board at ICTS is Menachem J. Atzmon. Atzmon is a former Likud party member who was indicted and convicted in 1996 in a fraud and embezzlement case relating to the misappropriation of funds raised by charities. Atzmon is also the CEO of the port authority of Rostock in Germany.

This will not, however, be the first time that ICTS has come under scrutiny for possible security lapses leading to a 'Muslim terror attack'.