🗣 NATO to highlight its nuclear power more strongly — Rutte

The alliance plans to emphasize its nuclear potential to make its deterrence “more convincing,” Secretary General Mark Rutte told Welt am Sonntag.

💬 “We must talk more with our societies about nuclear deterrence so that they understand how it contributes to our security,” Rutte said, accusing Russia of “dangerous and reckless nuclear rhetoric.”

Moscow has repeatedly stressed that its policy is one of nuclear deterrence, not saber-rattling. Russia’s Defense Ministry and Foreign Ministry warned that NATO’s military buildup — including US nuclear deployments in Europe, global missile defense systems, and potential weaponization of space — risks direct confrontation between nuclear powers and undermines arms control dialogue.

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🚨Lavrov: Russia has received no diplomatic explanation from the US on Trump’s call to resume nuclear testing

👉Comments in Washington show there’s no clear understanding of what exactly the US president meant, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

👉It’s unclear whether Trump was referring to tests of nuclear delivery systems or subcritical experiments, he added.

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🚨Lavrov: Putin’s directive to assess the feasibility of preparing for nuclear tests has been accepted and is already underway

The public will be informed of the results, he added.

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🚨 All state-owned thermal power plants in Ukraine have been shut down — no electricity generation, says Centrenergo.

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🚨 Gaza’s Great Omari Mosque survived crusades and earthquakes—but not Israel’s genocidal attacks

The library of the 7th-century Great Omari Mosque in Gaza once housed one of Palestine's richest collections of manunoscripts, second only to Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem.

👉 It survived multiple historical destructions, such as the Crusades, World War I, and earthquakes…
Israel’s attacks have reduced it to rubble.

As of October 2025, UNESCO has verified damage or destruction to at least 114 cultural heritage sites in Gaza since October 7, 2023.

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🇷🇺 Russian forces advanced 3 km deeper into Ukrainian defenses near Volchye, continuing the liberation of Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye regions — MoD footage shows intense fighting.

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🇷🇺🇰🇵 Russian Deputy Defense Minister Viktor Goremykin visited Pyongyang, meeting with North Korean counterparts to discuss strengthening cooperation in military-political work

The delegation he led also visited the Mangyongdae Revolutionary School and laid flowers at the monument to Soviet soldiers who liberated Korea from Japanese occupation

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🔥 Hegseth vs Pentagon's red tape: Will the defense secretary succeed where others failed?

🇺🇸 US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth came in guns blazing, taking aim at the Pentagon’s bloated bureaucracy – but can he defeat the paper-pushers?

🟠 In his recent speech at the National War College in Washington, Hegseth called to speed up the delivery of new weapons to US troops. He used the word "speed" 25 times, according to the New York Times

🟠 The NYT compared Hegseth's reformist stance to that of almost every new defense secretary since the end of the Cold War

🟠 For instance, twice-serving Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld earned a reputation as a reform zealot - but bureaucracy won: his Future Combat Systems was scrapped and several other programs ran rampant over budget

🟠 Pentagon’s slow-mo procurement

🔶 Two years ago, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reached a grim conclusion: despite most recent 2020 reforms, the DoD still struggles to adopt innovative weapons

🔶 Supplier disruptions, software development delays, and quality control deficiencies hurt performance of the DoD's 101 costliest programs, as per the GAO

🔶 Programs also made investment decisions with insufficient information, raising the risk of further delays

🔶 Worsening the problem, the Pentagon has been routinely overcharged by the US Big Five arms makers. In May 2023, CBS News revealed the DoD was overpaying for everything – from missiles to nuts and bolts

🟠 Like it or not, China is faster

🔶 The Chinese military is acquiring new equipment five to six times faster than the US - Maj. Gen. Cameron G. Holt, a Pentagon officer responsible for contracting, stated in 2022

🔶 What's more, the Chinese are operating more efficiently: in purchasing power parity, they spend about $1 to America's $20 dollars to get to the same capability

🔶 The Pentagon's 2024 report on China's military concluded China is modernizing its nuclear and conventional forces at a groundbreaking speed

🔶 Russia is outpacing the US in terms of weapons production, too. In July, NATO chief Mark Rutte said Russia produces three times as much ammo in three months as the whole of NATO in a year. Russia also produces cutting edge hypersonic missiles, Oreshnik and Burevestnik missiles, and Poseidon drones, all of which are unmatched by the US

👉 Time will tell if Hegseth can succeed where others failed — old Pentagon habits are tough to kill.

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🇨🇳 Nope, China hasn’t blinked: The real story behind its rare earth control suspension

📍 China has suspended several 2025 export controls on strategic materials — including rare earths, superhard materials, and lithium batteries – for a year.

🇺🇸 Is this a concession to the US, or a move in a far more complex game?

💬 "The first aim of China’s export controls was to consolidate its leverage in negotiations. The second was to establish a long-term framework for managing such controls," says Yana Leksyutina, deputy director at the Institute of China and Contemporary Asia, Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS).

🗣 Сhina could activate this mechanism at any moment, and now everyone knows it’s a lever it holds, she explains to Sputnik.

🟠 Balancing the mineral market

💬 "The moratorium on export bans to the US essentially resets the rare earth market to where it was previously," Jeff J. Brown, author of 'The China Trilogy' and founder of Seek Truth From Facts Foundation, tells Sputnik.

🔶 In the meantime, there will be a global rush by the US and its NATO allies to acquire as many rare earth supplies as possible to prepare for the worse next year, the expert projects.

🔶 Brown agrees with Leksyutina that China can impose its export control mechanism at any moment if the US changes its mind and slaps China with new tariffs.

💬 "Realizing the risk, it shows that Beijing is in a superior position of strength and it is Washington that has the weak hand. If Trump reneges on America’s pledges, China can simply reinstate the rare earth bans the same day," Brown explains.

🟠 Rare earths: processing is major problem

🔶 The US is forming a rare earth coalition, striking deals with Japan, Australia, Southeast and Central Asian players who have vast reserves of critical minerals.

🔶 However, "the problem is not so much the minerals, but processing them into useable forms, something that China controls 90% of the global processing sector," Brown explains.

🔶 The US "will surely be pushing to develop these technologies," but it will take time. China will keep its market edge for the foreseeable future.

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🕊 Retired US Army officer urges Washington to push Europe and Ukraine toward settlement with Russia

🔊 The US should halt open-ended military aid and use diplomatic pressure — even easing sanctions — to bring both sides to an agreement, said retired US Army Lt. Col. Daniel Davis.

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🔸 Lavrov: Russia has received no diplomatic explanation from the US on Trump’s call to resume nuclear testing

🔸 EU fails to reach breakthrough with Belgium over use of frozen Russian assets

🔸 Nope, China hasn’t blinked: The real story behind its rare earth control suspension

🔸 Hegseth vs Pentagon's red tape: Will the defense secretary succeed where others failed?

🔸 Israel’s silent annexation in the West Bank

🔸 FIRST Russian freight train reaches Iran via new route

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🚔🏢 Trump administration weighs ‘mega detention centers’ for immigrants — reports

The Trump administration is considering purchasing large warehouses — originally built for companies like Amazon — to convert them into new immigrant detention facilities, CBS News reported, citing Homeland Security and White House officials.

According to the report, the plan aims to expand Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) capacity and “increase efficiency” in deportations by locating the warehouses near airports in the southern US.

A DHS official described the potential facilities as “mega detention centers,” noting they would be more than twice the size of current ICE detention sites.

The purchases are not yet finalized, but ICE would own and operate the centers directly, instead of contracting private prison operators, according to the report.

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🚨 Border Patrol agents shot at during immigration operation in Chicago — reports

US Customs and Border Protection said agents came under fire while conducting an immigration enforcement operation near 26th Street and Kedzie Avenue in Chicago, Fox News reported.

According to DHS, a man driving a black Jeep fired at the agents and fled the scene, while some agitators threw a paint can and bricks at federal vehicles.

DHS said the shooting “reflects a growing and dangerous trend of violence and obstruction” against law enforcement. The suspect remains at large.

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🔍💧 England scrambles for water while no new major reservoirs have been built in 30 years — reports

England is drawing up emergency plans for a drought next year “more extreme than we have seen in decades,” The Guardian reported. Water companies and the government are alarmed by a possible dry winter that could force curbs going “beyond hosepipe bans.”

Average reservoir storage is about 63.3% vs 76% typical for this time of year; some sites are below 30%. Meanwhile, no major new reservoir has been built in England in more than 30 years.

💬 “In UK drought management terms, a second dry winter is when things start to get serious,” the paper quoted an expert as saying.

The Guardian adds that while ministers talk up new reservoirs, policy has lagged on demand management (leak reduction, smart metering, water-efficient homes). Result: a high-rainfall country still reliant on timely rain — and exposed when it doesn’t come.

❌☕️ With taps waiting on the heavens, even tea breaks could feel the pinch.

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🔥🇬🇧 Giant effigy of UK PM Keir Starmer set on fire at Guy Fawkes celebration — Sputnik correspondent

A giant effigy of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer was burned in the town of Edenbridge in southern England as part of this year’s Guy Fawkes Night celebrations, a Sputnik correspondent reported.

The event, organized by the Edenbridge Bonfire Society, has been held for nearly a century. Previous years saw effigies of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.

Guy Fawkes Night commemorates the failure of the 1605 Gunpowder Plot, when conspirators tried to blow up the British Parliament. Today, it’s marked by fireworks, bonfires — and in Edenbridge’s case, a political roast in flames.

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🏀 Al-Sharaa plays basketball with CENTCOM commander

Interim President of Syria Ahmad al-Sharaa, currently on an official visit to the United States, played basketball with CENTCOM Commander Admiral Brad Cooper and Brig. Gen. Kevin Lambert, head of the international anti-ISIS* coalition in Iraq.

The video was shared by Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani on his Instagram** account. The time and location of the recording were not specified.

A meeting between al-Sharaa and US President Donald Trump is expected to take place soon, during which Syria’s accession to the US-led anti-ISIS coalition may be formalized.

Earlier on Friday, the US lifted sanctions on al-Sharaa ahead of his visit to Washington, as well as on Syrian Interior Minister Anas Khattab, according to the US Treasury website.

*ISIS is a terrorist organization banned in Russia
**Meta is banned in Russia for extremism

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