 RFE/RL Headlines 11/6/2009 5:53:34 PM A daily digest of the English-language news and analysis written by the staff of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |
| News Ukrainian Election May Be Postponed Due To Swine Flu Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko is considering postponing the country's presidential election scheduled for January due to the spread of swine flu in the country. More  Iran To Give UN Watchdog More Details On Nuclear Fuel Plan Iranian Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki says Iran is preparing to give the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) more details of its response to proposals from the major powers for the supply of nuclear fuel. More  Ukraine PM Says 'Difficult' Russian Bill Settled Ukraine has paid Russia for October gas supplies on time, despite European Union fears that bills would not be settled but the process had proved "extremely difficult," Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has said. More  Uzbekistan To Deliver Natural Gas To China Uzbekistan says it has signed an agreement to export up to 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas to China, RFE/RL's Uzbek Service reports. More  Palestinian President Says He Won't Run In January Election The troubled Israeli-Palestinian peace process has been dealt a new blow by Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas saying he will not run in an election he has called for January. The announcement, just days after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited the region, comes as Abbas has increasingly expressed frustration over the lack of progress in negotiations with Israel. More  Iran Cleric Says Conditions Unacceptable On Nuclear Fuel The UN nuclear watchdog is legally obliged to provide Iran with nuclear fuel for its research reactor without setting any conditions, a hard-line Iranian cleric has told worshippers. More Ukraine has told the European Commission that it has 25 billion cubic meters of gas in storage, which should be enough to prevent disruptions to flows to Europe this winter, a spokesman has said. More  U.S. Embassy Denies Karabakh Recognition Threat The U.S. State Department has strongly denied an Azerbaijani media report that alleges Washington threatened to recognize Nagorno-Karabakh as an independent state unless Baku commits to a peaceful resolution of the Armenian-Azerbaijani dispute over that territory, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More  Britain's Brown: Afghan Government Must Deliver British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has warned that Britain will not risk more lives in Afghanistan unless the new Afghan government cracks down decisively on corruption. More Belarusian authorities have refused to issue a visa to the director of the Warsaw-based Belsat television company that broadcasts to Belarus, RFE/RL's Belarus Service reports. More Alcohol Sales Banned Near Uzbek Schools, Mosques The Uzbek government adopted a law on November 1 that bans the sale of alcoholic beverages near all educational and religious buildings in the country, RFE/RL's Uzbek Service reports. More The first swine flu case has been officially confirmed in Azerbaijan, RFE/RL's Azerbaijani Service reports. More  IMF Shares World Bank Concern About Monopolies In Armenia A senior International Monetary Fund official says the IMF agrees with the World Bank that the Armenian economy is dominated by monopolies and other "oligopolistic" structures that hamper the country's development, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More  Two Arrests Made In Moscow For Markelov, Baburova Murders A Russian Investigative Committee has charged two suspects in the January murders of a human rights lawyer and a journalist, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports. More The chairman of the Grozny-based human rights organization Pravo (Right), Arbi Khachukaev, has been detained by Moscow police, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports. More  Nationalists, Antifascists Clash In St. Petersburg Ultranationalist and antifascist protesters have clashed in St. Petersburg, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports. More  Georgian Foreign Minister Renounces Russian Citizenship Georgian Foreign Minister Grigol Vashadze has renounced his Russian citizenship, RFE/RL's Russian and Georgian services reports. More  Russian Deputy Says Polish Comments Hurt Relations A Russian Duma deputy says that comments by Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski claiming that Russia is threatening Polish security could harm relations the two countries. More The Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) is supporting calls to prosecute anyone in Nagorno-Karabakh who publicly advocates the return of Azerbaijani territories that are now controlled by Karabakh Armenians, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. More  Georgian Opposition Gears Up For New Protests November 6 is the second anniversary of a brutal police crackdown in Tbilisi on demonstrators who had for days picketed the parliament building to demand early parliamentary elections and the release of persons they considered political prisoners. Georgian media have recently been discussing the possibility that the opposition will launch a new wave of protests on November 7 to demand President Mikheil Saakashvili's resignation. But with the opposition divided over tactics and strategy, the likely impact remains unclear. More  Confronting Corruption In the wake of his reelection, President Hamid Karzai is facing intense international pressure to move decisively against the corruption that affects all aspects of life in Afghanistan. But what is the scale of corruption in the country, how does it systematically undermine efforts to establish stability, and what would it take to stem the growing menace? More  What Iran's Green Movement Wants From Obama Members of the Green movement opposed to Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad voiced a clear demand to U.S. President Barack Obama this week. More  It's Not Easy Being An Environmentalist In Turkmenistan A court in Turkmenistan has overturned a five-year jail sentence handed down last week to a biologist whose environmental organization was shut down by the state in 2003. The case marks the second time in three years that Andrei Zatoka has been sentenced and detained before being released, and highlights the difficulties activists commonly encounter in Central Asia. More  In Once-Divided City, East Berliners Still See 'Us' And 'Them' Physically, little today is left of the Berlin Wall, the potent symbol of Germany's Cold War division. But the psychological barrier between East and West -- the "Wall in the head" -- still runs deep two decades after the Wall's destruction. More  Twenty Years Later, And The Communists Are Still With Us In November 1989, we were given a chance, and we are doing relatively well. We are part of the broader world. Our children are growing up in a sort of democracy. They can travel and study abroad. They speak many languages and so hold the keys to open other worlds. Nonetheless, all is not right. More |
