Free Republic

urope's tallest skyscraper is nearly finished. The Lakhta Centre in St Petersburg, Russia, now stands at 462m (1,516ft) tall – making it the 13th tallest building in the world. The 87-storey tower takes the title of the tallest building in Europe from Moscow's Federation Tower, which stands at 374m (1,227ft). The building's facade is made from 16,500 individual panes of glass that have been fitted with automatic shutters and valves in a bid to reduce heat loss.

The Russian spy case that exploded into public view this week was preceded by nearly a decade of cat-and-mouse activities with the FBI, according to court documents and an interview with a senior U.S. official familiar with the case.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Tuesday criticized the arrests of suspects in an alleged Russian spy ring, saying U.S. law-enforcement authorities "went out of control." He voiced hope that the scandal would not harm relations between the two countries. Russia's Foreign Ministry acknowledged that some of the suspects are Russian citizens. It called on American authorities to give them access to lawyers and Russian consular officials, and to take into account the "positive character" of U.S.-Russian ties in treating the case. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation on Monday announced the arrests of 10 alleged deep-cover Russian agents, saying...

Alleged Creation of Perpetual Energy Source Splits Scientific Community 04/15/2003 11:54 On the one hand, it may be an incredible breakthrough that will help realize the ideas of science-fiction writers. On the other, many say the creators are mistaken The Russian Academy of Sciences is treating the news that Volgograd University laboratories say they have discovered a fundamentally new source of energy rather skeptically. A special meeting with journalists dedicated to the discovery was later held in Moscow, in which the results of the scientific experiment were presented. One of the items presented was a chemical compound that, according to...