SOURCE: The St. Petersburg Times
DATE: Issue #969 (37), Tuesday, May 18, 2004
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TITLE: City Taps Banking Partners
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Kovalev
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: City Hall has named the banks that it will use to process up to 4.5 billion rubles ($155 million) of surplus city budget income in 2004.
Conspicuously absent from the list is Baltinvestbank, which was one of City Hall's biggest partners when former governor Vladimir Yakovlev was in charge of the city.
The banks selected included Baltiisky Bank, Industrial Construction Bank, or PSB, St. Petersburg International Bank and Bank St. Petersburg, the vice president of which is Sergei Matviyenko, son of Governor Valentina Matviyenko, who was appointed to the position a year ago.
"The main bank to work with the budget money will be Bank St. Petersburg, and PSB [and others] will be there just to make an impression of objectivity," said Vladimir Yeryomenko, a member of the Mariinsky faction in the Legislative Assembly, said Monday in a telephone interview.
"Political elites change and the structures that service them change with them," he said. "Bank St. Petersburg is closely linked to Governor Matviyenko with her son, if I remember rightly, working there,"
Bank St. Petersburg could not be reached for a comment Monday and no statements from it were printed in local media. Yeryomenko said City Hall's selection of the banks was in accordance with the law - a tender was announced last month.
However, the absence of Baltinvestbank among the chosen few indicates that City Hall has returned to the system of selecting financial structures to service the city government that operated before 1996, when President Vladimir Putin worked in City Hall as a deputy mayor.
Yeryomenko said banks that service budget money usually get both economic and political advantages
"This money allows the banks to raise their starting capital or to just use this money while it is in the bank to generate additional income," Yeryomenko said.
The practice of processing an administration's entire budget through private banks was suspended last year, after the federal government issued a regulation saying such funds should be serviced only by the Central Bank. However, the approximately 20 administrative regions that contribute more to the federal budget than they receive have retained the right to service income over and above what they planned for in their budgets in local commercial banks.
In March, Matviyenko promised the Banking Club of St. Petersburg, which represents local bankers, that there would not be "any piggy banks for City Hall" and that a contract for securing and managing all surplus budget resources would be offered through an open tender on the St. Petersburg stock exchange.
"To service money for up to a month, the surplus income will be placed for an open trade or transferred to banks deposits," Vice Governor Mikhail Oseyevsky, who is responsible for city finances, said in March. "If the money requires servicing for more than a month, the money will be distributed through open trades only."
But later this spring City Hall returned to the practice of creating a list of banks allowed to work with the city government.
Baltinvestbank, said it did not compete in the tender to be on the list.
"It doesn't demand any sort of special status for the bank or a necessary to be involved in some competition to attract the budget money," Baltinvestbank said in a statement in April. "If a commercial bank wants to attract budget resources for servicing, it can always participate in another tender and offer its conditions on profits and terms."
Baltinvestbank spokesman Konstantin Sidorov said Monday there was no political motive in the bank's decision.
"We got confused with all these competitions," he said. "When Oseyevsky announced the scheme in April this sounded very transparent, but then they decided to do something else." In June last year Baltinvestbank won tenders to service three of four amounts of surplus city budget income. PSB won just one tender, but, according to Sidorov, it was for the biggest amount. Without mentioning exact figures of total budget resources it had serviced, Sidorov said that in 2003 Baltinvestbank paid the city 200 million rubles ($6.9 million) of profit it had earned from servicing the budget.
Interfax quoted Eduard Batanov, deputy head of City Hall's finance committee, as saying Monday that creating the list of banks would "increase competition and leave room for financial maneuver."
It is the second time in the last two months that City Hall has broken its promises about financial openness and transparency and given privileges to financial and business organizations close the city government.
At the end of April, fuel industry operators filed complaints to the City Prosecutor's Office and the local anti-monopoly committee asking that City Hall be stopped from handing over 60 sites for new gas stations to LUKoil, which allegedly financed Governor Valentina Matviyenko's election campaign last year.
Yeryomenko suggested that the selected banks were chosen because Matviyenko owed them some favors.
"She's got to pay money back," Yeryomenko said.
Members of the City Hall's financial committee could not be reached for comment Monday.
The 2004 budget estimates spending of 83.9 billion rubles ($2.9 billion) with a deficit of 3.9 billion rubles ($135 million).
Matviyenko on Monday repeated her intention to double the city budget within the next four years.
"We've got to do double the total amount of the budget so that we can have normal living standards in St. Petersburg," she said in an interview on state-owned radio station Mayak. "We understand how to do this and have already started running a program about it."
TITLE: Iraqis Free 2 Russian Hostages
AUTHOR: By Valeria Korchagina
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Two Russians were freed in Iraq on Monday after being held hostage for seven days.
Construction workers Alexander Gordiyenko, 27, and Andrei Meshcheryakov, 33, appeared unharmed and cheerful on NTV television late on Monday afternoon.
The two men were reunited with work colleagues at the Baghdad offices of Russian construction firm Interenergoservis, which is the largest employer of Russians in Iraq.
A third Russian, Alexei Konorev, was killed in the May 10 ambush by unidentified guerrillas on the men's vehicle that led to the abduction of Gordiyenko and Meshcheryakov.
Meshcheryakov said that their abduction, which took place about 60 kilometers south of Baghdad, was simply an unfortunate coincidence. It was unclear Monday evening whether any ransom was paid for the hostages' release.
"[The abduction] was a mere accident, as tragic as it was a mistake," Meshcheryakov told NTV television. "[We were] treated like guests."
Russian consul in Baghdad, Bashir Malsagov, said the two men were in "good condition," but one was wounded in the arm during the ambush, Reuters reported.
They were handed over at the home of a local sheikh who appeared to have been involved in negotiations to free the men, Malsagov said.
Interenergoservis is the lead contractor rebuilding a power plant south of Baghdad. It currently has about 300 workers from Russia and other former Soviet republics working on the project.
The May 10 ambush came after a spate of attacks on foreign workers in Iraq since the start of April.
On April 12 eight of Interenergoservis' workers - three Russians and five Ukrainians - were taken hostage. They were released unharmed the next day. The three men attacked on May 10 were replacements for some of the company's workers who left the country after the first incident.
"We only learned about the release from television news," said Alexander Gordiyenko's mother, Alina, by telephone from their hometown of Solnechnodolsk in the Stavropol region. "Whenever we called [Interenergoservis] all we were told was that there was no information of any kind."
Alina Gordiyenko said the family was still trying to calm down after a week of worrying about her son.
"We only knew what was said on television and on Mayak radio," she said, adding that the family had no plans to celebrate Alexander's release until he gets home. "For now we are just going to finish up the supply of sedatives that we have here, to get us back into some kind of shape."
Alexander Gordiyenko had agreed to work in Iraq for $1,000 per month after three months of working for 1,000 rubles ($34.50) a month in Solnechnodolsk.
"I was against this from the very beginning," Alina Gordiyenko said.
The freed hostages were thought likely to return to Russia on Tuesday, together with another 112 Interenergoservis employees who had decided to leave after the latest hostage-taking incident. The plane was originally due to leave Baghdad on Monday, but was grounded when the airport closed for the day.
"The boarding procedure ... took longer than was initially planned," an official for Interenergoservis told Interfax from Baghdad. "Baghdad Airport closes at 4:30 p.m. and the [Iraqi] authorities categorically refused to extend the working hours for everyone to board the plane." As a result, the plane's departure was moved to 1 p.m. local time on Tuesday.
It was unclear Monday whether the company would evacuate all of its employees from Iraq. The company could not be reached Monday.
The Foreign Ministry on Monday again urged for Russians to return. "Despite the resolution of the hostage crisis, the Foreign Ministry again would like to repeat that the military-political situation in Iraq continues to be extremely unstable," the ministry said in a statement. "We reiterate the necessity for all Russian citizens to refrain from trips to Iraq and for all those in the country to leave."
TITLE: City Icon Painter Decorates a U.S. Church
AUTHOR: By Irina Titova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: When Reverend Harry Hayden used to look up at the white ceiling of the St. John the Evangelist Episcopal Church in Brunswick, New Jersey where he preaches, he thought: "Something is missing."
What was missing was provided by St. Petersburg-based Orthodox icon painter Filipp Davydov, 29, who has created a new atmosphere in the church by adding a Russian-style fresco painting.
Davydov arrived in Brunswick at Hayden's request early last month. In three weeks he painted a colorful vision of Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist on the ceiling.
"My parishioners have been captivated by Filipp's work," Hayden said Monday in a telephone interview from Brunswick.
"Filipp is still a young man but he has a great ability, and is so committed to his art," he said. "Nowadays, people are often about money, but Filipp is surprising. He is about art and soul."
Back in St. Petersburg, Davydov said Monday that he had loved working in New Jersey.
"I gave all my mind to my work in the church," Davydov said. "Therefore my only condition for working there was a request to have an aeroplane ticket with an open date, so that I would not have to think about anything, including how long I would have to be there, but only the work."
Davydov said he fell in love with icon and fresco painting at the age of 16 when he started helping his father Andrei Davydov, a famous icon painter, and currently priest of St. John's church in Pskov.
Davydov Snr. was so dedicated to his art that in the Soviet times when icon painting was all but forbidden, he moved from Moscow to Lithuania, then still part of the U.S.S.R., but which allowed more space and freedom for his occupation.
Three years ago Davydov Jnr. moved to St. Petersburg, and started working independently.
Here he painted the ceiling of the Church of the Assumption in the village of Sologubovka, where the biggest German cemetery in Europe is located; an entrance decoration for the St. Nicholas Church at the Predportovaya railway station; and numerous icons.
Davydov said his work is as important in his life as his family.
"I work in the same way as a magician," Davydov said about his occupation. "Just imagine how a man who transforms space should feel.
"Frescos on walls create an impression of air and space," he added. "Surrounded by certain frescos a man feels the atmosphere around him in a special way."
Davydov said sometimes he says his work as a "fight with the wall."
Fresco painting requires very quick work because it involves painting on wet plaster, which usually stays wet only for a couple of days, he said.
"It's like Formula 1, when you can't take time out for a rest, but you have to drive all the time," he said.
However, any real icon and fresco paining is about quality and not quantity, he said.
"If one strives for quantity it immediately affects quality, when pieces of art lack soul and become merely technical," Davydov said.
Therefore, Davydov said he spent a lot of time preparing for the work in New Jersey.
Hayden said he invited Davydov because he was impressed by the young man's work that he had found on Davydov's web site.
"And also when inviting Filipp I wanted my parishioners to understand people in Russia," he said.
"There were times when we thought Russians would bomb us, and Russians thought we would bomb them. Now we live in peace with each other, and that is great."
Davydov, Orthodox by confession, said when working in St. John's church, he got a great chance to learn about the another denomination and its traditions, and to realize one more time how close religions can be.
Davydov's web site: www.iconaantica.spb.ru
TITLE: Basayev Says He Ordered Assassination
AUTHOR: By Anatoly Medetsky
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev on Monday claimed responsibility for the assassination of Chechnya President Akhmad Kadyrov and for the first time threatened to carry out an attack on President Vladimir Putin.
"By the mercy of Allah, the Chechen people celebrated a double holiday on May 9 - the victory over fascism and a small but very important victory over Russia," Basayev said in a statement posted on a rebel web site.
Kadyrov's death in a bomb blast during Victory Day celebrations in Grozny was the execution of a Shariah court ruling that sentenced Kadyrov to death as a traitor for abandoning the rebels and allying with the Kremlin in 1999, Basayev said.
Basayev, taking on a mocking tone at the end of the statement, said rebels are plotting an attack against Putin.
"We are interested in who will be appointed the prime minister of Russia - Katya or Masha - should we, by the mercy of Allah, successfully conduct special operation Moska-2," he said, apparently referring to Putin's two daughters and the recent appointment of Ramzan Kadyrov, the son of the slain leader, as first deputy Chechen prime minister.
The Federal Security Service declined to say whether the statement would prompt any increased security measures.
"We don't usually comment on [verbal] attacks," an FSB spokeswoman said.
The threat against Putin is "something new," said Svyatoslav Kaspe, chief analyst at the Russian Public Policy Center. But he dismissed it as a political stunt that won't materialize, likening it to "slinging banana skins."
Alexei Makarkin, an analyst at the Center for Political Technologies, agreed, saying the threat was little more than a sign of "euphoria from the success" of Kadyrov's killing in the rebel camp.
"They want to raise the stakes and show that they are capable of doing more than killing Kadyrov," he said.
The FSB is checking Basayev's claim in the killing but said it is also looking at other possible culprits, Interfax reported.
Besides the rebels, Kadyrov had plenty of enemies and rivals. Several Chechen officials have said the killing was an inside job.
In his statement, Basayev indicated that former Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov had approved the plan to assassinate Kadyrov - which he called "Operation Revenge."
"We apologize to the president of the Chechen republic of Ichkeria, Aslan Maskhadov, for being unable to literally throw Kadyrov's head at his feet as we promised a month ago," Basayev said.
Maskhadov, who is widely considered a moderate in the rebel camp, denied last week that he had been involved and said he suspected the attack was staged by Russian security services "to liquidate a marionette government" unable to resolve the Chechen conflict.
Basayev's announcement would dismay Maskhadov but Basayev was apparently trying to legitimize the killing by using the name of the popularly elected rebel president, Makarkin said.
Basayev has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks in Chechnya and elsewhere in Russia.
Most recently, he said he had masterminded two deadly suicide attacks in December - one on a train in the Stavropol region, which killed 46 people, and the other outside the National Hotel in Moscow, which killed six.
Further report, page 4
TITLE: Joint U.S.-Russian Exercise Launched
PUBLISHER: The St. Petersburg Times
TEXT: MOSCOW - The Russian and U.S. military launched an unprecedented six-day command post exercise in Moscow on Monday to train for conducting joint operations in a third country.
For the first time, more than 100 officers from the Russian ground forces' Combined Arms Academy will work together with the U. S. Army Southern European Task Force (Airborne) and the U.S. 7th Army Training Command to plan a peacekeeping and anti-terrorist operation.
The exercise, codenamed Torgau 2004, runs from Monday to Saturday at the academy's Moscow headquarters and at an Army training center in the Moscow region, a Russian army spokesman said.
Torgau in Germany is where Soviet and U.S. troops met up in April 1945.
The exercise "will allow us to achieve the compatibility needed for participation in real peacekeeping, anti-terrorist and other operations," Interfax quoted Russian ground forces commander Colonel General Nikolai Kormiltsev as saying Sunday.
TITLE: Kaliningrad Offers Resorts, Amber and Kant
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Kovalev
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: KALININGRAD - A few days after New Year's Day, in January 1255, several hundred tired knights of the Teutonic division moving east from the German province of Elbe stopped on a hill by a river flowing into the Baltic Sea.
On a cold winter day they started building a fortress that over the next 690 years would become one of the most beautiful cities in Eastern Europe with labyrinths of streets lined by fragile-looking buildings, parks, alleys and the spires of Gothic churches pointing to the sky. The bells of streetcars rang out among thousands of maple trees, the greenery of which covered the town.
Its streets heard the footsteps of famous Enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant. He walked these alleys in the 18th century, while he created his masterpieces "Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals" and "A Critique of Pure Reason."
Since the British air force carpet bombed the city, formerly named Koenigsberg, in 1944. All that is left of the beauties of that city are to be seen on black-and-white post cards that bear little resemblance to the city as it is today.
In 1945, the city was completely razed by the artillery of the Red Army. Barely a building was left standing. The main cathedral looks lonely surrounded by new apartment buildings constructed in the late 1970s.
"Do you get it now, Kant? The world is material," somebody wrote in 1945 on a statute of the philosopher that had been struck by a shell.
The Germans of East Prussia were driven out at the end of the war. The province in which they had prospered for 700 years, was divided between Poland, Lithuania and Russia and the capital was renamed Kaliningrad.
The new Soviet spirit of the city almost obliterated its old Gothic soul. It is widely believed that Koenigsberg's central cathedral has only survived thanks to Kant's grave being located on its far-left corner.
While many other churches around the city that were not destroyed by the bombings were dismantled brick-by-brick by its postwar Soviet masters, the cathedral was left alone because Kant was described in the writings of Vladimir Lenin as "a precondition who led on to Marx and Engels."
But despite its tragic history, contemporary Kaliningrad, which will celebrate its 750 anniversary in 2005, is still very attractive to tourists.
Top attractions are two seaside resorts located about one hour's travel from the city center, and the downtown itself, where tourists can take a choice of numerous walking tours that tell of Koenigsberg's mysterious background.
One of the most interesting walking routes starts on the Island of Kant, a small area of the city formally known as midlevel town of Kneiphoff. It is a series of tiny squares and 16 streets that pass around the main cathedral. The area was known throughout Europe in the 18th century because of a famous puzzle of how to cross its seven bridges without stepping on any of them twice. The answer to the puzzle is that this is impossible.
Several of the seven bridges still cross the river around the cathedral, but the buildings have all been destroyed, including the Albertina University, where Kant worked as a professor.
On the place where it once stood there is a stone and only some of the older trees are witnesses to the times when student life was full of joy and tension.
Student life is still full of bright colors on Friday nights in a remote area of Kaliningrad at the Vagonka Club. It is described in a local tourist guide as a must-see for young tourists who want to get some drinks and entertainment and to listen to live bands in the good company of their friends. Relatively cheap drinks and quite good music compensate for the somewhat high entry fee of 200 rubles ($7).
There is a big network of 24-hour clubs in the city with small casinos, pizza bistros and bowling alleys, which seem to be poplar with the local teenage crowd, even though they resemble a fake Las Vegas on a tiny scale.
With 90 percent of the world's amber deposits in the Kaliningrad region, one of the definite places to visit in the exclave is the Amber Museum. Despite the local factory being almost totally bankrupt because of mismanagement and mass theft, the museum presents outstanding pieces of art made of the precious material that is famous around the world.
The Prussian Museum is another place worth visiting. Located in the main cathedral with the Immanuel Kant exhibition, the museum has a collection of ancient tools used by prehistoric residents of the region made of stone, steel, gold, bronze and amber. The original museum, founded in 1844, was the biggest of its type in Europe with more than 240,000 exhibits in stock, before it was burned and destroyed in 1944.
As almost always happens it is cheaper for Russians to see what is left - 15 rubles for a ticket. Foreigners have to pay twice as much.
Those tourists who would rather enjoy nature will be happy with the region's range of resorts, such as Zelenogradsk and Svetlogorsk, which before 1946 were called Kranz and Rauschen. The two villages unexpectedly started getting bigger at the beginning of 19th century, shortly after German doctor Fredric Kessel pronounced that enjoying the sunshine and nature was preferable to taking medications and letting blood.
It took just half of the century forthe Prussian shoreline to be covered with numerous cottages, fashionable private houses and bright hotels. Many of them survived the war and have been restored to something of their former glory in the 13 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
After Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania regained their independence, Russian tourists appeared to be practically cut off from the shores of the Baltic Sea. The Kaliningrad region became the only place where Russians can enjoy the Baltic sand and waters without standing in lines for visas outside embassies.
Fears that new visa regulations introduced by Lithuania for Russians transiting through Lithuania to the exclave could create obstacles were not borne out. A transit visa is issued on board the train if a ticket is bought at least 28 hours before departure.
Things are trickier for foreign citizens living in Russia.
They don't need a separate visa for Russia if they fly to Kaliningrad, but have to have a multi-entry visa or a new one if they travel by train.
According to a Russian-language book "Kaliningrad and its Environs" by publisher Amber Pages, tourists who would like to experience the contrast between the European Union and Russia in one journey, should definitely visit the resort area around the border crossing at Kurshskaya Kosa between the Kaliningrad region and Lithuania.
"Nida, one of the [resort] villages on the Lithuanian side couldn't be called any thing else except a slice of heaven. The heart warms to the Baltic style of the houses with their colorful window shutters and front yards of an amazing beauty," the guide says.
The place is full of tiny bars and small cozy restaurants.
"There is a feeling of pleasantness and calmness everywhere, which was probably what attracted Thomas Mann here," the book says. "The giant of German literature invested his Nobel prize money in building his residence here."
It's no problem to find a place to stay in Kaliningrad. Unlike St. Petersburg, Russia's most westerly city is full of small hotels, just as if it was in some country in Eastern Europe. The hotels are usually located about 15 minutes ride in a streetcar ride from the city center. They are extremely comfortable with room rates starting from about $40 for a single room.
The hotels are in neighborhoods that are quiet and appealing whatever time of day it is.
Large hotels, such as the Kaliningrad or Moskva hotels, are more expensive, up to $100 and more for a single room.
Kaliningrad has good train and bus connections with the neighboring new EU states Poland and Lithuania, making it possible for tourists with the right travel documents to make trips to the Polish city of Gdansk and the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, which are both located only three to five hours' drive from the city, not including time at the border.
HOW TO GET THERE
Trains leave from St. Petersburg's Vitebsky station on even dates of the month at 6:13 p.m. and arrive in Kaliningrad at 8:09 p.m. the next day. Tickets cost 1,032 rubles ($36) for berths in a four-bed compartment and 2,165 rubles ($75) in a two-bed compartment.
The train returns on odd-numbered dates of the month, leaving Kaliningrad at 11:38 a.m. and arriving in St. Petersburg at 1:38 p.m.
Flights to Kaliningrad take about 2 1/2 hours and cost 4,100 rubles ($141) roundtrip or 2,400 rubles ($82) one way. There are eight direct flights a week.
There are regular bus connections to Germany, Lithuania and Poland from a central bus terminal located a few steps away on the right from the train station.
TITLE: Warning HIV Rate Will Soon Hit 1%
AUTHOR: By Simone Kozuharov
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: A thousand city residents have been infected with HIV over the last six months and by 2010, one in every 100 St. Petersburgers will be infected, experts said Sunday at a rally commemorating World AIDS Memorial Day.
"The disease spreads at such a rate that sooner or later it will concern all of us," an organizer said. "By 2010, the rate of infected people will be 1 percent."
That would mean 1.45 million people infected with HIV across the country.
In 2001, the CIA already put the Russian figure at 0.9 percent of the population or 1.3 million cases. By comparison, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated a cumulative total of 886,575 AIDS cases in the United States through 2002.
About 200 people, mostly students, braved rainy weather and attended the rally Sunday on St. Isaac's Square, police estimated, although organizers had expected up to 500.
"The purpose of our meeting is to honor those who have died and to call the government's attention to those who still need help," rally organizers told the crowd.
"We want to say 'no' to the policy of the government, which allows people to die without getting help," they said.
Ksyusha, a young woman at the rally, contracted HIV through sexual contact in 2000, she said in an interview. Clad in dark glasses and a scarf tied around her head to conceal her identity, she took the stage and addressed the crowd. "Today I am exposing my face to you, but tomorrow my parents will not be able to go outside," she said. "We hope that the situation will change because the majority of people do not know how the virus is passed on."
Only 59 percent of Russians believe that habitual condom use can reduce the risk of contracting HIV, according to a new study conducted by the University of North Carolina.
The majority of attendees Sunday were clad in T-shirts given to them by organizers.
This year's slogan, "to remember, to believe, to live" was written on the back of the shirts.
Others held up banners or displayed home-made quilts with the names and years of death of loved ones who died from HIV/ AIDS.
Times have changed, organizers stressed, and AIDS is no longer a disease of high-risk groups, like prostitutes and drug addicts.
AIDS in Russia is an epidemic, Alexander Tsekhanovich, of Humanitarian Action, said in a recent interview. At the stage the epidemic has reached in Russia, the disease can touch any member of the population, he said.
Large numbers of Russians started being recorded as HIV-positive only in the last few years. Many of them may be unaware of their status and few are receiving treatment.
It can take from five to 10 years for full-blown AIDS to develop so the problem is not yet highly visible in Russia.
Russia's leading AIDS expert, Vadim Pokrovsky, has said the official number of deaths from AIDS in the country - 4,375 - understates the true figure. "The disease has not manifested itself yet and a person may live [with it] without knowing he is infected," he added.
TITLE: Plaque for Starovoitova
AUTHOR: By Irina Titova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: A memorial plaque to murdered State Duma deputy Galina Starovoitova was unveiled in St. Petersburg on Monday - the date of her 58th birthday.
It is the first memorial to Starovoitova, who in the 1990s became one of the most outspoken and respected democrats in Russia.
The plaque, which portrays Starovoitova in profile, is on the wall of her former home at 91 Kanal Griboyedova. She was shot dead in 1998 on the staircase of the building while going up to her apartment.
Six people are on trial for assassinating her. "Galina Vasilyevna Starovoitova, scientist, defender of human rights, and State Duma deputy lived in this building from 1994 to 1998," the plaque says.
"Galina Vasilyevna was a pioneer who turned the country on to the democratic road to development," said Governor Valentina Matviyenko who, together with Starovoitova's son, Platon Borschevsky, unveiled the plaque.
"She was really a heroic woman, who defended national minorities and human rights in general," Matviyenko said. "Her death shocked us and we still cannot come to terms with it."
Borschevsky said he hoped his mother's democratic policies would be realized in Russia, because this was what she had "wished for with a passion." "Happy birthday, Mama!" he said.
Yuly Rybakov, a former Duma deputy who knew Starovoitova for 10 years, remembered that after her murder some people had tried to tarnish her reputation.
"I remember how the gutter press and even some police said they would find compromising materials on her," he said. "It was all false, and now her murderers are in court. We still don't know the names of those who ordered her murder, we hope we'll know them one day."
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Manevich Investigation
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The investigation of the 1997 murder of city property committee head Mikhail Manevich has been extended by three months, Interfax reported Monday.
"The work is ongoing and there will be a result," Interfax cited the press service of the city and Leningrad Oblast Federal Security Service as saying. "It's too early to speak openly of the results that we have already achieved."
Manevich was shot in his car as he went to work by a sniper on Aug. 18, 1997.
Corruption Case Filed
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The City Prosecutor's Office has completed its investigation of a criminal case over the actions of Vladimir Yarmin, the former head of the Kirov district, and has sent the results to a court, Interfax reported Monday.
He is charged with exceeding his authority in a way that was intended to allow him to receive a large bribe, even though because of circumstances not under his control he did not receive the bribe in full, the report said.
Citing earlier reports, Interfax said Yarmin had demanded that construction company Severnaya Zvyozda-Torgservis pay 160,000 rubles ($5,500) plus $100,000 in order to allow the enterprise to operate.
Honor for Likhachyov
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - A city street will be named after the late Dmitry Likhachyov, an academician of the National Literature Institute, Interfax quoted Vice Governor Sergei Tarasov as saying Saturday.
This street is located between Bolotnaya and Orbeli streets in the north of St. Petersburg.
"The academician lived in this area," Tarasov said. "Scholars of Dmitry Sergeyevich had been offering to name a part of the embankment between Birzhevoi and Tuchkov bridges, but the embankment practically doesn't exist there. That is why we decided to rename an existing street."
Likhachyov, who died in 1999, wrote over 500 works on ancient Russian history.
First Bonbon Ball
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The first Russian Bonbon Ball, like those originally staged in Vienna will take place in the city's Alexandriinsky Theater, on Thursday, Interfax reported Friday.
"When we discussed [the possibility] of running the ball in Russia it became clear that it could take place only in St. Petersburg," Interfax quoted Olga Pelinka, an adviser to the Austrian government on cooperation with countries in the Eastern Europe, as saying.
The ball will include performances by Mariinsky Theater artists, samples of Austrian and Russian sweets, a lottery and the selection of the belle of the ball.
Information to be Unified
ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - City Hall has plans to set up a unified information systems for its committees, departments and its enterprises, Interfax quoted Governor Valentina Matviyenko as saying Friday.
"We have to synchronize all the systems of the committees and departments," she said. "For this a City Hall commission is going to be set up that has to work out first-hand measures to create a unified information system."
The system will have several security levels and will be largely closed to the public . It is likely to cost from 20 million rubles ($690,000) to 1 billion rubles ($35 million), the report said.
A tender will be held for the system, which will link data bases of committees including the real estate property bloc.
TITLE: Gref Says Chechnya Will be Easy to Fix
AUTHOR: By Valeria Korchagina and Simon Saradzhyan
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref acknowledged that Moscow has turned a blind eye to the desperate need to rebuild Chechnya and said that the situation there could be easily fixed.
Echoing President Vladimir Putin, who secretly flew to Grozny for a whirlwind visit last week, Gref expressed shock upon seeing the state of destruction in the Chechen capital during a visit Saturday.
"What we saw today at Minutka looks almost like a set from a Hollywood movie," Gref said, referring to Grozny's main square.
"The time has come to rebuild. ... We've realized there hasn't been enough attention from the central authorities," Gref said, Reuters reported.
"The main purpose of my visit is to see the situation in the republic with my own eyes, meet the leadership and to clarify the government program on rebuilding the republic. More precisely, how to refocus federal funding," Gref said at the start of talks with a group of local officials, Interfax reported.
He said the number of projects funded by Moscow must be cut in favor of key infrastructure projects - which would help attract outside investment and allow small businesses to open and farms to prosper.
Although Moscow has poured more than $1 billion into Chechnya since the end of the first war in 1996, ongoing military operations coupled with widespread regional corruption have brought little change to Chechnya and its capital, which has been a frequent target for federal artillery fire and carpet-bombing raids.
Gref, however, seemed unabashed. "This is a very interesting task and one that can be solved easily," he said.
Acting Chechen President Sergei Abramov expressed similar optimism. "We have managed to solve in three hours things we have not been able to solve in four years," he was quoted by Reuters as saying.
Gref's and Putin's visits came after the Kremlin-backed Chechen president, Akhmad Kadyrov, was killed May 9 in a bomb blast in Grozny.
Kadyrov, a former rebel who embraced Moscow after the start of the second military campaign, in 1999, was the man who the Kremlin hoped would make the Chechnya problem go away, analysts say.
His assassination has created a power vacuum that promises to be hard for the Kremlin to fill, given that he sidelined all of his potential rivals while manning his retinue on the basis of loyalty rather than professional qualities and political experience.
During his nearly four years in power, Kadyrov muscled out rather than engaged all of the seasoned administrators who had the potential to emerge as a future rival, appointing officials for their loyalty rather than their professional and political experience.
Of his loyalists, his younger son and former security chief Ramzan Kadyrov initially emerged as a leading presidential candidate. But despite signs of Kremlin support, such as a personal meeting with Putin and a promotion to the post of first deputy Chechen prime minister, Ramzan Kadyrov has so far rejected the possibility that he may run.
"No, of course not. The law, the constitution, doesn't allow this," Kadyrov said on NTV television last Thursday when asked whether he would run.
The Chechen constitution sets the minimum age for president at 30, while Kadyrov is 27. An early election has been called for Sept. 5.
Some senior Chechen officials have suggested amending or overriding the constitution to accommodate the younger Kadyrov.
Central Election Commission chief Alexander Vyeshnyakov sharply criticized such talk over the weekend, saying there is no legal way to alter the Chechen constitution in the current situation.
"The president of Chechnya may submit proposals to change the constitution, but an acting president may not," he was quoted by Itar-Tass as saying.
"The constitution adopted by the people is a guarantee of stability and peace on Chechen territory. ... The legal foundations of the republic must not be shaken," he said.
With Kadyrov possibly off the list, the Kremlin will have to cast around for another candidate. Among the names being floated as possible contenders are Putin adviser and career police officer Aslanbek Aslakhanov, Moscow-based businessmen Malik Saidullaev and Khusein Dzhabrailov and former Russian parliament Speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov.
The Kremlin may take a close look at Said Peshkhoyev, a deputy presidential envoy to the Southern Federal District, Kommersant reported last week. Peshkhoyev, a career Federal Security Service officer who headed the Chechen police in 2001 and 2002, would probably have little difficulty working with the law enforcement agencies in Chechnya, Kommersant said.
Meanwhile, investigators have detained a builder who helped carry out repairs at Grozny's Dynamo stadium, where Kadyrov was killed, and at least six other suspects, Izvestia reported Saturday.
Lomali Chupalayev was detained at his home on in the village of Alazurov village near Urus-Martan on Friday evening on suspicion of helping plant the bomb. Investigators went after him after a crosscheck of stadium repair records with law enforcement data showed that two of his brothers were rebels, Izvestia said.
TITLE: Saratov Governor Faces Corruption Charge
AUTHOR: By Oksana Yablokova
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - Regional prosecutors on Monday formally charged Saratov Governor Dmitry Ayatskov with abuse of office in an investigation into the suspected large-scale misappropriation of regional funds.
Ayatskov was summoned to the Saratov regional prosecutor's office Monday afternoon where formal charges were presented to him, said Nina Gellert, an aide to the senior prosecutor, by telephone from Saratov.
The governor has taken a leave of absence until the end of the investigation, which is connected with his administration's decision to authorize the payment of 70 million rubles in customs fees for imported combine harvesters worth 500 million rubles. The combines ended up in private hands.
Ayatskov was questioned Saturday but refused to testify. He is now barred from leaving the region pending the end of the investigation, Gellert said.
Ayatskov, who has said the investigation against him is politically motivated and designed to undermine his re-election bid next spring, insisted that he has done nothing wrong.
He said that he has not yet decided whether to run for a third term as governor next April, while analysts said that the investigation is aimed at discouraging him from standing for re-election.
In an interview published in Monday's Gazeta newspaper, Ayatskov said that he might support another candidate to succeed him.
"People's mood can change with time, and I am not an exception ... I can only say that I will not give up power to scum," he told the paper. "But if a fellow resident from Saratov decides to run, I can help."
Ayatskov named as possible candidates he might support actors Oleg Yankovsky and Oleg Tabakov and pop singers Valeria and Alyona Apina. None of the four are thought likely to run for governor.
The statement came a surprise from Ayatskov, a governor since 1996 and once one of the country's most powerful regional leaders.
In 1998, then-President Boris Yeltsin introduced Ayatskov to U.S. President Bill Clinton at a G-8 summit in Britain as a potential future Russian president.
In 2000, with the support of the pro-Kremlin Unity movement, Ayatsov was re-elected for a second term with 67 percent of the vote. His popularity has since slipped, analysts said.
Since news of the investigation against Ayatskov broke last week, Russian television has aired several reports about him, using mainly library footage. In one report, he was shown riding a pet camel in Saratov, while in another the stocky governor was shown rolling around in the snow in his underwearafter a banya.
Ayatskov warned that the criminal case against him would harm the region's image and its attractiveness for investors.
His spokesman could not be reached for comment Monday.
Ayatskov had earlier said that regional prosecutor Anatoly Bondar might be targeting him because he was considering running for governor.
In comments published Monday in Kommersant newspaper, Ayatskov also said Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov had personally ordered his prosecution as revenge for Ayatskov once blocking his appointment.
Until 2000 Ayatskov was a member of the Federation Council, which approved Ustinov's appointment.
Unlike federal lawmakers, a governor has no immunity from criminal prosecution. If Ayatskov is found guilty of abuse of office, he could face up to 10 years in jail.
TITLE: Bus Rams Plane in Moscow
PUBLISHER: Combined Reports
TEXT: MOSCOW - A bus carrying passengers rammed an Aeroflot jet at the Sheremetyevo Airport on Saturday, injuring nine people and damaging the plane, officials said.
The bus carrying 43 passengers hit the port wing of the Tu-154 airliner, which was being moved by a truck in preparation for takeoff, the airport said in a statement.
Nine people were injured, including seven passengers on the bus, it said. Aeroflot officials said the passengers were slightly hurt and were given medical assistance, Interfax reported. The driver was seriously injured, RIA-Novosti said.
The plane was preparing for takeoff to St. Petersburg. The bus was carrying passengers to a plane headed for Krasnodar.
The 69 passengers on board the Tu-154 later flew to St. Petersburg on another plane, the airport said.
(Reuters, AP)
TITLE: Russian Execs' Pay Tops Poll Of Europe
AUTHOR: By Simon Ostrovsky
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - The average Russian laborer may earn less than a tenth of a western European worker's wages. But Russia's fat cats face no such indignity, netting even more than their western European counterparts, a new survey has found.
Thanks to favorable tax conditions and a booming economy, executives at Russia's biggest companies on average take home 750 euros more per month than western bosses, according to a survey by global consultants Watson Wyatt.
Average after-tax pay for Russian managers was calculated at 108,750 euros, as opposed to 108,000 euros for west European executives. The report surveyed 125 companies in Russia.
"This is a phenomenon almost exclusively within executive positions," said John Lewis, who authored the report, in a telephone interview from Brussels. "Further down there is still a big gap between how much professionals are paid in the West and Russia."
The average salary for mid-level managers is anywhere between $20,000 and $70,000 annually, another study found earlier this year.
That survey, released by human resources firm Ancor, interviewed 68 companies in Russia.
Annual wages across Russia last year averaged some 66,000 rubles, or about 1,900 euros, according to official statistics.
A limited pool of people with the right experience and talent to fill executive positions in Russia plays a part in driving up wages.
However low income taxes play a greater role in giving Russia's top managers the upper hand over colleagues further west, said Lewis.
"In Germany, net pay at the executive level is 55 to 65 percent of the pay check because of taxation," he said, while Russian bosses take home 87 percent thanks to the 13-percent flat tax.
As the economy grows, the trend has been for the gap in Russian and European gross wages to narrow considerably.
A recent study from PriceWaterhouseCoopers showed that executives in Moscow companies with a turnover of over $50 million earn a median of $109,000 before taxes, with average annual bonuses of 20 percent.
The Russian edition of Forbes magazine on Thursday published a list of the of the country's 100 richest people, including 36 billionaires. That is a ninefold increase since Forbes first published the names of 4 Russian billionaires in 1997.
Businesses catering to high earners are catching on to the fact that some Russians make a lot.
On Thursday HSBC Bank announced it would open a Moscow office to offer private banking services for well-to-do Russians.
"As the Russian economy continues to grow, the number of big net worth individuals will grow very fast,'' Richard Tickner, HSBC's Russia country manager, told Bloomberg.
Ordinary Russians think they earn too little while bosses earn too much.
According to a survey, released by Fond Obshchestvennoye Mneniye on Thursday, 85 percent of workers who responded said they are not paid enough.
Twenty-three percent of those respondents held the state of the economy responsible, while 17 percent blamed their higher-ups, who they said are "the only ones with high wages," and "thieves," Interfax reported.
A startling 53 percent of the 3,000 adults surveyed said they were jobless.
TITLE: Plastic Replaces Steel as Duma Teaspoons Disappear in Dozens
AUTHOR: By Francesca Mereu
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: MOSCOW - State Duma deputies have been accused of having their cake and eating it. And not giving back their spoons.
Up to 12 teaspoons per week mysteriously go missing from a Duma cafeteria and ice cream-scoffing deputies are seen as the likely culprits.
And whether the spoons go missing through dishonesty or forgetfulness, the light-fingered attitude toward Duma cutlery is hitting low-paid cafeteria workers in the pocket.
"We have to pay for every teaspoon that goes astray. It's so unfair," said Katya, a young cafeteria worker who declined to give her last name.
The teaspoons, Katya said, began to disappear from the small stand-up cafeteria after a new intake of deputies arrived following December's Duma elections. Over the months, she said, the losses have been getting steadily worse.
"At the beginning we would have only one or two teaspoons go missing every week, but now it is up to 12," she said.
In an attempt to stop customers taking more than one teaspoon at a time, frustrated cafeteria workers stopped putting the steel spoons on the cutlery tray and started handing them out to diners individually. But it failed to solve the problem, Katya said.
Starting this month, deputies will have to use plastic spoons for their tea and desserts.
The problem appears to be isolated to the smallest of the Duma's cafeterias, where deputies consume food and beverages standing up, off of buffet reception-style tables. Workers say the cutlery from the Duma's other eateries, a restaurant next door and a larger, sit-down cafeteria is all present and accounted for.
According to Katya's colleague Natalya, deputies who take the spoons do not intend to steal them. "Deputies take teaspoons with ice cream and cakes and just leave them in their offices. It's unlikely that anyone wants to take these worthless teaspoons home," she said, showing one of the cafeteria's typical thin steel spoons.
Natalya said that sometimes deputies forget to bring back saucers and bowls as well. "Their offices are full of stuff from our cafeteria," she said, adding that fortunately workers don't have to pay for crockery since it can be written off as breakages.
Deputies deny they are stealing cutlery or walking off with it to their offices.
"I cannot deny that things like that might happen, but if it was a serious problem the food department would have asked us to take some measures," said United Russia Deputy Oleg Kovalyov, head of the Duma's Self-Regulation and Organization Committee. "But they didn't, so it means that the problem does not exist."
Sergei Proshin, a member of the Credentials and Ethics Commission from the Rodina bloc, agreed with Kovalyov. "Deputies do not need to steal cutlery from the cafeteria," he said.
But United Russia Deputy Gennady Raikov, head of the Credentials and Ethics Commission, told Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper that he was not surprised that spoons are disappearing. "They [the deputies] could even roll up a carpet or two and slip them out," he said.
A Communist deputy, who asked not to be named, said the deputies he knows prefer to eat in the cafeteria rather than taking it into the elevator and up to their offices.
"We like to have clean offices," he said.
As for taking the spoons home, Sergei, a Duma guard, said it would be impossible, as everyone who goes in or out of the Duma has to pass through a metal detector. "We check bags for metallic objects, and we would see if someone was taking cutlery from the cafeteria," he said.
TITLE: Acquittal in Chechen Case
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: ROSTOV-ON-DON - A Russian military court on May 11 confirmed the acquittal of four officers who had been charged with murder in the deaths of six civilians in Chechnya. The case, only the second time that Russian servicemen have faced charges in the deaths of civilians in the warring region, attracted wide attention.
A jury this month found the men not guilty, saying their actions had not violated military regulations. Court judge Alexander Kargin confirmed the acquittal, as required under law. The officers had opened fire on a truck that failed to obey their order to stop, according to trial testimony; one of the six was killed and two were wounded.
According to the defense, the officers were then instructed by their superiors over radio to kill the survivors.
The Russian military has been widely criticized by human rights groups for alleged killing, abduction and abuse of civilians in Chechnya.
The same court that acquitted the officers also tried Colonel Yury Budanov, who was charged with murdering an 18-year-old Chechen woman. The court ruled Budanov was insane at the time of the killing and couldn't be held accountable, but the Supreme Court overturned the ruling and last July he was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
TITLE: Dutch Shipbuilders Eye the Local Industry
AUTHOR: By Sophia Kornienko
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: The Russian market holds lucrative opportunities for Dutch shipbuilders and marine equipment manufacturers, renowned for their quality standards. The ticket to the Russian market is good legal consultants and flexibility.
Even though Russia continues to be a legislative roller-coaster and its market is yet to mature, it is no longer an uncivilized debris of speculative prices and cheap labor, experts said at a recent maritime mission.
"St. Petersburg is quite a substantial bureaucracy," said Dick Alewijnse, head of last week's Holland Maritime Mission to St. Petersburg, owner of Alewijnse Marine Systems in the Netherlands, in a telephone interview Friday.
The event was a good opportunity to get to know each other and see what is happening in the local market, Joska Voerman, Holland Maritime Mission's project manager said in a telephone interview Monday. "We have totally reached the goals we have set for the meeting, but I can't say now how many companies will sign actual deals as a result," she added.
It was thanks to the mission that getting 8 Dutch companies and up to 30 Russian companies together at one meeting became possible, said Maxim Balanyov, project manager at the St. Petersburg Foundation for Small and Medium Entrepreneurship Development, one of the mission's organizers.
"We are already working with quite a few Dutch companies, so the mission discovered nothing new," said Vladimir Zuev of the Admiralteiskie Verfi, a state-owned shipyard. "We do not discriminate between Dutch companies and our other Western partners. There is nothing exclusive that we have seen Dutch manufacturers supply in the local market. All we want is more orders," he said.
Russian imperfect tax legislation and border facilities are the factors keeping Dutch businesses from taking a more active stand in the St. Petersburg market, Alewijnse said.
"Both Dutch and Russian companies are not always ready for cooperation," Balanyov said. "Russian companies often have problems with languages. Not every company's sales department has a fluent English speaker," he said. "Dutch companies are not prepared to face the unpredictability of the Russian market, when no prognosis can be made for the future," he said.
"The frequency with which the customs legislation is being changed in Russia shocks Dutch businesses. A company is planning to come out in the Russian market, and suddenly sees the regulations and tariffs change," said Svetlana Dotsenko, chief assistant of the economic department at the Dutch Consulate General in St. Petersburg, which provided generous support for the mission. "Dutch companies are capable of accepting such conditions, given that a good legal partner goes through every detail with a fine tooth comb every time changes happen," she said in a telephone interview Monday. "Hardly anyone but a lawyer can follow the legislative changes at the speed they occur. For Russia, changes introduced "as rarely as once a year" are a dream," Dotsenko said.
Because of the above circumstances, Dotsenko said, it would be great if at least one or two of the Dutch companies that participated in last week's mission would enter the Russian market.
Registration and taxation are two other problems. Most of the legislative obstacles exist on the federal level, so the Consulate has no opportunity to change the situation. However, many Dutch companies approach the Consulate for general consultancy and contacts. "There are many companies in the Netherlands specifically dealing with Russian legal consultancy," Dotsenko said.
"I am quite positive about the future," Dotsenko said. "A Dutch contact once told me that Dutch companies are coming to Russia not because the Russian market has developed, but because the European market is saturated. I am more optimistic. What I see now is that while for years, Russian requests to find Dutch partners used to exceed the Dutch requests by a few times, this year, they have nearly evened out," said Dotsenko.
"The problem is that the Russian market is quite occupied by now, and the Dutch newcomers do not have the same chances as they had ten years ago. What we count on is that shipbuilding has traditionally been Holland's core business, which makes Dutch companies competitive," Dotsenko said.
In Alewijse's opinion, business in Eastern Europe will depend on the growth of the population's demand for high quality Western equipment from Sweden, the Netherlands and Norway. "The tendency I see now is positive. One example is a shipyard in Moscow dealing in luxury yachts," he said. "We also see a growing interest in Western equipment for medium-cargo vessels," Alewijse said.
"We hope Dutch companies will be more active in supplying equipment for small sailing boats and motorboats. The niche is currently fully occupied by Finns. Meanwhile, the Dutch have a great potential for supplying small elegant parts," said Yekaterina Larionova, deputy marketing director at Almaz Marine Yard in a telephone interview Monday. "There is quite a demand in the sector. The way to start may be to cooperate with the Finns," she said.
Western partners are usually surprised to find no state support for the shipbuilding industry in Russia, said Balanyov. The only way out is to have a good legal partner - any professional customs broker can act as a good advisor, he said.
State support in the form of providing banking guarantees to a number of companies would make a world of difference, Larionova said. Dutch companies are afraid to put funds in the Russian market when there are no banking guarantees, she said.
"Other problems we face are transportation and low cost expectations," she said.
It is true that many Dutch companies still have outdated views on the Russian market as one where speculative prices and cheap labor dominate, Dotsenko said. The main message that the Russian companies need to get across to their Dutch partners is that Russia is no longer cheap or uncivilized, Dotsenko said.
TITLE: IN BRIEF
TEXT: Transneft Capacity Low
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian oil exports have hit a ceiling and after many years of growth the world's second largest oil exporter cannot boost shipments if new pipelines are not built, oil pipeline monopoly Transneft said on Friday.
The head of Transneft Semyon Vainshtok told Reuters in an interview that Russia, the only major non-OPEC producer to boost output significantly in recent years, may need to curb growth very soon because of export pipeline bottlenecks.
Vainshtok said Transneft was already exporting just over 4.0 million barrels per day, and warned he needed to expand the system by at least 800,000 bpd to sustain growth.
"Transneft is expanding its system, but we are not meeting the demand of our oil companies... It's a very tough period. We are still short of 40 million tonnes (800,000 bpd) capacity and we cannot solve the problem without building new pipelines."
"We need the government to quickly decide on the expansion of [the Baltic Sea port of] Primorsk and a decision on at least one major pipeline," he said.
He said Transneft's exports will average about four million bpd this year, up 18 percent from 2003, while oil output will rise nine percent to 9.2 million bpd.
Finnish Trade Study
HELSINKI (SPT) - Finnish-Russian Chamber of Commerce and market research company Taloustutkimus Oy carried out the fifth Barometer study of Finnish trade with Russia.
The study showed that Finnish businesses are more interested than before in investing in Russian operations. Belief in growth of the Russian economy continues to be strong, but belief in their own growth is more pessimistic than before, the key results said. 301 companies took part in the survey.
Sibneft Output Rises
MOSCOW (Bloomberg) - Sibneft, the country's fifth-biggest oil producer, said oil output rose 12 percent in the first quarter and exports were little changed after loading delays in February. Crude extraction rose to 8.2 million tons (660,500 barrels a day) in the first three months of the year, from 7.3 million tons in the same period last year, the company said on its web site. Oil exports were little changed at 3.1 million tons. Sibneft spokesman John Mann last month said that the company's oil loadings at the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk were delayed at the end of February. A group of shareholders led by billionaire Roman Abramovich sold 92 percent of Sibneft last year to Yukos for $3 billion in cash and a 26 percent stake in Yukos. The group never transferred operational control of Sibneft to Yukos and it is now trying to reverse the takeover.
Aeroflot Reshuffle Call
MOSCOW (SPT) - Flagship carrier Aeroflot will call an extraordinary shareholder meeting July 24, the airline said in a statement Monday. The meeting will be called to reelect the 11-member board of directors following the annual shareholder meeting scheduled for June 5.
The meeting was called on the initiative of the National Reserve Bank, which owns 30 percent of Aeroflot, the airline's deputy general director Lev Koshlyakov said. Koshlyakov said that the board -' in particular the six seats currently held by government representatives - is in need of changes to reflect the recent government reshuffle.
TITLE: Germans Like Details, Russians Value Speed
AUTHOR: By Sophia Kornienko
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Russians' perception of modern Germany is a mix of respect for its economic achievements and romantic affection for its cultural heritage. Nevertheless, the German's addiction to schedules makes working with Russians difficult, locals say with a smile. Russia is not a country where you can plan far ahead, they say.
Germans form the biggest foreign business community in Russia and are not lagging in cultural and educational exchanges either. Some 800 to 1,500 Germans are believed to live in St. Petersburg, most of them affiliated with either German or Russian companies, the statistics published this year by the House of German business in St. Petersburg said.
The Russian market is perceived as something of a minefield, respondents said in the project called "Perceptions of Germany and the Germans in Russia," conducted in late 2003. And although many Russians agree their country lacks clarity, transparency and political stability, Germans still target the Russian market because of its growth and potential, said the report. The research was ordered by the German Consulate General in St. Petersburg and carried out by the Center for Independent Sociological Research. On the other hand, Russian respondents said Germans were very cautious in business matters and not active enough due to legislative obstacles, the study reported.
Several respondents said it would be sensible to appoint Russians as directors in joint venture Russian-German companies and representatives of German firms in Russia, as Germans do not have a complete understanding of Russian ways. Those Russians who had experienced working in Germany liked that Germans did not give unrealistic promises, fulfilled the promises they had given and did not agree to accept overstated proposals. "German employers treat their employees with great respect. They do not have the practice of "I'm the boss, you're the fool." The employee has a right to know everything," an interviewee said.
"Germans are impeccable at doing business," said Natalia Bogdanova, European exports manager at the Lomonosov Porcelain Factory, in a telephone interview Monday. "The difficulties I experience in communication with Germans are of an emotional nature," she said. To an even larger extent than Swedes and Finns, Germans tend to always conceal their opinions and their personalities, Bogdanova said. "If you go out for a drink together, your German partner may suddenly turn out to be a completely different person than you used to think. To Russians, this is spooky, because they never know who they are dealing with," she said.
Germans are accustomed to a different rhythm of life - it is calmer and more predictable, Russian respondents said. For example, a German teacher asked the class to explain the notion of stress, the report told. Russians said that a relative's death was stressful. The German teacher did not accept the definition. "Death is worse than stress. An example of stress is a bus leaving the station earlier than you arrived," she explained. In another situation described in the report, a German employee was distressed by the fact that it was snowing outside. She was worried how she would get home and could not concentrate on her work.
Deviations from the accepted norm or schedule generally make Germans nervous, respondents said. German punctuality at work is reflected in meticulous planning of their days, weeks and even the whole year, the Russian interviewees said.
"Germans keep their promises much better than other nations," agreed a young Russian businessman in a telephone interview Monday, supplier of computers from Europe to St. Petersburg, who wished to stay anonymous. "It is normal that any person used to stability does not understand it when the rules of the game change on a daily basis and he is told to forget about previous arrangements. Germans have normal expectations about things," he said.
"The duties are clearly outlined, employees are not encouraged to carry extra duties or come forward with new proposals to improve efficiency, because there is a special department working on that. I do not like this," a Russian respondent said. "Everything is planned beforehand. In Russia, there is more spontaneity in decision making and preparation for meetings. In Germany, it is assumed that a meeting should be planned in detail and everyone should be notified," another Russian respondent said. Careful planning is not what Russians are accustomed to in business relations, the report said.
On the other hand, too much specialization may also cause problems. Narrow specialization of duties may be a serious problem in Germany, said Helena Kammann, executive director of Baltika's affiliate in Hamburg, Baltika Deutschland. At a German company, it is often difficult to find the person responsible for the precise issue in question, she said. "We needed to inquire about the German requirements for plastic packaging. It may sound funny, but we failed to find the person who could answer that question. We were being constantly redirected to other departments, until we had a whole new book of contacts, but all in vain," Kammann said.
The key to the German heart is sincerity, Kammann said. "Germans have difficulties with saying the truth directly in your face, so when you suddenly speak out openly, their hearts melt," she said. For example, Kammann said, if you ask a German, "Is my accent the problem with you not understanding me?" you are going to deserve your opponent's respect.
The key to the German mind is reliability, Bogdanova said. If you fulfill all your promises on time, everything will run smoothly, she said. Germans are easy to work with, because you can count on the goals you have set together, Bogdanova said.
Germans do not like to have any moral liabilities before their partners. If you help them, they will definitely return the favor," Kammann said.
"Germans have a complex of their own. Many of them don't think other nations like them," a respondent said. On the other hand, Russian respondents admitted that they tended to be more careful in what they said and the way they behaved, when communicating with Western Europeans, because they felt they were being examined. Lack of good German language skills also made Russians feel self-conscious. To many respondents, speaking English to Germans helped break the ice, because it put both sides into equal positions. Most Russian interviewees said they made easier contacts with Eastern Germans.
The longer the Russian respondents lived in Germany, the more they found in common between Russians and Germans in general, the report said. Some Russians spoke of strong emotional connections with the German culture. "Germany is a country of philosophy and classical music," a young respondent said. "When I came to Germany I bought a stereo and some CDs, including Beethoven, because I really like him. It suddenly struck me that it was there that he had heard and wrote down the tunes that are sounding in my head. The following morning, when I left the student house and looked down the street, the music was still sounding in my head. It made me feel high," he said.
TITLE: Germany Plays a Vital Role In Developing Russian Markets
AUTHOR: By Robin Munro
PUBLISHER: Staff Writer
TEXT: Germany has been the biggest Western trading partner of Russia since 1972. In 1997 it overtook Ukraine and became Russia's biggest trading partner altogether, according to the Moscow-based Delegation of German Industry and Commerce.
All types of German businesses are represented in Russia, including many small enterprises.
According to the Moscow-based Verband der Deutschen Wirtschaft's web site www.vdw.ru, Germany has been the No. 1 foreign investor in Russia in 2003, ahead of Cyprus, Britain and the United States.
CITY PARTNERSHIP
Germany was the city's leading trading partner in 2003, according to a report by City Hall's external relations committee.
Trade turnover rose 16 percent last year to $1.025 billion with exports rising 3 percent and imports 19 percent.
Germany occupied first place among importing countries to the city with imports values at $841 million while exports lagged far behind at $184 million, putting Germany fourth among export destinations for goods from St. Petersburg.
Exports were as varied as bronze, timber, machine tools, aluminum, chemicals and ships while imports included fast moving consumer goods, vehicles, paper, cardboard and optical equipment.
Germany invested only $45 million in the city last year, maintaining a trend of decreasing investment since 2001. In 2000 the Germans invested $116.5 million or 10.2 percent of all foreign investment in the city, the report said.
At the beginning of last year, accumulated German investment was $158.1 million, with $119.4 million of this direct investment.
About 400 German companies are currently registered in the Northwest region and the community's life is focused on the House of German Business in St. Petersburg where regular meetings and seminars are held and information is exchanged.
150 YEARS OF SIEMENS
German electric, communications and information technology giant Siemens began its activities in St. Petersburg in 1853, and its anniversary was celebrated in the presence of Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and President Vladimir Putin last year.
Today Siemens has several subsidiaries in the city, including a technical support department, a programming center for communications technology, a mobile telephone center and Siemens Business Services.
According to the external relations committee's report, Siemens owns a 20-percent stake in local giant Electrosila and a 10-percent stake in the Leningrad Metal Works, or LMZ and has been involved in upgrading power and heating stations and consulting on automation of industrial processes throughout northwest Russia.
In March Siemens used a subsidiary, Demag Delaval International to obtain a 28-percent stake in the city's Nevsky Zavod, with the intention of producing electrical equipment that will be competitive in world markets.
KNAUF BUILDS UP
Knauf, a family-owned Bavarian construction material firm that is Europe's No. 1 plaster product producer, has invested more than $430 million and built 20 factories in Russia in the last 11 years, making it the leading German investor in the Russian construction industry. It employs 7,000 Russian staff.
It has not all been plain sailing; the company prevailed in court against outsider's attempts to seize company assets in Krasnodar and Nizhny Novgorod and kept operating right through the 1998 financial crisis.
Heinz Jurkowitsch, director general for Knauf in Russia and the CIS, said the company started working in Krasnogorsk in the Moscow region, producing insulation and plaster materials in 1993. It has since invested more than 100 million euros in that business, a month ago bringing the latest plant into operation that for the first time for Knauf in Russia will produce cement-based products.
"After investing more than 20 million euros in creating the most modern plant in Europe, we estimate that in the next two years we will occupy as high a position in this market segment as we do in the market for plaster products," he said in a written reply to questions.
In St. Petersburg, the company has what it describes as a "unique plant for producing construction tiles with insulating properties." In addition, metal fittings that are used for constructing interior walls, plaster products and insulating materials are produced in the city.
"Acquiring and modernising the enterprise that is today known as Pobeda/Knauf was one of the first investment projects of our company," Jurkowitsch said. 'The mutual efforts of German and Russian specialists in just a few years allowed this enterprise to be transformed into one that produced modern high-quality goods that were much in demand.(a)
Knauf opened a training center in the city last year and works closely with the city's Architectural and Construction University.
Jurkowitsch said that although the business is booming and had exceeded expectations, the company had not come to Russia purely to make profit.
"Back at the beginning of the '90s, it was not so much commercial interest, but an openhearted wish to help Russia become an effective economy and taking part in this was what motivated the directors of the firm," he said. "Today we are firmly convinced that not a single kopek, or, perhaps more appropriately, a single cent, has been spent in vain."
HENKEL CLEANS UP
German manufacturer Henkel is a leading presence in the market for fast-moving consumer goods, which has appealed to a broad section of the local population. All the conglomerate's businesses are present in Russia.
Best known for its detergents and cleaners, including Persil and Lox, Henkel also produces cosmetics under the Schwarzkopf brand and consumer adhesives.
"Henkel was one of the first multinationals to start operating in Russia," said Yulia Krasheninnikova, head of human resources for Henkel Russia. "The decision was based first of all on the huge potential of the Russian market."
In 1990, even before the break up of the Soviet Union, Henkel started a joint venture in the Saratov region. Now 100-percent Henkel owned, the factory is called Henkel South.
The company has four plants, including the Henkel-Era factory at Tosno in the Leningrad Oblast, where 850 people are employed. Krasheninnikova said the Oblast was a prime choice because of its proximity to the border and St. Petersburg with its large market for consumer goods, good infrastructure and very friendly investment climate. Local staff are some of the country's best in terms of education, skills, job attitude and company loyalty, she added.
LUFTHANSA FLIES HIGH
German airline Lufthansa has been flying to Russia since 1972 and to St. Petersburg since 1980. Today it operates 29 flights a week to the city.
Lufthansa is the leading foreign airline flying to Russia with more than 260 employees in Russia. It has 14 destinations in Russia and the CIS and carried more than 1 million passengers to or from them in 2003.
"St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast are an attractive market in terms of passenger air transport,"Ilya Novokhatsky, Lufthansa's PR representative for Russia/CIS, said in a written reply to questions. "The region is a major tourist destination in Russia and large business center with many ties to Europe." Last year was the most successful yet for Lufthansa in Russia and the CIS, he added. "The number of passengers transported by Lufthansa between Russia and Germany increased by 8.14 percent compared to 2002 and reached 745,591passengers," he said. "The number of passengers transported between Germany and Russia & CIS for the same period was 1038,363 passengers. That is 10.9 percent higher than in 2002. "The seat load factor on the routes between Germany and Russia reached 68.5 percent," he added.
RETAILING WITH METRO
German grocery wholesale giant Metro Cash & Carry studied the Russian market for several years before opening its first two stores in Moscow in Nov. 2001. It is on a fast expansion course with five stores in Moscow and two in St. Petersburg and a third to open in the city this year.
Each store employs up to 400 people and up to 1200 suppliers, producers, distributors and traders are involved in the assortment of 20 000 items, both food and non-food commodities, which are available in each store, on a sales surface of 10 000 sq. m.
"We truly believe the Russian market has a big potential and once our operations in Moscow and St. Petersburg proved to be efficient we have intentions to go to the regions," said spokeswoman Yulia Belova. "Metro's format and concept in the regions does not change, however certain things are to be adapted to the needs of the particular market."
DIPLOMACY AND CULTURE
A German consulate has operated in the city since 1972 and it was there in 2000 that Putin and Schroeder began the annual German-Russian summits known as the Petersburg Dialogs.
German firms have been no less active in the cultural life of the city with natural gas giant Ruhrgas sponsoring the restoration of the Amber Room in the Catherine Palace at Pushkin. In 2000, Daimler-Chrysler sponsored the Mariinsky Theater's production of Wagner's Rheingold, which has become the main operatic event in the "Stars of White Nights" festival.
Germany, through the EU's TACIS program, has also participated in repatriating and rehousing former Soviet soldiers who were based in East Germany.
The German charities Caritas and Hamburg-based Samaritans have been active in helping the city's less well off since the early 1990s.
HISTORICAL TIES
Northwest Russia's ties with Germany go back to the 13th century when Novgorod was part of the Hanseatic League of free-trading cities around the Baltic and North Sea.
In the 19th century German industrialists played a large role in developing the country. Many German multinationals operated in pre-Revolutionary Russia, including BASF, Mercedes Benz, Siemens, Zeiss, Agfa, Hoechst, Mannesmann and Bayer.
St. Petersburg once had a large German community, which almost disappeared in Soviet times due to political and social reasons.
After World War II, East Germany was the Soviet Union's top trading partner and many city residents had ties to troops stationed there. West Germany also reached out to the Soviet Union especially after Chancellor Willy Brandt adopted his Ostpolitik. Thus in the early 1970s, West Germany dropped its hard line toward the Soviet Bloc and economic relations blossomed.
Mannesmann pipe maker took advantage of the opportunity, cutting the "deal of the century" in February 1970. Under the agreement, Mannesmann was to deliver 1.2 million tons of large-diameter pipe, and in return the Soviet Union would deliver 52 billion cubic meters of natural gas to West German gas giant Ruhrgas over 20 years. A consortium led by Deutsche Bank arranged bridging finance for the delay between the pipe and gas deliveries.
At the time, it was the largest single deal between the Soviet Union and a Western country and the biggest deal ever for Mannesmann.
MODERN ECONOMIES
Total German investment had grown to $10.5 billion in 2003, and $2.5 billion of this was direct German investment. Exports to Germany account for roughly 7.5 percent and imports for 14.3 percent of the economy, the CIA worldbook reports.
But despite Germany's high place in Russian trade, Russia occupies a small place in Germany's due to the relative size of the countries' economies.
Achim Haensel, a German employed as a senior bank adviser with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development subsidiary KMB-Bank, which provides finance for micro, small and medium-sized businesses, is based in St. Petersburg and says the city could do more to develop and attract business. "With nearly 5 million inhabitants, a vibrant port and excellent connections to Europe, the potential for developing micro, small and medium enterprises was and is huge," he said in written answers to questions.
"I believe that the challenges for St. Petersburg are the same as for many other regions in Russia: first, being attractive to investors both foreign and domestic and, second, insuring that the local economy is sufficiently diversified. Micro, small and medium enterprises play a key role in both," he added.
"Consequently, establishing an environment favorable to the development of micro, small and medium enterprises is of strategic importance," Haensel said. "All investors, independent of size, need stability and transparency to allow for adequate planning."
The two economies are very different in size with Russia's GDP only $433 billion - just one sixth of Germany's $2,408-billion GDP last year even though Russia's population of 143.5 million is 70 percent greater than Germany's, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit.
However, recalculating GDP by using purchasing power parity paints a more balanced picture with Germany's $2,275 billion GDP only twice that of Russia's $1,198 billion GDP, according to the EIU. Nevertheless, even taking purchasing power parity into account, Germany's GDP per capita of $27,649 is more than three times Russia's $8,350, as calculated by the EIU.
TITLE: The Truth About Official Conservatism
AUTHOR: By Lilia Shevtsova
TEXT: The current crisis of liberalism and communist ideas in Russia has created a vacuum which is gradually being filled by different ideologies. Among them, the attempt by some Russian analysts to formulate a brand of so-called conservatism particularly stands out. In the Russian context, conservatism typically connotes opposition to the authorities and a call to return either to the Soviet or pre-Soviet past. This type of conservatism is associated with the Communist Party and the nationalists. The ideologues of the new pro-Kremlin strain of conservatism, however, are trying to justify preservation of the status quo, rather than advocating a return to the past.
These attempts could be dismissed as the latest manifestation of conformism, a widespread phenomenon in Russian politics these days. However, this "official" brand of conservatism merits greater attention. The very emergence of a pro-Kremlin conservatism is both a reflection of the crisis being experienced by alternative ideologies and of the authorities' efforts to formulate an ideological base for its policies, which for the moment rely on poor stereotypes and cliches.
Given that this official conservatism avoids extremes and emotional excesses, and is outwardly plausible, it could appeal to a diverse range of people. It seemingly combines common sense, a moderate pro-Western orientation and moderate statism. Liberal technocrats, bureaucrats and oligarchs can all subscribe to this conservatism.
Mikhail Khodorkovsky's letter about the crisis of liberalism, in which he calls for cooperation with the president, could also be interpreted as acceptance - albeit under duress - of the official conservative position, which can be defined as follows: "Needs must when the devil drives. You have to cooperate with the authorities, otherwise you'll be crushed."
What are the main tenets of this conservatism? First, its apologists argue that ideal democracy is not possible and that criticism of the authorities should be seen as a naive striving for perfection. Second, they tell us that democratic development occurs gradually. Third, there are no liberal democratic alternatives to the existing regime and none on the horizon - rather Russia is threatened by a communist or nationalist alternative; thus, apparently, it is better for us to sit back and enjoy what we have. Fourth, official conservatives are trying to convince us that Russia is progressively westernizing and even moving in the direction of the U.S. democratic model.
These arguments are rather simple and bear all the hallmarks of the traditional justifications used to support historical periods of restoration. But in this case, it is essential to take issue with these arguments for not only are they simplistic, they give a false picture of the direction of Russia's development.
It's all well and good to talk about stability, but stability a la russe is stability born of the need to survive and the adaptation of a large section of the population to lowered aspirations. "May it get no worse" is the mantra that underpins this stability. It does not provide any stimulus for development, on the contrary, it can only lead to stagnation.
What about economic growth? It has already become a banality to talk of the growth of a diversified economy while Russia's narcotic dependence on world oil prices continues. Viewing criticism of the authorities as an attempt to introduce to Russia an unrealizable ideal model is tantamount to full reconciliation with the status quo, complete with all its imperfections and dirty tricks. If the conservative position is that everything is reasonably okay, then there is no point in asking how the situation can be improved. The same goes for the thesis about developmental gradualism: why get worked up if accelerating reforms is futile?
I accept that the argument about a left-wing or nationalist alternative to Putin is well-founded. But is it not the authorities' policies that have created the conditions for such a revanche and stirred extremist sentiments, as, for example, with the creation of the Rodina party?
Regarding Russia's movement toward the U.S. model, our conservatives have an idiosyncratic understanding of American political life. Do they consider that the government of Mikhail Fradkov is a U.S.-style presidential Cabinet transplanted onto Russian soil? This analogy might hold, but only if the position of prime minister were abolished and the government made directly subordinate to the president, and if there were a parliament and courts independent of the president. In the absence of these, we are talking about the typical Russian regime formula, where all levers of power are in the hands of the leader who, however, carries no responsibility for the way the country is run.
This conservatism is a manifestation of the political class' loyalty to the authorities. Furthermore, the "official" conservatives are extremely consistent in the sense that no matter who is in power they say one and the same thing - that the authorities are right and all the alternatives are worse. They said this under Boris Yeltsin and now they are repeating it under Vladimir Putin.
What is curious today, however, is that the pro-Kremlin conservatives have unexpectedly received support from their Western colleagues. A couple of months ago, an article entitled "Normal Country" was published in Foreign Affairs magazine, arguing that for a mid-level income country - such as Brazil or Mexico - Russia has a normal democracy. The article attempts to reinforce a simple argument: "What you have is what you deserve. Do not aspire to anything more." The thesis about the "normality" of Russia bolsters the scanty arguments of the official conservatives who can now happily trot out that the West supports our system and does not see alternative development possibilities."
Official conservatism and its apologists are spreading like the plague. At the Russian Economic Forum in London last month, I was struck by the consensus of opinion of the Russian and Western businessmen, who praised the stability and favorable business climate in unison. It was all highly redolent of the Communist Party Congresses of old. One got the impression that forum participants sincerely believed that the Khodorkovsky affair and the absence of rule of law are marginal phenomena that certainly will not affect them. Well, good luck to them!
So what is the point in arguing with the official conservatives and their Western friends? Precisely because their defense of the status quo is the most serious obstacle today to debate about the present and future of Russia, the sources of development and stimuli for reform. Official conservatism distorts reality, lulls people into a false sense of security and encourages passivity. In the final analysis, this conservatism forms the basis of the Kremlin modernization project through returning to a traditional state. And it may well become the basis for even bigger steps back in the direction of dictatorship, given that "the authorities are always right" etc.
The very emergence of this official brand of conservatism results from the Russian political class' strategic myopia and its focus on the here and now. Pro-Kremlin conservatives, wittingly or unwittingly, by preserving the status quo remove from the agenda the question of the direction of Russia's development and encourage uncomplaining and uncritical acceptance of the existing system.
What we are talking about is a sedative, which can only put people in a complacent mood and distract us from unpleasant realities. In essence, it is an attempt to freeze incomplete reforms. In this context, conservatism, despite its outwardly civilized and decent appearance, inevitably leads to regression. And until liberal minded people begin to formulate a serious liberal alternative to the existing system, Russia's political class will enthusiastically march toward a new crisis under the banner of new conservatism.
Lilia Shevtsova, a senior associate of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, contributed this comment to The St. Petersburg Times. It is the last in a series of pieces written on the occasion of the Carnegie Moscow Center's 10th anniversary.
TITLE: Privatising Is the Only Way to Save Many Historic Monuments
AUTHOR: By Vladimir Gryaznevich
TEXT: Governor Valentina Matviyenko's initiative to privatise historical buildings has caused a stir in Russia. Many have a sinking feeling in the pit of their stomach. Yet how should the matter be dealt with? The idea of handing them over is upsetting, yet not letting them go will be their ruin.
The authorities are consoling those who fear what might happen to these monuments. The matter is nothing to do with well-known establishments like the Hermitage, Peterhof, or the Russian Museum. Moreover, the establishments likely to be privatised are those which are in an unsatisfactory condition and lack efficient users (criteria which, truthfully speaking, have been seriously eroded.) Representatives of the Culture Ministry emphasise that if they are privatised, use of monuments will be strictly controlled.
The idea of privatising monuments was quickly opposed by one influential figure Mikhail Piotrovsky, director of the State Hermitage Museum. His arguments are as follows: "Cultural monuments cannot be fully owned by anyone - neither by private individuals nor by the state. We received our cultural heritage to pass it on to the next generation, not to do with it as we please."
Critics of Matviyenko's idea point to two basic risks - unsatisfactory restoration, and the use of monuments for unsuitable purposes. "For example, to serve as a restaurant," writes someone from the ranks of the conservatives. In theory, the state can easily control both these issues. All the same, it is well known how bureaucrats control businessmen. The effectiveness of such control is distinctly dubious.
On the other hand, even a cursory study of the situation concerning so-called "second-class" monuments reveals two things. Firstly, they are in a horrific condition. Secondly, there is an obvious lack of state funds for restoration, and an absence of a notable number of businessmen willing to put their money into restoration under any conditions. The recent story of the private residence on the English Embankment being leased to LUKoil clearly demonstrates the reason for the stalemate - the price of the matter, that is to say the cost of restoration, is huge. It amounts to tens of millions of dollars. Serious businessmen don't want to invest that kind of money without firm guarantees that the building won't be seized back after reparation. And in our country even right of ownership does not give a 100-percent guarantee. Thus entrepreneurs prefer not to take the risk.
Entrepreneurs are one thing. Yet even the Russian Orthodox church - an institution treated so well in every way by the authorities - is not exactly bursting to take back the churches once nationalised by the Communists. Why, for example, did the church choose Kazan Cathedral as its pulpit? Why not the spiritual St Isaac's? As far as we know, the main argument in favor of Kazan Cathedral was its better preservation and compactness.
City Hall's committee for the conservation of monuments has published a list of monuments that could be first in line to be auctioned off. The present state of some of them is no better than the Konstantin Palace before restoration, which cost, as we recall, more than $300 million. Only the walls remain of stables belonging to the Znamenka estate. The Samoilovoi Palace with its park not far from Pavlosk is, without the slightest exaggeration, a pile of bricks. The Sheremetyev private residence on Shpalernaya is the left-over ashes of the former Union of Writers. The palace of Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich on the Moika is somehow still standing. But opposite stands the monstrosity of the Admiralty shipyards. This is the view from the windows. I don't think there will be many volunteers wanting to privatise and restore these monuments back to their original state.
But this is St Petersburg. Go a few kilometers away from the centre into the depths of the Leningrad region, and how many cultural monuments will we find there? And in what condition!
I believe the main argument of those opposed to privatisation is rooted on an emotional level. The truth is that the degradation of stables and their "use for unsuitable purposes" did not begin under the Bolsheviks. From the middle of the 19th century stables were sold and used as factories.
Our decisive governor Matviyenko is offering a radical solution - to privatise. And it seems she has the right idea. Privatisation is the only way to preserve monuments - not only in a material sense but in a legal one too. Yet after all this, they say that Piotrovsky has succeeded in raising doubts at the very highest level about the expediency of privatisation, and thus a final solution is being delayed. What a century we live in ...
Vladimir Gryaznevich is a political analyst with Expert Severo-Zapad magazine. His comment was first broadcast on Ekho Moskvy in St. Petersburg on Friday.
TITLE: Chris Floyd's Global Eye
AUTHOR: By Chris Floyd
TEXT: Criminal Negligence
The decapitation of American citizen Nick Berg at the hands of the Jordanian terrorist Abu Zarqawi was a shattering act of barbarism. What is perhaps equally disturbing is the fact that George W. Bush could have prevented it - but refused to do so.
Long before the war, Zarqawi and his band of non-Iraqi extremists had a camp in northern Iraq, in territory controlled by U.S.-backed Kurdish armies, who had wrested it from the hands of Saddam Hussein. American military and intelligence forces had a free hand to operate there; indeed, anti-Saddam Iraqi exiles also held open meetings in the territory, safe from the reach of the dictator.
As NBC reported months ago, American forces pinpointed Zarqawi's location in June 2002. They prepared an attack plan that would have destroyed this al-Qaida associate and his terrorist band. But their request to strike was turned down - twice - by the White House. Why? Because such a strike would have muddied the waters in the Regime's carefully calibrated public relations effort to foment war fever against Saddam's regime.
At every turn, Bush and his top officials painted a picture of Saddam Hussein as a powerful dictator able to threaten the entire world. At every turn, they implied, insinuated and sometimes openly declared that he was in league with al-Qaida. But this fictional portrait would have been undermined by a raid on Zarqawi, which would have exposed the truth: that Saddam was a crippled, toothless despot who had lost control of much of his own land and couldn't even threaten vast enemy armies within his own borders - much less threaten his neighbors or the rest of the world. It would have also exposed the fact that the only al-Qaida agents operating on Iraqi soil were in areas controlled by America's allies.
Bush could have easily destroyed this barbaric al-Qaida cell, but he chose instead to focus on his long-planned invasion of Iraq: a country that had nothing to do with the terrorist attacks on America but was itself a target of al-Qaida's hatred. Not only was Zarqawi allowed to live and thrive, but massive resources were also diverted from the battle against Osama bin Laden in order to launch an unprovoked war of conquest and occupation in the most volatile region on earth.
The entirely predictable results of this strategic and moral folly are plain to see. Iraq has been reduced to a state of chaos, where Islamic extremism has free rein for the first time. In Afghanistan, the Taliban and al-Qaida have made a strong comeback, controlling large swathes of territory and operating with impunity throughout the land. Indeed, al-Qaida has launched more terrorist attacks around the world in the past two years than in the whole of its previous history.
And just last month, Bush officials told us that it is "almost inevitable" that al-Qaida will strike America again, this time with a radioactive "dirty bomb." (Perhaps in time for the election?) Like Zarqawi, bin Laden has thrived on Bush's obsession with Iraq, which long predated the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and had nothing to do with the "war on terrorism" - or indeed any desire to "liberate" the Iraqi people from Saddam Hussein.
As we've noted here many times, the plan to invade Iraq was set out long ago, in Sept. 2000, by a group called Project for the New American Century, whose members included Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and many others now in the top ranks of government. PNAC declared publicly that Iraq must be conquered in order to establish an American military presence in the heart of the oil-rich Middle East. The issue of Saddam's thuggish regime was irrelevant to this larger goal, they said. Here is a direct quote: "The United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security.
While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein."
The Bush Regime was always going to invade and occupy Iraq, no matter what. It is central to its geopolitical strategy of ensuring what it calls "American dominance" of world affairs in the coming decades. The Sept. 11 attacks gave it an opportunity to galvanize - and manipulate - public opinion in support of this long-held goal. But as we have clearly seen, the real war on terror - the one focused on capturing or eliminating al-Qaida terrorists like Zarqawi and bin Laden - has been given short shrift while the Bush Regime pursues the "bigger prize" of controlling Iraq.
Now the Regime and its apologists have seized on this latest atrocity to continue their heinous and deliberate policy of conflating the Iraqi people with al-Qaida. They've used it to deflect attention from the Regime's war crimes in the prisons of Iraq, where the U.S. military's own intelligence officers say that an astounding 70 percent to 90 percent of the captives have been wrongfully imprisoned, the Wall Street Journal reports. Yet the war crime apologists are now declaring that the act of these foreign al-Qaida terrorists justifies the torture and abuse of innocent Iraqis.
Nick Berg went to Iraq in search of "business opportunities" offered by the Bush Team's "reconstruction" of the country they have destroyed. Zarqawi, who could have been eliminated long ago, was "liberated" by Bush's Iraqi invasion to roam the country, thriving on the post-war chaos. Their fatal encounter is a paradigm of Bush's entire misbegotten enterprise in Iraq: a tragic, senseless, unnecessary waste.
For annotational references, see the Opinion section at www.sptimesrussia.com
TITLE: Gandhi Clan Reclaims Leadership
AUTHOR: By Beth Duff Brown
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: NEW DELHI - After all the pundits had written off the family dynasty that dates back to the birth of modern India, the legendary Nehru-Gandhi clan has captured the kingdom once again. And its matriarch, Sonia Gandhi, is likely this week to become India's first foreign-born prime minister, further burnishing the family name.
"I feel deeply humbled," Gandhi told fellow Congress party lawmakers after they elected her their Parliament leader Saturday in a major step toward making the Italian-born widow of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi the next leader of the world's largest democracy.
"I stand here today, in the space once occupied by my great teachers," she said, naming India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, her mother-in-law, Indira Gandhi, and her late husband.
Her charming and charismatic children, Rahul and Priyanka, also have secured a place in history for the family's fifth generation. Rahul was elected to Parliament on Thursday and his younger sister is likely to follow once her toddlers are packed off to school.
"With the entry of the children, suddenly it gives the Congress party a 25-year horizon," said Rajiv Desai, a close family friend and Sonia Gandhi's media adviser. "Suddenly, the Congress is thinking: "Wait a second, here's this old guy who's 80 and doddering with steel knees, and look at us - the future is ours.'"
That doddering old guy is caretaker prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who resigned Thursday after Gandhi's Congress party unexpectedly devastated his ruling alliance in Parliament elections last week.
The 79-year-old, lifelong politician with knee replacements belongs to an old guard who attacked the 57-year-old Gandhi's Italian origins and claimed her children were coasting on the family name.
Millions of Indians, particularly those out in the villages untouched by Vajpayee's "India Shining" economic boom, thought differently. Like the Kennedys in the United States, the Gandhis have tried to maintain an aura of service and sacrifice for their country.
"There has been no single family that has lived their lives for this abstract thing called the nation," Desai said. "I think what they represent is sacrifice. That's their charisma and their enigma."
Not everyone worships the Nehru-Gandhi clan. Hindu nationalists abhor them and campaigned on a pledge to amend the constitution to prohibit foreign-born Indian citizens from holding office.
Prime Minister Indira Gandhi jailed thousands of her opponents, including Vajpayee, during her bizarre crackdown on civil liberties from 1975 to 1977. Critics say India fell deeper into poverty and corruption under the Congress party, which ruled from 1947, when the country won its independence from Britain, until 1996.
But the magic of the Gandhi name is not hurt by both young Gandhis being attractive - with their mother's dimples and father's penetrating eyes - and hip enough to spark curiosity among the apathetic Generation X.
Photogenic Priyanka sports a short haircut and flashes coy smiles as she gives pithy sound bites on behalf of her evasive mother.
The fiercely private Rahul, Harvard-educated with a Colombian girlfriend, blossomed into an outspoken and charismatic speaker on the campaign trail.
He stunned his bodyguards Saturday, two days after his mother's victory, by climbing over the barricades in front of their New Delhi home and leaping into the crowd to shake hands with supporters.
"I will never forget this moment," gushed Satish Kumar, 32, a candy seller who had elbowed his way to Rahul. "This is just the beginning. He will be prime minister one day."
TITLE: Gay Couples Line Up To Marry in the States
AUTHOR: By Ken Maguire
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts - City clerks began handing out marriage-license applications to gay couples just after midnight Monday, making Massachusetts the first state in the nation to legalize same-sex unions and the United States just one of four countries in the world where homosexuals can legally wed.
The first couple to begin filling out the paperwork was Marcia Hams, 56, and her partner, Susan Shepherd, 52, of Cambridge. They showed up a full 24 hours ahead of time to stake out the first spot in line to get the nation's first state-sanctioned gay marriage applications.
"I'm shaking so much," Hams said as she filled out the application while sitting at a table across from a city official.
Outside, throughout the day and into the night, the atmosphere was festive - complete with a giant wedding cake - as officials in the liberal bastion of Cambridge seized the earliest possible moment to begin the process of granting same-sex couples the historic right at the center of legal battles nationwide.
The state's highest court had ruled gays and lesbians must be allowed to marry beginning Monday, and some of the couples in line planned to head to the courts as soon as they opened later in the morning to seek waivers allowing them to wed before the usual three-day waiting period.
Massachusetts was thrust into the center of a nationwide debate on gay marriage when the state's Supreme Judicial Court issued its narrow 4-3 ruling in November that gays and lesbians had a right under the state constitution to wed.
In the days leading up to Monday's deadline, opponents looked to the federal courts for help in overturning the Supreme Judicial Court's ruling. On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene.
The SJC's ruling touched off a frenzy of gay marriages across the country earlier this year, emboldening officials in San Francisco, upstate New York and Portland, Oregon, to issue marriage licenses as acts of civil disobedience. Even though courts ordered a halt to the wedding march, opponents pushed for a federal constitutional ban on gay marriage, which President George W. Bush has endorsed.
Both sides in the debate say the issue may figure prominently in the November elections across the country. Voters in Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Missouri and Utah - and probably several other states - will consider similar amendments to their state constitutions.
TITLE: Israel Promises More Home Razing in Gaza
AUTHOR: By Mark Lavine
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: JERUSALEM - Despite U.S. criticism, Israel plans to demolish hundreds more homes in a Palestinian refugee camp if violence and weapons smuggling persist there, officials said Sunday after one of the bloodiest weeks in the current round of fighting.
Israeli also plans to make wider use of airstrikes in Gaza, the Israeli defense minister was quoted as telling the Israeli Cabinet. Missile strikes tend to be more lethal than other means of fighting.
Early Monday, Israeli helicopters fired five missiles into an office run by Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement in Gaza City, witnesses said. No one was hurt in the attack, which came just after midnight. The Israeli military would say only that the air strike was aimed at two offices in the same building that were "focal points for terrorism."
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon wants to withdraw from Gaza, but his plan of "unilateral disengagement" has been vetoed by his Likud Party, and the military instead is intensifying its strikes against armed Palestinians.
The main area of recent friction has been the Rafah refugee camp on Gaza-Egypt border, where seven Israeli soldiers were killed last week - five in an explosion on a border patrol road and two by sniper fire in the camp.
In response, army bulldozers demolished 88 houses in Rafah on Friday, according to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, which aids refugees. The demolitions left about 1,000 Palestinians homeless, UNRWA said.
House demolitions have been condemned by international human rights groups as collective punishment, and on Sunday, the practice drew rare U.S. criticism of Israeli policy. "We don't think that is productive," Secretary of State Colin Powell said at the World Economic Forum in Jordan. "We know Israel has a right for self-defense, but the kind of actions that they're taking in Rafah with the destruction of Palestinian homes, we oppose."
At the weekly meeting of the Israeli Cabinet, the army chief, Lieutenant General Moshe Yaalon, told ministers the military has marked hundreds of homes along the border for demolition if violence continues, participants said.
The homes would be razed in order to widen the Israeli patrol road between the camp and the border with Egypt. The road is 10 kilometers long and initially was 23 meters wide.
Since the outbreak of fighting, Israeli troops have torn down hundreds of Rafah homes abutting the road, and widened the buffer zone to about 180 meters in some areas. A senior Israeli army officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the military wants to widen the entire zone to up to 230 meters - which could require the destruction of many more houses.
Israel's Supreme Court on Sunday cleared the way for more demolitions, rejecting a petition to prevent the razing of 13 houses in Rafah. The three judges said the army had a "real, imminent need" that justified the demolitions.
Raji Sourani, director of the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, said house demolitions violate the Geneva Conventions and appealed to nations that signed them to intervene.
Peter Hansen, the UNRWA chief, said he was "extremely alarmed" by Israel's plans to take down more homes.
At the Cabinet meeting, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said he would step up military activity, according to officials briefing reporters. During fighting that followed the attacks on the soldiers, 32 Palestinians were killed.
TITLE: Head of Iraqi Council Assassinated
AUTHOR: By Christopher Torchia
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: BAGHDAD, Iraq - The head of the Iraqi Governing Council was killed Monday in a car bombing near a U.S. checkpoint in central Baghdad, Iraqi officials said. The killing was the second of a member of the U.S.-appointed council since last year and dealt a blow to U.S. efforts to stabilize Iraq ahead of a handover of sovereignty on June 30.
Abdel-Zahraa Othman, also known as Izzadine Saleem, was among four Iraqis killed in the blast, according to Redha Jawad Taki, a member of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a Shiite Muslim organization.
As the current council president, a rotating position, he was the highest-ranking Iraqi official killed during the U.S.-run occupation. His death occurred about six weeks before the United States plans to transfer power to Iraqis on June 30 and underscores the risks facing those perceived as owing their positions to the Americans.
Saleem, the name he went by most frequently, was a Shiite and leader of the Islamic Dawa Movement in the southern city of Basra. He was a writer, philosopher and political activist, who served as editor of several newspapers and magazines. The position of council head rotates monthly.
Six Iraqis and two U.S. soldiers were injured in the bombing near the coalition headquarters, which is called the Green Zone, U.S. Army Colonel Mike Murray said. Three cars waiting in line to enter the headquarters were destroyed.
Smoke rose from the site of the blast on the west side of the Tigris River. Firefighters and about 10 ambulances raced to the scene.
Saleem was in a convoy of five vehicles, and the car carrying the bomb was adjacent to the council chief's car when it exploded, said witness Mohammed Laith. He said Saleem's driver and assistant were among those killed.
Coalition officials said they could not confirm Saleem's death, but released a statement that read: "Due to unforeseen and tragic events, the football game scheduled for Monday afternoon between the coalition press officers and Iraqi media will be postponed until further notice."
Saleem was the second member of the Governing Council to be assassinated since the group was established last July.
Aquila al-Hashimi, one of three women on the 25-member body, was mortally wounded Sept. 20 when gunmen in a pickup truck ambushed her car as she drove near her Baghdad home. She died five days later.
Meanwhile, fighting persisted the Shiite heartland in southern Iraq, where American jets bombed militia positions in the city of Nasiriyah early Monday after fighters loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr drove Italian forces out of a base there. Residents said seven fighters were killed in overnight battles.
An Italian soldier on Monday died of wounds suffered during an attack on the base of the Carabinieri paramilitary police the day before in Nasiriyah, the Defense Ministry in Rome said.
The Italian troops in Nasiriyah have been under attack for three days. At least nine others were injured in the clashes with armed supporters of the al-Sadr, who launched an uprising against the coalition last month and faces an arrest warrant in the killing of a rival moderate cleric last year.
The soldier was the 20th Italian to die in Iraq, after a suicide truck bomb in Nasiriyah killed 19 on Nov. 12.
Amid the ongoing violence, the United States is looking to move some of its 37,000 U.S. troops stationed in South Korea to bolster forces in Iraq, South Korean and U.S. officials said.
"The U.S. government has told us that it needs to select some U.S. troops in South Korea and send them to Iraq to cope with the worsening situation in Iraq," said Kim Sook, head of the South Korean Foreign Ministry's North American Bureau.
A senior U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said any shift in troops from South Korea would be part of the next rotation of American troops in Iraq, set to begin late this summer.
Tapping into the U.S. military force in Korea would be an historic move by the Pentagon, underscoring the degree to which the military is stretched to provide enough forces for Iraq while meeting its other commitments.
TITLE: New Saint Would Not Abort
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: VATICAN CITY - Pope John Paul II named six new saints Sunday, including a woman who became a symbol for abortion opponents because she refused to end her pregnancy despite warnings that it could kill her.
The Vatican has long championed the case of Gianna Beretta Molla, an Italian pediatrician who died in 1962 at the age of 39 - a week after giving birth to her fourth child. Doctors had told her it was dangerous to proceed with the pregnancy because she had a tumor in her uterus, but she insisted on carrying the baby to term.
In proclaiming her a saint, John Paul praised her "extreme sacrifice" and her simple but profound message.
"May our era rediscover, by the example of Gianna Beretta Molla, the pure, chaste and fertile beauty of conjugal love, lived as a response to the divine calling," he said.
John Paul also praised the examples of the five other people canonized Sunday, including two Italian priests and a Spanish monk who founded religious orders, a Lebanese Maronite priest and a wealthy Italian widow who opened her homes to abandoned children.
The pope has made giving Catholics new role models one of the hallmarks of his papacy. With Sunday's ceremony, he has proclaimed 482 saints in his 25-year pontificate, more than all his predecessors in the past 500 years combined.
In approving the six new saints, John Paul confirmed miracles were attributed to their intercession.
In the case of Beretta Molla, the Vatican says the first miracle concerned a sickly Brazilian woman who recovered in 1977 after her fourth pregnancy. The Vatican says a second miracle occurred in 2000 when a healthy child was born to a young Brazilian woman who had lost her amniotic fluid.
TITLE: U.S. Regrets Beijing's Approach To Autonomy of Hong Kong
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: HONG KONG - A top U.S. official told Hong Kong leader Tung Chee-hwa on Sunday that Washington will be watching to see how the territory's political system develops now that Beijing has ruled out full democracy in the near term.
Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly said it was too soon to determine whether China had harmed Hong Kong's promised autonomy when it ruled out direct elections for the territory's next leader in 2007 and all lawmakers in 2008.
"That's a judgment we're going to need to take a lot more time to conclude or see whether it's hurt or enhanced it or damaged it," Kelly said in an interview with journalists. "It's raised questions."
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher has said Washington was "disappointed" by Beijing's decision, while U.S. Consul General James Keith attacked the "erosion of the high degree of autonomy" that China promised when Britain handed back Hong Kong in July 1997.
Hong Kong's mini-constitution, the Basic Law, sets out full democracy as an eventual goal but gives no timetable.
People in Hong Kong had been hoping they could directly elect Tung's successor in 2007 and all lawmakers in 2008, but Beijing recently ruled out that possibility, saying universal suffrage could stir up economic and social instability.
Critics charged that China had violated its pledge to grant Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy for at least 50 years. Kelly said Sunday that Washington has confidence in Hong Kong at a time when people in many parts of Asia are choosing their leaders through elections.
Beijing recently escalated the controversy here by telling Hong Kong's Legislative Council early in May that it was not allowed to criticize the decision on democracy handed down in April by China's most powerful legislative panel, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress.
Opposition lawmakers say their free speech rights have been subverted.
The highly unpopular Tung was chosen by an 800-member committee that tends to side with Beijing, and he has recently proposed that Hong Kong could get a more representative government by expanding the committee. Tung's foes say that would not amount to real reform.
Hong Kong residents will be allowed to directly elect 30 of 60 lawmakers in September, and the Hong Kong and Chinese governments are worried about ending up with a legislature that won't back Tung. The other 30 seats will be chosen by special interest groups, such as business executives, bankers and doctors, who tend to side with Beijing.
Tung and Beijing were alarmed last July 1, when popular sentiment exploded into a protest by 500,000 people who marched against an anti-subversion bill that was widely viewed as a threat to the territory's Western-style freedoms. Tung withdrew the measure.
TITLE: Russia Vies For 2012 Olympics
AUTHOR: By Stephen Wilson
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: LAUSANNE, Switzerland - When the International Olympic Committee meets this week to come up with a shortlist of finalists to host the 2012 Summer Olympics, the question is: How short?
With nine cities, including Moscow, in the running, the IOC executive board is expected to eliminate at least three candidates and possibly as many as five Tuesday.
The IOC doesn't have a target number of finalists, but several members said in interviews that five is most likely.
Four cities are virtually assured of making the cut: Paris, London, New York and Madrid.
One definitely won't stay in it: Havana.
That leaves four cities on the bubble: Moscow; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Istanbul, Turkey; and Leipzig, Germany. At least two of those could be dropped.
The 2012 host will be selected in July 2005 in Singapore.
Geography favors a European city, because the 2008 Olympics will be in Asia (Beijing), and the 2010 Winter Games will be in North America (Vancouver, British Columbia).
Paris, which last hosted the games in 1924, is viewed as the front-runner. It successfully hosted soccer's World Cup in 1998, and it is seen by IOC members as having paid its dues after failed bids for the 1992 and 2008 Olympics.
London has a strong bid featuring some of the capital's most famous sports venues and tourist landmarks, including tennis at Wimbledon and triathlon in Hyde Park.
Madrid is the only major European capital which has never hosted the Olympics. Neither has New York.
"We're cautiously optimistic" of making the short list, New York bid leader Dan Doctoroff told The Associated Press. "We're not taking anything for granted. There's nothing we can really do."
Peter Ueberroth, who ran the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, recently said New York has a good chance of getting the 2012 Games because it's "the only major, major" city in the world yet to host the games.
But New York has to contend with anti-American sentiment fueled by the invasion of Iraq, as well as the geographical disadvantage of having the 2010 Winter Olympics in Canada.
Also, the proposed $1.4 billion Olympic stadium in Manhattan, which would also serve as a new home for the New York Jets, has run into opposition.
The IOC board's three-day meeting that started Monday is also reviewing the frantic preparations for the Athens Olympics, less than 90 days away. But the main issue on the agenda is the 2012 contest, which shapes up as the most glamorous bid competition in Olympic history.
IOC president Jacques Rogge said last year that the board could let all nine cities stay in the running, but he recently acknowledged that some will be weeded out.
"We have all agreed to that," IOC board member Gerhard Heiberg of Norway said. "All of us have the same point of view: Nine finalists would not be right. Let's get it down."
Based on the bid documents he has read, Heiberg said, "Five or six deserve to go through."
British IOC member Craig Reedie was part of the evaluation committee for the 2008 Olympics, when a 10-city field was reduced to five.
"The 2012 process will work better with a smaller number of candidate cities," he said. "Four cities would be a brave decision, and six might be a practical alternative."
Among the secondary cities, Moscow - which hosted the 1980 Olympics - might have the best chance of surviving the cut.
The IOC board will make its decision after studying a report by a group analyzing the nine cities.
TITLE: Pistons' Win Reverses Fortunes
AUTHOR: By Chris Sheridan
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: EAST RUTHERFORD, New Jersey - Nothing deterred the Detroit Pistons - not their three straight losses, their three-overtime heartbreak nor an early double-digit deficit - from forcing a Game 7 against the New Jersey Nets.
Richard Hamilton pump-faked Jason Kidd off his feet and drilled a clutch 18-footer with 15.5 seconds remaining, capping a 24-point performance that kept the Pistons' season alive.
Hamilton's shot, Ben Wallace's rebounding and the Pistons refusal to quit added up to an 81-75 victory Sunday night, evening their Eastern Conference semifinal series at three games apiece.
"We knew what kind of game this was going to be, what kind of environment this was going to be. We knew it was tonight or it's over," Pistons guard Chauncey Billups said.
After two blowout victories and one close win for each team, the series will be decided on the Pistons' home court.
Game 7 is due to be played Thursday night with the winner advancing to the Eastern Conference finals beginning next Saturday. New Jersey will be looking to make it there for the third straight year, while Detroit will try to get there for the second consecutive season.
"We let an opportunity go, but it's not the end of the series," Kidd said.
Hamilton was the most productive member of Detroit's offense for the second time in three games, the Pistons choosing to attack whichever player Kidd was defending.
Ever since Nets coach Lawrence Frank switched Kerry Kittles onto Billups in Game 3, Kidd has been the primary defender on Hamilton - a matchup that favors Detroit.
"I know he expends so much energy on the offensive end - he's the catalyst for that team, he's got to score, pass and rebound, so I just tried to make him work on the defensive end," Hamilton said. "I think I'm in the best shape in the league running-wise - I can run forever."
It'll be the first Game 7 for the Nets in the franchise's NBA history.
TITLE: Navratilova to Contest French Open at Age 47
AUTHOR: By John Leicester
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: PARIS - Martina Navratilova will play at the French Open, a decade after her last Grand Slam singles match.
Navratilova, 47, received a wild card for the clay-court major she last won 20 years ago, tournament spokesman Christophe Proust said last week.
Another past champion, Monica Seles, pulled out of the event, which would have been her first in a year.
Navratilova has said she will retire from all competitive tennis at the end of 2004. She requested the wild card Wednesday.
"What is there to be afraid of? Losing? We're playing tennis; it's not like I'm getting into a ring with Mike Tyson. Then I'd be afraid," Navratilova said after playing a doubles match at the Italian Open. "Tennis is not a contact sport, and I've never been afraid in my life. I'm certainly not going to start now."
Navratilova last played singles at the French Open in 1994, losing in the first round. Her last Grand Slam singles match came later that year at Wimbledon, where she made the final.
"I figured I can't do any worse than I did in '94," Navratilova said.
She won the French Open in 1982 and 1984, part of her collection of 18 major singles championships.
Also in Rome, 2002 French Open champion Serena Williams called Navratilova's return to topflight singles "amazing." "If I could even think about playing tennis at that age, it would be great," Williams said.
The French Open starts May 24. On Wednesday, organizers announced second-ranked Kim Clijsters, runner-up in 2001 and 2003, had withdrawn with a left wrist injury.
Still a top doubles player, Navratilova showed she can compete in singles by playing at smaller events recently, Proust said. "She will draw a crowd, but we didn't do it for that. She represents something huge for women's tennis. She's a genuine monument," he said.
Navratilova also plans to play women's and mixed doubles at Roland Garros. Jennifer Capriati, who won the 2001 title at Roland Garros, said, playing Navratilova would be like "deja vu a little bit."
Told of Navratilova's wild-card status, Capriati said: "Good for her. I just hope that instead of some youngsters that are upcoming, they haven't shunned them away and just decided to give it to Martina. I understand her being a great champion, but you've got to make way for new players coming up, for the future. But I'm sure they took that into consideration."
Seles, meanwhile, also asked for and was given a wild card but then decided she wasn't fit, Proust said.
The nine-time major champion is recovering from a lingering left foot injury and hasn't played a competitive match since losing in the first round at the 2003 French Open.
In an interview in February, Seles said she's thought about retiring.
"It does go through my mind, because my brain wants to be out there, playing or practicing, but my body says, 'Wait! Hold on!' I have to listen to my body," Seles said then. "I'm not 18 years old anymore. Not that 30 is old, but I started so young, and my body has taken a lot of pounding."
TITLE: Mauresmo In Excellent Form for Open
AUTHOR: By Aidan Lewis
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: ROME - With her second clay court title in two weeks, Amelie Mauresmo heads to the French Open in excellent form.
After an impressive 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (6) victory over Jennifer Capriati in the Italian Open final Sunday, Mauresmo was asked the inevitable question: Can she succeed in Paris?
"I hope. We'll see. Of course, it gives you a lot of confidence to win these kind of matches, especially in the final," she said.
Added to her confidence, Mauresmo will have a partisan crowd cheering her at Roland Garros in the Grand Slam event that begins a week from Monday.
The only other women to win the German and Italian Opens back-to-back were Steffi Graf (1987) and Monica Seles (1990). Both went on to win the French.
Mauresmo lost the Rome final in three of the past four years, and was clearly relieved to have finally won the title. She sank to her knees with fists clenched in the air after winning on her second match point.
Before winning in Berlin, her season was interrupted by a back injury that forced her out of the Australian Open. But now she looks to be in top form, while many other stars are sidelined.
Defending French Open champion Justine Henin-Hardenne has missed five weeks with a virus. Fellow Belgian Kim Clijsters, twice the runner-up in Paris, is out with an injured left wrist.
Serena Williams was the top seed in Rome, but looked rusty in her run to the semifinals, where she lost 6-4, 6-4 to Capriati. Her sister, Venus, was set to play Mauresmo in the final of the German Open, but pulled out with an ankle injury.
Capriati is another player in good shape. After a 6-2, 6-0 loss to Mauresmo in the Berlin semifinals, she held a match point in Sunday's closely fought final. "The tennis, I think, just speaks for itself. I think I can just get better and better," Capriati said.
Capriati kept up a high level of play until the end, including some scintillating cross-court forehands. But Mauresmo outlasted the American.
"I felt that I still had some more energy left than she did, but it was a very intense match," said Mauresmo.
"I was very satisfied with the level in this match and hanging in there till the end."
TITLE: Federer Victor in Hamburg Ready for Roland Garros
AUTHOR: By Nesha Starcevic
PUBLISHER: The Associated Press
TEXT: HAMBURG, Germany - Roger Federer looks as if he's ready for this French Open.
Federer beat Guillermo Coria 4-6, 6-4, 6-2, 6-3 Sunday to win the Hamburg Masters and end the Argentine's 31-match winning streak on clay courts.
It's a promising result for Federer, who has won two of the past three Grand Slam tournaments but lost in the first round at Roland Garros the past two years.
"I have the experience of big finals now, and I also know that I've played well in them and won them," the No. 1-ranked Federer said. "I am more relaxed now before the French."
At a key women's tuneup for the French Open, Amelie Mauresmo came back to beat Jennifer Capriati 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (6) Sunday in the Italian Open final for her second straight title.
In Coria, Federer was facing the top player on clay this year, at 16-0 with two titles. Coria boasted a winning streak on the surface dating to the 2003 French Open semifinals.
"It was a very important win for me," said Federer, who also won this tournament in 2002.
He made an impressive run to the final but looked uncomfortable at the start Sunday, losing his serve in the first game. Coria used that edge to win the set, hitting a deep forehand that Federer could only put into the net.
"I had to adjust a bit to his game. I had to see how he would play," Federer said.
After taking the second and third sets, the Swiss star held serve at the start of the fourth. Coria then received treatment for a blister on his racket hand.
When he returned, Coria handed Federer a break point by putting a forehand into the net. Coria then played a weak drop shot that bounced high in midcourt, giving Federer all the time to put away a forehand winner and go up 2-0.
That was enough for Federer to close it out.