Eurasia

DUSHANBE/MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia’s energy minister and a top oil company denied on Friday they were preparing to cut oil flows to Europe in response to threatened sanctions, a step Moscow never took even at the height of the Cold War.

ANKARA (Reuters) – An explosion rocked a gunpowder factory in central Turkey on Friday, killing two people and injuring another 12, Turkish broadcasters reported.

TEHRAN (FNA)- Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said no one doubts Iran’s right to use peaceful nuclear energy in accordance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described Western interference as the root cause of conflicts in the region, particularly in South Ossetia.

TEHRAN (FNA)- The presence of Islamic Republic in the 8th Summit of Shanghai Cooperation Organization would help boost the organization, Kazakh Ambassador to Tehran Yerik Utembayev said on Thursday.

KOHAT, Pakistan – A suicide bomber tried to force his vehicle into a Pakistani military camp in the northwest on Friday but was blown up when soldiers opened fire on him, a day after dozens of people were killed in violence across the region

Criticism by the G7 group of nations of Russia’s actions in Georgia is biased and groundless, Russian officials say.

A Bosnian-born man has pleaded not guilty in Norway’s first war crimes trial since the end of World War II.

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian and Turkish education ministers met here in Tehran on Wednesday in a bid to improve ties and enhance mutual cooperation in the field of culture and education.

TEHRAN (FNA)- Azerbaijan’s national oil company, SOCAR, said on Monday it had begun exporting Azeri Light crude to Iran to compensate for export constraints imposed by a pipeline blast in Turkey and war in Georgia.