Russia

MOSCOW, December 25. /TASS/. Russia has launched the underwater trials of the Poseidon nuclear-capable strategic drone whose development was unveiled by Russian President Vladimir Putin in his state-of-the-nation address to both houses of the Russian parliament, a source in the domestic defense industry told TASS on Tuesday.

"In the sea area protected from a potential enemy’s reconnaissance means, the underwater trials of the nuclear propulsion unit of the Poseidon drone are underway," the source said.

MOSCOW, December 25. /TASS/. The family of Russian national Maria Butina, arrested in the United States on charges of conspiracy and acting as a foreign agent, needs about 30 mln rubles ($436,000) to pay her lawyer’s fees, Maria’s father Valery Butin told a Russian TV show on Tuesday.

"The debt amounts to about 30 mln rubles at the moment. It is indeed a huge debt. The case is politicized, this is why the fees are that high but the lawyer did not abandon the case in July and has been actually working for free since then," Butin said.

MOSCOW, Dec. 25 (Xinhua) -- Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has signed a decree expanding the list of Ukrainian individuals and entities subject to sanctions, the government said Tuesday.

Moscow will add over 200 Ukrainian citizens and legal entities to the list that already has 322 individuals and 68 entities, according to a Russian government statement.

"This was done to protect the interests of the Russian state, companies and citizens," Medvedev tweeted following his signing of the decree.

MOSCOW, December 24. /TASS/. Anti-aircraft gunners of the Central Military District have returned to Novosibirsk after performing tasks to protect Russia’s facilities in Syria, the district’s press service told TASS on Monday.

MOSCOW, December 24. /TASS/. The Russian Foreign Ministry deems as important the decision of the UN General Assembly to convene a conference on the establishment of a zone free of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East in 2019, the ministry reported on Monday in comments on the decision approved on December 22.

ROSTOV-ON-DON, December 22. /TASS/. Servicemen from the 49th general army have participated in large-scale military drills to practice deactivation of contaminated objects after a massive nuclear attack, the press service of Russia's Southern Military District said on Saturday.

"On the territory of the Stavropol and Kuban regions, over 3,000 servicemen took part in drills on conducting radiation, chemical and bacteriological reconnaisance; as well as on deactivating contamination from nuclear weapons of terrain, weapons and military equipment," the press service said.

MOSCOW, December 22. /TASS/. The fact that the Russia-initiated resolution supporting the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) was voted down at the United Nations General Assembly will enable Washington to ruin the document thanks to those countries that rejected it, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

MOSCOW, Dec. 22 (Xinhua) -- Amid ongoing tense frictions between Moscow and Washington, Russian President Vladimir Putin appeals to his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump to resume direct talks so as to discuss urgent issues on bilateral and international agendas.

Noting that the two countries "have reached the bottom of our relations" at his annual press conference Thursday, Putin reconfirmed his readiness for dialogue and said it is time for both sides to think with a clear head and start mending bilateral ties.

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) — Russia’s nuclear power company says a Soviet-built nuclear reactor has been taken out of operation after 45 years of service.

The state-controlled Rosatom corporation said Saturday that Reactor No. 1 at the Leningrad nuclear power plant has been shut down as planned. It said it will take until 2023 to fully unload its uranium fuel.

MOSCOW, December 20. /TASS/. Using a smartphone puts one’s privacy and security at risk and this poses a great danger particularly to any high-profile leader, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with the Rossiya-24 TV channel, adding that this was the reason why Russian President Vladimir Putin does not use a cell phone.

When asked whether the head of state owned a smartphone, Peskov said: "not as far as I know, he does not have a phone."