Two positions held by Syrian forces in the Homs Governorate were hit by missile strikes shortly before midnight on June 22, the Russian news outlet Daily Storm reports. The first strike targeted the village of Al-Halba, which lies south of Palmyra, and the second strike was directed further south, at Al-Qaryatayn, south-east of Homs. At least one Syrian soldier was killed and several were wounded. Sources report that the air strike was made by the US-led coalition in order to counter the Syrian …

Iran’s oil minister Bijan Namdar Zangeneh, who was invited to the meeting of the OPEC monitoring committee in Vienna, left the meeting about an hour after it started and said he did not consider it possible to reach an agreement with OPEC on quota adjustments.

“I do not think it is possible to reach an agreement,” said the Iranian minister to reporters in a hotel. “It was a protocol meeting. It wasn’t good,” he told reporters. He did not state exactly why he left the meeting.

However, …

On Thursday June 21, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko asked Russian President Vladimir Putin over the phone to ensure that Ukrainian Ombudsperson Lyudmyla Denisova is given access to Oleg Sentsov and other Ukrainian prisoners, Poroshenko’s press service reported.

“The head of the Ukrainian state urged [Putin] to release the Ukrainian prisoners held in Russian prisons and in its occupied territories. He also pointed out the importance of giving Human Rights Commissioner Lyudmyla Denisova …

The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) has begun an offensive in the south against the opposition forces in the Daraa Governorate. Artillery and aircraft have bombarded the eastern regions of the territory, including regions previously classified as de-escalation zones in agreements between Russia and the US. The SAA’s offensive is the largest since the assault on Ghouta in the spring of 2018.

SAA infantry forces encountered intense resistance from the Syrian opposition regiments, Turkish news agency …

Ukraine's international reserves are sufficient to meet public debt payments until the end of 2020, said the Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine, Yakiv Smolii, the bank’s press service reported.

"The volume of Ukraine's international reserves is enough to go through a period of peak payments on public debt until the end of 2020 and without external financing but further prospects for the country’s economic growth will directly depend on progress in the implementation of structural reforms, …