L military drill

Beijing will send troops to Russia to take part in joint military exercises later this month to "deepen cooperation" between the two militaries, the Chinese defence ministry said. China and Russia enjoy close defence ties and Beijing has said it wants to take bilateral relations "to a higher level", despite international condemnation over the war in Ukraine. According to a statement released on Wednesday, China will take part in the annual "Vostok" exercises - scheduled from 30 August to 5 September according to Moscow - as part of its cooperation with Russia. "The aim is to deepen practical and friendly cooperation with the armies of participating countries, increase the level of strategic collaboration between the participating parties and strengthen the ability to respond to various security threats," the defence ministry said in the statement. Other countries taking part in this year's Vostok exercises include India, Belarus, Mongolia and Tajikistan. China and … [Read more...] about China to send troops to Russia for military exercises

Photo-Illustration: Dakarai Akil; Photos: Getty, Alfiero Crisci (@alfierocrisci), DJ L (@ thakiddjl), Sean Aveli The sound of drill is the brazen brrrrrap of street-level rap over the past decade. It’s the unsettling, aestheticized sound of gunplay evoked by spraying hi-hats, double-tapped rhyme blasts, and a bottomless pool of ad-libbed variations on BANG! BAM! POW! Hyperlocal yet deeply translocal, it’s the sound of New York via Chicago and London. It’s the self-made soundtrack of young Black artists in these cities as well as a rhythm that any laptop producer can program after a YouTube tutorial. Drill can be many things, but as a musical term, it increasingly refers to a distinctive pattern, one that bears audible witness to its locale-hopping history. New York drill, as told by … 19 artists who define the scene. The tragedy of Jayquan McKenley. . The sound itself. The essential tracks. Lawyers and lawmakers. The Chicago Sound … [Read more...] about What Is the Sound of Drill?

By Steffan Powell Published 3 May Share close Share page Copy link About sharing Foreign nationals thinking about travelling to fight in Ukraine were given a clear warning earlier this year: "This is not Call of Duty." The horrors of a real-world battlefield are a long way from their virtual versions, no matter how much games have evolved in recent years. However, the gaming industry's relationship with the military has been getting closer - whether through the technology used to train officers, the tactics to change public perception, the close ties to veterans, or the simple fact that soldiers love to play. "There's absolutely a deep affinity to gaming among those actively serving and younger veterans," says Dan Goldenberg, who served in the US Navy and now runs the Call of Duty Endowment, a military veterans' organisation affiliated with the popular video game franchise. … [Read more...] about War games: The military’s deep affinity with gaming

Russia's novel coronavirus vaccine trials were successfully completed on Monday and the results indicated long-term immunity could be established, Russia's ministry of defense said. "The Russian Defence Ministry together with the Gamaleya [Gamalei] Scientific Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology has successfully completed clinical trials of the vaccine against COVID-19 with the participation of volunteers at the Burdenko Main Military Clinical Hospital," the ministry confirmed in a statement, Kremlin-backed news website Sputnik reported. The final assessments of the test results have been made and "without exception, all volunteers, having received immunity from the coronavirus, felt fine. Thus, the first domestic vaccine against the new coronavirus infection is ready," the First Deputy Defense Minister of the Russian Federation, Ruslan Khadzhismelovich Tsalikov, told Moscow's Argumenty i Fakty newspaper. The ministry also stated: "Test results clearly show that … [Read more...] about Russia coronavirus vaccine is ready and safe, ministry of defense says

Breakfast 1News US Correspondent Anna Burns-Francis discusses the US House Speaker’s controversial visit to the island China claims as their territory. Ben Saul is a Challis Chair of International Law at the Sydney Law School, University of Sydney EXPLAINED: “Strategic ambiguity” – the policy that has underpinned the West’s defence of Taiwan for half a century or more – rests on another ambiguity: Taiwan’s status in international law . And that status matters because it could help us answer three questions: Does China have a legal right to restore control over its own territory by force? Do Taiwan and its allies have a legal right to resist such an attack? Might Taiwan even have the right to declare independence? The islands we know as Taiwan have been inhabited for 30,000 years, including by successive waves of peoples from mainland China. Taiwan was subject to partial Dutch and Spanish colonisation from the early 17th century, was partly … [Read more...] about Why is the Taiwan independence question so complex?

Jessica Raine has just finished watching The Handmaid’s Tale , and is incensed because, she tells me, she got there first. ‘I had the idea to bring The Handmaid’s Tale to TV a couple of years ago and I brought it to a producer and they were like, “Oh my God, that’s such a great idea.” And then we discovered it had been snapped up [by Elisabeth Moss]. It’s amazing, but how annoying!’ She may have missed out on the chance to bring Margaret Atwood’s dystopian masterpiece to the small screen, but the 35-year-old British actress isn’t exactly short of high-profile TV roles – far from it. After working in theatre, Jessica made her name in 2012 when she was chosen to play the lead in one of the most popular period dramas of the decade. As Jenny Lee, the prim and proper young nurse in Call the Midwife, the BBC’s warm-hearted drama about midwifery in post-war London, she had us weeping every Sunday evening as the nation took the series firmly into its heart. Viewing figures topped 10 … [Read more...] about Jessica Raine: I was a little bit ashamed of wanting to be an actress – I associated them with a falseness

No two countries with a McDonald’s ever go to war: it was the kind of tale a naive, trusting world preoccupied with spending its Cold War peace dividend wanted to hear. So when Thomas Friedman, the US author, coined his Golden Arches theory of conflict prevention back in 1996, the idea was lapped up enthusiastically.It was an exhilarating, hopelessly optimistic take, perfect for a pre-9/11, pre-internet era that still believed in unstoppable economic and political progress. Friedman’s screed, later expanded into a book, was merely the latest to argue that some freedom begets more freedom: 19th-century economic liberals saw free trade not just as a means of generating prosperity but also of replacing war with peace, military empires with commerce. They argued that free trade raises the cost of armed conflict, reducing its prevalence. More contemporary thinkers went even further, positing that with the universal adoption of capitalism would also come mass democracy. Consumers used to … [Read more...] about Forget Nato. We need a new world alliance to take on totalitarian capitalists in Russia and China

China has echoed the rest of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in expressing support for the Palestinians and tacit condemnation of Israel's plan to annex a large portion of the West Bank, alongside President Donald Trump's Middle East peace plan. President Xi Jinping spoke with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday, according to China's Xinhua news agency, expressing Beijing's continued support for the demands of the Palestinian people as the world waits for Israel to begin its annexations. The Israeli coalition government—led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu until 2021, after which he will hand power to rival and former Israel Defense Forces general Benny Gantz—has said it plans to annex Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank. The settlements are widely considered to be illegal under international law—including by the United Nations—though some in Israel and the U.S., including Secretary of State Mike Pomepo, dispute this. The … [Read more...] about U.S. stands alone on Israel annexation plan as China backs Palestinians

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to miss his self-imposed July 1 target to begin annexing territory in the Palestinian West Bank, a controversial election pledge illegal under international law that has prompted protests from the international community. Netanyahu plans to extend Israeli control to West Bank Jewish settlements and the Jordan Valley—some 30 percent of all West Bank land—as part of President Donald Trump's Middle East peace plan. Palestinian leaders have rejected the proposal as a pro-Israeli blueprint more akin to continued hostile occupation than a bilateral peace deal. Netanyahu entered into a power sharing deal with rival Benny Gantz—leader of the centrist Blue and White coalition—in April after three inconclusive general elections. He will remain prime minister until November 2021 when Gantz—currently defense minister—will then take over. Gantz has supported annexation in the past, but said this week that the project cannot get underway until … [Read more...] about Netanyahu to miss West Bank annexation date as pandemic takes precedence

Next Sunday, U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman is scheduled to join a meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Benny Gantz, and Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi. The purpose of the meeting is to resolve differences between the positions of Netanyahu and Gantz/Ashkenazi on the issue of Israel's proposed unilateral annexations of part of the West Bank; land captured by Israel 53 years ago this week. Sunday's meeting will be the second time Friedman has taken the unprecedented step of directly interfering in Israel's domestic affairs, in a manner and direction that has never been done before. Granted, U.S. ambassadors have always been very public figures in Israel. But they never became openly involved in disputes within the Israeli government—and certainly never to push a point of view that has been antithetical to the position held by successive U.S. administrations for the past 53 years. The topic of the meeting is, whether, and how much of the West … [Read more...] about With annexation pledge, Netanyahu might have bitten off more than he can chew | Opinion