Europe

MOSCOW, January 26. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Vladimir Zelensky have established a working and effective contact, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with Moscow. Kremlin. Putin program on Rossiya-1 television.

"The two presidents have already established a working and rather effective contact, as recent events have shown," Peskov said.

The Kremlin spokesman stressed that the contact between Putin and Zelensky was not sensational. "This is a working and meticulous process," Peskov noted.

MOSCOW, January 26. /TASS/: New Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin has a certain freedom of actions to form his team, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with "Moscow. Kremlin. Putin" program on Rossiya-1 TV channel on Sunday.

"Certainly, there is some candidate pool, from where if needed candidates are picked or proposed. However, since Mishustin received a proposal to head the cabinet, definitely, I believe he had and has a certain carte blanche to form his team," Peskov said.

MOSCOW, January 26. /TASS/: Russia’s Investigative Committee has ended a criminal case against former head of Russia’s nanotechnologies state corporation Rusnano Leonid Melamed and former financial director Svyatoslav Ponurov, who were earlier accused of embezzling 220 mln rubles ($3.5 mln), a source in the law enforcement agencies told TASS.

"The criminal case opened in 2009 against Melamed and other suspects has been terminated over the expiry of the period of limitation for reasons other than exoneration," the source said.

MOSCOW, January 24. /TASS/: The crews of Caspian Flotilla ships employed the latest sonars to detect hostile underwater drones in the areas of the ships’ naval bases, the press office of Russia’s Southern Military District reported on Friday.

"The Flotilla’s minesweepers dropped robotized deep-water submersibles, after which the ships’ crews and sonar-operating teams were given the command for their search and detection," the press office said in a statement.

MOSCOW, January 8. /TASS/: 80 people were killed in Iran’s missile attack on US bases in Iraq, Reuters reported with reference to Iran’s state television.

Earlier, CNN said citing sources that the missiles launched by the Iranian side hit the part of the Ain al-Asad air base in Iraq where no American troops were stationed.

MOSCOW, December 18. /TASS/: NATO military exercises in the Baltic States, Poland, and in the Black and Baltic Seas indicate that the Alliance is preparing for a large-scale conflict, Chief of the Russian General Staff Valery Gerasinov told foreign military attaches on Tuesday.

MOSCOW, September 14. /TASS/: Russia’s Sukhoi Su-57 multirole stealth fighter has touched down in Turkey for Technofest 2019 techno festival, due to be held in Istanbul on September 17 through 22, Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) told TASS on Saturday.

"The multipurpose fighter jet Sukhoi Su-35 has arrived at Turkey’s Ataturk airport to take part in the Technofest exhibition," the spokesperson said.

The UAC press service added that other Russian aircraft - both passenger and special - were expected to arrive for Technofest, but it did not specify their models.

MOSCOW, January 26. /TASS/: The launch of Soyuz 2.1a rocket with Meridian-M military satellite from Plesetsk, northern Russia, was cancelled over a malfunction of the booster’s electrical equipment, two sources in the rocket and space sector told TASS on Sunday.

"The launch was cancelled over a problem with the booster’s electrical equipment," one of the sources said.

26 January 2020; AFP: Italians vote Sunday in a key regional election which the far-right hopes will shake the country's fragile coalition government to its core and return strongman Matteo Salvini to power.

26 January 2020; AFP: The curtain comes down on Britain's membership of the European Union on January 31 after more than three and a half years of disagreements and delays.

Here are the milestones in the rocky process.

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