JAPAN - China has claimed Japan is "preparing for war" as it stages its first major military exercises for nearly 30 years. The defence drills stoked already rising tensions between the neighbours as a dispute over a chain of strategic islands threatens to escalate into open conflict. Beijing's ships and planes have made dozens of incursions this year close to the uninhabited Senkaku islands - known as Diaoyu in China.

EUROPE - Brussels' bid to crack down on big tech firms based in Ireland is motivated by "sour grapes" on the part of Germany and France - while the bloc has also been accused of having an "anti-US agenda". Ex-Irish diplomat Ray Bassett said: “Ireland is heavily reliant on the American companies which contribute greatly to the State's economy and provide a large proportion of our tax receipts, hence there is a natural desire not to work against their interests. “ In Brussels however there is a clear agenda against the American tech giants. “The European Commission has regularly expressed its discomfort at the domination of high tech by American companies and hence the EU authorities are very vigilant in prosecuting any perceived transgressions. The EU would love to greatly limit the US role and also would like to remove the individual countries' role in policing the GDPR.” Mr Bassett further suggested the enforcement of EU law on giant tech firms was always going to be a major problem.

USA - Imports to Los Angeles in August fell 5.9% year on year amid heavy congestion. The number of container ships at anchor or drifting in San Pedro Bay off the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has now blown through all previous records and is rising by the day. There were an all-time-high 65 container ships in the queue in San Pedro Bay on Thursday, according to the Marine Exchange of Southern California. Of those, a record 23 were forced to drift because anchorages were full. Theoretically, the numbers — already surreally high — could go a lot higher than this. While designated anchorages are limited, the space for ships to safely drift offshore is not. The Southern California gateway is acting like the narrow tube on a funnel: Ocean volumes pour in from Asia and can only flow out at a certain velocity due to terminal limitations as well as limitations of warehouses, trucking and rail beyond the terminal. When the flow into the top of the funnel is too great, as it is now, it creates an overflow in the form of ships at anchor or adrift.

IRAN - Iran on Saturday hailed its acceptance into a China and Russia-led bloc, an eastward turn it sees as opening access to major world markets and a counter to crippling Western sanctions. Conservative and reformist newspapers showed rare unity in welcoming the outcome of a conference in Dushanbe on Friday at which members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation endorsed Iran's future membership in the bloc. The eight-member group, created two decades ago and which also includes India, promotes itself as an antidote to Western dominance. Chinese President Xi Jinping said Iran's membership had been unanimously accepted. Apart from Russia and China, the other founding members are the former Soviet states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. India and Pakistan were admitted in 2017. Together they represent around 40 percent of the world's population and more than 20 percent of global gross domestic product - an immense potential market for Tehran.

EUROPE - Playing host was German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who delivered a speech to his Baltic counterparts at a luncheon they enjoyed together. He said: “...Yes, it’s true that in Germany we often instinctively look to the west. The decades of the Iron Curtain still have an impact decades later. And it remains true that the Franco-German friendship is a fundamental element of a united Europe. But good European policy is only possible when my country works closely with all member states, in the north and south, in the centre of Europe and in the north-east.

EUROPE - The European Union shows all the signs of worsening economic, social and political decline, with symptoms ranging from tepid economic growth and chronically high unemployment to social unrest and rising political extremism. The idealistic roots and worthy intentions of early European integration in the wake of two world wars have long given way to a bureaucratic cadre steeped in etatist [the extreme authority of the state over the individual citizen] doctrines. At its heart, the EU is an elite-driven project that rejects the primacy of market economics over social welfare models, compounded by a disdain for democracy. Until Europe starts to acknowledge the increasing gulf between old and new Europe, and takes economic reform seriously, it will continue to experience tepid growth. But while it may be only a matter of time before the system collapses, it will probably have to await a major ‘existential’ crisis or the arrival of a new generation of realists.

DENMARK - Denmark-based toy company LEGO is introducing a new set for kids, inspired by the Netflix reality show Queer Eye — a series featuring five gay men who give straight men a makeover. The LEGO set, “Queer Eye — The Fab 5 Loft,” features each member of the “Fab Five” inside a decorated loft. “Get ready to be your true self as you join the Fab 5 for a rewarding building project with this LEGO® Queer Eye,” LEGO said in an announcement. “As you recreate all the details that make up the interior of the Fab 5’s original Atlanta loft, you’ll discover lots of features from the show with tributes to each of the Fab 5’s special talents,” the company added. This is not the first time LEGO announced a pro-LGBTQ set for kids. This year, the toy company also released a rainbow “Everyone is Awesome” set for kids, just in time for Pride month. The multicolored set features 11 single-colored, non-gendered figurines that together form a rainbow with black and brown stripes, as well as the “transgender flag colors.”

USA - The TRUE inflation rate is 13%, if using the Bureau for Labor Statistics’ original calculation method. They changed this method in 1980, to deliberately downplay inflation risks and manipulate public opinion. The last time it was at current levels was in 2008, just before the crash…

CANARY ISLANDS - Fears are growing that a volcano on the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands could erupt after 1,000 earthquakes were registered on the island in the past five days. Experts have noticed an upsurge in seismic activity and magma displacements under the volcanic ridge of La Cumbre Vieja on the popular tourist hotspot, which has a population of 85,000. More than 11 million cubic metres (388 million cubic feet) of magma have seeped into Cumbre Vieja in recent days, swelling the peak by around 6 centimetres, the Volcanic Institute of the Canaries said. A 2001 research article claimed a change in the eruptive activity of Cumbre Vieja volcano and a fracture on the volcano that formed during the 1949 eruption may be the prelude to a giant ridge collapse. Authors Steven N Ward and Simon Day estimated such a collapse could cause tsunamis across the entire North Atlantic and severely impact countries as far away as North America.

CHINA - Are we in danger of stumbling into a major military conflict? This week, a couple of startling revelations have really shaken up those that closely watch US relations with China. The relationship between our two nations continues to deteriorate, and we are now closer to a war with China than we have ever been since the end of the Korean War. …Here in the United States, it is pretty much a non-issue, because the vast majority of the population does not think that such a war will ever happen in their entire lifetimes.

EUROPE - The European Union’s radical green agenda risks sparking widespread political unrest as seen during the Yellow Vest movement in France as energy prices soar throughout the bloc. According to the consumer prices index, energy costs have risen by 15 per over the past year in the EU, as Brussels continues to push its plans to decarbonise Europe’s economy by the year 2050. Toby Couture, director at consultancy at the Berlin-based renewable energy consulting firm E3 Analytics waned that the green transition could see political unrest across the bloc. “As we start phasing out coal and nuclear capacity that’s been in the system for decades, there’s a risk that prices will have to rise further,” he told the Financial Times. “If it starts jeopardizing power reliability and significantly increasing energy prices that people pay, it could lead to significant political pushback.”

IRELAND - About half of all Covid-19 patients in hospital and in intensive care are fully vaccinated against the disease, new figures show. One-sixth of deaths of people with the virus since April have been categorised as breakthrough infections of fully vaccinated patients, according to Health Service Executive data. More than one-quarter of ICU admissions since July were also breakthrough infections of fully vaccinated people. The proportion of vaccinated people requiring treatment in hospital has been increasing over recent months, as the number of vaccinated people in the wider population has risen.

USA - This wasn’t supposed to happen. We were promised that once Joe Biden was in the White House that the tremendous anger that was building up in our country would start to subside, but that obviously is not happening. In fact Americans have been getting even angrier. And everywhere I go on social media this week, I am seeing huge explosions of anger. What in the world is our country going to look like if all of this anger continues to grow?

GERMANY - This Is the candidate to beat in the race to become Germany's next leader. The hammering typically begins at 8 o'clock sharp and continues through the day, its pulsing sound echoing along the gleaming renovated buildings and canals of this city's harbor district. It's the heartbeat of Hamburg. For the past 10 years, this has been the soundtrack to the transformation of Germany's largest port from one of run-down warehouses to a thriving cultural center filled with loft apartments, hotels and pedestrian trails and capped with a massive philharmonic hall, a glass goliath whose roof is in the shape of undulating ocean waves. This is the city where Olaf Scholz, 63, grew up and served as mayor from 2011 to 2018. Supporters credit Scholz, of the center-left Social Democratic Party, for steering the city's construction spree. Now the German finance minister and vice chancellor, he's shaping up in national polls and debates as the front-runner to succeed Chancellor Angela Merkel in Germany's election on September 26… "Schulz has a very, very clear plan of how things should develop and look like."

CHINA - Tensions between China and the US continue to boil amid another threat about warships "showing up near Hawaii". Earlier this month, the US deployed the Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group (VINCSG) to the highly contested South China Sea for the first time during the group's 2021 deployment. The strike group is conducting maritime security operations, including flight operations and maritime strike exercises. Rear Admiral Dan Martin, commander of the Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group, said: "The freedom of all nations to navigate in international waters is important, and especially vital in the South China Sea, where nearly a third of global maritime trade transits each year.