Georgia has no chance of becoming a member of the European Union until its "foreign agents" law is abolished and all recommendations of the European Commission are implemented, a delegation of German politicians visiting Tbilisi said on September 6.

Four German legislators representing the three parties in the government coalition and the main opposition party traveled to Georgia to call for free and fair parliamentary elections on October 26, while at the same time slamming the controversial "foreign agents" law enacted in June.

Juergen Hardt of the Christian Democrats (CDU), Nils Schmid of the Social Democrats (SPD), Ulrich Lechte of the Free Democrats (FDP), and Deborah Duering of the Green Party spoke about recent developments in Georgia and the country's European future during the news conference.

They stressed that last time representatives of the four main German parties held a joint visit to Tbilisi was after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Emphasizing the importance and rarity of such a visit, Schmid said: "Why? Because we are very sorry for the events that have developed in Georgia and for Georgia's European future."

Schmid told a press conference at the German Embassy in Tbilisi that with the policy of the current government, Georgia had "no chance to become a member of the European Union."

He added that if nothing changes, his party will not support the opening of EU membership negotiations for Georgia.

The four politicians also agreed that with the "foreign agents" law in place, Georgia would not have enough support in the Bundestag to back the start of talks on EU membership.

The start of negotiations for joining the European Union requires the consent of the parliament, Schmid said, noting that the three government coalition parties and the main opposition party represent the vast majority of the Bundestag.

"I can tell you that with the current policy, Georgia will not be able to obtain the consent of the German Bundestag to open negotiations for joining the European Union," said Schmid, whose party is the largest faction in the Bundestag and the party of Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Duering said Georgia had been a leader among the candidate countries seeking EU membership, "but, unfortunately, now it is lagging behind. To be clear, Georgia will not be able to join the European Union under the Law on Foreign Agents. It's just not up for discussion."

The law, which has been widely criticized as being modeled on a similar Russian law used by the Kremlin to repress dissent and stifle democratic opposition, requires civil-society and media organizations that receive more than 20 percent of their funding from foreign sources to submit to oversight that could encompass sanctions for potential criminal offenses.

Tens of thousands of Georgians braved a brutal crackdown and violent retaliation to demonstrate against the bill prior to its passage by the Georgian parliament in May.

The Russian Justice Ministry on September 6 added Zalina Marshenkulova, a feminist activist in exile, to its list of "foreign agents." In May, a Moscow court issued an arrest warrant for Marshenkulova on a charge of justifying terrorism. The charge stems from Marshenkulova saying on social media last year that the death of pro-Kremlin blogger Vladlen Tatarsky, who was killed in a blast in a restaurant in St. Petersburg, "appropriate." Marshenkulova, a native of Russia's mostly Muslim Kabardino-Balkaria region, has a Telegram channel called Women's Power, with around 30,000 subscribers. Last month, the Interior Ministry added her to its wanted list. To read the original story by Current Time, click here.

The deputy speaker of the Uzbek parliament, Alisher Qodirov, has proposed banning all Soviet symbols and ideology in the country. Qodirov made the comment in response to a September 3 court decision in the southeastern Uzbek city of Samarkand to hand a parole-like sentence to a local resident that stemmed from his cooperation with a pro-Soviet Russian group and his activities promoting the restoration of the Soviet Union. The 74-year-old man, whose identity was not disclosed, was found guilty of calling for the disruption of the constitutional order in Uzbekistan. The charge stemmed from posts on Telegram in which he denounced the legality of the Soviet collapse in 1991 and said he cooperated with a pro-Soviet Russian group. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Uzbek Service, click here.

Eight human right groups on September 6 called on Kyrgyz authorities to retract their decision to liquidate the award-winning investigative outlet Kloop Media.

The initial decision by a court in Bishkek ordering the closure of the Kloop Media Public Foundation was made in early February. The court said then that the group's website was distributing "false information aimed at damaging the reputation of Kyrgyz officials."

Last week, Kloop reported that its staff learned days earlier that the Supreme Court on July 16 had upheld a lower court's ruling to shut down the outlet. Kloop has now exhausted its chance to appeal.

Human Rights Watch (HRW), Amnesty International, the International Partnership for Human Rights, Civil Rights Defenders, the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, Article 19, the International Federation for Human Rights, and the World Organization Against Torture condemned the court decision in a joint statement.

"The forced closure of Kloop Media not only silences a crucial voice in Kyrgyzstani society but also signals a continued decline in Kyrgyzstan's respect for civil and political rights and freedoms of its citizens," said Hugh Williamson, HRW's Europe and Central Asia director.

"This action undermines the public's right to information and further weakens the foundations of democratic governance in the country."

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Closing The Kloop: Kyrgyzstan's Media Crackdown Becomes Farcical As Leading Journalism Foundation Shuttered

Since the initial court ruling in February, the case has wound its way through the Kyrgyz courts.

In March, the Bishkek Administrative Court canceled the ministry's move to block Kloop's Russian-language site, after which the ministry appealed the ruling to the Bishkek City Court.

In early June, the Bishkek City Court ruled that the move by the Culture Ministry to shut down Kloop was legitimate.

Separately, Kloop's Kyrgyz-language website was blocked in November 2023 amid a government campaign to pressure the Kloop foundation.

The ministry said it disrupted the sites after the State Committee for National Security (UKMK) claimed that Kloop had distributed false information.

The claim referred to a report on Kloop's website in September about jailed opposition politician Ravshan Jeenbekov and a statement he made about being tortured while in custody.

The ministry demanded Kloop remove an article about the alleged torture of Jeenbekov that appeared on its Russian-language website or face being blocked.

Kloop refused to remove the material, saying the story in question attributed all information about the situation faced by Jeenbekov while in custody to actual individuals and sources.

Kloop said at the time that it was officially informed of the lawsuit against it and that the move was made after an audit by the UKMK determined its "published materials are aimed at sharply criticizing the policies of the current government" and "most of the published materials are purely negative, aimed at discrediting representatives of state and municipal bodies."

Established in June 2007, Kloop is a Kyrgyz news website whose main contributors are students and graduates of the Kloop Media Public Foundation School of Journalism.

As an independent media entity, it is known for publishing reports on corruption in various governmental bodies and for providing training to Central Asian journalists in fact-checking and investigative techniques.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on September 6 that no single military weapon will be decisive for Ukraine to defeat Russia's full-scale invasion and that the use of donated U.S. weapons for long-range strikes into Russia would not turn the tide of the war in Ukraine's favor.

Speaking after a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany, Austin told reporters that Russia had moved its glide bombs back to positions beyond the range of U.S.-made Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS).

He also noted that Ukraine itself had significant capabilities to attack targets well beyond the range of the British Storm Shadow cruise missile.

Austin made the comments after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy personally appealed to the group for more weapons support from its Western allies and called on allies to allow Ukraine to use the weapons they provided to strike deeper inside Russia.

"We need to have this long-range capability, not only on the divided territory of Ukraine but also on Russian territory so that Russia is motivated to seek peace,” Zelenskiy said at the meeting with top U.S. military leaders and more than 50 partner countries.

"We need to make Russian cities and even Russian soldiers think about what they need: peace or Putin," he told the gathering hosted by Austin.

Russian forces have made gains in eastern Ukraine around the city of Pokrovsk, a crucial supply hub for the Ukrainian military. Moscow’s military gains have continued despite a surprise cross-border incursion by Ukrainian forces into Russia's Kursk region last month.

Kyiv claims its army has captured about 1,300 kilometers of Russian territory and killed or wounded about 6,000 Russian soldiers.

While the incursion has put Russia on the defensive, "we know Putin's malice runs deep," Austin said in remarks to the media ahead of the meeting. Russian forces continue to press on, especially around Pokrovsk, Austin said.

Austin annnounced a new $250 million security assistance package at the meeting, saying it will provide "more capabilities to meet Ukraine's evolving requirements."

The assistance includes ammunition for High-Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and anti-tank and antiaircraft weapons.

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine

RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's full-scale invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war in Ukraine, click here.

Since 2022, the member states of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group together have provided about $106 billion in security assistance to Kyiv. The United States, Ukraine's biggest supporter during the conflict, has provided more than $56 billion of that total, according to Pentagon.

Zelenskiy met later with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Frankfurt, and the two leaders discussed preparations for the second summit on peace in Ukraine.

"I greatly appreciate sharing our efforts to bring a just peace closer," Zelenskiy said on X.

Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Germany will supply Ukraine with 12 more self-propelled howitzers valued at 150 million euros. Half of them will arrive by the end of the year and the remainder will follow in 2025. They have a firing range of 30 kilometers.

"Germany's position is absolutely clear: We will support Ukraine for as long as it is necessary," Pistorius said. "It is important to protect the freedom, sovereignty and territorial integrity of sovereign states against aggressors such as Russia. Ultimately, we are also doing this in our own interests."

As the allied partners met, Russia continued its persistent drone and missile strikes on Ukrainian cities and regions. At least five people were wounded in the latest Russian attacks across Ukraine, Kyiv said on September 6, adding that air defenses shot down 27 out of 44 Russian drones launched overnight.

A missile attack in the morning on September 6 damaged residential buildings and injured three people in the northeastern Kharkiv region, local authorities said.

Overnight attacks wounded two people, damaged at least 12 homes, and impacted power lines and gas pipelines in the central Dnipropetrovsk region, officials said. Falling debris from a downed Shahed drone in the western Lviv region caused a fire at a warehouse, destroying four vehicles, according to local authorities.

With reporting by AP, AFP, and Reuters

The European Union on September 6 announced a new aid package to provide humanitarian aid to vulnerable Ukrainians ahead of the winter months. Balazs Ujvari, European Commission spokesman for budget, human resources, humanitarian aid, and crisis management, announced the aid package worth 40 million euros ($44 million) at a European Commission news briefing in Brussels. "The funding will serve to repair damaged buildings, ensure electricity and heating, and also to provide shelter to those in need," Ujvari said. About 5 million euros of the aid will be allocated to Ukrainian refugees in Moldova, Ujvari added. The new aid package brings to nearly 1 billion euros the amount of humanitarian funding that the European Commission has allocated to Ukraine since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Kyrgyzstan's foreign minister said on September 6 that the country had taken the Taliban off of its terrorist list "to secure regional stability and further develop the ongoing dialogue." A day earlier, the Taliban-led Afghan government's Foreign Ministry expressed thanks to Bishkek for removing the group from its terrorist list. The Kyrgyz Prosecutor-General's Office earlier this week issued a list of 20 groups labeled as terrorist organizations. It did not include the Taliban. In early June, Kazakhstan said it removed the Taliban from its terrorist list. The Taliban regained control over Afghanistan in August 2021 after the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the country. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service, click here.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has said that his country and Armenia have agreed on about 80 percent of a peace treaty. "We can achieve peace in the Southern Caucasus," Aliyev said at the 50th International Cernobbio Forum in Italy, adding that the two countries had begun the process of border delimitation and demarcation. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian said recently that 13 of 17 articles of the draft treaty had been agreed upon. Baku continues to insist it wants a reference to Nagorno-Karabakh's unification with Armenia removed from the Armenian Constitution. Azerbaijan retook control of the breakaway region in September 2023 following a lightning offensive. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service, click here.

Hungary has reiterated its threat to send asylum seekers to Brussels to put pressure on the European Union into canceling heavy fines against Budapest over its strict anti-migration policies. Standing in front of a row of passenger buses, Parliamentary Secretary of State of the Human Resources Ministry Bence Retvari said on September 6 that Hungary will “offer these illegal migrants, voluntarily, free of charge, one-way travel to Brussels…after the implementation of the European procedure.” He didn’t elaborate what status asylum seekers would have if they were to be transported. The European Court of Justice recently ruled Budapest must pay $223 million for continuously violating the bloc’s migrations rules and a daily fine of $1 million for each day of delay. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Hungarian Service, click here.

Serbian opposition legislators questioned Interior Minister Ivica Dacic on September 6 over the alleged mistreatment of activists protesting against a controversial lithium-mining project in the Balkan country. The Serbian opposition has accused the police of intimidating activists during a string of protests against the mine in recent weeks. Allegations include claims that authorities have relied on arrests, wiretaps, and arbitrary detention at border crossings to harass activists. "We demanded that the Interior Ministry submit a report on its actions against activists during the period from June to August this year," said Bogdan Radovanovic, a parliamentarian from the opposition Green-Left Front.

The European Union needs closer cooperation on markets and defense but not on political issues such as migration, where major differences between countries make this impossible, Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on September 6. "There are issues, even existential issues, to which we don't have common answers, this is war and peace, migration, gender, labor-based society, full employment," Orban told a conference in Cernobbio, Italy. "If you force us to come together on issues we don't agree, you disintegrate the European Union," he said.

A court in the Polish capital, Warsaw, on September 6 issued arrests warrants for three Belarusian men over their roles in the forced landing in Minsk of a commercial flight from Athens to Vilnius in May 2021 with dissident blogger Raman Pratasevich aboard.

The Wyborcza.pl website reported on September 6 that the warrants were issued on charges of "capture of an aircraft" and "illegal deprivation of freedom" for the former chief of the Belaeronavigatsia air navigation company, Leanid Churo; the head of the air-traffic control shift, Yauhen Tsyhanau; and an unidentified KGB officer who was present in the air-traffic control booth during the operation to land the Ryanair passenger jet.

The charges were filed after Polish investigators obtained data from a 42-year-old Belarusian dispatcher who fled to Poland in summer 2021.

After the plane was forced to land in Minsk in May 2021, Belarusian police arrested Pratasevich and his then-girlfriend, a Russian citizen, Sofia Sapega.

Pratasevich, who fled Belarus in 2019, worked as an editor at the Poland-based Nexta Live channel on Telegram that extensively covered a violent crackdown on unprecedented protests in Belarus following an August 2020 presidential election that the opposition and Western governments say was stolen by authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka, who has run the country with an iron fist since 1994.

In early May 2023, a Minsk court sentenced Pratasevich to eight years in prison, and his co-defendants, Stsyapan Putsila and Yan Rudzik, who were tried in absentia, to 20 years and 19 years in prison, respectively, on charges stemming from their online coverage of the 2020 anti-Lukashenka protests.

Weeks later, Pratasevich told journalists he had received a pardon from Lukashenka.

Sapega was sentenced to six years in prison in May 2022 on a charge of administering a Telegram channel that published the personal data of Belarusian security forces.

Sapega was released and allowed to return to Russia in June 2023 after Lukashenka pardoned her.

Lukashenka, who denies stealing the election, has cracked down hard on the opposition, whose leading members were either jailed or forced to flee the country out of fear for their safety.

With reporting by Wyborcza.pl

The Russian Interior Ministry on September 5 added self-exiled military observer Yan Matveyev to its wanted list on unspecified charges. In May 2023, the Justice Ministry added Matveyev to the list of "foreign agents." Matveyev has refused to follow the law requirements to mark his online materials as made by a foreign agent. Russian courts fined him twice in absentia for refusing to comply. According to the law on foreign agents, a repeated violation of the law within one year may lead to a criminal case. Russian authorities have been accused of using the law on foreign agents to muzzle independent media and dissent. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Siberia.Realities, click here.

Telegram founder Pavel Durov, in his first public comments since his arrest in France late last month, expressed surprise that he was interrogated and told by investigators that he "may be personally responsible for other people's illegal use" of the popular messaging app.

Durov said in a lengthy blog post that he was arrested and questioned for four days after arriving in in Paris because "the French authorities didn’t receive responses from Telegram" regarding their complaints.

He was charged on August 28 with several crimes related to alleged illicit activity on the messaging app but avoided jail after posting a $5.5 million bail and was released on the condition that he remain in France and report to a police station twice a week.

French prosecutors accuse the 39-year-old Durov of complicity in allowing drug trafficking and the sharing of sexual images of children on Telegram, and of refusing to share documents demanded by authorities investigating illegal activity on the app.

But the Russian-born Durov -- who has citizenship in France as well as Russia, the United Arab Emirates, and the Caribbean archipelago of St. Kitts and Nevis -- said his arrest was "misguided."

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"Telegram has an official representative in the EU that accepts and replies to EU requests," Durov wrote. "If a country is unhappy with an Internet service, the established practice is to start a legal action against the service itself."

He denied any suggestion that the app is an "anarchic paradise" and defended efforts to monitor its 950 million users, saying that "we take down millions of harmful posts and channels every day."

Durov said Telegram also publishes daily transparency reports and that he had personally helped set up a hotline on Telegram to help the French authorities deal with the threat of terrorism.

"Sometimes we can’t agree with a country’s regulator on the right balance between privacy and security. In those cases, we are ready to leave that country," he wrote. He singled out Russia and Iran, where the encrypted app is a popular and safe means of communication among citizens and during protests, as places where Telegram was banned because it would not aid authorities' efforts to monitor users.

"When Russia demanded we hand over 'encryption keys' to enable surveillance, we refused -- and Telegram got banned in Russia. When Iran demanded we block channels of peaceful protesters, we refused -- and Telegram got banned in Iran. We are prepared to leave markets that aren’t compatible with our principles, because we are not doing this for money," Durov said.

He acknowledged that Telegram was "not perfect" and that "growing pains" had "made it easier for criminals to abuse the platform," but Durov said the app was driven by the "intention to bring good and defend the basic rights of people, particularly where these rights are violated."

Kyrgyzstan's first president, Askar Akaev, has filed a request with the Kyrgyz parliament to have his status as a former president restored, lawmaker Cholpon Sultanbekova said on September 5. Akaev was stripped of the status in 2010, five years after he fled to Moscow following anti-government protests. Akaev was facing corruption charges at the time. In 2023, all charges against Akaev were dropped after the statute of limitations expired. Akaev was president from 1990 to 2005. After he left Kyrgyzstan, he avoided returning there for many years. In 2021, he made several short visits to Bishkek to be questioned by the State Committee for National Security. To read the original story from RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service, click here.

Russians are voting for governors and regional legislators in 83 regions and cities, including Moscow and St. Petersburg, but many opposition candidates barred by the electoral authorities won't be on the ballot. Governors will be elected in 21 regions, while four regions, including the illegally annexed Crimea in Ukraine, will elect regional parliaments. A group defending voters rights, Golos, dubbed the vote an "imitation" of elections, saying it lacks genuine competition. According to Golos, 35 percent of nominees, including all three candidates from the liberal opposition party, Yabloko, were denied registration. In some regions, elections that began on September 6 will last for three days. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Russian Service, click here.

At least five people have been wounded in the latest Russian drone and missile attacks across Ukraine, Kyiv said on September 6, adding that the air defenses shot down 27 out of 44 Russian drones launched overnight. A missile attack in the morning on September 6 damaged residential buildings and injured three people in the northeastern Kharkiv region, local authorities said. Overnight attacks wounded two people, damaged at least 12 homes, and impacted power lines and gas pipelines in the central Dnipropetrovsk region, officials said. Falling debris from a downed Shahed drone in the western Lviv region caused fire at a warehouse, destroying four vehicles, according to local authorities.

Latvia's parliament is debating a draft law that bans vehicles with Belarusian license plates in the Latvian territory. If the bill is approved, the owners of such vehicles would have to either replace the number plates with Latvian ones or remove the vehicles from Latvia by October 31. In July, Latvia banned Belarus-registered passenger cars from entering its territory from Belarus and Russia. Only vehicles of diplomatic or humanitarian missions, persons with reduced mobility driving specially equipped vehicles, and cars crossing through Latvia in transit will be allowed in the country with Belarusian plates. The measure is being taken in accordance with European Union laws to prevent the circumvention of sanctions imposed on Russia and Belarus over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. To read the original story by Current Time, click here.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on September 6 will visit Germany, where Ukraine's military backers are meeting days after one of the deadliest strikes of the war and as Russian forces make battlefield gains. Zelenskiy and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz will hold one-on-one talks in Frankfurt, according to a German government spokesman, who did not give further details about the Ukrainian leader's program. But German news outlet Der Spiegel reported that Zelenskiy will also attend the gathering of Kyiv's backers, which includes the United States, at the U.S. Ramstein Air Base. The meeting at the base southwest of Frankfurt is being hosted by U.S. defense chief Lloyd Austin.

The top spokesman for the Pakistani Army said on September 5 that since the beginning of 2024 the army has conducted 32,173 anti-terrorism operations in which 193 officers and soldiers have been killed. Major General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry said in Rawalpindi that in the past month a total of 4,021 operations were conducted in which 90 suspected militants were killed. He said that the army and law enforcement agencies conduct an average of 130 operations per day. The army has recently stepped up raids against militants, and Chaudhry said the Pakistani Army was "continuing its efforts" to "end terrorism.” He did not identify terrorist groups by name but said foreign elements are training the militants and are involved in the attacks. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal, click here.

The death toll from a Russian missile strike on the Ukrainian city of Poltava rose to 55 on September 5, the Interior Ministry said, adding that the number of wounded also rose and now stands at 328. The strike on a military communications institute on September 3 partially destroyed the institute's six-story educational building, the ministry said on Facebook. "Probably, there are still people under the rubble. Search-and-rescue operations are ongoing," the ministry said. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that two ballistic missiles hit the grounds of the institute and a nearby hospital. The attack, one of the worst in the war, triggered widespread condemnation. Washington denounced it as "another horrific reminder of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's brutality."

A grand jury in the U.S. state of Maryland has charged six Russians, including five who are officers in Russia's military intelligence agency (GRU), with conspiracy to hack into computer systems and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. The indictment, unsealed on September 5, alleges that the Russians conspired to hack into computer systems associated with the Ukrainian government in advance of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Their original targets included Ukrainian government systems and data with no military or defense-related roles and later included computer systems in countries around the world that were providing support to Ukraine, including in the United States, the U.S. Justice Department said in a news release. The whereabouts of the men are unknown, and the Justice Department has issued a reward for information leading to their arrest.

Russian TV presenter Dimitri Simes, who served as an adviser to former President Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, and his wife, Anastasia, have been charged with violating U.S. sanctions in connection with alleged schemes to benefit Russian broadcaster Channel One.

The couple is charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), one count of conspiracy, and one count of money laundering.

If convicted, they each face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison for each count, the Justice Department said on September 5.

Following an FBI raid on the Simes’ Virginia home on August 16, the Justice Department alleges that the couple participated in the violation of U.S. sanctions by providing services to Channel One, a state-owned Russian broadcaster that was sanctioned by the United States in 2022.

The department said Simes was a presenter and producer of programming for Channel One and for his services received $1 million, a personal car and driver, a stipend for an apartment in Moscow, and a team of 10 employees from the broadcaster.

Simes, 76, as an adviser to Trump's 2016 campaign, arranged an important 2016 foreign policy speech in which Trump outlined a vision for greater cooperation with Russia. According to a 2019 report by special counsel Robert Mueller, who was assigned to look into whether Trump's campaign had colluded with Russia, Simes also sent Trump adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner a letter detailing potential talking points for Trump about Russia.

The Justice Department also announced on September 5 a second indictment, naming only Anastasia Simes, alleging she participated in a separate scheme to benefit Russian oligarch Aleksandr Udodov through the buying, selling, and shipping of art from the United States to Russia. The department accused Anastasia Simes of receiving reimbursements and a service fee from Udodov, who was designated for sanctions in 2023 by the United States.

The Justice Department said the couple remains at large and are believed to be in Russia.

Simes, born in Moscow in 1947, emigrated to the United States in 1973 and later became a U.S. citizen. He served as an informal adviser to President Richard Nixon and regularly traveled with Nixon to the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries.

In 1994, Nixon named him to head the Center for the National Interest, which at the time was called the Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom. Simes retired from the position in 2022.

The White House called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to "stop interfering" in U.S. elections after he stated his support for Vice President Kamala Harris at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok on September 5. According to Meduza, Putin said, “Our favorite, so to speak, was Mr. Biden. He has withdrawn from the race, but he recommended supporting Ms. Harris. And we will do so. We will support her." National Security Council spokesman John Kirby responded by saying Putin "shouldn't be favoring anybody one way or another." Kirby added that the only people who should determine who the next president is are the American people, adding, "We would greatly appreciate it if Mr. Putin would...stop talking about our election, and...stop interfering in it."

A Moscow court on September 5 sent three officers of a notorious immigration center in Sakharovo, near Moscow, to pretrial detention for at least two months on corruption charges. Abdulgazip Mustapayev, Olga Adakina, and Rudik Teknedzhyan were charged with fraud. Investigators say the trio extorted money from migrants awaiting deportation, promising expedited trips to their homelands. The center has been known for its cruel treatment of migrant workers from Central Asian and the Caucasus. Many migrants who went through Sakharovo have claimed they were humiliated, beaten, and deprived of their money while being held there. To read the original story by Current Time, click here.