Kids at the Muzeon Park enjoying the festival with a large English bear. The fourth annual Kids English Festival took place in the lively surroundings of the Muzeon statue park near the Central House of Artists and New Tretyakov Gallery over the weekend. More than a thousand aspiring and bright-eyed young English linguists flocked to the park on Saturday for the fair, allowing themselves to become immersed in the language — and bask in the sun while they climbed, danced, played and ran around.

Five men have been gunned down in a Dagestani forest in an attack apparently carried out by local insurgents, news reports said Sunday. The five men were reported missing Friday when they failed to return from a hunting trip in the surroundings of the Khtun village in the Suleiman-Stalsky region of Dagestan, the TASS news agency reported Sunday, citing an unidentified local law enforcement official.

President Vladimir Putin in 2014 said measures should be taken to protect the Russian market and consumers from GMO products. The Russian government will ban production of goods using genetically modified organisms (GMOs), Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich was quoted as saying Friday.

In this file photo, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev meets with Vyacheslav Gaizer, left, at the government headquarters in Moscow, Oct. 23, 2014. The governor of Russia’s oil-rich Komi republic on Saturday became the second regional head in six months to be arrested for corruption in a high-profile corruption case that pundits say could be politically motivated or be part of a struggle for influence among energy companies.

A German manager for Mercedes-Benz's Russian operations died after falling down a staircase at a Moscow nightclub on Saturday night, Russia media reported Sunday. Alexander Lambert tripped while descending a staircase from the second floor of а nightclub on Moscow's Rochdelskаyа Ulitsa, TASS reported, citing unidentified law enforcement officials. He died of his injuries at the scene, the news agency reported.

Any postmortem of Russia's recent regional elections should begin with hearty and sincere praise for those in the opposition who had the courage and invested the time necessary to run, and worked to support campaigns and protect the vote. Given the state of affairs in Russia today, theirs is not only a dangerous undertaking, it is often thankless and always seemingly Herculean. A number of seasoned campaign veterans were involved in running this year's Parnas campaign.

The young actors in “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” all got a standing ovation at the Sundance Film Festival. Amfest, the American film festival organized by the Cool Connections agency with the support of the U.S. Embassy, is once again taking over the halls of the Formula Kino Gorizont theater. This is the festival's 10th year in Russia.

Children inspect rubble as smoke rises behind them during clashes between forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad and the Army of Islam fighters, on the eastern mountains of Qalamoun in Damascus, Sept. 19. Several Russian contract soldiers who claimed this week they were being deployed to Syria, undermining Russian government denials that it has sent combat troops to the war zone, are now being threatened with criminal charges, their lawyer said Saturday.

Relations between Russia and the United States were already bad two years ago. Even before the problems in Ukraine began, Moscow had granted temporary asylum to former NSA intelligence leaker Edward Snowden and disagreements were deepening between the two countries. U.S. President Barack Obama canceled a visit to Moscow but agreed to attend the G20 summit in St. Petersburg.

"At the same time we are sorry to notice that neither the Soviet nor the Russian side has so far shown interest in a worthy commemoration of the 800,000 Red Army soldiers murdered by German Nazis during the Second World War as captives,” the ministry said.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry steps off his plane after arriving at Berlin Tegel Airport, ahead of a meeting with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier about the ongoing crisis in Syria, Berlin, Sunday, Sept. 20. LONDON — U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Saturday that Russia's movement of tactical aircraft and surface-to-air missiles to Syria could pose a threat to American and allied forces, and made clear that the U.S.

The toilet was supposed to be unveiled on Moscow's City Day holiday two weeks ago, but that deadline was missed. The Moscow metro has opened its first ever public toilet, the Russian News Service reported on Friday. The toilet is located in the Prospekt Mira metro station on the Circle Line. A Troika public transport card is needed to access the toilet, though its use is free.

McDonald's and other fast-food chains have faced hundreds of claims from unlucky coffee drinkers. A Moscow court on Friday ruled that McDonald's must pay 320,000 rubles ($4,850) in compensation after an employee spilled hot coffee on a 3-year-old girl, the Interfax news agency reported. The girl's father, Alexei Karelov, had sought 5 million rubles ($75,000) when his daughter was hospitalized in April for first-degree burns to her neck and torso, the agency said.

The possibility of Russia raising taxes on oil companies was reported by Bloomberg and several Russian media in recent days. Russia's Finance Ministry has proposed changing the calculation method for mineral extraction tax for oil companies by including a so-called "ruble deduction" that would significantly boost revenues, news agency RIA reported on Saturday, citing Finance Ministry documents.

Police said about 4,000 people attended the rally, while its organizers put the turnout at twice that number. Thousands of people rallied on the streets of Moscow on Sunday to demand fair elections and challenge Vladimir Putin’s 15-year rule, in the first significant opposition protest in the capital for months. The gathering was restricted by authorities to a district of southern Moscow.