One of the forests in the Moscow region and abandoned equipment again. Put on the rubber boots and come go with us!
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Another Forest Full of Abandoned Equipment
2013/11/30
Russia Says It’s Ready for Talks on Ukraine-EU Deal
2013/11/30
MOSCOW, November 30 (RIA Novosti) – Moscow is ready for trilateral talks with Kiev and Brussels on the consequences of the association agreements between Ukraine and the EU, a senior Russian diplomat said Friday.
“We were not the ones who proposed or insisted on these talks, but if the European Union and Ukraine want us to discuss the economic consequences of the association to our trilateral relations, we are ready, in principle, to so,” Deputy Foreign Minister Vasily Nebenzya said.
Ukraine has decided to suspend the planned signing of the association agreement and free trade deals with the EU at the two-day summit which was held on November 28-29 in Vilnius.
The Ukrainian government has cited significant economic losses because of shrinking trade volumes with Russia and other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States, an alliance of former Soviet countries, as the reason for the decision.
Ukraine has instead proposed the creation of a trilateral commission between itself, Russia and the European Union to explore ways to deepen mutual ties.
However, EU leaders rejected the proposal on Friday saying that Europe does not need “a trilateral agreement for a bilateral deal.”
Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych offered a glimmer of hope during the summit, when he told leaders that Ukraine was committed to European integration and intended to sign the agreements “in the near future.”
Russia says that it will introduce a harsh new customs regime with its smaller neighbor if the EU deal goes ahead.
A spate of rallies by pro-EU protesters took place across Ukraine over the past week.
Early on Saturday, riot police allegedly used “excessive force” to disperse a protest at the Independence Square in the capital Kiev. Dozens of protesters and at least 12 police officers were reportedly injured in violent clashes, which have already been condemned by Ukrainian government officials and opposition, as well as by a host of foreign countries.
Russian Army Goes East With Biggest 2014 Drill
2013/11/30
MOSCOW, November 30 (RIA Novosti) – The Russian military will hold its biggest drill of 2014 in the country’s east, First Deputy Defense Minister Arkady Bakhin said Saturday.
The East-2014 exercise will involve several army branches, Bakhin said on Ekho Moskvy radio.
He did not elaborate on the program or the exact time and venue for the event.
This year’s biggest drill, West-2013, took place in the Russian western exclave of Kaliningrad and the neighboring Belarus, Russia’s major European ally.
The Russian army held about 3,000 drills in 2013, including some 400 involving multiple army branches, Bakhin said.
Russia has 29 international military exercises lined up for next year, Bakhin also said.
Moscow announced last week plans to hold joint drills with China and Mongolia in 2014.
Tatarstan to Treat Church Torchings As Terrorism
2013/11/30
MOSCOW, November 30 (RIA Novosti) – Prosecutors in the Russian republic of Tatarstan said they seek a case on terrorism charges opened into burnings of Christian churches in the predominantly Muslim region.
Seven Orthodox Christian churches were torched in Tatarstan over the past six months, including two on Thursday night, Regnum.ru news agency said.
Republican Prosecutor General on Thursday blamed the attacks on unspecified extremists in a statement on Tatarstan’s prosecutor office’s website.
The perpetrators could face up to 20 years in jail on terrorism charges.
Komsomolskaya Pravda tabloid said investigators were inclined to blame the arsons on Wahhabis, adherents of a radical branch of Islam favored by many Islamic terrorists in Russia.
Tatarstan was largely unaffected by the wave of militant Islamist extremism that has swept the Russian North Caucasus since the Soviet Union’s demise.
But the number of incidents involving alleged Islamists has slowly been rising in the republic on the Volga River.
Incidents over the past year included attacks on pro-governmental Muslim clerics, street rallies in support of al-Qaida and police shootings of terrorism suspects.
© RIA Novosti.
Terrorist threat levels in Russia
Tatarstan has a population of 3.8 million, about 53 percent of them ethnic Tatars and 40 percent Russians, according to the nationwide census of 2010.
Pashutin Gets Nod as Coach of Russia Basketball Team
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (R-Sport) – Basketball coach Evgeny Pashutin has been rewarded for guiding Russian team Lokomotiv Kuban into the top-tier Euroleague with a contract to coach the national team.
Pashutin, 44, will take over from Vasily Karasev, whose four-month stint at the helm ended in disaster at EuroBasket, where Russia won only one game and was unable to qualify for next year’s World Cup.
“I’d like to thank everyone for the trust. I’m ready to work day and night,” said Pashutin, who will combine his duties at Kuban with those of leading the national team.
“Besides tactics and training process, we will have to improve relations with the players and fans. It is a big responsibility and a huge volume of work,” he said.
Almost all of the national team's stars – including Timofey Mozgov, Alexander Kaun, Andrei Kirilenko and Viktor Khryapa – cited different reasons for skipping the European championships in September, leaving Karasev with a young and inexperienced roster.
Pashutin led Lokomotiv to triumph in the second-tier Eurocup last season, enabling the team to qualify for participation in the Euroleague. On Thursday, Lokomotiv qualified for the final 16 stage in its maiden Euroleague season.
Pashutin’s other honors include European gold with Russia’s U20 team, a VTB United League title with CSKA Moscow in 2010, and another Eurocup trophy with UNICS Kazan.
Two Missiles, Two Fates
2013/11/29
A photo story of two missiles whose destiny was to become a monument and a museum exhibit.
This one (on the picture above), R-13, stands in Severomorsk, Russia. It’s a Soviet liquid-fuelled single-stage ballistic missile.
It was used to make the only one Soviet launch of a ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead from the submarine.
You can see that the missile is in a poor condition.
The missile can be seen from afar.
Another missile was lucky to become a museum exhibit, itis located in the Navy Museum of Saint-Petersburg.
Missile R-11FM is a soviet liquid-fulled single-stage ballistic missile, a part of the missile complex D-1. With this complex the Soviet Union became the first country whose submerged forces had submarines with ballistic missiles. Since 1958 to 1967 there were made 77 launches of R-11FM missiles, 59 of them were successful. The missile complex D-1 was put out of service in 1967.
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Freighter With Advanced Navigation System Docks at Orbital Lab
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 30 (RIA Novosti) – An unmanned Russian resupply spacecraft carrying an improved navigation system docked early Saturday with the International Space Station, Russian Mission Control said.
"The manual docking was carried out by cosmonaut Oleg Kotov," Mission Control said.
The Progress M-21M space freighter was loaded with almost 2.5 metric tons of food, fuel, experiment hardware and other supplies for the space station’s six Expedition 38 crew members. The craft lifted off aboard a Soyuz-U launch vehicle from the Russian-leased Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan on Tuesday.
On November 28, the spacecraft conducted flybys of the orbital station and successfully tested a lighter and more efficient automated navigation and docking system, known as Kurs-NA.
The Kurs-NA boasts advanced electronics, a fully-digitized control system and increased docking precision compared to its predecessor, Kurs. The improved system will be used on all upgraded Soyuz and Progress vehicles in the future.
The space station's crew currently comprises Russian cosmonauts Mikhail Tyurin, Sergey Ryazanskiy and Oleg Kotov, NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Mike Hopkins, and Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata.
Gorbanevskaya, Veteran of 1968 Red Square Protest, Dies at 77
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 30 (RIA Novosti) – A Soviet-era dissident and poet best remembered for a seminal protest on Moscow’s Red Square in 1968 over the Red Army’s invasion of Czechoslovakia died Friday in Paris, aged 77, cultural affairs website Colta.ru has reported.
Natalya Gorbanevskaya, who was born in Moscow in 1936, studied philology at Leningrad University and went on to work as a bookseller and translator of technical literature.
She became a founding member of the self-published underground publication The Chronicle of Current Events, which documented human rights issues in the Soviet Union for a 15-year period up until 1983.
On August 25, 1968, Gorbanevskaya took part in an eight-person demonstration on the Red Square against the decision to dispatch Soviet armed forces to crush the reformist Prague Spring. The group stood on a spot reserved for executions in prerevolutionary times, holding up signs reading “Hands Off Czechoslovakia” before being attacked by security service agents.
Gorbanevskaya was arrested in late 1969 and subsequently subjected to forcible psychiatric treatment at Moscow’s then-notorious Serbsky Institute.
In August, Gorbanevskaya and several other demonstrators marked the 45th anniversary of the Czechoslovak invasion with a recreation of the 1968 protest on Red Square. The rally was quickly dispersed and most its participants detained by police.
After emigrating from the Soviet Union in 1975, Gorbanevskaya moved to Paris and worked as an editor of the Kontinent émigré dissident journal and as a correspondent Radio Free Europe’s Russian service.
From the early 1980s through to 2003, she worked in the émigré newspaper Russkaya Mysyl.
Gorbanevskaya has authored dozens of collections of poetry and translated literary works from Polish, Czech, Slovak and French.
In 1976, US folk singer Joan Baez released “Natalia,” a song she dedicated to Gorbanevskaya. Introducing the song on her "From Every Stage" live album, she said that "it is because of people like Natalia Gorbanevskaya, I am convinced that you and I are still alive and walking around on the face of the earth."
US Court Orders Review in Russian Gay Man’s Asylum Case
2013/11/29
WASHINGTON, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – A US court has ordered immigration authorities to review a decision to deny asylum to a gay Russian man who said he was attacked in his home country because of his sexual orientation, national media have reported.
The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday that the US Department of Justice’s Board of Immigration Appeals was incorrect in deciding the man had failed to show Russian authorities were unable or unwilling to prevent persecution, Courthouse News Service reported.
The appeals court said US immigrations authorities would have to show that "there has been a fundamental change in circumstances such that (the man) no longer has a well-founded fear of persecution" if deported to Russia, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
The man, who has been identified only as “John Doe,” said he was first attacked in 2002 after fellow students at a university in eastern Siberia discovered he was gay, leading to a three-week spell in hospital, Courthouse News Service reported Wednesday.
When he filed a legal complaint, however, local police told him his injuries were not serious, the Associated Press reported, citing court records.
The man said he was attacked again in 2003, but authorities again refused to take action, the AP reported Thursday.
The man moved to the United States in 2003 to attend a language school, but immigrations authorities initiated deportation proceedings when he stopped coming to classes. He then applied for asylum, Courthouse News Service reported.
The new ruling comes as the Russian government comes under continuing fire for its treatment of gays.
President Vladimir Putin in June signed a law banning the promotion of “non-traditional relationships” to minors.
The Kremlin says the law is aimed at protecting children and does not prevent adults from making their own choices. Critics claim the legislation is part of a much wider crackdown on homosexuality in Russia.
Russia Plans to Launch 11 Military Satellites By 2015
2013/11/29
SOCHI, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – President Vladimir Putin said Friday that Russia will launch a total of 11 military satellites by 2015.
Speaking at a meeting on the development of the Russian satellite fleet, Putin said five military satellites have already joined Russia’s orbital group in 2013 and that five more will be added to it before the year is out.
Next year, Russia will launch another six satellites in line with the state arms procurement program, he said.
Putin did not specify the type of satellites or whether they would include dual-purpose Glonass navigation satellites.
According to Maj. Gen. Alexander Golovko, the commander of the Russian Aerospace Defense Forces, Russia currently operates some 120 active satellites in orbit. About 80 of these satellites are reportedly military or dual-purpose.
Moscow, Minsk to Discuss Russian Airbase in Belarus
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – A senior Russian defense official said Friday that talks will be held next month on the planned deployment of an airbase in Belarus.
Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov told reporters in Moscow that several potential locations have been identified in Belarus, but that further consultations were needed with the neighboring former Soviet nation's authorities.
The airbase would be Russia’s first on Belarusian territory in modern times and would consolidate defense cooperation under the auspices of the Union State of Russia and Belarus, defense officials in Moscow have said.
“In addition, we are working on the placement of a Russian fighter jet unit on alert duty at a Belarusian airbase. We will finish this work soon,” Antonov said.
Plans for the airbase come amid continued irritation in Moscow over combat air patrols from NATO members states Latvia and Lithuania, which lie near Belarus, wandering into areas close to Russian airspace.
European defense officials have bristled at evidence of Russia’s increased military deployments close to NATO’s border, arguing that it fuels tension with former Communist bloc countries in Central Europe and the Baltic States.
But Antonov said Russian-Belarus defense ties comprised a legitimate effort to ensure a solid defense for the countries’ Union State.
Moscow and Minsk signed an agreement on the joint protection of the Union State's airspace and the creation of an integrated regional air defense network in February 2009.
The network reportedly comprises five air force units, 10 air defense units, five technical service and support units, and one electronic warfare unit.
It is part of the integrated air defense network of the Commonwealth of Independent States, a loose alliance comprising nine post-Soviet nations.
British WWII Vet Gives His Arctic Convoy Medal to Russia
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – A British war veteran involved in shipping military supplies to the Soviet Union by sea during World War II on Friday presented his recently awarded medal for his role in the campaign to Russia.
James Pitts, 89, handed his Arctic Star to Moscow’s Museum of the Great Patriotic War, the museum said on its website.
Pitts was on two Arctic Convoys that shipped British and US supplies across the Norwegian Sea and the Arctic Ocean to the Soviets during World War II under the constant threat of attacks by Nazi Germany’s navy, the Kriegsmarine.
In 2012, the British government established a number of awards for World War II campaigns, including the Arctic Star for people who participated in campaigns above the Arctic Circle.
Many veterans have volunteered to hand over their Arctic Stars to Russia in a sign of recognition of the Soviet Union’s input in the war, the museum said.
The veterans drew lots to choose who would part with their medal, which was then taken to Russia by ship from London, retracing the Arctic Convoy’s route.
Pitts flew to Moscow with his fellow veterans for the handover ceremony and a tour of Moscow, the museum said.
Russia Ready to ‘Eradicate’ Double Standards at UN Rights Body
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – Moscow is determined to eradicate what it describes as “double standards” at the UN Human Rights Council, Russian diplomats said at a human rights meeting with the European Union on Friday.
The United Nations General Assembly elected Russia to the council earlier this month. The international body, responsible for promoting and defending human rights around the globe, comprises 47 states elected for a three-year term.
“The Russian side noted that the HRC is becoming increasingly politicized and, as its newly elected member, expressed its intention to make all possible efforts to overcome the state of confrontation [and] eradicate the ‘double standards’ policy,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
The ministry made its statement as Russia and the EU exchanged views on the human rights situation in their respective spaces at a meeting in Brussels.
The Russian delegation gave a clarification of the recently adopted law forbidding the promotion of homosexuality to minors, reiterating the official position that it is aimed at protecting children from harmful influences.
The law’s critics in Russia and abroad allege the move restricts freedom of speech and is part of a broader crackdown on Russia’s gay community.
Russia, meanwhile, expressed concern about the intensified violation of rights of national and language minorities in the EU, clampdowns on journalists and human rights activists and the growth of “ethnic discrimination, intolerance and xenophobia.”
Russia also drew attention to the problem of so-called “non-citizens” in Latvia and Estonia, mostly Russian speakers who immigrated into the republic during the Soviet era. They have no right to vote or to be elected.
The next round of EU-Russian human rights consultations will take place in Brussels next year.
Louis Vuitton Faces Sanctions Over Giant Trunk on Red Square
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – An administrative case has been launched over a giant Louis Vuitton suitcase-shaped pavilion recently installed in the middle of Moscow’s Red Square, Russian officials said Friday.
A spokeswoman for the Moscow government’s authority overseeing the use of state-owned non-residential real estate said the French fashion house faces “penal sanctions” for illegal use of land.
Measuring 30 meters (100 feet) long and nine meters (30 feet) high and adorned with the Louis Vuitton logo, the gargantuan trunk was due to house a "Soul of Travel" exhibition organized by the designer goods company from December 2 to January 19.
It was not immediately clear which department of the city government had given the company permission to erect the pavilion. Earlier, a Kremlin source told journalists that the presidential administration had not agreed to its construction.
The giant suitcase’s installation on Red Square, an iconic Moscow tourist attraction and a UNESCO World Heritage site, sparked a wave of public outrage and numerous demands for its removal.
The dismantling of the pavilion began Thursday and is expected to take about a week.
Mine Opponents Held for Alleged Bribery as Activists Cry Foul
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (Alexey Eremenko, RIA Novosti) – Police in Russia have detained two people formerly linked to an environmental protest movement for alleged extortion in a case activists say is a crude attempt to discredit their campaign.
Mikhail Bezmensky and Igor Zhitenyov stand accused of attempting to extort 15 million rubles ($450,000) from the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company, police said Friday.
Plans by UMMC to explore nickel and copper deposits by the Khoper River in the agricultural-intensive Voronezh Region in southern Russia has been greeted by vocal resistance from local residents and Cossack groups.
The standoff has been ongoing since mid-2012 and has resulted in violent clashes between protesters and company guards. UMMC estimates that 60 million rubles ($1.8 million) worth of equipment was destroyed in attack by project opponents.
The Interior Ministry said in a statement Bezmensky and Zhitenyov approached the company with a promise to end the protest movement in exchange for a cash payment.
In police footage of the arrests, the suspects are seen being asked to open the trunk of their cars to reveal bags containing cash and branded with the UMMC logo. Police say the money was the payment for ending the nickel mine dispute.
In the footage, neither man is shown commenting on whether they had approached UMMC.
UMMC could not be reached for comment Friday.
Tatyana Kargina, a spokeswoman for the Save Khoper movement, told RIA Novosti on Friday that Bezmensky and Zhitenyov had not been active in the anti-mining movement for some time.
Bezmensky was expelled from the movement in July, while Zhitenyov retired from active campaigning after being beaten up in May by private guards at the nickel exploration site, Kargina said.
“Activists on the ground have the feeling it could be a setup,” Kargina said.
Fellow Save Khoper activist Konstantin Rubakhin said that UMMC would in any case have no chance of using its considerable financial means to halt resistance to their project.
“Giving money to stop the protest is like paying to stop the winter,” Rubakhin told RIA Novosti.
Police say the two suspects have been arrested and taken to Moscow. If charged and convicted of extortion, they face up to 15 years in jail.
The Voronezh Region is part of an area historically occupied by the Cossacks, a conservative-minded socio-ethnic group undergoing a revival after decades of repression under the Soviet Union.
Opponents of the nickel exploration project say it poses a danger to the environment, including to the nearby Khoper Natural Reserve.
Eighty-nine percent of the local population oppose nickel exploration plans, according to a poll conducted last fall by the Sociology Institute at the Russian Academy of Sciences.
UMMC insists nickel mining poses no threat to the environment and would create thousands of jobs in the region.
The miner, controlled by Uzbek-born businessman Iskander Makhmudov, whose wealth was this year valued at $8.7 billion by Forbes, plans to begin producing nickel in the region by 2020.
Final Greenpeace Activist Released on Bail in Russia
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – An Australian activist with the Greenpeace group detained by Russian authorities during a protest in September became the final member Friday to be released on bail from pretrial detention.
Greenpeace said on its Twitter account that Colin Russell was greeted and hugged by fellow activists as he left the detention facility in St. Petersburg.
The environmental group announced a day earlier that it had posted the 2 million ruble ($60,000) bail required for his release.
Russell’s wife Christine said she was flying to Russia with her daughter to meet up with her husband, Greenpeace said in a statement Thursday.
“My daughter and I are one step closer to being in the arms of my darling Col. I am so relieved that my beautiful, peaceful man will soon be out of detention,” Christine Russell said.
A group of 28 activists and two journalists was arrested in September after some of them attempted to scale the Prirazlomnaya oil platform owned by an affiliate of state-owned energy giant Gazprom in protest at offshore drilling in the environmentally sensitive Arctic.
The Greenpeace group was initially accused of piracy, but that charge was later downgraded to hooliganism, which is punishable by a maximum sentence of seven years in jail.
‘Door Still Open’ for Ukraine – EU Leaders
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – European Union leaders said Friday that a deal to let Ukraine boost economic ties with Europe is still on offer after the former Soviet nation backed away from signing at a landmark summit.
“The door is still open, we are ready to sign,” European Council President Herman Van Rompuy told reporters at the end of the Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius.
Kiev’s surprise decision last week to halt preparations for association agreements with the EU caused dismay among European officials, and has sparked mass street demonstrations inside Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s position did not escape criticism from EU leaders at the summit.
Ukraine’s leadership “chose a way going nowhere,” said Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite, whose country currently holds the rotating European presidency, at a joint news conference with Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Barroso.
EU leaders stressed that they would not engage in horse-trading with Kiev, and that the conditions for the association agreements were not negotiable.
But the head of the European Parliament told reporters that the mandate of its monitoring mission to Ukraine, which has led negotiations on the agreements, will be extended. The mission is led by former Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski and former European Parliament President Pat Cox.
Russia has been repeatedly condemned by the EU for putting economic pressure on Ukraine to stop it moving toward Europe.
EU leaders rejected an offer Wednesday from Russian President Vladimir Putin for three-way negotiations over trade ties.
“We don’t need trilateral agreement for a bilateral deal,” said Barroso.
Yanukovych offered a glimmer of hope during the summit, when he told leaders that Ukraine was committed to European integration and intended to sign the agreements “in the near future.”
Unlike the European leaders, however, the Ukrainian president left Vilnius to return to Kiev without holding a press conference or talking to reporters.
Ukrainian officials say that serious economic damage has been inflicted on the country over the last year as trade turnover with Russia and other former Soviet states dropped 25 percent.
Russia says that it will introduce a harsh new customs regime with its smaller neighbor if the EU deal goes ahead.
Detained CEO Elected to Uralkali Board
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – The head of Russia’s largest potash producer Uralkali, who was charged last week with abuse of office, was elected to the board of directors on Friday, the company said.
Vladislav Baumgertner was detained in Minsk in August after Uralkali pulled out of a cartel agreement with Belarusian state-owned fertilizer giant Belaruskali, sparking steep falls in potash prices.
He was arrested in absentia by a Moscow court in October and extradited to Russia after spending several weeks under house arrest in Belarus.
Russian investigators formally charged him with abuse of office last Friday. He was placed in a pre-trial detention center in Moscow.
Uralkali has repeatedly denied any impropriety.
Putin Tours Sochi Opening Ceremony Venue
2013/11/29
SOCHI, November 29 (R-Sport) – Russian President Vladimir Putin toured the venue of the Sochi 2014 Olympic opening ceremony on Friday.
The visit to the 40,000-seater Fisht Olympic Stadium, which is nearing completion at the center of the coastal Olympic Park, comes some 70 days before the Games begin.
The facility, the only one yet to be completed, will serve as the venue for the lighting of the Olympic cauldron, kicking off the start on February 7 to a little more than two weeks of sporting competition.
Putin toured the stadium with the general director of state-run television network Channel One, Konstantin Ernst, who had significant role in designing the arena to accommodate broadcasting requirements.
"You were the architect to a large extent, because the stadium was done according to your scenario for the opening and closing ceremonies," Putin told Ernst.
The capacity for the arena will be increased by 5,000 after the Games, when it is to be used as a football stadium for the 2017 Confederations Cup and the 2018 World Cup.
The Fisht arena, which is specially designed to grant spectators views of the mountains to the north and the Black Sea to the south, is named after a nearby peak in the Caucasus range.
Russian, US Defense Officials to Meet to ‘Settle Differences’
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – Senior defense officials from Russia and the United States will meet next week in a bid to settle differences in military affairs, the Russian envoy to the meeting said on Friday.
Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov told journalists he will meet US Under Secretary of Defense for Policy James Miller in New York on December 6.
Antonov expressed hope the meeting will “produce positive results and we will be able to move forward and settle the differences that exist between our states.”
Christian Activists Sabotage Theater Production in Moscow
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – Ultraconservative Christians who have previously targeted erotica exhibits, Pastafarians and supporters of feminist punk group Pussy Riot have attacked a theater performance in Moscow.
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Christian Activists Sabotage Theater Production in Moscow
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Christian Activists Sabotage Theater Production in Moscow
Dmitry Enteo and a female accomplice hijacked the stage during a performance of Konstantin Bogomolov’s “An Ideal Husband” at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater late Thursday.
The duo spent about two minutes loudly extolling the public to fear God, before being dragged away kicking and screaming by guards, according to a video of the incident posted on YouTube.
The pair interrupted a scene in which a gay priest prays to a naked woman who is pretending to be crucified, Enteo told RIA Novosti.
A member of the audience said that some people in the audience mistook the crusaders’ intervention for the play’s scripted finale and left after they were taken away.
City police reported detaining two people on hooliganism charges, but did not elaborate.
Enteo, 24, told RIA Novosti the play violated a recent law that introduces jail terms of up to three years for offending the feelings of religious people.
Enteo and his radical Orthodox Christian supporters have a track record of flashy media stunts, including storming the G-Spot erotica museum in Moscow to “preach” to staff, assaulting in the streets people wearing T-shirts depicting Pussy Riot members as the Virgin Mary, and hijacking a rally by the ironic religion of Pastafarianism to pelt participants with macaroni.
The attacks are not endorsed by the Russian Orthodox Church, whose clergy have previously criticized them.
Bogomolov, 38, is one of the most popular and controversial theater directors in Russia. His staging of “An Ideal Husband,” based on Oscar Wilde’s works and on stage since February, is billed as a social satire.
(The article was amended to correct the play's name.)
Russian Former Defense Minister to Face Criminal Charges
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – Russia’s Investigative Committee will press criminal charges against former Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov within days, a committee spokesman said in an interview published Friday.
Serdyukov is suspected of negligence, punishable with up to three months in detention, investigators said Thursday.
He will face formal negligence charges by the end of next week, Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told Lifenews.ru online tabloid.
The charges may be reclassified by then, Markin also said, but did not elaborate. Serdyukov has already been questioned more than once as a witness in investigations into corruption in the Defense Ministry.
He is accused of causing 56 million rubles ($1.7 million) worth of damage to the state by using conscript soldiers to build infrastructure for a private holiday resort.
The former minister, who now heads a state-owned engineering enterprise, declined to comment Thursday.
Serdyukov is the first minister in the 13 years of President Vladimir Putin’s rule to face a criminal case.
Serdyukov’s fall from grace began last November, when he was sacked from the job that he had held since 2007.
Several of his subordinates came under investigation on corruption charges involving the sale of ministry real estate, with total damage put by the Investigative Committee earlier this year at 4 billion rubles ($120 million).
Serdyukov, a former furniture retailer and tax official, was tasked with reforming Russia’s armed services and defense industry, a sector plagued by corruption and poor management.
But his reforms met a backlash from both the uniformed establishment and military industry and some elements of the program are being rolled back by his successor Sergei Shoigu.
Georgia, Moldova Ink EU Agreements as Ukraine Backs Off
2013/11/29
VILNIUS, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – Georgia and Moldova signed association agreements with the European Union at a summit Friday as another ex-Soviet country, Ukraine, confirmed it would not go ahead with a similar deal.
The preliminary agreements with Georgia and Moldova, which are set to be ratified next year, put the two countries on a path to stronger economic ties with Europe amid a wider EU push to integrate Eastern European and Southern Caucasus nations formerly ruled from Moscow.
The Eastern Partnership summit began Thursday in the small Baltic state of Lithuania despite Ukraine’s surprise announcement last week that it would not sign the long-planned association agreements.
Residual hopes that Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych would change his mind appeared to have been dashed Thursday evening after leaders met behind closed doors.
"It's over," Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski told the Associated Press news agency Friday, when asked about the negotiations over Ukraine’s signing.
“Ukraine Foreign Minister [Leonid] Kozhara in our discussions confirms that Ukraine has succumbed to severe Russian economic pressure,” Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt tweeted.
EU officials have accused the Kremlin of threatening its smaller neighbor with punitive economic sanctions if it signed the agreements in Lithuania. Russian President Vladimir Putin has denied the charge.
Georgia, Moldova Ink EU Agreements as Ukraine Backs Off
2013/11/29
VILNIUS, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – Georgia and Moldova signed association agreements with the European Union at a summit Friday as another ex-Soviet country, Ukraine, confirmed it would not go ahead with a similar deal.
The preliminary agreements with Georgia and Moldova, which are set to be ratified next year, put the two countries on a path to stronger economic ties with Europe amid a wider EU push to integrate Eastern European and Southern Caucasus nations formerly ruled from Moscow.
The Eastern Partnership summit began Thursday in the small Baltic state of Lithuania despite Ukraine’s surprise announcement last week that it would not sign the long-planned association agreements.
Residual hopes that Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych would change his mind appeared to have been dashed Thursday evening after leaders met behind closed doors.
"It's over," Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski told the Associated Press news agency Friday, when asked about the negotiations over Ukraine’s signing.
“Ukraine Foreign Minister [Leonid] Kozhara in our discussions confirms that Ukraine has succumbed to severe Russian economic pressure,” Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt tweeted.
EU officials have accused the Kremlin of threatening its smaller neighbor with punitive economic sanctions if it signed the agreements in Lithuania. Russian President Vladimir Putin has denied the charge.
Russian Helicopter Attacked in Afghanistan – Embassy
2013/11/29
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – A helicopter that was attacked in eastern Afghanistan apparently belonged to a Russian company, Russian diplomats said Friday.
Unidentified men fired at the helicopter in the province of Gardez on Thursday.
No injuries were reported, and damage from the attack was limited to a single bullet hole in the aircraft’s side, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Kabul said.
Russian governmental agencies have no helicopters in Afghanistan, but the aircraft could have been contracted by the International Security Assistance Force, the NATO-led mission there, the spokesman said.
The helicopter was owned by Skol Airlines, based in the city of Surgut in western Siberia, the spokesman said.
The company had not commented on the incident as of Friday morning.
The Russian embassy was trying to establish whether any Russians or nationals of other former Soviet countries were on board the helicopter, the embassy said.
Russian Bank Debt to Reach 10 Trillion Rubles in 2013
2013/11/28
MOSCOW, November 29 (RIA Novosti) – The total amount of money Russians owe to banks will rise to 10 trillion rubles ($300 billion) by the end of this year, a Russian newspaper reported Friday citing the central bank.
A boom in consumer lending in Russia this year has sparked concern that the market may be overheating, with officials warning of possible financial volatility if the trend is not checked.
Almost half of the 10 trillion rubles owed to banks is unsecured consumer borrowing, the head of the financial regulator’s bank regulation department Vasily Pozdyshev told Vedomosti business daily.
The amount of retail credit in Russia has increased 24.3 percent this year, according to the newspaper.
Despite Russia’s slowing economy, the central bank is currently seeking to reduce more risky borrowing practices, including a move to cap loans issued at a high rate of interest.
“Consumer lending may become not so much an engine of growth as a threat to financial stability,” the Bank of Russia chairwoman Elvira Nabiullina told Russian lawmakers last week, according to a transcript on the regulator’s website.
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