July 26, 1997   

This Date's Issues:   1086  •1087  

Johnson's Russia List
#1087
26 July 1997
djohnson@cdi.org

[Note from David Johnson:
1. Boris Kagarlitsky in Moscow: Yeltsin and the 
Mausoleum.
2. PBS News Hour: Interview with David Hoffman, 
The Washington Post's Moscow Correspondent since 1995. 
3. Reuter: Russia to axe 10 percent of government 
bureaucrats.
4. MSNBC: Preston Mendenhall, In Moscow, art begins 
to imitate life. Film festival shows gunfire as common
on the street as the screen.
5. RIA Novosti: PRESIDENT YELTSIN HAVING AN EASY DAY 
AT LAST.
6. Reuter: Young Russians to go abroad to study
business.
7. Reuter: Yeltsin vetoes parliament's land sale bill.
8. Boston Globe: David Filipov, Russian shines among 
Mir woes.
9. Reuter: Russia's LUKoil to break into U.S. gasoline 
market.
10. RIA Novosti: IRKUTSK REGION TO ELECT ITS GOVERNOR 
JULY 27.
11. Rabochaya Tribuna: Front-runners in Irkutsk 
Gubernatorial Race Profiled.]



**********

#1
Date: Sat, 26 Jul 1997 18:40:11 +0400 (WSU DST)
From: austgreen@glas.apc.org (Renfrey Clarke)
Subject: Boris Kagarlitsky: Yeltsin and the Mausoleum

#YELTSIN AND THE MAUSOLEUM
#By Boris Kagarlitsky
#MOSCOW - Why should Yeltsin want to bury Lenin? Rhetoric aside, this
question has a quite literal meaning. For more than 70 years the body
of the first Soviet leader has lain embalmed and on public display in
a mausoleum on Red Square. Now Russian President Boris Yeltsin wants
the corpse removed and buried. But as a good democrat, Yeltsin has
suggested that the fate of the Bolshevik leader's remains should
first be put to a national referendum.
#Political commentators have not been taken in by the reasons, along
the lines of ``affront to Russia's Christian traditions'', which the
president has cited for his initiative. Instead they have explained -
in suitably rapt tones - the artful ploy which Yeltsin has conceived,
involving a plan to provoke the ``red'' parliament or Duma. The next
stage, we are to believe, will come when the communist-nationalist
majority in the Duma responds with some ill-judged move. The
president will then face the deputies down in another cathartic
public confrontation.
#Like many of Yeltsin's supposedly masterful steps, this one on
closer scrutiny turns out to be quite bumble-footed. A referendum on
burying Lenin? Communists and financiers alike express outrage at the
idea. And indeed, it is hard for the authorities to explain why, at a
time when there is supposedly no money for wages and investments,
billions of rubles should be thrown away on a poll that is neither
urgent nor especially important.
#Could Yeltsin even bring out enough of his supporters to win a
referendum? It is possible - with the help of almost the entire media
- to explain to people that if they fail to turn out and vote the
right way, the terrible communist Zyuganov will come to power and
civil war will ensue. But it is beyond even a media monopoly to show
that the same consequences will follow if a corpse remains on Red
Square.
#Meanwhile, the mobilisation of the communist electorate - the people
who really do care about the corpse - would be highly effective. A
referendum defeat, even on a secondary question, would be a severe
blow to the Yeltsin regime. A steep price for a political adventure,
especially since the authorities have long since realised that the
Duma communists are, on the whole, quite inoffensive.
#Someone in the Kremlin, if not Yeltsin, must be smart enough to
discern all this. The fact that the provocation was launched anyway
suggests that there is more to the threats against the Lenin
mausoleum than an ill-conceived political game-show.
#In the same way as daring feats are often performed out of fear,
many political initiatives have their origins in a lack of self-
confidence. Among the president's admirers there are those who blurt
out the secret: Lenin has to be buried in order for the communist
ideology to be defeated! A lack of faith in the future and in their
own actions, together with a subconscious fear of the return of
communism, gives these people no peace.
#If ``red'' ideas are spreading in Russian society that is not, of
course, the work of the mummy, but the result of people's own
experience. Ideas cannot be buried, since the social relationships
that give rise to them do not disappear. But this is obvious only to
the rational mind. The subconscious has laws of its own.
#The authorities cannot close the gap between the ``new Russians''
and the mass of the population, or limit exploitation, and neither do
they wish to. But they feel the need to carry out a symbolic act of
purification, punishing the mummy for everything. Lenin's presence
clearly allows the new tenant of the Kremlin no peace. Yeltsin has to
be the only leader in the country, the only positive hero. Lenin,
even dead, remains a rival. Lenin and Yeltsin occupy, as it were, one
and the same space. At the subconscious level, this is a persistent
torment for the present authorities and their ideologues. It explains
a striking Freudian slip heard recently from television presenter
Yevgeny Kiselev: ``Lenin, that is, Yeltsin....''
#Stalin was untroubled by the presence of Lenin on Red Square,
because Stalin considered himself a ``living Lenin'', the ``Lenin of
today''. On key public occasions, Stalin and later Soviet leaders
were to be seen on top of the mausoleum, reviewing well-regulated
streams of ``the masses''. The nature of the mausoleum as both tomb
and reviewing-stand had a profound symbolic meaning. The Soviet
leaders turned Lenin's body, like his actions when alive, into a
pedestal for themselves. They rested on him at the same time as they
trampled him underfoot. Yeltsin cannot use Leninist symbolism for his
own aggrandisement, and is therefore uncomfortable with Lenin's
presence. The best spot on Red Square is already occupied!
#Once Lenin has been buried, Yeltsin has made clear, the mausoleum
will be demolished. At least to the rational mind, there is no logic
in this pledge. If there is any need to bury Lenin, that can be done
inside the mausoleum; the glass case can be replaced with a closed
sarcophagus or gravestone. However, Russia's rulers are not
interested in the question of the body, but of the spirit.
#Our leaders, however much they talk about democracy, remain pupils
of Stalin, and are quite Byzantine in their ways. Hence their love of
political intrigue and their fixation with symbols. But the main
thing is that a totalitarian consciousness demands power over the
past. This is impossible so long as material evidence remains of
another, ideologically incorrect history.
#The Soviet leaders demolished architectural relics from the past
precisely because they were trying to remake history. The present
authorities curse Bolshevism and ``Soviet totalitarianism'', but
their own actions are cast in the same mould.
#As well as everything else, the Lenin mausoleum is an architectural
masterpiece, an outstanding example of 1920s constructivism. Moscow
has only a few buildings from the Soviet period with unquestionable
architectural value, and the mausoleum is one of them. The people who
have been forced to recognise this include even Yevgeny Kiselev, the
present regime's leading propagandist.
#On his program ``Itogi'', Kiselev tried to apologise for Yeltsin,
saying that the president had been misunderstood, and that there was
no question of demolition. However, demolition is very much on the
agenda. Or can the words ``remove'' and ``liquidate'' have some other
meaning when applied to a building?
#In this context it is quite unimportant how we regard Lenin as a
political figure. Numerous palaces and public monuments, beginning
with the pyramid of Cheops, were erected for unsavoury individuals.
The squares of European cities are crammed with statues of people who
shed whole rivers of blood. But monuments and palaces have a
remarkable ability to take on an independent significance. They
define the appearance of cities, and are an important element in the
history of art.
#In recent times, the word ``vandalism'' has been slipped into
Russian political parlance. For some reason it is used as a synonym
for ``terrorism'', though its real meaning is quite different.
Demolishing the mausoleum would be an act of vandalism in the precise
sense of the word.
#Meanwhile, the most striking aspect of these developments has been
the reaction of Russian intellectuals. Yeltsin made his promise to
demolish the mausoleum at a meeting of cultural figures. The usual
corporate ethic of these people, not to speak of their aesthetic
sense, should have made them protest. The hall, however, did not
erupt in howls of indignation. Instead, there was a roar of applause.
The hall was full of vandals. The regime's intellectual friends once
again showed themselves to be loyal servants of the state, with their
rightful place not so much in the field of literature and the arts,
as in the department of agitation and propaganda.
#The story of the mausoleum is unlikely to have a happy ending. After
pledging to raze the building, Yeltsin will be reluctant to be seen
failing to meet his promise. The call for a referendum is likely to
be discreetly dropped; instead, a decree will be drawn up and signed.
And so, Yeltsin himself will not get to lie in the mausoleum. Not
even for a few years, like Stalin. And our president is now at an age
where he would do well to think of such things.

***********

#2
PBS 
The News Hour with Jim Lehrer
July 22, 1997
Elizabeth Farnsworth speaks with David Hoffman, The Washington Post's
Moscow Correspondent since 1995. 

JIM LEHRER: Now a foreign correspondence, our new series of
conversations with correspondents from
American news organizations about the places and stories they’re
covering. Elizabeth Farnsworth has tonight’s. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And with me is David Hoffman of the Washington
Post, who has served as the paper’s Moscow correspondent since 1995. 
Thanks for being with us, David. Is Boris Yeltsin as much in control
and as vigorous as he seems? 
DAVID HOFFMAN, Washington Post: Very much so. He’s got a big head start
on the second term. He’s put young reformers in charge--two guys, especially, 
Anatoly Chubais and Boris Nemtsov, very active young reformers, very 
ambitious. We don’t know what the result will be, but we
"do" know that Yeltsin has already
crossed the big hurdle in securing democracy. They had an election last
year. 65 million people voted twice within
two weeks. I think that’s a big statement. Nobody in the system now
wants to go outside the democratic process.
The bad news is there are a lot of holes left, a lot of things left
unfinished. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Like? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, there’s no rule of law. There’s no respect for the
law. A lot of laws don’t exist yet.
Also, there’s no civil society, the thing that keeps people in touch
with their rulers. There’s nobody answering the
phone at city hall when citizens call. And that’s part of democracy too,
not just electing somebody but actually making it work. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Now, something happened today. Boris Yeltsin
rejected a law that was passed
by the duma having to do with religious freedom. Tell us about that. 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, it was an excellent sign that Yeltsin is in
control, and I think on the right track,
because here was a law that would have restricted freedom of religion.
It would have created two classes of
religion, one essentially free and one restricted. And Yeltsin says this
does not comport with our Constitution; I veto it. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: You know, I--in reading your articles from Russia,
the theme of change is just
omnipresent, change in every field, political change, economic change,
and a sense of people’s lives as being very
dislocated by these changes. Is this evident everywhere you look, or do
you have to go out and really make an
effort to find the evidence of this kind of change and dislocation? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, it’s amazing because the Russians are
extraordinarily patient and I think industrious
and adaptable in all this turmoil that surrounds them. Here’s a country
where nuclear physicists, men who are at
the cream of their scientific achievement and their careers, are making
$50, getting rations every month, standing
in line for bread, mathematicians who’ve become locksmiths. 
So there’s an overriding sense of humiliation. And people are bearing
it, and many of them are trying to adapt.
There are also enormous changes around them. You find grandmothers
selling raw chicken on the street corner
and whizzing by them fancy Mercedes. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: How--tell me other ways that people are adapting.
If people are making this
small amount of money, if they’re making such a low salary, how do they
survive? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, it’s very interesting. One way they survive is to
have little garden plots. And this
summer, as we speak now, people were out furiously trying to keep their
gardens growing before the first frost,
which comes earlier in Russia, because these little garden plots, maybe
3 percent of the total land mass of this
huge country, produce a quarter of their food. 
And they sock it away in their cellars. People are finding ways to
adapt. I don’t think it’s easy. I don’t think it’s
happy. I think they feel humiliated, but it’s extraordinary how hard
they work at it. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Why are salaries so low? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, this huge inflation after the Soviet Union
collapsed, and when that inflation came
down, it cost--it created a lot of debt. People are paid their salaries
months late, and they’ve never received any
serious money for their work. One reason is that the government is going
through a process of wringing out that
inflation and trying to meet these IFM standards for becoming a normal
market economy. 
It’s very painful. It’s really not the fault of the people now, but it’s
the fault of this history that they brought with
them, this centrally-planned economy. Turning it into a free market is
not easy or quick. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: We hear in this country so much, and, in fact,
you’ve written about it, the new
capitalist class, people who--some reporters have referred to them as
robber barons. What do you see? I mean,
when you’re say in the streets or out in Moscow, what do you see of this
new capitalist class? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, they ride around in caravans, you know, armored
Mercedes and several Cherokee
jeeps following them, lights blaring and guns bristling, because they
all have their own little private armies to
protect them. They’re also extraordinarily rich, and they flaunt it. And
there’s a huge amount of what you’d
consider sort of 1920's Chicago kinds of--ways of dressing and ways of
behaving. 
But I have to say they also are the new power--one of the new power
centers of Russia. Seven or eight of these
big bankers, we call them oligarchs. Maybe that’s too nice a
word--robber barons. They’re buying up
newspapers, airlines, oil companies. They are beginning to create a
structure for Russia. It’s not a liberal free
market economy like we think of. It’s actually much more of a European
or even South Korean economy, with several huge conglomerates, monopolies. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: With criminality involved or not? I mean, we hear
a lot about banditry, but is that something totally separate? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: No. Criminality has infiltrated all aspects of Russian
business and commercial life,
unfortunately. There are people that would like to get rid of it. I
think ultimately it’s going to take these oligarchs. 
It’s going to take the power structure, itself, to come to some
conclusion that this is--these lack of a rule of law
makes it impossible to track foreign investment, makes it difficult to
do business, but right now it’s everybody for
themselves. It’s a "winner take all" economy and the rules don’t exist,
except the rule of the gun and the rule of the use of force. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: What about outside of Moscow? Is it different
outside? I know you’ve traveled a lot. 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Well, Moscow is a state unto itself. It’s a booming
capital, where casinos stay open all
night, and it doesn’t resemble Moscow of the end of the Soviet era at
all, but the rest of the country is actually
desperate. People are in despair. You find whole towns where this boom
town mentality has not spread. It’s a
great puzzle to a lot of people. Why hasn’t this spread? 
Why don’t the Russians have, for example, okies who pull up roots in the
provinces and come streaming toward
the prosperity of Moscow? It’s not happening, and it’s a big puzzle.
There are signs in some other
cities--Nisninograd--St. Petersburg--of prosperity taking hold, but
frankly there’s just too much to spare in the provinces. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Overall--I mean, I know it’s hard to make a
generalization, but I’m going to ask
you for one anyway--do you get the sense that people are optimistic or
pessimistic about what’s happening to them? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: People are cynical and pessimistic. And I think actually
a very small number of them are
beginning to adapt and to change and change that attitude. There’s a
middle class in Moscow. Those people are
optimistic. There’s a very small number of people who’ve made it to an
upper class. They’re optimistic. 
There’s a large number of people to whom the words "democracy" and "free
markets" mean chaos and confusion
and disorientation and humiliation. And it’s very, very important, I
think, that we understand that they don’t view
these words and these values in the same way we do. They haven’t seen
the results. It’s only five years, and that’s
not enough time. It’s a warped, sort of imperfect period for them. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And how important is it that Americans know about
this? The Cold War is over;
we’re not threatened in the way we were by Russia at all. Do you still
think this is a really important story for Americans to be following? 
DAVID HOFFMAN: It’s very important and for different reasons than in the
past. You’re right. This is a weak
state, and in its weakness is the threat. The threat isn’t any longer.
In a Cold War we’ll have an exchange of
intercontinental ballistic missiles, but Russia today is so weak it’s
sort of like a blender without a top. 
Things are spinning around so badly inside something is going to pop
out. And I think a lot of people worry
nuclear proliferation, chemical weapons proliferation, weapons of mass
destruction, biological weapons, even
pollution, which is getting worse and worse, I think Americans should
care about that, because one day one of
these hazards, if not kept inside the blender, is going to pop up, and
it’s going to be dangerous. 
ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Well, David Hoffman, thanks so much for being with
us. 
DAVID HOFFMAN: Sure. 

***********

#3
Russia to axe 10 percent of government bureaucrats

MOSCOW, July 26 (Reuter) - First Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov said on
Saturday that Russia planned to cut government bureucracy by 10 percent as
part of its drive to save money. 
About a quarter of the officials at the Ministry of Fuel and Energy, headed
by Nemtsov himself, will be axed, Interfax news agency quoted him as saying
during a phone-in session with the public organised by the Komsomolskaya
Pravda newspaper. 
Nemtsov, a youthful pro-market liberal, said the big cuts in red tape would
free up funds for ``more burning needs'' like the prompt payment of wages and
pensions. 
President Boris Yeltsin has said tackling chronic wage and pension arrears is
his top priority. 
He brought Nemtsov, a former regional governor, and other young reformers
into the government earlier this year in a bid to revive Russia's sluggish
market reforms and defuse the arrears crisis. 
During Saturday's phone-in session, Nemtsov also said army officers due to be
pensioned off or qualifying for help finding accommodation under the
government's military reform plans would receive cash directly in their bank
accounts to avoid the risk of money being syphoned off by officials. 
Yeltsin wants to reduce the size of Russia's bloated armed forces and boost
their military effectiveness. 
On Friday Yeltsin said privatisation of some military property would provide
funds to house the many officers and their families who have waited years for
somewhere to live. 

*********

#4
MSNBC
July 26, 1997
In Moscow, art begins to imitate life 
Film festival shows gunfire as common
on the street as the screen 
By Preston Mendenhall 
NBC NEWS PRODUCER 

        MOSCOW — The 20th Moscow International Film Festival would give 
any self-respecting Hollywood insider a heart attack. Maybe that’s why 
so few bothered to show up.
        Take the festival’s much-heralded premier of “Batman & Robin.” 
There were no spotlights, movie stars, or limousines, not even a “Batman 
& Robin” poster in sight. Moscow International Film Festival         
Five hours before the premier, none of the organizers could say where 
the film would be showing.
        There weren’t enough tickets for the Udarnik theater, the 
premier venue. One enterprising Russian made hundreds more on a color 
photocopier. The result: hundreds of people sitting in the aisles.
        If watching a movie in the middle of a serious fire hazard 
didn’t bother the audience, the lack of headphones for simultaneous 
translation did. The movie was in English; the audience was Russian.
        “Udarnik,” the theater’s name, was a title given to model Soviet 
workers. Its meaning seems to have been lost on the Moscow film festival 
employees.
        The Moscow festival, which runs July 19-29, and the city itself, 
are doing their very best to imitate the real Gollyvood, as Russians 
call it. Mercedes convertibles, press flaks and Stalin-sized egos are 
more common here than zeros on a 100,000 ruble bill.
        But if imitation is a form of flattery, Hollywood should be 
shaking in its boots. Italian film star Gina Lollobridgida acknowledges 
greetings of Moscow fans at the opening ceremony of the 20th Moscow Film 
Festival in Moscow, Saturday, July 19, 1997. 
        Last year, there were more than 500 contract killings in Russia, 
most of which read like a bad Hollywood movie script. Real life 
remote-control bombs, grenades and high-powered sniper rifles reduced 
hundreds of victims to heaps of flesh Hollywood could only dream of 
designing.
        In a sense, Russian godfathers are like studio heads. They give 
commands to legions of underlings who “execute” their orders. They have 
the power to red- and green-light lives.
        On the festival’s fourth day, a typical Russo-Hollywood vignette 
played in front of the Kino Center, one of the festival’s venues. A true 
story, it went like this:
        Fade in:
        Thirty-nine-year-old Anatoly, a private-security-firm executive 
(read: he formed the company so he could carry a gun legally), exits a 
cafe at the Kino Center.
        (Bang, bang, bang)
        A sniper fires at him from an adjacent building. Anatoly falls, 
wounded, but manages to return fire from his semiautomatic pistol, 
conveniently holstered in his tailored suit.
        Innocent Moscow International Festival attendees scream and run 
for cover.
        Anatoly’s bodyguard jumps in and tries to get the boss to the 
safety of his Mercedes 500.
        (Bang, bang, bang)
        A second attacker fires from a nearby car. Anatoly is hit seven 
times in the back and chest. His bodyguard takes three rounds. Both die 
in pools of blood in the middle of the street.
        The Russians have one thing over Hollywood. Real life does not 
allow for audience polls, so in Russia the bad guys always get away.
        And they did.   

***********

#5
PRESIDENT YELTSIN HAVING AN EASY DAY AT LAST
VOLZHSKY UTES, JULY 26, RIA NOVOSTI - President Yeltsin who
has been spending his holiday at the Volzhsky Utes sanitarium in
the Samara region for a week now has finally decided to devote
this weekend exclusively to rest. Anyway, according to the
information supplied by a RIA correspondent, the president does
not have any working meetings or official functions scheduled
for either Saturday or Sunday. Boris Yeltsin will spend this
time in the beautiful forest surrounding Volzhsky Utes.
The conditions here are just perfect for good rest:
excellent fishing, a lot of berries, fine weather and so on.
Although it is not really hot, one can bathe and swim at
pleasure. At the sanitarium itself which is perched in a
picturesque place over the river there is everything for
improving one's health. By the way, on Friday a large group of
holiday-makers, many of them with children, from all parts of
Russia, settled in here. In an interview to our correspondent
all of them note the superior standard of service and excellent
conditions for rest and recreation. No one feels constrained by
the enhanced security measures around the place, for the
security personnel are working very professionally and
courteously. 

**********

#6
Young Russians to go abroad to study business

MOSCOW, July 26 (Reuter) - President Boris Yeltsin plans to send a large
number of young Russians to foreign business schools and has suggested
Western nations help foot the bill, his press service said on Saturday. 
Yeltsin wrote to U.S. President Bill Clinton and other Western leaders saying
that Moscow would pay the bulk of the students' tuition costs every year. 
But he also suggested that part of the technical assistance now being
extended by the West to support Russia's market reforms could be redirected
to help finance the programme. 
The first pilot project could start at the end of this year. 
Yeltsin has often called for the promotion of younger Russians in government
and business to help speed up the country's transition to Western-style
capitalism. 
Earlier this year he put youthful reformers in charge of economic reforms. 
Apart from Clinton, Yeltsin's message was sent to French President Jacques
Chirac, Germany's Chancellor Helmut Kohl, British Prime Minister Tony Blair,
Italy's Romano Prodi, Canada's Jean Chretien and the president of the
European Commission, Jacques Santer. 
Yeltsin met these leaders last month in the U.S. city of Denver at the annual
gathering of the Group of Seven main industrialised nations. 
The forum has effectively become the Group of Eight, including Russia, which
is keen to build closer economic and political ties with the Western nations.

**********

#7
Yeltsin vetoes parliament's land sale bill
By Oleg Shchedrov 

MOSCOW, July 25 (Reuter) - President Boris Yeltsin on
Friday vetoed a draft Land Code from which the Communist-led Russian
parliament had excised provisions allowing the sale of land. 
"The Land Code should be characterised as a legislative act which not only
grossly violates the constitutional right of citizens to own land but also
ignores the interests of the state in using and preserving the land,"
Yeltsin's press office quoted him saying in a letter to parliament sent with
the vetoed code. 
The State Duma lower house passed the diluted code earlier this year, arguing
that free buying and selling of land would end with foreigners buying up most
of the world's biggest country from impoverished Russian farmers. 
The Federation Council upper chamber, which is made up of influential
regional bosses, backed the Duma's version of the code earlier this month. 
Yeltsin blasted the legislators for trying to turn the clock back to Soviet
days, when all land was owned and farmed by the state following the brutal
collectivisation programme in the 1930s under dictator Josef Stalin. 
"The whole world is living like this. What are we scared of?" Yeltsin,
vacationing in Central Russian on the river Volga, said on Thursday in
reference to the land sale. 
"We should really return the land to farmers, make them real owners," he
said. "It's up to them how to use the land." 
Government officials say the right to sell and buy land would allow notably
cash-starved farmers an opportunity to raise funds by mortgaging their land
to banks in return for credits. 
Most of the agricultural land in Russia was nominally privatised after the
Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. But owners' rights are very limited and they
have no right to sell land. 
The cash-strapped government, tired of pouring money into the crippled
agricultural sector, plans to drastically cut farm subsidies in 1998. 
Interfax quoted Deputy Finance Minister Vasily Kovalyov as saying on Thursday
the budget would allot only 2.7 trillion roubles ($470 million) to farms, a
fraction of the 16.1 trillion roubles originally budgeted for this year. 
Parliament must now rally a two-thirds majority in both chambers to overturn
Yeltsin's veto. 
But Interfax quoted the head of Duma's economic committee, Adrian Puzanovsky,
as saying that the lower house was more likely to seek compromise with the
Kremlin. 
Puzanovsky, who belongs to the conservative Agrarian Party, which is close
the Communists, said that a series of supplementary bills, including a
mortgage law, could be worked out to help iron out differences between
Yeltsin and parliament. 
"If we cannot come to terms trying to solve the land problem in one global
document, we should start solving it step by step," Puzanovsky said. 

**********

#8
Boston Globe
26 July 1997
[for personal use only]
Russian shines among Mir woes 
By David Filipov, Globe Staff

KOROLYOV, Russia - It's a good thing for this nation's struggling space 
program that it still has a specialist who can jump into a training pool 
to simulate a tricky space repair. 
And someone who can explain what's happening on the stricken Mir space 
station to any audience. And someone who can lead Russia into the next 
century of space exploration. 
Who are all these people? 
Sergei Krikalyov. 
Few of Russia's 148 million residents, much less anyone outside the 
country, know that Krikalyov (pronounced ``Kree-cal-YOFF'') is Russia's 
cosmic Renaissance man, whose versatility on the ground is outdone only 
by one of the world's greatest careers in space. 
Since Mir was damaged in a June 25 collision with an unmanned cargo 
craft, Krikalyov, the deputy flight commander of the Mir mission, has 
emerged as an unsung hero of the space program's effort to keep the 
mission alive. On any given day at Mission Control just north of Moscow, 
Krikalyov, 38, can be seen brainstorming with technicians, briefing 
reporters, and offering guidance by radio to the weary cosmonauts aboard 
Mir, all with an authority forged during his own 15 months of experience 
in orbit. 
He does all this while training for his fourth mission in space, 
scheduled for next year, on board the first module of what will become 
the international space station Alpha. It is a grueling doubling-up of 
duties that Krikalyov shrugs off with his patented, soft-spoken 
confidence. 
``It is true, I spend a lot of time at ground control,'' he says. ``But 
many systems on Mir and Alpha are similar. ... I'll be OK.''
For a space program badly in need of stars, Krikalyov has all the 
qualities of one. Handsome and trim, fluent in English, he projects a 
cool, competent, and cosmopolitan image. If he were an American 
astronaut, he would spend a good deal of time on ``Nightline'' and the 
David Letterman show. 
As the cosmonaut who went up a Soviet and came down a Russian - one of 
his flights on Mir spanned the 1991 breakup of the USSR - his life story 
is the stuff of a Hollywood biography. 
Did someone mention making films? He has done that, too. 
``It is hard to envy movie stars,'' Krikalyov laughed, recalling his 
experience at this year's Cannes Film Festival, which he attended as 
director, actor, and camera operator for a documentary film about the 
Mir space station. ``They can't even go to their car without being 
surrounded by curious journalists. That's their life.''
But it's not Krikalyov's. Most Russians would recognize one or two of 
the dozens of cosmonauts whose portraits cover a wall at Mission 
Control, but Krikalyov is not one of them. 
``Krika-who?,'' was the response of Pyotr Nemchinov, an art-seller on 
Moscow's Arbat Street pedestrian mall. ``I used to follow all that space 
stuff back when there was nothing else on television, but I lost track 
years ago.''
That's a refrain heard often in the Russian capital. A steady decline in 
prestige has accompanied the space agency's downward spiral of failed 
launches, canceled programs, and Mir mishaps. 
While the aging space station's latest woes have prompted new questions 
about whether Mir has outlived its usefulness, Krikalyov bristles at the 
suggestion. 
``They say the station has gotten old, that it's not safe. The more I 
think about it, the more I realize the opposite is true,'' he said. 
``The latest events show that the station is rather alive. ... 
``Mir was rammed by the space equivalent of a truck, and we only lost 
one of six modules, not the whole station,'' he continued, referring to 
the Spektr module that was punctured and depressurized during the June 
25 crash. ``I'd love to fly it again.''
He probably will not. But he did recently spend several days floating 
around an underwater replica of Mir in a spacesuit, practicing repairs 
to the damage caused by last month's accident, so that he could convey 
to Mir's crew how theory might play out in practice. 
A new Russian crew is preparing to replace Alexander Lazutkin and 
Commander Vasily Tsibliyev in August to do the repairs - American 
astronaut Michale Foale will remain on board Mir until September - and 
Krikalyov's next job will be to find out from the two returning 
cosmonauts what went wrong. At stake will be whether the two Russians 
lose part of their flight bonuses for negligence. 
``There could be 10, even 20 reasons that could have caused the 
collision. And one reason here could be a mistake by the crew. That 
can't be ruled out,'' Krikalyov said. ``Another could be a failure of 
the technology.''
Krikalyov knows a thing or two about the way technical snags can get in 
the way of the best-laid plans. He was aboard Mir when the Soviet Union 
fell apart in 1991. When he finally parachuted into the Central Asian 
desert in March 1992, the USSR emblems on his flight suit were outdated. 
Born in Leningrad and educated as a mechanical engineer, Krikalyov 
joined NPO Energiya, which built Mir, in 1981; among his other duties, 
he tested space-flight equipment. In 1985, he was part of the 
ground-control team that brought the Salyut 7 space station back to life 
after it briefly failed. 
Selected for astronaut training that year, Krikalyov flew on Mir for the 
first time from November 1988 to April 1989. 
He is one of the few Russians to hold the highest awards of pre- and 
post-Communist Russia, Hero of the Soviet Union, as well as the newly 
created Hero of Russia. After his fateful second flight on Mir, he 
became the first Russian to fly on the US space shuttle Atlantis in 
1995. 
It is his experience with NASA that made him a logical choice for the 
first Alpha mission, and before the recent spate of troubles on board 
Mir, he spent much of his time flying between Houston and the Star City 
training center outside Moscow. 
Lately, Russia's ongoing financial troubles have also raised questions 
about whether the Russians will have to bow out of the Alpha project. 
Krikalyov says that would be a mistake. 
``If Russia is expelled from the program, it will be more difficult for 
everybody,'' he said. ``The experience we have will not be used. They'll 
be reinventing the wheel.''

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#9
Russia's LUKoil to break into U.S. gasoline market
By Tony McAuley 

NEW YORK (Reuter) - Russia's largest oil company, NK LUKoil, is teaming up
with four supermarket groups to sell gasoline at the pump in the United
States -- the first step in an aggressive plan to break into the world's
largest retail fuels market. 
The Russian company's strategy may raise fears among the major oil companies
which dominate U.S. gasoline retailing that a market-share battle, similar to
that waged in Europe in recent years, may be ahead, analysts said. 
LUKoil's 50 percent-owned affiliate Nexus Fuels of Irving, Texas, said Friday
it will formally announce Monday deals with Food Lion, Richfoods, Shaws
Supermarkets and Supervalu which will give it access to 5,000 sites next door
to supermarkets. 
``We are in contract negotiations with about five others (supermarket chains)
and one alone has 1,000 sites,'' said Bill Hall, chief executive of Nexus. 
Hall says the concept, developed through testing in sites in Texas, is to
jointly brand the gasoline stations with the supermarket name and LUKoil's
and cross market the supermarkets and the ``fueling centers'' through various
joint promotions and campaigns. 
Though Nexus says they do not aim to start any kind of price war, analysts
said the move represents a significant threat to major oil retailers in the
United States. 
``Should the majors be worried? You bet your bibby they should; that's
huge,'' said John Mahedy, oil sector analyst at Sanford Bernstein & Co. Inc. 
He notes that the mega-merger between Shell Oil Co., Texaco Inc.'s and Star
Enterprises U.S. marketing operations will result in that group having about
26,000 retail sites nationally, while LUKoil's first deal alone gives them
access to around a fifth of that. 
Hall of Nexus says some of the biggest U.S. oil companies were offered the
deal first. 
``After we got the store contracts we tried to get a major oil partner. We
talked to Exxon Corp., Shell and Phillips Petroleum Co. and for some reason
couldn't convince them that this is going to be a good market in the United
States,'' said Hall. 
``I think they are going to regret it down the road,'' he said. 
For LUKoil, which claims to be the world's largest private sector oil
company, the deal gives it a entree to the U.S. market. The company plans to
arrange deals with major U.S. oil companies to swap some of its vast crude
oil production for gasoline for the retail sites. 
Hall says the deal was attractive to the supermarkets as a way to recapture
some of the 10 percent to 15 percent of sales lost to major oil company gas
stations in recent years as the latter have expanded their on-site
convenience stores. 

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#10
IRKUTSK REGION TO ELECT ITS GOVERNOR JULY 27
IRKUTSK, JULY 26, RIA-NOVOSTI CORRESPONDENT ALEXANDER
BATALIN - About two million voters living in Irkutsk region are
to elect their new governor July 27. All in all, eight
candidates continue to vie for that important position. At least
25 percent of all eligible voters should turn up; otherwise
election results shall be declared null and void. The same
percentage of votes would be required to score a perfect
victory.
Irkutsk region, which boasts a rather impressive election
legislation, has prepared very well for these elections, Ms.
McDonald, project manager at the international election-systems
fund, told RIA-NOVOSTI here today. In her words, a group of
international observers are to visit local polls, checking on
the pace of elections at military units and prisons. 

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#11
Front-runners in Irkutsk Gubernatorial Race Profiled 

Rabochaya Tribuna
July 23, 1997
[translation for personal use only]
Report by Vladimir Barayev under the rubric "Passions Over Power": 
"Whom Will Baykal Choose?"

Just as Baykal is situated on a fault, so Irkutsk Oblast finds itself
at the epicenter of sociopolitical conflicts. The situation has become
especially tense on the eve of the oblast gubernatorial elections, which
are scheduled for 27 July. The race is already in the home straight. Of
the nine candidates three clearly stand out: B. Govorin, the mayor of
Irkutsk; I. Shchadov, general director of Vostsibugol; and F. Seredyuk,
president of the Angarsk Petrochemical Company [APC].
Many citizens of Angarsk and Irkutsk, while knowing and respecting APC
President F. Seredyuk, nevertheless do not consider him East Siberia's true
"gas station king"; after all, the controlling block of shares in the APC
belongs to the Uneximbank and to the International Financial Company headed
by A. Vavilov -- the main hero of the latest financial scandal, accused
over the disappearance of half a billion dollars. The General Prosecutor's
Office will discover whether this is true or not, but the true masters in
Moscow are hardly worried by the fact that Angarsk inflicts appreciable
environmental damage on the oblast; after all, the main thing is the
profits that come in from the shores of the Baykal.
When F. Seredyuk was named sole candidate at an extraordinary congress
of the Irkutsk Oblast Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, I.
Shchadov did not accept this, and proudly began to fly his own kite. Mind
you, the name of his father, former USSR Coal Industry Minister M.
Shchadov, with whom miners link what were just about the industry's best
years, works in his favor.
Ivan Mikhaylovich himself, following in his father's footsteps,
traveled the path from ordinary engineer to general director of
Vostsibugol. Today he is a doctor of technical sciences, a professor of
Irkutsk Polytechnical Institute, an honorary Russian miner, and member of
the International and Russian Engineering Academies.
Govorin lost his father -- a front-line soldier who died of his
wounds, leaving a wife and three sons -- at the age of 14. The oldest of
these sons, Boris, had to earn extra money as a longshoreman while still at
school, since their mother, Olga Yakovlevna, an ordinary electric
sewing-machine operator, did not earn much money. Having served in the
army, Boris Aleksandrovich worked his way up from engineer to deputy
director of Irkutskenergo. In 1990 he was elected chairman of the city
executive committee, and two years later President B. Yeltsin appointed
Govorin mayor of Irkutsk; this was no mere quirk, as it turned out, since
in 1994 this decision was confirmed by 78.8 percent of the electorate. 
Thus he was confirmed in the office of mayor by an overwhelming majority of
votes.
Here it should be said that Irkutsk is the only city in East Siberia
in which pensioners receive their pensions and teachers and medics their
pay on time. Moreover, public sector workers receive a 100-percent bonus
on top of their wages, introduced by ex-Governor Yu. Nozhikov and kept
thanks to V. Govorin's efforts. Several schools, a health center, an
ambulance station, and a new market that is not inferior to Moscow's
Tishinskiy market in terms of beauty and comfort have all been
commissioned. Trolleybus lines have been laid from the center to three of
the city's rayons. The meat combine is being modernized....
Valuing as he does Irkutsk's long-standing traditions, Govorin devotes
great attention to the city's culture. A tall, powerfully built Siberian,
he looks the typical inhabitant of the taiga, with whom you could safely go
hunting or fishing on Lake Baykal. Being 1.90 meters tall and weighing
more than 100 kg, he is even more reminiscent of a heavyweight boxer.
Ivan Shchadov is also, incidentally, a former sportsman -- a skater
and a basketball player -- and a first-class chess player. He is the
number-one fan and sponsor of the well-known basketball team "Shakhter"
(from Cheremkhovo).
And what of the candidates' programs? They almost all promise roughly
the same thing -- protection for the oblast from the center, from "that
damned Chubays," protection for Baykal, and prosperity for the Angara
region, which has so much timber, gold, aluminum, and the cheapest
electricity in Russia....

************