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Despite numerous protests by St. Petersburg citizens against in-fill-construction in the city, they say that federal and local authorities are completely ignoring residents' interests. Despite Governor Valentina Matviyenko promising an end to the practice during her election campaign last year, hundreds of trees have been cut down and the yards of apartment blocks filled in this year. |
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Almost two years after new legislation regulating foreigners who want to live and work in Russia came into force, expats still face legal and bureaucratic hurdles in obtaining work permits, even though the legislation was intended to simplify the process. |
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Vladimir Zubrin, head of the Northwest Region Prosecutor's Office, filed a letter of resignation last week. Zubrin is known as the initiator of criminal cases against members of former governor Vladimir Yakov-lev's regime and about misspending of federal funds on St. Petersburg's 300th anniversary celebrations. |
All photos from issue.
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Alexander Viktorov has been appointed chief architect of St. Petersburg, Vice Governor Viktor Lobko announced on Friday. Viktorov was chosen from 11 candidates by an expert committee, an unprecedented selection process to fill the position. The vacancy occurred last month, after Governor Valentina Matviyenko announced that Oleg Kharchenko would be stepping down. |
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Royal Burial Postponed ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The ceremonial reburial of the remains of Tsarina Maria Fyodorovna, which had been planned for this year, has been postponed until Sept. |
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MOSCOW - The United Nations has ranked Russia the 57th best country to live in, calling it "remarkable progress" from last year's ranking of 63rd. Russia is sandwiched between Bulgaria and Libya, ranked 56th and 58th, respectively, while Norway has retained the top spot on the annual human development index compiled by the UN Development Program. |
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MOSCOW - Audit Chamber head Sergei Stepashin suffered a major setback to his efforts to boost his political weight when the Federation Council rejected a bill that would have given the president, instead of parliament, the right to nominate the budgetary watchdog's chairman. |
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MOSCOW - The Armenian editor of a Russian-language magazine focusing on Armenian issues was beaten and stabbed to death Saturday, and his body dumped on the outskirts of Moscow, police said. Pail Peloyan, editor of Armyansky Pereulok, was found dead with knife wounds to the chest and severe trauma to the head at 7 a.m. Saturday just outside the Moscow Ring Road on the southwest edge of the city, a city police spokesman told Interfax. He died sometime between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. Deputy city prosecutor Alexander Krokhmal said investigators were on the crime scene Saturday, Interfax reported. No one answered the telephone Sunday at the City Prosecutor's Office. |
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 Every city has its shortage of something. For example in St. Petersburg, it is difficult to find peanut butter and, in Prague, an honest policeman. On a recent trip to Vilnius I had trouble locating a comb. |
 The 100th anniversary of Anton Chekhov's death on July 14, 1904, occurred last Wednesday, with barely a mention of this internationally important writer and playwright. Nevertheless, more than any other writer, Chekhov is mentioned as the deciding influence for taking up their pen by many noted authors living today. |
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MOSCOW - Moscow law enforcement agencies have announced they have busted two fake passport gangs - one inside the police force and a travel agency supplying fake documents to Chechen rebels. |
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WASHINGTON - Moscow is pushing hard to hammer out a deal with Washington on WTO membership terms before the U.S. presidential election in November, Russian negotiators say. "It may be possible to complete bilateral negotiations with our American partners in two or three months' time," said Yury Afanasyev, the chief trade officer at Russia's permanent mission to the United Nations in Switzerland. "The understanding of both parties is that the sooner we finish it, the better," Afanasyev said by telephone from Geneva. "We are intensifying the whole process." Russia, the largest economy outside the World Trade Organization, has been seeking to join the WTO for more than a decade, but a renewed drive by President Vladimir Putin's administration has brought the country to the verge of membership. |
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 In an admirable example of decentralization, the Russian government's recent gift to France has found its home not in the capital Paris, but in Agde, a tiny coastal town in the south of France. |
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MOSCOW - Andrei Denisov has been named Russia's permanent representative to the United Nations in New York by presidential decree, the Foreign Ministry said Wednesday. The post was previously held by Sergei Lavrov, and had been vacant since his appointment as foreign minister in March. |
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MOSCOW - The Exile newspaper claimed responsibility Tuesday for the fake letter, supposedly from five U.S. congressmen, concerning former Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko that circulated through the Russian media last month. |
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 Wealthy Russians are invited to move into baroque palaces. Several dozens miniature replicas of European palaces of the 17th and 18th centuries, worth from $1.1 million to $5.5 million each, will be constructed in St. Petersburg's Lahta, a district within a 40-minute drive from the city center, in the next two to three years. |
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The city administration intends to establish an industrial investment agency in the second half of 2004. The agency will serve two main functions, Vice Governor Mikhail Oseyevky said Monday at a news conference, Interfax reported. |
 St. Petersburg's car rental market is expanding at the speed of light, with the amount of orders doubling in three to five years, but it still has a few years to take shape, experts say. Over one half of rental car clients in the city are foreigners. |
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If traveling by car, a short visit to the city of Kronstadt will provide the opportunity to see the St. Petersburg naval base and the bizarre dam construction leading there. |
 A visit to the north shore of the Gulf of Finland reveals a less-known fun side of city life, one with a truly local character, though few city travelers make their way to the north as it lacks the glittering tsarist palaces of the southern shore. RESORT DISTRICT HISTORY The north shore is officially called the Kurort or Resort District, and still falls within the St. |
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 Alexander Yebralidze's business draws much attention yet the general public knows very little about the man behind the grand historical mansion at 59 Moika Embankment, which catches the eye of anyone strolling along Nevsky Prospekt in the direction of Palace Square. |
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GENEVA-The United States and other countries negotiating the terms of Russia's membership in the World Trade Organization said Friday they don't think the government is doing enough to fight counterfeiting and piracy. The issue is "a very dark cloud hanging over Russia's accession," one U.S. delegate told a meeting of the WTO working group, officials said. Japan, Australia, Norway and Switzerland also expressed concern at Russia's stance on intellectual property issues at the WTO working group negotiating its entry to the 147-member body, trade officials said. Governments said they were particularly worried about a Russian law that allows equipment used for producing pirated CDs and other goods to be resold after being confiscated by the police. |
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 BERLIN- German industrial giant Siemens has asked Russia's antitrust agency to approve a bid for a 71 percent stake in the country's biggest turbine maker, Power Machines (Siloviye Mashiny), the agency said Friday. |
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Sibneft Grows 96% MOSCOW (Reuters) - Net income at Sibneft, the fifth largest domestic oil firm, soared by 96 percent in 2003 to $2.28 billion based on U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, Sibneft said Monday. Revenues rose by 41 percent to $6.72 billion, while earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose by 30 percent to $2. |
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I arrived in Moscow almost a year ago under the illusion that after a traumatic decade Russia was stabilizing, becoming more predictable, maybe even rebounding. While the past year has been extraordinarily interesting intellectually, thoughts of stability and predictability must once again be set aside, if only for a time. |
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The main problem in the city's economic development is the lack of construction sites, including of those meant for housing, something which is increasing sharply the prices for housing and gradually making it inaccessible even to the large proportion of well-off citizens. |
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Mob Rule Anyone who wants to understand the reality of modern America should pick up Gus Russo's latest book, "The Outfit." With diligent research and relentless candor, Russo strips away the facade of America's pious national myths, showing in great detail how the criminal underworld - and the even more criminal "upperworld" of big business and politics - have fused in a deadly symbiosis that underlies the nation's power structure. |
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'Girlie' Democrats LOS ANGELES (AP) - A spokesman for California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said Sunday that the governor would not apologize for calling lawmakers "girlie men," despite criticisms from Democrats that the remark was sexist and homophobic. |
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U.S. Relay May Lose Gold GROSSETO, Italy (AP) - Track and field's governing body recommended that the U.S. 1,600-meter relay team, led by Michael Johnson, be stripped of its gold medal from the Sydney Olympics as part of Jerome Young's doping case. |
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Issues Archive