Eurasia

TBILISI, Georgia: A leading Georgian opposition party is putting forth its leader to challenge President Mikhail Saakashvili. Labor Party leader Shalva Natelashvili’s decision comes as opposition groups struggle to force Saakashvili to hold new elections.

NATO foreign ministers are set Thursday to green-light the resumption of formal high-level ties with Russia while reassuring Georgia and Ukraine they have a future in the military alliance. NATO diplomats confirmed Wednesday an in-principle agreement to end the freeze, sparked by Russia’s war with Georgia last August, in an …

Valdis Dombrovskis is forming a government after the old one collapsed last month, a victim of the global financial crisis. The former finance minister nominated to form a new Latvian government named his cabinet on Wednesday, but disagreements immediately emerged with a key coalition partner over who should join the …

The devices exploded, causing a fire, which seriously damaged the Piraeus Bank branch in the northern Athens suburb of New Psychico. Arsonists threw gas canisters and firebombs at a bank branch office in Athens on Wednesday, causing serious damage to the building but no injuries, Greek police said. There has …

Milorad Dodik, the Prime Minister of the Serb-dominated Bosnian entity of Republika Srpska, has seemingly softened his radical rhetoric and temporarily abandoned plans for his entity’s independence, local media reported on Wednesday. The apparent shift in Dodik’s attitude came after his meeting on Tuesday with Stuart Jones, the deputy US …

In the first war crimes trial to be held under the auspices of the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo, EULEX, judges found a Kosovo Albanian guilty of murder, attempted murder and grievous bodily harm, sentencing him to17 years in jail. Gani Gashi, 59, from Komoran in central Kosovo …

Romania’s parliament on Wednesday decided to allow criminal proceedings against former prime minister Adrian Nastase on corruption charges. With 158 votes for and 128 against, MPs in the second chamber of parliament, the Camera Deputatilor, decided to strip Nastase of his parliamentary immunity from prosecution and probe two corruption cases. …

Greece’s warning against traveling to Macedonia is an over reaction to an isolated incident, Macedonia’s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday, in a response to Athens’s decision to caution those traveling to their northern neighbour. The Greek Foreign Ministry on Tuesday issued what effectively amounted to a travel warning to its …

Albania Deputy Prime Minister, Genc Pollo, was fined by a Tirana court on Tuesday for slander over comments made toward the publisher of a local newspaper. Pollo was fined 300,000 lek (€2307) over comments he made during a press conference while serving as Albania’s Minister of Education in 2007. In …

NATO sought to put an end to media speculation that it plans an imminent reduction of troops in Kosovo when the organisation’s Secretary General Jaap to Hoop Scheffer said nothing of the sort has been decided. “I want to be clear. Those speculating of a possible KFOR troops reduction in …