SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1741 (52), Wednesday, December 26, 2012
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TITLE: Thousands March to Protest U.S. Adoption Ban
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Kravtsova and Natalya Krainova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Thousands of people thronged central Moscow on Sunday in a march protesting a ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian orphans, in one of the largest opposition protests of the last 13 months.
The march represented the most prominent expression of public anger thus far against the heavily criticized measure, which took effect Jan. 1 after being passed by the State Duma with overwhelming support and signed into law by President Vladimir Putin.
Two columns of people holding banners with images of deputies and senators who supported the bill and of Putin with the word "Shame!" written over them in red marched down both sides of Strastnoi Bulvar toward Prospekt Akademika Sakharova, an oft-used site for opposition rallies.
The turnout appeared to be much larger than that for other protests of recent months. Police said around 9,000 to 9,500 people took part, while opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov said more than 50,000 people were in attendance. Some participants estimated that there were more than 100,000 people there, outstripping protests held in December 2011 following disputed parliamentary elections.
Most participants interviewed said they didn't think the bill would be reconsidered by parliament but that they felt compelled to attend the protest anyway.
"I consider it my duty to come today, as I am a young mother myself," said Svetlana Ardayeva, a 27-year-old housewife. "Children's rights are sacred, and the bill violates these rights dramatically."
The two columns came together at Prospekt Akademika Sakharova, where the march concluded and participants threw the portraits of politicians into a large garbage container.
"The march was emotional, with tough slogans. This kind of beginning to the year is great," said Udaltsov, who led one of the columns and said the march represented the revival of the weakening protest movement.
Protests against the law also took place in other cities and towns across Russia on Sunday, including St. Petersburg, Rostov-on-Don and Barnaul.
The demonstrations came amid confusion over when the ban will take effect and to which potential U.S. adoptive parents it will apply.
A bilateral adoptions agreement that went into effect last year stipulates that a country wishing to exit the deal must warn the other signee a year in advance, during which time the agreement remains in force.
But Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that most U.S. families planning to adopt Russian children will not be able to do so.
Peskov told Dozhd television that only if the adoption procedure had been completed by a court before Jan. 1 would the U.S. parents be allowed to take the child.
This means that U.S. families that had started legal procedures to adopt a Russian child before Jan. 1 but hadn't received a court ruling granting them custody rights before the law took effect would not be able to adopt the child.
"This is children we're talking about, and children are, always have and always will be treated with a great deal of attention," Peskov said. "No one will take a formal approach on this. But there is the law, and this law says that adoptions are banned."
The Foreign Ministry informed the United States of its intent to terminate the agreement in early January, Peskov said.
The adoptions ban was part of Russia's response to the Magnitsky Act, passed by the U.S. Congress in December, which imposes travel restrictions and economic sanctions on Russian officials implicated in human rights abuses.
The adoptions ban has evoked a storm of criticism from Russian bloggers since it was proposed by United Russia lawmakers in December. Tens of thousands of Russians signed a petition calling on the U.S. Senate to put restrictions on Russian lawmakers who supported the ban and another petition urging the Duma to dissolve.
Last month, around 7,000 U.S. citizens also signed a letter asking Putin not to enact the law.
Many bloggers have expressed particular outrage over the fact that the law, they believe, deprives disabled orphans of a chance to receive good medical care and live a productive life abroad.
Duma Deputy Robert Shlegel of United Russia submitted an amendment to the law in late December that would have made an exception for disabled children, but he recalled it Friday.
The amendment "cannot be passed in its current form" and work on it will continue, Shlegel tweeted.
Duma Deputy Dmitry Gudkov of A Just Russia, who voted against the ban, called the bill "hysteria, not an answer to the Magnitsky list."
"We are conducting our own investigation. Most deputies who supported the bill may be on the Magnitsky list themselves," he said before Sunday's march.
He also said a petition against the ban organized by opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta that has gathered more than 100,000 signatures would be considered by the Duma on Monday.
The Kremlin human rights council sent Putin an evaluation of the bill that said it contradicted the Constitution because federal authorities were required by law to have consulted regional authorities before its passage.
On Sunday, Peskov told Interfax that Putin had been informed about the Moscow protest march. "He is certainly aware of it," he said.
Commenting on the protest, Peskov said that people's concern about the lives of orphans "certainly deserves attention and can be understood" but that calls to dissolve the State Duma were "non-constructive."
Senior Duma Deputy Yekaterina Lakhova of United Russia condemned the protesters, saying they rallied not to protect Russian orphans but to support U.S. businesses.
Lakhova told RIA-Novosti that she had studied the business of U.S. adoptions of Russian children and that U.S. agencies lost large sums of money because of the ban on adoptions.
She labeled the protest "purely political" and hinted that it was masterminded by an unidentified entity.
The march was attended by leaders of many of the political groups that have led the non-parliamentary opposition over the last 13 months, including Ilya Yashin of the Solidarity movement and Boris Nemtsov, Vladimir Ryzhkov and Mikhail Kasyanov of the People's Freedom Party — Republican Party of Russia.
People took up various chants as they marched along the hills of the Boulevard Ring, shouting "Putin to the Magnitsky list," "Withdraw the scoundrels' bill," and "Shame!"
Another popular slogan was "Down with President Herod," referring to the ancient Roman leader who in the Bible orders the killing of all children under the age of two in and around Bethlehem.
"We feel pity for the children and came here out of a sense of human dignity. Putin did exactly the same thing as Herod," said pensioner Zhanna Polyakova, 74.





TITLE: Putin Signals He’s Back in Business
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin on Thursday signaled a return to the classic days of his presidency by presiding over a 4 1/2-hour news conference, which at times resembled a call-in show as reporters from the country’s far-flung regions scrambled to pass personal messages to the head of state.
The president appeared comfortable and bullish, if at times haughty, when answering often unscripted questions from more than 60 journalists — and ignoring attempts by his spokesman Dmitry Peskov to end the performance after four hours had passed.
The marathon event for some 1,200 accredited reporters marked a return of an annual tradition during Putin’s first two terms as president, though unlike then, it was held in the World Trade Center, in western Moscow, instead of the Kremlin.
Some reporters, notably from national publications not known for openly criticizing the Kremlin, grilled him, only to be rebuffed in trademark style.
“You think it is normal if [the U.S.] humiliates us? Are you a sadomasochist or what?” the president barked at Alexander Kolesnichenko of the weekly Argumenty i Fakty, who had suggested that the State Duma’s bill to ban U.S. adoptions was “cannibalistic.”
Putin engaged in a tit-for-tat exchange with Maria Solovenko, the editor of the Vladivostok-based Narodnoye Veche newspaper, who cornered him on the government’s current anti-corruption campaign at the recent firing of former Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov for alleged widespread graft in his ministry.
“This former defense minister is such a pain,” she said, adding that she wondered how Putin would return the stolen taxpayers’ money. “They stole billions. Don’t you know?” Solovenko asked, to which the president dryly replied “no.”
Putin then asked the editor to “sit down, please,” addressing her as Masha and using the informal you (ty) — which is not considered polite between strangers — to which she retorted with “Thank you, Vova.”
A reporter from Izvestia, widely regarded as one of the city’s most Kremlin-friendly dailies, accused Putin of building an authoritarian regime of personal power over the past 12 years. “Don’t you think that this hinders Russia’s development?” he asked.
Putin rebuffed the question by saying his decision to heed the Constitution instead of changing it in 2008 and serving as prime minister for four years was ample proof that he was not authoritarian. “I consciously moved to a second post to guarantee the continuity of power,” he said, adding that “democracy is to observe the law.” He also offered trademark hawkishness over troubled relations with Washington, by lambasting the U.S. stance on the Magnitsky act as arrogant and defending the State Duma’s response to ban adoptions.
He argued that it was not Moscow’s fault that the U.S.-Russian “reset” offered by President Barack Obama was necessary. “We didn’t make the name, it was suggested by our American partners,” he said, adding that ties had deteriorated because of the Iraq war and U.S plans to install a missile defense system in Europe.
When Associated Press reporter Vladimir Izachenkov suggested that Moscow was losing influence in Syria by backing President Bashar Assad, a schoolmasterly Putin retorted: “Well listen, my dear, has Russia not lost its influence after interventionists started meddling?”
Putin paused when L.A. Times correspondent Sergei Loiko drew applause for a question that sharply criticized the planned adoption ban and the failure to investigate the death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. “What is that for?” he frowned, while clapping his hands slowly.
An adamant Putin retorted that the “Magnitsky tragedy” happened while he was prime minister and that he did not know the details of the case. He added that the adoption ban was more about U.S. lawmakers replacing the Jackson-Vanik trade sanctions with the Magnitsky Act sanctions.
“They did away with an anti-Soviet act and thought it necessary to adopt another anti-Russian act,” he said. He went on to argue that the cause of Magnitsky’s death in a Moscow detention center was still being investigated and that people were dying in U.S. prisons, too.
Putin touched on nationalities issues more than once. He praised Mordovia as a multiethnic republic with “absolutely harmonious” relations between religious and ethnic groups. The Volga region republic saw an increase in the number of people classifying themselves as Mordvin, a Finno-Ugric people, in the last census 2010. However, ethnic Russians still form a more than 50 percent majority.
The president reiterated that traditional Islam in Russia doesn’t use hijabs. “In our culture — and by this I mean traditional Islam — there are no hijabs,” he told a journalist from the North Caucasus Stavropol region, where schools have been trying to ban students’ Islamic headwear.
Significant time was devoted to regional media, whose reporters engaged in heated competition for the president’s or his spokesman’s attention. The audience’s mood swayed between amusement and frustration when questions were started with eulogies and thanks, while at least two journalists asked Putin to say hello to their children.
Peskov appeared to play with regional sentiment when awarding questions not to media outlets but to the region they hailed from.
“Let’s move from Echo Moskvy to Magadan,” he said, referring to the port city on the north Pacific coast.
Antonina Lukina of the Magadanskay Pravda newspaper then became the first reporter so far to publicly ask Putin about the recent speculations about his health.
But instead of questioning the Kremlin’s official explanation that the president’s two-month break from traveling in October and November was caused by a “sports injury,” she asked who was behind the online rumors and who profits from it.
“Political opponents profit — those who want to cast doubt on the government’s legitimacy and efficiency,” he said, adding the common Russian sarcastic phrase one gives to confirm one’s health, “don’t wait [around for my death].”
The audience was upbeat when a reporter for the Lifenews.ru online tabloid asked Putin when the end of the world would happen. The president paused before saying in about 4.5 billion years when the sun will turn into a white dwarf.
The hall was less amused when a reporter from the Glavbukh accountancy magazine asked Putin to introduce a professional holiday for accountants.
When Putin finally declared the event over, the hall applauded.



TITLE: Officials: Driver Stabbed Himself 5 Times in Suicide
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: A bizarre claim made by the Investigative Committee concerning the death of a man involved in a road-traffic accident has led to multiple arrests and at least five jail terms. 
An estimated 200 gathered on Pionerskaya Ploshchad on Sunday to await news concerning the death of Grigory Kochnev, who the Investigative Committee said stabbed himself five times in the chest after a traffic incident on Dec. 17.
On Tuesday, a local court heard cases of those detained on Pionerskaya Ploshchad. Five of those detained were given three-day prison terms plus hefty fines, while the rest were fined or had their cases sent to their local courts.
According to human rights lawyer Dinar Idrisov, about 10 people were waiting for their cases to be heard when this paper went to press on Tuesday evening.
Kochnev’s relatives insist that he was killed by the men who were in the other car and are demanding a proper investigation and the arrest of the attackers.
Eighty were detained by the police and charged with organizing an unsanctioned rally and failure to obey a police officer’s lawful orders despite witnesses and reporters, who were on the scene, reporting that they had no posters or megaphones and simply discussed the situation rather than held a rally. 
Video reports from the scene also show people being detained for no apparent reason by policemen who do not introduce themselves or give any reasons for detentions, as required by law. 
“I was in shock when they started detaining people,” video blogger Andrei Smirnov, who broadcasted the gathering on the web, said by phone Tuesday.
“There was not a single poster and not a single shout, nothing at all. These weren’t the kind of people who go to protests, they were purely random who were simply concerned about the situation. Timid, scared of everything.”
Some of the detained are shown on the videos asking the police officers for their IDs and the reasons for the detention, and shouting that they are being detained illegally when the officers continue taking them to the police buses, ignoring their requests.
About 50 were left to spend the night in the police precinct, while a number of those whose cases were not heard Monday were held for a second night.
The fines are reported to be 10,000 to 20,000 rubles ($330-$655). Some of the detained were not released by the police and were awaiting the trial in the evening Tuesday.
Lawyer Idrisov criticized the rulings as “illegal,” saying that the kind of assembly that was held on Sunday did not require any authorization by law.
“The police had no grounds for detaining people and shutting down the assembly,” he said.
“[The law] gives grounds for the police to disperse an event only in case of mass violations of public order and creating a threat to public safety, such as turning the event into mass riots. There was no threat to public order. 
“People gathered peacefully to discuss the situation about the [initial] refusal of the Investigative Committee to investigate the case, the refusal of the Investigative Committee’s investigators to speak with the relatives and with the misinformation about the alleged suicide that the Investigative Committee disseminated.”
 The Investigative Committee’s Dec. 19 report about a man dying as the result of stabbing himself in the chest five times after a traffic incident caused a wave of disbelief and criticism.  
The media cited a witness who said he saw a man being punched while passing the site in his car. Kochnev’s relatives said they did not believe in his suicide, saying he was into sports and had two daughters, a 2- and a 4-year old. He was reported to be on his way to take his daughters from the kindergarten when the incident took place.
Two days later, on Dec. 21, the Investigative Committee said a murder investigation was opened.
On Monday, the Investigative Committee’s spokesman told Interfax that Kochnev had been twice under trial on drug distribution charges, and was recently hospitalized with psychotropic drug poisoning.
“Even if that really is the case, it in no way diminishes the right of society and the victim’s relatives to demand that the murderer be found and a fair and objective investigation be conducted,” Idrisov said.
“In any case, a person died under rather strange circumstances, but instead of probing into the situation, the Investigative Committee started to soft-pedal it. This is exactly what brought about the public uproar.”


TITLE: Acquital Nears in Magnitsky Case
AUTHOR: By Natalia Krainova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A prosecutor on Monday requested that the only remaining defendant in whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky’s death be acquitted of criminal negligence.
The United States recently passed a law to impose international sanctions on Russians it believes were involved in the 2009 death, but Russia has not made any conviction in the case.
State Attorney Dmitry Bokov asked a Moscow court to acquit Dmitry Kratov, former deputy head of the city’s Butyrka pretrial detention center, due to a lack of evidence, the Rapsi legal news agency reported.
Magnitsky, who died of heart failure in a different jail, Matrosskaya Tishina, a few months after being transferred from Butyrka in 2009, had been incarcerated on tax evasion charges shortly after accusing tax and police officials of embezzling $230 million.
Kratov currently faces up to five years in prison. The verdict will be delivered Friday, the prosecution said.
An independent inquiry by the Kremlin’s Human Rights Council determined that Magnitsky died after being beaten by guards. In an e-mail in June, the firm that had employed Magnitsky, Hermitage Capital, called the investigation a “farce” because Kratov was “not present at Matrosskaya Tishina.”
Hermitage Capital founder Bill Browder has called Kratov a “scapegoat” and blamed President Vladimir Putin for influencing the prosecution. “What is apparent is that the prosecutor couldn’t prosecute anyone with that type of political direction,” Browder said.
Putin said Thursday that Magnitsky “wasn’t tortured but died of natural causes,” Browder said by e-mail. 
Browder expressed a belief that “the Russian government will surely get a conviction” in the posthumonous trial of Magnitsky on tax evasion charges.   


TITLE: Russia, India Strike Deal Over Purchase of Arms
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — India on Monday agreed to buy $2.9 billion worth of Russian weapons, as President Vladimir Putin visited the longtime ally.
Under the larger deal, India will purchase kits to assemble 42 Sukhoi-30 fighter jets for $1.6 billion. The other contract is for 71 Mi-17 helicopters worth $1.3 billion.
“We agreed to strengthen the partnership of Russia and India in the area of military equipment cooperation further and advance new projects, including creating joint ventures and transferring technology,” Putin said after his talks with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
The fighter jet deal brought the total number of Sukhoi-30 warplanes sold to India to 230, with a total value of $8.5 billion, Interfax reported.
India’s HAL Corp. plans to build 140 of these jets by the end of 2015.
“Russia is a key partner in our efforts to modernize our armed forces,” Singh said in a statement.
As far as helicopters go, India has already been taking delivery of Mi-17s under a previous contract. Signed in 2008, it stipulates that Russia will supply 80 helicopters worth $1.3 billion.
India has been Russia’s largest customer for military hardware, despite missed deadlines that sent New Delhi shopping for Western weapons more often.
In one such delay, Russia this year again postponed delivery of an aircraft carrier to the Indian navy, saying it will be ready in November.
“It’s clear that because New Delhi has plotted a course for diversification of weapons suppliers, the competitive battle is escalating,” Russia’s ambassador to India, Alexander Kadakin, said in an interview posted on the Foreign Ministry’s website Monday. “Russia is ready for this.”
Yet it appeared that the deals announced Monday fell short of expectations. Russian defense industry sources had said Putin’s visit to New Delhi would likely produce agreements for the sale of military equipment worth more than $7.5 billion.
In other business, the government’s Russian Direct Investment Fund and the State Bank of India agreed to set up a joint fund.
 The fund could invest up to $2 billion in projects that seek to develop trade and economic cooperation between the countries.
Indian state oil companies have also expressed interest in acquiring stakes in Russian projects, according to the joint statement on the outcome of Putin’s visit.
In addition, it said India wants to buy Russian oil and liquefied natural gas.

Multi-industry conglomerate Sistema expects an out-of-court resolution of a dispute over its subsidiary’s loss of a license in India, Sistema’s principal owner, Vladimir Yevtushenkov, said as he accompanied Putin on the visit.
India’s Supreme Court on Feb. 2 revoked 122 wireless-services licenses issued in 2008, including those of Sistema Shyam Teleservices, for which the carrier had paid about $600 million.
The ruling followed an investigation begun in the second half of 2010 into violations in the distribution of frequencies.
In May, Sistema Shyam Teleservices asked the Supreme Court to reconsider the decision to revoke the licenses.
Sistema owns 56.7 percent of the company, and the Russian State Property Agency owns 17 percent. The rest belongs to India’s Shyam Group.


TITLE: Language Books Stir Controversy
AUTHOR: By Patrick Reevell
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A policeman says in Russian: “I work a lot, sometimes even too much. … Winter or summer, rain or shine, I go from a bank to a store, from a store to a restaurant, from a restaurant to a market, looking for where to take money.”
What’s wrong with this passage? Is there a grammatical error or a moral dilemma? The author of “Poekhali!” (Let’s Go!), a Russian-language textbook series that has sold more than 100,000 copies around the world, maintains that passages like the one above help foreigners learn a famously complicated language.
But a United Russia lawmaker who made headlines last month with calls to raise $2.8 million to buy Hitler’s birthplace and demolish it says the textbooks are “disgracing the country” and are “worse than a manual for terrorism.”
Frants Klintsevich, deputy chairman of the State Duma’s Defense Committee, told Izvestia that the series, authored by St. Petersburg resident Stanislav Chernyshov, was tarnishing Russia’s image abroad. He has asked the prosecutor’s office to open an investigation.
“It’s outrageous. It kills the soul and creates a moronic impression of Russia. It makes foreigners think we’re all bandits, morons and drug addicts,” Klintsevich told St. Petersburg’s Channel Five.
In one edition, a professor says: “I used to love going to the university, but now I prefer to dance in a nightclub, walk in a park, think about work. At work I read interesting lectures, but stupid girl students don’t come. Sometimes I take drugs, then students say that my lectures are very good and they want to listen to more.”
The author of the series, which features beginner and intermediate editions and clearly states on the front covers that it’s “for adults,” counters that the lawmaker’s anger stems from a misinterpretation.
“The passages involving the policeman and the drug-taking professor are part of an exercise where the student is supposed to find mistakes and correct them. These phrases — about money and drugs — are mistakes,” Chernyshov said. “It’s very funny. The deputy and his assistants simply didn’t read the question properly.”
Chernyshov, who runs the Extra-Class Language Center in St. Petersburg with his wife, Alla, who co-authored the two beginner editions, is surprised that the series, whose first edition was published a decade ago, is now coming under fire.
“I believe it’s the first time in history that parliamentarians have asked for a grammar book to be investigated,” he told The St. Petersburg Times. “I think someone was really looking for passages to prosecute and, at last, found them.”
He said other texts in the series promote moral improvement. One exercise asks students to think of ways to make the world a better place by choosing a project suitable for receiving a grant from a group of obliging businessmen. One of the suggested projects is a worldwide censorship system for ridding the Internet of “bad sites.”
The publisher, Zlatoust, said the series competes well with more sober language books, most of which were produced in the Soviet era. Foreign students asked by The St. Petersburg Times defended the series, saying they liked its ability to spark debate.
“I think its excellent. It gives an accurate introduction to Russia,” said Simon Cahill, a 23-year-old British student. “This doesn’t mean a bad image of Russia. All the opinions and facts in it are readily available in the Russian press, which is where a lot of the material comes from, in any case.”
Not all foreign readers were as taken with the series, however. “I can understand why Russian parliament members would be upset. I personally prefer a more neutral textbook,” Alexandra Smith, a teacher at the University of Edinburgh, told The St. Petersburg Times.
She said the series did not have a solid reputation in the context of academic learning but said some parts were useful. “I personally would be happier to use more subtle humor. Using a text on Putin, for example, is stupid on many levels and too cheap. It seems that some people in Russia feel that these sorts of things are cool and might appeal to foreigners. It’s just a commercial trick.”
Chernyshov said his aim in the series was not to express his own views but “to provoke communication — the goal of a good teacher.” One of the most-cited passages in the series is a text featuring President Vladimir Putin: “I am president. My job is very simple: I just say yes or no.”
Klintsevich’s complaint is the latest in a series of conservative interventions by United Russia deputies on cultural issues in St. Petersburg — one being the introduction of stringent anti-gay legislation in March.
Chernyshov believes that his case shows that the state is trying to widen its control over new areas of society.
“First it was oil, gas, television. Now it’s Russian as a foreign language’s turn,” he said. “I believe it is a personal campaign by Deputy Klintsevich. But I see that the state is becoming more occupied with questions on the teaching of Russian — in both a positive and a negative sense. But in any case, they want more control.”
Chernyshov paints the controversy as a struggle between a vision of education inherited from the Soviet Union and that of a democratic Russia.
“Under the Soviet Union, teaching was under very strict control, and we see that someone in power considers that today we need that sort of control again,” he said. “My books are a good sign if Russia wants to be a democracy — foreigners see that we can laugh at policemen, even at the president’s work.”
What has attracted the deputy’s anger precisely now is unclear. He is known for a charismatic style and a penchant for big public gestures. Besides his campaign to buy Hitler’s house, he has submitted a flurry of proposals in the Duma, including a suggestion that capital punishment be reintroduced for treason.
According to Klintsevich, treasonous acts warranting execution could be widened to include major wastes of state resources, such as the botched Proton-M satellite launch in August.
Chernyshov also believes that he could be the victim of a business tussle in the Russian-as-a-foreign language industry. “There’s a state program at the moment that receives money from the budget. It’s possible that a popular independent textbook bothers specific people who want to earn money by writing official textbooks. This often happens in Russia. That’s how I explain it to myself anyway.”
Repeated attempts to contact Klintsevich by phone and e-mail were unanswered. A reporter spoke with the deputy’s secretary on several days in November and December but was told he was unavailable.


TITLE: Rossia-1’s Berezovsky Film Prompts an Investigation
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A documentary-style film called “Berezovsky” aired on state-owned channel Rossia-1 on Sunday night has prompted Prosecutor General Yury Chaika to order a probe into a range of serious allegations made against former Kremlin insider Boris Berezovsky, from ordering the murder of a liberal opposition leader to abducting a Ukrainian presidential candidate, news reports said Monday.
The film, authored by Andrei Kondrashev, a host on the Vesti news program, consisted of solemn interviews with Berezovsky’s former colleagues, all of whom came forward to accuse the tycoon of being involved in several high-profile crimes.
The allegations are already being checked by the Investigative Committee, the state-run RIA-Novosti news agency reported.
In one interview, Mikhail Kodanyev, a former co-chair of the Liberal Russia party who was sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment in 2004 for ordering the killing of fellow party member Sergei Yushenkov in the mid-2000s, told Rossia-1 that he never committed the crime but kept silent all these years because Berezovsky promised to pay him $3 million to do so.
Berezovsky’s motive, he says, was to secure refugee status for himself in Britain as a victim of political repression.
Kodanyev made his revelations for the first time from a prison colony, and the film also showed his written testimony asking prosecutors for a retrial of his case.
The film also accused Berezovsky of being behind the killing of Alexander Litvinenko, a former KGB officer who worked for Berezovsky and whose poisoning in London in 2006 seriously strained relations between Russia and Britain.
That accusation in the film came from Alexander Korzhakov, a former bodyguard of Boris Yeltsin.
Among the other crimes mentioned in the film in which Berezovsky was alleged to have played a role: the murders of journalist Vlad Listyev, businessman Badri Patarkatsishvili and politician Vladimir Golovlev, and the abduction of former Ukrainian presidential candidate Ivan Rybkin.
Berezovsky’s lawyer, Andrei Borovko, rejected the claims made in the film and said the channel wanted to present the self-exiled oligarch as a “monster.”
“If somebody wants to open another criminal case, let them open it,” he told Izvestia on Monday.

TITLE: Lenin Mausoleum Tilting, Requires Major Repairs
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The Lenin Mausoleum on Red Square will undergo major repair works because sagging ground underneath it has made the famous building tilt, officials said Monday.
The mausoleum suffered “serious strain” because of sinking ground and snow and rain damaging its exterior, Stanislav Kyuver, an official with the Federal Guard Service, which is in charge of security surrounding the Kremlin, told reporters.
Kyuver said that Lenin’s corpse won’t be removed and that the mausoleum will be surrounded by a tent to ensure an “esthetic view” and that builders can work in normal temperatures, Interfax reported.
Kyuver spoke at a news conference with city and Kremlin officials, Interfax reported. Participants said that the works would be the biggest in the mausoleum’s history. However, they did not say, when exactly they would begin, nor did they indicate whether the mausoleum, which is one of the city’s prime tourist attractions, would remain open to the public.
They also did not give any specific reasons for the sagging ground underneath the building. However, the Dozhd online TV channel said on its website that one theory is that it was caused by repair works inside the Kremlin.

TITLE: Navalny Hit With 3rd Case
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Kravtsova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A third criminal investigation was opened against opposition leader and anti-corruption lawyer Alexei Navalny on Monday, with the Investigative Committee claiming he stole money from a political party in 2007.
The committee said in a statement that Allekt, a company headed by Navalny in 2007, had received 100 million rubles ($3.3 million) from the Union of Right Forces party for the provision of advertising services and then transferred the funds to shell companies.
“No document confirming the fulfillment of the conditions of the contraction has been presented to investigators,” the statement said.
The investigators’ decision to open the case was met with criticism from both Navalny and former representatives of the party who said they had no complaints about Navalny and the charges were no more than a demonstration of political pressure.  
“The Investigative Committee has a right to request documents that prove that the conditions of the contract with Allekt were met,” Leonid Gozman, who in 2007 was deputy head of the party’s federal political council, said by phone. “The fact that they didn’t do that only proves incompetence and political bias.”
Navalny, who was banned from leaving the country, called the case absurd and said he was not going to cease his activity and leave the country anyway. He denied any involvement in any criminal cases brought against him and said his political activity was the reason for investigators’ accusations.
“It demonstrates that total lawlessness and a new legal reality have taken place,” he said in comments carried by Interfax, referring to the new case against him.
According to the Criminal Code, an embezzlement case — which Navalny is accused of — cannot be opened without a complaint from an affected party. “The Investigative Committee can’t just violate the law, which means there was a complaint from someone in the party,” a source close to Navalny told The St. Petersburg Times on condition of anonymity.
“The same situation happened when Navalny was charged last week with fraud and money laundering, and it was unknown until he was finally charged the Yves Roche company made a complaint to the Investigative Committee,” the source said.
On Dec. 20, investigators accused Navalny and his younger brother, Oleg, of stealing 55 million rubles ($1.8 million) from a foreign company.
The Union of Right Forces ceased to be a political party in 2008 and transformed into a civil movement the following year.
“This further criminal case against Navalny is the funniest one. No victims, no complaints, no Union of Right Forces party. But the case is still here. Awesome,” Ilya Yashin, Navalny’s colleague in the opposition’s Coordination Council, said on Twitter.
Kirov region Governor Nikita Belykh, a former head of the Union of Right Forces, declared his position on checks into Navalny and the party in his blog on Ekho Moskvy’s website back in October, when it was revealed that the Interior Ministry had begun checks into correspondence between him and Navalny.
“I’m sure there weren’t any violations. The party was closed down, all financial reports were submitted to the Central Elections Committee and the Justice Department on time. If anybody remembers what was the attitude of authorities toward the Union of Right Forces in 2007, then you may be sure that if there were any violations, they would be found back then,” he wrote.
Navalny faces 10 years in jail for the Union of Right Forces case, as well as 10 years for a case involving Belykh and two years for the case involving his brother. These charges, however, may not be the last for Navalny.
The Investigative Committee announced on Dec. 18 that it was conducting checks into the possible involvement of Navalny in yet another case into the sale of a distillery in the Kirov region.
Navalny said in comments carried by Interfax that criminal cases could be limited only by investigators’ imagination. “They can call any operation, made by an anti-corruption fund or by me, or by any firm that I ever headed, a fraud,” he said.

TITLE: EU-Russian Visa Regime Hot Topic at Summit
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The European Union insists that Russia agree to its terms for a visa facilitation agreement before any progress can be made toward a visa-free travel regime.
This is the message from Friday’s EU-Russia summit.
The talks between President Vladimir Putin and EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and EU Council chief Hermann van Rompuy in Brussels were dominated by visa and energy issues — none of which saw any significant breakthrough.
Barroso said at a joint news conference with Putin after the talks that in order to achieve “positive dynamics” for a visa waiver, it was important to reach a more modest agreement that would make travel easier for a range of professional groups, according to a transcript on the Kremlin’s website.
Talks about a visa facilitation agreement have been dormant for more than a year because Moscow demands visa-free entry for government officials, something the Europeans categorically refuse.
Putin did not respond to the trade-off at Friday’s news conference, and he reiterated his position that scrapping visas would remove a significant hurdle to investment. He said that “all technical questions were solved” and that all that was needed for a visa waiver now was a political decision by the European Union.
Despite Putin’s claim, the “common steps” program to achieve the technical conditions for abolishing visas is ongoing between the EU and Russia — and is nowhere close to completion.
According to EU diplomats, both sides just finished two of four areas covered by the program.
The common steps do not lead automatically to visa-free travel, but their completion is a precondition for negotiations about this to start. European officials are adamant that there is no time frame for this, whereas Russian officials have said they want to see visas scrapped before the Sochi Olympics in February 2014.
Putin argued that Russian tourists were important for the crisis-hit European economy because they spend more than 18 billion euros ($23.7 billion) in shops in EU countries each year.
“The lack of a visa-free regime constrains the future development of economic ties,” he said.
Barroso countered that EU countries gave 5.26 million visas to Russians in 2011 and that visitor numbers were up 62 percent. “This … means the system works relatively smoothly,” he said.
Putin also renewed his criticism of the EU’s third energy package, a set of regulations that forces suppliers to unbundle their assets in member countries — and mainly hits energy giant Gazprom.
Speaking at the beginning of Friday’s talks, he called the law “uncivilized” and said it destroyed mutual trust. He reiterated his argument that the package violated previous agreements with the EU because it took retroactive effect.
“We see the actions taken by some of our partners in some countries as a confiscation of Russian investment,” he said at the news conference.
Barroso replied that the rules apply equally for all companies, regardless of where they are from. “Your companies are most welcome in the EU market. But they have to respect fully our rules,” he told Putin, adding that “we have the rule of law, and today part of this law is the third energy package.”
However, Putin retorted that Barroso was wrong: “My good old friend Mr. Barroso outlined his position in such great detail, so emotionally, because he knows he is wrong. … Please look at our agreement, Article 34. Read it,” he said with reference to a partnership and cooperation agreement between Russia and the EU, which has been functioning since the 1990s and which the EU is keen to replace.
EU restrictions have prevented Gazprom from substantially increasing gas supplies via its Nord Stream pipeline through the Baltic Sea. Moscow is also seeking an exemption from EU regulations for the planned South Stream pipeline, designed to start carrying gas under the Black Sea in 2015.


TITLE: An Adoption Law Only King Herod Would Sign
AUTHOR: By Victor Davidoff
TEXT: After the State Duma passed a bill banning adoptions by Americans, journalist Valery Panyushkin wrote on Facebook, “I know of only two organizations in the world that scare their enemies by harming their own children: Hamas and the United Russia party.”
As a child welfare activist in addition to being a journalist, Panyushkin knows better than most how disastrous the situation is for Russia’s orphans. Today, more than 100,000 orphans live in state institutions, and about 11,000 are adopted in Russia every year. Children with cerebral palsy, other genetic conditions and HIV have it worst of all. Their chances of being adopted in Russia are nil. They are often denied basic care and grow up unable to speak or communicate. As  children’s rights activist Ksenia Fisher wrote on Twitter, “The last time I was in an orphanage, I remember what the kids with disabilities said. They all dream of being adopted by Americans. Otherwise, no one will take them.”
It is also well-known that the chances a child will die after being adopted by a family in Russia are almost 40 times higher than if adopted by a family in the West. In just a few days, more than 100,000 people signed a petition asking the Duma to vote against the ban. There was even opposition to the ban among some United Russia deputies, and the Kremlin was compelled to take unprecedented tough measures to tame their unruly deputies to vote for the ban. The deputies were given an ultimatum: Vote for the law or be ousted from the faction and lose your parliamentary seat. Deputy Alexander Sidyakin abstained, and he was asked to write a note explaining that the electronic voting system at his seat “broke.” Sidyakin refused and is now awaiting the party’s decision on whether his seat will be taken away.
That wasn’t the only dramatic moment in the debates. Vyacheslav Osipov, another United Russia deputy, had chest pains and didn’t attend the voting. But he left his electronic voting card with another party member. His colleague voted for him, and Osipov’s vote for the ban was duly registered. The twist was that by the time deputies cast their votes, Osipov had already died of a heart attack. Even the most rational mind would see a bad omen in a blessing from a dead man.
In the Russian blogosphere, the law was quickly dubbed “the law of scoundrels” and “the law of King Herod.” As television journalist Alexander Arkhangelsky wrote on his LiveJournal blog: “You can argue about whether the Magnitsky Act is good or bad. But you can’t argue about whether or not our orphaned children should be adopted by families that live in the country that passed the Magnitsky Act. Children are above political interests, sovereignty and citizenship. Any response that uses these children leads to dehumanization.”
The reaction of the country’s liberals could be predicted, but it was surprising to hear negative reactions from people who never disagree with the government. Even some members of the Russian Orthodox Church’s high clergy expressed criticism. On the Web portal “Orthodoxy and the World,” Bishop Panteleimon of Smolensk and Vyazemsk wrote: “It is unacceptable to make decisions that affect children based on political trends. All the laws passed by the government must be based on the interests of people. For the sake of people’s interests, you can even sacrifice the prestige of the state.”
Even more surprising was the opinion of Kremlin-loyal television commentator Mikhail Leontyev, whose anti-Americanism on a scale of one to 10 is a solid 11. Nonetheless, Leontyev came out against the law on his Odnako blog. While not renouncing his standard anti-U.S. rhetoric, he reasonably noted that “there are certainly problems with American adoptions, but not with American adoption in and of itself. Through these adoptions, about 50,000 children have gotten the help, care and love that they couldn’t have gotten in their homeland.”
Although passage of the law was formally motivated by concern for the health and well-being of adopted children, few deputies hid that their real goal was punishing the U.S. Liberal Democratic Party Deputy Sergei Ivanov made this very clear in his statement to the protesters: “We have a huge number of ill-wishers abroad. With this law, we can stop their activities in Russia.”
Just Russia Deputy Svetlana Goryacheva had an even more exotic justification for supporting the law. According to her theory, the U.S. is using these children to form an army to invade Russia. In her speech in the Duma on Wednesday, Goryacheva said that “60,000 children have been taken to the U.S. from Russia. And if even one-tenth of these orphans were used for organ transplants or sexual pleasure, there will remain 50,000 who can be recruited for war against Russia.” Josef Stalin would have applauded that speech with loud cheers of “bravo!”
Indeed, the Soviet government forbade foreign adoptions. They were first allowed during the warming of relations with the U.S. during the last years of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s rule. It looks like Putin’s time machine, set in motion at the start of his third term, is returning the country to that era. In the past year, inch by inch, Putin has been rebuilding parts of the iron curtain, creating obstacles to free flow of information and personal contacts. On the same day the law on adoptions was passed, the Duma also ratified a law prohibiting people with dual citizenship from heading Russian nongovernmental organizations. It is widely believed that this measure was taken against two people: Lyudmila Alexeyeva, who heads the Moscow Helsinki Group, and Tatyana Lokshina, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Moscow office.
Grigory Yavlinsky, a leader of the Yabloko party, wrote on his LiveJournal blog: “This law not only is cruel but also speaks of the Bolshevik nature and Stalinist roots of the Russian political system. This is capitalism with a Stalinist face.”
Now the only question is: How far back into the dark days of the Soviet Union will Putin’s time machine lead the country?

Victor Davidoff is a Moscow-based writer and journalist who follows the Russian blogosphere in his biweekly column.


TITLE: From A Safe Distance: Lights Dim Over the Duma
AUTHOR: By Alexei Bayer
TEXT: Many years ago on a U.S. flight to Moscow, a young, very mid-American couple asked me to help them with their Russian customs forms. I couldn’t help noticing that they had brand-new passports. It was their first trip abroad. The previous summer, the U.S. charity Save the Children had brought a group of Russian orphans to their town in central Pennsylvania. The children were in their teens, and the organizers hoped that the local families hosting them for the summer would consider adopting them. Back then, Americans were adopting Russian infants, but rarely older kids, who faced very poor prospects in life once they left state-run child care.
The wife was a pediatrician and Save the Children had asked her to donate her time to help care for the kids. Two Russian sisters also stayed in their house, and the couple decided to adopt them. Now, in mid-December, they were going to Bryansk to pick them up.
At that time, I wrote a column in Vedomosti on Christmas Eve called “An American Christmas Story.” It was indeed in the tradition of those heart-warming tales that are so sweet to hear in front of a fire on Christmas Eve. I kept up with this family for some time afterward. The girls were adapting to their new environment, helped by the fact that they had made friends over the summer. The parents hired a Russian-speaking babysitter to make sure they didn’t lose their mother tongue.
Today, a dozen years later, it is a high time to revisit this Christmas story. The State Duma on Friday passed by a huge margin the Dima Yakovlev bill, which bans U.S. citizens from adopting Russian children, including those with disabilities.
It is hard to fathom the depths of immorality of this piece of legislation. To start with, it is named after a Russian boy who died when left in a car on a hot day by his adoptive father. The judge acquitted the father of involuntary manslaughter, taking into account the accidental nature of the boy’s death and the true remorse of both parents. In the end, the judge ruled that the father didn’t meet the legal standard of “callous disregard for human life.”
The law ignores and perverts the fact that thousands of abandoned children have found new families and happy lives in the U.S. They enjoy the full protection accorded to minors under U.S. law. In the few cases when the parents committed child abuse, they received just punishment.
Worse, the phony patriotism in which this law is cloaked conceals the fact that the Dima Yakovlev bill is a response to the Sergei Magnitsky Act passed by U.S. Congress earlier this month. Named after the lawyer who died in prison, it punishes Russian officials involved in a well-documented theft of $230 million in tax refunds from the Russian government. These officials are implicated in the jailing and killing of Magnitsky as part of a cover-up.
In a tit-for-tat, the Duma law, if signed by President Vladimir Putin, will punish Russian orphans. It takes away their chance for happiness to shield a bunch of thugs. It is a new low for a regime that risks becoming an international pariah state. Rightly, a petition is being circulated on the Internet to add the Duma deputies who sponsored and voted for this shameful law to the list of Russian officials banned from travel to the United States under the Magnitsky Act.

Alexei Bayer, a native Muscovite, is a New York-based economist.


TITLE: Drinking for freedom
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: St. Petersburg has a plenty of very diverse themed bars, but the new Svoboda (Freedom) Bar stands out. It is a cross between a pub and a protest rally.
Launched earlier this month, it uses banners, opposition flags and other paraphernalia in its interiors, while drinks are served by activists who double as bartenders.
“Putin is a thief,” chanted opposition leader and anti-state corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny with the crowd, as “Winter, Go Away,” a recent documentary chronicling anti-election fraud protests of the late 2011 and early 2012 was shown on two television screens in the main room, when The St. Petersburg Times visited Svoboda Bar on Sunday.
Sunday’s screening gathered only a dozen people, but Moscow opposition leader Ilya Yashin packed the place — with its 70 seats occupied and about 30 standing in the aisles — when he came to speak with St. Petersburg audiences on Saturday.
The club would like to invite the popular Navalny — the only Russian to be named in Time magazine’s 2012 list of the world’s 100 most influential people — in person, but the activist has been banned from leaving Moscow, being the subject of three criminal investigations opened against him after the protests.
Launched with a huge party on Dec. 7, a year since protests against multiple violations during the Dec. 4, 2011 State Duma elections began, Svoboda Bar is in a way a child of the massive anti-fraud rallies and St. Petersburg’s answer to Jean-Jacques and Zavtra, the hangouts for activists and intelligentsia in Moscow. 
According to Natalya Gryaznevich, the person in charge of the venue’s programs who hosted the meeting with Yashin, the bar is operated by activists from Civic Responsibility, the political movement that emerged in the wake of the anti-fraud protests earlier this year — they work here as bartenders or waiters.
Andrei Pivovarov, a member of the Russian Opposition’s Coordination Council, Andrei Davydov of the Young Socialists of Russia, and Civic Responsibility’s Daniil Ken and Mikhail Lukyanov invested their own savings into the bar. Pivovarov is in charge of the practical aspects.
“The people who created this bar have never been into business like this, that’s why everything is done sporadically, with input coming from those who know how to do these things, and new ideas emerging along the way,” Gryaznevich said.
“As I see it, our activities will flow smoothly into the activities of the bar, where we will be holding events, meetings and debates.” 
The Civic Responsibility’s first protest was placing a sign reading “Elections without a choice” next to the Circus on Presidential Election Day on March 3. Since then the group has printed T-shirts with slogans such as “St. Petersburg Without Putin” (some are on display in the bar) and sent three buses of activists to join the notorious May 6 protest in Moscow, which resulted in a number of arrests and investigations.
“We demand an honest and free election,” reads the red banner hanging over the bar, while the walls are decorated with opposition paraphernalia and photographs of protests and arrests at the rallies.
The premises previously belonged to the now-defunct English bar The Tramp which left the space earlier this year in pretty good condition, even complete with dishes and glasses, so no repairs were needed.
The solid The Tramp signs are still seen in the courtyard, where the entrance is, and on the façade of the building facing the Fontanka River, but Svoboda Bar’s own sign was eventually placed over the door for Saturday’s Yashin event. Previously, the place could be found by following opposition stickers placed on the way to the bar by the activists.
“A lot of people came to the opening and could not find us, so first we were saying ‘Watch out for The Tramp,’ but then we installed a promo stand and put a ‘Strategy 31’ banner with [author and opposition leader] Eduard Limonov’s signature on it,” Gryaznevich said.
“Unfortunately, it had been stolen by the following morning.”
One of the reasons for establishing an opposition bar was the reluctance of regular bars and clubs to hold politically-themed events stemming from fears that they would be shut down by the authorities.
“We need a place for holding our political events,” Gryaznevich said.
“Every time such an event is being planned, a problem emerges, because the owners are afraid.”
So far, no threats or warnings from the authorities have reached the management, although three police vehicles with police officers were parked outside Svoboda Bar during the meeting with Yashin on Saturday, while men looking like counter-extremism Center E operatives were seen at the opening earlier this month.
“There have been no checks so far, but we are ready,” Gryaznevich said.
“Perhaps the owners who are not involved in politics are easier to intimidate, but they know that it would not scare us off.”
She compared the bar to “Occupy St. Isaac’s” protest campaign, where both activists and residents concerned with electoral fraud came to the garden on St. Isaac’s Square in the city center, with some staying overnight.
“We’d like the bar to become a place where you can meet your friends, just like St. Isaac’s Square was in the summer,” she said.
“If you were riding on a bicycle, in a car or whatever in the center, you wanted to stop by and see if there were any friends there, and spend some time with them. It is possible to do this throughout the year.”
Svoboda Bar’s location, on the corner of the Fontanka embankment and Voznesensky Prospekt, with no convenient public transport links around (it’s a one kilometer-plus walk either from Sennaya Ploshchad Metro or Tekhnologichesky Institut Metro), makes it possible for it to exist only as a themed bar, with regulars who are ready to attend events as its clientele, Gryaznevich said. Nevertheless, a number of locals showed up at the opening, too, she added.
Svoboda Bar does not stay away from street protests. It invited the Dec. 15 March of Freedom participants for a free drink after the rally, and offered a free drink in exchange for a police report for participating in an unauthorized rally in a Twitter announcement on Monday.
“We’d like to see more new faces here —people who have not yet taken part in protests,” Gryaznevich said. 
“For an average person interested in politics, it’s easier to come to a bar than to a rally, because taking part in a rally is a decision, because they might be afraid of being detained even if the rally is authorized or getting their photo taken.”
According to Gryaznevich, the bar is not about making money, but rather about providing the premises for various activities for both activists and local reporters, with five percent of the proceeds going to political prisoners. So far only a limited choice of snacks is available, but Svoboda Bar has already hired a chef and is planning to expand its menu.
Svoboda Bar’s nearest events include a Q&A session with Denis Bilunov, the Moscow-based activist and founder of the new Party of December 5, due on Dec. 28, and a New Year party on Dec. 31. The New Year party will feature the year’s political roundup, an election for the year’s most odious person, the formulation of a list of laws to be abolished over the next year and an alternative presidential television address due to be filmed by the activists themselves.
“We will not play Putin’s New Year address but we’ll put on our own — the one we would like to hear from the real president,” Gryaznevich said.
<i>
Svoboda Bar operates from noon to 11 p.m. on week-days and until the last customer leaves during weekends. It is located on 129 Naberezhnaya Reki Fontanki. Nearest Metro: Tekhnologichesky Institut and Sennaya Ploshchad.</i>

TITLE: CHERNOV’S CHOICE
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Feminist punk group Pussy Riot has been mentioned in many international reviews of 2012, with The Guardian describing it as “the only band that mattered in 2012” and Le Figaro ranking group member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova as the “Woman of the Year.”
Pussy Riot made punk rock relevant and influential again and become the only Russian group that became a household name globally. 
They have also epitomized what the past year was in Russia — from anger over the electoral fraud and massive rallies in Dec. 2011, hopes for change and the reaction and crackdown on protest that followed in the wake of the protest rallies.
Sadly, they have also become the first post-Soviet Russian band to be imprisoned for their work.
While the activists are being praised in the international media and winning awards such as the LennonOno Grant for Peace, Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina are in prison colonies far from Moscow, where they are held under harsh conditions, while Alyokhina was recently reported to have been punished by the colony administration for “oversleeping.”
An obedient Moscow court qualified their performance as “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” and jailed them for two years in August, although the actual sentence for third activist Yekaterina Samutsevich was later changed to a suspended sentence.
Even the most na&#239;ve, who believed that Pussy Riot did offend some religious people, cannot hold that position now. Late last month, a Moscow court banned all but one of the group’s videos — not only the video for “Holy Mother of God, Drive Putin Away” which criticized the head of the Russian Orthodox Church for backing Putin and became the pretext for arresting and imprisoning the activists.
These include the group’s unsanctioned political performances at metro stations as well as on bus roofs and trolleybuses (“Clear Up the Pavement”) and on Red Square (“Putin Has Pissed Himself”).
The court ruling was based on an expert report prepared by the Russian Institute of Cultural Studies, ill-famed for reaching exactly the kind of conclusions that the investigators require. The experts said that the videos contain a “hidden call for rebellion and disobedience to the authorities.”  The videos are most likely to be blocked in Russia after the appeal hearing, whose date will be announced Saturday.
Previously, the Kremlin — and the court — insisted that the trial was not politically motivated, though few were deceived. 
Amnesty International has named the imprisoned activists “prisoners of conscience,” while dozens of rock and pop artists, including Sting, Madonna, Paul McCartney, Peter Gabriel, Bjork and Patti Smith haven spoken out or performed in their support.

– By Sergey Chernov

TITLE: The circus comes to town
AUTHOR: By Tatyana Sochiva
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: This festive season, the traditional program of performances of “The Nutcracker” and one-off concerts will be enhanced by a visit to the city by the Chinese Circus. 
This will be the first local appearance by the world-famous Hebei Acrobatic Troupe, which was founded in 1970. Seventeen young women will present a show titled “Seventeen Flowering Roses,” named in honor of its captivating performers. Despite their young age, the girls are all circus award-winners.
“The average age of the artists is from 16 to 20 years old,” said Lyudmila Bragina, director of the St. Petersburg Russian Ballet Theater, which is bringing the Chinese troupe to the city. 
“It is a great honor in China to perform in a circus. Children start learning this art from four or five years old and do everything they can to appear in the ring. Becoming a member of a Chinese professional acrobatic troupe is as difficult as becoming an Olympic champion,” she added.
The Chinese Circus program includes acts titled “Lions on the Ball,” “Umbrellas,” “Exotic Bikes,” and “Icarian Games.” One of the most popular stunts is that known as “A Hundred Flying Plates,” a traditional trick based on the skill of rotating saucers (up to four in each hand) on long sticks. Another impressive act is an acrobatic number using burning candles. During this performance each girl holds five candlesticks with seven burning candles in each of them. In order to hold these props while performing acrobatic stunts, feet are used as well as hands.
For every circus number, the performers change costumes, meaning more than 100 outfits are used during each performance. This attention to detail throughout a three-hour enchanting show attracts both children and adults around the world, despite clear differences between Chinese and European circuses. For example, there are no clowns or animals in a Chinese Circus, except for lions and dragons played by human performers. 
The circus of the Celestial Empire is one of the most ancient in the world. The originality of Chinese circus art is the result of a combination of martial arts, ancient philosophy, culture and high discipline. Artists observe traditions that are 4,000 years old, therefore each performance has a symbolic meaning. For example, the plates in the legendary skill of rotating saucers on long sticks symbolize the sun, and the artist represents an intermediary between the sun and the people. 
As a result of their intensive training, Chinese acrobats are considered unsurpassed in the art of possession of the body, and a visit to the Chinese Circus is generally an unforgettable spectacle.
The show looks set to be a hit with Petersburgers of all ages, and best of all, children under three can attend it free of charge.

The Chinese Circus will perform from Dec. 26 through Jan. 7 at the Kolizei Concert Hall, 100 Nevsky Prospekt. Tel. +7 (921) 868 3121. M. Mayakovskaya. www.balet-spb.ru www.kolizey.spb.ru

TITLE: Back to the future
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW — Better known in the West for promising to “bury” the capitalist world, Soviet leader Nikita Khruschev is also remembered by Russians for banning works that didn’t conform to the Communist Party’s notion that art should be straightforward, realistic and appeal to workers and peasants.
Visiting “The New Reality” exhibition in Moscow in December 1962, Khruschev got so enraged with what he saw that he shouted obscenities at the artists, promised to deport them from the Soviet Union and ordered the exhibition closed down.
The exhibition’s shutdown marked the end of Khruschev’s “thaw” — the relative liberation of political and cultural life that reversed Stalinist-era purges. A subsequent crackdown got more artists blacklisted and drove whole genres of art underground — including folk singers, jazz and rock bands, a generation of avant-garde composers and filmmakers such as Andrei Tarkovsky.
Fifty years later, some of the banned canvases are on display again at the same Manezh exhibition hall in Moscow — at a time when critics compare Khruschev’s ban to recent charges against the band Pussy Riot and artists whose paintings have angered the Kremlin and Russia’s dominant Orthodox Church.
“Of course, there are analogies” between the ban and the charges,” says Leonid Rabichev, whose schematic painting depicting a blue crib with his infant son surrounded by trees and newly built apartment buildings was part of the 1962 exhibition.
Frail and stooped by age, the 89-year-old Rabichev recalls the fear he felt after Khruschev yelled threats at him and other exhibition participants.
“As I am talking to you, your (foreign) passports are being issued, in 24 hours you will be stripped of your (Soviet) citizenship and exiled,” Rabichev recalls Khruschev as telling the artists.
“And there were yells around us, Politburo members yelled, ‘What are you doing, Nikita Sergeevich, they should be arrested.’ And (chief ideologue Mikhail) Suslov, who stood next to me, raised both fists in the air and shouted, ‘They should be strangled!’”
Rabichev got away with losing his job as an advertising designer and writing a repentance letter that was dictated to him by a Communist official. He subsequently returned to advertising — his designs for Aeroflot airlines and sparkling wines are now text-book examples of Soviet-era ads — wrote several books and is still active as an artist.
But fame and big money eluded him. He sold the 1962 painting for a mere $3,000 in 2008 because he needed money to renovate his apartment, he said, wearing a worn-out suit festooned with his World War II medals.
The ban also changed the lives of half a dozen exhibition participants.
Sculptor Ernst Neizvestny, whose works Khruschev derided as degenerate and “distortions of Soviet people’s faces” emigrated to the West and found success in New York. Khruschev’s family later approached Neizvestny to design the Soviet leader’s sarcophagus at a Moscow cemetery.
Inna Shmelyova and other participants of the New Reality group have for years worked in a desolate park outside Moscow — and had their works exhibited for the first time only in the late 1980s, during Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika campaign.
“We made a breakthrough in art — and took a backseat with our breakthrough,” the bespectacled, 84-year-old artist said while clutching a booklet with reprints of her works.
The revival of the Manezh exhibition has coincided with another — much less brutal — crackdown on arts in Russia, amid what critics call the replacement of Communist ideology with Orthodox Christian dogma and nationalism promoted by the Kremlin.
In 2010, two prominent Moscow art curators who organized an exhibition titled “Caution: Religion!” were convicted of inciting religious hatred and fined. The 2003 show, which displayed an icon with Jesus Christ’s face replaced by a road sign and a photo of a crucified naked woman with the icon of Virgin Mary placed between her thighs, was closed after a raid by a group of Orthodox activists.
Another exhibition was closed in 2007 after a group of altar boys defaced many of the paintings.
Three members of the Pussy Riot band were sentenced to two years in jail after a February prank at Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral — following a trial that drew international condemnation and was followed by a massive campaign on Kremlin-friendly television networks that portrayed the feminist punk rockers as “offenders of faith.”
The organizer of the new Manezh exhibition drew parallels between the recent trials and the 1962 crackdown.
“Today, half a century later, we show these paintings, some people like them, some people don’t, but no one gets enraged,” Grigory Zaslavsky said. “The lesson of the exhibition is: let’s wait. Let’s wait for at least a year, take a pause — and maybe this will not be as offensive.”

TITLE: THE DISH: Extremely Grato-fying
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: While there is no shortage of Italian restaurants in the city — Italian and Caucasian cuisine are easily the two most popular in St. Petersburg — not all of them appear to be flourishing. Nevertheless, Trattoria Grato appears to be doing well as the place has expanded from a single-hall trattoria into a restaurant with three halls plus a caf&#233; and an on-site deli.
Grato cultivates the image of a classic trattoria. The restaurant is cluttered with bird’s cages, wine bottles, decorated pillows, wicker baskets, soft toys and dozens of other trinkets. The restaurant has wooden chairs and soft furnishings, and it is dimly lit in the evening, creating a cozy feel and a laid-back atmosphere.
The menu blends together the obligatory dishes essential for any Italian restaurant, from Parma ham and ruccola salad (370 rubles, $12.3) to Mozzarella di Bufala (520 rubles, $17.3), to Bruschetta with tomatoes and basil (110 rubles, $3.6). There is a range of pizzas, with bacon, ruccola, salmon and prosciutto crudo, as well as a tempting choice of pastas and risottos.
Our Tortelli Grande Grato (460 rubles, $15.3) turned out to be a gigantic single piece of juicy tortelli taking up the entire plate and stuffed with tomatoes, eggs and parmesan. Expertly made home-cooked pasta is definitely one of Grato’s strongest points and one of the obvious reasons for the place’s popularity. My dining companion also happened to be in the mood for pasta but chose a classic spaghetti carbonara (370 rubles, $12.3). Grato did justice to the pasta. The chef avoided the common pitfall of making the dish heavy, while being generous with cream and not economizing on top quality bacon.
The list of main courses impressed with its diversity, with dishes ranging from chicken liver, venetian style (470 rubles, $15.6) to dorado with broccoli cr&#232;me (550 rubles, $18.3) to rack of lamb with baked vegetables (830 rubles, $27.6).
My choice, however, was a risotto with red wine, aromatic herbs and quail (490 rubles, $16.3). The dish was intense in flavor, with the quail being succulent and rich. Apparently, quail is one of the chef’s favorite ingredients at Grato as it features prominently on the menu, and is a key ingredient in ravioli, soup and risotto dishes.
On weekends, booking is essential at Grato. Do not be misguided by the restaurant’s spacious size: its three halls were full when we arrived on a Saturday night, and it was immediately clear that you’d be well-advised to book ahead.
Diners tend to linger here. The clientele is most diverse and includes couples, families and business colleagues — all of them enjoy staying on for hours. On the night of our visit we spotted a prominent businessman, a University professor and a veteran parliamentarian who all happen to live in the neighborhood.
We opted to accompany the meal with Grato’s house rose, which, being fresh, light and fruity on the palate, proved a perfect companion to the meal.
The service was not exactly prompt, and at times bordered on the cavalier, although this minor downside appears to somehow fit into the eatery’s concept. Grato is by no means a bistro, so if you are up for a quick bite, you would be better off choosing the adjacent tiny cafeteria, owned by the same management, which also has a deli selling a range of home-made raviolis and desserts.
Desserts are a particular temptation here, and many of the guests appeared to be there for longish coffees and desserts. After our substantial meal, we resisted the bestsellers such as peach pie and millefeuille, instead sharing a portion of mango and ricotta mousse which provided a zesty and light finale to the dinner.
Being a resident of the Grato neighborhood, I am sure to return to the trattoria. Indeed, Moskovsky Prospekt may well be the longest street in town, but there are very few trusted restaurants to be found all the way from Sennaya Ploshchad to the Pulkovo airports. 

TITLE: Exile Chichvarkin Does Branding for Wine, Politics
AUTHOR: By Yekaterina Kravtsova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: LONDON — Oxford Street is illuminated by colorful Christmas decorations as cheerful crowds shop furiously. But a few miles away, in the prestigious Mayfair neighborhood, the number of consumers is not as significant as the high level of individual spending going on.
This is particularly true at one shop, whose owner’s face is familiar to those acquainted with Russia’s most famous entrepreneurs.
Hedonism Wines, run by self-exiled businessman Yevgeny Chichvarkin, is decked out like Santa Claus’ house. And his usual flashy attire is attuned to the season.
Chichvarkin sports a heavy beard and bright red Christmas boots. But unlike Santa, he’s not there to give away gifts but to earn money. He’s counting on the Christmas crowd to buy his wines and spirits, whose prices peak at &#163;120,000 ($193,000) for the rare 2004 Kalimna Block 42 Cabernet Sauvignon, which is encased in an ampoule made of hand-blown glass.
“This is a retail store, not an auction or private collection. People buy our wine for holidays, or they might be huge wine fans,” Chichvarkin said, sitting in the lower level of his 700-square-meter shop. “We have sold some very serious bottles: a Montrachet wine from 2005, Macallan whiskey from 1955, Napoleon cognac from 1811.”
Given the shop’s exotic offerings and corresponding prices, its name seems to make sense. Even the table at which Chichvarkin is sitting is decorated with fake wine stains, which Chichvarkin jokingly says were caused by a “fit of hedonistic delight.”
“I can’t say everything is exactly as we want it to be [in the shop], but the atmosphere that we managed to achieve is very cozy,” he said, sitting among wooden shelves containing thousands of bottles.
He has built his ambience piece by piece: a dark-brown ceiling, a children’s corner with iPads, books on wine and a record player with hundreds of rare records.  
Chichvarkin has been completely immersed in his new business. In the four months since the shop opened, he has spent almost every day there.
“I am a board of directors of one person,” he joked. “I made the decision to sell wine a couple of years ago. I saw there was a place beyond everything that already existed on the market. I instinctively felt there was a niche for me.”
Chichvarkin, the sole owner of the shop, declined to say how much he had invested. And he is getting used to a business environment different from the one he left at home.
“This [Western] information world is not like Russia,” he said. “After newspapers wrote that we opened the best wine shop, I was really scared that 3,000 people would show up the next day. But I underestimated that consumer inertness was so strong.”
Although Chichvarkin acknowledges that his life in London is very Russian, he insists that Hedonism Wines was not created for his countrymen. The only Russian presence in the shop besides the owner is the vodka for sale.
“I am very isolated in terms of language,” he said. “I write single-syllable messages [in English] because if I don’t know a word I am embarrassed to admit it, so I am trying not to get into correspondence. I’m too lazy to learn the language.”  
“We have just one wine expert who speaks Russian,” he continued. “Neighboring Berkeley Square is an old global financial center. Hedge fund managers, bankers, investors, asset managers live in the nearby buildings. They are our main customers. And, of course, we have celebrity buyers,”  
As the well-known business adage asserts, location is everything.
“It is possible to open such a shop in Moscow, but prices would be twice as high because to import wine you need to pay monstrous taxes and give bribes to police officers and others,” Chichvarkin said. “Here in London, you just need to pay high rent, high taxes and high salaries.”
But he doesn’t conceal that he misses Russia, even though he enjoys London weather and likes British people for their hardworking character.
“I lived in Russia for 34 years. Of course I miss it,” he said.
“When Putin dies of old age — and I will be very old too — I will come to Moscow,” he said. “I won’t open such a wine shop but will build a tourism village near Moscow.”
Chichvarkin is very critical of the current Russian government and especially of President Vladimir Putin, acknowledging that he wouldn’t be able to criticize openly if he lived in Russia.
“Putin is a guarantor of the largest corruption system in the world, the largest mafia state. He is very smart, very foxy and very evil,” he said.
“Two major problems are coming his way. The first one is nonfulfillment of social obligations, and the second one is structural catastrophe,” Chichvarkin went on to say. “These are two things Putin can’t escape. But instead of solving these problems, [officials] continue to steal as much  as they can. Therefore, there’s no chance they can hold out longer than 2017 or 2018.
“Plus, in line with global tendencies, there will be another reevaluation of oil, real estate, corn, everything around,” he added. “The bubbles, some of which are already overinflated, will burst.
“After that, I will come back [to Russia],” the 38-year-old concluded. “The wine shop will be paid off by the end of 2015. The 2015 Christmas season sales will allow me to get back my investments. So wise in experience, a gray-haired man will come back to [Russia] to build heaven on earth.”
He sympathizes with the Russian opposition and shares some of its liberal ideas, but he said it is not necessarily the current opposition that will create the revolution — which he believes is coming.
Instead, the foundation could also be ordinary people unhappy with the fact the government hasn’t fulfilled its social obligations,” Chichvarkin said.
Chichvarkin applies his business thinking across the board, even to political and social issues.
“Ideology is the most important thing, but branding is an essential part,” he said about his vision of an opposition strategy. “I met Ilya Yashin three years ago here [in London], told him about branding, about common color, common signs. A year and a half ago, I tried to explain that to Alexei Navalny and Vladimir Ashurkov.
“But we are a long way off from common branding. There still needs to be the realization that it has to become clear who is really with us and who isn’t. When we achieve this, the regime will fall, because people will see how many there are of us, and how few of them.”
“The most massive protests were held when all people were united by one color,” he said. “When they got tired of putting on a white ribbon, the protest movement abated. Modern marketing is a huge thing. You may not watch television, but it directs our consciousness nonetheless.”  
“I’m speaking as if I weren’t in the wine business but had decided to become a politician,” he said, adding that he had inadvertently gotten involved in politics before and became active.
“But the past four months, I have been too busy with the wine shop,” he said.
Asked if he would be a part of the current opposition if he was living in Russia, Chichvarkin became somber.
“If I decided to become a Coordination Council member, they would make up some criminal story, and I would have to leave the country anyway because I’m not ready to save everyone and be crucified for that. I’m not a hero,” he said.
But he continues to support some initiatives in his homeland.
“I gave some money to [Khimki mayoral candidate Yevgenia] Chirikova’s campaign. I hope I was an example for others. And I took part in Coordination Council voting,” he said.
In Britain he feels safe, despite reports about assassinations of compatriots.
“[Alexander] Perepelichny’s murder was hushed up because they were searching for polonium,” he said. “To put people under stress before Christmas is a serious loss of political points. And Britain doesn’t want to spoil relations with Russia while the deal of TNK-BP and Rosneft is under way, which is the last step of legalizing the assets stolen from [Yukos founder Mikhail] Khodorkovsky’s company.”
In the end, Chichvarkin says it’s all about marketing.
“[William] Browder did the right thing,” Chichvarkin said about the publicity campaign led by the head of the company that lawyer Sergei Magnitsky was working for before he died in prison. “The Yukos people, however intelligent they were, didn’t do that — although they could have.”


TITLE: Duma Bill to Clamp Down on Non-Government Organizations
AUTHOR: By Jonathan Earle
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Amid the public furor over the State Duma’s proposed ban on U.S. adoptions, many seem to have overlooked the fact that the so-called “anti-Magnitsky act,” which passed the lower house of parliament on Friday, would also place harsh new restrictions on non-governmental organizations.
Unlike the adoptions ban, the new restrictions on U.S. funding for certain groups haven’t sparked pickets outside the Duma, and tens of thousands haven’t signed online petitions opposing them.
But human rights leaders say the rules are a further tightening of the screws on civil society organizations, which have been pressed in recent months by new laws that expanded the definition of treason and required certain groups to classify themselves as “foreign agents,” which all major NGOs boycotted.
“It feels like war has been declared,” said Alexander Cherkasov, head of the Memorial human rights organization. “Nobody sewed on the yellow star. The new law, to extend the metaphor, says: ‘We’ll shoot you even if you’re not wearing a yellow star.’”
The proposed rules would make it illegal for NGOs that receive funding from U.S. citizens or organizations to participate in “political activities” or otherwise threaten Russia’s national interests.
They would also ban Russian citizens who hold American passports from being members or leaders of “political” NGOs, including local branches of international groups, which could see their assets seized for breaking the law.
Civil society leaders worried that the bill’s vague language meant it could be used selectively.
There’s no established legal definition of a “threat against Russian interests,” for instance, therefore the anti-Magnitsky act “is not a law,” concluded Transparency International’s Yelena Panfilova.
The restrictions on Russians who hold American passports seemed to be aimed at veteran human rights leader Lyudmila Alexeyeva, Panfilova said, referring to the head of the Moscow Helsinki Group, Russia’s oldest human rights watchdog.
Alexeyeva, 85, was forced to emigrate from the Soviet Union in 1977 and received U.S. citizenship in 1982. She returned to Russia in 1993 and received a Russian passport as well.
Last week, Irina Yarovaya, head of the Duma’s Security Committee, lashed out at Alexeyeva by questioning her loyalty in a statement carried on the party’s website.
The legislation would be a serious blow to the Moscow Helsinki Group, but not a deadly one, Alexeyeva said.
“If they’re going to literally enforce everything written in the law … then two of Russia’s leading, best-known civil organizations — the Moscow Helsinki Group and Memorial — should be closed,” she said by telephone on Friday.
But, she added, “I think it’s improbable. … We survived the Soviet regime. We’ll survive this. The question is how and in what form,” she said.
U.S. Ambassador Michael McFaul also expressed concern about the NGO measures, which he said would “deprive Russian civil society activists engaged in ‘political activities’ of the ability to work with Americans of their choice,” according to a statement posted on the embassy’s website on Friday.
The Kremlin has for years accused U.S. financed human rights and pro-democracy groups of being agents of the U.S. State Department and dismissed them as pests and troublemakers.
As in the past, McFaul insisted that the U.S. government’s “interaction” with Russian civil society “has always been non-partisan and transparent, and in the spirit of mutual respect and common interest.”
Specific commentary was not immediately forthcoming from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, two international rights organizations with Russian branches that would seem likely to be in violation of the proposed restrictions on funding by U.S. citizens.
Amnesty International’s Russia office said nobody was available to comment, and a Human Rights Watch official in New York was only willing to respond to the bill in general terms.
“[It] is harmful to Russia’s orphans, to democracy and public participation in Russia, and violates Russia’s international human rights commitments,” Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in an e-mailed statement.
The legislation, which also includes a travel and asset ban on U.S. citizens deemed to have harmed Russians abroad, was overwhelmingly approved by a margin of 420 in favor to seven opposed.
Those opposed included four members of the A Just Russia party, two Communists, and one ruling United Russia party deputy, Boris Reznik, who heads a charity for gravely ill children in the Khabarovsk region.
It must now be approved by the Federation Council and President Vladimir Putin to become law. The bill will likely be introduced in the upper house of parliament on Wednesday, First Deputy Speaker Alexander Torshin said Friday in comments carried by Interfax.
The legislation has been promoted as retaliation against the United States for the passage of the so-called Magnitsky Act, which calls for sanctions against Russian human rights abusers.
But it also appears to be the latest move in a long-running Kremlin campaign against critics that has included new restrictions on public rallies, the re-criminalization of libel, and new restrictions on Internet content.

TITLE: Etiquette Expert Brings French Touch to City
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Selecting a dress code is similar to making a cocktail: The wrong proportion destroys the result, believes French Countess Marie de Tilly, an internationally recognized expert on etiquette and head of her own studio French Touch, whose clients include, among others, Chanel, Lancome and Sotheby’s.
Developing the cocktail metaphor, Countess de Tilly, cranks out the perfect Christmas style: One dose of modesty, two doses of a sense of humor, two doses of self-control and three doses of cordiality.
“Let your manners shine on Christmas day, not your costume,” de Tilly suggests, speaking at a master class in W Hotel earlier this month. “Competing with the Bethlehem star, playing the glitz card and putting all your diamonds on, would be a big mistake.”
As de Tilly notes, Christmas lunches and dinners require substantial self-sacrifice: even if you do not like the food that is served to you, or are not comfortable with the company of a relative you have to sit next to, you are obliged to swallow the food, smile to the relative and endure whatever ordeal lies in store for you, come what may.
“Christmas is a family holiday, and family values must take center stage,” de Tilly said. “If you are far better off than the rest of the family, be considerate enough not to present your wife with yet another set of jewels in front of the poorer relatives who would not be able to afford anything close to it in a million years. Enjoy these precious moments in private. A family needs to feel united at Christmas. The spirit of warmth, understanding and reconciliation needs to settle in.”
On New Year’s Eve, forget all about Christmas Eve’s dressing style, however. Modesty is definitely not your key word on this day. “Half a dose of modesty would do, or even a hint of it,” says de Tilly, again employing the cocktail analogy. “A single dose of self-control, four doses of humour, and some cordiality, too.”
While an ideal Christmas reception dress is a monochrome one, with a dark blue, black or red cocktail dress being an elegant choice, for the New Year’s party, use the maximum of your resources, wear your best jewelry and show your courage, the expert recommends. There is no crime in being a rival to the Christmas tree on that night. The goal is to give the New Year an inspired and confident start. 
Marie de Tilly never responds to Christmas greetings and New Year wishes that are sent to her as text messages. “This sort of greeting is the least elegant thing one can think of,” she said. “Bring some personality to it, find a card and sign it to show that you really do care,” the expert said. 
“When choosing a present, the main rule is to think carefully about the recipient,” de Tilly said. “If you are invited to a family where you do not really know the people, a safe bet would be to think big brands. Handmade presents are also welcome, including Christmas tree toys or chocolate.”
Hand-made items or art objects are some of de Tilly’s most favored present choices. The expert advises against bringing wine as a present for the simple reason that the people who invite guests usually consider stocking up enough wine. Therefore, do not consider this option seriously, unless you have been asked.
“Still, a food basket would be appropriate, if, of course, it was you who selected all the items there, with the recipients’ tastes in mind.”
Marie de Tilly’s number one bad present is an aromatic candle. “For some inexplicable reason, quite a lot of people think that it is an appropriate universal present that fits any occasion, which is very wrong,” she said. 
As Tilly stressed, a fundamental faux pas would be to confuse colleagues with friends, especially during corporate parties. Trying to buy the friendship of colleagues with very expensive presents will not earn you respect, and overly informal behavior will also work against you, she warns. “Bribery does not work with friendship, do not delude yourself,” she said. 
“At corporate parties you are constantly being watched and assessed, therefore an extra awareness and self-control are required,” de Tilly explains. “When one decides that a corporate party is the right occasion to let go of the office discipline and get reckless, the outcome is usually a ruined or damaged reputation. When going to a corporate festivity, bear in mind that your alcohol consumption has to be very moderate, and your diplomatic skills at their most inspired best.
“Be natural, be friendly and grateful — these are the basic rules,” de Tilly added. “Do not try to be perfect: this is a hopeless enterprise, and would only make you look rigid or ridiculous or a laughing stock, like a well-trained monkey or a wooden soldier.
“There is one popular wisdom that should relax you: Perfect people are unnatural. And they are boring,” she said. “You do not want to be boring, do you?”


TITLE: Businesses Cut Back on Corporate Events as New Crisis Predicted
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — As experts predict a new wave of global economic crisis, businesses are cutting expenses on New Year’s parties, Vedomosti reported.
Many companies have slashed spending on corporate events since the 2008 financial crisis, said Yegnenia Kurbatova, a managing partner at event management agency Angels.
The market for corporate events has contracted, said Alexander Shumovich, a partner at event management agency Eventum Premo.
“There were hopes that our segment would grow, as the economy is expanding and the gross domestic product is increasing, but people have decided not to boost expenses on corporate events,” he said.
Customers have become more thrifty and seek to increase spending efficiency, Kurbatova said.
Businesses’ spending on corporate events has become more rational, Shumovich said.
This year, some companies canceled New Year’s parties or changed their format to cut spending. For example, companies often buy theater tickets for their employees, Shumovich said.
State-controlled and state-linked companies reduced their spending on New Year’s parties 30 to 40 percent year on year in 2012, sources at an event management agency said.
“I don’t think 2013 will bring us some global economic turmoil,” said Sergei Gromak, CEO of asset management company Eladi. “But all of humanity will have to tighten their belts for many years. That’s why we deem it right to invest in core activities, not in celebrations or luxury gift sets.”
But some businesses have not cut their expenses and still hold traditional corporate parties, Shumovich said.
“The corporate New Year’s party is the company’s only spending item that cannot be cut,” said Zafer Ustuner, CEO of Turkish consumer electronics producer Beko in Russia.

TITLE: Meat-Maker Dymov Prefers People to Sausage
AUTHOR: By Lena Smirnova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Come New Year’s Eve, Vadim Dymov’s dacha in Suzdal will be bustling with more guests than on most weekends. The house in the Golden Ring town is an escape for the eclectic entrepreneur, who  founded one of Russia’s most successful meat brands, a bookstore and a line of folk pottery.
But unlike the usual concept of a weekend getaway, Dymov goes there to be surrounded by people, not to escape from them.
The human factor always takes priority for Dymov, has served as a stable compass to guide him to new projects and is the personal quality that he credits most for his professional success.
“I like people,” Dymov said in an interview. “I adore them. To be honest, I couldn’t live without people, so all my projects, in one way or another, are connected to people.”
He entertains his dacha guests with long philosophical conversations on the veranda, walking tours around the historic city and the occasional sample of his homemade plov.
Dymov, 42, has an air of informality not always found with former military men. His father was an officer serving in the Primorsky region when Dymov was born. His matriculation at Suvorov Military Academy was a given.
Having retired with the rank of senior lieutenant, he entered the burgeoning world of post-Soviet business by chance in 1997. A friend suggested they open a meat processing plant, which they called Ratimir. Four years later, Dymov launched his eponymous company, whose revenues reached $510 million in 2011. Despite the company’s success, Dymov admits to being more passionate about the social aspect of eating than the food itself.
The importance of the people aspect is present in Dymov’s other businesses. He founded the bookstore chain Respublika, where he sometimes works incognito as a cashier, the Moscow-based restaurant Dymov No. 1, which he opened with restaurateur Arkady Novikov, and a ceramic crafts factory in Suzdal.
Dymov’s social nature even brought him close to entering politics. Once proposed as a candidate for governor of the region where he was born, Dymov decided to postpone any political career until he gains more life experience.
“I looked into what my goals are for the next five years,” Dymov said. “And I set priorities, then numbered them all, looked at what is urgent and relevant and said, ‘I am not interested in this, but I am interested in that and that.’”
Dymov added that he is already maturing. That means he will be more conservative when figuring out how many people to have over for New Year’s celebrations in Suzdal, he said. So some of the 100 people who received invitations in the past may be out of luck.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: What criteria do you use to select people for your team? How do you motivate them?
A: The first criteria: Does this person fit in? Is he one of us? Second: Is he reliable? This is also intuitive. The third measurement: Does he show promise? These are internal questions that you answer yourself. And the fourth important aspect is the person’s competitiveness in one sphere or another. For this, there are tests and HR departments.
A very important aspect for people is motivation, both material and nonmaterial motivation. Nonmaterial is respect, relations, career growth, authority inside the company and reputation.
I have already discovered that money is not the main motivator in life for me. It is life among people, their attitude to me, my attitude toward them, reputation, which is based on some small achievements that can feed my ego. In short, I want to feel as if I haven’t lived in vain and feel that I have helped society in some way, and at the same time, that society has responded to me and has also paid me with something — including profit.
I know a very good professor, and he once quoted a saying that made me drastically change my worldview. “I am lazy,” I told him. He replied, “There are no lazy people.” I said, “How is that possible? I am a lazy person.” He said, “No, you’re just not engrossed in what you’re doing.” When he said this, I thought that really, if something interests me a lot, I am willing to not sleep at night and to work on it.

Q: Do you see your ceramics production in Suzdal as a commercial enterprise or something designed to mostly benefit the local community?
A: It is unquestionably a community project because it allows people to work. We have about 40 people employed there. That means about 200 people live off those earnings. Two hundred people for Suzdal is a lot because the city is mostly made up of pensioners.
It also has a cultural significance. I was in Suzdal last week. I drove in and walked into a shop. Everywhere there were ceramics. I asked them, “What is this?” “This is Dymov,” they replied. I told them, “No, it’s not Dymov.” They said, “Yes, it is Dymov.” They don’t know what I look like, but I can see, of course, that this is not our pottery. This counterfeiting is a sign of our success.
My wife got indignant and asked the cashier, “How can you sell this? It’s dishonest.” I told her, “Let it go. What’s the harm? Let the people sell this.” And then I told the cashier, “I am Dymov, and this is not our product.” The cashier didn’t even apologize. She was just a little shocked and a little afraid. She thought I was going to start yelling, but I asked, “Do the ceramics sell better this way?” She said yes, and I told her to go ahead. So the social aspect of the project has increased even more! I have created additional value of some kind that allows people to earn more. 

Q: What would you recommend to someone who wants to start a community project?
A: In Russia, you must approach this very carefully and delicately. Why? Because Russia didn’t have these institutions before. I am creating this institution, but I already have experience. I am Russian. It is easier for me. I know the local mentality. Americans, foreigners, they don’t feel this. They sometimes mistakenly think that it is the same here as in America and try to bring over their standardized project version. This is not correct at all. If I went somewhere in the Middle East and tried to do there what I do here, it would be a fiasco. Same goes for America or France.

Q: What are Russia’s strengths?
A: It’s the people who live here, nothing more. It is people and historic memory. It’s in the culture of the land.
For us, Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs is different. For a Russian, the attraction to the land and to his past is very deep, and it exists regardless of which stage of life he is in. We need to remember this love for our land and heritage.
This is the task of the government. For what other purpose do we finance it? Why does it pump out so much oil if it does nothing in this regard? If we have oil, we want to live well. The question of effectiveness arises. People like me, who have earned the time to think with our heads, we start to ask questions. For this reason, some of us go into politics and some of us just continue to do our job well. Because of this, there are changes in the country.
I have no doubt that the Baltic states will return to us in the next 100 years and we’ll be friends again, because if we look at the history of Russia over the past 500, 700, 1,000 years, we’re similar people. We’re neighbors.
I am very happy that television content has changed a lot. There is the television channel Kultura and a lot of history shows. A lot of interesting channels have emerged. What we had in the Soviet Union, when you lived with the understanding of who you are, what you are, where you are, that is coming back to us. 
Russia is quickly moving ahead. At the same time, it is quickly coming back to its roots. I see a lot of potential, a lot of strength and a lot of energy. It is stronger than many think despite what is happening with the bureaucrats. There is now this feeling that we are going though a partial cleansing from all the corruption scandals. We have suffered through them, and now we are blowing off steam.

Q: Who or what inspires you?
A: I am interested in the history of World War II and Stalin’s personality. We haven’t completely evaluated his role. I am interested in Churchill if you’re talking about foreigners. I am interested in the whole history of England. Napoleon interests me.
At one time, I spent a year learning about what he has done for the world, not for France, but for the whole of humanity. In my opinion, Napoleon is the person who had the biggest influence on the history of the whole modern civilization. He changed it completely, including us Russians because he fought us.
In America, I am interested in all the presidents, particularly the first five. The first three for sure. I attentively studied their contributions and think that they are great people, geniuses.
I even studied the history of chivalry. This made a great impression on me in youth and adulthood. It’s very bad that in Russia there was no chivalry as it existed in Western Europe. Because of this, we didn’t have a full-fledged renaissance.

Q: What should foreign businessmen know about working with Russians?
A: First, be sincere and be yourself. Don’t wear masks. Second, know the cultural and historical context; this always brings a benefit. And third, just trust people.
The formula of successful partnership, whether in America, France, Canada, Armenia or Georgia, is the same. People value honest emotions. People value openness. People value respect and kindness, and people know how to work if they know what they’re working for.
Russian people are very soulful. If you have a problem, you need to talk. People here understand more from the heart than from pragmatism. If you talk emotionally and openly, people will feel that.
I can’t say that I like Americans better. They are very good at specializing, but it is merely an acquired habit. It’s not a personal quality. I have been to New York, and Americans seemed very skilled to me in a given area. So if a guy is an electrician, he is a very good electrician. Just don’t ask him about wine; he doesn’t understand anything about wine.
Russians are well-versed in everything. They’ll tell you everything. But in Western society, particularly in America as I have noticed, their knowledge is very compartmentalized.
This impressed me. It would probably be nice for Russians to be somewhere in the middle. To be overly specialized is also boring. Yes, let something fall and break. There must be some slip-ups, or life will become sterile.  

Q: What is the essence of good leadership?
A: Leadership is when you show your leadership qualities and, most importantly, are not worried about your reputation and looking bad. You have nothing to hide from people.
Pseudoleadership is when a person says he has a lot of money and therefore he is a leader. But really, if you say that, you could just be a lucky dealmaker, and in Russia you could just be a crook. What we definitely need in Russia are real leaders.
Predominantly in Russia now, we have these phantom leaders who base their leadership on money and some other external factors. A person thinks he is a leader because he has some money and a place in society. Most likely, he hasn’t earned his place in society by working in society but by having a position in the government or a state company.
Because of this, young people’s priorities have also been skewed. At some point, young people thought that to be a bureaucrat is right, that this is leadership.
I think there is a deficit of leadership in the country. The outflow of leaders from the country — and there was a big one — has bled the nation. 
Until we create a new generation of these young, enterprising people who can be responsible for what they create, another 30, 40, 50 years will pass. In that regard, we have a slight gap, and we need to work on this.
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Education
• 1986-1988 – Suvorov Military College, Ussuriisk, Primorye region
• 1988-1991 – High Military Political College, Donetsk, Ukraine 
• 1992-1999 – Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok, law degree
Work experience
• 1991-1993 – Interior Ministry, lieutenant 
• 1994 – Retired from military at the rank of senior lieutenant, started work as a judge’s assistant in Vladivostok 
• 1997 – Co-founded Ratimir meat-processing company with Alexander Trush 
• 2001 – Founded Dymov sausage factory 
• 2003 – Founded Dymov-Keramika
• 2006 – Founded Respublika bookstore chain 
• 2007 – Co-founded Dymov No. 1 restaurant with Arkady Novikov 
• 2011 – Expert council on small and medium-sized business in the Moscow city government, chairman 
• 2012 – Central Federal District public chamber member 
Favorite books: “Anna Karenina,” “War and Peace” and “Sevastopol Sketches” by Leo Tolstoy; “The Aristos” and “The Magnus” by John Fowles 
Reading now: The poetry of Anna Akhmatova 
Favorite films: “Where the Buffalo Roam,” directed by Art Linson; “Lawrence of Arabia,” directed by David Lean; “Barry Lyndon,” directed by Stanley Kubrick 
Favorite restaurant: All restaurants by Arkady Novikov 
Weekend getaway: “In Suzdal, I recharge my batteries, like a submarine.”