May 18, 2001 

This Date's Issues:   5260

Johnson's Russia List
#5260
18 May 2001
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
1. Moscow Times: Boris Kagarlitsky, A Better Chechnya Policy.
2. AFP: Bastion of democracy under threat as Putin pulls plug on pardons.
3. Izvestia: Yekaterina Vykhukholeva&Semyon Novoprudsky, HAPPY PAUPERS.
Russia has been declared a country of optimists.
4. Trud: Olga Neste, RUSSIAN FAMILY IS CHANGING.
5. The Russia Journal: John Helmer, THE KREMLIN MISSILE DEFENCE DEBATE -- JUST SAY NO, OR MAYBE YES.
6. Washington Post: Nora Boustany, A Russian's Passion for Mending Ethnic Fractures. (Emil Pain)
7. Moscow Times: Ben Aris, Fyodorov Lampoons Gazprom's Managers.
8. Novye Izvestia: Vladimir Telyuschenko, THE KREMLIN IS PUSHING RUSSIA'S DEMOCRATIC CHOICE TOWARD YAVLINSKY. The Union of Right Forces leader may be Nemtsov, Gaidar - or Chubais.
9. Post-Soviet Armies Newsletter.
10. US Ambassador to Moldova at CSIS.
11. AFP: Lenin's dying days subject of film at Cannes.
12. Financial Times (UK): Sergei Karaga, Building bridges with Brussels: Russia and the EU would benefit by deepening ties and working towards long-term integration.
13. The Electronic Telegraph (UK): Marcus Warren, Russians become prisoners of the land.
14. Vremya MN: Yelena Kostyuk, RUSSIAN MEGALOPOLISES: SCHOOL OF SURVIVAL.
15. BBC Monitoring: Senior liberal politician comments Russian-US relations. (Lukin)] 

********

#1
Moscow Times
May 18, 2001
A Better Chechnya Policy
By Boris Kagarlitsky 

The war in Chechnya made Vladimir Putin president. And the same war may, in 
the end, bring down his administration. The authorities simply have no idea 
how to escape from the present dead-end. As one Western journalist 
perceptively stated, Chechnya may play the same role for Russia as Algeria 
did for France in the 1950s.

On the one hand, officials are demonstrating a firm commitment to holding the 
territory while, on the other, they clearly don't know why they need it or 
what they will do with it if they get it. The main argument put forward in 
favor of continuing the war is that if Russia pulled out, a power vacuum 
would form in the region that would be filled by the field commanders 
("warlords," "bandits"). 

Such considerations would seem pretty convincing if it weren't for one thing: 
There is just no way that Russia can win the war in Chechnya. It doesn't have 
the strength, the will or the psychological resources. Even those who are 
reluctant to see this obvious truth are forced to confront its unpleasant 
manifestations on a daily basis. 

In such a situation, it is just a matter of time before the troops are 
withdrawn. And the longer the authorities try to postpone the inevitable, the 
longer they refuse to begin negotiations, the worse matters will be for 
Russia and the greater that risk that we will end up with — a power vacuum 
that will be filled by "bandits" and, most likely, destabilization in other 
parts of Russia.

Theoretically, there could be another resolution to the Chechen problem. 
Global experience shows that such conflicts can only be ended by means of 
negotiations. A cease-fire is the first step, followed by free elections 
under international control and, finally, a negotiated settlement on the 
status of the territory with a government holding a recognized mandate. 

The term of President Aslan Maskhadov is expiring and a new administration 
could be formed under local and Russian laws in keeping with international 
norms. The only problem is that, under Chechen law, Maskhadov's term is 
automatically extended indefinitely as long as the fighting continues. If 
anyone is interesting in having a legitimate regime take power in Chechnya, a 
cease-fire is the first step.

Incidentally, it is by no means certain that a new Chechen administration 
would necessarily be radically nationalist. During the war, the population 
has been stuck between the rebels and the army. Considering what the army has 
been doing down there, it is not surprising that so far they have generally 
supported the rebels. However, this does not mean that their sympathy runs 
very deep. Moreover, within the rebel camp there are a large number of views 
concerning the future of the republic. As long as the Russian army is there, 
they are working together. However, under a cease-fire, instead of simply 
acting against a common enemy, these people would begin advancing their own 
views.

Ultimately, a solution depends on the level of democracy and civil equality 
within Russia itself. Moreover, ending the war demands negotiations with the 
Chechen fighters. Without them, any negotiations are simply a farce, although 
the Kremlin still refuses to acknowledge this.

Rational arguments do not sway the racists and fascists who are essentially 
the only remaining loyal supporters of Russia's Chechnya policy. Whenever 
talk turns to civil rights or a peaceful settlement, they respond 
sarcastically that no Chechen ever won the Nobel Prize for mathematics. By 
that token, Luxembourg should also be considered a potential target for 
planned extermination.

Boris Kagarlitsky is a Moscow-based sociologist.

********

#2
Bastion of democracy under threat as Putin pulls plug on pardons

MOSCOW, May 18 (AFP) - 
The failure of President Vladimir Putin to pardon a single prisoner this year 
has fuelled fears for the future of Russia's pardon commission, a democratic 
symbol inherited from the Yeltsin era.

"The justice ministry is trying to claw back the pardon system under its own 
control. The commission's work is paralysed. It's a mortal attack on our 
institution," says the writer Anatoly Pristavkin, head of the commission 
founded in 1992, the year after the Soviet Union collapsed.

The commission, whose offices are located in the presidential administration 
building, near the Kremlin, is made up of 17 representatives from society at 
large including writers, human rights activists, a priest and a surgeon.

Every Tuesday without fail, the 17 commissioners meet to deliberate around a 
long table, although a picture of Bulat Okudzhava marks the place occupied by 
the famous writer and singer until his death in 1997.

From its very beginning, the commission has been subjected to numerous 
attacks from sections of Russian society that resent its non-conformist 
character, a symbol of former president Boris Yeltsin's lofty aims to do away 
with the summary injustice of the Soviet era.

"The prosecutor general was always against us. The justice and interior 
ministries often criticised us , but Yeltsin was surrounded by progressive 
advisors," recalls Pristavkin.

With only a few exceptions, the ex-president always followed the advice 
proffered by the pardon commission.

A total of around 57,000 prisoners held in Russian jails have benefited from 
the pardons handed out by the presidential commission since its inauguration.

In 1999 -- Yeltsin's last year in power -- 11,627 convicts received pardons, 
and the total rose to 12,835 in 2000, although the majority of the pardons 
granted during Putin's first 12 months in office had been approved under his 
predecessor.

Since last September, however, the Kremlin has only ratified 400 pardons, one 
of them for the US businessman Edmond Pope sentenced to 20 years in jail on 
dubious spying charges.

Moreover, since the beginning of 2001, not a single prisoner has walked free 
from a Russian jail as the result of a presidential pardon.

Pristavkin has no doubt who is to blame for the sudden halt to the pardon 
process, pointing the finger at Putin's tight-knit group of advisors 
especially the new official responsible for overseeing the commission, Viktor 
Ivanov, an ex-spy like the president himself.

The justice ministry has also exerted pressure on the commission to cut its 
work rate, with the result that whereas around 200 cases a week were examined 
in the past, that figure has recently fallen to an average of 30.

"Recently, they have been trying to scupper our work by accusing us of 
abusing the constitutional right to issue pardons," said another commission 
member, the writer Sergei Romazin.

"I don't understand why the justice ministry is obstructing our work, they 
should be doing the opposite because at the moment there is not enough food 
and medicine for prisoners in jail," added a former Supreme Court judge.

With a nationwide total of almost one million inmates, according to official 
figures, Russian jails are overcrowded and rife with tuberculosis and other 
diseases.

Pristavkin, 70, sees the crisis as a hangover from the harsh conditions and 
inhumane system of punishments inherited from the Soviet Union with its 
infamous gulag system of labour camps.

"The prison system perpetuates itself. It doesn't make economic sense to cut 
numbers. The more inmates there are, the more prison officers you need, the 
more jobs, in other words," he adds.

"If the justice ministry takes back control of pardons, it will examine 
perhaps 50 cases a month, and even then with one overriding brief: not to be 
so lenient," predicts another commission member, Valery Borshchev, a member 
of the Helsinki group.

Questioned by AFP, the justice ministry declined to respond to the charges.

As a last resort, the commssion's members have asked for a meeting with 
President Putin on three occasions, but they are still awaiting an answer.

********

#3
Izvestia
May 18, 2001
HAPPY PAUPERS
Russia has been declared a country of optimists
Author: Yekaterina Vykhukholeva, Semyon Novoprudsky
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]
DESPITE LOW LIVING STANDARDS, RUSSIAN PEOPLE LOOK TO THE FUTURE WITH OPTIMISM. NO ONE CAN UNDERSTAND OR EXPLAIN THIS PHENOMENON, BUT IT WILL BE USEFUL TO THE GOVERNMENT; AS LONG AS THE PEOPLE AREN'T DISAPPOINTED. MEANWHILE, REAL INCOMES HAVE BEEN RISING STEADILY.

Merrill Lynch has just released its "World Wealth Report 2001", a 
list of millionaires. A day earlier, analysts of the research group 
Monitoring.ru announced the results of a nationwide opinion poll 
concerning the views of Russian citizens on their circumstances and 
the short-term future, which covered all seven federal districts. It 
turned out that there are quite a number of rich people, and very many 
poor people, and in general the latter are satisfied with their lives. 
For the first time in the decade of market reforms in Russia, one can 
assert that Russians believe in a bright future. What kind of bright 
future they have faith in is another question.

Merrill Lynch and Cap Gemini Ernst & Young looked at people with 
investable assets of at least $1 million.

The number of millionaires has increased by about 180,000 people 
during the past year. As far as Russia is concerned, its millionaires 
were counted together with other countries in the section on Central 
and Eastern Europe. Here the number of millionaires has increased to 
200,000, worth a total of over $900 billion. The number of 
millionaires in Russia has increased because the share of Russian 
"rich Pinocchios" among the millionaires of the former "socialist 
camp" was always substantial. The results of the Russian poll are more 
interesting. According to 42% of respondents, the economic situation 
in Russia and the lives of ordinary people will improve over the next 
four to five years; 24% of respondents are sure that the situation 
will not worsen. About 16% of respondents are total pessimists. The 
number of optimists prevailed in all age groups. It is clear that the 
nation is swinging into euphoria.

About 23% of respondents are sure that their families are better 
off than four or five years ago, 29% say that their lives have not 
changed, 45% think that their lives have worsened during this period; 
however, they look to the future cheerfully.

As we know, optimism - and the enthusiasm which the government 
squeezes out of it - are the perfect fuel for moving the nation to a 
new standard in quality of life. At the same time, one has to figure 
out why Russians are so optimistic about their lives. Judging by the 
fact that the current incomes of the majority of people have not 
reached the pre-crisis levels, these optimists are not smart people, 
nor are they prophets.

On the one hand, two-thirds of Russians who look to the future 
with some optimism are the two-thirds who approve of the performace of 
the president and the government. On the other hand, the optimists' 
views on the future differ. Young optimists rely on their own strength 
and on living in Russia, not abroad. The elderly hope that the old 
order will be restored.

Be that as it may, the government has gained a powerful political 
resource - people's optimism. It's extremely dangerous to disappoint 
the happy paupers who are delighted by the absence of economic crises 
over the past three years. Everyone knows what happens when the masses 
get upset.

REPORT BY IZVESTIA

According to the State Statistics Committee average per capita 
income in the fourth quarter of 2000 increased to 2,382 rubles a 
month. This is twice the official poverty line. The number of people 
with incomes below the poverty line reached 39.2 million.

Official data cannot be relied on to reveal whether we are richer 
or poorer. For instance, in 1998 real wages decreased 40% in 
comparison with the pre-crisis levels, and the consumer basket of 25 
most important foodstuffs increased in price by 22.7%, to 425.6 rubles 
by the end of 1998. Average income per capita was 998.9 rubles a 
month.

The price of the consumer basket increased to 846.1 rubles by the 
end of April 2001. The most expensive is in Magadan (about 1,476 
rubles) and Yakutsk (about 1,331 rubles); the cheapest is in Orel 
(697.6 rubles). The average wage as at January 2001 was 2,572 rubles a 
month; it has risen by 39.9% in comparison with January 2000.
(Translated by Alexander Dubovoi)

********

#4
Trud
May 17, 2001
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
RUSSIAN FAMILY IS CHANGING
By Olga NESTEROVA

The International Family Day, marked this week, passed off 
very quietly in Russia. Only officials held their traditional 
functions. What is happening to the family in Russia?

It is said that some 14 million Russian children live in 
single-parent families, usually without a father (94%). And the 
reason for this is not just divorces, of which we have more 
than enough (their number topped 500,000 in the past ten 
years), but the growing number of children born out of wedlock. 
In Russian conditions, life without a father, which is a 
dramatic condition for a child, is aggravated by material 
privations. 

Statistics show that 40-60% of the poor in Russia are 
families with one or two children and two able-bodied parents.
Can you imagine how hard life is for single mothers? A half of 
such single-parent families, along with large families (10-12% 
of the total) and student families (2%), live below the poverty 
line, which is a very painful problem for Russia.
Another highly alarming fact is the high number of jobless 
women, of whom about a half have minor children, including 
77,500 single mothers who live on a token child allowance. 

Demographers have calculated that in the past ten years 
the number of children in Russia dropped by over 4 million.
The country is in the midst of the so-called reproductive 
crisis, which can be explained by both objective and subjective 
reasons. For example, unlike their peers in Europe and the USA, 
our girls became young mothers in the past, but today many of 
them tend to "live for themselves" a bit longer.
The number of weddings went down from 1.32 million to 911,000.
Strangely enough, the number if divorces dwindled, too, 
although not as noticeably as one could expect - by a mere 
20,000. 

The share of households (the international practice of 
studying the household, and not the family, was accepted in 
Russia in 1994) with minor children is rather high in Russia - 
46.6%. The size of an average Russian family dropped to 3.28, 
partly because many potential parents ask themselves where they 
should better invest their money and time, into children, or 
into a flat, a country house, career and pleasure? 

Sociologist Igor Kon, full member of the Russian Academy 
of Social Sciences, thinks that the Russian family is 
undergoing changes similar to those that happened in the bulk 
of industrialised countries. Like in society, the role of men 
and women in the family is becoming more balanced. But this has 
not detracted from the value of the family. Contrary to the 
forecasts of radically-minded sociologists, the family will not 
die away, for it cannot be replaced with any other form of 
cohabitation. 

********

#5
From: "John Helmer" <helmer@atom.ru> 
Subject: THE KREMLIN MISSILE DEFENCE DEBATE -- JUST SAY NO, OR MAYBE YES
Date: Thu, 17 May 2001 

The Russia Journal, May 18
THE KREMLIN MISSILE DEFENCE DEBATE -- JUST SAY NO, OR MAYBE YES
From John Helmer in Moscow

Just how flexible will Russia be, before its declared opposition to the Bush
Administration's national missile defence (NMD) scheme turns into
acquiescence?

That depends on which faction of Russian decision-makers emerge on top, as
the 
internal Kremlin debate gets under way. This behind-the-scenes debate is now
running parallel to the public talks which President Vladimir Putin's 
officials are holding with Bush Administration counterparts. 

Paul Wolfowitz, the US Deputy Secretary of Defense, opened the first round
of 
these talks in Moscow a few days ago. He was met by an interministerial 
committee chaired by Yury Kapralov of the Foreign Ministry. As the talks got
under way, Vladimir Lukin, an influential parliamentary deputy and 
ex-ambassador to Washington, called for flexibility in the Russian position
over what he described as a period "doomed to be long, difficult, and not
rich in immediate results." 

According to Lukin, "we should not, gritting our teeth, oppose the very idea
of NMD. Our stand should be flexible." By that, Lukin said he meant that the
Kremlin should not say no to start. Instead, it should speed up the internal
discussions between the Foreign Ministry, the Defence Ministry, and the 
intelligence service, so as to arrive at proposals that are "minimally 
acceptable for us. [Then we] should state that we cannot retreat any further
from these positions."

So far, the US reaction to signs of flexibility in Moscow has been to judge 
that, in the end, the Russian no to NMD will turn into yes.

For example, the US Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, recently
told a Pacific-region foreign minister that the US does not 
expect the Russians to be a source of serious opposition to the planned 
deployment of NMD in Asia. According to Armitage, much tougher opposition is
anticipated from China.

When the foreign minister went on to meet Igor Ivanov, the Russian foreign
minister 
last month, the latter said emphatically that Moscow is opposed to any US
move 
to deploy NMD in the Asia-Pacific region. Ivanov made it clear that Russia
is not only skeptical that the American technology can be made to work
against 
sophisticated missile systems. It is also convinced that deploying NMD 
against China would intensify the tension between Beijing and Taipei, and
add to the likelihood of preemptive action by Chinese forces. 

Ivanov is a policy executor, not an initiator. When the Kremlin debate is 
decided, he will voice the consensus. And so, for the time being, Ivanov is
expressing the flexibility towards Washington that one Moscow faction 
advocates. At the same time, he reflects unwavering support of the 
1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty which the opposing faction insists 
on as the foundation of strategic nuclear stability. The split between the 
two reflects the deep differences that have been obvious in Russian 
strategy for a decade between those who are pro-American; and those who are 
anti-American.

The pro-American position in Moscow was the dominant one during President 
Boris Yeltsin's decade in office. That was the time when US officials could
be 
sure that if Yeltsin told them no in public, he could be persuaded to say
yes in private. 

There are Russian policy analysts who believe the Putin Administration 
will not prove to be different, even if the reasons have changed. President
Vladimir
Putin, according to the pro-American faction, is far more thoughtful and
consistent than his predecessor, and holds no illusions about the threats to
Russian interests from the US superpower. However, Putin is also judged to
be realistic about Russia's dwindling means for nuclear missile attack. 

Within five years, this faction argues, the Kremlin will have barely one
thousand 
operational nuclear warheads, because it will be unable to afford to replace
its much larger stocks of today. The economic contraction that Yeltsin
oversaw
for a decade has now reached the point which Washington had always hoped for
-- Russia lacks the resources to conduct an arms race.

The pro-American faction wants to see Putin accept this, and avoid ruinously
expensive attempts to match NMD. The faction argues that the economic ruin 
is a more certain outcome than any benefit such an arms buildup could have
on 
Russia's security from US nuclear attack. That last possibility, the 
pro-American faction in Moscow also argues, is virtually impossible.

The anti-American faction responds that US expansionism remains the 
most dangerously destabilizing factor in global security. The only way to
deal with that, they argue, is to oppose each US move as it is made, 
mobilizing as many international resources as possible. This is why Russia's
evolving relations with China, India, the Koreas, Iran, Germany, and France
are now emphasizing what the governments judge to be their common interests
towards the Bush Administration.

The anti-American Russians insist on ABM as a minimum necessary 
condition for nuclear stability, because they know that noone trusts the 
Bush Administration to honour any commitment it makes, if and when it breaks
out of the 30-year old treaty. Thus, inside the Kremlin debate, it 
is easy for the opposing factions to agree on the appearance of flexibility.

It is much more difficult for the anti-Americans to accept the pro-American 
doctrine that Washington can be trusted not to utilize its strategic 
superiority to strike at Russian interests, whenever it wants. 

Flexibility in the Russian debate on NMD thus poses a question of trust in
Washington that makes pro-American Russian policymakers intensely
uncomfortable. With the Bush Administration appearing to have already
committed itself to such regionally aggressive figures as Ariel Sharon in 
Israel, and to the prospect of further expansion of NATO forces towards (and
across) Russia's borders, the stock of Russian goodwill towards the US is 
approaching the vanishing-point.

Flexibility in this Kremlin debate could produce a compromise. But that also
depends on signs of flexibility from Washington. The Russian compromise 
is likely to be a formula allowing amendment of the ABM Treaty to permit the
US (and other states) to protect itself from solitary missiles -- the 
so-called rogue state threat. Such a formula would not permit the US to
deploy the defence to cover allies such as Taiwan, Japan, Israel, and
others.

This is the essence of President Putin's proposal to the European states for
a missile defence umbrella that would be based on multilateral agreement,
joint deployment, and precise consensus on the threats to be dealt with.

What the compromise formula means in the Kremlin debate is that, so long as 
American intentions cannot be trusted, the only reliable basis for a change
in strategic stability is a multilateral agreement that also includes China and
Western Europe.

********

#6
Washington Post
May 18, 2001
A Russian's Passion for Mending Ethnic Fractures 
By Nora Boustany

How did Emil Pain, Russia's foremost ethnographer, find himself wandering 
through the treacherous, smoldering war zones of Chechnya, showing up in 
planes, cars and armored personnel carriers to do his job?

Pain was drawn suddenly into politics, after the Soviet Union collapsed, for 
his expertise on Russia's complex web of nationalities. He made his mark by 
speaking out on, and lobbying against, the use of military force against 
ethnic separatism in Chechnya. But President Boris Yeltsin was persuaded by 
the hawkish voices around him in the Kremlin, and plunged ahead to war, which 
he later called his greatest mistake.

Pain, 52, a stocky man with bushy brown eyebrows, slate-blue eyes and flushed 
pink cheeks, is completing a nine-month stint at the Woodrow Wilson Center as 
a Galina Starovoitova fellow on human rights and conflict resolution. 
Starovoitova, a liberal lawmaker who was slain in November 1998, was also a 
leading ethnographer who likewise advised Yeltsin against going to war.

Pain has not changed his views about the tragedy of war in the North 
Caucasus. He still argues that any notion of military victory is folly. But 
he looks back fondly on his years in power as a Yeltsin aide, despite the 
disappointments.

"It was the best time in my life," he said. "I was happy, not only because I 
was in power, but I became a columnist and a television personality. I was 
part of the in-crowd. More importantly, I was doing something useful, 
meaningful and interesting. I was being helpful to all these national 
movements, not only in theory but in practice."

On behalf of Yeltsin, Pain wrote letters to ethnic minorities and tried to 
sort out their problems with local governors and federal authorities.

"I had an opportunity to fix things. Besides, it was important for them to 
know that the president knew they existed," he said, recalling the excitement 
of stepping out of his textbook world to try out his views in reality.

Growing up Jewish in Kiev, Ukraine, Pain (pronounced pa-EEN) encountered 
anti-Semitism, including taunts in the street. He had few chances to excel. 
Official doors were closed; he could not make it in Communist Party politics. 
As a 4-year-old, in 1953, he remembers when his parents, both engineers, were 
kicked out of their jobs because of a "struggle against cosmopolitans."

"I remember that day. There were too many grown-ups at home, a one-bedroom 
flat for eight people, and it was not a weekend," he recalled. "There was 
talk of starvation and it scared me."

Thus his passion for disadvantaged groups in what was the Soviet Union. "It 
is necessary to be a minority to understand what it means," he said with 
passion.

"My whole life I was pained by it."

Pain said he chose not to resign from the Kremlin at the height of the 
Chechen war, as other intellectuals had, because he thought he could more 
effectively promote peaceful means from the inside. He recognizes now that he 
was in unfamiliar terrain: "They had their mentality and I was from a 
different world." Pain said he believes there are dangerous forces blowing 
through Russia; the growing role of the generals and the second Chechen war 
all point to trouble.

"The more the war drags on, the more Russian nationalism will grow. Russian 
troops have no chance of winning. Rebels resorting to guerrilla warfare are 
always more effective," he said. "In ethnic conflict, it is necessary to 
diminish the reasons for radicalization. When you use artillery, you don't 
kill selectively. Civilians who are not terrorists -- who could be allies of 
the state -- become enemies."

Pain was almost taken prisoner while on a mission to Chechnya. "Every man has 
to know what it is like to be in a war and this was my war. I was not really 
brave, I did not know better. When generals told me an area was safe, I 
believed them."

In Washington, Pain has been working on theories about how extreme 
nationalism can obstruct democratization.

He was one of a coterie of academics who advised Yeltsin, and they all now 
are out of government. "It is a dark time for people like him in Russia. They 
are not consulted," noted Michael McFaul, a senior associate at the Carnegie 
Endowment for International Peace. "Pain exemplifies a whole class of 
Russia's intelligentsia who have not found their new niche in Russia," he 
added.

Pain no longer gets invited to be on talk shows; anti-war commentators don't 
get airtime anymore. "It makes me very sad, not only because of this war, but 
the idea of democratic change is ruined, not forever, but for a while," he 
said.

On the whole, however, he sees his life as a long road of improvements from 
the grim days of his youth to the joys of a temporary academic perch in 
Washington. He works as a consultant for Russian and U.S. firms interested in 
the Caspian Sea. He loves the National Zoo, has discovered Fresh Fields, 
Brooklyn pickles and herring and believes Washington is a "communist city" 
because everything here, including special performances at the Kennedy Center 
and the Smithsonian, is "absolutely free."

********

#7
Moscow Times
May 18, 2001
Fyodorov Lampoons Gazprom's Managers
By Ben Aris 
Special to The Moscow Times

NEW YORK — Outspoken Gazprom board member and United Financial Group
founder Boris Fyodorov blasted the gas giant's management Wednesday,
accusing it of being behind a recent court decision that may block two
minority investors from voting at an AGM next month.

Fyodorov said that a move by the Moscow arbitration court in early May to
freeze 2.3 percent of Gazprom shares held by UFG-controlled investment
vehicles Arial and Onix-Invest — pending a court case amid allegations that
are foreign-owned — is an assault on minority shareholders rights.

"The freezing [of the shares] is a full blown attack by Gazprom management
via its intermediaries," Fyodorov told a group of U.S. businessmen. "The
idea is to block shareholders voting rights at the up-coming annual general
meeting. It is legal harassment."

The June 29 shareholders meeting is considered pivotal for the 38 percent
state-owned gas giant, Russia's largest tax payer, as a new management
board will be elected and the current chairman likely replaced at a time
when President Vladimir Putin has ordered an overhaul of the company's
controversial two-tiered share scheme.

Gazprom management, which has been accused of asset stripping, denied
allegations it was behind the court's decision in a statement Thursday.

Gazprom said that it was closely following the case — whose plaintiff is
backed by a group called the Association for Minority Shareholders' Rights
Protection — but denied any connection to it. 

"What is this organization?" asked Fyodorov. "No one has heard of it
before. It was founded only three months ago, it has three members and
probably only has three Gazprom shares. But somehow it has access to boxes
and boxes of detailed information about the shareholder structure of Gazprom."

The court also ordered Gazprom to exclude board candidates nominated by
Arial and Onix-Invest, including Fyodorov, a former finance and deputy
prime minister.

"Gazprom 's management categorically denies all from the lips of UFG
representatives and its honorable representative, Mr. Boris Fyodorov,
alluding to 'orders from the management of Gazprom,' about the 'hostile
activities' against UFG incited by people connected with Gazprom's
management," said the statement. 

"The management of Gazprom considers such statements to be slanderous and
provocation," it said. 

Foreigners can buy Gazprom only through American Depositary Shares, which
trade at a great premium to locally quoted stock, but some foreigners have
circumvented the restriction by setting up Russian companies to hold shares
for them. 

Fyodorov defended the scheme: "If you look at the law, signed by President
Boris Yeltsin, it is very specific. The law says that no company with more
than 50 percent of foreign ownership can own Gazprom shares."

Foreigners that want to own Gazprom local shares have only to buy into
companies that hold such shares. As long as the total foreign ownership
remains below 50 percent they meet the letter of the law. 

None of the UFG subsidiaries holding Gazprom shares are majority owned by
foreigners, Fyodorov said. 

Reuters quoted UFG on Thursday as saying that a court decision confirming
that Onix-Invest and Arial are more than 50 percent Russian owned might not
come in time for them to vote in the AGM.

********

#8
Novye Izvestia
May 18, 2001
THE KREMLIN IS PUSHING RUSSIA'S DEMOCRATIC CHOICE
TOWARD YAVLINSKY
The Union of Right Forces leader may be Nemtsov, Gaidar - or Chubais
Author: Vladimir Telyuschenko
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]
BATTLES FOR THE LEADERSHIP IN THE FUTURE UNION OF RIGHT FORCES PARTY CONTINUE. THE RIGHT WING IS TRYING TO PRESENT IT AS A PERSONAL CONFLICT BETWEEN NEMTSOV AND GAIDAR, BUT IT'S MORE COMPLICATED THAN THAT. SOME SAY THAT THE KREMLIN'S POLITICAL CONSULTANTS ARE STAGE-MANAGING THE ENTIRE CONFLICT.

Political consultants close to the federal government believe the 
process of unification on the right should be over on May 26, when the 
Union of Right Forces becomes a political party. However, this could 
turn into another of the Kremlin's failures to establish a controlled 
opposition.

This assumption is supported by the intrigues over election of a 
leader of the federal political council, which will take place at the 
inaugural congress of the future party. Leaders of two camps competing 
within the Union of Right Forces claim the honor - Boris Nemtsov, 
representing the small pseudo-movements created on the eve of the 
parliamentary election; and Yegor Gaidar of Russia's Democratic 
Choice.

In an attempt to play down the scandal, the right wing is trying 
to present it as a personal conflict between Nemtsov and Gaidar. 
Still, there is more to it than simple jealousy by one leader toward 
the other. Attempts are being made to conceal the reluctance of most 
members of regional branches of Russia's Democratic Choice to disband 
by May 19 in order to join the future Union of Right Forces party 
individually. The leaders of Russia's Democratic Choice, Gaidar and 
Viktor Pokhmelkin, are doing all they can to persuade their party 
colleagues to disband, pointing out that otherwise Russia's Democratic 
Choice will become a marginal party and fade away entirely. So far, 
they have not made any noticeable progress.

Even if two-thirds of Russia's Democratic Choice members vote to 
disband on May 19, it does not mean that most of them will join the 
Union of Right Forces at the inaugural congress on May 26. The leaders 
of the movement behave as though Gaidar is no longer of any 
importance. Nemtsov and Anatoly Chubais will use his candidacy for 
chairman of the political council in order to avoid accusations of a 
no-alternatives vote.

Events may now take one of two turns. One is the sudden 
announcment of another candidate - probably someone with no chance at 
all, like Aleksei Kara-Murza, for example, whose only purpose will be 
to take votes from Gaidar. This will allow Nemtsov to get a majority 
and be elected to the coveted position. The other option is a dramatic 
escalation of the conflict. And once the party members are 
sufficiently exhausted by all this, Chubais will be promoted as a 
compromise candidate. The assumption that events might be moving in 
this direction is supported by a staged leak from the Kremlin, which 
allegedly considers Chubais the best possible choice.

The Kremlin's opinion will indeed decide everything. Political 
consultants in its employ are out to simplify Russia's political 
structure and establish something like a three-party system. The 
Communist "alleged opposition" on the left is for the generation 
longing for the Soviet Union; the democratic "alleged opposition" on 
the right is for the intelligentsia longing for Western ideals and 
values; and the obedient majority in the center will pass all 
necessary decisions.

Indignant over the cynical pressure placed on their leader, 
Gaidar's supporters may quit the Union of Right Forces altogether. The 
Union of Right Forces will become all but a non-existent organization. 
It will have financial support (Pyotr Aven of Alpha Group may become 
the sponsor) and a significant media resource (the NTV network), but 
it will lack political influence.

Things could turn out even worse. Gaidar's supporters may feel 
cheated enough to rush over to Yabloko - and this is not something the 
Kremlin would like. It would have to make a deal with Yavlinsky; while 
it can simply issue orders to Nemtsov or Chubais.

********

#9
Date: Thu, 17 May 2001 15:15:23 +0100 
From: Elisabeth Sieca-Kozlowski <psan@iname.com> 
Subject: Post-Soviet Armies Newsletter

Elisabeth Sieca-Kozlowski, Post-Soviet Armies Newsletter Editor, is 
pleased to inform you that the third issue of INSIGHT - a new 
online-only PSAN publication providing insights and analysis, concisely 
presented in around 350 to 500 words - has been released today and can 
be consulted on PSAN http://www.psan.org
May 2001 : INSIGHT Vol. 1, Issue 3 : 
Stephen J. Cimbala, "Marginalizing Russia: The Wrong Move". 

*******

#10
Date: Thu, 17 May 2001 
From: "Keith Bush" <KBush@CSIS.ORG> 
Subject: CSIS Meeting

Topic: "Update on Moldova"
Speaker: US Ambassador to Moldova, Rudolf Vilem Perina. On
the record.
Location: CSIS, 1800 K Street, NW, Washington, DC 20006
Time and date: 3:30-5:00 PM, Tuesday, May 22
Registration: No fee, but please register name, affiliation, and telephone
number with jthomas@csis.org 

*******

#11
Lenin's dying days subject of film at Cannes

CANNES, France, May 17 (AFP) - 
After tackling Adolph Hitler's final hours in his 1999 movie "Molokh", 
Russian director Alexander Sokurov has turned his camera to the last days of 
the founder and first head of the Soviet state, Vladimir Ilich Lenin.

Presented Thursday in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, the movie -- 
titled "Taurus" in reference to Lenin's starsign and bullish constitution and 
spirit -- portrays an old man stricken by the wounds of an assassination 
attempt and weighing his moral legacy as death nears.

"I've shown that Lenin, whatever he did, was still a human being," Sokurov 
said.

"His life was in ruins. I'm sure he was depressed by the results of his work, 
that he was very unhappy," he said. 

"But I'm not here to judge: everything that could be said about him has 
already been said ... History erased everything that he fought for. There's 
nothing left of Lenin."

The film begins in Gorky in 1923, one year before Lenin's death and five 
years after the Bolshevik Revolution he led that forever changed the face of 
Russia.

Incapacitated after an operation to remove from his neck a bullet fired by a 
would-be assassin in 1918 and suffering from several strokes that has left 
his consciousness flickering, Lenin, played by Leonid Mozgovoi, is being kept 
in a state palace.

Secret police watch him and he is told the telephone doesn't work and nobody 
is writing to him because all the central committee members are sick.

Powerless, weakening, unable to do simple mathematical multiplications and 
given to childlike tantrums, he nevertheless refuses to step down from power, 
struggling to evaluate the good and the bad his regime has done.

"The people die of hunger and we swim in luxury. I'm ashamed," he says at one 
point.

"The undoing of Lenin in a way shows the undoing of Russia, which is 
currently in a juvenile phase, like a kid who's played too much, who's tired 
and falls over but who gets up again to play," said Sokurov. "You can take it 
as a metaphor."

The March release of "Taurus" in Russia, which still holds Lenin in a certain 
esteem, provoked sharp reactions, particularly among the elderly outraged at 
the mortal, feeble image of a man they had learnt to revere.

Instead of defending his film from these criticisms, Sokurov said that "Lenin 
offered something that the people accepted. The problem isn't that a man can 
lose his mind, but that millions of people can accept this madness as a 
truth."

*******

#12
Financial Times (UK)
18 May 2001
Building bridges with Brussels: Russia and the EU would 
benefit by deepening ties and working towards long-term integration
By SERGEI KARAGA
The writer is a Russian foreign policy specialist and chairman of the 
presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defence Policy, a prominent Russian 
think-tank 

On the surface,the growing relationship between the European Union and Russia 
looks more promising than ever before. Meetings such as yesterday's between 
the EU's troika of top officials and the Russian president have become a 
regular event. Both sides have developed programmes of mutual rapprochement. 

This entente cordiale led to President Vladimir Putin's participation in 
March's EU summit in Stockholm and an acceleration of high-level contacts 
between the European Commission and Russia. 

But relations have also reached a point from where, without a new goal for 
further integration of Russia into Europe, both sides could easily retreat. 

Mr Putin is probably the first Russian leader since the tsars who seems 
seriously intent on bringing Russia closer to Europe, if not into Europe. 
Many in his immediate entourage have first-hand knowledge of Europe, 
especially of Germany. There is a good chance that the priority now being 
given to relations with Europe will not be abandoned - as in the past - for a 
special relationship with Washington. 

It is also possible that Russia's resource base and its residual 
technological prowess could eventually be married to, and indeed integrated 
with, Europe. Such a marriage would help accelerate Russia's return to 
modernity and its rejoining of Europe. 

But immense obstacles remain. On the Russian side, there are widespread fears 
about integration into the World Trade Organisation - Russia hopes to be 
ready by next year - because of concerns about its ability to compete. These 
anti-integration forces range across the political spectrum - from old-style 
Communists to new capitalists who fear foreign competition. 

On the whole, Russia's political elite is uncertain where the country should 
belong. Its cultural and historical heritage, and the overwhelmingly European 
orientation of its trade (more than 40 per cent of exports go to Europe) 
point to greater involvement with Europe. 

But there are strong counter-currents. The economic reforms of the early 
1990s, which largely failed, were strongly associated with the west (although 
more with the US than Europe). The expansion of Nato and the war in former 
Yugoslavia left most Russians feeling isolated if not vulnerable. Adding to 
anxieties, the only European institution where Russia has a full voice - the 
Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe - is steadily fading 
into oblivion. 

Most of Russia's more sophisticated products - arms, nuclear reactors, 
aircraft - are in effect blocked from lucrative western markets, prompting 
hardliners among Russia's industrial elite to preach strategic rapprochement 
with countries such as China and Iran. 

There are other problems too. The Soviet experiment left the country lagging 
50-100 years behind more fortunate parts of Europe in terms of political 
culture. In many ways, Russia must still focus on nation-rebuilding to boost 
internal cohesion. Most Europeans tend to forget they had to do the same - 
and more or less by the same methods - not so long ago. 

Within the EU, too, obstacles remain to further rapprochement with Russia. 
These partly stem from unwillingness among much of Europe's leadership to 
think and act strategically. 

In the 1990s, Brussels seems to have put Russia on the back burner and to 
have focused instead on deepening and developing the EU's immediate 
periphery. 

Now, however, the EU has started looking more closely at Russia. But much of 
the dialogue concentrates on foreign policy and security matters, where 
Brussels is still comparatively weak, and not on critical issues of 
integration such as harmonising laws and industrial standards. Initiatives 
such as the Prodi plan - for integrating Russian energy supplies into Europe 
- still lack substance. 

The EU-Russia dialogue - although welcome - is more a bureaucratic exercise 
than a vehicle for further integration. And unless put on a different footing 
by both sides, it will soon start to produce disillusionment. Russia will 
start searching for allies and opportunities elsewhere, Europeans will resume 
their habitual soliloquies about Russia's geographical vastness or cultural 
differences. This historic opportunity could be lost again. 

The relationship needs a new aim; not only rapprochement or co-operation but 
also eventual Russian membership of the EU. No one could realistically 
foresee it happening in less than a generation. But putting the issue on the 
agenda would enhance and strengthen Europe's international standing. It would 
also solidify the western and democratic orientation in Russia and hasten 
modernisation. 

Some Russians and Europeans will put this issue on the agenda in coming 
months by launching a public committee for Russia in Europe. I will join. 

********

#13
The Electronic Telegraph (UK)
18 May 2001
Russians become prisoners of the land
By Marcus Warren in Levashovo

FROM communism to capitalism to good old-fashioned serfdom in less than a 
decade: that is the journey travelled by the peasants of this farm surrounded 
by the forests of the Russian north.

Unlike their ancestors, the swineherds and farmhands who care for livestock 
here are not the personal chattels of the local landowner - modern Russia 
still has no private owners of agricultural land. Moreover, the old members 
of the collective farm are now shareholders in their own private company. 
But, given their poverty, misery and complete lack of faith in the future, 
they might as well be slaves.

Their status as prisoners of the land is brought home most forcefully in the 
village shop, the only store where they can redeem the slips of paper that 
are their wages. In the wasteland of the countryside, to be paid at all is an 
achievement for many of Russia's millions of peasants. Here, however, four 
hours from Moscow, the farm workers' derisory salaries are paid on time but 
in monthly chits.

Of no use anywhere outside the village and worth as little as £4 each, the 
slips are handed to the shop assistant, signed, and the amount spent noted 
under "Animal Husbandry", "Mechanised Department" or "Central Office".

"I haven't seen any real money for four or five years," said Vladimir 
Bulatov, after buying a few loaves. "Of course we don't like this, but to 
change anything would need lots of people, lots."

At first the local currency was called "mustards", because of the yellow 
paper on which it was printed. Nowadays it is known as "Zverobucks", after 
the farm's director, energetic chief executive and, allegedly, its majority 
owner.

So go-ahead is Vyacheslav Zverev that the Levashovo farm even has its own 
website, a rarity in Russia, complete with an animated dancing pig and a 
photograph of the village's onion-domed church. "They are a bit like the 
smart cards used in the West," Mr Zverev said of the paper slips. 

"I exaggerate a bit, of course. I hope that it will be only a temporary 
measure. We need to change people's attitudes. Too many farm workers want 
just to receive wages, rather than earn them." His lament echoed that of 
would-be Russian reformers of the past, and the response of those under him 
also had a timeless quality about it.

The grandparents of the peasants eking out a living in Levashovo could well 
have been born serfs. The practice whereby those who worked on country 
estates were the property of their owners was abolished only in 1861, and 
then only half-heartedly.

"Zverev said right from the start that we were stupid-looking, thick and 
submissive," said Tatyana Barashkina, as she left the pig sties for lunch. 
"But then, he's our tsar and our god." She recently received £3.50 worth of 
real roubles to buy medicine to treat her heart. "I think he's a bit afraid 
of publicity," she said. "It might get back to Putin. Not that that would 
change much."

The only measure of independence enjoyed by the peasants is provided by their 
allotments, tiny islands of private land that feed them through the year and, 
in Levashovo, earn them cash to buy items other than food.

Mr Putin has cast his weight behind attempts to legalise the buying and 
selling of agricultural holdings. The right to private ownership of land is 
enshrined in the 1993 constitution, but it has no laws to back it up.

Privatisation of the land still has powerful enemies in the countryside. As 
dictatorial as Mr Zverev and dead set against the idea of reform is one of 
his neighbours, the head of a farm still owned by the state and named after 
the ruthless founder of the first Soviet secret police, Felix Dzerzhinsky.

The brother of a member of the junta that tried to topple Mikhail Gorbachev 
10 years ago, Dmitry Starodubtsev is nostalgic for the good old days of 
communism. But when "his" land is threatened, he can behave like any 
aristocratic landowner.

When Nikolai Katushev realised that two of his cows had escaped and were 
grazing a field of oats belonging to the Dzerzhinsky farm, the elderly 
peasant gave chase.

Mr Starodubtsev got there first and, enraged by the cows' trespassing, set 
about Mr Katushev with a truncheon. "I have to defend my own land, otherwise 
I wouldn't be doing my job," Mr Starodubtsev said.

******* 

#14
Vremya MN
May 16, 2001
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
RUSSIAN MEGALOPOLISES: SCHOOL OF SURVIVAL
By Yelena KOSTYUK

The first national report on "The Situation in the Cities 
of Russia" was prepared for the special June session of the UN 
General Assembly on settlements, but it can be undeniably 
regarded as a report on the situation in the country. For 
Russia has a predominantly urban population, with urbanisation 
embracing 107 million people, or 73% of the national 
population. The report mostly presents a gloomy, and possibly 
even dramatic, picture.

There is an average of 18.9 square metres of floor space 
per capita in Russia, or as much as the "generous" Soviet 
bureaucrats believed was enough for living normally. According 
to international standards, this is not a home but a shelter.
No wonder that the authors of the report had to state that "the 
bulk of the population of Russia live in very cramped 
conditions." But these irritatingly few metres of floor space 
are the wealth that the people fought to get from the state. A 
more befitting housing is being built for the more lucky few 
since 1992. It may seem strange to Muscovites, but the capital 
is not leading in Russia in terms of capital construction.
Moscow builds 360 square metres built per 1,000 of population, 
while the figure is 718 for Astrakhan, 632 for Belgorod, 500 
for Tyumen, 478 for Stavropol and 450 for Yoshkar-Ola. 

MODERNISATION OF HOUSING IN RUSSIA, 1998 

The trouble is not that the volume of housing construction 
has dropped by more than 25%. The problem is that there is 
virtually no chance of getting social housing now. 
Given the current speed of social sector housing construction, 
the last in the list of those who are "privileged" to get 
social housing will have a housewarming party in 100 years... 

Technogenic catastrophes, whose existence even President 
Vladimir Putin has admitted, are threatening Russia. The 
housing and communal services receive only 50-70% of the funds 
they need, which leads to the depreciation of fixed assets by 
70% in the past ten years. We saw from the example of the Far 
East what accidents in engineering systems can lead to. And 
this is only the beginning. Another few years of fierce 
discussions of the need for reform held against the background 
of a total absence of action, and our houses will start 
crumbling like those of cards. 

The municipal transport is breathing its last, too. The 
local budgets are fighting to mend holes, and a World Bank loan 
was used to modernise the bus pools in 14 cities. 

We are paying with our health for urban comforts, with 
only 15% of urban dwellers avoiding these risks. Over 50 
million people, or a third of the national population, breathe 
air whose pollution is 10 times above the admissible norm.
Those who live in cities with a population of over 500,000 are 
the hardest hit. Air pollution is relatively low in only two 
out of the 33 Russian megalopolises. There is a paradoxical 
fact which researchers cannot explain: despite the high air 
pollution, the death rate in large cities is relatively low.
The highest death rate is registered in towns with a population 
of 20,000-50,000. Russian cities have the largest number of 
health-hazardous industries in the world. These enterprises 
give us cancer, respiration and digestion diseases. 

One of the latest novel features in urban economy is the 
dramatic differentiation of urban population by income. The 
incomes of the richest urban dwellers are 13-14.5 times higher 
than the incomes of the poorest residents. 

"The report is a good one, yet its authors failed to say 
that 10% of the urban population are classed as the poorest 
section, the city 'bottom'" says Natalia Rimashevskaya, 
Director of the Institute of the Socio-Economic Problems of the 
Population. Her colleague, Yuri Simagin, reminded about one 
more gloomy fact that was not mentioned in the report:
"The greater part of small towns - and the bulk of the Russian 
population live there - have no development prospects at all 
for different reasons, but mostly because they have secret 
defence industries. There are dying towns in all CIS countries, 
but it is only in Russia that small towns are dying at such a 
high scale." 


               HOUSING STOCK STRUCTURE BY FORMS OF OWNERSHIP 

*******

#15
BBC Monitoring
Senior liberal politician comments Russian-US relations 
Source: Russian Public TV (ORT), Moscow, in Russian 0500 gmt 18 May 01 

[Presenter Anna Pavlova] The State Duma deputy chairman, Vladimir Lukin, is 
the guest on our programme today. Good morning, Vladimir Petrovich. 

[Vladimir Lukin, in a live link-up from the Rossiya studio] Good morning, 
Anya. 

[Pavlova] The attitude of the American administration towards Russia has 
changed considerably recently. Certain statements were made immediately after 
[President George] Bush moved to the White House, saying that the USA had 
nothing to discuss with Russia. Now they are speaking about the necessity of 
an urgent meeting between the presidents. How can you explain this? 

[Lukin] Do you remember what we were speaking about in January, February etc? 
[I told you] The election campaign effects would wear off, people in 
Washington would take their seats, and serious talks would start. Here we are 
- they are starting. Do you remember our hotheads making a fuss over a new 
Cold War and nearly engaging in fisticuffs? Up to now everything is going the 
usual way it does after American elections, especially when the Republicans 
win. However, we should not lose vigilance and get euphoric because 
everything happens in the usual way. Very complicated talks will take place 
now. The US foreign policy-makers have taken their seats and are ready to use 
all the resources, all the power of the USA, and it is no way small, to get 
the decisions they want. So the talks will be difficult and long and we 
should be ready for it. 

[Pavlova] Vladimir Petrovich, do you think the Russian-American talks may 
really influence US plans to quit the ABM treaty? 

[Lukin] Indeed, they can and they will unless we take the right stand at the 
talks - calm but firm on the issues that require firmness. However, it is too 
early to go into the details now. The recent talks that were held here in 
Moscow at experts' level have shown that the Americans were not showing their 
cards. They know something about their programmes, but do not tell us. At the 
same time, there are a lot of things they do not know about their programmes 
themselves. That is why they want us to agree to things they do not know 
themselves. So we face a long road ahead. For the Americans, it means to make 
firm the programmes they have, and for us to analyse them thoroughly and 
objectively in order to say what points they are absolutely unacceptable for 
us, and what points we are ready to discuss. That is the process to come. 

[Pavlova] Thank you for joining us, Vladimir Petrovich. 

******

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