4:14 pm, St. Petersburg time

The Turkish Ministry of Education apparently earns big profits off of the fees that it charges for administering standardized tests....I suppose that's a bad thing, but certainly it's better than shuttling all that money to your plutocrat donors. 

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Ural Rakhimov, the son of Bashkir president Murtaza Rakhimov, has given up his seat in the republic's legislature, according to Kompromat.ru. As I discussed the other day, Murtaza Rakhimov has recently sued Russian TV Channel NTV in response to the channel's claims that Ural has been involved in illegal activities relating to the republic's oil and gas companies.

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Four policemen wounded in PKK attack in Mus.

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Russian FM Lavrov: we're ready to resume economic relations with Georgia

10:44 am

New head of US Central Command: shooting Afghans is "a hell of a lot of fun."

....meanwhile, Bradley Manning, the US soldier who leaked the video of American forces having a hell of a lot of fun killing Iraqi civilians, is facing prison time.

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Informed comment: on American corporate political correctness re Israel and the Middle East

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More on the Turkish Constitutional court's prohibition of the AKP's efforts to pack Turkey's court, council of state prosecutors (background here)

Boo-hoo: AKP cheerleader Zaman cries foul

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No respect: Turkish prosecutor wants 10 years for politician who called PKK leader Ocalan "respectable"

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Shrug of the shoulders: No answers on who's getting the money from US military fuel purchases in Kyrgyzstan

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Russian senators, Chechen president: human rights organization an enemy of the state

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Crossing their fingers: Jamestown spooks on recent suicide bombing in Grozny

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Spy swap going down: Mark Ames sez Chapman for Sutyagin is a trade even the Golden State Warriors wouldn't make
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