🇨🇳🇺🇸 US fails to recognize it's reached limits of its power, CIA veteran says

The US president's request to send $345 million military aid package to Taiwan shows the US has "no regard or concern for angering China", Larry Johnson, a veteran of the CIA and the State Department’s Office of Counterterrorism, told Sputnik.

💬 “I think, unfortunately, the United States, if it persists in taking actions like this, will provoke a conflict that will be very damaging to the United States and will weaken it, not make it stronger. The United States can't even fund the one proxy war in Ukraine right now. It's been losing. It can't provide sufficient artillery shells, for example,” Johnson said.

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🇨🇳 Сhina enlists public support to promote private sector investment

According to a social media post by the State Council, the Chinese government will compile reports on various issues, such as obstacles private companies face when entering the market, unfair competition, favoritism towards local businesses, and unjust fines. Local authorities will be prompted to take action in some cases, while more severe instances will be handled by supervision teams sent from Beijing.

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❗️ Russian MoD briefing on progress of special military operation in Ukraine:

▪️ Russian forces carried out offensive operations on a broad front and destroyed up to 150 Ukrainian servicemen in the Kupyansk direction;

▪️The Ukrainian Armed Forces lost up to 175 servicemen in the South Donetsk direction;

▪️ Russian forces repelled eight attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Donetsk direction, and counterattacked and improved their positions. The losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces amounted to 380 fighters;

▪️Russian air defense systems intercepted 11 HIMARS MLRS rockets and two HARM missiles, and destroyed 38 Ukrainian drones;

▪️Ukrainian losses amounted to 45 soldiers in the Zaporozhye direction and up to 30 soldiers in the Kherson direction

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🗣️ On how the American media has been tamed by the CIA in terms of publishing news about Ukraine:

“The Biden administration, through the American Central Intelligence Agency and British MI6, has succeeded in taming the press. So, the press, the American media – even my friends and former colleagues at Fox, are giving a version of these events which is not based in reality on the ground,” Judge Andrew Napolitano, a former New Jersey Superior Court judge, author, and host of the Judging Freedom podcast on YouTube, told Sputnik.

🎧 Listen to more of Napolitano’s analysis in our podcast New Rules

👉 Watch the full episode of our show on YouTube or Rumble

📹 Nigerian media chiefs commend Russia's development, Sputnik Africa's work

Salihu Dembos (pictured left in the video), Director General of the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), and Mansur Liman (pictured right in the video), Director General of the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN), praised what they saw during their stay in Russia, noting that the expectations they had before coming were quite different, in an exclusive interview with Sputnik Africa.

"Agencies like yours should continue to project this image of Russia so that the world will know that its not the Russia that we hear from the Western media," says Liman.

Dembos, in his turn, states that "...of all the countries that I've travelled in the world, there is nothing compared to Russia."

👉The whole interview

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We'd like to draw your attention to a growing English-language news channel specializing in coverage of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Be sure to follow/subscribe for updates!

Subscribe using the link here:

https://news.1rj.ru/str/ukraine_watch

💬 "Сheap noscript made using British money"

🇷🇺🇬🇧 Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova unravels cheap "Agatha Christie"-style mystery narrative showing the British government's fingerprints behind the ICC arrest warrants against Putin and Russia’s children's rights ombudswoman

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🗣️ On Biden’s chances to run for president in 2024:

“Biden is in serious trouble regarding his son's activities, and I think he could wind up paying an enormous price. And he himself seems to grow physically frailer by the week, which raises the question of as to whether he'll even be able to run in 2024. And if he's unable, what on earth will the Democrats do instead?” Dan Lazare, investigative journalist and author of "America's Undeclared War: What's Killing Our Cities and How We Can Stop It”, told Sputnik.

🎧 Listen to more of Lazare’s analysis in our podcast The Critical Hour

Ukraine using colorful toy-like bombs to kill civilians as West runs out of ammo

When it comes to the use of artillery and missiles, Ukraine’s strategy has baffled Western and Russian observers alike, with troops expending precious and dwindling stocks of NATO-caliber ammunition to terror bomb civilians in the Donbass. Now, the Ukrainian military appears to have found a low cost, barbaric workaround.

👉 Follow this link for more details

🗣️ On how Russian and American involvement in Syria differ and why the US is still involved in the country despite being asked to leave:

“What Russia is doing is they were invited by the Syrian government to help in their fight against ISIS* when it was at its peak in 2015. And they're continuing in that capacity. What the US is doing, is they basically have bases in the South, and in the East, they have been explicitly asked to leave by the Damascus government. They are without the authorization of the government,” Rick Sterling, independent journalist, told Sputnik.

🎧 Listen to more of Sterling’s analysis in our podcast By Any Means Necessary

*ISIS (also known as Daesh/ISIL/IS) is a terrorist organisation outlawed in Russia and many other states

🇳🇪 Not all peoples equal in West's eyes, Niger activist denounces 'Western hypocrisy'

🗣"Not all peoples have the same value in the eyes of the West, nor do all countries enjoy the same respect. The West observes international values differently depending on whether it is an African country or a European state," Ibrahim Namaiwa, a participant in Niger's Social Movement for the Promotion of Responsible Citizenship, told Sputnik Africa.

The social activist's remarks come against the backdrop of the coup in Niger, which has provoked strong opposition in the West, especially from former colonial ruler France. In response to the events, France cut off financial aid to the West African country and began evacuating its European citizens

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🇨🇳📱China's top internet regulator has proposed a new rule that would limit the amount of time minors can spend on cell phones each day.

The proposed rule was announced on Wednesday by the Cyberspace Administration of China and would require all mobile devices, apps, and app stores to include a “minor mode” that would limit users under the age of 18 to a maximum of two hours on the device per day - even less for younger age cohorts.

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🇺🇸📉 Fitch downgrade of US credit rating is 'historic failure of leadership by both political parties and the Executive branch,' Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, stressed in a statement.

Manchin pointed out that Fitch specifically cited the decline in governance, erosion of cooperation in the federal government and ballooning national debt as reasons for its decision to lower the US credit rating.

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