Nearly three dozen Armenian human rights and civil society organizations have sent an open letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa calling for the release of Armenian prisoners held in Baku. The letter was published on the eve of the 8th European Political Community Summit and the Armenia-European Union meeting, scheduled to take place in Armenia.

Armenia's Anti-Corruption Committee has uncovered new cases of vote-buying by representatives of the opposition party "Strong Armenia," led by Russian oligarch Samvel Karapetyan.

Chechnya's leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, has received Vladimir Putin's support ahead of the region's latest election. During a meeting in the Kremlin the previous evening, the Russian president praised the republic's successes under the current leader's leadership and expressed confidence that the people of Chechnya will once again place their trust in him in the September 20 elections.

The 2026 World Press Freedom Index, published this morning by Reporters Without Borders (RSF), records the worst deterioration in global media freedom in 25 years. More than half of the world's countries rank the situation as "challenging" or "very challenging," and the average index level has never been lower. A key trend is increasing legal pressure on the media: of the five indicators used to assess press freedom worldwide (economy, law, security, politics, culture, and society), the "law" indicator showed the most significant decline.