Russia

MOSCOW (Reuters) - There are grounds for cautious optimism in Russia about the country’s coronavirus outbreak, where the situation remains stable, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on Monday.

Russia has reported 414,878 cases of the novel coronavirus and 4,855 deaths.

MOSCOW/WASHINGTON, June 1 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Libyan currency worth over $1 billion which was printed in Moscow and seized by Malta is not counterfeit, Russia’s foreign ministry said in response to US claims.

The US State Department said on Friday that it “commends” the seizure of $1.1 billion of “counterfeit Libyan currency” by Malta.

MOSCOW, May 30. /TASS/: The statements released by the US Department of State about the production of "counterfeit" Libyan dinars by the Russian Goznak printing factory are untenable, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

MOSCOW, May 31. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin will announce the date of voting on the constitutional amendments when he deems it right, depending on the coronavirus situation, Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov said on Sunday.

MOSCOW, May 31. /TASS/: The only minus for Russia in connection with the launch of the Crew Dragon spacecraft is that the country will not receive money from NASA for delivery of US astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station (ISS), Academician of the Russian Academy of Cosmonautics named after Tsiolkovsky Igor Marinin told TASS.

The Crew Dragon spacecraft with Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken on board was launched using the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at 22.22 pm Moscow time on May 30 from the Cape Canaveral, Florida. Docking with ISS is scheduled on May 31.

MOSCOW, May 31. /TASS/: Deliveries of the Russian drug Avifavir for treatment of coronavirus infection cases may start on June 11, the Izvestiya newspaper reports, citing the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF). The pharmaceutical will not be released for free sale and it will only be used under the supervision by medical workers, the newspaper said.

"It will be supposedly supplied to Russian hospitals on June 11, 2020, RDIF noted," the newspaper reported.

MOSCOW, May 30. /TASS/: The number of the novel coronavirus cases has surpassed six million worldwide, according to TASS estimates based on the governments’ official statements along with the conclusions made by experts and the media in the affected countries.

According to the latest data, as many as 6,002,403 people have been infected. Of those, 366,674 (or 6.11%) died. The cases have doubled approximately for a month, as the threshold of three million was passed on April 27.

MOSCOW, May 31. /TASS/: Some 9,268 coronavirus cases were confirmed in Russia in the past day, taking the total case tally in the country to 405,843, the anti-coronavirus crisis center reported on Sunday.

For the first time since May 23, the daily number of coronavirus cases surpassed 9,000. The daily growth rate reached 2.3%.

The number of recovered COVID-19 patients grew by 4,414 in the past day to 171,883. The daily number of recoveries was the lowest since May 18.

31 May 2020; AFP: Russian oil giant Rosneft, run by a close ally of President Vladimir Putin, is wielding growing influence over Russia's remaining independent media outlets, already squeezed by tightening press freedoms and pressure from the Kremlin.

Now, reporters at the country's top liberal business daily Vedomosti -- shaken in March by an announcement from owner Demyan Kudryavtsev that he planned to sell the newspaper -- have denounced censorship under its new acting editor-in-chief.

MOSCOW, May 29. /TASS/: More than 107,000 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus infection were registered worldwide on May 29, with the overall number of such cases exceeding 5.7 million, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in its daily bulletin on Friday.

As of 11:00 Moscow time on May 29, as many as 5,701,337 novel coronavirus cases and 357,688 coronavirus-associated deaths were registered across the globe. The number of confirmed cases grew by 107,740 in the past 24 hours and the number of fatalities increased by 4,354.