Day: January 11, 2021

A 6.8-magnitude earthquake struck early Tuesday in northern Mongolia not far from the border with Russia, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said. The epicenter of the quake, which struck at a relatively shallow depth of 10 kilometers (six miles), was located 33 kilometers south-southwest of Turt, U.S. seismologists said. The epicenter appeared to be located…

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh was still not resolved as he met the leader of his country’s arch foe Azerbaijan in Moscow on Monday. President Vladimir Putin hosted the heads of the two former Soviet states for a rare trilateral meeting and urged them to negotiate further steps in a…

A Swedish court on Monday convicted a Russian citizen of the attempted murder of a blogger from Chechnya critical of strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov, alleging high-level backing for the attack. The assault on Tumso Abdurakhmanov took place in his apartment in the Swedish city of Gavle in February 2020, when the accused struck him in…

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev said on Monday he expected U.S. President-elect Joe Biden to extend a landmark arms agreement with Russia and urged the two sides deepen arms reductions. The New START Treaty is the Cold War rivals’ last remaining nuclear reduction pact and is set to expire Feb. 5.  The fate of the…

Russia will trial a one-dose version of its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, officials said on Monday, as they aim to provide a stopgap solution for badly hit countries. The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), which financed the development of the two-dose Sputnik V jab, said it was also financing clinical trials of “Sputnik Light,” a less…

Moscow plans to expand its residents’ digital profiles to include data on their incomes, school grades and pets, the Kommersant business daily reported Monday, citing public documents. Moscow City Hall currently collects the gender, age and income level of residents signed up to its mos.ru municipal services website and as part of its monitoring systems. In…

Man-made fires have burned down forests and killed endangered animals at a protected Russian nature park on the border with China and North Korea, Russian activists say. Animals including Far Eastern forest cats as well as several endangered species either burned alive or died by asphyxiation while endangered plants such as relict oaks burned to…

The billionaire leader of Georgia’s ruling party, Bidzina Ivanishvili, who is widely seen as the Western-backed country’s most powerful man, announced Monday he was quitting politics. Ivanishvili made the announcement after his Georgian Dream party claimed a narrow victory in a tightly contested parliamentary election last year that sparked protests. “My mission has been accomplished,”…

Sardana Avksentiyeva, the popular independent mayor of one of the world’s coldest cities, has submitted her resignation nearly three years after defeating a Kremlin-backed incumbent for the role. Avksentyeva, 50, became the first woman mayor of the Siberian city of Yakutsk in September 2018 elections that drew international attention for being free and fair and…