How China Overtook the U.S. As the World’s Trade Partner
In 2018, trade accounted for 59% of global GDP, up nearly 1.5 times since 1980.
Over this timeframe, international trade has transformed significantly—not just in terms of volume and composition, but also in terms of the countries that the rest of the world leans on for their most important trade relationships.
Kyrgyzstan says Russia plans to install new air- and missile-defense equipment and drones at its air base near the former Soviet republic’s northern city of Kant.
“The Chinese military has never engaged in any form of cyber theft. The US accusation is groundless and totally hegemonic,” said Senior Colonel Wuqian, spokesperson for China’s Ministry of National Defense, in a written statement published on Thursday.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Friday said he would help Pakistan stay off a terrorism financing blacklist at a meeting of a global finance watchdog, a move he suggested would counter “political pressure” from Islamabad’s critics.
A Syrian man held on suspicion of plotting an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon was referred to trial on Thursday along with 20 other people, the Lebanese state news agency NNA said.
Greater Idlib and its immediate surroundings in northwest Syria—consisting of rural northern Latakia, northwestern Hama, and western Aleppo—stand out as the last segment of the country held by independent groups. These groups are primarily jihadist, Islamist, and Salafi in orientation. Other areas have returned to Syrian government control, are held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), or are held by insurgent groups that are entirely constrained by their foreign backers; that is, these backers effectively make decisions for the insurgents. As for insurgents in this third category, the two zones of particular interest are (1) the al-Tanf pocket, held by the U.S.-backed Jaish Maghaweer al-Thawra, and (2) the areas along the northern border with Turkey, from Afrin in the west to Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ain in the east, controlled by “Syrian
Syrian anti-air defense units fired in attempt to intercept incoming projectiles launched against the Damascus area early this morning. The Israeli Defense Forces is thought to have launched the attack.
The White House announced today that Qasim al-Rimi (or al-Raymi), the emir of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), has been “successfully eliminated” in a “counterterrorism operation in Yemen.”
On Wednesday, the spokesperson for the military wing of Hamas stated that Israelis in their captivity were injured during airstrikes conducted by Israel’s Air Force. The message about the injury of its captives may be closer to psychological warfare than truth.
As the Assad regime and its allies advance into Idlib from two directions, Hay’at Tahrir al Sham (HTS), the largest jihadist force in the area, has increasingly utilized suicide bombings in defense of the province.
Virtually every sector of Iran’s civilian economy is now subject to U.S. secondary sanctions, rendering additional sanctions progressively less significant.
In 2012, Hezbollah committed itself to armed conflict in defense of its Syrian ally, Bashar al Assad, against rebels and Islamic State fighters attempting to overthrow the Assad government. With the backing of Iran and Russia, they successfully supported the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) in largely putting down the armed insurgency.
Over the last few weeks, al Qaeda’s Group for Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) released two pamphlets that sent indirect messages to its detractors and supporters in the Sahel and beyond.
Vice Adm. Rick Williamson, deputy chief of naval operations for fleet readiness and logistics (N4), and Rear Adm. Masatomi Dairiki, director general of the Logistics Department of the Maritime Support Office, Japan Maritime Self Defense Force, signed a revised framework to improve cooperation and interoperability for maritime logistics Feb 5 at the Pentagon.
The State Department has made a determination approving a possible Foreign Military Sale to India of an Integrated Air Defense Weapon System (IADWS) for an estimated cost of $1.867 billion. The Defense Security Cooperation Agency delivered the required certification notifying Congress of this possible sale on February 7, 2020.
Taipei, Feb. 10 (CNA) Chinese military aircraft crossed over the median line of the Taiwan Strait and into Taiwan’s airspace on Monday for the first time in nearly a year, as Beijing continued military maneuvers near Taiwan for a second straight day.
The Department of the Air Force released a $169 billion budget proposal Feb. 10, which for the first time includes funding for the newly created U.S. Space Force while also focusing funds to help both services modernize, address threats from Russia and China, and sustain readiness.
The warning takes on greater meaning following a call on January 28 by ISIS’s new leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Quraishi, to direct greater attention to attacking Israel and Jews, including using chemical weapons.
An Israeli court Monday sentenced a firebrand Islamic cleric to 28 months in prison for incitement to terrorism in connection with deadly unrest at a Jerusalem holy site in 2017.
A bomb detonated on a truck containing diesel-filled barrels and killed eight civilians and wounded seven more, including children, in northwestern Syria’s Idlib region on Monday, the Turkish Defense Ministry said.
Syria and Turkey inched closer to all-out war Monday as their troops exchanged deadly fire for the second time in a matter of days in Idlib, a contested and ravaged northern province that is the last remaining major rebel redoubt in Syria’ s nearly nine-year war.
The Donald Trump administration is again set to slash funding for the fight against the Islamic State (IS) in a new budget request unveiled today, as Iraq’s leaders have publicly demanded an end to the US-led combat mission.
Shortly after Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Iraq, the Tehran-backed Lebanese organization Hezbollah urgently met with Iraqi militia leaders, seeking to unite them in the face of a huge void left by their powerful mentor’s death, two sources with knowledge of the meetings told Reuters.
Several neo-Nazi Atomwaffen Division (AWD) and ISIS videos were located on Facebook owned Instagram. One of the AWD videos was uploaded in September by an account that has also posted several additional pieces of neo-Nazi propaganda and prominently features a neo-Nazi flag in the user’s profile photo.
The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) reports weekly on the methods used by extremists to exploit the Internet and social media platforms to recruit followers and incite violence.
Most of the rockets fired in the past two weeks were fired by PIJ. Khalil Bathani, a leader in PIJ, is considered the main possible target, according to Ynet. He has been targeted in the past.
Paris has said it will deploy 600 additional troops to the border zone between Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. French forces are also seeking to train local fighters who Paris says are unprepared to take on jihadi groups.
Lebanon’s protests have drawn protesters from all religious sects. But Hezbollah, the Islamist militia and political party, and its ally, the Amal Movement, have tried to smother demonstrations by Shiites.
Iraq’s military said on Thursday it was resuming operations with the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State which had mostly halted after bases hosting U.S. troops came under rocket attacks and a U.S. drone strike killed a top Iranian commander.
A Russian-backed Syrian government offensive against the country’s last rebel enclave has caused one of the biggest waves of displacement in the nine-year-old war.
Islamic State extremists are mounting increasingly bold attacks in Syria and Iraq following their loss of territory in both countries and are planning for the breakout of their fighters in detention facilities, U.N. experts said in a new report.
