LOCAL NEWS

RELATIVES REMEMBER KURSK DEAD

MOSCOW - Two years to the day since a torpedo explosion sent the submarine Kursk to the bottom of the Barents Sea, relatives on Monday remembered the 118 sailors who died on board.

Flags were at half mast and prayers said in churches, synagogues and mosques as relatives of the crewmembers gathered in Vidyayevo, whence the submarine made its last journey, St. Petersburg, Moscow and Kursk.

Despite a government commission ruling that Russia's worst peacetime submarine disaster was an accident, feelings remain high among relatives that the true reasons for the sinking have yet to come out.

CROSS-BORDER TENSIONS RISING

MOSCOW - Tension between Russia and Georgia continued to rise on Monday as Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov claimed that some of the rebels killed recently by federal forces in Chechnya had Georgian refugee-identification cards, while Georgia accused Russian border guards and Abkhaz separatists of illegally crossing onto its territory and firing at a Georgian helicopter.

NATIONAL NEWS

CENSUS NUMBERS MAY WAIT

MOSCOW - The long-delayed census is finally to be held in October, but it seems the government may have to put up with another delay before it can use the data, after the Moscow Arbitration Court on Friday canceled the results of a tender the State Statistics Committee held earlier this year to choose a company to supply the software for processing the census data.

KALININGRAD PROPOSAL PANNED

MOSCOW - President Vladimir Putin's special envoy for dealing with the issue of Kaliningrad met with Lithuanian officials Monday, but rejected their proposal to introduce free, multiple-entry documents for its residents, saying it did not solve the problem of unrestricted travel for all Russian citizens.

IN BRIEF

Rates Up, Down

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - For the first time in ten years, the birth rate in St. Petersburg has gone up and the death rate gone down, the city administration announced Monday, according to Interfax.

Statistics provided by the city's Statistics Committee showed that 44,868 deaths were registered in the city in the first seven months of 2002, compared with 45,389 in the same period of 2001.

LOCAL BUSINESS

POWER STRUGGLE BREAKS OUT AT LOCAL AGRICULTURAL CONCERN

Raisa Streis was reelected as general director of Leto at an extraordinary general meeting on Monday, the company's press service reported. The vote to oust Streis came after a three-month struggle for power at Leto, one of the region's major agricultural concerns, with an attempted hostile takeover coming from the Faeton financial group.

KUDRIN SUBMITS 2003 BUDGET

MOSCOW - Alexei Kudrin submitted the final version of his Finance Ministry's 2003 draft federal budget late Thursday, officially opening debate on the election-year spending bill, which is notable for a sharp rise in debt payments and a disproportionate jump in allocations for defense and law enforcement.

U.S. Report Puts Russia At World No. 2 in Arms

MOSCOW - When it comes to selling arms, Russia holds a firm second place after the United States, according to a new report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service.

In 2001, Russia secured $5.8 billion in arms deals, about half of the $12.1 billion signed by the United States, according to the report titled "Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations, 1994-2001," a copy of which was obtained by The St.

OPINION

INDIA, PAKISTAN AND GLOBAL IT

BANGALORE, India - Two months ago, India and Pakistan appeared headed for a nuclear war. Colin Powell, the U.S. secretary of state and a former general, played a key role in talking the two parties back from the brink. But, here in India, I've discovered that there was another new, and fascinating, set of pressures that restrained the Indian government and made nuclear war, from its side, unthinkable.

A VODKA SHOT IN THE ARM FOR PUTIN'S POWER VERTICAL

LAST week, a search was launched to find Yury Shefler, the vodka magnate and head of S.P.I. Group.

Shefler owned the Stolichnaya and Moskovskaya vodka trademarks.

ECONOMISTS SHOULD LEARN FROM MISTAKES IN THIRD WORLD

THIS week's trip to South America by Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill is Washington's latest response to growing discontent about economic failure in the developing world. O'Neill, who has become known for his blunt remarks about economic policy, should take an honest look at what has happened to most low and middle-income countries during the past 20 years.

NATURAL RESOURCES THE LAST STAGE OF PUTIN'S PLAN

AT the end of July, Dmitry Kozak, the deputy head of the presidential administration, proposed an amendment to the law on subsoil resources which, if passed, would fundamentally alter the economic system that is taking shape in Russia.

MOSCOW TURNING UP THE HEAT ON GEORGIA

FOREIGN Minister Igor Ivanov declared earlier this month that international terrorists based in Georgia had committed acts of aggression against Russia. This harsh statement was followed up by Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov calling for Israeli-style cross-border raids to smash the aggressors.

GLOBAL EYE

Darkness at Noon

Every day, the war drums beat their restless tattoo from the sun-blistered scrub brush of Crawford, Texas. Attack Iraq! Attack Iraq! Attack Iraq! they cry, relentlessly, maddeningly, driving the tribal elders to frenzy in the ritual dance around the fire.

WORLD

IRAQIS REJECT INSPECTIONS AS U.S. TESTS OPPOSITION

CAIRO, Egypt - UN weapons inspections in Iraq are over, Iraq's information minister said Monday, in the clearest rejection yet of UN demands to allow inspectors to resume their work after a four-year standoff.

Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf told Arabic satellite television Al-Jazeera in an interview that the administration of U.

WORLD WATCH

Murderer Sought

NORFOLK ISLAND, Pacific Ocean (AP) - Behind white curtains in makeshift booths, police on Monday began fingerprinting the entire adult population of this tiny tourist island, an Australian external territory about 1,500 kilometers from Sydney, hoping to solve the first murder here in almost 150 years.

EUROPEAN LEAGUES UNDERWAY AGAIN

BERLIN - Newly promoted Arminia Bielefeld topped the Bundesliga on Sunday, after a 3-0 home victory over nine-player Werder Bremen completed a surprise-filled opening weekend.

Bielefeld captain Bastian Reinhardt led by example and opened the scoring in the 16th minute.

MOYA BEATS RAIN, HEWITT FOR TITLE

CINCINNATI, Ohio - Carlos Moya managed to overcome a rain delay and Lleyton Hewitt on Sunday to clinch the Cincinnati Masters title with a 7-5, 7-6 win in a classic baseline battle.