SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times DATE: Issue #1098 (64), Tuesday, August 23, 2005 ************************************************************************** TITLE: Police Want Computer Registration AUTHOR: Vladimir Kovalev PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: The police plan to introduce a new registration system in hotels to put in order information about foreign citizens visiting St. Petersburg, the Russian Tourism Union (RST) said last week. The system will be based on a unified computer network connecting hotels in the city, representatives of the union said. “I believe that this will significantly simplify the work of the hotels. We’re living in the 21st century and most of the hotels are using a computer system to register their guests. This would unite all the information. It would put it in order,” said Sergei Korneyev, head of the Northwest branch of the RST in a telephone interview Thursday. Hotels that still use paper-based systems and do not have computers should be obliged to install the new network, the RST said. RST said that according to the police the new system is aimed at protecting the city from illegal immigration and would improve the work of the police in that it would be easier to find people. “The way of registering visitors on paper that exists in hotels at the moment is out of date and doesn’t provide a credible way of finding people. Any sort of paper trail is yesterday’s experience. Besides the paperwork is highly involved in a number of mini-hotels that don’t use computers,” Korneyev said. Asked if the unified registration of guests operates in hotels in European cities, Korneyev said that legislation in Russia is different. “I don’t think a system like this can be found in European hotels. It’s a question of legislation. I don’t know any European country which demands the registration of tourists,” Korneyev said. The new system would be welcomed in mini-hotels, said Vladimir Vasilyev, vice president for the Association for Mini-Hotels in St. Petersburg and a hotel owner. But while the system was reportedly due to start working last Saturday, representatives in the local mini-hotel business said they are not familiar with the project. “So far I haven’t heard anything about this system, but we are constantly cooperating with the police and official registration offices in order to provide safety for our visitors,” Vasilyev said in a telephone interview on Thursday. “If the police offer to install such a system, we would, of course, welcome it,” he said. Vasilyev also said that there are unscrupulous operators offering registration for money that may be improperly registering migrant workers. “There are lots of organizations in the city that offer semi-legal registration services to make money from it, registering everyone, including people from the South, who come to work here. It’s very easy for them to just open a 15-square meter office and without getting involved in any hotel business just make money on the registration,” he said. The big city hotels do not know much about the police idea either. “We, in principle, have seen the plan. But I haven’t read it with great attention to detail, to be honest. If we had been asked to install it, I would have said something,” Anna Monsoon, a spokesman for the Radisson SAS Royal Hotel on Nevsky Prospekt, said in a telephone interview on Monday. Some of the organizations that have been engaged in registration have stopped this business in 2005 as did the International Center for Incoming Tourism (ICIT), which was offering to register foreigners for 500 rubles ($17.80), according to numerous advertisements placed on the world wide web. “We have stopped this service. There is no explanation. It was a decision by our board of managers,” said an anonymous representative at ICIT in a telephone interview on Monday. “There is a problem about registration in general,” said Natalya Kudryavtseva, executive director of St. Petersburg International Business Association (SPIBA) in a telephone interview on Monday. “This, among other things, affects businessmen that live here with children. Despite the fact that the legislation doesn’t have such a regulation, their children are obligated by the responsible authorities to get an HIV test each time they come back to Russia. So it happens that such children start getting scared of Russia when they know what they have to experience each time they come back into the country,” Kudryavtseva said. The police could not be reached for comment. Since Russians as well as foreign citizens are required to register at hotels, the aim of using the system to find people could become a civil rights issue. “If this idea is based on the idea that the law will be obeyed when somebody arrives at a hotel, gets registered and forgets about it, this is fine. I hope that this way it would be better to fight terrorism — but only terrorism — and not those who come to St. Petersburg for political reasons as the National Bolsheviks or Yabloko [party] members do,” said Yury Vdovin, co-head of Citizen’s Watch, a local human rights organization, in a telephone interview on Thursday. “But on the other hand it is seems that under the name of the fight against terrorism the power-that-be just wants to control everyone and everything,” he said. TITLE: LDPR, SPS Mourn ’91 in Their Own Ways AUTHOR: By Stephen Boykewich PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: The anniversary this past weekend of the 1991 coup attempt was bookended by two radically opposed memorials: a Friday rally by the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party mourning the coup’s failure and a Sunday ceremony by the liberal Union of Right Forces (SPS) mourning those who died opposing it. On Monday, SPS also marked the national Flag Day holiday — which commemorates the Supreme Soviet’s decision after the failed coup to replace the Soviet flag with the Russian tricolor — with a small demonstration near federal buildings in central Moscow. Police reported “a minor incident where a young man tried to burn a national flag.” The offender fled, MosNews reported. Several young men involved in a fight shortly after the rally began were detained by the police, witnesses reported to MosNews. The events of August 1991 were pivotal in the collapse of the Soviet Union and the rise of Boris Yeltsin to worldwide prominence. A dozen hard-line communists calling themselves the State Committee for a State of Emergency, or GKChP, attempted to seize power from Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev by placing him under house arrest on Aug. 19 and sending hundreds of armed vehicles to occupy the streets of Moscow. The coup failed when tens of thousands of Muscovites took to the streets to oppose the GKChP. Also crucial were the defection of a company of tanks to the coup opponents, led by newly elected Russian President Yeltsin, and the deaths of three men who attempted to stop an armored vehicle on the night of Aug. 20. Public outrage over the deaths fed the collapse of the coup on Aug. 21. At a Friday rally on Pushkin Square, Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky portrayed the three victims — Dmitry Komar, Ilya Krichevsky and Vladimir Usov — as traitors. “Why are these three scoundrels buried in the center of Moscow?” Zhirinovsky said, referring to the Vagankovskoye Cemetery, which also holds the remains of prominent figures such as poet Sergei Yesenin and human rights champion Andrei Sakharov. “They are treated like heroes for threatening our brave Russian soldiers.” About 20 LDPR members held signs reading “Thank You, GKChP” and “Long Live the U.S.S.R.!” In a more than hourlong speech, Zhirinovsky said the failure of the coup had led to thieving oligarchs, sex slavery and a dramatic drop in the population over the past decade. After trumpeting the LDPR as Russia’s first opposition party, he concluded with a Kremlin-friendly call to prevent “revolutions of any kind, colored or otherwise.” On Sunday, about 60 members of the Union of Right Forces, or SPS, gathered at Vagankovskoye Cemetery in a very different spirit. Party leader Nikita Belykh spoke of the three men who were killed during the coup as martyrs to freedom. Belykh also suggested that the administration of President Vladimir Putin had betrayed the ideals that pro-democracy demonstrators had fought for. “It is very painful that everything that was won in 1991 is now being devalued and discredited. The further the events of August 1991 are from us, the more abstractly citizens understand freedom. And the authorities understand freedom completely differently,” Belykh said. A recent poll by state-controlled VTsIOM supported Belykh’s claim that popular attitudes toward the coup are shifting. Kevin O’Flynn contributed to this report. TITLE: Kasyanov: Kremlin Policies Are Cynical AUTHOR: By Tom Miles PUBLISHER: Reuters TEXT: MOSCOW — Former Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov has thrown down the gauntlet to President Vladimir Putin with a manifesto for Russia in which he trashes the Kremlin’s policies. Kasyanov — who has hinted he may stand for president in 2008 — wrote in the preface to a British thinktank publication that key Putin policies were false, cynical and irresponsible. “Almost all the essential characteristics of a modern democratic state have in fact disappeared in Russia within a short period of time,” wrote Kasyanov. “The Government and Parliament can no longer function without daily instructions and the judiciary is increasingly servile,” he said in the Foreign Policy Centre “Blueprint for Russia”, available at http://fpc.org.uk/fsblob/553.pdf “I believe that our main goal is to do our best to unite all the democratic forces in Russia to return the country to the democratic course,” he wrote, adding that until recently Russia had done much to become a modern democratic state. “The current leadership’s policy swings — however dramatic they are — should not conceal this objective fact and nor should we allow them to.” Kremlin-watchers expect the robustly popular Putin to try and ensure the election of a hand-picked heir after the constitution forces him to leave office at the end of his second term in 2008, and they are on the alert for any potential rival. Kasyanov, who was prime minister for about four years until Putin sacked him in 2004, challenged authorities last month by accusing them of mounting a smear campaign against him, after prosecutors announced they were probing his acquisition of a villa from the state during his time in office. Kasyanov’s words then appeared to set him on a collision course with the Kremlin, although analysts cautioned at the time that it was too early to say whether he intended to put himself up as a rallying figure for a rejuvenated opposition to Putin. In the policy pamphlet Kasyanov called for a reversal of the vast majority of recent political changes. He warned that the alternative was rapid economic deterioration, the undermining of civil society and “non-constitutional developments.” He said recent changes to the electoral law should be cancelled, judicial reform made a priority, inflation brought back under control and property rights strengthened. The media should also be liberalised, he wrote. “At least one central TV channel should be — as a matter of policy — transferred into private hands to give Russian citizens an alternative view to what is considered necessary by the Kremlin. “In foreign policy, Russia should admit its recent failures obvious to anyone and restore normal relationships with its main international partners — the EU and U.S. — and neighbouring countries.” TITLE: Russia Urges Global Bird Flu Effort AUTHOR: By Aleksandras Budrys PUBLISHER: Reuters TEXT: MOSCOW — Russia urged the international community on Monday to make a joint effort to halt the spread of bird flu, which is potentially fatal to humans and is being carried by migratory birds across its vast territory. “This is not a problem of just one country — Russia or Kazakhstan — it is a global problem which should be dealt with by joint efforts at a global level,” Yevgeny Nepoklonov, a senior veterinary official, told a news briefing. The H5N1 subtype of bird flu, which has been found in Russia, has killed more than 50 people in Asia since 2003, but Nepoklonov said no case of human infection with the virus has been discovered in the country. Since its discovery on a farm in a Siberian region in mid-July, bird flu has spread to other areas in Russia, leading to the forced culling of 120,000 birds in an attempt to prevent its further spread. In Kazakhstan 9,000 birds have died or been destroyed since the outbreak started in the north of the Central Asian state last month. Nepoklonov, deputy head of the state veterinary watchdog, said migratory birds could carry the disease, which originated in southeast Asia, to any part of the world. He said birds from China, southeast Asia, the Middle East and southern Africa all nest near Siberian lakes for the summer. “Then they will return, and nobody knows what they will carry with them,” he said. “The routes of migratory birds from southeast Asia cross practically every country — from Russia, Kazakhstan and Mongolia to Alaska and Europe.” Nepoklonov said the H5N1 strain of the bird flu virus had been officially confirmed in six regions: Novosibirsk, Omsk, Tyumen, Kurgan, Altai in Siberia and Chelyabinsk in the Urals. It has not yet been found in the Kalmykia region in southern Russia on the Caspian Sea, where birds deaths had been reported. Nepoklonov said the virus had so far been confined to small villages, but reports that it had been found on a large poultry farm with 142,000 birds would have to be checked. He said foot-and-mouth disease had been discovered in cows in the far eastern region of Khabarovsk near the Chinese border, where quarantine had been imposed on three local farms. Foot-and-mouth does not harm humans but is a highly contagious disease, which causes fever in cattle, affects reproduction and reduces meat output. TITLE: Airport Installs New Security PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: MOSCOW — Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport has updated a series of new security measures in the aftermath of terrorist attckes last August, when suicide bombers blew up two passenger jets shortly after takeoff and killed all 90 people on board, the airport operator said Monday. There are now X-ray machines that can determine whether passengers are carrying dangerous or forbidden materials, such as drugs or explosives, hidden inside their bodies, said Dmitry Kamenshchik, chairman of Domodedovo’s operator, East Line Group. The airport also now uses gas sensors that can reveal minuscule traces of explosives on a passenger’s body or clothing, said East Line spokeswoman Anna Krasnova. The X-ray machines and gas sensors are used only on passengers judged suspect, she said. Kamenshchik said it was impossible to guarantee that the new security measures will prevent further terrorist attacks, but said the new devices are meant to minimize the risk. “We are confident that we are moving in the right direction,” he said. The suicide bombings Aug. 24, 2004, which authorities said were carried out by women who boarded the planes at Domodedovo, were part of a series of deadly terrorist attacks late last summer. Domodedovo first installed gas sensors right after the bombings, but recently switched to a newer type that can scan for a greater number of explosives and also drugs, Krasnova said. The devices have enabled airport officials to detain seven passengers who were carrying drugs in their stomachs in the past year, Alexander Zolotaryov, East Line’s air security chief, said at a news conference. TITLE: Report: Russian Church To Expand in Finland TEXT: ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The Orthodox Church of Russia plans to widen its activities in Finland, Helsinki newspaper Helsingen Sanomat reported on its website Monday. Aleksei II, the Patriarch of Moscow was quoted as telling Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE’s TV-news on Friday that the Orthodox Church has to take care of the spiritual needs of Russians living in Finland, and to give them an opportunity to attend services that are held in Church Slavonic. The Orthodox Church of Finland belongs to the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, Helsingen Sanomat reported, not to the Patriarchate of Moscow. The current head of Finland’s Orthodox Church, Archbishop Leo, said that the Patriarch of Moscow has promised him he would honour its autonomous canonical status. TITLE: Matviyenko Polls Badly Nationwide AUTHOR: By Vladimir Kovalev PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: Despite leading Russia’s second city, Governor Valentina Matviyenko is only the fifth most popular regional politician in Russia according to a national survey conducted by state-controlled VTsIOM polling agency in August. Matviynko was behind four other regional politicians, including Moscow mayor Yury Luzhkov, Kemerovo governor Aman Tuleyev, Tatarstan President Mintemir Shaimiyev and the Governor of the Krasnodarsky region Alexender Tkachev. St. Petersburg’s governor is behind Luzhkov and Tuleyev, according to estimates made by respondents in relation to politicians’ activity in solving social and economic problems, and fighting crime. While Tuleyev and Luzhkov got a support of 10 percent of respondents respectively when people were asked about the governors’ efforts to solve social problems, Matviyenko got only 3 percent. At the same time the St. Petersburg governor got 1 percent of respondents in relation to her policies against crime, while Luzhkov got 3 percent in the same area of activity. At the same time most of the 1,600 questioned respondents, that had been offered to estimate activity of 22 regional leaders in total, did not give any clear answers to all the questions asked by VTsIOM. “The survey aimed to find out the public opinion about how regional leaders deal with problems in their regions in the most successful way and who should be an example for others,” VTsIOM said in its official press release this week. The economic success of the city is more important for Matviyenko than positive remarks in relation to her personal achievements, City Hall representatives said. “She doesn’t follow such surveys closely, but if she sees it in the media, she always reads it. She takes this information into consideration,” said Natalya Kutabayeva, the governor’s spokeswoman in a telephone interview on Monday. “Today she is more interested in information about a credit rating of St. Petersburg, which has grown, according to numerous reports in the media this week,” she said. Public organizations operating in St. Petersburg have interpreted the survey skeptically. The rating received by Matviyenko is nothing more than a reflection of the support the regional leader receives from the Kremlin, said Tatyana Dorutina, head of St. Petersburg League of Voters. “Our people support the people who are in the favor of the president. They know that Vladimir Putin supports Matviyenko and for this reason they vote for her,” Dorutina said in a telephone interview on Monday. TITLE: MuzTV Gives Up ‘Masyanya’ Fight AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: Muz-TV, Russia’s home-grown clone of MTV, has withdrawn an appeal against the verdict of Moscow’s Savyolovsky municipal court to close down the channel’s popular prime time talk show “V gostyah u Masyani” for its illegal use of the aminated character, Masyanya, created by St. Petersburg animator Oleg Kuvayev. Kuvayev owns the copyright for the character and the use of images of Masyanya without a legitimate copyright agreement is illegal. On June 14 the Moscow Arbitration court demanded that Muz-TV stop broadcasting the program, which was produced without permission from Kuvayev as required by law. But the channel had obtained permission for the use of Masyanya from a company which possessed the copyright at the time the agreement was made. Kuvayev’s copyright battles date back to March 2002, when the artist signed a contract with Moscow-based limited liability company “Masyanya,” led by producer Grigory Zorin, which offered Kuvayev a range of promotion and distribution services. Zorin then granted Muz-TV the right to use the popular character legally. But Kuvayev didn’t receive any royalties from the deal as Zorin’s company left him without any control over Masyanya through a series of skillful manipulations. It took Kuvayev more than a year to regain his copyright. In August 2004, Kuvayev won a court case which returned to the animator the copyright of the character. The verdict of Savyolovsky district court in Moscow then ruled that “any commercial use of Masyanya’s image without securing a permission from Oleg Kuvayev, is illegal.” The channel considered appealing the decision but altered course this week. “Having revised the situation once again, the channel took a decision to withdraw its appeal,” a statement from Muz-TV’s press-office reads. The statement said the motive behind the recall of appeal is the channel’s great respect for the reputation and high professional achievements of Masyanya’s creator Kuvayev. “V gostyakh u Masyani” was a popular talk show, hosted by a slightly altered but recognizable rendition of Kuvayev’s vivacious, single-tooth provocative creature, frequently described as Russia’s answer to “Beavis and Butthead.” In the program Masyanya interviewined A-list celebrities such as writer Darya Donstova, pop-singer Shura and the rock-band Agatha Christie. The channel hasn’t been fined for copyright violation, so neither Kuvayev personally, nor his studio will recieve any kind of compensation. “We didn’t demand any financial compensation from the popular channel. We weren’t after their money,” a “victory note” on Kuvayev’s official website, www.mult.ru reads. “All we wanted was to shut down that program.” In an interview with Novye Izvestia on Monday, Kuvayev appreciated the channel’s decision but stressed the move would have looked better if it had been made before the discouraging verdict. “I am grateful to hear about what they call my ‘high professional achivements’, which, by the way, didn’t stop the channel causing huge moral damage to the artist, the studio and the audiences for more than a year,” the newspaper quotes Kuvayev as saying. “Regrettably, the channel’s management hasn’t acknowledged the scale of what they did and no apologies have been made.” TITLE: Putin Praises Chechen Leader PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: President Vladimir Putin praised Chechen First Deputy Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov on Sunday, telling him that he had done much to restore Chechnya. In a meeting clearly designed to bolster Kadyrov’s credibility and authority, Putin met with him at the presidential retreat on the Black Sea resort of Sochi. The meeting, which was attended by Kadyrov’s mother, came a day after Kadyrov failed to attend a ceremony in Grozny for the unveiling of a new statue of his father, the late Chechen President Akhmad Kadyrov, who was killed in a bomb blast in May 2004. Putin told Kadyrov, 28, that the situation in Chechnya was improving. “Much of what Akhmad Kadyrov envisioned now exists,” Putin said in televised comments. “The son of Akhmad, who is present here, we can say to a significant extent, has taken the torch from his father. For this, I want to thank you.” Kadyrov responded: “The things that you have started with my father are supported by the people, and every day, this proves the memory of my father.” Kadyrov heads a security force that is commonly referred to as Kadyrovsky Spetsnaz, or Kadyrov’s Commandos, and is widely feared and is accused of abuses ranging from kidnappings to robberies. TITLE: IN BRIEF TEXT: Extra School Security ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Security around all schools in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast is being stepped up ahead of the first day of school on Sept. 1. The first day of school, normally a festive occasion known as Knowledge Day, is this year the first anniversary of the terrorist attack at a school in Beslan, southern Russia, after which more than 300 people died. Police on Monday were carrying out checks of all residential buildings, commercial premises and private vehicles near educational institutions, Viktor Kudryavtsev of the Municipal Department of Internal Affairs said Monday, Interfax reported. Kudryavtsev also said that from the end of August, police will be on high-alert. ‘Free Russia’ Passport ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Young activists from the “Oborona” (“Defence”) movement photographed people outside one of the city’s metro stations on Sunday in a protest action in which volunteers will receive a “passport of a citizen of a free Russia,” Interfax reported. Aleksandr Shurshev, one of the project organizers, told Interfax that around 100 people had been photographed, and would receive a passport valid from 2008, the date of the next presidential elections. The protest group said it does not believe patriotism should be expressed as love for the president or support for militarism, but as respect for one’s country. The action was due to be repeated in St Petersburg on Monday, the report said. Semenenko: ‘Accident’ ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The prosecutor’s office in Sochi has refused to open a criminal investigation into the death of Pyotr Semenenko, general director of Kirovsky Zavod, who died on Aug. 10 after falling from the window of a 15-story hotel, Interfax reported on Monday. Sochi deputy prosecutor Temur Vorobyev told Interfax that the prosecutor’s office was refusing to open a criminal investigation due to lack of evidence, and had declared Semenko’s death an accident. It had earlier been announced that the decision whether to open a criminal case would be taken on the completion of an preliminary investigation, the agency reported. New Mariinsky Venue ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The Mariinsky Theater is planning to open a new venue in derilict stage-set workshops that were severely damaged by fire in 2003, Interfax reported on Monday. Head of the Construction and Planning department of the Admiralty district, Igor Myasnikov, told Interfax that the building would be reconstructed, while the historical facades would be preserved. Currently preservation and planning work, due to be completed by mid-2006 is being carried out on the premises by a French firm, the agency said. Interfax also cited Myasnikov as saying that work to strengthen the buildings foundations was under way. The new hall, expected to house 1,150 people, will host concerts by the Mariinsky’s orchestra and visiting orchestras, the report said. TITLE: 2 New Beslan Schools Are Opened AUTHOR: By Fatima Tlisova PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: NALCHIK — Officials held ceremonies to mark the opening of two new schools in the North Ossetian town of Beslan on Wednesday to replace School No. 1, devastated by last year’s horrific hostage seizure that killed more than 330 adults and children. Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov attended the ceremonies. State television broadcast footage showing rooms with new computers and furniture and teenagers — some of whom were hostages in last year’s raid — wandering through the halls and looking at maps and pictures. State television said modern security technology had been installed in the schools, but gave no further details. One of the schools has a pool. Principal Lyudmila Dzusova said that the schools would not open for classes until Sept. 5, four days after the official nationwide beginning of classes. “Every day we meet children who studied at School No. 1, who come here,” Dzusova said in televised comments. “There is an inner fear, but after walking around the school, we organize tours for the children and parents and teachers and they end up being pretty relieved.” A banner on one of the schools’ glass-and-concrete facades read “Thank You, Moscow, Thank You, United Russia” in a reference to the pro-Kremlin political party. Ismel Shaov, a spokesman for the regional Interior Ministry, said all schools in North Ossetia are now equipped with alarm systems and will be staffed with security officers. Shaov also said investigators were still searching for thieves who ransacked one of the schools last week, making off with computers worth thousands of dollars. The two schools replace School No.1, which was seized by armed militants on Sept. 1 with more than 1,100 hostages inside. The three-day raid ended in the deaths of 331 captives, most of them children. Officials said they opted for two separate schools so that schoolchildren would not have to cross the railroad tracks that cut through the town. School No. 1 is a burned-out shell littered with trash, graffiti, shell holes and broken windows. The leader of a Beslan citizens’ group said the building was being constructed under tight supervision and that it was possible to access the building only during construction hours after having passed a security check. TITLE: Ban on National Bolshevik Party Overturned by Court AUTHOR: By Nabi Abdullaev PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: MOSCOW — The Supreme Court last week struck down a lower court’s order to disband the National Bolshevik Party, the anti-goverment youth organization that has irritated authorities with its nonviolent, theatrical protests. National Bolshevik Party leader Eduard Limonov praised the ruling as “an extremely important decision.” “Today, the state acknowledged ... that dissident parties have the right to exist in Russia,” Limonov said Tuesday. The Prosecutor General’s Office said it would appeal. After 15 months of deliberation, the Moscow regional court in late June ordered the National Bolshevik Party to disband. The Moscow regional prosecutor’s office had argued that the organization was extremist, citing as evidence inflammatory statements in its literature and the numerous arrests and convictions of its members on various charges. Prosecutors had also accused the group of improperly representing itself as a political party, as it was registered with the Justice Ministry as a public group. Vitaly Varivoda, the lawyer who filed the National Bolshevik Party’s appeal to the Supreme Court, said the higher court had accepted his explanation that the Moscow regional branch of the Justice Ministry three times rejected the group’s requests to drop the word “party” from its name. “We explained to the Supreme Court that the National Bolshevik Party had done all in its power to follow the letter of law,” Varivoda said. Limonov said the Justice Ministry had refused to allow the name change because it said there were mistakes in the applications filed by the group. The Moscow regional prosecutor’s office refused to comment on the ruling, but the Prosecutor General’s Office said its regional colleagues had done their duty by demanding that the group be disbanded for using the word “party” in its name. Limonov said that after the ruling he expected a milder verdict for 39 National Bolshevik Party members who are on trial in Moscow’s Nikulinsky District Court for briefly seizing a presidential administration reception office in central Moscow in December. The defendants, who had been demanding President Vladimir Putin’s resignation, are charged with public disorder and face up to eight years in prison if convicted. “Now, I believe that the judge in their case will think 40 times before deciding whether he should treat their political activity as a crime,” Limonov said. The National Bolshevik Party, which Limonov, a counterculture writer, created in 1993, is arguably the most popular political movement among urban youth. The organization has come under increasing fire from the Kremlin, which has begun looking for support among Russia’s youth. The group is known for its nonviolent protests, which include throwing food at senior officials and hanging anti-government banners on landmarks. TITLE: Putin: Missiles Can Serve War on Terror AUTHOR: By Simon Saradzhyan PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: MOSCOW — After spending the night on a warship beyond the Polar Circle, President Vladimir Putin observed the successful launch of a ballistic missile from a submarine during naval maneuvers last week on the Barents Sea and told reporters that Russia could use cruise missiles to fight terrorists. Putin, flanked by Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov, stood on board of the Pyotr Veliky cruiser to watch the Sineva missile blast out of the water and vanish into the gray sky after being launched by the submerged nuclear submarine Yekaterinburg near the Kola Peninsula. Exactly 28 minutes later, the missile completed its flight across the country and hit a designated range on the Kamchatka Peninsula — much to the joy of Navy commanders. During similar naval exercises last year, a Sineva missile had to be destroyed in flight after veering off course and a second Sineva did not launch at all. Navy commanders were keen Wednesday to show Putin that they had done their homework this time. Putin, who wore a Navy uniform during the maneuvers, said he was pleased with the result of the exercise, in which a group of Northern Fleet ships and submarines were to prevent another group from deploying into the open sea and simulating the launch of nuclear missiles. “Everyone probably remembers the failed launch last year,” Putin said at a news conference on the Pyotr Veliky on Wednesday. “Now, all of the shortcomings have been corrected.” State television channels showed a stern-faced Putin exchange words with Ivanov as the two observed a formation of Northern Fleet warships fire missiles. Su-33 fighters from the nearby Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier flew overhead. On Tuesday, Putin donned an Air Force uniform and helmet to fly to a Northern Fleet base in a Tu-160 strategic bomber, which fired a new type of cruise missile and broke the sound barrier en route. He slept on the Pyotr Veliky. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Putin said the cruise missile would be commissioned and could be used to fight terrorists. Channel One television showed Defense Ministry footage of the missile hitting and destroying a house. The high-precision conventional missile has a range of 2,000 kilometers and Tuesday’s launch was one of the final tests before its deployment, Ivanov said at the same news conference, RIA-Novosti reported. While singling out the cruise missile and the successful Sineva launch, Putin also praised the overall increase in combat readiness across the armed forces and said the defense budget would continue to grow — but not exceed 2.6 percent to 2.7 percent of gross domestic product. Putin, whose second term ends in 2008, said part of the money would go toward modernizing the armed forces beyond 2015. He said military morale and the public’s attitude toward the armed forces had been improving after hitting a low in the 1990s. In a clear reference to U.S. deliberations over lowering the threshold for use of nuclear weapons, Putin said Russia was opposed “to this dangerous trend in the minds of certain politicians and military men.” TITLE: President Pleased He Can Hire and Fire Governors AUTHOR: By Francesca Mereu PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday said the law allowing him to hire and fire governors had worked well since its introduction in January, but admitted there were delays in nominating new candidates. “Some time ago, I said that it was necessary to create such a system of regional leadership under which the heads of the regions would try to solve regional problems ... and think about the national interest. This is what it is happening now,” Putin said during a visit to military exercises in the Barents Sea, Interfax reported. The delays in nominating new candidates were due to “shortcomings in the work of the presidential administration,” Putin said. The Altai legislature on Wednesday was waiting for Putin to nominate a replacement for the region’s late governor, Mikhail Yevdokimov, who died in a car accident earlier this month, said Tatyana Syomina, spokeswoman for the Altai legislature, and Nikolai Pimenov, spokesman for acting governor Mikhail Kozlov. Citing sources close to the presidential administration, Vedomosti newspaper said Wednesday that Alexander Karlin, the head of the Kremlin’s civil service department, was Putin’s most likely choice.If selected, Karlin would be the third new governor to be nominated in the last month without close previous ties to local business or political elites. Karlin was one of two candidates proposed to Putin by his envoy to the Siberian Federal District, Anatoly Kvashnin. The other candidate was Yakov Ishutin, the head of the Altai Forestry Agency, the paper reported. Late Tuesday, Putin confirmed that Nikolai Fyodorov would serve a fourth term as president of the Chuvash republic. TITLE: Irksome Firm Nearly Ejected From Air Show AUTHOR: By Lyuba Pronina PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: ZHUKOVSKY, Moscow Region — The jamming equipment made by Aviakonversia is so effective against U.S. planes and missiles that it apparently provoked an angry phone call to the Kremlin from U.S. President George W. Bush in the first days of the Iraq war. Russian officials do not seem to have forgotten the scandal and on Friday tried to shut down the company’s stand at the Seventh Moscow Aviation and Space Show, MAKS 2005, said Aviakonversia director Oleg Antonov. Perhaps the company’s presence was simply too embarrassing, considering that the U.S. Air Force occupied a prominent place on the tarmac, displaying a B-1B bomber, F-15 and F-16 fighters, and two bulbous tanker planes used in mid-air refueling. Three representatives of the Federal Industry Agency and the Federal Service for Technical and Export Control, which oversees the export of defense technology, unsuccessfully attempted to close the stand on the grounds that Aviakonversia had not received clearance from the Defense Ministry to showcase its product, Antonov said. The government representatives, concealing their ID badges, did not allow this reporter to be present during their conversation with Antonov. “They demanded we pack up, but we have the right to be here — we paid the rent for this stall,” Antonov said after the meeting. “We have made the product using our own money and do not need the approval from the Defense Ministry, a grocery director or a banya director.” The Federal Industry Agency could not be reached for comment. Aviakonversia, which makes devices that jam the global positioning systems used in navigation, caused a storm of protest from Washington in the early days of the Iraq war in March 2003. Antonov, who for 24 years worked in the State Research Institute of Aviation Systems developing defense systems for planes, founded Aviakonversia with a dozen staffers in 1992. The company developed jammers that interfere with GPS signals and were apparently used by Iraqi forces during the U.S.-led invasion. The Bush administration charged that Aviakonversia personnel were on the ground instructing Iraqi forces how to use and maintain the equipment, The Washington Post reported at the time. “Our GPS jammer puts all U.S. high-precision weapons out of order,” Antonov said. “They have turned billions of dollars that the U.S. government has spent into dust.” Antonov denied that his company delivered any equipment directly to Saddam Hussein but acknowledged it might have reached Iraq via arms dealers. “Right before the war, there were a lot of people in Moscow with suitcases full of money shopping for anything that could deter U.S. troops,” Antonov said. Aviakonversia now manufactures its gear outside Russia so as not to irritate the authorities, he said, though he declined to specify where. He also refused to identify his clients, saying only that they were foreign governments that acquired the jammers through middlemen. After Aviakonversia first displayed its wares at MAKS 1997, the Pentagon acquired a few dozen jammers, Antonov said. “Then they went quiet.” A hubbub ensued, however, in the first days of hostilities, when U.S. forces had difficulty in honing in on their targets. Bush reportedly picked up the phone to voice concern to President Vladimir Putin that Iraqi forces were using Russian-made night-vision goggles, GPS jammers and anti-tank missiles. Antonov lamented that his company did not reap more praise back home. A representative of state-owned Phazotron-NIIR, the maker of radars for fighter jets, also said Friday that their stand had been rigorously inspected by the export control service. Some weapons systems — such as the S-400 air defense system — were not even displayed at MAKS, despite previous advertisements. TITLE: Maks 2005 Sets Record PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: ZHUKOVSKY, Moscow Region — The Seventh Moscow Aviation and Space Show, MAKS 2005, saw a record number of visitors this year and yielded nearly $1 billion in deals signed, the air show’s organizers said Sunday. More than 650,000 people visited the six-day show, Interfax reported, citing organizers. On Aug. 16, Rosoboronexport, the state-owned arms sales agency, signed a $300 million deal for licensed production of 1,000 Al-55I engines in India. King Abdullah II of Jordan, who visited the show, sealed a deal for two Il-76MF transport planes for about $100 million. European aerospace and defense giant EADS and Italy’s Finmeccanica signed a number of cooperation agreements with Russian companies. Fulfilling expectations, EADS finally committed to buying 10 percent in Irkut Corp., the privately controlled maker of Sukhoi fighter jets. Volga-Dnepr airline signed a general agreement with state-owned Vneshekonombank on the revival of An-124 supercargo jet production at the Aviastar-SP plant in Ulyanovsk. On the civilian side, state-controlled Financial Leasing Co. agreed to buy 10 Sukhoi-made Russian Regional Jets, marking the first firm contract for a project due to go into mass production in 2008. The competing Antonov 148 regional plane made its public debut at MAKS and scored several orders. The presence of the world’s major business jet producers — Canada’s Bombardier, Brazil’s Embraer, France’s Dassault and the United States’ Raytheon — was indicative of growing demand among Russian clients. Raytheon signed a memorandum with Russian leaser Travers-Avia for three Hawkers 800XPI and two Hawkers Horizon planes, popular models among Russian business clients. Bombardier vice president Bob Horner said that a Russian property mogul had placed an order for a Challenger 5000 jet. TITLE: Putin Meets King of Jordan, Inaugurates Way to Skifield PUBLISHER: Combined Reports TEXT: SOCHI, Southern Russia — President Vladimir Putin and Jordanian King Abdullah II held a second day of talks Friday in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, discussing bilateral relations and international issues, the Kremlin said. Putin also on Friday inaugurated a newly built tunnel connecting Sochi with five towns in the mountains, including a ski resort where he vacations during the winter. After meeting with Abdullah on Thursday, Putin called for a timetable for pulling U.S. and other troops out of Iraq and for broader involvement of the international community in efforts to stabilize the situation there. He also said he had spoken to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas about the situation in the Gaza Strip, and praised Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for showing “courage and consistency” in withdrawing Jewish settlers from the region. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov sent a special envoy to the Middle East on Friday to take part in a meeting Saturday of the so-called Quartet comprising Russia, the United States, the European Union and the United Nations, which is seeking peace between Israel and the Palestinians, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The envoy, Alexander Kalugin, was planning to hold talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials and to visit Gaza. His trip was part of “Russia’s efforts to provide for the non-problematic and calm withdrawal of Israel from Gaza and part of the West Bank” and to support the Quartet’s “road map” peace plan, the ministry said. Putin has been seeking to revive Russia’s influence in the Middle East recently with a series of meetings and visits, including a historic trip to Israel and the West Bank in April. Abdullah, who left Russia after the talks Friday, said Thursday that Russia had an important role to play in the Middle East. The Foreign Ministry also said Friday that Palestinian Foreign Minister Nasser Al Kidwa might visit Russia for talks with Lavrov next Thursday. Meanwhile, Putin inaugurated the new tunnel by driving through it in his vintage Volga car, the one in which he gave U.S. President George W. Bush “driving lessons” in May, RIA-Novosti reported. The 3-kilometer tunnel links Sochi with five settlements in the mountains, including the popular Krasnaya Polyana ski resort. RIA-Novosti said Putin drove to the resort in his ivory GAZ-21 Volga and his arrival remained unnoticed for a while because he went without a traffic police escort. (AP, SPT) TITLE: Torshin Defends Troops Over Blaze in Beslan AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: MOSCOW — Grenades that federal commandos fired at the Beslan school during September’s crisis could not have set off the blaze that swept through the hostage-packed gym, the head of the parliamentary commission investigating the Beslan seizure suggested in an interview published Friday. Alexander Torshin, a Federation Council deputy speaker, said footage filmed by federal troops during the hostage-freeing operation showed grenades struck school walls near the gym but none set a fire upon detonation. “Let someone explain it to us then: Why would it burn in one place and not burn in another?” Torshin told Izvestia. Relatives of the more than 1,000 hostages have speculated that commandos fired grenades at the gym, and that the grenades started the fire that contributed to the high death toll. More than 330 hostages died. Torshin said experts had studied the positions of the commandos who fired grenades and the grenades’ likely trajectories, and that they had concluded that it was highly improbable that any grenades had struck the gym. Deputy Prosecutor General Nikolai Shepel acknowledged in July that commandos had fired Shmel grenades, which are classified as flamethrowers but are in fact rocket-propelled projectiles. Shepel said the Shmels were of the RPO-A type, whose projectiles contain fuel-air explosives. After impact, such projectiles release an aerosol cloud of fuel that is then ignited by an embedded detonator to produce an explosion, according to Jane’s Information Group. The result is a brief fireball followed by the projectile’s main destructive force: a wave of high pressure. In an apparent attempt to place the blame for the fire on the attackers, Torshin said a witness had told his commission that an attacker under the influence of drugs had set off a blast and the fire by shooting at a cluster of explosives in the gym. He added that another witness said a bomb had dropped to the floor and exploded. Yet, other witnesses suggested that the attackers’ leader, known only as the Colonel, had triggered the explosion, as the blast rang out immediately after he stepped out of the gym, he said. TITLE: Burns Takes Up Post as New U.S. Ambassador PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — New U.S. Ambassador William Burns took up his post Friday with a visit to the Foreign Ministry. During a meeting with Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin, Burns presented copies of his letter of credence from U.S. President George W. Bush, allowing him to officially assume his duties in Russia, a U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said. He also handed over an official letter of recall for the previous ambassador, Alexander Vershbow, who completed his posting last month. Burns said he would work to strengthen ties between the United States and Russia. “Relations with Russia are very important for the United States for many reasons,” Burns said, Interfax reported. “I hope for successful efforts, close cooperation and improvement of relations between the United States and Russia.” Karasin wished Burns success during his Moscow posting and expressed hope for “further constructive development” in all areas of Russian-U.S. relations, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. Burns, a career diplomat who served in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow in the mid-1990s as minister-counselor for political affairs, joined the Foreign Service in 1982. He speaks Arabic, Russian and French and was the ambassador to Jordan from 1998 to 2001. From 2001 to 2005, he was assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. Burns arrived from Washington on Thursday with his wife, Lisa Carty, and their two children, the U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said. TITLE: Russians See Job Prestige Connected With Crime AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: Ministers, politicians and civil servants are seen as criminals by 19 percent of Russians, while only seven percent of the population associates lawyers with criminal activities, the Levada Center said in a survey earlier this month. The survey reported that Russians believe all prestigious and profitable jobs to be strongly connected to criminal activities. Legislative and executive branches of power were delegated to second place in the list of most criminally involved. The survey asked 1,200 people of voting age to indicate several professions they thought to be the most profitable, the most prestigious or the most criminal. Levada Center said the statistical accuracy is within three percentage points. Business people and entrepreneurs — seen as the most profitable occupations — racked up 14 percent of the most criminal vote. Exactly the same number of respondents said the most criminal occupations were those of thieves, killers, drug dealers, racketeers and terrorists. Uninspiringly, the country’s police service and road inspection were assumed by most respondents to be the most criminal professions in Russia, picking up a massive 38 percent of votes. “The criminal professions may seem surprising only at first sight,” said Irina Palilova, public relation manager at the Levada Center. “Law enforcement employees were given first place because of respondents’ personal experience of interactions with them and an unfavorable image of ‘uniformed werewolves’ that they get in the mass media.” Over a third of Russians think that jurisprudence is the most prestigious professional area, with lawyers, notaries, prosecutors and judges topping the prestige list, the survey reported. However, those surveyed considered jurisprudence to be less profitable than banking or business, which came low on the prestige list. Despite being considered unprofitable careers, doctors and pharmacists took third place in the most prestigious list, being a “rather predictable” result that nonetheless showed that money did not translate into respect for most Russians, Palilova said. The respect lawyers enjoy has not meant significant increases in students taking to law, said Alexander Victorov, Committee for Science and Higher School chairman. The most popular university courses remain acting, economics and management, with law and informational technologies coming much lower on the list, he said. “Although for the last three years the demand for engineering and informational technologies specialties at universities is growing,” Victorov added. Data from recruiting companies shows that popular stereotypes have little to do with reality. The most highly paid jobs are in the alcohol and especially tobacco production and distribution industries, said Oksana Pochtivaya, operation manager at Ancor recruitment agency. IT and telecom firms also provide high wages and attractive social packages, she said. A less lucrative industry is banking, according to Ancor figures, though salaries vary significantly depending on job position. Retail banking holds the best job opportunities in finances due to huge bonuses, but does demand high competence and special working skills, Pochtivaya said. TITLE: LAES Plans Exports to Finland AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: This week the Energy and Industry Ministry will start discussions on a project for high-voltage transmission cable that will allow Russia to export energy to Finland, Interfax reported Friday. The 150 kilometer-long cable, to be laid at the bottom of the Gulf of Finland, will connect the Leningrad nuclear power plant (LAES), through the village of Kernovo in the Leningrad Oblast, to the Mussalo power plant, in the southeast of Finland. The project is estimated to require about 350 million euros ($427.8 million) of investment and will support a cable with a capacity of 8.7 billion kilowatts per hour. Interfax quoted a member of the ministry as saying that the project will “broaden the sales market for Russian energy and attract additional investment into substituted infrastructure.” A subsidiary of LAES, Baltenergo, has already been appointed as the operating company for the cable. When contacted Monday, Baltenergo refused to provide further details on the project before a governmental commission reaches a decision this week. “The project is advantageous from a geographical point of view, because the cable will be placed near the costal high-voltage transmission line,” said LAES press secretary Sergei Averyanov. Until the negotiations between the Russian and Finnish sides are complete, however, “the project’s full potential is hard to estimate,” Averyanov said. According to a previously declared scheme, a high-voltage transmission cable will allow the pipeline to carry a capacity of 1,000 megawatts. Averyanov suggested that the project’s infrastructure could be used by Russian energy giant Unified Energy Systems (UES), as part of the power utility’s export operations. UES may not be the only one to benefit. The energy production volume of LAES also makes export “technically possible,” Averyanov said. Currently, the St. Petersburg power plant operates four power-generating units of 1,000-megawatt capacity, he said. LAES supplies about 50 percent of its energy to other areas of the country, with the rest consumed locally. Averyanov is sure that Russian energy will find a market in Finland, since “Russian energy is much cheaper.” Industry players agreed that the Northwest region is not short on energy volumes. However, LAES may have to add one more power-generating unit to meet export volume figures, said Larisa Semyonova, head of Lenenergo power utility’s press service. “From an economical point of view, it makes more sense to export electrical power to a neighboring country, than [aim for a client who is] far away,” said Gianguido Piani, an independent expert on the power industry. “But from an environmental and even moral consideration the idea is not sound. Finland’s neighbor Sweden wants to switch off its nuclear power plants, which means they will also become buyers of Russia’s nuclear power via the Nordic power market. And the reliability of such an integrated network will decrease,” he said. Piani added that the return on investment for the electricity pipeline project will depend on the price Russian power will have on the Nordic market. Using undersea cable technology is not unusual in Europe, where several such links already operate between Sweden and Germany, Britain and France, and Italy and Greece. Industry experts say that finding investors for the pipeline projects rarely proves difficult. In the case of Russia, Semyonova and Averyanov named Finnish energy firm Fortum as involved in the pipeline project. Fortnum’s St. Petersburg office spokeswoman Vera Burtseva declined to confirm or deny that the company was intending to participate in the project, “due to corporate policy.” Fortum is a leading energy company in Nordic countries and parts of the Baltic Rim. It owns and operates regional and distribution networks, delivering electricity to a total of 1.4 million customers in Sweden, Finland, Norway and Estonia. TITLE: Raiffeisen Considers More CIS Buys After Ukraine Deal AUTHOR: By Marcus Kabel PUBLISHER: Reuters TEXT: VIENNA — Eastern Europe lender Raiffeisen International is on the lookout for more acquisitions in Russia and the former Soviet Union after buying Ukraine’s second-largest commercial bank, Bank Aval, Raiffeisen said. Chief Executive Herbert Stepic said Monday the Aval deal, whose price he declined to disclose, made Raiffeisen the largest bank in Ukraine by assets and would draw more international interest to Ukraine’s financial sector. “We underpin our pioneer role in central and eastern Europe and our plan to repeatedly benefit from a first-mover’s advantage is definitely still vital...,” Stepic told a conference call. “Most importantly, Raiffeisen will now have strong positions in each of the three exciting large growth markets — number 1 in Ukraine, number 3 in Romania and number 2 foreign bank in Russia,” Merrill Lynch analyst Stuart Graham said in a research note. Stepic said Aval was Raiffeisen’s largest acquisition to date and fits into a strategy of expanding in eastern Europe, with a focus on Russia and the former Soviet territories. “We started an expansion policy [in Russia] early this year, opening 10 to 12 large branches in the larger cities of Russia, and will use them as bridgeheads,” Stepic said in a telephone interview. “Secondly we are looking here and there for smaller acquisition targets [in Russia]... With regards to other countries, the CIS is still interesting. That will not happen tomorrow, literally, but there might be one or the other acquisition target that we are looking at in the CIS,” he said. Raiffeisen announced Saturday it had closed months of negotiations over a deal with 12 private investors to buy 93.5 percent of Aval. It said Aval was number two in Ukraine by total assets, with $2.1 billion at the end of 2004, as well as about 3 million retail customers, 210,000 corporate customers and 1,378 branches. TITLE: IN BRIEF TEXT: Alien Stops Ship ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Cruise line operator Alien Holding has suspended the catamaran service between St. Petersburg and Kotka, Finland, which the company launched in May. Market operators said low passenger turnover was the main reason for the suspension of a service Alien claimed would attract 7,400 people between May and October. Traveling between St. Petersburg and Kotka on Alien’s catamaran took 4.5 hours and cost from 59 euros to 70 euros ($72.1 to $85.5). The catamaran will be undergoing repairs until the end of August after which the ship is scheduled to continue servicing the route, said Yevgeny Dmitriyev, Alien’s vice-president, told Kommersant business daily on Monday. “This was a try-out year,” Dmitriyev said, explaining the route’s low turnover volume. He added that the company hopes for the development of tourism infrastructure on Gogland island to boost the route’s interest. Taxmen Eye Machines ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The tax service has decided to take a closer look at machine-building firms in St. Petersburg, by setting up a specialized interregional inspectorate in the city, RIA Novosti agency reported last week. The new branch of the federal tax service will be based in the city and monitor large tax contributors in the machine industry. The inspectorate will be an addition to the seven other such specialized branches in the country that focus on oil, gas, alcohol, energy, metals, transportation and communications, the news agency said. Kia Launches Line MOSCOW (AP) — South Korea’s Kia Motors Corp. launched an assembly line producing its Spectra model at a Russian factory Monday, the Russian government said. The Izhavto factory in the city of Izhevsk, about 1,000 kilometers east of Moscow, is assembling the mid-priced sedan and Kia has agreed to outsource welding and painting to local companies within 18 months, the Ministry of Industry and Energy said. Kia has also agreed to cut imports of components by at least 30 percent in value terms in three stages over about five years, the ministry said. Sales of the Izhevsk-produced Spectras are stated to begin in October, Izhavto said on its web site. Izhavto plans to make 8,000 Spectras this year, 25,000 next year and reach full capacity of 40,000 in 2008, the factory said. The price of cars will range from $11,500 to $14,500, RIA-Novosti reported. TITLE: The Great Mobile Phone Scam AUTHOR: By Mikhail Lerman PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Last week’s seizure of smuggled cellphones at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport shook the entire mobile industry. The $10 million worth of contraband phones — destined for several nationwide mobile retail chains — was, however, just a fraction of a continuous operation to smuggle phones, phone accessories, and computer parts into Russia. The seized goods loaded onto cargo aircraft in Finland or Germany were being delivered to a cargo terminal at Sheremetyevo, then temporarily stored at the airport’s warehouse facilities. With the help of forged documents they were then transferred to an internal warehouse beyond the territory controlled by customs, then transported to the warehouses of large retailers. The media have named the retailers involved as Severen, Sota-Online, Euroset, Dixis, Svyaznoi and Betalink. Analysts agree that the well-planned action by the police must have been initiated by one of the market players. The smuggling schemes of this kind are not new. Previously, for some reason or other, the law-enforcement organs shut their eyes to them. Hence, it is second-tier retailers who are suspected of serving their interests by destroying the market (it cannot be excluded that they will receive the confiscated goods at ¸re-sale prices) as are Russian representatives of the goods’ producers. Experts say the size of the Russian market had been expected to exceed $5 billion this year. However, even the seizure of goods valued at $10 million is capable of leading to temporary shortages and rising prices for telephones. Dixis’ spokeswoman Tatyana Moskalyova said that the market is already experiencing a supply shortage. For St. Petersburg operators, the situation has already called for extraordinary measures. Chains UltraStar and Teleforum last Friday installed a selling limit of two mobile handsets per customer, Kommersant business daily reported Monday. Oksana Pankratova, senior analyst at iKS-Consulting, estimated that prices would now grow about 15 percent. Euroset made similar estimates, although they saw different causes for the rise. “The prices were already rising for the last two weeks. In our case the shortage was related to us buying fewer telephones for what was expected to be a dead season. However, the season turned out to be far from dead. We sold many more phones than we expected,” a spokeswoman for Euroset said. Analysts, however, find it a little hard to believe that the purchasing department of one of the largest retailers in the country could make such a mistake. Their assumptions are challenged by the retailers. Vladimir Plyako, general director of Tsifrograd, which is part of the Severen holding, said that “companies like Euroset, Svyaznoi, Dixis and others invest quite large amounts of money and time into the development of their business. Therefore they are above all interested that the market does not require them to use the services of murky companies.” Pankratova said the shortage and price rises will continue until fall. TITLE: Online Banking Forecast To Be the Next Big Trend AUTHOR: By Mikhail Lerman PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Online banking and mobile banking are catching on as the latest fashion amid IT and financial companies, with strategic cooperation deals and consumer options being signed almost weekly. So far, the investment and hype around online services have not justified the consumer response, limited access to the Internet particularly holding back progress, and companies have partly turned to mobile banking to rouse interest. Meanwhile industry experts say the market could see an explosion in user numbers in the near future, because the increasing number of net and mobile banking offers is sure to sway a public growing ever more affluent and technology-savvy. Last week Alfa Bank became the latest firm to declare its venture into mobile banking, this time with Samsung. The bank said it will offer clients a chance to control their accounts using a cellphone with a service called Alfa-Mobile. To take advantage of the offer, phone subscribers will have to own a handset that supports Java MIDP 2.0 and be serviced by the Alfa Bank Express arm of the bank, requiring a switch to an Alfa-Zhisn tariff. The complex conditions are likely to limit the user numbers, but the bank’s management remains upbeat about the future of the project. In addition to allowing users to pay for their mobile phone connection and managing banking operations, the bank aims to broaden the service specter and make the project more exciting for users. “After a pilot trial, we will start mass subscription,” said Dmitry Skibinsky, spokesman for Alfa Bank. Initially the project will be supported by selected Samsung handsets. The service, however, promises to be as simple as “pressing a couple of buttons.” Alfa’s main advantage is that its tariff continues working even if a person decides to change their SIM-card. This is not Alfa Bank’s first foray in the IT market. The bank previously cooperated with i-Free mobile content provider in a service called Alfa-Check. Subscribers could get notification of incoming banking transaction via SMS. Kirill Goryn, general director of i-Free, sees mobile banking as having great opportunities in Russia. “It will expand, partly because of the active development of technology, and partly because services of this nature are becoming interesting for the market,” Goryn said. “Consumers will come to value the new possibilities, and then having such a service will become vital for a bank’s competitiveness,” he said. Another option for online banking has been the recent installation of automated kiosks that allow cash payments. Such kiosks, in the shape of an ATM have cropped up in metro stations, mobile retail shops and public places. Now, Pochta Rossii, or Russian Post, has decided to get in on the act. The St. Petersburg division of the post office vowed last week to set up 5,000 self-service terminals to accept mobile phone payments at the majority of its city and Leningrad Oblast branches. The terminals will allow payments from all MTS, MegaFon and Beeline, irrespective of region. Further down the line will come options to pay for NTV+ and Kosmos TV satellite channels. TITLE: New Holland Could Be City’s Best Investment AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: By the end of this month the committee for investment and strategic projects will declare an open tender for the development of the New Holland island. The territory, situated between the Moika river and the Kryukov and Admiralteisky channels, counts as an 18th century architectural monument. History aside, the authorities want the island’s prime property location to yield premium results. Industry players, however, say the proposed scheme is at the least inefficient if not completely unheard of in construction practice. Although investment and architectural design bids for the development of New Holland, which was previously occupied by naval headquarters and warehouses, are soon to start pouring in, little is as yet known about the project. The tender’s organizers say a proposed plan must combine residential, hotel and business functions while preserving the status of the site’s historic-architectural ensemble. “The main construction will be conducted along the Admiralteisky channel. Architectural limits assume that buildings should be no higher than 23.5 meters,” said Vera Heifets, press-secretary at the city’s committee for investment and strategic projects. The residential part should not exceed 20 percent of the total space, while 1,000 places parking and a 10,000 square meter multifunctional center are a must, Heifets added. The center will remain in state ownership and is expected to provide facilities for conferences, exhibitions and Mariinsky theater performances during the high tourist seasons. Also possible is the construction of four pedestrian and one automobile bridges, Heifets said. A number of large commercial projects have appeared in Russia in the last 10 years, but a project with such extensive renovation focus as the New Holland island demands is being seen for the first time, said Svetlana Shalayeva, research and consulting department director at the Colliers International property agency. The city estimates the investment needed to be more than $300 million. Shalayeva said that for the 220,000-square meter island, the declared investment volume is quite realistic, working out at $1.500 per sq. m. to finance construction and renovation. However, the transformation of the historical ensemble into a functional commercial facility will be no easy task. Eduard Tiktinsky, general director of RBI construction holding, said that before the city will receive any bids for the project, the island needs to be opened to a thorough engineering and geodetic survey, which would assess the infrastructure and land soil conditions. “Only after fully understanding all the [island’s] parameters, can I prepare and offer an optimal concept for tender. Without it the concept will be incorrect,” Tiktinsky said “At the moment combined architectural and investment tender on this project is a difficult task since selection criterions are unclear,” he said, adding that predictability of expenses was especially important since foreign companies are expected to participate in the tender. Construction firms point to the multifunctional aspect of New Holland development as its most attractive feature. Realtors agree, but warn that the small territory may limit creative possibilities. “A combination of residential, hotel and business functions will create a self-sufficient city district,” Tiktinsky said. The lack of rivals could make the island ideal for 4-star and 5-star hotels and expensive residential real estate projects, he added. Shalayeva said that usually such a combination works well, “but New Holland is a small island. Declared construction density makes it hard to combine all functions. For expensive residential real estate such construction is too dense.” With a lack of other such projects in the city, New Holland still presents the best multifunctional development opportunity in St. Petersburg, which is only rivaled by the Moskovskaya-Tovarnaya project near the Moskovsky railway station, Tiktinsky said. Shalayeva estimated the construction period to develop New Holland fully at five years and a return on investments of no sooner than in 15 years, “or at least no less than 10 years in the most optimistic scenario.” The committee for investment and strategic projects said that a number of Russian and foreign investors “have already shown interest.” The committee said it will give preference to one company or concortium to cover the whole project, with a preliminary construction completion deadline of 2008. Realtors, however, see “co-investment as the most likely solution.” TITLE: Morgan Stanley Expands in Russia AUTHOR: By Guy Faulconbridge PUBLISHER: Reuters TEXT: Morgan Stanley will start trading Russian stocks, bonds and currency instruments as early as next month as top investment banks flock to the country to profit from its soaring markets. The Wall Street bank has hired 35 new employees in Moscow and has received a license from the Central Bank, the head of Morgan Stanley in Russia, Rair Simonyan, said on Friday. Trading may start as early as mid-September, and chief executive John Mack, who recently returned to bring the bank stability after months of management turmoil and executive departures, is expected to attend the official opening in October. “This is a very big commitment. It is the biggest investment by Morgan Stanley in Europe for some time,” Simonyan said. Sources familiar with the situation said Morgan Stanley had spent about $50 million on building its Moscow sales and trading operation. Simonyan declined to comment on how much the bank had spent. Bulge-bracket banks, many of which lost billions after Russia defaulted on its domestic debt in August 1998, are adding staff and boosting trading and sales to take advantage of Russia’s bull markets, a surge in IPOs and a booming economy. Citigroup, ING, Credit Suisse First Boston and Allianz unit Dresdner have expanded Moscow trading operations, while Deutsche Bank owns 40 percent of local investment bank United Financial Group. They join UBS, which has long had sales and trading on the Russian market and weathered the 1998 crisis. Moscow-based traders said the entrance of some of the world’s biggest banks could change the landscape of the Russian market to the detriment of local brokerages. “These big banks are coming to town, and they can do things that we simply cannot do because of the capital they have behind them,” said a senior trader at a Moscow brokerage. “This is going to have a massive influence on the shape of the Russian market,” added the trader, who requested anonymity. Simonyan said he wanted to boost the number of products on the Russian market, which fund managers say is still shallow. “We want to trade on the local market, and the opportunity cost of not being here is just too high,” Simonyan said. “We want to be able to offer our Russian clients a wide menu of services, and we want to offer a whole range of new products, above all connected with derivatives.” Igor Kan, an executive director at Morgan Stanley in London, will become Simonyan’s deputy in Moscow. Morgan Stanley first entered the Russian market in 1994 but scaled back operations after the country’s $40 billion default seven years ago. At the time, many bankers in London and New York swore never to return, but now bankers say conditions are different. Moscow is awash with money as record prices for oil and gas drive the economy, which is forecast to grow to 24.4 trillion rubles ($856 billion) next year. Russia is paying off debt early, and foreign currency reserves exceed its foreign debt. Both Russian benchmark stocks indexes rose to a record on Friday, while the spread between U.S. Treasuries and Russian eurobonds also narrowed to record levels this month. This year, the bank has arranged several major initial public offerings, including the $1.6 billion London listing of conglomerate Sistema, the biggest ever IPO by a Russian company. TITLE: IN BRIEF TEXT: Port Safety in Doubt LONDON (Bloomberg) — Primorsk Shipping, Russia’s third-largest shipping company by tanker capacity, said the Russian government should consider alternative locations for a new Pacific port at the end of the oil pipeline from Siberia. Transneft, Russia’s oil-pipeline monopoly, plans to invest $11.5 billion to build an oil pipeline across eastern Siberia to the Pacific Ocean to ship crude to Asia. The company plans to build a new loading terminal in the Perevoznaya Bay close to the city of Vladivostok. “Nakhodka, Vanino, Vladimir Bay, Gorny cape in the Bezymyany Bay and some other points on the map fit much better because of depths, access by ships,” Alexander Kirilichev, chairman at Prisco, said in a statement e-mailed Monday. Perevoznaya will cause problems navigating for tankers that can carry 100,000 to 300,000 metric tons, he said. Bosses Sue Own Firm AMSTERDAM (Reuters) — The main owners of Yukos on Friday teamed up with creditor banks in a $1.1 billion lawsuit against the crippled oil company in a bid to get some cash out before its expected collapse. Group Menatep is using its subsidiary, Moravel, which has made loans to the oil company, to claim $650 million from Yukos in a suit filed in Amsterdam. “Now we have a claim against Yukos as a creditor. We are not acting as a shareholder here, but as a creditor,” said Allard Huizing, a lawyer for Moravel. Moravel filed its suit together with a claim from a syndicate of more than 10 western banks, led by Societe Generale and including Deutsche Bank AG, Citigroup and ING NV. The banks are chasing about $480 million outstanding from $1 billion loaned to Yukos in 2003, when it was Russia’s top oil company and produced a fifth of the country’s oil. DB Closes Accounts MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas, a unit of Deutsche Bank AG in the U.S., has been closing correspondent accounts with Russian lenders amid concern over money laundering, daily Kommersant reported, citing Russian bankers. The Bank of New York and the United Bank of California have also closed accounts, the newspaper said. Raiffeisen Zentralbank Oesterreich AG and Dresdner Bank AG are benefiting as the Russian banks reopen accounts with them, according to the newspaper. About 300 Russian banks, mainly small-capitalized lenders, had their accounts in the U.S. closed between the spring of 2004 and the spring of 2005, the newspaper said, citing Alexander Murychev, head of an association of Russian regional banks. U.S. banks must spend more money to monitor transactions at accounts of foreign banks following tougher demands from the FBI, the paper said, citing bankers. The damage from a scandal outweighs money to be made from servicing the accounts, Sergei Korepanov, chairman of a Russian mortgage bank, told the newspaper. Metro to Build 10 a Year LONDON (Bloomberg) — Metro AG, which has opened its first Real supermarket in Russia, plans to add eight to 10 Cash & Carry wholesale or Real outlets a year in the country, Handelsblatt cited Chief Executive Hans-Joachim Koerber as saying. TITLE: Sovereign Democracy and the Usurper State AUTHOR: By Vladimir Ryzhkov TEXT: The subject of Russia’s sovereignty has recently come to the forefront of political discussion. This in and of itself is surprising and needs explaining. Strangely enough, top government officials are the ones expressing the most concern about the issue. These are the very officials who claim that they have made Russia significantly stronger in recent years and saved it from impending collapse and international isolation. Yet none of the notable political forces in Russia, even among the opposition, has ever cast doubt on Russia’s sovereignty. No one is questioning Russia’s borders, either. So why the panic over sovereignty? Or is this discussion really about something else altogether? The subject of external threats to Russia’s independence and territorial integrity first came up during the Beslan tragedy last September, when in an address to the nation, the president stated that certain powerful outside forces longed to weaken and even dismember Russia. After Viktor Yushchenko won the presidential election in Ukraine, sovereignty was even more widely discussed, and the defeat of Kremlin favorite Viktor Yanukovych was seen as the result of outside interference. Many officials demanded Russia take measures to prevent a similar turn of events back home. Federal Security Service director Nikolai Patrushev warned the State Duma of the danger and named particular international organizations that he believed were trying to organize a color revolution. In recent interviews and statements, deputy chief of staff Vladislav Surkov, one of the Kremlin’s main ideologues, has spelled out his vision for state power, which he calls “sovereign democracy.” The state should be headed by the “national elite,” as opposed to the “offshore aristocracy” that practically governs from abroad. Domestic capital or the state should dominate in strategic industries, as a sovereign democracy faces tough competition from other countries. Historical memory, or in other words recollections of imperial greatness, is crucial and sets Russia apart from other European nations. Democracy will grow stronger as society becomes objectively more prepared to handle it — and today, it’s simply not ready yet, Surkov believes. This kind of rhetoric reveals a conflict between two ideas, two sets of values that are equally dear to every patriot and citizen’s heart: Russia’s freedom and independence — its sovereignty — and Russians’ political and civil rights, or Russian democracy. These two concepts have been set in opposition to one another. How are democracy and sovereignty related? Who is the real sovereign in today’s Russia? Who really holds the power and jurisdiction? There can be no doubt about it: According to the Constitution, the only possessor of sovereignty and the source of authority and power is the multiethnic people of Russia. For this reason, we need to cast aside the widely held conviction among many Russians and even among certain analysts and experts that confuses sovereignty with state power. Several important consequences and conclusions flow from the notion that the people are the sole sovereign in today’s Russia. First, let’s look at the current Constitution, which was approved in 1993 by the people via national referendum and which forms the basis of the state. The Constitution stipulates the basic political and civil rights of all Russians. Everything that prevents Russians from enjoying these rights is unconstitutional and limits the sovereign people from exercising their power. Thus, the recent version of the law on referendums contradicts the Constitution, as it makes it virtually impossible to conduct a referendum based on public initiative. The constitutionality of the latest changes to election laws seems similarly questionable, as the amendments eliminate single-mandate districts — and therefore deny individual citizens the right to participate in the Duma. They furthermore raise the amount of votes a party needs to be part of the parliament and allow officials to lower the required voter turnout and to remove the “against all” option from ballots. Along with the elimination of popular elections for regional leaders and the appointment of senators to the Federation Council, these changes indicate that the state, which does not have sovereign rights and has only been engaged by the people to rule them for a particular period of time within certain limits, is consciously and consistently pushing the true sovereign aside, away from governing via the state, which wholly belongs to the people. The policy of limiting citizens’ rights and liberties to preserve and strengthen state sovereignty — putting democracy on ice, so to speak — is also extremely questionable. If the people are the sovereign in today’s Russia, then limiting their sovereign power in the name of Russia’s sovereignty is absolutely absurd. Sovereignty is not at variance with democracy. On the contrary, sovereignty is democracy: The more democracy, the more sovereignty. When the state limits civil liberties, it is like a vassal limiting the rights of his own master. The Constitution defines this kind of action as a crime punishable by law: the usurpation of power. Understanding the true meaning of sovereignty means that the people have the inalienable right to disobey authorities who have usurped their sovereign rights. The German Constitution directly states that citizens have a right to resist in such situations. The Russian Constitution does not contain a passage of this sort, but this does not mean that the Russian people do not have the right to resist a government that is ruling them illegally. The Russian people have the right to organize protests without the authorities’ permission. Why? Because the very law that prohibits demonstrations without a permit violates our constitutional rights by making our right to peaceful assembly dependent on bureaucrats’ whims. Resisting this unjust law is therefore justified. The concept of sovereignty has been completely misinterpreted recently. The constitutional principle of the people as sovereign is being replaced by the unconstitutional notion of sovereign democracy. Any attempt to usurp the people’s sovereign power will be doomed to fail tragically. In the merciless and bitter irony of history, those who have tried to hold on to power while shouting slogans about saving Russia were not only unable to stay in power; they also drove Russia to the brink of destruction. Only the full and unambiguous expression of the people’s sovereignty via free, fair and timely elections will protect Russia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, its internal strength and liberty. Vladimir Ryzhkov is a deputy in the State Duma. He contributed this comment to Vedomosti, where it appeared in longer form. TITLE: Dodgy Statistics Give Unreal Picture of Exclave AUTHOR: By Vladimir Gryaznevich TEXT: The Kaliningrad region grew faster than any other in the Northwest region in the first half of this year, according to figures released by Ilya Klebanov, the presidential envoy to the region. The exclave grew faster than St. Petersburg, which was the fastest-growing administrative region last year, Klebanov said, but he did not describe which sectors this growth occurred in. “This high rate of growth was thanks to transshipment of oil and the high activity of agricultural enterprises,” Regnum quoted him saying. However, transshipment of oil should be classified in the transportation sector, and agriculture should be classified separately — it is not part of industry at all. The Kaliningrad regional government also has given no clear explanations. Judging by the region’s own statistics, it looks like the strong growth was caused by assembly projects — factories that assemble western appliances: cars (BMW third and fifth series, Hummer H2s, Chevrolet Tahoes and Blazers, Cadillac CTSs, STSs and offroader SRXs), televisions, vacuum cleaners, motorcycles, four-wheelers and others. Last year and at the beginning of this year several such plants were established and existing ones expanded their production. This was stimulated by the political situation connected to the expectations about a new law treating the region as a special economic zone, which was amended at the beginning of last year. According to the law, assembly plants operating before Jan. 1 2006 would be able to run for 10 years without having to pay any customs tariffs. Those commissioned after that date would no longer be entitled to customs concessions. That was the sole reason for the surge in such developments this year. When announcing the outstanding achievements of the Kaliningrad region in terms of industrial development, Klebanov presented them as if they were indicators of robust socio-economic development of the region. Like other administrative regions in the Northwest, Kaliningrad’s industrial growth rate was also significantly higher than the national average. However, Klebanov’s conclusion is wrong. When such claims are made about the Kaliningrad region they represent a gross exaggeration. Assembling parts creates very little added value. In fact, it is a hidden form of importing — 75 to 80 percent of the value of goods from Kaliningrad consists of the price of imported parts. Therefore, although the volume of industrial production grows at an impressive rate (everything that comes off the conveyor belts of such plants is statistically considered entirely the work of local industry), the size of the gross regional product changes little. But gross regional product is a more appropriate indicator of economic development than industrial output. By the way the size of gross regional product per head of population in the Kaliningrad region is less than half the national average (and 19 times less than in Hong Kong). In addition, the region continues to experience problems in investment of charter capital, and on this indicator is the last region in the Northwest. But without such investment it is impossible to count on favorable socio-economic development in the prevailing conditions. The regional government predicts high industrial production growth rates into the future, even though there are grounds to doubt this. In the near future, the growth will really slow down — on account of the commissioning of the Thermal-Electric Station-2 at the end of this year. But how will it behave in the future with indicators in sectors that are dependent on the special economic zone, to forecast at the moment is impossible. What is clear is that the new law on the special economic zone will not be passed, and it remains unclear what tax and customs regime will operate in Kaliningrad. That means unclear prospects including those of the industrial production of assembly plants — they are heavily dependent on the special economic zone regime. It has long been known that Russian statistics are “sly numbers,” mainly because the authorities don’t so much use them to describe the objective development of the country as much as for propaganda of their own achievements. Fundamentally they represent them with an image from which they can personally profit and they do not hurry to create an objective picture. It is therefore no surprise that officially Kaliningrad has still not published its GRP, not even for last year. Vladimir Gryaznevich is a political analyst with Expert Severo-Zapad magazine. His comment was first broadcast on Ekho Moskvy in St. Petersburg on Friday. TITLE: Duck Soup AUTHOR: By Chris Floyd TEXT: Now is the summer of discontent for President George W. Bush, a man beset on every side — by a failing war and falling popularity, by scandal, suspicion and rising hostility, even in the red-state heartlands. With each passing day of his long vacation in the Texas wastes, his presidency is shrinking palpably before our eyes, his wildly inflated public image shrivelling like a punctured balloon. The fountainhead of his trouble, of course, is the murderous quagmire he has created in Iraq. Some say he has no exit strategy, no way to escape the corrosive effects of this gargantuan disaster, which is draining his support and destroying the aura of the all-conquering “war leader” that he used to impose his radical right-wing agenda on the country. The tide has turned against him at last, some say; he’s a lame duck crashing to the ground. But those writing Bush’s political obituary have “misunderestimated” him once again. For it’s becoming increasingly clear that Bush does have an exit strategy from Iraq — and it runs through Iran. For months, the Bush Faction has been conducting a low-key PR campaign to put Iran in the crosshairs for a military strike. Last week, Bush himself upped the wattage with a public declaration that “all options are on the table” for slapping down Tehran, Agence France Presse reports. He even alluded to the invasion of Iraq as an example of the kind of action he has in mind. Bush scarcely bothered to hide his disdain for peaceful solutions to the row with Iran. After mouthing the usual pious lies about “working feverishly on the diplomatic route,” he immediately dismissed such efforts with a sneer: “As you know, I’m skeptical.” The chief angle of Bush’s warmongering campaign has been Iran’s nuclear energy program. Although Iran is allowed by international treaty to develop nuclear energy resources and has been proceeding under international supervision, there are concerns that Tehran might follow the example of U.S. allies such as Israel and Pakistan and use the technology to develop a secret nuclear weapons program. This has been the cue for a reprise of those “smoking gun/mushroom cloud” tropes that the Bushists used to such great fear-rousing effect in fomenting their aggression against Iraq. But the latest investigation by the International Atomic Energy Agency found that Iran is not developing a nuclear weapons program, The Independent reports. And Bush’s own intelligence services say that even if Iran did start a weapons program, it would take at least 10 years to produce a bomb — plenty of time for “feverish diplomacy” to work, you would think. So while “Iranian Nuke Threat” is still a good scare phrase for a cable news crawl, it might not be enough to sway an increasingly war-weary public to leap into another military adventure. That’s why the Bushists are throwing new tropes into the mix. In his chest-thumping bluster this month, Bush said pointedly that he would be willing to use military force to “provide the opportunity for people to live in free societies.” That’s a blank check for hitting Iran (and many other countries) any time he feels like it. But such noble gasbaggery might still prove too vague to close the deal. So now they’re waving the bloody shirt: “Iran is killing American soldiers in Iraq.” That’s the charge currently percolating through the corporate media — NBC, Time magazine, etc. — from the usual anonymous “senior officials” and the never-anonymous but always mendacious Pentagon warlord Don Rumsfeld. “It’s true that weapons clearly, unambiguously, from Iran have been found in Iraq,” he announced last week, with the same clinched-sphincter certainty he once displayed in declaring that he knew where Iraq’s WMD were hidden: “They’re in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad, and east, west, south and north somewhat.” Left unexplained is why Shiite Iran would want to help Sunni insurgents overthrow a Shiite-dominated Iraqi government led by Tehran proteges (and employees) who are busy aligning the country with, er, Tehran. That’s the kind of self-defeating stupidity one might expect from the Bush poltroons, who have spent $300 billion and almost 1,900 American lives to establish an unstable, terrorist-ridden, fundamentalist Islamic state in the center of the Middle East. But it’s unlikely that the subtle Persians, with 3,000 years of statecraft behind them, would be foolish enough to kill the golden goose that Bush has handed them by destroying Saddam and installing their allies in power. Still, a lack of sense and credibility in a casus belli has never hindered the Bush Faction before. And it won’t now. The plain fact is that Bush doesn’t want “diplomacy to work” against Iran. He wants the situation to reach a crisis point that will “justify” military action. It’s the only form of politics he knows: You foment (or invent) a crisis, then use deceit, fear and brute force to impose your radical agenda. And the takedown of Iran is a long-held ambition of the corporate militarists behind the Bush Faction’s relentless quest for “full spectrum dominance” over world affairs. The “high” Bush got from his Iraq assault is now wearing off, politically and personally. He needs another hit of blood and destruction. And don’t think he’s worried about the prospect of a much wider conflagration arising from a bombing strike against Iran. After all, chaos and instability only mean more money for his war-profiteering family and cronies — and greater authority for “war leaders” seeking to “secure the Homeland.” More war is the only way for the Bush Faction to maintain its power and keep advancing its rapacious agenda. So there will be more war. For annotational references, see Opinion at www.sptimesrussia.com TITLE: Ancient India’s Yoga Gaining Appeal in Russia as Relief From the Rat Race AUTHOR: By Olga Kalashnikova PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Madonna, Barbra Streisand, David Duchovny, Uma Thurman, Sting, Keanu Reeves, Ricky Martin ... What joins this group of very different people? It’s a wish to find themselves, to achieve a happy, balanced and useful life, to improve their health, to join body with mind and mind with soul. One word, yoga, means all these things. It is derived from the Sanskrit word Yuj (to join and unite). This ancient Indian teaching has spread from the subcontinent to the United States and Europe and has now arrived in Russia. “In the West, yoga appeared earlier, 30 years earlier,” says Tatyana Menshikova, manager of St. Petersburg’s Iyengar Yoga Center. “I think foreigners pay more attention to their health. Russia was closed from everything for a long time, so it is only now that it has come here.” Yoga schools and centers offering different programs are sprouting up around Russia as the trend becomes fashionable. More and more people are trying it. People who want to practice yoga should carefully choose a school that is suitable, convenient and at the right price and location. But before joining a yoga center, one should understand what it is and what the reasons are for it. According to legend, knowledge of yoga was first passed by the god Shiva to his wife Parvati and from there on to mankind. The varied philosophies and methodologies of yoga were defined and classified by the sage Patanjali in his set of 196 aphorisms called “The Yoga Sutras,” written about 2,200 years ago. The sutras bring together all the various strands of theory and practice from all sources of yoga and present them in one integrated and comprehensive text. Different schools define yoga differently so it’s rather difficult to give a definition of what exactly it is. “Yoga is the condition of consciousness. It’s the bridle, the control of your mind, feelings and emotions,” said a teacher at the city’s Astanga yoga center who declined to be named. “Yoga is a science and an art of improving the personality, based on the knowledge of anatomy and physiology of the person, “Menshikova said. “Yoga is the world of new impressions,” said Natalia Kichayeva, the hatha yoga instructor at Planet Fitness. The main aim of yoga is to reach harmony and freedom. “The aim is spiritual development, but if a person doesn’t feel his body, they can’t develop themselves. If they have health problems, they can’t achieve inner harmony,” Menshikova said. All yoga centers have the same goal, but they present many different paths. Various schools of yoga were established by renowned teachers and reflect their methods, explanations about yoga, and ways of teaching. The most famous and popular schools today are Iyengar, Astanga and Vini Yoga. There are some general principles in yoga. The long road to higher spiritual development usually starts with Yama and Niyama. These are universal ethical principles. Yama includes non-violence, truthfulness, not stealing, and sexual restraint; Niyama is purity, contentment, intense dedication, study of self and scriptures and self-surrender. “Everyone decides for himself if he follows Yama and Niyama or not. We can’t say, ‘you must do it.’ But when people don’t pay attention to it, there can be some accidents. For example, a person creates an asana and then has some health problems,” said the teacher at the Astanga Yoga Center. The next step is Asana – the postures, then comes Pranayama — breath control, Pratyahara — withdrawal and control of the senses, Dharana — concentration, Dhyana — meditation and Samadhi — a state of higher consciousness where the sense of self dissolves in the object of meditation and the individual self exists in its own pure nature. But yoga centers usually try just the first steps: Yama, Niyama and Pranayama. The more advanced steps are too difficult for common people. “Through the asanas the person understands the moral moments, so after doing yoga the wish to do something bad disappears. A person feels inner harmony,” Menshikova said. The Iyengar method is considered to be classical yoga, and is based on the study of asanas and pranayama. A feature distinguishing this center is the strict sequence of asanas. Each one is always followed by another in a systematic way. “Before a girl becomes a ballerina, she has to learn how to walk, she takes her first steps,” Menshikova said. “The same is true of yoga. When someone comes to our center, they start with basic, easy elements. Sometimes people want to come and do a difficult asana at the first lesson. That’s impossible. “A very important precept in yoga is to do no harm,” she added. “And such haste can’t be good for one’s health. We make great demands on the quality of teaching. Our teachers don’t teach how difficult postures can be assumed. A person has be readied for them.” At the Iyengar center, teachers never do the asana at the same time as the pupils. “When the teacher sits in asana, he can’t look after the pupils, can’t see if something is wrong. It’s important to teach the pupil correct technique, if it’s wrong, health problems can occur,” Menshikova said. “And if the teacher does the asana, the pupils try to follow him, look at him and get it wrong.” Everybody can do yoga regardless of their health, however some may require special programs, she added. Her center has special classes for people who have problems with health and for pregnant or menstruating women. At advanced levels, the center uses mantras, or incantations. These combine certain sounds that are said to be imbued with energy. Another yoga school is Astanga yoga. Astanga means 8 steps, or levels of self-control. “Our first lessons are usually so-called ‘yogatherapy,’” said the Astanga yoga center teacher. “This improves health and immunity. It teaches how not to identify body with sensations.” “Sometimes we just know that we’re tired after work, that we feel pain but when we do yoga we make our mind overcome it. “It’s difficult at first,” she added. “But once you see that your back is straight, other people notice it, you feel fine. You feel joy. Your health is fine. You like the world around you. “It’s like the feeling of love, happiness, joy. You don’t worry about stupid things,” the teacher said. Yoga helps to achieve inner harmony. But to achieve that, just doing asanas is not enough. Astanga yoga teaches that harmony is achieved through the combination of different elements, including meals. What those elements should be depends on the individual features, but yoga should help people to listen to their organism and sense what they need. Another element is cleaning procedures, and bathing the nose in salt water. All this helps to be healthier. “Not to do something is like missing out some notes from a melody. But, of course, you should be careful not to do harm.” Iyengar yoga is more guarded in relation to cleaning procedures. “You can’t do it regularly because you wash the life energy from your body. It’s dangerous, you lose life energy,” Menshikova said. Yoga does not have to be practiced at a center, one can also do it at home and those who attend classes may want to do some at home as well. “You can do yoga just at home, but you can’t see yourself from the outside,” Menshikova said. “There are a lot of techniques that can’t be described in books, and you can harm your health. It’s useful to do yoga in the class and in addition to do it 2-3 times a week at home. We have special programs where it is written when and what asana to do.” Yoga attracts people of all ages, but most practitioners in St. Petersburg are young. You can even find children aged as young as five among pupils. Yoga is presented to them in a playful manner. There is also no upper age limit and one is never too old to learn yoga. Yoga centers are not the only place where you can do yoga. Now many fitness centers have special yoga classes. “Yoga has recently appeared in its program and it is very fashionable,” said Alina Kiselyova, manager at Planeta Fitness. “Yoga here is almost the same as in the yoga centers,” she said. “At the yoga centers the whole timetable is devoted to yoga while fitness clubs combine these classes with other activities.” Fitness centers usually teach hatha yoga, Iyengar yoga, and astanga viniyansa yoga. Here everyone can do yoga, the main thing is to get a good start and experienced instructors. “The teachers at Planeta Fitness are people who have devoted more than five years of their lives to yoga,” Kiselyova said. “Almost all the yoga teachers organize seminars and are well-known in the city.” Planeta Fitness yoga classes are divided into several levels, according to experience. “It’s difficult in the beginning. It seems impossible to do a simple posture, just to sit with a straight back is an awful trial,” said Natalya Kichayeva, a hatha yoga instructor at Planet Fitness. “But with practice, a lightness appears in your body, pain goes away, your mind becomes calm and conscious – more pure. You study to breathe and relax. Your attitude to the world changes, it is easier to live.” All exercises in hatha yoga are aimed at improving health, cleaning organs and their recovery, and the improvement of joints and the spine. “The wrong meal, sedentary life, nerves — all this is accumulated in our body. It’s easy to decide to have a good meal, but it’s very difficult to do,” Kichayeva said. “Yoga helps to overcome this process, because with training your body begins to feel what meals to eat.” Although the goal of fitness centers — all-round health — is the same as yoga, many yoga purists frown at fitness centers that emphasize glamour and accompany aerobic exercise with loud music. Nevertheless, many teachers from yoga centers work in fitness centers. The key is not where one does yoga, but that an experienced and qualified teacher will never ask you to do a difficult asana without paying attention to your idiosyncracies. In any other circumstances, yoga becomes dangerous. Prices for yoga classes vary from 150 rubles ($5) per 2-hour lesson to 900 rubles ($30) per hour. For foreigners the rate is usually higher. Some centers have special foreign groups with an English-speaking teacher. It’s also possible to have an individual teacher, but at a premium. Regardless of where they practice yoga, practitioners’ reasons are all rather similar. It’s in fashion, they say, it improves your health, you become united and balanced, get rid of stress, it helps to keep fit. That’s why it’s so popular among young women. Many come to yoga just to find out what it is. “I’ve never practiced yoga. But I’d like to try it,” said Yekaterina Sivitskaya, 18, a student. “I heard positive opinions about it, celebrities do it, Madonna, for example. I think it is worth trying.” TITLE: Putin Satirist to Join Pavlovsky on TV AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: MOSCOW — An upcoming political show on NTV will be hosted by Kremlin-connected spin doctor Gleb Pavlovsky and feature satirist Maxim Kononenko, whose popular spoofs about President Vladimir Putin are on the web site www.vladimir.vladimirovich.ru, the television channel said Thursday. NTV spokeswoman Maria Bezborodova said that Pavlovsky would “play the main role” on the show, which has the working title of “Big Politics” and is scheduled to begin airing in late September, and that Kononenko would be a contributor. “Yes, there will be a columnist under the pseudonym of Mr. Parker,” Bezborodova said by telephone, in answer to a question about whether Kononenko, who publishes his online spoofs as Mr. Parker, would be on the show. “As well as Mr. Parker, there will be other columnists.” Neither Pavlovsky, who has recently denied speculation that he would host a show for NTV, nor Kononenko were immediately available for comment Thursday. In the imaginary world of Vladimir Vladimirovich, the lighthearted vignettes portray Putin as an almost childlike innocent who sometimes has trouble understanding the affairs of state and seems unaware of how he ended up in the Kremlin. Excerpts from the spoofs have also been regularly featured on Ekho Moskvy radio, as well as in newspapers Gazeta and The Moscow Times. Pavlovsky’s show, which will run weekly on either Saturday or Sunday, will be “a journal of stories summing up the week from the point of view of a spin doctor,” Bezborodova said. She declined to give further details, saying NTV would say more about the project at the end of August. Pavlovsky is a longtime Kremlin ally who was involved in helping Moscow’s favored candidate in last year’s Ukrainian presidential elections, Viktor Yanukovych, build his campaign. Natalya Timakova, deputy head of the Kremlin press service, declined to comment on NTV’s program when contacted through her secretary Thursday. Manana Aslamazyan, director of Internews Russia, a media freedom watchdog, said television was in need of independent analytical programs, but questioned the choice of Pavlovsky as host. “I don’t think that the host of such a program should be a spin doctor, a person who has certain views that he doesn’t hide,” she said. “It would lack impartiality.” Mikhail Fedotov, a former press minister and a senior member of the Russian Union of Journalists, also predicted that the program would have a slant. “It will not be an independent review of political events, but a dissection ... from a strictly defined angle,” he said. “Very inconspicuously, you will be encouraged to love the authorities and hate anyone in opposition.” Yury Korgunyuk, head of the Indem think tank, said NTV executives might be hoping that Kononenko could help balance out the show. “They want to combine two opposites,” Korgunyuk said. “They want the channel to remain toothless and loyal to the authorities, yet enjoy respect at the same time. I don’t believe that will work.” Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Radio Liberty talk show host who worked at NTV before it was taken over by state-controlled Gazprom-Media in 2000, said Kononenko could attract a young, liberal audience to the show. Kara-Murza added, however, that he was surprised that some of the characters that appeared in Kononenko’s columns, such as influential Kremlin aide Vladislav Surkov and State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov, had not blocked the show. “I don’t understand how the prototypes agreed to that,” he said of the people parodied in the spoofs. Korgunyuk said that Kononenko was not too much of an irritant for the Kremlin, and that his stories had grown kinder toward Putin. “They all appear to be pretty gentle humor,” he said. Yevgeny Kiselyov, who hosted NTV’s “Itogi” weekly news analysis show under the channel’s former owner, Vladimir Gusinsky, went further, saying that many Kononenko columns showed Putin in a positive light. “In most of the stories, Putin looks the smartest, the hippest and the coolest,” Kiselyov said. Kononenko had displayed “out-and-out, blatant anti-Western views” in his web log on www.livejournal.com, Kiselyov added. TITLE: Nemtsov and Gorbachev Tune In to Past AUTHOR: By Kevin O’Flynn PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: MOSCOW — Boris Nemtsov watches to recall a time when state television had more freedom. Mikhail Gorbachev watches to see what he missed during his busy years as president. Vladimir Ananich and scores of others just watch to relive their youth. Ananich is the brains behind Nostalgia, one of two hugely successful cable television channels that offer viewers a trip back to the Brezhnev and Gorbachev eras with a lineup of classic Soviet television programs. The other channel is Retro TV. Viewers wake up to perform morning exercises along with the same trainers who put the nation through their paces 30 years ago, listen to the weather from the same date three decades ago and watch news from when the Soviet Union was a superpower. With critics accusing present-day Russian television of turning Soviet with a pro-Kremlin news slant, perhaps the last thing anyone needs are channels that recycle old shows. But some viewers say that Nostalgia and Retro TV, which have been launched over the past 12 months, are the freest and most dissident channels now on the air. Broadcasting executives insist that there is no political motivation behind the channels and that they are simply reliving the past. “There is no ideological relationship, it is simply nostalgia. We just do it for ourselves,” said Irina Zenkova, the general director of Nostalgia, whose logo is a hodge-podge of Russian and English letters with a hammer and sickle serving as the letter “G.” Ananich, who thought up the concept of Nostalgia and acts as its general producer, said the channel was an indulgence of his youth, a remembrance of things broadcast and not broadcast. “It is my youth,” said the now-balding 46-year-old, who was a hippie in the 1970s. In addition to old shows, the channel also has plenty of time devoted to the favored Western bands of his youth that would never have been allowed on Soviet television. Ananich is now trying to secure the rights to broadcast footage of The Doors on the channel. Nostalgia aside, viewers tune in with the added knowledge of what is not being said, Ananich said. “We look at history with new eyes,” he said. “You watch it with the subtext ... and understand what was happening.” Nostalgia is one of the top four channels on NTV Plus cable television, while Retro TV says it reaches more than 2 million viewers. Much of the channels’ programming is limited to reruns from the 1980s and early 1990s because few shows from before that were preserved or are in a good enough condition to broadcast. Some programs are strikingly similar to what is shown today on state television: concerts featuring pop diva Alla Pugachyova — although she appears much younger and thinner — and news that is cloyingly pro-government and anti-American. One of the most popular programs on Nostalgia is “Born in the U.S.S.R.,” a chat show in which the host interviews Soviet stars, celebrities and politicians who have often been out of public view for years. Call-ins to the show come from all over the former Soviet Union, Europe and the United States. Many viewers from the United States complain that the channel is trying to return to the Soviet Union. “We are not returning to that country, we are returning to that atmosphere,” Ananich said, adding that the present day is a tougher, crueler reality than back then. Ananich is proud of the variety of guests that they have on the program. “One day we have an adviser to Brezhnev, and the next a dissident,” he said. Nemtsov, the liberal politician and former leader of the Union of Right Forces party, is not a figure usually associated with a desire to return to the Soviet Union, but he also has appeared as a guest. He came upon the channel by chance when he noticed that there was a call-in taking place on “Born in the U.S.S.R.” “Live programs are a rarity in Putin’s Russia,” he said pointedly in a telephone interview. Nemtsov was immediately put through live. “When they heard my voice, they started to laugh. They thought it was a joke,” he said. The producers then cut him off. Later they rang him up to double check and, realizing their mistake, invited him on. Nemtsov called the concept of the channel “boring and uninteresting” but said he enjoyed his appearance on the chat show. “It’s a very comfortable place, [with] straight questions. It smells of perestroika,” he said. “I wouldn’t say it is nostalgia for the U.S.S.R. but nostalgia for freedom of speech.” Gorbachev, who Ananich said was a regular viewer, has more reason to feel nostalgic. “He didn’t have any time to watch television then,” Ananich said. He said Gorbachev enjoyed watching comedic impressions of him from the 1980s. “They were gentler then, not mean like now.” TITLE: Saddam Pens Plea For Martyrdom AUTHOR: By Jamal Halaby PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: AMMAN, Jordan — Ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein said in a letter that he would sacrifice himself for the Arab cause, seeking to cast himself as a martyr ahead of his trial this fall and possible execution for the massacre of fellow Muslims. The letter was received by a Jordanian friend through the International Committee of the Red Cross, which verified its authenticity and said it had been censored by Saddam’s American captors in Iraq. “My soul and my existence is to be sacrificed for our precious Palestine and our beloved, patient and suffering Iraq,” said the letter, which was published in two Jordanian newspapers Sunday and made available to The Associated Press. The letter appeared to include Saddam’s musings on his mortality. “Life is meaningless without the considerations of faith, love and inherited history in our nation,” the letter said. Iraqi authorities are preparing about a dozen cases against Saddam and his former lieutenants but have completed the preliminary investigation of only one — the 1982 massacre of Shiite townspeople in Dujail, north of Baghdad, after an assassination attempt against the Iraqi leader. That case is expected to go to trial in the fall, although no date has been set. Government spokesman Laith Kuba, however, said in an interview with CNN on Sunday that the first trial might start within six weeks. Saddam and his co-defendants could face the death penalty if convicted. Others indicted in the Dujail massacre are Barazan Ibrahim, intelligence chief at the time and Saddam’s half brother; former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan; and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, at the time a Baath party official in Dujail. The Jordanian Arab Baath Socialist Party, which made the letter public, said its recipient refused to be identified. It was believed to have been the first letter since Saddam was captured in December 2003 sent to someone other than a family member. Rana Sidani, a spokeswoman for the ICRC’s Iraq delegation in Amman, said “The ICRC has confirmed the authenticity of the message published in the Jordanian media.” “It was censored by the detaining authorities before being handed over to the ICRC for distribution, The letter’s defiant tone, flowery Arabic and support for Palestine were similar to old speeches by the ousted Iraqi leader. A friend of Saddam’s family, speaking on condition of anonymity because she did not want to strain her relations with them, said the “handwriting is 100 percent Saddam’s.” Saddam’s two daughters, Raghad and Rana, have lived in Amman since fleeing the U.S. invasion two years ago. The ICRC’s Sidani said Saddam and other such political detainees to whom the ICRC has access are normally allowed to write letters only to family members and loved ones and in exceptional cases to friends. She said the Red Cross messages are not meant for publication. Party Secretary General Tayseer Homsi said the letter’s recipient was not a party member but an “independent Jordanian political figure who wished to remain anonymous.” He handed the letter over two days ago, Homsi said. “He’s an old friend of Saddam, he’s not a member of our party nor is he a party functionary,” Homsi added. Also Sunday, the Iraqi government said neighboring Jordan has allowed Saddam’s family to fund a network seeking to destabilize Iraq and re-establish the banned Baath Party. TITLE: Pope Urges Youth Against ‘DIY’ Faith AUTHOR: By Michael Paulson TEXT: COLOGNE — Pope Benedict XVI, wrapping up his first foreign trip, celebrated Mass Sunday for an estimated 1 million people on a field in his native Germany, quieting questions about whether the cerebral conservative could rally the young people who in the past had flocked to see the more instinctively charismatic Pope John Paul II. The vast crowd, including as many as 700,000 who had slept outdoors in a chilly overnight vigil punctuated by candlelight and singing, gave the new pope an enthusiastic welcome even though a combination of security concerns and Benedict’s reserved personality meant the altar was removed from much of the crowd and the popemobile traveled along the perimeter, so that the best view for many was on large television screens. In his homily at the concluding Mass, Benedict stuck largely to theological themes, urging the young people to go to Mass and confession; to be forgiving, sensitive, and sharing; to reach out to the elderly and those who are suffering; and to spread the Catholic faith to others. He also urged them to form communities of faith, giving a nod to the surge in recent years of international lay Catholic religious movements that have energized some segments of the church. But Benedict also offered a critique of more general societal trends in religion, in which many people pick and choose a combination of rituals and beliefs that please them. ‘’There is a kind of new explosion of religion,” Benedict said. ‘’I have no wish to discredit all the manifestations of this phenomenon. There may be sincere joy in the discovery. Yet if it is pushed too far, religion becomes almost a consumer product. People choose what they like, and some are even able to make a profit from it.” Benedict, 78, went on to exhort the young people to become ‘’true worshippers of God.” ‘’Religion constructed on a ‘do-it-yourself’ basis cannot ultimately help us,” he said. ‘’It may be comfortable, but at times of crisis we are left to ourselves. Help people to discover the true star which points out the way to us: Jesus Christ!” The Mass marked an end to a four-day visit to Cologne by Benedict, a former theology professor and bishop in Germany who served as the Vatican’s controversial defender of doctrine before being elected pope in April upon the death of John Paul II. TITLE: Police Chief Backs Shoot-to-Kill Policy AUTHOR: By Mara D. Bellaby PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: LONDON — London’s police chief said he wants to ensure Britain’s anti-terror investigators are not affected by criticism about the killing of an innocent man, telling a Sunday newspaper their most important task is to prevent further attacks. London’s police have been fiercely criticized after armed officers shot and killed Jean Charles de Menezes, a 27-year-old Brazilian wrongly suspected of being a suicide bomber. Menezes was shot seven times in the head July 22 by police who tailed him to a subway station the day after four bombs were carried onto London’s transit system but failed to detonate fully. Those attacks came two weeks after four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters on the London Underground and a double-decker bus. “We have to concentrate on how we find the people who are helping or thinking about planning further atrocities,” Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair told Sunday’s News of the World. Blair told the newspaper he is making “sure anti-terror investigators are not affected” by the criticism. “I have told them ‘This is not your problem,’” Blair was quoted as saying. “For myself, it’s a job I have to do. And I am not going to be distracted from the main job, which is finding the terrorists.” Blair said he did not know the Brazilian was not connected to the attempted bombings until 24 hours after he was shot. A spokeswoman for the Metropolitan Police confirmed Sunday that the tabloid’s interview with Blair was accurate. “Somebody came in at 10:30 (Saturday) and said the equivalent of ‘Houston we have a problem,’” Blair was quoted as saying. “He didn’t use those words but he said: ‘We have some difficulty here, there is a lack of connection,’” Blair said. “I thought, ‘That’s dreadful. What are we going to do about that?’” The Metropolitan Police said Saturday it reviewed the use of deadly force against suspected terrorists following Menezes’ killing and made some minor changes. A police spokeswoman declined to discuss details of the changes in Operation Kratos, the force’s name for what British media call a “shoot-to-kill” policy. Meanwhile, Britain also reportedly reduced the official level of threat for the first time since the July 7 bombing. The Sunday Telegraph reported that intelligence officials had reduced the threat level from the highest rating of “critical” down to “severe general” because there was no specific intelligence of an imminent repeat of attacks. But Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott told the British Broadcasting Corp. on Sunday that there remained “a serious threat ... all the time.” “We are in a state of high alert, which we need to be,” he said. Blair has said he will not resign over Menezes’ killing, which he called “tragic and appalling” and said the police have taken full responsibility for. Britain’s top security official, Home Secretary Charles Clarke, who is responsible for policing, said Saturday he had full confidence in Blair. Blair has denied there was any police cover-up or attempt to block the Independent Police Complaints Commission’s investigation now under way. TITLE: Castro, Chavez Unite Against U.S. Criticism AUTHOR: By Vanessa Arrington PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: HAVANA — Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez criticized the United States for recent remarks about his role in Latin America, saying in a Sunday broadcast from Cuba that it is the policies of the U.S. government that are harming the world, not his own. Chavez spoke alongside Cuban President Fidel Castro during his weekly television and radio show from the western tip of the island, flaunting the close ties between the two leftist leaders that U.S. leaders say are threatening democracy in the region. “The grand destroyer of the world, and the greatest threat ... is represented by U.S. imperialism,” Chavez said. Chavez was responding to remarks Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld made on his way home from visits to Paraguay and Peru last week. Referring to uprisings in Bolivia that have pushed out two presidents in less than two years, Rumsfeld told reporters that Venezuela and Cuba have been influencing the Andean nation “in unhelpful ways.” Uneasy about the close relationship between Castro and Chavez, Rumsfeld and other U.S. officials have repeatedly said the two men are fomenting instability in Latin America. Both leaders have consistently denied the accusations. Chavez gave a new vote of confidence to Castro’s communist government Sunday, calling it a “revolutionary democracy” in which the Cuban people rule. People “have asked me how I can support Fidel if he’s a dictator,” Chavez said. “But Cuba doesn’t have a dictatorship — it’s a revolutionary democracy.” Television footage showed Chavez and Castro together in the streets of Pinar del Rio earlier in the day, standing on the back of a jeep wearing olive green military uniforms and saluting hundreds of shouting residents waving Cuban and Venezuelan flags. During the nearly six-hour show, Castro and Chavez talked mainly about their joint social ventures, particularly in the health sector. Cuba has sent a fifth of its doctors to work in poor communities in Venezuela, in gratitude for massive shipments of Venezuelan oil under preferential terms. The leaders praised each other throughout the show and took phone calls and messages from supporters in both countries. They also received praise from the audience, which included Castro’s Cabinet members, the ex-Salvadoran guerrilla leader Shafick Handal and former Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega. TITLE: Report: Iraqi Factions Agree On Constitution AUTHOR: By Slobodan Lekic PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: BAGHDAD, Iraq — Hours before a midnight deadline, Shiites and Kurds reached an agreement Monday on a draft constitution and were trying to persuade Sunni Arabs to go along with their compromises, officials said. Negotiators met for about three hours Monday morning and convened again shortly after 4 p.m. at the home of Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani in the Green Zone for talks Kurdish lawmaker Mahmoud Othman said would “be decisive.” He said there was some progress in the earlier session. A senior government official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject, said an agreement had been reached between the Shiites and the Kurds in the morning. Those groups were now trying to sell the deal to the Sunni Arabs in the afternoon session. A Shiite television station quoted Vice President Adil Abdul-Mahdi as saying “major breakthroughs” had been made and that the draft would be submitted to parliament Monday. Issues holding up agreement were believed to include federalism, the distribution of Iraq’s oil wealth, power-sharing questions among the provinces and the role of the Shiite clerical hierarchy. It was unclear how those issues might have been resolved between Shiites and Kurds. An initial Aug. 15 deadline was pushed back a week after no agreement was reached. Iraqi officials have insisted they would meet this second deadline and present a final document to the National Assembly, dominated by Shiites and Kurds. Negotiators for all three communities — Shiites, Kurds and minority Sunni Arabs — met in Baghdad's fortified Green Zone for a new round of talks Monday. Shiite politician Khaled al-Attiyah said the political leaders “have tentatively agreed that the National Assembly would meet” Monday evening. Parliament will either receive the draft of the new charter or vote on setting a new deadline. If it doesn’t agree on either, the legislature will have to dissolve. Earlier, a Kurdish member of the drafting committee, Abdul-Khaleq Zangana, had said there were problems with “the role of religion and women's rights.” He would not elaborate but predicted “either an extension — and this is not good — or parliament dissolves — and this is difficult.” Also before the end of the morning session, Shiite lawmaker Bahaa al-Araji accused the Kurds and secular allies of former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi of trying to “curb the political process” to bring down the government and force new elections. “If an agreement is not reached, we will hand a draft and win slight majority in a vote and this is our right,” al-Araji said. Sunni Arab negotiators had complained of being sidelined in the final week of talks and that Shiites and Kurds were cutting deals excluding them. TITLE: Israel Completes Gaza Pullout AUTHOR: By Dean Yates PUBLISHER: Reuters TEXT: NETZARIM, Gaza Strip — Israeli troops marched unopposed into the Gaza Strip’s last Jewish settlement of Netzarim on Monday to complete the evacuation of the territory after nearly four decades of occupation. But in the West Bank, radicals opposed to ceding settlements on any land that Palestinians seek for a state dug in for a last stand at two enclaves that are also due to be removed under Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s pullout plan. There was no sign in Netzarim of the noisy protests or burning barricades that greeted the evacuation of some of the other 20 settlements in Gaza last week. Residents agreed to go quietly after a mass prayer with the soldiers. Even before troops arrived, the seven-branched menorah was lifted carefully down from the roof of Netzarim’s synagogue. “I wanted to say good-bye with honor,” said settler David Farash. “I wanted to be with my family here. the heart breaks and there are no words.” The religious farming community, one of the first settlements established in Gaza after the 1967 war, had been a frequent target for militants. Palestinians particularly resented Netzarim because it cut the strip in two. Despite the scenes of settlers being dragged weeping from homes and protesters carried screaming from synagogues, evacuations of the 8,500 Gaza settlers have gone more than twice as fast as planned. But more clashes are expected at Sanur and Homesh, two West Bank settlements due to be removed Tuesday. Pullout opponents hope to make those withdrawals so traumatic it will be much harder to ever consider giving up more settlements in the West Bank - to which Israelis see a much stronger biblical claim than to tiny Gaza. Thanking evacuation squads Sunday, Sharon stressed there would be no further unilateral withdrawals from the West Bank, where Israel aims to keep major settlements, the biggest of which house tens of thousands. “There will be building in the settlement blocs,” he said, quoted by the Jerusalem Post newspaper. “I will build.” Sharon says further withdrawals will only come through talks with the Palestinians, which in turn depend on militants being disarmed under a U.S.-backed “road map.” Israel has failed to meet its own commitment to freeze settlement building under that plan. The World Court says Jewish settlements are illegal under international law. Israel disputes this. Netzarim residents will move to temporary homes at a college campus in a West Bank settlement. Israeli forces finished emptying the main Gaza bloc of Gush Katif on Sunday. Bulldozers set about razing the red-roofed homes and neat lawns under a deal with the Palestinians, eyeing the space to house some of Gaza’s densely packed population. A full handover may not happen before October. Palestinians are glad to see the back of the Gaza settlers and 500 more in the West Bank. But they fear Israel aims to keep forever most other West Bank settlements housing 230,000 people. Some 3.8 million Palestinians live in the West Bank and Gaza. U.S.-led mediators see the move as a catalyst for reviving a Middle East peace process frozen since 2000. Israeli rightists say the pullout is a victory for Palestinian militants, a view echoed by the gunmen. TITLE: Jaruzelski Offers Apologies PUBLISHER: Reuters TEXT: PRAGUE — Former Polish President General Wojciech Jaruzelski on Sunday apologised for the first time for ordering Polish troops to take part in the Moscow-led crackdown on the Prague Spring socialist reform movement in 1968. Speaking to Czech state television on the 37th anniversary of the crackdown, Jaruzelski, Polish defence minister at the time, said the invasion of another Warsaw Pact nation was “very painful for me”. “But, in 1968, I was the defence minister implementing a political decision, convinced that there were grounds for that on the basis of the information available to us then. Today, and naturally much earlier, I realised this decision had been incorrect, wrong, shameful. As I took part in implementing it, I am now offering my sincere apologies.” Soviet troops and soldiers from four communist bloc countries stormed into Czechoslovakia on August 21, 1968, to halt a liberalisation movement led by Czech Communist party chief Alexander Dubcek, fearing they might provoke a wider pro-democracy push. Eighty people were killed. After the invasion, the Soviet Union helped install a hardline leadership which dismissed reformers from the party and some jobs, and suppressed human rights and opposition movements. The Soviet army occupied Czechoslovakia until 1991, two years after the Velvet Revolution peacefully overthrew communism. TITLE: At ‘Gonzo’ Writer Thompson’s Funeral, His Ashes Get High TEXT: AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE DENVER, Colorado — U.S. writer Hunter S. Thompson got the send-off he wanted when his cremated ashes were shot into the sky at his Colorado home amid fireworks and cheers in a ceremony befitting his over-the-top journalistic career. The “gonzo journalist” and gun lover had been in failing health and shot himself to death on Feb. 20 at his home near Aspen, Colorado, the posh ski resort dotted with multi-million dollar homes. The ceremony was a private affair, but television pictures showed a tower - about as tall as the Statue of Liberty topped by a clenched fist with two thumbs — and fireworks as the writer’s ashes were scattered about a hundred meters up into the air. Nobody knew exactly why he wanted such a strange send-off, but odd behavior was nothing strange for a writer best known for “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” a novel about a drug-hazed automobile trip through the American Southwest. The book was made into a movie in 1998 starring Johnny Depp, who became a close friend of Thompson’s and who funded construction of the tower. Depp, other celebrities and about 300 other close friends and family were expected to attend the ceremony. Thompson said in a 1978 BBC documentary that he wanted the cannon send-off, prompting family and friends to start planning the event soon after he died. The Kentucky-born Thompson created “gonzo” journalism — a form of story telling where the author is part of the story — in the 1970s. TITLE: IN BRIEF TEXT: Senator Questions War WASHINGTON (AP) — A leading Republican senator and prospective presidential candidate said Sunday that the war in Iraq has destabilized the Middle East and is looking more like the Vietnam conflict from a generation ago. Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel, who received two Purple Hearts and other military honors for his service in Vietnam, reiterated his position that the United States needs to develop a strategy to leave Iraq. Hagel scoffed at the idea that U.S. troops could be in Iraq four years from now at levels above 100,000, a contingency for which the Pentagon is preparing. Thai Ward Off Evil BANGKOK (Reuters) — With Asian tourists still shunning its southern beaches, Thailand is calling in a revered Chinese sea goddess to ward off the restive spirits of the thousands who died in last December’s tsunami. A statue of Godmother Ruby, known as Mazu in Chinese, will be brought to the Thai island of Phuket from the Chinese coastal province of Fujian next month for ghost-clearing rites, said Suwalai Pinpradab of the Tourism Authority of Thailand. “After the tsunami, Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Chinese and other East Asians dare not come because they don’t want to visit places where mass deaths took place,” Suwalai told Reuters on Friday. “It is inauspicious.” Mazu, a Taoist goddess of the sea, has a huge following among fishermen and shipworkers in coastal provinces of southern China and Taiwan. Shuttle Hitches a Ride MIAMI (AFP) — The U.S. space shuttle Discovery returned to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida aboard a specially modified Boeing 747 jet. Television news footage showed the Boeing 747, with the shuttle on top, landing in Florida on a runway at the sprawling National Aeronautics and Space Administration facility. “This is a welcome sight for (NASA) employees,” a NASA spokesman said Sunday, adding “Discovery is back at the Kennedy Space Center.” The shuttle’s return to its homebase had been delayed Saturday due to bad weather. Afghan Rebels Killed KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Hundreds of U.S. Marines and Afghan forces killed more than 40 suspected militants in the past week in an operation against insurgents who had inflicted the deadliest blow on American forces since the Taliban regime was ousted nearly four years ago, a military spokesman said. The operation, which concluded over the weekend, was aimed at rebels believed responsible for twin attacks, including the downing of a helicopter, that killed 19 U.S. troops in late June. Lustful Bird Threat n LONDON (Reuters) — Europe’s rarest songbird is facing extinction, despite being the most promiscuous and energetic lover in the avian world, and concerned scientists are looking urgently for ways to save it. The male aquatic warbler is described as “continuously ready to mate” and able to indulge in record-breaking mating sessions, which in turn gives the females ample opportunity to sample and select the best mates. However, numbers have slumped to less than 20,000 in the past century — a decline of 95 percent — and its range has shrunk from continent-wide to isolated strongholds in eastern Europe as humans have ravaged its habitat. Alligator On the Loose LOS ANGELES (Reuters) — More than a week after a man-sized alligator stunned authorities by surfacing in a murky Los Angeles lake, the fugitive reptile has already become a folk hero in the gritty neighborhood where he continues to outwit wranglers and elude capture. Dozens of residents gathered on the shore of Lake Machado on Thursday, sitting in lawn chairs or scanning the water with binoculars as park rangers with nets waited for the 7-foot (2 meter) alligator to rise out of the muck. “We’re pretty confident we’ll be able to catch him,” park ranger Albert Jedinak said as he stared at the calm surface of the lake.