Main news of September 21

RUSSIA

* Russia's gross domestic product grew 7.7% year on year in January-August 2008, Economic Development Minister Elvira Nabiullina said

* Viewers of the Russian adult animation channel 2x2 that is facing charges of promoting extremism held a sanctioned rally in St. Petersburg in support of the channel

* Dinara Safina won the Pan Pacific Open title, beating fellow Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-1, 6-3

WORLD

* At least 53 people were killed and another 226 injured in a suicide bomb attack on the Marriott hotel in Pakistan's capital on Saturday, Pakistani officials said

* The Czech ambassador to Pakistan died in a suicide bomb attack on the Marriott hotel in Pakistan's capital on Saturday that killed at least 53 people, Pakistani officials said

* Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said the Islamic Republic's military will "break the hands" of any aggressor, if attacked

* Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the Cabinet that he was resigning

* Slovenians voted in a parliamentary election, with center-right Prime Minister Janez Jansa and his conservative Slovene Democratic Party facing challenge from the opposition leftist Social Democrats and their leader Borut Pahor

* Twelve people died after a truck smashed into a minibus in the Central Asian Republic of Kazakhstan, the republic's emergencies ministry said