* Rival Palestinian groups Hamas and Fatah declared a ceasefire as of 8 p.m. local time (5 p.m. GMT), after the death toll reached 40 on the fourth day of violence between the factions
* Neft-Activ, a subsidiary of state-controlled Rosneft oil company, bought Yukos non-core assets for 1.8 billion rubles ($70 million)
* The previously unknown company Prana signed an agreement to buy the bankrupt oil firm Yukos's office in central Moscow, after winning a liquidation auction last Friday
* Gazprom denied any links to Prana a spokesman for the state-controlled energy giant said
* The Yukos bankruptcy administrator said the company's assets in Krasnodar, southern Russia, would be offered to ZAO Promregion Holding, a company linked to state-controlled oil giant Rosneft
* Russia was invited to start negotiations on accession to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Andrei Kondakov, the head of the Foreign Ministry's department for economic cooperation, said
* Until the U.S. lifts sanctions against a Macao-based bank holding North Korean funds which were previously frozen over alleged money laundering, no foreign banks will agree to act as intermediaries to transfer the funds from the bank, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov said
* Russian President Vladimir Putin will pay an official visit to Austria on May 23-24 and Luxembourg on May 24, the Kremlin said
* Estonia's Prime Minister Andrus Ansip defended the decision to move the Bronze Soldier statue from central Tallinn to the outskirts, but admitted he had underestimated the significance of the monument for Russians
* Estonia's ambassador to Russia returned to Moscow after having left the country two weeks ago at the height of the diplomatic dispute over the Bronze Soldier monument
* The Russian president's aide for relations with the EU, Sergei Yastrzhembsky, said:
- Russia and the European Union are not experiencing a crisis in their relations
- Russia and the European Union will not sign a new cooperation pact this year
* Russia plans to complete bilateral negotiations on its accession to the World Trade Organization within three weeks and all multilateral talks by the end of July, a senior economics ministry official said
* Six representatives of energy giant Gazprom were elected to the board of directors of the electricity provider Mosenergo at an annual shareholders' meeting, the company said in a news release
* Rising water levels on a West Siberian river hit villages across the region, flooding homes and cutting off roads but causing no casualties, local emergencies officials said
* Kazakhstan's parliament approved constitutional amendments cutting a presidential term from seven to five years after 2012
* U.S. Senator Richard G. Lugar said Russia was aspiring to take control over potential energy reserves in the Arctic Ocean at the expense of U.S. interests
* Russian-Iranian trade turnover that totaled $2 billion in 2006 could double in the next few years, a deputy Russian foreign minister said
* Ukraine's Interior Minister Vasiliy Tsushko quoted a pro-presidential opposition member, Yuriy Lutsenko, as denying speculation of a murder plot being prepared against him and other opposition leaders
* RussNeft, one of Russia's top ten oil and gas producers, posted an 18.8% revenue decline year-on-year in the first quarter of 2007, to 21.2 billion rubles ($822 million), the company said
* Norilsk Nickel, Russia's largest mining and metals company, said it was unpleasantly surprised by an announcement made by Swiss-based Xstrata PLC that it will increase its offer for shares in a Canadian mining company
* The revenue of Russia's oil pipeline monopoly Transneft according to Russian Accounting Standards (RAS) rose 2.4% in the first quarter of 2007, to 50 billion rubles ($2 billion) year-on-year, the company said
* LUKoil's revenue according to Russian Accounting Standards (RAS) declined 35% in the first quarter of 2007, to 115 billion rubles ($4.5 billion), year-on-year, the company said
* Russia's largest state-controlled crude producer Rosneft said its revenue in the first quarter of 2007 rose by an annualized 1%, to 142 billion rubles ($5.5 billion)
* Severstal, one of Russia's leading steel manufacturers, said its revenue according to Russian Accounting Standards rose 38.6% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2007, to 44.6 billion rubles ($1.7 billion)
