ENNISKILLEN, Northern Ireland - Global leaders at the G-8 summit called for peace talks to resolve Syria’s civil war Tuesday, but made no mention of arming the rebels or what should happen to President Bashar Assad.

“We remain committed to achieving a political solution to the crisis based on a vision for a united, inclusive and democratic Syria,” said a final communique.

The document made no mention of Assad, whom Western leaders have said in the past said must step down as part of a resolution.

However, in an indication of some agreement, it did call on both sides to commit to “destroying and expelling” al-Qaeda-affiliated groups and removing “any other non-state actors linked to terrorism.”

President Barack Obama echoed that concern, saying it was important to build a strong opposition in Syria that could function if Assad loses power.

Isolated at the G-8, Russia's Vladimir Putin had clashed with other leaders over the conflict and resisted their attempts to get him to agree to anything that would imply Assad should step down or that Russia should tone down its support for Assad.

Obama and U.S. allies want Assad to cede power while Putin, whose rhetoric has become increasingly anti-Western since he was re-elected last year, believes that would be disastrous at a time when no clear transition plan exists.

Russia has been Assad's most powerful supporter as his forces struggle to crush an uprising in which an estimated 93,000 people have been killed since March 2011. He can also count on backing from Iran.

The United States, Turkey, and European and Gulf Arab states support the rebels, who have lost ground to Assad's troops in recent weeks.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, speaking on the summit sidelines, said earlier that Russia had refused to accept any mention of Assad's fate in the communique.

"This would be not just unacceptable for the Russian side, but we are convinced that it would be utterly wrong, harmful and would completely upset the political balance," Ryabkov said.

Slideshow: Syria uprising

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A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.

Launch slideshow

Russia and the United States agree the warring sides should be brought together to discuss Syria's future at a peace conference possibly as soon as July. 

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said the leaders’ talks on the issue had been more successful than anticipated, given the strong differences between Russia and the West.

"We have a very different outcome and much better outcome than I thought we were going to have," Harper told reporters. Before the summit, Harper had said he feared Putin's support for Syria would make a G-8 agreement difficult.

"I think this was a very significant move on the part of Mr. Putin and the Russians," he said.

The United Nations says 93,000 people have been killed in Syria and 1.6 million Syrians have fled abroad. Lebanon, the smallest of Syria's neighbors, has taken in more than half a million Syrian refugees.

Related:

• Obama and Putin cite differences on Syria but say they want violence to end
• Obama announces extra $300 million in aid for Syrians, refugees
• US military officials say help for Syria likely to escalate gradually

This story was originally published on Tue Jun 18, 2013 12:18 PM EDT

BEIJING -- More than 200 bear paws were discovered being smuggled into China in the tires of a van, Chinese officials told local media.

Video footage showed customs officers removing the 213 severed paws, which included large, adult ones and smaller ones from younger bears, from inside the tires.

They were laid out in rows in front of news cameras.

There were varying estimates of the value of the haul – said to be the biggest by Chinese authorities – but China Central Television reported it would have been worth about 2.8 million yuan (about $460,000) on the black market.

Reuters

The bear paws were found hidden inside the tires of a van driving across the border from Russia to China last month.

CCTV said that two Russian suspects were detained when the paws were discovered in Manzhouli, Inner Mongolia, in May and they were awaiting trial. It said bear paws were believed by some people in China to have high nutritional value.

"This case is quite special as it occurred in May, which is not a peak time for smuggling bear paws as the weather is too warm to keep the paws fresh," Sun Rongxin, an official from Manzhouli customs, told the People's Daily.

China's Global Times reported the paws were believed to be from brown bears, a protected animal in China.

"The demand is huge because more people can afford them and the country has the tradition to treat bear paw as a rare ingredient for cuisine or as an expensive present," Zhang Xiaohai, director of China's external affairs office for the Animals Asia Foundation, told the paper.

"Bear farms in China exacerbate the situation as they also sell paws illegally which stimulates the growing trade," he added.

Animals Asia has been campaigning against the farming of bears in China and other countries for their bile, which is used in traditional medicine. The group says "most farmed bears" are kept in small cages for up to 30 years and that the bile extraction process is painful.

Last month, 30,000 people took part in events in 20 cities in China to show their opposition to bile farming.

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• Rescued bear cubs now poster children to end harvesting bile from bears
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• 257 bears killed on first day of NJ hunt

Evan Vucci / AP

President Barack Obama meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, on Monday. The two leaders met privately to discuss security matters and a deal to reduce nuclear arms.

ENNISKILLEN, Northern Ireland -- President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin said they would sign an agreement on securing and destroying nuclear material to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, replacing a 1992 deal that expired on Monday.

Obama and Putin met privately at the G-8 summit to talk about pressing security issues and agreed to work together to protect, control and account for nuclear weapons.

"I think it is an example of the kind of constructive, cooperative relationship that moves us out of a Cold War mindset," Obama said after meeting with Putin.

Ben Rhodes, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said Russia had been reluctant to extend the agreement, which was signed after the collapse of the Soviet Union and was known as the Nunn-Lugar agreement after former Democratic Senator Sam Nunn and former Republican Senator Richard Lugar.

Rhodes said the Russians' concerns were "well founded in some respects," noting the Nunn-Lugar agreement had taken a "very aggressive and intrusive" approach to securing nuclear material in Russia.

On Monday, Nunn applauded the new deal, although he noted that some parts of the old one focused on chemical and biological weapons would not continue.

"We must find ways beyond this agreement to work together on these critical issues," he said. "I believe that we will."

Related stories:

• Obama and Putin cite differences on Syria but say they want violence to end
• Derelict Northern Ireland shops get facelift ahead of G-8 summit
• 'Like a war movie': Painful past of the small town hosting the G-8 summit

Kristin M. Hall / AP

An Mi-17 helicopter used by the Afghan Air Force sits on Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan.

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon said on Monday it will spend $572 million to buy 30 Russian-built military helicopters that will be used by Afghan security forces.

The Mi-17 helicopters will be used by Afghanistan's National Security Forces Special Mission Wing, which supports counter-terrorism, counter-narcotics and special operations missions.

The contract with Rosoboronexport, the Russian arms company, covers spare parts, test equipment and engineering support. The Pentagon said the work would be performed in Russia. It is expected to be completed by the end of 2014.

A year ago, the Defense Department purchased a dozen of the Mi-17 aircraft from Rosoboronexport for $217.7 million, as part of a larger contract originating in 2011.

Jason Reed / Reuters file

U.S. President Barack Obama shakes hands with Russia's President Vladimir Putin at last year's G20 meeting in Los Cabos, Mexico on June 18, 2012.

LONDON -- In the year since U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin last met face to face, tens of thousands of Syrians have been killed and hundreds of thousands have fled that country’s raging civil war. So Syria will likely monopolize what’s expected to be a short, one-hour bilateral meeting on the sidelines of next week’s G-8 summit in Northern Ireland.

There is some common ground – the U.S. and Russia both support peace talks in Geneva between Syrian strongman Bashar al Assad’s regime and the rebel coalition, though Russia has criticized the U.S. for insufficiently pressuring the rebels to commit. 

But Obama and Putin remain miles apart on what to do about Assad himself: the U.S. wants him removed from power as part of a U.N.-backed transition; Russia is set against any foreign military or diplomatic intervention into Syria’s internal affairs, including arming the Syrian rebels. 

It’s unclear whether U.S. intelligence reports confirming Assad’s use of chemical weapons against his own people will change Russia’s position. For its part, the White House has parlayed those findings into a decision to provide “military support” to the rebels. 

Understandably, aside from Syria, there won’t be much time left over for other problems weighing on the U.S.-Russian relationship. Here are just some of the more pressing issues the two world leaders should be talking about…

IRAN
The U.S. has imposed tougher sanctions against Iran, but Russia has balked, saying those sanctions have hurt diplomatic efforts to curtail Iran’s nuclear weapons program (if it indeed has one).  Russia continues to argue against an Israeli or U.S.-Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities – some of which were built by Russia. So far the U.S. has failed to convince Russia to flex its muscles against its erstwhile ally.

ANTI-MISSILE DEFENSE
Going back to U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s Star War’s program, the Soviet Union – and then Russia – have seen any American anti-missile defense system, whether based in space, on land or at sea, as a direct threat to their own nuclear capability. The Obama administration may have eased some of the tension recently by canceling the final phase of its Europe-based missile-defense plans, no longer placing interceptors on the U.S. West Coast or Alaska. Without a formal agreement, both sides have agreed to disagree, knowing that the missile defenses themselves have yet to be built.

STRATEGIC AND TACTICAL NUCLEAR ARMS TREATY
This has always been the keystone to U.S.-Russian relations, but without agreement on missile defense, experts say making any fresh progress on nuclear weapons reductions will be unlikely.

During his State of the Union address in February, Obama proposed cutting the U.S. nuclear arsenal by one third, that is, down to about 1,000 deployed strategic warheads from the current level of 1,700, as well as a ceiling of some 2,500 tactical nuclear weapons. But Putin has, so far, resisted any talk of further cuts until the U.S. abandons its anti-missile shields.  Still, there has been a shift in tone of late which the two leaders may want to build on, even – potentially – announcing something of substance.

HUMAN RIGHTS
This is perhaps the thorniest issue on the U.S.-Russia agenda. Putin continues to crackdown on his opposition – and any dissent – with a series of draconian laws that have sent anti-Putin activists behind bars and labeled foreign-funded non-governmental organizations (NGO’s) into quasi spies or “foreign agents”  reminiscent of the Cold War days.

After the death, in prison, of Sergey Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who worked for an American investment company, the Obama administration passed the Magnitsky Act, banning a number of Russians accused of human rights violations from traveling to the U.S. and freezing their U.S. assets.

In retaliation, Russia passed its own ban on Americans who had allegedly abused Russians, including some U.S. adoptive parents of Russian children who died in their care. That soon became a ban on the adoption of Russian orphans by any Americans.  The ban remains in place, preventing thousands of abandoned Russian children from finding loving families in the U.S.

COUNTER-TERRORISM 
By far, it’s the most promising area of cooperation. Both U.S. and Russian officials say that, since the Boston Marathon bombing, both countries have significantly improved their joint efforts in tracking potential terrorists. 

Revelations that Russia didn’t inform the FBI or CIA about phone calls made by bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev to militants in Dagestan until after the bombings has led to a serious Russian rethink. Now the FSB, the successor agency of the KGB, is reportedly sharing secret transcripts, for the first time, with the intelligence agencies of its former enemy. Still, there’s much to do before overcoming deeply ingrained suspicions and mistrust.

There are other important topics to review together – the winding down of the war in Afghanistan and the search for peace in the Middle East – but more substantial talks beyond the deadly crisis in Syria may have to wait…. At least until the G-20 summit, this September, in St. Petersburg...coincidentally, Putin’s hometown.

Related: 

• US offers Syrian rebels 'military support,' alleges Assad used chemical weapons 
• 'Long overdue': Reactions to White House announcement on Syria 
• Russia's Putin shows off his English
• Putin's wife steps out of the shadows - to bid him farewell 

Frederic J. Brown / AFP - Getty Images, file

A train passes on tracks running parallel with the Tian Shan mountain range on the outskirts of Korla, an oil town south of Urumqi, capital of China's far west Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, on October 10, 2006.

ASTANA, Kazakhstan -- Kazakhstan has launched a new transit railway linking China to Europe, aiming to beat rival routes for journey time in the competition to handle a growing flow of goods along the ancient Silk Road trade route.

"Kazakhstan is a virtual bridge linking the East and the West," Yerkin Meirbekov, deputy railway department chief at Kazakhstan's Transport Ministry, said in an interview. "You can actually say this is the revival of the Silk Road."

Centuries ago, it would take months for caravans of camels and horses from China to reach Europe across the sun-scorched steppes and deserts of Central Asia to exchange silk for medicines, perfumes and precious stones.

Now it takes just 15 days for trains carrying containers with electronic goods, construction materials and other cargo to cover the 6,750 mile route from Chongqing in southwest China to Duisburg in Germany's industrial Ruhr region.

Late last year, Kazakhstan completed construction of a 183-mile stretch from Zhetygen to Korgas at the Chinese border, looping it in to the existing national railway network and opening the second China-Europe link across its territory.

Meirbekov said that the annual volume of freight turnover along the new route, guaranteed by China, was set to total 2 million metric tons this year and would rise eventually to 15 million metric tons.

Zhi Jun / ColorChinaPhoto via AP, file

A train carrying 45 tons of liquefied petroleum gas imported from Kazakhstan arrives at the Alashankou (Alataw Pass) Port in Bozhou in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region on June 14, 2010.

"The Chinese side, as well as the Kazakh side and European partners -- everyone is ready (to handle these volumes) already tomorrow," Meirbekov said.

"All railways, as well as customs and border guards, are ready to assist fast passage of cargo across their territories."

Europe-bound trains from China cross from Kazakhstan into Russia. Then they go via Belarus and Poland before reaching Duisburg in Germany.

Transit routes are a major earner for the fast-growing economy of Kazakhstan -- the world's ninth-largest nation by area but with a population of only 17 million.

Related:

• Russian train brings medical care to remote areas of Siberia
• Oasis on China's ancient Silk Road now draws tourists not traders
• A Silk Road culture pushed to the brink

Muhammad Hamed / Reuters

U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Robert Catalanotti, director of Exercises and Training Directorate J-7 for U.S. Central Command, shakes hands Sunday with Maj. Gen. Awni el-Edwan, Chief of Staff of the Jordanian Operations and Training Armed Forces.

U.S. troops equipped with Patriot missiles and fighter jets began military exercises in Jordan that have drawn condemnation from Russia, which accuses the West of fanning the conflict in neighboring Syria.

Washington confirmed last week it was sending the F-16 jets and missiles — which can be used against planes and other missiles - to its ally Jordan, and said it may consider keeping them there after the drills.

Both Washington and Amman said on Sunday the Eager Lion exercises were not related to the war in Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad's air power has given him an edge over lighter-armed rebels.

But the Damascus government, and its most powerful ally Moscow, have been sensitive about any transfer of Western arms closer to the conflict, particularly any gear that could be used to enforce a no-fly zone.

More than 4,500 American troops, around 3,000 Jordanians, and 500 soldiers from Britain, Saudi Arabia and other countries were taking part in the exercises, less than 75 miles from the Syrian border, said military officials.

"The drills having nothing to do with any objective related to what is happening in Syria," the top army commander in charge of Jordanian troops, Major General Awni al-Adwan, told reporters during the launch of the exercises on Sunday.

U.S. Major General Robert G. Catalanotti told a joint news conference the Eager Lion events would increase "our ability to operate together in any upcoming contingency."

The exercises also involved a number of F-18 jets from bases in the Gulf and drills on handling chemical strikes, which Syria's government and rebels have accused each other of carrying out.

PRIVATE REQUESTS
Jordan is one of a number of Arab countries that have lent support to the Syrian opposition, caught up in the two-year-old civil war.

Jordan, like Syria's other neighbors, is increasingly nervous that the fighting will spill over and ignite a regional conflict.

U.S. President Barack Obama has been reluctant to become involved despite having called for Assad to resign and hinting at military action if the Syrian government crossed a "red line" by using chemical weapon. He has shown some willingness to protect friends in the region.

Jordanian officials privately say they requested that at least two Patriots are kept after the end of the exercises to guard against any missile attack from Syria.

Western diplomats say Washington has favorably responded to the request to bolster its ally's security.

Moscow complained vociferously last year when the United States, Germany and the Netherlands deployed Patriots on Syria's northern border in Turkey, a NATO ally.

Russia complained again after Washington confirmed its deployment of missiles and jets to Jordan last week.

"We have more than once stated our opinion on this - foreign weapons are being pumped into an explosive region," Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said in a statement on June 4.

"This is happening very close to Syria, where for more than two years the flames are burning of a devastating conflict that Russia and its American partners are trying to stop by proposing to hold an international peace conference as soon as possible."

Related:

• US to deploy Patriot missiles, F-16 jets to Jordan
• Assad claims Syria has Russian missiles
• UN launches 'largest humanitarian appeal in history' for Syria

Ria Novosti / Reuters

Vladimir Putin and his wife, Lyudmila, attend a service, conducted by the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill, to mark the start of his term as Russia's new president at the Kremlin in Moscow in this May 7, 2012 file photo.

When Russian President Vladimir Putin and his wife Lyudmila announced Thursday on Russian TV that their nearly 30-year marriage was over, the news seemed to confirm the gossip swirling around for years -- that Putin and the first lady had long been leading separate lives.

Susan Walsh / AP

In this Friday June 24, 2004 file photo, former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi and his ex-wife Veronica Lario wait for President George W. Bush and first lady Laura Bush at the Villa Madama residence for a social dinner, in Rome.

“This is true,” Putin said. “All my activity is to do with publicity, absolute publicity, and some people like this, and others do not. But there are some people who are absolutely incompatible with this ... Lyudmila Alexandrovna has stood by this post for eight or nine years - so it's a mutual decision.”

Lyudmila confirmed Putin’s words, adding: “Our marriage is over due to the fact that we no longer see each other.”

The newly single Putin now joins a small group of world leaders whose marriages ended during their tenures. 

John Schults / AP

Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife Cecilia walk together during a garden party at the Elysee Palace, as part of Bastille Day celebrations in Paris, in this July 14, 2004 file photo.

1. Silvio Berlusconi
Given the former Italian Prime Minister's fondness for bunga-bunga parties and barely legal dancers, it is perhaps no surprise that his second wife, Veronica Lario, announced in 2009 she was divorcing the billionaire media mogul. Once the divorce was finalized in 2012, Berlusconi was ordered to pay Lario $4 million a month in alimony. 

2. Nicolas Sarkozy
The former French president separated from his wife, Cecilia, in 2007, but it only took about a year for the politician to rebound and marry the glamorous model and singer Carla Bruni. Prior to Sarkozy getting elected, Cecilia had famously declared: "I don't see myself as a first lady. It bores me. I'm not politically correct."

Boris Roessler / ASSOCIATED PRESS

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez Frias smiles during his visit of the German pavilion at the ground of world exhibition Expo 2000 in Hanover, northern Germany, on Saturday, July 8, 2000. Next to Frias stands his wife Marisabel Rodriguez de Chavez.

3. Hugo Chavez 
The late Venezuelan president was rumored to have a long list of romances, but he was only married -- and subsequently divorced -- twice. He divorced his second wife, Venezuelan radio journalist Marisabel Rodriguez in 2004, claiming she had a bad temper. For her part, Rodriguez blamed Chavez's affairs for the dissolution of their marriage. 

4. Nelson Mandela
The former president of South Africa was married to his wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, for 38 years. The two broke it off in 1996, with then President Mandela accusing his wife of having had an affair with a younger man. Mandela remarried in 1998 at the age of 80.  

Debbie Yazbek / Zinc Media via Reuters

South Africa's former President Nelson Mandela, along with his ex-wife Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and former members of the National Reception Committee, celebrate the upcoming 20th anniversary of his release from prison in Johannesburg on Feb. 4, 2010.

5. Thomas Klestil 
The late Austrian president married Edith in 1967, when they were both 17. Two years into his presidency, Klestil announced he had an affair with a younger woman. Edith left her husband, and the two were finally divorced in 1998. Soon after, Klestil married his paramour. When he passed away while in office in 2004, both women attended his funeral. 

6. Jaime Lusinchi
The former Venezuelan president and his wife Gladys separated in 1987 while he was still in office. The divorce was not final until 1991, after Lusinchi had left power. Setting off a national controversy, Lusinchi divorced his wife so and wed a former private secretary.

Rudi Blaha / AP

Austrian President Thomas Klestil and his first wife Edith Klestil attend the Viennese Opera Ball, on Feb. 18, 1993.

7. Habib Bourguiba
The founder and first president of the Republic of Tunisia married his second wife, Wassila Ben Ammar, in 1961. He was still in power in 1986, when he divorced and banished her. Bourguiba said in a statement he was divorcing her for violating the constitution by making political statements without his approval, according to Reuters.
 

Pawel Kopczynski / Reuters, file

In happier times: Russian President Vladimir Putin and his wife Lyudmila sit in front of the Taj Mahal while touring the city of Agra in this October 4, 2000 file photograph.

When Lyudmila stood alongside her husband Vladimir Putin to confirm that “our marriage is over,” it was a rare glimpse into the private life of Russia’s soon-to-be-former first lady.

Such is the secrecy surrounding the Russian president, a former KGB agent, that little is known about Lyudmila or their two children.

Putin often cuts a lone figure at public events.

His wife tended to accompany him only for high-profile occasions, such as voting in last year’s presidential elections. She has also been seen with him at Orthodox Christmas in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, now famous as the stage for all-woman punk group Pussy Riot’s anti-Putin performance in 2012 that landed some of them with prison sentences.

Lyudmila has been markedly quiet throughout their near 30-year marriage despite his rise to high office and little is known about her.

She was born on Jan. 6, 1958, in Kaliningrad, a city near the Polish border that was once part of Germany.

Putin’s personal website is uncharacteristically forthcoming about how they met.

A mutual friend invited him to a concert in St. Petersburg, promising that there would be girls that night.

“And so there were girls,” Putin recalled, with his future wife among them. He returned to the theater the following night and "this time I got the tickets,” he said.

Putin was already working for the KGB, and the young Lyudmila was charmed.

“There must have been something about Volodya [Vladimir],” Lyudmila said on the website, “since in three or four months I had decided that he was the very person that I needed.”

Putin had decided if he did not marry soon, he “would not marry at all,” and they tied the knot in July 1983.

Lyudmila studied Romance languages and literature at Leningrad State University, as it was then called, and later received awards for promoting Russian language and culture.

She and Putin had two daughters – Maria, born in 1985, and Ekaterina, born in 1986 – but little is known about them.

Toward the end of their relationship, Lyudmila was a distant figure. Celebrations for her 55th birthday this year saw no public celebrations and barely a mention in the media.

Svetlana Kolchik, deputy chief editor of Marie Claire magazine in Russia, contrasted Lyudmila with the personable Raisa Gorbacheva, late wife of former Soviet leader Mikhail.

“It is really important for Russia to have a strong first lady. For me as a journalist and as a woman, it is really sad,” Kolchik said.

www.kremlin.ru

Vladimir Putin and Lyudmila Shkrebneva on their wedding day, July 28, 1983.

“I have tried several times to organize personal interviews with first ladies, for example with the former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s wife. But unfortunately it is a closed zone."

Putin and Lyudmila met at a concert and announced their divorce at a ballet - Esmeralda at the Kremlin Palace - when a reporter from state-owned Russia24 television asked on Thursday about rumors they had split.

It was the first time a Russian head of state had publicly announced the end of a marriage since Peter the Great in the 17^th century and may have surprised Russians who only listen to state media.

But the information vacuum has been filled by rumors on the internet and certain radio stations.

While the president’s spokesman, Vladimir Peskov, told the liberal radio station Echo Moskvy that “there is no other woman in the life of the head of state,” Russian bloggers suggest otherwise.

The claims may be nothing more than scurrilous rumor, but Putin is said to have been in a relationship with former Olympic gold medal gymnast Alina Kabaeva. In 2008, the Moskovsky Korrespondent newspaper dared to cover the alleged affair, but mainstream media in Russia has largely avoided the story.

Putin has vigorously denied the claim.

“I always thought badly of those who go around with their erotic fantasies sticking their snot-ridden noses into another person's life,” he told a press conference in 2009. 

In contrast to the blogger’s image of Putin, Lyudmila has been portrayed as religiously devout, and was even rumored to have spent time at a monastery.

The Russian government has rigorously promoted family values and how the divorce will be seen domestically is yet to be tested.

Related:

• Russia's Putin and his wife say their marriage is over
• 'Serious problems' with vote that kept Vladimir Putin in power, monitors say
• Analysis: Vladimir Putin's crackdown guts Russia's opposition movement