Ukraine

Submitted by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

With a Russian ship sailing in very close proximity to the primary east coast submarine base, and tensions between the US - and perhaps the Trump administration - and Russia, once again rising it seems like an odd moment to organize a meeting between the top US military general and his Russian counterpart on Thursday in Azerbaijan, the first such meeting between the two since military cooperation between the two nations was suspended in 2014 following the hostilities in Ukraine.

Russia will not be giving Crimea back to Ukraine a Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said in response to White House comments saying that Donald Trump expected Moscow to “return” the peninsular. Maria Zakharova told a weekly news briefing “We don’t return our territories. Crimea is a territory of the Russian Federation” White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters on Tuesday that the US president expects Moscow to “return” Crimea to Ukraine. RT reports: Trump later reiterated his position on Crimea on Twitter. Crimea was TAKEN by Russia during the Obama Administration.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer says President Trump expects Russia to give back Crimea to Ukraine. During a press briefing Tuesday, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said U.S. President Donald Trump has made it clear that he expects Moscow to “return” the Crimea peninsula to Ukraine.

The Russian Investigative Committee says it has received “irrefutable” evidence that armed forces in Kiev have been using weapons of mass destruction against civilians in eastern Ukraine. The investigators say they have obtained proof that Ukrainian military used missiles equipped with high-explosive fragmentation and cluster charges against a number of settlements.