Dmitry Medvedev urged in response to the new Western sanctions to do everything possible to inflict maximum damage on the countries that imposed them.

According to the deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, retaliatory measures should affect all possible spheres, and there can be no rules against the enemy.

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❗️The next logical step after the membership freeze will be Armenia's withdrawal from the Collective Security Treaty Organization, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has said that neither he nor any other Armenian official will visit Belarus as long as Alexander Lukashenko is president.

Pashinyan said that Yerevan could change its attitude toward the CSTO if Lukashenko apologizes to Armenia or Belarus withdraws from the organization

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❗️The Chinese Foreign Ministry condemns new American anti-Russian sanctions, calling them illegal and unilateral.

The United States is constantly supplying weapons to Ukraine and using the crisis as an opportunity to impose sanctions, the Chinese Foreign Ministry announced.

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Protests against Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan have erupted again in Yerevan:

The government building is cordoned off by police, supporters of protest leader Bagrat Galstanyan hold a march.

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☄️ A social media video appears to show an Israeli soldier using a trebuchet to launch fireballs across the border with Lebanon

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'Not escalation' Stoltenberg style?

NATO chief attempts to justify Ukraine's strikes into Russian territory.

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Hezbollah published footage of its large-scale missile attack against Israel yesterday.

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Germany cannot supply additional Patriot air defence systems to Ukraine, German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said

"We already provided three [Patriot] systems, that means a quarter of our capacities, so there is no space for providing even more than those three systems ... it is on other partners to provide assistance," Pistorius said ahead of the NATO defense heads' meeting.

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Zelensky still bowing & begging before Swiss summit, this time in Saudi Arabia

Volodymyr Zelensky met with the Middle Eastern country’s leader, Mohammed bin Salman, to ask the latter to participate in the Swiss "peace summit" on Ukraine scheduled for June 15-16, the media say.

The meeting was "meaningful and energetic," Zelensky has claimed, while local media were far more restrained, admitting only the fact that "during the talks, the leaders discussed issues of bilateral relations."

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Alexander Maltsev secures gold in synchronized swimming at BRICS Games, the second for Russian team

Russian athlete Alexander Maltsev won the solo technical routine in synchronized swimming at the BRICS Games in Kazan, scoring 267.3216 points. Thailand's Kentan Adisaesiributr claimed silver with 209.9667 points. Only two athletes competed in this event.

This victory marks Russia's second gold at the BRICS Games after Svetlana Kolesnichenko took home the women's equivalent earlier.

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❗️At the second stage of the drills with non-strategic nuclear weapons, the Russian troops worked out the provision of combat duty with training nuclear warheads, the Defense Ministry reported.

Issues of joint training of Russian and Belarusian units have already been worked out, the delivery of training nuclear warheads to field storage points has been ensured.

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❗️The Central Bank of Russia is able to ensure stability in the markets, which is what is being done, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, commenting on the new US sanctions.

According to him, Moscow is considering retaliatory measures “that will best suit our interests.”

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Israel’s ‘all-out war’ with Hezbollah: what the US thinks about this scenario

The US is "scrambling" to prevent a full-blown conflict between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, according to Axios, citing unnamed American officials.

The Biden administration is extremely concerned about a scenario in which the current bilateral tensions escalate into an "all-out war." The White House is also alarmed by the possibility that Israel could start or be drawn into a war with Hezbollah "without a clear strategy or consideration of the full implications of a wider conflict.”

In recent weeks, Washington has reportedly cautioned Tel Aviv against the notion of a "limited war" in Lebanon, warning that Iran could intervene.

The Biden team is trying to address the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah while working to secure a hostage-ceasefire deal in Gaza, which the US sees as the only measure to de-escalate tensions on the Israeli-Lebanese border.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, has vowed to intensify its attacks along the border to avenge Israel's killing of the group's top military commander, Taleb Sami Abdullah. Hezbollah fired hundreds of rockets into northern Israel on Wednesday, hours after Abdullah was killed in an Israeli airstrike.

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❗️Russian TV channel NTV correspondent Alexey Ivliev and two other channel employees were seriously injured in the village of Golmovskiy in the Donetsk People's Republic while performing their professional duties, Mayor Ivan Prikhodko said.

The channel's employees were taken to hospital, according to the NTV Telegram channel.

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🇷🇺🪖 Latest statements from the Russian Defense Ministry’s daily briefing on the progress of the special military operation in Ukraine:

▪️Units of the Sever Battlegroup repelled eight counterattacks by Ukrainian troops in the Kharkov region. Ukrainian losses amounted to 305 soldiers;

▪️ Units of the Zapad Battlegroup improved the situation along the front line, the losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces per day amounted to 450 soldiers;

▪️ Units of the Yug Battlegroup improved the situation along the front line and repelled the counterattack, the Ukrainian Armed Forces lost up to 635 soldiers and seven ammunition depots;

▪️Ukrainian troops lost up to 345 soldiers in one day in the area of responsibility of the units of the Yug Battlegroup;

▪️Russian air defenses shot down 33 Ukrainian drones in one day, as well as four Vampire and HIMARS missiles.

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❗️The UK, following the US, imposed sanctions against the Moscow Exchange, the National Clearing Center and the National Settlement Depository.

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Americans oppressed by Biden regime — Trump’s former adviser

"We're being suppressed by an illegitimate regime that usurped power here, and that's what we have to break. And look, I don't need to tell you they're on you every day, as you know. They're on everybody that stands up," said Steve Bannon, former Trump adviser.

Steve Bannon, former White House chief strategist under Trump, will be jailed on July 1, convicted of contempt of Congress in 2022 after failing to provide documents and testimony to the House Select Committee that investigated the January 6, 2021, US Capitol riot.

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❗️If NATO launches a mission in Ukraine, alliance troops will be there sooner or later, at least as peacekeepers, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's office said.

If NATO troops are attacked on Ukrainian territory, Hungary is not obliged to participate in Article 5 response actions, Orban's office declared.

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