🚀 SpaceX delivers Russian, Native American women to station

A Russian cosmonaut who caught a US lift to the International Space Station arrived at her new home Thursday for a five-month stay, accompanied by a Japanese astronaut and two from NASA, including the first Native American woman in space.

The SpaceX capsule pulled up to the station a day after launching into orbit. The linkup occurred 260 miles (420 kilometers) above the Atlantic, just off the west coast of Africa. It was the first time in 20 years that a Russian hitched a ride from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, the result of a new agreement reached despite friction over the Ukraine conflict.

Until Elon Musk’s SpaceX started launching astronauts two years ago, NASA was forced to spend tens of millions of dollars every time an astronaut flew up on a Soyuz.

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‼️ WATCH Sputnik Correspondent Wyatt Reed is reporting from Donetsk after Ukrainian forces carried out an artillery strike on the Donbass Palace Hotel.

Mainstream media couldn’t possibly defend the Ukrainian terror tactics that I saw unfold tonight — instead, they will simply ignore it. Sadly, the people of Donetsk don’t have the luxury of looking the other way.

Watch this firsthand footage and see the results of the US government’s backing of the rogue regime in Kiev for yourself.

⚖️ Harvey Weinstein goes on trial in LA, where he once reigned

Five years after women’s stories about him made the #MeToo movement explode, Harvey Weinstein is going on trial in the city where he once was a colossus at the Oscars.

Already serving a 23-year sentence for rape and sexual assault in New York, the 70-year-old former movie mogul faces different allegations including several that prosecutors say occurred during a pivotal Oscar week in Los Angeles. Jury selection for an eight-week trial begins Monday.

Weinstein’s trial is one of several with #MeToo connections that have begun or are about to begin as the fifth anniversary of the movement’s biggest moment passes, including the rape trial of “That ’70s Show” actor Danny Masterson just down the hall from Weinstein’s and the New York sexual assault civil trial of Kevin Spacey.

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💵 White House spending $265K on staff to deflect Hunter Biden probe

The White House is gearing up for a growing army of staff to fend off potential Republican-led probes on everything from Hunter Biden to the US withdrawal from Afghanistan — and taxpayers are footing the bill.

Battening down the hatches should the GOP regain control of the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, the White House is shelling out $265,000 a year in salary for staff, including Richard A. Sauber, the top attorney for the Department of Veterans Affairs, whose primary portfolio will be to run comms and defense for the administration from an approaching blizzard of subpoenas.

House Republicans have vowed to investigate everything the connections of Hunter Biden and his father in his shady overseas business dealings.

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🇿🇼 Zimbabwe will continue to support Russia following referendums held in Donbass and Kherson and Zaporozhye regions on joining Russia, Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Zimbabwe Jacob Mudenda told Sputnik.

"Zimbabwe, even before the referendum[s], was on the side of Russia in terms of understanding the root cause of the conflict. …Zimbabwe and Russia are victims of sanctions, so they are comrades in the sanctions battle," Mudenda said.

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🍡Marshmallows go on trial in the UK.

This summer, Britain's First-tier Tribunal assembled to examine a bag of 27 Mega Marshmallows to determine their fate in the world of sweets.

🕵️‍♂️No crimes here, though. The British legal minds were deciding whether large marshmallows should be subject to the same standard retail sales tax as regular ones.

According to the nine-page court ruling, larger marshmallows are not in fact confectionery and should therefore be zero-rated, unlike standard marshmallows, which are subject to a VAT of 20 percent

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🇲🇽The prosecutor's office in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas says it is investigating the causes of mass poisoning of high school students in the municipality of Bochil.

According to local media reports, the students' parents claim that about 100 people exhibited various symptoms, such as nausea, drowsiness, abdominal pain, and fainting, after a Friday school event. At least 57 minors required medical assistance and two remain hospitalized.

🔬The prosecutor's office said that, following toxicology tests on students from the Juana de Asbaje secondary school, 15 samples came back "negative for prohibited substances, drugs of abuse." Further testing will be conducted.

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❗️🇦🇲 An explosion occurred in Yerevan, Armenia, in Bagratunyats Avenue on Sunday morning, according to the National Center for Crisis Management.

There are casualties but the emergency services have not yet disclosed the number and severity.

"Two combat teams from the fire-rescue squad of the Yerevan rescue department went to the scene of the incident," the official statement read.

⚡️The blast in Bagratunyats Avenue has injured two people, they were hospitalized — Armenia's National Center for Crisis Management

💎🇿🇼Companies mining highly valued minerals in Zimbabwe, such as gold, diamonds, lithium and the platinum group of metals (PGM), will have to pay half their royalties in refined mineral produce to the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ).

According to Zimbabwe's president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, the policy, which comes into effect this October, will allow Zimbabwe to build up a national reserve of precious minerals to “augment the country’s credit-worthiness” and help “circumvent and fend off funding limitations caused by illegal sanctions imposed on the country”.

💰The plan to accumulate physical reserves of precious and strategic minerals will also boost the collection of cash revenues for the daily running of state affairs, Mnangagwa wrote in his weekly column for The Sunday Mail.

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🇮🇱The Israeli soldier killed yesterday in the shooting at the Shuafat checkpoint has been identified as Noa Lazar, the Israeli Defense Forces said.

A member of the Military Police’s Erez battalion, Lazar was 18 years old. After her death, she was promoted to the sergeant rank, the IDF said.

Lazar, as well as a civilian guard, were hit in a shooting attack at a checkpoint near the Shuafat refugee camp in East Jerusalem on Saturday night. She was proclaimed dead in the hospital. Prime Minister Yair Lapid, along with President Isaac Herzog, expressed condolences over Lazar's death and vowed to apprehend the gunman.

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🤔Former US President Donald Trump said that "immediate negotiation of a peaceful end" to the conflict in Ukraine is needed, or else "we will end up in World War Three".

"And there will be nothing left of our planet - all because stupid people didn't have a clue... They don't understand [...] the power of nuclear."

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Amber Heard used the name of a famous Wild West frontierswoman Martha Jane Cannary, aka ‘Calamity Jane,’ to rent a luxury Mallorca villa, according to El Mundo.

After losing her widely-publicized defamation trial against ex-husband Johnny Depp, the “Aquaman” actress has been keeping out of the public eye, vacationing with her friend Bianca Butti and daughter Oona Paige.

The multimillion-dollar villa in the municipality of Costitx is said to belong to disgraced politician Maria Antònia Munar, who recently did a sting in jail on corruption charges. It is not clear how Heard is paying for the accommodations, as she reportedly owes her legal team $15 million - more than she does to her ex-husband.

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🐦 WATCH: A video showing a small adorable bird building a nest for her future chicks is circulating on social media.

Netizens were amused by this accelerated version of building a nest and called the bird
"a hard-working mommy".

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The James Webb Space Telescope has captured an image of the hidden gaseous "bone" structure of a distant galaxy.

The galaxy, named IC 5332, is more than 29 million light-years away and is almost face-on with respect to Earth which means that its spiral arms can be seen clearly.

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❗️OPEC+'s responsible position balances lawlessness caused by US in global energy market: Kremlin

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov's latest statements:

▪️The US has begun to lose self-control due to the OPEC+ decision to cut oil production

▪️The EU pays big money to the US for gas, depriving its economy of competitiveness

▪️The situation of energy resources for Europe in the coming 10-20 years will be sad

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Putin will hold a meeting with members of the Security Council on Monday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Sputnik

Russian MoD briefing:

▪️In the Kupyansk direction, all enemy attacks were repelled. More than 50 Ukrainian servicemen, one tank, and nine armored fighting vehicles were destroyed;

▪️In the Kharkov region, Russian troops destroyed about 60 Ukrainian servicemen, two tanks, and three armored vehicles;

▪️In the Krasniy Liman direction, 17 Ukrainian troops, two pickup trucks with heavy machine guns, and one car were destroyed;

▪️More than 120 Ukrainian servicemen, three tanks, seven armored fighting vehicles, and 11 vehicles were destroyed in the Lugansk direction;

▪️In the Zaporozhye direction, all attacks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine were repelled by Russian troops, and about 100 Ukrainian servicemen, two tanks, five armored combat vehicles, and six vehicles were destroyed

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▪️The Russian Aerospace Forces struck at temporary deployment points of units of Foreign Legion mercenaries on the island of Khortitsa and the Bars special forces brigade of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine near the city of Zaporozhye;

▪️Ukrainian forces lost more than 80 servicemen, two tanks, 22 armored combat vehicles, and seven infantry fighting vehicles in the Kherson region. A Polish Krab self-propelled artillery mount, two American M777 howitzers, and four vehicles were destroyed;

▪️Attacks by two Ukrainian motorized infantry companies were repelled in the Andreevka direction. Up to 90 Ukrainian servicemen, one tank, 12 armored fighting vehicles, and three other vehicles were destroyed;

▪️In the Nikolaev region, the Russian Aerospace Forces destroyed an ammunition depot of the 61st Infantry Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which stored more than two hundred missiles for US HIMARS multiple launch rocket systems, as well as Uragan MLRS;

▪️Russian Aerospace Forces fighter aircraft shot down a Ukrainian Su-24 jet and Mi-24 attack helicopter;

▪️Air defense systems destroyed six UAVs during the previous day, including one Bayraktar-TB2

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