LONDON | TASS | Moscow is ready for a very serious conversation about a peaceful settlement of the conflict in Ukraine, but is not moving away from its previously taken position, Russian Ambassador to London Andrey Kelin said in an interview with the British television channel ITV. “I will say …
Read More »Ukraine’s existential culture war
COMMENT | IAN BURUMA | In 2022, Lithuania’s then-Minister of Culture Simonas Kairys decided that performing Russian composer Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet The Nutcracker was no longer an appropriate way to celebrate the Christmas season. Lithuania is a staunch supporter of Ukraine, and Kairys, believing that Russian culture could not be separated from Russian …
Read More »Trump declares desire to meet with Putin ‘very quickly’
NEW YORK | TASS | US President-elect Donald Trump would like to hold a meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin as soon as possible, he told the Newsmax TV channel in an interview. “I know he wants to meet and I’m going to meet [him] very quickly. I would’ve done it sooner …
Read More »Trump wants conflict in Ukraine to end as soon as possible
NEW YORK, the United States | TASS | US President-elect Donald Trump wants to end the conflict in Ukraine as soon as possible, the politician’s nominee for special envoy on Ukraine Keith Kellogg said. “He wants to end it as quickly as he can. <…> This is a war that …
Read More »189 Ukrainians return from Russian captivity under prisoner swap
KIEV | Xinhua | A total of 189 Ukrainians returned from Russian captivity on Monday as a part of a new prisoner swap, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said. Among those released were 187 servicemen, including officers, soldiers and sergeants, along with two civilians, Zelensky wrote in a post on Telegram. …
Read More »Trump wants China’s help on peace in Ukraine
He unlikely to get it because the longer the war in Ukraine continues in this way, the longer China reaps the benefits COMMENT | STEFAN WOLFF & TETYANA MALYARENKO | U.S. president-elect Donald Trump has invited China’s president Xi Jinping to his inauguration on January 20 in a surprise move which …
Read More »Ukraine opens second front in Africa
NAIROBI, KENYA | TASS | Ukraine has opened its second front in Africa, struggling to defeat Russia on the battlefield, Moscow’s Ambassador to Mali and Niger Igor Gromyko told TASS. “Unable to defeat Russia on the battlefield, Vladimir Zelensky’s regime has decided to open a ‘second front’ in Africa, supporting …
Read More »A requiem for Europe
The costs and consequences of American primacy on a continent that gave birth to the modern world THE LAST WORD | Andrew M. Mwenda | By 1900, there was no part of this planet that was not directly (or somewhat indirectly) ruled from a European capital – London, Paris, The Hague, Berlin, Rome, …
Read More »Top Russian diplomat lists conditions for peace in Ukraine
MOSCOW | TASS | A peaceful settlement of the Ukrainian conflict is possible only if Kiev abandons its plans to join NATO, closes Western military bases on the country’s territory and cancels exercises involving foreign troops, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with American journalist Tucker Carlson. …
Read More »Kim Jong Un sees missile strikes inside Russia as Western involvement in conflict
SEOUL, NORTH KOREA | TASS | North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said at a meeting with Russian Defense Minister Andrey Belousov that strikes inside Russia with longer-range Western weapons represent direct interference in the conflict in Ukraine, the Korean Central News Agency reported. “Comrade Kim Jong Un said the …
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