MOSCOW - Russia said it was concerned by a US ruling that the death of an adopted Russian boy in Texas was an accident, fuelling a diplomatic row as thousands marched in Moscow demanding an end to all foreign adoptions. Russia's foreign ministry said it had learned of the US coroner's findings, which cleared the boy's parents of wrongdoing, "with concern". AFP

WASHINGTON - The State Department raised no major objections to the Keystone XL oil pipeline and said other options to get the oil from Canada to US Gulf Coast refineries are worse for climate change. But the latest environmental review stops short of recommending whether the project should go ahead. AP

WASHINGTON - Two US senators said a Department of Justice response to their criticism that it didn't criminally prosecute HSBC for money laundering was "aggressively evasive". Senators Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat, and Chuck Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, sent the Justice Department a letter on January 29 asking whether the federal government avoided prosecuting banks that they described as "too big to jail". Bloomberg

BAMAKO - Al-Qaeda's top commander in Mali has been killed, Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno said. Deby said Abou Zeid, the Mali-based operative of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb was killed during fighting between Chadian troops and Islamist fighters on February 22. AFP