"An appeal to morals today is all that we have left," Khodorkovsky wrote in the open letter posted on the Web site of the All-Russia Civil Congress, a rights group.

Khodorkovsky is serving an eight-year prison sentence after being convicted of tax evasion and fraud in a trial seen by his supporters as punishment for his attempt to mount a political and economic challenge to President Vladimir Putin. His Yukos oil company, once Russia's largest, has been taken over by the state.

His open letter, which was dated Monday but only drew attention Thursday, was his first in more than two years.

It was directed at Russia's liberals, but contained his prescription for Russian society as a whole.

"Only by convincing people that they, deep in their soul, do not simply want to live in good conscience but cannot be happy living otherwise, will it be possible to lay the foundation for building a democratic, law-abiding state, our Russia," the letter said.

Khodorkovsky was ruthless in consolidating his control over Yukos in the rough privatizations of the 1990s, when Russia's prime resources were parceled out to the politically connected businessmen who became known as the oligarchs.

Once he had consolidated his control, he was among the first in Russia to push for Western-style business practices. He also began to support political parties that opposed Putin's policies and created a foundation to help strengthen civil society in Russia.

"He has stopped being a businessman not only in practice, but in his thoughts," Lyudmila Alexeyeva, one of Russia's most respected human rights advocates, said Thursday on Ekho Moskvy radio. She said the transformation occurred even before his arrest in October 2003.

"The ordeal he went through has contributed to these reflections. This is a traditional path for people living a difficult life," Alexeyeva said. "This is a very true path, and it's a pity that very few businessmen or politicians take it."

In his last missive from prison, issued in August 2005, shortly after his conviction, Khodorkovsky had warned of a growing sense of social injustice over post-Soviet reforms that had enriched a few and plunged the majority of Russians into poverty.

In this week's letter, Khodorkovsky referred several times to the need for faith. He said morals were the strongest and most important argument against the presence of hundreds of thousands of homeless children and the lack of medicines in a country with a budget surplus.

Morals also were the only argument "against terror and revolution as a means of solving political problems and against the shutting up of all sorts of dissenters," he wrote.

In 2005, Khodorkovsky had called for liberals to create a broad "social-democratic" coalition with communists and nationalists to oppose the Kremlin.

Such a coalition, called the Other Russia, was formed in 2006. It has held a series of street protests called dissenters' marches, some of which have been violently dispersed by police, but has not succeeded in uniting Russia's squabbling liberals or in attracting communists.

On Sunday, the Other Russia chose former world chess champion Garry Kasparov to be its candidate in the March presidential election. Even if he were to be allowed to run, which is unlikely, he would have little hope of posing a significant challenge to the Kremlin's chosen candidate.

Li Heping said he was attacked with fists and electric batons and held for about five hours Saturday night. He said he was forced into an unmarked car by unidentified men after leaving his Beijing office.

"They covered my head and drove me to somewhere far away and brought me to a basement and beat me," Li told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. "They said you out-of-town lawyers are making trouble in Beijing, making it unstable."

The alleged attack on Li came the same day a dissident in eastern China who wrote about local corruption was arrested on charges of subverting state power. Also over the weekend, police detained the son and brother of Ye Guozhu, a Beijing resident serving a four-year prison sentence for disturbing the social order after he applied for a permit to hold a protest against forced evictions.

China's ruling Communist Party has taken some steps to appear more open ahead of the Beijing Olympics next summer, such as loosening restrictions on foreign reporters.

But critics say its grip on dissent has in fact tightened under President Hu Jintao. Controls seem to be ratcheted up as China prepares to hold its twice-a-decade Communist Party congress at which some new senior leaders will be appointed. The meeting, which begins Oct. 15, will set policy for the next five years.

Li, who said he was left with bruises and a swollen face, didn't know if the attack was related to the congress.

"They shouldn't do this during the 17th Party Congress. Aren't they going out of their way to cause trouble?" he said.

The lawyer said he was dropped off near some woods after the attack and walked a long distance until he found a taxi to take him home. He said he was being followed around the clock by security agents.

Li said he wasn't sure if he would be able to continue working. He returned to his office the day after the attack and found his lawyer's license was missing. A portable hard drive and his computer memory had been wiped clean, he said.

The lawyer's clients have included Chen Guangcheng, a blind activist who helped villagers file a lawsuit accusing local officials of forcing them to undergo abortions or sterilization. Cases this year include that of a Falun Gong practitioner whose family members were detained, and four farmers who were wrongly accused of murder, he said.

Telephones at the Beijing public security bureau, which often monitors the activities of dissidents, rang unanswered on Wednesday. The general inquiry line of the state security bureau was not answered.

Analysts said the spat, which revived European fears over stability of gas flows, was politically motivated. Moscow issued the threat as votes were being counted from a parliamentary election in Ukraine that showed gains for pro-Western parties.

"We have reached an agreement to avoid such problems in the future," Dmitry Medvedev, Russian First Deputy Prime Minister and chairman of gas export monopoly Gazprom, said after meeting Ukraine Energy Minister Yuri Boiko.

Gazprom said Boiko had pledged to repay the debt before November to avoid a reduction in supply and to guarantee stable deliveries to Europe.

"European consumers won't suffer. European customers are in an absolutely comfortable situation," Medvedev was quoted by Russian agencies as saying. Gazprom's stock fell by 0.7 percent, in line with the broader market.

A program to employ spy satellites for certain domestic uses has been postponed because of privacy concerns. Congress had already provided money for the program, which was to begin this month. But some lawmakers demanded more information about its legal basis and what protections there were to ensure that the government was not peering into the homes of Americans. As a result, the Homeland Security Department is not formally moving ahead with the program until it answers those questions, a department spokesman said.

The program would have expanded access to material gathered by satellites that monitor American territory to agencies involved in emergency response, border control and law enforcement. A new office within the Homeland Security Department, called the National Applications Office, would coordinate requests from civilian agencies for satellite information. Currently, civilian use of the material has generally been limited to monitoring weather and climate changes and to making maps.

Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, an opponent of the program, commended the department on Monday for its decision to "go back to the drawing board and get it right."

The department would not say how long it planned to postpone the program. "We are cooperatively working with the Congress to answer any questions that they have," said a spokesman, Andrew Lluberes. "We are totally confident that this is going to go forward."

President Vladimir V. Putin, who is barred from seeking another term, suggested Monday that he might become prime minister next year, seeming to confirm what many analysts had assumed: that he plans to hold on to the power he has accrued over eight years.

Mr. Putin, who spoke at the congress of the United Russia party, the country's dominant political force, said he would lead that party's candidate list in the December parliamentary elections.

The announcement was at once consistent and surprising. The president, who is popular among Russia's citizens and has a centralized lock on his government, has often said he intended to remain involved in politics beyond his second term. He has even said that he may seek re-election after another president holds the office, as the Russian Constitution allows him to do.

But he had not previously suggested a new political office for himself immediately after the presidential election next March, as he did when he said he could become Russia's next prime minister.

"Heading the government is quite a realistic proposal," he said, before adding a qualifier he often uses when publicly discussing his plans for 2008. "But it is too early to think about that."

In Mr. Putin's years in the Kremlin, Russia's economy and international influence have expanded, and many Russians have seen their living conditions improve.

Mr. Putin's speech here elevated the Kremlin's stagecraft to new levels. United Russia's party congress led the national news broadcasts, which featured scenes of Mr. Putin sitting on an elevated viewing stand above each speaker as a crowd looked up toward him adoringly.

One speaker, a weaver from the Ivanovo oblast, or district, pleaded with party officials to find a way to keep Mr. Putin in office for a third term. "I see so many big bosses and just smart people at this congress," said the weaver, Yelena Lapshina. "I appeal to all of you — let's think of something together so that Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin will remain the president of Russia after 2008 as well."

The use of a weaver from Ivanovo borrowed directly from Soviet iconography and the pantheon of state-endorsed heroes of the proletariat. Mr. Putin's managers quickly topped even that clear symbol, as an athlete in a wheelchair rolled onto the stage and praised the president.

"Vladimir Vladimirovich, you are lucky," said the athlete, Mikhail B. Terentyev, a ski champion from the Paralympic games. The crowd broke out in applause.

Mr. Terentyev continued: "And while you are the president, the luck accompanies Russia. You have become a talisman for tens of millions of people, a symbol of the successful development of the country. Of course it is up to you to decide which place in the country's political life you will occupy, but no matter what decision you make, I want you to stay with us, with Russia."

Mr. Putin looked down from his seat, head tilted, eyebrows raised, emanating calm and power.

The day's events ignited a new round of speculation about Mr. Putin's path through the elections ahead.

The prime minister's position in Russia is often viewed as a step toward the presidency; Mr. Putin briefly held the job under President Boris N. Yeltsin before swiftly rising to the seat of power.

Last month Mr. Putin abruptly appointed Viktor A. Zubkov, a confidant of little prior prominence, to the prime minister's post. He then hinted that Mr. Zubkov could succeed him as the president. The president's remarks, taken together, suggested that when his term expires he might step one rung down the government's ladder — and then step back up.

But Mr. Putin's latest speech also accompanied his acceptance of a new type of prominence: as the symbolic head of Russia's dominant political party, United Russia. The party unfailingly supports the Kremlin and Mr. Putin, although the president has never joined it and did not join it on Monday.

By accepting the position at the head of the party's candidate list, Mr. Putin instantaneously lent the party his vast domestic political stature — and, in all likelihood, the resources of the Russian government — to its efforts to extend its dominance in Russia's 450-seat Duma, the lower house of Parliament.

The party had appeared already to bank on its close relationship with Mr. Putin. Its slogan for the parliamentary campaign, even before Mr. Putin agreed to be on the party list, was "Putin's Plan: Russia's Victory."

The party holds a strong majority of the Duma's seats. Its leadership said Monday that Mr. Putin's new public support guaranteed it an unconditional victory in the next round of elections, scheduled for Dec. 2.

The small remaining opposition conceded as much soon after the president's remarks were broadcast on national television. Grigory A. Yavlinsky, the leader of the opposition Yabloko party, said on the Ekho Moskvy radio station that the day's events were further proof of a "one-party system in Russia."

Whether Mr. Putin could serve in Parliament and as president simultaneously is an open question. Russia's Constitution and electoral law allow parties to nominate candidates for the legislature who are not party members, but the Constitution also requires a separation of powers as one of its fundamental principles.

However, Maya Grishina, a member of the federal Central Election Commission, told the official RIA Novosti news agency that "the head of the state is not banned to nominate his candidacy at any election, including the parliamentary election."

"Along with this he can still carry out his duties," she said. "The law doesn't contain any restrictions on this."

Gleb O. Pavlovsky, a political scientist who leads a research institute closely connected with the Kremlin, said that Mr. Putin would give his name to the party as an electoral locomotive, but would not actually seek a seat in the Parliament after the results were tallied in December.

Instead, Mr. Pavlovsky said, Mr. Putin had identified the party and the parliamentary campaign as another possible base of power after he leaves office. "The party may become his main tool after the end of his presidency," he said by telephone. "The new president won't be able to appoint a prime minister without the support of the party leader."

The measures, part of the government's proposed package of spending and taxes for 2008, were debated at a Cabinet meeting that stretched over about 12 hours, beginning late Friday afternoon and ending early Saturday.

Prodi's center-left coalition has been struggling to stay intact virtually since it began governing in May 2006, and some of his allies have been predicting that if his coalition unravels, early elections, eagerly sought by conservative opposition leader Silvio Berlusconi, would be the consequence.

The government's popularity has been sagging in opinion polls, and Berlusconi, the media mogul and former premier who Prodi defeated in 2006 elections, has been pressing for a return to the ballot box.

Prodi's description of the proposed national budget for next year sounded both like a pep talk to keep his coalition partners enthusiastic and a campaign rally in case elections are near.

"We are proud of this outcome of team play which will help families, businesses and citizens and the weakest members" of society, Prodi told a news conference at the premier's office.

The premier boasted that the overall euro11 billion (US$15.6 billion) budget was nearly one-third less than the current year's budget.

The budget must be passed by Parliament by the end of 2007, and if past years are any guide, many of the measures approved by the Cabinet could be revised several times before becoming law.

With his often rebellious, far-left coalition partners, including Communists, balking over Prodi's aim to reform Italy's generous pension system, the Cabinet decided to put off a decision on that thorny issue until Oct. 12.

The far-left had gone into the Cabinet session threatening not to approve the budget unless welfare spending took priority over tax cuts.

Prodi told the news conference that reforms to the pension system and hiring rules would be approved at the Oct. 12 session.

Economy Minister Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa said Italy's economic growth rate was declining, "but the drop is not dramatic."

He also sounded an optimistic note, saying that mortgage crises that have hit financial institutions and consumers hard in the United States, does not seem to be hitting Italy.

The government "is keeping all its promises" and "we are operating in a context of healing" Italy's finances, Padoa-Schioppa said.

Far-left parties already have forced Prodi to briefly resign over Italy's military mission in Afghanistan, and their opposition to economic reforms has stifled or watered down attempts to liberalize the country's economy and reduce public spending.

No examples were given, but Chinese television channels have increasingly broadcast late-night infomercials featuring scantily clad women, as well as ads for products that claim to boost sexual performance.

Regulators have already targeted ads using crude or suggestive language, behavior, and images, tightening their grip on TV and radio a few weeks ahead of a twice-a-decade Communist Party congress at which some new senior leaders will be appointed.

The latest ban by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, or SARFT, also bans advertisements for sexual aids including tonics and sex toys, along with "inelegant images" in ads for what it referred to simply as "adult products."

The notice indicated that regulators were concerned about both lascivious imagery and outrageous or insupportable claims about some products' benefits or effectiveness.

"Illegal 'sexual medication' advertisements and other harmful ads pose a grave threat to society," said the SAFT notice, issued last week and seen Sunday on the administration's Web site.

"They not only seriously mislead consumers, harm the people's health, pollute the social environment, and corrupt social mores, but also directly harm the credibility of public broadcasting and affect the image of the Communist Party and the government," the notice said.

China has already also issued strict rules for TV talent shows, including the banning of "American Idol"-style mass audience voting by mobile phone text message or the Internet.

A few weeks ago, SARFT ordered 11 radio shows off the air in southern and central China for talking too explicitly about sex or for broadcasting material of an "extreme pornographic nature."

Regulators have also banned television shows about cosmetic surgery and sex changes, and a talent show that they deemed coarse.