News Russia Sets Its Sights on Naval Reform Russia may start construction of a new aircraft carrier by 2015, the Russian Navy commander said Monday. Presently, Russia has only one operational aircraft carrier, the Nikolai Kuznetsov, which was commissioned in the early 1990s and has recently re-entered service after a prolonged overhaul.

News Corruption Crackdown MOSCOW (RIA Novosti) - Foreign officials could in the future be brought to account for corruption-related crimes they commit in Russia, the chairman of the Anticorruption Commission of Russia's lower house of parliament told RIA Novosti in an interview Thursday.

News Russian TV Crew Held in Georgia MOSCOW (RIA Novosti) - The Ros­siya TV channel confirmed reports Thursday that two of its correspondents had been detained in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict area.

News Mother Accuses Doctors of Abuse NOVOSIBIRSK (Combined Re­ports) - A woman in Novosibirsk is pitted against local doctors whom she claims abused her baby daughter. Regional prosecutors have launched a criminal case after medics discovered a number of bruises on the baby. Relatives of one-year-old Alina

News Rice Smugglers Detained in Far East KHABAROVSK (RIA Novosti) - Customs officers at the international cargo terminal in Khabarovsk in Russia's Far East have arrested suspects attempting to smuggle 120 metric tons of rice from China, a local customs spokesman said Thursday.

News Trucks Block Russian-Latvian Border RIGA (RIA Novosti) - More than 1,300 trucks are stuck in queues on both sides of the Russian-Latvian border, a spokesman for the Latvian border guards said Thursday.

News 10 Year Residence Minimum for Senators MOSCOW (The Moscow News) - The upper chamber of Russia's parliament adopted a new set of amendments to laws on the Federation Council, now stipulating that a senator must have resided for at least 10 years on the territory he is representing.

National Extremism Bill Makes It Past Duma By Igor Yefimov As of now, printers and publishers of extremist materials will lose not only the materials but also the equipment that has been used to produce them. This amendment to the Code of Administrative Infractions was adopted by the State Duma July 4 on second reading. [The lower house passed it on the third and final reading July 6.- Ed] It introduces changes to a number of legislative acts designed to improve state control and administration in countering extremism. Given the rather loose definition of the notion of ‘extremism,' the new law will probably affect the media first and foremost.

National Local Self-Government, Still a Pipe Dream By Dmitry Bulin The Russian law gives a laconic and exhaustive definition of local self-government as "a form in which the people exercise their power." In this canonical sense, there is not even a whiff of local self-government in Russia. Until now it has been successfully superseded either by local arbitrariness or the vertical chain of administration. Today, reform (or less radically, improvement) of the system of local self-government is a widely debated issue.

News Attack on PM Shakes Up Abkhazia Ahead of Moscow Talks By Anna Arutunyan Abkhazia Prime Minister Alexander Ankvab was injured when his car came under attack Monday, just hours before Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov and Sergei Bagapsh, the president of this unrecognized breakaway region, signed a cooperation agreement. The agreement was meant to forge closer ties ahead of the 2014 Olympic Games in nearby Sochi.

News Security Council Chief Resignation Letter Has Media Buzzing By Anna Arutunyan Reports that Security Council chief Igor Ivanov intends to step down has the Russian media talking about what awaits the former Foreign Minister, and now the post that he may be leaving behind.

CIS Georgia Hosts NATO-led Emergency and Rescue Exercises TBILISI, Georgia (AP) - NATO-led rescue drills involving the air forces of 12 nations kicked off Wednesday in Georgia, which hopes that hosting the maneuvers will improve its chances of joining the Western military alliance.

News Russia’s New Black Sea Base Complete by 2012 The construction of a new base for the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the port of Novorossiisk will be completed by 2012, the Navy Commander said Wednesday. President Vladimir Putin signed a decree in 2003 setting up an alternative naval base for the Black Sea Fleet in Novorossiisk after Ukraine demanded the base in Sevastopol be withdrawn by 2017.

CIS Rabbi Accosted by Neo-Nazis in Ukraine KIEV, Ukraine (AP) - A group of about 20 people chanting Nazi slogans accosted a rabbi in central Ukraine, a Jewish community spokesman said Wednesday.

News Russia Protests Theft of Plaques from Graves of Soviet Soldiers in Prague PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AP) -The Russian government has lodged a formal protest over the theft of bronze plaques from 48 graves of Soviet soldiers at a Prague cemetery, an official said Wednesday.