RA’s Daily Russian News Blast – September 23, 2009
TODAY: EU chief has faith that Russia will not stand in the way of sanctions against Iran; US reproaches Russia on human rights; hope for WTO bid? Yushchenko suggests move towards NATO would receive popular backing; ethnic haters charged. New accusation for Berezovsky; chess matches and political clashes. Drama at the Bolshoi.
EU foreign policy head Javier Solana has said that he does not believe that China and Russia will oppose new sanctions against Iran. US diplomat Douglas Griffiths has told the UN Human Rights Council that ‘in Russia we are concerned about killings with impunity of human rights defenders and journalists in the North Caucasus’. First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov has said that Russia has received signals from a US official that its bid to join the WTO (with Belarus and Kazakhstan) may be successful as early as 2010. The New York Times reports that Russia’s top drug enforcement official, Viktor P. Ivanov, will push the US to redouble its efforts to destroy Afghan poppy cultivation, as Russia is ravaged by heroin abuse.
EU foreign policy head Javier Solana has said that he does not believe that China and Russia will oppose new sanctions against Iran. US diplomat Douglas Griffiths has told the UN Human Rights Council that ‘in Russia we are concerned about killings with impunity of human rights defenders and journalists in the North Caucasus’. First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov has said that Russia has received signals from a US official that its bid to join the WTO (with Belarus and Kazakhstan) may be successful as early as 2010. The New York Times reports that Russia’s top drug enforcement official, Viktor P. Ivanov, will push the US to redouble its efforts to destroy Afghan poppy cultivation, as Russia is ravaged by heroin abuse.