Deputy Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of Abkhazia Zakan NANBA answered questions from Vremya Novostei newspaper correspondent Dmitry STAROSTIN. — How did the clash between Abkhazian and Georgian units begin in the Marukh Pass area? - For about two weeks, according to our data, Georgian military personnel numbering about a company have been in this area. At 11.50 am on August 13, fire was opened from their location on the positions of our border guards.

A new theater has appeared in Moscow - “Crown of Russian Ballet” The new team was created by the leading soloists of the Sats Children's Musical Theater - Anna Aleksidze and Anatoly Emelyanov, and they are listed as artistic directors. The name of the famous miniaturist choreographer Georgy Aleksidze (father) is in the air and is listed on the poster among the authors whose works will be in the theater’s repertoire, but it was not possible to see his work on the premiere evening.

The trial of the escape of 15 prisoners in February of this year began in the Ulyanovsk Regional Court. In addition to the fugitives, two officers from the security department of the colony, located in the suburbs of Novoulyanovsk, were also in the dock. Investigators from the regional prosecutor's office blame the prisoners for the escape and robberies that they managed to commit while free. The officers are accused of negligence leading to the escape of dangerous criminals.

Experiment on the national team Exactly a week ago, hockey Russia received a new head coach of the national team. The choice of the hockey federation surprised many: the cabin of the flagship was entrusted to Vladimir Plyushchev, a captain who had no experience of working independently with teams of masters. The first steps of the new coach are even more surprising.

The path to the Champions League lies through Austria Today, the capital's Lokomotiv begins its performances in the Champions League with a match against the Austrian club GAK. And if last year Semin’s team managed to get into the main tournament with great difficulty, then this time there should not be any special difficulties. GAK, which currently occupies last place in the Austrian championship, has huge problems.

Mosenergo will today sign an agreement with the EBRD on a loan for $70 million, said Mosenergo Deputy General Director Vladislav Nazin. He emphasized that receiving a loan from the EBRD is not associated with payments on Eurobonds. At the beginning of the year, Mosenergo’s debt on Eurobonds was $155 million, now less than $110 million remains, noted Arkady Evstafiev, general director of the energy company.

The Strasbourg court rejected the claim of the investor SBS-Agro The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg rejected the first claim of one of the private investors of SBS-Agro, who demanded lump-sum compensation for damages for his deposit. At the same time, the judges recognized the legal settlement agreement concluded between the creditors of SBS and ARCO.

Edinburgh's annual arts festival kicks off The Edinburgh International Arts Festival opened on Sunday and runs until the end of August. In contrast to the popular fringe running parallel to it, which floods the streets of the ancient Scottish city with experimental genres and spontaneous forms, the main festival looks stricter and, at first glance, even less colorful.

With her double victory at the tennis tournament in Helsinki, 17-year-old Svetlana Kuznetsova made a lot of noise in tennis circles. It’s not that no one knew about the St. Petersburg tennis player until Sunday evening - number 127 in the world ranking implies some fame, and not only among specialists. But hardly any experts would have risked on the eve of the Nordea Nordic Light Open the victory of the tennis player, who began moving through the tournament bracket with qualifying matches.

Europe is being washed away from industrialization German authorities have declared a “disaster alert” in the south and east of the country. The low pressure zone that formed here - a cyclone named “Ilse” (in Western Europe, it is customary to give cyclones female names, and anticyclones, respectively, male ones) - brought with it such an unprecedented abundance of precipitation that large areas of Bavaria and Saxony were cut off from the mainland .

Its citizens will travel through Lithuania with new passports The Russian President's special envoy for the Kaliningrad problem, Dmitry Rogozin, yesterday announced his readiness for a compromise. After inspecting the Sovetsk border crossing, he came to the conclusion that Russia should require free passage through Lithuania not for all its citizens, but only for holders of new passports or international passports.

Prosecutors will divide the blame for the death of the Su-27 among ten Secretary of the Security Council of Ukraine Yevgeny Marchuk announced on Tuesday the preliminary conclusions of the commission to investigate the causes of the Su-27 crash in Lviv. On July 27, during an air show at the Sknyliv airfield, a Ukrainian Air Force plane fell on the heads of the public. The commission found that the cause of the death of 85 people was a whole range of violations.

The United States will register persons of “terrorist” nationality The US Department of Justice has set a symbolic date for the start of an experiment to “screen out guests who pose an increased risk to national security.” From September 11 - on the day of the first anniversary of the tragedy - foreigners, especially those of suspicious “Middle Eastern” appearance, will begin to have their fingerprints taken upon entry.

The Pskov experiment may fail The Ministry of Defense allocated 2.7 billion rubles for the experiment on the transition to contract service of the 76th Airborne Division (Airborne Division) in Pskov. Detailed figures were finally released by the Main Financial and Economic Directorate of the Moscow Region. Over 2 billion rubles.

Boris FEDOROV, who retained his chair on the board of directors of Gazprom, has for some time now not only begun to criticize management much less frequently, but also generally speak publicly about the work of the concern. Columnist for the Vremya Novostei newspaper Alexey GRIVACH asked the independent director of Gazprom to share his opinion on the current problems in the activities of the largest Russian company. —You have become less critical of the situation at Gazprom.