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MOSCOW - Russia's largest corporation stands at a crossroad, where it will be forced to choose between market-oriented reforms that may expose the company's weak spots, and the status quo that could undermine the country's role as a strategic natural gas supplier. Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller will be mulling over this kaleidoscope of pressures as he addresses Gazprom shareholders at their annual meeting Friday. |
All photos from issue.
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MOSCOW - President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that officials had failed to heed storm warnings and to act in time to soften the impact of floods that have killed 77 people and made tens of thousands homeless in southern Russia. Speaking in Canada on the sidelines of the G8 summit, Putin said too many people had been hurt and that the poor were always the ones to suffer the most. |
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The president of Russia's Federal Audit Chamber, Sergei Stepashin, called on Legislative Assembly Speaker Sergei Tarasov to clear up the current conflict between himself and St. |
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MOSCOW - The Moscow Military District Court on Wednesday acquitted all six defendants in one of the most high-profile murder cases of the past decade - the 1994 killing of Moskovsky Komsomolets reporter Dmitry Kholodov, who was investigating corruption in the highest echelons of the Defense Ministry. |
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Money Law Changed MOSCOW (SPT) - The cabinet on Thursday approved a proposal to change currency legislation, in order to allow both foreigners and Russians to take up to $1,500 out of the country without a customs declaration. |
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In anticipation of the city's 300th anniversary celebrations, St. Petersburg is in desperate need of another 20,000 hotel beds to cater for the city's coming 300th anniversary celebrations, according to participants in a round table meeting held on the subject this week. |
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MOSCOW - A battle is raging for control of the Olkon iron-ore plant, which supports the one-company Arctic town of Olenogorsk in the Murmansk region. As in many disputes, the feuding sides - in this case metals giant Severstal and the Your Financial Adviser, or VFP, brokerage - insist that the very future of the plant is at stake. |
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MOSCOW - The State Duma's decision to postpone the first reading of a raft of energy bills throws a kink in the government's plan to have the legislation ready by next year, Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Khristenko said Thursday. The lower house of parliament will consider the bills after the summer break, but enough legislation is already on the agenda for the fall session, Khristenko said. |
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MOSCOW - Russian companies using Cyprus as an offshore haven may soon have to move onshore to take advantage of the country's lower tax rates. As part of efforts to join the European Union in 2004, the Cypriot parliament is expected to pass a series of tax bills that, among other things, require Cyprus-registered Russian companies to be managed and controlled from the island to take advantage of a double-tax treaty. |
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MOSCOW - The State Duma gave initial approval Wednesday to a raft of legislation, paving the way for a three-stage reform of the railroads that will lead to their eventual privatization. Lawmakers passed four bills in the first reading that will lay a legislative foundation for the reform of the giant state-owned monopoly. |
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ON June 6, the U.S. Department of Commerce declared Russia a free-market economy. On the surface, that historic judgment seems reasonable. After all, only 12 percent of the country's enterprises are still owned entirely by the state. Government outlays as a percentage of GDP in 2000 stood at just 30 percent, the same as in the United States. |
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LAST week the State Duma passed in its second - and most important - reading a draft law to allow alternative community service as an option to the draft. |
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 The year's main local film event, the Festival of Festivals, winds up on Saturday, but the last two days are packed with screenings at seven cinemas. The festival does not include a competition but, instead, aims to present a collection of films from Western international film festvials. This year, the festival is celebrating its tenth anniversary, and the promoters threw a grand opening at the Leningrad film theater on Sunday. |
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 Vladimir Ashkenazy, arguably the world's foremost interpreter of Rachmaninov's piano music, is coming to the Shostakovich Philharmonic on Friday. However, on this occasion he will not be playing, but conducting a program of works by Rachmaninov - including the First Piano Concerto - and Elgar. |
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Akvarium, which returned to the city this week after finishing its biggest U.S. tour to date with a concert at Seattle on Monday, is getting ready to please its local fans with what it calls a "Traditional Summer Concert" on Thursday. |
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When I was at university, Sunday brunch was something usually along the lines of a traditional English "fry-up" - a fried breakfast of eggs, beans, sausages, bacon, bread and so on, plus whatever else happened to be in the fridge and not too far past its expiry date, all cooked in artery-hardening amounts of grease. |
 The Fifth International Vaganova-Prix Ballet Competition opened at the Russian Academy of Ballet on June 19, and concluded with a gala concert by the competition's prize-winners and other participants at the Mussorgsky Theater on Wednesday. The competition was a week of hard work for the competitors, the jury and the academy's administrative staff. The day before the opening, a service was held in the academy's church, and Father Andrei, the church's senior priest, wished all the participants and their teachers success and strength - both in body and in mind - for the forthcoming marathon of ballet. |
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 SPECIAL TO THE ST. PETERSBURG TIMES Gennady Golshtein, who has taught saxophone in the jazz department at the Mussorgsky School of Music since its inception in the mid-seventies, has instructed everyone from Russia's greatest jazz export, Igor Butman, to local ska enthusiasts Alexei Kanev of Marsheider Kunst and Grigory Zontov of Spitfire. |
 One of the successes at the Mariinsky Theater's "Stars of the White Nights" festival this year has been the three concerts given by its Youth Philharmonic Orchestra. The orchestra was accorded the honor of playing Rachmaninov's "The Bells" at Smolny Cathedral on the summer solstice and, with another all-Ravhmaninov program, packed the Shostakovich Philharmonic on Tuesday. |
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The State Russian Museum and St. Isaac's Cathedral are playing host to two series of concerts this summer. "Under the Vaults of St. Isaac's" is a groundbreaking step, as the cathedral has never before been used as a concert venue. |
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St. Petersburg has been called a "little Paris," and the traditional friendship between the cities has left many traces on the northern capital throughout its almost 300-year history. For a month, the Peter and Paul fortress is hosting "French St. Petersburg," a photo exhibition held on the roof of the Naryshkin Bastion displaying 50 photos of French-related places in the city, with a sweeping view of the Neva and the Hermitage Embankment as a backdrop. The exhibition is part of the City Museum Foundation's year-long project, "A Window on ... ," which illustrates the cultural, historical and architectural influence of seven different European countries in St. |
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 MOSCOW - Listening to the top prize winners at the closing ceremony of the 12th International Tchaikovsky Competition on Sunday did not do much either to enhance or, as has been the case in the recent past, to tarnish the competition's reputation. |
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Kashmir Market Blast SRINAGAR, India (AP) - Suspected Islamic militants hurled a grenade into a crowded market in the Indian state of Jammu-Kashmir on Thursday, injuring at least 25 people, police said. The attack took place in the town of Anantnag, 35 miles south of Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu-Kashmir. |
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Scolari To Go? YOKOHAMA, Japan (Reuters) - Brazil coach Luiz Felipe Scolari has said he will be unemployed on Monday - even if his team lifts the World Cup against Germany in the final the day before. |
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