RUSSIA

* Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Tuesday that he hopes military ties between the countries will strengthen

* Five Russian Tu-22 Blinder bombers will fire live missiles at a test range in East Siberia's Irkutsk Region during tactical exercises starting on Wednesday, the Air Force said

* Russian drifting station North Pole-36 (SP-36) will start operating in early September, the hydrometeorology service's Arctic and Antarctic research institute

* A deserted village named California in a Russian Volga province is likely to be removed from maps, following a decision by a committee of local lawmakers, a legislature spokesman said

* A Russian missile cruiser started on Tuesday patrols in the area around Norway's Arctic archipelago of Spitsbergen, to ensure security of Russia's maritime navigation in Arctic, a Navy spokesman said

* Russian state-run arms exporter Rosoboronexport denied on Tuesday any involvement in deliveries of Russian jet fighters to Sudan

* NATO expansion will not lead to greater stability in the world, the head of a post-Soviet security bloc said

* Russia hopes former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic will receive a fair trial at the UN tribunal, the Foreign Ministry said

* Witnesses in the case of Russian doomsday sect leader Pyotr Kuznetsov, whose followers recently spent six months underground, have been forced to testify in court, a Penza Region judicial spokesman said

* The joint Rubezh-2008 command-and-staff exercises of the CSTO bloc of post-Soviet states, which began in Armenia on Tuesday, are aimed at boosting joint defense capabilities, an Armenian security official said

* Activists from the banned anti-establishment National Bolshevik Party staged a protest against Russian prisons in the reception office of the penitentiary service headquarters on Tuesday, the service said

* Nanotechnology will soon allow people to have their blood plasma cleaned relatively inexpensively, the head of Russia's Nanotechnology Corporation told his American partners during a visit to the United States

* A total of 435 pigs have died of the African swine fever virus in Russia's North Caucasus republic of North Ossetia, the local emergency service said

* Ukraine's state oil and gas company Naftogaz told energy giant Gazprom on Tuesday that Russia is supplying more natural gas to Europe via Ukraine than it is obliged to under existing contracts

* Six people were killed on Tuesday morning in a car accident in southern Russia's Astrakhan Region, a spokesman for the regional emergencies ministry said

* The Russian construction company Inteko, which is owned by the mayor of Moscow's wife, Elena Baturina, is planning to invest about 500 million euros ($794 mln) in construction projects in Moroccan holiday resorts, a Russian business daily said

* The United Nations Security Council has held a closed session at Georgia's request to discuss an incursion into Georgian airspace by Russian military aircraft

* Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez arrived in Moscow on Tuesday for "strategic" talks on political, economic and defense cooperation

* A Russian carrier rocket has successfully put into orbit a fifth German SAR-Lupe reconnaissance satellite, a Russian Space Forces spokesman said

WORLD

* British oil major BP is recalling its 60 remaining technical specialists from Russia amid a conflict with Russian shareholders in joint oil venture TNK-BP, the company said

* A bill on preparing for the Russian Black Sea Fleet's withdrawal from Ukraine's Crimea by 2017 is ready and will soon be submitted to the Ukrainian parliament, the country's foreign minister said

* At least 13 people have died following a head-on collision between a bus and a truck in southern Brazil, national media reported

* A bulldozer driver was shot dead after ramming into vehicles in west Jerusalem on Tuesday afternoon, injuring sixteen people, national media reported

* Russia, which blocked UN sanctions against Zimbabwe's regime, believes the start of talks between the government and the opposition justify Moscow's veto, President Dmitry Medvedev said

* Arrested war crimes suspect Radovan Karadzic was hiding in Belgrade and worked in a private clinic using a false identity, Serbian officials said

* At least six of the 36 miners trapped in a coal mine in southern China have been confirmed dead, the state news agency Xinhua said

* Hotels in Beijing are cutting their prices as demand for rooms proves lower than expected in the run up to the Olympic Games, Chinese media said

* A British national has been detained in Kazakhstan on charges of organizing drug smuggling from Tajikistan to Europe, the country's National Security Committee said

* Turkish police have opened an investigation into almost a week of celebratory gunfire at a wedding in the southeast Turkish province of Sirnak, national media said

* Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez arrived in Moscow on Tuesday for "strategic" talks on political, economic and defense cooperation

* Russia's Nikolai Valuev is to fight John Ruiz for the vacant WBA heavyweight title in Berlin on August 30, the Russian said on his website

* Former Bosnia Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, on the run for over a decade after being charged with war crimes, has been arrested in Serbia, the country's president has announced

BUSINESS

* The Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service said on Tuesday it could ban indirect deals between aviation companies and fuel suppliers if an investigation confirms price collusion between the five largest oil companies

* Russia's government has approved a rise in Russian oil export duty of $97.8 to a record $495.9 per metric ton as of August 1, the government press service said

* Russian energy companies have signed cooperation agreements with Venezuela's state oil and gas company as part of President Hugo Chavez's official visit to Russia

* Russian energy companies have signed cooperation agreements with Venezuela's state oil and gas company as part of an official visit by the South American country's president to Russia

* Mobile TeleSystems (MTS), Russia's largest cell phone operator, said on Tuesday it had received back tax claims totaling 1.13 billion rubles (around $49 billion)

* The Lunnoye company is to build a new plant in the northeast Siberian republic of Yakutia to process uranium and gold ore, the republic's ministry for industry said