Russia

Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies Marcel Ciolacu said on Friday that any form of threat from the Russian Federation is "unacceptable," claiming that Moscow is "disturbed" that Romania is and is consolidating as the safest country in its region." "Any form of threat from the Russian Federation is unacceptable!

Russia's Foreign Ministry has accused Romania of serving third parties' interests in seeking confrontation with Moscow at the expense of its own interest.

The spat erupted after Romania's proposed 2020-2024 National Defence Strategy defined Moscow as an "aggressive" threat.

The Russian capital has been hardest hit. Of Russia's total of 281,752 confirmed cases, over half -- 142,824 -- are in Moscow, the country's coronavirus headquarters said Sunday. But the virus is now spreading across Russia's regions, an enormous landmass that covers 11 time zones and includes some of the country's most remote and impoverished places.

Russia's healthcare regulator on May 13 ordered a stop to the use of ventilators believed to have caused two fires at coronavirus hospitals that left six people dead.

The federal regulator Roszdravnadzor "has halted the use on Russian territory of... Aventa-M ventilators produced from April 1, 2020" by a Urals factory, part of the state conglomerate Rostec.

The Romanian Embassy in Moscow published the names of another nearly 10,000 Romanian prisoners of war and civilian deportees buried in the international cemeteries located in the Russian Federation, thus completing the full nominal list with the data of those who died between 1941 and 1956 in the NKVD-MVD camps, hospitals and special facilities, respectively in the Soviet labor battalions.

Constitutional changes allowing Vladimir Putin to run for president again in 2024 sailed through Russia's lower house of parliament on Wednesday, opening the way for him to potentially stay in power until 2036, Reuters reported.

Russians' trust in Vladimir Putin has declined: from 59% in 2017 to 35% today.

"I think that Russia, with its vast territory, with many faiths, with a large number of nations, peoples, nationalities living in the country - you can't even count, someone says 160, someone 190, you know, needs strong presidential power," Putin said at a meeting with the public.

Moscow is once again the center of world politics, German Handelsblatt correspondent Matthias Brugman writes.
Russian President is a geopolitical winner, thanks to his choice to take risks. He has secured power in the country and has also strengthened himself on the world stage in foreign policy, Brugman claims.

Moldova's pro-Russian president and government want to turn Europe's poorest country into a building site before the presidential elections in late 2020. And they want Russia, Turkey and China to fund it.