Russia

MOSCOW, June 2. /TASS/: Advanced weapons and munitions will be supplied under the guise of NATO’s Sea Breeze 2021 drills to the Ukrainian troops and nationalist formations stationed close to the areas of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions outside of Kiev’s control, Russian Defence Ministry Spokesman Major General Igor Konashenkov said on Wednesday.

"Advanced armaments, munitions and materiel are planned to be delivered precisely to that region for the Ukrainian troops under the guise of holding the drills," the spokesman said.

MOSCOW, June 2. /TASS/: The Ministry of Health of the Republic of Mauritius has approved the use of Sputnik Light, a single-dose vaccine against coronavirus, the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) said in a press release on Wednesday. 

"The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF, Russia’s sovereign wealth fund) announces the approval of the Russian single-dose Sputnik Light vaccine against coronavirus by the Ministry of Health and Wellness of the Republic of Mauritius," RDIF said.

MOSCOW, June 2. /TASS/: Kremlin is not trying to interfere in investment activities of Russian regions and to restrict the governors who turned to Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk with a proposal to establish the production of Tesla cars in their regions, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday.

"Of course not," he said, answering the question whether the Kremlin was holding back the governors of the regions who offered locations for the development of the automobile industry to the American entrepreneur.

MOSCOW, June 2. /TASS/: The official US delegation will not take part in the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum and embassy representatives will be present on Forum floors to assist the US business representatives, press secretary of the US Embassy in Moscow Jason Rebholz told TASS on Wednesday.

"There is no official U.S. delegation from Washington and no high-level U.S. Government speakers," the press secretary said.

ST.PETERSBURG, June 2. / TASS /: The Nord Stream 2 facilities in the Leningrad Region will start working in a test mode next week to prepare for the launch of gas in Germany, the Leningrad Region Governor Alexander Drozdenko told reporters on Wednesday.

(Reuters) --- A Russian court on Wednesday rejected a lawsuit brought by jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny designed to force his prison to overturn his designation as 'a flight risk,' his Anti-Corruption Foundation said on Twitter.

Navalny says the designation was used as a pretext to wake him up every hour during the night to verify his whereabouts, a practice he has called absurd.

MOSCOW, June 1. /TASS/: The State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, has adopted the bill regulating the activities of big foreign internet companies in Russia in the first reading.

The bill submitted to the State Duma states that from January 1, 2022, owners of large foreign Internet resources with a daily audience of over 500,000 Russian users should create branches in the Russian Federation, open representative offices or establish Russian legal entities that must fully represent the interests of parent companies.

MOSCOW, June 1. /TASS/: Russia has prospects of military and technical cooperation with Iran, and the Islamic Republic is interested in getting various types of Russian weapons, Head of Russia’s Federal Service for Military and Technical Cooperation Dmitry Shugayev said on the sidelines of a congress of the Union of Machine-Builders on Tuesday.

MOSCOW, June 1. /TASS/: The Kremlin believes it is important to make sure that Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Joe Biden of the United States hold their much-awaited summit but there are no plans to soften the meeting’s agenda, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

"Naturally, nobody wants to soften the agenda in the run-up to the summit. We think that it is still very important that this summit takes place," he pointed out.

SOCHI, June 1. /TASS/: Relations with former Soviet countries are among Moscow’s foreign policy priorities, Russian President Vladimir Putin said during a video conference meeting with the permanent members of the country’s Security Council on Tuesday.

"Relations with our closest neighbors, the former Soviet countries, are among Russia’s most important foreign policy priorities," the president pointed out.