Gorbachev calls for probe of seizure
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HAMBURG -- Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev yesterday called for a ''clear and careful analysis&quot; of last week's hostage drama at a school in southern Russia and argued that parliament should be involved in the investigation.
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Russia's President Vladimir Putin on Friday urged the West to persuade Georgia's leadership to change its "irresponsible" policies, the Kremlin press service said in a statement.
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Police on Wednesday investigated the death of a billionaire Georgian opposition leader accused of fomenting a coup in the ex-Soviet state which they said was "suspicious".
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President Vladimir Putin has agreed to a parliamentary investigation in an apparent response to public criticism over last week&#39;s deadly school hostage siege.
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LONDON, Sep 24 (IPS) - Mikhail Gorbachev is an ex-president going after  weapons of mass destruction. But not the way U.S. President  George Bush thought he was going after them in Iraq.
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MOSCOW - Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev warned yesterday against whitewashing the crimes of dictator Josef Stalin, stressing that Russia cannot move forward without facing the truth about its bloody past.
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The quality of mercy Mikhail Gorbachev, the former, and last, leader of the Soviet Union is asking Bill Gates to intervene in a case of a Russian school teacher who is facing time in a Siberian prison camp for using pirated software.â¦
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BUCHALKI, Russia - Russian investigators labored Wednesday to determine whether terrorism caused the near-simultaneous crashes of two jetliners, killing all 89 people aboard and spreading anxieties about a possible bloody escalation of the Chechen conflict.    Officials stressed that no evidence of a terrorist attack had yet been found among charred wreckage and said they opened a criminal investigation as they looked into other causes like bad fuel, equipment malfunction and human error...
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Alexander Torshin, the head of a parliamentary commission investigating last month&#39;s Beslan school hostage crisis, on Tuesday questioned officials&#39; contentions that the raiders were using narcotics, saying he believes they were deranged by an unknown drug
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft is sidestepping an appeal from a former leader of the Soviet Union to intervene in a piracy case involving a school principal. Mikhail Gorbachev, who is credited with aiding the end of the Cold War, wrote to Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates on Monday asking for help in halting the trial of Aleksandr Ponosov, 40, who could face up to five years in prison. In the letter, posted on his Web site in Russian, Gorbachev wrote that his country finds the prosecution of Ponosov scandalous. Ponosov, 40, was charged in November with using more than $10,000 in pirated Microsoft software. The principal claims he bought the computers with the unlicensed software preinstalled. Police seized 12 computers from his school in the village of Vereschagino in western Russia in May 2006, but soon returned them so the school could conduct its computer science exams. Gorbachev wrote that while Russian law allows for the prosecution of those who unknowingly use pirated software, the case against Ponosov is unwarranted. The former leader also made an emotional appeal, writing that Ponosov dedicated his life to teaching for a modest salary, which doesn't compare to those of Microsoft employees. Gorbachev's high-level intervention comes as Microsoft continues anÂ aggressive legal campaign to stop piracyÂ of its software. Microsoft has launched dozens of civil lawsuits and aided law enforcement in criminal investigations throughout Europe and the U.S. A Microsoft executive said Tuesday that Russian authorities contacted the company to verify the software was illegal. Microsoft did not request that charges be filed, and the decision to charge Ponosov was made by prosecutors, said Kim Gagne, corporate affairs director for central and eastern Europe. Microsoft will not pursue a civil case against the principal. "We don't see this as a serious violation," said Olga Dergunova, who heads Microsoft's Russian operations. The protection of intellectual property has become a key sticking point between Russia and the U.S., which has said lax enforcement hurts Russia's chances of entering the World Trade Organization. Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week the focus should be on the producers and distributors of pirated software. "The law recognizes the concept of someone who purchased the product in good faith," Putin said at his annual press conference on Feb. 1. "It is easy to just grab someone and punish, but what we need to do is get to the bottom of each case, which is harder," he said. During a visit to Moscow in November, Gates said Microsoft will do what it can to provide Russian school children with advanced software while also praising government efforts to protect intellectual property, according to the RIA Novosti, a government-owned news agency. (Pavel Kupriyanov of Computerworld Russia contributed to this story). Â
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By Bill Condie, Evening Standard, London  Feb. 7--In a bid to stem a PR disaster in Russia, Microsoft today told  former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev that it is not responsible for the  prosecution of a poor headmaster for buying pirated Windows software.
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State prosecutors from Equatorial Guinea have requested permission to question Mark Thatcher over his alleged involvement in coup attempt on President Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
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The Russian parliament plans to form a commission to investigate the Beslan school siege that ended a week ago with the death of more than 330 hostages.
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FORMER Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has called for a &quot;clear and careful analysis&quot; of last week&#39;s hostage drama at a school in southern Russia and argued that parliament should be involved in the investigation.
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Ukraine's outgoing government sought Monday to control the inquiry into the poisoning of presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko, with officials close to the government taking charge of both investigations into who tried to harm or kill the leader of the "Orange Revolution."
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The head of a parliamentary commission investigating the September hostage seizure at a school in southern Russia said there is evidence of involvement by a foreign intelligence agency, the Interfax news agency reported Saturday.
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Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev must be tried over the Beslan massacre, rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov says.