“Russia's presence in Syria, of course, changed the security atmosphere, and changed the balance of power,” Hosein Dehqan said in an interview with Rossiya 24 news channel. Dehqan also stressed that Iran, which has “a unique position in its region” and is a “big, influential regional nation,” wants to expand military, technical and industrial ties with Moscow. Iran is also seeking Russia’s consultations on the “security of the region.”

Calling the security situation in the region and the entire world “turbulent” and characterized by a “lack of stability” with different countries playing “their own role,” especially Washington which wants to “destabilize the region,” Dehqan stressed that Iran wants to purchase “defensive” weapons from Russia. “The most important thing is to raise the level of our security [both] qualitatively and quantitatively, so that we could insure protection against possible attacks of our enemies,” Dehqan said.

“We believe that the implementation of bilateral projects will largely depend on the effectiveness of Russia's and Iran's measures to combat international terrorism,” Shoigu said. “We seek to make Russian-Iranian cooperation in this field long-term and multidimensional. Our countries face common challenges and threats in the region, which we can only withstand together.”

Merkel, who in the past has insisted that the “two-state solution” is the best way to end the conflict, appeared to signal at Tuesday’s Government-to-Government meeting that she would turn down the pressure on Israel to push for a diplomatic process with the Palestinian Authority (PA).

"Now is not the time for a significant step forward [in the two-state solution]," she said during a joint press conference with Netanyahu in Berlin, according to i24news. Nevertheless, Merkel stressed that while substantial progress can't be achieved at this time, "it is possible to make improvements in specific fields," and promised Germany's help in doing so, particularly in the economic area.

Merkel’s remarks echo recent statements by officials in the United States, who admitted that President Barack Obama recognizes that reaching a two-state solution before he leaves office is unlikely. Similar expressions have been sounded in Israel as well, where opposition chairman Yitzhak Herzog has also admitted that the “two-state solution” is not feasible at this time and has offered his own, alternative plan for peace.

Netanyahu last week mocked Herzog over his recognition that the two-state solution is not feasible, when he "congratulated" the Labor party leader for finally "waking up" to the reality of the Middle East.

The Chinese account for more global trade than anyone else, and so the fact that their imports and their exports are both collapsing precipitously is a huge red flag. When less stuff is being bought and sold and shipped around the world, that tells us that the “real economy” is contracting. Tremendous efforts are being made to try to prop up financial markets all over the globe right now, but in the end those efforts are going to prove to be rather futile. The global economy is clearly plunging into recession, and at this point it is becoming exceedingly difficult for even the most optimistic economic analysts to deny this reality.

When the trade numbers for China for the month of January were released, they were an extreme disappointment. The following comes from CNBC…

“China‘s exports fell 11.2 percent on-year in January, while imports declined 18.8 percent, clocking far bigger slides than expected by analysts. Analysts polled by Reuters had expected a 1.9 percent drop in January exports, and a 0.8 percent drop in imports, after China’s exports fell 1.4 percent in December from a year earlier and imports slid 7.6 percent.”

We never see numbers like this outside of a recession. Never.

We have reached the terminal phase of the greatest financial bubble in history, and now the endgame is upon us. Yes, governments and central banks will keep trying to “fix things”, but it is becoming exceedingly clear that they are rapidly losing control. And there are other factors, such as the potential start of World War 3 in the Middle East, that could turn this new crisis into a complete and utter nightmare in no time at all.

Sweden's Riksbank - the world's oldest central bank - became the first major monetary authority to cross the rubicon and take its main policy rate into the red exactly a year ago to the month. The Riksbank’s move followed the likes of Switzerland and Denmark, who had turned negative in a bid to stimulate flagging inflation and halt the punishing appreciation of their currencies.

But the introduction of sub-zero rates caused no immediate panic that central bankers were "losing control". Neither did they seem to produce deleterious economic effects in their host countries, as savers continued to keep their money deposited in banks rather than fleeing for the safety of cash. Commercial lenders, meanwhile, adjusted their business models to help maintain profitability.

In September, Andy Haldane, chief economist at the Bank of England, joined a chorus of influential thinkers in positing that negative rates could be necessary to protect the UK and the other advanced economies from the next global recession.

But recessionary fears have crept up on the world much faster than the likes of Mr Haldane may have anticipated. Global markets have crashed into bear market territory. A cocktail of fears, including the collapsing price of oil, the creaking health of the world's biggest banks and China’s competence in managing its economic slowdown, have ignited fears that investor panic may lead the world into a new downturn.

Which kind of relationship would Britain have with the EU if it decided to go it alone? Eurosceptics hail the Norwegian model of trading with Europe but staying outside it, however, the Norwegians have only managed to secure their free trade deal by accepting freedom of movement as a condition, something the out campaign would find hard to agree to.

If Britain votes to leave, how will the EU react? As the EU’s largest single export market it may be in their interest to secure a quick trade deal but they may also decide to make an example of Britain to discourage other member states from leaving. It seems likely that Scottish voters will vote to stay in the EU and so an overall out vote may trigger a second referendum potentially breaking the Union and leaving what remains of the UK even smaller in its negotiations with the rest of the world.

It is these unanswered questions that are likely to confuse and worry voters in the run-up to the referendum and it will be up to the in and out campaigns to try to take advantage of that.

Recall that the €500 note is the second highest currency denomination in G10, after the CHF1,000 note. More importantly, the total value of €500 notes in circulation amounts to €306.8 billion. In other words, if overnight the €307 billion worth of €500 bills were eliminated, the notional value of the entire amount of European physical currency in circulation would decline by 30% to €700 billion!

And there you have it: while it may not be banning all European cash outright, we are confident the ECB would be delighted if one third of it was to start, while pretending to be fighting financial crime, terrorism, corruption and drug dealers. Then the Federal Reserve follows suit and listens to Harvard “scholar” and former Standard Chartered CEO Peter Sands who just last week said the US should ban the $100 note as it would “deter tax evasion, financial crime, terrorism and corruption.”

[In the USA] $100 bills account for $1.08 trillion of the $1.38 trillion total in circulation. So, should the Fed react to the ECB’s “scrapping” of the €500 bill, which accounts for 30% of the value of currency in circulation, then the Fed would respond in kind by eliminating 78% of all paper currency in circulation by value.

Not a bad way to launch a global ban on paper currency ahead of a global NIRP regime, and all, of course, in the name of fighting “tax evasion, financial crime, terrorism and corruption.”

A total of nine minor earthquakes were reported, according to the US Geological Survey. The quakes were felt across Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, Nebraska, Texas, Arkansas and Iowa. The epicenter was near the East Campbell Gas Field and about 75 miles west of Cushing - the “Pipeline Crossroads - and one of the largest oil storage hubs in the world.

Oklahoma is one of the top five oil production states and accounts for some 3 percent to 4 percent of total US output. The US Energy Information Administration last week raised its estimate for total state production by 100,000 barrels per day, up 25 percent to 30 percent.

While Oklahoma’s oil fields have experienced a boom over the past decade thanks to fracking and horizontal drilling, the state also reported 907 earthquakes of magnitude last year. This represents a 54 percent increase in earthquakes from 2014 alone.

Researchers using a bioprinter, described Monday in Nature Biotechnology, say that they’ve found a way to manufacture living muscle, bone and cartilage. They say that this technology can make unprecedented advances in the healing of battlefield injuries by using a combination of living cells and a plastic-like material.

While printed tissue has been accomplished before, scientists have not figured out a way to nourish the tissues by allowing blood vessels to colonize them after they are transplanted. “Cells simply cannot survive without a blood vessel supply that’s smaller than 200 microns [0.07 inches], which is extremely small,” Atala told Gizmodo. “That’s the maximum distance. And that’s not just for printing, that’s nature.”

So far, the manufactured body parts have only been tested on laboratory animals, but the transplants were stable enough to be considered successful in those tests.

Mr Obama launched a scathing attack on the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination in which he identified Mr Trump by name. He said: "I continue to believe Mr Trump will not be president. And the reason is I have a lot of faith in the American people. I think they recognise being president is a serious job. It's not hosting a talk show or a reality show, it's not promotion, it's not marketing, it's hard and a lot of people count on us getting it right.

"It's not a matter of pandering and getting in the news every day. It requires being able to work with leaders around the world in a way that reflects the importance of the office, and gives people confidence that you know the facts, and you know their names, and you know where they are on a map, and you know something about their history." Mr Obama added: "The guy who's standing where I stand has the nuclear codes with him. He can order 21-year-olds into fire.

"This is reported as entertainment but as you get closer (to the election) the reality has a way of intruding. The American people are pretty sensible and I think they'll make a sensible choice." Mr Obama was speaking at a press conference in California after hosting a summit with Southeast Asian leaders.

Fred Trump, Donald’s father, who was a strict taskmaster with all his five children, told his three sons to be “killers”. After graduation from high school in 1923, Fred started to work full-time in construction. He realised quickly that his German origins could be a hindrance, so he pretended that his parents were Swedish, though his mother spoke English with a thick German accent and baked Apfeltorte for family reunions.

Trump’s success in the casino and property business was down to his early understanding of the power of branding. “Trump” lends itself to big lettering on buildings because it suggests luck and success. Like his father, though, he thought his German origins might not endear him to possible backers. He stuck to Fred’s tale and wrote in his autobiography, “Trump: The Art of the Deal”, that his father was of Swedish descent. Challenged on this point in an interview with Vanity Fair in 1990, he replied: “My father was not German; my father’s parents were German… Swedish, and really sort of all over Europe.”

Were he to become president, Mr Trump would not be the first occupant of the White House of German descent. Dwight Eisenhower’s family was originally called Eisenhauer and hailed from Karlsbrunn, close to the German-French border. Herbert Hoover’s ancestors were called Huber and came from Baden in southern Germany. They both made little of their origins — but they did not go so far as to invent new ones.

But while the leaders of all 28 EU member states will have to sign up to the agreement before it is finished the European Parliament will still have to pass legislation to enact it - and MEPs will not be party to any legally binding deal. The European Parliament will be asked to pass EU laws on the so-called 'emergency brake' on migrant benefits and reforms to how child benefit is paid to migrant workers.

It was made clear today the legislation will not be put to MEPs until after Britain's referendum - expected in June. The potential roadblock to Mr Cameron's deal comes from the so-called 'co-decision' powers that hand the 751 MEPs veto powers over certain laws.

David Cameron looks set to call the EU referendum on Friday after being warned that he faced a Cabinet revolt if he attempted to wait until after the weekend in order to gag eurosceptic ministers. Downing Street on Monday agreed to hold a Cabinet meeting on Friday if, as expected, Mr Cameron is able to secure a final deal with EU leaders at a Brussels summit.

Mr Cameron will use the Cabinet meeting to lift “collective responsibility” rules, meaning that eurosceptic members will finally be able to speak out and say that they are backing the campaign to leave the EU. The Prime Minister made the decision after being warned that Iain Duncan Smith, the eurosceptic Work and Pensions Secretary, was preparing to “go out all guns blazing” on Saturday if the gag was not lifted as soon as the deal was finalised.

Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, on Monday warned that there is a “real” risk that the talks could break up at the summit. “The risk of break-up is real because this process is indeed very fragile,” he said. “Handle with care. What is broken cannot be mended.”

"A speculative attack could come very fast. If I were a politician in Italy and I was confronted by this sort of insolvency risk I would want to go back to my own currency as fast as possible, because that is the only way to avoid going bankrupt,” he told The Telegraph. The German Council has called for a “sovereign insolvency mechanism” even though this overturns the financial principles of the post-war order in Europe, deeming such a move necessary to restore the credibility of the "no-bailout" clause in the Maastricht Treaty. Professor Bofinger issued a vehement dissent.

The plan has the backing of the Bundesbank and most recently the German finance minister, Wolfgang Schauble, who usually succeeds in imposing his will in the eurozone. Sensitive talks are under way in key European capitals, causing shudders in Rome, Madrid and Lisbon.

At the Munich Security Conference, the prime topics are the refugee crisis, the Syrian conflict, Russian aggression and the potential dissolution of the European Union's very structure. Top European leaders repeatedly lamented that 2015 saw all of Europe’s problems deepen, and unanimously predicted that in 2016 they would get even worse.

“The question of war and peace has returned to the continent,” German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told the audience, indirectly referring to Russian military interventions. “We had thought that peace had returned to Europe for good."

Several European officials told me that there was little expectation that President Barack Obama, in his last year in office, would make any significant policy changes to address what European governments see as an existential set of crises that can’t wait for a new administration in Washington.

But then the price of oil started crashing and the global economy began to slow down significantly. Energy company debt makes up somewhere between 15 and 20 percent of the junk bond market, and the credit rating downgrades for that sector are coming fast and furious. But it isn’t just the energy industry that is seeing a massive wave of defaults, debt restructurings and bankruptcy filings.

Just like with subprime mortgages in 2008, investors are starting to wake up and realize that the paper that they are holding is not worth a whole lot. So now investors are rushing for the exits and we are starting to see panic on a level that we have not witnessed since the last financial crisis. Just look at what has been happening in recent days. Investors took nearly 500 million dollars out of the largest junk bond ETF (iShares HYG) last week alone.

We keep making the same mistakes, but we never seem to learn from history. In fact, the mainstream media keeps telling us that this new financial crisis “isn’t 2008″ over and over again. Even though the exact same patterns are happening once again, they still believe that this time will somehow be different. And to a certain extent that is actually true. This current crisis is not going to be the same as the last one. Eventually, it is going to prove to be even worse than the last one once everything is all said and done.