Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Russia

Russia Says No Decision Yet On INF Treaty

Sergei Lavrov (file photo) (ITAR-TASS)

February 16, 2007 -- Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says Moscow has not decided whether to withdraw from a Cold War-era treaty eliminating intermediate- and short-range missiles in Europe.

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February 16, 2007

Russian armed forces Chief of Staff General Yury Baluyevsky said earlier this week that Moscow would consider withdrawing from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty if the United States went ahead with plans to build a missile-defense system in Europe.

Lavrov said today a final decision had not been reached.

Speaking in Warsaw earlier in today, General John Craddock, the NATO supreme allied commander, said Russia had nothing to fear from the missile-defense system.

Craddock said the system would provide security from attacks by "rogue regimes."

The United States has proposed placing elements of the missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic.

(Interfax, ITAR-TASS, Reuters)

Syrians in the northwestern town of Kfar Nubul pose with a cartoon depicting Russia

Angry Over Syria, Arab World Threatens Russian Boycott

Groups in a number of Arab states, angry over the Russian-Chinese veto of a UN resolution aimed at stopping the violence in Syria, have called for a one-day boycott of Russian and Chinese goods on February 12. More

Alla Dzhioyeva attends a protest by her supporters in Tskhinvali on January 28.

South Ossetian Opposition Leader Hospitalized After Raid

Alla Dzhioyeva, the opposition candidate whose victory in a runoff ballot in November for de facto president of Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia was swiftly annulled by the republic's Supreme Court, was taken to a hospital after a raid by some 200 masked security personnel on her headquarters in Tskhinvali. More

Protesters gather behind a banner reading "Honest Elections" during a demonstration in Moscow on February 4.

How To Rig An Election

A whistle-blower in Samara explains how the authorities fixed the Duma elections in December -- and plan to do the same in the presidential vote in March. More