New York Times: “American officials intercepted electronic data showing large financial transfers from a bank account controlled by Russia’s military intelligence agency to a Taliban-linked account, which was among the evidence that supported their conclusion that Russia covertly offered bounties for killing U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan.”

“Though the United States has accused Russia of providing general support to the Taliban before, analysts concluded from other intelligence that the transfers were most likely part of a bounty program that detainees described during interrogations.”

“The European Union will open its borders to visitors from 15 countries as of Wednesday, but not to travelers from the United States, Brazil or Russia, putting into effect a complex policy that has sought to balance health concerns with politics, diplomacy and the desperate need for tourism revenue,” the New York Times reports.

The Guardian: “More than 60% of respondents in Germany, France, Spain, Denmark and Portugal said they had lost trust in the United States as a global leader.”

“The Chinese government is taking draconian measures to slash birth rates among Uighurs and other minorities as part of a sweeping campaign to curb its Muslim population, even as it encourages some of the country’s Han majority to have more children,” the AP reports.

“While individual women have spoken out before about forced birth control, the practice is far more widespread and systematic than previously known.”

Iran has issued an arrest warrant and asked Interpol for help in detaining President Trump and dozens of others it believes carried out the drone strike that killed a top Iranian general in Baghdad, Al Jazeera reports.

The Washington Post confirms last week’s blockbuster from the New York Times: “Russian bounties offered to Taliban-linked militants to kill coalition forces in Afghanistan are believed to have resulted in the deaths of several U.S. service members.”

“The intelligence was passed up from the U.S. Special Operations forces based in Afghanistan and led to a restricted high-level White House meeting in late March.”

Speaker Nancy Pelosi blasted President Trump for being beholden to the Russian government, following a startling New York Times report that Russia secretly offered bounties to Taliban fighters to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan, Politico reports.

Said Pelosi: “Just as I have said to the president: With him, all roads lead to Putin. I don’t know what the Russians have on the president, politically, personally, or financially.”

She added: “This is as bad as it gets, and yet the president will not confront the Russians on this score.”

“The European Union will bar most travelers from the United States, Russia, and dozens of other countries considered too risky because they have not controlled the coronavirus outbreak,” the New York Times reports.

“The exclusion of the United States, an important source of tourism to the European Union, represented a stinging rebuke to the Trump administration’s management of the coronavirus scourge.”

“American intelligence officials have concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing coalition forces in Afghanistan — including targeting American troops — amid the peace talks to end the long-running war there,” the New York Times reports.

“Islamist militants, or armed criminal elements closely associated with them, are believed to have collected some bounty money… Twenty Americans were killed in combat in Afghanistan in 2019, but it was not clear which killings were under suspicion.”

“The intelligence finding was briefed to President Trump… Officials developed a menu of potential options — starting with making a diplomatic complaint to Moscow and a demand that it stop, along with an escalating series of sanctions and other possible responses, but the White House has yet to authorize any step.”

Tom  McTague: “It is hard to escape the feeling that this is a uniquely humiliating moment for America. As citizens of the world the United States created, we are accustomed to listening to those who loathe America, admire America, and fear America (sometimes all at the same time). But feeling pity for America? That one is new, even if the schadenfreude is painfully myopic. If it’s the aesthetic that matters, the U.S. today simply doesn’t look like the country that the rest of us should aspire to, envy, or replicate.”

“Even in previous moments of American vulnerability, Washington reigned supreme. Whatever moral or strategic challenge it faced, there was a sense that its political vibrancy matched its economic and military might, that its system and democratic culture were so deeply rooted that it could always regenerate itself. It was as if the very idea of America mattered, an engine driving it on whatever other glitches existed under the hood. Now, something appears to be changing. America seems mired, its very ability to rebound in question. A new power has emerged on the world stage to challenge American supremacy—China—with a weapon the Soviet Union never possessed: mutually assured economic destruction.”

“European Union countries rushing to revive their economies and reopen their borders after months of coronavirus restrictions are prepared to block Americans from entering because the United States has failed to control the scourge,” the New York Times reports.

“That prospect, which would lump American visitors in with Russians and Brazilians as unwelcome, is a stinging blow to American prestige in the world and a repudiation of President Trump’s handling of the virus in the United States, which has more than 2.3 million cases and upward of 120,000 deaths, more than any other country.”

British prime minister Boris Johnson has all but ended his country’s lockdown after deciding coronavirus infection rates are now low enough to justify relaxing social distancing measures, the Times of London reports.

The British prime minister said people in England will no longer have to stay two meters apart—instead Johnson has introduced a new “one-meter plus” rule to help pubs take in more drinkers.

Said Johnson: “Our long national hibernation is coming to an end.”

“Another group of House Republicans is urging President Trump against drawing down the number of US troops in Germany, a request that comes one day after White House national security adviser Robert O’Brien penned an op-ed explaining the administration’s reasoning for the reduction of American forces in the country,” CNN reports.

“The latest group of Republican lawmakers — led by Rep. Michael McCaul, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an Air Force veteran — argue that reducing the number of US troops in Germany will negatively impact the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s ability to deter Russian aggression.”

“The State Department’s top spokeswoman on Monday muted the line of a reporter asking about John Bolton’s book during a briefing extolling press freedom,” Politico reports.

“The Department convened a telephone briefing ahead of its designation of four additional Chinese news outlets as foreign missions. But when David Brunnstrom, a journalist from Reuters, asked whether U.S. allies had reached out to the assistant secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs in the wake of Bolton’s book, his line was muted.”