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MOSCOW — Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov claimed responsibility for the deadly Moscow metro explosions in a short video posted on a rebel web site late Wednesday, hours after two new suicide bombings killed at least 12 people in Dagestan. The authorities had blamed Umarov for the Moscow bombings on Monday, which killed 39 people and injured 85 others, and they promised Wednesday to boost security on transportation, including the introduction of metal detectors in the Moscow metro. Umarov said in a 4 1/2-minute video clip that the bombings were carried out on his personal orders in retaliation for an attack on impoverished Ingush and Chechens who were gathering wild garlic outside the Ingush village of Arshty on Feb. |
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 Dozens were detained during a banned demonstration in defense of the constitutional right to assembly in the center of St. Petersburg on Wednesday. Part of the Strategy 31 campaign, the demonstration took place near Gostiny Dvor department store on Nevsky Prospekt, the city’s main thoroughfare, despite having failed to obtain permission for the event from the city authorities. |
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MOSCOW — The impoverished Russky island in the Far East will be developed as a special economic zone to promote tourism after it hosts the 2012 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Wednesday. Preparations for the summit have turned Russky Island into the country’s second-biggest construction project, following work for the 2014 Sochi Olympics. |
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An opposition activist has unexpectedly won a case against the St. Petersburg chief of police. A court ordered St. Petersburg Police Chief Vladislav Piotrovsky to retract the accusations he had made in a letter to the activist’s university, and ruled that the student should receive compensation for moral damages. |
All photos from issue.
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The Legislative Assembly passed a law on forestry in mid-March that grants any local citizen the right to cut down 15 cubic meters of timber from the city woods annually for heating needs, causing an outcry in the country’s environmental circles. The law also allows citizens to cut down up to 50 cubic meters of lumber for construction or renovation needs once every 10 years, and up to 15 cubic meters of wood for personal needs once every five years. |
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MOSCOW — Foreign workers make up as much as 10 percent of the country’s work force, a report published by the United Nations said Wednesday. There were 2. |
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MOSCOW — Veteran human rights campaigner Lyudmila Alexeyeva was struck in the head as she laid flowers for bombing victims in the Park Kultury metro station late Wednesday instead of attending an anti-Kremlin rally. The 82-year-old activist said the attacker — a young man — approached and asked, “Are you still alive?” before hitting her. |
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MOSCOW — A federal media watchdog said Wednesday that it had issued a warning to Kommersant Vlast, the influential news magazine, for divulging military secrets in a report about the Strategic Rocket Forces. |
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Forum Party Tender ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — City Hall has announced an open tender for the organization of the governor’s reception at the annual St. Petersburg Economic Forum, which will take place from June 17 to 19 this year. The cultural program of the forum is expected to cost about 15 million rubles ($510,000,) and the governor’s reception may cost another 10 million rubles ($340,000,) Delovoi Peterburg newspaper reported. |
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St. Petersburg’s insurance companies have suffered significant losses this winter due to the heavy snowfalls that the city experienced. The warmer weather promises little relief, however — now more trouble is expected in the form of flooding in the city. Most car insurance claims this winter were related to car accidents caused by ice on the roads. |
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 Every explanation offered for Monday’s Moscow metro bombings is connected in some way with the North Caucasus. Most refer to the fact that Federal Security Service commandos killed several well-known separatist leaders in the region over the past few weeks. |
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Terrorist bombings of apartment buildings, markets and the metro have been ripping Russia apart for 11 years. Although the media focus mostly on terrorist attacks in Moscow, most of the bombings took place in other cities — especially in the North Caucasus, where it was much easier for militants to execute them. |
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 Why Pyotr Konchalovsky? And why now? At the preview of the opening of a blockbuster exhibition of this artist — the first in St. Petersburg since 1985 — Yevgenia Petrova, deputy director of St. Petersburg’s State Russian Museum, said simply: “The time has come. |
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A few weeks ago, Russians were outraged to learn that traffic cops ordered drivers and their passengers in civilian cars to form a æèâîé ùèò (human shield) to stop a criminal speeding toward them on the Moscow Ring Road. |
 MOSCOW — The Golden Mask Festival, offering up some of the best Russian theater from last season, is well underway. In the coming week alone, Muscovites have the opportunity to see shows by the Bolshoi Drama Theater from St. Petersburg, the Volkov Theater from Yaroslavl and the Krasny Fakel Theater from Novosibirsk, as well as several Moscow productions that are nominated for awards. |
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On a quiet side street off Stary Nevsky, about 10 minutes from the Moscow train station, next door to a banya sits a nondescript illuminated edifice. The building’s large red metallic door misleadingly suggests a bank or an insurance agency, but in fact conceals the Italian restaurant Gusto, which replaced the deceptively named Simple Bar after the latter’s closure last year. |
 Last week, the tabloids were busy investigating a comedian advertising women’s underwear, a television host’s extravagant taste in interior decoration and a feud between the first lady of Russian pop and the plaited former first lady of Ukrainian politics. Comedian Sergei Svetlakov, best known for his roles as a gay metal worker and two gastarbeiters’ loud-mouthed boss in sketch comedy “Nasha Russia,” is complaining that a Perm store has illegally taken his face to advertise women’s tights and underwear, Tvoi Den reported. |
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 NEW YORK — 2010 looks set to be another bumper year for Hollywood films. While no one is expecting any to come even close to “Avatar’s” box-office-shattering record of $2 billion, there are still plenty of familiar formulas involving action, romance, animation and the pull of major stars to draw audiences to cinemas this year. |
 NEW YORK — Brooklyn-born director Darren Aronofsky feels a strong affiliation for his Russian heritage. “I have deep connections to Russia. My grandparents came from Russia and so many of my family traditions are connected to the country.” It’s no wonder, then, that his latest film boasts some Russian inspiration. He’s just wrapped shooting on “Black Swan” in New York, a thriller about two dancers and their turbulent relationship, set around a production of Tchaikovsky’s ballet “Swan Lake. |
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 NEW YORK — New York-based Alla Verlotsky is passionate about Russian film and this year the company she founded, Seagull Films, is celebrating its tenth anniversary as a leading distributor of quality Russian films in North America. |
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