SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1288 (54), Friday, July 13, 2007
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TITLE: Governor Sets Sights On Hosting Olympics
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Inspired by the success of the southern Russian city of Sochi, which has  won the right to host the 2014 Winter Olympic Games, Governor Valentina Matviyenko has announced that St. Petersburg will put itself forward as a candidate city for the 2020 Summer Olympics.
Speaking at the Ekho Moskvy radio station, Matviyenko revealed the city had intended to participate in the run for the 2016 Olympics but Sochi’s victory put an end to the ambitious plan.
"I am not disappointed for St. Petersburg," Matviyenko said. “It is not only Sochi that is going to benefit from the Olympics. Sochi’s victory is set to give an enormous boost to sport in the country. It will also make sport fashionable and prestigious, which is an especially important factor in getting young people interested.”
“Of course, St. Petersburg would not stand a chance as a possible host of the 2016 Summer Games because there is a rotation principle in the selection process, but we will certainly prepare a bid for the 2020 Games,” she added. 
St. Petersburg had previously applied to host the 2004 Summer Games but the International Olympic Committee (IOC) turned down the bid before it reached the final vote. Those games were eventually held in Athens, Greece.
Unlike Sochi, a popular summer resort, where facilities for winter sports will have to be built from scratch in nearby mountains, St. Petersburg already boasts a number of sports complexes and arenas.
The city has hosted top-flight winter sports competitions, including the Ice Hockey World Championship in 2000. Every year, the city’s Ice Palace plays host to the Cup of Russia figure skating competition — or ISU Grand Prix Cup of Russia — an event in the ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating series, also known as the Champions Series.
A modern, brand-new training center for winter sports is being built in the Leningrad oblast to serve as a major training base for the Russian athletes nearing the 2014 Sochi Games — and apparently with an eye toward St. Petersburg’s own Olympic bid.
“It is no longer a secret that we are building a huge multi-functional center in the outskirts of St. Petersburg,” said persidential property manager Vladimir Kozhin. 
The center is slated to welcome its first visitors in 2010.
Leningrad oblast governor Valery Serdyukov said the center will be located in a picturesque part of the Karelian Isthmus, around 20 kilometers from St. Petersburg.
Russia’s Olympic Committee and the Russian government took the construction under their control when Sochi won the 2014 bid at an IOC vote held in Guatemala.
“We launched the construction about a year ago, and the center was not originally meant as an Olympic facility,” Serdyukov told reporters on Monday. “With Sochi's win the significance of the training base has grown immensely.”
The Sochi Olympics has a budget of $12 billion but this is likely to grow. London’s 2012 Summer Games budget has grown by threefold and now stands at $18.5 billion. The budget for the games in Athens also increased by three times during the preparatory process, and it eventually cost $14 billion.
Russia hosted the Olympic Games in 1980, when it was still part of the Soviet Union.
Moscow attempted to receive the 1976 Olympics but lost to Canada’s Montreal in the final vote, and then competed for the 2012 Games without success.
Sochi had bid for the 2012 Summer Games but failed to make the short-list.
Svetlana Zhurova, who won Olympic gold in speed skating at the Turin Winter Games in 2006, is one of the coordinators of the Sochi’s Olympic bid. A resident of St. Petersburg and a member of the Legislative Assembly of the Leningrad oblast, Zhurova said St. Petersburg has a good chance of winning the right to host the Olympic Games but with one condition: upon submitting the application, the city had to be fully armed with a strong infrastructure and sports facilitites.
“Sochi’s scenario — where a huge amount of trust was put into a place where no infrastructure exists for winter sports — is not going to work for another Russian city,” she said. “At least 80 percent of all facilities have to be ready by the time the city hands its application over to IOC.” 
Another important question for any Olympic Games is how to keep the sports facilities busy after the prestigious event is over. For example, the Athens Games are infamous for holding the most expensive games in history that  left giant stadiums to gather dust rather than spectators.
The most profitable games were held in Los Angeles in 1984, while the games in Montreal in 1976 turned out to be a financial disaster, leaving the organizers with losses of $1.2 billion. Canadian taxpayers are still paying it off.

TITLE: Britain Considers Its Next Step in Standoff
AUTHOR: By David Nowak
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — Russia and Britain appeared to be on a diplomatic collision course Wednesday after they traded accusations over the extradition case of former security services officer Andrei Lugovoi.
British sources said they expected an outcome to the standoff in the near future and Malcolm Rifkind, a member of parliament and former foreign minister, said the British electorate would be expecting the government to take a tough stand.
Moscow answered with criticism of what it sees as London’s lack of respect for constitutional provisions and shoddy investigative work.
But while the danger of serious damage to bilateral relations between the countries appeared sincere, there were questions about Britain’s real options for increasing pressure.
Rifkind himself refused to speculate on what action London could take, but said some kind of nonverbal response was plausible.
“People in Britain are saddened and concerned at the Russian government’s refusal to extradite Lugovoi,” Rifkind said by telephone Wednesday from London.
“Russia could have tried to explore ways to get around the obstacles,” Rifkind added, in reference to the Constitution, which forbids Russia from extraditing its citizens. “Unfortunately, there is no way to force Russia to change its approach.”
On Tuesday, the British Foreign Office labeled the lack of cooperation as “unacceptable.”
Litvinenko died Nov. 23, three weeks after ingesting a rare radioactive isotope. British prosecutors say he was poisoned during a Nov. 1 meeting with Lugovoi and others at a London hotel.
Ambassador Anthony Brenton handed a request May 28 to the Foreign Ministry for Lugovoi’s extradition to face murder charges in Britain. Russia officially refused on July 5, citing the constitutional ban on handing over its citizens.
Lugovoi said Wednesday that the heated reaction was just a smokescreen to cover up unprofessional work by British detectives and that his negative portrayal in Western media would bias any jury.
Government officials also attacked Britain’s stance.
“It is strange that a country would be offended by our strict adherence to stipulations of the Constitution,” Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov told Vesti-24 television Wednesday, adding that bilateral ties would not be harmed.
Similarly, the Foreign Ministry was “surprised at the British reaction ... especially considering the fact that our position is in complete compliance with Russian law,” said ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin, Interfax reported.
The main question for the British side now is what comes next.
David Bentley, a political analyst at British think tank Chatham House and former legal adviser to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, said Wednesday that setting visa quotas for Russians or the expulsion of low-level diplomats were among possible measures.
“But it probably won’t come to that,” Bentley said. “It’s far too collateral to the legal issue of extradition,” he added.
He added that Britain’s current problem was partly of its own making, as the government has been slow to try to push international partners to drop extraditions prohibitions. “The U.K. tolerated that for far too long,” Bentley said.
A better idea of what actions Britain might take could be close, as its Foreign Affairs Committee will submit a report on the case to the parliament, the Times of London reported. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office refused Wednesday to comment on the report.
James Nixey, manager of the Russian and Eurasia program at Chatham House, said Wednesday that Britain had “very little leverage” and had been too ready to commit itself to action with the term “unacceptable” on Tuesday.
“Britain will not want to make an international incident out of a smaller, bilateral incident,” Nixey said.
“We’re not talking about kicking ambassadors out of the country,” he said, adding that he saw no real resolution to the situation. He said the entire situation was likely simply to “fizzle out.”
Masha Lipman, a political analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center, agreed that the case would end in a stalemate. “Russia is making it clear there will be no compromise,” Lipman said. “Standing up to demands from the West is very popular among Russian people.”
Lipman said the only way Lugovoi would stand trial was if it were held in Russia, and even then the evidence provided by British prosecutors would have to be examined by their Russian counterparts before a decision could be reached about going to trial.

TITLE: UNESCO Slams Skyscraper Plans
AUTHOR: By Evgenia Ivanova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The United Nations’ culture and heritage body UNESCO has asked City Hall to stop any development associated with the building of a skyscraper for energy giant Gazprom until after a new evaluation is made about possible damage to historic monuments in St. Petersburg, the Rosbalt news agency has reported.
The center of St. Petersburg is listed as a World Heritage site by UNESCO.
“[UNESCO’s world heritage committee] strongly urges the State Party, at the earliest opportunity, to provide a detailed report on the Gazprom tower development project in order for the World Heritage Committee to evaluate the impact on the Outstanding Universal Value of the property,” the committee’s draft report, published on the agency’s website on Tuesday, reads. 
The document summarizes decisions of the 31st session of the World Heritage Committee that ended in Christchurch, New Zealand on July 2.
“[The UNESCO committee] requests the State Party to stop any development [associated with the Gazprom tower], including the issuing of building permits, until all relevant materials have been reviewed and its impact on the Outstanding Universal Value of the World Heritage property has been fully assessed,” the document continues.
However, Gazprom Neft, the Gazprom subsidiary in St. Petersburg, released a statement on June 21 saying the presentation of the project to the St. Petersburg Planning Council in June “was concluding a series of the discussions in relation to the project.”
In a news release posted on Gazprom Neft’s website, Russia’s richest company claims that “[the tower] will become the dominant feature of modern St. Petersburg” and that it “will” be built in the city in the Krasnogvardeysky district.  
Although the majority of the city’s Planning Council members severely criticized the plan to erect a skyscraper in the district, Gazprom nevertheless said that “the concept of development of Okhta-Center [as the development has been dubbed] was approved by the Planning Council.” 
Later, the press release noted that the skyscraper idea has “provoked a lively discussion” on the council, but underplayed its objections to the tower.
“Some members of the Planning Council raised doubts regarding the viability of the presented characteristics of the object,” Gazprom’s statement reads. 
UNESCO warns that non-compliance with their request might lead to St. Petersburg’s inclusion on a “World Heritage in Danger” list.
But Philip Nikandrov, the St. Petersburg head of RMJM London Limited, the architectural company behind the skyscraper’s design, said UNESCO “is not the law” for his company.
“UNESCO doesn’t represent a body able to issue orders to St. Petersburg — the city has to choose its own destiny by itself,” Nikandrov told the St. Petersburg Times earlier this year in a telephone interview.
Zhivoi Gorod, a movement to preserve the historic center of St. Petersburg, meanwhile said it was doing everything it could to ensure its efforts against Gazprom “haven’t been made in vain.”
The group claims to have collected 10,821 signatures in a petition against the project. 
A copy of the document was sent to Governor Valentina Matviyenko on Monday, Zhivoi Gorod said in a press release.

TITLE: Senators Approve Rules On Where They Can Live
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The Federation Council on Wednesday approved a bill requiring senators to have lived 10 years in the regions they represent in order to serve in the upper chamber.
In their final session before summer recess, senators passed the bill 133-4 with seven abstentions, Interfax reported. It will not affect the status of acting senators.
The bill would exempt senators whose professions require them to move a lot, including soldiers, Interior Ministry officers and prosecutors. Such individuals, however, will be required to serve at least 10 years in their respective field.
Despite the overwhelming majority in Wednesday’s vote, several senators were sharply critical of the bill, which will now be sent to President Vladimir Putin to be signed into law.
Krasnoyarsk Senator Vyacheslav Novikov called the bill “utterly incomprehensible,” noting that it allows exemptions for military and law enforcement officers but not for people in comparably mobile professions, such as diplomats and scientists, Interfax reported.
Kaluga Senator Valery Sudarenkov concurred, calling the exemption rules “totally absurd,” Interfax said.
Rules committee head Nikolai Tulayev defended the exemptions and reiterated that the bill is first and foremost aimed at shoring up lawmakers’ connections to their respective regions, Interfax said.
The bill, proposed by Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov in April, was passed 338-77 in its third reading in the State Duma last week, with opposition coming primarily from the Communist and Liberal Democratic parties.
Senators on Wednesday also discussed the possibility of instituting popular elections for Federation Council representatives, Interfax reported.
The Federation Council is made up of two representatives for each of the country’s 85 regions.
One is chosen by the regional leader and the other by the regional legislature.

TITLE: Baby Mammoth ‘Lyuba’ Astounds Scientists
AUTHOR: By Kevin O’Flynn
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — Lyuba was only about four months old when she died on a full stomach. Ten thousand odd years later she is set to become world famous.
Scientists have hailed the discovery of the baby woolly mammoth, dubbed Lyuba, as one of the finest examples of preserved mammoths ever discovered after it emerged from the melting permafrost in western Siberia.
“There has never been such a find,” Pavel Kosintsev, one of the first scientists to see the mammoth, said in a telephone interview from Yekaterinburg.
“The mammoth is an animal that you look at and you see that there is an entire epoch behind it, a huge time period when climate was changing,” said Alexei Tikhonov, deputy director of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Zoological Institute in televised comments last week.
With her trunk still intact, eyes in place and small tufts of fur still on her skin, Lyuba looks more like a museum fake than a link to life in the Ice Age, though her tail seems to have been nipped off.
One hundred and thirty centimeters long, 90 centimeters high and weighing only 50 kilograms, the mammoth is almost exactly as it was when it died nearly 10,000 years ago, said Kosintsev, deputy head of the Zoological Museum in the Institute of Ecological Plants and Animals.
“The animal died and immediately was buried in a watery area or a bog. There was no decay. She was located there in a frozen state for several thousand years,” said Kosintsev. Lyuba likely reappeared to the world after the river’s bank slipped at the end of last year, he said.
Lyuba was found almost two months ago on May 15 by Yury Khudi, a nomadic reindeer tribesman near the Yuribei River in the Yamal-Nenets autonomous region. Khudi, a Nenets, thought it was a sick reindeer at first and went to investigate, said Kosintsev. When he saw that it was a mammoth, he went to the nearest village to tell of his find.
She was named Lyuba by scientists in honor of Khudi’s wife, though how he feels about that is not yet known as he is back in the tundra with his reindeer.
“We could not contact him, but if he says it is not the right name we will change it,” said Kosintsev. Mammoth finds are usually named after the person who finds them.
To keep her from deteriorating, Lyuba is being stored at minus 10 degrees Celsius in an industrial freezer in the Yamal-Nenets republic’s regional museum in Salekhard, the regional capital.
Mammoths, believed to be close relatives of the modern day elephant, roamed the earth from almost 5 million years B.C. to just a few thousand years B.C. when they disappeared.
Although mammoths once inhabited almost the entire world, Russia has always had a strong association with the beast. Mammoths are considered special animals by northern tribes, said Natalia Fyodorova, the deputy director of the museum, in a telephone interview from Salekhard.
“All the native tribes have tales about this mythical animal,” she said. When finding mammoth parts, native tribes such as the Nenets often take them to their holy places to talk with their souls. Now, she said with a touch of pride, “they tell the museum.”
Lyuba will go to Japan soon for a CT scan at Jikei University to be examined by a team led by Professor Naoki Suzuki.

TITLE: Oligarch Tried In Absentia
AUTHOR: By Steve Gutterman
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW — A preliminary hearing was held Thursday in the trial in absentia of Kremlin foe Boris Berezovsky on charges that he embezzled millions of dollars from Russia’s flagship air carrier, Aeroflot.
A court-appointed attorney for the tycoon, who has ordered his own lawyers not to take part in what he calls a politically motivated farce, won a two-week postponement that he said he badly needs in order to read the voluminous case materials, Russian news agencies reported.
Berezovsky, a fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin who has asylum in Britain, said last month that the trial was part of an effort by Russian authorities to draw attention away from the poisoning death of his associate Alexander Litvinenko, which he blames on Putin’s Kremlin.
Berezovsky is charged with embezzling 214 million rubles from Aeroflot in the 1990s and laundering some of the money, as well as with fraud. The figure is worth about $8 million at today’s exchange rates.
A former Kremlin insider, Berezovsky fell out of favor after Putin came to power, and he fled to Britain in 2000 to avoid prosecution in the Aeroflot case. He also faces potential prosecution in Russia over alleged calls for the government’s overthrow.
He could be sentenced to 10 years in prison if convicted in the embezzlement trial, but Britain has repeatedly refused Russian requests for his extradition.
Berezovsky’s confrontation with the Kremlin has deepened over the poisoning of Litvinenko, an ally and fellow Putin critic who died in a London hospital in November after receiving a dose of radioactive polonium-210.
Before he died, Litvinenko blamed Putin for his poisoning, as has Berezovsky.

TITLE: Foreign Adoptions Get Go-Ahead from Authorities
AUTHOR: By Alexander Osipovich
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — Russia is reopening its doors to foreign adoptions, months after they all but ground to a halt due to bureaucratic barriers.
Seven U.S. adoption agencies have recently been reaccredited to work in Russia, Sergei Vitelis, an official at the Education and Science Ministry who deals with children’s issues, confirmed Wednesday.
Vitelis said he could not provide further details, and the ministry’s press service did not respond to questions sent by e-mail Wednesday afternoon.
But the National Council for Adoption, a U.S. research and advocacy organization, said the reaccreditations came over the past two weeks and more agencies are expected to have their licenses renewed soon.
“This will benefit many thousands of children,” Thomas Atwood, the organization’s president, said by telephone from Alexandria, Virginia.
Foreign adoption agencies working in Russia have not had much to cheer about in the past few years.
In 2005, after the well-publicized deaths of several Russian children at the hands of their adoptive parents in the United States, influential State Duma deputies called for a moratorium on foreign adoptions.
Child advocates criticized the idea, arguing that the number of deadly abuse cases was minuscule compared with the number of children adopted from Russian orphanages by foreign parents.
Russia at the time was the second most popular country for international adoptions by U.S. parents, after China, according to the U.S. State Department.
The moratorium never happened, but foreign adoption agencies began facing greater bureaucratic hurdles. A law passed in 2006 forced them to reregister as nongovernmental organizations.
Many agencies were left hanging after applying for reaccreditation in January. The last two agencies to have accreditation saw their licenses expire in April.
Officials in the Education and Science Ministry, the main government body that deals with international adoption, blamed the delay on bureaucratic hassles, pointing out that each application needed approval from the Interior and Foreign ministries.
Some child advocates, however, suggested that the authorities might have deliberately thrown a wrench into the works because of hostility toward foreign adoption.
Whatever the case, the impasse seems to have ended.
“We believe this to be a substantial step in the direction of the stability of Russian adoption,” reads a statement on the web site of the International Assistance Group, one of the agencies that was reaccredited.
The statement appears along with a copy of the agency’s new accreditation document from the Education and Science Ministry, dated June 27.
Atwood, of the National Council for Adoption, said he was happy that the agencies had been reaccredited, but he added that the transition to the new rules could have been smoother for the sake of the children waiting for homes.

TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: <b>Endurance Boat Race</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The Sixth Inflatable Boat World Championship, featuring a 24-hour race, is due to be held on Saturday on the River Neva and the Kronverksky canal, Fontanka.ru reported. 
From 12 a.m. sailors will compete on a 2,750 meter circuit and the competitor that completes the most laps in 24 hours wins the race.
Organizers recommend watching the race from Ioanovsky and Kronverksky bridges, where the most enthralling moments of the race can be observed. It is also possible to watch the race from the beach of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

<b>Arctic Exploration</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The science expedition ship “Academic Fyodorov” left port in St. Petersburg on Tuesday heading for the Arctic, Fontanka.ru reported. 
During the first stage, members of the expedition will lower deep-water devices in the vicinity of the North Pole to investigate the environment of the Arctic. 
The second stage will be dedicated to organizing the new Russian polar station North Pole-35.

<b>Art Sale in London</b>
LONDON (SPT) — On Sept. 19, Sotheby’s London will offer for sale the Rostropovich-Vishnevskaya Collection of Russian Art, which is estimated to realize in excess of $5.5 million. 
The collection comprises more than 350 lots of fine and decorative Russian art from the 18th to the 20th centuries — including paintings, porcelain figures, plates, vases, ivory caskets, glass and portrait miniatures — belonging to the late cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife, the opera singer Galina Vishnevskaya. 
A previous series of Russian art sales at Sotheby’s, when the works of such painters as Larionov, Korovin, Kravchenko and Aivazovsky were sold, raised more than $49.5 million.

TITLE: Ford Announces New Model, $100M Upgrade
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Ford is to start production of its Mondeo model at its Leningrad Oblast plant as part of a $100 million upgrade, the company said Tuesday in a statement. The new model will be launched by the end of 2008 with a production line of 25,000 units a year.
 “The Russian car market has been expanding dramatically over the last few years. We see that demand for stylish cars with good technical specifications, the cars that Ford offers, keeps growing,” John Fleming, president and CEO of Ford Europe, said in the statement.
At the moment Ford’s Russian plant, which employs over 2,200 people, produces four types of Ford Focus. Ford opened the plant in 2002 with an initial investment of $150 million.
By 2009 production capacity will increase from the current 72,000 units to 125,000 units a year while Ford’s total investment into Russia will amount to over $330 million. Focus production will increase by 28,000 units a year. The growth in production is based on record growth in sales. 
Last year Ford sold 115,985 cars in Russia, a 92 percent increase on 2005 figures.
Since 2003, the Ford Focus has remained the most popular foreign car in Russia — 73,468 such models were sold last year. Ford Fusion was also popular, selling 16,532 cars, a 143 percent increase on the previous year, while Mondeo sales in Russia totaled 10,120 cars.
“We are proud of our results in 2006 and especially the sales of the Focus and Fusion models. By increasing production by 89 percent and importing more Focus models from Europe, we have shortened the waiting list for our clients in Russia. Orders for 2007 already amount to 29,300 cars,” Henrik Nenzen, president of Ford in Russia, commented.
In the first half of 2007, Ford sales in Russia increased by 122 percent compared to the same period last year up to 81,782 cars. 
The company sold 46,173 Ford Focus models, 20,313  Fusions, 5,464 Fiestas and 3,091 Mondeos. By the end of the year the company plans to sell 160,000 cars.
Analysts saw increasing production as a natural step for the company.
“For a while we saw high demand for economic class sedans. Now we see an increase in demand for business class cars in the lower price bracket,” said Sevastian Kozitsyn, analyst of Brokercreditservice.
“I don’t think there is at the moment an equivalent car that could challenge the Ford Focus. Though we should wait to see what models Volkswagen will produce and how they will be priced. If Toyota starts producing cheap cars, of course, they would beat off most competition,” Kozitsyn said.
Ford managers saw the dramatic growth in sales as a result of the “attractive model range, the low price and beneficial credit programs.”
Ford introduced loans with an interest rate of 4.9 percent. In the first quarter of 2007, out of 15,950 sold cars 6,075 cars were sold through credit scheme — a 94 percent increase on 2006 figures.
In July, Ford announced a new credit program for its Fiesta, C-Max and Explorer models and prolonged the credit program for the Fusion, Focus and Mondeo.
Sales and production growth in Russia last year were considered a brand record. 
Sales also increased across all of the company’s key markets including Great Britain, Italy and Benilux. Total sales of Ford Europe increased by 81,000 cars in 2006.
The total voume of production at seven plants increased by 125,000 units because of “the record volumes of production in Cologne, Kosaely (Turkey) and St. Petersburg.”
According to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers, Russia will grow to become Europe’s largest car market by 2011 with sales amounting to $96 billion.

TITLE: The State of Northwest Banking
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The state of the banking industry in the Northwest provoked mixed opinions Thursday at the 12th Northwest Banking Conference. 
Vladimir Dzikovich, president of the Northwest Association of Banks, took a moderate line, saying that the Northwest may only account for a relatively small share of the country’s banking offices but the region is still attracting renowned foreign capital.
According to him, 81 credit organizations operate in the Northwest, which is 11 percent of Russia’s total. Recently four banks with foreign shareholders opened in the Northwest — a considerable result for the region, he said.
“Over the last five years Northwest banks have grown five to eight times in terms of capital and assets,” Dzikovich said. However 50 percent of banks are still small with assets of up to 500 million rubles.
Dzikovich expects the total number of bank offices in the region to increase to 1980 by the beginning of the next year.
One regional problem mentioned by Dzikovich was the volume of private deposits in the Northwest Bank of Sberbank Rossii, which is several times larger than other banks in the region. He also indicated the small share of mortgages (411 billion rubles) compared to the total volume of loans (2 trillion rubles).
The conference focused on ways to improve the quality of management and increase the capitalization of Russian banks, opportunities for growing businesses to attract financing and problems of financial markets.
“The conference welcomed over 400 guests from 220 companies and banks registered in Russia and 30 foreign countries. From year to year the conference is gaining in popularity and status,” said Alexander Levkovsky, president of Promsvyazbank – the organizer of the conference.
Garegin Tosunyan, president of the Association of Russian Banks, called for an increase in capitalization and assets, for regional development and IPOs.
“In many respects Russia is behind Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Moldova and even Georgia,” Tosynyan said.
GDP growth in Azerbaijan was reported at 34 percent last year as opposed to eight percent in Russia. In Armenia inflation was just three percent. In Tajikistan investment into fixed capital increased by 55.1 percent last year, in Armenia by 37.1 percent, in Belarus by 31.4 percent, but in Russia by only 13.5 percent.
“60 million people in Russia have no familiarity at all with banking services,” Tosunyan said.
In the last five years state funding in Russia increased five times while bank financing increased only 2.2 times, he said. “This trend should be changed. State funding is less effective compared to bank loans. In Kazakhstan and Ukraine bank assets represent a larger share of GDP than in Russia,” he said.
Mikhail Sukhov, director for licensing and financial enhancement at the Russian Central Bank, was more positive. The banking industry in Russia grew by one trillion rubles every three months last year, he said, while this year it is growing by 1.5 trillion rubles every three months.
Sberbank and VTB IPOs increased the capital of the Russian banking industry by 25 percent (436 billion rubles). However, he admitted, the capital of Russian banks is only enough to cover operational risks but not for development.
“Comparing the balances of Sberbank and VTB with other top 30 Russian banks, I can say that those banks should attract over 300 billion rubles to approach similar financial ratios,” Sukhov said.
Although the inflow of foreign investment is unavoidable, “with profitability of average assets at 26 percent Russian banks should also be attractive for local investors,” Sukhov said.

TITLE: Skepticism Over New Luxury Cruise Ship
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: A unique cruise ship to operate between St. Petersburg and the island of Valaam in Lake Ladoga is due to set sail for the first time Saturday running three times a week to the end of September.
Alien Shipping, in cooperation with Inflot Travel, believe the 4-star ship “Kazan,” is unique. 
“For the first time Russian tourists are being offered such a luxury ship,” Alexei Gakkel, chairman of the board of directors of the Alien group of companies, said Wednesday at a press conference. High-class ships are usually chartered for several years ahead by foreign tour operators, he said.
Compared to the older ships normally operating on river cruises, “Kazan” has the advantage, according to Gakkel, of enlarged areas of public space (a restaurant, conference hall and upper deck with a pool). Alien and Inflot have chartered “Kazan” for six months from a U.K. registered company Tartan Shipping. The four-deck ship was built in 1999 in Italy. It has a capacity of 150 passengers and a crew of 50 people.
 “The ship’s interior is very original. Its inner walls are covered with antique-style stone,” Korol said. The ship has 75 cabins including five first class cabins (two-room apartments), four luxury cabins and standard two-bedroom cabins.
Each cabin will include satellite television and telephone, air conditioning, a fridge and safe. The ship will also feature shops, a gym, sauna and bars, with Wi-Fi to be offered in the near future.
Leaving from the River Terminal the trip will cost 9,400 rubles per person. A first class cabin will cost 25,000 rubles. At weekends the prices will be higher – 9,900 rubles and 36,000 rubles respectively, which is significantly more expensive compared to the one-day trips to Valaam on hydrofoil boats. Alien Shipping offers such trips for 2,800 rubles, while at Neva Travel the trip costs 4,500 rubles per person. 
Russian Cruises has operated a three-deck ship “Svyataya Rus” on trips to Valaam for the last seven years. The ship offers standard and luxury cabins, said Alexander Yudin of Russian Cruises press service, with prices varying between 2,290 rubles and 16,000 rubles depending on the cabin. Longer trips cost up to 45,000 rubles. 
The ship has a restaurant, cinema hall, music room and bars.
“The trip is very popular. The ship is usually 95 percent full,” Yudin said.
Yudin doubted whether Alien would succeed in operating the route on a regular basis. “Alien has started a number of projects that have not been completed — their idea of trips from St. Petersburg to Turku for example. Their Peterhof boat operates very rarely,” Yudin said.
He was also concerned about safety. “How could they get all the necessary approvals for sailing and mooring, if other operators got their approvals in March and April? Where will they moor in Valaam?”

TITLE: EU Alrosa Antitrust Ruling Annulled
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: LUXEMBOURG — The European Union’s Court of Justice on Wednesday annulled an EU anti-monopoly decision that had prevented South African giant De Beers from buying rough diamonds from Russian rival Alrosa.
De Beers agreed last year to cease all purchases of rough diamonds from Alrosa beginning in 2009 to settle EU charges of monopoly abuse. Alrosa challenged the EU’s acceptance of the deal.
The European Court of First Instance said the settlement was “manifestly disproportionate,” adding that EU regulators did not prove that together the two held a “dominant position” in the EU market that would justify limiting their freedom to do business.
Alrosa is the world’s second-largest rough diamond producer after De Beers. Under a 2001 deal, De Beers said it would buy diamonds worth $800 million from Alrosa every year for five years.
But the commission said last year that De Beers agreed to legally binding commitments to stop buying rough diamonds from Alrosa.
EU regulators claimed that De Beers held an unrivaled position in the diamond market for much of the 20th century but its promise to stop buying gems from Alrosa starting in 2009 would open up new opportunities for competition in the worldwide rough diamond market — worth $12 billion in 2004.
Last year’s deal closed an anti-monopoly probe into the deal between the firms, which the EU warned could shut out other competitors.
The EU court ruled that the European Commission was wrong to agree to the deal. 
“The commission merely accepted the commitments proposed by De Beers at face value, without looking for alternative solutions which might have better respected the contractual freedom of the parties,” the five-judge panel ruled in Luxembourg.
It added that Alrosa also had “a right to be heard” in the negotiations last year before a deal was reached.
Alrosa told the court the agreement between De Beers and the commission would have forced it to look on while its competitors continue selling diamonds to De Beers. The commission argued the February 2006 decision would have opened up the diamond market to normal competition.
“If there is a contract, and the commission accepts undertakings by one party, it creates a problem with the co-contractor,” said Michel Struys, a competition lawyer at Allen & Overy in Brussels.
 “The commission should have consulted with the co-contractor. The commission can remedy that and reach the same conclusion after consulting Alrosa.”
Wednesday’s ruling can be appealed at the European Court of Justice, the EU’s top tribunal, which is also based in Luxembourg.
The commission will study the judgment and consider an appeal, said Jonathan Todd, a spokesman for the commission.
De Beers controls about 60 percent of the world’s rough diamond supplies and produces 43 percent of world output. Under the 2006 deal, the company was to start to phase out purchases from 2006 to 2008.
AP, Bloomberg

TITLE: French Total Picked As Shtokman Partner
AUTHOR: By Lucian Kim and Torrey Clark
PUBLISHER: Bloomberg
TEXT: Gazprom, the world’s largest natural-gas producer, chose Total SA to help develop Shtokman, an Arctic offshore field that may hold enough gas to supply Europe for more than three years.
Paris-based Total will take 25 percent in an operating company that will finance, build and own infrastructure in the $20 billion project, while the Russian company will hold the rest, Gazprom Chief Executive Officer Alexei Miller said in an e-mailed statement Thursday. Gazprom may later offer 24 percent to one or more additional foreign partners, Miller said.
Gazprom, which already supplies a quarter of Europe’s gas, expects Shtokman to revive stagnating output as world demand for the fuel soars. The company may also sell half of the field’s output as liquefied natural gas to new customers like the U.S., helping President Vladimir Putin realize his plan to turn gas into a globally traded commodity like oil.
“Shtokman is the biggest undeveloped gas field in the world,’’ said Chris Weafer, chief strategist at Alfa Bank in Moscow. “Shtokman will fill all of Europe’s new demand and allow Russia to completely dominate the global LNG trade by opening up markets like the U.S.’’
Gazprom plans initial production of 23.7 billion cubic meters of gas a year at Shtokman, with first pipeline deliveries in 2013, Miller said. The first shipment of LNG, super-cooled gas for transport by tanker, will follow the next year.
Gazprom last year scrapped its original plan to let foreign partners share ownership of the license and output. The company was considering a shortlist of partners that included Total, Statoil ASA, Norsk Hydro ASA, Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips.
Total spokeswoman Patricia Marie said she couldn’t confirm that a decision had been taken on Shtokman. Talks with Gazprom are “very advanced’’ and an agreement may be signed tomorrow, she said by phone from Paris.
“We are still in a dialog with Gazprom,’’ Ola Morten Aanestad, a Statoil spokesman, said by phone. “The solution that Gazprom and Total have agreed on is of interest to us.’’
Gazprom repeatedly delayed making a decision on the field’s development and surprised possible partners in October when Miller went on state TV to say Gazprom would develop Shtokman alone. The company later softened its stance, saying it would accept international companies as operating partners and possibly let them book some of Shtokman’s reserves.
“Given the political situation, the probability a U.S. partner would be chosen for the project was minimal from the get-go,’’ said Steven Dashevsky, co-head of equities at Aton Capital in Moscow, referring to tense relations between the U.S. and Russia. “It would be reasonable to assume the Norwegians will get a stake.’’
While one or more additional foreign partners may still be allowed into the project, Miller said Gazprom won’t let its stake fall below 51 percent.
“The devil will be in the detail’’ on how much reserves, if any, Total will be allowed to book as its own, said Jason Kenney, an analyst at ING Wholesale Banking in Edinburgh, who has a “buy’’ rating on Total. Miller said Thursday that Gazprom will own 100 percent of the Shtokman license and all of its production.

TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: <b>Atomic Help</b>
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Russia will help Kazakhstan build its first nuclear power plant by 2013 as the countries pool as much as $10 billion of resources to prepare for a global resurgence in atomic power, a Kazakh state official said.
Atomniye Stantsii, a joint venture between the two countries, plans to build the first of three medium-sized BVER-300 plants using 300-megawatt fast-neutron reactors, and may subsequently export nuclear fuel. “After we see how these work, we’ll consider exports,’’ Mukhtar Dzhakishev, the president of Kazakhstan’s state-owned uranium-mining company, Kazatomprom, said by telephone Wednesday from Almaty.

<b>Rosneft Win</b>
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Rosneft, Russia’s state-run oil company, won a bankruptcy auction for Yukos Oil Co.’s equipment and property at 11 oil and natural-gas fields in Siberia and Russia’s south.
Rosneft bid 5.85 billion rubles ($229 million) at the auction in Moscow on Thursday, beating Benefit, Nikolai Lashkevich, a spokesman for Yukos’s external manager, said by phone Thursday. That was two bids higher than the starting price of 5.73 billion rubles, one of the fastest sales this year.
The state oil company bid directly, rather than through a unit, as it did at other auctions this year. Rosneft became the country’s largest oil company this year, spending more than $25 billion on buying Yukos’s production units, refineries, retail chains and other property.
“The acquisition of these assets will allow the company to strengthen its position in these strategically important regions,’’ Rosneft said in an e-mailed statement.

TITLE: A Corrupt Way of Life
AUTHOR: By Georgy Bovt
TEXT: The event that most caught my attention in the news the other day was the arrest of a top municipal official in the small town of Solnechnogorsk near Moscow. This position is roughly equivalent to serving as the head of a village. And this “village head” was arrested on suspicion of taking a $200,000 bribe for granting permission for the construction of a single apartment building in his jurisdiction.
In the West, a bribe of this scale would qualify as a major corruption scandal. These scandals usually attract a lot of attention, triggering various investigations. Not only is the individual crime directly addressed, but Western countries take a close look at whether there was a systemic failure in the way government institutions regulate, punish and deter malfeasance.
But here in Russia, this bribe case resulted in only a terse and dry announcement in the news as if it were some trivial matter. And to be perfectly fair, what is a meager $200,000 bribe when such building permits in Moscow go for $1 million at the very least? In fact, the scale of bribe-taking in Russia has reached such levels that nobody is shocked anymore by news of yet another case of corruption.
The town of Solnechnogorosk, 65 kilometers northwest of Moscow, is by no means a depressed or dilapidated town. You can see the construction of modern apartment buildings, supermarkets, offices and various industrial buildings.
Of course, you could console yourself with the thought that bribes are not required for every construction project, but this would be naive. As anyone who has ever tried to build something can tell you, bribery is standard practice in Russia. It can be direct or indirect, in cash or in services. Whatever the form of the bribe, bureaucrats always profit the most.
Corruption is so pervasive that it has long been viewed as a banality of Russian life. We are no longer indignant when we hear about corruption because we have gotten so used to it. It has become the norm both for higher ups and for those of lower rank. The only difference is the scale.
Of course, Russians “notice” the corruption in the country and, in theory, they are opposed to it (and remain opposed until they become the focus of a corruption allegation). According to a recent survey conducted by the Levada Center, 43 percent of respondents named corruption as the main problem in Russia, and another 29 percent named “pressure from officials and bureaucrats.”
This is nothing new. Although this problem has been around and has been publicly acknowledged for years, President Vladimir Putin’s war on corruption has not improved the situation. The number of people accepting illicit payments and the size of the bribes have increased significantly. From an informal polling of business acquaintances, I learned that the usual kickback during the years under President Boris Yeltsin’s tenure was from 20 percent to 30 percent, but that it has risen to 60 percent to 70 percent or higher today. State-owned companies and organizations close to administration siloviki are especially burdened by the problem.
Understandably, respondents usually named the institutions with which they had the most frequent dealings as being “among the most corrupt.” For this reason the Health and Social Development Ministry, the Interior Ministry and the Finance Ministry led the list. But various State Duma deputies, judges and education officials were also mentioned.
Respondents did, however, note improvements in a range of areas. A Levada Center survey conducted back in the spring of this year showed honesty on the rise among the traffic police. In 2005, motorists reported paying bribes in 78 percent of roadside spot inspections, while in 2007, the number dropped to 57 percent. It would also seem that the number of bribes has decreased in connection with the issuance of driver’s licenses and vehicle technical inspection certificates. Examining the situation more closely, however, it is clear that a side business in technical inspections has sprung up that is in cahoots with the police. Now, instead of a traffic police officer on the street pocketing the bribe, motorists pay the same amount to a firm closely connected with the traffic police; this private company promises to “help” speed up the processing of necessary documents. The issuance of driver’s licenses is carried out in close “cooperation” with driving schools. Moreover, private organizations linked to every auto dealer act as middlemen in issuing license plates and official vehicle passports.
Within the last few years, “auxiliary” service firms that work with every state institution have popped up everywhere. “Express” and “simplified” ways to process required paperwork have become ubiquitous — and always for a fee. The average Russian has become accustomed long ago to looking for the simplest and quickest way to get around bureaucratic obstacles rather than trying to fulfill formal legal requirements.
The result is that it has become customary to “thank” others for their services. Money is paid not as fines for violations of the law, but to induce bureaucrats to simply do what they are supposed to do as an official part of their job — issue the necessary stamps, certificates or documents. Even if the person doesn’t agree to pay the bribe, the bureaucrat can still find a way of squeezing the same amount of money from you by levying a fine for some kind of violation of a rule. Or the bureaucrat can act as a roadblock by simply refusing to carry out his normal duties as required by his job function and by the law.
The same practice applies to university professors, who “allow” their students to pass their exams; to the bureaucrats who issue residency registration documents; or to the government property registration department when a property owner applies for his ownership documents. This is also how the Federal Tax Service “helps” private firms to reduce their clients’ tax obligations.
An acquaintance in business told of the following typical experience: After Federal Tax Service inspectors completed a review of his firm, they announced that no violations were found — a rarity to say the least. The ranking officer then took the businessman aside and said, “That will cost $10,000.”
“What for?” the perplexed businessman replied. “You just said there were no violations.”
“You’re paying for the fact that we didn’t find any,” the officer matter-of-factly responded. “Had we found violations, the fee would have reached $50,000.” He then kindly gave the businessman a few pointers on how to fill out the necessary tax-reporting forms.
Is this corruption or simply the typical way of life in Russia, where the distinction between legality and illegality has been almost entirely erased?

Georgy Bovt is a Moscow-based political analyst.

TITLE: An Anti-Missile Proposal Doomed to Fail
AUTHOR: By Alexander Golts
TEXT: Imagine a situation in which a good acquaintance — but not a close friend — suggests that you start a joint venture that requires you to invest all of your savings. If you hesitate, he whips out a revolver and threatens to shoot your close relatives. This is how Russia's most recent suggestion for cooperation with the United States on a joint anti-ballistic missile defense system comes across.
For months now, Russian defense officials have tirelessly reiterated how decisively and "asymmetrically" Moscow would respond to the U.S. plan to place elements of its anti-missile batteries in Poland and the Czech Republic. The generals threatened to deploy a mystery warhead, which supposedly has the capability of eliminating enemy anti-missile systems with amazing efficiency. They also threatened to re-target Russian rockets at European capitals, as they did in the 1980s.
During his recent meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush, however, President Vladimir Putin put forward a "peaceful initiative" — a term the Soviet leaders notoriously used for initiatives they had no intention of fulfilling. Putin offered for the United States to share the aging Russian early warning radar system in Gabala, Azerbaijan, and possibly build a new joint warning station near Armavir in southern Russia.
The Russian president also recalled a bilateral agreement signed in 1998, which promised to develop a joint center in Moscow to share information on rocket launches. Putin is suggesting that the two countries create these types of joint operations facilities in both Moscow as well as Brussels, the headquarters of NATO.
First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov wasted no time in clarifying that a global anti-missile system involving Russia, the United States and European nations could be created as soon as 2020. Ivanov explained in a recent interview that Russia would contribute its anti-missile early warning technology to the global system. In return, the United States would provide its Aegis sea-based combat system. This would mean that Aegis-equipped U.S. ships would have to be stationed much closer to regions representing potential missile threats.
There is no denying that such a joint system — were it to be developed — would have a major impact on the nature of U.S.-Russian relations. Not only would U.S. ships be permanently positioned near Russia's shores, but both partners would have access to each other's super-sensitive technologies.
But the main point is that if the United States were to accept the Russian offer, it would have to entirely reject its present strategy of intercepting enemy warheads in space using missiles with a range of more than 2000 kilometers. In addition, the joint project would mean that the billions of dollars that the United States has already spent on its unilateral anti-missile system would be for naught.
The other problematic aspect of Russia's proposal is that it would require an unusually high level of trust between both countries to make this new relationship work.
However, Russia has done everything in its power to undermine this trust. A case in point: Ivanov has promised that if the United States does not cancel its plans to place a radar in the Czech Republic and elements of anti-missile batteries in Poland, Russia will deploy Iskander rockets in Kaliningrad aimed at U.S. installations in Europe. If Russia deploys these weapons, it will violate the terms of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. This in turn could lead to a new stand-off with Europe.
On the surface, Moscow has offered to create a joint global anti-missile system that would significantly improve U.S.-Russian relations. But Moscow has threatened a new military stand-off if Washington refuses its proposal and develops its own anti-missile system in Europe. Thus, Moscow has proposed an absolutely meaningless and unrealistic initiative that will only distract and irritate Washington at a time when the Kremlin is frantically looking for U.S. support for Putin's successor.

Alexander Golts is deputy editor of the online newspaper Yezhednevny Zhurnal.

TITLE: Spellbound
AUTHOR: By A. O. Scott
PUBLISHER: The New York Times
TEXT: “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,” the fifth movie in the series, begins, as most of the others have, with a spot of unpleasantness at the Dursleys, and ends with Harry facing down Lord Voldemort. The climactic battle between the young wizard (Daniel Radcliffe) and the Dark Lord (Ralph Fiennes) foreshadows the final, potentially fatal showdown we all suspect is coming in Book Seven, which will be published later this month.
Anticipation of that event may be stealing some thunder from this movie — a rare instance of the book business beating Hollywood at its own hype-producing game — but between now and publication day on July 21, Potter fans can take some satisfaction in a sleek, swift and exciting adaptation of J. K. Rowling’s longest novel to date. Devotees of fine British acting, meanwhile, can savor the addition of Imelda Staunton (an Oscar nominee for “Vera Drake”) to the roster of first-rate thespians moonlighting as Hogwarts faculty.
Curiously enough, “Order of the Phoenix,” clocking in at a little over two and a quarter hours, is the shortest of the “Harry Potter” films. The nearly 900-page source has been elegantly streamlined by Michael Goldenberg, the screenwriter (who replaces Steve Kloves), and David Yates, the director (who follows Chris Columbus, Alfonso Cuar?n and Mike Newell in the job). There is no Quidditch, and not many boarding-school diversions. Instead, “Order of the Phoenix,” which begins like a horror movie with a Dementor attack in a suburban underpass, proceeds as a tense and twisty political thriller, with clandestine meetings, bureaucratic skullduggery and intimations of conspiracy hanging in the air.
Yates, whose previous work has mainly been in television, is best known in Britain for “State of Play,” a brilliant mini-series about power, corruption and deceit. Those are among the themes he explores in this film, which depicts a wizard world riven by factionalism and threatened by chaos and inflexible authoritarianism. While Cornelius Fudge, the minister of magic (Robert Hardy), maintains his highly suspect denial of Voldemort’s return, a coup at Hogwarts threatens the benevolent administration of Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon). Harry, meanwhile, has gone from prince to pariah, smeared in the magical press (where his name is rendered “Harry Plotter”) and subject to cold stares and whispers at school. Back in Harry’s early days at Hogwarts, Severus Snape (Alan Rickman), Harry’s foil and reluctant ally, sneered at the boy’s “celebrity.” But in this episode, the boy — if you can still call him that — encounters the darker side of fame.
Some of his schoolmates doubt his account of the death of Cedric Diggory, who was killed by Voldemort at the end of the previous film, “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.” Dumbledore, Harry’s chief patron and protector over the years, seems to be keeping his distance, which leaves Harry feeling abandoned and betrayed. And more acutely, the pressures of being a designated hero — and possibly martyr — have begun to weigh on Harry, to isolate him from friends and to come between him and the possibility of a normal teenage life.
He does, at least, experience a first kiss with Cho Chang (Katie Leung), but that turns out to be a brief and equivocal moment of bliss. Whereas “Goblet of Fire” plunged Harry and his pals into the murky waters of awakening adolescent sexuality (or at least got their toes wet), “Order of the Phoenix” tackles the emotional storms that can buffet young people on their way to adulthood. Radcliffe, maturing as an actor in perfect time with his character, emphasizes Harry’s anger and self-pity. Yates frequently places him alone on one side of the frame, with Ron and Hermione (Rupert Grint and Emma Watson), his loyal but increasingly estranged friends, together on the other.
But this is not an Ingmar Bergman film, though perhaps Bergman can be coaxed into service for the film version of “Deathly Hallows,” the final book of the series. “Order of the Phoenix” has its grim, bleak elements, but it is also, after all, an installment in a mighty multimedia entertainment franchise. And like its predecessors, it manages to succeed as a piece of entertainment without quite fulfilling its potential as a movie. Perhaps by design, the films never quite live up to the books. This one proves to be absorbing but not transporting, a collection of interesting moments rather than a fully integrated dramatic experience. This may just be a consequence of the necessary open-endedness of the narrative, or of an understandable desire not to alienate “Potter” readers by taking too many cinematic chances.
Although “Order of the Phoenix” is not a great movie, it is a pretty good one, in part because it does not strain to overwhelm the audience with noise and sensation. There are some wonderful special-effects-aided set pieces — notably an early broomstick flight over London — and some that are less so. People waving wands at one another, even accompanied by bright lights and scary sounds, does not quite sate this moviegoer’s appetite for action. But the production design (by Stuart Craig) and the cinematography (by Slawomir Idziak) are frequently astonishing in their aptness and sophistication. The interiors of the Ministry of Magic offer a witty, nightmarish vision of wizardly bureaucracy, while Harry’s angst and loneliness register in Idziak’s cold, washed-out shades of blue.
The scariest color in his palette, however, turns out to be pink. That is the color favored by Dolores Umbridge (Staunton), whose cheery English-auntie demeanor masks a ruthlessly autocratic temperament. She posts proclamations on the Hogwarts walls, subjects violators to painful punishments and substitutes book learning for practical magic. Her purpose is to institute Minister Fudge’s head-in-the-sand policy with respect to the Voldemort threat, and she does a heck of a job.
Staunton joins an astonishing ensemble of serious actors who, in the best British tradition, refuse to condescend to the material, earning their paychecks and the gratitude of the grown-ups in the audience. Rickman has turned Snape (whose animus against Harry is partly explained here) into one of the most intriguingly ambiguous characters in modern movies, and it is always a treat to see the likes of Emma Thompson, David Thewlis and Gary Oldman, however briefly.

TITLE: Chernov’s choice
TEXT: <b>Art Brut</b> is a sensational last-minute addition to the city’s music activities as concerts begin to die out in mid-summer.
The British art-punk band will replace Boy Kill Boy, the initial headlining act for a beer-sponsored beach event this weekend. 
Performing on Laskovy Plyazh (Gentle Beach) on Saturday, Art Brut is part of a bigger event called <b>F-Day</b>, that will start at noon and feature things like a competition of “tropical beauties” wearing “uncompromising bikinis,” which is only a small portion of “a galaxy of sunny entertainment” to be thrown at the public, according to the event’s news release. 
Art Brut is expected to perform at around 9 p.m., but further last-minute changes cannot be excluded.
It seems as if it’s an impromptu gig on the band’s part too, as its MySpace web site only lists performances at the Traffic Festival in Turin on Friday and the Soundlabs Festival in Roseto degli Abruzzi on Sunday, both Italy.
Fronted by Eddie Argos, whose vocal delivery has been described as “witty declarations,” Art Brut formed in 2003. Its debut album, “Bang Bang Rock and Roll,” came out in May 2005.
Art Brut released its second album, “It’s a Bit Complicated,” on Mute last month. It was launched with so-called “karaoke gigs,” when the band performed in several cities in the U.S. without Argos’ vocals leaving it to the public to sing.
Apart from Argos, Art Brut features Ian Catskilkin on lead guitar, Jasper Future on guitar, Freddy Feedback on bass and Mikey Breyer on drums.
Art Brut made its Russian debut at Moscow’s B1 Maximum in January, when it shared the bill with Maximo Park.
Meanwhile, an open-air concert by <b>Elton John</b> on Palace Square last week has been criticized for, well, bad weather. 
According to a member of the public, when heavy rain began, the audience hurried to open umbrellas and then climb on their chairs so there was no chance for anyone to see the stage. 
Concert-goers had paid between 1,500 and 15,000 rubles ($58-$580) for the pleasure.
On a darker note, Canada’s “electro-industrial” band <b>Frontline Assembly</b> will perform at Red Club on Saturday, which will be the last date for the venue that goes on vacation for the rest of summer.
Later this month, the British Council will bring a bunch of U.K. acts over for an event called <b>U.K. Flavours</b>.
A multi-national team of <b>Lily Allen, Mad Professor, Fun-Da-Mental, Dub Pistols, Misty in Roots</b> and <b>Tiger Style</b> will come to perform on the beach of the Peter and Paul Fortress on July 21. The event aims to promote tolerance in Russia, which is has seen a rise in hate crimes, xenophobia and racism. Tickets only cost 300 rubles ($12). 

<i>— By Sergey Chernov</i>

TITLE: Moving stories
AUTHOR: By Matt Brown
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The Third International Body Navigation Contemporary Arts Festival is underway, continuing its mission to explore the human body and its relationship to the environment around it with a series of events that combine dance, photography and music.
Unlike many apparently international festivals held in St. Petersburg, Body Navigation succeeds in bringing an array of artists from numerous countries to present their works and explore its central concept.
“The festival program presents a showcase of the latest experiments in media and movement… at the crossroads of visual arts, dance and performing arts, from Nordic countries, Europe, Asia and Russia,” the organizers write at www.bodynavigation.ru. “The festival benefits each artist involved, as well as the larger community of St. Petersburg. The dialogues begun during the festival continue, not only here in St. Petersburg, but in each of the countries represented.”
This year those countries include Australia with the presence of installation artist Lara O’Reilly and her “site specific” work “Absence Presence: Kronshtadt.” The film and performance takes place on Tuesday in an abandoned chapel on Kotlin Island in the Gulf of Finland where the fortified town of Kronshtadt is located. 
“‘Absence Presence: Kronshtadt’ is a continuation of a series of site-specific performance and film installations that take place on islands,” said O’Reilly in e-mailed remarks this week. “I work within abandoned spaces, built and natural, and usually located on islands, so Kronstadt provided the perfect canvas for me to create ‘Absence Presence.’
“I seek to compose highly experiential and dramatic experiences within the abandoned worlds. Through a spatial, temporal and theatrical exploration of the rupture/suture paradox between marine and terrestrial, past and present, the outside and inside, the remote and the intimate, of seduction and abandonment, experience and the underworld.”
O’Reilly previously staged the performance on Cockatoo Island in Sydney Harbour, Sydney Australia, an island with a similar history to Kotlin Island as a naval base and industrial zone. Now converted into arts venues, the buildings on Cockatoo Island resonate with Australia’s often violent early history in the 19th century. But the history of Kronshtadt offers violence and tragedy on a truly Russian scale: in 1921, disillusioned with Bolshevik tyranny, the crews of two battleships stationed at the garrison staged an uprising and issued demands for free elections. The Red Army was sent in and crushed the rebellion; thousands of people were killed.
O’ Reilly said she was acutely aware of Kronshtadt’s tragic history when she created her work. 
“This has been something which I have found most fascinating and in all of my works I am drawn to the embedded memory within the site,” she said. “The filmic sequences of ‘Absence Presence: Kronshtadt’ are primarily performed by the Russian model and dancer Olya, in the Konstantin Fort, the 300 year-old Kronshtadt Cemetery, and the Summer Gardens. These cinematic performances are overlaid with film sequences of ascending movement through the interior space of the chapel, conjuring the bodies of the victims of the revolutions that passed through.”
O’Reilly said the work transforms the chapel, beside the military hospital on Kronshtadt into “a memory world” with rooms occupied by suspended female bodies, veiled and lit in a sensuous light, to conjure emotions of sadness, loss, loneliness and reverie.
The live performance and film elements are combined with a live cello to reflect O’ Reilly’s interest in sound and technology. She notes that the Russian physicist Alexander Popov conducted early radio experiments on islands in the Finnish Gulf at the end of the 19th century.
There are other “site-specific” references in the work. For example, the dissonant montages of film footage O’Reilly has evoke early Russian filmmaker Dziga Vertov’s Kino-Eye cinema experiments. Vertov wrote in 1944 that the Kino-Eye is conceived as “what the eye does not see”, as the “microscope and the telescope of time, as telescopic camera lenses, as the X-ray eye.” 
In O’ Reilly’s island experiences, the catalogue for the work explains, the viewer “must cross a psychological threshold to enter the work, because like Eurydice’s mythic journey to the underworld, we must re-play the allegorical journey across the river Styx from the mainland onto the island and into a simulated netherworld.”
Tuesday’s performance, which is supported by Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, is just one event in the packed Body Navigation program. Sweden’s Robert Brecevic and Geska Helena Andersson bring “Men That Fall/ Women That Turn,” a video installation using the latest plasma screen technology to address gender issues installed at the popular new venue The Place on Marshala Govorova Ulitsa from Saturday through Tuesday. The Place is also the venue where Body Navigation holds its official opening event on Saturday. 
Earlier Saturday, at 1 p.m. on the Lebazhya Kanavka, a canal running alongside the Summer Garden and into the River Neva, one of Body Navigation’s most intriguing performances is set to take place. “You Cannot Deny It Just Might Happen,” by Norway’s Anne-Britt Rage, Gunnhild Bakke, Anneke von der Fehr and Rolf-Erik Nystrom takes the form of the three women artists trying to stand up in a canoe on the canal, to the accompaniment of live music performed on the bank.

“Absence Precense: Kronshtadt” takes place at the Chapel of the Naval Hospital, 2 Manuilskogo Ulitsa, Kronshtadt on Tuesday through 2 p.m. A special bus departs at 10 a.m. from Ploshchad Iskusstv (Arts Square) in central St. Petersburg. 
<i>www.bodynavigation.ru</i>

TITLE: A waltz in history
AUTHOR: By Shasta Kearns Moore
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Johann Strauss, Jr., the “Waltz King,” spent 11 summers in the mid-1800s entertaining St. Petersburg high society at Pavlovsk’s “musical train station.” 
Back then, in the new Vitebsky railway station in southern St. Petersburg, smartly dressed men and women rushed about to catch their trains. The women looked elegant in their fabulous evening gowns, puffed up and back-weighted in the latest 1850s fashion. Excitement ran high and everyone was preparing themselves for the short train ride to a grand evening of world-class music and dancing.
Johann Strauss, Jr. arrived in St. Petersburg at the start of an exciting new era in Russia. It was 1856 and the new tsar, Alexander II, had just announced the end of the Crimean War and promised new economic reforms and modern advances, including expansion of the nation’s railway lines.
On Oct. 10 1837, Russia’s first railway was inaugurated, running from St. Petersburg to Pavlovsk, a royal palace. The train station at Pavlovsk was nothing less than royal Russian extravagance, recalling London’s Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens — giving rise to the Russian word vokzal — a train station.
The magnificent terminus was called “The Musical Station” and was surrounded by a beautifully manicured park and it included among its many amenities a concert hall to seat one hundred.
Some years after its construction, the Russian railway company invited Strauss Jr. — the scion of an Austrian dynasty of composers — to play at the station. He arrived with a 26-man orchestra and played his first concert on May 6, 1856. And so began St. Petersburg’s 11 seasons of Strauss.
Strauss was instantly popular in Russia, especially among the ladies. Portraits of their idol were widely sold in bookstores, and jewelry shop windows carried rings and brooches with his image. Even uptown florists offered bouquets named after his waltzes. Strauss was, in short, the 19th century equivalent of a pop star.
One particular St. Petersburg lady was very taken with Strauss — and the feeling was mutual.
Olga Smirnitskaya, the daughter of a Russian bureaucrat, was a sensitive person with a talent for the piano and a composer of several romances. After she met Strauss in 1858, the young lovers employed adolescent strategies to keep their relationship a secret. They wrote notes to each other on candy wrappers and delivered them through mutual friends. Later, they would play hide and seek in a particular tree trunk in the park at Pavlovsk. The nearly a hundred letters written between them that exist today are wonderfully romantic.
Strauss’ compositions “Viennese Bonbons” and the remorseful “Parting with St. Petersburg” were inspired by Smirnitskaya and the love they shared.
Sadly, women of that era did not marry outside their social rank, even to composers as great as Strauss, and in 1860 the affair ended when her parents refused to sanction a union.
Despite this, Strauss was admitted to the highest levels of St. Petersburg society and was considered a friend of the Romanovs.
Tsar Nicholas I’s youngest son, Mikhail, himself a skilled musician, became very close to Strauss through their mutual passion for music. Tsarevich Mikhail even displayed his talent publicly, occasionally playing violin in Strauss’ orchestra at Pavlovsk. Several of Strauss’ compositions were written for or influenced by the Tsar and his family.
For example, Opus No. 107 was written for the occasion of Tsar Nicholas’ and his sons’ visit to Vienna in 1852. The piece is filled with good humor and was praised by the press for being a breath of fresh air from the normal pomp and circumstance that other composers  churned out for such occasions.
“The Coronation March” was the first of Strauss’ works to be played in Russia, written in honor of Tsar Nicholas II’s ascension to the throne and his September 1856 coronation.
But honoring the leaders of Russia was not always a politically wise decision.
Strauss’ homage to Tsar Alexander II, presented in 1864, came after a high-profile and unpopular massacre of nationalist revolutionaries in Poland. In Strauss’ hometown of Vienna, the homage would have outraged high society as a tribute to a monster, or worse, a tribute to the massacre itself. The piece was actually written for a concert benefiting Polish orphans and widows, but Strauss was still afraid of political backlash so the work was neither published or played in Vienna.
“Public Relations” often played a significant role in Strauss’ management decisions. The titles of several of the works he wrote for Russian audiences were changed when they were published in Austria to reflect Viennese tastes and attitudes.
Strauss could also be credited for bringing Pyotr Tchaikovsky to the world stage. While still in school as one of the first students of the St. Petersburg Conservatory, the young Tchaikovsky became a favorite of Professor Anton Rubinshtein. It was Rubinshtein who brought Tchaikovsky’s school project “Characteristic Dances” to Strauss’ attention. Strauss quickly recognized the budding genius in the piece and gave Tchaikovsky his first concert.
The envy of all his schoolmates, Tchaikovsky, who as a young boy was considered a worthless music student, conducted to the crowd’s delight.
From that moment forward, Tchaikovsky was destined to become one of the world’s most loved composers. Strauss’ 11 magical summers at Pavlovsk were ended with the composition “Russian March Fantasia.”
He was to have performed the piece during his 12th season in Russia but St. Petersburg’s fans never heard it. Strauss skipped out on the Russian capital and instead accepted an invitation from the “World Peace Jubilee” in the United States.
Strauss did not, however, consider the legal consequences of his change of plans, which ended up costing him dearly.
The Russian railroad authorities sued him in court for breech of contract. Though Strauss came back to Russia in 1869, 1872 and 1886, Strauss would never again play at Pavlovsk.
The Russian composer Mikhail Glinka took over the reins from Strauss and the Musical Station lived on until World War II, which brought the near total destruction of Pavlosk, including the main venue for the concerts, the station itself. During Soviet times, Strauss was still popular but slowly lost influence as his genre of music died out.
In 1999, however, a year declared by the Austrian government as the Year of Johann Strauss, the Musical Olympus foundation hosted a revival in St. Petersburg called “Remembering Johann Strauss.” The balls were held for only four years but were replaced by the annual Grand Waltz Festival which this year also celebrates the work of Polish composer Frederic Chopin (see box).
The interest in Strauss’ music in St. Petersburg is itself a sign of the great influence the Austrian composer had on the cultural and musical life of Russia.
Those 11 musical seasons facilitated a sentimental and cultural link between Vienna and St. Petersburg at a time when Russia was searching for European influence.
<hr><b>This summer is the sixth Grand Waltz Festival and concerts have been organized in venues connected to Strauss’ stay in Russia.  Besides the Hermitage Theater and the Armorial Hall of the Winter Palace, the public is invited to Pavlovsk, Peterhof and the Konstantinovsky Palace to hear symphony music, chamber music and recitals. Leading Russian and foreign performers are participating in the festival with the Hermitage and the Admiralty orchestras.</b>

<b>Yulia Kantor, Artistic Director, of the festival, said:</b>
“We imagined this Festival could be one more way to revive cultural traditions, the spiritual treasures that the Hermitage and the suburban palace museums have in common. The restoration of the Rose Pavilion, one of the venues where Strauss gave concerts, was the starting point. Then the festival spread to other palaces.”  

<b>Do you invite well-established performers or young musicians just starting their careers?</b>
“Our Russian and Western participants are experienced and well known musicians. Some of them are regulars with us, while others are new to Russian audiences. This year I recommend you pay special attention to German mezzo-soprano Ute Priev, who is a soloist with the Berlin Opera house, and to Polish pianist Karol Radziwonowicz. Our conductors are the well-known Russian musicians Vladimir Ziva, Vladimir Altshuller, Michael Sinkievich, Alexei Karabanov and Sergei Roldugin.”

<b>How does this year’s program differ from the previous festivals?</b>
“This year we want to underline the musical and cultural ties between Russia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It seemed logical to include works by Chopin and music by Viennese composers. When he came to Russia, Strauss traveled via Warsaw, where he stopped and performed. We have a recital of ‘Gypsy melodies,’ but they were arranged by Schumann, Brahms, Schubert and Tchaikovsky.”

<b>What other features are special about the festival? </b>
“Our ticket prices.  From the very start we decided to set prices accessible to everybody for whom this festival was created, namely teachers, medics, scientific researchers, the intelligentsia. That was our precondition.”

<b>A combination of smaller halls and affordable prices means that the festival cannot cover the expenses. How do sponsors feel about that? </b>
“Our general sponsor this year is Bank Moskvy. From the start they knew this is not a commercial project and that it cannot be one.”

<b>Arranging festivals of this level requires a lot of work. How do you manage?</b>
“I am responsible for the artistic direction, but the rest is done by Domus, an agency which does the administration, ranging from visas for foreign guests to transportation. We have successfully worked with them before.”

<b>Do the performers get paid?</b>
“Absolutely. This is not a charity project. It was stated so from the beginning. If you pay nothing, you are not in a position to make demands. We pay normal fees.” 

<b>Are you trying to please serious music lovers or people who want entertainment?</b>
“We are trying to strike a balance between popular music which is associated with Strauss’ name and unknown or less-known works which could attract professionals or serious music lovers. We are rather insistent in promoting this. For example, two years ago we put together a program of romances composed to poems by Olga Smirnitskaya, the woman Strauss was in love with. The hall was not full. We put this program on again and this time the hall was full. So our festival also has an educational goal which hopefully will bring us serious music lovers.”  

<b>Has the popularity of the festival increased or remained stable?</b>
“It grows. I was pleased when tourists from Novosibirsk called us, to ask where they can buy tickets for the whole series of concerts. People from Karelia and Arkhangelsk did the same. Many concerts are sold out.” 

<b>Does the festival still have ties with Vienna? </b>
“Certainly. Viennese musicologists help us to locate rare music scores and Viennese conductors show us their manner of conducting Strauss’ works. The schools are different.”

<b>Are Strauss’ descendants involved as well?</b>
“He did not have children. But his brothers did and yes, their descendants are involved. They are here now in the city and are attending our concerts.” 

<i>The Grand Waltz Festival ends on July 16.  See Stages section of the site for details. Tickets are on sale in city booking offices.</i>

— Larisa Doktorow

TITLE: Breaking through
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Local art-rock band Auktyon has achieved something that no other authentic Russian group has of late — it has grabbed the attention of the U.S. media. After performing at the globalFEST music event in New York in January 2006 and a subsequent U.S. tour, and recording an album in a New York studio with American musicians, the St. Petersburg band has burnished its reputation stateside. 
Auktyon has been described as “imaginative” and “emotional” (The Washington Post), “legendary” and “undefinable” (Time Out, New York), and “infectious” and “brilliant” (The Boston Globe).
From the start, Auktyon did not want to limit themselves to a Russian emigre audience, as has been the case with most Russian bands that tour the U.S., said Max Milendorf, Auktyon’s U.S. tour manager and executive producer of its latest album.
Even top Russian bands, from Akvarium to Leningrad, who regularly appear in the U.S. performing mainly to the Russian community with concerts advertised in the Russian emigre press and on Russian web sites, remain largely ignored by the regular U.S. media. 
Auktyon, however, had known better times when it represented “perestroika rock” to the general audiences in Western Europe, notably Germany and France, in the late 1980s.
“From the very beginning we had a good understanding with [Auktyon’s frontman Leonid] Fyodorov about the purpose of these tours and concerts,” wrote the Boston-based Milendorf in an email exchange.
“He was not interested in just being able to come to the U.S. and to play to Russian audiences.”
Although Auktyon’s performances at globalFEST, a two-day world-music event attended by many music industry insiders, were essential, the band’s American career started a long time before that, said Milendorf.
“During their first visit to the U.S. in 1997, by chance they ended up in Boston, playing a concert that was organized for them with a few days’ notice,” he said.
“That’s when I first met them, and, living in a huge apartment at the time, was able to house a few musicians for the night. After that we became friends, and in 1999 I began to plan their first major tour in the U.S. After that first trip in 1997 they came again for a couple of Russian festivals, but these trips were not planned in any organized way.”
The 30-year-old, St. Petersburg-born Milendorf, who moved to Boston with his parents in 1989 when he was 13, put together Auktyon’s first major U.S. tour, with about 10 concerts coast to coast in 2000.
“Of course the logistics of the tours required advertising mainly to the Russian crowds. It was expensive to bring 10 people from Russia for a three-week tour, so in order to cover expenses and make some money we had to play ‘Russian’ concerts in major cities. 
“But the ultimate goal was to find the right venues in the U.S. that would attract the ‘right’ audience; right in the sense that Auktyon understood it. I think their lengthy experience in Europe in the ’90s had developed in them a certain taste for a fresh and unsuspecting audience; the shocked reactions of the unprepared audience carried a unique atmosphere in itself; this is what attracted Fyodorov and the gang.”
Milendorf said that on all subsequent tours over the years the goal was to book venues that would have a certain cult following or a regular audience. At the same time the technical qualifications of the venue or equipment did not matter.
“We have had some of the best concerts in crappy little rooms with terrible sound, and some of the worst ones in state-of-the-art theaters with multi-million dollar sound equipment,” he said.
In 2003, Auktyon submitted the song “Den Pobedy” (Victory Day) to the International Songwriting Competition (ISC), and got an honorable mention.  Two years later, soon before Auktyon’s 2005 U.S. tour, Milendorf met the director of Joe’s Pub in New York, Bill Bragin.
“Joe’s Pub is one of the trendiest small venues in Manhattan, and a chance to play there was a major break for Auktyon,” said Milendorf.
“Also, Bill liked the music so much that he was very enthusiastic in trying to help us reach a wider audience. The concert there in 2005 already attracted some attention of the local press, and opened further doors for us.”
The booking agency Skyline Music offered their services, and later, record label Circular Moves also wanted to release a compilation of Auktyon’s music.
Auktyon then were invited to globalFEST — a major international festival in New York (co-founded by Bragin), with 13 showcases picked from all over the world, and it was the first Russian band ever to play there. The festival also coincided with a conference organized by APAP, the Association of Arts Presenters, which gathers music industry professionals each year to hear new acts. Prior to globalFEST, the band’s management had already secured the contracts with Skyline Music and with Circular Moves.
“The Circular Moves release of the [compilation album] ‘Pioneer’ was done by the president of the company, Edgar Betelu, who simply loved the music and wanted to release a CD in the U.S., regardless of his understanding of how difficult it may be to sell a band like this,” said Milendorf.
“Auktyon has never catered to any specific audience; the language barrier was there, but it certainly didn’t matter to the band, and it seemed not to matter to the English-speaking audiences. The release had certain difficulties associated with it, but this was the first Auktyon album that got national distribution in the U.S., and it was with this benefit in mind that it was created. It was certainly not a commercial enterprise in any way.”
The performance at globalFEST got the band more attention, but it was a meeting with Frank London that had a big impact, according to Milendorf.
“[Auktyon’s Russian manager] Sergei [Vasilyev] and me were going into globalFEST knowing that it was a unique opportunity to develop contacts in the music industry in the U.S. that could open new doors for us. With that understanding in mind, as soon as an acquaintance with Frank had developed, I told him that the band was interested in possibly recording an album in NYC, and asked whether he could be of any help. 
“Frank London, being who he is, got very excited at the idea, and immediately suggested bringing in more musicians to the recording. If you know who Frank is, you will understand, that he knows everyone. Literally. He suggested that Fyodorov and Co give him a list of 10-20 names of people that they dreamed of recording with, and even if he did not know them personally, he could put me in contact with them. The first name on my mind was Marc Ribot — Frank said, ‘no problem.’ He then suggested John Zorn. He also said that he could help find the studio, and would even produce the album.”
“This was very exciting, and I came back to Fyodorov and explained to him, that Frank London had suggested  recording an album in NYC with guest musicians. Fyodorov said that if this is the case, it would be great to get John Medeski. Some other names were floating around, but these were the major ones.”
“For the first time in many years Fyodorov got really hooked on the idea, and seemed to be committed to doing this. It was unclear at the time whether there was any music to record, or any new songs, but Fyodorov said that there would be.”
When contacted, Zorn replied that he was not participating in any outside projects then, but Medeski and Ribot were interested.
The globalFEST performance in January 2006 was followed by a tour that spring. It was the first tour for which a publicist was hired.
“Fyodorov was interested in being able to record the entire band live; in other words playing at the same time in one room, as opposed to laying each track individually. Therefore we needed a room big enough to accommodate nine people with a grand piano thrown in.”
The whole project almost died when Auktyon failed to get U.S. visas in time for the sessions originally scheduled in New York in June 2006. However, Milendorf managed to rearrange it for September. But by then producer Andres Levin, who was originally scheduled to work on the album and who suggested using Stratosphere Sound studio in Manhattan and an engineer he had worked with before, was not available.
“I was sure that we had missed a unique opportunity and that it would be impossible to line up the recording like this again,” said Milendorf.
“What’s more, I was afraid that Fyodorov was losing steam and would abandon the whole idea. But I was proven wrong — I was able to reschedule both Medeski and Ribot and the studio for September 2006. Unfortunately at that point Andres was not  able to produce; he promised to be at the studio at least for a day, and maybe help later with mixing the material. So we were on our own at this point.”
The bulk of the material was recorded in the four days that Ribot and Medeski were at the studio, according to Milendorf.
“They had never heard the music they were about to perform; Fyodorov would just take a guitar before each song and play them the melody; possibly explain the chord changes. Then everyone would play and it would be recorded. On many songs or parts of songs the very first takes are the ones that ended up being used. Some overdubs were done by Marc and John, and on later days by Auktyon. 
“But there was a clear understanding that we only had these musicians for four days, so everything would have to be done quickly. Eleven songs were recorded, and at the end of the fourth day there was about 1 1/2 hours left before John and Marc had to leave; so everyone jammed. That was also recorded and later mixed, and may see the light of day at some point. 
“During the recording Volkov suggested phoning a musician that he had played with before — Ned Rothenberg. He was available and was able to come the next day; and ended up doing a beautiful intro with shakuhachi [Japanese bamboo flute] on ‘Tam Dam.’ Frank London also stopped by, and recorded the wonderful solo on [the track] ‘Devushki Poyut.’ They also both played on ‘Debil.’ 
“The sound engineer who was working on the recording proved to be such a highly skilled professional and a sensitive musician that Fyodorov expressed the desire to come back to NYC in a few months to mix the album with him. The mixing was done in the same studio over a period of nine days — an unprecedented speed for Auktyon. For comparison, Fyodorov usually spends six or more months working on his or Auktyon’s recordings. It took more than a year to record and mix [the album] ‘Zhilets Vershin.’ This is not to suggest that ‘Devushki Poyut’ was sloppy or rushed in any way.”
Although Milendorf had been looking for a record label to distribute this recording in the U.S., he ended up selling it to international audiences via the Internet.
“I don’t have any illusion about being able to appeal to a huge audience with this kind of music. The band will continue to have a cult following, but the abysmal state of the recording industry may make it difficult to sell many copies of this album in the U.S.”
“Right now we are selling the album through mp3 services like eMusic, Napster, Sony, and are waiting for it to appear on iTunes. I think that this is a better strategy than looking for a label at this point,” Milendorf wrote in an email this week.
<i>www.auktyon.com</i>

TITLE: In the spotlight
AUTHOR: By Anna Malpas
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The tabloid Tvoi Den reported last week that pop singer and one-time Eurovision contestant Alsu formally joined United Russia, along with her businessman husband Yan Abramov. In a strangely Soviet-style ceremony — lavishly depicted in six photographs — the singer was given a bouquet and a plastic card featuring the Russian flag, which is probably very useful for waving at traffic police. 
She didn’t seem to get one of those flashing blue lights to put on her car, but then again she could always ask Daddy. It was a family affair for the impossibly glossy singer, since her father, Ralif Safin, is also a member of the party of the movers and shakers, representing Altai in the Federation Council. And if she ever needs a backing singer, her comrades should be able to help out: The party ranks already include popster Oleg Gazmanov, the whole of patriotic rock band Lyube, crooner Iosif Kobzon and bard singer Alexander Rozenbaum.
The Tvoi Den photospread showed Alsu wearing a sober black suit and carrying a satchel — rather as if she was off to school for the first time. The ceremony took place in a nasty meeting room with ceiling tiles and long net curtains. United Russia bosses in gray jackets raised their hands to admit her and her sheepish-looking husband, who was given a lapel badge. 
It all looked rather dull, but Tvoi Den reported that United Russia high-up Vyacheslav Volodin had them rolling in the aisles with a quip about how people used to have weddings organized by the Komsomol, but this was the first time that a married couple had joined the Yedinorossy together. And at least they won’t be arguing about politics, he added, as the gray suits split their sides.
Alsu told the meeting that she joined up because she is a “patriot of her country” — albeit one who spends a lot of her time in Britain and the United States, but who’s quibbling? She also talked of wanting to get involved in “the problems of young families and children.” She’s a young mother herself; her daughter, Safina, was born in Los Angeles last year at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, the glamorous hospital where Julia Roberts recently gave birth.
The announcement that Alsu was planning to join United Russia was officially made by the party last month, so the leadership is clearly keen to have a pretty young figurehead. 
Let’s face it, Gazmanov and Lyube are getting a bit wrinkly. She certainly is lovely looking, although promoting a party will be a bit more of a challenge than draping herself over billboards to advertise a brand of watches, as she did at one point. And I can imagine the single mothers getting a bit uppity when she starts talking about how fluffy the towels are at Cedars-Sinai. 
Still, she certainly knows how to party. Tvoi Den also gave a detailed report of her 24th birthday party at a restaurant in Moscow earlier this month. Guests, although presumably not the Muslim birthday girl, sipped Dom Perignon champagne and Kauffman vodka that cost $500 per bottle. Alsu’s gynecologist flew over from America to give her a painting and other guests brought Bulgari jewelry. She also had a cake in the shape of a heart that was so big the waiters had to push it in through the window.
The tabloid reported that the neighbors called the police because the music kept them awake into the small hours. But when the police officers arrived, they had to wait for half an hour outside the restaurant until a manager finally let them in. Don’t try that at home, not even if you have a little plastic card with a Russian flag.

TITLE: Broad strokes
AUTHOR: By Evgenia Ivanova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Gouache // 12 Vladimirsky Prospekt. Tel: 575 8852, 575 8847 // Open daily from noon until the last customer leaves // Major credit cards accepted // Menu in English and in Russian // Lunch for two (one alcoholic cocktail included): 2,355 rubles ($92)

The street that inspired Dostoevsky to write the first of his depressing novels and was home to Tolstoy’s famous suicidal heroine, Anna Karenina, Vladimirsky Prospekt now has something to smile about. Gouache, a restaurant that opened in January in the building of the Lensoviet Theater, offers extremely good dishes in elegant surroundings. 
The eatery has two floors. The first floor hosts an Oyster Bar, a place with a modern design and a cheaper menu than that of the restaurant proper, which is on the second floor. According to Internet chat, it is almost impossible to get in upstairs: the roomy but cozy restaurant is often booked for private parties. 
Our experience showed that even if you come to Gouache during the day, the staff are reluctant to offer you a place on the second floor anyway. What they are also reluctant to do is simply greet you. All gathered together near the bar area, they looked at us with a surprised gaze. After the waiters came back to life with the realization that someone indeed wanted to have a meal there, someone led us upstairs, through a stairwell dusted in golden sparkles, and into… heaven. 
Gouache represents a rare restaurant in St. Petersburg whose starched tablecloths of perfect white together with fanciful ceiling moldings don’t impose, frighten or bore but rather welcome the guest. Big windows, simple but refined table styling, and ambient music contribute to a relaxing atmosphere in which to enjoy great food. Great food but not drink. Given the heat, iced tea is currently a hit and is prepared in many local restaurants with a temptingly refreshing mix of tea, chunks of ice and various selections of herbs and fruit. But the 120-ruble ($4.70) iced tea in Gouache is a waste of money. It came warm, weak, and (as it turned out later) the mint wasn’t fresh. An Americano coffee (120 rubles, $4.70) and a Mojito for 180 rubles ($7), on the other hand, were too strong. 
However, all the dishes came beautifully decorated and tasted as if they were made of the freshest ingredients (a big achievement for St. Petersburg’s culinary scene) by someone with imagination and even a sense of humor. Carrot and saffron cream soup (130 rubles, $5), grilled shrimps (400 rubles, $15.70), duck breast with polenta (820 rubles, $32) and a halibut fillet with baked beets and puree of root vegetables (450 rubles, $17.70) were all worth trying — although in reality the fancy root puree appeared to be simply mashed potatoes. 
If Dostoevsky, observing Vladimirsky Prospekt from the window of his apartment, was once upon a time prompted to write “Poor Folk,” nowadays he’d more likely write a novel titled “Relaxed, Rich and Beautiful” with Gouache’s sleek atmosphere to inspire him.

TITLE: The Restoration Of a Unique Clock Completed
AUTHOR: Maria Zinchenko
TEXT: The musical clock was made in 1792 by English craftsman Eardley Norton and the Gravell and Tolkein company by the special command of Catherine the Great, and kept in the storage at the Hermitage until this week. 
It is made of bloodwood, gilded bronze and marble, with brass, steel, wood and even leather fittings. 
Among the melodies the clock plays are the British national anthem, a song, a march and a Russian dance. As the clock laboratory manager Mikhail Guryev said, the clock may be wound an indefinite number of times but the chiming can barely be heard without a microphone, because the sound of the original music is not louder than the spoken voice. 
Support for the restoration came from South Korean electronics company Samsung. At the opening of the exhibit, Lee Jae Hong, representing Samsung, a partner of the Hermitage for the past ten years, drew a parallel between his company’s reputation for technical innovation and the marvels of the restored clock.

TITLE: Slava's Snow Show
AUTHOR: Andrei Khalip
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: RIO DE JANEIRO — Russia’s most famous clown, Slava Polunin, says the key to his success is not his humor — but his cunning.

Dressed in a baggy yellow boilersuit and red shoes, he seems every bit the traditional clown at the start of his surreal production “Slava’s Snowshow” that has been staged in over 25 countries and more than 80 cities.
But Polunin takes the art of clowning to a different level as the lights go out, leaving spectators in pitch black until he appears on stage in a blaze of light with deafening, eerie music and huge fans blowing a blizzard of blinding, snow-like paper that engulfs the entire audience.
“I try to charge people positively. But I also show life is not plain. A tragi-comedy is a more perfect art form,” Polunin, 57, said during a Brazilian tour.
“The main thing is to create a fantasy space. I do it for grannies and children, intellectuals and nuts. Everyone gets a bit of what they want.”
Mixing alternative clowning with visual theater, tragedy with comedy, red-nosed buffoons with winged demons, Polunin has built an international franchise. He runs four international troupes in London, New York and Paris, as well as Moscow, where he is now a rare guest.
According to Forbes magazine, he was Russia’s fourth best-paid celebrity two years ago, earning $4.2 million.
Vyacheslav Polunin was born in a small town in Russia and started acting under the Soviet regime, giving up his plan to study engineering in Leningrad to join a mime studio.
He founded a theater company that became popular in the early 1980s for his heartwarming, eccentric pantomimes, which he dubbed “expressive idiotism,” and he managed to take clowning out of the circus and into major theaters.
But he made his name overseas following his first performance in Britain in 1988 and in 1989, when months before the Berlin Wall fell, he mobilized hundreds of clowns and performers for a so-called Peace Caravan across Europe.
Polunin says he basically cheated the Soviet state with his clowning to be able to do what he wanted.
“I’m sly and cunning ... When I understood that clowning slips away from responsibility before the state, I chose it as the best means to express myself freely. They don’t really hold fools responsible,” he said with a laugh.
“In those times I managed to perform at the very top -- in the Kremlin, on the state TV, at young Communist league concerts -- and be in the underground simultaneously. We had fantastic surreal plays in the theater, for which any other theater could have been closed with everyone going to jail.”
Polunin says his troupes also serve as clown schools and are full of foreigners, some of whom later join bigger international companies like Cirque du Soleil.
But he says he has never lost his Russian roots.
“Some critic in London wrote that if you want to see Chekhov, Dostoevsky and Tolstoy in one show, go to see those clowns. I guess they got it right,” Polunin said.

<i>“Slava’s Snowshow” recently completed a run at the Peter and Paul Fortress and it will next appear on tour in the U.K. in September. www.slavasnowshow.com</i>

TITLE: A rat’s tale
AUTHOR: By A. O. Scott
PUBLISHER: The New York Times
TEXT: The moral of “Ratatouille” is delivered by a critic: a gaunt, unsmiling fellow named Anton Ego who composes his acidic notices in a coffin-shaped room and who speaks in the parched baritone of Peter O’Toole. “Not everyone can be a great artist,” Mr. Ego muses. “But a great artist can come from anywhere.”
Quite so. Written and directed by Brad Bird and displaying the usual meticulousness associated with the Pixar brand, “Ratatouille” is a nearly flawless piece of popular art, as well as one of the most persuasive portraits of an artist ever committed to film. It provides the kind of deep, transporting pleasure, at once simple and sophisticated, that movies at their best have always promised.
Its sensibility, implicit in Mr. Ego’s aphorism, is both exuberantly democratic and unabashedly elitist, defending good taste and aesthetic accomplishment not as snobbish entitlements but as universal ideals. Like “The Incredibles,” Bird’s earlier film for Pixar, “Ratatouille” celebrates the passionate, sometimes aggressive pursuit of excellence, an impulse it also exemplifies.
The hero (and perhaps Bird’s alter ego) is Remy (Patton Oswalt), a young rat who lives somewhere in the French countryside and conceives a passion for fine cooking. Raised by garbage-eaters, he is drawn toward a more exalted notion of food by the sensitivity of his own palate and by the example of Auguste Gusteau (Brad Garrett), a famous chef who insists — more in the manner of Julia Child than of his real-life haute cuisine counterparts — that “anyone can cook.”
What Remy discovers is that anyone, including his uncultured brother, can be taught to appreciate intense and unusual flavors. (How to translate the reactions of the nose and tongue by means of sound and image is a more daunting challenge, one that the filmmakers, including Michael Giacchino, author of the marvelous musical score, meet with effortless ingenuity.) Remy’s budding culinary vocation sets him on a lonely course, separating him from his clannish, philistine family and sending him off, like so many young men from the provinces before him, to seek his fortune in Paris. That city, from cobblestones to rooftops, is brilliantly imagined by the animators.
And, as usual in a Pixar movie, a whole new realm of physical texture and sensory detail has been conquered for animation. “Finding Nemo” found warmth in the cold-blooded, scaly creatures of the deep; “Cars” brought inert metal to life. At first glance, “Ratatouille” may look less groundbreaking, since talking furry rodents are hardly a novelty in cartoons. But the innovations are nonetheless there, in the fine grain of every image: in the matted look of wet rat fur and the bright scratches in the patina of well-used copper pots, in the beads of moisture on the surface of cut vegetables and the sauce-stained fabric of cooks’ aprons.
Individually, the rats are appealing enough, but the sight of dozens of them swarming through pantries and kitchens is appropriately icky, and Bird acknowledges that interspecies understanding may have its limits.
Perhaps because animation, especially the modern computer-assisted variety, is the work of so many hands and the product of so much invested capital, we are used to identifying animated movies with their corporate authors: Disney, DreamWorks, Pixar and so on. But while the visual effects in “Ratatouille” show a recognizable company stamp, the sensibility that governs the story is unmistakably Bird’s. A veteran of “The Simpsons” and a journeyman writer for movies and television, he has emerged as an original and provocative voice in American filmmaking.
He is also, at least implicitly, a severe critic of the laziness and mediocrity that characterize so much popular culture. He criticizes partly by example, by avoiding the usual kid-movie clichIs and demonstrating that a clear, accessible story can also be thoughtful and unpredictable. “Ratatouille” features no annoying sidekick and no obtrusive celebrity voice-work, and while Remy is cute, he can also be prickly, demanding and insecure.
Moreover, his basic moral conflict — between family obligation and individual ambition — is handled with unusual subtlety and complexity, so that the reassurances and resolutions of the movie’s end feel earned rather than predetermined.
And while the film buzzes with eye-pleasing action and incident — wild chases, hairbreadth escapes, the frenzied choreography of a busy kitchen — it does not try to overwhelm its audience with excessive noise and sensation. Instead Bird integrates story and spectacle with the light, sure touch that Vincente Minnelli brought to his best musicals and interweaves the tale of Remy’s career with beguiling subplots and curious characters.
Since no Parisian restaurant will let a rat work in its kitchen, Remy strikes a deal with a hapless low-level worker named Linguini (Lou Romano), who executes Remy’s recipes by means of an ingenious (and hilarious) form of under-the-toque puppetry. Linguini’s second mentor is Colette (Janeane Garofalo), a tough sous-chef who unwittingly becomes the rodent’s rival for Linguini’s allegiance. Even minor figures — assistant cooks, waiters, a hapless health inspector — show remarkable individuality.
At stake in “Ratatouille” is not only Remy’s ambition but also the hallowed legacy of Gusteau, whose ghost occasionally floats before Remy’s eyes and whose restaurant is in decline. Part of the problem is Gusteau’s successor, Skinner (Ian Holm), who is using the master’s name and reputation to market a line of mass-produced frozen dinners.
Against him, Remy and Bird take a stand in defense of an artisanal approach that values both tradition and individual talent: classic recipes renewed by bold, creative execution. The movie’s grand climax, and the source of its title, is the preparation of a rustic dish made of common vegetables — a dish made with ardor and inspiration and placed, as it happens, before a critic.
And what, faced with such a ratatouille, is a critic supposed to say? Sometimes the best response is the simplest. Sometimes “thank you” is enough.

NB: In Russian cinemas the film is dubbed into Russian by Russian actors.

TITLE: GOP Unity Fraying Over Iraq
AUTHOR: By Anne Flaherty
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: WASHINGTON — With both houses of Congress debating war-related legislation, lawmakers awaited the Bush administration’s assessment Thursday of political, economic and military progress made by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s government.
The report comes at a time when sharp divisions over the next course in the nearly 4 1/2-year-old war have frayed Republican unity on Capitol Hill, not to mention civility.
“Wimps,” House GOP leader John Boehner called Republican defectors in the Senate — a growing breed as public opinion polls chart ever-deepening opposition to the war and a climbing U.S. casualty count 16 months before the 2008 elections.
Administration officials said in advance the new assessment amounts to a mixed review of al-Maliki’s government. It concludes among other things that the Iraqis have failed to pass long-promised laws that the administration has called key to national cohesion and economic recovery, such as legislation that would fairly divide Iraq’s oil resources.
But officials also said the report would cite progress in several areas, such as a drop in sectarian killings in Baghdad and opposition to al-Qaida terrorists by tribal sheiks in Anbar province.
Predictably, Democrats say the findings are proof the war effort is failing, while Republicans say the limited progress shows hope and that lawmakers should not lose faith.
Boehner, Republican of Ohio, made his “wimps” remark in a private meeting Wednesday with rank-and-file Republicans — ironically at nearly the same moment that several GOP senators beseeched the White House without apparent success for a quick change in course on Iraq.
“I’m hopeful they (White House officials) change their minds,” Senator Pete Domenici,., said after a meeting that President Bush’s national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, held with several Republicans in the Capitol.
Domenici and several other GOP members, including Senators Richard Lugar of Indiana and George Voinovich of Ohio, say they want Bush to begin reducing the military’s role in Iraq. In the meeting, Hadley said Bush wants to wait until September when General David Petraeus, the Iraq war commander, will reassess military progress.
Emboldened by the Republican divide, Democrats called for a vote on legislation to end U.S. combat operations next year. The House planned to vote first on Thursday.
Boehner spokesman Brian Kennedy said the lawmaker’s comments “were intended to illustrate the fact that we just recently voted to give the troops our full support — including ample time for the Petraeus plan to work, and that too much is at stake for Congress to renege on its commitment now by approving what can only be described as another partisan stunt by Democrats.”
A senior U.S. official familiar with the report’s conclusions said it would assess Iraq’s progress toward congressional benchmarks in three main categories: completed, partially completed and those that show limited or no progress.
Most of the bigger and more difficult issues, the ones that the Bush administration has said were key to Iraq’s national cohesion and economic future, likely would fall into the partially completed category, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

TITLE: Woods’ Carnoustie Prayer
AUTHOR: By Tony Jimenez
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: LONDON — Tiger Woods, who will be chasing a hat-trick of British Open victories next week, is praying the Carnoustie venue will be easier than it was eight years ago.
With a reputation as the toughest on the British Open rota, the narrow fairways and deep rough on the Scottish course caused the players grief throughout the 1999 edition.
Conditions were particularly difficult on the first day when a stiff wind blew and the average score was seven-over-par.
“It was really hard,” Woods told reporters at the invitational tournament he hosted in Bethesda, Maryland last week.
“I’ve never played a golf course as hard as that course was set up and as unfair as it was set up as well.”
The world number one believes the Royal & Ancient (R&A) organisers will avoid making the same mistake this time.
“I think they probably learned a lesson from that set-up,” said Woods. 
“I played two Scottish Opens there, in 1995 and 1996, and I thought it was one of the best golf courses I’ve ever played. Lo and behold, we came back in 1999 and it was not that way any more.”
The R&A have extended the par-71 layout to 7,421 yards, 60 yards longer than the record set eight years ago.
Three holes have been changed.
The par-four third has been redesigned, new bunkering brought in on the long sixth and subtle recontouring carried out by the driving area at the par-four 17th.

TITLE: Funeral Held for Slain Cleric in Pakistan
AUTHOR: By Khalid Tanveer
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BASTI ABDULLAH, Pakistan — The captured chief cleric of the Red Mosque was allowed to lead funeral prayers for his slain brother Thursday, and forecast that the death of the mosque’s militant defenders would push Pakistan toward an “Islamic revolution.”
The army crackdown on the radical mosque has raised the standing of President General Pervez Musharraf among moderates and foreign backers worried about rising extremism in Pakistan.
But it has given hard-liners a rallying point, new martyrs to mourn and has prompted calls from al-Qaida and Taliban for revenge attacks.
Troops combing the Islamabad mosque and its adjoining seminary for girls found Abdul Rashid Ghazi’s body among the remains of at least 73 people after the 35-hour commando assault ended Wednesday.
The remains of dozens of militants were lowered into temporary graves in the capital early Thursday.
Officials released Ghazi’s body directly to his relatives, who carried it to his ancestral village in Punjab province for burial on Thursday.
Police escorted Maulana Abdul Aziz, who was caught during the eight-day siege while trying to flee disguised as a woman, to Basti Abdullah so that he could lead the prayers at his brother’s funeral at a seminary set up by his father.
The brother took over the running of the Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, in the capital after their father’s assassination in a sectarian attack in 1998.
“Hundreds of our mothers, sisters, sons and daughters have rendered sacrifices,” Aziz, a gray-bearded man dressed in white clothes and a checkered head scarf, said before leading prayers attended by about 3,000 people.
“Whatever happened in the past days is not hidden from anyone. God willing, Pakistan will have an Islamic revolution soon. The blood of martyrs will bear fruit,” Aziz said calmly.
“We can let our necks be severed but we cannot bow down before oppressive rulers. Our struggle will continue. There are many Ghazis living to be martyred,” he said.
About two dozen police commandos led Aziz into the madrassa compound and escorted him back after the funeral prayers and drove him away in a white police pickup truck.
Several female relatives of Ghazi dressed in black veils flashed victory signs to reporters as police escorted them to a waiting car after the funeral.
Some 700 police, including 100 plainclothes officers, were deployed for security at the gathering, area police chief Maqsoodul Hassan Chaudhry said.
According to official reports, 106 people died in eight days of fighting around the Red Mosque and its adjoining seminary for girls, which had challenged the government with an increasingly aggressive anti-vice campaign in the capital.
Officials said the dead included 10 soldiers, one police ranger and several civilians killed in the crossfire of the initial street battles that erupted July 3.
After the government cleared the compound of its die-hard defenders Wednesday, Al-Qaida’s deputy leader joined the militant outcry against Musharraf, calling on Pakistanis to wage holy war to avenge the army assault.
In a video message, Ayman al-Zawahri told Pakistanis their president “rubbed your honor in the dirt.”
Ghazi’s death was a “dirty, despicable crime” that can “only be washed away by repentance or blood,” said al-Zawahri, who is believed to be hiding near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
The bodies of about 70 of Ghazi’s militant followers were buried early Thursday in a graveyard near Islamabad’s police academy.
Momin Agha, a city official, said 69 bodies, including those of three minors, were buried.

TITLE: Argentina Makes Copa Final
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: PUERTO ORDAZ, Venezuela — Argentina routed Mexico 3-0 in the Copa America on Wednesday and set up a rematch of the 2004 final against defending champion Brazil.
In fact, Sunday’s match will be the 10th final between the soccer powerhouses in the 91-year history of the South American championship. Brazil’s victory in a penalty shootout three years ago in Peru was its first over its archrival in a Copa final.
“It’s the last link in the chain and playing in a classic derby against Brazil is the greatest,” said Argentina coach Alfio Basile. During his previous stint in charge, he led Argentina to championships in 1991, over Brazil, and 1993.
After a pressure-filled opening in Puerto Ordaz, a charging Gabriel Heinze lifted his left leg high and toed in a Juan Roman Riquelme free kick for Argentina’s first goal in the 44th minute.
After halftime, Riquelme fed Lionel Messi, whose marvelous lob inside the area arched over the outstretched hands of Mexico goalkeeper Oswaldo Sanchez to double the lead after 61 minutes.
“It was something only the superstars do — an extraordinary feat that moved everybody,” Basile said.
The goal was the second in the tournament for the 21-year old forward from FC Barcelona, whose sprinting hip-shaking antics have endeared him to Venezuelan fans, who in almost every match chant “Messi, Messi.”
Riquelme scored his fifth goal of the tournament five minutes later from a penalty for a foul on Carlos Tevez.
“There’s nothing left but to recognize the superiority of Argentina,” Mexico coach Hugo Sanchez said.
Argentina travels to Maracaibo for Sunday’s final against Brazil, which knocked out Uruguay 5-4 on penalties after they finished regulation 2-2 on Tuesday.
Argentina brought its European-based stars to Venezuela to claim its 15th Copa title and break free from its tie with Uruguay for the most titles.
Strong offensive performances by Messi, Riquelme and Tevez have allowed Argentina to score a tournament-best 16 goals while racking a perfect 5-0 record.
By contrast, Brazil has brought a mostly younger team which rebounded from a tournament-opening defeat to Mexico.
Brazil has won three of the previous four tournaments.
The Albiceleste haven’t won the Copa since 1993.
Mexico plays Uruguay for third place on Saturday in Caracas.

TITLE: South Korea Exchanges Oil To Close Nuclear Reactor
AUTHOR: By Jae-Soon Chang
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: SEOUL, South Korea — A shipment of oil headed Thursday to North Korea in exchange for the expected shutdown soon of the communist nation’s only working nuclear reactor, which would be the first step by Pyongyang to stop making atomic bombs in nearly five years.
The chief UN inspector, Mohamed ElBaradei, said he expects the agency’s monitoring of the shutdown of the North’s Yongbyon reactor will start “early next week” and the initial inspection is expected to be completed “within a maybe month or so.”
“I expect that operation to move smoothly,” ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said in Seoul of the visit by inspectors to North Korea expected to begin Saturday. “I am quite optimistic that this is a good step in the right direction.”
A South Korean ship — the 6,750-ton No. 9 Han Chang — departed for North Korea from the port of Ulsan on South Korea’s southeast coast, carrying an initial batch of 6,200 tons of heavy fuel oil being given to the North for its agreement to shut down Yongbyon.
The ship was expected to arrive Saturday in the North’s northeastern port of Sonbong and will take some 48 hours to unload.
North Korea, after refusing to go forward with the accord for months due to a banking dispute with the U.S. government, strongly hinted last week that it would undertake the long-delayed shutdown as soon as it receives an initial shipment of oil aid.
The shipment is part of 50,000 tons promised for the reactor shutdown, and the North would get an additional 950,000 tons of energy aid if it disables all its nuclear facilities under a February deal with the U.S., China, Japan, Russia and South Korea.
If the North shuts down Yongbyon, it would be the first move it has made to scale back its atomic weapons development since the nuclear standoff began in late 2002. In the first months of the crisis, Pyongyang kicked out UN monitors and restarted Yongbyon.
Tensions in the standoff climaxed with the North’s first-ever nuclear test in October last year.
ElBaradei said that beyond these initial moves, the North’s eventual entire abandonment of its nuclear facilities would be a “long process” that would depend on progress at the six-nation disarmament talks.
“We should not delude ourselves,” said ElBaradei, who was attending an international atomic technology conference in Seoul. “It will take time to have a comprehensive solution.”
On Wednesday, he had said it was unclear when the North would actually switch off the reactor.

TITLE: Russia Without Sharapova At Fed Cup
AUTHOR: By Mark Meadows
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: CASTELLANETA MARINA, Italy — Russia will be missing Maria Sharapova and maybe their coach for this weekend’s Fed Cup semi-final against the United States while defending champions Italy face a daunting task against France.
World number two Sharapova has pulled out of the U.S. clash in Stowe, Vermont saying she was not match fit having initially agreed to make her Fed Cup debut in the hardcourt semi.
Sharapova has been suffering with a shoulder injury since April but Russian tennis officials have accused her of being selfish and questioned whether her American entourage had influenced the decision.
Russia’s Fed Cup captain Shamil Tarpishchev could also be forced to miss the tie after he said he had been denied a U.S. visa.
Tarpishchev has asked the International Tennis Federation (ITF) to move the tie to a neutral country and even considered boycotting the event.
“The Americans always like to talk about human rights and democracy but they are the first ones to deny others the same rights,” he told Reuters.
A spokesperson for the U.S. embassy in Moscow said Tarpishchev’s visa application was being processed by U.S. authorities in Washington.
By contrast, the American team is on a high after Venus Williams triumphed at Wimbledon for the fourth time on Sunday, beating Sharapova on the way.
Venus and sister Serena are both likely to compete despite picking up injuries at the All England Club, with Lisa Raymond and Vania King making up the quartet.

NO BARTOLI
In the other semi on Castellaneta Marina’s clay, France visit Italy without Wimbledon singles runner-up Marion Bartoli after captain Georges Goven turned down her request to be accompanied by her father and coach, Walter.
Goven picked Amelie Mauresmo, who lost her Wimbledon crown when she was beaten by Nicole Vaidisova in the fourth round, as well as Tatiana Golovin, Nathalie Dechy and Severine Bremond.
Italy, who hammered China 5-0 in the Fed Cup quarters in April, know they will have to play substantially better than they did at Wimbledon if they are to have the chance of defending their title in the final in September.
Francesca Schiavone, Tathiana Garbin, and Roberta Vinci were dumped out in the second round while Mara Santangelo lost in round three to Mauresmo, whom she could face again over the Saturday and Sunday programme.
“I really want to be part of the adventure, and help the girls reach the final,” Mauresmo told www.fedcup.com. “Fed Cup could be a good way for me to get going; I love the team spirit of it.”

TITLE: Looking Fantastic 
On Plastic
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: MOSCOW — Moscow’s Luzhniki Olympic stadium will stage Russia’s Euro 2008 Group E qualifier against England, the Russian Football Union (RFU) said on Wednesday.
“Yes, the match will be played at Luzhniki and it is now 99.9 percent certain that it will be held on a synthetic pitch,” a spokesman for the RFU told Reuters.
Initially, the Russians also included the 30,000-seat Lokomotiv arena as a possible venue for the October 17 qualifier before deciding on the 84,000-seat Luzhniki, the site of next year’s Champions League final which will be played on grass.
“[Russia coach] Guus Hiddink also wanted the England match to be played on natural grass but I don’t think it would be possible to lay out the grass turf in time for the game,” the spokesman said.
The two sides also meet at Wembley on September 12.
Croatia lead Group E with 17 points from seven matches, with Russia in third place on 15 points and England in fourth, a point behind.

TITLE: Formula One - No Stranger to Spying
AUTHOR: By Alan Baldwin
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: LONDON — Formula One teams have always kept a close eye on rivals, eager for any gain that might make their cars go quicker, but the current ‘spy’ controversy goes well beyond that.
As McLaren team boss Ron Dennis explained at the British Grand Prix last weekend, there is a clear dividing line between what is generally considered acceptable and what is evidently illegal.
“I remember with great amusement locking another team’s aerodynamicist, who was measuring and photographing parts of our bodywork, into the back of our truck,” Dennis recalled of one past incident. “And you could say that was over the limit.
“Equally, many photographers are commissioned to take detailed photographs of other people’s cars — and we take detailed photographs of other people’s cars,” added Dennis.
“And that is probably within the accepted practices in grand prix racing.
“There are unwritten limits to which everybody should adhere and clearly these (latest allegations) exceed all previously known occurrences.”
The case involving McLaren’s chief designer Mike Coughlan, suspended last week after a house search found a significant quantity of confidential Ferrari technical information, has been the talk of the paddock.
There have been allegations of sabotage, denied by former Ferrari engineer Nigel Stepney who has also rejected suggestions that he and former Benetton colleague and fellow-Briton Coughlan were acting together.
The courts will unravel the full story but, whatever the outcome, few if anyone in Formula One will have been surprised by data leaking from one team to another.
“You cannot stop it. As long as human beings are around, it will always be there,” former champion Niki Lauda said of paddock espionage. “These things happen, in big car manufacturers and everywhere. It’s logical.”
The last such incident happened in 2002 when Ferrari took legal action against two of their engineers who had moved to Toyota, whose subsequent car aroused suspicions.
Earlier this season, Spyker principal Colin Kolles presented a Red Bull document to try and demonstrate the illegality of that team’s car.
Formula One is a sport where people have been known to start rumours just for fun, to see how long it takes before the whispers come full circle. There is a constant exchange of information.
At the Canadian Grand Prix some years ago, then team boss Eddie Jordan related how he had been given a digital photograph of a race engineer’s sheet taken by somebody peering down from the Paddock Club above.
The Paddock Club is an exclusive area reserved for VIPs, sponsors and special guests.
In those days, teams covered up their race cars and erected screens in front of the garages to keep out the photographers’ lenses.
But there is little teams can do when designers and top technical staff are headhunted other than impose a period of ‘gardening leave’ before they start their new jobs.
“You cannot un-invent things,” said Dennis. “People move with all the knowledge and inevitably that knowledge is going to appear, sometimes with great perfection and accuracy, on other grand prix cars.”