Main news of October 19

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD

* The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog said that Monday's talks between Iran and world powers on a new uranium enrichment deal have started positively

* Serbia is close to signing a deal for a $1.5-billion Russian loan, the Balkan country's first deputy prime minister Bozidar Djelic said

* The director of a major children's holiday camp on Ukraine's Black Sea coast has said that he wants to be questioned as soon as possible over allegations that children were sexually abused at the camp

* The next round of Russian- U.S. consultations on a replacement for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START 1) will be held on Monday in Geneva

RUSSIA

* Russia's Foreign Ministry said on Monday that a Japanese minister's recent statement on the territorial dispute over the Kuril islands was out of line with the Japanese leadership's aim of improving dialogue

* Russia and the EU have started negotiations on the wording of a new partnership and cooperation agreement, the Russian foreign minister said

* The Russian branches of seven multinational food and soft drink companies signed a deal on Monday to restrict advertising aimed at children under 12 from 2010

* Russia guarantees uninterrupted natural gas supplies to Europe, and will solve gas transit problems taking into account the interests of all parties, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said

* Ukraine officially launched on Monday a presidential election campaign, the first since the 2004 "orange revolution" that swept Viktor Yushchenko to power

* The arrest of the top law-enforcement official in an east Siberian region could be linked to a smuggling investigation against a Russian jewelry firm, a business paper reported

* Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Monday offered President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad cooperation in the fight against terrorism and extremism, the Kremlin press service said

* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will attend a meeting of the EU-Russia Permanent Partnership Council in Brussels on Monday, a ministry spokesman said

* No one is entitled to settle the issue of Kosovo's independence without Serbia having its say, the Russian president said ahead of his Tuesday visit to Belgrade

BUSINESS

* Turkey's government has approved geological exploration work for the South Stream gas pipeline in its Black Sea economic zone, the Kremlin quoted the countries' presidents as saying

* Three Russian oil companies signed an agreement on Monday with Turkey's Calik Enerji and Italy's Eni on a pipeline project to pump Caspian oil to the Mediterranean via Turkey

* The oil arm of Russian energy giant Gazprom has obtained a medium-term unsecured $500 million loan from a syndicate of banks, Gazprom Neft said in a statement

SPORT

* Russia will have to overcome Slovenia to reach the 2010 World Cup finals in South Africa, following Monday's draw for the playoffs