In the latest rosy news for an economy hard hit by the economic crisis, industrial output in Russia rose 7.8% in January from the same month the year earlier, the statistics office said on Feb. 15.

However production fell a steep 20.4% in January from December, a plunge explained by the large number of holiday days in in January.

Industrial production fell 10.8% for 2009 as a whole as Russia was hard hit by the economic crisis and only started to recover year-on-year from November.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2010