LOCAL NEWS

SHOPPERS TO SPEND $275 ON PRESENTS

MOSCOW — From the crowds in Okhotny Ryad in Moscow, you’d never know it was a workday. On a recent afternoon, people were strolling past shop windows decorated with garlands, artificial Christmas trees and fashionably dressed mannequins sporting Santa Claus caps.

As the New Year’s shopping season entered its frantic last week, most customers said they hadn’t changed their plans much since last year, while store mangers seemed buoyed by sales after a sleepy November.

Tatyana, a 55-year-old teacher who came to Moscow a few days ago from the Zabaikalsky region in Siberia, looked confused as she stood at the balustrade of the mall’s second level.

UKRAINE FACING ‘SERIOUS PROBLEMS’ PAYING FOR GAS

MOSCOW — The head of Russian gas giant Gazprom said Friday that Ukraine had cut back on purchases of Russian gas since mid-December and appeared to be facing serious cash problems.

“Ukraine is experiencing serious problems with payment,” Alexei Miller said on the Vesti channel in comments carried by the Ria-Novosti news agency.

Ukraine has until January 11 to pay for gas, according to Gazprom, which has cut off supplies to the country over unpaid bills repeatedly in the past.

RECORD LEVELS OF SNOWFALL HIT CITY

More than 3,000 people have been recruited by City Hall to clear the snow as Governor Valentina Matviyenko said that St. Petersburg stands on the verge of collapse.

Around 1,000 civilians and more than 2,000 soldiers have been out on the streets on a round-the-clock basis saving the city from what some have described as a snow siege.

TRANSPORT FARES TO GO UP ON NEW YEAR’S DAY

Public transport fares in St. Petersburg will be increased from Jan. 1, following the third round of price hikes in the last two years. Metro fares will be raised from 20 to 22 rubles ($0.

NATIONAL NEWS

KANDINSKY VERY BLAND AFTER 2008 ‘FASCIST’ SCANDAL

The Kandinsky Prize, Russia’s most financially generous contemporary art award, marked its third year with its safest choice and blandest ceremony yet. Vadim Zakharov, self-anointed archivist of the Moscow conceptualist school, beat out ersatz land artist Nikolai Polissky and fellow conceptualist Pavel Pepperstein for the 40,000 euro ($58,300) grand prize with his “St.

IN THE SPOTLIGHT: RUSSIA’S IT-GIRL SOBCHAK

Last week, the Afisha listings magazine relaxed its hipster sensibilities and put It Girl Ksenia Sobchak on the cover of what it called its “money issue.

Wanted: A Festive Tree Or Cash Bribe for a Traffic Cop

The man pulled open the car door and said “Give me 3,000 rubles [$100], or I’ll give them the yolka.”

It’s never nice to be confronted by a man fearful of losing his driver’s license, but there was no way that I was giving up that yolka, a wrapped up Christmas tree picked from the barren wasteland of the north of Russia, i.

OPINION

LIFE IS NOT FAIR

One of the great heroes of our time, Yegor Gaidar, has passed away. In November 1991, after being appointed by President Boris Yeltsin as deputy prime minister, later acting prime minister and head of his reform team, Gaidar was responsible for transforming Soviet Russia into a market economy.

A NATION OF SWINDLERS

After great tragedies, when people are most moved by compassion, crooks often set up fake charities claiming to collect money for the victims and their families.

FEATURES

SCIENTISTS TARGET A COLLEAGUE WITH GREAT CONTACTS

MOSCOW — Leading Russian chemist Vladimir Novotortsev calls him a modern Thomas Edison. The now-defunct Nuclear Power Ministry nominated him for a Nobel Prize. And former U.S. President George W. Bush sought his advice on purifying water.

Furthermore, he and State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov co-own a patent for a filter to clean radioactive water, and he holds a separate patent for a water filter that could reap millions of dollars in sales next year after winning a United Russia contest.

SCIENTISTS TARGET A COLLEAGUE WITH GREAT CONTACTS

MOSCOW — Leading Russian chemist Vladimir Novotortsev calls him a modern Thomas Edison. The now-defunct Nuclear Power Ministry nominated him for a Nobel Prize.