"Russia"

Bangkok Governor Chadchart Sittipunt met Russian Ambassador to Thailand Evgeny Tomikhin at City Hall earlier this week to mark 125 years of bilateral ties and the 25th anniversary of Bangkok and Moscow becoming twin cities.

President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Russia would respond in kind if Nato deployed troops and infrastructure in Finland and Sweden after they join the U.S.-led military alliance.

Ukraine on Wednesday carried out its biggest exchange of prisoners of war since Russia invaded, securing the release of 144 of its soldiers, including 95 who defended Mariupol's steelworkers, Ukraine's military intelligence agency said.

While global confidence in United States President Joe Biden has dipped from a year ago, most countries surveyed still have more confidence in him than in China's leader Xi Jinping, an international study published in June showed.

Six major tourism operators have said they could woo some 450,000 Russian tourists to visit Thailand this year, but the lack of direct flights could instead drive them to visit Vietnam and the Middle East.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida plans to declare, at the Group of Seven summit to be held in Germany from Sunday to Tuesday, that Japan will provide food assistance to developing countries facing a food crisis due to the impact of Russia’s armed aggression in Ukraine.

Amid a spiralling energy crisis brought on by the Russian invasion of Ukraine putting pressure on global fuel reserves, Pakistan’s energy minister has admitted that the country simply cannot compete with the buying power of European countries.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo said on Sunday he will urge his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts to open room for dialogue during a peace-building mission to the countries because "war has to stop and the global food chains need to be reactivated".

Russia will supply Belarus with Iskander-M missile systems within a few months, Russian President Vladimir Putin told a televised meeting with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on Saturday.

European leaders on Thursday granted Ukraine the much-coveted status of official candidate to join their 27-nation union, in a bold geopolitical move hailed by Ukraine and the EU itself as a "historic decision"

Russia's threat to punish Lithuania over blocked rail shipments to Moscow's enclave of Kaliningrad jangled nerves on Tuesday for residents living just across the border who put faith in Nato membership to thwart any potential military action.

Dmitry Muratov, the co-winner of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize and the editor of one of Russia's last major independent newspapers, auctioned off his Nobel medal on Monday for a record $103.5 million to aid children displaced by the war in Ukraine.