Notebook

Settling In

Presidential term to extend to six years

President Dmitry Medvedev announced in his first state of the union address that he would support changing the Russian Constitution to extend the presidential term from four to six years. The Kremlin-friendly Duma raced to approve the measure in a fast-tracked decision that bypassed the usual three readings for legislation. The bill was also quickly approved in the Federation Council, by a vote of 144-1. The measure must still be approved by two-thirds of the subjects of the Russian Federation (regional legislatures). 

Medvedev said the six-year term would be more appropriate for Russia, giving the president the opportunity to implement long-term plans, though he did not elaborate what sort of plans he had in mind. Though media reaction to the changes has been underwhelming, with critical voices drowned out by coverage of the economic crisis, questions abound as to the implications of the move. 

Vladimir Putin, when he was president, repeatedly denied rumors that he would amend the Constitution to secure a third presidential term for himself. Now Medvedev is seen by liberal critics as paving the way for his predecessor’s comeback as early as in 2009. Political analyst Dmitry Oreshkin has called the change a “constitutional junta” carried out by Putin as a preemptive step to secure his power in a time of instability brought on by the financial crisis.

Top Blog

Russian president speaks
outside the box

Looking to burnish his image as a modern and democratic leader, President Dmitry Medvedev recently launched a videoblog. 

Even before Medvedev took office, he made a point of underscoring his familiarity with RuNet culture and jargon. On his videoblogs, Medvedev has discussed the financial crisis, his tour to Latin America, his speech in Evian and his first state of the union address. 

Medvedev is usually filmed sitting next to a MacBook laptop in a pose that would seem unnatural if he were to actually use the computer for blogging purposes. In later posts, he appears less formal, losing the tie and even his suit. In one he is shown walking his dog. 

In an interesting twist on conventional Kremlinology, the videoblogs have prompted online discussions about the interior of the president’s office and the programs visible on Medvedev’s computer screen. RuNet users generally consider the move positive, but complained about the inability to leave comments about the posted videos.

Iconic Scandal

No place in church for a Soviet tyrant

After a public outcry Father Evstafy Zhakov, a small-town priest from Leningrad region, resigned after he failed in a bizarre initiative to bring an icon featuring Joseph Stalin and Orthodox Saint Matryona to his church. 

On the icon, Stalin is pictured at full height, in a room that is presumably the quarters of Matryona (Matryona Dmitriyevna Nikonova), a blind, paralyzed miracle-worker and fortune-teller who lived in Moscow until her death in 1952. One legend has it that she comforted Joseph Stalin when he came to seek advice in 1941 (she was said to comfort many during the war, while also being constantly on the run from Soviet authorities). She is pictured sitting on her bed as Stalin is walking out of the room. Matryona was canonized in 1999 as a locally worshiped Moscow saint, and is buried in Pokrovsky Monastery. 

“I pray for Stalin during all services, especially on days when he was dying, on his birthday, and on days when he was celebrating Victory of our people in the war,” Zhakov told New Izvestiya. Parishioners nonetheless did not follow their priest’s lead and refused to pray before the image. The St. Petersburg Metropolitanate reprimanded Zhakov, who asked to be released from his parish on health grounds. He took the icon back to his home.

Khimki Chaos

Moscow suburb dangerous for newspaper editors

Assaults on independent newspaper editors in Moscow’s northeastern suburb of Khimki became the focus of public discussion after journalist and environmentalist Mikhail Beke-tov was beaten so hard it put him in a two-week coma. Beketov is an outspoken critic of the local Khimki administration. 

Although there were no witnesses and the investigation predictably stalled, friends and colleagues linked the assault to Beketov’s newspaper work, in which he vehemently opposed building a St. Petersburg-bound toll road through the local nature reserve. Khimki residents have been against the road, which would cut through a 1000 hectare forest, and environmentalists have predicted that the road would lead to a real estate bonanza, destroying the federal park altogether. 

Public discussion ensued in the wake of the attack because two other local newspaper editors have been attacked in two years, one suffering 10 stab wounds, The Moscow Times reported. 

Caucasian Changes

Will a new president help avoid catastrophe?

President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree that sent Ingushetian President Murat Zyazikov packing, due to “instability in the republic.” The decision was greeted with enthusiastic celebration across the conflict-ridden Russian republic.  

Ingushetiya has long been viewed as the potential epicenter of a new, full-blown conflict in the Caucasus that could envelop all the surrounding republics. Zyazikov was seen as the culprit behind growing lawlessness in Ingushetiya, pushing it to the brink of civil war. As reported in this space in November, he is also alleged to be behind the murder of opposition figure Magomed Yevloyev, whose website was a key news source on violence and kidnappings in the republic. 

The new Ingushetian president is Yunus-bek Yevkurov, a military hero who made his name during the Chechen wars. The opposition perceives him as someone who can bring stability, the Kavkaz-Uzel website reported, however achieving such stability will prove difficult. Yevkurov will have to get both rebel and federal forces under control, simultanerously satisfying local desires for autonomy and the Kremlin’s desire for a strong “vertical of power.”

Freeing Faina

Somalian pirates raise the stakes

When a Ukrainian ship loaded with Russian arms was seized by pirates last September off the coast of Somalia, the world watched anxiously, worried that the weapons would fall into the hands of terrorists. It was the highest profile case of sea piracy in 2008.

On board the Faina were 33 Soviet-era tanks, 150 grenade launchers, aircraft guns and ammunition supplies. The ship had a crew of 20, and its Russian captain, Vladimir Korobkov, died of a heart attack a few days after the hijacking. The pirates demanded $20 million in ransom for the ship, though the usual amount for hijacked vessels is $1.5 to $1.8 million, the AP reported. The Ukrainian newspaper Gazeta 24 reported that one of the pirate leaders, Abdulla Yusuf Akhmed, actually attended a military school in Kharkov, Ukraine.

Pirates, who were holding a dozen ships in October, including a Russian frigate and a Saudi tanker worth $100 million, pocketed some $30 million in ransoms in 2008, the British think tank Chatham House estimated. The piracy stems from the fact that Somalia has not had a functioning government since the early 1990s. 

On December 2, the pirates announced that the Faina would be released in two days, saying a ransom deal – terms unspecified – had been reached.

Morphine Released

Bulgakov, Bodrov, and Balabanov author dark period drama

Alexei Balabanov, author of the controversial and violent film Gruz-200 has released a period piece, Morphine, (Морфий) based on Mikhail Bulgakov’s works. The screenplay was written by the late Sergei Bodrov Jr. (morfiyfilm.ru).

In the movie, a young doctor sent to work in the countryside in 1917 turns to drugs for comfort when faced with pre-revolutionary turmoil and his own demons. The doctor, played by Leonid Bichevin, is composited from two Bulgakov works, A Country Doctor’s Notebook and Morphine. Bulgakov is known to have battled an addiction to morphine while working as a rural doctor in Smolensk region after receiving his medical education in Kiev. 

Balabanov said that the movie is a tribute to Bodrov, who died in an avalanche in 2002. Morphine was filmed in Uglich and also stars award-winning actress Ineborga Dapku-naite, Andrei Panin, and Sergei Garmash.    

Repeating History?

On December 4, armed and masked officials from the Russian Prosecutor’s Office stormed the St. Petersburg headquarters of Memorial, Russia’s most respected Human Rights Group. The Prosecutor’s office said the raid was connected with a hateful newspaper article which Memorial in turn said it had no knowledge of. Irina Flige, head of the organization’s historical wing, told the St. Petersburg Times that investigators seized all the organization’s research material from the past 20 years. “The files contain our research into the Red Terror and the history of Russia’s Gulag,” she said. “Clearly, the authorities have had enough of us.”

Grant and Gorby 

Actor Hugh Grant reportedly paid £250,000 to have dinner with ex-Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, Russia Today reported. The dinner date was auctioned off by the Raisa Gorbachev Charity to raise funds for scanning equipment at a cancer treatment center. A businessman who preferred to remain anonymous also paid a quarter million pounds to be at the dinner.

Laborers to Learn 780

The Federation Council proposed legislation that would test guest workers’ Russian language skills. The test, similar to the American TOEFL, would consist of 6 levels, and passing the first level would be sufficient qualification for guest workers, Kommersant reported. Passing level one would require knowledge of about 780 Russian words. The test would not be compulsory, but guest workers who pass it would be eligible for a two-year rather than a one-year work permit. 

Peter and Paul Return

After a six-year restoration effort by the State Art Restoration Research Institute, Russia’s oldest icon has been returned to a museum in Great Novgorod, Kultura TV reported. The 11th century work is an icon of the Byzantine school and depicts Sts. Peter and Paul. It was discovered in storage in post-war Berlin, looted by the German army during the war. 

Aleksy II  Passes

On December 5, Aleksy II, Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) , passed away in his dacha in Pere-delkino, outside Mos-cow, after years of battling heart ailments. Born in 1929 in Tallinn, he entered se-mi-nary in 1947, in Leningrad. Over the next four decades, he  rose through the ranks of the Church. In 1990, he became the first freely-elected Patri-arch of the ROC after decades of religious oppression under the Soviet regime left the Church decimated. Aleksy was extremely successful in rebuilding the body and buildings of the Church, and even reunited it with the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, which split off from the ROC when the latter accepted Soviet Power.  

Stalinism Exposed

A project to expose the horrors of Stalinism will publish and distribute academic works to Russian regional libraries. The series, The History of Stalinism, will be issued by Russian Political Encyclopedia Publishing House during 2008-2010 and include the 100 best books on the history of Stalinism by Russian and foreign authors. 

Eurovision Victory

Moscow authorities have decided to open the next Eurovision competition in the city on May 9 – Victory Day – Interfax reported. The opening ceremony will be held on Sparrow Hills (Воробьевые Горы) near Moscow State University. Russia won the right to host the contest after singer Dima Bilan won first place last year.

Bleeding Oil  

Low oil prices are likely to lead to budget deficits, analysts warned. Prices for oil, Russia’s main export commodity, tumbled from a high of $147 a barrel during the summer to $47 a barrel in early December. Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said that oil prices had to stay above $70 per barrel to keep the state budget in the black. The 2009 budget was originally pegged to $95 a barrel. Shortfalls will be made up from the Russian reserve fund, Kudrin said.

New Literary Lights

St. Petersburg writer and philosopher Alexander Sekatsky (left) won the Andrey Bely Literary Prize for fiction this year, with his book Two Chests, of Turquoise and Jade. (Два ларца, бирюзовый и нефритовый) Sergei Kruglov and Vladimir Aristov were winners in the poetry nomination. The award has been given out since 1978 and is the oldest non-governmental literary prize in Russia, originally instituted by the samizdat magazine Hours (Часы). Meanwhile, Mikhail Yelizarov (above) was the surprising pick for this year’s Russian Booker prize. His novel, The Librarian (Библиотекарь) is a hilarious farce where innocuous Soviet-era tomes become Books of Power and clans sprout up in a soviet landscape to seek out the last remaining copies of the treasured books, battling over turf like petty mafia dons. 

Soccer Rising

The Russian national soccer team has risen to eighth place in the latest FIFA rankings, up from ninth since October. Russia is currently in second place in World Cup qualifying Group 4.

Spain remains at the top of the rankings, while Germany rose to second place. European countries occupy the first four places, with Brazil in fifth and Argentina in sixth. 

The biggest hop up the rankings was made by Jamaica, which beat Mexico and Honduras in World Cup qualifiers to move from 116th to 83rd place. In its qualifiers, Russia lost 2-1 to Germany in Dortmund and beat Finland 3-0 at home.  

Each group winner earns an automatic place at the finals in South Africa, while the eight best second-placed teams will battle one another for the remaining four spots. 

Kazan Champs

Rubin from Kazan (capital of Tatarstan) sealed its first Russian soccer league title with three games remaining, after beating Saturn Ramenskoye 2-1. Former Serbian striker Savo Milosevic, who joined Rubin this season, scored the 89th-minute winner from close range. It was the team’s 60th goal in 27 matches and gave Rubin a 10-point lead over second-placed CSKA Moscow. 

Rubin’s title was especially sweet for fans, as the club celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. 

“Allah has listened to our prayers and given us the strength to fight for the title,” said the team’s Turkmen coach Kurban Berdyev. 

“We didn’t want to wait another week, that’s why we played to win,” said former Ukraine International player Serhiy Rebrov, who also joined Rubin this year. 

Kramnik Ousted 

Viswanathan Anand of India (aka the “Tiger from Madras”) defeated Vladimir Kramnik in an 11-game match, 6.5-4.5, to retain his FIDE World Chess Championship title.

Anand became FIDE world champion last year by defeating Kramnik in Mexico City. Kramnik competed in the 2007 match with the understanding that, if he lost, he would get a chance to win back his title in 2008. 

“I tried everything, but it just was not enough. Life is like that and defeat is part of it,” Kramnik conceded.

Kramnik has been Russia’s top chess grandmaster since Garry Kasparov retired in March 2005. Kramnik defeated Kasparov to take the World Chess Title in 2000, and successfully defended it in 2004. In 2006, after the chess world had been split between two competing organizations for several years, Kramnik was the first to win the unified title, defeating Veselin Topalov.

Anand and Kramnik will share the total prize fund of  €1.5 million. 

Close, But No…

Nikolay Davydenko reached   his first Masters Cup tennis final in November, but fell to Novak Jokovic 1-6, 5-7. 

Davydenko was far from on his game, landing only 47 percent of his first serves and hitting just 15 winners versus 25 unforced errors. “Against Djokovic you need to be perfect,” Davydenko said. 

Nonetheless, the match was a success for Davydenko, both in competitive and financial terms. In the semifinals, Davydenko unexpectedly shocked Andy Murray to win 7-5, 6-2, reaching his first final in four straight visits to the year-end showpiece. 

“I was supposed to be flying tomorrow — I’ll have to change my flight!” Davydenko joked after his semifinal victory against Murray. 

Russia’s GDP is forecast to grow 6% for 2008 and 3% for 2009. Inflation was targeted at 11.8% for 2008, but will reach 13.5%. Some 1.3 million Russians will remain in poverty in 2009.

About 600,000 foreign branded cars were assembled in Russia in 2008. This is less than the predicted 640,000. 46% of the Russian new car market is locally-assembled, and 54% is imported. The average car costs $22,357, up from $19,264 the year before.

500 Christmas trees are installed in Moscow’s public places for the holidays

11% of all HIV-positive Russians are in prison. Of them, 91% are men, 8.5% are women, and .6% are teens. Over 64% of HIV-positive Russians contacted the virus via drug use. 74% of drug users are HIV-positive.

Russia’s international reserves shrank from an August high of $600 billion to under $450 billion at the end of November. Some $70 billion was spent in October and November to prop up the value of the ruble.

Between January and October 2008, there were 25 aviation accidents in Russia. Of these, 13 had fatalities, with a total of 141 deaths. Last year, 11 fatal incidents resulted in 37 deaths.

According to planned cuts in the Russian military, due to reforms, the Russian

armed forces will shrink from 1.13 to

1 million in uniform.

Just 5% of Russians said they plan to have a child in the next 1-2 years. Somewhat more, 25%, said they thought it is a good time to have children, whereas 28% did not think so. The main obstacle to parenting? 

4.6 million or 6.1% of Russians were looking for a job at the end of October. Unemployment grew by 1.7% in October. Only 1.3 million people are registered as unemployed. 76,000 Russians lost their jobs in October and the unemployment rate grew by 8.7%, a five-year record.

21% of workers are seeing their salaries paid late, 17% have had their salaries reduced, and 20% are working for an employer who is cutting jobs.

Some 33% of Russian have or have family members who are paying off bank loans. Of those, 32% have seen their salaries paid late or have been laid off

6 in 10 Russians support lengthening Russia’s presidential term from 4 to 6 years, 26% are opposed.

SOURCES: 1. The World Bank. 2. Autostat.ru. 3. Interfax, quoting a Moscow administration official. 4. Human Rights Watch. 5. Russian Central Bank. 

6. Ministry of Transport. 7. Ministry of Defense. 8. Public Opinion Foundation 

9. International Labor Organization, RosStat, Ministry of Health. 10-11. Levada. 12-13. Public Opinion Foundation.