TODAY: Luzhkov may have pick of new job if (or rather when) ousted; Moscow gay rally crushed; judges seek protection over badgering; FSB steps up investigations into spying; rights associations complain on checks.  Russia intransigent on missile sales to Syria; Kyrgyzstan president to throw spanner in works of US base operations? Hardline Islam gaining ground in central Asia; architecture under threat. 

According to today’s reports, an unidentified Kremlin source apparently received Mayor Yury Luzhkov last Friday and informed him that he had one week to resign, and that a new job would be found for him within two to three weeks.  The cancellation of a TV show in his defense, ‘Russian Hell’, due to apparent technical glitches, has also been taken as a sign that Luzhkov is becoming more marginalized.  Meanwhile police have broken up an unsanctioned gay rally near Moscow’s City Hall, against the notoriously homophobic mayor’s policies, where ten activists were detained.  The Moscow Times reports on the case of two St. Petersburg scientists who were arrested in March on spy charges by the Federal Security Service, which rights activists claim are factitious accusations, trumped up by FSB agents who need to provide evidence that the Services are working.  Moscow’s top judge, Olga Yegorova, has told reporters that 13 judges have sought police protection this year in an unprecedented spate of harassment complaints.  Moscow Memorial, Transparency International-Russia and the Moscow Helsinki Group are among several rights group to issue a statement protesting last week’s impromptu checks of their documentation.