Europe

DONETSK, March 18. /TASS/. Ukrainian forces have shelled the western outskirts of Donetsk which led to interruptions in electricity supply, the mission of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) to the Joint Center for Control and Coordination (JCCC) said on Monday.

MOSCOW, March 18. /TASS/. The Russian Foreign Ministry has expressed indignation at the Western sanctions imposed on Russian citizens over the Kerch Strait incident.

"An attempt was made once again to score political points by means of the November 2018 Kerch Strait incident provoked by Ukraine. The EU made an outrageous decision a few days ago, blacklisting a number of Russian citizens, including our border guards who took part in the operation to foil the Ukrainian provocation," the ministry said in a commentary posted on its website on Monday.

ROME, March 19. /TASS/. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov will hold consultations in Rome with US Special Envoy for Venezuela Elliott Abrams on the situation in the Latin American country.

SIMFEROPOL, March 19. /TASS/. Members of a German delegation of public organizations are impressed by the changes over the past five years since Crimea’s reunification with Russia, Deputy Chairman of the Security and Politics Society Frank Porsh told a meeting with representatives of Crimea’s parliament, the State Council.

The delegation consisting of ten representatives of German pubic organizations arrived in Crimea on March 16 to learn about the region’s life. They hold meetings with the republic’s authorities and members of the public.

MOSCOW, March 19. /TASS/. Russian and Syrian inter-agency coordination headquarters believe that Syrian citizens won’t receive a dime out of the $400mln assistance allocated by Washington, they said in a joint statement released on Tuesday.

"Out of nearly $400mln earmarked by the US side for Syria’s assistance, the Syrian people won’t get a dime," chiefs of the Russian and Syrian coordination headquarters, Mikhail Mizintsev and Hussein Makhlouf, said in the statement.

MOSCOW, March 19. /TASS/. Russia is ready to help the US in case trials of manned spacecraft are delayed, head of Russia's state space corporation Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin said on Tuesday.

"We are ready to help American partners in case trials of their new manned spacecraft are delayed. We agree with NASA's proposal to use both US (after their qualification) and Russian spacecraft for delivering mixed international crews to the ISS [International Space Station] in the future," Rogozin wrote on his official Twitter account.

GENEVA, March 18 (Xinhua) -- The UN Independent Commission of Inquiry on the protests in the Palestinian Gaza Strip on Monday urged Israel to immediately ensure that its security forces' rules of engagement are revised to comply with international legal standards.

The commission presented its findings Monday to the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), "after investigating all killings and many injuries occurring by the separation fence between Israel and Gaza during the demonstrations last year".

THE HAGUE, March 18 (Xinhua) -- The man suspected of shooting three people dead and injuring five others on a tram in the Dutch city of Utrecht on Monday morning has been arrested, local police said.

The arrest coincided with the conclusion of a joint press conference held by Utrecht Mayor, Jan van Zanen, the public prosecutor and the police, who were just describing the continuing hunt for the suspect.

Prior to the arrest, Utrecht police described the suspect as Turkey-born, 37-year-old Gokmen Tanis.

PARIS, March 18 (Xinhua) -- France's Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA), which is investigating the recent crash of an Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 MAX plane, announced on Monday that it had found similarities between the doomed jet and Indonesia's Lion Air flight of the same model that crashed into the sea in October last year.

MILAN (AP) — The directors of Italy’s premier opera house, Teatro alla Scala in Milan, are meeting to decide whether to accept controversial funding from Saudi Arabia.

The meeting Monday came amid media reports last weekend that at least some of the 15 million euros ($17 million) had been deposited into an escrow account pending approval of the funding.