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Russian authorities must pay more than $20,000 in damages to a St. Petersburg prisoner forced to share a cell measuring 8 square meters with 12 other inmates, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has ruled. Andrei Frolov, 40, was awarded 15,000 euros ($20,060) in damages last Thursday in a verdict that could throw light into the dark corners of Russia’s penal system. “The fact that [Frolov] was obliged to live, sleep and use the toilet in the same cell as so many other inmates for more than four years was in itself sufficient to cause distress or hardship of an intensity exceeding the unavoidable level of suffering inherent in detention,” the ruling reads . St. Petersburg’s Kresty Prison, where Frolov was held from January 1999 to February 2003, was built for 3,000 prisoners but routinely holds 10,000 inmates. |
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FIRE DRILL
/ The St. Petersburg Times
Firefighters from Fire Station No. 14 carrying out training exercises at the Novotel St. Petersburg on Friday. In the exercise, a fire on the fourth floor had to be extinguished. |
 MOSCOW — The few foreign traders working at Moscow’s Leningradsky outdoor market whispered Sunday that they were selling off the last of their eggplants and potatoes and then would leave for good. The foreigners, mostly Azeris, were keeping a low profile because they weren’t supposed to be selling anything under a law that went into force Sunday and bars all foreigners from working in outdoor markets.
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Despite what people think, St. Petersburg’s young people are not apathetic victims of consumer society, St. Petersburg State University said as it unveiled the results of a contest of projects promoting the future of Russia. The competition, “Our Future is Russia,” run by the university for the first time, aimed to attract students’ and graduates’ attention to humanitarian problems, and the promotion of tolerance and democracy. |
All photos from issue.
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MOSCOW — The government media regulatory agency has warned Kommersant not to mention the unregistered National Bolshevik Party on its pages. The Federal Service for Media Law Compliance and Cultural Heritage said in a letter to Kommersant that the newspaper would be in violation of the law if it printed the words “National Bolshevik Party” or an abbreviation of the unregistered party’s name. The agency was enforcing its own ruling that since Eduard Limonov’s organization is not registered, the media should not refer to it as a political party. |
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German Pavlov / amcham
Governor Valentina Matviyenko speaking at an event marking the 10th anniversary of the American Chamber of Commerce on Friday. |
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MOSCOW — The Other Russia, a coalition of political opposition groups, applied Friday for a permit to hold a large-scale march in central Moscow on April 14. The so-called Dissenters’ March will take place with or without a permit from City Hall, organizers said. “We have a constitutional right to hold peaceful demonstrations,” said Alexander Averin, spokesman for the unregistered National Bolshevik Party, who submitted the application.
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MOSCOW — Gennady Zyuganov rattled out joke after joke at a news conference Thursday, but was only met with the occasional polite chuckle from attending journalists. The Communist Party leader’s jokes went along these lines: “There are two main problems in Russia: roads and fools. In the Duma, one is trying to fix the other. |
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American automotive giant General Motors has announced it will triple investment into its new Russian assembly plant, currently being constructed in Shushary on the outskirts of St. Petersburg. As a result, the plant will produce three times as many cars as was initially planned. |
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Several shareholders of ANCOR Management recruiting company have appealed to the Moscow Arbitration Court to invalidate the decisions and activities of General Director Igor Khukhrev, who also has a stake in the company. |
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MOSCOW — Oil, nuclear and high-tech industries dominated talks between Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov and Kazakh leaders in Astana, the government said in a statement released Friday. “Our talks have been highly constructive and were actively engaged in by both parties,” Fradkov told a news conference after a meeting with Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and Prime Minister Karim Masimov. |
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BERLIN — European rail enthusiasts may soon be able to travel even further into the depths of Siberia without having to switch trains as a Russian rail operator plans a direct, roughly five-day journey between Berlin and Irkutsk. |
 As one might expect, Germany’s Consul General in St. Petersburg has had a long and successful diplomatic career. Before being sent to Russia in July 2006, Bernd Braun worked in such countries as Sudan, the U.S., Hungary, Ukraine, Estonia and Kenya, where he enjoyed learning about new cultures and different political systems. Born in 1946 in Berlin, Braun first thought about an international career in 1964-1965 when he went to the U. |
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 MOSCOW — A battle is brewing over the fate of $1.5 billion between state utility Unified Energy Systems and one of its main strategic partners, Norilsk Nickel. |
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LONDON — Aricom, a London-listed miner with assets in the Amur region, plans to acquire control of an iron ore deposit with a view to supplying China’s booming economy, its CEO said Friday. Aricom has agreed to pay $27 million for 60 percent of Lapwing, which owns the rights to develop the Garinskoye deposit in the Amur region. |
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 Recent developments revolving around energy supplies and the future of Kosovo demonstrate how an emboldened Russia is intent on dominating the European agenda. Moscow’s strategy toward the European Union consists of three core elements: disrupting EU consensus; gaining influence over key states; and preventing any further NATO or EU expansion. |
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Returning to theory is often one of the ways people try to explain what went wrong in major auctions that have been held here in the past. The sale of the state’s 75 percent stake in Slavneft in 2002, for example, was run in such a way that it maximized the opportunity for collusion between the most likely bidders. |
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Until recently, the tax authorities often went unpunished for any unlawful decision they made or any illegal activity they carried out. Taxpayers rarely appealed to the arbitration court, neither to declare the tax authorities’ decision or activity unlawful, nor to request compensation for the legal expenses of going to the arbitration court. |
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MOSCOW — VTB, Russia’s No. 2 bank, hopes to raise as much as $6 billion when it offers nearly 25 percent of the company next month, the Vedomosti daily on Monday quoted sources familiar with the transaction as saying. That estimate of proceeds from Russia’s first international banking IPO, in which state-owned VTB would float new shares equivalent to 22 percent to 23 percent of its equity, is one-half higher than a forecast by Economy Minister German Gref of $4 billion. |
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MOSCOW — Leading food retailer X5, controlled by Mikhail Fridman’s Alfa Group, is mulling an offering of new shares to finance acquisitions, it said Friday. |
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 Let that be a lesson. Even before Britain’s politicians had finished saying sorry for depriving millions of their liberty last Sunday, the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade, 15 Britons found themselves deprived of their liberty by the Iranian government. |
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In a song cataloguing the ills of contemporary Russia, sardonic balladeer Timur Shaov sings about Russians who choose to leave the country, cautioning them: “London is not elastic, we won’t all fit there. |
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For over a week now I have been perplexed by the fact that those monitoring human rights in Russia have not come up with an answer for the following question: Why after four years of relentlessly prosecuting the Yukos case did Moscow’s Basmanny District Court decide in favor of former CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky on March 20? Why has the court — the very name of which has become synonymous with selective application of the law, or simply lawlessness — suddenly granted the defense’s motion against hearing the latest charges against Khodorkovsky and his former business partner Platon Lebedev in a court in the remote Chita region? There was another decision from the court, on Monday, that muddied the waters a bit but likely didn’t represent a change in the outcome. |
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SEOUL — South Korea and the United States reached a deal Monday that could increase their annual $72-billion trade by more than $20 billion, officials from both countries said. The agreement follows nine months of talks between the U.S. and Asia’s third-largest economy, and comes in time to allow the Bush administration to use fast-track trade legislation that expires June 30. |
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WASHINGTON — Another major U.S. pet food maker said Sunday that it is recalling some edible products for cats and dogs after learning from the Food and Drug Administration that the company had received tainted ingredients from a manufacturing plant in China. |
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WASHINGTON — The chief strategist of George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign said he had lost faith in the U.S. president over Iraq and other issues, in a high-level rupture of Bush’s famously loyal inner circle. Matthew Dowd, a polling expert who switched parties to become a Republican and also served as a senior strategist in Bush’s 2000 presidential campaign, told The New York Times in an interview on Sunday that Bush must face up to Americans’ growing disillusionment with the war. Dowd said he had found himself agreeing with calls by Democratic Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, Bush’s opponent in 2004, for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. |
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 BUENOS AIRES — Argentina brushed away British diplomatic overtures and accused London of “arrogance” as the two countries on Monday marked the outbreak of their war over the Falkland Islands 25 years ago. |
 VATICAN CITY — The campaign to make Pope John Paul II a saint reached a landmark on Monday as promoters offered proof of a purported miracle and a cardinal suggested it should be speeded up because there was no doubt of his sanctity. At a ceremony including solemn oaths and centuries-old sacred rituals on the second anniversary of his death, officials formally concluded the first phase of a probe into his holiness. |
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CASCAIS, Portugal — Spain’s Pablo Martin became the first amateur to win on the European Tour on Sunday since its opening season in 1972. The 20-year-old took the Estoril Portuguese Open title by a stroke from France’s Raphael Jacquelin. Martin achieved what he failed to do in 2003 when he led going into the last day of a tournament in Tenerife only to fade away. This time he created golfing history with a closing three-under-par 68 to total seven-under-par 277. The Spanish youngster began the final round two strokes behind his former Oklahoma State University golf team mate Alex Noren but the Swede was the one to wilt as he slid to a 76. Martin’s only real blemish was to find a sandy lie in gorse roots on the short 15th. |
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 PALMA DE MALLORCA, Spain — Olympic champion Chris Hoy of Britain won his fourth 1-kilometer sprint title at the world track championships Sunday. Hoy finished in 1 minute, 0. |
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FC Zenit St. Petersburg coach Dick Advocaat promised tough words at team training Monday after a nightmare third round tie Saturday at Petrovsky Stadium that left his team languishing at eighth in the Premier League and police sources saying that more than 20 fans fans were injured in post-match brawling. |
Temp: -2°C moderate or heavy snow showers
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