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Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent diplomatic push into Central Asia yielded high-minded rhetoric but few substantive gains, as Kazakhstan resisted Kremlin pressure on trade and labor, foreign policy expert Paul Goble told Kyiv Post.

Faced with limited returns in Astana, Putin dedicated a significant portion of his post-visit press conference to lecturing Armenia – a move Goble described as a sign of Moscow’s anxiety over its fading influence in the former Soviet space.

The remarks came as Moscow has intensified pressure on Yerevan over its pro-European course. Russia has warned Armenia that it could lose preferential fuel and energy arrangements if it continues its EU path, while the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union has raised the possibility of suspending Armenia over its European ambitions.

While Moscow hoped to secure critical concessions during the high-level talks, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev used his diplomatic experience to protect Astana’s strategic autonomy, Goble said.

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Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chair of the Security Council of Russia and the country’s former president, cautioned the European Union on Friday to be “vigilant” amid the “war with Russia” that Europe has entered, after an errant Russian drone crashed in Romania.

“Citizens of EU countries, You should realize your authorities have unilaterally ehttps://thehill.com/policy/international/5901241-dmitry-medvedev-eu-russia-drone-attack/ntered into a war with Russia,” the senior Russian official wrote in a post on social platform X. “So be vigilant and don’t be surprised by anything. The peaceful sleep is over. But you know who to ask why.”

The warning from Medvedev, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, came after Romanian authorities said a Russian drone that was part of an overnight attack on Ukraine crashed into an apartment building in eastern Romania, injuring two people.

NATO condemned the incident in its member country as reckless and reaffirmed its commitment to defend its alliance territory.

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Trump’s Board of Peace for Gaza has raised no money into its official World Bank fund four months after launch and multibillion-dollar pledges, the Financial Times reported. Instead, donors have sent limited contributions to a private JPMorgan account that is not subject to the same independent oversight, with none of the promised US support being deployed for rebuilding on the ground yet.

US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, the flagship body created to oversee Gaza’s postwar reconstruction, has raised no money for the World Bank fundTrump himself promised an additional $10 billion in US backing, but the money pledged has yet to reach the World Bank account, which was designed to provide a transparent channel for reconstruction funds. set to hold donor contributions, four months after the board was originally launched.

Several countries, including Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Morocco, Bahrain, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, have signed up to Trump’s Board of Peace and have since contributed more than $7 billion toward a Gaza “relief package,” the US president said, as per a BBC report.

Trump himself promised an additional $10 billion in US backing, but the money pledged has yet to reach the World Bank account, which was designed to provide a transparent channel for reconstruction funds.

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The Trump administration has quietly instructed federal prosecutors in Miami to avoid pursuing criminal investigations into Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez, a longtime target of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, according to current and former U.S. law enforcement officials, in the latest sign of warming relations between the White House and the oil-rich nation.

It’s unclear whether prosecutors had implicated Rodríguez in any crimes or whether investigators were moving toward an indictment. A Justice Department spokesperson said in an email “there was never an investigation into her to shut down.”

But DEA records obtained by The Associated Press earlier this year show she consistently surfaced on the radar of federal law enforcement dating to at least 2018, though she has never been criminally charged in the U.S. like several other senior Venezuelan officials.

The directive to pause scrutiny into Rodríguez was meant to avoid upsetting the administration’s efforts to stabilize Venezuela after the capture of her predecessor, Nicolás Maduro, among other reasons, the official said. It was not clear whether the White House, which deferred comment to the Justice Department, was involved in the decision.

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Canada has entered into talks to buy Saab’s GlobalEye early warning jets, which are based on Canadian-made Bombardier Global 6500 aircraft. The deal is projected to support 3,000 jobs in Canada’s aerospace and defense sector.

Canada picked Saab over Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail jets, which have been plagued by cost overruns. Another option would have been the Aeris X made by L3Harris.

“The first job of the government is to keep Canadians safe. Our government is protecting Canadians and supporting our Allies with an approach that transforms defence procurement,” Carney said in a statement. “With our new strategy, we are building our economy and creating careers in the skilled trades, science and engineering. The GlobalEye procurement will help us secure our North and build our economy at once.”

GlobalEye is equipped with powerful active and passive sensors, able to provide long-range detection and identification of objects at sea, air and on land.

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THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES Bill will be brought before cabinet for government approval later, with the aim of enacting it before the Dáil summer recess.

The long-awaited bill was first proposed by senator Frances Black in 2018 and would ban trade from illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Foreign affairs minister Helen McEntee will later seek government approval and aims to meet this summer deadline.

A department spokesperson remarked that Ireland has “continually advocated for a peaceful resolution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians”.

However, the spokesperson added that it is “clear from the actions of the Israeli government, both in Gaza and in the West Bank, that they have no intention of reaching a peaceful resolution”.

The spokesperson added that it “remains the government’s preference that collective action would be taken at EU level” and that McEntee is “continuing to actively pursuing this”.

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