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A group of armed and masked men who claimed to have been sent by the local prosecutor’s office raided the local headquarters of the Memorial human rights group on Thursday, confiscating hard drives from all of the group’s computers. Tatyana Kosinova, one of the leaders of Memorial, said in a telephone interview later Thursday, that several masked men armed with sticks stormed into her office on 23 Ulitsa Rubinsteina at around 1 p.m. and began searching the premises. “Staff were confined to their seats and not allowed to communicate,” she said. A spokesman for the Investigative Committee of the Russian General Prosecutor’s Office said the search was part of an investigation of a criminal case involving the publication of the “Here Comes the Real Candidate,” an article by Konstantin Chernyayev in Novy Peterburg newspaper in June 2007. |
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 MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin predicted Thursday that Russia will weather the global economic crisis with “minimal losses” and he pledged to maintain rises in social spending and avoid a sudden devaluation. |
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China witnessed both joy and tragedy in 2008 with the summer Olympic Games in Beijing in August coming just weeks after the Sichuan earthquake in which, it was reported on Nov. 21, as many as 19,000 people died. In a unique recognition of these two events, Chinese workers of the International Red Cross decided to honor with Olympic-style medals those people who gave blood following the earthquake and recognize the volunteers who had assisted the injured as champions. |
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MOSCOW — A convicted murderer who killed at least six people, including his wife and daughter, by poisoning their food has been found dead in a Yaroslavl prison, and officials believe that he may have died from the side effects of the poisons he used on his victims. |
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Cluster Bomb Ban OSLO (AP) — Nations began signing a treaty banning cluster bombs Wednesday in a move that supporters hope will shame the United States, Russia and China and other non-signers into abandoning the weapons blamed for maiming and killing civilians. Norway, which began the drive to ban cluster bombs 18 months ago, will be the first to sign, followed by Laos and Lebanon, both hard-hit by the weapons. |
All photos from issue.
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After more than two weeks of repeatedly failing to find a venue to hold a conference, new democratic movement Solidarity looks set to finally hold the event on Saturday. The movement, which has some of the most vocal critics of the Kremlin among its members, had been turned down by a string of potential host venues, including the Pulkovskaya and Pribaltiiskaya hotels, which both claimed to be booked on the requested dates. Olga Kurnosova, the local leader of Garry Kasparov’s United Civil Front, said the venue’s location is being kept secret to prevent the authorities from exerting pressure on the organization that has agreed to play host to the event. |
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MELTDOWN
Alexander Belenky / The St. Petersburg Times
A skier enjoying ideal but short-lived conditions on Tuesday at the Krasnoe Ozero resort, 100 kilometers to the north-west of the city. Snow is predicted in the coming week, though it is unlikely to settle. |
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MOSCOW — Russia’s ambassador to NATO said Wednesday that the alliance’s decision to rule out near-term membership for Ukraine and Georgia shows that the U.S.-led military bloc is shying away from interfering with Russia’s sphere of influence. NATO foreign ministers, meanwhile, affirmed on Wednesday their support for U.S. plans to install anti-missile defenses in Europe despite Russia’s opposition.
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MOSCOW — An announcement by Sibir Energy on Wednesday that it was taking on an additional $340 million worth of distressed assets owned by major shareholder Shalva Chigirinsky sent the company’s shares plummeting, losing more than half of their value on the London Stock Exchange. |
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MOSCOW — Gazprom will invest 920 billion rubles ($33 billion) next year and may borrow from state banks to cover spending, CEO Alexei Miller said. “We are fully maintaining our plans for 2009 as far as key projects are concerned . |
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MOSCOW — Moscow-based MDM Bank and the regional Ursa Bank, Russia’s 13th- and 15th-largest banks, respectively, will merge to become the country’s second-largest privately owned bank, according to a joint statement released Wednesday. Shareholders at the banks will merge their equity stakes in the new joint holding with 523 billion rubles ($18. |
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MOSCOW — Natural Resources and Environment Minister Yury Trutnev presented a report to the State Duma on Wednesday calling for measures that environmentalists have been requesting for the past eight years. |
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 With real estate bubbles and toxic mortgages among the root causes of the global financial crisis, it’s no wonder that Russia’s real estate market has been singled out to bear the brunt of the turmoil. As falling prices breed panic for many producers, they are forgetting that less does not always mean worse. |
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The fact that Saturday’s congress of Russia’s Communist Party was its 13th did not bode well. Superstitious patriots saw in that number something vaguely reminiscent of a Masonic plot — or at least something deeply disturbing to any true Russian Orthodox believer. |
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 Artist and poet Babi Badalov feels that his life is threatened both in his home country Azerbaijan and in Russia because of his politically conscious art and because he is openly gay. Growing nationalism and increasing attacks on people from the former Soviet republics also means that Russia is not entirely safe for someone from Azerbaijan. Badalov thought he had found a new home in Cardiff, Wales, where he had been based since December 2006, but earlier this year the U. |
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 When Jay-Jay Johanson came to Russia for the first time in 2003, the Swedish crooner was backed by two men extracting loud electronic beats from two Apple laptops. |
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In Greece it is called a taverna; in Slovakia it is a krcma; in Bulgaria a mehana. Russia also has its variation of this Eastern European bistro offering inexpensive but authentic national cuisine served in a simple and warm ambiance. Brynza Cheburechnaya is one place to experience this hospitality. The restaurant is open 24 hours and is easy to find on Moskovky Prospekt as it is colorfully lit against a gloomy background of neighboring buildings. The cozy atmosphere inside is somewhat spoiled by the presence of unsuitable interior elements. The orange and red vertical curtain blinds and Roman style columns covered with newsprint seem randomly chosen for the wooden decor and brick walls. |
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 A hundred examples of classic Italian Post-War commercial design from the Olivetti typewriter to the Vespa scooter are on show at the Loft Project “Etzahi” art center in an exhibition organized in association with Milan’s Triennale Design Museum. |
 If you list the themes examined at this year’s German Film Festival, it reads somewhat like a series of words and phrases produced by foreigners playing word association with the country’s name: World War II, militarism, Black Forest, communism, fascism and Turks are all there. Thankfully, for those who have had their fill of German stereotypes, these are not the only themes covered by the more than a dozen films at the seventh edition of the annual festival. |
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ISLAMABAD — U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in Islamabad on Thursday that Pakistan gave assurances that it would root out terrorism and round up anyone connected to last week’s attack in the Indian city of Mumbai. Rice said the fight against terrorism is a “global struggle” in a news conference at the end of a brief visit to Pakistan aimed at curbing tensions between the nuclear-armed South Asian neighbors. |
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HARARE — Zimbabwe has declared a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 560 people a national emergency and has appealed for help from donors to deal with the crisis, state media said on Thursday. |
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Issues Archive