Sergei Furgal has been in a Moscow jail since his arrest on July 9, and Russian President Vladimir Putin has named an acting successor.

The party unexpectedly dropped its veteran leader Gennady Zyuganov, choosing instead Pavel Grudinin, a mechanical engineer who has run a farm on the outskirts of Moscow since the mid-1990s.

The Russian lower house of parliament has approved a proposal to launch an investigation into U.S. media organizations that operate in Russia.