Floating restaurant fire localized in Moscow

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MOSCOW, July 8 (Itar-Tass) - A pier barge that houses a restaurant is
on fire in central Moscow. The fire broke out in a floating restaurant on
Frunzenskaya Naberezhnaya at around thee o'clock in the morning on
Thursday, a law enforcement source told Itar-Tass.
"The flames have engulfed the entire area of the pier barge," the
source went on to say. Though no casualties have been reported, he doesn't
rule out that there may be people inside the restaurant.
Fire crews have managed to contain the fire. They are trying to
suppress the flames from a fire-fighting boat that had arrived at the
scene.

.Vietnamese Communist leader to arrive in Russia.

MOSCOW, July 8 (Itar-Tass) - The General Secretary of the Central
Committee of the Vietnamese Communist Party Nong Duc Manh will arrive in
Russia for an official visit on Thursday at the invitation of Russian
President Dmitry Medvedev.
"The Russian-Vietnamese high-level talks will be held on July 9," the
Kremlin press service reported.
Nong Duc Manh will meet the speakers of both chambers of Russian
parliament: the Federation Council and the State Duma, as well as
Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov. The Vietnamese leader will visit
St. Petersburg.
The Russian-Vietnamese talks will focus on expansion of
Russian-Vietnamese economic and political interaction.
Four cooperation agreements in the oil and gas sector are to be signed
with the Zarubezhneft Company. A joint Vietnamese-Russian venture '
Vietsovpetro' has been operating since 1981. Zarubezhneft and
Petrovietnam, Vietnam's Oil and Gas Group, one of the world's biggest oil
companies, founded it.
Russia has a "mirror structure" of this joint venture. The
Rusvietpetro Company has launched its first project in the Yamal-Nenets
Autonomous District.
The sides will also discuss the construction of the first nuclear
power station in Vietnam's Ninh Thuan Province. The construction works are
to begin in 2014. The station will begin operation by 2020. The State
Corporation Rosatom will be Vietnam's partner in this project.
Tourism will be another vital topic for discussion. Seventy thousand
Russians reportedly visited Vietnamese resorts in 2008.
Bilateral trade relations are also on the rise. Reciprocal trade
volumes exceeded 1.4 billion dollars in 2008. There are plans to increase
the figure to three billion dollars in 2010. Russia and Vietnam develop
inter-regional ties.
The construction of a new Vietnamese cultural and business centre in
the northeast of Moscow will contribute to bilateral cooperation. It will
house exhibition space, sport and business complexes and a hotel.
In turn, the construction of the House of Moscow is to be launched in
Hanoi soon.

.Moldovan Constitutional Court to consider decree on Soviet Occupation.

CHISINAU, July 8 (Itar-Tass) - Moldova's Constitutional Court will on
Thursday consider the decree of the country's acting president Mihai
Ghimpu on the institution of the Soviet Occupation Day on June 28.
The opposition Moldovan Communist Party has sent an inquiry to the
court. The Communists claim that Ghimpu violated 13 articles of the
Moldovan Constitution when he signed his scandalous decree.
The decree providing for commemorative events and the opening of a
monument to the victims of Soviet occupation on Chisinau's central square
split the Moldovan society and politicians. Many local leaders, including
those in Beltsy, Moldova's second largest city, and Gagauzia refused to
obey the decree. The present and former Moldovan leaders, including Prime
Minister Vlad Filat, Foreign Minister Yuri Leanca, the former speaker
Marian Lupu and ex-president Vladimir Voronin. However, Ghimpu, renowned
for his radical pro-Romanian views, refused to renounce the decree.
The Russian State Duma has described the decree as "political campaign
aimed against the Russian-Moldovan relations and an attempt to distort
history and justify the inefficient policy of the Moldovan authorities."
In the meantime, the Moldovan Academy of Sciences on Wednesday
officially backed up the institution of Soviet Occupation Day.
Archive documents and historical research done by international
experts prove that " North Bukovina and Bessarabia were annexed in 1940.
Stalin's military command had conceived the annexation as a military
operation to occupy these territories, " Academician Andrei Eshanu said.
"The historical truth cannot be used for splitting society or as a
pretext for creating tensions in relations between Moldova and Russia,"
the academician went on to say.
On June 28, 1940 the Soviet Union demanded that Romania withdraw its
troops and administration from Bessarabia and North Bukovina, which they
seized in 1918. The Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic, which incorporated
areas on the left bank of the Dniester River, was set up on those
territories when the USSR acceded them.
Moldova became an independent country after the USSR collapsed, and
the unrecognised Trans-Dniester Republic was proclaimed on the left bank
of the Dniester River.

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