Lawyers for Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev say he will appeal a decision by Swiss prosecutors to close his case against a top art dealer he accused of swindling him out of more than $1 billion.

The lawyers said in a statement that the decision on September 17 of the Public Prosecutor's Office to close the case was “one-sided” and will be appealed to Geneva's Criminal Court.

"It is essential that this case, the most serious the art world has ever known, be duly considered and finally judged on its merits," lawyers Marc Henzelin and Sandrine Giroud said in the statement.

Rybolovlev, president of the AS Monaco football club, accused Swiss art dealer Yves Bouvier of inflating prices on 38 works he acquired from 2003 to 2014.

The office of Geneva's top prosecutor said last January that it planned to drop Rybolovlev’s case against Bouvier.

Since 2015, Rybolovlev has filed other cases against Bouvier in other countries, including Singapore, Hong Kong, New York, and Monaco.

"Today marks the end of a six-year nightmare," said Bouvier said in a statement. "Truth prevailed,” he added, calling it “a complete victory."

Bouvier, who consistently denied wrongdoing, had to stop almost all his art dealing activities to defend himself against the attacks and has suffered “immense damages,” the statement said.

The Russian businessman accuses Bouvier of having conned him out of $1.1 billion by inflating the price of the works of art he sold to Rybolovlev after he commissioned Bouvier to help build up an art collection.

Rybolovlev was himself charged with bribery and influence peddling in Monaco. Those charges have implicated several former ministers, forcing one, the justice minister, to retire over claims he accepted bribes.

Based on reporting by AFP

One of the most outspoken supporters of jailed Russian opposition politician Aleksei Navalny says she is "disappointed" with the Kremlin critic’s exiled associates and has broken ties with them as the country heads to polling stations for elections.

Anastasia Vasilyeva, the chief of the Physicians' Alliance NGO, accused Navalny's now-defunct Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) of leaving her and her team without any support after "using" them, saying that Navalny's associates Leonid Volkov, Ivan Zhdanov, and Maria Pevchikh, who currently live outside of Russia, "are ruining everything that we once created."

"I’m very disappointed. The foundation’s managers are now destroying what all of us worked so hard to create," she wrote in a Facebook post late on September 16.

"Now [Navalny's associates] are in Europe and a certain someone (Navalny) finds himself in prison. See the difference? Anyone who believed in him is now at risk of criminal prosecution. And when they lock these people up, no one will remember them," she added while not elaborating on what was being destroyed.

Vasilyeva's posting sparked a heated reaction online, with many believing that she was forced to make the statement on the eve of parliamentary elections as the Kremlin-backed ruling party, which has seen its support slump, aims to retain power.

Vasilyeva, who famously played her piano while police recently ransacked her apartment during a crackdown over the past year against Navalny and his allies, has been under increasing pressure from authorities.

WATCH: Navalny Supporter Defiantly Plays Piano As Russian Police Raid Her Home

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In March, the Physicians' Alliance was placed on the state's controversial "foreign agents" list, which has been used to stymie monitoring groups and the media, to disqualify prominent opposition candidates, to drive opposition leaders to flee the country, and to restrict access to volunteers and fundraising for any person or group placed on it.

On September 1, Moscow police detained her and took her to a court hearing to face charges of allegedly violating restrictive measures aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus.

The hearing appears to never have taken place even though several of Navalny’s associates and supporters who were part of the case faced the court and were handed parole-like sentences on charges for publicly calling for people to take part in unsanctioned rallies to support the Kremlin critic in January.

Some compared Vasilyeva's situation with that of Belarusian blogger Raman Pratasevich, once a critic of his country's strongman leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka and his crackdown on the opposition.

Pratasevich was arrested along with his girlfriend in Minsk on May 23 after Belarusian authorities forced their Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius to land in the Belarusian capital. He later changed his public stance and views on the political situation in Belarus, a move many opposition leaders say appeared to be made under duress.

The beginning of the year marked Navalny's return to Russia following treatment in Germany for a nerve-agent poisoning he claims was carried out by Russian security agents at Putin's behest.

Navalny was arrested and subsequently sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison on a parole violation charge that he denounces as absurd.

Thousands of Russians were detained during nationwide protests calling for his release and later the FBK and his network of regional offices were shut down as "extremist" organizations.

MINSK -- The Belarusian Prosecutor-General's Office says it has suspended an investigation into the death of Raman Bandarenka, the anti-government protester whose killing in November 2020 intensified unprecedented protests demanding the resignation of authoritarian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka following a disputed election.

The Prosecutor-General's Office said in a statement on September 17 that the probe was suspended because a suspect had yet to be identified in the case, adding that the case had not been closed and the probe can resume if information on a suspect arises.

The 31-year-old Bandarenka died in hospital on November 12 after he was reportedly beaten by masked security forces.

Bandarenka's last known written words, "I'm going out," have turned into one of the slogans of the protests against Lukashenka that have been held across the country since the presidential poll in August last year that the opposition says was rigged.

It remains unclear who exactly killed the activist, but videos recorded the incident from a distance, and many in Belarus believe the former chief of the country's national ice hockey federation, Dzmitry Baskau, martial arts champion Dzmitry Shakuta, and Lukashenka's spokeswoman Natallya Eismant were present. None have been officially questioned in the case.

Bandarenka's sister Volha Kucharenka told RFE/RL that her family was shocked because nobody informed them about the decision to suspend the probe.

"We learned about it from the Internet.... It took a lot for us to make it possible to launch the investigation....There were many witnesses who saw what happened and there were so many video recordings taken at the site at that moment from different angles. But they were reluctant to start the investigation and only did so three months later," Kucharenka said, adding that she believes there's reason to believe that the investigators did not want to find the perpetrator to start with.

Several protesters have been killed and thousands of people arrested since authorities declared Lukashenka, who has ruled Belarus since 1994, the landslide winner of the vote.

There have also been credible reports of torture during a widening security crackdown.

Most of the country's opposition leaders have been arrested or forced to leave the country.

A group of 23 international and Belarusian nongovernmental organizations are launching a campaign to demand the release of seven members of Belarus’s Vyasna human rights center who were detained as part of a wider crackdown on civil society following last year’s presidential election.

The #FreeViasna campaign was initiated on September 17, which the human rights groups said marks the anniversary of Belarusian authorities launching their “shameless witch hunt” against Vyasna by arbitrarily detaining coordinator Marfa Rabkova.

In the following months, six other members of the human rights organization were put behind bars and charged with “unfounded” criminal offenses for carrying out their legitimate human rights work, they said in a joint statement.

The campaign also aims at highlighting the plight of hundreds of other people who have been “prosecuted and jailed solely for exercising their rights to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression” after the disputed August 2020 presidential election handed authoritarian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka a sixth term.

Mass protests broke out against alleged election fraud, which were met by a brutal crackdown from the Lukashenka government.

The opposition and the West have refused to recognize the results and called for a new, independently monitored vote.

“Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s government is wielding a war on civil society and ruthlessly suppressing all forms of dissent,” said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at New York-based Human Rights Watch.

“Key international actors should join forces to demand the immediate and unconditional release of Vyasna’s members and other jailed activists, and do their utmost to help and protect Belarusian civil society,” he said.

The human rights organizations are calling on people to join a global rally under the hashtag #FreeViasna.

Supporters are suggested to use their networks and social media to tell the world about the campaign using the #FreeViasna hashtag, take a picture with a campaign banner or a poster, write an open letter to an imprisoned human rights defender, and join rallies that are being organized across the world.

BISHKEK --Kyrgyzstan has added several former leaders of Canada's Centerra Gold company and its operator of the Kumtor Gold company to its wanted list as part of a widening investigation into alleged corruption during the development of a major gold-mining project.

The State Committee for National Security (UKMK) said on September 17 that investigations so far revealed that the former leaders of the Canadian company and its operator had been involved in "corrupt" activities through which they illegally pocketed up to $200 million in December 2013.

The UKMK said that it launched a probe against former Centerra Gold manager Ian Atkinson; the former chief of Kumtor Gold, Michael Fischer; the former chairman of Kumtor Gold's managing council, Andrei Sazonov; and the former vice president of Kumtor Operating Company, John Suter. All of them have been added to the Central Asian nation's wanted list, he said.

SEE ALSO:

Another Former Kyrgyz Prime Minister Detained In Kumtor Case

A day earlier, the UKMK said it had detained former Prime Minister Joomart Otorbaev as part of the investigation.

Otorbaev, who served as prime minister between 2014-15, is one of several former prime ministers and other senior officials arrested in connection with the Kumtor project in recent months.

Kumtor has been a target of financial and environmental disagreements for years. It is currently the subject of an ongoing control battle between the Kyrgyz state and Centerra Gold.

The Kyrgyz government has temporarily taken over control of the mine in what President Sadyr Japarov has called a necessary move to address environmental and safety violations.

Centerra has called Kyrgyzstan's actions "wrongful and illegal."

In May, the Canadian firm said it had "initiated binding arbitration to enforce its rights under long-standing investment agreements with the government."

Last month, investigators questioned two former Kyrgyz presidents, Sooronbai Jeenbekov and Askar Akaev, in the high-profile case.

Leaders of the Russia- and China-led Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) have urged the world to unfreeze Afghanistan's assets and boost assistance to the war-torn nation as it teeters on the brink of crisis following the Taliban’s return to power last month.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, told a parallel summit of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, on September 17 that failure to provide necessary support to Afghanistan could allow terrorism and drugs to flourish while pushing the country into a full-blown humanitarian crisis -- a perspective that has raised alarm of the potential for tens of thousands of refugees to pour over the border.

Founded 20 years ago to combat what it calls the “three evils” of separatism, extremism, and terrorism, the Eurasian security bloc initially consisted of China, Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan before India and Pakistan joined in 2017.

SEE ALSO:

Aid Groups In Afghanistan Face New Challenges Under The Taliban

In Dushanbe, CSTO leaders also said they were beginning the process of accepting Iran into the organization.

Since Taliban militants swept into Kabul on August 15, some $9 billion in foreign reserves of Afghanistan’s central bank have been frozen -- most of it held in the United States.

The International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, foreign governments, and other donors have suspended payments to Afghanistan, while ordinary bank transfers to individuals in the country also have been blocked, leaving ordinary Afghans reeling from rocketing inflation, rising poverty, cash shortages, a plummeting currency, and rising unemployment.

SEE ALSO:

Tajikistan: The Taliban's Toughest Critic

Addressing the SCO summit via video link, Putin insisted that the organization should do its "utmost" to prevent the threats of "terrorism, drug trafficking, and religious extremism" emanating from Afghanistan.

He added that the security bloc should "use its potential" to "stimulate the new Afghan authorities" in fulfilling their promises on normalizing life and bringing security in Afghanistan.

“I think it also makes sense to work with the United States [and] other Western countries for a gradual unfreezing of Afghanistan’s reserves and restoring programs through the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund," he added while blaming Washington in large part for the current situation, saying it should bear the "main part" of the expenses related to the rebuilding process.

SEE ALSO:

'We Need Help': Drought Destroys Crops In Rural Afghanistan

Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoev, whose country borders Afghanistan, called for efforts to prevent the rise of extremism in Afghanistan, saying that unfreezing the assets kept in foreign banks could help achieve these goals by facilitating dialogue with the Taliban-led government in Kabul.

China’s Xi said SCO member nations should help to drive a smooth transition in Afghanistan and assist it in developing an inclusive political structure that would see it follow moderate internal and external policies, according to Chinese state media.

Beijing has called on the Taliban to hold to its pledge to restrain militants seeking independence for the northwestern region of Xinjiang.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan called for economic support for Afghanistan to “prevent a humanitarian crisis and an economic meltdown.”

SEE ALSO:

Spy Chief's Visit With Taliban Underscores Pakistan's Victory In Afghanistan

“We must remember that the previous government depended heavily on foreign aid and its removal could lead to economic collapse," Khan said, adding that Islamabad thinks that “positive engagement of the international community with Afghanistan is extremely important."

Pakistan has been accused of supporting the group as it battled the U.S.-backed government in Kabul for 20 years -- a charge denied by Islamabad.

Tajik President Emomali Rahmon called for members countries of the SCO and the CSTO to create a "reliable security belt around Afghanistan to stop the possible expansion of terrorist groups" in the region.

"The current developments and the high risks of a catastrophic scenario confirm the necessity of helping countries bordering Afghanistan," Rahmon told the gathering in Dushanbe on September 17.

Rahmon said "the entire burden of negative impacts" following the withdrawal of the international coalition from Afghanistan "will be placed on Afghanistan’s neighboring countries."

"Contrary to their statements, the Taliban are following the path of creating an Islamic emirate with rules that are foreign to the modern era and the government they formed consists of their members only," Rahmon said.

He said the capabilities of the SCO's regional anti-terrorist structure need to be bolstered along with "the interaction of our countries' law enforcement agencies and special services" in order to counter "challenges and threats" emanating from Taliban-led Afghanistan.

Rahmon also expressed serious concern over the situation in Panjshir Valley, the last pocket of resistance to the Taliban takeover, reiterating his call for the international community to provide emergency assistance to the province, which he said has been under a "complete [Taliban] blockade for about two months."

With reporting by Reuters, TASS, and AFP

Soviet-era Georgian chess champion Nona Gaprindashvili has launched a $5 million lawsuit against Netflix for defamation, accusing the streaming network of "brazenly and deliberately" lying about her in the fictional television series The Queen’s Gambit.

The final episode of the popular TV series that premiered in 2020 includes a line from an announcer who describes Gaprindashvili as “the female world champion" and as a player who "has never faced men.”

The lawsuit, filed in the Central District of California on September 16, says the dialogue in the episode is “false” and “sexist and belittling” and is directly tied to Gaprindashvili as her name is mentioned in the final scene and "the camera pans onto an actor sitting in the audience, watching the game, who is obviously meant to be Gaprindashvili."

"The allegation that Gaprindashvili 'has never faced men' is manifestly false, as well as being grossly sexist and belittling," the lawsuit states, noting that by 1968, the year in which the episode in question is set, she had competed against at least 59 male chess players, at least 10 of whom were grandmasters at the time.

"Netflix brazenly and deliberately lied about Gaprindashvili's achievements for the cheap and cynical purpose of 'heightening the drama'.... Netflix humiliated the one real woman trailblazer who had actually faced and defeated men on the world stage in the same era," it added.

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Gaprindashvili, 80, played for the Soviet Union in the Women's Chess Olympiads from the early 1960s until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, winning 11 team gold medals and nine individual gold medals.

She also successfully competed in several men's tournaments. Her performance at the Lone Pine tournament in 1977 made her the first woman to perform at a high enough level to earn the title of International Grandmaster, which FIDE granted to her in 1978.

Forbes quoted Netflix as saying in a statement that the company has the “utmost respect for Ms. Gaprindashvili and her illustrious career.” However, they “believe this claim has no merit” and they will “vigorously defend the case."

With reporting by Forbes and The New York Times

An election-guide app created by opposition activist Aleksei Navalny to erode the dominance of the ruling United Russia party disappeared from Apple and Google stores on the same day that Russians began voting in national parliamentary elections.

Allies of Navalny, who is currently in a notorious prison east of Moscow, said the Smart Voting app was no longer visible in the two tech giants' online stores on September 17, just as three days of voting for the State Duma got under way.

The app, which was still accessible and downloadable outside of Russia, previously had been available despite growing threats by Russian authorities, who had demanded Apple and Google take it down.

Neither Apple nor Google immediately responded to e-mails and phone calls from RFE/RL seeking comment.

News agency AFP, citing sources familiar with the matter, reported Google and Apple's decision was taken under pressure from Russian authorities, including threats of serious criminal charges and arrest of local staff.

One source said Apple employees faced "bullying tactics and threats of arrest," while another noted Google had acted under "extraordinary duress."

Ivan Zhdanov, one of several lawyers working with Navalny, posted a screenshot of a letter from Apple that appeared to confirm the deletion. The letter cited Russian authorities’ decision earlier this year to designate Navalny and his Anti-Corruption Organization as “extremist” -- an order that effectively bars them from political activity.

“The way the [Anti-Corruption Organization] was recognized as an extremist organization was not a trial, but a mockery of common sense,” Zhdanov said in post to Twitter. “Google and Apple are making a huge mistake.”

Zhdanov did not immediately respond to a message seeking further comment.

The Smart Voting app is designed to expand on and simplify the Smart Voting initiative that Navalny and his team pioneered in 2018.

The strategy identifies candidates who have the best chance to defeat a United Russia candidate -- even if that alternative candidate comes from one of the other main established political parties, something that many liberal Russians have typically opposed.

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United Russia currently has a supermajority in the State Duma, with the Communist Party holding the most seats in the minority, followed by the Liberal Democratic Party, and A Just Russia.

Navalny’s allies continued to promote Smart Voting using other networks, including on the Telegram messaging app and Github, a popular site for software developers and coders. In a post to Telegram, Leonid Volkov, a top Navalny aide who fled Russia two years ago amid fears of arrest, blasted Apple and Google, suggesting they had succumbed to pressure from President Vladimir Putin.

“This shameful day will remain in history for a long time, because on this day, a crazy, frightened old man managed to force two great companies, which have something to be proud of, to publicly say that under certain circumstances they are ready to agree that 2 + 2 = 17,” he wrote.

Russian authorities had repeatedly threatened the two tech giants with fines if they didn’t block the app. Officials even tried to throttle secondary servers and Internet traffic routers to try and hamper access to the software.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Google and Apple were merely conforming to "the letter and spirit" of Russian law by removing the app.

"There were legal requirements. This [app] is illegal on the territory of our country. Both platforms received a notification and, in accordance with the letter and spirit of the law, they made such a decision, most likely," Peskov was quoted as saying by the TASS news agency.

On the eve of the election, regulators also temporarily blocked the Google Doc app as Navalny’s team released its slate of Smart Voting endorsements, the overwhelming majority of which were from the Communist Party.

SEE ALSO:

Navalny's 'Smart Voting' Backs Communist Candidates In Bid To Loosen Grip Of Ruling United Russia

Russia’s Foreign Ministry accused the United States of interfering in the election campaign, asserting that the refusal by Apple and Google to block access to sites and apps related to Navalny was due to pressure from the U.S. government. The U.S. ambassador was summoned to the Foreign Ministry to be reprimanded.

The U.S. Embassy, which has not commented on the Foreign Ministry reports, did not immediately respond to a message from RFE/RL.

The Interfax news agency, meanwhile, reported on September 16 that a Russian lawmaker who is also an officer with the Federal Security Service had threatened local employees of Google and Apple with criminal prosecution.

"Structures and individuals who are associated with Apple and Google should be aware that their deliberately illegal actions and criminal inaction after receiving appropriate warnings from Russian officials will inevitably have legal consequences for them, including criminal ones," Vladimir Dzhabarov was quoted as saying.

Russian and foreign reporters in Moscow confirmed that that app either no longer accessible, or functional, as of September 17.

"This is, of course, a tremendous act of censorship," Navalny spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh said. “It's a pity that at the moment of standoff between honest people and the corrupt regime, these companies played into the latter's hands.”

Russians began three days of voting on September 17, choosing not only a new Duma, but also legislatures in 39 regions, and nine regional governors.

Russians began heading to polling stations across the country in the first of three days of voting expected to be dominated by the Kremlin-backed ruling United Russia party after a clampdown by authorities on dissent that almost completely ruled out opposition candidates.

The last polling stations in the Baltic Sea exclave of Kaliningrad opened in the morning of September 17, nine hours after the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Far East kicked off the vote in the vast country, which spans 11 time zones.

All 450 seats in the lower house of parliament, or State Duma, are up for grabs in the vote, which is being held alongside local polls in dozens of regions, including regional assemblies and gubernatorial elections.

Preliminary results are expected shortly after polls close on September 19.

As the vote kicked off, Aleksei Navalny’s Smart Voting application disappeared from the Apple and Google online stores in what the jailed opposition politician’s associates called a “tremendous act of censorship.”

Navalny's team used the application to promote candidates other than those proposed by the Kremlin-backed United Russia party amid an unprecedented crackdown on opposition and independent media.

Election officials said the vote needed to be spread over three days to prevent crowding because of the COVID-19 pandemic that has ravaged Russia, despite it being the first country in the world to approve a vaccine.

Opposition activists and some liberal lawmakers say the move was part of a series of efforts by the Kremlin to manipulate turnout and engineer a plausible majority victory for United Russia.

Reports on social media showed lines at some polling stations. One source close to the government told the independent news outlet Meduza that many state employees were told to cast their votes early.

Others posted unverified videos that appear to show incidents of people casting multiple ballots.

Aside from the decision to hold voting over three days, the Central Elections Commission has made other tweaks to voting rules, such as sharply limiting international observers, limiting live-stream camera feeds from polling stations, and pushing for people in some regions to vote electronically, rather than in person.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said in August it would not send elections observers for the first time in nearly three decades due to "major limitations" imposed by Russian authorities.
Golos, an independent vote monitoring group, said it expects "big fraud and falsifications” during the vote.

Authorities have also moved to block the election’s biggest wild card: the Smart Voting initiative backed by jailed corruption crusader Aleksei Navalny, which aims to erode United Russia’s stranglehold on national politics.

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Do Russians Have Real Choices In The Parliamentary Elections? Voters Tell Us

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Navalny's spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, tweeted on September 17 that the application had disappeared from Apple and Google online stores.

"This is, of course, a tremendous act of censorship. It's a pity that at the moment of standoff between honest people and the corrupt regime, these companies played into the latter's hands," Yarmysh wrote.

Neither of the two U.S. tech giants has immediately commented on the situation.

Another close associate of Navalny, Ivan Zhdanov, called on those voters who have already uploaded the app to their devices to share information with others on the candidates being recommended by the system.

Polls before the election by the independent Levada Center show a majority of Russians were unhappy with how the Duma was functioning.

Polls show even deeper disdain with United Russia, a nominally independent party that is in fact closely linked to guidance from the Kremlin and the powerful presidential administration.

United Russia holds a supermajority in the chamber, but its popularity is currently the lowest in the nearly two decades it has been in existence, saddled with the widespread belief that the party is a vehicle for graft and patronage.

Even the state-run pollster VTsIOM found United Russia’s support hovering around 29 percent.

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'It's Scary': Russian Election Observers Train For Challenges

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By contrast, Putin, who is not a member of the party, retains wide popularity. However, his popularity has slipped in recent years, driven down partly due to sweeping pension reform passed after his reelection in 2018, and perceptions that high-level corruption among government insiders is rampant and unchecked.

Wages have stagnated for a wide swath of the population, as the economy struggles with Western economic sanctions, higher taxes, mounting inflation, and fallout from the pandemic.

United Russia’s dismal approval ratings have posed a challenge for Kremlin domestic policy advisers, some of whom fear the party could lose its supermajority or otherwise suffer a legitimacy crisis with voter apathy.

"It is the Russian regime, rather than the public, which needs the elections," Andrei Kolesnikov, an analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center, said in an online commentary. “They serve to validate the regime’s legality and legitimacy, and also keep the so-called majority relatively mobilized.”

Three other parties currently have seats in the Duma, plus two seats held by lawmakers from two obscure parties.

The strongest is the Communist Party, which retains a strong following among older Russians. The two others are the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, headed by the flamboyant Vladimir Zhirinovsky, and A Just Russia, which this year merged with another relatively unknown party headed by a popular nationalist writer.

All three parties are nominally in opposition to United Russia, but in reality, they rarely vote against majority initiatives or those explicitly lobbied for by the Kremlin.

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Last Man Standing: Navalny Ally Makes Lone Fight In Russian Election

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A loss of a supermajority could make it more difficult for the Duma to ram through major legislation, such as constitutional amendments. That, in turn, would potentially complicate the run-up to the 2024 presidential election, when Putin’s current term is scheduled to end.

The Duma last year passed constitutional amendments that opened the door for Putin to stay in power beyond 2024. He has not indicated if he will.

Still, half of the Duma’s 450 seats are apportioned by party list, as opposed to single-mandate districts, which gives United Russia a formidable advantage.

“The Kremlin will get what it wanted: the Duma as an institute of support for a political system that is entering a stage not of transition, but effectively another reset in 2024,” Kolesnikov said.

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Outsmarting The Kremlin? How Navalny's 'Smart Voting' Works.

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Navalny, who is the Kremlin’s most potent domestic critic, has pushed Smart Voting as a way to chip away at United Russia’s dominance. The initiative helps guide voters to support candidates who have the best chance of defeating United Russia candidates, even if the candidate comes from the current major political parties, like the Communists.

Navalny has been in prison since January, when he was arrested upon his return from Germany where he had been recuperating from nerve-agent poisoning he blames on the Kremlin.

His foundation and political network were later designated an “extremist organization,” which barred the politician's allies from participating in elections.

Ahead of the election, Navalny urged Russians to avoid apathy and vote pro-Kremlin candidates out of power.

“If the United Russia party succeeds, our country will face another five years of poverty, five years of daily repression, and five wasted years,” a message on Navalny’s Instagram account read.

Russians have also been frustrated by the cycles of restrictions and conflicting public-health guidance regarding the coronavirus. The country is going through a third wave of infections and deaths. Nearly 1.6 million cases have been reported since the pandemic began, and nearly 28,100 deaths have been reported. The real number of infections and deaths is believed to be higher.

The country’s vaccination effort is flagging badly, with many people deeply skeptical, despite Russia approving Sputnik V, the world’s first COVID-19 vaccine last summer.

Meanwhile, multiple independent media outlets have been shut down or harassed in recent months after authorities targeted them for being "foreign agents,” leaving state-run media in a dominate position to control information.

One of the more closely watched governor races is being held in the Far Eastern region of Khabarovsk, where the Kremlin last year ousted the popular local governor, Sergei Furgal, prompting months of street protests.

Armenia has challenged Azerbaijan at the United Nations' top court, accusing it of decades of rights abuses against Armenian citizens and ethnic Armenians -- including events that unfolded during the 2020 war over Azerbaijan's breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Armenia contends that Azerbaijan has "subjected Armenians to racial discrimination" for decades as a "state-sponsored policy of Armenian hatred," according to a statement issued on September 16 by The Hague-based International Court of Justice.

As a result, the court said, Yerevan claims that "Armenians have been subjected to systemic discrimination, mass killings, torture, and other abuse."

The tribunal said Armenia is alleging that "these violations are directed at individuals of Armenian ethnic or national origin regardless of their actual nationality."

Armenia also claims that "these practices once again came to the fore in September 2020, after Azerbaijan's aggression" against Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia.

The Armenian claim says "during that armed conflict, Azerbaijan committed grave violations" of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD).

Armenia also alleges that "even after the end of hostilities," following a cease-fire which entered into effect on November 10, 2020, "Azerbaijan has continued to engage in the murder, torture, and other abuse of Armenian prisoners of war, hostages, and other detained persons."

"Armenia further contends that “all good-faith efforts by Armenia to put an end to Azerbaijan’s violations of the CERD through other means [have] failed," The Hague-based tribunal said.

Armenia has called on the tribunal to take provisional measures "as a matter of extreme urgency" in order to "protect and preserve Armenia's rights and the rights of Armenians from further harm, and to prevent the aggravation or extension of this dispute" until the court determines the merits of the allegations.

A spokesperson for Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry said Azerbaijan would defend itself "robustly" and plans to file a countersuit accusing Armenia of the same rights violations.

Western diplomats have expressed concern over Ukraine’s delay in implementing recently passed judicial legislation that is seen in Washington and Brussels as crucial to improving the nation's rule of law and cleaning up corruption.

Following a meeting on September 16 at President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's office in Kyiv with senior members of Ukraine’s parliament and judicial bodies, diplomats from the Group of Seven (G7) industrial nations and the European Union backed a joint statement demanding judicial reforms move forward.

The G7 diplomats warned against attempts to delay reforms “aimed at strengthening the rule of law, increasing public confidence in the judiciary, attracting foreign investment, and bringing Ukraine's Euro-Atlantic future closer,” according to a copy of the statement distributed by Ukraine’s presidential office.

Ukraine’s parliament in July passed two bills to revamp the nation’s judicial system in a long-awaited move applauded by Washington and Brussels.

The nation's judicial system is plagued by corruption, undermining political and economic progress. Western nations have tied future financial aid to its overhaul.

The legislation calls for the creation of panels to oversee the two bodies responsible for selecting and choosing candidates for judicial vacancies.

The panels would consist of six experts each, including three Ukrainian citizens chosen by the nation’s Council of Judges and three foreigners picked by G7 nations.

Ukraine’s judiciary has opposed the reforms, saying the inclusion of foreign experts in the selection process compromises the nation’s sovereignty. It wants to amend the legislation.

In a move seen as an attempt to delay its implementation, the Council of Judges failed to name three experts for one of the two panels by the September 13 deadline. That prompted Zelenskiy to call the meeting with representatives of the G7 countries -- Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United States.

In a statement, the U.S. State Department said the Council of Judges' refusal to nominate Ukrainian judges to participate in the process “threatens to derail the promise of real judicial reform in Ukraine.”

“We remain firmly committed to assisting in this critical reform so that the people of Ukraine may trust their courts and judges and so that Ukraine can continue on its path toward Euro-Atlantic integration,” State Department spokesperson Ned Price said.

Civil society activists say outside experts are necessary because the nation’s judicial system is controlled by tycoons and other powerful special interests.

Pointing to past failures to get rid of compromised judges, they say Ukraine's judiciary is incapable of reforming itself.

Ukraine has a history of failing to implement legislation deemed critical to its aspirations of joining Euro-Atlantic organizations because of opposition by special interests.

During the September 16 meeting, Nicolas Harrocks, the deputy head of mission at the British Embassy in Kyiv, called on Ukrainian officials to move forward with what he called "high-quality" legislation.

Matti Maasikas, the head of the EU delegation to Ukraine, told the meeting that the fate of judicial reforms will impact Ukraine’s ability to attract aid and foreign investment.

Bohdan Monich, chairman of the Council of Judges, said his organization is “determined to implement this law." But he also stated that it had prepared amendments to the bill for choosing members of the panels.

The meeting was chaired by Andriy Smyrnov, the deputy head of the presidential office.

Tetiana Shevchuk, legal counsel for the Kyiv-based Anti-Corruption Action Center, told RFE/RL the meeting seemed to generate “no meaningful progress” on the standoff between the judiciary and proponents of reforms.

“The office of the president and the parliament showed their commitment to the reform, but it's unclear whether this will be enough to unblock it,” she said.

MOSCOW -- Russian President Vladimir Putin has accepted an invitation to attend the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, according to Russian media reports.

The state-run TASS news agency on September 16 quoted Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov as saying Putin had accepted an invitation from Chinese President Xi Jinping "with delight."

Lavrov was speaking following a meeting with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, in Dushanbe.

Following revelations of a long-running, state-sponsored doping program, Russian athletes were barred from competing at the Olympics and other major international competitions under the Russian flag and anthem until December 2022.

A Russian team will compete in Beijing under the name ROC, for Russian Olympic Committee.

Russian officials are also barred from receiving Olympic credentials unless they are invited by the head of state of the host nation.

Moscow has acknowledged shortcomings in its anti-doping procedures but has denied the existence of a state-organized doping program.

With reporting by Sport.ru and Reuters

Authorities in Tehran have approved use of the coronavirus vaccine produced by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson as Iran faces a fifth wave of COVID-19 infections.

"The Johnson & Johnson single-dose corona vaccine has been approved," Mohammad Reza Shanehsaz, head of Iran's Food and Drug Administration, said on September 16.

RFE/RL's Coronavirus Coverage

Features and analysis, videos, and infographics explore how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the countries in our region.

Shanehsaz said the Russia-developed single-shot Sputnik Light vaccine has also been approved in Iran.

Iran's decision to approve the Johnson & Johnson vaccine comes eight months after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei banned vaccines produced in Britain and the United States, saying those countries were "untrustworthy."

However, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who took office in August, has promised to prioritize combatting the pandemic.

Iran has been using its own COVIran Barakat vaccine, as well as Russia's Sputnik V, India's Covaxin, and a version of the British-developed Oxford/AstraZeneca shot produced by a Russian-South Korea joint venture.

Iran's Health Ministry says about 13 million people out of the country's population of 83 million have been fully vaccinated.

According to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, Iran had recorded more than 5,378,000 infections and 116,072 deaths from COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic, making it the hardest-hit country in the Middle East.

Iran has registered nearly 16,000 COVID-19 deaths in the last 28 days.

Based on reporting by Reuters

BISHKEK -- Another former Kyrgyz prime minister has been detained as part of a widening investigation into alleged corruption during the development of the Kumtor gold-mine project.

The State Committee for National Security (UKMK) said on September 16 that Joomart Otorbaev was arrested and placed in a detention center. A decision on whether he will be moved formally into pretrial detention will be decided by a court within 48 hours.

Otorbaev, who served as prime minister between 2014-15, is one of several former prime ministers and other senior officials arrested in connection with the Kumtor project in recent months.

Kumtor has been a target of financial and environmental disagreements for years. It is currently the subject of an ongoing control battle between the Kyrgyz state and the mine's operator, Canada's Centerra Gold.

The Kyrgyz government has temporarily taken over control of the mine in what President Sadyr Japarov has called a necessary move to address environmental and safety violations.

Centerra has called Kyrgyzstan's actions "wrongful and illegal."

In May, the Canadian firm said it had "initiated binding arbitration to enforce its rights under long-standing investment agreements with the government."

Last month, investigators questioned two former Kyrgyz presidents, Sooronbai Jeenbekov and Askar Akaev, in the high-profile case.

DNIPRO, Ukraine -- A car explosion killed the spokeswoman of a regional emergencies service and her companion in Ukraine's southeastern city of Dnipro, the country's National Police said on September 15.

The cause of the explosion was not immediately clear, but the State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said it has launched a probe into a terrorist act over the deadly blast, which took place on Bohdan Khmelnitskiy Avenue in Ukraine's fourth-largest city.

The State Emergency Service in the Dnipropetrovsk region identified the victims of the explosion as its 35-year-old spokeswoman, Darya Hrechyshcheva, and a member of the Ukrainian Legion public group, a paramedic Oleksiy Kavlak.

An official at the World Health Organization (WHO) says the group has suspended its approval process for Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, after a number of manufacturing infringements were uncovered during an inspection in Russia earlier this year.

Jarbas Barbosa, assistant director at the Pan American Health Organization, the regional office of WHO for the Americas, suggested on September 15 that new inspections at one of the plants where the vaccine is being manufactured would be required before the vaccine is granted approval for emergency use.

The plant “needs to take this under advisement, make the necessary changes, and be ready for new inspections. The WHO is waiting for the manufacturer to send news that their plant is up to code,” Barbosa said.

SEE ALSO:

Sputnik V: The Story Of Russia's Controversial COVID-19 Vaccine

In a report published in June, the WHO reported it had found multiple infringements at a factory owned by Russia’s pharmaceutical company Pharmstandard in the city of Ufa, including regarding the “implementation of adequate measures to mitigate the risks of cross contamination.”

The plant later said it had addressed these concerns.

Russia submitted its applications for approval by both the WHO and European Medicines Agency (EMA) in February, after peer-reviewed results published in the medical journal The Lancet showed it to be safe and 91.6 percent effective against COVID-19.

Despite a lack of approval, Sputnik V is being used in a number of countries across the world.

With reporting by The Moscow Times

A court in Moscow has suspended an Interior Ministry decision to ban a stand-up comic of Azerbaijani origin from entering and residing in the country for life over his on-stage joke about Russians.

Sergei Badamshin, a lawyer for comedian Idrak Mirzalizade, said on Telegram that the Zamoskvorechye district court had suspended the decision on September 16 until a full court decision on the issue is made.

The Interior Ministry said on August 30 that the presence in the Russian Federation of Mirzalizade, a Belarusian citizen who holds permanent residence in Russia, is "undesirable" because of his statements that "incited hatred and enmity towards ethnic Russians."

Mirzalizade, who is a well-known stand-up comic in Moscow, has said the performance at the heart of the controversy was about problems faced by non-Russians when they want to rent an apartment in the Russian capital.

In the performance, the comedian jokes about what would happen if the perception of Russians by others was based on separate incidents, drawing a parallel with situations that shape prejudices about non-Russians living among Russians.

Mirzalizade served 10 days in jail in August for the performance.

Though he has maintained his innocence, he also has publicly offered apologies several times to "all who felt insulted by some parts of my performance, which were taken out of context."

Earlier in June, the comic wrote on Instagram that two unknown men attacked him after he received several threats because of his performance.

He also placed on YouTube a video showing the moment of the attack.

Mirzalizade is an ethnic Talysh, which is a Persian-speaking ethnic minority of Azerbaijan.

Independent Internet monitors say access to Google Docs has been restored after a temporary outage that coincided with the publication by associates of jailed opposition politician Aleksei Navalny of a list of election candidates voters should cast ballots for to topple ruling party incumbents in elections later this week.

GlobalCheck, a group that monitors websites' accessibility in Russia, said late on September 15 that Russian telecommunications operators MTS, Megafon, and Rostelecom started blocking Google Docs hours after the list was published as part of Navalny's "Smart Voting" system.

Another watchdog, the online privacy NGO Roskomsvoboda, said it had noted that Tele2 customers in Russia also could not access the Google site ahead of the September 17-19 elections.

GlobalCheck said on September 16 that Google Docs was once again accessible.

Navalny's team said in a tweet that it had published the list on Github as a workaround to the blockage of Google Docs.

Russian Internet regulator Roskomnadzor denied it had ordered any blocking of the site, adding that as of midday on September 16, "the Internet services in question are accessible on the territory of the Russian Federation."

Russians will vote for a new State Duma -- the lower house of parliament -- along with legislatures in 39 regions and nine regional governors.

In recent years, authorities have adopted an array of legislation to boost Russia's Internet "sovereignty" while also investing in digital tools to make Internet policing more sophisticated.

In addition, most genuine Kremlin critics have been barred from running in the elections, seen as a key part of President Vladimir Putin’s efforts to further cement his hold on power heading into the next presidential balloting, scheduled for 2024.

Smart Voting, an idea that Navalny came up with in 2018, is an online strategy designed to promote candidates that have the best chance to defeat those from United Russia, the Kremlin-linked ruling party.

In two regional elections over the past two years, it showed largely successful results and allies of Navalny, whose movement was banned as extremist this summer, are hoping the system that runs on an app mobile phone users can download once again will upend candidates for United Russia.

The party has seen its popularity decline amid the Kremlin's flagging efforts to deal with an economy hit by the coronavirus pandemic and years of ongoing international sanctions.

With reporting by Meduza, TASS, and RIA Novosti

Russian President Vladimir Putin says he expects to remain in self-isolation for several days after dozens of members of his inner circle tested positive for COVID-19.

Speaking via a video conference with leaders of the member states of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) who had gathered in Dushanbe for a summit on September 16, Putin said he wished "he could shake hands and embrace" the other leaders as he originally intended before being forced to self-isolate.

"You know, unfortunately, I had to cancel my trip to Dushanbe at the last moment, and I am sorry about that. But that is because, as you know, the coronavirus was discovered not just in one or two people, but in several dozens of people in [my] closest circle. So now I have to stay in self-isolation for several days," Putin said.

It was previously unclear how big the outbreak was and how long Putin would remain isolated.

It is not known which of Putin's close contacts tested positive for COVID-19, but Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on September 15 that the president is “absolutely healthy” and "of course" has tested negative for the illness.

Putin, 68, has described his self-quarantine as a "test" for the Russian coronavirus vaccine Sputnik V, which he says he received several months ago.

CSTO members include Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, along with the presidents of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Belarus, were being hosted by their Tajik counterpart Emomali Rahmon, in Dushanbe.

Based on reporting by RIA Novosti, TASS, and Interfax

TARAZ, Kazakhstan -- Police in Kazakhstan’s southern Zhambyl region have summoned two journalists as part of a probe into what they called the "distribution of false information" over deadly ammunition explosions last month that led to the resignation of Defense Minister Nurlan Ermekbaev.

Regional police took the two journalists -- Islambek Dastan of Turaninfo.kz and Daniyar Alimkul -- in for questioning on September 16. Dastan was summoned as witness, while Alimkul's status is a witness with the right to defend himself.

Dastan told RFE/RL after the questioning that he answered the investigators' questions regarding his live broadcast on Facebook covering the explosions and fire at the ammunition warehouse on August 26 that killed at least 17 people. One person remains missing in the accident.

The blasts also injured 98 people -- about half of them employees of the Emergency Situations Ministry.

"The explosions took place, right? I do not know how one can falsify anything by just covering the blasts," Dastan said.

Alimkul refused to comment on the questioning, saying that he signed papers prohibiting him from disclosing the investigation’s proceedings. His lawyer, Aliya Arzymbetova, said that there are no suspects in the case at this point.

The explosions caused a public outcry and criticism of the government as many in the Central Asian nation recalled similar explosions at an ammunition warehouse near the town of Arys in the nearby Turkistan region in 2019 that killed four people and injured dozens of others.

Some 85 percent of Arys's buildings, mainly private houses, were damaged by heavy smoke, shock waves, and flying debris from the explosions.

KALININGRAD, Russia -- The condition of a Russian woman who launched a dry hunger strike to protest against the "anti-sanitary conditions" of her prison cell is deteriorating rapidly.

Antonina Zimina's father, Konstantin Zimin, told RFE/RL on September 15 that his daughter, who was handed a 13-year prison sentence on high treason charges she denies, is refusing both food and water.

"Antonina has been on a dry hunger strike for five days. Death usually occurs around the seventh day," he said in noting her state of health.

Zimin said that his daughter started the hunger strike after she was moved to a so-called "transit" cell in the detention center in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad on September 7, from which convicts are sent to prisons to serve their terms.

Zimina informed her father by letter that there were 15 women in the cell and that the toilets and sewage system did not work. After the detention center's administration ignored the women's request to fix the toilet and sewage, Zimina started the hunger strike and four other women joined her.

Zimina and her husband, Konstantin Antonets, were convicted of spying for Latvia, in December. The charges against them stemmed from a wedding photo that included an officer of the Federal Security Service.

Antonets was handed a 12 1/2 years prison sentence. The couple has denied any wrongdoing ever since they were first arrested in July 2018.

On September 15, Russia's Supreme Court rejected the couple's appeal and upheld their sentences.

In recent years, the number of cases of alleged high treason has increased dramatically in Russia.

One of the latest high-profile high treason cases involves Ivan Safronov, a journalist and an aide to Russian Roskosmos space agency chief, Dmitry Rogozin.

Safronov was arrested on July 7 and later charged with passing classified materials to the Czech Republic. Safronov and his supporters reject the charge.

A court in Kyrgyzstan has handed life sentences to two Tajik nationals over deadly ethnic clashes that erupted earlier this year near a disputed segment of the Kyrgyz-Tajik border.

Relatives of Abduroziq Qahhorov and Askar Yunusov told RFE/RL on September 15 that the two men were found guilty a day earlier of looting and committing crimes against the peace in Kyrgyzstan's southern region of Batken and sentenced a day earlier.

According to the relatives, the trial was held behind closed doors at the Leilek district court. Tajik authorities have yet to comment on the court's rulings.

The court is currently trying three Kyrgyz citizens of Tajik origin on charges of high treason, illegal border crossing, and illegal drug trafficking. The charges also stem from the deadly clashes near the border in late April, during which 36 Kyrgyz citizens and 19 Tajik nationals were killed and dozens more injured on both sides.

Authorities from the neighboring countries have blamed each other for the conflict.

Many border areas in Central Asia have been disputed since the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991.

The situation is particularly complicated near the numerous exclaves in the volatile Ferghana Valley, where the borders of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan meet.

Russia and its Central Asian allies have launched two days of talks in the Tajik capital to discuss the situation in Afghanistan a month after Taliban militants entered Kabul and seized power in the war-torn country.

Leaders of the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) met for a summit in the Tajik capital on September 16, to be followed a day later by a gathering of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which includes China.

The talks come as Moscow and Beijing move to assert themselves as key players in the region following the rapid collapse of the Western-backed government in Kabul at the end of a 20-year-old U.S.-led military mission in Afghanistan.

Both regional security blocs have been viewed as Moscow's and Beijing's counters to U.S. geopolitical dominance.

With Afghanistan facing a looming major humanitarian crisis in the aftermath of the Taliban's takeover, Afghanistan’s Central Asian neighbors are wary of the security threats emanating from the war-torn country and the potential for tens of thousands of refugees to pour over the border.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who was forced to join via video conference after self-isolating because of close contact with several people in his inner circle who tested positive for COVID-19, and other leaders of CSTO member states, which include Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, kicked off the diplomatic talks in Dushanbe.

The leaders “agreed to fortify the CSTO’s southern borders and continue to plan and implement a package of measures aimed at bringing down the level of and neutralizing potential threats in the organization’s space," Tajik President Emomali Rahmon said after the talks, according to TASS.

Meanwhile, the office of Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev said he "supported the joint CSTO position that the placement of Afghan refugees or foreign military bases on our countries' territories is unacceptable."

SEE ALSO:

Afghanistan In Focus At Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit

At a presummit meeting on September 15, CSTO Secretary-General Stanislau Zas acknowledged that the situation on the Tajik-Afghan border was "unfavorable," and pledged that Dushanbe would be provided with "all the necessary military and military-technical assistance" to combat any threat from the south.

In recent weeks, the security grouping held military exercises in Kyrgyzstan to prepare for any possible trouble. Tajikistan conducted military maneuvers with Russia and Uzbekistan, while Uzbekistan also held separate drills with Russia along the Uzbek-Afghan border.

The CSTO has scheduled three more sets of military maneuvers close to the Tajik-Afghan border in October, with a fourth scheduled for November.

Russia has military bases in the former Soviet republics of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Leaders from the eight-member SCO are then due to hold talks in Dushanbe on September 17.

Founded in 2001, the SCO initially consisted of China, Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan before India and Pakistan joined in 2017.

Putin, who is self-isolating due to "all-day" exposure to a close contact who tested positive for the coronavirus, cancelled his attendance at the two summits.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will also participate in the SCO meeting virtually.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, whose country is an observer member of the SCO and keen to join the grouping, will attend the gathering.

Before heading to Dushanbe, Raisi said that Tehran's participation in the SCO meeting shows that "regional cooperation is a top priority for us."

Afghanistan holds observer status at the SCO, but Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on September 15 that the Taliban had not been invited to observe proceedings in the Tajik capital.

"Nobody is hurrying to give full recognition to the Taliban," Lavrov said.

The Taliban has sought to reassure neighboring countries and Russia that it poses no threat since gaining control last month over almost all of Afghanistan’s territory, including Kabul, the capital.

The hard-line Islamist group also promised inclusiveness and a general amnesty for former opponents, but many Afghans remain deeply fearful, especially after the group formed an all-male government led by hard-line veterans, banned protests, and cracked down on demonstrators and journalists.

Lavrov said he "welcomed" several Taliban promises, including on curbing drug-trafficking and preventing attacks on other countries, but added: "Now we are monitoring to see how it will be fulfilled in practice."

Tensions between CSTO member states also surfaced during the September 16 talks, with Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov proposing to "draw up mechanisms for rapid response and decision-making within the [CSTO] in case of armed conflict” between member states, according to his press service.

The proposal follows deadly ethnic clashes that erupted earlier this year near a disputed segment of the Kyrgyz-Tajik border.

With reporting by AFP

Germany joined France on September 15 in expressing concern about reports of an agreement between Mali’s new military rulers and the Vagner Group, a Russian military contractor with ties to the Kremlin.

Germany has several hundred soldiers taking part in a United Nations peacekeeping mission and a European Union training program in the West African country.

"If Mali's government reaches such agreements with Russia, it contradicts everything that Germany, France, the EU, and the UN have been doing in Mali for eight years," said German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer.

“If cooperation between Mali and Russian mercenary groups is confirmed, that puts into question the mandate of the German military, the UN’s Mali mission MINUSMA, and the EU’s training mission,” she said, adding that there would be consequences.

France has been at the forefront of a broader counterterrorism operation in the Sahel region with about 5,000 troops ever since a coup in Mali in 2012 helped trigger an Islamist insurgency in the north.

But France announced plans earlier this year to reduce that force to 2,500 to 3,000 troops in the coming years.

French Defense Minister Florence Parly and Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian expressed concern on September 14 about the possible use of Russian mercenary troops in Mali in comments to the National Assembly's Defense Committee.

"We are in Mali and will certainly remain so in the months and years to come," Parly said.

However, she said it would be "very worrying" if there was an agreement between Mali's junta and Russian mercenaries.

"[This would be] contrary to everything we have been doing for years to support the countries in the Sahel," she said.

The Vagner Group has reportedly neared a deal to train the Malian military, which seized power in a coup in May, and provide protection for senior officials.

Western governments have accused Moscow of using the Vagner Group as a paramilitary force in conflicts in Ukraine, Libya, Syria, and the Central African Republic. The mercenaries have also been accused of carrying out human rights abuses, including by the UN in the Central African Republic.

Earlier this year, Washington described the Vagner Group as "mercenaries working as an arm of Russia's Defense Ministry."

Russia denies a link between the government and the Vagner Group, often describing the paramilitary force as trainers or advisers despite evidence they have been engaged in combat operations.

In response to the reports about Mali, Russia denied any official military involvement in the West African country.

“There are no representatives of the Russian Armed Forces there, and no official negotiations are being held,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on September 15.

The Vagner Group is believed to be run by Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close associate of President Vladimir Putin.

With reporting by AFP, AP, dpa, and Reuters