A troubling new report released by the Ministry of Civil Defense, Emergencies and Elimination of Consequences of Natural Disasters (EMERCOM) today states that President Putin has issued a dreaded “Black Notice” to all Russian ministries banning the foreign travel of all “vital and essential” civilian and military persons under the powers granted to him by Articles 87 and 88 of the Constitution. The... 

A “near-natural” prosthetic arm, that took eight years to develop and test, has been approved for mass production by the US Food and Drug Administration. The DEKA Arm System has been affectionately dubbed “The Luke,” after Star Wars’ Luke Skywalker who received a robotic replacement for the hand he lost in a fight with Darth Vader in the 1980 film “The Empire Strikes Back.” One of the... 

Is the petrodollar monopoly about to be shattered? When U.S. politicians started slapping economic sanctions on Russia, they probably never even imagined that there might be serious consequences for the United States. But now the Russian media is reporting that the Russian Ministry of Finance is getting ready to pull the trigger on a “de-dollarization” plan. For decades, virtually all oil and... 

Ukraine’s interim Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk Ukraine has accused Russia of stealing energy resources in Crimea and threatened to take Russia to court over its recent gas price increases. On Tuesday, Ukraine’s interim Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said that the Ukrainian government would take Russia to court unless it agreed to a gas supply contract based on market prices. He also said... 

Italy is threatening to allow refugees currently residing within its borders to make forays into the rest of the European Union unless the EU increases assistance in managing the influx of migrants arriving via boats from North Africa. Interior Minister Angelino Alfano demanded on Tuesday that the EU step up its efforts. “The European Union has two options: either it comes to the Mediterranean to... 

Experts from the drinking water inspectorate found that cocaine use in Britain is now so high it has contaminated the drinking water supply, even after it has gone through intensive purification treatments, UK media reports. Scientists found supplies of drinking water contained traces of benzoylecgonine, the metabolized form of the drug after it has been processed by the human body. Benzoylecgonine... 

Kiev has summoned the Hungarian ambassador over remarks made by Prime Minister Viktor Orban about autonomy for Hungarians living in Ukraine. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry expressed concern about the Hungarian premier’s call for autonomy and dual citizenship of ethnic Hungarians living in the western Ukrainian province of Transcarpathia. The ministry said Orban’s comments contradict Ukrainian laws. The... 

Stephen Hawking has shocked physicists by admitting ‘there are no black holes’. In a paper published online, Professor Hawking instead argues there are ‘grey holes’. ‘The absence of event horizons means that there are no black holes – in the sense of regimes from which light can’t escape to infinity,’ he says in the paper, called Information Preservation... 

An upcoming expert-level meeting of the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) in Geneva is to host a debate on killer robots. The discussion is to be held between Prof. Noel Sharkey, co-founder of the Campaign Against Killer Robots and chairman of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control, and Prof. Ronald Arkin from the Georgia Institute of Technology, a public research university... 

Chinese researchers at the Applied Superconductivity Laboratory of Southwest Jiaotong University claim their fast transportation concept based on magnetic levitation (Maglev) technology could potentially be three times faster than an airplane. Maglev technology was first proposed in the mid-20th century. Nowadays, the Shanghai Maglev Train can reach speeds of over 430 kilometers (260 miles) per hour... 

Ukrainian troops outside the town of Andreyevskoe near Slaviyansk, Donetsk Region, where local residents blocked a column of Ukrainian Army armored personnel carriers. About 400 elite mercenaries from the notorious US private security firm Academi (formerly Blackwater) are taking part in the Ukrainian military operation against anti-government protesters in southeastern regions of the country, German... 

The most famous Michael Harari was a James Bond-style Mossad agent and gun-runner. However the Dr Michael Harari recently in the news is an Australian trained paediatrician (apparently no direct relative to the spy) who helps al Qaeda fighters and their families get back on their feet. Dr Harari held a speech on 8 May at Sydney University on his treatment of injured children at Ziv, which has taken... 

Production line: Chickens after ritual slaughter in a halal abattoir in Burgundy, France. Hundreds of schools have banned pork – sausages and bacon – and switched to halal only meat for meals even where Muslims are in the minority. Hundreds of UK schools have banned pork sausages and bacon and switched to halal only meat for meals even where Muslims are in the minority. Many families of... 

The head of the Roman Catholic Church in Israel has condemned Israeli hate crimes against local Christians and Muslims. Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal told a news conference in the city of Haifa on Sunday that the acts of vandalism “poison the atmosphere” ahead of a visit by Pope Francis to Jerusalem. The Pope’s visit is set to begin in Jordan on May 24 and he is due to spend two days in Israel... 

Donbass residents vote in the referendum on the status of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic. Donetsk People’s Republic has proclaimed itself a sovereign state and has asked Moscow to consider its accession into Russia, the Republic’s council said. “We, the people of Donetsk, based on results of the May 11 referendum and the declaration of sovereignty of the Donetsk People’s...