Another US drone attack on Pakistan’s northwestern tribal belt has killed at least 15 people amid the ongoing military campaign in the region by Pakistani armed forces. ● The strike by the pilotless US aircraft on Wednesday hit the border region of North Waziristan, where government troops have been engaged in fierce fighting aimed at purging the entire area of pro-Taliban militants and their fortifications, according to Pakistani authorities. “A US drone fired two missiles targeting a militant compound in Zoi Saidgai area, killing at least 15 insurgents,” said a high-ranking security official in Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan.

Moscow and Havana have reportedly reached an agreement on reopening the SIGINT facility in Lourdes, Cuba - once Russia’s largest foreign base of this kind - which was shut down in 2001 due to financial problems and under US pressure. ● When operational, the facility was manned by thousands of military and intelligence personnel, whose task was to intercept signals coming from and to the US territory and to provide communication for the Russian vessels in the western hemisphere. Russia considered reopening the Lourdes base since 2004 and has sealed a deal with Cuba last week during the visit of the Russian President Vladimir Putin to the island nation, reports Kommersant business daily citing multiple sources. “I can say one thing: at last!” one of the sources commented on the news to the paper, adding that the significance of the move is hard to overestimate.

SPECIFIC EXAMPLES OF WHAT THEY MAY BE DOING

At 13:00 today July 16, hearings are held in the Stockholm District Court whether to lift the almost-four-year-old detention in absentia for Julian Assange. This is live reporting from the court hearings, which will be followed by a press conference at the Police at 16:00.

Dr. Mads Gilbert, a Norwegian doctor, joins us from Gaza where he has been treating hundreds of victims wounded in Israel’s ongoing assault, including young children.

Dr. Gilbert says hospitals are operating without electricity, water and proper medical supplies, but adds: "As a medical doctor, my appeal is don’t send bandages, don’t send syringes, don’t send medical teams. The most important medical thing you can do now is to force Israel to stop the bombing and lift the siege of Gaza." Gilbert recently recently submitted a report to the United Nations on the state of the Gaza health sector in 2014.

"Where is the humanity? Where is the decency of the U.S. government allowing Israel this impunity to punish the whole civilian population in Gaza? It’s just outrageous. And the main problem in the Middle East today, it is the Israeli impunity. They go on with these so-called military campaigns every third year. They kill. They maim. They try to sort of oppress the population to surrender. The Palestinians will never surrender. And our duty is to support them and to raise the awareness and to raise the solidarity work in our countries to pressure our politicians to change the attitude towards the real oppressor and the real criminal here. It is the state of Israel."

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A total of 660 suspected paedophiles have been arrested across Britain in the biggest police operation of its kind, it was revealed today. ● Detectives seized suspects including doctors, teachers, care workers, scout leaders and ex-police officers in a six-month crackdown. Police say they have protected or “safeguarded” a total of 431 children, many of whom were at immediate risk from suspects. Some of these suspects had unsupervised access to children in the course of their work. The operation, codenamed Notarise, was co-ordinated by the National Crime Agency and in- volved searches of 833 homes and offices across the UK. Police said they seized nearly 10,000 phones and computers.

The Mirror: Labour peer escapes probe over 20 child sex claims because he is 'suffering dementia'

A court in the Netherlands has ruled that the Dutch state is responsible for the deaths of over 300 people in the Srebrenica massacre. ● Presiding Judge Larissa Elwin at the civil court pronounced the verdict on Wednesday in the Dutch city of The Hague. Elwin said the Netherlands is liable for the deaths of the men killed in July 1995 after being expelled from a UN compound, which was a designated "safe area" protected by Dutch peacekeeping troops. The judge continued by saying that the Dutch UN peacekeepers should have known that the deported men would be killed as there was evidence of the Serbs committing war crimes. The 300 men were among over 8,000 Muslim men and boys, who were slaughtered by Bosnian Serb troops, led by Ratko Mladic, after his forces outnumbered Dutch peacekeepers, who bowed to pressure and forced thousands of families out of the Dutch UN compound.