LOCAL NEWS

JOBLESS RATES EXPECTED TO SPIKE BY END OF YEAR

MOSCOW — The number of registered unemployed is likely to rise 18 percent by the end of the year, Federal Labor and Employment Service head Yury Gertsy said Wednesday, a figure that calls into question the efficacy of the government’s multibillion-dollar anti-crisis plan.

RUSNANO SEEKS TAX BREAKS FROM OBAMA

MOSCOW — Rusnano, the state nanotechnology giant, hopes to press President Barack Obama for tax breaks for Russian technology as it wraps up plans to create a $1 billion venture fund with U.

CITY POLICE RAID FORMER CASINOS IN BID TO ENFORCE NEW BAN

As all casinos in the country should have closed from July 1, 2009, Dmitry Nevelsky, head of the St. Petersburg Association of Gambling Businesses announced that the industry had come to an end.

“It’s a dead field now,” Nevelsky said at a news conference at the Rosbalt news agency on Thursday.

TRAIN BOMBING SUSPECTS CLAIM TORTURE

MOSCOW — Two Ingush suspects charged in the 2007 bombing of a Moscow-St. Petersburg train told a court Tuesday that they had been tortured by police and subjected to interrogations in a forest and a cellar rather than the police station.

Most Russians Ignorant Of Pikalyovo Events, Poll Shows

Less than half of Russians have heard anything about the recent events in Pikalyovo, where unpaid workers blocked a federal highway and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin publicly berated factory owners, state pollster VTsIOM said Tuesday.

The conflict over wage arrears in the Leningrad Oblast town threw the government into action to head off further protests.

NATIONAL NEWS

SINGER ZYKINA DIES AT 80

MOSCOW — Lyudmila Zykina, one of the Soviet Union’s best-loved folk singers who rose to stardom from the factory floor to charm millions at the height of the Cold War, died Wednesday at the age of 80.

The ITAR-TASS news agency quoted her doctor Vladimir Konstantinov as saying that she had died in a Moscow hospital on Wednesday morning.

MEDVEDEV APPALLED BY ALCOHOL STATISTICS

President Dmitry Medvedev has expressed surprise at how much alcohol Russians drink and ordered the government to develop a program to discourage drinking.

In Brief

Professor Detained

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — A senior professor at a St. Petersburg university has been arrested on suspicion of accepting bribes on two occasions this summer, according to the prosecutor general’s office.

Lyubov Zhigar, a senior professor at the St. Petersburg State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, was arrested for allegedly taking bribes in exchange for giving out diplomas, the Investigative Committee of the St.

OPINION

Giving China a Piece of Russia

On June 17, President Dmitry Medvedev and Chinese President Hu Jintao signed an agreement in which Russia will sell 300 million tons of oil to China over 20 years for $100 billion. That breaks down to $57 per barrel.

In order for Russia to deliver that oil, a new pipeline must be built to China. This is something that Yukos had originally planned to build by the mid-2000s at a cost of $4 billion.

CULTURE

MICROSCOPIC ART MAKES RUSSIAN FICTION A REALITY

The well-known Russian story about the left-handed craftsman (“Levsha” in Russian) who shod a life-sized mechanical flea has been transformed from a fairytale into reality.

Although its author, the writer Nikolai Leskov, said that he had made up the subject of his novel and that the brilliant craftsman was no more than a fantasy, real miniature masterpieces can now be seen by visitors to the city’s Peter and Paul Fortress.

CHERNOV’S CHOICE

Morrissey roamed through St. Petersburg this week, bequeathing a sweaty shirt to his fans, which means that this summer’s main music event is safely behind us and only a few smaller things are left.

An eye for detail

The “Nuddles” on the English menu would have been highly perplexing without the Russian original to hand (“Lapsha,” or “noodles”), and the true nature of the mysterious additive “Rosswater” remains a mystery (“Rosewater,” perhaps?). Dyslexic English translation aside, Fiolet bowled this diner over with its impeccable attention to detail and well-crafted Euro-Asian fusion cuisine.