SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1538 (100), Friday, December 25, 2009
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TITLE: Plans For Rebuild Of Memorial Gain Steam
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Mayor Yury Luzhkov proposed placing a replica of a 46-meter-tall war monument razed in Georgia on Poklonnaya Gora in western Moscow on Wednesday as a suggestion by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to build the replica gathered steam.
State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov said United Russia was ready to raise funds for the World War II monument and part of it could be built by the Victory Day holiday on May 9.
Luzhkov, Putin and Gryzlov spoke after meeting with Zurab Nogaideli, a former Georgian prime minister-turned-opposition politician who promised to rebuild the monument in Georgia’s second-largest city, Kutaisi, if his party assumed power.
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s government ordered the monument commemorating the Soviet Army’s victory in World War II to be demolished to make room for the construction of a new national parliament building. The monument was leveled last Friday, and flying debris struck and killed a mother and her 8-year-old daughter in a nearby courtyard.
Putin, who first proposed a replica Tuesday, said Wednesday that the demolition of the monument showed that Saakashvili’s government was continuing “its policies directed against the people.”
Because of those policies, he said, official relations between Moscow and Tbilisi have reached “the lowest point in history.”
Gryzlov, who leads United Russia’s supreme council, said the monument was the last straw for his “patience with Saakashvili’s regime,” according to a statement on the party’s web site.
Putin, who heads United Russia, said rebuilding the monument in Moscow could actually improve ties below the government level. “The relationship between our people … has a solid, centuries-old foundation, and we are linked by thousands of invisible bonds of common interest and history,” he said.
Gryzlov said United Russia would collect money for the reconstruction.
Luzhkov, a founding member of United Russia, said the monument would be rebuilt with donors’ funds and the best location would be Poklonnaya Gora, Interfax reported. The area west of the city center contains a World War II museum and Victory Park.
Nogaideli, who heads the For a Fair Georgia party, vowed to do everything possible to re-erect the monument in his home country.
“Our main task is to re-erect the monument in Kutaisi. We will definitely do this when we get to power,” he said, RIA-Novosti reported.
The Georgian opposition has questioned the rationale behind the destruction. Dato Zurabishvili, a leader of the Republican party, said Saakashvili had disliked the concrete and bronze monument, built by Georgian artist Merab Berdzenishvili in the 1980s, and probably had ordered it destroyed on a whim. “He is like an Arab sheikh. If he dislikes something, he just gives it the thumbs down,” he told The Moscow Times.
But Giorgi Kandelaki, deputy head of the Georgian parliament’s International Affairs Committee and a close ally of Saakashvili, said Russia was “creating a hysteria aimed at the recreation of a dominant empire.”
He said the monument had blocked the construction of the new parliament building and grieved Georgians because it glorified the Soviet Army.
“The parliament will move in 2012, and the chosen area left no choice but to do away with the monument,” he said by telephone from Tbilisi.
Tbilisi has little tolerance for monuments that glorify the Soviet Union, Kandelaki said. “While we do respect Georgian veterans who fought in the war, we do not respect the Soviet Army,” he said.
He added that Tbilisi would not destroy random war monuments, many of which commemorate fallen soldiers and not the Soviet Army. “We are not monument vandals,” he said.
TITLE: Online Approach to Replace Waiting in Line
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky and Alex Anishyuk
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — British citizen Tremayne Elson recently spent six hours in a Moscow line to reregister the Antal Russia Recruitment Company where he is managing director, starting the ordeal at 5 p.m.
“You queued to get into the compound, then you queued to get into the building, then you queued to get a ticket to give you a place in the queue to go to the counter,” he said. “I got pictures of it. It was just complete chaos.”
Dealing with the government — for both Russians and foreigners — may actually start getting easier next year, because President Dmitry Medvedev is pushing for all state services to be available online. He told a Kremlin meeting on the issue Wednesday that he wanted it done by 2015.
People will be able to apply for some of the services online at Gosuslugi.ru by the summer, Communications and Press Minister Igor Shchyogolev said at the meeting. The services will include registration of marriages, obtaining driver’s licenses or birth certificates and filing complaints to the police.
Individuals and companies, including foreign adoption agencies, will have the opportunity to file for visas, set up businesses and apply for various other licenses and registrations. Pharmaceutical companies will be able to seek permission to market their products.
The government unveiled the web site Dec. 1 and is now filling it with information and options. Handled by state-controlled Rostelecom, the portal now tells visitors about the documents, costs and time frames for specific services, has a search engine and lists links to other government web sites. One of the links takes visitors to the Prosecutor General’s Office page that invites tips on corrupt officials.
Clicking on “Required Documents” expands the list of paperwork to include remarks about which papers are required specifically from foreign applicants. But the site will not have an English-language version, said a spokeswoman for the Communications and Press Ministry, which oversees the measure.
Medvedev warned that officials must make a priority of providing online services to build the so-called electronic government.
“Those who will not deal with this matter, are simply not fit for work in modern conditions,” he said at the meeting.
Elson — who said he used the web back home to set up a business and apply for a driver’s license — welcomed the prospect of similar opportunities here.
“For most things that people have to go somewhere for in Russia, the process is just so diabolical that anything to cut down on the amount of physical visiting of state offices has to be a good thing,” he said.
Describing the excruciating line at a Federal Tax Service office in October, he recalled that the door to the compound was one-person wide so that when people started coming out, they blocked the “kilometer-long” incoming trickle. For Elson, all the trouble was to sign just one document.
Daniel McGrath, who works for a major multinational company in Moscow, said he would appreciate saving time on taking care of his Russian driver’s license, which he has to do every six months.
“Once a year I lose at least half a working day, basically, to go to Tsaritsyno to renew my driver’s license,” he said, referring to one of Moscow’s districts. “Anything that would speed that process would be more than welcome.”
Stephane Philip, deputy director of the French Chamber of Commerce in Russia, agreed that the electronic government would “make life simpler,” but said French companies needed to learn more about the opportunity.
Luc Jones, a partner at Antal Russia, said most companies employing white-collar foreign staff hire local private agencies to do visa- and work permit-related legwork for their staff. Many such companies and employees may not notice the change, he said.
Chris Weafer, chief strategist at UralSib, said he didn’t have to worry about any of his legal matters.
“If I need some paperwork done, what I basically do is fill out a special corporate form outlining which document I need and normally in two weeks I get it,” he said.
Leonid Romanov, a lawyer with Alinga Group, a consultancy that helps foreigners resolve legal hurdles, said the cost of such services could drop if the web site works well.
The more up-to-date way of tackling Russian bureaucracy is unlikely to affect foreign adoptions, which take 18 months or more, said a Moscow employee at an international adoption agency, who asked not to be identified to avoid possible repercussions for her work.
Couples will continue to have to send their documents by mail and visit Russia three or four times to meet the child and undergo various formalities, she said.
Government agencies have grown more scrupulous in handling foreign adoption requests after several deaths of adopted Russian children in the United States in recent years, she said.
Romanov, the Alinga lawyer, warned that the new web-based system had to guarantee against any leakage of confidential data contained in the online exchanges with officials.
“Data should be properly encoded to make interaction via the Internet secure and trustworthy,” he said.
Online services will take time to work properly and gain popularity but will eventually improve the environment for living and doing business in Russia, he said.
Alexei Filipenkov, a partner at the agency Visa Delight, which facilitates visa and registration formalities, approved of the idea of an Internet savvy government, saying it presented “interesting” options, such as a less-painful way to make official invitations for foreigners to come to the country and register them when they arrive.
Unfortunately, the web site so far doesn’t have a section for companies to apply for work permits for their foreign employees, he noted.
The Communications and Press Ministry spokeswoman said government agencies were still uploading data to the portal.
TITLE: Chechen President Says West Gives Backing to Rebels
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: GUDERMES, Chechnya — Russia needs a military strategy to resist the United States and other Western powers that are stoking disorder in the North Caucasus to destroy Russia, Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov said in an interview.
Kadyrov, 33, said last year’s attack by Georgia on South Ossetia was part of a Western plot to seize the whole Caucasus region.
“If they get control of the Caucasus, you could say they’ll get control of virtually all of Russia, because the Caucasus is our backbone,” Kadyrov said.
The conversation was conducted at his exotic private offices near the town of Gudermes. The complex features a zoo, a racecourse for his horses, two large golden lions guarding the entrance and an artificial mountain lit up in different colors at night.
“The Russian government needs to work out a strategy. It needs to attack,” Kadyrov said. “Georgia, South Ossetia, Ukraine, all this will go on and on. It’s Russia’s private affliction. Why should we always suffer if we can eradicate this for good? We are a great power. We have everything — an army, technology. We need to attack.”
Kadyrov took pains in the interview to counter accusations by human rights groups that he had been involved in the murders of activists, journalists and opponents in Russia and overseas.
Dressed in a dark blue Ralph Lauren velvet-finish shirt, his hair and beard carefully groomed, Kadyrov smiled frequently but became animated when asked why many of his opponents at home and abroad had met violent deaths.
Human rights groups have linked him to the murders of campaigning journalist Anna Politkovskaya, activist Natalya Estemirova, opposition Chechen exiles in Austria and Turkey and rival Chechen clan chiefs shot dead in Moscow and Dubai.
Kadyrov, who was guarded by armed, black-clad militiamen wearing balaclavas embossed with his initials, said he had personally helped many of the murder victims and their families and was not their enemy.
“I don’t want to kill,” he said. “Who did I fight? I fought terrorists. Who did I protect? I protected the whole of Russia so that people in Moscow or St. Petersburg … could live in peace. … They accuse me of killing women and children. It’s not true.”
Kadyrov dismissed a claim on an Islamist web site that fugitive Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov was behind a bomb attack Nov. 27 that derailed a Moscow-St. Petersburg train, killing 26 people. Umarov, he said, lived in a cave in the mountains and had no idea what was going on.
“Today there are very few [rebels] left,” he said. “This year we destroyed a great many terrorists in Ingushetia, Dagestan and Chechnya.”
Asked how many remained, Kadyrov replied: “If I knew how many and where, I would have destroyed them a long time ago.”
Kadyrov said the remaining rebels were kept going by Western money and guns.
“The West is financing them,” he said. “I officially declare this: Those who destroyed the Soviet Union, those who want to destroy the Russian Federation, they stand behind them.”
Kadyrov said it would be good for Washington if the United States followed more friendly policies toward Russia. “And if not,” he said, “we have a very strong politician of global stature, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. There is no one like him on the world stage.”
Kadyrov made several references to Prime Minister Putin during the one-hour interview last week but did not mention President Dmitry Medvedev.
At pains to appear modest and show his loyalty to the Kremlin, Kadyrov shrugged off suggestions that he might extend his responsibilities to cover the entire North Caucasus.
Kadyrov said being president was a difficult job and he would prefer to dedicate more time to his seven children and the study of Islam. His official residence features a huge private mosque visible from the marble staircase of the main building. “To get to heaven, you have to work very hard,” he said. “I want to go to heaven so I will try to pray more.”
TITLE: Interpol Chief: U.S. Silent on Mogilevich
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The United States has not asked for the extradition of suspected organized crime boss Semyon Mogilevich, whom the FBI put on its 10 most wanted list this fall, a top law enforcement official said Tuesday.
“We have not been contacted officially by U.S. authorities,” Timur Lakhonin, head of Russia’s Interpol office, told reporters.
Mogilevich was released from custody on the condition that he not leave Moscow this summer, after being arrested in a tax evasion case in last year.
He is wanted in the United States on fraud and racketeering charges, and the FBI in October put him on its list of 10 most wanted criminals.
Lakhonin said any extradition request would be futile because Mogilevich is a Russian citizen.
The Russian Constitution does not allow the extradition of Russian nationals to foreign countries.
TITLE: 8 Tigers, Lioness Die on Trip
AUTHOR: By Sergei Venyavsky
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: ROSTOV-ON-DON, Russia— Eight circus tigers and a lioness died during a 20-hour journey in an enclosed and heated truck across Siberia, and Russian police are investigating whether they might have been suffocated by exhaust fumes or sickened with food poisoning.
The animals were dead when they arrived early Tuesday in the city of Yakutsk, where they had been due to perform in holiday shows, police spokesman Nikolai Sizykh said.
A third possible cause of death may have been overheating in the truck, the Mechta circus administrator Yevgeny Kudashkin said. Another circus employee said the truck should have been opened every two hours for ventilation, but was not.
A Doberman dog traveling in the same truck survived, Kudashkin said. More dogs and a bear traveling in a second truck arrived healthy.
Circuses, popular in Russia since the 19th century, thrived under Soviet rule with state circus schools training generations of acrobats, clowns and animal trainers.
There are still permanent circuses in dozens of Russian cities and town, including two in Moscow, as well as dozens more traveling circuses.
The private Mechta circus — or Dream circus — based in the southern city of Krasnodar, had been performing in the Far Eastern region of Khabarovsk before moving on to Yakutsk, about 2,400 kilometers away.
The big cats were last seen alive some 820 kilometers from Yakutsk in the city of Neryungri. Temperatures in Yakutsk were around minus 36 degrees Celsius on Tuesday.
TITLE: Drunks Shoot Priest
AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — An Orthodox priest who scolded a trio of drunken men for urinating in the hallway outside his apartment was shot dead by one of them in the Moscow region city of Podolsk, marking the second slaying of a priest in recent weeks.
Oleg Shekhov, a 38-year-old Podolsk resident previously convicted in a separate murder, admitted in televised comments to shooting the priest, Alexander Filipov, 39, with an air pistol modified to fire regular bullets late Tuesday.
“It was a mistake,” Shekhov, a thin man wearing a green jacket and a black baseball cap, said after investigators brought him in handcuffs to the crime scene Wednesday. “Nothing was premeditated.”
Investigators said Filipov had tried to stop Shekhov and two friends from urinating in the entryway of the apartment building where he lived with his family on the ground floor.
Shekhov was detained hours after he shot Filipov, even though he tried to send investigators on a false trail by collecting bullet casings from the crime scene and planting them and the air pistol in the car of a friend, Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin.
“Filipov wanted to reprimand a group of three drunken men who were behaving badly near his apartment building, and one of them shot him,” Markin said on NTV television.
Two other suspects have been detained. Investigators did not release their names.
If charged and convicted of murder, Shekhov could face up to life in prison.
A police search of Shekhov’s apartment turned up a hunting rifle, a knife and a taser, the Investigative Committee said in a statement.
Television footage showed flowers lying on the stairs inside the shabby apartment block where the priest had lived with his wife and three children. Filipov, the head of a local church that he had rebuilt from scratch in the early 1990s, was a popular figure in Podolsk, local residents said.
“He was a very kind and very responsive man who always was ready to help,” said Lidia Boldyreva, a teacher at a school in the neighborhood where Filipov lived.
Russian Orthodox Church spokesman Vladimir Legoida called Filipov an “outstanding man” on NTV.
Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill opened a meeting of top Orthodox priests with a prayer for Filipov. More than 1,000 priests stood during the prayer, Interfax reported.
Last month, another Orthodox priest, Daniil Sysoyev, who led a parish in southern Moscow, was gunned down in his church by an unidentified attacker. Sysoyev was a well-known critic of Islam and neo-paganism and had received many threats in recent years.
TITLE: Court Rules Platon Lebedev’s Arrest Illegal
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the 2003 arrest of Yukos partner Platon Lebedev was illegal, marking the biggest victory yet for former Yukos owners in their long-running legal fight with the government.
The Supreme Court decision, which follows a similar ruling by the European Court of Human Rights in 2007, does not mean that Lebedev will be freed or that investigators will revisit his 2005 conviction on tax and fraud changes, prosecutors and his lawyers said.
But it does offer hope to Lebedev and former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky that Russian courts might accept future rulings by the European Court of Human Rights, including a $100 billion lawsuit against the Russian government that the court will start considering on Jan. 14.
Lebedev was jubilant about the Supreme Court’s ruling, which said his rights had been violated when a lower Russian court ordered his arrest in 2003, his lawyer Vladimir Krasnov said.
“Platon said that it was a victory,” Krasnov told The Moscow Times.
“But,” he said, “it’s hard to predict now what effect it [the ruling] will have later on.”
Lebedev, wearing his trademark dark tracksuit, arrived in the courtroom against his will, but he was broadly smiling at his defense team a few hours later.
Lebedev asked the court last Friday to postpone Wednesday’s hearing until next year and to excuse him from attending if it was held earlier. “I refuse to take part in the hearing because it is impossible to prepare for it in such a short period of time,” Lebedev said in a statement.
Deputy Prosecutor Viktor Grin, who attended the hearing Wednesday, had little to say about the ruling. Asked whether it meant that Lebedev would be freed, he loudly answered, “No,” and rushed out of the courtroom without commenting further, The Associated Press reported.
He spoke for less than a minute during the hearing and refused to talk to reporters afterward.
Repeated calls to the Supreme Court’s spokesman went unanswered Wednesday afternoon.
It took the presidium of judges in the Supreme Court about an hour to draft the ruling.
Lebedev told the court that despite its ruling, no one has been punished for the violations during his arrest. “No guilty people have suffered for it,” Lebedev said, according to a transcript of the hearing published on the web site Khodorkovsky.ru.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2007 that Lebedev was illegally placed under arrest in 2003 and ordered the Russian government to pay him 10,000 euros ($14,200). Lebedev has said the money would be donated to charity.
The Supreme Court’s ruling “gives a hope that judges will start noticing the European court’s decisions in the framework of the Yukos cases,” Khodorkovsky’s lawyer Vadim Klyuvgant said.
He said it was the Supreme Court’s duty to uphold the European court’s ruling and complained that it had taken the Russian court 18 months to act.
Khodorkovsky has also filed a lawsuit about his arrest with the European court, but it has not been heard yet. Khodorkovsky and Lebedev have also filed lawsuits about their convictions. Both men are serving eight-year sentences.
A Moscow court opened a second trial against the two in March on charges of embezzling more than $25 billion in oil.
President Dmitry Medvedev was to discuss the effectiveness of the European court and other issues with visiting Council of Europe Secretary-General Thorbjorn Jagland on Wednesday, the Kremlin said in a statement. Asked by a journalist about the timing of the Supreme Court’s ruling Wednesday, Jagland said he did not think that it was meant to coincide with his visit. “I would find it strange to suggest that the Supreme Court made its decision to please me,” he said, Interfax reported.
Lilia Shevtsova, who follows the Khodorkovsky trial at the Carnegie Moscow Center, said it was not clear why the court had decided to rule now after an 18-month delay and cautioned about reading too much into the verdict. “The Russian court’s decision just reflects the dual nature of the Kremlin,” she said. “On the one hand, it can’t ignore Strasbourg, but that also doesn’t mean that Lebedev will be released soon.”
Even while the Supreme Court was overturning Lebedev’s arrest, the government’s legal onslaught against Yukos was continuing to unfold. Moscow’s Basmanny District Court on Wednesday ordered the arrest in absentia of former Yukos treasurer Andrei Leonovich on money-laundering charges. Leonovich has lived in Britain since 2004.
Khodorkovsky has dismissed all charges against him and his company as punishment from Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin for his political and business ambitions.
Prime Minister Putin made it clear in a recent televised call-in show that he believed Khodorkovsky should stay in prison. Asked when Khodorkovsky might be released, Putin grew visibly angry and accused Khodorkovsky and other former Yukos officials of murder.
Putin’s spokesman could not be reached for comment on Putin’s reaction to the Supreme Court ruling.
TITLE: In Live Interview President Positive About U.S. Deal
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Isachenkov
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Dmitry Medvedev said Thursday that nuclear arms control talks with the United States required some give-and-take on both sides and voiced optimism that a deal would be reached soon.
The agreement succeeding the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty has required painstaking work and tough negotiations, Medvedev said.
He added that Moscow and Washington had failed to strike a deal by Dec. 5 when the START treaty expired because of the talks’ complexity.
“The issue is very difficult,” he said in a live interview with the heads of Russian television stations. “It’s a treaty that would determine the parameters of the development and reduction of the strategic offensive potentials of the two largest nuclear powers.”
Between them, the two countries control 90 to 95 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons.
At a summit in Moscow last July, President Barack Obama and Medvedev agreed to cut the number of nuclear warheads on each side to between 1,500 and 1,675 within seven years, as part of a broad new treaty.
The 500-page START agreement contained a sprawling web of control measures seen as crucial for both nations to keep a wary eye on each other’s nuclear stockpiles. Russia now sees them as too intrusive and unnecessary.
Medvedev said Thursday that both Moscow and Washington had to make some concessions in the arms control talks.
Medvedev said that Obama’s call for a nuclear-free world is a “beautiful and right goal,” but added that movement toward it should be gradual and require other nations also to cut their nuclear arsenals.
TITLE: President Reminds Kudrin to Be Polite
AUTHOR: By Scott Rose
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Dmitry Medvedev had to remind Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin to mind his manners Wednesday after a testy debate about a national payments system with Vneshekonombank chief Vladimir Dmitriyev.
Dmitriyev said a law was needed to create a national payment system that would be operated by a noncommercial entity and could include some 80 percent of Russian banks. Currently, several regional systems are operated by commercial banks, primarily state retail giant Sberbank, and these are not enough, he said.
“The idea is that [banks] could work through the operator with the public and cooperate with state bodies,” Dmitriyev told a meeting of the State Council, Interfax reported.
He said the system could be created within a year after the law was passed.
VEB is “ready to become the platform,” he said. Otherwise, a planned postal bank based on bailed-out Svyaz Bank and Russian Post could serve as the operator.
Kudrin, who also holds the rank of deputy prime minister, lashed out at Dmitriyev’s “inaccurate” comments.
“Dmitriyev, in his speech, gave a contentious, I’d even say conceptually inaccurate, approach to a national payments system,” Kudrin said, Interfax reported. “He’s confusing a powerful domestic system for handling accounts … with a national payment system.”
Kudrin said a bill to create a national payment system was being prepared by a working group, including representatives from the Finance and Economic Development ministries, the Central Bank and the banking industry.
But “the government hasn’t discussed this proposal by VEB, and these proposals came as something of a surprise for me today,” Kudrin said.
Medvedev said there would be time to discuss the payment system, which he proposed would complement his plan to make more government services available electronically.
“And there’s a second thing,” Medvedev said. “It’s small, but important. In our country, it’s historically accepted that when speaking about people who are present, we address them by name and patronymic, not in the third person.”
Turning to Kudrin, he added: “Alexei Leonidovich, I’d ask you not to forget that.”
Kudrin apologized to Medvedev, who responded that he was not the one who should be asked for forgiveness.
TITLE: Inflation Poses Risk
To Renewed Growth
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: MOSCOW — The economy will probably contract 8.7 percent this year, and the nascent recovery still faces risks, particularly faster inflation, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Wednesday.
“We have to achieve a lower level of inflation and low interest rates, keeping bank deposits safe for consumers,” Kudrin told reporters. “It’s the basis for future investments.” Inflation will not exceed 7.5 percent in 2010, he said.
The State Statistics Service said Wednesday that the inflation rate advanced 0.2 percent, the biggest weekly increase since July, in the seven days through Monday as food costs increased. That brought inflation rate for the year to date to 8.8 percent, the service said.
The Economic Development Ministry said Tuesday that inflation would likely reach 8.8 percent to 9 percent this year and slow to between 6.5 percent and 7.5 percent in 2010, down from 9 percent to 10 percent.
“Having won at the first stage of fighting the crisis, we should not relax and should be ready for a second stage. … The second year will be difficult in its own way,” Kudrin said. “Uncertainty is very high, demand and investment remain very low. … There remains a risk of letting inflation go.”
Output in Russia has picked up as prices for commodities gained on improved prospects for a global recovery and bank lending stabilized. The Central Bank has cut the refinancing rate to a record-low 9 percent to help spur lending and curtail a contraction that saw the economy slump a record 10.9 percent in the second quarter.
The economic decline eased in the third quarter, when output fell an annual 8.9 percent. Gross domestic product will continue growing this quarter after increasing during the previous three months, Kudrin said.
Russia may post a net capital outflow in the fourth quarter, Kudrin said. The government boosted budget spending by 27 percent this year compared with 2008, and expenditure will remain at the same level next year, he said.
A stronger ruble and high profit margins available on Russian markets continue to lure speculative capital, the finance minister said.
Kudrin said “hot money” flows played a negative role during the crisis and that Russia might start capping foreign borrowing by state-run companies. It will not, however, revise its plan to sell about $18 billion in debt next year, even after the price of oil rose.
The debt sale is “necessary to gradually shift to a market means of plugging the deficit, which is used by all countries,” Kudrin told reporters. The government has approved borrowing of as much as $17.8 billion on international markets next year in the country’s first bond sale since its 1998 default on $40 billion.
Russia’s return to the sovereign debt market will also allow the country to create a benchmark that can function as a “reference point” for other borrowers, including private companies, Kudrin said.
This year’s 74 percent rise in Urals crude has prompted other policymakers to suggest that the government may need to sell less debt to plug its deficit.
Next year’s deficit will be equivalent to about 6.2 percent to 6.5 percent of gross domestic product, Klepach said, compared with a Finance Ministry estimate of 6.8 percent. The government, which is running its first deficit in a decade, expects the gap will reach 6.9 percent this year.
Standard & Poor’s raised the outlook on Russia’s BBB credit grade to stable from negative on Monday. The move is being taken as “high praise” for the government’s plans to reduce the deficit, Kudrin said. “It also means that Russia will have a good opportunity to borrow on international markets.”
He also said the country’s Reserve Fund would hold 1.8 trillion rubles ($59 billion) at the start of next year, while the National Welfare Fund would be at 2.8 trillion rubles.
(Bloomberg, SPT)
TITLE: Gazprom Agrees to Resume Turkmen Imports
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: MOSCOW — Gazprom on Tuesday agreed to resume Turkmen gas imports next year, ending a nine-month political dispute, but the volumes were less than half of what had been agreed in deals before a supply dispute prompted Ashgabat to develop new markets in China and Iran.
The state-run company said it would import up to 30 billion cubic meters of Turkmen gas under a long-term deal and the two countries could also cooperate on a new pipeline and production ventures.
But the annual volumes are below the 50 bcm that Gazprom was buying annually before the dispute and also below the 70 bcm to 80 bcm agreed in a long-term deal earlier this decade.
“We plan to start supplies starting from Jan. 1, but no later than Jan. 10,” Gazprom deputy chief Alexander Medvedev told reporters.
He did not specify volumes for 2010 or the price that Russia would pay, saying only that they would move to a pricing formula that “fully matches the terms of the European gas market.”
The Russian delegation to Ashgabat was headed by President Dmitry Medvedev, who was meeting Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov for the third time in as many months in an attempt to solve the gas supply dispute.
“I consider this a step forward,” President Medvedev said after the gas deal was agreed on.
Berdymukhammedov told reporters: “Our meeting with the president confirmed our mutual readiness and desire to increase cooperation.”
But Turkmenistan, holder of the world’s fourth-largest gas reserves, has since moved out of Moscow’s shadow with deals to supply energy to China and Iran.
“If you deny a country like Turkmenistan access, then sooner or later they will find ways to circumvent your territory. It was important for Russia to bring Turkmenistan into the fold,” said Chirvani Abdoullaev, senior oil and gas analyst at Alfa Bank.
Turkmenistan, long dependent on Russian gas purchases, accused Moscow in April of suspending gas imports at a time when demand for gas nose-dived in Europe, and stepped up diplomacy to clinch alternative gas export routes elsewhere.
Alongside oil and cotton, gas represents the lion’s share of Turkmen budget revenues, bringing in up to $1 billion per month. The suspension encouraged Turkmenistan to open a new gas pipeline to China this month and develop contacts with Iran.
“Turkmenistan lost at least $7 billion, or about 25 percent of annual GDP” because of the halt, Mikhail Korchemkin, an analyst at East European Gas Analysis, said in an e-mail. “Before signing a new deal, Russia needs to reimburse the loss of Turkmenistan, for instance by price discounts in Russian exports.”
Gazprom initially blamed an explosion on a key pipeline for the halt but later said Ashgabat should understand that it cannot sell the same volumes when demand in Europe is falling.
(SPT, Bloomberg)
TITLE: Deripaska Berates Khodorkovsky
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: MOSCOW — Former Yukos chief Mikhail Khodorkovsky became an oligarch through “the support of a fairy godfather” and Russia became a free country under Vladimir Putin, billionaire Oleg Deripaska said in an interview published Monday.
Speaking to Spanish newspaper El Pais, Deripaska offered harsh criticism for the reforms of the 1990s and made a string of accusations about Khodorkovsky.
“Khodorkovsky, for example, didn’t serve in the army,” Deripaska said. “And I’d like to know why, and he didn’t have very good grades.”
The Basic Element owner also brought up Khodorkovsky’s past as a high-ranking official in the Komsomol, the Communist Party’s youth organization.
“There are people who worked, and there are those who, as a member of the Komsomol, found the support of a fairy godfather who gave them everything,” Deripaska told the newspaper.
Alexander Temerko, a former deputy chief of Yukos, responded to the interview, suggesting that Khodorkovsky would defend his political convictions even from prison, where he is serving an eight-year sentence on tax charges.
“If, God forbid, Oleg Vladimirovich [Deripaska] were to find himself in such a situation, one could only wish him courage and express the hope that his service in the army would help him bear similar ordeals with just as much dignity” as Khodorkovsky, Temerko said.
The interview is not political, and Deripaska is merely offering his personal opinion on a number of economic issues, his spokesman said. In October, El Pais and other Spanish newspapers said local judge Balthazar Garzon was planning to visit Moscow to speak with Deripaska, whom he suspects of laundering “the Russian mafia’s” money in Spain.
Deripaska criticized the reformers of the 1990s, including the recently deceased Yegor Gaidar, who served as Russia’s first acting prime minister and “put an end to the planned economy overnight and didn’t create anything to replace it.”
President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin received much warmer praise. “Our country is much freer than certain other developed democratic countries,” he told the newspaper.
He also said he was not an oligarch because he only helps the state and doesn’t ask it for anything.
Over the past two years, however, his companies have received significant state assistance. In October 2008, United Company RusAl received a $4.5 billion loan from VEB, and the state bank recently said it was willing to spend 20 billion rubles ($656 million) to buy 3 percent of the company during its January IPO.
TITLE: A Year of Increased Graft and Deadly Disasters
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Ryzhkov
TEXT: Russia will finish out 2009 sadder and a slightly more sober than usual but hardly any wiser. Russia’s economy fared worse than all other Group of 20 countries during the crisis, and the excessive number of catastrophes it suffered underscored how woefully ineffective, incompetent and corrupt the government is. Nonetheless, the government hasn’t budged one centimeter from the status quo course that has driven the country into a political and economic dead end.
The State Duma’s reaction to Yegor Gaidar’s death is highly symbolic and is a fitting way for President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to conclude their disastrous year as leaders of the nation. Led by Oleg Morozov, first deputy speaker of the Duma and a United Russia member, the lower house of parliament refused the motion to observe a moment of silence for Gaidar, a Duma deputy of six years, an acting prime minister and one of the most influential economists and reformers in Russian history. Not a single high-ranking member of United Russia or the presidential administration came to pay their last respects at Gaidar’s funeral.
For the past eight years, Gaidar warned the country’s top politicians and economists in the Kremlin and White House about the danger of building an authoritarian police state, of increasing the government’s role in the economy, of closing markets to foreign competition and of increasing protectionist barriers. His final book, “Power and Property,” released this year, serves as Gaidar’s political will and testament. In the book, Gaidar warns that giving the government so much control in the economy will mean that Russia will never be able to catch up with the developed world. Furthermore, Gaidar wrote, Putin’s state-capitalism model will lead to the demise of the state itself. Gaidar never tired of telling Putin supporters that Russia’s so-called “special path” would take the country to only one destination — the Third World.
More than 10,000 people stood for hours in minus 20 degree Celsius weather to attend Gaidar’s funeral. This once again demonstrates that the number of Russians who share the reformer’s liberal and democratic views is much larger than the Kremlin admits. According to several Levada Center polls taken this year and last, the number of Russians who share Gaidar’s
liberal-democratic views ranges from 15 percent to 20 percent of the adult population, or from 21 million to 28 million people. These supporters of liberal reform have not been represented in the Duma since 2003, when the Union of Right Forces and Yabloko, according to official election results, received just under the minimum threshold of 5 percent of the vote. In addition, other liberal parties such as my Republican Party of Russia were not even allowed to compete in the 2007 Duma elections after being disqualified on trumped-up “technical violations.” The liberal political and economic programs of these parties have been systemically defamed by the Kremlin in state-controlled national media outlets. With reformers absent from the ranks of the political and economic elite, there is no chance that Medvedev’s modernization program can succeed.
2009 highlighted several stylistic differences between Medvedev and Putin. Medvedev likes to make harsh criticisms of Russia’s state of affairs while calling for rapid modernization and softening Moscow’s foreign policy course. Putin, however, insists that the existing political and economic models work well. He remains in favor of heavy state control of much of the economy and an aggressive foreign policy.
Medvedev has not backed up his idealistic rhetoric regarding the need for liberal reforms and modernization with any concrete actions. Moreover, nothing in 2009 indicated that Medvedev has finally become an independent political figure. The government and presidential administration remain completely loyal to Putin. Moreover, United Russia has strengthened its position as the country’s single political force. The nationwide elections in October set a new record for their level of falsification. At the same time, United Russia is trying to extend the vertical power structure even further by pushing to end the direct elections of mayors.
Throughout 2009, Putin undermined most of Medvedev’s positions, which were already weak to begin with. During Putin’s December call-in program, in answer to a question of whether he would consider retiring, Putin snapped, “Don’t hold your breath!” This doesn’t leave much room for Medvedev, who for his part said he doesn’t want to “lock elbows” with Putin in running for president in 2012. In regard to Medvedev’s criticism of state corporations, Putin replied that they are “necessary.”
Throughout the year, Medvedev was incapable of managing the country’s numerous political and economic crises. In March, Moscow’s Khamovichesky District Court started a new criminal case against former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his former business partner Platon Lebedev that is even more absurd than the first conviction. There was a trial against several minor accomplices in the killing of journalist Anna Politkovskaya, but the mastermind has yet to be charged.
In April, drunken Moscow police Major Denis Yevsyukov went on a shooting spree in a supermarket, using a gun that had been sought in connection with a previous crime. Not long ago, police Major Alexei Dymovsky made a YouTube appeal to Putin complaining of abuses in the police force. Amazingly, Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev, a close associate of Putin, has managed to hold onto his job. Nor have there been any shakeups in the secret services, despite a repeat bombing of the Nevsky Express train and a wave of terrorist acts in the North Caucasus.
2009 was also a sad year for journalists and human rights activists. Human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburov were murdered in Moscow in broad daylight. In Chechnya, unknown assailants abducted and killed rights advocate Natalya Estemirova.
The level of corruption became markedly worse in 2009. What’s more, this year showed that corruption kills, as illustrated by the Perm fire that killed 150 people and the Sayano-Shushensky disaster, in which 75 people died. Medvedev continues to battle corruption with empty words.
As we approach the end of the year, there is not much to celebrate on the political and economic fronts. In Russia, 2009 will be remembered for its increase in corruption and bloody catastrophes and for the country’s overall deterioration. Happy New Year, Russia!
Vladimir Ryzhkov, a State Duma deputy from 1993 to 2007, hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio.
TITLE: Countdown to Global Zero
AUTHOR: By Mikhail Margelov
TEXT: The Cold War is over, but the nuclear deterrent remains. This is largely because the West and Russia never fully seized the opportunity that arose 20 years ago. It was a chance for lasting peace, but the two sides opted in the end for a truce.
Given the circumstances, the very idea of a world without nuclear weapons looks like a utopian vision. In other words, it is something that is possible in principle but difficult to realize in the real world. But the world does change. Our idea of a world without nuclear weapons has “gripped the masses,” to borrow a term from the Marxist lexicon.
It is clear that the struggle against the proliferation of these weapons must ultimately lead to their destruction. The coexistence of nuclear weapons alongside a regime of nonproliferation is a legacy of the Cold War. Today, many states consider that legacy as key to their security. But there are uninvited and unwanted guests now knocking at the door to the nuclear club. As long as old members continue to hold these weapons in their arsenals, their numbers will likely expand. Today, at least 30 countries possess several hundred reactors for industrial and research purposes. It only takes a 1,000-mega-
watt reactor to manufacture enough plutonium in a single year to produce 50 warheads. This is highly dangerous because those who are keen to possess their own nuclear weapons have little experience in being able to store them or in guaranteeing that they won’t use them. This increases the ominous possibility that sooner or later these weapons will be used. Anton Chekhov wrote in the 19th century that if there is a rifle hanging on the wall in the theater on stage then at some point during the play the rifle will be fired. The same situation applies today. The nuclear rifle has been hanging over the whole world since the days of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Over the past year, the work of Global Zero has proceeded amid the “reset” in U.S.-Russian relations. Inspired by circumstances, the first item on our agenda was the question of disarmament and the follow-up treaty to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START. In September, the United Nations Security Council adopted a resolution calling for nuclear disarmament. Global Zero declared its initiative for a step-by-step elimination of nuclear weapons. Today, Global Zero unites more than 200 world leaders. These individuals are former heads of state, defense ministers, foreign ministers and senior military, civilian and religious leaders. Our mission requires the widest support. Already more than 140,000 citizens from all over the world have signed the Global Zero declaration, and in early 2010 a documentary film about the nuclear threat, “Countdown to Zero.” will debute at the Sundance Film Festival. In February, we will hold a Global Zero summit in Paris, where we will discuss the next steps toward the elimination of all weapons and projects related to the education and informational support of our initiative. This gives all the more reason to believe that a nuclear-free world will be the No. 1 issue for the coming year.
But we have an enormous amount of work ahead of us — first and foremost among the members of the nuclear club. A nuclear-free world can be a reality if the leaders of these countries unite in support of our initiative. We also need the help of civil institutions. They can offer a unique form of diplomacy, which is often better able than official diplomatic channels, to engage in a frank discussion on the issue of nuclear disarmament.
But the main condition for the advancement of the Global Zero platform remains the positions of the two main nuclear powers — the United States and Russia. They can set the example for other members of the nuclear club. After all, the very idea of a “global nuclear zero” at a government level was originally laid out by the United States and the Soviet Union. At the summit in Reykjavik in 1986, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and U.S. President Ronald Reagan were prepared to destroy their nuclear arsenals by 1996. Unfortunately, a lack of trust from both sides and the U.S. insistence on going forward with its Strategic Defense Initiative prevented these good intentions from materializing. During the April summit in Moscow, there was a bit of deja vu as we once again heard U.S. and Russian presidents pledging their intention of “moving toward a nuclear-free world.”
We wholeheartedly welcome this declaration and are ready to start work. We have a concrete plan for the phased elimination of all nuclear weapons together with the appropriate enforcement and control measures. We are thus ready to add new substance to U.S.-Russian relations with fresh ideas and arguments. Today, we have presidents in Russia and in the United States who are not of the old mindset of confrontation. They both understand that our countries must work together first and foremost in the interests of global security. This cooperation between the two nuclear powers is crucial as part of the ultimate goal of providing the complete prohibition of nuclear weapons.
We understand that there are many obstacles on the road to achieving a “global zero” in nuclear arms. But the fact that the replacement treaty for START, which will lower the number of nuclear warheads and their delivery vehicles even further, will be signed in early 2010 inspires much hope.
Mikhail Margelov is chairman of the International Affairs Committee in the Federation Council.
TITLE: Gaidar’s Dislike for Power Did Him In
AUTHOR: By Yulia Latynina
TEXT: Exactly 2,000 years ago in 9 A.D., harsh reformer Wang Mang seized the Chinese throne and proclaimed the start of the Xin Dynasty. Wang Mang had every chance to go down in Chinese history as the founder of a dynasty. But when the Yellow River flooded and tens of thousands of people died, most Chinese believed that the emperor was to blame. Despite widespread public opposition, Wang Mang tried to carry out new reforms anyway. But in 12 A.D. the river changed course once again, and this was the end of Wang Mang.
Yegor Gaidar would probably not have liked Wang Mang’s reforms, whose measures — like all Chinese reforms — were something of a mix between Lenin and Bismarck. But in the end, it wasn’t Wang Mang’s reforms that did him in. It was the rising Yellow River — which he had no control over, of course.
Gaidar’s political fate was not decided in the turbulent years of 1991 and 1992 but by 70 years of Soviet communism. In 1991, the Soviet Union was bankrupt, and the worst consequences of this bankruptcy hit the country at precisely the time when Gaidar was given the responsibilities of reforming Russia’s ruined economy and saving the country from famine and civil war. Gaidar had as much control over the hyperinflation that hit Russia once he liberalized prices in 1992 as Wang Mang had over the flooding of the Yellow River.
Gaidar was a brilliant economist, but he was a weak politician because he did not crave power. Politicians should not hide their love for power; they should love it with passion. This is one of the prerequisites for the job.
But because Gaidar wasn’t like that, he didn’t do certain simple things that any demagogue in his place would have done. Gaidar did not like to kick a person while he was down. After the Soviet Union collapsed, he didn’t try to whip up emotions and foment hatred among Russians against the Communist Party. As to the role that the Soviet Communist Party played in ruining both the Soviet and Russian economies, Gaidar thought that there was no need to spell out the obvious.
Because Gaidar didn’t like power, he considered economic reforms to be the most important task. In the end, the reformers and former President Boris Yeltsin fell hostage to the siloviki. They were hostages to corrupt and obstinate generals who started the war in Chechnya and to the Prosecutor General’s Office. That was why they needed to find a successor to Yeltsin who could rein in the Prosecutor General’s Office and the military. They found one from the ranks of the siloviki — Vladimir Putin.
Gaidar was also a very courageous man. Although he didn’t hold photo ops in the cockpits of fighter jets or pose shirtless while fishing (for which he did not have an ideal physique), it was Gaidar who called people to the streets to rally in support of Yeltsin in October 1993 when armed anti-Yeltsin forces stormed the Ostankino television center. Unlike Putin, Gaidar did not hide from the television cameras for three or four days after every terrorist act. And if Gaidar had been president in 2004, I can guarantee you that he never would have ordered his Nalchik-bound plane to return to Moscow upon learning that Beslan School No. 1 had been seized by terrorists.
Yulia Latynina hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio.
TITLE: Sharpshooters
AUTHOR: By Sasha de Vogel
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: In an age when all one needs is a cell phone to snap a picture when inspiration strikes, photography has truly become the artistic medium of the masses. More than ever, people are documenting their lives and the world around them. The ease of use and decreasing cost of digital cameras, along with the popularity of photo-editing software, mean that a photographer no longer needs years of specialized training to take a good picture—though it probably helps. Where, then, should we draw the line between art and enthusiasm?
The Russian Museum explores this question with its first-ever Photobiennial. The Photobiennial, which opened on Nov. 26 at the Marble Palace exhibition hall and runs until the beginning of February, displays the work of amateur shutterbugs alongside photos by professional artists. At the same time, the exhibit provides a sweeping look at contemporary photography and at life throughout Russia.
From February to May of this year, would-be exhibitors were able to submit their work on the Russian Museum website.
This open call for submissions garnered 5,000 photographs from professional and amateur photographers throughout Russia. That number was then winnowed down to 970 shots, representing the work of around 400 photographers; these second-round winners all appear in the printed catalogue, which is for sale at the exhibit and can be viewed online. Of these, approximately 460 photos are on display, representing the work of nearly 300 photographers from 62 cities across the Russian Federation.
The Photobiennial was designed to showcase the talent of contemporary artists working in the photographic medium, while extending the scope of the Russian Museum’s collection beyond the already-canonized masters.
The undertaking also offers the Museum the chance to highlight new artistic trends. The Museum plans to make the Photobiennial a recurrent exhibition.
While for many artists the chance to exhibit their work at the esteemed Russian Museum is enough of an honor, three winners will be selected by a special committee; their photographs will be considered for permanent inclusion in the Museum’s collection. Prizes will also be awarded.
Finally, in keeping with the populist spirit of the Photobiennial, the Museum is offering a people’s choice award, based on the votes of viewers who attend the exhibit. Ballots can be cast at the exhibition or online, via e-mail. With so many photos on display, it will be interesting to see which photographers make a lasting impression on the audience.
The exhibit, which occupies over a dozen rooms, is divided by topic. Beginning on the top floor of the Marble Palace, the Photobiennial starts with the Ethno section, much of which was devoted to Andrei Shapran’s excellent Kamchatka series, then moves to Byt —images of daily life.
Portraits occupy the next room; two of the stand-outs are Natalia Ulyanova’s haunting images of miner’s coal-covered faces, from her “On the Creation of Light” series.
The Reportage section prominently features images of Soviet nostalgia, particularly observances of May 1 and May 9.
The Religion section provides an interesting look into Russian religious practices, as it contains several photos of religious masses, as well as photos of the clergy and images of Old Believer communities.
Still Lives and Landscapes are followed by Nudes and Ballet, and finally Sport, which highlighted photographers’ ability not only to capture the dynamism of athletics, but also to capture the passion of the athletes; Alexei Ankushev’s “Painful Leghold. M-1. Ultimate Fighting” accomplishes this beautifully.
The whole of the second floor is devoted to Art, which the Museum distinguishes as “photography as part of contemporary art.”
In fact, the works collected in the Art section seem as if they could have been integrated into the genres upstairs, and it is not clear why they were singled out in this way.
Many of the photographs seek to express the dramas of everyday urban life, through images of stairways, alleys, smokestacks, traffic, the fresh faces of the young and the weary faces of the old.
One of the best of these images is Vladimir Raitman’s “Monument,” which, dating from 1980, is one of the oldest images in the exhibit; it shows a suited old man gazing hopefully into the distance as his wife stands by.
Other photos express feelings of fear, bondage and violence, like Vadim Grigoriev-Bashun’s “Images from the Book of Samurai Cycle”. Some of the most interesting photos in this section flirt with abstraction.
Wandering through the Photobiennial, one truly gains a sense of the current photographic scene in Russia.
While life offers an endless font of photographic inspiration, the variety of ways these artists have found to express their vision is, in itself, inspiring, as it assures a promising future for Russian art.
With the institution of the Photobiennial, the Russian Museum will continue to keep its finger on the pulse.
TITLE: Chernov’s choice
TEXT: A major local rock music venue succumbed to the fire-security campaign raging in Russian cities after the Dec. 5 deadly fire in the nightclub Khromaya Loshad in Perm. Glavclub was closed by Smolninsky Court for 60 days to fix the violations found by fire inspection last Friday.
Glavclub, a large, hangar-type venue capable of holding thousands of fans, had to quickly move Saturday’s concert by Swedish metal band Dark Tranquillity to Orlandina, another concert club that fire inspectors found satisfactory.
According to a statement by Glavclub’s management, the place will reopen on Feb. 20. Until then already scheduled concerts will be redirected to other venues, such as Orlandina and Zal Ozhidaniya.
The already announced 2010 concerts at Glavclub include Ian Brown, due to perform on Feb. 23.
The clubs located at Konyushchennaya Ploshchad in the large building that once held a Soviet taxi park will close but not because of the current fire safety campaign. The owner of the building decided not to prolong rental agreements with Mod, Achtung Baby and BubbleBar, so the trio will close in the next couple of weeks.
Achtung Baby has announced its last concert, which will be by the electro-punk band Gender ID, the same act that opened the club two and a half years ago. The band will perform on Jan. 9, while a farewell party will be held on Jan. 10, after which the club will close.
The club is looking for new premises and hopes to reopen at a different location some time next year. Mod has already found one. According to Mod’s owner Denis Cherevichny, his club will move just around the corner. He said it would open in spring.
In the face of all these closures, the opening of Chinese Pilot Jao Da was good news. Its art director is Seva Gakkel, who compiles a nice music program of older and newer local and foreign acts.
The other piece of good news is that Griboyedov Hill, a room on top of the bunker club Griboyedov, has been expanded and is now almost twice as large.
New Year’s Eve parties will feature performances by Les Touffes Kretiennes at Tantsy and Noblisse Oblige at the newly opened local branch of Moscow’s Chinese Pilot Jao Da.
Les Touffes Kretiennes is a French band that features around 15 members, whose backgrounds include such bands as Les Hurlements d’Leo, Babylon Circus and Les Tetes Raides. Self-described as a “Crazy Punk Brass Band,” which is the title of the band’s most recent, live album, Les Touffes Kretiennes can be caught on YouTube performing The Clash’s “Guns of Brixton.”
Ex-London, now Berlin-based duo Noblesse Oblige performs a blend of disco punk and 1960s French chanson. It was formed by German producer/songwriter Sebastian Lee Philipp and French vocalist Valerie Renay in 2004.
— By Sergey Chernov
TITLE: Siege siren
AUTHOR: By Larisa Doctorow
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The year 2009 marks the first time in the 17-year history of the existence of the Russian Booker Prize that a St Petersburg novelist has won what is arguably the country’s most prestigious independent literary prize in the country.
Andrei Ariev, editor of the local literary journal Zvezda, which previously published the work in its pages and nominated it for the competition, said at a gathering held last week to celebrate the victory that “‘A Time of Women’ corresponds to Alexander Pushkin’s definition of the novel as ‘a historic epoch presented in the form of literary narration’.”
In this respect, the work is very much in line with the format Chizhova established in her previous four novels, all of which focus on dramatic moments in history.
The historical epoch in question here is the tragic Siege of Leningrad, 1941-45. It is the setting for the lives of the three women that are the novel’s central protagonists. Two of them have lost everything: their husbands, children, parents. Though she is much younger, the third heroine’s life is also deeply touched by the war.
Speaking with the St. Petersburg Times, the author said that she based the novel’s central stories on what she heard from her grandmothers and others of their generation. What we have is a collective image of manifold suffering: those who remained in the city throughout the Siege, those who were evacuated via Lake Ladoga, the many who were killed in the bombing, and those who came back to live in the harsh poverty that followed the war.
Nevertheless, the author shows the misery indirectly and a mood of tolerance and love prevails in the narrative. The technique of the composition is complex. It is narrated by an authorial voice into which extracts from the younger girl’s diary are inserted, providing the perspective of a six-year old.
Life proceeds on several levels. It goes on in the communal flat where the three women live, then outside in the streets, in a church, at a factory, in food lines, in their conversations where they talk about their pasts, the years before the Revolution, their lives during the Siege and the years of war; and then in the girl’s head, as she listens to all this, absorbing everything and then recording her impressions in her diary and drawings.
At first it seems that fate has been cruelest to the two older women, who are in their 50s, because they have lost all those who are dearest to them. They have seen better times and can compare them to the present. Antonina, on the other hand, is a representative of the younger, post-war generation. Her life is one of overwhelming poverty and hunger. She raises her six-year old mute daughter on her own and lives in permanent fear that Sofia will be taken away from her and put in a state institution for handicapped children.
Sofia has no father and lives among the impoverished, but is the recipient of so much love that childhood might easily be envied. The two older women, her neighbors, bestow their love upon her, standing in for both her parents when Antonina dies.
The author manages to take readers from all this darkness and raises us to the sky.
The girl grows, enrolling at the Arts Academy, and we follow her life into the 1970s, moving on to issues such as emigration from the Soviet Union. Sophia hesitates as she is confronted by the dilemma of whether to leave and start a new life or stay near her dear graves. She feels that leaving them behind would be a betrayal. She stays to be with the souls of those who loved her so much that they would have sacrificed their own lives for her without a moment’s hesitation.
The novel is written in lucid prose. It is touching, full of love and compassion for her heroines. The end result is a novel which is emotionally uplifting and optimistic. In the grand scheme of things, since the 1980s, Russia has not given us much in the way of uplifting and optimistic novels. And the Booker in particular has repeatedly been criticized for being clubby, remote from the general public and tending to award books that no one reads. This year Petersburg has turned the page.
Chizhova’s victory was not entirely unexpectedly. She was short-listed twice before in the Booker contests. It is also perhaps worth noting that 2009 saw women take many of the top literary awards on the international scene as well, sweeping the Nobel Prize, the Goncourt Prize (France) and the UK Booker Prize.
TITLE: Going public
AUTHOR: By Sasha de Vogel
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: From dried calamari beer snacks to slick sushi restaurants to fishing in the Neva, Petersburgers have a serious love of seafood, and who can blame them? This is, after all, a port city with a long history of connection to the sea. That’s a good thing for the just-opened Publika, where you’ll be a fish out of water if you’re looking for a dinner that once walked on four legs.
Publika is the latest in a line of successful ventures from the Decadence Group, including Korovabar and Moskva, whose Anatoly Stolyarov is now the executive chef at Publika. The restaurant sits on the first floor, above the street-level Publika Caf?. Up in the stylish and sleekly designed restaurant, the standard of service is a grade above average, managing to be professional without being fussy and adding a friendly tone to the atmosphere.
Occupying an annex of the opulent 19th century Korsakov mansion, the interior of Publika blends the over-the-top elegance of an ornate ceiling and art nouveau chandelier with modern Scandinavian-inspired design and a wall installation of dozens of photos of fish and fishermen from all over the world. The intimate dining room features comfortable leather armchairs as well as large ubiquitous floor lamps, which seem borrowed from the Lensovet Theater next door. Although there is much to be said in favor of a well-lit dining experience, eating under a spotlight is less than enjoyable; luckily, requests to adjust the lighting were well received. The first-story view out onto Vladimirsky Prospekt makes Publika the perfect place to linger over dinner and watch the world go by.
We were also delighted by the complimentary mineral water and breadbasket, with three varieties to sample—a European tradition that is still uncommon in Russia. It helped compensate for the temporary lack of a wine card. While it promises to materialize soon, at present only beer is available (Kronenburg, 150 rubles, $4.88), although by the looks of the fun being had at a nearby table with a bottle of Jameson, a temporary bring-your-own policy is in effect.
Almost every dish on Publika’s menu features some sort of aquatic creature, from oysters (90 rubles each, $3) to sea bass (690 rubles, $22.45). Even the vegetable salad of cucumbers, tomatoes and radishes is topped somewhat incongruously with warm chunks of pike-perch (250 rubles, $8.15). The lightly battered and fried crab croquettes (650 rubles, $21.13) were surprisingly rich and served with a side of spicy tomato sauce. The dish would have been greatly enhanced by a garnish to add some texture to its softness, though neither of the two options of rice or potatoes seemed complimentary. The flaky texture and delicate flavor of the steamed pike-perch (450 rubles, $14.63) was well balanced when paired with the roasted cherry tomatoes that accompanied it, and by the light olive oil and sage sauce that drizzled the plate.
For an alternative to fish, try the sweet squash (290 rubles, $9.45) as an appetizer. The squash, served with a warm sugary tomato sauce and topped with a generous dollop of cream cheese, really lived up to its description. Though a dessert-like appetizer may not work for everyone, the unusual flavor combination was a pleasing start to the meal. Meat offerings are limited to rib eye steak (990 rubles, $32.18) and beef strip loin with ratatouille (690 rubles, $22.45).
When it comes to dessert, the chocolate mousse (210 rubles, $6.83), served in a tall glass with whipped cream and raspberry sauce, is a perfect dish to share. The gooey pear pie served with ice cream (190 rubles, $6.18) had a pleasantly fruity flavor, but suffered from a crust that was just as soft as its filling.
Downstairs, the Publika Caf? is an excellent option for passers-by looking to grab a reasonably priced lunch. Their made-to-order sandwiches are served up on a warm, toasted roll and mostly feature fish, much like the restaurant above. The tuna and egg salad sandwich (180 rubles, $5.85) had just the right level of dressing, and each part of the sandwich could really be tasted. Sandwiches are also available in half-sized orders. The flavorful and smooth coffee (Americano with milk, 90 rubles, $3) pairs excellently with one of the house-made baked goods. The silky hot chocolate makes the perfect treat for a snowy day.
TITLE: Switzerland’s Thermal Baths Recharge Your Batteries
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: There are a million and one reasons to go to Switzerland. Some go for the spectacular ski resorts, whether it be St. Moritz to Zermatt. Others go for the famous classical music festival in Lucerne, an exclusive beauty treatment in a private clinic in the Geneva Lake region, or a weekend of wine tasting in Valais. Swiss wines rank among the best in Europe, although the country produces just enough to meet its own needs, so hardly anything is exported. And one shouldn’t underestimate the country’s gastronomic lure — even if we were to ignore the ever-popular fondue and rosti, the countless ways in which perch, wild game or calf liver are creatively prepared and presented are enough to titillate any gourmand’s taste buds in a country that is peppered with Michelin-starred restaurants.
The focus of this trip, however, was the country’s thermal baths and spas.
Reigning as one of the world’s wellness Meccas, Switzerland boasts some fabulous spa resorts. The healing properties and comforts of Yverdon-les-Bains and Leukerbad rival the reputations of Italy’s Abano Therme, India’s Kerala and Japan’s Atami.
My Swiss bathing odyssey began in Yverdon-les-Bains — an idyllic spa town, only 50 minutes drive from Geneva. In my bath robe and with a huge towel over my shoulders, I entered the Centre Thermal through the glass passage connecting the pools to the Grand Hotel des Bains, the resort’s premiere lodging, and headed straight to the outdoor pools. It was a chilly morning, and a plunge into the luxurious warm and bubbly pool felt absolutely divine. As I was breathing the refreshing morning air and watching the steam rising from the 34 degree Celsius pools, I found myself almost wishing that it was snowing — I could have stretched out my arms out and watched the snowflakes melting before reaching the water. Although both the resort and the hotel are busy all year round, the pools are somehow never crowded, making the bubbly relaxation quiet and serene. There are no street sounds whatsoever, and the view of the Jura mountains and the Alps is stunning. The benefits of the Yverdon waters were described in ancient manuscripts dating back over 1,500 years to a period when the Ancient Romans set up a camp in this spa town.
The thermal pampering continued in Leukerbad, once home to an Ancient Roman bathhouse and a traditional destination for Christians in search of healing. The picturesque Swiss Alps village, just over 200 kilometers northeast of Geneva, houses Europe’s largest thermal-spring resort — 3.9 million liters of water flow into its 22 pools every day. Leukerbad boasts 60 hot springs, the water comes out of the ground at 51 degrees Celsius, and has to be cooled to body temperature before entering the pools. According to the locals, 40 years pass between the water falling on the mountains as rain or snow and it coming out of the springs, enriched with essential minerals.
At first sight, thermal bathing might appear somewhat old fashioned, practiced mainly by the elderly people suffering from conditions such as chronic arthritis. In fact, until a decade ago, as well as being popular with the elderly, Leukerbad attracted numerous athletes who came on rehabilitation programs. Since then, the situation has changed, with the appearance of the idea of “wellness,” a concept of nourishment and relaxation for both the body and the soul. Today, Leukerbad is flourishing primarily as a wellness.
Though you might find it hard to coax yourself away from the languid hours spent at the spas, there is much more to do in Switzerland than just bathe. Even if you have no time to visit the country’s top art galleries, such as, for instance, the Pierre Gianadda Foundation in Martigny, Basel’s Jean Tinguely Museum or Bern’s Zentrum Paul Klee, it is certainly worth taking a ride on the glamorous Glacier Express, “the slowest train in Europe,” undoubtedly the king of Switzerland’s panoramic trains. The train links Zermatt and St. Moritz and, during the 7 1/2-hour journey, the landscapes change as though you were crossing whole countries in just hours. This is one of Switzerland’s great marvels: What you can see just before entering a mountain tunnel and what you see in the next pass are, quite simply, poles apart.
Russians flock to St. Moritz, and make up at least a quarter of the guests visiting the resort in the winter. With their passion for St. Moritz, the Russian nouveau riches are in fact following the footsteps of Russia’s last tsar, Nicholas II, who developed a taste for this elegant Alpine resort back in the early 19th century.
In 1913, he built a residence in St. Moritz, which was later turned into the five-star Carlton hotel with lavish comforts, a “tsar’s menu” in its Le Romanoff restaurant, and a gorgeous new spa.
The history of St. Moritz as a ski resort dates back to 1864, when Johannes Badrutt bought his first property here — currently the five-star Kulm Hotel, the oldest lodging in the village.This region, known as Engadine, the largest winter sports region in the country, has 88 diverse downhill ski runs from the very easy to extremely challenging, with many of them accessible from St. Moritz by cable car. St. Moritz is a pioneer of both sports and glamour. This place welcomed the first Alpine tourists and boasts the first hotel in the world ever to be named a “Palace.” It held the first horse races on snow and the first European ice-skating championship.
This resort was fashioned for big spenders and money always made wheels turn here. Even so, with care, and if you plan well, you may be able to negotiate your way between the glamorous shopping arcades of St. Moritz, adorned with Prada, Chanel, Cartier, Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Ermenegildo Zegna boutiques and other fancy deluxe labels, to find relative bargains.
St.Moritz originally drew the attention of visitors for the healing powers of its mineral springs. The effects of St. Mauritius mineral water were appreciated at the highest levels. In 1519, Pope Leo X promised full absolution to every Christian visitor coming to the spa.The growing numbers of Russians coming to St. Moritz may suggest some people feel the Pope’s offer is still valid.
St. Moritz’s neighbor in the Engadine, the relatively subdued and meditative Pontresina, radiates Medieval charm – you will struggle to find a designer clothes shop in the town, where the streets are adorned with thick-stoned, multi-colored 17th-century houses, though here you can relish the privilege of privacy. By contrast, in neighboring St. Moritz, everyone knows immediately who the guests are, where they are staying, and how long for. It is remarkable, that this discreet and low-key place hides a real spa jewel. The vast spa facilities at the Kronenhof Hotel – which was awarded the prestigious Gault&Millau “Hotel of the Year 2008” title – spoils you rotten with a floating grotto, underwater music, stone and saltwater grottos and a wealth of Jacuzzi and whirlpools.