Turkey took offense at a U.S. statement that said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo would promote religious freedom during an upcoming visit to Istanbul and called Wednesday on Washington to focus on racism and hate crimes in the United States instead.

Turkey is ready to discuss U.S. concerns about the technical compatibility of Russian S-400 defences and U.S.-made F-35 jets, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said Thursday, repeating Ankara’s proposal for a joint working group with Washington on the issue.

Russia’s peacekeeping mission in Nagorno-Karabakh, the ethnically Armenian breakaway region of Azerbaijan where thousands of civilians and soldiers have died in recent weeks of fighting, has released a map detailing the operation ahead, clarifying many of the territorial ambiguities of the truce between Yerevan and Baku announced on November 10. …