Eurasia

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Police in a central Russian region have advised priests to apply for firearms licenses so they can defend their churches from marauding thieves who have been stealing religious icons at gunpoint.

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada will formally recognize the breakaway ethnic republic of Kosovo later on Tuesday and the Serb ambassador will return temporarily to Belgrade for consultations, the Serb embassy in Ottawa said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said he had agreed with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice after six hours of talks in Moscow to study further U.S. proposals aimed at allaying Russian concerns about the shield.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia will announce soon whether it will allow NATO to deliver supplies to Afghanistan through its land and air spaces, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – President-elect Dmitry Medvedev urged experts outside the Kremlin to stimulate public debate about Russia’s economic and social challenges.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia, which cut passenger flights to Georgia in November 2006 amid a bitter political row, said on Tuesday it would resume civil aviation links with the Caucasus neighbor from March 25.

MITROVICA, Kosovo (Reuters) – A Ukrainian police officer serving with the United Nations in Kosovo died of injuries sustained in violent clashes with Serbs on Monday, Ukraine’s interior ministry said, confirming earlier reports.

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan recognized Kosovo’s independence on Tuesday, a month after the majority Albanian region declared secession from Serbia with the backing of the United States and most European Union states.

BELGRADE (Reuters) – Serbia and its ally Russia are consulting on joint steps to stop “all forms of violence against Kosovo Serbs”, Serbia’s caretaker prime minister Vojislav Kostunica said in a statement on Monday.

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (Reuters) – Members of a pro-Kremlin youth group demonstrated outside a U.S. consulate in Russia’s far east on Monday to support Alexander Kashin, a local man paralyzed in an accident involving a U.S. diplomat’s car.