Author: News Desk

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Monday new U.S. sanctions blacklisting Iran’s central bank for a second time pointed to U.S. “desperation” in the face of the Iranian resistance. President Donald Trump last year quit a 2015 nuclear pact between Iran and six world powers, reimposing and then tightening sanctions that had been lifted under the deal in return for Iran curbing its nuclear program. The United States on Friday imposed further sanctions, including on Iran’s central bank which was already blacklisted, following Sept. 14 attacks on Saudi oil facilities that Riyadh and Washington have blamed on Iran. “Americans are…

Key Point: Will the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) ever take the leap into nuclear propulsion for its aircraft carriers? Credible reports confirm that the PLAN is already building at least one conventional carrier in the 80,000-ton range. Given how quickly Chinese shipbuilding has accelerated, does it make sense for the PLAN to think nuclear for its next generation of ships? Current Carriers China has taken huge steps forward in the past decade, acquiring and modifying an old Soviet carrier, and building a new ship to the same design. China will follow up the Type 001— essentially a half-sister to Liaoning,…

Former Massachusetts Governor and Republican presidential candidate Bill Weld slammed President Donald Trump’s contacts with the government of Ukraine in a television interview on Monday morning, calling Trump’s actions “treason.” “Talk about pressuring a foreign country to interfere with and control a U.S. election. That’s not just undermining democratic institutions. That is treason. It’s treason pure and simple, and the penalty for treason under the U.S. code is death. That’s the only penalty,” Weld said, speaking on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “The penalty under the Constitution is removal from office, and that might look like a pretty good alternative to the…

President Donald Trump acknowledged Sunday that he accused a leading political rival of corruption during a phone call with Ukraine’s president, as pressure intensified on reluctant Democrats to move quickly toward impeachment over allegations that Trump engaged in a brazen effort to enlist foreign help to aid his own reelection. In public and in private, many Democrats suggested that evidence in recent days indicating that Trump pressed the Ukrainian government to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, and his administration’s stonewalling of attempts by Congress to learn more, were changing their calculations about whether to seek his removal from office.…

Binance.US, the American outpost of crypto exchange giant Binance, launched today, offering up seven cryptocurrencies to citizens in 37 states. This marks the exchange’s first official steps into the US, giving it access to a large crypto-focused market. Trading will begin tomorrow at 13:00 UTC. “We believe we are just at the beginning of crypto adoption globally. There is room to grow for every organization in this space, and the industry will continue to get bigger in every country around the world,” Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao told Decrypt today. Though Binance could always be accessed by Americans using a VPN, Binance was never technically…

A ‘fart competition’ held on Sunday in Gujarat’s Surat, touted as the country’s first-ever turned out to be a massive fail as only three participants managed to overcome shyness and inhibitions to take a shot at the three trophies on offer. They too, however, failed to pass the test as they could not find the courage to pass the wind. While sixty people had registered to display their prowess in letting out “longest”, “loudest” and “most musical” farts at a banquet hall in the Vesu area, only twenty turned up on Sunday, said organizer Yatin Sangoi. According to the organizer,…

Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says his country will not succumb to economic pressure by the Trump administration. “We are resisting unprovoked aggression by the United States,” Zarif told NPR’s Steve Inskeep in an interview in New York City on Sunday. “I can assure you that the United States will not be able to bring us to our knees through pressure.” “Abandon the illusion that Iran can be defeated by pressure,” said Zarif, who spoke with NPR ahead of this week’s United Nations General Assembly, where he will seek to convince world leaders that harsh U.S. economic sanctions on…

An Instagram influencer with millions of followers and a host of celebrity endorsements claims that drinking celery juice can cure chronic illnesses. But he doesn’t have any medical qualifications, and doctors say many of his claims about celery and other vegetables and fruits aren’t backed up by science. If you spend a lot of time on Instagram, you may have come across posts of people sipping on a green beverage – celery juice. While it might not be to everyone’s taste, it is certainly a drink of the moment. Google Trends statistics show relatively little interest in celery juice over the…

It wasn’t a bomb or a bullet, but a can of dry shampoo that turned into a projectile and burst through the sunroof of a car. Now a St. Peters woman is warning others not to leave aerosol cans inside a car. “We thought something fell down from the sky, but the glass was going out so we know that wasn’t the case,” Christine Debrecht told. Debrecht is talking about the giant hole in the sunroof of her daughter’s Honda Civic. Luckily, nobody was inside the car at the time. Debracht said the damage was so severe, it took about 10…

Malaysia has deemed Lorene Scafaria’s “Hustlers” too vulgar for audiences. The country’s censorship board said no way to the film’s apparent parade of nudity and eroticism. The film’s international distributor confirmed the ban on social media today. See the post below. https://www.instagram.com/p/B2mRpoChPev/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet “Hustlers” last weekend took the second spot at the top-10 box office, beneath “It Chapter Two,” and is currently riding high on rave reviews — as well as Oscar buzz for star Jennifer Lopez, who plays a streetwise stripper who takes ingénue Constance Wu under her wing (and into her fur coat). The film’s nudity and sex are relatively light but…