Free Republic

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Dutch Foreign Minister Halbe Zijlstra quit on Tuesday after admitting that he had fabricated a story about attending a meeting in 2006 at which he said Russian President Vladimir Putin had outlined a strategy for building a greater Russia. The incident has embarrassed Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s coalition government, which has a parliamentary majority of just one, and further strained difficult ties with Russia. Zijlstra, visibly emotional as he took the floor during a parliamentary debate convened to discuss his behavior, said he had decided to tender his resignation to the king because the situation risked harming...

As Ukraine appears to have all but conceded Crimea to Moscow, ethnic Russians in Kherson, the province just north of the peninsula, are believed to be pushing a secession vote of their own in what a local leader angrily denounced as "treason." The province has a huge ethnic Russian population, and a vote - particularly with politicking from Russia - could go against Kiev as did last Sunday’s referendum in Crimea. In addition to a major push from ethnic Russian politicians, the proposal in Kherson could be boosted by the presence of Russian soldiers, pro-Moscow protesters and the kind of...

MOSCOW, March 20. /ITAR-TASS/. The Russian State Duma has adopted in first reading and a whole the federal constitutional law on Crimea’s admission to the Russian Federation and on creating new sub-federal entities — the Republic of Crimea and the city of federal significance Sevastopol. In the final reading, 445 parliamentarians casted affirmative votes and one deputy voted against the bill submitted by the president. The only lawmaker that did not support the document was member of A Just Russia party Ilya Ponomaryov. The lawmakers have also ratified the interstate treaty on the admission of Crimea into Russia. The treaty,...

Russia signaled concern on Wednesday at Estonia's treatment of its large ethnic Russian minority, comparing language policy in the Baltic state with what it said was a call in Ukraine to prevent the use of Russian. Russia has defended its annexation of Ukraine's Crimea peninsula by arguing it has the right to protect Russian-speakers outside its borders, so the reference to linguistic tensions in another former Soviet republic comes at a highly sensitive moment.