Russia does not believe in the American economy. Over the past year, Russian investment in US Treasuries has halved. Other investors are also reducing their exposure to US debt. Find out more from Kommersant FM columnist Andrei Zagorsky. It would seem that the beginning of this year provides grounds for optimistic assessment of the prospects for the American economy. Thus, in the first days of January, the S&P 500 broad market index grew by 4%, which is the best performance in the last 25 years.

Restaurant news with Anna Karmanova In the first news release of this year, we will talk about the dishes that Moscow restaurants are going to feed us throughout the second half of winter. The T-Bon restaurants have a winter offer from brand chef Vyacheslav Kolotushkin. Among the appetizers there was a traditional Russian jellied meat (prepared without gelatin, 220 rubles) and boiled beef tongue with Provencal sauce (420 rubles).

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin meets with former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. The parties exchanged assurances of improving relations between the countries. “You and I have long-standing, very good relations, I believe that you are one of the most subtle experts, including in Russian-American relations,” Mr. Putin told his interlocutor. In turn, the former US Secretary of State confirmed that relations are really good.

The founder of Eldorado is creating a chain of shoe stores The founder of one of Russia's largest household appliance chains, Eldorado, Igor Yakovlev has taken up a new business: as Kommersant found out, he is investing about $150 million in creating a chain of inexpensive Kari shoe stores in Russia, Poland, Kazakhstan and Ukraine. By the end of 2012 alone, 150 retail outlets should be opened. A top manager of a Moscow shoe chain spoke about the new project.

Introduced the Chairman of the Twelfth Arbitration Court of Appeal Yesterday, the Twelfth Arbitration Court of Appeal introduced the new chairman of the department, Sergei Sharaev, who previously headed the arbitration of the Kaluga region. In the Saratov region, he replaced Alexander Grebennikov, whose term of office had expired, in his new post. Kaluga lawyers evaluate Mr. Sharaev as a high-class professional, and Saratov officials and lawyers hope that he will honestly fulfill his duties.

Russian biathlete Evgeny Garanichev won a silver medal in the sprint at the sixth stage of the World Cup, which takes place in Anterselva, Italy. The race was won by Swede Fredrik Lindström. The Russian showed clean shooting and covered the 10 km distance in 24 minutes 56.1 seconds, 18.2 seconds behind 22-year-old Swede Fredrik Lindström (0 misses). Frenchman Martin Fourcade finished with the third result (+19.1 seconds), who also made no mistakes on the shooting range.

Tatarstan will experience electoral innovations In Tatarstan, almost all 3 thousand polling stations will be equipped with web cameras that will broadcast the voting process in the presidential elections. Party members have ambivalent assessments of the election commission's innovations. Unlike United Russia, the opposition is confident that cameras will not be able to “exclude” violations. Experts agree with this: “people should make honest elections.” Yesterday a Moscow-Kazan-St.

The Chechen woman sentenced at the end of last year served her sentence As Kommersant learned, late on Wednesday evening, a resident of Chechnya, Aishat Magmadova, was released from the Lefortovo pre-trial detention center, who on December 26, 2011 was sentenced by the Moscow Regional Court to two years in prison for attempting to recruit Lithuanian citizen Egle Kusaite as a suicide bomber. The Chechen woman served her sentence while under arrest and trial for two years.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court of Chuvashia upheld the verdict of the Moskovsky District Court of Cheboksary against the general director of Volzhskaya Mortgage Corporation LLC (VIC), Berik Nurpeisov, who was found guilty of fraud on an especially large scale, the press service of the Chuvashia Prosecutor's Office told Kommersant. Let us remind you that Mr. Nurpeisov was sentenced to eight years in a general regime penal colony. In addition, he must pay a fine of 500 thousand rubles.

How did he merge with free football radicals? Yesterday, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg, together with FIFA President Joseph Blatter and UEFA President Michel Platini, met with the heads of several fan clubs in the country. Fans lobbied for the lifting of the beer ban in stadiums—and they did. Kommersant special correspondent ANDREY KOLESNIKOV notes that Mr. Blatter unexpectedly turned out to be the main and decisive fan of beer.

The republic received funds from the federal budget to provide disabled people with technical means of rehabilitation in the amount of 138.1 million rubles, assistance in providing medicines, medical products, as well as specialized medical nutrition products for disabled children - in the amount of 129.8 million rub., provision of medicines to certain categories of citizens - in the amount of 77.3 million rubles. Alexey Prokhorov

The Ministry of Finance summed up the results of the budget year The Ministry of Finance summed up the execution of the federal budget in 2011. Instead of the deficit planned at the beginning of the year, a surplus of 0.8% of GDP was obtained.

The head of the Kyiv City State Administration (KCSA), Alexander Popov, at an emergency meeting, instructed all municipal services of the capital to bring all snow removal equipment to the city streets. “Winter decided to repay our debts. However, the city has enough snow removal equipment to quickly cope with bad weather. We must make every effort, because now the situation on the roads is extremely difficult. I will personally monitor the work of all services,” said Alexander Popov on meeting.

The editor-in-chief of Vechernyaya Tyumen has been charged with extremism Tyumen investigators brought charges under extremist Article 282 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation against the editor-in-chief of the newspaper “Evening Tyumen” Vladimir Efimov.

Amy Kanaan Mann's thriller "Fields" was released in Ukraine Premiere/cinema In the boring serial killing movie Texas Killing Fields, director Amy Kanaan Mann plays the good daughter of her father, Michael Mann, who produced the film. The main director's discovery in the film is, perhaps, the appearance of the ghost of Laura Palmer, who, however, was liked dead by LYDIA MASLOVA more.