In fact, the only thing that makes North Korea a threat is their nuclear capability — made possible by the Clinton and Bush administrations. These two administrations played key roles in helping the late Kim Jong-Il develop North Korea’s nuclear prowess from the mid 1990’s onward. Former US Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld was on the board of technology giant ABB when it won a deal to supply North Korea with two nuclear power plants.

According to the 2003 report from SWI, the Swiss-based ABB told swissinfo that Rumsfeld was involved with the company in early 2000, when it netted a $200 million (SFr270million) contract with Pyongyang. The ABB contract was to deliver equipment and services for two nuclear power stations at Kumho, on North Korea’s east coast. However, Rumsfeld was simply taking the baton from the Clinton administration, who, in 1994, agreed to begin replacing North Korea’s domestically built nuclear reactors with light water reactors.

Henry Sokolski, head of the Non-proliferation Policy Education Center in Washington, noted at the time that “LWRs could be used to produce dozens of bombs’ worth of weapons-grade plutonium in both North Korea and Iran. This is true of all LWRs — a depressing fact US policymakers have managed to block out. These reactors are like all reactors, they have the potential to make weapons. So you might end up supplying the worst nuclear violator with the means to acquire the very weapons we’re trying to prevent it acquiring,” said Sokolski.

On Tuesday, the Washington Post reported that a US intelligence assessment concluded North Korea has successfully produced a miniaturized nuclear warhead, a disclosure that rapidly intensified an already tense standoff with the rogue nation. Soon after the report, President Donald Trump warned Kim against making further threats, saying North Korea “will be met with the fire and the fury like the world has never seen.”

Whether Kim truly possesses the ability to miniaturize a nuclear warhead — and successfully launch it on an intercontinental missile — is unknown and remains hotly debated. Yet there is no doubt now that Kim has scored one major achievement: He is finally being taken seriously by the foreign policy establishment and intelligence agencies, evidenced by the latest assessment on his nuclear capabilities.

Moon Chung In, a national security adviser to South Korea’s president, said that Kim has taken rational steps to shore up his regime, with a goal of deterring any form of US attack or intervention. “North Korea is very, very stable,” said Moon during a recent interview in Seoul. “Kim Jong Un has consolidated power fully.”

Jonathan D Pollack, a Korea specialist and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, recalled how Senator John McCain of Arizona this year labeled Kim Jong Un as a “crazy fat kid.” He said seeing North Korea’s leader this way is risky. “I treat it seriously,” said Pollack of North Korea. “It’s not a cartoon because of its increasing capabilities.”

Last September, the North Koreans detonated a nuclear device that was estimated to be in the 20 to 30 kiloton range, and back in January President Trump pledged to stop the North Koreans before they would ever have the capability to deliver such a weapon to US cities.  But now the North Koreans have already achieved that goal, and they plan to ultimately create an entire fleet of ICBMs capable of hitting every city in America.

Right now, North Korea and the Trump administration are locked in a game of nuclear chicken.  Kim Jong Un’s regime is never, ever, ever going to give up their nuclear weapons program, and so that means that either Donald Trump is going to have to back down, find another way to deal with North Korea, or use military force to eliminate their nuclear threat.

And time is quickly running out for Trump to make a decision, because now that North Korea has the ability to produce miniaturized nuclear warheads, the game has completely changed. The truth is that nobody actually knows how many nukes North Korea has at this point, and they are pumping out more all the time.

Yes, the Trump administration could order an absolutely devastating military strike on North Korea.  But if the North Koreans even get off one nuke in response, it will be the greatest disaster for humanity since at least World War II. But at this point Trump doesn’t sound like someone that intends to back down.  In fact, on Tuesday he threatened North Korea with “fire and fury” if they keep threatening us…

Most Americans appear to be completely oblivious to the seriousness of this crisis.  Once we hit North Korea, they will respond.  A single nuke could potentially kill millions in Tokyo, Japan or Seoul, South Korea.  And the North Koreans also have some of the largest chemical and biological weapons stockpiles on the entire planet.  If things take a bad turn, we could see death and destruction on a scale that is absolutely unprecedented.

Let us pray that a way can be found to derail North Korea’s nuclear program that does not involve us going to war. Because the moment that US forces start striking North Korea, the North Koreans could literally unleash hell if they are inclined to do so. It appears that we are now closer to nuclear war than we have been at any point since the Cuban missile crisis.  A nuclear holocaust was avoided back then, and hopefully a way will be found to avoid one now.

When complete around 2023, it will generate 2.2 GW of power from the Kwanza River in North Kwanza province, expected to meet more than half of the country's power needs. Nearly 10,000 local jobs will be created during the peak construction period.

Addressing the opening ceremony on Friday, Energy and Water Resources Minister Joao Baptista Borges called the project "crucial" to the economic construction of Angola. “It will solve the power shortage in Angola and bring jobs to the country,” he said.

Chinese state-owned conglomerates behind colossal dams like The Three Gorges and some of the world’s highest-situated dams on the Tibetan Plateau have flexed their engineering muscles in Africa. By late June, according to survey by People’s Daily Online, Chinese firms have raised or contracted to build hydropower plants in at least 24 out of 54 African countries.

After reports of the possibility that an early trade deal agreement with the US could allow the importation of chlorine-washed chicken, the media rushed to herald the death of food safety standards as another Brexit bad news story – and yet more evidence that the cost of exiting Europe is too high for Brits to bear.

An article in the Irish Times sneered over ‘Brexit-Flavoured Chlorination Chicken’, and in the Metro, Oliver Wheaton moaned: “We Might Start Getting Chlorinated Chicken Thanks To (You Guessed It) Brexit,” claiming that “the EU bans this practice on health grounds”. In fact, the European Food Safety Agency has passed chlorinated-washed chicken for safe consumption.

Launching a campaign to help parents manage their children’s internet use, she said it was essential that parents understood the importance of balancing their child's time online, just as they would balance their diet. "Many children are using social media and the internet like sweets or junk food. Parents wouldn’t let their kids eat a double cheeseburger and fries every day, so they shouldn't let them spend time online in an unhealthy way," she said. 

"They have a responsibility as the providers of the smart phones, computers and iPads their children use, to step in now and make sure their children’s online lives are healthy. "We do think there is a role here for parents to step up, to stop waiting for others to come up with the solution, be that government or [social media] companies.”

The forest is also home to the largest herd of European bison, unique birds and insects, and the ECJ has issued an interim order demanding Poland cease its activities. But the Polish government, led by the eurosceptic Rule and Jutice Party (PiS), has claimed the logging is necessary to control a beetle outbreak and has ignored the ECJ ruling. 

It is the latest act of defiance by PiS, having passed controversial judicial reforms giving the government greater powers over the judiciary and the state-run media.  Last week European Council president Donald Tusk, a former Polish prime minister, admitted there was a "question mark" over his country's future with the EU. 

He said: "It smells like an introduction to an announcement that Poland does not need the European Union and that Poland is not needed for the EU. I am afraid we are closer to that moment.” 

EU states are divided on rules under which, for example, a Bulgarian truck driver or a Lithuanian bricklayer can work in France for a limited time for the eastern European wage, often below the minimum level guaranteed in wealthy western Europe.

Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic say they should be allowed to compete on lower prices - just as more developed western EU nations compete on quality products and know-how - to catch up after decades of communist stagnation. The dispute is shaping up as one of the most contentious issues facing the bloc, exacerbating an east-west rift as it seeks unity to tackle Brexit.

Now, a new row is erupting as Polish MPs call for Germany to pay Poland PLN 1.5 trillion (EUR 350 billion, USD 420 billion) in reparations for invading the country during WWII. Marek Jakubiak, a deputy for the anti-establishment Kukiz' 15 grouping, followed similar comments from his conservative peers. Jakubiak told public broadcaster Polish Radio: "The fact that we are a poor country does not come from the fact that we are idiots. The Germans burned our homeland. We lost 50 years.

"I do not want a war with the Germans, I do not want bad relations with Germany... The Germans have to pay for the damage done to Poland and then we will talk normally as partners.” Jarosław Kaczyński, head of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party revealed the matter is on his mind at a convention in July. He said gargantuan damages caused to his country were “really still not made up for”.

PiS deputy Arkadiusz Mularczyk wants a report on whether demanding reparations from Germany is feasible. The final report will be ready by the middle of August. During the invasion by Hitler’s Nazis from 1939 to 1945, Poland lost nearly six million Poles, Mularczyk said. The politician claimed seeking war reparations from Germany was a "moral duty".

His latest comments on the purported head of the Catholic Church may have been his most perceptive as of yet and should be heeded not only by Western secular leaders, but by the globe’s one billion or so Catholics, most of whom regard Jorge Bergoglio as pope.

The Russian President’s statement came on a visit to the Naval Cathedral of St Nicholas in Kronstadt.  Mr Putin succinctly sums up what Pope Francis is not: “If you look around at what he (the Pope) says it’s clear that he is not a man of God.  At least not the Christian God, not the God of the Bible.”

Not only is Pope Francis a Christian fraud as Vladimir Putin and other perceptive commentators have observed, but in secular matters he is a neo-Marxist in economic thought, a One-World Government advocate, and an enthusiast of open borders and mass migration.  In other words, an enemy of what is left of Western Civilization.