IN BRIEF

Published: November 2, 2001 (Issue # 718)

Hoaxes on the Rise

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The direct expenses incurred by municipal agencies as a result of suspicious letters or anonymous bomb threats since the beginning of the anthrax scare have reached 70,000 rubles ($2,330), Interfax reported Wednesday, citing Vice Governor Mikhail Mikhailovsky.

Police Major General Alexander Serov told reporters Wednesday that more than 100 cases of "biological terrorism" had been registered, not one of which turned out to be substantiated, Interfax reported.

Nonetheless, law enforcement authorities continue to receive new reports of suspicious letters and to investigate them. Police departments have formed special rapid-reaction groups to deal with such cases, Interfax reported.

Politician Plucked

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Legislative Assembly Deputy Leonid Romankov was robbed on Tuesday, Interfax reported.

According to the news agency, Romankov, 64, was approached by four unidentified assailants at about 8:30 p.m. near the entrance to his home in the Nevsky District.

The thieves took 13,000 rubles ($430), his mobile phone, some railroad tickets to Moscow, his apartment and office keys and some other documents. Romankov was not injured, according to Interfax.

Tax Haul Is Up

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Over the first nine months of this year, the city increased its tax collections by 17 percent compared to the same period in 2000, Interfax reported Thursday.

The city gathered 55.477 billion rubles ($1.85 billion) in taxes and fees in the period from January through September. Of that amount, 23.78 billion rubles ($793 million) were sent to the federal budget, and 31.69 billion ($105.6 million) went to the city budget. The remainder went to the municipal road fund, Interfax reported.

Shutov Files Libel Suit

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - Legislative Assembly Deputy Yury Shutov, who is currently on trial for allegedly organizing several contract killings, has filed a civil libel suit against State Duma Deputy Lyudmila Narusova, widow of former St. Petersburg Mayor Anatoly Sobchak, Interfax reported Thursday.

Shutov sent the documentation for the suit from the prison hospital where he has been for the last several days. The suit alleges that Narusova defamed Shu tov in an Oct. 13 interview with the news paper Argumenty i Fakty, in which she made several statements that injured Shutov's honor and reputation, Shutov's lawyer, Andrei Pelevin, told Interfax.

The news agency quoted Narusova as saying: "I am not concerned about the suit, and I think that Shutov is using this trick to attract attention to himself."

Kursk Victims' Burial

ST. PETERSBURG (SPT) - The bodies of three crew members recovered from the Kursk nuclear submarine arrived in St. Petersburg on Thursday for burial, Interfax reported.

The bodies were those of Captain, 3rd Class, Ilya Shchavinsky; Captain, 3rd Class, Aleksei Mityaev; and Captain, 2nd Class, Vasily Isaenko, according to sources at the Northern Fleet. Shchavinsky and Mityaev were from St. Petersburg, and Isaenko was originally from the Crimea.

In all, more than 50 bodies have been recovered from the vessel, which sank during a training exercise in August 2000. More than 30 of them have been identified, Interfax reported.

Skinheads Rampage

MOSCOW (SPT) - Hundreds of skinheads brandishing iron bars rampaged through Moscow market stalls run by vendors from southern Russia and the Caucasus on Tuesday night, killing two people, news reports said.

About 300 young people charged through a market outside Tsaritsyno metro station in southern Moscow, attacking the dark-skinned vendors there. Afterward, a large group of skinheads headed to the area where Moscow's Afg han community is based, to continue the violence.

Media reports said one person was killed during the raids and another died in a hospital Wednesday morning. Twenty-two people were injured.

Police detained 26 people and went on high alert to prevent new outbreaks of violence, officials said Wednesday, amid fears that the victims' relatives may try to retaliate.

It was unclear what prompted the attacks. Interfax said they were organized by members of the ultranationalist Russian National Unity party, a paramilitary group that wears insignia similar to a Nazi swastika.

Police Raid Protested

TBILISI, Georgia (Reuters) - State security police raided the offices of Georgia's main private television news station late Tuesday, sparking an angry outcry from company staff and liberal parliamentary deputies and prompting the resignation of a top Georgian security official.

Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze ordered an inquiry into the raid and pledged to uphold press freedom in the former Soviet republic.

Shevardnadze accepted Security Minister Vakhtang Kutateladze's resignation as the "right" decision during a security council meeting Wednesday, but criticized staff at Rustavi-2 television station for defying a court order to open their financial records for examination.

"There is no threat to the freedom of speech in Georgia," said Shevardnadze. "It is inviolable."

Aid for Afghanistan

LONDON (Reuters) - The British government said on Thursday it had put in place a joint initiative with Russia to transport thousands of tons of food aid into Afghanistan.

Prime Minister Tony Blair's spokes person said convoys will carry about 9,000 tons of food into northeastern Afghanistan over the next two months.

Shipments should start within two weeks, he said, with local drivers negotiating the "difficult, dangerous" route.

Rumsfeld To Visit

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld will leave on Friday for a whirlwind visit to Moscow and the region near Afghani stan to discuss cooperation in the war on terrorism and warming U.S.-Russian ties, the Pentagon said on Wednesday.

Speaking as U.S. warplanes bombed targets in Afghanistan for a 25th consecutive day, Pentagon spokesperson Victoria Clarke declined to say what other countries the secretary might visit. But she said he expected to return home on Monday.

Rumsfeld earlier visited several moderate Persian Gulf states and Uzbekistan, where hundreds of U.S. troops are now based, to discuss support for the opening round of a war on terrorism declared by Washington after the Sept. 11 attacks on America.

"We are scheduled to leave on Friday, mid-day. We are going to Moscow and other countries in the [central-Asia] region still to be determined,'' Clarke told reporters.

Anthrax in the Baltics

VILNIUS, Lithuania (AP) - A laboratory in Lithuania confirmed Thursday that traces of anthrax were found in at least one mailbag from the U.S. Embassy in Vilnius, the first such discovery in Europe.

Kazimiera Rutiene, chief of the microbiology laboratory at the Lithuanian Public Health Center, said that chemical analyses indicated anthrax and that mice injected with the suspect substance Wednesday had died by Thursday morning.

"This is real proof that there were traces of anthrax there," she said. She said she was now "100 percent" sure they had found anthrax.

"This news of anthrax cases in Lithuania is shocking," said the head of Lithuanian State Security Department, Arvydas Pocius. "This proves that no place on the planet is safe from the threat of bioterrorism."

U.S. Embassy spokesperson Mi chael Boyle said the diplomatic pouches had come straight from the State Department in Washington - appearing to rule out that the contamination could have come from letters sent within Lithuania.

Public buildings in Vilnius, as well as embassies, were closed Thursday for All Saint's Day. Boyle said the embassy hadn't yet decided whether to stay closed beyond Thursday as a safety precaution.

Straw in Moscow

MOSCOW (AP) - British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw conferred with Russian officials Wednesday on joint efforts to uproot the terrorist network in Afg ha nistan and help build a stable government there.

Straw's visit is "part of intensive political dialogue reflecting the high level of bilateral relations," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said President Vladimir Putin has accepted British Prime Minister Tony Blair's invitation to visit Britain, with the exact dates to be set later.

Missile Silos Destroyed

KIEV (AP) - Ukraine destroyed its last nuclear-missile silo on Tuesday, fulfilling the nation's pledge to give up the vast nuclear arsenal it inherited after the breakup of the former Soviet Union.

The silo was blown up at a military range in the southern Mykolaiv region near Pervomaisk, Interfax said. The U.S.-Ukrainian Cooperative Threat Reduction Program oversaw the process.

A team of U.S. and Ukrainian officials joined three schoolchildren in turning six keys to detonate the explosives that destroyed the nuclear-missile silo, the last of 46 to be dismantled. The land beneath the silo is to be cleaned and converted for agricultural use, officials said.

"So far, Ukraine confirmed its commitment to secure peace and stability, and made a significant contribution to strengthening the international regime of arms nonproliferation," said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Serhiy Borodenkov.

Ukraine inherited the world's third-largest nuclear stockpile with the 1991 Soviet collapse, including 130 SS-19 missiles, 46 SS-24 missiles and dozens of strategic bombers. It later renounced nuclear weapons and transferred all missiles and its 1,300 nuclear warheads to Russia. After processing, nuclear materials from the warheads were brought back to Ukraine as fuel for power plants.