Russia

MOSCOW, February 25. /TASS/: Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov refrained from commenting on remarks by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who claimed that Russian-made Iskander tactical missile systems used during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict allegedly "failed to explode or exploded in only 10% of the cases." According to the spokesman, Russian military equipment has repeatedly proven its efficiency.

MOSCOW, February 25./TASS/: Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov expressed hope for a peaceful settlement to the situation in Armenia in a phone call with his Armenian counterpart Ara Ayvazyan, emphasizing that Moscow viewed the latest developments as an internal affair of Yerevan.

"Ayvazyan reported on the latest developments in the republic. The Russian side emphasized that we consider the situation to be an internal affair of Armenia, and expect that it will be settled peacefully," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a report circulated after the phone call.

MOSCOW, February 25. /TASS/: Russian and Belarusian Presidents Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko may have discussed a model of further integration between Moscow and Minsk during their recent talks in Sochi, among other issues, head of the Belarusian Studies Center at the Institute of Europe under the Russian Academy of Sciences Nikolai Mezhevich told TASS on Wednesday.

MOSCOW, February 25./TASS/: The struggle to defeat poverty in Russia faces certain difficulties, but national officials are not giving up on it, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Thursday.

"True, not everything works out well," he admitted, when commenting on the endeavors to do away with poverty in the country. "Yes, certain factors seriously impede this work sometimes. However, nobody is going to give up, and work on this will carry on," he pledged.

MOSCOW, February 24. /TASS/: Washington humiliates the European Union by imposing political decisions that run counter to Europe’s interests, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told Channel One’s Vremya Pokazhet (or Time Will Tell) show.

MOSCOW, February 24. /TASS/: The prolongation of the Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (the New START Treaty) guaranteed predictability in the Russia-US relations, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in his video address to participants in the Geneva disarmament conference on Wednesday.

MOSCOW, February 24. /TASS/: The Russian and Belarusian presidents, Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko, agreed at talks to step up work between the two countries’ economic agencies and tax services, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday.

MOSCOW, February 24. /TASS/: The Progress Space Rocket Center (part of the state space corporation Roscosmos) has launched work on Bion-M No.2 satellite for delivering mice into outer space, the Center’s press office told TASS on Wednesday.

"Work has begun at the enterprise’s production units to make the spacecraft’s hulls, namely, the descent vehicle, the instrumentation and assembly compartments and solar panel sections," the press office said.

MOSCOW, February 24. /TASS/: Russia’s COVID-19 case tally rose by 11,749 in the past day reaching 4,200,902, the anti-coronavirus crisis center told reporters on Wednesday.

For a second day in the row fewer than 12,000 daily coronavirus cases were recorded.

In relative terms, the growth rate stood at 0.3%.

The lowest growth rates in the past day were registered in the Tuva Republic (0.05%), the Magadan Region (0.06%), the Altai Republic (0.07%), the Khakassia Republic (0.07%) and the Jewish Autonomous Region (0.07%).

MOSCOW, February 23. /TASS/: Gas transit to Kazakhstan was stopped after an explosion at the Soyuz pipeline section in the Orenburg region, according to the information published on the telegram channel of the RF Ministry of Energy on Tuesday.