Europe

MOSCOW, September 1. /TASS/: US President Joe Biden’s claims that the pullout of his country’s forces from Afghanistan was a success sounded unconvincing and were just an attempt to boost his rating, the chairman of the State Duma’s international affairs committee, Leonid Slutsky, said in his Telegram channel on Wednesday.

MOSCOW, September 1. /TASS/: Omsktransmash (part of the Uralvagonzavod defense manufacturer within the state tech corporation Rostec) is holding talks with potential customers on upgrading Soviet T-55 main battle tanks, Company CEO Igor Lobov told TASS at the Army-2021 international arms show that ended outside Moscow.

MOSCOW, September 1. /TASS/: Ukrainian politicians are dabbling in verbal gymnastics, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Wednesday, adding their remarks on various historical topics, along with President Vladimir Zelensky’s snipe over Russian gas being "the dirtiest in the world" are made due to their lack of intelligence.

DUBLIN, Sept 1 (NNN-AGENCIES) – Ireland’s population topped five million for the first time in 170 years, to reach an estimated 5.01 million in Apr, 2021, according to an annual population survey, released by the country’s Central Statistics Office (CSO) yesterday.

The survey showed that Ireland’s population increased by 34,000 persons, in the twelve months to Apr, 2021, up 0.68 percent, when compared with the population in Apr, 2020, which stood above 4.97 million.

MOSCOW, Sept 1 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that the U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan had achieved nothing but tragedy and loss of life on all sides and showed it was impossible to foist foreign values on other nations.

Speaking to teenagers at an educational facility in the Russian far east, Putin made clear that he deemed the U.S. approach to a country once invaded by the Soviet Union to have been deeply flawed.

MOSCOW, Sept 1 (Reuters) - The United States will help build new facilities for border guards in Tajikistan along the Central Asian country's frontier with Afghanistan and Uzbekistan to better respond to security threats, the U.S embassy in Dushanbe said on Wednesday.

The new facility, which will be built in Tajikistan's southwestern tip, will replace an outdated detachment and allow border guards to "deploy forces more quickly to border areas in response to threats," the embassy said.

LONDON, Sept 1 (Reuters) - Britain's foreign minister Dominic Raab said the intelligence assessment was that it was unlikely Kabul would fall this year as he defended Britain's withdrawal from Afghanistan after the Taliban swept across the country much more quickly.

Britain, like the United States, failed to predict how quickly the Afghan government would fall, meaning it had not made sufficient preparation for the chaos that would follow when the Taliban seized power.

BERLIN/PARIS, Sept 1 (Reuters) - France and Germany on Wednesday urged Iran to return rapidly to nuclear negotiations, after a break in talks following Iranian elections in June, with Paris demanding an "immediate" restart amid Western concerns over Tehran's expanding atomic work.

France's foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told his newly-appointed Iranian counterpart Hossein Amirabdollahian in a telephone call it was urgent for Tehran to return to the talks, Le Drian's ministry said in a statement.

TALLINN, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- Estonia's new president-elect Alar Karis on Tuesday vowed to find a way to further develop the country.

Speaking at a press conference after the presidential election at the Parliament of Estonia, Karis said: "I will try to communicate with all political forces and find a way for Estonia to develop further."

He also said that Estonia needs to address both domestic and foreign policy, adding that he will also follow the example set by his predecessors, Estonia Public Broadcasting (ERR) reported.

31 Aug 2021; MEMO: The UK retains "the right to exercise self-defense" after withdrawing from Afghanistan, the British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said on Tuesday, Anadolu Agency reported.

Raab was speaking to British news channel ITV after British Air Chief Marshal Sir Mike Wigston told the Daily Telegraph newspaper that the UK could launch airstrikes against 'ISIS-K', the branch of the Daesh terrorist group in Afghanistan.