Greece’s Prime Minister George Papandreou urged Turkey on Monday to withdraw its troops from Cyprus to help ongoing talks aimed at reunifying the divided island. The long-festering dispute on the eastern Mediterranean island has poisoned relations between Greece and Turkey, both NATO members, undermining alliance and European Union cooperation on …

Kazakhstan intends to pay special attention to so-called frozen conflicts during chairmanship in OSCE, Georgian deputy foreign minister, Alexander Nalbandov, said after Georgian-Kazakh inter-ministerial consultations in Tbilisi. Nalbandov said that the Kazakh side intends to appoint special representative within OSCE. This representative will specially operate to solve conflicts all over …

The U.S. does not intend to deploy a missile defense system (MDS) in Georgia, U.S. Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Vershbow said today in Tbilisi. This statement has been made at a joint press briefing with the First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia Giga Bokeria on the results of …

Visiting Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping put forward a four-point proposal to boost China-Romania relations when meeting with Romanian President Traian Basescu here on Monday. The proposal includes maintaining the consistency of high-level exchanges, promoting economic and trade cooperation, increasing exchanges in the areas of education, science, culture and health, …

Vice President Joe Biden heads to eastern Europe Tuesday to meet key US allies, after a decision last month to shelve a Bush-era missile shield initially angered Poland and the Czech Republic. Officials deny that Biden is being sent on a mission to pacify the two US partners, on a …

Processing of applications for Bulgarian citizenship filed by ethnic Bulgarians living abroad has improved considerably, Bozhidar Dimitrov, Minister without Portfolio responsible for Bulgarians abroad, told Bulgarian-language Trud daily on October 19 2009. In just one month, the speed at which the Citizenship Council at the Justice Ministry worked had tripled, …

Representatives of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are to arrive Tuesday on a visit to Belgrade. On the eve of the visit, Serbian media commented that examining the statements made by representatives of the mission, one may draw the conclusion that there is increasing suspicion in Serbian government’s success in …

President of the Hellenic Republic Karolos Papoulias has accepted the proposal by Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou to serve a second term in Greece’s highest post, as it was formally announced on Monday afternoon.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is currently holding a one-on-one discussion with his Serbian counterpart Boris Tadic. The Russian leader landed at Belgrade’s Nikola Tesla Airport at around 11am and was transported directly to Serbia Palace where he was welcomed with full state and military honours.

Representatives of all three of Bosnia’s main ethnic groups have essentially rejected the package of demands and incentives proposed by senior EU and US officials ahead of Tuesday’s resumption of negotiations. Local, EU and US officials have reconvened today at the Butmir military base near Sarajevo to discuss the package, …