Russian Officials

Russian tax authorities filed lawsuits demanding the liquidation of the private media company Media-Most, officials said Friday, as the company's beleaguered chief, Vladimir A. Gusinsky, sought bail from a Spanish jail. The civil suits submitted by Tax Inspectorate officials to the Moscow Arbitration Court demanded the dissolution of Media-Most and its flagship NTV television for insolvency, a court spokesman said. NTV is the country's only private nationwide channel.

MOSCOW - Russian authorities detained an American diplomat accused of attempting to recruit a Russian intelligence officer into the CIA, the Federal Security Service said Tuesday. Ryan Christopher Fogle, the third secretary of the American Embassy in Moscow, was held overnight before being handed over to U.S. authorities Tuesday, according to the Federal Security Service, or FSB, the main successor agency to the KGB. Fogle, who was ordered to leave the country, was carrying a large amount of money and written instructions for the Russian recruit, the FSB said.

Russia's foreign minister criticized the United States on Sunday for expressing concern about actions against the giant Yukos oil company, but President Vladimir V. Putin's new chief of staff said he doubted the wisdom of freezing a large chunk of the company's shares.

MOSCOW -- North Korea has recommended that foreign embassies and consulates evacuate their personnel from the country given rising tensions with the U.S. and South Korea, a top Russian official said Friday. "This suggestion was received by all the consulates in Pyongyang, and now we are trying to clarify the situation," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters during a visit to Uzbekistan. "We put before our North Korean neighbors several questions necessary to be asked in such a case.

Russian figure skating officials denied knowledge of an alleged conspiracy to fix the pairs and ice dancing events at the Salt Lake City Olympics, denouncing what they called "the continuing campaign of groundless attacks on Russian figure skaters that has been unleashed in North America."

moscow -- Top Russian officials on Friday publicly rejected a new proposal personally presented by two senior U.S. Cabinet secretaries aimed at persuading Moscow to withdraw its objections to a missile defense system in Eastern Europe. Moscow's rebuff was made in substance and tone, with President Vladimir V. Putin coming close to openly ridiculing the antimissile system and the Russian foreign minister saying the U.S.

Years after the former Soviet Union failed in its occupation of Afghanistan and then fell apart, Afghans got revenge, of sorts. They occupied a small, ruined piece of Russia. As many as 20,000 Afghans, mostly farmers from the plains north of Kabul, have moved into the sprawling and empty Russian Embassy compound, which under international law is still rightfully sovereign Russian territory.

An explosion ripped through the home of a district leader in Chechnya, wounding her and killing her brother. It was the latest in a series of attacks on pro-Russian officials. Chechen rebels are targeting local officials who work with federal authorities, aiming to cripple Moscow's efforts to build a stable local government, Russian officials say. In the latest attack, a bomb went off at the house of Isita Gairbekova, head of Chechnya's Nozhai-Yurt district.

NHL President John Ziegler said he has forbidden Russian players to join their homeland's national team while the former Soviet Army team is suing the Detroit Red Wings. Ziegler testified for nearly six hours in a U.S. District Court case in which Russian officials are trying to get Viacheslav Kozlov's Detroit contract ruled invalid to return him to the Central Sports Club.

Richard L. Bliss, an American technician charged with espionage, will not have to go back to Russia, a U.S. official said in Washington. Bliss was arrested Nov. 25 in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don while installing a cellular telephone system. Presumably, Russian officials knew that he could not be compelled to return when they allowed him to go home for the Christmas holidays.

MOSCOW -- The Russian government has no idea how about 44% of the country's registered workers are making a living, a top official said Wednesday. Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets said the government is unaware of what's happening with about 38 million of the 86 million Russians registered as workers. About 48 million people are working in sectors of the economy that officials “can see and understand,” she said. “It is unclear what everybody else is involved in and to what extent,” Golodets said at an international economic conference at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow.

The Bolshoi Ballet will be the subject of a government audit after January's acid attack on the company's artistic director, according to an Associated Press report. The legendary dance company has been in the international spotlight after assailants threw acid in the face of artistic director Sergei Filin near his Moscow home. PHOTOS: Bolshoi acid attack Russia's audit agency said Thursday that the investigation had been planned in advance, according to the AP. It said the audit isn't linked to the accusations of financial abuse raised by Bolshoi soloist Pavel Dmitrichenko, who was arrested this month on charges of staging the attack on Filin.

News swirled this week that a 3-year-old adopted from Russian who died in a Texas hospital last month had bruises on his body, stoking the already sensitive topic of Americans adopting Russian toddlers. While one Russian official characterized the Jan. 21 death of Max Alan Shatto as “inhuman treatment” at the hands of American adoptive parents, federal, state and local officials in the U.S. stressed prudence as the investigation continues. The Sheriff's Department in Ector County, Texas, where the boy's parents live, launched an investigation into the case after responding to a local emergency room, where the boy died, department spokesman Gary Duesler said.

MOSCOW -- Russia has prepared the “Guantanamo list” of U.S. officials who will be denied entry visas, officials in Moscow said Friday, the latest apparent retaliation for a U.S. law imposing sanctions on Russians over the death of an activist lawyer. Alexei Pushkov, chairman of the foreign relations committee in the lower house of parliament, said Friday the list as drafted last month initially included 11 U.S. officials involved in running the prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and other sites allegedly used by the U.S. and its allies as secret prisons to hold terrorism suspects.

MOSCOW -- Russia is ready to meet with leaders of the opposition group seeking to overthrow Moscow's ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, a high Russian official confirmed Friday. "We expressed readiness to meet with [the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces] head A. M. al Khatib and are still inclined to do it,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said during a news conference in Moscow after meeting with his Egyptian counterpart, Mohamed Kamel Amr. “We understand that they don't have objections to the proposal to meet.” Russia has long been one of Assad's staunchest supporters, along with Iran.

BEIRUT -- A top Russian official conceded Thursday that time may be running out for Moscow's close ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, as the latest in a series of car bomb attacks reportedly killed 16 outside the Syrian capital. "We must face the facts: The possibility exists that the [Syrian] government may progressively lose control over an increasing part of the territory," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov said in Moscow, according to Russian news accounts. "An opposition victory can't be excluded.

News swirled this week that a 3-year-old adopted from Russian who died in a Texas hospital last month had bruises on his body, stoking the already sensitive topic of Americans adopting Russian toddlers. While one Russian official characterized the Jan. 21 death of Max Alan Shatto as “inhuman treatment” at the hands of American adoptive parents, federal, state and local officials in the U.S. stressed prudence as the investigation continues. The Sheriff's Department in Ector County, Texas, where the boy's parents live, launched an investigation into the case after responding to a local emergency room, where the boy died, department spokesman Gary Duesler said.

Russian authorities said they had confirmed that a man killed over the weekend in a clash with Russian border guards in the Dagestan region was Ruslan Gelayev, 39, one of Chechnya's most powerful rebel warlords. Officials cited a leg wound, personal effects and statements from rebel suspects in making the identification. Russian officials have in the past repeatedly reported Gelayev's death.

As concerns mount that Syrian President Bashar Assad could unleash chemical weapons against his opponents, the Kremlin appears to be recalibrating its support for a desperate ally. Russia three times has wielded its veto power in the U.N. Security Council to shield Assad from international condemnation for brutality against Syrians fighting for his ouster, a 21-month-old siege that by some accounts has taken 40,000 lives and displaced 2.5 million. Russian President Vladimir Putin signaled the first step back from ardent defense of Assad after a meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan this week.

MOSCOW - Prisoners detained without charges. Prisons operating outside the legal system. Limits on free speech and the Internet. Legitimate voters prevented from casting their ballots. Sanctioned kidnappings. Witch hunts and torture. It's all part of life, says the Russian government - in the United States. The Russian Foreign Ministry on Monday issued a 56-page report in Russian and English titled, " On the Human Rights Situation in the United States . " The report, distributed at hearings held by the International Affairs Committee of Russia's lower house of parliament, was the first such full examination of the U.S. human rights record issued here since the fall of communism in 1991.