MOSCOW – President Dmitry Medvedev warned that the crisis gripping Russia’s banks and capital markets has spread to the real economy and pledged to use the Kremlin’s still-massive oil wealth to provide more state aid for stricken industries.

His comments, his frankest on the subject yet, came as the World Bank cut its growth forecast for Russia next year by more than half because of the country’s acute dependence on oil prices. The bank said it expects the ruble to keep softening as it tracks oil prices lower. Read more…

MOSCOW, Nov 18 (Reuters) – Russia pledged fresh efforts to boost its economy on Tuesday after data showed industry growth slumping and the World Bank said further weakness in the rouble looked inevitable. Read more…

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Rising unemployment and economic crisis in Russia will force Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev from power by 2012, an opposition leader predicted on Tuesday.

“I believe this regime will not see 2012. It is probable it will not see out 2010. Things are unfolding too fast,” Garry Kasparov, a former world chess champion who has led a crusade against Kremlin policies, told Reuters in an interview. Read more…

Moscow, Jun 13 (Prensa Latina) Russia’s Attorney General Investigation Office said corruption exceeds 2,000 fold official estimates. Read more…

Approximately $33.5 billion is paid annually in bribes by big companies to corrupt officials, while the total amount of funds grafted by officials employed at different levels of the bureaucratic hierarchy is roughly a third of the state budget, or $120 billion, according to reports published at a recent meeting of the Investigation Committee of the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office. Read more…

Successful companies are bankrupted, sold off and their staff sacked after financial attacks by gangs who seem above the law. Read more…

In Russia corruption has been a bit like that elephant stuck in the corner of the living room: everyone knows that it is there but is loath to acknowledge it. At least until President Dmitry Medvedev came to power, pledging to stamp out corruption which has been a strain on Russia’s economy and its ability to attract investment. Read more…

REUTERS/RIA Novosti/Kremlin/Sergei Subbotin/Pool Incoming Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (L) listens to explanations of film director Nikita Mikhalkov at a shooting area of the movie “Burnt by the Sun” Part Two at settlement Shushary outside …

Dmitry Medvedev was sworn in as Russia’s new president this past week, in a stately event at the Kremlin that should make no one feel at ease. Medvedev, 42, is the hand-picked successor of former president (and former KGB colonel) Vladimir Putin. Read more…

All that was left behind was a pool of blood when Leonid Rozhetskin disappeared two months ago. Investigators are still no closer to working out what happened. What has become of the Russian tycoon with a thirst for danger?

There was blood on the carpet. Lots of it. The room was in disarray, but nobody had seen a fight. The villa was secluded in its own private pine wood, yards from a beautiful white beach on the coast of Latvia. The owner was gone. Read more…

MOSCOW (Passport) — Historians, philosophers and novelists have for centuries struggled with one of the great questions of mankind: Why did Russia veer so tragically away from the democratic path of the rest of Europe?

The answer, according to recent archeologist findings, is that Russia is built on an ancient Indian burial site, one which was never supposed to be disturbed. Read more…