Russia

MOSCOW, April 21. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin has held a telephone conversation with Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Kremlin press service said in a statement on Tuesday.

"The parties discussed pressing issues related to Russian-Turkish cooperation, focusing on trade and economic ties, including nuclear energy projects and plans to boost agricultural and transport cooperation," the statement reads.

MOSCOW, April 21. /TASS/: Specialists of the Energomash Research and Production Association have launched active work to adapt the RD-180 liquid-propellant rocket engine for the new Soyuz-6 carrier rocket, Energomash CEO Igor Arbuzov said on Tuesday.

NOVO-OGARYOVO, April 21. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for equipping more hospital beds for receiving coronavirus patients even if such beds may not be needed, for which he said he hopes.

"We understand that it [extra beds and equipment] may not be needed, I hope to God, but we must have that all the same," he said on Tuesday at an online meeting with governor of the Far Eastern Primorsky Territory.

MOSCOW, April 21. /TASS/: The Kremlin has no information if media rumors about North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s health have anything to do with the reality, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the media on Tuesday.

"We’ve seen the media reports. We have no idea to what extent these reports agree with the reality. We are waiting for official information," Peskov said.

MOSCOW, April 21. /TASS/: Russia’s Vector State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology has formed a preliminary group of volunteers aged between 18 and 60 for preclinical trials of vaccine against the novel coronavirus, researcher Natalya Dumchenko has said.

Vector Director General Rinat Maksyutov said in early April that preclinical tests will begin in early May and last until June 22. The vaccine has already been tested on animals.

MOSCOW, April 21. /TASS/: People diagnosed with acute respiratory viral infections will have to obey by the same lockdown rules as those diagnosed with the coronavirus infection. Their movements will be traced with the use of geolocation technologies, as follows from the Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin’s decree issued on Tuesday.

MOSCOW, April 20 (Xinhua) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday that although the country is managing to slow the spread of COVID-19, its peak is yet to come.

"Now we need to do everything to smooth out this peak, to shorten the transit time through the so-called plateau," Putin said in an online conference with officials, scientists and doctors.

He said the situation remains difficult as the virus has spread to all the country's 85 regions.

MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has condemned the refusal of the US and Western states to lift unilateral sanctions against several states in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Al-Assad made this statement during a meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in Damascus, quoted by SANA news agency.

MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin has stressed that foreign interference in Venezuelan affairs is unacceptable, the Kremlin press service informed on Monday on the outcomes of the phone call between the Russian leader and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

"Russia has reaffirmed its support of Venezuela’s legal government on peaceful regulation of domestic policy disputes based on national dialogue. [Russia] has stressed that destructive foreign interference in Venezuelan affairs is unacceptable," the message informs.

MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/: Issues of combating the coronavirus infection were among the topics of a telephone conversation between Russian and Venezuelan Presidents, Vladimir Putin and Nicolas Maduro, the Kremlin press service said on Monday.

"The sides noted the importance of internationally agreed measures to combat the new global threat, including Vladimir Putin’s initiative to create the so-called green corridors, free from trade wars and sanctions, for deliveries of medicines, food, equipment and technologies for the crisis period," the press service said.