TODAY: Sobchak cleared of tax evasion; Deripaska and Cherney settle; opposition to hold ‘free and fair’ elections online; deputies and diplomats accuse Europe of Russophobia; Gazprom seeks up front payments from China; Belarus saves $1 billion in duties; corruption-related crimes on the rise; Putin’s puppy for Chavez.

Ksenia Sobchak, the socialite-turned-political activist, has been cleared of tax evasion; the $2 million in cash removed from her apartment by authorities in June will be returned to her by federal investigators.  Oleg Deripaska and Michael Cherney have unexpectedly settled their long-running feud in an out of court deal, with Deripaska terminating his litigation just days before Cherney’s scheduled video-link testimony.  The New York Times looks at the recent Kremlin-influenced election in Ryazan, as RFE/RL reports on the opposition’s ‘free and fair’ online primary elections, to be held in late October, which will help the movement to form a 45-member Coordinating Council.  The Other Russia speaks to several NGOs about how they plan to deal with the Kremlin’s new law that labels them as ‘foreign agents’.  85-year-old Lyudmila Alexeyeva has reassured her supporters, reminding them that ‘Our human rights movement was born in the 1960s, when you could easily get a sentence or forced psychiatric treatment or exile.’