Europe

BELGRADE, November 1. /TASS/: The Serbian government is considering the purchase of Russian missile defense systems S-400 through obtaining a long-term loan, the Vecherne Novosti daily informed on Friday, citing its own sources.

"Serbia’s military and state leadership was impressed by the efficiency of the S-400 system [during the recent drills "Slavic Shield-2019" with the participation of the Russian military]. In the coming months, they might hold talks with Moscow on acquiring a long-term loan for the purchase this missile defense system," the newspaper wrote.

SOFIA, November 1. /TASS/: A Russian diplomat was expelled from Bulgaria earlier this week over allegedly trying to recruit a high-ranking staff member, who had access to classified data, Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov said on Friday.

MOSCOW, November 1. /TASS/: The Kurdish issue in Syria must not exacerbate tensions in the region, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with Rossiya-24 TV channel on Friday.

"The Kurds are living in Iraq and in Iran, and certainly, a huge number of the Kurds are living in Turkey. Nobody wants this region to "explode" over tensions around the Kurdish issue, and no one wants the Kurds to feel like they are secondary citizens," Lavrov said.

CHITA, November 1. /TASS/: A delegation of the Arctic Palladium Company, which Nornickel and Russian Platinum have organized for implementation of a new project in the Norilsk industrial district, visited the Bystrinsky Mining and Processing Plant (a part of Nornickel) in the Trans-Baikal Region’s south-east. The Bystrinsky plant is Nornickel’s most advance asset, the plant’s press service told TASS on Friday.

MOSCOW, November 1. /TASS/: Turkey has handed over to Russia18 Syrian servicemen captured by groups supporting Ankara in the north of Syria, the Turkish Ministry of National Defense said on Friday.

"Eighteen [Syrian] servicemen detained during search, reconnaissance and military activities to the south-east of Ras al-Ayna on October 29, were handed over [to the Russian side] as a result of coordination with the Russian authorities," the ministry wrote on its official Twitter account.

MOSCOW, November 1. /TASS/: Russia’s state arms seller Rosoboronexport has exported weapons worth over $11 billion to 43 countries this year and signed more than 800 contracts for future deliveries, Company CEO Alexander Mikheyev said on Friday.

MOSCOW, November 1. /TASS/: There is no genetic material that would make it possible to conclude that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State (IS, terror group, outlawed in Russia), was killed in a US raid, Director of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service Sergei Naryshkin told TASS on Friday.

"There is no genetic material, which would allow us to say that with 100-percent certainty," he emphasized.

1 November 2019; AFP: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's office has defended his Brexit deal with the EU, after US President Donald Trump warned it would make it impossible for the two nations to strike a future trade agreement.

The president, whose impeachment in the US has moved a stage closer following a key vote in Congress, waded into the British election campaign on Thursday to criticise Johnson's divorce terms with the European bloc.

LONDON (Reuters) - As Britain’s “Brexit election” campaign swings into action, it may not be the country’s exit from the European Union which takes centre stage but another national obsession - the health service.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has cast the Dec. 12 election as necessary to break the deadlock in parliament over Brexit, telling voters that only by returning his Conservatives with a majority can the country finally quit the European Union.

BELFAST (Reuters) - British police, investigating deaths of 39 people found dead in the back of a truck near London last week, made a direct appeal on Friday to two brothers from Northern Ireland to hand themselves in to detectives.

Police say Ronan Hughes and his brother Christopher are crucial to their inquiries into the discovery of the bodies of 31 men and eight women in the container on an industrial estate in Grays, to the east of the British capital.