• U.S. Secretary of State Nominee was a managing director of a U.S.-Russian offshore company

    The main nominee for the position of U.S. Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, was a Managing Director of a subsidiary of ExxonMobil that was registered in the Bahamas and was created to conduct business with Russia, Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported. Even Republican Senators have criticized his close ties with Russia and Vladimir Putin.

    “The fact that Tillerson used the Bahamas as a tax haven to conduct his business in Russia would only enhance criticism,” the edition noted. According to …

  • Turkey denies secret 'Syria bargain' with Russia

     On Monday, Ankara denied any secret deal with Russia regarding the future of Syria, Western media outlets reported.

    "That's not how we see it. That is not how we make deals. We don't see any connection," a senior Turkish Foreign Ministry official said.

    Earlier, a number of Western media outlets suggested that since relations between Moscow and Ankara improved, it is possible that Turkey has agreed to assist Russia in Aleppo while Moscow promised not to hinder operations carried out by the …

  • Poland appealed the European Court’s decision to increase Gazprom’s pipeline access

    The Polish government appealed to the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg due to the decision to increase access of Gazprom to the key gas pipeline OPAL, which links Nord Stream with Germany. The European Commission adopted this decision in late October, Polskie Radio reported on December 18, with reference to the official representative of Polish Foreign Ministry, Joanna Wajda.

    The decision of Brussels was heavily criticized by Warsaw. The Polish administration stated that it recognizes a …

  • Ukraine signed cross-border cooperation agreements with four EU countries

    During the third meeting of the EU-Ukraine Association Council, Ukraine signed cross-border cooperation agreements with four neighboring countries of the EU, Evropeyskaya Pravda reported.

    Stepan Kubiv, who is both the First Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine, signed the draft agreement on behalf of the Ukrainian side, and the European Commission's Director General for the European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations, Christian …

  • Media: Gazprom assets were nationalized in Turkey

    As reported by the the Kommersant newspaper in early December, Turkey essentially nationalized the Akfel Holding shares owned by Gazprom and Gazprombank. According to the newspaper’s sources, the gas dispute with Turkey is "already inevitable."

    The largest private importer of Russian gas to Turkey, Akfel Holding, is being effectively nationalized by the authorities in accordance with the emergency decree N674, adopted after July’s attempted coup in the country, the newspaper wrote. Gazprom, …