Russia & CIS

Daughter of the President of the Italian Republic Laura Mattarella has visited Gobustan National Historical-Artistic Reserve, AzerTag reports.

As a result of launch of polypropylene plant and launch of polyethylene plant at the end of the year, Azerbaijan’s export potential will increase significantly. Both plants will produce 300,000 tonnes of products every year and 70% of these products will be exported.

Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov met with Enzo Moavero Milanesi, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation of Italy.

Mikael Arzumanyan was dismissed as Armenia's deputy chief military inspector.

The majority of foreigners, who visited Russia during the FIFA 2018 World Cup, were thrilled with what they saw and experienced in the country. They were thrilled to see Russia that was so much different from what their media was making them to believe. The level of organization of the tournament in Russia was superb indeed: no incident was reported, not a single brawl occurred. Nikolskaya Street, where most fans gathered, became the street of global peace and the main street of the world. The goal of the organizing committee was to show foreigners Russia's best side, to make them remember their time in Russia and have unforgettable impressions. Today, one can say for certain: the goal has been achieved. The 2018 World Cup has changed Russia's imaged for the better in the whole world. The performance of the Russian football team at the tournament became an important addition to the organization of the whole event. Few in Russia could even think that the national football team could exit the group, reach the 1/8 finals and even leave Spain behind on the way. Even when Russia lost to Croatia in a series of penalty kicks, the whole nation was infinitely grateful to their footballers for their amazing achievement. Ratings of broadcasts of playoff matches with the participation of the Russian national team were comparable with the ratings of president's New Year speech. The World Cup has given Russia not only 12 stadiums that hosted the games, but also almost a hundred smaller arenas throughout the European territory of the country. They will be used for  children's sports schools.New airport terminals, renovated roads and streets, the experience of thousands of people who were involved in the organization of the world's biggest event has become the precious legacy that football has given Russia. The whole world has finally got a chance to see Russia as an open and hospitable country, and we would like to hope that many foreign fans would like to come to Russia again and bring their families along. It is worthy of note that all foreigners having FAN IDs for the 2018 World Cup will not need to get the Russian visa if they wish to visit Russia again before the end of 2018. The 2018 World Cup cost Russia more than $14 billion. The financial results of the tournament  have not been calculated yet, but one can already say that the income that Russia has received was a lot lower than the spending. However, profit is not the most important thing, and Russia did not have the goal to make as much as possible from football. Russian football fans bought the largest amount of tickets - 900,000 of 2.4 million. Surprisingly, American fans come next - they bought 89,000 tickets. The list continues with Brazil - 72,500 tickets, Colombia - 65,200, Germany - 62,500, Mexico - 60,300, Argentina - 54,000, Peru - 43,600, China - 40,300, Australia - 36,400, and England - 32,400.The number of European visitors was unexpectedly low. Having been zombified by the media, many British and French fans preferred to stay home and watch the games on TV. Yet, the number of American visitors was higher than expected. Financial results of the 2018 World Cup will follow soon, although experts say that the football tournament has contributed from 0.2 to 1 percent of GDP to the Russian economy. The infrastructure created for the competition and the subsequently growing tourist flow can bring an additional 120-180 billion rubles to Russia's GDP annually for the next five years.Given that Russia's GDP amounted to about 92 trillion rubles last year, these expected revenues will simply be invisible and fit within the error margin. The spending of 1.2 trillion rubles that Russia has incurred during seven years of preparations for the event is just as insignificant.

The Russian T-14 Armata tank will serve in the army for at least 25-30 years before it is replaced with combat vehicles developed on new physical principles, Colonel-General Sergei Mayev, former chief of the main auto-armored department of the Defence Ministry believes. It is worth noting that the Armata tank, just like the Su-57 fifth-generation fighter aircraft, has not been passed into service yet. Yet, Russian military officials already want to know what weapon will come to replace it. According to Sergei Mayev, such platforms as Armata, Kurganets-25 and Boomerang, which Russia has been working on lately (they are at the final stage of development), are traditional weapons. They will be replaced with new arms systems based on new physical principles. However, this can only be possible against the backdrop of the favourable development of fundamental science, technology, design thought, production and financing of all these aspects.Weapons on new physical principles include laser weapons, microwave guns, sound weapons, electromagnetic bombs and so on.According to Mayev, ground robotic armoured vehicles are to appear in about 10-15 years. "As for the air force, opportunities for using robotic weapons in the air are, of course, more homogeneous than for those used on the ground," the specialist said, TASS reports. In general, a lot has been said in Russia during the recent several years about new weapons based on new physical principles.Earlier, military expert Viktor Murakhovsky said in an interview with Pravda.Ru that we are witnessing the development of another stage in the development of arms systems."The development of arms systems based on new physical principles does not mean that Russian physicists have discovered new fundamental physical laws in secret laboratories and are now going to apply them in the defence industry. There are absolutely no secrets about physical laws in general, but in this particular field it goes about certain physical phenomena that we have never used in the development of arms systems," the expert said. At the same time, the new technologies are being developed at the time when Russian military engineers are still working on new traditional weapons, such as Armata tank and Su-57 fifth-generation fighter aircraft (formerly known as T-50 PAK FA). A few days ago, Russian MP, president of the League of Assistance to Defence Enterprises, Vladimir Gutenev, said that there was no need to speed up the mass production of the Su-57 fighter aircraft. In his opinion, in the era of rapid technological development, the Su-57 fifth-generation fighter will  become obsolete quickly. Therefore, one needs to focus on the development of the sixth-generation aircraft. "The Su-57 will not be massively introduced at the Russian Air Force, but the aircraft has a wonderful export potential, and many countries already want to purchase it," Gutenev told Interfax.Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov said in an interview with Rossiya 24 TV channel that the Su-57 had made a good showing so far, including in Syria, where the aircraft could demonstrate its flight performance and combat capabilities in practice. At the same time, Borisov noted that one of the best aircraft in the world today is a representative of the previous generation "4+" - Su-35.Apparently, the question of price is the most important one here. Both fighter jets and Armata tanks are much cheaper than Western analogues, but at the same time they are quite expensive for the massive rearmament of the Russian army.Western experts talk about it as well. Paying tribute to new models of Russian weapons, they pay attention to their price, which becomes the main problem.Naturally, this is not a problem of Russia alone. During the NATO summit in Brussels, US President Donald Trump was salivating in his calls for the allies to increase military spending. In addition, a lot has been said about the F-35 program that has generated quite a number of high-profile scandals, including because of the price issue. Yet, the Americans can sell their aircraft to NATO allies and compensate costs at least partially. Russia has no such opportunity, if we talk about mass exports. How can Russia sell its fighter jets and tanks if the Russian army is unwilling to pass them into service? Director of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, Ruslan Pukhov, noted that the problem has several aspects to it. "The new armament program, which was adopted last year, is superimposed on the previous one, for 2010-2020. The current program is designed from 2018 to 2017. First, it is not so ambitious, and not so large as the previous one. Russia has finished its rearmament program. Most importantly, the Russian economy does not generate as much money as it used to, when oil prices were high," the analyst told Pravda.Ru. "Therefore, we need to treat military spending thoughtfully. Any kind of military spending, by definition, takes money away from such things as roads, healthcare, education, etc. There is always a temptation to cut a number of expensive programs, and Russia has already done that. In particular, we have sacrificed expensive naval programs, such as the Storm aircraft carrier and Leader class destroyers," said Ruslan Pukhov.Oleg ArtyukovPravda.Ru Read article on the Russian version of Pravda.Ru

At least 79 drug trafficking suspects were detained after a huge dawn sweep across the Turkish capital Ankara, security sources said on Thursday.

A London-Mumbai British Airways flight Boeing-777 made an emergency landing at 6:29 a.m. in Baku after its left engine stopped.

Azerbaijan has improved results in the Global Innovation Index 2018 rating, the Copyright Agency of Azerbaijan told Trend July 11.

NATO urged Iran to continue to fully cooperate in a timely manner with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Israel should appreciate and continue to develop friendly and strategic relations with Azerbaijan and not allow any forces to harm these relations, reads the article of the veteran American-Israeli journalist and vice president of marketing and brand strategy for Israel365, a social impact business Maayan Hoffman, published in the Jerusalem Post.

Azerbaijani oil has fallen in price by more than $2.

The head of EU diplomacy Mogherini reiterated at the meeting the support to the peaceful settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Military units of the armed forces of Armenia violated ceasefire 101 times throughout the day, using large-caliber machine guns.

Prior to the meeting, Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov met with the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs.

Nephew of former President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan, Hayk Sargsyan has been charged for committing a murder attempt and illegal possession of firearms, the Investigative Committee reported.

Mobile phones imported by individuals to Azerbaijan for personal use cannot be used for commercial purposes, Deputy Chairman of the State Customs Committee (SCC) Igbal Babayev said at a conference entitled as "Electronic trade in Azerbaijan: current situation and prospects of development" July 11.

On July 11, Brussels hosted a reception for the Heads of State and Government of the NATO Allies and Partners.

Three people drowned in the Caspian Sea, APA reports quoting to the website of the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

Power went off in Amiryan and other central streets of Armenia’s capital city Yerevan as a result of an accident at one of the substations, AzVision.az reports citing Sputnik.