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MOSCOW — Russia said on Monday it was watching the extent of militarization in the Arctic as global warming makes potentially valuable resources in the polar region more accessible and would plan its strategy accordingly. Russia has already staked its claim to a majority of the Arctic waters, which it shares with four NATO countries, and planted a Russian flag on the seabed under the North Pole 18 months ago to reinforce its position. “Overall, we are looking at how far the region will be militarized. Depending on that, we’ll then decide what to do,” Interfax news agency quoted General Nikolai Makarov, the head of Russia’s General Staff, as saying during a visit to Abu Dhabi. Makarov was in the United Arab Emirates for an international arms fair. NATO Secretary-General Jaap De Hoop Scheffer last month asked whether the Western military alliance should increase its focus on the region, saying that it was necessary to build confidence and trust among the five Arctic states — four NATO members and rival power Russia. |
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/ Reuters
President Dmitry Medvedev attends a wreath-laying ceremony marking the Defender of the Fatherland day at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Kremlin wall in Moscow on Monday. |
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Russia on Saturday sought to defend its firing on a Chinese- and Indonesian-crewed cargo ship in the Sea of Japan, after Beijing strongly denounced the chain of events that left eight sailors dead. Russian coast guards had fired on the Sierra Leone-flagged New Star last week after pursuing the vessel for 18 hours without the ship responding to their orders, the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.
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A lawyer and a rights activist have contested the claims of the city’s ombudsman that the police acted within the law when they detained, searched, photographed and fingerprinted fans during a Feb. 6 raid on Arctica music club. Speaking at a roundtable at Rosbalt news agency on Friday, rights activist Yuly Rybakov dismissed the claims of St. |
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Zenit Candy Launched ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) Local soccer club Zenit and the Krupskaya Confectionary Factory have teamed up to produce a line of chocolates featuring Zenit’s iconic blue-and-white logo. |
All photos from issue.
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MOSCOW — A total of 64 Russian servicemen were killed during last year’s war with Georgia and in the immediate aftermath, while another 283 were wounded and three are missing, the deputy defense minister said on Saturday. General Nikolai Pankov said in an interview with Ekho Moskvy radio that the figures were recorded from August 8 to August 24. |
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MOSCOW — Russia will guarantee loans worth a total of 15 billion rubles ($415.6 million) to nine defense industry firms, the finance ministry said on Saturday, showing determination to support the military-industrial complex. |
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Nanotech Aims High FRANKFURT (Bloomberg) — Russian Nanotechnology Corp. aims for sales of 20 billion euros ($25.2 billion) by 2015 compared with 100 million euros currently, Die Welt said, citing an interview with Chief Executive Officer Anatoly Chubais. |
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MOSCOW — Russia’s unemployment rate climbed to 8.1 percent in January, its highest in more than six years, the State Statistics Service announced Thursday. |
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 Faced with dwindling stockpiles, Russia’s steel traders recently found themselves in the unfamiliar position of struggling to keep their warehouses full. Steelmakers were exporting more to profit from the weaker ruble, leaving domestic consumers to scramble for what remained of the country’s stunted output. |
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Davis Match May Move STOCKHOLM (AP) — Stockholm may replace Malmo as host of the Davis Cup match between Sweden and Israel after the original venue said it would ban spectators due to security reasons. The secretary general of the Swedish Tennis Association, Henrik Kallen, said Monday that Stockholm had offered to step in as an alternative venue for the March 6-8 World Group match. |
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 February has been a stressful month for Russian high-school students. The final list of exams they have to pass to enter higher educational institutions was only announced on Feb. 1, leaving students with just one month to choose where they would like to study after school, and three months to prepare for the exams. |
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Despite the difficult financial situation, many of St. Petersburg’s residents have not given up learning foreign languages, though the number of foreign students studying Russian in the city has significantly dropped, according to the directors of some of the city’s language schools. |
 This year will be a difficult one for the Russian business education market. Business schools are preparing for a decrease in students of up to 50 percent, and are being forced to reconsider their programs. According to research conducted by Begin Group in fall 2008 into the influence of the economic crisis on change in demand for business education, only 10. |
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The importance of teachers was summed up in the classic Russian film “The Irony of Fate:” “Doctors’ mistakes cost people dearly.” “Teachers’ mistakes are less noticeable, but ultimately cost people as dearly as those of doctors. |
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The city’s English-speaking business community will have another helping hand available from this week with the launch of Business English magazine. Created by the team responsible for Cool English Magazine, the monthly publication will contain material aimed at helping Russian students of English to improve their knowledge of “business English. |
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The QS Global 200 Business Schools 2009: The Employers’ Choice annual MBA employer survey published on on Jan. 22 by QS Quacquarelli Symonds, the independent MBA experts, demonstrates that MBA employers around the world are increasingly targeting a broader selection of regionally strong business schools from which to hire MBA graduates. |
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Former president Vladimir Putin’s appeal and financial incentives to young Russians to have more children and reverse the country’s population decrease has resulted in a baby boom in St. Petersburg during the past couple of years, highlighting the problem of finding reliable and affordable childcare for working parents. |
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The Test of Russian as a Foreign Language (TORFL) is the first challenge faced by many foreigners seeking to study or work in Russia. To enroll at a Russian university, be eligible for a job in Russia or teach Russian, a certificate verifying the candidate’s knowledge of the Russian language is essential, and the only official document which verifies Russian language skills is the TORFL certificate. |
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