64% Of Rwanda Politicians Are Women; Just 4% In Nigeria

Data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union shows the extent to which differences in gender equality in parliament exist between countries, with only four nations currently representing an even or almost even 50:50 split of men to women in their lower house of parliament. These are Andorra, Mexico, Bolivia and the United Arab Emirates.

Meanwhile, as Statista's Anna Fleck details below, there are only three countries worldwide with a higher ratio of women to men. These are Rwanda (63.8 percent share of women), Cuba (55.7 percent) and Nicaragua (55.0 percent).

You will find more infographics at Statista

A look at selected countries shows that gender parity in parliaments is lagging behind in European nations as well as in the United States, where only around 29 percent of House members where women most recently.

In Europe, Scandinavian nations lead, like Sweden at 45 percent, Finland at 45.5 percent and Iceland at 46 percent. Spain follows suit with 44.3 percent.

Lowlights in Europe include Hungary at 15.2 percent, Bosnia and Herzegovina at 19.1 percent and Bulgaria at 21.3 percent.

However, Germany is not far ahead at 32.4 percent.

Globally, Nigeria was among the countries with the lowest female participation in parliament at 4.2 percent.

Sri Lanka, Syria, Iran and Algeria all stayed below 10 percent. 

India reached 13.8 percent. The country is scheduled to up representation to 33 percent after its next census towards the end of the decade.

Japan stood at a slightly improved 15.7 percent, but still towards the bottom of the ranking.

Tyler Durden Tue, 10/21/2025 - 05:45

Sweden Tells Citizens To Prepare For "War Mode"

Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFPlan.com,

Swedish Defense Minister Pal Jonson said that NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) members should prepare their citizens for “war mode.” 

Jonson said that the possibility of a war with Russia is still on the table.

Jonson told RedaktionsNetzwerk Deutschland (RND), as reported by RT, in an interview published on Sunday.

“To preserve peace, we must prepare ourselves both mentally and militarily for the possibility of war,” the official said. 

“A change in mentality is necessary: We must switch to war mode to resolutely deter, defend, and preserve the peace.”

Swedish Defense Minister Pal Jonson, Warsaw, Poland, April 3, 2025. © Foto Olimpik / NurPhoto via Getty Images

Moscow has long viewed the Ukraine conflict as a NATO proxy war aimed at undermining Russia’s security following decades of expansion.

Sweden is the bloc’s newest member, while Ukraine was 'promised' accession sometime in the future.

RT reports that The European Commission last week unveiled a roadmap outlining its plans to expand joint arms procurement to at least 40% by 2027.

The document emphasized the need to “invest more, invest together, and invest European,” citing global strategic shifts to other regions among “traditional allies.”

The push for greater defense spending aligns with calls from US President Trump, who has demanded that European members buy more American weapons – including for Ukrainian use.

Jonson justified such purchases, saying that Europe “simply doesn’t have or cannot yet produce” the necessary systems.

“Ukraine needs these assets fast,” he said.

“If Europe lacks them, it’s logical to procure them from the US.”

Recently, several American officials told the Wall Street Journal, according to a report by Yahoo News that Trump is putting much more pressure on the Ukrainian ruler Volodymyr Zelensky than he is on Russia.

Officials say that they have observed Trump’s “hesitation to push Putin, who has shown little interest in concessions needed for a deal.”

One Wall Street Journal source noted that “the White House has put more pressure on Kiev than on Moscow.”

Tyler Durden Tue, 10/21/2025 - 05:00

EU Energy Ministers Want To Finish Ditching Russian Gas In Two Years

European Union energy ministers think they'll be able to phase out the import of Russian gas by 2028, and have backed a proposal that would begin the process by phasing out the contracts themselves for both pipeline gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG) by Jan. 1, 2026. 

Gas pipelines at the Atamanskaya compressor station facility of Gazprom's Power Of Siberia project outside the far eastern town of Svobodny, in Amur region, Russia, on Nov. 29, 2019. Maxim Shemetov/Reuters

Current agreements may continue until June 17, 2026, while long-term contracts may would be cut off on Jan. 1, 2028.

That said, landlocked members states (Hungary, Slovakia) which have limited alternatives to Russia would be afforded some flexibility. 

If the proposed regulations are backed by the European Parliament, it would require member states to submit plans for how they will diversify their energy supplies if they're currently receiving (directly or indirectly) gas from Russia. 

Composed of national ministers from each member state, the Council of the EU said in a press release, "The same requirement to submit a national diversification plan will apply to those member states that are still importing Russian oil, with a view to discontinuing those imports by 1 January 2028."

Danish minister for climate, energy and utilities, Lars Aagaard, said "An energy independent Europe is a stronger and more secure Europe. Although we have worked hard and pushed to get Russian gas and oil out of Europe in recent years, we are not there yet," adding that it's critical for Denmark - which currently holds the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU, secures "overwhelming support from Europe’s energy ministers for the legislation that will definitively ban Russian gas from coming into the EU."

The Council presidency will begin negotiations with European Parliament (720 lawmakers) before agreeing on the final text of the regulations.

In other words - two years will have come and gone by the time they're done talking...

That said, Europe has already significantly cut back on Russian gas;

Between Q1 2021 and Q2 2025, the EU-27 reduced Russian oil imports by more than 90 percent, cutting the share of Russian oil in total extra-EU imports from 29 percent to less than 2 percent. During the same period, Russia’s share of the EU’s natural gas imports dropped from 39 to 13 percent, driven mainly by a 52-percent reduction of natural gas imports in gaseous state. The value of liquefied natural gas imports from Russia actually almost tripled between Q1 2021 and Q2 2025 but still accounted for a smaller share of the EU’s total LNG imports in the most recent quarter. This is due to total LNG imports more than quadrupling during this period, as the EU replaced Russian pipeline gas with LNG from suppliers like the United States, Qatar and Norway. -Staista

As the Epoch Times notes further, when it comes to Hungary and Slovakia:

Following the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the EU has sought to reduce its dependence on energy from Russia. According to an explainer on the European Council’s website, “Russia’s share of EU imports of pipeline gas dropped from over 40 percent in 2021 to about 11 percent in 2024.”

In 2024, Russia accounted for less than 19 percent of the EU’s imported gas and LNG combined.

While much of Europe has moved away from Russian energy and Brussels has imposed extensive sanctions on most Russian oil imports, Slovakia and Hungary still receive Russian supplies via the Druzhba oil pipeline.

Bratislava and Budapest maintain closer ties with Moscow than the rest of the bloc and have defended their continued purchase of Russian oil, saying alternatives are too expensive.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has repeatedly called for the EU to drop its plan to stop Russian energy from being imported, and his environment minister, Aniko Raisz, echoed those sentiments on Sept. 18.

“I think you know our position. We are one of the few landlocked countries in the region. So, our position has always been guided by the energy security for Hungary,” Raisz told reporters in Brussels.

“We know that we have important, important tasks ahead of us, but let’s not daydream.”

Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico (R) signs a mutual memorandum of cooperation with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (L) in the Mirror Hall of the Slovak Governmental Office in Bratislava, Slovakia, on April 28, 2025. Zuzana Gogova/Getty Images

Last month, Slovakia pushed back on U.S. President Donald Trump’s calls for Europe to curb Russian oil imports.

“We don’t have any other options which could be sustainable and also for the price to be reasonable,” Slovak Foreign Minister Juraj Blanar told Reuters during an interview on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 24.

“It takes time to diversify this. So that’s why we are calling for some kind of empathy.”

Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Sept. 24 that the country will not stop buying Russian oil.

“We are a landlocked country,” Szijjarto told ATV television in an interview in New York City, where he was also attending the U.N. General Assembly. “It would be great if we had access to the sea; we could build an oil refinery or an LNG terminal on the coast and cover the entire world market. But that’s not the case.”

Guy Birchall and Owen Evans contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Tue, 10/21/2025 - 04:15

Peter Schiff: Printing Money Is Not the Cure for Cononavirus



In his most recent podcast, Peter Schiff talked about coronavirus and the impact that it is having on the markets. Earlier this month, Peter said he thought the virus was just an excuse for stock market woes. At the time he believed the market was poised to fall anyway. But as it turns out, coronavirus has actually helped the US stock market because it has led central banks to pump even more liquidity into the world financial system. All this means more liquidity — central banks easing. In fact, that is exactly what has already happened, except the new easing is taking place, for now, outside the United States, particularly in China.” Although the new money is primarily being created in China, it is flowing into dollars — the dollar index is up — and into US stocks. Last week, US stock markets once again made all-time record highs. In fact, I think but for the coronavirus, the US stock market would still be selling off. But because of the central bank stimulus that has been the result of fears over the coronavirus, that actually benefitted not only the US dollar, but the US stock market.” In the midst of all this, Peter raises a really good question. The primary economic concern is that coronavirus will slow down output and ultimately stunt economic growth. Practically speaking, the world would produce less stuff. If the virus continues to spread, there would be fewer goods and services produced in a market that is hunkered down. Why would the Federal Reserve respond, or why would any central bank respond to that by printing money? How does printing more money solve that problem? It doesn’t. In fact, it actually exacerbates it. But you know, everybody looks at central bankers as if they’ve got the solution to every problem. They don’t. They don’t have the magic wand. They just have a printing press. And all that creates is inflation.” Sometimes the illusion inflation creates can look like a magic wand. Printing money can paper over problems. But none of this is going to fundamentally fix the economy. In fact, if central bankers were really going to do the right thing, the appropriate response would be to drain liquidity from the markets, not supply even more.” Peter explained how the Fed was originally intended to create an “elastic” money supply that would expand or contract along with economic output. Today, the money supply only goes in one direction — that’s up. The economy is strong, print money. The economy is weak, print even more money.” Of course, the asset that’s doing the best right now is gold. The yellow metal pushed above $1,600 yesterday. Gold is up 5.5% on the year in dollar terms and has set record highs in other currencies. Because gold is rising even in an environment where the dollar is strengthening against other fiat currencies, that shows you that there is an underlying weakness in the dollar that is right now not being reflected in the Forex markets, but is being reflected in the gold markets. Because after all, why are people buying gold more aggressively than they’re buying dollars or more aggressively than they’re buying US Treasuries? Because they know that things are not as good for the dollar or the US economy as everybody likes to believe. So, more people are seeking out refuge in a better safe-haven and that is gold.” Peter also talked about the debate between Trump and Obama over who gets credit for the booming economy – which of course, is not booming.

We are living in crazy times. I have a hard time believing that most of the general public is not awake, but in reality, they are. We've never seen anything like this; I mean not even under Obama during the worst part of the Great Recession." Now the Fed is desperately trying to keep interest rates from rising. The problem is that it's a much bigger debt bubble this time around , and the Fed is going to have to blow a lot more air into it to keep it inflated. The difference is this time it's not going to work." It looks like the Fed did another $104.15 billion of Not Q.E. in a single day. The Fed claims it's only temporary. But that is precisely what Bernanke claimed when the Fed started QE1. Milton Freedman once said, "Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program." The same applies to Q.E., or whatever the Fed wants to pretend it's doing. Except this is not QE4, according to Powell. Right. Pumping so much money out, and they are accusing China of currency manipulation ? Wow! Seriously! Amazing! Dump the U.S. dollar while you still have a chance. Welcome to The Atlantis Report. And it is even worse than that, In addition to the $104.15 billion of "Not Q.E." this past Thursday; the FED added another $56.65 billion in liquidity to financial markets the next day on Friday. That's $160.8 billion in two days!!!! in just 48 hours. That is more than 2 TIMES the highest amount the FED has ever injected on a monthly basis under a Q.E. program (which was $80 billion per month) Since this isn't QE....it will be really scary on what they are going to call Q.E. Will it twice, three times, four times, five times what this injection per month ! It is going to be explosive since it takes about 60 to 90 days for prices to react to this, January should see significant inflation as prices soak up the excess liquidity. The question is, where will the inflation occur first . The spike in the repo rate might have a technical explanation: a misjudgment was made in the Fed's money market operations. Even so, two conclusions can be drawn: managing the money markets is becoming harder, and from now on, banks will be studying each other's creditworthiness to a greater degree than before. Those people, who struggle with the minutiae of money markets, and that includes most professionals, should focus on the causes and not the symptoms. Financial markets have recovered from each downturn since 1980 because interest rates have been cut to new lows. Post-2008, they were cut to near zero or below zero in all major economies. In response to a new financial crisis, they cannot go any lower. Central banks will look for new ways to replicate or broaden Q.E. (At some point, governments will simply see repression as an easier option). Then there is the problem of 'risk-free' assets becoming risky assets. Financial markets assume that the probability of major governments such as the U.S. or U.K. defaulting is zero. These governments are entering the next downturn with debt roughly twice the levels proportionate to GDP that was seen in 2008. The belief that the policy worked was completely predicated on the fact that it was temporary and that it was reversible, that the Fed was going to be able to normalize interest rates and shrink its balance sheet back down to pre-crisis levels. Well, when the balance sheet is five-trillion, six-trillion, seven-trillion when we're back at zero, when we're back in a recession, nobody is going to believe it is temporary. Nobody is going to believe that the Fed has this under control, that they can reverse this policy. And the dollar is going to crash. And when the dollar crashes, it's going to take the bond market with it, and we're going to have stagflation. We're going to have a deep recession with rising interest rates, and this whole thing is going to come imploding down. everything is temporary with the fed including remaining off the gold standard temporary in the Fed's eyes could mean at least 50 years This liquidity problem is a signal that trading desks are loaded up on inventory and can't get rid of it. Repo is done out of a need for cash. If you own all of your securities (i.e., a long-only, no leverage mutual fund) you have no need to "repo" your securities - you're earning interest every night so why would you want to 'repo' your securities where you are paying interest for that overnight loan (securities lending is another animal). So, it is those that 'lever-up' and need the cash for settlement purposes on securities they've bought with borrowed money that needs to utilize the repo desk. With this in mind, as we continue to see this need to obtain cash (again, needed to settle other securities purchases), it shows these firms don't have the capital to add more inventory to, what appears to be, a bloated inventory. Now comes the fun part: the Treasury is about to auction 3's, 10's, and 30-year bonds. If I am correct (again, I could be wrong), the Fed realizes securities firms don't have the shelf space to take down a good portion of these auctions. If there isn't enough retail/institutional demand, it will lead to not only a crappy sale but major concerns to the street that there is now no backstop, at all, to any sell-off. At which point, everyone will want to be the first one through the door and sell immediately, but to whom? If there isn't enough liquidity in the repo market to finance their positions, the firms would be unable to increase their inventory. We all saw repo shut down on the 2008 crisis. Wall St runs on money. . OVERNIGHT money. They lever up to inventory securities for trading. If they can't get overnight money, they can't purchase securities. And if they can't unload what they have, it means the buy-side isn't taking on more either. Accounts settle overnight. This includes things like payrolls and bill pay settlements. If a bank doesn't have enough cash to payout what its customers need to pay out, it borrows. At least one and probably more than one banks are insolvent. That's what's going on. First, it can't be one or two banks that are short. They'd simply call around until they found someone to lend. But they did that, and even at markedly elevated rates, still, NO ONE would lend them the money. That tells me that it's not a problem of a couple of borrowers, it's a problem of no lenders. And that means that there's no bank in the world left with any real liquidity. They are ALL maxed out. But as bad as that is, and that alone could be catastrophic, what it really signals is even worse. The lending rates are just the flip side of the coin of the value of the assets lent against. If the rates go up, the value goes down. And with rates spiking to 10%, how far does the value fall? Enormously! And if banks had to actually mark down the value of the assets to reflect 10% interest rates, then my god, every bank in the world is insolvent overnight. Everyone's capital ratios are in the toilet, and they'd have to liquidate. We're talking about the simultaneous insolvency of every bank on the planet. Bank runs. No money in ATMs, Branches closed. Safe deposit boxes confiscated. The whole nine yards, It's actually here. The scenario has tended to guide toward for years and years is actually happening RIGHT NOW! And people are still trying to say it's under control. Every bank in the world is currently insolvent. The only thing keeping it going is printing billions of dollars every day. Financial Armageddon isn't some far off future risk. It's here. Prepare accordingly. This fiat system has reached the end of the line, and it's not correct that fiat currencies fail by design. The problem is corruption and manipulation. It is corruption and cheating that erodes trust and faith until the entire system becomes a gigantic fraud. Banks and governments everywhere ARE the problem and simply have to be removed. They have lost all trust and respect, and all they have left is war and mayhem. As long as we continue to have a majority of braindead asleep imbeciles following orders from these psychopaths, nothing will change. Fiat currency is not just thievery. Fiat currency is SLAVERY. Ultimately the most harmful effect of using debt of undefined value as money (i.e., fiat currencies) is the de facto legalization of a caste system based on voluntary slavery. The bankers have a charter, or the legal *right*, to create money out of nothing. You, you don't. Therefore you and the bankers do not have the same standing before the law. The law of the land says that you will go to jail if you do the same thing (creating money out of thin air) that the banker does in full legality. You and the banker are not equal before the law. ALL the countries of the world; Islamic or secular, Jewish or Arab, democracy or dictatorship; all of them place the bankers ABOVE you. And all of you accept that only whining about fiat money going down in exchange value over time (price inflation which is not the same as monetary inflation). Actually, price inflation itself is mainly due to the greed and stupidity of the bankers who could keep fiat money's exchange value reasonably stable, only if they wanted to. Witness the crash of silver and gold prices which the bankers of the world; Russian, American, Chinese, Jewish, Indian, Arab, all of them collaborated to engineer through the suppression and stagnation of precious metals' prices to levels around the metals' production costs, or what it costs to dig gold and silver out of the ground. The bankers of the world could also collaborate to keep nominal prices steady (as they do in the case of the suppression of precious metals prices). After all, the ability to create fiat money and force its usage is a far more excellent source of power and wealth than that which is afforded simply by stealing it through inflation. The bankers' greed and stupidity blind them to this fact. They want it all, and they want it now. In conclusion, The bankers can create money out of nothing and buy your goods and services with this worthless fiat money, effectively for free. You, you can't. You, you have to lead miserable existences for the most of you and WORK in order to obtain that effectively nonexistent, worthless credit money (whose purchasing/exchange value is not even DEFINED thus rendering all contracts based on the null and void!) that the banker effortlessly creates out of thin air with a few strokes of the computer keyboard, and which he doesn't even bother to print on paper anymore, electing to keep it in its pure quantum uncertain form instead, as electrons whizzing about inside computer chips which will become mute and turn silent refusing to tell you how many fiat dollars or euros there are in which account, in the absence of electricity. No electricity, no fiat, nor crypto money. It would appear that trust is deteriorating as it did when Lehman blew up . Something really big happened that set off this chain reaction in the repo markets. Whatever that something is, we aren't be informed. They're trying to cover it up, paper it over with conjured cash injections, play it cool in front of the cameras while sweating profusely under the 5 thousands dollar suits. I'm guessing that the final high-speed plunge into global economic collapse has begun. All we see here is the ripples and whitewater churning the surface, but beneath the surface, there is an enormous beast thrashing desperately in its death throws. Now is probably the time to start tying up loose ends with the long-running prep projects, just saying. In other words, prepare accordingly, and Get your money out of the banks. I don't care if you don't believe me about Bitcoin. Get your money out of the banks. Don't keep any more money in a bank than you need to pay your bills and can afford to lose.











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The Financial Armageddon Economic Collapse Blog tracks trends and forecasts , futurists , visionaries , free investigative journalists , researchers , Whistelblowers , truthers and many more

The FBI released a summary of its file from the Hillary Clinton email investigation on Friday, showing details of Clinton's explanation of her use of a private email server to handle classified communications. The release comes nearly two months after FBI Director James Comey announced that although Clinton's handling of classified information was "extremely careless," it did not rise to the level of a prosecutable offense. Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced the next day that she would not pursue charges in the matter. "We are making these materials available to the public in the interest of transparency and in response to numerous Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests," the FBI noted in a statement sent to reporters with links to the documents. The documents include notes from Clinton's July 2 interview with agents, as well as a "factual summary of the FBI's investigation into this matter," according to the FBI release. Throughout her interview with agents, Clinton repeatedly said she relied on the career professionals she worked with to handle classified information correctly. The agents asked about a series of specific emails, and in each case Clinton said she wasn't worried about the particular material being discussed on a nonclassified channel.