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One jacuzzi: $201,362. A bench on wheels: $1,675. A set of referee whistles: $1,231. So reads a list of more than 100 items that were recently ordered by the Kremlin property department to spruce up the government's prestigious Va tu tin ki sanatorium, according to documents first obtained by the Vedomosti newspaper earlier this week. The $20.7 million proposal, which calls for four jacuzzis, 24 benches on wheels and two sets of whistles, sets prices for the goods at up to 16 times more than their real market value, experts said. The leaked documents have created an uproar in government circles since their publication in Vedomosti on Monday. |
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 Danzig Baldayev has spent his whole life in the company of prisoners and criminals. He has searched them out in jails and gulags, on beaches, in banyas, and even in the morgue. |
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MOSCOW - European Union leaders on Thursday urged Russia to start accepting euros instead of dollars for its exports, promising a boom in investments and trade. But the bonhomie at their summit was shadowed by EU criticism of Russia's war in Chechnya. Russia currently gets paid in dollars for its oil and gas exports to Europe, and the EU wants to switch to euros instead. |
All photos from issue.
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 It's almost exactly one year ago that Viktor Cherkesov was appointed governor general of the Northwest region, one of seven heads of the supersized federal districts created by President Vladimir Putin. And it's almost exactly 12 months to the day that Vladimir Yakovlev, the man many thought had most to lose from Putin's new order, was elected to a second term as governor of St. |
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On the birthday of State Duma Deputy Galina Starovoitova, who was murdered in November 1998, the Federal Security Service said that it had a good chance of solving the case. |
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The Petersburg Radio station has lost a lawsuit that was filed in an attempt to get back on the "first button," the main channel on the wired receiver sets in Soviet-era apartments that only broadcast fixed channels. On April 1, Petersburg Radio was shifted from the first to the third button - which has a much weaker signal - by order of the Press Ministry. |
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Mirilashvili Still Held ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The City Prosecutor's Office has prolonged the pre-trial detention term for the well-known Russian-Israeli businessman Mikhail Mirilashvili, who is being held in remand prison on kidnapping charges. |
 The four legendary horse sculptures that have been missing from Nevsky Prospect's Anichkov Bridge for a year will soon be returned to their places. In the dark hours of May 25 to 26, the new-look "Taming of Horses," the creation of 19th-century French sculptor Peter Clodt, will be lifted back onto the bridge - but instead of the gray-green horses of 12 months ago, the sculptures now have an olive-black sheen, according to Vladimir Timofeyev, director of the St. |
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After unexpectedly ditching an international consortium set to help lift the sunken Kursk submarine, Russian officials have stepped up talks with a Dutch company that has no experience lifting sunken vessels, in hopes of clinching a contract Friday. |
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St. Petersburg women's rights organizations are teaming up with their counterparts in five other Russian cities and towns to raise awareness of the way in which women are lured abroad by the promise of work - only to end up in servitude. Volunteers here and in Moscow, Nov gorod, Yaroslavl, Petrozavodsk and Nizhny Novgorod, have taken to the streets to distribute leaflets and other information explaining the dangers of human trafficking. |
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 The World Bank has announced it will provide a $150 million credit for reconstruction work in St. Petersburg's city center between 2002 and 2005. Of the new credit, $50 million will be administered through the federal budget, while the remaining $100 million will be channeled to Smolny, but will be conditioned on the adoption by the city of a number of pending property and construction regulations. |
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Energy shutdowns in two municipalities in the Leningrad Oblast this week led to hurried scuffling to make good on debts to the utility and served to point out some of the social effects the cuts bring with them. |
 A local court has ruled that Russian rock star and frontman for the popular band Akvarium, Boris Grebenshchikov, is entitled to $2,500 compensation as a result of a copyright violation. Late last month the St. Petersburg City Court turned down the appeal of an earlier decision filed by Atlant Publishing. The company had been ordered by the Leninsky District Federal Court to pay the sum to the artist after it found last fall that Atlant had made improper use of lines from one of Grebenshchikov's songs. |
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 MOSCOW - "Don't walk past! Shells from the Black Sea! Exclusive to Russia!" called a bespectacled blond teen in a sailor's outfit, his voice swelling as a prospective customer backed toward a competitor's stall. |
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After holding their tongues while the Finance Ministry hammered out a tax plan it said wouldn't harm the industry, four of Russia's top oil firms have broken their silence to condemn the ministry's proposals. "In reality, the Finance Ministry does not lower, but raises the tax burden on oil companies, while at the same time making public statements about lowering taxes," said the text of a joint statement, circulated by LUKoil, Yukos, Sibneft and Tyumen Oil Co. |
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MOSCOW - Already suffering from a bitter labor dispute, Aeroflot's woes continued Thursday as a major brokerage downgraded the company's shares and a leading global ratings agency said it would "review" its corporate governance rating. |
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UES Hearing Delayed MOSCOW (Reuters) - The government has delayed its hearing on the controversial reform of electricity monopoly Unified Energy System by one day until Saturday, the prime minister's spokesperson said Thursday. Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov's spokesperson Tatyana Razbash did not provide any reason for the delay. |
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Dear Editor: Congratulations on missing the point of NASA's objections entirely [Editorial "NASA's Outrage is Hypocritical," May 8.] First, I noticed that there is no mention in your opinion piece about the fact that for the last 10 years, the U. |
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ADVOCATES of building a system to defend the United States against an attack by ballistic missiles, to which President Bush has committed his administration, rest their case on two propositions. |
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WE are skeptical of Boris Berezovsky's latest attempts to use his checkbook to paper over a decade of self-serving sins that have laid waste to every value he now pretends to hold sacred. Having tracked his machinations for years, we have every right to question Berezovsky's motives, to believe that he continues to put his own interests above all else. |
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IF somebody asked me who should keep the city's streets free from hooligans, my answer would be obvious - the police, of course. But Legislative Assembly lawmakers have a different opinion; they say that St. |
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THE stiffing of Vladimir Putin by George Bush is about to end. The American president is preparing to sit down with the Russian leader and begin a dialogue on the future of arms control. A sense filters out of the White House that four months of openly rebuffing Putin's eager appeals for a one-on-one meeting accomplished a purpose: The stage is set for a brief Russian-American summit that will essentially be conducted on Bush's terms. |
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"WELL, finally. Now they'll pay us for our gas," was what most of the media had to say when news broke that former prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin had been named ambassador to Kiev. |
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Red Menace You can accuse America's religiopolitical fundamentalists of many things, but an excess of incredulity is definitely not one of them. That fact was on vivid display last week as Christian warriors throughout the land unleashed a massive prayer blitz to save their fellow fundo George W. Bush from being killed - by an ancient American Indian curse. |
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 Being a versatile director takes more than just natural talent. It takes a true concerted effort. This was all too evident in Andrei Konchalovsky's second opera production, Verdi's "Un Ballo in Masche ra," which failed to demonstrate a new angle or a fresh approach. |
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The weekend's good alternative entertainment will start at Moloko, where the two-day Club Sputnik Festival will take place on Friday and Saturday. |
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For the Zazerkalye Theater to put on a production of Giacomo Puccini's "La Bohème" might seem strange, given that the Zazerkalye is supposed to be a children's theater, the kind of place that moms and dads bring their children to broaden their minds. But in fact the Zazerkalye is a family theater, which is why its repertoire takes the risk of combining children's and adults' music: from the Chinese folk tale "Nightingale" to Gaetono Donizetti's "L'Elisir d'Amore." Alongside the occasional morning show, children's operas written by St. Petersburg composers of various generations, and humorous, quasi-horror stories, the shows for grown-ups slot into the repertoire of the theater with ease. |
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 Don't ask for Tri Debila in kiosks and shops - the recent album of Sergei Shnurov's "more intimate" project is on sale as Leningrad's latest output, as part of the marketing strategy of the band's label. |
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For those in search of a good cheap dining experience, there can be few places more suitable than Tinye, a Chinese restaurant that recently opened on Konnogvardeisky Bulvar, not far from St. Isaac's Cathedral. Their prices are so reasonable, in fact, that people even come in off the street to buy beer there - at 20 rubles a bottle, some nearby drinkers probably couldn't find anywhere more suitable to pick up a cold beer on a balmy May evening. |
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Plane Crash Kills 29 TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - A plane carrying Iran's transport minister and six parliament members crashed Thursday in northern Iran, killing all 29 people on board, the Interior Ministry said. After disappearing early Thurs day, the plane was located several hours later in the mountains between Gorgan and Shahroud, about 320 kilometers northeast of Tehran, a ministry official said. |
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Issues Archive