Russia's university suspended over fire safety, opposition suspects political reasons

A Russian university has been forced to suspend its activities over a fire safety check. But an opposition party the closure Monday as an official punishment for its EU-sponsored election monitoring course.

St. Petersburg's Dzerzhinsk district court ordered the city's European University to temporarily stop its work because of violations of fire safety rules. The university's head, Nikolai Vakhtin, said the order suspended the school's activities for a week.

Vakhtin denied that there was any political intent behind the court's order. But Maxim Reznik, the head of the St. Petersburg branch of Russia's liberal Yabloko faction, said the real reason for the …