Moscow - The splurge of oil profits feeding Russia's years of growth has turned sticky with falling production and energy prices.

This double whammy is threatening to undercut the government's economic policy as the industry that is its main source of revenue takes a battering from the country's worst financial crisis in a decade.

Scooping huge oil windfalls into state coffers over the oil industry's boom years from 1999 to 2004 has been at the root of Russia's ideology under former President Vladimir Putin.

The surplus helped pay back a national debt as part of a therapy to recover from the humiliation an impoverished Russia suffered by the Soviet collapse and then move toward a resurgent foreign policy.

Taipei - Taipei is filling up potholes, removing the sensitive Taiwanese national flags from roadsides and holding police drills to prepare for next week's Taiwan-China dialogue.

Hundreds of policemen are combing each floor of the Grand Hotel, venue of the November 3-7 dialogue, and its surrounding hills to check for bombs and security gaps.

The island will mobilize 7,000 policemen to maintain order and assign 40 bodyguards to protect Chinese negotiator Chen Yunlin's safety. Chen will arrive on November 3 leading a 60-member delegation.

The dialogue will be the most important talks between Taiwan and China in a half century. President Ma Ying-jeou called it a milestone in Taiwan-China ties.

Beijing - Severe snowstorms have left at least nine people dead and trapped hundreds in China's Tibet region, state media said on Saturday.

Rescuers had evacuated 1,892 people in the worst-hit counties of Lhunze and Cuona in Tibet's Shannan district and were trying to reach some 250 people still trapped by heavy snowfall, the semi-official China News Service said.

Most of the nine people who died had either frozen to death or were hit by falling buildings brought down by the weight of snow, other reports said.

The worst-hit areas reported snow lying an average of 1.5 metres deep after heavy snow fell for 36 hours continuously earlier this week, the official China Daily said.

Washington, Nov 1: ‘Full House’ star Ashley Olsen has pledged to keep her kids miles away from pursuing a career in Hollywood, insisting that the industry has turned "ugly".

Along with twin sister Mary-Kate, the 22-year-old began filming their first starring roles in U. S. TV series Full House at nine-months-old before launching a media empire with their company Dualstar in 1993.

However, Ashley is convinced her own children would have a less pleasant experience growing up in the limelight than her own, reports Contactmusic.

London, Nov 1: Holly Madison, it seems, didn’t took much time to get over Playboy mogul Hugh Hefner, for the busty blonde has reportedly fallen under the spell of ‘mindfreak’ Criss Angel.

London, November 1: ‘Take That’ has made a record sell-out with its 600,000 tour tickets vanishing in just four-and-a-half hours.

Becoming the fastest selling tour in UK history, the band’s 2009 stadium tour, ‘The Circus’, has managed to displace Michael Jackson’s record sales of ‘Bad tour’ tickets in 1987, reports the Daily Star.

The tour tickets, which were put on sale at 9 am, were all sold by 1.30 pm – despite the added announcement of two extra shows at Wembley and Manchester.

While many fans queued themselves in the cold to make sure they would see their favourite group perform, others crashed the Internet sites by flooding the cyberspace in want of the passes.