Eurasia

SKOPJE (Reuters) – Voting began in Macedonia’s parliamentary election on Sunday, widely seen as a test of its political maturity after campaign violence raised fears its slow march toward EU membership could be further delayed.

PARIS (Reuters) – Vladimir Putin was treated like a president in Paris on his first visit to a Western capital as prime minister, reinforcing an impression that he still runs Russia even after leaving the Kremlin.

Iran-Nuclear Programme (IRNA) Iran has not only cleared all outstanding issues with regard to its nuclear programme but also cooperated with the IAEA “far beyond its treaty obligations,” according to the Iranian Embassy in Oslo.

TEHRAN (FNA)- Russia’s gas export monopoly Gazprom said on Tuesday it had increased gas supplies to Turkey after it asked for more gas following a stoppage of flows from Iran.

SARAJEVO (Reuters) – A man shot and killed six people in a village near the northern Bosnian town of Tuzla on Thursday, gunning down three in their homes and three aboard a bus, police and witnesses at the scene said.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian investigators on Monday scrapped an arrest warrant for the head of a media charity, effectively ending a prosecution that rights campaigners said was a Kremlin attack on civil society.

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Sunni-led Arab states need to offer more support to the Shi’ite-led Iraqi government to give reconstruction efforts a chance to succeed, Sweden’s foreign minister said on Wednesday ahead of a conference on Iraq.

TBILISI (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of people protested in Georgia’s capital on Monday against President Mikheil Saakashvili, who they said had stolen victory for his ruling party in last week’s parliamentary election.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – The Roman Catholic Church hopes a year dedicated to Saint Paul, born two millennia ago in Tarsus in today’s southern Turkey, will bring signs of more religious tolerance in the mostly Muslim but secularist country.

THE HAGUE (Reuters) – Serbia denied it was guilty of genocide during the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia on Monday, opening its defense before the U.N.’s highest court against Croatian allegations of ethnic cleansing.