A three-judge panel of the Minnesota Court of Appeals on Tuesday rejected the Republican's bid to toss out his disorderly conduct conviction.

Craig still has the option of appealing to the Minnesota Supreme Court, and he said Tuesday he was considering future options.

Craig was arrested June 11, 2007, by an undercover police officer who was conducting a sting operation against men cruising for gay sex at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

He quietly pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor and paid a fine, but changed his mind after word of his arrest became public that August. Craig insisted he was innocent and said he was not gay. His attorney argued that the police officer misconstrued Craig's foot-tapping, hand movements and other conduct.

But the case brought widespread ridicule and effectively ended his political career.

Craig lost several GOP leadership positions in the wake of the scandal, and the Senate Ethics Committee said in February that Craig had brought discredit on the Senate. The committee members said they believed he was guilty, and that his attempt to withdraw his plea was just an effort to evade the legal consequences of his own actions.

He did not seek a fourth term in last month's election. He will be replaced in January by Idaho Lt. Gov. Jim Risch, a Republican.

Craig's attorney, Billy Martin, argued before the appeals court in September that there was insufficient evidence for any judge to find him guilty.

In its 10-page opinion, the appeals panel said that Craig failed to show that Hennepin County District Judge Charles Porter abused his discretion by denying his petition to withdraw his plea. Porter had said the plea was "accurate, voluntary and intelligent, and ... supported by the evidence."

Tuesday's opinion also said Craig failed to show that the state's disorderly conduct law was unconstitutionally overbroad.

"I am extremely disappointed by the action of the Minnesota Court of Appeals," Craig said in a statement. "I disagree with their conclusion and remain steadfast in my belief that nothing criminal or improper occurred at the Minneapolis airport." He said he and his attorneys were reviewing into the possibility of further appeals.

After the story became public, Craig had initially said that he would resign from the Senate, but he changed his mind about that, too, and vowed to fight to clear his name.

Patrick Hogan, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Airports Commission, which runs the airport, said the appellate decision again confirms that Craig knew what he was doing when he entered his plea. He said the agency hopes it's the end of the case.

France had repeatedly refused to apply a 2002 EU law that set out rules by which biotech crops could be planted in areas where other conventional crops were grown. France argued it could not adopt the rules because of violent anti-GMO demonstrations. The EU court rejected those arguments. France has applied the law since July.

The Luxembourg-based court says France's conduct was "unlawful" and said Tuesday's ruling should act as a warning to others that ignoring EU regulations has a price.

In an order issued late Monday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit says the slot auction cannot be held until a federal court rules on objections from New York airport officials and airlines.

Transportation Secretary Mary Peters called for the auction as a way to reduce air traffic at John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark airports. Peters' decision to auction slots followed widespread complaints last year about lengthy flight delays.

Airlines and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey filed suit saying the proposal would add new costs and make a mess of day-to-day airport operations.

The court did not comment on its order Monday rejecting the call by Leo Donofrio of East Brunswick, N.J., to intervene in the presidential election. Donofrio says that since Obama had dual nationality at birth — his mother was American and his Kenyan father at the time was a British subject — he cannot possibly be a "natural born citizen," one of the requirements the Constitution lists for eligibility to be president.

Donofrio also contends that two other candidates, Republican John McCain and Socialist Workers candidate Roger Calero, also are not natural-born citizens and thus ineligible to be president.

At least one other appeal over Obama's citizenship remains at the court. Philip J. Berg of Lafayette Hill, Pa., argues that Obama was born in Kenya, not Hawaii as Obama says and the Hawaii secretary of state has confirmed. Berg says Obama also may be a citizen of Indonesia, where he lived as a boy. Federal courts in Pennsylvania have dismissed Berg's lawsuit.

The Moscow City Court set bail for Vasily Aleksanian, who faces embezzlement and money-laundering charges, at 50 million rubles ($1.8 million), spokeswoman Anna Usachyova said.

Aleksanian, a 36-year-old U.S.-trained lawyer who's been jailed since 2006, was moved to a clinic in February, while lawyers demanded that he be released from custody given his state of health.

His trial was suspended earlier this year due to major health problems.

The court's ruling represented a rare victory for defendants in cases against Yukos and its jailed founder, Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

Aleksanian had been a vice president at Yukos and served as a lawyer for Khodorkovsky, who is serving an eight-year sentence in a Siberian prison on fraud and tax evasion charges.

Once Russia's largest oil producer, Yukos was broken up and sold off in auctions in what was seen as the Kremlin's punishment for Khodorkovsky's political ambitions. Most of its assets were purchased at bargain prices by state-owned corporations.

Aleksanian's lawyers and supporters protested what they described as inhumane treatment and unsanitary conditions in the prison and the hospital.

The treatment of another Yukos lawyer, Svetlana Bakhmina, has also attracted wide attention. Bakhmina became pregnant while in custody and her supporters had called on President Dmitry Medvedev to grant her amnesty.

She was recently transferred to a clinic near Moscow and gave birth to a girl last month.

The 63 defendants in the first-known group lawsuit stemming from the scandal, including the parents of two children who died, were seeking nearly 14 million yuan ($2 million) in compensation from state-owned Sanlu Group Co., Beijing-based lawyer Xu Zhiyong said.

The dairy based in the northern Chinese city of Shijiazhuang was at the center of China's worst food safety crisis in years, in which six babies are believed to have died and nearly 300,000 became sick with urinary problems after drinking infant formula tainted with the industrial chemical melamine.

Three of six defense lawyers presented the suit to the Hebei Supreme Court's registry office on Monday but were told it could not be accepted because government departments were still investigating.