Eurasia Press & News

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic got his wish for a different judge on Thursday when the U.N. tribunal for former Yugoslavia assigned his war crimes case to a new chamber on procedural grounds.

BIR NABALA, West Bank (Reuters) – Israel, under international pressure to ease restrictions on Palestinians, removed a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Thursday that had curbed movement outside a main Palestinian city.

SOCHI, Russia (Reuters) – Russia will withdraw troops that were sent to Georgia to reinforce peacekeepers within 10 days, the commander of Russian ground forces told reporters on Thursday.

TSKHINVALI, Georgia (Reuters) – Russian conductor Valery Gergiev led a performance of Tchaikovsky among the bombed-out buildings of South Ossetia on Thursday in a concert he said was to alert the world to the region’s suffering.

KIEV (Reuters) – Ukraine fears it could be the next target of Russia’s campaign to reassert influence over countries it long dominated in the Soviet Union, with Moscow well placed to foment separatist feelings in its Russian-speaking regions.

GENEVA (Reuters) – Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross, who have reached South Ossetia, will focus on visiting detainees and helping families trace missing loved ones, an ICRC spokesman said on Thursday.

PARIS (Reuters) – France has complained to Russia after soldiers stopped the French ambassador to Georgia at a roadblock on Thursday, the foreign ministry said.

OSLO (Reuters) – The United States warned Georgia against trying to retake rebel South Ossetia by force, including on the very eve of the August 7 attack that drew a crushing response from Russia, the U.S. envoy to NATO said on Thursday.

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Suicide blasts and sinking financial markets added pressure on Pakistan’s government to tackle the nation’s mounting problems on Thursday after President Pervez Musharraf quit but a split threatens to tear the coalition apart.

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Two Pakistani Taliban suicide bombers blew themselves up outside the country’s main defense industry complex on Thursday, killing at least 59 people as workers were leaving at the end of their shift, officials said.