SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times DATE: Issue #1709 (20), Wednesday, May 23, 2012 ************************************************************************** TITLE: Tensions Rise as Opposition Leaders are Freed AUTHOR: Natalya Krainova and Jonathan Earle PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Two of the opposition’s most popular leaders emerged from prison Thursday, vowing to ratchet up street demonstrations while a rare, dramatic standoff erupted at a State Duma hearing over a bill that would significantly raise fines for illegal protests. Sergei Udaltsov and Alexei Navalny, who have electrified the opposition in recent months, struck a defiant tone after 15 days in prison, assuring cheering supporters of eventual victory and announcing vague plans for the future of the protest movement. “They won’t scare us with iron beds and government porridge. If we have to go to prison two more times or 22 more times, we’ll do it,” Navalny said, adding that he would take part in the next large rally, scheduled for June 12. Both congratulated opposition activists, who have maintained a small, roving protest camp despite frequent police raids since shortly after Vladimir Putin’s inauguration on May 7. The two also announced plans for scaling up the protests. Navalny called for activists to prepare for nationwide demonstrations in the beginning of September, while Udaltsov said protesters should stage a continuous protest outside the White House. Their release came hours before a group of opposition leaders stormed out of an “open forum” debate in a State Duma hearing on Thursday over a proposed bill to increase fines to tens of thousands of dollars for staging and taking part in illegal protests. The bill narrowly passed the first round on Tuesday and is slated for a second — and possibly a final — reading on June 5. The group left to protest not being given the floor for about 90 minutes, while pundits and lawmakers loyal to the Kremlin were allowed to defend the fines and even went so far as to accuse the opposition of attempting to mount a coup d’etat. “There is a monologue that for some reason authorities view as a dialogue,” noted socialite and prominent anti-government protester, Ksenia Sobchak, said after marching out of the event. “Although there are [opposition-minded] people who are open to discussion and have come here, all we see is a pack of pundits muttering that opposition is always to blame for everything and citing conspiracy theories,” she said. Sobchak was joined in the walkout by environmentalists Yevgenia Chirikova, Oleg Mitvol, blogger Marina Litvinovich, rally organizer Alyona Popova and A Just Russia Duma Deputy Dmitry Gudkov. They were followed later by opposition politicians Irina Khakamada, Yabloko party leader Sergei Mitrokhin, Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov and Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky. Gudkov complained that it was “wrong” that he wasn’t given the floor “as a participant, while various journalists took the floor.” He was later given a chance to speak at the end of the discussion after most participants and journalists had left. “It is impossible to stop the protests by force, but only through dialogue and reforms,” Gudkov told the round-table group. “It is absolutely clear that when there are no reforms and no dialogue, the protest will radicalize. This is not a threat, this is the way life is,” he added. Gudkov said his party planned to “shower the bill with amendments” in order to delay its passing “for weeks.” Following the walkout, political analyst Sergei Chernyakhovsky told the round table that “there can be no dialogue by 80 percent [of the population] with 10 percent [of it.]” “We have to see why they are doing this,” Chernyakhovsky said of the opposition rallies’ organizers. “Their goal is a coup d’etat.” Oleg Morozov, the senior United Russia Duma deputy who presided over the event, said at the end of the discussion — some 40 minutes after the walkout — that the opposition “shouldn’t have left” because they “would have had a chance to speak.” He defended the order of speakers, citing “traditions” and the need for some participants to leave early. Current fines for illegal protests are 2,000 rubles ($65) for participants and 5,000 rubles for organizers. The proposed changes, as they stand, would raise the fine for participants to 1 million rubles ($32,400) and 1.5 million rubles for organizers. Morozov and United Russia Deputy Vladimir Pligin, who are both preparing the bill for the second reading, said the proposed fines would have to be reduced from the amounts spelled out in the current draft of the bill. Morozov said the current figures were “excessive” but said the fines for illegal protests should be “felt” and “mustn’t be laughable.” Udaltsov and Navalny had been detained and released multiple times during several days of protests before and after President Vladimir Putin’s May 7 inauguration. The two were sentenced to 15 days in jail each after being arrested on the night of May 8-9 during one of the so-called “people’s strolls” and charged with disobeying police orders. Another opposition leader, Solidarity’s Ilya Yashin, is scheduled to be released from prison on May 27 after having served a 10-day term. Udaltsov was released shortly after midnight and Navalny about 10 hours later. After his release, Udaltsov set out for the current location of the roving protest camp, near a statue of Soviet-era bard Bulat Okudzhava on the Arbat, the epicenter of perestroika-era counterculture, where he spoke with those gathered there. But storm clouds appeared to be gathering over both the men, with fresh official inquiries pending into both their activities that supporters say are politically motivated. On Friday, Udaltsov is scheduled to appear in court in Ulyanovsk, where a pro-Kremlin youth activist has accused him of assaulting her during a rally in April. He denies the charges. Navalny’s financing is facing a probe by the FSB and Federal Financial Monitoring Service after a United Russia Duma deputy charged that he might be accepting laundered money sent to the several Yandex.Money accounts he uses to drive his anti-corruption projects. TITLE: Vkontakte Founder Throws Paper Planes With Money Out Window PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Founder of social media site Vkontakte Pavel Durov and colleagues threw paper airplanes with 5,000-ruble notes ($155) out the window of their St. Petersburg office, causing chaos among revelers celebrating the city's 309th birthday Sunday. Bloggers described the event online: "Just now Durov was throwing 5,000-ruble notes out the window and was recording how people jumped on the money, pressing on each other and beating each other," Ekaterina Abramova wrote on Vkontake. "This is disgusting. They threw out about 10 bills. People came out of the crowd with broken noses, were climbing on traffic lights and behaving like monkeys. Durov had a good laugh. Shame on you, Pavel," Abramova wrote. Other bloggers posted pictures of the event showing airplanes sailing out of the ornately decorated window of the iconic Singer building in which Durov's office is located. Durov explained the situation on his Twitter account. "My colleagues and I decided to support the holiday atmosphere with a little event, but we had to stop quickly — people started to behave like animals," Durov wrote. TITLE: Bosch Plans to Expand Auto Plant in Saratov PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Bosch is planning to localize more auto parts assembly lines in Russia following a profitable year during which the technology supplier saw its sales in the country jump 50 percent to almost 1 billion euros ($1.2 billion), the company reported. The announcement about the expansion of Bosch's Saratov plant comes just a few years after the company had to cancel its plans to build a second auto production site in Russia due to the economic crisis. Localization efforts will include building assembly lines for generators, starters, accelerators, oxygen sensors and electronic brake systems over 2013 and 2014 in Saratov. Diesel technologies will also be produced in Russia after 2014, but the location of the assembly is still not determined. Walter Schopf, regional director for automobile component sales, could not say how much the expansion would cost or how many jobs would be created, but he estimated that sales will more than double after the final stage of expansion is complete. Localization will help Bosch accommodate the Russian automakers' habit of making last-minute decisions about their own production lines, Schopf said. "Our Russian customers are still planning on a very short-time basis, and sometimes products are already on the road when our customer decides that he wants to delay something or that he wants to shift from one product mix to another product mix," he said. Schopf did not rule out that Bosch will build another auto parts plant in Russia and said the company is considering locations close to its existing clusters in Saratov, St. Petersburg and the Volga region. The company currently has three production locations and has invested 46 million euros in its regional network in 2011, 50 percent more than in 2010. TITLE: Village Grannies Make It to Eurovision Finals PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Russia's group Buranovskiye Babushki has made it into the finals of the Eurovision Song Contest in Azerbaijan, bringing the elderly folk singers from a far-off Russian village to the attention of more than 100 million viewers around the world. The Buranovskiye Babushki, or Buranovo Grannies, won the right to contend in the finals with their song Party for Everybody, whose title is sung in English as the song transitions from a traditional village song to an upbeat disco tune. They competed against Iceland, Hungary, Greece, and others in the semifinal round. In the final round, the group will face the U.K., Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Azerbaijan, and the victors of the next semifinals, scheduled for Thursday. The competition between the 20 finalists will be held Saturday. The women, all above the age of 70, come from a village in the Udmurtia republic and have endeared themselves to the country with their mix of traditional singing in Russian and Udmurt with international music hits. They first tried out to represent Russia in 2010, but didn't win until this year, beating out previous Eurovision winner Dima Bilan and tattooed rapper Timati to become Russia's choice for the contest. Last year, Eurovision's winners were Azerbaijan duet Ell & Nikki, while Russia's entry Alexei Vorobyov finished 16th overall. The contest, which pits representatives of European countries against each other in musical competition, has been held every year since 1956 and is one of the longest running television specials in the world. TITLE: More Public Figures Accused of Flouting Road Rules PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: In the wake of President Vladimir Putin’s order to cut the number of public officials entitled to use flashing lights to skirt through traffic, several incidents of alleged abuse involving high-profile figures have come to light. On Thursday, the son of Russia’s ombudsman for children failed to appear in court over his refusal to take a Breathalyzer test after getting into a minor fender-bender in April. The case comes after years of public rancor over officials’ abuse of driving privileges. Anton Astakhov’s father, Pavel Astakhov, a well-known lawyer and an outspoken advocate for young people’s rights as Russia’s ombudsman for children, said he recommends that his clients avoid police alcohol tests and ask for independent testing instead. “Not everything that is done immediately is always honest,” he told RIA-Novosti. But he said that if his son is guilty, he should be punished. The case comes on the heels of an incident in which a car carrying a top manager of Gazprombank struck a 2-year-old child in the Moscow region in April. Bloggers accused the Gazprombank official, Alexander Schmidt, of ordering the driver to leave before seeing whether the boy was OK. Media reports said the boy suffered injuries to his kidney. Schmidt denies that his car struck the child, telling Rossia-1 that the boy simply fell in front of the vehicle. He also denies ordering his driver to leave. Last week, a two-car motorcade — a BMW and a pricey Maibach — carrying Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party, was caught on video driving the wrong way on Tverskoi Bulvar. An LDPR party spokesperson confirmed to Life News that one of the cars, a BMW, belonged to Zhirinovsky, but said the Maibach had “nothing to do” with the party. The public backlash against bureaucrats and politicians violating traffic rules in cars equipped with flashing blue lights has prompted President Vladimir Putin to cut the number of officials entitled to have them in half. But activist Alexei Dozorov of the Blue Buckets group said Putin’s order was insignificant, since it doesn’t specify the number of cars involved. He also said that even without the flashing lights, officials’ cars often violate traffic rules with impunity. “Police don’t stop them, so they violate the rules even more than the cars with flashing lights,” he said, citing the incident involving Zhirinovsky’s cars as an example. TITLE: Tabloid: Superjet Downed by U.S. Industrial Sabotage AUTHOR: Roland Oliphant PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Russian intelligence agencies are investigating the possibility that the U.S. military may have brought down the Sukhoi Superjet that crashed in Indonesia, according to claims in a tabloid. Citing sources in the GRU, Russia's military intelligence agency, Komsomolskaya Pravda reported Thursday that interference from a U.S. air force base near Jakarta could have caused onboard equipment to go haywire, leading to the crash that killed 45 people on May 9. "We know that they have special equipment that can cut communications between an aircraft and the ground or interfere with the parameters onboard. For example, the plane is flying at one altitude, but after interference from the ground onboard equipment shows another," a GRU general told the paper. The Sukhoi Superjet 100 disappeared from radar screens on May 9 shortly after the pilot asked for permission to reduce altitude 1,800 meters — a dangerous maneuver in such a mountainous area. Its wreckage was later found on a spur of Mount Salak, a volcano that has been the site of numerous air crashes in the past. The claims follow speculation that the crash, which killed 45 people, could have been an act of industrial sabotage. "The main question is, why did the controller authorize the request to reduce altitude?" a source in Sukhoi asked Komsomolskaya Pravda. "Maybe he didn't see that the plane was heading straight at the mountain. On the other hand, we don't rule out the possibility that this was deliberate industrial sabotage to drive our aircraft from the market," a source at Sukhoi told the paper. "When the plane flew toward the mountain it should have triggered an automatic mode that would have guided it away from the obstacle," a pilot safety official at Domodedovo airport told the tabloid. "At Jakarta airport there is a U.S. Air Force base. And among our staff there is talk — couldn't a signal have been sent from that base at a particular moment to put the equipment out of order?" It is not the first time supposed American sabotage beams have been blamed for the loss of Russian equipment. Last October a former official blamed "powerful American radars" in Alaska for the loss of the Fobos Grunt space probe. The Sukhoi Superjet 100 is the first new civilian aircraft built in Russia since the Soviet collapse. The model that crashed was on a tour of Southeast Asia to drum up business for the aircraft. Industry observers have warned that the program may never recover if the investigation finds technical failure was to blame for the crash. TITLE: Ballet, Opera to Star at City’s Birthday PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: To celebrate its 309th birthday, St. Petersburg has decided to do something a little bit different. There will be no gaudy carnival making its way along Nevsky this year. Instead, the city authorities’ birthday gift to residents is a pair of unprecedented free concerts by world opera and ballet stars in the grounds of the Mikhailovsky Castle. At 9 p.m. on Saturday, May 26, opera singers including sopranos Hibla Gerzmava and Maria Guleghina and tenor Vladimir Galouzine will take to a stage erected around the steps of the castle especially for the event. The next evening, leading lights of the ballet world, including the city’s own Boris Eifman Ballet Theater, will perform a gala concert including excerpts from the cutting-edge choreographer’s ballets “Anna Karenina,” “Don Quixote” and the troupe’s latest production, “Rodin.” The ballet show will open with the Golden Ball scene from Eifman’s “Russian Hamlet,” a particularly poignant choice in light of the fact that the ballet focuses on Tsar Paul I, who built — and was murdered in — the Mikhailovsky Castle. “The gala concert will be further proof of the fact that St. Petersburg does not only lovingly preserve the artistic legacy of the past, but also creates an original ballet repertoire that sees global success and demand,” said Eifman. Joining the homegrown dance talent will be international soloists who have all performed at one time or other in the Dance Open festival, the city’s annual dance extravaganza. City residents will have an extremely rare chance to marvel at performances by the Bolshoi Ballet’s Nikolai Tsiskaridze and Ilze Liepa, English National Ballet’s Yonah Acosta, Staatsoper Berlin’s Dinu Tamazlakaru and many others — for free. “The Fontanka embankment, Summer Garden, Mikhailovsky Gardens and façade of the Engineers’ [Mikhailovsky] Castle are the finest backdrop for any performance or concert,” said Dmitry Meskhiyev, head of City Hall’s Culture Committee. TITLE: Ballet, Opera to Star at City’s Birthday PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: To celebrate its 309th birthday, St. Petersburg has decided to do something a little bit different. There will be no gaudy carnival making its way along Nevsky this year. Instead, the city authorities’ birthday gift to residents is a pair of unprecedented free concerts by world opera and ballet stars in the grounds of the Mikhailovsky Castle. At 9 p.m. on Saturday, May 26, opera singers including sopranos Hibla Gerzmava and Maria Guleghina and tenor Vladimir Galouzine will take to a stage erected around the steps of the castle especially for the event. The next evening, leading lights of the ballet world, including the city’s own Boris Eifman Ballet Theater, will perform a gala concert including excerpts from the cutting-edge choreographer’s ballets “Anna Karenina,” “Don Quixote” and the troupe’s latest production, “Rodin.” The ballet show will open with the Golden Ball scene from Eifman’s “Russian Hamlet,” a particularly poignant choice in light of the fact that the ballet focuses on Tsar Paul I, who built — and was murdered in — the Mikhailovsky Castle. “The gala concert will be further proof of the fact that St. Petersburg does not only lovingly preserve the artistic legacy of the past, but also creates an original ballet repertoire that sees global success and demand,” said Eifman. Joining the homegrown dance talent will be international soloists who have all performed at one time or other in the Dance Open festival, the city’s annual dance extravaganza. City residents will have an extremely rare chance to marvel at performances by the Bolshoi Ballet’s Nikolai Tsiskaridze and Ilze Liepa, English National Ballet’s Yonah Acosta, Staatsoper Berlin’s Dinu Tamazlakaru and many others — for free. “The Fontanka embankment, Summer Garden, Mikhailovsky Gardens and façade of the Engineers’ [Mikhailovsky] Castle are the finest backdrop for any performance or concert,” said Dmitry Meskhiyev, head of City Hall’s Culture Committee. TITLE: City Assists Soaring Diabetic Population AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: As Russia faces what experts describe as a hidden diabetes pandemic, St. Petersburg has opened six education centers aimed at helping diabetics to live a full and happy life, despite their condition. With 3.5 million people officially diagnosed with diabetes, the country is among the top ten countries in the world for the highest numbers of diabetes sufferers per capita. The centers are part of a joint project between the city’s health care institutions and the Swiss pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly. Similar centers have already opened in 33 Russian towns and cities. The project’s ideologists call it “managing illness” and argue that a patient can be successfully taught important self-help and prevention techniques. “The food that you eat, the lifestyle that you maintain, the hours that you sleep, what sort of sports you do — it all makes a vital contribution,” said Natalya Zhavoronkova, head of the St. Petersburg Diabetes Center No. 4. “The new centers will become an integral part of the state medical treatment scheme. For instance, after a routine visit to their local endocrinologist, a patient will be directed to their nearest education center, where they can receive specific lifestyle, diet or prevention advice.” The centers will operate four days a week. A detailed schedule is available from local general practice clinics. As Irina Karpova, St. Petersburg’s chief diabetes specialist and head of the city’s center for diabetes research, points out, although the number of people affected by the disease is rising steadily, many patients do not take their condition seriously enough. “Diabetes is a very serious chronic illness that can completely ruin a person’s body if patients do not learn how to support themselves, because they will develop complications affecting their eyesight, heart, kidneys and blood circulation,” Karpova said. “The good news, however, is that if sufferers learn how to take control, they can live like healthy people and avoid all these horrors.” As Karpova noted, during the first stages of diabetes, the illness is not very easy to detect. The symptoms — fatigue, weakness, weight loss and irritability — are often attributed to general stress, and people are in no rush to get checked. “Too many people are overworked and tired, and they do not have much trust in doctors; as a result, quite a few patients discover that they are ill when the disease has already done a lot of damage,” she said. Independent experts argue that although official statistics refer to about 3.5 million diabetes sufferers in Russia, in reality the figure could be three times as big. This opinion is supported by large numbers of advanced cases being discovered, and by the rapidly growing number of new cases. It is expected that by 2025, Russia will have a staggering 10 million diabetics. In St. Petersburg, there are currently 111,230 people registered as having the disease. There are two types of diabetes. Type 1, usually found among juveniles and sometimes triggered by severe sudden stress, requires daily insulin injections, while type 2 diabetes is mostly discovered in people older than 50 and is generally a result of unhealthy eating patterns. Type 2 diabetes is treated with pills. Kristina, 29, who works as a PA in a large international company and asked for her surname not to be printed, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes after a frightening incident on the road in which she narrowly avoided a crash. “It was just a few weeks after I got my driver’s license and I was not very confident,” she recalled. “And there was another car speeding toward me as I was trying to make a turn…I was far too slow, and suddenly the panic got the better of me. After the car passed by, I was soaked with sweat and was vomiting like hell.” Kristina felt ill for weeks after the accident, and her constant fatigue, sweating and weight loss were attributed to stress. Neither the young woman nor her relatives thought to check for diabetes. The illness was detected by her GP when she examined her for what Kristina thought was a stomach disorder. Yelena Morozova, 61, began to experience symptoms of type 1 diabetes after she nearly drowned in the sea. She was 12 years old, and her family was vacationing at a resort on the Black Sea coast. The girl went for a long swim, and suddenly noticed that a storm was brewing. Frightened, she headed toward the shore but was scared that she was too far away to reach it. “When I finally reached the shore, I was exhausted and my heart was pumping,” she said. “I could barely walk.” In the weeks that followed, Morozova felt weak and dizzy, and was losing weight. “When I got back to school in September, I fainted during class, but even then nobody thought that it might be diabetes. It was discovered by sheer chance by a friend of my parents’ friend, who was a doctor. We were visiting them at their dacha, and the doctor recognized the illness — which was already at a very advanced stage — just by looking at me. She had a hunch, and the tests proved her right.” Diabetes centers are located at: 1. City clinic no. 77. 261 Prospekt Obukhovskoi Oborony 2. City clinic no. 17. 56/1 Novocherkassky Prospekt 3. City clinic no. 86. 8/1 Ulitsa Sofii Kovalevskoi 4. City clinic no. 117. 5/1 Ulitsa Simonova 5. NovoVita Center 33/2 Grazhdansky Prospekt 6. Diagnostics and Consultancy Center no. 85. 29/4 Ulitsa Leni Golikova TITLE: Aquabus Public Transport Season to Open AUTHOR: By Dmitry Ivanov PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: The city’s public water transport system is to launch the new navigation season for its aquabuses on Tuesday, May 29, the city’s Transport and Transit Policy Committee announced on its website. A total of 20 moorings with distinctive yellow roofs are being installed along the routes. The moorings include information displays in Russian and English. The three inner-city lines will connect Rybatskaya metro station and Sverdlovskaya embankment (Nevskaya line), Sverdlovskaya embankment and Universitetskaya embankment (Central line); and Arsenalnaya embankment and Yelagin Island (Primorskaya line). These routes are serviced by 12-seat boats that can reach speeds of up to 60 kilometers per hour. Boats are supposed to run every 10 to 15 minutes between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. However, in previous years, aquabuses proved to be less frequent than advertized, and have also been known not to stop at every mooring along the route if they are full. Tickets cost 54 rubles ($1.70) per trip, with tickets for children aged five to 10 and for large items of luggage costing 27 rubles ($0.87). Children under five travel for free. The aquabus network also includes 120-seat boats operating between St. Petersburg’s Arsenalnaya embankment and the town of Kronstadt, which is located on the island of Kotlin in the Gulf of Finland (Kurortnaya line). These run several scheduled trips a day, at 100 rubles for full-price tickets, while discounted tickets cost half of that. A line between Kronstadt and the coastal suburb of Lomonosov was canceled last year after a bus route (no. 175) running along the St. Petersburg dam was launched. A planned line from Kronstadt to Zelenogorsk has also been put on hold, while a line between central St. Petersburg and Petrodvorets, where the former imperial estate of Peterhof is located, may be launched this year, Neva24.ru website reported, citing sources at City Hall. About 450,000 people used aquabuses in 2011, with numbers expected to rise to 500,000 or 600,000 passengers this year. Dmitry Ignatyev, a senior inspector at the city’s Transport Committee, told Delovoi Peterburg newspaper that 108 million rubles ($3.5 million) was spent to subsidize the aquabus network last year. The aquabuses will operate through the summer and into the early autumn, subject to weather conditions. TITLE: IN BRIEF TEXT: Hermitage Tops List ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — The State Hermitage Museum, State Russian Museum and Popov Central Museum of Communications topped the list of the city’s three most popular museums among St. Petersburg residents. According to a survey conducted during the city’s Museum Night, 43 percent of locals like the Hermitage most of all. The Anna Akhmatova Museum and the Kunstkamera also made it onto the list of favorites. Forty-five percent of respondents said they had visited a museum within the current month and 30 percent said they go to museums more often than they do to the cinema or theater. Half of those surveyed said they would go to museums more often if they were open until at least 10 p.m. Transit Visas to See End ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — As the city’s Pulkovo airport takes steps toward becoming an international airport hub, passengers with an international connection in Russia will soon not be required to have transit visas, Valentina Matviyenko, speaker of the Federation Council, said last week. “If St. Petersburg becomes an international hub, it is likely that the law requiring people to have transit visas will be canceled,” Matviyenko was quoted by Interfax as saying. Matviyenko said she was sure that Russia and the EU would be able to reach an agreement on simplifying the visa regime. A final report on steps to achieve a visa-free regime between Russia and the EU is expected at the end of this year. It is then expected that negotiations will be held on the cancellation of visas. Representatives from both sides say the best time to introduce the visa-free regime would be during the Olympic Games, which are to be held in Sochi in 2014. TITLE: Anti-Gay Protesters Attack Immigrants AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: An authorized International Day Against Homophobia rally held in Petrovsky Park on the Petrograd Side of the city was broken up by ultranationalists and Orthodox radicals and ended with attacks and mass beatings Thursday. A man shot at two demonstrators with a gun firing irritant fluid, and then a militant crowd smashed windows in two buses carrying Central Asian migrant workers — whom they initially mistook for departing LGBT activists — with stones and attacked those inside one of the buses when it came to a standstill. Called the Rainbow Flash Mob, the rally — which had been officially authorized by the Petrogradsky district administration — was stopped about half an hour after its start time when the police, who were present in large numbers at the scene, told the organizers that they would not be able to hold back the anti-gay protesters for long, according to the LGBT rights group Vykhod (Coming Out). Despite their massive presence, the police did not attempt to disperse an aggressive crowd that gathered near the rally site shouting homophobic slogans, firing rubber bullet and irritant guns and throwing objects. Video footage from Piter.tv shows menacing-looking young men — many with their faces hidden by medical masks or black cloth — clapping rhythmically and chanting, “We will hang and bury you!” Yevgeny Zubarev, a reporter with Piter.tv, said rubber bullets were also fired at journalists, as he was nearly hit by one. OMON riot police officers stood in a line, preventing the radicals from entering the rally, but did nothing to stop the threats being made. The anti-gay protesters, of whom there were more than 200, included Orthodox activists, nationalists and young men who resembled neo-Nazis or football hooligans. One young man, who held an offensive anti-gay sign, was wearing a scarf with the logo and name of the Young Guard, United Russia’s youth organization. The first attack occurred soon after the rally began, when a man wearing a suit and tie and glasses discharged a pistol firing irritant fluid at a woman who was holding colored balloons, and then shot at a man who rushed to help her. A video on the Piter.tv web site shows him shooting at people and shouting “Sodomy is a deadly sin” as he was being led away by a police officer. The police told the organizers to end the rally, which was scheduled to last from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., after about 30 minutes, arguing that officers would not be able to hold the crowd for long. Only two of the scheduled speakers had time to make speeches. Releasing more than 500 colored balloons into the air, the 100-plus participants left the park by bus for safety reasons. Provided by the organizers and the police, three buses left unnoticed in the opposite direction to where the counter-demonstrators were. They took passengers to the offices of Coming Out, as well as to several faraway metro stations. However, at about the same time, two other buses — which happened to be carrying Central Asian migrant workers — were driving past the site, and a group of about 60 young men and women ran after them shouting anti-gay insults, throwing stones and at least one smoke bomb at them until most of the windows were broken. Apparently they did not realize who was inside until they caught up with them as the buses slowed down on the bridge over the Zhdanovka River. Discovering that the passengers were not LGBT activists, however, did not cause them to end their attack. As the second bus stopped, having apparently mounted the curb, the attackers started to climb through the broken windows in the rear of the bus and punch those inside while at least one delivered several blows through a side window. As the attack continued, the bus passengers started to jump out from one of the front side windows and run away. The bus then managed to drive off as the attackers dispersed in the neighborhood. The police watched from a distance and did not intervene. According to LGBT activist Maria Yefremenkova, a young man and woman who were late for the rally were attacked by the same people afterwards as they were walking toward Petrovsky Park wearing rainbow paraphernalia. On Friday, the police spokesman said that the police had failed to find any of the victims of the attacks on the buses. “The bus is owned by one of the city’s enterprises, it was carrying the enterprise’s workers,” Interfax quoted him as saying. “The owner declined to file a report due to the insignificance of the damages.” The attacks went unreported on the police’s web site, where the May 17 bulletin included incidents such as a pickpocket being caught on a tram and two attempts to sell alcohol without a license. A probe has however been ordered by the St. Petersburg police chief to investigate the actions of the police during the event, the police spokesman confirmed Tuesday. The man who discharged the pistol firing irritant fluid has reportedly been charged with hooliganism and faces up to five years in prison if convicted. There has been no reaction from the city authorities, although the city’s new ombudsman, Alexander Shishlov, released a statement Friday urging the police to find the organizers and participants of the attacks and instigate criminal proceedings against them. The demo was supposed to be the first authorized LGBT rights event since the St. Petersburg law banning “the promotion of sodomy, lesbianism, bisexuality and transgenderism to minors” came into force in March. TITLE: Restored Summer Gardens Set to Open AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Kravtsova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: After two years of large-scale restoration work, the city’s historic Summer Gardens, which will reopen to the public on Monday, have been changed beyond recognition. The total cost of the work was 2.3 billion rubles ($74 million); restoration work on the sculptures and green areas were the most expensive, according to representatives of the State Russian Museum, of which the Summer Gardens are part. “The main goal was to reconstruct those items that would emphasize the regular layout of the garden and demonstrate its formal splendor,” said Sergei Renni, head of the Summer Gardens, Mikhailovsky Gardens and Green Areas department recently established within the Russian Museum. Eight fountains, four boskets, newly rebuilt structures and many new trees and bushes are among the most significant changes. All the new constructions were created from historical sketches, according to the museum, and the garden’s iconic railings have been fully restored. Four fountains are now situated on the main alley, as they were during the era of Peter the Great, when the gardens were first laid out. Another three fountains are located inside the boskets, and an eighth does not work, but is covered with a glass box set to show the development of the technology behind fountains throughout several centuries. “This will be one of the most attractive parts of the renewed Summer Gardens,” said Renni. Ninety of the 91 original sculptures have been replaced with copies made of marble aggregate and polyester. The originals have been restored and moved to the Mikhailovsky (Engineers’) Castle for permanent exhibition. The only sculpture to remain in its historic place — diagonally opposite from the Summer Palace, at the intersection of the Neva and Fontanka rivers — is an allegorical statue of the Treaty of Nystad, which was made at the request of Peter the Great to celebrate the end of the Great Northern War. The total cost of restoring the original sculptures and creating new copies of them was 700 million rubles ($22.5 million). Sable cages and a dovecote have been recreated, but will not be inhabited. “There will be no animals in the garden, except for a couple of white swans,” said Renni. Cultural and historic preservationists have, however, expressed criticism of the restored Summer Gardens. “Tourists pay money and they want to see certain things, even if they are crude imitations,” said Alexander Kobak, executive director of the Likhachev Foundation. “It is a European-wide tendency that we must resist.” “The notion of ‘restoration’ is absent in the Russian legislative system, and all restoration work is classified as ‘reconstruction’. All our efforts to change this situation have been unsuccessful for the last 20 years,” said Alexander Margolis, head of the St. Petersburg branch of the Russian Society for the Preservation of Historical and Cultural Monuments, which didn’t support the restoration plan. “Businesses actively lobby their interests through the government,” he said. “The Summer Gardens are one such example. The mentality of Russian people is based on a fundamentally pejorative attitude to the original works,” he added. Beata Nykiel, deputy director of the Research Institute of European Heritage at the International Cultural Centre in Krakow, emphasized that the problem of originals and fakes is one faced by most European countries. “We can’t rely on self-development from society,” he said. “We need to instil a sense of originality in people.” Renni acknowledged that parts of the Summer Gardens restoration project had elicited a mixed reaction. “But in our opinion, the Summer Gardens have now regained that historic formal splendor that they possessed in the past,” he said. TITLE: Norwegian Consul Found Dead PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: A deputy officer at the Norwegian Consulate in St. Petersburg was found dead in an apartment Monday morning. There was no evidence of violence having been inflicted on the man’s body, the Investigative Committee said in a statement. The statement did not identify the man by name, but according to the website of the consulate, the vice consul position is held by a man named Bjorn Are Prins, and Gazeta.ru reported Tuesday that a law enforcement source had confirmed to the publication that it was Prins’ body. The source said that a preliminary medical investigation suggested that he had died of a heart attack, but said the exact cause of death would only be known after an autopsy was carried out, Gazeta.ru reported. The Investigative Committee statement said the man found was born in 1975 and that the body was discovered in an apartment on Gorokhovaya Ulitsa. Investigators are currently conducting an inquiry into the circumstances of the man’s death, the statement said. TITLE: Officers Fail to Recognize Activists on Trial AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Prosecution witnesses gave contradicting testimonies as the trial against 12 opposition activists — dubbed “the Trial of the Twelve” — continued Tuesday. The activists, who belong to The Other Russia party, have been charged with organizing or conducting activities of the banned National Bolshevik Party (NBP). Some face up to two and others up to four years in prison. All of them deny the charges, saying they have acted legally within the Other Russia coalition and then the Other Russia party since the ban. Three of the five police officers who the prosecution brought to the Vyborgsky District Court on Tuesday failed to recognize the activists and, when they were read the activists’ names, said they did not know them. After every testimony the prosecutor asked the judge to read aloud the earlier testimonies given to the investigators in October because of “significant contradictions” to what they had said in the courtroom. Their earlier testimonies contained all the names of the defendants and accused them of being “active NBP members.” Moreover, the excerpts from the testimonies of all three officers turned out to be identical. Although their testimonies date to mid-October 2011, police officers Sergei Moshkov, Yury Nikitin and Vladimir Nikitin justified themselves by saying that they had forgotten the activists because it was “a long time ago” and they had made “very many detentions” since that time. Moshkov said he listed the names when testifying to the investigation because he was shown photographs and had been told the names of the activists by an interrogator. The policemen said they had heard the activists belonged to the NBP from their colleagues or at their weekly meetings, but failed to give the names of those officers. Each of them claimed, however, that they saw banned NBP flags at Strategy 31 rallies in 2010. Much of the time was devoted to Strategy 31, a nonpartisan campaign that defends the right of assembly. Although it was launched in St. Petersburg in January 2010, more than two years after the NBP was banned, the prosecution insists that the protests were really NBP party rallies. According to the indictment, Strategy 31 has been “aimed at expressing intolerance toward the senior leaders of state authority as well as toward the popularization of the extremist activities of [the NBP].” What the three policemen said contradicted the testimony of Andrei Fyodorov, the officer in charge of providing security at the city’s public events, who has frequently been seen at Strategy 31 rallies. Fyodorov said that the activists used NBP paraphernalia, such as flags and armbands, for about six months after the party was banned in 2007, but stopped when they started getting detained for using them. Police officer Makhir Iskenderov said he remembered only Andrei Pesotsky and Vadim Mamedov, adding that they were frequently detained near Gostiny Dvor (Strategy 31’s site) for “disorderly conduct.” He also said he saw the two giving away newspapers on the site, but did not detain them because it was legal. He said he did not remember what the NBP’s banned paraphernalia looked like. During the Friday session, Nikolai Strumentov, the City Hall official responsible for authorizing public events, was interrogated. He said he had seen no NBP paraphernalia at Strategy 31 rallies, adding that he had seen Yabloko Democratic Party paraphernalia there. The next session is scheduled for Friday. TITLE: Putin’s New Cabinet Has Many Familiar Faces AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin on Monday appointed a Cabinet that has a strikingly familiar look. Most ministers held on to their seats, received promotions from deputy ministers or came over from the Kremlin. The shuffle cements Putin’s grip on power while fulfilling a promise by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev that three-fourths of the faces would be new. Igor Shuvalov will be the second-in-command in the Cabinet, retaining the rank of first deputy prime minister. He will be the only first deputy prime minister: Putin named no replacement for the other person with this rank in the previous Cabinet, Viktor Zubkov. In other organizational changes, the Health and Social Development Ministry will be split in two, the Sports Ministry lost its “tourist” portfolio, and a new ministry was created to develop the Far East. Putin warned the new Cabinet that they faced a tough challenge amid global economic turmoil. “The situation in the global economy is unclear; there are quite a lot of factors that make it opaque,” Putin said in televised remarks. “You will have to fulfill a program of Russia’s development in these conditions.” After the Kremlin meeting, Medvedev and the ministers headed to the Cabinet building, where Medvedev set seven goals to achieve in the next six months. “People will read into these deeds, rather than papers, to see the Cabinet’s real course,” he said. He said a new schedule for privatizations should be made to carry out the plans the government announced earlier. Another goal is to move fast with salary increases for social-sector employees to levels already announced. He was apparently referring to instructions by Putin to raise salaries for teachers to the average income level in a given region. The Cabinet will also have to propose a budget for the next year and develop at least five federal development programs to start implementing next year. It wasn’t immediately clear what he was referring to. Medvedev also said measures in the next six months should seek to improve the investment climate according to the road maps developed by the Strategic Initiatives Agency. The government should also discuss its measures with the Open Government and hire more staff through competitions. In the new Cabinet, Arkady Dvorkovich, former presidential economic aide, will wield significant power as deputy prime minister in charge of industry, including the oil and gas sectors, filling Igor Sechin’s shoes. Olga Golodets, one of the few newcomers, will serve as deputy prime minister for social issues, Putin said at a Kremlin naming ceremony. Most recently, she was a deputy to Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, covering health care and education from December 2010. For almost a decade until 2008, she worked as Norilsk Nickel deputy director for personnel. Vladislav Surkov, Dmitry Kozak, Dmitry Rogozin and Alexander Khloponin retained their positions as deputy prime ministers. Surkov will also be the Cabinet’s chief of staff, Putin said. The Kremlin and the Cabinet didn’t spell out any other responsibilities for the deputy prime ministers. Former Deputy Finance Minister Alexander Novak will head the Energy Ministry, replacing Sergei Shmatko. He said Dvorkovich would take charge of oil, gas and other industries, RIA-Novosti reported. Anton Siluanov, the former acting finance minister, will continue heading the ministry. A long-serving ministry official, he was a deputy to former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin before replacing him last fall. Andrei Belousov became economic development minister, coming from a Cabinet economic department. He previously served as deputy economic development minister. Following Putin’s intention to give a greater focus to the development of the Far East, the government will have a new ministry dealing with exactly that. Presidential envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District Viktor Ishayev received the portfolio, retaining his envoy rank. Moscow city police chief Vladimir Kolokoltsev is the new interior minister. He replaces Rashid Nurgaliyev. Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov held onto their jobs. The youngest-ever minister, Nikolai Nikiforov, 29, will head the Communications and Press Ministry. He is coming from the same position in the Tatarstan republic. Businessman Mikhail Abyzov will coordinate the Cabinet’s relations with the expert community called the Open Government, a brainchild of Medvedev, in the capacity of a minister, but he will have no ministry. Denis Manturov, until recently deputy industry and trade minister, is the new head of the ministry. The same goes for Sergei Donskoi, now natural resources and environment minister and formerly deputy minister. He is replacing Yury Trutnev. Veronika Skvortsova, former deputy to Health and Social Development Minister Tatyana Golikova, is the new health minister. The other part of the formerly larger ministry is now called the Labor and Social Development Ministry. Another Golikova deputy, Maxim Topilin, is the minister. Nikolai Fyodorov, leader of the Chuvashia republic until 2010, received the portfolio of agriculture minister, replacing Yelena Skrynnik. He most recently was a member of the Federation Council and last May headed an institute at Putin’s request to propose a platform for Putin’s campaign-time umbrella group the All-Russia People’s Front. New Regional Development Minister Oleg Govorun is coming over from the Kremlin, where he oversaw domestic policy. Like Belousov, new Transportation Minister Maxim Sokolov is leaving a Cabinet staff position to become the minister. Sokolov used to be chief of the Cabinet’s industry and infrastructure department for the past two years. Vitaly Mutko held on to his sports minister job. The ministry lost its “tourism” responsibility. Alexander Konovalov remained justice minister. Former Deputy Emergency Situation Minister Vladimir Puchkov received promotion to be the minister. Writer and chairman of the previous State Duma’s culture committee Vladimir Medinsky is the new culture minister. The new education minister is Dmitry Livanov. He most recently was director of the Moscow Institute of Steel and Alloys, and served as deputy education minister before. TITLE: Minister Of Education Aims to Cut Scholarships PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — New education minister and former Moscow Institute of Steel and Alloys rector Dmitry Livanov said the country needs to cut the number of university students that receive money from the state budget. In an interview with Rossiiskaya Gazeta published Tuesday, Livanov emphasized that the move would not undermine support for students, but would represent a shift in strategy. Despite a decreased need for new engineers, the number of students in the field has increased three-fold, he said. “It’s obvious that the number of [scholarship] spots should be decreased, but the stipend for each student should be significantly more,” the minister said. Livanov suggested stipends should be raised from their current 60,000 rubles ($2,000) per year to between 200,000 and 250,000 rubles ($6,500 to $8,000). The minister also said the quality of technical education needs to be improved, suggesting that professors should be more actively recruited and salaries should be raised. Livanov said the average professor at his former university makes about 60,000 rubles a month and that some make as little as 30,000 rubles. Previous education minister Andrei Fursenko had also spoken in favor of decreasing scholarship spots, saying there were only enough spots for students who can and want to study, Vedomosti reported. TITLE: Medvedev Visits G8, Putin ‘Forms Govt’ AUTHOR: By Ken Martinez PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, who became an official member of the United Russia party Tuesday, insisted that the “reset” was still on during a meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the May 19 through 20 weekend G8 summit at Camp David. Medvedev said the pair’s first meeting since he became prime minister was friendly and informal, “not only without ties, but even without jackets,” Vedomosti reported May 20. The prime minister, who signed up on popular web service Instagram on the way to the United States, used the service to post a photo of the meeting. At a news conference on Saturday, May 19 Medvedev said he explained to Obama why he came instead of President Vladimir Putin, whose unexpected decision not to attend the summit was seen by some as a snub. “I said that my appearance here at Camp David, as the head of the Russian delegation at a time when the president is busy forming the government, or more precisely matching candidates to the government, must also be regarded as a symbol of a certain continuity of foreign policy, the policy of the ‘reset’ to which President Obama and I have devoted much time,” Medvedev said. He added that, as a person who “until a certain time participated in crafting foreign policy,” his understanding of the country’s priority foreign policy doesn’t differ from that of Putin. The meeting touched on economic issues as well. “I called attention to the fact that, according to one indicator, surprising even to myself, Russia has taken the lead against the United States,” Medvedev said. “If we talk about the volume of investment, our investment for the first time surpassed the United States, which, of course, on the one hand, is good for our investors, but for such a large economy like the U.S. economy, it in general is not a good indicator.” He did not give any additional details about the investment. Medvedev also said he was pleased with the conversation, which showed that “the communication continues.” He also said he conveyed a message from Putin that set out Russia’s position on a number of foreign policy and bilateral relations. Medvedev also spoke generally about the G8 summit, saying that besides discussions on nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea, support of Afghanistan’s economy and the conflict in Syria, the meeting focused on world economics, with special attention placed on the situation in Greece. He said the G8 members had reached a consensus that its exit from the euro zone was impermissible. “[The] Russian prime minister noted that we are not going to cut the share of the euro in our reserves in order not to send wrong signals on the situation in Europe,” Stanislav Voskresensky, Russia’s G-20 sherpa and deputy economic development minister, told reporters later the same day. A U.S. official speaking to Reuters said Medvedev showed “good unity” with the other G8 leaders on Iran. In addition, the leaders said in a statement Sunday that summed up the summit’s discussions: “We remain appalled by the loss of life, humanitarian crisis, and serious and widespread human rights abuses in Syria.” “Some may like or dislike the Syrian government, some may have different views on the last election that took place in Syria, but one cannot avoid a question — if [Syrian President] Bashar Assad goes, who will replace him?” said Federation Council Senator and Medvedev aide Mikhail Margelov on the first day of the summit. TITLE: Kremlin Rumored to Have Secret Dossier on Chamber AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — The Kremlin has compiled a dossier on the 126 members of the Public Chamber that measures their degree of loyalty and whether they would be willing to act on Kremlin orders, Novaya Gazeta reported. If confirmed, the internal documents would back suspicions that the Public Chamber, an elected group of citizens formed in 2005 with a mandate to influence government policy, is little more than window dressing of a civil society. “The document shows how the presidential administration rules its own court of civil society,” Novaya Gazeta columnist Andrei Kolesnikov said in an introduction to the 42-page dossier, which the newspaper published late last week. He compared the data on chamber members, who include well-known businessmen, actors and public leaders, to the information given to foreign intelligence agents. According to the report, the Kremlin believes that billionaire Vladimir Potanin should not be re-elected to the Public Chamber for not taking an active role, while Yaroslav Kuzminov, president of the Higher School of Economics and husband of acting Economic Development Minister Elvira Nabiullina, has not always kept his word to the Kremlin. The dossier purportedly describes Kuzminov as “manageable” but notes that he changed his mind after agreeing to join Putin’s re-election team. Potanin and Kuzminov could not immediately be reached for comment. Other chamber members are described as “not loyal” and also treated with a certain degree of respect. Mikhail Blinkin, a transportation industry insider who campaigned against a highway through the Khimki Forest, is “dedicated,” “respected” and should be “worked with.” It says lawyer Yelena Lukyanova, known for her opposition views, cannot be influenced by the Kremlin and recommends that the Kremlin negotiate with her through another chamber member. Political analyst Sergei Markov, who was mentioned in the leaked document as a “loyal” chamber member, said he saw nothing unusual in the existence of such a dossier. “It is a normal internal document for any political body. If such a document did not exist, people in the presidential administration should be fired,” said Markov, vice president of the Plekhanov Russian University of Economics. He said he believed that the leak was initiated by an opposition-minded relative of a staffer in the presidential administration or was part of an internal fight during the transitional period. “Some people wanted to bang a door,” Markov said. The dossier indicates that the “Letter of 55,” a letter signed by 55 chamber members that urged the public not to put pressure on the court system, affected the Kremlin’s opinion of the signatories. The letter appeared in March 2011, soon after the second guilty verdict in the trial of former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and was seen as an attempt to counterbalance a public campaign in support of him. Chamber member Iosif Diskin, a political analyst who signed the letter and is mentioned in the leak as a “loyalist,” denied by telephone that he had ever acted on Kremlin orders. “If such a document were made about State Duma deputies, the descriptions would be even sadder to read,” he said. TITLE: Eco-Print Continuing to Grow AUTHOR: By Roland Oliphant PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — If everyone lived like Russians, humanity would need 2 1/2 planet Earths to sustain consumption, though this profligacy is dwarfed by the American lifestyle — which would require no less than four planets to sustain on a humanity-wide scale, according to the World Wildlife Fund. WWF’s Living Planet report was released last week, ahead of the UN’s Rio +20 summit on sustainable development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June. It warns that the world is currently consuming resources 50 percent faster than they can be replaced — and that figure is rising. The biannual report, produced in association with the Zoological Society of London and the Global Footprint Network, ranked countries on two indexes: Their “ecological footprint” — how much natural resources people use to supply their renewable resources, meaning everything from animals and plants farmed or hunted for food, to trees that absorb CO2 emissions or are used in building; and “bio capacity” — the area of such land and water that the country has. The report is part of a push to include environmental health in calculations of economic growth in order to incentivize governments to “do more with less.” Russia was the 33rd “least rational” consumer, according to the report, needing about 4 1/2 “Earth hectares” of biologically productive land per person per year, the report found. That is generally in line with the EU average of 4.72 hectares per capita. Most of the Russian footprint (58 percent) comes from land and sea areas needed to absorb its vast carbon emissions, followed by crop raising and forestry. The rest comes from areas used for grazing animals, fishing and building. Experts said the greatest potential for reducing the country’s footprint lies in energy efficiency. “Energy saving in buildings is the largest reserve for Russia to reduce CO2 emissions,” WWF director Igor Chestin said. The least sustainable lifestyles are in Qatar, whose residents have a footprint of nearly 12 hectares each. The global average was 2.7 hectares per person in 2008. At current rates of consumption, it takes the Earth 1 1/2 years to regenerate the renewable resources that humanity uses in one year. And the report predicts that by 2030 we would need the equivalent of two planet Earths to balance our annual consumption of biological resources. In an effort to help improve the environmental situation, Federation Council lawmakers may introduce a “green filter” to weed out draft bills that could damage the environment. Under the plan any new potential law would be subject to assessment by independent environmental experts, Federation Council speaker Valentina Matviyenko said at an environmental conference in St. Petersburg last week. The move would be in line with an environmental development strategy approved by then-President Dmitry Medvedev on April 30. The policy document, which codifies the government’s main environmental goals up to 2030, calls for mandatory environmental impact assessment of decisions on economic and other activities and a blanket ban on any project that could lead to a degradation of ecosystems. TITLE: Cigarettes Could Cost 5 Times More by 2018 AUTHOR: By Ken Martinez PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MOSCOW — Smoking in Russia will soon be more expensive, as analysts say current tax plans will cause the price of cigarettes to jump five times higher by 2018. The average price of a pack of cigarettes would be about 145 rubles ($4.83), experts from the International Tax and Investment Center said, Rossiiskaya Gazeta reported last week. According to these estimates, middle-income smokers will have to spend about 12 percent of their daily disposable income, while poorer smokers will be spending as much as 28 percent, compared to today’s 5 percent and 7 percent, respectively. Experience from Bulgaria, Ireland, Poland and Romania shows proposed tax policies could result in a market volume collapse in Russia from 369 billion cigarettes per year to 186 billion, while at the same time boosting illegal trade from 11 percent to 35 percent of the market, said Daniel Witt, head of the International Tax and Investment Center. The Finance Ministry last year said it was considering hiking tax rates to 3,000 rubles ($100) per 1,000 cigarettes by 2015 as part of plans that would seek to add 1.9 trillion rubles ($66.9 billion) to the federal budget over three years. The budget boost from the cigarette tax increase alone was estimated at an additional 100 billion rubles. The tax hike would represent a ten-fold increase over last year’s rates, making it similar to the average cigarette tax in European countries, which is 64 euros ($90) per 1,000 cigarettes. The Health and Social Development Ministry is considering a raft of other bills aimed at convincing Russians to give up smoking, including banning smoking on all public transportation by 2014 and eliminating smoking in cafes, bars and restaurants by 2015. Displaying cigarettes at stores and other points of sale could also be outlawed. TITLE: City Hosts 2nd Legal Forum AUTHOR: By Irina Titova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: More than 2,000 delegates from 51 countries took part in the St. Petersburg International Legal Forum held in the city last week. Ministers of justice from 13 countries, including the U.S., U.K., China, Ireland, Poland and the CIS countries participated in the second annual forum. Participants discussed the world’s new legal challenges including the realization of an open government, police effectiveness, legal ethics and more. “This year we focused on the interests of consumers: Contacts, connections and different areas of legal practice,” Russia’s Justice Minister Alexander Konovalov said. “We did our best to pave the way for practical discussions, but at the same time did not ignore conceptual problems,” Konovalov said. British Secretary of State for Justice Kenneth Clarke said he was satisfied with the progress currently being made in the Russian legal system. “This forum indicates that the Russian government intends to follow the rule of law, providing court reforms and increasing reliability in the justice system,” Clarke said. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said “the U.S. wants to see Russia strong and prosperous” because both countries need “to achieve common goals.” “Russia and the U.S. found a way to work as partners... Together we do our best to provide the world with security,” Holder said at the opening session of the forum. “Today Russia is not only the biggest country in the world and a nuclear player but it’s also a member of the G8, G20 and will soon enter the WTO...therefore Russia’s security, wealth and national health will have a direct influence on progress,” Holder said. Holder said Russian and American leaders work “hand in hand” while both countries face many common threats such as international terrorism, child trafficking and the theft of intellectual property. TITLE: Putin’s Postman Delivers Nothing at the G8 AUTHOR: By Alexander Golts TEXT: In the mid-1990s, former President Boris Yeltsin fought hard for the right to sit as an equal at the same table with the leaders of the world’s seven leading democracies. Using a lot of political wrangling, Moscow finally secured permanent membership in this elite club where the real heavyweights are supposed to solve the world’s most pressing problems. In practice, though, during Group of Eight summits, few problems are actually solved, while participants spend more time haggling over every word in the final communique, ending up with a document lacking any hard guarantees or commitments. If Putin cannot find a way to influence Western leaders in the G8, perhaps his best option is to try to belittle them. Thus, Putin came up with a ridiculous excuse for his inability to attend the G8 summit at Camp David and sent Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in his place. As a result, the leaders of the G7 were forced to sit alongside a powerless stand-in, who seemed to play this role with masochistic pleasure. For example, Medvedev cheerfully posed for photographs with world leaders and posted them on the Internet as if he was sending friends pictures from his vacation, not a global summit. Like a passenger on the Titanic who smiles naively for the camera as the fatal iceberg looms in the background, Medvedev blithely reported, “This was perhaps the most problem-free summit yet, judging by the few disagreements among the various national delegations and individual leaders.” I suspect that he came away with such a rosy impression for the simple reason that he was excluded from the more serious and difficult consultations among Western leaders. But in reality, the G8 members split into two opposing camps over how to solve the economic crisis. U.S. President Barack Obama and a host of European leaders contended that increased investment in the economy is necessary to expand production and create more jobs. Meanwhile, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the solution lies with strict controls over spending and the money supply to limit inflation. The final communique issued by the summit reflected the delicate balancing act between those two approaches. At the same time, Medvedev seemed to be in a state of euphoria, claiming that the global economic slowdown has had no bearing on Russia. “For now, the overall situation with our economy is fine because we had a budget surplus last year,” Medvedev said. “Naturally, this year will be more difficult, but we’ll manage just the same.” Although Medvedev had nothing to offer his Western colleagues, his time there was not entirely wasted. He did play the role of postman quite well, delivering a letter from Putin to Obama. Putin objected to traveling to Camp David not only because he didn’t want to subject himself to a mild dressing down from his Western colleagues over the use of force against demonstrators and other human rights violations. The simple fact is that, without a single constructive idea to his name, Putin had nothing substantial to say on any subject on the summit’s official agenda. The G8 summit did touch on security issues — where Moscow considers itself a major player — but only in passing. Instead, those issues were central to the NATO summit that began in Chicago on Sunday. Russia did not send any top government official to the summit, which is apparently how the Kremlin tried to show its dissatisfaction over the U.S. plan to deploy missile defense installations in Europe. But Afghanistan was a much more important issue at the NATO summit. NATO member countries are mainly focused on how to withdraw their troops, and that means the Russian leadership should be concerned about what will happen after NATO troops are gone. Few believe that there will be any kind of peace in Afghanistan after NATO forces leave. Civil war and unrest could easily spread to the Central Asian republics, and that means a wave of refugees, as well as Islamic radicals, could soon spill into Russia. If Moscow needs a pretext to criticize the West, it should focus on Afghanistan, not missile defense. In place of pointless bickering over what the U.S. missile defense system might be able to accomplish in 20 or 30 years, Moscow should raise the issue of the U.S. and NATO responsibility for security in the region — an issue that will have a direct impact on Russia in less than two years. Security in Afghanistan is exactly what senior Russian officials should be discussing with their partners in the G8 and NATO. But then Moscow would have had to actually appear at these summits with constructive ideas. It is thus not surprising that Putin was a no-show. Alexander Golts is deputy editor of the online newspaper Yezhednevny Zhurnal. TITLE: comment: Chelsea Is the Luckiest Team in Soccer AUTHOR: By John Leicester TEXT: Lots of money, lots of luck and players who didn’t care about winning ugly, just so long as they won, turned Chelsea into the champions of Europe on Saturday night. The money, of course, is Roman Abramovich’s. The billionaire finally got his hands on the shiny trophy with big ears he so coveted. A bargain at £800 million ($1.2 billion) and counting. That’s roughly how much of his wealth the Russian has poured into the London club he bought in 2003, filling the heads of Chelsea fans with dreams of such special nights and scenes like these. Striker Didier Drogba, scorer of the late goal that kept Chelsea in the game in normal time and of the penalty that won it after extra time ended with a 1-1 draw, running across the pitch with the Champions League trophy in his arms and delight on his face. Tens of thousands of Bayern Munich fans, forming a wall of red and white, silenced and shellshocked in their own magnificent stadium. Chelsea now has the bragging rights of being the first club from London to claw its way to the top of Europe. Tottenham, Arsenal — are you watching? There were times in the Champions League final when Abramovich may have wished that he had bought another superyacht instead. At least it would have been prettier than a lot of the soccer played by his expensive team. But there’s no law against playing ugly soccer. Chelsea didn’t travel to Munich to dazzle as Barcelona and Real Madrid surely would have, had those Spanish clubs not foundered in the semifinals. No, Chelsea came to right the wrong of the tear-streaked night in Moscow in 2008, when Chelsea captain John Terry slipped on the soggy turf and hit the post in the decisive penalty shoot-out won by Manchester United. So what this final lacked in beauty, it made up for in drama and absorbing story lines. Like that of Terry, forced to watch from the sidelines because of his stupid red card earned in the semifinals, meaning that he couldn’t make amends for 2008 himself. Or Chelsea manager Roberto di Matteo, the stand-in who succeeded where the likes of Jose Mourinho and Carlo Ancelotti failed when they were at Chelsea. Abramovich has burned his way through seven managers in nine years, his impatience for success costing him tens of millions of pounds. Di Matteo only ended up in charge because Abramovich ditched the last manger, Andre Villas-Boas, in March. So is Chelsea the luckiest team in soccer? There are those who will argue that it is. Chelsea was the underdog and played like it, too. To borrow a phrase from Mourinho, Chelsea parked the airplane, letting the Germans come at them in waves and waiting for opportunities to counterattack. The victory may well have been the last big European hurrah for the nucleus of the team upon which Chelsea built a remarkable decade of success, with three Premier League crowns, four FA Cups and now the Champions League in the Abramovich era. The renovation, both in Chelsea’s style of play and in its roster, which Villas-Boas was hired at great expense to perform this season but which came to a juddering halt when Abramovich pulled the rug from under him, still lies ahead. Chelsea also has work to comply with UEFA’s drive to wean clubs off huge financial losses and generous sugar daddies like Abramovich. And it needs a new stadium larger than the 41,800-capacity Stamford Bridge, which is only the eighth-largest Premier League venue. But all that is in the future. The here and now is that shiny trophy. Chelsea are the champions of Europe. John Leicester is an international sports columnist for The Associated Press, which published this comment. TITLE: From green to white AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Singer-songwriter and guitarist Mikhail Novitsky is a frequent sight at rallies and at the opposition camp on St. Isaac’s Square. Apart from music, he is an active member of his preservationist group Green Wave, which he set up to protect St. Petersburg parks and lakes. On Sunday, Novitsky co-led a “test walk” from St. Isaac’s Square, via Nevsky Prospekt, to Arts Square. The walk was arranged to test the extent of freedom left to the opposition by the authorities, which broke up anti-Putin rallies timed to coincide with his presidential inauguration in Moscow during which hundreds — some wearing white ribbons symbolizing fair elections, some not — were arrested just for being in the street earlier this month. While walking, Novitsky sang his new songs “Putin Ski Magadan,” urging Putin to leave office, and “Putin Is Afraid of Everybody,” with hundreds — many equipped with white ribbons, anti-Putin buttons and white balloons — walking with him. St. Petersburg’s Test Walk repeated a similar event held earlier in Moscow. Invited by best-selling author Boris Akunin, an estimated 15,000 Muscovites walked through Moscow streets without being arrested on May 13. “A walk is supposed to be a spontaneous thing that does not need organizers,” Novitsky said. “I think we’re a bit late behind Moscow, but we will walk and send respects and solidarity to the Muscovites.” Although St. Petersburg’s walk lacked writers of national fame, it was joined by film director Alexander Sokurov, while musician Vadim Kurylyov, a former DDT guitarist who now fronts his own band, Electric Guerillas, performed three revolutionary songs to the accompaniment of an acoustic guitar near the Alexander Pushkin monument on Arts Square, despite police warnings. According to Novitsky, St. Petersburg cannot boast as large a number of politically-minded artists and authors as Moscow, but dissent is shared by people such as actress Larisa Dmitriyeva, who also took part in the Test Walk, and musicians Mikhail Borzykin of Televizor and Sergei Parashchuk of NEP, in addition to himself and Kurylyov. “We keep in touch with each other and correspond via social networks, while Larisa Dmitriyeva’s recent performance called ‘Democracy’ drew the entire creative intelligentsia, including rock musicians, singer-songwriters, actors and directors and everyone else in the Union of Theater Workers,” Novitsky said. “It all exists, but maybe is not expressed in such a spectacular way [as in Moscow]. There’s no one here who will say ‘I’m the leader, follow me.’” Novitsky, who went to Moscow to take part in the May 6 protest rally, which saw violent clashes with the police and resulted in hundreds of arrests, said change is in the air. “It is hotting up for some people; everybody feels that everything could be different, totally different tomorrow,” he said. “[Mashina Vremeni frontman] Andrei Makarevich performed at a concert celebrating the elections that brought Dmitry Medvedev to the presidency, which were rigged to no less extent than the most recent ones. Last summer, however, I saw him at [human rights festival] Pilorama, and he also took part in Moscow’s Test Walk. [TV presenter] Ksenia Sobchak used to be politically indifferent, but has turned into a protest figure. Even some officials feel that they should do something to be on the safe side.” Novitsky, 48, who has a degree in acting and worked at a local theater, fronts the rock band SP Babai, which he formed in 1993 from the ashes of his first band Avtobus. Every two or three days, he comes to perform in the public garden on St. Isaac’s Square, where protesters against electoral fraud have been holding an open-ended protest since May 7. “I like that people listen to each other,” he said. “I like their assemblies — people do work at them, and it wouldn’t hurt for parliamentary deputies to see how the assembly works. Even if they [participants] have no microphone, they have a very efficient system of gestures and everybody can hear everything. You can even ban somebody who talks too much or insults people, or back somebody or add something to what somebody says. It works very well.” Novitsky said he had plans to hold a couple of lectures on ecology in the gardens by St. Isaac’s, but said that the protesters turned out to have an ecological conscience without any help from the outside. “I noticed a few days ago that they have put up small signs saying ‘We don’t walk on the grass,’ and they even have somebody on duty to empty the trashcans,” he said. “For me as an ecologically-minded person, it was especially pleasant to observe how once in a while a young man and a young woman go around all of the trashcans, put the trash in a bag and take it away. They don’t think about whether a cigarette butt was dropped by an opposition activist or just a passerby. By the way, nobody throws cigarette butts on the ground at all — that rule is being followed, as well as a total dry law. It’s very well organized. “Any large-scale city event inevitably results in heaps of litter being left behind afterwards, but nothing is left here. You get the impression that people come here with the sole goal of tidying the garden.” On Saturday, Novitsky performed at an authorized preservationist rally called “Give nature back to the people” held on Pionerskaya Ploshchad by ecological, preservationist and animal rights groups, which deliberately avoided associating itself with political parties and slogans. “I am a bit upset, because people are fighting the consequences rather than the causes,” he said. “They protest illegal felling here, illegal land seizure there and some violations of the law, but they write complaints to the very people who ripped them off. Nobody in France would think of building a bowling club in Versailles, but the city government is ‘considering’ building a bowling club in the park at [the former imperial estate of] Pushkin! Corruption is the cause, and this cause has to be gotten rid of. Every violation has one and the same reason, that’s why a gathering of the greens can’t be apolitical.” Novitsky said he set up Green Wave to protect parks and lakes in 2003 after a public garden near his own home was destroyed by a developer, who wanted to use the site for construction and got approval from the authorities. He pointed out that a public garden on Ulitsa Ivana Fomina was saved from a developer last year after a series of protests were held thanks to the involvement of political organizations and groups. “The greens alone didn’t have sufficient forces to protect the garden; everybody from the Communists to anarchists went there and could have a say, donate money or plant a tree,” Novitsky said. “Because of that, the rallies were massive and the enemy had to retreat.” According to Novitsky, he got involved in politics through his preservationist activities. “I didn’t want to find out what types of parties there were, what democrats stood for or what liberals stood for, though of course, I never liked fascists,” he said. “I didn’t like police lawlessness either; the song called ‘With a Hat Badge in His Head’ that I wrote about 20 years ago has now found a life of its own. But in other respects, I was absolutely apolitical; I sang songs, worked at the theater and everything was just fine…until they came and started to destroy the garden under my windows. “It was a nice bright summer. They poured acid under the trees at night, the trees lost their leaves and then the workers showed up a week later with a permit and cut them down, everything happened very fast. When I started getting involved with such situations, I found out that the responsibility always lies with the authorities. It’s always their corruption, audacity, cynicism and cheating ways. When you’re trying to find the causes, the causes are always in the Kremlin.” For performing “With a Hat Badge in His Head” at Nashestviye (Invasion) — Russia’s main open-air music festival — in 2001, Novitsky was detained by the police immediately upon leaving the stage. The festival’s organizers Nashe Radio, a station specializing in Russian rock, subsequently banned Novitsky’s band from the airwaves, according to Novitsky, although SP Babai performed at Nashestviye again four years later. “I was taken to a separate room to speak with a police colonel, and explained to him that he would make things worse for himself if he didn’t release me,” Novitsky said. “Then journalists attacked me, [asking] ‘Don’t you think that agit rock has lost its significance?’ I replied, “Lady, if your son gets sent to war and doesn’t come back, I’ll see what you have to say about agit rock.’” TITLE: Stars shine in white nights AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Modest Mussorgsky’s opera “Boris Godunov,” which has arguably become the most popular operatic piece by a Russian composer on the international stage in the past decade, has been revamped by renowned British director Graham Vick. The production, which will see the stage on May 25 and 26 and June 26, opens the 20th International Stars of the White Nights festival, which runs through July 15. Spanning eight weeks, the annual festival at the Mariinsky Theater showcases a wealth of international classical music talent, from La Scala Philharmonic Orchestra to Greek virtuoso violinist Leonidas Kavakos (June 19) and mesmerizing French pianist Helene Grimaud (June 18). The orchestra will perform Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique under the baton of Mariinsky artistic director Valery Gergiev on June 27 and a Beethoven program the following day, conducted by Fabio Luisi. “Boris Godunov,” a joint production between the Mariinsky and Baden-Baden Opera House, will travel to Germany in July. While the director has been unwilling to share his vision of the production before the premiere, he has given a few hints as to the flavor of the staging. “Great writers and composers base their works on stories of old, but seeing the past and foreseeing the future is something they can only do through the prism of their own experience,” the director said. “This stage interpretation of Mussorgsky’s opera means searching for a theatrical idiom that makes sense in our time; a dialogue that can show us how we are both like and unlike those distant times.” Vick sought inspiration from a number of sources — from Shakespearean verse to television reports about mass public protests in Moscow and other Russian cities that have brought together tens of thousands of people looking for an alternative to the Putin-Medvedev vertical power system. “In the 16th century the All-Russian autocrat Ivan the Terrible asked for the hand of Queen Elizabeth I of England,” Graham said in an interview published on the Mariinsky Theater website. “Soon thereafter Holinshed published his historic chronicles in which Shakespeare discovered the story of one of Scotland’s kings — Macbeth. Three hundred years later Karamzin was to write his History of the Russian State, from which Pushkin borrowed the plot for his play in the Shakespearean spirit, Boris Godunov. And yet again dim and distant history was re-evaluated as a universal drama. Existentialist searches of the 19th century engendered a swamp of nihilistic works that depicted the human life cycle as one that was preordained to meet with disaster.” “From Wagner’s Ring to Mussorgsky’s stunning work — Boris, a man moved by highly complex claims and aspirations, a man obsessed with the need for eternal life and who created so much — we come to negation, disappointment and devastation,” Vick concluded. Singing the title role in the opera will be bass-baritone Yevgeny Nikitin, one of the Mariinsky’s most precious assets. At this year’s festival, Gergiev is focusing on instrumentalists. Refined British pianist Christian Blackshaw will treat audiences to four consecutive piano recitals encompassing all of Mozart’s piano sonatas (July 4, 5, 6 and 7), while the aspiring Dutch violinist Janine Jansen will go on stage June 9 playing Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2. Powerful Russian pianist Denis Matsuev, a Russian audience favorite, will play Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 1 on June 22, and Nikolai Lugansky will perform Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 3 on June 5. Thrilling Scottish percussionist Evelyn Glennie will perform a program of Vivaldi-Glennie, Stravinsky, Askell Masson and Jacob ter Veldhuis on June 25 at the Mariinsky Concert Hall alongside the Mariinsky Symphony Orchestra and Valery Gergiev. Deaf from the age of 12, Glennie gained international fame as one of the world’s leading solo percussionists with her astounding technique and unique tactile approach to music: She has learnt to “hear” music through vibrations. Glennie, who is always barefoot on stage, senses low sounds through the floor while “hearing” high notes through her chest and neck. The percussionist is teaching the self-taught method to hearing-impaired children at the Beethoven Fund, a London-based charity. “There is no method really, it is simply listening,” she said in an interview with The St. Petersburg Times. “It is a choice that you make, whether or not you want to learn it. It would be the same if I decided tomorrow that I wanted to learn to play the cello: Mechanically I could learn over a period of time. But you need to have a flair for the things that you do.” Glennie’s repertoire consists primarily of new music, though the musician is keen to adapt existing scores. “I have to play new music, otherwise I won’t survive as a solo percussion player, because Mozart, Beethoven and Stravinsky did not write for solo percussionists,” she smiles. “I try to find a balance between written pieces and improvised works. I love to give concerts when I am fully improvising because it asks the audiences to listen in a completely different way. And it gets much more of me as a musician because I can explore all sorts of colors and moods, which is not always possible in a concerto.” The musician believes a piece of music does not always have to be “enjoyable” in the usual sense of the word. “It could be the most squeaky gig on the planet but there could be something really exciting about, say, the use of percussion or the orchestration,” she said. “It is just that the composer must hang on to his own unique voice. For performers, it is equally important to be able to listen to their own inner voices. Whatever the bad reviews, or the overwhelming ovation, you are always your own best confidante.” Traditionally the festival’s ballet element is somewhat overwhelmed by the symphonic and chamber music program. However, this year’s schedule features a fair share of the Mariinsky’s trademark classics plus a few opportunities to see the troupe perform George Balanchine, including the premiere of the company’s staging of his ballet “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” set to a magical score by Mendelssohn (June 6 and 7). Another ballet event not to be missed is the revival of Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring” choreographed by Vaslav Nijinsky (July 14 and 15). Provocative Swiss director Daniele Finzi Pasca, who captivated audiences with his staging of Cirque du Soleil’s “Corteo” in 2010 and a humorous yet heartfelt take on Verdi’s “Aida” at the Mariinsky Concert Hall in 2011, is back in town this summer for another engagement with the company. On June 20 and 22 the Mariinsky premieres Finzi Pasca’s rendition of Verdi’s “Requiem.” The festival’s symphonic programs this year will favor Brahms: The Mariinsky Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Gergiev is embarking on a series of performances that will see all four of Brahms’ symphonies (June 13, 15, 21 and 29) and all of the composer’s instrumental concertos. Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 1 will be performed by Austrian virtuoso Rudolf Buchbinder (June 29), while Piano Concerto No. 2 will be played by Yefim Bronfman (June 13). Renowned violinist Nikolai Znaider will treat audiences to the composer’s Violin Concerto (June 15). For a full schedule of the 20th International Stars of the White Nights festival, visit the Mariinsky Theater website at www.mariinsky.ru. TITLE: the word’s worth: Taking a stroll through protest lingo AUTHOR: By Michele A. Berdy TEXT: Êîíòðîëüíàÿ ïðîãóëêà: test stroll As the protest movement continues in Moscow, I really feel sympathy for the one part of the population that has been suffering the most — translators. The words protesters are using to describe their activities are “simple” words known to any speaker of Russian. But these words each have two or three meanings and carry a cartful of historical and linguistic connotations. Take the êîíòðîëüíàÿ ïðîãóëêà (literally “test walk”) organized by a group of writers the weekend before last. In general, any peregrination of protesters from point A to point B is a “march” in English. But that word won’t work. First of all, as a translator I’d want to use march for ìàðø ìèëëèîíîâ (March of Millions), the organized protest march that turned violent on May 6. Russian writers used the hum-drum, everyday word ïðîãóëêà to describe their attempt to exercise their civil right to walk around the city wearing white ribbons. Out comes the thesaurus: walk, walkabout, stroll, promenade, constitutional. I’d probably go with “test stroll” or “test promenade,” although you could also call it a “test walkabout” to describe the sauntering writers signing autographs and shaking the hands of fans. But if I were in charge of English-language PR for the promenading writers, I’d call it a constitutional constitutional. But what are translators to do with íàðîäíîå ãóëÿíèå (people’s/popular/civil/national/public/folk festivities/promenade/romp/revelry/carnival)? Let’s start with íàðîäíûé, which can be translated variously depending on the context. Sometimes the emphasis is on “belonging to the entire nation,” as in íàðîäíîå õîçÿéñòâî (national economy) or íàðîäíîå îáðàçîâàíèå (public education). Sometimes it refers to the ethnographic qualities, as in íàðîäíîå ñðåäñòâî (folk cure) or íàðîäíûå ðåìåñëà (folk crafts). In other cases, it stresses the democratic nature of an institution, as in íàðîäíîå ïðåäñòàâèòåëüñòâî (popular representation) or íàðîäíîå ñîáðàíèå (national assembly). In still other cases, it stresses the people, not the state, as in íàðîäíîå äâèæåíèå (grassroots movement) or íàðîäíàÿ äèïëîìàòèÿ (people’s diplomacy). In the case of today’s íàðîäíîå ãóëÿíèå, the emphasis is more on “people’s” — as opposed to state — overlaid with the sense of popular, democratic and open to the public. Ãóëÿíèå comes from the verb ãóëÿòü, which can mean to stroll, as in ãóëÿòü ïî ãîðîäó (walk around the city). Or it can mean to spend time outside, as in äåòè ïîøëè ãóëÿòü (the kids went out to play). Or it can mean to party, as in ìû ãóëÿëè äî óòðà (we partied until dawn). Or it can even mean marital infidelity, as in ìóæ ãóëÿë íàëåâî (her husband cheated on her). Íàðîäíîå ãóëÿíèå usually means a street party, open-air festivities, a carnival or an outdoor celebration. Today the phrase also plays on the notion of moving around the city and having a good time. It doesn’t include marital infidelity, but does include sleeping with strangers. More important, when anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny called for áåññðî÷íîå, êðóãëîñóòî÷íîå íàðîäíîå ãóëÿíèå (a nonstop, around-the-clock street party), he was choosing his words carefully. A ìèòèíã (rally) or äåìîíñòðàöèÿ (demonstration) requires official permission. Íàðîäíîå ãóëÿíèå (open-air celebration) does not. In the end, I guess I’d call today’s íàðîäíîå ãóëÿíèå a people’s street party. But judging by the sleeping bags, Porta Potties, food and soda, if I were in charge of the protesters’ English-language PR, I’d call it the people’s moveable feast. Michele A. Berdy, a Moscow-based translator and interpreter, is author of “The Russian Word’s Worth” (Glas), a collection of her columns. TITLE: Born villain AUTHOR: By Tatyana Sochiva PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Controversial U.S. rocker Marilyn Manson will take to the stage of the city’s Yubileiny stadium on Monday, May 28 as part of his eponymous group’s “Hey Cruel World” tour. The tour promotes the band’s eighth studio album, “Born Villain,” which was released earlier this month by Cooking Vinyl Records. Although the band was formed more than twenty years ago, its music videos still resemble horror movies, the group’s provocative lyrics continue to shock audiences and its unique performances consistently attract fans from all over the world. The band’s lead singer (born Brian Hugh Warner) created his pseudonym by combining the names of iconic female sex symbol Marilyn Monroe and the infamous mass murderer Charles Manson. As his career progressed, Marilyn Manson achieved rock star status, lauded by some for supposedly exposing the vulgarity of modern society while slammed by others for allegedly promoting drugs, sex and violence. Manson’s worldwide fame is due not only to his controversial image, but also to creative achievements recognized by a variety of prestigious awards such as the MTV Video Music Award, Billboard Video Music Award, Grammy Award and many others. Throughout its existence, the band has worked on the soundtracks of a number of movies including “The Matrix,” “Lost Highway” and “Resident Evil.” Two of the group’s studio albums made the list of the 100 greatest rock albums of all time compiled by Classic Rock magazine. At the local concert, which is to take place two days before Manson performs in Moscow, fans will have the chance to hear the cult musician’s new songs as well as some of his classic hits. This will be Manson’s sixth visit to Russia. Marilyn Manson will perform on May 28 at the Yubileiny Sports Stadium at 18 Prospekt Dobrolyubova. M. Sportivnaya. Tel. 498 6033. TITLE: Fin de siecle AUTHOR: By Daniel Kozin PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: City concert-goers will have a chance to experience a genre quite unlike the usual classical music that characterizes the White Nights season at the revamped Sixth International New Music Festival that starts Saturday. Titled “The Time of Music: Fin de Siècle,” the festival comprises six consecutive concerts of diverse contemporary music from around Europe and Russia, to be held from May 26 to May 31 at several venues around St. Petersburg. In accordance with its name, the festival aims to promote the music of famous Western composers of music from the latter part of the 20th century, and young Russian composers of the same genre. “Contemporary music is a genre that has been lost to the average Russian listener, and trends that have long taken hold in the West are largely off the radar here [in Russia],” Iranian composer Mehdi Hosseini, the director of the festival’s organizing committee, told The St. Petersburg Times. “It is with this idea in mind that we decided to present the Russian public with works of contemporary music that are famous in Europe, and to introduce young Russian composers who, unfortunately, don’t receive the attention that they deserve.” The first two concerts of the weekend will be held at the Sheremetyev Palace, with the first dedicated to new music influenced by folklore, and the second, titled “France: Three Generations,” to include music from three generations of contemporary French composers, including Roger Tessier and Bruno Mantovani. The May 29 concert, due to be held at the Mikhail Shemyakin Art Gallery and Foundation, will include an interesting program comprised exclusively of Belgian and Dutch compositions. The Belgian trio Mangalam will perform works including those of Henri Pousseur, a leading composer of avant-garde music, and Ton de Leeuw, who combined exotic Eastern musical instruments with experimental European techniques. The last two nights will be based on the “quiet music” genre, and will present Italian, Chilean, Dutch, Greek and Russian composers at the Erarta contemporary art museum and the Mikhail Shemyakin gallery. The festival is being hosted by the St. Petersburg Contemporary Music Center, an organization dedicated to promoting contemporary music in Russia. The center hosts a number of music events throughout the year, including the International Sergei Slonimsky Composition Competition for young musicians, which will take place later this year. Apart from the two opening nights of the festival, concerts are free of charge for members of the public. The Sixth International New Music Festival runs from May 26 through May 31 at various venues around the city. For more information and a full schedule, visit www.remusik.org. TITLE: in the spotlight: Sobchak, the glamorous face of activism AUTHOR: By Anna Malpas TEXT: Ksenia Sobchak is continuing her role as the unofficial queen of the barricades — even if the more hardcore activists aren’t too happy about that. Wearing a thick layer of makeup, she arrived at the Barrikadnaya protest last Wednesday evening and was immediately surrounded by journalists and people filming on their iPads. A meter away, a line of riot police stood by implacably. In one surreal moment, Duma Deputy Dmitry Gudkov — the most glamorous member of parliament with his tan and good hair — told the crowd to stand back so he and Ksenia could hold talks with the riot police. Sobchak is 30 now and has had a long career in show business. She became really well known as the host of TNT’s “Dom-2” reality show, where contestants pair off and bitch about each other. Like most celebrities, she has a lucrative sideline as an emcee at parties and awards ceremonies. But lately she has branched out, writing articles and doing interviews and hosting a political talk show, “Gosdep-2,” which airs on Mikhail Prokhorov’s Snob website, after MTV Russia dropped it like a hot potato. It looks likely that her new political activities are going to affect her career, which she acknowledged. “I’m canceling work and filming and so on to come here. So far I do have work, probably it will end soon,” she said at Barrikadnaya. A group of protesters wrapped in blankets on a bench complained that the television lights kept them awake as she arrived. “Maybe we’ll get invited to host a show on TNT,” one sniped. Sobchak earlier turned up at the Chistiye Prudy sit-in with her hair elaborately curled for filming “Gosdep-2” and wearing a very expensive-looking leather jacket. It’s fair to say that there’s a lot of talk about her relationship with Ilya Yashin of the Solidarity movement, with the two even appearing in matching his-and-her’s striped tops at Chistiye Prudy. There’s a definite romance for an uptown girl like Sobchak to hang out with a man who regularly gets banged up for 15 days. But you do wonder what Yashin would discuss at Sunday lunch with her kitten-bowed mother, Senator Lyudmila Narusova. Yashin was once targeted by a pro-Kremlin honey trap, luring liberals with sex and drugs, filmed on hidden camera. He very smartly was absolutely open about it on his blog and said the worst he could be accused of was having sex with two women. Sobchak has had an on-and-off relationship with the protest movement. When she spoke at the rally on Novy Arbat in March, she said it was time to say what the protests are “for,” not just what they are “against.” She stayed away from the March of Millions on May 6, writing later on Twitter that she had heard there would be “provocations.” And, of course, plenty of people feel she doesn’t really belong. Bitchy website Spletnik.ru covered her “evolution,” no less, in a column this week with a lavish number of photographs from over the years. It traced her career from partying blonde with cigarette in one hand and a minigarch in the other to that famous shot of her looking out of the back of a police van after her first-ever detention. “I just want to shout: I don’t believe it!” a commentator called Marietta wrote, while another called Alina attacked her “lying.” Spletnik sneered that Sobchak is simply on trend. “It’s not fashionable any more to show off diamonds, dance on tables or smear black caviar on the walls of Courchevel hotels,” it wrote. “Now everyone is reading poetry and trying to say clever things about eternal values.” Sobchak has even let her roots grow out to be like “99 percent of Russians,” it bitched. TITLE: THE DISH: Beluga AUTHOR: By Elizabeth Rattey PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: Brown bag lunch Beluga is an interesting space. Its interior, dominated by red brick and wood, is certainly not reminiscent of a restaurant, but rather of someone’s country patio, an old mill or even an artist’s studio. Its rustic aura would trick people into feeling they had escaped the hustle and bustle of city life if only the whirring of embankment traffic weren’t so present in the background. The planked wooden tables, chairs and floors add to the establishment’s earthy feeling, as do the potted green plants hanging on the walls. Three decently-sized rooms, a couple of which are lined by empty wine bottles, allow guests to spread out into different nooks, making the dining experience private and personal. The long-necked desk lamps clamped onto the edges of some of the square tables spotlight the brown paper bag-esque placemats and make diners feel like they’re playing architect. The menus are made from the same paper as the placemats, and make a satisfying crinkling noise when the pages are turned. The restaurant has covered its bases, offering a solid but not overwhelming variety of soups, salads, meat, fish and pasta dishes — something for every taste. After overcoming the initial disappointment that, despite the wide selection, Beluga was out of its liver appetizer, spirits again soared when trying the salad with beets and goat cheese, topped with roasted pine nuts (390 rubles, $12.50). The bitterness of the salad greens, earthiness of the beets and kick of the pungent cheese complimented each other swimmingly and paved the way for a filling meat entrée. The second starter, baked vegetables with Mozzarella (370 rubles, $11.85), was unfortunately not nearly as stellar as the first. Artfully stacked, a leaning tower of roasted veggies (zucchini, eggplant and tomato) and cheese fell flat — right into the pesto drizzle and fresh basil garnishing the plate. Most of the dish’s failure was due to suspicions that its components had not been freshly grilled, but rather nuked in the microwave. Despite Beluga’s pleasant atmosphere, which is ideal for spending hours drinking coffee and reading a good book or sitting and enjoying a glass of wine or beer (120 rubles a bottle, $3.85) with friends, this enjoyment got quite old while waiting for the second course. It did, however, provide the opportunity to thoroughly admire the rest of the understated décor, including the tiled fireplace, whose white color was slightly reminiscent of a bathroom floor but nevertheless contributed to the room’s warm and homey feeling, especially with the iron statues and globe standing on its mantel. Next to the fireplace and built right into the wall was a faux woodpile of birch logs with only the ends of the logs glued onto the wall to create the clever illusion. After a 25-minute wait for the entrees (during which the appetizer plates were licked clean and the mildly depressing bread basket (90 rubles, $2.90), which consisted only of white bread, was devoured), the main courses finally showed up and were worth the wait. The 680-ruble ($21.80) steak (really more of a fillet) served in a pepper sauce was lean, juicy and any meat-eater’s dream. What appeared to be delectable green, fleshy capers but in fact turned out to be eye-wateringly fierce peppercorns were scattered across the meat. The knife effortlessly slid through the medium grill and the meat was devoured without any hint of the chewy struggle that can sometimes accompany a steak dinner. The side of grilled vegetables, just like its appetizer cousin, was tepid and took a back seat to the beef. The BBQ pork ribs (450 rubles, $14.40) were served on a simple wooden cutting board with a sheet of signature brown paper on it to help absorb the sauces. A red, doll-sized Le Creuset pot of homemade, buttery mashed potatoes also sat on the board. The sweet and tangy flavoring and tender pork left saucy smiles across the faces of all who tried it. Service was friendly and unobtrusive, but at times a bit relaxed — perhaps a consequence of the establishment’s leisurely environment. TITLE: It’s Always Colder in Murmansk AUTHOR: Nataliya Nedzhvetskaya PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: MURMANSK — Whenever you feel the urge to complain about the injustice of the climate where you live, you can always comfort yourself with the fact that it’s probably colder in Murmansk, where snow can linger into May and reappear in September. But the chilly temperatures and remote conditions come with their own rewards. Pristine wilderness, a long ski season and a prime location for viewing the northern lights are all points of pride for Murmansk residents. Despite the cold, this Arctic seaport amazingly remains ice-free all year long due to the warming effects of the North Atlantic Current, making it an important trade port on the eastern part of the Kola Peninsula. Shipping and fishing are the largest industries in the city, which trades extensively with neighboring Norway and Finland. Founded in 1916, Murmansk was officially the last city created under the Russian Empire. It was originally a railroad settlement on the Murman railway, built during World War I to stretch from Petrozavodsk to the potential naval base on the coast of the Barents Sea. From the beginning, the city seemed destined to play a critical role in 20th-century Russian history. During World War II, Murmansk was a crucial trade link between Russia and the other Allied powers, and thus a battleground for German control of the Arctic. Under Operation Silver Fox, German forces attempted to seize Murmansk by launching a two-pronged offensive, attacking from Norwegian and Finnish territories to the west of the city and cutting off railway lines further south. Although more than 90 percent of the city was destroyed, the Soviet Army held its ground. On May 6, 1985, the 40th anniversary of the Allied victory in Europe, Murmansk was designated a “Hero City” for the sacrifice made during World War II. To this day, the city’s role in World War II remains an important part of Murmansk’s identity. “From the time we’re children, we’re raised around World War II monuments and grow up hearing stories. It’s as if it happened last month,” said Yulia Chernichuk, a local journalist with Murmansk Business News. Like many of Russia’s midsized cities, Murmansk suffers from post-Soviet depopulation. Since the early 1990s, Murmansk’s population has declined steadily, decreasing from a city of almost half a million to one with just over 300,000 residents. But Murmansk retains an important role in Russia’s economy. It is the fourth-largest Russian port by turnover and the biggest shipping point for the export of Russian coal. Its location near some of the world’s greatest energy resource reserves also promises to give the city an increasingly prominent role to play in the near future. Oil extraction in the Russian Arctic has proven technically difficult and has yet to be successfully achieved on a large scale. The first Arctic offshore drilling platform, the Prirazlomnaya platform, was tugged from Murmansk to its permanent location on the Pechora Sea in August 2011. The platform failed to meet its most recent production deadline — March 2012. The bigger question, however, is what will become of the Shtokman oil field, located about 600 kilometers northeast of Murmansk. Experts estimate that it may contain as many as 200 billion barrels of oil, making it among the largest oil fields in the world. More than one-fifth of the world’s undiscovered oil and natural gas is believed to lie above the Arctic Circle. A development consortium for Shtokman was founded in 2008, headed by Gazprom. The first gas from the field is expected to go to market in 2016, coinciding with the city’s 100-year anniversary. What to do if you have two hours While central Murmansk is compact, many of the more interesting sites lie on the outskirts of the city, making it worth your while to rent a car if you’re pressed for time. Drive down to the city harbor in time for an hour-long tour of the Lenin icebreaker (18 Portovy Proyezd; +7 911-345-6777). From an observation room, tour guides will show you the nuclear reactor that once powered the icebreaker, which made its maiden voyage in 1957 and was decommissioned from service in 1989. Tours are available Wednesday to Friday at noon and on Saturdays and Sundays at noon, 1 and 2 p.m. (100 rubles ($3) for Russian citizens, 150 rubles ($5) for foreign nationals). English tours can be arranged in advance. From there, take a ride to see Alyosha, a 35-meter-high statue of a soldier that is Murmansk’s most recognizable landmark. Dedicated to those who defended the Soviet Arctic during World War II, Alyosha overlooks Kola Bay in the northeast of Murmansk from atop a hill that adds 173 meters to its height. Be sure to bring your camera to capture the spectacular panoramic view of the city. While you’re here, step inside the Savior on the Waters Church, which is located nearby and has an acclaimed collection of religious icons. What to do if you have two days A number of tourism companies organize multiday tours of the surrounding Murmansk region, giving adventurous travelers a chance to hike, kayak, fish, cross-country ski and snowmobile in one of the most ecologically diverse areas of Russia. Kola Travel (+7 815-367-1313; kolatravel.com) is one of the most experienced agencies and offers a diverse range of trips. If you’re feeling truly bold, Quark Expeditions (+ 1 802-735-1536; quarkexpeditions.com) offers 14-day voyages to the North Pole via Murmansk. All-inclusive packages start at $22,790. The town of Kirovsk (kirovsk-hibinogorsk.ru), located about three hours south of Murmansk, is one of the best places to ski in the region. You can reach the town by flying into the nearby Apatity Airport or getting off at the Apatity Station, one of the stops on the train ride to Murmansk. From there, Kirovsk is a half hour, 500-ruble ($17) taxi ride away. The South Slope of Mount Aikuaivenchorr (+8 815-313-4614) has the best-kept and most beginner-friendly slopes. Lift tickets are 90 rubles ($3) each or 1,100 rubles ($37) for a day pass). Mount Kukisvumchorr (+7 921-154-6464) is recommended for fans of extreme skiing. March is the ideal time to visit, when temperatures are chilly, but days are beginning to lengthen. Stay at Hotel Parkovaya (22 Parkovaya Ulitsa; +7 911-306-6801), a small, family-friendly establishment that offers apartment-style housing starting at 600 rubles ($19) a person. What to do with the family The Murmansk Oceanarium (2 Prospekt Geroyev Severomortsev; +7 815-231-3542) is the only aquarium on the European continent with trained Arctic seals. Shows are Wednesday to Sunday at 11 a.m., 3 and 5 p.m. Murmansk also has a well-known Puppet Theater (Teatr Kukol; 21a Ulitsa Sofi Perovskoi; +7 815-245-8178; murmanpuppet.ru) housed in the city’s library building. Seating is only available for 40, so be sure to buy tickets well in advance. All performances are in Russian. Nightlife Every year from Dec. 2 to Jan. 11, Murmansk is plunged into 24-hour darkness, giving new meaning to the term “nightlife.” Two of the best clubs in Murmansk are located in hotels. Ledokol, Russian for “icebreaker,” is located in the Radisson Park Inn Polyarniye Zori (17 Ulitsa Knipovicha; +7 815-228-9814; parkinn.ru/hotel-murmansk) and doubles as a popular concert venue. Marrakesh (43 Ulitsa Schmidta; +7 815-247-6464) is one of Murmansk’s most swanky nighttime hot spots, complete with a cigar room and a fine selection of wines. In addition to dozens of clubs, Murmansk also boasts several theaters. The Murmansk Regional Dramatic Theater (49 Prospekt Lenina; +7 815-247-2519; modt.ru) is one of the best-known theaters in the region, with a repertoire that includes both Russian classics and contemporary works. Any notable visiting acts are almost certain to be staged in Murmansk’s Philharmonic (3 Ulitsa Sofyi Perovskoi; +7 815-245-08-67; murmansound.ru). Where to eat Due to a constant influx of spendthrift sailors and Scandinavian businessmen, the Murmansk restaurant scene is competitive and surprisingly cosmopolitan. Seafood is guaranteed to be a good bet, though more adventurous foodies may be tempted by the chance to try regional dishes made with reindeer meat. Tsarskaya Okhota (Tsar’s Hunt) (86 Kolsky Prospekt; +7 815-225-5224) has an extensive menu that includes bear and reindeer meat. The interior is rustic and decorated with elk antlers, reindeer skins and stuffed bears. Dinner for two without alcohol costs about 1,000 rubles ($33). Reservations are recommended. Despite it’s Spanish name, Las Galletas (4 Ulitsa Polyarniye Zori; +7 815-225-9545) serves a range of European- and Russian-style meals, ranging anywhere from 200 rubles to 1,000 rubles ($7 to $33) for an entree. Ceiling-to-floor windows and leather couches make it an inviting place to relax with friends and enjoy the city from a warm, air-conditioned interior. Don’t miss the smoked-duck salad with raspberry vinaigrette for 330 rubles ($10.60). Continuing with the Spanish theme, Torro (80 Prospekt Lenina; +7 815-245-1700) is a haven for meat-lovers, boasting the best steak in all of Murmansk. Its close proximity to the Meridian Hotel makes it ideal for business lunches. A New York-style steak costs 1,060 rubles ($33). Cafe Leto (61 Prospekt Lenina; +7 8152-45-96-06, cafeleto.ru) is a clean, modern cafe, great for a coffee break or a longer meal. A visit to the dessert counter is a must for anyone with a sweet tooth. Try the yogurt mousse with fresh berries for 170 rubles ($6). Where to stay The Meridian Congress Hotel (5/23 Ulitsa Vorovskogo; +7 815-228-8800; meridian-hotel.ru) is the most popular destination for Scandinavian businessmen and Russian presidents. Dmitry Medvedev stayed here during a 2010 visit, presumably in the VIP suite that costs 21,000 rubles ($675) a night. Business rooms start at 4,900 rubles ($158) a night and include the breakfast buffet. The central location of this hotel makes it ideal for anyone who wants to explore the city, while the on-site restaurant, nightclub and bowling alley ensure that you don’t have to venture outside if the weather is too cold. For those traveling to Murmansk with a family, the Ogni Murmanska Hotel (1 Ulitsa Ogni Murmanska; +7 815-255-4009; ognimurmanska.ru) is undoubtedly the best choice. Perched on a hilly embankment on the southern edge of the city, the hotel doubles as a ski resort and also offers ice fishing and snowmobile racing. A family-style restaurant and small indoor water park are also located on the premises. King Harold V of Norway was a recent guest. Rooms start at 3,500 rubles ($120) a night. Culture tips As a result of the sizable Scandinavian expat population and close proximity to the Finnish and Norwegian borders, Murmansk residents have a better-than-average knowledge of English than most Russians. Foreigners are a common sight and don’t attract the sort of attention that they might in other cities of the same size. Residents are happy for the language practice and most high-quality restaurants have menus in several languages. Despite its location almost 200 kilometers above the Arctic Circle, Murmansk is not an uninhabitable winter wasteland. In the summer, temperatures hover around 15 degrees Celsius. In the winter, they rarely dip below minus 15 degrees Celsius. Jokes about igloos and reindeer herding aren’t appreciated. Most people live in apartment buildings and hold desk jobs. How to get there Nordavia, a subsidiary of Aeroflot, offers direct flights to Murmansk Airport (airport-murmansk.ru) from St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo Airport, as does the airline company Rossiya. The flight lasts two hours and costs about 10,000 rubles ($330) round-trip. Trains run from St. Petersburg’s Ladozhsky Railway Station to Murmansk twice daily at 9.10 a.m. and 5.20 p.m., and the travel time is about 27 hours. Prices start at 1,770 rubles ($57) for a one-way ticket. In the city itself, public transit is a straightforward system of trams and buses.
Murmansk Population: 307,700 Main industries: Shipping, fishing City manager: Andrei Sysoyev Founded in 1916 Interesting fact: Murmansk is home to the tallest building in the Arctic, the 16-story Arktika hotel. Helpful contacts: • Mikhail Sokolov, deputy city manager and chairman of the committee on economic development for the city of Murmansk (+7 815-245-0269; sokolovmy@murmanzkh.ru); • Alexei Veller, head of the municipality (+7 815-245-6464, gorsovet@polarnet.ru ), • City Manager Andrei Sysoyev (+7 815-245-5572, citymurmansk@citymurmansk.ru) Sister Cities: Curitiba, Brazil; Groningen, Netherlands; Jacksonville, Florida, U.S. Major Businesses • Murmansk Shipping Company (15 Ulitsa Kominterna, Foreign Trade and Financial Service Division, +7 815-248-1033, en.company.msco.ru), the largest shipping company working in the Russian Arctic, is responsible for 80 percent of cargo transported on the Northern Sea Route and 40 percent of the cargo transported by all Russian vessels. (Moscow Office; 13 Vasilyevskaya Ulitsa, Bldg. 2; +7 495-778-0080.) • Murmansk Commercial Seaport (19 Portovy Proyezd; +7 815-248-0644; portmurmansk.ru) is also the biggest company in Murmansk and the biggest transit point for coal in Russia, with more than 12 million tons going through every year.  • Siberian Coal Energy Company (Moscow office; 29 Serebryanicheskaya Naberezhnaya; +7 495-363-6405, suekag.com) is the biggest supplier of Russian coal to the foreign market, more than 50 percent of which is exported through Murmansk. SUEK bought a 24.9-percent stake in the Murmansk port in February 2012.
Q: What sets Murmansk apart from other cities in the northern, European part of Russia? A: Its geographical location. Murmansk is located on the rocky eastern shores of the Kola Bay on the Barents Sea. It’s the largest city north of the Arctic Circle. Actually, Murmansk residents have a joke: “Walking around on our streets, you can find reindeer, polar bears and sometimes the occasional penguin that’s flown in.” In reality, this is all hyperbole. But the problems of industrial development in our city are all tied to the challenges of Murmansk’s location, climate and environment. These include risks tied to additional operating costs. Q: What makes Murmansk a good city to do business in? A: Our city is currently the center for Arctic development in Russia, especially for the fishery and shipping industries. Right now, both the city and the region of Murmansk are working toward becoming a launch pad for major investment projects of national significance. In the near future, Murmansk is expected to become the transportation hub and logistical center for northern Russia. Within the framework of a project called “Integrated Development of the Murmansk Transportation Hub,” we are considering the creation of five large terminal shipping facilities on the shores of the Kola Bay. Q: What places in Murmansk would you recommend that tourists visit? A: I would recommend visiting the seafront Russian Orthodox Church Savior on the Waters and the nuclear icebreaker Lenin, which has been turned into a museum. Other than that, our city has the northernmost aquarium in the world, the Oceanarium. It’s the only aquarium on the European continent where trained Arctic seals perform. Of equal interest for tourists is the Kolsky Bridge. As a four-lane, 2.5-kilometer bridge crossing the Kola Bay, it is one of the longest automobile bridges north of the Arctic Circle.
Yevgenia Ovcharenko, Founder of Lissant-Nord, an air ventilation company Q: What are the benefits of doing business in Murmansk? A: It’s a small city, so you can start a business without borrowing huge sums of money. Business expenses are smaller. Rent is cheaper. Salaries are smaller. I was able to start my business with a 200,000-ruble ($6,800) loan from the bank. It’s not like Moscow, where even small businesses need million ruble loans to start. Capital from Moscow hasn’t made it here yet, so there are many opportunities for smaller companies. Q: What are the challenges of doing business in Murmansk? A: The main one is the absence of experience. Compared to European countries, which have centuries of tradition, Russian law has only two decades of practice with business. The system isn’t perfect, but it’s starting to become better. For small companies, there’s a lack of international integration, which makes it difficult to import foreign equipment. Murmansk is also far away from other cities, making transportation expensive. Q: What is it like to live in Murmansk? A: It’s a difficult climate. I love the city, but you need to take a break once in a while and get the kids out of it. Unfortunately, everything’s pretty far away, and traveling is expensive. The Arctic nights in the winter are especially hard to deal with. TITLE: Life in the Fast Lane: A Man’s Love for the Porsche AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times TEXT: One really needs to see Klaus Bischoff talk about his cars. The mechanic, who has more than 40 years of experience working with Porsche cars, is the director of the Porsche Rolling Museum in Stuttgart, Germany and pets his beloved vehicles as if they were champion horses of a noble breed as he speaks about their victories. “The most overwhelming moment ever was when the Porsche 962 participated in its first Le Mans [race],” Bischoff told The St. Petersburg Times, speaking at the Second Porsche festival in Shushary, on the outskirts of St. Petersburg, on Saturday. “All three cars that we put forward reached the finish at almost exactly the same time. It was a breathtaking, absolutely jaw-dropping sight.” “The 962 has won seven Le Mans races already, but its debut win was absolutely unforgettable and this gorgeous finale does not compare to anything else,” he added. Porsche 962 C (1987) was one of the four legendary Porsche racecars that came to town on Saturday for the Porsche festival, celebrating the Russian premiere of the brand-new shiny red Porsche Boxster, which goes on sale in June. Russia is an important market for Porsche, where the company sold more than 2,200 cars in 2011, nearly a 50-percent hike from the year before. In 2012, Porsche expects to sell at least 3,000 cars in the country. The 962 was joined by the Porsche 936 Spyder (1977), Porsche 911 GT1 (1998) and Porsche 1911 GT3 RSR. The four spectacular racecars made their first trip to Russia. “We chose the cars for this visit very carefully; we consider these four cars to be the brightest Le Mans race winners ever,” said Bischoff. The 24 Hours of Le Mans is the world’s oldest active sports car race in endurance racing. Le Mans, which is also known in the world of sports as the Grand Prix of Endurance and Efficiency, hosted the first competition in 1923 and it has been an annual event ever since. Le Mans puts its crews’ ability to maintain a high speed during the course of the demanding 24-hour marathon to the test. Part of the trick is to prevent the car from sustaining severe mechanical damage. The three drivers who typically make up a team take shifts as they go, with pit stops allowed throughout the race. Bischoff, who was originally asked to bring the core selection of the veteran Porsche cars back to life before joining the future museum, has a personal connection not only to the 90 cars that make up his museum’s permanent display or the nearly 500 vehicles that the gallery boasts in its collection. His hands have known thousands of Porsches: Champions and losers; classy glossies and sobering wrecks. During his professional career, the mechanic has worked at a staggering 27 Le Mans races. The Porsche 936 Spyder, which won the 1977 race at Le Mans, is the one that is closest of all to Bischoff’s heart. Indeed, there is a dramatic story behind the win. “The start turned out to be quite a disaster for us: Of the three Porsche cars — two 936s and one 935 — that took part in the race, two cars broke down and dropped out of the race during the first two hours of the competition,” Bischoff remembers. “Then the last one was up against five gorgeous-looking and highly competitive Renaults. And we were four laps behind! It took a titanic effort for the drivers to recover and even overcome the Renaults, and, before we could sigh a breath of relief, the car had a transmission problem and we couldn’t not replace it — the thing had to be repaired. I did the work, it took 27 minutes, and we still won. Really, everyone in that race was a hero, and I am proud to be part of that success.” It is the gallery’s philosophy that in the Rolling Museum every car in the collection has to run. Every month, a small number of collection representatives travel around the globe — from South America to Australia to Russia. “We are proud to be able to show these cars in running condition — we actually use them quite a lot in historical rallies,” Bischoff said. What the museum would not do is to rent out its gorgeous creatures — a useful reminder that not everything can be bought, especially where pride and respect are concerned. “Even though, technically speaking, all of the cars are in running condition and many people would pay a fortune for the chance to rev up a champion car even once, to us they are all antiques,” said Bischoff. “And they are truly priceless.”