What's going on in the World Today-180205

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USA

NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT

AFRICA

NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT

ASIA

Australia to spend $3.1 billion to increase stake in global arms exports

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said on Monday Australian military equipment manufacturers will be offered government-backed loans as part of a A$3.8 billion ($3.1 billion) package to become one of the world’s top 10 defense exporters.

Australia's Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull attends the APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting in Danang, Vietnam November 11, 2017. REUTERS/Jorge Silva
Australia said in 2016 it would boost defense spending by A$30 billion by 2021, purchasing frigates, armored personnel carriers, strike fighter jets, drones and a fleet of new submarines - many of which would be built at home.

The defense industry has struggled to obtain finance from traditional lenders that have been unwilling to fund the arms industry, so Australia has created a A$3.8 billion loan scheme for companies seeking finance to export military equipment...

CENTRAL/SOUTH AMERICA

Mexico to send troops to stem violence after record 25,000 murders

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican officials said on Sunday the government was set to unleash a new wave of troops to crack down on criminal groups in regions where a surge in violence led to more than 25,000 murders last year.

National Security Commissioner Renato Sales said federal police troops will work with local officials to round up known major criminals and bolster investigations.

The aim was “to recover peace and calm for all Mexicans,” he said. He did not provide details on the number of federal police to be deployed.

More than 25,000 murders were recorded last year as rival drug gangs increasingly splintered into smaller, more blood-thirsty groups after more than a decade of a military-led campaign to battle the cartels.

Violence is a central issue ahead of the presidential election in July. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto’s ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party is trailing in third place in recent polls...

Mexico to send troops to stem violence after record 25,000 murders

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican officials said on Sunday the government was set to unleash a new wave of troops to crack down on criminal groups in regions where a surge in violence led to more than 25,000 murders last year.

A soldier stands guard next to a crime scene, where men were killed inside a home by unknown assailants, in the municipality of San Nicolas de los Garza, Mexico, January 27, 2018. Picture taken January 27, 2018. REUTERS/Jorge Lopez
National Security Commissioner Renato Sales said federal police troops will work with local officials to round up known major criminals and bolster investigations.

The aim was “to recover peace and calm for all Mexicans,” he said. He did not provide details on the number of federal police to be deployed.

More than 25,000 murders were recorded last year as rival drug gangs increasingly splintered into smaller, more blood-thirsty groups after more than a decade of a military-led campaign to battle the cartels....

EUROPE

Interpol circulates list of suspected Isis fighters believed to be in Italy

Exclusive: Interpol believes the 50 suspects, all Tunisian nationals, may be attempting to reach other European countries

Interpol has circulated a list of 50 suspected Islamic State fighters who it believes have recently landed in Italy by boat, and may be attempting to reach other European countries.

The list, obtained by the Guardian, was drafted by the general secretariat of the international police organisation. It was sent on 29 November to the Italian interior ministry, which subsequently distributed it to national anti-terrorism agencies across Europe.

The suspects listed are all Tunisian nationals, some of whom were identified by officials when they landed in Italy. The document shows their first names, surnames and dates of births.

Around 5,500 Tunisians were believed to have travelled to Isis territory in Syria and Iraq to fight for the terror group, according to UN estimates – more than any other country. Now, after the collapse of its “caliphate,” governments have expressed concern that former fighters may try to mount attacks in Europe....

AFGHANISTAN

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CHINA

China Strengthens Missile Defense Near N.Korean Border

By Lee Kil-seong

China is preparing for a potential war on the Korean Peninsula by reinforcing missile defenses near the border with North Korea, Radio Free Asia reported Friday.

RFA quoted a North Korean source in China as saying the Chinese military late last year deployed another missile defense battery at an armored division in Helong, west of Longjing in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture.

Military units in Yanbian were relocated from Heilongjiang Province, thus adding 300,000 troops along the border, the source added.

Now it is deploying missile defense batteries near North Korean reservoirs by the Apnok and Duman rivers.

Chinese troops in the border area could be swept away if the North tore down the banks of the reservoirs or they were destroyed by missiles or air strikes, the source added.

On Jan. 24, Taiwan's Central News Agency reported that the 78th Group Army, the first Chinese military unit that would cross the border into the North in the event of a war on the Korean Peninsula, has been armed with newest surface-to-air missiles against South Korean and U.S. aircraft and missiles.

Why Is China Buying Up Europe’s Ports?

State-owned port operators are the aggressive leading edge of Beijing’s massive Belt and Road project.

China’s trillion-dollar signature foreign-policy project, the Belt and Road Initiative, is often lampooned as just a fuzzy concept with little to show for it on the ground.

But in bustling ports from Singapore to the North Sea, state-owned Chinese firms are turning the idea into a reality with a series of aggressive acquisitions that are physically redrawing the map of global trade and political influence.

A pair of deep-pocketed Chinese behemoths, Cosco Shipping Ports and China Merchants Port Holdings, have gone on a buying binge of late, snapping up cargo terminals in the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Atlantic rim. Just last month, Cosco finalized the takeover of the terminal in Zeebrugge, Belgium’s second-biggest port, marking the Chinese firm’s first bridgehead in northwestern Europe.

That deal followed a raft of other acquisitions in Spain, Italy, and Greece in just the last couple of years. Chinese state firms, which once kept close to their home market, now control about one-tenth of all European port capacity...

China’s plan to use artificial intelligence to boost the thinking skills of nuclear submarine commanders

China is working to update the rugged old computer systems on nuclear submarines with artificial intelligence to enhance the potential thinking skills of commanding officers, a senior scientist involved with the programme told the South China Morning Post.

A submarine with AI-augmented brainpower not only would give China’s large navy an upper hand in battle under the world’s oceans but would push applications of AI technology to a new level, according to the researcher, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the project’s sensitivity.

“Though a submarine has enormous power of destruction, its brain is actually quite small,” the researcher said.

While a nuclear submarine depends on the skill, experience and efficiency of its crew to operate effectively, the demands of modern warfare could introduce variables that would cause even the smoothest-run operation to come unglued....
IRAN

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IRAQ

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ISRAEL

Israel to legalize settlement outpost deep in West Bank

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel on Sunday said it plans to legalize an isolated West Bank outpost in response to the murder of one of its residents in a shooting attack last month.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his weekly Cabinet meeting that his government will legalize Havat Gilad to "allow the continuing of normal life there."

"Whoever thought that through the reprehensible murder of a resident of Havat Gilad, a father of six, that our spirit can be broken and we can be weakened, is making a bitter mistake," Netanyahu said.

Last month, Rabbi Raziel Shevah, 35, was shot dead from a passing vehicle as he drove near his home in the unauthorized settlement outpost near the Palestinian city of Nablus. The Israeli military is still searching the area for suspects.

KOREAN PENNSULEA

South Korea Defense Budget Is Threat-Driven

South Korea’s defense ministry wants a hefty increase in spending next year on weapons to face the missile and nuclear threat from North Korea. The proposed budget also would allow South Korea’s own surface-to-surface missile capabilities to advance.

Development of the Korea Aerospace Industries KF-X fighter and LCH-LAH civil-military helicopter (see page 65) are additional major spending items proposed for 2018.

Of the total budget request of 43.11 trillion won ($US40 billion) for 2018, the ministry wants to spend 4.33 trillion won on systems to face North Korean missile and nuclear threats, 13.7% more than in 2017. That will include a ground-based, ballistic-missile early-warning radar, perhaps a second Elta EL/M-2080 Green Pine from Israel...

RUSSIA

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SYRIA

NOTHING SIGNIFICANT TO REPORT

MIDDLE EAST GENERAL

Yemen rebels say Saudi airstrike on police building kills 8

SANAA, Yemen (AP) — Yemeni rebels say an air raid by the Saudi-led coalition fighting them struck a police building in the rebel-controlled capital, Sanaa, killing eight people.

In a statement by their military media unit, the rebels, known as Houthis, say that a child was killed in the Sunday attack that badly damaged a department of records building and wounding some 58 people.

Security officials and witnesses said many of the dead were civilians, speaking on condition of anonymity because they feared retribution...

MISC
Thales Highlights Integrated Aviation Cybersecurity

Sometimes, products that don't appear at an airshow still dominate proceedings - the absence of the F-35 from Farnborough in 2014 was almost as much of a talking point as its appearance there two years later, for example. But if Thales manages to get Singapore discussing one major product line that it has deliberately chosen not to highlight on its stand this year, it will have made a major contribution not just to its own marketing, but perhaps to the cause of enhanced aviation safety generally.

Cyber is often described as the "fifth domain" after land, sea, air and space. Yet computer networks underlie every domain, and problems in one area can quickly spread. If the only people practicing cybersecurity and cyberdefense work in their own department, separate from the other domains, the outcomes will not be good.

Thales is taking a different tack: and this is why, at the Airshow this week, there will be no roped-off section of the company's stand detailing its cyber offerings. Instead, the company is keen to emphasize the importance of integrating cybersecurity thinking across all parts of the aviation ecosystem - civil and military, in the air or on the ground.