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A scandal is brewing at St. Petersburg State University, with its president suing the dean of one of the institution’s schools, along with a former dean, for libel and embezzlement. The Dzerzhinsky District Court on Monday started reviewing the cases against Marina Shishkina, dean of the university’s journalism faculty, and Sergei Petrov, the former dean of the medical faculty. Shishkina is married to Petrov. Both cases were filed by the university’s president Lyudmila Verbitskaya, who alleges that Petrov and Shishkina have made libelous statements discrediting one of Russia’s oldest and most respected academic institutions. Petrov began the conflict by publishing a revealing, critical interview on a popular website, in which he accused the school’s management of authoritarian rule, rigid attitudes and the suppression of alternative opinions. |
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TOUCH DOWN
Dmitry Medvedev / Reuters
President Dmitry Medvedev attends a joint military exercise, ‘Interaction-2009,’ in Matybulak, Kazakhstan, on Friday. Russia and four other former Soviet republics staged war games on Friday to showcase a new NATO-style rapid response force. |
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MOSCOW — Yabloko leader Sergei Mitrokhin voted for his party when he cast his ballot on Oct. 11. But when Moscow Polling Station No. 192 reported its results, Yabloko failed to receive a single vote, the party said. “Probably, the leaders of the district [election] committee decided to show that I do not exist, either as a voter or as a citizen,” Mitrokhin said Friday.
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More than one thousand employees of St. Petersburg’s federal TV station, Channel Five, have signed an open letter to President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin warning them that the staff of the city’s main television channel are facing redundancies. The letter, which is also addressed to St. |
All photos from issue.
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Opponents of the city’s planned Okhta Center project were given hope Sunday when Channel One, the biggest state-owned TV channel, aired a report that was highly critical of the project in its main evening news program. Part of Sunday’s Vremya program, the 10-minute segment, titled “Experts and St. Petersburg residents against Gazprom’s Okhta Center,” said the controversial project would result in the city becoming “a cross between Venice and Singapore.” Local residents opposed to Gazprom’s planned 400-meter skyscraper said they saw it as a positive sign but did not intend to cease their struggle against what they say is a threat to the city’s heritage and against legal violations surrounding the construction. |
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HORSEPLAY
Yevgeny Astashenkov / For The St. Petersburg Times
A horse is harnessed in a photograph by LenOblast photographer Yevgeny Astashenkov. The Karl Bulla Photo Gallery at 54 Nevsky Prospekt opens an exhibition of Astashenkov's works on Tuesday. |
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MOSCOW — A Georgian television producer is seeking political asylum in Russia, complaining of harassment for his contacts with the Georgian opposition, RIA-Novosti reported Friday. The producer, Badri Afanasyev, asked for asylum when he arrived at a Dagestani border checkpoint from Azerbaijan on Oct. 15, the report said, citing the Dagestani branch of the Federal Security Service.
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 MOSCOW — The Big Mac that you pick up at a local McDonald’s restaurant might soon contain meat from an Orenburg cow processed by an Italian plant in the Moscow region. It’s all part of Italian businessman Luigi Cremonini’s strategy to tap into Russia’s “huge potential” by making “huge investments.” Italy’s Cremonini Group will open a new meat-processing plant in the Moscow region to produce hamburgers for McDonald’s by year-end as it moves to build a full production chain in Russia, Cremonini told The St. Petersburg Times. The founder of the Italian giant, one of the largest food companies in Europe, is not at all dismayed that the plant will cost twice as much as expected or that Russia’s cattle population is steadily declining. |
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SHOW BOAT
Alexandr Belenky / The St. Petersburg Times
Spectators at the naming ceremony of a highly-maneuverable tug ship built for shipping company Sovkomflot watch as the capabilities of the vessel are demonstrated in the Lenoblast on Saturday. |
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MOSCOW — In a sign that the financial crunch might finally be easing, two of the nation’s largest lenders have relaxed terms for consumer loans and rival banks are following suit. State-controlled Sberbank and VTB-24 have cut interest rates and down payment requirements as billions of dollars in government cash flood the banking system. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had ordered the cash infusion to encourage borrowing, and he recently prodded banks to extend the money.
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MOSCOW — Carrefour, Europe’s largest retailer, said late Thursday that it would leave Russia just four months after opening its first store because of an “absence of sufficient organic growth prospects.” The surprise announcement came as the Paris-based retailer reported a third straight drop in quarterly sales and amid reports that it was under pressure from shareholders to sell assets in emerging markets. |
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MOSCOW — AvtoVAZ plans to lay off as many as 21,773 workers until 2012, Interfax reported Monday, citing the carmaker’s president Igor Komarov. The workers will be needed in 2012 when the Tolyatti-based plant starts making Renault-Nissan models and automobile components, Interfax reported. |
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MOSCOW — Sberbank and VTB said Thursday that they were not interested in taking stakes in AvtoVAZ in exchange for debt, depriving the loss-making carmaker of another channel for possible salvation. On Monday, AvtoVAZ spokesman Alexander Shmygov said seeking protection from creditors is an option the carmaker would consider. The bad news from the banks came just a week after First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov, the government’s point man on the AvtoVAZ rescue, flew to Tolyatti to tour the factory, which he said had “good and realistic prospects” for the future. Rescue plans for the plant have largely revolved around additional share issues, either to state banks or current stakeholders. |
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 MOSCOW — Gazprombank reported losses of 15.5 billion rubles ($529 million) after the ruble strengthened in September, its worst month this year, but a spokesman said the damage was only on paper and that it has earned more than 24 billion rubles in 2009. |
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MOSCOW — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has promised to ban pharmaceutical makers from sending representatives to doctors’ offices, a practice they spend up to 50 percent of their revenue on and one of the last open channels for companies to promote prescription drugs. |
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Oleg Deripaska has not received any request from Spain for testimony in a money-laundering investigation and has told Russian law enforcement that he is willing to answer any questions they may have, his spokesman said Sunday in an e-mailed statement. |
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MOSCOW — The creation of a customs union for Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan has entered the home stretch, with a deal to be signed in late November giving the countries a unified Customs Code, external borders and even import duties on cars. The three countries’ presidents will sign a package of documents creating the customs union in Minsk on Nov. |
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MOSCOW — Hermitage Capital, once a leading portfolio investor in Russia, has alerted prosecutors and other government agencies of what could be eight new major tax frauds committed by the same group that it says damaged its business two years ago. |
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Russia is increasingly unable to resist the charm of China’s economic and political influence. As Russia’s relatively low productivity translates into declining competitiveness, China’s ways of influencing the north continue to expand. Even routine domestic economic decisions in Russia are increasingly made with a consideration for China. |
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Did Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan grin too enthusiastically while watching his country being beaten by its old enemy, Turkey, at an international football match last week? Sargsyan’s trip to watch the game with his Turkish counterpart Wednesday followed the signing of historic accords to normalize relations and open the border between the two countries after decades of animosity. |
 Russia has taken a significant step in its bid to become a dominant international energy supplier, one that has important implications for its relations with the European Union and its prospects of returning quickly to the high growth rates that have underpinned its national recovery in recent years. |
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The Germans lucked out with Hitler. He was so evil, so destructive and so unsuccessful that it was easy to reject him completely. But the Russians were not so “lucky” with Stalin. |
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Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will appear on Russian television next spring as the weapon-wielding interrogator of two U.S. comedy legends, an evil baby and a talking dog. Cartoon channel 2x2 told The Moscow Times that it would air a new episode of the popular U.S. cartoon comedy “Family Guy,” known in Russia as “The Griffins,” despite having excised less-than-flattering portrayals of the former president in the past. |
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 Russian Fashion Week takes over Moscow’s runways this week as Russian and foreign designers show off next year’s spring and summer collections. The Congress Hall of the World Trade Center will transform into the biggest catwalk in Eastern Europe for the event. Leading Russian designers such as Sabina Gorelik, Dasha Gauser and Masha Kravtsova will be among the 58 shows. |
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Issues Archive