According to an estimate of the Ministry of Finance, Lithuania intends to increase defense spending by 150 million euros next year, up to 725 million euros, Kauno Diena reported.

The current Lithuanian military budget is 575 million euros, approximately 1.48% of the country’s GDP. It is expected that next year's defense spending will rise to 725 million euros, or 1.77% of GDP.

According to Lithuanian Minister of Defense Juozas Olekas, the country plans to spend 2% of GDP on defense in 2018. …

According to a survey by Amnesty International, almost two-thirds of Russians are opposed to the settlement of refugees in the Russian Federation.

The Head of the Amnesty International representative office in the Russian Federation, Sergei Nikitin, reported at a talk at the anniversary conference of the Moscow Helsinki Group that “a statistical review by Amnesty International about the attitude of authorities and population toward refugees from other countries will be released in a week. …

A Ukrainian court has refused to recognize Russia’s armed aggression against Ukraine. This was reported by the initiator of the case, and human rights activist, Stanislav Batrin. He is also head of the “Open Court” project.

According to Batrin, this decision was made by the Shevchenko district court of Kiev on the 12th of May after nearly two years of judicial proceedings. It was also noted that the court had twice refused to open proceedings on the lawsuit. Batrin then went to the appeals …

The head of the EU delegation in Ukraine, Jan Tombinski, congratulated the head of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people, Refat Chubarov, on Jamala’s victory at Eurovision 2016, with the performance of the song "1944" dedicated to the deportation of the Crimean Tatars by Soviet authorities in 1944. “I didn’t watch the Eurovision contest but I have already congratulated our friends from the Crimean Tatar organizations, Mr. Chubarov, on Jamala’s success,” Tombinski said.

He added that Ukraine’s …

As was stated by the U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense, Robert Work, the Pentagon is concerned about statements made by Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding threats against Russia due to the placement of U.S. ABM systems, The Wall Street Journal reports.

“We would like to ask Russia to think about what they are saying, because we intend to cooperate with them wherever possible. However, such threats are highly problematic and of serious concern to us,” Work said.

On the 13th of May, Work …