Lawyers from the Russian Sberbank cannot find a legal mechanism that would allow them to operate in the Crimea while avoiding related sanctions, stated Herman Gref, the bank’s CEO, during a lecture at the World Festival of Youth and Students in Sochi, reports RIA Novosti.

"You can imagine what the price of such an issue is for Sberbank. It is a question of the entire financial system of the country, the competitiveness of the country as a whole. Therefore, the speculators who raise these …

At Turkey’s request, Cologne resident Kemal K., who has both German and Turkish citizenship, was arrested in Ukraine on an Interpol arrest warrant.

As reported by Deutsche Welle, it came out on October 17 that Kemal had been arrested already at the middle of this year at a request made by Turkey through Interpol. He is free to move about, but he cannot leave Ukrainian territory until a decision is made regarding his extradition to the Turkish authorities.

Residing in Germany since 2017, Kemal …

US Special Representative for Ukraine Kurt Volker will visit Ukraine next Friday, on October 27, Zerkalo Nedeli (the Mirror Weekly) reported with reference to a source in the Ukrainian government.

According to the source, Volker will meet with the Ukrainian authorities before meeting with Putin’s advisor, Vladislav Surkov. The date of Volker and Surkov’s meeting has not yet been determined.

While in Ukraine, Volker intends to take stock of the current situation.

Ukrainian Ambassador to the …

SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces) forces supported by the US have taken under their control the al-Omar oil field in the east of Syria.

It is reported that the SDF units supported by the US-led coalition air strikes drove the Islamic State militants out of the oil field. The oil deposit was the main source of income for ISIS. The al-Omar oil field is located on the eastern shore of the Euphrates, near the border with Iraq.

On October 14, the Syrian government army with the support of the Russian …

The leader of the ANO party, the decisive winner in the Czech elections, said that he will not negotiate the formation of the government with the pro-Russian parties who were also among the leaders of the election.

This was reported by iDnes, citing the speech given by ANO head Andrej Babiš. iDnes is part of Babiš’s own media holdings.

Appearing before the media after the announcement of election results, the politician said that he would work “with all the political forces” in parliament, …

The case against the leader of the LPR (Luhansk People’s Republic), Igor Plotnitsky, who is accused of committing a terrorist attack where an IL-76 aircraft transporting 49 Ukrainian service members was shot down, was transferred to the High Specialized Court of Ukraine for Civil and Criminal cases, as stated by the press service of the Court of Appeal of the Dnipropetrovsk region, where on October 20th hearings on the case were held, Ukrinform reports.

"The case against Plotnitsky (the leader …

On October 20th, the Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, Andriy Parubiy, signed the law "On tour events in Ukraine," according to which Russian performers must pass a check on Ukrainian legislation’ violations, as well as laws "On the basic principles of ensuring cybersecurity of Ukraine" and "On electronic confidential services."

The law on tours provides for a ban on carrying out activities if there is a person who is on the list of people posing a threat to national security.

If the …

NATO internal documents call into question the defense capability of the alliance in the event of a crisis, as reported by the German publication Der Spiegel. According to Der Spiegel, the internal "Progress Report on the Strengthened Deterrence and Defense Capability of the Alliance” indicates that the ability of NATO's rapid reaction forces to adequately respond to challenges is questionable.

In addition, there are serious problems with logistics on the eastern flank of the alliance.

A NATO …