I psyched myself up for a very long time before trying to put down on paper the words of a conversation with the future president of Russia. The meaning of what needed to be written first was immediately clear. But the music, rhythm, intonation, mood, which are no less important than the meaning, did not add up. Until I decided to just sit down and write. Dear Dmitry Anatolyevich.

Cannes 2008 program announced There are fewer big names than usual in competition at the Cannes Film Festival this year. At yesterday's press conference, the organizers even complained that their favorites did not have time to complete new films for the 61st festival, which will be held on the Cote d'Azur from May 14 to 25.

Germans do not trust the government, the church and banks German citizens are highly skeptical about fundamental democratic values. The results of a sociological survey conducted by the Leipzig Institute for Market Research showed that only 60% of German citizens trust the existing model of democracy.

Journalist accused of extortion sent to court The Investigative Committee (IC) under the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, as Vremya Novostei learned, has completed its investigation and has prepared a criminal case against the deputy editor-in-chief of Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 51-year-old Boris Zemtsov, for sending to court.

Deputies want to expand the practice of property confiscation By legislatively raising the threshold for petty thefts that do not fall under criminal cases, parliamentarians consistently advocate expanding the practice of confiscation of property. At a round table organized recently by the State Duma Committee on Security, deputies expressed dissatisfaction with the law enforcement practice of Russian legislation.

Vladimir Putin unveiled a monument to the first president of Russia The second and third presidents of Russia yesterday took part in the opening ceremony of the monument to the first president. Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev came to the Novodevichye cemetery to pay tribute to Boris Yeltsin, who died exactly a year ago .

Liverpool and Chelsea gave each other a goal Two errors decided the outcome of the first semi-final match of the Champions League. To the mistake of the Chelsea defenders, who allowed the Liverpool team to open the scoring, the Reds responded with an own goal from their defender Riise in the last minutes. The hosts' gift so far looks more valuable: a goal scored on a foreign field can decide the outcome of a two-round match between generally equal opponents.

Tournaments from the qualifying cycle for the World Championship are played at the same time In the last ten days of April, a real chess boom takes place in Europe. Everyone plays! The fact is that the playing field has expanded so much in recent years that chess professionals who want to make money on 64 squares have to carefully think through and tighten their calendar.

The Zarechye-Odintsovo team won Russian gold for the first time Yesterday, fans of Russian volleyball were destined for a difficult test. It turned out that the start of the first match of the “golden” series of the men’s national championship “Iskra” (Odintsovo) - “Dynamo” (Moscow) coincided with the third game of the women’s super final between the “blue and white” from the capital and the girls of the club “Zarechye- Odintsovo".

The US is rushing to reach an agreement with North Korea Today, the United States and North Korea are completing bilateral consultations in Pyongyang. The discussion is devoted to the content of the list of nuclear programs, materials and facilities that North Korea has undertaken to present in accordance with agreements within the framework of the six-party talks.

Works by Kasyan Goleizovsky were shown at the Bolshoi Theater's new choreography workshops The Bolshoi Theater hosted workshops of new choreography - a now traditional show of works by artists who dream of becoming choreographers. This show usually takes place on the upper (rehearsal) stage of the theater; ordinary spectators are not allowed there (only colleagues of the authors, critics and relatives), and the works presented, as a rule, are not subject to serious analysis.

Moscow City Duma deputies did not listen to the opinions of residents of the reconstructed quarter The opening of the first stage of Moscow City, apparently, will be accompanied by protest rallies by residents of the adjacent quarter .

The Russian Foreign Ministry published a message to the media on April 22.

Oleg Menshikov was seen in a new play at the Chereshnevy Les festival The most secular of Moscow's cultural events - the Chereshnevy Les arts festival, which Bosco di Ciliegi is organizing for the seventh time - will truly open by the beginning of May. The art on it, as always, will be of good quality and solidly elegant, the names will be only verified.

Chronicle of sporting events Hockey. NBA. Conference quarterfinals. "East". “Washington” – “Philadelphia” – 2:3 (OT) – Ovechkin “B” (1+1), Vic. Kozlov (0+1), Fedorov (0+1). The series score is 3:4. "West". “San Jose” – “Calgary” – 5:3. The series score is 4:3. The most Russian NHL club, Washington, still failed to win the series, losing 1:3 during the confrontation with Philadelphia. League statistics say that with such an intermediate score, the catching up team won only 9% of the time.