MINSK (Reuters) – The Supreme Court in Belarus on Friday upheld a three-year sentence on a U.S. lawyer convicted of industrial espionage, one of several irritants in Washington’s relations with the ex-Soviet state.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – A suicide bomber killed nine people on Friday in an attack on police in the northwestern Pakistani town of Mardan.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, starting his first visit to post-Soviet Russia on Friday, will discuss opening a Russian naval base in Libya to counterbalance U.S. interests in the region, a paper reported.