LOCAL NEWS

AMENDMENTS TO MARIINSKY 2 DESIGN APPROVED

One of several disputes swirling around French architect Dominique Perrault’s design for a second building for Mariinsky Theater artists ended Friday when the city’s architecture committee approved changes to the design.

Perrault won an international competition to design the building in July 2003, but the federal government has been in no rush to get things started as debates over the design’s costs and artistic merit rage.

NO WORK PERMITS FOR REPRESENTATIVE OFFICES

MOSCOW — Hundreds of expatriates might be refused work permits after the Federal Migration Service unexpectedly stopped issuing the documents to employees of scores of foreign companies, Western business leaders and lawyers said Monday.

IN BRIEF

Starovoitova Progress

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) —The St. Petersburg City court on Monday finished the investigation part of the hearing in the trial of those accused of slaying State Duma Deputy Galina Starovoitova, Interfax reported.

The court heard final statements made by the defense and the evidence of two prosecution witnesses, which implicated one of the main suspects participating in the hearing, Yury Kolchin, a former military intelligence officer.

NATIONAL NEWS

GREF : PRIVATIZATION IS WAY TO SAVE PALACES

The list of state-owned real estate that can be privatized, including architectural monuments such as palaces and historic buildings should be broadened, Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref said at a government meeting Thursday.

A substantial proportion of such buildings are in St.

MOBILE PHONE JAMMERS WORRY PUBLIC

Mobile phone calls made from at least two of St. Petersburg’s detention centers will soon be jammed, raising fears that residents and businesses living around them will also be affected.

BEAR CUB ATTRACTS ATTENTION

Visitors to the city’s Leningrad Zoo were excited last week to see a three-month-old polar bear cub, who on Thursday came out of his lair with his mother Uslada for the first time.

The zoo is still a bit puzzled about the sex of the cub because they have not had the opportunity to determine it.

GROUP SLAMS KIDNAPPINGS

MOSCOW — Human Rights Watch said Monday that kidnappings in Chechnya carried out by pro-Moscow forces now constituted “a crime against humanity.”

Meanwhile, Chechen government officials in informal talks with human rights activists in Strasbourg, France, acknowledged that abuses had taken place, but said rights campaigners had exaggerated the scale of the problem.

BASAYEV SAYS MASKHADOV’S PHONE CALLS LED TO DEMISE

MOSCOW — Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev said Friday that rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov was not betrayed but tracked down by federal special services who had intercepted his telephone calls.

The Federal Security Service has said Maskhadov was killed by FSB commandos during a sweep in the Chechen village of Tolstoy-Yurt on March 8.

SOTHEBY’S AUCTION HOUSE SAYS FABERGE EGG GENUINE

Sotheby’s auction house says the Spring Flowers Faberge egg, bought by Russian magnate Viktor Vekselberg last year, is genuine.

“The Spring Flowers Egg was carefully reviewed by both Sotheby’s and outside experts prior to its sale last year and at that time we saw no reason to question its authenticity,” Diana Phillips, a Sotheby’s spokeswoman, said in a written response to questions.

LOCAL BUSINESS

IKEA TO CARRY OUT ITS MEGA IDEAS IN OBLAST

Ikea, the home-furnishings giant, will begin construction of a mega-complex and a new store in the Leningrad Oblast before the end of the year, with total investment in the area reaching $300 million.

The company, which has four stores in Russia — two in Moscow and one each in St.

JTI PICKS UP ANOTHER $15M TAX BILL

Another subsidiary of Japan Tobacco International (JTI), St. Petersburg-based factory Petro, has been handed a $15 million back-tax bill by the federal tax service.

IN BRIEF

VTB Stake on Sale

n MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Russia will sell a stake in Vneshtorgbank, the nation’s second-biggest lender, through an initial public offering rather than a sale to a foreign bank, Vedomosti reported, citing the bank’s president Andrei Kostin.

Vneshtorgbank, which is 100 percent state-owned, won’t sell a stake to a foreign lender, Kostin said at a press conference in Kiev with Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to the paper.

OPINION

THE FORGOTTEN HISTORY OF DISSENT AND HOPE

In the 100 years since the democratic revolution in 1905, Russia has suffered more wrenching, radical changes than probably any other nation on earth. Yet, strangely, it remains deeply rooted in its history, if not imprisoned by it.

That was something Lenin’s Bolsheviks found out soon after importing into Russia a creed born of the Western Enlightenment and further fashioned by German political philosophers.

FREE HOUSING IS AN ILLUSION NO ONE WANTS TO GIVE UP

A significant part of the new Housing Code that came into force on March 1 is dedicated to the position of the government on the provision of housing. Forty-two articles in the third part of the code talk about the rules under which citizens are allocated state apartments.

SPORT

Zenit Takes the Lead As League Rivals Stumble

FC Zenit St. Petersburg took pole position in Russia’s Premier League on Sunday as a 3-0 away win over helpless Alania Vladikavkaz left its rivals eating dust.

It was Dynamo Moscow’s Portuguese striker Miguel Gomes who shone brightest on the day, however, in a sensational 2-1 win in a Moscow derby against Torpedo.