SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1429 (93), Friday, November 28, 2008
**************************************************************************
TITLE: Stability
To Cost
1 Trillion Rubles
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW — The government will spend 1 trillion rubles next year from its financial safety cushion, the Reserve Fund, as a result of the global economic crisis, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Wednesday.
The figure, equal to about $36 billion, would account for about one-third of the fund’s contents, which the country has been putting aside out of windfall oil and gas revenues since 2003.
Kudrin also indicated that spending would continue at about the same pace in 2010-2011.
“We have created a serious cushion of stability and security for the budget,” Kudrin told members of the Federation Council. “It will work for more than three years.”
Kudrin first announced just last week that the government might dip into the Reserve Fund to cover federal and regional budget shortfalls. At the time, he said the cost would be more than 500 billion rubles.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has since proposed a 4 percent cut in profit taxes and a slate of other business incentives to take effect next year to stimulate economic growth.
The introduction of these measures would mean foregoing another 550 billion rubles in revenues, the Finance Ministry said afterward.
Kudrin said the total cost of fulfilling all the obligations would be 1 trillion rubles, adding that the government should not make any further spending promises.
Speaking to the upper house of parliament before it approved the tax proposals, he put the current balance in the Reserve Fund at 3.6 trillion rubles.
President Dmitry Medvedev, then on an official visit to Brazil, signed the bill into law 2 1/2 hours after the Federation Council vote, Interfax reported.
The subsidies to regional budgets will go to those heavily dependent on tax revenues from the production of oil and metals, commodities that have fallen steeply in price as a result of the global crisis, Kudrin said last week.
The decision to tap the Reserve Fund represents a significant turnaround in a short period of time, indicating just how quickly the economic outlook has worsened. As recently as Oct. 16, the Finance Ministry said it was counting on $95 per barrel of oil next year and had no plans of dipping into the fund.
Urals, the main Russian export blend of crude, has consistently traded at a range of $40 and $50 a barrel over the past few weeks.
Valery Mironov, chief economist at the Development Center, a think tank, said that dipping so deeply into the Reserve Fund was not a bad idea.
“It’s possible to tolerate this for one year and see what happens,” he said. “Perhaps we won’t spend a third of it every year.”
He said that, if the fallout from the crisis does not show any sign of receding next year, the government could then look at cuts in budget spending.
The size of the outlay from the Reserve Fund might also reflect government thinking that the bigger the aid package, the faster the recovery, said Danila Levchenko, chief economist at the brokerage Otkritie.
In his presentation to the Federation Council, Kudrin also explained the rationale behind the recent rise in the Central Bank’s refinancing rate, a move that ran counter to that by most of the world’s central banks as they try to boost liquidity.
He said a higher rate would lead banks to raise the interest they pay to individual depositors, whom he described as the main source of liquidity. To be effective, he said the rates would have to remain higher than inflation, which was already above 12 percent for the first 10 months of the year.
What’s more, he said, the move has discouraged banks and companies from converting rubles into dollars, easing pressure on the domestic currency.
TITLE: Three Killed In Car Blast
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: As police continue to investigate a car explosion that killed three people including a three-year-old child on Tuesday morning, new details are emerging, giving rise to a range of new and intriguing plausible scenarios.
A bomb went off in a Lada-Priora car at around 8.45 on Tuesday morning outside 15, Yeletskaya Ulitsa near Udelnaya metro station in the north of the city, killing a couple and their child, and leaving the driver in critical condition.
The family was identified as Maria Sandalova, 27, Yevgeny Simonov, also 27, and their young daughter Yeva.
Vladislav Piotrovsky, the head of the St. Petersburg police, told reporters that a series of tests is being carried out and pledged that investigators would complete their work by the end of January 2009.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Piotrovsky rejected the suggestion that the explosion may have been a terrorist attack. He referred to the explosion as an “accident,” rather than a crime.
“The most plausible version is that Simonov happened to be carrying a grenade on him, which exploded accidentally,” Piotrovsky said. “It is not clear why the man had the weapon on him, and the police are looking into the circumstances of the accident.”
Piotrovsky said Simonov was a retired army officer who used to serve in the aviation forces in the Khabarovsk region. His most recent job in St. Petersburg was as a lawyer specializing in the real estate sector.
The driver, a 22-year-old man identified as Dmitry Korotkov, survived the explosion but received multiple shrapnel injuries to the chest and limbs. He is currently attached to a ventilation machine in hospital.
“The driver’s condition remains severe and the police have not yet been able to question him,” said Igor Samokhvalov, head of the surgery department of the St. Petersburg Military Medical Academy. “The young man has already undergone two operations.”
During the course of the investigation, it has emerged that Sandalova worked as head of a department within the financial monitoring service of Kit Finance Bank, part of Kit Finance holding — a fact that has prompted some to suspect that she may have been killed because of her professional activities.
It has been suggested that the bank official could have become the victim of a crime by interfering with or witnessing a financial operation that was meant to be secret. It is believed that she had access to a number of classified files, including reports prepared for the Russian Financial Monitoring Service.
Kit Finance holding is currently being absorbed by a consortium of investors that includes, in particular, Alrosa and Russian Railways, which will each have 45 percent of shares in the holding.
Sandalova’s colleagues from Kit Finance told the media she had no enemies and her professional activities could hardly have caused her any trouble, not to mention an assassination.
In the meantime, a source close to the investigation told Kommersant newspaper that a search of the victims’ apartment has revealed that the family had substantial debts. In the wake of the unfolding economic crisis, Simonov had not been able to get access to a large sum of money that had been invested into a business.
TITLE: Ex-Ambassador Says Georgia at Fault in War
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: TBILISI, Georgia — Before this summer’s Georgia-Russia war, President Mikhail Saakashvili was itching to do battle and authorities mistook messages from the United States as encouragement to use force, Georgia’s former ambassador to Russia said Wednesday.
But Russia also takes a share of the blame because it was trying to inflame Saakashvili’s itch, Erosi Kitsmarishvili says.
His statements at a news conference added new intensity to a growing debate about what and who bear the onus for starting the five-day war that saw Russia drive deep into Georgian territory, cause devastating damage to Georgia’s military, and aggravate already troubled Russia-U.S. relations.
Georgia launched a massive artillery barrage Aug. 7 on the capital of the separatist region of South Ossetia, which was backed by Moscow and patrolled by Russian peacekeeping forces. Russian forces poured into the region, drove Georgian forces out and went on to take control of substantial swaths of northern and western Georgia.
The war ended with Russian forces firmly in control of South Ossetia and another separatist region, Abkhazia. Moscow has recognized both regions as independent.
Georgian leaders have said they launched the Aug. 7 attack after separatists shelled Georgian villages and Russian forces invaded from the north. Russia denies that, saying it sent troops to protect civilians and Russian peacekeepers from the Georgian onslaught.
Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili, in testimony Wednesday to a parliamentary commission investigating the war, presented what he said were telephone recordings supporting the Georgian authorities — one in which men said to be South Ossetian border guards say Russian forces had crossed the border the night before the barrage and another purporting to show the South Ossetian interior minister receiving an order to raze a village under Georgian control.
But according to Kistmarishvili, “Saakashvili wanted that war, he has been bracing for that during the last four years. And Russia was eager to exploit it, pushing him to that using all means.”
In the early postwar period, Georgian public opinion was strongly behind Saakashvili and a large majority believed Georgia had reacted to Russian aggression in launching the attack on South Ossetia.
In recent weeks, opposition politicians have been increasingly critical of the president and the war, but Kitsmarishvili appears to be the most highly placed official of the prewar period to publicly challenge Saakashvili on the conflict.
The former diplomat said Georgian officials had hoped to regain South Ossetia within hours, and did not expect Moscow to intervene.
He said Georgian officials believed the United States backed the idea of sending Georgian troops to reclaim Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which have been de-facto independent and patrolled by Russian peacekeepers since the early 1990s.
Kitsmarishvili said Georgian officials told him President George W. Bush gave his blessing for such a use of force when he met the Georgian president in Washington in March.
“Saakashvili’s entourage has tried to form an opinion that the U.S. administration would support the use of force,” Kitsmarishvili said. “In reality, it was not like that.”
Georgian officials also perceived a July 9-10 visit by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as encouragement for the plan, Kitsmarishvili said. He said people in Saakashvili’s circle told him that Rice “gave the green light.”
Rice has denied that Washington encouraged Georgia to use force on the provinces. The U.S. Embassy reiterated that line on Wednesday.
Kitsmarishvili made similar allegations to a Georgian parliamentary panel Tuesday, angering pro-government lawmakers who accused him of siding with Moscow and called for a criminal investigation against him. Some pro-government lawmakers accused him of lying in order to deflect attention from his alleged ineffectualness as ambassador.
Georgia recalled Kitsmarishvili from the Georgian Embassy on July 10, about a month before the war broke out. In the intervening weeks, he met in Georgia with an array of Western and Russian politicians and diplomats.
The countries have since severed diplomatic ties.
TITLE: Medvedev, Chavez Sign Accords
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: CARACAS, Venezuela — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed to help start a nuclear energy program in Venezuela and said Moscow is willing to participate in a socialist trade bloc in Latin America led by President Hugo Chavez.
Medvedev used his visit to Venezuela — the first by a Russian president — to extend Moscow’s reach into Latin America and deepen trade and military ties. Chavez denied trying to provoke the United States, but he welcomed Russia’s growing presence in Latin America as a reflection of declining U.S. influence.
Chavez and Medvedev planned to visit a Russian destroyer docked in a Venezuelan port on Thursday. The arrival of Russian warships this week for training exercises with Venezuela’s navy was the first deployment of its kind in the Caribbean since the Cold War.
Accords signed Wednesday included one pledging cooperation in nuclear energy for peaceful uses. Russia also agreed to work with Venezuela in oil projects and building ships.
Moscow plans to develop a nuclear cooperation program with Venezuela by the end of next year, said Sergey Kirienko, head of the Russian Federal Atomic Energy Agency.
“We are ready to teach students nuclear physics and nuclear engineering,” he said through an interpreter. He said the help would include “research and development” and “looking for uranium in the territory of Venezuela.”
Chavez says Venezuela hopes to build a nuclear reactor for energy purposes.
The Venezuelan leader — one of the world’s most strident U.S. critics — thanked Medvedev for helping to create a “multi-polar” world with declining U.S. influence.
Medvedev called Venezuela “one of our most important partners in Latin America” and pledged to keep supplying the South American nation with weapons. But he said arms sales to Venezuela “are not aimed against any other country.”
Chavez’s government has already bought more than $4 billion in Russian arms, including Sukhoi fighter jets, helicopters and 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles.
Chavez had assembled a group of Latin American allies for talks hours before Medvedev’s visit, and leaders including Bolivia’s Evo Morales and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega joined them for a late-night meeting.
Medvedev said Russia is ready to “think about participating” in the Bolivarian Alernative for the Americas, likely as an associate member. Chavez launched the socialist trade bloc, named after South American independence hero Simon Bolivar, as an alternative to U.S.-backed free-trade pacts.
The Russian naval squadron deployed to the Caribbean includes the destroyer Admiral Chabanenko and the nuclear-powered cruiser Peter the Great, the largest in the Russian fleet.
The military show of force is widely seen as a demonstration of Kremlin anger over the U.S. decision to send warships to deliver aid to Georgia after its conflict with Russia, and over U.S. plans for a European missile-defense system.
But U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters in Washington on Wednesday that “a few Russian ships is not going to change the balance of power” in the region.
Medvedev was to finish his four-nation Latin American tour in Cuba.
Medvedev said he also discussed the global financial crisis with Chavez, and “exchanged different ideas of what actions to take in this situation.”
TITLE: Russian Art Market Slows Amid Economic Turmoil
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: LONDON — Wealthy Russian collectors, one of the main factors behind the recent boom in art prices, appear to be feeling the pinch like everyone else, with a series of Russian sales in London falling well short of expectations.
Gone are the days of 2005 to 2007, when salerooms buzzed with anticipation as Russian buyers fought for precious pieces of their heritage.
This week both Sotheby’s and Christie’s failed to make their low pre-sale estimates, an increasingly common phenomenon as the global financial crisis catches up with the art market.
At Sotheby’s, four sales held from Monday to Wednesday fetched 25.2 million pounds ($37.9 million), compared with expectations of between 29.6-41.4 million pounds.
The auctioneer’s reaction appeared to be one of relief that things were not worse rather than disappointment at seeing the Russian art boom coming to an end.
“Our sales of Russian art ... concluded realizing a combined total of 25 million pounds, representing the third highest total for a series of sales in this category at Sotheby’s,” said Jo Vickery, head of Sotheby’s Russian art department.
“Given the current economic climate we are extremely pleased with the total achieved and have sold almost two-thirds of the lots we offered for sale.”
She saw ongoing strength in the Russian market, albeit at a “slightly recalibrated level.”
At Christie’s, the main sale on Wednesday made 7.9 million pounds ($12.2 million), barely half the pre-sale low estimate.
TITLE: Islamist Militants Say They Killed Mayor
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: MOSCOW — Islamist militants claimed responsibility on Thursday for killing a mayor in Russia’s North Caucasus, an attack that prompted security services to warn that violence in the region could destabilize the entire country.
A sniper shot the mayor of Vladikavkaz, capital of the mainly Christian region of North Ossetia, on Wednesday as he left his home and climbed into his silver Mercedes car. He died later in hospital.
“The execution of the enemy of Allah was carried out by the amir of Kataib al-Khoul,” a statement posted on the www.kavkazcenter.com Internet site.
The site, used as a mouthpiece for Islamist rebels in the North Caucasus, described the Kataib al-Khoul group as the local faction of Islamist rebel forces.
The group said it had killed the mayor because of his policies that insulted Islam and women.
Bomb attacks and assassinations have escalated this year across the North Caucasus and the murder came two weeks after a suspected bomb on a minibus killed 12 people in Vladikavkaz.
The head of Russia’s domestic intelligence agency, Alexander Bortnikov, was quoted by RIA news agency as saying the attacks were an attempt to destabilize the country.
“Armed attacks by bandits on state officials and law enforcement workers in Ingushetia, Dagestan, Chechnya and the sharpening of the situation in region close to the zone of the Georgia-Ossetian conflict are... threats to Russian national security,” said Bortnikov, head of the Federal Security Service.
TITLE: Politkovskaya Judge Reopens Trial to Press, Public
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The judge presiding over the trial of three men charged in the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya refused to recuse himself from the case on Wednesday after prosecutors accused him of bias for reversing his decision to close the proceedings to the public.
Judge Yevgeny Zubov of the Moscow Military District Court rejected prosecutors’ appeal to have him removed from the trial in preliminary proceedings held behind closed doors Wednesday, court spokesman Alexander Minchanovsky told reporters.
Zubov last week ruled to close the trial to the press and public, reversing his ruling two days earlier to open the proceedings.
On Tuesday, Zubov again said the press would be allowed in the courtroom for the proceedings, though he gave no explanation for the decision.
TITLE: Fates of Poland, Georgia Linked, Says Polish Leader
PUBLISHER: Reuters
TEXT: WARSAW — Poland must stand firm with Georgia in its conflict with Russia because the two countries’ fates are intertwined, the leader of Poland’s main opposition party and twin brother of its president said Wednesday.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski was defending a decision by Polish President Lech Kaczynski to join Georgian leader Mikheil Saakashvili on a trip last Sunday to the de facto border between Georgia and breakaway South Ossetia, which is backed by Moscow.
The two presidents’ convoy came under fire in an incident both men have blamed on Russian forces. Moscow denies any involvement. Some Polish newspapers have branded Kaczynski’s trip to the South Ossetian border area as irresponsible.
“There’s a link between Polish and Georgian independence. Only a complete idiot can fail to see that,” Jaroslaw Kaczynski, a former prime minister and leader of the conservative Law and Justice party, told reporters. “It is in Polish interests to prevent a restoration of the Russian empire,” he said.
President Kaczynski, a conservative nationalist, emerged as Tbilisi’s strongest European ally during the five-day war between Russia and Georgia in August over South Ossetia, rushing to the ex-Soviet republic to underline Polish solidarity. Kaczynski has also urged the European Union to take a tougher stance on what he has branded “Russian imperialism.”
Many Poles are deeply suspicious of Russia, which helped carve up their country in the 18th century and again dominated it during the communist period after World War II.
Poland’s center-right government, which has been more circumspect in its criticism of Russian actions in Georgia, is conducting an investigation into last Sunday’s incident.
TITLE: Putin Promises to Upgrade Checkpoints
AUTHOR: By Kati Pohjanpalo
PUBLISHER: Bloomberg
TEXT: HELSINKI — Marjatta Oksanen recalls how fresh the leaves used to smell when she strolled through her forest in southeastern Finland, along the Russian border.
Now, the aroma around Oksanen’s cottage and surrounding woodland is more like that of a loading dock as thousands of Russia-bound trucks line up on a nearby road with their motors idling.
“It’s not fun,” said the 69-year-old pensioner, whose retreat is just 10 kilometers from the southernmost border crossing. Her village “is really suffering.”
The quiet of Finland’s clear, rocky lakes and untouched pine forests along the 1,300-kilometer demarcation between Russia and Finland is pierced these days by the whirr of an unending stream of truck traffic.
The road-gouging freight from Finnish ports to Russian consumers has become a political issue between the two nations: The Finnish government plans to introduce fees on Russian trucks, and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin promised during a visit on Tuesday to the region to simplify customs procedures and upgrade facilities at checkpoints.
“The roads of southern Finland are a giant storage area,” said Tommi Kivilaakso, who heads the customs office in the city of Lappeenranta, near the second-busiest crossing. “Few countries plan their road networks to be used as parking lots for neighboring countries.”
Russia needs Finland’s ports and roads to feed its demand for autos, electronics and mobile phones from Western Europe. Seven out of 10 trucks headed east serve the transit trade that provides Finland with little other than highway potholes. The traffic generates only 3,000 jobs in this Nordic country of 5.3 million, according the transport ministry.
In the forests her father loved, Oksanen’s wild blueberry patches are now covered with stacks of tires left by Russian truckers. Food wrappers and cigarette butts litter the roadsides. As truck traffic on the icy and narrow highways increases, so does the chance of accidents. This time of year is the worst as Russian retailers stock up for the holiday season.
Last year at Christmas, lines at the Vaalimaa-Torfyanovka border crossing, which feeds a steady flow of trucks to St. Petersburg, stretched to a record 63 kilometers. On an average day, the lines are about 20 kilometers, said Kivilaakso, the customs official.
Kivilaakso says the backup is caused in part by the antiquated Russian system to process the goods. Customs clerks enter details of the trucks’ cargo manually into their computers, which is too slow for the amount of traffic, he said.
The Finnish government said earlier this month that the fees it plans to introduce will be used to pay for new parking areas and road safety improvements.
Only one of the nine road improvement projects planned in the area is under way. In the meantime, the trucks — especially those carrying autos, the heaviest — are creating potholes. The weight of hundreds of trucks lining up on the side of the road sometimes makes road shoulders collapse as well.
Last year, Russia imported 679,000 cars through Finland — more than triple the number in 2004. Although the slowing economy and tightening credit markets are now curbing demand, by mid-October of this year trucks had already carried 760,000 vehicles.
“The heavy traffic is burdening the highways,” said Kari Halme, a Finnish Road Administration traffic engineer. “We have to pave them more often.”
During his visit, Putin viewed the Vaalimaa-Torfyanovka crossing near Oksanen’s residence and acknowledged that conditions at the busiest entry point had not improved.
“Traffic lines remain standard practice,” Putin said.
Russia, 50 times larger in land mass and 27 times larger in population, became Finland’s biggest trading partner this year for the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
While 20 percent of Russian imports travel through Finland, most of the goods are recorded as transit trade, leaving Finland only about 360 million euros ($462 million), the transport ministry estimates.
Railways provide little relief: Only three percent of the cars Russia imports travel by rail because of a scarcity of terminals, said Kivilaakso at the customs office.
The Finnish government is considering building a parking lot at the Vaalimaa-Torfyanovka crossing that would hold 1,000 trucks. Currently, the lots there hold only 160 trucks. The project, spanning 65 hectares and estimated to cost 24 million euros, is on hold pending planning approvals.
For now, the roar of engines and wisps of blue gasoline fumes mark where the Toyotas, Audis and Volkswagens are ferried off to Russian consumers. Oksanen, whose family has owned property in the area since the 16th century, said she’s a bit fearful to venture out onto the roads: “The accidents are so close.”
TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: VEB Lends to AvtoVAZ
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Russian state bank Vnesheconombank will provide the country’s largest carmaker, AvtoVAZ, with an emergency loan of up to $1 billion, the Interfax news service reported.
The loan will be granted under Vnesheconombank’s mandate to support key sectors of the economy, the Moscow-based service said, citing an unidentified banking official.
BRIC to Meet in Russia
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva agreed that the first summit of the world’s largest developing nations should be held in Russia.
The summit between China, India, Brazil and Russia, the so-called “BRIC” nations, is scheduled to be held in 2009. Medvedev and Lula announced their support for holding the heads of state talks in Russia in a statement following meetings on Wednesday in Rio de Janeiro.
280 Banks Make a Loss
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — One-third of Russian banks posted a loss last month amid the country’s worst financial crisis in a decade, Kommersant reported, citing central bank data.
Two hundred and eighty eight banks were unprofitable in October, with combined losses of 69 billion rubles ($2.52 billion), the newspaper reported. Total net income for the other 683 banks was 39.3 billion rubles, Kommersant said.
The biggest loser was Svyaz-Bank, with 26.4 billion rubles, prompting state investment bank VEB to take it over, the newspaper said. VTB Group, the second-biggest lender, lost 7 billion rubles, while Gazprombank, a unit of the national gas-export monopoly, lost 3.4 billion rubles, Kommersant said.
Oil Firms Demand Cuts
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Russian oil companies are lobbying the government for a further cut in the export duty after oil prices fell, Vedomosti reported, citing unidentified officials.
From Dec. 1, the duty should be cut to $192.10 a metric ton from $287.30 a ton, the Moscow-based newspaper said. Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin is yet to sign off on the tax because he wants to help producers secure a deeper reduction, according to Vedomosti.
TNK-BP to Name CEO
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — TNK-BP will name Denis Morozov, the former head of GMK Norilsk Nickel, as chief executive officer, Kommersant reported, citing unidentified people with knowledge of the matter.
Morozov is yet to sign the contract as the details are being worked out, the Moscow-based newspaper said. He will probably start his role as Robert Dudley’s replacement by the end of this year, Kommersant said.
Ukraine May Hike Fees
KIEV (Bloomberg) — Ukraine may more than double the transit fee for natural gas from Russia to Europe should Gazprom impose a similar increase on Ukraine’s imports of the fuel, Kommersant-Ukraine reported.
Naftogaz Ukrainy, Ukraine’s state energy company, will seek a transit rate of $4 per 1,000 cubic meters for every 100 kilometers should Gazprom charge Ukraine $400 for the same volume in imports, the newspaper said, citing Naftogaz CEO Oleh Dubina.
TITLE: Russia Dragging Its Feet on Kyoto
AUTHOR: By Oldag Kaspar
TEXT: In the two first weeks of December, the Polish city of Poznan will host one of the most important international conferences of the year. With thousands of government officials and nongovernmental organizations attending, Poznan will lay the groundwork for a successor to the Kyoto treaty, which aims at reducing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. But as policy experts around the world prepare for the conference, Russia’s role as a potential hazard to the post-2012 climate-change negotiations is being dramatically underestimated.
There are signs that Russia may prove to be among the most difficult negotiation partners in the ongoing international talks on a successor agreement to Kyoto. If the Russian government refrains from accepting an ambitious cap on its emissions in the United Nations talks on climate change in Copenhagen in 2009, other crucial negotiation partners such as India, China and the United States are likely to retreat from an agreement that requires them to make ambitious commitments.
Between 1992 and 2003, average annual emissions of carbon dioxide per capita in Russia were as high as 11 tons, slightly higher than those in Germany or Britain. These figures clearly show that Russia bears the same high responsibility for climate change as do the other industrialized countries listed in Annex B of the Kyoto treaty. Countries in Annex B are expected to make significantly higher emission-reduction commitments in the ongoing round of negotiations than other countries. Nevertheless, the negotiation strategy of the Russian government so far seems to be more aiming at removal from this annex after 2012.
There are four main factors that explain why Moscow has not been overly supportive of the current global talks on a successor agreement. First, Russia has seen a continuous rise of its greenhouse gas emissions since 1999. The government believes that the record-high emissions level of 1990 could be reached again by 2020.
Second, Russia doesn’t fully understand the negative consequences of climate change. A “Russian Stern Review,” a comprehensive survey of the likely costs and gains of climate-change impacts for the country, is long overdue. The widespread view among decision-makers and the public is still that the country could, at least in the medium term, actually benefit from climate change. Nonetheless, recent studies suggest that the costs of even moderate climate change could be higher for Russia than the possible gains.
Third, public awareness on climate change issues is very low, which helps push the problem to the bottom of the country’s priority list. In a public opinion survey commissioned by the BBC, 55 percent of Russian respondents answered in 2007 that they had not heard or read very much about climate change, and 9 percent had read nothing at all. Among the 21 countries surveyed, Russia was second-last in climate change awareness. Unsurprisingly, at a time when climate change has become one of the most important long-term issues for Western media, the Russian media still pays very little attention.
Fourth, there is a lack of relevant expertise among many of the country’s scientists. In contrast to the high international standing of science in general, climate science plays a relatively minor role. As global warming is not a topic that generates significant attention and funding in Russia, scholars have largely been unable to take part in the international discourse. Therefore, some of the country’s scholars are still sure that man-made emissions could never be high enough to effectively contribute to global warming.
In addition, the reshuffle of the government after Dmitry Medvedev became president could hamper international climate talks. Observers expect that, as a consequence, responsibilities may still be unclear by 2009. At the very crucial UN talks in Copenhagen, we could then see a Russian delegation consisting partly of officials with little knowledge on the topic, no experience in negotiations on climate change and very limited decision-making competency.
If the Russian leadership wants the country to be recognized as a global power, it must make a significant contribution to solving international crises. This can only happen if Moscow recognizes the vital significance of the climate crisis to most actors around the globe. It is also imperative that Russia accepts the role it needs to play in solving the problem of climate change. By actively committing itself to meaningful cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, Russia would demonstrate its willingness and ability to take its place among the leading countries in the most crucial issue facing the global community today. With one of the world’s lowest energy-efficiency rates worldwide, vast potential for renewable energy and the political will to diversify the economy, Russia is in an ideal position to do exactly that.
Oldag Kaspar is climate change consultant for the Heinrich Boll Foundation in Moscow.
TITLE: The Risk of Piracy, Chechen-Style
AUTHOR: By Yulia Latynina
TEXT: The events in the Gulf of Aden seem to be a microcosm of the contemporary world. Located between Yemen and Somalia, the Gulf of Aden is a vital artery of global shipping that feeds the Suez Canal. Every day, 250 ships of every kind — giant tankers and container ships carrying everything from clothes to electronics — transport $2 billion of goods through the gulf.
In the past weeks, the Gulf of Aden has turned into a maritime version of Chechnya. In the beginning of their struggle against Russia, Chechen insurgents were relatively benevolent, releasing captured Russian soldiers and even giving them money for the road home. But soon human trafficking turned into a prosperous business when insurgents received large ransoms for the release of captives.
Somali piracy is on the rise. The only weapons pirates need to do business are automatic rifles. Their communication equipment consists of crude walkie-talkies, and they gather intelligence by slipping $100 bills to corrupt Kenyan port officials who tell them everything they need to know about potential targets. It is pure chaos, with the pirates high on drugs and the “mother ships” from which they launch their operations nothing more than souped-up washtubs.
The only positive trait of Somali pirates is that they are not bloodthirsty. There has not been a single instance of the pirates killing a hostage. They are more likely to shoot each other under the influence of narcotics than to slit the throats of their captive crews.
After seizing the Faina, a Ukrainian cargo ship, Somali pirates for the first time demanded a ransom for the cargo rather than the crew. Then, on Nov. 14, they pulled off a superheist when, for the first time in history, they captured a supertanker — Saudi Arabia’s Sirius Star. The only bigger prize left for the pirates to seize is a giant container ship. Judging by how things are going, though, that day cannot be far off.
What can the West do in this situation? Not much. Burn Somali coastal villages? Sink the pirates’ boats with heat-seeking missiles? This would be difficult since their vessels are indistinguishable from fishing boats.
What do the Islamic countries think about what is happening? They are deeply disturbed about the West’s growing military presence in the region. Egypt, with control over the lucrative Suez Canal, knows that its economy will sink faster than the Titanic if ships are forced to use alternative routes.
What comes next? The pirates will become more Islamized, and it won’t be long before pirates linked to an al-Qaida organization seize a container ship with $2 billion in freight. We will soon see a new version of both Chechnya and Afghanistan on the seaways.
Unfortunately, the global economy is helpless against the pirates, in the same way that an elephant can’t effectively battle lice. Globalization has made many countries dangerously dependent on key transport routes now held hostage by pirates.
Humane standards also complicate the problem. The West simply can’t get away with solving the piracy problem in the same ruthless and lawless fashion as Russia handles its Chechen problem.
The Islamic Courts Union, which held power in Somalia in 2006 until the United States kicked it out, was able to get rid of the pirates in a matter of weeks, just as the Taliban did with Afghan drug traffickers. Now pirates refer to the radical al-Shabab insurgency group, which controls many areas in the south of Somalia and has a good chance of taking control of the entire country, as the “defenders of the faith” and to Western ships in the Gulf of Aden as infidels and occupiers.
The United States always hopes for the best and ends up with the worst.
Yulia Latynina hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio.
TITLE: Word play
AUTHOR: By Andrea Hewitt
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Social and professional networking, cultural interaction, and an appreciation of Russian and English literature, combined with good food, delightful music and a soothing atmosphere are just some of the features of the Translators’ Tea Party, a fluid group of experienced and novice linguists who meet at St. Petersburg’s Zoom Cafe every Sunday to socialize and to translate a piece of Russian or English literature.
In a word, “it’s therapy,” said the group’s unofficial but committed organizer, Polly Gannon.
A visiting professor at the philological faculty of St. Petersburg State University, Gannon, 55, moved to St. Petersburg from Ithaca, New York, 11 years ago after completing her PhD in Russian literature and Slavic linguistics at Cornell University.
“I came here, ostensibly for a year, with my daughter,” says Gannon. “We’ve been here ever since.”
“The reason I came here was professional. I certainly didn’t plan on moving my whole life here,” says Gannon.
“But that was in the ’90s and it was a very chaotic but fascinating time in Russia. And it seemed that there was just a lot to do, and I felt somehow useful in a way that I wasn’t feeling at the moment in the States.”
The Translators’ Tea Party is just one of the projects with which Gannon is involved. She is a Russian-English translator, as well as academic director of cultural studies at the New York-St. Petersburg Institute for Cognitive and Cultural Studies, which conducts a three-week event held in St. Petersburg every summer in cooperation with Stony Brook University in New York.
The concept for the Tea Party grew out of one of these programs where Gannon had taught a seminar on translation studies in the summer of 2005. “We wanted to just keep meeting after the institute,” she recalls.
So a group of five or six people started meeting every week at Bouche Cafe where they would spend about three hours translating.
As the group expanded, they found it necessary to find a venue that could offer more space. So the translators moved to Zoom in late 2005 where they have been meeting ever since.
Without even looking at Zoom’s book-size menu, Gannon orders a latte and a bowl of vegetable soup. “They have the best food in the city,” she said.
However, before they knew the menu by heart, it was the unique character of the cafe, which is popular with students and young people, that appealed to the translators.
“There aren’t many places like Zoom in Petersburg, and I dare say there aren’t many places like Zoom in the world... It’s a place with a wonderful atmosphere and interesting people and good food... There are many good things to be said about Zoom,” said Gannon.
What makes Zoom particularly appropriate for the Tea Party is its literary quality, she said.
“It used to be full of books... And they always deliver your bill in a book,” said Gannon. “But I think people thought you were meant to just pay your bill and then take the book because the number of books dwindled pretty drastically after the first few years.”
However, looking around at the bookshelves, Gannon notes that the restaurant’s literary collection appears to be rebounding.
Just like books in the on-site library, the number of participating translators also fluctuates from week to week.
“There’s a core group of about six people,” says Gannon. But there are also quite a few people — many of them students at the philological department of SPbGU [the university] — who attend on a sporadic basis.
“[And] in the summer, for example, the numbers swell because of the New York Institute,” says Gannon. Of her 100 to 150 students every year, many of them like to take part, she explains.
“Sometimes we have several tables working together on different translations,” she says. “But usually in the summer it becomes more of a social event than a working translators’ event.”
Nevertheless, Gannon says the group almost always manage to complete at least one translation. And there are a few basic principles that the group tries to follow. Because the group mainly translate from Russian into English and English into Russian, the participants prefer to have at least one native speaker of each language in a group.
“But when there are people with other languages, the other languages are sort of brought into the discussion too,” she adds.
As for the selection of texts, suggestions are encouraged but the group does try to follow some basic principles.
The group enjoys translating short stories, but their focus is on poetry “because it’s manageable,” says Gannon. From Russian, the group has translated works by such poets as Arseny Tarkovsky, Boris Pasternak and Mikhail Kuzmin. Some of the English poets they have tackled are Allen Ginsberg, Denise Levertov and Robert Frost — “oldies but goodies,” as Gannon put it.
However, despite being shorter in length than most pieces of prose, translating poetry from English into Russian presents an added challenge because of the different poetic traditions, said Gannon.
“What Russians hear as poetry isn’t what we [English speakers] hear as poetry,” she explains. “In Russia and in Russian, you want to hear this meter and this rhyme, and it doesn’t really sound like poetry unless you hear those palpable, formal features.”
As a result, participants of both native languages are discovering the value of different forms of poetry.
“We talk about how we’re ‘growing different ears’,” says Gannon. “For those of us who are used to shying away from rhyming meter, because in English it easily sounds like a Hallmark greeting card or something, we’re learning to appreciate this rhyme and meter. And the Russians are also ‘growing ears’ for poetry without ... a formal metrical pattern.”
The group also has an objective in selecting Russian texts, and that is to try and choose pieces that have not been widely translated.
Recently, for example, Tea Party members have translated a number of short stories by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky (1887-1950), an ethnic Polish Ukrainian-born Russian-language writer who once said he was “known only for being unknown” and was largely unpublished during his lifetime, explains Gannon.
“I guess he would be considered a modernist. And, really I don’t know why he was neglected for so long, but recently a three-volume edition of his work came out in Russian. So he’s been making sort of a splash in Russia and also in the world of Slavic studies abroad.”
Nevertheless, Gannon admits there is one well-known, widely-translated Russian author for whom the group has a shared affinity.
“We love Chekhov,” she says. “You can never translate Chekhov often enough; that’s what we think.”
“For some reason his stories just lend themselves to English in a way, I guess, and are very much part of the spirit of the Tea Party,” said Gannon. “We have a special relationship with Chekhov.”
Ultimately, says Gannon, there are so many texts that have not been translated from English into Russian and from Russian into English that the choice can be overwhelming.
“So we sort of do it randomly, by serendipity,” she says, “and we just do what we feel compelled to do and what we love.”
The Translator’s Tea Party has a blog (http://translatorsteaparty.blogspot.com), maintained by Gannon, where she posts various texts that the group has translated.
TITLE: Chernov’s
choice
TEXT: A band called The Orchestra, some members of which once played with the Electric Light Orchestra, but which does not include the band’s main songwriter and singer Jeff Lynne, will perform at the Ice Palace on Thursday.
Lynne even sued the band, which cleverly uses the phrase “Electric Light Orchestra Part II Former Members” to advertize itself on posters and publicity materials, but lost.
Ridiculously, the miserable pop veterans are scheduled to perform at a 12,000-seater stadium, which will be interesting to watch if you like vast empty spaces.
On Wednesday, the band will entertain diners at the Grand Hotel Europe’s Krysha ballroom as the “main course” in a “Dinner with a Star” event.
Needless to say, the local promoter is advertizing the band as (and the website Kassir.ru is selling tickets for) the “Electric Light Orchestra.”
The promoter, E.M., was previously caught red-handed when they tried to deceive the press and public into thinking that a solo concert by Ali Campbell, the former singer of UB40, was a concert by the real band.
The Californian melodic indie-pop band Rubies, based around singer and songwriter Simone Rubi and bassist and background vocalist Terri Loewenthal will perform at Achtung Baby on Friday. (See interview with Rubi, page iv.)
The week offers a lot of local acts, some of which have not been seen performing in the city for a while, notably Pep-See, the local “extreme disco” band, whose core is three female singers.
Check out indie poppers The Krolls (Bubble Bar, Friday), alt-rockers/rappers Kirpichi (Zoccolo, Friday and Saturday), punk heroes P.T.V.P. (Mod, Tuesday) and the great young punk band Dottie Danger (Zoccolo, Wednesday).
— by Sergey Chernov
TITLE: Balanchine’s best
AUTHOR: by Kevin Ng
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: George Balanchine’s ballets are an integral part of the Mariinsky Ballet’s repertory. Yury Fateyev, the new director of the Mariinsky Ballet, is also the chief Balanchine repetiteur (instructor) for the company. Last week there were two different Balanchine programs on view with interesting debuts in several roles, before the Mariinsky Ballet left for a short tour to Baku in Azerbaijan. The highlight was Balanchine’s sunny 1947 masterpiece “Symphony in C” which closed both programs. “Symphony in C” was revived towards the end of the White Nights Festival last summer after being absent from the Mariinsky’s repertory for nearly five years.
The first performance was more noteworthy with Mariinsky star Uliana Lopatkina’s presence as the ballerina of the adagio second movement, partnered by Danila Korsuntsev. However, as seems to be typical of Lopatkina’s performances nowadays, she gave a cold and self-conscious star performance, devoid of any expressiveness and spontaneity. What a contrast with the second cast three nights later: Anastasia Kolegova’s dancing was far more musical, alive and flowing.
The ballet was magnificently danced by the whole troupe. On the whole, both casts were rewarding, with Viktoria Tereshkina making her debut as the ballerina of the allegro first movement. She was sharp and precise, and was more satisfactory than Alina Somova, who has just been promoted to principal dancer. Andrian Fadeyev, Tereshkina’s partner, was technically dazzling.
In the allegro third movement, rising star Vladimir Shklyarov, partnering a radiant Yekaterina Osmolkina, was splendid, with his soaring jumps and sauts de basque enhanced by his charming personality. In the later performance the lead roles were danced by Yelena Yevseyeva and Filipp Stepin, making their debuts in the roles. In the last movement, Yevgenia Obraztsova was totally ravishing and delightful as the ballerina. Her cavalier, Alexei Timofeyev, an up-and-coming talent, was full of liveliness. The exhilarating finale, with the large corps de ballet filling up the stage, was a wonderful showcase for the whole company.
“Serenade,” an early Balanchine masterpiece from 1935 that opened the later performance, was also superbly danced. The Mariinsky female corps de ballet danced with far more vibrancy than the Royal Ballet had done in London the week before; their upper bodies were far more uniform and harmonious. Yekaterina Osmolkina was most expressive as the waltz ballerina. Irina Golub was pure joy as the Russian ballerina, one of her best roles. And Yekaterina Kondaurova, or “Big Red” as the New York public fondly call her, was imposing as the dark angel.
Kondaurova also impressed as the leading lady in Balanchine’s haunting “La Valse.” Solslan Kulayev couldn’t have looked more deadly as the Fate figure. Ivan Kozlov made a respectable debut as the lover. Sergei Umanets, who has recently joined the Mariinsky Theater from St. Petersburg’s Vaganova Academy, stood out among the three supporting couples. This ballet has still retained its power since its Mariinsky premiere in 2004, when it was staged to celebrate the centenary of this greatest of 20th century choreographers.
TITLE: Rubies are forever
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Although both members of indie-pop duo Rubies hail from California, singer-keyboardist Simone Rubi and bassist Terri Loewenthal have gained more fame in Europe than in their home country. Getting set to arrive in Russia to play Achtung Baby on Friday, Rubi even describes the European tour they’re on now — their third —as the band’s “best so far.”
“We’ve had a great response in Europe,” Rubi said in an email interview from Norway this week. “Because of that, we haven’t really had time to focus on the States. We feel that fans in Europe enjoy dancing and because a lot of our music incorporates some elements of disco, the crowd in Europe is better for us.”
Rubi and Loewenthal met through some mutual musician friends in San Francisco. “We ended up getting along so well as friends and musicians we decided to move in together,” said Rubi.
“We’ve always shared a love of great melodies.”
Before forming Rubies in 2005, the pair spent seven years together in Call and Response, another Californian five-piece indie-pop band, but moved on because Rubi wanted to concentrate on her own songwriting, try new sounds and tour more. “Taking the driver’s seat” is how she described a shift in her roles between the two bands.
“We are a mix of different styles, kind of like a record collection of intimate songs whether they are pop, folk, or disco,” Rubi said about her new band’s music.
““We’ve always been influenced by melody driven, beachy, poppy, soul. I grew up in a small town in Southern California where the Beach Boys lived, always listening to harmonies and finding some Motown influence as well.”
The lead vocalist, whose favorite music includes Burt Bacharach, old folk records and the newest album from dream-pop purveyors Whitest Boy Alive, said that Rubies’ work even drew comparisons to Scandinavian music.
Both California and Scandinavia “are very strong with melodies,” she noted. Apart from music, the two musicians are keen on visual art: both practice artistic photography, while Rubi also designs album covers. Rubies’ shows occasionally feature photo projections, and among Rubi’s album-art credits is the jacket of Canadian singer-songwriter Feist’s best-selling 2007 album “The Reminder.”
That breakout Canadian appears on Rubies’ debut album “Explode from the Center,” which came out in March and features a who’s-who of guests from the international indie pop scene, including Eirik Glambek-Boe of Norway’s indie folk-pop duo Kings of Convenience and Maria Eriksson of Swedish band The Concretes.
But even with the list of eye-catching collaborators, Rubi and Lowenthal kept the album personal, not shying away from expressing intimate, and sometimes mystifying, emotions.
“I have one song that mixes the metaphor of living in a house that is designed wrong,” Rubi wrote.
“‘Every night we sit and feel the seasons passing by in a room designed too bright, in a box that has no sides. A house is made with walls that save the gentle and the helpless, but the roof will collapse without ideas that don’t last. I want a home that sees, a home that feels, and I’m holding on to you.’”
Rubies perform on Friday at 10 p.m. at Achtung Baby, located at 2A Konyshennaya Ploshchad. M. Nevsky Prospect.
TITLE: Call of the wild
AUTHOR: By Matt Brown
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: In Chapter 12 (Interjections) of “Essentials of Russian Grammar” (Nicolas Maltzoff, 1984), the expression “Au!” is translated as “O-eh!” to “express prompting or inciting.” Pronounced “Ow!” but intoned more positively than the English-language response to sudden pain, “Au!” is what you would call out if you had lost your friends in the woods, perhaps on a hunting trip.
Hence the log cabin-look of a new cafe on Ulitsa Dekabristov opposite (in every sense) the well-known Noble Nest restaurant called “Au-u!” (added “u” for emphasis). With a hearth made of boulders, furniture made of knotted branches, and pinecones strewn all over, “Au-u!” recreates a humble izba (hut) right down to the old lanterns, wind-up Pathephone and impressive collection of old samovars.
Some diners may be put off by the small zoo of stuffed wild animals, including a surprised looking squirrel gripping a pinecone in perpetuity. But “Au-u!” certainly goes a long way to create an ambience, with surprisingly tasteful jazz playing softly in the background. With seating available for about 100 people in two rooms, the cafe also has a no smoking policy that makes it family friendly.
The most expensive dish on offer is the house specialty — a kebab (shashlyk) of pork marinated in white wine and served “grandfather-style” with fries, salad and flatbread (250 rubles, $9.10). Offering excellent value with its fresh ingredients and homemade touch, this hearty dish would make an excellent “credit crunch lunch.”
Other options include such Russian staples as Zharkoye Po-domashny, a home-style stew of pork, potatoes, carrots and herbs served in a clay pot (145 rubles, $5.30), and a range of Russified salads such as a so-called Caesar salad of bacon, chicken and peas drowned in fresh mayonnaise and covered in grated cheese (130 rubles, $4.75).
The handsome old samovars that line the bar are not just ornaments. For 200 rubles ($8) the waitress will bring one to the table, stoke it up with pinecones and coals — giving off a pleasant campfire aroma — and place a white china teapot on top. On cold St. Petersburg days and nights there are fewer more authentic Russian pleasures than drinking hot tea prepared with steaming water from a pre-electric samovar. And “Au-u!” is one of the only places in the city that offers this treat.
TITLE: In Oslo, Captivating Contemporary Classical Music
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: OSLO — Deafening sounds of munching apples and slurping drinks are coming from all directions from the loudspeakers across the auditorium; on stage, a dozen robust, rough, worn-looking men are shouting out orders for meals — enormous quantities of greasy sausages, fried potatoes and hot chocolate. The scene — both visually and aurally unsettling, is part of Cecilie Ore’s new chamber opera, “Dead Beat Escapement” (sponsored by Norske Opera), that saw its premiere at the 18th International Ultima Contemporary Music Festival in Oslo in October. The men are death row prisoners ordering their last meal.
Pondering issues of loneliness, Ore’s death row opera sends a strong social message: many of the prisoners whose last hours the public is observing were “dead” long before they ended up on death row.
Dead men walking
“Was the body dead when found? When was the body found?” resounds a plain monotonous voice resembling a routine police interrogation firing questions into empty air, trying to establish the dead men’s identities and shed some light on their lives. “Did anybody kiss the dead body?” comes the final question, just seconds before the curtain goes down.
Billed as an opera, “Dead Beat Escapement” represents a fusion of genres, with elements of opera, drama and modern dance blended together in a poignant, cerebral and intense performance. The production reaches its climax when the prisoners silently reconstruct the setting of Leonardo Da Vinci’s “The Last Supper.”
Ore’s piece — set to a libretto loosely based on the last words of death-row prisoners — is a deliberate provocation: there is no orchestra or any live music involved. The singing is generally reduced to yelling, screaming, whispering, hysterical laughter or quiet wailing. In sound, Ore has assembled a chaotic palette, complete with nursery rhymes, Christmas carols and an array of physical human sounds.
ULTIMATE MUSIC
The Ultima festival, deservedly Northern Europe’s most respected contemporary music event, had pluralism as its focus this year. The program, which stretched into three full weeks in October, incorporated chamber concerts, operas, installations, contemporary dance and theater events. “Dead Beat Escapement” was among the festival’s nearly 40 world premieres.
“It is in the understanding that the best music is still a music of opposition that Ultima 2008 takes pluralism as its theme,” the festival’s director Geir Johnson said. “Not just the one form of opposition, but many, with their different world views and schools. The music of today is characterized by diversity — diversity of styles, truths, and schools which theoretically are placed in opposition to one another, such as the way in which the relationship between Schoenberg and Stravinsky was portrayed as a war, or the relationship between minimalism and serialism, to name two familiar examples.”
The performances were held in dozens of venues all over the Norwegian capital Oslo, which were diverse in style and size and ranged from the brand-new state-of-the art Norske Opera to the Dansens Hus, located in a former factory building. Each year, Ultima plays host to up to 90 concerts, performances, installations and exhibitions.
Since its first concerts in 1991, Ultima was aimed at pushing aesthetic, stylistic or psychological boundaries, breaking stereotypes and expanding the scope of genres, names, angles, and topics that the festival invites its audiences to go through. During its history the festival has won international acclaim as a platform showcasing cutting-edge art and groundbreaking new works of contemporary music, dance and drama.
“However ‘great’ or ‘important’ a festival of contemporary art might become, I believe one should always bear in mind that there must always be an element of ‘guerrilla,’ in the sense that the festival should dare to make room for oppositional voices, for that which makes us uncomfortable, for that which is rejected —either for being too traditional or too experimental,” Johnson said.
“From a historical point of view it is important to recognize how works which today are part of the repertoire, were once considered oppositional. That is why we can still perform John Cage’s piano concerto of 1958, because it still represents an oppositional point of view, a view which in many ways is the very essence of the aesthetics of resistance.”
Each year, the festival’s member organizations, like the Norske Opera, Dansens Hus and other classical music and arts institutions, “donate” productions to Ultima. Their self-funded contributions form the beating heart of the festival.
Since it first took place in 1991, Ultima has shown more than 1,500 works by 560 composers from more than 40 countries. More than 260 new pieces have had their world premiere at the festival. One of the festival’s key ambitions is to promote public interest in innovative art in Norway, and Ultima has been enthusiastic in sponsoring new works from both established and aspiring, up-and-coming composers and performers.
With its annual budget exceeding 750,000 euros, Ultima receives substantial part of its funding from the Royal Norwegian Ministry of Cultural Affairs and the Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the City of Oslo. Private donations come from international foundations funds and arts institutions both in Norway and abroad.
RUSSIAN CONNECTION
The brains and driving force behind the festival was the internationally renowned St. Petersburg conductor Mariss Jansons and it was founded jointly by Jansons, Johnson, John Persen, Helge Skansen, Knut Heyland and Jostein Simble.
“People perceive music through their souls, not their brains,” Jansons said.
“Generally, I think contemporary music enjoys more and more attention every year,” he says. “The Ultima festival is actually a very good example. Only 200 people came to the first event; now, the performances get full houses.”
Globally, however, pulling in an audience for classical-music concerts is becoming a problem, Jansons said.
“It’s a problem for almost all countries. The question is, how to attract a greater share of young people,” Jansons says. “The world is looking for forms and ideas. I admire the British idea of the Proms, in London, which brings in crowds of youngsters. They generate so much energy, and create an atmosphere.”
“But this is an exception. During the regular season, young audiences aren’t interested in classical music.”
The problem of audiences and funding is even worse in Russia, Jansons said.
“I find it tragic that there is less and less space for idealism in a world where financial issues predominate over virtually everything else,” he said.
Russian audiences, however, are even more depressing for Jansons, who said that today’s Russian concertgoers have no sense of music, compared with their pre-Perestroika counterparts.
(The problem is now so bad that the Shostakovich Philharmonic has resorted to inserting a note in its programs asking audiences not to applaud between movements and to switch off mobile phones.)
“It’s obvious that they need time, but what people are brought up with these days in musical terms is alarming,” Jansons said. “Sadly, most Russians don’t watch television critically; they just accept what they see. It’s a question of quality. I don’t mind the advertising, but presenting singers like [pop/opera singer] Nikolai Baskov as ‘international stars’ is just dishonest.”
“We have to be very careful about what people see,” Jansons said. “For example, when I worked in Oslo, I was asked by the Japanese government to record some works by [Norwegian composer Edvard] Grieg with the orchestra.”
Jansons was initially surprised, and told the Japanese that good recordings of Grieg’s works such as “Peer Gynt” already exist. He was stunned by the depth and simplicity of the answer he received: “We want to give our children Grieg performed by Norwegians in Norway, the way it should sound; when we need Beethoven, we’ll ask German orchestras.”
“They give this music to schoolchildren as part of their musical education in schools, because they want them to develop a good taste for music,” Jansons said. “This is how it should be done.”
As Ultima’s Johnson points out, it has been interesting to observe that while Ultima is considered by some as a bastion for radical, musical expression, the project has been more concerned with presenting an ever broader range of expression and variety of tradition within the festival’s profile.
“Sometimes this comes across, other times it does not. Whether or not these works were written in 2008 is therefore of secondary importance for us,” Johnson said. “Behind the selection of works on the program lies nonetheless an ambition to find music which has the power to make a statement in relation to our time.”
www.ultima.no
TITLE: Over 100 Killed by Terrorists in Mumbai
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MUMBAI, India — Black-clad Indian commandoes raided two luxury hotels to try to free hostages Thursday, and explosions and gunshots shook India’s financial capital a day after suspected Muslim militants killed 104 people.
Rescue efforts continued throughout the day amid sporadic gunfire, with some hostages escaping and others rescued by police. Several bodies were carried out of the five-star Taj Mahal Palace and Tower hotel, one of 10 sites seized by gunmen on Wednesday night.
More than 300 were also wounded in the highly coordinated attacks by bands of gunmen armed with assault rifles, hand grenades and explosives.
Flames burst from the hotel’s top floors and dome shortly after the attack began Wednesday night, and erupted again after commandoes raided the building Thursday.
After dusk Thursday, the soldiers ushered several dozen captives out of the Oberoi hotel, another Mumbai landmark.
One of the freed hostages who did not give his name told reporters he had seen many bodies inside the hotel. He refused to give more details, saying he had promised police not to discuss the rescue while it was ongoing.
The Maharashtra state home ministry said 45 captives had been freed from the Oberoi and 35 were still trapped inside.
Police said they were going slowly to protect the captives.
“The safety of the people trapped is very important,” said A. N. Roy, a senior police officer. “It will take time but it will be completed successfully,” he said.
Among the dead were at least one Australian, a Japanese and a British national, said Pradeep Indulkar, a senior government official of Maharashtra state, whose capital is Mumbai. An Italian and a German were also killed, according to their foreign ministries.
Police said 104 people were killed and 314 injured. Officials said eight militants were also killed.
The most high-profile target was the Taj, a landmark of Mumbai luxury since 1903, and a favorite watering hole of the city’s elite.
Soldiers outside the hotel said the operation would take a long time as forces were moving slowly, from room to room, looking for gunmen and traps.
In the afternoon, bodies and hostages slowly emerged from the building. At least three bodies, covered in white cloth, were wheeled out.
About a dozen people, including foreigners, were also evacuated from the hotel and whisked into a waiting ambulance. Several of them carried small pieces of luggage. One older man was carried into the ambulance by police.
The attackers, dressed in black shirts and jeans, had stormed into the hotel at about 9.45 p.m. Wednesday and opened fire indiscriminately.
“I was in the main lobby and there was all of a sudden a lot of firing outside,” said Sajjad Karim, part of a delegation of European lawmakers visiting Mumbai before a European Union-India summit.
Suddenly “another gunmen appeared in front of us, carrying machine gun-type weapons. And he just started firing at us ... I just turned and ran in the opposite direction,” he told AP over his mobile phone.
The shooting was followed by a series of explosions that set fire to parts of the century-old edifice on Mumbai’s waterfront. Screams were heard and black smoke and flames billowed, continuing to burn until dawn.
Dalbir Bains, who runs a lingerie shop in Mumbai, was about to eat her steak by the pool at the hotel when she heard the sound of gunfire. She said she ran upstairs, taking refuge in the Sea Lounge restaurant, with about 50 other people.
They huddled beneath tables in the dark, trying to remain as quiet as possible while explosions were going off.
“We were trying not to draw attention to ourselves,” she said. The group managed to escape before dawn.
The gunmen also seized the Mumbai headquarters of the ultra-orthodox Jewish outreach group Chabad Lubavitch. Around 10.30 a.m., a woman, a child and an Indian cook were seen being led out of the building by police, said one witness.
Chabad spokesman Moni Ender in Israel said there were eight Israelis inside the house, including Rabbi Gavriel Noach Holtzberg and his wife.
Dozens of Indian commandoes surrounded the five-story building, where heavy curtains hung behind windows broken by gunfire. Outside the center, thousands of people stood in the narrow alleyways watching the standoff.
Among those foreigners still held captive in all three buildings were Americans, British, Italians, Swedes, Canadians, Yemenis, New Zealanders, Spaniards, Turks, a Singaporean and Israelis.
At least three top Indian police officers — including the chief of the anti-terror squad — were among those killed, said Roy.
The motive for the onslaught was not immediately clear, but Mumbai has frequently been targeted in terrorist attacks blamed on Islamic extremists, including a series of bombings in July 2006 that killed 187 people.
An Indian media report said a previously unknown group calling itself the Deccan Mujahideen claimed responsibility for the attacks in e-mails to several media outlets. There was no way to verify that claim.
Magnus Ranstorp, a terrorism specialist with the Swedish National Defense College, said there are “very strong suspicions” that the coordinated Mumbai attacks have a link to al-Qaida.
He said the fact that Britons and Americans were singled out is one indicator, along with the coordinated style of the attacks.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh blamed “external forces.”
“The well-planned and well-orchestrated attacks, probably with external linkages, were intended to create a sense of panic, by choosing high profile targets and indiscriminately killing foreigners,” he said in address to the nation.
TITLE: Thailand’s Airports Occupied
PUBLISHER: Agence France Presse
TEXT: BANGKOK — Thailand’s premier on Thursday declared a state of emergency at two Bangkok airports occupied by protesters who are trying to topple him, as an escalating political crisis set off rumors of a coup.
Premier Somchai Wongsawat issued the order after an urgent cabinet meeting to discuss how to tackle the anti-government demonstrators who have paralyzed the kingdom and left thousands of tourists stranded.
The military denied speculation it was about to oust Somchai, who has rejected a call by the powerful army chief to hold fresh elections, but the government still urged soldiers to remain in their barracks.
“It is wrong for protesters to take the entire Thai nation hostage,” Somchai said in a televised address to the nation.
“The government is not intending to hurt anybody but is just facilitating official work, and the emergency will be temporary,” he added.
Somchai called on the army to back up police in enforcing the state of emergency at Suvarnabhumi International Airport and the old Don Mueang airport, which handles some domestic flights.
Protesters from the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) movement, which seized control of Suvarnabhumi International Airport on Tuesday night and blockaded Don Mueang earlier Thursday, swiftly vowed to defy the state of emergency.
“We are in the very, very final moment of our fight for democracy with the king at the head of state so I ask all the protesters not to panic,” Chamlong Srimuang, a key PAD leader, told protesters at government offices in central Bangkok, which the movement has occupied since August.
A coalition backed by elements of the palace, the army and Thailand’s Bangkok-based elite, the PAD accuses the government elected last December of being a corrupt puppet for ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
The military ousted Thaksin in a coup in 2006 after similar PAD protests, and as tensions rose Thursday the government insisted Somchai was not about to sack army commander General Anupong Paojinda.
“I would like to inform all military personnel to carry out your duty as usual. Do not make any movement or be on stand-by. This is to stop the coup rumors,” government spokesman Nattawut Saikaur said on national radio.
An army spokesman urged political reconciliation, saying it neither wanted to move against protesters at the two airports nor risk a confrontation with government supporters if it staged a coup.
PAD supporters effectively cut off Bangkok from the rest of the world when they blockaded Don Mueang airport.
Thai aviation authorities on Thursday gave airlines approval to use the U-Tapao naval base instead, saying several flights had already landed there, including a Thai Airways flight from Los Angeles.
But Somchai said the losses from the closure of Suvarnabhumi alone would top 100 billion baht ($2.83 billion) a day.