‼️US Capitol Police Reportedly Boosts Security Ahead of Potential Zelensky Visit on Wednesday

The Wednesday visit is expected to see Zelensky meet with congressional leaders and national security committee senior lawmakers from the Democratic and Republican parties.

The Biden administration has not yet officially confirmed the visit will actually take place.

💬 “There's been some grumbling not only in the UK but also in the US that we're spending so much money on Ukraine when there are issues at home. People are really struggling in the UK. Pensioners don't have enough money to heat their homes, to buy healthy food, to just live their daily lives with some dignity that they deserve,” says Christopher Helali, a political and foreign affairs analyst and independent journalist.

🎧Listen to more of Helali's analysis in our podcast: Immigration Emergency Declared in El Paso, Musk Puts CEO Post to Vote

US Defense Budget Promises No Funding for Notorious Azov Regiment: Now What?

Could a provision in a fresh $44.9 billion aid package to Ukraine really stop US taxpayer dollars from going to a notorious neo-Nazi militia? Probably not.

👉 Here's why

⚡Zelensky Visit Meant to 'Shake Down' US Lawmakers to Include $45 Billion in New Aid - Source

"It appears to be an effort to shake down Congress for $45 billion in funds in the omnibus. Joint session on Wednesday," a congressional aide told Sputnik on Tuesday.

‼️ Peruvian Congress approves plan for early elections amid political crisis

💬 “I think that any idea that [EU is] going to go below that price cap is going to be suicide, economic suicide for the European Union. And that's why countries that rely on Russian oil - Cyprus, Greece, Bulgaria, also, let's think of Hungary, which has an active and important pipeline. That's where it gets the majority of its oil. They won't agree to it because we don't really get, Russia hasn't necessarily turned off the taps entirely. But this could escalate an ongoing economic war and it could heightened tensions to new heights. I don't think that they're going to go for it,” says Christopher Helali, a political and foreign affairs analyst and independent journalist.

🎧Listen to more of Helali's analysis in our podcast: Immigration Emergency Declared in El Paso, Musk Puts CEO Post to Vote

👀 US House Ways and Means Committee Votes to Release Redacted Version of Trump Taxes

The House Ways and Means Committee approved a motion to release former President Donald Trump's tax records to the public.

The committee voted 24-16 Tuesday night in favor of releasing Trump's tax records.

Last month, the US Supreme Court rejected Trump's effort to block the US House Ways and Means Committee to obtain his tax records for the last six years.

🤨Twitter CEO Elon Musk has announced he will step down once he finds 'someone foolish enough to take the job'

💬 “It really shows how the federal government, the FBI was trying to push Twitter to say like, hey there is election interference happening. Give us the proof of it. They were really giving Twitter the outcome they wanted and then asking for proof, asking for Twitter to show it. But again, this goes back to 2016 where even Facebook in 2016 said there was not any kind of proof of Russian interference in the election. And then, within months, Mark Zuckerberg changed his tune,” says Chris Garaffa, a technologist and co-host of the CovertAction Bulletin podcast.

🎧Listen to more of Garaffa's analysis in our podcast: Immigration Emergency Declared in El Paso, Musk Puts CEO Post to Vote

🇰🇵🇯🇵 North Korea has issued a scathing attack against Japan over Tokyo's new 'National Defense Strategy', which plans to more than double Japan's military spending by 2027. What are the historical, military and geopolitical considerations behind Pyongyang's concerns?

👉 Sputnik explains

🎆 Texas company Sky Elements unveiled an impressive show of 1,001 drones instead of the usual annual fireworks

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👉 Follow our LIVE UPDATES on the Ukrainian crisis

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🦠 The number of cases of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in the US has surpassed 100 million, according to Johns Hopkins University. The US is the only country with such data, the nearest India has almost 45 million

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⚡️ Biden to have extended sit down with Zelensky at White House, Senior Official said

Microsoft to buy Netflix for $190Bln in 2023, British media reported.

Netflix, whose board members include Microsoft president Brad Smith, has chosen Microsoft as an advertising partner for a new ad-supported subnoscription service.

Microsoft's chief executive Satya Nadella has also previously bought the company that developed the Minecraft game. Subsequently it bought LinkedIn for $26Bln and Nuance, a developer of speech recognition and artificial intelligence software

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📌 The White House has confirmed that Zelensky is to visit Washington on Wednesday.

▪️The President of Ukraine is going to address a joint session of both chambers of Congress and meet with President Joe Biden

▪️The presidents of the two countries plan to discuss sanctions and western assistance to Ukraine

▪️Washington has announced a new $2Bln aid package for Ukraine, which will include a Patriot air defense battery

▪️US official says Zelensky's visit to Washington and the security aid announcement are meant to send a "message to Putin"

▪️At the same time, the White House has declared that the US isn't seeking to engage in direct confrontation with Russia, and that its position will not change after Zelensky's visit

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📌 Key points from the meeting between Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chief of Russia's Security Council and Russia's former president, and Chinese President Xi Jinping:

▪️Xi received Medvedev at his state residence in Beijing on Wednesday;

▪️Medvedev and Xi were unanimous in their high expectations for bilateral relations, and exchanged views on a wide range of issues;

▪️Medvedev said he discussed with Xi the interaction between Moscow and Beijing, economic issues and industrial cooperation;

▪️Medvedev conveyed Russian President Vladimir Putin's message to China's head of state that the two countries were enjoying an unprecedented level of dialogue and cooperation, and he expressed his confidence that interstate, inter-party ties would continue to flourish

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🇳🇱🇪🇺 One more proof that Europe has opted for a ‘Hasty, Self-Imposed’ Transition when abandoning Russian gas: high energy prices are putting European industrial companies in a difficult situation, with 15% of them considering moving out of the EU.

As per Statistics Netherlands, average daily production growth has slowed in NL, being at 3% in October

AD has listed Dutch companies affected by high energy proces:

▪️Zinc producer Nystar: production halted
▪️Aluminium plant Aldel: collapsed
▪️Fertilizer producer Yara: production cut
▪️Chemical company Chemelot: running at 50% of capacity

The US doesn’t have the same problem, as it’s not relying on Russian gas:

💬 “Depending on which contract you take, gas prices in the US are five to ten times lower than in Europe”, said Paul de Krom from the Association of the Dutch Chemical Industry.

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📌 Latest statements by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov:

▪️Russia believes that arms supplies to Kiev lead to an aggravation of the conflict

▪️Zelensky's position will hardly become more constructive after his visit to the US

▪️Putin not planning to meet with the IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi, who will visit Moscow on Thursday

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📌 The latest briefing from the Russian Federation's Ministry of Defense:

▪️Six Ukrainian servicemen laid down their weapons and surrendered in the Krasnolimansk direction;

▪️Russian Armed Forces eliminated more than 80 Ukrainian servicemen during the day;

▪️The Russian Aerospace Forces destroyed an oil storage facility near Andreevka in the Kharkov region;

▪️Russian forces destroyed up to 60 Ukrainian soldiers in the direction of Kupyansk;

▪️Russian artillery hit Ukrainian manpower and equipment of the units of the mechanized brigade in the South Donetsk direction;

▪️The Russian Federation's Armed Forces destroyed three US-made M777 artillery systems in the DPR;

▪️ Russian aviation shot down Ukrainian Su-25 aircraft;

▪️Russian Armed Forces destroyed more than 30 servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and one Ukrainian tank in the DPR;

▪️Russian troops destroyed two warehouses of artillery ammunition of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the regions of Kharkov and Zaporozhye

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📹 Russian and Belarusian servicemen conduct drills in Belarus (video courtesy of Russian MoD).

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