AFGHANISTAN - Taliban fighters have entered Kabul and are seeking a 'peaceful transfer of power' with gunfire heard near the presidential palace as the extremists seized huge swathes of the country in the wake of the US military departure. The militants were seen in the districts of Kalakan, Qarabagh and Paghman hours after taking control of Jalalabad, the most recent major Afghan city to fall to the insurgents as they make huge gains across Afghanistan. The US evacuated diplomats from its embassy by helicopter as a Taliban spokesman said they were looking for a 'peaceful surrender' of the capital after meeting little resistance, while the British ambassador moved to a safe place to prepare for an evacuation. A US defense official has warned it could be only a matter of days before the insurgent fighters take control of Kabul. Just last week, US intelligence estimates expected the city to be able to hold out for at least three months.

USA - Lawmakers in Texas have blocked a Chinese billionaire’s push to build a 15,000-acre wind farm on a large swath of land he purchased after news of his plans drew the attention of a conservancy group. It warned first about the environmental impact and then noted Sun Guangxin’s ties to the Chinese Communist Party and how the project could give him access to the state’s electricity grid. And the 140,000 acres that Sun snapped up in recent years is near Laughlin Air Force Base raising national security concerns. Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed the Lone Star Infrastructure Protection Act into law in June. “As far as I know this is the first law of its kind by any state in the United States of America,” Abbott said of the bill designed to prevent “hostile nations” from accessing Texas’ electricity grid and other “critical infrastructure,” such as computer networks and waste treatment systems.

RUSSIA - President Vladimir Putin on Saturday said the scale of natural disasters that have hit Russia this year is "absolutely unprecedented" as local officials ask for Moscow's help to tackle fires and floods. The Russian leader called on authorities to do everything possible to help Siberians affected by the region's gigantic wildfires, as well as Russians living in the flood-hit south of the country. Speaking at a video conference with the leaders of the affected eastern and southern regions, Putin said he received daily reports on the climate situation in the country. "In the south (of Russia), the monthly norm of rainfall now falls in a few hours and in the Far East on the contrary, forest fires in drought conditions are spreading rapidly," Putin said. In Russia's largest and coldest region of Yakutia, this summer's forest fires have already burned through an area larger than Portugal. Aysen Nikolayev, the head of Yakutia, said firefighters were able to save 230 houses from flames. He called the scale of the fires a first "in history" and asked for help after the region's harvest was severely affected.

USA - As a measure of both the nation’s creaking infrastructure and the severity of the drought gripping California there is the $5 shower. That’s how much Ian Roth, the owner of the Seagull Inn, a bed-and-breakfast in this tourist town three hours north of San Francisco, spends on water every time a guest washes for five minutes under the shower nozzle. Water is so scarce in Mendocino, an Instagram-ready collection of pastel Victorian homes on the edge of the Pacific, that restaurants have closed their restrooms to guests, pointing them instead to portable toilets on the sidewalk. “We’ve grown up in this first-world country thinking that water is a given,” said Julian Lopez, the owner at Café Beaujolais, a restaurant packed with out-of-town diners in what is the height of the tourist season. “There’s that fear in the back of all our minds there is going to be a time when we don’t have water at all. And only the people with money would be able to afford the right to it.”

SCOTLAND - The Scottish government has kicked off a storm on social media after issuing “deeply disturbing” LGBT inclusivity guidelines that allow children as young as four to change their gender and name at school without parental consent. In the 70-page document, issued to schools across the country on Thursday, teachers are instructed not to question students who declare that they are transgender or tell them “it’s just a phase”. Instead, they are urged to “be affirming” of the students’ feelings. Other “tips” for teachers include asking these students “what name and pronoun” they would prefer to be addressed by and to check if that is “all the time or in certain circumstances”. As well, teachers are encouraged to “ask reflective questions that allow young people to express themselves, explore their gender identity and identify their needs”. However, the majority of social media users claimed the guidelines did just that, with several people noting this was an example of “utter woke insanity”. Politician and RT host George Galloway, who is a former UK minister of parliament, denounced the policy as “sick” with many commenting in agreement. Others said it amounted to “child abuse”.

UK - Just one in five (21.1 per cent) of traditional, opposite-sex marriages in 2018 were religious ceremonies, the lowest on record, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). While the Church of England, the seat of the worldwide Anglican communion, forbids people legally of the same sex to marry, the Methodist Church of Great Britain announced last month that “marriage can be between any two people”. The Methodist Church, which ordained its first transgender vicar in 2017, stated in a resolution which was passed by 254 to 46 against that it “consents in principle to the marriage of same-sex couples on Methodist premises… by Methodist ministers”. Plans for the two English churches to reunite could be put at risk by the Methodists’ seismic shift to embrace non-Biblical unions; however, the Church of England itself appears confused over the relationship to gender and marriage.

HAITI - Haiti is facing the threat of a tropical storm bringing heavy rains and strong winds just days after a devastating 7.2-magnitude earthquake hit the country on Saturday, killing more than 700 people. There are fears that Tropical Storm Grace, which is projected to hit the island between Monday and Tuesday, could hamper rescue efforts. The quake comes over a decade after a disastrous 7.0-magnitude shock in 2010 that struck closer to the country’s capital of Port-au-Prince, killing an estimated 220,000 people.

The US Ambassador to Afghanistan and some of his staff were seen fleeing their Kabul workplace with the stars and stripes flag Sunday, as the Pentagon increased the number of troops deployed in the region by 1,000 to 6,000.

AFGHANISTAN - US mulls EVACUATING Kabul embassy as Taliban advances! According to sources, there are internal discussions underway at the State Department about evacuating the US embassy in Kabul, with one saying as early as the end of the month. After a 20 year war and over 2 trillion dollars spent, America is retreating from Afghanistan, a third world country, also known as the graveyard of empires. How humiliating! Without US troops, there’s no way for the so-called Afghan government to hold Kabul, as the overwhelming majority of the population of Afghanistan supports the Taliban, something that Americans are still not aware of. The Pentagon spent $88 billion dollars training the Afghan Army for 20 years. It collapsed in 1 month.

AFGHANISTAN - The Allies' reckless withdrawal has plunged Afghanistan back into darkness and allowed the Taliban – that horrifying group which brutalised the Afghan population and provided safe haven to Osama bin Laden – to take most of the country in just a few days. It's a terrible irony that by the 20th anniversary of 9/11 in a few weeks, the whole country may be ruled by the Taliban again.

UK - Britain is in a state of shock after its first mass shooting since 2010. Jake Davison gunned down five people, including his mother and a three-year-old girl, in the killing spree in Plymouth on Thursday evening. He took the lives of Maxine Davison, 51, Sophie Martyn, three, Lee Martyn, 43, Stephen Washington, 59, and Kate Shepherd, 66. The attack lasted around six minutes before Mr Davison turned the gun on himself, police said. In videos posted online prior to his death, Mr Davison described his life as “just me against the world". He also shared hate-filled views on Reddit forums used by “incels”, part of an online community and wider ideology which is growing in size.

UK - An incel is a man who expresses online hostility and resentment towards those who are sexually active, particularly women. It is an abbreviation used in online communities for ‘involuntary celibate’ - someone who is unable to find romantic or sexual partners despite wanting them. Online forums, hosted on websites such as Reddit, play host to discussions of resentment, misogyny, and racism, in particular towards women, especially those they perceive in a sexual way. Tim Wilson, director of Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St Andrews, said an incel is the idea sexual fulfilment is a human right and a “man not getting it is being actively repressed by women". “The basic idea, I’m afraid, is the idea that sexual fulfilment is a human right and that, as a man not getting it, you’re somehow being actively deprived and repressed by women.” Davison’s posts were filled with hatred for his mother, whom he described as “my vile dysfunctional chaotic mother”. He also ranted in general against the concept of single mothers.

USA - Joe Biden has been facing criticism after shelving his opposition to Germany striking a new energy deal with Russia, a move former Energy Secretary Rick Perry said would allow Moscow to "hold the European Union hostage." Despite initial opposition to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline ahead of his inauguration, US President Joe Biden U-turned on his stance effectively backing the project that will link the European Union to Russia. Supporters of the pipeline have insisted the connection will ensure the security of gas supplies to member states but detractors warned about the potential influence Moscow could exercise upon the bloc. Former US Energy Secretary Rick Perry raged at President Biden for his decision, telling Fox News his support effectively green-lighted Russia holding the European Union "hostage." Mr Perry said: "It is stunning to see how fast we went from energy independence to now being reliant on countries like Iran to get our energy."

CHINA - China is building a third missile field that will hold more than 100 new DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missiles, The Washington Times has learned. Construction of a silo array for DF-41s was identified from satellite imagery by US intelligence agencies in the past several weeks and appears equal in size to two other new Chinese missile fields recently identified, according to Pentagon officials familiar with intelligence reports on the strategic development. Admiral Charles Richard, commander of the US Strategic Command, said Thursday that the first two missile fields being built are part of China‘s “explosive” expansion of nuclear forces. “We are witnessing a strategic breakout by China,” Admiral Richard told a missile defense conference in Alabama. “The explosive growth in their nuclear and conventional forces can only be what I described as breathtaking,” he said, adding that “frankly, that word ‘breathtaking’ may not be enough.”

JAPAN - Japan's meteorological service has put three prefectures and the city of Hiroshima on the highest possible emergency alert, which means it’s too late to evacuate elsewhere, as torrential rains cause flooding and mudslides. The highest-possible Level 5 “special” weather warning was issued for Saga, Nagasaki and Fukuoka prefectures in the country's southwest on Saturday, as rains continue to batter parts of Japan. Earlier, the same warning was issued for the city of Hiroshima after several rivers running through the region were deemed at high risk of overflowing. In its advisory on Saturday, the Japan Meteorological Agency said that “there is a high possibility that some kind of disaster has already occured” in the areas that are especially prone to mudslides and flooding. “It's been raining heavily like never before,” the agency noted.