To make his case against Iraq, Bush has a powerful historical experience to draw upon: the end of the Cold War.

A day of sweet romance in Riga turns sour, ending in a case of acute appendicitis.

Suit Blocks Yukos Buy VILNIUS, Lithuania (Prime-Tass) -- No. 2 oil company Yukos' acquisition of a 26.85 percent stake in Lithuanian oil company Mazheikiu Nafta was annulled by a Lithuanian court Thursday, a move that surprised the Lithuanian government. Saulius Specius, an adviser to Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas, said the government had not yet received an original document spelling out the court's decision, but added that it ""was not going to sit on its hands."" Lawyers from Mazheikiu and Yukos were already working on an appeal of the decision, a spokesman for Mazheikiu said. The decision cancels 11 of the 12 decisions taken by Mazheikiu shareholders at their annual general meeting in April, including the decision to issue new shares for Yukos and to grant Yukos the right to buy them. The Lithuanian parliament approved an act last week acknowledging Yukos as a strategic investor and operator of Mazheikiu.

Georgia's foreign minister, Irakly Menagarishvili, said Georgian, Russian and U.S. officials may hold three-way talks on the controversy surrounding the Pankisi Gorge.

The Kremlin and the Russian Orthodox Church have spoken out against returning a statue of Soviet secret police founder Felix Dzerzhinsky to his pedestal on Lubyanskaya Ploshchad.

The last nine protesters jailed after riot police broke up their tent camp outside President Leonid Kuchma's office this week have been ordered not to leave their home cities pending the conclusion of criminal investigations.

U.S. pop star Lance Bass will resume his training Monday at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, outside of Moscow, but will not fly to the international space station in October.

U.S. officials said Friday they were encouraged by a telephone conversation that U.S. President George W. Bush had with President Vladimir Putin seeking support for U.S. action against Saddam Hussein.

Federation Council Senator Mikhail Margelov told U.S. Ambassador Alexander Vershbow on Friday that the United States must compensate Russia for economic damage incurred by what he saw as an unfair delineation of the border in the Bering Sea in a Soviet-era agreement.