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/ 15 November 2006
United States President George Bush and Russia’s Vladimir Putin confirmed at an airport meeting on Wednesday they plan to sign a bilateral deal next week for Russia’s accession to the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the presidents confirmed that they would sign a protocol paving the way for Russia to join the WTO. Bush and Putin also discussed Iran and its nuclear programme.
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/ 26 October 2006
Nato Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer urged the Russian Federation on Thursday to lift punitive sanctions against its southern neighbour Georgia during a visit that was intended to ease tensions between the Western military alliance and Moscow. At a Kremlin meeting, the Nato chief and President Vladimir Putin accentuated the positive in what has long been a rocky relationship.
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/ 25 October 2006
The Russian Federation is worried Georgia may try to resolve its problems with two separatist regions by resorting to force and is determined to prevent it doing so, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday. The Kremlin leader, answering viewers’ questions on live television, said Moscow had no intention of taking in Georgia’s breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
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/ 20 October 2006
On Thursday scores of foreign humanitarian aid groups and charities that failed to meet a deadline for registration under a controversial new law had to suspend their work in Russia. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Danish Refugee Council are among those obliged to cease their activities.
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/ 17 October 2006
Russia’s Vladimir Kramnik beat Bulgarian Veselin Topalov in a tie-break game on Friday to become the first world chess champion recognised by rival chess bodies for more than a decade, RIA news agency reported. Kramnik won the final tie-break game out of four to win the championship, being held in Russia in Elista, the capital of Kalmykia.
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/ 16 October 2006
Georgia’s ambassador to Moscow this week struck out at the Kremlin, saying Georgians living in Russia were ”hiding at home in fear” after a Kremlin-backed campaign of intimidation. Tbilisi has accused Russia of ”ethnic cleansing” after it deported 400 Georgians from its territory following the spy scandal that saw four alleged Russian military intelligence officers detained and then ejected from Georgia earlier this month.
President Vladimir Putin warned Georgia on Wednesday not to provoke or blackmail Russia as Moscow tightened the screw on its southern neighbour. Discussing a dispute with Georgia over the arrests of four Russian officers, who were later released, Putin told lawmakers: ”I would not allow anyone to talk to Russia in the language of provocation and blackmail.”
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/ 20 September 2006
Russia stepped up the pressure on Royal Dutch Shell and its Japanese partners on Tuesday over a -billion oil and gas development in the Far East, sparking protests from Tokyo, Brussels and London. In the latest blow to Sakhalin-2, Russian gas monopoly Gazprom revealed that asset swap talks with operator Shell had stalled for months due to Shell’s cost overrun.
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/ 3 September 2006
Russian President Vladimir Putin, a vocal advocate of a ”multipolar” world, will expand his diplomatic horizons this week with his first visits to South Africa and Morocco, looking to expand economic ties with the two African countries. Putin will be in South Africa on Tuesday and Wednesday, followed by Morocco on Wednesday and Thursday.
In a youth-crazed country that cranks out new musical stars in an endless series of televised competitions, it was only a matter of time before Russia’s political world caught up. The Kremlin and United Russia, the country’s party of power, have poured millions of dollars into political youth movements over the past few years, organising lavish summer camps and massive rallies.
Russia’s natural-resources ministry said on Monday that a oil pipeline leak threatened environmental damage, but the pipeline’s operator and emergency officials said the spill was far smaller than the ministry claimed and had already been cleaned up.
The president of Russian oil company Yukos, Steven Theede, announced his resignation on Thursday, saying that a court-appointed bankruptcy observer had recommended liquidation of the business. ”I am notifying you of my resignation as president. There is now nothing more to be accomplished by me that could benefit the company in a material way,” Theede said.
A Kremlin public-relations blitz ahead of the Group of Eight (G8) summit and an apparent softening of Washington’s stance have failed to disguise an ill-tempered debate gnawing at the heart of East-West relations: is Russia democratic? By some counts, cooperation between Russia and its G8 partners is in rude health ahead of the summit.
A plane carrying the chief of staff of the Russian navy and other officers caught fire after crash-landing at Simferopol airfield in Crimea, Ukraine, Interfax news agency said on Monday. It was the fourth serious aviation incident involving Russian passenger planes in 36 hours, one of which killed more than 130 people.
A Russian passenger plane burst into flames after it crashed on landing in the Siberian city of Irkutsk early on Sunday, killing at least 102 people. Russian news agencies said the death toll could be as high as 150. Transport Minister Igor Levitin blamed the crash on wet runway conditions after rain, Russian news agencies reported.
More than 150 people died, including all the crew, when a Russian Airbus A-310 with 200 people on board crashed early on Sunday while landing at Irkutsk airport in Siberia. The Airbus went off the runway while landing and hit a concrete wall before catching fire. The plane’s cabin was wrecked and the passengers had to be evacuated from the rear of the craft, rescuers said.
Nestled in a cradle at Moscow’s Hospital Number Two, the three-week-old baby girl has no name — or much of a future. Born to an HIV-positive mother, she was abandoned at birth and is now destined to grow up in an orphanage. In fact, the infant has a fair chance of perfect health, since two-thirds of children born of HIV-positive mothers are not themselves infected.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered Russia’s secret services to locate and kill the murderers of four Russian embassy staff who were kidnapped in Iraq, the Kremlin said on Wednesday. ”The president gave the instruction to the Russian secret services to take all necessary steps … ,” a Kremlin official said, reading from a prepared statement.
Global media chiefs launched a scathing attack on Monday on Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying the Kremlin’s tight grip on media flew in the face of Russia’s professed attachment to democracy and voicing deep scepticism of any ”real willingness” to allow a free press.
The bodies of seven Russian and Ukrainian climbers have been found on Mount Elbrus, Europe’s highest peak, and a search continues for four other missing alpinists, officials said on Thursday. ”We have found the bodies of seven climbers,” said a Russian Emergency Situations Ministry spokesperson. ”The search is continuing to find the other four.”
The United States is a ”fortress” because of its high defence spending and Russia should follow suit in order to ensure a solid defence of its own, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday. The US defence budget, in absolute terms, ”is almost 25 times that of Russia’s. Their home is their castle — and well done, well done,” Putin said. ”It means we should build our own house strongly and reliably.”
It can be a delicacy or status symbol, a cure-all or even an aphrodisiac, but ecologists are warning that Russian caviar could disappear altogether as the Caspian Sea’s sturgeon population reaches dangerously low levels. The WWF conservation group has for the past few months waged a campaign to persuade Russians to give up their caviar habit for six years.
Russia hit back on Monday at United States and European Union criticism, most recently voiced by US Vice-President Dick Cheney, that it was using energy as a political weapon, and said it was time the West came to terms with Russia’s progress as a market economy.
Russian media described United States Vice-President Dick Cheney’s harsh criticism of the Kremlin as the start of a new Cold War and a reprise of Winston Churchill’s famous ”Iron Curtain” speech, reflecting deepening distrust between Washington and Moscow.
As a black man in Russia, life for Gabriel Anicet Kochotfa means always being home by 9pm, never using public transit and hearing abusive remarks when he goes out in public with his white wife. ”Sometimes I even go to the shop with my wife and we go separately, so nobody knows that we are together,” the native of Benin says.
The crash of an Airbus A320 carrying 113 people off Russia’s Black Sea coast on Wednesday was mostly likely a result of poor weather conditions, Russian and Armenian officials said. The crash occurred as the aircraft made a second landing attempt at Sochi’s Adler airport after rain had severely reduced visibility.
One of three earthquakes that hit Russia’s remote north-eastern Kamchatka peninsula almost completely destroyed three small villages, local authorities were quoted as saying early on Saturday by Interfax news agency. Up to 180 people were evacuated on Saturday from the villages of Korf and Tilichiki.
A major earthquake hit a distant, sparsely populated region of Russia’s far east early on Friday, causing unknown damage and possible injuries, emergency officials said. The United States Geological Survey and Japan’s Meteorological Agency estimated the temblor to be about 7,7-magnitude.
World powers struggled on Wednesday to show a united front over Iran’s nuclear drive, fearing Tehran will exploit any split to forge ahead with uranium enrichment. ”I would have thought that this is the time for the world to send a clear and united message to the Iranian regime,” British Prime Minister Tony Blair said in London as diplomats gathered in Moscow.
The attendance of G8 leaders at a July summit in Russia will prop up a government that has abandoned democratic principles and thus spell the G8’s death as a credible organisation, a former advisor to President Vladimir Putin said in an article published on Tuesday.
Russian Football Union (RFU) boss Vitaly Mutko officially confirmed on Wednesday that Dutch manager Guus Hiddink will take over Russia’s national squad after the end of the World Cup in Germany. Mutko added that the RFU and the 59-year-old Dutch guru would sign a two-year contract on Friday, which later may be prolonged for another two-year term.
Russia on Wednesday attacked Iran’s claim to have enriched uranium on its own, calling the announcement ”a step in the wrong direction” and demanding that the Islamic republic immediately suspend all uranium enrichment work, news agencies reported. ”We believe this is a step in the wrong direction,” foreign ministry spokesperson Mikhail Kamynin said.