Putin says west is provoking Russia into new cold war as ‘spies’ deported

Russian president denies fanning tensions and says Nato expansion in Europe has been ‘geopolitical game changer’

Vladimir Putin has suggested to a German interviewer that the west is provoking Russia into a new cold war. The airing of the interview, which was recorded by the German channel ARD in Vladivostok last week, followed Russia’s tit-for-tat expulsions of German and Polish diplomats, as well as the deportation of a Latvian accused of spying.

Asked whether the accusatory rhetoric between Moscow and Washington and a noticeable increase in Russian displays of military strength near western countries points to a new cold war, Putin said two rounds of Nato expansion in central and eastern Europe had been “significant geopolitical game changers” that forced Russia to respond.

Moscow resumed strategic aviation flights abroad several years ago in response to US nuclear bomber flights to areas near Russia that had continued after the cold war, he added.

“Nato and the United States have military bases scattered all over the globe, including in areas close to our borders, and their number is growing,” Putin said. “Moreover, just recently it was decided to deploy special operations forces, again in close proximity to our borders. You have mentioned various [Russian] exercises, flights, ship movements and so on. Is all of this going on? Yes, it is indeed.”

Putin has previously been accused by western leaders of fanning cold war-style tensions, most recently by the Australian prime minister, Tony Abbott, who said he told Putin at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Beijing last week that Russia should stop “trying to recreate the lost glories of tsarism or the old Soviet Union”. In August, Barack Obama told the late-night talk show host Jay Leno that the Russians often “slip back into cold war thinking”.

In a speech in Australia on Monday, the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, who spoke at length to Putin during the G20 summit in Brisbane this weekend, said western sanctions against Russia would remain in place as far and long as they were needed and warned of growing Russian influence in eastern Europe. She argued that Russia should not be allowed to drive a wedge between Europe and the United States.

Also on Monday, the European Union’s new foreign policy chief, Italy’s foreign minister, Federica Mogherini, called for intensified diplomacy, including trips to Kiev and Moscow, to end the Ukraine crisis. Conservative commentators criticised Mogherini for being too soft on Russia after she was appointed in August, and her first meeting with other European foreign ministers on Monday saw them agree to consider additional sanctions against separatist leaders but not Russian officials.

The British foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, is to announce on Tuesday that the UK will donate communications equipment and 10 armoured vehicles worth £1.2m to the Ukraine special monitoring mission of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe , which is being expanded in the face of an increasingly unstable ceasefire in the east of the country.

During the ARD interview, Putin dodged a question about whether Moscow had supplied weapons to the separatists and deployed troops to eastern Ukraine, as Nato and Kiev have argued. “Nowadays people who wage a fight and consider it righteous will always get weapons,” he said, blaming the west for supporting the government forces’ use of ballistic missiles.

“You want the Ukrainian central authorities to annihilate everyone there in eastern Ukraine,” Putin said. “Is that what you want? We certainly don’t. And we won’t let it happen.”

But a report on the weapons used in the Ukrainian conflict released on Monday by the consulting group Armament Research Services (ARES) suggested that rebels were “very likely” to have received arms from Russia “however the level of state complicity in such activity remains unclear.”

“It is very likely that pro-Russian separatist groups have received some level of support (including small arms, light weapons, guided light weapons, heavier weapons systems, and armoured vehicles) from one or more external parties,” the ARES report said, although it admitted that the “most significant sources” of weapons and armoured vehicles were domestic ones.

Putin also said Russia’s “friendship” with Germany was stronger than ever. German business groups have been among the most adamant opponents of sanctions. But in a sign of slipping political relations, Russia’s foreign ministry confirmed to the news agency RIA Novosti on Monday that it had expelled an employee of the German embassy in Moscow in response to Berlin’s “unfriendly actions toward an employee of one of Russia’s foreign institutions in Germany”. A Russian diplomat in Bonn had previously been expelled on suspicion of spying, Der Spiegel reported.

Moscow has also deported Alexei Kholostov, a former Latvian MP known as an advocate of Latvia’s Russian minority, on spying allegations, the Latvian foreign ministry told Interfax news agency on Monday. In a Russian television report aired this weekend, Kholostov said on camerathat he was “in Russia on assignment for the Latvian special forces, which work under the CIA’s control”.

In another ongoing spy scandal, the foreign ministry also said on Monday it had expelled “several Polish diplomats” over “activities incompatible with their status”, a common euphemism for spying. Polish television reported that four diplomats had been deported. Poland’s foreign minister called the move a “symmetric response” after Polish authorities arrested a military officer and a Russian-Polish lawyer last month on suspicion of spying for Russia.

'God baby' born in India with four arms and four legs

A BABY has been born in India with four arms and four legs.

The child has attracted hordes of visitors and been dubbed 'God' by his parents due to his resemblance to a many-limbed deity.

A relative, who has not been named, said: "When he first came out we couldn't believe it.

"The nurses said he was badly deformed but I could see that this was a sign from God.

"In fact, this is a miracle, it's God's baby. Indian God's have extra limbs just like this." 

Thousands of people are flocking to the hospital in Baruipur, a city in India's eastern West Bengal State, to catch a glimpse of the baby. Chukka Rao, 67, from a neighbouring village, said: "When we first heard about God Boy we were slightly sceptical.

"But we came to see because we were intrigued by all the news we were hearing from friends and others.

"This is truly the son of the Hindu God Brahma, who also has four arms and four legs." 

However, a police spokesman said that the visitors were causing problems.

He said: "The crowds are going berserk and clamouring to see the child.

"Hundreds are crying in the streets, hundreds of others are praying and setting up camp here.

"Some are even panicking and believe this is a sign of the end of the world. I have never seen anything like this in my whole career."

Medics say that the infant's condition is a result of the arms and legs of a twin joining on to the foetus in the womb.

Ex-Navy SEAL Makes No Apologies For Going Public About Bin Laden

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Navy SEAL Robert O'Neill, who says he fired the shots that killed Osama bin Laden, played a role in some of the most consequential combat missions of the post-9/11 era, including three depicted in Hollywood movies. And now he's telling the world about them.

By doing so, O'Neill has almost certainly increased his earning power on the speaking circuit. He also may have put himself and his family at greater risk. And he has earned the enmity of some current and former SEALs by violating their code of silence.

But O'Neill, winner of two Silver and five Bronze Stars, makes no apologies for any of that. In a wide-ranging interview Friday with The Associated Press, he said he believes the American public has a right to more details about the operation that killed the al-Qaida leader and other important military adventures. And he insisted he is taking pains not to divulge classified information or compromise the tactics SEALs use to get the drop on their enemies.

"The last thing I want to do is endanger anybody," he said. "I think the good (of going public) outweighs the bad."

O'Neill, who last week began discussing his role in the bin Laden mission, was in Washington for a round of television and media appearances that drew both praise and criticism.

After helicoptering to the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, assaulting the house and killing three men and a woman, some of the SEALs reached the third floor, where a CIA analyst had told O'Neill that bin Laden would be. O'Neill followed an unnamed point man into bin Laden's bedroom, he told the AP, and the point man tackled two women, believing they had a bomb, in what O'Neill calls an incredibly selfless act.

"A few feet in front of me, on two feet, was Osama bin Laden," O'Neill said. "I shot him three times in the head and I killed him."

Many are impressed by the deed, but not everyone is impressed with the telling.

"We work in secret and we pride ourselves on that, so if somebody comes out and spills this much, it angers the rest of us," Jonathan Gilliam, a former SEAL, said in an interview.

But Debra Burlingame, whose brother Charles Burlingame was the pilot of the hijacked plane that crashed into the Pentagon, has said that O'Neill's descriptions were gratifying to the relatives of victims at a 9/11 museum ceremony where he donated the uniform he was wearing.

O'Neill's key role in the 2011 bin Laden raid was hardly his only brush with a high-profile mission. He was on the 2009 mission to rescue the captain of the merchant ship Maersk Alabama, who was taken hostage by Somali pirates. That episode was featured in the Tom Hanks movie "Captain Phillips."

And he was part of the group that helped retrieve Marcus Luttrell, the sole survivor of a four-man team attacked in 2005 while tracking a Taliban leader in Afghanistan. The Luttrell episode was featured in the 2013 film "Lone Survivor."

Long before those operations, O'Neill came to embody the dramatic transformation of the role of U.S. special operations over the last 13 years.

O'Neill joined the Navy in 1995, and in those pre-9/11 days, the SEALs did a lot of training with foreign militaries. High-risk operations in remote locations, let alone gun fights, were few and far between.

After the U.S. went to war against al-Qaida, the SEALs and other elite units were called upon for one combat mission after another — in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere. O'Neill believes he killed more than 30 people.

His most fulfilling time as a SEAL, he said, came in Iraq in 2007, when he was going on multiple combat missions a night, stalking and killing insurgents and bomb-makers.

One current and two former SEALs, declining to be quoted talking about a sensitive matter, say it is not disputed that O'Neill shot at bin Laden. But Pentagon officials say it's not clear whose shots were the lethal ones.

Another SEAL, Matt Bissonnette, wrote a book about the raid, "No Easy Day." Bissonnette's account suggests the point man fired the fatal shots, and that he and a second SEAL, presumably O'Neill, shot bin Laden when he was already down.

O'Neill disputed the account of his former teammate, whom he calls a hero. Everyone who was a part of the bin Laden operation and others like it deserve recognition, he said.

"I got there because amazing men did amazing things," he said. "These are real people that have real families — that mow their lawns, can barely pay their mortgages and then they get called."

Justin Bieber's father Jeremy 'ordered to pay almost $13,000 for damaging a house'

Justin Bieber's father has reportedly been ordered to pay almost $13,000 for damaging a house.

Jeremy Bieber, 39, was sued by his former landlord in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, who claimed he left pet urine and feces stains all over the property when he moved out in September 2012.

A judge sided with the landlord and ordered the hitmaker's father to pay $12,852.93 for the extensive damages, which also included a toilet that broke after someone flushed a hairbrush down it.

The 20-year-old star is expected to cover the bill, as he paid $1,650 every month for Jeremy's rent, according legal documents obtained by gossip website TMZ.com.

A source previously claimed Jeremy was a "bad influence" on the singer, who was criticised for a string of bad behaviour earlier this year and was recently ordered to do community service at charitable foundation MusiCares, as part of a plea deal he struck after being charged with damaging his former neighbour's house in Calabasas, California.

The chart topper was also ordered to pay $80,000 in damages after he pelted the house with eggs causing around $20,000 worth of damage to the property.

Abandoned Mercedes racks up £14,235 in car parking fees

This Mercedes has remained gathering dust in the bowels of a multi-storey car park for THREE YEARS. That’s a staggering £14,235 in parking fees.

But the crock in the bay – cordened off by a safety barrier – may soon be moved from Broadway Plaza, off Five Ways, Birmingham. The local authority has been asked to remove it after attempts to track down the owner drew a blank.

Police have also become embroiled in the motor mystery. They’ve discovered the car was not stolen or involved in crime.It is still not known why it was simply left to rot in the Plaza basement.

If nothing else, the car has proved a talking point among punters using the £13-a-day multi-storey, with imaginations running riot.

ISIS claims beheading of US hostage Peter Kassig

The Islamic State terror group has claimed to have beheaded American hostage Peter Kassig, an aid worker and former Army Ranger, in a graphic new video.
In the nearly 16-minute video uploaded to social networks on Sunday, a black-clad militant with his face concealed stands before a severed head that he claims is that of the U.S. aid worker.
"If confirmed, we are appalled by the brutal murder of an innocent American aid worker and we express our deepest condolences to his family and friends," Meehan said. The video was posted shortly after President Obama departed for Washington from the G-20 summit in Australia.
Ed and Paula Kassig, Peter's parents, released a statement early Sunday saying they were aware of the reports of their son's death and were awaiting confirmation of their authenticity. They also asked that media outlets not post any images or video distributed by Islamic State, better known as ISIS.
"We prefer our son is written about and remembered for his important work and the love he shared with friends and family," the statement read, "not in the manner the hostage takers would use to manipulate Americans and further their cause."

TIMELINE OF BRUTAL ISLAMIC STATE KILLINGS  

The murder of US aid worker Peter Kassig was the fifth such killing to be filmed and released by the Islamic State (IS). Here is a timeline of events, starting with the days leading up to the death of the first hostage, US journalist James Foley.

• Summer 2014 - A rescue mission fails to free Mr Foley from a secret location where he is being held by IS. The American freelance journalist, 40, was captured two years earlier.
• August 13: Mr Foley's family receive a message that he will be murdered.
• August 19: al-Furqan Media, which is controlled by the terror group, releases a video appearing to show Mr Foley's killing. His death apparently happened at some time in the previous week. Social media bosses are forced to act swiftly in banning both the video and still images of the beheading, while concerns mount for fellow reporter and captive Steven Sotloff, who is seen pleading for the US to stop air strikes in Iraq at the end of the video.
• August 20: David Cameron cuts short a family holiday in Cornwall to hold meetings in Downing Street over the 'shocking and depraved' murder. Meanwhile, US President Barack Obama remains defiant over his country's war on terror. He says: 'We will be vigilant and we will be relentless.'
• August 21: The killer is reported to be a British man who goes under the moniker 'Jihadi John'.
• September 2: Mr Cameron condemns the 'disgusting and despicable' video apparently showing Mr Sotloff wearing an orange jumpsuit and being beheaded by IS militants. The alleged killer speaks with a British accent, prompting suggestions he is the man who murdered Mr Foley. It emerges that a British hostage, now known to be aid worker David Haines, is also under threat.
• September 4: At the start of a Nato summit in Wales, leaders of the Western alliance show a united front in response to terror threats. Mr Cameron and Mr Obama insist they will not weaken in the face of threats from IS terrorists. The Prime Minister refuses to rule out joining the US in air strikes on IS. He says Britain must 'use everything we have in our armoury' to squash the terrorists out of existence.
• September 5: Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond joins Mr Cameron in saying the Government will not hold back on launching air strikes, and says threats on Mr Haines's life by his captors will not deter the UK from taking action. The Nato summit ends with a pledge to 'degrade and defeat' IS militants.
• September 9: Defence Secretary Michael Fallon confirms Britain will supply £1.6 million of machine guns and ammunition to Kurdish forces fighting IS militants in northern Iraq as part of a burgeoning international effort to drive back the jihadists.
• September 10: Mr Obama authorises air strikes inside Syria for the first time as well as an expansion of strikes in Iraq.
• September 13: A video showing the murder of British aid worker Mr Haines is released. The video, which involves the 44-year-old saying Mr Cameron and former PM Tony Blair should be held responsible for his death, is widely condemned. It comes hours after Mr Haines's family issue a plea to his captors to contact them. The clip also includes a threat to kill a second British hostage.
• September 14: Mr Cameron calls an emergency meeting of its Cobra committee in the wake of the murder. The next British hostage, 47-year-old minicab driver Alan Henning, is named as the man shown in the video.
• September 19: Islamic militants release a propaganda video featuring a British hostage believed to be journalist John Cantlie.
• September 23: Islamic extremists release a new propaganda video appearing to feature Mr Cantlie. The clip is the second showing the journalist to be circulated by IS militants in less than a week. It comes as the US - backed by Arab allies - carries out its first wave of air strikes on IS militants in Syria.
• September 24: Britain appears ready to ramp up its military involvement in the struggle against IS, as Mr Cameron addresses the United Nations in New York.
• September 25: FBI director James Comey is reported to have confirmed that the identity of Jihadi John has been uncovered. However, he refused to give the individual's name publicly.
• September 26: MPs vote by 524 to 43 to endorse attacks on the militants in Iraq in support of the United States-led coalition. The vote clears the way for RAF warplanes stationed in Cyprus to begin combat operations as soon as suitable targets are identified.
• September 27: RAF Tornado GR4 fighter bombers carry out their first sortie over Iraq since Parliament gave the green light for air strikes without finding any targets to attack.
• October 3: A video showing the brutal murder of Mr Henning, 47, by IS militants is posted on the internet. Mr Cameron vows to 'hunt down' the 'repulsive' terrorists responsible for the beheading.
• October 7: Former Guantanamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg claims he offered to help the Government secure the release of Mr Henning but was rebuffed. Mr Begg says he believed he knew those who held the murdered aid worker and had helped secure the release of hostages from extremists in Syria in the past.
• October 13: Mr Cantlie's sister urges IS to 'restart dialogue' with his family.
• November 16: IS releases a video showing the beheading of American hostage Peter Kassig. The IS militant in the footage speaks with a London accent and appears to be Jihadi John. Mr Kassig was captured in Syria in October 2013 while providing medical training and humanitarian aid to victims of the country's conflict.