SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1592 (53), Friday, July 16, 2010
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TITLE: Expats Face Shipping Fees For Households
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Foreigners hoping to uproot their families and move to Russia face a major new headache: new customs fees that can run into the tens of thousands of dollars.
Moving companies said Wednesday that dozens of shipments that arrived after July 1 have been left stranded after customs officials told them that every kilogram after the first 50 would be slapped with a minimum charge of 4 euros ($5).
The tariffs, which emanate from a new customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan, introduce a hurdle for the influx of foreign specialists advocated by President Dmitry Medvedev.
“This will not stimulate people to move to Russia,” said Norbert Gooren, general manager at AAA Logistics, a U.S.-based international freight company.
Harry Kerbs, owner of Moscow-based movers IMS, said he currently had three trucks awaiting clearance at the Zelenograd customs point outside the capital. One of them faces a bill of 12,000 euros ($15,000) — payable in cash at any Sberbank office.
“I do not know how to raise the money because my client said he will reimburse me only later and through a bank account,” an angry Kerbs said in a telephone interview.
Companies like IMS have been hit hard and unexpectedly by the new charges, which come right in the middle of the summer, the busiest season for family relocations.
The new regulations, spelled out on the Federal Customs Service’s web site, stipulate that household items, formerly customs-exempt, will be treated like commercial goods upon entry into the country, except for a list of 21 items that are exempt, including jewelry, consumer electronics, baby strollers and pets.
Company representatives said that the list of exemptions, identified in Appendix 4 of the regulation, was pointless because the items on it usually make up only a tiny share of a household shipment.
The new tariff is officially supposed to amount to 30 percent of the movers’ bill, but the regulation includes the minimum 4 euro-per-kilogram rule as a means against artificially low bills.
The only other exemption is the first 50 kilograms.
Shipments for diplomats and other governmental officials remain tax-free.
A family of five typically arrives with about 40 cubic meters of goods weighing 4,000 kilograms, Kerbs explained. “Subtract the exempt 50 kilos and you are left with a 15,800 euro ($20,000) bill,” he said.
Industry representatives contacted by The St. Petersburg Times said that while they had expected changes, they were caught off guard when customs officers told them about the new tariffs when the first shipments arrived this month.
“We found out the hard way last week,” said Sherman Pereira, regional director of Crown Relocations.
Gooren, of AAA Logistics, said it took customs officials more than a week to adjust to the new rules, leading to a backlog at customs checkpoints.
“When we came to them early in July, they told us they would not work because they were still studying the customs union,” he said by telephone from St. Petersburg.
Spokespeople at the customs service’s press office directed calls to a customs hotline, where Alexander Makulin, a hotline duty officer, said customs officials were just following the law. He conceded that the list of exceptions was too short. “Maybe they forgot to discuss the number of items on it,” he said, referring to the authors of the customs union.
But he added that the list left little room for interpretation and that the customs service could not change the rules.
“We are law-takers and not lawmakers,” he said.
But time is pressing.
Trucks have to pay a parking fee of 8,000 rubles ($260) every day that they wait at a customs point, and warehouse costs could be added to the amount if officials decide to unload the goods for inspection, Kerbs said.
Pereira, of Crown, said he was monitoring dozens of affected shipments and several clients had decided to send their goods back home after learning about the extra cost.
Still, he said, others who are less flexible have already paid up. “People have schools booked and paid deposits,” he said.
This, he suggested, makes it unlikely that the new rules will be canceled by a government eager to collect extra revenues as it struggles with a budget deficit.
“It’s a tricky situation,” Pereira said.
TITLE: Medvedev Empowers Duma Deputies
AUTHOR: By Nabi Abdullaev
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Dmitry Medvedev acknowledged Wednesday that his much-trumpeted campaign against corruption has yielded no palpable results and urged lawmakers to start conducting parliamentary investigations to fight the problem.
Parliamentary investigations are nearly a forgotten practice in Russia after all but vanishing under Vladimir Putin, who shifted sweeping powers to the executive branch during his eight-year presidency. The last serious attempt to conduct a parliamentary investigation into official corruption stalled after its initiator, Deputy Yury Shchekochikhin, died under murky circumstances in 2003.
Medvedev said he has not seen any “meaningful successes” since he declared war on corruption in spring 2009.
“It is obvious that no one is satisfied with how corruption is being fought — neither our citizens, who consider corruption to be one of our country’s most serious problems and challenges, nor our officials, nor the corrupt individuals themselves,” Medvedev said at a Kremlin meeting with the leaders of federal and regional legislatures.
Medvedev signed a presidential decree in March 2009 demanding that senior officials and their immediate family disclose their incomes and declare their property.
Subsequent initiatives by Medvedev have aimed to reform the Interior Ministry, restrict the powers of law enforcement officials investigating economic crimes, and bring transparency to the courts by obliging them to publicize case documents.
Still, Russia dangles humiliatingly low in international corruption indexes, with some analysts estimating that corruption amounts to the size of the country’s gross domestic product. Corruption is also named in many surveys of businesspeople and ordinary Russians as the No. 1 threat and hindrance to Medvedev’s pet project to modernize the country.
Analysts and opposition leaders blame Medvedev’s visible failure on the fact that the anti-corruption effort has been entrusted to officials most likely involved in corruption schemes themselves.
None of Medvedev’s anti-graft initiatives has empowered public groups, media, parliament or even prosecutors to exercise effective oversight over corrupt officials or provided them with tools to stop corrupt practices, other than, perhaps, complaining on Medvedev’s personal blog, analysts said.
In a move that contradicts the Kremlin’s parliamentary policies of the past several years, Medvedev on Wednesday called for more active parliamentary investigations.
“The institute of parliamentary investigations is not used as actively as it should be,” Medvedev said.
He said it was not an instrument to resort to in ordinary cases but “it should bring in its share, be helpful in stopping corrupt actions.”
The ruling United Russia party, which is led by Prime Minister Putin and enjoys an overwhelming majority in the State Duma, has repeatedly quashed attempts by other factions to initiate parliamentary investigations.
The most well-known parliamentary investigation into corruption focused on a smuggling scheme at the Tri Kita furniture store that implicated senior officials from the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Federal Security Service. Its initiator, Shchekochikhin, a journalist who specialized in exposing corruption, died in July 2003 of what his colleagues at the opposition-minded Novaya Gazeta newspaper believe was poisoning.
Other examples of parliamentary investigations include an inquiry into the 2004 Beslan school attack and, more recently, the deadly accident last August at the Sayano-Shushenskaya power plant. The results of both investigations have raised more questions than answers about which officials were to blame for the high death tolls in both incidents.
Opposition calls to open parliamentary investigations into other major events, like the two wars in Chechnya, the 1998 default, the sinking of the Kursk nuclear submarine in 2000 and the Nord-Ost hostage drama in 2003, were ignored.
Medvedev on Wednesday once again called for the introduction of fines based on a multiple of the bribe taken as an alternative punishment to jail time.
“This should be a severe sentence measured in the millions, tens of millions and hundreds of millions of rubles,” he said.
He added that he had been advised against the measure but still called on the State Duma and Federation Council to consider it.
The president also lamented poor statistics on corruption, saying the real number of cases is “dozens or hundreds” of times larger than reported.
In the meantime, he said, the number of reported cases grew by 10 percent last year to reach 43,000.
“But this is all the tip of an iceberg,” he said.
The Duma will soon receive a bill that sets a flat fine of 500,000 rubles ($16,400) for a single case of bribe-taking of up to 3,000 rubles ($100) and a work ban of three to 10 years for the official caught taking the bribe, said the bill’s author, United Russia Deputy Vladimir Gruzdev, Interfax reported.
TITLE: Mokhnatkin Supporters Crash Bastille Day Event
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Opposition and human rights activists and journalists have been campaigning this week in support of the imprisoned Sergei Mokhnatkin, who they say is an innocent victim of Russian legal arbitrariness.
Mokhnatkin, 56, who earlier complained of the police choking and beating him at a rally, was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in custody last month on charges of attacking a police officer and breaking his nose.
On Wednesday, members of Eduard Limonov’s banned National Bolshevik Party (NBP) held an unauthorized protest at an official Bastille Day concert in the Hermitage’s inner courtyard, when they took to the stage before the set of the headlining French band Lo’Jo.
Four protesters unfurled a large banner reading “Freedom for Mokhnatkin!” in front of the stage and used the microphone to tell the 500-strong audience, which included foreign diplomats and VIPs, about his case and distributed leaflets reading “Death to Bastilles!” The protest was prepared in secret and took the authorities by surprise. No arrests were made.
Mokhnatkin and defense witnesses said that it was Mokhnatkin who was beaten by policemen when he was arrested at a rally in defense of the right to assembly on Triumfalnaya Ploshchad in Moscow on Dec. 31, but the judge ignored their testimonies.
Mokhnatkin said he did not take part in the Dec. 31 protest, but was attempting to verbally defend an elderly woman who was being roughly dragged by the police to a bus where detained people were being held. When released next morning, he filed a complaint about the incident.
Six months later he was asked to come to a police station to identify the officers who had beaten him, but was instead arrested and taken to a court. Sergeant Dmitry Moiseyev testified that Mokhnatkin had headbutted him and broken his nose.
Andrei Dmitriyev, the local NBP leader, described Mokhnatkin’s sentence as an “act of intimidation.”
“It’s a very unpleasant symptom; they decided that it’s politically beneficial to put a chance passerby in prison to intimidate all the rest.
“It’s despicable. Mokhnatkin should be defended in every possible way, [his case] should be talked about as much as possible, so that such things are not repeated and for him to be released as soon as possible.”
Dmitriyev said that the date and the occasion of the protest were chosen deliberately.
“The demand for the freeing of Mokhnatkin suits the spirit of a day that is celebrated as France’s national holiday, when the Bastille was seized, prisoners were freed and it was written ‘Now they dance here’ on the wall, and now it’s a French national holiday,” he said.
“We reminded people that not all the Bastilles in the world fell, they exist in Russia too, and there are innocent people among their prisoners. But we hope there will be a time when we celebrate the Russian Bastille Day.”
On Monday, Solidarity democratic movement, Yabloko democratic party, United Civil Front (OGF) and other liberal opposition and rights groups held an authorized rally in support of Mokhnatkin in St. Petersburg.
The authorities refused to sanction a number of locations suggested by the organizers, including Pionerskaya Ploshchad and St. Isaac’s Square, on various grounds, allowing them to have an event in the Chernyshevsky Gardens, away from busy streets and squares.
About 100 people turned out to protest Mokhnatkin’s imprisonment and collect money to support him and other political prisoners.
The weekly newspaper Moi Rayon, which is distributed for free at shopping centers, urged its readers last month to take part in what it described as a “virtual rally” by sending in photos of themselves next to a poster demanding freedom for Mokhnatkin.
Announcing the campaign in the newspaper, editor Diana Kachalova published a photograph showing her holding a poster reading “Freedom to Sergei Mokhnatkin!” Photographs sent in by readers continue to be published both in the print issues and on Moi Rayon’s web site.
The next Strategy 31 protests are due in a number of Russian cities, including St. Petersburg and Moscow, on July 31.
TITLE: Investigator in Magnitsky Video Leads Fight Back
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The battle over the death of Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky escalated Tuesday when an Interior Ministry investigator for the first time fought back against accusations of murder and corruption.
Friends and colleagues of Magnitsky, who died in a Moscow detention center in November, published a new online video accusing investigator Pavel Karpov of enriching himself with proceeds from a legal onslaught against Hermitage Capital, once Russia’s biggest foreign investment fund, that began in 2007.
The video, published late Monday on the web site Russian-untouchables.com, is similar to one released last month about Artyom Kuznetsov, who Magnitsky’s supporters say is another main investigator in the case.
It cites evidence like home ownership deeds and car ownership registries, also published on the web site, that indicate Karpov and his family “became $1.3 million better off” from 2007 onward.
The amount, the video’s authors say, hardly squares with Karpov’s official monthly salary of $535.
The authors call on the government to prosecute this “criminal group” before it continues to “murder and steal.”
Prominent among the web site’s sponsors are Hermitage founder William Browder and Jamison Firestone, the founder of the law firm where Magnitsky worked.
Shortly before the video appeared, Karpov announced that he had asked the Prosecutor General’s Office to open a criminal investigation into Browder and Firestone for orchestrating a libel campaign against him.
Karpov, in a statement carried by Interfax on Tuesday, denied that he was responsible for the Magnitsky case at the Interior Ministry’s Moscow branch. He argued that the real motive for the video was to divert attention from alleged tax crimes committed by Hermitage.
Karpov also claimed that Browder had a motive to see Magnitsky killed. “The only figure interested in Sergei Magnitsky’s death is William Browder himself, who has used this death to shape public opinion that law enforcement agencies are persecuting innocent people,” he said.
Investigators detained Magnitsky on charges that he was part of a scheme used by Hermitage to avoid tax payments in November 2008, shortly after he accused Karpov, Kuznetsov and other Interior Ministry officials of stealing $230 million in government funds.
Magnitsky, a partner with law firm Firestone Duncan, died of heart failure in prison one year later without having gone on trial.
Browder and Firestone maintain that the 37-year-old lawyer was imprisoned and tortured to death by the same investigators whom he had accused of stealing government funds.
Karpov’s statement could not be independently confirmed Tuesday.
Spokespeople for the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Investigative Committee refused to comment, and nobody picked up telephones at the Interior Ministry.
Browder and Firestone said they had only read the statement in the Russian media.
TITLE: Festival of Sand Sculptures Runs Through August
AUTHOR: By Lyudmila Tsubiks
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The 9th International Festival of Sand Sculpture opened on Monday, with 24 teams from nine countries, including Germany, Holland, Latvia and the Czech Republic competing.
The teams have been provided with 500 tons of sand and given five days to perform tasks set by the competition organizers. The theme of this year’s festival is cinema, with characters such as Conan the Barbarian, Andrei Rublyov, Mr. Bean and Batman all being depicted in the sand.
The concepts for the sand sculptures are developed and coordinated with the organizers of the festival in advance.
Prize winners at the festival are due to announced on Friday, and the sand sculptures will remain on display until the end of August.
TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: Extremist Arrested
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Police have arrested an Uzbek citizen who is alleged to be a member of an extremist Islamic organization and is currently on international wanted lists. Rustam Zokhidov was arrested in the center of St. Petersburg, on Zakhorevskaya Ulitsa, Interfax reported.
“The Office of Internal Affairs of the Samarkand Oblast has been searching for him in connection with the spreading of materials containing threats to public security and law and order, as well as participating in extremist organizations,” Interfax reported a source within the police force as commenting.
Car Thieves Busted
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Nine members of a gang that focused on stealing luxury cars have been arrested. Vladimir Markin, a spokesperson for the Prosecutor’s Office, said that one of their number was a traffic police office.
Markin said the group is suspected of having stolen at least 10 luxury cars between July 2009 and May 2010.
“The license plates were immediately changed and the cars were reregistered and sold on in Russia, anywhere from the Caucasus to the Urals,” Markin said.
Markin said that during the raid, officers found large sums in cash and expensive equipment used in car thefts, as well as fake traffic police documents. Three cars that have been filed as missing were also recovered. The Investigative Committee is now searching for the remaining members of the group.
Relatives’ Income
MOSCOW (SPT) — A bill introduced to the State Duma would require all officials to disclose the incomes of their close relatives, including spouses, children, grandchildren, parents, grandparents and siblings, Rossiiskaya Gazeta reported Wednesday.
Officials, who have been required to declare their income publicly since last year, are often accused of hiding illegally obtained property by listing it as owned by their relatives.
TITLE: Strawberry Fields Face Threat of Destruction
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Russian property developers are preparing to destroy the world’s largest and most valuable field collection of genetically diverse fruits and berries — including almost 1,000 types of strawberries from 40 countries — from which commercially grown varieties are derived.
The site, which belongs to the Vavilov Horticultural Research Institute, is home to more than 4,000 varieties of fruits and berries, some of which have become extinct in their natural environments. It now looks set to be used for the construction of holiday homes.
Developers received access to the site when the St. Petersburg Horticulture Institute lost the land following the rejection of an appeal against a decree of the Russian Ministry for Economic Development in Moscow’s Arbitration Court earlier this week.
Experts say the Pavlosk Research station, comprising 910,000 square meters, is the largest genetic field bank in Europe. According to Mikhovich, just one of the plots of land at the site contains more than 5,000 samples of rare plants from all over the globe.
Moscow’s Arbitration Court ruled that the institute must hand the land over to the Residential Construction Development Fund. The institute’s acting director at the facility, Fyodor Mikhovich, said the task of transferring the specimen would be impossible, even if they were given three years instead of the three months that they have been granted for the task. He said that the consequences of the move would be devastating, and that in order to properly carry out the move at least 15 years would be needed.
The institute has stressed that the research conducted at the facility is of great use in research into the treatment of chronic illnesses, such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.
The institute has filed another appeal against the verdict, but analysts says its chances are poor. The court hearing that will decide the fate of the land is scheduled for Aug. 11. Researchers and environmentalists alike are campaigning around the globe, urging influential organizations such as the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, to intervene at the highest level and halt the destruction of the Pavlosk collection.
In December 2009, the Russian Ministry for Economic Development issued a decree ordering the institute to vacate the land on the grounds that the fields are allegedly not economically viable and are hampering the economic development of the region.
“The real issue is that the monetary value of the collection is impossible to define,” Mikhovich said. “Who on earth can tell what the value of a specific unique sample of a plant or a berry is? And we have large numbers of them. This makes the collection priceless, but doesn’t help us to win trials, where decisions are based on precise calculations.”
According to Biodiversity International, a Rome-based organization that works to support the improved use and conservation of agricultural diversity, the destruction of the Pavlosk Research station’s cultivated fruits and berry fields will deprive the world’s breeders of a unique source of genetic biodiversity needed to develop varieties that are better adapted to climate change as global food production moves north.
“Strawberry breeders, in particular, say the Russian varieties are exceptionally hardy and disease resistant,” said Pascal Marbois, a spokesman for Biodiversity International. “There is strong scientific evidence that land suitable for strawberry cultivation will decrease as global winter temperatures rise.”
Bioversity International says research it conducted with its partners on the Pavlosk collections shows that key species in the collection contain important phytochemicals for glycemic control and anti-oxidants, as well as being exceptionally rich sources of vitamins and micronutrients. “We have evidence that these important genetic resources, which will be lost forever, could contribute to healthier diets,” said Dr. Emile Frison, director general of Bioversity International.
“Russia is sitting on a global gold reserve of far greater value to the whole of humanity than holiday homes for a few lucky individuals.”
TITLE: Magazine Loses Suit Over Word
AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A Moscow court on Wednesday found the opposition New Times magazine guilty of defaming a United Russia deputy by writing that he “supervised” an ultranationalist youth group and awarded him a token 1 ruble
(3 cents) in damages.
Analysts warned that the verdict spelled a setback for free media that would encourage self-censorship.
The author of the disputed article, Yevgeny Levkovich, and other people blamed poor semantics for the ruling, noting that the word used in the article, kurirovat, or “supervised,” could be interpreted to mean “in control of” or “to provide support for.”
The Presnensky District Court sided with the interpretation that the article accused Maxim Mishenko, the State Duma deputy who sued the New Times, of being in control of the ultranationalist Russky Obraz.
There is little dispute that Mishenko has provided support for Russky Obraz, perhaps best known for organizing rowdy anti-migrant marches on the Nov. 4 holiday known as National Unity Day. Last year, an Internet site co-founded by Russky Obraz quoted Mishenko as saying: “I have a good feeling about Russky Obraz. I have cooperated with them on many projects and am continuing with my cooperation.”
“Mishenko had ties to Russky Obraz, and I think the verdict is the result of using wrong definitions,” said Galina Kozhevnikova, a researcher with the Sova center, which monitors ultranationalist groups.
Mishenko was unavailable for comment Wednesday, but his spokeswoman Natalya Maslova said the deputy had cut ties with Russky Obraz at the end of last year “after they started barking Nazi slogans.”
The New Times article, “Nazi on the March,” published Nov. 9, quoted an unidentified Kremlin official as saying that Mishenko had a supervisory role in Russky Obraz and that the group was supported by the Kremlin. Mishenko denied the claim in the same article.
Mishenko filed the defamation suit against Levkovich and New Times editor-in-chief Yevgenia Albats, who were ordered Wednesday to pay 1 ruble in damages. Mishenko’s lawyers also want New Times to publish a retraction in an upcoming issue, but New Times lawyer Viktor Zinoviev said the magazine was waiting for a full copy of the court’s verdict before making a decision on a retraction or filing an appeal.
Levkovich said he stood by his article and Mishenko should explain why he had links to Russky Obraz in the first place. “It is strange that a person who represents the ruling political party has ties to such an organization,” Levkovich told The St. Petersburg Times.
Russky Obraz representatives could not be reached for comment. The group, according to Sova, has close ties to Russky Verdict, an organization known for its defense of two young nationalists, Yevgenia Khasis and Nikita Tikhonov, accused in the killing of the human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov in January 2009.
TITLE: A Third of Inmates Are Ill, Prison Officials Say
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — More than a third of all inmates suffer from illnesses, including AIDS, syphilis and tuberculosis, a senior federal prison official said Tuesday.
Nikolai Krivolapov, deputy head of the Federal Prison Service, said illnesses affect about 340,000 of the country’s 846,000 inmates, RIA-Novosti reported.
“The big picture remains abysmal, although there is no year-on-year increase in rates,” Krivolapov said at a news conference held at RIA-Novosti offices.
An Interfax report put the number of ill inmates at 240,000. The data could not be immediately reconciled.
Krivolapov said 15,000 inmates have been diagnosed with syphilis, 40,000 with tuberculosis, 55,000 are HIV positive and 67,000 have mental disorders.
The state spends 2,000 rubles ($64) per month per inmate on medical needs, and the 13,400 medical staff employed by the prison service are required to examine all inmates every day, Krivolapov said.
The law allows courts to free convicted inmates who suffer life-threatening illnesses, and the Justice Ministry has drafted legislation that would extend the right to seriously ill suspects now held in pretrial detention centers.
Krivolapov gave no figures for ill suspects in pretrial detention.
TITLE: Returned Spies to Change Identities
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: MOSCOW — Several of the 10 Russian agents detained in the United States in June and handed over to Russia last week will change their identities under a witness protection program, a Russian intelligence official said Tuesday.
The unidentified official told Interfax that the agents, who were swapped with the United States for four Russians convicted on espionage charges, are now in Moscow, where “competent agencies” are debriefing them.
The 10 deep cover agents are being questioned by officials with the Foreign Intelligence Service, or SVR, to establish what caused their cover to be blown in the United States, Moskovsky Komsomolets reported Tuesday, citing an unidentified SVR official.
All but three of the agents were using false names when they were arrested by the FBI on June 27.
One of them, Donald Heathfield, whose real name is Andrei Bezrukov, triggered the FBI arrests by planning a trip abroad with a college-age son in late June, a U.S. law enforcement official said Monday.
The FBI feared that Heathfield, who lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with two sons and his wife, who was another Russian agent, might not return, prompting them to decide to take down a spy network that they had been watching for more than a decade, said the official, who spoke about the matter on condition of anonymity because the government had not given authorization to discuss it.
Meanwhile, Strategic Forecasting Inc., a security think tank, said Tuesday that Heathfield had tried to get the risk advisory group to install software that he said his company had developed.
Heathfield held five meetings with an employee of Texas-based Stratfor in an effort to get the firm to use his program, chief executive officer George Friedman said in a report.
“We suspect that had this been done, our servers would be outputting to Moscow,” Friedman said in an e-mailed report. “We have since reported the incident to the FBI.”
An 11th spy suspect, who adopted the name of a dead Canadian boy, vanished after jumping bail in Cyprus.
A previously undisclosed 12th suspect has been detained in the United States and faces deportation, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing an unidentified U.S. official familiar with the matter.
The 23-year-old suspect was monitored by the FBI shortly after he entered the country in October 2009, but investigators were not able to collect enough evidence against him to bring charges.
(SPT, Bloomberg)
TITLE: DST Sells 29% Stake For $388M, Mail.ru
AUTHOR: By Maria Antonova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — South African media holding Naspers invested $388 million in Digital Sky Technologies on Wednesday in a stake swap that gave DST full control of the popular Mail.ru service.
Naspers subsidiary Myriad International Holdings will receive a 28.7 percent stake in DST in exchange for Naspers’ 39.3 percent stake in Mail.ru and a $388 million cash infusion.
In addition, minority stakes in Mail.ru will be converted into DST shares, leading to DST gaining control of 99 percent of Mail.ru, the companies said in a statement.
DST is controlled by Yury Milner and Grigory Finger, while billionaire Alisher Usmanov owns an additional blocking stake.
The deal values DST at $2.5 billion, down from an estimated $2.9 billion valuation implied in April, when DST sold a 10.26 percent stake to China’s leading Internet and telecoms firm Tencent for $300 million, VTB media analyst Anastasia Obukhova said in a note.
Naspers already holds a 35 percent stake in Tencent.
The deal marks the next stage of an ever-closer integration among the three global Internet holdings with an eye for emerging markets.
The three companies have been tipped for purchasing the same assets over the past several years, as both Naspers’ and Tencent’s QQ messaging services have considered purchasing ICQ. ICQ was finally purchased by DST, with the $185 million deal closing on Tuesday.
With the fresh cash on hand, DST is likely to seek new purchases outside Russia, where the company already has “everything they need,” said Leonid Delitsyn, an analyst with Finam. Such purchases are likely to be in line with the strategies of Tencent and Naspers as well.
DST’s Russian assets include social networks Odnoklassniki and Vkontakte, as well as the HeadHunter employment web site. The Russian holding made global headlines last year when it acquired a 10 percent stake in U.S. social networking site Facebook for $200 million.
In May, the company announced plans to invest $1 billion into Internet firms in Asia, Australia, and the U.K.
TITLE: $281M Costs for Mine Repair
AUTHOR: By Scott Rose
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Costs to repair Raspadskaya’s largest mine after fatal explosions earlier this year will likely reach 8.6 billion rubles ($281 million), the coal producer said Wednesday, scaling back a higher estimate from Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
The sum includes expenses for social payments, extinguishing the fire, pumping water from the mine, and bringing the shaft back into working order, Raspadskaya said in a statement.
Production of coking coal, which is used in steelmaking, fell 42 percent in the second quarter compared with the preceding three months because all production is still halted at the damaged mine, the company said in a separate statement.
Raspadskaya’s shares finished up 1 percent in Moscow, outperforming the benchmark MICEX Index, which closed down 0.7 percent.
Twin blasts ripped through Russia’s largest underground mine on the night of May 9, killing 90 workers and rescuers, some of whom are still officially listed as missing. Restoring the mine, which employed about 4,000 people, could take 12 to 15 months, according to Energy Ministry estimates.
Putin traveled to the Kemerovo region mine on June 24 to discuss recovery efforts. He estimated that it would cost 10 billion rubles to restore the damaged mine, up from earlier estimates of 6 billion rubles.
TITLE: Oil Spill Seen as Bigger Risk Than Putin
PUBLISHER: Bloomberg
TEXT: MOSCOW — The worst oil spill in U.S. history is proving a bigger risk to debt investors than Prime Minister Vladimir Putin as BP bonds yield more than those of its affiliate TNK-BP.
BP’s 5.25 percent dollar bonds due 2013 yield 84 basis points, or 0.84 percentage points, more than the 7.25 percent dollar notes due the same year from TNK-BP, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s a turnaround from two months ago when TNK-BP debt yielded as much as 392 basis points more than BP.
Investors charged a 23 percentage point premium to buy TNK-BP notes at the end of 2008 as a battle for control between BP and its billionaire partners led to employees being denied work visas, an industrial espionage inquiry and the ouster of then-chief executive Robert Dudley, who fled Moscow citing security concerns. Now it’s BP’s bonds that have the higher yield as the cost for cleaning up the April 20 spill in the Gulf of Mexico surpasses $3.5 billion.
“The risk of BP taking longer than planned to contain the oil spill is far greater than that of TNK-BP being taken over by the government,” said Sergei Dergachev, who helps oversee about $6 billion of emerging-market debt, including TNK-BP dollar bonds, at Union Investment in Frankfurt. “The latter would actually be credit-positive, essentially making TNK-BP quasi-sovereign.”
BP’s 2013 bonds have dropped as much as 20 percent since the explosion on its Deep Water Horizon rig sent up to 60,000 barrels of crude a day gushing into waters off the coast of Louisiana. The U.S. administration forced BP to set $20 billion aside to cover damage claims. The company has said it will seek to raise half that amount by selling assets, though it’s ruled out selling its 50 percent stake in TNK-BP.
TNK-BP has generated more than $25 billion of net income and distributed over $20 billion in dividends since the tie-up began in 2003, chief executive Tony Hayward said last year. The British company under its former chief executive John Browne paid $7.7 billion in cash to Siberian oil producer TNK’s shareholders, including Viktor Vekselberg and Mikhail Fridman, to pool their assets and create TNK-BP under 50-50 ownership.
The transaction marked the last time a foreign shareholder gained more than 49 percent in a strategic natural-resources asset in Russia. Royal Dutch Shell Group was forced to sell control of its $22 billion Sakhalin-2 venture in 2006 to state-run Gazprom, ending regulatory threats to shutter the project on environmental grounds.
Russia won’t allow the European Union to interfere in the country’s energy industry unless Russian companies such as Gazprom get greater access to EU markets, Putin said at the time.
“If our European partners are expecting us to let them into the holy of holies of our economy, in this case we demand reciprocity,” Putin said in May 2006, after meeting EU leaders in the Russian resort town of Sochi.
Disagreements over expansion strategy and control in 2008 pitted BP against Vekselberg and Fridman, the country’s third and 16th richest men according to Forbes. TNK-BP’s offices were raided by Russian security services, foreign employees were denied work permits and an employee with dual British-Russian citizenship was arrested and charged with industrial espionage as the conflict escalated. Former chief executive Dudley left Moscow in July 2008 and tried to run TNK-BP from outside the country before officially resigning in December five months later.
TITLE: Largest Banks Mostly Pass on Dividends for ’09
AUTHOR: By Anton Trifonov
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: MOSCOW — Dividends do not seem to be a priority for the country’s 30 largest banks, with only 11 of the 19 that made a profit last year sending some of their earnings back to shareholders.
In relative terms, Bank St. Petersburg paid the largest dividend among stand-alone lenders, while in absolute terms, the biggest payout was from state-run VTB, according to data from lenders ranked by the Central Bank as the 30 largest.
VTB paid a full-year dividend of 6.1 billion rubles ($198 million) on profit of 23.75 billion rubles ($770 million). Its larger state rival, Sberbank, was just behind in profit, earning 21.7 billion rubles for the year, although its dividend was only 2.17 billion rubles.
In absolute terms, the combined dividends from Russia’s two largest banks are declining. In 2008, Sberbank and VTB paid a total of 14 billion rubles, while a year earlier their joint payout to shareholders was 19.5 billion rubles.
VTB’s retail subsidiary, VTB 24, paid 95 percent of profit in dividends. Another subsidiary, VTB Severo-Zapad, did not pay a full-year dividend, although its 2.2 billion ruble first-half payout ultimately exceeded the bank’s 2009 profit of 1.26 billion rubles.
Excluding VTB’s subsidiaries, Bank St. Petersburg paid the largest share of profit as dividends, with 78 percent. Of the combined 828.9 million rubles, the vast majority — 795 million rubles — was paid to preferred shareholders.
But far from all of the banks with publicly traded stock decided to cheer their shareholders; MDM-Bank, Bank of Moscow and Rosbank decided not to pay dividends for last year.
State-run Rosselkhozbank complied with the federal government’s request and paid 25 percent of its profit, or 382.5 million rubles, as a dividend. Bank of Moscow and AK Bars — close to the governments of Moscow and Tatarstan, respectively — passed on dividends.
Gazprombank and TransCreditBank, which have tight ties to state companies Gazprom and Russian Railways, paid around one-third and one-tenth of their annual profit, respectively.
Last year, most of the big private banks recorded a loss — including Alfa Bank, Binbank, Moscow Bank of Reconstruction and Development, Nomos-Bank, MDM-Bank, Petrokommerts, Promsvyazbank, Trust Bank and UralSib — and did not pay shareholders.
Svyaz-Bank, which was taken over by the state corporation Vneshekonombank, also did not pay. Rusbank will pay its preferred shareholders 330,000 rubles on a profit of 42.3 million rubles.
Loss-making subsidiaries of foreign banks did not pay dividends, while the profitable ones were split in their payouts. Raiffeisenbank sent owners one-third of its 1.5 billion rubles in profit, and UniCredit Bank paid more than three-fourths of its 5.5 billion rubles from 2009. Citibank, however, did not pay a dividend from its 6.9 billion rubles.
“The state is counting on dividends from state banks as a source of revenue,” said Mark Rubinstein, a banking analyst at Metropol.
State-run lenders benefit from cheap money from the state, which in turn requires that they pay a dividend, whereas private banks are forced to reinvest their profit, said Mikhail Zak, head of the analytical department at Veles Capital.
Analysts also noted that 2009 was a rough year for the financial sector, with heavy write-offs and losses, and the lion’s share of earnings had to be set aside to meet capital requirements.
TITLE: Market Confidence Bugaboo
AUTHOR: By Dani Rodrik
TEXT: A specter is haunting Europe — the specter of “market confidence.”
It may have been fear of communism that agitated governments when Karl Marx penned the opening line of his famous manifesto in 1848, but today it is the dread that market sentiment will turn against them and drive up the spreads on their government bonds. Governments all over are being forced into premature fiscal retrenchment, even though unemployment remains very high and private demand shows few signs of life. Many are driven to undertake structural reforms that they don’t really believe in — just because it would look bad to markets to do otherwise.
The terror spawned by market sentiment was once the bane of poor nations alone. During the Latin American debt crisis of the 1980s or the Asian financial crisis of 1997, for example, heavily indebted developing countries believed that they had few options but to swallow bitter medicine — or face a stampede of capital outflows. Apparently, now it’s the turn of Spain, France, Britain, Germany and, many analysts argue, even the United States.
If you want to keep borrowing money, you need to convince your lender that you can repay. That much is clear. But in times of crisis, market confidence takes on a life of its own. It becomes an ethereal concept devoid of much real economic content. It turns into what philosophers call a “social construction” — something that is real only because we believe it to be.
If economic logic were clear-cut, governments wouldn’t have to justify what they do on the basis of market confidence. It would be evident which policies work and which do not, and pursuing the “right” policies would be the surest way to restore confidence. The pursuit of market confidence would be superfluous.
So, if market confidence has a meaning, it must be something that is not pinned down simply by economic fundamentals. But what is it?
In “Communist Manifesto,” Marx went on to say that it is “high time that Communists should openly, in the face of the whole world, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies, and meet this nursery tale of the specter of Communism with a Manifesto of the party itself.” Similarly, it would be nice if markets would clarify what they mean by “confidence” so that we would all know what we are really dealing with.
Of course, “markets” are unlikely to do any such thing. This is not just because markets comprise a multitude of investors and speculators who are unlikely ever to get together to publish a “party program,” but more fundamentally because markets have little clue themselves.
A government’s capacity and willingness to service its debt depend on an almost infinite number of present and future contingencies. They depend not just on its tax and spending plans, but also on the state of the economy, the external conjuncture and the political context. All of these are highly uncertain and require many assumptions to reach some form of judgment about creditworthiness.
Today, markets seem to think that large fiscal deficits are the greatest threat to government solvency. Tomorrow they may think the real problem is low growth and rue the tight fiscal policies that helped produce it.
Today, they worry about spineless governments unable to take the tough actions needed to deal with the crisis. Perhaps tomorrow they will lose sleep over the mass demonstrations and social conflicts that tough economic policies have spawned.
Few can predict which way market sentiment will move, least of all market participants themselves. Even with hindsight, it is sometimes not clear why markets go one way and not the other. Similar policies will produce different market reactions depending on the prevailing story or fad of the moment. That is why steering the economy by the dictates of market confidence is a fool’s errand.
The silver lining in all this is that, unlike economists and politicians, markets have no ideology. As long as they make money they do not care if they have to eat their words. They simply want whatever “works” — whatever will produce a stable, healthy economic environment conducive to debt repayment. When circumstances become dire enough, they will even condone debt restructuring — especially if the alternative is chaos and the prospect of a greater loss.
This opens up some room for governments to maneuver. It permits self-confident political leaders to take charge of their own future. It allows them to shape the narrative that underpins market confidence, rather than play catch-up.
Their storyline needs to convince their electorates as well as the markets. If they succeed, they can pursue their own priorities and maintain market confidence at the same time.
This is where European governments (along with their economist advisers) have kept missing the boat. Rather than face up to the challenge, leaders first procrastinated and then buckled under pressure. They ended by fetishizing the pronouncements of market analysts. In doing so, they have denied themselves economically desirable policies that have greater chance of garnering popular support.
If the present crisis gets worse, it will be political leaders that bear primary responsibility — not because they ignored markets, but because they took them too seriously.
Dani Rodrik, professor of political economy at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, is author of “One Economics, Many Recipes: Globalization, Institutions, and Economic Growth.” © Project Syndicate
TITLE: The Sutyagin Syndrome
AUTHOR: By Yulia Latynina
TEXT: This week brought bad news for Amnesty International and other human rights activists. They had declared Igor Sutyagin, former defense analyst at the Moscow-based Institute for U.S.A. and Canada Studies who had been serving 15 years in prison on trumped-up espionage charges, a political prisoner and had fought to prove his complete innocence.
Sutyagin and three other people in Russian custody were traded for the 10 spies arrested in the United States two weeks ago. The United States initiated the trade. The three other people who came with Sutyagin were secret agents and traitors.
Sutyagin, who specialized in Russia’s nuclear weapons development, deployment and control, did not distribute classified information. The data he collected was about as secret as the open-source information gathered by the 10 Russian “illegals.”
The problem was that Sutyagin gave information to a phantom British company called Alternative Futures. The company claimed to provide investment advisers, but also took a particularly strong interest in Russia’s nuclear submarines. What’s more, the firm was registered to British citizens Nadia Locke and Sean Kidd, who do not even exist.
In Russia, a scientist can end up behind bars for something that would make him a millionaire in the West.
Scientist Ivan Petkov also landed in jail for 5 1/2 years for attempting to set up the manufacture of synthetic sapphires overseas.
Physicist Valentin Danilov was given a 14-year sentence for espionage for passing supposedly classified information to the Chinese about the effects of space on Earth’s satellites.
Up until the swap deal was proposed, Sutyagin never admitted any guilt in the espionage case that the state brought against him. In this way, he showed courage as well as the pragmatism and calculation of a good analyst. Although admitting guilt might have resulted in a lesser sentence, it would have put an end to his career.
In the Sutyagin case, the human rights activists showed the same herd mentality that Russia’s hardened patriots display. They demonstrated a remarkable infantilism and willingness to believe in the innocence of anyone from among their own ranks — that is, from the intelligentsia. If Sutyagin said he was innocent, he must be a victim of the regime.
There was a similar case in Germany in 2008. Werner Greipl, an engineer for the French-German helicopter manufacturer Eurocopter, gave the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service technical data regarding civil helicopters for a fee of 13,000 euros ($16,000). After his arrest, Greipl admitted his guilt but argued that the data was not classified. As a result, he was given an 11-month suspended sentence. And German society never thought to accuse the state of wrongly arresting a person who was merely passing along unclassified information.
It is difficult to say how many years Sutyagin would have received if he had behaved as Greipl did. Unfortunately, the Sutyagin case will do more to hurt the defense of unfairly jailed scientists than anything else.
Yulia Latynina hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio.
TITLE: Giving religion a bad name
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Bad Religion, an influential Southern Californian band that blends convincing, melody-based punk rock with intelligent, anti-establishment lyrics, is celebrating its 30th anniversary with a tour and a live album.
Although the band has not yet been to Russia, it managed to annoy the Russian authorities last year, when a St. Petersburg district prosecutor ordered a rock record shop to stop selling Bad Religion paraphernalia with “Crossbuster” — the band’s logo featuring a black cross with a red prohibition sign over it — on the grounds that it “might be promoting certain intolerant national, racial or religious attitudes.”
Bad Religion, whose most recent album is “30 Years Live,” a collection of live recordings made at U.S. concerts earlier this year, will perform in St. Petersburg and Moscow early next week.
Bassist Jay Bentley spoke to The St. Petersburg Times by phone from Los Angeles.
Q: Your Russian concerts are part of Bad Religion’s 30th Anniversary Tour, so can we assume you’ll perform songs from the band’s entire history?
A: Yeah, we’ll play something from everything we’ve done, part of our whole catalogue. We’ve got 30 years of music to play, over two hundred and something songs — we obviously can’t play them all, but we’ll play the ones that we can.
Q: Could I ask you about the ideas that led to you forming the band?
A: I think that when [vocalist] Greg Graffin and [guitarist] Brett Gurewitz met, they had an idea to start a punk band. Not a new wave band or anything; they wanted to start a punk band. And as the songs were being written, I think at one point there was this decision of what kind of a band we wanted to be, and after a little bit of discussion we decided we wanted to be thought-provoking, and we hoped to have lyrical content that would last longer than just the current President of the United States. So we gave a bit of thought to the things that we wanted to talk about and how we wanted to present them, and that was pretty much the beginning of the band. And that idea hasn’t really changed much in 30 years.
Q: You’re pretty melodic for a punk band. Where did the influence come from, maybe some British bands like Buzzcocks?
A: Yeah, there was a bit of that, but I think there was probably more of an influence, maybe, from bands like the Ramones and Elvis Costello. I mean we were all big fans of Elvis Costello as well, and Brett and I have always admitted to being huge suckers for pop music. I would say that when the band first started, my favorite band at the time was The Jam. I think the melodic part of it, like the songwriting part, was just a natural reaction to not wanting to be thought of as a three-chord punk rock band. Even if that’s what we were, we wanted to be thought of as something different.
But the melodies, the singing, the background vocals, all those things didn’t really come until later, when we made the “Suffer” record in ’88. That was just a whole different ball game.
Q: Where did the idea for the band’s name come from? What came first, the band’s name or the song, “Bad Religion?” Has it proven to be controversial?
A: The band name was before the song. Then Brett wrote the song, and then came up with a logo. It’s never been as controversial as people would think, never really been some kind of an issue we’ve had to deal with. It’s never been anything, it’s just been a band name.
Q: What was punk rock to you when you first started? Was it a return to true rock and roll roots or something else?
A: I was only 14 years old at the time; the idea of it returning to anything was unknown to me. All I know was it spoke to me, and it was everything. It answered all my questions about life. I’m not sure why, but it worked for me. I came out of the school of kind of liking KISS, when I was 10 or 11, 12 or 13, and then all of a sudden the Sex Pistols came out and that was the end of that. Yeah, it was weird.
Q: Is there anything particular in your music that makes you a Californian band, that sets you apart from New York bands?
A: I think you touched on it earlier, I think it’s the melody. Southern California bands, especially bands coming out of Orange County, they could play and they could sing. They would write songs. It wasn’t just abstract anger.
That’s what I can get from the East Coast-West Coast thing, though DC had a whole different ball game as well with Minor Threat and the Bad Brains. But in Southern California, a big influence was coming out of Orange County with The Adolescents, Social Distortion, Agent Orange, Middle Class, the Minutemen — these guys were all just fantastic musicians… So that kind of pushed everybody down here to be better. You had to be good enough to play with these guys, otherwise it was sort of embarrassing.
Q: Some bands say that they are into music, not politics. What made you become articulate about political issues?
A: Well, there are only a few schools of thought in the music world, which is 1) you’re angry at your girlfriend; and that’s not gonna work for us, 2) you’re not gonna clean up your room, “I hate you” and whatever; that’s not that great. And the other one is like sharing a philosophy, which is more of a folk idea.
It goes back to what we were talking about earlier, wanting to be relevant and wanting to sing about something other than just being angry at the cops. It was so easy to be angry at the cops. But let’s break it down and get more into what it’s like to be a human being. It doesn’t matter where you’re from. That was the idea we were thinking of. It’s bigger than just being in Los Angeles and being harassed by the police.
Q: Do you think that music can change anything?
A: Well, I was changed by music, because I allowed myself to be changed by music. I allowed myself to listen to the lyrical content of bands that I really enjoyed and said, “Yeah, that makes a lot of sense to me.” And that led me to read more, and to examine my surroundings more. All these things came from me being willing to listen to what these bands were saying to me.
But not everybody’s like that. Not everybody cares about what a band is saying, and not everybody wants to think while they’re being entertained by music.
So it can have a profound impact on an individual, but as far as changing the world, I really don’t think so, because a great-selling record is a million copies. There are seven billion people on the planet; that’s a pretty low percentage of people that buy a hit record. And I don’t know very many bands who have been thought-provoking that have had a hit record! Most of the hit records are about “my girlfriend doesn’t like me.”
So I think it has more of an impact on the individual than on society as a whole.
Q: What are people looking for in your music?
A: I think it is the sharing of an idea; and if you have something in your head… There is a feeling, and I remember this from when I was younger, because I didn’t have the vocabulary and emotional skills to deal with the way I felt. And when I heard someone else write a song about the way I felt, it connected me to someone else. It made me have a direction to put my feelings in. Now I can understand that. So maybe if we’re doing anything good lyrically, we’re sharing a philosophy, maybe an idea, maybe a feeling, and someone says, “Oh, I feel that way, too! I couldn’t put my finger on what it was that I was feeling, but you put it into words and now I get it.”
Q: How has punk rock changed over the years? Has it become more commercial?
A: There’s certainly more commercial success now than there ever has been. In the history of punk rock, ’94 to ’95 was about at the half-way point. Most punk rock bands just went along unknown, even the most popular ones weren’t really known outside of the punk rock circles. Nirvana kind of kicked the door open for everybody, and then it was the Offspring and Green Day and Rancid, and now you have bands that wouldn’t be considered punk rock, but they call themselves punk rock, and so they’re kind of flying that flag. But it’s the commercialism that’s led other bands to say, “Well, I want to be in a band like that,” because they’re popular, versus wanting to do it strictly for the art of doing it. That said, there are tons of true punk bands still out there, still playing. It’s just been a bit of a different time frame right now, because people have ideas of success that were never viable before. No one ever thought about a punk rock band selling millions and millions of records. That was never going to happen.
Q: You’ve never been to Russia. What expectations do you have of the country?
A: I’ve never been, I have no idea. Having never been there and getting an opportunity to go to someplace is truly humbling, and I’m really excited to go somewhere that I haven’t been before. This is a place that I’ve been looking forward to getting to for a long time. I’m really excited.
Bad Religion will perform at 8 p.m. Monday at Glavclub, 2 Kremenchugskaya Ulitsa. Metro Ploshchad Vosstaniya, Ploshchad Alexandra Nevskogo. Tel.: +7 812 905 7555.
TITLE: Chernov’s choice
TEXT: Podpolny Front (Underground Front), an occasional supergroup comprising local politically-minded band frontmen, has come up with a song in support of the right to assembly, which is guaranteed by the constitution, but largely ignored by the current Russian authorities.
Called “Pesnya 31” (Song 31), it has been made available as a YouTube video and was premiered by two members, Vadim Kurylyov of Electric Guerillas and Mikhail Novitsky of SP Babai, at a protest rally on Monday.
The Underground Front also includes Mikhail Borzykin of Televizor, Alexander Chernetsky of Razniye Lyudi, Sergei Parashchuk of NEP and Yury Rulyov of Patriarkhalnaya Vystavka. Kurylyov wrote the music and the lyrics.
The video, edited by Mikhail Yeliseyev, uses footage of the police brutally dispersing rallies in Moscow and St. Petersburg.
“Song 31” is the second of the Underground Front’s songs.
The first was “Bud Protiv” (“Be Against”) and was against Gazprom’s planned 400-meter Okhta Center skyscraper.
It was written and recorded days after Governor Valentina Matviyenko signed off on the planned building’s height, which is four times taller than that permitted by local legislation, and was first played at an anti-tower rally, which drew 5,000 to 8,000 concerned residents in October.
Speaking on Thursday, Kurylyov said he took inspiration from Strategy 31, the series of rallies in defense of the right to assembly held on the 31st day of all months that have 31 days.
Such rallies are mainly thwarted by the police in Moscow and St. Petersburg, with the protesters occasionally being beaten.
“It’s a confrontation between thinking people and an unjust state and authorities,” he said.
“It was not written to achieve any political goals. I am an anarchist, I am against any forms of power, I am for an ungoverned society, and I wasn’t intending to support any political party with this song.”
According to Kurylyov, members of the Underground Front slightly differ in their political views, but “Song 31” brought them together.
“It’s because of the terrible events of March 31 of this year, where, primarily in Moscow, there were beatings, and a man was sentenced to 2.5 years for trying to protect a woman,” he said. (See article about Sergei Mokhnatkin’s prison sentence, page 1.)
“It hurts our soul, that’s why the song came together quickly, it’s simple and in a folk-form — because it’s not like the first song, which superficially appears to address a St. Petersburg issue, Gazprom Tower — this one is about an issue for the whole country.
“It’s about how the authorities are elected — in my opinion, it’s like a cat in a bag, nobody knows anything about what’s going on. That’s what the song is about.”
This week’s shows include U.S. punk rockers Bad Religion (Glavclub, Monday — see interview) and their Finnish counterparts Punk Lurex (Griboyedov, Thursday).
— By Sergey Chernov
TITLE: Returning to Wonderland
AUTHOR: By Kristina Aleksandrova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: This year, a book written by the English mathematician and writer Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known under his pseudonym Lewis Carroll, is riding a new wave of popularity. Due to Tim Burton’s film version of “Alice in Wonderland,” the Hatter, White Rabbit, Duchess and Cheshire Cat are once again in the spotlight. Now, more than 30 original prints made by John Tenniel will be shown at St. Petersburg’s Mayakovsky Library.
“Burton’s film promoted the book in many respects, but ‘Alice’ is extremely popular nowadays, because it’s a really interesting, unusual and mysterious novel,” said Marina Passet, head of the library’s art division.
Carroll wanted to illustrate his work himself. The first manuscript copy of “Alice’s Adventures Underground” with pictures drawn by the author himself was given to Alice Liddell, who was the inspiration for the character of Alice, as a Christmas present. Today this book is kept in the British Library.
In 1864, fate brought the writer and John Tenniel together. Carroll wanted the painter to make 42 pictures for his novel, and insisted stubbornly that all the characters should look exactly how he wanted. He sent some pictures of girls and persistently asked Tenniel to use them as models, but Tenniel changed Alice’s appearance. Her prototype Liddell was a brunette, but Tenniel’s Alice has long blonde hair.
“It’s difficult to say why the artist made this decision,” said Passet. “Carroll had a specific prototype, and he wanted his requirements to be satisfied. Tenniel must have had an opposing opinion.”
Tenniel worked as a caricaturist for “Punch” magazine, which perhaps explains the element of grotesque in his pictures. Carroll himself didn’t like Tenniel’s style, writing: “I venture to think that he was mistaken and that for want of a model, he drew several pictures of ‘Alice’ entirely out of proportion — head decidedly too large and feet decidedly too small.”
All the pictures were first drawn on wooden plates, then the Dalziel brothers engraved the illustrations. The original engravings were used as models for the costumes in the American film version in 1993.
“Alice in Wonderland” runs from July 15 to Aug. 12 at the Mayakovsky Library, 20 Nevsky Prospekt. Tel: 495 755 5230M: Nevsky Prospekt.
TITLE: Hot in the city
AUTHOR: By Tobin Auber
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: By a cruel twist of fate, our trip to this modest caf? on Galernaya Ulitsa came immediately after the bizarre annual Russian rite that is the medical tests that expatriate personnel must undergo in order to receive a work permit. Having spent the morning on a team outing giving blood and filling plastic pots with urine, this was to be our treat, our compensation for having to stand in line interminably, blood seeping out of wounds inflicted in the name of the standards of health in the Russian workplace. Although by no means a disaster — most of the dishes were, in fact, excellent — the unbearable heat in the city made eating in this confined basement an option perhaps best left until winter.
The caf? is modest, comprising a few small rooms just a stone’s throw from “the Copper horseman,” the publicity materials tell us, and the food is Russian, European, Italian and “East cuisine.” Despite some strong recommendations in the local press and the incredible presentation of the dishes, the interior is modest, looking like any one of hundreds of small restaurants and cafes in the center of the city, the kind that are popular with officials and mid-level management looking for a bite to eat as close to the office as possible. There are some understated medieval elements in the d?cor, but don’t expect suits of armor, halberds and stag’s heads on the walls.
The decoration of the dishes, however, puts some of the city’s finest restaurants to shame. Salad with spinach pancakes (240 rubles, $8) was a beautifully turned out affair, the vibrant green pancakes tightly wrapping up a wonderfully moist salad that managed to avoid being heavy on the inevitable mayonnaise. The salmon Carpaccio stuffed with spinach and creamy curd cheese (250, $8.20), was another visual feast, decorated with very finely sliced roasted almonds, cherry tomatoes, a big, healthy slice of lemon and the additional treat of red caviar. The obvious enthusiasm in the presentation of the dishes almost had us trying the “cheese composition” (370 rubles, $12), a title which may or may not have been a mistranslation.
The gazpacho soup (250 rubles, $8.20) was less successful, and is definitely only recommended to those who like their food blisteringly hot and spicy. In fact, spice addicts should also be forewarned, as the dish leaves a powerful aftertaste that you will struggle to lose during the rest of the day.
The spicy gazpacho also had the drawback of being served on one of the hottest days in the recent history of St. Petersburg. The heat was at least partially fought off with some excellent homemade lemonades (70 rubles, $2.30 a glass), that were made with freshly crushed ice (true, when the disturbingly loud ice-crushing device is fired up you will wonder if you’ve accidentally strayed into some hellish industrial facility).
The rabbit cutlets with roast potatoes (310 rubles, $10) was again excellently presented, although a sound dish rather than a taste extravaganza. The cutlets were reasonably fresh, and the potatoes nicely browned, but they didn’t come close to the pancakes or Carpaccio mentioned above.
The eggplant “parmedzhano” (sic) for 250 rubles ($8) also failed to match these two signature dishes. It was richly spiced with an excellent cheese topping and tomato sauce, all let down by the marrow (which was apparently standing in for the absent eggplant), which was spongy, chewy and undercooked.
In short, then, if you work in the area it’s worth exploring for some of the gems on the menu and the reasonable prices. But if you want gazpacho, head for Krokodil directly opposite, which has one of the best in the city.
TITLE: PetroJazz festival
AUTHOR: By Kristina Aleksandrova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: For two hot days this weekend, the beach at the Peter and Paul Fortress will be turned into a giant stage where top jazz bands will perform at the international PetroJazz festival
This year, musicians from St. Petersburg, Finland, Turkey and Lithuania will perform at the festival, which was established in 2003.
“A lot of people come to the festival with their families,” said the festival’s founder, Innokenty Volkomorov. “Sometimes women come with small children and rock them while the music is playing. People even used to bring their pets, but that’s prohibited now.”
As part of a world tour in support of its third album, titled “Mystic Radical,” the popular U.K. group Schez Raja will perform in Russia for the first time, combining jazz, funk, reggae and drum&bass.
“Schez Raja Collective is itself proof that we live in a multiethnic world with a lot of different cultures and traditions,” said Volkomorov. “Their music differs from classical jazz, and this year people will hear a lot of improvisations and different styles. As usual, we don’t just want our festival to satisfy only intellectuals, so dances are also organized,” he said.
Musicians from the Lithuanian quartet InSearch are the biggest experimenters, combining new-jazz with alternative sound, while Finnish virtuoso pianist Jenia Gimer will perform on both saxophone and clarinet.
PetroJazz is a chance to hear a lot of improvisation and unusual solutions. Guests from Turkey’s MuGam Project do not limit themselves to one style, singing in Turkish, Azerbaijani, English and Russian in a “mugam” style. This Azerbaijani vocal art is a very old tradition which was recognized by UNESCO in 2003.
The local groups are well known to jazz fans. Andrei Kondakov, art manager of JFC Jazz Club, will perform with his Electric Project, while the Chizhik Jazz Quartet will entertain people on the vibraphone. Soul singer Elizabeth Attim Allai, who is Afro-American by birth but lives and works in St. Petersburg, will also take to the stage.
Another foreign-born singer performing at the festival requires no introduction. Amy Pieterse was born in Amsterdam and raised in New York, but has lived for many years in St. Petersburg, where she has a popular band.
PetroJazz has its own traditions, including having its own currency — “jazziki.”
“It’s really hot and people don’t want to stand in long lines,” explained Volkomorov. “Jazziki helps people to avoid doing so.” The currency can be bought at the festival, and used at the art market, tea or beer house.
“It’s our sixth festival, and it’s an outstanding achievement, because St. Petersburg will receive the official status of jazz host,” said Volkomorov. “There is a league of such cities, including Rotterdam, Pori, San Francisco and other places. We are being sent a lot of applications from Brazil, Norway, Serbia and even Africa. After we receive this status, we will broaden our horizons.”
TITLE: World Press Photo Comes to Petersburg
AUTHOR: By Kristina Aleksandrova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Tragic events and suffering are the main themes this year at World Press Photo, which opens Friday, showcasing the top 200 press photos of the year at Loft Project Etazhi.
In 2010, more than 100,000 photos were sent to the organizers of the international photojournalism contest. It took about two weeks to look through all of the images, and the winner was announced in February. The Italian freelance photographer Pietro Masturzo was given the prestigious Golden Eye photojournalism award and 10,000 euros. Masturzo took a set of photos in Iran after the presidential election in 2009. After Ahmadinejad won the election, disturbances overwhelmed Tehran, with people chanting “Down with the dictator!” taking to the streets. Masturzo’s winning shot depicts a woman standing on a roof and screaming antigovernment slogans.
The “Spot News” category features a winning image by Australian photographer Adam Ferguson depicting a woman escaping from a bomb explosion near the hotel Wazir Akbar Khan in Afghanistan. Photos of the bombings in Gaza are also on display in this category.
“All these photos show reality,” said the event’s organizer, Anna Balagurova. “There is a world most people don’t know about. Photojournalists want to tell us about it. If we had been born a few miles to the south, we would have another reality. These pictures may scandalize public opinion, but all these events are daily routine for somebody.”
A picture taken by Walter Astrada of a man trying to save himself from gunfire near Madagascan government offices won first place in the “Stories” category, while Kent Klich won the “General News” category with a photo of the interior of a house in Gaza with its roof punched out by a tank shell. Second place was given to a bloody portrait of a young man killed during a shoot-out in Colombia.
More violent photos are presented in the “People in the News” category. The main heroes in this section are a man with his face covered, holding a stone in his hand during a pro-separatist demonstration in Srinagar, and U.S. soldiers taking defensive positions in Afghanistan.
One of the bloodiest photo reports was created by the Italian photographer Tommaso Ausili. All of his pictures were taken in an Umbrian slaughterhouse. Ausili said he didn’t want to simply scare people with the bloody images of killed and butchered animals, but to show people the truth about meat production.
The presence of so many shocking images may keep some parents from taking their children to the exhibition.
“I know that it is normal practice in Amsterdam for school groups to visit World Press Photo,” said Balagurova.
Other photos on display include a killed giraffe, starving villagers, a drug dealer shot to death, and the suffering of people who have lost their relatives during a war. World Press Photo 2010 is short on positive images, offering a sparse handful dedicated mostly to sport and nature.
“I think this exhibition may lead to a reappraisal of values,” said Balagurova. “Some people don’t know that most of their desires aren’t so important. If they see real sorrow, they will understand that life itself is of the greatest value.”
World Press Photo is an independent organization with headquarters in Amsterdam. The international photojournalism contest was founded in 1995. Every year, the jury chooses the best works in 10 categories and one Photo of the Year. The awards ceremony takes place in Oude Kerk in Amsterdam, after which a traveling exhibition of the prizewinning pictures goes on tour all over the world. This year it will visit about 100 cities.
World Press Photo 2010 runs from July 16 to Aug. 15 at Loft Project Etazhi,
74 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel: 339 9836. M: Ligovsky Prospekt.
TITLE: Cham Mystery In Focus
AUTHOR: By Kristina Aleksandrova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: A rare and fascinating insight into Buddhist rituals can be gleaned this summer at the Roerich museum where an exhibition of Cham Dance masks opened earlier this month.
The artist and philosopher Nikolai Roerich, who was born in St. Petersburg in 1874, became fascinated by spiritualism during the course of many journeys to Asia. The Buddhist rituals he observed in India, where he died in 1947, made a profound impression on him.
The Cham Dance is an annual sacred practice in Buddhist monasteries, or datsans. The dance-drama is performed in the courtyard of the datsan by lamas wearing masks depicting guards. It is not known when the ritual originated, but according to an ancient legend, the first Cham Dance was performed by the 9th-century Buddhist guru Padmasambhava.
“The masks of the keepers are kept guarded in a special compartment,” Roerich wrote in his book “Altai-Himalaya. A travel diary.”
“Is it possible that these frightful visages can symbolize the way of benevolence? However, they are not symbols of benevolence, but symbols of earthly elemental forces. For there is both heaven and earth,” he wrote.
The aim of the Cham Dance is the annihilation of evil spirits. During the ceremony, spectators are shown the “other world.”
“Our exhibition is ‘synthetic’,” Viktoria Shurshina, deputy director for the museum’s activities, said. “Along with the Cham Dance masks being exhibited, other Buddhist ritual objects can also be seen at the museum.”
“All of the masks were made by Sergei Pancheshny,” Shurshina said. “He took the images from books and brochures. His masks have been used in Cham Dances in Mongolia and Buryatia.”
In St. Petersburg, masks made by Pancheshny, who has long been interested in the Cham Dance, are kept at the Gunzechoinei Datsan and at the State Historical Museum of Religion.
Pancheshny uses papier-mache to create the masks. All of the colorful masks have a festive appearance, so it is difficult for uninitiated spectators to identify which represents good or evil. Even fearsome Buddhist deities are always kind, however. Traditional characters in the Cham Dance are the Lord of the Other World, the protector Dharma Mahakala, and the White Old Man, who is the patron of health and wealth.
The Cham Dance ritual can be seen as a bridge between the human world and other worlds. Not only those present are believed to be cleansed of evil during the performance — Buddhists say that the ceremony, when held in a datsan, helps to purify the whole world.
“Masks of the Cham Mystery” runs through Oct. 11 at the Nikolai Roerich Apartment Museum, 1 18th Liniya of Vasilyevsky Island. Tel: 325 4413. M: Vasileostrovskaya. www.roerich.spb.ru
TITLE: Film Festival Gets Underway
AUTHOR: By Lyudmila Tsubiks
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The 20th “Message to Man” international documentary short and animated film festival opened in St. Petersburg on Thursday, promising opportunities for communication between filmmakers from around the world.
Film director Alexei Uchitel, the festival’s president, said the selection commission had watched 2,853 films from 83 countries in order to choose the most interesting works for the competition. The program features 73 films.
This time, the focus of the festival, which is based at Dom Kino, is on documentaries. This year’s program includes an international competition of debut films and a Russian documentary national competition.
The jury chairman is Tue Steen Muller from Denmark, a recognized expert in the field of documentary cinema.
The jury of the Russian documentary category, which includes 23 films, is chaired by director, writer and film scholar Galina Dolmatovskaya. The Russian premiere of Dolmatovskaya’s movie “Serebrykovy. French Etudes” features on the festival’s program.
Mikhail Litvyakov, the festival’s general director, said that the renowned French director and photographer Agnes Varda would be a special guest of the festival. She will present two of her feature films: “The Beaches of Agnes,” which received a Cesar Award, and “The Gleaners and I,” as well as several special programs of documentary films and a master class.
Uchitel said that the Ministry of Culture had allocated 1.5 million rubles ($50,000) for the festival. “We need to ensure proper funding of the festival in order to invite interesting directors, actors, scriptwriters, cameramen, filmmakers, and, above all, we need to ensure the quality of the film festival,” he said. The festival’s funds were boosted by local hypermarket chain Lenta, a sponsor of the festival.
Russian director Rasim Poloskin, who is best known for directing “Lost in Afghanistan. 20 years later,” will present his film “Infernal machine. A suicide-bomber dreaming,” while Zhanna Romanova will introduce her work, “On the Volga River,” about a weaver from the city of Ivanovo.
“The film is about a woman who dreams of becoming president in the future,” said Romanova. “In general, she is the mysterious Russian soul, truthful and on the verge of stupidity,” she said.
The festival will also feature a retrospective of films by Alexander Sokurov, Yury Norshtein, Anri Kulev (Bulgaria), the Coen brothers (U.S.) and other famous filmmakers. Mahen Bonetti, the director of the New York African Film Festival, will show a program from his annual festival.
The Message to Man international film festival runs from July 15 to 22. For a detailed program,
visit http://m2m.iffc.ru/index.htm.
TITLE: Defector Ballet Dancer Honored on Fontanka
AUTHOR: By Olga Gileva
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The Sheremetevsky Palace unveiled a new exhibition Saturday devoted to the famous Soviet ballet dancer Rudolph Nureyev, who was for years ignored by his native country after defecting to the West.
“Rudolph Nureyev. Threads of Times” includes 48 original costumes worn by Nureyev and his stage partners, provided by the National Theater Costume Center (Moulin, France), the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet in St. Petersburg, the Paris National Opera and some private owners.
Natalya Metelitsa, director of the State Museum of Theatrical and Musical Art in St. Petersburg and one of the exhibition’s curators, said the exhibition reflects the image of a great artist known in Russia only through small fragments of smuggled films, which explains why documents do not play a leading role in the exhibition.
One of the most impressive parts of the exhibition is the Black Room, which is composed as an encircled scene from Nureyev’s final and probably best known ballet “La Bayadere.” Sparkling tutus glitter against a huge screen depicting the Dance of Shadows from the ballet.
The organizers of the event said that they had overcome a range of obstacles, many the result of the project’s low budget. Each costume is worth about 50,000 euros and needs to be transported in special wooden boxes — the fabric is so delicate that it can be spoilt even by moonlight. Representatives of the Moulin Center added that it was sometimes not easy to come to an agreement with the private owners who gave costumes from their collections to the center for temporary storage.
Remarkably, some of the exhibited costumes, including the Mouse King costume from the ballet “The Nutcracker” are still used in performances. They are due to be delivered back to the Paris National Opera by the beginning of the new season.
Nureyev trained at the Choreographic School in Leningrad, as St. Petersburg was then known. He defected in 1961 at a Paris airport with the help of French police. He was not permitted to return to the Soviet Union until 1989, when Mikhail Gorbachev allowed the dancer to visit his dying mother.
Nureyev died of AIDS in Paris in 1993 at the age of 54.
The exhibition is one of 350 events being held in Russia and France as part of the year of culture and business dialogue between the two countries.
“Rudolph Nureyev. Threads of Time” runs through Sept. 12 at the Sheremetev Palace, 34 Nab. Reki Fontanki.
Tel: 272 4441
M: Gostiny Dvor / Mayakovskaya.
TITLE: ‘Abducted’ Nuclear Scientist Returns to Iran
AUTHOR: By Nasser Karimi and Brian Murphy
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: TEHRAN, Iran — Flashing a victory sign, an Iranian nuclear scientist who claims he was abducted and abused by U.S. agents a year ago returned Thursday to his homeland and into the heart of the latest crossfire between Washington and Tehran.
The conflicting accounts about Shahram Amiri — captive or defector who got cold feet — are unlikely to alter the Western-led pressure on Iran over its nuclear program.
But Iran’s leaders are expected to use Amiri to ring up as many propaganda points as possible against Washington — showing that relations remain in a deep freeze and hopes of breakthrough talks appear as distant as ever.
It also gives the ruling clerics a welcome distraction at a time when domestic protests are growing over Iran’s stumbling economy and worries about the fallout from international sanctions.
Journalists were allowed to cover Amiri’s first steps back in Iran in a rare relaxation of media restrictions. The last such press gathering permitted at Tehran’s international airport was linked to another tussle with Washington: the May visit by the mothers of three jailed Americans arrested last year on the Iran-Iraq border.
Amiri’s pre-dawn arrival capped a stunning tumble of events over the past month that included leaked videos with mixed messages, Amiri surfacing at a diplomatic compound in Washington and the White House finally acknowledging his presence in the country.
The U.S. says he was a willing defector who changed his mind and decided to board a plane home from Washington. Amiri has told a very different tale, claiming he was snatched while on a pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia and bundled off to the United States to be harshly interrogated and offered millions of dollars by the CIA to speak against Iran.
Amiri was embraced by his family — including his tearful 7-year-old son — and greeted by a top envoy from Iran’s Foreign Ministry. The 32-year-old Amiri smiled and gave the V-for-victory sign.
Speaking to journalists after a flight via Qatar, Amiri repeated his earlier claims that he was snatched while in the Saudi holy city of Medina and carried off to the United States.
The first months were full of intense pressures, he alleged. “I was under the harshest mental and physical torture,” he said at the Tehran airport, with his young son sitting on his lap.
He also alleged that Israeli agents were present during the interrogations and that CIA officers offered him $50 million to remain in America. He gave no further details to back up the claims or shed any new light on his time in the United States, but promised to reveal more later.
“I have some documents proving that I’ve not been free in the United States and have always been under the control of armed agents of U.S. intelligence services,” Amiri told reporters.
Previously he claimed that CIA agents “pressured me to help with their propaganda against Iran,” he said, including offering him up to $10 million to talk to U.S. media and claim to have documents on a laptop against Iran. He said he refused to take the money.
But the Washington Post reported that the CIA paid Amiri $5 million to provide intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program. The Post in its online edition late Wednesday said the money came from a secret program aimed at inducing scientists and others with information on Iran’s nuclear program to defect.
On Thursday, Amiri sought to play down his role in Iran’s nuclear program — which Washington and allies fear could be used to create atomic weapons. Iran says it only seeks energy-producing reactors.
“I am a simple researcher who was working in the university,” he said. “I’m not involved in any confidential jobs. I had no classified information.”
His case was often raised by Iranian officials in the past year, but Washington offered no public response. It took a higher profile after Iranian authorities decided to pursue charges against the three Americans arrested along the border with Iraq in July 2009.
Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Hassan Qashqavi, said there would be “no link” between Amiri’s return and the case of the three Americans, whose families say they were hiking in northern Iraq and that if they crossed the border, they did so inadvertently.
Amiri was generally a footnote in the international showdown over Iran’s nuclear ambitions until last month. Iranian state TV aired a video he purportedly made from an Internet cafe in Tucson, Arizona, to claim he was taken captive by U.S. and Saudi “terror and kidnap teams.”
The video was shortly followed by another, professionally produced clip in which he said he was happily studying for a doctorate in the United States. In a third, shaky piece of video, Amiri claimed to have escaped from U.S. agents in Virginia and insisted the second video was “a complete lie” that the Americans put out.
U.S. officials never acknowledged he was on American soil until Tuesday, hours after he turned up at the Iranian interests section at the Pakistani Embassy in Washington asking to be sent home. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Amiri had been in the United States “of his own free will and he is free to go.”
On Thursday in Tehran, he asked American authorities to explain their secrecy.
“Why didn’t they allow me to have an open interview with the media in the United States?” he said. “Why didn’t they ever announce my presence?”
TITLE: Argentina Legalizes Marriage For Gays
AUTHOR: By Michael Warren
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Argentina legalized same-sex marriage Thursday, becoming the first country in Latin America to grant gays and lesbians all the legal rights, responsibilities and protections that marriage gives heterosexual couples.
The vote came down to 33 in favor, 27 against and 3 abstentions in Argentina’s Senate shortly after 4 a.m. Since the lower house already approved it, and President Cristina Fernandez is a strong supporter, it now becomes the law of the land, and is sure to bring a wave of marriages by gays and lesbians who have increasingly found Buenos Aires to be more accepting than many other places in the region.
The approval came despite a concerted campaign by the Roman Catholic Church and evangelical groups, which drew 60,000 people to march on Congress and urged parents in churches and schools to work against passage.
Nine gay couples have already married in Argentina after persuading judges that Argentina’s constitutional mandate of equality supports their marriage rights, but some of these marriages were later declared invalid.
As the debate stretched on for nearly 16 hours, supporters and opponents held rival vigils through the frigid night outside the Congress building in Buenos Aires.
“Marriage between a man and a woman has existed for centuries, and is essential for the perpetuation of the species,” insisted Senator Juan Perez Alsina, who is usually a loyal supporter of the president but gave a passionate speech against gay marriage.
But Senator Norma Morandini, another member of the president’s party, compared the discrimination closeted gays face to the oppression imposed by Argentina’s dictators decades ago. “What defines us is our humanity, and what runs against humanity is intolerance.”
Same-sex civil unions have been legalized in Uruguay, Buenos Aires and some states in Mexico and Brazil. Mexico City has legalized gay marriage. Colombia’s Constitutional Court granted same-sex couples inheritance rights and allowed them to add their partners to health insurance plans.
But Argentina now becomes the first country in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage nationwide, granting gays and lesbians all the same rights and responsibilities that heterosexuals have. These include many more rights than civil unions, including adopting children and inheriting wealth.
TITLE: BP Works to Fix Leak Before Choking Flow
AUTHOR: By Colleen Long and Harry Weber
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: NEW ORLEANS — BP engineers working to choke the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico found a leak on a line attached to the side of the new well cap and were trying to fix it Thursday before attempting to stop the crude.
BP said Wednesday evening it had isolated the leak and was repairing it before moving forward. It wasn’t clear how it would affect the timing of the operation, or whether oil continued to be slowly closed off into the cap.
Work started earlier Wednesday after a day-long hiatus to allay government fears that the disaster could be made worse by going forward with the tests to determine whether the temporary cap can withstand the pressure and contain the oil. It was the best hope yet of stopping the crude from streaming into the water for the first time since the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig that killed 11 people.
The process began with BP shutting off pipes that were funneling some of the oil to ships on the surface so the full force of the gusher went up into the cap. Then deep-sea robots began slowly closing, one at a time, three openings in the cap that let oil pass through. Ultimately, the flow of crude will be blocked entirely.
All along, engineers were watching pressure readings to learn whether the well is intact. The first two valves shut off like a light switch, while the third works more like a dimmer and takes longer to close off. The leak was found in the line attached to the dimmer switch, but live video footage showed that oil previously spewing from other sources on the cap remained closed off.
Retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, the Obama administration’s point man on the disaster, said a committee of scientists and engineers will monitor the results and assess every six hours, and end the test after 48 hours to evaluate the findings.
If the cap works, it will enable BP to stop the oil from gushing into the sea, either by holding all the oil inside the well machinery like a stopper or, if the pressure is too great, channeling some through lines to as many as four collection ships.
The cap — a 75-ton metal stack of lines and valves — was lowered onto the well on Monday in hopes of either bottling up the oil inside the well machinery, or capturing it and funneling it to the surface. But before BP could test the equipment, the government intervened because of concerns about whether the buildup of pressure from the gushing oil could rupture the walls of the well and make the leak worse.
“We sat long and hard about delaying the tests,” Allen said. He said that the pause was necessary in the interest of the public, the environment and safety, until officials were convinced the test could go forward.
TITLE: N. Korea Health System in Chaos
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea’s health care system is in shambles with doctors sometimes performing amputations without anesthesia and working by candlelight in hospitals lacking essential medicine, heat and power, a human rights watchdog said Thursday.
North Korea’s state health care system has been deteriorating for years amid the country’s economic difficulties. Many of its 24 million people reportedly face health problems related to chronic malnutrition, such as tuberculosis and anemia, Amnesty International said in a report on the state of the health care system.
A 24-year-old defector from northeastern Hamkyong province told Amnesty that a doctor amputated his left leg from the calf down without anesthesia after his ankle was crushed.