The US Senate has approved Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education. The casting vote was cast by Vice President Mike Pence, as the votes of the senators were equally divided, 50 to 50. 46 Democratic senators, two Republicans and two independent senators voted against the appointment of DeVos. As noted by The Hill, this is the first time in the history of the United States when the vice president had to cast a casting vote in order to approve the candidacy of a minister.

Andrei Zhdanov, a participant in the program “Own Game”, was found dead on February 7 in his apartment in Tolyatti. This was reported by Interfax with reference to a source in law enforcement agencies. “Andrei was found dead by his relatives this morning. No signs of violent death were found on the body,” the source said. Several regional publications, including TLTgorod and City Day , citing sources, write about the presence of injuries on the man's body.

Blogger Alexander Lapshin, who was arrested in Belarus at the request of Azerbaijan, was taken to Baku on a flight from Minsk. This was reported in the press service of the Prosecutor General's Office of Azerbaijan. Earlier, on February 7, the Supreme Court of Belarus rejected Lapshin's complaint against the decision to extradite him. After that, it took effect. Alexander Lapshin is a blogger and traveler, a citizen of the Russian Federation, Ukraine and Israel.

Apple is preparing to introduce a new port for connecting devices - Ultra Accessory Connector. It is needed to solve the problem of incompatibility of headphones with different connectors: for example, now Lightning headphones from an iPhone cannot be connected to the USB-C port of a computer. At the same time, the company also does not plan to abandon Lightning and USB-C. Meduza tells what is the point of all this.

Photo: Ramil Sitdikov / Sputnik / Scanpix / Leta The Dissertation Council of Moscow State University refused to consider the doctoral dissertation of the Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky. Council members explain this decision differently. The dean of the Faculty of History of Moscow State University Ivan Tuchkov said that it was accepted due to the lack of accusations of plagiarism.

The heads of a number of higher educational institutions of St. Petersburg signed an appeal to the Governor Georgy Poltavchenko with a request to expedite the transfer of St. Isaac's Cathedral to the use of the Russian Orthodox Church. It is reported by "Fontanka". “We believe that the transfer process should be completed in the near future in order to prevent the so-called oppositionists and politicians, and in fact, provocateurs who use the issue of St.

The Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation sent to the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City Court a case against the former governor of Sakhalin Alexander Khoroshavin and three other local officials who are suspected of taking bribes and money laundering. According to investigators, in 2009 Khoroshavin created a criminal group, which included his deputy Sergei Karepkin, adviser Andrey Ikramov and Minister of Agriculture and Trade Nikolai Borisov.

A passenger flying out of Lukou International Airport in Nanjing in eastern China took almost 15 kilograms of pancakes in his hand luggage. Published by People's Daily, China February 3, 2017 At first, the pancakes were in the man’s luggage, but his suitcase exceeded the permitted limit, and airport staff allowed him to carry the pancakes in his hand luggage.

On January 23, the Basmanny Court of Moscow placed human rights activist and journalist Aigul Makhmutova under house arrest in the apartment of the head of the Moscow Helsinki Group, Lyudmila Alekseeva. This is reported by Novaya Gazeta. The decision was due to the fact that Makhmutova was registered in Alekseeva's apartment. Lyudmila Alekseeva filed a complaint with the court, on February 8 it will be considered, TASS reports .

Doctors and employees of charitable foundations - about treatment abroad Photo: Valery Sharifulin / TASS / Scanpix / Leta There is a common misconception that being treated abroad is always better than in Russia. In fact, this is a difficult question: in some cases, they really will not help anywhere like abroad, and sometimes the best treatment can only be obtained in Russia. It is impossible to make a complete list of diagnoses that you definitely need or do not go abroad.

Roskomnadzor reported that the porn site YouPorn was excluded from the register of banned sites in connection with the cancellation of the court decision to block it. According to the registry on the Roskomnadzor website , providers continue to restrict access to the YouPorn website page, which was banned in August 2016 by the Petrogradsky District Court of St. Petersburg. The registry still has separate pages from the YouPorn site. Update.

On the morning of February 7, FSB officers broke down the door and detained civil activist Mark Galperin, one of the first Russian citizens charged with multiple violations of the rules for holding street protests. This time he became a defendant in a new criminal case - about calls for violating the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation (in connection with the publication of videos of Galperin’s speeches on Red Square). Meduza tells what is known about this case.

Photo: Jack Brockway / Virgin / Reutras / Scanpix / Leta Barack Obama almost immediately after his second presidential term has ended, he went to the British Virgin Islands to engage in caitesurfing. He is resting in the company of British billionaire Richard Branson.

Photo: Valery Levitin / Kommersant / Tvindie Film Production Boris Nemtsov with her daughter Dina and son Anton, July 2011 On February 23, the documentary “too free person” of Vera Krichevskaya and Mikhail Fishman will be released in Russia. This is a picture of Boris Nemtsov: his friends and associates from the 1990s tell about his life in the frame, as well as those who have been near him in recent years.

2010. Anatoly Serdyukov is the Russian Minister of Defense. His son-in-law's business partner buys a plot of land in the Leningrad Region for 150 million rubles , on which Alexander Yukhnevich's dacha is located. 2014. The plot and buildings become the property of Anatoly Serdyukov's son. 2016. The dacha is listed on Avito for 350 million . Photo in the announcement: Petr Ivanov / Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain