United Russia is a party of like-minded individuals only in so far as its members want to be big bosses.

International Women's Day, a once-quintessential Socialist occasion, is now just another Valentine's Day.

GAZ, Russia's second-largest automaker, could lose its best customer -- and its flagship model -- if the Iraqi government is toppled.

Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin urged citizens not to shift their savings out of the American currency because it will not fall dramatically.

Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Sunday that Russia's economy was strong enough to cushion the impact of a possible war in Iraq.

Baltic Oil Shipments VILNIUS, Lithuania (Reuters) -- Lithuania will start exporting Russian crude oil via the state-owned Klaipedos Nafta terminal besides boosting export capacity at the Butinge terminal, Lithuania's economy minister said Friday. ""Klaipedos Nafta is now adapting fuel oil facilities to also handle crude brought in from Russia,"" Petras Cesna told a news conference, noting that until now the firm had only handled light oil products delivered by rail. ""This is especially good for the summer when demand for fuel oil shrinks,"" he said. Butinge, which as part of the Mazheikiu Nafta oil complex is 53.7 percent owned by Russian oil major Yukos and 40.66 percent by the Lithuanian state, recently asked the government to increase its authorized export volume from the present 160,000 barrels per day to 260,000 bpd.

Transneft is not building oil pipelines quickly enough to handle rising output, forcing Moscow to face continuing domestic gluts and a cap on significantly higher exports.

Russian oil experts in India are under police protection due to fears that separatist rebels who blew up a gas pipeline and storage depot may try to kidnap them.