|
|
|
|
NEW YORK — Microsoft Corp founder Bill Gates is the richest man again, overtaking investor Warren Buffett, as the global financial meltdown wiped out $2 trillion from the net worth of the world’s billionaires, Forbes Magazine said on Wednesday. It’s been a terrible year for Russia’s richest, however, the magazine reported, and New York City overtook Moscow in terms of the number of resident billionaires. The number of billionaires in the world fell by nearly a third to 793 in the past year, with large numbers dropping off the list in Russia, India and Turkey. Gates regained his title as the richest man in the world, with $40 billion after slipping to third last year when he was worth $58 billion. Buffett, last year’s richest man, fell to second place with $37 billion, down from $62 billion. |
|
LOCAL LEGEND
Alexander Belenky / The St. Petersburg Times
New York-based, Russian-born artist Mikhail Shemyakin teaches schoolgirl Lyudmila Paltayeva, aged 9, on Thursday at a master class organized by the Unilever International Schools Art Project. |
|
MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Thursday said Ukraine was on the verge of bankruptcy but promised Moscow would not push its ex-Soviet neighbor over the edge with high gas bills, local news agencies reported. The global crisis has battered Ukraine’s economy, with industrial output down more than 30 percent year-on-year, GDP seen shrinking six percent in 2009 and its currency losing 50 percent of its value against the dollar at one point last year.
|
|
St. Petersburg’s Kuibyshevsky court ruled on Wednesday that hearings in the case against businessman and alleged criminal authority Vladimir Barsukov (also known as Kumarin) be transferred from St. Petersburg to Moscow. “A decision was made to transfer the hearings to Moscow. |
|
Russia cannot afford to cut interests rates to lower levels than inflation, as it would represent a serious threat for the economy, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Thursday. |
|
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Congress could act on legislation this year to establish “permanent normal trade relations” with both Russia and Kazakhstan and to eliminate tariffs on goods from Georgia, a senior Democratic lawmaker said. “As you know, the administration has signaled that they want to try to review our relationship with Russia. |
|
‘Conman’ Busted ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — A man who allegedly posed as the son of a St. Petersburg vice governor to elicit money by promising political favors was arrested Thursday, the Ministry of the Interior announced. |
All photos from issue.
|
|
|
|
|
Three activists were detained on Thursday near Smolny Institute where St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko and the city’s government reside, as oppositionists came to present Matviyenko with a letter listing proposed anti-crisis measures and what they called an “anti-crisis parcel” as part of Dissenters’ Day, a nationwide series of protests organized by pro-democracy coalition The Other Russia. The parcel contained half a loaf of black bread, a pack of rock salt and a glass (a reference to “Valka Stakan” or “Valka the Glass,” one of Matviyenko’s nicknames stemming from her past as a Komsomol (Communist Youth organization) leader in Leningrad, as St. |
|
 MOSCOW — Vladivostok prosecutors have opened an investigation into whether a banner reading “Putler Kaput!” used by opposition groups at several recent rallies is a call for violence against Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. |
|
MOSCOW — Russia’s membership in the Council of Europe is not threatened by sanctions, despite Moscow’s continued refusal to ratify two key human rights protocols, two of the council’s top politicians said Wednesday. Luc van den Brande and Theodoros Pangalos, who monitor Russia’s compliance with its commitments to the council, said talk of sanctions against Moscow was groundless and that they hoped that the State Duma would soon ratify the outstanding protocols. |
|
|
|
|
MOSCOW — Russian power consumption has bottomed out at 2006 levels, and it could take years for producers to claw back lost ground after the sharp downturn of recent months, an industry regulator said Wednesday. Some of Russia’s electricity generators — which have been recently sold off to foreign and local investors — are at risk of operating at a loss as prices tumble, the regulator said. In February, electricity use fell 4.8 percent year on year after a January decline of 7.7 percent, which corresponded to Russia’s worst drop in industrial output on record. For the rest of 2009, the decline in power use will stay in the range of 5 percent to 7 percent year on year because consumption in industries such as metallurgy is no longer dropping, said Vladimir Shkatov, deputy head of the Market Council. |
|
 The St. Petersburg architectural studio, Yevgeny Gerasimov and Partners, in collaboration with Germany’s Sergei Choban Architectural Bureau, has won the international architectural competition to design the Europe Embankment on the Petrograd Side. |
|
MOSCOW — A collapse in the car market deepened last month, with sales down 38 percent year on year after a 33 percent fall in January, a sign that consumer spending is still far from a recovery. The Association of European Businesses, which puts out monthly statistics on the car market in Russia, said the downward spiral was set to continue. |
|
|
|
 I recently returned to Star City, Russia’s spaceflight training center located 30 kilometers northeast of Moscow, and it struck me how much — and how little — has changed since I first came here in the spring of 1989. As I passed an ad in the Moscow metro promoting advertising space for sale, I remembered hurtling down one of those same long, fast escalators sometime in the mid-1990s with a pioneering advertising man. |
|
I don’t think there is a point in discussing new charges against former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky. If a thief robs somebody at gunpoint, does it make sense to discuss the robber’s claim that his victim did not pay taxes? In the Yukos affair, the robber is the state. |
|
|
|
 This weekend will see the stage of the Mikhailovsky Theater transformed into flamboyant Ottoman Greece, with white houses and mosques straggling up a mountain slope above the boundless emerald Mediterranean Sea as the backdrop for a new version of the ballet “Le Corsaire” choreographed by Farukh Ruzimatov, artistic director of ballet at the Mikhailovsky Theater. |
|
In response to the massive intolerance and racist violence in Russia and St. Petersburg, a number of organizations and individuals have come up with a No to Xenophobia Campaign, a series of events that will start on Sunday and be held through March 29. |
 The Karelia Philharmonic is in St. Petersburg this weekend to perform a concert in celebration of its 75th anniversary. The program will include a work by a British composer, reflecting the background of the Petrozavodsk-based orchestra’s principal conductor, Marius Stravinsky, who is a British citizen. |
|
“U Prichala,” translates as “on the pier,” and this moniker suits the nautical decor of this undiscovered treasure trove of Indian cuisine located at the far end of Bolshoi Prospekt on Vasilievsky Island. |
|
People roaming the streets in Guinness hats with painted faces and shamrock accessories between March 14 and 17 can mean only one thing — St. Patrick’s day has come round again. Boasting numerous Irish pubs, concerts of Celtic-inspired music, Irish, Scottish and Breton dance schools, and excellent home-grown Celtic-style bands, St. |
|
|
|
 When the going gets tough, the tough get drinking — bottle after bottle of illicit vodka. The sale of illicit vodka is expected to account for nearly half of all vodka sales countrywide this year as people look for cheap, untaxed alcohol as their salaries shrink amid the economic crisis. “Illegal vodka production has always been a problem in Russia, and it will be even worse this year,” said Vadim Drobiz, spokesman for the Union of Alcohol Market Participants. |
|
|
|
|
BAGHDAD — An Iraqi reporter who hurled his shoes at former President George W. Bush was convicted of attempting to assault a foreign leader on Thursday and jailed for three years, dismaying many Iraqis who regard him as a hero. Muntazer al-Zaidi, 30, who pleaded not guilty to the charge, told the Baghdad court: “What I did was a natural reaction for the crimes committed against the Iraqi people. |
|
BELFAST — Republicans in Northern Ireland’s power-sharing administration have reassured their Protestant partners by denouncing guerrilla killings this week, but they risk losing support from hard-line nationalist backers. |
|
|
 INDIAN WELLS, California — Roger Federer will shake off the rust following a six-week break from competition by playing in the ATP and WTA Indian Wells tournament which begins on Wednesday. The world number two’s last competition was the Australian Open final on February 1, which featured a teary trophy ceremony as the Swiss lost to Rafael Nadal. |
|
MANCHESTER — Sir Alex Ferguson demonstrated why he has been Manchester United’s special one for over two decades as he laid into his players in the aftermath of a 2-0 win over Inter Milan that sent them into the last eight of the Champions League. |
Temp: -1°C clear 
Issues Archive