Author: Steven Sahiounie

Earlier, Trump said that he might consider meeting Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro. US President Donald Trump took to Twitter to reiterate his administration’s objection to what he described as the “oppressive Maduro regime”. This comes shortly after Trump said in an interview with Axios news website that he has had second thoughts about his decision to recognise Juan Guaido as Venezuela’s legitimate leader and said he might consider having a meeting with President Nicolas Maduro. Trump said that he was not very supportive of his administration’s decision to back Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, who tried to oust Maduro amid protests that…

Trump ally-turned-whisteblower John Bolton spent 17 months in the president’s administration. Widely described as tough-nosed foreign policy hawk, Bolton insists that President Trump was acting in his personal interests and not in the best interest of the United States. John Bolton, Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, offered a brutal review of his former employer’s presidency in an interview with ABC News, aired on Sunday. Bolton, who is set to publish a tell-all memoir about his stint at the White House, expanded on some of the anecdotes from the book and gave a broader picture of a president who is…

Last week, veteran economist Stephen Roach wrote in an op-ed for Bloomberg that a 35% decline in the dollar’s value against other major currencies may take place in the coming years. Stephen Roach, a senior fellow at Yale University and former Morgan Stanley Asia chairman, has warned that the US dollar “is going to fall very, very sharply” in the not-so-distant future as the era of the American national currency apparently comes to an end. Speaking to CNBC’s “Trading Nation” on Monday, Roach referred to the US economy and said that it “has been afflicted with some significant macro imbalances for a long time,…

Turkey has launched new military operation Claw-Tiger in the northern Iraqi region of Haftanin against forces of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and “other terrorist elements”, the Defence Ministry said on Wednesday. “#Operation Claw-Tiger is being carried out as part of our legitimate defense rights arising from international law oriented against the PKK and other terrorist elements that have recently attempted increased harassment and attacks on our police station and base areas,” the ministry said, as cited by the Anadolu news agency. According to the ministry, Turkish forces have already entered Haftanin, and are supported by the Air Force, ATAK helicopters, UAVs and…

The Green Zone in Baghdad, where the US embassy and the military bases of the US-led coalition are situated, has several times found itself in crossfire missile attacks in recent times. Four ‘Katyusha’ rockets landed in Baghdad’s Green Zone, according to Al Arabia, as sirens could be heard after the explosions from the US embassy located in the area. Al Arabia also reported that helicopters were flying over the Green Zone, with multiple reports from social media users that the helicopters belonged to the US. There were no immediate reports on casualties or damage. ​The tweet reads: “Al-Arabiya correspondent: 4…

After importing all types of armaments and equipment for years, Iran has been increasingly switching toward the domestic production of military wares presenting new achievements of its defence industry almost every year. Iranian naval forces have tested newly acquired land-to-sea and sea-to-sea cruise missiles. This occurred during the so-called “Ramadan Martyrs” drills conducted in the Sea of Oman and in the northern part of the Indian Ocean. The missiles, the newest product of the Iranian defence industry, were fired from ground-based launchers and from the Iranian Navy’s warships, successfully hitting their designated targets around 280 kilometres away. The military said…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised by 1 July to start unilaterally extending the Jewish state’s sovereignty over one third of the West Bank, an area offered to Tel Aviv as part of the so-called Deal of the Century introduced by US President Donald Trump on 28 January, an offer strongly rejected by the Palestinians. The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan’s Foreign Minister, Ayman Safadi, warned on Thursday that Israel’s plans to expand its sovereignty on lands in the West Bank are considered an “unprecedented danger” to the peace process in the region and could potentially trigger a “long and violent” conflict.…

Iran regrets that the resolution, adopted earlier on Friday by the IAEA’s Board of Governors, was introduced by three European signatories to the nuclear deal, namely France, Germany and the UK, as they themselves have produced no concrete action to implement their obligations under the agreement, Gharib Abadi said. “It is also a deep regret that this resolution was presented by the three European States which have not taken any concrete practical step in the implementation of their obligations under the JCPOA. These lacks of willingness or inability to take practical actions in this regard, along with the unilateral, illegal…

At the beginning of the year the Iraqi parliament voted in favour of a plan that would end the US military presence in the country. The vote came in response to the killing of top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in a US drone strike in the capital Baghdad. The move received harsh condemnation from the international community. Iraq doesn’t want a quick withdrawal of US troops, said General Kenneth F McKenzie, head of United States Central Command, which oversees US operations in Africa, Central and South Asia, and the Middle East. The statement was made on 18 June during an…

The statement comes ahead of the publication of former US National Security Adviser John Bolton’s memoir detailing his work in the Trump administration. In some excerpts of the book, obtained by US media, Bolton claims Trump is easily influenced by foreign leaders. Russian President Vladimir Putin cannot play Donald Trump “as a fiddle” as he does not regard his US colleague as an easily manipulated politician, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in a statement on Friday. “Putin has repeatedly voiced his opinion about Trump in numerous interviews”, Peskov added. The Kremlin spokesman’s statement comes in response to claims made in the…