Russia

MOSCOW, April 12. /TASS/: The Russian military enlistment system needs to be streamlined and the bill on electronic military summonses is meant to help with the effort, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday.

"This is about the need for us to streamline the system of keeping a record of, and calling up those who should serve in the military. Under the Constitution, our military calls up conscripts to serve. It’s a civil duty that’s enshrined in the constitution," the spokesman said.

MOSCOW, April 12. /TASS/: The fact that Washington is denying that it was involved in the explosions at the Nord Stream gas pipelines only confirms the version by journalist Seymour Hersh that the US had a hand in the terrorist acts, official spokeswoman of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova said.

MOSCOW, April 12. /TASS/: The assault teams of the Wagner private military company captured three urban quarters in Artyomovsk in the Donetsk area over the past day during the special military operation in Ukraine, Defense Ministry Spokesman Lieutenant-General Igor Konashenkov reported on Wednesday.

"In the Donetsk direction, Wagner assault teams captured three urban quarters in the area of Artyomovsk. Airborne Force units immobilized enemy forces on the flanks of the assault teams," the spokesman said.

MOSCOW, April 12. /TASS/: Russia’s space corporation Roscosmos already knows the shape and parameters of a future orbital station and the stages of its creation, Roscosmos CEO Yury Borisov said at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday.

"The preliminary design will be ready in the summer. Today, we already know the station’s main parameters and shape and the stages of its creation," he said.

Putin noted that one of the purposes of the station would be to implement the Moon program.

MOSCOW, April 11. /TASS/: A bill for establishing a common register of Russians subject to military service, which would introduce digital draft notices, has nothing to do with mobilization efforts but is intended to modernize military recordkeeping, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday.

When asked if the Kremlin had any sense that such changes could spark panic and a new wave of emigration, he said: "Absolutely not."

MOSCOW, April 11. /TASS/: There is no second mobilization wave in Russia, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday.

"There is no second wave," the spokesman told reporters Tuesday.

The journalists noted the statements Peskov made in March that the Kremlin does not discuss an option to carry out a second mobilization wave. When asked if there are any changes in this regard, the spokesman underscored: "No, there have been none, and there are still none."

MOSCOW, April 11. /TASS/: The southern part of the Kuril Islands are an inseparable part of Russia, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday, commenting on a Japanese Foreign Ministry statement alleging that these territories are under Russian occupation.

"We see them [such statements] quite regularly. We reject such ideas and such wording. The Kuril Islands are an inseparable part of Russia," he said.

MOSCOW, April 11 (NNN-XINHUA) — Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said that it seized 699 kg of cocaine from Latin America, part of which was planned to be sold to the European Union (EU).

Two Colombian nationals and an EU citizen carried the wholesale batch of drug worth more than 2.5 billion rubles (31 million U.S. dollars) to Russia and stored it in a Moscow warehouse, the FSB said in a statement.

The suspects planned to smuggle part of the cocaine to an EU country and sell the remaining part in Russia, the agency said.

MOSCOW, April 11 (Reuters) - Russia is poised to introduce electronic military draft papers for the first time in its history in an effort to make it harder for men to avoid being drafted as it seeks to perfect a system it has used to bolster its military forces in Ukraine.

The State Duma, the lower house of parliament, is due to consider the move - which requires a change in the law - in a session on Tuesday, though government officials say there are currently no plans to compel more men to fight in Ukraine.

PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMCHATSKY, Russia, April 11 (Reuters) - One of Russia's most active volcanoes erupted on the far eastern Kamchatka peninsula on Tuesday, shooting a vast cloud of ash far into the sky that smothered villages in drifts of grey volcanic dust and triggered an aviation warning.

The Shiveluch volcano erupted just after midnight reaching a crescendo about six hours later, spewing out an ash cloud over an area of 108,000 square kilometres (41,699 square miles), according to the Kamchatka Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Geophysical Survey.