Main News of May 6

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

RUSSIA

* Thousands of opposition activists rallied in Moscow to mark the first anniversary of a protest march that erupted into violence and triggered a radical tightening of political screws by the Kremlin.

* The share of new weaponry in service with the Russian armed forces must reach up to 75 percent by 2020 in order to ensure the country's defense capability is sufficient, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said.

* Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said he had no plans to offer any assistance to the suspects in last month’s deadly bombing in Boston, saying that the two brothers “got what they deserved.”

* Russia does not have conclusive evidence that chemical weapons have been used in Syria, Russian Security Council head Nikolai Patrushev said.

* The launch of Russia’s new Angara carrier rocket has been delayed by at least a year, Defense Ministry officials said.

* Russia’s newest Baltic Fleet warship, the Project 20380 Boiky corvette, will be handed over to the Navy on May 16, St. Petersburg's Severnaya Verf shipyard said.

* A Moscow Region court has sentenced a Tajik national, who was caught stashing a large amount of heroin in his rented apartment, to 9.5 years in a high security prison, the Federal Drug Control Service said.

* Law-enforcement officers in Russia’s southern Astrakhan Region said they had detained seven members of an undisclosed extremist organization and confiscated explosives from them.

* A Mi-8 helicopter carrying nine people and tons of explosives crashed in Siberia’s Irkutsk Region, the Emergencies Ministry said.

 

WORLD

* US officials are “highly skeptical” of claims that Syrian rebels had deployed chemical weapons in their war with forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

* Giulio Andreotti, the man who was seven times the prime minister of Italy, has died at the age of 94, Italian media said, citing family sources.

* South Korea and the United States began an antisubmarine exercise in the Yellow Sea, the Yonhap news agency reported.

* Serbia is planning to buy several MiG-29M/M2 Fulcrum fighter jets from Russia, and Serbian pilots are already being trained in flying the aircraft, the country’s First Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Aleksandar Vucic said.

 

BUSINESS

* The board of directors of Russia’s state-controlled oil giant Rosneft has recommended that 25 percent of the company’s net profit be allocated for dividend payouts for 2012, Rosneft said.

 

SPACE

* Russia’s space agency Roscosmos said it had reached an agreement with US-based Space Adventures Ltd. company to proceed with the plans to put British singer Sarah Brightman on a space flight to the International Space Station (ISS) in October 2015.

 

SPORTS

* Russia has won four medals at the Chicago Sabre World Cup, including a gold in the men's team event.