Reuters. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday (October 23) that Ukraine should be able to use Russia’s frozen assets for domestic weapons production and to purchase European and U.S. weapons.   The president’s comments came as European Union leaders gathered at a summit in Brussels are set to agree in principle to finance Ukraine…

Reuters. Russia said on Thursday (October 23 ) it will deliver a “painful response” to any move by the European Union to seize its frozen assets.   The warning came as EU leaders met in Brussels to discuss a plan to use the assets as the basis for a 140 billion euro ($163 billion) “reparations…

Reuters. A man shot and injured a supporter of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic on Wednesday (October 22) outside the parliament building in Belgrade, where anti-government protests have been held for almost a year – an incident that Vucic blamed on his opponents.   Vucic told a news conference that the shooting was an act of…

Reuters. Russian missile and drone attacks in and around the Ukrainian capital Kyiv killed six people, officials said on Wednesday (October 22).   Two people were killed in Kyiv, while four, including two children, died in the aftermath of Russian strikes on the surrounding region, Ukraine’s emergency service said on Wednesday.    Handout video released…

Reuters. There are no plans for U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin to meet “in the immediate future,” a senior White House official said on Tuesday, days after Trump floated another summit with his Russian counterpart.   U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov also have no…

“Azerbaijan has lifted all restrictions on the transit of existing goods to Armenia,” Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev said in a joint press statement with Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev in Astana, APA reports.   According to Aliyev, the first such transit shipment was the transportation of Kazakh grain to Armenia.    Aliyev also said a new…

Reuters. Hardline conservative Sanae Takaichi was formally nominated as Japan’s first female prime minister on Tuesday (October 21) after winning votes in parliament’s both lower house and upper house.   An acolyte of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and an admirer of Britain’s Margaret Thatcher, Takaichi received 237 votes in the lower house election to…

After three years of reasoning, pleading and conceding, the EU has had enough.   On Monday, the bloc’s 27 member countries are expected to back a new bill that will permanently cut Russian gas supplies to Hungary and Slovakia — whether they like it or not, POLITICO reports.   Since Moscow launched its all-out war…

Reuters. .S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday (October 19) he never asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to cede all of the Donbas region to Russia in an earlier meeting, but that it should stay divided as it is.   “Let it be cut the way it is. It’s cut up right now. I think…

Iran says it is no longer bound by restrictions on its nuclear program, as a landmark 2015 deal with world powers officially expired, DW reports.   From now on, “all of the provisions (of the deal), including the restrictions on the Iranian nuclear program and the related mechanisms, are considered terminated,” Iran’s Foreign Ministry said…

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy came to the White House on Friday looking for weapons to keep fighting his country’s war with Russia, but met an American president who appears more intent on brokering a peace deal than upgrading Ukraine’s arsenal, Reuters reports.   While U.S. President Donald Trump did not rule out providing the long-range…

United States President Donald Trump has said he expects an expansion of the Abraham Accords soon and hopes Saudi Arabia will join the pact that normalised diplomatic relations between Israel and some Arab states, one week into the all-encompassing and fragile Gaza ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, Al Jazeera reports.   “I hope to see…

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky hopes the momentum of the Middle East peace deal will help end the war in Ukraine, he said Thursday after arriving in the US for arms talks. “Tomorrow, a meeting with President (Donald) Trump is scheduled — and we expect that the momentum of curbing terror and war that succeeded in…

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Georgia (MFA) expresses concern regarding the visit to Georgia by the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Finland, Elina Valtonen, in her capacity as OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Georgian Public Broadcaster reports. The Ministry addresses the OSCE Secretariat and participating states with a protest note, the Foreign Ministry told…

US President Donald Trump has once again accused the BRICS bloc and its members of undermining the strength of the US dollar. During a meeting with Argentine President Javier Milei at the White House on Tuesday, Trump said the United States would impose new tariffs on countries choosing to work alongside BRICS, Financial Express reports….

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened trade penalties, including tariffs, against Spain, saying he is unhappy with its refusal to raise defense spending to 5% and calling the move disrespectful to NATO, Reuters reports.   “I’m very unhappy with Spain. They’re the only country that didn’t raise their number up to 5%… so I’m…

Reuters. Military police officers appeared on stage outside Antananarivo’s city hall on Tuesday (October 14), as youth-led protests against President Andry Rajoelina continued to swell. One officer stood guard inside a military vehicle, rifle in hand, while others drove through crowds of demonstrators gathered in the square.   Their presence, and public remarks, have fuelled…

The United States is prepared to make a deal with Iran when Tehran is ready, U.S. President Donald Trump said in a speech to the Israeli parliament on Monday, Reuters reports.   Tehran and Washington held five rounds of nuclear talks, prior to a 12-day war between Iran and Israel in June, which Washington joined…

On October 13, Deputy Prime Minister of Azerbaijan Shahin Mustafayev met with Iran’s Minister of Roads and Urban Development, Farzaneh Sadegh, Azerbaijani media reports.   The meeting highlighted mutual satisfaction with the comprehensive development of Azerbaijan–Iran relations.   The sides exchanged views on key issues of mutually beneficial cooperation, particularly in the areas of transport…

France’s newly re-appointed Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu named a new government Sunday, as he faces pressure to urgently produce a budget and quell political turmoil that is scaring businesses and staining the country’s image, France 24 reports.   The Cabinet includes several members who served in previous governments, from French President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist camp…

The United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has reportedly delivered hundreds of Martlet Lightweight Multirole Missiles (LMMs) to Ukraine. Delivered five months ahead of schedule, the missiles were made by Thales in Belfast, Northern Ireland, as part of a £1.6 billion defence cooperation agreement between the UK and Ukraine.   “The latest phase of a…

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has launched a petition campaign against a defense plan currently being discussed by European Union leaders, RBC-Ukraine reprots.   He announced the move on his Facebook page, warning of a “hot autumn” and saying Europe is rapidly approaching war. Orban noted that a few weeks ago in Copenhagen, Brussels had…

US President Donald Trump promised to impose an additional 100 percent tariff on China Friday and threatened to cancel a summit with Xi Jinping, reigniting his trade war with Beijing in a row over export curbs on rare earth minerals, France 24 reports.   Trump said the extra levies, plus US export controls on “any…

The White House on Friday criticized the Nobel Prize committee’s decision to grant the peace prize to a Venezuelan opposition leader instead of U.S. President Donald Trump, who aggressively lobbied for the award and touted his role in brokering international ceasefire deals, Reuters reports.   “President Trump will continue making peace deals, ending wars, and…

Reuters. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen comfortably survived two bids to remove her when the European Parliament rejected no-confidence motions from hard-right and left groups on Thursday (October 9).   EU lawmakers rejected the two motions of censure with 378 members of the 720-strong parliament expressing support for the von der Leyen and…

Turkey welcomed the establishment of a ceasefire in Gaza and expressed hope that this ceasefire would bring an end to the “genocide that has continued for the past two years. We expect the ceasefire agreement to be fully implemented”.   The statement by the Turkish Foreign Ministry reads:    “With the ceasefire in place, it…

Ambassadors and heads of European missions in Tehran were summoned to the Iranian Foreign Ministry in protest over the European Union’s interventionist stance on Persian Gulf issues, Mehr reports.   According to the Foreign Ministry, following the interfering and baseless claims made in the joint statement by the foreign ministers of PGCC and the EU…

Two years after the Gaza conflict erupted, President Donald Trump pledged U.S. support for Gaza security guarantees and said he believes a deal is close to being completed for the remaining hostages, Reuters reports.   Talking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump said, “I think there’s a possibility that we could have peace in…

Reuters. Former French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said on Monday (October 6) that he no longer understood President Emmanuel Macron’s decisions, speaking on the French channel TF1. He spoke after outgoing French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu was asked by the president to start two days of last-ditch talks on Tuesday (October 7) with members of…

“The elections held on Saturday were marked by an extensive crackdown on media, civil society, and opposition parties. We have also seen low turnout, which was also marked by a boycott of the opposition. We have also seen that the Georgian authorities failed to invite OSCE and ODIHR observers in due time, undermining the transparency…