CSKA Moscow's Brazilian striker Jo became the first non-CIS player to score four goals in the Russian Premier League, hitting the mark in a 5-1 demolition of Shinnik Yaroslavl on Sunday.

A man was handed an 18-month suspended sentence on Monday for threatening to kill a referee in a Russian Premier League match last season.

With just over nine months remaining before Russians lose the right to privatize state-issued apartments, a legislative race has begun to extend the deadline or abolish it altogether.

IKEA Russia is finally close to making a profit after six years of operations and nearly $2 billion in investments, the company's new general director, Per Kaufmann, said at a news conference last week to mark the company's anniversary.

Peeling facades, abandoned buildings and potholed lanes in Istanbul's trendy Beyoglu mask a housing market boom that is tempting foreigners to invest in the city and doubling the price of a Bosporus view.

Gref Says CPI to Increase Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref said consumer prices would probably increase in March at half the pace of February, Interfax reported Monday. The consumer price index probably will advance 0.6 percent this month, after the government curbed gains in prices for state-regulated monopolies and municipal services, the news agency said, citing comments by Gref in a meeting of President Vladimir Putin and senior government ministers. Industry and Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko said at the same meeting that there were not any grounds for gains in the prices of fuel and lubricants in the next two months, Interfax reported. (Bloomberg) Fradkov: Hold Oil Prices Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov urged oil companies to hold down prices to curb inflation and help farmers complete the spring sowing campaign. The situation ""is critical,"" Fradkov told executives from the country's biggest oil producers Monday, according to the government web site.

A suicide bomber attacked an army recruiting station near a U.S.-Iraqi military base in northern Iraq Monday, killing at least 30 people and wounding 30 others, the U.S. military said.

Hamas called Monday for talks with Western powers to try to reach a ""just peace"" in the Middle East but showed no sign of softening its stance on Israel as it presented its government to the Palestinian parliament.

Iceland has long been a pioneer in the battle against global warming, tapping its unique combination of volcanoes, geysers and thundering waterfalls to produce the electricity, heat and hot water it needs while protecting the environment.