SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #761 (27), Friday, April 12, 2002
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TITLE: Belarus Union Under Scrutiny
AUTHOR: By Yevgenia Borisova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - A new Audit Chamber report spells out hundreds of ways the Russia-Belarus Union has misused its budget money because of corruption and incompetence - including more than 100 million rubles (roughly $3,5 million at the time) that were misspent in an attempt to develop a diesel car.
 
Much of funding provided by Russia and Belarus for their union, the report shows, was spent by union bureaucrats as if it was their own pocket money: Unbudgeted cars and trucks were purchased; buildings were constructed in cities other than those named in the budget; and useless projects were funded and loans were given to unapproved projects, while no money was allocated for approved projects.
 The Audit Chamber announced in December that 181 million rubles (about $6.4 million) were misused by the bureaucrats of the Russia-Belarus Union and those running its programs in 2000 and the first half of 2001. A 25-page report showing how the union's money was spent was released this week.
 The union has been headed since January 2000 by Pavel Borodin, the former head of the Kremlin property department who was convicted in Switzerland last month of money-laundering. He was accused of accepting millions of dollars in kickbacks for awarding contracts to two Swiss firms for renovating the Kremlin and other government buildings.
 Union officials have denied that any budget money was embezzled. At a news conference earlier this month, Borodin's deputy, Sergei Kalashnikov, said some of the money was "not used rationally" and "measures are being taken to get the money back."
 Dmitry Vorontsov - a consultant with the information department of the Standing Committee, the union's executive body headed by Borodin - said a mechanism has been created to stop "such things in the future." All contracts are now being scrutinized by the Russian Finance Ministry and the Standing Committee, Vorontsov said.
 "Borodin is very meticulous now about his economic decisions," Vorontsov said. "He is now reaching agreement several times with the financiers and the lawyers on each of his decisions. He has created special orders for the circulation of all documentation within the committee. Everything is being scrutinized, and our financial and legal departments have been strengthened by highly qualified personnel."
 The union's measures to correct the problems uncovered by the Audit Chamber are to be discussed at Friday's meeting in Moscow of the union's Higher State Council. Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko, who heads the council, is to preside.
 Yury Korgunyuk, an analyst with the INDEM think tank, said he has trouble believing the Russia-Belarus Union can change its ways.
 "I would not believe it even if I was told that Russia's Finance Ministry is now to become ideally disciplined in the spending of the money, although it is the most orderly in Russia. This is because this union was created as a feeding trough for bureaucrats in the first place.
 "This money was just thrown at the wind. This post was given as a sinecure for Pal Palych Borodin and as an opportunity for Lukashenko to solve his problems at Russia's expense."
 Korgunyuk said Russia does not need the union, but Belarus has benefitted tremendously. The Audit Chamber's report shows that all of the construction projects paid for by the union were in Belarus, although two-thirds of the union's budget is funded by Russia.
 Belarus officials also used union money as they saw fit, the report said. For example, the Belarussian KGB spent 2.1 million rubles ($75,000) to build an apartment building in Minsk and also spent 1.8 million rubles ($63,000) on office equipment, although these expenses were not listed in the programs it was supposed to fulfill.
 Among the 40 projects under way during the audit period, the biggest single abuse listed in the report involved a project run by BelRusAvto to design a diesel car. BelRusAvto misspent 51.2 million rubles ($2 million) in 1999, received 300 million rubles ($10.7 million) more in loans in 2000 and misspent 67.7 million ($2.4 million) of them, the report said. The car is still under development.
 A manager in the Moscow office of BelRusAvto denied that the company misappropriated budget funds and accused the auditors of not doing their job properly. "We had no auditors in our office, none at all," said the manager, who asked not to be identified. "The whole audit was done in the offices of the Standing Committee, which did not have full documentation of our work."
 The union's expenditures for 2000 and 2001 were planned at 2.23 billion rubles ($79 milion) and 2.36 billion rubles ($81 million), respectively. But according to the Audit Chamber's report, which was completed last October, the real figures could not be determined.
 No system was in place at the time for keeping proper records, revising budget spending and preventing the misuse of cash, the report said. As recently as October, when the report was completed, such mechanisms still did not exist.
 The report said some budget money appeared to have been pocketed in a classic corruption scheme. For example, the report said the chamber found severe violations in a tender for a blood analyzer to be used to help victims of the Chernobyl nuclear accident.
 "An analyzer delivered [by the Medical and Science Instruments dealer] in February-March 2001 at a cost of $144,758 was given to a clinic in August-September 2001. The Audit Chamber of the Russian Federation has an offer from Bayer Diagnostics (the producer of the equipment) to sell it for $90,487," the report said. It did not get into the details of who might have pocketed the $54,000 difference.

TITLE: FSB Details Charges of U.S. Spying
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Isachenkov
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW - U.S. spies used drugged cookies and drinks to break the will of a Russian defense employee and recruit him as an agent, according to new details of the FSB allegations published Thursday. 
 The Federal Security Service (FSB) ridiculed the alleged U.S. espionage effort in a report in the daily Komsomolskaya Pravda, saying the CIA once delivered secret instructions to their agent in invisible ink that melted away when he used Russian tap water to develop them. 
 "The Americans will never defeat us because they will never figure out that our tap water differs from that in Langley," the city in Virginia where the CIA is based, the newspaper said, quoting FSB officials. 
 The FSB said Wednesday that CIA officers posing as embassy officials in Russia and another, unnamed former Soviet republic had tried to recruit an employee at a secret Defense Ministry installation. 
 CIA spokesperson Mark Mansfield and the U.S. Embassy in Moscow both declined to comment Wednesday on the allegations. 
 In the two-page report Thursday in Komsomolskaya Pravda, the FSB elaborated on details of the allegations. It identified the Russian expert as Viktor, 58, a worker at a Defense Ministry facility near Zhukovsky Air Base, the air force's top flight-test center near Moscow. 
 According to the newspaper, in April 2001 Viktor went to the U.S. Embassy in the former Soviet republic to seek information about a relative that had gone missing abroad. After leaving the embassy, he was found by local police sitting on a garden bench in shock and amnesia. 
 Viktor was brought to Moscow, where the FSB concluded that the U.S. Embassy officers had slipped him psychotropic drugs to get information out of him. 
 The newspaper said that David Robertson, the embassy official who met with Viktor, treated him with drinks and cookies while asking him "in-depth" questions about his work. 
 "Within minutes, Viktor felt weakness and a light trance," an apparent reaction to drugs, the newspaper reported. 
 Under FSB control, Viktor received instructions in invisible ink allegedly delivered by Yunju Kensinger, reportedly a third secretary in the consular department of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. On one occasion, the message began to melt away when Viktor tried to read it using special tablets and Russian tap water. FSB agents rushed to save it with bottled water, the newspaper said. 
 In the first message, disguised as a juice pack, the alleged U.S. contacts sent Viktor $10,000 in cash along with instructions to provide information about confidential documents received by his organization and data on Russia's latest air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles. 
 After the FSB concocted a response, Viktor delivered it to Robertson in the same city where they first met. The newspaper said Viktor later received more cash and instructions from his handlers, but the FSB decided to end the operation after getting enough "factual evidence" of U.S. espionage activities. 
 Komsomolskaya Pravda said Kensinger had already left Moscow - the claim made Wednesday by Interfax and Russian television. 
 The espionage accusation comes amid renewed U.S.-Russian tensions - over U.S. steel tariffs and a Russian ban on U.S. chicken - following a warm spell prompted by Russia's support of the U.S.-led anti-terror campaign.

TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Tallinn Salutes Piter
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - A delegation from St. Petersburg arrived in the Estonian capital on Thursday to participate in the St. Petersburg Days festival being held there, Interfax reported.
 The delegation - headed by Vice Governor Yury Antonov and made up of officials, businesspeople and cultural figures - will participate in the four-day festival, which ends on April 14.
 The festival will include exhibitions of works by several St. Petersburg artists and a seminar on economic cooperation between the two cities, the news agency reported. The St. Petersburg delegation will also report on preparations for the city's 300th anniversary celebrations in May 2003.
 
 
Museum Celebrates
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The State Russian Museum will hold special exhibitions in all of its branches in connection with the city's 300th anniversary in 2003, museum officials announced Thursday, according to Interfax.
 "We want this to be a celebration not just for St. Petersburg, but for the entire country," museum Director Vladimir Gusev told journalists in Moscow.
 The Stroganov Palace will host an exhibition of Russian porcelain and the Mikhailovsky Castle will develop a traveling exhibition entitled "From the Russian Museum to the Cities of Russia," as well as a special exhibition called "Russian Artists in France."
 "We will show [artists] beginning with the first wave of emigration and running through the 1950s," Gusev told the newspaper Novye Izvestiya, according to Interfax.
 "We will find sponsors," Gusev said. "Our program operates under the slogan 'From Russian business to the Russian Museum.' Plus we have a society of friends of the Russian Museum, which helps us a lot."
 
 
A Global Celebration
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Speaking at a press conference in Paris on Monday, Governor Vladimir Yakovlev noted that a number of foreign governments have outlined plans to participate in the celebration of St. Petersburg's 300th anniversary in May 2003, Interfax reported this week.
 Yakovlev stated that UNESCO had advised "all countries on all continents to include in their cultural programs events connected to the upcoming 300th anniversary," Interfax reported.
 UNESCO itself has pledged funding for a documentary film detailing the historical connections between St. Petersburg and Europe, the governor stated, according to Interfax.
 
 
Regions To Pitch In
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - A number of Russian regions are planning to finance projects connected with the celebration of St. Petersburg's 300th anniversary in May 2003, Interfax reported this week.
 The city of Kazan has pledged to restore the facades of 39 buildings along Kazanskaya Ulitsa and the surrounding streets, according to the news agency. The Republic of Karelia will hold a "St. Petersburg Days" festival, and a reciprocal program of events has been scheduled between the Leningrad Oblast and the city of Pskov, which is celebrating its 1,100th anniversary in 2003.
 In all, more than 60 regional and foreign governments are involved in the anniversary planning, Governor Vladimir Yakovlev said at a press conference in Paris on Monday. 



TITLE: High Court Rejects Raduyev's Appeals
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Isachenkov
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW - The Supreme Court on Thursday turned down appeals from a prominent Chechen rebel leader and three accomplices who had been convicted of terrorism. The convicts took part in the hearings via televised hookup from their Moscow jail because of security concerns. 
 
The Dagestani Supreme Court found Salman Raduyev, the first prominent Chechen rebel warlord to be prosecuted, guilty of terrorism and murder and sentenced him to life in a maximum-security prison in December. It handed out prison sentences ranging from five to 15 years to his three accomplices. 
 The charges against Raduyev, who was arrested in March 2000, focused on a January 1996 raid on the southern Russian town of Kizlyar in which 78 people were killed. He and other rebels took hundreds of hostages at a local hospital and used some of them as human shields. 
 Raduyev maintained he was taking orders from the late rebel President Dzhokhar Dudayev when he led the raid, which came at the end of the first Chechen war. In excerpts of the hearing shown on Russian television, Raduyev, wearing a baseball cap and large aviator sunglasses, gesticulated frenetically as he asked the court to commute the sentence. 
 "You just want to make me a scapegoat," Raduyev said from behind bars, flanked by prison guards. 
 The New York-based group Human Rights Watch accused the Russian authorities Wednesday of failing to properly investigate allegations of rape and sexual assault of Chechen women by troops during security sweeps this year. 
 It said five women had told Human Rights Watch about sexual violence, and three of them tried unsuccessfully to report assaults to local authorities. The officials refused to investigate. 
 Bek Baskhanov, the head of the Russian Justice Ministry's branch in Chechnya, insisted Thursday that the authorities were properly investigating all abuses against civilians. He refused to comment on the allegations of sexual violence, saying that all cases of alleged military crimes were being investigated by military prosecutors and taken up by closed military courts outside his authority. 
 Igor Botnikov, a spokesperson for the Kremlin information office on Chechnya, also refused to comment on the allegations, saying they were being studied. 
 
 
q
 Russia was back in the dock at the annual meeting of the United Nation Human Rights Commission in Geneva, Reuters reported. The EU had sought a deal with Moscow on how to refer to violence in Chechnya but later the bloc went ahead with a resolution attacking Russian policy.

TITLE: Seleznyov Clings to Post Despite Order
AUTHOR: By Nabi Abdullaev
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - The Communist Party refrained Thursday from punishing State Duma Speaker Gennady Seleznyov for disregarding his party's order to step down from his post, and experts said the Communists are not likely to press ahead with his ouster from the party.
 
The Communists "understand very well that harsh moves can end up catapulting them from big-league politics," Yury Korgunyuk of the Indem think tank said. 
 "The Communists have become very good at balancing: They almost never win, but they don't give up without a fight and retain their image in the eyes of their electorate."
 Top party officials on Wednesday voted 74 to 15 that Seleznyov should abandon his speaker's post in protest against the recent parliamentary power struggle that stripped the Communists of eight of their 10 Duma committee chairs. Seleznyov has said he will not step down.
 Seleznyov has been given until May to decide whether he would comply with the party line, a top Communist official said Thursday.
 "We understand the decision ... cannot be implemented instantaneously, so Seleznyov was given time to decide," Sergei Reshulsky, coordinator of the Communists' faction in the Duma, said. "Then, if necessary, the issue of Seleznyov's membership in the party will be considered at the next meeting of the party's central committee next month."
 Speaking to reporters Thursday, Seleznyov reiterated his opposition to Wednesday's decision, saying he has too many duties and obligations to serve only his party's interests.
 "Today, at this difficult time for the faction, it would be a great mistake to abandon the top post in the State Duma," he said.
 Some Communist hard-liners, like Moscow party boss Alexander Kuvayev, slammed Seleznyov's decision. But both Seleznyov and Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov played down talk of a rift, with Seleznyov stressing he did not intend to give up party membership.
 "Any meeting has the right to be mistaken. ... Some members of the central committee have already confessed to me that now they think they were too hasty [in ordering the resignation]."
 Most centrist and liberal lawmakers supported Seleznyov's decision, saying it would help maintain stability in the Duma. Interfax, citing unnamed sources, reported Wednesday that the Kremlin, too, was pleased with the move.
 Last week, after a coalition of centrist and liberal legislators ousted the Communists from eight of their 10 Duma committee chairs, party leader Gennady Zyuganov presented the more moderate Seleznyov with an ultimatum: abandon the speaker's post in protest or leave the party. 
 Seleznyov initially indicated that he planned to stay on as speaker and even announced that President Vladimir Putin did not object to the move. 
 Now, however, the pendulum has swung the other way, with experts saying Seleznyov has realized that his political career cannot be furthered without the support of his party.

TITLE: Britons Halted by Border Bureaucrats
AUTHOR: By Valeria Korchagina
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Two British explorers were forced to abandon an attempt to drive across the frozen Bering Strait from Alaska to Chukotka when they ran into paperwork problems at the Russian border, the expedition's spokesperson said this week.
 
Steve Brooks and co-pilot Graham Stratford set out from Alaska on the morning of April 4 in their amphibious vehicle Snowbird 6, and by April 5 they had reached Little Diomede Island, the halfway point of the 90-kilometer trip. Here they hoped to get final permission to continue to Chukotka, Alexandra Foley said by telephone from London.
 But it soon became clear that despite some six months spent obtaining permissions to cross the border, the crew was missing the necessary documents for the vehicle, a custom snow craft that does not fall into any traditional category, Foley said.
 "Something slipped through the net. They didn't have permission to bring the vehicle, Snowbird, across the border and onto the Russian coastline," she said. "It's not a boat and it's not an automobile. ... It seemed to confuse the bureaucracy on the Chukotka side." 
 Foley said the Russian authorities proved inflexible to the point that the explorers were threatened with arrest should they attempt to enter Russia.
 Even a meeting held by Brooks with officials at Chukotka Governor Roman Abramovich's office in November did not seem to help when it really mattered. "Which is quite curious given the fact that Roman Abramovich is important not only in Chukotka for obvious reasons as governor, but also in Russia in general," Foley said.
 The explorers' problems were compounded by the fact that events took place at the weekend, when there were no strings around to pull.
 "So I guess the moral is, 'Do not try to enter Russia on a weekend,'" Foley said. "But the expedition is still a success, because they did reach Russia in the sense of Russian territory, albeit not the coast."
 Officials at the Federal Border Service's department of border control were unaware of the weekend's events in Bering Strait on Tuesday. "We have not received any documents on this," an officer on duty said.
 Brooks and Stratford did not dare tempt the Russian authorities and instead returned from Little Diomede to Alaska by helicopter. Nevertheless, by crossing the International Date Line, which makes the border between Russia and the United States, the explorers drove further across the Strait than anyone else has done in a motorized vehicle. 
 Brooks and Stratford were arranging a return trip from Alaska to London on Tuesday, while Snowbird 6 is to be picked up from Little Diomede in the summer, Foley said.

TITLE: U.S. Embassy Says New Rules Won't Hurt Russian Tourists
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - The United States announced proposed new visa rules designed to keep out terrorists, but most Russians will not find it any more difficult to get a U.S. visa than they do now, officials said this week.
 
The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service said Monday that one proposal would allow immigration officials to determine how long a tourist can stay in the country. Instead of automatically admitting tourists for six months, they would admit them for "a period of time that is fair and reasonable for the completion of the purpose of the visit," the INS said. If the time period cannot be determined, the INS would grant a 30-day period of admission.
 Jacqueline McKennan, spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, said in a written reply to questions that the INS plans to allow immigration officials to make this determination after questioning visitors upon arrival would be unlikely to cause a big change.
 "Applicants are expected to answer those questions on their visa application," she said. "If they are being truthful, they should certainly not have a problem at the port of entry."
 The INS also proposed prohibiting foreigners from studying in the United States unless they have been approved for a student visa. McKennan said this would affect few Russians. 
 David Patton, regional director for the American Councils for International Education, agreed. "We do our selection almost a full academic year prior to departure and in some cases six months before departure," he said in a telephone interview.
 In the past several years, between 1,500 and 1,750 Russians have received student visas each year, McKennan said. The overall number of visa applications per day in Moscow is about 400. "After Sept. 11, the average dropped to 200, but is now climbing to normal levels," she added.
 All 19 hijackers who participated in the Sept. 11 attacks were in the United States legally, most on tourist visas.

TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: No Arms Breakthrough 
 

MADRID, Spain (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell took a break from Middle East diplomacy on Thursday to meet Russian counterpart Igor Ivanov, but no breakthrough emerged on finalizing a document to cut nuclear arsenals. 
 The United States and Russia are working on an agreement to reduce the world's two largest nuclear stockpiles by about a third in time for it to be signed by U.S. President George W. Bush and President Vladimir Putin at the summit from May 23 to 26. 
 Powell and Ivanov reported no progress on thorny issues such as how to count the number of warheads and what will be done with them once they are removed from their missiles. 
 But Powell said he was "pleased with the progress that the two sets of negotiators are making" and that they would meet again next week in Moscow and could move forward at a Washington meeting with Ivanov set for May 3. 
 
 
Cloning Bill Passed
 

MOSCOW (AP) - The State Duma on Wednesday gave preliminary approval to a bill that imposes a five-year ban on human cloning and says cloned human embryos cannot be brought into Russia.
 The Duma also narrowly approved a bill stripping military employees of some Soviet-era benefits but boosting their pay.
 The Duma voted 260 to 4 with one abstention to pass the government-proposed cloning bill in the second of three required readings. The document doesn't ban animal or therapeutic cloning, and says the ban on human cloning could be either extended or revoked after five years.
 The lawmakers turned down a proposed amendment to make the ban permanent.
 The military bill was passed on a final third reading by the Duma 233 to 150 with one abstention. It needed 226 votes to pass. The bill now goes to the Federation Council for approval and must be signed by President Vladimir Putin to become law.
 
 
Lesin Defends Press
 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Press Minister Mikhail Lesin conceded Tuesday that Russia's fledgling independent press and television had growing pains, but said they were often unfairly portrayed in the U.S. media.
 Lesin, who is in the United States to discuss the development of free media in Russia after decades of communist control, told reporters it was unfair to hold Russian media to U.S. standards.
 Noting that the U.S. press had been independent for more than a century, Lesin said: "I always say let us remember how this 100-year-old gentleman looked when he was 10 years old. Didn't he have any problems at that time?"
 
 
Underwater System
 

MOSCOW (AP) - The sinking of the Kursk nuclear submarine has prompted the navy to speed up development of a new underwater communications system that would allow submarine crews to contact the navy in case of emergency, Interfax reported Wednesday.
 The system, which has a self-sustaining power supply, will remain in standby mode and switch on automatically in case of emergency, Interfax quoted an unidentified navy admiral as saying.
 He said all newly built Russian submarines, as well as those undergoing planned repairs, will be fitted with the communications system.
 
 
Soldier Kills Four
 

MOSCOW (Reuters) - A border guard in Dagestan shot dead four comrades on Tuesday in what appeared to be a drunken shooting spree, Interfax reported.
 Private Albert Sibagatov gunned down four soldiers after grabbing a Kalashnikov rifle from a night guard, Interfax said. Quoting military sources, Interfax said Sibagatov was believed to be drunk and was eventually disarmed and arrested.
 In a separate incident, troops and police launched a manhunt for two soldiers armed with Kalashnikovs who deserted their North Ossetian anti-aircraft unit. It was not clear why they had deserted.
 
 
Officers Detained
 

MOSCOW (AP) - The head of an ammunition depot in the Far East and several other officers have been detained on allegations they sold off hundreds of kilograms of stolen explosives to criminal groups, a news report said Tuesday.
 The Pacific Fleet's Federal Security Service department seized 479 kilograms of stolen explosives and about 2,000 detonators in the operation to arrest the men last week, state-run RTR television reported. Officials with the security service said the men had established channels for trafficking the explosives to criminal groups. The report did not say how many people were detained or give other details. 



TITLE: Report: Finances Clearer But Still Not Perfect
AUTHOR: By Torrey Clark
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - They're not ready to bare all, but Russia's top companies are slowly revealing more financial information, Dmitry Vasiliyev, head of the Institute of Corporate Law and Governance, said Wednesday.
 
Of 34 companies accounting for about 90 percent of total market capitalization, all but nine boosted their scores on the institute's corporate-transparency rating for the fourth quarter of 2001. The institute is a minority shareholder in all the companies it rates.
 The main improvements were fuller disclosure, an increase in the number of independent directors on companies' boards and stronger boards of directors that actually wield some control over management, most notably at natural monopolies Unified Energy Systems and Gazprom, Vasiliyev said.
 Only three companies, however, provided full information with explanatory notes in their financial statements, as required by the Finance Ministry. Another 13 companies left out minor details, while the rest left large gaps and omissions. Lack of disclosure hurt Moscow power utility Mosenergo, which tied for ninth place after its score fell 3.93 percent to 57.96, and steel producer Severstal, which tied for 20th after its score fell 0.98 percent to 52.26.
 Disappointments included oil major Surgutneftegaz, which provided only two pages of accounting statements and a two-page audit opinion, Vasiliyev said. The company's score fell 3.93 percent to 44.6 and 30th place. What riled the institute the most was the whopping $9 per page that Invest-Zashchita, Surgutneftegaz's authorized representative for investor relations, charged for the documents.
 The institute shelled out about $300 for documents to prepare for the annual shareholders meeting, but opted not to buy the company charter for $3,000, Vasilyev said.
 The institute sent a letter of protest Tuesday to the Federal Securities Commission, complaining that Invest-Zashchita's policies violate clauses in joint-stock-company law. The institute also sent a letter to the Anti-Monopoly Ministry, saying that Invest-Zashchita is using its monopoly position on information to charge exorbitant prices. Neither Surgutneftegaz nor Invest-Zashchita could be reached for comment.
 Four additions were made to the latest rating.
 Metals major Norilsk Nickel returned to the list at a higher position after a yearlong absence, placing 23rd after improving its score to 51.47 of a possible 100. In January 2001 it scored 44.2 and ranked last in 25th place.
 Power company Sverdlovenergo debuted at 14th place, while telecoms company Voronezhsvyazinform joined at a less impressive 25th place.
 Car giant AvtoVAZ brought up the rear, ranking 34th with only 40.1 points.

TITLE: High-Speed Rail Link Faces Court Action
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Temkin and Alexei Nikolsky
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: The Prosecutor General's Office has launched a criminal case against a company that has drawn some $76.3 million in loans to build a high-speed rail link between Moscow and St. Petersburg and failed to pay back the money as the project flopped.
 
The High-Speed Rail Co., or VSM, was formed in 1992, but has only managed to dig a large pit in St. Petersburg that was intended as the location for a new railroad station and business center.
 "The project was initially thought up as an opportunity to get fat off budget money," said Mikhail Khazin, director for strategic development at the Modern Business Technologies consulting company. Prosecutors are now rushing to prove to VSM's Western creditors that it is serious about tackling theft, he added.
 VSM General Director Vladimir Tulayev declined to comment on the criminal case, while VSM President Alexei Bolshakov, a former deputy prime minister, could not be contacted.
 The federal government controls 87 percent of VSM, with the remainder of the shares split between the Moscow and St. Petersburg city administrations.
 The rail link was estimated to cost $5 billion, of which $330 million was to go toward the new train station. VSM placed government-backed bonds worth 1 billion rubles to finance the project.
 In 1997, VSM decided to build a business center on the site, drawing a credit line from the London divisions of Indosuez and SBC Warburg for more than $200 million over 13 years at 7.3 percent interest annually, with the federal government acting as guarantor. VSM, however, only managed to dig the pit.
 In July 1998, then President Boris Yeltsin terminated construction and froze payments under the VSM bonds and all operations connected with the foreign credit line - and the pit has been growing weeds ever since. VSM had spent $49 million of the foreign credit.
 The prosecutor's office said a investigation was requested by the Audit Chamber, the State Duma's budget watchdog. The case has been transferred to the St. Petersburg Prosecutor's Office.
 No one is suspected of criminal activity, but a letter from the Prosecutor General's Office to the Audit Chamber states that "the actions of VSM management have the elements of a crime under Article 176, Part 2 of the Criminal Code."
 The article specifies prison terms of up to five years for "the illegal receipt of a targeted state loan and its use to ends other than those intended."
 The Audit Chamber said the budget guarantees for the VSM loan were given illegally because they were not targeted - the construction of the commercial center was not included in any of the programs. According to the Audit Chamber, a total of $76.3 million has been poured into the pit.
 Direct losses from the project are estimated at $26.4 million, which the Finance Ministry last year paid foreign banks under the credit, the Audit Chamber said. Including interest, foreign creditors are owed a further $36.3 million, and budget payments on the government bonds must be added.
 As compensation, VSM shareholders have ruled that the company's main asset - the pit - will be passed to the Property Ministry.

TITLE: Cabinet Says Yes to Long-Term Tourist Plan
AUTHOR: By Alla Startseva
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - The cabinet has approved a three-year concept for tourism development aimed at boosting the number of foreign visitors, partly by easing the visa process and halting the loathsome practice of seizing undeclared foreign currency at customs upon leaving the country.
 
Tourism could attract billions of dollars in revenue while requiring less capital investment than other industries, Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov said Thursday.
 "It is time to look closely at how the government can encourage the development of tourism, what is to be done by regional authorities and what kind of signal we could send to private business," Prime-Tass quoted Kasyanov as saying. Unlike other countries, Russia has neglected this industry, he added. 
 Some 18 million Russians visited foreign countries and eight million foreigners visited Russia last year, according to government estimates, which Kasyanov said amounts to just 1 percent of the tourism industry worldwide. 
 Russia spent only $140,000 last year on promoting tourism, while other countries spend upward of $40 million, Interfax reported Kasyanov as saying.
 The Economic Development and Trade Ministry drew up the concept, with the Labor Ministry, Culture Ministry, Foreign Affairs Ministry and other state bodies contributing.
 "It's great that the government finally recognized tourism," said Helene Lloyd, marketing director of the Tourism, Marketing & Intelligence consulting company.
 The first hurdle to be jumped to develop the industry is the issue of visas, Lloyd said, adding that "complicated procedures and general lack of coordination" are the biggest problems.
 According to the concept, visas will be easier to obtain for residents of countries whose citizens are unlikely to stay illegally. Furthermore, the cost of entry visas will be reduced.
 "The state must earn not on the cost of visas, but on additional services given to tourists while in Russia," Interfax quoted Deputy Economic Development and Trade Minister Vladimir Strzhalkovsky as saying.
 Furthermore, the cabinet ordered the State Customs Committee to stop seizing undeclared hard currency at customs when visitors leave the country, with Strzhalkovsky calling this one of the worst problems for the Russia's tourism climate.
 The concept names Moscow and the Moscow region, St. Petersburg and northwest Russia, Kaliningrad and the Golden Ring as major tourism centers and priorities for development.
 Development could start in Moscow and St. Petersburg as soon as visa problems are solved and a public-relations campaign is implemented, said Lloyd of Tourism, Marketing & Intelligence. But the rest of the country must start from scratch by building tourism facilities.
 Russia is now the 13th most popular tourist destination in Europe, the Economic Development and Trade Ministry said. Experts have noted a gradual growth in tourism, saying that by 2020 Russia will be fifth in Europe after France, Spain, Britain and Italy. 
 Poles visit Russia in the largest numbers, followed by Finns, Germans, Chinese, Americans, Italians and Latvians. According to money spent, Japanese tourists are the highest spenders at $300 a day, followed by the Spanish, French, British, Canadians and Americans.

TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Boat Building
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Local shipyard Severnaya Verf, a subsidiary of Noviye Programmy i Kontseptsy (NPK), and the Czech Republic are planning to sign a contract later this month for the construction of 15 ships over the next five years, Interfax reported on Thursday. The deal is reported to be worth more than $100 million and will be part of a larger program for Russia to pay off Soviet-era debt to the Czech Republic.
 NPK General Director Boris Kuzyk told a press conference that the agreement will call for the Russian government to pay for the vessels' construction. The Czech owners of the ships will then turn the management of the vessels over to Severo-Zapadnoye Parokhodstvo, Interfax reported Kuzyk as saying.
 
 
Heated Up
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The St. Petersburg General Prosecutor's Office issued a statement on Thursday, saying that it had found that local Lenenergo had impinged on the constitutional rights of residents of 12 apartment buildings and 56 dormitories to which the utility company cut off the heat supply this winter as a result of unpaid debts, Interfax reported Thursday.
 The press-release said General Prosecutor Ivan Sydoruk had presented a report to both Governor Vladimir Yakovlev and Lenenergo General Director Andrei Likachyov calling for the measures to avoid these occurences in the future.
 In the press release, Sydoruk said that the interuption of heat supply "impinged on the constitutional rights of conscientious bill-payers, necessarily worsened their conditions for survival and placed a greater strain on conditions in the city," Interfax reported.
 
 
No Plane Retaliation
 

MOSCOW (SPT) - Russia will not retaliate over the European Union's newly introduced ban on noisy planes, Interfax quoted Russian First Deputy Transport Minister and chief of the State Civil Aviation Service Alexander Neradko as saying Thursday.
 "We are not introducing any measures in response to this. On the contrary, we are developing our cooperation in the sphere of air transport. However, we see our international cooperation in the sphere of air communication as based on conditions of parity," he said. 



TITLE: OPEC Stands Pat on Output
AUTHOR: By Bruce Stanley
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: LONDON - OPEC has no plans to pump more oil to replace the crude Iraq is withholding from the market, reasoning that the recent spike in oil prices will ease once violence between Israel and the Palestinians abates, the group's top official said Wednesday.
 
OPEC Secretary General Ali Rodriguez defended the decision to keep output steady until at least June by insisting that global supplies were "normal" in relation to the demand for crude.
 Oil prices seesawed on a day of conflicting market signals. Iran's oil minister reaffirmed that his country wouldn't join Iraq in suspending its crude exports unless other Muslim countries also do the same.
 However, the International Energy Agency warned that political uncertainties in the Middle East and labor strife in Venezuela could yet upset the market.
 May contracts of North Sea Brent crude rose $0.22 a barrel in London before slipping to $26.01, down $0.07 from Tuesday's close. In New York, contacts of light, sweet crude for May delivery rose $0.31 to close at $26.13 a barrel
 "Twenty-six dollar Brent isn't a terrible, terrible number," said Peter Gignoux, head of the petroleum desk at Salomon Smith Barney. But he hastened to add: "It's not a great number."
 The big question, Gignoux said, is how quickly other oil producers can replace the crude that Iraq has kept away from markets. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein suspended oil exports on Monday for 30 days or until Israel withdraws from the Palestinian territories.
 Iraq, which has a daily production capacity of 2.5 million barrels, exports at least 1.8 million barrels a day under the close supervision of the United Nations. Iraq is OPEC's third-largest producer but doesn't participate in the group's production agreements.
 Iran and Libya had earlier expressed support for the idea of using an embargo as a means of pressuring the United States to lean on Israel to end its military offensive against the Palestinians.
 Libya has been quiet on the issue since Iraq began its boycott, but Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zangeneh insisted that Iran would not act on its own to suspend its crude shipments. Iran is OPEC's second-largest producer after Saudi Arabia.

TITLE: How To Cope With America's 'Hyperpower'
AUTHOR: By Timothy Garton Ash
TEXT: STANFORD, California - For most of the 20th century, the defining political question was: What do you think of Russia? At the beginning of the 21st century, it is: What do you think of America? Tell me your America and I'll tell you who you are.
 
Sitting in sun-dried California, I have been trying to work out exactly what I think. Quite a few European writers caricature America as a dangerous, selfish giant, blundering around the world doing ill, and as an anthology of all that is wrong with capitalism - in contrast to morally superior European versions. 
 But, of course, America can't be reduced in this way. Apart from anything else, it is just too large, too diverse, too much a cornucopia of combinations and contradictions to allow any simple interpretation. 
 Here in Stanford there is the post-Sept. 11 "United We Stand" poster on the Japanese-American sushi bar, but also the bookshop that declares itself a "hate-free zone," with a notice in the window deploring attacks on Arab-Americans. There's the gung-ho unilateralism of Fox TV, but also the patient multilateralism of elder statesmen interviewed on CNN. 
 As Walt Whitman wrote: "Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.)"
 So any simple generalization will be wrong. My own, more complicated conclusion is this: I love this country and I worry about its current role in the world. I use the word love loosely, of course, as we do in our increasingly Americanized English. 
 I love the energy, the openness, the everyday cheerfulness of people in shops and on the street, the sense of freedom you get driving for hours down a California highway under those king-size skies, and the feeling that all people - whoever they are, wherever they come from - have a chance to shape their own lives. 
 I love the accuracy of The New York Times, the vigor of television's "Crossfire," the probing tough-mindedness of the best universities in the world and the American activists I've frequently encountered in eastern Europe and the Balkans who really do want other people to share the freedoms they enjoy.
 Most people in the world will have some such list. For America is part of everyone's imaginative life, through movies, music, television and the Web, whether you grow up in Bilbao, Beijing or Bombay. Everyone has a New York in their heads, even if they have never been there - which is why the destruction of the twin towers had such an impact. This fascination with American culture, in the broadest sense of that term, is part of what Joseph Nye, dean of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, calls America's "soft power."
 So why I am worried about this wonderful country's current role in the world? Partly because, until President George W. Bush changed tack last week, I feared that if the United States were to attack Iraq without taking the lead in negotiating a settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Islamic world would be united against the West, while Europe would be divided from the United States, with disastrous consequences for years to come.
 But my concern goes deeper than simply a worry about the Middle Eastern policy of a particular administration. 
 The fundamental problem is that the United States today has too much power for anyone's good, including its own. It has that matchless, global soft power in all of our heads. In economic power, its only rival is the European Union. In military power, it has no rival. Its military expenditure is greater than that of the next eight largest military powers combined. Not since the Roman Empire has a single power enjoyed such superiority - but the Roman colossus only bestrode one part of the world. 
 Stripped of its anti-American overtones, French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine's term "hyperpower" is apt. Contrary to what many Europeans think, the problem with American power is not that it is American. The problem is simply the power. It would be dangerous even for an archangel to wield so much power. 
 The writers of the U.S. Constitution wisely determined that no single locus of power, however benign, should predominate - for even the best could be led into temptation. Every power should therefore be checked by at least one other. That also applies in world politics. 
 Of course it helps that such power is exercised by leaders under the scrutiny of a developed and self-critical democracy. But even democracy brings its own temptations when it exists in a hyperpower.
 That temptation is illustrated by the Bush administration's recent imposition of unjustified tariffs on steel imports, threatening the international framework of free trade in order to win votes in steel-producing states.
 And when a country has so much power, what it doesn't do is as fateful as what it does. Thus, the Bush administration came into office determined not to get dragged into close mediation between Israelis and Palestinians, as former President Bill Clinton had been. The horrors of the suicide bombings of Israeli civilians and the siege of the West Bank are at least in part a result of this policy, which might be called partisan disengagement. 
 Critical Europeans generally see the United States as misusing its power by intervening, as in the cases of U.S. actions in Cambodia and Nicaragua. But as often, the problem is that the hyperpower does not intervene - as we saw in the agony of Bosnia until the United States finally stepped in to stop the bloodshed.
 Who, then, should check and complement American power? 
 International agencies, starting with the United Nations, and transnational, nongovernmental organizations are a place to start. 
 But they alone are not enough. 
 My answer is Europe. I would like to see Europe acting as an economic equal to the United States and as a close-knit group of states with long centuries of political, diplomatic and military experience.
 The European Union is already a major force in trade and foreign aid, and it is slowly acquiring more diplomatic coherence. But the gulf between its military capacity and that of the United States grows ever wider.
 The complicated double task for us pro-American Europeans is to strengthen Europe's capacity to act outside its own borders while disentangling the idea of a stronger Europe from its sticky anti-American integument. We need to build a Europe that sees itself not as a rival superpower to the United States, but as America's most important partner in a world community of liberal democracies. 
 Americans, in their own enlightened self-interest, should want to see Europe succeed. Otherwise, the United States will be left to cope alone with the loneliness of its long-distance hyperpower.
 
 <i>Timothy Garton Ash is director of the European Studies Center at St. Antony's College, Oxford, and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He contributed this comment to The New York Times. </i>

TITLE: Not Every Incident Is an Assault on the Press
TEXT: IN March 1994, I served as a European Union election observer in Moldova. Our group published a report critical of election coverage in Moldova proper and the self-proclaimed Transdnestr republic. The fighting along the banks of the Dnestr River had stopped by that time, but nerves were still strained to breaking point. 
 
I got a taste of this when my car was first searched at the &quot;border&quot; between Moldova and Transdnestr. &quot;Moldova is massing military hardware on the border,&quot; a border guard explained.
 As my colleague and I drove through the Transdnestr republic we were stopped and searched several times by drunken men in camouflage with no badges of rank.
 When they opened the trunk and discovered a case of vintage Moldovan wine, they demonstratively cocked their Kalashnikovs, hinting at the tension between Chisinau and Tiraspol.
 Staring into the machine-gun barrels I was gripped by a single thought: &quot;If they shoot us out here in the steppe, the fact that we died defending our wine will never be known. Everyone - the European Commission, the European Parliament, the Council of Europe, the OSCE, human-rights organizations - will conclude that our criticism roused the ire of powerful forces, and declare us heroes in the battle for a free press. That's not right.&quot;
 We came up with an inspired lie. We said that the wine was a gift for Alexander Rozenbaum, a singer wildly popular on the fringes of the former Soviet Union, and that we were organizing his tour in the Transdnestr republic.
 Of 20 bottles in the case, we got away with 19, one of the few achievements in my life of which I am truly proud.
 This experience left me with the firm conviction that not every apparent infringement of press freedom actually is one. I am often confirmed in this belief by the most unexpected sources. 
 Human-rights activist Oleg Panfilov, head of the Center for Extreme Journalism, said not long ago: &quot;When we investigated the causes of journalists' deaths last year, we found that most of them died as a result of drunken altercations or other mundane causes.&quot;
 Why recall this now? 
 Because two weeks ago, according to Union of Right Forces leader Boris Nemtsov, &quot;the war on journalists entered a new phase.&quot;
 A few months back, the daily newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported without concrete proof that certain Moscow judges had taken $1 million in bribes. The judges requested that the prosecutor's office file libel charges. 
 Newspaper officials told investigators they did not actually know who had written the article. It arrived by e-mail, they said, and was never confirmed. In the absence of an identifiable author, prosecutors decided to file charges against the deputy editor who had signed off on that day's edition. 
 Tatyana Koshkareva, the chief editor of Nezavisimaya Gazeta, without whose approval such <i>kompromat </i>could not or should not have been published, has spent the last two weeks declaring her newspaper is under attack because it belongs to Boris Berezovsky.
 It is worth recalling that Koshkareva was head of the news division at ORT when Sergei Dorenko was earning his living as a television hitman. If memory serves, friends of free speech were then calling for ORT to be publicly censured.
 They should be calling for censure now. Let them march with Nemtsov to the Nezavisimaya Gazeta offices, shouting: &quot;Koshkareva - leave the profession!&quot; 
 In this situation, it would do more than anything else to defend press freedom. For nothing threatens that freedom today so much as irresponsible, mercenary journalists.
 
 <i>Alexei Pankin is the editor of Sreda, a magazine for media professionals (www.internews.ru/sreda) </i>

TITLE: The Roots of Anti-Americanism
AUTHOR: By Boris Kagarlitsky
TEXT: PUBLIC opinion polls show that anti-American sentiment in Russia has reached a level not seen since the days of the Cold War. This hostility is not the product of a political confrontation, as was the case during the Soviet era, or of a diplomatic standoff, as happened on Yevgeny Primakov's watch as prime minister.
 
Paradoxically, it has arisen during a period of unprecedented political partnership between Russia and the United States in the &quot;war on terrorism.&quot;
 America's popularity reached its peak during perestroika. Russians loved America simply because they had been forbidden to do so for 40 years. But all that changed during the 1990s, as U.S. support for the unpopular policies of Boris Yeltsin's administration steadily eroded its appeal. I remember how in October 1993, after the shelling of parliament, my American students found themselves surrounded by a general malevolence. 
 &quot;Tell people you're Canadian,&quot; I advised. &quot;Canadians never hurt anyone.&quot;
 The anti-American mood was fiercest during the conflict in the Balkans. For the first time crowds of angry young people gathered outside the U.S. Embassy - not the indigent and marginalized, but middle-class kids who had grown up in the post-communist era and never underwent the ideological indoctrination of Soviet schools. These scenes gave the lie to the theory that after 10 to 15 years of democracy and free market reforms, Russians would come to see themselves as part of the West.
 The tragedy of Sept. 11 altered this situation somewhat. People felt sorry for the Americans, though their pity was often mixed with <i>Schadenfreude </i>of the sort expressed in the popular slogan: &quot;We're sorry for the American people, not for America.&quot; 
 But the attitude toward America did significantly improve.
 As it turned out, this trend was short-lived. America's poll numbers in Russia began to fall along with bombs dropped by U.S. planes in Afghanistan. Hostility heated up when U.S. troops appeared in central Asia and reached boiling point when Washington imposed restrictions on imports from Russia. According to data from the Public Opinion Foundation collected this spring, more than 70 percent of those polled considered the United States a hostile country.
 This mood has not gone unnoticed by politicians of all stripes, who indulge in &quot;Yankee-bashing&quot; to boost their numbers in the run-up to parliamentary elections next year. Putin and his inner circle, on the other hand, have little choice but to demonstrate their loyalty to their U.S. allies. As a result they seem more and more isolated from society.
 Russian anti-Americanism is as diverse as Russia itself, and it expresses three different, even mutually exclusive, views of the world. The nationalists, for a start, have never been big fans of the United States. They hate Americans mostly because they hate the entire outside world. In the United States they see a country that spreads the worldwide Jewish conspiracy and the repulsive ideas of political correctness, human rights and racial tolerance. They suspect the United States of providing clandestine aid to the Chechen fighters.
 Russia's many ignorant and unprincipled politicians constitute the second main group. They know that America-bashing is a big crowd-pleaser. More important, they can blame foreigners for their own stupid mistakes. For them, anti-Americanism is a political alibi. They talk about a confrontation without reflecting on the meaning of their words.
 Today's Russia is not the Soviet Union, and ideologically it's in the same camp as the United States. But a half-conscious memory of the Soviet past remains part of the national psyche. In their dreams, upper-class Russians still see themselves as Communist Party committee secretaries.
 The third group criticizes the United States for the same reason that the left all over the world criticizes the administration of President George W. Bush. For them, the United States is a country with a questionable record on human rights, the environment and race relations - a country that looks on indifferently at the suffering of the Chechens and the Palestinians. This is still a minority position. But that minority is growing.
 Much in Russia will depend on which of these trends achieves ascendancy. To overcome anti-Americanism as such, however, something also needs to change in the United States itself.
 
 <i>Boris Kagarlitsky is a Moscow-based sociologist. </i>

TITLE: The Duma Has To Get Out of Its 10-Year Rut
TEXT: THE fracas following last week's move by pro-Kremlin factions to strip the Communists of most of their State Duma committee chairs has roused the political establishment from its mid-term slumber.
 
Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov launched an unprecedentedly scathing attack on President Vladimir Putin and announced that his party would take up unrelenting opposition to the current administration.
 Analysts, meanwhile, have been hard at work trying to calculate whether the Communists have lost more in terms of financial resources through loss of key Duma posts or gained more by re-affirming their opposition credentials prior to upcoming regional and Duma elections.
 In all of this, however, one thing is clear: Communist Duma Speaker Gennady Seleznyov is caught between a rock and a hard place. Zyuganov has said that Seleznyov cannot remain in the party and retain the speaker's post. Seleznyov, thus, is faced with the unenviable choice of retaining the powers and perks of his office or returning to an unexceptional party leadership post but preserving some shred of credibility.
 Seleznyov gave a pretty clear indication of where his inclinations lie when he scurried off at the end of last week to meet with Putin and secure the president's support. The former editor of Pravda has long been a largely compliant creature of the Kremlin, forming the center-left Rossiya bloc in 2000 in an unsuccessful attempt to split the Communist electorate, among other services.
 While Seleznyov and Co. seem to be trying to hammer out a face-saving fudge, it is worth recalling the fate of his immediate predecessor, Ivan Rybkin. Rybkin, a member of the Agrarian faction, became speaker in 1994, was coopted by the Kremlin, distanced himself from his party and set up his own center-left bloc to contest the 1995 Duma elections, at which his group flopped spectacularly. He succeeded in limping back into the Duma, but wound up on the political sidelines.
 Two conclusions can be drawn from this: first, that Seleznyov would do well to think twice before surrendering himself completely to the Kremlin's whims.
 But a more important and gloomy conclusion to be drawn from this re-run is just how little progress the Duma has made and just how little it has grown as an independent institution - not an adjunct to the presidential administration - over the past decade.
 The good news for Seleznyov is that regardless of what happens, he is pretty much sure to receive some sinecure or other - just as Rybkin was appointed secretary of the Security Council not long after his election fiasco. The outlook for democracy, however, is far less encouraging.
 
 <i>This comment originally appeared as an editorial in The Moscow Times on April 9. </i>

TITLE: celebrating our photographers
AUTHOR: By Robert Coalson
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: If ever an article needed a disclaimer, this is it. Its author is the editor of The St. Petersburg Times. Its subject is an exhibition of works by Alexander Belenky and Sergey Grachev, The St. Petersburg Times' two staff photographers, organized to celebrate the paper's ninth birthday. 
 
&quot;Faces of the Times&quot; presents 50 shots chosen by Belenky and Grachev themselves. As the name suggests, it focuses almost exclusively on the people of the city, with only a couple of exceptions.
 All the photographs are hung tightly together in a small room, and the viewer can hardly fail to feel the unsettling power of all those eyes looking out. Both photographers have chosen generous selections of young faces, capturing the city's moods - from bewilderment (Grachev's &quot;Homeless Andrei, Seven Years Old&quot;) to contemplation (Belenky's &quot;Orthodox Easter&quot;) to ecstasy (Grachev's &quot;First Snowfall&quot;). It is encouraging that so many of these pictures are optimistic: Grachev even manages to capture smiles in a prison for juvenile criminals, as a group of shaven-headed inmates plays with a pet rat.
 The exhibition provides an opportunity to think about our photographers as creative personalities, something we at the paper rarely have time to do. &quot;Faces of the Times&quot; reveals Belenky as light-hearted and ironic, while Grachev comes across as more serious and reflective. A number of Belenky's pictures are laugh-out-loud funny: His &quot;Cover Girl&quot; depicts a woman reading a magazine, its cover almost perfectly superimposed over her face; &quot;The Anatomy of Love&quot; shows a pair of schoolgirls intently studying a certain portion of a male model at the Hygiene Museum. Several of Belenky's photos are implicitly or explicitly erotic.
 Grachev's scenes, on the other hand, suggest a deeper meaning, even when they are outwardly funny. His &quot;Spring 2001&quot; shows a man standing in the fountain in Alexandrovsky Garden, studying the mechanism as water sprays around him, and &quot;Perestroika&quot; shows a busload of Lenin busts staring out the windows while being trucked off into storage.
 This excellent exhibition is marred by sub-standard presentation though. First, it is very difficult to find: The only sign at Dom Zhurnalista indicating that you are in the right place is taped to the inside of the front door. The show itself is on the second floor, but there is no sign to indicate this. The names of the photographers are not attached to the photographs. (The pictures to the right of the entrance are Grachev's and those to the left are Belenky's.)
 The show is definitely worth seeking out, however, and I would say so even if I were an unbiased source. As an insider, though, I can say that this tiny selection of photographs is just the beginning of the thousands of images these two artists have created, images that really do tell the story of a beautiful city going through a tremendous transformation. It would really be wonderful to show more of this body of work someday.
 
 <i>
&quot;Faces of the Times&quot; runs through May 31. See Exhibits for details, or call Maria Berntseva at 325-6080. </i>

TITLE: piter set to dominate masks again
AUTHOR: by John Freedman and Raymond Stults
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: St. Petersburg dominates this year's Golden Mask festival nominations - for opera and ballet at least - and seems likely to clobber the competition when the awards are handed out on Monday.
 
The Masks, Russia's annual showcase honoring the top accomplishments in the performing arts from around the country, brings together some three dozen shows from 11 cities. Moscow and St. Petersburg run neck-and-neck in the nominee race with 12 shows each. Including individual honors for directors, actors, designers, choreographers and conductors, there are 105 nominees for 26 awards in seven categories: drama, opera, ballet, operetta/musical, modern dance, puppetry and a generic hybrid called &quot;innovation.&quot;
 Three of the four operatic nominees come from the Northern Capital: Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's &quot;The Tale of Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevronia&quot; and Richard Wagner's &quot;Die Walkure,&quot; both from the Mariinsky Theater, and Zazerkalye Theater's modern-dress version of Giacomo Puccini's &quot;La Boheme.&quot;
 The 15-year-old Zazerkalye plays two small halls with a young artistic company and often takes a radical new look at the war-horses of opera. Its repertoire, however, extends beyond the mere operatic to such things as musicals, folklore dramas, miracle plays and shows aimed at audiences of the very young.
 Alexander Petrov, the director of &quot;La Boheme,&quot; places the action at the fore, with the orchestra arrayed behind the stage proper. He dispenses with scenery and uses minimal props. Aside from a few awkward moments, this intimate view of Puccini's masterpiece works well, both musically and in terms of conveying the drama.
 Except for weak singing in the minor roles, Zazerkalye provides a very creditable account of the music. Especially notable is Golden Mask nominee Tatyana Serzhan in the role of Mimi. She combines a sympathetic stage presence with a warm and, where necessary, powerful lyric soprano. Rare among present-day Russian singers, she sounded thoroughly at home with both the Italian text and the musical idiom attached to it.
 The final operatic contender is Giuseppe Verdi's &quot;Rigoletto&quot; from the Saratov Theater of Music and Ballet. Almost certain to displease traditionalists, the Saratov staging turns the Duke of Mantua into a show-business magnate and Rigoletto himself into a transvestite cabaret soloist.
 In the realm of ballet, two of the three nominations for best production likewise come from the Mariinsky: a triple bill of one-act ballets by American choreographer John Neumeier - the third of which, &quot;The Sound of Empty Pages,&quot; was created especially for the Mariinsky - and the highly touted new setting of Tchaikovsky's &quot;The Nutcracker,&quot; a clear favorite in terms of audience appeal.
 The new-look for Tchaikovsky's venerable masterpiece combines decor, costumes and, bizarrely enough, staging by popular emigre Russian artist Mikhail Shemyakin with a fresh reading of the musical score by Mariinsky Artistic Director Valery Gergiev. It caused an explosion of controversy at its premiere last year. 
 The third ballet nominee, &quot;Coppelia&quot; - set to music by Leo Delibes and, like &quot;The Nutcracker,&quot; based on a fantastic tale by German writer E.T.A. Hoffman - comes from the Novosibirsk Theater of Opera and Ballet.
 The competition for best production of operetta curiously contains but a single nominee - the Novosibirsk Musical Comedy Theater's &quot;The Count of Luxembourg,&quot; by Franz Lehar. Yet again, St. Petersburg enters the picture, with staging in the hands of Grigory Dityatkovsky. His &quot;Count&quot; promises something out of the ordinary, a look into the evil he finds lurking behind the frivolous world of Viennese operetta.
 Dityatkovsky, 43, is one of the frontrunners for best drama director, for his production of Racine's &quot;Phaedre&quot; at the Bolshoi Drama Theater. Dityatkovsky was a surprise winner last year in a deep field of nominees and promises to put in a strong showing this year. Up against Dityatkovsky are such perennial nominees as St. Petersburg's Lev Dodin (for Chekhov's &quot;The Seagull&quot;) and Moscow's Pyotr Fomenko (for Tolstoy's &quot;War and Peace. The Beginning of the Novel&quot;), as well as several repeat nominees from the provinces, including Yakutsk's Andrei Borisov (the folk legend &quot;Olonkho&quot;), Oleg Rybkin with a show from Omsk (Nabokov's &quot;An Invitation to a Beheading&quot;) and Mikhail Bychkov from Voronezh (Strindberg's &quot;Miss Julie&quot;). 
 As usual, the competition for best dramatic production is broken into two categories: large and small-stage works. This means that a small show like &quot;Romeo and Juliet,&quot; directed by the popular playwright Nikolai Kolyada for the Yekaterinburg Drama Theater, need not compete with Vladimir Mashkov's big production of Ray Cooney's &quot;No. 13&quot; for Moscow's Chekhov Art Theater. With seven large-stage and five small-stage works nominated, plenty of competition is guaranteed within each category. 
 The innovation category presents an intriguing mix: the clown-like &quot;White Story&quot; by St. Petersburg's Comic-Trust; the Mariinsky's contemporary opera, &quot;Tsar Demyan,&quot; based on a Russian folk play; and a show that defies description, &quot;The Lilikan Museum of Theatrical Ideas&quot; by Moscow's famed Tyen Theater.

TITLE: penderecki: one of a dying breed
AUTHOR: by Gyulyara Sadykh-zade
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: Last weekend we saw Krzysztof Penderecki as both composer and conductor. On Friday, he conducted the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra in Beethoven's Fourth Symphony and his own Fifth Symphony, and on Saturday in the same Beethoven and &quot;Metamorphoses,&quot; his own second violin concerto, with Lithuania-born Austrian violinist Julian Rachlin.
 
Penderecki began his career in the 1960s as a revolutionary innovator. As part of the Polish School, with composers like Witold Lutoslawski and Kazimierz Serocki, Penderecki experimented with aleatory and serial techniques, but quickly convinced himself that this path only led down a cul-de-sac.
 &quot;I understood that aleatorism had nothing more to say to me, that I was inescapably doomed to repeating myself,&quot; he says. And so he returned to a more academic tradition of large-scale symphonies, oratorios and the like.
 Penderecki now believes that, &quot;[no] noteworthy author has found a theoretically new mode of self-expression,&quot; and willingly acquiesces when compared to a colossus such as J.S. Bach: Just as Bach powerfully and unequivocally conluded the Baroque era, Penderecki, it can be argued, is the seal on the &quot;grand symphonic&quot; era, a time when the symphony is the queen of genres.
 Nowadays, Penderecki's durable symphonies can be seen as leftovers of a bygone aesthetic, as archaic testimony, estranged from today's artistic mindset. An academic, prolix symphonic letter such as the &quot;Korean&quot; Symphony can no longer reach listeners' hearts and minds. What we witnessed was not a crisis but the death of a genre that can't find a convincing cultural step to reinvigorate itself.
 Friday's concert, therefore, was somewhat boring and sad. Boring because the unexpressive, worn-out thematicism that the composer has assiduously and tediously employed begins to grate after about five minutes,and sad because it is impossible to be present at the demise of a formerly flourishing genre and observe the charisma of the most important artistic figure of the last century and not be sad.
 It is comforting, though, that Penderecki in his time - he is now nearly 70 - has collected such a huge quantity of prizes, titles and suchlike that his contribution to world culture has clearly been acknowledged. The latest signs of recognition in a long line of awards have been the presitigious Cannes &quot;Living Composer of the Year&quot; award and Penderecki's induction as a member of Vienna's Musikverein, an authoritative musical society that counted as its luminaries Wagner, Brahms and - posthumously - Mozart and Schubert.

TITLE: chernov's choice
TEXT: JFC Jazz Club</strong>,<strong> </strong>probably the city's finest jazz spot, will celebrate its eighth birthday on Friday with an all-night event that will start at JFC's own premises and then continue at house club Par.spb.
 
The venue opened as the New Jazz Club in Tavrichesky Garden on April 12, 1994, but moved to its current location at 33 Shpalernaya Ulitsa the next year. 
 The Sergei Grigoriyev Trio, with Grigoriyev on piano, Robert Pilakalnis on double bass and Gary Bagdasaryan on drums, will perform on Friday, with some activities taking place outside.
 After about 10 p.m. the festivities will move to Par.spb, where a special program will be on offer, including jazz bands, jazz dancers, jazz films and jazz DJs.
 The films &quot;Some Like It Hot,&quot; &quot;The Mambo Kings&quot; and &quot;The Cotton Club&quot; will be screened, while live performances will include very different styles of improvised music. Academy of Silence, Slava Gaivoronsky and the Alexei Kanunnikov Dixieland Band will play, while Germany's Max Bitter will spin some jazz vinyls.
 <strong>The Seventh Jazz Spring in St. Petersburg Festival</strong>,<strong> </strong>promoted by JFC, will run from May 15 to May 25 and feature acclaimed French pianist <strong>Laurent de Wilde</strong>.
 A very different crowd will celebrate pop club <strong>Hollywood Nites</strong>'<strong> </strong>fifth birthday the very same night. It is difficult to believe now, but the place had very promising beginnings, opening with two concerts by Deborah Harry, but quickly drifted toward lip-sync Russian pop.
 There's also a birthday party for Deep Purple frontman <strong>Ritchie Blackmore </strong>at the student club Eurasia on Friday. Though held <i>in absentia, </i>Blackmore will appear in person on Tuesday when he performs with his group Blackmore's Night at the Shostakovich Philharmonic.
 What's more, Friday gives two more excuses for celebration. Techno clubs prefer to celebrate Soviet Cosmonauts Day while the rock clubs Money Honey and Red Club throw their <strong>Rock and Roll Birthday Parties</strong>. History has it that Bill Haley's first session at Pythian Temple studios, New York, which produced &quot;Rock Around the Clock&quot; was held on April 12, 1954
 Those who favor oddities will probably be happy to see <strong>Dmitry Dibrov</strong>, a rather odious Moscow-based television host, in rock-singer mode with his recently formed band, Antropologiya. Judging from reports, it is in fact a tribute band honoring 1980s local band Zoopark's late singer Maik Naumenko. Dibrov performs nothing but Naumenko's songs, which were influenced by Lou Reed and the Rolling Stones.
 Finally, old Soviet &quot;rock&quot; found recognition on the pages of NME (the British one, not the Russian surrogate). In a recent issue, Northern Irish techno DJ David Holmes praised Soviet singer Alexander Gradsky's &quot;Death of a Hero&quot; from the soundtrack to &quot;A Song of Lovers&quot; (&quot;Romans o vlublyonnykh&quot;). 
 &quot;It's the sickest f***ing record you've ever heard,&quot; he said. &quot;Listen to those drums, man, they're so f***ing amazing, so compressed and rough and filthy and loose and funky. And then you've got this ever-changing bassline that evolves through the track with these strings. Someone actually sat down and wrote this out <i>[shakes head in disbelief]. </i>It's an incredible piece of music.&quot; Holmes claimed he paid about Pound120 ($170) for the record.
 
 <i>- by Sergey Chernov </i>

TITLE: fusion cuisine raises the heat
AUTHOR: By Robert Coalson
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Stolid St. Petersburg is rarely on the cutting edge of any new trend, and culinary trends are no exception.
 
&quot;Fusion&quot; has been a hot buzzphrase in food circles for some time, denoting a style that aims to combine previously uncombined elements of numerous national cuisines into entirely unheard-of creations. Fusion restaurants around the world are mixing elements of oriental, Indian, African, Latin American, Mediterranean and other styles, and getting rave reviews for it.
 With Aquarel, however, St. Petersburg now has a worthy fusion-cuisine restaurant offering a dining experience on a par with similar restaurants across the globe.
 Aquarel is located on a barge docked right next to the Birzhevoi Most on the Petrograd Side. You can't miss it. It has two glass dining halls on the second and third floors offering romantic panoramic views of the riverfront. The spare, but elegant interiors are comfortable and wisely do not try to compete with the views or the imaginatively presented food. 
 The character of any fusion restaurant is largely determined by the experience of the chef.
 Aquarel's Alexandre Geffroy has worked previously in France, South America and southeast Asia, and these are the influences - especially Thai and Japanese - that set the mood at Aquarel.
 The restaurant's two dining halls offer different menus, with the second floor giving you the full fusion experience and the upper-level bar offering a less expensive - or, as they tactfully put it, &quot;more democratic&quot; - alternative. We went for the full monty.
 A good portion of the charm of any fusion restaurant is the joy of reading through the menu, since every dish must be described in exquisite, mouth-watering detail. Since every dish is new and none are like the others, dedicated fans have no choice but to keep going back until they have sampled everything - which is exactly the kind of attention Aquarel deserves.
 A couple of the things we <i>didn't </i>try: &quot;filleted beef glazed with aniseed and tamarind tonkatsu sauce with shrimp&quot; ($15.50) and an appetizer described as &quot;grilled scallops, tiger shrimp with parmesan-anchovy sauce and curry&quot; ($21). 
 My dining companion and I decided on a simple selection of soups and entrees. We started with Aquarel's two soups, &quot;corn soup with crab rolls pomelo-and-lobster seasoning&quot; ($8) and &quot;Thai spicy coconut soup with tiger shrimp and black mushrooms&quot; ($8.50). Both soups were elegantly presented, the corn soup coming with the crab-rolls towering out of it like rocks on the seashore and the coconut soup served in a coconut shell. The crab rolls were delicious and delicately seasoned, with the corn and seafood forming the kind of &quot;why-hasn't-anyone-thought-of-this-before?&quot; experience that fusion is all about.
 The Thai soup was indeed spicy, with fresh rice noodles and mushrooms making valiant contributions to the effect. Although Aquarel's menu states that only fresh ingredients are used, I would have guessed that the tiger shrimp had been frozen. Both soups were superbly complemented by lovely black-olive rolls and garlic butter.
 For mains, we opted for &quot;French lamb ribs in thyme-honey sauce with truffle-and-pineapple chutney served with potato souffle, wasabi and figs&quot; ($19.50) and &quot;Soy-mirin glazed duck breast with fois gras custard, shiitake ragout and Sichuan black pepper&quot; ($23.50). Both were elegantly presented in nouveau-cuisine-sized portions, and both offered taste combinations to do fusion proud. There can be no disputing the freshness of the ingredients for these dishes. Where do they get their mushrooms?
 I don't think I've tasted mirin before. It is a sweet alcohol made from yeast and used for cooking, but it stood out nicely in this combination. With the lamb, the chutney went marvelously with the traditional &quot;lamb-and-thyme&quot; combination.
 Faced with this medley of flavors, we were hard-pressed to choose a wine, but we ended up with a French rose (a bottle for $23) that did sterling service to everything and filled the pauses between courses nicely. Aquarel's service was just to my liking - friendly and helpful without becoming too familiar. Our waiter gave us flawless and knowledgeable advice at every turn, for which we are still grateful.
 
 <i>
Aquarel. Petrograd Side near Birzhevoi Most. Tel.: 320-8600. Open daily from 12 p.m. until the last customer leaves. Dinner for two with wine, 3,007 rubles ($97). Menu in Russian and English. Credit cards accepted. </i>

TITLE: Venezuala Goes on Strike Over State Oil Monopoly
AUTHOR: By Alexandra Olson
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: CARACAS, Venezuela - A revolt against leadership at the state-owned oil monopoly spiraled into a national crisis after labor groups and Venezuela's largest business extended a general strike indefinitely.
 
The labor troubles have seriously affected oil exports in Venezuela, the world's fourth-largest oil exporter. 
 The announcement of the extended strike late Wednesday was cheered by thousands of Venezuelans gathered outside the headquarters of the 1 million-member Venezuelan Workers Confederation and the Caracas offices of Petroleos de Venezuela - the oil company.
 Also on Wednesday, OPEC said it has no plans to pump more oil to replace supplies being withheld by Iraq to protest Israel's offensive against Palestinians.
 Since last week, managers at Petroleos de Venezuela have been staging a slowdown to demand that President Hugo Chavez rescind a new corporate board they consider unqualified. They call his appointments an assault on the oil company's autonomy.
 Other labor groups started the general strike on Tuesday to show their support for the protesting managers.
 &quot;It's a matter of a simple demand by small businessmen and civil society that the country find fundamental solutions to a profound crisis that involves not only economic and petroleum issues, but the political conduct of the nation,&quot; said Pedro Carmona, president of the business association Fedecamaras.
 Defense Minister Jose Vicente Ran gel condemned the general strike as &quot;insurrectionist&quot; and said strike leaders were &quot;jumping into the void&quot; because Cha vez won't be overthrown. He urged Ve nezuelans to ignore the strike call.
 Chavez's leftist government contends that Carmona and labor boss Carlos Ortega head a conspiracy to overthrow Chavez and are actively fomenting unrest in the armed forces.
 Since the general strike began on Tuesday, both strikers and Chavez supporters have been accused of violence. Eighteen people, many of them Chavez supporters, were severely beaten during a confrontation outside Petroleos de Venezuela headquarters on Tuesday.
 Industry officials said gasoline supplies to major Venezuelan cities could be threatened if the slowdown continues.
 Retired General Guaicaipuro La me da, a former Petroleos de Venezuela president, said production had fallen by nearly 450,000 barrels a day. Venezuela usually produces 2.5 million barrels daily.

TITLE: WORLD WATCH
TEXT: Ferry Fire Kills 23 
 

LUCENA, Philippines (Reuters) - Fire swept across a Philippine inter-island ferry on Thursday, killing at least 23 people, many of whom drowned after jumping overboard. The MV Maria Carmela caught fire on its way to the port of Lucena, southeast of Manila. 
 A total of 290 people, including 243 passengers and 47 crew had been on board. Montenegro Shipping Lines, the owners of the Carmela, said a total of 219 people had been rescued from the burning ship. Coast-guard vessels, passing commercial ships and fishermen were taking part in the rescue operations. The coast guard said it had not established the cause of the fire, but investigators were at the scene. 
 
 
Asylum Seekers Escape
 

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - About 250 Afghan asylum seekers broke out of an Australian detention camp on the Pacific island of Nauru and pelted police with rocks before being returned to the compound, officials said on Wednesday. The detainees walked out of the camp Tuesday morning and were confronted by Nauruan police and Australian Protective Service officers who urged them to return, an immigration spokesperson said.
 The breakout was sparked by news Monday that just seven of 292 Afghans being held at the camp had been granted refugee status by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The 285 Afghans were denied asylum because their claims were based on persecution by the Taliban regime, which has since been overthrown, the UNHCR said. However, they will get a second chance to present their claims.
 
 
Rebel Goes on TV
 

ILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka (NYT) - In a rare appearance on Wednesday night, Velupillai Prabhakaran, the elusive leader of the rebel army the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, said that he wished to forget the bitter memories of the past and look to a political resolution to the war that he has waged against the Sri Lankan government for the last 18 years.
 The news conference comes as the Tamil Tigers and the Sri Lankan government are poised to hold their first direct peace talks in eight years. The talks, to be mediated by the Norwegian government, are to begin next month in Thailand. 
 Asked if he would give up his claim for a Tamil homeland, he did not give a straight answer, suggesting he would back down from his demand for secession if a long-lasting peace could be forged. But he also said, using the initials for his group, "The right conditions have not arisen for the LTTE to abandon the policy of independent statehood."
 
 
Timor Elections
 

DILI, East Timor (AP) - Three days before East Timor goes to the polls, presidential favorite Xanana Gusmao outlined his vision on Thursday for an independent East Timor, pledging to open the country to foreign investment and work for reconciliation with former pro-Indonesian militiamen. 
 Gusmao, who once led a guerrilla army fighting Indonesian occupation, was speaking at a public debate with his sole challenger, Francisco Xavier do Amaral. Do Amaral, for a brief period in 1975, was East Timor's first president in before Indonesia invaded.
 Presidential elections are scheduled for Sunday.
 On May 20, the East Timor's UN administration will hand over the government to democratically elected authorities - the final step to independence for East Timor's 800,000 population. 



TITLE: SPORTS WATCH
TEXT: SKA Coach Quits
 

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Rafil Ishmatov left his post as head coach of St. Petersburg ice-hockey team SKA on Tuesday. Ishmatov, who was unavaible for comment Thursday, was reported by national sports daily Sport Express as needing the time for his PhD dissertation in Sports Management.
 The SKA press service would not comment Thursday, stating only that a new head coach would be announced by the team's management by April 25.
 Spokesperson Vladimir Kuzin confirmmed that Russian national hockey team head coach Boris Mikhailov was being considered for his former post but that "he was one of the less likely candidates."
 Kuzmin also confirmed reports that Anatoly Bagdanov, formerly head coach of Sokol Kiev, was being considered for the post.
 Mikhailov was head coach for SKA from 1982 to 1984, 1992 to 1998, and finally as a "consultant" during the relegation tournament of 1999.
 
 
Safin Rumor Denied
 

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian tennis chief Shamil Tarpishchev denied Wednesday that Australian Open finalist Marat Safin, who parted company with Swede Mats Wilander earlier this year, had hired Alexander Volkov as his new coach. 
 Earlier this week, the Russian media quoted Tarpishchev as saying that Vol kov and Safin would begin working together at the Monte Carlo Masters next week. 
 "Indeed, both Safin and myself have asked Volkov to coach Marat, but so far without any success," said Tarpishchev, who is also Russia's Davis Cup captain. 
 
Snead Hits Spectator
 

AUGUSTA, Georgia (Reuters) - Three-time champion Sam Snead launched the 66th U.S. Masters at Augusta National Golf Club by hitting a spectator with the ceremonial first shot at the par-four opening hole on Thursday.
 On an overcast and humid morning, the 89-year-old Snead pushed his drive 90 meters right into the crowd, poleaxing a fan and breaking his spectacles in the process.
 The shaken spectator was given first aid but tournament officials later described his condition as "fine."
 "He was struck on the bridge of the nose but, although his spectacles were broken, there was no abrasion and no need for him to go hospital for X-rays," a media official said
 The official added that the spectator would be given a Masters green jacket - an honor usually only accorded the tournament winner - for his pains. 



TITLE: Hurricanes Defy Odds, Breeze Into Playoffs
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: RALEIGH, North Carolina - If the Carolina Hurricanes listened to outsiders, they wouldn't have gotten very far in the Southeast Division. 
 
Most experts picked the Washington Capitals, with their newly acquired superstar Jaromir Jagr, to win the division and had the Hurricanes finishing out of the playoffs in the Eastern Conference. 
 Carolina got the last laugh Wednesday night, beating the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-2 to win the Southeast for the second time in four seasons and, in the process, ousted the Capitals from the playoff chase. 
 &quot;Nobody picked us to win the division, but we didn't let that bother us,&quot; Carolina captain Ron Francis said.
 &quot;Now we have to go into the playoffs believing in ourselves and our abilities to win and not be concerned what anybody else says.&quot; 
 Francis and Rod Brind'Amour each scored in the first period, played more than 22 minutes apiece and combined to win 29 of 40 faceoffs to control the tempo of the game. 
 O'Neill scored his team-leading 31st goal of the season on the power play midway through the third for the game-winner. Bates Battaglia added another one 24 seconds later for a 4-1 lead. 
 Carolina, in first place since Oct. 26, secured the third playoff seed in the Eastern Conference, and its 88 points matched last year's total for second-best in franchise history with two games left.
 The club record is 93 points in the 1986-87 season. 
 Arturs Irbe stopped 28 of 30 shots as the Hurricanes won at home for just the fourth time since the first of the year.
 
 <strong>Devils 1, Flyers 0.</strong> Martin Brodeur stopped 22 shots and John Madden scored with 10:42 remaining to give New Jersey a win over Philadelphia. 
 The victory was the fourth in succession and ninth in 12 games for the Devils.
 It also prevented the Flyers from clinching the Atlantic Division title. 
 The Devils moved into sixth place in the Eastern Conference with 91 points, one more than the idle New York Islanders. New York has three games remaining, one more than New Jersey. 
 Philadelphia's Roman Cechmanek made 18 saves.
 
 <strong>Maple Leafs 7, Rangers 2.</strong> In New York, Darcy Tucker and Cory Cross each scored two goals as Toronto beat the New York Rangers. 
 Shayne Corson, Mats Sundin and Mikael Renberg also scored for Toronto. 
 Pavel Bure scored his 12th goal in 11 games since being traded to New York. Eric Lindros added a goal for the Rangers. 
 Corey Schwab made 21 saves for the Maple Leafs. 
 Dan Blackburn stopped only 17 of Toronto's 24 shots before being replaced in the third period. 
 
 <i>
(For other results, see Scorecard.) </i>

TITLE: Celtics Get Through to Playoffs for First Time Since 1995
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BOSTON - It seemed like nobody wanted to win - not in Boston or anywhere where the Eastern Conference playoff seedings were at stake.
 
The Celtics were the only ones of the East's playoff leaders to win on Wednesday night, and they did it despite scoring only 70 points - the fewest for a winning team in the NBA this season.
 The victory assured Boston, which hasn't been to the playoffs since 1995, of home-court advantage for at least the first round of the playoffs. It also eliminated Miami from playoff contention - the first idle postseason in coach Pat Riley's 20-year career.
 Paul Pierce had 15 points and 12 rebounds and Antoine Walker scored 21, coming alive at the end as Boston went on a 13-3 run over the final 4:32 to turn a five-point deficit into a five-point win.
 Walker hit a three-pointer to tie the game with 2:36 left and a baby hook a minute later to give the Celtics the lead for good. &quot;My first playoff. It's nice we don't have to start out on the road,&quot; said Walker, a Celtic since 1996. &quot;Hopefully, that will be the edge we need.&quot;
 Alonzo Mourning and Eddie Jones each had 16 points for the Heat.
 Miami led 62-57 before Tony Battie slammed in the rebound of Pierce's miss with 3:31 left. After Rod Strickland missed two free throws, Walker hit a three-pointer to tie it.
 Eric Williams stole the ball and eventually got it to Walker, who drove to the basket and made a little hook from the lane to make it 64-62. Walker, who played the second half with his thumb taped, then knocked away an entry pass to set up Pierce's drive that completed the 9-0 run.
 The Celtics scored eight of the game's first 10 points and led 40-30 with two minutes left in the first half, before Miami cut the lead to four points by halftime. Boston led 44-41 with 10:14 left in the third before Miami scored seven consecutive points, taking a 45-44 lead on Mourning's layup. Mourning added a hook shot and Jones made a three-pointer to complete a 20-4 run.
 The 70-65 win was the lowest-scoring game in the NBA this season, slipping under Toronto's 72-70 victory over Philadelphia on March 31.
 
 <strong>
Chicago 102, Detroit 101. </strong>At Auburn Hills, Michigan, Jalen Rose scored 24 points and rookie Tyson Chandler added a career-best 21 points and 12 rebounds. The win was Chicago's first against the Pistons since Jan. 22, 2000, ending an eight-game losing streak.
 
&quot;I just don't think we took the Bulls seriously enough,&quot; said Cliff Robinson, who led Detroit with 27 points. &quot;I don't want to take anything away from them, but there is no way they should be beating us at this point.&quot;
 The Pistons led by as many as nine in the fourth quarter, but couldn't closeout the Bulls.
 
 <i>
(For other results, see Scorecard) </i>

TITLE: Woods' Masters Defense off to Shaky Start
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: AUGUSTA, Georgia - Defending champion Tiger Woods bounced back from a shaky start, but Scott Verplank fired three birdies in his first nine holes to set the early pace in the opening round of the U.S. Masters on Thursday.
 
The 37-year-old Texan, who has missed the cut in all six of his previous Masters appearances, picked up shots at the third, sixth and ninth holes to reach the turn in three-under-par 33.
 That put the American one stroke ahead of the field - with Woods, two-time Masters winner Jose Maria Olazabal, U.S. Open champion Retief Goosen and American Jerry Kelly grouped together at two under for the day.
 Woods had to scramble a par at the 400-meter first hole after slicing his drive into the right rough and then hitting his approach into a greenside bunker.
 But the two-time Masters champion, who is bidding to become the third back-to-back winner at Augusta after Jack Nicklaus in 1966 and Nick Faldo in 1990, hit back with successive birdies at the third and fourth to close to within a shot of early pacesetter Verplank.
 Olazabal, winner of the 1994 and 1999 titles, eagled the 510-meter second and then parred his next three holes to stay at two under for his round.
 This year's Masters hype is not about the grand slam. It's about the punishment expected from a grand course.
 Augusta National has undergone many changes since Tiger Woods left last April after completing his unprecedented sweep of the four biggest tournaments in golf.
 Woods is defending his title on a super-sized version of Augusta, a course that has been stretched to nearly 6,700 meters and provides the 89-man field with the toughest test in Masters history.
 Only half of the 18 holes were changed during the largest renovation project in the 70-year history of Augusta National.
 Bulldozers cleared out Georgia pines to make room for a tee box 55 meters farther back on No. 18. The club bought land from the adjacent Augusta Country Club for a new tee on the par-5 13th.
 What does it all mean? The player with the lowest score will slip into a green jacket at the end of the Masters, of course. What remains to be seen is what kind of score it will take.
 &quot;I don't know what ... number you put on the increased difficulty of the golf course,&quot; said David Duval. &quot;I think you'll see a lot of 70s each day, 71s, scores that are more reflective of the other majors.&quot;
 Duval has been in contention on the back nine Sunday at Augusta each of the last four years, has never shot worse than 70 in the final round and still hasn't won.
 The scores were never a source of irritation for Augusta National chairperson Hootie Johnson when he announced the sweeping changes last year. The clubs that players were hitting into the green on the par 4s were what bothered him.
 &quot;We just hated that time after time, they were pulling out sand wedge or pitching wedge,&quot; Johnson said.
 For Phil Mickelson, it's his next chance to win his first major championship, the only thing missing from his remarkable record of 20 PGA Tour victories in his 10-year career.
 All the hype is about the new Augusta National. By Sunday afternoon, the focus will shift back to the players who are desperate to win golf's most prestigious prize.
 
 <i>(Reuters, AP) </i>