🇿🇦 South Africa has been granted $497 million by the World Bank for the conversion of one of its old coal-fired power plants, according to a Friday statement by the bank

▪️ The institution said the financing is intended “to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in South Africa and support a just transition.”

▪️ The country’s green transition goals secured $8.5 billion in loans and grants last year. Ahead of the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, negotiations on the utilization of the money are planned.

❗️ South Africa’s industry, which is the biggest on the continent, gets 80% of its electricity from coal

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🤔 Ukraine aid will drop to zero if GOP takes Сongress, Marjorie Taylor Greene says.

💬 “Democrats have ripped our border wide open. But the only border they care about is Ukraine, not America’s southern border. Under Republicans, not another penny will go to Ukraine. Our country comes first,” Greene said at a ‘Save America’ Trump rally in Sioux City, Iowa on Friday.

▪️The congresswoman accused President Biden and the Democrats of ignoring domestic problems, including the economy, inflation, crime, and the fentanyl crisis, of “putting America last” and “destroying every single thread of democracy in the process.”

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💬 "For two years, the TPLF has been backed by Western governments, led by the United States, and they've been enabled to do what they've been doing, including the media kind of taking their side. And that is what has really prolonged the war for this long. But as you know, there's been a massive resistance from the Ethiopian people, a Pan-African movement called No More, saying "No more intervention". And what we had witnessed is a humanitarian imperialism where, a humanitarian issue was being weaponized for this unwelcome intrusion into African affairs," says Nebiyu Asfaw, a co-founder of the Ethiopian American Development Council

🎧 Listen to more of Nebiyu Asfaw's analysis on our podcast.

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National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden has posted a picture mocking those who blame "Russian bots" for political failures.

▪️Earlier, Snowden said that censorship on Twitter and other social media had become excessive, depriving users of the right to make their own decisions regarding content.

▪️Edward Snowden sparked a major international scandal after he leaked classified US and UK intelligence information about extensive surveillance programs to US media.

▪️Forced to leave the United States for Hong Kong and then Moscow, Snowden was later granted a three-year Russian residency. He was granted Russian citizenship by President Vladimir Putin earlier this year.

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☢️ US media yarn about nuclear chatter by Russian military is nothingburger, intelligence vets say.

"It's simply a sign of weakness and desperation on the part of Joe Biden and his administration," said Larry Johnson, a veteran of the CIA and the State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism, which provided training to the US military’s special operations taskforce for 24 years.

💬 "If things were going well in Ukraine, as far as the United States was concerned, if Ukraine really was defeating Russia on the battlefield, there'd be no need to talk like this. But that's not the case,” he said.

Russia's nuclear doctrine clearly forbids the use of nuclear arms of any sort unless the country is nuked, or faces a conventional attack so severe that it threatens the country’s existence.

👉READ THE FULL STORY

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⚡️ Terrorists planning attack on Russia's Syria base using kamikaze drones – Russian MoD

💬 "According to information received by the [Center for Reconciliation], militants from the Jahbat al-Nusra* and the Islamic Party of Turkestan* are planning an attack on the Khmeimim Air Base using strike UAVs and kamikaze drones," Oleg Yegorov, deputy head of the Russian MoD's Center for Reconciliation in Syria, said at a briefing Friday.

▪️The Russian officer said that a large number of drones intended for use in the attack had been assembled near Jisr ash-Shughur, a city in northwest Syria occupied by Nusra and the TIP.

Russia operates two military facilities in Syria - the naval facility in Tartus and the Khmeimim Air Base in Latakia Governorate. Khmeimim has come under terrorist fire repeatedly since its establishment in 2015.

*Terrorist organizations banned in Russia.

🇸🇪 Sweden's top general has admitted that Stockholm is an "actor" in the Ukraine security crisis.

Why is Sweden able to recognize its role in Ukraine, while the US and NATO continue to tip-toe around their involvement?

👉 Sputnik has a couple of ideas.

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🤔 New Bibi, Same as the Old Bibi?

After a diverse coalition united in 2021 from across the Israeli political spectrum with the singular goal of denying Benjamin Netanyahu another turn at the head of the Israeli government, that coalition collapsed and in November 1 elections to the Knesset, Bibi emerged on top once more.

👉 MORE

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🇺🇸 More Republicans now oppose continued US contributions to the ongoing Ukraine crisis, according to a new survey.

📍The poll shows that 48% of registered Republican respondents said that they believe the US is doing too much for Ukraine, compared to 6% earlier this year. 17% of Republicans said that they believe the US isn’t doing enough for Ukraine, a 44-point decrease from the 61% in March.

▪️In October, some GOP lawmakers started to criticize the aid, with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy saying that the Republicans will cease to write blank checks to Kiev if the Republicans get the majority in the lower chamber of Congress after the upcoming midterm elections.

▪️Russia has heavily criticized the US for prolonging the hostilities in Ukraine, with Washington effectively becoming a party to the conflict.

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District of Bezos

▪️ The fourth-richest man in the world has his sight set on one particular American city. Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon and who has a net worth of $114.4 billion, is reportedly looking to purchase the Washington Commanders. The pro football team is estimated to be worth $5.6 billion, but it wouldn’t be Bezos’ first DC purchase.

👉 LEARN MORE

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📹 Moment a Russian Lancet loitering munition destroys US-made Paladin self-propelled howitzers in the Nikolaev-Krivoy Rog direction.

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🦠 A man in the UK was finally cured of COVID after 411 days, British media says.

▪️The 59-year-old patient, who has a weakened immune system after a kidney transplant, first tested positive at the end of 2020, but continued to test positive until 2022.

▪️Medics at Guy's and St. Thomas' Hospitals in London said the unnamed 59-year-old had one of the earliest variants of the Wuhan strain, and noted that the patient had not been re-infected.

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🇬🇧 British spies are training an army of Ukrainian insurgents to attack Russian military and civilian targets in Crimea, leaked documents have revealed.

🕵️ Investigative news website The Grayzone named the key players working with the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) in Odessa, the Black Sea port to the west of Crimea, to set up the covert force.

▪️They include military consultant Hugh Ward, who works for private security firm Rezolutionz, MI6 veteran Guy Spindler, former Lithuanian Defense Minister Audrius Butkevicius, and veteran intelligence agent Chris Donnelly.

👉READ THE FULL STORY

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🕳 Netizens are pondering about the reason for the “drill size holes” in the veins of Biden's hands.

Recent pictures of the commander-in-chief's hands have left some on the Internet wondering whether he has been administered an intravenous line (IV) of late. While some people were looking for a rational explanation, others resorted to wild claims.

💬 “Apparently the embalming of Joe Biden is a nightly thing,” wrote one user. “Looks like they installed a tracking chip,” said another in jest.

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🚨 Republicans have offered a sneak peak of their attack strategy against a "politicized" FBI and DoJ in the event of victory in the upcoming midterm elections, accusing the domestic intelligence agency of turning into President Biden's secret police force.

📝 The document is based on the testimony of “a multitude of whistleblowers” who have come forward to the House Judiciary Committee “with allegations of political bias by the FBI’s senior leadership and misuses of the agency’s federal law-enforcement powers.”

👉READ THE FULL STORY

📹 Footage showing the moment a Russian Lancet loitering munition destroys a Ukrainian military boat in the Dnepr.

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📹“The wind was blowing in our direction”: A woman from Shakhtyorsk on why the fire at the fuel base, which began after the Ukrainian shelling, endangered civilians

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🇨🇦 Chrystia Freeland, the deputy prime minister and finance minister of Canada, could replace Jens Stoltenberg as a NATO secretary general unless his term is extended, American newspaper reported on Friday, citing a US official familiar with the debate.

🧐 According to the official, Freeland is the prime candidate that has surfaced in Washington.

▪️ The United States is unlikely to put forward an American candidate since a US general is traditionally appointed as the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, the report said.

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🐘 🥺 Drought in Kenya killed 205 elephants and scores of other wildlife between February and October as much of East Africa endures its worst drought in 40 years, according to Kenya’s Tourism Ministry

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📹 “We were trying to save everything we could”: A man from Shakhtyorsk on a blaze caused by a Ukrainian strike on fuel tanks near his village

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🤔 US Deputy Secretary of Defense Kath Hicks will host a classified meeting with chief executives of leading American arms makers, including Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Technologies and General Dynamics next week to discuss supply chain-related problems, a UK-based news outlet has reported.

▪️ Pentagon spokesperson Eric Pahon told the outlet that the gathering would focus on ways to secure supply chains and shore up the defense industrial base, against the backdrop of “an expected surge in demand for weapons from US allies”, such as Germany and Poland, due to the ongoing Russian special military operation in Ukraine.

▪️ Last week, UK media reported about a possible scenario where the Pentagon’s top four military industry contractors faced persistent shortages of parts and personnel over the next two years.

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