Andrei Kolesnikov in Gazeta.Ru on April 26, 2005 analyzes the President’s message to the Federal Assembly of April 25, 2005. The liberal idea, the author writes, has been taken into ideological service by the Kremlin - and thereby partially rehabilitated. Russia has actually been declared the historical birthplace of liberalism, which completely debunks the previously formulated thesis about the inorganic nature of liberal values.

In the article "Zakhozhane" published in the "Political Journal" , the director of the Institute for the Study of Religion in the CIS and Baltic States, Ph.D. ist. Nikolai Mitrokhin draws attention to the difficulties that researchers face when trying to accurately determine the number of parishioners of the Russian Orthodox Church.

The message of the President of the Russian Federation to the Federal Assembly, published on April 25, 2005, brought to life a prompt reaction from Stanislav Belkovsky. On April 26, 2005, he published in the Vedomosti newspaper and on the APN.Ru website an article "Vladimir Putin's Decline", in which he expressed his very pessimistic view of this document. According to S. Belkovsky, the message testifies to the end of the Putin era.

at a closed court session On April 26, 2005, the Volgograd Regional Court, having considered the jury's verdict , pronounced a verdict on seven skinheads accused of killing three immigrants from Central Asia on the basis of "ethnic hatred." The longest term - 10 years in prison in a general regime colony - was received by Andrey Bondarev, who was accused of "murder of two or more persons committed by a group by prior conspiracy motivated by national hatred .

On April 25, 2005, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Bashkiria addressed the republican authorities with a “recommendation to minimize political activity in the region on May 1-9” - due to the threat of terrorist attacks planned by Chechen militants. Political activity means any rallies and demonstrations, writes Gazeta.Ru.

On April 25, the press service of the Vladivostok Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church issued a statement in connection with the speeches scheduled for May 1-2 in the capital of Primorye by an English pastor who came at the invitation of the neo-Pentecostal organization "The Church of the Living God." “A religious organization that does not have a stable calendar,” the document says, “in one case, celebrates Easter in the Western, Gregorian style, in the other, in the Julian, Orthodox.

On April 23, 2005, on the eve of the Jewish Passover (Pesach), an anti-Semitic incident took place in Tambov. A group of short-haired teenagers, seeing the leader of the Jewish community and yeshiva students in traditional clothes heading towards the place of the Seder (dinner), began to loudly shout: " Jews!" and "Jude Schwein!" A journalist and cameraman from the Tambov television company, who happened to be nearby, witnessed what was happening.

On April 26, 2005, Izvestia reported that Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov had signed a decree on the creation of 705 public law enforcement posts (OPOP), whose members would henceforth monitor the observance of law and order. The resolution provides for material "incentive measures" for active social activists. Human rights activists fear that the system created will encourage whistleblowing and extortion.

*This article was published in the journal Svobodnaya Mysl-XXI, N4, 2004, and was written back in March 2004.

The international agency Forum 18 informs that the court session scheduled for April 19 in the case of Elena Kareeva, a member of the Baptist community with. Lyubuchany (Chekhov district, Moscow region) - canceled without explanation and appointment of a new hearing date. E. Kareeva is formally the owner of the building that houses the new prayer house of the community. It was built on the site of the former one, which burned down in September 2004.

On April 26, 2005, the Surgut City Court continued hearings on the case of five skinheads accused of killing and beating citizens of Central Asia and Azerbaijan. In March, the case was adjourned due to the absence of relatives of the victims. Now the relatives have filed an application with a request to consider the criminal case in their absence. At the meeting on April 26, the court heard the testimony of all the defendants.