A brief look at the stories making headlines in the Russian-language press

Jamie Foxx, Oprah Winfrey, Maya Angelou, Angelina Jolie. These are just a few of the famous faces who have gotten involved in the world crisis of how to help raise the many children who find themselves without homes.

In an age whose crabbed sense of justice finds expression in dismal phrases like ""zero tolerance"" and ""three strikes and you're out,"" the events in a New York courtroom on Monday came as an undeserved gift, something startling and luminous.

Politicians and the media have suddenly realized that there are young people in Russia. Not a week goes by without some announcement of a new endeavor that has been cooked up by the opposition or supporters of the current regime to attract and educate Russia's youth. We hear how the National Bolshevik activists are on trial after taking over the presidential administration reception office last December.

I am thinking a terrible thought. I've been trying to push it to the back of my mind, because there are many good reasons not to think it. It's about Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who is serving a nine-year prison sentence, and one shouldn't think these kinds of thoughts about people who are down.

President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday said the law allowing him to hire and fire governors had worked well since its introduction in January, but admitted there were delays in nominating new candidates.

While the oligarchs used to ignore government requests to help improve the prison system, now -- when they would like to lend a hand -- their contributions are no longer welcome, Federal Prison Service chief Yury Kalinin said in an interview published on Wednesday.

Presidential envoy Konstantin Pulikovsky, who met recently with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, said Wednesday that Kim told him Pyongyang might return to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty provided his country faced no threat from the United States, Interfax reported.