Russian battalion departs for the Middle East Yesterday, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the Ministry of Defense to assist Lebanon in eliminating the consequences of hostilities. Yesterday, at an extraordinary meeting, the Federation Council, with 124 votes, supported the president’s proposal to send a separate bridge battalion to Lebanon.

The new Moscow prosecutor has assembled his team The new prosecutor of Moscow, Yuri Semin, as Vremya Novostey learned, recently completed a personnel purge in the area entrusted to him. He himself took office on July 18, as part of the personnel reform initiated by the new Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika. Like other associates of the head of the supervisory authority, he immediately continued work to renew the ranks of the prosecutor.

Russia and Belarus continue to quarrel over the economy Russian-Belarusian relations seem to be far from a full-scale crisis. But they are difficult to the point of impossibility. The allies seem to speak different languages. Russia proposes to separate the problems of bilateral relations and building a union state. Belarusians, on the contrary, prefer okroshka. With this, the meeting of the next Council of Ministers of the Union State began yesterday at the President Hotel.

Shinzo Abe formed the new government of Japan Yesterday, Japan received a new prime minister and a new government in one day. The lower house of parliament, in which the ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the New Komeito Party have a majority, elected 52-year-old Shinzo Abe, a former chief cabinet secretary, as prime minister.

Maria Fedorovna spent the last years of her life in her homeland, Denmark. This period of her life is described in some detail in the memoirs of her youngest daughter, Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. These memoirs were recorded by J. Worres and republished in 2004 by the Zakharov publishing house. We present excerpts from these memoirs and some comments to the attention of our readers with the kind consent of the publisher. Electricity bills The Grand Duchess loved Denmark since childhood.

The country's men's team had the worst season in its history The club season in Russia started last week with matches for the Russian Cup among men's teams in Chekhov near Moscow. But if there are no serious concerns about the quality level of the honorary trophy, the holding of the Super League championship and the results of our clubs’ performances in European cup tournaments, then the future of the country’s national team is vague.

The Kolyma region will not become a special tourist zone Yesterday, the procedure for the official opening of applications from federal subjects for the creation of special economic zones of a tourist and recreational type took place. The formal procedure immediately caused significant losses to a number of regions wishing to develop tourism on their territory on special financial grounds. Of the 28 applications submitted, the commission rejected ten.

The Ministry of Justice of Belarus appealed to the Supreme Court with a claim to suspend the activities of the Party of Belarusian Communists (PKB). The official reason for the claim is failure to provide documents on the size of the party. PKB leader Sergei Kalyakin explained that the party leadership refused to provide the Ministry of Justice with a detailed list of its members, limiting itself to a minimum list of a thousand names.

Yuri Trutnev sent Oleg Mitvol to Sakhalin The powerful international outcry that the Ministry of Natural Resources’ campaign against the Sakhalin-2 project provoked forced the head of the department to carry out “explanatory work.” Foreign media correspondents were gathered for a briefing in Moscow. Judging by news agency reports, Mr.

Alfa Capital wants to become universal Alfa Capital is dissatisfied with its status as one of the largest players in the collective investment market. And although it has achieved the greatest success in this segment, in the future the investment structure intends to develop as a universal company, engaging, in addition to mutual funds, in corporate business, as well as trust management.

The day after tomorrow, the UN Security Council will discuss the next report of the commission it created in April 2005, investigating the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The politician died on February 14, 2005 in Beirut in a car bomb explosion; the shadow of suspicion of organizing the assassination attempt fell on the Syrian intelligence services.

The country's leadership will help its entrepreneurs start a business in Russia While the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources is trying to deprive the main French oil company Total of the license to develop the Kharyaga field, small and medium-sized enterprises from this country are planning to enter the Russian market as investors. Russia became one of five countries for which France developed a special “Export Course” program.

CLUBS Festival "Long Arms". The festival is dedicated to the memory of the popularizer of “new music” and the ideologist of the “Dom” center Nikolai Dmitriev. The festival will present various styles of contemporary music: from avant-garde jazz to noise electronics. It will be attended by musicians from around the world who are connected by the name of Nikolai Dmitriev and his activities for decades.

Tony Blair said goodbye to the party According to an old English joke, a wife can only make her husband a millionaire if he is a billionaire. An event that took place at the annual Labor party conference in Manchester showed how a wife can inflict not only material, but also serious political damage on her husband. Cherie Blair, the wife of the British Prime Minister, almost played this destructive role.

Bulgaria and Romania will be admitted to the EU on January 1 Yesterday, politicians in Bucharest and Sofia breathed a sigh of relief - European Commissioner Olli Rehn released his report on the admission of both states to the European Union at a meeting of the European Parliament. The long-awaited event for Bulgaria and Romania will take place on January 1, 2007.