Main news of April 16

Russia:

* Russian President Dmitry Medvedev arrived in Hong Kong

* Experts conducting round-the-clock monitoring of radiation in Russia’s Far East say levels do not exceed natural background despite the accident at the Japanese nuclear power plant in March

* Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin says he will step down as chairman of the boards of directors of VTB bank and diamond producer Alrosa next week

* The pro-Kremlin Nashi youth group and the Russian opposition People’s Freedom Party have held separate rallies in Moscow to protest corruption

* Traffic police in Moscow will block streets near the capital’s main cemeteries as many Muscovites mark Easter by visiting the graves of loved ones

 

World:

* The Egyptian Supreme Administrative Court has ordered to dissolve the country’s ousted President Hosni Mubarak’s party

* An emergency law, which lasted for the last 48 years in Syria, can be lifted next week, the country’s President Bashar al-Assad said

* Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said that during the investigation into the Minsk metro bombing people, because of whose negligence the explosion was not prevented, were arrested

* Russia and Turkey scrapped the visa regime

* Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Kazakhstan saw the two sides sign deals on uranium supplies and Indian involvement in developing a Caspian Sea oilfield

* A suicide bomber dressed in an Afghan army uniform walked up to a military base near the eastern city of Jalalabad and blew himself up

* Five NATO troops and four Afghan soldiers were killed when a suicide bomber dressed in an army uniform struck at a military base in eastern Afghanistan