https://sputnikglobe.com/20080321/101962677.html

Main news of March 21

Sputnik International

RUSSIA * Russia will deliver 24 Pantsir S1 (NATO reporting name SA-22 Greyhound) anti-aircraft surface-to-air missile systems in 2008, First Deputy Prime... 21.03.2008, Sputnik International

2008-03-21T19:00+0000

https://cdn1.img.sputnikglobe.com/i/logo/logo-social.png

Sputnik International

feedback@sputniknews.com

+74956456601

MIA „Rossiya Segodnya“

252

2008

Sputnik International

feedback@sputniknews.com

+74956456601

MIA „Rossiya Segodnya“

252

News

en_EN

Sputnik International

feedback@sputniknews.com

+74956456601

MIA „Rossiya Segodnya“

252

Sputnik International

feedback@sputniknews.com

+74956456601

MIA „Rossiya Segodnya“

252

Sputnik International

newsfeed

Main news of March 21

19:00 GMT 21.03.2008

RUSSIA

* Russia will deliver 24 Pantsir S1 (NATO reporting name SA-22 Greyhound) anti-aircraft surface-to-air missile systems in 2008, First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said

* The arrest of Ilya Zaslavsky, employed by TNK-BP Russian-British venture, and his brother is not related to the recent closure of British Council offices, a Russian Foreign Ministry official said

* Russia's lower house of parliament has proposed that the president and the government consider the issue of whether to recognize the independence of breakaway separatist regions in Georgia

* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called the U.S. decision to allow arms supplies to Kosovo illegal and expressed fears that the move may further endanger stability in the region

* Russia's Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov said Moscow regards U.S. sanctions against Belarus as political and urged Washington to review them

* Russia may soon see new faces among its top military commanders as the result of a major military leadership reshuffle, a high-ranking Defense Ministry source said

* The head of Daghestan's state TV and radio company was killed in the North Caucasus republic's capital Makhachkala

* Ilyas Shurpayev, a Russian television journalist, was found dead in his apartment in the northeast of Moscow, a police source said

WORLD

* Turkish and Greek Cypriot leaders agreed to restart peace talks to reunify the divided island, opening the way for a Turkish bid to join the European Union

* Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas plans to pay a visit to the Russian capital, Moscow, in the nearest future

* Investigations and hearings into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, killed in a car crash in Paris over a decade ago, have cost nearly 7 million pounds ($14 million), according to latest figures

* Tbilisi and Washington have agreed that a Georgian military contingent will stay in Iraq until the end of 2008, a Georgian first deputy defense minister said

* Ukraine's Party of Regions blocked the country's parliamentary rostrum demanding the withdrawal of Ukrainian peacekeepers from Kosovo and the defense minister's resignation

* Serbian swimmer Milorad Cavic was suspended from the 2008 European Championships in Eindhoven for wearing a t-shirt during a medal ceremony with a political message

* Chantal Sebire, a terminally-ill French woman whose legal application for assisted euthanasia was rejected earlier this week, did not die of natural causes, the France Info radio said citing a local prosecutor

* Moldova's President Vladimir Voronin appointed First Deputy Premier Zinaida Grecianii, 52, as the country's first female prime minister

BUSINESS

* Russia will raise the price of natural gas to Belarus from $119 to $128 per 1,000 cubic meters in the second half of this year, a Russian deputy economic development and trade minister said

* Iran grossed $70 billion from oil sales over the country's past solar year, which according to the Iranian calendar runs from March 21, 2007 until March 20, 2008, the oil minister said

* Severstal, Russia's largest steel producer, is to purchase a steel mill in the U.S. for $810 million, the company announced