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Main news of February 26

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RUSSIA * Russia's new Voronezh-type radar site in the southern town of Armavir was put on combat duty on Thursday, the head of the Moscow-based Military... 26.02.2009, Sputnik International

2009-02-26T19:07+0000

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Main news of February 26

19:07 GMT 26.02.2009

RUSSIA

* Russia's new Voronezh-type radar site in the southern town of Armavir was put on combat duty on Thursday, the head of the Moscow-based Military Forecast Center said

* Scientists at the Moscow-based Russian Institute of Medical and Biological Problems have named six people selected to take part in a 105-day experiment to simulate a flight to Mars due to start in March

* A former Russian presidential aide known for his criticism of current Kremlin policy has hit out at the U.S. administration's intention to "reset" ties with Moscow

* Russia responded calmly on Thursday after the U.S. State Department released a critical human rights report, with the foreign minister acknowledging that the country has problems in the sphere

* The future placement of U.S. Patriot air defense systems in Poland is another reason for Russia to maintain its moratorium on a major arms reductions treaty in Europe, a Russian analyst said

* The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has ordered Russia to pay 176,744 euros ($225,700) in compensation to the relatives of four people who went missing in Chechnya between 2002-2005

* One of the people injured when a gas canister exploded on Thursday on a train in southern Russia's Rostov Region has died in hospital, bringing the death toll in the blast to two, a local police source said

* Russia and NATO are pleased with the pace that relations are progressing within the Russia-NATO Council, frozen after last August's war with Georgia, the Russian envoy to NATO said

WORLD

* Ukraine's national oil and gas company Naftogaz has asked Russia's Gazprom to reduce natural gas supplies to the country from the contracted 40 billion cu m to 33 billion this year, a presidential energy aide said

* The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia on Thursday acquitted former Serbian president Milan Milutinovic, who was accused of war crimes against Kosovo Albanians in 1998-1999

* Statements made last week by an OSCE representative on the murder trial of investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya have damaged the organization's reputation, a spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry said

* A border guard mutiny that left at least 50 people dead in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka has been brought under control, national media said

* At least nine people have been injured in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad after a blaze broke out in a luxury hotel that was virtually destroyed in a terrorist attack last September, Pakistani Geo-TV said

* The U.S. space agency NASA has postponed the launch of shuttle Discovery to the International Space Station (ISS) until March 12

* Palestinian national unity talks involving the rival Fatah and Hamas movements began on Thursday in the Egyptian capital of Cairo, the country's MENA news agency said

* North Korea released on Thursday a Russian ship seized off the coast of the secretive communist state over a week ago, a spokesman for the Russian consulate in Chongjin said

* U.S. Patriot air defense systems will be placed in Poland regardless of the prospects of the deployment of a U.S. missile defense base in the country, the Polish foreign minister said

* Six people have been killed in flash floods and landslides in Indonesia, the country's Antara news agency said

BUSINESS