When Vladimir Putin was elected president in 2000, Russian television was a rough-and-tumble place, broadcasting fierce debates and biting satire. One by one, those programs were taken off the air.

  Russia’s gas export monopoly Gazprom threatened on Tuesday to cut gas supplies to Ukraine by 25 percent from March 3 over arrears, two weeks after the two ex-Soviet states agreed on how to settle the problem.

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) – British forces set up a checkpoint at a bridge outside Basra on Sunday, witnesses said, but a spokesman said they had no plans yet to retake Iraq’s second city, scene of a government crackdown on Shi’ite fighters.