The FINANCIAL -- At least 25 people were killed and another 13 wounded after a bus in southwest China veered off a mountain road and tumbled into a valley on January 29 morning, Xinhua news agency reported.

The FINANCIAL -- According to RIA Novosti, the Russian government has provided $200,000 in humanitarian assistance to the Democratic Republic of Congo following a plane crash last year, the Foreign Ministry said on January 28.

The FINANCIAL -- According to RIA Novosti, although hope remains that talks could be resumed on Kosovo, currently pressing Serbia for independence, it is fading, the Russian envoy to the status negotiations said on January 28.

The FINANCIAL -- According to RIA Novosti, Iran's president will travel to Iraq by March 20 for the first official visit by an Iranian leader in almost 30 years, the country's foreign minister said on January 28.