Russia

MOSCOW, September 13. /TASS/: The joint stock company NPO Mashinostroyeniya (an affiliate of the corporation Tactical Missile Corporation) plans to upgrade its supersonic anti-ship cruise missile Oniks.

"It is true that we have been asked to improve the Oniks missile’s flight parameters for increasing the effectiveness of this anti-ship complex," a spokesman for NPO Mashinostroyeniya told TASS without specifying what parameters were in question.

MOSCOW, September 13. /TASS/: The Arctic LNG 2 project being implemented by Russia’s gas producer Novatek, may be financed through the National Wealth Fund, First Deputy Prime Minister, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Thursday.

MOSCOW, September 13. /TASS/: Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev will pay a visit to Tokyo on September 16-17 to hold Russian-Japanese security consultations, spokesperson for the Russian Security Council Yevgeny Anoshin told reporters.

"Nikolai Patrushev will pay a working visit to Tokyo on September 16-17 to hold Russian-Japanese consultations on security," he said.

Earlier on Friday, Japan’s NHK broadcaster announced that Patrushev could meet with new head of Japan's National Security Council Shigeru Kitamura in Tokyo on September 17.

MOSCOW, September 13. /TASS/: Nations that have over 80% of the global population living within their borders share Moscow’s foreign policy line, Russia’s top diplomat Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with the Trud newspaper.

MOSCOW, September 12. /TASS/: The Android Technology Company is designing a robot that will test Russia’s next-generation partially reusable spacecraft Orel (Eagle), formerly known as Federatsiya, the company’s acting director Yevgeny Dudorov told TASS.

The official said his company was designing a "robotic system that will be the first to test the Federatsiya spacecraft."

"If everything proceeds smoothly, it will be ready in 2022," Dudorov said, adding that the robot will perform the first and second test flights of the spacecraft.

MOSCOW, September 12. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Sochi on Thursday.

According to the Kremlin press service, "issues of further development of the bilateral cooperation are planned to be discussed, while opinions are expected to be exchanged on the situation in the Middle East."

This is Netanyahu’s third trip to Russia this year, which follows his visits to Moscow in February and April.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Deputy Finance Minister Vladimir Kolychev said on Thursday that there was no question of the economy going into recession despite a slowdown in economic growth.

The central bank last week lowered its 2019 economic growth projection to 0.8%-1.3% from an earlier forecast of 1.0%-1.5%.

MOSCOW, September 11. /TASS/: Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov has not confirmed media reports that a former staff member of the Kremlin administration named Oleg Smolenkov, who has been alleged to be a CIA agent in media reports, had access to sensitive Russian information.

MOSCOW, September 11. /TASS/: Russia illuminated Moldova’s authorities on the need to abandon discriminatory action against Russian-language mass media, Moscow’s top diplomat Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday at a news conference on the results of the negotiations with Moldovan Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Integration Nicolae Popescu.

MOSCOW, September 11. /TASS/: The Russian Interior Ministry has developed a bill on simplified procedure for obtaining citizenship by foreign graduates of Russian universities. The bill has been published on Wednesday on the federal website of legal information.