Moscow - Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich is ready to dish out 5 million dollars (3.9 million euros) to pay the wages of national team coach Guus Hiddink and his staff, the Interfax news agency reported on Wednesday.

The agency cited the head of Abramovich's football acadamy, Sergei Kapkov, as saying that Abramovich has announced the payment as the salaries weren't paid on time by the Russian football federation.

The Chelsea owner Abramovich is to transfer the money to the Russian football federation to guarantee the salaries. The Dutchman Hiddink, who led Russia into the Euro

Moscow, Nov. 28 : Not so long ago, Vladimir Putin was adamant about changing Russia’s Constitution to allow a president to extend his or her four-year term thrice consecutively.

"The terms of presidential authority will not be changed under the current president," Putin had said unequivocally in 2001.

Now, months after leaving office and becoming prime minister, Putin is helping current President Dmitry Medvedev to rewrite the Constitution to extend the presidential term.

Moscow  - The son and daughter of slain investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya took the stand in her murder trial Thursday, talking about their mother's growing sense of threat in the days before her death, news agency Interfax reported.

"She warned me she had seen strange people hanging outside the entrance of the apartment building that weren't there earlier, and told me to be cautious," said Politkovskaya's daughter Vera, who moved in with her mother about one week before she was killed.

Washington/London/Moscow/Chicago, Nov. 27: There has been widespread international condemnation of the series of shootings across Mumbai in which at least
80 people have been killed and many more injured. Following are some of the statements issued by heads of state, government and leaders, as reported by the BBC.

"These outrageous attacks in Mumbai will be met with a vigorous response. I have sent a message to [Indian] Prime Minister [Manmohan] Singh that the UK stands solidly with his government as they respond, and to offer all necessary help. Urgent action is underway to offer every possible protection to British citizens in the region," said British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Moscow - Russia on Wednesday test-fired its new RS-24 intercontinental multiple-warhead ballistic missile designed to counter air-missile defence systems like the planned US shield in eastern Europe, the military said.

The RS-24 was launched from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Russia's northern region of Arkhangelsk at 16:20 local time (1320 GMT), a spokesman for the military' Strategic Missile Forces told news agency Interfax.

"It's the third launch of the RS-24 missile in the last two years. The previous launches in May and December 2007 were successful," the spokesman Alexander Vovk was quoted as saying.

Moscow  - A controversial judge in the trial of three men charged with murdering investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya will stay on Wednesday after the Moscow Military Court rejected prosecutors demands to dismiss him for bias.

Court spokesman Alexander Minchanovsky called the accusations against Judge Evgeny Zubov "baseless" and said the trial would resume Wednesday.

Proceedings have had a confused start in trial of slain reporter Politkovskaya, gunned down in a contract killing in front of her Moscow flat in 2006.