SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #780 (46), Tuesday, June 25, 2002
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TITLE: Farm Bill Gets Second Duma Reading
AUTHOR: By Yevgenia Borisova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - After six hours of half-hearted debate, the State Duma on Friday approved a bill in the crucial second reading allowing Russians to buy and sell farmland and restricting foreigners to 49-year leases.
 
Liberals slammed the limitation on foreigners. The only protest from the Communists, who oppose the sale of farmland altogether, came from a crowd of about 200 people rallying outside the Duma building.
 Most lawmakers appeared to be more interested in following two World Cup soccer games that were being played, and the Duma hall was all but empty during the debate.
 The bill, which had the support of the four centrist factions that make up the majority of the parliament, was quietly passed, 245-150, with three abstentions.
 "We have prepared a bill that creates a civilized turnover of agricultural land," said Vyacheslav Volodin, head of the pro-Kremlin Unity faction after the vote.
 "We have protected our agriculture producer, the rural workers. Now we must wait and see how it will work."
 Russia has 221 million hectares of farmland, 137 million hectares of which have been privatized and are owned by 12 million citizens, according to government statistics.
 The 29-page bill approved Friday states that farmland must be sold or leased at "market prices" or at prices determined by an auction.
 The land must be used solely for farming.
 A single person or company cannot have more than 10 percent of the land in one region.
 Plots can be confiscated by a court if they are used for purposes other than farming or left abandoned.
 If a plot is sold by an individual, the first right of purchase belongs to the region or municipality, which effectively means its renationalization. The state also has the right to buy a share of commonly held land if other shareholders are not willing to buy it.
 Regions are left to decide the timing and procedures of sales and minimal size of a plot.
 Foreigners, people without citizenship and entities with more than 50 percent foreign ownership can only take out leases on farmland for up to 49 years.
 If a Russian company buys land and later increases its foreign ownership to more than 50 percent, it will be obliged to start leasing the land.
 Volodin hinted that foreigners may not always be limited to leasing land.
 "We may come back to this issue in five or six years, depending on how this law will be implemented, and foreigners may get the right to own land," he said.
 "But they must first prove that they have come as genuine investors," he said.
 Foreigners have insisted that the private ownership of farmland is essential for investment. However, at least one foreign company said Friday that it is satisfied with the bill that allows only leases.
 "We at Heartland Farms believe the correct way forward is to lease the land for a 49-year period with the option to purchase the land after a designated period, say five to seven years, and our project is structured around this principal," said Colin Hinchley, director of the British-based Heartland Farms, which plans to establish up to 80 British-run farms in the Penza region in the next five years.
 "This allows serious investors the security to develop the land and return it to full production," he said, adding that it creates employment and sales for support industries such as fuel, seeds, fertilizers, machine repairs and transport.
 Volodin said the Duma could pass the farmland bill in a third and final reading as early as this week. The Federation Council must then pass the bill before President Vladimir Putin can sign it into law. It would come into force six months after then being published in the official Rossiiskaya Gazeta.
 Aside from members of the four centrist factions - Unity, Fatherland-All Russia, Russia's Regions and People's Deputy, which lobbied hard for farmland sales but insisted on limiting foreigners' rights - no-one seemed to be pleased with what was approved and the way it was done.
 "What is taking place now is not only the rudest violation of law but also the preparation for battles over the division of land in every region, especially in the southern regions," Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov said, breaking his silence after the six-hour debate.
 The liberal Yabloko and Union of Right Forces factions spoke against the amendment to the bill that puts limits on foreigners, pointing out that the curbs were not included in the government-backed version that passed in the first reading.
 "Such an amendment shows investors that the authorities in this country are dashing back and forth and don't know what they want," said Yabloko's deputy head Sergei Ivanenko.
 The amendment was supported 366-6, with two abstentions.
 The Communists tried several times to push through an amendment of their own that banned companies with any foreign ownership from buying land.
 The head of the Duma's agriculture committee, Gennady Kulik, who chaired the debate, retorted every time that approval of the amendment would mean that a Russian farmer could not even be allowed to include a U.S.-built John Deere combine in its charter capital.
 The amendment was rejected, after getting only 134 votes.
 A dozen Kuban Cossacks wearing colorful black-and-red uniforms and medals were sent to a hall where reporters were watching the Duma session on television monitors. They napped during part of the land debate but sprang to their feet when Kulik and the heads of the centrist factions walked into the hall to give interviews to the media at midday.
 One of them, who called himself Mitrich, shouted at Kulik: "Were you born in Russia? Who decided to sell Russian land? I came here to say it is unacceptable! You democrats have already ruined collective farms!"
 Viktor Protsko, a lawmaker in the Krasnodar regional legislative assembly, complained that the Duma had not conducted a referendum on farmland sales.
 Kulik replied, "Please be quiet. No one is going to sell community Cossack land. They will be held in common forever by this law."
 Turning to Protsko, he said, "Look, you are the one who allowed the sale of your own land. Half of the land in your region has been sold off. Our [Duma Deputy Vladimir] Bryntsalov has purchased two vineyards - where have you been looking?"
 The Communists promised to organize protests in the regions in the near future.

TITLE: Film Rouses Anger With Brothel Allegations
AUTHOR: By Irina Titova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: In film portrayals of sea ports during wartime, the scene portraying the local brothel is a cliche. But plans by one Russian director to make a brothel the central focus of a film have angered Foreign and Russian World War II veterans and Russian citizens who lived in Murmansk during the war.
 
Alexei Uchitel, using a script written by director Alexander Rogozhkin - best known for his comedies "Peculiarities of National Hunting" and "Peculiarities of National Fishing" - is planning to make a film set in 1943 at the Murmansk International Club, which he says was operated as a brothel run by the Soviet authorities and serving the crews of the ships that carried Western aid to the Soviet Union during the war.
 Uchitel locked on to the idea of making the film after reading that the Soviet government had selected young women - Komsomol members - and set them up to work as prostitutes for the sailors from the United States, Great Britain, Canada and other countries that sailed into the northern port carrying "Lend Lease" aid.
 The club even picked up a nickname, the "Churchill Brothel," which is also, so far, the working title for the film.
 People who lived in or visited Murmansk during the period maintain that the whole idea is a vicious lie.
 "It's disgraceful," said Maria Vologdina, 84, who worked as an accountant in Murmansk International Club from 1942 to 1945, and now lives in Pushkin. "It's such a shame that Russians want to lie this way about ourselves, even if it's for the sake of an exciting movie."
 "I'm not denying that many foreign sailors paid a lot of attention to us. They brought us chocolate and other food, cigarettes and invited us to dance," she said. "They asked us out on dates and we invited them to our homes sometimes, but there was no brothel in the club."
 "For me, I can even give you my word that I never even allowed any of those admirers to kiss me," she said.
 The international clubs were organized in the three northern cities of Murmansk, Arkhangelsk, and Severodvinsk (then called Molotov) in 1942 and 1943, under the auspices of the All-Russia Society for Cultural Contacts with Foreign Countries.
 The clubs were intended to provide a place to rest for foreign sailors delivering military and strategic cargo to the Soviet Union over the stormy Barents Sea, exposed to the brutal cold and fascist bombings. The clubs held a movie hall that would seat from 30 to 40 people, and these halls were also used for dances, parties and theater performances. There was also a cafe serving better food than could be purchased in most spots at the time. When dances were held, the clubs would also invite young women working in the cities.
 Veterans of the foreign ships that came to the port say that portraying the clubs as brothels is not only unfair, but slanderous.
 "I can swear on my grandchildren's lives, that there was no brothel in the Murmansk Inter Club," said Terry Gilligan, who lived in Murmansk for a year from 1943 to 1944, in a telephone interview from England. "I'm very angry about this film's idea and, I tell you, if this man still makes the movie the way he wants, I'll have to talk to my solicitor," he said.
 Gilligan says that he should know that the planned movie portrayal is inaccurate, as he went to the club almost every day during the year he spent in Murmansk. "There was no other place to go to," Gilligan said.
 Eddie Grenfell, a former English Navy officer who served in the northern convoys, said that, although he had been to the Murmansk International Club a number of times, that was not the only spot the sailors frequented.
 "I also remember that when visiting another spot, the Red Army Officers Mess near Murmansk, we were allowed to dance with Russian girls, but not to develop friendships," he said. "Russian officers really watched us, so that we wouldn't do anything wrong. The girls whom we met there were often even afraid to talk to us."
 The nervousness of the young women was justified, according to Vologdina, as a number of young women who started relationships with foreign sailors were taken away, often to be sent to penal camps, after the war.
 Israel Levinson, a former pilot in the Russian Navy, said that the behavior on the part of the Russian women was not only due to fear. "One has to understand that at those times customs of the Soviet Union were very strict," Levinson said.
 According to Levinson, when he was in the club he saw about 15 young women, some working either as interpreters or waiters, while others were just guests. The number of sailors varied depending on the number of convoy ships in the port.
 For his part, Uchitel maintains that the general scenario for the movie is based on fact. "The basis of the film is a true story," he said in the telephone interview on Saturday. "You have to understand that many details come from the author's mind because it's not a documentary. But I know that institutions like this really existed. Because of this, I do believe the writer."
 Both Levinson and Vologdina said that there were cases when Russian women had serious relationships with foreign sailors and pilots, or even looked to cash in on their relative prosperity.
 "Thus, two of the English pilots I served with married Russian girls," Levinson said.
 Olga Golubtsova, a journalist from Severodvinsk, who has been investigating the facts behind the story, says that she didn't find any proof of the story's plot in Murmansk archives, although relationships between foreign sailors and Russian women did take place.
 Golubtsova, who spent seven years gathering information on love stories between Russian women and foreign sailors, and who later wrote an account of the period called "War Love in English," says that there is no need to reject the fact that those young people often fell in love with each other.
 Levinson said that sometimes it was obvious that some of the women were looking to get out of the Soviet Union.
 Vologdina remembered the case of two Russian women who dressed themselves in English Navy uniforms and managed to slip on board a British ship that was leaving for Great Britain. The young women were spotted and turned over to the Soviet authorities. One of them was sentenced to five years in jail.
 "I also remember how Englishmen boasted that they had spent good time with Russian girls, who invited them to their homes," Levinson said. "But, I tell you, there was no brothel in the club!" he said.
 Vologdina said that she wouldn't mind if the story was the writer's brainchild, and if the film-makers weren't claiming to be presenting a true story.
 While Uchitel said that he has seen no documents from the period or had contact with witnesses who confirm the brothel's existence, he says he strives for realism in his films.
 "My father worked as a camera operator all through the 900 days of Leningrad blockade, and I only want to show the truth in my films," Uchitel said.
 But even he is skeptical about whether one of the events in the screenplay really happened. In the film's final scene, the young women who worked at the club are loaded onto a tugboat, which is then sunk by a Soviet submarine.
 "This episode requires more research," Uchitel said.

TITLE: Officers Held Over Mine Attack
AUTHOR: By Oksana Yablokova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Six military officers have been arrested on suspicion of providing the land mine that killed 45 people - mostly soldiers - during Victory Day celebrations in the southern town of Kaspiisk, Deputy Prosecutor General Vladimir Kolesnikov said Monday.
 
Wrapping up an unusually swift investigation into the May 9 attack, Kolesnikov also said eight of 18 suspects detained in connection with the explosion have been charged and 10 suspects remain at large.
 Kolesnikov reiterated that the Prosecutor General's Office believes the attack was ordered by Rappani Khalilov, a Chechen warlord of Dagestani origin believed to be hiding in Chechnya. He said it was carried out by a well-trained group of rebels from Chechnya, who purchased the land mine from army officers stationed at a base near Kaspiisk. "In order to carry out the attack, the terrorist group purchased the MON-90 landmine, brought it to Kaspiisk and set it off as the column was marching past," Kolesnikov told reporters in the Dagestani capital, Makhachkala, Interfax reported.
 The mine, stuffed with scraps of wire and planted in shrubbery near the sidewalk, tore through a festive crowd with the force of 3 kilograms of dynamite as a military brass band marched by. Twenty-two people, including six children, died on the spot, and 110 were hospitalized. Twenty-three died of injuries in the hospital.
 Kolesnikov said investigators concluded that the mine had been stolen from an ammunition depot at Military Base No. 63354, located in the town of Buinaksk. 
 He said the six arrested officers include two of senior rank, one who is thought to have stolen the mine and the other who is suspected of selling it to the attackers.
 He did not identify the officers.
 The Defense Ministry refused to comment Monday.
 Kolesnikov did not give any details of the investigation, which was remarkably short and productive for investigators often criticized for their failure to solve a number of high-profile attacks in recent years, including the 1999 apartment bombings in Moscow and Volgodonsk that claimed about 300 lives. 
 Immediately after the May 9 blast, President Vladimir Putin ordered Federal Security Service chief Nikolai Patrushev to head the team of the investigators and told Patrushev to report directly to him.
 Prosecutor General's Office spokesman Leonid Troshin said investigators linked the mine to base No. 63354 by the fragments it left in its bloody wake.
 "The type of the explosive device was determined by the fragments found at the scene," he said in a telephone interview. "An inventory was taken and a shortage found."
 Cases of the theft of arms, ammunition and other military equipment from military bases are not new in the cash-strapped army. But the military has always been reluctant to acknowledge such incidences.
 Both Kaspiisk and Buinaksk have been targets of attacks over the past five years. Dozens of people have been killed, and investigations have yielded few results.
 In addition to the May 9 blast, Chechen warlord Khalilov is suspected of masterminding 15 attacks in Dagestan in the past several months.

TITLE: Burenin Review Seen As Political Maneuver
AUTHOR: By Claire Bigg
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The head of the St. Petersburg Audit Chamber, Dmitry Burenin, was to come before a board on Tuesday that was to assess his performance as Audit Chamber president.
 
But, while such revues are standard for the city's civil servants, Burenin says that his position is among the list of those automatically exempt from such procedures, and that the move on the part of Legislative Assembly Speaker Sergei Tarasov to have him undergo the review counters federal law.
 "By law, the head of the Audit Chamber belongs to a category that is not liable to examination. The governor and deputies, for instance, are included in this category," he said in an interview on Monday. "In addition, the three Legislative Assembly officials that are part of the board are being used unlawfully by Sergei Tarasov, and I, therefore, don't consider their presence on the board to be justified."
 The board that was to perform the review was to be made up of four deputies from the Legislative Assembly and another three assembly officials.
 While lawmakers such as the Legislative Assembly's vice speaker, Vadim Tyulpanov, say that "such examinations are standard procedure for civil servants and bear no political motivations," a number of lawmakers and analysts say that the procedure was aimed at bringing Burenin to heal, or even removing him from his post.
 The examination has also led some lawmakers to charge that Tarasov was acting in a manner counter to the chamber's democratic character.
 "I believe, along with everyone else in our faction, that Tarasov's decision was incompetent. The examination should involve the whole Legislative Assembly, or at least one deputy from each faction," said Mikhail Brodsky, the head of the Union of Right Forces (SPS) faction in the assembly. "Tarasov formed the examination board on his own, choosing deputies who are committed to him."
 According to Yabloko spokesperson Olga Pokrovskaya, the documentation for the examination was also strongly biased against Burenin.
 "I saw Burenin's evaluation, which is signed by Tarasov, and I can say that it was very tendentious. It contained a series of inaccurate accusations, such as that Burenin was unable to form a working team, even though this isn't even part of his duties," Pokrovskaya said. "Tarasov's behavior makes both himself and the Legislative Assembly look bad."
 The move against Burenin is just the latest phase in an ongoing battle between Tarasov and Smolny, on one side, and the city's Audit Chamber on the other.
 Burenin's examination comes six days after German Shalyapin, the deputy president of the Audit Chamber, was dismissed. Tarasov refused to sign an extension of Shalyapin's contract, although Shalyapin had served as president of the audit chamber from 1995 to 2001 and has been described by many as a highly competent specialist.
 "Shalyapin's dismissal is linked to the conflict between Tarasov and Burenin, which is the result of the Audit Chamber's negative analysis of the 2000 budget. Shalyapin was an excellent specialist," said lawmaker Leonid Romankov's assistant, Andrei Tomachyov.
 Shalyapin's ouster followed the introduction by lawmaker and head of the Budget Committee Sergei Nikeshin in March of a draft law that would reduce the Audit Chamber president's power, ease the conditions for his or her dismissal, and also control the amount of information the Audit Chamber can disclose to the public. Not all of Burenin's opponents are on the Smolny side, as some lawmakers resent the fact that the Audit Chamber reveals its findings as to how they use budget monies.
 "Tarasov, along with other deputies, resent Burenin for talking openly about the results of the audit chamber's investigations," said Lev Savulkin, senior researcher at the Leontief Center for Socio-Economic Research. "The Legislative Assembly would like to control the publication of this information."
 Burenin is credited by many with strengthening financial controls over the city administration after succeeding German Shalyapin as the head of the Audit Chamber over a year ago, which has provoked an angry response from Smolny.
 In March, the Audit Chamber inspected the Committee for Health Care, whose president, Anatoly Kagan, was subsequently dismissed. In April, following an inspection by the Audit Chamber, the prosecutor's office brought criminal charges against the head of the Finance Committee, Viktor Krotov.
 Burenin has locked horns with Tarasov, who is a strong supporter of Governor Vladimir Yakovlev, in particular, and says that he is presently considering suing him for publicly calling him a "provocateur" and accusing him of lying.
 Burenin has raised the administration's ire by maintaining that it has mismanaged large sums from the city's 2000 budget. According to Burenin, 1.5 billion rubles ($53.5 million at the time) from the regional road fund have been misused, and the Audit Chamber has not received any documents accounting for 1.2 billion rubles of this sum.
 As a result of Audit Chamber's investigations, the budget report for spending for the year 2000 has yet to be passed by the Legislative Assembly. 
 While a number of lawmakers feel that the move against Burenin is simply intended to get him to tone down his act, he and some other lawmakers think that it might be an attempt at something more severe.
 He says that, although he was elected by the Legislative Assembly for a four-year term and cannot legally be dismissed, Tarasov's actions are all part of a bigger plan to remove him from office.
 "I was told by the ;leadership of the assembly: 'Yes, the fact that you are being examined is not lawful, but you will end up spend six to eight months proving your innocence'" said Burenin. "I was told that I might not be able to regain my post after this, as the legislation could be altered while this process was taking place."

TITLE: Scientists Try To Highlight Underfunding
AUTHOR: By Kevin O'Flynn
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - A group of scientists began a 100-kilometer march to Moscow on Monday to protest against low pay and a lack of government funding.
 
Forty protesters set out from Pushchino, a small town south of Moscow known for its scientific institutes, in an attempt to draw attention to the chronic underfunding of science in the country and the low pay - even by Russian standards - of scientists.
 Organized by the Academy of Sciences trade union, the march will hold meetings in the towns of Chekhovo and Klimovsk on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively, before rallying at the White House at 11 a.m. on Friday.
 "The government does not value science," Anatoly Mironov, an official with the Academy of Sciences trade union said in a telephone interview. "The condition of science is especially worrying as it is not attracting young people."

TITLE: German-Russian Program Extends to the Philharmonic
AUTHOR: By Peter Morley
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: One hundred years after it was first installed in St. Petersburg, the organ at the Shostakovich Philharmonic is to be rebuilt, in a deal between the Russian and German governments, worth over 1.5 million euros ($1.45 million).
 
According to a protocol signed Saturday by the Russian and German culture ministers, the organ - which was originally installed in 1903 at the Ott Gynocological Institute on Vasilievsky Island - will be installed in time for the beginning of the concert season in fall 2004.
 The German government is to contribute 1.35 million euros to the project, with the other 235,000 euros coming from the Russian government. In return, Russia is to return the stained glass windows taken from the Marienkirche in Frankfurt-an-der-Oder at the end of World War II.
 The agreement is part of a program called "Russian-German Cultural Encounters 2003-2004" that has been set up by the Russian and German governments to fund restoration projects in Russia as part of the preparations for St. Petersburg's 300th-anniversary celebrations next year.
 According to Julian Nida-Rumelin, the German culture minister, the setting-up of the fund is a symbol of a deeper political movement.
 "What is more important is that we are beginning a new era of cooperation and friendship between the two peoples, Russian and German," he said at a press conference on Sunday.
 This new era was further demonstrated on Saturday, when the German government returning seven paintings, originally belonging to Russia, that had long been kept at the Museum of National History in Berlin.
 The return of the paintings, and the return of the Marienkirche's stained glass, "indicate a new political step in our relationship, which is noted in the protocol," said Denis Molchanov, Russia's first deputy culture minister, on Sunday.
 According to Interfax, four of the paintings were given to the palace in Gatchina, two to the Catherine Palace in Pushkin, and one to the Peterhof Palace.
 Yury Shvartskopf, the director of the Philharmonic, stressed the importance of the organ, calling it the "most meaningful gift for the city's anniversary."
 "From a cultural point of view, I think that there is no-one in St. Petersburg who has such close relations with Germany," he said.
 "For me, as a half German, this is even more pleasing," he added, smiling.
 The work on rebuilding the organ will be carried out by one of two firms - Kuhn, from Switzerland, and Klais, from Germany - that were selected from an original field of 14 that competed in an original tender, held under EU law in 1997. The final decision should be reached within the next month.
 The Philharmonic's organ was originally installed in 1903, as a project to mark St. Petersburg's 200th anniversary, on the initiative of Dr. D. O. Ott, a music-loving German practising medicine in St. Petersburg. The organ was installed by the German firm Walcker, which also installed organs in the city's German and Dutch churches, the Capella and the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory.
 In 1931, the instrument was moved to the Philharmonic, which, until that time, had not had an organ. Daniil Zaretsky, the organist at the Philharmonic since 1997, says that this was fortunate. "Unfortunately, at that time, many organs were simply destroyed," he said in an interview on Monday.
 In its new surroundings, the organ seemed to be too small and, therefore, it was decided at the end of the 1960s to rebuild it, and the Czech firm Rieger-Kloss was contracted to perform the work.
 "This was just after the events of 1968 in Prague," said Zaretsky, referring to the "Prague Spring," when the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia to reassert its authority.
 "Unfortunately ... the best masters from this firm, which wasn't very good in the first place, had left for the West, and so we had less-talented people doing the repairs," said Zaretsky.
 It was even more unfortunate, said Zaretsky, that Russia's top organ professor died in 1970, and there was nobody left to supervise the rebuilding, which was carried out in 1972. As a result, technical problems appeared almost immediately, and the sound quality of the new instrument was also poor.
 It was not until 1997 that a decision was taken to repair the organ, when an open tender was held under EU law to find a firm to repair the organ.
 However, the Philharmonic could not find funding for the project, and so approached the German government, through the German Consulate in St. Petersburg.
 "We understood that our ministry could not find this kind of money," said Zaretsky.
 "The Germans were interested in the project, as the organ here was German, and many of the organs in Germany are now also being restored," he said. "It worked out that the German culture minister took a decision to find the means for the restoration."
 The new organ will contain few of the original's parts, but will be rebuilt in the original style, said Zaretsky.
 "Only the parts dating from 1903 will be kept," he said. "Only around half of the pipes are original."
 The other parts of the organ - the remaining pipes, the keyboards and the internal workings - were all installed by the Czechs, said Zaretsky. The Czech parts will all be thrown away, he added.
 "The facade, which doesn't really suit the hall, will also be thrown away, and a new one put in," said Zaretsky.
 He added, "The Czech pipes are of very low quality. The technical filling was already getting old in 1972. Today it is completely outdated."

TITLE: Orderlies Quit Jobs Over Service Bill
AUTHOR: By Oksana Yablokova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - A controversial bill allowing alternative civil service, which the State Duma approved in the key second reading last week, dashed the hopes and efforts of a group of pacifists in Nizhny Novgorod who had been participating in an experimental alternative service project.
 
The young men, who had been serving as hospital orderlies, quit Thursday after the Duma voted a day earlier for a bill that did not count their work as a valid part of alternative service. The bill gives the army the right to decide where those seeking alternative service will work.
 The army said they will be drafted in the fall.
 Their boss, Galina Kratayeva, chief nurse at the Nizhny Novgorod Hospital of Emergency Medicine, said the 20 men had been of tremendous help over the past six months and will be missed.
 "They had taken on all of the difficult physical duties. It will be difficult for us, and we really want them back," Kratayeva said by telephone from Nizhny Novgorod on Friday.
 The young men began working in the hospital in January after Nizhny Novgorod city officials decided to set up the experimental project while they waited for parliament to approve an alternative service law. Taking orders from nurses, the men fed and washed patients, emptied bed pans, delivered bodies to the morgue and took out garbage.
 Each of them received a salary of 500 rubles a month, Kratayeva said.
 One of the orderlies, Yevgeny Nagornov, 26, said he was disappointed with the Duma's decision.
 "Since I was a teenager, I have always felt panic at the idea that I would be ground up by the state military juggernaut that turns everyone into a cogwheel and kills your individuality," Nagornov was quoted by the Los Angeles Times as saying.
 "We thought that there could be some use from this alternative service of ours,'' he said. "We thought that other people would notice our experiment and follow suit."
 Colonel Alexander Kozyrev, deputy head of the Nizhny Novgorod region's draft board, said the General Staff had demanded that the former orderlies be drafted in the fall.
 "The law on alternative service will only come into force in a year or in a year and a half, and I must fulfill this order by the General Staff to draft the conscripts," he told Interfax.
 After the bill is passed in a final, third reading by the Duma, the Federation Council and President Vladimir Putin must also give their stamp of approval. The legislation is expected to come into force in 2004.
 Nizhny Novgorod city officials announced they would fight for the young men's rights in court, saying their experiment was backed by the Russian Constitution, Interfax reported.
 Kratayeva said the hospital authorities were also ready to support the former orderlies.
 "We have nothing but good words to say about them, and I hope that they will be heard," Kratayeva said.

TITLE: Gazprom Seals Ukraine Transit-Pipe Deal
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: KHARKIV, Ukraine - Gazprom and Ukraine's state oil-and-gas monopoly Naftogaz signed an agreement Friday to transport gas across Ukraine, easing a decade-long dispute on gas exports.
 
The deal will give Russia the right to transit 110 billion cubic meters of gas through Ukraine every year from 2003 until 2013, and ends Kiev's defiant denial of any foreign access to its huge and aging pipeline system.
 "The conditions of the agreement envisage the transportation of at least 110 billion cubic meters of Russian gas on the territory of Ukraine every year," Ukraine's First Deputy Prime Minister Oleh Dubina told journalists in eastern Ukraine.
 "Prices and [several] other conditions should be settled in an agreement to be prepared before July 1, 2002," he said after a meeting between the countries' prime ministers.
 Russia supplies about a quarter of Europe's natural gas, 90 percent of which is transported through Ukraine.
 The deal, a breakthrough for Gazprom, shows Ukraine's desire to improve its image as a transit state to secure more gas to ship to Europe from Russia, Central Asia and possibly the Caspian Sea, analysts say.
 It should also ease Ukraine's energy supply worries as Ukraine receives gas in exchange for transporting Russian gas to Europe.
 Earlier this month, President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma signed a protocol calling for their governments to set up by August a joint venture between Gazprom and Ukrainian pipeline monopoly Naftogaz to manage pipelines.
 The venture will operate and rebuild Ukrainian gas pipelines and, later, invite firms from Germany, Italy and France, Europe's biggest consumers of Russian gas, to participate.
 German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder has also added the weight of the largest European consumer of Russian gas, signing a separate gas cooperation statement with Putin and Kuchma.
 The earlier spat between Ukraine and Russia had worried Western consumers about the reliability of supplies. But at the meeting, Gazprom failed to make headway on another problem of settling Ukraine's debts to the gas giant.
 Gazprom has repeatedly accused Ukraine of stealing gas from transit pipelines, never repaired since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, and has threatened to bypass Ukraine with a major line to Western Europe via Poland and Slovakia.
 Ukrainian debt to Gazprom for gas deliveries stands at $1.4 billion. The Russian giant has voiced the idea of exchanging debt against a stake in transit pipelines, but Ukraine's government and parliament have opposed the idea.
 Ukrainian Prime Minister Anatoly Kinakh and Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov were in Kharkiv to discuss plans for the gas pipeline consortium as well as ways to boost bilateral trade.
 "I am absolutely sure that we'll have the political will and professionalism to solve those problems gradually in the interests of our two countries," Interfax quoted Kinakh as saying.
 The two premiers said they hoped to boost bilateral trade between Ukraine and Russia, which dropped last year to about 60 percent of its 1996 level.
 Kinakh and Kasyanov approved a program for trade in aviation equipment and agreed to speed up work on the consortium.
 Kinakh denied speculation that Ukraine might sell parts of its pipeline system to investors. "Ukraine doesn't plan to privatize its gas transport system because this strategic object is a Ukrainian state asset," he said.
 Russia also agreed to provide a $44-million loan to Ukraine to complete two nuclear reactors at the Rivne and Khmenytskyi power plants.
 The reactors will compensate for power losses due to the closure of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Chernobyl, site of world's worst nuclear disaster in 1986, was closed down for good in December 2000. 
 <i>(Reuters, AP) </i>

TITLE: Duma Passes Second Reading of Draft Bankruptcy Law
AUTHOR: By Torrey Clark
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - With little debate, the State Duma late Thursday passed, in the crucial second reading, a draft of amendments to the 1998 bankruptcy law designed to end the use of the law as an asset-grabbing tool.
 
Deputies voted 188-82 for the bill - a key item on this year's structural reform agenda - that would increase protection of debtors from the current law's pro-creditor stance and give indebted companies the right to challenge claims in court, as well as pay off debts at any stage up to liquidation to end the bankruptcy process.
 In 2001, about 30,000 bankruptcy cases were filed in Russia, far fewer than in the West, but they were also far more likely to be part of an attack on the owners' property rights.
 &quot;As things stand, this central element in the overall defense of property rights, hence the quality of the investment climate, has been largely counter-productive in practice, since the beneficiaries have been corporate raiders and predators more often than creditors seeking good-faith remedies,&quot; United Financial Group said in a research note Friday.
 The draft, hotly debated on its way to the second reading, should also make it harder for just anyone to file a claim by requiring creditors to show they have already gone to court in an attempt to recover their money before turning to bankruptcy. The influential business group RSPP, or the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, lobbied to have the amendment included. The RSPP had demanded in April that the bill be returned to the first reading.
 However, the threshold for claims remains so low that it leaves most companies open to legal action, said Viktor Ovsyannikov, a corporate finance director at Ernst &amp; Young. The draft would double the minimum debt to 1,000 minimum monthly wages, or 450,000 rubles ($14,500).
 The draft would give secured creditors the right to veto auctions of assets pledged as collateral. Assets are now lumped together for sale, and the proceeds are split pro rata among the creditors, often accompanied by accusations of insider deals and rock-bottom prices. Furthermore, secured creditors may prefer the asset - whether a painting or a factory - over the fair value of that asset.
 The draft also promises stricter screening and selection processes for bankruptcy managers. The Federal Service for Financial Rehabilitation has been authorized to implement harsher criteria and exams from July 1.
 &quot;The problem is not the legislation but that licensed crisis managers, judges, and others involved don't have a strong understanding of finance, even something simple like the balance sheet,&quot; Ovsyannikov said.
 Other amendments include the right of shareholders to vote for or against the issuing of shares; the right of the state to vote at creditors meetings; and clarified financial rehabilitation measures that would allow companies to apply for a two-year rehabilitation period.
 No law, however, can solve the serious problem of poor financial controls at the companies themselves.
 &quot;In the majority of cases, the company would not have been hit with a bankruptcy case if it had noticed and fixed its problems early enough,&quot; Ovsyannikov said.
 Certain issues are to be addressed in separate laws, including the bankruptcy of city-forming enterprises, credit organizations and natural monopolies.

TITLE: Lawsuits Against PwC Thrown Out by Moscow Judge
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - A Moscow Arbitration Court judge has thrown out five lawsuits that minority shareholder activist William Browder filed against Big Four auditing firm PricewaterhouseCoopers.
 
&quot;We hope we're at the end of it,&quot; said PwC managing partner Richard Buski. &quot;These decisions are pretty definitive.&quot;
 Earlier this year, Browder, CEO of investment fund Hermitage Capital Management, asked the court to declare PwC's audits of gas monopoly Gazprom &quot;false and misleading.&quot;
 PwC officials say they stand behind their auditing of Gazprom's 2000 statements, as well as their examination of the relationship with Itera, a Florida-registered gas trader suspected of being owned by former Gazprom managers.
 Browder said he plans to appeal the judge's decisions all the way up to the Constitutional Court.
 &quot;Never since this controversy began has [PwC] addressed the substance of the allegations, nor has the court addressed whether their audits were correct,&quot; Browder said.
 The scandal surrounding the audits springs from a misunderstanding of the role auditors play, said Keith Rowden, head of PwC's Russian energy practice.
 &quot;Our role is to report on whether the company's financial statements are fairly presented,&quot; Rowden said. &quot;It's not to say whether management made good decisions or bad decisions. That's up to the shareholders.&quot;
 Last month, Gazprom's board of directors recommended that shareholders approve PwC as the company's auditor at their annual meeting, to be held June 28.

TITLE: Entrepreneurs Cater for Local Banya Fanatics
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Tyomkin
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: St. Petersburgers are in the habit of heading off to the banya with veniki - bundles of birch or oak twigs - in order to flog themselves, and each other, to their heart's content. Usually, the veniki are either home-made, bought cheaply at a market or obtained at the banya itself. The market is modernizing, however, and two entrepreneurs, Alexei Apukhtin and Vadim Novakovsky, have come up with an alternative, employing production line techniques in the manufacture of the humble venik. Founded only a year ago, their firm, Troitsa, is now producing tens of thousands of veniki a year and selling them through retail outlets such as Ramstor and British Petroleum gas stations.
 
The road to veniki has been long. Alexei Apukhtin, a qualified engineer, and Vadim Novakovsky, formerly a civil aviation pilot, went into business separately at the end of the 1980s. In the 1998 crisis, Apukhtin's chain of domestic-appliance stores went bust. He began to work for Novakovsky in the wholesale food business. This new venture, however, faired little better, and the two entrepreneurs were soon looking for a new direction. &quot;I always wanted something new and unusual. And something that could be totally my own,&quot; says Apukhtin.
 The idea of producing veniki came to the two entrepreneurs on their regular trips to the banya: why hadn't anyone tried using production line techniques in the manufacturing of veniki? 
 The founders of Troitsa believe that the banya is not just a simple means of having a wash. Instead, they see it as being massage, healthcare and socializing all rolled into one. &quot;The banya is a ritual, and the venik is one of the most important details in that ritual,&quot; says Apukhtin.
 Novakovsky and Apukhtin began visiting villages in the Russian countryside in order to study the nuances of this traditional banya implement. Nevertheless, despite the folk roots of the venik, they were determined to employ mass-production techniques. As a result, they were forced to invent their own tools for manufacturing, such as a simple clamp to make the venik handles with and a spindle for applying the twine that binds it all together. 
 The creation of the humble venik, it transpired, is a complex process involving 15 separate production stages. The harvesting of the raw materials for the most popular birch-twig bundles begins at the end of June. According to aficionados, the twigs have to be collected in the space of a month, with their thickness being a maximum of 3mm. In fact, this tradition has pagan roots - it was once believed that trees were at their strongest at this time of year. The venik must then be dried, out of the sun and free of damp, for three weeks. The entrepreneurs decided to package the goods in canvas bags and specially-shaped cardboard boxes, &quot;so that customers understand that this isn't just something that's been dragged off a bush,&quot; comments Apukhtin. 
 Production was set up in the town of Okulovka in the Novgorod oblast, with locals employed in their &quot;down&quot; time, when planting has already been completed and the berry-picking season has yet to begin.
 Problems were encountered, however, in the distribution of the new product. At first, Apukhtin and Novakovsky intended to sell them directly at banyas. &quot;Traditionally, veniki have been a lucrative sideline for banya attendants and they didn't want to let us onto their territory,&quot; says Apukhtin. 
 To find new outlets, the two mentried distributing them through retail stores such as St. Petersburg's Maxidom hyper-markets, Moscow's Ramstor and British Petroleum petrol stations. They soon discovered that their products were in demand. In St. Petersburg alone they are now distributing at 30 outlets, where they have set up their own Troitsa stands. St. Petersburg accounts for about half of their sales, the rest being made up by Moscow, Pskov, Novgorod, Arkhangelsk and Rosto-na-Donu. In addition, the veniki are sold as souvenirs to foreign visitors. 
 At first, Troitsa concentrated on &quot;elite&quot; birch veniki, selling them at about 180 rubles. The company is now trying to offer the same veniki, without the expensive packaging, for 70 rubles, in order to compete with the veniki sold directly at banyas at the lower end of the market. For the time being, &quot;elite&quot; veniki account for about 75 percent of Troitsa sales, though it's hoped that this figure will be reduced to 50 percent by the end of this year with an increase in sales of the more modest line. 
 The firm is also planning to expand into the production of oak and lime veniki, as well as the &quot;all-seasonal&quot; evergreen eucalyptus. The eucalyptus twigs are bought in bulk in Abkhazia and imported all year round. &quot;It's a 'woman's' venik,&quot; says Apukhtin. &quot;It's softer and more aromatic.&quot;
 The entrepreneurs are not keen on revealing the volume of their sales, though they admit that they have already more than covered their original investment. 
 They also have plans to widen the range of their products to banya hats, banya gloves, towels and other accessories. They have also decided to publish a small book on the rules and etiquette of the banya. &quot;It all centers on the venik. The venik is like a train dragging us into this niche market,&quot; says Apukhtin.

TITLE: Has Joining the WTO Been Thought Out?
AUTHOR: By Victoria Lavrentieva
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - While World Trade Organization General Director Mike Moore was saying Thursday that Russia was making &quot;significant progress&quot; toward joining the global trade body, other delegates at the sixth annual St. Petersburg Economic Forum were wondering what membership will mean, exactly.
 
Moore said that talks currently under way in Geneva between government representatives and the WTO are &quot;going well,&quot; and reiterated his belief that Russia would be granted membership by the end of next year.
 Moore said on Wednesday, the opening day of the four-day forum, that the biggest obstacle Russia has to overcome is reforming its agricultural sector. Several WTO members are insisting that Russia stop export subsidies on agricultural products as a condition of membership.
 In addition to resistance abroad, there is growing concern domestically that the government has not done its homework properly regarding exactly what the consequences of membership will turn out to be.
 &quot;The Russian government does not yet have a thorough analysis and forecast as to what complications and ramifications joining the WTO will bring for the real sector of the economy,&quot; said Vladimir Gusev, a Federation Council senator who is also deputy of the economic-policy committee of the State Duma's upper chamber.
 Gusev's criticism is well-founded for a number of reasons. 
 Gusev said that although the government has set up a special office to handle inquiries regarding changes that will be brought about by Russia entering the WTO, it has so far failed to produce a comprehensive report detailing how each of the country's 89 regions will be affected.
 Gusev said it isn't even entirely clear what the government's goal is in its current negotiations with the WTO or what will be the precise conditions of membership.
 &quot;Unawareness is greater in the regions than in the center, and I think the government should do more to explain what WTO membership will mean to ordinary people,&quot; he said.
 President Vladimir Putin has made WTO entry on standard terms a key plank in his economic platform, and Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov told the forum Wednesday that integrating into the world economy is &quot;the main current economic priority for Russia,&quot; the largest economy still remaining outside the WTO.
 Georgy Petrov, the deputy chairperson of the Russian Chamber of Commerce, said that, while there was little doubt among the vast majority of producers that Russia should join the WTO, several items remain unclear. The main problem, he said, is that the legislative reforms that will be required for membership have yet to be worked out, such as the passing of a new Customs Code.
 Petrov said the State Duma will have to pass at least 20 new laws, including one covering external trade policy, in order to qualify for membership. &quot;The negotiations with the WTO are probably the toughest Russia has ever gone through, and we don't have enough grounds to base our position on,&quot; he said.
 The decade-long talks on Russia's entry to the WTO gained momentum under Putin, who has made membership a priority, and were given further support when finance ministers at a meeting on June 14 in Halifax, Canada, backed Russia's attempts to become a member of the organization. In a joint statement, they said that WTO membership would work as a catalyst for further reforms in the Russian economy.
 Speaking at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum, First Deputy Economic Development and Trade Minister Ivan Materov said that, while there will be some teething problems with being in the WTO, they will not have any major insignificance in the long run.
 &quot;All these worries remind me of Y2K, which people expected to threaten the whole world, but in the end, no one noticed the change in dates,&quot; Materov said. &quot;I think that WTO accession will be the same way for most people in Russia.&quot;

TITLE: Cabinet Raises Rates For Power, Gas and Railways
AUTHOR: By Alla Startseva
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: In an effort to keep inflation in check, the Cabinet agreed last week to let Gazprom, the Railways Ministry and Unified Energy Systems hike their prices, but not by as much as the natural monopolies had hoped.
 
Starting July 1, domestic-wholesale-gas prices will jump 15 percent, the cost of shipping by rail will rise 6.8 percent and wholesale-electricity rates will nudge up 2.4 percent.
 Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref was quoted by news agencies as saying the new tariff levels would allow the government to meet its inflation corridor of 12 percent to 14 percent for the year. Gas and electricity prices have already been allowed to increase some 20 percent this year.
 &quot;Taking into account seasonal factors, this will be possible because inflation may be below zero in the summer months,&quot; Gref said, adding that the Central Bank would have difficulty managing inflation in the second half of the year.
 Thursday's decision was generally expected and in line with statements made earlier in the week by President Vladimir Putin, who urged the government to be cautious on tariff hikes, which he called a very &quot;sensitive&quot; issue for the country's economy, Prime-Tass reported.
 Gref said the government's 2003-inflation forecast would remain unchanged at 10 percent to 12 percent and that his ministry was recommending that Gazprom be allowed next year to raise its prices 20 percent, UES 14 percent to 16 percent and the Railways Ministry 12 percent to 14 percent.
 UES was the most disappointed with Thursday's decision.
 For Gazprom, 15 percent was less than hoped for, but a source within the company said it was satisfied, Interfax reported. The Railways Ministry also got less than the 7 percent to 10 percent it was asking for. But for UES, &quot;an increase of 2.4 percent will definitely not resolve our financial problems,&quot; UES spokesperson Andrei Yegorov said.
 Electricity tariffs have more influence on inflation than those for railways or gas, Gref has said.
 While Russian gas and electricity prices, which lag behind those in the West by roughly 30 percent and 50 percent, respectively, must grow eventually, any increase has a very significant effect on the economy, said Oksana Dynnikova, natural monopolies specialist at the Economic Expert Group think tank.
 &quot;The competitiveness of producers depends on the level of tariffs,&quot; she said.
 Vladimir Tikhomirov, an economist at NIKoil, said that while the decision was expected, it showed that the government's priorities are wrong.
 He said that when an economy is going through structural reforms, as Russia's is now, an inflation rate of 20 percent is normal. But the natural monopolies are not being allowed to charge enough to cover their expenses.

TITLE: Changes Needed To Catch Up in the IT and Software Market
AUTHOR: By Larisa Naumenko
TEXT: MOSCOW - With its wealth of computer programmers and solid reputation for scientific study, Russia has the potential to emulate some of India's success as a center for offshore software development. To achieve this, however, a lot will have to change.
 
It was during the twilight months of communism in 1991 that computer programmer Arkady Dobkin formed a small software company in Minsk. He then emigrated to the United States with plans to develop the business in his new homeland, but in December, the Soviet Union collapsed and so did the ruble, and Dobkin's firm of 25 people found itself out of action.
 Dobkin quickly got back to work, teaming up with a specialist he knew from Minsk to start up Epam. Today, the firm employs 350 people - although 50 of them are in its U.S. offices, all of Epam's software developers are located back East (250 in Minsk and 50 in Moscow), making it an offshore outsourcing company.
 Epam now provides IT services to a number of international corporations, including Colgate-Palmolive, SAP AG and Halliburton Co. The company was selected as a finalist for research firm Aberdeen Group's Offshore Outsourcing Best Practices Report, published earlier this month.
 &quot;For me, it's the business of my life,&quot; Dobkin said.
 With Epam's sales of $9.5 million in 2001, the company seems to be a successful part of Russia's growing offshore software development market, but it's more than that. Epam accounts for one-sixteenth of the total offshore programming market in Russia, which is tiny in comparison with India and China.
 Russia's software outsourcing market had total revenues of just $154 million last year, according to Market-Visio/EDC research group.
 India, meanwhile, is expected to gain $8 billion this year from the sector, up from $6.2 billion in 2001, according to the country's National Association of Software and Service Companies, or Nasscom.
 The sector accounts for 16 percent of India's exports. Although almost half the size, China's software development market still pulled in $3.5 billion in 2001.
 Offshore software development, so far, comprises a small percentage of Russia's $3.2-billion information technology sector, which accounted for a tiny 1.16 percent of gross domestic product last year, according to UBS Warburg.
 And while Russia's offshore programming market is expected to grow at a rate of 50 percent per year and reach $348 million by 2003, according to Market-Visio/EDC, the demand for outsourcing IT services by corporations from the United States and Western Europe alone is expected to increase by 40 percent. Offshore outsourcing will soon make up 28 percent of companies' IT budgets, according to Forrester Research, and the number of offshore IT workers worldwide is expected grow from 360,000 now to more than 1 million in 2005.
 It is now that Russia's IT companies should act to find a niche in the worldwide market, industry insiders say, but first they must solve some of the problems facing the sector.
 
 
Size Does Matter
 
Most of the country's software companies are relatively small. Only 31.3 percent of companies in Moscow, 13.6 percent in St. Petersburg and 15.4 percent in the regions had revenue of greater than $3 million, said Market-Visio/EDC.
 
The majority of the companies in St. Petersburg and the regions had annual revenues less than $750,000 and more than one-third of Moscow-based software companies did not cross that mark.
 &quot;It's hard for Russian firms with staffs of 100 people each to compete with Indian teams of up to 1,000 employees in offshore programming,&quot; said Andrei Sviridenko, CEO of Spirit, which specializes in licensed software.
 &quot;Russian companies need to grow to be able to compete with Indian companies. Small companies do not produce the impression of stability,&quot; Dobkin said.
 
Image Problems
 
Russia's poor image abroad is another factor hurting the development of the country's offshore software companies, market players said.
 
&quot;[Russia] is perceived by many as having an unstable economy and political situation, along with corruption and crime,&quot; said Alexander Yegorov, general director at Reksoft, a St. Petersburg-based company that recently signed a deal to produce software for Swisscom Mobile AG.
 &quot;When my sales people talk to a potential customer, they can spend 60 percent to 80 percent of their time selling Russia versus selling my company,&quot; said Andrei Konev, vice president at St. Petersburg-based Digital Design. Konev has worked with IBM, General Motors, Tetra Pak and other multinationals.
 One of the ways companies can solve this problem is by setting up representative offices in countries with a large number of potential customers, industry players said.
 &quot;To find and keep international clients you should be on their side and speak their language,&quot; said Dmitry Loshchinin, managing director at Luxoft, one of Russia's leading software companies. &quot;That means, at least, representative offices in the client's country, and reliable partners in their countries that can handle what is called matchmaking.&quot;
 &quot;Often a big company without a U.S. office thinks that, by sending a manager to the United States for a couple of weeks, it will be able to get a contract,&quot; Epam's Dobkin said. &quot;You can't work like that, you need to have real communication.&quot;
 A lack of teamwork also hinders many software companies, and many rely solely on the abilities of individuals.
 &quot;We have a low level of management and insufficient culture of teamwork in software development,&quot; said Boris Pozin, director of the consulting and information systems development department at IT Co., a provider of business integration systems. &quot;There's this idea that all programmers are geniuses and not team players. Indians are more modest and earn money through team work.&quot;
 A lack of management is another weakness in the Russian software industry, Pozin said. &quot;We always have everybody in the field working, and nobody has time or money to take care of organizing work and its quality,&quot; he said.
 &quot;Companies rarely suggest that their clients include a separate budget for managing projects,&quot; he added. &quot;They should, and regular clients will agree to that. They will be surprised if companies don't do that.&quot;
 
 
Ranks and Taxes
 
Few Russian software developers have international certification and they rank low on international systems used to gauge the efficiency of a company's software development process. There are currently two such systems: one is administered by the Swiss-based International Organization for Standardization, the other is the U.S.-based Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute's Capability Maturity Model.
 
Russia has one company with the highest CMM level of five and two companies ranked at four, according to the Software Engineering Institute. Meanwhile, there are 46 Indian companies with level-five CMM and 28 level-four CMM.
 There are 69 companies with level-five CMM and 73 companies with level-four worldwide.
 &quot;The more ISO and CMM-certified companies there are in Russia, the faster we will be able to strengthen our position on the international market,&quot; said Taras Netrevozhko, development manager at Moscow-based Diasoft, which provides software products for finance companies.
 &quot;One of the main problems is a lack of government support in tax legislation and customs regulation,&quot; said Alexei Sukharev, president of Auriga, one of Russia's leading providers of offshore services.
 The Indian government has played an important role in bringing India to its current leading position in the offshore programming market, he said.
 The Economic Development and Trade Ministry drew up a list of initiatives in October 2001 to improve the IT sector, including the creation of tax-free zones for IT companies and tax holidays and other breaks.
 However, the ministry said in May that more research into the industry is required, to determine what offshore software development can bring to the economy and the government.
 &quot;The government should understand that software exports could very quickly become a significant part of the income to the country's budget,&quot; Reksoft's Yegorov said.
 &quot;At the moment, IT and telecommunications don't exceed 1.5 percent of the entire export volume.&quot;
 
 
More Than Just Science
 
Another major problem facing the Russian IT sector is a lack of proper education in information technology.
 
Russia has been praised for its high level of education in the sciences, and about 50 percent of all Russian students are enrolled in science-related programs, according to the American Chamber of Commerce. But only 250 out of some 1,000 higher education institutions train IT specialists, according to Microsoft Research.
 The number of students in IT-related programs does not exceed 100,000 out of a total of 3.5 million students. Annually, only 10,000 specialists in the IT field graduate from colleges and universities out of 186,000 that do have some basic IT preparation.
 &quot;The government should start caring more about the reorganization of the education system as a whole and the preparation of software developers in particular,&quot; said Igor Agamirzyan, head of relations with research institutions at Microsoft Research in Eastern Europe.
 Russian universities offer an IT education solidly based in fundamental science, and gifted children are sought out for training in specialized schools. St. Petersburg State University won the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest two years in a row, in 2000 and 2001.
 However, IT training programs in Russia do not conform with international standards, Microsoft Research said, and the quality of training is relatively low. A lack of teaching staff and insufficient number of graduating IT specialists, especially programmers, are other problems, Microsoft Research said.
 Furthermore, no Russian university teaches an Association for Computing Machinery or IEEE-Computer Society &quot;Computing Curricula 1991,&quot; a commonly accepted curriculum in IT fields.
 
 
Joining Together
 
To solve the industry's problems, companies themselves agree that they most join together. The national software-development association, Russoft, was formed in September 2001 and now unites 50 Russian and Belarussian companies employing 5,000 software developers out of an estimated 30,000 programmers working in the two countries.
 
&quot;Our goal is to turn from an industry of small individual companies into an industry of serious mature businesses that will be successful competitors in the international market,&quot; Russoft President Valentin Makarov said.
 The association is often compared to India's Nasscom, which has more than 870 member companies and makes up more than 95 percent of revenues in the country's software industry.
 Russoft's tasks include maintaining ongoing dialogue with the government in an attempt to create better conditions for operating IT businesses and promotion of the industry abroad. &quot;The association will represent the interests of the entire Russian IT industry in the West,&quot; Makarov said.
 The group helped organize the U.S.-Russia IT round table that took place in Moscow in May as part of a visit by U.S. President George W. Bush. The association will participate in a working group that was created at the round table to foster cooperation between Russian and U.S. IT companies.
 It is difficult to enter highly competitive international markets, Makarov said, but to do this, Russoft organized two outsourcing summits in St. Petersburg in 2001 and 2002 to help draw attention to the Russian IT market.
 About 450 participants from 30 countries gathered at the Second Outsourcing Summit in St. Petersburg earlier this month to discuss current issues in the industry. The summit also offered a chance for potential customers in the West to find partners in Russia. &quot;We came up with the idea of the summit to help consolidate the industry,&quot; Makarov said. &quot;Potential customers could see what Russia's technological opportunities are.&quot;
 Russoft members could also use the association as a way to save money on training specialists and getting necessary international certification.
 Although the need for such an association has been understood by many players in the IT market for a long time, Makarov said that there were some difficulties when Russoft was first formed. &quot;Companies were cautious about each other because they thought each member would use the association only in the interests of their own company,&quot; Makarov said. &quot;There was no mutual trust.&quot;
 The situation is much better now, he said. &quot;People have come to understand that companies need not fight against each other - they need to fight together.&quot;
 Russian graduates of MBA programs in leading U.S. universities formed an organization similar to Russoft in January. The Russian Digital Alliance focuses on helping Russian companies enter the U.S. software-products and IT offshore-outsourcing markets. RDA also hopes to mitigate the worries of U.S. companies that are considering partnering and outsourcing with Russian companies.
 &quot;Russian companies need to have a clear development strategy to be able to enter American and European markets,&quot; RDA president Vadim Kapustin said. &quot;There should be more people who can think strategically, who can divide the market into niches and see in which niches Russians can compete with Indians and in which ones it's already too late.&quot;
 RDA was formed by &quot;a group of enthusiasts&quot; to help the Russian IT industry mature into an important part of the country's economy and to promote the interests of Russian companies, Kapustin said. &quot;We invest our time in business opportunities.&quot;
 Russian IT companies are good value, but U.S. companies are still unaware of what the Russian IT market has to offer, Kapustin said. &quot;If you ask an ordinary American what Russia has, he will say, 'Oil, gas and the Mafia.'&quot;
 The RDA is planning to organize events to increase awareness among U.S. businesses. Meanwhile RDA's ambassador programs will search for U.S.-based representatives for Russian IT companies, and Russian graduates of U.S. MBA programs could fill those positions.
 
 
The Right Path
 
There is no doubt that the Russian software industry has the potential to develop into a major part of the country's economy, and experts are now concerned about how the industry should evolve.
 
One development model, called the Indian model, focuses on pure offshore programming, or selling individualized services to Western companies. The second, often referred to as the Israeli-Scandinavian model, focuses on developing licensed software.
 One inherent problem in Russia, said Spirit's Sviridenko jokingly, is the creativity of individual programmers.
 &quot;What they consider right may not be what they have been ordered [by a client] to do,&quot; he said.
 Spirit was founded in 1992 and used to specialize in offshore services. The company switched to licensed software products in 1999 and has worked with NEC, Nortel Networks and Samsung Electronics.
 Last year, Spirit partnered up with Texas Instruments, a designer of digital-signal processors. Spirit software will be used in TI processors used for cellphones, pagers, modems, soundcards, digital cameras and other equipment.
 Sviridenko said that companies need to target global markets and specialize, finding the right product niche. &quot;The necessary condition for success is to enter the market with a professional partner, and it's even better if it's the world leader in the chosen product niche,&quot; he said.
 Alex Freedland, CEO of Mirantis, a U.S.-based company that specializes in providing offshore technology development centers, said Russian IT companies should focus on the software product model.
 &quot;We are counting on big Western companies gradually entering Russia as the market and skilled staff shortage grows, not with the small projects that the current IT industry in this country is based on, but to open their development centers for long-term perspectives,&quot; Freedland said.
 Russian IT entrepreneurs could learn how to successfully run their businesses at foreign companies' development centers and then set out on their own and promote their own licensed-software products, he said.
 Several such development centers already exist in Russia. Motorola opened a software development center in St. Petersburg in 1997 that became a part of Motorola Global Software Group in 1999. Its 200 employees develop software for cellular-network equipment and microprocessors and microcontrollers. The center cooperates with the city's universities to train IT specialists.
 Another international IT major, Intel, opened a development center in Nizhny Novgorod in spring 2000. The center currently employs more than 200 specialists, and the number is expected to grow to 500 in the next few years. Russian students can apply for internships at the center.
 Cadence Design Systems, which supplies electronic design automation products, methodology services and design services, earlier this year opened a development center in Moscow together with Mirantis. The two companies support the training of 20 specialists a year at the Moscow Institute of Electronic Technology to eventually work at the center.
 Mirantis' Freeland believes that such centers and licensed software are the future of the country's software development industry, and that the industry should steer away from individualized-software solutions. &quot;Russia doesn't have a chance in offshore programming and never will,&quot; he said.
 However, Digital Design's Konev disagrees, saying that growing demand in the software solutions market allows for Russian businesses to find their niche.
 &quot;You can't come up with ready solutions for everything, and this is why customer-specific software development will always exist,&quot; he said. &quot;[Digital Design] is gradually moving from services to products, but we do not consider it necessary to force this process.&quot;
 A combination of the two models is the best, Reksoft's Yegorov said. &quot;I don't understand why they have started to oppose these two business models,&quot; he said. &quot;It's easier for offshore services companies to enter international markets because this model requires significantly lower investments, and one successful project leads to another one.&quot;
 &quot;The market is very diverse and the companies that can perform the required services or make products on demand survive and even become profitable,&quot; said IT Co.'s Pozin.
 Which path the country's software companies should take is still up in the air, RDA's Kapustin said. &quot;We think the market will show where the demand is and what segment Russians are particularly successful in.&quot;

TITLE: U.S. Growth on Shaky Ground
AUTHOR: By David Friedman
TEXT: If the U.S. economy is growing at anything like the 5.6 percent annual clip reported last quarter, why are U.S. stock markets sagging and economic confidence still shaky? Corporate accounting skulduggery, and fear of terrorist attacks are commonly cited reasons. But the real problem is more fundamental: Nobody seems to know how the economy will generate new and sustained wealth. The least productive sectors - government, health-care and education services - are driving the economy, while entrepreneurial industries and manufacturing languish. In the absence of at least a plausible fantasy about the &quot;next big thing&quot; that will ignite the private economy, investors are uncertain about what the public sector's accelerating expansion means for the United States' economic future.
 
During the 1980s and early 1990s, the U.S. economy transformed itself from an aging, uncompetitive has-been into a beehive of industrial ingenuity, as large companies split up into more entrepreneurial units. After the recession in the early 1990s, the Internet and the newly emergent &quot;digital age&quot; reinvigorated the industrial transformation. To be sure, new-economy hype and Wall Street excess eventually masked the nation's more fundamental economic development. For years, however, U.S. entrepreneurial creativity and highly effective industrial reorganization were the engines of wealth-creation. From 1994 to 1998, nearly 12 million jobs were created. About 4.6 million of them were in goods-producing sectors - manufacturing, construction, business services and trade. Government, health-care, and social and education services added just 2.4 million jobs.
 Virtually none of these trends, nor any newer, more promising ones, can be discerned in today's economy. Over the last four years, wealth-producing manufacturing, business services, construction and trade industries steadily declined, losing more than 700,000 jobs. Manufacturing employment alone fell by 11 percent, the sector's second-worst decline since 1939. Business services, which produced 2.3 million jobs from 1994 to 1998, rose by only 800,000 from 1998 to 2002, roughly matching the expansion in education, social services and health care.
 But wealth-consuming sectors - government, state-supported social and education services and health care - grew even more rapidly between 1998 and 2002, despite the most recent recession. These sectors grew by more than 3.2 million jobs, one-third more than from 1994 to 1998, and constituted 60 percent of U.S. total employment growth. If growth in retail employment is factored in, an astonishing 80 percent of total U.S. job growth since 1998 has been in wealth-consuming sectors, compared with just 35 percent from 1994 to 1998.
 These trends show few signs of abating. In the last quarter, government and related services added 220,000 jobs, while manufacturing, construction and business services shed 300,000. So the first-quarter report of 5.6 percent annual growth is a bit misleading. Aside from the fact that such reports tend to magnify any one quarter's performance, the nation's seemingly robust growth mainly reflected the continuing expansion of public and closely aligned sectors.
 All this undercuts more hopeful interpretations of recent developments. The U.S. manufacturing decline, for example, is often downplayed as natural. As countries mature they shift from making widgets to designing software. This change might inconvenience workers in the doomed sectors, but, over time, they will find more rewarding jobs .
 Such beliefs were plausible from 1994 to 1998, when business-service employment was booming. As millions of jobs in technically demanding work - programming computers, setting up communications systems, for example - were created, business services offset slower growth or job losses in manufacturing. 
 But when manufacturing went into a tailspin in the later 1990s, the business-service growth that powered the healthiest phases of the decade's boom slowed too. Rather than supplant manufacturing, business-service enterprises depended on healthy factories, which, after all, were among their biggest clients.
 Worse still, service-sector expansion began shifting from the private to the public. In 1994-98, engineering, management, film and business services, all of which are private-sector wealth-producing activities, accounted for more than half of the growth in U.S. service employment. During the next four years, however, they generated just one-third of total service growth. 
 It's hard to imagine how service-sector expansion can play a role in wealth creation if growth in, say, manicurists exceeds that of engineers. Growth in service jobs appears to be increasingly dependent on government spending, a connection not normally correlated with sustainable wealth creation.
 The economy is also suffering from nervousness about the public sector's fiscal solvency. The dramatic expansion of state and local government jobs and functions over the last few years has produced billions of dollars in red ink. The federal budget might soon follow suit, depending on its response to last year's terrorist attacks.
 Government planners hope that the private economy will soon recover, allowing tax revenues to rise, funding all of this public expansion. But what if they don't? What if continued public spending, and possibly large-scale deficits, slow the recovery?
 There are many examples of public spending burdens crippling economies. Japan's high-growth period, for example, was once the envy of the world, but stalled in the early 1990s when the nation's real estate bubble burst. The Japanese government repeatedly tried to spend its way to a recovery, but only succeeded in amassing a huge public deficit. 
 No one has suggested that the U.S. economy is heading toward anything like a similar fiscal meltdown. Yet neither has anyone painted a convincing picture of how growth in the public sector can lead us to a new era of prosperity when the manufacturing economy is rapid decline. 
 Until U.S. economic growth is more balanced and its emerging public finance challenge more manageable, it's likely that our economic prospects will fail to fire investors' and consumers' enthusiasm. An expanding public sector might be necessary at a time of global terrorism. We'll soon learn whether it can also choke off the economic development necessary for sustained prosperity.
 
 <i>
David Friedman is a fellow at the New America Foundation. He contributed this comment to the Los Angeles Times. </i>

TITLE: The Market Can Defeat Administrative Resources
TEXT: &quot;A sexual revolution has taken place in Russia - the organs have seized power.&quot; This old chestnut from Soviet times gulped down an elixir of youth and got a new lease of life recently. The &quot;organs&quot; have definitely seized the RTR television company with the appointment of Lieutenant General Alexander Zdanovich to the position of deputy chairperson of VGTRK.
 
Up to now, Zdanovich, as top FSB spokesperson, had been performing an important function in the national economy. With each and every freshly killed field commander or liberated hostage, Zdanovich would pop out, like a cuckoo from a cuckoo clock, with a statement about the FSB's &quot;brilliantly executed special operation.&quot;
 After which, it would normally transpire that the hostages - as in the case of Kenneth Gluck - had escaped themselves, or that the field commander had been shot by a 7-year-old boy avenging the death of his father.
 Zdanovich, thus, on a daily basis, effectively did his best to convince the public of the FSB's incompetence. So when people like Boris Berezovsky started talking about an FSB operation to blow up several apartment blocks in Moscow, it sounded convincing for about as long as it took Zdanovich to open his mouth again on television - as soon as the lieutenant general started talking, any idea that the FSB was capable of performing an operation more complicated than bugging a telephone was immediately banished from people's minds.
 One of my friends in the FSB recounted that: &quot;In the 1970s we were tracking a dissident. Every day we wrote reports, wasted a load of gasoline. And then a verification commission arrived and uncovered that the suspect had died half a year before.&quot;
 But this individual case is not the real point. The point is that, in Russia, an organization that is cruel, closed and unaccountable by definition cannot be effective.
 Take, for example, the SORM regulation (System for Operational-Investigative Measures) that was published two years ago. The regulation states that all internet providers are obliged, at their own expense, to install equipment that has been certified by the Federal Agency for Government Communications and Information allowing the security services to monitor all e-mail traffic.
 What a fuss was kicked up. And what came of it? Absolutely nothing. Providers simply don't bother to adhere to the SORM regulations. The plead: &quot;No money,&quot; and that's all.
 In general, communications have always been under the unofficial patronage of the chekists. In this respect it is worth mentioning the holding company Telekominvest, which has shares in almost all St. Petersburg telecom companies and a controlling stake in which was purchased by First National Holding, an unknown Cypriot offshore company.
 What a panic erupted among mobile phone providers when Telekominvest top managers were appointed to just about every vaguely important post in the telecommunications sector - from telecommunications minister to CEO of Svyazinvest! And then, not long after, Telekominvest started expanding at break-neck speed.
 For example, two companies - MTS and Telekominvest - wanted to buy Krasnodar-based KubanGSM. MTS made an offer, and Telekominvest offered about one quarter of that sum. However, for some reason, the top managers of KubanGSM were under the impression that if they didn't sell to the right buyer, then Telecommunications Minister Leonid Reiman would have their license revoked.
 And what happened? MTS won. Because administrative resources are still not everything. Brains and money are sometimes more important.
 So, back to the spetssluzhby. They really are capable of a great deal: shooting, imprisoning, spying on people. We know for sure that they are good at listening. But the question is, can they read?
 <i>

 Yulia Latynina is a journalist with ORT and a columnist for Novaya Gazeta. </i>

TITLE: Creative Accounting the Final Nail in the Coffin of Extended Bull Market
AUTHOR: By James Pinkerton
TEXT: So, Arthur Andersen has been convicted, Dennis Kozlowski of Tyco has been indicted, Samuel Waksal of ImClone has been arrested, and even his friend Martha Stewart has become embroiled in an insider-trading investigation. And now the U.S. Justice Department is examining Enron for criminality. It shouldn't be too hard to find something even more rotten in Houston.
 
So what should one conclude about the stock-optioning, creative-accounting culture of today's corporations? Is everyone a crook?
 No doubt more legal violations will be found, but the average investor is more likely to be affected by the breaking of another rule: the reality of market history, the financial equivalent of the law of gravity. Put simply, investors have been getting away with murderous winnings in recent years, and such gains could never have continued. Indeed, the next few years could see portfolios getting murdered.
 On Aug. 12, 1982, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 776.90. Over the next 19 years, the Dow would increase 14-fold, closing at a peak of 11,175.80 on June 5, 2001. But already, gravity's pull was being felt.
 In March 2001, investment strategist Mark Rostenko had predicted that the then-temporary downward correction in the bull market was in fact the beginning of a bear market. He based his analysis on the price-earnings ratio of stocks in the Standard &amp; Poor's 500 index. The historical P/E ratio since 1926, he noted, was 16. That is, share prices were 16 times the per-share earnings.
 Fifteen months ago, when Rostenko was prophesying, the S&amp;P P/E was 21 - which is to say it was abnormally high. Indeed, he continued, the two great bull markets of recent decades, 1949-1966 and 1982-2000, both began when the P/E ratio was between 7 and 8. So, at a 21 P/E ratio, the market was bumping up against its historical peaks, not down against its historical troughs. Therefore, Rostenko concluded, prospects for continued upward movement were dim.
 What's happened since? Stock prices have fallen, but earnings have fallen too, and so the P/E ratio remains at 21. By this reckoning, the market still has nowhere to go but south. It's always possible, of course, that conditions will change for the better. Productivity gains from information technology might pump up profits. Yet market jitters over war and terrorism seem to be canceling out that boon. Indeed, if stocks were to drift down to merely their historical average P/E ratio, the market would fall by another fourth.
 So, another pile of shoes still to drop are the Guccis worn by Wall Street &quot;Masters of the Universe.&quot; On the long bulling upward, idols of investment were worshipped, such as Peter Lynch of the Fidelity Magellan Fund or Abby Joseph Cohen of Goldman Sachs. But now comes the disillusioning reckoning. Assets managed by Janus Capital, for example, jumped from $30 billion in 1995 to $330 billion in March 2000. Today, Janus' assets have shrunk to $159 billion.
 And there's probably more such shrinkage ahead. Stagnant markets show a basic fallacy of investing: most fund managers can't beat the overall performance of the market. Smart as money mavens might be, few can outsmart the globalized market. John Bogle, who beat the averages during his 50 years on Wall Street, calculates that over those five decades, mutual funds lagged 1.8 percent per year behind the S&amp;P index.
 So what's the answer? According to Bogle, it's &quot;indexing.&quot; That is, buy stocks or funds that mirror the market, and then sit tight as the market goes up and down. Indexing doesn't leave much room for sages and seers of course, but their aggregate stock-picking record hasn't justified much faith.
 But what about Wall Street corruption? It's good that prosecutors will be nailing crooks, but it's doubtful that politicians will have much to offer, except red tape and press releases. Why? Because the top-down bureaucratic culture of Washington gives politicians little feel for the risk-taking nature of globally competitive hyper-capitalism.
 And for most Americans mindful of their financial future, the real problem is that the bull market of the 1980s and 1990s is over. Government-imposed &quot;reforms&quot; won't make Wall Streeters smarter, nor investors richer, as the overpriced market bears back down to historically normal levels. Unless, of course, it really dips. And who should be indicted then?
 
 <i>
James Pinkerton is a columnist for Newsday, to which he contributed this comment. </i>

TITLE: Younger Journalists Offer Future Hope
TEXT: Editor,</i>
 Recently, the U.S. State Department sent me on a five-day speaking engagement in Moscow to deliver a series of presentations to government press secretaries, reporters, leaders of national political parties and journalism students. The World Bank Institute and Press Development Institute hosted the programs where I was to address such topics as the importance of a free and independent press, the responsibilities and ethics of a press officer and the relationship between the government and the press in America.
 
Just like a lungful of Moscow air makes you realize how much progress we've made in environmental protection in America, fielding questions from any of these audiences makes you realize how far we've come since the days of Peter Zenger's New York Weekly Journal and the United States' nearly 300-year tradition of a free press.
 To the press secretaries, I stressed just how important it is to be responsive and to welcome the adversarial relationship between a governor's spokesman and the press.
 &quot;Laying out in detail your policies and programs and fielding the toughest questions a reporter can throw at you is one of the most effective ways you can publicize and promote your initiatives,&quot; I told them. &quot;If your programs can't stand the scrutiny of a reporter, they'll never stand the scrutiny of the voters.&quot;
 That was a foreign concept to the press secretaries. Their bosses got elected without the help of a free press. &quot;Didn't need a free press then, don't need one now,&quot; was the operating mantra.
 Many see nothing wrong with the established practice of political leaders or their parties owning newspapers. If they need coverage, that's where they'll get it.
 The press secretaries were astounded to be told that former New Jersey Governor Christine Whitman, for whom I served as chief spokesperson, regularly held two or three public events or press availabilities each day. Their bosses participated in news events only when they absolutely had to, perhaps once or twice a week.
 When told of Whitman's difficulties attracting television news coverage out of New York or Philadelphia, the flacks asked why we didn't just buy a station.
 Clearly Pravda is history, but it's going to be a while before officeholders embrace a free and independent press in the former Soviet Union.
 Older reporters with whom I spoke saw themselves and their newspapers as extensions of the political elite. Many of the established reporters continue to embrace the idea that paying for news coverage was an acceptable practice. 
 Sharing the podium with Anna Politkovskaya, the war-sharpened correspondent from Novaya Gazeta whose passionate reporting of the war in Chechnya earned her personal hardship and worldwide praise, showed me that the new generation of Russian reporters are indeed committed to writing the stories straight, with an enormous commitment to personal and journalistic ethics. 
 Unfortunately for those reporters and their readers, their newspapers and television stations are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. But to the 120 journalism students at Moscow State University for the Humanities, Politkovskaya is an icon and an inspiration. The students understand that their most precious assets are their ethics and their belief that a free press is fundamental to democracy.
 I told them that, despite the whining of politicians who may not be receiving the most flattering news coverage, the government and the press are in the same business - to bring about positive social change.
 U.S. politicians and editors may regularly differ on just what positive social change is, but our shared goal is to make our world a better place to live, work and raise a family.
 The idealism of Russia's next generation of journalists is refreshing. Though many will be corrupted by the conventions of established post-Soviet journalism, many will not.
 The next generation of Russian journalists will tell the truth, and probably live. They'll be backed-up by the unfettered flow of information on the Internet. Their readers, like the readers of many U.S. newspapers, will expect and demand the truth. They will know the truth when they see it, and know it when they don't. 
 The future of a prosperous Russia requires a free and independent media. Until Western investors can rely on the information they glean from Russian newspapers, dollars and euros will be slow in coming to the free markets of the former Soviet Union.
 When public opinion and public policies are shaped by news reports delivered by editors, reporters and publishers who answer to a calling higher than personal enrichment, true democracy will be realized in the new Russia.
 Though in the past 10 years our friends in Russia have come a long way toward a free press, they have a long way to go. Fortunately, with the idealism of their students and the growing influence of an Internet that knows no boundaries, they'll complete their journey.<i>
 Peter J. McDonough Jr. 
 Pennington, New Jersey</i>
 
 <strong>
It Could Backfire</strong>
 <i>
In response to &quot;Land Bill Set To Pass Second Duma Vote,&quot; a June 21 story by Yevgenia Borisova.
 </i>

 <i>
Editor,</i>
 With regard to restricting sales of farmland to foreigners, it may interest you that during the 1980s and early 1990s a similar question was raised in my home state of Illinois. At that time the worry was of the Japanese and, to a lesser extent, the Arabs buying rich Illinois land. 
 
In the end, no laws were enacted and, indeed, they probably would have been ruled unconstitutional. The few foreigners who did invest did so at greatly inflated prices; they were &quot;out bargained&quot; by our local farmers.
 By the mid-1990s, all of the farmland in question was no longer in foreign hands, having been repurchased by our local farmers at greatly reduced prices. The free market worked as it invariably will if left alone.
 <i>John Naylor
 Bloomington, Illinois</i>
 
 <strong>
Zhirinovsky Go Home</strong>
 <i>
In response to &quot;Foreigners Go Home,&quot; a brief by The Associated Press on June 14.
 </i>

 <i>
Editor,
 </i>I was provoked to write this rather unforgiving letter upon reading Vladimir Zhirinovsky's remarks that people from Asia and Africa need to go home and that Russians are a civilized people.
 
I have lived in Russia and understand the country and psyche very well. I am always amused to hear Russians desperately trying to convince themselves that they are civilized and European. Then they go off and riot after losing a match, attack and kill innocent and defenseless foreigners on the streets, butcher civilians in Chechnya, spread their cancerous business practices to neighboring countries, or simply descend in their droves on the Middle East and Turkey to prostitute themselves for money. Russian women are known throughout the region for their despicable morals. 
 No civilized country does this, and civilized people have a certain dignity and knowledge of their place in the human race. 
 <i>Sanjeev Singh
 Parsippany, New Jersey
 </i><strong>
 
Putin and Willows</strong>
 <i>
Editor,
 </i>I have a mid-ranking belt in the sport of judo, so I was pleased to learn that President Vladimir Putin has a black belt in judo. It might be of interest to interview Putin and ask how the philosophy of judo has shaped his diplomatic and governing style.
 
Judo is more that a sport - it is an attitude. To illustrate that, the world center of judo, the Kodokan, in Japan, has as its symbol the willow leaf. The idea is that in judo, like the willow tree in windy weather, one bends instead of giving stiff resistance like the large but shallow-rooted oak tree, which might fall over.
 By taking the force and direction of the opponent and using it to your advantage, one succeeds over a larger and stronger opponent. The physics of judo - levers, acceleration - are quite complex and interesting. 
 I wonder if Putin has had opportunities to be able to finesse his political relationships to his country's advantage thanks to his judo training. It would be an interesting interview, and no doubt a good way of getting people around the world who are avid judo fans to know a little more about Russia.<i>
 Terry Bowen
 Sacramento, California</i>
 <strong>
Open the Borders</strong>
 <i>
In response to &quot;Kaliningrad Hard Line Is Bound To Backfire,&quot; a June 18 comment by Pavel Felgenhauer.
 </i>

 <i>
Editor,</i>
 I was amazed when I read Pavel Felgenhauer's comment.
 
A reasonable request by Russia to allow Russian citizens to travel between two points of Russian territory without visas - as they have already done for many years - has apparently been refused by Europe. This is an encroachment on Russian sovereignty and the rights of Russians in a supposedly democratic new Europe.
 Imagine if Canada started requiring visas for Alaskans to travel to the mainland of the United States? What kind of response would the United States give to Canada or the British Commonwealth?
 It appears that the new rights of the new European Union members are coming at the expense of Russia. And Pavel Felgenhauer's position is incomprehensible to me, since he is a citizen of Russia and is willing to sacrifice his own rights, by effectively calling the Russian position of non-visa passage unreasonable.
 Now Russians need European permission to travel within their own territory. Great! What's next?
 <i>
Igor Biryukov
 Boston, USA</i>
 

 <i>
Editor,</i>
 Having been a resident of Kaliningrad for many years, I can understand the Russian leadership's concern over the future introduction of visas. Between Kaliningrad and mainland Russia there is quite a significant movement of people. Let me remind you that Kaliningrad is one of the major Russian tourist destinations on the Baltic Sea, and that between Kaliningrad and major Russian cities there are several trains running daily.
 
Introducting visas would further complicate the transportation to and from this poor region. Throughout the article it becomes clear that the author doesn't understand all the troubles it might bring. Moreover, he blames Russian officials for their firm stance on the problem.
 Nobody wants to invade anybody. Russia should defend its interests and the constitutional rights of its citizens, so that they can move throughout the country, visa-free.
 Just think about the tens if not hundreds of thousands of relatives visiting family in the Kaliningrad region annually. I'm sorry, but should I, a Russian citizen, have go to the Lithuanian consulate if I want to visit my parents living in Kaliningrad? Not under any circumstances!
 <i>Dmitry Bulgakov
 Moscow</i>
 
 <i>
Editor,</i>
 The only way to resolve this kind of problem is to tear Russia apart. Countries can no longer afford to be big without being strong. And yes, the uncompromising vows by our leaders will again lead to national humiliation. The cherished recollections of former imperial times, when we could send our tanks to many parts of the world, now do us no favors.
 
They prevent us from being honest with ourselves: We are no longer strong, and our resistance to NATO and EU expansion proves to be ridiculous.
 This is basically at the root of the issue - and the Kaliningrad spat is only one of the many repercussions.
 I would recommend that our government leave the Kaliningrad region for the Europeans. As compensation we could annex a small territory in the Baltics, adjacent to our borders.
 This way we would eliminate the echo of perennial East-West antagonism, although the root of the problem will only die with the Soviet generation.
 <i>
Sergei Kuzin
 Moscow</i>
 

 <strong>
Give It a Chance</strong>
 <i>
In response to &quot;Subcontinent a Chance To Strengthen New Ties,&quot; a June 18 comment by Ian Bremmer.
 </i>

 <i>
Editor,</i>
 Ian Bremmer's article is far too pessimistic. Presidents Bush and Putin not only have a close, warm working relationship, with mutual trust. Recent polling in the USA shows that over 64 percent of citizens now have a relaxed, trusting, and favorable view of Russia and all things Russian. However, a similar poll mentioned in same article I read here recently shows Russian people only have a 25 percent favorable rating of the US and our government. Better government-to-government and people-to-people relationships are apparently needed inside Russia.
 
Russia has a right to regional differences of opinion, but all of us who belong to the United Nations have a duty to support and uphold the now over 50-year-old free and independent Israel.
 President Bush has been in the vanguard of efforts for a parallel free state of Palestine, but the terrorists in the Middle East seem hell-bent on destroying every effort at peace and nation building in and for Palestine, which surely you in Russia must know, see on television, and read of daily. 
 Regarding Iraq and Iran, President Putin's assistant recently wrote an article here in The Moscow Times stating that Russia's number one concern with Iraq was continued repayment of past debts owed the old Soviet Union, now Russia, for past arms sales and related matters. He went on to say that Russia should have in place, now, a policy to accept and deal with any future government of Iraq, on the basis that the remaining debt owed today's Russia by Iraq would continue to be paid. This should be doable under any circumstances.
 The fact that the governments of both Iran and Iraq foment and finance terrorism in the Middle East should not be lost on Russia, as some of the same funding seems to be going to the Chechen Muslim rebels and terrorists as well.
 It is a major mistake to think that &quot;all&quot; Americans or our government are condemning of the Chechnya terrorist war Russia has long been forced to wage. Since Sept. 11, 2001 many eyes are opened to the deeper meaning of that conflict. I have noted an editorial bias in The St. Petersburg Times, however, that seems to be opposed or negative toward the Chechnya crisis, and think you all owe it to yourselves to see things clearly and not be befuddled by do-gooder notions vs. murderous terrorism.
 <i>
George Lightfoot Singleton
 Birmingham, Alabama </i>

TITLE: Russia's Long March to a Win/Win Position
AUTHOR: By Sir Roderic Lyne
TEXT: IN his recent and spellbinding book &quot;Across the Moscow River,&quot; former British Ambassador Sir Rodric Braithwaite warns of the perils of judging Russia. Pushkin's friend Prince Vyazemsky (Braithwaite recalls) remarked that if you want a foreigner to make a fool of himself, just ask him to make a judgment about Russia.
 
Russia loves to be mysterious. Russia is unique. Russia, as Russians love to say, has its own &quot;spetsifika,&quot; its own rules. However, after centuries of mostly standing apart, Russia has now made the choice to join the world. A recent opinion poll showed that a remarkable 52 percent thought Russia should seek admission to the European Union, with only 18 percent opposed. The decision to integrate is warmly supported by Russia's friends and partners. But implementing it, getting from here to there, requires us to get better at talking to each other, and trusting each other.
 We are in the midst of a flurry of summit meetings, which demonstrates how dramatically Russia's place in the world has changed in a few years. From being part of the problem to being part of the solution. From being a country in economic distress to one which is reversing capital flight and attracting investment - a country whose relative stability and economic growth (although not as fast as it would like) compare favorably with the volatility in many other emerging markets.
 The language of partnership is now commonplace. &quot;We are partners and we will cooperate to advance stability, security and economic integration, and to jointly counter global challenges and to help resolve regional conflicts,&quot; said Presidents Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush on May 24. They committed themselves to &quot;a relationship based on friendship, cooperation, common values, trust, openness and predictability.&quot;
 These are sentiments to which any of Russia's Western partners would subscribe. Is this just words, another &quot;detente,&quot; a Potemkin village of international diplomacy? Self-evidently not. Russia and Western countries, with others, are working in unprecedented ways to counter terrorism. In sharp contrast to days gone by, Russia and the West find themselves on broadly the same side on the world's major issues - for example, on Afghanistan and the Middle East; in working to reduce tension in South Asia; in opposing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the spread of the drugs trade, and threats to the environment; and in seeking freer trade.
 So our interests now align, we sit at the same tables (from the G-8 to the NATO-Russia Council and in due course the WTO), we cooperate. Russia wants to integrate. The West wants to integrate. What's still to be done?
 The answer, I think, is not what we expected to find. It is communication and culture (with a small &quot;c&quot;). In the Cold War, Russia and Western Europe had opposing political and economic systems, but thought they shared the same European cultural tradition. Now the burial of our political and economic differences has exposed a wider gap than we appreciated in our mindset and behavior, in our cultures - not in the sense of Shakespeare and Chekhov or Repin and Rembrandt, but in our ways of relating to each other and of doing business.
 In his book, Braithwaite comments on some of these differences. &quot;Human relationships in Russia,&quot; he writes, &quot;have an intensity which they lack in the more orderly West. Foreigners can be admitted at least in part to these relationships: Russians are embarrassingly generous with their time and their few possessions, in a way which is wholly uncharacteristic in the West.&quot;
 We may live inescapably in the world of global economics, but no sane person wants to homogenize culture and lose the richness of national traditions. However, for our partnership to succeed, we need to play the same game by the same rules on the famous &quot;level playing field.&quot;
 Let me illustrate this in two areas - business and foreign policy. A U.S. businessperson said to me the other day that, in order to succeed in Russia, he had had to unlearn everything he had learned in America. Sergei Witte, Russia's prime minister just over a hundred years ago, expressed a similar thought: &quot;I am not in the least afraid of foreign capital, since I consider it is in the interests of our country. What I am afraid of is just the opposite, that our way of doing things has such specific characteristics, so different from the way things are done in civilized countries, that not many foreigners will want to do business with us.&quot;
 We are now in an age when foreigners clearly do want to do business with Russia, and Russians with foreigners, but they are still having to learn how to do so. Sometimes to their cost, foreigners have to learn that in Russia trust is based, as Braithwaite suggests, on the human relationship - on knowing the individual, not relying on paper information. Russian companies that seek foreign investment or go to the stock market in London or New York have to learn the opposite: They are required to disclose information, and produce track records of audited accounts, in a manner alien to the tradition of guarding information closely for fear of what an opponent might do with it.
 Attitudes to the rule book contrast. The capitalist free market, with all its imperfections, only works if most of the people abide voluntarily by most of the rules most of the time. &quot;Voluntarily&quot; is the key word. As the stock market turmoil triggered by Enron shows, the system runs into trouble when companies play fast and loose. Russia is still building up the sets of rules and regulation to govern the market that elsewhere have been developed over a hundred years or more. The habits of voluntarily paying taxes, or respecting the rights of shareholders, or separating business from government, are having to be grafted in. Communism developed in Russians a genius for finding ways around the rules of an oppressive state. Restraining the instinct to take advantage of a loophole or an illicit opportunity comes hard. In Pushkin's words, &quot;bylo by koryto, a svinyi naidutsya&quot; - when there's free food around, the snouts will find the trough. This shows in the paradox that Russia is a country of exceptional personal honesty that nevertheless has acquired an international reputation for the exact opposite in business deals. Banks and institutions that grant personal loans, mortgages and consumer credit to individual Russians report a default rate far lower than in the West - indeed close to zero; but charts like Transparency International's &quot;Corruption Perceptions Index&quot; put Russia down near the bottom. There is a clear trend toward better corporate governance. Carrying this through will be a vital ingredient for Russia's success.
 One other area seems to me to hold the key to Russia's future competitiveness: her ability to liberate the talent and initiative of the rising generation. The next generation needs to be encouraged to believe in Russia's future, and to take the initiative to shape it. Initiative is developed by giving people responsibility. A belief in strong leadership is common to the business cultures of Russia and the West; but the idea of delegating responsibility is not, yet.
 Business partnerships are gathering speed. How about the partnership in foreign policy?
 Russian students of international affairs love to quote Lord Palmerston's dictum that countries don't have permanent friends, only permanent interests. I am wont to respond with the anecdote of Prince Metternich's reaction, at the 1815 Congress of Vienna, to the death of the Russian ambassador: &quot;I wonder what his motives were.&quot;
 If we are confident, as I am, that our interests lie in the same direction, we need to shake off the habit of nervousness about each other's motives.
 A lasting business partnership has to be based, not on &quot;zero/sum,&quot; but &quot;win/win.&quot; The same is true in international relations. The mentality of the Cold War was, necessarily at the time, zero/sum. This led to aggressive and hugely wasteful competition between East and West around the globe - in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, Asia; and, above all, in an unsustainable arms race.
 The competition has gone, but the mentality lingers on. One sees this when people argue &quot;concessions&quot; must be matched and traded - the language of opponents rather than partners. Or when forces are maintained against threats that no longer exist. Or, especially, in the addiction which some still have in both West and East to the outdated concept of &quot;zones of influence&quot;: the language of Yalta, 1944, not of 2002.
 The threats and challenges we now face - whether international terrorism; or weapons proliferation; or organized crime, the drugs trade, epidemics, migration flows, barriers to trade; let alone environmental degradation and global warming - transcend zones and do not respect national boundaries. The majority of the world's conflicts are within states, not between states.
 The world has moved on. What matters now, not only here but in the West, is making a success of Russia's redevelopment over the next generation as a prosperous, competitive, secure democracy, integrated into the global economy. In 1914, Russia - industrializing rapidly, and groping towards parliamentary government - had the world's fourth largest economy. A Russia using her human and natural potential to move again toward that position will be a huge benefit to her partners in Western Europe and elsewhere: win/win.
 
 <i>
Sir Roderic Lyne is the British ambassador to Russia. This comment, contributed to The St. Petersburg Times, is based on lectures given in a personal capacity to the Moscow Higher School of Social and Economic Studies and the Moscow School of Political Studies. </i>

TITLE: Unhealthy Prejudice Running Riot Again
AUTHOR: By Matt Bivens <i>
TEXT: &quot;President [George W.] Bush told Americans today to exercise more and to eat less, and to stop using drugs, tobacco and excessive amounts of alcohol. The 55-year-old president, a teetotaler who can bench press 185 pounds for five repetitions and run a 6:45-mile for three miles ... held himself up as an example. ... He added that he expects the same of his staff. ... On Saturday, the president is to participate in a three-mile run in Washington ... About 400 members of the Bush administration have signed up for the same run, and the question among some of the fittest staffers is whether they should finish before the president or allow him to win.&quot;
 </i>
- The New York Times, June 21
 
 
WASHINGTON - Just five months earlier, Vladimir Putin put much the same plea before the Russians: they should exercise, it's good for them.
 
Then, the Western media pounced gleefully. The New York Times report said Putin's suggestion, and the way in which the political elite stood and saluted, told &quot;a tale about the Russian condition - not just physical, but psychological and political ... The scramble [by politicians] to fulfill Mr. Putin's will - comical to some, depressing to others - has resonated far beyond Russian playing fields. It has provoked a debate about the national character, the wisdom of imposing change from above and even the president's commitment to democracy.&quot;
 So, in Russia, when the president does something as innocuous and common-sensical as urging people to take responsibility for their health, he is instantly and viciously mocked by the Russian press, which drew all sorts of knee-jerk &quot;remember how the Communists made us do jumping jacks&quot; parallels; and in the West, this series of events is seized upon as evidence that Putin is not a democrat.
 Yet in the United States, when the president urges people to take responsibility for their health, it's an opportunity for that same press to assert proudly (and without attribution) that George Bush runs a brisk three miles.
 In Russia, when the suck-ups around the president wonder how fast to run at his heels, it's &quot;comical to some, depressing to others,&quot; and resonates far and wide. In America, the same subject is treated with the gentlest of understated humor.
 Here are some things that have happened recently in the United States: the Justice Department jailed a journalist for 168 days because she had conducted her own investigation into a Texas murder but refused to surrender to police her notes and sources; a nuclear reactor in Ohio developed a fist-sized rust hole that came within 3/8ths of an inch (one centimeter) of a disastrous loss of pressurized coolant; the Bush administration reaffirmed Washington's commitment to helping North Korea build a nuclear reactor; the government has detained, without charges or trial, more than 1,200 non-U.S. nationals since Sept. 11; the Justice Department installed blue curtains at headquarters to hide the bare breasts of a large aluminum sculpture.
 Any one of these things, had they happened in Russia, might have prompted ironic or indignant musings about national characters, or the nature and viability of democracy. But not here.
 In Russia, when a biographer sucks up to the president, it's headlines. In America, when the Topps baseball card company issues &quot;Enduring Freedom&quot; trading cards - split evenly between gushing about our leaders and our military hardware - then that's just something we get for the kids.
 
 <i>
Matt Bivens, a former editor of The St. Petersburgt Times, is a Washington-based fellow of The Nation Institute [www.thenation.com]. </i>

TITLE: Global eye
TEXT: <p><b>Southern Cross
</b> So who's next on the Bush team's hit list? Beside Iraq, of course. It's abundantly clear that the Chickenhawk-in-Chief and his corporatic cronies will be slapping hot iron all over Saddam Hussein just as soon as the poll numbers are right. The whole saucy crew has been on a sustained propaganda offensive for weeks, methodically preparing the public to accept the wholly un-American notion of aggressive war. Those droopy invertebrates known as Congressional Democrats are already on board, so it's body bags for Baghdad any day now. Collateral damage, here we come!
 
But we all know that the Righteous Runner-Up has a broader vision for the world. A world in which no banker has to go to bed hungry - or even slightly peckish - in any of the homes he or she owns. A world in which no multimillionaire corporate trough-feeder - like, say, the treasury secretary, the defense secretary, the secretary of state, the secretary of the Army, the national security advisor, the White House chief of staff, the president and vice president of the United States, etc. - has to sacrifice even one single penny of unearned profit to clean up the land and air they have despoiled with their noxious evacuations. A world where bribery, tax evasion, capital flight, money laundering, false accounting and fraud are protected by law and rewarded by government. A world where the manufacture and use of even the deadliest weapons have been loosed from the profit-choking constraints of international treaties and sworn agreements. A world where even the poorest women - or rather, only the poorest women - are free to die in a pool of their own blood, liberated from an enervating dependence on basic health care in childbirth, all to serve the maniacal misogyny of religious extremists allied with unelected rulers. A world in which every government has the power and duty to strip away the outmoded and unproductive regulations that once protected its natural resources, its national economy, its working people, its poor and elderly, its schools and hospitals, its way of life, even the very air that it breathes and the water that it drinks from unfettered exploitation by small bands of predatory elites.
 It's a bold and far-reaching agenda, this quest to remake the world in the image of a profoundly ignorant pipsqueak frat boy and his fellow barons in the New Feudalism that is engirdling the earth. But President Pip has publicly committed the full might of the United States to this cause; he certainly won't be content with just mopping up the Iraqi mess left behind by the feudal baron whose title he has inherited.
 So who will next feel the glint of his - dare we say it? - global eye? Well, if you're the betting type, you might want to lay some good money on Brazil, the largest jewel in the Bush family's traditional fiefdom of Latin America. It seems those southern silly-billies have drawn the ire of the Great White Father in Washington - and his paymasters on Wall Street - by giving the presidential candidate of the (gasp!) Workers' Party a 20-point lead in the polls.
 At the moment, Luis Ignacio da Silva - or &quot;Lula,&quot; as he is universally called - is thrashing the candidate of the ruling right-wing coalition, which has been hobbled by a series of - what else? - corruption scandals. Lula is leery of Bush's proposed pan-American &quot;free trade zone,&quot; which would subject the entire hemisphere to the &quot;Washington consensus&quot; cult of Enron-style &quot;deregulation,&quot; Chubais-style &quot;privatization&quot; and the NAFTA-style &quot;liberation&quot; of powerful business interests from national laws governing commerce, zoning, the environment, even the judiciary.
 Instead, the Workers' Party wants to increase public investment in the national infrastructure - such trifles as sewers, roads, education, health and small-scale agriculture - while lowering interest rates to help the country's ailing industrial base, a move backed by many Brazilian business leaders and long-term foreign investors. The party's &quot;moderate and efficient&quot; administration of the local and state governments it already controls has been praised by that Bolshevik terrorist tract, The Financial Times.
 But all this is so much tinkling brass to the Bush Regime and its cream-skimming cronies. Infrastructure? Sewers? Get real. All they want are high-interest yields on sweetheart deals pimped for them by government bagmen. (That is the textbook definition of &quot;globalization,&quot; isn't it?) And - oh yes - slavish devotion to the foreign policy dictates of His Pipness. It seems that here, too, Lula falls short: he favors &quot;an independent foreign policy&quot; - i.e., he might want to pay a visit to Cuba sometime, just like Jimmy Carter.
 So when Lula began soaring in the polls, the White House went to work, through its proxy armies on Wall Street. Major firms (and Bush donors) like Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and Merrill Lynch took time out from their various Enron entanglements and criminal investigations to sniffily downgrade Brazil's investment rating - citing Lula's potential victory as the reason. The move - derided as a mistake by the Financial Times and others - sent the Brazilian stock market tumbling, destroying millions of dollars in local investment.
 This economic terrorism by the Bush regime is just the opening salvo in a dirty war that will doubtless continue until the October election. The regime may have fumbled its first attempt at a foreign coup - the ham-handed farce in Venezuela - but Brazilians should take little comfort in that. As we saw in November 2000, when these boys set their minds to it, they know how to gut a democracy.
 
 <i>
For annotational references, please see Global Eye in the &quot;Opinion&quot; section at www.sptimesrussia.com </i>

TITLE: Dollar Falls As Markets Back Euro
AUTHOR: By David McHugh
TEXT: FRANKFURT - The euro rose sharply against the dollar Monday, topping $0.98 in a rally that economists say is fueled by doubts about the greenback and U.S. stock markets.
 
The shared currency reached 98.13 cents in morning trading in Europe, then slid back just below $0.98. The last time the euro was that high against the dollar was in February, 2000.
 The euro, which was trading around $0.87 just 11 weeks ago, reached $0.9705 on Friday but had fallen back to $0.9687 in early trading Monday before the sudden spike of more than $0.01.
 Economists say the shift in exchange rates is driven more by pessimism about the dollar than by new confidence in the economies of the 12 countries that use the euro.
 Economist Michael Schubert at Commerzbank in Frankfurt said the desertion of the dollar in currency markets has taken on a momentum of its own, regardless of long-term signs of growth in the U.S. economy such as an upturn in house construction and rising business confidence.
 &quot;Markets are really only looking at the data that are against the dollar, and they don't recognize fundamental data that are rather optimistic for the U.S. economy,&quot; Schubert said.

TITLE: For a Healthier Break, Head South to Anapa
AUTHOR: By Todd Prince
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: The doctors and residents of Anapa like to say that the southern city's clean, salty air has healing potential.
 
And they are usually quick to add that the best place to take advantage of Anapa's air is not on its sandy beaches, but atop the bluffs that overlook the city's little corner of the Black Sea. But if you inhale deeply from that lofty perch, it may not be the scent of salty air or even the aroma of roasting animal fat from the nearby street grills you sense. In this resort town geared toward the very young, the odor that hangs heavy in the air is - to paraphrase late rocker Kurt Cobain - that of teen spirit.
 A provincial town of 65,000 on the northeastern coast of the Black Sea, Anapa is Russia's second most popular resort destination after Sochi, which is also on the Black Sea. But unlike big brother Sochi 360 kilometers to the south, Anapa has since the Soviet era been regarded as a vacation spot for children and teenagers - thanks to its shallow waters and 40 kilometers of clean, sandy beaches.
 During the 1960s and 1970s, the Soviet government made an effort to build up the resort's infrastructure, erecting several dozen young people's sanatoriums and a series of campgrounds along Anapa's main thoroughfare, Pionersky Prospekt. Children from all over the Soviet Union began to flock to the city to vacation, receive medical treatment or attend gatherings of the Soviet youth organization, the Pioneers. In those days, processions of marching boys and girls dressed in the Pioneer uniform of red scarf, white top and blue trousers quite possibly outnumbered even cars and trucks on the city's streets.
 The Pioneers may be a thing of the past, but groups of children and adolescents from all over Russia continue to make the trip to Anapa during the summer months. Dressed today in the latest beach fashions, they shop or sunbathe by day and pack the city's clubs and amusement parks by night. Last year, visitors under 18 accounted for more than a third of Anapa's 800,000 tourists.
 With summertime temperatures that average about 25 degrees, Anapa earned its reputation as a healthy destination for the nation's children by virtue of its mild climate, clean sea air and nearly cloudless summers, ideal for the sunlight-deprived children of the Russian north.
 In addition to a network of natural springs, the region also possesses ample reserves of volcanic and sulfuric mud, which local doctors use to treat a number of conditions, from pimples to gynecological ailments to gum pain. Many of Anapa's more than 200 sanatoriums and hotels offer mud-and spring-water therapy that boast a European standard of quality, but a characteristically low Russian price tag.
 After a hot mud mask or a bromide bath, visitors to Anapa who've reached the age of consent may choose to relax with a glass of local wine (try Kuban Vino or Primorsky). Anapa is surrounded by vineyards, several of which welcome visitors and tour groups.
 If you're wondering what need a mecca for children has for spirits, keep in mind that the 10-to-16 set may be Anapa's latest conqueror, but was by far not its first. For 2,600 years, Anapa's coast has been home to the settlements and trading posts of various peoples. The first were the Greeks, who in the sixth century B.C. began to extend their presence to the Black Sea region - to what is today Crimea, Georgia and southern Russia, including Anapa. Their control of Anapa continued to the fourth century - and left behind ruins, many of which today operate as museums.
 Over the following centuries, groups of nomads from the East made Anapa their temporary stomping grounds, but stable settlement returned only in the 13th century, when Genovese Italians established a trading port called Mapa there. Two centuries later, the forces of the Ottoman Empire swept into the eastern Black Sea region, taking over Mapa without much resistance from the Genovese. It was under the Turks that the name Anapa first came into use.
 Nearly 300 years later, Catherine the Great began to push southward in hopes of conquering the Black Sea region and thus gaining access to its warm water ports. Although her troops were soon victorious in several other southern regions, it would take them 40 years and six attempts to take the Turkish fortress at Anapa, which they destroyed almost completely several years after the final battle. Only the fortress' right gate remains standing today.
 War came again to Anapa in 1942, when German forces overran the area, holding Anapa for &quot;one year, one month and one week,&quot; according to the popular refrain, before the Red Army drove them from the city. Not before, however, Hitler's troops had reduced Anapa to rubble, more than 80 percent of its infrastructure destroyed. Unlike major Russian and Ukrainian cities, Anapa received no financial assistance from the government for its reconstruction. Local residents rebuilt their homes from whatever materials they could get their hands on, which explains the poor condition of much of the city's housing stock today.
 Despite this hardship, however, in subsequent decades Soviet authorities began to place a heavy emphasis on the health of children, and in the 1980s Anapa enjoyed a heyday during which it saw an average of 1.5 million visitors a year. But with the fall of the Soviet Union its resorts lost their government subsidies and began to go out of business, as clientele dwindled and destinations overseas began to replace domestic ones. Today, the number of yearly visitors to Anapa is at roughly half its all-time high.
 If many Soviet-era sanatoriums stand empty or have fallen into disrepair, however, Anapa has by no means given up. Several of the hotels that managed to survive have refurbished their facades, remodeled their interiors and outfitted their clinics with modern equipment; the city's boardwalk is lined with new cafes; and Anapa's amusement park recently expanded to include a water park with 13 slides.
 A good start, certainly, but much more is required if Anapa is to stem the exodus of vacationers to resorts abroad: Not only are the revamped hotels in the minority, but few of the boardwalk's new eateries can boast either good food or service, and the amusement park consists mostly of rickety attractions that have seen better days.
 These shortcomings are not enough to completely diminish the resort's guileless charm. Anapa is certainly unpolished, but it offers a tranquil Black Sea alternative to Sochi with the added bonus of being a suitable destination for families with children - or just those itching to try out a volcanic mud mask. 

<strong> DETAILS </strong>
<strong>WHERE TO STAY
 </strong>Double rooms at the comfortable Kuban sanatorium (30 Ulitsa Pushkina, 86133 52-648) start at $60 a night and include breakfast, a health examination after check-in and mud treatments. For the traveler on a budget, the U Chyornogo Morya hotel (24 Tamanskaya Ulitsa, 86133 50-269) has simple double rooms without private bath for less than $20 a night.
 

 <strong>
WHERE TO EAT
 </strong>While gourmets will almost certainly be disappointed by Anapa's restaurants, the less discriminating visitor will not go hungry. For no-frills, hearty Russian fare, try one of the eateries at the Vysoky Bereg restaurant complex (2 Ulitsa Ivana Golubtsa, 86133 50-677), or visit Anapa's very own English pub, the Holly Willy Pub (30 Ulitsa Kalinina, 86133 46-195).
 

 <strong>
HOW TO GET THERE
 </strong>Pulkovo Airlines operates flights to Amapa from Pulkovo I every day but Tuesday and Wednesday. Tickets cost 6,700 rubles ($213) return.

TITLE: Israel Calls Up Reserves, Seizes Ramallah
TEXT: RAMALLAH, West Bank - Israeli forces surrounded Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's headquarters before dawn Monday, barricading the front gate with debris and fanning out to take control of a sixth West Bank population center.
 
The latest incursion into Ramallah came as the Palestinian leader ordered Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin placed under house arrest in the Gaza Strip. 
 As dozens of tanks and armored personnel carriers rolled into Ramallah, Israeli soldiers flashed victory signs and used a bulldozer to fortify a barrier at the front gate of Arafat's headquarters. The Palestinian leader remained inside the compound, where Israeli forces had pinned him for a month during the army's last major West Bank operation.
 &quot;A large number of tanks and Israeli jeeps are surrounding the president's office from all sides,'' Arafat aide Nabil Abu Rdeneh said from inside the compound shortly before dawn, local time.
 The Israeli army confirmed taking up positions in &quot;strategic points in the city'' of Ramallah and placing the area under curfew. Explosives were detonated targeting the forces, the army said, slightly injuring one soldier. The army gave no further details, but three explosions were heard in al-Amari refugee camp.
 Israeli forces began re-invading Palestinian towns when back-to-back suicide bombings killed 26 Israelis in Jerusalem last week. The attacks prompted an Israeli policy shift toward taking Palestinian territory with no plans to leave until all terror attacks stop. 600,000 Palestinians in the West Bank are now confined under round-the-clock curfews.
 &quot;There's no doubt that, with the current situation, it's hard to see how we can fight terror effectively without being in the Palestinian areas,'' Israeli Cabinet Secretary Gideon Saar said Monday on Israel Radio.
 Meanwhile, Palestinian hospital workers and witnesses said Israeli Apache helicopters fired at two cars traveling in a remote area of the southern Gaza Strip on Monday, killing six people and injuring five others. Izzedine al Qassam, of Hamas' military wing, said four Hamas members were among the dead. The Israeli Army declined to comment on the incident.
 The militant group renewed its threats against Israel and warned Arafat to lift the house-arrest order against Yassin. Outside the spiritual leader's Gaza home, masked Hamas supporters armed with machine guns and hand grenades stood watch while Palestinian police kept their distance. 
 Palestinian police arrested dozens of Hamas members in Gaza on Sunday, including local leader Muham med Shuhab.
 Before dawn on Monday, Israel arrested eight wanted Palestinians in Hebron, two in Siair village just north of Hebron, another in Jenin and another in Beit Sahour, near Bethlehem, the army said. Palestinians said that many of those arrested in the Hebron area were Hamas members. Soldiers pulled back after making the arrests.
 The army also said that four Palestinians wanted by security forces were arrested in the Askar refugee camp east of Nablus.
 In Jenin, Israeli troops carried out house-to-house searches, arresting the Palestinian head of military intelligence, Mohammed Abu Hanana, and his bodyguard, Palestinian security officials said. Since the end of March, when Israeli forces, beginning a massive military offensive in the West Bank, bombarded Arafat's compound and stayed there for a month, tanks have been back to his offices three times. Early this month, they blew up some buildings inside the compound and left the same day. They returned about two weeks ago, encircling the compound again for three days before leaving.
 During the latest raid, Arafat was inside the compound, along with Faisal Abu Sharakh, head of the Force 17 security apparatus; West Bank intelligence chief Tarik Tirawi, who is wanted by Israel; and Ribhy Arafat, the Palestinians' senior official responsible for coordination with the Israelis, Abu Rdeneh said.
 The move into Ramallah widens the Israeli military's scope of control over once-autonomous Palestinian areas. Israeli troops now control most Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, including Nablus, Tulkarem, Jenin, Qalqiliya and Bethlehem. Curfew restrictions were temporarily lifted in Nablus and Qalqiliya on Monday so residents could shop, and go to school.
 Israeli officials deny Arafat's claim of their intention to re-establish civil control over the West Bank, making Israel again responsible for municipal services, building permits, education and vital records. An Israeli military administration presided over Palestinians until creation of autonomous areas began in 1994.
 &quot;It is clear that this is a continuation of the occupation in our towns and refugee camps,'' Arafat said on Sunday.
 Raanan Gissin, spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said that &quot;Israel will be there in military presence only, in order to crush terror.''
 To deal with the expanded West Bank operation, the army has begun calling up reservists. Speaking after the weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday, hard-line Israeli Cabinet Minister Effi Eitam said that Israel was at war and would remain in Palestinian areas &quot;for many months, responsible for security there.''

TITLE: 6.3 Quake in Rural Iran Devastates Communities
TEXT: &quot;Mother, where are you? Why are you buried in the dirt?'' he cried. When rescue crews and dogs found her body, it was more than Taheri, 40, could bear. He fainted.
 Workers moving through Changooreh, among the hardest hit of the villages destroyed by Saturday's magnitude-6.3 earthquake, said they had dug up at least 140 bodies from the debris by early Monday. In all, the earthquake flattened some 100 remote villages and killed 220 people.
 Only one person remained missing in Changooreh, and was believed dead, rescue workers said. Villagers sifted through the debris of their homes, every once in a while digging out a kettle, a broken radio or another possession.
 &quot;This looks like a scene from a World War II movie,'' said rescue worker Majid Elahi as he surveyed the destruction from atop a mound of brick and mud that was once a home.
 State radio put the toll at 220 dead and 1,300 injured, saying the latest toll was based on reports by rescue teams on the ground. Earlier estimates had been as high as 500.
 The quake struck at 7:30 a.m., local time, when most people were in their homes of brick, stone or mud. The quake, whose epicenter was in the Qazvin provincial town of Bou'in-Zahra, left thousands homeless.
 In Changooreh, 180 kilometers west of Tehran, only two of the village's 100 houses remained intact.
 In Abdareh, a village near Changooreh, the quake toppled a mosque, demolished 40 homes, and killed at least 20. The dead there were buried at a cemetery overlooking the village as survivors huddled in groups, most covered in dust and dazed with grief. Men, women, and children wailed as they placed the dead in rows of graves made by bulldozers.

TITLE: WORLD WATCH
TEXT: Voice of al-Qaida
 

BEIRUT (AP) - Osama bin Laden and his main advisor are both alive and well and their al-Qaida network is ready to attack new U.S. targets, bin Laden's spokesperson said in audiotaped remarks aired Sunday. The message also claimed responsibility for a deadly April fire at a synagogue in Tunisia.
 The Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite television network said that it had received a recorded audiotaped message from Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, the Kuwaiti-born spokesperson for bin Laden.
 The administration of U.S. President George W. Bush has said that it does not know whether bin Laden is alive or dead. There was no immediate reaction Saturday from the White House on Abu Gaith's claims of bin Ladin's survival.
 "I want to assure Muslims that Sheik Osama bin Laden ... is in good and prosperous health and all what is being rumored about his illness and injury in Tora Bora has no truth,'' Abu Gaith said.
 The tape appeared recent. Referring to recent U.S. warnings about imminent al-Qaida threats, Abu Ghaith said the group will choose the right time, place and method.
 "I say 'Yes' to what American officials are saying ... that we are going to carry out attacks on America,'' he said.
 
 
Clues from the Cockpit
 

TAIPEI, Taiwan (NYT) - The cockpit voice recorder in the China Airlines Boeing 747 that crashed last month recorded a dozen faint, mysterious noises in the 13 minutes before the plane broke into four pieces at 9,000 meters and plunged into the Taiwan Strait, crash investigators said on Monday.
 Kay Yong, the managing director of the Aviation Safety Council, the government agency conducting the investigation, declined to discuss what causal clues the noises might hold, though, and cautioned that it was unclear whether the sounds were related to the crash.
 The air disaster, which killed all 225 people aboard, has captured the attention of air-safety experts around the world because it is very unusual for a jumbo jet to come apart in midflight.
 Amplifying the tape tenfold, investigators heard seven thumping sounds between 13 and nine minutes before the plane came apart, Yong said. There were four more sounds between seven and three minutes before the crash, and finally a last, faint thud a second before the recording ended, Yong said, adding that all conversation among members of the flight crew was completely normal for the duration of the recording.
 
 
Arizona Burning 
 

SHOW LOW, Arizona (NYT) - Two wildfires that have burned about 330,000 acres of northern Arizona in the last week merged on Monday, becoming the biggest fire in this southwest state's history. Officials said it could cover a million acres, about 1,900 square kilometers, before it goes out.
 It was bearing down Monday night on Show Low, normally a town of 8,000 in the White Mountains that was eerily ghostlike on Monday. Most of its residents fled on Saturday night, leaving squadrons of firefighters, and several hundred obstinate townspeople defying the mandatory evacuation order.
 The fire, one of the largest in the United States' history, is easily the most challenging of the young fire season, surpassing even the forest fires that have beset Colorado in recent weeks.
 Most of the 25,000 residents of the region have left their homes. With the fire's leading edge running for 75 kilometers at the north and the east, plumes of bruise-colored smoke are rising 5,000 meters and are visible halfway to Phoenix, 155 kilometers away. 



TITLE: Baseball Mourns Cardinals Pitcher Kile
TEXT: CHICAGO - On a night when Darryl Kile was supposed to be on the mound, the St. Louis Cardinals mourned their lost teammate and honored him at the same time just by taking the field.
 
Kile, 33, was found dead Saturday afternoon in his Chicago hotel room. Dr. Edmund Donoghue, the Cook County Medical Examiner, said Sunday that initial findings of an autopsy showed he had &quot;80 to 90-percent narrowing of two of the three branches of the coronary artery.&quot; He said the blockage was the &quot;likely cause of death.&quot;
 Kile was a tough team leader, who never spent a day on the disabled list in a career that began in 1991.
 &quot;It was tough. Darryl is such a big part. When he doesn't play, he is on the bench,&quot; Cardinals manager Tony la Russa said. &quot;We missed him. He says things during the game. It was very difficult. It's going to be difficult. It should be difficult because he was very special.&quot;
 Kile's familiar No. 57 was everywhere at Wrigley Field. On the umps' hats. On the message board in center field. In the St. Louis dugout, where two of his jerseys hung by the runway door. On the Cardinals' shirt sleeves.
 And, most certainly, on his teammates' minds. Their emotional burden obvious, the Cardinals lacked the concentration Sunday night that helped them take over first place in the NL Central, losing 8-3 to the Chicago Cubs.
 The Cardinals committed two errors and appeared to be going through the motions, one day after Kile's shocking death.
 &quot;We gave it everything. If we hadn't played, we would have had huge regrets,&quot; la Russa said. &quot;We came out and tried our best and we got beat.
 At a team meeting after Saturday's game was postponed, the Cardinals voted unanimously to play Sunday night. They took the field with the support of Kile's widow, who told the team at a memorial service Sunday that her husband would have wanted them to play.
 Jason Simontacchi (5-1) took the mound, trying to become the first St. Louis rookie starter since Allen Watson in 1993 to win his first six decisions. He lasted only four innings, while the Cubs got strong pitching from Kerry Wood (7-5) and homers from Alex Gonzalez and Moises Alou.
 The game had an eerie feel from the outset. Organ music that usually fills the neighborhood park during batting practice and between innings was silent. The only P.A. announcements were to inform the 37,647 fans of lineups and player changes. Flags were at half-staff.
 Gonzalez had a solo shot in the second and Alou hit a two-run homer in the third. Fred McGriff added a sacrifice fly and RBI single for the Cubs.
 Wood (7-5) allowed just five hits - including Albert Pujols' two-run homer - in eight innings, to get his first win in more than three weeks. Wood struck out four and walked three.
 <strong>

 Florida 5, Detroit 4.</strong> The Detroit Tigers weren't going to give Luis Castillo another chance to extend his 35-game hitting streak. Castillo went 0-for-4 and was left on deck when the Florida Marlins finished off a four-run, ninth-inning rally to beat the Tigers 5-4 Saturday night.
 
Disheartened by the end of the streak, Castillo had a blank stare on his face as his teammates celebrated the victory. He might be relieved to know that a fifth plate appearance wouldn't have changed anything.
 Detroit manager Luis Pujols said Sunday that he and bench coach Felipe Alou had agreed to intentionally walk Castillo and take their chances against Eric Owens.
 &quot;Felipe and I said we were going to look bad in our country, but we had to walk him,&quot; said Pujols, who like Castillo and Alou is from the Dominican Republic.
 But, with one out and Andy Fox on third, pinch-hitter Tim Raines lifted a fly ball to center. Fox tagged and easily beat Wendell Magee's throw home for the game-winner.
 Castillo's streak, tied for the 10th-longest in baseball history, stands as the longest by a Latin player and the longest by a second baseman. Only nine players have had longer streaks, including just two since 1950. Joe DiMaggio set the record of 56 games in 1941.

TITLE: Have-Nots Have Their Day At NHL Draft
TEXT: TORONTO - It's not often the Detroit Red Wings and hockey's other high-profile teams take a back seat. This weekend's NHL draft belonged to the league's have-nots.
 
Highlighted by Florida and Columbus swapping two of the top three selections, the league's 39th annual draft ended with a whimper when rounds four through nine were completed in Toronto on Sunday.
 Things grew so uneventful that both Philadelphia and Carolina cleared their respective draft tables and left the Air Canada Center floor before the start of Round 8.
 &quot;It was a quiet draft, more so than usual,&quot; Florida general manager Rick Dudley said. &quot;There's usually at least one or two major deals. There wasn't really any of that.&quot;
 In comparison, last year's draft at Florida featured the New York Islanders acquiring both Michael Peca and Alexei Yashin.
 This year, Tampa Bay, acquiring Ruslan Fedotenko and Brad Lukowich, Atlanta - Slava Kozlov - and Montreal - Mariusz Czerkawski - were the only ones that bolstered their rosters.
 Otherwise, there were teams such as Washington, which couldn't swing a deal even though the Capitals were offering one or all three of their first-round draft picks.
 And then there were teams looking ahead to the free-agency season, which opens on July 1.
 That group includes the Stanley Cup-champion Red Wings, who are still awaiting word from defenseman Chris Chelios and goaltender Dominik Hasek on whether they plan to return next season.
 Red Wings GM Ken Holland said he continues to negotiate with Chelios, while Hasek is expected to decide by the end of week on whether he'll retire.
 &quot;If those two return, I don't know how active we will be [in free agency],&quot; Holland said. &quot;I don't really see us all that active with the top guys.&quot;
 The New York Rangers fall into this category, too, deciding whether to bring back captain Mark Messier and goaltender Mike Richter. The Rangers are unlikely to re-sign forward Theo Fleury after failing to meet a June 15 deadline to pick up the option on his contract.
 The Toronto Maple Leafs continue to negotiate with goaltender Curtis Joseph, while the Boston Bruins risk losing forward Bill Guerin to free agency. Suggesting that Guerin's asking price is too high, Bruins GM Mike O'Connell said, &quot;I might not offer him a contract.&quot;
 Other potential high-profile free agents include Chicago's Tony Amonte, Boston's Byron Dafoe, San Jose's Teemu Selanne and Dallas' Ed Belfour.
 With all that on the horizon, it's no wonder the NHL's lesser lights managed to steal the show.
 Dudley led the way on Saturday, trading the No. 1 pick to Columbus, which selected rugged forward Rick Nash. After Atlanta drafted goaltender Kari Lehtonen No. 2, the Panthers used Columbus' pick on defenseman Jay Bouwmeester.
 Red Wings general manager Ken Holland said Sunday that goalie Dominik Hasek hasn't made up his mind about whether he'll retire or return to the Stanley Cup champions next season.
 &quot;I talked to him on Tuesday,&quot; Holland said. &quot;I know he's leaning one way. I'm not going to say which way. We expect him to make a decision by Tuesday or Wednesday.&quot;

TITLE: WORLD CUP WATCH
TEXT: Phantom To Appear?
 

YOKOHAMA, Japan (Reuters) - Brazil and Germany, the two most successful World Cup countries, are just two semifinals away from ending the remarkable sequence of events which has prevented them from ever playing each other in the finals.
 The World Cup's phantom match will take place in the final in Yokohama on Sunday, only if Germany gets past resilient co-hosts South Korea, and Brazil beats Turkey in the semifinals, on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively.
 That Brazil has never met Germany in the finals is one of the great curiosities of soccer. Brazil has played in all 17 finals and Germany in 15. Both have appeared six times in the final itself, Brazil winning four and Germany three.
 The two have played more matches than any other countries in the finals - Brazil's semifinal will be its 86th game, Germany's its 84th.
 
 
Good Neighbor
 

SEOUL (Reuters) - World Cup co-host South Korea has used loudspeakers to broadcast its World Cup triumphs across its heavily fortified frontier with North Korea, the only country on earth being shielded from soccer's biggest festival.
 The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that has bisected the peninsula since the Korean War ended in 1953 has long been an arena of high-decibel propaganda competition between the capitalist South and the communist North.
 But the sound pulsating from southern speakers last week was spirited soccer commentary, as South Korea defeated first Italy and then Spain to become the first Asian side ever to reach the World Cup semifinals, the Defense Ministry said.
 "We've aired the matches directly from the radio broadcast," said a ministry spokesperson. "The North Korean soldiers who were on duty at that time will probably be aware of the news," he added.
 However, the spokesperson declined to comment on rumours circulating in Seoul that North Korean soldiers could be heard cheering South Korea.
 
 
Northern Lights
 

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea has broadcast one of South Korea's World Cup matches for the first time, giving the isolated country's viewers an unprecedented glimpse of their southern neighbours' remarkable soccer adventure.
 North Korea has been showing edited highlights of World Cup matches, but has not even made clear the tournament is being co-hosted by its neighbours and rivals South Korea and Japan.
 North and South Korea are still technically at war because the Korean War of 1950 to 1953 ended in an armed truce rather than a peace treaty. The anniversary of the start of the Korean War is June 25 - the date of their Seoul semi-final with Germany.
 The South Korean Unification Ministry said that North Korea broadcast an hour-long programme late on Sunday that showed highlights from South Korea's 2-1 win over Italy last Tuesday to reach the quarter-finals.
 "South Korea has finally advanced to the quarterfinals, after it had played six times in the World Cup. South Korean players' morale is rocketing," a ministry official said, quoting the North Korean television commentator's words.
 North Korea reached the quarterfinals of the 1966 tournament in England, but did not even appear in the qualifying event for this year's finals.
 
 
New Awards
 

YOKOHAMA, Japan (Reuters) - The most entertaining team at the World Cup finals will receive an award at the end of the month-long tournament for the first time. FIFA, world soccer's governing body, said five awards will be given out after the final on June 30 in Yokohama:
 The Golden Shoe Award for the top goalscorer. If two or more players finish with the same number of goals, their "assists" will be counted to separate them; The Golden Ball for the most outstanding player, voted for by the media attending the finals; The Fair Play Award to the team with least bookings and red cards. The team's general behaviour will also be taken into consideration. At present, Belgium narrowly leads Sweden; The award for the most entertaining team, which will be voted for by fans on the FIFAworldcup.com Web site; The Yashin Award for best goalkeeper. Named after late Russian goalkeeper Lev Yashin, this will be decided by FIFA's Technical Study Group.
 
 
Fight for Your Right ...
 

LONDON (Reuters) - English football fans are demanding a grand reception for the country's impressive national squad after players and coaches flew home from Japan to a low-key welcome in the dead of the night.
 England's World Cup team - knocked out in the quarter finals by tournament favourites Brazil - flew into Heathrow airport late on Saturday, dodging thousands of waiting fans and failing to talk to reporters.
 Led down the steps of their Boeing 777 by captain David Beckham and coach Sven-Goran Eriksson, the team merely posed briefly for photographers and then boarded buses and were whisked away.
 A few thousand die-hard fans gathered on the tarmac and enthusiastically waved red-and-white St. George's flags, but had hoped for a bigger party.
 "I can understand people being whipped up by England's impressive performance wanting a bigger reception than a few cheers at Heathrow," a spokesperson for the England supporters club said.
 Last week, a delirious crowd of 100,000 filled a park in Dublin at a celebratory concert to honour the gritty Irish squad, who were knocked out of the tournament in a nail-biting penalty shoot-out.
 
 
S. Koreans Get Ready
 

SEOUL (Reuters) - More than 6.5 million South Korean soccer fans are expected to take to the streets to watch their team's World Cup semifinal against Germany on giant screens.
 Police said they would deploy more than 40,000 officers and other personnel to control the crowds for the game on Tuesday.
 Last Saturday, some 5 million red-clad South Korean fans flooded the country to watch their team beat Spain and become the first Asian team to reach the semi-finals in World Cup history. The match against Germany is being played in Seoul's soccer-only stadium.
 "We guess more than 6.5 million people will gather to support our soccer team nationwide on Tuesday," a senior police officer said, adding that 5,000 more police officers would be on duty than for Saturday's quarterfinal.
 "At the stadium alone, we will station 2,000 or 3,000 police officers," he said.
 One of the striking features of this year's tournament has been the absence of violence linked to soccer hooliganism which has marred previous World Cups.
 Pictures of orderly fans swiftly clearing the streets and gathering up litter after brief, albeit passionate, post-match celebrations in South Korea have predominated.