US must not act on fabricated pretexts in Syria: Moscow

Moscow today warned the United States against carrying out a "military intervention on fabricated pretexts" in Syria, insisting that the Damascus regime did not use chemical weapons on an opposition holdout in Eastern Ghouta.

"We must once more warn that a military intervention under far-fetched and fabricated pretexts in Syria, where there are Russian soldiers at the request of the legitimate Syrian government, is absolutely unacceptable and could have the most dire consequences," the foreign ministry said in a statement.

Released before Donald Trump called Syrian President Bashar al-Assad an "animal" and warning that there would be a "big price to pay" for what the US president called a "mindless chemical attack", the ministry called the allegations "provocations".

The rebel holdout of Douma in eastern Ghouta near Damascus was pounded Friday and Saturday by renewed airstrikes that killed at least 80 people, with first responders accusing forces loyal to Assad of using poisonous chlorine gas in the attacks, claims denied by state media.

Russia blames pilots for plane crash, probe reveals heating unit wasn't on

The pilots of the Russian airliner, which crashed on February 11, have been blamed for the accident.

According to the investigators, the pilots failed to switch on a heating unit, which led the speed sensors to ice up and provide wrong information.

"A factor in the development of a special situation in the flight could be the wrong data about flight speed on pilots' indicators which was likely due to iced pitot tubes (speed probes) while their heating systems were shut off," The New York Post quoted the Russian Interstate Aviation Committee as saying.

"A special situation began to develop about two minutes and 30 seconds after the takeoff at an altitude of around 1,300 meters and the indicator speed of 465-470 km/h," the committee added.

Russia-Pak friendship new, Moscow has no influence in Islamabad: US

Amid increased bonhomie between Russia and Pakistan, the White House believes that Moscow does not have a great influence on Islamabad, a senior Trump Administration official has said.

"I don't particularly believe that there is a great deal of influence that Russia is asserting (over Pakistan) even though I do acknowledge they have a better relationship than they had five years ago," a senior administration official has said.

The official was responding to questions on the recent increase in relationship between Russia and Pakistan and how much influence it has over Islamabad.

"But Russia as of now does not have a great deal of influence over Pakistan, with which its ties is relatively new," the official said who on condition of anonymity.

"I think the Russia-Pakistan relationship is still something relatively new," the senior administration official said noting that Pakistan, being an independent country is making its own assessment and doing what it considers is in its own interests.

However, the official said that the Russian thinking that the Taliban can help fight ISIS is a flawed approach.

Most of the US soldiers who perished last year were in operations against ISIS in Afghanistan.
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External interference in Iran's situation unacceptable: Russia

The Russian Foreign Ministry has said Moscow hopes the ongoing mass protests in Iran will not develop into severe violence and that any external interference in the situation is unacceptable.

"It is Iran's internal affairs. We hope that the situation would not develop under the scenario of violence and bloodshed," Xinhua reported, citing the Russian media which quoted the ministry's spokesperson as saying.

External interference destabilizing the situation is inadmissible, the ministry said on Monday.

At least 12 people have been killed in recent rallies across Iran in protest against the regime of President Hassan Rouhani.
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Why Russia needs troops from Syria; how they boost Moscow's 'eastern' image

During the early years of the Cold War, the Soviet Union made a great push to reach out to the developing world, and particularly to the Middle East and Asia. It established particularly close ties with Nasser’s Egypt and later with Syria, but didn’t do so well with others; the Chinese leadership in particular doubted whether the USSR really empathised with the Global South and its anti-colonial struggle. Russia, it argued, was essentially a former colonial power, or at the very least a white European country incapable of understanding the developing world’s problems.

Moscow duly tried to prove the opposite by cultivating its own “eastern” identity. It sent its “easterners” on conspicuous missions abroad: Armenians and Azerbaijanis worked in solidarity committees and friendship societies, while Uzbeks and Tajiks served as ambassadors in the Middle East or played a key role as soldiers during the invasion of Afghanistan.

These plans to win over Middle Eastern and Asian allies were rendered moot when the USSR crumbled. But today, Russia’s push to claim an eastern identity seems to be underway once again – and nowhere more so than in Syria.

As media attention has shifted to efforts to oust the so-called Islamic State from its Syrian stronghold, Raqqa, the Syrian regime is struggling to govern the areas of Syria it has recaptured with the help of Russia and other backers. Particularly troublesome is Aleppo, the country’s largest city and former business hub, which was brought back under Damascus’s full control in December 2016. Enter Russia, whose help has already turned the tide in the Syrian regimes’s favour.
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Russia slams fresh US sanctions, says move is a blow to normalising ties

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov on Wednesday slammed the US move to impose fresh sanctions on Moscow, calling it "destruction of prospects for normalising relations between the two countries".

Ryabkov's comments came after the US House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a package of further punitive measures for Russia's alleged interference in the 2016 US elections and its 2014 annexation of the Crimea.

"What is happening is beyond common sense," Ryabkov told Russia's official TASS news agency. "The authors and sponsors of this bill are making a very serious step towards destruction of prospects for normalising relations with Russia."

He said the approval of the law "would be the work of the enemies of Russia and the US".

Ryabkov also said that Washington's move had complicated negotiations between the two countries about the reutrn of seized Russian diplomatic property in the US.

"The US executive authority's capabilities to make the only correct decision to return to us the diplomatic property without any conditions are significantly narrowed... Therefore, of course our dialogue on this topic becomes even more difficult," Sputnik news agency quoted Ryabkov as telling RIA Novosti.
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