Biden could only project the illusion that he is "a leader of the free world", while Xi was "at the top of his game," says renowned journalist Pepe Escobar in his column for Sputnik. According to him, while the US president was promoting his usual agenda, Xi saw right through all the American demagogic statements:

🗣 “Xi knows all there is to know about imperial, rotating hybrid war fronts, plus others that can be powered on at the flick of a switch. The hegemon continues to provoke disturbance not only in Taiwan but in the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, India, and continues to flirt with possible color revolutions in Central Asia,” the analyst stresses.

Check out his full article here

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🇰🇵 North Korea's warning roars: 'offensive' actions promised in face of US 'provocations'

The DPRK condemned the recent visit of top US defense officials to South Korea, promising intensified and "offensive" responses to what it perceives as military threats from the United States and its allies.

🗣 "The armed forces of the DPRK will strongly control and manage all threats to its national security and interests with more offensive and overwhelming counteraction capabilities and through visible strategic deterrent military actions," the statement said.

Pyongyang claims that the United States and its allies are responsible for exacerbating military tensions on the Korean Peninsula. The reasons cited include large-scale military exercises and the increased presence of US strategic assets in the region.

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🇺🇸 CIA Chief's Ukraine visit linked to looming palace coup against Zelensky

Ukrainian government infighting has already escalated to assassinations of factional lieutenants. International affairs and security analyst Mark Sleboda said CIA Director William Burns would either "tamp down" the civil war or tell President Zelensky to go quietly.

Washington's spymaster has flown to Ukraine in secret to stamp US authority on the power struggle within the Kiev regime, says a security expert.

Security analyst Mark Sleboda told Sputnik that Burns' visit "dovetails" with this week's visit to Washington by Andriy Yermak, "Zelensky's powerful, grey, cardinal, chief of staff" to meet US Secretary of State Antony Blinken — who duly uttered pledges of continued military support for Kiev in the US proxy conflict with Russia.

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Russia’s response to NATO upgrading its fleet of AWACS aircraft may involve the development of an equally advanced early warning and control aircraft, says military analyst Dmitry Kornev.

NATO’s new E-7A aircraft equipped with powerful radars are expected to enter service as early as 2031 and can supposedly peer deep into Russian territory without entering the country’s airspace.

He added that further efforts to conceal Russian troop movement from foreign countries’ signal intelligence is also not a bad idea.

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✈️ Flying Power!

📹 Long-range aviation aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces performed scheduled flights in the airspace over the neutral waters of the Barents, Norwegian and Black Seas

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🇺🇸 The US House Ethics Committee stated that it found substantial evidence of criminal conduct by Congressman George Santos, following an investigation into the lawmaker by the panel’s Investigative Subcommittee (ISC).

The ISC found “substantial evidence” that Santos filed fraudulent reports with the US Federal Election Commission, used campaign funds for personal purposes and willfully violated the Ethics in Government Act as it relates to financial disclosure statements to the House of Representatives, the panel said in a statement.

“The Committee has unanimously voted to adopt the ISC’s report, and with it, refer the substantial evidence of potential violations of federal criminal law to the Department of Justice for such further action as it deems appropriate,” the statement read.

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📈 Thanks to an increase in exports of petroleum, gas, and other energy products this year, the Russian government’s current account is expected to post a surplus of some $75 billion this year, based on new data from the country’s central bank.

The Central Bank of the Russian Federation said on Tuesday that the current-account surplus amounted to $53.8 billion as of November 1, about four times the level it was at just a year prior. October followed September as the second straight month in which the account had an $11 billion surplus.

As a result, a US business newspaper has updated its projection for the year, estimating Russia’s account will have $75 billion in it by the end of next month, assuming the trend continues.

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Israel's hidden nuclear arsenal makes it unaccountable for war crimes - journo

Israeli government ministers and other officials have already mooted using nuclear weapons in the Palestinian Gaza Strip. Independent journalist Sam Husseini told Sputnik that Israel's atomic arsenal deterred Palestine's allies from stopping Tel Aviv's atrocities.

Israel's undeclared nuclear weapons grant its leaders impunity in committing war crimes, says a journalist.

👉 Check out his full interview

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🇺🇸 New documents released after a Freedom of Information Act request suggest the company LexusNexus has been selling personal location and facial recognition data to the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) since late last year. The information was revealed in a report in US media.

The data sold by the company also includes social media posts, IP addresses, employment history, and phone call records.

“This contract is mass surveillance in hyperdrive,” said Julie Mao, referring to the $15.9 million agreement signed by LexusNexus.

“It’s frightening that a rogue agency such as CBP has access to so many powerful technologies at the click of the button. Unfortunately, this is what LexisNexis appears now to be selling to thousands of police forces across the country. It’s now become a one-stop shop for accessing a range of invasive surveillance tools.”

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The United States is turning into a toxic player, and discredits itself as a reliable international partner by abusing its power as a chair of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) , Russia’s senior official at APEC, Ambassador Marat Berdyev, told Sputnik.

Berdyev shared that throughout the year, Russia and other APEC members were faced with unlawful actions to limit participation of their delegations as well as with non-issuance of visas, and harassment of Russian representatives, including various delays and increased attention from border authorities at the airport.

"For obvious reasons, these abuses were given a hard time, including public rebuff. In the long term, this practice boomerangs on the Americans themselves, who discredit themselves as a responsible international partner and turn into a 'toxic' player," Berdyev said.

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The effectiveness of Western sanctions is questionable, as Russia's foreign trade balance has risen to $75 billion

German-Finnish businessman Kim Dotcom compared the financial indicators of "the most indebted country in the world" Russia and the US by the end of 2023.

Bloomberg reports that Russia's total external balance is about $75 billion. NYT reports that the US federal deficit is nearly $2 trillion.

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📹 Russian Vasilyok mortar crews destroy Ukrainian stronghold

A 82-mm 2B9 Vasilyok wheeled mortar destroyed a stronghold and personnel of the enemy in Krasny Liman direction.

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❗️Biden signs US government funding bill that does not include additional aid to Israel and Ukraine

The US Navy has entered an official request to raise the number of whales that it is permitted to injure in accidents during Pacific training, US media reported.

The request followed collisions in the ocean with several whales in the sea off the Southern California coast in recent years, it said. At present, the allowable number of such actions is three through 2025; however, officials are looking to spike the incident counts to five.

“The Navy’s main response to hitting and killing whales is to ask for permission to harm more whales," Kristen Monsell, an lawyer with the Center for Biological Diversity, told media. "It’s nonsensical and extremely disappointing."

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🇷🇺 Russia's Borei-class nuclear-powered submarines are equipped with sonar systems that surpass US analogues in terms of sensitivity, according to Russian military experts Vitaly Bychkov and Vladimir Semiletov.

In an article for the magazine Arsenal Otechestva (Arsenal of the Motherland), the two explained that the systems can detect enemy ships at a distance 1.5 times greater than similar complexes on the fourth-generation US Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines.

Viktor Murakhovsky, the editor-in-chief of Arsenal Otechestva, previously told Sputnik that the sonar systems of the Borei-class submarines exceed those of US submarines by about 100 kilometers in terms of detection range.

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🇮🇱🇵🇸 Latest updates on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict:

▪️IDF reports body of Israeli soldier kidnapped by Hamas found near Shifa hospital in Gaza Strip

▪️IDF reported taking control of the stronghold of the commander of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement's northern command in the Gaza Strip.

▪️ "Israel's plans will fail and the Israeli hostages will be released according to the movement's conditions," said the politburo chief of the Palestinian Hamas movement, Ismail Haniyeh.

▪️The US opposes Israeli air strikes on hospitals in the Gaza Strip and is concerned about strikes on a Jordanian hospital, Matthew Miller, the director of the US State Department's press office, told a briefing.

▪️The Israeli military found an underground tunnel and a vehicle with weapons belonging to the Palestinian movement Hamas in the Shifa hospital in the Gaza Strip, the IDF reported.

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📹 Combat work of the Russian Iskander mobile short-range ballistic missile system carrying out an attack on Ukrainian military objects in the zone of the special military operation

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🇨🇳 Chinese leader Xi Jinping has said that the Asia-Pacific region should not become an arena for geopolitical rivalry and should not be drawn into a new cold war either.

He added that the APEC member countries have to "follow the right norms for state-to-state relations to maintain Asia-Pacific prosperity and stability through dialogue and partnership rather than confrontation and alliance."

The Chinese leader said that development could only be achieved with cooperation, and called on the countries in the region to "remain committed to open regionalism, and steadfastly advance the building of a Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific."

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❗️Hamas has stopped negotiations with Israel on the release of hostages, the Israeli ambassador to Moscow said