Page 61 - Russia

Russia flaunts its doomsday weapons to keep West from supporting Ukraine

This year has seen President Vladimir Putin repeatedly brandish the nuclear sword, reminding everyone that Russia has the world's largest atomic arsenal to try to deter the West from ramping up support for Ukraine. He ordered his military to hold drills involving battlefield nuclear weapons with ally Belarus. He announced Russia will start producing ground-based intermediate range missiles that were outlawed by a now-defunct U.S.-Soviet treaty in 1987. And last month, he lowered the threshold for unleashing his arsenal by revising the country's nuclear doctrine. Putin is relying on those thousands of warheads and hundreds of missiles as an enormous doomsday machine to offset NATO's massive edge in conventional weapons to discourage what he sees as threats to Russia's sovereignty and territorial integrity. A look at Russia's atomic arsenal and the issues surrounding it: Russia's strategic weapons The Federation of American Scientists estimated this year that Russia has an invento

Zelenskyy says 10K North Koreans could join Russian forces in Ukraine

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday his government has intelligence information that 10,000 troops from North Korea are being prepared to join Russian forces fighting against his country, warning that a third nation wading into the hostilities would turn the conflict into a world war. Zelenskyy did not go into detail about the claim that came a day after U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said that Washington and its allies are alarmed by North Korea's military support for Russia's war in Ukraine but couldn't confirm Ukrainian claims that soldiers were sent to fight for Moscow. From our intelligence we've got information that North Korea sent tactical personnel and officers to Ukraine, Zelenskyy told reporters at NATO headquarters. They are preparing on their land 10,000 soldiers, but they didn't move them already to Ukraine or to Russia. Earlier, he warned that any North Korean involvement would be "the first step to a world war. NATO Secretary-General

US warns of growing North Korean military support for Russia's war

The US and its allies are alarmed by North Korea's nuclear and missile threats as well as its increasing military support for Russia's war in Ukraine, a senior US official said Wednesday, but couldn't confirm Ukrainian claims that North Korean soldiers were sent to fight for Moscow. US Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell spoke with reporters following discussions with South Korean and Japanese counterparts on reinvigorating an international pressure campaign against North Korea, which faltered in recent years amid a deepening divide at the UN Security Council. Earlier on Wednesday, Washington, Seoul and Tokyo announced plans with eight Western governments to launch a new multinational team to monitor the enforcement of sanctions against North Korea. Russia in March vetoed a UN resolution in a move that effectively abolished monitoring by UN experts of Security Council sanctions against North Korea. It prompted Western accusations that Moscow was acting to shield its arms purchas

SCO Summit Day 2: S Jaishankar to attend talks on trade, terrorism in Pak

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif exchanged pleasantries during an informal dinner hosted by the latter on Tuesday

Zelenskyy to present victory plan to parliament after presenting to allies

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was set to at least partially unveil a plan to win the war against Russia to his country's Parliament on Wednesday after weeks of dropping hints about the blueprint to lukewarm Western allies, including U.S. President Joe Biden. The plan comprising military, political, diplomatic and economic elements is considered by many as Ukraine's last resort to strengthen its hand in any future cease-fire negotiations with Russia. Thus far, however, no country has publicly endorsed it or commented on its feasibility. Zelenskyy is keen to get the victory plan in place before a new U.S. president is sworn in next year, though Ukrainian officials say neither presidential candidate will necessarily improve Kyiv's standing in the war. Zelenskyy's presentation to Parliament, announced on Monday by presidential adviser Serhii Leshchenko, comes during a bleak moment in Ukraine. The country's military is suffering losses along the eastern front as Russian force

Trump says it would be 'smart thing' if he spoke to Putin, doesn't confirm

Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday refused to say whether he's spoken with Russian President Vladimir Putin since leaving office, as reported in journalist Bob Woodward's latest book. But if the two did speak, Trump said, it would be a smart thing for the United States. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, was pressed on his communication with the Russian president during a wide-ranging and sometimes contentious interview with Bloomberg editor-in-chief John Micklethwait at the Economic Club of Chicago. Woodward reports in his book War that Trump has had as many as seven private phone calls with Putin since leaving the White House and secretly sent the Russian president COVID-19 test machines during the height of the pandemic. A Trump campaign spokesperson previously denied the report. During Tuesday's interview, Micklethwait posed the question to Trump directly: "Can you say yes or no whether you have talked to Vladimir Putin since you stopped being president? I don'

Russia holds 'substantive' talks with China to bolster defence ties

China and Russia declared a 'no limits' partnership in February 2022 when President Vladimir Putin visited Beijing less than three weeks before his forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine

China's exports to Russia surge 15.7% in September, fastest in 9 months

"Bilateral trade has maintained a momentum of growth," Chinese state media cited Li as telling Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin at the time

Russian exporters fear liquidity crunch as payments stall on sanctions risk

That's adding to pressures on their cash reserves, the people said, particularly as overnight borrowing costs on domestic and foreign currencies have surged above 20% and there's little

Vladimir Putin to meet Iranian counterpart Pezeshkian in Turkmenistan

While Iran and Russia are historical geopolitical rivals, Iran has been assisting Russia in its war against Ukraine since 2022

Duped into building drones for use in Ukraine: Africans working in Russia

The social media ads promised the young African women a free plane ticket, money and a faraway adventure in Europe. Just complete a computer game and a 100-word Russian vocabulary test. But instead of a work-study programme in fields like hospitality and catering, some of them learned only after arriving on the steppes of Russia's Tatarstan region that they would be toiling in a factory to make weapons of war, assembling thousands of Iranian-designed attack drones to be launched into Ukraine. In interviews with The Associated Press, some of the women complained of long hours under constant surveillance, of broken promises about wages and areas of study, and of working with caustic chemicals that left their skin pockmarked and itching. To fill an urgent labor shortage in wartime Russia, the Kremlin has been recruiting women aged 18-22 from places like Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, South Sudan, Sierra Leone and Nigeria, as well as the South Asian country of Sri Lanka. The drive is expanding

Drone strikes another arms depot inside Russia, says Ukraine military

A Ukrainian drone struck an important arms depot inside Russia, the Ukraine military said Wednesday, three weeks after another drone blasted a major Russian armoury and three days after a drone smashed into a key oil terminal in Russia-occupied Crimea. The Tuesday night strike targeted an arsenal in Russia's Bryansk border region where missiles and artillery munitions were stored, including some that had been delivered by North Korea, a Ukrainian General Staff statement said. Hugely powerful glide bombs that have terrorised civilian areas of Ukraine and bludgeoned Ukrainian army defences were also kept at the arsenal, located 115 kilometres (70 miles) from the Ukrainian border, and some of the ammunition was stored in the open, it said. Striking such arsenals creates serious logistical problems for the Russian army, thus significantly reducing (its) offensive capabilities, the statement said. Russia is expending enormous amounts of ammunition as it makes its advantage in artillery

EU's new system to sanction people indulging in sabotage on Russia's behalf

The European Union on Tuesday set up a system for imposing sanctions against people accused of cyberattacks, information manipulation or acts of sabotage on behalf of Russia to undermine EU support for Ukraine. NATO warned earlier this year of Russian hostile state activity against the Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and the U.K., and said that the Kremlin's actions constitute a threat to allied security. The EU said that it too has detected an increasing number of a broad range of activities. It said that Russia also continues to disrupt satellite communications, violate European airspace and organize physical attacks against people. The challenge is that many of the activities fall below a threshold that might require a military response and both organizations are struggling to discourage such attacks effectively. The EU's new framework will allow it to target people, agencies or organizations that seek to undermine its fundamental values or security,

Russian forces reach another key frontline city Toretsk: Ukraine military

With Ukraine now losing more and more territory, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has ordered his top brass do 'everything that can be done' to minimise Moscow's advance along the frontline

Russian missile strike damaged vessel carrying grain in port, says Ukraine

The ministry said this was the 20th civilian vessel to be damaged by Russian attacks

Russia aims to boost coal exports to India amid growing fuel demand

China remains the biggest buyer of Russian coal but Moscow has said India may overtake it by the start of the next decade

Fire breaks out at oil depot in Feodosia on Crimean coast of Black Sea

Ukraine's air and sea drone attacks on Russian military targets in Crimea over the course of the war have damaged or destroyed several ships

'God save the Tsar!': Prez Putin receives first wishes for 72nd birthday

The greeting came from ultra-nationalist Russian ideologue Alexander Dugin on his Telegram messaging channel

Ukraine shoots down Russian fighter plane, Moscow claims gains in east

Ukrainian forces said they shot down a Russian fighter plane on Saturday while Russia claimed it made gains in Ukraine's east. The Russian bomber was shot down near the city of Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk province, head of the Kostiantynivka Military Administration Serhiy Horbunov was quoted as saying by Ukraine's public broadcaster, Suspilne. Photos showed charred remains of an aircraft after it landed on a house that caught fire. Also in the partially occupied Donetsk province, Russia's Defence Ministry claimed on Saturday that it had taken control of the village of Zhelanne Druhe. If confirmed, the capture would come three days after Ukrainian forces said they were withdrawing from the front-line town of Vuhledar, some 33 kilometers (21 miles) from Zhelanne Druhe, following a hard-fought two-year defense. Although unlikely to change the course of the war, the loss of Vuhledar is indicative of Kyiv's worsening position, in part the result of Washington's refusal to grant Ukrain

US, Microsoft disrupt Russian hackers targeting officials, nonprofits

A hacking group tied to Russian intelligence tried to worm its way into the systems of dozens of Western think tanks, journalists and former military and intelligence officials, Microsoft and US authorities said Thursday. The group, known as Star Blizzard to cyberespionage experts, targeted its victims with emails that appeared to come from a trusted source a tactic known as spear phishing. In fact, the emails sought access to the victims' internal systems, as a way to steal information and disrupt their activities. Star Blizzard's actions were persistent and sophisticated, according to Microsoft, and the group often did detailed research on its targets before launching an attack. Star Blizzard also went after civil society groups, US companies, American military contractors and the Department of Energy, which oversees many nuclear programmes, the company said. On Thursday, a US court unsealed documents authorising Microsoft and the Department of Justice to seize more than 100 ...