TODAY: Poll names Putin as most admired; Khodorkovsky case troubling university; LUKoil faces hefty spill fine; Iran and Russia on verge of trade deal; Sochi protest zone location announced as police continue terror sweep; gay rights, Pussy Riot, Polonsky freed.

A YouGov poll conducted for The Times newspaper named President Vladimir Putin the third most admired person in the world.  Mikhail Khodorkovsky may have been freed, but his case is still causing trouble for the Higher School of Economics, where several professors are under investigation for allegedly receiving funds to lobby on Khodorkovsky’s behalf.  The former head of Yukos will not engage in any legal battles for the company’s seized assets, although shareholders are demanding $100 billion in damages, and a verdict will be decided at some point this year.  LUKoil has been fined – for its nine oil spills in 2011 – a total of $18.5 million, thought to be the biggest of its kind in Russian history.  Russia and Iran are closing in on an oil-for-goods exchange worth $1.5 billion a month, which would counteract the effects of Western sanctions.  Russia’s swing to the right is not the fault of country’s nationalists, but the Kremlin itself, says Vladimir Pastukhov.