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MOSCOW - Russia successfully launched a military satellite on Thursday, finally putting it in orbit after several earlier attempts were aborted for technical reasons, an official said. A Ukrainian-made Zenit-2 rocket carrying the Kosmos-2406 satellite lifted off from the Russian launch complex in Baikonur, Kazakhstan at 5:28 a.m Moscow time and entered orbit 14 minutes later, a spokesman for the Space Forces said. The spokesman for the Space Forces, a military branch that carries out Russian military satellite launches with help from the nation's space agency, said the launch went as planned. Initially scheduled for March, the launch was pushed...

US banks were ordered to freeze the assets of three Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) charities, suspected of financing the al- Qaeda terrorist network Thursday (6 May). The US Treasury Department also asked the UN to add the charities to its list of suspected terrorist financiers. The three charities are Al Furqan, Al Haramain & Al Masjed Al-Aqsa Charity Foundation and the BiH branch of Taibah International, the treasury department said in a statement. "Unfortunately, we have seen the vulnerabilities of charities in countries like Bosnia and Herzegovina, where there is not only a need for charitable giving but also a...

National Lithuanian daily Lietuvos Rytas raised the issue of the conduct of the NATO troops recently deployed in the country. The newspaper wrote the story headlined "NATO soldiers are headache for the police". According to the paper, the incident when several NATO soldiers were beaten on the day of their arrival, was just a beginning. About 100 NATO troops (pilots and technical personnel) were deployed in town Zoknyai. They reside in the hotels of the nearby Shaulyai and seem to have a good time. Low prices for alcohol and sex services put some soldiers into excitement. General Commissar of Lithuanian...

Priest Velimir Stojanovic, who lives with his family in the churchyard of the Serbian Orthodox Church of St. Sava in the southern part of Kosovska Mitrovica, told Tanjug that the Greek soldiers protecting this shrine have forbidden the use of the church bells. "Representatives of KFOR introduced this ban with the explanation that Orthodox church bells irritate the Albanians," says Father Velimir. "The last time the bells were heard was on Easter Sunday, April 15 of this year," he explained, adding that so far he has not publicized this ban because he thought it was temporary. "The church bells did...

A former commander of the UN forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) has told the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague that, having witnessed the level of hatred in the area of Srebrenica in March 1993, he warned Slobodan Milosevic of a possible "terrible tragedy" there. Using the power he had over the Bosnian Serb leaders at the time, the former Yugoslav President prevented a likely massacre in May of that year, retired French General Philippe Morillon testified Thursday (12 February) at Milosevic's war crimes trial. Milosevic faces 66 counts of war crimes under three separate indictments for his...

BELGRADE (Reuters) - A helicopter carrying a man dressed as Santa Claus to street celebrations in a Serbian town has crashed, injuring several people. The helicopter crashed a few hundred metres (yards) from a crowd of children gathered to greet Santa in the central town of Kragujevac, witnesses and local media said on Tuesday. The pilot, co-pilot and the Santa were all injured, Beta news agency reported. Four people were injured but their lives were not in danger, a hospital official said. There was no word on the cause of the crash. Serbs celebrate Orthodox Christmas on January 7 but...

The Serbian Radical Party has become the biggest force in Serbian politics following the country's general election. It is unlikely it will be able to form a coalition to govern the country, but already there are fears that the destructive nationalism witnessed in Serbia during the wars of the 1990s is returning. The BBC's Matthew Price spoke to the party's vice-president, Tomislav Nikolic, to find out if this fear is justified. Do you think the tag ultra-nationalist is a fair one for your party? We are a Serbian national party. Most of us are Orthodox Serbs, but we also include...

The president of Serbia-Montenegro has apologised to the people of Bosnia- Hercegovina for atrocities committed during the 1992- 1995 war. Svetozar Marovic issued the apology - the first by a Belgrade official - during a visit to the Bosnian capital. "Individuals are guilty and they need to be held responsible," he said. The Bosnia atrocities form part of the genocide charges at the trial in The Hague of former Serbian and Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic. He is alleged to have helped the Bosnian Serbs in the war, but denies this. Bosnia is also suing Belgrade at the International Court of...

SOFIA, Sept 4 (AFP) - The self-declared commander of the banned Albanian Liberation Army (ANA), Avdil Jakupi, Thursday threatened to launch a separatist war in Macedonia in an interview with Bulgaria's bTV private television. "Macedonia cannot be a state because Prime Minister Branko Crvenkovski is a criminal who is implicated in the murder of (slain Serbian prime minister Zoran) Djindjic", Jakupi told bTV by telephone. "Because of this we will rise up and start a war," the rebel, who is wanted by Macedonian police, added. "Macedonia must become a protectorate of Europe and the United States." ANA on Monday issued...

A group of friends in Russia tries out a new invention — the talking vodka bottle. (ABCNEWS.com) When you open the bottle, the cap starts talking. It starts with practical instructions like "Pour," then, as the evening progresses, it produces an increasingly drunken mixture of shrieks, giggles and sound effects. "It starts out with one persona — the electronic vodka genie," inventor Dmitri Zhurin told the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda. "As the drinking progresses, he is joined by women, who start to laugh and shriek." The talking bottle cap looks just like a regular one. But packed inside are batteries, a...

By Alma Lama in Pristina (BCR No 430, 16-May-03) Kosovo: Religious Tuition Calls Spark Concern Islamic clerics step up campaign for religious instruction in schools, amid fears it could deepen inter-ethnic divisions. Petrit Carkagjiu is not your average advocate of religious education. The 26-year-old lead singer of rock band Jericho believes teaching Kosovo's kids about faith can protect from the cultural onslaught of computer games, MTV and blockbuster movies. "In the transitional phase that Kosovo is going through, where the rule of law is barely functioning, a lot depends on personal responsibility. So if we want to avoid corrupting society,...

The two constituent republics of Serbia and Montenegro have fallen out over what colours should be used in the new state's flag. An official from one of Montenegro's ruling parties described as "unacceptable and inappropriate" plans to use the Serbian tricolour. Branislav Radulovic told the Vijesti daily that a completely new flag should be created which "fully reflects the meaning of the state union". The Serbian and Montenegrin republican flags differ only in their shades of blue - dark and light respectively. "Not only is this proposal inappropriate and symbolically violating the essence of the union as a union of...

The Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in the Hague yesterday indicted the Serb ultranationalist, Vojislav Seselj, for alleged war crimes in Croatia and Bosnia. Mr Seselj, once a key ally of Slobodan Milosevic, said he knew the UN court had been preparing a warrant for his arrest, but said he planned to surrender voluntarily. "I will not let anyone arrest me," Mr Seselj, 48, told reporters in Belgrade. "I shall go when it pleases me." A prosecution spokeswoman, Florence Hartmann, said the indictment only became public yesterday and she could not explain how Mr Seselj had prior knowledge. He is charged...