Russia supported its ally Syrian President Bashar al-Assad at the UN Security Council on August 30 in New York. Permanent Representative of Russia to the UN Vitaly Churkin refused to accept the facts provided in the report of the UN and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

After the meeting of the UN Security Council, he rejected the US and other countries demands to condemn the chemical attacks and punish al-Assad's regime for the use of chemical weapons. The …

Bellingcat has analyzed the number of medals that have been awarded to Russian soldiers over the past years. According to the British investigative journalists group, tens of thousands of servicemen from Russia were involved in the hostilities in eastern Ukraine.

A British investigative journalists group that conducts independent investigations on open source data found that tens of thousands of Russian soldiers were involved in hostilities in the Donbas. Bellingcat provided evidence of this …

Russia stated that  it is holding the final stage of the sudden readiness check of its troops in the Crimea and in the southern part of the country. According to the press service of the Russian Defense Ministry, the final stage of the readiness check took place on 30-31st of August.

“Tactical and special-tactical drills, including live fire, training in troops’ practical actions, training on countering sabotage and reconnaissance groups, exercises on driving combat vehicles and tanks, weapons, …

EU ambassadors will make a decision about extending targeted sanctions against Russian citizens involved in the violation of Ukrainian territorial integrity. In particular, 146 people and 37 companies could have their visas restricted and accounts frozen.

As Radio Svoboda reports, citing its own sources in the EU, a decision about extending the sanctions for another six months is expected to be adopted without much discussion by September 15. The parties in question include companies in the …

France, Germany and the United States do not acknowledge the fact of the presence of the Russian troops in the Donbass region. In his article for Apostrophe news portal, Ambassador Oleh Shamshur claims that these countries hope for a return to the prewar order of things.

According to Shamshur, who is the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to France, Western countries realize that Russian troops are in the Donbas region but this position is not public and will not be made …

The Ukrainian General Prosecutor’s Office has initiated a criminal case against the French deputies who visited the Crimea in July of this year, the Ukrainian MP of the People’s Front party, George Logvinsky, wrote on his Facebook page.

On August 11, Logvinsky reported that the Prosecutor’s Office “initiated pre-trial investigation of criminal proceedings over a criminal offense envisioned by part 1 of Article 332-1 [Violation of the procedure of entry to Ukraine’s temporarily occupied …

Russian servicemen will train to block the Kerch Strait and gas condensate field in the annexed Crimea, the Russian Ministry of Defense press service reported on Wednesday, August 31.

“Formations of various attack forces from the Black Sea Fleet and the Caspian Flotilla will hold a series of trainings in the waters of the sea, aiming to defeat a hypothetical enemy and suppress an attempt to lift a blockade of the Kerch Strait and one of the gas condensate fields, and will also train to free a  …

The Russian Ministry of Economic Development has revised its outlook on the reduction of the GDP for 2016. On the 30th of August, Vedomosti reported that the ministry expects that this index may grow from 0.2% to 0.6% at the end of the year.

The ministry has estimated that the pace of economic decline in the country, compared to the same period of the previous year, has accelerated.

For this year, Russian economists have forecasted a slight increase of the average oil prices, from $40 to $41 …