Section: The Gulf Today (United Arab Emirates)
Putin, Berlusconi probed for wine tasting in Crimea
KIEV: Ukraine has launched a criminal probe into wine-tasting by Russian President Vladimir Putin and ex-Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi after they allegedly quaffed a $100,000 bottle of centuries-old wine in Crimea, prosecutors said on Saturday. The Kremlin strongman and the disgraced billionaire reportedly cracked open a bottle of 1775...
Ukraine campaigns to strip Russia of UN veto power
KIEV: Ukraine redoubled its efforts on Wednesday to see Russia stripped of its veto power on the UN Security Council when the global body’s General Assembly meets in the coming weeks. Numerous nations are upset with Russia for being one of the five permanent council members that together with China has blocked a series of UN efforts to...
Ukrainian pilot’s murder trial to start on Sept.22
MOSCOW: A Russian court on Tuesday said a Ukrainian female helicopter pilot will go on trial next week over the murder of two Russian journalists, and ruled that she must stay behind bars meanwhile. Nadiya Savchenko, who is feted for her heroism in Ukraine, faces up to 25 years in prison for her alleged role in pre-meditated, hate-motivated...
EU extends Ukraine sanctions by six months
BRUSSELS: EU member states formally approved on Monday a six-month extension of sanctions against Ukrainian and Russian figures accused of backing pro-Moscow rebels fighting to break away from Kiev. “The assessment of the situation did not justify a change in the regime of sanctions nor in the list of persons and entities under restrictive...
Putin makes US boxer a Russian citizen
MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin has granted Russian citizenship to Roy Jones Junior, a prominent US professional boxer who had asked for it last month when he met Putin in the disputed region of Crimea, the Kremlin said on Saturday. The move is the latest example of the Kremlin publicising cases of prominent Westerners who praise Russia...
Berlusconi rubs shoulders with Putin in Crimea
YALTA: Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi rubbed shoulders with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday in Crimea, the most prominent Western politician to visit the Black Sea peninsula since Moscow annexed it from Ukraine last year. Western visitors have been rare since the annexation, which drove relations between Moscow and the...
Ukraine truce holding amid Russia threat: Poroshenko
KIEV: Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko told an international conference on Friday that Russia remained a threat to the “entire democratic world” but that he held out hope a new truce with pro-Moscow insurgents would hold. The Western-backed leader told an audience of about a hundred global investors and top diplomats that they must press...
Russian court sets tough jail term for flag stunt
MOSCOW: A Russian court on Thursday convicted a man of helping try to paint a Ukrainian flag on a Moscow skyscraper as an act of protest against the Kremlin’s foreign policy and sentenced him to two years and three months in jail. The incident, in August last year, attracted international attention because it was a rare example of protest...
‘Ukraine ceasefire more respected now’
PRAGUE: A ceasefire in eastern Ukraine is being respected more now than in the past, Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Wednesday. “So far it looks like the ceasefire is now more respected than it has been for a long time. I welcome that, at the same time, the situation in Ukraine is still very fragile,” he told reporters during a...
Nearly 8,000 killed since start of Ukraine conflict: UN
UNITED NATIONS: Nearly 8,000 people – including civilians, soldiers and militia members – have been killed since the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, the United Nations human rights office (OHCHR) said on Tuesday. “Since the conflict began in eastern Ukraine in mid-April 2014, a total of at least 7,962 people … have been...
