USA - A tweet repeating a false claim about a 90-day pause on tariffs contributed to momentary chaos. Wall Street was braced for chaos when the US markets opened for trading on Monday, but no one could have anticipated the $4 trillion meltdown that ensued. An unsourced claim that Donald Trump was mulling a 90-day pause on the sweeping tariffs he imposed on virtually all of America’s trading partners sent stocks flying upwards before plummeting back down at breakneck speed. In the space of minutes, trillions had been added to and wiped off some of the most sophisticated financial markets in the world.

USA - The United States and Iran have agreed to meet for high-level talks over Tehran’s nuclear programme for the first time in nearly a decade. Donald Trump announced that the US is starting “direct talks” with Iran and confirmed that discussions would begin on Saturday in Oman. This morning, Iran pushed back, saying there would be “indirect talks” through intermediaries, but confirmed that they will be sending a delegation to Muscat. Iran will be represented by Abbas Araghchi, its foreign minister while Steve Witkoff, Mr Trump’s envoy to the Middle East, will head the American delegation. The intermediary will be Badr al-Busaidi, Oman’s foreign minister. Mr Araghchi said: “It is as much an opportunity as it is a test. The ball is in America’s court.”

GERMANY - German poll shocker: Alice Weidel’s Right-Wing AfD Surges to the Top and Is Now Tied with Incoming Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s CDU. After the rather disappointing results in the latest elections in Germany that saw Friedrich Merz and his CDU Globalist ‘conservatives’ as the most-voted party, there are increasing signs that the German people aren’t letting up. After Merz betrayed his voters and sought a coalition with the very same horrible parties (SPD and Greens) that led the failed and unpopular Olaf Scholz government we learned that Poll Shows 73% of German Voters ‘Feel Deceived’ by Incoming Chancellor Merz’s Spending Spree Plans – Right-Wing AFD Party Keeps Rising and It’s Within 4 Points of ‘Conservative’ CDU.

FRANCE - Almost any MEP in Brussels could be prosecuted. Only Eurosceptics like Le Pen are. Technical misuse of European funding is difficult to completely avoid, and outright corruption scandals are frequent. Was Marine Le Pen guilty of improperly funnelling money from the European Parliament into her party’s coffers? Probably. Heaven knows there was a lot of it going on in Brussels. Should she have been disqualified as a presidential candidate in consequence? Absolutely not. Banning popular opposition candidates is what dictators do. We have come to expect such chicanery from Russia, Belarus, Iran, Venezuela. But France? We often talk of elections being “rigged”, but falsifying results is technically very difficult. The favoured tool of autocrats is therefore to ban opponents from standing, often by having them convicted of some infraction or other.

UK - The US no longer seems to be reliable. That’s partly about Trump’s destructive and bizarre personality: nobody, and perhaps not even the president himself, seems to know what he is going to do next. It’s partly about his values. He likes strongmen, so he is naturally drawn to autocrats not democrats, which puts him at odds with a western alliance whose raison d’etre was in part the promotion of democracy. Churchill supposedly said that America could always be counted on to do the right thing once it had exhausted all the other possible options, but I fear it can no longer be counted on at all. That’s why, when we have to choose, we should go with Europe.

UK - Britain this morning became the latest nation forced to take a dose of Donald Trump's economic 'medicine' as the FTSE 100 tanked on opening to its lowest level in a year. Amid massive hits to Asian markets overnight London followed suit this morning in the wake of the US president's decision to levy import taxes on friends and foes alike last week. The FTSE 100 is down 5 per cent in trading today, having seen its worst day since the pandemic on Friday. Manufacturers with high exposure to the US market like Airbus and Rolls-Royce, and banks, were among those worse hit.

USA - President Donald Trump on Friday posted a video on his social media accounts of a US military strike against Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen who have been targeting American ships in the Red Sea. “These Houthis gathered for instructions on an attack. Oops, there will be no attack by these Houthis! They will never sink our ships again!” he posted. Since 2023, the Houthis have shot at United States warships at least 174 times and commercial vessels at least 145 times in the Suez Canal, Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden, according to the White House. After a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas broke down last month, the Houthis threatened to resume striking at ships traversing the Suez Canal, Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden. Trump then ordered the US military to strike the Houthis until they stop firing missiles and drones at American ships. The campaign, called Operation Rough Rider, began on March 15.

USA - Last time renowned attorney Larry Klayman was on USAWatchdog.com, he pointed out there is a full-blown, legal civil war happening in the court system. Klayman, founder of Judicial Watch and now Freedom Watch USA, says there are now more than 140 federal court cases trying to stop or delay President Trump’s agenda. "The Trump Administration did get a win this past week with canceling DEI training for teachers, but legal battles are still mounting. Now, the civil war is turning hot with words, organized paid protests and violence. You saw what they tried with President Trump on two occasions? I don’t think this was random. We still don’t know anything about the assassination attempts. Then there is what they are doing out in the streets right now. They are calling for violence, and they are, in fact, causing violence.” In closing, Klayman says if the violence gets bad enough and the Left starts burning down cities along with Tesla dealerships, President Trump may have to impose harsh measures to regain law and order. Klayman says, “If violence breaks out in a bigger way, Trump can declare martial law."

USA - Our Judeo/Christian civilization is unravelling before our very eyes and if we don't dramatically change course we will be regressing to a pre-enlightenment dark period in world history. Instead of advancing American patriotism and American exceptionalism, the global left here at home and across Western Europe adopted the UN's agenda of transplanting millions of third world migrants from Africa and the Islamic Middle East into first world cities of Western Europe and North America. The result has been a disaster for native Americans and Europeans.

CHINA - China said on Friday it will impose reciprocal 34% tariffs on all imports from the United States from April 10, making good on a promise to strike back after US President Donald Trump escalated a global trade war. On Wednesday, Trump unveiled an additional 34% tariffs on all Chinese goods imported into the US, in a move poised to cause a major reset of relations and worsen trade tension between the world’s two largest economies. “This practice of the US is not in line with international trade rules, seriously undermines China’s legitimate rights and interests, and is a typical unilateral bullying practice,” China’s State Council Tariff Commission said in a statement announcing its retaliatory tariffs.

USA - Even if Trump’s trade wars avoid tipping the US and world economies into recession, they look set to fail on multiple fronts. Already, China has responded with equally brutal retaliatory measures. Always a stickler for the legalities, the EU will take time to act, but act it eventually will. Who’s to say what comes next? If, for instance, Europe retaliates by targeting the digital economy, where the US currently enjoys a considerable trade surplus, Mr Trump might respond with increased US protections around financial services and other service based industries so far unaffected by the blizzard of new tariffs.

UK - The world as we knew it has gone. Nobody wins from a trade war. First it was defence and national security. Now it is the global economy and trade. Old assumptions can no longer be taken for granted. The world as we knew it has gone. We must rise to meet the moment. We are ready for what comes next. The new world is less governed by established rules and more by deals and alliances. It demands the best of British virtues – cool heads, pragmatism and a clear understanding of our national interest.

UK - Security experts have urged Brits to keep a three-day survival kit on hand in case Putin targets crucial infrastructure. The UK's increasing reliance on imported gas could make it particularly vulnerable to Russian gas pipeline sabotage, security experts have warned. Advisors have urged Brits to follow the example of EU leaders who have told citizens to pack three-day survival kits in case of blackouts from Russian sabotage of underwater pipes transporting gas to the UK. Around 40% of the country's gas supply comes from Norway, including through the 700-mile Langeled pipeline. The North Sea infrastructure helped Britain to keep the lights on over the winter after the Government's drive towards Net Zero saw the UK's last coal-fired power station close in September.

GERMANY - Berlin’s rearmament drive could see automotive assembly lines retooled to roll out tanks. Ferdinand Porsche became widely known as the brilliant engineer behind the bestselling Volkswagen Beetle and some of Porsche’s first sports cars. But like his creations, the German industrialist had a dark side that is impossible to separate from his technical achievements.

MIDDLE EAST - Hamas has removed more than 3,400 previously reported deaths from its official casualty figures, including 1,080 alleged child fatalities, according to new research that asserts the numbers were knowingly falsified. On Tuesday, The Telegraph reported that a March update from the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health drastically revised down its earlier tallies of war dead. According to Honest Reporting’s Salo Aizenberg, the updated fatality list dropped thousands of names that had been publicly listed in PDFs released in August and October of 2024. “These ‘deaths’ never happened,” he stated. “The numbers were falsified – again.”