TERRORISMHostage Situation Continuing in Texas Published 14 January 2022 The FBI joined local and state police to surround a synagogue in Coleville, Texas, a city of about 26,000 residents about 15 miles northeast of Fort Worth, where a man has been holding the rabbi and four other people hostage since late morning. A few minutes

TERRORISMU.S. Judge Orders Colombia’s Now-Demobilized Insurgents to Compensate Family of Kidnapped Politician Published 14 January 2022 A Pennsylvania federal judge ruled on Thursday that Colombia’s now-demobilized Marxist guerrilla, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), will have to pay $36 million in compensation to the son of Ingrid Bentacourt, a Colombian politician who was kidnapped

CHINA WATCHEnvisioning the Overthrow of China’s Xi Jinping By Natalie Liu Published 14 January 2022 On 14 October 1964, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was deposed. Members of the Politburo, led by Leonid Breshnev and Alexei Kosygin, informed Khrushchev that he was being replaced, and he was escorted to a villa in a secluded area on

THE RUSSIA CONNECTIONMassive Cyberattack Targeting Ukraine’s Government Websites Published 14 January 2022 Several Ukrainian government websites have been targeted in a massive cyberattack amid heightened tensions between the West and Russia, which has massed troops and military equipment near the border with Ukraine. Several Ukrainian government websites have been targeted in a massive cyberattack amid heightened

NUCLEAR PROLIFERATIONThe Progress of Iran’s Nuclear Weapons Program Published 14 January 2022 As of November 2021, Iran had enough enriched uranium hexafluoride (UF6) in the form of near 20 and 60 percent enriched uranium to produce enough weapon-grade uranium (WGU), taken here as 25 kilograms, for a single nuclear weapon in as little as three

NUCLEAR PROLIFERATIONExamining How Countries Go Nuclear — and Why Some Do Not By Peter Dizikes Published 14 January 2022 In a new book, political scientist Vipin Narang argues that too often we imagine that all countries pursue nuclear weapons the way the U.S. and Soviet Union did during and after World War II — a

PANDEMIC & PRIVACYGerman Police Unlawfully Accessed Data on Contact-Tracing App Published 13 January 2022 Police investigators in the German city of Mainz used the Luca app to search for witnesses in a case they were working on. To get around federal and state laws banning such use of the contact-tracing app, the city’s prosecutor office

MISINFORMATIONFor Accurate Health Information: Mainstream News More Reliable Than Social, Alternative Media Published 13 January 2022 New study finds that accurate and truthful health-related information has been found by individuals who rely more on mainstream news. Meanwhile, people who depend on social media or less-established forms of “alternative” health media are more likely to subscribe

ARGUMENT: TRUST & TRACING APPSHow Our Outdated Privacy Laws Doomed Contact-Tracing Apps Published 13 January 2022 Last spring, when the disease first started its rapid spread, contact-tracing apps were heralded as a promising way to control it by tracking diagnoses and exposure through self-reporting and location tracking. Jessica Rich writes that these apps have had

EXTREMISMDOJ Adding New Unit Dedicated to Combatting Domestic Terrorism Published 13 January 2022 The Justice Department’s National Security Division is adding a new unit, dedicated to combatting domestic terrorism, as attacks, threats, and associated cases continue to grow. The FBI tells lawmakers that the greatest threat of mass casualty attacks against civilians in the United