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MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin said on Monday he would become prime minister in a future Russian government if his close ally Dmitry Medvedev was elected president, giving Putin a new role after he leaves the Kremlin. A 42-year-old lawyer with no political base of his own, Medvedev is virtually certain to win next March’s presidential election since most Russians will vote for whoever the highly popular Putin endorses. “If Russian citizens express their confidence in Dmitry Medvedev and elect him as the country’s president, I will be ready to head the government,” Putin told a congress of his United Russia party held near Moscow’s Red Square. |
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IN THE RING
Alexander Natruskin / Reuters
Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov attends a party congress outside Moscow on Saturday. The opposition Communist Party on Saturday backed Zyuganov to run for president next March against Kremlin-backed Dmitry Medvedev. |
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A scandal is brewing over alleged violations in the draft of a high school student into the army. The St. Petersburg pressure group Soldiers’ Mothers is demanding a criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the drafting of Vladimir Timofeyev, an 11th-grade student at evening school No. 153. Ella Polyakova, the chairwoman of Soldiers’ Mothers claims the draft was illegal.
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MOSCOW — One is talking about a change in leadership. The other is talking about changing its logo. But after a disastrous performance in the State Duma elections and facing millions of dollars of debt, the liberal parties Yabloko and Union of Right Forces have managed to come to an agreement on one thing: Something has to change. |
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MOSCOW — The Communist Party on Saturday nominated leader Gennady Zyuganov to run for president in March — a vote where he faces a daunting challenge against President Vladimir Putin’s preferred successor. |
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MOSCOW — It may have outlived perestroika and survived the Yukos affair, but now financial problems seem to have sunk the weekly newspaper Moskovskiye Novosti. Following a management meeting, the publication’s parent company, Obyedinyonniye Media, announced Friday that the newspaper would stop publishing from Jan 1. |
All photos from issue.
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MOSCOW — A British citizen is in custody on suspicion of killing his new wife and her grandmother in their apartment in the Tver region, investigators said. William Cocks, 52, has admitted to killing the two and has been charged with murder, the Tver branch of the Investigative Committee said Friday. If convicted, he faces life in prison. Cocks was found unconscious in the apartment in the town of Udomlya on Dec. 3 with a dozen stab wounds to his lower arms, which investigators believe were self-inflicted, said Karina Begetova, a spokeswoman for the Investigative Committee. The bodies of his wife, Irina Cocks, a 35-year-old former stripper, and her grandmother, Vera Romanova, 82, were found in an adjacent room, Begetova said. |
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WE HAVE A WINNER!
Denis Sinyakov / Reuters
Ksenia Sukhinova, 20, poses after winning the Miss Russia beauty contest in Moscow on Friday |
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MOSCOW — A Swiss citizen who asked for refugee status in Belarus has returned to Switzerland without explanation after spending 10 days in the country, Belarussian officials said. The Swiss asylum seeker, 32, entered Belarus on Nov. 28 at a checkpoint on the Poland-Belarus border, saying he wanted to live and work in Belarus, said Vitaly Aksyonov, head of the citizenship and migration department in the Brest region of Belarus.
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Sponsor For Admiralty ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — A sponsor, who preferred to remain anonymous, gave 100 million rubles ($4 million) for the restoration of the Admiralty tower and sculptures, Interfax reported on Saturday. The sponsorship was offered at the auction of the second Gifts Store for St. Petersburg’s Birthday that was held on Friday. The auction offered 17 St. Petersburg monuments in need of restoration. All the sites on offer for renovation were bought by large companies or private sponsors, who will allocate their money for the restoration works. World Ice Show ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — World ice skating stars will perform in a unique show to take place on Moscow and St. |
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 PRIOZERSK, Leningrad Region — When duty called, a young Viktor Zubkov donned his old pants and black rubber boots to clean stables and check heating pipes. |
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 MOSCOW — David Sarkisyan, the director of the Shchusev Architecture Museum, often lets it drop that he has lived four lives. “I am exceptionally lucky as a person, because despite having four professions I have never ‘worked,’ my wage was always small, but I only did things that I liked, I am one of the happiest people in the world,” he said. |
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MOSCOW — Shareholders blocked the spinoff of Norilsk Nickel’s energy assets Friday in an anticipated move that casts a pall over the miner’s development plans. Mikhail Prokhorov’s Onexim Group, which is in the process of selling its 25 percent plus one share stake in the palladium and nickel miner, abstained from voting at Friday’s extraordinary shareholders meeting, said Alexei Rebinkin, a spokesman for Onexim. |
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Ford Motor Company workers ended a strike that had lasted for almost a month in Vsevolozhsk, Leningrad Oblast, at midnight on Sunday. “We are very pleased with the decision taken by the trade union that will allow all employees to get back to work from Sunday midnight and start earning their salaries again in this period leading up to the winter holiday season,” said Theo Streit, the plant’s director, according to Ford’s press service. |
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MINSK —Belarus will pay 19 percent more for Russian gas beginning next year, Gazprom said Saturday, a day after President Vladimir Putin announced $1.5 billion in loans to help its economy adjust to rising prices. The announcements came after Putin paid a two-day visit to Minsk, which yielded no signs that the two countries were inching toward a full merger. |
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TBILISI, Georgia — Georgian Finance Minister Nika Gilauri halved his forecast for 2008 economic growth on Friday, saying political turmoil had scared off foreign investors. |
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RIGA — Latvia’s gas company said Friday that it had struck a gas supply deal with Gazprom for 2008 through 2010, which could lead to a rise in prices of up to 50 percent, depending on heavy fuel oil price changes. Latvijas Gaze, 47 percent owned by E. |
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MOSCOW — If elected president, Dmitry Medvedev will most likely tip the scales in favor of Gazprom in any new acquisitions and help the state-controlled gas giant with domestic prices and taxes. |
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Elite Apartment Sold ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — St. Petersburg Property Fund auctioned off an elite apartment on Krestovsky island after the owner failed to pay mortgage fees to Sberbank, Interfax reported Friday. The starting price for the 174-square meter apartment in the Fifth Element residential complex was $1. |
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MOSCOW — German Economics Minister Michael Glos on Friday urged the Russian government to step up its battle against bureaucracy and to improve the legal environment for investors. |
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MOSCOW — Russian Railways showed off a trial e-ticketing system Friday that will cut out some of the hassle of traveling on the country’s notoriously cumbersome rail network. The system allows customers who buy their tickets online to bypass the lines at railway stations and go straight to the train with just their passport and a printout confirming their purchase. |
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MOSCOW — Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin has met with his deputy Sergei Storchak, charged with attempting to embezzle $43 million, for the first time since Storchak’s arrest, his ministry said Friday. |
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MOSCOW — Nord Stream, the firm building a subsea gas pipeline from Russia to Western Europe, said Thursday that early next year it would revise upward the project’s costs, which analysts say may soar by at least 60 percent. Nord Stream, majority owned by Gazprom, has said it would take at least 5 billion euros ($7. |
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 A new political model has emerged after the State Duma elections — Putin’s model. Putin began constructing this model in 1999, but it only reached its most advanced stage this fall. Putin’s regime is the Russian version of the typical authoritarian model. |
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The deflation of the real estate bubble began with a weak link — the subprime segment of the U.S. mortgage market among poor homeowners who were unable to service their loans. |
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Plans for a transition of power were unveiled last week in Russia. The news is that there won’t be one. This choreographed switcheroo is Putinism to a tee. The president and his men trample on civic freedoms and concentrate power in the name of “order” and “stability. |
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At the United Nations Conference on Climate Change that has just concluded in Bali, the world’s governments agreed to begin two years of negotiations to replace for the Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions. |
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 BASRA, Iraq — British troops handed over security to Iraqi forces on Sunday in the last of four provinces it once patrolled, effectively marking the end of nearly five years of control of southern Iraq. Thousands of Iraqi police and troops marked the handover with a parade along the palm-fringed embankment in Basra, the country’s second-biggest city, in a show of Iraqi military force on a scale unseen since the days of Saddam Hussein. |
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NUSA DUA, Indonesia — Nearly 200 nations agreed at UN-led talks in Bali on Saturday to launch negotiations on a new pact to fight global warming after a last-minute reversal by the United States allowed a breakthrough. |
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BEIRUT — Lebanon’s presidential election was postponed for a ninth time Monday, to December 22, despite intense international efforts to convince rival parties to srike a deal and end a dangerous political vacuum. “The parliament session that was scheduled today has been postponed to Saturday December 22 at 12:30 p. |
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LONDON — World number ones Roger Federer and Justine Henin were named 2007 ITF World Champions, the governing body announced on Monday. Federer, who won eight titles during the season, became only the second player after Pete Sampras to receive the accolade for the fourth successive year. |
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TEHRAN — President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has withdrawn his candidate to head the national football federation, in a bid to end a row with FIFA that threatened Iran’s future in world football. |
 LONDON — Fabio Capello embarked on the task of restoring England’s football fortunes on Monday with a pledge to drag the best out of the country’s under- performing stars. The Italian, who has a reputation as a strict disciplinarian, also issued a warning that no one could take a place in his team for granted. |
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LONDON — Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech said there was no-one to blame but himself for the mistake that presented Premier League leaders Arsenal with a 1-0 victory over their London title rivals. |
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LONDON — Chelsea center back John Terry will be out of action for up to six weeks after a scan on Monday showed he had broken three bones in his right foot. The Chelsea and England captain sustained the injury after being caught by Emmanuel Eboue in the first half of Sunday’s 1-0 defeat by Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium. |
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The St. Petersburg International Business Association for North-Western Russia celebrated its 12th anniversary on Thursday, October 25, 2007, at the Mansion of A.F. Kelch (the Lawyer’s House). More than 120 people representing SPIBA members – companies, partners and guests, attended the reception. |
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The transport infrastructure is one of the major challenges in a megapolis. Can we expect improvements? We received some answers on November 29, 2007, when SPIBA held its General Meeting at the Neidgart Mansion. |
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During 2007 SPIBA’s Committees successfully worked to provide a platform to exchange experience and ideas related to key business issues and to develop a dialogue with authorities to achieve SPIBA goals and objectives. The SPIBA Legislation & Lobbying Committee made good progress in improving the investment climate in the region. |
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As usual, SPIBA celebrated the forthcoming New Year season early on Saturday December 8, 2007. The SPIBA New Christmas Party at the Konstantin Palace, which functions as the coastal residence of the President of the Russian Federation and a congress center, brought together a large group of SPIBA members and guests. |
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The number of employees in the St. Petersburg office of ANCOR increased to 75 persons this autumn, which made it possible to augment monthly sales in comparison to the precedent quarter by 47%. Presently the regional network of the company includes 30 offices on the territory of Russia, 4 offices in Ukraine and also offices in Belarus and Kazakhstan. |
Temp: -2°C moderate or heavy snow showers
Issues Archive