The last word in the protracted struggle between public organizations and the State Duma will have to be said by the president. Yesterday, the Federation Council ignored the position of members of the Public Chamber and approved the scandalous bill “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation,” providing for new principles of state regulation of the activities of non-profit organizations (NPOs).

Four secret sheets were found in the Khlebnikov case Today, the Moscow City Court is expected to form a panel of jurors who will have to render a verdict in the case of the murder of the editor-in-chief of the Russian version of Forbes magazine, Paul Klebnikov. The circumstances of his death will be heard behind closed doors, since there are classified materials in the case.

Far Eastern governors discussed with federal ministers the implementation of national projects How to live further and how much money will be allocated for this was discussed in Moscow by the Far Eastern governors with the ministers of education, medicine and regional development. Only the governor of the Khabarovsk Territory, Viktor Ishaev, and the owner of Chukotka, Roman Abramovich, were absent.

For the Caucasus, 2005 turned out to be better than 2004 By the end of the year, a paradoxical impression emerged: even against the backdrop of the October attack by militants on Nalchik, it seems that the Russian North Caucasus has passed some very dangerous point. People began to breathe more calmly and now really hope that the current relative respite will be the beginning of a long peace, and not the calm before the big storm predicted by analysts.

The leader of the Super League fights on equal terms with the players of the Swiss championship By tradition, our hockey players are left without New Year and Christmas holidays every season. There is no special break in the national championship, and on the contrary, some teams have to agree to postpone matches in order to take part in various international tournaments, including official ones.

The best event of the festival for the 65th anniversary of Mikhail Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita” was the concert “Repressed Music of the Land of the Soviets,” prepared by the “Return” cultural development fund. The Anatoly Vasiliev Theater on Sretenka featured music from composers who suffered under the Stalinist regime. Conventionally, they can be classified as avant-garde, leftist front of the arts - like constructivist and expressionist artists.

On the eve of the 150th anniversary, the Tretyakov Gallery opened an exhibition of drawings from the collection of Pavel Tretyakov On the eve of 2006, the anniversary year for the Tretyakov Gallery, we were pleased with an elegant surprise in the spirit of a “box with a secret” or the literary device “a story within a story.” You enter the main Tretyakov Gallery, and hidden in it, like in a nesting doll, is another one, developed sketchily in graphic sheets.

Gerhard Schröder signed a contract with the Harry Walker lecture agency Yesterday, another place of work of ex-Chancellor of Germany Gerhard Schröder became known. The German newspaper Bild reported that the management of the American agency Harry Walker from New York confirmed the fact of concluding a contract with this famous politician of the very recent past.

Eight candidates will compete for the post of President of Belarus. On Tuesday, all initiative groups that submitted applications were registered, CEC Secretary Nikolai Lozovik told Vremya Novostei. The main events of the campaign will unfold around the current President Alexander Lukashenko and the leader of the united opposition Alexander Milinkevich (VN wrote about the other candidates on December 26). The signature collection campaign starts tomorrow.

Azerbaijan denominated its currency Today, in the most fashionable hotel in Baku, the Excelsior Hotel, built this year, a presentation of the new denominated banknotes of Azerbaijan - manats - will take place. The banknotes and coins will be presented by the country's President Ilham Aliyev. The national currency, denominated with a coefficient of 1:5000, will be put into circulation on January 1.

Law enforcement agencies are preparing for the New Year The Moscow police invites everyone to celebrate the New Year, but they have prepared a decent reception only for “ill-wishers.” As Alexey Laushkin, head of the department for ensuring public order in the capital's Central Internal Affairs Directorate, said yesterday, after “two or three days ago information was received that there are ill-wishers who want to prevent the celebration,” unprecedented security measures were taken in Moscow.

Forecast for the coming days On the European territory of Russia, due to the confrontation between two dissimilar atmospheric vortices, the weather is very different. If in the northeastern half of the territory, in the anticyclone, there are frosts and almost no precipitation, then in the southwestern half, where the cyclone rules, there is snow, sometimes strong, snowstorms and gusty winds, and the frosts are weakening. In most central regions, worsening weather is expected on December 29.

Seven rounds were played at the Russian Chess Championship. Sergei Rublevsky and Dmitry Yakovenko are in the lead - 5 points each, Peter Svidler, Vadim Zvyagintsev and Evgeniy Bareev are half a point behind. In the second third of the tournament, the leading triumvirate disintegrated.

Woody Allen's new film Match Point Everyone is surprised - how Woody Allen, in his eighth, one might say, ten years, suddenly took and made not just a good film, but also one completely different from his previous films. Having moved to London, that is, having reconnected with the very European cultural environment that had always been considered natural for him - it was “Europeanness” that was the distinctive feature of this New York intellectual - Woody Allen found a second wind.

Ukraine intends to take 15% of gas from Gazprom’s export flow Four days before the new year, Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuriy Yekhanurov promised to begin unauthorized withdrawal of Russian gas if Gazprom stopped supplies to Naftogaz of Ukraine on January 1 due to the lack of a contract. “We charge 15% of gas for transit through our territory, for all the work that thousands of people are doing in Ukraine today from border to border,” he said.