A key Russian general who Russian President Vladimir Putin promoted this week views the invasion of Ukraine as a mere "stepping stone" to further conflict with Europe.

Putin launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, sparking fears from many analysts that the Kremlin may have greater ambitions beyond taking control of its former Soviet neighbor. Russian commentators and lawmakers have often heightened those fears with their anti-North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) rhetoric throughout the war—routinely encouraging direct strikes on European and even American targets.

This week, Putin promoted Lieutenant General Andrey Mordvichev to the rank of Colonel-General. The military leader had already been serving in the role of commanding the Central Military District and Russian Central Grouping of Forces in Ukraine.

In a recent interview with Moscow's state-run Russia-1, a clip of which circulated widely on social media Saturday, Mordvichev said he believes Putin's war will last quite a long time and expand in the future.

A Marine veteran accused of stolen valor allegedly stole more than $344,000 in military disability benefits and submitted a Purple Heart application for injuries suffered in a roadside bombing that never occurred.

Paul John “PJ” Herbert, 52, of Shelburne Falls, Mass., was indicted by a federal grand jury and arrested Friday morning on one count of theft of the government and one count of making false statements, according to the Department of Justice.

Herbert allegedly stole more than $344,000 in veteran disability benefits “used to help veterans in need” from Jan. 1, 2010, to March 11, 2023, “falsely representing” himself as a decorated war hero injured in the line of service.

Herbert served in the Marines on active duty between 1989 to 1993 and in the reserves from 1993 to 1995

A powerful Nye County sheriff’s captain, whose questionable conduct was exposed in a Las Vegas Review-Journal investigation last year, was arrested Friday and later pleaded not guilty to federal charges of wire fraud, perjury and civil rights violations.

Capt. David Boruchowitz, 42, stands accused of using his position to falsely arrest the former CEO of Valley Electric Association, Angela Evans.

He also is accused of committing wire fraud by issuing press releases falsely stating that Evans’ arrest was the result of a court-authorized process, when she was actually arrested “under false and fraudulent pretenses and without probable cause,” according to a statement from the U.S. attorney’s office.

“The indictment further alleges that the false arrest was part of a larger scheme to defraud the former CEO of her job by falsely alleging in various court documents that the CEO embezzled services from the VEA,” the U.S. attorney’s office said.

A Georgia judge on Monday forcefully rejected an effort by former President Donald J. Trump to throw out evidence collected by a special grand jury and to remove the current prosecutor from the investigation into Mr. Trump’s attempts to overturn his 2020 election loss in the state.

Judge Robert C. I. McBurney of the Fulton County Superior Court wrote in a nine-page order that Mr. Trump did not have the legal standing to make such challenges before indictments were handed up. The judge said the “injuries” that Mr. Trump claimed to have suffered from the two-and-a-half-year investigation “are either insufficient or else speculative and unrealized.”

The order comes on the cusp of the investigation’s culmination. The office of the Fulton County district attorney, Fani T. Willis, a Democrat, is expected to present potential indictments in the matter to a regular grand jury by mid-August.

A “special purpose” grand jury, which did not have indictment power, interviewed dozens of witnesses and subpoenaed documents over the course of roughly seven months. Then, the jury issued an advisory report that recommended the indictment of a number of people for violations of Georgia laws, according to the jury forewoman.

WASHINGTON — President Biden has quietly ordered the U.S. government to begin sharing evidence of Russian war crimes in Ukraine with the International Criminal Court in The Hague, according to officials familiar with the matter, signaling a major shift in American policy.

The decision, made by Mr. Biden in recent days, overrides months of resistance by the Pentagon, which had argued that it could pave the way for the court to prosecute American troops, according to the officials.

It was unclear why Mr. Biden let the impasse linger or what finally led him to resolve it, but he has been under mounting bipartisan pressure to act. Last week, for example, a Senate committee approved a government funding bill that had a provision stating that the president “shall provide information” to the court to assist with its investigations into war crimes in Ukraine.


American intelligence agencies are said to have gathered information including details about decisions by Russian officials to deliberately strike civilian infrastructure in Ukraine and forcibly deport thousands of Ukrainian children from occupied territory. Already, they have shared some of that evidence with Ukrainian prosecutors but had refrained from doing so with The Hague.