President Dmitry Medvedev hosted the leaders of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Tajikistan yesterday to discuss terrorism, the drugs trade, and general stabilization in the area, and pledged Russia’s support for Afghan peace efforts.  The US responded positively to the meeting.  Russia will be permitted to keep and expand its Armenian military base until 2044 after the lease was extended, apparently due to the latter’s security concerns over relations with Azerbaijan, to whom Russia is reportedly selling S-300 surface-to-air missiles.  Responding to these reports, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said ‘We never export weapons to regions where such weapons may cause the destabilization of the situation.‘  Police are monitoring the country’s major infrastructure after yesterday’s Caucasus bombings and a scare on Moscow’s World Trade Center.  It’s official, say meteorologists: the heatwave is over.  But Moscow’s smog has yet to disperse completely as fires continue and a landfill covering 15 hectares is burning northeast of Moscow.