Category: MOSCOW

The 71-year-old leader was quick to add that the conversation - including on issues of security and strategic stability - is possible "only on equal terms, respecting each other's interests" and "not from a position of strength".

Ukrainian drones attacked the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) on Sunday, including one on the dome of the 6th power unit, according to the plant's press service.

Russia's space agency Roscosmos has said that its Luna-25 spacecraft crashed into the moon after it ran into "unspecified trouble", the media reported on Sunday.

Luna-25 took off atop a Soyuz-2.1b rocket from the Vostochny launch facility in Russia at 2:10 a.m. Moscow time (4:40 am IST) on Friday, TASS news agency reported.

The explosion happened on Wednesday morning at around 10:40 a.m. local time at a pyrotechnics warehouse, which was being rented out on the optical-mechanical plant's territory by a private company, said Governor of the Moscow Region Andrei Vorobiev in a Telegram post.

Putin made a case for India as he discussed the opportunities for Russian companies due to the West’s sanctions policies, and the need for the Moscow to “offer support tools to help our companies market their products more efficiently".

A US Air Force MQ-9 Reaper surveillance drone was brought down over the Black Sea, after what its European Command (EUCOM) described as "an unsafe and unprofessional intercept" by two Russian jets, media reports said.

In a major move, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday announced that his country was suspending its participation in the New Start treaty - the sole remaining strategic weapons reduction treaty between the US and Russia.

The US has been reaching out to armed groups that oppose the Taliban and secretly giving money to Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), as per Russia's Presidential envoy for Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov, media reports said.

"...The Pentagon is openly planning more orders for the US defence industry for years to come, keeps raising the bar for military spending to cover the needs of the Ukrainian forces and wants other members of the anti-Russia alliance to do the same," he added.

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Tuesday said that bilateral talks with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov will address the overall global situation as well as specific regional concerns.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday fulminated against the West's record, singling out the US use of nuclear weapons in the closing days of the Second World War, and then western nations' centuries of "colonialism", "slave trading" and the "plundering of India".

"Today, the police received a report about shooting at School 88 in Izhevsk. Police officers immediately set out to the scene. Measures are being taken to apprehend the suspect," Russia's TASS News Agency quoted law enforcers as saying.

Having burned bridges with the West and sparked an energy war with Europe, Putin is attempting a pivot east. He's hoping to reorient the Russian economy and find new markets for Russian oil and gas, BBC reported.

"Our relations are actively developing, the trade has also increased significantly with supplies of Russian oil, coal and fertilizers increasing," RT news quoted Kremlin foreign policy spokesman Yury Ushakov as saying to reporters in Moscow.

The Kremlin has confirmed that Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping will discuss the Ukraine war and other "current international problems" at this week's Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.

"Our manufacturers, primarily producers of potash fertilizers, are willing to transfer them free of charge to developing countries that are in dire need of these fertilizers," Putin said at a regular meeting of the Russian Security Council.

The internationally respected statesman was often credited for bringing the Cold War to a peaceful end and for his instrumental role in German reunification. East Germans in particular still revere "Gorbi," as the man who brought them freedom over three decades ago.

It further said the alleged suicide bomber was identified as "a native of a country in the Central Asian region, who planned to commit a terrorist act by blowing himself up against one of the representatives of the ruling circles of India".

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree banning "unfriendly" investors from making transactions with their shares in strategic Russian enterprises and projects until the end of the year.

Now Greece has a limit of 34 people, Denmark 20, Slovakia 16, while Slovenia and Croatia will not be able to hire employees in their diplomatic missions and consular offices, the Russian government said in a statement on Friday.

The Japanese officials "have taken a hostile anti-Russian stance," and have "made baseless accusations" against Russia in the context of the country's special military operation in Ukraine, it said.

The submarine opens new opportunities for Russia to implement various scientific research tasks and conduct rescue operations in remote areas of the oceans, Xinhua news agency quoted Nikolay Yevmenov, commander-in-chief of the Navy, as saying at a ceremony on Friday.

The Russian military conducted a series of drills utilising the Yars intercontinental ballistic missile system under the Russian Strategic Missile Forces, the Defence Ministry said.

Russia and Ukraine, during the negotiations, developed a 15-point plan, including a ceasefire and the withdrawal of troops, subject to the neutrality of Kiev and the reduction of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU).