Vladimir Ashkenazy and Evgeny Kissin received the most prestigious music award Russian-born conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy and pianist Evgeny Kissin (pictured) were unable to attend the 52nd Recording Academy Awards ceremony yesterday. Award in the section “Best instrumental recording with orchestra. Classics" for the live London recording of Prokofiev's Second and Third Piano Concertos (Philarmonia Orchestra, EMI Classics) will be given to them at a later date.

Scientists in search of extraterrestrial life One of the main tasks facing astronomy has long been the search for Earth-like planets in other solar systems, where, at least theoretically, life can exist. Such planets are called exoplanets. Michel Mayor, professor of astronomy at the University of Geneva, surprised everyone by promising to find an Earth-like exoplanet in the very near future.

French and Russians in search of identity “Is there a historical identity for France?” -- the famous French scientist Pierre Nora gave his lecture on this topical topic yesterday in Moscow at the Russian State University for the Humanities. A researcher who critically examines the problems of national history recalled his long-standing idea about “places of memory.” This concept includes archives, museums, monuments, national holidays and the like.

The State Duma is finalizing the law on polygraph testing of officials and law enforcement officers The head of the State Duma Security Committee, United Russia member Vladimir Vasilyev, supported the idea of ​​checking the honesty of Russian officials using a polygraph - a device better known as a lie detector.

The law on trade regulation that has come into force is not supported by enforcement mechanisms On February 1, the main provisions of one of the most controversial bills of recent years - the law “On the Fundamentals of Regulation of Trade Activities in the Russian Federation” - came into force. It was assumed that the implementation of the law would, if not reduce, then at least significantly limit the rise in food prices.

The Sundance Independent Film Festival has ended in the United States. The main prize of the American feature film competition went to Debra Granik for the film “Winter's Bones,” a Southern Gothic tale about a girl who, at any cost, must find her unlucky father in the Missouri mountains. Social realism goes well with local witches and a chainsaw, which is not used for cutting down wood. Winter's Bones already has an American distributor.

Will Nicolas Sarkozy dare to remove the veil from French citizens? In France, a two-month nationwide discussion of the problem of national identity has ended, and now it is the turn of the country’s authorities to make decisions based on the discussions and recommendations heard. This was an initiative of the 55-year-old French President Nicolas Sarkozy, and the main thing in it was to understand the place of Muslims in modern French society.

Russia recognized the independence of the South Ossetian passport The Foreign Ministers of Russia and South Ossetia, Sergei Lavrov and Murat Dzhioev, signed an agreement yesterday on a visa-free regime for crossing the border. Georgia, which de jure continues to consider South Ossetia part of its territory, immediately declared the agreement illegal. In fact, no visas were needed to cross the Russian-South Ossetian border before.

For the first time, a Russian became a prize pilot of the Royal Races 25-year-old Vitaly Petrov was the first Russian driver to get a seat as an active driver in the most prestigious world circuit racing championship in the Formula 1 class. A three-year contract with the Russian was signed by Renault, which was recently included in the category of top teams and plans to regain lost ground. It was hard to believe.

Stuttgart defeated Borussia Football. German Championship. 20th round. "Hamburg" - "Wolfsburg" - 1:1, "Hannover" - "Nuremberg" - 1:3, "Hertha" - "Bochum" - 0:0, "Eintracht" - "Cologne" -- 1:2, Borussia M -- Werder -- 4:3, Bayern -- Mainz -- 3:0, Schalke -- Hoffenheim -- 2:0, " Stuttgart - Borussia D - 4:1, Bayer - Freiburg - 3:1. Leading : Bayer - 44 points, Bayern - 42, Schalke - 41.

This week, Parisian public prosecutor (prosecutor) Jean-Claude Marin is appealing the decision of the Paris Correctional (Criminal) Court, which on January 28 acquitted former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin in the Clearstream case. The prosecutor believes that the new trial should take place at the end of this year or at the beginning of 2011. The first took place in September-October 2009.

Alexander Khloponin retained the Krasnoyarsk Territory for his team The list of candidates for the post of governor of the Krasnoyarsk Territory was presented yesterday to President Dmitry Medvedev by the United Russia party.

The mass consciousness of Russians needs liberation from the myths of Soviet history On January 27, the Perovsky Court of Moscow upheld the claim of Great Patriotic War veteran Viktor Semenov and the Nashi movement against journalist and human rights activist Alexander Podrabinek for the article “As an anti-Soviet to anti-Soviet people.” The court assessed the moral damage to the veteran at 1,000 rubles. instead of 500 thousand, which the plaintiffs sought.

The Russian economy finished 2009 better than expected Rosstat continues to summarize the statistical results of the past year. Experts highlight the main achievement of the authorities: the crisis in 2009 did not hit the population as hard as it could have been. Even though, according to data released yesterday by Rosstat, GDP fell by 7.9% last year, the biggest drop since 1994, real incomes rose.

Citi is ready to go smaller Once the first, and now the third largest American bank, Citigroup may sell its division specializing in private asset management. On the one hand, the bank is solving its financial problems, and on the other hand, it is actually fulfilling the instructions of US President Barack Obama, who demands reducing the size of leading Wall Street banks and separating investment businesses from them.