Free Republic

Russian President Vladimir Putin will be meeting with Iran's leader, Sayad Ali Khamenei, during his visit to Teheran which will begin on the 19th of July.

The EU's top diplomat has issued a statement expressing sympathy ahead of the day nearly eight years ago that local separatists working with a missile system deployed by Russian intelligence officials are accused of having shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine. -snip- Russian suspect Oleg Pulatov, a former officer of the Russian Army, in 2014 headed a unit of the Main Intelligence Directorate in a region of eastern Ukraine controlled by Russia-backed separatists. Pulatov was involved in the transport and protection of a Buk antiaircraft missile system that investigators say fired the missile that brought down the...

John Sweeney, a prominent British investigative journalist who has long covered Russian President Vladimir Putin, wrote in his new book that he feels the leader looks "seriously ill" with puffy cheeks that make him resemble a hamster. In his forthcoming book (out July 21), Killer in the Kremlin, Sweeney described changes he has noticed in Putin's demeanor and physical appearance that he said scare him. He theorized the use of steroids for Putin's changes, noting the president could have started taking the medication years ago to treat a back injury sustained after falling off a horse. According to Sweeney, this...