The Belarusian authorities announced the detention of PMCs of the Wagner PMC near Minsk 10 days before the presidential election: why is this necessary Very strange events take place in Belarus. 10 days before the presidential election, Alexander Lukashenko, faced with the most serious political crisis in his career, is trying to sharply turn the situation - and as a threat that can allow him to realize a power scenario, uses Russia.

In Belarus on Wednesday, not only the alleged Wagner PMC fighters were detained, but also political strategist Vitaly Shklyarov, who in different years worked in the campaign headquarters of Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders in the United States, and in Russia participated in the campaigns of Dmitry Gudkov and Ksenia Sobchak. The detention of Shklyarov was reported in the evening newscast on the Belarusian TV channel ONT, writes the online edition Tut.by. The reasons have not yet been reported.

The Investigative Committee has completed its investigation into the criminal case of drug planting by police on Meduza correspondent Ivan Golunov. However, the investigation settled on the version that the detention was accidental: the drug police just wanted to improve their performance, writes .

Film-era photo giant Kodak jumped more than fivefold today on news of a federal contract to produce drug components. Hopes for Kodak's pharmaceutical future stem from a $765 million U.S. federal Defense Production Act (DPA) loan that the U.S. administration has invoked under the guise of fighting the coronavirus. Under the order, a separate company, Kodak Pharmaceuticals, is created. The loan is long-term (25 years), but the terms are close to commercial ones.

From September 1, Sberbank plans to transfer 30% of its employees to permanent work from home, regardless of the epidemiological situation, reports . TASS From September, almost a third of Sberbank employees will remain in remote work on a permanent basis - this decision was made by the bank's management, the press service reported. In 2019, the total headcount of Sberbank was 281,300 people.

Subjected to a full set of US sanctions, Russian billionaires, the brothers Arkady and Boris Rotenberg, have found a way to circumvent US laws and launder millions of dollars in the art market, writes The Wall Street Journal, citing a Senate investigation. The Rotenbergs deny the allegations. According to the investigation: Two months after the imposition of individual sanctions in 2014, the Rotenbergs bought 10 paintings for $6.8 million at Sotheby's.

Investors in China's ByteDance, which owns the TikTok service, were valuing it for a $50 billion buyout, reported Reuters . This is a very high score compared to similar applications, but the parent company wants even more. Offers to sell control began to come in after TikTok got into trouble with US regulators over the security of personal data. A number of ByteDance investors, as well as third-party companies and investment funds, have offered $50 billion for TikTok.

The Russian state has allocated at least 210 billion rubles for the direct fight against coronavirus, the Project resource found out after studying government procurement related to coronavirus. The publication found out what this money was used for and who received it. How did you spend it? Regions and federal departments received 122 billion rubles of “coronavirus” government subsidies, and hospitals spent another 7 billion rubles on purchases through compulsory health insurance.

Megafon began testing eSIM technology. True, to activate a virtual SIM card, you still need to go to the sales office. Megafon became the third major operator in Russia to offer subscribers to use eSIM. A year ago, Tele2 did this, in the spring of 2020, the virtual operator Tinkoff Mobile (works on the Tele2 infrastructure). Applications for connection are collected at the MegaFon sales office in the Moscow Metropolis shopping center. From August 3, eSIM will be connected at other points.

Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said today that Russia has at least two promising vaccines against coronavirus, and both have a chance to be launched in the fall. Golikova spoke at a remote meeting on the sanitary and epidemiological situation in Russia with the participation of President Vladimir Putin. At the beginning of the remote meeting, Putin set the task of avoiding the re-imposition of restrictions due to the coronavirus through preventive and proactive measures.

On the night of July 29, law enforcement agencies of Belarus detained 32 militants of a foreign private military company near Minsk, reported . the state agency BELTA In the first hours after the brief news from the state agency, no details were reported. But then BelTA reported that it was about the Russian PMC Wagner.

US intelligence agencies believe that the Russian SVR and the GRU are honing the techniques of information warfare on conspiracy sites. This is not about trying to directly influence the US elections, writes The New York Times, but about disinformation about the coronavirus, but this campaign has become more difficult to isolate and contain than in 2016. Material of similar content was simultaneously published by AP.

Sberbank bought 8.5% of the Rambler Group shares, becoming a group of a group of a group: now the State Bank owns 55% Rambler. Sberbank promises to invest about 2 billion rubles in the company. Most of them will go to the development of the OKKO online cinema. In June, RBC wrote that the desire of Sberbank to put Rambler under full control may be associated with the Nginx case. Sberbank will invest 2 billion rubles in Rambler Group, the bank statement refers to RBC.

In Russia, they may start installing alcohol locks in all cars during assembly - such a proposal is being prepared by the Ministry of Industry and Trade. Because of this, cars can rise in price, and drivers will face the consequences of an erroneous operation of the “alcohol” blocking.

The Russians postponed a quarter of income for savings in a crisis The fear of the crisis and the closing of the economy forced the Russians to set the savings record: in the second quarter of 2020, citizens, having lost the opportunity to spend money, posted 23% of the actually disposed income compared to 8.8% in the first quarter, calculated the Central Bank.