Johnson's Russia List
#6579
29 November 2002
davidjohnson@erols.com
A CDI Project
www.cdi.org
[Contents:
1. Interfax: Some 60% of Russians believe in God - poll.
2. Interfax: Russia's population at 145.1 million - early census results.
3. Reuters: Russia may face huge bill to treat AIDS-World Bank.
4. Luba Schwartzman: TV1 Review.
5. Novaya Gazeta Digest.
6. Wall Street Journal: Yelena Bonner, A Prisoner in Copenhagen.
7. Los Angeles Times: Robyn Dixon, In the Caucasus, a Foreign Element
Threatens. Arabs lived quietly in a Georgian village, then left, perhaps to
fight in Chechnya. Suspected militants from abroad have been arrested.
8. The Guardian (UK): Nick Paton Walsh, Grozny, where recovery is still
just a word. Russia wants to show off success in the Chechen capital, but
reality defeats it.
9. pravda.ru: The World Bank Confesses Its Sins. The World Bank
acknowledged
that its activity in Russia was useless for the last decade.
10. AFP: Bolshoi's ultra-modern new stage fails to meet old standards.
11. Wall Street Journal: Marina Rozenman, Two Moscow Chefs Rejuvenate
Classic Russian Cuisine, Lightly.
12. www.fednews.ru: PRESS CONFERENCE WITH FOREIGN AND DEFENSE POLICY
COUNCIL
HEAD SERGEI KARAGANOV AND POLITIKA FOUNDATION PRESIDENT VYACHESLAV NIKONOV.]
********
#1
Some 60% of Russians believe in God - poll
MOSCOW. Nov 29 (Interfax) - Approximately 60% of Russians believe in God,
according to a poll of 2,000 adults conducted by the Romir Research Center.
As many as 21% believe in a Supreme Force, Spirit or Reason, while 16%
do not.
Orthodox Christianity is practiced by 69%, Islam is practiced by 2.5%
and Buddhism by 0.4%. Other types of Christianity are practiced by almost
3% and another 1% practices other religions. Some 22% are atheists.
A total of 46% of the respondents do not have time to pray. Roughly 14%
pray on a daily basis, 10% pray once a week and 9% pray once a month. About
7% of those polled pray twice a year and 10% pray less frequently.
*******
#2
Russia's population at 145.1 million - early census results
MOSCOW. Nov 29 (Interfax) - The preliminary results of Russia's national
census suggest that the country's population is 145.1 million. The previous
census in 1989 showed a total of 147 million, said Vladimir Zorin, Russia's
Ethnic Policy Minister.
These figures refute dire forecasts that the country's population could
drop below 140 million to about 137 million.
*******
#3
Russia may face huge bill to treat AIDS-World Bank
November 29, 2002
By Andrew Hurst
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia, grappling with one of the fastest rates of HIV
infection in the world, faces a huge bill it can ill afford if hundreds of
thousands develop full-blown AIDS in years to come, a World Bank economist
said.
Christof Ruehl, the World Bank's chief economist in Russia, said Friday
that although there are 220,000 registered cases of HIV infection in the
country, the real number of people who are infected with the deadly virus
could be more than a million.
"According to our estimates 800,000 to 1.2 million is roughly the range of
where it (HIV infection) is," Ruehl told Reuters.
HIV infection has spread like wildfire among Russia's large population of
narcotic drug users through needle-sharing for intravenous injection.
Russia's top AIDS specialist, Vadim Pokrovsky, earlier this week warned
that at least half a million Russians will die from AIDS by 2010 -- even
though only about 800 people have so far been diagnosed as suffering from
the disease.
A report prepared by Ruehl on the likely economic consequences of Russia's
looming AIDS crisis paints a bleak picture of an economy continuing to grow
but straining to pay for public medical treatment as the epidemic spreads.
Russia's biggest challenge will be to offer expensive anti-AIDS drugs free
to patients in a country where most people are far too poor to pay for them
out of their own pockets.
"You will see people dying in Russia on a massive scale after 2005-06 if
they don't get the drugs," said Ruehl.
"The fiscal costs will blow the budget at current retroviral treatment
prices."
Foreign anti-AIDS drug treatments sell in countries like China, which also
faces an HIV crisis, for about $10,000 a year while locally produced
cocktails sell for a few hundred dollars.
Ruehl estimated that treating the HIV-infected population at a cost of $900
per person per month would soak up more than 80 percent of Russia's current
annual federal budget. However, if treatment can be provided for only $30
per month per patient, the cost would eat up less than 2.72 percent of the
budget.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia's health service has
steadily deteriorated due to lack of funds, and the sick often pay to
receive adequate treatment.
The AIDS threat to Russia's economy is particularly acute because low
average life expectancy among men is driving down the nation's total
population by about 800,000 a year.
"This combination of high HIV transmission rates and a decreasing
population really aggravates the problem," he said.
Many African countries have suffered devastating AIDS epidemics but their
populations have continued to grow because of high birth rates, said Ruehl.
Infection rates in Russia have fallen off in recent months but Ruehl said
it would probably take another six months to determine whether infection
was really in decline or not.
******
#4
TV1 Review
www.1tv.ru
Compiled by Luba Schwartzman (luba_sch@hotmail.com)
Research Analyst, Center for Defense Information, Moscow office
HEADLINES
Thursday, November 28, 2002
- Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah is in Moscow for a visit. He
will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and other government
representatives. The prevention of drug transit from Afghanistan to Russia
is on the agenda.
- Lithuanian Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis declared that the Information
Center of Ichkeria, located in Vilnius, will be closed if reliable
information links it to terrorist activity.
- Russian President Vladimir Putin met with representatives of Russia's
organizations for the handicapped. Putin emphasized the need to continue
developing the positive trend of improving conditions for the handicapped in
Russia. Certain changes in Russian tax legislation that may affect
employment of the handicapped will be discussed by the Cabinet.
- The General Prosecutor's office has restarted a criminal case against
State Fishery Committee Leonid Kholod. His case is among the 104 that are
related, though not directly, with the investigation of the murder of
Magadan Governor Valentin Tsvetkov.
- Chechen Administration Head Nikolai Babich promised to pay compensations
to migrants who agree to return to the republic. Each person will receive
20 rubles daily for bread and rent.
- Representatives of media organizations, the Duma and the Federation
Council discussed new version of the Law on the Media, prepared by the
Industrial Council.
- Famous Russian animation character Masyana will help the Red Cross in a
campaign to improve AIDS awareness.
- According to a public opinion survey conducted by ROMIR, 60 percent of
Russians believe in God; 20.9 percent believe in abstract higher powers; and
16.5 percent do not believe in a superior being at all. Half of the
respondents said that they do not have time to pray.
- A new annual award for journalists "PRESSzvanie," has been established by
the Moscow Association of Entrepreneurs and the Union of Russian
Journalists. Russian and foreign journalists writing about the Russian
economy will be eligible.
- Russia and the EU will conclude an agreement that will ease the
deportation of illegal immigrants.
- The Russian Cabinet approved currency regulation measures that will allow
Russians to open accounts abroad.
- In Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, garbage has not been collected for 4 days and
roads are covered with snow. 900 housing and utilities workers on the
Kamchatka continue their strike, demanding the payment of owed wages.
- The trial of 24-year-old Chechen terrorist Aslambek Abubakarov, member of
the Dzhamaat band formation, is beginning in Pyatigorsk.
- Rescue workers in the Karmadon Gorge are continuing to look for the
entrance to the tunnel where victims of the glacier that moved in two months
ago may have been hiding.
- A meeting to discuss the distribution of power between central and local
authorities was held in Moscow. State Duma Speaker Gennady Seleznev noted
that the 1993 Consitution left many underground mines that we are stumbling
across now.
- Five former KGB officers are on trial for "crimes against humanity" in
Tallinn, Estonia.
- Russia will launch 8 international ecological monitoring satellites from
the Plesetsk cosmodrome over the next two years.
- State Duma Deputy Valentin Letnev was attacked last night in his home on
Mitino Street. An investigation has been initiated.
- Christian Orthodox believers are beginning the Christmas Fast, which will
last until January 7th.
- A rabid wolf attacked residents in a Maritime Region settlement.
Seventeen people have been hospitalized and received rabies shots. One
person died despite the treatment. Dozens of animals have been put to
sleep.
*******
#5
Novaya Gazeta Digest
No. 88, Monday, 28 November 2002
Compiled by Luba Schwartzman (luba_sch@hotmail.com)
Research analyst at the Moscow office of the Center for Defense Information
LEADING ARTICLE. "Policemen, prosecutors and bandits have found each other.
They do business together," asserts Roman Shleinov. Here's what happened:
Criminal entrepreneurs illegally acquired expensive cars abroad. Unafraid
of customs officials, bypassing all laws, they delivered them to Russia,
registered them – once again, illegally -- and sold them to wealthy
citizens. Without having people in place, they wouldn’t have succeeded.
They needed someone to get the registrations, the right documents. The
scheme, formulated over the years, would have kept working, except the
conspiracy involving lower-ranked police officials reached up and drew in
their superiors. And where there’s a police chief, there’s a prosecutor.
In the end, the hereto unknown businessmen, paying cuts to major as well as
minor law enforcement officers, were starting to run out of money. So they
decided to make the owners of the import cars pay twice. An investigation
has been initiated. We will continue our journalistic investigation. We
think it will be rather interesting and consequential.
SPECIAL REPORT. “The future of opposition in Russia is inseparable from the
anti-military movement. Everything else is a bidding war for power,” writes
Novaya Gazeta columnist Boris Kagarlitskiy. For the powers that be, only
the convergence of various forms of protest poses a danger. Things change
when the opposition not only converges, but also focuses its protest against
concrete institutions or key elements of the system. In Russia, where the
government is becoming more authoritarian, we are talking not only about the
protection of democratic freedoms, but also about the fact that social and
anti-war protest is the only effective way to defend civil liberties. The
Russian opposition has been paralyzed by fear since 1993. It fights the
government only by means the government permits, and only on questions the
government designates. The future of the leftist opposition in Russia is
inseparable from the future of the anti-war movement. This is not only
because events in Chechnya go against all international conventions on human
rights as well as the Russian legislation. The current Chechen opposition
is unlike the classical national liberation movement. The war is waged
mainly against civilians, and not against the fighters. The subject of the
Chechen has been handed off to the liberal opposition, which the government
does not mind for two reasons. First of all, while criticizing the
president for his anti-democratic measures, it supports him on everything
else. Second, it is ineffective in principle. It approves the system while
criticizing its concrete manifestations. It is pointless to criticize Putin
for not wanting to conclude a peace, since for him peace is not an option.
Demanding an end to the war and economic and social order in Russia is
paramount to asking a wolf to become a vegetarian. The Russian leftist
movement will be supported only when it proves that it can combine social
demands with democratic and anti-war ones.
ISSUE DETAILS. “Why aren’t war expenses a separate budget item?” asks
Novaya Gazeta columnist Irina Gordienko of State Duma Defense Committee
Deputy Chairman Aleksei Arbatov. It hasn't been since the first Chechen
campaign. Back then there was already talk of a separate budget section for
Chechnya, but, unfortunately, few supported such transparency. No one wants
to reveal the true amount of the expenses. The general situation
demonstrates that, despite all of its declarations, the government is unsure
of its policy. When the Americans conduct an operation in Afghanistan or
Iraq, they calculate and publish all of their expenses. They don’t care who
says what -- they are sure they are right. In the Chechen conflict,
however, we are fighting not only armed separatism, but also international
terrorism. We are right, so why all the insecurity? Considering the
current public opinion, a separate budget clause would be supported on the
whole. Especially since this spending goes towards saving the lives of our
soldiers, and insufficient financing will be paid for in blood. But -- this
isn’t likely to happen...
PRESSURE POINT. When the Svobodny space station was being constructed in
the Amur Oblast six years ago, the military promised that the rockets would
not be fueled by the highly toxic heptanol fuel. We signed an agreement on
arms reduction with the US at the end of the cold war. Now, Strela class
rockets are subject to reduction as well. They are supposed to be
converted. But the military thinks -- instead of throwing away good stuff,
let's use it for civilian purposes -- launching civilian satellites. They
are not under the current agreement, so our commanders will probably
continue launching them after 2007 as well. Vladimir Lupandin, M.D., read
of research at the Geology Institute of the Russian Academy of Science said:
Our experimental experience shows that heptanol launches have adverse
effects on civilians and, above all, children. For example, in 2002,
immediately after the liquidation of RS-20 missiles in the Aleisk region of
the Altai Krai, the rate of children digestive problems, dermatitis and
hyperthyroidism in children increased. Almost all children in the region
were affected. Then, children were increasingly diagnosed with leukemia --
over 2000 the number of cases tripled. It’s difficult to say what will
happen later. Will the Amur Oblast and Yakutia turn into an ecological
disaster area on a whim of the "compassionate commanders" who felt sorry for
the written-off missiles? Or will human lives be considered more important
than the poisonous missiles? To be practical, liquidating the aftermath of
the heptanol launches will cost the government much more than the conversion
of the Strels. For details, read Yekaterina Ignatova’s article.
Contact information for the Novaya Gazeta Digest (in Russian)
(095) 923-9485
www.novayagazeta.ru
********
#6
Wall Street Journal
November 29, 2002
A Prisoner in Copenhagen
By YELENA BONNER
Ms. Bonner, chair of the Andrei Sakharov Foundation, is the widow of the
late Dr. Sakharov. Alex Goldfarb, the vice-president of the Foundation for
Civil Liberties, assisted with this essay.
A man is waiting in a Copenhagen jail for a decision that may send him to
his death. Akhmed Zakayev, a Chechen, has been accused of terrorism in an
extradition warrant issued by Russia . But he is no terrorist. He is an
actor, a director, a diplomat, a statesman, a Chechen who has agitated for
a decent political solution to the crisis in his country. Among Chechen
rebels, he is the staunchest advocate of a political settlement, the
strongest opponent of militant Islamists. The Chechen rebellion has a
sordid side, but he is not a part of it.
Then why does Russia want him extradited? Because the demonization of
Akhmed Zakayev is something required by President Vladimir Putin to make a
point. He badly needs to show his war-weary people and the rest of the
world that the hard line that had brought him to power was and still is the
only option, that there is no such thing as a moderate Chechen. And to
claim that Europe accepts Russia as a civilized nation by handing over a
suspect without fear that he would be killed or tortured.
Yet if Mr. Zakayev is extradited, he is likely to be tortured -- a common
practice in Russia's jails -- or will simply disappear, as has happened
with two other senior Chechen officials in Russian custody. On a larger
scale, extradition of Mr. Zakayev will give the Russian army license to
kill more civilians and legitimize official discrimination of Chechens and
other ethnic minorities. It will also embolden Chechen radicals, undermine
moderates and bury all hopes for peace in Chechnya.
Surely, Danish authorities know all that. Yet, there are at least three
reasons why they are hard-pressed to decide against Mr. Zakayev. First,
Denmark is obligated to Russia as a fellow member of the Council of Europe.
The membership could be construed as an automatic clean bill of health of a
civilized nation -- a guarantee of due process, fair trial, humane
treatment, for Mr. Zakayev. Should that not be the case, it would seem,
Russia would not have been in the club. This logic is faulty; it
substitutes substance for form, and requires Europe to look the other way
in the face of sham trials, torture, massive human-rights violations and
war crimes.
Secondly, there is tremendous behind-the-scenes pressure on Denmark,
diplomatic and otherwise. The political stakes in Mr. Zakayev's case cannot
be higher; failure to have him extradited would be a major embarrassment
for Mr. Putin. Thus, no effort is spared to "convince" Denmark to oblige.
Suddenly, Danes applying for Russian visas are being told to go take an
AIDS test, and trucks with Danish imports are singled out for indefinite
waiting at Russian customs control. Hopefully, such petty arm-twisting will
have an opposite effect. Once before, Danes set a benchmark of moral
behavior in the face of brutal force, when they all put on yellow stars in
defiance of Nazi orders. They should be just as stubbornly moral this time
around.
Finally, there is the war on terror. Russia's minor transgressions, we are
told, may be tolerated in the face of a common struggle against a greater
evil. Isn't Mr. Zakayev, and in fact Chechnya, a small price to pay to
reward an ally? This would be a grave mistake, a repetition of the debacle
of Yalta, when a democratic alliance, preoccupied by the fight against a
greater evil, failed to recognize a menace that would terrorize the world
for 50 years.
Today Russia is at a crossroad. It has a great potential as a democracy,
but harbors even a greater danger to the world as a nationalistic police
state. Extraditing Mr. Zakayev would encourage the worst in Russia ,
demoralize the best, and could tip the balance in the worst direction. We
can only hope that Denmark will not fail to recognize the historic
dimension of the Zakayev affair.
********
#7
Los Angeles Times
November 29, 2002
In the Caucasus, a Foreign Element Threatens
Arabs lived quietly in a Georgian village, then left, perhaps to fight in
Chechnya. Suspected militants from abroad have been arrested.
By Robyn Dixon, Times Staff Writer
TSINUBANI, Georgia -- TSINUBANI, Georgia -- In a small Georgian village
where strangers are rarely seen, the foreigners bought a house and kept to
themselves. Sometimes they borrowed a hammer or an ax from a neighbor,
speaking broken Russian and using sign language to convey their need.
There were five Arabs in the house, according to locals in this village in
the Pankisi Gorge about 30 miles from the Russian border. They had a black
prayer banner pinned to an inside wall and a satellite dish, both left
behind when they melted into the forests in August, along with the dozens
of Chechen fighters who had made the village their base.
They also left a slogan, painted in Russian and Arabic on a shed near their
house: "Paradise in the shade of sabers."
"They lived with us and then one night they just left," said Grigory
Tsarigov, a 79-year-old villager. "We don't know where they went. They
didn't understand our language and we didn't understand theirs. Whatever
they wanted they asked with their hands."
Locals say the Arabs were in this remote village to fight on the side of
separatist guerrillas against Moscow's forces in the neighboring Russian
republic of Chechnya.
"If you look at the village of Tsinubani, three to four months ago it was
mainly occupied by Chechen fighters and Arab terrorists," said Paata
Batiashvili, head of the Kakhetia district division of Georgia's Ministry
of State Security. He is responsible for operations in the Pankisi Gorge.
Tsinubani's Arabs disappeared. But about 15 non-Chechen foreigners,
including Arab militants, have been arrested by Georgian authorities in the
gorge in recent months. Some of the detainees have been linked to Al Qaeda
and other terrorist groups.
Georgian officials say the foreign fighters were handed over to U.S.
authorities. A Pentagon spokesman said last week that no guerrillas had
been turned over to the American military. "We don't have them. They were
not turned over to us," Maj. Tim Blair said.
The Georgian operation marked a step forward for this small Black Sea
nation, whose security forces in the past were fragmented, corrupt and
incompetent.
But State Security Minister Valerian Khaburdzania recently said that about
100 Arabs and 700 Chechen fighters had been in the gorge early this year
before the operation began to sweep the area clean -- meaning many more
have disappeared, probably fleeing to neighboring Chechnya.
"We had contacts with the leaders of the armed groups," Khaburdzania said.
"We offered their people a choice of laying down their arms and becoming
ordinary refugees like everyone else or leaving our territory. Otherwise
we'd have to use force against them."
The Chechen fighters and many Arabs left quietly in small groups without a
fight.
Further steps are planned to remove the 40 to 60 fighters believed to be
still in the Pankisi Gorge, which borders Chechnya. About 20 are Arabs,
according to Georgian officials.
The gorge has been a lawless region where money and arms have been funneled
to Chechen guerrillas, particularly to Khattab, a rebel commander linked to
Al Qaeda who was killed by Russian forces in March. But even as of this
spring, U.S. and Georgian officials believed that only a handful of Arabs
with potential terrorist connections were in the area.
In Tsinubani, some of the Chechen fighters lived in empty houses, while
others stayed with locals who are Kists -- ethnic Chechens born in Georgia.
The Chechens and Arabs fled into the hills in the month before Georgian
forces blockaded the village Sept. 18, running a house-to-house sweep for
rebels. Seventeen Chechens were arrested, but all were found to be refugees
from the war between Russian troops and rebels in their homeland. They were
released.
Russian officials have demanded the extradition of eight Chechens arrested
crossing from Chechnya into the Pankisi Gorge over the summer. Georgia has
referred the case to the European Court of Human Rights. Five other
Chechens were turned over.
Even before Chechen rebels seized about 700 hostages in a Moscow theater
last month, Russian President Vladimir V. Putin had threatened military
strikes to wipe out rebels taking shelter in Georgia. After the takeover
ended Oct. 26 with security forces storming the theater, leaving 129
captives and about 50 rebels dead, Russia increased its pressure on Georgia
over the Chechens' presence in the gorge.
The theater siege severely damaged the Chechen cause internationally, with
the U.S. embracing Russia's line that rebel leader and former Chechen
President Aslan Maskhadov should be excluded from any peace talks.
But in the Pankisi Gorge, the view among Chechens and Kists of the
hostage-taking is very different.
"It was a cry of despair," said Musa Magomedov, 31, from the Chechen city
of Urus-Martan, a former fighter who carries a refugee ID card. "I know a
girl from a village called Gekhi. Six of her brothers were killed. Her
mother and father were killed in this war.
"A year ago the Russians took her away and they cut her body with knives
and put out cigarettes on her skin. Who can guarantee that she would not
pull off that sort of act [like the hostage-taking] in the future?"
Magomedov said he has given up fighting, though he still has a good pair of
military boots by his door. He left Chechnya in 1999 "because I did not
want to be slaughtered like a lamb." But he's sure his year-old son will
one day be a rebel fighter.
"I'll teach him that he should take up arms and fight," Magomedov said.
"I'm just a patriot. My heart aches for the Chechen land. Maybe my son will
be the next shahid [martyr] in our family."
Russia's military campaign in Chechnya has been condemned by human rights
organizations, which in particular criticize the zachistki -- mopping-up
operations -- in villages where Russians sweep in, seize dozens of men and
boys, many of them civilians, and loot and pillage. Many of the detainees
are never seen again.
But after the Sept. 11 attacks, U.S. disquiet about links between the
Chechen rebels and Al Qaeda led the Bush administration to mute its
criticism of Russia's military campaign.
American fears were confirmed when Georgian intelligence said that about
100 Arabs were in the gorge at one point. The reported arrest of Saif al
Islam el Masry, a member of the Al Qaeda military committee, in the area
this summer was further confirmation of the terrorist threat.
Batiashvili, the Ministry of State Security official from Kakhetia, which
includes the gorge, said the Arabs in the Pankisi opened a powerful
communications center in the village of Lower Khalatsani. In recent months,
security forces have confiscated CD-ROMs with terrorist training manuals;
satellite phones, dishes and phone interception devices; radios and two
carloads of military uniforms.
"We closed down two Arab schools in August. Every single fighter had a
sophisticated radio. In the State Security Ministry, we don't have the kind
of equipment they had," Batiashvili said. "There were many terrorist
training manuals on how to take hostages, how to make explosive devices,
defensive and offensive operations, how to shoot down planes."
Batiashvili said messages uncovered by security forces also suggested that
the Arabs were planning terrorist attacks against Russian or Western
targets in the region.
Kakha Kobakhidze, chief of Georgia's Internal Security Department, said
forces found videocassette recordings of rebel attacks in Chechnya --
including killings of civilians.
"I saw one cassette with a Russian woman crossing the road with her child.
They fired a grenade at them and the woman was left alive, but her child
was blown up. She was left holding just her child's arm," Kobakhidze said.
Nika Laliashvili, spokesman for the Ministry of State Security, said that
among the Arabs were religious emissaries, financial couriers and fighters
with links to terrorist organizations.
"They spent two years sitting there," he said. "It was comfortable. They
were recruiting people to fight in Chechnya through the Internet."
After Russia's sharp threats of military intervention, Putin and Georgian
President Eduard A. Shevardnadze met early last month and reached a deal on
greater cooperation between both nations' border guards and intelligence
services.
That deal eased Russia's pressure on Georgia -- until the Moscow hostage
crisis created new tremors in the relationship.
The departure of most of the fighters, without major bloodshed or loss of
civilian life, is something Georgian officials are quietly gloating about.
But they face another threat in coming weeks. With Russia launching
operations in Chechnya in retaliation for the Moscow hostage crisis, there
is a threat that the Chechen and Arab fighters who deserted the Pankisi
Gorge might be forced to return.
The mountain passes will soon close for the winter. If the fighters stay in
Chechnya, they face the threat of annihilation. If they return to Georgia,
Russia will demand their extradition, creating a new political headache for
Georgia.
Times staff writer Esther Schrader in Washington and Alexei Kuznetsov of
The Times' Moscow Bureau contributed to this report.
********
#8
The Guardian (UK)
November 28, 2003
Grozny, where recovery is still just a word
Russia wants to show off success in the Chechen capital, but reality
defeats it
Nick Paton Walsh in Grozny
Aslan lost two friends before he turned 16 this year. A young Chechen who
moved to Grozny from the volatile region of Vedeno when he was 10, he is a
prime candidate for a Russian clean-up operation designed to intercept
"terrorists", or "potential terrorists".
But so far he has been lucky, he says, despite last year losing his friend
Rusul, 18, to a missile explosion, and Rustan, 16, six months later, to a
landmine.
"There is no life to live here", he said, fidgeting nervously on a street
in Grozny patrolled by Russian soldiers. "Every night in the town there is
unrest, and murders. Several times a week there are clean-up operations.
"We are all against the Russians. If they left it would be all right again
here. In Grozny there are snipers, checkpoints. If you have a good car,
they stop you and take it away."
He has a small scar on his cheek. "We all have scars, all over." he says.
"You would be a fool not to be afraid here. Nobody knows the names of the
killers. But where can I go from here? There is nowhere else for Chechens."
Things are little different from the other side of the line, despite
Russian officials insisting they have Chechnya "105% under control".
Anatoli, 20, is a Russian conscript from Omsk. He toys with his sleeve as
he mumbles about his six months based near Grozny. "There is fighting and
shooting every night in town."
Many rebel fighters are in the surrounding region, he says. "Have we lost
our people? Yes. But, for the present, none were friends of mine."
Since the second Chechen war of the 90s came to a close in April 2000, the
killing has gone on under different guises - to use Moscow's terms, of
"anti-terrorist clean-up operations", and "banditism by terrorists". For
every brutality there is a reprisal.
A little before some 50 gunmen burst on stage at the Nord Ost show in
southern Moscow to demand a Russian withdrawal from Chechnya, a group of
Russian soldiers had burst into a block of flats in Chechen-Aul. According
to human rights group Memorial, they led away eight men, aged from 20 to 77
years, whose whereabouts remain unknown.
Memorial has seemingly endless lists of the missing, which Russian
officials say are exaggerated.
Colonel Boris Podoprigora, the assistant commander of Russian forces in the
north Caucuses, said: "These lists are a political show for the
international community. A few days after they are published, the people
return home.
"Our soldiers are not angels, but many of these disappearances are from
Chechen internecine violence."
Yet the lists grow.
The world caught a glimpse of how both sides have given up on their
humanity recently when negotiators appealed to the Moscow theatre gunmen to
let children aged over 12 go free. They were told that back in Chechnya,
even pre-teen Chechen boys were targets for Russian sweeps, so Russian
teenagers were legitimate targets for Chechen reprisals.
But ordinary Chechens are tired of the killing. Some of them have been
beaten into submission. There is no longer enough left of Grozny to be
called a city. Everything has been brutalised beyond recognition. What were
once its ruins are now just piles of dust and litter. Its walls are worn
down to their concrete support struts.
Open fires inside the shells of blocks of flats keep the city's 300,000
people warm. Greyed cars and buses queue behind the city's numerous
checkpoints, on which edgy soldiers have scrawled the names of their
hometowns, and the warning: "Stop ten metres away or we shoot."
Two weeks ago, 30 passengers from a bus that had been machine-gunned were
brought into hospital, some with their legs missing.
Women scurry along pock-marked streets, laden with shopping. Getting to
school is a "nightmare", said Magammad, 17, a student at Grozny university,
"but it is the safest place. I live 2km away, but pass two checkpoints each
morning."
Amid Grozny's dust and chaos, a clothes line, a window or a lightbulb seem
opulent and out of place.
As part of the three-day tour choreographed by Moscow, we were driven past
a large building whose brand new, prim blue roof looked ridiculous in the
wreckage around it. Streets that have been carpet-bombed have shiny, new
name plaques. We are shown scaffolding, fresh concrete: a town on the mend,
perhaps wheeled out for our benefit.
At dusk, both Russian soldiers and Chechens rush home or back to base,
petrified of what night will bring in a city with no streetlamps. The dark
sky is only punctuated by the odd apartment with a light on, and by
gunshots and explosions.
On the Monday of our trip, three Russian soldiers were reported killed in
Grozny's central market. On Tuesday, the head of the Komsomolskaya region
was kidnapped, along with his son.
As Col Podoprigora says: "We speak of the quantity of our control in
Chechnya, but the quality of it is another matter."
Yet the Kremlin has peddled the same line since summer last year: life in
Chechnya is returning to normal, albeit slowly.
Major General Anatoly Kriachkov was mid-way through telling journalists
that life had improved in Grozny enough for ordinary Chechens to volunteer
to join the Moscow-led local police, when an explosion rattled the windows
of his office, and for a second wiped the fixed grin from his face.
He continued, outside, a few minutes later by saying Chechnya should be
part of a harmonious "multinational Russia", but a second explosion caused
his audience to duck, and his credibility to crumble. When they rose, he
said: "I don't know what that was."
In the past six months, both sides have become more galvanised towards
brutality. The theatre siege has strengthened Moscow's hawks.
'Systematic genocide'
Military officials say operations have not accelerated since the incident,
but human rights groups say that this "usual pace" of operations translates
as the systematic genocide of young Chechen men.
Even President Putin criticised the sweeps in the summer.
On the Chechen side, the moderate, elected president of the separatists,
Aslan Maskhadov, has lost out to the extremist Shamil Basayev, who sees his
struggle as that of the "international mujahedin" against infidels.
Mr Maskhadov made Mr Basayev his chief of military operations in August,
perhaps with the aim of reining him in before peace talks.
Yet it was Mr Basayev who ordered the Moscow theatre attack, pushing all
Chechen separatists into the sights of the "war on terror".
Washington, a firm advocate of a political solution, now refers to Mr
Mashkadov as "damaged goods".
On Saturday, Mr Basayev threatened more terrorist attacks if Russian troops
did not immediately withdraw from Chechnya. Few western states would
negotiate any kind of peace on such terms.
Now, instead of working towards some kind of talks, the Kremlin is busy
designing an administration for Grozny, run by pro-Moscow Chechens,
something which will do little to turn ordinary Chechens against the
radicals.
It is the extremists for whom this is a war without end; and it is lucrative.
In the bowels of Lubyanka, the Moscow headquarters of the Russian security
service, the FSB, the Guardian was shown a tape of teenage Russian
conscripts, filmed bleeding to death after their throats had been cut by
Chechen rebels. The FSB said the tape was used to raise funds from Gulf
state donors.
But there are spoils for others involved in the conflict, too. The Kremlin
recently reacted positively to a UN offer of help in controlling the
millions they pour into the Chechnya each year. "So much just 'disappears'
in their bureaucracy", said a senior UN source. "It apparently offends
Putin."
The shadow of war has also given organised crime a stronghold in an area
where guns and drugs can be moved easily, if a few palms are greased.
As one Russian soldier put it: "This war is not about us, or politics. It
is about power, and about money."
The personal details of the young Chechen men and Russian soldiers in this
article have been changed.
********
#9
pravda.ru
November 29, 2002
The World Bank Confesses Its Sins
The World Bank acknowledged that its activity in Russia was useless for the
last decade
The World Bank acknowledged in its latest report that its policy in Russia
has been incorrect since 1992. It was particularly said the policy of the
World Bank in Russia did not assist in the development of market relations
in the economy. This actually helped to prepare the financial crisis of
1998 and aggravated its consequences for the country.
Well, as it turns out, Russia’s problems are not only of its own making.
Dishonest, hypocritical foreign counselors are to blame. All the horrible
things that have appeared in Russia over the ten years of reform were
developed in a “correct” Russian way, so to speak. It does not take the
Russian people much to rejoice, really.
Russian media outlets pointed out that Russia still treats the World Bank
as a global money bag. “Give us some money, and we will decide how to spend
it.” The Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper wrote that the World Bank would like
to be not only to be creditor for Russia, but a political analyst as well.
In other words, the bank would like to evaluate the economic risks from the
point of view of the current policy. Does Russia need that? Moreover, the
World Bank will now make crediting decisions only if the bank is sure that
the political conditions are good for the success of the crediting programs.
The new directions of the relations between Russia and the World Bank came
up after a profound analysis of the bank’s previous activity in the
country. The report mentions that all its efforts were pointless in Russia
during the period of 1992-1998. The World Bank’s activity never helped to
set up the market economy. Needless to mention, Russia can only welcome
this criticism. However, the Russian authorities do not hurry to be
critical, in contrast to foreign bankers. They should, though.
The World Bank honestly acknowledged that it was completely dissatisfied
with the results of its activity. Its influence on the development of
Russia in 1992-1998 was rather humble, to put it mildly. The report says
that the World Bank’s credit programs were implemented only partially under
the conditions of insufficient political will. To all appearances, the
Russians had the desire to borrow money, but then they would send the money
to offshore zones or invested it in French real estate.
In this connection, the World Bank is not ready to claim the entire
responsibility for the failure of the majority of Russian reforms. Well,
this is correct, as the Russians would turn their noses up otherwise.
The World Bank justifies its incompetence by claiming that the moment when
the bank started working in Russia (in 1992) turned out to be a serious
challenge for it. The bank’s specialists did not know anything about Russia
at that time. They did not know what to do with Russia’s changing economy.
In addition, the administration of the bank now tries to lay the blame on
the political leaders of the West. The World Bank had to launch its
activity in Russia on account of shareholders’ pressure (i.e. the developed
countries, which put their money on Boris Yeltsin). The World Bank could
not say that it was actually crediting the change of a political system.
All it had to do was to declare its assistance for the creation of market
economy institutions and so on. Yet, the money was spent on completely
different purposes.
Nevertheless, the World Bank was devoted to its goals. It offered a series
of loans for the structural transformation of the economy. It became known
later that those loans were basically useless. Probably, Moscow did not
know how to approach the structural transformation of the economy. The
government was not certain that there any such need.
In addition, the World Bank showed its worth during the attempts to reform
the Russian coal industry. The coal industry currently is in the same
condition it was before. Market reforms started only after Moscow oligarchs
got their hands on it.
The World Bank assures that the international community made it take hasty
measures towards a lot of lending projects, including investments or budget
support. The Bank’s decisions were not thought-out well, and it was not
possible to predict their implementation. Risky operations became flops. A
bright example of these flops is the multi-billion loan for reforming the
banking system. The World Bank claimed that it did not have the influence
to overcome political and economic barriers in Russia in the 1990s.
Certain improvements of cooperation with Russia appeared in 1998. This was
the period when the thoughtless funding was replaced with analytical and
counseling aspects. The counseling activity of the World Bank played a very
small role before the crisis of 1998. However, this activity obtained a lot
of priority for the economic policy after the year 1998. As a matter of
fact, the World Bank now works according to the principle “little money,
more counseling.” Yet, it seems that Russia does not really expect anything
at all from this international organization.
After a decade of its activity in Russia, the World Bank has learned that
one should pay major attention to all political aspects of reforms. This is
the issue that determines the Bank's strategy towards Russia for the period
of 2003-2005. In other words, the World Bank realized that if there is no
political will or a strong government, any crediting program will only
hamper reforms.
Furthermore, the World Bank will now give loans only after the state
government starts adequate reforms. Thus, the Bank will first see what the
Kremlin can do. If the Bank believes that the strengthening of vertical
power brings harm to economy, it will not give any loans. Yet, the latest
activities of the Russian government show that the Kremlin does not care
much about the World Bank’s or any one else’s approval. At the present
moment, the burden of state loans is shifting over to internal loans.
Nevertheless, experts continue to think the West uses the World Bank and
its new approach to Russia for pulling the Russian government up. The
situation has changed a lot. It is now believed that Russia does not need
loans from the West anymore. Yet, Russian officials still consider the
World Bank as an investor. The Board of Directors of the Bank approved
several loans for the year 2002. They include a loan for the development of
budgetary federalism and the reform of the regional finance system for 120
million dollars; a loan for the development of the Federal Treasury for 231
million dollars, and a loan for the modernization of tax bodies for 100
million dollars. The bank is to assign $150 million for the struggle with
TB and AIDS in Russia.
However, those sums pale in comparison with what the Russian government
borrowed until 1998. The Kremlin will consider a hundred times whether or
not this money is worth listening to economic and political recommendations
from foreigners. By the way, the World Bank approved 55 loans of a total
sum of 12.6 billion dollars by end of the year 2001. Seven billion, eight
hundred million dollars of that sum were spent and 2.4 billion were
cancelled.
Kira Poznakhirko
PRAVDA.Ru
Translated by Dmitry Sudakov
********
#10
Bolshoi's ultra-modern new stage fails to meet old standards
November 29, 2002
AFP
Russia's world-famous Bolshoi theatre inaugurates a second stage with a
performance of Snegurochka opera but critics have panned the brand-new
development for its tacky looks and poor acoustics.
Visually the 900-seat hall, decked in white and pistachio green and
illumined by a mammoth three-tonne chandelier hanging from a ceiling
painted by contemporary artist Zurab Tsereteli, is a jarring sight compared
to the main scene.
In fact only golden rails and the "royal box" in the middle would remind
the visitor that one is actually in the Bolshoi, famed for its magnificence
of imperial gold and somber purple.
The new stage is of the same 21-meter (69 feet) length and 18-meter width
as the original one in the Bolshoi but the ceiling above is lower by five
meters.
Worse yet, the new hall, erected at the Bolshoi's side for a cost kept
scrupulously secret but estimated by the media at more than 60 million
dollars (euros), has proved a true headache for its architects and
acoustics engineers.
The subway tunnels passing underneath the building forced them to many an
arduous study and extensive isolation works but even after eight years of
labor the result leaves much to be desired.
"In that hall there are places where you can hear and others where you hear
nothing, some where you can understand what they are saying on the scene
and some where you cannot," nervously confided Elena Brilyova, who sings
the leading part in Friday's opera.
Even on the stage itself "the sound gets blurry very fast" she warned,
saying she feared this may complicate the performance.
The acoustics engineers struggle on to improve the hall's sound quality,
while admitting ruefully that the stone walls will never have the virtues
of the old hall's wooden ones.
The public will also get a disagreeable surprise -- the new hall has no
space to accommodate those wishing to take a stroll during intermissions.
But the Bolshoi annexe does have redeeming qualities, its supporters say.
As far as technical equipment goes, it is among the world's finest, with
lights, special effects and decorations all operated by computer.
"There is no better lighting anywhere in the world. I don't know how about
Paris's Opera Bastille but it can well compare with New York's
Metropolitan," boasted chief operator Sergei Rumkin.
But Rimsky-Korsakov's "Snegurochka", which was originally to be presented
on the Bolshoi's main scene, needs few of the special effects offered by
the new hall, the opera's director Dmitry Belov shrugged.
Belov nevertheless used its possibilities to spice up the rather bland
decor with some new surprises which may spark interest in his audience --
only to distract them from the action when the plot thickens.
As for the singers, what troubles them most is the lack of energy
permeating the Bolshoi's history-charged walls.
"It is like a new dress. One has to get used to it," Brilyova explained,
adding that it would take time for the new hall to acquire the soul its
sister hall is famed for.
Still the Bolshoi's director Anatoly Iksanov faced the hall's future
cheerfully.
"I would like to believe that no technical or psychological barrier will
hinder creative effort (on the new stage)", he said.
********
#11
Wall Street Journal
November 29, 2002
Two Moscow Chefs Rejuvenate Classic Russian Cuisine, Lightly
By MARINA ROZENMAN
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
MOSCOW -- Sushi bars are popping up all over Moscow these days, in a huge
contrast with the city's legendary food shortages of the past. But cabbage
and lard are also back, and they've never tasted better than in the hands
of chefs Andrei Makhov and Alexander Filin.
Mr. Makhov, chef at business-favorite Cafe Pushkin, and Mr. Filin, chef at
tourist-favorite 1, Red Square, are updating classic Russian dishes such as
Olivier salad (potatoes with smoked chicken, crawfish and game) and kurnik
(chicken pie with a pastry top).
On a recent Friday afternoon outside Cafe Pushkin, the doormen look like
the kind of bodyguards who watch over movie stars. An expensively suited
young Russian sits at the bar, talking on his mobile phone about a
billion-dollar deal he's just done in Siberia. The restaurant's tall and
burly manager, Alexander Vyacheslavovich Zaytsev, guides the way in an
old-fashioned lift to the first floor library for a meeting with the
executive chef, Mr. Makhov. Before the interview starts, Mr. Makhov makes
sure his two cellular phones -- one on the table, one in his chef's apron
pocket -- are switched on. "We never show the kitchen," he warns. "The
process of cooking should remain a mystery."
The 36-year-old chef started cooking by accident at the age of 16 when he
accompanied a friend to pass an exam to enter cooking school and was
accepted himself (his friend wasn't). He tried it, liked it and became a
cook in the army. In the 1980s, he prepared meals for the top leaders of
the Communist Party, and in 1990, he entered the famous Metropole Hotel
kitchen as its executive chef.
Mr. Makhov says he likes to cook with delight, quickly and with a light
hand, the same way he likes to eat. He believes that all dishes should
remind his clients of homemade food. "The taste of food should remind our
clients of the food which they remember from childhood, when their mothers
and grannies cooked for them," he says. "Simple but tasty food." Mr.
Makhov, who is himself married with two children, relaxes by going to his
datcha outside Moscow "to do nothing."
When the Soviet Union collapsed, Russians flocked to experience new
cuisines from the West arriving in their country. But three years ago,
restaurateur Andrey Dellos wagered on classical Russian cuisine and opened
Cafe Pushkin (named after a 1983 song, "Nathalie," by French singer Gilbert
Becaud, which tells the story of a Russian guide who casts a spell on her
visitor by taking him for a warm chocolate in an invented Cafe Pushkin).
Andrei Makhov was offered the position of chef.
Today, Cafe Pushkin's 19th century perfect mise en scene is the favorite
venue of businessmen, deputies from the nearby Duma and popular artists.
The ground-floor dining area looks like an old pharmacy, the first floor
like a library, and the basement bar, which opens at 6 p.m., a laboratory.
The restaurant counts 140 employees, including 90 waiters. Mr. Makhov has
four assistants and 12 captains.
Salavat V. Rezbaev, a 30-year-old Russian who is director of a
private-equity company, calls Cafe Pushkin his "canteen." He's back from
the U.S., where he's been working in New York in investment banking and
studying at Harvard Business School. He's been away from the city for five
years and praises Pushkin's unique setting, quick and efficient service
("which is not always the case in Russia"), and its classy and modern
clientele. Mr. Makhov says Russian cuisine was killed by poor-quality
Soviet-era cooking. He adds that true Russian cuisine was always good, its
reputation just suffered from Western stereotypes such as Russia being the
country of guns and mafia, or Russia not having any quality food. "Russian
cuisine is very flavorsome," he says.
Since he arrived in Moscow a year and a half ago from France, Xavier Van
Gaver, managing director for the consumer-products division of L'Oreal
Russia, has dined at Pushkin almost 20 times. "I systematically recommend
the Stroganoff beef to newcomers," he says. Other recommendations include
shti (cabbage soup) or Pozharskiye kutlet (chicken cutlets).
According to legend, these cutlets were first cooked by an innkeeper by the
name of Pozharsky from the small Russian town of Torzhok. A Russian czar
visiting the inn ordered veal cutlets, but Pozharsky had to use what he had
at hand -- chicken. He put the poultry cutlets on a veal bone to disguise
them. After the czar ate them and was very pleased, the innkeeper admitted
that he had deceived the monarch. But the czar liked the cutlets so much
that he ordered Pozharsky to supply them regularly to his royal table.
Later, Russian poet Alexander Pushkin wrote in one of his works that all
visitors to Torzhok should taste Pozharskiye cutlets.
Mr. Makhov likes to add some of his secret ingredients to the original
recipe. "We combine chicken and veal, and serve the cutlets with a mushroom
sauce. The cutlets are thick and extremely juicy," he says.
Cafe Pushkin is also popular for its desserts. Traditional recipes include
pancake pies, in which layers of pancakes are mixed with layers of cream.
Another dessert is Medovichok cake -- "med" is Russian for honey, and it's
added to the dough along with sour cream.
Russian cuisine is the food people used to eat a century or even two
centuries ago, Mr. Makhov says. Ordinary people gathered all the necessary
ingredients for cooking in woods and fields, grew various grains, and baked
their food in ovens. He says classical Russian cuisine isn't fully
acceptable to modern tastes, so it has to be treated as a basis, to which
he'll add something modern. "If I was following exactly the recipes from
the 18th century, nobody would eat them, because tastes changed," Mr.
Makhov says. "Now people want to eat light. They don't want too much butter
or vinegar."
But beware, light eaters: Mr. Makhov systematically looks at his customers'
plates when they leave. If the plate is empty, he's happy. When people only
try the dish but don't finish it, he asks the waiter what happened.
At 1, Red Square, Mr. Filin followed in the footsteps of a relative who was
a chef in a famous restaurant in Moscow called "National." Mr. Filin is
proud to say he worked himself up the ladder, from a vocational training
school for young cooks, to the title of "Russian master cook."
Five years ago, back from a successful stint as a chef at Russian embassies
in the Netherlands, Switzerland and the U.S., he opened 1, Red Square, a
restaurant inside the State Historical Museum, on Red Square. "I had been
advertising Russian cuisine around the world for 30 years in Russian
embassies," he explains, his chef's hat under his arm. In the late 1980s,
he worked in the embassy in Washington and later went to work in the
"Russia House," a private club in Washington. "The degree of responsibility
was very high," Mr. Filin says, noting he has prepared receptions for
Russian and for American presidents.
Today, you can find almost everything in Moscow, including the most
sophisticated kitchen tools. But at the time that Mr. Filin came back from
abroad, ingredients were lacking, and he felt like "an artist with bound
hands," he says. "It was like torture."
Having the restaurant located inside the museum had two direct
consequences: It attracted tourists and gave the chef access to archives
that describe historical dishes. The place inspired Mr. Filin to try to
revive aristocratic Russian cuisine. "I work with the so-called historic
cuisine, which was almost lost here, and I very carefully try to contribute
to its restoration," he says.
To some extent, opening such a place five years ago was quite a risk. Chefs
from all over the world were arriving in Moscow, and there was one cuisine
boom after the other -- an "Italian boom," a "French boom" and so on.
Russian food was considered plain and not very interesting.
But Mr. Filin had faith that classic Russian cuisine would find followers.
In the menu at 1, Red Square, each dish is given a historical explanation.
For instance, Bagration soup, a velvety veal cream soup, was created by the
chef of Princess Ekaterina Pavlovna, the widow of the famous Russian
general P.I. Bagration, the hero of the war against Napoleon in 1812. Asked
whether his menu is a faithful replica of the past, Mr. Filin explains that
it is based on written descriptions. "I don't know the way it looked...or
the way it tasted," he says. "I revise and change a little."
Mr. Filin's signature dishes include lamb with club kasha. He makes it the
way they cooked it in the Moscow English Club, which was famous for its
gourmet cuisine. It's roasted lamb and buckwheat groats with brains,
walnuts and porcini mushrooms. Another porridge served as a warm dessert,
Guryevskaya, dates back to the 19th century. It's made with fruit, nuts and
layers of baked cream, and was named after a Russian minister of finance.
Mr. Filin says it's been a culinary hit for two centuries, both in taverns
and aristocratic clubs.
Russians like to have a hearty meal and are known for their hospitality, so
Russian cuisine is characterized by numerous courses. Every month, 1, Red
Square proposes historic menus with as many as 13 courses, accompanied by
music from the same period, and references to famous Russian authors of the
time. "Russians like jellied food [cold fish or meat in jelly], they like
to add pickled cucumbers into soups ["solyanka" or "rassolnik" soups] and
to finish their meals with hot, sweet desserts," Mr. Filin says. "I
appreciate the tradition of Russian hospitality rooted in its past."
Besides taking care of his three grandchildren, Mr. Filin, 55, enjoys
reading histories of cooking during his free time. He unwraps a precious
package and explains its story. After reading an article about him in a
newspaper, a 95-year-old Russian woman gave him a notebook that has turned
yellow with time. The book contains recipes of her grandmother, who
dictated them to her when she was a child in 1912. It also contains
collected recipes from a gardener, a soldier and a clergyman. Today, some
of these recipes, which are as much as 150 years old, appear on 1, Red
Square's menu. Its traditional Easter cakes made with cardamom, nutmeg and
white raisins are very popular.
In the kitchen, down the basement, young men are cutting tomatoes, garlic
and meat, but they all have only one dream: "Everyone intends to visit
other countries to see how Western cooks work," Mr. Filin says. Whether
they'll come back with the intention of cooking European recipes or keep
preparing Russian cuisine, he can't say.
-- Svetlana Rubalskaya contributed to this article.
*********
#12
Excerpt
TITLE: PRESS CONFERENCE WITH FOREIGN AND DEFENSE POLICY COUNCIL
HEAD SERGEI KARAGANOV AND POLITIKA FOUNDATION PRESIDENT
VYACHESLAV NIKONOV
[INTERFAX NEWS AGENCY, 11:37, NOVEMBER 26, 2002]
SOURCE: FEDERAL NEWS SERVICE (http://www.fednews.ru/)
Moderator: Good day, colleagues. Let us begin our work. Our
press conference is devoted to the first issue of the new magazine
"Russia in Global Politics". The magazine is published with the
participation of the US "Foreign Affairs".
Our guests today are the chairman of the editorial board and
deputy director of the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy
of Sciences, Sergei Karaganov; deputy chairman of the editorial
board and the president of the Politika Foundation, Vyacheslav
Nikonov; the editor-in-chief of the magazine, Fyodor Lukyanov; and
the editor-in-chief of the English-language version of the
magazine, Mikhail Ozerov.
I think we will work in our traditional way. At first our
guests will make short introductory remarks and then we will move
on to your questions.
Karaganov: After six months of work we are beginning
celebrations devoted to the launching of a new magazine. We hope
that this will be an unprecedented magazine. First of all, it will
be scientific and educational rather than purely scientific or
political. The essence and the main objective of the magazine is to
educate the Russian elite, including the present and the future
ones, in what is happening in the outside world.
The main reason for the appearance of the magazine is the
growing gap between our dependence on the outside world and our
understanding of this outside world. This gap is becoming simply
dangerous. This is why we decided to launch this magazine. It will
never justify itself financially because a considerable part of its
circulation will be distributed for free. The web site that was
also launched today -- globalaffairs.ru -- will also be free for
all those who cannot receive, buy or subscribe to the magazine,
because subscription costs some money.
We plan to publish the magazine four times a year, maybe five
and then six. Since we want this magazine to be a top-class
magazine, and unfortunately over the past 10-11 years we have
largely lost our ability to analyze the world at the top-class
level, we decided that about half of the circulation or about 40
percent of it will be translated from foreign languages. We will
reprint the best articles from foreign publications.
Finally, there will be an English-language version. Its
circulation will be smaller and it will be sent to members of the
world elite, university libraries and Slav studies specialists. It
will contain, of course, original articles by Russian and foreign
authors written specially for us, and articles that are written
specially for each issue, as well as reprints from the best Russian
magazines by the best Russian authors who otherwise won't be able
to reach out to the world public.
I repeat, this will be an educational magazine. Therefore we
will welcome any reprints from our magazine. We have already seen
that some newspapers have reprinted, not in full, of course, but
reduced versions of many articles. Usually magazines object to
this, but we will support this. We will support quoting, we will
give practically free rights to quote because we understand that in
order to be successful this magazine must be accessible and
affordable to everybody and must be used all the time. This is its
main idea.
We are glad that this idea was supported by a group of leading
Russian businessmen. This magazine will never justify its costs.
You know, when people launch a magazine, they say that they will
break even in six months or a year. Of course, we will try to earn
some money by printing advertisements or through subscription, but
it can't be financially self-supporting in principle because it
pursues a totally different goal. It will be distributed for free
to a large extent.
So, we are glad that a large group of Russian businessmen has
decided to help the magazine on a long-term basis because this is
the first clear sign of new social responsibility on the part of
Russian business. People have agreed to invest just for the sake of
public wellbeing and public recognition. And they are contributing
rather big sums by Russian standards, and even international
standards.
Actually that is all. The magazine has already come out. You
will receive it and you will be able to read it. I think this is a
very good magazine, and we are quite happy, although it's wrong to
praise oneself. But we are very glad. Let's see how things will
stand after the 5th, 6th or the 20th issue....
Karaganov: And now we will give the floor to
Vyacheslav Nikonov, who is deputy head of the editorial board and
the contributor of one of the key articles in the first issue.
Nikonov: Thank you. In the last 80-odd years a huge cultural
and intellectual gap has opened between Russia and the rest of the
world. the current situation is -- and there I agree with Sergei
Karaganov -- that the Russian and Western elites speak different
languages and they find it hard to understand each other even at
the linguistic level.
On the other hand, our intellectual life, intellectual
ferment, everything that we say and write is totally unknown
outside the Russian Federation or perhaps Byelorussia, also perhaps
Ukraine and Kazakhstan. The rest of the world does not know about
Russian intellectual debates although, in my view, our intellectual
life is much richer than, say, the intellectual life of most
European countries.
This journal makes an attempt to bridge the gap, the gap in
perception of the surrounding world by the Russian elite and the
gap in the perception of Russian reality by the leaders of Western
countries. This is a formidable challenge, probably an impossible
challenge to meet, but this is the most serious such attempt made
in the last 85 years at least.
As for the content of the journal, I think it is worthwhile.
It is a quality journal. Naturally, my article is featured
prominently in the journal. In this article I have tried to present
an optimistic view of the world in the 21st century in which Russia
occupies a more important place than we think. There are two main
concepts of present-day international relations. One assumes that
the United States will predominate and lay down the law in the
foreseeable future. And the second concept is that since the United
States is sure to botch this job the world is heading for total
anarchy and ungovernability, a war of everyone against everyone, a
clash of civilizations -- the North against the South and so on.
I propose a third concept of the mega scenario of the
development of the world in the 21st century and I argue that,
first, the United States while being the only super power is not
the only power and that there are quite a number of powers and they
will all play big role in the world in the 21st century.
The United States is not unprecedented in its might. Even if
the Untied States accounts for 20-30 percent of the world economy
we know examples of countries which accounted for much more. In the
middle of the 18th century China produced more than a third of the
world output.
My other argument is that Russia is as indispensable as other
powers. Of late, America has been often described as "an
indispensable power". Well, America is probably a little more
indispensable than Russia, but Russia too is indispensable when it
comes to many issues. It is the world's ninth largest economy but
it can well be the world's sixth largest. It is the world's second
largest military power, it is a state on which depends the energy
security of the future, the fight against terrorism,
non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, the solution of the problems
of the Middle East, China and Korea and all the main problems of
our time.
And proceeding from this I draw the conclusion that actually
the world is moving neither towards the dominance of one power or
towards chaos, it is moving towards a concert, reverting to the
concert that existed in the 19th century after the Vienna congress.
It existed in Europe and it ensured peace on the European continent
for a hundred years. But after Russia returned into the world
system from which it dropped after World War I, the world system
was put together again, and it was put together on the global
scale, and what has been happening over the past decade, years and
months shows that the world is moving toward greater integrity and
greater concert of great powers which, in my view, have good
chances to secure at least a century of peace. However, this does
not mean that there may not be conflicts between greater powers,
but this surely means that there will be no armed clashes between
them.
Read the magazine. I think this is a good magazine. But there
is always room for improvement, of course. We will continue our
work, and I think that the gap I mentioned in the beginning, the
gap between Russia and the rest of the world after Russia has
returned to this world should close.
Moderator: Thank you, your questions, please....
Q: Radio Free Europe. Two questions. First, how will the
journal be distributed abroad? Will it be mailed free or will it be
sold and at what price, if you can tell me? The second question is
to anyone who cares to answer, perhaps, for Mr. Karaganov and Mr.
Nikonov. It's about Iraq. How do you assess the actions of the US
and do you think that the US has changed its stance and is not
seeking to remove Saddam Hussein?
Lukyanov: As for the distribution abroad, there are detailed
instructions at the end of the journal on how you can subscribe to
"Russia in Global Politics." But this applies to the Russian
version. There is also, for both Russian and English versions,
subscription via the editorial board. You can fill the form and
send it to us or through the company SU Publications, which is a
major distributor of Russian press abroad. You'll find all the
information there.
Initially it will be mailed free, but naturally we are not
going to provide it free for ever. For starters, yes, but
subsequently, we hope to distribute it by subscription. It is not
a high price for a publication of this kind.
Karaganov: But it isn't cheap either, about 50-60 dollars a
year, depending on the country. But of course initially we will
mail it out free. As for the Russian version we will distribute a
large part of the circulation free always. That is, libraries --
district, university and research libraries, to some individual
scholars, to provincial newspapers that cannot afford to pay for
such an expensive journal. We will always send it for free. After
a while we will send several copies abroad and then we will see the
response and coordinate our actions. By the way, it will also be
distributed through Aeroflot and part of the circulation will be
sold in retail outlets. But our main effort will go to the Russian
edition, the Russian edition will be four or five times larger than
the foreign editions.
But if you live abroad you can access our website for free. We
decided against charging for access to our site, at least the
English-language edition at the early stage will be free of access
in order to gain a foothold into the market. Perhaps, some day we
will start selling it abroad. In Russia, I hope, It will be free of
charge always.
And as for Iraq, let Slava take that question.
Nikonov: I will start. The question was the assessment of
American policy vis-a-vis Iraq. That policy is very consistent. The
United States undoubtedly seeks to deprive Iraq of mass destruction
weapons which, I think, it probably has, and that meets the
national interests of Russia. In any case, Saddam Hussein had mass
destruction weapons in the past, he used them against Iran and
against the Kurds. And I see no reason why he shouldn't have it
now.
In addition, the United States certainly pursues geopolitical
goals because Iraq has always been the geopolitical key to the
Middle East over thousands of years. And of course, it is solving
an important problem because the country which has the second
largest oil reserves in the world is under sanctions which
naturally complicates things in the oil market.
The motives are understandable. As for how valid this policy
will turn out to be, for the moment it is hard to say because the
consequences of American action in Iraq are unpredictable. Nobody
can say how it will end. I do not rule out that the Untied States
will score an easy military victory in Iraq, but it doesn't mean
that destabilization will not occur in Saudi Arabia, for example.
It doesn't mean that the Arab-Israeli conflict will not be
exacerbated. It doesn't mean that Turkish Kurdistan will not be
destabilized. So, the consequences are beyond conjecture. And these
consequences may be negative even for the United States, for Russia
and all the other countries.
So, Russia has no particular reason to egg the United States
on to start military actions. Especially since we too are unable to
predict the aftermath, including the most important consequences
for us, those connected with oil prices.
Of course, Russia shouldn't run ahead of the locomotive but,
realizing that the United States is still likely to go ahead with
the military operation -- I think that the decision has been made
80 percent or more -- we should try as far as possible to agree
with the United States on a number of concrete issues. These may
include more important issues connected with Russian participation
in the rehabilitation of Iraq, the building of new state structures
in Iraq, and also more particular issues connected with existing
contracts Russian companies have, for example, Zarubezhneft or
Lukoil, the contracts that should be preserved. Western Kourna is
an important oil field and Russia is interested in controlling it.
And if there is any chance of making a deal with the Americans, it
must be made.
Karaganov: Let me express my own opinion. I think the American
position is rapidly becoming more and more reasonable. While some
six months or nine months ago the overriding aim was to topple the
regime of Saddam Hussein and secondly, that America was prepared to
go it alone -- when they looked into the matter and started
figuring out the consequences -- the cost of the operation the fact
that after a major war the country would have to be occupied and
that occupation should have a human face -- it should be under the
UN aegis and so on -- they become aware of the price. First, the
resolve to attack has diminished and we can now speak about 80 or
70 percent while, six months ago there was 98 percent support for
an attack. Secondly, there is a new readiness to heed the
international community because the US wants the responsibility to
be shared. The evolution of the American position at the UN is
amazing and very positive.
Let me remind you that initially the position of the United
States was that it didn't care if it had an international mandate,
it was ready to start the war regardless, and let the UN perish.
But eventually a deal was struck on the terms that were practically
proposed by France and Russia.
So, one can say that the American position is getting closer
to the positions of the principal countries of the world community,
including Russia. This will mean also the possibility that -- if
Iraq violates the sanctions, if it fails to comply in good faith
with the resolution about inspections -- that Russia at least will
take a neutral-positive attitude to the possibility of a blow dealt
in order to deprive Iraq of weapons of mass destruction and of the
possibility to produce it.
After that, other possibilities for cooperation will open up
not only as regards oil and construction, but also as regards a
military-political settlement.
Nikonov: Incidentally, the change in the US position
brilliantly confirms the correctness of my article on the Concert
of Powers.
Moderator: Any questions?
Q: The newspaper Tribuna. I apologize for my answer somewhat
echoing what you said. I would like to ask Vyacheslav Nikonov to
give us his view as to the principles of harmonizing the interests
of business and the state outside Russia? This is one question.
Secondly, how do you assess the trend of Russian companies
getting transnational?
Nikonov: Well, as to the tendencies toward the interests of
business and the state getting harmonized outside Russia, then how
can it be so arranged that the Russian business would pursue a
policy not at variance with the interests of the state?
Q: So that the state would pursue a policy...
Nikonov: I understand, the state should pursue a policy
supporting Russian business. But we have practically answered the
question. Of course, there must be a mechanism of constant
consultations on the foreign economic activity between the
government and the state.
Generally speaking, this question has been resolved in all
countries. Meaning in normal countries. It would be impossible to
imagine a US corporation pursuing a policy at variance and counter
to the policy of the American state. Such a corporation can very
rapidly cease to exist or it will begin being plagued with serious
problems. This is to say that actually the state has a huge number
of levers to influence the behavior of its own economic players.
For this, the state should simply be aware of its interests.
I think the first step toward answering your question must be
the molding of Russia's foreign policy, Russia's forming its
foreign policy. When Russia's foreign policy interests are
formulated, it will be easier for the Russian corporations and the
state authorities directing the corporations into the appropriate
mainstream. So far, in my opinion, there is a certain jumble with
regard to our foreign policy priorities. It will be quite difficult
to arrange such a line of interaction.
As regards the Russian corporations, I think they are prepared
as a matter of general policy to follow the state line. If they
know it and if the state makes certain efforts to promote the line,
well, I think the business community will support.
I believe that there are a number of positive points in this
sphere in reality. For instance, representatives of big business
are very frequently invited as part of a Russian delegation during
big state visits -- this is also very good. And incidentally during
such visits the representatives of big business solve issues which
are more substantive and large-scale than those that are resolved
as part of political line. For instance, during the visit to China,
Khodorkovsky there solved much more questions than the rest of the
Russian delegation, barring the President. It is because naturally
the energy dialogue with China is indeed a large question for the
future.
What is my attitude to the transnationalization of Russian
capital? It is positive, without a doubt. This is to say that the
Russian business is developing in the same direction as does the
business of the world for a long time on a global scale. The market
niches are indeed available throughout the world.
What I don't like in our transnational capital? It is the fact
that it does not attach sufficient attention to the domestic
Russian market and thus it differs -- to the worst -- from the
transnational companies of other countries.
And at the same time, I am not quite in agreement, say, with
the position of Andrei Illarionov, who regards the outflow of
capital from Russia as a boon. I think that in Russia there are
quite many spheres to apply the capital and thus to regard as a
boon the Russian investment abroad, when there is a shortage of
Russian investment inside the country, is not correct. Without
this, foreign investment cannot be assured either. I do not regard
it as good.
Q: You have a flag, you have the leader, you have the "faces
in the journal". In a public relations company they say it is
necessary to have an anthem and a slogan. We will not speak about
an anthem but we will say: "Proletarians of all countries,
unite!"...I understand that this is not your slogan, nevertheless,
what would you put in the subheading?
Karaganov: I think there is a slogan there? Isn't there?
Lukyanov: Of course, there is no such quality and strong
slogan as the "Proletarians of all countries, unite!"
Karaganov: But we will think it over.
Lukyanov: In principle, as we wrote in our advertising
material, it is a journal for those who wish to know how the world
is structured.
Nikonov: But I believe that the general thrust, at least of
all the articles of this issue is obvious to me -- Russia must
become a part of the world, a global world. This is probably the
main slogan. For too long we were inventing our own national table
of multiplication. It has probably resulted wrong. The rest of the
world is using a different table of multiplication, the real one.
Russia generally must return to the world, into the normal economic
and political environment and into the system of international
relations. This is what is actually happening now. It is Russia's
integration into the world in the process of globalization. I think
it will be the most common denominator for the publications that
are there now.
Karaganov: A regards the anthem, we will think it over.
Q: Voice of America. I have two questions -- to Karaganov or
to Mr. Nikonov. The first question is whether there is some promise
to the export of Russian oil to the US? This is the first question.
And the second. Mr. Putin begins his China visit next week. It
is the first visit, a meeting with the new generation of Chinese
leaders. Could you comment now on the state of the Russian-Chinese
relations? Thank you.
Karaganov: The first concerns the export. We have recently
discussed this question with our US colleagues at a joint meeting
of the Foreign and Defense Policy Council (FDPC) and the Aspin
strategic group. The consensus we came to is that the prospects for
exports are few and far between. Firstly, it is because oil is a
kind of a world product. It can be purchased anywhere. That is why
it is not necessary to take Russian oil to long distances. So it
has mainly political importance and does not have big economic
significance.
Secondly, Russia has very few terminals for the export of oil.
We mainly supply oil to the outside world through pipelines, I will
remind you. To organize massive export to the USA, we need to build
new terminals and new pipelines. This means very big investment of
funds which could be used more advantageously. That is why we are
cautioning the Russian politicians and the Russian businessmen
against being euphoric on this issue. Simply so that there be no
disappointment later.
But there is another aspect to this issue, and that is
American investments in Russian oil extraction and transportation.
As far as I know, there are some prospects here, especially with
regard to investments not in Russian oil giants that have enough
money but in small oil companies that exist in great numbers and
that are quite efficient, but they may grow substantially if they
get additional funding.
I understand that there are good prospects for that,
especially since US oilmen have received a strong signal from the
Bush administration who keeps on urging them to go to Russia and
invest. We have very many US oilmen here who are negotiating with
small Russian oil companies for the further development. But I
repeat, we must not overestimate things in order not to get
disappointed in the future or feel deceived.
On your second question, maybe Slava will answer it.
Nikonov: A little bit on the first one. Of course, it is too
early to speak of serious Russian-US energy cooperation. It may
make sense only if Sakhalin fields are well developed and if the
necessary port infrastructure is created there. And second, if the
project that is now in kind of limbo, to build an oil pipeline to
the Pacific, is implemented. The creation of an oil terminal in
Nakhodka is very important for our energy ties with East Asia, but
it may also be important for Russian-US energy ties.
As for Putin's visit to China and his meeting with the new
Chinese leadership, first of all I do not expect anything
revolutionary from this meeting for two reasons. First, there can
be nothing revolutionary immediately after the change of
government. Second, there will be nothing revolutionary because the
previous leadership still rules the country. Jiang Zemin remains
the chairman of the Chinese State Council and he undoubtedly
determines the country's internal and foreign policy and will do so
for at least several more months or maybe several years.
While being a formal leader, Hu Jintao is of course not yet
the real leader of Chinese communists, although we wish him every
success. But at this point he is not the person who determines the
political climate in China. The inertia of political processes is
still there. This is why I think that Russian-Chinese cooperation
will not undergo any radical changes with the election of new
political leaders in that country. At least this won't happen
before or during Putin's visit to China.
Karaganov: And I think that nothing will change after that
either because the Chinese make long-term plans, and there are no
reasons to think that their interests may change in the near
future. Given their understanding of these interests and despite
the fact that we have excellent relations with the US now, we have
an interest in having friendly, not just good, but friendly
relations with China that is one of the most important countries
for us and one of the geopolitical pillars of our policy....
*******
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