SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1607 (68), Tuesday, September 7, 2010
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TITLE: Suspect Held In $41M Pension Fraud Case
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Police have arrested a 28-year-old suspect on suspicion of stealing $41 million from the federal pension fund in an elaborate scheme that involved Cyprus bank accounts, 23 cell phone numbers and a travel regime that avoided the use of trains and planes.
The suspect, Kirill Ustinov, was detained early Thursday in Ryazan, a city some 250 kilometers southeast of Moscow, the Interior Ministry said in a statement on its web site.
Investigators believe that Ustinov used counterfeit documents and a forged passport to wire 1.25 billion rubles of pension fund money kept in Central Bank accounts to a fictitious company called SpetsTekhProm last November.
The falsified bank orders claimed that the money would be used for capital investments and construction projects for the pension fund. Instead, the funds first went to Kuban Commercial Bank and then in six tranches to other banks, some of which had accounts in Cyprus, the ministry said.
But the fraud ultimately failed because the pension fund found out quickly after being notified by the Central Bank. “Thanks to the tactical and competent actions of investigators and Central Bank officials, the whole sum was returned,” the statement said.
The Central Bank said it took three working days to block the transfers and return the money.
In April, the Central Bank revoked the license of Kuban Commercial Bank, citing “substantial inaccuracies in its financial statements.”
But Ustinov remained at large.
Investigators said Thursday that he managed to evade them by using 23 different cell phone numbers and avoiding travel by train and plane, which in Russia requires a passport.
“He only used taxis,” the statement said.
Yet the Federal Security Service seems to have found Ustinov’s trail.
“According to the FSB, he was part of a criminal gang that regularly engaged in bank fraud using counterfeit documents and lost passports,” the Interior Ministry said.
A search in Ustinov’s home uncovered 150 official stamps, including those of courts, tax inspectorates and the Moscow city police department to fight economic crime, it said, without saying where the home was located.
The ministry also suggested that there was a leak — without specifying where. “The decision to arrest Ustinov was made after he found out about the search for him. He received anonymous phone calls recommending that he go into hiding,” the statement said.
When police arrested him in Ryazan, Ustinov had just 100 rubles ($3) on him, the Rosbalt.ru news service reported. He threatened the officers with a weapon that turned out to be an air gun, the report said, citing an unidentified law enforcement source.
The ministry statement did not say whether charges had been filed against Ustinov.
Such a large-scale heist could not have been carried out by ordinary criminals, analysts said, and senior pension fund officials have been linked to two cases that followed Ustinov’s.
Only days after the November heist was averted, police arrested Sergei Dubinkin, chief of the pension fund’s Sverdlovsk branch, on charges of embezzling about 1 billion rubles ($32.5 million). The money was said to have been taken from VEFK-Ural bank, and Olga Chechushkova, a former bank chairwoman, was also arrested.
While Chechushkova was released on condition that she not leave the country, a Yekaterinburg court last week prolonged Dubinkin’s detention until Nov. 18, RIA-Novosti reported. He faces up to 10 years in jail if convicted.
In February, investigators arrested the head of the pension fund’s St. Petersburg branch, Natalya Grishkevich, on charges of accepting a $585,000 bribe for illegally transferring an undisclosed amount of pension fund money.
The pension fund, which pays benefits to more than 39 million citizens, is suffering from a deficit that this year exceeds 1 trillion rubles ($32 billion).
The situation is acerbated by low birth rates and high death rates, and Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said in June that the national retirement age, currently set at 55 for women and 60 for men, will have to be increased.
TITLE: Serdyukov Visits Dagestan After Blasts
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Dmitry Medvedev dispatched Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov to Dagestan on Sunday after the North Caucasus republic was rocked by a series of attacks that killed at least three people and injured dozens, including a local government minister.
Serdyukov arrived in the local capital, Makhachkala, on Sunday afternoon to personally oversee efforts to aid the victims, Interfax reported. He has orders to regularly brief Medvedev on the situation, the report said, citing the Kremlin’s press service.
The biggest attack happened early Sunday when a Lada packed with explosives blew up inside a military firing range near the city of Buinaksk, about 50 kilometers west of Makhachkala. Shortly after, a roadside bomb targeted investigators driving to the scene of the blast.
The first bomb killed three to five soldiers and injured more than 30, while the second caused no injuries, RIA-Novosti reported.
The car, driven by a suicide bomber, smashed through the compound’s gates at about 1 a.m. and headed toward a tent camp where soldiers were sleeping, officials said. But he was stopped by the driver of a GAZ-66 truck who managed to turn around and block the Lada’s path.
The ensuing explosion killed three soldiers, the Defense Ministry said. Thirty-two soldiers were injured, five in serious condition, ministry spokesman Alexei Kuznetsov told Interfax.
A local police source later told the official Riadagestan.ru news site that the numbers had risen to five dead and 39 injured. It was unclear whether the figures included the suicide bomber.
The soldier driving the truck was being treated in the hospital for injuries, Interfax reported.
The soldier probably saved many lives by stopping the attacker before he reached the tents.
The VAZ-21014 car carried explosives with a force of 40 to 50 kilograms of dynamite, investigators said. Television footage from the scene showed the burned out wreck of the truck, while almost nothing of the car remained.
On Saturday, Dagestan’s nationalities minister Bekmurza Bekmurzayev was injured when a bomb under his car exploded in Makhachkala.
The blast, which went off just as the car was leaving his house, also killed his driver and injured at least one bodyguard accompanying him, news reports said.
Bekmurzayev was rushed to the hospital with multiple injuries and a concussion, but his life was not in danger, Interfax reported.
The Investigative Committee said earlier that two passengers other than Bekmurzayev were injured, but Riadagestan.ru reported Sunday that the only other person who was injured was the bodyguard.
The job of nationalities minister, which includes responsibilities for religion and external relations, has proven dangerous, with two of Bekmurzayev’s predecessors assassinated over the past 10 years.
But analysts voiced doubt that the attack had personally targeted Bekmurzayev, who was appointed in March after previously holding the post between 2005 and 2006.
Enver Kisriyev, an analyst with the Regional Research Center in the Academy of Sciences, said the local ministry had little influence in local politics because all important decisions were made at the presidential level.
“Bekmurzayev was probably targeted because he traveled with relatively little security,” Kisriyev told The St. Petersburg Times.
Dagestan has for years been beset with violent Islamist insurgents, and the predominantly Muslim region, whose population is divided into 28 linguistic groups, has recently seen a surge in coordinated attacks.
In June 2009, the republic’s interior minister, Adilgerei Magomedtagirov, was gunned down in Makhachkala. And in February, the city’s police chief Alhmed Magomedov was shot dead in his car.
The twin suicide bombings in the Moscow metro on March 29 were blamed on Dagestani militants, and authorities last month claimed the death of Magomedali Vagabov, a local rebel leader blamed for the bombings.
Dagestani President Magomedsalam Magomedov, who was appointed by the Kremlin earlier this year, promised Sunday that stability would return despite the continued attacks.
“The bandits and terrorists have no future. The Dagestanis do not support them but condemn them,” Magomedov told reporters at the scene of the Buinaksk bombing, Riadagestan.ru reported.
Last month, Magomedov called for the creation of anti-terrorist and anti-extremist units staffed by locals.
TITLE: First Senior Regional Officials Quit Over Wildfires
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Three senior Volgograd regional officials resigned Monday over their handling of wildfires after coming under criticism from the Kremlin.
Igor Pikalov, a deputy governor who headed Volgograd’s emergency situations commission, filed his resignation along with heads of the worst-affected Kotovo and Rudnya districts, Alexander Kazachkov and Viktor Morozov, the Kremlin said in a statement.
“I think I had no choice. Seven dead people is too high a price for negligence,” Pikalov said, Interfax reported Monday.
Wildfires broke out in the Volgograd region on Thursday, killing seven, injuring eight and destroying about 700 houses before being extinguished the next day. The fires followed weeks of blazes in the summer that ravaged central Russia and gave the federal government a new headache ahead of October regional elections.
The Kremlin sharply criticized regional authorities over the most recent fires, making a U-turn from an earlier policy of not holding local officials responsible and labeling the summer fires as a natural disaster.
The Prosecutor General’s Office has completed an investigation into fire safety violations in the Volgograd region ordered by President Dmitry Medvedev on Saturday and is preparing to file its findings in court, the Kremlin said.
On Sunday, the Investigative Committee’s Volgograd branch opened a criminal case into negligence charges, punishable by up to seven years in prison. But no officials were charged as of Monday.
Volgograd Governor Anatoly Brovko criticized the three outgoing officials Monday as “directly responsible for the situation” with the wildfires, Interfax reported.
Alexei Titkov, an analyst with the Institute of Regional Politics, said the resignations were unavoidable after Medvedev’s pointed criticism.
“It’s a chance to show that the federal authorities are keeping an eye on the situation,” Titkov said by telephone.
“But the Volgograd resignations are unlikely to affect other regions because the fires are decreasing due to weather changes,” he added.
New fires also broke out late last week in the Saratov and Samara regions. The Emergency Situations Ministry said Monday that the number of fires nationwide had increased seven times over the past 24 hours, from 70 to 501 hectares.
The only other official who has stepped down amid the wildfires is Alexei Sokolov, head of the Nizhny Novgorod region’s Vyksa district, where fires killed 22 people and destroyed 660 houses last month.
Sokolov first quit in August, but local lawmakers refused to accept his resignation. He refiled his resignation Friday, Interfax said, adding that his decision was only made public Monday.
TITLE: Jailed Mother Free Until 2022
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Yulia Kruglova, a pregnant mother of four young children, was released Friday after the Samara Regional Court postponed her prison sentence on embezzlement charges until 2022 — when her youngest daughter will turn 14.
Kruglova, 36, who is due to have a Caesarean section to deliver her fifth child Sept. 20, burst into tears on the doorsteps of the prison hospital where she had been jailed, thanking her supporters and promising to fight to clear her name, Interfax reported.
Kruglova was sentenced in July to three years in prison on charges of embezzling 16 million rubles ($522,000) from the Tolyatti branch of insurer Oranta, now owned by a Dutch-based company. She pleaded not guilty.
The ruling ignored a legal provision that allows the postponement of prison sentences for parents of underage children.
Kruglova’s jailing sparked a public outcry and a campaign to free her, spearheaded by former Yukos lawyer and mother of three Svetlana Bakhmina, who herself was denied leniency in a similar situation during a politically tainted trial in 2006.
Kruglova was also backed by children’s ombudsman Pavel Astakhov and the Public Chamber. Even the prosecution appealed the July ruling, asking for leniency.
Astakhov praised Friday’s decision to postpone the sentence and said 467 women were granted leniency in similar situations last year, Interfax reported.
The leniency provision triggered a heated debate in August after it was applied to the daughter of an Irkutsk official who had her sentence for killing a pedestrian and seriously injuring another in a road accident postponed by 14 years.
Bakhmina said she was glad that Kruglova’s fifth child would not be born in prison. “Yulia still has a struggle for acquittal ahead of her. The court decided that acquitting her would be too good,” she wrote Friday on her LiveJournal blog. “But for those who understand, the main thing is that the child will be born free, and the older kids will see their mother in an hour.”
TITLE: EU Lawmaker: Russia Better Off Without Putin
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A senior European lawmaker harshly criticized Russia’s human rights record and said the country would be better off without Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
Heidi Hautala, head of the European Parliament parliament’s subcommittee on human rights, told Ekho Moskvy radio on Friday that the living conditions of Russian prisoners amounted to a “catastrophe” and said the legal onslaught against former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky was “politically fabricated.”
Hautala, wrapping up a visit that included a stop by a banned opposition rally near Moscow’s Triumfalnaya Ploshchad on Aug. 31, said she was “shocked” that Putin had made a “direct call” for the police to use violence against peaceful demonstrators who take part in regular unsanctioned rallies at the end of every month with 31 days.
Putin told Kommersant in an interview published last Monday that the police would beat unsanctioned protesters “upside the head with a truncheon.”
At the Aug. 31 rally, Hautala told reporters that “Russia would be better off without Putin,” BBC Russian Service reported Wednesday.
Hautala criticized Khodorkovsky’s ongoing trial, saying she had seen “the prosecutor clearly exercising pressure on a witness to make him testify against Khodorkovsky under the threat of jailing [the witness].”
Khodorkovsky is serving an eight-year sentence on fraud and tax evasion charges and is now on trial on related charges that carry a sentence of up to 22 years. He maintains his innocence.
Prosecutors had no immediate comment about Hautala’s criticism.
Hautala also called prison living conditions “the main catastrophe of human rights” in Russia and said the European Parliament was “closely following” the case of Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who died in detention last November.
The Prosecutor General’s Office said Aug. 11 that more than 90 percent of prisoners in Russian prisons and pretrial detention facilities have health problems.
TITLE: Court Rejects Nashi’s Lawsuit
AUTHOR: By Natalya Krainova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A Moscow court has rejected a defamation lawsuit filed by Nashi against opposition leader Ilya Yashin over his accusations that the pro-Kremlin youth group had made Internet videos targeting opposition politicians and journalists.
The Tverskoi District Court ruled that Yashin, a leader of the Solidarity opposition group, did not need to retract the accusations he made in a March 18 interview with the Vremya Novostei newspaper, Yashin wrote on his blog Friday.
In March, clips suggesting that Yashin, independent political analyst Dmitry Oreshkin and Russian Newsweek editor-in-chief Mikhail Fishman had given bribes to traffic police were posted on Nashi’s web site. Fishman and Yashin said the videos were doctored footage and denied they had paid the bribes.
In Vremya Novostei, Yashin accused “people close to Nashi” of being involved in the production of the videos.
Then in late April, footage showing satirist and radio host Viktor Shenderovich; writer and Other Russia opposition movement leader Eduard Limonov; and Alexander Potkin, leader of the nationalist Movement Against Illegal Migrants, apparently having sex with the same woman made the rounds on the web.
Later that month, Yashin asked the Prosecutor General’s Office, the Investigative Committee and the Interior Ministry to check whether Vladislav Surkov, first deputy head of the presidential administration, or Vasily Yakemenko, chief of the Federal Agency for Youth Affairs, were behind the March and April videos.
Surkov is widely believed to have created Nashi, while Yakemenko was its first leader and remains a patron of the group through his government post.
TITLE: Sapsan Adds Nizhny to Route
AUTHOR: By Olga Razumovskaya
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: NIZHNY NOVGOROD — Russian Railway’s Sapsan train will now run twice daily between Nizhny Novgorod and Moscow, the company said in a statement Monday, adding seats to a route that has become popular since its launch in late July.
The Sapsan — or peregrine falcon in Russian — began traveling between Moscow and St. Petersburg in mid-December, slashing travel times between the country’s two main cities to just under four hours.
On July 30, the state railway monopoly, also known as RZD, added a leg to Nizhny Novgorod, which local officials believe could help Russia’s fifth-largest city restore its historical reputation as a hub of commerce and business.
The morning route will allow Nizhny Novgorod residents to leave at 6:45 and arrive in Moscow at 10:40, with just a brief stop in Vladimir.
The cheapest economy-class ticket from Nizhny Novgorod to Moscow will cost 1,267.40 rubles ($41.44), with the least expensive business-class seats going for roughly three times more, at 3,374 rubles. On Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays the prices are 22 percent to 24 percent higher.
RZD spokesman Dmitry Pertsov estimated that seat occupancy on the full route from St. Petersburg to Nizhny Novgorod has been 70 percent to 75 percent since the launch. The St. Petersburg to Moscow trains are almost always 100 percent full, he said.
“This is the normal occupancy. We make the estimates for the whole Sapsan project,” he said, declining to break the figures down by weekday and weekend.
Sapsan has already stirred up some controversy because some local commuter trains were canceled, prompting some shoe and rock throwing by the locals.
The high-speed train has also killed two people crossing the tracks since its launch, and in late August a man lost a leg to a Sapsan while crossing the tracks in the Leningrad region.
RZD is now running advertisements on state television featuring the slogan, “If you throw a rock at a train, you hit a person,” in an effort to discourage the attacks. The spots do not, however, feature a high-speed train.
The company also appears to be in serious talks about running a route to Kiev, Ukraine’s ambassador to Russia, Volodymyr Yelchenko, said Thursday.
“I met with [RZD president Vladimir] Yakunin last week. He said they want to launch the Sapsan in Kiev,” Yelchenko told St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko, according to comments carried on RZD’s web site.
In June, RZD and Ukrainian Railways agreed to create high-speed routes, although the terms are still under discussion.
But while the Siemens-built train is capable of traveling at 400 kilometers per hour during test drives, its speed does not exceed 160 kilometers per hour on the journey between Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod.
“It’s clean, it’s all neat, everybody’s polite, but the speed … where’s the speed? This, after all, should be a high-speed train!” complained a passenger on a recent trip to Moscow.
TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: Alcoholism, Inflation
MOSCOW (SPT) — Alcoholism and inflation scare Russians much more than terrorism and extremism, according to a new poll.
About 57 percent of Russians are afraid of alcohol and drug addiction, while 55 percent fear inflation, and 50 percent — unemployment, state-run pollster VTsIOM said in an Aug. 14-15 survey released Friday.
Other major worries are corruption (41 percent) and crime (32 percent).
Far less worrisome are terrorism and environmental problems, each of which was identified by 22 percent of respondents.
Only 5 percent of respondents voiced worries of extremism.
The survey quizzed 1,600 people in 140 towns and cities in 42 regions. Its margin of error was 3.4 percentage points.
Cops in Rape Case
MOSCOW (SPT) — A Moscow court has sanctioned the arrest of three suspects, including two former metro police officers, in a rape case Interfax reported Saturday.
Kadyrov Titled
MOSCOW (SPT) — Chechnya’s parliament unanimously approved on Thursday a bill to change the title of the republic’s leader from “president” to “head,” Interfax reported.
The idea was proposed by the incumbent leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, who said in August that there should only be one president in the country. He was referring to President Dmitry Medvedev.
Kadyrov said Thursday that he expects many leaders of North Caucasus republics to follow his lead. But the presidents of Tatarstan and Bashkortostan have not voiced support for the idea.
Club Owner Held
MOSCOW (SPT) — Konstantin Mrykhin, co-owner of Perm’s Khromaya Loshad nightclub, which burned down in December, killing 156, was detained in Spain, Interfax reported Thursday.
The Prosecutor General’s Office is preparing paperwork for the extradition of Mrykhin, who was placed on the federal wanted list in July, the report said.
Mrykhin, who was detained in Barcelona, faces up to 10 years in prison on charges of providing services that caused multiple deaths. Eight more people, including the club’s other co-owners and firefighter officials, have also faced various charges over the December disaster.
Cop Fired Over Plea
MOSCOW (SPT) — A Sverdlovsk region police major who posted a YouTube video accusing her superiors of corruption was fired for a weeklong absence from work, Gazeta.ru reported Thursday.
But the officer, Tatyana Domracheva, said she was set up by superiors who did not inform her that they had transferred her to a new workplace in another department.
In July, Domracheva posted a video appeal to President Dmitry Medvedev saying local police officials were closing cases on false pretexts to improve crime-solving statistics.
Domracheva has accused her superiors of various violations since 2008. No police officials have been charged in connection with her complaints, but prosecutors have confirmed some of the information she provided, Gazeta.ru reported.
Officer Blown UP
MOSCOW (SPT) — A Federal Security Service lieutenant colonel, Akhmed Abdullayev, died when his car exploded in Dagestan on Thursday, Interfax reported.
Two unidentified men were spotted fleeing the scene in Dagestan’s Tsumadinsky district, and a police officer who tried to pursue them was seriously wounded when the assailants opened fire, the report said.
Lawmaker Pelted
MOSCOW (SPT) — An Astrakhan resident threw a bag of feces at Oleg Shein, a State Duma deputy with the Just Russia party, on Thursday, Interfax reported, citing local police.
The assailant, who was not identified, was detained by police and faces a fine of up to 1,000 rubles ($32) or 15 days of arrest over petty hooliganism charges. It was not immediately clear what prompted the assault.
Glonass Launch
MOSCOW (SPT) — Three Glonass navigation satellites were successfully launched into orbit from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Thursday, Interfax reported, citing a Space Forces spokesman.
The new satellites will begin operations in October, said Nikolai Testoyedov, head of the company that develops the Glonass equipment, Interfax reported.
The Glonass system, which now has 26 satellites, including two reserve ones, will be completed after the last satellite launch in November, Testoyedov said. Glonass is a rival to the U.S. GPS system.
Zebra Horses
MOSCOW (SPT) — Moscow traffic police painted a number of horses and ponies as zebras and take them across five of the city’s busiest crosswalks Friday, Interfax reported.
The event, a play on crosswalks’ international nickname, “Zebra,” was supposed to draw attention to public safety during the new school season, which started Sept. 1, traffic police said.
Police did not specify the number of painted horses and ponies that it will place on the streets but said the paint would not endanger the animals’ health. Children will get a chance to ride the painted ungulates, but not on crosswalks, it added.
The horses will be dispatched to crosswalks on Smolenskaya Ploshchad, Bolshaya Pirogovskaya Ulitsa, Novocheryomushkinskaya Ulitsa, Komsomolsky Prospekt and Universitetsky Prospekt.
$1M Car in Chechnya
MOSCOW (SPT) — Chechen traffic police found a $1 million Rolls-Royce that was stolen in Moscow in 2007 and returned it to its rightful owner, the Chechen Interior Ministry said Thursday.
The Rolls-Royce Phantom sedan was placed on a federal stolen-car list, and its owner, a Moscow businessman whose name was withheld, hired private investigators to find it, the ministry said in a statement.
The car was found by Grozny police who stopped it for a routine document check, the ministry said, without elaborating whether the Rolls-Royce’s new owner faced any penalties.
Church Bans Media
MOSCOW (SPT) — Media outlets not approved by the Russian Orthodox Church will not be allowed into its distribution system starting next September, the Moscow Patriarchate said Thursday.
Media interested in distribution via the church-owned newspaper stands should apply for authorization with the church’s Synodal information department, it said on its web site.
To be authorized, a media outlet must “not corrupt the Orthodox Christian creed, not contradict the church’s official stance, and provide no inaccurate and ethically unacceptable information,” the statement said.
TITLE: Rights Veteran Quits Rallies
AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Human rights veteran Lyudmila Alexeyeva said Thursday that she would stop attending opposition rallies because of her age and poor health, as Washington criticized a police crackdown on a rally near Moscow’s Triumfalnaya Ploshchad last week.
“I’ve had my share of going to rallies in my life. After the last event on Triumfalnaya Ploshchad, I understood that I am physically incapable of doing it,” said Alexeyeva, 83.
“I had to leave the car too far [from the site], and the walk is too long,” she said, Interfax reported.
Alexeyeva was referring to last Tuesday’s rally on Triumfalnaya Ploshchad, the latest in the opposition’s attempts to stage rallies on the 31st of each month to draw attention to Article 31 of the Constitution, which grants freedom of assembly. The events are regularly banned by authorities and broken up by police.
The rallies, held since 2009, are organized by Alexeyeva together with writer turned politician Eduard Limonov and Left Front activist Konstantin Kosyakin.
Ilya Yashin, a senior member of the Solidarity political movement, praised Alexeyeva as a symbol of the Triumfalnaya Ploshchad protests and called her “more of a man” than many opposition leaders.
“This woman has turned out to be more of a man than many well-known opposition leaders, who have shown themselves to be babblers,” Yashin told The St. Petersburg Times.
He said he respected her decision.
Alexeyeva, a slight, frail Soviet-era dissident, was detained by police at a Dec. 31 rally on the square, sparking international condemnation. She was not touched at last Tuesday’s rally.
TITLE: Mitvol Asks Nashi To Vacate Office
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Senior Moscow official Oleg Mitvol has asked the pro-Kremlin Nashi youth group to vacate its headquarters in a building meant to house a kindergarten, in what analysts called a sign that Nashi was losing its clout.
Mitvol, prefect for Moscow’s Northern District, petitioned Deputy Moscow Mayor Lyudmila Shvetsova to give the former kindergarten on 1st Ulitsa Yamskogo Polya near the Belorusskaya metro station back to children.
The building and its surrounding territory have been rented by the Irmos scientific and educational institution since 2000 but in fact is occupied by Nashi, Mitvol wrote in his letter to Shvetsova, Interfax reported.
He said 92 young children are waiting for slots in kindergartens in northern Moscow, and a plan by his office to restore the building would provide places for at least 80 of them.
Nashi said it had already made plans to vacate the premises, which it has used for four years, in response to an order from Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for former kindergartens to be reopened to deal with a national shortage.
Nashi accused Mitvol of staging a publicity stunt by writing the letter. “Even though Mitvol knew about Nashi’s plans to move out, he couldn’t miss an opportunity to do some publicity,” the group said in a statement Thursday.
Mitvol, an outspoken former federal environmental inspector, has been known to enjoy the media spotlight.
TITLE: Berlin’s New Airport Aims to Boost Russian Links
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: In the evening on July 2, 2012, Berlin’s two airports, Tegel and Schoenefeld, will simultaneously close, marking the start of a swift “Two Become One” operation that will see the opening of what aims to be one of Europe’s busiest transport hubs. Over the course of the following night, all portable and mobile equipment and machinery will be transferred to the new facility – the Berlin Brandenburg International Airport – at a dramatic pace. The first scheduled flight is supposed to take off in the morning of July 3.
Work on BBI — Europe’s largest airport construction site — started back in 2006, with a stated goal of putting the facility in the top 10 of Europe’s busiest airports.
The project will involve 2.5 billion euros of capital investment, with an additional 600 million euros provided by the German government for the construction of a train terminal, and a further 70 million euros for the construction of additional roads leading to the airport.
Airport Berlin Brandenburg International BBI will cover a vast area of 1,470 hectares, which is the equivalent of 2,000 football fields. “In a sense, BBI will be a like a small town,” said Leif Erichsen, a spokesman for Berlin Airports.
BBI shareholders include Federal Republic of Germany (26% of shares), the State of Berlin (37% of shares) and State of Brandenburg (37% of shares.)
Private investors are expected to build a string of hotels, a business park and an extensive shopping area around the terminal.
In 2009, nearly 21 million travelers used Berlin airports. According to current business forecasts, the new terminal will have an initial capacity to receive 27 million passengers per year, which is expected to increase up to 45 million passengers, thus making the hub Germany’s second-largest airport, after Frankfurt.
“We don’t expect to ‘steal’ any transfer flights from Frankfurt; instead, we expect to serve the new routes,” Erichsen said.
The company’s hopes are largely connected with the expansion of the Air Berlin airline. With an annual turnover of 33 million passengers, Air Berlin is currently Europe’s fifth biggest carrier, after Lufthansa, Air France/KLM, Ryanair and Easyjet. At present it is responsible for 30 percent of the numbers of flights going through Berlin airports.
“The opening of the new airport will see a shift in the structure of Germany’s airport system from the current two-pillar system to three pillar,” explains Dr Rainer Schwarz, chief executive officer of Berlin Airports. Frankfurt is currently Germany’s biggest airport, with 50 million passengers per year, followed by Munich airport, which caters for 32 million passengers annually.
Designed by the cult German architect Meinhard von Gerkan of the internationally respected GMP Architects, the new terminal building is meant to reflect the spirit of the city of Berlin and raise visual associations with the city’s famous New National Gallery, nicknamed “a temple of light and glass” by its many admirers.
Designed by Mies van der Rohe, the gallery houses a collection of 20th century European paintings and sculptures, including works by Munch, Kirchner, Picasso, Klee, and Kokoschka.
Remarkably, the Tegel airport was one of von Gerkan’s student works that originally gained him professional recognition. Some of the architect’s most successful projects include designs for the New Weimar Hall, the Berlin Main Station, the National Conference Center in Hanoi and Olympic stadiums in Berlin and Kiev.
The architect is currently busy implementing a series of important projects in China, including, Lingang Harbour City, the National Museum in Beijing and the Opera House in Chongquing.
Many Berliners say they regret the closing of Tegel. “This airport is very special; we love its octagonal shape and that particular cosy feel,” said Kurt, a private driver in his 50s, who makes regular trips to the airport to meet his clients. “Somehow, Tegel is never a hassle, unlike most airports, and is actually very homey.”
The airport’s major weakness — Tegel’s facilities can’t cater for a serious flow of international transfer flights — leaves no space for sentimentality.
The fate of the Tegel terminal building, which belongs to the state, has not yet been decided. One of the most likely options is that the venue be used as an exhibition space for new technological products.
Russians are expected to account for a substantial proportion of passengers traveling via BBI.
At present, Russia is already Air Berlin’s third-largest market: eighteen percent of international flights to and from Russia are operated by Air Berlin, making the airline the third most important international carrier in the country. Its ambitious expansion plans are hampered by traffic rights issues, said Joachim Hunold, Air Berlin’s general manager, at a presentation in Berlin on Aug.17th.
In the near future, Air Berlin will launch services to Kazan, Samara and Ufa. The company’s managers admit Air Berlin has its eyes on the Russian market, and would like to expand its already sizeable dealings with Russia.
“Technically speaking, there are only 10 destinations in Russia where we can fly, being a German airline,” said Gunther Seibt, head for Air Berlin Russia. “For example, we would really like to fly to Omsk but at present, owing to traffic rights restrictions, it is impossible.”
Located within 20 kilometers of Berlin, the airport will be within easy reach of the city. It is expected that at least 50 percent of passengers will be arriving at the terminal on public transport. A special high-speed shuttle train departing from Berlin’s main station every 15 minutes will connect the airport with the city center.
Links: www.berlin-airport.de,
www.airberlin.com
TITLE: Military Festival Takes Over Red Square
AUTHOR: By Mikael Bernstein
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The sound of soldiers marching on Red Square in Moscow could be heard all weekend as the Spasskaya Tower International Military Music Festival started up in force.
The military tattoo, which will see performances every night through Thursday, offers a combination of military, classical, folk and popular music, as well as military band parades and dance shows.
More than 1,000 military musicians and artists, invited from nine countries — Russia, Germany, Israel, Kazakhstan, the United States, France, Bahrain, Ukraine and Tajikistan — are participating in the event, in front of a daily audience of more than 7,000 people. The total amount of spectators over the course of the festival’s duration is expected to approach 35,000.
One of the most awaited visitors is from the United States.
“For the second time in world history, U.S. forces are marching on Red Square,” festival spokesman Lev Agronov said. “The first time was on May 9, Victory Day. The U.S. was an ally during the Second World War, but people have forgotten this fact, so this will be a great reminder. The U.S. is now marching as descendants of our allies.”
“This event definitely has political significance in terms of U.S.-Russian relations,” said the U.S. band and chorus commander, Lieutenant Colonel Beth Steele. “I think it is a great opportunity for us to show our emerging and growing partnership.”
Organizers also see the event as partly propaganda for the foreign audience.
“One of the main purposes of this event is that we Russians want to establish a memorable tradition. So many countries have traditions like this, and we want to follow them,” Agronov said. “Also, the festival is a great way to fight the foreign demonization of Russia. People abroad don’t see beyond our leaders, and we want to show them that we are people with great culture.”
Red Square’s first international military parade took place only in 2007, but the following year, because of the war in Georgia, the show was canceled. The festival returned last year, renamed as the Spasskaya Tower festival.
One of the highlights is Bahrain’s participation. The Kingdom of Bahrain Police Band, founded in 1929, adds a unique element to the tattoo with its traditional Arabic instruments and music.
“Generally, our band plays many kinds of music. But for this particular show, and for the first time in history, this type of Gulf-Arab music will be played by a military band,” said brigadier Mubarak H. Al Najem. “We will be playing three different types of Arabic drums, as well as our traditional instruments — the oud and the kanun.”
The oud is a pear-shaped stringed instrument, while the kanun is a multi-stringed instrument similar to a zither.
The EU band — The Crossed Swords Pipes & Drums — representing a continental pool of talent, is also performing, as is France’s North West Region Army Band from Brittany. The latter, which preserves its military musical heritage to emphasize its Celtic roots, is the only French marching group that uses bagpipes.
So far the festival has gone according to plan and without major problems. However, weather conditions remain a constant point of concern among organizers.
“During rehearsals, we realized that it will be very cold for the musicians to perform,” Deputy Mayor Lyudmila Shevtsova said. “The weather is the way it is, but at least it’s not 40 degrees [Celsius] any longer!”
The shows start at 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday on Red Square. Tel. 917-8507, http://kremlin-military-tattoo.ru.
TITLE: Backing The Best Of British
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The warming properties of aged whiskies and fine English tea were perhaps even more appreciated than their famed tastes on Thursday, when the British Consulate-General in St. Petersburg hosted a garden party promoting fashionable British brands.
When the event started at 6 p.m under pouring rain and in a piercing wind, some guests shook their heads sceptically looking at a rapidly deteriorating red carpet that had been prepared for a Vivienne Westwood fashion show.
Yet, just over an hour later, the models, clinging gamely to their sponsored umbrellas, paraded courageously in the harsh conditions, undeterred.
A lively band playing British music in the style of The Beatles from a covered stage in the garden demonstrated both drive and resilience, as the tent’s flimsy walls flipped under the gusts of wind.
As the event’s hospitable host, William Elliott, Consul-General of the UK in St. Petersburg put it, “Made in Britain’ started our autumn season of UKTI activity with bang.
More than 400 guests representing local business, cultural and fashion circles attended the event, which featured internationally established British brands such as Mini, Jaguar, Land Rover, Paul Smith, Wedgewood, Fred Perry, Twinings, Grants’ Whiskies, Greenall’s Gin and RoccoForte Collection hotels.
The guests were treated to Pimms, British beer, malt wiskies, freshly-made scones with fresh cream, strawberries and orange marmalade, a gigantic chocolate cake and an equally sizeable mille-feuille. The more energetic guests enjoyed a table-tennis tournament and lined up for test-drives in a Mini painted in jolly prints, a Jaguar and a Land Rover.
“The British brand is very strong in Russia,” Elliott said.” For Russians, UK products are synonymous with quality and tradition, but also with individuality and innovative design. This event, which was 100-percent funded by sponsorship, was a chance to pull together a group of business leaders and opinion formers and highlight some great British products.”
Elliott said the event provided a precious opportunity to get across some wider messages about “the strength and resilience of the UK economy,” both to those present and to a wider audience through media coverage.
TITLE: Putin Extends Grain Embargo
AUTHOR: By Irina Filatova and Anatoly Medetsky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Thursday abruptly extended the grain export ban by at least several months from the end of this year because farmers and wholesalers sent grain prices up by holding the latest harvest.
Putin’s decision, made at a regular session of the Presidium, the downsized Cabinet, threatens to further undermine Russia’s hard-won status as the world’s third-largest grain exporter. But Putin appeared intent on stabilizing the domestic grain market, still reeling from the worst drought in decades despite an export embargo from Aug. 15.
“We are seeing that grain is being held in anticipation of the next steps,” Putin said, adding that the government would not consider removing the export ban until after the collection of next year’s harvest. “We can’t allow any back and forth here.”
Farmers normally end harvesting late grain crops in October, meaning that the export ban might be in place until next fall.
Putin said the measure was an effort to remove “unnecessary nervousness” and prompt grain business players to “target the demands of the domestic market.”
No government officials had previously signaled that there might be such a long wait to lift the export ban. Putin’s statement, however, is hardly a surprise for the global market because it anticipated the decision on the news of the poor grain harvest in Russia, said Andrei Sizov Jr., managing director at SovEcon, a market research agency.
Wheat futures were trading up 1.2 percent in Chicago.
Despite October being the time when harvesting comes to a close, Putin might have meant that the ban would be lifted before that, Sizov said.
“I think he might have been talking about the middle of next year when harvesting starts and it’s already clear what the new crops will look like,” he said by telephone.
Some suppliers may indeed be holding their grain because they are counting on higher prices in the future, but some farmers have gradually resumed deliveries since the export ban came into effect Aug. 15, Sizov said. Grain prices may, however, grow significantly by next summer as reserves deplete, he said.
Prices for some sorts of grain, including milling wheat, have decreased over the past two weeks, while prices for feed grain have soared, he added.
Putin’s warning was so abrupt that the Agriculture Ministry conceded Thursday that it had been unaware of any extension for the export ban.
TITLE: Rosneft Replaces Longterm President
AUTHOR: By Olga Razumovskaya
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Rosneft’s board has approved first deputy chief Eduard Khudainatov as its new president, the company said Sunday, ending Sergei Bogdanchikov’s 12 years at the helm and tightening chairman Igor Sechin’s control over Russia’s largest oil producer.
During his tenure, Bogdanchikov turned Rosneft into the industry leader — in large part through the acquisition of assets from the now-bankrupt Yukos. But the CEO had a cool relationship with Sechin, the influential deputy prime minister who oversees industry in the government.
Khudainatov, a relatively little-known Rosneft vice president since 2008 and former head of a major Gazprom production unit, is not expected to change much at Rosneft, where Sechin has been gradually installing loyal managers.
“I’m confident that Eduard Khudainatov has the experience and insights to lead the management team as Rosneft enters its next stage of development,” Sechin said in a statement announcing the decision.
President Dmitry Medvedev met Khudainatov at his residence near Moscow on Saturday and officially proposed his candidacy, Kremlin spokeswoman Natalya Timakova told reporters.
The oil industry had speculated for years that Bogdanchikov could be on his way out, but the rumors intensified after Vedomosti reported Wednesday that his ouster was imminent.
“Last week there was an article in one of the papers that said I would replace [Energy Minister Sergei] Shmatko and that someone else would take my place,” Bogdanchikov said Wednesday, without specifying the publication.
“As you can see, I am here and not planning on going anywhere and these rumors are absolutely false,” he told reporters. “I’m a shareholder, the president and besides — I’m a board member. I am so attached to [Rosneft],” he said.
Bogdanchikov’s contract was not extended at the June 18 annual shareholders meeting, even though it was set to expire June 29. Sechin said at the time that “no replacement candidates were being considered.”
Rosneft itself added fuel to the fire Friday, releasing a message from “acting president” Khudainatov to congratulate workers with the national oil and gas industry holiday, celebrated on the first Sunday of September.
The company later denied that Bogdanchikov was being replaced and posted a press release changing Khudainatov’s title back to first deputy president, noting that he was filling in as chief while Bogdanchikov was on a business trip.
Several other names had been floated as possible replacements, including Deputy Energy Minister Sergei Kudryashov and former Rosneft vice president Alexander Ryazanov. But analysts called Khudainatov a logical choice, despite his low profile among investors.
The 49-year-old joined Rosneft in September 2008 as head of capital construction and was promoted to first vice president in January 2009.
Khudainatov held several oil posts in the 1990s and served as a regional inspector for the presidential administration from 2000 to 2003. He then took over as chief of Gazprom’s Severneftegazprom unit, based in the Tyumen region, where he remained until joining Rosneft.
“Khudainatov is untainted. He has never participated in any business alliances and has industry-specific expertise. He has proven to be prompt and receptive to instructions,” a source close to Rosneft told The Moscow Times.
“There are people who are easy to work with and who will quickly get things done, and there are people with whom it is difficult to get along,” the source said. “That’s not to say that Bogdanchikov wasn’t effective. He’s a top-notch professional. But with Khudainatov things will run [more] smoothly.”
Analysts agreed that investors would not be overly concerned by the management change, particularly given Sechin’s influence.
“As someone uninvolved in any Kremlin clans, Khudainatov is a good choice. Khudainatov, the technocrat, will do as he is told,” Konstantin Simonov, head of the National Energy Security Fund, a think tank, told The Moscow Times.
“Truth be told, nothing has changed in the company. Sechin is in control, so the market has nothing to worry about,” Simonov said. “Khudainatov may be a dark horse, but we’ll have to wait and see whether he’ll be a winner.”
But the unfamiliar face could nonetheless take a toll on Rosneft’s shares when markets reopen, said Shirvani Abdullayev, an independent oil and gas analyst.
“The reaction will probably be negative, come Monday, since very little is known about [Khudainatov],” Abdullayev said.
“It’ll be followed by a quiet period when investors will be cautious and looking out for his first move, the first thing he does or says during a press conference,” he said.
It was not immediately clear whether Bogdanchikov, 53, would retain his seat on Rosneft’s board. He owns 0.0012 percent in Rosneft, Interfax reported Wednesday.
Rosneft had a market capitalization of $69.5 billion at the close of trade in London, valuing Bogdanchikov’s stake at $83.4 million.
The outgoing CEO could find a state job or move on to another company in the Russian oil industry, analysts said.
“Bogdanchikov’s employment is his headache now. Do you think anybody will be running around looking to find him a job?” Simonov said, calling rumors that Bogdanchikov could take over the Energy Ministry “absurd.”
The position reports directly to Sechin.
Independent gas producer Novatek, in which Gennady Timchenko and Leonid Mikhelson own large stakes, is “a plausible option,” Simonov said. The company hired Bogdanchikov’s son, Alexei, as head of business development after he left Rosneft in January.
International oil and gas companies would be unlikely to tap Bogdanchikov for a management role, since his experience in Rosneft would be of little use in another corporate environment, Simonov added.
Abdullayev suggested that a new industry job in Russia could also be tough, since the top spots at other oil and gas companies do not appear to be up for grabs.
“He can work for the state, but the big companies are taken,” he said.
TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: Pilgrim’s Pride
MOSCOW (SPT) — JBS said its Pilgrim’s Pride subsidiary will resume poultry exports to Russia starting Saturday, Bloomberg.
Four of the company’s U.S. plants were approved for export to Russia, JBS said in a regulatory filing. The plants are located in Boaz, Alabama; Russellville, Alabama; Athens, Georgia; and Dallas, Texas._
TNK Eyes BP Algeria
MOSCOW (SPT) — TNK-BP Holding may be interested in acquiring BP assets in Algeria, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday, citing sources familiar with the matter, Bloomberg.
Discussions are at an early stage, and a deal is not imminent, the Journal reported. BP is also considering selling assets in Vietnam and Venezuela. If assets in all three countries are sold, it could net BP as much as $5 billion. Both companies declined to comment, the Journal reported.
OMV Shutdown
MOSCOW (SPT) — OMV, Central Europe’s biggest oil company, ended exploration in Russia, one of its partners said Friday, Bloomberg reported.
OMV is selling stakes in oil field licenses to its minority partner, Mineral & Bio Fuels. OMV sold its almost 75 percent stake in Ring Oil Holding & Trading, which has 10 licenses in the Saratov and Komi regions, and CorSarNeft, the operator, to Mineral & Bio Fuels, based in Malta.
Polymetal Shares
MOSCOW (SPT) — Polymetal, the largest silver producer in Russia, may distribute as much as $386 million in shares to managers and other employees in 2013, UralSib said Friday, Bloomberg reported.
The miner said Thursday that it would reward 70 senior employees by giving them as much as 7.5 percent of the stock in September 2013, depending on share performance.
Turkish Gas Grid
MOSCOW (SPT) — Gazprom is in talks with Turkey’s Aksa Gaz Dagitim and Calik Enerji about a partnership with either of them to buy assets of Igdas, Istanbul’s gas grid company, Referans reported Friday, without citing a source, Bloomberg reported.
Gazprom is also interested in linking up with Calik Enerji on building a natural gas storage facility under a salt lake in central Turkey, the newspaper said.
Dixy in the Black
MOSCOW (SPT) — Dixy Group swung to profit in the first half of the year, as the economy recovered from the steepest contraction on record, the food retailer said Friday, Bloomberg reported.
Net income was 74.8 million rubles ($2.4 million) versus a loss of 99.1 million rubles in the same period last year, Dixy said. Sales advanced 15 percent to 30.8 billion rubles.
Canadian Reserves
MOSCOW (SPT) — The Central Bank may begin investing its reserves in Canadian dollars in “several weeks,” First Deputy Chairman Alexei Ulyukayev said in an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda, Bloomberg reported.
TITLE: Mortgage Market Recovers
AUTHOR: By Natalya Samarina
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: MOSCOW — Russians are once again turning to mortgages to purchase homes, borrowing an impressive 155.3 billion rubles ($5.04 billion) in the first half of 2010 — the vast majority of it in the national currency.
According to data from the Central Bank, 142,848 mortgages were given out in the first six months of the year, of which 140,848 were in rubles. Just 1,724 mortgages in foreign currencies were taken out over the period, the regulator said.
Much of the lending took place in the last few months, however. According to Central Bank figures, as of Feb. 1, banks had offered just 9,566 mortgages worth a combined 9.85 billion rubles.
Mortgage lending volumes are doubling every month, said Anatoly Aksakov, head of the Russian Regional Banks Association, Prime-Tass reported. He said the effect was a result of the low base level after mortgage lending collapsed in 2009.
The positive trends for banks have allowed the state-run Mortgage Lending Agency, or AIZhK, to increase its forecast for the amount of property-secured loans this year to between 320 billion rubles and 360 billion rubles.
TITLE: Corruption Drive Seen in Media, Not Courts
AUTHOR: By Anastasia Kornya and Natalya Kostenko
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: MOSCOW — Analysts at the Justice Ministry have reviewed official statistics and concluded that there has been no improvement in the battle against corruption. The actual number of corrupt officials exposed and punished has not increased over the last three years, though the topic is much more frequently in the news.
Judging from media reporting on the subject, the battle against corruption is being waged effectively. Reports about such crimes have become far more frequent in the past year, according to data from Medialogia.
From January 2008 through fall 2009, about 100 instances of corruption being “exposed” were reported daily, according to the company’s analysis of more than 4,500 media sources. Last fall, the number of such reports peaked at 224 per day and then leveled off at an average of 125 daily.
The real situation remains unchanged, however, according to the Justice Ministry’s corruption research institute, which analyzed police and judicial data.
Researchers compared data from 2007 to 2009 from the Interior Ministry and the Supreme Court’s legal department about the leading corruption crimes: abuse of power (Article 201 of the Criminal Code), commercial bribery (Article 204), abuse of authority (Article 285), illegal participation in entrepreneurial activity (Article 289), receiving bribes and taking bribes (Articles 290 and 291, respectively).
A total of 21,842 such crimes were registered in 2007, of which 6,185 made it to court. Of those that went to court, 675 people were sent to prison, 3,650 received suspended sentences, and 1,744 were fined.
Last year, the figures were largely unchanged, with 23,518 corruption crimes registered, or 7.6 percent more than 2007. Of those, 6,691 went to trial, 903 people were imprisoned, 3,694 received suspended sentences, and 1,926 were fined.
It turns out that on average, only one in 25 of the total cases resulted in someone spending time behind bars. Looking at the numbers for those cases that actually went to trial, one in eight of those accused went to prison.
In 2007, verdicts of a suspended sentence or a fine were handed down to 86.9 percent of the accused, while in 2009 the figure was 85.2 percent, according to the authors of the research. Furthermore, the maximum possible sentence of three to five years incarceration for abuse of power was not used at all in the last two years; the maximum punishment for bribe taking — from five to eight years in prison — was only used four times in 2009.
The research suggests that there have been no real gains in the battle against corruption.
“The possible consequences are not a serious deterrent,” the researchers wrote in the report.
Positive trends are noticeable only in the area of minor corruption, said Viktor Astanin, the research institute’s deputy head. There was a 10 percent increase in those crimes being registered last year, he said.
The Interior Ministry and the Supreme Court declined to comment.
The materials required further study, an Interior Ministry spokesperson said.
“We have to understand to what extent the statistics used in the study were correctly interpreted,” said Pavel Odintsov, press secretary of the Supreme Court.
An official close to the presidential administration said this was the first time such research had been conducted.
Under its obligations to the Council of Europe’s anti-corruption committee, Russia is supposed to create a continuous monitoring system for corruption statistics, the official added.
Current statistics do not take into consideration a number of criteria, so a clear picture of the situation is impossible to obtain, and adequate responses are not being made, he conceded.
A poll taken of 1,000 employees of the Interior Ministry, Prosecutor General’s Office, Investigative Committee, Justice Ministry and other government officials in 80 regions revealed that only 27.3 percent trusted information about corruption that they receive from law enforcement agencies and prosecutors. They say the statistical data is “tweaked and falsified.”
The battle against corruption in a systematically corrupt country is a political question, and not one for law enforcement or the courts, said Yelena Panfilova, head of Transparency International in Russia. It’s pointless to blame statistics — they only give an indication of the effectiveness of law enforcement and the courts, not corruption itself, she said.
TITLE: Evraz Sees Weaker Q3 Result, Despite Developing Demand
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Evraz Group expects that core profit will have slipped in the third quarter, despite improving Russian demand, because of volatile prices and concerns about a sustainable economic recovery, the company said Thursday, Bloomberg reported.
The weaker profit outlook and a wider-than-expected first-half net loss drove the company’s London-listed stock down 1.9 percent to $26.75, while the market finished up 0.1 percent.
Evraz — which also has operations in the United States, Canada, Italy, Ukraine, Czech Republic and South Africa — said its three Russian mills were running at full capacity, and its foreign plants had boosted capacity use.
Major Russian steelmakers increased output in the second quarter in the hopes that the trend of weaker prices in the early summer months would turn around in the fall.
In May, Evraz forecast a sharp rise in second-quarter earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization to $725 million to $825 million, after $424 million in the first quarter.
First-half EBITDA was $1.15 billion, suggesting that the second-quarter figure was at the lower end of the range. The company cautioned, however, that core earnings would decline in the third quarter to the $480 million to $550 million range.
Evraz recorded a net loss of $270 million in the first half, which it blamed on depreciation-related one-off items.
CEO Alexander Frolov told a conference call that there would be no dividend for the year.
Interest expense on the company’s $7.2 billion in net debt was the biggest loss maker, Renaissance Capital said in a note.
“In our view, Evraz could not avoid losses at the net profit line, taking into account the downturn in steel prices in May-June,” Renaissance said.
The company must repay $1.1 billion in the next 12 months, chief financial officer Giacomo Baizini told a conference call. It will refinance the full amount, though the company has $700 million in cash, he added.
“We don’t really see profit or returning to profit as one of our major targets,” Baizini said in an interview to Reuters.
Evraz instead focused on healthy volumes, especially in Russia, where an acceleration of government-funded construction projects in particular boosted demand by 30 percent from the first half of 2009.
Key projects included infrastructure development in preparation for the 2012 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in the Far East and the 2014 Sochi Olympics, Frolov said.
“There is potential for continued growth because, in volume terms, the pre-crisis level has not been reached. There is another 15-20 percent to go,” Frolov told the conference call.
Analysts said that might be cold comfort for investors, as the outlook for Russia’s own growth dims.
“The main future driver of Evraz’s equity story should be the recovery of construction activity in Russia,” Citi analyst Daniel Yakub wrote. “Recovery of the domestic construction market demand back to pre-crisis levels may take some time, unless growth rates accelerate.”
TITLE: Fake Diplomas = Fake Modernization
AUTHOR: By Michael Bohm
TEXT: Three weeks ago, NTV television reported that more than 70 engineers working at a Komsomolsk-on-Amur airplane factory in the Khabarovsk region had obtained fake engineering degrees from a local technical college. The high-security military plant, which belongs to state-owned Sukhoi, assembles the Su-27, Su-30 and Su-35 fighter jets, as well as the much-anticipated Superjet 100 passenger plane. The trade in fake diplomas is nothing new, of course, but the sheer number of employees involved was mind-boggling.
Sukhoi management took a nonchalant attitude toward the scandal and refused to fire the employees, referring to a company rule that employees can be dismissed only for “grave crimes.” (According to the Criminal Code, knowingly purchasing a fake diploma carries a maximum punishment of an 80,000 ruble [$2,600] fine and two years of “correctional labor.”) Sukhoi management also explained that the diplomas were a mere formality since the engineers had been employed at the plant for years and assured that no engineers with fake diplomas had been employed in actual plane production.
This is a classic case of self-deception. Sukhoi pretended that it had “raised worker qualifications” by instantly turning dozens of employees with only a high school education into engineers with college degrees. Until they got caught, everyone seemingly gained from the scheme. The plant reported to Sukhoi headquarters in Moscow that it fulfilled its plan for the number of degree-holding engineers on staff, the workers received a small bonus for their new skill level, and everyone pretended that they were making better airplanes.
The fake-diploma scandal at the Sukhoi plant was also unique in that an investigation was initiated. These schemes almost always go unnoticed — with the exception of show cases like when authorities wanted to discredit then-Archangelsk Mayor Alexander Donskoi in 2006 by exposing that he had purchased his diploma. There are also plenty of ridiculous cases that get public exposure — for example, in October, when a group of counterfeiters tried to sell fake diplomas from Harvard University to Russians for $40,000 each, or when it became known that Marina Petrova, who was awarded the title of “Best Teacher in Russia-2007,” had purchased a false university diploma.
The most popular fake diplomas are legal degrees, followed by medical degrees, Izvestia reported July 20.
Although the problem is rampant, employers rarely check the validity of applicants’ diplomas. The Federal Security Service, Interior Ministry and other government organizations related to security and defense are supposed to check every diploma, but they are quite lackadaisical about this, as the Sukhoi scandal showed. Roughly every third policeman has a fake diploma, Alexander Yudin, former head of the Interior Ministry’s personnel department, said in the Izvestia report.
In the private sector, most Russian companies don’t even bother checking candidates’ diplomas, but the few that do are invariably turned down by universities for the reason that the information is “confidential.” (Interestingly enough, completely different rules are applied to foreigners who apply for Russian work permits. They must present to Russian authorities apostille seals that prove the validity of their foreign diplomas.)
For years, the government has vowed to establish a single database that employers could use to verify diplomas with a single click of the mouse, but there has been little political will to jump-start the project. Even if the database were established, it would be useless against those who pay to have their fake diplomas officially registered at a university with the rector’s approval.
Students who study honestly get the short end of the stick. No matter how conscientiously they study, their diplomas will be inevitably devalued by widespread corruption within the country’s higher education system. Amid this nationwide devaluation, too many people view a university degree as a mere formality, as the Sukhoi case shows.
For those who cringe a bit at buying a diploma outright, there is a more “respectable” way of essentially accomplishing the same thing: paying someone to write your dissertation for a Ph.D. degree or candidate’s degree (something roughly between a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in the West).
The number of postgraduate degrees has skyrocketed since the collapse of the Soviet Union. About 30 percent of the holders purchased their dissertations, said Mikhail Kirpichnikov, head of the Higher Attestation Commission, the government agency that regulates the granting of postgraduate degrees, Newsru.com reported in 2006. In 2008, Oleg Kutafin, former rector of the Moscow State Law Academy, put the figure at 50 percent.
Advanced degrees obtained through purchased dissertations are particularly popular among top managers and the bloated army of mid- and upper-level bureaucrats. They are also popular among mayors, governors and their aides, as well as State Duma deputies, for whom a new academic title is a respectable status symbol that goes nicely with the dacha, Mercedes, driver and flashing blue light.
For this segment, cheap semblance counts as much as substance. During the early 1990s, it was considered prestigious among the elite to buy false certificates showing that they were descendents of Russian nobility. Now it has become prestigious to place the words “Candidate of Sciences” or “Doctor of Sciences” on business cards.
Roughly half of State Duma deputies have postgraduate degrees. The remaining half are actively recruited by enterprising dissertation-writers who try to hawk their services for $25,000 a pop, according to Russian Newsweek.
Among Duma deputies with graduate degrees is Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky. In 1998, at age 52, he received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Moscow State University for a dissertation titled “The Past, Present and Future of the Russian Nation” — remarkably, while serving as a deputy and skipping the candidate level entirely. Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov received his Ph.D. in philosophy in 1995, at age 51, while also serving as a Duma deputy. Among Cabinet ministers, you might be surprised to learn that Sergei Shoigu has a candidate’s degree in economics, which he received in 1996, at age 41, while serving as emergency situations minister.
Questions have been raised about Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s Candidate of Sciences degree, which he received in June 1997 from the St. Petersburg Mining Institute while serving in Moscow as deputy head of the presidential administration under President Boris Yeltsin. In 2006, Clifford Gaddy, a senior fellow at Brookings Institution, compared Putin’s dissertation with a management study published by two University of Pittsburgh professors and found that 16 pages from Putin’s work, including tables, matched word for word or with only slight changes. Putin has never commented on Gaddy’s findings.
Unfortunately, the Kremlin doesn’t seem to care too much about how academic plagiarism has corrupted the education system. During Wednesday’s State Council meeting, President Dmitry Medvedev and Education Minister Andrei Fursenko gave detailed reports on the largest problems in the education system and how they impede the country’s modernization. Remarkably, not a single word was said about fake diplomas or academic plagiarism.
Of course, there are no easy solutions. Academic fraud, like corruption in general, is a systemic problem in Russia. But one good place to start would be to force the country’s top universities at least to adopt an honor code that every student — and faculty member as well — would be required to uphold, or face expulsion.
Today, the real question is how Russia will be able to resolve its most-pressing problems — above all, modernization — with so many fake managers, engineers, economists, doctors, lawyers, bureaucrats and politicians.
Michael Bohm is the opinion page editor of The Moscow Times.
TITLE: Pigs and Dogs Rule Again
AUTHOR: By Alexei Bayer
TEXT: George Orwell’s anti-utopian novel “1984” enjoyed a revival during the presidency of George W. Bush. Even though Orwell’s totalitarian future is now more than a quarter-century out of date, the book read like a collection of newspaper headlines. The current government in Washington also pays homage to “1984.” The recent U.S. withdrawal from Iraq can be described in Orwellian newspeak, “peace is war.”
Orwell’s other masterpiece, “Animal Farm,” is a wickedly funny look at the Bolshevik Revolution and Stalinism. But since communism has collapsed and its hypocrisies and evils have been condemned by most thinking persons inside and outside Russia, there seems little point in revisiting this work.
Not so. Published in 1945, “Animal Farm” satirizes Soviet history through World War II but also takes it far into the future. With extraordinary prescience, it paints a picture of post-Communist Russia that is extremely accurate even for our own times.
The book’s allegorical plot is deceptively simple. Fed up with appalling conditions at Farmer Jones’ Manor Farm, barnyard animals rise up, expel humans and rename the place Animal Farm, setting up an all-beast republic under the leadership of the pigs. Eventually, the animal paradise turns into an oppressive dictatorship.
The parallels are transparent. The pigs, who arrogate a supervisory role, are clearly Communist Party officials. The dogs, who protect the pigs and terrorize other animals, are state security personnel, the siloviki. After the animals repel a bloody invasion by humans, both pigs and dogs grow extremely numerous and fat, while other animals work hard and eat less and less.
But the real clincher comes at the end, when the pigs abandon their animalistic ideology, learn to walk on hind legs and begin to trade with humans, buying luxuries for themselves. They bring back religion and restore the old Manor Farm name — just as the Soviet Union has been renamed the Russian Federation.
Since the establishment of the Bolshevik state, Russia’s history has been the story of the rise of bureaucracy. Freed from the constant threat of purges by Stalin’s death, the Soviet bureaucracy grew increasingly corrupt under the leadership of Leonid Brezhnev, but for a while had to settle for relatively puny bribes and shoddy Soviet goods. In the 1990s, moreover, the bureaucrats were briefly eclipsed by the new class of private-sector oligarchs. Since Vladimir Putin became president in 2000, bureaucrats have rallied as never before. On the wave of mind-boggling corruption and crony deals, they’ve now joined the world’s moneyed elites —precisely as Orwell predicted.
What Orwell failed to foresee is that the pigs’ golden age would dawn when the dogs — the siloviki —took control of Russia.
“Animal Farm” is truly an angry book. It was banned in the Soviet Union. Anyone caught with the novel faced criminal charges. I first came across it in 1972 in a samizdat translation. I had an hour to read a dog-eared carbon copy, my heart pounding the entire time. Fifteen years old at the time, I then had to recount the plot several times to my parents’ friends.
The full text, of course, is now freely available in Russia. The Kremlin clearly has little to worry about. While the Communist leadership feared for their lives — that if millions of Soviets read Orwell’s works, they might rebel — it is not so today. In post-Communist Russia, the dogs and the pigs clearly regard their countrymen as a bunch of sheep.
Alexei Bayer, a native Muscovite, is a New York-based economist.
TITLE: Tallinn: European Capital of Culture 2011
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: TALLINN — On Aug. 20, Edgar Savisaar, the Mayor of Tallinn and once a member of the pro-independence Public Front, proclaimed the city European Capital of Culture 2011, speaking from the open stage on Vabaduse valjak —Freedom Square — in Tallinn.
The date was celebrated as the Day of Restoration of Independence, and LED screens were showing video footage from 1991, with Soviet tanks rolling on the city’s streets in Moscow’s failed attempt to crackdown on the Baltic States, which were seeking independence, and with Estonian politicians appealing directly to the people after re-declaring their country’s independence.
On the right of the stage, was the Freedom Monument – a 23.5-meter glass column with a cross in the shape of the Cross of Liberty, Estonia’s most distinguished award established in 1919. The memorial is dedicated to soldiers and civilians killed in action during the Estonian War of Independence (1918-1920) and was originally planned in 1919, but only built 90 years later, delayed by the subsequent war and Soviet occupation. It was officially unveiled on June 22, 2009.
The square, which was called Victory Square under the Soviets (there were also Soviet plans to destroy the 1867 neo-gothic Jaani kirik (St. John’s Church) to build a giant “arch of victory” in the 1950s) was the site of numerous pro-independence rallies that were held there in the late 1980s and the early 1990s.
As the public gathered for the holiday concert, featuring pop and rock singers and Trumm-It, a youth drum orchestra, many queued to get white and blue balloons — the colors of the striped flag of Tallinn, Estonia’s capital and largest city. The flag itself was raised over the square alongside the blue-black-white national flag of the Estonian Republic.
As Tallinn becomes European Capital of Culture next year, Estonia’s new-found independence will be celebrating its 20th anniversary, providing a great opportunity for even more massive celebrations and events. It will share the title of the European Capital of Culture with Turku, in Finland.
Tallinn already hosts a great number of festivals and cultural events every year, but the organizers, Foundation Tallinn 2011, claim that things will happen on a daily basis in 2011.
Although the grand opening ceremony of the European Capital of Culture, covering the whole city, will be held on December 31, the program opens earlier that month — as one of the first events is the 23rd European Film Academy Awards Gala, the ceremony for which will be hosted this year by Tallinn. The event is run by the European Film Academy, established by some of the most important European filmmakers in Berlin in 1988. The European Film Academy Awards are held in different cities around the continent and in alternate years in Berlin.
The ceremony, scheduled for December 4, will coincide with Tallinn’s own major film event, the Black Nights Film Festival, or POFF (an acronym of its name in Estonian, Pimedate Oode Filmifestival). Founded in 1997, it combines a feature film festival with sub-festivals of animated films, student films and children/youth films.
Held from November 17 to December 5 this year, it was conceived as the last European film event of the year, according to the festival director and member of the European Film Academy Tiina Lokk. There are plans to hold various films events over the course of the whole year.
www.poff.ee
One of the most important music festivals in Tallinn is held amid the imposing ruins of the Pirita Convent, built more than 500 years ago, close to Tallinn Bay, and ravaged by war and fire in the 16th century. Established in 2005, the Birgitta Festival claims to be one of the most innovative music festivals in the Baltic and Nordic region.
The concept of the festival is to present acclaimed new pieces from the world of music theatre: ballet and opera, staged oratorios and other productions based on national history and religion. Highlights of the 2011 festival will include a new, full-length Estonian opera (based on Andrus Kivirahk’s novel “The Man Who Could Speak the Language of Snakes” and composed by Tauno Aints) with guest performances by the Mariinsky Theatre from St. Petersburg.
www.birgitta.ee
The Estonian Music Days, scheduled for various Tallinn concert halls on March 21-27, are devoted to contemporary classical music and composers. The festival has been organized by the Estonian Union of Composers since 1979.
In 2011, the event, the highlights of which will include a premiere of a new piece by Erkki-Sven Tuur, will focus on Tallinn’s neighborhoods, with composers spending time living in different parts of the city and writing pieces inspired by those particular areas.
www.helilooja.ee
The Estonian Youth Song and Dance Celebrations will be held at the Tallinn Song Festival Grounds on July 1-3. About 35,000 young participants are expected, while a far larger nationwide Song and Dance Celebration is due in 2014.
www.laulupidu.ee
Jazz music can be heard at Jazzkaar 2011, one of Tallinn’s most important musical events, which will be headlined by Bobby McFerrin and held at various locations from April 22 through May 1.
www.jazzkaar.ee
Electronic music, technology and art will all be blended at the Plektrum festival run by Jaagup Jalakas and Sten Saluveer. When held last month, its theme was “Would you love a robot?” The theme of the next year’s event will be “What is life?”
Jalakas and Saluveer operate from Von Krahli Teater-Baar, a friendly-looking inexpensive pub that hosts some of the best live concerts in Tallinn. It is located right in the downtown area and is described by www.tallinn-life.com as the “perfect antidote to Tallinn’s yuppie bar scene.”
www.plektrumfestival.ee, www.vonkrahl.ee
August will see the August Dance Festival 2011, one of the most important contemporary dance festivals in Northern Europe, which will be held in Tallinn for the 12th time. The festival art director and main organizer is Priit Raud.
www.saal.ee
One of the main ideas behind the Cultural Capital project is to restore the connection between the city and the sea, lost under the Soviets. Curiously, the official program shows the distance between every site and the sea.
Tallinn Maritime Days, due to be held on July 17-19, is the most important event in the coastal area of Estonia’s capital. Tallinn Maritime Days will take place in the Admiralty Basin and Seaplane Harbor, and there are plans to connect the area to the sea with a promenade titled the “Culture Kilometer” and boat trips between the two harbors. Maritime Days will involve maritime and harbor related programs, concerts, boat trips, water-related events and performances.
www.tallinnamerepaevad.ee
The seashore attractions also include historic ships, such as the 1936 Estonian submarine Lembit, owned by the Estonian Sea Museum, which can be visited for a small fee, and the old prison, which stopped operating as recently as 2004 and has now been turned into a museum and a site for dance and theatrical events.
www.meremuuseum.ee, www.patarei.org
These are only some of the events due take place in Tallinn during its years as the European Culture Capital in 2011.
More useful links: www.tallinn2011.ee
www.tourism.tallinn.ee
www.visitestonia.com
The St. Petersburg Times was a guest of the Foundation Tallinn 2011.
How To Get There
From St. Petersburg, Eurolines (www.luxexpress.eu) and Ecolines (www.ecolines.net) operate bus services to Tallinn, and Estonian Air (www.estonian-air.ee) flies to Tallinn.
Where To Eat
Moon – An increasingly popular cafe opened by award-winning chef Roman Zastserinski on Dec. 1, 2009. The name is pronounced as mo-hon, meaning a “poppy” in Estonian, while the menu is based on the classic Russian cuisine and the chef’s fantasy. Vorgu 3, Tallinn 10415. Tel. + 372 631 4575. www.kohvikmoon.ee
Where To Stay
Meriton Grand Conference & Spa Hotel – A modern hotel, opened last year right opposite the Tall Herman tower. Paldiski maantee 8, Tallinn 10149. Tel. +372 628 8100. www.meritonhotels.com
TITLE: Guatemalan Landslides Leave 38 Dead
AUTHOR: By Rodolfo Zelada
PUBLISHER: Agence France Presse
TEXT: GUATEMALA CITY — Guatemalan rescue teams searched for survivors Monday after landslides caused by heavy rains killed at least 38 people around the country and left nearly two dozen others missing.
President Alvaro Colom declared a “national tragedy” as fears grew the eventual toll from scores of landslides across the country set off by weeks of torrential rain could be far higher.
“It’s a national tragedy,” Colom said as he visited a site where up to 40 people were feared to have been buried alive in a mudslide.
“This weekend alone we have seen damage comparable to what we experienced with Agatha,” he added, referring to a tropical storm in May that killed 165 Guatemalans and left thousands homeless.
Officials said 40,000 people had lost their homes and another 11,686 had been evacuated.
A fresh mudslide in northern Guatemala late Sunday killed one person and injured eight, including two children, bringing the overall death toll to 38, officials said.
“Top priority at present is dealing with this emergency,” Colom said as he toured the devastation and put the cost of the damage, in one of the poorest countries in the Americas, at up to 500 million dollars.
Rescuers on Sunday dug nine bodies out of a 300-meter deep ravine off the main Pan-American Highway, west of the capital Guatemala City.
Fire service spokesman Cecilio Chacaj told AFP some 40 people had been buried in mud there even as they tried to help the occupants of five vehicles and a bus swept into the abyss by a previous landslide.
Ten people were killed in a separate incident on Saturday when a second bus on the main highway was buried near the town of Chimaltenango. Rescuers managed to unearth 20 survivors.
A landslide also buried a family of four inside their house in the western region of Quetzaltenango, while 13 more people were killed in separate incidents around the country.
Heavy rains Sunday afternoon forced rescue work to be suspended until Monday, said David de Leon, a spokesman for the national disaster response effort, adding that the latest figures showed 37 dead and 23 missing, down from 40 missing earlier in the day.
In Nahuala municipality, rescuers in bright orange uniforms used shovels, hoes and their hands to unearth the corpses of victims. Among the dead was Manuel Sohon, whose uncle Manuel Ajtzalam wept as he identified him.
Guatemala’s National Coordination for Disaster Reduction listed almost 200 landslides, wall collapses and mudslides across the country.
Three regions in the country’s south, Escuintla, Retalhuleu and Suchitepequez, were placed on red alert.
With more heavy rain forecast, authorities have closed part of the Pan-American Highway.
“This section of the road has been declared impassable,” Communications, Infrastructure and Housing Minister Guillermo Castillo told reporters. “It will not reopen until we are sure a similar tragedy will not occur again.
Colom also ordered rescue workers to halt operations if heavy rains passed through the area again.
He warned he had little funds left to cope with the disaster as the country was still struggling to recover from the killer storm Agatha in May.
Central America has been lashed by an unusually fierce rainy season this year. The recent bad weather has killed 55 people in Honduras, at least 40 in Nicaragua, nine in El Salvador and three in Costa Rica.
Worryingly, the downpours have come ahead of what is traditionally the worst part of the rainy season, which lasts until October 30.
TITLE: Spain Turns Down Ceasefire Offered by ETA
AUTHOR: By Katell Abiven
PUBLISHER: Agence France Presse
TEXT: MADRID — Spain’s government Monday rejected a ceasefire by Basque fighters ETA as totally inadequate and demanded it renounce guns and bombs forever in its battle for an independent homeland.
The government, opposition, and media reacted in unison with deep scepticism to Sunday’s video declaration of a ceasefire in the ETA campaign, blamed for the deaths of 829 people over 42 years.
Three ETA members in berets and yellow hoods, sitting at a table against the background of ETA’s symbol of a snake curling around an axe, announced the halt to attacks in a video released Sunday.
In the center of the trio, a woman fighter said ETA had decided some months ago to stop offensive violent actions.
But she did not say if the ceasefire was permanent or temporary, provoking scorn among Spanish politicians who recalled that ETA abandoned a “permanent ceasefire” by bombing the car park of Madrid’s airport in December 2006, an attack that killed two people.
“ETA has to renounce violence completely, forever,” said Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba.
The ETA statement failed to meet the demands of the Spanish government and even ETA’s own outlawed political wing Batasuna of “a definitive and unconditional abandonment of armed struggle,” he told Spain’s TVE public television.
“We are not going to change a dot or a comma in our anti-terrorist policy. What we want is for ETA to renounce violence. So long as it does not break with violence it will not be admitted into institutions.”
Batasuna, declared illegal since 2003 because of its ties with ETA, wants to return to politics in time to take part with a new ally in Basque and northern Navarra municipal elections next year.
It vowed in February only to use non-violent means and in past days has called on ETA to do the same.
Rubalcaba said ETA was forced to call a ceasefire as it has been weakened by the arrests of dozens of members, including several of its overall leaders, in recent years and the dismantlement of a major logistical base in Portugal.
“ETA is stopping because it can’t go on any more,” he said.
The Spanish government’s reaction dovetailed with the judgment of the conservative opposition Popular Party which demanded Sunday nothing less than permanent disarmament and ETA’s dissolution.
The Spanish press joined in the condemnation of ETA’s failure to unequivocally renounce violence, saying its fighters were also desperate to buy time and reorganize after a police crackdown.
Listed as a terrorist group by the United States and European Union, ETA has not staged an attack on Spanish soil since August 2009.
Since the start of this year Spanish police working with other forces including in France have arrested 68 suspected ETA members.
“If the separatist organization chose this ambiguous and limited formulation at this moment, it is without a doubt because it needs to gain time, both because of the police pressure it faced as well as because of the political price violence entails,” centre-right daily El Mundo wrote.
The newspaper called ETA’s declaration a “tactical pseudo-ceasefire” and it recalled the outfit took advantage of its two previous ceasefires to “reorganise and rearm”.
Left-wing daily Publico agreed.
“It is possible that these steps could lead further. Hopefully. But for now ETA is trying to save enough time with a statement that gives the bare minimum to allow Batasuna to make new political movements,” the paper said.
ETA killed two police officers in a bombing in Majorca on July 30, 2009, its last deadly attack in Spain.
TITLE: Blind Golfers To Play Pros On Asian Tour
PUBLISHER: Agence France Presse
TEXT: SINGAPORE — Three blind golfers will test their skills this week against Asian Tour professionals during the inaugural Handa Singapore Classic in a drive to encourage more people with disabilities to tee-off.
Australian David Blyth, England’s Neil Baxter and Yam Ting Woo of Malaysia will play a three-hole challenge, each paired with a professional who will be blind-folded.
The initiative is the brainchild of Japanese philanthropist and businessman Haruhisa Handa, whose Tokyo-based company International Sports Promotion Society (ISPS) is the main tournament sponsor.
“It is really important that everyone can enjoy the sport regardless of their age or ability,” he said.
“Blind golfers are an inspiration to me and professional players alike. They understand the course in different ways and it’s amazing to see them strike the ball so well.
“ISPS wants to encourage more juniors, seniors and people with disabilities to get involved with golf.”
TITLE: Suicide Bomber Kills 19 In Pakistan
AUTHOR: By Lehaz Ali
PUBLISHER: Agence France Presse
TEXT: PESHAWAR, Pakistan — At least 19 people were killed and 45 wounded when a suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden car into a police station in northwest Pakistan on Monday, destroying the building, police said.
Nine policemen and four schoolchildren were among those killed by the attack in Lakki Marwat in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, not far from tribal areas that are a stronghold of the Taliban, police said.
At least 110 people have been killed over the past week as militants step up their attacks across the country.
“Nineteen people have died in this suicide attack, the target was the police station,” provincial information minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain told reporters in the regional capital Peshawar.
Four schoolchildren, aged between nine and 10 died in the massive explosion, police said.
“Three schoolboys and a girl also died, they were waiting for their school van,” district police chief Gul Wali Khan said by telephone.
Some 20 policemen were among those wounded by the blast which destroyed the police station and damaged a nearby administrative building.
There were some 45 policemen inside the building when the bomber struck.
The police chief said rescue workers had recovered all those trapped under the rubble after the building collapsed.
Doctor Ghulam Ali, medical superintendent of Lakki Marwat’s main hospital, said by telephone that 17 bodies and 45 wounded had been brought to his hospital, which was also damaged in the blast.
Police said the bomber hit the back of the police station because the front and side walls of the building were heavily protected with sand bags.
Police cordoned off the whole area after the incident and launched a search operation to avert further attacks.
Local TV footage showed the destroyed building and shops and a mosque damaged by the blast.
Hussain warned they were standing on a powderkeg “and if effective action is not taken, it will be a failure of the government.”
“Terrorists are regrouping, they need to be hit hard,” the minister said.
Monday’s attack is not the first to hit Lakki Marwat district.
In January a suicide bomber killed 99 people when he rammed his car into a crowd of men, women and children watching a volleyball tournament in Shah Hasan Khan village.
There has been no claim of responsibility for the latest attack but the Pakistani Taliban has been blamed for similar suicide bombings.
The group Friday vowed to carry out further attacks inside Pakistan and against the United States and Europe after the US State Department added it to a blacklist of foreign terrorist organisations.
Militants have launched a series of attacks as Muslims mark the final days of the holy fasting month of Ramadan.