New Delhi, Nov 17 : Minister of State for Industry Dr. Ashwani Kumar stressed upon the need to increase the level of trade and economic engagement between India and Belarus on Monday.

He was speaking at the bilateral meeting between him and Rusetsky, Minister of Industries, Republic of Belarus in New Delhi today.

Riga- Latvia and Belarus formally demarcated their border Thursday in a signing ceremony in the Latvian capital, Riga.

The move officially sets part of the European Union's eastern border.

The final protocol of the Latvia-Belarus state border demarcation was signed by Irina Mangule of the Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Colonel Alexander Arhipov of the Belarus Border Guard. The ceremony ended a process that had gone on for more than ten years.

Minsk - Belarusian President Aleksander Lukashenko called for a "multipolar world" not dominated by any superpower, upon Libyan leader Moamer Gaddafi's arrival in the former Soviet republic.

Gaddafi was in the Belarusian capital Minsk on the first of a two-day official visit.

Lukashenko, isolated internationally because of his authoritarian regime, in a welcome statement to Gaddafi argued smaller countries must band together, to block hegemony by a major country.

Moscow - Russian President Dimitry Medvedev met outside Moscow on Saturday with his Belarus counterpart, Alexander Lukashenko, for talks focusing on the financial crisis.

A spokeswoman for Medvedev said the two leaders discussed the world financial crisis, with the talks coming a few days after Russia promised a loan of 2 billion dollars to Belarus.

Belarus needs the financial support in order to be able to finance purchases of Russian gas in the coming winter months.

In another development in Minsk, Lukashenko's chancellery office has welcomed a move by the European Union to lift for six months a temporary travel ban which the EU had imposed on Lukashenko and other members of the Belarus government.

Moscow/Minsk - Moscow will give Belarus a two billion dollar credit to purchase Russian natural gas Minsk cannot otherwise afford, the Belapan news agency reported Tuesday.

Russian Finance Minister Aleksei Kudrin announced the loan at a Moscow press conference. At least half of the money would be transferred to the Belarusian government by the end of 2008, he said.

Luxembourg - European Union foreign ministers were Monday due to discuss re-starting cooperation talks with Russia amid disagreement over whether Moscow had fully complied with a peace deal in Georgia.

Ministers arriving at their meeting in Luxembourg indicated that reaching consensus on the strategic Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) talks would be difficult.

"We have to take it fairly slowly," said Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb. "I do not expect a decision (on the PCA) to be taken today."

Stubb chairs the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), which has a military monitoring operation in Georgia.