Roskosmos (Russia’s state space agency) has confirmed the arrest of Viktor Kudryavtsev, a scientist from the Central Research Institute for Machine Building (TsNIIMash), Russian media reported on Sunday, July 22.

“He is currently being investigated,” Roskosmos spokesman Vladimir Ustimenko told Russian news agency TASS. He did not provide any further details.

News came out earlier that 74 year-old Viktor Kudryavtsev, a scientist from TsNIIMash, had been sent to the Lefortovo pre-trial …

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has signed a bill ratifying an agreement with the Netherlands regarding their international judicial cooperation. This decision will allow the Dutch to carry out a legal process concerning the crash of the Boeing 777 Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 in Donbass in 2014, the president’s press office announced.

President Petro Poroshenko has signed bills “which ratify an agreement between Ukraine and the Kingdom of the Netherlands for international judicial …

The Israeli Air Force struck a military target near the city of Masyaf, Hama province, reported the Syrian state agency SANA with reference to a military source.

According to other Syrian sources, the  target of the air strike was the Center for Scientific Research near Masyaf that has been transformed since the summer of 2015 into the development center for Fateh-110 ballistic missiles of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

There are reportedly a number of dead and wounded in the ranks of the …

According to Ukrainian Minister of Infrastructure Volodymyr Omelyan, Ukraine is negotiating sanctions with the West against Russian Black Sea ports.

“We are holding negotiations with our European and American partners in order to impose appropriate sanctions against the Black Sea ports because of the blockade of the Azov Sea  for Ukrainian ships [ by Russia],” he said on channel 112 TV.

According to Omelyan, the wave of sanctions against Moscow is rising and the latest decision by US Congress …

More than 50 Moldovan mercenaries are fighting in the east of Ukraine for Russian for the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) and Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), reported the Moldovan publication Ziarul de Garda with a reference to data from the Security and Intelligence Service of Moldova (SIS). However, according to unofficial data, the number of Moldovan mercenaries in Donbass is close to 100 people.

As journalists note, mercenary activity in Moldova has intensified with the …

Nurmakhmad Kholov, the Russian Ambassador to Qatar said in an interview with TASS that Moscow and Doha are negotiating on the supply of S-400 anti-air missile systems but that "there’s no final conclusion on the discussion."

The diplomat clarified that Qatar might want to buy the weapons but so far there is "discussion around the question." "Apparently, no steps have been taken, and so this is a matter for the future," Kholov pointed out.

The ambassador said that Saudi Arabia is strongly …

The Russian Ministry of Defense announced that it had held naval aviation exercises in the Mediterranean Sea for pilots of its Black Sea Fleet. The Ministry’s press service reported that Ka-27PL helicopter crews and the patrol boat Yaroslav Mudry participated in the exercises.

“Pilots of the naval aircraft of the Black Sea Fleet in cooperation with the crew of the ship practiced take-offs and landings on the deck of the ship and also trained to search and track enemy submarines,” the statement …

According to a statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry’s official website, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held a phone conversation with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to discuss the improvement of bilateral relations. During the conversation, Lavrov stressed “the unacceptability of the actions of U.S. authorities, who have arrested Russian citizen Maria Butina in the United States on the basis of fabricated charges, and the need for her early release.”

Maria Butina is accused …