the unbalanced evolution of homo sapiens

The US has imposed sanctions on 30 foreign companies or individuals for transferring sensitive technology to Iran for its missile program or for violating export controls on Iran, North Korea and Syria, the State Department said on Friday. Eleven companies or individuals from China, North Korea or the United Arab Emirates were sanctioned for technology transfers that could boost Tehran’s ballistic missile program, the State Department said. Nineteen entities or individuals were sanctioned for other violations under the Iran, North Korea and Syria Nonproliferation Act. They are believed to have transferred or acquired sensitive technology that could contribute to development of weapons of mass destruction. https://www.rt.com/news/line/

As millions suffer from hunger, disease, illiteracy and grinding poverty in the Lake Chad region of West Africa, a sinister game of resource extraction and exploitation is playing out, with geopolitics at the heart of it all. by Eric Draitser Part 3 - A Humanitarian Crisis and a Resource War Sadly, most humanitarian crises in the world stem from politics and greed; the human tragedy unfolding in the Lake Chad region is no different. At the heart of the issue is oil. In recent years, oil discoveries throughout the Lake Chad Basin have transformed how the states of West Africa view their economic future. At the heart of the basin is Lake Chad, surrounded by the countries of Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon and Niger. According to a 2010 assessment from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the Chad Basin has “ estimated mean volumes of 2.32 billion barrels of oil, 14.65 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 391 million barrels of natural gas liquids. ” The potential size

Tsipras will be defeated one more time, unless he threaten seriously with Grexit globinfo freexchange The Greek government is about to make one more attempt to show some resistance against the latest demands of the Troika (IMF, ECB, European Commission). After seven years of orchestrated economic destruction and one open financial coup by the ECB, Greece is experiencing another wave of huge pressure by its creditors to implement the last details of the brutal neoliberal experiment. The last demands concern the complete dissolution of labor rights and privatizing big parts of the Public Power Corporation in the energy sector. The Greek PM, Alexis Tsipras, is about to make another attempt to resist, by bringing on table the forgotten social values of Europe, especially concerning the labor rights. As Reuters reports: EU officials said on Thursday they were hopeful Greece would drop its eleventh-hour objections to a declaration marking the bloc

Συνέντευξη με αναφορές στην Ελλάδα παραχώρησε στην Τageszeitung η Γκεζίνε Σβαν, ιστορικό στέλεχος του SPD, καθηγήτρια Πολιτικής Θεωρίας στο Ελεύθερο Πανεπιστήμιο του Βερολίνου και σημαίνουσα προσωπικότητα της γερμανικής αριστερής διανόησης. « Πιστεύω ότι ο ελληνικός λαός δεν θα το βάλει κάτω. Η πολιτική της γερμανικής κυβέρνησης ζημίωσε έντονα την Ελλάδα », λέει χαρακτηριστικά ρίχνοντας στη συνέχεια τα βέλη της προς τον υπ. Οικονομικών Βόλφγκανγκ Σόιμπλε. « Ο Σόιμπλε δεν έχει μια λογική, οικονομική προοπτική για τη χώρα. Αυτό που τον ενδιαφέρει είναι να ανατρέψει τον ΣΥΡΙΖΑ. Αυτό ήθελε πάντα και συνεχίζει να το θέλει. Οι πράξεις του είναι βαθιά ιδεολογικές. Για το λόγο αυτό το φθινόπωρο πρέπει να πετύχουμε μια κυβερνητική αλλαγή στη Γερμανία ». Αναφορικά με το αν βλέπει προσεχώς επανάληψη του καλοκαιριού του 2015, η Γκεζίνε Σβαν λέει σχετικά: « Θεωρητικά, ναι. Αλλά οι φόβοι για τη διάσπαση της ίδιας της Ευρώπης, ιδίως μετά την απόφαση της Μ. Βρετανίας για το

Tachira — where the paramilitary camp was discovered — was also the region where the government found a large cache of Venezuelan currency in December. Venezuela’s Bolivarian National Armed Forces, FANB, dismantled a right-wing paramilitary camp near the Colombian border Tuesday, discovering U.S. army uniforms, among others. The FANB also discovered stolen Venezuelan military uniforms as well as combat attire belonging to the Colombian military forces. “ We are advancing an investigation, ” Tachira Governor Jose Gregorio Vielma Mora said at a press conference, according to HispanTV. “ We found accounting books with a list of victims of extortion on the site. ” Right-wing Colombian paramilitaries are responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Colombians since the 1950s. Usually targeted are campesinos, Indigenous people, Afro-Colombians, human rights activists and those sympathetic to Colombia’s leftist guerrilla movements and Venezuela’s Bol

US confirms strikes in 'vicinity,' says no evidence they hit school US forces were conducting an airdrop of Kurdish fighters around the Syrian town of al-Mansour, near the ISIS capital city of Raqqa, and carrying out heavy airstrikes to cover the drop. Among the airstrikes, one hit a school in the town which was being used to house civilians from the surrounding area displaced by the fighting. At least 33 civilians were killed. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 33 dead had been recovered from the rubble so far, and that only two survivors had been recovered yet. Raqqa is being slaughtered silently, another NGO, reported the school sheltered around 50 displaced families, which might suggest the toll will continue to rise. The Pentagon is, as always, evasive about the civilian casualties, confirming that they carried out multiple airstrikes in the immediate vicinity of the incident, but saying that there is “no evidence” that they hit a sch

As millions suffer from hunger, disease, illiteracy and grinding poverty in the Lake Chad region of West Africa, a sinister game of resource extraction and exploitation is playing out, with geopolitics at the heart of it all. by Eric Draitser Part 2 - The shadowy networks behind Boko Haram Some of the statistics on the humanitarian situation around Lake Chad are truly appalling. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, there are at least 2.1 million internally displaced people in the region, as well as 7.1 million suffering from hunger. One in every two families need life-saving assistance, according to aid workers. Countless thousands have been killed, injured or otherwise terrorized by Boko Haram and other terror groups. The situation is dire. So when the UN announced that the conference had raised 672 million dollars to help the people of the region, the news was obviously welcome. With such funds come very serious quest

The CIA’s vast database of software vulnerabilities has not only been putting the cyber security of millions of Americans at risk for years, it has also cost American taxpayers millions of dollars, as the agency has had to pay for a monopoly on the vulnerabilities. Considering that the CIA lost control of this database over a year ago, those dollars have essentially been wasted. Part 4 - Losing control and compromising security on an unprecedented scale Despite pouring millions into the purchase and hoarding of technological vulnerabilities, the contents of this vast database did not stay secret for very long. Wikileaks, during its press conference on the “Vault 7” release, noted that the CIA “ lost control of the the majority of its hacking arsenal. ” According to the source that provided the documents to Wikileaks, the CIA’s hacking tools and exploits had been “ circulated among former U.S. government hackers and contractors in an unauthorized manner, ” lea

Eric Tousaint’s study of the odious debt doctrine by Eric Toussaint Part 12 - Why the US repudiation of the debt claimed from Cuba in 1898 is relevant to Greece today I can’t resist drawing a parallel with the current situation in Europe. The comparison with the Washington-Madrid-Havana conflict in 1898 is of capital importance if we study the situation of Greece and other countries such as Cyprus or Portugal in the 2010s. After 2010, many recent studies demonstrate that the amounts Greece is being held responsible for were never transferred to the Greek authorities. They served mainly to repay private foreign banks, in particular French and German ones . Since 2010, credits have been granted to Greece by 14 States of the Eurozone, by the IMF and by the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), which took over from the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), because Greece no longer has access to the financial markets (in another context, like Cuba und

globinfo freexchange Gesine Schwan gave an interview to Τageszeitung with references in Greece. Schwan is a historical member of SPD, Political Theory Professor at the Free University of Berlin and influential personality of the German left intelligentsia. " I believe that the Greek people will not give up. The German government policy strongly harmed Greece,” she says characteristically. Schwan accused Schauble, concerning the Greek debt issue, saying that “ Schauble does not have a rational, economic perspective for the country. He is only interested to overthrow SYRIZA. This is what he always wanted and still wants. His actions are deeply ideological. For that reason we must achieve a governmental change in Germany, this Autumn. ” In another question on whether she sees a repeat of the situation of summer 2015, Schwan says: “ Theoretically yes. Yet, the fear for a breakup of Europe itself, especially after the decision of Great Britain for Brexit,