Main news of August 13

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD

* Belarus has not recognized the former Georgian republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia because Russia refused to help it cope with the consequences of such a step, the Belarusian president said

* The United States and the European Union have backed the idea of setting up an international emergency response system, Russian Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu said

* The Kyrgyz interim government stripped the country's first president, Askar Akayev, of immunity and demanded his extradition from Russia

* A New York judge set February 28, 2011, as the start date for the trial on drug smuggling charges of a Russian pilot detained in Liberia and transferred to the United States

RUSSIA

* The section of the U.S. Department of State's Country Report on Terrorism 2009 covering Georgia is surprisingly biased, a statement published on the Russian Foreign Ministry's website said

* The Russian government has ordered antitrust, law enforcement and other related agencies to monitor food prices and crack down on speculators, the first deputy prime minister said

* The presidents of Russia's North Caucasus republics are to ask the lower house of the Russian parliament, the State Duma, for new titles, a spokesman for Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov said

* The shipment of Russian fuel to the Bushehr nuclear reactor shows that Iran has no reason to continue its nuclear activity, the French Foreign Ministry said

* The Russian Prosecutor General's Office has sent a case of price fixing on medical equipment bought under government contracts to its special investigations committee, spokeswoman Irina Gridneva said

* Areas affected by wildfires in Russia shrank by 15,000 hectares over the past 24 hours, the Emergency Situations Ministry said

BUSINESS

* Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin backed the Federal Antimonopoly Service's proposal to create a grain exchange

* The two biggest U. S. poultry producers have proposed programs for rearing poultry in line with Russian requirements, Russia's food safety watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor said

DEFENSE

* The deployment of S-300 air defense systems in Abkhazia is not a violation of Russia's international obligations, the Russian Foreign Ministry said