| January 2012 |
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Tens of thousands people are expected to brave the bitter cold at two major rallies in downtown Moscow on Saturday as a power play between champions of political liberalization and supporters of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin continues to unfold.
Demonstrations against alleged electoral fraud by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party have taken place in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other cities. A protest on December 5 saw the largest opposition demonstration in Moscow for a decade. A second night of protests followed on December 6. A mass rally has been called for downtown Moscow on Saturday.

About 9,000 law enforcement officers will ensure public order and security at mass rallies downtown Moscow on Saturday.
The organizers of a new mass opposition protest in Moscow urged on Friday a nationwide voting campaign to prevent Prime Minister Vladimir Putin from returning to the Kremlin next month.
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The upper chamber of the Russian parliament, the Federation Council, set March 4 as the date of the 2012 presidential elections.

RIA Novosti’s International News Service will cover Saturday’s march and a rally demanding fair presidential elections and a rally by supporters of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Moscow in English, Chinese, German, French, Spanish, Arabic and Persian languages.
The Phobos-Grunt probe was launched from the Baikonur Space Center in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, but its engines failed to put it on course for the Red Planet.

Two space-defense missile plants will be built in central Russia, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said on Friday.
Russia’s ruling United Russia party said non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are excessively politicized and financed from abroad and need to be regulated.
The Russian Foreign Ministry rejected reports on Friday that it could strike a deal on Iran with the United States in exchange for non-intervention by the West in Syria.
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Ukraine should own a 34 percent stake in any gas transortation consortium with Russia and the EU to manage its gas transportation system, Germany's Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper reported on Friday, quoting Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych as saying.
Ukraine's new leader Viktor Yanukovych is seeking to revise a long-term gas deal by offering Russia a stake in its gas transportation system, which currently
accounts for about 80% of Russian natural gas exports to Europe. The project was put on hold during Yushchenko's presidency. 

Faced with a cold snap, some Gazprom customers in Europe have complained that deliveries of Russian natural gas have declined, but Gazprom said they were asking for above-contract volumes, a Gazprom export official, Sergei Komlev, said on Friday.
Sukhoi Civil Aircraft has received the Type Certificate for its Sukhoi Superjet 100 (SSJ100) regional passenger aircraft from the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), the company’s press service said on Friday.
A surface warship in Russia’s Northern Fleet has for the first time achieved 100-percent manning by contract servicemen, a Western Military District spokesman said on Friday.
All tenders on state defense contracts are to be completed by April 15, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Friday.
At least 64 people died of hypothermia across Russia in January from the freezing weather gripping most of the country, Maxim Topilin, a deputy health minister, said on Friday.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Friday proposed an individual performance assessment system for civil servants.
A technical and economic assessment of the South Stream gas project will
be ready in February 2011 and the pipeline will go into operation at
the end of 2015. Russia has already signed intergovernmental agreements with Bulgaria,
Serbia, Hungary, Slovenia and Croatia to implement the onshore part of
the project.




