Russia and the European Union have reached an agreement on long-term visas, for up to five years, a Foreign Ministry official said on Wednesday. “In addition to a visa-free regime with the EU, we are also negotiating visa facilitation,” said Vladimir Voronkov, director of the ministry’s European Cooperation Department. The EU currently issues short-term visas [...]
Archives: 01 June 2011
June 1, 2011
June 1, 2011
Visa-free travel between Russia and the EU
Russia and the European Union have reached an agreement on long-term visas, for up to five years, a Foreign Ministry official said on Wednesday.
June 1, 2011
Foreign carmakers to invest over $5 bln in Russia
The Russian government has signed four car assembly agreements with a total investment of over $5 billion, including $1.1 billion which Fiat plans to invest in the expansion of a local automobile factory and the creation of a factory to produce engines, an Economic Development Ministry official said on Wednesday. “Four additional agreements on the [...]
June 1, 2011
Watching the stars
Using the Hubble Space Telescope, University of Michigan research fellow Alyson Ford and astronomy professor Joel Bregman proved that old elliptical galaxies, which were considered “dead,” are still making new stars. The scientists saw individual young stars and star clusters in four galaxies that are about 40 million light-years away. One light-year is about 5.9 [...]
June 1, 2011
Sharapova advances to French Open semifinals
Russian tennis star Maria Sharapova ensured on Wednesday her return to the French Open semis for the first time in three years by defeating Germany’s Andrea Petkovic 6-0, 6-3. It took an hour an a half for seventh-seeded Sharapova, who has significantly improved her game on clay courts, to stride past 15th-seeded Petkovic. The Russian [...]
June 1, 2011
PR based bubble economy may lead Georgia to collapse
In an interview with RIA Novosti’s Samir Shakhbaz, Felix Stanevsky, head of the Caucasus department of the Institute of CIS countries, claims that Georgia will inevitably face major upheavals sooner or later due to its dramatic internal situation. Georgia is living on borrowed money and its economy with exaggerated achievements is built on PR, he [...]
June 1, 2011
Russian spy Chapman to head business newspaper
Anna Chapman, detained for espionage and deported from the United States last year, was appointed editor-in-chief of Venture Business News newspaper. “I’ve become the chief editor. It’s a small newspaper,” Chapman told RIA Novosti. She admitted to have no plans yet on her future job at the newspaper. In a statement published on the newspaper’s [...]
June 1, 2011
Moscow’s naked truth and some soft porn
It’s officially summer as of June 1 and the Muscovites are celebrating it with enthusiasm, peeling off their clothes and walking practically naked down the streets. It’s 30 degrees Celsius (almost 90F) in the capital. Summer attire in Moscow is at the almost illegal point and on the edge of people being arrested for indecent [...]
June 1, 2011
Moscow financial center contingent on improved investment climate
The Russian government must take bolder steps towards fighting corruption and improving Russia’s image abroad if it wants to achieve its goal of establishing Moscow as an international financial center, analysts said on Wednesday. The long-term goal to establish Moscow as an international financial center is one of the centerpieces of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s [...]
June 1, 2011
Blatter reelected FIFA president for fourth term
Swiss Sepp Blatter has been reelected president of the international football’s ruling body, FIFA, for a fourth term. The vote took place in Zurich during FIFA’s 61st congress and had only one candidate after Blatter’s only rival Mohamed Bin Hammam from Qatar pulled out his candidacy in late May. Blatter, 75, was supported by 186 [...]
June 1, 2011
Russian Rock Critic Targeted In Slander Suits
MOSCOW — Artemy Troitsky has made a career out of criticizing musicians. So slamming a prominent rock star probably didn’t seem like such a bad idea. But when Troitsky called Vadim Samoylov, the black-clad, mop-haired former front man of the disbanded gothic rock band “Agata Kristi,” a “trained poodle” for Deputy Kremlin Chief of Staff [...]
June 1, 2011
The Return Of The (Housebroken) Oligarchs
The Power Vertical Mikhail Prokhorov Apparently Mikhail Prokhorov isn’t wasting any time revamping Right Cause. The billionaire oligarch — the president of the Onexim Group and owner of the New Jersey Nets — says he wants to rebrand the pro-Kremlin center-right party, change its name, and bring in fresh faces. “Vedomosti” reported on Monday that [...]
June 1, 2011
Explosions At Russian Military Base Finally Cease
URMAN, Russia — Explosions caused by a fire at a military ammunition depot in the Russian republic of Bashkortostan nearly a week ago have finally ceased, RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir and Russian services report. The fire and explosions started at a military base northeast of the republic’s capital, Ufa, on May 26. Some of those who had [...]
June 1, 2011
RIA Novosti marks 70th anniversary
RIA Novosti at June 2 will hold a live broadcast of its unique seminar with Ralph Simon, a longtime leader in the mobile entertainment industry, and Kei Shimada, CEO of Japanese company Infinita, which develops mobile and cross-platform websites and adapts global know-how in the mobile industry to the Japanese market.