UKRAINE - Ukrainian troops and pro-Russian rebels are exchanging heavy tank and artillery fire in and around Debaltseve, a strategic town in eastern Ukraine. There are reports - not independently confirmed - that the rebels have seized the nearby town of Vuhlehirsk. Many civilians remain trapped in Debaltseve, while others - including people with shrapnel wounds - have managed to reach the town of Artemivsk. Russian media say shellfire has killed seven people in the city of Donetsk. The recent heavy fighting has left a ceasefire agreed in September in tatters.
NIGERIA - Boko Haram Islamist militants have launched a fresh assault on the strategically important Nigerian city of Maiduguri, eyewitnesses say. Gunfire was reported on the streets of the northern city after an attack that began in the early hours of Sunday. It comes a week after Boko Haram's last attempt to capture the capital of Borno state was repelled by the Nigerian army with heavy loss of life. The conflict has displaced at least 1.5 million people, while more than 2,000 were killed last year. Boko Haram's last attempt to take over Maiduguri a week ago was stopped by the military. But the militants did succeed in capturing the town of Monguno - 125km (80 miles) outside the city and took over a military base.
GREECE - In his first act as prime minister on Monday, Alexis Tsipras visited the war memorial in Kaisariani where 200 Greek resistance fighters were slaughtered by the Nazis in 1944. The move did not go unnoticed in Berlin. Nor did Tsipras's decision hours later to receive the Russian ambassador before meeting any other foreign official.
EUROPE - It’s time for Greece to leave the euro, default on its debt and move on. I write this with a heavy heart as the short-term consequences for ordinary Greeks could be disastrous, but there is now no other practical way out. Syriza is serious about change and simply will not honour the country’s debts or stick to international agreements. Germany is equally serious about not accepting a debt write-off. A N24/TNS poll shows that 43 percent of Germans are unwilling to negotiate debt relief or a longer loan repayment schedule with Greece. As to Brussels, the European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker has said that “there’s no question of writing down Greek debt”. The stand-off will escalate, and escalate further. Neither side will blink, which means that a Grexit and default is now almost inevitable.
USA - The United States has been at war since 2001, and America must not let down its guard. One of the newer threats to national security is economic warfare. Its goal is to cripple a country's economy, rendering it weak and ineffective. When you think of war, images from the battlefield or troops scouring city streets in search of terrorists probably come to mind. Another arena is the financial front. In economic warfare, enemies use financial markets as weapons to attack national interests.
DAVOS, SWITZERLAND - The recent decision by the European Central Bank to open the monetary floodgates has weakened the euro and is boosting the German economy. But the move increases the threat of turbulence on the financial markets and could trigger a currency war. The concern could be felt everywhere at this year's World Economic Forum in Davos, the annual meeting of the rich and powerful.
UK - Islamic Sharia law is on the rise in Great Britain as members of the UK parliament are seeking to ban self-established Muslim courts in the nation. There are approximately 85 Sharia tribunals throughout Great Britain, all of which are run by Islamic judges who rule according to the Koran. There are no appeals following judgment and sentencing.
UK - Two seats may for first time be decided by migrants, who make up majority of voters, with parties warned not to ignore this electorate. A record number of people who were born outside the UK will be able to vote in this year’s general election and are likely to hold the balance of power in several key constituencies, according to the first comprehensive analysis of the migrant vote. Almost 4 million voters – about one in 10 of the entire electorate in England and Wales - are predicted to have been born overseas come May and, for the first time, it is predicted that more than 50% of voters of the eligible electorate will have been born abroad in two seats.
USA - A White House spokesperson preferred to talk of the Taliban as “an armed insurgency” rather than a terrorist organization during a press briefing, when a reporter pressed him about Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl’s release. Responding to a question posed by ABC’s chief White House correspondent Jonathan Karl, deputy press secretary Eric Schultz argued the US can swap prisoners with the Taliban because the group is not a terrorist organization but “an armed insurgency.” Senator Ted Cruz also worried about the precedent the swap might set. “What does this tell terrorists? First, that if you capture a US soldier you can trade that soldier for five terrorist prisoners? That’s a very dangerous precedent,” Cruz told ABC.
USA - The entirely preventable California measles outbreak has now sickened more than 70 people. With perhaps hundreds more exposed, the outbreak will likely continue. As the disease spreads, experts will debate how we respond and what to do about the anti-vaccine movement that's partly to blame for this mess. Likely, all we'll agree on is better outreach to parents. That's not enough. Parents who do not vaccinate their children should go to jail. The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that before widespread vaccination began in 1980, 2.6 million people a year died from measles. About 400 people a day still do. Put simply, no person has the right to threaten the safety of his community.
USA - Official reports are claiming that unvaccinated children are to blame because some of those who contracted the measles hadn't been vaccinated. Some of them had been vaccinated, of course, and the original source of the disease has yet to be determined. But like always, it is automatically those pesky individuals who choose not to inject their bodies with a vaccine linked to brain damage and autism - and that's been shown to spread the measles - that must have triggered the outbreak.
USA - With California gripped by a measles outbreak, Dr Charles Goodman posted a clear notice in his waiting room and on Facebook: His practice will no longer see children whose parents won't get them vaccinated. "Parents who choose not to give measles shots, they're not just putting their kids at risk, but they're also putting other kids at risk - especially kids in my waiting room," the Los Angeles pediatrician said. It's a sentiment echoed by a small number of doctors who in recent years have "fired" patients who continue to believe debunked research linking vaccines to autism. They hope the strategy will lead parents to change their minds; if that fails, they hope it will at least reduce the risk to other children in the office.
USA - Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz told CNBC on Monday that the euro zone should stay together but if it breaks apart, it would be better for Germany to leave than for Greece. "While it was an experiment to bring them together, nothing has divided Europe as much as the euro," Stiglitz said in a "Squawk Box" interview. The risk of a sovereign default in Greece has increased after the anti-austerity party Syriza won Sunday's snap elections, raising concerns over the possibility of a Greek exit from the euro zone.
GERMANY - Germany’s Wolfgang Schäuble is 'relaxed' about Greek exit from the euro. A top German body has called for a clear mechanism to force Greece out of the euro if the left-wing Syriza government repudiates the terms of the country’s €245 billion rescue. “Financial support must be cut off if Greece does not comply with its reform commitments,” said the Institute of German Economic Research (IW). "If Greece is going to take a tough line, then Europe will take a tough line as well."
GREECE - Markets have yet to grasp that the rift between EU creditors and Greece's firebrand premier Alexis Tspiras is 'so large as to be unbridgeable', warns Nomura. The new Greece of Alexis Tsipras will run out of money by early March. It will then face a series of escalating crunch points that will end in default and a return to the drachma unless it can reach a deal with EU creditors.
“Just what is an APOSTLE?”
Today we find the Church of God in a “wilderness of religious confusion!”
The confusion is not merely around the Church – within the religions of the world outside – but WITHIN the very heart of The True Church itself!
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