Russian scientists say they have discovered small plastic debris along the entirety of an Arctic shortcut connecting Asia and Europe that Russia calls the Northern Sea Route. Microplastics — plastic particles smaller than 5 millimeters in length — are now present in every part of the environment, according to a 2019 scientific review by European Union researchers.…
Russian President Vladimir Putin told his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan by phone on Wednesday to avoid any steps in Syria that could damage its peace process, the Kremlin said, as Turkey prepared to launch an operation in northeastern Syria. The Kremlin said that both Putin and Erdogan agreed in the phone call that Syria’s sovereignty…
State media outlets in Russia and North Korea have signed a new cooperation agreement that includes plans to counteract “fake news” together, the state-run TASS news agency reported Wednesday. TASS and North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) previously signed a cooperation agreement in 2005. TASS is currently the only Russian media outlet to…
A radiation spike thought to be caused by a cancer patient has been recorded onboard a passenger train that arrived in Moscow from Berlin on Tuesday, Russian media outlets have reported. Russian news channels published footage of police, firemen and radioactive waste decontamination teams inspecting the train upon its arrival. No passengers were reportedly onboard…
A group of pro-Kremlin lawmakers has drafted legislation that would allow authorities to block individual email or online messenger users who circulate banned content. The bill is likely to alarm advocates of internet freedoms, but the lawmakers say the legislation is needed to combat a wave of hoax bomb threats that have been sporadically called…
Release October 9, 2019, 12:45 A working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Georg Graf Waldersee, Commissioner of the Federal Government of the Federal Republic of Germany for Gas Transit across Ukraine, took place today in Moscow. The parties discussed issues related to supplies of Russian natural gas to Europe in the period from January 1, 2020. Ukraine is currently taking steps…
Russia’s Justice Ministry has on Wednesday blacklisted opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) as a “foreign agent.” Russia’s 2012 “foreign agent” law requires labeled organizations to report their activities and face financial audits. Activists have denounced the law, saying it seeks to silence groups critical of the Kremlin’s human rights record. The Justice Ministry…
A top-secret Russian military intelligence unit has been engaged in a campaign to destabilize Europe, The New York Times has reported, citing intelligence officials in four Western countries that only recently discovered the unit’s activities. GRU Unit 29155 reportedly oversaw a campaign to destabilize Moldova, an arms smuggler’s assassination attempt in Bulgaria, a thwarted coup…
The World Bank has become the latest organization to cut its outlook for the Russian economy, predicting growth of just 1% in 2019. A host of domestic and international factors are holding back the economy, the organization said in its new forecast published today. The bank had previously predicted growth of 1.2% in 2019. “The…
Ever since five employees of Baring Vostok were arrested on fraud charges in February, the world’s attention has been on the private equity fund’s American founder Michael Calvey and his French business partner Philippe Delpal. Outcries in support of the two men, widely seen as having been caught up in a business dispute, came from…
Russian intelligence services have uncovered a secret “charity” that had more than 100 members and sent money to the Islamic State in Syria, authorities said Wednesday. Russian police and the Federal Security Service (FSB) uncovered Islamic State cells in 17 regions so far in 2019, a top anti-extremism official said last month. The FSB said…
Nearly 40% of Russians believe that the recent criminal convictions of more than a dozen people over this summer’s Moscow protests were politically motivated, according to new independent polling. The Sept. 8 local and regional elections were among the most remembered events of the past month, according to the independent Levada Center pollster. Five of…
KAZAN — At first sight, Shahrizat and Shahdiyar Shavkat, 23-year-old twin brothers from China, look like regular students. They spend their days listening to music, playing sports and hanging out with friends in Kazan, Russia’s sixth-largest city and the capital of the majority-Muslim republic of Tatarstan. Only a “Free the Uighurs” screensaver on one of their…
The number of attacks and threats on Russian journalists by the authorities has more than doubled since 2017, according to a new report published by the international Justice for Journalists NGO on Monday. The report was published to mark the 13th anniversary of Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskya’s murder. While five men were sentenced to…
Background Gazprom Transgaz Nizhny Novgorod is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Gazprom that delivers natural gas to 15 regions in the Volga and Central Federal Districts of the Russian Federation. The company’s gas transmission system is composed of trunklines stretching for over 13,000 kilometers. Gazprom Transgaz Nizhny Novgorod operates 54 compressor workshops, 284 gas compressor units, 371 gas distribution stations, 2 mobile CNG refuelers and 4 refueling modules at the premises of gas…
Doctors in southern Russia have removed part of a birthmark on the head of an American baby who was born with a rare skin condition, the state-run TASS news agency reported Tuesday. Seven-month-old Luna Fenner was diagnosed with giant congenital melanocytic nevus, with the shape of the mark covering her face resembling a Batman mask…
A Moscow court has sent theater director Kirill Serebrennikov’s criminal fraud case back to its starting point a month after the case was returned to prosecutors, and more than two years after he was first arrested. Serebrennikov was detained in August 2017 on charges of embezzling 68 million rubles ($1 million) in government funds, a…
Marina Tsvetayeva was born in Moscow in 1892 to a professor of art history – who founded what is today known as the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts – and a mother of German and Polish ancestry. Tsvetayeva’s family was one of wealth and influence, albeit not supportive of their daughter’s poetry. When Tsvetayeva was…
President Vladimir Putin has presented U.S. astronaut Nick Hague with one of Russia’s top state honors a year after the astronaut survived an emergency onboard a Russian spacecraft. Hague, along with Russian cosmonaut Alexei Ovchinin, made a dramatic emergency landing in the steppes of Kazakhstan in October 2018 when a booster rocket on their Soyuz…
Russia and China will sign a cooperation treaty aimed at combating illegal content on the internet this month, Russia‘s state communications watchdog said on Tuesday, an example of deepening cooperation between the powers. Critics have accused Russia‘s authorities of trying to implement Chinese-style curbs on the internet. Cooperation in this area between the two regulators could alarm proponents…
A group of friends frolicking on a beach in Brazil recently discovered a Russian message in a bottle thought to be written by Soviet sailors, Brazilian media have reported. The 15 friends were vacationing on the country’s southern tip on Sept. 20 when they came across a glass bottle containing a rolled sheet of paper…
In 1881 the Russian writer Nikolai Leskov wrote a short story called “The Tale of Cross-Eyed Lefty and the Steel Flea” about a group of blacksmiths in Tula led by a left-handed master. In the story, Tsar Alexander I brought back a miniature mechanical flea made of steel from England. His son, Tsar Nicholas I,…
President Vladimir Putin wants to connect ports on Russia’s Arctic coast with ports on the Indian Ocean, he said at the Valdai Discussion Club conference. Asia and the Middle East were in the spotlight during the conference, which Putin has attended since its establishment in 2004. Infrastructure development was a key part of this year’s talks which took…
Russia was not informed in advance by the United States or by Turkey about U.S. plans to pull troops back from Syria’s northeast border region ahead of a Turkish military operation, the Kremlin said on Tuesday. Russia, a close ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, has emerged as a leading power broker in Syria over more…
A court in Moscow ruled Tuesday that U.S. investor Michael Calvey should remain under house arrest facing charges of embezzlement until Jan. 13, the state-run TASS news agency reported. Calvey and other executives at private equity group Baring Vostok were detained in February. They deny wrongdoing and say the charges against them are being used…
The Kremlin will no longer allow authorities in Moscow to run their own elections after the ruling party lost a third of its seats in the capital’s city legislature last month, the Vedomosti business daily reported Tuesday. President Vladimir Putin’s administration has reportedly reviewed the results of the Sept. 8 vote — where the pro-Putin…
Russia is aiming to launch a new high-speed rail connection between Moscow and St. Petersburg by 2026, the state railway organization said yesterday. The proposed launch date was confirmed at a meeting between lawmakers in Russia’s Federation Council and Dmitry Kattsyn, head of high-speed projects at the country’s state rail operator, Russian Railways. Russian Railways…
The former head of a Siberian diamond mine owned by Alrosa where eight men were killed in a flood two years ago was found dead in a pre-trial detention center on Tuesday, a day after he was arrested, Russian investigating authorities said. A regional branch of the federal Investigative Committee said there were indications the…
A group of scientific researchers has discovered a record methane emission coming from the eastern Siberian Sea, expedition organizer Tomsk Polytechnic University (TPU) said in a statement. The scientists found concentrations of the greenhouse gas — which can significantly influence the planet’s climate — up to nine times the global average. “This is the most…
Businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin has for the first time said he is linked to pro-Kremlin media after years of denying the association, Russia’s RBC news website reported. A newly formed group of four pro-Kremlin outlets called Patriot mentioned Prigozhin by name, identifying him as chairman of its board of trustees. “This is undoubtedly a big honor…
Personal data relating to the Russian mobile operator Beeline’s 2016 database of 8.7 million clients has been leaked, the Kommersant business daily reported citing banking security department sources. Kommersant checked the database, which list Beeline’s internet clients, and found that it includes full names, addresses and phone numbers. Beeline’s press office told Kommersant the leak…
Couriers at one of Russia’s biggest online retailers Ozon staged a strike in St. Petersburg against low wages on Saturday and Sunday, disrupting deliveries in the country’s second-biggest city, the Fontanka news website reported. Ozon, which pioneered the Russian e-commerce sector in 1998 and is often referred to as Russia’s Amazon, holds around 10% of…
Almost 300 lawyers have signed an open letter demanding that Russian authorities stop prosecuting two of their colleagues for allegedly insulting an FSB investigator, the Bumaga news website reported Sunday. St. Petersburg lawyers Andrei and Mikhail Zlomnov are accused of insulting Dmitry Sablin while they were defending their relative Pavel Zlomnov against charges of arms…
A Russian journalist who is being held in Iran was detained last week for a visa violation and not for spying, the Students News Agency ISNA quoted Iran’s government spokesman as saying on Monday. The spokesman said Yulia Yuzik’s case was undergoing a “quick review” by the Iranian authorities but gave no more details. “Her case…
President Vladimir Putin turns 67 today. The Kremlin announced that Putin would be spending his birthday outdoors with family and friends, and released a series of pictures of the president hiking in the Siberian taiga over the weekend. Today also marks the 13th anniversary of the murder of Russian investigative journalist and fierce Putin critic…
Michael Calvey has had almost $1 million in assets frozen in the latest development in the high-profile legal case against the star U.S. investor and his Baring Vostok private equity fund, the Financial Times reported. The development is a setback for Calvey’s team following reports last month that prosecutors were considering dropping the case. A…
Thousands of people gathered in Kiev’s main square on Sunday to protest against President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s deal with Moscow to grant autonomy to Ukraine’s pro-Russian rebel-held east as part of efforts to end a five-year conflict there. In the first breakthrough towards a possible peace deal in years, envoys from Moscow and Kiev agreed at…
One of my superpowers is the ability to come up with names for dishes. I play with puns, literary allusions, alliteration, and assonance. But in the case of this particular eggplant recipe, I cannot, for the life of me, come up with anything better than the name by which it is known in my immediate…
News from projects and regions October 5, 2019, 18:00 On October 5, employees from the companies and organizations within the Gazprom on Baikal non-profit partnership took part in an annual autumn cleanup arranged in the regional center by Irkutsk gas workers. As usual, the partnership’s teams cleaned up the outdoor area of Irkutsk Residential Care Facility No. 1, as well as the areas adjacent to the water…
Russia will find ways to help Cuba secure supplies of oil and petroleum products, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview broadcast on Saturday. Medvedev pledged to help develop Cuba’s energy sector during a visit to the island this week, but did not announce any short-term measures to provide relief for the island…
After a long, warm summer of shashlik in the park and skateboards on the streets, Moscow is settling into colder nights and shorter days. But before winter gets here, we’re enjoying the colors and shades of autumn! Here’s a look at the capital this season.
From yoga to pho to escape rooms, Moscow has gone through more than its fair share of fads in the past couple of decades. While predicting what the next wave will be is like trying to guess which of your aunt’s cat videos is going to go viral on YouTube, one sleeper contender for Moscow’s…
October 2, 2019, Moscow – TITAN-2 JSC, contractor for building and supply of equipment for Hanhikivi-1 NPP (Finland) construction, has signed a contract with Framatome-Siemens, the French-German consortium, to supply Main Instrumentation and Control (I&C). The contract was signed following a competitive procedure with the participation of international companies that are market leaders in the…
On October 3, 2019 in Havana, an agreement for the implementation of a project for the construction of a multipurpose irradiation center in the Republic of Cuba was signed. Jose Fidel Santana, Vice Minister of Science, Technology and Environment, and Nikolay Spassky, Deputy Director General at ROSATOM, signed the document on the Cuban side and…
Release October 4, 2019, 19:00 The award ceremony for the Oil and Gas Projects: Glance into the Future international competition for young scientists took place at the 9th St. Petersburg International Gas Forum. The top prize went to Vadim Tsygankov, associate professor at the Gubkin Russian State University of Oil and Gas (National Research University), for his project entitled Liquefied Petroleum…
October 4th, 2019, Moscow – Rusatom Overseas JSC and The Department of Energy of the Republic of Philippines and signed Memorandum of Intent on cooperation in the sphere of small modular reactors. In the frames of MoI parties agreed to conduct a pre-feasibility study on construction in the Philippines of nuclear power plants based on…
Blaming Stalin for starting World War II is “the height of cynicism,” Russian President Vladimir Putin has said amid renewed discussion over the Soviet Union’s role in the conflict. “To say that Stalin unleashed the war is the height of cynicism,” Putin said at an international conference in southern Russia on Thursday. “It’s as if…
The year was 1909. Mahatma Gandhi was 40 years old and just starting out; Leo Tolstoy was 81 and one of the most famous men in the world. In a letter written on Dec. 14, 1908 by Tolstoy in response to an Indian revolutionary, the Russian writer argued that only through the principle of love could…
October 03, 2019 – Within the framework of the Russian Energy Week 2019 international forum, Rusatom Automated Control Systems JSC (RASU JSC), JSC Specialized Scientific Research Institute for Instrumentation Engineering (JSC SNIIP) and Thermo Fisher Scientific Messtechnik GmbH (Germany) signed the Memorandum of Understanding, which marks the beginning of, and provides the general framework for…
Russia’s protest movement is spreading across the country and narrowing its focus to political issues, the Kommersant business daily reported Friday, citing a new study that tallied 434 rallies from April-June 2019. The Moscow-based Center for Social and Labor Rights NGO found that only the Chechnya and Chukotka regions saw little protest activity. “There are…
Background Gazprom Transgaz Tchaikovsky is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Gazprom. The company is focused on natural gas transmission to consumers in the Perm Territory, the Republic of Udmurtia, the Kirov Region and the Republic of Tatarstan, as well as on gas transit via 15 gas trunklines to the central regions of the Russian Federation and abroad. The company maintains over 10,500 kilometers of gas trunklines carrying more than 300 billion cubic meters of gas. The…
Russian airlines are demanding the government compensate them for three months of losses from suspended flights to Georgia as the neighboring countries move toward resuming the schedule, the Kommersant business daily reported Friday. President Vladimir Putin ordered the temporary ban of passenger flights from Russia to Georgia following an outbreak of unrest in Tbilisi triggered…
Release October 4, 2019, 14:30 The award ceremony of the 2018 corporate contest for the best inventors and innovators took place today at the meeting of the Scientific and Technical Council of Gazprom as part of the 9th St. Petersburg International Gas Forum. The top place in the Best Inventor among Gazprom’s Subsidiaries category was shared by Gazprom Transgaz Krasnodar and Severneftegazprom. In 2018, these…
Legendary game designer Hideo Kojima has arrived in Russia to promote his latest game, “Death Stranding,” at the IgroMir computer and video game expo. “Death Stranding” is a post-apocalyptic action thriller created exclusively for the PlayStation 4 and set to be released on Nov. 8. The game’s main characters were designed to resemble stars like…
As comic culture continues to catch on in Russia, Moscow’s annual Comic-Con has delighted, enthralled and captivated fans of comics and superheroes alike. This year’s event alone is expected to draw more than 160,000 people. Similar to Comic-Cons in other countries, the event is a pop culture smorgasbord, showcasing the latest in movies, television and…
Nicknamed the “Venice of the North” for its canals, rivers and bridges, St. Petersburg has had a close bond with Italy since it was first built on the Neva River. Peter the Great, envisioning a capital for his empire that could compare to the great capitals of Europe, invited the Swiss-Italian architect Domenico Trezzini to…
Russian journalist Yulia Yuzik has been detained in Iran on suspicion of espionage, according to her family members and Russian media reports. Yuzik’s disappearance was first announced by her daughter, who said her mother was arrested “in another country” and that her trial was scheduled for this Saturday. She faces up to 10 years on…
The Kremlin said on Friday that Moscow’s move to help Beijing build an early warning system to detect missile attacks showed the two countries had a special relationship. President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia was helping China build an early warning system to spot intercontinental ballistic missile launches, something only Russia and the United States possess at…
Only 10.3 million people in Russia can be fully considered as members of the middle class, according to Moscow’s Higher School of Economics (HSE). Real wages have been declining for five years in a row, fueled by Western sanctions and low oil prices. State-run media analysis of official data placed Russia’s middle-class figures at 14%,…
Ukraine plans to carry out a major prisoner swap with Russia and hopes it will take place next week, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko said late on Thursday. The comments come after a breakthrough at talks between Moscow and Kiev this week that open the way for an international summit to be held aimed at…