Main news of November 25

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD
* The Palestinian leadership does not believe that an Israeli offer to limit settlement construction for ten months is sufficient for peace talks to restart, a PNA spokesman said

* Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will start a two-day visit to France on Thursday, during which the two countries may finally agree on the purchase of a French Mistral-class amphibious assault ship

* Turkmenistan and Italy signed a number of bilateral cooperation agreements during Turkmen leader Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov's visit

* Geneva prosecutor's office opened on Wednesday an investigation into a drunken high-speed car race which involved four Russians and left a pensioner severely injured, the Swiss ATS news agency said

* Iran on Wednesday completed the first day of the third stage of an air-defense exercise, which saw the test firing of modern missile systems, the ISNA news agency said

* U.S. space shuttle Atlantis undocked from the International Space Station (ISS) on Wednesday and is set to return to earth on Friday, NASA said

* Philippine President Gloria Arroyo has declared Wednesday to be a national day of mourning for victims of Monday's politically-motivated massacre, Philippine News Agency reported

* The U.S. has begun preparations to send an additional military contingent of 34,000 troops to Afghanistan, CNN has said citing defense ministry sources

RUSSIA

* Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who recently died in a Moscow prison, aided the company's owner in a scheme to illegally buy and sell Gazprom stock, Russian investigators said

* Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko is trying to stir up tensions in Russian-Ukrainian ties ahead of upcoming elections, a Russian MP said

* The sixth Runet national award ceremony was held in Moscow on Wednesday

* The upper house of Russia's parliament adopted on Wednesday the federal budget for 2010 and basic budget parameters through 2012

* Russia has launched a national domain name .рф - Russian Federation - using the Cyrillic alphabet instead of Latin letters on Wednesday, a spokeswoman for the national domain coordination center said

* Russia's Proton-M rocket, which was launched late on Tuesday after a one-day delay, has delivered Europe's Eutelsat W7 communications satellite to orbit, the Federal Space Agency said

BUSINESS

* Ukraine will have to pay about $280 per 1,000 cubic meters of Russian gas in 2010, a spokesman for Russia's energy giant Gazprom said

SPORT

* CSKA Moscow came from behind to beat German champions Wolfsburg 2-1 in the Russian capital on Wednesday evening and keep their hopes of progress to the last 16 of the Champions League alive