* The Emergency Situations Ministry said six people died and 18 were injured in a fire in a St. Petersburg dormitory
* President Alexander Lukashenko said while summing up the results of Union Shield-2006, a large-scale military exercise with Russia:
- Belarus is determined to strengthen its armed forces at any cost
- There will be no need to deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus
* Russia's defense minister Sergei Ivanov said Russia and Belarus were resolved to strengthen the operational capacity of their joint forces in the region
* Moldova's first deputy prosecutor general said Moldovan national Igor Velchev, suspected of killing Russian journalist Ilya Zimin February 26, would be tried in his country
* Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov said on Ekho Moskvy radio that inflation in Russia in 2006 would be at 9%
* Igor Smirnov, the president of the breakaway Moldovan region of Transdnestr, said three breakaway regions in former Soviet republics currently embroiled in "frozen conflicts" had started forming a joint peacekeeping contingent to be deployed should Russian peacekeepers withdraw
