:: Russia - Blue October

First there was the mess over local elections, where President Dmitry Medvedev stepped in to sort out a growing row over allegations of cheating by regional authorities - from Moscow City Hall on down. The final straw for opposition parties was the revelation that even Yabloko party leader Sergei Mitrokhin's own vote was mysteriously trashed - leaving the liberal party with null points in his own district.

After an abortive parliamentary boycott, the country's loyal opposition parties (the Liberal Democrats, Just Russia and the Communists) were appeased with the promise that election rules would be tweaked to give them a (slightly) better shake of the dice.

But the biggest result is likely to be intensified pressure on Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov, who is fighting to keep his job amid a chorus of grumbling - apparently originating from close to the Kremlin.

Next, the country's car industry continued to fall apart, with AvtoVAZ announcing more than 20,000 job losses amid a car-sales freefall. Sberbank's Opel deal - aimed at rescuing more jobs, particularly at GAZ's Nizhny Novgorod plant - also faltered, with GM having second thoughts.

Then, just to make matters worse, the oligarchs have started scrapping in public again. This time it was a debt-laden Oleg Deripaska complaining to the Kremlin about judicial corruption. Clearly frustrated, Medvedev tried to keep the peace by putting both Deripaska and Mikhail Fridman in their places, but the squabbles don't make his job any easier.

There is some good news, of course. The authorities expect quarter-on-quarter GDP growth of 3 to 4 per cent in the last three months of 2009, while Prime Minister Vladimir Putin went one better, predicting an absolute halt in inflation until the end of the year. And the budget deficit for 2010 is likely to be less severe, thanks to the current surge in oil prices to $80 a barrel.

But this must be tempered with caution, as the tentative recovery so closely depends on what happens in the rest of the world

The printing of money by governments from the US to China has so far averted a 1929-style crash. But it may be fuelling a new stock market and commodities bubble that could burst again at any time.

And if that happens, the Kremlin's current blues will look like a pleasant distraction.

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