* Russia called on Iran to re-impose a voluntary ban on uranium enrichment before the head of the UN's nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, reported to the UN Security Council on April 28
* Russia's permanent envoy to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Grigory Logvinov said there were no plans to turn the regional-security organization into a military bloc, but that the SCO needed armed forces to combat threats facing it
* Russian prosecutors submitted proposals to the Education Ministry to toughen the procedure for foreigners to adopt children in the wake of reports on the deaths of 12 children adopted by non-Russian families since 1991
* Russia's state statistics service said the country's oil production in the first two months of 2006 had grown 1.6% year-on-year to 76 mln tons (about 557 mln bbl), while oil exports grew 3.9% to 39.1 mln tons (287 mln bbl)
* Russian state owned oil company Rosneft said it would boost its capitalization by $10 bln by transferring all the assets and licenses of its subsidiaries to itself
* Russia's second largest mobile phone operator VimpelCom posted a 75.6% year-on-year increase in net profits in 2005 to $615 mln calculated to US GAAP
* State-owned oil firm Tatneft said its net profits calculated to Russian Accounting Standards had grown 49.8% year on year in 2005, to 36.87 bln rubles (about $12.8 mln)
* Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov said the government had no plans to reintroduce import duties for high-tech equipment for Russian enterprises
* A lawyer of Russia's jailed tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky voiced protest against his client's transfer to a single cell to ensure his safety after an alleged knife attack
* Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said he was concerned that potential partners in a parliamentary coalition were wasting time in quarrels instead of formulating a positive action plan
* Japan said it would suspend aid to the Hamas-led Palestinian government until it was satisfied the radical Islamist movement is committed to the Middle East peace process
* Kyrgyzstan's Foreign Ministry said that a U.S. envoy's invitation for the former Soviet republic to sign up for an international debt relief program amounted to interference in its domestic affairs
* Belarusian opposition leader Anatoly Lebedko said country's opposition groups were proposing an international public trial of the regime of President Alexander Lukashenko in September
