Eurasia

Orthodox Christian believers are gathering in Belgrade today to attend the funeral of the Head of the Serbia’s Orthodox Church Patriarch Pavle. Holy Liturgy was served this morning at 7.30 by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I at the Cathedral Church of St. Michael the Archangel in Belgrade. A funeral procession will …

European Union foreign ministers are discussing the situations in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo at a meeting in Brussels. “There are no security risks in Bosnia-Herzegovina, maybe there are political dangers, but I want to stress that there are no security dangers,” EU Foreign and Security Policies Chief Javier Solana said.

EU Council president Carl Bildt said that solving name issue between Greece and Macedonia will happen only if both sides sit on the same table. After yesterday’s optimistic messages on name settlement, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt suggested to George Papandreou and Nikola Gruevski to enter direct name talks and …

Macedonian Deputy PM and Finance Minister Zoran Stavreski visits Russia in order to regulate Macedonia’s clearing debt to Russia and finally settle this issue. Stavreski is scheduled to meet his Russian counterpart Aleksej Kudrin on Wednesday.

Twelve candidates will be in the run for election to office of the President in Croatia. The 12 candidates will race in presidential polls slated for December 27 to succeed the incumbent Stipe Mesic whose second term expires in early 2010.

Greece’s Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas has embarked on a tour of the Balkans. Droutsas will be visiting Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) and Albania, starting Wednesday. The purpose of the visits is to coordinate these countries’ commitments for the European Union membership by 2014. “The Balkan is a …

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will meet Thursday with his Ukrainian counterpart Yulia Tymoshenko for talks on energy amid unease in Europe over possible cuts in gas supplies this winter. The two premiers are due to meet at the Livadia Palace in Yalta, the venue for the historic Yalta Conference …

Bulgaria will receive about BGN 180 mln “fresh money” under the PHARE program. This is what Prime Minister Boyko Borisov said. In his words-this is considerable political stimulus for the government.

Work to rebuild Russia’s Chechnya region, devastated by separatist wars from the 1990s, is now virtually complete, the region’s leader said at the lavish opening of a new shopping center in the capital.

There could be an early parliamentary election in Macedonia in the spring, or opposition attempts to take down the ruling coalition even sooner, if in December Greece blocks the EU from giving Macedonia a start date for its accession negotiations, local media speculate. The prime minister and head of the …