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The 2,625 bombs planted in July represent a near-doubling from January, when 1,454 bombs were planted, according to the military count. According to U.S. military officials, attacks have also increased against U.S. and Iraqi military forces by methods other than bombs: mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and small arms.

President Bush's retreat from the ambitious goals of his second term will proceed one small but fateful step further this Friday. That's when, after more than two years of stalling, the president will deliver a warm White House welcome to Ilham Aliyev, the autocratic and corrupt but friendly ruler of one of the world's emerging energy powers, Azerbaijan.

MOSCOW, April 22 (RIA Novosti) - Russian military planes flew undetected through the U.S. zone of the Arctic Ocean to Canada during recent military exercises, a senior Air Force commander said Saturday. The commander of the country's long-range strategic bombers, Lieutenant General Igor Khvorov, said the U.S. Air Force is now investigating why its military was unable to detect the Russian bombers. "They were unable to detect the planes either with radars or visually," he said. Khorov said that during the military exercises in April, Tu-160 Blackjack bombers and Tu-95 Bears had successfully carried out four missile launches. Bombing exercises...

72.2% Georgians believe that the problem of national minorities in Georgia should be settled like this: “to create the conditions to make them return to their historic territories.” The poll was conducted by BCG among 1,000 respondents. Other 18.8% think, in this case conditions should be created “to ‘Georgianize’ national minorities and assimilate them with the Georgian populate of the country.” 18.5% respondents see another way of settling the problem: “creation of conditions to make national minorities preserve their cultural and religious originality and simultaneously study Georgian to become participants of the Georgian state establishment enjoying full rights.” The results...

Russian state television has broadcast video footage of what it claims are British diplomats spying in Moscow. In the programme, people claiming to be Russian agents say British spies retrieved data from a transmitter in a fake rock planted on a Moscow street. The intelligence officers also said a UK diplomat made regular payments to Russian non-governmental organisations. The UK Foreign Office said it was "concerned and surprised" and denied any improper conduct with Russian NGOs. The programme said four officials from the UK embassy and one Russian citizen, allegedly recruited by the British secret service, downloaded classified data from...

WHEN the Russians start complaining about the weather, you know you're in trouble. For several days now, nighttime temperatures in Moscow have plummeted below minus 30oC and, by the time you read this, the Russian capital will be gripped by its lowest-ever figure, minus 41¡C. The average Brit will never feel cold like this. And let me tell you, you don't want to. First, your nostrils freeze, causing your nose to itch uncontrollably and making every breath painful. Then frost attaches itself to your eyelashes, which freeze into an icy lump that scratches your eyeball each time you blink. Any...

IT IS brutal, but it is business. Gazprom’s imposition of an enforced new year energy slim on Ukraine brought a loud squeak from Kiev, followed by the sound of spanner on metal as Ukrainians tapped the Russian firm’s gas export lines to Europe. If you think the Russians cruel for cutting off their neighbour, try the Ukrainian option when the gas bill next drops on your doormat (the price we pay in Britain, too, is about to soar). Tell the gas company that the price is unreasonable, refuse to pay and see what happens. I can predict a flurry of...

Premiere for Stalin satire bedevilled by setbacks and superstition From Jeremy Page in Moscow One of the finest novels of the Soviet era is at last adapted for Russian TV THE DEVIL is coming back to Moscow today — or at least to its television screens. Russia’s first television production of The Master and Margarita, the satirical novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, is due to begin tonight after 20 years of failed attempts to bring it to the screen. And the ten-part mini-series of arguably the greatest novel to emerge from the Soviet Union is already causing a sensation, especially in...

BERLIN (Reuters) - Nikolai Valuev won the World Boxing Association (WBA) heavyweight title with a controversial majority decision over American John Ruiz on Saturday to become the first Russian champion in boxing's most glamorous division. Ruiz's bitterly disappointed manager, Norman Stone, grabbed the title belt away from Valuev after the fight and ran around the ring holding it over his head until five ring bodyguards forcibly took it back. Two of the judges put Valuev ahead of the defending champion at the end of the 12-round fight, scoring it 116-114 and 116-113 for the Russian who is known as the...

Russian RPG Line Dominates World Market for Man-Portable Anti-Armor Weapons NEWTOWN, Conn. (December 5, 2005) ¯ As the role of a man-portable anti-armor weapon continues to morph from a dedicated anti-tank weapon to a general-purpose fire support asset for light and medium forces, the international market for man-portable anti-armor and bunker buster weapons remains robust. In its annual analysis, "The World Market for Man-Portable Anti-Armor and Bunker Buster Weapons," the Forecast International Weapons Group expects the market will produce nearly 1.9 million weapons, worth $5.33 billion, through 2014. Dean Lockwood, a weapons systems analyst at Forecast International, notes the Russian...

MISSILE DEFENSE Russia Developing New Generation Of Super Missiles By Martin Sieff UPI Senior News Analyst Washington (UPI) Dec 05, 2005 Almost ignored by the mainstream U.S. media, the strategic nuclear arms race between the United States and Russia has revived -- with spending and weapons development at an intensity unseen since the days of the SS-18 and Pershing II deployments a quarter of a century ago. On Nov. 17, as reported by United Press International, the U.S. Navy successfully carried out its most ambitious and successful test yet of an anti-ballistic missile interceptor launched from an Aegis class cruiser...

Text of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Speech This is a translation, by Nazila Fathi in The New York Times Tehran bureau, of the October 26 speech by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to an Islamic Student Associations conference on "The World Without Zionism." The conference was held in Tehran, at the Interior Ministry. The text of the speech was posted online, in Persian, by the Iranian Student News Agency (www.isnagency.com). Bracketed explanatory material is from Ms. Fathi. I thank God that I have had the opportunity to participate in the event today …. We need to examine the true origins of the issue of...

European satellite CryoSat was ruined with Ukrainian electronics The Reason of failure of a booster rocket "Roar" with European scientific satellite CryoSat became sofware failure in the equipment of bosster block management " Breeze-km ", "Businessman" informs. This equipment has been developed on Kharkov joint-stock company "HARTRON". "Roar" has been created on the basis of two-level ballistic missiles RS-18 removed from arm forces (on NATO classification - SS-19). It consists of three steps - first two represent the block of accelerators of strategic rocket RS-18 (on NATO classification - SS-19), as the third step is "Breeze-km". Failure has occured on...

Tensions running high at asylum center Police in the southeastern county of Østfold have been spending lots of time at an asylum center in Våler, where a group of refugees from Chechnya have demanded that strict Muslim laws be followed. Police worry that center administrators have lost control. Both residents at the center at Nordbybråten in Våler and employees working there have been frightened by the group of around a dozen Chechen refugees, reports local newspaper Moss Avis. The Chechens allegedly are demanding that everyone must pray to Allah, that no one can wear shorts and that they must be...

Just How Effective Is the F-22 October 3, 2005: With the F-22 finally entering service, there is still a lot of debate over whether the aircraft is worth the cost (about $400 million each, including the enormous development costs, about $100 million each without.) About five years ago, the British Defence Evaluation and Research Agency did a rather extensive, and still largely classified, study using pilots flying aircraft simulators tuned to represent the characteristics of various aircraft. The pilots used the weapons and tactics of each nation. The benchmark was how many Su-35s (the advanced Russian warplane, then in development,...

The Sight (http: // www.vzglyad.ru/politics //2005/10/1/8451.html) Historical "sensations" The Polish historians prove, that in 1945 Berlin was taken by the Polish army, and Red Army only supported its actions 1.10.2005, 09:51 With the beginning of academic year at many schools of the CIS countries and the East Europe there were new textbooks of history. Russia is reflected in them not in the most favorable light. It is understandable - long-term cohabitation should leave a negative trace in national memory. Attempts are explainable also to rewrite history on official level – what will not make for the sake of the future...

Russia offers $100-million lunar tour 26/07/2005 16:10 MOSCOW, July 26 (RIA Novosti) - The Russian space-shuttle maker Energia has submitted a proposal for would-be space tourists to the Federal Space Agency Roskosmos to charter a flight to the moon, the daily newspaper Izvestia reported. Spacecraft have already been selected, a flight route worked out and a business plan compiled. All that is left to do is find someone wanting to take a 2-week trip to the Moon for $100 million. The game tourist will spend the first seven days aboard the International Space Station (ISS). After that, a Soyuz TMA...

On September, 16th, 2005, Washington Interview to the American telechannel "Fox Njus" The QUESTION: When you met in 2001 president Georges Bush, it has told, that has looked to you in eyes and has felt your soul. Now some officials in the USA speak that you have curtailed democratic reforms in the country that you have disagreements from the USA in occasion of Iraq, Iran and Northern Korea and that you sell the weapon to China, to Syria, to Venezuela - to President U.Chavesu. Tell fairly, whether it is possible to speak what you hark back the Kremlin? V.PUTIN: I...

Open joint-stock company " Gazprom " www.gazprom.ru e-mail: pr@gazprom.ru -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 13.09.2005 19:26 ABOUT RESULTS OF WORKING MEETING ALEKSEJA MILLERA AND MALKOLMA UIKSA Today the working meeting of Chairman of Board Alexey Miller and Minister of power of Great Britain Malkolma Uiksa took place in the central office of Open Society " Gazprom ". At a meeting prospects of cooperation of Russia and the Great Britain in gas sector were discussed. In particular, opportunities of increase in deliveries of natural gas to the Great Britain, participations of the British firms in projects of "Gazprom" in Russia were considered. Special attention of...

All signs point to an approaching Chinese economic crisis. Given the lack of transparency, the impact of the coming “landing” is even less predictable than such economic developments elsewhere. There are daily announcements by Communist leadership aimed at cooling an overheated economy. But most are fictitious, a cover for bottlenecks in some sectors, unrestrained speculation in others. So any divination is just that. There is no denying the remarkable last decade’s progress. GDP growth figures are probably exaggerated. The truth is nobody really knows. [One cannot forget an angry ex-Prime Minister Zhu Rongzi publicly dressing down regional officials for giving...