Car Drives on Sidewalk Leaving 9 Dead in Southwest China

A car rammed into a bus stop in Leshan, China in the southwestern province of Sichuan on 27 November, according to the People's Daily, China.

Nine people have reportedly been killed, while the number of injured is still uncertain, local media reported.

The local police said in a statement that seven people had been killed and four injured. The injured people have been taken to a hospital for treatment, the statement said.

The driver has been detained, according to police, as the investigation is ongoing.

https://sputniknews.com/asia/201811271070159630-china-car-passersby-killed/

Scalise: We’re in ‘Big Negotiations’ over Increased Border Wall Funding

On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Outnumbered,” House Republican Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) stated that there are “big negotiations” on increased funding for a border wall.

Scalise said, “[T]here are negotiations going on right now over the end of the year funding, and in just a few weeks, this all comes to a head. So, the Homeland Security Department’s budget expires at the end of November. One of the big negotiations we’re in the middle of right now is over whether or not we can get more money to build the wall. I support that. We ought to do it.”

https://www.breitbart.com/video/2018/11/26/scalise-were-in-big-negotiations-over-increased-border-wall-funding/

EXCLUSIVE: Roger Stone Associate Reveals What She Told Mueller Grand Jury

At least three Mueller grand jury witnesses have testified that left-wing comedian Randy Credico acknowledged being a source for Trump confidant Roger Stone regarding WikiLeaks.

Kristin M. Davis, a former New York gubernatorial candidate, told The Daily Caller News Foundation that she testified on Aug. 10 that she overheard a conversation in which Credico asked Stone not to reveal him as the source to WikiLeaks.

The testimony undercuts Credico’s public denials that he was Stone’s link to WikiLeaks.

A former New York gubernatorial candidate who once operated a high-end escort service, Kristin M. Davis, testified over the summer to a grand jury in the special counsel’s Russia investigation that she overheard left-wing comedian Randy Credico admit that he was a back channel between Trump confidant Roger Stone and WikiLeaks.

Davis, a longtime friend of Stone’s, told The Daily Caller News Foundation that she testified on Aug. 10 that she “heard the tail end of a conversation where Credico was trying to impress upon Roger not to disclose his name.”

That makes her the third grand jury witness who has testified in support of Stone and against Credico, who has publicly denied being a link between WikiLeaks and Stone.

Speculation has swirled for months over the special counsel’s interest in Davis, who is known as the Manhattan Madam for operating an escort service that she claims was used by former Democratic New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer and other politicians. Davis has discussed some of her interactions with Mueller’s team in the past, but has not previously revealed that Credico, a comedian and radio show host, was a topic in her grand jury appearance.

She is among around a dozen current and former Stone associates who have been interviewed by the special counsel’s office or testified to the grand jury.

The conversation in question occurred in May 2017 at a duplex that Davis shares with Stone in New York City. Stone and Davis have known each other for around a decade, and Davis has done media relations work for Stone in the past, though not in 2016.

Mueller, the special counsel, is investigating what Stone and other Trump associates may have known about WikiLeaks’ plans to release emails stolen from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta.

Stone has claimed that Credico was his source of information that WikiLeaks planned to release documents that would be damaging to the Clinton campaign. The longtime GOP operative claims that, while he had vague insight into WikiLeaks’ plans, he did not know the source or content of the WikiLeaks documents.

Credico has publicly denied being a conduit between Stone and WikiLeaks. He has also claimed that he testified the same before Mueller’s grand jury on Sept. 7.

But Davis and at least two other grand jury witnesses who also spoke to TheDCNF have disputed Credico’s denials. Davis, who also met with prosecutors on July 25, suggested that her interactions with Mueller’s team was one factor in a subpoena issued for Credico.

“My providing Randy Credico as Roger’s source was news to them, clearly,” she told TheDCNF.

Stone introduced Credico to Davis in 2010 when she ran for governor of New York. Credico ran on Davis’s “Anti-Prohibition Party” ticket for the U.S. Senate seat held by Democrat Chuck Schumer.

Davis described Stone and Credico as longtime “frenemies.” She said that the pair got into a fist fight at a campaign event in 2010 after Credico began heckling her. While Davis says she did not forgive Credico following the incident, Stone did, and the pair re-established contact during the 2016 presidential campaign.

https://dailycaller.com/2018/11/26/roger-stone-associate-mueller-jury/

Armed with New Federal Report, Dems Declare Climate Change 'Not Debatable' and Vow to Act

WASHINGTON – Democrats vowed that they'll use their new House majority next year to force action on climate change in the wake of a new report from 13 federal agencies that paints a bleak picture of the current and expected effects of global warming.

The National Climate Assessment released Friday is an interagency effort including more than 300 experts guided by a 60-member federal advisory committee. The report was then subjected to peer review and studied by federal agencies and a panel of the National Academy of Sciences.

"Climate change, once considered an issue for a distant future, has moved firmly into the present," began the report's introduction. "…This National Climate Assessment concludes that the evidence of human-induced climate change continues to strengthen and that impacts are increasing across the country. Americans are noticing changes all around them. Summers are longer and hotter, and extended periods of unusual heat last longer than any living American has ever experienced. Winters are generally shorter and warmer. Rain comes in heavier downpours."

The 1,656-page report stresses that "many lines of independent evidence demonstrate that the rapid warming of the past half-century is due primarily to human activities."

Climate change, it adds, has "affected and will continue to affect human health, water supply, agriculture, transportation, energy, coastal areas, and many other sectors of society, with increasingly adverse impacts on the American economy and quality of life."

“Climate change is not debatable, and no region of our country and no sector of our economy will be spared," Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) said in response to the report. "While the Trump administration and congressional Republicans continue to deny that climate change exists, Democrats will use our new House Majority to take aggressive action to reduce climate pollution and help communities build their resilience to the impacts of climate change.”

How that will take shape is uncertain. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Friday that Democrats "understand the severity of this challenge and are determined to act."

"We will use our House majority to ensure that this challenge is not ignored," Hoyer vowed. "We will look for every opportunity to advance legislation to address one of the most pressing issues of our time."

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) told CBS on Sunday that Congress must "take Trump on, take the fossil fuel industry on, and transform our energy system away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency and sustainable energies like solar and wind."

"We have got to rally the American people… but this is not – this is not an issue where we can debate," he said. "The reality is real. The scientific community has made it 100 percent clear that this is a major crisis facing this country and our planet."

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/armed-with-new-federal-report-dems-declare-climate-change-not-debatable-and-vow-to-act/

Israel Arrested 32 Arabs Serving In Palestinian Authority’s Security Services In Jerusalem

On November 25th, Israeli police arrested 32 individuals suspected of serving in the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) security services.

According to the police statement, the suspects were Israeli residents and some of them were receiving state social benefits, while also serving in the PA’s armed forces. The statement claimed that their activities were illegal under the 1994 Gaza-Jericho agreement, a follow-up treaty to the Oslo Accords.

The arrests came as a result of a covert investigation into the PA’s operation inside Israel, according to the police.

During searches of the suspects’ homes, police said officers uncovered tens of thousands of shekels in cash, weapons, ammunition, uniforms and various PA security forces documents.

Police said the suspects were engaged in activities that “directly affect the personal safety of Israeli Arabs.” They were taken in for a hearing and were expected to be brought before a judge for a remand hearing on November 26th.

“The police will take a hard and uncompromising hand against Israeli residents and civilians acting in the name of the Palestinian Authority and other terrorist organizations in violence of the law, while violating the sovereignty, governance and security of the citizens of the State of Israel,” Israel Police said in a statement.

The arrest came one day after police arrested the Palestinian Authority governor of Jerusalem for the second time in two months. He was reportedly arrested as a result of a PA investigation into an East Jerusalem land sale.

Adnan Ghaith was arrested in Jerusalem’s Beit Hanina neighborhood overnight on November 24th. Reports in Hebrew-language media said that Israeli authorities are investigating Ghaith after the PA arrested a man last month accused of selling property in East Jerusalem to a Jewish buyer.

https://southfront.org/israel-arrested-32-arabs-serving-in-palestinian-authoritys-security-services/

Ukraine Imposes Martial Law, Calls On Foreign States To Deploy Warships, Observers In Black Sea, Sea Of Azov

On November 26, Ukraine’s parliament voted to impose martial law in parts of the country to fight what President Petro Porshenko called “growing aggression” from Russia.

The move was justified by the November 25 maritime incident between the Ukrainian naval group and Russian coastal guards in the Black Sea off Crimea, when 3 Ukrainian warships violated Russina territorial waters and were detained and escroted to the Russian port of Kerch.

Russia and Ukraine blamed each other for the escalation, which seems to be the biggest incident between the states since 2014. It should be noted that testimonines from the detained Ukrainian servicemen confirm that the November 25 was a pre-planned provocation by the Poroshenko regime.

The 30-days long martial law is starting in some regions of Ukraine on November 28 morning. Accoridng to an initial announcement, the martial law will be employed in 10 of Ukraine’s 27 regions. The chosen regions are bordering Russia, Belarus and Moldova’s breakaway republic of Trans-Dniester. These regions were described by Poroshenko as a possible front against the “Russian agressor”.

“Martial law doesn’t mean declaring a war,” Poroshenko claimed. “It is introduced with the sole purpose of boosting Ukraine’s defense in the light of a growing aggression from Russia.”

However, the final list of these regions is currently unclear because different Ukrainian official sources provide different lists.

The approved martial law measures include a partial mobilization, strengthening of air defenses, anti-terrorism measures and “information security” that will for sure impact rights and freedoms of the Ukrainian population.

Seaprately, the Ukrainian Parliament adopted an amazing by its sentense resolution calling on naval powers to deploy warships and observers in the region of the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea in order to prevent further “esclation” of the situation by Russia.

It’s interesting to get how members of the Ukrainian Parliament imagine deployment of some foriegn “observers” in the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. Do they suppose that Polish or Romanian snorkeling swimmers should swim from Odessa to Mariupol defending peaceful Ukrainian warships from dark-minded Russian coastal guards?

https://southfront.org/ukraine-imposes-martial-law-calls-on-foreign-states-to-deploy-warships-observers-in-black-sea-sea-of-azov/

Detained Ukrainian Servicemen Confirm They Provoked Black Sea Incident With Russia Upon Order From Their Command

The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said on November 26 that it has questioned Ukrainian servicemen who were detained following the maritime incident in the Kerch Strait.

The FSB released a video footage of the questioning session with:

3rd Rank Captain Vladimir Lesovoy, commander of a support vessels division of the Ukrainian South naval base (army unit A-1728);

Andrei Drach, according to Russian officials, officer of the 7th main military intelligence directorate of the Ukrainian Security Service who had been onboard the Nikolpol boat;

Sergei Tsybizov, a sailor from the Nikopol.

The Ukrainian servicemen confirmed that they were action upon a direct order from their command and the November 25 maritime incident was a pre-planned provocation.

“Radio requests [from Russian border guards] were deliberately ignored. There were firearms and machine guns with munitions onboard. I was aware that these were provocative actions,” Lesovoy stated adding that the formal goal was to reach Mariupol [the Sea of Azov] from Odessa [the Black Sea] through Kerch Strait.

The Urainian intelligence officer, Drach, confirmed that the Russian side was working to prevent an armed clash in the area.

“We entered Russia’s territorial waters where the Russian coastal guards warned us that we were violating Russia’s laws. They told us to leave the Russian territorial waters,” he said.

However, the Ukrainian naval group was ignoring the warnings.

“We continued to move. We were contacted by Russian ships which warned us they would open fire if we did not stop, The commander stopped the boat, and we were detained. That’s all,” Tsybizov said.

https://southfront.org/detained-ukrainian-servicemen-confirm-they-provoked-black-sea-incident-with-russia-upon-order-from-their-command/

UN Security Council Refuses to Hear U.S’ Nikki Haley Over Kerch Strait Skirmish

Haley's pressure backfires, depriving the U.S of a meaningful response

The UN Security Council has blocked consideration of the issue of Russia on the situation in the Kerch Strait.

Four countries voted for consideration of the agenda, seven against, four more abstained. This comes as previously, U.S Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley stated earlier today that:

“An emergency Security Council meeting has been called for tomorrow at 11:00am,” Nikki Haley tweeted, sharing an earlier tweet by Nolan Peterson, a correspondent who has long covered events in Ukraine.

Peterson’s tweet read:

“This is the most dangerous moment I’ve seen in Ukraine in years. Tonight, a war that many people in America can only imagine thanks to Hollywood movies, teeters on the razor thin edge of becoming real.”

The announcement comes as Poroshenko is actively considering the move to impose martial law, a move that would push back an upcoming election that would likely see his defeat, perhaps indefinitely. As FRN reported earlier, Russian coast guard ships opened fire on a group of vessels of the Ukrainian Navy – two small-sized ‘Berdiansk’ and ‘Nikopol’ armored artillery boats and the ‘Yany Kapu’ tugboat – as they were violating Russian maritime space near Kerch Strait on Sunday evening.

As a result, Haley will not be having her desired UN Security Council resolution turn out as hoped, and this effectively preempts any diplomatic charade and ‘time-wasting’ maneuver at the UN. Any US backed initiative that disregarded the status of Russia’s maritime borders would have been vetoed by at least two of the permanent members, and any initiative backed by Russia would be vetoed at the US.

At first, it appears as though Haley got her way – but she was the one trapped in a box of confusion of her own making. For it is Kiev, which lost the Azov crisis, that needs international mediation in order to squeeze concessions from Russia. It is not Russia that needed anything from the UNSC, even as it was Russia that called the meeting.

This is the only rational way to understand the Russian representatives feigned words of disapproval at Haley’s ‘wish’ being granted. For what was granted was Russia avoiding a formalized procedure at the UNSC where the U.S would make any proposal, and while it would have been doomed to be vetoed, it could have made the usual ‘made for home viewers’ drama and spectacle of the matter.

Given Haley’s history at the UN with heavy-handed and dishonorable practices – famously lying to other diplomats about the possibility of the U.S invading North Korea – it is also possible that her credibility is very low and her colleagues would have little reason to gain any currency with the out-going U.S diplomat.

While Russia went through the motions of calling the UNSC meeting, this was merely necessary for the historical record. It was clear from the start that Haley would veto any binding resolution.

An emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on the crisis in the Kerch Strait began with a back-and-forth between the representatives of Russia and the United States.

US Representative to the UN Nikki Haley, in an act of ‘penny-wise, pound-foolishness’ urged the UNSC not to consider the interpretation of events proposed by Russia, which provided for the accusation of Ukraine of violating the borders of the Russian Federation.

Haley said that the United States regards the Crimea and the waters around it as Ukrainian territory.

“We strongly support the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine within internationally recognized borders,” she said, calling the incident near Kerch “Russian provocation” and “dangerous escalation in violation of international law”.

The Americans were answered by Dmitry Polyansky, Russia’s deputy to the UN.

“On November 25, the Kiev regime created a direct threat to international peace and security, by ordering the Ukrainian Navy to carry out aggressive provocation against the state border of the Russian Federation,” he said.

Polyansky stressed that the violation was carried out “by rather dangerous methods – maneuvering in a fairly narrow strait – created risks for the normal movement of vessels in this area.”

https://www.fort-russ.com/2018/11/breaking-un-security-council-refuses-to-hear-u-s-nikki-haley-over-kerch-strait-skirmish/

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