Main News of October 31

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD

* The Polish foreign minister on Wednesday warned Ukraine about the possible delay in signing the association deal with the European Union if Kiev fails to fulfill all conditions, including the timely release of a jailed former premier

* A surveillance plane carrying US and British military personnel is stranded in southern Siberia because it has not paid airport servicing fees, the Russian Defense Ministry said

* Russian hockey goaltender Semyon Varlamov has been arrested by Denver police on charges of kidnapping and assault, the US city's sheriff department said

* A woman accused of being involved in defrauding Kazakhstan's BTA Bank of billions of dollars is to remain in detention until February, the Kommersant newspaper reported

* A court in the former Soviet republic of Georgia found a former interior minister not guilty Thursday of hazing police officers last year

* Syria has destroyed equipment at all its declared chemical weapons production sites, the global chemical weapons watchdog said

* Federal prosecutors have refused to say whether they've recommended the death penalty for Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev as a deadline approaches for them to send their proposal to US Attorney General Eric Holder

* Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov is set to build a $50 million training facility atop an industrial building with a view of the Statue of Liberty for his Brooklyn Nets team of the National Basketball Association (NBA), the sports website SB Nation reported

* US aviation authorities announced Thursday what many bored and disgruntled airline passengers have long suspected: that airlines can safely expand the use of electronic gadgets like iPads, games and e-books during all phases of flight

* A Colorado judge Thursday set a $5,000 bail for Russian hockey goaltender Semyon Varlamov after he was arrested for allegedly stomping on his girlfriend and dragging her by her hair

* Iran’s foreign minister said Thursday that Tehran would continue enriching uranium to 20 percent purity to power a nuclear reactor, denying a senior lawmaker’s earlier claims of a temporarily halt, Iranian news network Press TV reported

* A popular ski resort town in western Ukraine has cut off mobile phone communications due to residents’ concerns about “dangerous radiation,” Ukrainian media reported

RUSSIA

* The US Department of the Treasury said on Wednesday that it had blacklisted three Russians, including a popular Russian crooner, over links with an international criminal group

* Fugitive former US security contractor Edward Snowden has found a website maintenance job in Russia, his lawyer said

* Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation is to open a new facility for the production of composite wings for the new MS-21 passenger jet by the end of the year, the company said

* Russia’s Defense Ministry plans to launch a campaign to root out drug abuse in the army and military schools, local media reported

* Corruption in Russia has cost the country damages worth more than an estimated 10 billion rubles ($312 million) this year, the Kremlin administration chief said

* About 30 fans were detained in the Central Russian city of Yaroslavl on Wednesday following a violent brawl during a football match, a police spokesman said

* Russia was named seventh best country for expatriates in an annual survey involving more than 7,000 expats worldwide and described as one of the largest of its kind

* Two Russian Tupolev Tu-160 Blackjack strategic bombers arrived in Nicaragua on Thursday after taking off from an airbase in Venezuela, the Russian Defense Ministry said

* Russian law enforcement officials said Thursday that they have found over 1,000 World War II artillery shells near the southern Russian city of Volgograd

* Police are investigating crowd trouble at a football match late Wednesday that forced the referee to stop proceedings for half an hour while authorities used water cannons to disperse belligerent fans

* Police have arrested a top official at Russia’s state construction committee for making a fraudulent deal worth around a million dollars, the Interior Ministry said

* A Moscow court revoked the license of a popular news portal Thursday for featuring purportedly indecent language in videos posted on its website

* A group of Russian lawmakers from the ruling United Russia party has proposed canceling the work permits of foreigners convicted of crimes of any sort, an author of the initiative told RIA Novosti

* A Russian innovation center that is the pet project of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Thursday it will contribute over 200 billion rubles ($6.2 billion) to the Russian economy through 2020

* A senior Moscow Region police officer said Thursday that over 16 percent of crimes in the region are committed by foreign migrants

* Russian investigators on Thursday named two suspects believed to have been involved in a deadly double explosion in Russia’s volatile North Caucasus republic of Dagestan

* Russian investigators finalized charges on Thursday against one of several officials implicated in a major Defense Ministry embezzlement scandal

* The Russian football association's disciplinary committee has fined top-flight side FC Kuban $15,000 for desecration of the Dagestani flag after the team's fans were photographed burning it during a game against Anzhi Makhachkala this week

* An elderly woman in northern Russia who sought supernatural help was duped into paying thousands of dollars just to listen to music on the phone, police said

* A Siberian man fatally stabbed a woman living with him because she distracted him from watching television, local investigators said

* Russian customs officials said Thursday that at least 300 trucks exporting goods from Ukraine were lined up at the border as tensions between the two countries escalate