GERMANY - The 2019 Munich Security Conference marks an apogee in transatlantic relations. The strategic alliance between Europe and the US, long understood as the West, is failing as a political factor. The standing ovations for the Chancellor in Munich came from the relief of hearing it said out in the open. Also from the clarity with which she rejected the new American unilateralism – in method, as well as in the real world. Whether trade war, Iran agreement, or energy policy, at none of these points did she omit the contradiction to the ultimate demands from the Trump administration.

GERMANY - A study has shown that Germany stands to lose the greatest number of jobs if Britain exits the EU without a deal. Some of the country's well-known auto and tech hubs are likely to be the worst hit. A hard Brexit could affect more than 100,000 jobs in Germany, the Welt am Sonntag newspaper reported on Sunday, citing a study by the Leibniz Institute for Economic Research Halle (IWH) and the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg. The study, which looks at the effect of a hard Brexit down to individual districts and cities, showed that some of Germany's well-known auto and technology hubs could face the maximum brunt. "In no other country is the effect on total employment as great as in Germany," Oliver Holtemöller, one of the authors of the study, told the newspaper.

USA - The number of states where liberals outnumber conservatives has dropped more than 30 percent, with just six now in that category: Massachusetts, Hawaii, Vermont, Washington, New York, and New Hampshire. According to the latest Gallup survey, in every other state but California, where conservatives and liberals split 29 percent to 29 percent, conservatives lead. Nationally, those who identify themselves conservative hold a nine-point lead. Before conservatives start to cheer, Gallup said the gap used to be 21 points and a handful of the state numbers fall in the margin of error. But the survey still shows a large swath of red and pink states bookended by the whole West Coast, New England, and the mid-Atlantic, including the Washington, DC area.

VATICAN - Pope Francis said Friday that the Church does not want “ecclesiastical feminism” since every form of feminism ends up being just “machismo in a skirt.” The pope’s off-the-cuff remarks came in response to an address by Dr Linda Ghisoni, the undersecretary of the laity section of the Vatican’s Department of Laity, Family, and Life. Dr Ghisoni delivered her remarks to the participants in a major Vatican summit on clerical sex abuse. “Listening to Dr Ghisoni, I heard the church talk about herself,” the pope said. “That is, we all spoke about the church, in all interventions. But this time it was the church herself that spoke.” “It is not just a matter of style,” Francis continued, “the feminine genius is reflected in the church that is a woman. Inviting a woman to speak is not shifting into the mode of an ecclesiastical feminism, because in the end every feminism ends up being machismo with a skirt.”

VATICAN - Pope Francis on Sunday compared the sexual abuse of children to human sacrifice as he addressed the Catholic Church's top bishops at the end of a landmark summit to tackle paedophilia. "Our work has made us realise once again that the gravity of the scourge of the sexual abuse of minors is, and historically has been, a widespread phenomenon in all cultures and societies," he said.

USA - China’s first emperor ordered his subjects to search for the elixir of life in a quest for immortality. In 16th century France, nobles would drink gold in a bid to extend their lifespans. Gilgamesh, the Sumerian king at the heart of humanity’s earliest epic poem, found a magic herb, but a snake ate it. In 2015, a woman on the MTV series True Life: I’m Obsessed With Staying Young bathed in pig blood.

UK - Plastic poses a health risk to humans "at every stage of its lifecycle," a shocking international report warned yesterday. It linked plastic to diseases such as cancer and kidney, heart and reproductive problems. It declared: "Uncertainties and knowledge gaps undermine a complete evaluation of health impacts, limit the ability of consumers, communities and regulators to make informed choices, and heighten both acute and long-term health risks at all stages of the plastic lifecycle." It cited particular concerns about "the health effects of the cumulative exposure to the mixtures of thousands of chemicals used in food packaging and other manufactured products". The report by groups including the US Center for International Environmental Law and Britain's Exeter University comes amid growing concerns about the impact of plastic pollution.

GERMANY - German Chancellor Angela Merkel has turned the corner on relations with the United States. Her speech at the Munich Security Conference should be considered Germany’s divorce filing from the US-led post-WWII institutional order.

GERMANY - Donald Trump, Mike Pence and John Bolton – best known for their “erratic and aggressive” traits – are a “toxic mixture” that leaves Europe less secure, a reputable German MP has warned. Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government hoped that it could quietly wait for the Trump administration to end, but that was “a bitter illusion,” Jurgen Trittin, formerly minister for the environment and now a prominent Green Party MP, argued in an op-ed for Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper. The sitting US administration combines the erratic destructiveness of Donald Trump with the neoconservative aggression of [Mike] Pence and [John] Bolton.

GERMANY - German Chancellor Angela Merkel's Cabinet has decided to extend the military mission in Afghanistan a day after an internal strategy paper showed Germany had offered to host another peace conference, this time with an extra invitation for the Taliban, the fundamentalist Islamic movement currently at war with NATO in the country. The Taliban took part in framework talks with US Special Representative Zalmay Khalilzad in Doha, Qatar, last month, while further talks, without the US, were held in Moscow.

PAKISTAN - Pakistan will respond to any attack by India with "full force", the army said on Friday amid heightened tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors, as Islamabad said it took over the base of a militant group that claimed a deadly bombing in Kashmir. Army spokesman Major General Asif Ghafoor was speaking a week after a Pakistani-based militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed claimed responsibility for a suicide car bomb attack that killed 40 Indian paramilitary policemen in the Himalayan region disputed between India and Pakistan.

PAKISTAN - Pakistan said it will respond if India launches a military strike, a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration announced plans to divert water from its neighbor as tensions between the nuclear-armed countries remained high following a deadly terrorist attack in Kashmir. On Friday, Pakistan’s army spokesman said that the country did not want a war with India but warned that Islamabad would retaliate and “dominate the escalation ladder” if New Delhi authorized any military strikes. Still, the scope for escalation is limited. Any military strike risks a miscalculation that could trigger a devastating conflict in one of the world’s most populous areas as both the South Asian nations have nuclear weapons. India - as well as the US - blames Pakistan for harboring terrorists seeking to destabilize its neighbors, claims Islamabad denies.

USA - Lockheed Martin offered India on Wednesday a new multi-role fighter jet, the F-21, in an attempt to secure a large defense order worth $15 billion, reported Reuters. The American defense company said the new plane will be specifically designed and manufactured for the Indian Air Force (IAF), and provide "Made In India" economic opportunities that strengthen India’s path to becoming a military powerhouse in the Indo-Pacific region.

EGYPT - A Biblical swarm of locusts has plagued Egypt, the United Nations (UN) has warned, with two generations currently breeding due to abnormally wet weather conditions which have devastated crops around the coast of the Red Sea. Long periods of rain around Eritrea and Sudan have lead to a substantial increase in locusts, which have now become a huge swarm threatening crops in both Egypt and Saudi Arabia, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. One swarm crossed the border to Saudi Arabia last month, with further swarms following suit a week later. The swarms are the result of two cyclones of bad weather in 2018, which triggered a locust epidemic in the Empty Quarter region of Saudi Arabia, near the Yemen-Oman border. Another swarm has descended on southern Iran after travelling from Egypt, with the UN warning of a risk the locusts could spread towards the India-Pakistan border.

VATICAN - Pope Francis has proposed a list of 21 initiatives he believes will stall the erosion of trust in the Catholic Church which has been plagued by numerous sexual abuse scandals and accusations of trying to sweep them under the rug. Trying to apply maximum pressure to convince the clergy to confront the issue, the Pope opened a landmark summit on ‘The Protection of Minors in the Church’ by presenting a “practical handbook” which should serve as “a simple starting point” for the Vatican to overcome its sexual abuse crisis.