Rosneft has been fined $180 million by the Federal Anti-Monopoly Service for deliberately driving up wholesale prices for gasoline and other oil products in the first half of 2009, and Lukoil was warned that it could face a similar penalty...in which case, it's going to need the $1.5 billion it is trying to raise by selling dollar-denominated debt to international investors.  The state-owned Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant was raided by riot police yesterday as part of a probe into an August flood that killed 75 employees.  Iran agrees with the 'general framework' of the UN-brokered proposal that it send most of its enriched uranium to Russia for processing into reactor fuel, but plans to make some changes.  'One common reaction is: 'If the foreigners are prepared to agree to this, there must be something wrong with this from Iran's point ...

After a second consecutive month of growth in July, when GDP increased by 0.5%, government ministers Igor Shuvalov and Andrei Klepach have felt optimistic enough to suggest Russia's recession may be over - 'but the crisis has yet to be overcome'.  Sberbanks's profits fell by 93% in the first seven months of the year.  The bank will provide Rushydro with up to 20 billion rubles to fund the rebuilding of the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant.  ITAR-TASS reports that mortgage loan interest rates may decrease to pre-recession levels in 2-3 years.  Opel unions will put pressure on GM to accept the Magna bid for the car maker's European unit, promising 'spectacular measures' to push a deal through.  Apparently joblessness continues to rise in 47 of Russia's regions.  Following a chorus of criticism joined by Oleg Deripaska, ...

TODAY: Security shake-up in Ingushetia; blame put on local police; Russia does tit-for-tat on diplomats; Medvedev and Peres meet to discuss Middle East, Russia to reevaluate plan for weapons to Iran?; hope for power plant disaster survivors wanes.  CPJ fears for the death of journalism.According to the BBC, President Medvedev has appointed a new interior minister in Ingushetia, Viktor Zhirnov.  Russia's Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev's has slammed local police for failing to act on a tip-off they received about the bombing.  Medvedev has sent 'battle-hardened' Deputy Interior Minister Colonel-General Yedelev to Ingushetia to put the region 'in proper order'.  Reuters reports on the 'Afghan-isation' of the North Caucasus where the Kremlin's policy of '...

Yesterday's fatal accident at the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant will present a considerable setback in Russia's attempts to increase its power production, says the New York Times.  It will take 'years rather than months to restore three of the 10 turbines' that were destroyed.  President Medvedev has said that Russian oil enterprises should increase their presence in the Caspian Sea to reenforce the region's economy.  Lukoil has announced that hydrocarbon production in the first six months of the year increased 2% on last year and crude production by 4%.  Oerlikon has won a solar order worth $277 million from Nano Solar Technology, a business partly owned by Viktor Vekselberg, who has a controlling interest in Oerlikon itself.  Turkey may call off a tender for its first nuclear power reactor in order to create a new framework under ...