Russia - WikiLeaks
Russia 091123
Basic Political Developments
• Prime-Tass: Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov to start visit to North Korea, until Nov 25
• Yonhap: Russian parliamentary speaker to visit N. Korea: report
• Prime-Tass: Nov 26–27: Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to visit France
• Prime-Tass: Nov 27: Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to take part in Eurasian Economic Community (EurAsEC) summit
• Prime-Tass: Nov 27: Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Sobyanin to take part in Russia-Thailand intergovernmental commission in Bangkok
• Xinhua: DM: Iran pursues delivery of S-300 missiles from Russia- Iran's Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi said Sunday that the country is still pursuing Russia's commitment on delivering S-300 anti-aircraft missiles, the semi-official ISNA news agency reported.
• Inerfax: Tymoshenko says Russian gas price for Ukraine in 2010 won't change much - "I am confident that the gas price for Ukraine in 2010 will be virtually the same as in 2009," she said in an exclusive interview with the ICTV channel on Sunday.
• APA.az: Chief of Russian presidential administration Sergei Narishkin arrives in Baku
• Aysor.am: CIS Informational Council to sit in session in Minsk
• Itar-Tass: CIS Information Council to prepare for 65th victory anniversary
• The Moscow Times: Medvedev Reprimands United Russia - By Nikolaus von Twickel
• : Medvedev ire puts party consensus in focus - By Charles Clover in Moscow
• The Moscow Times: Putin Thanks Party, Sets Priorities for 2010 - By Irina Filatova
• Politics.hu: Orbán meets Putin at congress of Russia's ruling party in St. Petersburg
• Saigon: CPV seeks enhanced ties with United Russia party
• Russia Today: “Next EU-Russia summits will take place according to the new rules” - President Medvedev’s Press Attache Natalia Timakova’s RT interview
• The Moscow Times: KamAZ Head Named As AvtoVAZ Director
• The Moscow Times: GM Russia Plant Fires Head of Union
• : Aaron Klein to debate pro-Iran commentator - Program airs live on globally broadcast Russian television - WND Jerusalem bureau chief Aaron Klein will debate a commentator from Iran today live on Russia's all-news network.
• Itar-Tass: First ever road connecting Russia’s west to east to be ready in 2010 – Ivanov
• Xinhua: First Russian brigade with Iskander missiles to be formed in 2010
• Itar-Tass: French helicopter carrier to call in St Petersburg
• AP: French ship Russia wants docks in St.Petersburg
• RIA: Russian submarine towed to port after engine malfunction
• RIA: Launch of Proton rocket carrying European satellite delayed
• RIA: Russia set to launch Eutelsat satellite from Baikonur
• Itar-Tass: French telecom satellite to be launched from Baikonur space center
• Axisglobe: Russian security services already preparing to defend Kremlin against "extremists"
• Interfax: Patriarch Kirill plans to visit Ukraine next summer
• Itar-Tass: Patriarch Kirill to attend funeral of priest killed last Thursday
• RFERL: Patriarch Kirill To Take Part In Funeral For Slain Priest
• The Moscow Times: Controversial Priest Gunned Down in Church
• Itar-Tass: Over 40 people trapped in snow on Chechen-Dagestani road
• RIA: Suspected militant killed in Chechnya
• The Moscow Times: Militant Killed in Dagestan
• Reuters: FACTBOX-Five facts on Ingush president Yevkurov
• Reuters: FACTBOX-Key facts about Russia's region of Ingushetia
• Reuters: RPT-INTERVIEW-Ingushetia boss admits corruption fuels rebellion
• The other Russia: Letter to Medvedev: ‘Stop this Mad Conveyor of Death’ - The brother of a murdered Chechen rebel has appealed to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev for help and protection in an open letter published by the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper, reports Gazeta.ru on November 19.
• The Moscow Times: 2010 Work Permit Cuts Planned - The Federal Migration Service said Friday that it would cut the number of job permits available to foreigners next year to just less than 2 million people, down from an initial 3.8 million at the start of 2009, after the economic crisis severely cut demand for foreign labor.
• The Moscow Times: A Strong Nation of Lawyers - Last month, the president gave lawyers a special boost, signing an executive order to create an annual Lawyer of the Year prize. It will be awarded on the legal profession’s national day, Dec. 3.
• The Moscow Times: The Promising Continent - By Ruben Vardanian: Last month I visited the 13th Africa Forum in Cape Town, organized by Troika Dialog’s strategic partner Standard Bank. Talking with delegates, I was struck once again by the sheer scale of opportunity that exists in Africa for Russian business, just as Russia becomes an increasingly attractive market for African products.
• Russia Today: Litvinenko case unsolved three years on
• BBC: Russia 'is now a criminal state' - Bill Browder of Hermitage Capital was reacting to the news that his lawyer had died in prison in Russia after being held for a year without charge
• The Washington Times: Corruption drags down Russian economy
• LA Times: Hungary zigzags when it comes to Russia - Some in the former Soviet satellite now part of NATO and the EU warn that Moscow is intent on reasserting influence, but others see Russia as a useful investor and lucrative market.
• Newsweek: How Medvedev plans to reform the military—and why Obama should not be worried.
• Chel.kp.ru: The killer who shot the head of FOMC Chelyabinsk region, had an accomplice
National Economic Trends
• EasyBourse: Putin Raises 2009 Inflation Forecast To 9.6% From 8%
• Russia Today: Putin’s United Russia address puts economy in focus
Business, Energy or Environmental regulations or discussions
• Reuters: REFILE-Russian markets -- Factors to Watch on Nov 23
• Stock Markets Review: Russian stock market daily morning report (November 23, 2009, Monday)
• Bloomberg: PIK, Gazprom, AvtoVAZ, MTS, RusHydro: Russian Equity Preview
• Atomenergoprom intends to place the bonds
• Reuters: Deripaska seen buying back Strabag stake –paper
• The Moscow Times: Sberbank, VTB May Face Large Loan Losses
• Reuters: Russia chief says Renault won't up Avtovaz stake now
• RBC: MTS secures long-term loan from foreign banks
• RIA: Chetra to present tractor equipment in India
Activity in the Oil and Gas sector (including regulatory)
• iStockAnalyst: South Kurils Shelf Rich in Oil, Gas – Scientists
Gazprom
• Steel Guru: Gazprom and Inter RAO to swap electricity assets
• The Moscow Times: Gazprom May Double Stake in Germany’s VNG
• AFP: Schalke's relief at sponsorship extension - Schalke 04 have signed a five-year extension to their sponsorship deal with Russian firm Gazprom worth 100 million euros which looks to have eased the German club's cash problems, it was reported Saturday.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Full Text Articles
Basic Political Developments
Prime-Tass: Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov to start visit to North Korea, until Nov 25
Yonhap: Russian parliamentary speaker to visit N. Korea: report
SEOUL, Nov. 22 (Yonhap) -- Sergei Mironov, chairman of the Federation Council of Russia, was set to visit North Korea in the near future, the North's state media reported Sunday.
The speaker of the upper house of the Russian parliament will "soon visit" North Korea at the invitation of the North's Supreme People's Assembly, said a brief dispatch from the North's Korea Central News Agency, monitored in Seoul.
The report did not specify when the Russian politician will make the trip or who he was set to meet during his stay in the North.
Prime-Tass: Nov 26–27: Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to visit France
Prime-Tass: Nov 27: Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to take part in Eurasian Economic Community (EurAsEC) summit
Prime-Tass: Nov 27: Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Sobyanin to take part in Russia-Thailand intergovernmental commission in Bangkok
Xinhua: DM: Iran pursues delivery of S-300 missiles from Russia
[pic]2009-11-22 21:36:55
TEHRAN, Nov. 22 (Xinhua) -- Iran's Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi said Sunday that the country is still pursuing Russia's commitment on delivering S-300 anti-aircraft missiles, the semi-official ISNA news agency reported.
Vahidi had said earlier on Tuesday that there was no official news over the cancellation of delivery from Russia of S-300 missiles.
The S-300 anti-aircraft missile system, which is to be delivered to Iran according to a 2007 agreement, was developed as a system against aircraft and cruise missiles for Soviet Union's anti-air defense branch, but later variations were also developed to intercept ballistic missiles.
Russia has said that technical causes were the main reason for the delay in delivery, according to earlier reports of the official IRNA news agency.
Speaking to reporters on Sunday, Vahidi referred to the presence of NATO and U.S. troops in the region, saying that "lasting security will become a reality when cross-regional troops withdraw and do not interfere in domestic issues of other countries."
"We believe that regional security is closely related to collective security of regional states," ISNA quoted him as saying.
Inerfax: Tymoshenko says Russian gas price for Ukraine in 2010 won't change much
23.11.2009
Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko forecasts that the average yearly price of Russian natural gas in 2010 for Ukraine will be almost the same as in 2009.
"I am confident that the gas price for Ukraine in 2010 will be virtually the same as in 2009," she said in an exclusive interview with the ICTV channel on Sunday.
Taking into account the current international situation, we can predict that the Russian gas transit through Ukraine's territory in 2010 will be charged 60% more than in the previous year, she said.
"That is why I want to calm industrialists, and all consumers of the natural gas. This is how we view the next year," Tymoshenko added.
APA.az: Chief of Russian presidential administration Sergei Narishkin arrives in Baku
23 Nov 2009 11:19 ] [pic]
Baku. Lachin Sultanova – APA. Chief of the Russian presidential administration Sergei Narishkin arrived in Baku on Monday for a short-term visit.
He will attend the opening of Russkaya Kniga book store and branch of Vneshtorgbank of Russia in Baku, APA reports. Narishkin will present Medal of Honor to the chairman of the Caucasian Muslims Office Sheikh-al-Islam Allahshukur Pashazadeh. Narishkin is expected to be received by President Ilham Aliyev.
Aysor.am: CIS Informational Council to sit in session in Minsk
Today CIS Informational Council will sit in session in Minsk to hold its 10th meeting on planning of celebrations in connection with 65th anniversary of Victory Day.
CIS Informational Council is chaired by Director General of ITAR-TASS, Vitaly Ignatenko, and involves state agencies of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, and Tajikistan.
Celebrations Plan includes, in particular, issue of publishing of a commemorative calendar, as well as holding of a joint Internet project, and launching of a special photo contest. Participants will also discuss celebrations on 2010 Veteran Year announced to be marked in CIS countries. Media will pay particular attention to covering war history to prevent weaken of significance of the Victory as some politicians try to. The participants will also focus on item of training courses for journalists which led to necessity to cooperate with universities, as well as on item of creating of a new joint informational product.
Itar-Tass: CIS Information Council to prepare for 65th victory anniversary
23.11.2009, 11.50
MINSK, November 23 (Itar-Tass) -- The Tenth meeting of the Council of Heads of State of Information Agencies of CIS Member Countries (CIS Information Council) opens here on Monday to discuss joint preparations for the celebration of the 65th anniversary of the Victory in the Second World War.
The plan of preparing the celebration of the remarkable date in the history of the peoples of the Commonwealth includes, among other measures, the publication of a commemorative calendar, the holding of a photography competition in the CIS countries and a joint Internet project. The Information Council will also consider functions to devote to the World War II Veterans’ Year to be observed in 2010. Special attention will be given to the responsibility of the mass media to war veterans and their descendants for true presentation of the history of the fight against fascism and for exposing attempts of certain politicians to play down the importance of the Victory and whitewash accomplices of the Nazis.
The meeting will also discuss the training of journalists for news agencies and possibilities of interacting in this area with the leading educational establishments of the CIS countries. It will also discuss prospects for development of cooperation in a joint information project.
The CIS Information Council comprises the news agencies of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, and Tajikistan. Vitaly Ignatenko, Itar-Tass Director-General, is the head of the Council.
The Moscow Times: Medvedev Reprimands United Russia
23 November 2009
By Nikolaus von Twickel
United Russia got a new program, membership of the country’s most prominent female politician and broad praise from its leaders at the party’s 11th congress this weekend. And it got a dressing down from the president.
The party, which dominates Russian politics and counts Prime Minister Vladimir Putin as its chairman, replaced the long-standing cornerstone of its policy, known as Putin’s Plan, with the less personalized Russian Conservatism.
But the platform of socially oriented conservatism — United Russia’s first ideologically coherent program since its creation a decade ago — appears to run counter to Dmitry Medvedev’s stated desire to modernize the country’s economy and political system.
Those contradictions appeared on full display Saturday, when Medvedev subjected United Russia to his strongest criticism yet, indirectly accusing the party of election manipulation and broadly painting its members as bureaucrats intent on keeping power.
The speech was Medvedev’s second major one this month. In his Nov. 13 state-of-the-nation address, he set out a broad path for the country’s modernization, primarily in the economy. In St. Petersburg, Medvedev followed up on his calls for political modernization, saying United Russia needs to step up and reform itself and put a halt to “administrative excesses” within.
“United Russia can only achieve change if it changes itself — I believe that is obvious,” he told the more than 600 delegates and 2,000 guests.
In his clearest reference yet to the massive allegations of fraud in last month’s regional elections, Medvedev said the party must learn to win fairly.
“The party … must learn to win, in fact we all need to learn how to win in an open contest,” he said.
The opposition cried foul after the Oct. 11 elections brought massive gains for United Russia, and in a step unprecedented this decade, the Duma’s three opposition parties boycotted the lower house of parliament for several days.
But the protests soon collapsed and party leaders expressed satisfaction after Medvedev promised election law reforms in his state of the nation, which critics called window dressing.
Medvedev suggested that the misconduct came from regions where party officials were confusing democratic procedures with administrative ones.
“Sadly, some regional divisions of United Russia … show signs of backwardness and concentrate their political activity on intrigues and games within the apparatus,” he said. He demanded that those responsible be fired, saying “such people need to go, as do some other political customs.”
He also suggested that party officials needed a lesson in democracy, arguing that “democracy does not exist for the party — be it the governing or opposition. It exists for the people.”
Renewing his warning that United Russia’s position as the ruling party was not a “lifetime privilege,” Medvedev directed party officials to not lose touch with voters.
United Russia controls a large enough majority in the Duma to change the Constitution, and it also controls most of the country’s regional assemblies and the Federation Council, the upper house of parliament.
Putin, who is not a party member, despite being party chairman, used his speech to focus on the party’s role in formulating economic policy. He did, however, warn members against seeing the party as an “elite, prestige club” for furthering careers rather than the public’s interests.
The remarks were reminiscent of what he told party delegates last year: that United Russia should be debureaucratized and cleansed of “unqualified people pursuing selfish goals.”
Medvedev has also refused to join the party, saying the president should not pledge allegiance to any party, and he has had a noticeably smaller role in its decision making than Putin, who has also refrained from officially joining.
While speaking at the convention, Medvedev addressed delegates as “dear colleagues” but made it clear that he was an outsider by using “you” instead of “we” when he referred to the party.
St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko said Saturday that she officially joined the party and its Supreme Council — six years after being elected as an independent governor.
“In this case, I did the honest thing. I ‘legally declared’ my feelings about the party, with which I, as governor, have long had a constructive relationship,” she said in a statement released by her press office. She stressed that she only declined to join earlier because of her election as an independent, and that she “never saw” the party as an elite club.
State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov, who heads United Russia’s Supreme Council, proudly told delegates that the party was the unifying force for all branches of government.
He lashed out at those who call United Russia a party of bureaucrats, arguing that while it had respect for members working in state agencies, that was not its defining principle.
“What unites our 2 million members is not proximity to the state but common values and a common ideology,” he said.
Gryzlov said the new program contained elements both from Putin’s Plan and from Medvedev’s “Go, Russia!” article, published in September, and his state-of-the-nation speech. “We are shaping the new, while keeping the best,” he said, referring to United Russia’s formulation of conservatism.
Sergei Markov, a United Russia Duma deputy and Kremlin-connected analyst, said that while Medvedev’s criticism was justified, it would be wrong to take it as proof of a rift between the president, the party and Putin.
“Yes, he said those things, and I fully agree with him, but he also made it clear that he’s siding with the party when he praised its support for the Kremlin anti-crisis program,” Markov said Sunday.
He admitted that there was potential for conflict between Medvedev and Putin and United Russia, but that the St. Petersburg convention had shown that the party agreed with both.
Markov compared Medvedev’s criticism to an argument between husband and wife. “If you criticize your spouse, you do not do that to leave her but to improve your marriage,” he said.
Oleg Shein, a Duma deputy for the Just Russia party, said there was a real danger that United Russia was becoming too powerful. “Today the party has effectively as much influence as the Kremlin,” he told The Moscow Times.
As an example, he named a new rule for nominating governors, introduced by Medvedev. The system gives the biggest local party, invariably United Russia, the right to put forward a list of candidates to the president.
“Important personnel decisions are now made in Banny Pereulok,” he said, referring to the party’s headquarters. “This is a very dangerous trend toward party dictatorship.”
Shein, who lost a bid to become mayor of Astrakhan in the October elections, argued that the strongest opposition to Medvedev’s modernization campaign came from the “conservative bureaucracy,” which is heavily represented in United Russia, especially on a regional level.
: Medvedev ire puts party consensus in focus
By Charles Clover in Moscow
Published: November 21 2009 15:35 | Last updated: November 22 2009 19:42
The annual congress of the ruling United Russia party is usually a predictable affair, full of self-congratulations and long-winded speeches punctuated by polite clapping.
This year’s congress, held in St Petersburg on Saturday, was no less polite and carefully staged but the smiles seemed unusually forced after blistering criticism by Dmitry Medvedev, the president, scolding Russia’s hegemonic party for its authoritarian ways and “bad political habits”.
Speaking after the congress, analysts said the event demonstrated the lack of a consensus within Russia’s political elite, which the party is supposed to represent: “Our political class is not ready for modernisation, does not want it and look at it as a campaign which will go away. But it will not go away, hence we will be facing a conflict,” said Gleb Pavlovsky, a top political consultant who has worked for several presidential administrations.
United Russia dominates Russia’s political system, controlling parliament and virtually all provincial and local elected governments. It is known informally as “the party of bureaucrats” which has no real ideology other than preservation of political power and the status quo.
Mr Pavlovsky said three speeches by three figures: Mr Medvedev, Vladimir Putin, the prime minister, and Boris Gryzlov, the parliamentary speaker, contained very little in common.
“They didn’t correlate well,” as Mr Pavlovsky put it. For example, Mr Medvedev made “modernisation” the core focus of his speech, scolding the party for being “backwards”, while Mr Gryzlov somewhat incongruously introduced the party’s new ideology of “Russian conservatism” which in a later TV interview he insisted was fully in line with Mr Medvedev’s modernising manifesto entitled “Forward Russia!”.
Mr Gryzlov told Vesti-24 television channel: “It means we shall go forward with Russian conservatism.”
Mr Medvedev’s speech contained some of the most direct criticism yet of Russia’s authoritarian political system, taking United Russia to task for iron-fisted tactics it routinely uses to win elections. “Unfortunately some regional departments of United Russia and other parties ... show signs of backwardness, reducing political activity to bureaucratic intrigues, to games,” he said.
“Elections, which are supposed to be the expression of the national will, the competition of ideas and programmes, as a result sometimes turn into stories where democratic procedures are confused with administrative ones. It is necessary to get rid of such people, as well as of such bad political habits.”
Local elections across Russia last month were widely criticised for dirty campaign practices, which kept opposition parties from being represented and sparked a brief walkout by opposition deputies from Russia’s parliament.
Mr Putin, who is chairman of United Russia in addition to being prime minister, took scant notice of Mr Medvedev’s remarks and announced measures to widen anti-crisis aid to the economy.
Old friends from St Petersburg, Mr Putin handpicked Mr Medvedev as his successor last year, after serving his limit of two presidential terms, and their relationship appears cordial.
But recently, Mr Medvedev appears to want to establish a separate political identity as a liberal, and his public political positions seem increasingly at odds with those of the authoritarian Mr Putin. The prime minister is widely expected to return to the presidency in 2012, though Mr Medvedev clearly wants a second presidential term himself, according to Kremlin insiders.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009. You may share using our article tools. Please don't cut articles from and redistribute by email or post to the web.
The Moscow Times: Putin Thanks Party, Sets Priorities for 2010
23 November 2009
By Irina Filatova
Minister Vladimir Putin addressed United Russia’s 11th party congress Saturday in St. Petersburg, where he congratulated his government for averting economic disaster and rehashed a set of policy ideas for the coming year.
Putin offered mild praise to the governing party, which had just met with a harsh rebuke from President Dmitry Medvedev, and promoted government programs in his first major domestic policy speech since the president’s state-of-the-nation address.
“Russia’s economy is showing the first signs of recovery. However, it’s too early to speak about the end of the crisis. There are serious hurdles in a number of industries,” Putin said in comments posted on the government web site.
The prime minister outlined a range of policy areas where he said the government would focus next year, including: modernizing strategically important companies, developing the country’s high-tech sector, stimulating housing construction, boosting domestic demand and dealing with unemployment, especially in single-industry towns.
Putin pointed to the struggling automotive industry as one where the government has a particularly urgent role to play, singling out AvtoVAZ, the country’s biggest carmaker, for support. (Story, Page 6.)
“Car production has contracted by 60 percent. That’s why anti-crisis measures in this industry should be not only preserved but also increased,” he said.
Putin pledged to launch a controversial “cash-for-clunkers” program, in which the government would give 50,000 rubles ($1,274) to car owners who trade in cars more 10 years old for newer, domestically made vehicles.
He also proposed a pilot program to develop single-industry towns, which would start in AvtoVAZ’s hometown, Tolyatti.
“We’re talking about new infrastructure, roads, modern production facilities, techno-parks and ‘business incubators,’” he said.
Modernizing Russia’s economy and industrial base has been a goal pushed hard by Medvedev, who emphasized the topic again in his speech to United Russia.
He said United Russia would preserve its dominance in Russia’s political system only if it could help modernize the country’s economy.
“United Russia will be able to preserve its dominating position in the political system under the only condition, if it is able not only to stabilize the situation in the country but also modernize the economy — that’s the main task today,” he said.
Putin referred back to Medvedev’s state-of-the-nation address, saying Medvedev’s calls for modernization “reflect the mood of the entire Russian society.”
“Today, a very difficult goal stands before us, but one that can absolutely be realized and fulfilled,” he said.
As evidence of the success of his government’s policies, Putin pointed to a less-than-expected decline in gross domestic product and lowered inflation.
“The decline in GDP by the end of the year will not be as big as we thought. Our calculation was at 10 percent or maybe even more,” he said, adding that Russia’s economy would return to the precrisis level not earlier than in two to three years.
The government is now projecting an 8 percent to 8.5 percent drop for the year.
Putin also said the inflation rate “would fall substantially” from 13.3 percent in 2008 to 9.6 percent in 2009, which was one of the lowest indicators since 1992.
Nevertheless, 9 percent, not to mention 10 percent, is “intolerably high” and the government will continue implementing its anti-inflation program, he said.
Putin also called for the extension of several government programs, some because they had been successful and others because they hadn’t worked out yet.
The government’s 300 billion ruble ($10.3 billion) program for loan guarantees has not been effective enough and must be corrected, he said. He vowed that the state guarantees program would be implemented in full by the end of 2009 as planned initially. “We’ll continue this program in 2010. Enterprises will be able to raise more than 500 billion rubles in loans,” he said.
Critics have knocked the program of state guarantees, saying the bureaucratic hoops that banks and other enterprises had to jump through in order to qualify made them all but unattainable.
Putin also pushed a new mortgage program announced last week. The government plans to use 250 billion rubles from the Pension Fund to buy mortgage bonds, with the aim of pushing down interest rates on mortgages.
“In order for mortgages to become cheaper, rates should fall to 10 to 11 percent,” he said. “We have two sources for that purpose — the National Welfare Fund and pension savings being managed by Vneshekonombank.”
Putin said Thursday that the average mortgage rate of 14.5 was “too much.”
The prime minister also repeated pledges to provide support for the labor market, as the situation there was “very strained.”
The government will give 36 billion rubles in 2010 in order to support employment, Putin said, adding that it was less than in 2009, but was nonetheless “a significant sum.”
The country’s jobless rate was 7.7 percent in October, up from the September figure of 7.6 percent, the State Statistic Service said Friday.
In January, the government presented a 43 billion ruble employment stimulus package to fund region-specific job retraining programs, relocation assistance, small business development and job creation.
November 23, 2009, 8:58 CET
news
Politics.hu: Orbán meets Putin at congress of Russia's ruling party in St. Petersburg
By MTI
Main opposition Fidesz party leader Viktor Orban held talks with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on the future of Russian-Hungarian relations in St. Petersburg on Saturday, a senior Fidesz official told MTI.
Orban and Putin met on the sidelines of the 11th congress of the ruling United Russia party, staff leader Peter Szijjarto said.
Orban told news channel Hir TV after the meeting that "I clearly informed the prime minister that we would like to settle Hungarian-Russian relations and place them on new gound."
"We would like to develop a partnership for the 21st century in order to ensure that our future relations differ from the past, so that we should never shift back into the Hungarian-Russian system of relations that we lived in during the 20th century," Orban said.
Saigon: CPV seeks enhanced ties with United Russia party
Monday ,Nov 23,2009, Posted at: 09:50(GMT+7)
The Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) maintains a policy of enhancing its ties with the United Russia (ER) party to help strengthen and further develop traditional friendship and all-sided, trustful and mutually beneficial cooperation between Vietnam and Russia, a CPV senior official said at the ER’s 11 th congress.
|Addressing the congress on Nov. 21, Mr. Truong Tan Sang, who is Permanent Secretary of the CPV Central Committee’s Secretariat, |
|reaffirmed that in its foreign policy, Vietnam always places importance and gives high priority to the development of |
|relationship with Russia . |
|He told the ER members that Vietnam is satisfactory with new developments in the two countries’ ties in every field in the spirit|
|of strategic partnership adopted by senior leaders of both countries. |
|The secretary said that the Vietnamese communists and people have keenly followed the operation, role and position of the ER, and|
|felt happy for immense achievements Russia has gained under the leadership of President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister |
|Vladimir Putin. |
|The Vietnamese communists and people have lauded Russia’s positive stance as well as its important role in maintaining peace and |
|stability and in promoting cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region and the world for the establishment of a new world order of |
|justice and equality, he noted. |
|He expressed belief that by implementing a resolution to be adopted at this congress, the ER would continue to reaffirm its |
|position and leading role in Russia ’s socio-political life, contributing to realising strategic tasks of modernising Russia and |
|turning the country into a prosperous and powerful one which plays an important role in international relations. |
|Earlier on the day, Mr. Truong Tan Sang handed over the CPV Central Committee’s greetings to the Chairman of the ER Supreme |
|Council, Boris Gryzlov. |
|On the occasion, he signed with the ER Chairman an agreement on cooperation between the CPV and the ER, following which the two |
|parties will regularly hold consultancy and exchange of information regarding outstanding events in the two countries, and in |
|bilateral and international relations. |
|The two parties will share experiences in the Party building work, organisational affairs, inspection and supervision, personnel |
|training, publication, and other areas of interests. |
|Furthermore, the two parties will frequently exchange visits at all levels, and organise expert-level meetings, bilateral and |
|multilateral seminars, conferences and round-table talks to discuss emergency issues in the Vietnam-Russia relationship and |
|international ties of mutual concern. |
|In the agreement, the two parties pledge to further support the relationship between youth’s organisations, women’s unions, |
|educational and humanitarian organizations and other social organizations. |
|Later on the day, Mr. Truong Tan Sang and his entourage attended a symposium debating political parties’ social responsibility in|
|global crisis. |
|On Nov. 19, the Vietnamese communists laid a wreath at a monument dedicated to President Ho Chi Minh at the Ho Chi Minh Square in|
|Moscow, and met with the Vietnamese embassy staff and representatives of Vietnamese communities in Russia . |
|They met with Vice Secretary of the Saint Petersburg ER Committee, Konstantin Serov and held talks with St. Petersburg Mayor |
|Valentina Matvienko on ways to step up the wide-ranging strategic partnership between St. Petersburg and Vietnamese cities. |
|Mr. Truong Tan Sang and his entourage arrived in Russia on November 18 and will stay there until November 23. |
|Source: VNA |
Russia Today: “Next EU-Russia summits will take place according to the new rules”
22 November, 2009, 11:47
Disregarding who will rule Europe and how, it’s absolutely obvious that Europe needs Russia as a partner and vice versa, believes President Medvedev’s Press Attache Natalia Timakova. She shared her views with RT.
RT: In his address during this year’s APEC summit in Singapore, President Medvedev said that Russia has serious plans for becoming a global financial center. Does this mean that the country’s leadership has fully adopted the world crisis and has real and effective ways of coming out of it?
Natalia Timakova: The idea that Moscow, St Petersburg, or some other large city in Russia would become a new financial center, came into being awhile ago, before the world financial crisis. Of course, this year the idea has not been very popular, because it was hard enough to keep the old financial centers going, let alone create new ones. Now, when the leaders of APEC countries got together and stated the fact that there are different signs of improvement in the economic situation – signs of coming out of the financial crisis – the questions are how we are going to live after the crisis, what lessons should be learned.
Most importantly, we need to figure out what new things could be done for our economy, which is part of the global economy, so that this will not happen again. That is why the idea of having a financial center in Russia is being revived, because, first of all, the President has mentioned it a number of times. The financial crisis showed us that one currency, even if it is as strong as the American dollar, cannot keep the global economy stable. The more strong currencies we have, like the euro for example, or maybe the yuan or the ruble, the more stable the situation is going to be.
In this sense, our suggestion to make the ruble one such currency has been seriously discussed not only at the recent APEC summit, but also at the BRIC and SCO summits. This idea is supported by many leaders, and I think that now, looking at the positive trends in the economy, it is time to go back to the idea, there is potential there.
RT: This year’s APEC summit in Singapore was mainly concentrated on tackling the global financial crisis. Doesn’t that mean that this summit was more important for economically than it was politically?
NT: Well, all the summits that took place this year, not just the APEC summit, but also the G-20 summit and even the G-8 summit, which has always been a political event, focused on finding ways out of the financial crisis. This agenda overshadowed all other agendas.
Nevertheless, the Asia-Pacific region has a lot of its own problems, including political ones. Russia could play a very important role in solving them. So I would say that the main focus was the economy, finding ways out of the financial crisis, dealing with consequences of the crisis, restoration of economy, consumer growth and finding new markets, including among APEC countries. But I think the political aspect was very significant as well, because it is a unique region with its own leaders, political problems that needed to be solved. So economy dominated, but politics were just as important.
RT: On the sidelines of the APEC summit President Medvedev met with Barack Obama and there has been talk that relations are improving between Russia and the US and we have seen evidence of this. However, what are the remaining stumbling blocks between the two countries?
NT: The situation is quite unique at the moment. If you look at the last 10 years in the relations between Russia and America, every meeting between the two Presidents – I will remind you, this was their fourth meeting this year – has marked serious advances in Russian-American relations. So far the agenda is limited, since the main topic remains the new START treaty. Nevertheless, the Presidents are faced with more and more new topics, new issues in the bilateral relations and international problems.
First of all, the Iranian problem. The presidents talked a lot about it at their meeting in New York and again in Singapore. The Iranian problem concerns all countries, including Russia. Russia, along with its Western partners, took a strong stand – Iran should disclose all the details of its nuclear program, especially because of the construction of the new plant.
So I wouldn't talk about problems that are still there, because of course there are disagreements. Both Presidents talked about it after the meeting. Disagreements do not mean stalling of relations. The important thing is that we have a dialogue, the Presidents are open with each other, they discuss existing problems in detail, looking for solutions together.
So I think now Russian-American relations had a good jump start, we have every reason to think that, first of all, work on the Treaty will be successful. At least both Presidents said after the meeting that they are ready to agree on the main points of the Treaty by the end of the year.
Besides, I hope our co-operation in such difficult areas as the Iranian nuclear dossier, the North Korean nuclear problem, the Middle East settlements – all the problems the solution of which depends on the two countries will be addressed.
RT: Let’s talk a little bit about the recent Russia-EU summit in Stockholm. During the summit, the EU said it fully supports Russia’s bid to join WTO. What is it really going to take to get Russia in to the World Trade Organization?
NT: This is up to our partners at the WTO, because not only did we voice our readiness many years ago, but have done a lot to comply with the rules the WTO requires from its members. We have been regularly performing more than half of the rules.
We have to admit that the common idea, as President Dmitry Medvedev told a news conference of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia, that ascension to the WTO by the Customs Union, boosted interest among our Western partners to Russia’s joining the WTO. It seems like they themselves are expecting this.
We have expressed our stance more than once – we want to join the WTO and are waiting for an adequate understanding from our partners on whom this decision really
RT: President Medvedev said that the next EU-Russia summits will take place according to the new rules. How will the relationships between Russia and the EU change under the Lisbon Treaty?
NT: It’s a question of changing the form of contact first of all. Now that the EU has its first president and foreign minister, this will change the format but not the contents of the relationship. Recent summits have been characterized by a positive atmosphere and aspirations to jointly solve the existing problems, first of all to conclude an agreement on interaction between Russia and the EU.
We do hope the new EU leadership and new officials will help develop Russia-EU relations – at least the president said so at the concluding news conference: disregarding who and how they will rule in Europe, it’s absolutely obvious that Europe needs Russia as a partner, so does Russia. In any case we really hope this positive progress will continue, no matter what the posts of officials we talk to are called.
RT: About domestic policies. In his recent address to Russia’s Federal Assembly, Dmitry Medvedev offered a number of solutions in the country’s grassroots problems. Do you think that Russians are ready for the kind of modernization the President was talking about?
NT: No doubt the president is aware of all the complexities of the problem, not only with the economy being not ready for modernization, the bureaucracy not ready to accept the goals of modernization, as well as business not ready to join the process. You’re right by saying there is also a psychological aspect in that.
However, as the president presented these ideas in detail, also in his “Go, Russia!” article and his recent State-of-Nation Address – without changing psychology and one’s own concept about ways the economy should develop life in Russia, we’ll not be able to occupy the place we deserve in the new global world. It’s absolutely obvious. And it was the chief theme of his Address, that in order to preserve the leading positions Russia [still] has – as it is indispensable not only to preserve them, but also to improve them – all of us must change, become more active, more competitive and be more aware of our personal responsibility and initiatives of us, the citizens of this country.
The Moscow Times: KamAZ Head Named As AvtoVAZ Director
23 November 2009
Reuters
Heavily indebted carmaker AvtoVAZ appointed Sergei Kogogin, head of truck maker KamAZ, to its board of directors, increasing the prospect for the creation of a state-controlled autos giant.
Kogogin agreed earlier this year to head a proposed holding company for government stakes in both KamAZ and AvtoVAZ, controlled by Russian Technologies — a huge state conglomerate with interests in aviation and defense as well as autos.
The move is seen as part of a long-term Russian effort to revive the country’s embattled car industry, struggling under falling demand, high debt, outdated technology and a bloated work force.
“This appointment will be connected to Russian Technologies’ plans to create an autos holding company for its stakes in these companies,” VTB analyst Vladimir Bespalov said.
“A new company may make it easier to secure new loans for AvtoVAZ, which is finding it extremely difficult to attract money. Other stakes could be used as collateral,” he added.
AvtoVAZ, which also said Friday that car sales would rise 11 percent in 2010, needs to restructure a $2 billion debt pile and reverse heavy losses to continue as a going concern.
State development bank Vneshekonombank said it was prepared to finance an investment program in AvtoVAZ after its debt restructuring is completed.
Russian Technologies has a 37.8 percent holding in KamAZ, but sources said earlier this year that it was talking to Moscow investment bank Troika Dialog about acquiring its 13 percent stake in the truck maker.
It also has a 25 percent stake in AvtoVAZ.
Germany’s Daimler, a 10 percent stakeholder in KamAZ, has first refusal on the Troika stake, but the head of its trucks division said last month it was happy with the level of the stake for the foreseeable future.
Russian plans to shake up the industry were dealt a blow earlier this month when General Motors decided not to sell its European arm to a consortium including Russian lender Sberbank.
The Moscow Times: GM Russia Plant Fires Head of Union
23 November 2009
Vedomosti
The management of General Motors’ St. Petersburg plant fired two workers for carrying out a slowdown strike — union leader Yevgeny Ivanov and member Olga Shafikova.
Ivanov received his pink slip on Friday, the day after the union met with the management of the plant and was denied all of its requests, Ivanov said. Shafikova found out about her layoff the day before, when she failed a routine medical checkup, he said, adding that the management was happy with her health the year before.
Shafikova declined to comment.
According to his discharge documents, Ivanov was fired for “absence from work for more than four hours without a legitimate excuse.”
Ivanov said he requested on Oct. 21 that the management give him safety instructions for working with load-lifting machinery and copies of documents certifying that he took the safety lessons and passed examinations permitting him to work.
“After a day, they didn’t show me the documents, and throughout this time I was at work but wasn’t working, because I consider the layoff illegal, which I will prove in court,” he said.
“We will get them to restore those laid off to their jobs and are going to appeal to the prosecutor’s office with a complaint,” said Stanislav Tokarev, Ivanov’s deputy.
GM spokesman Sergei Lepnukhov confirmed that Ivanov was laid off, but declined to reveal the reasons for his firing. “If an employee thinks that his rights are violated then he can appeal to the courts,” he said.
“If in the course of a medical checkup a worker is found to be unfit to carry out his duties, he is offered another position if there is one. At the moment, there are no open positions at the factory,” factory representative Yulia Boicharova said.
Ivanov said the layoffs were a response to union activity. Two weeks ago, the workers began a “slowdown strike,” in which production, according to Ivanov, was cut 30 percent, from 90 to 60 automobiles per day.
Workers want a guaranteed yearly raise of 8 percent, a 40-hour work week and two weeks of discretionary vacation instead of one week.
A union leader cannot be fired for fulfilling his union responsibilities during work time, but there should be some evidence confirming Ivanov’s rightness, said Natalya Neverovskaya, a partner at Unicomlegal. She added that courts often side with workers in order to avoid a dominance of unemployment.
WND ON THE AIR
: Aaron Klein to debate pro-Iran commentator
Program airs live on globally broadcast Russian television
Posted: November 23, 2009
12:04 am Eastern
© 2009 WorldNetDaily
WND Jerusalem bureau chief Aaron Klein will debate a commentator from Iran today live on Russia's all-news network.
The debate will begin at 11 a.m. Eastern on Russia Today, a globally broadcast English-language news channel from Russia and the first all-digital Russian television network.
Just yesterday, Iranian media reported the country began large-scale air defense war drills aimed at "protecting" the country's nuclear facilities from attacks.
One day before, a senior Iranian cleric warned on the Islamic Republic will strike Tel Aviv if attacked.
"If the enemy should want to test its bad luck in Iran, before the dust from its missiles settles in this country, Iran's ballistic missiles would land in the heart of Tel Aviv," said cleric Mojtaba Zolnour, the IRNA news agency reported.
Itar-Tass: First ever road connecting Russia’s west to east to be ready in 2010 – Ivanov
22.11.2009, 22.21
MOSCOW, November 22 (Itar-Tass) -- The first ever road to connect Russia’s west with the east will be built in 2010, Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said.
“We plan to build about 6,000 kilometers of federal roads next year. The construction of the Chita-Khabarovsk road started in 1967, with approval of the Soviet Communist Party Central Committee. That road, of 2,000 kilometers, will be ready next year. For the first time in the history of the Russian empire, the Soviet Union and modern Russia we will have a road stretching out from the west to the east,” Ivanov said.
Seventeen bridges and one supplementary bridge across the Oka River in Murom will be commissioned this year, Ivanov said.
“The construction of the majority of these bridges started in the Soviet period. The projects were abandoned in the 1990s. Vladimir Putin made the political decision to finish the projects in 2004, and the funding began in 2005. These are huge bridges. The last of them will be commissioned in Ulyanovsk next week. That bridge, of 24 kilometers, had been under construction since 1987. There was a ten-year pause in the project,” Ivanov said.
He promised to build any new bridges in Russia within 18-24 months. “The rapid construction will reduce project costs. It is very unprofitable to drag out construction projects. We intend to commission about 6,000 meters of bridges on federal roads next year. The bridge to the Russky Island will be the longest cable stayed bridge in the world, and the Ulyanovsk bridge will be the longest in Europe. It is not that Russia wants to beat a record. It is just that this country is vast, and our rivers are wide,” he said.
The construction of two toll roads will begin next year, Ivanov said. “It is possible to collect money wherever traffic is very busy, so we will organize concessions and build toll bridges. The toll will be five or six times smaller than in Europe, about 5 rubles per kilometer [the current exchange rate is 28.85 rubles to the dollar],” Ivanov said.
Xinhua: First Russian brigade with Iskander missiles to be formed in 2010
2009-11-21 22:25:25
MOSCOW, Nov. 21 (Xinhua) -- Russian armed forces will form its first brigade fully equipped with short-range Iskander missile systems, said Russian Missile Forces and Artillery Commander Sergei Bogatinov here Saturday.
"We will form the first missile brigade armed with 12 Iskander missile systems by the end of 2010," Bogatinov told Echo Moskvy radio.
"Such a brigade will be formed by the end of 2010, and then we will consistently form one more missile brigade each year," he added.
Five Iskander missile systems will be bought next year, he said.
A battalion armed with Iskander missile systems has already been set up in the Russian armed forces. It has successfully conducted exercises at the Kapustin Yar, a Russian rocket launch and development site, from Nov. 2 to Nov. 7, said Bogatinov.
The high-precision tactical Iskander missile systems with a range between 300 to 500 kilometers are to replace the 120-kilometer Tochka missile system, he said.
Itar-Tass: French helicopter carrier to call in St Petersburg
23.11.2009, 06.35
St PETERSBURG, November 23 (Itar-Tass) – French helicopter carrier Mistral, which the Russian Navy has taken an interest in as a possible object of purchasing, is due to make a technical visit to St Petersburg Monday.
Spokespeople for the French embassy in Russia told Itar-Tass the ship will moor to the Lieutenant Schmidt embankment or to the wharfs of the Maritime Fa·ade – the city’s new commercial port being built on Vassilyevsky Island. The site of mooring will depend on the whether.
The time of arrival will depend on the speed at which Mistral is able to proceed through a navigable pass near Kronstadt.
“The problem is the Mistral is a big enough and heavy ship and the weather is quite unstable and this may complicate the passage along a narrow corridor,” an embassy source said.
During its stay St Petersburg, Russian Navy and shipbuilding industry experts will be able to examine the ship and to assess its characteristics.
The Mistral, a universal helicopter carrier, has a water displacement of 21 tons, the maximum length of 210 meters, the speed of over 18 knots, and the maximum distance of up to 20,000 nautical miles.
The ship has a standard crew of 160 members but it can host aboard an additional 450 people or even 900 people for a brief period of time.
The Mistral’s cargo deck has room for up to 40 tanks or 70 cars.
Russian Navy officials showed interest in the characteristics of the helicopter carrier at an international naval show in St Petersburg in June. Two months later, sources at the Navy’s Main Staff confirmed that ship might be purchased for the Russian naval forces.
Naval experts believe the Mistral can be used for peacekeeping and rescue operations.
AP: French ship Russia wants docks in St.Petersburg
November 23, 2009 3:36 AM ET
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) - A French navy ship of the type that Russia hopes to buy has arrived for a visit to St. Petersburg.
The Mistral amphibious assault ship docked Monday on the Neva River downtown, close to the Hermitage museum.
Russian officials are considering buying a Mistral ship and a license to build several others. It would mark the first such purchase from a NATO country.
The rumors of the deal have fueled concern in Georgia and other ex-Soviet nations that Russia may use the ship to strong-arm its neighbors.
The Mistral, which is capable of carrying more than a dozen helicopters along with dozens of tanks and other armored vehicles, is fit for missions intended to project Russian power.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
RIA: Russian submarine towed to port after engine malfunction
01:4223/11/2009
MOSCOW, November 23 (RIA Novosti) - A Russian diesel-electric submarine from the Black Sea Fleet is being towed to the port of Novorossiisk after suffering an engine malfunction during sea drills, a Black Sea Fleet official said.
The Alrosa, a Kilo class diesel submarine, was on a training exercise in the Black Sea on Saturday when it reportedly experienced some problems with its jet propulsion system.
"The submarine is being towed in a surfaced position to the port of Novorossiisk. Its arrival is expected on Monday. Experts will establish the cause of the malfunction there," the source said.
A Russian Navy spokesman earlier said the situation on the submarine was under control and there was no danger to the crew.
He also said the submarine would continue the drills after the problem is fixed.
Alrosa, commissioned in 1990, is the only submarine in active service with the Black Sea Fleet. It is based at a Russian naval base in Sevastopol on Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula.
RIA: Launch of Proton rocket carrying European satellite delayed
11:4023/11/2009
The launch of a Proton-M carrier rocket bearing the European Eutelsat W7 satellite has been delayed, the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos said on Monday.
The launch was scheduled for Monday from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan.
"The launch of the European space vehicle has been postponed by the Kazakh side for an indefinite period," Roscosmos said.
The agency also said that the reason for the delay was unclear, as the areas in which the rocket's spent parts would fall into had already been agreed on with Kazakh authorities.
"This is not the first time the launch of a spacecraft has been threatened with failure for reasons that do not depend on Russia," Roscosmos said.
According to unofficial data, however, the launch could take place on Tuesday, at 17:19 p.m. Moscow time (14:19 p.m. GMT).
Russian-American joint venture International Launch Services (ILS) had signed a contract with the Eutelsat satellite operator to launch the Eutelsat W7 to upgrade its existing satellite grouping.
The launch was expected to be the eighth Proton launch in 2009 and the 349th overall for the famed Russian carrier rocket.
Eutelsat W7 was manufactured by Thales Alenia Space on a Spacebus 4000C4 platform.
The 5.5-ton satellite features up to 74 Ku-band transponders (12 kW) and has a lifetime of about 15 years (up to 2024).
It will provide digital broadcasting for customers in Europe, including Russia, Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East.
Eutelsat W7 is designed to replace the SESAT 1 satellite, which has been in orbit since 2000.
MOSCOW, November 23 (RIA Novosti)
RIA: Russia set to launch Eutelsat satellite from Baikonur
05:3323/11/2009
MOSCOW, November 23 (RIA Novosti) - A Proton-M carrier rocket with the European Eutelsat W7 satellite will be launched on Monday from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan, the Russian Federal Space Agency said.
Russian-American joint venture International Launch Services (ILS) has signed a contract with the Eutelsat satellite operator to launch the Eutelsat W7 to upgrade its existing satellite grouping.
It will be the eighth Proton launch in 2009 and the 349th overall for the famed Russian carrier rocket.
Eutelsat W7 has been manufactured by Thales Alenia Space on a Spacebus 4000C4 platform.
The 5.5-ton satellite features up to 74 Ku-band transponders (12 kW) and has a lifetime of about 15 years (up to 2024).
It will provide digital broadcasting for customers in Europe, including Russia, Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East.
Eutelsat W7 will replace the SESAT 1 satellite, which has been in orbit since 2000.
Itar-Tass: French telecom satellite to be launched from Baikonur space center
23.11.2009, 05.13
MOSCOW, November 23 (Itar-Tass) – A Russian carrier rocket of the Proton-M family is due to lift off from the Baikonur Space Center at 14:19 GMT Monday and to take into orbit the W-7 telecommunications satellite of the French company Eutelsat, Alexander Borbrenyov, the press secretary of the Khrunichev State Aerospace Corporation said.
“Total trip into orbit from the liftoff of the carrier rocket to the satellite’s separation from the booster block will last 9 hours 12 minutes,” a source at the Russian Space Agency Roskosmos said.
He indicated that the burned-out first stage of the carrier rocket is expected to fall in the Karaganda region of Kazakhstan, the second stage – in the Republic of Altai in the south of Siberia, and the third stage – in the Pacific Ocean.
The W-7 satellite has been produced by the French company Thales Alenia Aspace to ensure telecommunications and television broadcasting in Europe, Central Asia and Africa. It will stay in operation for fifteen years.
Launches of Proton-M three-stage liquid-propellant missiles are effectuated by the company International Launch Services /ILS/, in which the Khrunichev corporation has the controlling stake.
This is the sixth launch of the Proton-M missiles this year and the 55th launch since their commissioning for commercial operations in 1996.
Axisglobe: Russian security services already preparing to defend Kremlin against "extremists"
22.11.2009
In October the Russian Federal Protection Service (FSO) held a large-scale exercises in the territory of Moscow, online paper Forum.msk.ru reports. The Federal Security Service (FSB), the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Emergency Situations were involved in the exercises, too.
First the special equipment, including heavy equipment, was pulled together in the Moscow centre. All of it was concentrated around the Kremlin. The insulation and delimitation of the area operated round the clock. According to the caption of the exercises, a vehicles filled by explosives was revealed at the Red Square. It was the first time when such significant scale of the exercises were carried out, online paper marks.
According to Forum.msk.ru, the collateral aim of the exercises was training of defensive measures of the subject of the Kremlin in case of its blocking by crowds of extremists. The danger of such succession of events were realized back in 1993 when the officials in the Kremlin were expecting storm of supporters of the then Vice-President Alexander Rutskoy and parliamentary speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov.
Late October similar exercises were held by the Ministry of Interior in the Moscow oblast. According to the caption of exercises, police forces were deallocating the federal lane from the pensioners who have blocked it; the old age people were demanding increased social support from the government, online paper expands.
It is clear that similar exercises have been carried out from fears that the economic situation of the population can sharply worsen, Forum.msk.ru points out. The online paper considers that in the further one can expect certain preventive actions by the Ministry of Interior, the FSB, and the Ministry of Emergency Situations and the Federal Protection Service (FSO).
23 November 2009, 11:23
Interfax: Patriarch Kirill plans to visit Ukraine next summer
Moscow, November 23, Interfax - Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia plans to visit Ukraine again next summer.
"I am deeply convinced that, as Patriarch, I should visit all parts of my Church. I intend to visit Ukraine next summer," Kirill said on Rossiya TV.
Patriarch's previous visit to Ukraine in his current capacity took place in summer 2009.
Itar-Tass: Patriarch Kirill to attend funeral of priest killed last Thursday
23.11.2009, 08.57 MOSCOW, November 23 (Itar-Tass) - Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia Kirill /Cyril/ is expected to attend the funeral of the Reverend Daniil Sysoyev, the father superior of St Thomas’s Church in southern Moscow who was killed by an unknown masked gunman right inside his church in the late hours of Thursday.
His Holiness Kirill is due to come to the St Peter and Paul’s Church in the district of Yasenevo at around noon.
A remembrance service will be chanted prior to his arrival there. It will be conducted by the Patriarch’s aide, Archbishop Arsenius of Istra.
The slain Reverend Sysoyev’s father, priest Alexy Sysoyev is one of the clergymen in St Peter and Paul’s Church
The Reverend Daniil Sysoyev will then be buried at Moscow’s Kuntsevskoye cemetery.
Father Daniil was 35 years old, and he has left a wife and three children.
The raising of money to help his children and the family has begun in the St Peter and Paul’s Church, St Thomas’s Church and some other parishes we he had did his service.
For three days after the murder, Muscovites came to St Thomas’ to bid final farewell to the Reverend Sysoyev Jr. Public admittance to the coffin with his body that was placed in the church he supervised was open for the past day and a half.
Mournful people brought literally tons of flowers with them, practically covering all the approaches to the building with petals.
The Rev Sysoyev Jr. was known as a Russian Orthodox missionary and a specialist on Islam who took part in numerous disputes and discussions with representatives of that religion.
Some of the followers of Islam who participated in those discussions would convert to the Orthodox Christian faith later.
As the remembrance prayers were read in the St Thomas’s Church during the weekend, one could see many representative of Caucasian peoples among the believers.
The Rev Sysoyev Jr.’s death gave a surprising push to the Russians’ religious feelings, as Moscow priests reported a sharp increase in the numbers of laymen who attended services over the weekend.
Priests believe Thursday’s tragedy impelled the people to recall their Orthodox Christian identity.
The Rev Sysoyev Jr. was shot and killed at around 23:00 hours Thursday and the choirmaster of his church, Vladimir Strelbitsky, was severely wounded. The latter man is still staying in hospital.
Moscow City’s best detectives have been drawn into the effort to investigate the case.
Investigators say religious hatred was the most probable motive behind the murder.
RFERL: Patriarch Kirill To Take Part In Funeral For Slain Priest
November 23, 2009
Patriarch Kirill, the head of the Orthodox Church in Russia, will take part in the funeral of slain priest Daniil Sysoyev today at St. Peter and Paul Cathedral in Yasenevo, Moscow.
Archbishop Arseny of Istra will lead the service, which starts this morning, and Patriarch Kirill is scheduled to arrive later to pay his last respects to Sysoyev.
Sysoyev was a known critic of Islam and said he had received death threats for converting Muslims to Christianity.
A masked gunman shot Sysoyev outside his church in Moscow on the night of November 19.
compiled from agency reports
The Moscow Times: Controversial Priest Gunned Down in Church
23 November 2009
By Alexander Bratersky
Hundreds of mourners gathered Sunday to pay their respects to Father Daniil Sysoyev, a Russian Orthodox priest famous for his missionary work and criticism of Islam, after he was gunned down in his church last week.
Church insiders said the attack, which happened late Thursday in southern Moscow, could have been the work of radical Islamists, who had regularly threatened him for preaching to Muslims. Law enforcement officials said they believed religion was the primary motive in the killing.
The 35-year-old Sysoyev, who led the St. Thomas Church on Kantemirovskaya Ulitsa, was shot point-blank four times by an unidentified man wearing a medical face mask, police said. He was severely wounded and died in an ambulance.
Vladimir Strelbitsky, a 41-year-old regent who was nearby during the attack, was also shot and remains hospitalized in serious condition.
Citing sources with knowledge of the matter, Interfax reported that the killer called Sysoyev twice shortly before the shooting. Viktor Kupriyanchuk, the church's elder, told Kommersant that the killer burst into the church shouting, "Where's Sysoyev?" When Sysoyev stepped forward from behind the altar, the assailant shot him several times and attempted to flee.
The shooter encountered and wounded Strelbitsky on his way out of the church, Kupriyanchuk said.
Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said "witness accounts were collected indicating that Father Daniil had long received threats because of his religious activity."
In February 2008, Sysoyev said on television that he had received "10 threats via e-mail that I shall have my head cut off," unless he stopped preaching to Muslims. "As I see it, it is a sin not to preach to Muslims."
Sysoyev was a popular blogger, who also wrote against cults in his LiveJournal blog. An ethnic Tatar, he was a fervent critic of Islam, arguing that coexistence between Christians and Muslims was not possible.
"How can we create a union with people who see a territory not governed by sharia law as a land of war?" he said in the interview on Ekho Moskvy radio in 2005.
In one of his books, "Marriage to a Muslim," Sysoyev spoke against intermarriage between Muslim and Christians, saying such unions were only possible if Muslims converted. Writing in his blog about the anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution earlier this month, Sysoyev said Christians should not even sit at the same table with Communists, comments that angered many on the left.
Although in his books and speeches he tried to refrain from radical remarks often used by the Orthodox Christian right, religion experts said Sysoyev often crossed that line while clashing with his opponents.
"Many of his texts strayed far from political correctness. He often balanced on the edge," said Alexander Soldatov, a religious commentator and editor of the Credo.ru religious news service.
News of Sysoyev's death was met with cheers on Internet forums for radical Islamists, with some acknowledging that they had dreamed of knifing him to death personally.
The official leaders of the Russian Islamic community condemned the murder, and Orthodox leaders called for calm.
"We are against any extreme act or act of terror, and we consider the killing of an Orthodox priest a terrible sin," Ravil Gainutdin, chairman of the Muftis' Council of Russia, told reporters Friday.
Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, extended his condolences to Sysoyev's family and called on investigators to solve the murder.
"The killing of a priest in a church is a challenge to divine law and the desecration of a sacred place," he said in a statement.
Sysoyev's funeral will be held at 10 a.m. at the Church of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, in Yasenevo, after which Kirill will perform the conclusion of the all-night vigil. Sysoyev will be buried at the Kuznetskoye Cemetery in western Moscow.
And while some religious experts told The Moscow Times that the patriarchate had been distancing itself from the outspoken priest, he was popular and respected among the lower-ranking clergy. Sysoyev's supporters were collecting signatures on a petition over the weekend asking Kirill to make sure that his missionary work is continued.
Father Boris, who leads an Orthodox church outside Moscow, told The Moscow Times that he admired Sysoyev's books and that he believed the priest was a victim in a war against Christianity unleashed by Muslims.
"When I was reading them, I understood that it will end like this," he said. "There is a war, and people are being shot. Then they leave the trenches to go to battle. Father Daniil has left his trench."
Itar-Tass: Over 40 people trapped in snow on Chechen-Dagestani road
23.11.2009, 11.06
MAKHACHKALA, November 23 (Itar-Tass) - Forty-three people are trapped by heavy snowfall on a mountainous road on the border of Chechnya and Dagestan, an official at the main department of the Russian Emergencies Ministry for Dagestan told Itar-Tass on Monday.
Seven vehicles, including two trucks and a bus, remain trapped on the Vedeno-Andi road for over 24 hours. There are no children among them.
Rescuers left Makhachkala for the site of the incident on Monday morning. The area of distress is situated 240 kilometers from the capital of the republic.
RIA: Suspected militant killed in Chechnya
10:2023/11/2009
A suspected militant was killed in Chechnya when police encountered a group of over 10 gunmen in the Caucasus republic's Shali district, a police official said on Monday.
The shootout occurred on Sunday in a mountainous wooded area, the police source said.
"The gunmen opened fire, one of them was killed when police returned fire, the others fled," he said, adding that no police were injured in the attack.
The gunman is being identified, the official said.
Attacks on police and other officials have been reported almost daily as fighting has resurged in Chechnya, which saw two brutal separatist conflicts in the 1990s and early 2000s. Violence has also spiraled in neighboring regions of Russia's mainly Muslim North Caucasus.
MOSCOW, November 23 (RIA Novosti)
The Moscow Times: Militant Killed in Dagestan
23 November 2009
MAKHACHKALA, Dagestan — A police official said Sunday that a suspected militant was killed while trying to set up an explosive device on a highway in the Buinaksk district of Dagestan.
Regional police spokesman Mark Tolchinsky said police shot the militant late Saturday. He also said a police officer lost a hand after an explosion Sunday in the regional capital, Makhachkala.
Tolchinsky said the officer tried to remove a beer can stuffed with explosives from the hood of his car.
(AP)
Reuters: FACTBOX-Five facts on Ingush president Yevkurov
Sun Nov 22, 2009 3:25pm EST
Nov 22 (Reuters) - Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, the head of Russia's turbulent Ingushetia region, told Reuters in an interview on Sunday that corruption amongst officials was plaguing his small republic and aiding an Islamist insurgency.
In June a suicide bomb attack left him fighting for his life, but he has since recovered.
Following are key facts on the 46-year-old ex-paratrooper:
* Yevkurov, an ethnic Ingush, was born in 1963 in the neighbouring Russian republic of North Ossetia. A career soldier who rose to the rank of general, he graduated from the elite Ryazan Airborne Forces Academy. He was named a Hero of Russia for leading the audacious 1999 Russian operation to seize Pristina airport from under the noses of NATO forces advancing into Kosovo.
* Yevkurov asked senior commanders not to send him into action when the Kremlin was fighting rebels in neighbouring Chechnya, ethnically close to Ingushetia.
* Yevkurov has been trying to clamp down on official corruption and poverty, blamed for driving young people into the arms of Islamist rebels.
* In 1992, Yevkurov's home village in North Ossetia was embroiled in battles between the mainly Ingush residents and local North Ossetians, over land that Soviet dictator Josef Stalin transferred to North Ossetia in 1944. Tens of thousands of Ingush fled North Ossetia, and their demand to return home has bedevilled relations between the neighbouring republics and proven a major challenge to Yevkurov's presidency.
* Human rights groups say they have found Yevkurov to be straightforward to deal with and sincere in his efforts to rein in abuses by security forces. Yevkurov has also been widely praised for his success in reconciling dozens of local clans involved in bloody feuds. (Writing by Dmitry Solovyov and Amie Ferris-Rotman; Editing by Kevin Liffey) (( For an interview with Yevkurov, click on [ID:nGEE5AL09K]
For a factbox on Ingushetia, click on [ID:nGEE5AL0BM] ((amie.ferris-rotman@, +7 495 775 12 42, Reuters Messaging: amie.ferris-@))
Reuters: FACTBOX-Key facts about Russia's region of Ingushetia
Sun Nov 22, 2009 3:50pm EST
Nov 22 (Reuters) - The tiny republic of Ingushetia is at the heart of mounting violence across the North Caucasus, on Russia's southern fringe. Its leader told Reuters on Sunday that widespread state corruption was fuelling an Islamist insurgency.
Following are key facts about the region:
POVERTY
Ingushetia is the smallest and poorest region in Russia, wedged between North Ossetia and Chechnya. The unemployment rate was estimated in March 2009 at over 50 percent. Over 90 percent of Ingushetia's revenue comes in subsidies from Moscow.
Desperate poverty and widespread corruption are at the very least a factor in fuelling an insurgency that is nominally about establishing Islamic rule.
Russian and Ingush officials say publicly that corruption has reached shocking levels, opening a gulf between the region's ruling class and its population of around half a million.
PRESIDENT
Ingush president Yunus-Bek Yevkurov came to power with Moscow's support last year to replace ex-KGB general Murat Zyazikov, appointed in 2002 with the backing of Vladimir Putin, then Russia's president.
Promising to tackle corruption, Yevkurov promptly sacked his entire government. He was almost killed in a suicide bomb attack in June. After recovering, the former paratrooper promised to wage a merciless war against terrorism and appealed to militants to lay down their arms. He has also proposed a poverty reduction programme, financed by Moscow, in a bid to curb discontent.
REBELLION
Russian special forces have been fighting rebels in Ingushetia since 2002.
Around 90 people died in a rebel attack on the city of Nazran in 2004. Last August, a suicide bomber killed 25 people and wounded over 100 at a police headquarters in Nazran, the bloodiest attack to hit the North Caucasus since 2005.
NEIGHBOURS
The Soviet Union lumped ethnically close Ingushetia and Chechnya together. But after its collapse in 1991, Chechnya declared independence and Ingushetia chose to become a republic within Russia.
Relations with neighbouring North Ossetia are strained. Paramilitary groups fought a brief war in 1992 over a disputed district. Hundreds died and thousands became refugees.
Ingushetia's president from 1992 to 2001, Ruslan Aushev, steered it away from the conflict in Chechnya, where rebels fought federal forces in two wars from 1994.
During the second Chechen war, which began in 1999, Ingushetia was the destination for thousands of Chechen refugees.
STATUS
* Ingushetia is one of 21 republics within Russia and has nominal autonomy with its own president, parliament and constitution. Its main religion is Sufi Islam.
(Writing by Moscow bureau; Editing by Dominic Evans and Kevin Liffey) (( For an interview with Yevkurov, click on [ID:nGEE5AL09K]
For a FACTBOX on Yevkurov, click on [ID:nGEE5AL0BK] ((Moscow bureau, +7 495 775 1242))
Reuters: RPT-INTERVIEW-Ingushetia boss admits corruption fuels rebellion
Mon Nov 23, 2009 7:45am GMT
(Repeats Nov. 22 report without changes to text)
* Ingush leader says state corruption aids militants
* Pledges to punish corrupt officials more severely
By Amie Ferris-Rotman
MOSCOW, Nov 22 (Reuters) - The leader of Russia's Muslim republic of Ingushetia, who narrowly survived an assassination attempt in June, conceded on Sunday that widespread state corruption was helping an Islamist insurgency in the region.
He declined to say what proportion of officials were corrupt, but acknowledged the problem was bad enough to fuel a cycle of violence and crime that has put his impoverished region at the heart of mounting violence across the North Caucasus.
"Bandits give money to officials, knowing they can be easily paid off," Yunus-Bek Yevkurov told Reuters in an interview during a trip to the Russian capital. "This in turn means officials are (aiding) the terrorists and militants."
He added that law enforcement agencies were also behind eight kidnappings this year.
The tall, moustachioed leader, who spent two months in hospital including a fortnight in a coma after a suicide bomber blew up his car in June, said he was banking on a stabilisation programme including harsher punishment for corrupt officials.
When Yevkurov was appointed just over a year ago, he immediately sacked his entire cabinet, pledging to reduce corruption. He admitted his efforts had yet to show progress.
"We underestimated the situation before and this was a mistake ... But I believe in myself, that I will control it by punishment," he said, adding that more officials still needed to be stripped of the power they had amassed in the previous government.
FORMER PARATROOPER
The decorated paratrooper, who led Russian troops in a showdown with NATO forces at Pristina airport during the Kosovo war in 1999, was chosen by the Kremlin to replace Murat Zyazikov, whom rights groups accuse of murder and corruption.
Yevkurov is largely credited with securing an aid package from the Kremlin worth 32 billion roubles ($980 million) over the next six years.
Over half of Ingushetia's economically active population are unemployed, and 90 percent of the region's revenues are subsidies from Moscow.
He aims to use the aid package to develop the economy and create jobs, in the hope that this will reduce crime.
Armed attacks on authorities and law enforcement agencies are a near daily occurrence in the region of 470,000 people bordering Chechnya, where Moscow has gone to war with rebels twice in the past two decades.
President Dmitry Medvedev has described the North Caucasus as Russia's biggest domestic political problem, and rights groups and analysts say Ingushetia is at war with Islamist rebels.
But Yevkurov rejected the term, saying the violence stemmed from poverty and easy access to weapons, as well as abuses and corruption by law enforcement agencies.
He said his biggest challenge was to prevent "disenchanted, disappointed" young men being drawn into the insurgency by creating more jobs and establishing social programmes.
Having grown up with a surge in violence that started after the Soviet Union fell in 1991, Ingushetia's youth "know nothing but violence, terrorism, and banditry", he said. (Editing by Kevin Liffey) (( For a FACTBOX on Ingushetia, click on [ID:nGEE5AL0BM]
For a FACTBOX on Yevkurov, click on [ID:nGEE5AL0BK] ((amie.ferris-rotman@, +7 495 775 12 42, Reuters Messaging: amie.ferris-@)) ($1=32.55 Rouble)
The other Russia: Letter to Medvedev: ‘Stop this Mad Conveyor of Death’
November 20th, 2009 • Related • Filed Under
The brother of a murdered Chechen rebel has appealed to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev for help and protection in an open letter published by the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper, reports Gazeta.ru on November 19.
According to the report, Isa Yamadayev says in the letter that his life is in danger, and he asks for personal support from the president. “One after another my brothers are killed. In 2003 militants killed Yamadayev Dzhabrail. In 2008 in Moscow they killed Ruslan Yamadayev; in the United Arab Emirates my brother Sulim Yamadayev was shot. Now the hunt is open for me,” he says.
Yamadayev refers in the letter to common speculation in the press that the Kremlin has given carte blanche to Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, and therefore closes its eyes to the murders of political opponents in the region.
“Is it really so that now, without analysis, all opponents of Kadyrov are declared enemies of Russia and can be killed? Human rights advocate Natalya Estemirova of Memorial, killed in 2009, Movladi Atlangeriyev, kidnapped in Moscow in 2007, and then killed in Chechnya, the president of Konvers-Group Aleksandr Antonov and his anonymous guard, killed in Moscow in 2009. They are what, also enemies of Russia?” the letter asks.
Yamadayev says that he sees only one answer to this question: That President Medvedev is not informed of the true state of affairs concerning the investigation of these crimes.
At the end of his letter, Yamadayev expresses certainty that he will also be killed, and asks Medvedev “to stop this mad conveyer of death.”
The Yamadayev brothers were former allies of the Kadyrov family in Chechnya, but their relationship took a turn for the worse after the death of former President Akhmad Kadyrov in 2004. Relations between the clans spoiled altogether after a crash between the Kadyrov motorcade and a convoy driven by Badrudi Yamadayev.
Several months after the crash, Ruslan Yamadayev was shot and killed in Moscow. In March 2009, unknown persons shot Sulim Yamadayev; one of the suspects had close ties to President Ramzan Kadyrov. The Times newspaper in London cites Sulim’s killing as the sixth violent murder of Kadyrov opponent in a row. Isa Yamadayev had stated in May that he believed his life to be in danger.
The Kremlin-backed Kadyrov regime in Chechnya has recently come under fire for murdering members of opposition forces, a charge that both the Kadyrovs and the Kremlin deny. Nevertheless, the murdered Yamadayev brothers are among a number of other recently targeted opponents. Former Kadyrov bodyguard Umar Israilov was assassinated in Vienna after becoming a critic of the regime. Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, the president of a breakaway Chechen republic, was killed in exile by Russian military intelligence in 2004.
The Moscow Times: 2010 Work Permit Cuts Planned
23 November 2009
The Moscow Times
The Federal Migration Service said Friday that it would cut the number of job permits available to foreigners next year to just less than 2 million people, down from an initial 3.8 million at the start of 2009, after the economic crisis severely cut demand for foreign labor.
Alexei Lomkin, the service’s director for foreign labor migration, said the initial quota would be 1.3 million, with the rest of the permits available as a reserve, Interfax reported. The 2009 quota — eventually lowered to 2 million people — was only 65 percent fulfilled, he said.
Fyodor Karpovets, the service’s chief in Moscow, said the city would have a quota of 250,000 permits, including a reserve of 80,000. That is down from more than 392,000 permits this year, he said.(MT)
The Moscow Times: A Strong Nation of Lawyers
23 November 2009
By Brian L. Zimbler
Some people hate lawyers. Shakespeare’s Henry VI wanted to “kill all the lawyers,” and Vladimir Lenin advised clients to give their lawyers “hell” and denounce them as scoundrels. In the United States, even children recite anti-lawyer jokes like: “Why won’t a shark attack a lawyer? Professional courtesy.”
Given such attitudes, we lawyers are delighted to see that Russia is bucking the trend. Serious steps are being taken to increase respect for lawyers and even honor them. President Dmitry Medvedev, himself a lawyer, has frequently spoken about the importance of a sound legal system for the country’s future development. Presumably, he expects lawyers to help lead the fight against “legal nihilism” and promote the rule of law.
Last month, the president gave lawyers a special boost, signing an executive order to create an annual Lawyer of the Year prize. It will be awarded on the legal profession’s national day, Dec. 3.
The private sector is doing its part as well. On Friday, a special ceremony was held in Moscow to grant the Corporate Lawyer magazine awards to the best company legal departments in Russia.
These actions make good sense. Russia competes for jobs, contracts and investments with the many countries suffering from the global credit crunch, including Brazil, India and China. To win this competition, Russia must quickly modernize its economy, streamline its overwhelming state bureaucracy and encourage investments in technology and training. Russia’s lawyers should play a key role in these efforts.
Why are lawyers essential for national success? In brief, healthy societies require a level playing field, where the most talented individuals and best companies are able to succeed on merit and the same laws apply to all. This is the real meaning of the often-used expression “rule of law.” Lawyers can facilitate the development of such a society, by helping individuals and companies to protect their property and human rights and ensure fair and equal treatment.
So why are lawyers so often disliked? Some lawyers are overzealous in promoting the interests of their clients. Others are all too willing to bend the rules to win a case for their clients. In business transactions, they raise meaningless objections and “over-lawyer” the documents. Such actions cause nonlawyers to lose faith in the legal system, and they damage the reputation of the legal profession.
Clients as well as lawyers are to blame. The American comedian W.C. Fields once said that if someone asked him for a loan, he would first seek advice from a lawyer, and if he did not like the lawyer’s advice he would find another lawyer. Such attitudes are common.
Lawyers are also used as battering rams to beat up the other side and advance selfish interests rather than to achieve a fair result.
At present, Russia has a good chance of overcoming many of these problems with its relatively new legal system. Substantial progress has been achieved. In less than two decades, the country has adopted a wide range of rules and regulations appropriate to a 21st-century economy.
While the legislative reform process continues, attention should focus on a new goal: winning the hearts and minds of officials, civil servants the business community and ordinary citizens. All of these groups need to embrace the rule of law for Russia to benefit and to overcome the many well-publicized obstacles, such as continuing corruption, remaining gaps in legislation and the like.
Good lawyers can play a key role in this process by doing excellent legal work, setting examples for others, helping to educate the public about legal matters and properly training our own colleagues and personnel.
Having spent more than 20 years working on legal matters in the Soviet Union and Russia, I am proud of the many young Russian lawyers who have worked in my firm. I am confident that they will contribute to the future development of their country. In this context, the president’s Lawyer of the Year award and the other programs being developed to encourage lawyers are welcome and appropriate incentives.
Brian L. Zimbler is the managing partner at Dewey & LeBoeuf, an international law firm in Moscow.
The Moscow Times: The Promising Continent
23 November 2009
By Ruben Vardanian
Last month I visited the 13th Africa Forum in Cape Town, organized by Troika Dialog’s strategic partner Standard Bank. Talking with delegates, I was struck once again by the sheer scale of opportunity that exists in Africa for Russian business, just as Russia becomes an increasingly attractive market for African products.
A complex continent of 53 countries and more than 2,000 languages with historical connections to Europe, Asia and the Americas, Africa’s economy has continued to grow through the financial crisis, albeit at a slower rate than before. Despite the decline of conventional capital flows, innovative solutions such as microfinance, private equity and venture capital have maintained the powerful pace of progress.
To be sure, there is still a lot that has to be done in terms of improving the investment climate and infrastructure as well as easing the overbearing regulatory environment.
President Dmitry Medvedev’s visit to Africa in June was an important step to shift Russian perceptions of the continent. But it was not just a diplomatic mission. Medvedev was accompanied by 300 businesspeople, inspired to talk to African counterparts about how they can share expertise and resources.
Russia still lags behind its BRIC partners in terms of bilateral trade with Africa, but its trade with Africa is the fastest growing — at 15 percent annually since 1992. Although most other trade partners look to Africa mainly as a source of raw materials, Russia, which is rich in raw materials, can expand its trade relationship to a higher level.
This story is no longer about lackluster investment as a vehicle to plunder Africa of resources. Africa is an enormous potential marketplace for Russian goods and services. It has a population of almost 1 billion people, recognized early by telecoms companies that provided the continent with mobile phone service.
But cooperation is a two-way street. Russia has the high technology to upgrade the African resources industry and the expertise that comes from a century of developing its own natural resources. Africa is already a major exporter of food and iron ore to Russia, with volumes set to soar in coming years.
The lion’s share of Russian investment into the emerging markets has been focused on the Commonwealth of Independent States, but investment in Africa, in particular, is growing fast. This investment is an important factor to develop the continent’s infrastructure, services sector and financial markets.
Education is also critical. An increasing number of African university students are studying in Russia, and leading business schools like the Skolkovo School of Management are preparing future business leaders to work with Africa and other emerging markets.
It’s no longer necessary for trade and investment flows between two emerging markets to take a circuitous route via London or New York. Relationships are direct, and the benefits are felt directly by both parties. I would like to see Russia more connected to the world, and Africa is an excellent place to expand Russia’s role as a leading economic power.
Ruben Vardanian is chairman of the board of directors and CEO of Troika Dialog Group and president of the Skolkovo School of Management.
Russia Today: Litvinenko case unsolved three years on
23 November, 2009, 09:24
It is three years since former Russian security officer Aleksandr Litvinenko died of polonium poisoning in London.
After Scotland Yard's investigation pointed the finger at Russian businessman Andrey Lugovoy, legal wrangling over possible extradition led to a diplomatic spat between the UK and Russia.
Britain’s prime suspect says he is innocent and is willing to come to the UK to cooperate with the investigation.
“We would be ready to go there if firstly, the British resume the investigation; secondly, send all the materials they have here [to Moscow] to prove the basis of the charges; and thirdly, we see their real initiative,” Lugovoy insists on his conditions.
This month, Scotland Yard’s case against Lugovoy sustained a blow. A German court dropped its legal action against another Russian, Dmitry Kovtun, who was suspected of transporting the polonium-210 that Britain believed was used to kill Litvinenko. Kovtun has now been given access to the evidence against him.
“Already now we can see a lot of inconsistencies. If we study carefully all the documents and discrepancies in this case, it will help us to prove the guilt and to show to the world that the Russian party had nothing to do with that,” Kovtun said.
Originally, German authorities said the case against Kovtun was open and shut. They said he appeared to have left a trail of polonium wherever he went in the days leading up to Litvinenko’s murder – on a plane, in a car, and even in the Hamburg apartment of his ex-wife.
A leading writer of Britain’s The Times newspaper, Michael Binyon, believes the German court closed the case because of lack of evidence:
“It was probably decided there would not be a safe conviction – they wouldn’t have enough evidence to prove that the radioactive material was transported by Kovtun. They wouldn’t be able to call witnesses. They probably wouldn’t be able to produce the man and credible witnesses in Germany to have a fair trial. And without those things there’s no point going ahead with an accusation,” Binyon claims.
Now that Germany has thrown that case out, for many it begs the question: how strong is Britain’s evidence against Lugovoy?
“I sometimes wonder if the evidence is as strong as what we suggest it is. I’d like to think it was because the whole country is being led to believe that the evidence is so overwhelmingly patently easy to prove. Then we should try it and see if we can convince the Russian judicial system of the merits of the case. If we can’t, then let’s be honest enough to say we can’t,” says MP Mike Hancock, chairman of Britain’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on Russia.
Bringing Lugovoy to trial in Russia would be hard. While he is a Duma deputy he remains immune from prosecution.
The vindication of Kovtun may not automatically prove Lugovoy innocent. But the German case against Kovtun and the British case against Lugovoy both hinge on a radioactive trail. So if the Germans did not have enough to bring Kovtun to trial, the question is, how incontrovertible is the evidence of the Crown Prosecution Service?
BBC: Russia 'is now a criminal state'
Russia has now turned into a "criminal state", according to the man who was once its leading foreign investor.
Bill Browder of Hermitage Capital was reacting to the news that his lawyer had died in prison in Russia after being held for a year without charge.
He told the BBC that his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, had effectively been "held hostage and they killed their hostage."
Through Hermitage Capital Bill Browder campaigned against corruption at some of Russia's largest companies.
Russian officials say they are investigating Mr Magnitsky's death.
In 2005 Mr Browder was banned from Russia as a threat to national security, after allegations that his firms evaded tax, but Mr Browder says his company was targeted by criminals trying to seize millions of pounds worth of his assets.
Mr Browder says he was punished for being a threat to corrupt politicians and bureaucrats.
Since then, a number of Mr Browder's associates in Russia - as well as lawyers acting for his company - have been detained, beaten or robbed.
Before the accusations of tax evasion were raised, for many years Mr Browder had been one of the most outspoken defenders of the Russian government and its then-president Vladimir Putin.
'False confession'
According to Mr Browder, Sergei Magnitsky developed stomach and pancreas problems in prison which were diagnosed by a prison physician. He claims Mr Magnitsky was then moved to a new prison and then deprived of medical treatment.
"They basically said to him if you sign the following false confessions then we'll give you medical treatment - otherwise we wont," claims Mr Browder.
Mr Magnitsky apparently wrote numerous complaints to the court, prosecutors and the prison authorities requesting medical treatment. Mr Browder claims that Mr Magnistky's pleas were first ignored and then denied.
Mr Browder believes that Mr Magnitsky's death is a direct result of tax evasion allegations against him.
"They're trying to come up with any kind of charges they can against me and they were using him as their tool. He was their hostage and they killed their hostage by denying him medical attention, " he says.
Sergei Magnitsky was one of the lawyers hired by Mr Browder to investigate whether fraud had been committed against his firms.
Mr Browder claims that when the police raided his office they took away corporate documents which they then used to steal his companies.
"Sergei Magnitsky was one of the lawyers who discovered the whole crime, figured out who was responsible and then testified against the police officers and after he testified against the police officers the very same police officers had him arrested on spurious charges."
The circumstances surrounding Mr Magnitsky's death has caused Bill Browder to question his attitude to Russia under Putin.
'Criminal state'
"When Putin first showed up and said he was going to tame the oligarchs I was the biggest fan of that particular concept. Then I realised that what he meant by taming the oligarchs was by sticking law enforcement people in their place," he says.
"Now you have a bunch of law enforcement people who are essentially organised criminals with unlimited power to ruin lives take property and do whatever they like and that's far worse than I have ever seen in Russia before. Russia is essentially a criminal state now."
Mr Browder says he is going to do all he can to get justice for Sergei Magnitsky.
"We're not going to let it rest until the people responsible for the death face justice," he said.
Responding to Mr Magnitsky's death, Russian Justice Minister Alexander Konovalov said he needed more evidence that the prisoner did not receive adequate medical care.
"I would be grateful to human rights activists for providing specific information. In every case where there are doubts that assistance was timely and of good quality, there has to be a probe".
The investigative committee for the Prosecutor's office said they were conducting a full investigation in the death.
"As of now, we don't see a justification for starting a criminal case," said Moscow Investigative Committee chief, Anatoly Bagmet.
The Washington Times: Corruption drags down Russian economy
Monday, November 23, 2009
By Jason Motlagh
MOSCOW | The Hotel Moscow, an icon of Soviet architecture, is today a monument to another pervasive aspect of Russian reality: crony capitalism.
Seven years ago, the city government decided to demolish and rebuild the towering, thousand-room structure just off Red Square, and awarded the contract to a U.S.-registered developer. But the deal was annulled under murky circumstances, investigators say, in favor of business interests well connected to officialdom and organized crime. Financial irregularities have since delayed the project's completion.
The fate of the hotel is emblematic of Russia's troubling business culture. A string of similar high-profile cases in which bureaucrats, police and justice officials are suspected of using their authority to pressure or swindle foreign companies has caused an increasing number of investors to pull out, with potentially dire consequences for a flagging economy.
Foreign investment is down 22.9 percent compared with last year, according to the Noviye Izvestia newspaper. In the second half of 2008 alone, an estimated $7 billion in foreign capital exited Russia.
Russia also was ranked 146th out of 180 countries last week in Transparency International's annual survey, which measures corruption in government and business - a drop of nearly 30 places since 2002.
The watchdog group estimated that bribery costs Russia $300 billion a year, or about 18 percent of its gross domestic product.
"With the current level and volume of corruption ... we cannot move forward," Transparency International said in a statement last week. "If corruption stays as it is now, it will continue to eat up the resources" that Russia could invest in its future.
President Dmitry Medvedev has acknowledged the problem, lamenting the "legal nihilism" that has rotted the system. In a major speech earlier this month, he said corruption needed to be tackled from many directions but that a solution would take time: "We won't solve the problem in a single bound, but we have to dig in."
Russia analysts say implementation of promised reforms has been scant.
Dmitri Simes, president of the Nixon Center, a Washington think tank, and a frequent visitor to Russia, said that "senior government officials do not hide their wealth" and can be seen wearing watches worth tens of thousands and even hundreds of thousands of dollars.
"This systemic corruption makes it very difficult to introduce meaningful political change," Mr. Simes said at a recent forum on Russia.
In July, Robert Dudley, the chief executive officer of a joint venture between BP PLC and Russian oil company TNK, left the country in the face of harassment. Masked agents raided the company headquarters, BP staff members suddenly were denied visas on dubious grounds, and Mr. Dudley faced threats over what appeared to be bogus labor law violations.
The week after his departure, Russian stocks plummeted 12 percent. JP Morgan lowered its stock rating from "neutral" to "below market," citing the risk of state interference.
When Ikea, the Swedish retailer, began opening stores across the country, it faced extortionate rates from utility companies. Rather than pay, it rented private generators to power its stores, only to find that the Russian executive in charge of the generators was inflating prices.
Ikea claims it lost nearly $200 million over two years and has suspended all investment in Russia.
One of the most notorious cases involves a criminal lawsuit under way in a Moscow court, in which government employees are accused of defrauding Russian taxpayers of a half-billion dollars and, adding insult to injury, using the legal system to punish those who sought justice.
According to Bill Browder, head of the Hermitage Fund, a hedge fund that was once the biggest foreign investor in Russia, scammers within the government have taken over companies that have paid taxes, then created fake losses to retroactively reclaim taxes as a rebate.
Last week, an attorney for Mr. Browder's hedge fund, Sergei Magnitsky, died in a Moscow prison hospital. He had been in pretrial detention for nearly a year, during which he claimed that police made offers to release him if he testified against Hermitage.
"He entered prison as a healthy 37-year-old and exited the prison dead," Mr. Browder told the Associated Press by telephone. He said Mr. Magnitsky had developed pancreatitis in jail and was repeatedly denied medical attention.
Attempts by The Washington Times and the AP to contact authorities for comment on the case were unsuccessful.
Mr. Browder, who now lives in London, has been blacklisted as a "threat to national security."
His attorney's death is likely to deepen Western concerns about the risks faced by anyone who challenges the authorities in Russia. Several independent journalists and human rights activists and lawyers have been victims of unsolved slayings in recent years.
Analysts say corruption is so widespread that even those determined to combat graft don't know where to start or whom to trust.
"Nothing will change with this case," Yulia Latynina, a prominent investigative journalist who tracks state corruption, said of the Hermitage Fund situation. The government's "response has been crude and fantastic. It's quite evident that the people behind this are high up in the system."
In the case of the Hotel Moscow, politics and crime meet, with a twist.
Investigators say businessmen with close links to the city government were given a majority stake in the reconstruction contract after the contract had been issued to another company, Decorum Corp.
The businessmen adopted a variation of the same name, Dekorum, prior to assuming control, and partnered with the Moscow Development Co. to form a new company called Dekmos. Among the main stakeholders was Ashot Yegiazaryan, a veteran banker and member of parliament suspected of having ties with criminal networks.
One investigator, a former Western intelligence officer who monitors Russian organized crime and asked not to be named because he works in Russia and does not want to compromise his investigations, said that for the past two decades Mr. Yegiazaryan has colluded with Moscow government officials to secure properties illegally and development rights at a fraction of their real value.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Yegiazaryan founded Moscow National Bank, where, according to the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, a leading independent daily, he used high-level official contacts to divert tens ofmillions of dollars in state funds. It soon became one the largest banks in Russia.
Mr. Yegiazaryan departed as the bank's fortunes soured, and subsequently moved on to co-own Unikombank. Within several years, the bank declared bankruptcy. By then, he had also left that company.
To finance the Hotel Moscow project, associates at Dekorum took out an $87.5 million loan from Deutsche Bank, according to Novaya Gazeta. However, the overextended company was hit with heavy losses during the economic downturn and eventually defaulted.
The city government intervened to cover the loan, on the condition that Dekorum transfer an additional 25.5 percent stake to the city, which has yet to happen.
In mid-June, Mr. Yegiazaryan's offices were raided by police. Investigators suspect that the loan and failure to repay may have been planned from the outset.
Mr. Yegiazaryan is now keeping a low profile and could not be reached for comment. Dekorum's offices are closed.
Reports have circulated in the media that he may be stripped of his seat in the Duma, the lower house of parliament, and with it, immunity to prosecution. Moreover, a new anti-mafia law signed earlier this month by Mr. Medvedev aims to punish those who leverage their ties to organized crime.
Mr. Yegiazaryan "was always considered one of the most corrupt," said Ms. Latynina, the investigative journalist. "For sure, he was never a model businessman."
The city construction department, meanwhile, has taken control of the Hotel Moscow project.
On a recent afternoon, empty scaffolding ringed the vast exterior. Only an artist's rendering of the completed building on a billboard affixed to the chain-link security fence suggests its realization.
City authorities say doors will open sometime in 2011, years after the overhaul began. That may be optimistic.
LA Times: Hungary zigzags when it comes to Russia
Some in the former Soviet satellite now part of NATO and the EU warn that Moscow is intent on reasserting influence, but others see Russia as a useful investor and lucrative market.
By Megan K. Stack
November 22, 2009
Reporting from Budapest, Hungary - There's a museum in Budapest called the House of Terror. It has a metal awning with the word "terror" carved out of it, and when the sun is high, the people below step on terror, pass through terror, because the shadow of the word hangs in the air before it hits the ground.
Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall signaled the end of Soviet dominance in Hungary, Russia's ghosts linger in a fledgling political system, and its oil and gas muscle spooks the Hungarian government. Russia exists today as an anxiety; to a rising generation, an abstraction. And yet, to some -- an opportunity.
The fall of the Soviet empire freed Hungary to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and European Union and reinvent itself, along with other parts of the surrounding region, as the eastern edge of a unified Europe.
As an increasingly assertive Russia has capitalized on its oil and gas wealth, some former satellites have remained hostile and frightened; others have opted for greater cooperation with Moscow.
Hungary's dealings have been more ambiguous. Business and politics are typified by mixed impulses -- tentative steps together, sudden flashes of vulnerability and push-back.
Moscow is there, after all, and must be dealt with. Moreover, Russia is rich, and many Hungarians are bitter and disillusioned to realize that EU membership has failed to deliver them into wealth.
But there is the problem of the past in a country where Soviet tanks put a bloody end to a 1956 uprising -- the paranoia left over, but also a general unease about thinking too hard about the decades of quiet collusion that followed.
"Everything is mellowed and blurred. The past is defined as bad, but it's never engaged in a social discussion," said Gergely Romsics of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs. "People don't want to face the last 40 years, the little compromises they made with power. What happens with Russia in post-1989 Hungary is forgetting."
Walk through the door of the House of Terror and you are confronted by a star and the arrow-tipped cross of the pro-Nazi party that surged to power in the 1940s. The pair of symbols conjure the history of this building, which housed the Arrow Cross party before being seized by the Communists and converted to a secret police headquarters.
It's also the kind of thing that infuriates many Russians -- the conflation of Soviet and fascist occupation.
Walk a little deeper and you will find a television set flashing the same pictures, over and over again.
"Sixteen-, 18-year-old kids whose thinking was different, and they sent for the hangman, the executioner," weeps a man in black and white. "This was their socialism."
This is where the museum of history meets contemporary politics. Critics say the museum was opened as a political ploy on the part of the conservative party.
Socialists, who believe the museum was created to undermine their popular appeal, point out that the exhibits are weighted heavily on the side of recapturing and condemning the brutality of Soviet repression.
The museum's director brushed aside the complaint. Budapest already had a Holocaust center, she pointed out, but was lacking any public dialogue about decades of socialism.
"This created a big discussion about the past, which is good," Maria Schmidt said. "We had these very, very hot discussions."
Schmidt is a former advisor to Viktor Orban, the head of Hungary's most powerful conservative party, Fidesz. As a young man, Orban electrified the country during the heavily symbolic 1989 reburial of former Prime Minister Imre Nagy, who had stood up to the Soviets in 1956 and been executed for his trouble.
The day Nagy was laid to rest, Orban stole the show with an audacious call for the Soviets to leave the country. He would go on to serve as prime minister from 1998 to 2002.
"It was very brave, and people were horrified," said Tibor Dessewffy, director of Budapest's socialist-linked Demos think tank. "With that single performance, Orban divided the country in two."
Today, Orban preaches that Hungary must avoid becoming the "happiest barrack of Gazprom," the Russian gas giant.
He is invoking the much- repeated line that Hungary, with its relatively liberal brand of socialism, was the happiest barrack of the Soviet bloc.
This is how Russia flickers through domestic politics, used as a bludgeon between the conservatives, who have found themselves relegated to the opposition, and the leftists, in power but beleaguered.
Ivan Boytsov is nostalgic for the Hungary he discovered in 1978, when he traveled the countryside as a student at St. Petersburg State University. As an administrator at the Russian Culture Center in Budapest, he is here championing the study of Russian language and culture, and trying to improve what he regards as deeply flawed perceptions.
"If there's any information on TV, it will be about Russian expansionism," he said. "I can't remember any coverage of Russian sports, science or accomplishments."
Mandatory under Soviet occupation, the Russian-language curriculum vanished from schools after the fall of the Berlin Wall, replaced by German, French and -- most of all -- English.
Today, driven by curiosity and ambition, interest in Russian studies is creeping back, school by school. The rekindling of interest comes despite school administrators who keenly recall the old days, Boytsov says.
"Students and parents want it, but the administrators make it impossible," he said. "They say it's of no use to students to speak Russian."
Still, students are signing up for his courses by the hundreds. Almost all of them have an eye on doing business in Russia, lured by tales of booming wealth.
Hungarians who fret over resurgent Russian influence see the return of eastern power not in tanks, but in -- often cloudy -- business transactions.
"Russia is a threat to its immediate neighbors, whether or not they see it," said Istvan Gyarmati, a longtime ambassador and president of the International Center for Democratic Transition in Budapest. "Oil and gas is a weapon, and they use it."
This year, an opaque Russian energy firm with close links to the Kremlin bought a 20% stake in the Hungarian oil and gas company MOL. Meanwhile, the national airline, Malev, has fallen under the management of Aeroflot, Russia's national airline.
There are two ways to look at this: Russia is a cash-rich country full of people looking for investment opportunities in nearby markets. Or, Russia is a sinister force spending cash in its effort to regain influence in the former Soviet bloc.
Some countries have aggressively blocked Russian investors. But Hungary has tried to hedge its bets.
In a Europe split by gas wars, Hungary supports both South Stream, a pipeline backed by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin that would deliver Russian gas under the Black Sea to Europe, and Nabucco, a rival, U.S.-backed project that would carry Central Asian gas to Europe through Turkey, bypassing Russia.
The idea is to stay in the middle, to give it a little time, to try to turn a profit.
"It's good to have Russia as an ally, but it's good to have them far," said Zoltan Kiszelly, a political scientist in Budapest. "You have to think this way when you're a small country."
The New Red Army
Newsweek: How Medvedev plans to reform the military—and why Obama should not be worried.
By Owen Matthews and Anna Nemtsova | NEWSWEEK
Published Nov 20, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Nov 30, 2009
On a chilly day earlier this fall in a forest near the Lithuanian border, Dmitry Medvedev strode out to inspect one of Russia's latest tactical missiles as it was trundled into launch position. The president wore a green officer's jacket with commander-in-chief decals and used a pair of outsize binoculars to watch the rocket soar toward its target.
Not long ago, such atmospherics would have been left to Vladimir Putin, Medvedev's old boss. But Russia's young, reformist president has become very invested in the country's military, and not just, like his predecessor, to bulwark a tough-guy image. While Putin quadrupled defense spending without making much headway on reform, Medvedev has embarked on a bold campaign to transform the Red Army, trying to turn a creaking Cold War–era institution plagued with a corrupt officer corps, outdated equipment, endemic bullying, suicide, and alcoholism into a modern fighting force able to effectively project power abroad for the first time in a generation. In his state-of-the-empire speech on Nov. 12, Medvedev told the Duma that Russia's "old economic model doesn't work anymore" and said that "our nation's survival will depend on modernization." The same goes for the military. It's an enormous project: to succeed, Medvedev will have to make the Russian Army smaller, better equipped, and more professional. This will mean painful cuts and dismantling deep vested interests that have thrived on the rotting, subsidy-soaked body of Russia's military-industrial complex.
If it works, however, the payoff could be just as great: a military that might actually live up to the Kremlin's ambitions. Those don't include threatening the West. Medvedev wants to stop preparing for the conventional European war the old Soviet Army was designed to fight and to focus instead on the kind of regional missions Russia may actually face in the years ahead. This will take rapid-reaction forces capable of fighting brushfire wars and clobbering smaller neighbors. Russia's not getting out of the great-power game entirely: Medvedev is also investing heavily in the country's still-gigantic strategic nuclear arsenal in order to preserve Moscow's place at the top table of nations. But even as he builds next-generation nukes, he has made a point of reassuring Washington by agreeing to cutbacks in Russia's aging nuclear stockpile.
Medvedev embarked on his reform campaign last year, shortly after Russia's dismal performance in the August war against Georgia, according to Pavel Zolotarev of Russia's Academy of Sciences. It was the first time Russia's Army had been tested against a foreign enemy since the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and the results weren't pretty. The campaign exposed what independent military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer calls "embarrassing failings" in Russia's fighting ability. At least 11 Russian aircraft and several drones were shot down, and there were reports of extensive burning and looting of abandoned Georgian villages by undisciplined troops. Many Russian soldiers were spotted going to battle in running shoes and polyester sweatpants instead of boots and camouflage uniforms, and one junior officer even asked NEWSWEEK reporters to lend him a Georgian SIM card to call his superiors after radios failed. A line of broken-down Russian armored personnel carriers was also seen on the main road from Tskhinvali to Gori. The ultimate end to the conflict was never in doubt—Georgia has 4.6 million citizens versus Russia's 140 million—but the tiny nation's spiffy U.S.-supplied military vehicles and uniforms made the Russians look as if they'd just stepped out of a World War II documentary.
Medvedev started to clean house in the days that followed. Nikolai Makarov, a top general he'd appointed just before the Georgia campaign, commissioned a root-and-branch review of the state of the military. It turned out that the troops deployed in Georgia were actually better than average. The review found, among other things, that only 17 percent of Russia's military units had a full complement of men and equipment. "All the other units either had faulty ammunition and weapons or did not have enough people," says Zolotarev. The Army was also seriously top-heavy, with more than 900 generals (the U.S. Army has about 300) and one officer for every 2.5 men, compared with the 1–15 ratio favored by Western armies. Meanwhile, up to a third of conscripts were "mentally un-fit, drug addicts, or imbeciles," according to a public statement last year by Col. Gen. Vladimir Mikhailov, the Air Force commander in chief. As for the Army's practices, these weren't stuck in the Cold War—they were downright medieval, with NGOs reporting hair-raising tales of officers hiring out their own men as slave laborers and male prostitutes.
With these exposés came a recognition that, while Russia may have managed to roll over Georgia, it won't always be so lucky. "If, God forgive us, we start a war with a highly technological nation like the United States, we have no chance of survival," says Alexander Golts, a Moscow-based military analyst. "Now, finally, the Russian government has accepted the gravity of the problem."
Medvedev's hatchet man is Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov, appointed by Putin in 2007 and, like Putin and Medvedev, a graduate in law from St. Petersburg State University. The reform plan he helped draft, which was finalized in the fall of 2008, is impressively ambitious. Nearly 200,000 officers—more than a third of the total—are to be fired, while some of those remaining will get pay raises (up to a total of $5,000 a month, more than five times the current level) in order to improve quality. Compulsory service has been cut from two years to less than one, and the Army is to be organized into modern fast-reacting brigades of 2,000 rather than the old lumbering divisions of 5,000 and more. The overall size of the armed forces is to be cut by a quarter, largely by getting rid of many nonfighting units. And if Serdyukov has his way, resources will be concentrated on elite fighting battalions that will form the core of a new rapid-reaction force.
Of course, grand plans for reforming the Army have been coming out of the Kremlin for centuries, and most have foundered on institutional resistance and corruption. But there are good reasons to think Medvedev may succeed. The most promising sign is the way he's taken on some very sacred cows. One is procurement. The very idea of buying defense systems abroad would have been considered treason in the Soviet era. In September, however, Deputy Defense Minister Vladimir Popovkin told the bosses of Russia's weapons industries that he would not hesitate to source matériel from overseas if they couldn't provide it. Sure enough, that month Moscow announced it would buy $50 million in unmanned drones from Israel rather than go with a clunky, overbudget Russian-made drone that had failed to perform in Georgia. This year Russia also bought sniper rifles from the U.K. and pistols from Austria for its elite units. "Acknowledging that Russia cannot produce everything is the first step toward modernizing the system," says Golts.
Perhaps, but updating the military-industrial complex will be as hard as modernizing the rest of Russia's moribund technology sector. Thanks to injections of cash—Russia's military budget hit $50 billion in 2008, and Putin recently pledged to raise it to $125 billion by 2011—old giants like the aircraft makers MiG and Sukhoi are now cranking out new planes. But the latest generation of Russian hardware—the Su-34 and Su-35 fighter-bombers, the MiG-35 fighter, the S-400 air-defense system, and the Iskander short-range missile—is in fact little more than upgraded versions of projects designed 30 years ago. "As soon as these design bureaus got money, they just dusted off their old projects that were a generation old," says Felgenhauer. Medvedev seems to recognize this problem, and during a visit last month to the Mashinostroyenia factory in Reutov, he blasted the industry and called for a "fundamental modernization."
n other areas, there are small signs of progress. New units—effectively, a new Army within the old one—have been set up and shown off by Medvedev to the presidents of neighboring countries as part of a new 5,000-man, post-Soviet regional rapid-reaction force that Russia will lead. The new units will be "just as good as NATO forces," Medvedev promised earlier this year, and will have kit standard in Western armies (but previously unheard of in Russia): individual radios and night-vision equipment for every man and vehicle, for instance, and uniforms and boots made of breathable modern materials rather than wool and leather. The units' brief will be "to repulse military aggression, conduct antiterrorist operations, fight transnational crime and drug trafficking, and disaster relief." The force will be permanently based in Russia, but special units will be manned by members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), which also includes Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan. Russia has also done a good job upgrading what is perhaps the key element of its strategic military power—its nuclear arsenal. In October, the new Dmitry Donskoi missile submarine successfully test-fired the Bulava, Russia's newest sea-launched ballistic missile, after failing on its first eight attempts. The Bulava is a 30-ton Death Star capable of circling the earth and launching 10 targeted nuclear warheads from orbit. Two more submarine missile cruisers, which will pack 16 Bulavas each, are also under construction. Such weapons are more suited to the Cold War than to a modern, agile, tactical army—but even the reforming Medvedev knows that an outsize nuclear capability is one of the keys to keeping Russia's place among the great powers. He also knows that big impressive rockets are crowd pleasers—which is why he ordered Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missiles paraded in Red Square on Victory Day last year for the first time since Soviet days.
Such displays and the new spending are being enthusiastically cheered in some parts of the country, especially the archipelago of closed military cities. "Our hearts filled up with joy when we saw the rockets we test here on the Red Square," says Alexander Likh, mayor of Znamensk, a closed city in central Russia where missiles are designed and tested. "Finally, after almost a decade of degradation and poverty, our range is important again."
But not everyone is so enthusiastic, especially Russia's neighbors. Last week Poland's Defense Minister Radek Sikorski sounded the alarm in a letter to NATO, complaining about maneuvers involving 12,000 Russian and Belarussian troops in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. "This disturbs us," he told Polish state radio. "We demand that NATO take this into account." Sikorski and others were also upset last month when Medvedev made the quick deployment of Russian forces abroad easier by signing a new law allowing them to be dispatched outside the country "to repel an attack on Russian military units or prevent an armed attack on another state asking Russia for military assistance, [or] to defend Russian citizens abroad from an armed attack." That sounds a lot like a mandate for Moscow to "defend" Russian minorities in former Soviet neighbors such as Ukraine and Kazakhstan, should it perceive the need—or want the pretext.
Medvedev's reform campaign may also create other dangers at home. Earlier this year, the Kremlin slowed its planned troop reductions and officer firings, apparently nervous that disgruntled soldiers might cause trouble if they were discharged without proper accommodation and benefits. Still, Medvedev has made his determination to remake Russia's Army clear, refusing to cut budgets even as the rest of the country tightens its belt in the wake of economic crisis. That doesn't necessarily mean that his ambitions are aggressive (though Washington is worried enough about its regional allies that it has offered to build up Georgia's defensive capabilities). But it certainly shows that the Kremlin is serious about establishing its military as a credible deterrent to further NATO expansion—as well as a powerful incentive for neighbors to accept Russia's leadership in the region.
Chel.kp.ru: The killer who shot the head of FOMC Chelyabinsk region, had an accomplice
/Google translation/
Murderers of Nekrasov left at the crime scene fingerprints and cigarette
Olga Karpova - 23.11.2009 13:20
The case of the murder of Valery Nekrasov was taken under special control of the prosecutor's office, all materials from Satka investigative committee sent to Chelyabinsk. We have initiated a case on Article 105 part 2 - "murder committed by a group of persons for hire."
Investigators found that the crime scene the killer did not come alone, he had an accomplice. Valery G. arrived home on Saturday - although he lived continuously in Chelyabinsk, but many cases are resolved in Satka.
On Sunday morning he went to make garbage. At the site of the fourth floor waiting for his killer, who missed his victim by himself and fired. Then straight let another bullet - the reference in the head. On the first floor of the killer's accomplice was waiting, they both ran to the door and disappeared.
Killers behaved recklessly and had become familiar neighbors - first they have noticed in the hallway, where they were waiting for the head of FOMC, then saw the run out of the entrance. Their words and were making a sketch. Moreover killer left no fingerprints and a cigarette butt.
National Economic Trends
EasyBourse: Putin Raises 2009 Inflation Forecast To 9.6% From 8%
MOSCOW -(Dow Jones)- Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said the country would see inflation of around 9.6% in 2009, one of the lowest readings on record but a change from his earlier forecast of just over 8% on the year.
"Judging by the current situation, inflation for 2009 will fall significantly to somewhere around 9.6%," Putin told a congress of the United Russia party at the weekend.
Consumer prices edged up in the first two weeks of November after staying flat for a record three months, putting Russia's inflation at 8.3% from January through mid-November, compared to 12% for the same period last year.
Putin had earlier predicted inflation of just over 8% for 2009, which would have been a post-Soviet low. His new forecast is in line with central bank officials, who have said inflation would come in between 9% and 10% for 2009.
Web site: ernment.ru
-By Ira Iosebashvili, Dow Jones Newswires; +7 495 937 8445; ira.iosebashvili@
Publié le 23 novembre 2009
Russia Today: Putin’s United Russia address puts economy in focus
23 November, 2009, 10:14
The economy was central to Russian Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin’s, St Petersburg address to 600 delegates of United Russia, as he noted pressing issues remain.
Putin said the government had successfully contained the economic downturn, with unemployment down from its February peak. But he acknowledged that inflation remains a problem although it has been improving it, and that the economic contraction has less than expected.
“At the end of the year our GDP decline won’t be as big as we had assumed earlier. We thought it would be 10 %, but it will be lower – around 8 to 8.5%. But that’s still too much, more than some other countries. Judging the current inflation situation, in 2009 it will shrink substantially. If last year it was 13%, then this year by the end of the year, it will be around 9.6% and definitely less than 10% which is the best figure since 1992. But that’s still too much and we will continue battling inflation.”
Putin spoke about measures to boost the car industry, power generation and to improve the availability of mortgages. He said the car industry would benefit from three types of support: Subsidy, government orders, and a cash for clunkers scheme, which will pay just under $2000 dollars starting next year.
“Any Russian citizen, who uses a car 10 or more years old, will receive a check for 50 thousand Roubles and will be able to use that money to buy a new car. It doesn’t matter what car he will buy, Russian or foreign, as long as it is assembled in Russia.”
Business, Energy or Environmental regulations or discussions
Reuters: REFILE-Russian markets -- Factors to Watch on Nov 23
MOSCOW, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Here are events and news stories that could move Russian markets on Monday.
You can reach us on: +7 495 775 1242
STOCKS CALL (Contributions to moscow.newsroom@):
Olma: "We expect RTS index may go up in early trade on the heels of oil prices and Asia stock indexes"
Aton: "We expect the market to open higher on the back of rising oil prices"
EVENTS (All times GMT):
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 23
MOSCOW - The Adam Smith Conferences to hold an international conference 'Russian Power Finance & Investment' (to Nov. 24). LINK:
MOSCOW - Sergei Shvetsov, a central bank board member, to attend a conference on the impact of the world financial crisis on the banking sector - 0700
MOSCOW - Russia's government to hold a briefing ahead of its meeting on privatization programme
MOSCOW - Promsvyazbank to hold a press conference on the sale of 12 percent of its shares to EBRD
MOSCOW - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to hold a press conference ahead of CIS Summit in Minsk, Belarussia.
IN THE PAPERS:
The government may channel another 15-25 billion euros to revive the country's national automakers while raising the tariffs for car import by 40-80 percent, Vedomosti business paper reports, citing a draft of the programme which the government will discuss soon.
Evgeniy Dodd, CEO of state-controlled power trader Inter RAO , leaves his chair to head a power generating company RusHydro and Yuri Kovalchuk will replace him, Kommersant daily reports.
TOP STORIES IN RUSSIA AND THE CIS: TOP NEWS:
• RUSSIAN AUTOMOTIVE GIANTS STRENGTHEN TIES
• RUSSIA'S ECON RECOVERY CONTINUES, BUT FRAGILE
• VEB TO BUY RUSAL STAKE WITH OWN CASH-FINMIN
• RUSSIA'S PUTIN SAYS COMFORTABLE WITH UKRAINE'SPM COMPANIES/MARKETS:
• ROUBLE CLOSES AT 10-DAY LOW ON C.BANK REMARKS
• PIK BREACHES COVENANTS, TO MAKE LOSS
• VEB PREPARED TO FINANCE AVTOVAZ
• MOODY'S SEE VTB, SBER LOAN LOSSES AT 16-27 PCT
• ILYUSHIN FINANCE MAY SELL 16PCT IN HK
• AVTOVAZ SEES IT CAR SALES UP 11 PCT IN 2010
• POLYUS GOLD SHAREHOLDERS CANCEL STAKE SALE
• SEVERSTAL POSTS STRONG Q3, OUTLOOK IMPROVED ECONOMY/POLITICS:
• RUSSIA TAX CHIEF SEES TROUBLE WITH TAXES IN 2010 ENERGY:
• AZERI-OWNED PORT TO START CRUDE SHIPMENTS IN '10 COMMODITIES:
• ROSNEFT SELLS 200,000 T CRUDE FOR DEC DELIVERY
MARKETS CLOSE/LATEST:
RTS 1,436.44 -1.02 pct
MSCI Russia 807.90 -1.01 pct
MSCI Emerging Markets 968.45 +0.35 pct
Russia 30-year Eurobond yield: 5.311/5.392 pct
EMBI+ Russia 225 basis points over
Rouble/dollar 29.0050
Rouble/euro 43.0595
NYMEX crude $78.38 +$0.91
ICE Brent crude $78.20 +$1.00
For Russian company news, double click on
Treasury news Corporate debt
Russian stocks Russia country guide
All Russian news Scrolling stocks news
Emerging markets top news
Top deals European companies
Keywords: RUSSIA FACTORS/
Stock Markets Review: Russian stock market daily morning report (November 23, 2009, Monday)
By Veles Capital
On the last trading day of the week the RTS index started with positive values. Likely the direction of movement changed to the opposite one. Negative mood dominated at the market against the background of commodity market that was loosing in price, nevertheless, the activity of the players reduced on expectations of the week-end. The open of the European session also went in the negative zone, having that way accelerated the drop of the Russian share market. One of the several shares that closed the day in the positive value was Polyus Gold. The shares of the company added more than 2% in price against the background of the decision of the principal holders not to conduct SPO.
Main news
The state plans giving money to AvtoVAZ once again.
The future of AvtoVAZ should be decided this week – in course of the visit of Vladimir Putin to Paris. Renault might gain control over the enterprise with time, but for now the state is deciding whether to give Rostechnologies another 50 bn RUR or not.
Other news
- Oneksim and Nafta Moskva decided not to sell the shares of Polyus Gold due to insufficient demand.
Oneksim Group of Mihail Prohorov and Nafta Moskva of Suleyman Kerimov decided not to sell their shares of Polyus Gold at the market due to insufficient demand on behalf of the investors. The holders do not wish to sell less than the announced 5%, but 5% precisely have no buyers within the announced price range of 28-29 USD per depositary note.
- The company Evraz Group refused from the dividends for a long time.
According to the data of Vedomosti, the banks-creditors of Evraz Group agreed on changing the conditions of company’s creditors by 3.64 bn USD. One of the agreement’s terms is the refusal of Evraz Group from paying dividends up until its net debt / EBITDA ratio gets lower than three.
Bloomberg: PIK, Gazprom, AvtoVAZ, MTS, RusHydro: Russian Equity Preview
By Paul Abelsky
Nov. 23 (Bloomberg) -- The following companies may be active in Russian trading. Stock symbols are in parentheses and share prices are from the previous close.
The 30-stock Micex Index declined 0.1 percent to 1,334.15 at the close in Moscow, trimming last week’s gain to 1.8 percent, the third weekly increase. The dollar-denominated RTS Index dropped 1 percent to 1,436.44.
PIK Group (PIK LI) and LSR Group (LSRG LI): Russia’s state development bank Vnesheconombank and the National Welfare Fund will be used to support the mortgage market with 250 billion rubles ($8.6 billion) next year, which should lower rates on mortgages to between 10 and 11 percent in the first quarter, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said.
Moscow-based homebuilder PIK Group, Russia’s biggest property developer by market value, dropped 0.2 percent to $4.15 in London. LSR Group, the St. Petersburg-based developer and maker of building materials, dipped 2.8 percent to $7.
OAO Gazprom (GAZP RX): Poland may not need to buy additional gas from Russia this year as current usage is “low” because of high air temperatures, Maciej Wozniak, an energy adviser to the Polish prime minister, said in Warsaw.
Russia’s natural-gas exporter slid 1.5 percent to 178.07 rubles, the lowest level in two weeks.
OAO AvtoVAZ (AVAZ RX): Renault SA, which owns 25 percent of Russia’s biggest automaker, may boost its stake to 51 percent by 2013 or 2014, said Sergei Chemezov, chief executive officer of AvtoVAZ shareholder Russian Technologies Corp.
AvtoVAZ retreated 1.9 percent, the biggest drop in two weeks, to 16.472 rubles.
OAO Mobile TeleSystems (MBT US): Russia’s largest phone operator, known as MTS, signed an agreement for a credit line of $1.07 billion from Calyon, ING Bank NV, Nordea Bank AB and Raiffeisen Zentralbank Oesterreich AG. The funds are for buying equipment from Ericsson AB and the loan is guaranteed by Swedish export credit agency EKN.
MTS added 0.5 percent to $51.22 in New York.
OAO RusHydro (HYDR RX): OAO Inter RAO UES Chief Executive Officer Yevgeny Dod may replace Vasily Zubakin as head of Russia’s biggest hydropower producer, Interfax said, citing sources it didn’t identify.
RusHydro gained 1.6 percent to 1.153 rubles, the highest since Oct. 14.
To contact the reporter on this story: Paul Abelsky in Moscow at pabelsky@
Last Updated: November 22, 2009 21:00 EST
23.11.2009 - AK&M
Atomenergoprom intends to place the bonds
Nov. 25 Atomenergoprom is going to place two issues of the bonds, the company informed.
The 30bn rub. worth primary issue includes 30mln papers of 1ths rub. par.
The expiration date is fixed on Feb. 15, 2014.
Nov. 26 the second issue should be placed in the volume of 30bn rub.
The bonds will be placed through the collection of the bids on the acquisition at the fixed price. The placement agent is Sberbank. Some part of the raised funds will be spent to cover the credits; remained - to finance the invesment programs of subs and Rosatom-held entities.
The Company intends to issue 10 series of the bonds of the 5-year maturity.
The total volume of the issues gains 195bn rub. The 30bn rub. worth issues will be placed on MICEX.
Atomenergoprom is a state company of the full cycle which deals with the desining, building and operation of the atomic power plants, modernization and repair of the nuclear sets, researches in the atomic energy sphere etc.
It covers 89 atomic power entities.
The share capital is worth 3.4bn rub. split in 3.4mln common stocks of 1ths rub. par each. All stocks are held by the state corporation Rosatom. The reserved fund covering 5% of the share capital is under formation now through the annual deductions in the volume of 5% of the net profit up to the fixed amount. It will be used to cover the losses and bonds.
It involves now TVEL (17% of the nuclear fuel world market), Tekhsnabexport (40% of the uranium market), Atomenergomash, Atomredmetzoloto, Energoatom Concern (former Rosenergoatom) involving 10 atomic power plants.
The 2008-revenues gained 290.5bn rub.; in IH the figures reached 146.5bn rub.; net profit 14.4bn rub.
Reuters: Deripaska seen buying back Strabag stake –paper
11.23.09, 02:44 AM EST
VIENNA, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaksa is expected to exercise an option to buy back a 25 percent stake in Austrian builder Strabag which he had to cede earlier this year, an Austrian newspaper reported on Monday.
Deripaska's stake, partly debt financed when he bought it for around 1 billion euros ($1.5 billion) in 2007, was taken over by other shareholders earlier this year, but Deripaska retained an option to buy it back by year end.
Strabag was not immediately available for comment.
Deripaska, who flourished as a commodity trader in the chaos that followed the fall of the Soviet Union, rose to be ranked as Russia's richest man last year with an empire stretching from airports to cement production.
But he has since also sold stakes in Canadian car parts maker Magna International ( MGA - news - people ) and German builder Hochtief as the value of those often debt-funded stake purchases dropped.
Der Standard said a rise in Russian share prices had improved Deripaska's financial standing, enabling him to claw back the Strabag stake.
Based on Friday's closing price, the 25 percent stake was worth 609 million euros. The price at which he would be able to buy it back under his option has not been disclosed.
(Reporting by Boris Groendahl; Editing by David Holmes)
($1=.6697 Euro) Keywords: STRABAG/DERIPASKA
(boris.groendahl@; +43 1 53112-258; Reuters Messaging: boris.groendahl.@)
The Moscow Times: Sberbank, VTB May Face Large Loan Losses
23 November 2009
Reuters
Sberbank and VTB could post losses on up to 27 percent of their loans, Moody’s ratings agency said, warning the banks against cutting their bad debt provisions.
Under the worst-case scenario, state-run VTB alone would require a recapitalization of about 150 billion rubles ($5.23 billion) to keep its capital adequacy ratio at 10 percent, the international agency said in a report.
“Based on our stress tests, we believe that the expected loss on VTB’s loan book is likely to be around 16 [percent] under our base-case scenario, and 27 [percent] in a worst-case scenario,” it said. The base case should be manageable for VTB and will be absorbed by available capital without breaching the 10 percent minimum regulatory capital adequacy ratio, the agency said.
For Sberbank, losses are estimated at 15.5 percent and 26.5 percent by mid-2010, respectively, under the two scenarios, Yevgeny Tarzimanov, an analyst at Moody’s, said Friday.
The probability of the worst-case scenario is very low — it will only occur if the economy collapses and the ruble devalues significantly, Tarzimanov said. “It is very difficult to estimate the banks’ implied losses as a huge number of loans are being restructured,” he said.
Banks are struggling with losses as bad loans rise as the economy has been hit by the first contraction in a decade.
Moody’s view comes as a contradiction to the most recent forecasts of the Central Bank Chairman Sergei Ignatyev, who believes that the share of nonperforming loans in portfolios could start falling as early as January 2010.
“The trend in asset quality is negative, as Moody’s sees limited signs of economic recovery in Russia,” the agency said.
Banks should refrain from cutting provisions against bad debts, despite the recent signs that the worst of the crisis is over, the Central Bank has said.
Reuters: Russia chief says Renault won't up Avtovaz stake now
Sun Nov 22, 2009 12:50pm IST
MOSCOW (Reuters) - The head of state-owned conglomerate Russian Technologies said on Saturday French car maker Renault might raise its 25 pct stake in troubled Russian partner Avtovaz in future, but won't do so for now.
"They said that they will at least keep their share package," Sergei Chemezov said. "As far as raising their stake goes, it is hardly possible now, but in the future, there is a perspective that they are prepared to increase their stake."
He said Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had offered Renault control of Avtovaz, which makes Lada cars and whose sales have collapsed this year amid the economic crisis. The French company had replied that it would "think about it", he added.
"I think (it could happen) around 2013-2014", Chemezov added.
Russian Techologies and Renault currently each hold 25 percent of Avtovaz, which has debts of 59.9 billion roubles ($2.08 billion) and employs 96,000 workers in its headquarters city of Togliatti.
Chemezov added the Russian government had agreed to increase Avtovaz's share capital but did not provide further details.
(Reporting by Denis Pinchuk and Gleb Bryanski; writing by Alfred Kueppers; editing by James Jukwey)
RBC: MTS secures long-term loan from foreign banks
RBC, 23.11.2009, Moscow 10:31:09.Mobile TeleSystems (MTS) has signed agreements with a number of banks on the opening of a credit line worth $1.074bn backed by Sweden's Export Credit Agency EKN, the Russian mobile operator announced on Friday. The company plans to use these funds for the development of mobile networks through purchases of equipment from Ericsson, the world's leading provider of technology and services to telecom operators.
The annual interest rate on the loan was set at LIBOR plus 1.15 percent, and the money will be extended in two tranches. The first tranche, in the amount of $428.9m, is to be repaid in June 2019, and the second, worth $645.5m, is to be repaid in October 2020.
MTS President Mikhail Shamolin explained that securing a long-term loan would provide the company with the necessary flexibility in the implementation of its capital investment program aimed at developing its networks with high-quality services to subscribers. He added that MTS's goal was to take advantage of every possibility available on both voice and data markets in order to launch new innovative services.
RIA: Chetra to present tractor equipment in India
23:0622/11/2009
Chetra - Industrial Machinery, a Russian specialized auto parts trader, will take part in an international construction technology and equipment exhibition, Excon, to be held in India November 25-29, Chetra said.
Chetra is owned by the Concern Tractor Plants holding.
"New modified models of equipment produced by the concern's specialized enterprises will be presented at the exposition," Chetra said in a statement.
"Despite the global financial crisis, the Tractor Plants Concern keeps creating innovative, modernized and high-technology equipment and expanding its presence in promising, industrially active world regions," it said.
Chetra - Industrial Machinery said it had shipped over 250 items of equipment to India in the past five years, including Chetra pipelayers, Chetra T11 and T20 bulldozers and trail tractors.
Indian companies like Reliance Infrastructure Ltd, Punj Lloyd Ltd, Essar Constructions Ltd, KALPATARU Ltd, Hindustan Constructions Ltd, Jaihind Projects Ltd, KSS India Ltd, Neyveli Lignite Corporation and others use Chetra tractor equipment.
MOSCOW, November 22 (RIA Novosti)
Activity in the Oil and Gas sector (including regulatory)
iStockAnalyst: South Kurils Shelf Rich in Oil, Gas – Scientists
Friday, November 20, 2009 2:53 PM
(Source: Daily News Bulletin; Moscow - English)[pic]YUZHNO-SAKHALINSK. Nov 20 (Interfax) - The Institute of Marine Geology and Geophysics of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Far Eastern branch has published a study titled, "The geological and geophysical description and potential of the oil and gas bearing reserves capacity of the Middle Kurils curve" (between the island Kunashir and Shikotan, Southern Kurils).
According to the study, "this area contains quite large oil and gas reserves. They could provide the Southern Kurils with necessary fuel and energy for at least 15 years," a spokesperson for the Sakhalin regional committee of international, foreign trade and inter-regional relations told Interfax.
The Middle Kurils curve is estimated to have 1.2-1.6 billion tonnes of fuel equivalent, the Kanashir cave - 56-60 million tonnes of fuel equivalent.
"Given Japan's claims to a part of the southern Kurils Islands, from the political point of view it is time for Russia to study oil and gas reserves in this area," Iliyev said.
(c) 2009 Daily News[pic] Bulletin; Moscow - English. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
A service of YellowBrix, Inc.
Gazprom
Steel Guru: Gazprom and Inter RAO to swap electricity assets
Monday, 23 Nov 2009
Interfax cited Mr Denis Fedorov CEO of Gazprom Energy Holding, which consolidates the Russian electricity assets as saying that Gazprom Group is in negotiations with Inter RAO regarding an exchange of electricity assets.
Mr Fedorov said "We have quite a large portfolio of non-profile assets, this and FGC. Now we are in negotiations with a series of companies, including colleagues from Inter RAO, concerning an exchange of power assets."
He did not clarify the assets that could be exchanged between Gazprom and Inter RAO.
Inter RAO confirmed that negotiations have taken place but the assets in question were not specified.
(Sourced from Interfax)
The Moscow Times: Gazprom May Double Stake in Germany’s VNG
23 November 2009
Reuters
FRANKFURT — Gazprom aims to double its stake in eastern German gas group VNG in its bid for greater clout in Germany, Gazprom’s country head told a magazine.
“We have been working for almost 20 years to get an appropriate position in VNG. I hope we’ll now succeed,” Gazprom Germania head Hans-Joachim Gornig told German magazine WirtschaftsWoche in an interview. Gazprom currently holds a 5.3 percent stake in VNG, according to VNG’s web site.
Gazprom wants to take over GdF Suez’s 5.3 percent stake in VNG, and in exchange accord GdF a participation in the planned Nord Stream pipeline under the Baltic Sea.
“But it is not Gazprom’s decision alone. The other shareholders in the Nord Stream consortium also have to agree,” Gornig said in the magazine’s edition, which was released in advance of publication Monday.
Gazprom is not the only company aiming to gain influence in VNG, however.
The southwestern German power utility EnBW is also seeking a leading role after it bought a 48 percent stake in VNG earlier this year.
Media reports had said there was opposition to EnBW’s leadership bid from municipal and private shareholders, which besides GdF Suez, also includes Wintershall.
AFP: Schalke's relief at sponsorship extension
(AFP) – 1 day ago
BERLIN — Schalke 04 have signed a five-year extension to their sponsorship deal with Russian firm Gazprom worth 100 million euros which looks to have eased the German club's cash problems, it was reported Saturday.
Last month it was revealed the Gelsenkirchen-based club had debts of up to 230 million euros, but the new sponsorship deal with the Russian gas suppliers looks to have safeguarded the Bundesliga side's future.
The current Gazprom deal, which had been due to expire in 2012, will now run until 2017 and is worth up to 130 million euros if Schalke is successful in the Bundesliga and the Champions League.
"We have closed the deal for the next five years," Clemens Toennies, chairman of Schalke's advisory board, told German daily Bild.
"It will improve conditions for us and I explained that on my last trip to Moscow, because this deal will help stabilise the club."
Schalke coach Felix Magath had warned last month they may have to sell their top players in a bid to balance the books, but the new deal looks to have eased those fears.
"This is a very positive signal for the club," admitted Magath, whose side are fourth in the table and play Hanover 96 at Gelsenkirchen's Veltins Arena on Saturday afternoon.
................
................
In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.
To fulfill the demand for quickly locating and searching documents.
It is intelligent file search solution for home and business.
Related download
Related searches
- 10 facts about russia s history
- facts about russia for kids
- videos about russia for kids
- learn about russia for kids
- map of russia for kids
- russia kids learning tube
- russia for kids printables
- information about russia for kids
- russia and central asia map
- german soldiers in russia ww2
- china and russia warn us
- iran china russia news