NATO has announced a review of relations with Russia in connection with the situation in Ukraine, Reuters reports citing NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Rasmussen clarified that NATO decided not to hold any meetings with the Russian side at the civilian and military level. To preserve the dialogue, it was decided to keep meetings only at the ambassadorial level.

Former Italian Prime Minister and billionaire Silvio Berlusconi has decided to sell the Milan football club, whose value Forbes estimates at $945 million, Bloomberg reported on Thursday, citing sources. According to Bloomberg's interlocutors, Lazard Ltd has already sent out marketing documents to potential buyers. The sources did not specify who exactly was on the list of possible Milan buyers. The agency was unable to contact Lazard spokeswoman Judy McKay.

At the referendum on the status of the autonomous republic of Crimea, two questions will be raised: whether the autonomy will remain part of Ukraine or become part of Russia, RIA Novosti reported on Thursday, March 6, citing the first deputy prime minister of the autonomy, Rustam Temirgaliev. He said that the referendum was postponed from March 30 to March 16, 2014. This information was confirmed on Twitter by the Prime Minister of Crimea Sergei Aksenov.

The European Union published a list of 18 former Ukrainian officials, their relatives and businessmen whose accounts in European banks were decided to be frozen on Wednesday. The list is published in the official publication of the EU. The highest-ranking person on the list is the ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.

Forbes photojournalist Max Novikov's report from Crimea - portraits of Ukrainian military and unmarked fighters, who are called "Crimean self-defense forces" On the Crimean peninsula you can now count representatives of three armies: these are the regular troops of Ukraine, units of the Russian Black Sea Fleet and military without identification marks, which are called the “self-defense forces of Crimea.” The latter now control or block most key military installations in Crimea.

An explosion occurred in a column for processing petroleum products at the OJSC Omsk Rubber plant in Omsk on Thursday, there were casualties, the main department of the Ministry of Emergency Situations for the Omsk region reported . According to the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, at 10:30 Moscow time a message was received at number “01” about a fire at a rubber plant. At 10:35 there was an explosion at the enterprise.

VTB refused to accept early the debt from Sheremetyevo on a loan taken out in 2006 for the construction of terminal D at the airport, the Vedomosti newspaper writes on Thursday, March 6, citing a source close to one of the parties. According to the newspaper, on February 28, Sheremetyevo transferred the bank $180.1 million in principal and just under $3.3 million in interest. As the source clarified, on March 4, the bank returned the principal amount to the airport, retaining the interest.

As early as next week, the State Duma may adopt a bill to simplify the procedure for accepting part of a foreign state into Russia as a new entity, said on Thursday the leader of A Just Russia, Sergei Mironov, who was one of the authors of the bill. “To put it bluntly, this bill was introduced by me for the sake of Crimea,” ITAR-TASS quotes Mironov as saying . Next week, the State Duma is scheduled to hold three plenary sessions on March 11, 12 and 14.

In Ukraine, criminal proceedings have been opened regarding the fact that Sergei Kurchenko’s VETEK group of companies caused losses to the Ukrainian Naftogaz in the amount of 1.6 billion hryvnia ($175.8 million), Rada deputy Arsen Avakov, who headed after the overthrow of Victor, reported on Thursday on his Facebook page Yanukovych Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs. “I report to the Ukrainian people, Kurchenko,” Avakov wrote.

The largest Russian social network VKontakte on Thursday announced an update to its notification system for unread messages. “In a nutshell, it’s like this: individual unread messages no longer exist - instead there are now unread dialogues,” the team explained on the social network’s wall. Now notifications in the left menu do not mean the number of unread messages, but the number of dialogs in which the user has not read messages.

Mark Zuckerberg's social network has become a springboard for a whole cohort of young businessmen who broke into the global Forbes ranking The success of the world's largest social network, Facebook, has become a springboard for a whole cohort of young Internet companies that make industry giants like Google and Yahoo look ancient. Young, hungry entrepreneurs are riding a new wave - the boom in mobile devices and people's desire to communicate online.

photo by Artem Holoshchapov for Forbes Financier Elena Levina changed many jobs before she discovered that the idea for her business was always nearby. How did she create a successful pipe and heating cleaning company? A spectacular blonde deftly removes a piece of cast iron pipe from her purse: on one side you can see a centimeter layer of scale inside, on the other - an absolutely clean surface. This is how Elena Levina, General Director of Nanoserv LLC, demonstrates the work of the company.

The State Duma will consider the issue of simplifying the procedure for accepting new territories into Russia after a referendum on the status of autonomy is held in Crimea and after the Russian leadership decides on this issue, said the head of the Duma Committee on CIS Affairs Leonid Slutsky on Thursday.

US President Barack Obama signed an order introducing visa sanctions against Russian citizens and Crimeans who “threaten the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” the Associated Press reported on Thursday. The agency does not specify who exactly was sanctioned.

photo Kommersant Why Ukrainian reformers should not fight at all costs to restore “justice” An empty treasury, a falling hryvnia, a recession in the economy, and an off-scale level of corruption - this is not a complete list of the achievements of the collapsed regime of Viktor Yanukovych.