* Russia could raise its oil export duty by more than $40 to $200 per metric ton from June 1, a Finance Ministry official said
* Russia suspended imports of livestock and meat products from Kazakhstan due to outbreaks of foot-and-mouth disease, Russia's food safety watchdog said
* Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is alive and continues to plan military attacks on "infidels," a Taliban warlord said in an interview with the Al-Jazeera television channel
* Ukraine's Supreme Administrative Court banned holding early parliamentary elections amid the ongoing political turmoil in the former Soviet country, the justice minister said
* Ukraine's Constitutional Court is in a closed doors session on the presidential move to dissolve parliament as the country awaits a decision in the ongoing political turmoil
* Centrist Francois Bayrou, who gained 18.5% of the vote in Sunday's presidential election in France, said he does not intend to back any candidate in the runoff
* Exhumation of Soviet soldiers' remains near the Bronze Soldier statue in Tallinn will start soon, but the statue will not be moved before VE Day May 9, Estonia's Prime Minister Andrus Ansip said
* The third military convoy left a Russian military base in Georgia as part of a deal on the withdrawal of Russian military bases from the South Caucasus country, signed in 2006
* A special mission of the UN Security Council will arrive in Belgrade to monitor the situation around Serbia's breakaway province of Kosovo on Russia's initiative
* EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and European MPs urged Russia to abandon using energy as a political weapon and resume oil supplies to Lithuania
* The Council of Europe issued a reminder to Russia about the need to ratify an additional protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights
* Russia's largest crude producer LUKoil obtained a $250 million loan refinancing facility, the company said
* Russian oil company RussNeft will begin developing two oil fields in Azerbaijan May 3, a Russian trade representative in the Caspian country said
* Russia's government-controlled foreign trade bank Vneshtorgbank (VTB) bought a 7.69% stake in VTB Bank (Deutschland) AG at an auction for Yukos assets, the federal property fund said
* Russia's state-controlled foreign trade bank Vneshtorgbank (VTB) set the indicative price range for its planned global offering at 11.3-13.9 kopeks per share, the bank's press office said
* Japan's Marubeni, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) and Chubu Electric Power Co., Inc. (Chubu) closed a deal with a Kazakh uranium producer expected to meet 25% of Japan's needs, a Tokyo newspaper said
* Russian border guards in the Sea of Okhotsk have seized a refrigerated fish transport flying the flag of Belize on suspicion of poaching, a spokesman for the Northeastern border control department said
