TODAY: Putin fires Serdyukov; May protesters implicated in grand conspiracy; Lavrov says Russia is supplying arms to Syria; German magazine says Cyprus bailout will benefit oligarchs; rubber bullet guns; Kirill to visit Israel; services, inflation growth; Gazprom sales down.

President Vladimir Putin has fired Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov, and replaced him with Moscow Governor Sergei Shoigu.  The prosecution of 19 people suspected of being involved in violent clashes during May’s anti-Putin rally is apparently part of an attempt to prove ‘a grand conspiracy instigated by financiers, organizers and activists’ that will implicate Leonid Razvocchayev and Konstantin Lebedev, according to suspects’ lawyers.  Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says that Moscow is supplying arms to Syria, but only through Soviet-era contracts meant to boost defense against external threats.  A report in Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine alleges that wealthy Russians would be the main beneficiaries if the E.U. were to bailout Cyprus due to its being a popular offshore tax haven; the Cypriot government has rejected this claim.  This piece looks at Russia’s crackdown on rubber bullet guns and the stigma attached to them due to their being seen as increasingly popular within the migrant population.  Russian observers are gearing up to monitor the U.S. general election, which begins today.  Russia wants the United Nations to improve its international nuclear disaster notification mechanism.