SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1368 (32), Friday, April 25, 2008
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TITLE: Governor Short On Specifics
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Contradictions abounded in this year’s annual address delivered by Governor Valentina Matviyenko to the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly on Wednesday.
Matviyenko’s speech received a predictable welcome from the pro-Kremlin United Russia faction that holds the majority in the city parliament. 
However the speech was slammed by the Communist and Just Russia factions of the assembly for containing an overdose of wishful thinking, lacking consistency and balance, and failing to give details of a credible program of social reforms. 
Matviyenko brought a customary sense of pomp and pride to the presentation.
“Throughout the past year, Russia’s northern capital has been striving to strengthen its reputation as an international business and cultural center: the level of the 11th International Economic Forum was unbelievably high; the Mariinsky Theater’s anniversary became an event of international significance; the world’s sports elite flocked to the city to attend the award ceremony of the Laureus prize,” Matviyenko told the parliamentarians on Wednesday.
These opening lines were pounced on by critics who said the city government did not have a role in the events mentioned by the governor.
“What really drew international attention to St. Petersburg was actually shameful: Western media across the globe covered the crackdown and unjustified police violence against opposition protesters and the attempts to close the European University,” said Boris Vishnevsky, a member of the political council of the democratic party Yabloko. “And these are the issues that the city government is responsible for.” 
Calling 2007 the most prosperous year in the city’s recent history, the governor said she was proud to announce that the average salary in St. Petersburg has increased to 16,788 rubles ($700). 
The governor also urged St. Petersburgers to have more children. 
“A child, rather than a fancy car, must become the key criterion of a successful individual,” she said.
Oleg Nilov, head of the Just Russia faction, was disappointed by the address which he said failed to demonstrate an effort to improve living standards in the city.
“Behind the pomp and big plans it is hard to see that the government cares for its residents,” Nilov said. “For instance, Matviyenko was very specific in her plans to support sports but many other bits of the speech were lacking consistency or were simply overlooked. I am especially concerned about no special attention being devoted to socially vulnerable groups that depend the most on state support.”
Matviyenko praised her cabinet for succeeding in making St. Petersburg a tourist-friendly and safe city and stressed — indirectly criticizing the city’s cultural institutions — that it is a lack of events in the city that keeps visitors away.
But according to a recent survey conducted by the Northwestern branch of the Russian Tourism Industry Union, the main obstacle that stops foreign tourists from coming to the city is expensive travel and accommodation. Personal safety concerns have also been high in the past several years.
Two new human rights reports released in February 2008 by the Sova Center and the Moscow Bureau for Human Rights argue that the numbers of hate crimes in Russia look set to increase in the near future, with St. Petersburg keeping its notorious status as a hotbed of xenophobia.
Vladimir Dmitriyev, head of the Communist faction in the city parliament, expressed reservations about the content of the address.
“Even if half of what the governor was talking about was fulfilled, it would be a wonderful achievement but I am afraid that most of her promises are going to remain on paper,” the lawmaker said. “What troubles me most is that the governor tended to confuse facts with wishful thinking.”
After she finished her speech, Matviyenko left the parliament without offering the lawmakers a chance to ask questions. Some parliamentarians took it as a sign of disregard.
“The deputies would have had a much better understanding of the direction and the prospects of the city government’s policies,” Dmitriyev said. “Apparently, our opinions do not count.”

TITLE: Talks With EU Stall Due to Lithuanian Veto
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: MOSCOW/BRUSSELS — European Union efforts to agree a long-delayed mandate for partnership negotiations with Russia stalled again on Thursday despite a prediction of imminent agreement from Luxembourg’s prime minister.
Diplomats said Lithuania maintained its veto on starting the talks to demand assurances on energy supplies, cooperation over a missing businessman and Russian movement on frozen conflicts in former Soviet republics.
Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker said in Moscow he expected the 27-nation EU would overcome 18 months of internal divisions and agree to start talks on a new partnership deal with Russia within days.
“I do know that in Poland, in Lithuania, maybe elsewhere, there are great or small reluctancies, but I think that these will be sorted out in the next coming days,” Juncker said in an interview before talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
However, diplomats in Brussels said no progress was seen at a meeting of EU ambassadors on Thursday and there was scant prospect of the bloc’s foreign ministers breaking the deadlock when they meet next Tuesday.
“It could take until June,” one EU diplomat said, predicting the mandate may be approved just in time for an EU-Russia summit with President-elect Dmitry Medvedev in Siberia on June 26-27.
Russia’s ambassador to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, voiced concern last week that the EU was allowing the negotiations to be taken hostage by new member states that were once Soviet satellites and bore a grudge against Moscow.
The negotiations, covering trade, economic development, energy, human rights and political cooperation, were due to have been launched in November 2006 but Poland vetoed the mandate after Moscow barred imports of fresh food products from Warsaw.
Poland recently dropped its reservation after Russia lifted the embargo.
But Lithuania has widened its concerns from a cut-off of Russian oil supplies to its refinery, to the disappearance of a businessman in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad and Russia’s relations with the ex-Soviet republics of Georgia and Moldova.
Juncker is the longest-serving prime minister within the EU and is considered a crucial player amongst the exclusive club of 27 leaders. He is also the chairman of the euro-zone group of finance ministers.
“I do think that the European Union and Russia do need the strategic partnership and I would like the negotiations to take a real start under the Slovenian presidency,” Juncker said, referring to the current holder of the EU’s rotating presidency.
Juncker said he had a good working relationship with Putin and had been invited to meet his successor, Medvedev, who will be sworn in as Russian President on May 7. Putin is expected to serve as his prime minister.
“My impression is Mr. Putin did a good job in the sense that he was stabilizing Russia and the Russian state and I am among those who are grateful to him for having done this,” he said.
Medvedev said they must discuss both security issues and the new partnership deal.
“We live in a single, European home. We have much to talk about, both in this area, on the question of signing a new agreement, and ensuring European security,” Medvedev said.
When he then met Putin, Juncker said he believed in the importance of linking Russia to Europe.
“I have always believed that Russia is a part of the European architecture and I was always certain that we need a strategic partnership,” Juncker told Putin.
“After my lengthy meeting with the president-elect, I am absolutely sure there will be continuity in our relations.”

TITLE: Georgia Wants Russian Presence Out of Abkhazia
AUTHOR: By Margarita Antidze
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: TBILISI — Georgia said on Thursday it would seek Western support to replace Russian peacekeepers in the breakaway province of Abkhazia with an international force, but NATO struck a cautious note.
“Russia’s presence, the presence of the Russian contingent in the conflict zone, is becoming a risk factor,” Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili told a meeting with foreign ambassadors broadcast by national television.
“We plan to start intensive negotiations with countries that are Georgia’s friends about the expediency of the Russian peacekeeping contingent’s presence in the conflict zone,” he added.
Russia sent peacekeepers to Abkhazia in 1994 after it brokered a deal between Tbilisi and Abkhaz separatists ending nearly two years of war in which thousands of people died and hundreds of thousands were made refugees.
Since then, Tbilisi has accused Moscow of backing the separatists. The row over Abkhazia and another breakaway region, South Ossetia, has become the most difficult issue in Georgia’s thorny relations with Russia.
The fate of Abkhazia and South Ossetia has become a major bargaining chip in Moscow’s efforts to prevent Georgia, ruled by a pro-Western government since 2005, from joining NATO.
Georgia wants Russian peacekeepers to be replaced by a Western force. Russia says it has responsibility for the security of its citizens, which now make up the majority of residents in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
“I cannot say that NATO is looking for a direct role in peacekeeping or in dealing with conflicts in this region,” Robert Simmons, the NATO Secretary General’s special envoy for the South Caucasus and Central Asia, told a news conference.
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his government to establish close ties with the two rebel provinces. Saakashvili said the move amounted to annexation of the two regions by Russia.
Earlier this week, Saakashvili accused Moscow of an act of aggression against Georgia, saying a Russian fighter plane had downed a Georgian unmanned plane over Georgian territory. Russia has rejected the accusations.

TITLE: Web Site to Provide  Pirated Personal Data
AUTHOR: By Tai Adelaja
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Time was when getting your hands on an individual’s income, property and telephone numbers required a trip to a nearby kiosk to buy pirated discs containing illegal databases.
But now one web site is offering a one-stop, online database providing extensive confidential information about Russian citizens to anyone with a computer and an Internet connection.
Radarix.com, a self-styled private detective web site registered in the United States, claims to carry three terabytes of personal data on citizens of Russia and former Soviet republics.
“Our area of activity is extensive. It does not stop with helping people search for their relatives and close friends, which by itself is invaluable,” reads an e-mail sent to users who register with the site. “Only our system can help many people avoid the fate of victims of deception and criminal machinations.” 
The e-mail is signed by Serzh Kovalenko, identified as the development director for Radarix Group.
The site, which as recently as last week was providing individuals’ home and cell phone numbers, license plate numbers and tax numbers, among other data, has sparked outrage among senior lawmakers and highlights the government’s tenuous ability to keep citizens’ private data from seeping into the public domain.
Last week, for example, users could log in and find details about real estate and the fleet of cars owned by legendary pop diva Alla Pugachyova, as well as her tax number. 
But at least two individuals were off-limits for web surfers: President Vladimir Putin and President-elect Dmitry Medvedev.
A filter on the site rebuffed attempts to access their personal information with an automated message that read: “You are requesting for information that is closed to public access.” 
“This is hardly surprising, since the private lives of those two individuals have long become public knowledge,” said Anatoly Baranov, editor of the popular web site Msk-forum.ru. “But the good gesture may be a ploy to keep the site afloat a little longer.”
Exactly how long is unclear. As of Wednesday, access to the database was blocked. Attempts to reach the site’s operators for comment were unsuccessful, and it was unclear if or when the database would again be accessible.
Personal data ranging from vehicle registration to residential addresses have long been freely available on pirated discs across the country. 
“However, by opening shop on the Internet, Radarix.com puts at everyone’s fingertips personal information that used to require at least some trips to the market or local kiosks,” said Yelena Kolmanovskaya, chief editor of Yandex.
But even at a pirated disc shop, customers looking for comprehensive private data on an individual have to purchase several discs containing databases from various ministries and government agencies. At Radarix.com, dozens of databases have apparently been merged into one giant data repository.
Because authorities have failed to combat the open sale of such information at markets and kiosks, it is logical to expect the data to end up on the Internet sooner or later, Kolmanovskaya said.
Anton Nosik, one of the pioneers of the Russian Internet, said Radarix.com posed little threat because much of the data is old and available anyway on pirated discs.
The site could have been set up by a former security service or government official “with the aim of making a quick buck,” said Nosik, who added he had registered with and browsed the site.
It is unclear exactly how Radarix.com planned to profit with its database.
Valery Komissarov, head of the State Duma Information Policy Committee, called Radarix.com “a disgrace” and vowed to call on the relevant government agencies to take immediate action against the web site.
He echoed Nosik’s assessment, however, saying “the information in the database is 100 percent old.”
“Years ago such sites could lay their hands on fresh data but not this time,” Komissarov said. “The government now tightly controls confidential information about our citizens after we passed the law on personal data last year.”
Komissarov said the site “must have been set up by those wanting to discredit Russia or portray authorities as lax.”
“It is more of a one-off provocation than a mass phenomenon,” he said.
Experts say Radarix.com has been a constant source of frustration for authorities, who have been unable to close the domain or block access to it because it is registered in the United States.
Baranov, the editor of Msk.forum.ru, said authorities would have to coordinate with U.S. authorities in order to close Radarix.com. “There are laws to fight unauthorized distribution of personal data, but lack of expertise has made it impossible for officials to close the site,” Baranov said, adding that authorities had made “only timid efforts to fight it.”
It was unclear whether a criminal case had been opened. Irina Zubareva, a spokeswoman for the Interior Ministry’s high-tech crimes department, said she could not comment because prosecutors are “dealing with the Radarix.com issue.”
She declined to say whether Russian authorities had contacted their U.S. counterparts regarding the web site.
Repeated calls to the Prosecutor General’s Office for comment went unanswered Wednesday.
Under the Russian criminal code, “illegal collection or distribution” of confidential information about individuals is punishable by a fine of up to 200,000 rubles, one year of community service or up to four months in jail.

TITLE: Government Calms Foreign Investors
AUTHOR: By Miriam Elder
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — A senior government economic official on Wednesday urged foreign investors not to fear new legislation that limits foreign investment in the country’s most strategic, and lucrative, sectors and asked them to give it time to work.
The bill, passed by the State Duma earlier this month, aims to ensure majority state control over 42 strategic sectors, including energy, aerospace and telecommunications.
“Don’t be scared of this law, but approach it with the belief” that it will one day run smoothly, Deputy Economic Development and Trade Minister Stanislav Voskresensky told a investor conference hosted by the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia. “I don’t think it will work efficiently from the first day. We need time.”
In addition to codifying the rules for foreign investment, the bill also aims to cut down on official corruption, Voskresensky said, by enshrining the investment process in clear legislation. Yet he went on to say that the bill should not be considered too literally.
“The law names 42 formal sectors, but really it includes just five to seven, namely those related to the military-industrial complex,” he said.
Voskresensky failed to elaborate, but AmCham president Andrew Somers said after the conference that five sectors were key — military, energy, metals, telecommunications and aerospace.
Somers praised the bill, which now just has to be signed by President Vladimir Putin to become law, as “a positive step,” but added, “In Russia — in all countries, but especially Russia — it’s all about implementation.”
Voskresensky, 31, a former economic adviser to Putin who was appointed a deputy minister in February, said the law would cut down on corruption.
“We want clear rules of investment so that investors do not need informal relations with state officials,” he said.
“All big foreign investors here carry out a roadshow, but not in front of foreign investors — in front of state officials,” he said.
President-elect Dmitry Medvedev has named fighting corruption a key task.
Yet an anti-corruption drive promoted by Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov last fall has produced few results aside from the detention of Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak, who is accused of embezzling state funds in what colleagues and analysts say is a politically motivated campaign.
Conference participants on Wednesday consistently singled out corruption at all levels, as well as a shrinking qualified labor force, as the biggest impediments to doing business in the country.
Billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, who is battling pressure to sell his stake in oil firm TNK-BP, sat quietly as Voskresensky extolled the virtues of the strategic sectors legislation, which aims to bring transparency to the investment climate.
In the last month, TNK-BP, half-owned by British oil major BP and half by billionaires Vekselberg, Len Blavatnik and Alfa Group’s Mikhail Fridman and German Khan, has seen its head office raided, an employee arrested and its main oil field investigated by state environmental authorities amid market speculation that a state-controlled firm hopes to buy into the company. 
On Wednesday, TNK-BP said it was facing new back tax claims, and Gazprom said it was growing impatient with drawn-out negotiations with the British-Russian firm over Kovykta, a huge prospective gas field in eastern Siberia. (See story, page 6.) 
Sidestepping the issue of TNK-BP’s troubles, Vekselberg told the conference that he “remained an optimist” about Russia’s ability to recover from the stagnating oil production that hit the industry this year. 
Yet he warned that extraction tax cuts proposed by the Finance Ministry last month would have to be drastically increased to ensure a growth in future production. The ministry has proposed raising the taxation exemption bar to $15 per barrel, from the current $9.

TITLE: Putin Pays Tribute to ‘Unique’ Yeltsin
AUTHOR: By Anna Malpas
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin called Boris Yeltsin “one of the most striking politicians of the 20th century” as he honored the former president at the unveiling of a new monument at his grave Wednesday, the first anniversary of Yeltsin’s death.
Family members and politicians, including President-elect Dmitry Medvedev, Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov, Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov and the director of the Federal Security Service Nikolai Patrushev, attended the ceremony at Yeltsin’s graveside in Novodevichye Cemetery.
The new monument was created by sculptor Georgy Frangulyan in the form of the Russian tricolor flag, which was reintroduced by Yeltsin.
“It is proper that his tombstone is covered with the Russian state flag — the tricolor, the national flag of Russia, which was returned by Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin to our history, our country and our people,” Putin said.
Channel One news showed Putin appearing to fight back tears as he watched Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Alexy II bless the monument.
“Boris Yeltsin traveled a difficult path as a politician and a citizen and in the course of his life often found himself faced with a complex choice, based on principles,” Putin said during the ceremony. “But his path was as unique as the fate of our country — a country which passed through unprecedented transformations and severe shocks, but which defended its statehood and its right to free, independent development.”
Among those in attendance were Yeltsin’s political contemporaries, including the former president of Kyrgyzstan, Askar Akayev, former Russian prime minister and now Russian Ambassador to Ukraine, Viktor Chernomyrdin, UES chief Anatoly Chubais and the first president of Ukraine, Leonid Kuchma.
While these leaders, along with Yeltsin, were part of a period that has been heavily disparaged in recent official rhetoric, Putin stressed Yeltsin’s positive qualities during the troubled period.
“The stormy 1990s were a time of rapid change and bold, gifted people — personalities capable of going against the tide, who called for new aims and led the masses with them,” Putin said. “Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin, without any exaggeration, belonged to this outstanding constellation.”
Yeltsin’s widow, Naina, and one of their daughters, Tatyana Yumasheva, laid roses at the stone memorial.

TITLE: Soyuz Reports Anger Russian Space Agency
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: The Federal Space Agency on Wednesday denied media reports that the lives of a crew returning from the international space station were in danger during their unusually rough ride in a Soyuz capsule on the weekend.
“This is nothing but a smear campaign,” agency spokesman Alexander Vorobyov said.
On Tuesday, a Russian space official told Interfax that the crew of the Soyuz capsule, which landed in Kazakhstan hundreds of kilometers off-target, was in serious danger.
The official said the capsule entered the atmosphere improperly, hatch-first instead of with its heat shields leading the way, Interfax reported. As a result, the hatch suffered significant damage.
“The fact that the entire crew ended up in one piece and uninjured is a great success. Everything could have turned out much worse,” the official said. “You could say the situation was on a razor’s edge.”
Kommersant reported that the crew — South Korea’s first astronaut, Yi So-yeon, U.S. astronaut Peggy Whitson and Russian flight engineer Yuri Malenchenko — could have died. A “well-informed” space industry official said the capsule’s hatch had almost been burned through, but the capsule for some reason reversed its orientation to continue its descent with the heat shields leading, the paper reported. If the hatch-first descent had continued, the capsule’s parachutes could have also been destroyed, causing the craft to slam against the Earth at an enormous speed, the source said, Kommersant reported.
The three-person crew was subjected to forces of about eight times those of Earth’s gravity for up to two minutes. Normal Soyuz returns generate G-forces of about five. 
The crew endured such severe gravitational forces because the craft took a steeper-than-usual re-entry, called a “ballistic trajectory.”
The Interfax source said the TMA-11 capsule’s antenna burned up on entry.
The space agency’s Vorobyov confirmed there had been problems, saying the Soyuz hatch and the antenna suffered partial burn damage but that this was a common occurrence when capsules re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere. 
Vorobyov insisted that the capsule could not have entered the atmosphere backward, as the hatch side is lighter than the side where heat shields are located. “The laws of physics would have made it impossible” for the capsule to descend in that position.
The Federal Space Agency spokesman described as “incompetent” the sources for the story that the crew was threatened and accused of them of trying to tarnish the image of Soyuz capsules as reliable craft to discourage NASA from buying them.
Agency officials say they hope NASA will start buying launches of two Soyuz-TMAs per year in order to facilitate U.S. participation in the international space station once the U.S. agency discontinues the use of shuttles.
The landing was the second straight — and the third since 2003 — in which something went awry with the Soyuz’s return. The space official quoted by Interfax said this signaled problems with the Russian space program. 
NASA associate administrator for space operations William H. Gerstenmaier said the U.S. space agency was not aware that there had been any danger to the crew, although it had not asked if the crew was at risk.
AP, SPT

TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: <b>Tambov Mayor Charged</b>
MOSCOW (SPT) — Prosecutors have formally charged Tambov Mayor Maxim Kosenkov with kidnapping in connection with the abduction of a Ukrainian man in Moscow, Interfax reported Wednesday. 
The purported victim, identified only by his last name — Baby — was kidnapped March 26 on Ulitsa Borisovsky Prudy in southwest Moscow and taken to Tambov, where he was held captive at Kosenkov’s home, authorities said.
Police detained Kosenkov, who faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted, on April 17 after he arrived in Moscow to attend the party conference of United Russia, of which he is a member. 

<b>Kazakhs Detain Suspect</b>
ALMATY, Kazakhstan (Reuters) — Kazakh police have detained a man wanted in neighboring Uzbekistan on suspicion of taking part in a riot in the Uzbek town of Andizhan in 2005, a Kazakh police spokesman said Wednesday.
The West condemned Uzbekistan in May 2005 for its handling of the Andizhan events, where witnesses said hundreds of people were killed when state troops opened fire on unarmed protesters. Uzbekistan blamed the violence on Islamist rebels. 
Kazakh police said Wednesday that the Uzbek man, detained Sunday in Almaty during a raid on his apartment, is accused at home of taking part in acts of terror in Andizhan.

TITLE: Inchcape Inks Deal to Buy Musa Motors
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: LONDON — British-based car retailer Inchcape  has agreed to buy Russia’s Musa Motors Group for up to $700 million to tap the country’s fast-growing luxury car market, it said on Thursday. 
Inchcape, whose main markets are currently Australia, Belgium, Greece, Hong Kong, Singapore and Britain, said it was buying 75.1 percent of Musa Motors for an initial $200 million. 
It will pay a further sum, depending on Musa’s performance in 2008, of up to $250 million, and then buy the remaining 24.9 percent stake after 2010 for up to a further $250 million. 
Moscow-based Musa Motors is one of Russia’s top ten car retailers, and in the top three for sales of premium brands such as BMW, Jaguar and Rolls Royce. 
It sold 13,281 cars in 2007 and 3,222 cars in the first quarter of this year, a 53 percent increase on the same period of the year before. 
Russia’s car market is growing rapidly, fuelled by rising disposable incomes for the country’s middle class, and Inchcape said it would use the deal as a platform to expand into the regions outside Moscow and St Petersburg. 
Inchcape said the deal would immediately boost earnings, and that it would pay for it from existing resources.

TITLE: Lenta Partners Agree
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Lenta’s warring shareholders seem to have finally come to an agreement after Alexei Bobrov replaced Vladimir Senkin as general manager of Lenta LLC, and changes were made to the board of directors of Lenta Ltd.
According to a statement made by the supermarket chain this week, a new agreement means that August Meyer and Dmitry Kostygin will replace Loren Bough and Greg Lykins as members of the board. A new independent director will be introduced when shareholders approve a candidate.
As a result the board will include seven people, the other members being Oleg Zherebtsov, Vladimir Senkin, Mikhail Leshchenko and Sevki Acuner.
Commenting on the decision, Vladimir Senkin said that for a long time he had planned to resign from the management team and become an independent investor. Now that the shareholder conflict is settled, he will realize this goal, he said.
Senkin claimed that the conflict between Meyer and Zherebtsov should improve Lenta’s resistance to negative factors.
“Despite disputes over the development of Lenta, they always managed to find a compromise. The current situation was complicated by the difficult choice of a development strategy for Lenta and sources for its funding,” Senkin said.
Senkin said that during his tenure, Lenta had continued to operate as usual. In January-March this year Lenta sales reached the planned figure of 11.5 billion rubles ($488 million).
Until now Alexei Bobrov had been director for development and construction at Lenta. Bobrov said that under his supervision, Lenta will continue its expansion into Russia’s regions, opening 11 new stores this year.
Before June this year Lenta will open new stores in St. Petersburg, Ryazan, Krasnodar and Novosibirsk, and more will open later this year in Naberezhnye Chelny, Rostov-na-Donu, Novosibirsk, Krasnodar, Saratov, Penza and Omsk.
In 2009, Lenta will open stores in Ufa and the Volgorodskaya Oblast. “We have already announced the acquisition of land plots for new construction in Krasnoyarsk and the Moscow Oblast,” Bobrov said.
Lenta invests about $20 million into each new store. The company currently operates 26 stores, including 13 in St. Petersburg. Over the next three years the company plans to open about 15 new stores every year.
“Recently we decided to open a new kind of store. In addition to our own stores, we will rent space in existing shopping centers,” Bobrov said.
According to the agreement, the shareholders will cooperate on raising funds for Lenta’s development. However, the new general director did not specify what sources of funding would be used. One of the options that has been discussed is an IPO.
“I am truly glad to say we have come to an agreement which is acceptable to all sides,” said August Meyer. However Meyer did not comment on whether or not he plans to retain his stake in the company if Lenta holds an IPO.

TITLE: RusAl Begins Takeover Bid By Acquiring Norilsk Stake
AUTHOR: By Yuriy Humber
PUBLISHER: Bloomberg
TEXT: MOSCOW — Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska’s United Co. RusAl acquired 25 percent of GMK Norilsk Nickel worth $13.4 billion, the first step in a potential takeover of the country’s biggest mining company.
RusAl, the world’s largest aluminum producer, acquired the shares from Onexim Group, an investment company controlled by billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, Moscow-based RusAl said Thursday in a statement. Onexim received 14 percent of RusAl and a cash sum supported by a $4.5 billion loan the aluminum company arranged. RusAl said in December it intended to seek a full takeover.
A combination of both companies would have about $25 billion in sales, produce 12 percent of the world’s aluminum and more nickel and palladium than anyone else. It may create Russia’s third-largest company by market capitalization after Gazprom and Rosneft, and challenge BHP Billiton Ltd. and Rio Tinto Group as a diversified metals producer.
“I find it difficult to believe that Norilsk minority shareholders will benefit,” said James Beadle, who manages about $200 million in bonds and stocks including Norilsk at Pilgrim Asset Management in Moscow.
“We will establish our relationship with the company’s management and other shareholders based on the principles of partnership and contribute to the growth of the company’s value in the interests of all shareholders,” RusAl Chief Executive officer Alexander Bulygin said in the statement.
Deripaska may now seek to persuade Vladimir Potanin to sell his stake of about 30 percent. Separately, Potanin has pushed Norilsk to begin talks with Metalloinvest on a possible combination. Metalloinvest, controlled by billionaire Alisher Usmanov, is Russia’s largest iron ore producer.
RusAl has nominated four people to the Norilsk board, including Deripaska and RusAl investor Viktor Vekselberg.

TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: <b>McDonald’s to Expand</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — McDonald’s plans to increase the number of its restaurants in Russia to 233 restaurants by the end of 2008, Interfax reported Tuesday.
McDonald’s will open 40 new restaurants this year. Last year the company opened 21 restaurants in Russia, investing 1.5 billion rubles ($64 million). In addition, the company renovated ten restaurants at a total cost of $5 million.

<b>X5 Seeks Extra Funding</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — X5 Retail Group plans to raise over $1 billion by issuing new shares, the company said Tuesday in a statement.
The funds are being raised for the acquisition of Karusel retail chain (Formata Holding) estimated at $970 million. X5 Retail will issue 48.1 million GDRs (global depositary receipts), each equivalent to 0.25 percent of a share. The new GDRs will be sold until May 2, 2008, at a cost of $21.32 each.

TITLE: Merger Helps Exigen to Increase Its Turnover
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Dranitsyna
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The merger between Exigen Services and StarSoft Development Labs has brought expected benefits, managers said Thursday at a press conference. Over the last year, turnover of the companies, which united under the name of Exigen Services in January 2007, increased by 40 percent to more than $70 million.
In the near future the company will open new R&D centers in Russia and abroad, including a center in Asia.
“From 2003-2006, StarSoft grew by 74 percent a year and turnover increased from $3 million to $20 million. Then we were faced with a lack of sales representatives in the EU, and a lack of marketing professionals. We needed resources and technologies for development, and so we looked for a partner,” said Nikolai Puntikov, president of Exigen Services for Eastern Europe.
As a result of the merger, the unified company inherited Exigen’s sales force in its U.S. headquarters, development centers in the EU and new technology, while StarSoft contributed its Russian development centers and its expertise in “agile software development.”
Exigen Services focuses on software outsourcing and system integration, providing solutions for the financial, health, telecommunications and entertainment industries.
Last year Exigen attracted new clients including Deutsche Bank, Standard & Poor’s and British Telecom, and this year America’s largest insurance company, Nationwide, also became an Exigen client.
Exigen Services operates 17 offices in total. Half of its turnover last year came from seven research centers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. New centers were opened in Minsk and Nizhny Novgorod. The St. Petersburg office employs about 700 people.
“We will expand our presence in Russia. We will keep growing. Soon we will open a development center in Asia,” Puntikov said. He did not specify the location.
Besides introducing American management standards to regional offices, Exigen now applies a new approach to software development, which the managers labeled “Outsourcing 2.0.”
“The traditional IT approach doesn’t work — we had several rather horrific failures, and it could not continue,” said David Webb, vice-president of Exigen Services EMEA.
He described the traditional approach as mailing piles of documents and specifications to the cheapest software developer available. A lack of feedback and collaboration and the isolation of IT and business teams do not allow for effective work, he said.
Instead of this approach, Exigen uses “fast planning” and face-to-face meetings with clients, Webb said.
“Exigen is growing at a normal rate — 40 percent is the average growth for the industry,” said Svetlana Vronskaya, director for corporate communications at Reksoft. She indicated, for comparison, that Reksoft turnover increased by 98 percent last year up to $22.6 million.
Vronskaya regarded Luxoft as the largest Russian software outsourcer. Last year Luxoft reported turnover of $105 million, and on Tuesday it announced the opening of an office in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam.
“Growing wages in Russia make competition in the outsourcing market tougher for Russian companies. Having an office in Vietnam will increase our competitiveness compared to traditionally strong Indian developers,” said Dmitry Loshchinin, president and CEO of Luxoft.
Other experts said that expenses are not the only factor to consider.
“The cost of opening a new R&D center in a developed region of India would be incomparably higher than in a peripheral city in China. In either case, costs would be lower than the cost of opening a similar center in St. Petersburg. But St. Petersburg offers other advantages that make it a popular city for software development,” Vronskaya said.
Another expert agreed that every location has its advantages. “The office next to ours belongs to an American company that has a development center in the Philippines. When they decided to make their own product, they opened a center in St. Petersburg,” said Mikhail Zavileisky, chief operational officer at DataArt.
Zavileisky said that DataArt had investigated opportunities in Vietnam and found that the cost of opening an office there could be 20-30 percent lower than in St. Petersburg.
Along with Luxoft, Zavileisky listed Epam as one of the largest companies operating in Eastern Europe and Russia.
Zavileisky said that Exigen’s increased turnover resulted both from organic growth and the merger, and that it would be difficult to separate those effects. 
As for DataArt, he indicated that its business grew 70 percent last year, and 30 percent since the beginning of 2008.

TITLE: Gazprom Threatens To Revoke Kovykta License
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — Gazprom warned Wednesday that its patience was running out in the talks to finalize the purchase of Kovykta from TNK-BP, saying the government could simply seize the license for the huge field from the besieged Russian-British venture. 
“We can’t wait forever,” Gazprom deputy chief executive Alexander Medvedev said at a news conference. “We have received a signal from the Natural Resources Ministry. If things keep going the same way, they can return to the question of revoking the Kovykta license.” 
TNK-BP chief executive Robert Dudley said three weeks ago that he hoped the companies would conclude the long-delayed deal by the end of this month. Medvedev’s remarks hinted that little, if any, progress had been made. 
The Natural Resources Ministry confirmed that it was unhappy about the delay. “If the issue isn’t resolved in the near future, the ministry will consider applying sanctions,” ministry spokesman Nikolai Gudkov said. 
Requests for comment from TNK-BP were not answered by press time, while a spokesman for BP in Moscow, Vladimir Buyanov, said BP wasn’t involved in the Kovykta talks and referred questions to TNK-BP. 
In June 2007, Gazprom agreed to buy a 63 percent stake in Rusia Petroleum, the company that holds the rights to develop Kovykta, at a price to be determined in the next 90 days, but that deadline has repeatedly been moved back. 
Gazprom valued the stake at no more than $800 million, but Dudley said earlier this month that TNK-BP was seeking close to $1 billion. 
Medvedev and Gudkov said Wednesday that Rusia Petroleum was still in breach of the license terms for the field. The Kovykta deal in June came as the government was closing in on revoking the license on the grounds that Rusia Petroleum had been unable to meet production targets. 
TNK-BP said at the time that it would not have been able to sell that much gas locally. It bought the field in the hope of exporting gas to China, but a federal law later blocked that option. 
Medvedev’s comments came as TNK-BP confirmed new back tax charges Wednesday, the latest in a series of problems the company has faced. 
Medvedev’s other comments Wednesday were about a delay in the launch of Russia’s first plant to liquefy natural gas, which is part of the Sakhalin-2 project. LNG deliveries will start early next year, he said. The previous plan was to send the first shipments in the third quarter of this year, he said. 
A contract that Sakhalin Energy, the project operator, signed with Japan’s Hiroshima Gas in 2006 envisioned that deliveries would start in summer of 2008, according to a statement posted on Sakhalin Energy’s web site. 
Medvedev didn’t elaborate on the reasons for the delay. A spokeswoman for Gazprom Export said she had no further information. 
Gazprom entered Sakhalin-2 as a majority owner last April. Maxim Shub, a spokesman for Shell in Russia, the project’s second-largest shareholder, insisted that construction of the LNG plant was going according to schedule and would be commissioned by year’s end.

TITLE: Crime And Punishment
AUTHOR: Editorial
TEXT: Judges from the Golovinsky District Court have probably presided over quite a few puzzling cases in their careers. But the case of U.S. Pastor Phillip Miles must have seemed particularly strange to observers and the general public, if not to the judges themselves. 
Two months ago, the 57-year-old pastor at the Christ Community Church in Conway, South Carolina, decided to bring a gift for a friend living in Perm. His idea for a present was 20 hunting rifle rounds. 
What was he thinking? 
After all, there is probably no country in the world that allows outgoing or incoming passengers to carry undeclared ammunition, whether for hunting rifles or other firearms. 
The decision by the court on Monday to convict Miles of smuggling came as no surprise, but the fact that he was given such a severe sentence — three years and two months — is unfathomable. It is hard to believe that someone who is clearly not a serious criminal would be sent to prison for more than three years for bringing in a box of bullets. Individuals who have been found guilty of stealing large sums of money from state coffers cause much more harm to society than those bringing in undeclared goods, and they usually spend less time in jail or are even given suspended sentences. 
Perhaps Miles was given such a harsh punishment to send a signal to other Western pastors that they are not welcome here, where the Russian Orthodox Church is jealously guarding its flock. 
Or perhaps he received such a severe sentence to provoke him to ask for a presidential pardon, in which case President Vladimir Putin can score another high-profile PR victory. Putin has done this before, when he pardoned Edmund Pope, another U.S. citizen, who was convicted of the much more serious crime of espionage and given a far lengthier sentence. 
We can only hope that Miles will be allowed to return home quickly, either through presidential pardon or after an appeal. 
We also hope that the judges and the judicial system in this country, where more than 99 percent of criminal cases result in convictions, will one day be guided by the basic judicial principles of fairness and equity, under which the punishment fits the crime.

TITLE: Cold But Profitable
AUTHOR: By Andrew Cahn
TEXT: Imagine a huge and diverse country bordering the European Union yet spanning 11 time zones — one with a developing and dynamic market, an annual growth rate of about 7 percent over the last eight years and a growing and increasingly affluent middle class. If the country didn’t happen to be called Russia, British businesses would already be climbing over each other to gain access. 
Nonetheless, the balance of business calculations over the past few years has shifted in the country. If the main question used to be, “What risks are we taking by being in Russia?” it is increasingly being replaced by, “What risks are we taking by not being in Russia?” 
Given the well-publicized vicissitudes in British-Russian relations, Moscow might be surprised by my bullish view on doing business here. But despite all of the negative publicity about Russia in the British and other foreign media — TNK-BP’s recent visa difficulties being the latest example — exports of goods from Britain to Russia went up by 37 percent last year. In particular, business for British firms involved in the financial services sector is booming. The largest global accountancy and law firms don’t know how to recruit enough qualified staff into big enough offices. This is hardly surprising given that in 2007, in value terms, about one-quarter all the IPOs in London were from Russia. 
Russian growth is being driven not only by high oil prices but by the growing number of entrepreneurs who have decided to leave their Rust Belt factories and set up small businesses. Decisions like those are transforming Moscow into one of the most dynamic cities on the European landmass. If British companies are not impressed with where Russia is now, think about where many economists expect the country to be in 20 years. After all, there is plenty of inefficiency and excess capacity still left to be squeezed out of the remnants of the Soviet economy.  Most foreign companies don’t need to be convinced that if they want to grow, they have to be active in India and China. All too often, however, when I mention Russia to these companies, brows furrow. The country somehow seems colder and more, dare I say, “foreign.” As far as cold is concerned, I can understand, but foreign? Take a look at a map. For all of its historical uniqueness, Russia is still a variant on a European theme. 
In all fairness, some recent Russian actions almost seem as if they are designed to generate bad press. Improving PR starts with improving behavior, but undoubtedly Russia is open for business. 
Of course, it is not all good news coming out of the country. Inflation is a big worry, for example. Like all rapidly developing emerging markets, there are likely to be bottlenecks and uneven sector performance. And it is not always the easiest place for foreign companies to do business. There are still important issues, such as gaining access to markets, but developing the long-term relationships necessary to do business in the country requires time, effort and patience. Most in the British business community will be able to tell a story or two about the complexities of dealing with Russian bureaucracy, but in the next breath they will often tell of high profit margins and hard-working, capable and well-educated Russian colleagues. 
Perhaps it would be better to pay less attention to the front pages and more attention to the business sections of leading newspapers. Companies should explore the market and develop business relationships. Yes, bureaucracy and corruption remain problematic, but the country is going through one of the most exciting and vibrant periods of its history. This is an excellent opportunity to get into Russia. If you don’t do it now, you’ll probably have to do it in the next decade or two anyway. 

Andrew Cahn is CEO of UK Trade and Investment, a British government organization.

TITLE: Kadyrov Is the Better of Two Evils
AUTHOR: By Yulia Latynina
TEXT: Modern Chechnya, like France under Louis XIV, is going through the final stage of its centralization. The latest victim in that process is the Vostok battalion commanded by Sulim Yamadayev. Vostok is an elite Defense Ministry unit that reports to the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff. Not counting insurgents in the mountainous regions, the unit, headed by Sulim Yamadayev and his two brothers, Ruslan and Badruddi, is the only significant group in the republic not controlled by President Ramzan Kadyrov. 
Here is how the present conflict unfolded: On Sunday, two soldiers from the Yamadayev camp died when their vehicles collided with cars driven by Kadyrov loyalists. Such accidents are a typical occurrence in Chechnya, where drivers regularly ignore every street sign except the roadblock. 
On Monday, Badruddi Yamadayev, who is Sulim’s younger brother, and several Vostok servicemen set out for the burial of their comrades. (Badruddi Yamadayev should really be serving a 12-year jail term for attempting to murder a senior Moscow health official. But his brothers managed to take him back to Chechnya, where he is serving his sentence and assuming the unofficial role of deputy commander of Vostok.) 
On the way to the funeral, the Yamadayev cortege collided with Kadyrov’s motorcade of 50 cars traveling at high speed. This prompted Badruddi Yamadayev to open fire. His bodyguards pulled the pins on their hand grenades and stood ready to throw them. Observing all of this, Kadyrov stepped out of his car and exchanged hugs with Badruddi. You have to admit, it would not have been right for Kadyrov to arrest Badruddi for such a trifle as firing on the presidential convoy when the man was on his way to a funeral. 
Kadyrov has persistently hounded the Yamadayevs, his main strategic impediment. Although the Yamadayevs once controlled all of Gudermes, the town gradually came under Kadyrov’s control; the Chechen president even established his personal residence there. Furthermore, Kadyrov arranged for Ruslan Yamadayev to be replaced on the ticket of pro-Kremlin party United Russia in the December State Duma elections in an effort to further sideline the Yamadayev clan. 
When Kadyrov rebuilt Chechnya, he became the virtual owner of the republic, with the Yamadayev brothers remaining as field commanders. 
The party is not, as some believe, about to begin. It is nearing its end. In this deadly game of chess, Kadyrov waited until his opponent had only two pawns left on the board before he began to play. 
Kadyrov’s opponents always run to Moscow for help whenever they have a problem. But Moscow has no interest in helping them. The siloviki sell out every Chechen that they have bought in the past. When former Chechen President Alu Alkhanov’s personal bodyguard, Alikhan Mutsayev, was gunned down in Moscow, federal law enforcement agencies turned a blind eye to the murder. But what was really shocking was that even Alkhanov remained silent. 
Lastly, Kadyrov does not just take a dominating position in Chechnya’s affairs. He starts conflicts only when he sees that his opponent is in an indefensible position. After all, nobody will ever have much sympathy for Badruddi Yamadayev, who has a nasty habit of shooting at presidential motorcades, not to mention a senior Moscow health official. 
Despite its setting in the Caucasus, this is more a story of political strategy than of an isolated shootout after a car accident. This story illustrates that the surest way to defeat your opponent is to gain the strong upper hand. Since Kadyrov runs the show in Chechnya, you have to agree to his terms to get anything done in the republic. But things could be much worse. After all, if Kadyrov were to be swept from power, Islamic extremists could easily take his place. Imagine having to agree to their terms. In the end, it is better to agree to Kadyrov’s terms than to Osama bin Laden’s. 

Yulia Latynina hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio.

TITLE: I’m Spartacus
AUTHOR: By Olga Sharapova
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Tuesday’s premiere of a new production of the classic ballet Spartacus at the Mikhailovsky Theater is not just another opening of another show but an important event for cultural life in St. Petersburg. After all, the director of the ballet, Georgy Kovtun, says that it should be “suicide” to stage Spartacus in St. Petersburg because every new version is compared to the legendary original staging at the Mariinsky Theater by choreographer Leonid Yakobson in 1956. 
Aram Khachaturian’s 1954 score to the story of the leader of a slave uprising against ancient Romans is widely considered a modern masterpiece and Yakobson’s production for the Kirov Theater, as the Mariinsky was known during the time St. Petersburg was called Leningrad, is the apotheosis of mid-century Soviet dance art. 
Yakobson created an experimental epic, depriving the dancers of points and tutus, changing Nikolai Volkov’s libretto and shortening Khachaturian’s music. It was a ballet in which the tunic-wearing heroes seemed, in the words of celebrated ballerina and Yakobson favorite Alla Osipenko, as if they were figures from ancient bas-reliefs come to life. 
Leningrad, a city with strong classical traditions, witnessed a brilliant and erotic performance that broke all the rules of classical ballet. Theater-goers were shocked and stunned by Yakobson’s Spartacus and even today, more than 50 years later, the original staging greatly influences how the ballet is percieved by both dancers and audiences. A one-act version of the masterpiece is still performed at the Yakobson Ballet Theater. 
Another renowned production of Spartacus, directed by Yury Grigorovich at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow, was staged in 1968. The full-length score was used and many heard the full scope of Khachaturian’s vision anew. 
“If the sense of the new ‘Spartacus’ should be expressed in one word, then I choose the word ‘modernity’,” wrote the Soviet ballerina Galina Ulanova of the 1968 version. 
This short introduction to the history of the ballet shows that Kovtun is right to realize the risks of being compared to such legends as Yakobson and Grigorovich. However, Kovtun long harbored the ambition of staging a new Spartacus at the Mikhailovsky Theater, which is sometimes referred to as the Mussorgsky. 
The director has worked and taught at the theater for many years, not only in ballet, but in dramatic theater, circus and musical theater. Kovtun has directed more than 300 performances in Russia, Ukraine and elsewhere. Among his best-known works are the ballet Rasputin, which he created for dancer Farukh Ruzimatov at the St. Petersburg Ballet and Opera Conservatoire, a ballet of Peer Gynt performed by the Kazan Ballet and Opera theater, and a ballet for children based on the story of Pippi Longstocking for the Omsk Music Theater. 
Kovtun calls himself a “one-man theater” who prefers to control all creative aspects of a performance. He is both the author of the script or libretto as well the director of his works, which means that he has created his own libretto for the new Spartacus. In it he has included different materials and more historical events from the life of Spartacus and the Roman epoch than in the classic version. 
With support of Vladimir Kechman, general manager of the Mikhailovsky Theater, and Ruzimatov, who heads of the ballet company at the theater, Kovtun has finally been able to bring his new Spartacus to the stage. 
The choreographer promises innovations in the art of dancing in the new production, which after its premiere on Tuesday will also be performed on Wednesday. Kovtun has said he aims to combine dance, music, opera and choral singing to provide a theatrical epic worthy of its antecedents.
There are two tigresses prortayed in the ballet, whose predatory and gracious movements  are repeated by the tiger-like gestures of Spartacus and the others heroes. There will be tough fights  between gladiators and amazons with naturalistic weapons. 
With a budget of $3.5 million, the painter Vyacheslav Okunev has been able to design splendid sets reconstructing the magnificent atmosphere of ancient Rome and which allow non-stop action on a cinematic scale. 
Denis Matviyenko, 28, will star in the title role. Matviyenko is an experienced Spartacus having recently danced the Grigorovich version for the Bolshoi Theater during its 2007 tour to London. 
Alla Osipenko, 76, and Nikita Dolgushin, 69, who have been ballet stars since the original versions of Spartacus were staged, also appear in the cast. Although he said he was surprised by the offer to dance in the ballet, Dolgushin said he was very happy to have received it.
“I was especially pleased by the opportunity to go on stage with such a wonderful ballerina as Alla Osipenko. We last danced together at a ballet gala in honor of her anniversary [50 years on stage], and I am very happy about this new opportunity. Our roles are rather small but by no means unimportant, and quite complicated technically.”
“Artistically, I find it very interesting to be able to dance a confident and experienced woman who does not need and does not try to conceal her age,” Osipenko said.
The production is full of other surprises. The show even has a role for renowned mezzo-soprano Yelena Obraztsova, 68, the artistic director of the Mikhailovsky’s opera division.
“Together with the staging’s musical director we sought to recreate the atmosphere of a genuine Roman feast on stage. Then Obraztsova came into picture,” said Kovtun. “A Roman feast was always a work of art; exquisite dishes, graceful dancers and amazing singers.”

Spartacus (Spartak) premieres on Tuesday and Wednesday and is performed on May 1, 15 and 16. www.mikhailovsky.ru

TITLE: Chernov’s
         choice
TEXT: This week, local television channel 100-TV banned a live appearance by <b>Televizor</b>, a local band whose recent lyrics criticize Kremlin’s policies and whose frontman, Mikhail Borzykin, has been a frequent participant of opposition rallies. The show was due to air on Thursday.
Borzykin sees his political stance as the motive for the ban, but the channel tried hard to persuade the public that it was prompted only by a line containing expletives in one song, In doing so the channel in fact admitted that the ban was political.
“A television show is not a rally,” Andrei Radin, the channel’s news editor, was quoted by Kommersant as saying this week.
“We are ready to invite them [...] But it is a music program, rather than the platform for expressing political ideas.”
The song under dispute is “Stay Home,” which does contain Russian equivalents for the words “dick” and “arse,” but the words, Borzykin argues, are necessary to deliver a message. “It’s a scream, it’s an attempt to make oneself heard,” he said.
Speaking by phone this week, Borzykin said the televised concert was originally due to air in October, but was postponed twice. It was finally set to be held this week, but a week before the planned show Borzykin was asked to email his lyrics to the channel.
Although the channel claimed the musician refused to take part if the song under question was not performed, Borzykin said he was prepared to skip it, as he had two other new political songs to play.
He said he was not offered any options at all after the channel had scanned the lyrics and trashed the planned program. “They called and said, ‘We can’t have such things on television. Well, you see, there’s such a situation now... I asked ‘Is that censorship?’ And they went on again, ‘Well, you see...’”
Borzykin said 100-TV came up with the “bad words” line after the news about the ban had made it into the media. “They needed something to counter the scandal, so they invented this one,” he said.
“When you speak to people like this, privately they admit it, but in public they claim there isn’t any political censorship.”
As under the Soviets when his band was repeatedly banned, Borzykin, who performed at a Dissenters’ March early last month, has been the subject of political censorship recently.
Local station Radio ROKS, which invited him to a live talk show in February, cancelled the program when Borzykin, having arrived at the studio, refused to avoid discussing politicals as requested by host Zhenya Glyukk.
Earlier in February, ROKS music club axed a Televizor-headlined concert called “The Other Song Festival,” where several acts were going to perform politically themed songs. The bands believe it did so after a call from the authorities.
“Don’t put on an honest face and make clowns out of people who try to tell the truth,” said Borzykin.
<i>— By Sergey Chernov</i>

TITLE: SKIF’s riffs
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Diverse genres of music will be represented, as they are every year, at SKIF, the annual contemporary music festival that commemorates the late local musician Sergei Kuryokhin, and run by his widow Anastasiya Kuryokhina.
With its opening night on Thursday, headlined by the Norwegian trio of Nils Petter Molvaer, Thomas Stronen and Eivind Aarset, already behind it, SKIF looks forward to further highlights including Harmonia, Germany’s reformed Krautrock band from the 1970s that featured Brian Eno as a member in 1975/76, performing Friday. 
Also from Germany come former Einsturzende Neubauten percussionist FM Einheit, who used self-made metal instruments, hammers and drills in the industrial pioneers’ performances, performing in a duo with Caspar Brotzmann, an electric guitarist compared to both Jimi Hendrix and Edgard Varese.
Friday will also see French experimenter Pierre Bastien perform with his custom-made, intricate music machines as well as Rome-based band Zu, which collaborated with The Ex, blending punk, jazz, rock, avant-garde and metal.
From the U.K. comes folktronika musician Leafcutter John, who lists Queen and ELO among his favorites on his MySpace page (Friday), and nu-jazz band Polar Bear (Saturday). 
Saturday’s best bits are perhaps Antwerp, Belgium-based DAAU, Iceland’s electronic/industrial artist Ben Frost, Italian experimental jazz metal band Black Engine and Jahcoozi, a Berlin-based multinational trio blending ragga, hip-hop and electronica. 
(See schedule in the box on this page for the rest of the music program). 
Sunday is reserved for a film and video program, which starts at 2 p.m.
Now held for the 12th time, SKIF, or the Sergei Kuryokhin International Festival, has established itself as the city’s most varied and most chaotic festival of non-mainstream music, drawing experimental, jazz, folk and rock acts from many countries. 
Kuryokhin, a jazz pianist and a one-time member of seminal underground rock band Akvarium was the founder, in 1984, of Pop Mekhanika, or Pop Mechanics, an eclectic ensemble with a flexible lineup. Kuryokhin died of a rare heart disease in July 1996.
The festival was founded in January 1997 in New York as the Sergei Kuryokhin International Interdisciplinary Festival, or SKIIF, by Russian emigre cellist Boris Rayskin, who played with Pop Mechanics before moving to the United States in 1989.
However, Rayskin committed suicide in March 1997, which eventually led to the moving of the festival to St. Petersburg by Kuryokhina, who formed the Sergei Kuryokhin Foundation to promote it.
Held at Baltiisky Dom Theater or the Youth Palace in the past, for the last three years SKIF has been based at the premises of an old Soviet movie theater, the Priboi, which has been turned into a modern arts center. Earlier this year, the center was renamed the Sergei Kuryokhin Art Center.

<b>The Sergei Kuryokhin International Festival</b>
<b>Fri., Apr. 25</b>
<b>MAIN:</b> MoHa!, 8 p.m.; FM Einheit & Caspar Brotzman, 9:15 p.m.; ZU, 10:30 p.m.; Pierre Bastien, 11:45 p.m.; Harmonia, 1 a.m.; Funckarma, 2:45 a.m.; BJ Nilsen, 4 a.m.
<b>SMALL HALL:</b> Akademiya Stranstvy, 8 p.m.; Atlantida, 9 p.m.; Port Mone, 10 p.m.; Leafcutter John, 11:15 p.m.; Mechanery Kultury, 12:30 a.m.; N._._., 1 a.m.; Dick el Demasiado, 2:15 a.m.; Cyclofillydea, 3:30 a.m.; Digital Forks, 4:30 a.m.
CHILL OUT: George Bagdasarov and The Cra(o)wling Papers;
Novye Osnovaniya (Russia); music videos and short films, times t.b.c.

<b>Sat., Apr. 26</b>
<b>MAIN:</b> Silence Kit, 8 p.m.; Black Engine, 9 p.m.; Polar Bear, 10:15 p.m.; DAAU, 11:45 p.m.; Ben Frost, 1 a.m.; Jahcoozi, 2:15 a.m.; The Complainer & The Complainers, 3:30 a.m.; Midi Lidi, 4:30 p.m.
<b>SMALL HALL:</b> Benzolniye Metrvetsy, 8 p.m.; Mechanery Kultury, 8:45 p.m.; Sireny, 9:30 p.m.; I Am Above on the Left, 10:15 p.m.; Mitch&Mitch, 11:15 p.m.; Gurzuf, 12:45 a.m.; Analogik, 2 a.m.; Nid & Sancy, 3:15 a.m.; Fusedmarc, 4:15 a.m.
<b>CHILL OUT:</b> A-5; Yury Elik; George Bagdasarov and The Cra(o)wling Papers; music videos and short films, times t.b.c.

TITLE: Bedazzled by Balanchine
AUTHOR: By Alastair Macauley
PUBLISHER: The New York Times
TEXT: A colleague of Serge Diaghilev (1872-1929) shrewdly wrapped up that great impresario’s work into three categories: “To reveal Russia to itself; to reveal Russia to the world; to reveal the world — the new world — to itself.” We can now see that a fourth project remained: to reveal that new world to Russia. Only after the Iron Curtain had lifted, decades after his death, could that be possible. The Kirov Ballet closed its three-week season at New York City Center on Sunday with a triple bill of ballets by George Balanchine, the last of the five choreographers Diaghilev introduced to the West. These three — “Serenade” (Tchaikovsky), “Rubies” (Stravinsky) and “Ballet Imperial” (Tchaikovsky) — demonstrated just how this process is still going on.
What experience could be more historically and aesthetically complex than watching companies that are still waking from the deep freeze of the Communist era coming to terms with works made in the West by radical St. Petersburg modernists who got out of Russia before that freeze began? Even some of the early Diaghilev ballets by Michel Fokine, a few of which the Kirov danced earlier in this City Center season, have joined the St. Petersburg company’s repertory relatively recently.
There have been horrors: no account of Bronislava Nijinska’s “Noces” can ever have been worse (more misdirected in body language and accentuation) than the Kirov’s a few years ago. There have been triumphs: the Kirov’s illustrious 1989 accounts of Balanchine’s “Scotch Symphony” and “Theme and Variations”; its galvanized, glowing 2000/2 accounts of his “Rubies”; and to a lesser extent, the rest of “Jewels.”
Generally any Kirov season in the West will now contain a Balanchine program or at least one Balanchine ballet, and it’s always a completely compelling spectacle. If St. Petersburg is the Russian city known as the “window on the West,” then Balanchine in New York is always, in part, a window on St. Petersburg. When you watch the Kirov dancing any Balanchine ballet, you see how strong a stylistic connection still runs between the two. And any Balanchine ballet wakes up these dancers and turns their spectacular and competitive technique into sheer dancing.
To watch a corps of 16 Kirov women hopping in arabesque in “Serenade” or “Ballet Imperial” is a joy. The radiant line of Russian style, so juicy, here becomes not statuesque but energized. To watch the same corps, in either ballet, facing into the wings with the same annunciatory arms they use in “La Bayadere” is to see one of a hundred moments in which the Kirov refracts ballet history like a hall of mirrors. They then move those arms, and the rest of the body, turning dance past into busy present. This is especially true at City Center, where the audience is so close to the stage and where, in these performances, “Serenade” has never been more brightly lighted. Innumerable choreographic masterstrokes that on larger stages pass casually fell into the sharpest focus here.
But it’s also true that the Kirov dancing almost any Balanchine ballet will show how deep the chasm is between these two ballet cultures. Kirov dancers tend to be grandly theatrical; like the British Royal Ballet, they need almost always to act Balanchine, to present Balanchine. It’s not enough for one dancer to look another in the eyes; she has to give that moment dramatic weight and let us know just what that weight is.
In the first three City Center performances of these ballets, I enjoyed and admired no dancer more than the bewitchingly elegant Yekaterina Kondaurova: beautiful in “Serenade” as the heroine (Saturday evening) and the Dark Angel (Friday evening, Saturday matinee), and marvelous as the “Rubies” second girl (Friday evening). But she seemed to need to show us (even at curtain calls) how the “Serenade” heroine was an innocent girl struck down by transformative experience, how the Dark Angel is a reluctant agent of tragic fate and how the “Rubies” soloist is a twinkling source of dark mischief. Apparently, she can’t just be these things and let the rest take us by surprise.
As a result, layers of the ballets — much of their true and thrilling mystery — go missing. So much of “Serenade” is just about dancers doing, and returning to, basic ballet class work. But the Kirov responds to the real drama in “Serenade” by “playing” even the class work theatrically. (Though in “Etudes” and its William Forsythe quadruple bill, the Kirov drops its airs and shows unaffected, cool manners.)
The Kirov “Rubies” is no longer the ultrapercussive knockout it was a few years ago. All three ballerinas officially cast for it at these performances dropped out at short notice. Replacing them, Olesia Novikova danced the role with a soft and demure loveliness that was all wrong until, on Saturday night, she began to find the sharpness and nonstop impetus it needed. 
Of three successive men in the male principal role, Anton Korsakov (Saturday matinee) showed the right basic Balanchine style, the whole body shiningly engaged, but without any of the role’s particular technical flair; Leonid Sarafanov (Saturday evening) had technical flair of a far too weightless kind.
In the central role of “Ballet Imperial,” Victoria Tereshkina had something of a triumph on Friday night. Deservedly so. She not only manages all its complex turns and jump steps with real skill, she also finds moments of pliancy and luxuriance in between. On Saturday night Uliana Lopatkina showed even more understanding of its many interpretative nuances, but in a role that calls for juice galore she is the least juicy of all Kirov ballerinas, and she simply can’t manage all the technical challenges with sufficient ease.
At these performances I heard some people say, “The Kirov shouldn’t be dancing Balanchine,” and others say, “Nobody dances Balanchine better.” I disagree with both; the Kirov dancing Balanchine is revelatory. Yet even now, 19 years after the first Balanchines it showed us, there is still much left for it to reveal to itself. 
The Kirov has become the temple of ballet academicism. Balanchine was the genius of ballet classicism. The connections and the differences between the two were rivetingly evident at these performances.

TITLE: Off the cutting room floor
AUTHOR: By Mike Collett-White
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: LONDON — A Danish choreographer has dug up a forgotten film score by Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev and turned it into a ballet danced by Cuban star Carlos Acosta.
Kim Brandstrup, whose “Rushes — Fragments of a Lost Story” premiered at Covent Garden in London on Wednesday, stumbled across an incomplete score Prokofiev wrote for a film version of Pushkin’s classic short story “The Queen of Spades.”
But the movie never made it to the screen, and the music, by one of the 20th century’s greatest composers who worked both in ballet and film, had been left to languish in a Russian archive.
“I was reading an article ... and in a footnote it said that there were these scores that Prokofiev had written in the 30s for films that had never been used because the films were either abandoned or banned by Stalin,” Brandstrup said.
“I set out to look out for this and I found a photocopy in the Prokofiev archive at Goldsmiths College [in London] which was very lucky,” he said backstage at Covent Garden. “I thought I would have to go much further to find it.”
Although the score was for a film based on Pushkin’s work, Brandstrup used another Russian literary giant for inspiration.
“There are some very early drafts of ‘The Idiot’ by Dostoevsky where he’s trying out different permutations and different characters, and I thought there would be something very interesting superimposing these sets of fragments.”
Brandstrup was also inspired by Russian film director Sergei Eisenstein’s epic “Ivan the Terrible,” for which Prokofiev wrote the music.
“It made an enormous impression on me,” he said. “I’d never seen that kind of theatricality on film ever before and the kind of stylized way of movement — that’s more opera and ballet than it’s film.”
To turn 24 musical fragments from Prokofiev into a 30-minute ballet, Brandstrup called in British composer Michael Berkeley, who jumped at the chance of interpreting such a renowned composer at the peak of his powers.
“Although it’s filmic in many places it’s also of incredible quality, some of it,” Berkeley said in an interview. 
“Nineteen thirty-six, when Prokofiev wrote it, is the same year as [his ballet] ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and it has some of that yearning quality to it and some of that power.”
The stage at Covent Garden, home to the Royal Opera and Royal Ballet, is divided by long lines of heavy thread hanging from the ceiling, creating a screen that characters can move through and which is used to project black and white images as if from a film projector.
Each fragment is introduced by footage of numbers counting down as if at the start of an old black and white movie.
Acosta dances the lead, and appears to be a combination of the two main male characters in “The Idiot” — the good and naive prince and the dark figure of Rogozhin.
His scenes with Romanian-born Alina Cojocaru and Spain’s Laura Morera are at times tender and loving and at others violent and filled with hate.

TITLE: Kitchen sinking
AUTHOR: By Marina Kamenev
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: There can be few more literal or expressive examples of Soviet ideology in architecture than the Maslennikov Kitchen Factory in Samara.
On the ground, it appears to be a normal multistorey building, but when you walk around it you notice its slightly unusual shape. A glance at an aerial photograph makes things much more obvious.
The kitchen factory, designed by architect Yekaterina Maksimova, is in the shape of a hammer and sickle. In its heyday it was a canteen that produced 9,000 meals per day for the rapidly industrializing nation, but today it is not in use and under threat of demolition.
Moscow architect Maksimova was given the obscure task of designing something in the shape of a hammer and sickle, but she reworked the plan so that the building was perfectly functional but still rich in symbolism.
“It was built in the golden era of Soviet Architecture,” said Clementine Cecil, one of the founders of MAPS (Moscow Architecture Preservation Society). “Just because its not in Moscow or St. Petersburg, doesn’t mean it should be ignored. It is such a unique and exciting example of constructivism.”
Three conveyor belts in the hammer part of the building delivered the cooked food to the sickle-shaped canteen. The factory also had a gymnasium, a reading room and other communal services. It was technically advanced and demonstrated the transition to a new kind of functional aesthetic.
The building was bought several years ago by Moscow property developers Clover Group. Earlier this month, the daily newspaper Noviye Izvestia reported that there were plans for the building’s demolition, and said Clover Group intended to demolish the building, and put a replica in its place.
Clover Group is denying these allegations. “We are talking to experts in the field about how to restore the building in the best possible way,” said Dmitry Ponomaryov, Clover Group press secretary. “Articles about the building being demolished are untrue.”
Nevertheless, a news conference was held in Samara Town Hall and a letter signed by representatives from UNESCO and Docomomo, a nonprofit organization devoted to the conservation and documentation of buildings, was sent to the mayor of Samara, Viktor Tarkhanov, requesting that the situation be resolved and the building restored to a functioning condition.
Currently, the factory has the lowest possible protection status. It is on a long list of monuments awaiting heritage protection, but, while it is on that list, it should be treated as a protected building and it would be illegal to demolish it, Cecil said.
The factory has a delicate history: It was almost not built at all, as in the 1930s reinforced concrete was considered a luxury that was difficult to finance, and the Maslennikov Kitchen Factory was the first building in Samara to be made out of the material.
In 1944, the factory’s facade was given a neoclassical makeover. A corner window, a typical constructivist detail, was left behind. But the building’s original avant-garde look was diluted.
In 1988 the factory, whose kitchen facilities were still used, had a facelift to remove the classical facade and restore the original appearance. Its interior changed to house two clubs and a shopping center.
Today the building is no longer functioning, and the lucrative land on which it sits in the center of the city has great potential to become a shopping complex or business center, like the many that populate central Moscow.
The kitchen factory is one of a few buildings in its rare style. The Theater of the Red Army in Moscow was built in the shape of a star, and the School of the Tenth Anniversary of the October Revolution is in the shape of a hammer and sickle, but the outline is vague, with symbolism more conceptual than literal.
“The new interest in constructivist buildings in Moscow should set a precedent for the regions. Constructivist architecture can function beautifully in the fabric of a contemporary city,” Cecil said. “This is a building that should be cherished by Samara.”

TITLE: A long way from Gorky Park
AUTHOR: By Timothy L. O’Brien
PUBLISHER: The New York Times
TEXT: Confronting the career-ending possibilities presented by a mass grave unearthed in central Moscow, a government supervisor in Martin Cruz Smith’s novel, “Stalin’s Ghost” (2007), frets aloud: “What if the grave runs under the entire court?”
Not one to miss a straight line, Arkady Renko, the stoic, indefatigable investigator who is making his sixth appearance since his debut 27 years ago in Smith’s “Gorky Park,” weighs in. “That’s always the problem, isn’t it?” he responds. “Once you start digging, when to stop?”
Like Holmes, Poirot, Marple, Marlowe, Smiley and other predecessors who are best in show, Renko just doesn’t know when to stop digging because he is almost dysfunctional when doing anything else. Renko’s turf is, of course, Russia. And a reading of the five Renko novels set in and around there (which means excluding his odd little excursion to Cuba in “Havana Bay”) offers an incisive encapsulation of Soviet and post-Soviet travails over the last few decades.
Deep down Renko is a patriot. He loves the promise of Russia — its poetry, music and people — even though he is routinely battered and emotionally scarred. That’s also why he’s so often disgusted with the operatic corruption and indignities that swarm around him, and why he loathes the stifling bureaucracy that he is part of yet somehow can’t bring himself to leave.
At the end of “Gorky Park,” still the most surprising in a collection of often tautly written and deftly woven tales, Renko has the opportunity to defect from the Soviet Union, yet doesn’t. Yes, he stays because leaving would imperil Irina, the woman he loves and has helped escape, but where else could he really live? Russian to his bones.
The Berlin Wall wouldn’t fall for another 8 years and the dissolution of the Soviet Union wouldn’t occur for another 10, so “Gorky Park” is steeped in fin de siecle cold war angst. As a well-heeled, Armand Hammer-esque American bribes and murders his way around Moscow, hot for Soviet sables, Renko navigates the gray, oppressive ranks of a Communist administration feeding off itself. People ingratiate themselves to apparatchiks in uniform. Otherwise they disappear.
Renko, whose powers of observation are matched only by his contempt for party-driven venality, cracks the case and snares one of his military superiors in the process. When he turns up again, in “Polar Star” (1989), he has fled “rehabilitation” in a state psychiatric hospital for anonymity aboard a fishing trawler in the Bering Sea. This time out Moscow is swapped for the subzero nightmare of Siberia; Solzhenitsyn and “Ivan Denisovitch” loom large here, evoked through the book’s frigid, claustrophobic despair.
Even at sea Renko can’t avoid corruption and murder. “Gogol’s great vision of Russia was of a troika madly dashing through the snow, sparks flying, the other nations of the earth watching in awe,” he tells a smuggler. “Yours is of a car trunk stuffed with stereo equipment.”
Siberia’s prison camps were the most tactile, horrific manifestation of the Soviet failure, of the moral bankruptcy of a state trying to ensure conformity through incarceration. “Polar Star” reeks of that failure and offers a singular moment: a convict, naked, choosing to dive into an icy sea rather than be captured and returned to the gulag. Renko watches the convict swim to freedom, and death, as he disappears, wraithlike, beneath the waves.
“Red Square” (1992) actually ends on a happy note. Renko reunites with Irina, and they hold hands outside the White House in Moscow as Boris Yeltsin presides over the Soviet Union’s demise. 
Watching the glimmer of hope offered by Muscovites marching in a popular uprising, Renko allows himself to believe that even though the “courage we have at birth becomes hoarded, shriveled, blown away,” perhaps something better lies ahead for him and his lover.
Well, no.
By the time “Wolves Eat Dogs” (2004) takes place, Irina has died because of bungled medical treatment in a Moscow hospital. Soviet Union or no Soviet Union, proper health care is a dice roll, and the burgeoning Yeltsin democracy has given way to a neon-fueled playground for unimaginably wealthy and predatory oligarchs. The Ferris wheel that is a Gorky Park landmark is echoed with haunting dread by another Ferris wheel that sits dormant in Ukraine’s most infamous city: Chernobyl. Renko still possesses his dry wit and unflagging sense of honor, but by now he is gaunt, spent and vaguely suicidal.
As he tools around Chernobyl on a wheezing motorcycle, noticing that trees, flowers and even people (albeit many maimed or diseased) have returned to a countryside ticking with radiation, he doesn’t hesitate to eat food that makes the readout on his dosimeter run wild. 
Despite their grim circumstances the Ukrainians and Russians press on, admirably, with decency and a fatalism that courses throughout all of the Renko books. “To vodka, the first line of radiation defense,” one of the characters offers as a toast. Everyone drinks.
Renko emerges from “Wolves” with an anemic new romance and a troubled, paternalistic relationship with a Moscow street urchin skilled in that prized Russian pursuit, chess. But little of “Red Square’s” elan remains. Russia is shown at loose ends, stumbling on an uncertain path.
“Stalin’s Ghost” revolves around another milestone in modern Russian history, the war in Chechnya. Moscow is still the city of “Wolves Eat Dogs,” home to parading oligarchs, quasi-criminal entrepreneurs, scheming politicos and average Russians caught between the old and the new, full of pride and irretrievably cynical.
About two-thirds of the way through “Stalin’s Ghost” Renko encounters a lovely, graceful harpist at the Metropole Hotel in Moscow. She later flirts with him before managing to lasso a garrote around his neck, nearly choking him to death. We have encountered her in different shapes and sizes in earlier books. She is Renko’s Russia: brimming with talent, lyrical and entrancing, corrupt and murderous.

TITLE: In the spotlight
AUTHOR: By Anna Malpas
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: This week, the festering Yana Rudkovskaya and Viktor Baturin divorce scandal has erupted again in the tabloids. Who needs Heather Mills and Paul McCartney? This couple — or at least one half of it — has been spraying its personal life over the tabloids with the same kind of gusto as the glass-of-water-throwing Heather “Mucca” Mills. And, let’s face it, Heather hasn’t been romantically linked with a celebrity ice-dancer and doesn’t manage a histrionic Eurovision hopeful.
Baturin is Mayor Yury Luzhkov’s brother-in-law and used to work with his sister in her successful concrete business. Rudkovskaya is a blonde who met Baturin when she was running a beauty salon in Sochi. They have two children and one Eurovision contestant, Dima Bilan, who is produced by Baturin or Rudkovskaya, according to which one of them is telling the story.
The divorce broke in the tabloids with grubby and undignified accounts of Rudkovskaya climbing over the fence of the family house to see her children — with a few tabloid photographers in tow.
The story had sex — Rudkovskaya has said her husband is now living with a former backing dancer of Filipp Kirkorov called Ilona — as well as quite a few lies, depending on which party is telling the story.
Then there’s Yevgeny Plyushchenko, the blond figure skater whom tabloids are insistently matchmaking with Rudkovskaya. He is even set to appear in Bilan’s Eurovision performance later this year, which promises to be baroquely over-the-top in a way that may raise eyebrows even at Eurovision.
Last week, things got silly as Tvoi Den published text messages that it says a reporter found on a cell phone left by Rudkovskaya at the Oktyabr Cinema. She is quoted in the article as saying she did leave a phone at the cinema, but she doesn’t sound too indignant. “I’m worried,” is all she says. The text messages are rich with mutual condemnation and fling around foul-mouthed insults. Baturin rather quaintly told the tabloid that he couldn’t have written the messages because he never swears. The messages seemingly from Baturin say Bilan betrayed him. Baturin gave Bilan a yellow Hummer and luxury apartments after he came second at Eurovision in 2006, Tvoi Den writes.
The messages call Rudkovskaya a “cheap lay” and express regret about marrying her when there were lots of other women out there. They also say the couple’s children are much better behaved without her there. One wryly comments on an insult apparently from Baturin’s wife about his “mini-penis.”
The ones apparently from Rudkovskaya are equally charming, insinuating that her husband was a bit too interested in their pop-protege, Bilan, and telling him that he has no chance with Plyushchenko, since Olympic champions are “real men.” She suggests that he will have to simply masturbate over their photographs and threatens to sue him for allegations of drug taking.
It’s hard to see how the tabloids would do without this story, which keeps blossoming with new plot developments. Komsomolskaya Pravda wrote Thursday that Baturin refused to turn up for a divorce hearing, calling Rudkovskaya’s actions a “farce.” The businessman is worth $35 million according to Forbes magazine, KP wrote, but cited unofficial sources as saying that he’s worth a cool half billion. The tabloid wrote that the couple signed a prenuptial agreement, according to which Rudkovskaya gets $5 million upon divorce, as well as their business center in Sochi, which includes a salon and stores.
Oh, and she gets Bilan. But Baturin is contesting the agreement and has already cut off water, electricity and heating at the Sochi complex, KP wrote. “Viktor doesn’t want to give the business in Sochi to me because it’s worth $30 million,” Rudkovskaya is quoted as saying.

TITLE: Perfect paella
AUTHOR: By Shura Collinson
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Madridsky Dvor // Suvorovsky Prospekt 26 // Tel.: 271 2094 // Open daily from 12pm until the last customer // Menu in Russian and English // Dinner for two with alcohol: 3,410 rubles ($145)
Indoor fountains, pseudo-stone sculptures, arches and lampposts. Stained-glass windows, shrubs and creeping vines. Plastic fruit adorning the windows. A live band performing both classical and modern Spanish music, and if you are really lucky, sangria-fuelled dancing by guests to said music. The Spanish restaurant Madridsky Dvor (Madrid Courtyard) has all this to offer and more.
The restaurant’s interior certainly does its best to conjure up the atmosphere and surroundings of a genuine Spanish outdoor restaurant, and although it doesn’t really create the impression of being outside, the red tiled floor, attractive high-backed chairs, raised booths and table flower arrangements are certainly a welcome island of calm and warmth from the dirt and traffic of Suvorovsky Prospekt. 
The menu is authentic enough, featuring an extensive selection of fish dishes and somewhat smaller selection of tapas, as well as paella, salads and a special Lent menu. From the latter, the pumpkin soup at 210 rubles ($8.40) was a perfectly palatable standard pumpkin soup. The wonderfully soft, crusty white bread with which we had been served while we were waiting complemented the soup so well that it was difficult to choose between dunking it in the latter, or in the snappy salsa that accompanied the bread, along with a gigantic green olive each.
Pea soup (somewhat pricier at 370 rubles, $14.80) was a real melting pot of ingredients, including kidney beans, chickpeas — a rarity in these northern parts — sausage, bacon, onion, carrot and herbs, as well as the eponymous peas, floating in a transparent broth. 
Once emboldened by our aperitifs, namely a Bloody Mary (150 rubles, $6) and a Tequila Sunrise (300 rubles, $12), the wine list began to seem more reasonable — and after all, what Spanish meal would be complete without a few glasses of wine? But even the cheapest option of a bottle of Red Bordeaux will set diners back 1,500 rubles, which may prompt indignation among those inclined to calculate how many bottles could be drunk for that price in the real Madrid. 
Nevertheless, it was a welcome accompaniment to chicken fillet in oporto sauce (350 rubles, $14), a smooth affair which arrived adorned with cream, more peas, beans and garlic, and was complemented well by a side order of potato wedges (60 rubles, $2.40). The vegetable paella (350 rubles, $14) was a colorful carnival of peppers, tomatoes, onion and... sure enough, peas, served sizzling in its pan, and was plentiful enough to sate even the most famished diner.
Madridsky Dvor is not cheap, but certainly seems to be a hit with local revelers, most of whom were making enough noise of their own not to care that the live music was several decibels above a level that would have permitted a normal conversation. For those who prefer a bit more privacy, the raised booths around the back of the restaurant are a little more out of the way. There is also an attractive private banqueting room at the very back, while those looking for a more casual dining experience may prefer to sit in the first room, which lacks the outdoor features and live music of the second.
Some might say the design borders on the kitsch, but for those whose souls yearn for something more than the faceless monotone steel-and-chrome minimalist look, the plethora of greenery, lanterns and frescos, not forgetting the dungeon-style toilets (diners, fear not — the toilets themselves are perfectly modern) may be a welcome return to the old New Russia — albeit with excellent service.

TITLE: Beauty and the geek
AUTHOR: By A. O. Scott
PUBLISHER: The New York Times
TEXT: One way to enjoy “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” — at least vicariously — is to think of the movie as the Judd Apatow Stock Company’s Hawaiian vacation. Those pasty-faced funny guys have been working awfully hard over the past few years, so who can begrudge them a few weeks of surf, sun, babes and fun? I don’t know if Apatow himself, a producer of this movie (the director is the first-timer Nicholas Stoller), went along for the trip. The members of his troupe who did managed to squeeze in enough work to placate the I.R.S., and also that segment of the audience, myself included, whose appetite for naturally sweetened raunch has not yet abated.
Jason Segel, author of the film’s screenplay and a fixture in Apatow’s universe since the television series “Freaks and Geeks,” takes his allotted turn as the romantic lead, which is to say as a slobby, goofy but basically decent fellow navigating the uncertain waters of modern sexual ethics. He does so at an island resort where the evening sun bathes the palm trees in honeyed light and imparts a gemlike sparkle to the Pacific Ocean.
Supporting Segel are some of the usual gang — Jonah Hill as a waiter, Paul Rudd as a surfing instructor, Bill Hader as the brother back home in Los Angeles — and a few newish dudes (notably Jack McBrayer and Da’vone McDonald) stepping up to deliver YouTube-ready riffs on matters of eros and pop culture. (Politics, the actual YouTube obsession of the moment, doesn’t really exist in Apatow’s world.)
Not that everything is breezy and casual. “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” is, after all, a breakup comedy, and its overall jollity is streaked with some raw emotions, including jealousy, heartache and humiliation. A few minutes in, Peter Bretter (Segel), a composer who writes the music for a television cop series, is peremptorily dumped by Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell), his girlfriend of five years, who is one of the show’s stars. Sarah has taken up with a louche, longhaired British rocker, Aldous Snow (Russell Brand), with whom she escapes to the same vacation spot where Peter, after a montage of meaningless hookups, goes to heal his battered soul. An important axiom is thus established early on: To a single, gainfully employed man in Los Angeles, sex comes easily. Love, however, is hard.
Or complicated, anyway, which is not the same thing. Once in Hawaii, Peter meets — in addition to a beachful of amusing bit players — the friendly, dark-haired receptionist you kind of suspect will be Sarah’s replacement. Her name is Rachel, she is played by Mila Kunis, and she has, for purposes of symmetry, her own history of romantic trouble. But the bad boyfriend in her past may not be quite enough to establish the enabling conceit that a woman like this would be (a) unattached and (b) likely to fall for Peter.
Still, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” does not entirely play by the established conventions of its genre. Its willingness to explore states of feeling and modes of behavior that tamer romantic comedies never go near is decidedly a virtue, though this same sense of daring and candor also exposes its limitations.
Speaking of which, the filmmakers forgo the cheap and easy thrill of female nudity, preferring the display of male flesh for comic effect. Bell, Kunis and Maria Thayer (as a voracious honeymooner in an amusing subplot) keep their tops and bottoms covered even when vigorously feigning naked passion. Segel, however, appears, near the beginning of the film and again toward the end, in his unclothed entirety, a spectacle that I must report did not entirely impress a quite vocal woman a few rows behind me at the sneak preview. Segel’s willingness to face the kind of criticism she voiced is surely to his credit.
So is his ability to display both Peter’s charms and his unappealing traits — he is a loose-faced, needy, ingratiating Labrador retriever of a man — and to orchestrate a comedy of betrayal and cruelty that rarely feels meanspirited. For much of the movie’s first half, Sarah seems to be a climber and a two-timer, cheating on her devoted, unglamorous boyfriend and then ditching him for an oversexed celebrity. But at least briefly the perspective is flipped, as Sarah, accompanied by illustrative flashbacks, gently and persuasively explains to Peter what a drag he was when they were together — what a mopey, self-absorbed loser.
Which, curiously enough, is what catches Rachel’s eye in the first place. Her attraction to Peter originates not in lust but rather in pity. Something similar happened in “Freaks and Geeks,” when Linda Cardellini’s character started going out with Segel’s largely because she felt sorry for him. In that case, though, the girl’s point of view was much more central, and the shakiness of the ensuing adolescent relationship was both funnier and truer than this grown-up variation on it.

TITLE: Manchester Utd Optimistic Despite Missed Penalty
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: BARCELONA — Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson praised Cristiano Ronaldo’s performance in the 0-0 draw with Barcelona in the Champions League semi-final first leg on Wednesday despite his failure to convert an early penalty.
“Cristiano Ronaldo was a bit unlucky with the penalty,” said the Scot. “Maybe it came too early in the first minute of the match. He leant back a little bit ... disappointing. Nevertheless, he was fantastic tonight.”
The Portugal winger sent his spot kick high and wide at the Nou Camp after which Barca dominated without managing to take advantage. Ferguson said United have a strong chance of winning the return on Tuesday to reach next month’s final.
“With our record at Old Trafford, with the crowd behind us then I think we have a good chance of going through,” he told a news conference.
Ferguson was particularly pleased his side kept a clean sheet given that influential centre back Nemanja Vidic had to pull out of the game because of a stomach infection.
“I think it was professional. We sealed off the areas teams don’t normally do against Barcelona.
“They didn’t make a lot of chances, although they had a lot of play on the edge of our box. Our defending was very good. In that respect it was a professional performance.
“But we should have done better with our possession. We gave the ball away too easily I felt,” added Ferguson. “But in the context of a first leg semi-final, going to Old Trafford, it gives us a marvellous chance.
“We want to impose ourselves much better... next week, I think we’ll do that. They had a lot of possession with an extra man in midfield. Tonight I think we had the answers to that.”
Barca striker Samuel Eto’o said his team were disappointed at failing to press home their advantage but he was confident they would be able to get an away goal at Old Trafford.
“It was a shame not to score at home but we are capable of scoring at any ground and we can do it in Manchester too,” the Cameroon international told reporters.
Coach Frank Rijkaard agreed and said the tie remained delicately poised.
“It was an evenly balanced game,” said the Dutchman. “The team played well and didn’t give them too many chances. We wanted a win but on the other hand the tie is still open and they know we are capable of scoring a goal away from home.”
“In terms of football it wasn’t our best game but the team played well and the fans responded to that. It isn’t a good result but it is going to be hard for them.”
n  LIVERPOOL — Liverpool’s John Arne Riise accidentally headed the ball into his own net in the fifth minute of injury time, giving Chelsea a 1-1 tie Tuesday night in the first leg of the Champions League semifinals.
Dirk Kuyt put Liverpool ahead in the 43rd minute when he beat goalkeeper Petr Cech from close range after Javier Mascherano’s mis-hit spun over Chelsea’s Claude Makelele. But Riise tied it when his diving header to clear Salomon Kalou’s cross for Nicolas Anelka went in from about 5 yards. Goalkeeper Pepe Reina had no chance to stop the ball.
“These ties are decided on small details, and unfortunately the little bit of luck’s gone to Chelsea at the end,” Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard said. “But maybe we’ll get a bit of luck at Stanford Bridge. No fingers pointed at John; we’re all in this together.”
Liverpool and Chelsea are meeting in the semifinals for the third time in four seasons. Liverpool advanced in 2005 and 2007 but played the second leg of the total-goals series at home. The teams meet April 30 at London, with the winner advancing to the May 21 final against Manchester United or Barcelona, who play their first leg Wednesday in Spain.
“I think we deserved definitely to get the draw at the end,” Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard said. “They had chances, we had chances. It was a battle and we carried on to the end.”
Liverpool co-owner Tom Hicks met with manager Rafa Benitez before the game and attended his first match at Anfield since December. Fans flicked abusive hand signals at the Texan as he appeared to join in the club anthem “You’ll Never Walk Alone” before the game while his son, Tom Hicks Jr., waved a Liverpool scarf. Chelsea fans bellowed taunts of “U-S-A! U-S-A!” during the early stages of the match.
Hicks is being blamed for threatening to block George Gillett Jr. from selling of his 50 percent stake in the Premier League club to Dubai International Capital. Gillett had been planning to also attend but he didn’t travel to northern England on doctors’ advice.
Police warned the club about the fans potentially targeting Hicks and Gillett.
“Security advice was provided to the club based on standard ongoing risk assessments,” the Merseyside Police said. “As with any other event, the safety of all those attending has been considered.”
(Reuters, AP)

TITLE: Soaring Rice Prices Could Cause Riots
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: BANGKOK — Rice prices in Thailand, the world’s top exporter, surged to $1,000 (500 pounds) a tonne on Thursday as concerns about food security first triggered by a handful of Asian export bans spread as far as the United States.
This week’s five percent jump takes prices to nearly three times their level at the start of the year, intensifying fears of social unrest in Asia as millions of the region’s poor find themselves struggling to pay for staple goods.
The surging price of fuel and food, which some analysts attribute to panic buying by both consumers and governments rather than a dire shortage of supply, has so far sparked riots in Africa and Haiti, but not Asia.
Having started with India’s imposition of export curbs to protect domestic supplies last year, the crisis was felt in the United States this week, with major retailers saying they had started to notice signs of panic buying.
Sam’s Club, a unit of retail giant Wal-Mart, said on Wednesday it was capping sales of 20-pound (9 kg) bulk bags of rice at four bags per customer per visit to prevent hoarding.
The previous day, rival Costco Wholesale Corp said it had seen increased demand for items such as rice and flour as customers concerned about global food shortages stocked up by buying in bulk.
“Everywhere you see, there is some story about food shortages and hoarding and tightness of supplies,” said Neauman Coleman, an analyst and rice broker in Brinkley, Arkansas.
In Bangkok, some traders said Thai 100-percent B grade white rice, the world’s benchmark, could hit $1,300 a tonne due to unsated demand from number-one importer the Philippines, which fell well short of filling a 500,000 tonne tender last week.

TITLE: Racing Officials Campaign Against Racism on Internet
AUTHOR: By Alan Baldwin
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: BARCELONA — Formula One’s governing body launched an anti-racism campaign on Thursday at the Spanish Grand Prix circuit where McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton was abused in February.
“With the support of the Formula One community, the launch of the Every Race campaign sends a message that discrimination and prejudice can have no place in sport or society,” The International Automobile Federation (FIA) said in a statement.
It encouraged fans to visit a web site, www.everyrace.net, to pledge support for the campaign message that motor sport welcomed everyone irrespective of their gender, race or background.
Hamilton, Formula One’s first black driver and former team mate of Spain’s double world champion Fernando Alonso, was abused by spectators at the Circuit de Catalunya during a pre-season test.
The FIA warned the Spanish authorities and circuits after that incident that the country’s two grands prix — the other is in Valencia in August — could be at risk if there was any repeat.
There has been none and the governing body said on Thursday they had received a comprehensive report from the Spanish motor racing authorities and circuit owners.
“The FIA is grateful to the RFEA (Real Federacion Espanola de Automovilismo) and the Catalunyan circuit authorities for their effective and efficient response to this situation,” the statement said.
“The FIA has monitored the measures recommended and implemented since February and has noted that no further such incidents have occurred.
“The FIA agrees with the RFEA assessment that the people involved in these incidents were ‘not at all representative of the thousands of people who enjoy a convivial atmosphere and the spectacle offered by motor sport’.”
Hamilton spoke warmly of the Spanish fans in a McLaren preview of Sunday’s race, the fourth round of the season, making clear he harboured no ill-feelings.
“The Circuit de Catalunya is a great track; we can’t ever lose it from the calendar,” he said. “It always sees competitive racing and there are so many enthusiastic fans there all the time which makes for a great atmosphere.”
Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone has added his support to the campaign.

TITLE: Arms Recalled On Way to Zimbabwe
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: HARARE — A shipment of Chinese arms bound for Zimbabwe will be recalled after South African port workers refused to unload the vessel and neighboring countries barred it from their ports, China said on Thursday.
The recall of the An Yue Jiang, carrying 77 tonnes of assault rifle ammunition, mortars and rifle grenades, came after unprecedented regional opposition in addition to Western pressure over Zimbabwe’s election crisis.
No results have been announced for the March 29 presidential vote, while the outcome of a parliamentary poll which the opposition won is also in doubt because of partial recounts.
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai has said he won the presidential election outright and has accused President Robert Mugabe of delaying results to rig victory and keep his 28-year hold on power.
Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told a news conference in Beijing that the ship is to be recalled after it was unable to offload its cargo.
“To my knowledge, the Chinese company has decided to recall the ship and the relevant goods bound for Zimbabwe,” Jiang said.
She defended the shipment in the face of criticism from New York-based Human Rights Watch, which said that any state that sent arms and ammunition to Zimbabwe could be complicit in the country’s rights abuses. Neighboring Zambia had also said the weapons could worsen Zimbabwe’s crisis.
The European Union already has an arms embargo against Zimbabwe, part of sanctions in place since 2002. The embargo bars the 27 EU states from supplying arms or equipment intended for military operations. The U.S. has also imposed sanctions.
Jacob Zuma, leader of South Africa’s ruling African National Congress, said on Thursday it was not yet time to impose an arms embargo on Zimbabwe.
Zuma, who has become the most outspoken African leader on Zimbabwe, was in London after talks with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, one of Mugabe’s harshest critics. Former colonial ruler Britain wants a wider arms embargo on Zimbabwe.
“I don’t think we have reached the stage for arms embargo, I think it is going too far and I think it complicates a situation that needs to be handled with great care,” Zuma told a press briefing in London.

TITLE: U.S. Fed Team Missing Star Players
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW — With her three best players missing, U.S. Fed Cup captain Zina Garrison is looking at the semifinal series against Russia as a test.
The Americans, who have won a record 17 Fed Cup titles, will be missing Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Lindsay Davenport when they face the defending champion Russians on indoor clay at the Luzhniki arena.
Teenage amateur Madison Brengle, former South African player Liezel Huber, Vania King and Ahsha Rolle will be representing the United States in the best-of-five series that starts Saturday.
“My expectations are actually that we go out on the court and compete,” Garrison said Wednesday. “At least they’ll have the opportunity of being around and play the Fed Cup.”
King, Rolle and Brengle are beyond the top 100 in the WTA rankings, and Rolle and Brengle are making their Fed Cup debuts. Huber, however, is a top-ranked doubles player who has competed for South Africa but is playing for the United States for the first time.
“I think the USTA does a great job of trying to bring young and future Fed Cuppers,” Garrison said. “We thought that this would be a good time to bring the players that should be coming up from the developmental stages. If we were ever going to do it, this would be the proper time to do it.”
Venus Williams is skipping the event because of injuries, while Serena Williams had earlier said she would pull out. Davenport withdrew from the recent tournament in Amelia Island, Florida, because of the flu.
Russia, which is trying to win its fourth title in five years, will have 2004 U.S. Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, Anna Chakvetadze, Vera Zvonareva and Elena Vesnina.
Russia will be missing Australian Open champion Maria Sharapova, who is skipping the series as part of what Russia captain Shamil Tarpishchev has said was an agreement with Kuznetsova.
“I was sure the Williams sisters would not play,” Tarpishchev said. “They have the same schedule as Sharapova has, but the absence of Davenport was a surprise.”
Zvonareva, who lost to Serena Williams in Family Circle Cup final last Sunday, is replacing Dinara Safina, who is sidelined with a knee injury.
“We are favorites in this tie and all will depend on our game,” Tarpishchev said. “It’s one of those rare cases when not we but our opponents are to adapt to us.”
The draw is scheduled for Friday, and Garrison said King and Rolle were most likely to play in Saturday’s singles. The reverse singles and doubles are scheduled for Sunday.
Despite Russia’s status as favorite, Tarpishchev warned his players against overconfidence.
“It’s the most dangerous thing in sports-to relax and underestimate your opponent,” Tarpishchev said. “Team competition differs from a tournament. A young player cannot play his best tennis during the whole week but he can do his best in one single match.”
The United States last won the Fed Cup title in 2000, while the Russians won in 2004, ‘05, and ‘07.