Russia downed Slovakia 3-1 at the Baltika Cup international ice hockey tournament on Saturday.

Racist abuse has dismayed the European governing soccer body.

The day after the Republican triumph in the U.S. midterm elections, a jubilant Trent Lott held a celebratory press conference.

A world without warmth, a world without light. It's what our ancient ancestors most feared.

White House said that President Bush had ""complained privately about his failure to exercise physically.""

With a spectacular triple bank shot, Karl Rove and President George W. Bush, the Butcher Cassidy and Sundance Kid of politics, blew away Trent Lott, Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton.

In a column late last summer I told how our dacha was besieged by wasps.

Foreign Banks' Access MOSCOW (AP) -- The Finance Ministry has drafted legislation giving foreign banks greater access to the Russian banking sector, Interfax reported Friday. The proposed amendments to the country's banking law would allow foreign banks to acquire up to 10 percent of shares or stakes in the charter capital of a Russian lending institution without government permission, Interfax said. It was not immediately clear when the government might submit the legislation to parliament. During the first nine months of this year, the number of Russian banks with foreign capital grew by three to 129 and the number of banks fully controlled by nonresidents grew from five to 28, the report said. Iraq Oil Deal 'Reserved' MOSCOW (MT) -- Despite scrapping a contract with LUKoil to develop the West Qurna 2 oil field, Iraq considers it Russia's, a top Iraqi oil ministry official said in Cairo on Saturday, Agence France Presse reported.

Russia's state stability increased according to the Lehman Brothers Eurasia Group Stability Index.

Standard & Poor's on Friday gave a thumbs down to last week's $1.86 billion joint purchase of Slavneft by Sibneft and TNK.

Top oil producer LUKoil said on Friday it will sell its stake in a key Azeri oil field to Japan's unlisted Inpex for $1.375 billion in one of the biggest transactions in Russian corporate history.