In a historic ceremony Saturday, President Berdymuhamedov of Turkmenistan used a gold-plated spanner to bolt together two sections of rails, marking the formal start of construction of railway link between Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Iran.   

The Afghan ministry of defence has announced plans to treble the size of its army. The ministry said this was to dissuade Afghanistan’s neighbours, Iran and Pakistan, from interfering, as well as to provide better internal security.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Turnout in Russia’s parliamentary election is likely to be more than 60 percent, higher than last time, the electoral commission said on Sunday.

MOROZOVKA, Russia (Reuters) – Voters looked on in amazement when a group of Russia’s most beautiful women turned up to cast their votes in Sunday’s parliamentary election.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – A handful of foreign election observers scrambled to monitor voting across Russia’s vast territory on Sunday, with the chief of one mission admitting there was little his team could do.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Sunday played down expectations for a peace deal with the Palestinians before the end of 2008 as laid out at a U.S.-sponsored peace conference last week.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Former world chess champion and opposition leader Garry Kasparov accused Russian authorities of “raping the whole electoral system” with numerous instances of irregularities in Sunday’s parliamentary election.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraq must take advantage of improved security to enact laws aimed at reconciliation or risk a resumption of sectarian violence, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte said on Sunday.

(Reuters) – Following are security developments in Iraq at 7:30 a.m. EST on Thursday. * denotes new or updated items. * BAGHDAD – Iraqi soldiers killed one gunman and detained 47 other suspects in different areas of Iraq in the past 24 hours, the Defence Ministry said.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – The U.S. military will carefully manage the growth of neighborhood police units credited with helping to curb violence in Iraq, aiming ultimately to move many into public work roles, a spokesman said on Thursday.