Putin Discontent with Russian Law Enforcers’ Work

NOVO-OGARYOVO, August 1 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President Vladimir Putin has expressed discontent with the work of law enforcers after a recent incident at a Moscow market when a police officer was seriously injured.

An operation to arrest a suspected sex offender at a market in the Russian capital last weekend ended with a police officer suffering serious head injuries when he was attacked by an angry mob.

“The efforts being made are clearly not enough: either nothing happens or the rates are unacceptably slow,” Putin said Wednesday at a special meeting on the fight against crime at trade outlets.

Two Russian police officers, Senior Lieutenant Vladimir Cherezov and Senior Sergeant Yury Lunkov, are being investigated for their alleged failure to take action when a crowd of people at the Matveyevsky market in western Moscow attempted to stop the detention Saturday of a man suspected of sexual assault, investigators said.

In the scuffle that broke out, one of the police officers present, Anton Kudryashov, was hit over the head, reportedly with brass knuckles. The blow smashed his skull and he has since undergone brain surgery. The brawl at the market, a video of which was posted on the Internet, has attracted nationwide attention in Russia.

Moscow police launched a series of raids in the wake of the attack “to decriminalize Moscow marketplaces.” The raids continued even after the detention of Magomed Rasulov, the man suspected of inflicting the blow, who has now been charged with the attempted murder of a police officer. In total, more than 1,000 people were detained in the market raids, police said.

At Wednesday's meeting attended by acting Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev and Federal Migration Service chief Konstantin Romodanovsky, Putin also blasted the injured police officer’s colleagues for their inaction.

“Police officers are standing near watching their colleague being beaten up,” the president said. “Why? Are they so cowardly? Possible but unlikely. Most likely that they did nothing in order to work off 30 pieces of silver they get from sellers.”

It is “clear to everyone,” Putin said, “except the Interior Ministry’s internal affairs division. Where is the result of their work?”

Putin called on the Interior Ministry’s Main Internal Affairs Directorate to investigate the incident on the market. He urged all other relevant bodies, including the Migration Service and the Investigative Committee, to work effectively on the case.

Saturday’s incident has fueled ethnic tensions in Moscow, whose marketplaces employ many migrants from post-Soviet states and representatives of ethnic minorities from the North Caucasus who, though Russian citizens, are also treated as migrants by many Russians outside the North Caucasus.

Investigators will thoroughly look into not only the alleged police negligence but also corruption that sellers and law enforcers are allegedly involved in, Vasily Piskaryov, a deputy chief of the Investigation Committee, said at the meeting with Putin.

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Most Russians Positive About Snowden - Survey

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Over half of Russians on the whole approve of what fugitive former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden did, an opinion survey by the Levada Center pollster has shown.

Snowden, who is wanted by the United States for leaking classified data about the US National Security Agency’s surveillance programs, formally requested temporary asylum in Russia on July 16. Washington has repeatedly called on Moscow to reject Snowden’s request and send him back to the United States to stand trial on charges of espionage and theft.

According to the survey published Wednesday, 15 percent of respondents said they have a positive attitude toward Snowden’s leak, whereas 36 percent said they were “rather positive” about it.

Fourteen percent said they were “rather negative” about what Snowden had done, while 3 percent totally disapproved of his actions. A total of 32 percent had not made up their minds.

Asked whether Russia should grant asylum to Snowden, 13 percent of respondents said it should, 30 percent said “rather yes,” 19 percent said “rather not,” whereas 10 percent were against it. Some 28 percent said they did not know.

The survey was conducted on July 18-22, 2013 among 1,601 urban and rural residents aged 18 and above in 130 cities, towns and villages across 45 Russian regions. The statistical margin of error did not exceed 3.4 percent.

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US Releases Secret Surveillance Docs Amid Fresh Snowden Leaks

WASHINGTON, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – The US government on Wednesday declassified three documents shedding light on its domestic telephone surveillance amid fresh leaks from fugitive former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden revealing the United States’ ability to secretly comb through troves of information on individuals’ Internet use across the globe.

The Office of the US Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) released the documents Wednesday shortly before the Senate Judiciary Committee grilled senior intelligence officials about the controversial surveillance programs and within hours of a report published by the British newspaper The Guardian based on documents leaked by Snowden showing US monitoring of Internet use worldwide.

The ODNI said the document release was done “in the interest of increased transparency.”

Among the documents is a heavily redacted court order requiring a company to hand over enormous amounts of Americans’ telephone records to the US National Security Agency (NSA). The company’s name was blacked out, but US officials have identified it as US telephone carrier Verizon Communications, The Washington Post reported.

In June, The Guardian reported on a document leaked by Snowden showing that the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, a secretive body known as the FISA court that authorizes such surveillance, had ordered Verizon to provide the NSA with daily information about calls made by the company’s customers.

The other two documents include reports to Congress from 2009 and 2011 on the NSA’s so-called “Bulk Collection Program” under the US Patriot Act that describe the surveillance programs as critical to the government’s fight against terrorists.

Lawmakers chastised the ODNI for releasing the documents just prior to Wednesday’s hearing and delays in opening up classified documents on domestic surveillance programs.

“I don’t want transparency only when it’s convenient to the government,” US Sen. Al Franken said during the hearing, adding that the agency “has known for weeks that this hearing was coming and ODNI released this only in the minutes before this hearing began.”

“That doesn’t engender trust,” Franken said, The Washington Post reported.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse criticized intelligence officials for only releasing the documents after Snowden, who is living in a Moscow airport transit zone while applying for temporary asylum in Russia, forced the government’s hand with his leaks.

“It all came out in response to a leaker,” Whitehouse said, The Associated Press reported. “There was no organized plan for how we rationally declassify this so that the American people can participate in the debate.”

The Guardian report published Wednesday, meanwhile, focuses on documents leaked by Snowden about a top-secret NSA program known as XKeyscore, which enables US intelligence analysts to access Internet activity by users throughout the world after giving a perfunctory justification for the search and without judicial review, according to the newspaper.

Activities that can be monitored include online chats, emails and Internet browsing, including search terms entered by a user, The Guardian reported.

The XKeyscore provides tools for filtering the vast amounts of data harvested by the NSA, thereby allowing an analyst to more efficiently target the research, according to the report.

The NSA documents leaked by Snowden claim that XKeyscore had yielded intelligence leading to the capture of 300 terrorists as of 2008, The Guardian reported.

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UN Helicopter With Russian Crew Crash-Lands in Ethiopia

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – A United Nations helicopter with a Russian crew crash-landed in Ethiopia on Wednesday, a Russian Embassy official said, adding that all four crewmembers were alive but three were in a serious condition.

All of the crewmembers are at a hospital in Addis Ababa, Pavel Temnenko, deputy head of the embassy’s consular section, told RIA Novosti.

A representative of the company that owns the Russian-made Mi-8 helicopter, which was reportedly being operated under contract with the UN, told RIA Novosti that the craft was en route from Djibouti to Ethiopia when it made a “hard landing.”

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Fair Trial Not Likely for Average Person, Russians Say – Poll

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Some 60 percent of Russians think that an average person cannot expect a fair trial in the country, according to a poll released Wednesday.

Only 25 percent of respondents to the survey, conducted in June by the independent Levada Center pollster, said an average Russian could expect a fair trial.

Respondents also appeared distrustful of juries. Just 23 percent said a hearing with a jury would be fairer and more independent than one with only a judge, a drop from 34 percent in 2004.

The survey was conducted in 130 residential areas across 45 Russian regions with a statistical margin of error of 3.4 percent, pollster said.

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Russian Billionaire Seeks US Government Loan for Luxury Jets – Report

WASHINGTON, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Russian billionaire Gennady Timchenko is seeking US government financing to purchase American-made luxury jets and has hired powerful Washington lobbyists to assure officials that his wealth is legitimate and not tied to his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Reuters reported Wednesday.

Timchenko, co-owner of leading oil trader Gunvor, has hired the lobbying firm Patton Boggs to advocate on his behalf to US officials as his luxury charter jet firm seeks to buy aircraft from Gulfstream Aerospace using funding from the government-backed US Export Import Bank, Reuters reported.

This effort includes addressing what the lobbyists call “unfounded allegations” that he is one of a group of businessmen who have amassed fortunes thanks to their ties to the Russian president, Reuters reported, citing emails and documents related to the lobbyists’ work for Timchenko, as well as interviews with US officials and Patton Boggs.

“We know you have concerns about Gennady,” Patton Boggs partner Laurence Harris wrote in a May email requesting a meeting with a US government official, Reuters reported. “We’d like to talk to you about this.”

Harris wrote in the email that he is representing Airfix Aviation, a Finnish luxury air travel company owned by Timchenko that is seeking financing from a US bank to purchase up to 11 aircraft from the American luxury aircraft maker Gulfstream Aerospace, a US official who spoke to the lobbyists was quoted by Reuters as saying.

Timchenko holds a Finnish passport.

Patton Boggs did not immediately respond to a request for comment from RIA Novosti on Wednesday. But the company confirmed to Reuters that it had held preliminary talks with US Export-Import Bank about a loan guarantee for one jet that Airfax has ordered from Gulfstream.

The firm also confirmed that its lobbyists had met on Timchenko’s behalf with officials from two US Senate offices and with a congressional policy advisor, Reuters reported.

The lobbying effort also comes two years after a US subsidiary of Geneva-based Gunvor was served a subpoena by US federal prosecutors in connection with documents related to oil-trading activities, Bloomberg reported earlier this year, citing a Gunvor prospectus dated May 10.

Three employees of the Delaware-incorporated subsidiary, Castor Americas, were served with subpoenas, as was a Gunvor employee, Bloomberg reported. The US Department of Justice has not publicly commented on the investigation/

An information sheet prepared by Patton Boggs describes Timchenko as “a global investor who seeks to further invest in the United States – investments that could increase US exports and US jobs,” Reuters reported Wednesday.

“Mr. Timchenko has found himself at the receiving end of unfounded allegations that have triggered caution on his part in further investments in the United States,” the lobbyists added in the information sheet, according to Reuters, which said it had seen the document.

A US official said on condition of anonymity that Timchenko’s air company is seeking financing to purchase 11 Gulfstream jets, which range from $15.7 million to $64.5 million, Reuters reported.

Forbes Magazine in March estimated Timchenko’s fortune at $14.1 billion, placing him at No. 62 in the list of the world’s richest individuals and No. 8 among Russian billionaires.

Registered in Cyprus and with its headquarters in Geneva, Gunvor is the world’s fourth largest commodity trader and exports about 30 percent of Russia’s crude oil.

Both Timchenko and Putin have denied reports that the two are “friends” and that Gunvor, which Timchenko co-founded with Swedish businessman Torbjörn Törnqvist in 2000, has benefited from Kremlin connections.

Born in Soviet Armenia, Timchenko was educated in St. Petersburg, where he and Putin say they met during the twilight of the Soviet Union. Timchenko told the Swiss newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung in April that the two men met in 1989 or 1990, and that they were both involved with the same judo club.

Putin has publicly said that he has no business relationship with Timchenko.

“All his business projects are his own business,” Putin said in September 2011, when he was serving as Russia’s prime minister. “I have never interfered in it and have no such desire. I hope that he will not poke his nose into my business, either.”

In February of that year, a Moscow court awarded Timchenko 200,000 rubles ($6,780) in a libel suit against Kremlin critics Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir Milov, who claimed the businessman’s wealth stemmed from his ties to Putin.

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Russian Billionaire Seeks US Government Loan for Luxury Jets – Report

WASHINGTON, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Russian billionaire Gennady Timchenko is seeking US government financing to purchase American-made luxury jets and has hired powerful Washington lobbyists to assure officials that his wealth is legitimate and not tied to his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Reuters reported Wednesday.

Timchenko, co-owner of leading oil trader Gunvor, has hired the lobbying firm Patton Boggs to advocate on his behalf to US officials as his luxury charter jet firm seeks to buy aircraft from Gulfstream Aerospace using funding from the government-backed US Export Import Bank, Reuters reported.

This effort includes addressing what the lobbyists call “unfounded allegations” that he is one of a group of businessmen who have amassed fortunes thanks to their ties to the Russian president, Reuters reported, citing emails and documents related to the lobbyists’ work for Timchenko, as well as interviews with US officials and Patton Boggs.

“We know you have concerns about Gennady,” Patton Boggs partner Laurence Harris wrote in a May email requesting a meeting with a US government official, Reuters reported. “We’d like to talk to you about this.”

Harris wrote in the email that he is representing Airfix Aviation, a Finnish luxury air travel company owned by Timchenko that is seeking financing from a US bank to purchase up to 11 aircraft from the American luxury aircraft maker Gulfstream Aerospace, a US official who spoke to the lobbyists was quoted by Reuters as saying.

Timchenko holds a Finnish passport.

Patton Boggs did not immediately respond to a request for comment from RIA Novosti on Wednesday. But the company confirmed to Reuters that it had held preliminary talks with US Export-Import Bank about a loan guarantee for one jet that Airfax has ordered from Gulfstream.

The firm also confirmed that its lobbyists had met on Timchenko’s behalf with officials from two US Senate offices and with a congressional policy advisor, Reuters reported.

The lobbying effort also comes two years after a US subsidiary of Geneva-based Gunvor was served a subpoena by US federal prosecutors in connection with documents related to oil-trading activities, Bloomberg reported earlier this year, citing a Gunvor prospectus dated May 10.

Three employees of the Delaware-incorporated subsidiary, Castor Americas, were served with subpoenas, as was a Gunvor employee, Bloomberg reported. The US Department of Justice has not publicly commented on the investigation/

An information sheet prepared by Patton Boggs describes Timchenko as “a global investor who seeks to further invest in the United States – investments that could increase US exports and US jobs,” Reuters reported Wednesday.

“Mr. Timchenko has found himself at the receiving end of unfounded allegations that have triggered caution on his part in further investments in the United States,” the lobbyists added in the information sheet, according to Reuters, which said it had seen the document.

A US official said on condition of anonymity that Timchenko’s air company is seeking financing to purchase 11 Gulfstream jets, which range from $15.7 million to $64.5 million, Reuters reported.

Forbes Magazine in March estimated Timchenko’s fortune at $14.1 billion, placing him at No. 62 in the list of the world’s richest individuals and No. 8 among Russian billionaires.

Registered in Cyprus and with its headquarters in Geneva, Gunvor is the world’s fourth largest commodity trader and exports about 30 percent of Russia’s crude oil.

Both Timchenko and Putin have denied reports that the two are “friends” and that Gunvor, which Timchenko co-founded with Swedish businessman Torbjörn Törnqvist in 2000, has benefited from Kremlin connections.

Born in Soviet Armenia, Timchenko was educated in St. Petersburg, where he and Putin say they met during the twilight of the Soviet Union. Timchenko told the Swiss newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung in April that the two men met in 1989 or 1990, and that they were both involved with the same judo club.

Putin has publicly said that he has no business relationship with Timchenko.

“All his business projects are his own business,” Putin said in September 2011, when he was serving as Russia’s prime minister. “I have never interfered in it and have no such desire. I hope that he will not poke his nose into my business, either.”

In February of that year, a Moscow court awarded Timchenko 200,000 rubles ($6,780) in a libel suit against Kremlin critics Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir Milov, who claimed the businessman’s wealth stemmed from his ties to Putin.

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Chicago Rebuffs Call to Suspend Moscow Ties over Gay Rights

This article contains information not suitable for readers younger than 18 years of age, according to Russian legislation .

WASHINGTON, July 31 (RIA Novosti) –The city of Chicago will not suspend its “sister city” relationship with Moscow over Russia’s recent criminalization of gay rights activism, resisting pressure from a prominent regional gay rights organization, CBS Chicago reported Wednesday.

In a statement Tuesday, Equality Illinois called for the suspension and urged Chicago officials to block all Russian participation in the annual Chicago Sister Cities International Festival, beginning next week. Equality Illinois also called for a boycott of recreational or cultural travel to Russia, and urged local businesses to suspend commercial activity involving Russia.

CBS Chicago reported that the city answered via a statement from Aleksandra Efimova, chair of the Chicago Sister Cities’ Moscow Committee. The report quoted Efimova as saying that “curtailing business and cultural contacts would isolate and further hurt gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender Russians” and that she wanted to keep the ties and “emphasize understanding and tolerance.”

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Putin Proposes Extending High-Speed Moscow-Kazan Railway to Siberia

NOVO-OGARYOVO, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday called for the $28 billion high-speed Moscow-Kazan railway to be extended to the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk.

The 800-kilometer line that is currently under construction is expected to cut travel time from Russia’s capital to the biggest city in the Volga republic of Tatarstan from 11 1/2 to just 3 1/2 hours.

But that line, Putin said, is an initial step that could become “a pilot section of a future route that will link the Volga and Ural regions.”

According to state railroad monopoly Russian Railways, the Moscow-Kazan line is expected to carry 7.4 million passengers annually by 2019.

Putin also proposed that the regions along which the new line will pass should have a direct stake in the project, which would also help enhance the responsibility of regional authorities for their part of the effort.

Russia’s Finance Ministry on Wednesday confirmed the allocation of 150 billion rubles (about $4.5 billion) from the National Welfare Fund for the Moscow-Kazan line, Transport Minister Nikolai Sokolov said.

“Of the 649 billion rubles in state support for the construction project, the Finance Ministry has confirmed the provision of 231 billion rubles: 150 billion from the National Welfare Fund and 81 billion in budget grants,” he said at a meeting on the railroad project.

Another project financing option is the investment of pension funds into 139 billion rubles worth of bonds with maturities of up to 30 years at a rate of inflation plus one percentage point, he said.

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Russian Armed Forces to Start Mornings With Anthem

RZHEVKA (Leningrad Region), July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Wednesday that all Russian military units should begin their mornings by singing the national anthem.

Currently, some Russian military units sing the anthem during evening roll call. But doing so is not mandatory and is carried out upon orders from the commander.

"I instruct Russian military units to begin every morning by singing the anthem, no matter with what the servicemen are busy with," Shoigu said at a meeting of senior ministry officials.

Shoigu also said that a unified course of Russian history studies should be developed and introduced into all educational programs for Russian servicemen. The announcement comes about a month after Deputy Defense Minister Nikolai Pankov voiced plans to create a special military unit to work with archives and monitor the "falsification of history."

Russia’s armed forces are in the midst of a major program of reform, including a gradual transition to an all-volunteer makeup, organizational changes and re-equipment with advanced weapons, in a bid to create a military more suitable for future challenges and less like the legacy left over from the Soviet era.

In line with the reform, the Defense Ministry is looking for numerous computer programmers to develop new software for the forces. The ministry also plans to create other units to work in fields such as sociology and psychology.

Although Russian soldiers’ daily schedules vary by region and military branch, their regimes are now being revised to give conscripts more time to rest and recover after intense training and studies, according to a website offering useful information for military officers. In recent years, Russian ground force units have started introducing naptime.

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Self-Proclaimed ‘Gerard Depardieu’ Denied Registration in Arctic Mayoral Race – Official

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – An eccentric Russian environmentalist who has changed his name to “Gerard Depardieu” and wanted to run for mayor of an Arctic city was denied registration on a technicality, an election official said Wednesday.

Often calling himself “Tree Man” or “Drevarkh the Enlightened,” the 48-year-old resident of the city of Arkhangelsk was apparently photographed for his new “Depardieu” passport with a four-leaf clover design covering half of his face. Born Andrei Khristoforov, he has changed his name at least two dozen times since 2003, Russian media said.

The mayoral hopeful, frequently photographed with a red police beacon on his head and traditional Russian wooden shoes on his feet – along with extravagant robes or nothing but a G-string, has also been repeatedly detained by police for his erratic public lectures on “tree genocide” and politics, reports said.

In April, he changed his name to “Gerard Depardieu” after a French film star-cum-Russian citizen – and tried to get registered as a mayoral candidate in the Arctic port of Severodvinsk, which lies near his native Arkhangelsk, a Russian tabloid reported Tuesday.

“I am almost a mayor,” he was quoted by Metro as saying. “I am running for election so that there are more sensible people in power.”

However, he failed to impress the election authorities and was denied registration for the September 8 vote, an election official in Severodvinsk told RIA Novosti. The official said that the regional department of the Agrarnaya (Farmers’) party, on whose ticket the self-proclaimed “Depardieu” planned to run, is not allowed to field mayoral candidates.

This is not the first time that “Tree Man” has not been allowed to run for office. Since 2003, he has repeatedly been denied registration in parliamentary, mayoral and presidential elections, according to media reports.

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US Applies Double Standards on Manning – Russian Diplomat

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – The Russian Foreign Ministry’s point man for human rights said Wednesday that the United States had applied double standards when dealing with former army intelligence leaker Bradley Manning.

Manning, 25, was accused of leaking the largest amount of classified information in US history, including thousands of war logs about US operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. A US military judge on Tuesday found him not guilty of aiding the enemy, but guilty of lesser charges. His sentencing hearing is set to begin on Wednesday.

Konstantin Dolgov, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s special representative for human rights, democracy and the rule of law, said that although the United States often criticizes Russia for human rights violations, US authorities react “harshly, firmly and often without taking human rights into account” when interests of the US government are affected.

“The double standards, demonstrated by the US authorities’ in how they have approached the [Manning] situation, are raising eyebrows. If one demands others to fully observe freedom of speech, then, essentially, one should apply the same approach on himself. When different standards are applied, this is bound to cause disappointment on behalf of foreign governments and human rights institutions,” the Russian diplomat said.

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Second Prominent Economist Leaves Top Russian University

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Prominent economist Konstantin Sonin has announced he is quitting Russia’s New Economic School just two months after the institution’s influential rector Sergei Guriev fled to Paris fearing he could be imprisoned.

Sonin, 41, said Wednesday his decision to resign was linked to disagreements with the management of NES, which is currently looking for a permanent replacement for Guriev.

“It is clear that the direction of NES’ development is changing, and I think that I am not a part of the vision of those who are in charge,” Sonin said.

NES, a private graduate economics university, was set up in 1992 and is governed by a board of directors that includes Russian billionaire Peter Aven, the chief economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development Erik Berglof, and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich.

In a blog post, Sonin stressed his departure was not a political decision, and said he will honor all his remaining teaching commitments. “There is no anger, there is no bitterness,” Sonin wrote late Tuesday. “It’s not at all linked with politics.”

Sonin, who has worked at NES for 12 years, was also a vice rector at the university and had been tipped as one of the likely candidates to succeed Guriev, with whom he shared some research interests. Sonin has said that he does not plan to move abroad and is likely to take up another position at a Russian university, according to media reports.

Guriev fled to Paris and resigned as rector of the NES at the end of May. His decision followed his questioning by investigators looking into a case against Yukos, the now-defunct oil company founded by former billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky who has been imprisoned for almost a decade. Supporters insist his trials were politically motivated, but the Russian government insists they were legally justified.

In 2011, Guriev contributed an expert statement to a Presidential Civil Society and Human Rights Council report on the legality of the second Yukos case, maintaining Khodorkovsky was not guilty.

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Russia’s Consumer Rights Chief Slams Lenders, Collection Firms

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Russia’s chief consumer rights chief on Wednesday criticized the country’s consumer lending system, saying that loans are too easy to obtain and collection agencies often resort to illegal practices while pursuing debt payments.

“Getting a loan is criminally easy in Russia, no one is doing any checks,” said Gennady Onishchenko, who heads the country’s consumer rights watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor.

“Collection agencies are not regulated by the law, they undertake functions such as investigative procedures, [they resort to] physical pressure, moral, psychological – any type of pressure to collect a loan,” he said.

Onishchenko has repeatedly said that selling loans to debt collection agencies contradicts several provisions of the Russian Civil Code and the federal law on banks.

Russia has no specific legislation about debt collection, and activities of collection agencies are regulated only by several relevant provisions of the Civil Code.

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Poachers Kill 19 Russian Tigers in 2012-13 – WWF

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – At least 19 endangered Siberian tigers, some of the rarest animals on earth, have been killed by poachers in Russia since 2012, the World Wildlife Fund said Wednesday.

In 2012-2013, Russian investigators launched seven criminal cases against tiger poachers and traders and confiscated the skeletons and body parts from at least 19 dead tigers, Pavel Fomenko, coordinator of the WWF’s branch in Russia's far eastern Amur province, said in a statement.

Siberian tigers – also known as Amur, Ussuri or Manchurian tigers –weigh up to 384 kilograms (850 pounds) and prey on wild boars and deer in the taiga forests of Russia’s Far East and China’s Manchuria. Because of their mythical powers, they have for centuries been used in traditional Chinese folk medicine.

Despite massive efforts to protect the species, there are only about an estimated 450 Siberian tigers left in the wild, most of them in Russia's Far East, according to the World Conservation Union. In 2009, the New-York based Wildlife Conservation Society said the total number of Siberian tigers remaining in the wild is about 300.

Fomenko praised the Russian authorities for stepping up efforts to toughen the penalties for poachers who kill and smuggle tigers to neighboring China, where their bones and pelts are sold on the black market for tens of thousands of dollars.

“I hope that new additions to the Russian Criminal Code … will finally suppress those who want to kill tigers and trade them,” Fomenko said in a statement.

The WWF said earlier this month that the body parts of a Siberian tiger may fetch up to $500,000 in China. Illegal deforestation in Russia’s Far East is also another major threat to the species, as it contributes to the loss of the tigers’ habitat, the group said.

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, who is known to have a weak spot for animals, has a particular fondness for tigers.

On Monday, the Kremlin said Putin had initiated the establishment of the Amur Tiger Center, a non-governmental organization that will preserve and boost the Siberian tiger population.

In early July, Putin signed a law punishing poaching and trading of endangered species, including Siberian tigers, with up to seven years in jail.

In August 2008, Putin attached a tracking collar to a Siberian tigress during a visit to the Ussurisky reserve. He was also given a two-month-old Amur tiger cub as a present on his 56th birthday in October 2008. The tigress was named Mashenka and later sent to a zoo in southern Russia.

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Snob Mag Tops Russian Foul-Mouthed Media Survey

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – A magazine for Russia’s wealthy has topped a list of media most prone to using bad language, according to a new study that comes in the wake of a new campaign by conservative lawmakers against online obscenities.

Russian media used 1,133 obscene words over the past two years, according to data posted by media monitoring company Medialogy on its Facebook page Wednesday.

The online domain of the monthly Snob magazine, aimed at Russia’s moneyed set, was the runaway leader with 354 instances of obscenity used between mid-2011 and this July.

The runner-up was Sports.ru with 202 bad words, but other top cursers included Russian Pioneer website, whose columnists have included Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and former Kremlin ideologist Vladislav Surkov; online lifestyle magazine Lookatme.ru and culture website Openspace.ru, both popular with the hipster crowd; and the Russian edition of Esquire magazine.

Use of “strong language” in media has been an administrative offense punishable with fines of up to 200,000 rubles ($6,000) since a new law was passed in Russia in April.

The bill was criticized for not giving a legal definition of “strong language,” a task that has repeatedly puzzled conservative Russian lawmakers in the past. The Russian language has four words generally recognized as comparable in strength to the “F-word” in English, but also numerous derivatives and other obscenities that do not have the same impact.

Conservative lawmaker Yelena Mizulina said Monday she is ready to draft a law to ban bad words on the Russian internet and file it with the federal parliament in the fall, Lenta.ru reported. Mizulina, who was behind recent legislation on non-political internet censorship and a ban on “gay propaganda,” also sought recently along with her colleague Olga Batalina to have criminal case opened against gay rights champion Nikolai Alexeyev, who has repeatedly slammed her on Twitter using terms that have been, since the April law, unfit for media citation.

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Culture Ministry Accused of Corruption in St. Petersburg - Auditors

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Russia’s Audit Chamber said Wednesday it had uncovered “indications of corruption” in contracts for the restoration of buildings belonging to St. Petersburg’s Hermitage Museum concluded between the Culture Ministry and a large construction company.

The alleged graft took place between 2007 and 2012 as a result of collaboration between the Culture Ministry, restoration company Intarsia and the state-owned St. Petersburg Building Project Investment Fund, according to a statement posted on the Audit Chamber’s website.

As well as the loss of state money, the World Bank, which provided financing for the project, also suffered as a result of the alleged corruption, according to the Audit Chamber.

A spokesperson for the Culture Ministry said that the ministry had not been informed by the Audit Chamber of the findings, but “as soon as we receive official documents from the Audit Chamber we will work on this.”

It was “a pity” the Audit Chamber had made such claims, a spokesperson for Intarsia said, but declined to provide any further comment on the graft allegations.

The exact scale of the corruption was not made clear by the Audit Chamber.

But the oversight body said that in 2010, the Culture Ministry and the St. Petersburg Building Project Investment Fund canceled a tender for carrying out reconstruction work in the eastern wing of St. Petersburg's General Staff building, owned by the Hermitage. The contract was instead awarded to Intarsia, with whom an additional contract worth 6.2 billion rubles ($188 million) was subsequently signed, according to the Audit Chamber.

“[This] allowed Intarsia to gain a significant volume of extra earnings at the expense of the federal budget and loans from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development [part of the World Bank],” the Audit Chamber said.

Itarsia won a contract for the recostruction and restoration of the General Staff building in 2008 worth 4.4 billion rubles ($133 million), and they were awarded a contract for the second tranche of reconstruction in 2010, according to media reports.

Work at the historic General Staff building, which was designed by Italian architect Carlo Rossi in the early 19th century, began is expected to be completed this year, according to Intarsia’s website. It will become an extension of the Hermitage Museum and will house items from the museum's collection.

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Kiev Ready for Talks Over Russia's Candy Import Ban

KIEV, July 31 (RIA Novosti) - Kiev is ready to hold immediate talks with Russia over a ban imposed by Moscow on Ukrainian candy imports, the Ukrainian trade minister said Wednesday.

Russia banned imports of products from four factories operated by Ukraine’s major candy maker Roshen earlier this week. Russia’s sanitary and consumers’ rights watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor, said in a statement Tuesday that tests revealed some of its products violated Russian food safety standards.

“Ukraine will act promptly on this issue… We were ready and we have an action plan,” Ukrainian Economic Development and Trade Minister Ihor Prasolov said. “Our experts are ready to travel to Moscow for talks at any time, as soon as agreement is reached with the Russian side.”

Prasolov said he would chair a working group including Agrarian Policy and Food Minister Mykola Prysyazhnyuk to negotiate with Russia on the issue.

“The strategy is as follows: we will hold consultations with the Russian side, we will request and study the official results of tests and engage in talks about an inspection of our factories by Rospotrebnadzor experts,” Prasolov said.

Rospotrebnadzor first voiced its concerns about the quality of Ukrainian candies several weeks ago, claiming tests revealed the presence of benzopyrene in Ukrainian milk chocolate and other violations.

The dispute is the latest in a string of recent arguments over trade between Ukraine and Russia, including Moscow's complaint that an additional import tax on cars imposed by Kiev would be harmful for its carmakers.

Ukraine also remains locked in a long-standing dispute over the price it pays Russia for imported gas. Russia's gas supplier Gazprom claims Kiev owes billions of dollars in back-payments for gas it has declined to buy under a disputed contract signed in 2009 by former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

Russia has also been trying to persuade Ukraine to join its customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan. Ukraine, however, has been reluctant to join the group because it expects to sign a free-trade agreement with the European Union. The two deals are mutually exclusive.

Rospotrebnadzor chief Gennady Onishchenko denied on Wednesday that the candy ban was politically motivated.

“No matter… how they try to find a political aspect in this, they won’t find [it], because we have objective evidence to prove that the quality does not meet the declared requirements,” he told journalists in Moscow.

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Iran Not in S-300 Missile Replacement Talks – Envoy

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Iran and Russia have not discussed Moscow’s tentative offer to supply Tehran with Antei-2500 surface-to-air missile systems instead of the S-300, whose sale was previously blocked by the Kremlin, Iran’s envoy to Russia said Wednesday.

“As for the Antei-2500 [missile] systems, it’s just words,” Seyed Mahmoud-Reza Sajjadi told RIA Novosti. “There were no agreements, and there are no talks [on the matter].”

Russia agreed in 2007 to supply Iran with then state-of-the-art S-300 air defense systems, but scrapped the deal in 2010, unilaterally expanding on sanctions ordered by the UN (Resolution 1747) against that country over its alleged nuclear weapons development program.

The ban on the S-300 deal was ordered by then-President Dmitry Medvedev, following intense lobbying by the United States.

Tehran filed a $4 billion lawsuit against Moscow for compensation for failing to complete the deal. Moscow is now trying to settle the matter out of court.

Kommersant daily reported in June that Russia was ready to supply the Antei-2500 air defense system, itself a modification of the S-300 and superior to early variants of that system in capability, but this was never officially confirmed.

© RIA Novosti.

The S-300-P surface-to-air missile system

The paper quoted unnamed sources in the Russian arms industry who claimed that Antei-2500, a modification originally developed for Russia’s ground forces, did not technically come under the remit of Medvedev’s ban, but the sources did not explain on what grounds.

The designation S-300 is a blanket term for a family of related air defense systems, including radars, command posts and several different missiles, with a range of capabilities, including the ability to intercept cruise and ballistic missiles, defense analysts say.

Possibly hinting at a chill in relations, Sajjadi also denied Wednesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to visit Iran for talks with his newly elected counterpart Hassan Rouhani in mid-August.

“The matter of Putin’s visit is not even being discussed,” Sajjadi said, adding that the speaker of the lower house of the Russian parliament, Sergei Naryshkin, will represent Russia at Rouhani’s inauguration on August 3.

Putin is slated to tour the Caspian Sea littoral nations in mid-August, but not Iran. Kommersant said last week Moscow and Tehran had failed to agree on whether Rouhani should come to visit Putin in the port city of Bandar-e Anzali, or whether the Russian president would visit the Iranian capital.

A Kremlin spokesman said last week Putin’s trip to Iran was on the cards, but gave no timeframe.

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Nationalists Stage Anti-Migrant ‘Russian Raids’ in Petersburg

MOSCOW, July 31 (Alexey Eremenko, RIA Novosti) – Russian nationalists have jumped on the bandwagon of marketplace raids following a police clampdown in Moscow, taking to the streets in force and armed with baseball bats – to check the documents of fruit vendors, they say.

The so-called “Russian raids” in St. Petersburg helped expose several dozen illegal fruit stands staffed by foreigners without work permits this week, raid co-organizer Nikolai Bondarik told RIA Novosti on Wednesday.

“There's nobody to do it but us,” said Bondarik, a radical nationalist who sits on the Russian opposition’s Coordination Council.

Raiders comprise groups of 50 to 60 grassroots enthusiasts, both radical nationalists and civil society activists “tired of having [Tajikistan’s capital] Dushanbe in our streets,” Bondarik said.

The raiders check the work permits of vendors and report them to the police if there are any problems with their paperwork, he said.

City news website Fontanka.ru claimed the raiders smashed fruit stands using the baseball bats, and published a photograph showing fruit and vegetables spilled across the ground near a market stall, but Bondarik denied the allegations and said the bats were for self-defense.

The St. Petersburg raids were prompted by last week’s assault on a Moscow policeman, whose skull was smashed by a marketplace worker when he was trying to detain a sex offender.

The incident triggered sweeping police raids in Moscow, where more than 1,000 people, most of them migrant workers from Russia’s North Caucasus region or neighboring Central Asian countries, were detained at local marketplaces. The attacker was arrested and faces life in prison.

No violence was reported during the “Russian raids,” though police were looking into reports about raiders obstructing lawful street trading, a St. Petersburg police spokesman told RIA Novosti.

He declined to comment on a report by Fontanka.ru that cited an unnamed city policeman as calling the raids “an interesting and so far effective measure.”

The fractured nationalist movement in Russia gained notoriety during the 2000s due to the actions of its radicals, mostly skinheads who formed migrant-killing gangs. Skinhead activity in Russia has decreased following a series of high-profile trials in recent years, and nationalists are increasingly switching from violent attacks on migrants to “raids” teetering on the brink of legality, anti-xenophobia watchdog Sova said in a report earlier this month.

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When Your Home Is Taiga

What is it like to live deep in taiga far from the noisy world? Little wooden houses, modest utensils, the mode of life we do not see every day. This is how Khanty people live in remote settlements.

The way to the settlement is not so easy. Such roads are used by locals to tranport animal skins and meat to Ugut village.

There is only one family consisting of four members in this settlement.

Khanty people know a lot of curious ways of fishing. This is one of them. They throw something edible on the bottom and fish comes up where it can get some oxygen and food. It only remains to scoop it out daily with a net.

This way of fishing is really good.

Links to explore: See even more of English Russia:

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Snowden's Father Thanks Russia For Protecting His Son

MOSCOW, July 31 (RIA Novosti) - The father of fugitive former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden has thanked President Vladimir Putin and Russia for helping his son, in a first interview with the Russian media aired on Wednesday.

Lonnie Snowden told state-owned Rossiya 24 television he was grateful to Putin and the Russian government for their “courage” and “strength” in protecting his son, who has been holed up in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport since arriving from Hong Kong on June 23.

He said FBI officials had previously asked him to fly to Moscow to see his son a few weeks ago, but he declined. He said in remarks translated into Russian that he might still decide to go to Moscow to meet his son.

Edward Snowden, who is wanted by the United States for leaking classified data about the NSA’s intelligence gathering operations, requested temporary asylum in Russia earlier this month. Russian officials have not yet issued him with a document that would allow him to leave the airport’s transit zone.

Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena, who is assisting Snowden’s asylum request, said in an interview broadcast Wednesday that he planned to send an invitation to Snowden’s father to support his visa application.

“I will do my best to do this today,” Kucherena told Vesti FM radio station, a sister outlet of Rossiya 24. No particular date has yet been set for Lonnie Snowden’s visit, he said.

Kucherena also said it was still unclear when Russian officials would issue documents for Edward Snowden, adding it should happen in the next few days.

Lonnie Snowden said in his interview that his son should stay where it is safe for him.

“I hope to see you soon. But most of all I want you to be safe," he said. “I hope you are watching this… Your family is well. We love you," he added.

He reiterated that he did not expect his son would have a fair trial if he returns to the United States.

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Pink All Terrain Vehicle For the Girl

One girl from Moscow really likes huge pink cars, so she drives along the capital in a cool all-terrain vehicle TRECOL-39294 that costs approximately 80 thousand dollars.

Links to explore: See even more of English Russia:

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Russian Patrol Robot

Russian company SMP Robotics started production of patrol robots “Tral Patrul 3.1″. The autonomous mobile system is intended to patrol and guard objects with large territory, protect them from foreign objects. It could be used at oil and gas storage objects, warehouses, objects of power industry, coastal and tourist zones, on household plots etc.

The robot is able to move along a given route (or several routes) and examine a guarded territory for presence of unwanted guests. Some cameras are mounted on the robot, if it detects a moving object it automatically switches to the tracking mode and sends an alarm signal to the central guard post. If the guarded territory has two or more patrol robots they can exchange alarm information between themselves and operate more effectively together.

The robot does not need an operator, it moves along the route programmed in advance. It can overcome about twenty four kilometres with speed of 5-7 km/h on one battery charge. The company may start production of the tracked robots soon and the range of their tasks will extend.

The robot is able to detect a person at the distance of 60 m in daytime, and 30 meters at night.

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North Koreans Face Jail for Beating Russian Border Guard

VLADIVOSTOK, July 31 (RIA Novosti) – Investigators in Russia’s Far East have opened a criminal case against two North Koreans suspected of beating a Russian border guard with clubs while attempting to cross the country’s border, law enforcement officials said Wednesday.

According to investigators, five North Koreans crossed the Russian border in a motorboat last Saturday, sailing into the Peter the Great Gulf in the Sea of Japan.

A border guard from Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) was trying to detain their boat when two of the suspects resisted by “hitting him on his hand with wooden clubs,” the investigators said in a statement.

The Koreans were later detained, and face charges of “using violence against a state official,” punishable with up to five years in prison. It was not immediately clear why they had crossed into Russian territory or whether their trip was sanctioned by the North Korean authorities.

Russia’s eastern Primorsky Territory has long been a refuge for Koreans hoping to flee their country, including many economic migrants and political refugees.

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Hunts for a Hooker, Gets Abducted

Warning! This video might have a strong language unacceptable to minors!

Russian dude tries to get a call girl but as a result rants his way thru the crazy adventure which starts at his native city as a love romance for a call girl, but quickly escalates as a gran scale intergalactic domination conflict resulting in a massive destruction and an alien death toll. One of the most popular Russian shock cartoon web shows is now available in English too!

Got awesome critical acclaim amongst Russian web viewers and a lot of support recently so we decided to feature it as well.

Official English fan page of the series is here

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US Gay Activists Emboldened as Russian Vodka, Sochi Protests Spread

This article contains information not suitable for readers younger than 18 years of age, according to Russian legislation.

WASHINGTON, July 30 (By Carl Schreck for RIA Novosti) – As boycotts of Russian vodka spread across the globe in protest over new Russian laws on homosexuality, US gay rights activists warn the campaign could be the first stage in a broader drive targeting Russia’s economy and image with the Sochi Winter Olympics six months away.

“I don’t think the Russian vodka industry is going to be hurt, but it brings the attention,” journalist and author Michelangelo Signorile, a prominent US gay rights activist, told RIA Novosti on Tuesday. “… Then we’ll see the focus go to American companies and investment in Russia. That is where there can be a very effective strategy.”

Amid a stream of images and reports highlighting an official crackdown and vigilante violence against gays in Russia, US activists last week called for a boycott of Russian vodka, a campaign that has centered on Stolichnaya, an iconic Russian brand of the traditional sprit.

The movement has morphed into a global groundswell, with gay bars in several US cities being joined by establishments in Canada, Britain and Australia in yanking Russian vodka from their shelves.

At the same time, there has been a smattering of calls to boycott the Sochi games, though several notable gay activists and former Olympians – including US figure skater Johnny Weir and Olympic champion diver Greg Louganis – have publicly stated their opposition to such a move.

Instead, the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community could take the momentum from the vodka boycotts and pressure corporations sponsoring the Sochi Olympics, including Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Procter & Gamble and Visa, said Nina Long, co-president of RUSA LGBT, a gay rights group made up of Russian-Americans in New York.

“They, of course, are next in line to feel the pressure to withdraw their sponsorship from the games,” Long told RIA Novosti on Tuesday “Then of course there are companies that heavily invest in Russia, and they would be a third target.”

Pressure from LGBT groups is likely to be more effective when applied to economic interests rather than trying to directly impact Russia’s political system, Long said. A controversial law signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin banning the promotion of “non-traditional relationships” toward minors is worded too vaguely to hold it up as a clear demonstration of human rights violations, she said.

Critics say the law is part of a broader crackdown on Russia’s gay community, while proponents say it shields children from harmful influences.

Since US author and gay rights activist Dan Savage called for a boycott of Stolichnaya and other Russian products in a blog post last week, there has been debate in the LGBT community and its supporters about the wisdom and effectiveness of the campaign. Nikolai Alexeyev, a leading Russian gay activist, has said the boycott makes little sense since Stolichnaya – commonly known as “Stoli” – is bottled in Latvia and has its corporate headquarters in Luxembourg.

But another well-known US activist, John Aravosis, wrote this week that “the point of a boycott isn’t only the boycott itself.”

“My goal in this campaign is to make clear to countries that homophobia is not okay, and that they will pay a severe price for oppressing their [LGBT] citizens,” Aravosis wrote. “And that goal can be accomplished whether or not Stoli or any other Russian brand loses a lot of, or ‘enough,’ (or any) money.”

Individual Russian companies are merely tactical targets in a larger battle to tarnish Russia’s image and pressure lawmakers in Moscow “to make permanent change on this issue – if for no other reason than to simply make us all just go away,” Aravosis wrote.

In a blog post Monday, Signorile proposed that the next step in the campaign should be to pressure US companies with corporate policies promoting equality for the gay community and that have significant interests in Russia. These include Procter & Gamble, the heavy machinery company Caterpillar, accounting firm Ernst & Young, and hotel chains such as Holiday Inn, Hyatt, Marriott, and Sheraton, Signorile said.

The vodka boycotts have gained traction in part due to a series of graphic images and videos that have circulated widely on the Internet over the past two weeks showing LGBT activists being attacked and abused by vigilante groups and being detained by police during protests, Signorile said.

These images – along with prominent voices such as Savage publically taking up the cause of gay rights in Russia and the global spotlight the Kremlin finds itself in as Sochi approaches – have created “a perfect storm” to galvanize activists for the vodka boycotts, he added.

Dozens of activists are planning to protest Russia’s gay rights record Wednesday outside the Russian embassy in Washington and the Russian consulate in New York City, where demonstrators plan to dump Russian vodka into the gutter.

Aravosis wrote Monday that the vodka boycott “has begun as well as any boycott could, and really far better than even I expected.”

“I’m looking forward to many more,” he wrote.

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Fire Prompts Evacuation of Ostankino TV Center

MOSCOW, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – A fire broke out at Moscow’s Ostankino Technical Support Center late Tuesday, prompting the evacuation of more than 1,000 people, including a sports commentator who was told to leave even though he was covering a football match.

Thirty-five firefighting teams including 127 emergency services personnel arrived to the ASK-1 building, where at least 1,200 people were working at the moment, a police source said. The blaze was extinguished around 11 p.m. Moscow time (19:00 GMT). No deaths or injuries were reported.

According to Moscow’s emergencies service, the fire spread across about 25 square meters (270 square feet). Although the blaze was promptly contained, the building was covered in dense smoke.

The fire was initially described as a Category 2 on a five-point scale by Ostankino spokesman Denis Nazarov, but a police source told RIA Novosti that the status was later upgraded to Category 4.

Sports commentator Gennady Orlov was told to evacuate during the second period of a Champions League third qualifying round match between Zenit St. Petersburg and Denmark’s Nordsjaelland.

“The whole crew has been evacuated, so the broadcast goes ahead without a commentator,” said Dmitry Chukovsky, head of the NTV Plus sports channel that broadcast the game.

Nazarov said that the fire caused no disruptions in television broadcasts, and that equipment and communications were unaffected.

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Russian Prosecutor Questions Reported Bribery Figures

MOSCOW, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – While the number of bribes being offered in Russia rose 30 percent in the first six months of this year, the number of bribes accepted was down 6.5 percent, a top prosecutor said Tuesday, questioning the objectivity of those figures.

Such figures could be related to the desire of regional prosecutors to embellish statistics, First Deputy Prosecutor General Alexander Buksman said at a meeting to assess the agency’s performance in the first half of the year.

Prosecutors in the Novosibirsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Kemerovo and Samara regions (central Russia and Siberia) who have reported a significant rise in the number of accepted bribes “need to look into the objectivity of that phenomenon as a matter of urgency and report back on measures taken,” Buksman said.

He also urged regional prosecutors to go after corruption in a big way and not bother with 1,000 ruble to 5,000 ruble ($30-$150) lawsuits in an effort to pad their figures.

Buksman attributed such practices to prosecutors in central Russia’s Vologda, Ryazan and Ivanovo regions, and warned against attempts to churn out apparently impressive reports that lack substance.

Overall, the number of corruption-related lawsuits for damages filed by prosecutors so far this year was almost 25 percent higher than in the same period last year, he said.

Russian courts have already approved 80 percent of those suits, worth almost 700 million rubles, the deputy prosecutor general added.

The Transparency International global watchdog estimated the cost of corruption in Russia at $300 billion last year, placing Russia 133rd out of 174 countries in its Corruption Perceptions Index.

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Russia Bans Imports From Ukrainian Candy Maker Roshen

MOSCOW/KIEV, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – Russia has banned imports from major Ukrainian candy maker Roshen after the carcinogen benzopyrene, which can naturally occur in roasted coffee and cocoa beans, was found in analyzed product samples.

Russia’s sanitary and consumers rights watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor, said in statement Tuesday that products from Roshen factories in Kiev, Vinnitsa, Mariupol and Kremenchug violated Russian standards for quality and food safety.

Ukraine’s association of major confectionery companies, Ukrkondprom, has called on the Ukrainian government to protect Roshen from Russia’s trade sanctions, adding that the firm was ready for an immediate inspection by Russian experts of its Ukrainian factories.

“The association is convinced that any administrative bans on behalf of the Russian side would lead to creating artificial restrictions in bilateral trade. Ukrkondprom urges the Ukrainian government to determine in cooperation with the Russian side an interstate mediation procedure for solving the problem without imposing trade bans,” the organization said in a statement.

Rospotrebnadzor first voiced its concerns about the quality of Ukrainian candies several weeks ago, saying tests revealed the presence of benzopyrene in Ukrainian milk chocolate and other violations.

The move comes on the backdrop of recent differences between Ukraine and Russia over Kiev’s additional import tax on cars that Russia believes would be harmful for its carmakers.

In addition, Russia has been trying to persuade Ukraine to join its customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan in recent months. Ukraine, however, has been reluctant to join the group because it expects to sign a free-trade agreement with the European Union. The two deals are mutually exclusive.

During his visit to Ukraine last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated his proposal to Ukraine to join the customs union. He said it would be more advantageous for the country than the agreement with the EU, which Ukraine hopes to sign in November.

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Kremlin’s Man in Moscow Mayoral Race Reluctant to Debate Navalny – Reports

MOSCOW, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – Moscow’s powerful, Kremlin-appointed mayor will likely aim to avoid public debates with his rivals for the post, including charismatic opposition leader Alexei Navalny, ahead of upcoming elections, two Russian newspapers reported Tuesday.

A spokesman for acting Mayor Sergei Sobyanin told RIA Novosti that his boss would decide whether to participate in the debates closer to their start on August 12.

The comment came in response to reports by two respected dailies, Vedomosti and Kommersant, which said earlier the same day that Sobyanin was strongly disinclined to debate Navalny, famous for his impassioned Kremlin-bashing. Both papers cited unnamed sources reportedly close to Sobyanin.

Sobyanin expects “rudeness” at debates with Navalny and wants to avoid it, Vedomosti reported, citing an unnamed source close to the acting mayor. Kommersant cited sources in Sobyanin’s campaign staff as saying he did not want to face possible “insults” from Navalny.

Navalny said in a blog post that the real “rudeness” was avoiding public debate with rivals.

Sobyanin, who has governed Moscow for three years, also has “no topic for dialogue” with his five rivals, all of them opposition politicians without a serious track record in city management, Vedomosti said.

Six rounds of debates between the six candidates are slated to take place before the election on September 8, though a mayoral hopeful has the right to decline to participate.

The debates will be aired on city-owned radio and television channels. The broadcaster said the debates would be pre-recorded due to “technical limitations,” which caused a flurry of criticism from all five opposition candidates.

“The authorities are afraid of a face-to-face conversation,” Communist Party mayoral nominee Ivan Melnikov told RIA Novosti.

Candidates from the ruling establishment rarely participate in public debates in Russia. The most prominent case is Sobyanin’s political patron, President Vladimir Putin, who never debated with his rivals during his three successful election campaigns between 2000 and 2012; neither did Sobyanin’s predecessor as Moscow mayor, Yury Luzhkov. The opposition has repeatedly accused such candidates of capitalizing on purportedly privileged exposure in state- and city-run media.

Sobyanin was appointed to his job in 2010 by then-President Dmitry Medvedev. But following a new law that reintroduced direct mayoral elections in the Russian capital, Sobyanin resigned last month, prompting the early election.

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Russian Navy to Keep ‘Unchristian’ Neptune Day

MOSCOW, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – The Russian Navy will not be nixing the 200-year-old tradition of featuring the Roman god of the sea in its festivities, despite complaints about his “pagan” nature, a Navy spokesman said Tuesday.

“The claim that humorous skits featuring Neptune and other mythological creatures […] go against the Navy’s Christian traditions […] is beyond criticism,” the spokesman told RIA Novosti.

Neptune, accompanied by an entourage of mermaids and imps, is a staple feature at various maritime festivities in Russia, including Navy Day, nicknamed Neptune Day.

Local media reported earlier this week that the Russian Orthodox Church had asked the country’s Navy to give up on Neptune and his unchristian following, who “were not on board Noah’s Arc” starting next year.

This anti-Neptune sentiment was endorsed in mid-July by controversial church spokesman Vsevolod Chaplin, who spoke out against people at public festivities “dressing up as pagan gods, unclean spirits or characters symbolizing dark spiritual powers.”

The Russian Navy first celebrated Neptune Day in 1803. The tradition was continued by the Soviet Navy despite the Soviet Union’s atheistic state ideology.

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Russian Officials Mull Using Tobacco Tax to Fund Healthcare

NOVO-OGARYOVO, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – Russia’s health and finance ministries are to mull the option of using tobacco taxes to help fund spending on healthcare, Russian President Vladimir Putin indicated at a meeting on Tuesday.

At a meeting in his Novo-Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow, Putin noted that just 35.4 percent of the population is happy with the public healthcare on offer, and said that funding is a key issue.

The Astrakhan Region governor and Health Minister both spoke up in favor of using revenue from taxes on tobacco to help meet the costs of providing public healthcare.

Putin said that this is something that would have to be developed in liaison with the finance ministry, and called linking a particular tax to a particular goal “exotic.”

“It is done in some countries, but by no means everywhere, certainly – not often. But it can be worked on,” Putin said.

Putin singled out the government’s anti-smoking policies as a particular success.

Under the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control that Russia signed with the World Health Organization in 2008, the country is obliged to take a tougher line on smoking and the advertising and of tobacco products by 2015.

This year Putin signed an anti-smoking law banning smoking in a variety of places ranging from government buildings and healthcare facilities to public transport and restaurants. The law is due to be fully in force by 2015.

Speaking in 2012, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said that 400,000 Russians die each year from smoking-related causes.

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Russian Cop Who Beat Up Taxi Driver Avoids Jail Time

KAZAN, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – A Russian policeman received a suspended sentence on Tuesday for beating up a taxi driver in an apparent road rage incident during which both of their vehicles were blocking traffic.

The 29-year-old officer, who headed an anti-corruption division in Russia’s Tatarstan republic, jumped out of his vehicle, ran over to the taxi and punched the 42-year-old driver several times, the local Investigative Committee said in a statement.

Officer Ivan Kornev then dragged the driver out of the taxi and, together with an acquaintance, punched and kicked the victim in various parts of his body, the statement said, adding that the man lost a tooth in the October 2012 attack.

“On the same day, Kornev went to the victim’s home and threatened him with violence and problems at work if he reported [the attack],” the statement said.

Officer Kornev was found guilty of battery, as well as abuse of office in connection with the threat. He will not be able to serve as a policeman for two years.

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150-200 Militants Active in Dagestan – Republic’s Leader

MAKHACHKALA, July 30 (RIA Novosti) – About 150 to 200 militant insurgents are currently active in Russia’s turbulent North Caucasus republic of Dagestan, the republic’s acting chief told RIA Novosti.

The Russian Interior Ministry branch for the North Caucasus Federal District said in late January that some 40 militant groups contained about 600 active members who were operating in the region, most of them in Dagestan.

“Various figures emerge, [from] 150 [to] 200,” Dagestan’s acting leader, Ramazan Abdulatipov said in an interview.

He added that although the republic’s authorities were currently trying to help militants return to a normal life, law enforcement officers “need to enhance their activities” in order to successfully deal with this task.

“On the whole, I think that the Interior Ministry and the Federal Security Service are doing good work in order to ensure security. … Many successful [security] operations have been carried out in the past months. They are doing what they can,” he said.

Russia has been fighting militants in the North Caucasus for over a decade, including two separatist wars in Chechnya. Volatile Dagestan, which borders Chechnya, has seen the majority of all militant attacks in Russia in the past years.

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