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A raid by US troops on an Iranian office in Iraq was "absolutely unacceptable" and violated international law, Russia's foreign ministry has said. The raid Thursday in the northern Iraqi city of Arbil was "absolutely unacceptable" and "the crudest possible violation of the Vienna convention on consular relations," ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin said in a statement. The statement referred to the raid as being directed against "the Iranian consulate general" and described five Iranians arrested as "diplomats." Iraq's foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, denied this Friday, saying that the Iranians had been working officially in Iraq but as part of a...

December 21, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Nearly every week in the month of December features a key date in the history of the Soviet collapse. This year, which marks the 15th anniversary of the death of the USSR, finds some in Russia looking back wistfully as there seems to be a rise in historical revanche. The last days of the Soviet Union began on December 8, 1991, when the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus announced that the USSR had "ceased to exist as a geopolitical reality." They culminated on December 31 -- a week after the resignation of the first...

Alexander Litvinenko’s final testament, released after his death on Thursday evening, is deeply moving. It is also political dynamite. He thanked the hospital that battled to save him. He thanked his friends and the British authorities and paid tribute to the country that had granted him citizenship a month before his death. And dramatically accusing President Putin of having no respect for life, liberty or any civilised value, he said the Russian leader may have succeeded in silencing one man, “but a howl of protest from around the world will reverberate in your ears for the rest of your life”.His...

Russia has begun delivery of Tor-M1 air defense missile systems to Iran, a Defense Ministry official said Friday, confirming that Moscow would proceed with arms deals with Tehran in spite of Western criticism. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue, declined to specify when the deliveries had been made and how many systems had been delivered. Ministry officials have previously said Moscow would supply 29 of the sophisticated missile systems to Iran under a $700 million contract signed in December, according to Russian media reports. The United States called on...

Russia has begun deliveries of the Tor-M1 air defence rocket system to Iran, Russian news agencies quoted military industry sources as saying, in the latest sign of a Russian-US rift over Iran. "Deliveries of the Tor-M1 have begun. The first systems have already been delivered to Tehran," ITAR-TASS quoted an unnamed, high-ranking source as saying Friday. The United States has pressed Russia to halt military sales to Iran, which Washington accuses of harbouring secret plans to build a nuclear weapon. Moscow has consistently defended its weapons trade with Iran. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said the contract for 29...

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