A Russian consul general in Kazakhstan has been sacked following a controversial interview in which he claimed that the Central Asian country was intentionally discriminating against the Russian language in schools. Yevgeny Bobrov, who headed the Russian consulate in Almaty, said in the interview published last week that Kazakhstan, which is home to the world’s…
A Kyrgyzstan court said Monday state prosecutors had urged it to close down Kloop, a mainly U.S.-funded media organization, for content allegedly discrediting the government of the Central Asian nation, a Russian ally. “We have received a complaint from the Bishkek prosecutor for the shutting down of public foundation Kloop.Media,” a court spokesperson told AFP.…
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is to visit Russia “soon” for talks with Vladimir Putin on reviving a deal to ship grain across the Black Sea, his party spokesman said Monday. The meeting will take place in Russia’s resort city of Sochi, Erdogan’s ruling party spokesman Omer Celik told reporters, adding that Turkey hoped to…
A Swedish-Russian dual national who was arrested last year in a spectacular helicopter raid on his Stockholm home was charged in Sweden on Monday with spying for Moscow. Sergei Skvortsov, 60, was formally charged with carrying out “unlawful intelligence activities” against the U.S. and Sweden for a decade until his arrest in November 2022, court…
Russian authorities have detained a man in northwestern Russia suspected of assaulting an Al Jazeera reporter live on air last week, the St. Petersburg-based news website Fontanka reported Monday. Rania Dridi was broadcasting from the former headquarters of Russia’s mercenary outfit Wagner last Thursday when the man accosted her, demanding that she speak Russian during…
The world’s largest crypto exchange Binance said Monday that it has banned Russia-based users from trading in all currencies besides the ruble. Binance’s restrictions follow reporting by Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal on a U.S. Justice Department investigation into the company’s possible violation of financial sanctions on Russia despite its public commitment to comply with…
Russia said it has arrested a former employee of a U.S. consulate on charges of collecting information about Moscow’s war in Ukraine, Interfax reported Monday. The U.S. State Department had in May denounced Robert Shonov’s detention in the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok, saying he had been performing routine activities as a private contractor. Russia’s Federal Security…
Russian air defenses destroyed a drone approaching Moscow and two in a region bordering Ukraine, authorities said early Monday. Air defenses in the Lyubertsy district southeast of the Russian capital “destroyed a drone flying toward Moscow,” the city’s mayor Sergei Sobyanin wrote on the Telegram messaging app without specifying whether it was Ukrainian. “There were…