SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times DATE: Issue #1581 (42), Friday, June 11, 2010 ************************************************************************** TITLE: Deputies Flock To Duma — To Chat AUTHOR: By Natalya Krainova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Attendance vastly improved in the State Duma on Wednesday after a television report exposed poor turnout, but some deputies complained that fellow lawmakers were chatting so loudly that they drowned out the speakers. Viktor Ilyukhin, a deputy with the Communist Party, urged Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov at the opening of Wednesday’s session to force lawmakers to stop discussing their private affairs and quiet down. “The hall is buzzing, the hall is discussing some other problems,” Ilyukhin said, RIA-Novosti reported. “It’s impossible to speak if you are the first to speak.” Each Duma session traditionally begins with a five-minute speech on politics delivered by the Communists, RIA-Novosti said. Gryzlov said the noise indicated a drastic increase in turnout. “Some of the deputies have been skipping out for six months and now, seeing their friends, sprang to embrace them,” Ilyukhin told The St. Petersburg Times. Ilyukhin said he proposed opening Duma sessions with protocol matters, not political speeches, to give lawmakers some time to settle down. He said Gryzlov promised to think over the proposal. Another deputy offered a radical proposal on how to improve Duma attendance. Absentee lawmakers should be monitored with the help of electronic bracelets used to track people placed under house arrest, Liberal Democratic Party Deputy Sergei Ivanov suggested at the session Wednesday. But Gryzlov rejected this idea, pointing out that Wednesday’s turnout had improved without tracking devices. Parliamentary slackers came into the spotlight in May after Ren-TV television aired footage of a Duma session successfully passing legislation on drunk driving even though only 88 of the 450 deputies were in attendance. Duma regulations allow the deputies to authorize their colleagues to vote for them, but it is unlikely that all 88 deputies exposed by Ren-TV had legal clearance to vote for others, Ilyukhin said Wednesday. A 100-member list of the worst offenders in terms of attendance in both houses of parliament was compiled by the Public Chamber, but it was never officially published. TITLE: ‘Russian Rambos’ Hunt Cops in Far East AUTHOR: By Alexey Eremenko PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Primorye authorities on Thursday claimed that a member of a gang likened to “Russian Rambos” had been arrested, following reports that the group had killed at least one policeman and injured several others in a month-long campaign of self-described vigilante justice against corrupt law enforcement officers. The suspect, Roman Savchenko, 18, faces charges of illegal weapons trafficking and an attempt on the life of a law enforcement officer, said investigators in the far eastern region. But an unidentified law enforcement official told Primamedia.ru, a local news site, that the suspect was a supporter, not a member, of the gang. He was detained carrying a bag of food, the report said. Savchenko’s father, Vladimir, urged the police to show restraint in their hunt for suspects and asked to be allowed to speak with any detainees. The attacks against the police follow a spate of similar violence against Moscow police that could signal a shift in tactics by ultranationalists, who previously targeted dark-skinned migrants, analysts said. Some news reports said Primorye authorities had cornered gang members in a forest in the far eastern region’s Spassky district using helicopters and army tanks, and were ready to kill them if they refused to surrender. The Defense Ministry said no tanks or soldiers were involved in the operation, RIA-Novosti reported. The wave of attacks started after Primorye police in April received unsigned letters demanding an end to the “lawlessness” of police officers, prosecutors and judges and threatening “cruel revenge” on law enforcement officers, Kommersant reported Wednesday. Police ignored the threats, and the string of attacks soon followed, beginning with the torching of a police precinct in the village of Varfolomeyevka about two weeks after the letters arrived, local news site Vl.ru reported. The perpetrators of the torching are also suspected of stabbing a police officer to death on May 27, attacking a police patrol on May 29, and shooting and wounding two policemen who stopped their car Tuesday, Interfax reported. The police have found stashes of weapons prepared by the gang in the Spassky district forest but are unable to track the suspects among the trees, Vl.ru said. The gang’s leader is believed to be Roman Muromtsev, 32, a former army officer and a veteran of the Chechen campaign, and the group is thought to include five to 30 members. Among the other suspected members are Alexander Sladkikh, 19, Andrei Sukhorada, 22, and Alexander Kovtun, or Kavtun, 20, Vl.ru reported, citing law enforcement authorities. Sukhorada and Kovtun were previously accused of assaulting Asian migrants, and Sladkikh is a conscript who deserted his unit, the report said. Vladimir Savchenko, the father of the arrested suspect, said his son, Sukhorada and Kovtun were “driven over the edge” after police officers illegally beat them, according to Primamedia.ru. The Movement Against Illegal Immigration, a nationalist organization, published on its web site Tuesday a statement credited to Muromtsev and addressed to Vladimir Kvachkov, a nationalist and former army officer accused of trying to kill Anatoly Chubais, the architect of Russia’s 1990s privatizations who now heads Rusnano. The statement said Muromtsev’s “guerilla band” was fighting against “Jewish fascism” and “the lawlessness of the global shadow government that terrorizes our land.” The authors of the statement call themselves “warriors of our Russia” who “have arisen against the evil that has enslaved our country and brought the Russian nation to its knees.” Kommersant reported that the attacks might in fact be actions of timber dealers trying to take revenge on the police for terminating black market operations in which they were involved. Whoever the attackers might be, they seem to be winning the support of the local population. User comments posted on local web sites praised the attackers for fighting “petty police warlords,” and Newsru.com reported that the gang was viewed as a Russian answer to Rambo, the hero of the eponymous Hollywood movie who fought against corrupt police. A seemingly unrelated string of attacks against police took place in April in Moscow, where five police buildings were torched by unknown assailants who posted videos of the attacks on a blog. They said the attacks were in response to police corruption. A series of scandals in the notoriously corrupt and violent police force prompted President Dmitry Medvedev in December to declare a reform, which has yet to yield visible results. A number of ultranationalists have recently declared that their new main target is the “regime,” not dark-skinned migrants, as was previously the case, security expert Andrei Soldatov told The St. Petersburg Times. But it is too early to say whether the attacks in Moscow and Primorye mark the start of a trend of increasing violence against law enforcement officers because the motives of the Primorye gang remain unclear and might be linked to a business dispute, said Soldatov and Alexander Verkhovsky, director of the Sova Center, which studies nationalism and xenophobia. “Attacks against the police have become a significant part of ultranationalists’ activity since last year, but such incidents can still be counted on one’s fingers,” Verkhovsky said. TITLE: Prince Inspects Plans for City’s International Airport AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: Designers from the U.K. company Grimshaw Architects presented their vision Thursday of the new Pulkovo terminal, which will see its official groundbreaking ceremony on June 26, to His Royal Highness Prince Andrew, Duke of York. The presentation was the final event of the Duke of York’s three-day visit to the city, which included visits to a number of Russian-British enterprises, including the local headquarters of HSBC bank and two companies of the Unilever holding, in his capacity as U.K Special Representative for International Trade and Investment. The purpose of the visit was to facilitate the development of trade and economic cooperation between the U.K. and Russia, and support British companies in the region. Grimshaw Architects was chosen to design the new 450-million euro Pulkovo Airport back in 2007. Despite the test of patience and resilience it has since proved to be, the U.K. architects appeared inspired and enthusiastic at the presentation at Pulkovo I. “The major disappointment with airports is that they all tend to look the same, so we sought to reflect the unique face of St. Petersburg,” said Mark Middleton, a partner at Grimshaw Architects. Both the interior and exterior of the new terminal contain references to some of St. Petersburg’s signature features: Its islands, bridges and the golden domes of the city’s Orthodox churches. The terminal’s internal spaces will be connected by individual walkways designed to resemble a journey around St. Petersburg’s bridges and canals as passengers move between customs, security checks and other areas. The blueprints have been created with the city’s harsh climate, heavy snowfalls and shortage of daylight in the winter months in mind. The terminal’s flat undulating roof is designed to cope with massive snowfalls, featuring a series of large indents shallow enough not to allow snow to pile up, but deep enough to provide good drainage. “There is a trick that we noticed in the courtyards of St. Petersburg, where they paint the insides of these courtyards yellow as a way of warming the light in these places,” said Andrew Thomas, an associate director at Grimshaw Architects. To make the most of the available daylight, the designers suggest placing light reflectors on the roof and using gild to liven up the space. During the presentation of the ambitious project, the Duke of York engaged actively in the discussion, inquiring about the details of the project. “I especially appreciate your idea of using the daylight,” he told the architects at the end of the meeting. The new Pulkovo terminal is due to start operating in 2013. When it opens, the terminal is expected to process around 14 million passengers per year. According to traffic forecasts, Pulkovo Airport is likely to process more than 17.3 million passengers by 2025 and has the potential to reach 40 million passengers by 2039. With the launch of the new, techically advanced Pulkovo terminal, the project’s managers are hoping to poach a sizeable fraction of customers from Helsinki airport — especially those who currently use the Finnish hub to travel to Asia. Pulkovo also plans to launch a direct high-speed tram line that would connect the terminal with the Moscow Train Station in 2013. TITLE: Shmatko Says Oil Pipeline in Doubt AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Russia may indefinitely delay construction of an oil pipeline across Bulgaria and Greece if Sophia does not complete its revision of the plan in the next few months, Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko said Wednesday. Speaking to State Duma deputies, Shmatko also said his ministry supported raising the export duty for east Siberian oil to 45 percent of the standard duty, a policy shift that would squeeze profit margins in the industry. The change could also send Russian oil output into a nosedive by discouraging investment in new fields lost in the wilderness. Rosneft and other oil producers have enjoyed a zero export duty on their east Siberian oil since January, although the Finance Ministry has been lobbying to tax the exports to help patch a budget deficit. The possible demise of the Burgas-Alexandropoulis project would likely push Russia into the embrace of Turkey, which has been touting a competing pipeline to deliver Russian and Caspian Sea crude to the Mediterranean market, including to Southern Europe, Shmatko said. Russia needs a pipeline to deliver its own crude and sell transportation services to Kazakhstan, which is planning to boost production from giant offshore Caspian fields now being developed by international oil majors. Coupled with Turkey’s intention to restrict tanker traffic through its narrow straits, which connect the Black and Mediterranean seas, due to environmental concerns, the imminent increase in oil trade makes building an overland line essential, Shmatko said. Greece, which the European Union is saving from defaulting on its foreign debt, has also recently called for the plan to move ahead as soon as possible in anticipation of investment and future transit fees. Construction of the line has been on ice since Bulgaria’s government, elected last year, balked at the potential environmental damage that the pipeline could inflict on its resort-dotted coastline. “There has to be a decision on the future of the project no later than this fall,” Shmatko told reporters at the State Duma after a speech on the situation in the country’s energy industry. “It’s quite possible that we will have to — not terminate — but freeze the project.” Rosneft and Transneft, the state-run Russian shareholders of the venture that would build the pipeline, will stop funding preparatory work and recall staff from the site, he said. If that happens, Russia will invigorate its talks to join the Samsun-Ceyhan line across Turkey, Shmatko said. “We need to understand how we will export oil,” he said. On the export duty for east Siberian crude, Shmatko confirmed a statement made by Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin last week that the government was planning to strip oil companies of their current exemption starting next month. Shmatko said his ministry agreed that a 55 percent discount would be fair, given the current international prices for crude. The government is expected to make a final decision by Tuesday, which is the midmonth deadline for readjusting the oil export duty, he said. But the measure must not cause companies to wind up their development in the region. “That’s something we should prevent by all means,” he said. Oil companies should confirm that the duty will still allow for further investment, Shmatko said. He was likely referring to the companies that now operate there, such as industry leader Rosneft; privately held TNK-BP, which is half-owned by BP and is Russia’s third-largest oil producer; and Surgutneftegaz, which ranks as the country’s fourth-largest oil company by output. TITLE: Mass Grave With at Least 495 Bodies Found in Vladivostok PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: VLADIVOSTOK — At least 495 skeletons, many with head gunshot wounds, have been unearthed in a mass grave probably dating back to purges under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in the 1930s, Vladivostok authorities said, Reuters reported. At least 3.5 tons of bones were extracted from the site on the outskirts of the Pacific Ocean port of Vladivostok after it was discovered by workmen building a road, City Hall said in a statement. Millions of Soviet citizens were executed or died in labor camps during Stalin’s rule from the 1920s until his death in 1953, but discoveries of mass graves became less frequent after a surge in finds that followed the 1991 Soviet collapse. Experts were checking the hypothesis that the bodies were victims of Stalin’s purges. “Practically all of the skulls have bullet wounds,” said Yaroslav Livanksy, the head of a group of volunteers who helped to excavate the site. He said money and clothes from the 1930s had been found at the site. A crushed child’s skull was discovered close to a bead bracelet and a small slipper. Irina Fliege, a senior researcher with human rights group Memorial, which collects information about Stalin-era killings, said she had no doubt that the victims were shot by Stalinist forces. She said far more bodies were likely to be found as adjacent sites are investigated. “This happens all over the country, it’s impossible to say how often,” Fliege said. “All we can do is put up memorials to remember the dead.” TITLE: Medvedev Looks to Cut Bureaucracy by 20 Percent AUTHOR: By Scott Rose PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — President Dmitry Medvedev on Tuesday ordered the government to draft a proposal on reducing the federal bureaucracy by 20 percent, a politically risky idea floated by the Finance Ministry to help patch the budget deficit. A decision will only be made after a final proposal has been submitted and studied, Medvedev said at a government meeting on federal targeted programs. Any downsizing of Russia’s sprawling bureaucracy — traditionally a strong voting bloc — could have major implications for the 2012 presidential elections. Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have both left open the possibility that they could seek the post. “I know that this has already been partially discussed in the government. We need to see a final proposal and only then make a decision,” Medvedev said, according to transcript posted on the Kremlin web site. Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin mentioned the idea on Monday, he said. “It is, of course, a fairly severe measure, which could help solve a whole series of problems,” Medvedev said. “At the same time, these cannot be knee-jerk decisions or based exclusively on financial considerations. “First of all, these are people’s fates, and secondly, I’d like to understand ultimately what we could achieve,” he said. The comments suggested that Medvedev wanted a say on the politically touchy subject of budget politics, which is generally handled by the Cabinet. Vedomosti reported on Tuesday that the Finance Ministry wanted to reduce the number of officials by 20 percent because the federal government can no longer afford to support a bloated bureaucracy. The suggestion was made to Putin at a government meeting last week, the newspaper reported, citing a government source and an official in the Finance Ministry. Putin heard out the proposal but indicated that he would make a decision later, the government source told Vedomosti. The Finance Ministry wants to raise the remaining state workers’ salaries in line with inflation, rather than using the freed up funds to raise wages further. The government has raised the amount of funds available to pay federal employees by 30 percent since December 2008, creating a key safety net to shelter state workers from the effects of the global economic crisis. Putin — while not publicly taking a stance on the Finance Ministry’s proposal — did tell a meeting with labor union officials last week that the government would consider raising pensions and budget workers’ salaries in the fall if the economic situation allows. That would appear to put him at odds with Kudrin, who warned last week that Russia could have a budget fall of between 5 percent and 5.9 percent this year. The federal budget had a shortfall of 5.9 percent in 2009. Medvedev also said Tuesday that he would make an address on the state of the budget at the end of the month after the government settles some final issues. “Given that we have a budget deficit, we need to optimize expenses as thoroughly as possible,” he said. “That is the government’s most important task.” According to the State Statistics Service, some 800,000 people are employed as federal officials, a categorization that does not include the military or other security services. That would suggest a reduction of 160,000 positions. Yelena Panfilova, head of Transparency International’s Moscow office, said the number of officials could be cut by up to 25 percent without endangering the quality of services rendered. “This is realistic, not just to achieve budget cuts and to reduce corruption, but also because the country is increasingly introducing e-government services,” Panfilova told The St. Petersburg Times. The most formidable task, she said, would be identifying which functions would have to go. “I strongly suspect that nobody has a clear idea of how to do that,” she said. Panfilova also warned that while big bureaucracies do encourage corruption, reducing staff does not automatically reduce the problem. Medvedev in December ordered an anti-corruption purge at the Interior Ministry that would cut its 1.4 million-member work force by 20 percent by 2012 and provide raises to remaining staff. Firing tens of thousands of federal officials could undermine electoral support for the current leaders, said Dmitry Orlov, director of the Agency for Political and Economic Communications, a think tank. “Officials are a very substantial part of the power base for any country’s leaders,” he said. “They have a wide social network.” TITLE: Ingush Rebel Leader Taziyev Captured by Security Service PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Ingush rebel leader Ali Taziyev appears to be cooperating with authorities after being seized by the Federal Secret Service this week, Kommersant reported Thursday. As evidence of Taziyev’s possible cooperation, the report pointed to an operation in Chechnya on Wednesday that killed six militants, including an Arab mercenary named Yasir. The operation used chemical-warfare gases, the report said. Interfax said 10 insurgents were killed but did not confirm Yasir’s death. No officials commented on Taziyev’s possible cooperation. The rebel leader, nicknamed “Magas,” has been blamed for organizing hundreds of deaths and numerous bombings, including a 2009 attack that nearly killed Ingush President Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, who later called Taziyev “a rabid dog.” The FSB announced Taziyev’s capture on Wednesday. Kommersant said he is being held in Moscow’s Lefortovo jail. Interfax reported on Thursday that Taziyev had been enticed into an ambush in the Ingush town of Malgobek and captured without a shot having been fired. TITLE: Putin, Medvedev Already Mulling 2012 Elections PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev are already considering their roles in the 2012 presidential election, Putin told French media on Wednesday. “Naturally, I am already thinking about this issue with President Medvedev but have decided not to make much fuss about it, not to let ourselves be distracted by this problem,” Putin said. His comments to the French media were carried by Russian news agencies. Putin, president from 2000 to 2008, anointed Medvedev as his successor when his second and last term in office expired. Putin can run for president again in elections in 2012 and stay in power until 2024. Since 2008, the Medvedev and Putin duo have been running the country in tandem. “What we will do in 2012 will depend on the results [of our work],” Putin said in an interview ahead of his visit to France, which began Thursday. He said there was “no need to interfere in each other’s area of competence.” TITLE: Sand Sculpture Presents a Tour of Russian History AUTHOR: By Marina Darmaros PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — The fact that Russians carve ice into sculptures makes some kind of sense for obvious reasons. But sand? Currently there is a thousand tons of sand — next to the Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow — that has been transformed into a phantasmagorical yellow sculpture that takes viewers on a tour of Russian history. The sculpture is the work of Vladimir Kurayev and several others, including top sand sculptors from Ukraine, Portugal, Spain, Canada and the United States, and has been completed in time for Russia Day on Saturday. The 23-meter-long, 7-meter-tall composition is housed in a huge tent in the gardens of the cathedral. Before starting, the foreign artists had to be taught about Russian history. “For a whole month, we took a trip through the history of Russia,” Kurayev said. American sculptor Ray Villafane was the first to accept, simply telling Kurayev, “I want to do the Alexander Nevsky.” Canadian David Billings chose to depict the Mongol invasion of Rus. Among the sites in the sand is the Battle of the Ice between Alexander Nevsky and the Teutonic Knights, and the Church of the Intercession on the Nerl river, which has an impressive icon at its entrance. In front of the cathedral is the famous icon painter Andrei Rublyov, sculpted by Kurayev. The composition was built as part of a competition to select a participant for the World Championship of Sand Sculpting to be held in Washington in September. The winner was Vadim Gryadov, from Siberia, who sculpted the Church of the Intercession. “The organizers also organize festivals of ice sculptures, and I have been invited to come back in winter,” said sculptor Pedro Mira from Portugal. The sculptures will be on show until Sept. 30. Visitors can see the sculptors in action on Saturday when they sculpt nearby the tent, while a dozen Irishmen living in Moscow play Russian folk music on their bagpipes. “There is a philosophy in all this as well. The sand sculpture shows how time is short,” Kurayev said. “Sand is also a clock, an hourglass. But you can turn it over. Here you can also turn it over and make another, new project.” The Holy Russia sand sculpture exhibition runs through Sept. 30. Vsekhsvyatsky Proyezd, near the Christ the Savior Cathedral, Moscow. Metro Kropotkinskaya. Tel. (495) 227-1043. TITLE: New National Holiday Irks Some AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Russia will celebrate a new holiday next month under a decision backed by the Kremlin and Russian Orthodox Church that is stirring up decidedly unholy feelings among non-Orthodox Russians. Christianization of Rus Day on July 28 won’t be counted as a day off work, but it will be recognized on calendars as the country’s ninth so-called “memorial holiday,” which also includes Cosmonauts Day on April 12 and Constitution Day on Dec. 12. The new holiday commemorates the baptism in 988 of Vladimir the Great, who accepted Christianity together with his family and the people of his state, Kievan Rus, the predecessor to the Russian Empire and whose capital was Kiev. Now Protestant Christians and Muslims want their own holidays, too. Konstantin Bendas, a senior official with the Russian Union of Christians of the Evangelical Faith, said Christianization of Rus Day has created tensions between the Orthodox church and other faiths, which believe that they also deserve memorial holidays. “The Protestants have a plan to set their holiday on Oct. 31,” Bendas said, referring to the day in 1517 on which Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the door of a Roman Catholic church and started the Reformation. Lawmakers in predominantly Muslim Tatarstan are calling for Russia to celebrate the Day Islam Came to Russia on May 16, the date in 922 on which Islam was officially approved as a state religion in the Middle Volga region. Such a holiday would “contribute to an interfaith dialogue and strengthen the international authority of Russia,” Tatarstan lawmakers said in a statement. A spokesman for Tatarstan’s parliament declined to comment on the initiative, saying it would be officially debated Wednesday. Muslims comprise about 6 percent of the Russian population, while less than 1 percent is Protestant, Catholic, Jewish or Buddhist. In contrast, 60 percent to 70 percent of Russians consider themselves Orthodox, although few attend church regularly. A senior Orthodox official said his church respected the other faiths but their holidays should not be recognized nationally like Christianization of Rus Day. “Russia is an Orthodox state, and we should not be ashamed of declaring it,” said Vsevolod Chaplin, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s department for church and society affairs. President Dmitry Medvedev signed a law establishing the new holiday on June 1, marking the latest manifestation of vibrant ties between the state and the Russian Orthodox Church and a chance for politicians to tout improved relations with Ukraine. The legislation was earlier approved by the State Duma and the Federation Council. In Ukraine, the date was declared a state holiday in 2008, prompting the Russian Orthodox Church to seek a similar decision in Russia. The date is considered by the Russian and Ukrainian Orthodox churches as the beginning of Christianity in the region. Sergei Markov, deputy chairman of the State Duma’s Social and Religious Organizations Committee, said the Duma backed the new holiday in recognition of warmer ties with Ukraine after the election of President Viktor Yanukovych in February. “The main reason for the holiday is a vital improvement in relations with Ukraine. It’s important now to have mutual dates,” Markov told The St. Petersburg Times. “There are other mutual holidays already, like Victory Day, Women’s Day and New Year’s, but the more the better,” he said. An overwhelming 422 deputies approved the holiday in the 450-seat Duma in its third and final reading on May 21. Chaplin, the Orthodox official, said the holiday promised to build closer ties between Russia and its predominantly Orthodox neighbors, Ukraine and Belarus. “Russia, Ukraine and Belarus have the same cultural roots that define people’s lives,” he said. A spokesman for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church said the church welcomed Russia’s decision to celebrate the holiday as “an important event that unites brothers.” The holiday also puts Russia at the center of the Orthodox faith, an idea pushed by Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, noted Roman Lunkin, director of the Religion and Law Institute. In the end, though, ordinary Russians are unlikely to be terribly impressed with the new holiday — one of dozens that are officially recognized by the state and already crowd their calendars. TITLE: Ministry Admits Official Was In Vicinity of Crash AUTHOR: By Natalya Krainova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — The Interior Ministry acknowledged on Tuesday that a car owned by Deputy Interior Minister Mikhail Sukhodolsky was in the vicinity of a crash that injured a woman, but it denied that the car was responsible for the accident. A Cadillac Escalade, from a cortege equipped with flashing blue lights, rammed into a Mitsubishi Lancer driven by 35-year-old Moscow resident Natalya Brezhneva after two cars from the procession crossed into the oncoming lane on a highway in the Moscow region on Monday, Lifenews.ru reported. Brezhneva was hospitalized with concussion, a pelvic fracture and a bruised shoulder, the report said. The Interior Ministry said in a statement that Sukhodolsky’s car was present at the time of the crash on the 31st kilometer of Kaluzhskoye Shosse but wasn’t involved. In fact, it said, Sukhodolsky’s driver returned to the site of the crash and provided unspecified assistance to people involved in the incident. The statement did not say whether the Cadillac was accompanying Sukhodolsky’s car or just passing by. The Cadillac was “assigned to” Sukhodolsky, an official in the Interior Ministry’s department of state protection of property told Lifenews.ru. But a spokesman for the department, Vladimir Pushkaryov, said by telephone that the car could not have escorted Sukhodolsky because the department’s cars only escort cargo. Only traffic police cars are allowed to escort Interior Ministry officials. An eyewitness of the accident said Sukhodolsky’s driver removed the flashing blue lights from his car before returning to the scene of the crash, while the Cadillac driver took the license plates off his car, Lifenews.ru reported. In addition, a senior Interior Ministry official, Colonel Vitaly Semenenko, contacted Brezhneva’s relatives and arranged to bring her car in for repairs and cover all repair expenses, Lifenews.ru reported. The Cadillac driver was drunk, Rosbalt reported, citing a spokeswoman for the Moscow region branch of the Investigative Committee, Yulia Zhukova. But Zhukova denied the report when reached by telephone Tuesday. Repeated calls to the press office of the Moscow region traffic police went unanswered Tuesday. Officials’ cars with flashing blue lights have been involved in a series of traffic accidents in recent months, prompting outraged drivers to call for severe restrictions on using the lights or their outright ban. The flashing lights, which allow the cars to break traffic rules, have also been blamed for contributing to Moscow’s notoriously bad traffic jams. TITLE: Tax May Double Vodka Price PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — The Finance Ministry has proposed increasing the excise tax on hard alcohol, in a rate hike that would double the minimum vodka price to 200 rubles (about $6) per half liter by 2013. The tax hike would mean that the price of the cheapest vodka would be increased from the current 90 rubles to 120 rubles in 2011, 160 rubles in 2012 and finally 200 rubles in 2013, Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Shatalov said Wednesday. The ministry has recommended raising the tax next year to 330 rubles per liter from 210 rubles, and in 2013 to 650 rubles, State Duma Deputy Mikhail Blinov said, Kommersant reported Wednesday. The tax hikes would lead to a 50 percent reduction in the market, Blinov said, estimating the measure’s chances of passing at 90 percent. Vodka makers say that high consumer prices for distilled alcohol will lead to an increase of bootleggers and would devastate producers in the low-end price segment. Last year, the government passed a similar tax hike on beer, raising the rate from 3 rubles to 9 rubles per liter. This resulted in a 15 percent drop in beer production in the country over the first four months of the year, compared with the same period last year, according to data from the State Statistics Service. A report released last month by the New Economic School warned that relatively low taxes on vodka in Russia were responsible for the country’s heavy drinking and reduced average life expectancy by 10 years. Shatalov also said the excise tax on cigarettes could be increased by 30 percent per year over the next three years. TITLE: Rosatom Agrees to First Asset Sale to Foreign Firm AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Rosatom agreed to sell a stake in one of its uranium enrichment plants to the Kazakh state company Kazatomprom in a deal that would for the first time unlock a Russian nuclear fuel maker for partial foreign ownership, both companies said Tuesday. Kazatomprom, the world’s largest uranium producer, hopes to complete the deal before the end of September, its chief, Vladimir Shkolnik, told reporters at an industry conference. Rosatom, the state corporation that runs the country’s nuclear industry, made the offer in the first quarter of this year, said Vladislav Korogodin, deputy chief of Rosatom’s department for nuclear energy industry. For sale is up to 49 percent in either the Uralsky Electrochemical Combine or the Electrochemical Plant, he said, Interfax reported. The agreement replaces a previous accord that Russia, owner of 40 percent of global enrichment capacity, and Kazakhstan signed to jointly build an enrichment plant in Angarsk, Interfax said. The countries decided to use an existing facility for their cooperation because they determined that there was an excess of such facilities worldwide, the report said. Shkolnik said the new deal would also “hopefully” allow Kazatomprom to market the venture’s fuel-grade uranium independently of Rosatom. The companies could divide the markets to avoid competition, he said. In another joint venture, the two companies are continuing to work on a plan to build a medium-capacity nuclear power plant in Kazakhstan, Shkolnik said. The project, now being studied by the Kazakh government, would provide a model for duplicating in any future contracts with third countries, he said. Rosatom chief Sergei Kiriyenko said at the conference that Russia’s trademark power reactors of at least 1.2 gigawatts capacity were too large for countries that are only starting to develop their nuclear power industries. Rosatom needs to rapidly develop small capacity models of up to 100 megawatts and medium-capacity models of 300 megawatts to 600 megawatts, he said. As part of that policy, Rosatom is planning to take delivery of a barge later this month that will carry Russia’s first floating nuclear power plant, Kiriyenko said. The 80-megawatt plant is scheduled to begin operating in 2012, he said. Shkolnik estimated that medium-capacity plants account for 20 percent of demand for new nuclear power generation. Also at the conference, Kiriyenko announced that Russia and Iran would jointly run Iran’s first nuclear power plant that Rosatom plans to launch in August. Iran agreed to establish a joint venture with Rosatom to operate the plant because the country doesn’t have enough experience in maintaining such facilities, he said. In other news, Rosatom signed an agreement with the French Atomic Energy Commission to expand cooperation on reprocessing, decommissioning and isotopes technology. In what could further extend Rosatom’s international reach, the State Duma is scheduled to ratify an accord between Russia and Australia on peaceful nuclear cooperation on Wednesday. Australia holds the world’s largest reserves of uranium and is the world’s third-largest producer of the radioactive ore used to make nuclear fuel. TITLE: Dvorkovich Gives Support to Biofuel Energy Projects AUTHOR: By Maria Antonova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — The government should support small energy-generating projects that use biofuel by giving them tax breaks and subsidized interest rates, presidential economic adviser Arkady Dvorkovich said Tuesday. Dvorkovich has been a key advocate of President Dmitry Medvedev’s goal to make Russia 40 percent more energy-efficient by 2020. The government has started pursuing the target by phasing out incandescent bulbs for more energy-efficient lights. His proposal Tuesday is also the latest effort in a recent Kremlin drive to improve environmental policy. But experts warned that tax breaks might not be the right approach, saying new laws were needed to remove barriers that make small energy projects economically unfeasible. “Wider use of bio-resources — primarily to develop local, small-capacity energy facilities and to increase the share of bio-resources in energy consumption of certain regions — is one of the key goals,” Dvorkovich said during a meeting in the Kirov region on using timber waste and peat. “We need to determine a legal framework for peat bogs,” he said. Kirov Governor Nikita Belykh applauded biomass-fueled stations as a way to keep heating bills low, calling the region’s abundant peat resources “Vyatka gold.” Vyatka is the pre-Revolutionary name for Kirov, which Belykh has lobbied to restore. The Kremlin is “ready” to support such projects with tax breaks, subsidized interest rates on loans and lower customs fees for imported equipment, Dvorkovich said, adding that the issue was considered when the government was drawing up its energy production and consumption estimates. Last week, the Energy Ministry published a revised general plan for the location of power facilities, which spells out the use of new and existing power capacity through 2030. Under the updated plan, new low-capacity power plants will make up 1.1 gigawatts in 2021 to 2025, and another 2 gigawatts by 2030, for a total of 3.1 gigawatts. Total new capacity planned before 2030 is 173 gigawatts, according to figures published by the Energy Ministry last week. A planned 6.1 gigawatts will come from renewable energy sources, equal to less than 2 percent of the total 324-gigawatt capacity by 2030. But making even such modest increases in the share of renewable energy will be difficult because small generators using the technology have no way to sell energy to the grid. Grid operators prefer generators with a guaranteed power supply, which small, biomass stations would not be able to provide, said Mikhail Yulkin, director of the Environmental Investment Center, who has served as consultant on several biomass energy projects. The problem could be resolved if a bill is passed requiring grid operators to first purchase power from generators using renewable resources. The government has until Sept. 1 to “take measures directed at required purchases of power generated from renewable resources,” according to a list of Medvedev’s orders given at the State Council. The list was published on the Kremlin’s web site Monday. Yulkin said, however, that inadequate waste legislation is also an obstacle. TITLE: iPhone 4 Set to Arrive In Russia in Autumn 2010 AUTHOR: By Igor Tsukanov PUBLISHER: Vedomosti TEXT: MOSCOW — VimpelCom will start selling the new iPhone 4 in September or October, the mobile operator said. VimpelCom and Apple are currently negotiating shipping details on Apple’s latest version of its best-selling smartphone, which was presented by Apple CEO Steve Jobs on Monday. VimpelCom expects sales of the iPhone 4 to be “at least comparable” to sales of previous models, company spokeswoman Anna Aibasheva said. She refused to comment on the price or any other details of the deal with Apple. The new iPhone is priced at $199 to $299 in the United States, depending on storage capacity. Apple’s three Russian partners — VimpelCom, MTS and MegaFon — have sold iPhones since fall 2008. MegaFon official Roman Prokolov said he expected all three mobile operators to start selling the iPhone 4 at the same time. He did not elaborate. MTS is negotiating a deal with Apple, spokesman Irina Osadchaya said, without giving further details. MTS expects to start receiving shipments in September or October, a source close to MTS said. Sales in the United States, France, Germany, Japan and Britain will begin June 24. TITLE: One Way to Disarm AUTHOR: By Alexander Golts TEXT: A distinctive feature of the Russian power vertical is that leaders do not bother determining what government officials have already said on a particular subject before preparing their own remarks. At a meeting on security agency budgets on May 24, President Dmitry Medvedev set the goal of modernizing at least 30 percent of Russia’s weaponry by 2015. The president was apparently unaware of the previous arms program, announced by then-Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov three years ago. In 2007, Ivanov told State Duma deputies that the program would rearm 45 percent of the military by 2015. It failed miserably. In addition, officials often do not feel obliged to fulfill the orders  of their bosses — even those issued by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. In a February meeting on the new armament program, Putin ordered that 70 percent of the country’s armed forces be modernized by 2020. But at a recent Duma hearing, acting army chief Lieutenant General Oleg Frolov contradicted Putin. Frolov said the 13 trillion rubles ($418.4 billion) for rearmament to be allocated over the next 10 years was only sufficient for modernizing Russia’s strategic nuclear forces, air defense forces and aviation. He said 36 trillion rubles ($1.2 trillion) would be needed to carry out all of the tasks put before the armed forces. Thus, the new armaments program is doomed to fail, just like the four previous plans. All of these programs go through the same life cycle: Stage 1: New goals are ceremoniously proclaimed stating exactly what percent of the military will be rearmed over the next 10 years. Stage 2: The government allocates trillions of rubles with lofty promises about modernizing the armed forces with new technology and weapons programs. Stage 3: The money disappears without a trace — or at least the traces are ignored. And then the whole cycle repeats itself in the next round of “weapons modernization programs.” During the meeting on security agency budgets, nobody asked Ivanov, who was sitting next to Putin, why the previous armament program had failed several years ago. Why didn’t anybody ask Ivanov where the tanks and armored vehicles were for equipping 40 tank battalions, 97 motorized infantry battalions and 50 airborne battalions that he had promised in 2007 — not to mention the five brigades equipped with Iskander missiles? Why was there not a peep about the much-vaunted S-400 missile defense systems, only two of which have been deployed? It goes without saying that corruption is one of the main reasons why so little modern weaponry has been manufactured over the past 10 to 15 years. Kickbacks for weapons contracts can account for 30 percent to 50 percent of the total cost. The level of corruption in military weapons programs grows with every year, despite all the methods announced by Medvedev to curb kickbacks. The other major problem is that Putin and Ivanov have created a parody of the Soviet military-industrial complex. Huge, clunky and inefficient Soviet-era ministries have been revived in the form of state-owned giants such as the United Aircraft Corporation and the United Shipbuilding Corporation — both of which were created by then-President Putin’s decrees in 2006 and 2007. Just like their Soviet analogues, these government behemoths are on the brink of bankruptcy. The price tag for delivering the proposed military equipment includes the cost of keeping those dying firms afloat. This makes the defense industry enormously inefficient. Recently published Audit Chamber data reveals that only 64 percent of state defense orders were filled last year. Another pie-in-the-sky goal is the plan to switch all military communications to digital technologies by 2012. This goal is hardly attainable considering that 85 percent of the army’s technologies are still stuck in the old analog system. Take, for example, the ultramodern prototype radio unit that Medvedev recently demonstrated. These units can only be manufactured abroad. It would be interesting to know which country will be producing Russia’s secret military communications technology and which country will supply the spare parts. Perhaps France will offer its know-how as a follow-up to the Mistral ship deal, or perhaps China will sign a technology-transfer contract with Russia. In reality, nobody has any serious plans to resolve the problems of the domestic military-industrial complex. It remains a cash cow for corrupt military officials and enables hundreds of dying companies to stay alive on the state’s highly expensive and wasteful life-support system. The one thing the country’s military-industrial complex cannot do, however, is provide the armed forces with the modern weaponry it so urgently needs. Alexander Golts is deputy editor of the online newspaper Yezhednevny Zhurnal. TITLE: The Red Partisans AUTHOR: By Yulia Latynina TEXT: In 2004, Vasily Kononov, the former leader of a pro-Soviet commando unit in Nazi-occupied Latvia during World War II, was convicted by Latvia’s highest court of killing nine civilians in the village of Mazie Bati in 1944. On May 17, the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights upheld the ruling. As usual, the Russian authorities were outraged by the decision. Members of the pro-Kremlin Nashi youth movement demonstrated outside of the Latvian Embassy in Moscow. Kononov insists that the victims, including a young pregnant woman, had been collaborating with the Nazis. To understand the nature of the wartime actions of the “red partisans,” not only in Mazie Bati but in all occupied territories, it is important to remember the directive issued by the Council of People’s Commissars on June 20, 1941, “Do not leave the enemy a single kilogram of bread or a single liter of fuel,” and the order from the headquarters of the Supreme Command of Nov. 17, 1941, instructing saboteurs “to destroy and burn down all the settlements in the German rear at a distance of 40 kilometers to 60 kilometers from the front and within 20 kilometers to 30 kilometers of both sides of the road.” These orders applied to all Nazi-occupied territories. NKVD troops were deployed to create diversions in the enemy rear, and they had to find a way to gain support of the local people whom they knew were already sentenced to death by Stalin. Their solution was to win support by terrorizing and plundering. Kononov and others like him are typically referred to as “partisans,” but this is a misleading term. The word “partisan” usually refers to a local resident who has the support of the local population in waging war against the occupiers. But none of these conditions applies to Kononov. First, Kononov was not a civilian but a special forces agent. Second, he did not fight the occupiers. On May 27, 1944, he was fighting against the civilian population. Among the nine people his commando unit killed were three women, one of whom was nine months pregnant. She was shoved back into a burning building from which they had only just managed to escape. Third, Kononov’s unit obviously did not enjoy the support of the local population. The locals hated the partisans even more than they did the Nazis. In fact, the Nazis — who themselves were occupiers — were not afraid to issue rifles to the locals so that they could protect themselves from the “reds.” It is true that the verdicts of the Latvian court and the European Court of Human Rights are vivid examples of an attempt to rewrite history. But this is precisely the history that needs to be rewritten. Soviet propaganda created a glorious picture of the “people’s war in the enemy’s rear.” But the reality is that a civil war was fought behind the front lines. From 1941 to 1944, the red partisans behaved exactly like the Vietcong did during the Vietnam War — that is, by terrorizing the civilian population even more than the ruthless enemy did. The Latvian and Strasbourg court rulings have shed valuable light on a small, but extremely important, historic episode. Let’s hope the correct lessons will be learned. Yulia Latynina hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio. TITLE: It takes two to tango AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: A four-day tango fiesta, complete with Argentinian star dancing pairs, a world-famous tango pianist and even an entire tango-orchestra has descended upon the city. The event kicks off on Friday night with a free open lesson of Argentinian tango for the uninitiated. This year’s “White Nights Tango” festival features a whole array of Argentinian tango couples, including Guillermo Merlo and Fernanda Ghi; Rodrigo “Joe” Corbata and Lucila Cionci; Stefano Giudice and Marcela Guevara; Alejandra Arrue and Sergio Natario; Silvio Grand and Mayra Galante; and Rodrigo Palacios and Agustina Berenstein. This year, which has been officially designated the Year of the Tango by UNESCO, is the ninth year the festival has been held in the city. Mayra Galante and Silvio Grand have more than 10 years of professional Argentine tango dancing under their belts. The pair is no stranger to St. Petersburg: For a number of years they were chosen as the main artists of the “Dreams about Tango” show together with the bandoneon player Jorge Spessot at the city’s Musical Comedy Theater. They have also been invited as artists of the Argentine Cinema and Tango Festival, dancing at the Maxim Gorki Theater and Fesco Concert Hall in Vladivostok. All festival events will take place in the concert hall of the Hotel St. Petersburg. After the opening lesson at 7 p.m. on Friday, the evening will continue with a grand-scale gala concert featuring both Russian and Argentinian pairs. Saturday and Sunday will see master classes followed by evening milonga shows by the festival’s most celebrated soloists. Coaches Sergio Natario and Alejandra Arrue began performing together in 1987. Their 23-year tango career is distinguished and extensive. They worked as international judges at the Buenos Aires Tango Festival for six years, as well as at the tango championship in New York, and have performed at the most important milonga venues, including La Ventana, Michel’angelo and Boca Tango. Since 2003, Arrue and Natario have devoted themselves exclusively to teaching tango. Currently they live in Naples, Italy, where they have their own school, known as the Salone Margherita, located in the historic old Umberto gallery. Topping the list of the festival’s celebrity participants is the virtuoso Argentinian pianist and composer Federico Mizrahi, the founder of Demoliendo Tangos project, one of the most acclaimed tango ensembles in the world, internationally renowned for its recordings and live performances of tango music. Demoliendo Tangos is known for producing original and thrilling new interpretation of the venerable tango classics. The musicians have already performed in St. Petersburg in recent years as guests of the Tangomania series of concerts. “The talented musicians of ‘Demoliendo Tangos’ captivate audiences with lively renditions of fiery folk tunes, making them both poetic and humorous,” reads a recent review in the Russian press. Demoliendo Tangos was established in Paris in 1999. The musicians released their first, eponymous album in 2001 to high critical acclaim, and then began touring extensively in Argentina and far beyond. Mizrahi, the founder of the group, has won awards for his own compositions and is popular with filmmakers around the world as a soundtrack composer. Joining forces with the Argentinian musicians will be their Russian counterparts from the Moscow-based Soledad tango orchestra. Founded in 2001, the ensemble has become Russia’s first large professional orchestra specializing exclusively in tango melodies. Originally comprised of inspired students from Moscow’s Gnesini Musical Academy united by their love for the tango guru Astor Piazzolla, the orchestra has grown into an established and well-traveled ensemble. Soledad tango orchestra boasts a diverse repertoire within the tango genre, incorporating anything from traditional Argentinian tango to the more contemporary tango nuevo, including works by composers such as Carlos di Sarli, Osvaldo Pugliese, Rodolfo Mederos, Juan D’Arienzo, Matos Rodriguez and others. Soledad has recently become the official orchestra of a number of international tango competitions. According to many critics, the Russian orchestra currently numbers among the best of its kind in Europe as it combines the qualities of two orchestras at once — an excellent concert orchestra and superb milonga ensemble. St. Petersburg’s answer to Soledad is the Primavera Orchestra, which consists of recent graduates of the St. Petersburg State Conservatory. The ensemble often works with Russian and Argentinian dancers alike at various festivals and competitions. The festival ends on Monday with an epic program that begins at noon with a master class, followed by a free tango lesson for beginners, a gala concert at 8 p.m. and a milonga party until 3 a.m. The “White Nights Tango” festival runs Friday to Monday at the Hotel St. Petersburg, 5/2 Pirogovskaya Naberezhnaya. M: Ploshchad Lenina. For a full program, see www.tango-festival.ru TITLE: Word’s worth AUTHOR: By Michele A. Berdy TEXT: Áàçàð: marketplace; free-for-all, talk, chatter, an issue to discuss (slang) As a longtime fan of the rock group DDT and its lead singer and songwriter, I was fascinated by the discussion between Shevchuk and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin that took place recently. But after reading the transcript, I was puzzled, too. First question: Who invited Shevchuk? And did they really think he’d drink his tea and keep his mouth shut? Second question: Did Putin really look at Shevchuk and ask: À êàê Âàñ çîâóò, èçâèíèòå? (Excuse me, but what’s your name?) This would be like British Prime Minister David Cameron not recognizing Mick Jagger, or U.S. President Barack Obama not recognizing Bruce Springsteen. Maybe I should send Putin a collection of DDT’s greatest hits. Then there was the question of who called Shevchuk and told him not to ask îñòðûå âîïðîñû (pointed questions). Was it Putin’s ïîìîùíèê (aide), as Shevchuk thought, or ïðîâîêàöèÿ (a provocation), as the prime minister suggested, or êàêîé-òî ÷óäàê (some jerk), as Shevchuk conceded? The conversation was filled with such extremes of lofty language and base slang expressions that listening to it was like being on a linguistic roller coaster. Take this example from Shevchuk: Ýòî ñîñëîâíàÿ ñòðàíà, òûñÿ÷åëåòíÿÿ. Åñòü êíÿçüÿ è áîÿðå ñ ìèãàëêàìè, åñòü òÿãëîâûé íàðîä — ïðîïàñòü îãðîìíàÿ. (This has been a class society for thousands of years. There are princes and boyars riding in cars with flashing lights, and there are working stiffs, with a huge gap between them.) Or this from Putin about traffic cops: Òàì åñòü ëþäè, êîòîðûå âåðîé è ïðàâäîé ñëóæàò ñâîåìó íàðîäó è íå æàëåþò íå òîëüêî çäîðîâüÿ, è æèçíè ñâîåé íå æàëåþò, è ïîä ïóëè èäóò. … Òå æå ñàìûå ãàèøíèêè, êîòîðûå «ìçäó ñíèìàþò» è «áàáêè ñòðèãóò» íà äîðîãå, — åñòü òàêèå. (There are people who serve their people faithfully and honorably. They risk their health and even their lives. They put themselves in the line of fire. Yes, there are some traffic cops who “take a payoff” or “pull in some loot.”) Another possibly puzzling word was áàçàð. The primary meaning is a marketplace, but in today’s slang it has several meanings. Áàçàð can mean “an issue to be discussed,” as in the phrase: Ó ìåíÿ ê òåáå áàçàð (I got something we need to talk about). Or it can mean a screaming tantrum: Íå óñòðàèâàé áàçàð (Don’t make a scene). Or it can be a disorderly argument, as in Putin’s rebuke when Shevchuk tried to interrupt him: ß Âàñ âíèìàòåëüíî ñëóøàë è íå ïåðåáèâàë! À òî ó íàñ äèñêóññèè íå ïîëó÷èòñÿ, à ïîëó÷èòñÿ áàçàð! (I listened to you attentively and didn’t interrupt. Otherwise we won’t have a discussion, we’ll have a free-for-all!) Hey, sounds good to me. But I guess a bazaar, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. Michele Berdy is a Moscow-based translator. TITLE: Book of blockade AUTHOR: By Xenia Prilepskaya PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Alexander Sokurov’s latest film has people reading from a book, one after another, for the whole 96 minutes. “Reading Book of Blockade” has children, soldiers, artists and actors reading true stories about the horrors of the 900-day Siege of Leningrad during World War II. The film uses stories from “Book of Blockade,” written in the 1960s by Daniil Granin and Ales Adamovich, where they wrote down the stories of the people who survived the siege. “It was a life-long decision … to make this film. Every citizen of St. Petersburg has at least once read the book,” Sokurov said in a written statement. “I wanted to catch the momentary impression that these real stories of enormous sufferings, cold, famine and deaths produce on our contemporaries, those who live in a safe and comfortable world and, perhaps, have never read this book and do not have the slightest idea how cruel the world could be.” When reading, each and every person must ask him or herself how to be strong to survive and not lose honor, Sokurov said. “While filming the reading of the book, Sokurov asked us not to act but just read the text. The book itself is incredibly strong and touching, and reading it sends you through all the unique feelings that Leningrad residents felt,” said Sergei Barkovsky, one of the actors in the film. “The movie sounds like a perfectly directed orchestra with its distinctive tone. You can’t peel yourself away from this music.” The film has been well received by critics. “‘Reading Book of Blockade’ is, first of all, a movie about limits and ways to overcome them,” said Konstantin Shavlovsky, deputy editor of Seance magazine. “People reading the book are barred from viewers by a glass wall with water flowing down over it. The ‘crying’ glass is not only an image of a great tragedy, but also a means of dissolving borders, between the living and the dead, between cinema and literature, between the past and the present.” Shavlovsky even saw a modern message in the film. “Reading Book of Blockade” is the most important movie about civil society in Russia,” he said, “about the fact, that you can try however hard to limit civil society, but it’s ineradicable, and eventually it will break through any blockade.” It is currently being shown on the international film festival circuit. Foreign audiences were shocked, the director said in media interviews last year. “Even though the book has been translated into many languages, the West still knows very little about the Siege of Leningrad. Western people don’t understand how it is possible to eat shoes, earth and each other to survive,” he said. Reaction at home has been positive among critics, but the film has hardly been shown anywhere. When shown, it has provoked a strong reaction. “After the end of the movie, people began to applaud and stopped all of a sudden,” recalled LiveJournal user nam3el. “There was the feeling that people got confused and realized their applause was inappropriate because the subject was too serious.” The only Russian television channel that has shown interest in the film so far is St. Petersburg channel TV100, which has posted the film in two parts on its web site. The movie can be watched at www.tv100.ru/video/view/5049. TITLE: Cinema Paradiso AUTHOR: By Tobin Auber PUBLISHER: Staff Writer TEXT: The Petrograd Side, once an arid wasteland for locals in search of a bite to eat, has yet another decent restaurant to boast of, and again it’s a newcomer from the Ginza Project people. The group’s restaurants have always been strong on creating an exclusive atmosphere, albeit with prices to match, but Capuletti, which opened in January year, manages to combine a truly excellent interior, good food and very reasonable prices. The restaurant itself is housed in what was for many years a fairly gloomy, sinister cinema which specialized in screening religious films. The peeling black paintwork and listings for the film, all written out by hand, were hardly inspiring, which makes the transformation by Ginza’s designers even more impressive. Now, as you enter from Bolshoi, you’ll find a caf? area on the right (another great trend in the city that Ginza is largely responsible for — restaurants and cafes that do decent sandwiches), and then one large room ahead, with large galleries above that effectively create a second floor without blocking out the light. All of this is beautifully paneled in wood and given a very high quality trattoria feel, all of it flooded in light. So far, so good, and we hadn’t even started eating yet. The menu fits onto one page, but manages to pack in a great deal of variety, with about 30 starters, salads and soups ranging in price from 190 to 590 rubles ($6 to $18.50), 15 pastas and risottos (most of them around the 350-ruble mark ($11), pizzas at about 300 to 350 rubles ($9.50 to $11), and meat and fish mains for 450 to 690 rubles ($14 to $22). Not your typical Ginza haunt, then, if the prices are anything to go by. We started with stewed squid in a creamy tuna sauce (370 rubles, $11.70) and a green bean cream soup with smoked meats (250 rubles, $7.90). The former was a very generous portion, coming with boiled potato and a rich sauce, and the squid itself managing to avoid the usual pitfall of tasting like trimmings from a Pirelli tire. It could easily have served as a meal in its own right. The same could be said of the green bean soup, which was a hearty meal in itself, although it didn’t really stand out. This was all outdone by the bargain bowl of spaghetti Bolognese for 270 rubles ($8.50), which could easily have fed both of us. In most Italian eateries in the city, the cheapest pasta dish involves a few strands of spaghetti with a worryingly weak, runny and almost watery tomato sauce. Not here. The cheapest main on the menu, the meat to pasta ratio was generous and it came in a deep, capacious bowl. The cheese risotto (290 rubles, $9.20), was less successful, particularly in view of some confusion over the ordering (we were presented with cheese instead of the mushroom ordered). My dining companion described the risotto itself as reasonable, but nothing out of the ordinary. Even despite this slight disappointment, Capuletti is well worth a visit. TITLE: South Africa Revels in Its World Cup Moment AUTHOR: By David Crary PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: JOHANNESBURG — Soccer’s stars have converged on South Africa from across the globe, but on the eve of the World Cup it is the host nation — with all its flaws and all its wonders — that has seized the spotlight. Crime is rampant, in shantytowns and posh suburbs. An HIV-AIDS epidemic rages. Yet the welcome for the world — from Cape Town to Soweto — couldn’t be warmer, or more proud. Blaring their plastic trumpets, or “vuvuzelas,” and displaying their multicolored flag on their cars and their homes and themselves, South Africans are embracing this historic moment. It’s by far their boldest foray onto the world stage since Nelson Mandela formally ended the apartheid era by winning the presidency in 1994. “It has unified all South Africa,” said Irvin Khoza, chairman of the local organizing committee. “It doesn’t matter if you’re black or white, or if you’re close to the sport or not. Everybody in this country is wearing the flag.” The four-week, 32-team tournament opens Friday with South Africa’s national squad — a longshot to bookmakers but a favorite to adoring local fans who call it Bafana Bafana — taking on Mexico at Soccer City, the 94,700-seat stadium rising amid old gold mines between Johannesburg and Soweto. It will be the first time the world’s most-watched sporting event is held anywhere in Africa, where soccer fever runs deep, and it takes place in a country that for decades was an international sports outcast, boycotted because of its racist policies. Brazil and Spain are the favorites to win the title. Other popular teams, according to a worldwide survey released this week by Nielsen Media Research, include former champions Argentina, England and Germany — along with the United States, which was picked to win by 46 percent of North Americans. Even enigmatic North Korea is here, its unheralded and longshot team qualifying for a World Cup for the first time since 1966 amid a flare-up of tension with its neighbor and fellow tournament entry, South Korea. A few top stars are absent due to injury, but England’s Wayne Rooney is here, as is Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo. Argentina has arguably the world’s best player, Lionel Messi, and the most flamboyant coach, Diego Maradona. Estimates vary as to how many foreign visitors will come — perhaps 350,000 or 400,000. When ticket sales lagged last month, organizers made more of them available to South Africans, and now nearly all have been purchased. First-time visitors, if they venture beyond the hotels and stadiums, will see a land of dramatic contrasts: first-world luxury and infrastructure closely coexisting with squalid shacks, a dazzlingly varied landscape of jagged mountains and unspoiled beaches, deserts and vineyards and wildlife preserves. There are 10 stadiums in nine cities across South Africa, with two of them — Soccer City and the long-established 62,500-seat Ellis Park — in Johannesburg. Racial reconciliation remains a work in progress, yet is remarkable given the white minority’s harsh oppression of blacks under apartheid’s web of segregation policies. The end of apartheid was no panacea for the nation’s many problems. More than 40 percent of South Africans live below the government-defined poverty line, a quarter of the work force is unemployed. The huge security force mobilized for the World Cup will have its hands full keeping visitors safe, restraining hooligans, monitoring possible terrorist threats and maintaining crowd control to prevent any stadium stampedes. The government and private businesses spent huge sums renovating airports and building roads, transportation systems and stadiums. Traffic jams are expected, but a new high-speed train linking Johannesburg and its airport opened Tuesday, and a new bus line serves the downtown business district, Soccer City and Soweto. Newspaper columnist Oupa Ngwenya of The Sowetan, a black-oriented daily, marveled in a column this week at how the projects were completed on time despite widespread doubt. “Enjoy the games by laughing doubting Thomases out of your lives,” he wrote. In an interview, Ngwenya said a successful World Cup could be a morale booster for the many South Africans struggling with poverty. TITLE: Suicide Attack Kills 40 At Wedding In Afghanistan AUTHOR: By Mirwais Khan PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: NADAHAN VILLAGE, Afghanistan — A suicide bomb ripped through a wedding party for a family with ties to police in the Taliban’s heartland in Afghanistan, killing at least 40 people and wounding dozens more, officials said Thursday. The Taliban denied carrying out the attack, but strong suspicion fell on the insurgent group because it has previously attacked allies of the government or Afghan security forces. The blast hit in an area that is largely considered a Taliban haven, and village residents said they believed they were attacked in an air bombardment. Mohammad Rassool, a cousin of the groom, said helicopters were circling above the compound before the explosion. NATO said no service members from the alliance were involved or operating in the area at the time of the explosion. U.S. military spokesman Colonel Wayne Shanks said the deaths were not the result of an airstrike. New British Prime Minister David Cameron — making his first visit to Afghanistan since being elected last month — joined President Hamid Karzai in condemning the attack. The two talked in Kabul on Wednesday about the progress of the nearly 9-year-old war. Cameron, whose nation is the second largest contributor of NATO forces in Afghanistan with some 10,000 troops, said 2010 was “the vital year” for showing that the U.S.-led counterinsurgency was working. “This is the year when we have to make progress — progress for the sake of the Afghan people, but progress also on behalf of people back at home who want this to work,” Cameron told a joint news conference with Karzai. Cameron, whose coalition government is considered less invested in the war than its Labour predecessor, ruled out sending more British forces, saying, “The issue of more troops is not remotely on the U.K. agenda.’ There has been a spike in bloodshed in recent weeks, and the latest NATO death — an American killed Thursday by a roadside bomb, the U.S. military said — was the 30th this month for the alliance, and the 20th for the United States, according to a count by The Associated Press. The bomb blast late Wednesday almost completely flattened the outer wall of a compound in the Arghandab district of Kandahar where male wedding guests had gathered for a meal. The windows and walls of the mud-brick dwellings were shattered and cracked. Female guests at the party were in another compound that was not hit by the explosion, witnesses said. Limbs and pieces of flesh still littered the bombing site at Nadahan village in the Arghandab district of Kandahar province about midday Thursday, when an Associated Press reporter visited. Villagers said no security forces had yet arrived to secure the area or start an investigation. TITLE: Ex-Workmate Slams ‘Stratospheric’ Trades AUTHOR: By Annie Thomas PUBLISHER: Agence France Presse TEXT: PARIS — Jerome Kerviel’s “stratospheric” stock market risks nearly brought down Societe Generale, an ex-workmate told a Paris court on Thursday at the former trader’s fraud trial. The French bank accuses Kerviel of secretly gambling away 4.9 billion euros ($7.1 billion dollars at the time) in the huge 2008 rogue trading case, seen as a symbol of the excesses blamed for the financial crisis. After being branded a liar on Wednesday by a former top boss at Societe Generale, Kerviel faced testimony by one of his ex-colleagues at the trading desk, Salim Menouchi. Kerviel “put in danger” the bank by making trades “for stratospheric amounts,” Menouchi, 31, told the court. “I can’t explain his actions. I am disappointed by his behavior,” said Menouchi. “All traders have limits they must respect.” Menouchi was the only one to show up to court out of four traders scheduled to testify on Thursday, but was the second to defend Societe Generale. Another trader, Antoine Delorme, 38, had told the court Wednesday that he thought Kerviel was taking positions that were “completely crazy”. Societe Generale, one of Europe’s biggest banks, said it suffered heavy losses when it was forced to unravel 50 billion euros of unauthorised trades in January 2008. Its market capitalisation at the time was about 56 billion euros. Kerviel, 33, has admitted regularly exceeding trading limits and logging false transactions to cover his gambles, but says this was common practice and that his bosses turned a blind eye as long as earnings were high. Menouchi said he was not aware such practices were common, prompting Kerviel to interject: “I am very surprised. It was obvious.” On Wednesday, Jean-Pierre Mustier, the former head of Societe Generale’s investment division, denied bosses knew of Kerviel’s excesses and told the court Kerviel had engaged in “inhuman” risk-taking. “You lied to me all along,” Mustier angrily told Kerviel in court, accusing him of taking “risks that no bank in the world could take.” Menouchi said he had “friendly relations” with Kerviel but they did not discuss their trading activities. He recalled that shortly before the scandal broke, Kerviel appeared to realize that he was in trouble. The two had a drink together on the evening of January 18, days before Societe Generale announced its losses, and the next day Kerviel sent him a text message saying: “I am going to get fired. Nice knowing you.” Branded a crook by his ex-employer but seen by others as a scapegoat, Kerviel faces up to five years in jail and a fine of 375,000 euros if convicted of breach of trust, forgery and entering false data into computers. Lawyers have wrangled over whether his colleagues and bosses could have overlooked his excesses while sitting within metres of him at the “Delta One” trading desk and sharing a common computer system. Defence lawyer Olivier Metzner on Thursday showed the court an extract from Kerviel’s trading screen on which he said the bank had “deactivated” certain controls so the trading limits could be exceeded. The bank says a limit was applied collectively to the eight traders at the desk, not to each trader individually. The witness Delorme admitted that fictitious deals “were routine” on the trading floor but these were “managed” to give traders some leeway in their transactions. TITLE: Iran to Review Relations With UN Watchdog AUTHOR: By Nasser Karimi PUBLISHER: The Associated Press TEXT: TEHRAN, Iran – Iran said Thursday it will review relations with the UN nuclear watchdog a day after the UN Security Council approved a fourth round of sanctions against Tehran over its disputed nuclear program. Iran’s president dismissed the sanctions as “annoying flies” as useless as “used tissues.” Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the head of Iran’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, described the sanctions as “political, illegal and illogical” and said lawmakers would quickly “begin a revision of Iran’s relations” with the International Atomic Energy Agency. A revision could result in restricting International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors’ access to Iran’s nuclear facilities. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said imposing new sanctions “is not constructive, and will destroy the grounds for solving the current crisis” with the West.