SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1004 (71), Friday, September 17, 2004
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TITLE: Plans for Toll Road Advance
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Construction of a high-speed toll road between St. Petersburg and Moscow, one of about 20 such roads planned nationwide, is due to start next year.
The road between Russia's two capitals will be one of the first projects in a transport-route modernization program that will run until 2025, which was approved by the federal government this week.
Work on planning details for the road is to be undertaken during the remainder of this year.
Construction is expected to take about five years and cost some 180 billion rubles ($6.2 billion), the Transport Ministry said.
Deputy Transport Minister Alexander Misharin said the government will hold a tender to select a general planner for the highway on Sept. 29. Speaking at a news conference in St. Petersburg this week, he said building traffic roundabouts, viaducts, and over- and underpasses could significantly raise the cost of the project.
Viktor Bukreyev, deputy head of the Federal Road Agency, said the four-lane, 650-kilometer highway will run parallel to the existing arterial road, but will bypass major towns to reduce construction costs.
"Half of the funding will be provided by the Russian government, while the other half should be covered by private investors," Bukreyev said. "The investors will be granted the right to rent the surrounding lands for the long term."
Misharin said several Russian and foreign private companies have already expressed interest in the project.
By 2025, about 20 toll roads are to be built in Russia, according to the Russian Transport Ministry.
RIA-Novosti quoted Transport Minister Igor Levitin as saying that a full list of routes that are destined to be served by toll roads is scheduled to be prepared before the end of this month and presented to the government on Oct. 1.
"On Oct. 1 we will present a thorough concept of the construction and development of toll roads in Russia, along with our estimate of the costs for using them, " he said. "I wouldn't like to make any suggestions regarding the prices now, as it will very much depend on investors."
However, Bukreyev said to make the St. Petersburg-Moscow road profitable would require between 35,000 and 40,000 vehicles using it per day. The average cost of using an existing section of the federal road network is about 10 rubles (34 U.S. cents) per vehicle per journey, depending on the road or section of road.
Several small-scale toll roads are already functioning in Russia. The first toll road in the Moscow region, linking the Volokolamskoye and Ilyinskoye highways and the M-9 Baltia road, is expected to be built in the near future. The Moscow region government is going to charge autos 12 rubles each trip, while trucks will pay 20 rubles. Fixed-route taxis, or marshrutki, ambulances, rescue and repair services, traffic police and state service vehicles will be able to use the roads free of charge, according to the Moscow region press office.
The new highway between Moscow and St. Petersburg is set to become a part of an already projected transport corridor linking Moscow with Helsinki via St. Petersburg.
Misharin said the Finnish government has already confirmed their participation in the project.
St. Petersburg lawmaker Vatanyar Yagya is one of the strongest supporters of the toll road.
"Some may say that it would divide the drivers into rich and poor, but this is a far-fetched criticism," he said. "Yes, perhaps in the first years drivers with meager incomes won't be going through the high-speed toll road but in the long run the differences are sure to disappear. As living standards grow in the country, the difference will be scarce."
Yagya cited the United States as a perfect example of efficient use of toll roads.
"Completion of the toll road between Moscow and St. Petersburg will become a crucially important step in the development of Russia's transport routes," he said. "What is most important, the new highway will link the ring roads of the two cities, thus providing an ideal route for freight transport. This will indeed facilitate operation of the existing highway."
Some experts expressed reservations that investors for the new road project would be very hard to find.
Lev Savulkin, an analyst with the Leontieff Center in St. Petersburg, suggested that the government should have planned to extend and improve the existing highway.
He sounded a warning against what he said looks like yet another gigantic Soviet-style scheme.
"Foreign investors have had enough of them," the expert said. "Memories of the VSM [high-speed train] money-wasting adventure are still fresh. A single glance at the hole at the Moskovsky Station [where terminal buildings were due to be built], which is still there, is enough to scare off investors."
TITLE: Governors Hail Putin's Reform Plan
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Yury Lodkin, the Communist governor of the traditionally red Bryansk region, is not only saluting President Vladimir Putin's plan to strengthen his grip on the country by nominating regional leaders but calling the proposed change "fantastic."
"People voted for the president and he has the right to choose," Lodkin told reporters in Bryansk this week, according to his press office. "The government badly needs to reinforce the executive chain of command, and this is why I back what the president said. This is fantastic."
Yury Luzhkov, Moscow's managerial-minded mayor who would not have to step aside under Putin's plan when his third and final term ends in 2007, was equally enthusiastic. He said a regional leader should be "more a good manager and less a politician."
The sentiments of these two men are being echoed by regional bosses in the country's other 87 regions - in what is perhaps a surprising show of support for a clear attempt by Putin to put more power in his hands.
Analysts said regional leaders have no choice but to embrace the plan if they want to hold on to their posts because they realize that Putin will implement the change no matter what they say. And many of the leaders have their jobs thanks to the Kremlin.
Moreover, analysts said, the shakeup is all part of the run-up to the 2008 presidential election, when Putin will have to hand the reins to a successor. To make sure the presidency goes to the right person, Putin is trying to stamp out any opposition in the regions, they said.
Regional bosses, of course, are not putting it so bluntly, and their comments in interviews this week indicated that they are looking for the silver lining. Many said the move will not only give the Kremlin more power but them as well, including eventual control of local law enforcement and security agencies.
"I talked with my colleagues, and everyone agrees that Putin's initiative is positive," Mordovian President Nikolai Merkushkin said through a spokes-woman.
"The executive chain of command will be reinforced when governors get the power to coordinate the security agencies."
"Governors will get more power," Arkhangelsk Governor Nikolai Kiselyov said in an e-mailed reply to questions. "This gives them the opportunity to be heard and opportunity to coordinate the activities of the federal structures in the regions," he said. "For almost a year, our region has not had anyone to head our Interior Ministry."
He added that Putin's plan will help to "unite" and "reinforce" the country.
In explaining the move Monday, Putin told a meeting with regional leaders that political life "needs to not only adjust to the Beslan tragedy but also prevent a repeat of such a crisis."
Regional lawmakers, who will get to vote on Putin's nominees, are pleased and expect the status of their legislatures to rise.
"Putin's move will reinforce regional legislative assemblies by giving them the right to pick the candidates for the job," said Vladimir Nikitin, speaker of the Kalinigrad regional legislature.
"The status of the regional Duma will grow," said Alexander Anpilov, speaker of the Kursk legislature.
Getting rid of the popular vote for regional leaders would end any of the independence they still hold. Regional leaders were allowed to run their affairs pretty much as they pleased under President Boris Yeltsin, and they have been a thorn in Putin's side since he took office in 2000.
Their independence prompted Putin to carve the country into seven "super regions" early in his first term and appoint a presidential envoy to each, as well as to overhaul the Federation Council, which was once comprised of governors and is now filled with Kremlin-endorsed politicians and businessmen.
A lack of criticism to the move does not mean lack of opposition, analysts said. Regional leaders do not dare to criticize the Kremlin because they understand that to keep their jobs need to show loyalty. In fact, the move allows regional leaders like Luzhkov who are serving their final term to stay in office indefinitely if they are loyal.
"Most governors say they back Putin's initiative because they hope to stay in power as long as possible. They are doing anything they can to show their loyalty to the Kremlin," said Alexei Titkov, a regional analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center.
"Governors are even afraid to utter the word 'against,'" said Andrei Ryabov, another analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center. "Many governors are finishing their [final] terms, and they hope that the Kremlin says, 'He is a good pal, why should we replace him?' This is what they are counting on."
What the regional leaders really thought could be seen by looking at their faces after the president's speech Monday, said Dmitry Orlov, a political analyst at the Agency for Political and Economic Communications.
"Everyone was unhappy," he said.
While there will probably not be any open opposition, there will be a hidden opposition that will gain momentum if a new crisis hits the country, Orlov said.
What's more, analysts said they believe the change will not give regional leaders or local legislatures the power they are hoping for because every decision will be made in the Kremlin and the regions will be stripped of any initiative.
"Deputies are wrong if they think that they will get the chance to choose. They will have to vote the way the Kremlin asks them," said Alexander Dianov, director of the Institute for Regional Problems.
But Putin should be careful as well, he said, because the game could be played against him. "Putin will be the only person who is responsible for everything, but he also will be the only person who will get blamed for everything, even for regional problems," he said.
According to Dianov, the plan announced Monday has been on the Kremlin drawing board for the past 18 months and the Kremlin was waiting for the "right moment to present it to the people."
Putin decided to package the change with a broad anti-terror plan in the aftermath of the recent terrorist attacks, even though they have nothing to do with the struggle against terror, analysts said.
The Kremlin is merely trying to crack down on any potential opposition in the regions ahead of the next presidential election, analysts said.
Putin wants to be sure that he will be able leave his post to the right person, Dianov said.
Vladimir Pribilovsky, head of the Panorama think tank, said the president is afraid that discontent will grow in the regions over his social reforms and people will vote for leftist governors. This is dangerous for the Kremlin because leftist governors might back leftist candidates and not the Kremlin-backed candidate for president in 2008, he said.
Putin hopes to nip any potential regional opposition in the bud, Ryabov said.
For example, some governors opposed the controversial Kremlin-backed bill replacing benefits for socially vulnerable groups with cash payments, and "they had to behave that way, since they were elected by the population and the population wanted them to be against it," Ryabov said.
But an appointed governor can ignore popular protests.
Putin's move is a step back toward the Soviet Union, when the Central Committee recommended proteges for administrative posts and the local council confirmed the appointments.
Putin said he will submit a bill on regional leaders to the Kremlin-controlled State Duma this fall, and the change is expected to come into effect next year.
The plan will not affect the upcoming elections of 12 regional leaders later this year, said Alexander Vesnyakov, head of the Central Election Commission.
TITLE: Air Ticket Scalpers Turn Blind Eye to Safety
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - People who privately sell and swap airline tickets - like the person who helped two suspected suicide bombers board the planes that crashed almost simultaneously last month - are still out in full force in airports, and a bribe of as little as 500 rubles ($17.10) can get anybody on board a domestic flight, according to airline officials and media reports.
"Everybody knows them and everybody loves them, including the police, because they bring in extra profits," an airline official said. "These are mostly former airport employees - loaders or porters. They know everyone in the airport."
"Arutyunyan is jobless but a former Domodedovo employee. ... There are more like him who remain on the job," the official said on condition of anonymity.
Armen Arutyunyan is the man detained for assisting two Chechen women get on board the Sibir Tu-154 to Sochi and the Volga-Aviaexpress Tu-134 to Volgograd on the evening of Aug. 24. Both planes exploded in midair at about 11 p.m. that night.
Investigators found residue of explosives in the debris of both crashes, and suspicion has fallen on the two Chechen women, who boarded the flights at the last minute.
The identities of the women have not been established. They identified themselves as Satsita Dzhebirkhanova and Amanat Nagayeva, but were not using their own passports.
Summing up preliminary results to the crash investigation, Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov said Wednesday that Arutyunyan charged the women a total of 5,000 rubles ($171) for his services.
He stepped in after the women were detained by airport police upon their arrival from Makhachkala, Dagestan, Ustinov said, Interfax reported. A police officer released them without a check, he said.
The women were apparently unnerved by the police stop and wanted to get on outbound flights as quickly as possible. The woman calling herself Nagayeva had missed a Sibir flight to Volgograd and was hysterical, according to Kommersant. Arutyunyan swapped her ticket for one on the Volga-Aviaexpress Tu-134.
The woman calling herself Dzhebirkhanova was supposed to fly to Sochi on a larger Sibir Il-86 the next morning. But two minutes before check-in closed for Sibir Flight 1047 to Sochi, Arutyunyan gave her ticket and 1,000 rubles to a Sibir official overseeing check-in and boarding, Ustinov said.
"In violation of all regulations," the Sibir employee wrote on the ticket "Admit on Flight 1047," Ustinov said.
The Sibir official, identified by the media as Nikolai Korenkov, was indeed detained a week after the crashes, but he did not violate any rules, Sibir said.
"It is his job to help out passengers, and he has the right to rebook passengers if there are available seats," Sibir deputy director Mikhail Koshman said.
He said that after the tickets were changed, both women went through the required security and baggage checks and received airport security stamps on their boarding passes.
"The prosecutor general is just looking to shift the blame," Koshman said.
Domodedovo Airport director Sergei Rudakov said video surveillance footage shows the women were properly checked by security.
"If the explosive substances are like sugar or honey, they cannot be detected," he said. Rudakov said the airport, which is widely considered the country's most modern, fell victim to "the human factor."
"Ticket scalpers and illegal cabbies exist, and we fight them with some success but haven't eliminated them," he said. The airline official who requested anonymity said the private business of selling and swapping tickets is rampant in airports across the country.
A passenger can pay an airport staffer as little as 500 rubles to be whisked past security checks or sent through staff-only corridors, he said.
"A 'client' just needs to ask an airport employee, who will then take him by hand and lead him to the airplane," he said. "There are many loopholes, especially at night. The easiest way is to go through 'staff-only.' The fee is 200 rubles [$6.80]," he said.
For 100 rubles ($3.40), a bus driver can be hired to take a passenger directly to the plane.
Selling plane seats under the counter is profitable for police and airline crews.
No one checks or counts passengers once they arrive at their destination airport on domestic flights.
Sergei Masterov, deputy head of flight safety at the Federal Air Transportation Service, said he was not familiar with this practice. "We have not registered any such cases," he said.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Alarms for Schools
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Alarm buttons will be installed in all the city schools before January 2005, Interfax reported Tuesday quoting Governor Valentina Matviyenko.
The buttons, which will allow schools to alert law enforcement officers that something is wrong, will cost the city budget 12 million rubles ($411,000).
"In 2005 - 2006 we also plan to complete the installation of fences around schools," Interfax cited Olga Ivanova, head of the city education committee as saying.
Burial Date Agreed
MOSCOW (SPT) - The governments of Denmark and Russia have agreed to rebury the remains of Empress Maria Fyodorovna, who is known in Denmark as Princess Dagmar, on Sept. 26, 2006 in St. Petersburg, Interfax reported Wednesday
The date was chosen as 140th anniversary of Princess Dagmar's arrival to Russia to marry ... the future emperor Alexander III," Interfax cited the Foreign Ministry as saying.
The Empress outlived her son, Nicholas II, and is buried in Copenhagen.
Rosh Hashanah
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The St. Petersburg Jewish community celebrated Rosh Hashanah, or the New Year, by practicing an ancient custom - emptying their pockets of rubbish, Interfax reported Thursday quoting the St. Petersburg Synagogue.
On Sept. 16 and 17, Jews go to a bank of a river or a shore of a sea or a lake and with words, "Take our sins deep into the sea," clean out their pockets.
The practice is called Tashlikh and serves as a symbol of people to clean up themselves from all the sins to enter the New Year clean with new intentions.
Cell Suicide Probed
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The City Prosecutor's Office has launched an investigation into an apparent suicide by a prisoner this week, Interfax reported Thursday quoting prosecutors.
The prisoner, who was charged with theft, escaped from jail in summer but was later caught. He was found dead in an isolation cell Wednesday afternoon in a jail located on Ulitsa Lebedeva.
Burglar Caught
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - A suspect charged with burglary of an apartment where staff of the Mining Institute live was detained shortly after he committed the crime, Interfax reported Tuesday quoting the city police.
The Mining Institute was the elections headquarters of President Vladimir Putin in 2000 and 2004.
TITLE: 'Nord-Ost' Directors Sue City Music Hall
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The directors of the musical "Nord-Ost" are suing St. Petersburg's Music Hall theater in the Moscow Arbitration Court for 10 million rubles ($345,000) in damages after the musical was canceled in St. Petersburg.
"We also plan to sue other participants in the scandal," producer Georgy Vasilyev said Tuesday at a news conference.
The Music Hall has denied any wrongdoing in the case and blamed the scandal on the management of "Nord-Ost."
The musical's management have abandoned plans to stage "Nord-Ost" in the city from Sept 24 to Oct. 24. Instead, a national tour will begin in Nizhny Novgorod on Nov. 19 and plans to perform in St. Petersburg as the last venue many months later.
"The premiere in St. Petersburg was to be a starting point for the musical's tour across the country," Vasilyev said. "However, we are not going to cancel the performances in other cities."
The music hall's official reason for refusing to host "Nord-Ost" was because the stage and technical equipment need repairs and would not cope with the musical's massive sets, he said.
However, Vasilyev and others in his team rejected the findings of a technical commission that said the music hall was in need of urgent repairs, saying that they had inspected it and it would have been suitable to perform in.
"We can only guess what the real reasons [for spurning the musical ] are," Vasilyev said. "It seems the motives of the theater's director (Anzhela Khachaturyan) were absolutely mercenary."
Vasilyev said Khachaturyan had not returned an advance payment of $15,000.
Gleb Filshtinsky, a St. Petersburg lighting technician who worked on the performance, said Khachaturyan had also been misleading about the nature of the planned St. Petersburg performance.
"The director of the Music Hall theater tried to prove that the directors of the musical were bringing a concert version [that would not have required elaborate sets or stage effects]," he said.
"She knew from the very beginning, that it was not so. At least 54 technical experts were working on the performance, which meant there could be no talk about a concert version.
"I'm deeply sorry, disgusted and ashamed that my city won't see this musical because St. Petersburg has never hosted a performance of such high professional level," he said.
Vasilyev said he was also shocked that city officials had supported Khachaturyan's actions against the musical and said he may take legal action against the officials.
However, Khachaturyan said Thursday that the Music Hall had not refused to host "Nord-Ost," though the theater has its own concerns about the musical's managers not fullfiling their side of the contract.
Accusing the managers of miscalculating, Khachaturyan said she suspected that the managers canceled the St. Petersburg performances in order to receive the full compensation of $345,000 mentioned in the contract.
The musical could have earned this much only if it was booked out for all 37 performances, she said.
"At some point they realized that ticket sales were not going well," she said. "That became clear after the tragic events in Beslan and on Sept. 7 the musical's directors already announced they were canceling the tour," Khachaturyan said.
"For a long time Nord Ost did not provide us with the technical passport for the performance, which is essential for any touring theater," she added. "We received it only on Sept. 6 but there were several important documents missing.
"We demanded that the managers provide us with those papers," she said. "Instead, next day the musical direction announced canceling the tour."
Khachaturyan said the musical's managers were wrong in saying that the city authorities did not want it in the city.
"Nord-Ost," which is based on the Veniamin Kaverin book 'The Two Captains" received international attention when spectators at a performance in Moscow in 2002 were taken hostage.
The theater where they were held captive was stormed resulting in the deaths of 129 spectators.
TITLE: New Drama Festival Starts
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: An international festival highlighting contemporary drama opens Friday, showcasing cutting-edge plays largely centered upon Russia's most painful and sensitive issues: terrorism, totalitarianism, corruption, alcoholism, drug addiction, migration and social inequality.
Running Sept. 17 through 26 in the Lensoviet, Baltiisky Dom and Osobnyak theaters and the city's Academy For Theatre Arts, the festival features performances by experimental troupes from Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Perm, Tolyatti and Kemerovo as well as by foreign counterparts from Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Serbia, Germany and Iran.
The Golden Mask, Russia's top theatrical festival, established the New Drama Festival in 2002. But unlike the Mask, which brings together the cream of the crop of the country's theatrical scene, the younger festival is meant to introduce audiences to aspiring young artists, who are expected to dominate Russia's theatrical landscape in a few years' time.
Festival founder Eduard Boyakov said Thursday that the event emerged as an attempt to confront escapist and cowardly tendencies in modern Russian theater.
"Most directors are too intimidated to stage daring and controversial modern plays, preferring to either hide behind the big names of the past or indulge in fantasy, Harry Potter-style," he said at a news conference. "I do not argue that realities should dictate what artists do, but ignoring real life and turning a blind eye to the plight of your own country is dishonest."
The New Drama Festival looks at Russia's plight with wide open eyes. In Artyom Seversky's play, "Skin," the main character is a skinhead and the author is apparently sympathetic toward the hero. "Shapito-yurt" by Pyotr Filimonov is centered in Chechnya, while Inga Abele's "Iron Grass" tells the story of a recovered drug addict breaking loose after being rejected by his own family who refuse to accept the prodigal son.
"We compiled the festival's program in July, and, tragically, it has become even more resonant, relevant and burning over the past two months," Boyakov said. "It has to be acknowledged that we live in a country of ethnic conflicts and rampant violence, where tragedies like Beslan are regular events."
The festival is divided into three parts, juxtaposing the stagings of modern Russian and international plays as well as readings of new dramas.
For the full festival timetable, visit http://www.newdrama.ru
TITLE: Vinnichenko Goes, But No Questions Are Asked
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The Legislative Assembly has voted not to bother Nikolai Vinnichenko with a request to explain why he resigned as city prosecutor with just four members of the Democratic faction saying they wanted to know.
"I voted for [Vinnichenko to explain because] I'm not happy with the way the Prosecutor [General's] Office works," Mikhail Amosov, one of the four and head of the Yabloko faction said Thursday in a telephone interview.
"Last year, all the lawmakers voted for appointing Vinnichenko when he was presented by the Prosecutor General's Office, which said then he would be city prosecutor for the next five years, for a long time," Amosov said. "And now, just one year later, he leaves and not just from the city prosecutor's office, but also entirely from being a prosecutor. This all looks very suspicious to me."
Vinnichenko is believed to be taking up a post in the presidential administration. Amosov said it seems that the Prosecutor General's Office pressured Vinnichenko to go.
"He was forced to go for his professionalism," he said. "Vinnichenko was not active enough in opening the investigations that the Prosecutor General's Office wanted him to pursue here against certain people.
"I can't give any comment, I don't know," Yelena Ordynskaya, spokes-woman for the city prosecutor's office said Thursday, when asked the reasons for Vinnichenko's departure.
It appeared that Vinnichenko signed the resignation letter before going on vacation in August, which contradicts earlier statements from the City Prosecutor's Office that his resignation was merely a rumor and that Vinnichenko simply went on vacation.
"He doesn't work with us any more," Ordynskaya said. "He filed a letter of resignation Aug. 6 and was on holiday until Sept. 12. I went to our human resources department and found out that he quit."
She said there was no official information about who will succeed Vinnichenko as city prosecutor, despite widespread discussion about Chuvash republic prosecutor Sergei Zaitsev as the most likely candidate.
The Prosecutor General's Office could not be reached for a comment Thursday.
On Wednesday, Vinnichenko spoke with Vadim Tyulpanov, speaker of the Legislative Assembly, just before the voting.
"He confirmed to me that he resigned of his own initiative," Tyulpanov said Wednesday.
TITLE: Putin Blesses Gazprom Deal and Shares Soar
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - President Vladimir Putin sent Gazprom shares soaring this week by indicating he backed ending the long-derided dual trading system for the gas giant's shares.
Putin gave Gazprom the go ahead to acquire the government's last major oil company on Tuesday while simultaneously lifting an eight-year ban on foreign ownership of the gas monopoly's local shares.
However, on Wednesday, a top minister said limits on foreign ownership of the gas giant could remain in place.
"Liberalization means a leveling of the conditions for turnover of the paper, but it doesn't mean the removal of limits in the company's activities for all residents and nonresidents," Industry and Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko told reporters Wednesday in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, Interfax reported.
Khristenko's statement may indicate a lack of clarity inside the Kremlin about the mechanism to liberalize the share market after Putin's sudden announcement on Tuesday, which apparently took even some top Russian oil executives by surprise.
Investors said it was too early to say what Khristenko's comments meant. Konstantin Bogdanov, a spokesman for the Economic Development and Trade Ministry, declined to comment when asked whether there would still be restrictions for foreign owners of Gazprom stocks.
Uniting Gazprom and Rosneft, two of the three companies considered best positioned to acquire the assets of besieged oil giant Yukos, dramatically strengthens the government's hold on the energy sector while paving the way for billions of dollars of foreign fund money to flow into the stock market.
In a televised meeting, Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov told Putin he had come up with a way to increase the state's stake in Gazprom, the nation's biggest taxpayer, from 38 percent to a controlling one, a condition the Kremlin said had to be met before it would agree to the elimination of restrictions on foreign ownership in the company.
Gazprom's subsidiaries own 16.6 percent of their parent company's stock, and Fradkov told Putin that they would exchange most of it to acquire Rosneft.
Putin readily agreed, telling Fradkov: "Do what you think is right."
"I am convinced that the dual system [of share ownership] should be ended as quickly as possible," Putin said. "The sooner it is done... the better."
Currently, foreigners are only allowed to buy Gazprom proxy shares bundled into groups of ten and sold at a premium in the West as American Depository Receipts.
Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller later said the company would trade 10.7 percent of its own shares for Rosneft, valuing the deal at about $5.6 billion.
"This is a deal that the market has been waiting for a long time," Miller said.
"It will be a real locomotive for the whole Russian stock market."
Analysts said the decision, which led national news broadcasts all day, solves two major problems at once: It creates a new global energy force along the lines of Saudi Arabia's Aramco, and it breathes new life into a depressed stock market.
"This is a watershed event for the market," said William Browder, CEO of Hermitage Capital Management, which manages some $1.5 billion on the Russian stock market and is a significant minority shareholder in Gazprom.
Gazprom shares in Moscow soared nearly 15 percent on the news, pushing its market capitalization up more than $7 billion to $54 billion.
Despite the massive revenues Russia is enjoying from record oil prices, foreign investors have become increasingly put off by the year-long legal campaign against Yukos and a summer-long crisis of confidence in the banking system. Adding to the malaise have been growing signs of government recalcitrance on key reforms. More frightening still, investors said, was Putin's announcement Monday that he was rolling back more than a decade of democratic reforms by doing away with directly elected governors and parliamentarians.
But that may all be forgotten now that the decision to bring down the "ring fence" on Gazprom shares has been made, investors and analysts said.
"It is a breakthrough event," said Ian Hague, president of New York based Firebird Fund, which manages some $650 million in the Russian equity market, including Gazprom shares. "They are buying the loyalty of the foreign investor community as they create what looks like a political dictatorship. And it is working."
In some ways, analysts said, the merger of Gazprom with Rosneft is in line with Putin's drive to consolidate power, which started in politics and has spread into the energy sector, which is the lifeblood of the Russian economy.
"The Ministry of Oil and Gas Is Back," privately owned MDM Bank wrote in a note to clients late Tuesday, referring to the Soviet-era institution.
"On the political side, we've had the reactivation of some of the Soviet infrastructure," said Chris Weafer, chief strategist at Alfa Bank. "Now we have the appearance of a new state oil and gas giant."
"Russia is the only major oil exporter outside of the United States where the state does not own a major oil company," Weafer said. "They are building Russia's version of Saudi's Aramco.
In an interview with Kommersant last year, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov called for the state to retake control of the "commanding heights" of the economy, in particular the oil sector.
The head of the Federal Energy Agency, Sergei Oganesyan, recently told journalists that the state should ideally control about 20 percent of Russia's oil production.
If the newly merged Gazprom Rosneft behemoth were to take over key Yukos subsidiary Yuganskneftegaz, the state would indeed gain control of 20 percent of national oil output, said Steven Dashevsky, head of research at Aton brokerage.
Analysts said Tuesday the new company will be well-poised to win any auctions the government might conduct for assets taken from Yukos, which has been hit with a back-tax bill that is $7 billion and rising.
"It will create an oil and gas supermajor that will have the financial resources and the strategic rationale to bid for any of Yukos' assets, including Yuganskneftegaz," Dashevsky said.
In a bitter, politically charged battle with the state, Yukos looks set to lose control of Yuganskneftegaz, the production unit that accounts for more than 60 percent of its output. Justice Ministry officials have said they are preparing to sell it to offset the company's tax bill.
Rosneft, Gazprom and Kremlin-friendly Surgutneftegaz are considered to be in the running. But even Putin has expressed doubts whether Rosneft has the funds to buy Yuganskneftegaz, which if valued at market prices could go for about $14 billion.
The combined force of Gazprom and Rosneft could, however, create the ideal vehicle, analysts said.
In theory, if Gazprom-Rosneft does buy Yuganskneftegaz, it could pay for part of it with the 5.5 percent of Gazprom stock still held by its subsidiaries, which is worth $3 billion and is likely to climb dramatically in the months ahead.
But Miller denied that the new company, which he said would be finalized early next year, would seek to acquire Yuganskneftegaz or any Yukos assets.
"Gazprom is not examining the possibility of taking part in such tenders or auctions," he said, Interfax reported. "The company is not interested in the destabilization of the situation around Yukos, which is a partner of Gazprom."
Fradkov, however, appeared to leave the door open for Gazprom to acquire other oil assets.
"The plans are ambitious," he told reporters as he flew in for a meeting in the capital city of Kazakhstan, Astana. "The assets that are going to be acquired are oil and gas assets," he said.
The Gazprom-Rosneft tie up, he said, will create "a transnational company of global significance."
GAZPROM
Reserves 28 trillion cubic meters
Output 540 billion cubic meters (bcm)
Exports 140 bcm
Sales $28 billion
Profit $5.5 billion
Debt $16 billion
Key Partners - E.ON, ConocoPhillips, Total, Shell, BP, Statoil
ROSNEFT
Oil Reserves 1.4 billion tons
(10.3 billion barrels)
Gas Reserves 4.3 trillion cubic meters
Output 19.4 million tons
Sales $3.6 billion
Profit $390 million
Partners - ExxonMobil, ChevronTexaco, BP, Statoil, Gazprom
*All figures are for 2003
Source: Reuters
TITLE: Capital Flight Could Reach $17 Billion
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Capital flight from Russia this year may exceed government estimates by as much as two times, a leading economist said Wednesday.
Following the legal assault on Yukos, a mini-banking crisis and a spate of terrorist attacks, capital flight could hit $17 billion this year, said Tatyana Monegen, director of the Moscow-based Institute for the Legal Protection of Property and Entrepreneurship.
"Capital flight has already reached $9 billion to $10 billion in the first half of this year," she said, speaking at a conference dedicated to capital flight and held at the Federation Council.
"This is slightly less than for the whole of last year and some experts forecast $17 billion this year, which is worrying."
The Economic Development and Trade Ministry is estimating that capital flight could be between $8 billion and $12 billion this year, up from $2.3 billion last year, the lowest figure since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Andrei Klepach, the head of the ministry's forecasting department, said Wednesday that the final figure for 2004 could be "slightly higher" than current estimates, Interfax reported.
A high outflow of capital is likely to continue next year, he added, but the country stands a chance of becoming a net importer of capital in 2006 and 2007, mostly from the corporate sector.
For that to happen, however, the government needs to provide a better investment climate, said economists speaking at Wednesday's conference.
"Belief in investment in Russia has been shaken," Monegen said.
"The story around Yukos complicated the situation. Calls to declare oil, gas and metals strategic resources in view of national security do not add confidence to investors. But it all pales in comparison with the new risks of Russia, which are terror-related."
Natalya Lopashenko, head of the Saratov-based Center for the Research of Organized Crime and Corruption, agreed that terrorism is largely to blame.
"We would have passed the peak of capital flight if it hadn't been for the banking crisis and the tragic events. Russia has again become unpredictable," Lopashenko said.
In the mid-1990s, she said, Russia saw its largest outflow of capital, with some $80 billion leaving the country in the worst years. According to independent estimates, Lopashenko said, capital flight has been on a steady decline in the past four years, with $24 billion leaving in 2000, $16 billion in 2001, $8.2 billion in 2002 and $6.7 billion in 2003.
She said that the wish to keep capital safe and inability to legalize it in Russia remain among the chief reasons for capital flight.
Lopashenko said Russia should study the experience of other countries, such as Kazakhstan, in declaring tax amnesties on capital. For example, the Kazakh government helped legalize $500 million in 2001, she said.
"We, too, have to think about it," Lopashenko said. "Until property becomes a sacred cow, capital flight will continue."
TITLE: Moscow Chains Overcharge Petersburgers
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: The city's residents may have lower incomes than their compatriots in Moscow, but most Moscow restaurants and cafe chains do not lower their prices when they open up in St. Petersburg.
There are around 30 Moscow restaurant and cafe chains operating in Russia's northern capital, according to Rashid Magdeyev, the director general of the Association of Restauranteurs. These include: Planeta Sushi, Coffee House, Il Patio Pizza, Yakitoria, Teremok and Kroshka-kartoshka.
Instead of lowering their prices in St. Petersburg, Moscow chains try to appeal to a wealthier clientele and to offer them higher service standards. Moscow restauranteurs are waiting for the growth of disposable income in St. Petersburg, and this will mean that they lose customers, hospitality-industry experts say.
The average income of a St. Petersburger - at $205 a month - is about 20 percent less than your average Muscovite's - at $257 a month - according to statistics from Comcon SPb research agency from spring this year.
Based on further research conducted by Comcon SPb, 4.8 million Muscovites (62 percent of the city's population) and 2.5 million Petersburgers (59 percent of the population) eat out at least once every three months. The research also says that full-service restaurants and fast-food chains are popular in Moscow, while St. Petersburgers prefer cafes and pubs.
Moscow-chain sushi bars Yakitoria and Gin-no Taki did not change their prices when they opened up in St. Petersburg. "It wasn't necessary," said Inna Ismaylova, marketing manager at Vesta Center, a holding company which manages both chains. "Your average bill at Yakitoria doesn't exceed $20," she said. "And, any Petersburg resident who regularly eats out can afford that."
Andrei Konanchuk, director general of the Kroshka-kartoshka chain, or 'Baby Potato', said that his company could not lower its prices in St. Petersburg because operating costs were not any lower than in Moscow.
Local restauranteurs say that not taking into account St. Petersburgers' purchasing power is a mistake.
"When dealing with competition in the local market, price has been the determining factor so far," said Alexei Fursov, president of Evrasia holding, which owns 18 restaurants and sushi bars in St. Petersburg. "For this reason, we're not afraid of the expansion of Moscow chains," he said.
The turnover of an average Moscow dining outlet is more than $3,420 a day, Fursov said, which is twice the average turn-over of outlets in St. Petersburg. The average bill at an Evrasia eatery is $10.
"If we were to enter the Moscow market, we would raise our prices by about 30 percent," said Boris Krupkin, director general of local crepe and tea-house chain Chainaya Lozhka, or 'Teaspoon.' "And, even then, our prices would be lower than those of our competitors," he said.
Nevertheless, one Moscow chain of cafes: Coffee House, which already has five outlets in St. Petersburg, has taken into consideration the specifics of the St. Petersburg market.
The chain's marketing director, Yekaterina Salagina, said that the prices at Coffee House's St. Petersburg outlets were 25 percent to 30 percent cheaper than in Moscow, and that an average bill in St. Petersburg was between $6 and $9 - 25 percent less than in Moscow.
Salangina said that the city restaurant and cafe market was not yet saturated, but that St. Petersburg residents have less disposable income than in Moscow. "In our operations, we count on the future growth of disposable incomes," she said.
Salangina said that table service is one of the chain's attractions, because most cafes in St. Petersburg are self-service.
"Coffee House targets a more affluent and demanding group, that wouldn't want to wait by the cash register," Salangina said.
The St. Petersburg cafe chain Idealnaya Chashka, or 'Ideal Cup', which has two Moscow outlets, has taken Moscow market conditions into consideration in its pricing system. The Moscow outlets' prices are 20 to 30 percent higher than their Petersburg prices, while the service format remains the same. "We're not going to change our standards in different regions," said Idealnaya Chashka's deputy director Leonid Lugovoi.
Andrei Petrakov, the head of Rest Con consulting company, said that Petersburg residents are more patient with service staff and the quality of service and that explains why paying at the cash register and self-service are standard practice in the city.
If Moscow restauranteurs want to compete with local eateries they will have to adopt more flexible pricing policies, Petrakov said.
TITLE: Real Estate Prices Will Increase
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The growth of commercial real estate, fair property valuation and the legal and financial questions associated with entering the city's real estate market were all discussed at the Real Estate Market in St. Petersburg: Status and Trends conference, organized by the city chapter of the American Chamber of Commerce on Thursday.
With presentations from city government officials, real estate experts and consulting and legal advisers, the conference provided a comprehensive analysis of the city real estate market, which is developing dynamically.
Maxim Sokolov, the chairman of the city Investments and Strategic projects committee, welcomed the attendees, who were mainly the representatives of international firms operating in the city, including American Express and Ernst & Young. The city government hopes to become a more accessible and user-friendly partner to investors, he said.
St. Petersburg's residential real estate has a 20-percent growth potential until it plateaus, said Alexander Vinogradov from AVK Research group. Citing AVK's research and analysis, Vinogradov said that $1,400 per square meter was a fair price for city residential real estate.
With the average September price for residential property in the city nearing $1,100, there is still room for considerable growth. Vinogradov said that AVK's estimation of growth in Moscow had already been reached and that the going rate in the capital was $1,900 per square meter.
St. Petersburg developers need to conform to international standards in property classification and provide more transparent information on the deals they make, said Helena Tabala, director of Knight Frank, an international real estate agency that entered the St. Petersburg market in July. She cited the lack of information as the major obstacle to comparative analysis of the market, saying that it left clients to rely solely on the opinions of experts.
However, she said, there is much to be positive about in the Russian market, and in St. Petersburg specifically, where there are lower thresholds to investment and all the opportunities an emerging market has to offer.
Anatoly Seroka from property consultants Colliers International provided an overview of retail and business center development in St. Petersburg. "For now, interestingly enough, the retail center market is dominated not by Moscow or Western developers, but by companies originating from St. Petersburg, such as Lenta and O'Kei, that continue to be successful in the city," Seroka said. The new Perinniye Riadi complex next to Gostiny Dvor mall on Nevsky prospekt and the shopping center Pik on Sennaya square, once opened, Seroka said, will become showcases of how city retail centers can perform in densely occupied and competitive locations.
Retail and business center development is booming, particularly in the centre and on the Petrograd side, where the higher-quality developments are concentrated.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Wal-Mart for SPB
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - American hyper-market chain Wal-Mart plans to open a store in St. Petersburg, Interfax quoted the head of the city economic development committee as saying Wednesday.
Wal-Mart, with an annual revenue of over $270 billion, plans to open a hyper-market in 2005, he said.
"I have this information, but I'm not ready yet to discuss the opening in more detail," he said.
Meanwhile, the city's recruitment agencies are already interviewing prospective staff for Wal-mart, said a representative of one of the city's major retail chains. He added that while the exact location of the store had not been announced, the 20,000 square-meter store is likely to be in the Leningrad Oblast, close to the city's outskirts.
Pricey Piter
ST. PETERSBURG (SPB) - The city made it into the world's top-ten most expensive cities, according to research conducted by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, reported RosBusinessConsulting on Tuesday.
Tokyo remained the most expensive city in the world, while St. Petersburg came in at number ten.
New York has fallen off the ten most expensive locations list altogether, the study said.
London has gone up five places from last year's rating and is now number two, replacing Moscow, which, this year, is in third position.
The study does not take into account the spending of your average St. Petersburger, said news portal fontanka.ru. Instead, Mercer looks at living and entertainment costs for elite business people. It conducts this research to provide estimations for large corporations for expatriate employee packages.
St. Petersburg's expensive five-star hotels and car-rental prices may explain why the city rated so highly on the list, according to Fontanka.ru.
A total of 144 world cities were considered in the research.
New City Plan
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - A new strategic program for city planning till 2025 was presented on Thursday at the Committee for Economic Growth, Industrial Policy and Trade.
The ambitious plan envisions that in twenty years, St. Petersburg will have been turned into a modern, western-European standard city with solid city infrastructure which provides for a high standard of living for its residents.
Legislative amendments and construction programs associated with the plan will begin in 2005.
Critics of the plan say that administrative obstacles still dramatically slow-down infrastructure development in the city. They say that this needs to be addressed before ambitious new infrastructure projects can be started, according to a report on news portal Fontanka.ru.
Gambling
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - St. Petersburg deputies are behind a plan to dramatically increase taxes on gambling.
Fourteen city deputies signed an agreement which included a range of legislative reforms that would introduce new taxes and increase existing ones on gambling machines and equipment.
The proposal stated that every poker machine would be taxed a 85,000 ruble ($2,900) one-off tax and then 7,500 rubles ($257) per year.
The proposal is a reaction to the dramatic increase in poker machines in both casinos and clubs, and also in city shops. Poker machines will soon be introduced into metro stations as well.
TITLE: Putin's Reforms Are Danger to Russia
TEXT: In response to the recent wave of terrorist attacks that has stunned Russia, President Vladimir Putin on Monday announced a package of sweeping government reforms that will bolster the authoritarian direction of Russia's political development. Putin proposed a fundamental restructuring of the entire executive branch, making it far more rigid and centralized than before. His plan further weakens representative democracy by dismantling key institutions such as direct elections.
Of all the measures that Putin proposed, only the Special Federal Commission on the North Caucasus is directly connected to the tragedy in Beslan, which served as the occasion for announcing the entire package of authoritarian reforms. The reforms break down into two groups: emergency measures intended to help the Kremlin maintain control of the North Caucasus and a number of broader anti-federalist and anti-democratic proposals.
The second group includes a return to the late-Soviet practice, also in place during the early years of Boris Yeltsin's presidency, of appointing regional leaders, as well as what amounts to an attempt to restore a single-party political system. The first group consists of what could be called tactical measures, although Putin's plan for coordination between the heads of "district and regional anti-terrorism commissions" was in fact introduced in the Southern Federal District a month before the tragedy in Beslan. The Kremlin had been working on the second group for some time, however. Only now, it seems, did Putin decide that the time was right to put his plans into action.
In the name of strengthening the state and improving its ability to battle terrorism, Putin has proposed a fundamental revision of the democratic achievements of the Yeltsin years, including the main such achievement still in place-direct parliamentary and gubernatorial elections. Party-list contests involving United Russia will differ little from Soviet-era elections in which people were invited to cast their votes for the "indestructible bloc of Communists and unaffiliated candidates."
Regional elections, unmanageable as they were, nevertheless played an extremely important role in teaching the voters about direct democracy and the regional political elite about public policy and responsibility to the electorate. It's also worth keeping in mind that a majority of governors are now serving their final term. Switching to a system of appointments means that those governors could remain in power.
The Constitutional Court now finds itself in a tricky position. Asked back in 1996 to determine the constitutionality of the charter of the Altai region, the court ruled that representatives of one branch of government cannot be in charge of forming another. That was a different time, of course. But from the legal point of view, nothing has changed since that ruling.
Putin's reform plan will require the revision of all regional statutes and constitutions. The package as a whole represents a major reform of the constitutional order that will entail the widespread revision of existing laws. The Constitution itself, however, will not need to be changed. Yet less than two years ago, in comments broadcast live on television and radio on Dec. 19, 2002, Putin said: "I have no desire to put appointed officials in charge of the regions. The leaders of the regions are elected by the people in a direct, secret ballot. That is what the Constitution prescribes, and that is how it should stay." You can still find this quote on Putin's official web site.
Putin also announced the creation of a so-called public chamber, which he described as a "forum for broad dialogue" and "a place for carrying out public analysis of key government decisions." "In practical terms," Putin said, "we are talking about civilian control over the work of the state apparatus, including law enforcement and the security services." The creation of such a chamber would put the finishing touches on a system of surrogate institutions intended to replace such weakened democratic institutions as parliament, the government, an independent judiciary and a free press.
This new system of shadowy doubles is nowhere provided for in the Constitution, and depends entirely on the president. Instead of a parliament we will have the State Council and the public chamber.
Instead of the government, we'll have the presidential administration, the Security Council and the maze of presidential advisory councils. Institutional systems of information gathering and public reception offices stand in for a free press. A transparent budget gives way to all sorts of off-budget funds and direct requisition from "socially responsible businesses." Governors are no longer elected and accountable to the voters, they are appointed by the Kremlin. Political competition is weakened and the state becomes sealed off and ineffective.
The main defect in this rigid, centralized system is its total lack of flexibility, its inability to adapt to changing situations and to react to crises. A system in which everything is bound to a single person, the president, is potentially extremely unstable.
The issue of personnel is also important. Putin had already assigned Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref to help the hapless siloviki in the North Caucasus. Now he is sending in the last of his reinforcements, the irreplaceable Dmitry Kozak. The former Cabinet chief of staff was named Putin's envoy to the Southern Federal District.
The transfer means that Kozak will abandon his crucial work on administrative reform, including the demarcation of powers between federal and regional agencies and municipal reform. Unlike former presidential envoy Vladimir Yakovlev, who will now head up the resurrected Nationalities Ministry, Kozak has been given such extensive powers that he will serve essentially as a sort of governor-general in the south.
Until recently, the Kremlin was battling on two main fronts. On one front, it was pitted against the rebellious governors; on the second, it was dealing with a public backlash over unpopular social reforms. Many analysts assumed that to open a third front against terrorism the Kremlin would have to retreat in its standoff with the governors. Instead, Putin has opted to eliminate the governors as a more or less independent political class.
Beslan revealed that the federal government had learned nothing from the Nord Ost hostage crisis in 2002. The conclusions it has drawn from the most recent tragedy are contrary to common sense.
Beslan demonstrated the inability of Putin's executive chain of command and the centralized state to meet the challenge of terrorism. We witnessed a total lack of responsibility within the government and chronic indecisiveness at every level of power save the very top.
Initial responses to Putin's speech from State Duma deputies and the governors unfortunately leave no doubt that the Kremlin's package of reforms will sail through parliament. The only hope is that cooler heads will prevail inside the Kremlin as the necessary legislation is being drawn up-people who understand just how dangerous Putin's plan is not just for society, but for themselves.
Nikolai Petrov, a scholar-in-residence at the Carnegie Moscow Center, contributed this comment to The St. Petersburg Times.
TITLE: Mr. President, What About The Constitution?
TEXT: Only a blind person could have failed to notice that in the last four years Russia has slowly but surely been turning into a state that is like a parody of the Soviet Union.
On Monday, President Vladimir Putin made a new and a very significant step in turning back the clock when he announced that the head of state would choose candidates for governor that the regional parliaments would only then approve.
Can this be the same person who put his hand on a copy of the Russian Constitution in 2000 and again in May this year and swore as the elected president to uphold the main law of the country. The Constitution says, "Citizens of the Russian Federation shall have the right to elect and to be elected to bodies of state governance and to organs of local self-government, as well as take part in a referendum." (Article 32. 2).
At the same time Chapter 4 of the Constitution, which describes functions of the president, does not say that the head of state has the right to present a candidate to head a region.
The right to elect a governor is in the hands of Russian citizens, and therefore, by introducing this new practice, Putin is violently at odds with the Constitution.
On the other hand, he has become quite used to operating outside the bounds of the Constitution over the last several years.
One of the best examples here is his decision to set up seven federal districts with presidential representatives in each of them. Putin created these districts shortly after he was elected in 2000.
While the Constitution says the president has a right to appoint his representatives, it makes no mention of the structure of the seven districts introduced by Putin. The Constitution says the Russian Federation contains 89 administrative regions, that's all.
Most political analysts who still think independently have seen quite clearly that the new structure will end up creating positions so that former top officials may stay in business rather than doing anything useful for citizens.
"We live in a transition economy and under a political system that does not correspond with the conditions and the level of the development of society," Putin said in his recent address to the nation.
Looking back at last year's gubernatorial elections in St. Petersburg, I can say without a doubt that Putin himself has done quite a lot to lower that level of development by using his so-called administrative resources to get Valentina Matviyenko elected.
This campaign has stuck in my memory. She was Putin's envoy, even if technically on leave during the campaign. Journalists were beaten up by Matviyenko's bodyguards, local businesses that financed campaigns of other candidates were driven into the ground and local and national television reported how good the Kremlin's favorite was.
Many election campaigns in Russia in the last few years have been conducted in exactly the same way, leading people to a simple conclusion - civil society has little influence on choosing rulers no matter how you vote.
Putin had a chance to raise "the level of the development of society" but did exactly the opposite and continues to lower it despite its being quite clear where such an approach leads, even to him.
"We have shown weakness, and it is the weak that are beaten," Putin said.
And I would add that the weak will keep being beaten, because the one who was supposed to strengthen the society by teaching it to believe in itself, turns out to be a bad teacher. Most of his assistants manage just two tasks perfectly - to lying and backing each other no matter how many representatives of the public, who have been weakened by them, have been deprived of their rights or died.
By introducing the practice of presenting governors to be approved by regional parliaments, Putin is pushing society back to Soviet times, when the authorities paid no attention to people's rights and interests, but only to the positions they held.
TITLE: Shooting Hitler
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: A controversial new film documenting the last hours of the life of Adolf Hitler that opened in cinemas across Germany on Thursday has already sparked an international debate about how the Nazi dictator should be portrayed on film.
"Der Untergang," (to be released in English as "Downfall") was shot in St. Petersburg, Berlin and Munich last fall by director Oliver Hirschbiegel and is based partly on the memoirs of Hitler's last secretary Traudl Junge, first published in 2002
"Downfall," which cost $15 million to make and is one of the most expensive German films ever made, traces the final day of Hitler's life, including his suicide on April 30, 1945.
Hitler is played by the celebrated Swiss actor Bruno Ganz, and not only does "Downfall" focus on the Fuhrer, it is also compassionate toward him, critics say.
Until now, German films have shied away from portraying Hitler in a central role. In breaking this long-held taboo, Hirschbiegel has stoked controversy among critics and industry professionals, who fear the film will divide German society. While winning praise for stepping away from demonizing Hitler, the film was attacked for "showing a monster as a human being" as Bild, a tabloid newspaper, put it.
Is Germany ready to see the Nazi leader as a tormented and tragic person?
"Until he starts having hysterical fits, Ganz's Hitler talks in a soft, melodic Austrian accent, far different from the barking tone he adopted for his mass rallies," wrote Kate Connolly in her report for Britain's The Daily Telegraph published on Aug. 24.
Russia's taboo regarding the portrayal of Hitler had its downfall in 1999, with Alexander Sokurov's 1999 "Moloch."
After the end of World War II, Soviet and subsequently Russian film directors traditionally portrayed Hitler as a hysterical and unbalanced caricature. Audiences saw a chaotic, goggled-eyed man, with a slanting fringe over his eyes, racing around and yelling at everyone.
"A similar trend existed in Western cinematography as well, but it went away much sooner, in the 1960s, when Hitler and Benito Mussolini were shown in a more reflexive, complex and sophisticated kind of way," said St. Petersburg film historian Alexander Pozdnyakov. "But Russians persistently stuck to their 'compare and contrast' approach of showing a ridiculous, semi-delirious Hitler versus a wise, stable, calm and confident Stalin, whose screen behavior suggests that he had known the outcome of the war from the start."
For ideological reasons, heavily mythologized images of Hitler and Stalin remained commonplace on Russian screens for much longer than in other parts of the world. The only exception was Germany, which had its own myths to part with.
In "Moloch," Sokurov refrained from presenting a grotesque image of the dictator and offered a much more human portrayal of the tyrant.
St. Petersburg actor Leonid Mozgovoi, who played Hitler in "Moloch" and also starred in the role of Lenin in Sokurov's "Taurus", which followed in 2000, said "Moloch" was the first ever attempt in Russia to emphasize the human qualities of the dictator.
"We were interested in showing the Fuhrer as a tormented and suffering human being, not as a powerful political leader," Mozgovoi said. "The directors of 'Downfall' have exactly the same goals for their film, although they chose a different period of Hitler's life to illustrate their point."
While "Downfall" develops in the dismal gloomy atmosphere of 1945 Berlin, with the air pierced with anticipation of the German defeat, and shows the last hours of Hitler's life, "Moloch" takes place in 1942, before the Battle of Stalingrad. For Sokurov it was more important to explore what eventually led to his defeat and suicide, than actually to show Hitler claiming his own life.
"In our film, Hitler is visiting his beloved Eva Braun for a couple of days," Mozgovoi recalls.
"I faced the hugely complicated task of playing a man obsessed with his mission, who truly believes he mustn't get married because he fully belongs to his nation, and who was extremely feeble both mentally and physically, suffering from hysterical fits, insomnia and chronic diahrrea."
Of all the 20th century's tyrants from Stalin to Mao, Castro to Pol Pot, Hitler was perhaps the most demonized on film.
"I believe the main reason why Hitler has long been portrayed in such a grotesque way was his obvious artistic talent," Pozdnyakov said. "His speeches were hot, full-scale performances, with temperatures rising as he spoke. Hitler was very much of an aesthete, who tried his hand on poetry and painting. His feelings were always too vivid, whereas most other dictators seemed reserved and self-disciplined."
As Bernd Eichinger, the producer and scriptwriter of "Downfall" emphasized, the greatest danger he saw in making a film about Hitler was the temptation to show him as a psychopath or madman.
"Hitler possessed an enormous criminal and destructive energy, and he was a barbarian in the most fundamental sense of the term," Eichinger said. "But I am convinced that he was totally of sound mind until the very end, which is why leadership never slipped from his hands."
Eichinger has dismissed accusations of "giving the monster a podium."
"These complaints are nonsense," he said. "We should be in a position to look at our own history, and this is only possible if we also show the major players, those who were essentially responsible for setting all this into motion - and Hitler was one of them, in the extreme... You wouldn't be able to portray on film events of world history, at least in Europe, because you wouldn't be able to focus on the person who provoked so much horror."
Hirschbiegel says there is no precedent for the detail and authenticity with which the crew has made the film.
"I want to believe what I see," he explains. "This only works if one is truthful. And this is clearly difficult with such a topic: how do I present truthfulness with Himmler [head of the SS]? Credibility also has to do with affection and love, with getting under the skin of a figure. But here we are showing people whom we wouldn't want to have anything to do with even in our worst nightmares."
Parts of "Downfall" were shot in St. Petersburg for purely pragmatic and utilitarian reasons: it was much cheaper to film here, and it was impossible to find an appropriate architectural landscape in Germany, where nothing resembling wartime Berlin has survived to the present day.
Christine Rothe, the movie's executive producer, said the team searched Europe for an appropriate location before choosing St. Petersburg.
"We tried Berlin itself, but it's too modern, because it was totally destroyed at the end of the war," Rothe said. "We tried in Prague, Poland, Latvia and Romania."
The irony of of the film makers' choice is bittersweet as it seems images of a devastated war-time Berlin could only be found in Russia - which won the war. Nothing particular had to be altered in the state of shabby buildings on Angliisky Prospect or Ulitsa Shkapina in central St. Petersburg, which stood in for the ruined city, to make them look convincing.
The sight of extras dressed as Nazis wandering St. Petersburg streets was uncomfortable for some, given that the city was subject to a Nazi siege for almost 900 days in 1941-44 in which hundreds of thousands of people died.
For Bruno Ganz, the actor whose job it was to play Hitler, the most difficult scene came when he had a child on his lap who sang the song "Kein schoner Land in dieser Zeit" ("There is no more beautiful land at this time").
The actor knew that the child as portrayed in the movie would soon be killed by his father - Joseph Goebbels.
"That was horrible," Ganz recalls. "This is a moment where you really want to run away. There are also other difficult, trying scenes and dialogs, such as the massively anti-Semitic rants. But when I decided to take on the role, I was aware of what this meant."
TITLE: CHERNOV'S CHOICE
TEXT: Nick Cave, the all-time Russian favorite for his black clothes and dark songs will return to St. Petersburg to perform what he calls a solo concert. The "prince of darkness" will be backed by a trio of Warren Ellis on violin, Jim Sclavunos on percussion and Martyn P. Casey on bass. Ellis came to St. Petersburg with his own band, The Dirty Three, earlier this year, while Cave's first and so far only local concert was with the Bad Seeds.
Although guitarist Blixa Bargeld, better known for his own band Einsturzende Neubauten, quit the Bad Seeds last year because he "got bored," as he said in an interview in St. Petersburg earlier this year, the band keeps going. Cave and the Bad Seeds' new studio two-album, "Abattoir Blues / The Lyre Of Orpheus," set is due for release on Mute on Monday.
Cave will perform at Oktyabrsky Concert Hall on Tuesday.
Studmenn, arguably Iceland's best-known band, which formed in Reykjavik in 1970, will arrive in St. Petersburg as part of the Dni Islandii v Peterburge festival. Translated as "Funmen," the band is notorious for its strange costumes and catchy tunes, and has been compared to Finland's Leningrad Cowboys.
The band will play at an unlikely mainstream jazz venue of the Jazz Philharmonic Hall on Friday and the rock-oriented Red Club on Sunday.
Along with the Iceland festival, a Dutch festival is taking place in the city this week.
From Holland comes Jan Akkerman, co-founder and guitarist of the 1970s Dutch prog-rock Focus. Akkerman will perform at Red Club on Wednesday and JFC Jazz Club on Thursday.
The Legendary Pink Dots, the veteran Anglo-Dutch band formed by singer, keyboard player and lyricist Edward Ka-Spel, the Englishman who moved to Amsterdam for personal and political reasons in 1985, will return to play its second Red Club show on Saturday.
Maria Gasolina, a young band from Helsinki, Finland will play at Moloko on Friday as part of an annual Finnish alternative tour to the city.
The band, whose name is a Brazilian slang term for a girl who only dates boys who own nice expensive cars, performs easy-going, jazzy Latin music, that sounds reminiscent of early Dva Samaliota to some Russian ears.
Meanwhile, the Dva Samaliota-directed bunker club Griboyedov will launch its new compilation album Griboyedov Music 7 with a concert on Monday.
Over almost eight years Griboyedov has been in the heart of underground musical and artistic activities.
Compiled by Dva Samaliota drummer Mikhail Sindalovsky, the CD is supposed to represent some of the music that has been performed at Griboyedov since the club was launched in 1996.
Unlike the past six compilations, released in a small number of copies and not available outside the club, the seventh will go on sale in regular record shops and is expected to reach a larger audience.
Solnechny Udar, Katyusha, Sporno, Dva Samaliota, Mister Maloi and Alexander Lushin will perform at the concert.
- By Sergey Chernov
TITLE: Weighty matters
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: An old proverb says that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, and I'm convinced the same holds true when it comes to discovering the heart of a foreign country. Food constitutes the most sensitive and important expression of a national culture and it is often the culinary side of a country that attracts foreign guests. Russia boasts an impressive range of national dishes and culinary traditions, and no visitor coming to Russia can escape bliny, Russian-style pancakes, or borshch, the most familiar Russian dishes outside the country's borders. But Russian cuisine has much more to offer as a visit to "Na Zdorovye" ("To your health," a traditional toast) will prove. The restaurant had caught my attention when taking a walk on the Petrograd Side - that is, to be more precise, it was the restaurant's colorful interior design that stirred my curiosity. Some days later my friend and I were on our way to the restaurant and arrived just in time before heavy rain started. As soon as I reached out for the door handle, one of the restaurant's staff opened the door for us and invited us to enter. Several other staff were lined up opposite the entrance, eagerly waiting for guests to arrive. We handed our coats to the cloakroom attendant and were ushered to the main room, although I would have liked to cast a look around the entrance area, which displayed a number of Russian and Soviet decorative items.
At the time of our arrival, the restaurant was fairly empty and we were spoiled with choices as to where to sit. After having spied a small table for two in one corner, we asked to be seated there and were immediately handed two menus. But first our attention was riveted on the interior decor of the restaurant which for a moment made us ignore even our growling stomachs. The main room is decorated with innumerable items related to Russian peasant life and Soviet times. Samovars, various Siberian tools, wooden mugs painted in the traditional Khokhlama design, pictures displaying scenes of rural life and Soviet placards cover most of the walls. The tables are laid with multi-colored quilted place mats and the chairs are covered with quilted cloth, which give the room a particularly cheerful and friendly atmosphere. The adjoining room is a bit smaller than the one we had chosen but decorated in a similar style. Rural tools and everyday gadgets are displayed on the walls, which are painted in bright turquoise. To complete the picture of peasant life, a band dressed in national costume was playing traditional songs and ballads for the guests. The décor was fascinating and we could have spent another couple of minutes just looking around if our empty stomachs had not reminded us of our main reason for coming here.
We pored eagerly over the menu which offers a wide choice of traditional Russian and Soviet dishes. From Russian zakuski like pickled gherkins and sauerkraut to national drinks like kvass, berezovy sok (birch tree juice) or klyukvenny mors (cranberry juice), there is probably not one single traditional dish or drink which cannot be found on the menu. Eventually, I decided to start my culinary journey with lightly salted herring served with chopped beetroot and mushrooms, herring mousse and hot potatoes (138 rubles, $4.73) while my friend opted for a salad composed of smoked white fish from Lake Ladoga and fresh vegetables (120.75 rubles, $4.14).
The starters turned out to be rather disappointing. The mousse which I expected to be light and frothy seemed to be made mostly of butter, and the herring was too oily and over salted. After having tasted some of the potatoes, which, in contrast to the herring, were not salted at all, I decided to wait for the second course.
My friend was not really happy with his salad either, which, in his opinion was not very fresh and a bit boring.
The second course also failed to meet our high expectations. My kartofelnie oladki s sousom iz lesnykh gribov, potato fritters with mushroom sauce (103.50 rubles, $3.54) was baked in far too much grease and was too lightly seasoned. My friend regretted having chosen chicken soup, a broth with pieces of chicken liver and rice (103.50 rubles, $3.54) and gave up after a few spoonfuls. Our expectations had been set way too high, and I looked disappointedly at the remains of my obladi. Hope dies last another proverb says, and I decided to give it another chance before making up my mind.
For the main course, I had settled on crab meat baked with cheese and served with brussel sprouts (241.50 rubles, $8.27) and my companion had opted for fried duck served with noodles, fried mushrooms and turnip (276 rubles, $9.45). This time there was no complaint. My friend enjoyed his duck, which was crispy and well seasoned, and I was quite happy with my choice of crab meat.
After finishing off our main dishes, we felt that we were not too full for dessert and ordered some ice cream with strawberry sauce (138 rubles, $4.73).
It seems that my taste buds have not yet grown accustomed to the Russian way of preparing dishes which are a lot greasier and heavier than what I am used to. Our bill arrived in a small wooden box, one of the many details that give this place its charming atmosphere even if the food's not up to scratch.
On our way out, we stopped to take a closer look at the avtomat dlya gazirovannoi vodi which was standing in one corner of the entrance area. My friend explained to me that during Soviet times, people used to get carbonated water from it, a forerunner of our modern soft-drink dispensers. It had stopped raining and we decided to take the opportunity to go for a short walk - a good way of digesting our heavy food.
Na Zdorove, 13 Bolshoi Prospect, Petrograd Side. Tel: 230-74-63. Menu in Russian and in English. All major credit cards accepted. Open daily from 12 a.m. through 11p.m. Dinner for two,
with vodka: 1,397.25 rubles ($47.85)
TITLE: Much more than sausage
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: For a German native with a Chinese wife and a penchant for Thai food, an international career as an executive chef seems logical. Michael Roehr, appointed as chef at the Corinthia Nevskij Palace Hotel in March 2004, says that the profession is what he has wanted to do even since adolescence.
"You've got to make up your mind pretty early what you want to do with your job," he advises. "I knew what I wanted from the beginning. I was inspired by my cousin, who was an international executive chef. I achieved fairly quickly what I wanted."
Born in Groemitz, Germany in 1960, Roehr completed culinary school by the time he was 19 and had his first overseas appointment when he was 23, at the Excelsior Hotel in Hong Kong. In subsequent years he has plied his trade at hotels and on cruise lines across Australasia and the Middle East, including the Brisbane Sheraton (Australia), Manila Midtown (The Philippines), Kempinski Hotel (United Arab Emirates), Shanghai American Club (Shanghai), Princess Cruises, and the Shangrila Hotel (Beijing), which is where he met his wife, who is from Harbin.
"My favorite area will always remain Asia," he reminisces. "I like the towns, especially Shanghai. I've traveled there a lot."
For Roehr, St. Petersburg is a change from the pace and scale of the Asian metropolises. "It's very different from where I have been," Roehr said, calling the transition, "a bit of a set-back," and mentioning the lack of a strong culinary apprenticeship system in Russia.
Roehr estimated about 80 percent of his job deals with management and about 20 percent with cooking. In terms of cuisine he said that St. Petersburg has presented some unique opportunities, like working with fresh strugeon and affordable caviar. "Russian cuisine is pretty new to me," Roehr said, adding that he's learned a lot about it since being here. Roehr is by no means new to St. Petersburg, though - his first visits here were during the eighties when he was working on cruise liners.
Roehr said that part of what's new about working in St. Petersburg is adapting to the taste of the Neva natives.
"You have to adapt your food to your customers," he said. "Here in St. Petersburg people like much more the classical, the traditional style, which comes from the French ... Russians like big portions, lots of meat, rich food. It probably has something to do with the temperature," he continued. "And potatoes," he added with a wry smile. "They're even bigger here than in Germany."
TITLE: Mad for it
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The Fall, the longest surviving British post-punk band, hailed as a British institution and absolute classic band, is making its long-awaited live debut in Russia. The band, which has influenced generations of rock bands from Nirvana to The Strokes, will perform two concerts at the 16 Tons club in Moscow this weekend.
The Fall is touring following the release of its most recent LP, the acclaimed "The Real New Fall Album (Formerly 'Country on the Click')," first released in Britain in October 2003, then reworked for June's US release.
"That one that came out in England I wasn't very happy with," explained Mark E. Smith in a recent telephone interview from his home in Manchester.
"It was OK, but it was very overproduced, I thought."
Smith considers the album's final version The Fall's best LP for a long time and is now working on its follow-up.
"We are in the middle of our LP... we call it an 'interim record,' you know, a 'between records' record," he said.
"It's half-live and half-rehearsed."
Even if The Fall's music resonates in many bands of today, Smith is critical of the current state of music, claiming he can't find anything of interest lately.
"If there were, I wouldn't be recording, really," he said.
"It seems to be almost karaoke. All the pop music on TV here is almost mimed, like puppets."
Smith described the recent upsurge of British rock as "revivalist."
"It sounds like all the music their fathers listened to. It is guitar music," he said.
Smith said he finds consolation in old rock and roll and reggae.
"I listen to a lot of old rock and roll, Gene Vincent and stuff like that, he said.
"I'm listening to Mouse from Mars from Germany, they're OK. And I love a lot of old reggae... Lee Perry, maybe, and things like that."
Formed in 1976 in Manchester, The Fall took its name from Albert Camus' novel. The band's early influences included the avant-rock of the Velvet Underground and such German art-rock bands as Can.
The fabulous Manchester scene, from 1976 to 1992, was effectively charted in "24 Hour Party People," Michael Winterbottom's 2002 acclaimed film, where Smith made a brief appearance as himself. Smith, however, has some reservations.
"I saw the first half an hour of it. I fell asleep, to be honest. I think most films rewrite some history," he said.
"I was the only person who played myself, actually. I destroyed all the part that I was in. They couldn't have me doing all the stupid things, you know. I caused the alarm; it was a bit like Marlon Brando just doing two sentences."
Although the 47-year-old Smith sounds skeptical about the younger generation of rock bands, his own band now comprises mostly young players.
"The group is mostly the new generation at the moment, so that's why I have to play [The Fall's classic 1989 album] 'This Nation's Saving Grace.' To get them into practice."
The Fall will perform at 16 Tons in Moscow at 11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. Links: www.visi.com/fall/, www.16tons.ru
TITLE: Never too late
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: He is a giant of Canadian art, but Tom Thomson is hardly known outside Canada. But since last Friday the State Hermitage Museum has given the landscape painter pride of place in the Alexander Hall in its first major exhibition of a Canadian artist.
Thomson, who died in mysterious circumstances in 1917, is considered a Canadian original. This show is the first major retrospective of Thomson's work outside Canada and marks a watershed in cultural relations with Russia.
The Canadian consulate in St. Petersburg supported the opening with a "Days of Canada" mini-festival while the show's organizers, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the National Gallery of Canada and the Hermitage have put together lavish support materials to raise Thomson's international profile.
"His work, so refreshing and spirited when it was first shared with Canadians almost one hundred years ago, continues to speak to the essential spirit of a northern country well defined by links between man-made landscapes and the wilderness," reads the show's official brochure. "There is a liveliness in Thomson's work that makes it seem eternally new."
Thomson was born near Toronto in 1877 and after a career as a commercial artist turned to nature studies and landscape painting in his 30s.
His technique of making detailed sketches in the field gave his landscapes an appealing honesty suited to the emergence of a distinctly Canadian national identity at this time.
Thomson's works "The Jack Pine" and the "The West Wind," completed in 1916 a year before he disappeared while hiking (his body was later recovered from a lake and he may have drowned) have become icons of Canadian art.
"The sketches of the last year and a half of his life exemplify Thomson's remarkable capacity to fuse design, the act of painting and the lived experience in one breathtaking object," Dennis Reid, chief curator at the Art Gallery of Ontario writes in the brochure to the show.
Reid, who was in St. Petersburg to supervise the hanging of Thomson's canvasses in the Alexander Hall, hopes that the artist's belated international debut will spark a revival of interest.
"What's necessary is for curators in other places to get interested," Reid told Canadian national broadcaster CBS last week.
"And art historians and people who are going to write about early 20th Century art are going to realize that Tom Thomson is part of the story."
The show is part of a partnership between the Hermitage and the Art Gallery of Ontario which dates from 1998 and will continue with an exhibition in Canada about Catherine the Great in 2005 to be drawn from the Hermitage collection.
The climate and frontier spirit of the world's two largest countries has forged cultural bonds too.
The organizers of the Thomson show clearly hope that putting him in the spotlight on the Hermitage stage will bring Canada to the world's attention, but also to that of Russia's too. "Although his paintings present the wilderness of Canada, the Russian visitor to the exhibition will experience something familiar and close to hand," says the exhibition's listing on www.hermitagemuseum.org.
"Thomson's 'Sunset' brings to mind a study of the same name by Arkhip Kuindzhi in St. Petersburg's Russian Museum. Thomson's 'March' and his winter landscapes may be compared with the paintings of Konstantin Yuon, Isaak Levitan or Igor Grabar."
"Art lovers in Russia can really appreciate the beauty of this northern country, depicted by Thomson with such ardor," said Pierre Theberge, Director of the National Gallery of Canada, which contributed 41 of the 58 paintings on display.
Tom Thomson is showing in the Alexander Hall of the State Hermitage from Sept. 10 through Nov. 14.
TITLE: Sweden's pearl
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Sweden is a country where the king drives himself to work, where mothers get 80 percent of their salary during maternity leave, where everyone speaks English, and where women are almost exclusively all beautiful.
Those are the four things that really impress a newcomer to this lovely country. Sweden's pearl is the country's capital - Stockholm.
Stockholm, located on an archipelago, is known for its natural beauty, its Nobel Prize Gala, and the ancient sights of Gamla Stan. Gamla Stan, or Stockholm's Old Town, founded by the regent Birger Jarl in 1252, is one of the most impressive parts of the city.
It is situated on one of the islands and includes the Royal Castle, where the royal family no longer resides, although King Carl XVI Gustaf has his office there. Most of the streets in Gamla Stan are so narrow that residents can literally shake hands with their neighbors across the street. However, they are not as excited by this as romantic tourists are because their apartments lack sunlight and privacy.
The Old Town is full of bustling streets, souvenir shops, bookstores, churches and museums. Tourists flock there, including those who travel to Stockholm on Silja Line ferries for a day.
FOR YOUNG AND OLD
Opposite the Royal Palace on the eastern side of Stockholm's main waterway is the Blasieholmen spit and the charming islands of Skeppsholmen and Kastellholmen.
Connected by bridges, this is where 19th century palaces such as the National Museum of Fine Arts jostle with grand hotels, banks and renowned places of entertainment, as well as with auctioneers, art galleries, exclusive antique shops and antiquarian bookshops. Here, I was a guest of the luxury Radisson SAS Strand Hotel for three days last month.
Many of the archipelago's boats, ferries and sightseeing tours depart from the quays below.
One of the most attractive museums in Stockholm is the Vasa Museum, featuring a huge royal ship that sank in Stockholm harbor 15 minutes after it was launched in 1628.
The gigantic, seven-story wooden galleon was recovered from the harbor bottom 333 years after it sank, but it was still in a good condition, and a museum was built around it.
Another exciting museum is Junibacken, or a museum and theme park based on the work of Swedish children's writer Astrid Lindgren.
It is amazing even for an adult to take the "fairy train tour" to the land of Lindgren's characters such as Karlson on the roof, Mardie (or Mischeivous Meg as she's known the U.S.), or Pippi Longstocking. This year the museum is also playing host to Tove Janssen's Moomins and presents their valley home, complete with the lovable family's blue house, for guests to explore. Parents can't tear there children away from this enchanting exhibit.
Another favorite place to explore is Skansen, which claims to be the world's first open-air museum, dating from 1891, where you will find old Swedish handicrafts, old houses and exhibits on original traditions. Swedish elk and other typical Swedish animals can be found here at Skansen's zoo.
The green island of Djurgarden, which used to be a royal hunting park, has more opportunities to enjoy nature - people can ride on bicycles, paddle canoes or just walk around. In winter Djurgarten turns into a Christmas market, where one can buy homemade jams, fruits and vegetables.
OPULENT PRIZE
Stockholm is also known for hosting the smartest people on the planet who every year come to the city to receive Nobel Prizes on Dec. 10.
The prominent Nobel Prize Gala is held in the Blue and Golden halls of Stockholm City Hall. After the prize-giving ceremony, a splendid banquet for 1,200 invited guests is held in the Blue Hall.
Tourists are able to tour these famed halls, and well as the rest of City Hall - an important national symbol with the three golden crowns at the top of its tower. The tower, at 106 meters high, offers one of the best views of Stockholm.
If you only have time for one gallery, go straight to the National Museum on the south side of Blasieholmen. Designed by the 19th century German architect August Stuler, it houses Sweden's largest art collection, with over 16,000 works from the 15th-20th centuries.
Another place reveling in 19th century opulance is Cafe Opera, a center Stockholm nightlife for the young and elite, located in the grandiose building of the Opera House. The Cafe is not just a cafe, despite its name. It includes a luxurious restaurant in the baroque style, an open-air bar, and a fashionable disco after midnight. One of the best and most expensive restaurants in town, Operakallaren, is also located in the building.
The restaurant, which one can enter only if dressed in a suit and one has foregone using one's mobile phone, offers its lavish dinners and services to Sweden's top people, including the royal family.
The restaurant's wine bar has a collection of nearly 30,000 bottles of the most best wine ever produced. Clearly this place isn't cheap.
EATING, DANCING, SHOPPING
The Opera House is located just next to the city's business district, which is home to a number of Stockholm's biggest department stores, banks, nightclubs and business centers.
The area includes the so-called "Golden Triangle," where many fashionable stores and restaurants are located.
Here one can see the famous Stockholm "Mushroom" - a sort of a city monument shaped like a mushroom, where Stockholm residents like to arrange to meet each other.
Just next to the "Mushroom" is the Sture Hof restaurant which indulges its guests with a great variety of sea food. As a coastal city in a seafaring nation, Stockholm offers a real feast of seafood at its restaurants and cafes.
For young people looking for a fancy disco, Stockholm residents advise hitting the Spy Bar. They say even princesses visit the place sometimes.
One of the biggest department stores in Stockholm is NK. Its round emblem, which tops the roof of the huge building, can be seen from far away in the city center, so it's not a problem to locate.
Unfortunately, NK was the focus of the world's attention for tragic reasons when Swedish foreign affairs minister Anna Lindt was stabbed to death in one of its sections in 2003.
GOOD ADVICE
The city of Stockholm has extremely clean air compared to many other European capitals.
They say that this is because many Stockholm streets are so narrow it discourages cars from the city center. At least 70 percent of Stockholm residents use public transport to avoid traffic jams.
On weekends many Stockholm residents go outside the city to relax on the numerous beautiful islands that surround the city. Some of the most popular among them there are the five Jaderholmarna or "Fluffy Islands."
To get there take a 20-minute boat ride and pass by a coast dotted with the villas of the wealthiest Swedish families.
Among them is the estate of Sweden's richest family, the Wallenbergs, who own 7 percent of Swedish industry.
Surprisingly, while the villas look pretty, they are not super glamorous. Swedes are modest. Even rich people prefer not to display their wealth.
Unsuprisingly, Stockholm is a very attractive place to tourists. The Stockholm Visitors Board, which promotes tourism in Stockholm, says that in 2003 about 6.5 million tourists visited the city.
The Board also declared recently that Stockholm has become more popular among Russian tourists. Last year the number of Russian tourists visiting Stockholm increased by 4 percent, totaling 68,000 visitors.
Practical advice Stockholm residents give to foreign tourists includes how find the best currency exchange rate - Sweden's currency remains the Kroner after the EU member state rejected adopting the euro - at FOREX bureaus and good taxi rates from Taxi Stockholm. It is also important to know that Stockholm museums and public transport are rather expensive, and it's worth buying special tourist cards to make excursions cheaper.
Irina Titova was a guest
of the Radisson SAS Strand Hotel
in Stockholm.
HOW TO GET TO STOCKHOLM
SAS Scandinavian airlines have a daily flight from St. Petersburg to Stockholm (except Saturdays). Tickets: $279 for an economy class ticket plus $78 airport commission.
Those who prefer more romantic traveling can buy an excursion package to get to Stockholm by ferry which goes from Helsinki. The package also includes a bus ride from St. Petersburg to Helsinki, and atogether it costs about $200. The tour includes two nights on a ferry - one night on the way to Stockholm and one night on the way back to Helsinki, and a day tour in Stockholm.
WHERE TO STAY
Stockholm has a wide variety of comfortable accommodation.
However, if you're looking for a central 5 star hotel with a magnificent view of the water and the splendid historical buildings, located next to the harbor, you could choose to stay at the Radisson Strand SAS Hotel at 9 Nybrokajen Street.
It offers a hospitable atmosphere, top-of-the-line service, fine interiors and the most delicious breakfasts.
TITLE: Hurricane Ivan Whirls Into The Southern United States
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOBILE, Alabama - Hurricane Ivan and its 217-kilometer per hour winds churned toward this historic port city with frightening intensity Wednesday as the storm began its assault on the Gulf Coast, lashing the region with heavy rain and ferocious wind, spawning monster waves that toppled beach houses and spinning off deadly tornadoes.
The storm was expected to make landfall early Thursday near Mobile and could swamp the coastline with a 5-meter storm surge and up to 38 centimeters of rain. Ivan offered a daylong preview of its destruction as it took aim at the coast: Sheets of rain across the region, a series of tornadoes, and escalating winds that shredded signs, knocked out power to tens of thousands and made traffic lights and oak trees whipsaw.
"We have never seen a hurricane of this size come into Alabama," Governor Bob Riley said, who earlier asked President George W. Bush to declare much of the state a disaster area.
An 11th-hour shift turned Ivan away from New Orleans, but the sheer size of the storm could create catastrophic flooding in the bowl-shaped city. Officials warned that the levees and pumping stations that normally hold back the water may not be enough to protect the below-sea-level city. In the Florida Panhandle near Panama City, tornadoes produced by the storm killed two people and damaged more than 70 homes. Rescuers dug through rubble Wednesday night but found no one trapped underneath.
"We have a report from a deputy that it looks like a war zone," said sheriff's spokeswoman Ruth Sasser.
Hurricane-force winds extended out 170 kilometers from the Category 4 storm, threatening widespread damage. After reaching land, Ivan threatened to stall over the Southeast and southern Appalachians, with a potential for as much as 51 centimeters of rain.
TITLE: Pakistan's Musharraf Breaks His Promise
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf backed out of a pledge to step down as army chief, slamming the door Wednesday on this key Washington ally's slow progress toward democracy five years after his bloodless coup.
Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said Musharraf made the decision in the best interest of the nation, but the move was denounced by the opposition as further evidence the general is not genuinely committed to restoring civilian rule.
"The president will keep both the posts. The national situation demands that he keeps the two offices," Ahmed said.
Pakistan is engaged in a fierce fight against al-Qaida militants, much of it in a rugged no man's land near Afghanistan where Osama bin Laden and other key terror leaders are believed to be hiding. More than 550 al-Qaida suspects have been arrested here since the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States, helping win Musharraf billions of dollars in aid from Washington.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher declined to give immediate comment on the development except to say the United States "has always supported movement and progress toward democracy in Pakistan."
Pakistan's crackdown has led in recent months to several major arrests, including that of a Tanzanian wanted in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Africa and a Pakistani computer expert whose capture led to terror warnings in the United States and Britain.
When asked why Musharraf was going back on his promise to quit as army chief, Ahmed said: "The situation has changed."
The decision comes after weeks of speculation, some fueled by Musharraf himself, that he was considering backing out of an agreement he reached in December with a hard-line Islamic political bloc to give up his army post.
Musharraf, who took power in a bloodless coup in 1999, said earlier this month he felt most Pakistanis wanted him to retain both positions.
"Ninety-six percent [of people] will say, 'Do not remove [the army uniform],'" he said.
TITLE: Turkey Shuns Adultery Ban
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: ANKARA, Turkey - Turkey's leaders distanced themselves from a proposal to outlaw adultery after the opposition came out against it and western governments made clear enacting the law would jeopardize the country's already fragile chances of joining the European Union.
The proposal was part of a major overhaul of the mostly Muslim country's penal code undertaken as the 25 EU states prepare to decide by the end of the year whether to begin talks on Turkey's membership.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed it would protect families and women who have been wronged by their husbands. Opponents claimed it was a bid to appeal to Erdodan's conservative, devoutly Islamic base and would be a step backward for women's rights.
On Tuesday, it appeared the opponents had won.
Justice Minister Cemil Cicek said after a meeting with the leader of the opposition party that only measures that both his ruling party and the opposition agreed on would be brought to the floor.
Ali Topuz, a senior lawmaker from the opposition Republican People's Party, then made it clear the adultery proposal wasn't one of them.
"We're strongly against the proposal on adultery," Topuz told private CNN-Turk television.
The penal code package, which lawmakers began debating Tuesday, includes harsher punishment for rapists, pedophiles, torturers, human traffickers and women who kill children born out of wedlock. It also makes rape in marriage and sexual harassment crimes.
The adultery proposal has generated strong criticism in the European Union. Supporters of Turkey's EU bid say the measures would help the cause of Europeans vehemently opposed to the predominantly Muslim country joining the 25-member bloc.
EU enlargement official Guenter Verheugen warned the anti-adultery measure would create the impression Turkey's legal code is moving toward Islamic law.
Women's groups claimed the law would be used against women - who they say could be imprisoned and lose custody of their children. They said it would encourage "honor killings" in which family members kill girls or women said to have disgraced the family.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Britons Seized in Iraq
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Three British nationals, believed to be civilians, were snatched by gunmen from a house in central Baghdad early on Thursday, Iraq's Interior Ministry said.
The men were staying at a house in the al-Mansur district of western Baghdad, a wealthy neighborhood where many foreign businessmen and contractors live if they are not staying in the heavily defended Green Zone.
The Interior Ministry official, who asked not to be named, said there was no fighting as the men were taken. He said he believed they were civilians but there was no immediate confirmation.
Hanson to Run
SYDNEY (AFP) - Pauline Hanson, the former leader of Australia's xenophobic One Nation party, has announced that she is coming back from political retirement to run for a seat in the Senate next month.
In a bombshell announcement, Hanson, 50, said Wednesday she had decided to run as an independent from Queensland state in the Oct. 9 election to represent "the average Joe Blow" with her populist message.
The former fish-and-chips shop owner had announced last year that she was quitting politics after serving 11 weeks of a three-year prison sentence on political fraud charges. The conviction was eventually quashed.
Milosevic Trial Delay
THE HAGUE, Netherlands - Stalled by reluctant witnesses and an uncooperative defendant, judges in Slobodan Milosevic's war crimes trial adjourned the proceedings for a month Wednesday to give the former Yugoslav president's court-appointed lawyers time to prepare their case.
At least 20 of Milosevic's witnesses, including high-level foreign politicians, have refused to show up since the court limited Milosevic's ability to mount his own defense, British attorney Steven Kay told the tribunal.
Kay asked for an adjournment while an appeals chamber weighed his request to return that right to Milosevic, who had represented himself since his trial began in February 2002.
Fox Hunting Ban
LONDON (AFP) - Britain's lower house of parliament, the House of Commons, voted to ban fox hunting Wednesday, despite angry public protests inside and outside the chamber.
By 356 to 166 votes, the bill passed with a majority of 190 votes after debate was suspended briefly when five opponents of the ban burst into the chamber.
Speaker Michael Martin said he was "gravely concerned" about the protest incident and promised to report back to MPs after discussing security with the sergeant-at-arms.
The Commons has voted before for a total hunting ban, but opposition in the upper House of Lords, rooted deeply in the land-owning aristocracy, stalled legislation long enough for it to die on the order paper.
FAA Failure Cited
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Federal Aviation Administration's failure to properly maintain communications equipment led to Tuesday's breakdown of radio contact between air controllers and pilots over parts of the western U.S., officials said Wednesday.
The disruption, which was not resolved for nearly five hours, forced airlines to cancel hundreds of flights into and out of Los Angeles, San Diego, other California airports and Las Vegas.
The FAA said late on Wednesday that it was investigating five instances in which planes had flown too close to other aircraft. The 10 planes involved included two passenger aircraft, cargo aircraft and business jets.
TITLE: Zenit Play 1st UEFA Match
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: St. Petersburg's FC Zenit was due to play Belgrade's FK Crvena Zvezda in the UEFA Cup first round Thursday night at Petrovsky Stadium. Zenit are currently top of the Russian Premier League 21 games into the season.
Earlier this week coach Vlastimil Petrzela extended his contract with FC Zenit St. Peterburg, committing to the Russian club until 2007, UEFA announced.
The Czech coach has overseen a remarkable turnaround since taking the helm two years ago, reported uefa.com. After guiding Zenit to 10th place in the 16-member league in 2002, the St. Petersburg side finished as Premier League runners-up last year. Petrzela ended the season with his first silverware at the club, when it triumphed in the Russian League Cup.
"We have a brilliant group of players with real fighting spirit. It's vital for us to keep that," Zenit general director Ilya Cherkasov told uefa.com.
"Although he signed a Lithuanian, Egidijus Maius, and a Czech, Jan Flachbart, in the summer in order to strengthen a leaky defense, Petrzela has yet to entirely resolve Zenit's frailty at the back," said football writer Eduard Nisenboim. "However, he has plenty of strength elsewhere on the field."
TITLE: NHL Lockout May Last Season
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: NEW YORK - No shots, no saves, no goals. The National Hockey League locked out its players Thursday, threatening to keep the sport off the ice for the entire 2004-05 season and perhaps beyond in an effort by management to gain massive economic change.
After the long-expected decision was approved unanimously Wednesday by NHL owners, commissioner Gary Bettman repeatedly belittled the union's bargaining position, talked about the possibility the confrontation could extend into the 2005-06 season and said the conflict has jeopardized the NHL's participation in the 2006 Winter Olympics.
"When we ultimately make the deal that has to be made, we will then see whether or not there is time for a season or some semblance of a season," he said. "If there is, great, and if there isn't, then we'll deal with the next season when it comes along."
Bettman claimed teams had combined to lose more than $1.8 billion over 10 years, and said management will not agree to a labor deal that doesn't include a defined relationship between revenue and salaries.
"Until he gets off the salary-cap issue, there's not a chance for us to get an agreement," union head Bob Goodenow said in Toronto, adding that players "are not prepared to entertain a salary cap in any way, shape, measure or form."
Far apart on both philosophy and finances, the sides haven't bargained since last Thursday and say they are entrenched for the long run, echoing words of baseball players and owners at the start of their disastrous 7 1/2-month labor war of 1994-95.
There is almost no chance the season will start as scheduled on Oct. 13, and Bettman told teams to release their arenas for other events for the next 30 days. Bettman said the season can't extend past June, and the lockout threatens to wipe out the Stanley Cup final for the first time since 1919, when the series between Montreal and Seattle was stopped after five games due to a Spanish influenza epidemic.
"The union is trying to win a fight, hoping that the owners will give up. That will turn out to be a terrible error in judgment," Bettman said. "They are apparently convinced that come some point in the season, the owners' resolve will waver, and I'm telling you that is wrong, wrong, wrong."
NHL management claims teams combined to lose $273 million in 2002-03 and $224 million last season. Bettman said the union's proposals would do little for owners, and said the six offers rejected by the union would lower the average player salary from $1.8 million to $1.3 million.
Goodenow said players had offered more than $100 million in annual concessions.
"The notion that we don't have competitive balance is absurd," said Vancouver center Trevor Linden, the union's president.
Bettman made clear that declaring an impasse under U.S. labor law and imposing new work rules unilaterally was an option, but said it had not yet been considered.
"I think it's pretty fair to say that we're at an impasse right now, and my guess is that we've probably been at an impasse for months, if not a year," he said. "At some point when we're at an impasse, we could simply say, 'We're going to open, and here are the terms and conditions. Let's go.' It's that simple."
Goodenow said attempting to impose terms would be a "very, very ill-advised strategy" and predicted "the results of it could be catastrophic." Bettman said the use of replacement players is not contemplated.
The 30 teams - 24 in the United States and six in Canada - had been set to start opening training camps on Thursday, the day after the expiration of the current labor contract. The deal was first agreed to in 1995 and extended two years later through Sept. 15, 2004. Bettman termed the extension "a mistake, in hindsight."
"It kind of stinks, packing up and moving out of here," Philadelphia right wing Tony Amonte said at his team's practice rink. "I can't say they weren't preparing us for it."
Some players are expected to sign with European leagues, and others could join a six-team, four-on-four circuit called the Original Stars Hockey League.
The stoppage is the first for a North American major league since the 1998-99 NBA lockout canceled 464 games, cutting each club's regular-season schedule from 82 games to 50.
It is the third stoppage for the NHL following a 10-day strike in 1992 that caused the postponement of 30 games and a 103-day lockout in 1994-95 that eliminated 468 games, cutting each team's regular-season schedule from 84 games to 48. That lockout ended on Jan. 11, five days before the deadline set by Bettman to scuttle the season.
TITLE: Fans Boo Porto Off Field
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: PORTO, Portugal - Reigning European Champion Porto saw its players booed off by fans at the end of a frustrating 0-0 draw against CSKA Moscow as the Portuguese team began the defense of its trophy Tuesday.
Porto dominated much of the game, but the team was unable to find a way through the stubborn CSKA defense, with goalkeeper Igor Akinfeyev having an outstanding game.
Helder Postiga squandered the Portuguese side's best chance just after the hour when the unmarked striker struck the post when left with a clear shooting chance from close range.
CSKA was content to defend throughout, but created danger for Porto on counter-attacks with striker Ivica Olic hitting the post and bar midway through the second half.
"We played much better than we have compared to other games - much faster, better team play, and we had a lot more shots on goal," said Porto coach Victor Fernandez.
"We were really pushing in the second half. The worst thing was the score, a 0-0 draw leaves a bad taste. The team had the will to win but we let the Russians off the hook."
CSKA coach Valery Gazzayev said he was satisfied to tie the defending champions since his side had only two players with Champions League experience.
He added that allowing Postiga to hit the post was the only defensive lapse by his side.
"We picked the right tactics, we created more chances but unfortunately we couldn't produce anything solid," he said.
"This is going to be a big morale boost for our players, who are very young. Did I expect more from FC Porto? A team gets what the other side gives it."
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In Tuesday's other Group H match, Chelsea coasted to a 3-0 win off two Didier Drogba goals at Paris Saint-Germain. The London side's win was the most comfortable of the night as Jose Mourinho continued his European success after guiding Porto to the title last season.
John Terry headed the London side ahead in the 28th minute and Drogba got his first goal moments before halftime, with both strikes resulting from PSG mistakes. Drogba's superb second-half free-kick sealed a comfortable win.
"It was fantastic, the players controlled the game from the first minute to the last," Mourinho said. "We scored goals and had a lot of possession as well as controlling in the defense. We had a lot of the ball and we were top class, every single player."
Arsenal beat PSV Eindhoven 1-0 when defender Alex scored into his own net, while Ezequiel Gonzalez scored both in Panathinaikos' 2-0 win over Rosenborg in Group E.
While Arsenal missed some early chances, it was forced to defend its slender lead in the closing stages.
"I think we never reached our usual level of play," Arsenal striker Dennis Bergkamp said. "They made it very difficult for us. In my opinion, they had no intention to get anything out of this game."
Italy's Inter Milan beat 10-man German champion Werder Bremen 2-0 in Group G.
In Group F, AC Milan needed a late goal to beat Ukraine's Shakhtar Donetsk 1-0, while Henrik Larsson came on as substitute to score against former club Celtic as FC Barcelona won 3-1 in a match that started 30 minutes late because of crowd congestion.
(Reuters, AP)
TITLE: Italians in Trouble After a Referee Is Struck
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: ROME - Italian football was again in the dock with AS Roma facing heavy punishment from the sport's European governing body UEFA after a Swedish referee was hit by an object thrown from the crowd.
The incident happened as Anders Frisk walked off at the interval of Wednesday's Champions League match with Dynamo Kiev and left the Swede with blood dripping from his head.
The match was abandoned and UEFA Communications Director William Gaillard said they would be weighing up what action to take after reviewing the match delegate's report.
UEFA could award victory to Kiev, order Roma to play matches at a neutral ground and hit them with a hefty fine.
Frisk had just sent off Roma's French defender Philippe Mexes after he petulantly kicked Maris Verpakovskis with Kiev leading 1-0 at half-time.
"This is the first time in many years that a European match has been stopped for such an incident," Gaillard said.
Roma coach Rudi Voller, who has been in charge of Roma for just two weeks, said: "These are things that should not happen. Now we have to await a decision by UEFA. It has been a sad night."
Wednesday's incident highlights the continuing problem of violence in Italian stadiums.
Last season Roma and Lazio fans clashed with police at the Olympic Stadium after the city derby was halted by a false rumour that a child had been killed by a police car.
A year ago a fan fell to his death as rioting fans spilled onto the pitch before a match between Serie B sides Napoli and Avellino.
And two years ago Roma and Turkish side Galatasaray were involved in a mass brawl involving players, officials and riot police at the end of a Champions League game in Rome.
Frisk also refereed that game.
After Roma appealed, UEFA reduced some of the punishments it had initially imposed.
Roma captain Francesco Totti had his suspension reduced from three matches to two, while Brazilian midfielder Francisco Lima's three-match ban was cut to one.
UEFA also withdrew its decision to ban Roma from the Olympic stadium for one match, and instead fined the club 325,000 euros.
UEFA was not expected to be so lenient this time.
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LYON, France - Ruud van Nistelrooy struck twice in six minutes to salvage a 2-2 draw for Manchester United against Olympique Lyon in the Champions League and set a 30-goal European scoring record for his club on Wednesday.
The Red Devils were 2-0 down at the interval in the Group D game after Lyon, which dominated for most of the first half, went 2-0 up with goals in by Brazilian defender Cris in the 35th minute and striker Pierre-Alain Frau just before half-time.
The French champions looked poised for a comfortable victory but Van Nistelrooy, who came back from injury at the weekend, had other ideas with goals in the 56th and 61st.
The Dutchman, who began the match equal with Dennis Law on 28 European goals for United, rose superbly above Cris to head Cristiano Ronaldo's cross for his first goal of the season.
Van Nistelrooy struck again when he latched on to a deflected shot from Ronaldo to steer the ball past goalkeeper Gregory Coupet from close range.
"We proved that you can never count us out," said Manchester United defender Gabriel Heinze. "There are outstanding players in this team.
"It's rather a good result for us as Lyon played pretty well throughout the match. They gave us a lot of trouble before the break. But eventually we managed to bounce back.
"Taking one point here, against a very good side, is not bad at all."
Manager Alex Ferguson told Sky Sports: "Goals change games and Van Nistelrooy changed the game for us."
Fenerbahce of Turkey beat Sparta Prague 1-0 at home in Wednesday's other Group D match.
The French champions never really recovered from Van Nistelrooy's double blow even though former England striker Paul Scholes saved United when he blocked a late shot on the line to follow his headed clearance in the first half.
(AFP, Reuters)
TITLE: Canada Regains The World Cup
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: TORONTO - The World Cup returned to Canada after 13 long years. How long hockey will be gone is anyone's guess.
Joe Sakic, Scott Niedermayer and Shane Doan scored on Canada's first shot of each period Tuesday night, and Martin Brodeur shook off a wrist injury to make 27 saves in a 3-2 win over Finland in the World Cup of Hockey championship game.
The host nation celebrated the victory, but the joy was tempered because the NHL was set to announce a lockout on Wednesday because of a labor dispute with the players association.
"We'll worry about tomorrow tomorrow," said Sakic, who scored four goals in the tournament. "Tonight, we're going to celebrate."
No negotiations are scheduled before the current collective bargaining agreement runs out at midnight Thursday. The NHL's board of governors will meet Wednesday, but the lockout is a forgone conclusion.
But Canada will always have this victory to savor.
"We're just going to go out and enjoy this and then it'll set in what's going on with the NHL season," forward Joe Thornton said.
Fans counted down the final seconds that could be the last ones played in North America by Mario Lemieux and Finland's Teppo Numminen if the NHL lockout lasts a year or longer as feared.
"It's looks like it's going to be a while before we get back on the ice," said Lemieux, who plays for and owns the Pittsburgh Penguins. "I just want to keep myself in shape and try to play a few more years and enjoy the game."
Canada clinched the tournament, formerly known as the Canada Cup, for the first time since 1991. The Canadians lost the World Cup in 1996 to the United States, but rebounded to win the event for the fifth time. Canada has reached the finals all seven times the tournament was held.
This marks four straight national championship wins for Canada, which was victorious at the 2002 Olympics and captured two consecutive IIHF world titles.
Doan clinched this one just 34 seconds into the final period when he cut from the corner and came in front to take Thornton's no-look, backhand pass from behind the goal and give Canada a 3-2 lead.
Miikka Kiprusoff only allowed six goals in Finland's first five games. He withstood tons of late pressure and kept it close, but his teammates couldn't net the equalizer in the biggest hockey game in the history of the small European nation.
Finland was in the finals of the eight-team tournament for the first time.
"We played here in Canada, in Toronto, and everybody could see that we were ready to fight," Finland coach Raimo Summanen said. "Five years ago, three years ago, two years ago, one year ago, this was a whole different mental approach for the team and I'm proud of that."