The CIA has frozen a program to support the rebels from the Free Syrian Army (FSA), who control territories in northwestern Syria. This is reported by Reuters, citing sources among the rebels and in the US government. This is a program with the participation of Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, in which the rebels received money and ammunition, as well as military training.

Journalists Ilya Barabanov (Kommersant) and Nadezhda Prusenkova (Novaya Gazeta) reported that the Eksmo publishing house refused to accredit them to the presentation of a new book by former press secretary of the RF IC Vladimir Markin. Earlier, Barabanov and Prusenkova found borrowings from their own articles in his previous book. Barabanov wrote on his Facebook that he had sent a letter to the publishing house with a request to accredit him.

The Presidential Council for Human Rights (HRC), the Russian Red Cross and the Fair Aid Foundation will establish an award named after Elizaveta Glinka (Doctor Lisa), who died in a plane crash near Sochi at the end of December 2016.

Ukrainian businessman Dmitry Firtash was detained in Vienna. This was reported in the prosecutor's office of the city. Firtash was detained at the request of Spain. This came just minutes after a court allowed him to be extradited to the United States in another case, writes The Guardian. How the detention of a businessman will affect the extradition process, the prosecutor's office did not specify, the newspaper writes.

The Mediazona publication received notifications from Roskomnadzor of two fines of five thousand rubles for the fact that news about extremist organizations did not say that they were extremist. The publication's editor-in-chief Sergei Smirnov told Meduza about this.

Icelandic President Guðni Jóhannesson has spoken out against adding pineapple to pizza. Moreover, according to the Icelandic leader, if it were in his power, he would ban pizza with pineapple altogether. The president made these statements at a meeting with schoolchildren, one of whom asked how Jóhannesson felt about Hawaiian pizza . Afterwards, the Icelandic press wondered how the disdain for pineapples might affect Guðni Jóhannesson's approval ratings.

Watch? Calculators? ATMs? Cars?! DOOM is over 23 years old, but it is still very popular. Those who are tired of just playing the legendary shooter on the computer will port him on other devices - sometimes rather crazy. "Medusa" tells what DOOM, Doom 2 and their clones can be launched on.

Researchers of the work of the American poet and writer Walt Whitman managed to discover his previously unknown work - the novel The Life and Adventures of Jack Angle. The novel was found in the archives of the Sunday Dispatch newspaper. The Life and Adventures of Jack Angle was printed in several numbers of this edition in 1852. The authorship of the novel was not indicated in the publication, however, Whitman's diaries contain a detailed synopsis of this work.

The Russian Foreign Ministry proposed to ban the export of carpets worth more than $500 to the DPRK. The published draft of the presidential decree also states that porcelain dishes worth more than $100 should not be exported to North Korea. The Foreign Ministry proposed to supplement the list of "luxury items" that are prohibited from being sent to the DPRK, after the decision of the UN Security Council to impose new sanctions against the country.

Photo: Vladimir Astapkovich / Sputnik / Scanpix / Leta On February 21, Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev appointed his wife Mehriban Aliyev as vice president. According to the president, she has played a significant role in the life of the country for many years, and also occupies the post of deputy head of the ruling party of Azerbaijan. "Medusa" tells who the Mehriban Aliyeva is.

The Ukrainian prosecutor's office opened a criminal case under the article "treason" in connection with the development by the deputy of the Verkhovna Rada Andrey Artemenko of a plan to resolve the conflict in Ukraine, which provides for the transfer of Crimea to Russia for rent for several decades.

State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin asked the government to revise the bills submitted to the lower house of parliament and withdraw documents that have lost their relevance. With such a request, according to RBC, Volodin turned at a meeting of the Duma Council to the authorized representative of the government in the lower house, Alexander Sinenko.

Photo: Mark Lennihan / AP / Scanpix / LETA Russia’s permanent representative to the United Nation Vitaly Churkin suddenly died in New York on February 20. He was 64 years old. Churkin was known for his toughness in the face of his Western counterparts. US, UK, and EU officials echoed Russian officials in calling him an outstanding diplomat. Vitaly Churkin was 64 years old. The ambassador died just one day shy of his 65th birthday. His death was unexpected.

A radioactive isotope leak is not related to nuclear tests: Science Alert Photo: US Air Force American aircraft WC-135W Constant Phoenix, which is used to monitor the consequences of nuclear tests and accidents at nuclear enterprises In the Earth’s atmosphere in January 2017, a slight increase in the content of the radioactive isotope of the Yod-131 was recorded. This became known in February, and immediately the theory of nuclear trials in Russia appeared.

Assistant to the State Duma deputy from United Russia Maxim Ivanov, during a business trip to Yekaterinburg, went to purchase Hawthorn. Thus, he decided to check how easy it is to buy alcohol-containing surrogates. According to Ivanov, his assistant dressed sloppily, “gargled with cognac” and went to the place where local alcoholics gather. “I asked the peasants where you can get boyars, you want to drink.