Russia

12 July 2023; MEMO: Turkey should be under no illusion that it might one day be allowed to join the European Union, the Kremlin said yesterday, as Moscow stressed its desire for strong relations with Ankara despite existing disagreements between them, including over the growth of NATO, Reuters reported.

MOSCOW, July 12. /TASS/: The price of security guarantees from the Group of Seven (G7) is a Ukraine cleared of Ukrainians by Western weapons, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday.

Earlier, Ukrainian Defense Minister Alexey Reznikov expressed concern over the G7’s security guarantees, saying that "Kiev will not believe in them until it finds out what their price is."

MOSCOW, July 12. /TASS/: Russia will have to respond to Ukraine potentially using cluster munitions, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday, without elaborating.

"Naturally, the potential use of this type of weapons is a game-changer and it will certainly force Russia to take specific steps in response," Peskov said, as he forwarded questions about exactly what measures will be taken to the Defense Ministry.

Earlier, emergency services in the Zaporozhye Region reported that Ukrainian troops had shelled the city of Tokmak with cluster munitions.

MOSCOW, July 12 (Reuters) - Russia is decaying in a potent brew of absurdity and repression that is comparable to the Leonid Brezhnev-era of the Soviet Union, Oleg Orlov, one of the Russia's most respected human rights campaigners, told Reuters.

Orlov, 70, is on trial in Russia for articles he published last year which cast Russia as a "fascist" state seeking revenge for the perceived humiliations of the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. He faces up to three years in prison.

MOSCOW, July 11. /TASS/: Kiev hyped up its counteroffensive so much that many countries expected to see substantial results by the start of the NATO summit in Vilnius on July 11, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said.

"I think they have touted and hyped up this counteroffensive issue so much that practically, if not half the world, then a third of it for sure, was waiting for the 11th to take stock of some results such as what was achieved by this widely touted and anticipated thing they called a ‘strategic’ counteroffensive," he said.

MOSCOW, July 11. /TASS/: The supply of cluster munitions by the Americans to Kiev will prolong the conflict in Ukraine, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu told reporters on Tuesday.

MOSCOW, July 11. /TASS/: The inflation level in Russia is currently among the lowest across the world, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on Tuesday at the meeting on economic issues.

"Inflation remains moderate. It stood at 2.9% from January to early July, which is much lower than last-year values," Mishustin said. Inflation in annual terms is not above 3.5%, he noted.

"This is among the lowest indicators globally at present," the prime minister stressed.

July 11 (Reuters) - A Russian military official who had commanded a submarine in the Black Sea and appeared on a Ukrainian blacklist of alleged war criminals has been shot dead by an unknown assassin while on his morning run.

Russia's top investigative body said Stanislav Rzhitsky, 42, was gunned down early on Monday in the southern city of Krasnodar.

Rzhitsky's address and personal details appeared on the Ukrainian website Myrotvorets (Peacemaker), a vast unofficial database of people considered to be enemies of Ukraine.

MOSCOW, July 10. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin had a nearly three-hour-long meeting with Yevgeny Prigozhin and PMC Wagner commanding officers in the Kremlin on June 29, Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.

Commenting on a piece by the Liberation newspaper about Putin’s meeting with Prigozhin after what happened on June 24, the Kremlin spokesman said, "The president did hold such a meeting."

YEKATERINBURG, July 10. /TASS/: Foreign partners remain interested in cooperating with Russia, despite all the attempts to cut it from global supply and payment chains, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said at the plenary session of the Innoprom international industrial exhibition.

"We see the interest in the Russian economy is not merely keeping but is growing, despite all the attempts of opponents to cut us from global manufacturing chains, logistical routes and systems of financial payments," the Prime Minister said.