Lawyers of Ukrainian pilot Nadia Savchenko, who is currently jailed in Russia, expect the Paris meeting of leaders will yield guarantees that Savchenko would be released.
“At a meeting in the Normandy format the issue of Nadia Savchenko’s release has to be firmly presented to Putin,” tweeted Nikolai Polozov.
“Savchenko’s defense would expect from the Normandy negotiations not just Putin’s guarantees about her release, but concrete dates,” tweeted Mark Feigin.
The hearings in Savchenko’s case in the Russian city of Donetsk court are ongoing. The next session will take place on October 6.
Hollande hugged Poroshenko, but only awkwardly shook hands with Putin.
A video promoting the bridge across the Kerch Strait, which is currently under construction, was shown to visitors at Russia’s International Investment Forum. The bridge is supposed to connect mainland Russia and Crimea, the peninsula it annexed from Ukraine last year.
The video claims that only 4 million people cross the Kerch Strait today, but “millions of people are waiting for the bridge.”
“Our grandfathers built BAM [the 4,324 kilometer-long Baikal-Amur Mainline]. And we will build the bridge,” the video says.
The bridge would be 19 kilometers long and serve cars and trains. The estimated price of the project is $7 billion.
Funny
German journalist's ire at being used as "drunk Poroshenko" source =
Berlin (dpa) - A German journalist reacted angrily Friday to news her
name was used as the source for a fake Russian media report about
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko supposedly being taken off a
flight from Kiev to Moscow because he was "absolutely drunk."
Christina Nagel, a former Moscow correspondent for Germany's public
broadcaster ARD and now working in its Berlin headquarters, told
ARD's WDR5 radio station the story was a complete fabrication.
"What is correct in this story is in principle this: I exist, Mr
Poroshenko exists, but that is really all. There was neither a call
from a trustworthy source nor any such report from us, neither from
me nor from anyone else," Nagel said.
Last week the popular Russian tabloid Moskovsky Komsomolets ran a
story about Poroshenko was heading to the Russian capital for an
urgent meeting with Vladimir Putin, but his apparent "predilection"
for alcohol wrecked the chance.
The report said Poroshenko rushed to the airport in his armoured
Mercedes S-600 to catch a civilian flight, boarded the plane and
drunkenly demanded that it leave immediately, then fell asleep and
was taken off the plane by officers from Ukraine's security service.
For added believability, the report quoted Nagel as the source, based
on a call she had received from a trusted source. A Russian woman
voiced Nagel's invented comments in Russian during the report.
"Even if Mr Poroshenko spontaneously decided to fly to Moscow, why
would he use a civilian plane and not his official plane?" Nagel
asked on Friday.
"Where are the mobile phone recordings, where are the witness
reports? These are all points that speak to the fact that this story
- let's say it in plain language - is a pack of lies."