Religion and Society

The FBI confirmed that a special agent was conducting “official duties” when he shot and killed a man whom FBI interviewed in recent weeks about his ties to Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the deceased Boston Marathon bombing suspect.

Red tape led to the lack of adequate infrastructure which significantly increased Oklahoma tornado death toll.

At their latest gathering in Amman in Jordan, the nations known as the Friends of Syria accused Russia and Iran of supplying the regime of the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad with modern arms. The actual situation, however, is very different. It is Assad’s Western and Arab foes who rush support, including arms, to one of the sides in the civil war in Syria.

At their latest gathering in Amman in Jordan, the nations known as the Friends of Syria accused Russia and Iran of supplying the regime of the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad with modern arms. The actual situation, however, is very different. It is Assad’s Western and Arab foes who rush support, including arms, to one of the sides in the civil war in Syria.

US Secretary of State John Kerry called on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday to make "a commitment to find peace in his country," ahead of a meeting of the Friends of Syria group in Amman.

As Senate panel votes to provide weapons to rebels battling the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, many begin to wonder what will happen if those weapons get into the hands of terrorists.

The head of an official inquiry into last month's collapse of a Bangladesh factory complex said Wednesday the building's owner was the main culprit because he violated building codes.

Turkish police have arrested six people who were planning attacks against refugees staying in camps near the Syrian border, a local governor said on Wednesday.

At five times the speed of sound, high-tech weapons could be in the skies by the middle of the next decade. One such hypersonic vehicle Air Force's X-51A Waverider has already completed its final test flight.

Ballerina Olga Smirnova, a rising star of Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater, has won a prestigious Benois de la Danse ballet award. She is the only woman in the company of six Benois de la Danse-2013 awardees, the other five being two male dancers and three male choreographers. The awards ceremony preceded the opening of the Benois de la Danse festival in Moscow.

The world's largest ever installation featuring 48 portraits of Russian women is on display as part of the “Face and Soul” exhibition at the Historical Museum in Moscow.

Analysts are racking their brains about the intrigue behind an international defense conference slated to begin in Moscow on Thursday. Entitled “Military and Political Aspects of European Security”, the meeting will bring together defense chiefs from the CIS, CSTO and NATO member states for two days of debates which, according to some experts, may have to do with the planned Russian-Belarusian military exercises Zapad-2013 and NATO’s Steadfast Jazz army drills in Eastern Europe.

The Internal Revenue Service official who this month revealed the U.S. tax agency's targeting of conservative groups asserted her constitutional right not to answer questions before a U.S. congressional committee on Wednesday.

The EU energy policy is one of the main topics at the EU summit that is currently underway in Brussels. Among other things, discussions are being unfolding there around the future of the shale gas in Europe. Despite the fact that great hopes are linked with shale gas, concrete decisions have not yet followed. The point is that there are many questions now about the future of the shale gas.

The Islamic Development Bank has temporarily suspended Syria’s membership, IDB President Ahmad Mohamed Ali Al Madani announced Wednesday.

Bitcoin, the digital cryptocurrency, is starting to attract the attention of the US government. It seems that the American authorities would like to destroy the digital currency before it could become a widespread alternative to the US dollar.

David Cameron's woes are continuing this week with plans to legalize same-sex marriage to be debated in Parliament today and tomorrow. The issue is hugely divisive, not least within the Tory Party which seems to have been in open rebellion in the last couple of weeks over everything from the E.U. to the next election. And on Sunday 34 current and former local party chairmen delivered a letter to Downing Street opposing the policy as "flawed, un-Conservative and costing us dearly in votes and membership". Gay marriage is causing a heated row across the political and public spheres.

A white-tailed deer crashed through the windshield of a public bus in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. It was filmed by a surveillance camera. (VIDEO)

The famous Italian opera house La Scala did not miss out on the celebration of the 200-year anniversary of composer Richard Wagner's birth. Carlo Maria Cella, the head of La Scala's press relations, talked to the Voice of Russia about what Wagner represents for Italy and the entire world.

Henri Dutilleux, one of France's leading 20th century composers, has died on Wednesday in Paris at the age of 97, his family announced.

The capuchin monkey named Mally, which was seized from Canadian pop-star Justin Bieber by customs officials in Munich in March, officially became property of Germany. Bieber has six weeks to contest the decision.