Author Salman Rushdie gives a 10-minute writer's workshop before an event recorded for radio in Portsmouth. The workshop was recorded backstage. #writing Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Scottish author, Alexander McCall Smith, lets us in on his writing process before an event recorded for radio in Portsmouth. The workshop was recorded backstage. #writing Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Marianne Williamson has written six New York Times best sellers, including The Age Of Miracles and A Return To Love. Known in some circles as Hollywood's favorite self-help guru, we just had to find out what the process for a spiritual author entails. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Chris Bohjalian has written some thrilling novels tackling some tough subjects - Armenian genocide, the ethics of midwifery, and, most recently, sex trafficking - but he speaks about the process of writing with humor and aplomb. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Alexander Chee is a careful craftsman of language. As we came to find out, when we talked to him from Argot Studios in NYC, he is as measured, unassuming and thoughtful in his speech. A retiring man, who prefers to write in transient spaces, he also just so happens to have penned the most hotly anticipated literary novel of 2016 - The Queen of the Night, a sophomore work fifteen years in the making*. *He assures us it only took eleven or twelve. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Alice Dreger is a historian of science, anatomy, and medicine, known for her work studying and advocating for people born with atypical sex disorders. She famously resigned from Northwestern University in protest of academic censorship, and gained some infamy on Twitter for live-tweeting her son's sex education class. We had a delightful chat with her about her writing process in advance of the paperback release of her book, Galileo's Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and the Search for Justice in Science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Donald Hall is now 87 and no longer writing poetry, a pursuit he calls "a young man's game" which takes "too much testosterone." But Hall, former Poet Laureate of both New Hampshire and the United States, long ago cemented his place in literary history. In this episode of the 10-Minute Writer's Workshop, Virginia and Sara traveled to Hall's home in Wilmot, NH, to speak to him - getting lost along the way, and, ultimately, finding themselves right at home. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

'In Maine, when we say something is "wicked good" – we really mean it.' That's how LL Bean describes their Wicked Good Slippers, and how we describe Jeff Ryan, who for decades wrote Bean's catalog copy. We spoke to him about finding the story in everyday objects and the tricks of the trade when it comes to copy writing. Jeff Ryan is also the author of Appalachian Odyssey, a memoir of hiking the Appalachian Trail, bit by bit, over 28 years. Episode music: "Auld Lang Syne" by Podington Bear Credit music: "Joy in the Restaurant" by David Szesztay Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

John Scalzi, the Hugo Award-winning author of science fiction both serious and less-so and an internet star from way, way back. He is former president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, perhaps best known for his Old Man's War series, his blog “Whatever,” and his novel Redshirts, which is currently being developed for television. He joined us in the NHPR studios while on tour for The Collapsing Empire, the first novel of a new space-opera sequence set in an all-new universe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Ohio State women's basketball team is having a great season. The Buckeyes are ranked seventh in the country ,, they just routed Big Ten power Purdue, and they take on rival Michigan Thursday night. For WOSU's sports show After the Score , Steve Brown and Thomas Bradley spoke with head coach Kevin McGuff.

Ohio State's Women's Basketball team has played one of the toughest schedules in the country and still hold a top 10 spot. Will the success continue to grow with the new year?

Ohio State has sold the name of a building before. Actually, several times before. But the naming rights to a job title? That seems a bit different.

You may be wondering at this point, "Who is Bernie Stowe?" Usually when we talk about sports, we talk about players, or coaches. Maybe even the front office. Not this time.

A new movie about OSU alumnus Jesse Owens debuts in theaters this weekend, so we get the whole story on the life of Jesse Owens.

This week on After The Score the guys talk about the slim chance Ohio State basketball has at making the NCAA Tournament, and how the hopes may be all but over before they even get off the air.

Ohio State basketball has lost 80 percent of its 2015 recruiting class, what does the future look like for Thad Matta and the Buckeyes?

This week on After The Score, Steve and Thomas talk to Martin Jarmond about the process of scheduling Ohio State football games. The process is a lot more in-depth than one might think.

Ohio State has rolled through most of its Big Ten games in recent years, but has taken tough criticism for a weak non-conference schedule. That changes this year, as the Buckeyes head to Norman, Oklahoma in the season's third week to take on the University of Oklahoma, a team that made the four-team postseason playoff last year.

Ohio State Football beings its 2016 campaign Saturday at noon in Ohio Stadium. The Buckeyes take on Bowling Green in what should be an easy win for Ohio State. Thomas Bradley and Steve Brown break down the matchup, the season and the team with Eric Seger from ElevenWarriors.com .

Hello Everyone! Today, August 16, 2013 is the day that this site was created and has been edited for the first time ! Here you may find my own compositions and arrangements, many will also have have the chance to hear my performances at the piano. All of this can be found on page "Products" section of this site.I hope is to have fun!

A straightforward guide to communicating more effectively on the job and building a more inclusive, creative, and productive workplace. How to Listen and How to Be Heard is a guide to empowering yourself and others to communicate with people who think, act, and experience things differently than you do. It's also guide to communicating with more confidence, candor, and authenticity. Too often, people avoid difficult conversations, but these discussions often need to happen to bring people togeth

A wandering fortune teller finds an unexpected family in this warm and wonderful debut fantasy, perfect for readers of Travis Baldree and Sangu Mandanna. Tao is an immigrant fortune teller, traveling between villages with just her trusty mule for company. She only tells "small" fortunes: whether it will hail next week; which boy the barmaid will kiss; when the cow will calve. She knows from bitter experience that big fortunes come with big consequences… Even if it’s a lonely life, it’s better th

Tournaments among young athletes can be viewed as a "junior school” so to speak, but emotionally, they are no different from professional sports, and their scandals are no less juicy as the European Boxing Championship showed. Budva, Montenegro, hosted the finals among boxers in the age group 17-18 from October 13 to 24. The Russian sportsmen took the first place in the medals race winning 11 gold, 6 silver and 4 bronze medals. In fact, the results could have been even better had our strong athlete Alexei Shendrik won gold. The judges initially announced him the winner but later reversed the decision.

AP Photo The number of overweight children under five years of age is set to almost double from 42 million to 70 million worldwide, which is a ticking global pandemic. The United Nations Organization blames the marketing of unhealthy food and beverages and asks governments to reverse the trend. 1990 - 31 million overweight under-5s. 2014 - 41 million overweight under-5s. 2024 - a projected 70 million overweight under-5s. And the focus of the UNO's concern is that many of these cases of childhood obesity are occurring in developing countries. The culprit? "The marketing of unhealthy food and non-alcoholic beverages is a major factor in the alarming increase", reads the report by the Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity (ECHO), presented this week to the World Health Organization. Direct negative effect on health and education Childhood obesity can have a direct negative effect on educational development, quite apart from posing economic hardship and physical and mental health consequences. The phenomenon cuts across all socio-economic groups and is not restricted to Western Europe and North America. Around three-quarters of overweight children of this age group reside in Asia and Africa: around half in the former and a quarter in the latter.

University of Coimbra Failure by immune cells worsens Alzheimer's disease, reveals study by the University of Coimbra A team from the Center for Neuroscience and Cell Biology (CNC), University of Coimbra (UC) in Portugal discovered how some cells of the immune system lose the ability to fight Alzheimer's disease. This new knowledge can help to find a definitive diagnosis. Ana Luísa Cardoso, the coordinator of the research group, explains that "We found that monocytes (the innate immune system cells) of Alzheimer's patients are unable to move when stimulated by substances produced in the brain, which may lead to reduction of cells that can be recruited to the nervous tissue and participate in fighting the disease."

US scientists have reaffirmed the benefits of eating walnuts in a new study. Specialists from the University of California at Davis conducted a series of experiments on a group of male mice diagnosed with prostate cancer. The mice were divided into three diet groups. The first group did not consume walnuts, the second group received walnuts, and the third one was fed with walnut oil. The experiment showed that the development of the tumor and malignant cells significantly slowed among the rodents in the second and the third groups. According to Natural News, the scientists explained the success of the experiment with the content of powerful phytonutrients in raw walnuts. This natural product contains that inhibit cancer cells and prevent them from developing.Just two handfuls of walnuts every day reduces the risk of cancer by almost 50 percent, the scientists said.Furthermore, walnut oil reduces the amount of harmful cholesterol in blood and increases insulin sensitivity, which helps fight heart disease and reduces the risk of diabetes. For example, one study found that overweight adults with type 2 diabetes who consumed just one-quarter cup of walnuts daily reduced their fasting insulin levels in just a few months' time compared to those on non-walnut diets. It is believed that walnuts can shrink levels of the hormone IGF-1, known to play a key role in development of both prostate and breast cancer, Natural News says.Thanks to their omega-3 fat content, walnuts are often the subjects of cancer-preventive studies. However, one should be cautious with eating them as walnuts are a high calorie product. For example, just 2.6 ounces of walnuts is about 482 calories, which may - in some people - contribute to an excess of stored fat. Health benefits of walnuts have been known since time immemorial. Hippocrates and Avicenna mentioned them in the treatment of various diseases. In addition, the ancients thought that they stimulate mental activity. Anna Protsenko, a nutritionist, told MedPulse.ru. "Walnuts contain a great deal of minerals," the expert explains. "They include iron, copper, cobalt, potassium, sodium, phosphorus, magnesium, calcium, and iodine. Many of them are antioxidants. In addition, walnuts contain unsaturated fatty acids, more than 20 amino acids, and vitamins A, E, B, P and C. By the way, they contain nearly 50 times more vitamin C than citrus, and 8 times more than black currants. In addition, walnuts are rich in protein.

Source: REX There are a number of factors that can change the general public’s attitude to late virginity among men. Reason One: it is not so easy for a man to lose virginity Historically, the first sexual experience is a subject of extraordinary pride for men. That is why most boys grow up with the aim of losing virginity as soon as possible. According to France’s National Institute for Demographic Studies (INED), an average West European man has his first sex at age 17. If it takes longer, boys think that there is something amiss with them and unintentionally enhance the possibility of turning from a proud eagle into a timid sparrow. There is another stereotype: men are the first to show an initiative. If they do not, they are automatically associated with a sniveler, a loser and an object of pity.

When the news of the crash of Ebrahim Raisi's helicopter arrived, the first thing that came to mind for anyone with a modicum of critical thinking was: "Is it Israel's doing?" This is an absolutely legitimate speculation. However, the journalists and commentators who work directly or indirectly for the imperialist propaganda apparatus categorically dismiss it. This is pure hypocrisy. It is they themselves who love to make the most idiotic speculations about everything - when it suits their bosses, of course. When Evgeny Prigozhin's helicopter crashed, for example, the first speculation made by these propagandists was that the Russian government was responsible. After all, the former Wagner Group leader had spoken out against Vladimir Putin. That was the great fact that underpinned the logic of this argument. He was an opponent of Putin, so Putin would most likely have ordered his elimination. Even if he had reconciled and received a pardon from the Russian president, even if the helicopter had crashed near the Ukrainian border and the Russians had assured him that it was Ukrainian sabotage.

LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky managed to get revaccinated. For the first time, the politician chose Sputnik V; for the repeated procedure, he opted for CoviVac. As Zhirinovsky explained, "the level of antibodies is gradually decreasing, I wanted to strengthen the defense of my body." Mass vaccination against coronavirus, which is now taking place in all countries, including Russia, still raises a huge number of questions. This is not surprising, given the fact that the coronavirus infection with which we are dealing has not been thoroughly studied yet, and the vaccines for it have not gone through all the required stages of clinical trials. Pravda.R asked most burning questions related to the topic of vaccination to Professor of Virology, Chief Researcher at the Gamaleya Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology Anatoly Alshtein.

Despite their rabid cynicism, the media of the collective West are forced to disavow the most odious manifestations of Nazism, extremism, and terrorism practiced by the Ukrainian security forces. Foreign instructors have not only trained the Nazis in military skills, but have also revived old colonial techniques to insult their opponents. After materials appeared on the Web with torture and murder of civilians and Russian servicemen, a report from Bucha was immediately concocted in response. Information about biolaboratories with pathogens of the most contagious diseases turned into accusations that Russia used chemical weapons, and much more. When calling Russians Nazis, lying experts are careful not to notice either the ISIS*-inspired video made by Ukrainians or the Wolfsangel stripes worn by Nazi Einsatzgruppen during World War II. The West has forgotten all about honor and dignity Extremism researcher Cynthia Miller-Idriss apparently has an eyesore that prevents her from seeing the real picture. She dictates that "among the foreign fighters going to Ukraine, the vast majority have nothing to do with the extremism of white supremacy advocates."

McDonald's new Bandera burger, which was introduced at restaurants of the chain in Oslo, Norway, sparked criticism on social media in Norway itself, in Ukraine, and in Russia. McDonald's sells Bandera burgers in Europe Many assumed that the fast food chain that suspended its businesses in Russia has thus expressed its support for Ukraine, where Stepan Bandera* is considered a national hero. However, it turned out that the Bandera Burger has nothing to do with the Ukrainian Nazi collaborator.

Not every serial killer should necessarily be either a social outcast or a sociopath. Some of them are good at disguise and may at times have a reputation of exemplary society members. Biographies of many famous serial killers of the USSR era testify to this. Chikatilo helped to catch himself Andrey Chikatilo, a serial killer from Rostov, committed his first crime in 1973, the last in 1990. Chikatilo killed 53 women and children in all that time. All the crimes were sexually motivated; he would stab and dismember his victims' bodies.

Kent McLellan, a 32-year-old American neo-Nazi who fought in the Donbass as part of the Nazi Right Sector* movement, who then joined Azov Battalion* after Russia launched the special operation in Ukraine, returned to Florida and started sharing his experience with media outlets. Some of his interviews do not fit into the framework of what American propaganda says about the Ukrainian conflict. In a conversation with Juan Sinmiedo, Ken "Boneface" McLellan busted myths about the coup on the Maidan, about today's Ukraine, and about how many neo-fascists Ukraine has actually sheltered.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of private military company Wagner, was killed in a plane crash on August 23. His Embraer ERJ-135BJ Legacy 600 plane crashed in the Tver region. Prigozhin was 62. Prigozhin was born in 1961 in Leningrad. He lost his father in his early childhood, and was raised by his mother and stepfather. Yevgeny Prigozhin received his first criminal record when he was 18, the second and third one followed soon afterwards. After he was released from prison, Prigozhin decided to open his own business. He and his stepfather started selling hotdogs in Leningrad.

World War Three that may put an end t your existence as a human civilisation, will set off on its destructive march from the Middle East. This is what a number of prominent figures, as well as seers and mystics predicted. Perhaps the most famous modern forecast on the subject came from the late leader of the Liberal Democratic Party Vladimir Zhirinovsky, authors of AZ numerology project said while collecting predictions about the Middle East conflict. Speaking on Vladimir Solovyov Live in 2019, Zhirinovsky voiced an opinion that elections in Ukraine were its last, as "such a country simply will not remain on the map by 2024.” Moreover, the crisis in the Middle East will be so intense everyone will completely forget about Ukraine. 

On December 7, a girl student, an eighth-grader, went on a shooting spree at Bryansk School No. 5. Five people were injured, two were killed, including the girl shooter herself. The girl's motive for the attack is yet to be established. According to unconfirmed reports, the girl suffered from bullying at school. This is the first time in the history of school shooting incidents in Russia, when the shooter was a girl. No incidents of school shooting were known in Russia before 2014. Before 2014, many in Russia believed that the phenomenon of school shooting was inherent with the United States. After 2014, however, episodes fo school shooting began to occur throughout Russia on a regular basis. 2014, Moscow

The Kemerovo regional court ruled to send Alexander Spesivtsev, a resident of Novokuznetsk, to compulsory treatment, the regional Office of the Public Prosecutor said. The defendant, Alexander Spesivtsev, is a serial killer, who killed at least 34 victims and ate them during the 1990s. Spesivtsev will undergo treatment at a special psychiatric hospital.

Oh, boy… Have to go back a spell to expound with clarity on this one. Those of you that follow the ‘beautiful game’ – as in futbol – the name Zindedine Zidane, should always conjure up some fine sentiments. At a bare minimum – ‘Zizou’ – as he was affectionately known to legions of fans spanning the earth, just saying his name would bring a pleasant smile. Algerian

Source: REX/Shutterstock Alexander Rutskoy, Russian Air Force General, was the man who brought Boris Yeltsin to power. Rutskoy has unveiled a few interesting facts from the history of Russia. The general said that Boris Yeltsin was drinking a lot during the coup in 1991 and tried to escape to the US Embassy. Rutskoy also said that after the collapse o the Soviet Union, Yeltsin called George H. Bush to report the news to the USA. When serving as vice president, Rutskoy defended independence and Constitution of the Russian Federation, especially in the days of the State Emergency Committee. Later, however, he changed his opinions. In an interview with the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper, Alexander Rutskoy spoke about the days, when the Soviet Union stopped its existence. He said that there was an urgent need to remove Mikhail Gorbachev from power, appoint Nikolai Ryzhkov as acting president of the USSR, prepare a new candidate and then hold popular elections for the President of the USSR and the Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR.Rutskoy said that he did not have even a shadow of doubt about whom to support in the situation of those days. "I swore as an 18-year-old boy to serve the Motherland and the people, and I have never showed disloyalty to the oath," he said.Today, Rutskoy does not conceal the fact that he had believed Yeltsin's promises about the defense of Russian interests. The vice president of the RSFSR, unlike those, who signed the Belavezha Accords, virtually had no access to the governance of the country. During the interview, Rutskoy said that Boris Yeltsin had tried to escape to the US Embassy. He also said that Gorbachev was not isolated from the world during the days of the State Emergency Committee. Gorbachev could be contacted via secret communication channels, and he was perfectly aware of what was going on. Rutskoy said that Gorbachev simply escaped prior to the signing of the new Unified Treaty. Gorbachev, Rutskoy stated, was executing the mission to destroy the country. It was Rutskoy, who escorted Yeltsin to Minsk,  only to find out later that the USSR would be dissolved. Rutskoy wrote a notice to terminate his powers of the vice president, but his initiative did not move forward. During the ratification of Belavezha Accords, he voted against it. Rutskoy and Yeltsin went separate ways when the latter appointed Gaidar, Chubais and Nechayev for key economic positions in the country. The three officials eventually made Russia experience an economic collapse. According to Rutskoy, the putsch in 1991 took place because Gorbachev betrayed his homeland and the people who were close to him in his team. The State Emergency Committee made a humble attempt to keep the Union afloat. The putsch in 1993 was a coup, which took place with the support of the United States and Europe. "There was an intelligence report saying that the White House in Moscow would be attacked. Yeltsin suddenly decided to go to the US Embassy. I was trying to stop him, I was telling him that he should not be doing it. I was asking him whether he was aware of the things that he was doing.  When they signed the Belovezha  Accorda, the first person, whom Yeltsin informed that the Soviet Union was no more, was George H. Bush," Rutskoy admitted. "Yeltsin was maintaining a contact with the US leadership to inform the Americans about successes of the unilateral surrender in the Cold War," he added.The book of memoirs by George H.W. Bush titled "A World Transformed" also says that Boris Yeltsin was cooperating with the USA for the collapse of the Soviet Union. "On December 8, 1991, Boris Yeltsin from a hunting lodge near Brest, in Belarus. Only recently elected President of the Russian Republic, Yeltsin had been meeting with Leonid Kravchuk, President of Ukraine, and Stanislav Shushkevich, President of Belarus. "Today, a very important event took place in our country," Yeltsin said. "I wanted to inform you myself before you learned it from the press." Then he told me the news: the Presidents of Russia, Belarus and ukraine had decided to dissolve the Soviet Union," George H.W. Bush wrote. According to George H.W. Bush, Yeltsin's tone changed after he finished reading his text. The signed documents, he continued, formulated the provisions that the USA had been advocating. Bush was unwilling to express either his approval or disapproval, so he simply responded with "I understand." 

Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev once had to beg Joseph Stalin for mercy. The episode in Khrushchev's biography took place before he came to power in the USSR. Khrushchev had to kneel in front of Stalin, begging him not to punish his son Leonid, who had shot an officer by accident.  Professor, biophysicist, Doctor of Biological Sciences, Andrei Malenkov, the son of one of Khrushchev's competitors in the struggle for power, Georgy Malenkov, said in an interview with Lenta.ru that Khrushchev came to Stalin and was crawling on his knees in front of him because his son was supposed to be executed for shooting an officer. Moreover, it was the second time when Khrushchev's son committed such a crime (he was forgiven for the first one), Malenkov said.   With this landmark report at the XX Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union "On the cult of the personality and its consequences" Nikita Khrushchev wanted to take revenge on Stalin for his unfortunate son Leonid, the professor also said, adding that Khrushchev was a "very vindictive little man."

Russia has a very extensive history of military operations and wars. Russia has been successful in most of its wars, but the price was too high as too many lives had been lost. Therefore, our descendants need to remember the lessons that our ancestors left for us as a legacy. Most of the threats that Russia had to deal with were coming from the south and the southwest. One of those campaigns took place in 1827-1828, when France and England pushed Russia into the flames of another war with Turkey. General Nikolai Yepanchin combined his service in the army ranks with extensive scientific and teaching activities. He was also a member of the Military Historical Commission of the General Staff for compiling a description of the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878. He repeatedly criticised the military component of the Russian Empire, dwelling in detail on how the Russian army was prepared for military campaigns.

The future of the International Space Station remains extremely vague. News reports about technical problems on board the ISS became, one might say, traditional. Is it time to decide? The service life of the International Space Station extends till 2024. At the same time, now is the time to decide what should be done to the station afterwards. Late last year, Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov said that the future of the ISS would be determined in the first quarter of 2021."The fate of the ISS has not been fully decided yet, it will be determined, probably, in the first quarter of next year," Borisov told TASS. He also added that Roscosmos corporation plans to launch a new segment of the ISS, which is expected to become the basis for the Russian orbital station in the future.It goes about "Nauka" ("Science") module, which will become a space laboratory for Russian cosmonauts. Does Russia want the ISS to last longer? Ivan Moiseev, the scientific director of the Institute of Space Policy, believes that stopping international cooperation was out of the question. "There is an official permit to run the station till 2024 - till 2025, in fact. All the countries participating in the ISS agreement agreed to consider the issue of extending the service life of the station till 2028-2030 - that was six months ago," the expert told Pravda.Ru.However, the situation took a turn due to a series of accidents on board the ISS."Those were insignificant accidents, but they create a relevant information background. The government had to decide. If it was not for those accidents, they would have quietly extended the service life of the ISS until 2028, and it would be beneficial to everyone. But when those accidents started happening, they led the general public to believe that the station was falling apart. There were official statements made about the need to finish its work," Ivan Moiseev said.However, the expert believes that the work of the station should be extended. "Therefore, the government apparently will make a decision on the matter in early 2021," he believes.

It is not the melting of permafrost that causes giant gas bubbles to erupt, geophysicists found. This crater in Yamal is the 17th such crater that was found in the region.Vasily Bogoyavlensky, geologist and geophysicist, said that there are many of such "black holes" in the north of Russia. Many of those craters have emerged during the past ten years.The very first crater, which was discovered in 2014, became the famous one. It was a hole about 50 meters deep and 40 meters in diameter. Geologists quickly established that the giant hole in the ground was just a hole, from which methane was bursting out.A cavity is formed in the layers of underground ice as it melts due to the influence of a local anomalous heat flow. This cavity is then filled with gas, and it grows larger, causing the surface on the ground to swell until the frozen rock reaches its ultimate strength and eventually explodes in a pneumatic explosion. Extraterrestrial cryovolcanoes found on Earth Some scientists assumed that the Yamal crater was the first cryovolcano on planet Earth - a volcano that appears in permafrost and spews out jets of gas instead of melted magma. Until recently, such cryovolcanoes were observed only in space - on Neptune's satellite Triton, and on Titan or Enceladus (the moons of Saturn). According to Vasily Bogoyavlensky, the Yamal gas eruptions can be referred to as volcanoes only to a certain degree, although several craters can be defined as such. "I believe that many of these objects can be categorised as ordinary mud volcanoes, but they have their own peculiarities, because the near-surface soil is frozen. It additionally restrains the gas, and the pressure in the cavity can reach high values. As a result, the gas still breaks through the rock," the researcher said.

The upcoming UN conference on climate change in Glasgow was supposed to show the world the triumph of the United States and the European Union as trendsetters for everything "green". Unfortunately for them, Europe faced an unprecedented energy crisis, which called into question not only the competence of officials from Brussels, but also the feasibility of the strategy to switch to green energy as soon as possible. Russia, which did not want to dive into the whirlpool of decarbonization, found itself in a more advantageous position. Nevertheless, Moscow has something to show in Glasgow on the climate agenda. China, the United States and India altogether account for more CO2 emissions than all other countries combined. Russia accounts for less than five percent, but the anger of Western politicians and journalists, who propagate environmental slogans, is directed primarily at Russia. Such a biased attitude towards Russia is based on the laws of hybrid war: dirty propaganda should keep citizens in good shape, while raising the degree of hatred. EU demonises Russia and wants more Russian gas When European politicians accuse Russia of the gas crisis, their accusations fit into the anti-Russian agenda just as perfectly. Gazprom strictly fulfills all of its contracts, but this argumentation falls on deaf ears in the EU. For example, EU chief diplomat Josep Borrell saw "deep geopolitical roots" in the rise in energy prices. The head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, reproached the Russian gas monopoly for "not responding to higher demand" in Europe. Her compatriot from the Green party, claiming the portfolio of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Federal Republic of Germany, Annalena Baerbock, stated that Russia was "playing poker" in matters of gas supplies. She has an ironclad argument: after all, European gas storage facilities are comparatively empty.

Green New Deal are three words that have acquired great notoriety in recent times and seem to finally be the answer to the increasingly pressing requests coming from the variegated environmental world. The fear that our planet will undergo an ecological collapse that makes it an uninhabitable hell for humanity and the rest of living creatures, be they animals or plants, has prompted a part of Western society to reconsider its priorities and way of living. A part that is not very large, to be honest, but that has received a lot of attention from media, celebrities, no-profit foundations and now also from some governments. Apparently, the new green revolution will guarantee us a bright future. Drastically reduced industrial pollution, zero-emission cars, super-efficient homes and workplaces, heated and powered by the energy of the sun: these are just some of the promises, written with fire on the rock, the realization of which will give us a new Garden of Eden planetary in size. But will it really be like this? Some of the visionary benefactors who are heralds for these fabulous ideas continue to insist that the Earth is overpopulated and that it would be better to return to the situation of the early twentieth century, when the population on our planet was about a quarter of what it is today. The question then arises spontaneously on how to get back to that level quickly, with what methods and with what results.

The Americans are using the experience they are currently gaining in Ukraine to be able to go to war with China in the future. The knowledge they have gained will be used to defend Taiwan, The NYT said. "The U. S. Army transforms itself, and its hundreds of thousands of young men and women, for yet another war, this one a potential conflict with China," the newspaper wrote. The upcoming conflict between such major nuclear powers as China and the US will be many times more dangerous. It may therefore lead to huge losses for both sides.

Putin's Annual Address to the Federal Assembly is scheduled for September 30. Kremlin sources say it will become even more historic and globally important than the 2014 address for the return of Crimea. Mass media and experts make their own suggestions about the content of Putin's speech that he is going to deliver to the Federal Assembly on September 30. There are a number of versions:

On October 19, Putin signed a decree to implement martial law in four regions of Russia. He explained this by the fact that Ukrainian forces continue shelling the new Russian regions and committing acts of sabotage. According to the Russian authorities, the terrorist attack on the Crimean Bridge was carried out by the special services of Ukraine, he also said. "In this regard, let me remind you that in the Donetsk People's Republic, the Luhansk People's Republic, as well as in the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, before they joined Russia, martial law regime was already in effect. Now we need to formalize this regime within the framework of Russian legislation,” Putin said. Martial law shall be introduced starting from October 20 midnight. The government, as well as the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the Federal Security Service and the National Guard, must submit proposals on measures that are planned to be applied in the territories where martial law has been declared within three days.

On January 11, 2023, Army General Valery Gerasimov was appointed Commander of the Russian grouping of troops in the zone of the special military operation in Ukraine. Gerasimov thus replaced General Sergei Surovikin, who became his deputy. Gerasimov has an extensive experience of army service. He fought Chechen militants at the head of the army, organised Russia's special operation in Syria, and chaired the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces in November 2012. Valery Gerasimov was born on September 8, 1955 in Kazan, into a working class family. In 1977 he graduated from the Kazan Higher Tank Command School named after the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the Tatar Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (currently the Kazan Higher Tank Command Red Banner School). In 1987, he graduated with honours from the Military Academy of Armoured Forces named after Marshal of the Soviet Union Malinovsky. In 1997 — from the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.

On Thursday, February 29, Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered his annual Address to the Federal Assembly. In the beginning of the speech, he touched on the topics of the special military operation in Ukraine, relations with the West, strategic stability, and later proceeded to announce a number of new national projects, changes in economic and social sphere. About special military operation Putin recalled that 2024 marks the tenth anniversary of the "legendary Russian Spring.” "The love that the people living in Crimea and new regions share for their homeland evokes pride," Vladimir Putin said.