Moscow/Kiev - Customs formalities at the Russo-Ukrainian border have delayed a camel shipment for days and killed one animal, news agencies reported Tuesday.

The lorry-load of 19 surviving Bactrian (two-hump) camels had been en route from Russia's Caspian Sea autonomous republic Kalmykia to a Bulgarian zoo, only to be halted by Ukrainian border guards near the Russian city Rostov.

One camel died waiting as Russian and Ukrainian border officials wrangled for close to two weeks over the animals' further transit.

Moscow/Tbilisi - Georgia's interior ministry said Tuesday that two European ceasefire monitors had been detained by South Ossetia militia on the border of the separatist region and Georgia.

A spokesman for the ministry, Shota Utiashvili, told news agency Interfax that the two monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) were detained near the Georgian- controlled village of Adziv and taken to the separatist capital Tskhinvali.

Moscow- The Kremlin-controlled Russian gas firm Gazprom announced Friday it was to reduce gas prices to Europe.

This year the average price paid by European energy firms will go from 409 to 280 dollars per 1,000 cubic meters, according to the Interfax news agency, citing a company official.

Gas prices are closely tied to the oil price, which since last summer has plummeted by almost three-quarters to around 40 dollars a barrel.

Moscow - Iran's nuclear reactor built by Russia at Bushehr will be switched by the end of this year, the head of Russia's state nuclear energy agency said Thursday.

"We are moving according to schedule," Sergei Kiriyenko told reporters in a Kremlin briefing. "I am planning to be there in late February."

The United States and many Western European countries suspect Tehran's civilian nuclear energy programme of serving as cover for ambitions to build atomic weapons.

Bishkek/Moscow  - The Kyrgyz government on Wednesday moved to shut down a strategic US airbase on its territory, crucial to supplying US and NATO operations in Afghanistan.

The United States has 180 days to close the airbase in the Central Asian state, the head of the country's Security Council, Adukhan Madumarov told journalists in Moscow on Wednesday.

"We see the United States as a democratic civilized country and believe that this country will fully comply with all relevant international bilateral agreements," he was quoted by news agency Interfax as saying.

Moscow  - Former world nu