- G8 leaders adopted a joint statement that included pledges to free up foreign investment, fight corruption, counterfeiting, and climate change.
- At a bilateral meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush, President Vladimir Putin offered the United States the joint use of a radar installation in Azerbaijan in an apparent attempt to ease tensions sparked by Washington's plans to deploy elements of missile shield in Europe
- President Bush said after the bilateral meeting that he and Putin had agreed to hold strategic dialogue on missile defense, involving the countries' militaries and diplomats
- German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that a new agreement replacing the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012, could be reached by 2009
- Sergei Prikhodko, a key Putin aide, raised the possibility that President Sarkozy of France would visit Russia this fall and said Putin's proposals on missile defense had aroused President Bush's interest.
* A group of eight U.S. Representatives submitted a draft resolution urging Russia to withdraw its troops, weapons and ammunition from Moldova's breakaway province
* Latvia is ready to consider the possibility of placing elements of a U.S. missile shield on its territory if necessary, the country's Prime Minister Aigars Kalvitis said
* North Korea fired several short-range missiles into the Yellow Sea, South Korean news agency Yonhap said
* President Vladimir Putin appointed Sergei Naryshkin, a deputy prime minister and chief of the Russian government staff, as the president's special representative for integration cooperation with CIS countries, the Kremlin said
* Armenian President Robert Kocharyan reappointed Serzh Sarkisyan as the country's prime minister, the Armenian presidential press service said
* Tigran Torosyan was re-elected speaker of Armenia's newly formed parliament as the only candidate
* Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic said independence for Kosovo is unacceptable to Belgrade in any form
* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov urged closer ties with Ukraine at a meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart Arseniy Yatsenyuk, after a diplomatic spat threatened to break out over entry controls
* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said leaders of Russia and Ukraine will meet at an informal CIS summit in St. Petersburg on June 10
* The prime ministers of Russia and Ukraine, Mikhail Fradkov and Viktor Yanukovych, will meet June 22, Ukraine's foreign minister said
* Kazakhstan's president held an online news conference, the first in the 18 years of his presidency, answering questions of concern to the nation
* Activists calling for the closure of a U.S. airbase in Kyrgyzstan took to the streets in the capital Bishkek to draw authorities' attention to their agenda amid a visit by a senior State Department official
* The governor of the Kemerovo Region where two mine blasts recently claimed 150 lives said he would not sign an inquiry report on the latest explosion, the local administration said, while the head of the Russian technological safety regulator in a West Siberian region resigned
* Evraz Group became 100% owner of Siberia-based coal producer Yuzhkuzbassugol and is ready to rectify mine safety violations, the head of Russia's industrial safety regulator said
* A train carrying military hardware left a Russian base in Georgia as part of a 2006 deal on the withdrawal of Russian bases from the ex-Soviet Caucasus state, the Georgian Defense Ministry said
* Costa Rica established diplomatic relations with China, breaking ties with Taiwan, the Xinhua agency reported
* NASA said there is still a 20% probability that the launch of the first U.S. space shuttle this year, already delayed for three months, will be postponed further until July
* The European Commission (EC) said it will reopen negotiations with Serbia on a Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA), broken off more than a year ago over Belgrade's failure to cooperate with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), June 13
* Net private capital inflow in Russia exceeded $60 billion in the first five months of 2007, the chairman of the Russian Central Bank said
* Russia's economics ministry and French carmaker Peugeot-Citroen plan to sign an investment agreement on industrial production of Peugeot cars in Russia's Volga area at an economic forum in St. Petersburg, a ministry official said
* An explosion went off in the center of the East Siberian city of Irkutsk, but no one was killed or injured, local police said
* Police in the Stavropol Territory in southern Russia have arrested a suspect in the recent murder of two students which sent shock waves through the local community, a local prosecutor said
