SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1623 (84), Tuesday, November 2, 2010
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TITLE: Cautious Praise For Revised Police Bill
AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Trying to understand what is new in the Kremlin’s latest version of its 176-page bill to reform the police force could take considerable time.
So the Kremlin, in line with its mantra to fight corruption with transparency, has published the entire bill online — complete with editor’s marks so readers can see what has been crossed out with a green line.
The result, lawmakers and analysts said, is a significantly improved bill that takes into account many critical public comments posted on a government web site that carried the initial draft of the bill in August.
“More passages have been clarified in the new bill, but many things regarding public control are still unclear,” said Alexander Brod, a human rights activist and a member of the Public Chamber. Brod said the bill still gives police more power in their checks on businesses, including the right to use taxes as a pretext.
Business associations say police checks are often used to demand bribes.
Unlike in the initial version, police will not be obliged to inform the tax authorities if they open a case on tax evasion charges.
“Until the police bill is amended to ban police from conducting tax inspections and opening criminal tax cases, we cannot expect the relationship between the police and business to reach a new level,” said Dmitry Lipatov, a lawyer with the Nologovik tax consulting firm. A controversial passage deleted from the bill gave police officers the right to enter a house at any time while on duty.
Also, if a person’s rights are violated, the police officer will be required to “bring his apology” to wherever the person desires — his home, office or educational facility, the bill says. The original version only said the officer should apologize, without elaborating.
As in the initial draft, police officers will for the first time be obliged to read a suspect their rights and explain the reason for their arrest. Detainees will have the right to make a telephone call unless they previously fled custody. If the suspect is a foreign citizen, police should notify that country’s embassy. Alexei Volkov, deputy head of the State Duma’s Security Committee, said the bill needed to preserve a “happy medium.”
“We have been afraid that our own police force might get out of control, but we should also realize that it has to fight crime and needs to be armed for the task,” the United Russia deputy said by telephone.
He said the latest version faced additional revisions in the Duma.
Medvedev submitted the police bill to the Duma on Wednesday, and it was posted on the Zakonoproekt2010.ru web site on Wednesday night.
The initial draft called for the police reform to come into effect Jan. 1. The date has now been changed to March 1, and a person close to the presidential administration told Vedomosti on Thursday that the reason was to avoid the introduction of new police rules during the long New Year’s holiday break. 
Nina Ostanina, a Duma deputy with the Communist Party, said the main problem was not the lack of a good law on the police but the lack of a pool of qualified police officers. “Most of the officers we have today are ready to cross any line and could be turned into a force to harass our own people,” she said by telephone.

TITLE: Strategy 31 Rally Hit With Criminal Case
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The authorities stepped up repressive measures against Sunday’s Strategy 31 rally in defense of freedom of assembly in St. Petersburg, holding detained activists at police precincts overnight, searching activists’ apartments and investigating several participants for suspected extremism. If they are found guilty, they will face up to three years in prison.
Andrei Pivovarov, the local leader of the People’s Democratic Union (RNDS) and one of the rally’s organizers, was detained almost immediately after the start of the rally, taken to court three hours later and sentenced to 27 days in prison Sunday.  The Other Russia’s Andrei Pesotsky was sentenced to 14 days in prison Monday.
Andrei Dmitriyev, the local leader of The Other Russia party, was sentenced to five days in prison Monday after spending the night in a police precinct. They were all charged with violating the rules on holding public events and failing to obey a police officer’s orders.
Speaking on his cell phone from a police truck where he was held before the court hearing on Monday afternoon, Dmitriyev said that his apartment and those of two other activists were searched by the Center E anti-extremism state agency on Monday morning. The officers showed his parents documents stating that a criminal investigation had been opened into suspected participation in the activities of a banned organization.
The three activists whose apartments were searched — Dmitriyev, Vadim Mamedov and Alexander Yashin — are all members of The Other Russia, the party formed by author and oppositional politician Eduard Limonov earlier this year. Limonov’s previous party, the National Bolshevik Party (NBP), was banned as “extremist” in 2005.
Dmitriyev said that Center E is claiming that the NBP has been active in St. Petersburg during the past 18 months.
The police detained 104 people near Gostiny Dvor on Nevsky Prospekt, St. Petersburg’s main street, and another eight at a separate, smaller rally on Palace Square, organizers said. About 30 were held at three different police precincts throughout the night and taken to court on Monday.
Five activists, including The Other Russia’s Ravil Bashirov, had their cases postponed, but upon leaving the court, they were seized by plainclothes men and taken in for interrogation, The Other Russia activist Andrei Milyuk said by phone Monday. According to him, the interrogations were part of the investigation into the “extremism” case.
The OMON special-task police, whose faces were hidden behind ski masks and helmets, charged the crowd and detained speakers promptly, preventing them from speaking for more than a minute on Sunday. Pivovarov, who opened the rally, was among the first people to be detained, at 6 p.m. One of the last, Sergei Kuzin of the Solidarity democratic movement, was detained at 7:15 p.m.
During Sunday’s event, activists hung a large banner featuring anarchist symbols and the slogan “Any form of authority is shit. It’s forbidden to forbid,” from the roof of Passazh retail center directly opposite the rally’s location.
RNDS spokesman Pavel Smolyak said he believed that Pivovarov’s sentence was predetermined.
Smolyak said that Judge Alexei Kuznetsov declared the hearing “closed,” and Smolyak was not allowed into the courtroom during the hearing, which lasted two hours. “The policemen in the corridor reported [Pivovarov’s sentence] by phone before it was even announced; it was all obvious from the very start,” Smolyak said by phone Monday.
Strategy 31 is a nonpartisan civil rights campaign demanding that the authorities obey Article 31 of the Russian Constitution, which states that “citizens have the right to assemble peacefully, without weapons.” Proposed by Limonov last year, the events have been held on the 31st day of months that have that many days.
First held in Moscow on July 31 last year, the Strategy 31 events have been held in St. Petersburg since Jan. 31.
Sunday’s rally was not authorized by City Hall on the grounds that “planned maintenance work” would be in progress on the site near Gostiny Dvor at the time of the planned rally, organizers said. No work could be seen on Sunday.
The Strategy 31 events were held in 67 Russian cities, with support events in New York and London, The Other Russia’s spokesman Alexander Averin said Monday. Thirty-eight were detained in Moscow.

TITLE: 24-Hour Flight Rule Lifted for Private Pilots
AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — As of Monday, a small but devoted army of amateur pilots are able to take to the sky with an hour’s notice instead of waiting 24 hours to get permission from federal authorities.
The change might seem small, but aviation authorities call it a revolution for the air industry that promises to help kick-start private aviation by bringing it closer to Western norms.
“We are getting close to Western standards where you can just get into your plane like you do with a car and fly,” said Vadim Katerinich, a flight instructor at the Jonathan Livingston flight club near the city of Ruza in the Moscow region.
For many years, pilots like Katerinich had to wait for 24 hours before the authorities would grant them permission to fly. Now all they will have to do is send their flight request to the web site of the Federal Air Transportation Agency, ivprf.ru, and wait for up to an hour to receive approval, agency officials said. The site will also provide pilots with information in connection with their fight plans, including the official federal weather forecasts.
“The new rules will bring new drive to the development of amateur and business aviation,” said Alexander Neradko, head of the Federal Air Transportation Agency.
“You will be able to bypass bureaucrats to send your information,” Neradko said, speaking at a news conference Friday.
According to the new rules, the Russian sky will be divided into three zones — A, C and G — with the first zone reserved for commercial and military aircraft and the other two open to private aircraft.
While the C zone will still require 24-hour advance notice, the G — or “golf” — zone will be open to pilots on an hour’s notice. The G zone varies from an altitude of 300 meters in the Rostov region to 4,500 meters in East Siberia, aviation officials said.
The sky above Moscow will remain closed because the city hosts a number of landmarks and strategically important facilities, Neradko said.
But the Federal Air Transportation Agency has promised to cut the number of no-fly zones around the country gradually. From Monday, the number of no-fly zones were cut from 85 to 59.
The agency also said the number of air routes reserved for commercial airlines only would be sliced by 75 percent from the current 2,209.
Amid the easing of the rules, the agency will toughen control over unsanctioned flights, Neradko said.
“Flying by notification order is not intended to be a flying disorder as some people probably wanted it to be,” said Neradko, adding that his agency would seek harsher penalties for violations.
A current fine of 5,000 rubles ($150) for aviation violations is “not effective,” his agency said in a statement.
Some private pilots said they were tempted to break the rules because of the red tape involved in keeping them.
Andrei, a 31-year-old owner of a second-hand Cessna 150, said he often flew in the Moscow region without permission because he could not wait a whole day for a flight request to clear, given unpredictable weather conditions and other nuances involved in flying. “I just hope that we will have an opportunity to fly openly and legally,” he said, asking that his last name not be used because he did not want to lose his license.
Russia has about 3,000 private pilots, according to  AOPA-Russia, a group that unites the owners of small planes.
More than 1,800 small private planes are registered with the Federal Air Transportation Agency.

TITLE: Shamanov Injured in Tula Car Accident
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Odynova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW (SPT) — Paratroopers commander Vladimir Shamanov was rushed to the hospital with serious injuries sustained in a car crash that killed one and injured two other military officials near Tula on Saturday morning.
A MAZ truck crushed the BMW sedan carrying Shamanov after swerving into the oncoming lane on Tula’s Moskovskoye Shosse, police said.
Shamanov suffered a broken arm and leg and a concussion. Doctors described his condition on Sunday as grave but not life-threatening and said he would undergo surgery this week, Rossia One state television reported.
Also injured in the accident were the acting commander of the 106th paratroopers division, Colonel Alexei Naumets, and Shamanov’s aide Colonel Oleg Chernous. Both were hospitalized in serious condition. Their driver, Ensign Oleg Zineyev, died at the scene.
The truck driver, Dovlatsh Elbigiyev, 38, survived and tried to flee the scene but was detained, Interfax reported, citing Tula police. He faces up to five years in prison on charges of traffic violations that resulted in a death.
Elbigiyev, a migrant worker from Tajikistan, said he lost control of the truck on the wet road after a car ahead of him suddenly slowed down, Lifenews.ru reported.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov visited Shamanov in a Moscow military hospital on Saturday.
“Good, at least you are smiling,” Putin told Shamanov, who was lying under a blanket with his hand and left leg wrapped in bandages.

TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: <strong>LGBT Pride March</strong>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The city’s Moskovsky district administration turned down the request of the St. Petersburg gay movement to organize a meeting on Nov. 5, the St. Petersburg LGBT Pride organization said on its web site Friday. 
The local LGBT community had submitted a list of three different proposed locations for their meeting: Ploshchad Chernyshevskogo, the vicinity of the Peterburgsky Sport and Concert Complex and the area around the Russian National Library. 
In their response to the request, the authorities referred to the “large number of popular cultural events being held at the listed spots and the possible presence of minors in these areas,” and said that “potential protests from other citizens may consequently provoke a breach of the peace.”  
The organizers have in turn asked the Moskovsky district administration to indicate a suitable place and time for the holding of their event.
At the beginning of October, the Moskovsky district court upheld a complaint from the city’s gay community against the banning of a gay pride event last summer. The Admiralteisky and Petrogradsky district courts have also ruled that City Hall’s ban of last summer’s event was illegal. 

<strong>Girl Survives Fall</strong>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — A two-year-old girl survived after falling from a fifth-story window in St. Petersburg, Interfax reported Monday.
The girl fell from the window of an apartment located on Prospekt Bolshevikov.
A law enforcement source said the child had been hospitalized in serious condition in City Children’s Hospital No. 5, Interfax reported.

<strong>Nazi Graffiti Removed</strong>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — Graffiti reading “Russia for the Tsar” and the image of a Nazi swastika have been removed from the wall of St. Petersburg’s Alexandriinsky Theater, Interfax reported Monday.
A source said that as a result of the vandalism, the administration of the Alexandriinsky Theater and of the neighboring Russian National Library have requested that police protect buildings and monuments from vandals.
On the evening of Oct. 31, the inscription “Russia for the Tsar” and a Nazi swastika were discovered on a wall of the Alexandriinsky Theater on Ploshchad Ostrovskogo.

<strong>Corpse Found in Hotel</strong>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The body of a 73-year-old Muscovite was discovered in a St. Petersburg hotel at the weekend, Interfax reported Monday.
“A Moscow resident born in 1937 was found dead with injuries to the head and chest on Sunday afternoon in one of the rooms of a hotel located at 4 Ulitsa Vozrozhdeniya,” a law enforcement spokesman said.
A criminal case into the murder has been opened, Interfax reported.

Man Held for Beating
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — A man suspected of beating a schoolteacher in a high profile incident in the city last week has been taken into custody, Interfax reported. 
Andrei Petrov is also suspected of being involved in the drug trade.
A man introducing himself as a pupil’s father went to school No. 339 in St. Petersburg’s Nevsky district last week and proceeded to beat up an elementary schoolteacher in front of children in the hallway.
The woman was taken to hospital and later discharged. Petrov has been charged with making murder threats, and has also been arrested on suspicion of drug trafficking.

TITLE: ‘Ecomobile’ Offers Safe Disposal for Toxic Waste
AUTHOR: By Irina Titova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT:  St. Petersburg residents are finally being offered a civilized way to get rid of broken mercury thermometers, used batteries, dead car batteries and other dangerous waste in an ecologically safe way.
The Ecomobile, a mobile center for the collection of dangerous waste, was introduced on a trial basis on May 1 this year by the city’s Nature Use, Environment and Ecology Safety Committee, and was unveiled to the press and public by the committee last week. 
The minibus travels around the city and collects waste from certain points at regular intervals.
“Today we are giving every citizen the opportunity to demonstrate their civil responsibility and return dangerous waste to a special service,” Alexei Petrov, deputy head of the Environment Committee, said at the press conference Wednesday.
The Ecomobile collects common home appliances such as mercury thermometers, mercury lamps with both fluorescent and energy-efficient light bulbs, used batteries, office equipment and other appliances that contain dangerous substances, Petrov said.
The list of items the vehicle will collect also includes tires, domestic chemicals such as paint and varnish, and medicines that are past their expiry date, he said.
Petrov said each Ecomobile minibus would visit dozens of points in all the districts of St. Petersburg and its suburbs at least four times a year, increasing the trips to each point up to between six or eight times next year. The timetable can be found at www.infoeco.ru. 
Dmitry Artamonov, head of the St. Petersburg Greenpeace office, said the introduction of the Ecomobiles service in the city was “a positive step.”
“Such a service is really needed in the current situation, when city residents have clearly been lacking a way of getting rid of dangerous waste,” Artamonov said.
“In developed countries, producers of appliances that become dangerous waste after use take responsibility for the safety of that waste themselves,” he said. “For instance, some cell phones manufacturers include special packages with their goods for the delivery of the item back to them after use. In Russia, however, the legislation for such services is not in place,” Artamonov said.
“So the Ecomobiles are the first step taken in the city to solve the problem of dangerous waste in a civilized way. Of course, not everyone is ready to show civil responsibility and bother to go and return used appliances, but those who care have got their chance,” he said.
So far, the Ecomobiles have collected 2,172 fluorescent lamps, 1,233 energy-efficient light bulbs, 11,696 batteries, 999 mercury thermometers and a number of other appliances.
The collected waste is processed at the city’s Ecostroi enterprise, which has facilities to receive the recyclable resources. The rest of the waste is buried at a specialized refuse dump in Krasniy Bor outside the city, the committee said.
In the event of a toxic waste-related problem, the city’s radiation and chemical emergency service can be contacted on 328 8069.
Grigory Gorsky, head of the radiation safety watch department at the regional branch of the Federal Consumer Protection Service, said people could call the hotline in the event of a mercury thermometer getting broken or any other such danger in their home.
“Many people think that if a thermometer gets broken, they can collect the mercury themselves, but usually they can’t do it properly or safely,” said Gorsky. “In such cases, they should call the above-mentioned emergency service, who will come and help.”
Gorsky said the same service could be required if a fluorescent or energy-efficient bulb was broken.
Radiation and ecology safety officials who attended the press conference said the city was also taking a whole other set of measures to boost environmental safety in St. Petersburg.
“We constantly monitor the sanitation of the city’s water, air and food products,” Gorsky said.
“I can also say that the radiation situation in St. Petersburg is safe. The average ionizing radiation background in the city is 11 microroentgen an hour, ranging from 10 to 20 microroentgens in some places, which is completely normal,” he said.
Gorsky said 74 percent of collective radiation in St. Petersburg comes from the natural environment, 25 percent from medical procedures such as X-rays, and only 0.15 percent from anthropogenic factors, X-ray medical equipment and nuclear power stations. 
Greenpeace’s Artamonov agreed that the overall radiation level in the city was reasonably safe, but said there were still a few places in the city — mostly old military or industrial sites — that could not be entirely safe.
He said that until recently, the transportation of nuclear waste from France and Germany through St. Petersburg’s port and railways was a serious problem.
“Once we measured the radiation level at a passenger platform outside the city where a train with nuclear waste was standing, and the level was 2,000 microroentgen an hour,” he said.
Artamonov said that numerous protests, mainly in the countries in which the waste originated, helped to stop those deliveries in July this year.
According to Artamonov, the two main sources of air pollution in the city are automobile exhausts and the waste from burning silt at the city’s sewage aeration stations.
“At this stage, the city should focus not on solving the automobile traffic problem, but rather on developing public transport that would help to decrease the extent of car use in the city and therefore make the air cleaner,” Artamonov said.
Artamonov said the burning of silt at three of the city’s sewage aeration stations emits highly dangerous dioxins.
“The effect of such substances on people is directly related to cancer problems, and as we already know, St. Petersburg has the highest incidence of cancer in the country,” Artamonov said.
Artamonov said the city’s water quality was also poor.
“The Neva River currently represents a broth of hundreds of diverse harmful substances,” he said.
Artamonov said that the problem was the result of the illegal dumping of raw waste waters, mainly from industrial enterprises, but also from home sewage systems.

TITLE: Cardboard Nation Arrives in City
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Cardboardia, a virtual and temporary country, will come to St. Petersburg this week after visiting Moscow, Berlin and Helsinki. Anyone can join in, be creative and even sell their artwork during the festival, which opens at the Bye Bye ballet studio located at 9 Ulitsa Belinskogo near Gostiny Dvor metro on Wednesday.
Called St. Cartonburg, the cardboard town will be located inside an old St. Petersburg five-story building. During several days, a cardboard town will be erected in which different cultural events are held, such as Public Wedding Day, Cardboard Dependence Day, the Really Free Market and the next elections of Cardboardia’s tyrant, at which only one candidate stands.
Cardboardia was conceived by Moscow promoter Sergei Korsakov, who is also the Tyrant of Cardboardia, in 2007. Cardboardia’s main visitors are families with children, young and creative people and anybody who likes art and other activities, organizers say.

TITLE: Kabul Grumbles About Russians in Drug Raid
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: KABUL, Afghanistan — Russian counternarcotics agents participated in a NATO-led drug raid that netted $56 million worth of heroin and morphine, but Afghanistan’s president complained that he had not been informed in advance of the Russian involvement, and his administration demanded a formal apology.
Nine helicopters and 70 men were involved in the raid, Viktor Ivanov, head of the Federal Drug Control Service, said Friday, adding that his agency told the United States where the labs were located.
Just a week earlier during a trip to Washington, Ivanov accused the United States of failing to dismantle such labs and slow down the flow of heroin into Russia.
Agents seized about 932 kilograms of heroin and 156 kilograms of opium in the raid Thursday in the village of Zerasari, near the Pakistani border, officials said. It takes about 10 tons of opium to make one ton of heroin.
U.S. officials said the heroin had a street value of $55.9 million. Ivanov gave much higher figures, saying the seized drugs were worth at least $250 million and probably even up to $1 billion.
Ivanov said two Russians were involved in the raid and that Russia may increase the number of its drug agents in Afghanistan in the future.
Photos shot at the scene and provided by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency show men in military uniforms carrying metal canisters across a dusty gray moonscape. The drab landscape is broken only by the occasional tree. Stacks of brown sacks lie near basins with white residue and oil drums painted black.
The level of cooperation between U.S. and Russian forces was significant and suggested an improvement in relations between the former Cold War foes, two decades after U.S.-financed Afghan militias chased the Soviet military out of the country.
Federation Council Senator Mikhail Margelov said Friday that the joint raid showed that efforts to reset U.S.-Russian relations are finally being backed by real action.
But it irked Afghan President Hamid Karzai. He stressed on Saturday that Afghanistan and Russia also have friendly relations but said no country should carry out military operations on Afghan soil without permission.
A Kremlin official downplayed Russia’s participation following Karzai’s criticism. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject, said, “We were in favor of the operation being conducted, but technically, we did not participate in it.”
He would not comment on why Ivanov and the United States claimed that it was a joint operation.
Some observers suggested that officials might have overstated Russia’s involvement to boost ties with Washington.
Karzai said the raid breached Afghanistan’s sovereignty and international law and ordered the interior and defense ministries to investigate the issue.
“While Afghanistan remains committed to its joint efforts with [the] international community against narcotics, it also makes it clear that no organization or institution shall have the right to carry out such a military operation without prior authorization and consent of the government of Afghanistan,” his office said in a statement.
While Afghan forces were involved in the raid, Karzai’s national security adviser, Rangin Dadfar Spanta, insisted that NATO had not asked for permission to bring the Russians along. He said NATO had verbally apologized but Afghanistan wanted a formal declaration.

TITLE: Kukushkin Wins St. Petersburg Tennis Open
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: Mikhail Kukushkin of Kazakhstan won his maiden career title, upsetting top-seeded Mikhail Youzhny 6-3, 7-6 (2) Sunday in the final of the St. Petersburg Open — his first final appearance.
Kukushkin’s previous best career result was a semifinal appearance in Moscow last season where he lost to eventual champion Youzhny in straight sets.
The 88th-ranked Kukushkin broke the 10th-ranked Youzhny twice in the first set. After an exchange of breaks midway through the second set, Youzhny, 2004 champion and runner-up in 2002, broke in the 11th game and served for the set, but Kukushkin broke back to force a tiebreaker.
In the tiebreaker, the Russian-born Kukushkin, who moved to Kazakhstan two years ago, jumped to a 6-2 lead and sealed the win on his first match point.
“I didn’t expect I could win more then two matches here,” Kukushkin said. “I’m really excited that I have won today and I think I won because I was running for every ball and played solid tennis. I do not remember how I broke back in the last game, but I’m happy with the way I played on the tiebreaker.”
Youzhny, who saved a match point in the quarterfinal and four more in the semifinal, said he was exhausted going into the tiebreaker.
“Mikhail has played a perfect match today and he deserved the victory,” Youzhny said. “He played better on key points and it was tough for me to concentrate while receiving in the second set.”
Kukushkin is expected to move to a career-high ranking in the top 60 next week.

TITLE: United Russia Wants 
To Create PC Games
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Taranova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — United Russia intends to team up with the country’s computer gaming community to create educational and social games, the party announced on its web site, and it has the support of a cybergaming group.
“I think it is time for interaction between the party and the gaming community,” said Sergei Shirokov, president of the National Professional Cybersport Leagues.
“We believe that the party can begin to communicate with a huge audience of gamers across the country and conduct various competitions for computer games,” he said in a statement published on United Russia’s web site.
Shirokov suggested computer games based on the “historical reality” of World War II battles.
“At least to some extent, players will be able to feel what our people had to go through to protect their homeland,” Shirokov said in the statement, which was titled, “The Game: It’s Serious.”
His comments also were posted on the web site of the Young Guard, United Russia’s youth wing.
United Russia will be a developer and inspirer of the games, said State Duma Deputy Robert Shlegel, a party member who sits on the Duma’s information technology committee.
The computer games “will combine education and patriotic features,” the 25-year-old deputy said, adding that the first game will be dedicated to Russia’s history.
The reaction from other corners was mixed. Oleg Kozlovsky, a member of the democratic opposition group Solidarity, said by telephone that the United Russia initiative was an “extravagant” idea to promote the party and to absorb money from state coffers.
“Neither gamers nor United Russia will get any benefit from this,” said Kozlovsky, 26, a civil rights activist and political blogger.
A Just Russia Deputy Ilya Ponomaryov, 35, who also is on the Duma’s IT committee, said he saw no problem with United Russia’s plans but noted that the games would need to be designed by professionals to be effective.
Nadezhda Nedova, deputy editor of the gamer magazine Igromania, voiced skepticism about the likelihood of an effective alliance between United Russia and gamers — starting with the fact that many gamers are under 18 and cannot vote.
“The most active gamers are 14- to 18-year-olds, and they are keen on action and bloodthirsty games,” she said.

TITLE: Government Wants ‘One Click’ Tracking for Kremlin Decrees
AUTHOR: By Natalya Krainova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A Kremlin official said Friday that the government would implement by year-end a system for tracking statistics on the fulfillment of presidential orders.
What’s more, President Dmitry Medvedev said he wants a version of the system installed on his personal computer so he can view presidential orders, delays and violations “with a single keystroke.”
But analysts cautioned that Medvedev alone won’t be able to control vast numbers of officials and that red tape would be eliminated only through an overarching administrative reform — which they said Medvedev could not achieve due to a lack of political clout.
The planned system would allow Medvedev to read documents drafted on his orders, check their deadlines and learn the names of the officials who are in charge, Konstantin Chuichenko, head of the Kremlin’s control department, told a Kremlin meeting.
Chuichenko demonstrated an initial version of the system for Medvedev, describing it as a customized software product with online access, according to a transcript of the meeting on the presidential web site.
Friday’s meeting, a video conference with federal and regional officials based at the president’s Gorki residence, was the third video conference this year dedicated to a discussion of how officials are carrying out the president’s orders.
Medvedev did not scold officials for failing to fulfill his decrees, as he had done at the meetings in March and June.
Chuichenko said Friday that the number of fulfilled presidential orders grew by 57 percent in the first nine months of the year compared with the same period last year.
Anna Lunyova, deputy head of the Center for Political Information, said the system would allow Medvedev to control only “key” orders, providing officials with an opportunity to “hamper or set in motion certain documents” as a “wonderful means of fighting with unwanted officials.”
“Without an overall administrative reform, Medvedev’s tut-tutting of officials will make no sense,” Lunyova said.
But Medvedev is “afraid” to undertake radical reforms of the bureaucratic system because officials can refuse to fulfill his orders and because “he will lose the little clout and respect of society that he has now,” she said.
Alexander Kynev, a political analyst with the Foundation for Information Policy Development, called Medvedev’s hope to oversee all officials an “overload of functions.”

TITLE: In Brief
TEXT: <strong>Army Numbers Down</strong>
MOSCOW (SPT) — The military has finished trimming down army personnel from 1.2 million to 1 million as part of its ongoing reform, Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said Sunday, Interfax reported.
Officers make up about 150,000 of the staff, and professional sergeants about 100,000 to 120,000, with the rest being conscripts, Serdyukov said in an interview with Rossia One state television.
He added that modernizing army equipment is the next stage of the reform, which will see about 70 percent of all weaponry replaced or upgraded by 2020.
Serdyukov also dismissed speculation that the term of mandatory army service may be increased from the current 12 months. 

<strong>Visa Form ‘Excessive’</strong>
MOSCOW (AP) — The Foreign Ministry said Friday that Canada is asking too many questions on a new visa application form.
Canada introduced the new form in October, requiring Russians wishing to travel there to give a detailed account of their military service, asking to provide “branch of service, unit numbers and names of your commanding officers” as well as “dates and places of any active combat.”
Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko told Friday’s briefing that the form is “excessive” and “raising serious questions.”

TITLE: Schneider To Work On Sites For Rosneft
AUTHOR: By Olga Razumovskaya
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: SAMARA — French power company Schneider Electric and its Russian joint venture partner, Electroshield, will be “closely involved” in the $3 billion modernization of three Rosneft oil refineries, Schneider Electric president Jean-Pascal Tricoire said Friday.
The Kremlin-owned oil company Rosneft has allocated $3 billion to upgrade the Samara region refineries over the course of the next five years, Governor Vladimir Artyakov said. Local authorities say they would like to see a domestic company involved in the project.
“This joint venture is now viewed as our [local] company,” Artyakov said, encouraging Schneider Electric’s involvement in the project and promising his support.
“If critical situations arise, I would like to ask you to get in touch with me directly to solve these problems,” the governor told Schneider Electric’s top management in Samara, a Volga River city in central Russia.
“We are undoubtedly interested and will get closely involved in Rosneft’s refineries,” Tricoire said.
The governor also noted that he was “especially interested” in Schneider Electric’s energy-efficiency initiatives.
Only two days earlier, President Dmitry Medvedev reinforced the importance of his energy plan at a modernization commission session.
Schneider Electric, which specializes producing in low- and medium-voltage distribution gear, announced last week that it was creating a joint venture with Samara-based Electroshield, which also manufactures medium-voltage products.
Tricoire said the partnership would help Electroshield enter the world market and strengthen Schneider Electric’s position in Russia.
Samara will be home to Schneider Electric’s largest production facilities, making Russia the company’s second-biggest European market after France in terms of production volume, Tricoire said.
The initial price tag on the transaction was 10.7 billion rubles ($347 million) for the 50 percent. Laslo Markotan, Electric Schneider’s director in the CIS and Russia, told reporters that the figure included Electroshield’s debt.
Schneider Electric had previously said the deal did not include Electroshield’s debt.
There are issues that the partners must resolve, including how to brand the joint venture’s products, managers said.
Andrei Polovinkin, who will head the joint venture, said the matter was “complex” and had not yet been resolved.

TITLE: Rosatom to Construct Plant in Vietnam
AUTHOR: By Irina Filatova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Rosatom signed an agreement Sunday to build the first nuclear power station in Vietnam as President Dmitry Medvedev wrapped up a two-day visit to the country.
Rosatom subsidiary Atomstroiexport will build two blocks of the power station with a capacity of 1,200 megawatts each, the state nuclear corporation said on its web site.
Sergei Kiriyenko, Rosatom’s chief, said the construction site could have four to six blocks.
“After the two blocks are built successfully we’ll start negotiations on building two more blocks on this site and on new sites,” he told RIA-Novosti.  
The station, to be built by 2020, is “the most effective project, which Russia currently offers all over the world,” Kiriyenko told reporters, adding that Rosatom planned to partner with Vietnam-based companies to localize equipment production and construction work.
The two sides also agreed to cooperate in building a research center to develop nuclear technologies in Vietnam.
Russia has been pushing hard on developing nuclear projects in other countries, with Atomstroiexport currently building power stations in Iran, India, Bulgaria and Slovakia.
Medvedev said construction of the power station “would allow Vietnam to develop as an independent country, which not only produces and refines oil, but also uses other energy sources.”
“If we ultimately implement the ideas outlined in the project and reach the planned capacity of the nuclear power station, this will provide a very significant part of Vietnam’s electric energy market,” Medvedev said, according to a transcript on the Kremlin’s web site.
The countries also agreed to continue cooperation in the oil and gas sector, with joint projects being implemented both in Russia and Vietnam, as well as in third countries, Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet said.
The Kremlin also intends to develop joint high-tech projects and strengthen the two countries’ investment ties, Medvedev said.
A gradual recovery from the economic crisis has, however, resulted in growing trade between Moscow and Hanoi, he said. The countries’ bilateral trade was worth nearly $1 billion in the first half of 2010 and might reach $2 billion by the end of the year.
The figure was 16.6 percent higher than in the same period of 2009, Reuters reported, citing the Russian government’s figures. Trade between the countries was worth $1.56 billion last year, compared with $1.4 billion in 2008.
Among other agreements signed Sunday was a deal by state-controlled VTB and Vietnam’s third-largest bank, BIDV, on starting a joint investment fund of $500 million.
Russia will invest $10 million in the enterprise, which is aimed at supporting energy and mining projects. Vietnam will add $5 million to the fund, VTB chief Andrei Kostin said. The sides also planned to raise another $85 million on international capital markets, he said.
The two sides will begin contributing to the fund next year, Kostin told reporters, adding that Vietnam’s debt to Russia would also be included in the total.  
Vietnam has suggested that Russia cut part of its sovereign debt of $700 million borrowed from the Soviet Union, Kostin said.

TITLE: Liberal Economist Joins New Chief of Staff as First Deputy
AUTHOR: By Maxim Tovkailo, Dmitry Kazmin and Nailya Asker-Zade
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has appointed Anna Popova, a deputy economic development minister described by colleagues as a staunch liberal, as the first deputy for his new chief of staff, Vyacheslav Volodin.
Putin signed the order Monday and it was published the following day on the government web site.
Popova will replace Anastasia Rakova, who joined Putin’s former chief of staff, Sergei Sobyanin, in the Moscow city government as a deputy mayor and Sobyanin’s chief of staff.
Like her predecessor, Popova will oversee administrative reforms and will be responsible for the lawmaking in the government administration, several sources told Vedomosti. Her responsibilities were confirmed by Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov.
Volodin has not yet decided how his six deputies, including five who served under Sobyanin, will divide their duties. Popova may take over some responsibilities from Sergei Gaplikov, who oversees the government’s economic bloc, a White House source said.
Peskov said there was no immediate rush for Volodin to determine his deputies’ responsibilities.
Popova was born in Leningrad and graduated from the Leningrad Finance and Economics Institute with a degree in industrial planning. She has worked in the Economic Development Ministry since 2004 and became a deputy minister in July 2007.
At the ministry she was also responsible for administrative reforms and drafting legislation, meaning that she is accustomed to the duties her new post will entail, a government official said.
Popova oversaw the development of legislation that significantly reduced the number of inspections faced by small business, an Economic Development Ministry official said, calling her “the motor behind that idea.”
Additionally, she was responsible for developing Russia’s financial market and improving corporate governance. Popova had a hand in drafting reforms that simplified bankruptcy procedures for companies and individuals.
“There was a breakthrough in corporate legislation under Popova,” said Dmitry Stepanov, a partner at the law firm Egorov, Puginsky, Afanasiev & Partners.
Popova has liberal views and is willing to compromise, but she will also stand by her position to the last, an Economic Development Ministry source said, adding that she is a good choice to conduct administrative reforms. “Popova is someone who’s respectable and incorruptible,” he said.
An official who knows Popova from their work on the government’s commission for administrative reform said she was very much a liberal.
After the Raspadskaya coal mine explosions that killed 90 people earlier this year, a law was passed allowing oversight bodies to halt the work of a company without a court order as of next year, but Popova was able to make sure that the measure was only applied to hazardous industrial sites, the source said.
It is possible that Popova will now chair the commission on administrative reform instead of Sobyanin, he added.
Several former colleagues described Popova as reserved. She’s not quick to show emotion, an Economic Development Ministry official said.
One of her former bosses agreed. “If she’s given responsibility for some of the economic matters, she’ll be able to handle it in terms of the logic, but in terms of her ability to push things through — she’ll have a tough time,” he said.
Businesses should expect only improvements from Popova’s appointment, said Sergei Borisov, president of the business lobby Opora. Popova consistently fought to reduce pressure on business, he said.
“Without the approval of the government administration you can’t get anything done, so Popova will have an easier time now,” said Vladimir Yuzhakov, head of the administrative reform department at the Center for Strategic Research.

TITLE: Magna Opens Kaluga Factory
AUTHOR: By Irina Filatova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: KALUGA — Canadian auto parts maker Magna on Thursday launched its new plant in Kaluga, and said this demonstrated its belief in the strong potential of Russia’s automotive market.
The facility, with a total production area of 15,000 square meters, will manufacture bumpers and front-end modules, and assemble radiator grills and instrument panel-beams.
The company said it was against corporate policy to disclose the volume of investment in the project.
Magna, which already has plants in St. Petersburg and Nizhny Novgorod, chose to build the new factory in Kaluga because its major customers — the world’s biggest carmakers — are located in the region, said Hubert Hoedl, the company’s vice president for corporate marketing and business development in Europe.
Among the carmakers that the Magna plant will supply are Volkswagen, Skoda, Renault and Peugeot Citroen.
The plant, which now operates at 25 percent of capacity, is making bumpers for three car models — Volkswagen’s Polo and Skoda’s Octavia and Fabia.
The plant’s chief executive Georgy Rotov said they expect to reach full capacity of 150,000 to 170,000 auto component kits per year by 2012.
The plant will also start supplying auto parts for the new Volkswagen Tiguan and Renault Duster next year, he told reporters during the plant tour, adding that Magna also has orders from Peugeot and Citroen, and is in talks with Mitsubishi.
Manfred Eibeck, president of Magna Russia, said at the opening ceremony that the plant was “a clear indication of our belief in the Russian automotive market and its potential for future development and sustainable growth.”
Kaluga Governor Anatoly Artamonov participated in the opening ceremony and said Magna’s presence confirmed that the region’s economic policy was right.
The Kaluga region, which offers tax breaks to investors, has attracted several leading foreign companies. French automaker Peugeot Citroen and Japan’s Mitsubishi opened a joint enterprise in April, and French cosmetics maker L’Oreal launched its first Russian plant there last month.
Artamonov said he hoped that Magna’s enterprise would contribute to “creating a full-fledged automotive cluster” in the region.
At the end of the ceremony, Artamonov and Magna’s executives signed the first Volkswagen bumper produced at the plant that was later presented to representatives of the automaker.
Dietmar Korzekwa, chief executive of Volkswagen Russia, examined the bumper and said its quality was “very good.” He  expressed the hope that the components supplied by Magna in future would be of the same quality.

TITLE: Fake Parts ‘Endanger’ Flight Safety
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A large number of counterfeit spare parts for the aviation industry enter Russia from former Soviet republics, jeopardizing flight safety on both military and commercial aircraft, Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said Thursday.
Ivanov cited Transportation Ministry statistics from an inspection of more than 60,000 aircraft parts that exposed about 14,500 counterfeits.
“In plain Russian, they’re all fakes,” Ivanov said, Interfax reported.
In 2009 and 2010 alone, the Federal Customs Service filed 19 criminal cases and more than 300 misdemeanor cases in connection with aircraft parts imports, he said.
Most of the counterfeit parts are imported to Russia illegally from bordering countries, he said. Ivanov mentioned Ukraine, Lithuania and Latvia as transit points for counterfeit parts made in third countries and said much of the counterfeit production comes from CIS countries.

TITLE: Europe Frets About Fees for Overflights
AUTHOR: By Roland Oliphant
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The European Union announced Thursday that it has initiated legal action against four of its own member states in an unusual attempt to end a long-running dispute with Russia regarding overflight fees.
The European Commission sent formal letters requesting information from France, Austria, Germany and Finland, due to concerns that their bilateral flight agreements with Russia are in breach of EU rules. The focus is on the fees themselves — paid by carriers for the right to fly over Siberia on the way to Asia — and that they are not applied to all EU carriers equally.
“The commission is concerned that such provisions may be in breach of EU antitrust rules and could lead to competition distortions to the disadvantage of both EU airlines and consumers,” the commission said.
Russia charges foreign airlines for the right to fly over Siberia, affecting European airlines’ services to Japan, China and South Korea — a practice the EU says may be against international law. The European Commission claims that the fees cost EU carriers about $420 million in 2008, most of which was paid directly to the Russian airline Aeroflot.
Helen Kearns, a spokeswoman for the commission, confirmed that more countries could face similar complaints before the end of the year.
Aeroflot did not respond to e-mailed questions Thursday. A spokesperson for the Transportation Ministry declined to comment.
The Europeans have accused Russia of failing to honor a 2006 agreement to end the overflight charges. Russia has linked implementation of the agreement to its accession to the World Trade Organization.
A ruling against the bilateral agreements in Brussels could force the countries concerned to amend their agreements with Russia — a move Brussels hopes will give Europe enough leverage to negotiate an end to the charges.
“It will get the EU and the member states back to the negotiating table, that’s for sure, because the airlines will have to say, ‘Sorry, it’s illegal for us to agree to this,’” said Peter Crowther, a partner at the law firm Dewey & LeBoeuf.
Kearns said if countries were found in violation of EU law, they would be ordered to renegotiate with Russia, but if they are unsuccessful individually, the commission could negotiate on their behalf.
Whether or not those negotiations lead to a new deal in the EU’s favor is quite a different story, however. “Instead of the rate being aligned at the lowest common denominator, its conceivable that you could end up with the highest common denominator — in other words, one high rate for everybody,” Crowther said.
The commission is also taking aim at Russia’s refusal to recognize the EU’s “open skies” policy — which states that aviation agreements must apply equally to all member states. This policy aims to guarantee that an airline taken over by another carrier does not lose the routes it operates. But the commission says Russia has argued that Austrian Airlines, which operates routes via Siberia to China and Japan, is no longer covered by the aviation agreement with Austria since it was taken over by Germany’s Lufthansa.

TITLE: Selected Stores to Start iPad Sales This Month
AUTHOR: By Anastasia Golitsyna
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: MOSCOW — Sales of Apple’s iPad will officially begin in Russia after the November holidays, and although mobile operators will not be selling the popular tablets independently, they are already planning special Internet rates.
Mobile TeleSystems and VimpelCom are preparing new rates for iPad users, spokeswomen for the two mobile operators, told Vedomosti.
The exact terms of the pricing have yet to be determined. MTS will offer an unlimited rate with payment charged from the user daily, said the company’s spokeswoman Irina Osadchaya, adding that those terms were Apple’s preference.
An Apple spokesperson declined to comment on the matter.
MTS said its iPad plan would also take into account the services most frequently used on the device — sending e-mail, browsing the web and watching videos on YouTube. The tablet uses less data than mobile devices connecting by modem, Osadchaya said.
The unlimited iPad rate will include less traffic, but it will also be less expensive than modem-based mobile Internet plans. MTS’ monthly rate for its MTS-Connect plan is 790 rubles ($26).
MegaFon is not preparing a special offer for iPad users. The company already has mobile Internet rates that are available for the microSIM cards used in Apple’s tablet, spokeswoman Tatyana Ivanova said.
Sources at mobile device retailers said the basic iPad model, with a 16-gigabyte hard drive, would cost about 19,900 rubles ($650), while the 64-GB model would cost about 37,000 rubles ($1,200). These prices would be 30 percent and 46 percent higher than those in the United States.
The 16-GB iPad will definitely cost no more than 20,000 rubles, one of Apple’s partners in Russia said.
One Apple partner said the iPad would arrive in Russia after the long weekend celebrating National Unity Day on Nov. 4.
Mikhail Tach, executive vice president of mobile electronics retailer Svyaznoi, said he heard the tablet would arrive in mid-November.
Initially, the iPad will only be sold in three stores selected by Apple — Re:Store, Bely Veter Tsifrovoi, and M.Video.
Re:Store is registered as an Apple Premium Reseller, while the other two retailers have special departments dedicated to Apple’s products.
Apple always begins sales of new products in authorized stores that have Wi-Fi connections and specially trained staff, a second partner of the U.S. technology giant said. The tablet could later be offered in additional chains, he said.
Spokespeople for MTS and VimpelCom, which operates the Beeline brand, said talks on iPad sales were under way. A source at one of the mobile operators said he hoped that the iPad would be available in his company’s stores after the New Year’s holiday.
Svyaznoi will not carry the iPad and is instead going to sell a rival tablet, the Samsung Galaxy Tab.
Yevroset president Alexander Malis said the retailer was also holding talks with Apple. He said they were discussing whether the iPad would be in Yevroset stores from the first day of Russian sales or 30 days later. In any event, Yevroset will offer the iPad, Malis added.

TITLE: Billionaire Prokhorov Pledges Better Nets
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: NEWARK, New Jersey — Billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov said the New Jersey Nets will improve, although he backed off his bold prediction of making the playoffs this season.
In a champagne toast before New Jersey’s season-opening 101-98 victory over the Detroit Pistons on Wednesday night, Prokhorov asked fans to give the Nets time to rebound from a franchise-worst, 12-win season.
“We have 82 games you know; at the end of the season we will be much better,” said Prokhorov, the first non-North American owner of a National Basketball Association franchise. “We will be much better with time.”
His first game as the owner certainly was better, as the Nets rallied from a seven-point deficit in the final 1:40 to win, allowing Prokhorov to stand and cheer his team at the final buzzer.
A year ago, the team lost an NBA record 18 straight games to start the season.
One of Russia’s richest men, Prokhorov purchased 80 percent of the Nets and 45 percent of the Barclays Center Arena project in Brooklyn, New York, from developer Bruce Ratner late last year. Since Prokhorov took over, the Nets have changed drastically.
Billy King has replaced Rod Thorn as general manager. Avery Johnson is the new coach and there are only four players back from last season’s 12-70 team.
“It’s a young team; it’s 11 new players,” Prokhorov said. “We just need time.”
The self-assured Russian quipped that he was calm before watching his team play at the Prudential Center and he was hoping that his team could have some fun.
Prokhorov did not have much fun getting to the United States. His plane was delayed, and he arrived at the arena less than an hour before game time. He intended to spend the rest of the week in the United States, seeing his team play three times, including a Sunday matinee against LeBron James and the Miami Heat.
“It’s a competitive league, and I like challenges,” Prokhorov said.
With the free-spending Prokhorov in control, the Nets thought they had a shot at landing James, Chris Bosh or Dwyane Wade in the attractive free agent market in July. Instead, they failed to lure any stars to New Jersey.
Prokhorov said he learned that the Nets lacked drawing power to lure superstars.
“When you have the worst record in the league, it’s not easy to the break the role between the team franchise and the great players, but the station is changing and I am very optimistic.”
The Nets plan to play their home games in Newark for the next two seasons, and Prokhorov was positive that the team’s new arena in Brooklyn would be ready for 2012-13.
Prokhorov laughed about the billboard battle the Nets and Knicks are waging in Brooklyn. The Knicks put one up recently, featuring Amare Stoudemire.
“I saw the picture, but I think Amare, he is very sad,” Prokhorov said. “It looks like he wants to play in Brooklyn in a couple of years.”
Prokhorov would not comment on the possibility of the Nets acquiring Carmelo Anthony from Denver, which was rumored before the season. He also would not comment on the upcoming labor talks with the players association.

TITLE: In a First, Aeroflot Will Sponsor New Jersey Nets
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: EAST RUTHERFORD, New Jersey — New Jersey Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov said the NBA team has entered into a sponsorship agreement with Aeroflot, marking the first alliance the airline has made with a professional sports team in the United States.
The deal was announced Wednesday, less than three weeks after the Nets and vodka company Stolichnaya agreed to a five-year alliance with the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, where the team is scheduled to move in 2012.
The alliance between the Nets and Aeroflot is for the next two years, while the team plays its home games at the Prudential Center in Newark.
The Moscow-based airline will receive television-visible courtside signage during Nets home games that will be broadcasted in Russia, and on-screen branding during select YES Network broadcasts of Nets away games.
Select games will air on NTV television this season.
“We’re proud to announce that one of Russia’s blue-chip companies and best brands is becoming a Nets corporate sponsor, and we’re looking forward to a long and mutually beneficial relationship with Aeroflot,” Prokhorov said.
Nets chief executive Brett Yormark hopes to extend the agreement with Aeroflot once the team moves to Brooklyn.
“They are an airline going through the same things we are, in terms of a lot of positive change, a new fleet and more direct flights from JFK [airport] to Russia,” Yormark said. “This is an opportunity to build their brand here but also to reinforce it in Russia.”
Yormark went to Russia last month and met with representatives from more than 30 companies.

TITLE: Mikhalkov’s Disturbing Manifesto
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: Film director and self-proclaimed monarchist Nikita Mikhalkov caused a big stir Wednesday when he released his 10,000-word political manifesto titled “Right and Truth.”
The main theme of the manifesto was that Russia needs a strong leader who will guide the country along its “special path” to become prosperous and powerful. This is nothing new. Mikhalkov has expressed these views in numerous television appearances, newspaper articles and in his films. The only possibly new aspect was his stress on “enlightened conservatism,” which jibes with United Russia’s vaguely formulated ideology that is supposed be based on “conservative values” and “conservative modernization.”
The manifesto comes several days after the Russian Union of Rights Holders — under the aegis of the Cinematographers’ Union, which Mikhalkov heads — won the right to collect 1 percent fees from electronic devices and blank media for redistribution among rights holders — a business estimated to be worth $100 million a year.
What type of government and civil society does Mikhalkov view as ideal for Russia? To become a “geopolitical and spiritual center of the world,” Russia needs to follow its own, unique blend of enlightened conservatism. After all, “we are no Honduras,” he reminded us.
It was comforting that Mikhalkov did not mention among his inspirations Count Sergei Uvarov, who is most famous for his ideological formula “Orthodoxy, Autocracy and Nationality.” Nonetheless, Mikhalkov does include pre-revolutionary conservative, monarchist thinkers Konstantin Pobedonostsev and Konstantin Leontyev, as well as 20th-century conservative thinkers Pyotr Struve, Nikolai Berdyayev and Ivan Ilyin.
Considering Mikhalkov’s stances, these choices are not surprising, but it is important to clarify which of the philosophers’ theses Mikhalkov would like to prescribe for Russia’s future enlightened conservatism.
For example, Pobedonostsev fiercely criticized the Russian judicial system at the end of the 19th century. “When the courts are separate from the state (in our grief this has already been done), it becomes a tool of the ruling party. … A united authority is Russia’s only guarantee of truth. …  [In the West,] there are lies, fatal lies for Russia.” If Mikhalkov is suggesting that we follow Pobedonostsev’s legal and judicial conceptions, it will be quite difficult, to say the least, to create an honest and independent court system that follows the law rather than simply obeying the Kremlin’s instructions.
Leontyev opposed not only political liberalism, but also technological progress, including railways. This is also a questionable ideological foundation for advancing Russia’s modernization agenda.
Mikhalkov’s choice of Ilyin is also disturbing. At the beginning of the 1930s, while in exile in Europe, he was not devoid of certain Nazi sympathies.  
Above all, it is not clear what exact kind of conservatism Mikhalkov prescribes to “modernize” Russia: Orthodox, monarchial or Soviet? If he meant Soviet, this is hardly inspiring, particularly considering the stagnation and deep economic degradation of the 1970s and 1980s.
Mikhalkov believes that Russians should obey the law not because they fear punishment, but because they understand the intrinsic fairness of the law — both secular and religious. Who would oppose the argument that it is better to be law-abiding than nihilistic?
The big question, of course, is how to achieve law-abidingness. Unfortunately, Mikhalkov does not answer this question. He only insists that the state must play a strong and dominant role in society.
To be sure, Russians, too, have an important role to play in building enlightened conservatism: They are assigned the role of practicing “loyalty, obeying authoritative power and respecting rank.” A peaceful union between citizens and the state is best achieved, we are told,  through “civil and church obedience, not administrative coercion.”
The construction of a constitutional monarchy has a special place in the manifesto. Strengthening the federal vertical power structure must occur alongside the strengthening of local and regional power structures. This thesis, however, goes against 19th and 20th century Russian history, when Moscow consistently viewed local power bases as “fifth wheels.”
Throughout his career as a director and a de facto political and ideological mouthpiece for the Kremlin, Mikhalkov has truly embodied one of goals in his manifesto: “to create an atmosphere of power, to produce and distribute virtual myths that will provide an identity for the nation, individual and state.”

This comment appeared as an editorial in Vedomosti.

TITLE: Bridging the Population Gap
TEXT: Dear Editor,

Until relatively recently, discussions of the possible partitioning of Russia into independent enclaves or even states have been considered unpatriotic and frowned upon. Nevertheless, 20 years after the collapse of the USSR, discussions of such issues have become increasingly widespread and open. The real issue is whether or not a state that occupies 10 percent of the world’s total land territory and owns 25 to 30 percent of the world’s natural resources can remain inviolable with just 2.5 percent of the Earth’s population. And in this context it should be kept in mind that Russia’s population of 160 million 20 years ago has shrunk to just 141 million in 2010. That is to say that the country has been losing about 1 million citizens ever year.
The international community has been quick to respond to this development. Politicians, entrepreneurs and journalists have begun voicing their doubts as to the fairness of so few people possessing so much land that they are unable to populate, cultivate or use; consequently, a belief that the scarcely populated territories in Siberia and the Far East should be taken over by other countries.
The Russian government, concerned about this turn of events and the unfavorable demographic situation in the country, is pressing hard towards finding a solution. Three years ago, on the initiative of the government of the Russian Federation, the State Duma passed a law concerning so-called maternity capital. It is hoped this law will boost the birthrate in the country. According to that law, each family that gives birth to or adopts a second child, as well as any number of subsequent children, receives a state certificate entitling it to 343,378 rubles or $11,500 per child. A family can apply for this support when the child reaches 2.5 years of age and will receive the money when the child turns three.
This legislative novelty quickly resulted in an increase of 50,000 births during 2009 — the first birthrate increase in recent years — though the statistics were further improved by a fall in infant mortality rates during births (in 2009 it fell by 16 percent relative to the 2007 figure). 
In some regions, the birthrate went up by between 1 percent and 5 percent. Sociologists have been quick to dub this a baby boom. For instance, in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast, where the birthrate has increased by 5 percent, 10,893 maternity capital certificates were issued during the first six months of 2010, giving an increase of 1,366 for the year.
The maternity capital can be used in three ways. Families can spend it on the improvement of their living conditions, on the children’s education or they can add it to the cumulative portion of the retirement benefits of each woman who gave birth to or adopted a second child or further children after January 1, 2007.
In 2010, most of Russia’s recipients of maternity capital certificates preferred to spend the money on purchasing homes or repaying mortgage loans. According to Alexander Zhukov, Russia’s deputy prime minister for social issues, the average weighted mortgage interest rate in rubles has now dropped to 13.4 percent and those in foreign currencies have fallen to 11 percent. 
The question now is for how long this upturn in the birthrate may continue and whether the resulting several hundred thousand newborns may be able to offset the giant losses Russia’s population suffers from the negative demographic and social developments. It is no secret that, in Russia, 100,000 children are victims of crimes annually, while 2,000 die every year. Russia has 700,000 children living outside families or homes, of whom 140,000 are orphans. Their fates are very much in doubt. Annually, 750,000 people succumb to alcoholism and addiction to drugs. Another 50,000 die in road accidents or drown. All this begs the question as to whether or not maternity capital is enough to save Russia and her dramatically shrinking population. The next few years will provide an answer to this question.
Dr. Yury Shokin,
	                   Scientist, Journalist

TITLE: Venice Film Festival Laureate Released
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The heroine of Alexei Fedorchenko’s new movie “Ovsyanki” (Silent Souls)  — a tender, subservient woman from provincial Russia — is a wordless role. Yulia Aug’s character, Tatyana, does not utter a single word throughout the 75-minute movie, which was an instant success at the Venice Film Festival earlier this year, where it won an International Film Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) Prize.
“Ovsyanki,” which has since received other awards, including the best feature film award at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, was released in Russia late last month and has been playing at St. Petersburg’s Khudozhestvenny cinema for a week to full houses.
Technically speaking, the film tells the story of a funeral, but in fact, the film depicts a man’s grief over the loss of his beloved wife. At the start of the film, Miron Alexeyevich (Yury Tsurilo), the director of a paper factory in the tiny town of Neya in central Russia, discovers that his wife, Tatyana, has died during the night. He asks his friend Aist (Igor Sergeyev), who works as a photographer at the factory, to help him with the preparations for her funeral. Together, they wash Tanya’s body, wrap her in a woolen blanket and drive to the banks of the Oka River, where the couple once enjoyed their honeymoon, and where they now burn Tanya’s body.
Aug, Tsurilo and Sergeyev are all St. Petersburg actors.
The cause of death of the middle-aged woman is never disclosed and is apparently not essential to the plot. Fedorchenko’s film is not a thriller or suspense drama. It is showing at cinemas with the subtitle “erotic drama,” though it offers barely any graphic sexual episodes. The erotic element is rendered mostly verbally, and in an eerie way, as Miron recounts his adventurous love life with Aist as he drives to the funeral.
“Tanya was very obedient; all her three holes were usable, and it was me who taught her everything,” the man recalls with sadness as he transports his deceased wife’s body in the back of his car. 
In the final scene of the film, Miron is driving back home. By accident, a birdcage containing two birds that Aist has bought — Ovsyanki (yellowhammers) — comes open and the birds fly out, blocking the driver’s view while the car is crossing a bridge. In an instant, the car carrying the two men disappears under the water.
While Miron’s passion for his wife is discussed and illustrated sparsely throughout the movie, Tanya’s feelings for him are mentioned only once — in passing and in a disturbing way. “Some people were saying that Tanya never really loved him, but Miron would not talk about it,” Aist thinks to himself as he listens to Miron’s lament. In the film, Tanya is alive only as a memory, when Miron relives various episodes from their past in his mind’s eye. And even in the scenes when she is alive, she does not talk. The woman simply obeys her husband’s wishes.
In an interview after the St. Petersburg premiere of the film, Aug delivered a surprising statement: That the issue of Tanya’s feelings for her husband are a secondary issue, and not simply because by the start of the movie the heroine has already been dead for several hours.
“It is no accident that Tanya remains speechless in the film,” Aug said. “In an earlier version of the script she had a speaking role, and there were dia­logue scenes for her. But the thing is that any dialogue would make her a real character, which is what we sought to avoid. Any speech would have both made her real and killed the message. This woman is surreal, and she is ageless, eternal, like the river that claims the lives of Miron and Aist. At one point, people might begin to wonder if the woman was in fact nothing more than Miron’s dream.”
This art-house film, based on Denis Osokin’s novel of the same name, has a substantial ethnographic element to it, as it skillfully blends an array of rituals and legends of the people of Neya and touches on the subject of a nation that exists on the brink of extinction — one of Russia’s most ailing issues.
It is remarkable that wherever the film has played, from Europe to the Middle East, many spectators tend to see it as a universal story, despite the strong dose of folklore, mythology and ethnography in it. A Catalonian cameraman who saw the film in Venice told the crew he felt the story was really about Catalonian people, Fedorchenko recalled.
“It is a genuine love poem,” said Tatyana Smirnova, an audience member, after the premiere in Khudozhestvenny movie theater on Oct. 25.
“Even in Abu Dhabi, most members of the audiences found the subject very touching,” Aug said. “There were a dozen or so religious people who left during the erotic scenes, but they left quietly, and it was not a demonstration of protest.”
After the screening in Venice, the renowned filmmaker Quentin Tarantino, the chairman of the jury, gave the movie a standing ovation and praised the film. “This is a truly poetic work, and all three actors in the main roles are truly tireless,” Tarantino told reporters in Venice.
Actor Igor Sergeyev said that for him, the film’s most precious element was the sense of admiration for a beloved woman that “Ovsyanki” radiates. “In our country, we seem to have totally lost this culture of admiring our loved ones’ bodies,” he said. “Many people tend to find it shameful, perverted or at the very least embarrassing. This film shows what sex can become when it is about love.”

TITLE: Cultural Exchange Showcases Perm City
AUTHOR: By Lyudmila Tsubiks
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: St. Petersburg is preparing to welcome an influx of musicians, dancers and actors from the city of Perm this weekend as part of the Cultural Alliance project between the two cities.
The Days of Culture of Perm in St. Petersburg will see a host of diverse exhibitions and theatrical performances as Perm artists present their works through November and December. 
All the performances and exhibitions being brought to St. Petersburg have appeared in Perm in the last two years, and many of them have won national awards. 
The festival opens Saturday at Tkachi creative space with a video-art project titled “Vision,” consisting of a collection of works by artists from different countries first shown at the Permm Museum of Contemporary Art. Permm, the brainchild of Marat Gelman, the owner and director of several galleries, will also present a photo collection titled “Portrait of an Unknown,” and several other exhibitions. Gelman is the driving force behind the Cultural Alliance project.
The festival’s theatrical program promises novelty for even the most experienced theater-goers in St. Petersburg. The Perm Academic Opera and Ballet Theater will perform two operas at the Mikhailovsky Theater, including “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich,” an opera written by Alexander Chaikovsky based on the eponymous novel by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. The opera’s premiere in May last year was attended by Solzhenitsyn’s widow. The second opera, Anton Rubinstein’s “Christ,” will be shown on stage for the first time in Russia after Anton Sharoyev, a conductor and great-grandson of the composer, found the score of the opera in the Berlin Library.
Perm Art Gallery and the Perm Development Center of Design are also participating in the project with displays including “I love P” and a collection of paintings by Pyotr Subbotin-Permyak, a well-known avant-garde artist. 
In total, more than eight city spaces will host the festival’s events, including the Krasnoye Znamya factory, Tkachi creative space, New Museum and the State Russian Museum. Theater performances will take place at the Mikhailovsky Theater, on the old stage of the Youth Theater, in the Baltiisky Dom theater and at the St. Petersburg Philharmonic. 
The invasion by Perm’s finest cultural figures is the response to a pilgrimage by St. Petersburg artists, who took their cultural offerings to Perm earlier this year to take part in the Live Perm summer art festival. They are set to head east once again to take part in the White Nights in Perm project, which is due to open next summer.

TITLE: Baghdad Church Siege Ends With 52 Dead
AUTHOR: By Barbara Surk and Hamid Ahmed
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BAGHDAD — Iraqi security forces stormed a Baghdad church where militants had taken an entire congregation hostage for four hours, leaving at least 52 people dead, including a priest, Iraqi officials said Monday.
It was not immediately clear whether the hostages died at the hands of the attackers or during the rescue late on Sunday night in an affluent neighborhood of the capital.
The incident began when militants wearing suicide vests and armed with grenades attacked the Iraqi stock exchange at dusk Sunday before turning their attention to the nearby Our Lady of Deliverance church — one of Baghdad’s main Catholic places of worship — taking about 120 Christians hostage.
Major General Hussein Ali Kamal, the deputy interior minister, said 52 people were killed and 67 wounded in the bloodbath. Officials said at least one priest and 10 policemen were among the dead. Many of the wounded were women.
A Christian member of parliament on Monday described the Iraqi rescue operation as “not professional,” saying, “it was a hasty action that prompted the terrorists to kill the worshippers.”
“We have no clear picture yet whether the worshippers were killed by the security forces’ bullets or by terrorists, but what we know is that most of them were killed when the security forces started to storm the church,” Younadem Kana said.
Video footage from an American drone that was overhead during the attack showed a black plume of smoke followed by flashes from inside the building before what appears to be soldiers going in. U.S. forces often supply air support to Iraqi forces conducting operations on the ground, feeding them video footage of what American drones see from the air.
The casualty information was confirmed by police and officials at hospitals where the dead and wounded were taken.
There were conflicting accounts about the number of attackers involved in the assault, with Baghdad military spokesman Major General Qassim al-Moussawi saying Sunday night that security forces killed eight, while the U.S. military said between five and seven died. Two police officers on the scene said only three attackers were killed and another seven arrested afterward.
Outside the Syrian Catholic church Monday morning, Raed Hadi leaned against his car on top of which rested a casket holding the body of his cousin, who was killed in the siege. Hadi was waiting for the police to let him onto the church grounds to bury his relative. He railed against Iraqi authorities.
“It was a massacre in there and now they are cleaning it up,” said Raed. “We Christians don’t have enough protection. ... What shall I do now? Leave and ask for asylum?”
Police pushed back onlookers from around the church by erecting a barbed wire fence but residents and people from the Christian community claimed that it was too little, too late.
A cryptically worded statement posted late Sunday on a militant website allegedly by the Islamic State of Iraq appeared to claim responsibility for the attack. The group, which is linked to al-Qaeda in Iraq, said it would “exterminate Iraqi Christians” if Muslim women in Egypt were not freed.
It specifically mentioned two women in Egypt whom extremists maintain have converted to Islam and are being held against their will in Egypt. The two are wives of priests and are believed to have converted to Islam to leave their husbands since divorce is banned by Egypt’s Coptic Church. One woman disappeared in 2004 and another in July.
Egypt’s Christians had maintained they were kidnapped and staged rallies for their release. Both were later recovered by police, denied any conversions and were then spirited away to distant monasteries.
In the message, the militants claim the two are still Muslim and called upon the Vatican, which held a meeting earlier in October to discuss the fate of Christians in the Middle East, to release the women.
“We direct our speech to the Vatican and say that as you met with Christians of the Mideast a few days ago to support them and back them, now you have to pressure them to release our sisters, otherwise death will reach you all,” the message said. 
Iraqi Christians, who have been frequent targets for Sunni insurgents, have left in droves since the 2003 U.S.-led war. Catholics represented 2.89 percent of the population in 1980; by 2008 they were just 0.89 percent. 
One Iraqi man who identified himself only as Abu Sami, said his wife was inside the church during the attack. Although she was unharmed, he said he feared that the church siege signaled a new round of violence by militants against Iraq’s Christian community.

TITLE: Indonesian Volcano Blasts, 21 More Rumble
AUTHOR: By Slamet Riyadi
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOUNT MERAPI, Indonesia — Evacuees cringed and fled for cover Monday as an erupting volcano — one of 22 showing increased activity in Indonesia — let loose booming explosions of hot gas and debris in its most powerful blast in a deadly week. No new casualties were reported.
The new blast from Mount Merapi came as Indonesia also struggles to respond to an earthquake-generated tsunami that devastated the remote chain of islands. The twin disasters, unfolding simultaneously on opposite ends of the seismically volatile country, have killed nearly 500 people and severely tested the government’s emergency response network. In both events, the military has been called in to help.
One of 129 active volcanoes in Indonesia, Merapi has killed 38 since it started erupting a week ago.
Even in the crowded government camps miles (kilometers) away, people still instinctively ran for shelter at the power of Monday’s eruption, which was accompanied by several deafening explosions, said Subrandrio, an official in charge of monitoring Merapi’s activity. About 69,000 villagers have been evacuated from the area around its once-fertile slopes — now blanketed by gray ash — in central Java, 400 kilometers east of Jakarta, the capital.
As massive clouds spilled from the glowing cauldron and billowed into the air — continuing for nearly three hours after the blast — debris and ash cascaded nearly four miles (six kilometers) down the southeastern slopes, Subrandrio said.
Merapi has erupted many times in the last two centuries, often with deadly results. In 1994, 60 people were killed, while in 1930, more than a dozen villages were incinerated, leaving up to 1,300 dead.
More than 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) to the west, meanwhile, a C-130 transport plane, six helicopters and four motorized boats were ferrying aid ato the most distant corners of the Mentawai Islands, where last week’s tsunami destroyed hundreds of homes, schools, churches and mosques.
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said relief efforts must be sped up, expressing dismay that it took days for aid to reach the isolated islands, though he acknowledged that violent storms have previously prevented most planes, helicopters and boats from operating.
The tsunami death toll had reached 450 by Monday, said Nelis Zuliastri from the National Disaster Management Agency, with the number of missing now less than 100.
Indonesia, a vast archipelago of 235 million people, straddles a series of fault lines and volcanoes known as the Pacific “Ring of Fire.”
The fault line that caused last week’s 7.7-magnitude earthquake and killer wave that followed — and also the 2004 tsunami that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries — is the meeting point of the Eurasian and Pacific tectonic plates that have been pushing against and under each other for millions of years, causing huge stresses to build up. It runs the length of the west coast of Sumatra island.
Both earthquakes and volcanoes can be related to movements in the overlapping plates that form the earth’s crust. As plates slide against or under each other, molten rock from the layer of mantle can break the surface via a volcano, or create energy released in an earthquake.
The government has raised alert levels of 21 other volcanoes to the second- and third- highest levels in the last two months because they have shown an increase in activity, said Syamsul Rizal, a state volcanologist, on Monday.

TITLE: Yemen’s Al-Qaeda Seeking Westerners
AUTHOR: By Hamza Hendawi
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: SAN’A, Yemen — Al-Qaeda in Yemen, suspected in a thwarted mail-bombing attempt, appears to be aggressively seeking to recruit American and European radicals who could provide an entryway for the group to carry out attacks in their homelands.
Yemen provides a potentially easy entry point for foreign radicals to link up with al-Qaeda, with a number of popular Islamic religious and Arabic-language schools that attract students from around the world.
Already there has been at least one confirmed case — the young Nigerian student Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab allegedly used a San’a language school as a cover to enter the country and meet with al-Qaeda militants for training, before he made a botched attempt to blow up an American passenger jet on Christmas Day.
Since then, Yemeni forces have cracked down, arresting a dozen Americans and an assortment of Europeans on suspicion of contacts with al-Qaeda.
Evidence that those arrested actually contacted al-Qaeda is sketchy, and some were likely caught up in the intensified Yemeni search. Two of the arrested Americans have since been deported and an unspecified number have been released, Yemeni security officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk about the cases.
But concern is high over the potential for al-Qaeda’s affiliate in this country to recruit militants with American or European passports. Among the senior figures in the group is the U.S.-born radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, whose English-language sermons advocating jihad, or holy war, against the United States have inspired a number of Western-born militants.
Al-Awlaki, whom the U.S. has put on a list of militants to kill or capture, was in e-mail contact with the army psychiatrist accused of last year’s deadly shooting spree at the Fort Hood, Texas military base. U.S. investigators say he also helped prepare Abdulmutallab for his failed attempt to bomb the Detroit-bound airliner.
The group has also issued an English-language web magazine called Inspire. In its second issue, posted in October, a young American militant, Samir Khan — believed to be the magazine’s producer — boasted how he had moved to Yemen from his home in North Carolina and joined al-Qaeda’s fighters, pledging to “wage jihad for the rest of our lives.”
Another American, Sharif Mobley — a 26-year-old from New Jersey of Somali descent — went on trial last week for killing a Yemeni soldier during an escape attempt in March. Mobley had been arrested originally for suspected links to al-Qaeda, and while being treated in a hospital, he reportedly convinced a guard to unshackle him, then grabbed a guard’s gun and opened fire.
In June, a German national was said by the government to be among four detained in connection with a failed suicide bombing targeting the British ambassador two months earlier.

TITLE: China Begins Biggest Census
AUTHOR: By Chi-Chi Zhang
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BEIJING — China kicked off a once-a-decade census Monday, a whirlwind 10-day head count that sees 6 million census takers scrutinize apartment blocks, scour migrant areas and scan rural villages to document massive demographic changes in the world’s most populous country.
And they aim to count every person.
The 2000 tally put China’s official population at 1.295 billion people, but missed migrant workers living in cities for less than six months. In the 10 years since, there has been an extensive shift in the population base as tens of millions of migrant workers have poured into urban areas looking for work.
“Wherever you are living from Nov. 1 to Nov. 10, you will be counted,” said Zhang Xueyuan, director of the publicity for the Beijing census committee.
It is the sixth time China has carried out a national census, but the first time it will count people where they live and not where their resident certificate is legally registered. The change will better track the demographic changes and find the true size of China’s giant cities.