Russia

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin sat down for talks Thursday with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, saying the summit should help plan joint efforts to resolve a standoff over Pyongyang’s nuclear program.

Speaking at the start of the talks at a university on the Russky Island across a bridge from Vladivostok, Putin voiced confidence that Kim’s visit will “help better understand what should be done to settle the situation on the Korean Peninsula, what we can do together, what Russia can do to support the positive processes going on now.”

MOSCOW, April 23./TASS/. The US crackdown on Iranian oil exports won’t enhance the international standing of the US, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s information and press department said in a communique on Tuesday.

"The US has obviously made a mistake in choosing tools, if it has decided to make Tehran an easy negotiator ready for any deals on American terms through suppressing it economically, dealing a blow to living conditions of ordinary Iranians," the commentary said.

GORKI, April 24. /TASS/. Research and development for the S-500 air defense system is in the final phase, Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov told the media on Wednesday.

"I’m talking about the completion of research and development and the subsequent beginning of batch production. I can now say that the R&D work is about to be completed," Manturov said.

Earlier, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the system would begin to be provided for the armed forces in 2020. The Aerospace Force Academy in Tver has been training operators for it since 2017.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un arrived in Russia by train on Wednesday, a day before his much-anticipated summit with President Vladimir Putin that comes amid deadlocked diplomacy on his nuclear program.

Kim, dressed in a black coat and a fedora, met with Russian officials at Russia’s Khasan train station near its border with the North. The official website of the Primorye governor released pictures of Kim stepping off the train and given the traditional Russian bread and salt at the station.

Moscow, April 23, IRNA – Defense Minister Brigadier-General Amir Hatami said upon arriving in Moscow on Tuesday that he is going to talk about the dangers of Trumpism and the necessity to fight it.

SAMARA, April 23. /TASS/. Russian-developed system Neurochat, which allows the power of thought to control devices and go online and surf the world web, began to be batch-produced this year, the project’s director, Natalya Galkina, said at the presentation of the system in Samara on Tuesday.

MOSCOW, April 22. /TASS/. A group of Russian inspectors will conduct an observation flight over the United States’ territory on April 22-27, Head of the National Nuclear Risk Reduction Center Sergey Ryzhkov said, according to Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper.

"In the framework of implementing the international Treaty on Open Skies a Russian group of inspectors plans to perform an observation flight on a Russian aircraft Tu-214ON over the United States’ territory," the newspaper writes on Monday.

MOSCOW, April 18. /TASS/. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu have reaffirmed their commitment to aid Libyan conflict settlement during a phone call on Thursday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

MOSCOW, April 19. /TASS/. The United States’ demands NATO countries should be spending more on defense in fact are aimed at making them purchase US military hardware to replace that of Russian manufacture still in service in the armies of many countries of the alliance, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko told TASS in an interview.

MOSCOW, April 19. / TASS/. The unreliability of the American currency is evident in the conditions that have emerged on world markets as a result of US actions, said Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Friday at the meeting with members of the International Council on Cooperation and Investments.