The body of Polish President Lech Kaczynski...

The red area in Moscow

MOSCOW, December 10 (RIA Novosti) - Russian...

MOSCOW, December 10 (RIA Novosti) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday that Russia Today, the country"s first 24-hour English-language news channel, that hit the airwaves at 1 p.m. GMT, would be a success overseas. "I do believe that giving the huge interest to everything related to Russia, be it culture, history, modern days developments, the information demand for Russian news, for Russian views of the world affairs, and of coverage of what is going on in Russia is going to be huge," Lavrov said in an interview with the channel. "And I think that the initiative to create this channel is a welcome one and will certainly get a lot of viewers around the globe," the minister said. Margarita Simonyan, the 26-year-old chief editor of Russia Today, said Friday: "We have several satellites, and we will broadcast to the United States and Canada via IA-5 and to Europe via Hotbird-6." She added that the Taicom-3 satellite would transmit the channel"s programs to Asia, Africa and Australia. Simonyan said people in Russia would be able to watch the channel as part of the NTV-plus basic package. The launch of Russia Today was announced in June, and technical broadcasting began September 15. "We want to show the way Russia sees itself and the world," Simonyan said when the channel was launched. She also said the channel would seek to strike a balance between domestic and international news reports.

Russian gas monopoly Gazprom paid $625 mln...

Russian gas monopoly Gazprom paid $625 mln on Wednesday to acquire an additional 12.5% stake in Beltransgaz, bringing its total share in the Belarusian gas transport company to 50%.

Russia could soon sign a contract with a...

Russia could soon sign a contract with a U.S. space company on the delivery of Soviet-era rocket boosters in support of the development of the Taurus II space launch vehicle, a Russian newspaper said on Wednesday.