TODAY: Surprise checks on human rights groups prior to regional elections; Microsoft to hand out free software to NGOs; United Russia meeting offers wholesale support to Luzhkov.  Russian Defense Sec in Washington as START ratification pressure mounts; Kremlin seeking to cement foothold in Kyrgyzstan with arms-for-bases deal; Belarus election date set – what part will chilly relations with Russia play?

A handful of prominent human rights groups have complained of impromptu detailed checks of their paperwork by the authorities in advance of the October elections.  Authorities claim this is to check how recent legislation on NGOs has affected their workings; activists disagree.  It should be harder now for authorities to use piracy as a pretext for searches: Microsoft will be handing out their programs free to NGOs after allegations of collusion again dissenters; labelled a ‘shocking failure of corporate responsibility’ in this NY Times editorial.  Russia’s opposition parties are apparently creating a coalition for the 2011 parliamentary elections and want to nominate a single candidate for the 2012 presidential elections from among its leading figures.  The defamation case brought against human rights activist Oleg Orlov by Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov over responsibility for the murder of Natalya Estemirova has begun hearings in Moscow.  A new watchdog group, For Transparency of Justice, established by a respected human rights activist and two lawyers, plans to put a spotlight on the way Russia’s courts operate.