The twitterati are out in force making light of the president's struggle with an umbrella against a powerful gust of wind after his arrival at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland Saturday night after a rally in Michigan. with his umbrella almost immediately flipping inside out, before walking down the steps and handing the ruined umbrella over to an aide. Social media users, particularly Trump's opponents, immediately began to make jokes about the blooper, one user quipping that perhaps the umbrella 'roasted' the president after he skipped the White House Correspondents Dinner. Others suggested there was a broader symbolism at play here. Others still suggested that comedian Michelle Wolf's White House Correspondents Dinner remarks, which included criticism of the media elite, were perfectly illustrated by the fact that that same media reported on Trump's umbrella troubles. Some users joked about the alleged collusion between Trump and Russia, quipping that he had turned the umbrella into a satellite dish to catch a KGB broadcast. Finally, others still offered topical jokes, from pop culture references to Trump's ostentatious speaking style.

The fan of Denizlispor, a second-tier football club from southwestern Turkey, was forced to find a workaround after getting slapped with a one-year ban from the team's stadium. Figuring that he wasn't allowed to watch the game from Ataturk Stadium, the fan decided to rent a crane instead, allowing him to watch the game from technically outside the stadium. The fan brought along a giant flag sporting Denizlispor's green and black colors, along with a scarf bearing the same colors, just to get his point across. However, his revelry didn't last long, and police forced him to come down from his perch. It's not clear if the fan's zeal helped his team or not, but Denizlispor did end up beating its Gaziantepspor rival five-zip during the Saturday match. Finding out about his action, other football fans praised the man, suggesting his ban should be lifted and that he should be given a medal.

The head of Lunel, a southern French town, which has become a symbol of the jihadist fervor reportedly raging in parts of France, has called on the government to suppress the "radicalized Muslim community" from blossoming in his town. France Bleu newspaper, which was first to obtain Mayor Claude Arnaud’s letter, cited him as saying: "I solemnly appeal to the state to prevent fundamentalist Islamic movements from flourishing freely in Lunel." He went on to say that the town has fallen victim to the effects of radical Islam, which he calls "the gateway" to Islamic terrorism. READ MORE: Refugees Illegally Sell Their European IDs Online — Reports Lunel, a town of 26,000 people outside the coastal Mediterranean city of Montpellier, has been continuously referred to in the media as the "Jihadi capital," after a group of five nationals, believed to have been sent to Syria to fight for the Nusra Front*, went on trial over terrorist conspiracy accusations. Among the 20 jihadists believed to have been supplied to Syria in 2013 and 2014, eight have reportedly been killed and another seven are missing in the war-stricken country. READ MORE: Twitter Ablaze After Most of French Museum Collection Found to Be Fake The mayor said that Lunel had grabbed the media spotlight in the wake of the notorious court proceeding and billing it "a true media massacre." Some media reports likened the "jihad town" on French soil to Molenbeek right outside Brussels, where several gunmen and suicide bombers behind the November 2015 Paris attacks and 2016 transport attacks in Belgium originated from. This is not the first public move performed by the mayor to curb the jihad connotations connected with the town. For instance, in late March, the mayor suggested that extremists who served their prison term be refused the right to come back to the town. The text of the initiative was subsequently sent to the authorities of the Hérault department, which Lunel is part of. Most recently, during a two-day conference on battling terrorism financing, Paris authorities announced they have identified over 410 donors supporting Daesh, France 24 reported. Over 200 people have been killed in a chain of terrorist attacks in France since January 2015. The deadliest coordinated attack hit France in November 2015, with gunmen and suicide bombers targeting several Parisian locations and the Stade de France stadium in the suburb of Saint-Denis. The death toll then climbed to 130, with some 368 people sustaining injuries. Less than a year later, on July 14, 2016, in Nice, a 19-ton cargo truck rammed into a crowd of people who were celebrating Bastille Day on the wide Promenade des Anglais in Nice, leaving 86 people dead and 434 injured. *Daesh (also known as ISIS/ISIL/IS) is a terrorist group banned in Russia.

The eighth test launch of a rocket manufactured by US private space company Blue Origin has proved successful, as both the booster and capsule have landed safely on a site in Texas. Blue Origin has launched its third New Shepard rocket despite postponing it twice earlier in the day. Blue Origin announced that the rocket would once again have aboard a crash dummy, namely Mannequin Skywalker, which is tasked with gathering data and conducting research. The payload was earlier reported to include a sensor suite, namely the Schmitt Space Communicator, to analyze the pressure noise, and environmental data in the capsule, while providing WiFi to commercial space travelers, as well as facilitate a slew of scientific experiments. In an ambitious project, the New Shepherd rocket is designed to eventually bring passengers into space, taking them on an 11-minute flight in a capsule that will land back on Earth with the help of parachutes. The booster, which was used in previous test flights, descends with a powered landing.

Agroterrorism: that was the word used by a representative of the Brazilian Intelligence Agency (ABIN), Danilo Coelho, speaking to the Chamber of Deputies of Brazil. He had cautioned that Brazil should be better prepared for potential acts of sabotage in agriculture and for what he has called “agroterrorism.” According to Danilo Coelho, Brazil doesn't have a list of chemical and biological agents (or biochemical agents as they are often referred to by some analysts) that should be under state control, as they are in other countries. In his interview with Sputnik, intelligence and security expert Ricardo Gennari noted that terrorism in this industry is something serious that could literally blow up the country: "Certain ABIN's concerns expressed in the Chamber of Deputies are not new. Brazil has been already trying to protect itself from bio-piracy for a long time. In 2011 the Institutional Security Cabinet (which governs ABIN) published the National Intelligence Strategy which covered espionage and sabotage issues in the country. So, what is now called "agroterrorism" is nothing new both in Brazil and anywhere in the world, because very serious interests of businesses and countries are involved in this issue." Gennari also analyzed the negative impact of agroterrorism on the food security of Brazil: "We are going to analyze recent cases of foot-and-mouth disease in the country, which are suspected to be deliberately instigated. The cases were documented in 2016 and had a severe impact on all the stockbreeders: small, medium and large. They had stopped selling meat for the domestic market and suffered too much from restrictions imposed by the countries importing meat from Brazil. We know that Brazil is among the world's largest, if not the largest, meat exporters. Thus, we can calculate the damage cost and assess the impact of these actions, probably caused by sabotage, on the country's economy and domestic consumption." The government took the problem very seriously and in 2017 announced that the foot-and-mouth disease had been completely eradicated in Brazil. At a public hearing in the Chamber of Deputies, the deputy head of the disarmament and secret technologies department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Cecília Vieira, noted that Brazil had signed several international conventions banning the stockpiling and use of chemical and biological weapons. She referred in particular to the Biological Weapons Convention, ratified by Brazil in 1976, and the Chemical Weapons Convention, approved by the government in 1999. Maria Cecília Vieira recalled that "Brazil strongly condemns the use of chemical weapons and weapons of mass destruction." According to Gennari, these are extremely serious matters and the government should ensure stricter and more effective control over prohibited agents: "The problem in Brazil is to make these chemical and biological agents inaccessible to the public. Brazil has set up some rules for the usage of these materials. And what about their utilization? Is the use and the utilization of these agents controlled enough? Is there necessary austerity in this control? These are questions that the government has not yet given satisfactory and encouraging answers to." READ MORE: World's Top Breadbasket: Russia Becoming Leading Wheat Exporter Beating EU, US Sputnik's interlocutor thinks Brazil has only one possibility to adequately care for the security and prevent terrorist acts both in rural areas and in cities: "All government authorities should act in a comprehensive way to prevent actions which threaten the security of the country, people and the national economy in terms of protection against terrorism in the agro-industry. The impact of those actions is terrible, and it is therefore particularly important for the government to understand the need to be vigilant to prevent such actions." The views of the speaker do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.

Grit and determination can sometimes pull you through, as evidenced by the unprecedented hiring of the first one-handed US-style NFL football player. Shaquem Griffin is the first one-handed player to be selected by a US National Football League (NFL) team, after recently being drafted by the Seattle Seahawks. The athlete's left hand was amputated when he was four due to a congenital defect called amniotic band syndrome, a condition that prevented his fingers from developing fully. He didn't let that stop him from playing football throughout his college years at the University of Central Florida. Griffin gained nationwide recognition at an NFL showcase in March after he ran the fastest 40-yard dash for any linebacker since 2003. The 22-year-old old will join twin brother Shaquill, as a Seattle Seahawks linebacker. "I want to show the entire world, no matter [if you have] one hand, two hands, if you're a ball player, you just play ball," Griffin said before the 2018 NFL draft, cited by BBC. After Griffin was chosen by the Seahawks in the fifth round of the NFL draft on Saturday, he told ESPN, "I couldn't breathe. I didn't know what to say. I was trying to get the words out, but I couldn't talk." "I don't think I cried on my draft day," said brother Shaquill, who was drafted by the Seahawks in the third round last year. "I couldn't hold it. I just couldn't hold it. I'm excited, and I'm glad we made that choice and we're bringing my brother back home." Seahawks coach Pete Carroll was enthusiastic about the hire. "They [the brothers] own this extraordinary connection that I think also is a demonstration of love and heart and all of the cool things about what they represent," he said, cited by ESPN. Shaquem "overcame a tremendous amount by just believing in himself, and I think the belief of his brother in him, as well, which is obvious, was also part of all of that. It's a great story," Carroll added.

BEIRUT(Sputnik) - The Syrian authorities agreed with militants on their withdrawal from Yarmouk camp located to the south of Damascus to Idlib, while some 5,000 civilians will be evacuated from the towns of Kefraya and Fua, local media reported Sunday. The deal’s implementation will start on Monday and is expected to finish before May 15, according to the Syrian state news agency SANA. The first stage of the agreement stipulates 1,500 people leaving Fua and Kefraya.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - US President Donald Trump intends to seek complete elimination of the North Korean nuclear and ballistic missile arsenal before making concessions to Pyongyang in lifting economic sanctions from the country, US National Security Adviser John Bolton told Fox News on Sunday. When asked whether Trump would make concessions to Kim only after North Korea completely destroys its missile and nuclear potential, Bolton answered positively. "Yes, I think that's what denuclearization means. We have very much in mind the Libya model [of complete elimination of weapons in question] from 2003, 2004 [when the country joined the UN convention on eliminating chemical weapons]… The Libyan program was much smaller, but that was basically the agreement that we made," he said as quoted by Fox News. Bolton also confirmed that the United States would start lifting economic sanctions from North Korea only after full denuclearization. Last week, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said that his country would stop nuclear tests and launches of intercontinental ballistic missiles as well as shut down a nuclear test site. Trump has welcomed the announcement calling it a "big progress." On Friday, Trump said that he would hold a meeting with the North Korean leader in "the coming weeks," and that the location for the meeting had been narrowed down to two or three sites.

It was reported that demonstrators in Seoul took to the streets to push for reunification of the two Koreas with some of them holding placards saying that President Trump deserves the Nobel Prize. Radio Sputnik discussed what underlies the recent breakthrough on the Korean Peninsula with Lee Sung-yoon, a Korea expert at Tufts University. Sputnik: How much credit should President Trump take for the recent breakthrough on the Korean Peninsula? Lee Sung-yoon: President Trump is the first US president to enforce sanctions against North Korea, against the regime, in a meaningful way, and indeed, there have been tough sanctions against North Korea implemented, legitimated by the UN Security Council resolutions and by US legislations – and credit is due where it’s due. At the same time, to go from there, to argue that President Trump, his tough rhetoric and sanctions enforcement brought Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, back to the negotiating table, although negotiations have yet to begin, is rather premature, almost absurd, I would say; more absurd, more questionable than President Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, merely for having been elected president and presenting a much happier, multilateral peaceful vision of the world. READ MORE: North Korea's Kim Ready to Lay Out Map for Denuclearization — Pompeo Sputnik: Donald Trump pledged to talk to Mr. Kim in the coming weeks, while the North Korean leader vowed to close the nuclear site soon. What are your expectations of the coming events? What are the chances that the parties arrive at a conclusive decision that will suit everyone? Lee Sung-yoon: Well North Korea keeps saying "denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula" instead of "North Korea," and that has a specific meaning in North Korean parlance. That is dislodging the US nuclear [extended] deterrence from the region. So, we are not talking about the denuclearization of North Korea per se, but disarmament or dislodging the US presence from the region. These are two very different conceptual definitions. Why did Kim Jong-un agree to shut down his main nuclear site? Because he probably doesn’t need to conduct another underground nuclear test. He has conducted six tests already in Punggye-ri in the northeastern part of his country. There are reports of mountain fracturing, the site being no longer usable. I don’t know if the site is still usable. Probably, maybe, but he doesn’t need to show off, to show the US that he can conduct another underground test. More likely, at some point, he will, as North Korea threatened last year, conduct a thermonuclear test in space, above the Pacific, above the Earth’s atmosphere, as the United States and the former Soviet Union used to, habitually, between 1958 and 1962, thus showing the world that he can fire a thermonuclear ICBM toward the US. Sputnik: Do you think we will witness the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula? Lee Sung-yoo: Only if Kim Jung-un is presented with a serious financial, political, security threat, which is unlikely to happen. North Korea has assiduously worked toward developing nuclear capabilities for half a century. It’s very unlikely that when North Korea now stands on the verge of complete nuclear breakout, that it will give it up. More likely, North Korea will try to buy time and money to advance, perfect, and complete its own nuclear posture review.

Austrian military forces found themselves in hot water as journalists brought a 2012 incident into the light, prompting public uproar and a governmental inquiry, as UN soldiers from Austria reportedly followed an order to not interfere and let Syrians die under fire. The Austrian government has launched an investigation into allegations that, in the wake of the Syrian conflict, the country’s Blue Helmets deliberately led local policemen into an ambush on the Golan Heights, following orders from their command. On April 28 the spokesman for the Defense Ministry, Michael Bauer, posted on Twitter that the investigation had commenced. The commission started working this morning. First, all notifications, orders, laws and regulations that may be relevant to clarification are collected, reviewed and evaluated. The UN is invited to cooperate. The public uproar arose after a local magazine "Falter" revealed a video from a whistleblower, which allegedly shows how Austrian peacekeepers on the Golan Heightswatch smugglers preparing an ambush. Then a vehicle with Syrian secret policemen arrives, but the Blue Helmets don’t warn them that there are going to be ambushed. The police’s pickup keeps moving and eventually gets attacked. According to UN reports, 13 gunmen killed nine policemen. According to the media, citing a UN peacekeeper, the attack was an assassination attempt on one of Syria’s top intelligence officials. The terrorists came to the buffer zone on the Golan Heights from Lebanon on purpose, aware that the UN peacekeepers wouldn’t be able to do anything, as a former Blue Helmet who was stationed with the UN group on the Golan Heights revealed to the newspaper Salzburger Nachrichten. He said that the order for the Austrians was: “Do not interfere." The man named Markus H., who didn’t reportedly take part in the incident, claimed that the soldiers on video had "acted 100 percent correctly according to our mandate." The ex-peacekeeper noted that if his fellow soldiers warned the policemen, they would have become targets, exposing themselves to a fatal threat, as the Blue Helmets didn’t have ammunition and bulletproof vests. He also stated that when the conflict in Syria escalated in 2011, the situation on the Israel-Syrian border became more dangerous for the peace group, causing problems for them, as the militia often blocked their provisions. The representative of the Defense Ministry stated to the local broadcaster ОЕ-24.TV that the soldiers couldn’t act on their own, as they had to follow their orders. Ex-Defense Minister Norbert Darabos, who occupied the post in 2012, wasn’t aware of the incident and claimed that those guilty should be punished. Meanwhile, the Austrian news agency APA reported, citing a UN spokesman, that the incident was therefore known as the UN Security Council was informed that the Blue Helmets had witnessed policemen being shot by 13 gunmen in the buffer zone. The UN had stated that it would work with the Austrian authorities to investigate the case. An Austrian group of the UN peace contingent stayed on the disputed Golan Heights, which has remained an apple of discord between Tel-Aviv and Damascus, since the seventies. The western two-thirds of the Golan Heights (known in Syria as the Quneitra governorate) was annexed by Israel during the Six-Day War in 1967, which has been repeatedly condemned by the UN. The dispute over the territories has not only prevented Syria and Israel from signing a peace treaty, but has also provoked tit-for-tat strikes in the border areas. READ MORE: 'Naive': Israel Rules Out Handing Over Golan Heights to Syria At the same time, the eastern Golan Heights, which has remained in Syrian hands, became the target of the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front, as well as Daesh* militants and other Syrian opposition forces. In 2012 Austria remained the only European country to remain in the area. The decision to withdraw their troops came only in 2013 after tensions in the border area grew as the conflict in Syria deepened. *Daesh (IS/ISIS/ISIL) — terrorist group outlawed in Russia.

As the US president struggles at home with a legislature and judiciary increasingly unwilling to do his bidding, new bluster and threats of a trade war with other nations appear to have become Trump’s rallying cry to the faithful. US President Donald Trump, at a meeting of his followers in Michigan on Saturday, suggested that his administration would do everything within its power to shift what the White House terms Washington DC's trade imbalance with the European Union, and hinted darkly that Americans must prepare for a bumpy and uncomfortable ride, according to RT. In asserting that the EU was primarily formed to divert financial gains from the US, Trump promised that what he termed "disastrous trade deals" would stop, as he was going to personally "take on" the economic European powerhouse, as well as China, the largest economy in Asia and the second largest economy in the world. At a carefully curated supporters-only promotional speaking event in Michigan, the strikingly unpopular US leader claimed that EU trade policies existed only "to take advantage of the United States," cited by RT. The US president warned of tough economic times for residents of the wealthiest country on earth, declaring that, "In short term you may have to take some problems, long term — you're going to be so happy." The former reality television producer and hotel magnate did not elaborate on the kind of problems Americans could expect to face. In keeping with an ongoing talking point repeatedly used by the president, Trump blamed previous US administrations for the issues he describes as problems. "I don't blame them," the US president declared — referring to those nations with which he seeks to engage in trade wars — adding, "I blame past presidents and past leaders of our country." A May 1 deadline has been implemented for the March 1 Trump ultimatum to various nations — including China and the EU — to either curb aluminum and steel exports to the US or face sharply-increased import taxes. The ultimatum triggered a speedy global backlash alongside threats of retaliation from China, the EU, and most other nations. At a meeting of EU members in Sofia on Saturday, Belgian Finance Minister Johan Van Overtveldt noted that Trump's strong-arm tactics will backfire, adding that trade wars are a no-win scenario over the long term. "A trade war is a losing game for everybody," Van Overtveldt observed.

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MOSCOW (Sputnik) - French President Emmanuel Macron and his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani spent more than an hour in telephone talks on Sunday and agreed to work together on preserving Iran's nuclear deal, the French presidential office said in a statement. "The French president and the Iranian president have agreed to work mainly in the next few weeks on the preservation of the content of the 2015 deal, with all of its elements," the statement read. Macron has expressed his wish to preserve the existing nuclear agreement and to launch discussions on additional aspects, such as control of nuclear activities after 2025, Iran's missile program and main regional crises. The statement contradicts the previous stance of French President Emmanuel Macron, expressed after his visit to the US, saying that he wanted to preserve the deal, but adding several new provisions to it. READ MORE: Macron Tells US France Committed to Iran Nuclear Deal, Syria Political Solution During the phone call, Rouhani, in his turn, reiterated Tehran's position on any possible amendments in the document. "The nuclear deal or any other subject under its pretext is not negotiable in any way," Rouhani stated, according to the website of the Iranian presidency. The two leaders also agreed to cooperate on the situation in Syria and Yemen. US Rhetoric Against the Deal US President Donald Trump has been expressing his discontent with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the diplomatic victory of his predecessor, ever since his presidential campaign. He has recently intensified his rhetoric, requesting to "fix" it and threatening to pull out of it otherwise. READ MORE: Macron: Trump Will Exit Iran Nuclear Deal in May European countries, which signed the agreement (namely, Russia, China, France, the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany) have repeatedly stressed their commitment to the deal. The Russian Foreign Ministry has announced that it will adhere to the JCPOA provisions as long as other participants do. The ex-US President Barack Obama's diplomatic triumph, the JCPOA, was signed on July 14, 2015, ensuring the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program. Under this agreement, Tehran pledged to not seek to develop or acquire nuclear weapons in exchange for the lifting of sanctions imposed against Iran. READ MORE: From Money Loss to New Conflicts: What May Happen if Trump Rips Iran Deal Up

Rumors are rife that big banks are entering the cryptomarket causing a surge in the price of bitcoin. While this is good news for anyone who has a stash of the digital dosh, it could be a sign that regulators are closing in on the cryptocurrency. The cryptocurrency bitcoin is trading at US$9,340 on the Bitstamp platform, which is a modest rise after its dramatic fall in January 2017 following its all-time high of US$20,000 in December 2017. Nigel Green, founder and CEO of the De Vere Group told the free London newspaper, City AM "current market activity indicates that the major cryptocurrencies are set for another considerable surge in prices gains in the near future." "We're certainly entering crypto bull territory, with many retail and institutional investors now finding that cryptocurrencies can no longer ignore the opportunities," Nigel Green said. READ MORE: Ancient Greek Democracy Digitalized: The Birth of Smart Arbitration Mike Lempres, chief legal and risk officer for Coinbase, a digital currency exchange and wallet service, recently submitted a written testimony for a parliamentary hearingin Britain on "examining the cryptocurrencies and ICO markets." Lempres says the technology "is in an early, vulnerable state", expressing concerns that while the financial technology "has tremendous potential," regulation is also necessary. "To fulfil that potential we believe that responsible regulation is required," Mike Lempres said in a written statement. "At the same time we want to help ensure that the technology's incredible benefits are not inadvertently stifled by regulatory or legal missteps." Lempres included in his statement. Lempres' company Coinbase limits its trading to four digital currencies on the basis that they are the only ones which possess any regulatory clarity. They include: Bitcoin, Ether (Etherium), Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash. Meanwhile Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England believes the volatility in value of virtual currencies like bitcoin suggests: "Their worth rests on beliefs regarding their future supply and demand — ultimately whether they will be successful as money." In his "future of money speech" at Edinburgh University, Mark Carney said: "Authorities need to decide whether to isolate, regulate or integrate crypto-assets and their associated activities." However, isolating crypto-assets by banning exchanges, financial institutions and payment processors from handling them, "risks foregoing potentially major opportunities from the development of the underlying payments technologies," according to Mark Carney. "A better path would be to regulate elements of the crypto-asset ecosystem to combat illicit activities, promote market integrity, and protect the safety and soundness of the financial system," Mark Carney said. READ MORE: Chinese Entrepreneur Says Government Should Use Bitcoin, Not Ban It "Scam" Meanwhile Bill Harris, former CEO of Intuit and founding CEO of PayPal has come out claimed "Bitcoin is a scam." In an article for Recode, Bill Harris suggested the cryptocurrency is "a colossal pump and dump scheme, the likes of which the world has never seen." "The losers are ill-informed buyers caught up in the spiral of greed. The result is a massive transfer of wealth from ordinary families to internet promoters," Bill Harris said. Bitcoin, despite a surge in value, is still plagued with issues within its governance and community. Whether its members continue to fight, or the virtual currency is indeed a "scam," Bitcoin's shares are up following regulatory discussion on how the crypto cash can be controlled — and whether it should be or not. READ MORE: Billionaires Betting on Bitcoin: Rockefellers, Soros Send Prices Soaring

According to standing bitcoin “rules,” a total of 21 million bitcoins can be mined. How soon will the remaining 20 percent be mined and what will happen next is anyone’s guess. Cryptocurrency miners will (or already have) obtained the 17 millionth bitcoin in what is yet another milestone for the world’s number one digital coin, the Blockchain.info website reported. Each bitcoin block generates 12.5 new bitcoins, and because each new block appears every 10 minutes, that means 1,800 new bitcoins are mined every day. This means that 80 percent of all bitcoins that will ever be mined have already been obtained, with a mere one-fifth of the possible supply left for future miners and would-be buyers. When bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto launched his first block on January 3, 2009, he created the first 50 bitcoins. Since then 210,000 blocks have been created and, in keeping with the tight schedule, the network is taking 50 percent off the bonus price for each block. After the latest downsize of July 2016, each block carries a bonus of 12.5 bitcoins. Therefore, it would be easy to calculate that if each bitcoin protocol stays unchanged (a new block appears every 10 minutes and bonus reduction schedule remains the same, etc.), the very last bitcoin will be mined in May 2140. READ MORE: Billionaires Betting on Bitcoin: Rockefellers, Soros Send Prices Soaring

The mix will be in traditional Russian national colours - white, blue and red. Company had to make some changes and print traditional S logo in pale blue on white candies with apple flavour. There will be five flavors — apple, cherry, strawberry, raspberry and black-currant. This limited edition is on the market since April, so hurry up — Russian embassy has already tried them. The highly anticipated 2018 World Cup will take place in 11 Russian cities, including Sochi, from June 14 to July 15.

The parents of Otto Warmbier, a college student detained in North Korea before being returned to the US last year and dying, have initiated legal actions against Pyongyang for holding their son captive. The Warmbier family alleges that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's government is liable for the 22-year-old's death. "In an attempt to extract various concessions from the United States government, North Korea detained Otto, forced him to falsely 'confess' to an act of subversion on behalf of the United States government, tortured him, kept him in detention for a year and a half without allowing him to communicate with his family, and returned him to them in a non-responsive state and brain dead," according to a complaint filed by plaintiffs Cynthia and Frederick Warmbier. The lawsuit was filed Thursday, April 26. The University of Virginia student died June 17, 2017 at a hospital in Cincinnati. He intended to visit North Korea on a tourist trip for five days. Instead, he was accused of stealing a piece of North Korean propaganda material and jailed for 17 months. "As a direct and proximate result of North Korea's actions, Otto died at 22, mere days after his release," according to the legal documents filed with the federal district court in Washington, District of Columbia on Thursday. Pyongyang has denied responsibility for the US national's death. "North Korea, which is a rogue regime, took Otto hostage for its own wrongful ends and brutally tortured and murdered him," the lawsuit stated. United States President Donald Trump and Kim are expected to meet in the coming weeks to discuss denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

Scientists from the University of Southern California and the US Army Research Laboratory (ARL) have come up with a machine-learning based AI system which boasts the ability to speed up troop training 13 fold. Dr. Rajgopal Kannan, a researcher at the ARL and coauthor of a new paper on the subject of field-programmable gate array accelerators for use by the military, said that the technology, based on the machine learning technique known as collaborative filtering, has good prospects for becoming embedded in the next generation of US combat vehicles. Housed in low-cost, lightweight but state-of-the-art hardware, the software helps soldiers to recognize, process and decipher information about threats more quickly, providing them with information about threats to their vehicles' safety, aerial images of the warzone, and other information allowing them to respond accordingly and thus gain a strategic advantage on the battlefield. The next-gen combat vehicle is one of six 'Army Modernization Priorities' being worked on by ARL, and part of a broader focus on AI aimed at imbuing troops with warfighter superiority.

Coinbase, the world’s biggest bitcoin brokerage, has blocked Wikileaks from using the service prompting Wikileaks to call for a global boycott of Coinbase. According to statement from Wikileaks, Coinbase blamed the ban on US financial regulations. Sputnik discussed this with Peter Todd, an applied cryptography consultant. Peter Todd: I mean it's not really surprising, it's just one of many things they've along these lines and many people in the bitcoin space would react by saying, "Well you shouldn't have been using Coinbase in the first place." Sputnik: But isn't Coinbase like the number one cryptocurrency exchange in the United States pretty much? Peter Todd: Sure, but in the United States it's tough to operate a cryptocurrency exchange, and I think they got number one in the States because they were willing to bend over backwards to make the US government happy. READ MORE: 'There Are Dozens of Companies That May Have Licensed or Sold Your Data' — CEO Sputnik: Cryptocurrency exchanges that are not as sensitive or that don't have such a low tolerance to any kind of scrutiny by anybody, are they less successful right now? I'm just wondering what's more important to the crypto community, is it more important that these companies are very flexible when it comes to implementing government directives? Peter Todd: I think a good example is actually Kraken. Kraken recently got pushed back quite hard on a request by New York to go and give up a lot of very basic details on very short notice on their operations, and well Kraken told them pretty much that you don't have jurisdiction over us so we're just not going to do this, and their actions were lauded by that community, but if you want operate in the US, it's just difficult, so yes in the US Coinbase is very popular but that's due to lack of competition, it's not that people actually like their operation, whereas outside the US there is much more wider variety of exchanges and they're all very popular, much more popular than Coinbase. READ MORE: Crypto No More? Coinbase Exchange Forced to Hand Over User Data to the IRS Sputnik: And a lot of them don't work in the United States, you can't use them in the United States. Right? Peter Todd: Yes, it's just a byproduct of the way US law works, the way US regulatory agencies work. Sputnik: So Julian Assange has called for this global blockade of Coinbase, do you think that's going to work? Have you heard of much support behind this? Peter Todd: Truth be told, I would say it's not going to work only because what he's called for is already something that everybody believes in anyway. He's not the first person to go and state something along this line, don't use Coinbase. I've not recommended that people use Coinbase for a long time, so I think it won't have much of an effect but only because there's sort of already is a blockade of Coinbase. For the traders who are trying to trade cryptocurrencies some of them are not going to care what the media or what others are saying and they're going to use Coinbase when it makes sense for their particular trade. READ MORE: Coinbase Attempts to Fix the Error That 'Drained' Clients Bank Accounts Sputnik: Do you think the crypto sphere is really behind Wikileaks and Julian Assage? Peter Todd: I think so, I personally use WikiLeaks as an example of why bitcoin needs to exist. I know for a fact that if bitcoin had never existed there's a good chance that WikiLeaks wouldn't even exist today; fortunately for WikiLeaks they have many more options to receive money than they used to, because courts around the world in various jurisdictions and did the obvious thing and said that blockading WikiLeaks shouldn't happen. WikiLeaks is a whistleblowing website and why are we blockading it, there was a critical time when bitcoin was one of the their very few ways of getting money. Sputnik: What can you say about the overall atmosphere in the US or the political climate when it comes to whistleblowers? Peter Todd: I think it's still quite toxic. I think WikiLeaks is one of many examples where whistleblowers have been prosecuted; it's not hard to find examples, unfortunately it's just not changing and it really does need to, but we're just not seeing it happen.

In the wake of raging controversy around Kanye West’s pro-Trump tweets, the rapper chose to transfer his supportive sentiment to the music studio and add a professional touch to his display. The famed rapper has recorded a track called "Ye vs. The People" and it essentially features an exchange of monotonous, clear-cut vocals between Kanye West and his fellow rapper from Atlanta, T.I., who's been an outspoken critic of police brutality and is no pro-Trumper. The latter assumes that by endorsing the president, West represents "dudes who seem crude and cold-hearted," thereby emboldening "white supremacy." West opposed the statement, arguing that he is engaged in a fight "for people." A recent picture showing West wearing Trump's renowned "Make America Great Again" cap, is also reflected in one of the lines, in which the rapper reiterated that the gesture is symbolic, as it renders the idea of human equality. T.I., though, counters the statement, saying that what makes one feel equal, causes negative reaction in others: "What makes you feel equal makes them feel evil." Separately, West has shared a really jaw-dropping idea for his new album cover: he notably posted a picture of a man under the following caption: "This is plastic surgeon Jan Adams. The person who performed my mom's final surgery." In the next line he asked his followers on Twitter to contribute and suggest their titles. Kanye West has met a storm of criticism recently over his continuous support of Trump, ever since his 2016 US tour. At that time, he lauded the president-elect’s communication skills while noting that he had not voted. Most recently, he has referred to the US president as his "brother," adding that they have the same "dragon energy" in common. Later he backtracked a bit saying that he couldn’t endorse everything that Trump does. "I don't agree 100% with anyone but myself," he concluded. Trump hurried to thank the loyal rapper, adding that it "was very cool." In another Tweet he said: "I have known Kanye for a little bit, I get along with Kanye. I get along with a lot of people, frankly," Trump said. "Kanye looks, and he sees black unemployment at the lowest it's been in the history of our country, okay? He sees Hispanic unemployment at the lowest it's been in the history of our country. He sees, by the way, female unemployment the lowest it's been in now almost 19 years." The president went on to say: "He sees that stuff, and he's smart. He says, 'Trump is doing a much better job than the Democrats did.'" READ MORE: Trump to Win Nobel Peace Prize if Solves Korean Issue — Senator Graham The bromance between the outspoken musician and the president that reached its climax this week could lead to an invitation to the White House, The Daily Beast reported Friday. Trump has reportedly asked his aides whether he should invite West over an Oval Office photo-op or for dinner, which, according to one source, puzzled them, as they didn’t know if Trump meant it seriously.