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On a sunny May day Andrei, 25, proposed on one knee to Svetlana, 24. He gave her a bouquet of flowers and he made his proposal in a romantic restaurant. It was an unforgettable moment of happiness for both young people, who declined to reveal their last names. |
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MOSCOW - The Meshchansky District Court on Tuesday convicted Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev of fraud and tax evasion and sentenced them both to nine years in a prison camp, ending the biggest trial in the country's post-Soviet history. |
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Leaders of the St. Petersburg Citizens' Resistance, an umbrella group for two dozen city NGOs and opposition movements, said Thursday the city government and law enforcement agencies are arbitrary in their treatment of them and media who cover their events. |
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MOSCOW - The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected an appeal by the Communist Party against a Central Election Commission ruling that 17 out of 19 questions submitted by the party for a referendum were unconstitutional. |
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Free Voice, a new St. Petersburg radio station focusing on human rights issues, was officially launched Monday. The station broadcasts for one hour a day in the dead of the night from 1 a.m. to 2 a.m. on medium wave (684 KHz). Yuly Rybakov, the station's founder and a prominent human rights advocate, said Free Voice will reflect a broad range of opinions on issues including the environment, ethnic tolerance and abuses of human rights. |
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Australian tourists Peter and Ann Rumble barely had time to see something of St. Petersburg's magnificent sights before they fell victim to a gang of pickpockets in the metro and were left cashless for six days. |
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MOSCOW - More than a dozen foreign adoption agencies have been denied renewed accreditation following checks by prosecutors, Deputy Prosecutor General Sergei Fridinsky said Monday. "This measure was applied due to violations found in operations of these agencies, including their failure to submit reports on monitoring adopted children abroad," Fridinsky told a meeting of government officials hosted by Education and Science Minister Andrei Fursenko, Interfax reported. |
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The City Prosecutor's Office has again refused to open a criminal case for inciting ethnic or religious intolerance over anti-Semitic articles printed in two city newspapers, Za Russkoye Delo and Rus Pravoslavnaya. |
 About 30 people participated in a protest in St. Petersburg on Monday against sending city policemen to Chechnya and to defend former city OMON special police officer Sergei Babin. Chechen prosecutors demanded at the end of last year that Babin be sent to Grozny to face questioning regarding his alleged killing of civilians while he was stationed in the war-torn republic. |
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Almost no passport controls have been made of travelers entering Russia from Finland where frontier guards began an 11-day strike on Tuesday. Senior officers have replaced the strikers at eight of the crossing points on the Finnish-Russian border. |
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Finnish officials were conducting last-minute negotiations late Monday to prevent frontier guards from beginning an 11-day strike that could slow or almost close the Russian-Finnish border beginning Tuesday. The strike was planned for 6 a.m. on May 31 through June 11, if the dispute remained unresolved. |
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The problem of attacks on tourists in Vyborg has been "resolved," local media quoted Vyacheslav Krasavin, executive head of the Northwest region directorate of the Interior Ministry, as saying last week. |
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Ammunition on Plane MOSCOW (SPT) - Police have detained an assistant of a Liberal Democratic Party State Duma deputy, who tried to carry ammunition on board a plane at St. Petersburg's Pulkovo airport on Sunday Yury Kuznetsov, assistant to LDPR deputy Sergei Abeltsev, tried to carry on cartridges for a TT pistol and a shell for a grenade launcher, Interfax reported Thursday. |
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Caricature Case ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The Dzerzhinsky federal court began Monday to consider a charge of libel against Alexei Andreyev, the editor-in-chief of newspaper Novy Peterburg. |
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MOSCOW - Anatoly Chubais said Saturday that he would not resign as head of Unified Energy Systems in the wake of last week's blackout and lashed out at politicians calling for his ouster. Chubais, in an interview on Rossia television, said he accepted responsibility for Wednesday's blackout, which left 1. |
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MOSCOW - The Union of Right Forces, or SPS, will not review its policies as it attempts to win over voters but instead will launch a public relations campaign with a motto such as "Russia in Europe" to help people understand what the party stands for, two top SPS officials said Monday. |
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MOSCOW - Radio Liberty correspondent Yuri Bagrov said last week that a Federal Security Service agent prevented him from covering an opposition rally in North Ossetia this month and then followed him to his office and threatened him. The incident is the latest in a series of actions by the Federal Security Service, or FSB, and by police that have prevented Bagrov from reporting. |
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LONDON - Russia's biggest steelmaker Evraz Group made a quiet London debut on Thursday after raising $422 million in an initial public offering (IPO) that valued the steel and mining group at $5.1 billion. Evraz ranks among the world's top 15 steelmakers and joins a wave of Russian firms listing in London, after telecoms group Sistema raised $1. |
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The government said foreign companies seeking to extract minerals in the country should find local partners, acting to ensure that domestic producers control development of the country's biggest oil, gas and metals fields. |
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MOSCOW - Global coffee behemoth Starbucks is planning expansion into Russia after quietly opening its first outlet in Moscow last week. The company has been eyeing the capital's expanding coffee culture for years but is entangled in a legal dispute with a local firm claiming ownership of the Starbucks trademark in Russia. |
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IT to Weigh In at 10% MOSCOW (Bloomberg) - Russia's information technology industry will account for 10 percent of gross domestic product by 2008, double its current share, the Economy Ministry said in its mid-term forecast Thursday, Interfax reported. |
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MOSCOW - Svenska Handelsbanken, one of Scandinavia's leading banks, has announced Tuesday the start of operations in Russia, the latest in a string of foreign lenders to enter the market. Handelsbanken's Moscow subsidiary, the first in Russia by a Scandinavian bank, will have charter capital of 45 million euros ($55.5 million) and will tailor mostly to Scandinavian and British corporate clients. It plans to move into retail banking in two years, the Swedish bank said. In addition to the Moscow unit, Handelsbanken plans to open an office in St. Petersburg, which will later become part of the Moscow subsidiary. "For our main customer group, the Scandinavian and UK corporate clients, Russia is becoming an increasingly interesting market," Lars Gronstedt, the bank's CEO, told reporters. |
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 The new U.S. Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez flew into St. Petersburg to discuss Monday an "action plan" to increase trade and investments between Russia and the U. |
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ST. PETERSBURG/MOSCOW - The Cabinet approved an 11 percent hike in spending this year to pay for social services even as officials are under orders to curtail the runaway inflation. Economists said they saw no easy options left to avoid yet another double-digit inflation this year as consumer prices have already recorded a 6. |
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Machines Win in China ST. PETERSBURG (SPT)- Power Machines, a major power equipment manufacturer, won the tender to supply machinery to Chinese power station Baishi, the company said Monday. |
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InBev subsidiary Sun Interbrew is on the verge of buying St. Petersburg-based Tinkoff brewery, Kommersant business daily reported Thursday. Sun Interbrew has already signed a preliminary agreement to buy Tinkoff and is now finalizing the acquisition details, anonymous sources close to the deal told the paper. |
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MOSCOW - Harmony Gold Mining Chief Executive Bernard Swanepoel said he has received approaches for the company's 11.5 percent stake in Gold Fields from people claiming to represent Russia's Norilsk Nickel. |
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Ruble May Rise 11% MOSCOW (Bloomberg) - The ruble may rise 11 percent against the U.S. dollar, when adjusted for Russia's higher inflation rate, Interfax reported, citing Andrei Klepach, director of macroeconomic forecasting at the Economic Development and Trade Ministry. |
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MOSCOW - AvtoVAZ, the country's largest carmaker, plans to cut 4,000 jobs this year because of a drop in its production plan for 2005. The news comes as the domestic car industry is struggling to keep up output as foreign auto makers aggressively carve out market share in Russia. |
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Timoshenko May Go MOSCOW (Bloomberg) - Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko may be sacked because of the worsening investment climate, Interfax reported, citing Boris Nemtsov, the Russian adviser to Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko. Timoshenko and Yushchenko are "so different" they won't be able to work together much longer, Nemtsov was quoted by the news agency as saying. The Timoshenko government has made "grave mistakes," including trying to control energy prices, which has hurt the country, Nemtsov told the news service. Capital is leaving the country, economic growth is slowing and investment is being reduced in export-orientated industries, Nemtsov said, Interfax reported. |
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 MOSCOW - If there are men who have gone through fire and water, Nikolai Melnik is certainly one of them. Once a test pilot, Melnik lives in Spain, where he has received a royal award for his efforts in aerial firefighting. |
 An entertainment center from St. Petersburg, called Materik ("Continent"), was honored with one of the top prizes at the second annual Commercial Real Estate Awards. It won in the category of the best entertainment complex in the country completed in 2004. Materik, the largest entertainment center in the Nevsky District, opened its doors in December 2004. It stands on Pyatiletok Prospekt, next to Prospekt Bolshevikov metro station and across from the Ice Palace. |
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 As the days lengthen and temperatures finally rise, many people's thoughts will be turning away from the stuffy, mosquito-ridden confines of the city towards a rural retreat where tranquility reigns. |
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Russia has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity in information technology, if it does not shoot itself in the foot. Just look at what India has accomplished. It has become the world's software, IT and business process outsourcing leader. Virtually overnight, it has taken the majority of what analyst Datamonitor recently predicted will be a $163 billion marketplace globally - and that's just IT outsourcing. In software exports alone, India sold $12.8 billion in 2003-2004, and this sector employed more than 770,000 people. And India does not even have the world's best programming minds. Russia does. IT and Telecommunications Minister Leonid Reiman has been trumpeting this fact for several years now. |
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 Two myths cling to the perception of 19th century novelist and short-story writer Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881). The first myth says that he was born in St. |
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After being sentenced to nine years in prison, former Yukos head Mikhail Khodorkovsky has finally become an important Russian politician. This has been his dream for a long time, apparently. His verbose public musings on liberalism and the deteriorating national infrastructure had already attracted notice several years ago. |
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Can orphans be exploited for political gain? You bet they can. In fact, it's a sure thing. The champions of orphans score political points while those who abuse them are regarded as evil incarnate. |
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Recently, the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs subcommittee on investigations of the U.S. Senate essentially accused Russia of receiving bribes from Saddam Hussein in exchange for lobbying for the Iraqi dictator's interests in the UN Security Council. |
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Valentina Matviyenko has recently made some clear changes of strategy. If in the first year of her rule she positioned herself as a radical reformer and her administrative machine's plans to restructure different spheres of city life appeared like mushrooms after rain, then today it looks as if City Hall's reforming zeal has noticeably faded. |
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Seymour Hersh, chronicler of madness from the My Lai massacre to Abu Ghraib, tells a chilling story of the lingering aftermath of atrocity. As the revelations of brutal torture by the victors were first spilling from conquered Iraq, Hersh was contacted by a family member of a young U.S. woman who had served in a unit policing Abu Ghraib, the Guardian reports. |
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Since launching its first list in 2002, Hesperus Press has acquired an enviable name in British publishing for its adventurous editorial policy and the attention it lavishes on each of its graceful volumes. Specializing in short works by major writers of the past, mainly from Western Europe, Hesperus has also earned praise for the high standard of its translations. |
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After Brian Eno's visit last week, another alumnus of the influential British band Roxy Music, Bryan Ferry, was due in St. |
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Sakura 12 Griboyedov Canal. Tel. 315 9474, 315 7391 Open from noon until 11pm. Menu in Russian and English Dinner for two with sake 1,120 rubles. ($40). You know a good Japanese restaurant by its tuna. This fish has become almost an icon in Japan, and can sell for as much as $100 a piece in Tokyo's Tsukiji fish market, the country's biggest seafood bazaar. |
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A new production of Richard Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde," which opened the Stars of the White Nights festival at the Mariinsky Theater last Friday is literal, universal and replete with claustrophobia. |
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Africans from the continent and the surrounding islands gathered in St. Petersburg last week to encourage Russians to explore the bright side of the traditionally derogated "Dark Continent." It took the rhythm of drums and a chorus of voices typical of Africa's many languages and cultural diversity to help counter Russian stereotypes of Africa as a continent only of poverty, hunger, disease and war on Africa Day (May 25) when a colorful display of traditional arts and artifacts, and even a fashion show, were held in St. |
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Chumbawumba is a punk band that does not really play punk rock. The British band combines, amazingly, anarchist ideas and pop harmonies and cites The Beatles as an influence. |
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A new album by British music legend Brian Eno, to be released in Russia a week before the rest of the world on Monday, ends with a controversial new song written from the point of view of a Palestinian suicide bomber. Eno, presenting his forthcoming solo album at the Russian Museum's Marble Palace last Saturday, said "Bone Bomb" was inspired by a newspaper story about a Palestinian girl who becomes a suicide bomber. |
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PARIS - Justine Henin-Hardenne moved smoothly into the French Open final with an impressive 6-2 6-3 win over Russian Nadia Petrova on Thursday. The Belgian former world No. 1, gunning for her second title at Roland Garros, looked in ominously good form as she clinched victory against her error-strewn opponent in just 68 minutes. |
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Israel to Release 400 JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's cabinet on Sunday approved the release of 400 Palestinian prisoners in what Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called a bid to bolster moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ahead of a Gaza pullout. |
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CSKA Moscow completed a memorable double on Sunday when they beat first division Khimki 1-0 in the Russian Cup final less than two weeks after lifting the UEFA Cup. Sunday's victory also meant that FC Zenit St. Petersburg, who lost to CSKA in the semi-finals, will represent Russia in the UEFA Cup next season. |
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