KOBLENZ / AP French presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen declared on Saturday that 2017 will be the “year of the awakening of the people of continental Europe” as she joined fellow nationalist leaders in Germany at the beginning of a year of high-stakes national elections. Le Pen was joined by the Netherlands’ Geert Wilders, Matteo Salvini of Italy’s Northern League …

  ISTANBUL / AP Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has started campaigning for constitutional reforms that would greatly expand the powers of his office, hours after a vote in parliament cleared the way for a national referendum on the issue. Speaking in Istanbul on Saturday, he hailed the assembly’s early-morning decision and said “God willing the people will give the true …

  Bloomberg The US defense agency that helped invent the Internet is now looking at blockchain, the database technology behind the digital currency bitcoin, to help protect the networks its research made possible. The Defense Advance Research Projects Agency, an R&D arm of the military, has funded several startups and technology companies, such as Guardtime Federal LLC, while others including …