Billionaire Mikhail Fridman resigned Monday as chief executive of TNK-BP, plunging the country's No. 3 oil firm deeper into crisis and challenging co-owner BP's grip on the business.

The founder of the social networking site Vkontakte celebrated St. Petersburg’s 309th anniversary over the weekend by tossing paper airplanes carrying 5,000-ruble notes out a building window.

The bottom half of what will be Russia’s biggest ice-resistant drilling platform looked like a gigantic upside-down table.

In a recent article that ran in Russia Beyond the Headlines, a newspaper supplement that is produced by state-owned Rossiiskaya Gazeta and is distributed to leading publications around the world, political correspondent Dmitry Babich wrote: "The much-praised middle class … who were behind the protests never threatened Putin with strikes. The reason was simple: The city could happily live with those people striking."

Analysts warned Monday that privately owned investment bank Renaissance Capital would be forced into more redundancies, after it fired a second tranche of employees last week in the same month that it announced its biggest loss for 10 years.

Four Russian bikers jailed for five days after entering Iraq with fake visas were to arrive in Moscow late Monday — without their motorcycles but grateful for freedom despite, as one of them said, their “stupidity.”

Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin has ordered prosecutors to investigate the "illegal" privatization of property assets belonging to the Yakovlev and Tupolev aviation firms.

The latest major opposition protest may serve as the first test of a tough new rally law that could be approved as early as next week.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague on Monday became the first senior Western official to hold talks with the new Russian government, in what analysts labeled an initiative to prevent further deterioration of relations.

The Foreign Ministry assailed U.S. Ambassador Michael McFaul for comments he made to students last week, saying the ministry was "utterly shocked" and that McFaul's remarks went "far beyond the bounds of diplomatic etiquette."

A tabloid claims that Russian intelligence agencies are investigating the possibility that the U.S. military may have brought down the Sukhoi Superjet that crashed in Indonesia.

When Mathias Rust landed his white Cessna on Red Square on May 28, 1987, he had placed all his hopes for world peace in Mikhail Gorbachev.

Sweden’s Loreen won the Eurovision Song Contest in Azerbaijan on Sunday before an international TV audience of 100 million, days after angering Azeri authorities by meeting rights activists critical of the host country’s human rights record.

Russia's group Buranovskiye Babushki has made it into the finals of the Eurovision Song Contest in Baku, Azerbaijan, bringing the elderly folk singers from a far-off Russian village to the attention of more than 100 million viewers around the world.

Continued protests in Russia will likely lead to violence or chaotic change, according to a new study ordered by the former finance minister.

Sergei Udaltsov and Alexei Navalny emerged from prison Thursday, while a dramatic standoff erupted at a State Duma hearing over a bill that would hike fines for illegal demonstrations.

About 150 people were detained Sunday as scores of people gathered for a series of anti-government demonstrations in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Following the president's order to cut the number of officials entitled to use flashing lights to skirt through traffic, several incidents of alleged abuse involving high-profile figures have come to light.

Ukraine's ruling party has triggered violent protests with a move to upgrade the official role of Russian, a sensitive issue opponents say will split the country.

A day after the formation of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev’s government, seven ministers who did not make the cut have resurfaced as senior staff in President Vladimir Putin’s administration.

As Moscow gears up to celebrate its victory in World War II, 67 years ago Wednesday, the shadow of political conflict shrouds the capital as hundreds of arrests cloud Victory Day festivities. 



A stunning 121-megapixel snapshot of the Earth was taken by a Russian weather satellite in what is thought to be the highest resolution picture of the planet ever taken from space.

Search and rescue helicopters and volunteers struggling through thick forest and mountainous terrain spotted bodies but no survivors on the Indonesian mountainside where a Sukhoi Superjet 100 crashed by the time darkness forced an end to the search Thursday night.

After the end of World War II, Paul Sadler returned home to Chicago with three German books and a photo album from the Dachau concentration camp.

A tabloid claims that Russian intelligence agencies are investigating the possibility that the U.S. military may have brought down the Sukhoi Superjet that crashed in Indonesia.

A 46-year-old furniture magnate was killed with six gunshot wounds to the head and chest early Sunday as he arrived in his Mercedes at his home in the Moscow region.

Three thrill-seekers who climbed two Vladivostok bridges earlier this week and took photos from the top were fined 300 rubles ($10) each for trespassing.

President Vladimir Putin on Monday announced the makeup of the new Cabinet answering to Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, with three-fourths of the members having been replaced.

A dark cloud was cast Wednesday on the revival of Russia’s aviation industry when a Sukhoi-built Superjet 100 with 50 people on board disappeared from the radar screens of Indonesian flight controllers.

On Monday, Vladimir Putin will take the presidential oath of office for the third time. After 12 years in power, Putin has increased his control over the country's major institutions, the siloviki and state bureaucracy.