USA - What does a poor or lower-middle-class white person, especially one from the South or Southwest, have to do to get a break from fancy high-end TV producers? It is a remarkable fact about this new Golden Age of television, which began with The Sopranos in 1999, that its primary focus of attention is the population cohort known (with the exquisite cultural sensitivity we have all learned in the era of political correctness) as “white trash.”

GERMANY - German Chancellor Angela Merkel hasn’t minced words. Unless Vladimir Putin steps back from Ukraine, she’s prepared to back European sanctions that would cause “massive economic and political harm” to Russia. What about the harm Germany would suffer if the showdown escalates into economic warfare?

GERMANY - A simple plaque marks the forsaken spot where the Red Baron was buried in central Berlin but hardly anyone stops to remember the flying ace shot down in 1918. For Germans, the Great War holds so little interest. The centenary of the outbreak of World War One has caught Germany off guard, while Britain, France, the United States and others mark it with battlefield tours, television programs, exhibitions and plans for ceremonies on the day, in August. Germans aren't sure how, or even if, they should commemorate a war that cost them 13 percent of their territory, all their colonies, huge reparations and 2.5 million lives. The government is under fire for its inactivity.

UK - A Christian couple who were told it was illegal to turn unmarried couples away from their guesthouse have launched a landmark legal case at the European Court of Human Rights. Sue and Jeff Green, who run a 13 bed B&B in mid Wales, advertised that only married couples were allowed to take double rooms. But at the end of last year they received a letter from the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s “legal enforcement team” informing them they could be guilty of discriminating against gay couples. Now Mr and Mrs Green have secured the backing of the Christian Legal Centre to take their case direct to Strasbourg in a bid to establish whether Christians’ beliefs and human rights are superseded by equality laws.

ICELAND - Hekla volcano, one of Iceland's most active volcanoes, is on the verge of a major eruption that could impact air travel, experts have warned. A University of Iceland geoscientist, Pll Einarsson, believes a 'bulge' on the northern side of the volcano is caused by huge deposits of magma rising. In 2010 the eruption of Iceland's Eyjafjallajökull volcano hampered air travel due to the ash and gas it spewed into the atmosphere, and there are fears another eruption could cause the same issues. Researchers say there is now more magma than in 2000, the last time the Hekla volcano erupted. Then, it took just 79 minutes from the first warning earthquake until the volcano exploded, Einarsson said.

GERMANY - German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday that Russia's absorption of Ukraine's Crimea region after a secession referendum and declaration of independence there violated international law.

CRIMEA - In an extraordinary day which redrew the map of Europe, fears were growing that widespread violence would erupt in the aftermath of Russia’s annexation of Crimea. An Ukrainian officer was killed in a confrontation in Simferopol, just hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered an incendiary speech justifying Moscow’s reclamation of the former Ukrainian territory.

MALAYSIA - Asian military officials may be staging a mass cover-up over missing flight MH370, because they do not want to expose gaping holes within their countries' air defences, a leading aviation expert has suggested.

ISRAEL - Israel's defense minister has accused the United States of projecting weakness internationally and said Israel could not rely on its main ally to take the lead in confronting Iran over its nuclear program. Moshe Yaalon, whose remarks were reported in the Haaretz daily on Tuesday, caused friction with the United States only two months ago when he described Secretary of State John Kerry's quest for Israeli-Palestinian peace as messianic and obsessive. His latest comments, confirmed by an Israeli official who was present at the lecture Yaalon delivered at Tel Aviv University on Monday, displayed deep disappointment with US President Barack Obama's handling of burning world issues. "We had thought it would be the United States that would lead the campaign against Iran," said Yaalon, who pointed to the Ukraine crisis as an example of Washington "showing weakness".

VATICAN - He is the spiritual father the world is looking for, whether they realize it or not. That’s how papal biographer and Vatican analyst George Weigel put it when we spoke the other day to mark the first anniversary of Jorge Bergoglio’s papacy. And as such, he is capturing the world’s attention, for reasons they may not even know or be correct in identifying. All they know is that he is reaching the human heart and mind and soul on a depth not even perceptible to the senses, except for that of the transcendent. Many people who are not Catholic, including the altogether un-churched, have called him ‘our pope’.

VATICAN - He was the most talked-about person of 2013 and winner of TIME’s “Person of the Year” award. Google Translate coders have set his name to translate as “a better world.” Yet Pope Francis insists that he is “a normal person,” and has no desire to be “a superman or a star.” Some religion columnists and commentators attribute the public’s esteem to his humble insistence that he is ordinary. In fact, humility may just be the pontiff’s paradoxical trademark. The Washington Post summed it up in one headline: “Like Pope Francis? You’ll Love Jesus.” The Post is not alone in pointing out that the pope’s actions, words and demeanor are often reminiscent of the Jesus portrayed in the Gospels. Humility may be exactly the kind of “ordinary” Pope Francis hopes will become the norm among all of those who claim to follow Christ.

UKRAINE - The Western press has been deceiving readers, listeners, and viewers since the beginning of the so-called “Euromaidan” protests - from covering up the ultra-right wing ideology and literal Neo-Nazi flag wavers leading the mobs, to the role the West has played in organizing, funding, and equipping the protesters in the first place. With their proxies now entrenched in Kiev after violently overthrowing the elected government of Viktor Yanukovych, the truth has begun to trickle out, and with it, Russia has gained ground against the West in its defense of the Ukrainian people from what is essentially and quite obviously a right-wing Nazi regime backed by foreign interests from the West once again occupying Ukrainian territory just as they had in World War II. And just like in World War II, the Crimea peninsula has become a pivotal battleground.

UKRAINE - American and German inspectors will make observation flights over Russia and Belarus within the framework of the international treaty on Open Skies. The mission is set to verify the true position of Russian troops and military equipment.

RUSSIA – Russia’s deputy prime minister laughed off President Obama’s sanction against him today asking “Comrade @BarackObama” if “some prankster” came up with the list. The Obama administration hit 11 Russian and Ukrainian officials with sanctions today as punishment for Russia’s support of Crimea’s referendum. Among them: aides to President Vladimir Putin, a top government official, senior lawmakers, Crimean officials, the ousted president of Ukraine, and a Ukrainian politician and businessman allegedly tied to violence against protesters in Kiev. It remains to be seen whether the sanctions will dissuade Russia from annexing Crimea, but an early clue that they will not be effective came just hours later when President Putin signed a decree recognizing Crimea as an independent state, perhaps an early step towards annexation.

UK - The scale of Britain's growing inequality is revealed by a report from a leading charity showing that the country's five richest families now own more wealth than the poorest 20% of the population. Oxfam urged the chancellor George Osborne to use Wednesday's budget to make a fresh assault on tax avoidance and introduce a living wage in a report highlighting how a handful of the super-rich, headed by the Duke of Westminster, have more money and financial assets than 12.6 million Britons put together. Oxfam's director of campaigns and policy, Ben Phillips, said: "Britain is becoming a deeply divided nation, with a wealthy elite who are seeing their incomes spiral up, while millions of families are struggling to make ends meet."