Notebook

Top Prosecutor Ousted

Ustinov steps down 

after seven years

The Federation Council, Russia’s upper house of parliament, voted unanimously on June 2 to dismiss Vladimir Ustinov, Prosecutor General since 1999, following a request from President Vladimir Putin. Ustinov’s deputy, Yuri Biryukov, assumed the top cop role for the interim. Immediately named as likely replacements were two presidential envoys: Dmitry Kozak of the Southern Federal District and Alexander Konovalov of the Volga region. 

Interestingly, just a few weeks prior to the dismissal, Ustinov was reappointed to his post for a second five-year term, by a similarly overwhelming Federation Council majority. 

Ustinov’s dismissal is being explained as a “purely administrative move,” yet some analysts connected it to Putin’s May 10 statements that Russia was failing to tackle corruption. Shortly after these remarks, a number of senior security officers in the Federal Security Service, along with high-ranking officials in the Federal Customs Service, were given the boot. At the time, Ustinov said that new, high-profile criminal cases would soon be launched, and he berated his colleagues for the influence of organized crime in Russia, RIAN reported.

On the other hand, Ustinov’s ouster has led to speculation about Kremlin infighting in advance of the 2008 presidential election. Ustinov’s departure is widely seen as a setback for his ally Igor Sechin, deputy chief of staff in the presidential administration, who is said to be behind the Kremlin’s strategy against the oligarchs and for the government’s re-acquisition of strategic assets. Given the rising importance of Putin’s anti-corruption campaign, the Prosecutor General appointment could be a stepping stone for an heir apparent. If Putin favorite and St. Petersburg native Kozak is chosen for the position, gazeta.ru speculated, he will have the inside track for the presidential nod in 2008.

Unlike his predecessors – Alexei Ilyushenko, who ended up in jail, and Yuri Shkuratov, who was forced to resign after a televised sex scandal – Ustinov enjoyed a relatively smooth tenure and may be stepping down with little or no tarnish. Ustinov will likely be best remembered for his leading role in the attack on oil giant YUKOS and its former owner Mikhail Khodor-kovsky, although he also played a role in the cases that drove Boris Berezovsky and Vladimir Gusinsky, Russia’s leading tycoons, into exile abroad. 

 

Is Bigger Better?

Some regions merge; 

others resist

The move to consolidate Russian regions – to make the country “more governable” – continues.

Already unified or on track to unification are: Kamchatka Krai (through consolidation of Kamchatka Oblast and Koryak Autonomous Okrug), Perm Krai (uniting Perm Oblast and Komi-Permyak Autonomous Okrug); Krasnoyarsk Krai (bringing together Krasnoyarsk Krai and the Taymyr and Evenk autonomous okrugs). 

In April, Irkutsk Oblast and Ust-Orda Buryat Autonomous Okrug, held a referendum on a proposed January 2008 merger into Irkutsk Oblast. Record voter turnout polled strongly in favor of unification: 89.8 and 97.79 percent in the two regions, respectively. The current administrative regions were established in 1993, when Ust-Orda Buryat Autonomous Okrug, unilaterally and without a referendum, became a separate entity. “Now the people have made their decision, which only they can change, not politicians,” said Viktor Ignatenko, head of Irkutsk Oblast Election Commission.

Another recent unification attempt has so far been less successful. When President Putin’s envoy in Southern Russia, Dmitry Kozak, proposed merging the Republic of Adygeya into the surrounding Krasnodarsky Krai, Adygeya’s head, Khazret Sovmen, offered his resignation in protest. Putin refused to accept Sovmen’s resignation, yet this failed to defuse rising tensions in Adygeya between the Adyg/Cherkess mi-nority and the Slav majority (see Russian Life Notebook, March/April 2006). The Union of Slavs of Adygeya issued a statement ex-press-ing disappointment that Putin had rejected Sovmen’s resignation, and pro-mised to continue campaigning for a merger of the two regions, REGNUM reported. 

Meanwhile, Dukvakhi Abdu-rakh-manov, head of the lower chamber of the Chechen Parlia-ment, proposed the unification of Chechnya and Ingushetia, arguing that this would “forever remove areas of tension,” Kommer-sant reported. Chechen President Alu Alkhanov is said to support the idea, while the government of Ingushetia opposes it. The Kremlin is also wary of unifications in the volatile Northern Caucasus, Kom-mer-sant said, citing a source in the office of the presidential envoy to the Southern Federal District. 

 

Lada Kalashnikov?

Biggest carmaker 

may make new jeep

AvtoVAZ, Russia’s leading automobile producer, and maker of the country’s Lada cars, may develop a Kalashnikov military jeep, Interfax news agency reported, citing a statement by Sergei Chemesov, head of the state arms trader Rosobo-ron-export.

AvtoVAZ currently does not produce military jeeps, and developing one would be costly – between $150 and $200 million. AvtoVAZ would also have to pay a German company to use the Kalashnikov brandname. Mikhail Kalashnikov, the 87-year-old designer of the AK-47 assault rifle, in 2003 sold rights for the use of his name to the German company MMI. The Kalashnikov brand has been placed on watches, knives, umbrellas and even vodka.

The only domestic competitor for a Lada Kalashnikov would be the UAZ-469, also known as kozyol (Russian for “goat”), which has been around since the mid-1960s. Mili-tary contractors like the inexpensive and simple UAZ, and analysts say that AvtoVAZ could only succeed if it produced a jeep as basic and reliable as Kalashnikov’s gun.

 

No Flattery Intended

The Russian Academy of Science’s Institute of Sociology has compiled a composite portrait of the Russian bureaucrat, the weekly Argumenty i Fakty reported. Gener-ating the profile from a public poll, the Institute determined that modern apparatchiks are characterized by indifference to people (63 percent), corruption (58 percent), indifference to the interests of the country (41 percent), incompetence and irresponsibility (32 percent). A major hurdle for the country’s development, bureaucrats are easier on big businesses, than on small enterprises, as the latter have to spend over R200 billion (over $7 billion) each year greasing bureaucratic wheels.

 

Hate Crime Rising

Russia counts victims 

of hate crimes 

In 2005, Russia witnessed 28 hate crime murders and 366 racially motivated attacks, president of the Union of Armenians in Russia, Ara Abramyan, told Ekho Moskvy radio. Abramyan’s statement came in the wake of the May 25 stabbing of a 19-year-old Armenian on a train near Moscow. The youth was attacked by two Russian men, who allegedly shouted “Glory to Russia!” as they murdered him. 

“Russia’s record on racism is incompatible with the country’s place on the international stage and undermines its standing in the world,” said Irene Khan, Secretary General of Amnesty International (AI), issuing a report in May on human rights in Russia. “These violent attacks are one of the most visible manifestations of deep-seated intolerance and xenophobia in many parts of Russian society. Yet turning a blind eye to race hate crimes has encouraged the growth of extreme xenophobia and neo-fascism in the country.”

AI blames authorities for failing to “provide adequate policing, and to investigate and prosecute the vast majority of such attacks effectively.” According to official figures, there are about 150 “extremist groups” with over 5,000 members in Russia, while non-governmental organizations put the membership at 50,000. Indeed, at least 6,000 young people are involved in extremist activities, Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev said on May 17. 

The number of crimes related to nationalism and xenophobia has been growing 30-40 percent per year in recent years, according to the analytical center SOVA, which monitors hate crimes in Russia and which was a main source for the AI report. At the same time, organizations and people researching and campaigning against racism face real threats to their lives.

The main targets for race-hate attacks are Chechens and other peoples of the Northern Caucasus, CIS citizens, Africans, Asians and smaller religious groups, including Jews. 

 

Caviar End Game

WWF calls for halt 

on caviar habit 

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) says that Russian caviar is in danger of disappearing altogether as the Caspian Sea’s sturgeon population continues to shrink. Over the past 15 years, the sturgeon stock has dropped by a factor of forty. Yet Russians still consume 1,200 tons of caviar a year, most of it poached, according to the Agriculture Ministry.

“You would not want your children to forever forget the taste of caviar, would you?” a WWF campaign asks. “Then stop buying it for six years.” 

Sturgeon numbers began to decline in the 1960s, when the Soviet Union started building multiple dams on the rivers, which prevented the fish from reaching their breeding grounds. As a result, sturgeon numbers dropped 25 percent. 

Further decline came with massive sturgeon poaching in the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991 and the subsequent economic crisis. 

Prior to the 1960s, the Soviet Union supplied 90 percent of the world market of caviar, and it was readily available to Soviet citizens. But then it began to disappear from store shelves and became a delicacy reserved for the political elite. Today caviar is on store shelves again, but at a higher price. Currently, 3.5 ounces of caviar costs $30 in open-air markets or $100 in luxury stores (versus $200 an ounce in the U.S.).

Debt Free?

President Putin has announced Russia’s intention to completely pay off all its debt to the Paris Club by the end of 2006, RIA Novosti reported. 

Russia agreed to assume all of the Soviet Union’s foreign debt – $107.7 billion in January 1992 – and, thanks to recent high oil prices, has lately been able to accelerate the payback schedule. Russia’s debt to the Paris Club was at $29.8 billion on October 1, 2005, yet some of that debt, particularly to Germany, is in the form of bonds that cannot be paid off before their maturation dates in 2007-2009.

 

Back From the Brink

Aral Sea refilling

earlier than predicted

The Aral Sea, once the fourth largest freshwater lake in the world, shrunk by 90 percent over the past four decades, due to massive Soviet water diversions for cotton cultivation. In 1990, the  Aral split itself into northern and southern seas; by 1996, the smaller North Aral Sea had lost half of its surface area and three-fourths of its volume. 

An $85 million project by the World Bank and Kazakstan led to the August 2005 creation of the 13-kilometer-long Kok-Aral Dam, which separated the North and the South Aral Seas. As a result of the dam, the surface area of the North Aral Sea has grown by a third over the last year. The former port of Aralsk, 80 kilometers away from the sea in 2005, is now only 12 kilometers from the water’s edge. 

The project also included work to improve structures on the Syr Darya, which feeds the sea. As a result, the Syr Darya doubled its flow into the North Aral Sea, and the water level rose to 41.5 meters in less than a year – versus the originally projected 5-10. As a result, salinity levels in the North Aral Sea and the Syr Darya delta have been considerably reduced, contributing to greater biodiversity, according to Masood Ahmad, World Bank task team leader. The delta lakes and sea now boast 11 species of fish, instead of just one. Fish stocks are rising, allowing the local population to return to fishing. The number of birds and bird species in the area is also growing.

An original concern about the project was that it would stop inflow of water from the Syr Darya to the South Aral Sea, dooming it to an accelerated disappearance. Yet currently the water is flowing over a spillway from the North Aral Sea into the South Aral Sea at a higher rate than before the dike, Ahmad said. “Not only have we revived the North Aral Sea, we are able to send more water to the South Aral Sea. But how much more, we have to see.” 

 

{KGB INFORMERS} The Latvian parliament will make public the names of nearly 4,500 suspected KGB informers, after discovering files left behind in 1992 by the departing Soviet KGB. The state newspaper Vestnesis will run the list in November. 

 

{ARMY REALITY TV} A pro-Putin youth organization, Nasha Strana (Our Country), may launch a reality TV show to promote army service, Channel One reported. “Army Week” would follow 30 uniformed volunteers through the standard course for young recruits, to calm popular fears about the horrors of army life. 

 

{DUMA CENTENNIAL} The Russian Duma celebrated its centennial with two days at St. Petersburg’s Tavrichesky Palace – site of the first, Tsarist-era legislature. Over 1,000 deputies and top officials attended the convocation to ponder Russia’s parliamentary history. The First Russian Duma was elected in July 1906, following the October Manifesto of 1905. There were four Dumas over the next decade, before the body was swept away by the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917.

 

{ZHIVAGO AIRS} Russia finally has a homegrown film adaptation of Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago. The 11-part TV series began airing on NTV on May 10 and starred Alexander Menshikov as Zhivago and redhead Chulpan Khamatova as Lara.  Two previous film adaptations were the 1965 film by David Lean with Omar Sharif as Zhivago, and a 2002 series directed by Giacomo Campiotti, with Keira Knightley as Lara. 

 

{WALKING RUSSIA} Karl Bushby, a fearless Briton attempting a round-the-world walk, will continue on his path across Russia after a Chukotka court overturned his deportation ruling. The former British paratrooper and his American travel companion, Dmitri Kieffer, were arrested on April 1 for illegally entering Russia when they walked across the frozen Bering Strait from Alaska. The two walkers will, however, face a fine of R2,000 ($72). 

 

{BESLAN FILM} Brian Grazer, producer of The Da Vinci Code, acquired rights to “The School,” an Esquire article about the 2004 Beslan elementary school siege, the BBC reported. The article, by New York Times Moscow correspondent CJ Chivers, covers the tragedy, which ended with the death of some 300 hostages and 31 Chechen terrorists. The story “cried out to be told on the big screen,” Grazer said.

 

“Comrade Wolf knows whom he is feeding on. He feeds and listens to no one.”

President Vladimir Putin, on the international situation. 

 

“In the 1990s, when the Commonwealth of Independent States was disintegrating and there were fears of Russia breaking up as well, some people in the West said they wanted a strong and united Russia. Now we are here. They should be grateful.” 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov (International Herald Tribune)

 

A Prince’s Gift

In May, Britain’s Prince Michael of Kent and his wife, Baroness Marie-Christine von Reibnitz, presented a new, eight-ton bass bell to Trinity Cathedral at Kostroma’s Ipatiev Monastery. The bell, a gift from the Prince Michael of Kent Foundation, was presented during a stop on the Russian National Orchestra’s 2006 Volga River Cruise. Ipatiev Monastery is closely linked with the Romanov dynasty, to which Prince Michael of Kent is related.

 

“The CPSU was not a party... It was a way of life.”

Mikhail Kasyanov, leader of the social movement, National-Democratic Union (Itogi)

 

“The State Duma has, in recent years, generally speaking, in some senses, lost its significance.”

Zhores Alferov, Nobel laureate and Duma deputy

 

“Not a single country in the world has become a great economic power just on the basis of its oil and gas reserves, however large they may be…  

Russia’s cultural sphere is enormous, and it’s embarrassing if the government and society do not invest in it. 

We should not begrudge money spend
on reconstruction of theaters. 

No matter what it costs, it is just a drop in the bucket compared to what
Russia has lost.”

Chief Conductor of Mariinsky theater, 

Valery Gergiev (Argumenti i Fakty)

 

“The Powers that Be now half-enforce the laws, the people half-obey them.”

Valery Zorkin, Chairman of the 

Constitutional Court (Itogi)

 

“I vow, before 2016, to provide proof of paternity for three children.”

Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the LDPR, 

on the president’s call for improving Russia’s demographic situation (Itogi)

 

“Our way of life, our morals, and our traditions... are more pure in all ways. The West has something to learn from us and should not race along in [allowing] mad licentiousness.... 

Our country is democratic, but we live in an organized country and an organized city.”

Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, 

on the city’s banning of a gay pride parade

Russian Art Craze

Modern and fin-de-siecle

art gaining popularity

Russian art is hot in the auction world. In late April, Sotheby’s New York held a Russian art auction, in which 589 lots garnered over $54 million. The top bid item at the auction was Nikolai Roerich’s “Lao-Tze,” which fetched $2.2 million, the most ever for a Roerich work in auction. A Russian tea service brought a winning bid of $1.8 million, as did a work by Alexander Yakovleff, “Kabuki Dancer.”

In early June, another successful auction, at Sotheby’s London, garnered £2.8 million ($5.16 million) for a pair of porcelain vases which Nikolai I had gifted to British Ambassador John Lampton. The auction also set a record for the highest amount paid in auction for a painting of Ivan Ayvazovsky. His painting, “The Varangians on the Dnepr,” had a winning bid of  £1.7 million ($3.13 million) from a private Russian collector. The total auction proceeds were over $52 million. Jo Vickery, head of Sotheby’s Russian department, said the greatest surprise of the auction was the popularity of contemporary Russian art, which was the subject of ferocious bidding in some cases. “Overall,” Vickery said, the auction was “a truly amazing result which re-asserts the importance of the Russian market within the global art market as a whole.” 

On June 2, Sotheby’s held another auction, this one of Russian books, that brought in nearly £1 million.

 

10 tons of Georgian mineral water “Borjomi” banned from sale in Russia was to be poured down drains, under a decision by a Moscow court. In 2005, some $19.7 billion in wines and spirits was sold in Russia, of which over $14 billion was spent on vodka. Russia’s GDP is expected to hit $1 trillion in 2006, representing an annual growth of over 25 percent per year, when compared to less than $200 billion in 1999. According to Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov, 2.6-2.8% of that GDP will be spent on the military in coming years. Meanwhile, Russia has an annual trade surplus of $120 billion and gold and foreign currency reserves (as of April 1, 2006) of $205.9 billion. This latter figure represents a 150% increase over 2005. The value of Gazprom is currently $305.9 billion, making it the third largest company in the world, after Exxon Mobil and General Electric. In 2005, Gazprom extracted 548 billion cubic meters of gas. However, by 2010 Gazprom may fall short of its needs by about 100 billion cubic meters, due to the company’s inefficiency, according to former Deputy Energy Minister Vladimir Milov. The average prices for apartments in the capital rose 15-20% from January to March this year, to $900 per square foot ($3,000 per square meter). Of the 370 buildings destroyed by the April 21 earthquake on Kamchatka Peninsula, 200 have been deemed to be beyond repair. According to official statistics, 350,000 Russians are HIV+, but independent experts claim the figure is about three times higher. 33% of Muscovites use plastic banking cards. The number of state officials in Russia grew 10% over 2005. There are nearly 500,000 NGOs in Russia. The Prosecutor General’s Office uncovered over $6.2 billion in budgetary violations committed in 2005 by state officials, including $246.7 million in misspent funds. The top abusers were Stavropol Krai, Sverdlovsk Oblast, the Republic of Tatarstan, and Moscow Oblast.

 

Updates to previously reported items

 

Reacting to public and activist pressure, President Putin issued an order requiring a new trans-Siberian oil pipeline to steer clear of Lake Baikal by at least 40 kilometers. Irkutsk region bettered this requirement, and now the pipeline will come no closer than 400 km. (Nezavisimaya Gazeta)

 

On May 27, despite city bans and protests from the Russian Orthodox Church and nationalist organizations, a gay rights march/demonstration was held in the capital. It was violently attacked and largely broken up by the groups protesting it.

 

The emerging Nuclear Power Vertical will be headed by President Putin’s former chief of staff, Sergei Sobyanin. He will chair TVEL, the nuclear fuel monopoly, which the Moscow Times said will be “a platform for a vertically integrated state holding that will come to control all the enterprises that make up the country’s nuclear power industry.”

 

RUSSIANS WHO

 

feel May 9 is a:

state, official holiday 55%

people’s (narodny) holiday 41%

simply a free day 4%

 

feel atomic energy should be:

actively developed 31%

kept at the same level 40%

cut back 15%

banned 5%

no answer 9%

 

feel the most worrisome trend at present is:

inflation on goods 81%

inflation in housing and transport 72%

crime in our region/city 37%

the threat of unemployment 36%

spread of new diseases / bird flu 12%

international problems 6%

ordered murders 5%

difficulty planning summer vacation 5%

(multiple answers allowed)

 

think everyone should pay taxes 68%

disapprove of tax evasion by companies 65%

disapprove of tax evasion by individuals 45%

 

think that “gray salaries,” still common
in Russia, should be abolished 44%

 

are serving a sentence in prison 847,000

 

will be freed from prison under a special 

amnesty to mark the Russian
parliament’s centennial 3,000

 

took out a mortgage in 2005 3%

plan to take one out in the coming year 5%

don’t intend to 91%

 

have a positive opinion of:

Vladimir Putin 76%

Vladimir Lenin 47%

Yuri Andropov 47%

Leonid Brezhnev 39%

Tsar Nikolai II 39%

Josef Stalin 36%

Nikita Khrushchev 28%

Mikhail Gorbachev 20%

Boris Yeltsin 12%

 

CSKA Hoopsters Tops

Moscow’s CSKA defeated Israel’s Maccabee 73:69 in Prague to win the Basketball European League. President Vladimir Putin congratulated the team, calling the victory “a bright triumph” and “a long-awaited present for fans of this sport.” CSKA is by far the richest Russian basketball club and can afford expensive foreign legionnaires and also a foreign head coach (Italy’s Ettore Messina). Top CSKA scorers in the final were Teodores Papalucas (Greece), with 18 points, and David Wonderpool (U.S.), with 16 points. It was the first time since 1973 that a Russian team had reached the final of the European League.

 

Czechs Upset Russians

Russia failed to reach the semifinals at the World Hockey Cham-pionships in Riga (Latvia), losing to the Czech Republic in overtime. “When I think of all the scoring opportunities we missed, it really hurts,” said Russian captain Maxim Suchinsky. The loss was all the more difficult, since Russia took first place in its qualifying group. “This is a young team with a great future,” said Head Coach Vladimir Krikunov. “I hope next year in Moscow many players come back and compete again.” Russia hosts the next World Championships in Moscow.

 

Larionov on DVD

Russian hockey legend Igor Larionov released a new DVD documentary, Farewell From Moscow, which captures his December 13, 2004 farewell game in the Russian capital and the various receptions and tributes surrounding the event. Helmed by Chrome Bumper Films director John Quigley, of MTV fame, the movie was recently chosen as a featured selection for the New York Independent Film Festival. The DVD also offers viewers highlights from Larionov’s 27-year career, plus interviews with old teammates and friends and Larionov himself. 

The legend of Larionov began in the 1980’s when he formed the “KLM Line” with wings Vladimir Krutov and Sergei Makarov, backed by the defensive pairing of Vyache-slav Fetisov and Alexei Kasatonov. The creative center was the playmaking mastermind behind the top Russian unit, which dominated the IIHF World Championships, garnering gold in 1981, 1982, 1983, 1986, and 1989. He also won the 1981 Canada Cup and Olympic gold in 1984 and 1988. 

But Larionov didn’t stop there. He spoke out against the authoritarian Soviet system that denied players the right to play in the West, and pioneered Russian hockey in the NHL starting in 1989, winning three Stanley Cups with Detroit (1997, 1998, and 2002). He finished with 644 regular season points and 97 more in the playoffs. 

 

U.S. vs. Russia

Russia became a true “bete noire” for France when the Russian Davis Cup team defeated France in the quarterfinals of the elite international tennis competition. France lost to Russia in the finals in Paris in 2002 and the quarterfinals in Moscow in 2005. Newcomer Dmitry Tursunov was the Russian standout, with strong supporting roles played by Marat Safin and Nikolai Davydenko. In the next round, Russia will play the U.S. team in Moscow in September. Captain Shamil Tarpischev promised to “play a very slow clay surface,” to give Russia an edge over the fast-serving Andy Roddick. The United States has won a record 31 Davis Cup titles, but has been struggling to recapture the Davis Cup trophy since 1995 (when the U.S. beat Russia in Moscow).   

 

Russia Clinches Title

Russia won the 2006 UEFA European Under-17 Soccer Cham-pionship against the Czech Re-public in a dramatic final with penalty shots. The victory gave a boost to Russian soccer fans, who are hungry for international soccer victories. Russia last won a European title in 1960 (senior players, not U-17). This year, the Russia national team failed to qualify for the FIFA World Cup.