Author: Phillip Colon

Researchers have tracked more activity by an influence campaign linked to Russia that spreads disinformation and propaganda in the U.S., Germany and Ukraine through a vast network of social media accounts and fake websites. The campaign, attributed to the Russia-linked influence operation network called Doppelgänger, has been active since at least May 2022. The U.S. tech company Meta previously referred to Doppelgänger as the “largest” and “most aggressively persistent” malign network sponsored by Russia. Researchers from Recorded Future’s Insikt Group are currently tracking over 2,000 inauthentic social media accounts associated with Dopplegänger, but say the actual number could be even higher. The Record is…

Brussels (50). Two years in the war of Russian aggression against the Ukraine the balance is grim. Let us take stock. Leadership. The EU model of command and control consist of an old grumpy old general, an Austrian, who nobody has heard before, taking a political control of a pretty large army based of a defeatist model. The question to pose is the General who often is compared with Franz Josef I. suitable for modern command? The likely answer is no. The European play wars. The Europeans appear to be out of the fight. NATO command is in contradiction with…

Jake Paul and Mike Tyson have been encouraged to cancel their ‘mismatch’ showdown. ‘Iron Mike’ is set to step back in the ring aged 58 to take on YouTube star Jake Paul in a blockbuster summer fight, a fight which has seen him given medical warnings given their 31-year age difference. Tyson has been documenting his training in footage posted to social media, with some fans surprisingly impressed by his punch power and suggesting he will beat Paul. And his new footage crushing the pads with trainer Rafael Cordeiro, has been met by new pleas from fans for Paul to abandon the fight…

Russia may respond to any U.S. confiscation of its currency reserves frozen in the West by seizing the assets, including property and cash, of U.S. citizens and investors in Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, a senior security official, said on Saturday. The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a bill allowing the Biden administration to confiscate Russian assets held in American banks and transfer them to Ukraine, something the Kremlin has said would be illegal and trigger retaliation. In response to Russia’s war in Ukraine, the United States and its allies prohibited transactions with Russia’s central bank and finance ministry and blocked about…

Frankfurt, Paris (14/4 – 40) Relations between Russia and NATO have reached boiling point due the recent event: the claim that Serbia and Russia want to refight Kosovo; the closure of the border by Finland; and the statement by the President of France, Emanuel Macron, on March, 14. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, Sergey Lavrov, in a series of posts on social media, claimed that NATO, the EU, and the US government were targeting Kosovo and Serbia and destroying the relationship. Never mind a coalition with Italy and Russia, this is just another pipedream of Radio…

As Congress continues to delay aid and Volodymyr Zelensky replaces his top commander, military experts debate the possible outcomes. Long before it was reported, at the end of January, that Volodymyr Zelensky had decided to replace his popular Army chief, Valery Zaluzhny, the Ukrainian counter-offensive of 2023 had devolved from attempted maneuvers to mutual recriminations. The arrows pointed in multiple directions: Zelensky seemed to think that his commander-in-chief was being defeatist; Zaluzhny, that his President was refusing to face facts. And there were arguments, too, between Ukraine and its allies. In a two-part investigation in the Washington Post, in early December, U.S. officials…

Giant portraits of President Emomali Rahmon adorn even the most nondescript buildings in Tajikistan’s capital of Dushanbe. Throughout the country, his sayings are featured on posters and billboards. Their ubiquitous presence underscores the consolidation of power by Rahmon – officially described as “Founder of Peace and Unity, Leader of the Nation” – since he emerged victorious from the 1992-1997 Tajikistan civil war that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. After three decades in power, he has established himself as an absolute ruler with no tolerance for dissent. Rahmon’s bid to centralize control includes efforts to silence political opponents, human rights activists, and independent…

Elon Musk was star guest this year at an annual conference organized by Italian PM Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party. He arrived against the backdrop of an ice-skating rink and an ancient castle in Rome with one of his 11 children to tout the value of procreation. Italy has one of the lowest birth rates in the world, and Musk urged the crowd to “make more Italians to save Italy’s culture,” a particular focus of the Meloni government. Meloni has been a strong opponent of surrogacy, which is criminalized in Italy, but there was no mention of Musk’s own recent children born of…

Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese hailed U.S. Congress for authorising the sale of nuclear submarines to another country for the first time, allowing the AUKUS defence partnership of Australia, the U.S. and Britain to go ahead. More than two-thirds of the U.S. House of Representatives voted in favor of a defence policy bill on Thursday that included a record $886 billion in annual military spending and authorised policies such as aid for Ukraine and push back against China in the Indo-Pacific. “This is an extraordinary achievement,” Albanese said in an interview with radio network 2GB on Friday, adding he had…

Today the US Congress passed the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which includes substantial enabling provisions for Australia’s AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine program. The NDAA will also establish a national exemption for Australia and the United Kingdom from US defence export control licensing, and adds Australia and the United Kingdom to the US Defense Production Act. Specifically, the NDAA will: The Albanese Government welcomes the significant and tangible steps the US Congress and the Biden Administration have taken to deliver on its commitment to both Pillar I and Pillar II of AUKUS. The NDAA will see the transfer of Virginia Class Submarines…