Vladimir Putin's participation in the first G8 summit of his new term was supposed to seal his comeback to the global stage as Russia's paramount leader after winning a third presidential term last year. Instead, it brought to the forefront a Kremlin agenda increasingly at odds with Western values and raised fresh questions about Russia's membership in the club of the world's richest democracies. On the first day of the summit in Northern Ireland, French President Francois Hollande reiterated the persisting disagreements with Russia over its close ally Syria.

US President Barack Obama and world leaders arrived in Northern Ireland for the G8 summit on Monday looking to put pressure on Russia to back away from its support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Hours before the summit was due to begin, host Prime Minister David Cameron said his priority for the meeting was to ensure a peace conference on the Syria conflict takes place later this year.

By Steve Gutterman MOSCOW (Reuters) - Hours after President Vladimir Putin and his wife, Lyudmila, told Russians their marriage was over, an anchorman on a satirical on-line show gravely announced the latest news: Putin has named Lyudmila "acting First Lady". It was a joke, of course, but Russians say there's a touch of truth in every joke: While the reasons for the separation may be deeply personal, the staged admission of a long-suspected estrangement was Putin's latest pragmatic political gambit.

By Alexei Anishchuk MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia has deployed a naval unit to the Mediterranean Sea, it said on Thursday, a move President Vladimir Putin said was to defend Russian security but which comes as Moscow faces off with the West over Syria. In what is Russia's first permanent naval deployment in the Mediterranean since Soviet times, it has stationed 16 warships and three ship-based helicopters in the region, the chief of staff said.