TODAY: Kremlin rights council says Khodorkovsky illegally imprisoned; first Duma session sees quarrels; Medvedev gives state-of-the-nation address, calls for political reform; tax officials held on suspicion of misappropriation of funds; Nemtsov phone tapping to be investigated; United Russia and Chechnya; anti-HIV measures; CSTO agreement.

The Kremlin’s human rights council has called for an overturning of the most recent verdicts against former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev, and says that the two were jailed illegally following their second trial.  Few of the 2,000 election violations currently under investigation involve vote-rigging, say Kremlin investigators.  Could transparent ballot boxes be the answer for next year?  The first session of the new State Duma was ‘one of its most quarrelsome in years’, with opposition MPs refusing to support the speaker candidate put forward by United Russia.  The Moscow Times is liveblogging ‘lame duck’ President Dmitry Medvedev’s annual state of the union address.  Thus far, the president has called for political reform and a crackdown on corruption, and for curbs on contracts involving companies with ties to government.