January 20, 2014. A court hearing where the pre-trial restrictions will be determined for eco-activists Igor Zhitenev and Mikhail Bezmensky will take place in Tverskoy Court of Moscow on January 20. The two men are suspected of extortion attempts targeted at Ural Mining & Metallurgical Company (UMMC) representatives (Article 163 of the Russian Federation Criminal Code), says a website called Protecting Khoper. The activists are currently being detained at Detention Unit 5 Vodnik. 'According to our data, Mikhail Bezmensky was pressured to testify against another environmental

January 20, 2014. The public prosecution authorities of Dzerzhinsky District of Nizhniy Tagil issued a bill of indictment against a former employee of OAO Uralkhimplast. The authorities accuse her of illegally giving away data that qualify as trade secrets, the spokesperson for Sverdlovsk Region public prosecution authorities reports. The investigative team claims that between June and December 2012, the accused repeatedly used a special software application installed on her computer to make screen prints of files opened on her computer. These files contained commercially sensitive data on

January 20, 2014. This January, Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant (a member of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) celebrates the 70th anniversary of the day the heavy tank IS2 was launched on an industrial scale. Tankograd's long-service employees are giving talks on the event at the local schools, and tours are being offered at the plant museum that are dedicated to this special date, Uralvagonzavod Corporation's press service reports. The new heavy tank was designed by a team headed by such outstanding engineers as Joseph Kotin, Nikolay Kotin, and Ivan Trashutin. All the organizational issues

January 20, 2014. In 2013, Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant (a member of ChTPZ Group) cut down on the energy resources spending by more than 4% in comparison with the year 2012, the enterprise's press service reports. The savings stemmed from the launch of energy-saving lighting fixtures at the plant departments and installing an automated system at the compressor equipment unit, and complying with the lighting schedule and upgrading the system for the revenue metering of electric power. Last year, PNTZ stopped outsourcing the maintenance of its information and measurement systems and created

January 20, 2014. Bulgaria is planning to reopen its consulate in Yekaterinburg, a counselor at the Bulgarian Embassy in Russia told acting Minister of International & Foreign Economic Relations of Sverdlovsk Region Vladimir Solovarov. Bulgaria's Deputy Minister for Economics & Energy Branimir Botev and Sverdlovsk Region Foreign Economics Minister Andrei Sobolev also talked about the possibility of reopening the consulate during the 9th Russian Arms EXPO exhibition in Nizhniy Tagil in late September 2013. It was said that the Bulgarian party was planning to take on a trade and