MOSCOW, May 27. /TASS/: Ukraine’s "puppeteers" in London and Washington start begin to concern themselves with mental stability of top officials in Kiev and Russia hopes that sanctions against the Ukrainian leadership will follow over the threats against Russian President Vladimir Putin, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview published Saturday.

Tehran, IRNA – Assadollah Assadi, a former Iranian diplomat imprisoned in Belgium on false charges, has returned home after five years.

The plane carrying Assadi landed at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Airport on Friday evening local time, IRNA reported.

Earlier on the day, Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nasser Kanaani had said that the former diplomat had been released from prison and would return home after “five years of captivity.”

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia’s southern Belgorod region bordering Ukraine came under attack Friday from Ukrainian artillery fire, mortar shells and drones, authorities said, hours after two drones struck a Russian city in an area next to the annexed Crimea Peninsula.

Moscow’s forces, meanwhile, struck a building containing psychology and veterinary clinics in the city of Dnipro, in central Ukraine, killing two people and wounding 30, including two children, Ukrainian officials said.

MOSCOW, May 27. /TASS/: Russian air defenses intercepted two Storm Shadow missiles, 19 HIMARS rockets, two HARM missiles and shot down 12 Ukrainian combat drones in the past 24 hours, Russian Defense Ministry Spokesman Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov told reporters on Saturday.

"The air defenses have intercepted two Storm Shadow long-range cruise missiles, 19 rockets fired from the HIMARS multiple launch rocket system and two HARM antiradar missiles," he said.

Tehran, IRNA - Sultan of Oman Haitham bin Tariq is slated to embark on a two-day visit to Iran on Sunday.

Sultan of Oman's visit will take place at the invitation of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, IRNA reported.

President Raisi will officially welcome Sultan Haitahm bin Tariq at Sa'ad Abad Cultural-Historical Complex in Tehran on Sunday evening.

The visit will be carried out within the framework of ongoing consultations between the two countries to discuss various regional and international developments and to enhance diplomatic and economic relations.

BRUSSELS, May 26 (Reuters) - The race to be the next NATO boss is heating up. But it is a race run largely in the dark, with no sign of a winner yet.

Jens Stoltenberg, the transatlantic military alliance's Norwegian secretary-general, is due to step down at the end of September after nine years in post.

Many alliance members would like his succession settled at, or even before, a NATO summit in Lithuania in mid-July.

MOSCOW, May 27. /TASS/: Russia decisively condemns Pristina’s provocative steps that have brought the situation in Kosovo to the brink of a "hot phase," Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Saturday, adding that the responsibility for anti-Serbian provocation lies with the US and the EU.

DETROIT, the United States, May 26 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao met with U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai on Friday, on the sidelines of the two-day 2023 APEC Ministers Responsible for Trade Meeting in Detroit, the United States.

The two sides had "candid, pragmatic and in-depth" exchanges on the China-U.S. economic and trade relationship, as well as regional and multilateral issues of common concern.

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — Gwendolyn Dean Schofield hoped to live to 100, and she was nearly there.

But on May 15, in what appeared to be a final act of kindness, Schofield and her daughter pulled over on a residential street in the northwestern New Mexico city of Farmington to help a woman who was shot at random, and they, too, were hit by gunfire and died.

“I guarantee they would have stopped in that situation 10 out of 10 times,” said Dallin Dean, Schofield’s grandson.

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s Sursock Museum has reopened to the public, three years after a deadly explosion in Beirut’s port — set off by tons of improperly stored chemicals — reduced many of its treasured paintings and collections to ashes.

The reopening Friday night offered Beirut residents a rare bright spot in a country reeling from a crippling economic crisis that has left around three-quarters of Lebanon’s population of 6 million in poverty.

26 May 2023; AA: The US is witnessing an explosion of child labor violations as legislative overhauls in Republican-majority states seek to remove safeguards intended to prevent a return to what was seen during the Industrial Revolution and Great Depression.

Child labor itself is not a novel problem for the US, but data from the Department of Labor released earlier this year indicates an explosion in violations across the country.

BERLIN, May 27 (Reuters) - Ukraine has asked Germany to supply it with Taurus cruise missiles, an air-launched weapon with a range of some 500 km (310 miles), a spokesperson for the defence ministry in Berlin said on Saturday.

Germany received the request several days ago, the spokesperson said, confirming a report by Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. She declined to provide further details or say how likely it was that Germany would supply the missiles to Ukraine.