EUROPE - Nigel Farage has led his fellow UKIP MEPs in a protest against the European Parliament at the opening of its new session in Strasbourg. The UKIP MEPs turned their backs as an orchestra played Beethoven's Ode to Joy, the EU's unofficial anthem. Most of the party's 24 MEPs - the biggest delegation to the Parliament from the UK - are believed to have taken part in the protest. "Don't recognise flag nor anthem," tweeted one newly-elected UKIP member. UKIP deputy leader Paul Nuttall MEP said: "We don't recognise or respect the EU flag or anthem. They are both symbols of our servitude inside a political union which the British people reject. Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan said members of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), which includes David Cameron's party, "sat quietly" during the anthem, while most MEPs stood. "When the UK leaves the EU, I'll happily stand for Ode to Joy as a mark of respect to the anthem of a friendly neighbouring state," he tweeted.

USA - The United States could soon become a large-scale Spain or Greece, teetering on the edge of financial ruin. That’s according to Donald Trump, who painted a very ugly picture of where this country is headed. Trump made the comments during a recent appearance on Fox News’ “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren.” According to Trump, the United States is no longer a rich country. “When you’re not rich, you have to go out and borrow money. We’re borrowing from the Chinese and others. We’re up to $16 trillion in debt.” He goes on to point out that the downgrade of US debt is inevitable.

USA - The US Supreme Court has ruled a Christian-owned company can claim a religious exemption to a law requiring employers to pay for their workers' contraception. The owners of craft chain Hobby Lobby and others argued the mandate in President Barack Obama's healthcare law violated their religious beliefs. This is arguably the biggest victory for opponents of the Affordable Care act since it was signed into law four years ago, and could open the door to challenges on other aspects of the legislation. Hobby Lobby's backers see it as a straightforward case of the oppressive hand of government forcing religious-minded people to do something to which they morally object.

JAPAN - Japan’s conservative government is making the most significant change in interpretation to its pacifist Constitution since the US-written charter went into effect 67 years ago. That is generating a mixed reaction at home and abroad, especially in the countries that suffered from brutal Japanese colonialism in the first half of the 20th century. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is defending his controversial push to reinterpret the war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution. Under the new rules approved by the Cabinet Tuesday, Japan's military would be allowed to exercise the right to "collective self-defense."

USA - In the meadow, four white-haired Shorthorn heifers peel off from the others, raising their heads at the same time in the same direction. Unsettling, when you know they are clones. From their ears dangle yellow tags marked with the same number: 434P. Only the numbers that follow are different: 2, 3, 4 and 6. The tag also bears the name of the company that bred them and is holding them temporarily in a field at its headquarters in Sioux Center, Iowa: Trans Ova Genetics, the only large US Company selling cloned cows.

USA - As negotiations continue for a new contract agreement covering 13,600 dockworkers at 30 ports stretching from San Diego, California, to Bellingham, Washington, a new study shows the US economy could lose as much as $2.5 billion a day if a prolonged West Coast port shutdown occurs. The study, conducted for the National Association of Manufacturers and the National Retail Federation by economists at the Inter-industry Forecasting Project at the University of Maryland, found that the economic repercussions of a port closure would grow with time. “A protracted dispute between the negotiating parties could lead to reduced or shuttered terminal operations for an extended period,” the joint study warned. “If such disruptions occur, the economic impact would be significant and widespread.”

ISRAEL - Israel has vowed retribution against Hamas, the militant Palestinian group it accuses of the kidnap and murder of three teenagers. The bodies of Naftali Frenkel, Gilad Shaar and Eyal Yifrach were found on Monday evening, after they had been missing for more than a fortnight. Israel PM Benyamin Netanyahu said: "Hamas is responsible and Hamas will pay." Hamas denies any involvement.

ISRAEL - The tragic end to the kidnapping of the three Israeli teenagers should also spell the end for Hamas, Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon (Likud Beytenu) said Monday evening. “The nation is strong and ready to absorb in order to allow an operation that will deal a fatal blow to Hamas,” he added. “We must stop terror and we should destroy the homes of Hamas activists, destroy their ammunition depots and stop any money that is used directly and indirectly to maintaining the flame of terrorism. We must discourage any organization that will even think about kidnapping an Israeli citizen or about threatening Israel.”

ISRAEL - The Palestinian Authority (PA) in Ramallah is reportedly anticipating a large scale Israeli military assault in the wake of the murder of three yeshiva boys, with PA head Mahmoud Abbas attempting to forestall such a move. According to Sky News in Arabic, Abbas has been conducting “feverish” communications with the United States and other countries, to pressure Israel not to launch a large scale operation. He has reportedly transmitted a message of this nature to Israel through the Americans. Abbas spoke to several world leaders Monday night, hours after the bodies of the three kidnapped Israeli teenagers were found, and asked them for help in reining in an Israeli response. A campaign against Hamas would in any case be a continuation of Operation Brother's Keeper, which has been targeting Hamas infrastructures in Judea and Samaria over the last fortnight.

ISRAEL - Israeli foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman is threatening a menacing ultimatum - continued airstrikes or full occupation - an Israeli military-owned radio station quoted him as saying on Sunday. The comments came hours after the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) launched an airstrike on the Gaza strip in retaliation for what they said were projectiles fired from the Palestinian territory into the Negev desert. “Either with each round we attack terror infrastructure and they shoot, or we go to full occupation,” Lieberman said on the IDF-operated Army Radio, or Galei Tzaha.

MIDDLE EAST - A video purportedly shot by Islamist militants at a captured Iraqi border post on the Syrian border shows captured Iraqi soldiers and vehicles, while an English-speaking fighter reaffirms the declaration of an Islamic "caliphate." The fighter, Abu Safiyya from Chile, claims to be standing on the Iraq border with Syria. In the clip, titled The End of Sykes-Picot, Safiyya says that the ISIS will eventually break all of the Middle East borders to make way to Jerusalem. "This is not the first border we will break," he says of the border he is standing on. "God will break all barriers... Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon... all of them until we reach Jerusalem. This is the first of many barriers we will break."

MIDDLE EAST - The Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), the terror army supported by Saudi Arabia, the CIA and trained by the Pentagon, has declared a caliphate in the Middle East. It has changed its name to the Islamic State, dispensing with Iraq, Sham and the Levant. The announcement was made on the first day of Ramadan, the Muslim holy day. An ISIS spokesman said Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is the leader of the declared caliphate reaching from Syria into Iraq. The spokesman, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, said all Muslims worldwide will be required to pay allegiance to al-Baghdadi. “The legality of all emirates, groups, states and organizations becomes null by the expansion of the caliph’s authority and the arrival of its troops to their areas,” explained al-Adnani. “Listen to your caliph and obey him. Support your state, which grows every day.”

RUSSIA - The industrial control systems of hundreds of European and US energy companies have been infected by a sophisticated cyber weapon operated by a state-backed group with apparent ties to Russia, according to a leading US online security group. The powerful piece of malware known as “Energetic Bear” allows its operators to monitor energy consumption in real time, or to cripple physical systems such as wind turbines, gas pipelines and power plants at will. The well-resourced organisation behind the cyber attack is believed to have compromised the computer systems of more than 1,000 organisations in 84 countries in a campaign spanning 18 months. The malware is similar to the Stuxnet computer programme created by the US and Israel that succeeded in infecting and sabotaging Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities two years ago. The latest attacks are a new deployment of malware that was first monitored by IT security companies at the beginning of the year.

UK - UK stock markets are approaching “coffin corner”, where even the slightest miscalculation could lead to a sharp correction or even a crash. “Coffin corner” is the point at which a passenger jet is flying at maximum altitude with engines at full throttle. This is when even the smallest mistake can lead to disaster, and it has startling relevance for today’s stock markets.

USA - The color guard leading the annual Gay Pride March down Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on Sunday carried flags of sky blue, navy blue, red-white-and-blue and rainbow. But, for these marchers, the colors that mattered most were the ones they wore. Khaki shirts, olive pants and rainbow neckerchiefs: the Boy Scout uniform, pride-style — a uniform that had never been seen on a group of marchers in New York City’s pride parade before. They had come to mark progress — the Boy Scouts of America’s breakthrough vote last year to end a decades-old policy of prohibiting openly gay youths from being scouts — and to call for more. However, the organization, a touchstone of traditional America, still bars openly gay adults from participating as troop leaders or volunteers. Ending that ban has become a signature cause for the gay-rights movement.