Europe

MOSCOW, September 24. /TASS/: The Kremlin did not nominate Russian President Vladimir Putin for the Nobel Peace Prize, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Thursday.

"You all know that completely different people are nominated for this award, this is an initiative of those submitting the nomination. In this case, [the nomination was submitted by] the aforementioned writer," the spokesman said, commenting on the nomination submitted by writer Sergey Komkov.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Commission launched an investigation on Thursday into imports of optical fibre cable from China, which EU manufacturers believe are being sold in Europe at artificially low prices.

The case comes as the 27-member European Union wants the digital economy to be a key part of its economic recovery and demands a greater opening of Chinese markets.

ABOARD ‘ARCTIC SUNRISE’ (Reuters) - Like many of her generation, Mya-Rose Craig feels strongly that adults have failed to take the urgent action needed to tackle global warming and so she has headed to the Arctic Ocean to protest.

Armed with a placard reading ‘Youth Strike for Climate”, the 18-year-old British activist is staging the most northerly protest in a series of youth strikes worldwide.

ROME (Reuters) - Italian President Sergio Mattarella, taking aim at British Prime Minister Boris Johnson for suggesting his country was more freedom loving than others, said on Thursday that Italy loved freedom, but was also serious.

Johnson told parliament in London on Tuesday that Britain had a worse coronavirus infection rate than nations like Italy and Germany because it was a “freedom-loving country” which therefore resisted social restrictions to curb the disease.

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil prices dropped on Thursday, despite a fall in U.S. inventories last week, amid a stronger dollar and a renewed wave of COVID-19 cases in Europe that led to renewed travel restrictions in several countries.

Brent crude LCOc1 futures fell 21 cents, or 0.5%, to $41.56 a barrel by 0922 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude CLc1 futures dropped 26 cents, or 0.7%, to $39.67 a barrel.

Both benchmarks climbed slightly on Wednesday after government data showed U.S. oil inventories dropped last week.

LONDON, Sept. 23 (Xinhua) -- Another 6,178 people have tested positive for coronavirus in Britain as pressure is building up on the government on the replacement of the government's furlough scheme.

The daily rise of coronavirus cases, the highest since May 1, brought the total number of cases to 409,729. The coronavirus-related death toll rose by 37 to 41,862, the official data showed Wednesday.

On Tuesday, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced new restriction measures to tackle a sharp rise in the country's coronavirus cases.

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP) — Swiss health authorities have ordered a quarantine for a staggering 2,500 students at a prestigious hospitality management school in the city of Lausanne after “significant outbreaks” of the coronavirus that are a suspected byproduct of off-campus partying.

23 Sep 2020; MEMO: Russia has added more EU individuals and entities to its blacklist, the Foreign Ministry said Wednesday, Anadolu reports.

“In response to actions of the EU, Russia has now decided to expand its reciprocal list that are denied entry to its territory,” ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a news conference in Moscow.

“The number of the relevant Russian listings has been brought to parity with that of the existing EU list,” she said.

MOSCOW, September 23. /TASS/: Artillery battalions armed with Msta-S self-propelled guns destroyed a hypothetical enemy’s facilities and vehicles at a distance of more than 15 kilometers at the Prudboi proving ground near Volgograd in the course of the strategic command and staff exercise Kavkaz-2020, the Defense Ministry told the media on Wednesday.

"Under the scenario self-propelled artillery Msta-S battalions attacked crucial facilities and military equipment of a hypothetical enemy at a distance of more than 15 kilometers," the Defense Ministry said.

MOSCOW, September 23. /TASS/: The rhetoric that Western countries are using in relation to the situation surrounding blogger Alexey Navalny is unacceptable, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a briefing on Wednesday.

"We have all seen Western countries and their leaders, officials, state agencies, as well as integration institutions led by Western countries, launch a large-scale disinformation campaign over the situation surrounding Russian citizen Navalny," she pointed out.