SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #1748 (7), Wednesday, February 27, 2013
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TITLE: Van Cliburn, Pianist and Cold War Hero, Dies at 78
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: FORT WORTH, Texas — For a time in Cold War America, Van Cliburn had all the trappings of a rock star: sold-out concerts, adoring, out-of-control fans and a name recognized worldwide. He even got a ticker-tape parade in New York City.
And he did it all with only a piano and some Tchaikovsky concertos.
The celebrated pianist played for every American president since Harry Truman, plus royalty and heads of state around the world. But he is best remembered for winning a 1958 piano competition in Moscow that helped thaw the icy rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Cliburn, who died Wednesday at 78 after fighting bone cancer, was "a great humanitarian and a brilliant musician whose light will continue to shine through his extraordinary legacy," said his publicist and longtime friend Mary Lou Falcone. "He will be missed by all who knew and admired him, and by countless people he never met."
The young man from the small east Texas town of Kilgore was a baby-faced 23-year-old when he won the first International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow just six months after the Soviets' launch of Sputnik embarrassed the U.S. and inaugurated the space race.
Cliburn returned to a hero's welcome and the ticker-tape parade — the first ever for a classical musician. A Time magazine cover proclaimed him "The Texan Who Conquered Russia."
The win also showed the power of the arts, creating unity despite the tension between the superpowers. Music-loving Soviets clamored to see him perform. Premier Nikita Khrushchev reportedly gave the go-ahead for the judges to honor a foreigner: "Is Cliburn the best? Then give him first prize."
In the years that followed, Cliburn's popularity soared. He sold out concerts and caused riots when he was spotted in public. His fame even prompted an Elvis Presley fan club to change its name to his. His recording of the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 with Russian conductor Kirill Kondrashin became the first classical album to reach platinum status.
Time magazine's 1958 cover story quoted a friend as saying Cliburn could become "the first man in history to be a Horowitz, Liberace and Presley all rolled into one."
Russian pianist Denis Matsuev, who won the Tchaikovsky competition in 1998 at the age of 23, the same age as Cliburn, said Cliburn's "romantic style captured the hearts of [the] Soviet audience."
"Everyone was in love with him," Matsuev said. "And he loved the Soviet Union, Russia and the Russian public."
Matsuev, who knew Cliburn personally, described him as an "incredibly delicate, kind and gentle man who dedicated his entire life to art."
He also used his skill and fame to help other young musicians through the Van Cliburn International Music Competition, held every four years. Created in 1962 by a group of Fort Worth teachers and citizens, it remains among the top showcases for the world's best pianists.
"Since we know that classical music is timeless and everlasting, it is precisely the eternal verities inherent in classical music that remain a spiritual beacon for people all over the world," Cliburn once said.
President George W. Bush presented Cliburn with the Presidential Medal of Freedom — the nation's highest civilian honor — in 2003. The following year, he received the Order of Friendship of the Russian Federation from Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"I still have lots of friends in Russia," Cliburn said at the time. "It's always a great pleasure to talk to older people in Russia, to hear their anecdotes."
After the death of his father in 1974, Cliburn announced he would soon retire to spend more time with his ailing mother. He stopped touring in 1978.
Among other things, touring robbed him of the chance to enjoy opera and other musical performances.
"I said to myself, 'Life is too short.' I was missing so much," he told The New York Times in 2008. After winning the competition, "it was thrilling to be wanted. But it was pressure, too."
Cliburn emerged from his sabbatical in 1987, when he played at a state dinner at the White House during the historic visit of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. Gorbachev leapt from his seat to give the pianist a bear-hug and kisses on the cheeks. Nancy Reagan, then the first lady, has called that night one of the greatest moments of her husband's presidency.
"After not playing in public for many years, he agreed to make an exception for this occasion, and his beautiful music brought the whole room to tears," Reagan said in a statement Wednesday, adding that "the world has lost a true treasure."
Cliburn was born Harvey Lavan Cliburn Jr. on July 12, 1934, in Shreveport, La., the son of oilman Harvey Cliburn Sr. and Rildia Bee O'Bryan Cliburn. At age 3, he began studying piano with his mother, herself an accomplished pianist who had studied with a pupil of the great 19th century Hungarian pianist Franz Liszt.
The family moved back to Kilgore within a few years of his birth.
Cliburn won his first Texas competition when he was 12, and two years later he played in Carnegie Hall as the winner of the National Music Festival Award.
At 17, Cliburn attended the Juilliard School in New York, where fellow students marveled at his marathon practice sessions that stretched until 3 a.m. He studied under the famed Russian-born pianist Rosina Lhevinne.
Between 1952 and 1958, he won all but one competition he entered, including the G.B. Dealey Award from the Dallas Symphony, the Kosciusko Foundation Chopin Scholarship and the prestigious Leventritt. By age 20, he had played with the New York Philharmonic and the symphonies of most major cities.
Cliburn's career seemed ready to take off until his name came up for the draft. He had to cancel all shows but was eventually excused from duty due to chronic nosebleeds.
Over the next few years, Cliburn's international popularity continued as he recorded pieces ranging from Mozart to a concerto by American Edward McDowell. Still, having been trained by some of the best Russian teachers in the world, Cliburn's heart was Russian, with the Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff concertos.
After 1990, Cliburn toured Japan numerous times and performed throughout the United States. He was in the midst of a 16-city U.S. tour in 1994 when his mother died at age 97.
Cliburn, who made his home in Fort Worth, endowed scholarships at many schools, including Juilliard, which gave him an honorary doctorate, and the Moscow and Leningrad conservatories. In December 2001, he was presented with the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors Medallion at the televised tribute held in Washington.
He practiced daily and performed limited engagements until only recently. His last public appearance came in September at the 50th anniversary of the prestigious piano competition bearing his name.
Speaking to the audience in Fort Worth, he saluted the many past contestants, the orchestra and the city: "Never forget: I love you all from the bottom of my heart, forever." The audience responded with a roaring standing ovation.

TITLE: Astakhov: 'Pedophiles' Want My Resignation Most
AUTHOR: By Jonathan Earle
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — The official at the center of Russia's controversial ban on U.S. adoptions struck back at critics Thursday, saying "pedophiles" were his most strident detractors and that journalists who accuse him of downplaying child abuse in Russia for political reasons are "either blind or dumb."
Children's ombudsman Pavel Astakhov also revealed "new evidence" that he said implicated U.S. parents Laura and Alan Shatto in the death of their adoptive Russian toddler last month.
Astakhov quoted a Texas police official as saying the death of 3-year-old Max Shatto "doesn't look natural" and asserted that Alan Shatto had confessed to giving Max the antipsychotic drug Risperdal because the boy was hyperactive and "refused to obey" his American parents.
In Astakhov's retelling, Shatto said Max's behavioral issues were the result of his time spent in an orphanage in the Pskov region, as well as "abuse" by the Russian representative of the Gladney Center for Adoption, the Texas-based agency that arranged his adoption.
It was not immediately clear when or to whom the police official and Shatto made these comments, which appeared on the children ombudsman's website, and Astakhov did not answer a telephone request for comment Thursday evening. 
The official, Sergeant Gary Duesler, spokesman for the Ector County Sheriff's Office, has refused to publicly speculate on the cause of Max's death and repeatedly told reporters that the investigation is ongoing, no arrests have been made, and the autopsy report is still pending.
Shatto lawyer Michael J. Brown confirmed that Max had been taking doctor-prescribed medication for hyperactivity but that the Shattos don't believe they had anything to do with his death on Jan. 21, The Associated Press reported Thursday. 
He also denied that the couple killed their son. The Shattos "didn't kill anybody," Brown said. 
A woman who picked up the phone at the number listed for the Gladney Center for Adoption on the government's website hung up immediately after a reporter asked whether he had indeed reached the right adoptions agency.
Nobody returned a voice message later left on an answering machine at the same number.
Astakhov appeared to save his heaviest ammunition for critics, who have accused him of politicizing Shatto's death to shame the United States and justify the Jan. 1 ban on U.S. adoptions
"Pedophiles want my resignation most of all because nobody has done more to fight pedophiles than we have," Astakhov declared, adding that he had the support of President Vladimir Putin and would not resign, media reported.
An online petition promoted by veteran opposition leader Boris Nemtsov asking Putin to fire Astakhov had gathered almost 10,000 signatures as of Thursday evening. 
American parents have adopted about 60,000 Russian children in the past two decades. 23 have died, according to the provocatively-named government website Adoption-killers.ru, which Astakhov's office launched Wednesday.
By comparison, up to 300 orphans entrusted to Russian families die every year, according to State Duma Deputy Yelena Mizulina, head of the Duma's Committee on Family, Women and Children, Gazeta.ru reported last week.
Such figures have fueled accusations that Astakhov, a close Putin ally, is emphasizing U.S. deaths for political reasons, a charge he denied. "Those who write that Astakhov doesn't talk about the deaths of children in Russia — my friends, you're either blind or dumb," he said, Interfax reported. 
Astakhov also said he was skeptical about bloggers' allegations that organizers of a march in support of the adoptions ban are recruiting participants with promises of cash. The ostensibly grassroots demonstration is scheduled for Saturday in downtown Moscow.

TITLE: U.S. Lawmaker Says Russia Denied Him Visa
AUTHOR: By Ivan Nechepurenko
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — A senior U.S. lawmaker says he has been denied a Russian visa as a result of his vocal backing of the U.S. Magnitsky Act, which allows Washington to punish Russians implicated in human rights violations with a visa ban and asset freezes.
Chris Smith, a Republican congressman from New Jersey who has served in the House of Representatives since 1981, said it was the first time his visa application to Russia had been denied over many years of coming to the country.
"This is the first time [I've been denied]," Smith told Foreign Policy magazine on Wednesday. "I was shocked. During the worst days of the Soviet Union I went there repeatedly."
The visa denial is the latest sign of a cooling in U.S.-Russian relations following the U.S. Congress’ passage in November of the Magnitsky Act, which was fiercely opposed by Russian authorities, who have called it a form of meddling in the country's domestic affairs.
Russian lawmakers responded to the act by passing the so-called Dima Yakovlev law, which includes a reciprocal visa ban and asset freezes for alleged U.S. human rights violators as well as a ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian orphans.
Valery Garbuzov, deputy director of the Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies in Moscow, said Smith's visa denial could be the first volley in an extended visa war that perhaps only the nations' top leaders can halt.
"President Obama cannot cancel the Magnitsky Act, so relations will have to be built on these premises," he said. "At the same time, the Russian response was excessive, which made the situation snowball."
Smith, one of the most vocal members in the U.S. Congress on human rights issues, said U.S. Ambassador Michael McFaul tried to intervene on his behalf to secure a visa but had no success.
The congressman said he also met with Russian Ambassador to Washington Sergei Kislyak, who said the decision to reject his visa application was made in Moscow, not at the Russian Embassy in Washington.
A Foreign Ministry official told The St. Petersburg Times that the ministry never comments on individual visa decisions.
But Alexei Pushkov, head of the State Duma's International Affairs Committee, said the sponsors of the U.S. Magnitsky Act will not be allowed to travel to Russia, in accordance with the "spirit" of the Dima Yakovlev law.
"In every country, restrictions can be put in place for certain categories of people based on the spirit of existing legislation," Pushkov said by phone.
Smith was not among the Magnitsky Act's 15 official sponsors, who included House members. Joseph Crowley, Charles Rangel and lead sponsor Dave Camp.
In January, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov announced that Russia had compiled a so-called "Guantanamo list" of 71 U.S. nationals who were barred from entering Russia due to "human rights violations."
Rear Admiral Jeffrey Harbeson, a former commandant of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba, was denied a Russian visa in December, apparently representing the first instance of Russia denying entry to a U.S. official after passage of the Magnitsky Act.
The last Russian parliamentarian to be denied a U.S. visa in recent memory was Duma deputy and Soviet crooner Iosif Kobzon, whose application to visit the U.S. for a farewell concert tour was rejected in April.
Kobzon, who has been dubbed Russia's Frank Sinatra, has been denied visas to the United States since 1995, when his visa was revoked by American authorities for alleged mafia ties.
Members of the countries' business and nongovernmental communities have expressed concern that the cooling in relations could make it more difficult for regular citizens to obtain visas as well, although there have been no indications that such barriers will be established.
In September, a visa facilitation agreement came into force that allows Russian and U.S. citizens to get multiple-entry, three-year visas with reduced bureaucratic hurdles.
Of the measures stipulated by Russia's Dima Yakovlev law, also known as the anti-Magnitsky act, the Russian ban on U.S. adoptions has been arguably the biggest blow to Washington.
Smith said he was planning a trip to Moscow to discuss Russia's reaction to the Magnitsky Act and to help address Russia's concerns over the treatment of adopted Russian children in the U.S.
"I even have a resolution that highlights the fact that those 19 kids died," he told Foreign Policy, referring to the number of adopted Russian children Moscow says have died in the U.S. since 1996. That number excludes 3-year-old Maxim Kuzmin, whose death in Texas in January has set off a new firestorm of criticism by Russian officials.
"If somebody is responsible for this, they ought to pay a price," he said. "I was going over to talk about adoption and human trafficking. They have legitimate concerns that we have to meet."
Repeated requests for further comment from Smith went unanswered by press time Thursday.
The congressman has been a longtime critic of alleged human rights abuses in Russia. He was a co-author of the 2002 On Democracy in Russia Act and has repeatedly called for suspending Russia's membership in the G8, citing a lack of media freedom and human rights violations.
Smith said he intends to file another visa application.
Pushkov noted that the Obama administration is required by the Magnitsky Act to submit a list of Russian officials to go on the blacklist by mid-April, which could trigger another angry retort from Moscow.
But he called Obama a "hostage" of the law, which he said was pushed by conservatives in the U.S. Congress.
The legislation in fact had strong bipartisan support, but the White House reportedly did want to expand the law to make it apply to human rights violators from other countries, in part to appease the Kremlin by not singling out Russia.
"Obama genuinely wanted to repair relations, but the conservative part of the U.S. Congress decided to tie [his] hands with that law," Pushkov said.

TITLE: Hollande and Putin Warm Relations
AUTHOR: By Nikolaus von Twickel and Irina Filatova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW – President Vladimir Putin on Thursday hosted his French counterpart Francois Hollande for four-hour-long talks in the Kremlin, which diplomats said were direct and productive.
Hollande's first visit since the socialist was elected president in May was preceded by expectations that the French leader would challenge his host on democracy and human rights. Meanwhile, Hollande conducted the first-ever meeting between a French president and his country's business leaders in Russia prior to heading to his meeting with Putin.
Both leaders appeared relaxed and businesslike at a joint Kremlin news conference late Thursday. Putin began his talks with the French president by calling France a "longtime privileged partner," while Hollande spoke of "strong historical ties" and added that "we are responsible for the future," according to a Kremlin transcript
When a reporter confronted the presidents by saying that 2012 was the worst year for human rights violations in the country's recent history, Putin responded by saying that there were "no particular issues with human rights in Russia" last year, just election-related disputes.
Putin said the country had seen two campaigns, the state Duma elections in December 2011 and the presidential election in March. "Big election campaigns always result in a tougher political contest" and "talk about violations," he said.
However, Putin continued by saying that "Russia has chosen democracy and respect for human rights and is not prepared to leave this path," according to Itar-Tass.
The French leader said he won't judge but just state facts. "If there are any violations, I speak about that openly, to correct the situation and not to attack and hit," he said.
However, he was scheduled to meet with rights activists and opposition members in the French Embassy on late Thursday.
Putin admitted that there was lingering disagreement over Syria, but said he was ready to discuss new suggestions made by Hollande to end the ongoing bloodshed in the Middle East country.
"I believe for this we need not only a bottle of good wine but a bottle of vodka. We need to sit down and think over it," he said.
Hollande retorted that a bottle of port would be better.
The French President said the negotiations should be widened to include parties that could act as negotiators between President Bashar Assad and opposition rebels. Moscow has been Assad's staunchest ally and opposes any joint action of the United Nations Security Council on Syria.
The news conference began two hours later than planned because bilateral talks had gone on longer than planned. "This is not a bad sign," a senior French diplomat told The St. Petersburg Times. The talks had been "frank and direct" the diplomat added, requesting anonymity under embassy policy.
Both leaders oversaw the signing of a number economic cooperation agreements, including a deal between the government's investment vehicle, the Russian Direct Investment Fund, Vneshekonombank and French financial group Caisse des Depots et Consignations to attract some $1 billion investment in each country, Interfax reported, citing a source close to one of the sides involved in the deal.
Both countries also agreed on a joint venture to develop satellite systems and signed deals between Russian Railways and France's SNCF state railway company, as well as between French drug maker Sanofi Aventis and Russia's Health and Social Development Ministry.
In the morning, Hollande met with French businessmen working in Russia, in what analysts said was an indication that economic cooperation will become a priority.
Hollande met with senior executives of French firms present on the Russian market — both global majors and those representing small- and medium-size business.
The list of the biggest French investors here includes carmakers Renault and PSA Peugeot-Citroen, oil giant Total, cosmetics maker L'Oreal and cement producer Lafarge.
The meeting is a significant milestone in the two countries' economic relations, since Hollande is the first French president who met with the French business community in Russia, said Philippe Pegorier, president of French transportation and machinery giant Alstom in Russia.
"It's important that the president got the idea of what our working conditions in Russia look like and what our concerns are," said Pegorier, who was present at the meeting.
Hollande's agenda in Moscow indicates that economic issues, which have always played a secondary role in the two countries' relations compared with politics, are now becoming another priority, said Arnaud Dubien, director of French-Russian research center L'Observatoire.
Under Hollande, France is expected to continue developing mutual trade with Russia, which stood at about $24 billion last year.
"There are good conditions for that: Big French companies have presence across all the major industries in Russia, and they are interested in its big potential as an industrial nation," Dubien said.
He added that the French president's message to the business community was clear: Hollande took personal responsibility for helping French companies develop in Russia.
At the meeting French businessmen asked their president to help facilitate an easier visa regime between the two countries, since this issue remains one of the major factors hampering cooperation.
The other concern voiced by foreign investors was the need to improve Russia's image in France, in order to boost investment.
Although Russia has its work cut out for it to improve its image globally, one reason for a negative reputation is lack of information abroad about the country, Dubien said.
He cited the results of a recent survey carried out in France: 13 percent of respondents described Russia as a hostile nation, an equal number of participants said it is a friendly country, while the remaining were undecided.
Hollande pointed out at the meeting that the lack of Russian investment in France remains a big problem and vowed to facilitate the work of Russian companies in France by easing the visa regime.
The investment issue was brought up again later Thursday during Hollande's visit to the Kremlin, with Putin saying that boosting the size of mutual investment should be a priority.
France has channeled about $9 billion in foreign direct investment here over the last few years, which is significantly more than the $190 million Russia has invested in France.
Jean-Pierre Chevenement, France's Special Representative for Russia appointed by the French Foreign Ministry said last year that France aims to become the second biggest investor here. France is currently the third biggest investor in Russia's economy after Germany and Sweden.
Meanwhile, Russian Railways' purchase of a 75 percent stake in French logistics company GEFCO for approximately $1 billion last year is Russia's biggest ever investment in France, Dubien said.
<hr />
The French president said Putin's decision to give Russian citizenship to Gerard Depardieu, the French actor who had criticized plans to introduce a 75 percent tax in his home country, does not infringe France's interests.

"If he (Depardieu) decided to leave the country, if he loves Russia and Russia so loves Gerard Depardieu, then it is understandable. But still Depardieu loves France, which recognizes him as a great actor," Hollande told Ekho Moskvy in an interview early Thursday.

Contact the authors at n.twickel@imedia.ru and irina.filatova@imedia.ru

TITLE: Russians Savor Kerry's Description of 'Stupid' Americans
AUTHOR: By Natalya Krainova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW – A first meeting between new U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov might have been a key development in tense U.S.-Russian ties this week, but Russian media instead savored a declaration by Kerry that Americans have "the right to be stupid."
Two prominent Russian personalities told The St. Petersburg Times on Wednesday that they think Americans do tend to be too narrow-minded.
Kerry, making his first foreign trip as the United States' top diplomat, made the comment while talking to German students ahead of the meeting with Lavrov in Berlin on Wednesday.
"As a country, as a society, we live and breathe the idea of religious freedom and religious tolerance, whatever the religion, and political freedom and political tolerance, whatever the point of view," Kerry said in comments posted on YouTube.
"People have sometimes wondered about why our Supreme Court allows one group or another to march in a parade even though it's the most provocative thing in the world and they carry signs that are an insult to one group or another," he said. "The reason is that's freedom, freedom of speech. In America, you have a right to be stupid — if you want to be."
The comment elicited laughter from the audience.
Kerry's remarks resonated with Maxim Shevchenko, a conservative television host on Channel One, who said many ordinary Americans practice their right to be stupid because they are "not interested in anything" and believe what they see on television.
"Most Americans do not overburden their brains with anything that isn't directly related to their private lives," Shevchenko said by telephone.
Sergei Markov, a member of the Public Chamber and a former State Duma deputy with United Russia, said Americans may not be stupid but they do lack broad-based knowledge. He said he has spoken with many ordinary Americans and found that instead they are "very developed" in moral principles, pragmatism and leadership qualities.
Russian media had a field day with Kerry's comments. The official government newspaper Rossiiskaya Gazeta ran the headline "U.S. Secretary of State: Every American Has the Right to Be Stupid," and Noviye Izvestia declared: "U.S. Secretary of State, After Making Up Kyrzakhstan, Endorses the Stupidity of Americans."
Last week, Kerry told students in Virginia that the State Department supports democracy in "Kyrzakhstan," a nonexistent state and an apparent mix of Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan.
Kerry meant to say Kyrgyzstan, according to an official State Department transcript of Kerry's remarks that did not reflect the mistake.
Kerry himself is well-educated and has broad professional experience, so his seeming slips of the tongue must be intentional and aimed at showing his human side to voters, Shevchenko said.
Kerry, 69, graduated from Yale University and received his law degree from Boston College Law School. He served for 28 years in the U.S. Senate before being appointed to his current post by President Barack Obama last month.
"Kerry is playing to the myth that Americans are stupid, as if to say, 'Yes, we are stupid, and we will keep doing what we are doing," Markov said, in a reference to U.S. foreign policy.
Kerry's "Kyrzakhstan" gaffe was not the first mishap the Obama administration has had in its dealings with Soviet successor states. In 2009, Kerry predecessor Hillary Clinton presented Lavrov with a symbolic button to mark a reset in U.S.-Russian relations. But the Cyrillic text on the button read "overload" instead of "reset."

TITLE: Re-Elected Zyuganov Defends Stalin's Grave
AUTHOR: By Natalya Krainova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW – Gennady Zyuganov, re-elected Saturday as leader of the Communist Party, a position he has held for 17 years, said Tuesday that public calls to remove Stalin’s and Brezhnev’s graves from the Kremlin Wall Necropolis came from “provocateurs” and “SS loyalists.”
He vowed that his party would continue to fight proposals to rebury the leaders, as well as hundreds of other communists who have their final resting places at the Kremlin.
Zyuganov, 68, has served as leader for the vast majority of the post-Soviet Communist Party’s 20-year history, and his re-election came amid a chorus of criticism from fellow party members and leftist activists that his reign has amounted to a dictatorship.
The weekend congress passed amendments to the party’s charter granting more powers to the party’s presidium and streamlining the procedure for dismissing a member or dissolving a regional branch.
Former party members and other Communist activists publicly criticized a draft of the new charter earlier this month, saying it further deprived rank-and-file members of rights and granted “dictator powers” to the party’s elite.
Boris Kagarlitsky, head of the independent Institute of Globalization and Social Movements, said Zyuganov’s re-election means he has “successfully eliminated his critics,” who pointed to “failures of his policies.”
The Communist boss and his Kremlin-aligned party need not care about popularity ratings as long as the ruling United Russia party remains in power, Kagarlitsky said by phone.
Talking to reporters Saturday, Zyuganov denied that his party was split or that the new leadership had been formed in an undemocratic way.
The Communist Party has never been so “unanimous and united,” Zyuganov said in comments carried by Interfax. He emphasized that he had not interfered in the appointment of candidates to the party’s ruling bodies.
The party’s weekend congress saw the re-election of two of Zyuganov’s long-term deputies — Ivan Melnikov, 62, and Vladimir Kashin, 64 — as well as the election of two new deputy leaders: Dmitry Novikov, 43, and Andrei Klychkov, 33.
“Zyuganov has created a cohort of young wolves who will protect him [from attacks of critics],” said Alexei Mukhin, head of the Center for Political Information.
In October, a group of Communists, including former party members, published an open letter criticizing the party’s leadership, Vedomosti reported last week. In December, a congress of Communist groups demanded Zyuganov’s dismissal at the then-upcoming election.
The October and the December events are related to infighting to become Zyuganov’s successor, an official close to the Kremlin told Vedomosti.
But the Communist leader can’t leave his post even if he wants to because his party has become a “brand” and “any changes” to that brand could lead to the party’s “destruction,” Mukhin said. Besides, Zyuganov has “cleaned up his environment” from critics, so now there is “no one to replace him,” the pundit said.

TITLE: Navalny Fraudulently Obtained Lawyer Credentials, Investigators Say
AUTHOR: By Howard Amos
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW – The Investigative Committee said Wednesday that anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny fraudulently obtained his credentials as a lawyer.
The accusation against one of Russia's most prominent opposition figures is the latest in a series of blows traded between Navalny and the powerful Investigative Committee.
"To meet the requirement for two years of legal experience, which is mandatory to receive status as a lawyer," Navalny said in his application documents that he was the deputy director responsible for legal issues at Allekt, a company where he was also director, the Investigative Committee said in a statement posted on its website.
"So he named himself both director and his own deputy," the statement said.
The statement goes on to say that the company Allekt did not even exist during the period when Navalny says he gained legal experience there.
The official accusation comes 48 hours after state-controlled television channel NTV aired a short documentary film which, based on a blog post by blogger and journalist Maxim Kononenko, suggested Navalny's lawyer status was obtained under false pretenses.
Navalny became a lawyer in 2009 while he was working as an adviser to Nikita Belykh, the governor of the Kirov region. Belykh is one of a group of prominent opposition figures, including Navalny, that have been tangled up in criminal investigations in recent months.
The Investigative Committee, which Navalny has repeatedly accused of being a political tool, was ridiculed by the anti-corruption activist in a blog post that said the allegations were old and baseless.
"So far all these complaints have been unsuccessful because they contain a load of rubbish that is instantly exposed under critical examination," Navalny said.
The Moscow Legal Chamber, which registers lawyers in the capital, said it would conduct its own check into Navalny's status, the RAPSI news agency reported.
Two years of legal experience is just one of the requirements for becoming a lawyer.
Navalny said he had been summoned by the Investigative Committee for questioning Wednesday at midday.
The alleged irregularities concerning Navalny's lawyer status were uncovered as part of an ongoing criminal investigation into Navalny's involvement with the theft of timber from the state-owned KirovLes company in 2009, the Investigative Committee said.
The news of the Investigative Committee's accusations against Navalny was first made public Wednesday morning through the newly-opened Twitter account of Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin.

TITLE: SKA St. Petersburg Inflicts 3rd Defeat on Atlant to Take Firm Grip of Quarter-Final
AUTHOR: By Christopher Hamilton
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Top-seeded club SKA St. Petersburg took a 3-1 lead in the Kontinental Hockey League Western Conference quarter-finals with a one-sided 6-1 win over Atlant Moscow Oblast at the Mytishchi Arena in Mytishchi on Monday night, and is well-placed to make further progress in its quest to lift the Gagarin Cup.

SKA dominated Game 4 in the best-of-seven series, with goals from recent transfers Mikhail Varnakov, Alexander Osipov and Artemy Panarin as well as regulars Fyodor Fyodorov, Maxim Chudinov and Tony Martensson.

Ivan Vishnevsky scored Atlant’s consolation goal with 1:01 remaining in regulation time, robbing SKA goalie Ivan Kasutin of a shut-out.

SKA finds itself leading 3-1 against Atlant in the Gagarin Cup playoffs for the third year in a row. Two years ago the Moscow Oblast team managed to fight back and win the last three games of the conference semi-final series, while last year SKA advanced after a dominating Atlant at home in the fifth game of the series.

This year Atlant managed to win Game 3 at home 3-1 after losing the first two games in the series. The Moscow region team kept it close in Game 1 in St. Petersburg last Wednesday, but ultimately fell in overtime 1-0 when SKA's Patrick Thoresen scored his 100th KHL goal. SKA crushed the 8th-seeded team 7-0 in Game 2 at home. 

Game 5 is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. on Thursday at the Ice Palace. Assuming SKA finishes the job, it will face the winner of the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl vs. Severstal Cherepovets series. Severstal currently leads that series 3-1. 

In other Western Conference matchups, Moscow teams CSKA and Dinamo swept their series 4-0 against Czech team Lev Praha and Slovak team Slovan Bratislava respectively. 

In the Eastern Conference quarter finals, top-seeded Ak Bars Kazan leads their series against Neftikhimik Nizhnekamsk 3-0. Seventh seed Sibir Novosibirsk and sixth seed Salavat Yulaev Ufa are looking to continue upsetting powerhouses Avangard Omsk and Metallurg Magnitogorsk, they both lead their series 2-1, as does Kazakh team Barys Astana over Traktor Chelyabinsk.

TITLE: Ex-Cop in Politkovskaya Case Claims Knowledge on 2 Other Murders
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW – Former Moscow police officer Dmitry Pavlyuchenkov, sentenced to 11 years in prison for his involvement in the 2006 murder of journalist Anna Politikovskaya, said he knows people involved in two other high-profile killings, a news report said Wednesday.
Pavlyuchenkov claims to have information on the murders of editor-in-chief of Russian Forbes Paul Khlebnikov in 2004 and of editor-in-chief of a Tolyatti newspaper, Alexei Sidorov, who was stabbed to death a year earlier, Kommersant reported.
Pavlyuchenkov's lawyer, Karen Nersisyan, confirmed that his client is cooperating in the murder investigation of Alexei Sidorov.
"As far as I know, the investigators are working on this case, as well as the murder of Paul Khlebnikov, because the same people could have been involved," he said.
The Investigative Committee did not comment on the matter.
According to Pavlyuchenkov's testimony, the suspects, whose identities remain undisclosed, belong to a group controlled by Chechen-born Lom-Ali Gaitukayev, who is also accused of organizing Politkovskaya's murder on Oct. 7, 2006.
Pavlyuchenkov said the men told him in 2003 that they had been sent to "punish" a journalist in Tolyatti, but that they killed him instead because he "unexpectedly put up strong resistance," Kommersant reported.
Pavlyuchenkov added that they told him the masterminds were extremely unhappy because they did not want the journalist killed.
In 2004, he says, the same people took part in the murder of Paul Khlebnikov, the editor-in-chief of the Russian edition of Forbes.
Anna Stavitskaya, a lawyer representing Politkovskaya's children, said that by cooperating with the investigation Pavlyuchenkov is trying to receive a reduced sentence.
"I cannot rule out that he is only trying to improve his own situation," Stavitskaya said.
On Oct. 9, 2003, Alexei Sidorov, editor-in-chief of Tolyattskoe Obozrenie newspaper, was stabbed 15 times and died at the scene from his wounds.
Investigators believe that he was killed because of his professional activities. He was actively investigating an embezzlement scheme that saw 2,323 vehicles stolen in 1994-1995 from AvtoVAZ during business dealings with LogoVAZ, then headed by Boris Berezovsky, Kommersant reported.
Paul Khlebnikov was shot and killed on July 9, 2004 as he left his office in Moscow.

TITLE: Gift to City Left to Decay Behind Metro Station
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The Miniature St. Petersburg sculpture park, which contains small versions of some of the city’s architectural marvels, from Alexander’s Column and the Hermitage to St. Isaac’s Cathedral and the Church on the Spilled Blood, is looking for an owner and a bodyguard.
Owing to an absurdist-style bureaucratic lapse, the sculpture park that first opened to the public in July 2011 in Alexandrovsky Park near Gorkovskaya metro station belongs to everyone and nobody all at once. This means that no one has ever been assigned to look after it, clean it, protect or repair the miniatures, which were designed by local artist Alexander Taratynov and presented to the city of St. Petersburg by Alexei Miller, the head of Russia’s oil and gas giant Gazprom. 
The plight of the sculptures, some of which have been damaged by vandals while others have suffered from exposure, has this month attracted the attention of Alexander Kobrinsky, a lawmaker from the St. Petersburg faction of the democratic Yabloko party. Kobrinsky has contacted City Hall with a request to find a custodian for the neglected group of sculptures.
Kobrinsky said he was amazed to discover that the sculpture park in fact belongs to no one. “I would assume that giving a present to the city should not be that easy: Before accepting anything and installing it the government has to first decide whether the city does actually need the gift,” Kobrinsky said. “And, if the answer is yes, then a responsible government would immediately assign a suitable organization to supervise the [maintenance of the] gift. In St. Petersburg, it happens the other way round — we first accept things, and then decide what to do with them.”
The sculptures were placed in Alexandrovsky Park following the instructions of then-governor Valentina Matviyenko. 
City Hall has reacted promptly to the inquiry. “The park will get an owner by May 1,” said St. Petersburg governor Georgy Poltavchenko. 
In the near future the sculptures will undergo cultural and historical assessment and, if acknowledged as having merit, will become part of the State Museum of Urban Sculpture. If state experts decide otherwise, the architectural miniatures will be placed under the protection of the Petrogradsky district administration.
The idea for the miniature city originally came from Gazprom’s Miller, who is a native of St. Petersburg. The thought came to Miller when he visited Amsterdam and saw the sculpture “Night Watch” based on Rembrandt’s painting, made by Russian sculptor Alexander Taratynov. Gazprom then contacted the artist and commissioned the miniatures.
The project received a mixed reaction from local residents when it first opened to the public. The project’s critics ridiculed it as a “fine example of fast art,” a reference to fast food.
St. Petersburg has to regularly review — and refuse to accept — various offers of presents in the form of artworks of varying quality. 
In 2005, the Moscow-based sculptor Zurab Tsereteli, who is frequently criticized for the elephantine scale of his works, offered the city a whole park full of his monumental creatures. City Hall at first reacted favorably to the prospect of dozens of life-size busts of Russian tsars and princes as well as fountains and sculptures, and the inevitable monument of Peter the Great with a golden angel behind his back, being placed in the city’s Primorsky Park. However, a number of art critics in Moscow and St. Petersburg shrugged their shoulders at the idea, and the idea never came to fruition.

TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: <b>Payments Flak</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — President Vladimir Putin has strongly criticized the high increase in the cost of communal services in a number of the country’s regions and demanded that the Russian Regional Development Ministry provide a clear explanation of such growth, news website Fontanka.ru reported.
“In some districts of St. Petersburg communal payments have risen by 40 percent. Please, explain to people why in November and December they had to pay one sum of money and then in January and February they had such a leap in payments. 
This has happened in some districts of St. Petersburg. In Murmansk, as you say, those payments increased by more than 200 percent in some districts. Have you lost your mind?” Putin said at a meeting on the issues of housing maintenance and utilities when speaking to Head of the Regional Development Ministry Igor Slyunyayev.

<b>Deadly Flu Outbreak</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — At least four people have died from complications of flu in St. Petersburg this season, Interfax reported last week, with reference to a source in medical circles.
Three lethal cases were registered in Botkin Hospital and one more case in Hospital No. 26.
However, no official information on the matter has been released yet, Interfax reported.

<b>Bride Snatched</b>
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) — About 300 members of Petersburg’s Azerbaijani diaspora have held a meeting in the city in connection with an incident that took place Feb. 19, when a dispute over the snatching of a bride resulted in a large-scale brawl in the south of the city, Interfax reported.
The meeting was attended by community leaders, who had traveled to St. Petersburg from Azerbaijan, and the parents of both families.
The Consul General of Azerbaijan in St. Petersburg, Gudsi Osmanov, described the incident as intolerable. He called upon the city’s Azerbaijani population to live in accordance with the legislation of their host country. “Otherwise, you may set the local population not only against individual people but also against the whole Azerbaijani community,” Interfax reported Osmanov as saying.
Representatives of the two parties shook hands and promised to resolve their problems by legal means in future.
The brawl, which involved more than 20 people, took place Feb. 19 near the Chistiye Prudy cafe on Ul. Dmitrova.
As a result of the conflict four people were hospitalized with different injuries. A knife, a baseball bat and two firearms were found at the site of the incident.
Police first detained 15 suspected participants and later 13 more. Three people have been arrested. The prosecution has opened a criminal case to investigate charges of attempted murder.

TITLE: New Local Bill Seeks to Ban Protests in City Center
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Opposition political groups and concerned citizens continue to protest against a new local bill on demonstrations that effectively bans protests in the city center, passed by the Legislative Assembly last week in its third and final reading. 
In hopes of preventing Governor Georgy Poltavchenko from signing it, the Yabloko Democratic Party has filed a complaint against the bill, describing it as “outrageous” and “illegal.”
“We are acting to prevent this becoming law, because, once in force, and used even once, the new law will have a devastating impact on the rights of citizens,” said Yabloko’s Nikolai Rybakov in a statement.
Called “On assemblies, rallies, demonstrations, marches and picketing in St. Petersburg,” the bill was passed Feb. 20 by 27 deputies, with 15 voting against.
The bill forbids the holding of rallies on Nevsky Prospekt, St. Petersburg’s main street, as well as on Palace Square and St. Isaac’s Square, which had previously been used for rallies, including the now-legendary mass protests against the 1991 anti-reformist coup.
Rallies will also be banned from within 50 meters of the entrances of buildings occupied by state authorities, while one-man demonstrations can only be held if there is no other protester within 50 meters.
According to the bill, the restrictions have been imposed “in order to protect the rights and freedoms of man and citizen, the rule of law, order and public safety.”
In his statement, Grigory Yavlinsky, chair of the Yabloko faction in the city’s Legislative Assembly, stressed that by passing the law, the city parliament ignored not only the negative opinion expressed by the public at the Dec. 3 public hearing and an address by the city’s ombudsman Alexander Shishlov, but also the Constitutional Court’s Feb. 14 ruling. Every amendment proposed by opposition deputies was rejected.
Apart from harsh restrictions on rallies, the bill also states that without authorization from the authorities, no more than 200 demonstrators are allowed to assemble at specially designated sites “for the collective discussion of socially important issues and expression of public opinion.” City Hall has designated a small site on the Field of Mars for such a purpose.
Andrei Dmitriyev, local chair of The Other Russia party, said that the law may obstruct the historic May Day demonstration, a massive event featuring a broad range of political parties and movements, from the pro-Kremlin United Russia party to liberals, communists and nationalists.
“It’s even not clear how they will hold a May Day demonstration this year, when everybody always used to walk down Nevsky Prospekt and then rallied on Palace Square and St. Isaac’s Square,” Dmitriyev said Tuesday.
“It’s essential not only for civic activists, but also for every citizen, because people, when they are unhappy about anything, want to come to protest where the authorities sit, be it the Governor, the Legislative Assembly, district administrations or courts.
“These are places where it’s forbidden to protest now, so they lose any meaning. Of course, it’s all illegal, it contradicts the Constitution, and we think that the main thing is not how the authorities act, but how the opposition and city residents will act.”
He said that the small site on the Field of Mars offered by City Hall as an allegedly liberal concession, allowing small groups to protest there without the necessary authorization, should be boycotted.
“No self-respecting opposition [campaigners] can rally there, but both Yabloko and the nationalists have taken the bait and obediently go there to rally. It makes no sense.”
The State Duma passed a national law harshly restricting the freedom of assembly in June 2012, following a wave of protests against the flawed State Duma and presidential elections that were held in late 2011 and early 2012. It imposed a number of restrictions on public assemblies and abruptly raised fines for holding unsanctioned protests. Local laws followed. 
Rights groups have criticized the law as violating both the Russian Constitution and international agreements.

TITLE: State Maintains Firm Grip on Pilfered Treasures
AUTHOR: By Ivan Nechepurenko
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin said last week that returning a Jewish book collection confiscated after the Bolshevik Revolution was impossible because it would open a “Pandora’s box” of claims on such property.
“[If Russia] starts satisfying these sorts of claims, there would be no end to them and no telling what the consequences might be,” Putin said at the vast new Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center in Moscow.
But some formerly communist countries have passed laws voluntarily giving back seized assets, and observers note that Russia has already opened this box by returning properties to the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Schneerson Library of thousands of religious tomes and manuscripts, which Putin proposed placing in the Jewish museum in Moscow, is among scores of cultural artifacts claimed by descendants of their former owners.
The Soviet government appropriated huge amounts of property after the 1917 revolution, including factories, banks and assets of the Russian Orthodox Church, and withdrew from Germany after World War II with trucks full of war booty.
One of the most prominent assets in Russia to be claimed by a foreign government is a collection of gold known as Priam’s Treasure, discovered by German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann in the 1870s on what he thought was the site of ancient Troy.
The collection of Trojan gold headbands, earrings and other jewelry was pilfered in 1945 by the Red Army from a bunker under the Berlin Zoo. Certain items from the treasure, including the Large Diadem, a headband made of shimmering gold leaf, are on display at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts.
According to the terms of a 1990 treaty, Russia was supposed to return all the art and artifacts the Soviet Union took from Germany, including Priam’s Treasure, but it hasn’t done so.
The Pushkin Museum and the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg are also home to a valuable set of impressionist paintings claimed by someone else. Art collectors Mikhail and Ivan Morozov put together the collection, which includes works by French impressionists Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Alfred Sisley, among others. Descendants of the Morozov family have claimed the paintings as their rightful property.
A spokeswoman for Hermitage director Mikhail Piotrovsky said the museum is “against all forms of restitution.”
Unlike Russia, certain central and eastern European nations have adopted laws stipulating the return of nationalized properties to their original owners. Some Russian pundits believe that Russia should now follow suit, but they warn of the difficulties involved.
Alexei Malashenko, of the Carnegie Moscow Center, said he thinks such a move would strengthen the country’s reputation.
“What was nationalized 100 years ago is now in a very different state,” however, he said. “Therefore, the process will be prohibitively difficult.”
Others point to the fact that Russian leaders, including Putin, have over the past 20 years ordered the return of highly valuable properties to the Russian Orthodox Church.
In 2008, Putin transferred several Christian relics from Moscow Kremlin museums, including a fragment of the holy robe of Jesus, to the church. These artifacts once belonged to the Russian imperial family.
Current descendants of the Romanovs have no claims over their properties in Russia and “would only be happy” if the relics that had belonged to them would benefit worshippers, said Alexander Zakatov, director of the chancellery of Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna, head of the Imperial Russian House.
Unlike the Romanov dynasty, museum experts and art critics have not always been so supportive of these transfers.
In 2008, a request by Patriarch Alexy II that Andrei Rublyov’s famous Holy Trinity icon, housed in the State Tretyakov Gallery, be allowed to travel to Sergiyev Posad for a holiday service was rejected after vehement public opposition.
Art experts also resisted but could not prevent the 2009 transfer of the 14th-century Toropets icon of the Virgin Mary from the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg to a newly built church in an elite gated community in the Moscow region.
In 2010, the Novodevichy Convent, one of three UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Moscow, was returned to the church.
With the recent rise in pro-church sentiment among the Russian political elite, the restitution process seems to have accelerated.
A 2010 law stipulates the return of all real estate seized from religious organizations in Soviet times and applies to religious hospitals, schools and residential properties but not museum pieces.
The law has led to some unusual results. In the Kaliningrad region, which belonged to Germany prior to 1945, Protestant and Catholic buildings were transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church.
Malashenko said he believes the church is “in a separate category, but it is difficult to accuse Putin of [playing favorites]. The church has always occupied a special role in Russian history.”
Well-known Orthodox Church theologian Andrei Kurayev said he believes that Orthodox relics can be transferred to the church “as soon as there are appropriate means to preserve them as well as [to allow] unrestricted access to the public.”
Some potential claimants of Russian property are not waiting for the legal framework to change in their favor.
Swiss financier Christopher Mouravieff-Apostol, a descendant of one of the most prominent pre-revolutionary aristocratic Russian families, restored his family’s former mansion in Moscow at his own expense.
He began the project in 2001 with grim prospects for the run-down property and rent of several million rubles a year. But now, the 19th-century building, at 23/9 Staraya Basmannaya Ulitsa, is leased to him at a rate of just one ruble per square meter under a program started by Mayor Sergei Sobyanin to encourage restoration of historic monuments.
The mansion, which is set to become a Decembrist museum and gallery, represents the only case in which a descendant of a Russian noble came to Russia to restore his family’s former property, museum director Tatyana Savelyeva said.

TITLE: Meatballs In Russia Free Of Horse, Says IKEA
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW — Swedish furniture giant Ikea said meatballs sold in its 14 stores in Russia are not affected by a European recall over fears of horse meat.
Ikea said the frozen meatballs that it sells locally use certified Russian ingredients and it will not suspend sales.
“We only use ingredients that are recorded in recipes and specifications registered in accredited laboratories,” the Ikea press service said in a statement carried by Interfax. 
The Ikea group initiated DNA tests on its entire range of meat products globally two weeks ago amid a horse meat scandal in Europe and found no trace of horse meat in 12 sample batches supplied by its various divisions. Ikea Russia supplied meatballs for the tests, the company statement said. 
Ikea plans new tests to “validate” the findings of authorities in the Czech Republic, who said they found horse DNA in tests of 1-kilogram packs of frozen meatballs labeled as beef and pork. 
The Czech State Veterinary Administration said it tested two batches of Ikea meatballs, one of which contained horse meat. It did not say how much. 
Meatballs from the same batch had been sent from a Swedish supplier to 12 other European countries — Slovakia, Hungary, France, Britain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Greece, Cyprus and Ireland — and will be withdrawn in all of them, Ikea said. 
The company has expanded the withdrawals to stores in 21 European countries and in Hong Kong, Thailand and the Dominican Republic, all of which used the same Swedish supplier. 
Ikea spokeswoman Ylva Magnusson said that included most European countries, but not Russia and Norway, which use local suppliers. Stores in Poland and Switzerland use both local suppliers and the Swedish one, but would now only use locally produced meatballs, she said. 
“This is an extraordinary effort to ensure that no one is worried,” Magnusson said.

TITLE: China to Get Russian Gas
AUTHOR: By Irina Filatova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Russia is negotiating to supply liquefied natural gas to China, and the two countries expect to reach a long-coveted gas cooperation agreement within a few months, Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich said Monday.
The deal, if closed, will bring the curtain down on years of price disputes between Gazprom and China National Petroleum Corporation, with the latter asking for a discount on the amount Russia charges European consumers.
“We have made a significant breakthrough on gas cooperation issues over the last few months, and there are all chances to reach certain agreements on expanding gas supplies,” Dvorkovich told journalists after a meeting with Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Wang Qishan.
“As for further cooperation in the gas industry, we see big potential for liquefied natural gas supplies. … This was discussed during today’s negotiations,” he said.
The LNG might be supplied by Gazprom, which is building a plant to liquefy gas near Vladivostok, as well as from the Yamal LNG facility, which is co-owned by Novatek and France’s Total, Dvorkovich added.  
This plan could be a good alternative to pipeline supplies amid the two countries’ fruitless efforts to reach a gas agreement over the past few years, said Valery Nesterov, an oil and gas analyst at Sberbank CIB.
Although pipeline deliveries will cost Russia less, they still involve certain risks attributed to the country’s dependence on transit countries and end users, Nesterov said, referring to the dispute over gas supplies that broke out between Russia and Ukraine in 2008.
Russia would benefit more from LNG exports to China, Nesterov said. This option would ensure greater flexibility in the signing of gas contracts and provide Russia an opportunity to sell gas to other interested countries, such as Thailand or Taiwan, if no agreement with China is reached.
Dvorkovich said the two countries are nearing an agreement and Gazprom is holding “active negotiations” on the gas deal with CNPC.
Russia hopes that the “main parameters” of the gas deal will be determined by the end of next month, when China’s incoming president, Xi Jinping, is slated to visit Russia, the minister said. He added that it would take a few months to finalize the legal and financial details of the deal.
Russia and China, the world’s largest energy consumer, have been negotiating the final gas price since 2006 because neither of them has been willing to bear potential losses from the contract.
Domestic prices for pipeline gas in China remain low as a result of strict government regulation, so the country has sought to pay less for gas than Russia’s European consumers.  
In 2010, Russia agreed to supply 30 cubic meters of natural gas to China annually starting in 2015 via the yet-to-be-built Altai gas pipeline, which will connect Siberia and China’s western border with Russia.
China needs Russian gas, since it is likely to see a shortage of up to 30 billion cubic meters a year by 2020, Nesterov said. At the same time, the country is rapidly increasing imports of LNG, whose major consumers include power plants and fertilizer producers.
“They are ready to pay a good price for gas,” Nesterov said.   
The two countries plan to strengthen cooperation in the energy sector. Russia is slated to boost oil supplies to China in the wake of Rosneft chief executive Igor Sechin’s visit earlier this month.
Dvorkovich said Russia could raise oil exports to China by 9 million metric tons a year, although China is interested in a greater increase. The oil will be delivered to the Tianjin refinery, which is being jointly built by Rosneft and CNPC, he said.
Certain figures have yet to be worked out, “but supplies should be sufficient for implementing the Tianjin refinery project,” Dvorkovich said, Interfax reported. “ This is about 9 million [metric] tons of oil.”
Russia exports 15 million metric tons of oil to China annually.
A contract for additional supply might be signed in the next few months, Dvorkovich said.

TITLE: Depardieu Lands in Grozny
AUTHOR: By Howard Amos
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: GROZNY — French actor Gerard Depardieu said he was inspired by the leadership of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov and accepted a five-room apartment from him during a visit to Grozny.
Kadyrov warmly greeted Depardieu on his arrival in Grozny on a flight from Saransk, where he got his Russian passport stamped Saturday with his new permanent address in Russia.
But Kadyrov also appeared to make an effort to convince the actor to consider settling down in Chechnya instead of the capital of the Mordovia republic.
“I just handed Gerard Depardieu the documents to a five-room apartment and a certificate making him an honorary citizen of Chechnya,” Kadyrov wrote next to a photo of him hugging the actor on Instagram on Monday.
Kadyrov, who is accused of widespread human rights abuses during his rule of the restive North Caucasus republic, met Depardieu at Grozny’s airport on Sunday and posted photographs on his Instagram account of the two men sharing a meal with eight of Kadyrov’s children. The two men also danced the traditional Caucasian Lezginka.
Depardieu, saying he was inspired by Kadyrov’s political leadership, promised to make a film about the rebuilding of Grozny following its destruction in two bloody separatist wars.
“I want to explain how one man could build a city all over again in five years. I am sure that really happy people live here. To dance and sing like Chechens you have to be genuinely happy,” Depardieu said in comments carried by Interfax.
The project will be an American-English-French-Russian collaboration called “Heart of My Father,” Kadyrov said on Instagram. It will be filmed in Grozny and feature local actors.
Depardieu has been involved in a public spat with the French government over proposals to raise taxes on the wealthy, and his presence in Russia comes ahead of an official visit by French Prime Minister Francois Hollande to Moscow on Wednesday. Putin personally handed Depardieu a Russian passport on Jan. 6.
This is not Depardieu’s first trip to Chechnya. In October, he came to Grozny for Kadyrov’s 36th birthday, and Kadyrov has said publicly that Depardieu would be welcome to live in the region.
Before flying into Chechnya, the star of films such as “Green Card” and “Cyrano de Bergerac” visited the Bolshoi Theater with Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky on Friday and collected his registration papers in Saransk, a city 600 kilometers east of Moscow, on Saturday.
While critics claim that Depardieu is being manipulated by the Kremlin, the actor has insisted he will spend significant amounts of time in his new homeland.
A film about Grozny is not the only cultural project to which Depardieu is committed. The actor said last week that he wanted to make a series of television programs based on Russian literature, and featuring actors from around the world.
Depardieu himself recently starred in a $7.9 million film about the Russian monk Rasputin, who was said to have wielded hypnotic power over Tsar Nicholas II and the imperial family. The joint French-Russian film premiered last year and is due to become available to Russian audiences in the fall.

TITLE: 3,000 Apply for Financial Aid After Meteorite Strike
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: CHELYABINSK, Ural Mountains — Almost 3,000 residents have applied for financial aid in the Chelyabins.k region, which is still recovering from the meteorite explosion that took place Feb. 15, a news report said Tuesday. 
Municipal bodies received 2,746 applications for lump-sum compensation and 28 requests for emergency aid from people in need of basic necessities, Interfax reported. 
Emergency crews have replaced broken windows in 6,775 buildings, including 5,712 residential buildings, 236 medical facilities, 679 schools and colleges, 25 public utility buildings, 94 recreational and 29 sports facilities, the report said.
According to the regional branch of the Emergency Situations Ministry, repair crews have already restored over 90 percent of the damaged buildings, Ekho Moskvy said.
The meteorite caught fire after entering the earth’s atmosphere and exploded above the Chelyabinsk region, producing a shock wave that caused extensive damage on the ground, including over 1,500 injuries.

TITLE: Priests Begin 16,000-km Motor Race
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: NOVGOROD, Western Russia — The record-breaking Expedition Trophy auto race kicked off in Veliky Novgorod on Monday with 15 teams, including one team of Russian Orthodox priests on a mission to bless Lake Baikal, Interfax reported.
The longest wintertime race in the world, covering 16,000 kilometers, will see the priests travel in an all-terrain vehicle from Murmansk, in Russia’s northwest, to Vladivostok, in the Far East.
The race’s founder, Alexander Kravtsov, said the priests’ participation in the journey was symbolic. “We always blessed the vehicles at the starting line, but we’ve never had a team made up entirely of priests.”
The team’s captain has a mission of his own to carry to Vladivostok a cross reliquary with a piece of stone from Calvary. He also plans to bless the water of Lake Baikal.
The race, which finishes March 8, offers a grand prize of $100,000. It was not immediately clear whether the team of priests would be eligible.

TITLE: New Law Requires Disabled to be Hired
AUTHOR: By Alexander Bratersky
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW — Oleg Smolin, a State Duma deputy with the Communist Party, praised a law that entered into force Monday and requires companies to hire disabled people or face fines of up to 10,000 rubles ($330).
“We supported this legislation because it looks like a first step forward,” Smolin, who is blind, told The St. Petersburg Times.
The amendments, published on the Kremlin’s website Monday, introduce fines for business owners who refuse to employ people with disabilities or fail to create a quota system that earmarks a certain percentage of jobs for them.
The legislation concerns companies with 100 or more employees and requires them to provide 2 to 4 percent of their jobs to people with disabilities. The fines for noncompliance range from 5,000 to 10,000 rubles.
When asked whether the fines are too small to make a difference, Smolin said the amount reflected a compromise between the government and organizations that work with disabled people. 
He acknowledged, however, that nongovernmental organizations had sought stricter measures to encourage employment of the disabled. One of them, which was ultimately rejected, would have required companies to pay into a special fund to create workspaces for the disabled.
Federal legislation passed in 2004 requires companies with more than 30 employees to fill a certain percentage of their positions with disabled people, should qualified candidates with disabilities apply. The law was amended in 2005 to increase the worker threshold from 30 to 100.
The latest law introduces the fines. The decision to establish fines appears to be aimed at forcing companies to be more socially responsible, in a country where 3.5 million people with disabilities, or 84 percent of all disabled Russians capable of working, are unemployed, according to government figures. 
But Vladimir Golovnyov, an official with the Kremlin-established office to defend investor rights, warned that the fines should not be used to pressure small businesses, including startups. 
“We should apply those measures very carefully because bureaucrats who see things in a formal way might use it to put pressure on business,” Golovnyov said. 
He said that while it is importnat for business owners to be socially responsible, at the same time they need to make a profit. 
Although some firms are prepared to look for compromises toward more inclusive employment, officials have not always welcomed them. 
In the mid-2000s, Noda, a leading Russian company that provides software solutions for call centers, opened a call center with 2,500 visually impaired employees in cooperation with Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov. After Luzhkov was fired in 2010, City Hall under the new mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, declined to extend the program.

TITLE: Anti-Bribery Legislation To Affect Firms
AUTHOR: By Alastair Gill
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Russia’s first comprehensive anti-corruption law, Federal Law No. 273 “On Combatting Corruption,” has been amended to require companies to have compliance officers and programs, according to international law firm Baker & McKenzie.
The new legislation, Article 13.3, which came into force Jan. 13, has a number of implications for companies operating in Russia, and means that firms have a statutory duty to develop and implement anti-bribery measures.
Previously, Russian law stipulated that organizations could be held liable for “failing to take all measures within their powers” to combat bribery. 
However, firms were under no obligation to set up a compliance program and there was no guidance as to the provisions such a system should contain.
The amendment means companies are now legally required to create compliance programs that meet the standards of Article 13.3, and failure to do so will be viewed as non-compliance with Russian law. 
Furthermore, dealing with third parties whose organizations do not have compliance programs may also be seen as failure to take all possible measures to prevent corruption.
Article 13.3 requires all firms to assess and supplement their existing compliance programs, ensuring that they have designated compliance personnel (anti-bribery “officers”) and clear procedures for conducting internal investigations and cooperating with police.
In addition, the amendment obliges firms to set up systems for identifying, preventing and resolving conflicts of interest; to prevent the creation and use of false and altered documents; and to conduct regular risk assessments inside the company itself and among its business partners and third party agents.
Firms also have to adopt a code of corporate compliance and ethics, as well as set up regular staff training programs on anti-corruption compliance, business ethics and conflict of interest.

TITLE: Ukraine Refuses to Pay Russia $7Bln Gazprom Fine
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: KIEV, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych said his country would not pay Russia a $7 billion fine for violations of a gas delivery agreement.
“We have refused to pay these fines, and now we are in negotiations,” Yanukovych told a national television show Friday.
In January, Gazprom billed Ukraine’s Naftogaz Ukrainy with a $7 billion bill for gas it says Ukraine did not buy in 2012, although it was obliged to do so under a so-called pay-or-take contract.
“I think we will genuinely restore normal relations with Russia in the gas sphere. We’re not losing hope,” said Yanukovych. “We need to think about how to make use of our gas-pipeline network, and no one except Russia can guarantee us a given volume of gas,” Yanukovych said.
Although Ukraine is seeking to diversify its gas supplies and took deliveries from European firms including Germany’s RWE in 2012, it remains heavily dependent on Russia for the bulk of its supplies.
Ukraine pays Russia $430 per thousand cubic meters under a deal negotiated by now-jailed former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and then-Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in 2009.
Yanukovych’s comments came during a television interview where he also promised not to raise heavily subsidized domestic gas prices — a pledge that is likely to cause tensions with the International Monetary Fund.

TITLE: New Smoking Ban Stokes Debate
AUTHOR: By Alan Maishman
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: President Vladimir Putin signed a law on Monday prohibiting smoking in public places. The legislation is due to come into force in July 2013 with a ban in schools, hospitals, airports and the public areas of apartment buildings. 
In July 2014 it will become illegal to smoke in cafes, restaurants and bars. Other provisions limit the display of cigarettes at the point of sale as well as sales from kiosks.
In a country with one of the world’s highest rates of smoking (40 percent of Russia’s adult population smoke), the effects of the public smoking ban will be widespread and complex, with ramifications for industry sectors such as hospitality. 
In the U.K., for example, a significant number of pubs have closed since similar legislation was imposed in 2007. The pub culture that is such a feature of traditional British life doesn’t exist in the same way in Russia, but even so, some fear a similar outcome.
Pavel Shteinlukht, co-owner of the city’s popular Terminal Bar on Ulitsa Rubinsteina, expressed concern about the impact the new legislation would have on local bar owners. 
‘The majority of our customers smoke,” he said, speaking to The St. Petersburg Times last Friday. “I think the destiny of these laws is unpredictable; they are so artificial for Russia... If they are totally implemented they will surely affect the bar business.”
The same argument is made by tobacco company Philip Morris International, one of three firms — the other two are Japan Tobacco Inc. and British American Tobacco — that account for about 87 percent of a market in Russia that is estimated at $14.5 billion.
“Public smoking restrictions are absolutely appropriate, including bans in many locations,” a company representative told The St. Petersburg Times last Friday. 
“However, in restaurants, bars and entertainment establishments, proprietors should have the freedom to accommodate both non-smokers and smokers and decide whether to permit, restrict, or prohibit smoking.” 
Both tobacco companies and local businesses have expressed concern over the opportunities the new legislation will present for criminal activity.
According to Simon Edwards at Imperial Tobacco, who responded to a request for comment from The St. Petersburg Times last week, “rapidly rising excise duties combined with excessive regulation increase the smuggling and counterfeiting of tobacco products.” 
Alexander Lioutyi, Corporate Affairs Director at British American Tobacco Russia agrees. 
“By introducing the retail display ban, law-makers simply put the legal product under the counter, the same place where illegal, and much cheaper cigarettes are,” he said, adding that “…the closure of kiosks (a traditional format of sale in Russia) is likely to trigger the appearance of illegal tobacco trade formats, such as street vendors...”
The potential negative consequences of the new legislation for businesses are not limited to illegal trading and smuggling, however. 
Asked about the potential for graft, bar owner Steinlukht answered, ‘Yes, for sure. Unfortunately, any ban in our country is usually followed by a new wave of corruption. The smoking ban definitely has a potential for it. Why can’t bar owners decide for themselves what to do with smoking at their places?”
Proponents of the legislation argue that it will reduce the use of tobacco in society, improving Russians’ health and reducing medical costs. 
In the U.K. the smoking ban has been credited with significant health benefits: reduced emergency admissions for heart attacks, a reduction in asthma in children and a decrease in premature birth rates, among others.
Attempts by governments to curb public smoking through the introduction of anti-smoking legislation are nothing new, and a number of countries and U.S. states have brought in anti-smoking laws since Adolf Hitler introduced the first modern public smoking ban in 1941.
The U.S. state of Minnesota introduced its own legislation in 1975, and in 1985 the city of Aspen in Colorado restricted smoking in restaurants. 
Increasingly persuasive medical evidence prompted progressively tighter legislation throughout California in the 1980s, Peru in the 1990s, and then New Zealand, Ireland, and the U.K. 
By 2010 Bhutan had banned the cultivation and sale of tobacco and 2011 Iceland was widely reported to be considering offering cigarettes on prescription only.
The idea of implementing such strong legislation to improve the health of the nation is not without precedent in Russia.
In May 1985 Mikhail Gorbachev announced an anti-alcohol campaign. As a result, alcohol was banned at official functions, the price of vodka increased and production was cut, leading to shortages and long lines at the shops. 
Although the average life expectancy for men briefly increased, the shortfall was soon made up by illegal production. 
By the early 1990s average life expectancy for men had fallen to 58 years.
Western visitors are surprised by the Russians’ dislike for Gorbachev, but the anti-alcohol campaign partly explains why. 
In Russia today approximately 70 percent of all deaths are caused by cardiovascular diseases or cancer. But Gorbachev’s experience warns of the political risks of addressing alcohol or tobacco use. 
The new legislation is likely to be unpopular with many of the government’s supporters.

TITLE: Pekhtin’s Mistake Was Investing in Miami
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Ryzhkov
TEXT: The sudden resignations of three State Duma deputies with the United Russia party and rumors of the imminent resignations of six more have caused widespread surprise. Within a span of just days, Deputies Vladimir Pekhtin, Anatoly Lomakin and Vasily Tolstopyatov relinquished their posts after having served only one year of their five-year terms.
What does it all mean? Is the parliament really getting tough on corruption? Have the authorities suddenly begun taking anti-corruption whistleblowerAlexei Navalny seriously, ousting Pekhtin just three days after Navalny posted information on his website indicating that Pekhtin owns apartments in Florida? Or has PresidentVladimir Putin begun enforcing a new initiative to ban Russian politicians and officials from holding foreign assets?
In fact, the answer is “no” to all of the above.
First, this has nothing to do with the fight against corruption. Putin is more than tolerant of corruption occurring on Russian territory. If he weren’t, corruption would not be growing yearly as it has, and Russia would not consistently have the world’s most expensive roads, sports and recreation facilities, bridges, hospitals, summits and Olympic Games. In this case, the problem is with offshore corruption as compared to corruption at home. In other words, by ousting Pekhtin, Putin is sending a new message to Russian officialdom: “If you remain loyal, you can continue doing whatever you want here at home, but don’t dare buy a home for yourself in the United States — our enemy.”
The Duma developments also are not the result of pressure from the opposition. The authorities are well aware that dismissing a key figure such as Pekhtin, seemingly in response to Navalny’s revelations, only strengthens the cause of the opposition. Pekhtin served in the United Russia leadership for several years and was recently instrumental in stripping opposition Deputy Gennady Gudkov of his parliamentary mandate.
The authorities know that each such scandal — and especially when they are connected with such high-profile dismissals — only further tarnishes the already badly tainted reputation of the party in power. It only makes Putin’s power vertical look weak, defensive and thoroughly corrupt.
The Kremlin is forging ahead because it has an even stronger motivation: the virulent anti-U.S. sentiment of Putin and his inner circle. This is the real reason behind what is happening.
Putin & Co. view Washington’s support of democracy around the world and in Russia as deliberately subversive toward the Moscow regime and aimed at Putin personally. Putin cannot forget how U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden offered some friendly advice during his visit to Moscow a few years ago by suggesting that he not cling to power. That is why Moscow now considers everything American anathema and is forcing everything directly linked to the U.S. out of the country.
Pekhtin’s undoing was not that he failed to declare his elite foreign real estate. After all, do any deputies or senators declare theirs? And it was not that he never declared the earnings that enabled him to purchase it. After all, most deputies and senators never provide a clear explanation of where their money comes from. What proved fatal for Pekhtin was that his property was in the U.S. — a country that Putin & Co. truly hate and consider an arch enemy.
Tellingly, rumor has it that Putin will only strip deputies of their posts if they hold property and assets in the United States. There is no example of deputies getting into trouble for owning property in, say, Switzerland, Austria, Germany or the south of France. In this regard, it will be interesting to see what happens in the near future to lawmakers Irina Rodnina, Vladislav Tretyak, Mikhail Margelov and Vitaly Malkin, all of whom reportedly have real estate, businesses or other personal interests in the U.S. There is a distinct possibility that more heads will roll because, as one source with close ties to the presidential administration told Kommersant, Pekhtin’s ouster was the result of the “anti-U.S. and patriotic agenda” of Putin’s third term in the Kremlin.
By stepping up the authoritarian rule of his regime, strengthening the role of intelligence agencies in cracking down on all forms of dissent, and by consolidating his rapidly declining majority around reactionary and patriarchal values, Putin is waging a campaign aimed simultaneously against the United States and the West as a whole. In a strategic sense, this means Putin is trying to once again isolate the country and its political elite from the outside world.
Putin wants to rein in the members of his political machine who have grown fat from corruption and the permissiveness that comes from being above the law. He wants to control them with the help of his personally loyal Federal Security Service and Investigative Committee. He not only tolerates but even seems to encourage corruption within his inner circle, but only on the condition that it is done at home where he can see it. Putin considers it an act of disloyalty, as treasonous and a challenge to his personal authority, if a Russian official purchases assets in the U.S.
However, Putin’s plan won’t work. Russia’s corrupt officials will need only about a year to adjust to the “less accommodating” circumstances. They will go right on plundering taxpayers’ money and state corporations and actively transferring those funds overseas — to the U.S. included. But they will figure out better ways of hiding the money by registering those assets in the names of distant relatives and by using trusts. The number of firms specializing in such services will grow exponentially, far beyond the dozens that already exist in Moscow.
For these officials, the desire to loot public funds and hide the money in countries that respect property rights will always be stronger than their loyalty to Putin. In the party of crooks and thieves, there are very few fools to be found — with the possible exception of Pekhtin.

<i>Vladimir Ryzhkov, a State Duma deputy from 1993 to 2007, hosts a political talk show on Ekho Moskvy radio and is a co-founder of the opposition Party of People’s Freedom.</i>

TITLE: the word’s worth: A Stylish Woman — and Car
AUTHOR: By Michele A. Berdy
TEXT: Is it just me, or does anyone else wonder why Keira Knightly is the go-to Western actress to play Russian beauties? Doctor Zhivago’s Lara, Anna Karenina: really? She may be a beautiful woman, but by the Russian standards of beauty when these works were written, she’s not what you’d call ðîñêîøíàÿ æåíùèíà (a sumptuous woman). Tolstoy would have taken one look at her and thought: ïîäêîðìèòü å¸ íàäî (she needs to get some meat on her bones).
In Russian there are two main words to describe people and objects that are lush, luxurious or splendid. One is the homegrown noun ðîñêîøü (splendor, luxury). You might hear this word being bandied about by the government, which is constantly threatening to tax it: Âíîâü ïîäíèìàåòñÿ âîïðîñ î ââåäåíèè íàëîãà íà ðîñêîøü. (The question of introducing a luxury tax is being raised once again.) Here, as I understand it, the difficulty is deciding what exactly is ïðåäìåò ðîñêîøè (luxury good), since it could be argued that a sheered mink coat, Bentley, and êîòòåäæ íà Ðóáë¸âêå (villa on Rublyovo-Uspenskoye Shosse) — not to mention a couple of properties abroad — are not luxuries, but simply everyday necessities. I mean, just ask the deputies in the State Duma.
In any case, the noun ðîñêîøü and adjective ðîñêîøíûé describe things that are beautiful, expensive and ornate — perhaps even over the top: ðîñêîøíûé äâîðåö (opulent palace), ðîñêîøíàÿ êâàðòèðà (luxury or premium-class apartment), or ðîñêîøíîå èçäàíèå êíèãè (deluxe edition of a book). Even a utilitarian facility might be ðîñêîøíûé: Ðîñêîøíîå áîìáîóáåæèùå: êàïèòàëüíûå, òîëñòûå ñòåíû, ñóõî, óþòíî — íå ñêàæåøü, ÷òî ïîäâàë. (It was a luxurious bomb shelter: dry and cozy with substantial, thick walls — you’d never know you were in a cellar.)
Ðîñêîøíûé can also describe a way of life that involves spending lots of money: Îí â¸ë ðîñêîøíûé îáðàç æèçíè. (He had an extravagant lifestyle.)
And ðîñêîøíûé describes anything that is lush and abundant, from vegetation to curvy body parts. Ðàñòåíèå õâàñòàåòñÿ ðîñêîøíûìè öâåòêàìè. (The plant has sumptuous blooms.) Ó íå¸ áûëà áîëüøàÿ ãðóäü è ðîñêîøíûå îêðóãëûå á¸äðà. (She had an ample bosom and voluptuous, rounded hips.) Îíà — õîðîøåíüêàÿ, ñ ðîñêîøíûìè êàøòàíîâûìè âîëîñàìè. (She’s a pretty little thing with luxuriant chestnut-colored hair.)
Then ðîñêîøíûé can simply refer to anything terrific, high-quality, splendid or wonderful. Ïîãîäà áûëà ðîñêîøíîé! (The weather was perfect.) Ìû ðîñêîøíî ïðîâåëè âå÷åð. (We had a marvelous evening.)
Another Russian word for high-class people and things is a French import, øèêàðíûé (from chicard: chic). Sometimes the word is used to describe something that is fashionable or stylish. ß ñíèìàëà øèêàðíóþ êâàðòèðó íà íàáåðåæíîé, ñ âèäîì íà ðåêó. (I rented a posh apartment on the embankment with a river view.) Øèêàðíîìó ìóæ÷èíå — Schick Protector 3D Diamond. (The Schick Protector 3D Diamond: For the stylish man.)
Of course, notions of chic change over time: Êîìó íóæíû òåïåðü ýòè ïîíàñòðîåííûå, øèêàðíûå — ñ ñîâêîâîé òî÷êè çðåíèÿ — îòåëè. (Today who needs all those Soviet-style “swanky” hotels they built all over the place?)
Øèêàðíûé can also refer to something that is wonderful, worth its weight in gold: Ìíå êàíàë “Êóëüòóðà” ñäåëàë øèêàðíûé ïîäàðîê: ïîêàç ôèëüìà Ìèõàèëà Ðîììà “Óáèéñòâî íà óëèöå Äàíòå.” (The Kultura channel gave me a magnificent gift: a broadcast of Mikhail Romm’s film “Murder on Dante Street.”)
In other cases, øèêàðíûé can refer to something elegant: Îíè ïðèäóìàëè øèêàðíûé ñïîñîá ðàçâîðîâûâàíèÿ äåíåã. (They came up with a nifty way of stealing money.) Or øèêàðíûé can just mean great. This can get a bit tricky for translators. For example, øèêàðíàÿ ñîáàêà might mean a trendy breed, a beautifully groomed dog or just a plain old wonderful pooch.
But it gets really tricky when it comes to people. What exactly is ðîñêîøíàÿ æåíùèíà or a ðîñêîøíûé ìóæ÷èíà? How are they different from their øèêàðíûå counterparts? My mini survey of native speakers revealed that ðîñêîøíûé and øèêàðíûé are incredibly subjective when used to describe people, although there are a few recurring themes. For example, øèêàðíàÿ æåíùèíà and øèêàðíûé ìóæ÷èíà were usually defined as stylish people, but were often just terrific people. Ðîñêîøíàÿ æåíùèíà was defined as a beautiful woman, usually expensively dressed and coiffed. Some people said the word only applied to her appearance; others — mostly men — said she was splendid in other ways. One older gentleman, bless his heart, had his own criterion: Ðîñêîøíàÿ æåíùèíà? Æåíùèíà â ïîðòðåòå Ðóáåíñà. (A luscious woman? A women in a portrait by Rubens.)
Ðîñêîøíûé ìóæ÷èíà? Like his female counterpart, he’s handsome and well-dressed. But unlike her, he is also successful, rich, kind and an all-around great guy.
So if someone says, “Îí æåíèëñÿ íà ðîñêîøíîé æåíùèíå” (He married a splendid woman), you won’t know what she’s like until you see her. It’s all in the eye of the beholder.

<i>Michele A. Berdy, a Moscow-based translator and interpreter, is author of “The Russian Word’s Worth” (Glas), a collection of her columns.</i>

TITLE: Pep-See celebrates 20 years
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Pep-See, the local “extreme disco” band fronted by three flamboyant female singers who seem to like wearing their grandmothers’ clothing while singing upbeat songs with sometimes dark overtones, will mark its 20th anniversary Friday with a birthday bash at Kosmonavt, a large concert venue located in a former Soviet film theater. 
According to the band, musicians Kesha Spechinsky of the group Vnezapny Sych, who wrote some of Pep-See’s best-known songs such as “Vovochka” and “Parni. Muzyka. Narkotiki” (Boys. Music. Drugs) and Vitaly Kudryavtsev, whose songs for Pep-See include “Manya” and “Disco,” will join Pep-See on stage to perform their songs with the band.
After three albums released in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Pep-See stopped putting out CDs, preferring live shows and the occasional audio upload and YouTube video.
Anna Kipyatkova, one of the three frontwomen, said this week that what the band is up to can be seen in last year’s video “Gorye” (Grief). The fast-paced and side-splitting short film stars Ivan Turist, who fronts the local avant-rock band NOM, as the main villain, and was directed by NOM’s bass player and singer Andrei Kagadeyev.
The other work that Kipyatkova recommended is a cover version the band recorded for a NOM tribute album. Called “Live in Porto Negoro (Your High-heeled Shoes Are Knockin’ At My Heart).” The song is a trashy Euro disco number sung in English and is available as a free download at www.pep-see.kroogi.com.
Turist is expected to take part in the anniversary concert along with Prepinaki singer Alexander Lushin, video artist Sergei Kravchenko and the band S.P.O.R.T., all of whom represented the face of the then-new and exciting St. Petersburg indie music scene of the early 1990s alongside Pep-See.
Former members of Pep-See, including Denis “Ringo” Sladkevich, who now performs with avant-rock instrumental band Volkovtrio and accordion-driven folk-punk Skazy Lesa, and Igor Rozanov, the drummer with ska-punk band Spitfire, will join the band onstage as well.
Pep-See formed in 1992, and originally featured singers Kipyatkova (born Tsaturova), Inessa Mikhailova and Maria Volkova (all three made their debut in the pioneering techno band Lyuki and billed themselves as the Kipyatkova Sisters), plus drummer Sladkevich and Vnezapny Sych frontman Kesha Spechinsky, who was actually the mastermind behind Pep-See’s formation.
“[Spechinsky] came up with the idea,” said Kipyatkova in an interview with The St. Petersburg Times back in 2002.
“He is a very active person. He gave us the initial push, but was instantly carried away by something else, and the snowball rolled on without him. And, of course, we had his songs.”
Spechinsky composed some of Pep-See’s best-known songs, including “Vovochka,” which led the band to national fame and overshadowed his own, underrated band.
Originally called Pepsi, the band took its name — suggested by drummer Sladkevich — in a na&#239;ve bid for sponsorship from PepsiCo, but soon discovered that the global soft drinks giant did not like the idea and wanted the band to change its name. 
Local legend Sergei Kuryokhin, the late musician and film composer, produced “Tikhy Shorokh Shin” (The Soft Rustle of Tires), the band’s first track, at the Lenfilm studios.
Alongside Markscheider Kunst, Tequilajazzz, Kolibri and S.P.O.R.T., Pep-See became one of a handful of popular local bands who frequently performed at the small number of trendy indie venues in the city at the time, such as Griboyedov and Fish Fabrique.
Because of the mainstream success of such songs as “Vovochka,” the band was frequently seen on Russian television. At one point Pep-See’s popularity saw them emerging from the underground scene where they belonged. But they were quick to retreat from big venues and television shows into the familiarity of cozy, smoky clubs.
“We had a period when we performed in big venues,” Kipyatkova wrote in answer to a question from a fan on Pep-See’s homepage.
“But showbiz in Russia is full of utter scum. And we were expected to lip-sync to a tape. We left this road to popularization. We rejected this sphere knowingly. This is a different idea of performing, a different type of concert. Having tasted this beauty, we understood that it was disgusting and left. That’s why we like clubs better. And, I should say to you, New Year’s Eve television concerts are a complete pile of puke!”
According to Kipyatkova, Pep-See mostly performs at clubs in Moscow and St. Petersburg. “They know us in the provinces, but can’t afford to invite us, because we’re mostly known to people who are really interested in music there,” she said. “[We mostly play] the club scenes in the two cities, although we also fly to Siberia once in a while.”
Kipyatkova did not specify why there haven’t been any more albums since the band’s third album “The Tantsy/Ze Dances,” which was released in 2001. But earlier she had expressed dissatisfaction with Pep-See’s first two releases, the 1996 “Tri Zvezdy Na Nebe” (Three Stars in the Sky) and the 1999 “Ustupite Lyzhnyu” (Get Out of the Way).
She dismissed them as badly recorded, a fact she blamed on poorly equipped local studios.
“[The albums] sounded rather provincial,” Kipyatkova said. “The idea was clear. Some people had fun [listening to it], some people didn’t, but it was simply not good enough as far as the sound was concerned.”
“Although we worked hard — especially on the second album — we were completely dissatisfied with the result,” she added.
Currently, Pep-See feels more comfortable releasing bits of material as soon as the band comes up with something worthwhile, Kipyatkova says.
“We upload things when we have something good, but we don’t want to present it as an album for the time being,” she said.
“It isn’t relevant or interesting to us. What’s interesting to us is to sing songs, as always. We continue to do this; we transform within ourselves and the musical space surrounding us transforms as well. We make use of [this space], and use innovations in music and technology, and we think that everything comes out well. People come to the concerts, dance and have fun with us and this is the most important thing. We do it for ourselves, because we can’t live any differently.”

<i>Pep-See will perform at 8 p.m. on Friday, March 1 at Kosmonavt, 24 Bronnitskaya Ulitsa. M: Tekhnologichesky Institut. Tel. 922 1300</i>

TITLE: CHERNOV’S CHOICE
AUTHOR: By Sergey Chernov
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Sunday, March 3 marks the first anniversary of the imprisonment of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, members of the feminist punk collective Pussy Riot. Symbolically, the arrests took place on the eve of the election that landed Putin back in the presidential chair amid public cries of rigged voting and other gross violations. 
The female group, clad in bright clothes and colored balaclavas, became in some ways the face of the movement of those sick of fraud and televised lies, and who opposed a regime that was set on keeping hold of power at any cost. 
They also became the first people to be imprisoned for staging protests, on the highly dubious charges of “hooliganism on the grounds of religious hatred,” a few months before the Russian authorities started to arrest and imprison people for taking part in the May 6, 2012 mass demonstration in Moscow.
It was clear that there was no “hooliganism” (as defined by the Russian law) or “religious hatred” in the group’s “punk prayer,” called “Holy Mother of God, Drive Putin Away.” What there was, was a protest against the Russian Orthodox Church’s support for Putin, whose rule Patriarch Kirill described as a “miracle.”
One year later, Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina are in remote penal colonies, while the Pussy Riot videos are banned as “extremist” (but were still available on YouTube in St. Petersburg when checked on Tuesday).
Despite the fact that the original protest has been largely crushed by the authorities, Pussy Riot’s unsanctioned performances seem to have set an example and shown a way towards restoring some measure of freedom in Russia.
 “As far as we can see, Putin is scared only of unsanctioned rallies; that’s why we promote holding unauthorized protests in our songs,” Pussy Riot said in an interview with The St. Petersburg Times in January 2012, a month before the arrests.
“The authorities will not get scared and make concessions because they are rallies that they sanctioned themselves.”
Yekaterina Samutsevich, who was arrested March 16, was the third member of the group to be arrested and was initially sentenced to a two-year prison term that was later was suspended by an appeals court. Samutsevich believes that Pussy Riot’s case has brought the issue the issue of human rights violations being committed by the Kremlin to international attention
“There was understanding about the situation in Russia,” Samutsevich said in a recent interview with this paper. “Because Putin and the powers-that-be say that we have democracy and freedom of speech. It turned out that this is not true, that it is all lies; that Russia had huge problems with freedom of speech, with human rights.”
Global events expressing solidarity with Pussy Riot are being held around the world this week to mark the first anniversary of the arrests of the group members.

TITLE: Remembering Alexei German
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Renowned St. Petersburg film director Alexei German, who was a legend in his own time, died in the Military Medical Academy Hospital on Feb. 21 after a lengthy illness. He was 74.
Hundreds of people attended the secular memorial service at the Lenfilm studio and the subsequent funeral at St. Petersburg’s Bogoslovskoye cemetery on Sunday. They were there to bid farewell to the man behind the films “The Trial of the Road,” “Khrustalyov, My Car!” and “My Friend Ivan Lapshin.”
Alexei German was among the most revered figures in Russian cultural circles, whose courage, uncompromising attitude, unorthodox opinions and independent thinking won him the admiration of both colleagues and audiences alike.
“Alexei German’s art did not know the self-imposed boundaries that hamper the creativity of so many talented artists; the amazing inner liberty that this director possessed enabled him to create films that nobody else would ever dare to make,” said prominent Russian actor Oleg Basilashvili, speaking at the director’s funeral Sunday.
“If a director is able to produce even ten minutes of the quality of footage that Alexei German treated us to, that would already win them profound respect from the country’s cultural community,” said celebrated Russian actor Leonid Yarmolnik, who also attended the funeral Sunday. “To make a complete film of the caliber of Alexei German, one ought to be, well, another German.”
Alexei German made a mere handful of films, yet each and every one of them became a classic that made history.
One of his most famous works, “My Friend Ivan Lapshin,” is set in the1930s and is loosely based on the stories of his father, the Stalin-era writer Yury German, whose prose documented Soviet realities. 
“I am not nearly as talented as my father; but my father was, well, flexible, and I am stubborn, and this makes all the difference,” Alexei German once said about his father.
 Unlike his writer father, who survived by poeticizing the Soviet regime, Alexei German would often find himself in a state of opposition to the authorities.
When the elder German was trying to persuade his son to join the Communist Party, Alexei would offer tough resistance and fire back with words like, “The Communist Party has already taken the most precious thing that I have — you!”
In the past decade of his life, Alexei German often went against the grain and confronted the authorities with criticism of their bungling cultural policies and plans to deliver Lenfilm — Russia’s oldest and perhaps most venerable film studio — into private hands. German backed the plan that saw Lenfilm’s revival as an important studio making serious art films. The director’s crusade against the destruction of the studio, in which he was joined by directors Alexander Sokurov, Viktor Buturlin and others, succeeded largely owing to German’s perseverance.
Alexei German was at the heart of the creation of the St. Petersburg Kinoforum film festival, which he described as “a charger for the soul,” and was the event’s president in 2011. 
“Art is the most important thing that humankind has,” German told The St. Petersburg Times in 2011. “Without it, people turn into a bunch of evil-minded communities that exist only to reproduce, fight and destroy nature.”
“The art of filmmaking is essentially the art of dreams. These dreams can contain anything: Love, horror, addiction, courage or humility. Anything is possible in this world but the most important thing is that films must be true to their mission, which is to make people’s hearts more sensitive, to enable them to be empathetic. A true film always speaks directly to the spectator’s heart, and it is for this opportunity that I am out there.”
Alexei German never completed his last film, “It is Hard To Be A God,” based on the fantasy novel by the St. Petersburg writers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky.
“He was a perfectionist, and he took time to finish his films. Yet perfectionism was not the main reason for the lengthy production process — he sought to show the truth,” said Lev Dodin, a prominent St. Petersburg director for the stage and the artistic director of the Maly Drama Theater, in his obituary for the German published in Ogonyok magazine. “This last work will still shine. But this will be a beauty of a particular kind — the grandness of an unfinished cathedral.”

TITLE: Central Asia rediscovered
AUTHOR: By Alastair Gill and Gillian Bradford
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Few people might identify Central Asia as one of the birthplaces of globalization, but those who view it as a strictly 21st-century phenomenon may be surprised to learn that similar cultural and commercial exchanges have been taking place for thousands of years in the arid steppes and mountains of China and Mongolia.
Visitors to the State Hermitage Museum once again have the opportunity to investigate its fascinating collection of art from the region, titled “The Culture and Art of Central Asia,” which reopened Feb. 14 after a long period of renovation.
The exhibition, which contains around 1,000 artifacts, spans two millennia and features artistic and cultural treasures from across Central Asia that together form a fabulous mosaic of peoples, religions, and artisanship. 
“The Culture and Art of Central Asia” is a reminder of the important role merchants and trading in the area played in the development of art and the expansion of religion — mainly Buddhism in this case — and also of how the iconography of these religions changed through interaction with various cultures. 
The Hermitage’s collection includes pieces from various parts of the vast region, including East Turkestan (the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China), Tibet, Mongolia, Buryatia and the western borderlands of modern-day China.
The Mongolian collection is especially extensive, spanning from the first centuries B.C. to the 14th century.  Its  diversity testifies to the waves of different cultures that passed through the region during this period.
Of particular interest is the collection of artifacts from the Noin-Ula kurgans, a group of 1st-century B.C. burial mounds excavated in northern Mongolia by Soviet explorer Pyotr Kozlov in 1923-1924. Here you can marvel at the ancient skills of the Xiongnu aristocracy, evident in a wealth of objects retrieved from the 200 kurgans, from household items and parts of chariots to lacquered cups and silver jewelry.
But most striking are the silk fabrics, with their diverse ornamentation and highly technical embroidery, which testify to the close links the Xiongnu enjoyed with China.
The area later came under Turkic influence, and this is represented by a helmet, arrowheads, and a stone head with an untranslated runic inscription dating from the 6th or 7th century — one of only two such heads found in Mongolia.
The exhibition also features a number of cultural artifacts and works of art from oasis cities located along the route of the Great Silk Road, the vast ancient network of trade routes linking Asia to Europe. 
Iranians, Indians, Chinese, Turks and Tibetans all left their mark here over the centuries, leaving their pottery, figurines of humans and animals, and household objects behind them.
However, it was Buddhism that left the greatest imprint on the art of the area. As it spread upwards from India to China during the early part of the first millennium, Buddhism exerted a powerful influence on the cultures along the Silk Road, and this is evident in clay sculptures of Buddhas and the cave paintings taken from Bezeklik Monastery at Turpan in Xinjiang, with their generous gold ornamentation and the fascinating presence of images of Persians, Indians and Europeans.
Also on display are items from another great Buddhist cave monastery — the vast complex of the “Caves of the Thousand Buddhas” at Mogao near Dunhuang in China’s Gansu province, a repository of some of the world’s finest Buddhist art, spanning a 1,000-year period. On show are brightly-colored wall paintings, banners, fabrics, and various sculptures of Bodhisattva and monks 
Two halls are devoted to artifacts relating to the Mahayana form of Buddhism practiced in Tibet and Mongolia. Silver Buddhist sculptures from Buryatia sit alongside women’s jewelry and belt fittings, as well as examples of thangka  —  paintings on silk or embroidery depicting Buddhist deities. Here it is possible to follow the expansion of Buddhism from Mongolia into Buryatia and Kalmykia by observing the varying iconography of the thangka from place to place, allowing the development of regional iconographic characteristics to be traced.
As Buddhism reached Tibet and Mongolia, its iconography began to include images of the Buddha not just in sculpture and temples but also in stucco, wall paintings, silk tapestries and vases. 
This movement away from purely temple-based iconography also shows the Buddha moving away from the more traditional Greco-Roman representation into one far more characteristically Eastern, while retaining the man-god imagery introduced by merchants from the West. It is these images of a far more oriental Buddha that have endured to become the images most often associated with Buddhism today.  
In fact, besides trade, religion was also a significant driver of population movements in the region, and the exhibition demonstrates a clear causality between the expansion of Buddhism and the evolution of Central Asia’s heritage and visual art as a result of the cultural influence of the various peoples with whom Buddhism came into contact. 
This glimpse into the kaleidoscopic cultural legacy of what is today one of the world’s least economically developed areas is a fascinating reminder that globalization has been with us for centuries in one form or another — but also that prosperity is by nature ephemeral.

TITLE: The thrill of exactitude
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Works by the groundbreaking American choreographer William Forsythe will take center stage at the forthcoming 13th Mariinsky International Ballet Festival, which kicks off Feb. 28.
March 3 will see the revivals of William Forsythe’s ballets “The Vertiginous Thrill of Exactitude” and “In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated.” Almost a decade after these ballets originally premiered at the Mariinsky Theater, a completely new generation of Mariinsky dancers is learning Forsythe’s distinctive choreographic language. Forsythe is coming to St. Petersburg in person for a few days to supervise the final rehearsals of the ballets and attend the premiere of the revivals. 
The choreographer is also bringing his Frankfurt-based troupe, The Forsythe Company, which he created in 2005, to the city to present his ballet “N.N.N.N.” Created for four male dancers, the minimalist piece celebrates masculinity and intensity.
“The imagery borrows from sports, martial arts, artificial respiration, and just plain goofing around,” wrote ballet critic Tobi Tobias in her review of the production for Artsjournal.com. “Fighting and bonding, Forsythe seems to be saying, that’s what men do, and the clue to their nature is that they do it simultaneously.”
The Forsythe troupe is Company-in-Residence at both the Hellerau European Center for the Arts in Dresden and the Bockenheimer Depot in Frankfurt am Main.
On March 9 the company is staging a creative workshop by young choreographers, at which aspiring Russian ballet masters will showcase their works. After the performance the Mariinsky will hold a discussion of the pieces, and if these choreographic experiments win enough critical support, they may enter the theater’s repertoire. The workshop starts at 15:00.
The festival also features gala performances by Mariinsky soloists Yekaterina Kondaurova (March 5) and Vladimir Shklyarov (March 8).
Kondaurova thrives on eccentricity, her most successful parts being tormented heroines of the likes of Anna Karenina in Alexei Ratmansky’s ballet, for which she was awarded the coveted Golden Mask prize, Russia’s most prestigious theatrical award; the vindictive princess Gamsatti in “La Bayad&#232;re”; and Alma Schindler in “Glass Heart,” the story of a love triangle between Schindler, her husband — the composer Gustav Mahler — and her teacher, composer Alexander Zemlinsky, to whose score the ballet was created.
For her gala, Kondaurova has chosen the George Balanchine ballet “Jewels,” where she will appear in all three parts: “Emeralds,” “Rubies” and “Diamonds.”
“When there is an opportunity to hold a ballet evening of your own, naturally, you aim to treat your audience to something special — a completely new work or a new role that will show your art from a different angle and give a different perspective on what you do on stage,” Kondaurova said. “I would be thrilled to do a whole evening of “Jewels” as this experience offers me a huge challenge. This will be a test of both my stamina and perseverance and my artistic skills alike. Stylistically, the three ballets are very different, and it will be tough having to switch from one to another.”
Kondaurova is also rehearsing the Forsythe works. “I am overwhelmed by this experience, and I am very much looking forward to seeing Forsythe at the festival,” she said. “He is an energizer of a person, and his ballets demand so much from you both physically and emotionally.”
Vladimir Shklyarov’s gala performance will mark the tenth anniversary of the start of the dancer’s professional career. Shklyarov will be dancing the “Rubies” segment from Balanchine’s “Jewels” with Olesya Novikova, “Le Jeune Homme et la Mort” with Yekaterina Kondaurova and “The Shades,” which is the final act of “La Bayad&#232;re,” with Doroth&#233;e Gilbert, a soloist with the Paris Opera Ballet. For Vladimir Shklyarov’s gala, the foyer of the third-level balcony will host an exhibition of photographs by Alexander Gulyayev, showing the dancer in various roles from his repertoire. 
Shklyarov will also dance with the Mariinsky’s star soloist Diana Vishneva at the festival’s opening on Feb. 28, which will see a performance of Sergei Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet,” choreographed by Leonid Lavrovsky. The pair will take to the stage again in the same ballet on March 1, when the performance will be broadcast by the French TV station Mezzo. 
Traditionally, festival performances feature the Mariinsky’s top talent as well as an impressive array of guest stars. 
Guest performers at this year’s festival include Svetlana Zakharova and Ruslan Skvortsov of the Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater in “Giselle”; Vadim Muntagirov, Lead Principal at the English National Ballet, in “La Bayad&#232;re”; Olga Yesina of the Wiener Staatsballett in “Swan Lake”; and Chase Finlay from the New York City Ballet in “Apollo.”
Mariinsky prima ballerina Ulyana Lopatkina will be appearing as Titania in Balanchine’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” on March 6. Joining Lopatkina will be her fellow Mariinsky dancers Maria Shirinkina, Timur Askerov, Andrei Yermakov and Filipp Styopin. 
At this year’s festival, the theater is celebrating the 75th anniversary of the birth of the legendary &#233;migr&#233; dancer Rudolf Nureyev with a performance of “La Bayad&#232;re” featuring Oksana Skorik, Yekaterina Osmolkina and Vadim Muntagirov. 
The show will coincide with two exciting exhibitions. The foyer of the theater’s Dress Circle will host the exhibition “Nureyev — Dance,” organized jointly with the Viktor Chernomyrdin Foundation and, from Feb. 28 to March 7, the foyer on the third-level balcony will play host to a photography display by Valentin Baranovsky.
Another exhibition of photography at the theater, titled “Nureyev — the Last Visit,” documents Nureyev’s well-publicized return to the then-Kirov Theater in the role of James in “La Sylphide” in 1989. 
The festival ends March 10 with a gala performance featuring all of the starring dancers from the run of the festival. 

<i>For more information, visit the Mariinsky Theater website at www.mariinsky.ru</i>

TITLE: THE DISH: 1780
AUTHOR: Allison Geller
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: <b>Less than meets the eye</b>
It’s a strange phenomenon witnessed at many St. Petersburg restaurants that the wait staff seems surprised and even miffed when customers come in looking for a meal. Perhaps these establishments cater more to those on a liquid diet. While the food at 1780 on a recent Sunday afternoon was no better or worse than the usual Russian and European fare found throughout the city, the restaurant seemed oddly unprepared for lunch guests.
Sampling from both the Russian and European sides of the menu, the red caviar (350 rubles, $11.50), served with blini, was nothing to complain about. The Caesar salad with shrimp ($450 rubles, $14.80) was a surprise hit, beautifully plated with a skewer of grilled shrimp and an artful swirl of pesto and balsamic vinegar. The shrimps were fresh and well seasoned, and the salad, while heavily dressed, hit home with large shreds of Parmesan and pleasant notes of garlic and anchovy. 
The harried waiter, who would return to our table throughout the course of the meal to inform us that, regrettably, something we had chosen was unavailable, offered his deepest condolences when we ordered a bottle of still water. Duly informed that sparkling water was the only kind to be found behind the bar, we settled instead on cappuccinos (150 rubles, $5).
The beef stroganoff (470 rubles, $15.50) — offered in place of the missing house cutlet — was filling but bland; a hearty, creamy dish of beef, onions, mushrooms, and slivers of pickle and parsley, served with mashed potatoes.  The mushrooms in the pasta with white mushrooms (350 rubles, $11.50) were woody and flavorful, but the dish was, on the whole, unremarkable. 
Dessert, sadly, is entirely worth skipping. After ordering strudel because it was the only thing on the menu that was available, we were then told that, in fact, panna cotta (200 rubles, $6.60) was the only dessert they could offer us. While appealingly presented with swirls of raspberry sauce decorating the plate — the chef seems to have a flair for presentation — the dessert was altogether bizarre, with an unpleasantly chewy texture and only the barest hint of vanilla flavor.
The restaurant claims to offer a kids’ menu of soups and hot and cold snacks on both the Russian and European pages of the menu.
Despite the absurdist moments, the restaurant is not without its charms. With its location down a few stairs from street level, the atmosphere is distinctly Russian and kitschy, but with the spirit of authenticity. A Russian tea set, complete with samovar, is out for display on a round table in the center of the room. Black and white prints, art deco paintings and statuettes of peasant girls decorate the walls and booths. It feels like the sort of place where a sulky Raskolnikov would have prowled, glowering at the other customers (had there been any). 
The name of the restaurant is taken from the year the original building was constructed by the chief architect of the “Commission of Stone Structures in St. Petersburg and Moscow,” Ivan Yegorovich Starov, and served as his own family home. There, Starov is said to have entertained such illustrious company as the artists F.D. Danilov and F.I. Shubin in the early 19th century. In 1879, it was renovated to resemble something close to its present-day appearance.
The restaurant offers live music in the “St. Petersburg style” from 8 p.m. onwards every night except Sundays and Mondays. That, at least, they seem prepared for — the main dining room focuses on a stage drawn with a red curtain. The restaurant even recommends calling ahead to reserve seats, as some nights the place is apparently very popular. 
After you’ve claimed your seat you can sip on wine ranging from 1,300 to 3,700 rubles a bottle ($42.90-$122) — but the jury’s still out on whether or not they have any of the 18,900-ruble Cristal in stock. Cocktails, beer and the usual spirits are also on offer. 
For a bit of local color, a splash of history and an apologetic wait staff, 1780 may be worth checking out for a relaxed concert and a bite to eat — provided you’re willing to make some concessions.

TITLE: In Search of an Ideal Education
AUTHOR: By Natalya Smolentseva
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: February and March have become extremely busy months for the growing number of Russian students seeking to continue their university education abroad, with most deadlines for testing and applications falling in late winter. 
Many students see a foreign education as a good way to gain an advantage in their chosen profession, develop international experience, or even as a first step in the emigration process. But no matter what their motivation, hopeful students applying to foreign universities all usually face the same issues, starting with where to go.

<b>SPOILED FOR CHOICE</b>
The most determined students go abroad with a clear understanding of what sort of education they want — they know which area they are interested in pursuing and where the top professionals in their chosen field are to be found. 
Those who may not have a clear idea in mind are helped in their decision making by the annual international rankings of universities, the most well-known among them being the QS World University Rankings published by Quacquarelli Symonds. QS holds a number of touring education fairs in cities around the world. The QS World Grad School Tour stops in St. Petersburg twice a year, with the next event scheduled to take place Feb. 28 at the Grand Hotel Europe. Such events can be extremely useful no matter whether you are simply considering an education abroad at some point in the future, or are currently gathering documents for a specific degree program.
Marina Tkacheva, a student in the History Department at St. Petersburg State University, who is now weighing her options said: “Tuition fees, the availability of a master’s course in English and a university’s or school’s rating are the most important criteria for me.”
“By using some of the official rankings that are out there (the Times Higher Education ranking or the Academic Ranking of World Universities) you can understand more or less if the university is strong, average or weak” said Alexandra Olenina, a representative of GradStudyAbroad, an organization that helps Russian students to secure financial aid. “But that is just a tenth of what you need to consider when choosing a university.”

<b>FINANCIAL AID</b>
Perhaps one of the most important issues facing those planning to study abroad is the cost of education, especially when financial resources are limited. Countries like Finland, France, the Czech Republic and some parts of Germany provide free education to both local and foreign students. The downside of many of these programs is that knowledge of a language other than English can often be a requirement. 
One option available is to find a scholarship or grant for a program at a university where tuition fees are charged. All universities offer some sort of financial assistance and most make information about such programs available on their websites. Governments also offer programs to help students finance their studies. The websites of the Russian Education and Culture Committee or other foundations like the British Council, the American Council, Germany’s DAAD, the Swedish Institute and Campus France all serve as good resources for those seeking financial support. The advantage of such programs is that the financial aid they provide can be used at any university. Competition, however, is often fierce. 
 “The higher the level of education you have, the easier it becomes to get a scholarship,” said Vladislav Popov, another representative from GradStudyAbroad. “To be able to receive funding for a bachelor’s degree you have to be a real genius, but if you have a master’s and are applying for a PhD program you have a better chance that your education will be funded, in whole or in part.”
The Russian government has been making changes recently to the way that it supports education abroad. From 2013 to 2015 the federal government’s Agency of Strategic Initiatives will fund 3,000 students to study at 300 of the world’s top universities. The government will cover the cost of education as well as living and transportation expenses, on the condition that students return to Russia and work in governmental and municipal management for three years.  
Internationally, however, it is becoming more and more difficult to receive scholarships with each passing year. Both austerity measures as a result of the ongoing economic crisis and increased competition for the limited funds available from European sources adversely affect the chances of Russians trying to secure financial aid. 
“If you wanted to study abroad in the 90s, all you had to do was be smart and have an average knowledge of the English language, whereas nowadays you really need to be something special,” said Popov. 

<b>ENGLISH PROFICENCY</b>
Because most foreign university programs require that prospective students demonstrate their knowledge of English before being admitted to a course of study, standardized tests have become a customary part of any student’s application procedure. Because of the variety of exams available, students often wonder which exam to choose. 
Kathleen Bull, director of the St Petersburg office of Carfax Private Tutors, explained that “a key difference between the TOEFL and IELTS exams is that candidates are expected to have a 30-minute one-on-one interview in IELTS, whereas in the TOEFL exam candidates interact with an automated computer program. IELTS also combines a greater variety of activities, whereas TOEFL is a much more standardized format with both reading and listening elements of the exam being purely multiple choice.” 
Olenina and Popov both advise choosing whichever exam seems more straightforward, as both are widely accepted. The Cambridge FCE, CAE or CPE exams, which have the advantage of their qualifications never lapsing, are generally accepted only in the UK, Australia, and some mid-level European universities. A relative newcomer in the testing field is the Pearson Test of English. Like TOEFL, the PTE is taken entirely on a computer and is also accepted by many educational institutions in the UK, Australian and America. The main advantage of the test is that there is a relatively short wait for results (1-5 days), which is often a boon to students who have left things until the last minute.
While many language schools offer courses to help students to prepare for the exams, self-study is also an option. For those who already have good English skills, the goal then becomes simply to become familiar with the structure of the exam. 
“If you are going to take an exam in 2013 you should buy a current book, as they constantly change,” said Olenina. 
Preparing for the stress that comes with sitting one of the exams is another problem, and one that a professional teacher, preferably a native-speaker, will be more able to address than a book.

<b>TIMING IS EVERYTHING</b>
Gathering all the documents necessary to apply for a university education abroad can take anywhere from six months to over a year and a half, and is serious work. 
“Deadlines at some European universities for foreign students are in November or December, and you have to send a copy of your diploma,” said Yana, a journalism student in her last year at university who wants to continue her education abroad and asked that her last name not be used. “The problem is, many students in their last year at school haven’t yet received them. In order to apply you have to wait a year after finishing your bachelor’s degree.” 
 “Some universities can send you a conditional offer if you don’t yet have your diploma,” said Olenina, addressing this problem. “That means that if you send the university your diploma by August, having received it in July, you will be accepted. If not, the university will offer your place to someone on their waiting list.” 

<b>MOTIVATION AND RECOMMENDATIONS</b>
One of the most important documents, and the one that helps applicants stand out from other students with good grades and great language skills, is a motivation letter. Answering the question of why a university should choose one student over another needs to be answered convincingly in the motivation letter. An interesting personal story that shows passion for a research subject and the specific reasons why you are a perfect fit for the university are two essential points that should be addressed in any motivation letter. 
“It is quite important to say in your motivation letter that you plan to return to Russia, but in fact I would like to find job and live in the country where I will be studying,” said Yana. 
“It is better to have a clear plan of exactly what you are going to do and with which professor. It is a great advantage if your interests match that professor’s current activity, rather than his or her area of interest from ten years ago,” said Popov.
When choosing whom to approach for letters of recommendation, it is important to take into account how well they know you and whether or not they can describe your achievements using specific examples, as well as if their work has been published in international academic journals. 
Academic mobility programs such as Erasmus and “free movers” exchange programs offer opportunities to study abroad throughout an education. But no matter which route you choose to go, such study opportunities have a beneficial effect on both the country hosting exchange students, as well as those studying abroad. To get started, all that is required is motivation and self-confidence; everything else can be accomplished as long as the will is there.

TITLE: Learning Russian by Solving a Mystery
AUTHOR: By Peter Beck
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Though he doesn’t aspire to rub shoulders with the likes of Boris Akunin or P.D. James, Ignaty Dyakov nevertheless had good reasons to make a foray into the world of mystery writing.
Dyakov is a London-based Russian linguist and entrepreneur whose business specializes in providing support services for companies entering the Russian market. He is also the author of a new book that intends to help learners crack the code of the Russian language by engaging them in a detective story.
The author said he believes that “The Story Sensation: For Learners of the Russian Language (and not only for Guadeloupians!)” is the kind of aid that Russian language learners have been searching for.
A major complaint among students that Dyakov heard while teaching was that the texts they were learning from seemed uninspiring and had little relevance to contemporary life. He decided to address this problem by writing a book in a genre with an enduring appeal and by placing the action in a modern setting.
“Students aren’t ready for Pushkin or Dostoevsky, but they do want something interesting to read,” he said. “Detective stories are a familiar convention in any language, and they can be picked up whenever the student has time in his day.”
Dyakov’s book is meant to be a supplemental aid rather than a replacement for core texts, and despite the unconventional approach, he said he feels that there is as much information as entertainment in what he has written.
Unorthodox and adventurous takes on any subject, even Russian language learning, don’t always go down well with everyone in Russia. Dyakov is only too well aware of this, following the minor tempest that surrounded the popular textbook “Let’s Go! (Poehkali!)” by St. Petersburg-based Stanislav Chernyshov last year.
The book series sold more than 100,000 copies around the world, but a Duma deputy from United Russia, Frants Klintsevich, proclaimed that passages in the book tarnished Russia’s reputation in the way they discussed money, drugs and corruption.
Some of the passages feature a corrupt policeman and a drug-taking university professor.
Dyakov thinks that the Duma critic “completely misunderstood the purpose” of the exercises that he found offensive in the book.
He sees his own book as a companion reader to such textbooks, and though his characters encounter corruption as well, he feels he has little to fear by way of censure, especially since his story is set outside of Russia, in Guadeloupe. The choice of locale was made more to accommodate the necessary grammar explanations rather than as any attempt to avoid controversy, he said.
Within the framework of his mystery, Dyakov tried to include as many current expressions as the story would bear. These relate to a diverse set of topics ranging from food and sports to transportation and business life. There is also a smattering of proverbs and references to well-known Russian songs and films to help the reader get up to speed with general conversation.
Speaking to The St. Petersburg Times, Chernyshov said, “I haven’t read the book yet, but I’m going to buy it for my school. There is still a serious lack of good up-to-date materials to help students study Russian. I wrote “Poekhali!” because I wanted to have a textbook that would be fun to read. Besides, people always like reading detective stories — generations of Russians learned English by reading Agatha Christie’s novels.”
“The very title sounds appealing and self-ironic. Moreover, for me it’s a good sign the author picked an international word that sounds the same in all European languages. I like the idea of pointing out that Russian is just another European language, and not something completely exotic.”
For those wanting to establish and maintain business contacts in Russia, it is important to be able to display some knowledge of the local culture as well as the language, Dyakov said.
“When foreign partners do that, it shows they’re serious,” he said.
Language learners with a business goal in mind are a particular group he expects to benefit from his efforts. It is a group that is slowly starting to grow again, he said, as companies emerge from the downturn and look again to the Russian market as a place to expand.
Undoubtedly, overcoming the language barrier remains a key point in living, working and doing business in Russia, and Dyakov said he hopes that solving a fictional crime will help his readers solve some of their own problems with Russian.

<i>“Rasskaz Sensatsiya” (The Story Sensation) is available through Amazon in Europe and the U.S., and Dyakov aims to find a publisher for it in Russia in the near future.</i>
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<b>THE ST. PETERSBURG TIMES BOOKLIST</b>
There are a variety of books that can be helpful according to the level, interests and requirements of people wishing to improve their Russian, including books not even intended for that purpose. I know, for example, a girl who went from beginner to very competent in English in about a month by sitting down with a borrowed copy of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby” and a dictionary. It worked for her — and, no, she didn’t develop an excessive tendency to throw wild parties in the process — but it would still be hard to recommend that anyone begin their study of Russian with page one of “Anna Karenina.” Here’s a short list of books that might be more suitable.

<b>“Russian Stories”</b> edited by Gleb Struve. This is the most widely available dual-language book. It contains stories by classic Russian authors from Alexander Pushkin to Anton Chekhov and is printed with the Russian and English pages facing each other. It’s also annotated and includes a vocabulary list at the conclusion.

<b>“Stories From Today’s Russia”</b> by Ludmilla Derevyanchenko, Ludmilla Tschakh and Svetlana Kokoryshkina. This is advertised as a collection of original contemporary stories intended for the intermediate student.

Individual phrase books abound, and though these are usually aimed more at tourists than serious language students, they can still be useful as a study aid.

The most important thing with these is how up-to-date they are, so checking the publication date is always wise. I have a phrase book that, as just one example, helpfully translates the question “What is your average per-hectare yield?” I think the focus of Russian has changed a bit since that book was published.

<b>“Russian Word’s Worth”</b> by Michele A. Berdy. This collection of columns by The St. Petersburg Times columnist is an endlessly delightful commentary on contemporary Russian usage. Some regular newspaper readers may already be familiar with some of the pieces included, but for them and for those new to her writing, this wide-ranging book is packed with detailed examples and helpful explanations of phrases and usages from all aspects of Russian life and culture.

TITLE: Behind the Scenes at Pulkovo Airport
AUTHOR: By Irina Titova
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: With St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo International Airport celebrating its 90th birthday this year, and talks underway about declaring the original terminal building a historic landmark, preparations for the opening of a new terminal at the end of this year continue apace. The airport is also continuing to develop and improve its lesser-known services, which include aviation ornithology and behavioral profiling. The St. Petersburg Times recently visited Pulkovo to find out more about these services and gain a better understanding of the inner workings of the airport.

<b>FOR THE BIRDS</b>
In addition to the expected airport security measures that Pulkovo follows, it also practices aviation ornithology. The work of its ornithology service involves the management and elimination of various factors that contribute to the gathering of birds at the airport, a phenomenon that presents a real danger for aircraft landing and taking off.
Pulkovo’s ornithology station, probably the airport’s most unusual service, is located in a separate building on the periphery of the airport. The first thing one sees on approaching the building is a number of falcons sitting in a row on a log, enjoying the fresh air.
The falcons are genuine airport “employees,” trained to frighten off the numerous other birds that approach the runway and risk colliding with aircraft.
“Other birds are afraid of falcons,” said Valery Nezdaiminov, an ornithology safety engineer.
“What’s interesting is that birds are not afraid of the noise the plane engines make but are terrified when they see a falcon. By the way, the higher a falcon is, the more scared other birds get,” Nezdaiminov said.
Nezdaiminov and his colleagues regularly train falcons for their job, and after each flight the falcons return to their trainers.
Sergei Lobanov, one of the engineers with the aviation ornithology group, said that while for many airports birds do not pose a threat, St. Petersburg is one of those airports at which they represent a serious hazard.
“The problem is that this area of St. Petersburg was historically a place where migrating birds landed to rest. Therefore they are still attracted here, especially during spring and fall migration. That is why our service is essential for the airport,” Lobanov said.
“The service was founded in the 1980s when a new generation of jet planes appeared on the market. They flew faster and birds had difficulties flying away from them as quickly,” he said.
Meanwhile, falcons are not the only means employed to scare away random birds. The aviation ornithologists also use special flares. 
“What’s interesting is that different birds have different reactions to such measures. For instance, crows perceive the danger quickly and fly away, while seagulls are a bit duller. In fact, we use the falcons when birds do not react to our use of mechanical devices,” Lobanov said.
Nezdaiminov said the ornithology service has five working falcons and two involved in breeding.
“It’s always better to have [our] own nestlings to rear and train from a very early age,” Nezdaiminov said.
Meanwhile, to strengthen Pulkovo’s ornithological security even more, the airport is also pursuing a policy of cutting trees and draining swampy areas, as well as erecting fences with flags that also scare the birds away. It has also equipped and modernized the airport’s runways with video cameras and a modern bioacoustics system, which monitors the area and is capable of emitting sounds targeted at scaring off birds in any given sector. 

<b>PROFILING</b>
In response to the increasing frequency of terrorist attacks both in Russia and the rest of the world, in 2008 Pulkovo’s security inspection service introduced a special unit of behavioral profilers — employees involved in “the identification of potentially dangerous persons.”
The first such service was introduced by Israeli air company El Al Airlines, said Natalya Borovikova, a psychologist working at the airport, who created the profiling strategy at the Pulkovo Security Inspection Service. “The Israeli experience proved to be effective and we decided to implement it,” Borovikova said.
The method of profiling is based both on technical means of identification and knowledge of human psychology.
“The identification of a person’s security status begins as soon as he or she enters the airport terminal. When people pass through baggage inspection they are already under close scrutiny by the security staff, who observe people’s behavior, appearance, luggage and other characteristics,” Borovikova said.
Making jokes about being in possession of a bomb or other means of carrying out a terrorist act is completely inappropriate while passing through security checks, Borovikova said.
“People must understand that any jokes of this kind put them at serious risk of being barred from boarding their flight because security personnel are obliged to respond to such statements with all seriousness,” she said.
Borovikova said when a young man accompanying his mother, who was in a wheelchair, joked that his belt bag was a suicide bomber’s belt, he was prohibited from flying and caused serious inconvenience for his handicapped mother.
If any passengers seem suspicious or anxious, security inspection personnel will engage them in an effort to deduce their intentions and mood. These interviews conclude with one of four results. If suspicions arise, the agent may request a member of the airport’s police unit to investigate the person further. More serious suspicions will lead profilers to recommend that the airline refuse to let the passenger fly. 
According to Borovikova, the profilers are highly trained security agents. They have to undergo psychological testing to see how fit they are for the job, as well as special training to develop their skills.
“People doing profiling have to be able to observe, to communicate, to sustain concentration, to analyze, and to make decisions,” said Borovikova, who also pointed out that intuition is essential.
“Profilers may also approach a person with no baggage buying a ticket. Sometimes there may be nothing obviously suspicious about a person, but something in the passenger’s behavior may attract the profilers’ attention. In fact, any passenger can be questioned by a profiler, even if the passenger is not acting suspiciously.”
Fortunately no terrorists have been discovered at the Pulkovo terminals, but the security services annually ban about 70 people from flights on the recommendation of profilers. 
Modern technologies also assist security services in the identification of potential dangers. Four years ago Pulkovo introduced a new system of biometric video monitoring. This system is capable of detecting suspicious behavior by passengers at the airport by analyzing a person’s biomechanical movements in order to calculate their physiological and emotional state. Using standard digital web or television cameras and image processing, the system registers and analyzes a person’s movements. The micro movements made by the human head in particular are linked to something called the vestibulo-emotional reflex, which indicates a person’s emotional state.
In just one minute, the system produces a profile that gauges the person’s emotional state according to 10 different markers, and assigns a color code to the person being screened.
People who are assigned red or violet markings by the system are then subjected to closer scrutiny by security personnel. The color red indicates signs of aggression, while violet indicates the possible presence in the body of psychotropic substances or other drugs. 
 
<b>EMERGENCY SERVICES</b>
The airport’s emergency service has a staff of 158, with 138 of them qualified to take part in emergency situations. On each shift there are at least 31 people on duty, said Vladimir Mamayev, deputy head of Pulkovo’s emergency situations department.
“We also have a certain amount of emergency equipment and machines meant to work with different kinds of airplanes,” Mamayev said.
According to Mamayev, emergency situations involving planes may arise at any time, whether during refueling, taxiing, taking off or landing. The emergency staff and its equipment must be prepared for all such situations, Mamayev said.
Fortunately, no serious emergencies have occured at Pulkovo during the past decade. The most recent such situation took place in 1996, when a Tu-134 plane clipped the runway with its wing while landing. An emergency observer who worked in one of the airport’s control towers saw the sparks and alerted the emergency services, Mamayev said.
“I must say the emergency crew were very fast. They managed to quickly cool the wing and began the evacuation of passengers via the inflatable escape chute,” he said.
According to emergency response guidelines, the first response vehicle should arrive at the site of the emergency within three minutes, while the rest of the emergency vehicles are to be there within the next minute.
The emergency staff keeps in good shape by working out every day.

<b>ALL TYPES OF ASSISTANCE</b> 
In 2011 Pulkovo introduced a new service meant to aid the disabled to use the airport. Currently the service has a staff of 12 people, whose task is to help passengers with serious health problems or with limited mobility, among others.
The staff is made up exclusively of young men who speak English and are able to handle both physical exertion and psychological stress — it is vital that as well as being empathetic, they are able to remain calm in any situation.
Passengers can request assistance on Pulkovo’s website, by phone or while booking their ticket.
Alexander Babayev, one of the service’s employees, said they assist from 10 to 15 people with physical difficulties a day.
Babayev confirmed that the service personnel needs to be resistant to stress and know English.
“For instance once we had a case when an elderly woman from Australia refused to leave the plane upon arrival in St. Petersburg, from where she was to embark on a cruise. The woman decided that she was still in Australia. So it took us quite a lot of patience to convince her she was in St. Petersburg and arrange her affairs,” Babayev said.
Meanwhile, Sergei Polyakov, a doctor with the medical service at Pulkovo, said their two major tasks were to provide medical assistance to passengers and employees, and to maintain emergency and first-aid equipment in case a dangerous situation were to arise.
“We always have to be on alert in case of emergency,” Polyakov said, showing an array of medical packages, each meant to provide aid to at least 10 people. 
“In fact, passengers may indeed need help in the airport. It may have to do with strokes, heart attacks, severe pain and other problems. Sometimes people feel bad on board the plane and we provide medical care upon their arrival,” Polyakov said.

<b>TESTING THE NEW TERMINAL</b>
Before the new Pulkovo terminal hosts its first passengers in late 2013, the terminal is to be operationally tested by trial passengers.
For that purpose, operating consortium Northern Capital Gateway has formed and created a special project called Operational Readiness and Airport Transfer.
ORAT, whose practices are in line with similar testing procedures all over the world, is to assess how comfortable potential passengers will feel in the new terminal, how fast they will be able to find their way to check-in, passport control or to the departure gates, Volker Wendefeuer, Chief Operations Officer of Northern Capital Gateway, said.
ORAT is also responsible for training the airport personnel for the new facilities. The new terminal is to be equipped with an automatic baggage system and four-sets of X-ray machines, and the number of check-in desks will increase from the current 40 to 88. The number of passport control desks will go up from 36 to 102, Volker said.
Panos Alevras, ORAT project manager in St. Petersburg, said that in order to adequately test the new terminal they will need to attract a couple of thousand people to perform the role of potential passengers. Those people will need to be of both genders, of different ages and from different backgrounds.
“We’ll need to involve in the operational trial people who speak only Russian, those who speak Russian and English, as well as those who speak neither English nor Russian, to see how those people will find their way through the new airport facilities,” Alevras said.
ORAT expects the testing to last for three months, probably at the end of summer.
“During that time we’ll test for whatever may go wrong, be it a partial or complete shutdown of electricity or any other problem,” Alevras said.
Alevras also said the help of an HR agency would probably be needed to find the trial passengers. The services of those trial passengers cannot be used more than twice during the trials, to eliminate the chance that they become acquainted with the new terminal and the rest of the facilities. Meanwhile, the transfer of the airport’s major services from the old terminals to the new building is to take place over the period of one night, and they are working to ensure that this event is well orchestrated, the ORAT experts said.

TITLE: Death Toll Rises to 19 in Egypt Balloon Crash
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: LUXOR, Egypt — A hot air balloon flying over Egypt’s ancient city of Luxor caught fire and crashed into a sugar cane field on Tuesday, killing at least 19 foreign tourists in one of the world’s deadliest ballooning accidents and handing a new blow to Egypt’s ailing tourism industry.
The casualties included French, British, Belgian, Hungarian, Japanese nationals and nine tourists from Hong Kong, Luxor Governor Ezzat Saad told reporters. Three survivors — two British tourists and the Egyptian pilots — were taken to a local hospital, but one of the Britons later died of injuries.
Egypt’s civil aviation minister, Wael el-Maadawi, suspended hot air balloon flights and flew to Luxor to lead the investigation into the crash.
The balloon, which was carrying 20 tourists and a pilot, was landing after a flight over the southern town, when a landing cable got caught around a helium tube and a fire erupted, according to an investigator with the state prosecutor’s office.
The balloon then shot up in the air, the investigator said. The fire set off an explosion of a gas canister and the balloon plunged some 300 meters (1,000 feet) to the ground, according to an Egyptian security official. It crashed in a sugar cane field outside al-Dhabaa village just west of Luxor, 510 kilometers (320 miles) south of Cairo, the official said.
The official and the investigator spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
Bodies of the dead tourists were scattered across the field around the remnants of the balloon. The security official said all 18 bodies have been recovered.
Hot air ballooning is a popular pastime for tourists in Luxor, usually at sunrise to give a dramatic view over the temples of Karnak and Luxor and the Valley of the Kings, a desert valley where many pharaohs, notably King Tutenkhamun, were buried.
Luxor has seen crashes in the past. In 2009, 16 tourists were injured when their balloon struck a cellphone transmission tower. A year earlier, seven tourists were injured in a similar crash.
Among the dead Tuesday was a Japanese couple in their 60s, among four Japanese who were killed, according to the head of Japan Travel Bureau’s Egypt branch, Atsushi Imaeda.
In Hong Kong, a travel agency said nine of the tourists that were aboard the balloon were natives of the semi-autonomous Chinese city. 
There was a “very big chance that all nine have perished,” said Raymond Ng, a spokesman for the agency. The nine, he said, included five women and four men from three families.
They were traveling with six other Hong Kong residents on a 10-day tour of Egypt.
Ng said an escort of the nine tourists watched the balloon from the ground catching fire around 7 a.m. and plunging to the ground two minutes later.
In Britain, tour operator Thomas Cook confirmed that two British tourists were killed in the crash, and a third later died in the hospital. 
Another British survivor and the Egyptian pilot, who state media said had severe burns, were being treated in the hospital.
“What happened in Luxor this morning is a terrible tragedy and the thoughts of everyone in Thomas Cook are with our guests, their family and friends,” said Peter Fankhauser, CEO of Thomas Cook UK & Continental Europe. He said the firm is providing “full support” to the victims’ families.
In Paris, a diplomatic official said French tourists were among those involved in the accident, but would give no details on how many, or whether French citizens were among those killed. 
The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to be publicly named according to government policy. French media reports said two French tourists were among the dead but the official wouldn’t confirm that.

TITLE: Syrian Missiles Kill At Least 141 In Aleppo
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BEIRUT — At least 141 people, half of them children, were killed when the Syrian military fired at least four missiles into the northern province of Aleppo last week, Human Rights Watch said Tuesday.
The international rights group said the strikes hit residential areas and called them an “escalation of unlawful attacks against Syria’s civilian population.” The statement from the New York-based group followed a visit to the area by a HRW researcher.
Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, has been the scene of some of the heaviest fighting of the civil war pitting President Bashar Assad’s regime against rebels bent on ousting him.
Rebels quickly seized several neighborhoods in an offensive on the city in July, but the government still controls some districts and the battle has developed into a bloody stalemate, with heavy street fighting that has ruined neighborhoods and forced thousands to flee.
A Human Rights Watch researcher, who visited Aleppo last week to inspect the targeted sites, said up to 20 buildings were destroyed in each area hit by a missile. 
There were no signs of any military targets in the residential districts, located in rebel-held parts of Aleppo and its northern countryside, said Ole Solvang, the HRW’s researcher.
“Just when you think things can’t get any worse, the Syrian government finds ways to escalate its killing tactics,” Solvang said.
Human Rights Watch said 71 children were among the 141 people killed in the four missile strikes on three opposition-controlled neighborhoods in eastern Aleppo. 
It listed the names of the targeted neighborhoods as Jabal Badro, Tariq al-Bab and Ard al-Hamra. The fourth strike documented by the group was in Tel Rifat, north of Aleppo.
“The extent of the damage from a single strike, the lack of [military] aircraft in the area at the time, and reports of ballistic missiles being launched from a military base near Damascus overwhelmingly suggest that government forces struck these areas with ballistic missiles,” the report said.
Syrian anti-regime activists first reported the attacks last week, saying they involved ground-to-ground missiles, and killed dozens of people. The reports could not be independently confirmed because Syrian authorities severely restrict access to media.
Human Rights Watch said it compiled a list of those killed in the missile strikes from cemetery burial records, interviews with relatives and neighbors, and information from the Aleppo Media Center and the Violations Documentation Center, a network of local activists.
The rebels control large swaths of land in northeastern Syria. In recent weeks, Assad’s regime has lost control of several sites with key infrastructure in that part of the country, including a hydroelectric dam, a major oil field and two army bases along the road linking Aleppo with the airport to its east.
A key focus for the rebels in the Aleppo area is to capture the city’s international airport, which the opposition fighters have been attacking for weeks.
Opposition forces have also been hitting the heart of Damascus with occasional mortars shells or bombings, posing a stiff challenge to the regime in its seat of power.
U.S. and NATO officials have previously said that Syria has a significant ballistic missile capability and is believed to have a few hundred missiles with a range of some 700 kilometers (440 miles) that could hit targets deep inside Turkey, said a NATO member and one of the harshest critics of the Assad regime.
NATO has in recent weeks deployed Patriot missile systems along Turkey’s border with Syria.
The missile attacks have outraged the leaders of the exiled opposition who have accused their Western backers of indifference to the suffering of the Syrian people.

TITLE: Afghan Drop In Taliban Attacks Reported Incorrectly by Officials
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: WASHINGTON — The U.S.-led military command in Afghanistan incorrectly reported a decline last year in Taliban attacks and is preparing to publish corrected numbers that could undercut its narrative of a Taliban in steep decline.
After finding what they called clerical errors, military officials in Kabul said Tuesday that a 7 percent drop in “enemy initiated attacks” for the period from January through December 2012 reported last month will be corrected to show no change in the number of attacks during that span.
The 7 percent figure had been included in a report posted on the coalition’s website until it was removed recently without explanation. After inquiries about the missing report, coalition officials said they were correcting the data and would re-publish the report.
“During a quality control check, ISAF recently became aware that some data was incorrectly entered into the database that is used for tracking security-related incidents across Afghanistan,” said Jamie Graybeal, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition known officially as the International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF.
Graybeal said a subsequent audit determined that portions of the data from unilateral Afghan military operations were “not properly reflected” in the trends ISAF had reported in its monthly updates on security and violence.
“After including this unilateral ANSF [Afghan National Security Force] data into our database, we have determined that there was no change in the total number of EIAs [enemy initiated attacks] from 2011 to 2012,” Graybeal said.
“This was a record-keeping error that we recognized and have now corrected,” he added.
The coalition defines enemy initiated attacks as attacks by small arms, mortars, rockets and improvised explosive devices, or IEDs. But it does not include IEDs that are found and cleared before they explode.
Trends in Taliban attacks are one yardstick used by ISAF to measure war progress. Others include the state of security in populated areas, the number of coalition and Afghan casualties, the degree to which civilians can move about freely, and the performance of Afghan security forces.
Graybeal said that even though the number of 2012 Taliban attacks was unchanged from 2011, “our assessment of the fundamentals of campaign progress has not changed. The enemy is increasingly separated from the population and the ANSF are currently in the lead for the vast majority of partnered operations.