TODAY: Government investigating NGOs; police behind May rally clashes? Medvedev pushing for Cyprus solution; Putin’s seals Rosneft deal; Chinese President in Russia for energy deals; Bolshoi probe.

Prosecutors are conducting wide-ranging checks on hundreds of nongovernmental organisations, with one rights worker alleging that up to 2,000 searches have been made since last month (a case in point: the group Memorial was searched yesterday).  Human Rights Watch says the scale of the inspections is ‘unprecedented and only serves to reinforce the menacing atmosphere for civil society’.  A man who claims to be a former government operative says that police officials organised clashes at last year’s opposition rally, and members of the Kremlin’s human rights council have voiced tentative support for his claims.  New charges have been brought against activist Leonid Razvozzhayev.  Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev says that a solution to the Cyprus crisis must be sought, but his meeting with the European Commission was ‘strained’ amid accusations that he was ‘play[ing] with his iPad’ during proceedings.  Ten opposition activists were detained yesterday for briefly blocking an entrance to the Central Bank, to draw attention to their demand that Russian money stored in tax havens be repatriated.