Russia is preparing to send two amphibious assault ships to the Syrian port of Tartus where Moscow operates a strategic naval base to ensure safety of its nationals, the Interfax news agency reported Monday.

"Two major amphibious ships -- The Nikolai Filchenkov and The Tsezar Kunikov -- are preparing to be dispatched to Tartus outside of their schedule," the Russian news agency quoted an unidentified officer from the Russian naval headquarters as saying.

World powers resume crisis talks with Iran on Monday amid hope that a crippling oil embargo and pressure from hosts Russia will finally force the Islamic Republic to scale back its nuclear drive.

The two-day meeting follows a bruising May session in Baghdad during which Iran nearly walked out of negotiations aimed ultimately at keeping it from joining the exclusive club of nations with an atomic bomb.

Iran is ready to make a "positive step" at talks in Moscow on Tehran's disputed nuclear program, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said, adding that he hoped for progress at next week's crucial meeting.

Two days of talks between Iran and the five permanent U.N. Security Council members plus Germany begin Monday under the watchful eye of President Vladimir Putin -- a strongman who expects results.

Russia on Friday denied holding discussions with other nations on a political transformation in Syria that would include the departure of President Bashar Assad.

"I read somewhere today that supposedly, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said something along the lines of the United States and Russia discussing a political transformation in Syria after the departure of Bashar Assad," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters.

Russia said Friday it is not making any new deliveries of attack helicopters to Syria and has only carried out repairs of helicopters sent there many years ago.

"There are no new supplies of Russian-made attack helicopters to Syria," the foreign ministry said in a statement, adding that "planned repairs were carried out earlier on helicopters supplied to Syria many years ago."

Russia on Friday denied discussing Syrian President Bashar Assad's departure with Western nations and warned it may skip a planned conference on the crisis if Iran is not invited as well.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov's comments seemed aimed at quashing reports from several major capitals about a discernible shift in Russia's approach to its Soviet-era ally that acknowledged the nearing end of Assad's regime.

British foreign minister William Hague Thursday urged Russia and Iran to use their influence over Syria to achieve a peaceful end to the bloody 15-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad.

Hague met his Russian and Iranian counterparts in Kabul on the sidelines of a conference on the future of Afghanistan and stressed the need for the implementation of a peace plan proposed by international peace envoy Kofi Annan.

A Polish football fan was so devastated when Russia scored against Poland at Tuesday's Euro 2012 match that he threw his television set out his third-storey window, police said Wednesday.

They took the man into custody, prompting him to miss the second half of the game, when Poland scored an equalizer, making the final score a 1-1 draw.

The United States Wednesday denied Russia's claim that it is arming Syria's opposition and expressed new concern over what it says is Moscow's supply of attack helicopters to Damascus.

"We do not and have not supplied weapons to the Syrian opposition. You know our position on that and we have made it very clear," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday accused the United States of supplying weapons to Syria's rebels, worsening the conflict engulfing Moscow's allied regime in Damascus.

Russia was supplying "anti-air defense systems" to Damascus in a deal that "in no way violates international laws," Lavrov told a news conference during a brief visit to Iran.