Main News of October 20

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD

British newspaper The Guardian scooped up two online journalism awards for its investigation of US surveillance programs leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden earlier this year.

 

RUSSIA

India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh arrived in Moscow for an official visit, during which he is due meet President Vladimir Putin and sign a series of agreements on trade, nuclear energy and defense equipment.

Police in St. Petersburg detained at least 24 people after a sanctioned demonstration against "crime involving foreign migrants" in a downtown area sparked violence on the city’s main street and a market area, local media reported.

Russia’s Federal centers of power should give hand of their functions to regional and local authorities, First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said.

Newly-elected Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, the Kremlin-backed incumbent who recently won the poll to stay at the helm of the Russian capital, has admitted he consulted with President Vladimir Putin about what role his rival, opposition leader Alexei Navalny,should play in the mayoral election.

Russia and Brazil are at the final stages of talks on the delivery of the Russian Pantsir-S1 air defense systems to the Latin American country, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said.

Russia’s space agency has a new mission on its plate: fighting asteroids, the organization’s head said.

An early-morning bar fight ended in shots fired from traumatic weapons in St. Petersburg, with police searching for the perpetrators, local investigators said.

 

SPORT

Russian boxer Ruslan Provodnikov won the world championship title over American Mike Alvarado with a technical knockout after the tenth round of a fight for the World Boxing Organization (WBO).

The Olympic flame for next year's Winter Games in Sochi arrived at the North Pole, the head of the organizing committee said.

Simona Halep continued her breakout 2013 tennis season by taking her fifth title of the year at the Kremlin Cup in Moscow with a straight-sets defeat of Samantha Stosur in the final.