Moscow - Jailed former Yukos executive Vasily Aleksanyan, in need of treatment for AIDS, was freed on bail after along legal fight for his release, Russian prison authorities said Wednesday.

Aleksanyan paid a 50-million-ruble (1.8 million dollars) bail on Tuesday and was freed from detention, a spokesman for the Federal Prison Service told news agency Ria-Novosti.

The report confirmed a statement by Aleksanyan's lawyer Yelena Lvova, who said the guard had been taken from his hospital ward Tuesday and he had been visited by relatives.

She did not say whether Aleksanian, 36, would leave the hospital.

Moscow (dpa) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Tuesday signed into law a bill extending presidential terms form four to six years, the Kremlin said.

Medvedev final endorsement of the constitutional amendment follows rapid legislative approval by both Russian houses parliament as well as 83 regional chambers.

The Kremlin pushed hard to fast-track the amendment - the first to Russia's 15-year-old constitution - through the constitutional process.

It has been less than two months since Medvedev proposed the constitutional changes in his first state-of-the nation speech on November 5.

Moscow, Dec. 30 : Russian academic Igor Panarin has predicted that the U. S. will fall apart in 2010.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Panarin is of the view that an economic and moral collapse will trigger a civil war in the United States, and this will lead to its eventual breakup.

The Russian state media has taken a particular interest in Panarin's views, so much that he is being interviewed as much as twice a day about his predictions.

"It''s a record, but I think the attention is going to grow even stronger," the WSJ quotes 50-year-old Professor Panarin, as saying.

Moscow  - Joseph Stalin, the Soviet dictator who ordered millions to their death in labor camps, was named as Russia's third- greatest man in history over the weekend.

The "Name of Russia" contest set by state-television channel Rossiya sought to elevate a historical figure from Russia's Tsarist and Soviet period in a bid to build up patriotism.

Local media said a total of one in three Russians, or more than 50 million, voted by telephone, text message and Internet since the campaign kicked-off in June.

Moscow - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin warned Tuesday that "the era of cheap gas" would soon be over in an address to ministers of gas exporting countries meeting in Moscow.

"The expense necessary for the development of fields is rising sharply, and this means that despite the current financial crisis and the fall of prices on energy commodities, the era of cheap energy resources, of cheap gas, is coming to an end," Putin said in televised comments.

Moscow - Up to 1,000 people demonstrated in Russia's eastern coastal city of Vladivostok to protest higher taxes on imported cars on Sunday.

Police, keeping promises to act decisively against the unregistered protest, arrested a number of participants and prevented journalists from recording the event, the RIA-Novosti agency reported.

Immediately preceeding the demonstration, protesters driving more than 40 cars, deliberately slowed down traffic through the centre of city, population 600,000.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in early 2009 raised import taxes on new and used cars to protect Russia's ailing automotive sector.