* The UN nuclear watchdog said in a report that Iran had defied Security Council demands to halt uranium enrichment over fears it could eventually build nuclear weapons
* Two members of the 14th crew of the International Space Station have repaired a malfunctioning antenna during a spacewalk, mission control said
* Russian President Vladimir Putin said that although Russia does not pose a threat to any other country, it will continue to build its defense potential to guarantee its own security
* Vladimir Putin submitted a protocol to a document that facilitates large-scale cooperation between the United States and Russia on nuclear nonproliferation for ratification by the lower house of parliament
* Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said:
- the Russia-NATO Council still had a lot of potential as a mechanism of collective cooperation
- a UN envoy on Kosovo, Marti Ahtisaari, should not set a deadline for a final decision on the status of Serbia's Albanian-populated region
* Russia's oil export duty could decline by about $25 to $154-$156 per metric ton as of April 1, a Finance Ministry official said
* Belarus's government has requested a $1.5 stabilization loan from Russia over "dramatic price hikes for Russian energy supplies," the Finance Ministry said
* Russia may consider granting a stabilization loan to Belarus, the economics minister said
* Russia's state-controlled retail savings bank Sberbank could sell about 2.8 million shares or 80% of its additional share issue, experts said
* Bolivia's state-controlled oil and gas company and Russia's energy giant Gazprom have signed a protocol on cooperation in prospecting and exploration of natural gas resources in the Latin American country
* All of Gazprom's and its subsidiaries' export activity will be carried out through its export arm Gazprom Export, the Russian energy giant's press service said
* Russia's gold and foreign currency reserves increased by $1.7 billion, to $311.2 billion in the week of February 9-16, the Central Bank of Russia said
* Russian oil deliveries to China via the Trans-Siberian railroad are expected to rise about 46%, year-on-year, in 2007, to 15 million metric tons (109.9 million barrels), the head of rail monopoly Russian Railways (RZD) said
* Estonia's President Toomas Hendrik Ilves vetoed a law permitting the demolition of Soviet war memorials in Estonia, the presidential secretariat said
* Ukraine's parliament rejected the candidacies of Volodymyr Ohryzko for the post of foreign minister and Vyktor Korol for the post of Ukrainian Security Service head, proposed by the president
* Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko will resubmit two candidacies to high-ranking posts in the country's government, the presidential press service said
* The Quartet of Mideast mediators failed to agree on a coordinated approach to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and put off any decision regarding aid to the Palestinian Authority until its next meeting
* Tehran said it is ready to resolve any problems over its purported failure to pay Russia for the construction of a nuclear power plant in southern Iran within 10 days
* The United States will close its air base in Kyrgyzstan, and other bases in Central Asia, as soon as military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq are over, a U.S. military official said
* The grandson of Soviet leader and Joseph Stalin's successor Nikita Khrushchev has died in a Moscow hospital from a stroke, his colleagues said
