Ramallah - Russia's decision to recognise the independence of
Georgia's rebel regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia was
"regrettable," US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Tuesday.

"It (the decision) puts Russia in opposition to a number of (United
Nations) Security Council resolutions to which it is a party," she told
a news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah, after meeting
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree Tuesday
recognizing the breakaway regions' independence, after Russian

Almaty, Aug. 26: The five republics of Central Asia and Russia need to consider adopting a united approach to ward off external threats, particularly from the West, said a Kazakh professor of history.

Speaking to ANI on the sidelines of a Central Asian and Caucasian security cooperation moot, Professor Marat E. Shaikhutdinov, Director of the Institute of World Economy and Politics (IWEP), said that recent conflict between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia had left the leaderships and people of Central Asia quite concerned about Central Asian and Euro- Asian security.

Stockholm - Strained relations with Moscow over the recent conflict in Georgia will not affect the construction of a gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea to provide Russian gas directly to Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Monday.

Speaking during a visit to Stockholm for talks with Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, Merkel said the approval process would be carried out in all the countries affected and brought to a conclusion.

"The pipeline is a strategic European project," Merkel said.

Vienna - The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has started to increase the number of its observers to monitor the ceasefire in Georgia, a spokeswoman said Monday.

In addition to the eight military monitors that had been stationed in Georgia's capital Tbilisi, six officers from Finland, France and the United States have been deployed to the country in the past days, Sonya Yee said.

A total of 20 monitors will arrive within the coming days. The unarmed officers are being recruited from a pool of 23 countries, Yee said.

Moscow  - Russia said Monday it would scale down WTO accession talks and pull out from trade agreements concluded with a mind toward membership, the news agency Interfax quoted Premier Vladimir Putin as agreeing with top ministers.

"We should pursue negotiations and working groups on Russia's WTO accession, but we will inform our partners of the need to exit some agreements which currently oppose the interests of the Russian Federation," first deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov was quoted by the agency as saying.

Putin approved the plan as "sensible."