U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed progress in combating the coronavirus pandemic along with arms control issues and oil prices in a phone call Thursday, the White House and the Kremlin said.
The US Justice Department on Thursday said it was dropping the criminal case against President Donald Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, abandoning a prosecution that became a rallying cry for the president and his supporters in attacking the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation.
Donors have pledged 7.4 billion euros ($8 billion) for developing a vaccine against the new coronavirus disease COVID-19. But after the online-meeting with world leaders, banks and organizations, officials warned more money might be necessary.
In the first such operation since the Cold War of the 1980s, U.S and British Navy vessels sailed into the Arctic Barents Sea Monday, between the northwest coast of Russia and Norway’s Svalbard archipelago. The US military said Russia had been given prior notice of the operation in order to avoid any “inadvertent escalation.”
Iran has suggested it will abandon an already shaky deal to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons if an arms embargo on Tehran remains in place. The United States wants to extend the ban, which was due to end in October this year.
Pakistan and Russia have reported their most significant one-day rise in new coronavirus infections. Their announcement Saturday came after some other countries and U.S. states where case numbers are stabilizing allowed businesses and public activities to reopen.
Turkey’s planned deployment of Russian S-400 missile defenses has been delayed by the coronavirus outbreak but will ultimately go ahead, President Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman said on Thursday, despite Washington’s warnings that Ankara risks U.S. sanctions.
Explosive new internal FBI documents unsealed Wednesday show that top bureau officials discussed their motivations for interviewing then-national security adviser Michael Flynn in the White House in January 2017 — and openly questioned if their “goal” was “to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired.”
A U.S. government advisory panel wants India on a religious freedom blacklist over a “drastic” downturn under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, triggering an angry reaction from New Delhi. In addition to India, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) also recommends the inclusion of four more – Nigeria, Russia, Syria, and Vietnam.
The United States has circulated a draft U.N. resolution that would indefinitely extend a U.N. arms embargo on Iran set to expire in October, a move almost certain to spark opposition from Russia, which has made no secret of its desire to resume conventional weapons sales to Tehran, U.S. officials and U.N. diplomats said Tuesday.
More than 130,000 people from across the world, many in lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic, have decided to follow Jesus Christ after an online evangelism event, organizers said. “We are living through a Great Quarantine Revival, and I think God is just getting started,” explained evangelist Nick Hall, whose Pulse movement organized the virtual program.
The Trump administration notified Congress this week that it will try to refill the money it took from Pentagon accounts to use to build the border wall by cutting European defense assistance.
Iran threatens a ‘crushing response’ to any American military attacks in the Persian Gulf after United States President Donald Trump threatened to ‘shoot down and destroy’ Iranian vessels. The leader of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned that the security of the Gulf is among Iran’s strategic priorities.
The foreign ministers of Russia, Turkey, and Iran will hold a video conference on April 22 to discuss Syria and a de-escalation deal in the last rebel-held enclave in Idlib.
President Trump threatened Iran with severe retaliation Wednesday after the U.S. military claimed Iranian ships had made ‘dangerous and threatening approaches’ toward American navy vessels in the Persian Gulf last week.
A week ago, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies agreed to slash production by 9.7 million barrels, a deal that brought an end to a price war between two of the biggest exporters, Russia and Saudi Arabia.
U.S. crude oil futures plunged to a historic low of below $0 on Monday. Desperate traders paid to get rid of that fossil fuel amid a coronavirus-induced lack of global demand.
Orthodox believers in the ex-Soviet republic of Georgia held church services, despite warnings that they complicated efforts to halt the new coronavirus pandemic. Worldwide, millions of Orthodox Christians celebrated Easter – the most important festival in their calendar, amid a series of restrictions and bans to prevent more infections.
With much of Hungary in lockdown, a minister attended a quite ceremony to remember the 600,000 Hungarian Jews killed in the Holocaust. At a time when much attention focuses on the coronavirus pandemic, Justice Minister Judit Varga made clear those who died should never be forgotten. Dressed in black, she placed pebbles, flowers, and candles at the Shoes on the Danube embankment monument in Budapest, the capital.
OPEC and its oil producing allies on Sunday finalized a historic agreement to cut production by 9.7 million barrels per day, following multiple days of discussions and back-and-forth between the world’s largest energy producers. The cut is the single largest output cut in history.