Russian Empire

Sofia City Court will hold a session on Russia's demand for the extradition of Russian-French businessman and activist Nikolai Kobliakov on Wednesday.

According to the Russian prosecution, Kobliakov was involved in a fraud for EUR 1.2 M. According to human rights organisaitons, however, he was being prosecuted for political reasons. 

Sofia City Court has released Russian-French businessman and activist Nikolai Kobliakov on recognizance.

Kobliakov was detained at the Sofia airport in end-July, after landing there from Paris.

He was freed from custody in a few days' time and was placed under house arrest a month later, on September 1.

Obama and Cameron: Together against Russians

NEWPORT -- U.S. President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron have pledged to jointly support Ukraine against Russia, according to a statement.

The sales of Bulgarian seaside real estate to Russian citizens has dropped by 30% since end of July, reports the Nova TV national channel. 

According to real estate brokers, the story with the British buyers repeats – suddenly the interest of Russian buyers dissipated and some of the owners are already trying to sell. 

MOSCOW - Serbia will increase its cheese export to Russia in two weeks, Russian Minister of Agriculture Nikolay Fyodorov said after the meeting with his Serbian counterpart Snezana Bogosavljevic Boskovic in Moscow on Thursday.

Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta announced Monday his country had decided to halt joint economic projects with Russia.

Ponta told the news TV channel Digi24 (as cited by a Russian business daily) that the "destabilization" of the region which followed the actions of the Russian Federation, meaning "the annexation of Crimea" and "the actions of separatists in Eastern Ukraine".

Bulgaria is the favourite spot of Russian state officials for buying real estate, shows an investigation of the Russian business publication RBC. 

The RBK journalists have analysed the property declarations of almost 500 Russian MPs and state officials. They show that 176 of them have apartments in Bulgaria. Often they own just part of the property.

The Russian citizens own 300 000 properties in Bulgaria and invested around EUR 18 B, reports Deutsche Welle. 

According to estimates, this is about 10 times more than the officially recognized investments by Russian companies in Bulgaria. Thus Russia becomes the largest foreign investor in Bulgaria's economy. 

Russian inspectors are to conduct an unarmed surveillance flight over Bulgaria this week, under the Treaty in Open Skies, a Russian official reported Monday.

BELGRADE - The dramatic situation in Ukraine underlines the deep crisis affecting entire Europe, and MPs in European countries must approach this issue in a responsible manner to prevent the catastrophe of the 1914 Great War from repeating, participants of a Russian-Serbian scientific conference have said.