Johnson's Russia List
#6086
19 February 2002
davidjohnson@erols.com
A CDI Project
www.cdi.org
[Note from David Johnson:
1. AFP: Russia expect deal with US as nuclear arms cuts talks begin.
2. Vremya Novostei: Viktor Khamrayev, IDEAS DO NOT BURN. Democrats want
to fight for freedom of the press - but don't know how.
3. BBC: Stephen Dalziel, RUSSIA'S COSY POLITICAL ELITE.
4. Peter Lavelle: Untimely Thoughts - The state of the Putinite state
(re Putin's State of the Union address, Part 2 of 5)
5. Dow Jones: Russia's UES Needs $20B-$35B Over 10 Yrs -CEO -Report.
6. Izvestia: Olga Gubenko, CHUBAIS SUSPECTED OF NURSING PRESIDENTIAL
ASPIRATIONS.
7. Baltimore Sun: Douglas Birch, Vatican, Russian church in battle of
faiths. Orthodox leaders resent Catholic gains.
8. Washington Post: Jeremy Eichler, Mother Russia's Brilliant, Difficult
Child. Programs Exemplify the Kirov Opera's Ambitious -- and Arduous --
Task.
9. Zavtra: Alexander Nagorny, PUTIN-END. Russia is in for some fairly
interesting events.
10. Reuters: Olympics-Freestyle skiing-Russia to protest over 'biased'
judges.
11. Moscow Times/AP: Official: U.S. Can Learn From Russia.
12. Los Angeles Times: Robyn Dixon, Russia to Retire Volatile Torpedo Model
Used on Kursk.
13. The Electronic Telegraph (UK): 'What's important is your conscience.'
As he celebrates his 75th birthday, Rostropovich tells Adam Sweeting about
unmusical conductors and secrets shared over vodka]
*******
#1
Russia expect deal with US as nuclear arms cuts talks begin
AFP
February 19, 2002
Russia's top arms negotiator said he expected to strike a deal on nuclear
disarmament with his Washington counterpart at the start of talks here
aimed at drafting an agreement for signature at a May presidential summit.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Georgy Mamedov said he was looking for
"substantial and tangible results" from his meeting with John Bolton, the
US Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security,
that began Tuesday morning in central Moscow.
Mamedov said the two sides were negotiating the wording of an agreement "on
radical reductions in strategic offensive weapons and a document on a new
framework of strategic stability relations between Russia and the United
States."
Bolton was expected later Tuesday to announce the first contours of the
agreement which will be signed at a summit meeting in Moscow between US
President George W. Bush and Russian leader Vladimir Putin at the end of May.
At the same time Kremlin officials urged other nuclear powers to join the
disarmament process now underway as Moscow sought to position itself as a
leader in nuclear non-proliferation issues.
"The question of nuclear stability cannot be the prerogative of only Russia
and the United States," the Kremlin's advisor on strategic stability issues
Igor Sergeyev was quoted as saying by Interfax.
"The parameters of strategic arms limitations announced by Moscow and
Washington should be taken into account by all nuclear powers," said
Sergeyev, a former Russian defense minister.
Moscow has sought a legally-binding document with Washington that would put
a ceiling of 1,700-2,200 warheads on the two sides' respective nuclear
arsenals over the next 10 years.
Moscow also wants to able to freely check on the progress of US
disarmament, and opposed Washington suggestions that some of the
decommissioned warheads could be held in temporary storage rather than
destroyed.
The cuts in nuclear weapons were decided by Putin and Bush at their summit
in Washington and Crawford, Texas, in November, but Washington has until
recently been reluctant to formalise the agreement on paper.
The last meeting between Bolton and Russian negotiators was held in
Washington last month, when Moscow officials presented their own proposals
for the wording of the summit agreement.
A Putin-Bush summit has been tentatively scheduled for May 23 to 25.
*******
#2
Vremya Novostei
February 19, 2002
IDEAS DO NOT BURN
Democrats want to fight for freedom of the press - but don't know how
Author: Viktor Khamrayev
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]
THERE IS NO FREEDOM OF SPEECH IN RUSSIA: PARTICIPANTS IN A NATIONAL
CONFERENCE OF DEMOCRATS AGREED ON THIS YESTERDAY. IN AN ATTEMPT TO
HALT THESE TRENDS, THE CONFERENCE WORKED OUT ITS OWN CONCEPT OF STATE
POLICY ON THE MEDIA. THIS SECTOR SHOULD BE WITHDRAWN FROM STATE
CONTROL.
Conference of democrats admits freedom of speech is lacking in Russia
There is no freedom of speech in Russia: participants in a
national conference of democrats agreed on this yesterday. But they
didn't develop the idea beyond a mere statement of the fact. Democrats
know exactly what ought to be done to free the media from dictatorship
of the government. Unfortunately, the question of how this can be
achieved was not answered yesterday.
The democratic conference does not idealize "Gorbachev's glasnost
era and Yeltsin's freedom" for the media, but those were periods when
"no one held a monopoly in the media industry", according to Igor
Yakovenko, General Secretary of the Union of Journalists. He considers
that the state's monopoly on information began taking shape in 1996
and is close to completion now.
"Everything done during the presidential election is being done
around the clock now," explained Yabloko leader Grigori Yavlinsky.
According to Yakovenko, all this generated some dangerous trends,
which conflict with the Constitution and the European Convention on
human rights. All the same, these trends are set out in Russia's
national doctrine on informational security. The doctrine states that
the role of state-controlled media should increase, and the state
"should regulate the flow of information."
That was how journalists were split into good and bad - because
the president himself split the media into "state and anti-state",
according to Yakovenko. "The concept of social responsibility is
crumbling," he said. Success as a journalist no longer has anything to
do with a person's reputation. Society responded instantly, and "58%
of Russians are in favor of censorship," said Yakovenko.
In an attempt to halt these trends, the conference worked out its
own concept of state policy on the media. This sector should be
withdrawn from state control, according to the concept. The concept
demands a great deal of legislative innovations - but democrats doubt
that their ideas will be accepted by the Duma. "All the same, it is
great that the document has been drafted," Yakovenko said. "Ideas do
not die. They evolve."
GOOD INTENTIONS
Access to information
Officials should be held accountable for refusing to divulge
information and for giving false information.
News-making
Pass laws against monopolization of the media, laws on
establishing a fund of resources independent of the state, even going
as far as granting buildings to editorial offices permanently.
Licenses for TV and radio frequencies
It is necessary to pass a law on the federal commission on TV and
radio broadcasting, which would specify how the commission is formed,
and how licenses are issued, monitored, and revoked.
State-controlled media
The majority of state-controlled media outlets should be
gradually transformed into private companies. Advertising in state-
controlled media should be provisionally restricted and eventually
banned.
Public TV and radio broadcasting
Establishing the institution of public TV and radio broadcasting
in Russia. Various models of this exist in virtually all advanced
democracies. A law should be passed on public TV and radio
broadcasting. On the basis of this law, a federal TV channel (RTR or
ORT) and a federal radio station (Russian Radio or Mayak) should be
transformed into a public broadcaster.
(Translated by A. Ignatkin)
*******
#3
BBC
February 19, 2002
RUSSIA'S COSY POLITICAL ELITE
By Stephen Dalziel, BBC Russian Affairs Analyst
stephen.dalziel@bbc.co.uk
(SUMMARY: The demotion of the Russian Deputy Prime Minister, Ilya Klebanov,
to Minister for Industry, Science and Technology, is yet another sign that
when Russia's politicians fall, it's rarely very far.)
So, Ilya Klebanov has been sacked from his post of Deputy Prime Minister
responsible for the powerful Military-Industrial complex. Does this mean
that he will be joining the ranks of Russia's unemployed, or seeking out
old friends who might find a job for someone who made such a mess of the
handling of the investigation into the loss of the nuclear submarine, the
Kursk? Not a bit of it. Mr Klebanov woke up on Tuesday morning simply to
the realisation that he had a little less power and influence than 24 hours
previously.
As well as the Military-Industrial post, which gave him a deputy
premiership, Mr Klebanov was already Minister for Industry, Science and
Technology, the post he retains. Previously, the Atomic Energy Ministry
and the Transportation and Communication Ministry also answered to him.
They now report directly to the Prime Minister, Mikhail Kasyanov. It's
certainly a slap on the wrists for Mr Klebanov; but, given that he retains
the status of a minister, little more than that.
But in stepping sideways and, for the time being, slightly down, Mr
Klebanov is simply continuing what has become the accepted practice for
Russia's political elite. There is another example in the news this week.
Marshal Igor Sergeyev was, to put it politely, an ineffectual Defence
Minister. Under his less than careful stewardship, the Russian Armed
Forces continued unabated the downward slide of sloppiness, poor training
and low morale which has marked out the armed forces since the late Soviet
period, and of which the sinking of the Kursk seems to have been such a
vivid example.
Despite the appalling decline of the armed forces under his less than
careful stewardship, Marshal Sergeyev was not sacked. Instead, he was
retired, having already served for a year beyond the supposedly compulsory
retirement age. He was given a cosy post as military adviser to the
President, Vladimir Putin. This week, he has been leading negotiations
with the Americans on a possible future agreement on strategic weapons.
Mr Klebanov and Marshal Sergeyev are just two of the many Russian leaders
who in recent years have made serious errors, and yet retained positions of
great influence and authority. Towards the end of his presidency, Boris
Yeltsin changed his prime ministers as frequently as some might change
articles of clothing. Yet none of those ex-prime ministers - Yevgeny
Primakov, Sergei Stepashin, Sergei Kiriyenko - have since found themselves
in the political wilderness.
Russia's longest-serving Prime Minister of the post-Soviet period, Viktor
Chernomyrdin, has a comfortable position as Russia's Ambassador to Ukraine
- a crucial post for both Moscow and Kiev. But how many of Russia's one
hundred and forty five million citizens consider that Mr Chernomyrdin's
record should have guaranteed him a political job for life?
Russia's political elite have learned quickly that, once you are in the
pack, the worst that can happen to you if you make a mess of your job is
that you will be reshuffled. It is only if you seriously upset the man at
the top that you stand to lose out.
Mr Yeltsin did for any future political ambitions that the former Soviet
President, Mikhail Gorbachev, held. Mr Putin has ensured that two men who
rubbed him up the wrong way, Boris Berezovsky and Vladimir Gusinsky, are in
exile abroad. But if you stick by the President, then you might fall all
the way from Deputy Prime Minister, to Minister; hardly a terrifying prospect.
*******
#4
From: "Peter Lavelle"
Subject: Untimely Thoughts
Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2002
Peter Lavelle: Untimely Thoughts - The state of the Putinite state
(re Putin's State of the Union address, Part 2 of 5)
Sometime in March President Putin is slated to address the upper house of
parliament in what is now being called his "State of the Union" address. In
this five part series, I reflect how Putin dealt with a number of issues in
last year's address and ponder what he might have to say this year.
Part 2: Civil society project
Few words were devoted to the civil society project in last year's address.
To my mind the term "dictatorship of law" is not directly concerned with the
development of a civic polity. I suspect the very idea of civil society
will be approached in the most defensive manner in this year's address. The
president can be boastful about most policy areas pursued during his tenure
as head of state. At this point, few are overly critical of his recent
foreign policy overtures. Russia's recent macroeconomic performance
indicates a modicum of sustained growth; incomes are up, the country's
balance of payments stable. On whole, Putin's Russian report card has a lot
to be proud of. One significant area Putin's Russia is lacking is the state
of the civil society project. So much so, this is probably the one subject
of his presentation that will be analyzed from the perspective of what is
not said, rather than on what will be said.
The politics of Russia's electronic media is an embarrassment for the
president and country. The very public saga of NTV and TV6 are borderline
soap operas that make Russia appear ruthless, chaotic, and backward. The
timing of the TV6 debacle could not be worse. Putin's turn to the west,
apparently, is to be very selective when it comes to domestic politics. One
has to wonder if the address will be given before or after the TV6 tender.
The fact that many are asking this question demonstrates that there is a
perception that freedom of speech is under threat in Russia. This may or
may not be true. What is obvious is that the rule of law remains intensely
weak in this country. TV is very political here, but the lack of meaningful
law is the greatest threat to freedom of expression.
Spy-mania is another area that demostrates citizens are very much at the
capricious will and malevolent designs of over-zealous security organs.
Again it is the lack of good law that makes ordinary citizens easy prey for
a security officer desiring promotion. Indeed, few individuals in the
security services involved in the Grigory Pasko and Igor Sutyagin cases have
been disciplined - just the opposite, many have been promoted! Part of
Russia's ruling elite still lives by the dictum that information is power -
secrecy remains a political weapon. The definition of national security puts
the average citizen at a disadvantage vis-a-via the state. If a citizen does
not know the law - because the law itself is a secret - how can a citizen
know he is breaking the law? It is a cruel paradox that most Russians look
to the state for protection while at the same time their legal recourse when
confronted by the state remains cloaked in mystery.
The recent suggestion that regional governors be appointed by the president
instead of elections is another issue that tells us something about Putin's
understanding of the civil society project and Russia's path to democracy in
general. This is a very difficult issue. Most of Russia is so poor that most
elections can be bought on the cheap. Most regional elections are about whom
will control the natural resources under the ground or state enterprises
located there. Federal authorities, with good reason, have an interest in
seeing the regions ruled in a way that benefits the region and country as a
whole. Though to date, it is unclear if Kremlin-appointed officials would
manage these interests better than oligarchs or local business interests.
What is almost completely absent from this debate is how such a change would
benefit or hinder democracy. Democracy is an ethos and practice learned.
Many in the regions may not have the chance to practice the concept of
political choice if the law is passed.
Civil society is also about entrepreneurship. Private ownership and the
pursuit of enterprise are key to any successful civil society project.
Watching Ustinov and Stepashin go after the 'bad guys' (albeit with
different political agendas) should be greeted at face value. Putting those
behind bars for pillaging the state of hundreds of million dollars does not
bother me in the slightest. What worries me is that entrepreneurs still
feel obligated to pay-off the rent-seekers in the state bureaucracy. These
are the people Putin should be most concerned with in the longer-term. It
is clear the state can do little to support the average Russian. If Putin's
vision of a strong Russia is to become a reality, private businesses and
non-government institutions will have to eventually replace the state in
most spheres of life. Putin has said much about this during his presidency,
what I see is that the importance of one's "roof" has never been so
important.
Is Putin afraid of the people? This is a very difficult question of answer.
Clearly he is very afraid of what some individuals have done to Russia
during the past decade. Who could disagree with him on this point? Those
who have abused this country due to the lack of good law is already
legendary. I understand the president's defensive posture. However, being
a control freak may eventually undermine much of the good work being
pursued. The civil society project is not dead in Russia - it is
struggling with a state which is unsure of its propose and mission. I take
my hat off to those working with NGOs here. Though most NGOs still need the
benevolent nod from the powers-that-be.
I will be listening very carefully to what is and what is not said during
the president's address.
Part 1: Foreign policy
Part 3: Economic reform
Part 4: State restructuring and corruption
Part 5: Overall assessment
Peter Lavelle, Head of Research, IFC Metropol, Moscow, Russia
*******
#5
Russia's UES Needs $20B-$35B Over 10 Yrs -CEO -Report
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
February 19, 2002
MILAN -- Russian electricity giant RAO Unified Energy Systems (R.UEN) needs
$20 billion-$35 billion in investment over the next 10 years to boost
production capacity to meet demand, Chief Executive Anatoly Chubais said in
an interview in Italian daily Il Sole 24 Ore published Tuesday.
Chubais acknowledged concerns of a looming electricity crisis in Russia ,
warned of last week in a report by the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development.
Chubais said he expects Russian electricity demand to grow strongly in the
next 10 years, but noted the supply side is "stretched".
"Things are bad. In the last 15 years there have been no investments," Il
Sole quoted Chubais as saying. Chubais is currently organizing tenders for
the construction of two new power plants. The tenders are due to be
completed in the third quarter.
Chubais said the government recently raised electricity prices by 20% for
the first half of the year and he was convinced that prices will reach
European levels within three years. They are currently less than a quarter
of the rates in western Europe.
Of the gas market, he said: "The domestic situation really isn't good in so
much as tariffs are too low."
He didn't see any problems for the oil market in Russia . Despite anecdotal
evidence suggesting less-than-perfect compliance, Chubais said he expects
Russian oil exporters to abide by their agreement with the Organization of
Petroleum Exporting Countries to restrict exports by 150,000 barrels a day
in the first quarter of this year.
"It's an important sign that Russia is ready to coordinate a key sector of
its economy with the entire world," he said.
Concerns that Russia's economy is too dependent on petroleum are valid, he
said.
"I believe that the economy should aim for diversification, but at the same
time there is nothing wrong if Russia is able to extract its petroleum
resources, transport them and export them," he said. "And this is positive
in the long term."
*******
#6
Izvestia
February 19, 2002
CHUBAIS SUSPECTED OF NURSING PRESIDENTIAL ASPIRATIONS
Author: Olga Gubenko
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]
IS ANATOLY CHUBAIS TRULY HARBOURING ANY PRESIDENTIAL ASPIRATIONS?
Anatoly Chubais adds a new political touch to his talks in
convincing business people in Europe to deal with Russia
RAO Unified Energy Systems CEO Anatoly Chubais has made another
attempt to persuade potential investors that Russian businesses can
and should be dealt with. Chubais did this while making a speech at a
roundtable conference in Turin, Italy, dedicated to economic
cooperation between Russia and the European Union. At the same time
the Financial Times (the most influential business newspaper in
Europe) featured an interview with Chubais where he was cautiously
critical of Moscow's policy. To a certain extent, Chubais contradicted
his own words because Western businesses are unlikely to want to deal
with a country that is moving towards authoritarian rule.
Anatoly Chubais' subordinates who were present at the roundtable
conference in Turin say that their patron began by saying right away
that he wanted to "talk business". "Let us talk business here. I do
not mean money for any specific projects. I am talking about
tendencies and prospects of cooperation", Chubais said. This was a way
of making sure that he would not be badgered with questions on
specific accords concerning European investments in Russia's economy.
Chubais did his best to overcome the attitude of European
capitals towards Russian business and did not mince his words. He said
that Europe failed to keep up with the meteoritic development of
Russian businesses. Business in Russia has undergone a qualitative
change, Chubais said. Businessmen in Russia understand the necessity
of corporate procedures and dialogue with minor shareholders.
Eki Lipkanen, European Union Commissar for Industry, said at the
end of the Turin forum that he had made proposals to the Investment
Bank of the European Union concerning granting loans to fund Russian
energy projects. According to information gathered by Izvestia,
Chubais managed to hold specific talks with business tycoons who were
present at the conference but "RAO UES CEO did not make any statements
after the talks".
Chubais made a statement prior to his departure for Italy,
according to a Moscow correspondent of The Financial Times. Asked by
the correspondent whether Russia was turning into a police state,
Chubais confirmed that this was a grim possibility that was not feared
in the West alone. "We cannot shrug it off as an example of
stupidity," Chubais was quoted as saying (in translation from the
Italian back into Russian). "No, this is serious. There are certain
forces fairly close to Putin who are prepared to support precisely
this line of development. There are, however, forces objecting to it
and the Union of Right Forces is one of them. It should not be
discussed whether or not it is going to happen. It should be fought".
Chubais said a few words about the 1993 events in Moscow as well.
Was blood shed then? It was, he said. "But were it not for this small
blood in 1993, the country would have paid much more in the following
year or two, or decade..."
At the same time, Chubais expressed his admiration in the bold
strategic decisions of the president in the area of economic and
foreign policies. The correspondent got the impression, however, that
he was talking to a politician who had far-reaching plans, which
extend beyond the time of President Putin's second term in office.
(Translated by A. Ignatkin)
*****
#7
Baltimore Sun
February 19, 2002
Vatican, Russian church in battle of faiths
Orthodox leaders resent Catholic gains
By Douglas Birch
Sun Foreign Staff
MOSCOW -- The bitter argument that erupted in public last week between the
Vatican and the Russian Orthodox Church comes down to this: Who has the
right to save Vitaly Kulyagin's soul?
He is a 39-year-old aerospace engineer dressed in jeans and a fleece
jacket, his brown hair tied in a tidy bun. He spoke about his reasons for
embracing Roman Catholicism instead of the Orthodox Church, the faith of
his Russian ancestors.
"To my mind, the Catholic religion is the most progressive," Kulyagin said
during a break from his religious studies at the Immaculate Conception
Church, north of central Moscow. "It is the most mobile, it has not stopped
developing. To my mind, the Orthodox Church stopped developing in the 15th
century."
That's the kind of talk that Russia's native church doesn't want to hear.
For years, Orthodox officials have accused the Vatican of aggressively
seeking converts in the former Soviet Union. Last week the Vatican seemed
to confirm the Orthodox hierarchy's suspicions by announcing the creation
of four full-fledged dioceses in Russia. That decision will give more
formal status to Catholic bishops in Moscow and three other cities.
Patriarch Alexy II and his church's Holy Synod denounced the decision as
"an unfriendly act" intended to lay "claim to the flock of all the Russian
people, who are culturally, spiritually and historically the flock of the
Russian Orthodox Church." In other words, they accused Catholic leaders of
trying to poach Russian souls.
One of those souls belongs to Kulyagin. After much thought over a decade,
the former atheist decided to become a Catholic. He and about 130 other
Russians are enrolled in religious training courses at Immaculate
Conception, one of two active Catholic churches in Moscow. The converts
expect to be baptized by summer.
As for the Orthodox Church's claim to be Kulyagin's only legitimate
spiritual home, he has a different view: "I am a Russian, but I am free to
choose for myself."
Catholic officials here say the creation of dioceses is an administrative
step to make it easier to serve parishioners, not recruit new Catholics.
They point out that fewer than 1 percent of Russia's residents are
Catholic, and more than 50 percent are Orthodox. "We are a minority in
Russia, and we will continue to be a minority in Russia, but we want to
take care of the Catholics who live in Russia," said the Rev. Igor
Kowalewski, a church spokesman.
The Roman Catholic Church has attracted a steady stream of new parishioners
since the fall of the Soviet Union. A century ago, Catholics in Russia
numbered about 30,000. There might be 1.3 million now. At least some of
them are ethnic Russians looking for an alternative to the faith of their
fathers.
Catholic leaders say they first try to persuade Russians to consider
joining the Orthodox faith. But they do not turn away nonmembers like
Kulyagin who are determined to be baptized as Catholics.
For some young Russians, the Roman Catholic Church represents a clean break
with the Soviet past. After the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, Russian
Catholics fiercely resisted state control and paid a heavy price.
Catholicism was almost wiped out by Stalin -- most churches were closed or
forcibly converted to Orthodox churches. Thousands of Catholics were shot,
beaten or starved to death for their faith. Thousands more were deported to
Siberia and Central Asia.
Klementina Klimova, 66, recalls the KGB arresting the priest of her church
in central Ukraine in the 1940s. He was never seen again. At the same time,
police rounded up about 160 Catholic men and took them to the cathedral's
basement, which was turned into a makeshift prison. The men were beaten,
interrogated and starved, she said. Within a few weeks, all were dead. The
cathedral was turned over to the Orthodox Church.
When the Orthodox priest arrived, Klimova said, he asked some of the
parishioners to help him clean the basement. They found the remains of 12
people, left behind by the security forces. "I remember the 12 coffins,
newly made," said Klimova, who lives in Moscow and attends services at
Immaculate Conception. "The priest said they were people murdered by
fascists. But they were not."
Soviet authorities in Moscow seized two of the city's three churches,
turning one into a cinema and converting the 3,000-capacity Immaculate
Conception church first into temporary housing, later into a school, then a
laboratory and finally a four-story factory loft building.
The domed Church of St. Louis of France, near KGB headquarters, was the
only Catholic church in Moscow to remain open after 1937, church officials
say. But state security agents watched who came and went and tried to
recruit informants in the congregation. The agency eventually installed
cameras at the entrances.
The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 ended overt repression of religious
organizations. But non-Orthodox faiths say more-subtle forms of
discrimination persist, sanctioned by a 1997 law that makes it difficult
for religions with mainly non-native clergy to operate in Russia.
The Rev. Joseph Zaniewski, who leads services at Immaculate Conception, is
a Russian citizen. But two of his three vicars are from Poland, and their
work is limited here because they have not been granted permanent resident
status. (One law requires residency permits for most religious work;
another forbids permits for religious work.) So they hold visas that must
be renewed every year.
Russian law also makes it difficult for non-Orthodox faiths to build places
of worship or to recover property seized during the Soviet era.
When Catholics tried to reclaim Immaculate Conception in 1989, four floors
of offices, storage space and a machine shop filled its soaring interior.
The courtyard was home to weeds and rusting factory equipment. The man who
claimed to own the building scornfully offered to rent part of the church
to the parish.
Catholics began holding services on the steps. In an escalating series of
protests, parishioners invaded the building, dragging machinery outside and
demolishing interior walls. In March 1995, they clashed with police.
Under pressure, city officials forced the return of the church in 1996.
After extensive renovation, the church was re-consecrated as a cathedral in
December 1999. Today, about 1,500 Muscovites attend Mass there each Sunday,
with larger crowds showing up on religious holidays.
Pope John Paul II has sought to end centuries of rancor between the
Catholic Church and other faiths, including Islam and Judaism. Last year he
became the first pope in 13 centuries to set foot in Greece and apologized
for 1,000 years of Roman Catholic mistreatment of Orthodox Christians.
The pope has repeatedly sought to meet with Alexy II, to help heal the
divisions between the churches. Their rivalry dates to the schism of 1054,
which divided eastern and western Christian traditions. But Alexy II has
refused, pointing to the return of Orthodox churches to Catholic control
and the Vatican's alleged missionary zeal in the former Soviet Union.
Many devout Russians pay little attention to the friction. Valentina
Avdeyeva, 81, began attending Mass at Immaculate Conception a couple of
years ago. She said she has no plans to convert but talks of feeling
"comfortable" beneath the cathedral's vaulted roof. "There is no difference
between the churches," she said, "because there is only one God."
******
#8
Washington Post
February 17, 2002
Mother Russia's Brilliant, Difficult Child
Programs Exemplify the Kirov Opera's Ambitious -- and Arduous -- Task
By Jeremy Eichler
Before its sibling ballet company dances its last pirouette, the Kirov
Opera has descended on Washington with what amounts to a small village of
singers, instrumentalists, coaches, supernumeraries, a huge tech crew, a
doctor, and a horse named Ben. On Tuesday evening the company kicks off a
six-night stand at the Kennedy Center with "A Tribute to Tchaikovsky," also
featuring the Kirov Orchestra and the Ballet, followed by performances of
Mussorgsky's "Khovanshchina" and Verdi's "Macbeth" through Feb. 24.
Fortunately for Washington opera fans, the Kirov's upcoming appearances are
not just a fly-by visit, but rather a sort of extended introduction: the
first installment of a 10-year relationship between the companies housed at
St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theater -- the Kirov Opera and Ballet -- and the
Kennedy Center. The planned series will help put the nation's capital on
the world's operatic map, or, in the words of Kennedy Center President
Michael Kaiser, "help turn Washington into a performing arts destination."
For the Russian company, it offers a stabilizing toehold in the United
States during a time of uncertainty at home.
The group, which still travels under its Soviet-era name, is no stranger to
the West. Since the mid-1990s, the company has been building its prestige
through recordings on the Philips label and frequent international tours,
forging new financial alliances and courting audiences that covet its
authoritative interpretations of the great Russian repertory.
Before presenting itself to the world, however, the Kirov had some major
reinvention to do. While its ballet company never quite lost its cachet,
the opera and orchestra languished under years of communist rule, standing
deep in the shadow of the Moscow's Bolshoi Theater. Lackluster productions,
a dearth of available Russian talent and poor state subsidies seemed to
guarantee that the opera's rich history would wither on the vine.
Then came the man often scripted as the Kirov's savior -- Valery Gergiev,
who was appointed as its artistic director and principal conductor in 1988,
and given full managerial reign of the Mariinsky in 1996. Through dynamic
and, his critics say, ruthlessly autocratic leadership, Gergiev has kept
the ballet strong, restored the opera to its former luster, and even pushed
the orchestra into a world-class ensemble in its own right.
On the podium, he leads with a charismatic confidence and an almost
mystical approach to the score that recalls the late German conductor
Wilhelm Furtwangler. His hands often tremble with the baton as if he were
funneling some sort of electric charge directly into the orchestra, and the
results are audible. He has also shown an eye for spotting talent, having
championed a host of singers such as Olga Borodina, Vladimir Galuzin and
Galina Gorchakova, all of whom now have established international careers.
Gergiev's partnership with his company has recently been chronicled in a
new book by John Ardoin titled "Valery Gergiev and the Kirov" (Amadeus
Press). The book is informative, but it leans toward hagiography. Gergiev's
strength, after all, has also proved to be his weakness. His preternatural
stamina has stretched the company beyond its limits, and examples of its
falling short abound. This June at the Mariinsky's Stars of the White
Nights summer festival, the conductor seemed to spend more time jetting in
and out of town than he did working with his orchestra. As a result, the
performances were frustratingly erratic and sometimes embarrassingly
underrehearsed.
More significant, the group's track record in London has swung wildly. In
2000, the group's residency at the Royal Opera House had the local critics
in fits of rapture, with some evoking the heady days of Serge Diaghilev's
Ballets Russes. This past summer, however, the company returned to London
to perform six Verdi operas and the Requiem. The productions apparently did
not have enough time to settle, and the Kirov was pounded in the press.
One hopes that Gergiev has taken away from such events a stronger sense of
his own limitations. These days, though, he is hardly taking it easy,
having spent recent weeks in rehearsals for Prokofiev's mammoth "War and
Peace," which opened Thursday night at the Metropolitan Opera, where
Gergiev serves as principal guest conductor. Reached at his Manhattan hotel
room between rehearsals, Gergiev conceded that he was busy but not as busy
as everyone makes him seem.
"When I read about myself, it seems I conduct 500 orchestras," he said.
"It's actually about five or six in total. And I'm extremely committed to
my mission at the Mariinsky -- that is, to help it become a great,
fantastically equipped, well-run and powerful artistic organization with a
strong management, and totally reconstructed technical means."
The conductor also stressed another facet of his commitment to the
Mariinsky Theater -- the preservation of a particular Russian operatic
tradition, even as he pushes the boundaries of that same tradition. Here,
Gergiev has a wealth of history to draw from, dating to Mussorgsky himself,
who lived and died in St. Petersburg, and whose "Boris Godunov" and
"Khovanshchina," like so many other classics of the Russian repertory, were
given world premieres on the Mariinsky stage.
St. Petersburg, after all, was the crucible of the golden age of Russian
opera, and when one hears the Kirov perform a work from its standard
repertory, it is impossible not to feel that history. Rimsky-Korsakov's
"Invisible City of Kitezh" was also premiered at the Mariinsky, and a
performance in that same theater this past summer was truly revelatory. Not
only were the voices beautifully deep and dusky, but the music poured from
the stage with a unity and naturalness that can only come from a living
connection to a historic body of work.
This connection was ironically reinforced by the years of Soviet rule, when
contact with Western influences was kept to a minimum. As many listeners
have noted, while the quality of life for musicians suffered behind the
Iron Curtain, their isolation also preserved a certain stylistic coherence,
a recognizable Russian school of singing. Top companies around the world
sound remarkably similar these days, sustained by the same coterie of
jet-set soloists, but the Kirov still sounds uniquely like the Kirov, and
that is something very important to Gergiev.
His commitment to the tradition means that this week's "Khovanshchina"
promises to be a magnificent event. The opera's five acts trace an epic
clash of politics, nationalism and religion around the beginning of Peter
the Great's reign, and are packed with rich music, at times steeped in the
liturgy of the Orthodox church, and closely wedded to the organic ebb and
flow of Russian speech.
"It is one of the most powerful operas ever composed in our country,"
Gergiev declared flatly, adding that the production itself will be very
traditionally Russian, with a huge chorus and vivid costuming. "It will
look like nothing you've seen before onstage in Washington, not necessarily
better or worse -- just nothing like it."
"Khovanshchina" will be interspersed with "Macbeth" in a new production by
the Scottish director David McVicar. The pairing of a new Verdi with the
classic Mussorgsky suggests a further tension in Gergiev's creative vision
for the company. While expert in all things Russian, his Kirov eschews
provincialism and has strived for recognition in a broader repertory. Verdi
had his own brief connection to St. Petersburg ("La forza del destino" was
premiered there), but his music clearly flows with an Italianate lyricism
completely distinct from the Russian equivalent. Gergiev has pushed his
singers to embrace this new style, even in their own musical accents.
In a way, the combination of old and new, Eastern and Western, is itself
indigenous to St. Petersburg, the city that Peter the Great established in
1703 as the perch from which he would rule the empire but also as a locus
of cultural infusion from Europe, with grand palaces built by Italian
architects, and wide-open canals that earned the city its nickname as "The
Venice of the North."
Both these faces of the Kirov will be on display at the Kennedy Center this
week. Perhaps the best part of all is that this is only the beginning.
Gergiev and his crew will return in December 2003 with two Tchaikovsky
operas -- "Mazeppa" and "Eugene Onegin" -- allowing Washington to continue
getting to know an unusual company that is valiantly preserving something
of its country's distant past, striving to maintain a musical tradition
while at the same time transcending it.
******
#9
Zavtra
No. 7
February 2002
PUTIN-END
Russia is in for some fairly interesting events
Author: Alexander Nagorny
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]
KASIANOV IS MAKING A MOVE, AND PUTIN IS AT A CROSSROADS. IT'S ALL
CONNECTED WITH US PLANS FOR A STRIKE AGAINST IRAQ, AND THE NEED TO GET
RUSSIA'S COOPERATION. RUSSIA'S NEUTRALITY WILL BE MINIMAL. THESE ARE
THE STRATEGIC DECISIONS KASIANOV HAS MADE: PUTIN HIMSELF WOULD HAVE
ACTED DIFFERENTLY.
The announcement of Bush's doctrine coincided with an interesting
turn of events in the Kremlin. Shortly after the US president's
address to the nation, Russia's second most prominent politician,
Prime Minister Mikhail Kasianov, visited Washington. Actually,
Kasianov was on his way to the World Economic Forum in New York, but
landed in Washington for some reason. According to reports on Russian
television, the stopover in the American capital was necessary "to
prepare for Bush's visit to Moscow in spring for a meeting with
Putin." However, experts who know how summits are arranged understand
that the main agreements on such matters are reached through embassies
or the telephone links between the Kremlin and the White House.
Therefore, it follows that the stopover in Washington was needed to
promote the interests of Kasianov himself and his supporters in the
upper echelons of government, and Kasianov's eagerness to establish
direct contact with the US leadership had its own logic and its own
political motives.
Let us now take a look at the results of Kasianov's meeting with
Vice President Cheney. It ended in an announcement of a previously
unforeseen meeting with Bush. To attend it, Kasianov returned to
Washington right after the forum in New York. When the meeting with
the US president was over, ebullient Kasianov ventured several
interesting comments. He said, specifically, that Russia was going to
quit the oil export restrictions regime in March and that Moscow
planned facilitation of cooperation with the United States within the
framework of the "counter-terrorism coalition".
Nothing extraordinary at first sight. Everything looks quite
differently, however, in the context of the military operations the
United States plans to launch in several month and he implied demands.
The problem is that the US Administration has already made up its mind
on the matter of another strike. Given the impending revelations
concerning the Bush-Enron connection and the securities crisis, a new
military victory is certainly essential. Hence the necessity of a
strike against the Iraqi leader (say, a missile strikes at the
locations where Saddam is likely to be found, a short threatening
maneuver near the borders, and an agreement with Iraqi generals -
agreement smoothed out by huge financial bribes the way it happened in
Afghanistan - on the return of Iraq into the international community).
Economic results of the operation are easily predictable -
legitimation of Iraq without Saddam and influx of oil at low prices to
the global markets in late summer. It will solve the problem of the
structural crisis the United States is facing and avert an impending
financial crisis.
Moreover, the new wave of patriotism would do away with the
corruption investigation concerning bribes from Enron and win Bush
another term in the Oval Office. Gore's and Lieberman's Democrats will
be crushed.
It is clear from this point of view that the strike promises Bush
significant strategic advantages at a low tactical cost, primarily the
indignation of the Arab states demanding an immediate oil price-rise.
This is where Kasianov's help in Russia will be very useful.
There is even more to it. Kasianov's promise of deeper "counter-
terrorism cooperation" - right after the proclamation of what the Axis
of Evil is - indicates official consent to anti-Iraqi actions. In
other words, Russia's neutrality will be minimal. These are the
strategic decisions Kasianov made. Putin himself would have acted
differently. He would have bartered Russia's consent for Berezovsky's
extradition and a pledge from the Americans to take into account the
positions of some Russian oil companies, like LUKoil.
Making all these bold decisions and statements, Kasianov does not
care that a successful American military operation in the Middle East
would bring down oil prices to $10 a barrel, killing Russian oil
companies and smashing the already crippled national economy. Massive
new financial injections into the economy would become essntial. This
turn of events will realize the concept of Chubais and the Finance
Ministry he controls via Kudrin, the concept of new international
loans. This concept and policy would eventually lead to more and more
debts, and eventually to bankruptcy. This is what happened to
Argentina.
This is where we come to a solution. Despite his pro-Western
position, earlier this year Putin found himself facing the necessity
of personnel changes. The necessity is dire indeed, caused in the
first place by Berezovsky's campaign (his claims concerning explosions
in Moscow are attentively heard in Washington and London). Berezovsky
will never be extradited to Russia, and his book of accusations will
be like Solzhenitsyn's "Gulag Archipelago". Putin's image all over the
world, primarily in Europe, will be ruined beyond repair. He will no
longer be received at Buckingham Palace or anywhere else, and the fate
of Ciausescu may eventually befall him.
Secondly, the leading oligarchs have already met in Moscow and
resolved to topple Putin and his team from the secret services. They
will accomplish that by deliberately provoking an economic crisis in
Russia in the near future. Oligarchs' attempts to save Kiselev and his
team are an example of this conspiracy. It makes logical the decision
- wholly unfounded - to raise tariffs when Chubais raised them by 25-
30% through his puppet Khristenko, without bothering to consult the
Federal Tariff Commission. Oligarchs fear too much that property will
be redistributed again and that someone may decide to investigate what
happened to the money of Gazprom, Russian Joint Energy Systems, oil
companies, etc.
Thirdly, lack of personnel decisions with regard to Chubais,
Voloshin, and finally Kasianov - even though they are so free in
talking to their masters from abroad - indicates weakness and lack of
confidence on the part of the new ruler. It is common knowledge that
the weak do not stand a chance in free-market economies.
Chubais and Voloshin plotted this game against Putin. this
assumption is confirmed by the fact that precisely their
representatives met with senior officials of the Bush administration
at Christmas and at the World Economic Forum and "persistently asked
to put Putin under pressure". It is all this taken together that made
usually spineless Kasianov self-confident for some maneuvering of his
own, maneuvering that may result in his resignation as prime minister
or even make him a target for the prosecutor's office (particularly
since there is lots of evidence proving certain machinations with
foreign debts).
Looking at all this, it isn't hard to predict that Russia is in
for some fairly interesting events soon. Berezovsky's predictions of
the president's early resignation may actually come to pass no matter
how unbelievable they may appear right now. Just like in a well-known
Russian folk story, Putin is at a crossroads: if he turns left (makes
staff changes) he'll lose his head because of the Americans. If he
goes straight ahead (leave everything as it is) he'll be slowly
strangled by an economic crisis and a propaganda campaign in Europe.
If he turns right (follows in Gorbachev's footsteps and permits the
disintegration of Russia) he'll be toppled by the military, with the
support of the starving masses (even though he might expect a Nobel
Peace Prize). Putin has made up his mind. In his interview with The
Wall Street Journal, he supported Kasianov's initiatives in
Washington.
*******
#10
Olympics-Freestyle skiing-Russia to protest over 'biased' judges
SALT LAKE CITY, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Russia are to file a protest with the
International Ski Federation (FIS), claiming that biased judging denied
freestyle skier Olga Koroleva an Olympic gold medal in the women's aerials
event on Monday.
Koroleva was leading after the first jump of the final, but had a low score
in the second and was edged out of the medals, finishing fourth.
Australia's Alisa Camplin won the gold, with two Canadians, Veronica
Brenner and Deidra Dionne, taking silver and bronze.
"She (Koroleva) definitely could have won today, if not the gold, then at
least silver or bronze, if it wasn't for the biased judges," Russian
Olympic Committee spokesman Gennady Shvets told Reuters.
"We are now preparing an official protest with the FIS, but we are prepared
to go all the way to the Executive Board of the International Olympic
Committee to seek justice.
"The American and Canadian media has staged a smear campaign against
Russian athletes from day one at these Winter Olympics," he added.
"They were behind the attempt to take away our gold medal in figure
skating, now we have another scandal. If we don't stop this campaign now I
don't know we will end up."
French figure skating judge Marie-Reine Le Gougne was suspended last week
for misconduct after she was one of five judges to vote for Russians Yelena
Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze ahead of Canada's Jamie Sale and David
Pelletier for the pairs gold medal.
The International Olympic Committee later decided to award a duplicate gold
medal to the Canadian pair.
*******
#11
Moscow Times
February 19, 2002
Official: U.S. Can Learn From Russia
The Associated Press
Russia's experience fighting Chechen separatists could be useful for the
United States in its campaign against international terrorism, U.S.
Congressman James Saxton said Monday.
Saxton, who heads the House Special Oversight Panel on Terrorism and is
among a congressional group visiting Moscow, said an aim of the visit was
to learn about the Russian security service's experience fighting rebels in
Chechnya.
"We recognize that the situation Russia is facing in Chechnya is very
important for us to understand," said Saxton, a Republican from New Jersey.
He said the United States and Russia were facing "a seemingly similar
threat from a seemingly similar enemy.
"We Americans would like to learn from the Russian government the most
effective way of fighting terrorism that threatens our two governments," he
added.
Another member of the delegation, representative Bernard Sanders, stressed
cooperation. "We hope that within this struggle, the U.S. and Russian
people will become closer together," said Sanders, an independent from
Vermont.
******
#12
Los Angeles Times
February 19, 2002
Russia to Retire Volatile Torpedo Model Used on Kursk
Military: The weapons detonated on board. Inspector says collision didn't
cause sub to sink.
By ROBYN DIXON, TIMES STAFF WRITER
MOSCOW -- The Russian navy said Monday that it is scrapping the type of
torpedo used on board the doomed nuclear submarine Kursk, which sank in
August 2000 after two explosions.
A four-month forensic examination of the submarine exposed shoddy practices
in the Russian navy and disproved claims by naval officials that a foreign
submarine collided with the Kursk, triggering the tragedy, Russian
Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov said at a news conference.
The Kursk sank during exercises in the Barents Sea, taking the lives of all
118 crew members. An initial explosion led to a catastrophic blast when
other torpedoes detonated, but the submarine's warheads and reactors were
unaffected. Ustinov said Monday that he was convinced that there was no
collision. Five vessels were in the vicinity of the sub, he said, but none
was dangerously close.
But the commander of the Russian navy, Adm. Vladimir Kuroyedov, said a
separate government commission investigating the disaster is still
considering three possible causes: a torpedo explosion, a collision with a
foreign submarine and a brush with a World War II mine.
Kuroyedov did acknowledge that the sub's torpedoes, propelled by volatile
hydrogen peroxide, were unreliable. Other countries abandoned them after a
1955 explosion on the British submarine Sidon, he said; the Soviet Union
began using them in 1957.
On Monday, Kuroyedov shifted responsibility for the torpedo's shortcomings
to "scientists and designers," saying the hydrogen peroxide's "contact with
certain metals may cause unpredictable consequences."
"The torpedoes have already been removed from submarines," Kuroyedov said
grimly. "Now we are considering a replacement."
Ustinov led the forensic examination of the Kursk, which was raised and
towed to port in a delicate operation last fall.
For years, Ustinov said, naval rules were breached aboard the Kursk. A
system to send out an emergency beacon was regularly turned off, and the
sub's emergency buoy, designed to mark the craft's position in case of an
accident, was out of order.
Investigators inspected 10 submarine logs, data recorders in the command
post and three notes left by crew members trapped in the Kursk, but Ustinov
said none explained the cause of the first explosion. He said he hoped that
the raising of the bow section, scheduled for this spring, would cast light
on the cause of the disaster.
The decision to scrap the torpedo was immediately controversial. Eduard
Baltin, a retired Black Sea Fleet commander, said in a phone interview that
the move was premature.
"They still don't know why it exploded, and that is the main thing. Adm.
Kuroyedov demonstrates his total incompetence by making such a stupid
decision. People die in cars every day, but no one tries to ban cars," he
said.
But retired Rear Adm. Georgy Kostev, former deputy commander of a Northern
Fleet nuclear submarine division, said in a phone interview that the
decision should have been made years ago.
"These torpedoes have always been a big headache for submariners because
they had hydrogen peroxide in their fuel, which is very leaky and can
easily cause a fire on board."
******
#13
The Electronic Telegraph (UK)
February 19, 2002
'What's important is your conscience'
As he celebrates his 75th birthday, Rostropovich tells Adam Sweeting about
unmusical conductors and secrets shared over vodka
EVEN George Bush's grandiose missile defence shield would have difficulty
in intercepting the fast-moving cellist, Mstislav Rostropovich. As he
approaches his 75th birthday, his schedule seems, if anything, to be
increasing in pace.
He copes on three hours' sleep a night, doesn't seem to know what jetlag is
and can't remember when he last went on holiday. He has been married to the
soprano Galina Vishnevskaya for 46 years, but admits they rarely see each
other. "If we were always together, I'm sure we'd be divorced by now," he
reckons.
During a brief touchdown at his Paris apartment, a few doors away from
where Maria Callas spent her final years, he takes a break from cramming
piles of freshly ironed shirts into a suitcase to find time to squeeze in
our interview. Surrounded by Russian paintings, glassware and furniture, he
has been up most of the night rummaging through heaps of musical scores,
which he will need for a string of concerts stretching from Spain to Italy,
Greece and Russia. He then breezes into London in March for some sustained
birthday celebrations. His brain seems clear, his mood ebullient.
Slava (as everyone ends up calling him) laments that playing the cello gets
harder as he grows older. But he has developed his conducting skills to
compensate. Why is it, I ask, that conductors always seem to live to an
enormous old age?
"Well, this was not the only reason I began conducting," he deadpans, in
English that impresses its meaning on you more by force of personality than
through its literal sense, "but it's good physical exercise and you work up
a lot of sweat. A soloist sweats a lot too, but he doesn't move about so
much."
He first became fascinated with the conductor's art as an eight-year-old,
when his father, an orchestral musician, would take his family to a summer
resort where he played open-air concerts.
"I would sit in the orchestra at rehearsals," Slava remembers. "But it's
difficult to define what are the special qualities of a conductor. Many
conductors I know don't understand music at all. They know how to give a
beat without knowing anything about music."
He picked up tips from such monumental figures as Wilhelm Furtwangler and
Carlo Maria Giulini. He remembers one intriguing encounter with Herbert von
Karajan, who slipped away from a recording session in west Berlin to hear
Slava conducting Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin with the Bolshoi opera in east
Berlin.
Backstage, Rostropovich mentioned that he was having great difficulty in
getting his chorus of merrymaking peasants to synchronise with the
orchestra in the opening scene.
"Herbert said: 'Ah! You must hold your hands high and conduct only the
choir, and say to the orchestra, don't watch my hands, just come in when
you hear the choir.' It worked perfectly. It's very interesting - when the
musicians don't see the conductor, each one has to make contact with his
neighbour. It's like glue, and it brings out a new quality of sound."
The London Symphony Orchestra Birthday Gala Concert in Slava's honour on
March 27 brings together an extraordinary roster of international talent,
including violinists Maxim Vengerov and Gidon Kremer, pianists Martha
Argerich and Evgeny Kissin and conductors Colin Davis and Zubin Mehta. If
you can judge an artist's worth from the respect he commands from his
peers, Rostropovich has established his own gold standard.
But for all the public clamour surrounding his achievements, and even
though his publicist likes to send out a list of his awards and accolades
that runs to 12 closely-typed pages, Slava claims that peace of mind is his
most valued asset. He often expounds the theory that it has been the
suffering endured by the Russian people that has produced so many great
writers and musicians, and he is proud of his refusal to crack under the
pressure of the communist regime.
He and Vishnevskaya harboured the dissident writer Solzhenitsyn in the
Seventies. When the decree on musical "formalism" left Prokofiev and
Shostakovich ostracised in 1948, Rostropovich refused to turn against them.
"Now I come to 75 years of age, I think what's most important in life is
your conscience," he reflects. "If you told a lie and made other people
suffer, I think that's very difficult when you reach this age.
"In 1948, when this decree was made against Shostakovich and Prokofiev,
many musicians - to make their own lives more comfortable - said, 'Ah, now
the Communists open our ears and we understand that they are bad composers.'
"Within two weeks, Prokofiev had lost 95 per cent of his friends and
admirers. But if you search, you will not find one word that I said against
my idols. We stood like soldiers together because I would not tell a lie.
That is why I'm so happy now."
Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev stripped Rostropovich of his citizenship in
1978, when he was working in America as music director of the National
Symphony Orchestra. It came as a kind of release. Even he was feeling
beaten down by decades of Soviet rule, where friends could only speak
truthfully to each other when stupefied with vodka.
"The next morning your friend would call and say, 'Slava, I was so drunk I
can't remember a word I said,' and I would say, 'Same with me, I also
remember nothing.' It was like a secret - a kind of security."
Although devastated at being disowned by his homeland, he made the best of
his exile by turning himself into a global citizen.
The London celebrations will reflect his stature as musician, humanitarian
and remorseless party-goer, while also being merely the latest fruits of a
warm relationship with the LSO dating back to 1987 and the occasion of
Slava's 60th birthday. He conducts the orchestra in works by three
composers to whom he has felt personally and artistically closest:
Prokofiev, Shostakovich and Britten ("the three titans in my life").
Fifteen years ago, two other London orchestras were dithering over the
costs and obstacles of hosting a mammoth Slavathon. Although the LSO was
broke, its manager, Clive Gillinson, sensed a rare opportunity. "I went to
Slava's agent and I said, 'We'll do it and we'll find the money.'
"It was totally rash on my part, but he was bowled over that this bankrupt
orchestra was volunteering to get the job done, and he thought he'd go with
these lunatics. It was a turning point for the LSO, and since then he's
really been at the centre of our life.
"Like any great artist, he's not completely impervious to material rewards,
but I think because he had such a terrible time in the Soviet Union, the
things that mean most to him in life are friendship and loyalty."
The icing on the cake will be a special concert in his honour at Buckingham
Palace on March 26, a kind of miniature pre-echo of the all-star Barbican
event the following evening.
The guests have been personally invited by Prince Charles, who got to know
Rostropovich when he studied the cello in his youth.
Slava is delighted that he doesn't have to perform. "When Clive Gillinson
was here in Paris for my 70th birthday celebrations, I did not play one
note or make one gesture for the orchestra," he gurgles gleefully."I was,
from the morning, very drunk. That's so nice!"
The Rostropovich 75th Birthday Series is at the Barbican from March 14
******
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