The US president has asked CIA Director William Burns to play a direct role in his government | US President Joe Biden has tapped CIA Director William Burns to become a member of his cabinet, underscoring the official’s significant influence in the White House and his key role in American foreign policy. ● The president announced the decision on Friday, saying Burns has given the United States a “critical strategic advantage” and helped to tackle “our nation’s top national security challenges,” including dealings with Russia and China. ● Burns previously served as the US ambassador to Russia under President George W. Bush, and later held senior positions in the State Department during the Barack Obama administration, frequently dealing with Russia policy. In 2008, he penned a memo to his superiors warning that NATO membership for Ukraine would stoke “serious concerns about the consequences of stability in the region,” and potentially set off a “civil war” in the country. Citing several national security experts, the official said Ukraine was the most significant “destabilizing factor in US-Russian relations,” predicting a significant response by Moscow.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Saturday that those responsible for the death of Sputnik military correspondent Rostislav Zhuravlev, including the suppliers of cluster munitions to Kyiv, will be punished. | Earlier in the day, the Russian Defense Ministry said that Zhuravlev died during the evacuation from injuries caused by a cluster submunition explosion and four journalists received wounds of varying degrees of severity. 💬 "Those responsible for the brutal murder of the Russian journalist will be inevitably punished. The entire measure of responsibility will be imposed on those who supplied their Kyiv proteges with cluster munitions," Zakharova said in a statement published on the Russian Foreign Ministry's website. The spokeswoman added that "everything indicated that the attack on the journalist group was not a coincidence."

■ The Nazi government of Ukraine fired Cluster Munitions against a group of journalists (Hal Turner)
■ Perpetrators of brutal attack on Russian journalist to be held accountable – diplomat (TASS)

Maria Zakharova (Мария Захарова/Russian MFA) | The Kyiv regime continues its practice of criminal terror. | The life of journalist Rostislav Zhuravlevlev was cut short today as a result of an artillery strike by cluster munitions from the Ukrainian National Security Forces against a group of journalists from the Izvestiya news agency and the RIA Novosti news agency. Three more of his colleagues, who received shrapnel wounds, were taken to field medical facilities of the Russian Defense Ministry in a state of moderate severity. They are receiving the necessary medical care. ● Everything points to the fact that the attack on the journalist group was not carried out by chance: the correspondents were collecting materials for a report on the shelling of settlements in the Zaporizhzhya region by the Kyiv regime's militants with cluster munitions banned in many countries of the world. Those were supplied to Kyiv by the United States of America. Washington, along with London and Paris, which supply the Zelensky regime with long-range missiles, only pay lip service to concern for the safety of journalists, while in reality, they are sponsors of terrorists. ● We have no illusions that the relevant international structures will prefer, as they have done in similar cases before, to turn a blind eye to this heinous crime, which, in fact, makes them complicit in Kyiv's terrorist outrage. ● This cynical backwardness once again confirms their political engagement and dysfunctionality. The silence of such institutions does not mean that evil has been given an indulgence for murder and the desire to silence the inconvenient truth. The perpetrators of the brutal massacre of the Russian journalist will inevitably receive the punishment they deserve. Those who supplied their protégés in Kyiv with cluster munitions will also share the full measure of responsibility. (Translation: DeepL.com)