Minsk

BELGRADE - Serbian Defence Minister Bratislav Gasic conferred in Minsk with Belarus Defence Minister Yuri Viktorovich Zhadobin, when they agreed that the two countries' overall political relations are excellent and are marked by no open issues, the Serbian Defence Ministry released.

Turkey is planning to send an unofficial delegation to inspect the situation for Crimean Tatars in the Russian-annexed peninsula, Foreign Minister Mevlut Çavuşoğlu said on Nov. 10.

U.S. vice president warns Russia to honor commitments

WASHINGTON -- Joseph Biden warned Russia over Ukraine "after new columns of tanks, trucks and heavy artillery rumbled towards the pro-Moscow rebel stronghold of Donetsk."

BELGRADE - Serbian Defense Minister Bratislav Gasic will be on an official visit to Belarus from Monday till Wednesday, and he will meet with his Belarusian counterpart, Lieutenant-General Yuri Zhadobin.

Ministers Gasic and Zhadobin will discuss bilateral cooperation and sign an agreement on defense cooperation.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will meet US Secretary of State John Kerry in Beijing on Saturday ahead of next week's APEC summit, Russian news agencies reported on Friday.
      

Serbia's "essential role" in resolving Ukraine crisis

BELGRADE -- French Prime Minister Manuel Valls has said Serbia will "play an essential role" in resolving the crisis in Ukraine, when it assumed OSCE presidency in 2015.

"Special status" bill in danger of being scrapped

LUGANSK -- Officials of the self-proclaimed People's Republic of Lugansk are not concerned about Petro Poroshenko's intention to scrap a law on their special status.

The law would have given that status to the region of Donetsk and Lugansk.

Romania's Foreign Ministry (MAE) is not recognising 'the so-called elections' of November 2 organised by representatives of the separatist forces of the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Lugansk, which it sees as integrant and inseparable parts of a sovereign Ukraine, MAE reports in a press release issued on Monday.

Bulgaria does not accept presidential and parliamentary elections held on Sunday in Ukraine's Donbass as legitimate, Foreign Ministry officials say.

Genoveva Chervenakova, who heads the institution's press service, told the Bulgarian National Radio the vote was not in line with international law.

Alexandеr Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnitskiy, leaders of the Donetsk ad Luhansk "People's Republics" in Ukraine's east, are to remain leaders of the rebel-controlled entities after the regions held presidential and general elections Sunday.

Partial count cited by Russian and Ukrainian media outlets suggest they get over 70 and 60 percent, respectively.