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Dramatic developments this week in the unfolding saga of the theft of millions of dollars worth of artifacts from the State Hermitage Museum included the arrest of three people earlier detained by police under suspicion of involvement in the heist.
More than 220 items were named as having been stolen from the museum on Aug. |
All photos from issue.
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DUBLIN — Twelve years after an embarrassing layover at Dublin’s Shannon Airport, a sprightly Boris Yeltsin returned to Ireland last week to hear a bit of traditional music, go fishing and, naturally, sample the local spirits.
Locals said the former president, known during the 1990s for his drinking binges, was in top form, catching a few fish from a yacht while cruising the waters off the scenic Country Clare. |
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The Russian Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the St. Petersburg City Court’s ruling clearing seven young men of racist murder charges in the 2004 stabbing death of a nine-year-old Tajiki girl, Khursheda Sultanova. |
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MOSCOW — Drawings worth an estimated $1.3 million have been stolen from a Moscow archive, authorities said Tuesday.
The theft of at least 274 drawings by Constructivist artist and architect Yakov Chernikhov from the State Literature and Art Archive was announced just a week after it was revealed that some 220 artworks worth a total of $5 million had been stolen from the State Hermitage Museum in St. |
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MOSCOW — A Moscow district military court Wednesday sentenced a retired intelligence officer to 13 years in prison on charges of spying for Britain.
Sergei Skripal, 55, a retired intelligence agency colonel, is believed to have passed sensitive data to the MI6 intelligence agency, an FSB spokesman said. |
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MOSCOW — The Federal Consumer Protection Service’s Moscow branch had egg on its face after it mistakenly announced that Pernod Ricard, the world’s No. 2 wine and spirits company, had had its license suspended.
A statement saying that Pernod Ricard’s Russian subsidiary, P. |
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The city’s real estate market can already be characterized by queues and bidding wars, as prices for residential property skyrocket and affordable supply drops to critically low levels. |
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MOSCOW — Russia is negotiating its first-ever arms sales to Argentina in a deal that could see Russian arms being swapped for Argentine beef.
The news came less than two weeks after a controversial $3 billion arms deal between Russia and Venezuela that has been widely seen in Moscow as the trigger for U. |
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Profits Brewing
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The Baltika brewery increased net profit by 16.3 percent in the first half of 2006, up to 94.7 million euros, according to International Financial Reporting Standards, Interfax reported Thursday. |
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Russians tend to disagree with complaints on the part of the political opposition that the parties aren’t treated fairly by the media. The majority of people surveyed believe that the opposition receives sufficient coverage in the national media. At the same time, however, many also believe that there is a real difference in the amount of coverage on national television devoted to, on one side, the United Russia party and, on the other, to the Communist and the Liberal Democratic parties, which receive much less coverage, and the Rodina, Union of Right Forces and Yabloko parties, which have pretty much given up hope of getting coverage. |
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While traveling around Abkhazia by bicycle in recent weeks, visiting most of its cities and peddling through much of its countryside, I became extremely skeptical about Georgia’s efforts to reassert itself in the region. |
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Ukraine finally has a government. As expected, it’s a coalition government. In fact, Viktor Yanukovych, head of the Party of the Regions, got votes during his confirmation as prime minister from his recent opponents in Viktor Yushchenko’s Our Ukraine party. The day before the vote, Ukrainian politicians ceremoniously signed their names to the Declaration of National Unity. |
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 The classical story of the labyrinth begins when Minos asks Poseidon for a sign that he should ascend the Cretan throne. Poseidon agrees, and sends a flawless snow-white bull to Minos, on the condition that the king sacrifice it back to him. So beautiful is the bull, however, that Minos sacrifices another in its stead, leading the enraged Poseidon to cause Minos’ queen, Pasiphae, to fall madly in love with the bull. |
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A film made in St. Petersburg about Emperor Hirohito is a hit in Japan.
Alexander Sokurov’s 2005 film “The Sun,” which tells the story of Japanese emperor Hirohito awaiting trial for crimes committed during World War II, premiered in Tokyo last Saturday. |
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As August heat seizes the city, the local music scene has also been hit by the “dead season,” as it is known among promoters. None will dare to set up a big gig at this time of the year because they are scared, not unreasonably, that nobody will turn up; too many people leave the city for a vacation or weekends in the country in August. |
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A new series on NTV has been dubbed Russia’s answer to the cult U.S. show “The X-Files.”
There are plenty of shows on Russian television that pit heroic cops against thuggish gangsters. |
 A popular bar for expats and independent travelers has ambitious plans.
City Bar, the ultimate expats’ hangout that called it quits six months ago, has magically returned and will have what its hostess Aileen Exeter calls “quiet summer opening” on Friday. |
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The St. Petersburg Times was not the first English-language newspaper in St. Petersburg. Before the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, when the city was a flourishing Imperial capital, a range of publications were printed in English. |
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KANTALAI, Sri Lanka — Sri Lankan war planes have bombed Tamil Tiger positions as the two sides shelled each other around a disputed waterway near Kantalai, leaving at least two soldiers dead and 26 wounded.
The renewed fighting comes after rebels reopened the Maavilaru dam in the northeastern district of Trincomalee after a blockade that had sparked fierce clashes in which hundreds died. |
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BEIJING — More than a million Chinese have fled their homes in the path of a super typhoon, the strongest to threaten the country in half a century, as it churned relentlessly towards the southeast coast on Thursday. |
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NAJAF, Iraq — A suicide bomber killed at least 35 people and wounded over 90 on Thursday near a Shi’ite shrine in the southern Iraqi city of Najaf, dealing a blow to fresh efforts to avert a sectarian civil war.
Hospital sources said the bomber blew himself up at a police commando checkpoint on his way to the Imam Ali shrine, one of the most revered sites in the world for Shi’ites and an annual destination for thousands of pilgrims. |
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LONDON — Successive league titles, one League Cup and a Community Shield represent a decent return on owner Roman Abramovich’s considerable outlay since the Russian billionaire waltzed into Stamford Bridge three years ago. |
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GOTHENBURG, Sweden — Olympic high jump champion Stefan Holm praised Andrei Silnov after the Russian claimed the European gold, relegating the Swede to third place on Wednesday.
The Swede had hoped to improve on the silver-placed finish he had achieved in Munich in 2002 but had to settle for third place in front of his home fans. |
Temp: -2°C moderate or heavy snow showers
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