The following is a press release being distributed today on behalf of the Mikhail Khodorkovsky defense team:

OVERWHELMING MAJORITY OF ITALIAN PARLIAMENT VOTE TO SUPPORT MIKHAIL KHORDOKOVSKY

Rome, September 23, 2009 - The Italian parliament today voted in favour of a motion urging the Italian Government "to activate all diplomatic channels, together with other European partners, to guarantee the respect for human rights and the right of defence for Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev and for all Russian citizens". The motion, presented at the Lower Chamber by Pier Ferdinando Casini, leader of the Christian Democrat Party (UDC), received overwhelming support: out of 478 MPs attending the plenary session, 430 voted in favour. During the debate, Alfredo Mantica, Undersecretary of State for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, expressed support for the motion on behalf of the Government and called for unanimous adoption

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Andrew Wilson of the European Council on Foreign Relations has a piece on Transitions Online which takes a look at some opinions of Gleb Pavlovsky and Yevgeny Gontmahker to debate what the Pikalyovo incident did and did not teach us about politics in Russia.Pikalyovo was also an attempt to address the inefficiencies in Putin's authoritarian project by creating what Russians call obratnaya sviaz ("reverse connection"). The system works, but only just. Russia still needs a modernization project, albeit not the "prosperity project," backed by good finances and sound macroeconomics, which the Putin-Medvedev tandem was originally supposed to implement. Not only will Russia have to proceed with fewer resources, it will have to tackle the flip side of a stronger state, what even Pavlovsky calls "severe monopolism in all social spheres," not just in government and the economy, but in the mass media and in society at ...

The Associated Press is running a story on some comments made by President Medvedev during a television address following meetings with Yabloko party representatives.  Considering the elements that Medvedev and other liberal reformers are up against in the Kremlin, he is telling the truth here - these are significant steps toward democracy, even if democracy is still a long, long ways away.  Also, this news makes zero sense next to that other report from United Russia...  This government appears to be split on message - either you are working toward democracy, or you are arguing that you don't need it.  Despite shortcomings and the whole words-vs.-actions thing, it is positive to hear the Russian president make these comments.President Medvedev, as quoted by AP:...

Today a former KGB spy, living in Canada since 1997, has taken refuge inside a church in Vancouver in a desperate move to avoid deportation of himself and his family.  The Canadian authorities are seeking to send Mikhail Lennikov, his wife Irina, and 17-year-old son Dmitri, back to Russia for having engaged in acts of espionage and subversion against democratic governments under the Soviet Union (though Lennikov insists that he was a low level translator).  To wit, a Federal Court rejected pleas from Lennikov's lawyers to suspend this deportation.Lennikov has rallied a staggering amount of political support, which may not be surprising for Canada given the country's traditionally forgiving stance toward refugees.  Over the past six months, the Lennikov case has become a media ...

In what may be the understatement of the year, Mikhail Gorbachev complains that Europe misunderstands Russia: Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev says Western portrayals of Russia as an aggressive, imperialist nation are "nonsense."Gorbachev said Wednesday that Europe misunderstands Russia and stressed that his country does not want military confrontation with anyone.It's not difficult to see where these portrayals of Russia come from.  Earlier in the day, a Kremlin policy paper signed by the president struck a much different tone, warning that armed conflict may break out at its borders over energy resources.

"The international policy in the long run will be focused on getting hold of energy sources, including in the Middle East, the Barents Sea shelf and other Arctic regions, the Caspian and

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Remember Natalia Morari (Morar)?  She was once one of Russia's most intrepid young investigative journalists, working for the news magazine the New Times.  She uncovered a few blockbuster stories about connections between an Austrian bank, a money laundering scheme which may or may not have been related to the government, and the murder of central banker Anderi Kozlov (we posted translations of both pieces).  Her reward for these journalistic achievements was not a Pulitzer-like prize, but rather expulsion from the country back to Moldova.  In an interview with Grigory Pasko for this blog, Morari says that she believes she was exiled in relation with her investigative reporting on corruption, where she named names like Bortnikov, Sobyanin, and Surkov.Now Morari is back, right ...

With the prospect of 30 million pounds of uranium evaporating from the supply lines four years hence, Blackmont Capital research analyst George Topping sees sovereign stockpiling already beginning to make itself felt on the demand side of the equation. In this exclusive interview with The Energy Report, George says he sees the price nudging up to $65 by the end of this year, then to $70 in 2010, $80 in 2011 and $100 within five years.

The Energy Report: Let’s begin with some of your thoughts about uranium. Almost two years ago, spot prices hit a record $137 per pound. A year ago—well before the bottom fell out of virtually all the markets—the spot price dropped by nearly half, to the neighborhood of $70. You focus a lot of your attention on uranium. How do you see its future shaping up?

George Topping: The situation right now is you’ve got the spot …

George Topping, a research analyst specializing in the mining sector at Blackmont Capital, pays closer attention to uranium and copper than he does gold and silver, but in this exclusive interview with The Gold Report, he shares what he foresees: gold flat at $950 per ounce (in real terms) through 2011, copper at $1.80 per pound in two years, and uranium nudging up $100 per pound within five years.

The Gold Report: Let’s begin with some of your thoughts about uranium. Almost two years ago, spot prices hit a record $137 per pound. A year ago—well before the bottom fell out of virtually all the markets—the spot price dropped by nearly half, to the neighborhood of $70. You focus a lot of your attention on uranium. How do you see its future shaping up?

George Topping: The situation right now is you’ve got the spot price down at about $43 a pound …

Dow futures are way, way down this morning as the US financial sector careens toward a ditch. On the other hand, gold started the morning up $14, but it's only up $5 as I write this as the US dollar rallies. We'll sit the morning out -- I may have trading recommendations for my services later.

Source: Chart of the Day/Bloomberg

“Despite all the rhetoric, with the rally in the dollar index, OPEC is still saying `thank you very much,''' Olivier Jakob, managing director of Petromatrix Gmbh in Zug, Switzerland, said. “For OPEC, $80 now is the same as $100 two months ago.''

Loss of Merrill, Lehman Signals `Tectonic' Shift in Wall Street Landscape In the biggest reshaping of the financial industry since the Great Depression, two of Wall Street's most storied firms, Merrill Lynch & Co. and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., headed toward extinction.

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It’s really make-or-break time for the CRB. That said, the 61% retracement is a good place to bounce, and pullback to this level is quite normal in a commodity bull market.Oil should be bouncing a lot more than it is with a Category 3 hurricane headed toward Energy Alley. This is indicative of the extreme pessimism in the market right now. Let’s see how the week plays out.

Gold also isn’t getting much of a break despite news of a big ramp-up in buying in India. Hmm …

Here is some news you can use.

OIL

Oil Rebounds From Five-Month Low as Ike Nears; Gold, Wheat, Copper Gain Crude oil and copper led gains in commodities as Hurricane Ike threatened rigs in the Gulf of Mexico and the U.S. government's takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bolstered

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