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fcastro2

Are China and Russia Moving toward a Formal Alliance? | The Diplomat - 0 views

    • fcastro2
       
      Why is this relationship forming now? Ukraine Crisis, they want a multipolar world, China/Japan dispute, & Russia and the NATO expansions. 
    • fcastro2
       
      Advocates for China-Russian alliance. Shared strategic interests and possible length of this alliance, U.S. and its Allies threat to Russia leaves in no choice but to side with China, but may lead to another cold war.
    • fcastro2
       
      Opponents of China-Russian Alliance. China could be dragged to war by Russia, Russian's unwillingness to be a junior to China, Russia wants good relations with ALL Asian countries. They believe this alliance is unrealistic and a strategic partnership is more reasonable. 
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  • China and Russia signed a huge natural gas deal that is worth about $400 billion.
  • China secures a long-term (30 years) provision of natural gas from Russia and Russia can reduce its dependence on the European markets as well as strengthen Russia’s position against Western sanctions
  • Russia is now moving closer to China’s side with regard to the territorial disputes between China and Japan
  • China and Russia last week vetoed a draft UN resolution to send Syria to the International Criminal Court for war crimes. China and Russia had vetoed three previous UNSC resolutions condemning Syria
  • In the joint statement issued by China and Russia, the main message is that China-Russia relations have reached a new stage of comprehensive strategic partnership and this will help increase both countries’ international status and influence, thus contributing to a more just international order
  • China and Russia will deepen cooperation under the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building in Asia (CICA), a new security framework in Asia-Pacific that conveniently excludes the U.S. and Japan.
  • , the main trigger is the recent Ukraine crisis that has seriously damaged Russia-West relations
  • mutual strategic needs as both China and Russia want to create a multipolar world that is not dominated by the U.S., particularly as China faces threats from the US-led alliance in Asia
  • China’s chance of winning maritime disputes with Japan partly depends on maintaining a good relationship with Russia
  • the NATO expansion is a serious threat to Russia’s national security and as such Russia has to fight back
  • new China-Russia alliance is now emerging and this will eventually lead to a multi-polar world order.
  • problems in China-Russia relations such as historical mistrust, the lack of a common threat, and conflicting interests in Central Asia
  • he most important factor determining whether China and Russia should form an alliance is whether the two countries have shared strategic interests and how long such shared strategic interests can last
  • China nor Russia could become a member of the Western bloc led by the U.S. because other allies of the U.S. would feel threatened by China and Russia
  • thus Russia has no better alternative to siding with China
  • , China’s number two position in the world means that China will not be supported by the U.S. with regard to most international affairs issues
  • Yan also refutes the argument that a China-Russia alliance against the U.S. would lead to another cold war.
  • ould be potentially high costs of such an alliance due to common problems such as fears of abandonment and entrapment
  • China could be dragged into an unnecessary war by Russia
  • Russia is unwilling to be China’s junior partner in the relationship
  • Russia wants to maintain good relations with all Asian states and thus will not side with China when it comes to territorial disputes between China and Japan
  • China-Russia alliance is unrealistic and a strategic partnership is more flexible and better for China.
  • seems that in the near future a formal alliance between China and Russia will not happen due to a variety of reasons.
  • U.S. militarily threatens both China and Russia at the same time
  • , a formal alliance will not occur
allieggg

The Age of Proxy Wars - 0 views

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    This article accentuates the "Age of Proxy Wars" in the Middle East. While Syria and Libya are the 2 most known proxy situations, the article illuminates other states involved as well. We know already about UAE, Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, which this article also brings up, but new information suggests that Bahrain and Kuwait are supporting sides of the regional war as well. While these nations think they're doing their part to support their values, these proxy wars are actually fostering further extremism since people supporting each side do not directly suffer the consequences. The article states that the metastasizing of these jihadist groups is grave threat to US national security, and the US must intervene in order to solve this crisis. The author says the US needs to improve their performance in donor cordination, funding the right groups, as well as be more aggressive in working directly with elections, uncovering networks of money and influence. He says rather than the conduction of elections, we must focus on the nature of politics in general, curbing corruption and embedding sectarian democratic values in their political sphere.
nicolet1189

Social Media Prove Double-Edged Sword for ISIS - 1 views

  • the dangers presented by metadata and other information contained in digital postings.
  • A new ISIS hashtag
  • Himlat Takteem Ialami—the media
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  • instruction manual in online behavior
  • restraint campaign.
  • individual identities and landscape and urban geography in photos to encoded data from email accounts, servers and location of signals.
  • Also, by destroying the telecommunications infrastructure, the U.S.-led air campaign has forced ISIS in Syria to rely on non-secure routers that boost signals, making communications easy to intercept for intelligence agencies.
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    Although ISIS has been able to successfully use social media platforms to cater to their agenda, they have recently changed their strategies to deter US intelligence from intercepting crucial information. They have issued a new instruction manual to members regarding online behavior in order to circumvent data collection from digital postings.
jreyesc

Inside The Chilling Online World Of The Women Of ISIS - 1 views

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    In this article we get to see why many Western women decide to join ISIS. Up to this point we have only seen the point of view of the ISIS men and not the women, so this article gives us a bit of an insight into the women's world According to this article we see that the ISIS women use social media in order to help other women that want to join and/or also trying to express their views about the world around them.
fcastro2

Syrian Opposition Groups Wary Of Russia's Invitation To Moscow : NPR - 0 views

  • U.N. envoy is pressing ahead on that front, while Russia tries to play peacemaker
    • fcastro2
       
      U.N. continues to try to collaborate with both groups while Russia wants to be a "peacemaker."
  • Russia is inviting the parties to Moscow this month, but some opposition groups won't go to a country that has been backing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad
    • fcastro2
       
      Rebel groups in Syria do not trust the Russian government since they have been supporting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. 
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  • Syrian opposition figures have good reason to be skeptical of Moscow's diplomatic moves
  • they provide weapons and advice to the Assad regime and they have taken an approach of cherry-picking who they talk to and who the regime talks to
  • The U.S. is not pressuring the opposition groups it supports to go to Moscow. Instead it's suggesting they should think about it so that Russia can't blame the opposition for the diplomatic stalemate
    • fcastro2
       
      U.S. is not pushing for the opposition groups to go to Moscow to talk peace but they feel they have nothing to lose if they do.
  • "If there are no guarantees as to the end state, that is, a movement towards a transitional government with full executive powers without Assad, then there is really no reason to go
  • meant to revive the peace process that started in Geneva in 2012
  • Russians aren't in a position to decide who will take part in future negotiations. And this has been the whole problem with their approach.
    • fcastro2
       
      Russian strategy
  • He says the Russian job has always been to deliver the regime to the negotiating table, but the Syrian government only wants to talk about fighting terrorism, not discuss a political transition.
  • We are hoping, more than expecting, that it will be a success," he says.De Mistura describes Syria as the largest humanitarian crisis since World War II
  • They all agree that we need to do something to avoid that the Syrian conflict goes into a back burner and that movement towards some type of political solution should take place this year,"
  • He says that's because Assad thinks he's winning — and U.S. plans to train and equip 5,000 moderate rebels a year won't help level the playing field.
  • The rise of the self-proclaimed Islamic State and the U.S.-led airstrikes against that group in both Syria and Iraq now top the U.S. agenda.
  • war in Syria has been raging for nearly four years and it's been challenging for diplomats to get warring sides to agree on even temporary truces.
    • fcastro2
       
      No guarantees as to what the alleged "peace talks" will provide from the opposition groups. 
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    Russia is attempting to bring opposition groups and the Syrian government to Moscow in order to "talk peace." In the past, Russia has supported the Syrian President and because of this, opposition groups are wearing of these alleged "peace talks." 
fcastro2

Turkish Military Evacuates Soldiers Guarding Tomb in Syria - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • The Turkish Army sent armored troops deep into Syria late Saturday on a rescue mission, to recover the remains of a major historical figure and to evacuate the guards at his besieged tomb
  • The tomb of Suleyman Shah, grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman Empire, is 20 miles south of the Turkish border, but it has been considered Turkish territory under a 1921 treaty with France
  • there were no clashes during the mission and only one casualty, a soldier who was killed in an accident
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  • He said Turkey notified the Syrian government, rebel leaders and the coalition forces fighting the Islamic State about the operation.
  • 572 troops, 39 tanks, 57 armored vehicles and 100 other vehicles were involved
  • Turkish flag was lowered, and the tomb and security station were destroyed to prevent any possible use by extremists.
  • operation was prompted by the chaos and instability in Syria
  • clashes were likely to erupt nearby between forces of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and Kurdish troops known as pesh merga, and that the tomb could become a target.
  • “The Suleyman Shah tomb has been a point of vulnerability for Turkey for a long time, and with this operation, such weakness has been eliminated
  • “The Islamic State could have used the presence of the tomb as leverage in case of any confrontation with Turkey
  • in accordance with the 1921 treaty, a new tomb for Suleyman Shah was being established in a part of Syria that is under Kurdish control
  • when conditions in Syria permitted, the tomb would be moved back again to the site that was evacuated, near the village of Karakozak
  • Tensions have mounted around the tomb since March, when the Islamic State took control of the surrounding area and began threatening to destroy the tomb unless guards there lowered the Turkish flag.
  • The militant group raided Turkey’s consulate in Mosul, Iraq, last June and seized 46 Turks and 3 Iraqis as hostages; they were released three months later on terms that were not disclosed
  • crisis discouraged Turkey from joining the United States-led military coalition conducting strikes against the Islamic State, though Turkey has cooperated with the United States in other ways,
  • Turkey has lobbied intensively for international military action in Syria, including no-fly zones and a presence on the ground to strengthen the more moderate Syrian rebel groups who are fighting both the extremists and the Syrian government.
  • Syrian government issued a statement on Sunday calling the military operation a “flagrant aggression” because Turkey did not wait for permission from Damascus to mount i
  • The Kurds were aided by airstrikes and other support from the American-led coalition
  • Mr. Ulgen, the analyst, said the choice of route was a sign of some improvement in relations between the Turkish government in Ankara and the Syrian Kurds, whom the Turks have regarded with deep suspicion.
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    The Turkish government recently went into an extremist-controlled territory in order to evacuate a tomb of a major historical figure, and the soldiers who guarded it. The safe passage of this mission has shown that the relations between Turkey and Syria have gotten a bit better. 
rlindse3

Obama calls on corporations to work with government to prevent cyber attacks - 0 views

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    Obama has signed an executive order that gives government agencies greater leeway in sharing data with private corporations. His idea is that if the government and corporations work together, vulnerabilities exposed by the internet will have better protection from cyber attacks.
katelynklug

Party payments squeeze out Egypt's youth candidates - 0 views

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    Political parties are demanding payments of up to $28,000 for candidates to be included in their electoral lists. This is prohibiting youth groups from having an active role in the formation of the new government. Although the new electoral law gave Copts, women, and people with disabilities the right to be a part of parties' electoral lists, splits and conflicts between parties interferes with the process. There is a consensus in the higher order of politicians that the youth are not prepared to be a part of the political process. Others believe this is an unfair statement. However, the mistake of the youth in the revolution was that they did not take part in the government process at the beginning. They missed their opportunity to fulfill their demands by only aiming to overthrow the regime.
kbrisba

Tunisia to revive Syria ties to track jihadists - BBC News - 0 views

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    Due to the attack on the Bardo museum last month Tunisia plans to re-establish diplomatic ties with Syria in order to track its citizens who have gone to fight alongside Islamist militants. It is said that some 3,000 Tunisian jihadists are thought to have gone to Syria and Iraq.
wmulnea

Libya's civil war: That it should come to this | The Economist - 3 views

  • It is split between a government in Beida, in the east of the country, which is aligned with the military; and another in Tripoli, in the west, which is dominated by Islamists and militias from western coastal cities
  • Benghazi is again a battlefield.
  • The black plumes of burning oil terminals stretch out over the Mediterranean.
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  • Libya looked like the latest fragile blossoming of the Arab spring
  • Army commanders, mostly of Arab Bedouin origin, refused orders to shoot the protesters
  • the revolutionaries cobbled together a National Transitional Council (NTC) claiming to represent all of Libya
  • Volunteers from students to bank managers took up arms, joining popular militias and only sometimes obeying the orders of defecting army commanders trying to take control
  • In August Western bombing of government bases surrounding Tripoli cleared an avenue for the revolutionaries to take the capital.
  • Recognised abroad, popular at home and enjoying the benefits of healthy oil revenues—97% of the government’s income—the NTC was well placed to lay the foundations for a new Libya
  • he judges, academics and lawyers who filled its ranks worried about their own legitimacy and feared confrontation with the militias which, in toppling Qaddafi, had taken his arsenals for their own.
  • militia leaders were already ensconced in the capital’s prime properties
  • The NTC presided over Libya’s first democratic elections in July 2012, and the smooth subsequent handover of power to the General National Congress (GNC) revived popular support for the revolution.
  • Islamist parties won only 19 of 80 seats assigned to parties in the new legislature, and the process left the militias on the outside
  • The Homeland party, founded by Abdel Hakim Belhad
  • tried to advertise its moderation by putting an unveiled woman at the head of its party list in Benghazi
  • The incumbent prime minister, Abdurrahim al-Keib, a university professor who had spent decades in exile, fretted and dithered
  • He bowed to militia demands for their leaders to be appointed to senior ministries, and failed to revive public-works programmes
  • which might have given militiamen jobs
  • Many received handouts without being required to hand in weapons or disband, an incentive which served to swell their ranks
  • the number of revolutionaries registered with the Warriors Affairs Commission set up by the NTC was about 60,000; a year later there were over 200,000. Of some 500 registered militias, almost half came from one city, Misrata.
  • In May 2013 the militias forced parliament to pass a law barring from office anyone who had held a senior position in Qaddafi’s regime after laying siege to government ministries.
  • In the spring of 2014, Khalifa Haftar, a retired general who had earlier returned from two decades of exile in America, forcibly tried to dissolve the GNC and re-establish himself as the armed forces’ commander-in-chief in an operation he called Dignity
  • The elections which followed were a far cry from the happy experience of 2012. In some parts of the country it was too dangerous to go out and vote
  • Such retrenchment has been particularly noticeable among women. In 2011 they created a flurry of new civil associations; now many are back indoors.
  • Turnout in the June 2014 elections was 18%, down from 60% in 2012, and the Islamists fared even worse than before
  • Dismissing the results, an alliance of Islamist, Misratan and Berber militias called Libya Dawn launched a six-week assault on Tripoli. The newly elected parliament decamped to Tobruk, some 1,300km east
  • Grasping for a figleaf of legitimacy, Libya Dawn reconstituted the pre-election GNC and appointed a new government
  • So today Libya is split between two parliaments—both boycotted by their own oppositions and inquorate—two governments, and two central-bank governors.
  • The army—which has two chiefs of staff—is largely split along ethnic lines, with Arab soldiers in Arab tribes rallying around Dignity and the far fewer Misratan and Berber ones around Libya Dawn.
  • Libya Dawn controls the bulk of the territory and probably has more fighters at its disposal.
  • General Haftar’s Dignity, which has based its government in Beida, has air power and, probably, better weaponry
  • the Dignity movement proclaims itself America’s natural ally in the war on terror and the scourge of jihadist Islam
  • Libya Dawn’s commanders present themselves as standard-bearers of the revolution against Qaddafi now continuing the struggle against his former officers
  • Ministers in the east vow to liberate Tripoli from its “occupation” by Islamists, all of whom they denounce as terrorists
  • threatens to take the war to Egypt if Mr Sisi continues to arm the east. Sleeping cells could strike, he warns, drawn from the 2m tribesmen of Libyan origin in Egypt.
  • Yusuf Dawar
  • The struggle over the Gulf of Sirte area, which holds Libya’s main oil terminals and most of its oil reserves, threatens to devastate the country’s primary asset
  • And in the Sahara, where the largest oilfields are, both sides have enlisted ethnic minorities as proxies
  • ibya Dawn has drafted in the brown-skinned Tuareg, southern cousins of the Berbers; Dignity has recruited the black-skinned Toubou. As a result a fresh brawl is brewing in the Saharan oasis of Ubari, which sits at the gates of the al-Sharara oilfield, largest of them all.
  • Oil production has fallen and become much more volatile
  • oil is worth half as much as it was a year ago
  • The Central Bank is now spending at three times the rate that it is taking in oil money
  • The bank is committed to neutrality, but is based in Tripoli
  • Tripoli may have a little more access to cash, but is in bad shape in other ways
  • Fuel supplies and electricity are petering out
  • Crime is rising; carjacking street gangs post their ransom demands on Twitter
  • In Fashloum
  • residents briefly erected barricades to keep out a brigade of Islamists, the Nuwassi
  • “No to Islamists and the al-Qaeda gang” reads the roadside graffiti
  • Libya’s ungoverned spaces are growing,
  • Each month 10,000 migrants set sail for Europe
  • On January 3rd, IS claimed to have extended its reach to Libya’s Sahara too, killing a dozen soldiers at a checkpoint
  • The conflict is as likely to spread as to burn itself out.
  • the Western powers
  • have since been conspicuous by their absence. Chastened by failure in Afghanistan and Iraq, they have watched from the sidelines
  • Obama washed his hands of Libya after Islamists killed his ambassador
  • Italy, the former colonial power, is the last country to have a functioning embassy in Tripoli.
  • Even under Qaddafi the country did not feel so cut off
  • Dignity is supported not just by Mr Sisi but also by the United Arab Emirates, which has sent its own fighter jets into the fray as well as providing arms
  • The UAE’s Gulf rival, Qatar, and Turkey have backed the Islamists and Misratans in the west
  • If oil revenues were to be put into an escrow account, overseas assets frozen and the arms embargo honoured he thinks it might be possible to deprive fighters of the finance that keeps them fighting and force them to the table
  • Until 1963 Libya was governed as three federal provinces—Cyrenaica in the east, Fezzan in the south and Tripolitania in the west
  • The old divisions still matter
  • the marginalised Cyrenaicans harked back to the time when their king split his time between the courts of Tobruk and Beida and when Arabs from the Bedouin tribes of the Green Mountains ran his army
  • Tensions between those tribes and Islamist militias ran high from the start.
  • July 2011 jihadists keen to settle scores with officers who had crushed their revolt in the late 1990s killed the NTC’s commander-in-chief, Abdel Fattah Younis, who came from a powerful Arab tribe in the Green Mountains. In June 2013 the Transitional Council of Barqa (the Arab name for Cyrenaica), a body primarily comprised of Arab tribes, declared the east a separate federal region, and soon after allied tribal militias around the Gulf of Sirte took control of the oilfields.
  • In the west, indigenous Berbers, who make up about a tenth of the population, formed a council of their own and called on larger Berber communities in the Maghreb and Europe for support
  • Port cities started to claim self-government and set up their own border controls.
  • Derna—a small port in the east famed for having sent more jihadists per person to fight in Iraq than anywhere else in the world
  • opposed NATO intervention and insisted that the NTC was a pagan (wadani) not national (watani) council
  • Some in Derna have now declared their allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the caliph of the so-called Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq.
  • In December the head of America’s Africa command told reporters that IS was training some 200 fighters in the town.
wmulnea

Libya official calls for OPEC output cut to make room for Iran - 1 views

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    A Libyan official suggests that OPEC should cut production by 800,000 bpd in order to stabilize the market in preparation for an influx of Iranian oil expected after sanctions are lifted.
jshnide

Hamas and Fatah Sliding Towards Open War in Gaza - Middle East - News - Arutz Sheva - 0 views

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    Fatah and Hamas are on their way to war after long string of car bombings. ISIS may have planned some of these bombings in order to frame one side against another.
fcastro2

Turkey arrests 19 foreigners heading to Syria - 0 views

  • Security forces in southern Turkey have arrested 19 foreigners as they tried to enter Syria illegally
  • those arrested included a pregnant woman, one of 13 Indonesians, a French citizen, two Russians, two Libyans and someone from Kyrgyzstan
  • arrested at checkpoints established by the Turkish government along the border with Syria in an effort to stop people crossing over to join ISIS
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  • Western governments and media have blamed Ankara for not doing enough to prevent the flow of foreigners into Syria
  • more than 12,500 people have been blocked from entering Turkey and that the government has deported more than 1,150 people since January
  • Turkey is doing its bit [to stop the flow into Syria] and will continue to do so
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    There are still numerous foreigners attempting to enter Syria in order to join the group ISIS. Many of these foreigners attempt to go through Turkey and while some Western countries criticize Turkey on the number of people still crossing, the Prime Minister believes he is doing as much as he can. 
ajonesn

Egyptian woman lived as man for 40 years to support daughter - 0 views

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    Sisa took on male identity after her husband s death in order to find work to support her daughter. This lasted for 40 years. She is not up for a presidential award.
kbrisba

'Our hearts are black': Tunisians in shock after gunmen target tourists in capital | World news | The Guardian - 0 views

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    Gunmen entered the Tunis museum to take ancient treasures and its tourists hostage. It was a beautiful day filled with tourists from everywhere. Many tourists and locals were killed and injured. Many were just stuck in shock with what was happening and when it was all over. Just when the people thought Tunisia was on the right track some tragic event like this happens and takes the people two steps back on what the government is really doing to protect them. The museum is in a top security place so for these gunmen to get in there with guns and take order scares the people. The prime minister said they may of had help at the security check points they are not for sure but are looking into it. This hurts Tunisia because majority of its economy is based off of beach resorts and foreign visitors.
mwrightc

'Flee': Message to ISIS oil tanker drivers released by Pentagon | Fox News - 0 views

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    This article describes what the Pentagon went through in order to warn the oil tanker drivers of the coming fighter jets that were going to destroy their trucks. This was because the tankers were carrying oil that was bringing in revenue to ISIS.
ysenia

I.A.E.A. Report on Iran's Nuclear Program - The New York Times - 0 views

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    Documents showcasing proposed sanctions issued by President Obama. It was suggested that Obama pressure Iran by ordering this sanction in regards to their missile testing.
ccfuentez

Human Trafficking and the Human Rights Agenda Against Eritrea | Red Sea Fisher - 0 views

  • “Ruthless Kidnapping Rings Reach From Desert Sands to U.S. Cities.” The article chronicles the touching personal accounts of Eritrean refugees being kidnapped and taken for ransom in Egypt’s Sinai desert.
  • we intend to give opportunities to study in the United States to those who oppose the regime
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    In 2013, human trafficking in Eritrea was gaining a lot of international attention, especially from the piece, "Ruthless Kidnapping Rings Reach From Desert Sands to US Cities." In 2009, a possible solution was made to send large numbers of youths to the United States in order for them to receive an opportunity to get a better education.
ralqass

Saudi Arabia, Russia to Freeze Oil Output Near Record Levels - 0 views

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    a deal between Saudi Arabia and other countries to freeze their oil production in order to stabilize the oil price.
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