Main news of December 14

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours.

WORLD

* Presidential elections in Moldova’s breakaway region of Transdnestr are set for a run-off after early results showed no candidate would win more than 50 percent of the vote

* The death toll after a gun-and-grenade attack in the eastern Belgian city of Liege has risen to six, including the gunman, and has left over 120 injured

* The Ukrainian Pechersk District Court dropped charges against former President Leonid Kuchma, who is accused of giving orders to kill opposition journalist Georgiy Gongadze in 2000.

RUSSIA

* Moscow city authorities gave permission for a 50,000-strong rally to protest against alleged election fraud in favor of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's party, officials said

*The speaker of Russia’s lower house of parliament, Boris Gryzlov, has said he is quitting his post

* Russian radical opposition leader and controversial writer Eduard Limonov applied for registration as an independent presidential candidate

* Russia’s first Tu-214ON aircraft specially equipped for the international Open Skies program has successfully completed a series of test flights, the plane maker sai

BUSINESS

* Iran fully supports a proposal to introduce a five-year moratorium on sturgeon fishing in the Caspian Sea, the Novosti-Azerbaijan news agency said