IN BRIEF

Published: December 12, 2012 (Issue # 1739)

Vishnevskaya Dies

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The renowned opera singer Galina Vishnevskaya has died at the age of 87, it was reported Tuesday.

“This is a huge loss, not just for Russian culture, but for world culture as a whole,” Mikhail Shvydkoi, an ex-culture minister and special envoy for the president on international cultural cooperation, was quoted by Interfax as saying.

“She and her husband, Mstislav Rostropovich, behaved like model citizens in the Soviet era,” said veteran human rights campaigner Lyudmila Alexeyeva. “They took in [dissident author Alexander] Solzhenitsyn when he had nowhere to live, even though they knew they would get no thanks from the authorities for it,” she said.

Vishnevskaya emigrated from the Soviet Union in 1974 with her husband, the cellist and conductor Rostropovich, and their children. They lived in the U.S. and France before returning to Russia in 1990. Rostropovich died in 2007.

Grateful Gaga

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Lady Gaga repeatedly thanked Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev during her weekend concert in St. Petersburg for allowing her to perform in Russia.

“Medvedev said Russia can have many laws, but that it is impossible to make a law that would regulate relationships between people,” the singer said.

Last Friday Medvedev said he didn’t see the need for homosexual relationships to be regulated by legislation.

“Far from all moral issues, far from all behavioral habits or issues of communication should be governed by legislation. Because not all relationships between people can be regulated by law,” Medvedev said.

Get Out of the Car

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The head of the city’s Development, Landscaping and Maintenance Committee, Vladimir Abramenko, called upon city residents last week to use public transport instead of their cars to avoid a traffic breakdown in the city, Interfax reported.

“To completely clear the city of snow, from six to eight hours are needed if there are few vehicles on the streets. The situation on Nov. 30 [when a heavy snowfall led to gridlock in the city] is not normal,” Abramenko said.

“Let’s not create difficulties at such a time. Please use public transport,” the official said.

Sweet 16 for Malafeev

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — FC Zenit goalkeeper Vyacheslav Malafeev is engaged to be married to Yekaterina Komyakova of the musical duo DJ Dolls.

Komyakova wrote on her Twitter page that the ceremony is scheduled for Dec. 16 at 4.16 p.m. (16.16 according to the 24-hour system). The date and the time have clearly been chosen to match Malafeev’s shirt number, which is 16, Interfax reported.

Komyakova was born in the town of Borovichi in the Novgorod Oblast on April 7, 1988, making her nine years younger than Malafeev.

Malafeev’s first wife Marina was killed in a car accident in St. Petersburg on March 17 last year.