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 NEW DELHI — Russian President Vladimir Putin sealed a deal on Thursday to construct more nuclear power plants in India, as Moscow moved closer to its long-term Asian partner through lucrative energy and arms agreements. Putin met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday in an annual summit, and will be guest of honor at India’s Republic Day celebrations on Friday, a reflection of the historically close ties between the two countries. “Energy security is the most important of the emerging dimensions of our strategic partnership,” Singh told a joint news conference. “We look forward to a long-term partnership with Russia in this vital field.” The deal signalled Moscow would not be left behind in the race to win lucrative nuclear contracts with India, a month after U. |
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Alexander Belenky / The St. Petersburg Times
Students attending a ball at the Shtiglits Arts Academy (formerly the Mukhinskaya) in celebration of St. Tatyana’s Day on Thursday. Girls called Tatyana are honored while St. Tatyana is the patron saint of students and Russia celebrates Jan. 25 as national students’ day. |
 TBILISI — Georgian special services have foiled an attempt by a Russian citizen to sell weapons-grade uranium for $1 million to agents he thought were radical Islamists, a senior Interior Ministry official said on Thursday. The official said Oleg Khintsagov, a resident of Russia’s North Ossetia region, was arrested on February 1 2006 and a closed court soon after convicted him to 8 1/2 years in prison.
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MOSCOW — Kremlin officials were scrambling Wednesday to get Sochi’s bid for the 2014 Olympics back on track after an embarrassing shutdown of the city’s Krasnaya Polyana ski resort drew disparaging remarks from President Vladimir Putin. Inspectors this week closed the resort’s slopes to skiers at the height of the season, claiming that the ski lift operator’s facilities were unsafe. |
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MOSCOW — First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev on Wednesday unveiled a host of measures to tackle Russia’s shrinking population, including moves to cut road traffic deaths that account for almost 5 percent of the decline. |
All photos from issue.
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MOSCOW — Russian lawmakers launched a scathing attack on Wednesday against the Estonian government’s plans to relocate Soviet soldiers’ graves and a monument to the Red Army in downtown Tallinn. “Estonia is meddling with victims and memorials. This is a historic mistake,” Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov said after the upper house voted unanimously in favor of a resolution condemning the relocation, Interfax reported. |
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MOSCOW — Foreigners who are detained on suspicion of criminal activity could soon be waiting out investigations and trials in the same detention facilities as the locals. |
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CEOs from all over the world remain optimistic that Russia and other members of BRIC (Brazil, India and China) will see strong economic growth over the year ahead, PricewaterhouseCoopers said in a survey released Wednesday at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos. |
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DAVOS, Switzerland — The possibility of a major market crisis caused by financial derivatives is replacing the danger of low interest rates driving asset markets to unstable levels as the top issue on policymakers’ worry list. |
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ST. PETERSBURG — Northwest Telecom, the Northwest region’s major landline operator has acquired network operator Petersburg Transit Telecom from the Telecominvest company for $97 million, Interfax reported Tuesday. The acquisition was approved in December by Northwest Telecom shareholders. |
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ST. PETERSBURG — Parnas holding company will invest about 1 billion rubles ($37.7 million) into a new pig-breeding farm in the Leningrad Oblast, Interfax reported Tuesday. |
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ST. PETERSBURG — Razgulyay group revenue increased by 12 percent last year up to 22 billion rubles ($831.6 million), RBC reported Wednesday. Sugar companies increased revenue by 20 percent up to 10.3 billion rubles and corn companies by 5 percent up to 11. |
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MOSCOW — A report that Surgutneftegaz managers covertly hold 72 percent of the secretive oil firm sparked a flurry of speculation among banks Wednesday and led Deutsche UFG to conclude that the firm’s shares had been widely diluted. |
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TULA — Russia may diversify further the currency structure of its $300 billion in gold and foreign exchange reserves, the world’s third largest, a senior central banker said Wednesday. “Diversification will happen. It makes sense. We are discussing it,” Alexei Ulyukayev, first deputy chairman of the Central Bank, told a seminar for journalists. |
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GENEVA — Russia has only Georgia in its way to accession to the World Trade Organization after it signed a trade agreement with Costa Rica on Wednesday. |
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 With the presidential election scheduled for March 2008 drawing ever closer, the amount of time political commentators and analysts are devoting to the “succession problem” continues to increase. Most of attention is focused on whom President Vladimir Putin will choose to replace him. |
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It is unfair to say that Russia’s leaders still live according to concepts inculcated during their KGB training and are incapable of learning anything new. |
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 Rich in oil and hugging the shore of the Caspian Sea, Baku is a city whose history has been punctuated by invasions from competing foreign powers, each of which have left their individual mark on the town. Baku, the capital and the largest city of the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan, is located on the southern shore of the Apsheron Peninsula that curls like a claw into the Caspian, mid-way between the borders of Russia and Iran. |
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The bad news this week is that Ilya Kormiltsev, the head of the radical publisher Ultra Kultura and former songwriter for the Soviet rock band Nautilus Pompilius, has been hospitalized in London, diagnosed with cancer of the spine in its worst stage. |
 The London press greeted the arrival this week of Valery Gergiev, the artistic director of St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theater. As the new principle conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, his presence was met with a mix of shock and awe. The Independent: Broadly speaking, there are two kinds of conductor — the intellectual and the inspirational. Gergiev sits squarely in the latter category, meaning that when and if he’s thoroughly prepared (and it’s a big “if”), when and if the fires ignite, then there’s no touching him. |
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 Few countries are as rich in their literary heritage as Russia. Any nation would be glad to have among its literary progenitors even one author with the commanding epic scope of Leo Tolstoy, or a darkly prophetic visionary like Fyodor Dostoevsky, or a wise, observant humanitarian like Anton Chekhov. |
 The National Center of Photography has simultaneously launched two shows — “At Both Sides” and “Positive Processes” — which, apparently, have nothing in common except the gallery space they share. While both are worth visiting, placing them side by side is a regrettable lapse of taste since it is awkward to have disturbing documentary photography from a recent war next to an idyllic demonstration of technical photographic virtuosity defined as “art for art’s sake. |
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 Revolution, the popular dance club located in the bleak, decrepit buildings of Apraksin Dvor, a crime-infected marketplace in the city’s center, launches a program of live music on Friday — a refreshing move because the city’s club scene has hitherto developed a trend away from live music in favor of DJs and discos. |
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The Caviar Bar Angleterre Hotel, 24 Malaya Morskaya Ulitsa. Tel: 494 5953 Open from 2 p.m. to 2 a.m. All major credit cards accepted Menu in English and Russian Lunch for two without alcohol 3,325 rubles ($125) You would be hard pushed to find a finer location for a restaurant than the Angleterre hotel’s new Caviar Bar. It stands at the intersection of Voznesensky Prospekt and Malaya Morskaya Ulitsa and its vast windows, elegantly arching around the corner, provide a spectacular view of St. Isaac’s Cathedral. You should be warned, however: Unless you are an oligarch, an oil tycoon and/or a local bureaucrat, this, perhaps, isn’t the ideal place to head to when you want a cheap snack at lunchtime. |
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 BEVERLY HILLS, California — Musical drama “Dreamgirls” led the Oscar field with eight nominations on Tuesday, but its historic omission from the coveted best picture and directing categories instantly transformed the race for Hollywood’s top honors into a wild guessing game. |
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LONDON — The British are back in force at the Oscars and Buckingham Palace says it is rather pleased, while not giving the slightest hint whether Her Majesty, the Queen, has seen the nominated film based on her life. With a best film nomination for “The Queen,” one best actor nomination, two best director slots and three best actress nods, British stars may be poised for one of their best years ever at the Oscars and a chance to echo the jubilant boast made in 1982 by screenwriter Colin Welland after “Chariots of Fire” was a surprise Academy Awards victor. |
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 BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraq’s prime minister told parliament Thursday that the coming U.S-Iraqi security sweep in the capital would not be the last battle against militants, who he said would not be safe anywhere in the country. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki did not reveal the details of the plan, which he has dubbed “Operation Imposing Law,” or say when it would begin. |
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WARSAW — Germany’s Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy won their first major title with a resounding victory in the pairs competition at the European figure skating championships. Maria Petrova and Alexei Tikhonov, the 2000 world and two-time European champions from Russia won silver, with husband-and-wife team Dorota and Mariusz Siudek of Poland claiming bronze. |
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20LONDON — Julio Baptista scored three times as Arsenal stormed back to draw 2-2 with north London rivals Tottenham Hotspur in a frenetic first leg of their League Cup semi-final at White Hart Lane on Wednesday. |
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BERLIN — Former world heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko is planning a comeback in April. “I am returning to get my WBC championship back,” said the Ukrainian in a statement on Wednesday. “In November 2005, due to a serious knee injury, I retired without having lost the WBC belt in the ring. “At the WBC gala on December 20, 2005 in Cancun, Mexico, the WBC designated me as “WBC Champion Emeritus” and assured me that whenever I was ready to return, I would become the immediate mandatory challenger for the title. |
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