Russia

MOSCOW, November 4. /TASS/:The ruble exchange rate has stabilized and will remain within existing norms, Russia’s Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said.

"We can now see that the exchange rate has stabilized. We believe it will remain somewhere within these parameters. So, the budget rule, fiscal stability, and control over the operations of foreign economic activity agents all have an impact on the currency rate," he said.

MOSCOW, November 3. /TASS/: The latest round of anti-Russian sanctions imposed by the US is a continuation of its policy of "inflicting a strategic defeat on Moscow," but Washington "shouldn’t hold its breath," Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.

MOSCOW, November 3. /TASS/: Moscow sees it as a top priority to get the parties in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict zone to cease fire, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

"We consider it necessary to take urgent measures to reach an immediate ceasefire, open humanitarian corridors to avoid new casualties and provide necessary assistance to the affected civilians," he said at a press conference following talks with his Kuwaiti counterpart Salem Abdullah al-Jaber al-Sabah.

MOSCOW, November 3. /TASS/: Large and medium-sized Russian businesses have grown accustomed to hedging risks in the environment of sanctions that exists today, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

"Sanctions create additional problems. But we have adjusted to the sanctions. We have learned to hedge against sanctions risks," the Kremlin official said, commenting on the introduction of new restrictions by the United States against Russian companies.

MOSCOW, November 3. /TASS/: The corruption within Ukraine is unmatched anywhere in the world, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday.

"In Russia, we have plenty of problems. We, in Russia, and in the entire world are fighting corruption, but corruption in Ukraine has taken on a life of its own - there is nothing like it in the world, you can take it from me," he said at a meeting with the new members of the Russian Public Chamber.

MOSCOW, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday that some Western weapons supplied to Ukraine were finding their way to the Middle East through the illegal arms market and being sold to the Taliban.

"Now they say: weapons are getting into the Middle East from Ukraine. Well of course they are because they are being sold," Putin said. "And they are being sold to the Taliban and from there they go onto wherever."

MOSCOW, Nov 2 (Reuters) - A top ally of President Vladimir Putin warned Poland on Thursday that the NATO member state was now considered a "dangerous enemy" by Russia and could end up losing its statehood if it continued on its current course.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council, made the comments in an 8,000-word article on Russian-Polish relations, saying Moscow now had a "dangerous enemy" in Poland.

MOSCOW, November 2. /TASS/: The Ukrainian shelling attack on Donetsk, which affected journalists from TASS, Izvestia and the Zvezda TV channel, provides direct evidence of the Kiev regime’s terrorist logic, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a briefing.

MOSCOW, November 2. /TASS/: The US has expanded its sanction list and added Russia’s Sistema holding to it, the US Treasury Department said.

New sanctions were introduced also against Russian banks and companies. In particular, AEON Corporation, drones producer ZALA, Post Bank, Arctic LNG 2 plant, the Bauman State Technical University, and HCF Bank were added to the list. In total, thirty Russian individuals and almost two hundred legal entities were hit by restrictions.

MOSCOW, November 2. /TASS/: Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev has warned that Poland's actions may lead to a direct confrontation with Russia and Belarus and launch World War III.

"Poland's own military buildup and Polish military presence in Ukraine may trigger a direct confrontation between Warsaw and Belarus and Russia," Medvedev said in an article for the Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspaper. "In this case, the allied group will give an appropriate response to prevent threats that stem from the evil ambitions of the Polish establishment," he stressed.