* President Vladimir Putin expressed his condolences to the families and friends of all those who died and pledged to make all the necessary assistance available
* President Vladimir Putin declared July 10 a day of mourning for the Siberian air crash victims
* A failure of the brake hydraulic system could have been the cause for the Siberian airbus crash, a source in the commission investigating the causes of the tragedy said
* European aircraft-maker Airbus, which manufactures A-310 airliners, said it would help Russia investigate an airbus crash in Siberia that claimed more than 100 lives
* A senior security official in Georgia's self-proclaimed republic of South Ossetia was killed Sunday in an apparently calculated assassination, the region's interior minister said
* Georgia's self-proclaimed republic of South Ossetia has stepped up border protection after the killing of its top security official, a spokeswoman for the South Ossetian leadership said
* Russia is not using energy as a political instrument, Industry and Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko said in an interview with U.S. Parade Magazine
* Russia could conclude bilateral talks with the U.S. on accession to the World Trade Organization before the summit of the G8 group of industrialized nations in St. Petersburg, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov said
* The ruble will fluctuate within the range of 26-27 rubles to the dollar in the next two to three years and inflation will hopefully be kept within the range of 8.5-9% in 2006, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov said
