The pace of growth in the Russian economy fell by almost half last year, fresh economic data released Monday has shown. Russia’s GDP grew by 1.3% in 2019, the Russian state statistics agency, Rosstat said. That compares with an official expansion rate of 2.5% recorded in 2018, and is the weakest annual growth since Russia emerged from economic crisis in 2016. Despite the slow-down, the economy did pick up in the final half of the year, managing to beat pessimistic forecasts from organizations such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) that had suggested Russia would struggle to...