Europe

BELGRADE – Italy’s Foreign Minister Federica Mogherini expressed the expectation Monday that Serbia would improve the level of alignment of its foreign policy with that of the EU, and her Serbian counterpart Ivica Dacic said that Serbia was already working on it.

Analysis of the black box flight recorders from a downed Malaysian airliner show it was destroyed by shrapnel coming from a rocket blast and went down because of "massive explosive decompression", a Ukrainian security official said on July 28.
   

Bulgarian socialists' Parliament chief said Monday it was "likely" that liberal Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) could decide not to return a mandate to form a government.

Outgoing Justice Minister Zinaida Zlatanova has called on political parties to agree on a declaration listing the goals in the sphere of judicial reform in the next 7 years.

Zlatanova and her colleagues at the Justice Ministry reported their achievements at a press conference on Monday, saying that they had accomplished as much as time had allowed them to.

U.S. publishes images claiming to show Russian attacks

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. has stepped up pressure on Russia by publishing satellite images allegedly showing missiles fired from Russia against the east of Ukraine.

Some also footage allegedly shows that heavy artillery, intended for pro-Russian activists, crossing the border.

BELGRADE - Serbia can have a very positive role in regional stability in the Western Balkans, in reforms in the process of European integration, as well as during its OSCE chairmanship, and the West is setting no ultimatums regarding the country's position on Russia, British Ambassador to Serbia Denis Keefe has said.

In June 2014, the number of trips of Bulgarians abroad was 411.1thousand or by 7.3% above the registered in June 2013, the National Statistical Institute reports.

Mikov was elected at a party congress on Saturday to replace Sergei Stanishev, who resigned earlier this month after the party’s poor showing in European elections in May and the subsequent collapse of the Socialist-led coalition government of Prime Minister Plamen Oresharski.

BELGRADE - President of the Coalition of Refugee Associations in Serbia Miodrag Linta wants all Croatian citizens living abroad to be allowed to register a temporary residence outside the Republic of Croatia for the period of five years and thus be able to preserve their Croatian IDs.

23.3% of households in Bulgaria live below the poverty threshold, according to Nikolay Nenkov from the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions in Bulgaria (CITUB).

Nenkov gave a press conference Monday to present a report on the cost of living in June 2014.