Video courtesy: Russian Investigative Committee. WARNING! Some users could find this footage disturbing. The video shows Volgograd railway station following a suicide blast that killed at least 15 people and left dozens of injured. LATEST.

BBC: 'Suicide bomber' hits Russia's Volgograd train station - Video

President Bashar al-Assad on Saturday sent a message to Pope Francis conveyed by Minister of State Joseph Sweid during his meeting with the Pope's Secretary of State, Archbishop Pietro Parolin. ● In the message, President al-Assad expressed the Syrian people and leadership's appreciation of the stances of his holiness regarding the crisis in Syria, highlighting that the crisis will be solved through national dialogue among the Syrians and under a Syrian leadership without foreign intervention as to enable the Syrians to determine their future and leadership through ballots. The message stressed Syrian government's readiness to participate in the international conference on Syria "Geneva 2," highlighting that combating terrorism that is targeting citizens is a decisive factor in making any peaceful solution to the crisis a success. The message also highlighted that stopping terrorism requires having the countries which are involved in supporting the armed terrorist groups stop providing any sort of military, logistic or training support, noting that this support was provided by some of Syria's neighbors and other known countries in the Middle East and abroad. President al-Assad stressed the Syrian government's keenness on carrying out its constitutional duty of protecting its citizens, regardless of their race and religion, from the crimes of the takfiri groups that target their homes, schools and places pf worship with terrorist bombings or arbitrary shelling. During the meeting, Archbishop Parolin said his holiness is constantly following the situation in Syria and is deeply concerned over the suffering of the Syrian people, adding that Pope Francis affirms the need to solve the crisis in Syria through dialogue among the Syrians without foreign intervention.

Top Secret NSA catalog reveals US government has been secretly back dooring equipment from US companies including Dell, Cisco, Juniper, IBM, Western Digital, Seagate, Maxtor and more, risking enormous damage to US tech sector. ● When it comes to modern firewalls for corporate computer networks, the world's second largest network equipment manufacturer doesn't skimp on praising its own work. According to Juniper Networks' online PR copy, the company's products are "ideal" for protecting large companies and computing centers from unwanted access from outside. They claim the performance of the company's special computers is "unmatched" and their firewalls are the "best-in-class." Despite these assurances, though, there is one attacker none of these products can fend off -- the United States' National Security Agency. Specialists at the intelligence organization succeeded years ago in penetrating the company's digital firewalls. A document viewed by SPIEGEL resembling a product catalog reveals that an NSA division called ANT has burrowed its way into nearly all the security architecture made by the major players in the industry -- including American global market leader Cisco and its Chinese competitor Huawei, but also producers of mass-market goods, such as US computer-maker Dell.

Have something to say against Israel's conduct (or the conduct of any US government criminal ally?) Well, that kind of behavior might earn you a visit from your local FBI thugs. They just want to make sure "everybody's safe" and "nothing happens." Hats off to this intrepid citizen who put these jack asses for hire back on their heels and videotaped the event for all of us to learn from.

The president called defense bill a "welcome step" toward closing Gitmo, but civil liberties issues abound. ● On Thursday President Obama signed into law the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a sweeping defense policy bill, which includes some improvements in terms of civil liberties and human rights on its previous two iterations. However, a number of provisions — as in the 2012 and 2013 NDAAs — should keep civil libertarians concerned. As a notable improvement, NDAA 2014 includes a provision that Obama called a “welcome step” toward fulfilling his longtime promise to close the Guantanamo Bay prison camp. The bill relaxes regulations that have held up the transfer of detainees out of the detention center. The defense act also includes provisions aimed at intervening in the epidemic of sexual assault in the U.S. military. But, as the Washington Post noted, “it stops short of the broad reforms that Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and other advocates have been calling for.”