Opinion

The US government must avoid preventive war against North Korea and instead embrace the proposal by China and Russia that requires Washington to cease militaristic activities in return for a nuclear freeze by Pyongyang, analysts told Sputnik.

The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) has crossed the Euphrates River and is trying to restore full control over its west bank. RIA Novosti correspondent Mikhail Alaeddin was on the ground to witness a unique operation that could lead to the complete encirclement of the terrorists in Deir ez-Zor.

Hundreds of Rohingya Muslims have been killed in Myanmar and thousands are flooding across the border into Bangladesh. Sputnik looks at what lies behind the violence and discovers the British Empire is partly to blame.

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism reported a significant increase in the US airstrikes in Afghanistan under President Donald Trump. Speaking to Sputnik, Afghan experts said that all this adds to the exacerbation of the situation in the country.

Just two months ago, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe stood below 30 percent in popularity polls and faced a tidal wave of scandals over alleged cronyism. But times have changed and Abe is now enjoying the stronger support and poised to call for snap elections to run for re-election and win in October. Tom McGregor takes a closer look.

Madrid’s decision to expel the North Korean ambassador shows that Spain lacks sovereignty and is willing to acquiesce to the demands of the US rather than make decisions on its own, according to Pyongyang’s special representative.

The Nordic nation of Iceland is facing yet another early parliamentary election, the second one in only two years. Despite the fact that allegations against Prime Minister Bjarni Benediktsson and his predecessor involve a pardon for child sex abuse and some hidden offshore accounts, an Icelandic professor sees no crime in either of the cases.

Facebook is in damage control mode after a series of racist and anti-Semitic ad categories prompted it to shut down the user-generated fields in its advertising system. Speaking to Radio Sputnik, Jewish and human rights activist Rabbi Abraham Cooper outlined what can be done to help companies like Facebook eradicate racism and anti-Semitism online.

Over the past year, Iran has signed several business deals in various sectors of the Syrian economy, including telecommunications, energy, agriculture, and mining. An opinion piece titled Assad is Selling Syria to Iran, Which is Bad for the Rest of the World, was published on Haaretz, an Israeli news site, earlier this month.

The coordinator at General Federation of Transport at the CFTC labor union claims that a larger military presence in the streets and on public transport in France provides a psychological effect, rather than an actual boost to security.

US President Donald Trump once described the UN as a “club for people to get together, talk and have a good time,” but on Monday the 45th US leader praised the 128 nations agreeing to implement new reforms centered on changing its culture of “bureaucracy and mismanagement.”

The Trump administration risks setting back US relations with Cuba for decades if it follows through on warnings that it is considering shutting down the US Embassy in Havana, which was opened less than three years ago, analysts told Sputnik.

Donald Trump is powerless to break the vicious circle of anti-Russian policies championed by the US foreign policy establishment, US academic Vladimir Golstein told Sputnik. Under these circumstances Russia needs to concentrate on building partnerships with other countries, ensuring security and economic development, he believes.

The British Prime Minister Theresa May has arrived in Canada on Monday, September 18, with the row between Boeing and Bombardier on her agenda. Sputnik spoke to an expert who said the dispute could "escalate."

Iran's reported creation of the "father of all bombs" should be seen as a message to Israel and the Persian Gulf States, Russian military expert Vladimir Korovin told Sputnik, expressing doubt that Tehran would use its 10-ton conventional aviation bomb against the US.

The Syrian Army, backed by Russian warplanes, broke through the Daesh terrorist encirclement of Deir ez-Zor earlier this month; now the Kurdish-led, American-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are poised and ready to enter this eastern Syrian city, a SDF spokesman told Sputnik Turkey.

US Senator Ben Cardin sent a letter to the US administration calling for sanctions against Turkey over its purchase of Russian S-400 missile systems. A Turkish political analyst stressed in an interview with Sputnik that Ankara's move is fully in line with international law and that the senator's push for sanctions is irrelevant.

Facebook has temporarily shut down user-generated fields in its advertising system after finding that companies could target users interested in racist and anti-Semitic themes. Speaking to Sputnik, human rights activist Aidan Fishman said that companies like Facebook must do much more to monitor and prevent this sort of activity.

When asked whether an upcoming independence referendum in Iraqi Kurdistan will become a precedent for Turkish Kurds, a Kurdish Regional Government spokesman told Sputnik that it largely depends on Ankara.

The independence referendum in Iraqi Kurdistan, set for September 25, will likely be held despite the Iraqi court ruling that suspended the preparations for the vote on Monday, according to the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).