The Biden administration has reached an agreement with Uzbekistan to transfer a group of Afghan military pilots to a U.S. military base, a U.S. newspaper says.

The Taliban-led Afghan government is pressuring Uzbekistan to turn the pilots and their equipment over to Kabul, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The pilots flew their families to Uzbekistan aboard Afghan military aircraft to escape the Taliban, who quickly overran government forces last month as the United States pulled its troops out of Afghanistan.

The United States fears the pilots could be killed if they were returned to their country.

Military pilots are believed to be among the members of the Afghan forces most despised by the Taliban for the carnage they wrought from the air, the paper said.

At the same time, Uzbekistan doesn't want tense relations with its militant neighbor and has asked the United States to resolve the problem quickly.

According to the paper, the pilots and their families -- a total of 585 people -- will first be flown to the U.S. military base in Doha, Qatar, on the weekend of September 11-12 for processing.

They will then be sent to live permanently in other countries. It was still not clear how many, if any at all, would be sent to the United Staets, the newspaper said.

The State Department declined to comment, the paper said.

The Wall Street Journal said the fate of the 46 aircraft flown by the pilots to Uzbekistan -- including U.S.-supplied Black Hawks, PC-12 surveillance aircraft, and Soviet-era MI-17s -- still remains unclear.

Based on reporting by The Wall Street Journal

A plane flying from the Turkish resort of Antalya to Vladivostok in Russia's Far East made a emergency landing in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk.

An Azur Air Boeing 767 requested an emergency landing while over Krasnoyarsk after experiencing problems with the hydraulics, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.

There were no reports of anybody being hurt.

The number of passengers and crew abroad the plane was not yet available. Boeing 767s can seat more than 200 passengers.

Azur Air is a former regional Russian airline that now operates charter flights.

An Azur Air flight leaving Antalya on September 10 on its journey to the Russian city of Belgorod, about 580 kilometers south of Moscow, initiated an emergency descent after a cabin-pressure alert, air-safety publication Aviation Herald reported.

That plane, a Boeing 757, returned safely to Antalya and a replacement Boeing 767 flew to Belgorod after a delay, according to the report and flight-tracking website Flightradar24.

Azur Air did not immediately respond to Russian media requests for comment.

Antalya on Turkey's Mediterranean is one of the most popular resort destinations for Russians.

Based on reporting by Interfax and Reuters

Thousands of Serbs have taken to the streets in Belgrade to protest against the planned development of a large lithium mine in the Balkan country and to call for tougher environmental controls.

Demonstrators gathered in front of the parliament building on September 11 to demand an end to the development of the lithium project as some waived signs saying that Serbia's nature is "not for sale."

Nenad Kostic, a chemistry professor, told the crowd there was no such thing as "green" mining, a reference to lithium's classification as a green energy source because of its use to power electric cars.

The protesters then proceeded to block Branko's Bridge -- one of the city's main thoroughfares -- for an hour.

The rally was organized by about 30 environmental groups, whose influence has grown amid widespread concerns that pollution is worsening.

It was the largest environmental protest in Belgrade since April. Organizers threatened to hold more should the authorities not heed their message.

London-based Rio Tinto, the world's second-largest metals and mining company, is studying possible development of Serbia's lithium mine, believed to be one of the largest in Europe.

The mine has the potential to generate significant export revenue and jobs for Serbia, especially if the country pursues plans to refine it locally and develop battery plants.

Demand for electric cars is expected to surge in the coming years as the United States, Europe, and China seek to cut carbon emissions.

Rio Tinto has said it would invest as much as $2.4 billion to develop the project.

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However, protesters say Serbia's rivers, natural surroundings, and air quality have already been endangered enough by profit-seeking government policies and fear fertile agricultural lands in the western regions will be harmed by the project.

"Our demand is that the government of Serbia annul all obligations to Rio Tinto," said Aleksandar Jovanovic, one of the organizers. "We have gathered to say no to those who offer concentrated sulphuric acid instead of raspberries and honey."

Organizers warned more protests lay ahead if the government doesn't heed their demands.

More than 100,000 people have already signed a petition against the development of the lithium mine.

In a statement following the protests, Rio Tinto said it understands citizens' concerns about the environmental impact of the project and would adhere to the nation’s ecology laws.

Serbian Minister of Mining and Energy Zorana Mihajlovic accused some organizers of the protest of using the lithium project as an opportunity to build their political careers.

However, she said the government would hold a referendum on the construction of mines and factories.

Serbia's environmental movement has been spurred in part by what citizens say is worsening air pollution and a growing waste-management problem.

Much ire for the air pollution has been directed at coal-fired power plants run by Chinese companies.

With reporting by AP

The top ice-hockey official in Belarus has stepped down after he was banned by the sport's leading international organization for threatening players over their political beliefs.

Dzmitry Baskau said on September 10 that he was vacating his position to avoid possible further sanctions by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) against Belarus if he stayed.

Baskau called the IIHF's demands "unsubstantiated, harsh pressure."

Following a nine-month investigation, the IIHF on September 8 ruled Baskau "abused his position" by trying to pressure players to back authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka and banned him for five years.

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The federation's investigation found evidence he "threatened and discriminated" against Belarusian athletes because of their political opinion.

The IIHF previously removed Belarus as host of this year's men's world championships after a backlash from sponsors.

Several Belarusian athletes, including members of its Olympic team, have spoken out against Lukashenka, an avid hockey fan, following his violent crackdown against protesters.

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Lukashenka claims he won the August 2020 presidential election that opposition leaders say was rigged in his favor.

The election results sparked months of mass, peaceful protests that were ruthlessly broken up by police, pushing Western governments to impose sanctions on Lukashenka, his associates, and state-owned companies.

With reporting by AP

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency will travel to Iran on September 12 in an attempt to salvage stalled talks between Tehran and the West over the Islamic republic's nuclear program.

In a September 11 statement, the IAEA said Director-General Rafael Grossi plans to meet in Tehran with Iranian Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri and the head of the country's atomic energy agency, Mohammad Eslami.

The visit comes after the IAEA issued a critical report saying Tehran had seriously hampered its efforts since February to inspect Iran's nuclear program, according to AFP, which reviewed the document.

President Ebrahim Raisi insisted that Iran was being "transparent".

However, the United States and Europe are losing patience with Tehran as they seek to resurrect the 2015 international agreement that lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for greater monitoring of its nuclear program.

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The Trump administration unilaterally withdrew from the agreement three years ago over concerns the agreement would open the door for Iran to eventually produce weapon's grade uranium.

The Biden administration said it would seek to have the United States rejoin the agreement if some of those concerns were addressed.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned on September 8 that the Biden administration was close to abandoning those efforts amid Iran's stonewalling.

Based on reporting by AFP and Reuters

SOFIA -- Bulgarian President Rumen Radev has announced that he is scheduling the country's third parliamentary election of 2021 to coincide with the next presidential election on November 14.

"In this way we will save both the treasury's money and people's time in particular Bulgarian President Rumen Radev has announced that he is scheduling the country's third parliamentary election of 2021 to coincide with the next presidential election on November 14.," Radev said during a visit to the Bulgarian town of Pleven on September 11.

"It is obvious that the two campaigns for the National Assembly and for president and vice president will run simultaneously and merge."

Bulgaria held parliamentary elections on April 4 and July 11. But no party in the divided legislature managed to put together a majority coalition needed to form a cabinet after either vote.

Bulgaria's National Assembly on September 2 scheduled the country's next presidential election to take place on November 14. Radev has said that he will run for a second term. So far, he is the only official candidate in the presidential race.

Two parties -- the Bulgarian Socialist Party and There Is Such a People -- have stated that they will support Radev's candidacy for a second term, rather than fielding their own candidates for the post.

Azerbaijan's Defense Ministry has said that Baku will host joint military drills in the days ahead with troops from Turkey and Pakistan -- the first such drills involving the three countries.

The ministry said in a statement that the goal of the so-called Three Brothers-2021 exercise is to improve the combat interoperability of the special forces from the three countries, to "prepare for operations in peacetime and wartime," and to exchange "knowledge and experience."

The nine-day exercise is due to begin on September 12.

Earlier this year, troops from Turkey and Azerbaijan held joint live-fire drills in Baku.

Turkey last year supported efforts by Azerbaijan's military to drive ethnic Armenian forces out territory they'd controlled since the early 1990s in and around Azerbaijan's breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Based on reporting by Reuters and APA.az

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Ukraine must remain a transit country for Russian natural-gas exports during her final tour of European capitals before leaving office.

"I have made clear that it is our concern that Ukraine remains a transit country for Russian gas," Merkel told reporters at a news conference with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on September 11 in Warsaw.

Merkel is stepping down as German chancellor after federal elections on September 26 after 16 years in office.

In the weeks leading up to her departure, Merkel struck an agreement with the Biden administration that will allow Russia to complete a controversial gas pipeline to Germany.

The pipeline, known as Nord Stream 2, will reroute Russian gas exports under the Baltic Sea, circumventing Ukraine and depriving Kyiv of nearly $2 billion a year in transit revenue.

The project has divided Europe.

Ukraine and Poland vehemently oppose the project on the grounds that it is a national security threat, while Merkel has steadfastly supported it.

The U.S. Congress has sided with Kyiv and Warsaw, imposing two rounds of mandatory sanctions to stop its completion.

However, the Biden administration in May agreed to waive some of those sanctions in an attempt to improve frayed ties with Germany, a key NATO ally.

In exchange for the waiver, Berlin promised to invest in Ukraine's alternative energy sector and push the Kremlin to continue to export some gas through the country.

Experts have expressed strong doubts that Russia would agree to continue to ship gas export through Ukraine once the pipeline is launched.

Russia currently occupies Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and is backing separatist fighters in two regions in eastern Ukraine.

Russia on September 10 announced that it had completed construction of Nord Stream 2.

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Russia's Gazprom Announces Completion Of Controversial Nord Stream 2 Pipeline

The project now awaits certification -- which could take several months -- before it can begin pumping gas to Germany.

Polish President Andrzej Duda cancelled his meeting with Merkel shortly after Russia's announcement.

The presidential office in Warsaw said that Duda would instead be in Katowice on September 11 for celebrations marking the anniversary of the Solidarity labor union.

Relations between Germany and Poland have been cool since the nationalist Law and Justice party took power in 2015, although top German officials had tried to thaw relations during repeated visits in recent years.

During her visit to Warsaw, Merkel is also expected to discuss migration from Europe's eastern borders -- and particularly, the situation on Poland's eastern border with Belarus.

The issue is of increasing concern in the European Union.

The governments of Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia have accused Belarusian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka of pushing large numbers of refugees from the Middle East across the Polish border in retaliation for EU sanctions against Minsk.

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Polish Lawmakers Back State Of Emergency Over Belarus Border Crisis

Officials said Morawiecki and Merkel also want to discuss developments in the coronavirus pandemic and the future of the EU.

Merkel's talks with the Polish prime minister also will cover the Polish COVID-19 National Recovery Plan, which has not been approved by Brussels because of concerns over Warsaw's commitment to the rule of law.

Poland, along with Hungary, is embroiled in a long-running dispute with the EU over a number of issues, including judicial independence, press freedoms, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights.

The conflict recently intensified when Brussels took legal action against Warsaw and Budapest. Both have lashed out at the holdup of the stimulus plans as ideologically motivated and unconstitutional.

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Merkel's farewell visit to Warsaw comes two weeks ahead of Germany's federal elections, which will draw the curtain on her 16 years in power.

Merkel's one-day visit to Poland began with a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Warsaw -- an act of remembrance and remorse for Nazi Germany's 1939 invasion of Poland that started World War II.

Her tour will continue next week when she travels to Serbia, Albania, and France.

She is to meet Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Belgrade on September 13 before meeting representatives of civil society from a range of Balkan states in the Serbian capital, her spokesman announced on September 10.

Merkel is scheduled to travel to Tirana on September 14 for talks with Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. She will also have discussions in Tirana on regional cooperation with the heads of government of six countries in the region.

With reporting by AFP, dpa, and Deutsche Welle

A court in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don has ordered the arrest of a journalist after he made a post on social media about the voting strategy of jailed Kremlin critic Aleksei Navalny -- the latest move against the opposition ahead of parliamentary elections.

Igor Khoroshilov, who is also a member of the local election committee, was detained on September 10 while on his way to work and charged with public dissemination of the symbols of an extremist organization following his Facebook post about Navalny's Smart Voting strategy.

His detention is to last 10 days, which his lawyer says will sideline him until after the elections. Khoroshilov was to monitor the vote for irregularities.

Russia earlier this year declared Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation an "extremist" organization in what critics say is an attempt to quash opposition to the Kremlin.

Navalny, who is serving a jail term on charges he says are bogus, has called on his supporters to vote against candidates from the ruling, pro-Kremlin United Russia party in this month's parliamentary elections.

The Kremlin has carried out a sweeping crackdown on the opposition heading into the September 17-19 vote amid concerns United Russia could fail to win the two-thirds majority needed to rubber-stamp legislation.

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Hacking Servers. Online Blocking. Police Raids. Information Attacks. What Won't The Kremlin Do To Stop 'Smart Voting'?

Some opposition politicians have been barred from running for parliament for spurious reasons, while others have left the country amid fear of detention. Journalists and bloggers have also been harassed.

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Feliks Berkovich, Khoroshilov's lawyer, said he was illegally denied access to his client at the police station in Rostov-on-Don.

The lawyer also said his client has the right to immunity during the election season as a member of the election committee.

He said the arrest of his client was "ordered" by the authorities.

Ukraine’s closely watched judicial reform inched forward as the nation’s Western backers submitted lists of foreign legal experts who will help Kyiv choose and review judges.

The United States and Europe say judicial reform in Ukraine is key to taming the influence of tycoons, cutting endemic corruption, and opening the country to greater foreign investment.

Washington and Brussels have made its successful implementation a top priority in their relations with Kyiv.

In a step applauded by the West, Ukraine’s parliament in July passed bills that aim to reboot two key pillars of the nation’s judicial system: the High Council of Justice (HCJ), which nominates judges for presidential appointment, and the High Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ), the institution empowered to select new judges.

Anti-corruption activists have said that the two bodies are compromised, having repeatedly allowed the appointment of politically controlled and dependent judges.

The new legislation calls for the creation of a six-person panel consisting of three foreigners and three Ukrainians to shortlist 32 candidates for 16 HQCJ seats. It also stipulates the creation of a six-member Ethics Council to assess the members of the HCJ.

In a statement on September 10, Ukraine’s international partners announced that they had submitted their recommended lists of foreign experts for the two panels to Kyiv.

“These nominations reflect our ongoing commitment to support key reforms aimed at strengthening the rule of law, attracting foreign investment for business and economic growth, and advancing Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic aspirations,” said a joint statement by Western backers, including the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv.

The next step is for the panels to begin short-listing and reviewing judges. Experts say vested interests oppose judicial reform and seek to undermine it.

Ukraine has a long history of passing reforms but failing to implement them successfully.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has told a conference he could not exclude the possibility of a full-scale war with Russia, even as he said he continues to seek a peace agreement with the Kremlin to end fighting in two eastern regions.

When asked on September 10 at the annual Yalta European Strategy (YES) summit about the likelihood of a large-scale war with Russia, Zelenskiy said it would be the "worst thing" that could happen, but did not rule it out.

"There is such a possibility," he said, adding it would be the "biggest mistake" by Russia.

The Kremlin earlier this year amassed more than 100,000 troops on Ukraine's border and in the occupied territory of Crimea in what the United States called an act of intimidation against Kyiv.

The military buildup came as Ukrainian forces battle Moscow-backed fighters in two eastern regions in a low-intensity war that has killed more than 13,200 since 2014.

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The Kremlin has denied any involvement in the fighting, even though there is substantial evidence of Russian fighters and arms crossing into Ukraine.

Zelenskiy said he had been seeking another meeting with Putin to resolve the fighting in the east, but that the Russian president has shown little interest. The two first met in Paris in December 2019 for peace talks.

"They do not see the point in this -- to resolve the issue and quickly end the war," Zelenskiy said. "And this is my problem...how to make them want to talk about the de-occupation of our territories in detail."

Zelenskiy, a political novice, won in a landslide in 2019 in part on a promise to end the war in the east.

In the months after taking power, Zelenskiy reached three agreements with Russia and the separatists on prisoner exchanges. However, the completion of those swaps has not led to a breakthrough in peace talks, with fighting in the east picking up in recent months.

During the YES conference, Zelenskiy reiterated his desire to have Ukraine join NATO, saying his country would be a strong addition to the military alliance.

Russia has called Ukraine's membership in NATO a "red line."

Zelenskiy raised the issue of NATO membership for Ukraine with U.S. President Joe Biden earlier this month during his first official trip to Washington.

The Biden administration has said the door is open to Ukraine to join NATO in the future, but did not give a clear path to membership.

A Bulgarian fugitive wanted in several European countries on money-laundering and drug-trafficking charges has been arrested in Kyiv after years on the run.

The Bulgarian Foreign Ministry confirmed on September 10 that Ukrainian authorities had captured former wrestler Evelin Banev.

Ukraine’s National Police on September 7 announced it had arrested a man wanted on an Interpol notice but did not disclose his identity.

Banev was captured in a parking lot as he walked toward his car, according to a police video posted to YouTube.

Bulgaria said it is working on extraditing Banev to Sofia.

The 56-year-old was facing trials in three countries for money laundering and drug trafficking when he was last seen in public at a hearing in the Sofia Court of Appeals in September 2015.

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Banev had been detained in Bulgaria in 2012 and handed over to Italian authorities for a trial in Milan. In Bucharest, Romanian authorities were also requesting his extradition on similar charges.

Then Italy allowed Banev to return temporarily to Sofia in 2015 in order to attend his Bulgarian trial.

That's when he disappeared, apparently fleeing and going into hiding before the authorities could return him to Italy or extradite him to Romania.

He's since been sentenced in absentia by an Italian court to 20 years in prison, by a Romanian court to 10 1/2 years, and more recently by a Bulgarian court, all for money-laundering or cocaine-smuggling offenses.

More recently, Swiss prosecutors in December indicted Banev along with Credit Suisse and one of the Swiss bank's former employees for allegedly helping to launder about $39 million of drug money through the bank.

Russia's Foreign Ministry says U.S. Ambassador to Moscow John Sullivan has been summoned over alleged election interference by U.S. tech giants.

The ministry said Sullivan met with Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov on September 10 where he was informed that Moscow has proof of violations of Russian law by U.S. tech firms ahead of elections to the State Duma later this month.

"During the conversation, it was emphasized that the Russian side possesses irrefutable evidence of the violation of Russian legislation by the American 'digital giants' in the context of the preparation and conduct of elections to the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation," the statement said, adding such interference was "unacceptable.

The state news agencies TASS and RIA Novosti said Sullivan arrived and left the ministry in Moscow after 20 minutes without commenting on why he was there.

The statement did not give any specifics, but in recent months Russian authorities -- including President Vladimir Putin -- have continuously accused firms such as Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp of failing to adhere to local laws on issues such as the storage of personal data and the removal of content deemed to be illegal.

In recent months, Moscow courts have fined Google, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Telegram, and TikTok millions of rubles over the issues.

Many critics say the push has nothing to do with "Internet integrity" and instead have accused the authorities of trying to quell dissent with parliamentary elections looming on September 17-19 and the ruling United Party's popularity slumping.

With reporting by TASS and RIA Novosti

MOSCOW -- A court in Moscow has ordered the arrest of a man suspected of being behind a website that offered a marketplace for hiring hitmen.

The Basmanny district court on September 9 ruled that Sergei Magdanov, a 38-year-old resident of Izhevsk, a city located 1,200 kilometers east of Moscow, must stay in pretrial detention for at least two months.

The Investigative Committee said in a statement on September 9 that Magdanov was detained amid an ongoing investigation into the murder of a married couple in the Vladimir region, which borders the Moscow region.

The unidentified couple was assassinated by a hitman allegedly hired via Magdanov's website, which operated on the dark net.

According to the Investigative Committee, another hitman hired via the website was preparing to assassinate an individual in St. Petersburg.

Similar to owners of legitimate online marketplaces, the committee said Magdanov received a cut of the transactions conducted via his website.

He was paid in cryptocurrencies as well as via digital wallets registered under other people's names, the committee said.

Investigators found more than 500 payment cards and "a significant amount of cash" in his possession.

During the 1990s and early 2000s, Russia experienced a jump in contract killings amid the turbulent transition to a market economy.

A court in the Russian city of Chelyabinsk has handed prison terms to a couple who protested the arrest of a group of activists and criticized pension reform.

Pavel Chikov of the legal defense organization Agora wrote on his Telegram channel that the Central District court in the Ural's city on September 10 sentenced Dmitry Tsibukovsky to 2 1/2 years and his wife, Anastasia Safonova, to two years in prison.

Prosecutors had sought six years in prison for each defendant.

Tsibukovsky and Safonova, who are self-declared anarchists, were initially arrested in 2018 after they placed a large banner with the words "FSB -- Main Terrorist” outside the building of the Federal Security Service (FSB) in Chelyabinsk. The FSB is the successor to the Soviet-era KGB.

Tsibukovsky and Safonova were seeking to express solidarity with a group of activists arrested in 2017-18 for allegedly creating a terrorist group called Set (Network), with cells in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Penza, and Omsk, as well as in neighboring Belarus.

Last year, nine members of the group were convicted of terrorism and handed lengthy prison terms.

Amnesty International has called the terror charges "a figment of the Russian security services' imagination...fabricated in an attempt to silence these activists."

The London-based human rights watchdog maintains the case is “the latest politically motivated abuse of the justice system to target young people.”

The government’s case against Tsibukovsky and Safonova was thrown out twice after investigators failed to prove elements of a crime in the couple’s actions.

Tsibukovsky said that he and Safonov were tortured while in custody.

The couple was later charged with vandalism for graffiti that protested against unpopular pension reforms passed in 2018.

They were arrested again in April 2020 and spent four months in pretrial detention before they were transferred to house arrest.

Russia said it has completed the construction of the controversial Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline after the Biden administration agreed in May to waive congressionally mandated sanctions against the Kremlin-backed project.

Aleksei Miller, the chief executive officer of Russia's state-owned energy giant Gazprom, announced on September 10 that the pipeline -- consisting of two parallel lines stretching 1,230 kilometers each -- had been completed after more than a one-year delay caused by U.S. sanctions.

Nord Stream 2 will reroute Russian natural gas exports to Germany under the Baltic Sea, circumventing Ukraine and depriving Kyiv of as much as $2 billion a year in transit fees.

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Ukraine vehemently opposes the project, which it calls a security threat.

The U.S. Congress passed sanctions in 2019 and 2020 to stop the completion of Nord Stream 2, which was initially slated for launch in 2020.

However, the Biden administration waived some of the sanctions in May in an attempt to mend relations with Germany, a key U.S. ally.

Nord Stream 2 still needs to be certified and approved for use before it can begin exporting natural gas to Germany.

Certification is expected to take up to four months but will only start once all the paperwork is completed, which entails checks by the German Economics Ministry and Gazprom.

Following Miller's announcement, Ukraine’s presidential spokesman Serhiy Nykyforov said that Kyiv will keep on opposing Nord Stream 2 "before and after its completion and even after the gas is turned on."

Based on reporting by TASS, Interfax, Reuters, and AFP

MOSCOW -- A Moscow court has sentenced Maria Alyokhina, a leading member of the Pussy Riot protest group, to one year of so-called "restricted freedom," a parole-like sentence, for allegedly violating restrictive measures aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus by calling on people to protest against the detention of opposition politician Aleksei Navalny.

The Preobrazhensky district court handed down the sentence to Alyokhina on September 10 after finding her guilty of publicly calling for people to take part in unsanctioned rallies to support the Kremlin critic in January.

According to the court ruling, Alyokhina is not allowed to leave her home from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m., attend public events, or leave Moscow without police permission.

Alyokhina was one of two Navalny supporters still facing charges for publicly calling for people to take part in the rallies.

The final person whose hearing in the case is pending is the chief of the Alliance of Doctors NGO, Anastasia Vasilyeva.

In the other cases, close associates and supporters of Navalny, including his brother Oleg, have been handed parole-like sentences restricting their freedom in recent weeks.

Media reports said that Navalny’s spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh and his close associate Lyubov Sobol fled Russia after they were sentenced, which had not been confirmed either by the two women or their lawyers.

Aleksei Navalny was arrested on January 17 after returning to Russia from Germany, where he was treated for poisoning with a Novichok-type nerve agent that he says was ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Kremlin has denied any role in the incident, which was the latest of numerous attacks on Navalny.

More than 10,000 people were rounded up during nationwide rallies protesting Navalny's arrest organized in more than 100 Russian towns and cities on January 23 and January 31.

On February 2, Navalny was convicted of violating the terms of his suspended sentence related to an embezzlement case that he has called politically motivated. The remainder of Navalny's suspended sentence, 2 1/2 years, was then replaced with a real prison term.

That ruling sparked new protests that were also forcibly dispersed by police.

More than 1,400 people were detained by police in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and other Russian cities during those demonstrations.

Russia's Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by would-be State Duma candidate and businessman Dmitry Potapenko against his removal as a candidate for allegedly owning "foreign financial instruments."

The court's September 1 ruling was published on September 9 and means that Potapenko will be removed from the party list of the Russian Party of Liberty and Justice for the September 17-19 national legislative elections. Potapenko was also seeking a single-mandate seat in the Duma from a district in Moscow.

Under Russian law, candidates and Duma deputies are not allowed to own foreign financial instruments such as shares of company stock. The same provision was used to bar popular Communist Party candidate Pavel Grudinin in July and several candidates from the liberal Yabloko party, the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), A Just Russia, and the New People party. Yabloko candidate Yekaterina Kolesnikova was disqualified for owning "foreign financial instruments" worth $68.

Potapenko was accused of owning shares in several companies that are traded on foreign stock exchanges, including Russian search engine Yandex and the state-owned Russian savings bank Sberbank.

Potapenko has said he does not own any disqualifying instruments, but instead holds only depositary receipts, which are domestic financial instruments that represent shares in companies traded abroad but are considered an alternative to actual international trading.

BISHKEK -- Orozaiym Narmatova, a member of the opposition United Kyrgyzstan political party and an outspoken critic of President Sadyr Japarov, has been detained in the southern city of Osh as she tried to leave the country.

Narmatova's lawyer, Seiitbek Dovlotov, told RFE/RL that his client was arrested at the Osh airport when trying to leave for Russia on September 10.

Dovlotov said that Narmatova, who currently lives in Russia, was detained on suspicion of publicly calling for people to seize power from the government, adding that the arrest was sanctioned by a court in Bishkek, the capital.

United Kyrgyzstan's leader, Adakhan Madumarov, called Narmatova’s detention "an act of blatant lawlessness," and demanded her immediate release.

The party's representative in Osh, Zamir Shamshidin, told RFE/RL that investigators have transferred Narmatova to Bishkek.

The Interior Ministry issued a statement saying that Narmatova, who is also a leader of the I Do Not Agree and I Have Rights movements, was detained for "holding frequent gatherings in Russia at which she constantly expressed unfounded criticism targeting the Kyrgyzstan’s political leadership with the aim of increasing the mood among labor migrants and people residing in Kyrgyzstan to protest."

The ministry accused Narmatova of wanting to create conditions for inciting inter-regional hatred and aiming to seize power.

Narmatova came to Kyrgyzstan several days ago to attend a funeral for one of her relatives and was trying to return to Russia on September 10.

She has been one of Japarov's most-vocal critics, chiding him for failing to follow through on the promises to increase freedoms that he made when he came to power in the wake of anti-government demonstrations after disputed parliamentary elections in October.

Russia and Belarus have launched massive joint military drills near NATO’s borders as Moscow and Minsk vowed to deepen their military ties amid persistent tensions with the West.

The Zapad-2021 weeklong military exercises kicked off on September 10 and with venues including Belarus, Western Russia, and the Baltic Sea, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

Up to 200,000 servicemen, about 80 planes and helicopters, 290 tanks, 240 artillery pieces, multiple rocket launchers, and mortars, as well as 15 ships will be involved in this year's drills, which are conducted every four years, according to Moscow.

What could be the biggest military exercises in Europe in decades have raised alarms at NATO, which says the Kremlin has refused to invite observers as it is obligated to do under an international agreement.

Russia and Belarus are formally part of a "union state" and have been in talks for years on further integration of their countries.

On the eve of the start of Zapad-2021, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarus’s increasingly isolated authoritarian ruler, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, met in Moscow where they agreed to deepen the integration of their ex-Soviet countries, including in areas of defense.

Putin said Moscow would provide Minsk with around $640 million in loans by the end of next year, and that he agreed with Lukashenka on a new unified natural-gas market.

Putin, in power for more than 20 years, and Lukashenka, in power for nearly three decades, also discussed “building a single defense space,” the Russian president said.

For his part, Lukashenka told reporters there was a "breakthrough" and that 28 separate "road maps" had been agreed to after many years of negotiations.

However, the two leaders sidestepped the question of whether after more than 20 years of talks, they had finally agreed to fully create a "union state" -- a major step toward reunifying the two ex-Soviet republics' economies and political structures.

If it comes to fruition, the union state would potentially undermine Belarus’s sovereignty, something Lukashenka has strenuously resisted for years.

But the Belarusian ruler has been increasingly isolated since last year’s presidential election in which he claimed reelection to a sixth term.

The vote was condemned by Belarus’s opposition as rigged and prompted months of street protests that Belarusian security forces have harshly cracked down on.

Western nations have refused to recognize Lukashenka as a legitimate president and slapped his government with sanctions.

Meanwhile, tensions along Belarus's border with the European Union have risen in recent months with Brussels accusing Minsk of intentionally sending thousands of migrants into bloc through Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland.

Russia's relations with the West have also been tense in recent years over a host of actions by Moscow, including aggression against Ukraine, election interference, state-sponsored hacking, and human rights abuses at home.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is calling on Tajikistan to add an ailing 70-year-old journalist who has been imprisoned for six years on politically motivated charges to a list of thousands of prisoners due to be freed under a mass presidential amnesty.

Hikmatullo Saifullozoda, a member of the banned Islamic Revival Party of Tajikistan (IRPT), “is being held in the most appalling conditions” and has “many health problems,” the Paris-based media freedom watchdog said in a statement on September 9.

According to the group, Saifullozoda contracted a serious form of COVID-19 and underwent a heart operation in June in the infirmary of the prison where he is being held.

Jeanne Cavelier, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said the journalist “is in danger of dying in prison.”

“Detained for purely political reasons, he risks spending another 10 years behind bars, where he is the victim of mistreatment. His release could save his life. Furthermore, he poses no danger to society or to the authorities in Tajikistan.”

Saifullozoda, the editor of the IRPT's Najot (Salvation) newspaper, was arrested in 2015 and sentenced the following year to 16 years in prison after a court found him guilty of involvement in a purported insurrection against Rahmon's government.

More than 16,000 prisoners are expected to be freed under the amnesty law adopted by parliament earlier this month and signed by President Emomali Rahmon to mark the 30th anniversary of Tajikistan’s independence on September 9.

Saifullozoda “will probably not be among those who are released,” RSF said, adding that his sentence “will probably be reduced by only four years, although he should benefit from the priority release reserved for persons over the age of 55 who are seriously ill.”

The IRPT, long an influential party with representatives in the Tajik government and parliament, was labeled an extremist and terrorist group and banned in September 2015 -- moves the party and human rights groups say were unjustified and politically motivated.

Dozens of IRPT officials and supporters have been prosecuted and many of them imprisoned, drawing further criticism of Rahmon's government from rights groups.

As a result of “increasingly repressive policies,” Tajikistan has fallen 46 places in RSF's World Press Freedom Index since 2015 and is now ranked 162nd out of 180 countries.

Russian tech company Yandex said a cyberattack on its servers this summer was the largest known distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack in the history of the Internet.

In a September 9 blog post, Yandex said it had identified a powerful new botnet, a network of computers infected with malware and controlled without the owners’ knowledge, that has also carried out DDoS attacks in other countries.

A DDoS attack is a hacking attempt to disrupt the traffic of a targeted server or network by overwhelming the target with a torrent of Internet traffic.

"Our experts did manage to repel a record attack of nearly 22 million requests per second (RPS). This is the biggest known attack in the history of the Internet," Yandex said in a statement.

The attack began in August and reached a record peak on September 5.

“But this is just one of many attacks aimed not only at Yandex, but also at many other companies in the world. The attacks have been going on for several weeks, their scale is unprecedented, and their source is a new botnet about which little is known so far,” the company said.

U.S. cybersecurity firm Cloudflare, which is widely used by businesses and other organizations, said in August the largest DDoS attack it was aware of reached 17.2 million RPS earlier this year. That attack was said to be three times larger than previously known ones.

Russian President Vladimir Putin says that he and his Belarusian counterpart, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, have agreed on a new unified gas market, and he praised Belarus, saying the situation there was "stabilized” after months of turmoil.

Putin spoke at a joint news conference, alongside Lukashenka, on September 9, after more than three hours of talks in Moscow.

Lukashenka's trip to Moscow came amid heightened speculation that he and Putin would finalize a decades-old plan to fully establish a "Union State" that would closely integrate the two countries.

It was unclear if that had happened, however, earlier, Lukashenka signaled that a final signing of 28 so-called road maps, which would finalize the countries' integration, would be signed on October 28.

Lukashenka, meanwhile, said his talks with Putin were honest and constructive.

Putin's praise for Belarusian stability comes after months of unprecedented political turmoil in Belarus, sparked by the August 2020 presidential election that Lukashenka claimed victory in.

Belarus's opposition considered the election rigged, and that kicked off months of street protests and mass demonstrations that were met with a brutal police crackdown.

News reports say German prosecutors have opened a formal investigation into a series of cyberattacks that have targeted German politicians -- attacks that the Foreign Ministry has blamed on Russia.

A spokesman for Germany's federal prosecutors told reporters on September 9 that the investigation had been opened "on suspicion of espionage."

The probe comes as the election campaign to choose a new German government heads into the homestretch. The parliamentary elections are scheduled for September 26, and none of the major parties have a decisive lead in the polls.

State security agencies have notified parliament at least three times this year about cyberattacks on lawmakers by foreign intelligence services.

On September 6, the Foreign Ministry said the government had "reliable information" that the attacks could be attributed to actors in Russia, "specifically to the Russian military intelligence service" known as the GRU.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Andrea Sasse said that a hacker outfit called Ghostwriter has been “combining conventional cyberattacks with disinformation and influence operations.”

She said the ministry had lodged a formal complaint with Russian authorities.

Germany has repeatedly accused Russia of cyberattacks in the past.

The highest-profile incident was a 2015 cyberattack that paralyzed the computer network of the lower house of parliament. German authorities blamed Russian military intelligence.

Germany's concerns about Russian interference have included scrutiny of the Russian state-funded broadcaster RT, whose online-only German-language service has emphasized divisive issues such as migration and coronavirus restrictions.

Based on reporting by AFP, dpa, and AP