Moscow/Warsaw/Washington - The office of Barack Obama Saturday said the president-elect has no commitment to building a missile defence shield in Eastern Europe.

The statement from Denis McDonough, Obama's senior foreign policy adviser, came as Russia and Poland jockeyed for attention from the administration-in-waiting over the disputed defence system that Poland and Czech Republic have approved.

India may import liquefied natural gas (LNG) to satisfy growing demand of energy in the country. Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Murli Deora said on Friday that Indian oil and gas companies must involve in Russian oil and gas fields.

Mr. Deora recently visited Russia and discussed various issues with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Moscow on November 5. He asked the PM for two million tonnes of LNG per year from Russia's Sakhalin LNG project. He also raised the issue of stake in big-ticket Sakhalin-3 oil and gas field in the meeting with the Russian PM.

Moscow  - At least 20 sailors and civilians were killed on board a Russian nuclear submarine in an accident apparently caused by a defect in the fire suppression system, a military spokesman said early Sunday.

The accident occurred in a submarine belonging to Russia's Pacific fleet with 208 people on board, Navy spokesman Igor Dygalo said, according to the Interfax agency.

The official said the submarine was not damaged in the accident and no radioactivity was released. There was also no measured rise in radioactivity.

President Dmitri Medvedev was informed about the accident.

At the time of the accident, there were 208 people including 81 sailors on board. The dead included sailors and shipyard workers.

Brussels - Lithuania and Poland should bow to the majority of European Union member states and approve the immediate relaunch of talks on a strategic deal with Russia, despite their own security concerns, top EU officials warned Friday.

The decision to restart talks "may not be 100 per cent what your feelings are, but it's better for you to be together with all the other (EU) states in expressing a view rather than having some countries making agreements with Russia and others not," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said.

Moscow - General Motors, the world's largest automaker, on Friday opened a 300-million-dollar factory, its first fully-owned venture in Russia.

GM joins five other foreign carmakers with plants in the outskirts of St Petersburg, an area coming to be known as the new Detroit of the automotive industry, as firms hope to compensate for slumping sales in Europe and North America.

Moscow/Tbilisi - Nearly 10,000 Georgian opposition supporters demonstrated against President Mikheil Saakashvili on Friday, the first major rallies since Georgia's war with Russia in August.

The march marked the first anniversary of a police crackdown on anti-government protestors in 2007. Saakashvili then drew western condemnation when riot police used tear gas, rubber bullets and water guns to breakup the protests and was pushed to call snap elections.

A coalition of opposition parties renewed demands for early presidential and parliamentary elections, promising more rallies towards holding a vote in the spring of 2009.