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 MOSCOW ¬— Environmentalists have welcomed the creation of a new nature reserve for Amur tigers in the Russian Far East as a key step toward preserving the species.
The Sredneussurissky nature reserve, which Primorye Governor Vladimir Miklushevsky signed into existence Friday, connects two existing protected areas, creating a corridor between tiger populations on either side of the Russia-China border. |
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 MOSCOW — Radio Liberty is hiring dozens of staff to rebuild its operations in a modern multimedia format, a senior executive of the station's parent company Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty said Friday. |
 MAKHACHKALA, Dagestan — A busy crossroad in the city center was full of masked camouflaged men who were stopping cars Friday for a security check.
Armed with assault rifles, the men — who by all signs represented local police — spoke little while searching the vehicles, including the one with a St. |
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MOSCOW — Estonia has granted political asylum to a Russian journalist and human rights activist who fled abroad more than two months ago, fearing prosecution over his criticism of the Russian Orthodox Church. |
 ST. PETERSBURG – City authorities rushed to deny Friday that they had authored a controversial brochure aimed at labor migrants that has stirred a scandal in the northern capital.
The brochure, titled "The Labor Migrant's Guide," appeared on the official website of the St. Petersburg administration's Tolerance program Thursday, drawing criticism from bloggers for its depiction of the city's migrants as craftsmen's tools, including a putty knife, broom and paint brush, while locals appeared in human form. |
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 MOSCOW – Moscow authorities have questioned Kirov Governor Nikita Belykh on suspicion of misappropriating more than $3.5 million from a now-defunct opposition party and giving the money to a firm founded by protest leader Alexei Navalny, Vedomosti reported Thursday, citing an undisclosed police source. |
 MOSCOW – Police said Friday that they had detained a senior executive at British-Russian oil company TNK-BP on suspicion of trying to sell sought-after positions in the presidential administration.
According to police, the executive offered to sell two businessmen the positions of head of the presidential administration's internal affairs department and deputy chief of staff for the presidential envoy to the Central Administrative District. |
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 MOSCOW – At midnight, the halls of the independent Dozhd television station at the former Red October chocolate factory were dark and empty, with only the "on air" sign lit up in red indicating that the channel still had something left to broadcast. |
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MOSCOW – The U.S. said that "serious military equipment" was found on board a passenger plane forced down by Turkish fighter jets during a flight between Moscow and Damascus last week and that it has spoken to Russia about it.
U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said U.S. diplomats have spoken with Russians both in Washington and Moscow about the cargo confiscated from the Syrian airline by Turkish authorities at the Ankara airport on Oct. 11.
"We have been in contact with the Russians," Nuland told reporters in Washington on Wednesday.
"As you know, we were pretty definitive publicly about our grave concern that this kind of activity continues, particularly by a Security Council member," she said, according to a transcript on the State Department's website. |
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 MOSCOW – Left Front leader Sergei Udaltsov, who investigators suspect of plotting mass riots on Russian soil, called on supporters to picket law enforcement agencies on Thursday in support of his assistant charged in the same case. |
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MOSCOW – Russia has written off more than $20 billion in debt and contributed $50 million to the World Bank Trust Fund to support development projects in African countries, a senior Foreign Ministry official told the UN General Assembly, as Moscow steps up its quest to join the OECD.
Russia is an active participant in the promotion of education and health in Africa, contributing $42.9 million in 2008-12 to education in developing countries and $100 million to health projects fighting HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
"We strongly believe that it is possible to overcome all the barriers on the way to transform the continent into an area of security, stability and sustainable development on the solid basis of international law, African unity and solidarity," Vladimir Sergeyev, director of the Foreign Ministry's department of international organizations, told the assembly Wednesday, according to a transcript on the website of Russia's UN mission. |
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 MOSCOW – The mother of Sergei Magnitsky, the anti-corruption lawyer who died in pretrial detention in 2009, has filed a complaint in the European Court of Human Rights. |
 MOSCOW – The Investigative Committee said Monday that it suspects a United Russia deputy of involvement in unlawful business activity, a month after an opposition lawmaker was stripped of his seat in parliament while facing similar allegations.
Investigators said in a statement Tuesday that a probe concerning the entrepreneurial activities of Alexei Knyshov revealed that he has been involved in managing multiple construction businesses while in office. |
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 ST. PETERSBURG – A legendary naval cruiser that played a symbolic role in the Bolshevik coup of 1917 was officially retired from military service Tuesday. |
All photos from issue.
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The established Moscow film critic and TV presenter Kirill Razlogov may be summoned to testify at the Trial of 12 after one of the prosecution experts was dismissed by the Moscow City Court as “unqualified.”
The defense of The Other Russia activists on trial for alleged “extremist activities” has demanded that Razlogov appear in court as the director of the Russian Institute of Cultural Studies to testify about his employees, Vitaly Batov and Natalya Kryukova.
Batov and Kryukova produced highly debatable “expert reports” supporting the investigators’ claims that the men on trial acted as the banned National Bolshevik Party (NBP), rather than legally within The Other Russia, the party that dissident author and political activist Eduard Limonov launched after the NBP was banned. |
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A HERO OF OUR TIME
KRISTINA FATINA / SPT
A new sculpture was unveiled in the city’s Izmailovsky Gardens on Friday. ‘Petersburg Angel,’ by local sculptor Roman Shustrov, the winner of a city
sculpture competition, was inspired by the old men that the artist recalled from his childhood in Leningrad, as St. Petersburg was then known. |
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ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — City Governor Georgy Poltavchenko said he was upset by the behavior of some St. Petersburg residents who jeered the cortege of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev during his visit to the city last week.
“When the prime minister and I drove along the streets of our honored city, the majority of drivers honked their horns at us and people standing along the roadside raised certain fingers — to somebody who had come to solve the problems of his native city, our native city,” Poltavchenko told reporters of the Baltic media group, web portal Fontanka.
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Drunk Cop Kills Man
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The head of the criminal investigation department of a local district police station was detained after he hit and killed a pedestrian while driving under the influence of alcohol Saturday.
The policeman hit the man, who was reportedly crossing the road in an area where there was no pedestrian crossing, in the city’s Krasnogvardeisky district, at 3. |
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The Russian and U.S. postal services have agreed on measures designed to speed up the delivery of American parcels to Russia.
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) has promised to solve the issue of improving postal logistics from the U. |
 The State Hermitage Museum has spawned a hotel of the same name.
The Hermitage Hotel will open at 10 Ulitsa Pravdy in the near future, according to the hotel’s website. The company has obtained the rights to the name, which belongs to the museum. The Hermitage signed a memorandum with International Baltic Investment Company (MBIK) regarding the partnership, and a corresponding contract is now being drawn up, said Larisa Korabelnikova, the museum’s press secretary, who declined further comment. |
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A new service that allows city residents to order a taxi using a smartphone application was launched in St. Petersburg on Thursday.
First launched in Israel, GetTaxi aims to simplify the process of ordering a taxi, and is also represented in the U. |
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This fall’s Blood Donor Week began in St. Petersburg on Monday, Interfax reported.
Blood Donor Week is held in the city every year to replenish local blood banks after the summer months, which traditionally see a low rate of blood donation. Many hospitals, including Cancer Center, are desperate for blood and its components, the National Social Help Center said. |
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MOSCOW — The crews of some European airlines will need visas to enter Russia as of Nov. 1 if the European Union does not scrap its visa policy for Russian officials, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said late Sunday in Luxembourg.
The declaration marked an escalation in the longstanding spat between Moscow and Brussels over a visa facilitation agreement.
“We have warned [our EU] partners that if we cannot sign an agreement in October, their airlines must obtain multiple-entry visas for their crews,” Lavrov said after an official dinner with European counterparts, according to a ministry transcript.
EU officials quickly rejected Lavrov’s ultimatum and said the union would not back down, making it highly unlikely that the dispute would be resolved anytime soon. |
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 MOSCOW — Investigators announced Tuesday that they have wrapped up a second inquiry into the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya and charged five suspects with murder and illegal possession of weapons. |
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MOSCOW — Russian human rights activists expressed dismay at the news that the EU will be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
“First they give [it] to Obama, then to the European Union. Who is next? Maybe the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,” veteran campaigner Lyudmila Alexeyeva quipped to Interfax, referring to a regional security watchdog dominated by Russia and China that is widely seen as ineffective. |
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MOSCOW — Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev on Tuesday pledged to take a tough stand on smoking and tobacco as the government is set to consider an anti-smoking bill. |
 MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin said Monday that voters had shown their trust in the way the authorities are governing by choosing United Russia candidates in regional elections Sunday.
“For me, these election results were not surprising. I consider this one more step confirming voters’ intent to support the current institutions of power and the development of Russian statehood,” Putin said at a meeting with Central Elections Commission head Vladimir Churov. |
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 MOSCOW — To find her father’s World War II grave, Natalya Pugachyova had to become a celebrity.
She is one of the Buranovskiye Babushki, a group of singing grandmothers who ended up second at this year’s Eurovision Song Contest with their catchy tune sung in the Udmurt language, a distant relative of Finnish. |
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MOSCOW — Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Monday that federal and regional government agencies shouldn’t demand any more paperwork from investors than existing rules call for.
Medvedev made the statement at an annual meeting of the Foreign Investment Advisory Council, which brings together representatives of about 40 major multinational corporations present in Russia.
“It’s necessary to state the principle that they can’t require documents that haven’t been directly stipulated,” Medvedev said, responding to one of the speeches at the event, Interfax reported.
The report didn’t say whose speech Medvedev was reacting to.
He also called on the foreign business community to press governments in Europe and the United States to work for a further easing of visa rules. |
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 MOSCOW — Promsvyazbank abandoned a $500 million listing in London and Moscow late Monday due to weak investor demand for one of Russia’s biggest privately owned lenders. |
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President Vladimir Putin recently promised to create 25 million new jobs by 2020. His loyal subordinates have proposed initiatives designed to make his promise a reality.
First came a proposal by Senator Tatyana Zabolotnaya from the Primorye region that would make it compulsory to register the nearly 5 million bicycles in the country. |
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MOSCOW — Aeroflot is selling its majority stake in Aerofirst, which runs duty-free shops and The Irish Bar at Sheremetyevo Airport, as it divests itelf of noncore businesses. |
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St. Petersburg’s residential real estate construction sector, which saw a decrease of nearly 40 percent on the previous year in the first half of this year, is once again nearing last year’s level.
In the first nine months of this year, 1.4 million square meters of residential real estate were launched in the city, 4. |
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MOSCOW — Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin is in India for a three-day visit to discuss ways to intensify trade, review nuclear liability issues and firm up the agenda for a meeting between the countries’ leaders, the Indian Asian News Service reported. |
 In a recent comedy sketch show, a police officer forks over the pay raise that he hid from his wife after she hears President Vladimir Putin announce the increase on TV.
“Vladimir Vladimirovich,” the policeman mutters on the “6 Kadrov” television show, “thank you for raising our salaries, but did you have to tell everyone about it?”
For municipal governments, more information about pay raises would be welcome. |
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 MOSCOW — Moscow-based retail property developers are showing more interest in building shopping malls in regional capitals as well as next-tier cities with populations of less than 1 million. |
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MOSCOW — The Russian government is talking about setting up economic zones for the processing of timber and fish in areas next to China, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said after IMF meetings in Tokyo, Interfax reported.
“We are considering the establishment of similar economic zones in areas next to Chinese land to set up processing, especially of timber and fish, to attract investors with beneficial taxation measures,” he said. |
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MOSCOW — The Economic Development Ministry has published a draft decree on state regulation of hotel prices for the 2014 Olympics and Paralympics in Sochi. |
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MOSCOW — The Economic Development Ministry has published a draft bill developed by the Labor Ministry that will liberalize migration legislation concerning foreign executives as a result of the country having joined the WTO, Kommersant reported Saturday.
The proposed changes affect senior managers and highly qualified specialists, which are termed “key personnel of commercial organizations” in the bill. |
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 More than a century ago, Russian writer and former political prisoner Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote, “The degree of civilization in a society can be judged upon entering its prisons.” Today, that assertion continues to be valid, but the brutalities of the recent past have shown that civilization should be judged by more than its attitude to just one minority group of prisoners. |
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 The city’s club scene has passed through some drastic changes since the 1990s, but Griboyedov club — which celebrates its 16th birthday this week — has remained one of its best loved historic hangouts.
Griboyedov first emerged amid the ruins of Ligovka — the largely neglected area close to St. Petersburg’s infamous Ligovsky Prospekt — in October 1996, and was run by Dva Samolyota, the band that at the time was one of the trendiest in the city and responsible for many art initiatives on the local club scene.
In addition to Dva Samolyota, every decent local band — including Tequilajazzz, Kolibri, NOM, Kirpichi, Markscheider Kunst, Prepinaki and Leningrad — performed there. |
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SERGEY CHERNOV / SPT
GRIBOYEDOV CLUB CO-FOUNDER
MIKHAIL SINDALOVSKY TALKS TO
THE ST. PETERSBURG TIMES
AHEAD OF THE BUNKER CLUB’S
16TH BIRTHDAY. |
 WASHINGTON — Fifty years after the Cuban missile crisis, the U.S. National Archives has pulled together documents and secret White House recordings to show Americans how President John F. Kennedy deliberated with advisers to avert nuclear war.
A new exhibit, “To the Brink: JFK and the Cuban Missile Crisis,” opened Friday to recount the showdown with the Soviet Union.
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Parisian chic has arrived in St. Petersburg! The legendary French beauty salon Lucie Saint-Clair, which boasts Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Adjani, Patricia Kaas and Eva Longoria among its top-flight clientele, has opened a franchise in Russia.
Located at 2 Tverskaya Ulitsa, the local Lucie Saint-Clair has virtuoso hairdressers who are coached twice a year by Parisian stylists from the brand’s own school. |
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Ïóòü: road, rails, path, way, route
It’s a road! It’s a path! No, it’s super word: ïóòü!
OK, so I exaggerate. But ïóòü is one of those wonderful Russian nouns that requires a dozen English words to translate and ranges in meaning from the very concrete to the broadly metaphorical. |
 Kind-hearted, sentimental and overweight, Helga is desperate for a baby. She pins her last hopes on a trip to Georgia, where, as she learns, it is impossible to be ignored by men.
“All it takes is to get yourself to Georgia, and a man will find you,” — these words sound so promising, and Helga packs her bag for a week-long trip to Tbilisi. |
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Ginger con fusion
Fusion as a concept is rather like the EU — on paper, it sounds like a recipe for multicultural harmony, but give it time and the cracks begin to appear in the utopian wallpaper. |
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 TAMBOV — Not many foreigners know of Tambov, but if you mention the city to a Russian, you’re bound to get the answer “Tambovsky volk tebe tovarishch,” loosely translated as “Tambov’s wolf is your friend.”
Sarcastic in the past, the phrase refers to the large number of wolves that once lived in the forests around this city 480 kilometers southeast of Moscow. |
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