SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #926 (94), Tuesday, December 9, 2003
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TITLE: New Duma Loyal to President, Lacks Liberals
AUTHOR: By Catherine Belton and Lyuba Pronina
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - The nation is facing a starkly new kind of parliament after election results came in Monday that for the first time in post-Soviet history gave pro-Kremlin and nationalist parties a landslide majority, trounced the Communists and pushed liberal Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces into the political wilderness.
United Russia, the party that ran on a program with zero content apart from loyalty to the president, looks set to gain a majority 50 percent of the 450 seats in the Duma, while the misnamed Liberal Democratic Party headed by virulent nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky, seen by many as a puppet of the Kremlin, will get 8.4 percent, according to estimates released by the Central Elections Commission after 98 percent of the vote was counted Monday.
The commission's estimates included results from the single-mandate districts, which are counted separately from the party list system.
The nationalist Homeland, or Rodina bloc, which analysts say was created by Kremlin spin doctors as a vehicle to split the Communist vote, is due to get 10 percent of all seats. Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces, meanwhile, collapsed and failed to get past the 5 percent barrier crucial for representation on the party list vote. Four Yabloko deputies scored wins in single-mandate districts, while SPS won just two.
The pro-Kremlin People's Party will have 19 seats through victories in single-mandate districts, while the rest of the Duma's 65 seats will be occupied by deputies running on independent tickets who have yet to determine their alliances.
Final results will be confirmed by the Central Elections Commission on Dec. 17 at the earliest. The new Duma will convene Dec. 26.
Analysts said the results of Sunday's poll come as the culmination of President Vladimir Putin's drive to consolidate the power of the executive branch. That bid began with moves to rein in the power of regional governors shortly after he took over the presidency in 2000 and sped up this year with the arrest of Russia's richest man, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, in a $1 billion fraud case that many have called an attempt to flatten the oil magnate's political ambitions. Khodorkovsky had been seen as trying to lock in a loyal faction in the Duma in a possible attempt to become president.
"Putin's bureaucratic consolidation has ended with these elections. It is farewell to the Yeltsin era," said Lilia Shevtsova, a senior political analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center.
"What type of democracy can there be if there are no democratic parties in the Duma?" she said.
Even a deputy head of the presidential administration, Vladislav Surkov said the election results marked the end of an era.
"Today, after the elections, we are living in a new Russia," said Surkov, the Kremlin's chief election strategist. "Before the elections it was not clear to many, but now the electorate has shown that the old political system based on Marxist dogmas of the left and right is finished."
Chillingly, he had little pity for the liberals who did not make it in. Instead, he said, they were finished. "We are entering a new political era, in which those who did not make it into the Duma should stay calm and understand that their historic mission is over."
Boris Berezovsky, the gray cardinal of Boris Yeltsin's Kremlin now in exile in London, said the election results came as the result of a buildup of an authoritarian regime that was not above using force to ensure its hold on power. "The Kremlin used its resource of fear to gain these results by jailing and threatening those who got in its way," he said in a telephone interview from London.
Analysts said the strong showing by pro-Putin forces came as a result of blanket television coverage for the parties in favor, a mud-slinging campaign directed against the Communists, who were left unable respond, and the intimidation and muzzling of alternative voices such as Khodorkovsky's.
"Putin has now defeated the elite of the '90s," said Stanislav Belkovsky, the head of the Council for National Strategy, a think tank that published a controversial report this summer alleging the oligarchs were mounting "a creeping coup."
He said the loss of the liberal factions in the Duma was a clear death knell for Yeltsin-era forces. "Putin now has carte blanche to change the system of power," he said.
Analysts said the overwhelming majority that Putin now appears to have in the Duma should let him pursue any economic reforms he chooses. For now, investors are giving Putin the benefit of the doubt and believe he intends to use that mandate to continue pushing for liberal reforms.
But the strong showing by parties like Homeland, which ran on a populist ticket of returning the nation's riches to the people, is raising fears that the political weight of a hard-line Kremlin clan known as the siloviki might grow further and strengthen momentum toward greater state control over the strategic sectors of the economy.
"The result today is very positive in that it will help Putin push reform through," sad Chris Weafer, the chief strategist at Alfa Bank. "But in the background, the concern is that the siloviki might feel they have more of a mandate to pursue their agenda. Putin might not be able to control the situation."
The leaders of Rodina, former Communist Deputy Sergei Glazyev and the head of the last Duma's international affairs commitee, Dmitry Rogozin, did little to reach out to investors Monday.
In a televised post-election debate as the first election numbers were being released in the wee hours of Monday, Glazyev said the controversial results of 1990s privatization should be re-examined.
"The deals that violated the law must be canceled," he said. "A stolen asset can't be managed efficiently."
Homeland's leaders ran on a platform crafted by Glazyev and calling for "social justice" and a redistribution of wealth from the handful of billionaires to the impoverished population via a huge tax hike on natural resources.
With his statements Monday, however, Glazyev appeared to be calling for a rethink of privatization results for the first time.
Glazyev on Monday promised to try to increase state revenues by 500 billion rubles ($17 billion) next year. "I hope we will be able to push through laws that will allow us to increase budget revenue by 500 billion rubles by taking away windfall profits from the exploitation of natural resources and by cutting back illegal capital outflows," he said.
With the rest of the Duma dominated by parties that have no agenda other than to serve as "yes men" to the Kremlin, there is a fear that Homeland's plans will fill parliamentary debate.
"Homeland is going to be the most lively element in the whole Duma," said Sergei Markov, a Kremin-connected political analyst. "LDPR and
United Russia have no ideologies and no programs."
But other analysts said it was unlikely that Rodina would be able to set the tone for the next four year's of lawmaking. "Policymaking will contiunue to be dominated by the government," said Roland Nash, chief strategist at Renaissance Capital.
"But this gives Rodina the opportunity to start whispering in the ears of the party of power," he said, referring to United Russia.
Nash warned that this might help build up momentum for a rethink of liberal policies.
"Once you start going down the slippery slope of raising taxes, it's very difficult to stop," he said. "One of the successes of Putin's first term was to roll back the tax burden. These sort of things could be put in jeopardy.
"We were heading for this tax hike before the elections," he said.
"But without the liberal factions having representation in the Duma, big business now has less defense."
Other observers are even more perturbed by some of the nationalist rhetoric coming from Homeland and said the party's campaign to redistribute wealth combined with a nationalist agenda raises the specter of a new national-socialist force creeping into parliament.
Speaking to journalists early Monday, Rodina co-leader Rogozin rejected those concerns. He said his bloc had done well because of the chord it had struck with the national mood. "This is a natural response to bandit capitalism, to the impoverishment of the people, to the humiliation of the people," he said.
"It sums up the bankruptcy of the politics of barbarian capitalism in Russia," he said.
Belkovsky, who is seen by many as being backed by the siloviki, said Rodina could be the inspiration for a national revival for Russia and the reawakening if its influence over the republics of the former Soviet Union.
"The elections reflected a general trend toward nationalist and imperialist ideas," he said. "The revival of the Russian empire will be a special subject of Putin's second term."
He said the United States' invasion of Iraq and its attempts to dominate global politics was provoking a backlash in Russia. "National humiliation is a basic problem for the Russian people and it cannot be ignored. Now we want Russia to be successful regardless of what Washington, Brussels and London thinks."
Rogozin's rhetoric on his foreign policy views Monday, however, was much more low key. "Europe is the main vector of development for Russia," sad Rogozin, who is Putin's special envoy for Kaliningrad. "Foreign policy starts with borders and, most importantly, should calm them down. That means an active policy in the CIS."
He said America was not the enemy. "America is not interesting for us as a model for economic or democratic standards but as a military partner for resolving complicated regional problems where our interests coincide."
Nevertheless, the rise of Homeland and the strong showing by LDPR is already sounding some alarm bells in the U.S. State Department.
A senior U.S. diplomat speaking on condition of anonymity said Monday that the increased influence of nationalists in the Duma has created "at least a potential for some shift in direction in the reform process and openness to integration with the West," The Associated Press reported.
The diplomat said it remained to be seen whether the Kremlin could maintain control over Homeland. Analysts have said the bloc was created by pro-business forces in the Kremlin led by former chief of staff Alexander Voloshin and his deputy Surkov, but the fear is that now that it has done well in the elections, it could break free from the Kremlin's sphere of influence.
Even the Kremlin seems to have been spooked by the runaway success of its own creation, some analysts said. "There are signs that there were definite Kremlin attempts to block the exposure of Homeland leaders in the last several days before the election," Shevtsova said. "Putin understands the possible negative consequences.
"Homeland is not dangerous because of Glazyev and Rogozin. They are tame. But the dangerous thing is the demand in society for such elements. Instead of this party that can be tamed and made loyal to the Kremlin, another party could appear that could take over the nationalist tide that has been unleashed and break free from the Kremlin."
SPS co-leader Boris Nemtsov warned that Putin could regret the appearance of Homeland on the political scene. "I don't think the president is jubilant," he said. "It seems to me that those people in the Kremlin who jumbled with these elections have more serious feelings, they have realized they have let the genie out of the bottle," he said, referring to the nationalist forces in the Duma.
It's not clear yet which way Homeland is going to play its position in the Duma. Analysts polled Monday suggested Glazyev could try to take over the leadership of the Communist Party.
On Monday morning, Glazyev would not pin down a concrete alliance for his party. "We have already introduced many of them [our proposals] to the Duma, and we will work with anyone who is ready to share responsibility with us," he told reporters.
TITLE: City Voters Abandon Reformers
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Kovalev
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The traditional liberal spirit of St. Petersburg voters has moved closer to the conservative nature of the rest of the country and further away from its much-proclaimed role as the nation's window to Europe, Sunday's State Duma elections showed.
City voters gave United Russia 30.7 percent of their votes, while the left-wing, nationalistic Homeland bloc came second with 13.7 percent, according to the City Election Commission, after 99 percent of ballots were counted.
The liberal Union of Right Forces, or SPS, and Yabloko parties, which failed to break the 5-percent barrier to Duma entry at the federal level, took third and fourth places in the city with 9.2 percent and 9 percent respectively, followed by the Communists with 8.5 percent, LDPR with 7.8 percent and the Party of Life with 5.25 percent.
The turnout was 40 percent with 3.8 percent voting against all parties.
"There are a variety of different interests and there is a balance of different interests because this is a democratic city," said Alexander Beglov, head of the United Russia party in St. Petersburg, said to politicians at an unofficial election counting night late Sunday. "Democracy has won in St. Petersburg."
"It is distressing that SPS could not manage to get 5 percent [on the federal level]," said Vadim Tyulpanov, the Legislative Assembly speaker. "It shows the population is prey to a national idea. But this is the people's choice and there is nothing we can do about it."
Liberals also lost most of the battles in electoral districts across the city. Yabloko lost one of its seats, leaving just two of its members to represent the city in the next Duma. Since 1995, Yabloko has lost a total of four of its representatives in the city.
Gennady Seleznyov, former State Duma speaker, won a seat in District No. 209, defeating SPS co-leader Irina Khakamada, with 47.32 percent against her 26.69 percent. Andrei Benin, the United Russia candidate, defeated Yuly Rybakov, liberal State Duma lawmaker, with 17.5 percent against 16.76 percent in District No. 206. Valentina Ivanova, the United Russia candidate, beat Igor Artemyev, Yabloko State Duma lawmaker, in District No. 208 with 32.05 percent against 30.41 percent.
Boris Vishnevsky, Yabloko faction member in the Legislative Assembly, said Monday his party's poor showing was partially due to its mistake in failing to position itself as a party opposed to President Vladimir Putin.
"There was a point of view that if we won't touch him, he won't touch us," he said. "But it looks like it was wrong to think that way. It seems he did touch us.
"I had this impression while watching the counting of results when the figure of 4.2 percent appeared in the Far East and stayed the same until the counting reached St. Petersburg and Moscow," he said. "About 300,000 people voted for us in Moscow and about 160,000 did in St. Petersburg, which is from 400,000 to 500,000 votes above the 4.2 percent level in total. That's is more than 1 percent of [national] voters in total. Where did they go?"
"The level of resistance to brainwashing in the population has weakened and under this condition the authorities can do whatever they like," Vishnevsky said. "The media is monopolized and portrays how good President Putin is and how fine everything is in the country, so those who can't think vote for what they see and those who can see don't vote because they feel nothing depends on them."
Only in two districts did Yabloko manage to beat its challengers. In District No. 211, party member Pyotr Shelish got 25.88 percent of the vote, while "against all" came second with 16.87 percent. Sergei Popov won District No. 212, beating Legislative Assembly lawmaker Viktor Yevtukhov with 29.25 percent against 20.87 percent. Andrei Shevelyov, a United Russia candidate, won District 210 with 19.9 percent against Anatoly Krivenchenko, Homeland bloc candidate, with 15.08 percent. Oksana Dmitriyeva, leader of the Party for Business Development, saved her seat in District No. 213, gathering 53.99 percent of votes.
No result was posted in District No. 207 where "against all" received more votes than any candidate.
"The authorities did everything to deform people's opinion by influencing it though the media," said Yury Vdovin, co-chairman of the St. Petersburg branch of the Citizen's Watch international human rights organization, said in an interview late Sunday. "And a society with a deformed opinion makes an absolutely unconscious choice in bureaucracy's favor."
Konstantin Borovoi, head of the Economic Freedom party, called for creation of a party of new democrats Sunday, although said he voted for SPS in Sunday's poll.
"I was one of the founders of SPS, but looking at the party list, I found most candidates, except for an exceptional few, are just authorities of different sorts who are don't understand anything," Borovoi said. "This must be changed. New, young people should come."
With 54.29 percent of St. Petersburgers voting in the 1999 State Duma elections, Unity garnered 17.68 percent while SPS pulled 17.42. The Fatherland-All Russia coalition, led by former prime minister Yevgeny Primakov, Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov and then-St. Petersburg Governor Vladimir Yakovlev, took third place with 15.72 percent, followed by Gennady Zyuganov's Communist Party with 14.14 percent and the Yabloko party with 11.21 percent.
Meanwhile, the paltry results garnered by St. Petersburg liberals could be considered a real success compared to performances in neighboring regions, such as Arkhangelsk, the Leningrad Oblast, the Novgorod Region and the Kaliningrad Region, where SPS and Yabloko failed to reach the 5 percent barrier. In Novgorod City Yabloko managed to get just over 5 percent of votes.
In the Leningrad Oblast, United Russia garnered 38.1 percent of the vote, LDPR 12.02 percent, Homeland 12 percent, and the Communists 9 percent.
TITLE: Seleznyov Beats Khakamada in Starovoitova's Old District
AUTHOR: By Irina Titova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: In a no-holds-barred battle between political heavyweights of the last State Duma, outgoing Speaker Gennady Seleznyov beat out Deputy Speaker Irina Khakamada to win a St. Petersburg single-mandate seat.
Seleznyov, whose Russia's Rebirth-Party of Life bloc polled just 1.9 percent nationwide, made it back into the Duma with 47.3 percent against Khakamada's 26.7 percent, according to preliminary results announced by the St. Petersburg elections committee.
"We're not going to comment on this result," Yelena Dikun, SPS spokeswoman, said Monday.
"We know only one thing that today we woke up in a different country," Dikun said. "Now we are going to take a week off to think over what has happened and what we should do about it."
The two were slugging it out in St. Petersburg Polling District No. 209, the area represented by liberal deputy Galina Starovoitova until her assassination in November 1998.
For Seleznyov, a Communist Party nominee as speaker who parted company with the party last year after a row over Duma posts, the win marked a personal comeback of sorts.
It is not clear what role he will have in the new Duma.
Seleznyov has suggested Interior Minister and United Russia co-leader Boris Gryzlov may opt to be Speaker, Interfax reported.
For Khakamada, the co-leader of the Union of Right Forces, or SPS, the loss was a further blow after her party narrowly failed to pass the 5 percent hurdle to enter the Duma.
Leonid Romankov, a St. Petersburg SPS party member, conceded that Seleznyov had run a "very active" campaign, delivering newspapers and leaflets to district residents, while Khakamada's campaign had been less high-profile locally.
"Seleznyov grew up in that district, he knows people there - and he used administrative resources as well," Romankov said.
Seleznyov also made efforts to tap into an unusual source of votes - Russia's expatriates in the United States, whose ballots were added to those of the potential 468,000 voters in District No. 209.
To woo an estimated 40,000 emigre Russians, Seleznyov's campaign took out an ad in the New York newspaper Novoye Russkoye Slovo and handed out flyers and calendars.
But another canvassing method - the alleged use of black PR and blackmail - also became an issue in the campaign.
On Dec. 2, Khakamada's team reported two people to the police for allegedly trying to extort $100,000, in return for not releasing flyers with what they said was libelous material about her.
Police detained the suspects as they were delivering 100,000 of the flyers to Khakamada's campaign headquarters, and opened an investigation into the incident two days later.
After that Seleznyov suggested that the incident was initiated by Khakamada's headquaters.
The district is famous for having elected in 1995 one of the most prominent democratic deputies and St. Petersburg native Galina Starovoitova, who was assasinated in 1998.
Before Sunday's elections, Starovoitova's sister, Olga, said that if Khakamada won the district she would be a worthy representative in the tradition of her slain sister.
"People are not replaceable. But Khakamada is the closest to Galina inall the district," she said.
Romankov said Khakamada who has previously run in St. Petersburg election district No. 207, always wanted to be a candidate for the district No. 209, "in order to follow Starovoitova's example."
"Unfortunately, Khakamada overestimated the democratic spirit of that district," Romankov said.
The atmosphere surrounding the election became literally darker on election day, when around 40 apartment blocks were plunged into darkness by a power outage.
The blackout, the reasons of which are still not completely clear, gave a ground for both candidates speculate about dubious election tactics.
Thus, Seleznyov said that the blackout could be an attempt of his rival's headquaters to prevent the elections.
"The headquaters of my main rival standing for in this district probably realized that she would not win and decide to ruin the elections," Seleznyov said, according to Interfax.
However, Khakamada said any blackout in the district would harm her chances.
"Unfortunately, any power cut off on this day plays against me because then people tend to blame Chubais [Anatoly Chubais, head of Unified Energy Systems and another SPS leader]," Khakamada said.
Meanwhile, a source at power utility Lenenergo said the power cut was caused by "physical damage of the cable,which was repaired by the company's emergency brigades," Interfax reported.
The source didn't exclude that the cable was damaged on purpose, though noting that the incident could be done with the purpose of stealing the cable, and could have not relation to politics.
TITLE: Nationalist Nevzorov Re-Elected
AUTHOR: By Galina Stolyarova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Controversial Russian TV journalist and right-wing extremist politician Alexander Nevzorov looks set to regain his State Duma seat in the Leningrad Oblast.
Once an official advisor on media issues to former governor of St. Petersburg Vladimir Yakovlev, Nevzorov is the northwest's answer to polit-clown and Liberal-Democrat leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky, though unlike Zhirinovsky, he is better known for his quick wit than his readiness to use his fists.
Nevzorov led candidates in the Vsevolozhsky district on Monday with 18.6 percent of Sunday's vote.
The head of the local branch of the Union of Right Forces, Zalina Medoyeva, finished second with 14.11 percent. Thirteen candidates ran in the district, where 13.6 percent of the voters chose to vote against all. The turnout was 44.9 percent.
Nevzorov shot to fame in the perestroika years with his own television program, "600 seconds," in which he exposed many city problems in a dramatic way in just 10 minutes.
However, his reputation was tarnished when he gave a report on Soviet troops storming the Vilnius television tower in Lithuania in 1991 as the republic sought to break away from the Soviet Union. Fourteen unarmed people were killed, and Nezorov reported that they had died in traffic accidents or of heart attacks.
Nevzorov has had a seat in the Russian State Duma from either St. Petersburg or Pskov since 1993, when he was elected in St. Petersburg. He was member of the Duma's Security Committee from 1993 to 1999. He belongs to no party and, although vocal outside parliament, has contributed little initiative or commentary in the Duma.
Leonid Romankov of the St. Petersburg branch of the Union of Right Forces said Nevzorov's nationalist attitude very much fits into the pattern of this year's campaign for the Duma, for which the biggest sensation was the effective exclusion from parliament of liberals and the triumph of the nationalist and Homeland party, co-led by Dmitry Rogozin.
"Nevzorov's victory is very symptomatic in this context, demonstrating that many Russians tend to show political immaturity," Romankov said. "They vote for flamboyant nationalists who make extreme statements and provide entertainment. I am very upset by this infantile attitude, when so many people mistake false values for real."
St. Petersburg sociologist Tatyana Protasenko, a senior researcher at the Institute of Sociology of the Academy of Sciences, expressed reservations about the consequences of the results of these elections. "People who vote for Nevzorov and candidates like them don't really need or expect anything from their deputies," she said. "Their motivation is a 'let's vote for a tough and cool guy' kind of thing."
Many experts believe that political strategists successfully exploited voters' national pride.
"The strategy of the Kremlin was to back the Rodina [Homeland] movement in order to weaken the Communist party, but the whole thing of making a Frankenstein has been heavily overdone," Romankov said. "Those who miss the old good times of the U.S.S.R., when the country was a strong and dominant empire, have become more aggressive, their feelings aggravated. "
Protasenko said St. Petersburg support for the nationalistic LDPR and Homeland was one of the highest in the country, partly because of the large numbers employed in defense industries, which in Soviet times were portrayed as glorious.
"The Kremlin hasn't completely realized what it has done with the society," Protasenko said. "Playing with hurt national pride and self esteem is a very dangerous thing."
Nezvorov, known for his statements that Chechnya should be led by an ethnic Russian to maintain peace and stability after the war, has been despised by local human rights advocates. In the first Chechen war, Nevzorov was in Chechnya filming for the Ministry of Ethnic Affairs and Regional Policy. The resulting documentary, "Hell," was met by criticism from most local papers, who accused him of bias, extremism and nationalism.
St. Petersburg's human rights group Soldiers' Mothers was outraged by Nevzorov's win. "It just shows that too many people haven't learned the lesson yet," said Soldiers' Mothers' Yelena Smirnova. "Politics is not a spectacle and the voters should be looking not for gestures but for programs.
"It is important that the democrats learn how to attract attention and get voters to listen to them," she added.
TITLE: OSCE Says Campaign 'Fundamentally Unfair'
AUTHOR: By Alex Fak
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - International observers on Monday issued a stinging indictment of the State Duma election campaign, calling it a step backward in Russia's transition toward democracy.
Earlier in the day, President Vladimir Putin had said just the opposite, that "the most important result of the Duma elections is that one more step has been made toward the strengthening of democracy in the Russian Federation."
"The government had ensured fair, free and open elections," he said, and the results "reflect the real sympathies of the people, and what the Russian people think, and the realities of political life."
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the Council of Europe, which together had about 500 observers at Sunday's election, however, said the final tally was "fundamentally distorted" in favor of United Russia because of the abuse of administrative resources during the campaign, including preferential coverage in the state media. The election observers also criticized the inclusion of about one-third of the country's governors on United Russia's party list.
The White House weighed in later in the day and threw its support behind the OSCE.
"It was the OSCE that monitored the elections, and they expressed concerns about the fairness of the election campaign," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. "We share those concerns."
The international observers drew a line between the actual voting, which they said the Central Elections Commission carried out "highly professionally," and the election process as a whole, which they said was "fundamentally unfair."
"These elections failed in meeting many OSCE and international standards," said Bruce George, a British MP and president of the OSCE's parliamentary assembly. "We are certain the government knows how to meet these standards. What we are yet to see is the willingness to meet them."
George described it as a "regression in the democratization process in Russia."
The sharpest criticism was directed at the use of "administrative resources," or state infrastructure and personnel, on behalf of United Russia. In many regions, the party used state offices as its local campaign headquarters free of charge, while in others, the monitors said, local governments supplied office equipment and services to Putin's party. Senior officials around the country actively promoted its candidates. In many regions, opposition candidates were barred from meeting voters and, in some instances, denied the use of public advertising space for which they had signed contracts.
Meanwhile, the inclusion on the United Russia party list of about 30 regional leaders "who have no intention of taking a seat is deceitful," said David Atkinson, head of the monitoring delegation from the Council of Europe.
The state-funded media also came in for criticism from the OSCE, which said they "failed to comply with their legal obligation under Russian law to provide balanced and unbiased reporting on candidates and political parties."
At a press conference after the OSCE released its preliminary report, Central Elections Commission chief Alexander Veshnyakov declined to comment on the OSCE's complaints.
TITLE: ST. PETERSBURGERS RESPOND
TEXT: Lyudmila, 54, economist:
I voted for United Russia, because I'm for the president - I like Putin.
As for the quite significant results of the Liberal Democratic Party, I was a bit surprised, though I think its leader Zhirinovsky often speaks about real things. As for the failure of SPS and Yabloko, I must say that I don't take a liking to the leaders of those parties.
Mers Pogosyan, 31, real estate agent:
I voted for United Russia. Though I feel sorry that Yabloko didn't get enough votes because I like that party, too.
Lyubov Karban, 63, pensioner:
I voted for Homeland because I liked Glazyev. At least we understand his position. And he obviously supports pensioners - that very old generation, which was building up the country and now has nothing.
For instance, my husband and I worked in the North of the country, and we were to get extra privileges as pensioners after that. But then they took away all our privileges.
I was glad that SPS didn't gather enough votes. I listened to many speeches of Irina Khakamada, but I never saw her as a woman who would care about our generation. And I even take offense toward her for that.
I remember how she once criticized elderly women who sell dill at metro stations, because they don't pay tax from their profit! They don't look at those who robbed the country of millions of dollars, but care about babushkas selling dill for some 50 rubles a day.
Natalya Kalugina, 20, student:
I'm satisfied with the election results. I voted for United Russia, because this party supports the president, who I like. I like Putin for introducing the reforms which I would also introduce.
As for the SPS failure, I'm a bit surprised. I remember that in the last elections of 1999, when I was not yet eligible to vote, I asked my parents to vote for SPS, but this time I didn't make that appeal to them.
The results of the Liberal Democratic Party, I think, were conditioned by the personality of Zhirinovsky, who is so eccentric. While the Communist Party got its votes due to the fact that it still means something for the elderly population.
Leonid Karban, 69, pensioner:
I'm satisfied with the election results. My wife and I voted for the Homeland bloc.
As for Yabloko not getting enough votes, I think it was fair. Just look, where do their children live and study ? Abroad!
Anatoly Labada, 60, artist:
I'm not interested in politics - I'm an artist. Though I went voting and voted for bloc Homeland and Sergei Glazyev, because he is a new person, and he is good at explaining what he wants, and I trust him.
As for the United Russia getting the major bulk of votes, it's completely clear for me why it has happened. It's the government's party, which had all the power to succeed.
I'm sorry for Yabloko, where Yavlinsky is a good economist.
Yelena, 34, saleswoman:
I didn't have time to vote yesterday because I was working. But if I went voting I'd vote for United Russia, though I don't know why. Maybe because it's the party of the president, and because most of my co-workers supported United Russia.
Roman, 24, submariner:
I'm not satisfied with the election results because I think that the percent gathered by the United Russia is not objective.
I've been to many places, and I think United Russia could have such big support only in big cities. In smaller places, where people live in poverty and many are unemployed, United Russia could not find so much support. They just used the administrative resource.
I voted for bloc Homeland and Sergei Glazyev, who seems to me a good economist.
As for the failure of SPS and Yabloko, it was conditioned by the radicalism of the reforms that they offer. After perestroika and Yeltsin, which put many people below the poverty line, people started being afraid of radical reforms.
SPS and Yabloko are for radical measures or so-called shock therapy. At the same time people could hardly like the figure of Chubais as a leader of SPS after he got to be known for cutting off the electricity in hospitals and at military bases.
The good results of the Liberal Democratic Party are conditioned by the behavior of Vladimir Zhirinovsky, who is ready to promise anyone anything : work to workers, husbands to women, skateboards to children.
- by Irina Titova
- Photos by Alexander Belenky
TITLE: Newpapers Assess Poll Outcome
AUTHOR: By Kevin O'Flynn
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - While most national newspapers led their front pages Monday with United Russia's runaway victory in the State Duma, Boris Berezovsky's Kommersant splashed out a large report of a boxing match between Vitalii Klitschko and Kirk Johnson - even though the match had finished a day before the elections began.
The election results were relegated to below the fold in a blatant snub by a newspaper that had backed Yabloko and the Union of Rights Forces, or SPS, which both failed to clear the 5 percent barrier to make it into the Duma.
A member of Kommersant's editorial team said the Boris Berezovsky-owned newspaper decided to lead with the boxing match because it had been more competitive than the elections.
"They were the technical implementation of decisions made earlier at a certain place," the journalist said, referring to the Kremlin.
Some Russian newspapers on Monday warned about the dangers posed by a pro-Kremlin parliament with a nationalist tinge. Many took a neutral stance, while a few went to press before preliminary results were released. But all were united on one theme: President Vladimir Putin's new puppies.
"We are waking up in different country," Gazeta said in a front-page editorial.
"It is dangerous to walk the streets of a country where millions vote for [Dmitry] Rogozin and [Vladimir] Zhirinovsky," satirist Viktor Shenderovich wrote in Gazeta.
The business daily Vedomosti cautioned that Putin now has carte blanche to do what he wants with the Constitution. "It is important that Russia doesn't turn into an authoritarian regime a la [Belarussian President Alexander] Lukashenko or [Turkmen leader Saparmurat] Niyazov," the newspaper said in an editorial.
Resigned hopelessness could also be seen. Shenderovich told the story of a friend who was handed a United Russia flyer on the street before the vote and responded with an expletive. The sad-eyed campaigner replied, "Yeah, I feel much the same."
Putin's revelation Sunday that his favorite black Labrador had kept him and his family up all night giving birth to eight puppies filled the front page of Komsomolskaya Pravda and was the leit-motif of many other reports.
Vedomosti columnist Olga Romanova contemplated who might take home the puppies and expressed hope that perhaps they might have some conciliatory effect. "Maybe we should give puppies to Rogozin, Zhirinovsky and General Valentin Varrenikov and our new Duma will not be a red-brown plague but one that fights fleas," she said.
She said the puppies could persuade United Russia to become open to journalists and Homeland to walk into parliament and declare: "Look, it was all a stupid joke. We just wanted to check whether there are still voters with a thirst for the ideas of Leninism, pogroms and cavemen nationalism."
"And they will hug [SPS' Anatoly] Chubais and [Yabloko's Grigory] Yavlinsky and take the idea of democracy to the people," Romanova said.
TITLE: Ural Mountains Regions Set to Unite
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - In a first, the residents of two Ural Mountains regions have overwhelmingly approved in a referendum a plan to merge into a single region.
Preliminary results from Sunday's referendum showed that 89.69 percent in Perm and 83.94 percent in neighboring Komi-Permyatsky voted in favor of the merger, Central Elections Commission deputy head Oleg Velyashev said, Interfax reported.
Several of the country's 89 regions have discussed mergers in the past, but this is the first time that concrete action has been taken toward that end. The federal government has toyed with the idea of ordering regions to unify in the past.
The Urals vote paves the way for similar referendums in other regions in the future and is a better option that ordering regions to merge, Nationalities Minister Vladimir Zorin said Monday.
"The enlargement of the regions of the Russian Federation will proceed ... in accordance with the wishes of the voters," Zorin was quoted by Interfax as saying.
The proposed Urals merger will raise living standards in economically depressed Komi-Permyatsky, he added.
For the merger to take place, the State Duma will have to amend the Russian Constitution to officially record the change.
"This will require the support of two-thirds of the State Duma's deputies," said Igor Bunin, director of the Center for Political Technologies think tank, Interfax reported.
"But the amendment is only a technicality, and it will not be hard to collect the necessary votes," he added.
TITLE: Rakhimov Faces Runoff in Bashkortostan
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - Bashkortostan's fiercely contested presidential election went into a runoff Monday after the incumbent, Murtaza Rakhimov, failed to win more than half of the vote.
Rakhimov won 43.03 percent in the Sunday election, while his two main rivals - Sergei Veremeyenko, a co-owner of Kremlin-connected Mezhprombank, and Ralif Safin, a former LUKoil vice president and a current shareholder in the oil giant, secured 25.15 percent and 22.89 percent, respectively, according to preliminary results released by Bashkir election officials on Monday afternoon.
The republic's top election official, Baryi Kindzyagulov, said results have been counted from all but 100 of Bashkortostan's 3,448 polling stations. He said Safin may edge out Veremeyenko after all the votes are tallied in this oil-rich republic of about 4 million people, but stresed that Rakhimov has already qualified to participate in the runoff.
Final results will be released on Wednesday or Thursday, and the second round of voting will be held Dec. 21, Kindzyagulov said.
Rakhimov, who has run Bashkortostan with an iron fist for 13 years, has been repeatedly accused of harassing the opposition, his rivals and media outlets. Local prosecutors determined last week that Rakhimov's chief of staff had ordered a batch of falsified ballots printed up for the Sunday election.
Central Elections Commission chief Alexander Veshnyakov said 100 complaints of violations in the vote have been filed with his commission.
TITLE: 4.8% of Voters Are 'Against All'
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - Of the 58 million voters who turned up at polling stations, 4.8 percent chose to cast their ballots against all 23 political parties and blocs in what political analysts saw as a sign of waning trust in politicians.
Turnout fell to 56 percent as disillusioned voters avoided participating altogether.
According to preliminary figures, the number of people who voted against all parties grew from 3.3 percent in 1999, although many analysts had expected it would be closer to 10 percent.
Elections in four of the country's 225 single mandate districts will probably have to be held again after it became clear Monday that "against all" was set to defeat all candidates.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Advent Service
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - An English-language Anglican Advent service will be held in the sanctuary of St. Peters' Evangelical Lutheran Church at 22/24 Nevsky Prospekt on Thursday at 6:30 p.m.
Conducted by Cannon Simon Stephens, the Dean of Russia, the service will feature special music by the Anglisky Accent Quartet, carols and candle lighting.
All are welcome.
Fingerprint Criticism
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The Foreign Ministry has criticized what it describes as a tougher procedure to obtain a U.S. visa, specifically the intention of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow to introduce fingerprint scans of all those seeking visas, Interfax reported Friday.
"We have to say that this does nothing at all to improve bilateral visa relations." the agency quoted the ministry as saying in a statement. "The question arises 'how can this be listed as part of the achievement of an agreement made at Camp David regarding the broadening of Russian-U.S. contacts between people and the simplification of visa procedures?'"
Acknowledging that the U.S. explanation for the introduction of fingerprinting is to comply with its national laws, the ministry said that it could only make receiving a visa harder for Russian citizens, the report said.
Hermitage Entry Rise
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The directorate of the State Hermitage Museum intends to raise the entry price for Russian citizens at the beginning of next year, Interfax reported Friday.
The current cost for the 1.5 million Russian citizens who visit each year is 15 rubles (60 cents), while 1 million are entitled to free entry, the report said.
How much the price will raise by is still being calculated, but museum director Mikhail Piotrovsky said the current price "is out of line with the status of the museum."
A visit to Moscow's Kremlin costs 70 rubles and a ticket to the Russian Museum costs 30 rubles, the report said.
Piotrovsky added that the Hermitage gets more than 1 billion rubles ($33 million) in state financing and earns 433 million rubles on its own.
Easier Lithuanian Visa
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Lithuania has simplified visa procedures for citizens of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan who want to stay no more than 10 days, Interfax reported Saturday.
"On Saturday a new procedure for issuing visas, confirmed by the foreign and interior ministries of Lithuania, comes into force," Interfax quoted the press service of the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry as saying.
Citizens of the four former Soviet republics who are insured can enter Lithuania and receive a single-entry visa without either an invitation or documents proving they are able to support themselves. Previously both an invitation and proof of funds had been required, the report said. Human Rights Award
GENEVA (AP) - A Swiss-based foundation said Friday that it would award its top prize to a Russian campaigner who works to expose violations in Chechnya and protect victims of abuse.
The Martin Ennals Foundation said Lida Yusupova would receive its annual award at a ceremony in Geneva in April.
Yusupova runs the Grozny office of human rights group Memorial.
"There is complete consensus among all human rights organizations that Lida deserves the award for her tireless efforts in a situation of war and extreme danger, with increased risk for women," said Hans Thoolen, chairman of the Martin Ennals Award jury.
Chechens Protest
MOSCOW (AP) - About 500 Chechens protested Saturday in Grozny, accusing authorities of detaining three people without reason and demanding their immediate release.
Two local administrators from the southern Vedeno district disappeared on Nov. 29 while heading to a political conference for the pro-Kremlin United Russia party, protesters said.
The men's car broke down en route, and while they were fixing it, they were allegedly seized by members of Chechen president Akhmad Kadyrov's security force, protesters said. It was unclear how they could know what happened. Chechen officials have said they do not know where the men are.
The protesters also called for the release of Khusai Baitimayev, 44, who was allegedly seized by soldiers in the village Belgatoi in the Nozhai-Yurt region on Nov. 11. His wife, Rosa, said he was seized along with eight other men, but they were all later released. Only her husband remains missing.
Vimpelcom Subscribers
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The number of Vimpelcom subscribers in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast hit 300,000, Interfax reported Monday.
According to data from ACM Consulting, Vimpelcom saw 50 percent of St. Petersburg subscriber base growth in November.
The total number of subscribers by the end of October was 245,000.
Vimpelcom operates the Bee-line GSM brand in St. Petersburg and 23 towns in the Leningrad Oblast.
High-Speed Rail
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Bombardier Transportation, a Canadian company, will submit a feasibility study for a high-speed above-ground transportation system to the St. Petersburg administration by May 15, 2004, Interfax reported Monday.
The project is worth $527 million, Bombardier Total Transit System president Patrice Pelletier told journalists at a press conference Monday.
Bombardier will also determine the structure of financing for the project. Financing will come from Bombardier itself, loans and a foreign partner.
Vice Governor Yury Molchanov, who is responsible for the city's investments, remarked at the press conference that the city administration would consider contributing public funds to the project.
The city signed a preliminary agreement with Bombardier in October 2002. The project envisions 20 kilometers of tracks with 46 cars that will be able to carry about 260,000 passengers daily.
Severstal Goes Cyber
MOSCOW (SPT) - Severstal initiated electronic trading, Interfax cited a company press release as saying Monday.
Severstal, located in the city of Cherepovets, Vologda region, signed an agreement with EPAM Systems to create the electronic trading system.
Electronic trading should make the business more transparent, attract more buyers, and improve service, according to the press release.
"About 75 percent of metals are purchased by construction companies and service centers through middlemen or major traders," sales director Dmitry Goroshkov said. Berezovsky to File Suit
MOSCOW SPT) - Boris Berezovsky wants to sue the government for $1 billion for the alleged appropriation of his assets in the media, oil and mining industries, the Financial Times reported Saturday.
Berezovsky told the FT that his lawyers were preparing claims in Britain's High Court and the European Court of Human Rights. He said he was forced into selling his stakes in ORT and TV6, as well as Sibneft, after he fell out with President Vladimir Putin. He accused the Russian government of trying to take control of companies from businessmen who are critical of the Kremlin.
Grain Exports Continue
MOSCOW (Reuters) - There are no immediate plans to limit grain exports to prevent a domestic shortage, although such measures might be taken if shipments increased sharply, Agriculture Minister Alexei Gordeyev said Friday.
"We are not talking about any urgent measures," Gordeyev told reporters when asked whether Russia, like neighboring Kazakhstan, planned any grain export restrictions.
But he added that if exports rose to 5 million tons from the current 4 million, the government might well impose curbs.
Prices Rise 1%
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) - Consumer prices rose 1 percent in November as prices for eggs and dairy products including milk surged more than 5 percent.
Consumer prices gained 1 percent in November from October, the State Statistics Committee said. Prices rose 10.8 percent in the first 11 months.
UAZ Production Up
MOSCOW (Prime-Tass) - The car output of the Ulyanovsk Automobile Plant, or UAZ, totaled 69,384 vehicles in January to November, up from 63,309 cars in the same period last year, the company's press service said Friday.
The output was worth 9.6 billion rubles ($323 million).
The company exported 13,273 cars, up 66.7 percent on the year. In November, 7,149 cars were exported.
The UAZ factory produces four-wheel drive cars and sport utility vehicles.
TITLE: New Political Deck Gives Putin All of the Aces
AUTHOR: By Caroline McGregor
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - First there were U.S. Army-issued playing cards of top Iraqi officials, then a spoof deck of the Bush administration, and now the Russian power elite is, well, following suit.
Kommersant, which created the new deck together with NTV's "Namedni" news program, said it was meant to create a historical record as the curtain closes on President Vladimir Putin's first term and as elections approach, potentially shifting the balance of power.
Political power is categorized by four groups - the Family (hearts), the siloviki (spades), the St. Petersburgers (clubs) and the liberals (diamonds).
The ace of each suit is Putin himself.
Why? "Because he holds absolute power," wrote Ilya Bulavinov, head of Kommersant's political section, in the Nov. 10-16 issue of the Kommersant Vlast magazine.
The Family of Yeltsin-era insiders who remained influential under Putin includes people like Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov and former Kremlin administration chief of staff Alexander Voloshin. Patriarch Alexy II also makes an appearance as the eight of hearts.
Voloshin, the king of hearts, quit his post Oct. 31, after the cards had gone to print. But Vlast editor Maxim Kovalsky, who led the group that decided who would be in the deck together with "Namedni" anchor Leonid Parfyonov, said Voloshin nonetheless maintains his influence and still deserves a card.
"We wanted a snapshot of who has influence at the end of 2003, and Voloshin until very very recently was there," Kovalsky said in a telephone interview.
The rival faction to the Family is a group from the security services and law enforcement, called the siloviki, including FSB director Nikolai Patrushev and Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov.
The St. Petersburg clan includes people like Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov and Dmitry Medvedev, Voloshin's replacement as Kremlin chief of staff.
Among the liberals, known for their pro-Western approach, are figures like Anatoly Chubais, who is a leader of the Union of Right Forces political party in addition to heading Unified Energy Systems, and Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin.
Of the 36 cards, only two are women: Yeltsin's daughter Tatyana Dyachenko shares the six of hearts with her husband, former Yeltsin chief of staff Valentin Yumashev; St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko is the queen of clubs.
Decks, like this one, of 36 cards - without jokers, and with no twos, threes, fours or fives - are common in Russia.
Perhaps for the amusement of those around the poker table, the other three queens are men: Kasyanov is the queen of hearts, Kremlin deputy administration chief Igor Sechin is the queen of spades and jailed Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky is the queen of diamonds.
The suits were unveiled one by one in four consecutive issues of Kommersant Vlast and four Sunday night broadcasts of "Namedni." The final broadcast on Nov. 30 was dedicated to the suits, and Vlast wrapped up the series in its edition on newsstands on Dec. 1.
In September, "Namedni" and Kommersant came up with a constellation of American political leaders, as a play on the decks of "most-wanted" Saddam Hussein lieutenants given to U.S. soldiers in Iraq.
The Bush administration cards were meant as a political lesson for a Russian audience, Parfyonov said back in September when the project was announced. He described the project as a type of "Americanology."
The hierarchy of moderates, careerists, neo-conservatives, and relatives and friends of the president who drive U.S. policymaking was released as "The Four Suits of American Power," and sold in Moscow.
A spokeswoman for Press House, which sold the U.S.-themed decks through its Khoroshiye Novosti newsstands in Moscow, said the total print run was quite small and the cards were scooped up quickly.
The last of the 500 decks was sold in early November.
"If they'd print more, we'd sell more, but for now it's not planned," she said.
The Russian deck is now on sale at the newsstands and in several bookstores, according to the Kommersant web site. The bookstores are the Moskva on Tverskaya Ulitsa, Moskovsky Dom Knigi on Ulitsa Novy Arbat and Biblio-Globus on Myasnitskaya Ulitsa.
Information in Russian about the cards is at http://www.kommersant.ru/ announcement11.html
TITLE: Stavropol Commuter Train Bombed, Leaving 42 Dead
AUTHOR: By Yuri Bagrov
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: YESSENTUKI, Southern Russia - One family plans to bury their daughter in the wedding dress she hoped to wear soon, while another mother wept Saturday after discovering her son alive but deeply disfigured from the suspected suicide bombing on a commuter train in the Stavropol region.
Hospitals - and morgues - were crowded with grieving relatives searching for loved ones after Friday's early morning attack that killed 42 and injured 200 near the Yessentuki station. Many were students from local schools and universities.
The blast - the second on the train line since September - seemed aimed at spreading alarm ahead of Sunday's parliamentary elections in the already tense region near Chechnya. Government officials closed public markets on what is usually the biggest shopping day, and extra police flooded the streets.
Officers with dogs swept deserted train stations, where ticket sellers said no one wanted to travel on the commuter line. The shrapnel-filled bomb believed strapped to a suicide attacker blew the train car apart as it was about 500 meters from the station, a spot where passengers would have begun crowding together toward the doors.
No one claimed responsibility, but government officials suggested Chechen rebels were behind the blast.
Authorities detained a man on suspicion of participating in the attack in the Stavropol region on Sunday. No other details were given by officials, who cited the need for secrecy.
Marina Tishtsenko found her son, Oleg, his face charred black on one side and swollen on the other. Others in his room had lost pieces of their skulls and suffered broken bones.
"The doctor said he would be OK," Tishtsenko said, weeping and shaking her head as if she herself were not sure.
One family found their daughter in the morgue and pledged to bury the bride-to-be in the dress that she had hoped to wear for her wedding.
Many relatives were too traumatized to talk after being redirected from hospital wards to morgues in search of their loved ones. They turned away in tears from journalists' questions.
The death toll rose to 42 on Sunday after a woman died of her injuries in the hospital. By midday, authorities had identified all but one woman who died in the blast, said Vladimir Gerasimov, a duty officer with the Emergency Situations Ministry. Scores remained hospitalized.
The blast was the latest in a series of suicide bombings and other attacks that have foiled security measures and killed more than 275 people in and around the rebellious region of Chechnya and in Moscow in the past year. In September, two blasts on the same railway line, which links the cities of Kislovodsk and Mineralniye Vody, killed six people. No group claimed responsibility for those attacks.
Federal Security Service chief Nikolai Patrushev said the remains of the suspected bomber Friday were found with grenades still attached to his legs. Three women also were involved in the attack - two who jumped from the train just before the blast, and one who was injured and unlikely to survive, he said.
President Vladimir Putin condemned the attack as "an attempt to destabilize the situation in the country on the eve of parliamentary elections," and he equated it, as he has with other attacks, to international terrorism.
TITLE: Opposition Parties Report Fraud
AUTHOR: By Catherine Belton
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - From suspected vote rigging in Chechnya and alleged stuffed ballot boxes in Kirov to disappearing election committee stamps in Tuva and Communist observers getting beaten in Kaspiisk, observers from opposition parties said a slew of violations tarnished parliamentary elections Sunday.
The head of the Communist Party's legal department, Vadim Solovyov, said the party's team of 200,000 observers had totted up a litany of apparently fraudulent voting schemes and had passed on its evidence to international monitors. He said the party had also called on prosecutors to open criminal cases into several alleged violations.
But Central Elections Commission chief Alexander Veshnyakov said Sunday's ballot appeared to have past "without excesses," while independent monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe still faced a check of ballot papers through the night and were saving their conclusions for a news conference Monday.
In Chechnya, some observers claimed ballot stuffing doubled voter turnout to more than 70 percent.
"At this polling station only 200 people voted, or about 10 percent," said Ruslan Khadashev, an observer for single-mandate independent candidate Salambek Maigov. "I don't know where they got 70 percent from."
An election official at Polling Station No. 403 in Grozny said the station had been ordered to ensure a turnout of 85 percent. "We filled in 1,000 ballots yesterday. As a percentage of the number of people allocated to this polling station - 2,100 - that's almost 50 percent. The rest we have to get by way of real voting," the official, Ziyavdi Chagayev, said.
The most complicated thing was to try and distract the attention of observers, Chagayev said. "You needed to put the ballots in one by one. If you stuck a whole packet in together, it would have been noticed during the count."
"The 1,000 ballots we filled in were for United Russia and Akhmar Zavgayev. It was said officially that we should support them," Chagayev said. Zavgayev, with the blessing of the Kremlin-backed Chechen admnistration, was running for Chechnya's single seat in the State Duma.
Chechens informally polled on the street expressed little interest in voting. "What sense is there in voting when the results are known beforehand?" said Zarema Dyshneeva, a 33-year-old teacher of foreign literature at the Chechen State University. "Everything is decided without us and for us."
Authorities, however, said the vote in Chechnya and elsewhere appeared to have been conducted without major violations.
"According to officials at my bureau, there were no significant violations during today's elections," said Abdul Khakim Sultygov, the presidential envoy for human rights in Chechnya, Interfax reported. "The course of voting in Chechnya is in line with all democratic norms. The voter turnout is high."
Veshnyakov conceded there had been problems in Bashkortostan, where observers were temporarily barred from doing their jobs and noted there had been an electricity blackout in parts of St Petersburg, Interfax reported. But he said all these events appeared to have been dealt with immediately and had "no serious consequences."
Even before preliminary results started coming in, Communist chief Gennady Zyuganov complained about breaches in elections procedure.
"Unfortunately, there have been a lot of violations," he said. "In Primorye, the governor is calling on everyone to vote for the Democrats. Yesterday in Yakutia, the vice president called on everyone to vote for whoever he considered necessary. This is a violation."
Solovyov listed just some of the violations uncovered by his party, including: ballots being handed out to more than 100 villagers in Udmurtia the day before elections with the box for United Russia already ticked off, 120 ballots at a polling station in the Altai region with the Communist Party scrubbed out, a missing election committee stamp in Tuva, and observers being barred from polling stations in Dagestan.
Yabloko deputy head Sergei Ivanenko said Sunday his party's observers had uncovered some violations in the Far East and the Urals but had no complaints to the Central Elections Commission yet.
Galina Mikhalyova, head of Yabloko's analytical center, said the day's first complaint came from Vladivostok Polling Station No. 310 at about 5 a.m. Moscow time. A Yabloko observer complained about a fraud nicknamed "carousel," in which defrauders obtain a clean ballot, fill it in favor of the party they choose and pay a voter to cast the filled ballot. The money is handed over after the voter returns with a clean ballot of his own. The observer called the police and supervising election officials, and the defrauders left in a minivan, Mikhalyova said.
Timur Aliev in Grozny and Anatoly Medetsky in Moscow contributed to this report.
TITLE: A Fight, an Egg and Some Wake-Up Calls
AUTHOR: By Alex Nicholson
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Not counting some fiery language and a hurled egg, political heavyweights past and present cast their votes in front of the cameras without incident Sunday.
Some were bellicose and others sad, but all had a few words for the public.
Appearing at a voting station around noon with his entourage, ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky wasted no time creating a ruckus.
After casting his ballot, Zhirinovsky began answering questions from a small army of reporters and camera crews. But when asked by an elections observer from Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov's campaign team to move the impromptu news conference away from the voting area, Zhirinovsky indignantly demanded to see the official's identification.
"Show me your documents!" he bellowed. "What gives you the right to get involved in the voting process?"
As a crowd pressed forward to watch the 15-minute dispute, Zhirinovsky's bodyguards pushed back a female voter who was scolding Zhirinovsky and began leading the politician toward the exit.
"She's crazy! Show me a note from your psychiatrist!" he shouted after her.
The elections observer, who declined to give his name, said he considered the incident a voting violation. "I will report this as a violation. ... We'll see what happens," he said.
More than harsh rhetoric was flung around across town at Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov's Polling Station No. 107.
"Kasyanov, the elections are a farce!" a woman cried out as she hurled an egg at the prime minister as he cast his ballot, Interfax reported. The egg struck him on his shoulder and broke.
As police led the unidentified woman out of the hall, Kasyanov quickly put on a brave face. "This little incident is part of democracy," he said with a smile, RIA-Novosti reported.
The radical National Bolshevik Party later claimed responsibility for the attack.
Police opened a criminal investigation of hooliganism.
For former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, his polling station on Ulitsa Kosygina held nothing more ominous than a 10-minute wait in line.
A local elections representative met Gorbachev and his daughter, Irena Virganskaya, at the door. "Mikhail Sergeyevich, I have a surprise for you. You will have to wait in this line."
"No problem," Gorbacheyev replied as he took his place.
Despite numerous offers from fellow voters, the former general secretary of the Soviet Union did not cut in line, Interfax reported.
Some were less lucky. Union of Right Forces co-leader Boris Nemtsov stood for a full 20 minutes in line at Polling Station No. 94 on Ulitsa Krasina.
Nemtsov told reporters that his daughter, Zhana, was voting for the first time, and congratulated the scores other young Russians for whom Sunday was their first hands-on taste of democracy.
SPS co-leader Anatoly Chubais said he came to vote in a "bad" mood.
"Many of the electorate do not fully understand the seriousness of the situation. We really could wake up in a different country tomorrow," Chubais said, also at the Ulitsa Kosygina polling station.
SPS warned last week that the State Duma was in danger of being swamped by "nationalist-socialist" candidates.
It seemed likely, however, that Chubais could count on at least one vote. Former President Boris Yeltisn gave a strong hint that his vote had gone to SPS, saying he had voted for "the youngsters who are having a hard time right now but with whom the future lies."
Nemtsov and Chubais were part of Yeltsin's team of "young reformers" drafted in the 1990s to steer Russia into a market economy.
Communist Party chief Gennady Zyuganov, asked why he had arrived at the polling station without his family, said it was just too early in the morning. "I have a big family, they will vote later. The young ones have just woken up."
Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu, a leader of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party, did not share Chubais' fears about the country and was looking forward to waking up Monday morning.
Interior Minister and United Russia chairman Boris Gryzlov urged Russians to follow his example after turning up at his polling station at 8:15 a.m.
"Russia is fine, there's no need to cure her. She just needs to be woken up," he said after dropping his ballot into the ballot box with a flourish. He called upon Russians to "wake up fast and come and vote."
One man for whom early morning wake-up calls have become a way of life cast his ballot along with the other inmates at the Matrosskaya Tishin prison. "[Mikhail] Khodorokovsky voted in the morning along with the other prisoners," Deputy Justice Minister Yury Kalinin said.
Asked who Khodorkovsky had voted for, a lawyer for the embattled Yukos founder, Anton Drel, told Agence France Presse: "I wouldn't like to hazard a guess."
Greg Walters contributed to this report.
TITLE: Moscow Mayor Captures Almost 75% of the Vote
AUTHOR: By Denis Maternovsky
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Yury Luzhkov's resounding re-election as Moscow mayor, capturing 74.9 percent of the city's electorate after 95 percent of votes were counted, hardly comes as a surprise.
Political observers attribute his victory more to a lack of an alternative candidate who could unify protest voters than to genuine support for Luzhkov's policies.
In Sunday's poll, Luzhkov, 67, was opposed by billionaire banker Alexander Lebedev, who garnered 12.3 percent of the vote; coffin magnate German Sterligov, with 3.6 percent; and construction firm head Nikolai Lifanov, winning 1.2 percent.
Voter turnout exceeded 57.5 percent, head of the Moscow city election commission, Valentin Gorbunov said.
Luzhkov has been the capital's mayor since 1992, winning re-election in 1996 with 88.5 percent and in 1999 with 69.9 percent of the vote. This term will be his last as he is ineligible to run again.
In striking contrast to the last election, Luzhkov was opposed by candidates unknown to the vast majority of Muscovites.
In 1999 his opponents included such renowned politicians as former prime minister Sergei Kiriyenko, former head of the presidential property department Pavel Borodin and LDPR Deputy Alexei Mitrofanov.
Of Luzhkov's three opponents this year, only Lebedev ran a proper electoral campaign.
At a Lebedev campaign event last week, retiree Antonina Kiryukhina said she would vote for him rather than Luzhkov because he is young and, as president of the National Reserve Bank, must be a good manager.
"I was thinking of voting for Lebedev because he is young, but I ended up voting for Luzhkov anyway," said Valentina, 68, who would not give her last name. "At least with Luzhkov you know what to expect."
Her sentiments were echoed by voters across the city who indicated that they voted for Luzhkov because they were afraid of change and did not take the other candidates seriously.
Lifanov, 57, who heads Progress Association, which has extensive contracts with City Hall to build municipal buildings, was generally regarded as Luzhkov's "back up." Electoral law requires that at least two candidates run for the post.
Coffin-maker Sterligov, 37, who founded the Alisa stock-exchange in the early '90s, ran on a promise to expel Azeris and Chechens from Moscow and to ban abortion.
Staff writer Lyuba Pronina contributed to this report.
TITLE: Selected Quotes
TEXT: SPS co-leader Boris Nemtsov:
"I would like to thank millions of our compatriots and fellow citizens for supporting the Union of Right Forces. ...
"What is of most significance to me is that there will be a large number of national-socialists in the new Duma, and we have warned about it. It is evident that there will be a large number of national-socialists and representatives of the party of Russian bureaucracy. I don't think that a Duma of this kind can facilitate Russia's progress. It is absolutely evident to me that it is Russian democratic parties that are the guarantor of Russia's progress. Only democratic parties guarantee freedom of press and the right of the citizens to justice. Only democratic parties guarantee economic development and normal relations of Russia with the world. And if our representation in Duma is minimal, then a lot of problems will arise for Russia, and I am very afraid that we are losing our opportunity."
Homeland co-leader Sergei Glazyev:
"We did not steal votes from any other political party - we simply worked with the people. ...
"In the case that we make it into the Duma, we will pass laws that enable us to double the country's budget, gross domestic product and the salaries of state employees.
TITLE: Fledgling Homeland Bloc Sweeps Up Voters
AUTHOR: By Catherine Belton
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - It was founded less than four months ago by diminutive economist Sergei Glazyev, a Communist deputy, together with an unlikely sidekick, presidential envoy for Kaliningrad, Dmitry Rogozin.
But, despite appearing from nowhere, the Homeland bloc scored a solid 8.9 percent in Sunday's State Duma elections, according to the Central Election Commission, garnering votes from well-entrenched, existing forces: the Communists and even liberal parties such as Yabloko and the Union of Right Forces, or SPS.
Homeland's campaign built up so much steam that the leaders of SPS, Anatoly Chubais, Irina Khakamada and Boris Nemtsov, last week warned that if the bloc got in, the Duma could end up being dominated by a "national-socialist" alliance consisting of Homeland, Vladimir Zhirinovsky's Liberal Democratic Party, pro-Kremlin United Russia and the Communists.
Homeland's secret? A very simple vote-winning platform: take away the huge windfall profits being reaped by the handful of oligarchs that own the nation's vast natural resources and hand them back to the state. A healthy handful of nationalism is thrown in by Rogozin, who heads the Duma's international affairs committee and in most public appearances promises to protect the interests of Russians abroad.
The Kremlin, meanwhile, appears to have lent Homeland a hand. The bloc has received extensive coverage on national state-controlled television.
For the voter, the campaign does not appear to be the usual bluster. Glazyev's earnest demeanor and the reputation he has built over the past decade as one of the nation's most prominent economists all give him weight.
Take one TV ad from the Homeland campaign: Glazyev stood before a full lecture hall, behind him showing on a blackboard pie charts splitting up the nation's wealth. Glazyev proposes raising taxes on natural resource owners and spreading their wealth back to pensioners and government workers.
The bloc's slogans include "Return the wealth of the nation to the people!" and "For social justice!"
Voters appeared to trust Glazyev.
"Glazyev is an economist and has a plan for Russia's economy," said Slava, a taxi driver, before Sunday's poll. "I'm going to vote for him."
Glazyev's pitch could not have come at a better time. Just as he was making his case for a redistribution of wealth, the alleged crimes of the nation's marauding oligarchs have hit prime-time news slots with the arrest of Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
"Glazyev has successfully managed to mine the theme of this election campaign: taking away the windfall profits from the oligarchs," said Sergei Markov, a Kremlin-connected political analyst. "He is a hugely popular figure, and he has been strongly supported by the Kremlin."
"The Kremlin created a number of groups to splinter off and take votes from the Communist Party. There is one to fit every possible turn in voter mood," said Nikolai Petrov, a political analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center, referring to other groups reportedly created by the Kremlin in recent months, such the Russia's Rebirth-Party of Life bloc. "It turned out that in this climate, Homeland got the winning ticket."
With the Communist campaign seemingly in tatters amid "massive internal struggles at every level from the local right up the top," Homeland will get a lot of the protest vote that in previous years would have gone to the Communists, sociologist Boris Kagarlitsky said. "The Communist Party electorate is decomposing daily. Homeland is hitting the nails in the coffin."
Glazyev's low-key approach to wealth redistribution had worked before. Just over a year ago, in what many call his debut as a politician in his own right, Glazyev ran as an outsider in Krasnoyarsk's gubernatorial election. He came from nowhere, and with apparently little funding, to finish third, pushing the two leading candidates both heavily backed by big business into a runoff. Catching local pundits blindsided by his run, all began proclaiming "the Glazyev factor."
This time, the "Glazyev factor" might also play against Glazyev. He might have done too well. "Now the fear is that Glazyev could become a serious presidential candidate from the left," said Andrei Piontkovsky, an independent political analyst. "The Kremlin's backing via its administrative resource is going to be key."
"In the last few days, the Kremlin has been changing its relations to Glazyev," said Stanislav Belkovsky, head of the Council for National Strategy, a think tank that published a controversial report predicting a "creeping coup" by the oligarchs last summer. "It turns out he has presidential ambitions that he has not agreed upon with the Kremlin."
Glazyev would not say at a news conference Thursday whether he was heading for a presidential run, saying only he wanted to fight the Duma battle first.
He denied reports that he had received Kremlin backing and funding from metals magnate Oleg Deripaska's Base Element. "These allegations we are being funded by the Kremlin are getting ridiculous," he said. "Why would we be fighting with United Russia and SPS - all pro-Kremlin parties - if this was the case?" He said he would form an anti-Kremlin patriotic alliance with the Communists if his bloc gets in.
That's something the Kremlin could regret. "One has to wonder whether with all the Kremlin's support, over time, this will be a Frankenstein that comes back to haunt them," Michael McFaul, a political science professor at Stanford University who specializes in Russian elections, said last week. "They will inadvertently have created a problem for themselves in the long run."
Glazyev on Thursday appeared to recognize waning support from the powers-that-be. "Channel One has stopped showing us all this week. We're not on TV anymore," he said.
Meanwhile, one of his bloc's senior members, billionaire banker Alexander Lebedev, stepped down unexpectedly Thursday, claiming too much extremism from party leaders. But analysts said the move probably came too late to effect Sunday's vote.
TITLE: State TV Focuses on United Russia
AUTHOR: By Anna Dolgov
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - Even if state-run television channels weren't aiming to make voters forget that any political parties other than Kremlin-backed United Russia were competing in parliamentary elections, they did little to dispel that impression Sunday.
While ballots for the State Duma offer Russians a choice of 23 parties, broadcasts on the main channels featured only one for a large part of the day.
Newscasts on state-controlled Channel One and Rossia were awash with footage of United Russia leaders casting ballots and urging citizens to vote.
They didn't say for whom, but the message was clear.
President Vladimir Putin, who has said repeatedly that United Russia had his full support, told reporters Sunday he could not disclose who got his vote, as that might be interpreted as illegal campaigning on election day.
"But I think my preferences are already known," he added with a grin.
In footage aired on Rossia, Emergency Situations Minister and United Russia co-leader Sergei Shoigu expressed hope that Russians would wake up in a better country on Monday.
Interior Minister Boris Gryzlov, who heads United Russia's party list, urged fellow citizens to "wake up and vote."
The party's No. 3 man, Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov, was also shown casting his ballot and extolling the "extraordinary" day.
Rossia added a brief mention of United Russia's main competitor, the Communist Party, saying that its leader, Gennady Zyuganov, also had voted.
Judging by the two channels' coverage, a viewer unfamiliar with Russian politics might not even be aware that other parties, such as liberal opposition Yabloko and the pro-reform Union of Right Forces, or SPS, were running in the election.
Only in the evening, when, according to the Central Elections Commission, more than 36 percent of Russians had already voted, did Rossia air footage of Yabloko leader Grigory Yavlinsky and SPS co-leader Boris Nemtsov casting ballots.
"The current campaign is certainly not an equal-opportunity campaign," said Alexei Melnikov, a Duma deputy from Yabloko.
"Representatives of United Russia are doing what effectively amounts to violating the law and putting pressure on the voters," Melnikov said in a telephone interview.
Sunday's coverage comes after months of heavy bias in favor of United Russia by all main television channels since the last privately owned national network, TVS, was shut down last summer.
"This is 'managed democracy' in the country. All decisions are made by the presidential administration," SPS Deputy Boris Nadezhdin said by telephone, referring to the Kremlin's term for tightening its grip on power. "I hope that voters will turn out to be more intelligent than those who are staging this show."
In advertisements reminiscent of the 1996 presidential campaign, some Russian web sites urged their visitors to go vote - or risk being ruled by an authoritarian regime.
In the summer of 1996, then-President Boris Yeltsin was running a tight race against Communist challenger Gennady Zyuganov, and pro-Yeltsin media painted a doomsday picture of what a Communist victory might entail.
This Sunday, popular e-mail portal mail.ru posted flashing red-on-black ads that read: "Accustomed to e-mail? Vote Sunday! Or on Monday you will be searching for envelopes."
Another ad read: "Downloading pictures? Vote Sunday! Or on Monday you will be unloading rail cars." A third said: "Following Chelsea games? Vote Sunday! Or after Monday you will be charged with espionage."
The mostly younger constituency of Internet users is considered to have generally above-average education or income. But while the demographic group is often expected by pollsters to favor liberal parties, it is often politically inactive.
TITLE: State-Controlled Media Coverage Favors Kremlin
AUTHOR: By Anna Dolgov
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - Newscasts on Russia's main television channels generally reflect the Kremlin's position in Sunday's State Duma elections, monitoring conducted over the past week by The St. Petersburg Times showed.
Alongside widespread, complimentary coverage of the main pro-Kremlin party, United Russia, news programs carried predominantly unflattering reports about its main rival, the Communist Party.
According to monitoring conducted between Nov. 28 and Dec. 4, state-controlled Channel One made no mention of any party except United Russia in the earlier of its two daily prime-time newscasts, although it reported on other contenders in its 9 p.m. newscast.
Throughout the week, both Channel One and state-owned Rossia were flooded with reports about United Russia leaders on occasions as varied as dropping in at a rock concert, touring a dairy factory and cutting the ribbon at a new bridge.
A lone report about a visit to Tver by Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov also aired on Rossia.
But the Tver piece came after news in preceding days about Communist veterans protesting against the new rich in their ranks - and Zyuganov saying the Communists would drop out of an informal goodwill pact to refrain from dirty campaign tactics during the election.
The law prohibits selective coverage of campaign events, so if a media outlet reports about events staged by one candidate, it must also report all the others.
But if a party campaigns more than its competitors, it can legitimately get more coverage, Central Elections Commission legal expert Maya Grishina said.
"If Zyuganov also opened a bridge somewhere, it should have been reported, too. [But] we don't keep track of his movements," she said, adding that as long as parties have not complained to the commission that their campaign events were being ignored, nothing could be done.
Newscasts on NTV - once the country's leading independent network, but now owned by state-controlled Gazprom - appeared more balanced.
But United Russia still racked up five reports or comments by its leaders on NTV newscasts. The Union of Right Forces, or SPS, was next with three.
President Vladimir Putin has said on a number of occasions that he would like to see United Russia win the Duma elections, and praised the party again in a lengthy interview that aired on all three main channels on Nov. 28.
In all, United Russia representatives featured 18 times on Channel One and 12 times on Rossia.
On all three main channels, the liberal Yabloko and SPS parties and the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party have received significantly less coverage.
The slant appears to have become a consistent trend on national television since the last privately owned channel, TVS, was shut down this summer.
The results of last week's monitoring were consistent with those of a similar survey conducted by The St. Petersburg Times in September, and with those reported by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe last week.
"State media failed to meet its obligation to provide objective information to the electorate," OSCE media analyst Rastislav Kuzel said.
"We have found that Channel One and Rossia have been providing United Russia with extensive positive or neutral coverage. There was an approximately similar amount of time given to the Communist Party, but it was different in tone, and mostly negative," Kuzel said in a telephone interview.
Zyuganov complained in a letter to Putin on Dec. 1 that state channels were disseminating "lies and slander" about the Communist Party.
But the CEC's Grishina said Zyuganov failed to provide any specific evidence to the electoral authorities.
"All our requests that they provide information demonstrating that their campaign events were not reported, or reported in an negative light, were left unanswered," she said.
TITLE: Novotel, Ibis Hotels Under Construction
AUTHOR: By Andrei Musatov
PUBLISHER: Vedomosti
TEXT: The Accor French hotel company will attempt to fill the city's need for mid-range hotels by bringing its Novotel and Ibis brands to St. Petersburg.
This is not Accor's first look at the St. Petersburg market. In spring of last year the company was engaged in negotiations with the St. Petersburg Hotel, and hotels at 19 Vladimirsky Prospekt and 18 Suvorovsky Prospekt. No contracts resulted.
Accor vice president for chain development Daniel Bourgois told Vedomosti that a memorandum of understanding has already been signed with ZAO Ligovsky 54 to build an Ibis three-star hotel on the site at the same address. The agreement should be signed by the end of the year.
Dmitry Gershon, a spokesman for the STEP general contractor that owns shares in Ligovsky 54, said STEP plans to start construction of the 200-room hotel in February 2004, with completion slated for the end of 2005. Gershon said an unnamed Russian company would fund the $10 million project.
Bourgois said the first Novotel hotel in St. Petersburg - a four-star hotel with 200 rooms - will open in mid-2004. The Russian company Galis Terminal is building the hotel on Ulitsa Mayakovskogo.
According to information from the St. Petersburg administration's committee on urban planning and architecture, Galis Terminal, which belongs to the Central Aviation Agency, purchased two plots costing $1.3 million in the city's 130th quadrant (between Nevsky Prospekt, Ulitsa Mayakovskogo, Zhukovskogo and Vosstaniya) in April 2001. Galis Terminal planned to build a three-star hotel with 265 rooms at a cost of between $6 million and $7 million. Galis Terminal representatives could not be reached for comment Friday.
Roman Lvov, regional manager of the Russian office of Caspian Developers, said construction of a Novotel hotel costs between $19 million and $24 million, or between $80,000 and $100,000 per room.
Bourgois said the company is also talking to the owner of the building on Pochtamtskaya Ulitsa where the opening of another 200-room Novotel is planned. Baltiiskaya Stroitelnaya Kompaniya received building rights to the plot at 4a Pochtamtskaya Ulitsa in July 2001.
According to Sergei Kovalyov, executive director of the Interkonsalt consulting company, Accor has good reason to open hotels under French brands in St. Petersburg. "The French and Germans are tied for second place after Scandinavians in terms of the number of tourists visiting St. Petersburg," he said.
Lvov said the St. Petersburg hotel market could easily handle an additional 30,000 beds, 70 percent of which would be in mid-range hotels.
The Accor Group runs 4,000 hotels under 11 brand names in 90 countries. Brands include Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure, Ibis, Suite Hotel and Red Roof. Sales in 2002 amounted to around 7.2 billion euros. The company's only hotels in Russia are two Novotel hotels in Moscow.
TITLE: BA Marks Decade, New Plans
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: British Airways celebrated its 10th anniversary in St. Petersburg Friday, an event that provided an opportunity to announce the airline's future plans.
In the works are daily flights between St. Petersburg and London, Daniel Burkard, the company's commercial director for Eastern Europe, said at a press conference Friday. The airline started in 1993 with three flights a week between the two cities. The number of flights was increased to five in 1994, according to a press release.
The company is also considering introducing morning flights from Moscow's Domodedovo airport, Burkard said.
This year BA has invested about $1 million in Russia, Burkard said. The company's passenger traffic in Russia rose 17 percent in September to November.
BA also plans to sign bilateral agreements on cooperation with Russian airlines Ankor, Samara and Domodedovo. Under these agreements, the airlines will be able to sell tickets for BA, while their flights will be available in British Airways' 150 branches around the world, Burkard said.
BA has already signed similar agreements with Russian airlines KrasAir, Transaero and YuTair.
BA is also planning to introduce a new flight from London to Yekaterinburg next year.
The airline flew passengers on a regularly scheduled international Concorde for the last time Oct. 24, 2003. After 24 years of flying the supersonic jets, BA discontinued Concorde service after a crash in 2001 suspended service temporarily.
The seven jets in the fleet were retired on Oct. 30 and were sent to museums in Barbados, Edinburgh, Seattle and New York, and also to Heathrow and Manchester airports.
(Prime-Tass, SPT)
TITLE: Kudrin Backs Yukos Probe
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: MOSCOW - The Tax Ministry is investigating how oil company Yukos used tax optimization methods to cut its tax bill, a French newspaper quoted Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin as saying on Friday.
The report extended a decline by Yukos shares and compounded speculation that an $11 billion merger with rival Sibneft would fall apart and that its licenses were at risk in an all-out attack on the company by the state.
The battered shares plunged nearly 8 percent on the day to close at $10.26. The stock has lost 29 percent of its market value since Khodorkovsky's arrest.
"The street talk is that people think this merger is possibly off the rails, which I think for a while people couldn't fathom," Brunswick UBS trader Nick Mokhoff said.
Kudrin was quoted by La Tribune as saying Yukos had cut its taxes by $5 billion using tax-optimization arrangements, including ones which were legal.
A report by Interfax Wednesday quoted a Tax Ministry letter alleging that Yukos may owe up to 150 billion rubles ($5.05 billion) in back taxes. Yukos has denied any wrongdoing.
"All I can say right now is that Yukos has cut its taxes by $5 billion by using tax-optimization practices, including legal ones," Kudrin told La Tribune.
"Everybody who has tried to avoid paying taxes and thought justice would leave him in peace must be punished. Our primary concern is to put an end to tax avoidance."
Many analysts believe the judicial assault on Khodorkovsky, who resigned as CEO shortly after his arrest, was orchestrated by the Kremlin, which is said to be determined to cut the politically ambitious oil tycoon down to size.
Two weeks ago, smaller oil company Sibneft said it was suspending the merger and analysts say Yukos management was under intense pressure from Sibneft's owners to give Sibneft operational control.
"People were really hoping someone like [main shareholder Roman] Abramovich on the Sibneft side, who is portrayed as well-connected and on the right side of the game, was going to be the white knight and save it," Brunswick's Mokhoff said.
"What does that mean for Yukos if he's not brave enough to get involved? It obviously means there's more trouble down the road."
(Reuters, SPT, Bloomberg)
TITLE: Retail Performs For Foreign Investors
AUTHOR: By Denis Maternovsky
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Shopping center floor space in Moscow will more than double by the end of 2005, as international retailers invest up to $2 billion in Russia over the next five years, according to a recent retail market profile by property consultants Stiles & Riabokobylko.
With retail trade remaining the best-performing sector of the economy, construction of shopping centers is booming and more than 900,000 square meters will be added to the 840,000 square meters that currently exists across 48 quality shopping centers in Moscow, the report said.
While 235,000 square meters in 15 shopping centers were built this year, the construction volume was less than expected as a number of large projects were delayed.
Although the planned 440,000 square meters in 2004 and 463,000 square meters in 2005 in 35 new shopping centers will increase quality shopping center stock to 1.8 million square meters, Moscow will still lag behind most of Europe in terms of retail space per capita.
The European level in 2003 stood at 147 square meters of shopping center floor space per 1,000 people, whereas in Moscow and the Moscow region the figure is three times less, or 45 square meters.
"It will take Moscow two to three years to reach the current level of Prague or Warsaw, and it will take Russia up to five years to catch up with the Czech Republic and Poland," Natalya Oreshina, a director at Moscow-based Stiles & Riabokobylko, said.
Ilya Shershnev, director for development at Swiss Realty Group, agreed that it would not be too long before the Moscow retail market develops to the level of the former Communist bloc capitals with which it is often compared.
"Despite the relatively low figure of some 50 meters of shopping space per 1,000 inhabitants, Moscow and the region will very soon be back-to-back with Eastern European countries. The level of Poland or the Czech Republic has almost been reached if we take into account all the planned shopping centers," he said.
The comparatively low spending power of the population is slowing down development and scares some potential foreign investors from entering the Russian market, experts say.
Yet only this year German do-it-yourself giant OBI opened two stores in Moscow and announced plans to open 30 more stores all over Russia in the next five years, while Sweden's IKEA began construction of the 230,000 square meter Mega 2 mall in northern Moscow and has recently said it aims to have as many as 22 stores in Russia within 15 years.
Germany's largest shopping center developer ECE Projektmanagement, which runs 74 shopping centers all over Europe, recently announced it will expand into Russia in the next three years.
"If population income continues to grow at the same rate - 44 percent this year - the Moscow market will quickly reach the level of development of other European markets," said Natalya Sazonova, market research consultant at Colliers International.
The most aggressive retailers in 2003, the Stiles & Riabokobylko retail profile reported, were pharmaceutical chains, cinema operators and the retail banking sector. And as the retail market is getting more civilized and professional, modern shopping centers are replacing traditional outdoor markets.
"Markets disappear step-by-step," said Jean-Christophe Cattin, head of retail department at Jones Lang LaSalle.
The combined floor space of the city's open-air markets has fallen from 1.6 million square meters in 1998 to between 600,000 square meters and 700,000 square meters today, Cattin said.
"Western-style shopping centers offer better service and are overall far more comfortable, while their prices do not differ from those in traditional markets," Oreshina said.
TITLE: Aeroflot Moves Focus From Elephants to People in Ads
AUTHOR: By Lyuba Pronina
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - With an appeal to the legendary Russian soul, Aeroflot is launching a new advertising campaign.
"Because it's from the soul" is the new slogan of the flagship carrier's slick publicity blitz.
A blue-eyed blonde, presumably a flight attendant, will smile down from billboards in Moscow and 12 other cities. Three TV commercials will feature a cake, a child playing with an origami bird, and an amorous couple. The emotional approach is based on a concept crafted by Media Arts FCB, a Moscow ad agency.
Alexei Filkov, creative director at Media Arts, said Aeroflot will emphasize feelings of "home and cordiality" as it positions itself against international competitors. "We have moved the focus away from elephants to people," said Tatyana Machalina, deputy head of Aeroflot's marketing department.
Aeroflot's first TV commercial in 1997 showed the unlikely sight of an elephant defying gravity and gradually taking off from the horizon. The current advertising campaign is Aeroflot's latest effort to shed Soviet gloom.
In 2000, the airline tried to teach cabin crews to smile as part of a business strategy devised by the international consulting firm McKinsey & Co.
This year, the British firm Identica unveiled a new silver, blue and red livery for the fleet.
Better business class service and upgraded menus, already introduced on flights to New York and Tokyo, will soon extend to 10 more destinations, including Vienna and Vladivostok.
Aeroflot's advertising budget will triple next year, said the airline's commercial director Yevgeny Bachurin.
Earlier the carrier reported that in 2003 some $2 million had been allocated for ads.
"It won't happen overnight, changes have already begun and with the new image we are investing in the future," Bachurin said.
"[The campaign content] looks interesting and attractive. But it is important to see it correspond with reality," said Yelena Sakhnova, a transportation analyst with United Financial Group.
TITLE: Pipeline Deal Under Fire in Ukraine
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: KIEV, Ukraine - Ukraine's president fired his vice prime minister after he made public comments throwing doubt on a multibillion dollar deal to upgrade natural gas pipelines that supply much of Europe's energy needs, an official said Saturday.
President Leonid Kuchma, who made the pipeline deal a top priority, dismissed Deputy Prime Minister Vitaliy Gaiduk late Friday. Gaiduk's ouster came just hours after he told reporters at a news conference that Ukraine had abandoned the high-profile project.
The project involves creating a consortium to renovate Ukraine's ailing Soviet-era pipeline system, which generates some 15 percent of government revenues. The consortium plan had been drawn at a June 2002 meeting, between Ukraine, Russia and Germany.
Kuchma fired Gaiduk after he insisted the pipeline network was working well - and thus didn't need any outside management.
Gaiduk stressed the decision was based on studies showing that none of the proposals for running the consortium - allowing it to run the pipeline on concessionary terms, transferring the pipeline to a management group or granting the consortium operational responsibility - were feasible.
Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych said Ukraine had not ruled out allowing the consortium to operate the pipeline, Itar-Tass reported late Friday.
Kremlin spokesman Alexei Gorshkov told Prime-Tass that Gaiduk's comments "sounded fairly strange" in light of the fact that the Gazprom consortium had already been created.
Kuchma appointed Gaiduk to the post in November 2002 after he served in top positions in the Fuel and Energy Ministry.
At the same news conference, Gaiduk railed against another Russian so-called monopoly, Unified Energy Systems, saying the electricity giant would not be allowed to buy state stakes in Ukraine's regional power utilities as long as the Russian government holds a controlling stake in the company.
This remark, however, was later backed up by Yanukovych, who said Kiev had frozen plans to sell its stakes in regional power companies across the country, one day after UES acquired shares in the prized assets and looked set on making a play for a controlling stake.
"Until we prepare the energy companies for privatization in a civilized way, we will not [privatize them]," Interfax quoted him as saying.
Yanukovych stressed that the companies' debts must be restructured and the country's energy market stabilized before the government would sell its shares.
On Thursday, UES said it had struck a deal to buy from 16 percent to 100 percent of 10 regional Ukrainian power companies as the first step in its long-term strategy to gain control of some of Ukraine's largest power suppliers.
UES acquired the shares in a deal with two so-called "oligarchs" - one of whom is President Leonid Kuchma's son-in-law, Viktor Pinchuk. The two businessmen each retained 33.3 percent of the energy suppliers, the Russian newspaper Vedomosti said Friday, citing UES board member Andrei Rapaport.
UES said Thursday it hoped to buy Ukraine's state-owned shares to secure control of the companies.
Ukraine's State Property Fund, the agency charged with selling government assets, said Friday it had postponed sales of 25 percent to 27 percent blocs of state-owned shares in three of the companies involved in the UES deal.
Before the deal was announced Thursday, Kuchma told UES CEO Anatoly Chubais that Ukraine welcomes Russian investment in its energy sector, but balked at selling the country's strategic assets.
(AP, SPT)
TITLE: Wild West Prepped Expat for Russia
AUTHOR: By Lindsay Kaye Ohlert
PUBLISHER: Special to The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: John Schwarz, president of the Baltic Cranberry Co., stands behind his document-laden desk in his St. Petersburg office, shirtsleeves rolled up, pounding out a Native American rhythm on a drum decorated with the image of a buffalo.
"It's a medicine drum from the Blackfoot tribe," he explains. "I've participated as far as they'll let a white man go - although I do have some Indian blood in me - in their Sun Dance and many of their sweat lodges." He carefully returns the drum to its place of honor on the wall beside his desk.
It's just one more example of East meets West in Schwarz's St. Petersburg headquarters. A relief map of Montana and an old West calendar share wall space with an abacus and a street sign that reads "Ulitsa Ivana Chernykh" in Russian characters.
But the most prominent place on the wall belongs to a large map of Europe and Western Russia, heavily dappled with red pushpins and tiny crimson flags, each showing a place where Schwarz does business.
"All the red items are berry collection points," Schwarz says, pointing at the map, then at the cluster of red pushpins that have escaped the map's confines and struck out into the territory of the neighboring doorframe. "The map wasn't big enough, so I had to stick some up there."
So how did Schwarz, who spent 21 years, most of his adult life, farming and ranching in Montana, end up dealing berries in Russia?
"Baltic Cranberries originally started out as Big Sky Foods Corp.," Schwarz says. "The reason the name's Big Sky Foods is that Montana's the Big Sky State."
Part of his Montana property, Schwarz says, included a problematic cherry orchard. "Five years out of six, it rained before the harvest. After the rain, the sun would come out, and the cherries would split. We'd lose the crop."
In 1987, Schwarz says, inspiration arrived in the form of "somebody who was doing what he called 'cherry raisins.' I said, 'that's the answer!'"
Schwarz's eureka moment led to a change of focus. "I found I was getting into another business - dried fruit," he says. The big change came when a contact called Schwarz and asked if he had any dried cranberries.
"I lied and said yes," Schwarz admits.
But he got his hands on a load of cranberries, had the cranberries processed, and before long, found himself dealing with Ocean Spray. Selling the ranch in 1988, he focused on his cranberry selling.
A few years later, when U.S. suppliers began dealing directly with Schwarz's clients, effectively cutting him out of the loop, he decided to take action. He'd read about Eastern Europe's vast supply of cranberries, so he decided to check it out. Schwarz came to Russia.
"Well, I observed all the negative stuff that was going on then - I mean the big sort of mafia influence - and I also saw Russians leaving Russia for the West or for Israel, and I said to myself, 'These guys are not seeing the goldmine that's right underneath their noses!'"
Schwarz's "goldmine" is Russia's vast supply of natural resources - including its natural cranberry bogs.
"Wisconsin, now, is the No. 1 cranberry growing state in the U.S., and they're grown in constructed bogs." Schwarz points to a map of Eastern Europe, heavily spotted with red hatching. "On this map here there are lots of crosshatches, and every crosshatch is a natural cranberry bog."
So Big Sky began operations in Russia, eventually moving the main office to St. Petersburg, where Schwarz now lives and works, and morphing the company into what it is today - Baltic Cranberries, which sells over 3,000 tons of Russian berries a year, including cranberries, lingonberries, blueberries and currants, and operates entirely in Eastern Europe, with the exception of one financial office back in the U.S.
Shortly after the move, Schwarz found a Russian treasure besides cranberries - Valentina.
"I, like a good farmer or rancher, on Saturday night was in bed by 10:00," he remembers. "At 10:30 the landlady knocks on the door and says, 'How'd you like to go to a party?'"
At the party, Schwarz met Valentina, the woman would soon be his spouse. "There was this lady there who was very attractive, and I later found out she was single," he says. He asked his landlady to pass on a proposal to Valentina - would she like to go on a date?
Valentina accepted, so Schwarz, then not speaking any Russian, bought a small Russian-English dictionary.
"We still have that dictionary," he smiles. "Still refer to it sometimes, too." They married in 1996.
When the two met, Valentina was also in the food import and distribution business. Now, the pair is a team both at home and at work.
"She's been a wonderful partner both in and outside of the business."
Despite his overall positive impression of Russia, Schwarz says that he has encountered some stressors since moving to St. Petersburg, such as the traffic, poor building maintenance and dense bureaucracy. But he says that both cranberries and people actually need to be aggravated from time to time.
He explains that Russian berries are more flavorful, because unlike the berries of Wisconsin's artificial bogs, they aren't coddled. That means the plant focuses on berry production. "You need a little stress in your life," he says.
Schwarz says his experiences in the U.S. prepared him well for anything Russia can dish out. He spent his childhood in New York City, where he says he developed the street smarts to deal with St. Petersburg, and his adult life in the wide-open spaces of Montana, which prepared him for his frequent missions into the depths of Russia's countryside.
"If you take away Moscow from Russia, and take away Washington and New York from the U.S.," he says.
He says Russians, like Montana natives, have an amazing ability to cope with extreme conditions and know how to survive. He also says that while people in the countryside act guarded at first, they have a wonderful openness.
Outside of cities like New York and Moscow, he says, "the primary difference between the people of Russia and the U.S. is language."
"When you come to Montana, something happens to your soul," Schwarz says. "You're a changed person. And when you come to St. Petersburg, something happens to your soul. You cannot come to St. Petersburg without being a changed person, whether you come for one or two days or, in my case, over 10 years."
TITLE: Indexes Move To Benchmarks
AUTHOR: By Meg Richards
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: NEW YORK - The Nasdaq composite index reached a milestone in its recovery from the bear market this past week, popping above the 2,000 level before falling back again. And the Dow Jones industrials trekked toward a benchmark of their own, 10,000.
Investors are taking their time as they send stocks to levels not seen since the first half of 2002, and that might be the most encouraging aspect of the market's recovery, analysts say. The deliberate pace of Wall Street's rise shows the market is being driven by fundamentals rather than sentiment, said Richard E. Cripps, chief market strategist for Legg Mason of Baltimore.
"This is a very healthy market, unambiguously," Cripps said. "In a market like this, that is showing some degree of soberness, you know you're not buying into hyped expectations."
The real question, Cripps said, is how much higher investors will push the market over the next several quarters, as expectations rise but year-over-year comparisons become less favorable.
It's already hard to impress investors. The Labor Department announced Friday that the nation's unemployment rate slipped to 5.9 percent in November, the lowest level in eight months. But stocks fell as investors focused on the negative aspect of the report, which found U.S. companies added only 57,000 jobs in November, far fewer than the 150,000 jobs analysts expected.
With economic data and earnings news generally good, there's little doubt the market can continue to move gradually higher, said Richard A. Dickson, senior market strategist at Lowry's Research Reports in Palm Beach, Fla. But it remains vulnerable to a plethora of external factors, such as the price of oil, the strength of the dollar and global terrorism concerns.
"There's a lot of things that are positive going on, but there's a lot out there that could change it in a hurry," Dickson said. "This is not the Goldilocks economy that we saw five years ago."
But Dickson also expressed concern about the swelling demand for small-cap technology stocks, which have led the rally since March. With so much uncertainty, he said, it's not clear how much longer this group can hold its momentum.
"The thing that amazes me most is that the same kinds of stocks that led the market in '98 and '99 seem to be leading the market again," Dickson said. "It's like, have investors learned nothing at all? How many times do they have to go out and get slaughtered? I don't understand why they are heading toward this same precipice."
The tech-dominated Nasdaq is still down more then 61 percent from its all-time high of 5,048.62, reached March 10, 2000. The Dow is about 15 percent off of its highest point, 11,722.98, reached Jan. 14, 2000, and the Standard & Poor's 500 index is 30 percent shy of its peak, 1,527.46, reached March 24, 2000.
Although the Nasdaq has risen 54 percent since the rally began March 11, no one can predict when or whether it will return to its millennial high. But analysts say the Dow, which has regained 32 percent of its value since March, could easily reach new highs in 2004.
The S&P, which has risen 33 percent since March, may have a tougher road ahead, however, said Thomas F. Lydon Jr., president of Global Trends Investments in Newport Beach, Calif. The S&P also has a high representation of tech stocks.
"I don't think it's impossible that the S&P could hit a new high next year, but that would be a pretty dramatic move from the lows of March," Lydon said.
Historically, bear markets are followed by several good years, particularly during times of economic recovery. The fact that 2004 is an election year could also give the markets a boost, Lydon said. Valuations, especially on the Nasdaq, remain a key concern, however.
"As you look to those who have helped the Nasdaq rebound as much as it has, you have to ask, are we getting ourselves back into trouble?" Lydon said. "I know that's weighing heavily on people's minds; it's a good reminder to diversify your portfolio, so that when there is a correction, you aren't hurt as much by the impact."
The Dow ended the week up 80.22, or 0.8 percent, finishing at 9,862.68. The S&P 500 rose 3.30, or 0.3 percent, during the week, to 1,061.50.
The Nasdaq fell 22.44, or 1.1 percent, to close the week at 1,937.82.
The Russell 2000 index, which tracks smaller company stocks, ended the week down 7.50, or 1.4 percent, closing at 539.01.
TITLE: Elections Not Expected To Change Debt, Bonds
AUTHOR: By Dmitry Dmitriev
TEXT: MOSCOW - Russian external debt ended last week in positive territory. The benchmark Russia 30 closed at 95 5/8, adding almost 2 percent, while its yield fell from 7.37 percent to 7.16 percent. Russian spreads tightened by 7-10 bp. The increase in Eurobonds was partially driven by the increase in U.S. Treasuries and partially by the ongoing tightening in Russian spreads.
Corporate spreads posted fairly similar gains (0.5-2 percent); their durations are smaller than those of the sovereigns. However, the compression in the spreads last week was more significant, at 20BAC30 bp. Meanwhile, VTB Capital, a Vneshtorgbank subsidiary, has placed $300 million worth of its five-year Eurobond. The issue pays a 6 7/8 coupon. It was sold at par at a 339 bp spread over U.S. Treasuries. Initially, the bank planned to sell Eurobonds worth $500 million, but it was forced to scale down the volume in order to sell at the desired price level. The issue was rated Baa3 by Moody's (the lowest investment grade, equal to Russia's sovereign rating). Vneshtorgbank also has a Fitch rating of BB+, equal to that of Russia's rating. The new issue's spread over the Russian sovereign yield curve was around 80 bp.
Russian sovereign spreads are expected to tighten further in the medium-term on the back of Russia's robust economy, the authorities' strong commitment to service the country's debt, and the decreasing volume of external debt in both absolute and relative terms. The outcome of the parliamentary elections is not expected to have a negative impact on Russian sovereign spreads, given that these are likely to reflect the strong hold of the presidential administration over the State Duma. The administration has demonstrated a firm commitment to service Russian state debt no matter what happens in the economy. The corporate spreads may experience increased volatility, which could last until the presidential elections are over and a new government is formed. Thus, Eurobonds issued by state-owned companies such as Gazprom are preferable as these bonds are protected from both types of risk (political and interest rate volatility). Meanwhile, the FOMC is due to hold a meeting this week that we expect to result in no change to the key interest rate.
GKOs, OFZs and corporate and municipal ruble bonds were very strong last week, backed by the strong ruble and improving liquidity. The record $1.9 billion surge in the Central Bank reserves provided the market with additional impetus, bringing the possibility of a further improvement in ruble liquidity. The increase in state ruble bonds was limited by their already low yields, their low liquidity and the Central Bank's sales of paper from its portfolio. Activity in the corporate and municipal segments was significantly higher last week, with first-tier issues adding 1.5-2.5 percent. Their spreads are currently just 100-120 bp above the lows seen in 2Q03 when the market was boosted by high liquidity.
Dmitry Dmitriev is an analyst with United Financial Group.
TITLE: Facts About the Kremlin-Sibneft Merger Revealed
AUTHOR: By Yulia Latynina
TEXT: Suddenly a memo was delivered to Yukos executives sitting in the conference hall. Something about a statement issued jointly by Yukos and Sibneft announcing that their much-ballyhooed merger was off. The memo landed on the table in front of Simon Kukes along with other notes from the hall.
Kukes figured it was just another note. He turned it over and began to read. Then he choked, mumbled something, then turned and whispered something to CFO Bruce Misamore. The meeting concluded. Everyone left the hall in a state of extreme agitation. And then came the call from Sibneft: come on over - we need to talk.
None of Yukos' bigwigs could make the meeting because they're either in the clink or on the lam. Instead, Yukos was represented by the head of its production division and a senior vice president. They were met by Sibneft CEO Eugene Shvidler and former presidential chief of staff Alexander Voloshin.
Shvidler and Voloshin explained that Sibneft's heart just wasn't in the deal anymore. Yukos used to be run by an outstanding manager, Mikhail Khodorkovsky - but he's sitting in prison, and Yukos is experiencing all sorts of difficulties right now. Nevertheless, Sibneft would like to help Yukos solve its problems, they explained.
How? You guessed it: by taking control of Yukos. Sibneft demanded that Shvidler be given operational control of the new company and that Voloshin be named chairman of the board. Such self-sacrifice! Yukos is under the gun, but Abramovich's selfless comrades are prepared to assume control of the company, running the risk of interrogation and imprisonment.
Oh, there was one other thing. It seems that Abramovich discussed this new proposal with President Vladimir Putin in advance.
The stunned Yukos execs left the meeting and fired up their cellphones. They got through to Khodorkovsky's lawyer, Anton Drel, just before he was allowed in to speak with his client. Khodorkovsky's response to Sibneft's kind offer to take control of his company was short and to the point.
It was widely suspected that Sibneft might try something like this. After all, when prosecutors froze 40 percent of Yukos shares, they effectively made Abramovich the company's largest shareholder. And this wouldn't be the first time that the second-largest shareholder in a company launched a takeover bid by arranging for the largest stake to be frozen.
And yet what happened Nov. 28 was a major strategic miscalculation - one of the first made by Sibneft and the Putin regime. The siloviki laid siege to Yukos, creating the possibility for Abramovich to take control of the company. But no one in his right mind would contend that the siloviki take orders from Abramovich. On the contrary, they hate him. The siloviki only take orders from the president.
So why did Putin personally intervene in a dispute that could give Abramovich control of Yukos? Abramovich has long been considered a partner of the Yeltsin-era Family. Whose partner is he now?
Is there a Kremlin-Sibneft joint-stock company that we didn't know about?
Yulia Latynina is a columnist for Novaya Gazeta.
TITLE: Liberalism Not Dead Yet
AUTHOR: By Nikolai Petrov
TEXT: The good news about the electoral process in Russia is that everything bad that could have happened already has. Things can only get better. So let's try to look on the bright side.
The most important result of Sunday's parliamentary election is the downfall of parliamentary political parties and the Yeltsin-era party system as whole. The system could not survive the passing of the Yeltsin regime and now follows it into history. Rather than lament its demise, however, we should analyze the new political situation in the country and learn a few lessons for the future.
Popular support for all the former State Duma parties was nearly halved this time around, costing two of them, the Union of Right Forces, or SPS, and Yabloko, representation in the fourth Duma, which convenes next year. Of the parliamentary parties only the Liberal Democrats remain. In fact, the LDPR bucked the trend. After a stunning initial success in 1993, the party mustered roughly half as many votes at each subsequent election, and it seemed that the current third Duma would be the LDPR's last. But the political winds changed in 2003. Vladimir Zhirinovsky's rhetoric once more found an audience, and the party staged a comeback.
While the SPS and Yabloko seem destined, in a best-case scenario, for a change of leadership and orientation, the newly minted Homeland bloc and its leader, Sergei Glazyev, scored a huge success in Sunday's vote. Conceived as one of the Kremlin's back-up parties aimed at diverting votes away from the Communist Party, Homeland rode a wave of popular support into the Duma. The bloc's success owed much to changing attitudes and priorities following the arrest of former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Its leaders also adopted a winning strategy in their television debates. Support for Homeland shot up noticeably in the final week of the campaign, too late for the pollsters to register. The untested bloc's fourth-place finish rates as the biggest surprise of the election.
Homeland is routinely included in a potential two-thirds pro-Kremlin majority in the next Duma, but this is somewhat unfair. In its current form, Homeland is not only internally diverse, it is also unmanageable. On one hand, it is unlikely that Glazyev and fellow party leader Dmitry Rogozin will be able to control the authoritative bankers, such as Viktor Gerashchenko, and the KGB generals in their ranks. On the other hand, the Kremlin's control over Glazyev himself should not be exaggerated, especially now that Homeland has made it into the Duma on its own. For Glazyev, the tempation to run against Vladimir Putin as the consensus candidate from the left next year will be strong.
During the campaign, Anatoly Chubais warned that we could wake up after the election in a different country. I would say that he overstated the case. Sunday's vote reflected changes that are already underway in society. The election of Homeland's competent "national-patriots" to the Duma is all for the good because it channels this powerful social force into the parliamentary process.
I would also argue that the upside of Homeland's success for the Kremlin has been exaggerated. The bloc could turn into a center of opposition more serious than the theatrical LDPR and tougher than the house-broken Communist Party. Nor can Putin relish the prospect of squaring off in the presidential election against the young, decisive populist Glazyev instead of his familiar sparring partner, Gennady Zyuganov.
Do the results of Sunday's vote signal the defeat of liberalism in Russia? Probably not in general, but in its current form. Many voters refused to choose the lesser of all evils and demonstrated instead their contempt for the current crop of politicians on the right and for the system those politicians fought tooth and nail to remain a part of.
The SPS now finds itself in a peculiar situation: well represented in government, but stripped of its base in the Duma. What's more, the word is that the program being developed by Igor Shuvalov's group in the Putin administration has a strong radical economic slant, and that the Kremlin is gearing up for the next stage of reforms. Liberal economists will therefore remain a driving force in Russian economic policy even as the right ceases to exist as an independent political force. In this regard, we should not lose sight of the regional elections that also got underway on Sunday.
On the eve of the election, many experts began talking about a Kremlin plan to keep the SPS out of the Duma, and to create a new faction from the right's single-mandate deputies. As it happened, only seven SPS and Yabloko deputies got elected along with a few independent liberals, such as Vladimir Ryzhkov. If the Kremlin wants to cobble together a faction on this basis, it will have to throw in a few pro-Kremlin independents of even a few deputies from United Russia.
The election and the vote-count could be characterized as free and fair by default. With the departure of former chief of staff Alexander Volition, the presidential administration could not chose not to promise regional leaders political cover if scandals broke out over vote-rigging. And not one of the weak democratic parties cleared the 5-percent barrier, although you could argue that the Kremlin loses more than it gains from the absence of Yabloko in the next Duma.
Nikolai Petrov, a scholar-in-residence at the Carnegie Moscow Center, contributed this comment to The St. Petersburg Times.
TITLE: A Mandate To Lead, But To Where?
TEXT: United Russia appears to have won an overwhelming victory in Sunday's election. If it were a proper political party, it could be expected to set the tone and agenda in the next State Duma.
We all know it is not.
To start with, it has no proper leaders. The men who made up the party's federal list and who were the face of the party throughout the campaign - Boris Gryzlov, Sergei Shoigu, Yury Luzhkov and Mintimer Shaimiyev - all have better things to do than sit in parliament.
Nor does it have much of a program to speak of, aside from its slavish devotion to a president who often takes months to publicly comment on burning issues of the day. United Russia ran an issueless campaign and refused to engage in televised debates. It also refused to accredit journalists to its campaign headquarters on election night, save for TV crews from national networks already under Kremlin control.
Yet more than one-third of voters, and, by the time single-mandate winners are added, possibly more than half of voters, chose President Vladimir Putin's "non-party." If this figure is added to the roughly 20 percent that voted for LDPR and Homeland, two puppet parties created to out-communist the Communists, and the additional seats all three will likely pick up in the single-mandate contests, Putin will come close to having the two-thirds majority needed to change the Constitution (something many say he secretly desires to do).
Unlike the drab United Russia, however, LDPR and Homeland are sideshow attractions for the nationalistic and hateful, whose leaders have virtually nothing of substance to show for their many years of lawmaking.
But there they are, two extremist parties who now have what looks like a full quarter of the new Duma. Add their hyperbole to the painfully uninteresting and woefully ineloquent United Russia and what we have is an unimaginative parliament that has moved decidedly to the right. Let us hope that Putin is enlightened, and that he has a plan to keep bottled the dark and dangerous populist urgings that Vladimir Zhirinovsky of the LDPR and Dmitry Rogozin of Homeland have spent their careers exploiting. If the last four years are any indication, LDPR and Homeland will rubber stamp whatever agenda Putin puts before them, acting the "bad cop" to Putin's "good cop" to counter criticisms of his policies - whatever those are.
If anything can be learned from Sunday's elections, it is that Putin and his entourage have successfully accomplished two of their major objectives. The first is the electoral gutting of the Communist Party, while the second is the enshrinement of the "power vertical." Although the first may be far overdue, the second is plainly dangerous.
TITLE: Road to U.S. Is Paved With Humiliations
TEXT: A few years ago, my Ukrainian-born wife and I were killing time in a waiting room in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. We sat in plastic chairs, which lined three of the walls; the fourth was a row of consular officials behind glass, and while one meekly awaited their summons one couldn't help but listen to everyone else's interviews.
The consular officials acted like this was utterly routine and banal (which for them it was); the applicants, like all of their hopes and dreams were at stake (which they were).
An older couple came scurrying obsequiously up and shoved their paperwork through the hole in the window. The consular official began asking bored-sounding questions, to which the couple gave eager-to-please answers.
It says here there's supposed to be a Baba Klava as well, he asked - where's she?
Baba Klava, the couple answered with apologetic grins, is in a wheelchair, and since they couldn't get her inside they left her out front.
A collective gasp shot through the room, as we all realized that some poor babushka had been left in a wheelchair on the sidewalk for perhaps a couple of hours. All eyes focused on the young consular official, who was starting to look angry - suspense mounted; would we finally witness a human emotion on the other side of the glass?
The young official sighed petulantly. "Is it still raining?" he asked - and again a collective gasp shot through the room, as many of us suddenly remembered it had been pouring rain and probably was still.
"Oh, yes," said the obsequious couple, with all of their enthusiasm, "Yes! Still raining!"
"Damn!" said the consular official. The suspense peaked, as he glared accusingly at the older couple before him. "Damn! Now I have to go get my coat!"
Get it? He didn't care about an elderly woman left in a wheelchair in the rain for two hours; he cared about himself, a young guy in his 20s, having to go out in the rain for two minutes to talk with her.
I, at least, am finally free of that particular circle of hell. My wife at last got her U.S. citizenship this year - after 11 years of marriage. She would have gotten it years sooner, but our time working abroad for the Dutch/Russian-owned Moscow Times counted against us. As one U.S. immigration official put it to us, I should have been working for "an American company like the World Bank - you know, a company that carries American ideology abroad."
Looking back, what my wife hated most was the incessant fingerprinting. She was fingerprinted at least a half-dozen times - sometimes within mere months of the previous fingerprinting. It's a fussy, time-consuming and messy affair - ink gets all over, and they aren't always good about having towels or water around to clean it off. And it's insulting.
So it's incredibly disheartening to think that in just a month's time, those who don't need U.S. visas will be flying into the United States and waltzing past long lines - where other nationalities who do need visas will all be getting fingerprinted and will all be collecting Baba Klava-like stories of countless thoughtless humiliations to share back home.
Matt Bivens, a former editor of The St. Petersburg Times, writes the Daily Outrage for The Nation magazine. [www.thenation.com]
TITLE: Chris Floyd's Global Eye
AUTHOR: By Chris Floyd
TEXT: Blood Kin
Imagine these banner headlines, circa, say, 1998: President's Brother in Biz With Red Chinese! President's Brother Beds Prostitutes as Corporate Perk! President's Brother Hip Deep in War Profiteering: The More Blood His White House Sibling Spills, the Fatter the Family Coffers!
Hoo-boy! There would've been a hot time in the old media town with all that, eh? Wall-to-wall coverage, 24/7, Fox News frothing, Washington Post pounding, tabloids screaming - "Oval Evil: Reds, Beds and Milking the Dead!" Earnest clucking in the halls of Congress: "We must get to the bottom of these unsavory connections." Late-night comics cracking wise: "Hey, when the president's brother orders Chinese, he ain't just talking chow mein: 'Yeah, I'll have the rice, the won-ton, two blondes and a bag of unmarked bills, please.'"
But of course, that was another millennium. In our new, more enlightened age, we humbly accept - even celebrate - the special privileges accorded to the great ones among us. And so, with a couple of honorable exceptions, the big-time American media lay a nice soft comfy quilt of silence over last month's revelations about presidential brother Neil Bush - details which emerged from the nasty divorce suit Neil brought upon himself by his flagrant adultery with a close family friend.
While others quilted, the Los Angeles Times and Houston Chronicle detailed Brother Neil's big "consulting" contract with Jiang Mianheng, son of former Chinese President Jiang Zemin. Young Jiang and his well-connected Communist capitalists are paying Neil $2 million in stock for his "advice" on manufacturing hi-tech computer circuits - despite Neil's sworn oath that he has "absolutely no background" in the field. "But I've been working in Asia for a long time," he added.
He certainly has. Neil also admitted that he'd experienced carnal canoodling with several anonymous women during his business jaunts to Asia over the years. He told the divorce court that these brazen hussies had simply knocked on his hotel door, came in and had sex with him. These encounters were not emollients offered by the businessmen courting his favor and royal name, Neil insisted. Why, he's not even sure the women actually were prostitutes, because "they never asked for money and I didn't pay them." If it's true, as he swears under oath, that he didn't know why those women were there, then the best you can say about Brother Neil is that he is an idiot of the highest order.
But of course Neil is no idiot. He first entered the public eye due to a sweet deal he pulled during the Reagan-Bush years. As a director of a Colorado savings-and-loan bank, he steered $100 million of homeowners' savings to his own business partners - without telling his fellow directors of the personal connection. The partners defaulted, and Bush, using his family links to Argentine strongman Carlos Menem, tried to hide the scam in a bait-and-switch south of the border, as the Austin Chronicle reports. When the feds finally caught up with him in 1990, Bush had cost American taxpayers $1.3 billion in bailouts to cover his mismanagement. As the son of the sitting president, Neil could not possibly go to jail for stealing $100 million; the high-born don't do hard time. No, he was merely fined $50,000 and banned from all banking activities. Naturally, Neil didn't pay his own fine; fatcat Republican fundraisers covered it for him.
We told you he was no idiot.
Now comes the sweetest deal of all - enriched by the blood sugar seeping out from the bodies of American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. Yes, Neil has dipped his silver spoon into the reconstruction gravy being ladled out by his brother George, the White House warlord. Neil is now being paid a fat annual fee to "help companies secure contracts in Iraq," the Financial Times reports.
Bush is co-chairman of a pork funnel called Crest Investment Corporation. His partner, Syrian-American businessman Jamal Daniel, is wired into the chief private conduit of war profits, New Bridge Strategies, a lobbying firm packed with Bush family retainers, many of whom left government service this spring to leap into the Iraq money pit. As long as Brother George keeps tossing cannon fodder into the Iraqi cauldron, Brother Neil will keep padding his bulging Bush wallet.
Neil's sordid saga exemplifies the Bush clan's prime "family value": rake it in from all sides, blood and honor be damned. We've often noted here that Neil and George's grandpa, Prescott Bush, was a huge investor in the Nazi war machine, maintaining his profitable Hitlerian arrangements even after America was at war with Germany. Some of these assets were seized in 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act. But last month, newly uncovered government documents showed that Prescott and his partners, including Democrat bigwig Averill Harriman, secretly held on to more than a dozen other Nazi assets throughout the war, the New Hampshire Gazette reports.
Did anyone go to jail for these crimes? Of course not! Instead, Prescott founded a political dynasty that has used aggressive war, insider trading, covert operations, government corruption and sweetheart deals with virulently anti-democratic patrons (the bin Ladens, Saudi Wahabbi extremists, the Chinese Communist Party, cult leader Sun Myung Moon, etc.) to enrich themselves and their cronies.
If you have no honor, no integrity, and don't care if people die to make you rich, why then, the world is just a nameless woman who shows up at your door unasked and lets you have your way with her. Right, Neil?
For annotational references, see the Opinion section at www.sptimesrussia.com
TITLE: Palestine Militants Fail To Find Truce
AUTHOR: By Sam Ghattas
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: CAIRO - Palestinians failed to agree on a truce offer to Israel on Sunday after three days of talks, setting back the Palestinian prime minister's hopes for a halt in violence to jump start the stalled U.S.-backed "road map" peace plan.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which have carried out most suicide attacks against Israel, resisted intense pressure from Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia and the top Egyptian mediator and refused a full cease-fire.
The two groups would agree only to a limited truce, ending attacks on civilians in Israel but not on Jewish settlers or Israeli soldiers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Israel said it would accept only a comprehensive halt. "There's no half-way cease-fire," said Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. He said Israel is willing to stop shooting if there was a total Palestinian truce.
An official from Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian delegates said a further meeting was planned but no date for it was set.
Egypt had called together the Palestinian factions - more than a dozen, ranging from Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement to the Islamic groups and smaller leftist movements - in hopes of producing a halt to all attacks. Egyptian Intelligence Chief General Omar Suleiman wanted to present the truce to Washington next week in a broad proposal that could win U.S. backing and put pressure on Israel.
But Qureia, who joined the talks Sunday in the hopes of bridging the gap, left the Egyptian capital, and several delegates acknowledged the talks produced no concrete results.
"There are disagreements about the nature of a cease-fire," Maher Taher, a senior delegate for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, told The Associated Press. "The factions have different positions on the issue."
Even when Qureia and Suleiman laid on the pressure in a three-hour meeting Sunday, Hamas and Islamic Jihad refused to buckle in their rejection of the broad halt. The two groups have carried out most of the suicide bombings against Israel that have killed hundreds during more than three years of violence.
The militant factions also rejected giving Qureia authority to speak for them in any negotiations with Israel. "We are not ready to give them authorization to sign a new agreement," Nazzal said.
The two groups said a more limited halt to attacks on civilians in Israel also depended on Israel's stopping its military actions.
In June, the Palestinians declared a cease-fire on attacks within Israel that also was negotiated in Egypt. Israel was not formally part of that truce, and it collapsed after seven weeks, with Israel attacking Palestinians and Palestinians resuming suicide bombings.
In the end, delegates said the Cairo meetings would only produce a final statement, but no deal.
"The statement will have no mention of refraining from attacks on civilians, cease-fire or authorizing" Qureia to negotiate with the Israelis, said Samir Ghosheh, head of the Palestinian Struggle Front.
In exchange for the full truce, Egypt and Fatah were demanding that Israel stop building settlements, pull its troops out of Palestinian areas re-occupied during the uprising and halt construction of its so-called security barrier along the borders with Palestinian areas, which juts into Palestinian land.
Essentially, their plan would have met much of the criteria of the "road map."
Sharon said Israel is still interested in a cease-fire.
"The solution is that if there is total quiet and there won't be terror, Israel will make every effort to abstain from its activity against terrorists," he said. He made the comments before the Cairo talks ended, in reaction to reports the Palestinians were considering offering the limited cease-fire only.
TITLE: Army Mishap Kills 9 Children
AUTHOR: Aijaz Rahi
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: HUTALA, Afghanistan - Shoes and woven hats littered a bloodstained field in this desolate Afghan village Sunday, a day after a U.S. warplane targeting a terror suspect mistakenly killed nine children.
The United States said the suspect, a former Taliban commander, was killed in the attack, but villagers said he had left the area days ago.
American officials offered their regrets Sunday and said they were "deeply saddened" by the deaths. The United Nations called for an investigation. And the Afghan government urged the U.S.-led coalition hunting Taliban and al-Qaida fighters to make sure such an accident is never repeated.
In Hutala on Sunday, a line of fresh graves marked the tragedy, and village men stood quietly by a stream in a dusty field where the children had been playing. They seemed as bewildered as they were angry.
"First they fire their rockets. Then they say it was a mistake," Haji Amir Mohammed told The Associated Press, as dozens of American soldiers sent to investigate the incident offered condolences or lay in the warming winter sun. "How can we forgive them?"
Villagers said the young victims had been playing with marbles in a dusty field beside mud homes in this impoverished valley, some 150 miles southwest of Kabul, when the A-10 ground attack aircraft homed in.
Military officials said Sunday they had no idea children were in the area when they decided to attack. U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said the suspect targeted and killed was a former Taliban commander named Mullah Wazir, adding that he was "deeply saddened" by the "tragic loss of innocent life."
Khalilzad said the former commander "had bragged of his personal involvement in attacks on innocent Afghan citizens," including aid groups and Afghans working on the Kabul-Kandahar road, a site of frequent violence.
Lieutenant Colonel Bryan Hilferty, a spokesman for the coalition, told the AP in Hutala that it had appeared to the pilot of the aircraft that "just that person that we wanted, that terrorist, was in the field. So we fired on him."
Troops discovered the children's bodies after rushing to the scene to verify that they had got Wazir. U.S. officers flew in Sunday to apologize to village elders, Hilferty said.
But residents were adamant that the military had acted on bogus intelligence. Many said the man killed was not Wazir, and that the former district commander under the Taliban had left the village some days before the attack.
"There are no terrorists, no Taliban or al-Qaida here," said Abdul Majid Farooqi. "Just poor people."
The 11,500 U.S.-led troops hunting Taliban and al-Qaida remnants in south and east Afghanistan often are supported by air power, and there have been a string of military mishaps.
The worst occurred in July 2002, when Afghan officials said 48 civilians at a wedding party were killed and 117 wounded by a U.S. Air Force AC-130 gunship in Uruzgan province, which borders Ghazni province.
On April 9, a U.S. warplane mistakenly bombed a home in the eastern town of Shkin, killing 11 civilians. Another air strike in the Nuristan province in eastern Afghanistan on Oct. 31 reportedly killed at least eight civilians in a house.
TITLE: Zimbabwe Defies Suspension, Resigns from Commonwealth
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: ABUJA, Nigeria - A defiant Zimbabwe withdrew from the Commonwealth of Britain and its former colonies on Sunday, hours after the 54-nation bloc upheld its 18-month suspension of the southern African nation for alleged abuses of civil liberties.
"It's quits, and quits it will be," President Robert Mugabe's government said in a statement from Zimbabwe.
In a major defeat for Zimbabwe's leader, Commonwealth heads of state had declared earlier Sunday that Mugabe's outcast status would stand until he made demanded human rights and democratic reforms.
Zimbabwe was suspended early last year on the grounds that Mugabe, who has ruled the country since independence in 1980, rigged his re-election in 2002 and persecuted his opponents.
The Commonwealth accord on Zimbabwe had averted a threatened public rift between Western and developing nations in the group, whose members represent nearly one-third of the world's 6 billion people.
Some developing nations in the Commonwealth had lobbied for Zimbabwe to be allowed back in but could not overcome more powerful nations who sought it.
The ban also appeared to maintain Zimbabwe's pariah status, although Commonwealth leaders insisted they were anxious to re-engage the nation to help bring about change.
"This was supposed to be seen as a way forward, not a way backward," spokesman Joel Kibazo said, saying Commonwealth Secretary-General Don McKinnon was concerned that Zimbabwe "not... isolate itself further" from the international community.
Mugabe accuses Britain and its allies of punishing him for land reforms that have given white-owned farms to landless blacks, an argument that finds resonance with other Africans.
"Our problem with Britain and Australia is over the land we took over from their white kith and kin to redistribute to the indigenous black people of this country," Zimbabwe Information Minister Jonathan Moyo told Reuters.
"These racist leaders are using the Commonwealth to try to punish us."
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said Zimbabwe would come to regret its decision to quit but voiced confidence that it would eventually rejoin under a democratic government.
"It's entirely in character, sadly, with President Mugabe," Straw said. "I think it's a decision which he, and particularly the Zimbabwean people, will come to regret," he added.
Once southern Africa's breadbasket, Zimbabwe now relies on aid to feed millions. Unemployment is running at more than 70 percent and inflation is above 500 percent.
(AP, Reuters)
TITLE: Greece Delivers Convictions To November 17 Terror Cell
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: ATHENS, Greece - A Greek anti-terrorism court on Monday convicted at least a dozen members of the November 17 terrorist cell, including its leader and hit man, for their roles in a spree of murders, robberies and bombings over nearly 30 years.
The rulings bring to a close one of the last trials in Europe against militant groups that took shape during the 1970s. The crackdown on November 17 was relief to authorities planning security for the Aug. 13-29 Olympics.
The three judges - following a nine-month trial in a bunker-like courtroom - issued multiple convictions Monday against Alexandros Giotopoulos, 58, who prosecutors described as the group's ringleader. The French-born academic steadfastly denied any links to the group, but others admitted their role in attacks that some described as "political."
The convictions came at the beginning of a lengthy procedure to read through the hundreds of charges against the 18 men and one woman. At least 12 defendants were convicted as the head judge read through the charges one by one. It appeared some of the defendants could be acquitted due to lack of evidence.
Sentencing is expected this week. Many of those convicted face multiple life sentences. November 17 is blamed for dozens of armed robberies, hundreds of bombings and 23 killings since 1975.
The victims include four American envoys, two Turkish diplomats and prominent Greek political and business figures. November 17's last victim was British defense attache Brig. Stephen Saunders, killed in June 2000.
November 17 was named after the date of a student-led uprising in 1973 which helped topple the 1967-74 military dictatorship.
Its targets included Greek officials linked to the junta, which mercilessly persecuted its leftist opponents. It also struck at military and diplomatic envoys from the United States, which backed the junta and remains an object of scorn for many Greeks.
TITLE: Klitschko Victory Removes Any Doubts
AUTHOR: By Tim Dahlberg
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: NEW YORK - Vitali Klitschko still had his doubters, even after giving Lennox Lewis a scare for the heavyweight title. Not anymore, after a devastating performance that may have given the division a new star in the making.
Klitschko knocked Kirk Johnson down twice Saturday night, battering him with big rights and lefts before stopping him at 2:54 of the second round in a fight he dominated from the opening bell.
The win meant far more than just his 32nd knockout to the giant from Ukraine who lives in Los Angeles. It also validated the claim he made against Lewis that he can be a heavyweight champion.
"I was prepared to be world champion on June 21 [against Lewis] and I was 100 percent ready for this fight," Klitschko said.
Klitshcko fought with the confidence of a fighter who had taken Lewis six tough rounds before being stopped on cuts, and the 6-foot-7 puncher showed he has the kind of dominating power that will add excitement to a heavyweight division currently in flux.
Johnson had only lost once and was a top contender, but Klitschko never let him get into the fight, much to the delight of the crowd at Madison Square Garden that waved Ukranian flags and chanted "Vitali, Vitali, Vitali."
Klitschko knocked Johnson down with a flurry of punches with 45 seconds left in the second round, then began hammering him with lefts and rights in the corner after he got back up. A right drove him against the ropes and two more rights put him on the canvas, where referee Arthur Mercante Jr. waved the fight to a close.
The dominance was so pronounced that Johnson, who had never been stopped, was credited with landing only nine punches to 55 for Klitschko.
Klitschko earned the right to be the WBC No. 1 contender with the win, and wants a rematch with Lewis. The heavyweight champion, however, has been reluctant to fight lately and may retire.
"Hello, Lennox. I know you saw this fight," Klitschko said. "You're a great heavyweight champion but I can beat you."
A lot of people thought Klitschko would have beaten Lewis if their June 21 fight in Los Angeles had gone longer. He had staggered the champion several times in a slugfest that ended when the doctor ruled Klitschko could not continue because of bad cuts.
In a battle of big men weighing a total of 510 pounds, Klitschko was both bigger and stronger than Johnson, who weighed 260 pounds and had a roll of fat around his middle.
Johnson, whose only previous defeat was in a WBA title fight to John Ruiz, was tentative and hardly landed a punch as Klitschko pursued him relentlessly around the ring.
"He was the better man tonight," Johnson said. "I had a sluggish night against a guy you can't afford to have a sluggish night against."
Johnson (34-2-1) was not the opponent Klitschko originally had penned in on his calendar. He expected to meet Lewis in a rematch of the June 21 fight Klitschko was leading when it was stopped after six rounds because of bloody cuts around his eyes.
Lewis, though, said he wasn't ready to fight again this year and needed time to think about whether he would ever fight again. That left Klitschko in need of an opponent and, to his credit, he took a potentially tough one in the once-beaten Johnson.
"To fight a nobody would be a step back," Klitschko said.
Klitschko (33-2, 32 knockouts) was backed in his corner by his brother, Wladimir, also a heavyweight contender. Wladimir ran out and helped raise his brother's hand when the fight was waved to a close.
If Lewis retires, Klitschko could fight Corrie Sanders, who beat Wladimir earlier this year for the vacant title. Either way, Klitschko's performance put him in the middle of the heavyweight title mix.
On the undercard, Joe Mesi's coming out party was almost ruined by one big left hand from Monte Barrett.
Barrett knocked Mesi down with a left hook early in the seventh round of their heavyweight fight, but Mesi held on to win a majority 10-round decision.
TITLE: Norway's Solbakken Earns His First World Cup Victory
AUTHOR: By John Mossman
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BEAVER CREEK, United States - For the second time at the weekend, Norwegian Bjarne Solbakken came down the course early and posted a fast time, then waited anxiously as higher-seeded skiers took aim at him.
Solbakken was overtaken Friday, but not on Sunday.
He earned his first World Cup victory, holding off Austrian ace Hermann Maier in a super giant slalom race.
Solbakken covered the demanding Birds of Prey course in 1 minute, 13.05 seconds, beating Maier by 0.39 seconds. Another Austrian, Hans Knauss, was third in 1:13.50.
The 26-year-old Solbakken acknowledged he had grown weary of his reputation as a rising star.
"I've been up and coming, I've been young and promising for a couple of years," he said. "I've had some good results but no podium results.
"This is a breakthrough for me. And it's good for Norway, because with [Kjetil-Andre] Aamodt injured, we're a very small team."
Solbakken enjoyed a stellar weekend. He tied for second in Friday's downhill, then was 15th in Saturday's downhill.
Maier, who won Saturday's downhill, turned 31 Sunday and was presented with a birthday cake on the medals stand. His performance was another step in his remarkable comeback from a motorcycle accident in August 2001 that nearly cost him his right leg.
Maier boosted his lead in the overall standings.
Peter Fill of Italy was fourth in 1:13.58, followed by Didier Cuche of Switzerland in 1:13.73 and Lasse Kjus of Norway in 1:13.76.
America Daron Rahlves who won Friday's downhill, finished 12th in 1:14.17. American Jakub Fiala of was a career-best 13th in 1:14.23.
American Bode Miller, runner-up in last season's World Cup overall standings, made a mistake for the third straight day. He crashed on Friday and missed a gate Saturday. This time, he skied wide on a turn and missed a gate near the top.
Solbakken, the ninth skier out of the start house, put up a quick run, then waited at the finish as 21 higher-seeded skiers failed to beat him.
Maier, who won the season's opening super-G last Sunday in Lake Louise, Alberta, came down 28th and was slightly faster than Solbakken at the third intermediate clocking. But he lost precious time on the bottom of the course.
"It's a great feeling when you know you have made a good run and just watch the others try to beat you," Solbakken said. "Maier is one of the top skiers in the world. When I saw him come in behind me - perfect."
Light snow fell during much of the race and reduced visibility for later skiers.
"It was a great race for me," Maier said. "But it was difficult with a higher number. Not only the snow but also the visibility. It was getting darker and darker. The lower numbers had a big advantage."
Austria's Stephan Eberharter, the defending World Cup overall, downhill and super-G champion, also was hurt by a late start number. He finished 19th, more than 1.5 seconds off the pace.
Rahlves had a hectic morning, showing up late and having to get dressed on the lift.
"I got to the start and had only four minutes to get my gear on and go," he said. "I was just happy to make it down alive without crashing."
TITLE: Baltimore Interrupts Bengals' Turnaround
AUTHOR: By David Ginsburg
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BALTIMORE - With one dominating performance, Baltimore interrupted the Cincinnati Bengals' turnaround season and showed it is a team not to be ignored.
Jamal Lewis ran for 180 yards and a career-high three touchdowns, and the Ravens gained sole possession of first place in the AFC North with a 31-13 victory Sunday.
"This is a statement game for us in our division," said Baltimore linebacker Ray Lewis, who had an interception and nine tackles. "We did what we need to do. We're hard to beat when Jamal's running the ball like that and our offense capitalizes on the turnovers we get."
The Bengals (7-6) came in looking to improve upon their remarkable season with a fifth straight win. Instead, they played a game that was all too typical of their recent past.
Cincinnati committed five turnovers, yielded a season-high six sacks and had no answer for the punishing runs of Lewis, who scored on runs of 1, 3 and 13 yards.
"They're physical, but we played more physical than they did," Jamal Lewis said. "Everything went exactly the way it was supposed to go."
Despite playing with a sprained wrist, Lewis ran for 96 yards in the second half and padded his margin as the NFL's leading rusher.
It all added up to the Bengals' seventh straight loss in Baltimore and a disappointing homecoming for Cincinnati first-year head coach Marvin Lewis, the Ravens' defensive coordinator from 1996-2001.
"We can't turn it over like we did today and expect to beat anybody," Marvin Lewis said. "We have a lot of football left; we'll prove what we're made of the next three weeks."
Baltimore (8-5) moved a game ahead of the Bengals in the AFC North. Cincinnati beat the Ravens in October, and would have gained a tiebreaker with a victory. But the Bengals never led after Jamal Lewis scored a first-quarter touchdown following a Cincinnati turnover.
The game was the opposite of the first meeting, when the Bengals capitalized on Baltimore mistakes to win.
"It was a sour taste in our mouth the last time we played them," Ray Lewis said.
"We just knew we didn't play our football game. Yeah, they were riding high, but they had to come into Baltimore sooner or later."
The game was played in a brisk 20 mph wind. Although Bengals quarterback Jon Kitna blamed the wind for one of his two interceptions, he had no excuse for his two fumbles.
"We just had some really costly turnovers at certain points in the game," he said. "But we'll bounce back. We've done it all year."
The Bengals hadn't allowed more than four sacks in any game this season, and Kitna had 19 TD passes and four interceptions in his previous nine games.
He finished 23-for-31 for 214 yards. Eleven of his completions were to Peter Warrick, who scored a touchdown but also committed a turnover.
Down 17-10 at halftime, the Bengals promptly moved 47 yards before Shayne Graham kicked a 38-yard field goal.
After a Baltimore punt, Kitna fumbled upon being sacked by rookie Terrell Suggs, who recovered at the Cincinnati 17. Jamal Lewis then ran for 14 yards before scoring from the 3 for a 24-13 lead.
He clinched the victory with 11:48 left, scoring after Will Demps returned an interception 54 yards to the Cincinnati 21.
It was the fifth straight home win for the Ravens, now poised to win the first division title in their history.
"All it does is create the opportunity to get something done that we had set our sights on in training camp," Ravens coach Brian Billick said.
A fumble by Jamal Lewis set up a field goal for a 3-0 Cincinnati lead, but Warrick fumbled a punt to set up the first of Lewis' three touchdowns.
Anthony Wright capped a 70-yard drive with an 8-yard touchdown pass to Marcus Robinson to make it 14-3, and after Warrick scored on a 4-yard throw from Kitna, Matt Stover gave the Ravens a seven-point halftime cushion with his 19th straight field goal with 2:09 left in the half.
TITLE: Russian IOC Head Faults Retest
AUTHOR: By Leonid Chizov
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: MOSCOW - The recent decision by the International Olympic Committee to retest samples taken at the Salt Lake City Games for newly banned substances and introduction of tighter control over athletes may harm sports and deprive it of spectator interest, a Russian anti-doping official has said.
Earlier this week, the IOC board approved a plan to retest for THG, or tetrahydrogestrinone, after determining there were no legal or scientific obstacles.
THG was unmasked this summer as a steroid chemically modified to avoid detection in standard tests. A test for THG was then developed at the UCLA lab.
A number of positive tests in summer sports and in track & field in particular forced the IOC and the World Anti-Doping Agency, or WADA, to review the results of tests taken during the Salt Lake City Games in 2002.
The move allows the IOC to test athletes at any time, wherever they are in the world, for its entire list of banned substances.
"It seems to me that those who fight against doping, and I count myself as one of them, have forgotten the main aspect - we must make sports cleaner, but at the same time sports should remain alive," said Nikolai Durmanov, head of the anti-doping board of the Russian Olympic Committee.
"Imagine if one or two champions or medalists test positive for this notorious THG. What next? Shall we strip the medals from those who have been national legends for two years? And if it happens to be a hockey player? Shall we strip the whole team?" Durmanov said.
Introducing the practice of retesting the results of competitions for newly developed substances may reduce interest in competitions, cast doubts on results and lead to new doping scandals that could be harmful for sports, he said.
"While watching final heats at the Olympics, millions of spectators will think not about who comes in first, but about what will happen to him in two years. Will he be stripped of his medal or not?" Durmanov said.
However, he added, he agrees in principle with fighting drugs in sports.
TITLE: SPORTS WATCH
TEXT: New Torpedo Coach
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Valery Petrakov has been named as coach of Torpedo-Metallurg Moscow, the Russian Premier League side said Saturday.
He replaces Alexander Ignatenko, who was sacked last month despite saving the struggling club from relegation. Torpedo-Metallurg narrowly avoided relegation by beating city rival Spartak Moscow on the last day of the league season.
Petrakov, 45, who last season almost guided first division Tom Tomsk into the top flight, is widely regarded as one of the most promising coaches in Russia.
Meanwhile, the coaching merry-go-around in Russia's top flight continued with 52-year-old Vitaly Shevchenko, who was sacked by Saturn Ren-TV with five games left in the season, being appointed at Rostov.
Torpedo-Metallurg and Rostov became the sixth and seventh premier league clubs to change coaches since the end of the season a month ago.
Real Beats Barca
MADRID, Spain (Reuters) - Real Madrid snatched its first league victory in 20 years at the Nou Camp after a goal in each half from Brazilians Roberto Carlos and Ronaldo gave it a 2-1 win over arch-rival Barcelona on Saturday.
Roberto Carlos broke the deadlock towards the end of an evenly matched first half when he cracked in with a ferocious drive, and former Barcelona idol Ronaldo added a second with a powerful drilled shot on 74 minutes.
But Real had to endure a nervous finish after Dutch striker Patrick Kluivert pulled one back for Barca when he fired in a brilliant header from a corner seven minutes from time.
The win allowed Real to open a three-point gap at the top of the table over Deportivo Coruna, which edged a 1-0 win over Malaga at the Riazor earlier on Saturday.
Kaka Sparks Milan
MILAN, Italy (Reuters) - A superb 30-meter strike from Brazilian substitute Kaka gave European champion AC Milan a 1-0 win at Empoli on Saturday to send it three points clear at the top of Serie A.
Unbeaten Milan now has 30 points.
In a game of few chances, Milan went close to an opener in the 37th minute when Rui Costa found Andriy Shevchenko. But the Ukrainian's volley was saved at point-blank range by Empoli keeper Luca Bucci.
Empoli had a goal disallowed a minute later when Antonio Di Natale's low shot squeezed under Milan keeper Dida and over the line, but Tomasso Rocchi was spotted in an offside position by the linesman.
Milan coach Carlo Ancelotti introduced Kaka for Andrea Pirlo in the 75th minute, and six minutes later the Brazilian won the game with a spectacular long-range strike which flew past the motionless Bucci.
Turkey Convicts Three
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) - A Turkish court on Sunday charged three more men for their involvement in a string of suicide bombings in Istanbul, raising the total number of suspects to 30.
A court that handles terrorism cases questioned the men for more than four hours and charged the men with "membership in an illegal organization and aiding and abetting the organization," the Anatolia news agency reported. Conviction on the charge carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison.
Police and court officials have questioned more than 160 people in connection with the bombings of two Istanbul synagogues on Nov. 15 and of the British Consulate and a British bank five days later. Sixty-one people, including the four suicide bombers, were killed.
President Gets 20 Years
MANAGUA, Nicaragua (AP) - Former President Arnoldo Aleman, dogged by corruption allegations for years, was convicted of embezzling millions of dollars from his impoverished country and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
Aleman, a conservative who returned from exile under the leftist Sandinistas to rebuild Nicaragua's ruling party, was also barred from serving in Nicaragua's legislature and fined $10 million.
The decision will almost certainly weaken Aleman's grip over the ruling Constitutionalist Liberal Party, where his authority has endured despite the charges he illegally diverted some $100 million in government funds to his party's election campaigns while president from 1997 to 2002.
It was the culmination of current President Enrique Bolanos' anti-corruption campaign that quickly placed the current leadership at odds with Aleman and members of the party.
U.S. Protests Cloning
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The Bush administration and its allies revive their bid in the U.N. General Assembly on Monday to enact a global treaty banning all forms of human cloning, including research on cloning human cells.
The campaign, led by the United States and Costa Rica and backed by several predominantly Catholic nations, seeks to overturn a recent vote in the assembly's legal committee to defer consideration of the treaty until 2005.
The panel, which includes all U.N. members, voted 80 to 79 last month to postpone any debate on cloning for two years, virtually blocking the U.S.-led initiative.
Medicare Overhauled
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush is signing into law the most far-reaching changes in Medicare - the federal health insurance program for the elderly - since the program's inception nearly 40 years ago.
The most significant part of the $400 billion overhaul adds prescription drug coverage to Medicare, starting in 2006. But a wide array of other programs are meant to tweak the Medicare system, and will add to the cost of the changes Bush signs Monday.
Many Democrats and even some of Bush's fellow conservatives have questioned the price tag of the reforms.
"Many people will wake up and discover that the Medicare bill is a cruel hoax," Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton told reporters Sunday. "It does not provide the kind of benefits that they had hoped for, and it will lead to the undermining of Medicare traditionally."
TITLE: Last-Second Win For Lakers
AUTHOR: By John Nadel
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: LOS ANGELES - Phil Jackson wanted a timeout, and tried to inform his players. Fortunately, Devean George didn't hear his coach.
George made a 3-pointer with 24.3 seconds remaining Sunday night, lifting the Los Angeles Lakers to a 94-92 victory over the Utah Jazz.
George connected after the Jazz, who trailed by 21 points in the third quarter, went ahead for the second time in the last minute on a jumper by Mo Williams.
After George's game-winning shot, Williams and Raja Bell missed outside jumpers that could have forged a tie. Shaquille O'Neal rebounded Bell's miss and dribbled out the clock.
"That was Rob - call me Rob, a young Rob," George said, referring to former teammate Robert Horry, known for his last-second heroics.
George hoisted his game-winner from the right corner - not far from the Lakers' bench. But with the crowd screaming, he didn't hear Jackson's plea.
"I didn't see what I wanted to have happen on that last play," Jackson said in explaining why he wanted to call time. "At least I didn't think it was going to happen.
"I told him, 'Call timeout,' but he didn't hear me. The shot went in anyway. So it was a good timeout that I called."
O'Neal had 19 points, 15 rebounds and eight assists and Kobe Bryant also had 19 points for the Lakers although he shot just 4-of-17. George added 16 points and Slava Medvedenko and Gary Payton each scored 15.
"We relaxed," George said. "They fought back from 20 down - they just kept playing. It's real tough to regain momentum."
Williams scored 12 of his career-high 16 points in the fourth quarter. DeShawn Stevenson added 13 points and Sasha Pavlovic scored 12 for the Jazz.
Utah coach Jerry Sloan played five reserves throughout the final period including three rookies - Williams, Pavlovic and Ben Handlogten.
The trio combined for 26 points in the fourth quarter as the Jazz outscored the Lakers 32-20.
It wasn't quite enough.
"They got us back in the ballgame a little bit," Sloan said of his reserves. "It's sad we couldn't get our guys to play hard for three quarters. We were basically afraid of them."
Until the final period, anyway.
The Lakers (17-3) played without former Utah star Karl Malone, suspended for one game by the NBA for elbowing Dallas guard Steve Nash in the head Thursday night.
Malone, the NBA's second-leading career scorer, has missed only 11 games in his 19-year career - six due to injuries or illness and five because of suspensions.
The win was the ninth straight for the Lakers and their 26th consecutive regular-season victory at home including 11 this season.
But it certainly didn't come easy.
The loss was just the fourth in 11 games for Utah (11-8), which fell to 1-7 on the road.
Pavlovic made two free throws with 7:52 remaining to cap a 10-2 run, cutting the Lakers' lead to 78-73.
The Lakers extended their lead to nine points, but again the Jazz battled back, and a tip-in by Handlogten with 55.3 seconds left capped a 7-0 run and gave the Jazz a 90-89 lead.
O'Neal made two free throws, but Williams made a jumper with 36.5 seconds remaining to put the Jazz back on top. George followed that up with his game-winner.
A 3-pointer by George and a jumper by Medvedenko extended the Lakers' lead to 61-40 with 7:06 left in the third quarter.
At that point, the Jazz began creeping back into contention, and it was 74-60 entering the final period.
Payton made three baskets and assisted on two dunks by O'Neal as the Lakers outscored the Jazz 12-1 to finish the second quarter for a 47-32 half-time lead.