January 28,
2000
This Date's Issues: 4073 4074
4075
Johnson's Russia List
#4075
28 January 2000
davidjohnson@erols.com
[Note from David Johnson:
1. AFP: Putin's Support Down By Six Percent, Says New Poll.
2. Reuters: Russia slams Clinton over Chechnya.
3. The Times (UK): Rebels 'kill 700 Russian troops.' Alice
Lagnado, in hiding in southern Chechnya, learns of the latest bloody battle for
Grozny.
4. AFP: Aushev Accuses Russia Of Cutting Refugees Off From Aid.
5. Newsweek International: Sergei Karaganov, The Trouble With the
U.S: It's Just Too Darn Big. Russians dislike the administration but not Americans.
6. Trud: No Apathy. (poll)
7. Interfax: RUSSIAN CHIEF BANKER WORRIED ABOUT CAPITAL FLIGHT.
8. Moscow Times: Robert Coalson, MEDIA WATCH: Russia Wages War of
Words.
9. Andrew Miller: Alexander Nikitin.
10. The Guardian (UK): Ian Traynor and Peter Capella, Swiss investigators order arrest of top Yeltsin aide.
11. Obshchaya Gazeta: Yelena Skvortsova, A Common Arrangement.(Kremlin, Mabetex Affair Examined)
12. St. Petersburg Times: Simon Saradzhyan, Journalist in Hiding
>From Psychiatric Test.]
******
#1
Putin's Support Down By Six Percent, Says New Poll
MOSCOW, Jan 28, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) Support for Russia's acting
President Vladimir Putin in the run-up to elections in March has dropped by
six percent over the past week according to a new survey by the VTSIOM
polling institute.
The drop in support -- the first suffered by Putin since he was appointed
prime minister last August -- follows mounting public concern over the
Russian death-toll in the conflict in Chechnya.
Appointed interim president by outgoing president Boris Yeltsin, who resigned
on December 31, Putin had until recently enjoyed widespread acclaim for the
way the war was being conducted.
But the new poll, showing Putin to have fallen back to 49 percent support
from 55 percent a week ago, suggests that setbacks in Chechnya, combined with
controversy over an alleged pact between pro-Kremlin and communist deputies,
have cut away at Putin's popularity.
Around 60 percent of Russians, however, still support the Chechen offensive
even if it leads to heavy Russian losses of life, the new poll showed.
The other candidates for the presidential elections on March 26 had varying
fortunes.
Communist party leader Gennady Zyuganov's rating dropped from 13 percent to
12 percent, while former Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov -- who is still
uncertain whether to join the race -- rose from 4.4 percent to 5.6 percent.
Liberal leader Grigory Yavlinsky's support, meanwhile, rose from 2.6 to 3.3
percent.
The poll was carried out between January 21 and 24 and covered a sample of
1,600 people. The margin of error was 2.5 percent.
******
#2
Russia slams Clinton over Chechnya
By Elizabeth Piper
MOSCOW, Jan 28 (Reuters) - Russia on Friday criticised U.S. President Bill
Clinton's characterisation of its war in Chechnya as "cruel and
self-defeating," saying the comment was a fresh sign of the West's lack of
understanding.
The government's new Chechnya spokesman Sergei Yastrzhembsky was quoted by
Itar-Tass news agency as saying: "The real causes of what is happening in the
Chechen Republic are still not fully understood in the West.
"(The West) tries to look at events in Chechnya through the prism of its own
fixed idea of how the struggle against terrorism should be waged,"
Yastrzhembsky, the man charged with improving the image of the offensive,
said.
In Moscow, Russian security services started taking urgent measures to
counter possible new rebel attacks from Chechnya, where a pro-Russian Chechen
leader said he would hold talks with rebel commanders in Grozny.
General Gennady Troshev, a senior Russian commander, said only a handful of
civilians were left in Chechnya's war-torn capital, dealing head on with a
subject which has particularly concerned the West. Most had been taken to
Russian-controlled areas, he said.
RUSSIA STEPS UP SECURITY
Amid fear of fresh terrorist attacks in Russia, Alexander Zdanovich,
spokesman for the FSB domestic security agency, told NTV television Moscow
would increase security.
His comments followed a statement by a leading Moslem guerrilla commander
threatening to launch lightning strikes similar to those which cut heavily
into Russia's advance early in the New Year.
"There is a big war going on with much military equipment, artillery and
planes, but our position is good in Grozny and in the mountains," Arab-born
Khattab, one of the main commanders battling Russian troops, told Reuters
Television.
"The (fighters) are ready not only to hit any city in Chechnya, but any city
in Russia as well."
Russia launched its offensive in Chechnya after devastating bomb blasts
rocked Moscow and other cities. Russia blamed the attacks on Chechen rebels,
who swiftly denied the charges.
In Grozny, Bislan Gantamirov, leader of a pro-Russian Chechen militia, said
some rebel commanders in eastern parts of the city had told him they were
ready to lay down arms.
"The commanders are ready to end resistance in the eastern sector of Grozny,"
Interfax news agency quoted Gantamirov as saying. He did not disclose the
names of commanders who were prepared for such talks.
"I am ready to talk to any reasonable forces except for outspoken terrorists,
bandits who blew up peaceful apartment blocks, seized hostages, were involved
in the slave trade and executions of hostages," Gantamirov, a convicted
embezzler released early from prison in October, said.
Russia's advance into Grozny has stalled in recent days as troops face
increasingly stiff resistance from the rebels.
ANNAN EXPRESSES CONCERN
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in Moscow for talks with Acting President
Vladimir Putin, expressed his concern over the four-month military drive.
"Mr Kofi Annan said that the efforts of the Russian authorities to fight
terrorism in the North Caucasus are understandable and enjoy support, but the
question also arises of the humanitarian situation," Sergei Prikhodko, deputy
head of the presidential administration, told reporters.
NATO Secretary General Lord George Robertson, in Ukraine, also called for an
end to the fighting. "NATO has made its position very clear -- we believe
that a political track is absolutely essential," Robertson told reporters.
Russia has so far ruled out talks, saying there is no one leader in control
of the rebel region.
*******
#3
The Times (UK)
28 January 2000
[for personal use only]
Rebels 'kill 700 Russian troops'
Alice Lagnado, in hiding in southern Chechnya, learns of the latest
bloody battle for Grozny
RUSSIAN troops were driven back after a struggle for control of the Minutka
Square area of Grozny that began early on Wednesday and ended yesterday
morning, Chechen rebel sources say.
The rebels report that Russian forces lost up to 700 troops in one of the
heaviest battles yet for control of the city.
A Chechen field commander based in southern Chechnya who is in constant touch
with the rebels fighting in Grozny told The Times that the battle near
Minutka Square, although it did not reach the square, began in the early
hours of Wednesday when Russian troops launched an offensive from the
direction of Khankala, a village east of Grozny.
Chechen rebels are able to communicate easily among themselves with simple,
readily available walkie-talkies.
The Russians in the latest assault on Grozny were defence ministry troops and
other special army regiments, the commander said. They came from two
directions on either side of the railway tracks leading from Khankala to
Grozny. Between 500 and 700 Russian soldiers had been killed in the fighting,
he said.
Approximately 30 tanks and armoured personnel carriers (APCs) were destroyed,
their burnt shells lining the eastern approach to Minutka Square.
Another 12 tanks and APCs were left intact, abandoned by fleeing Russian
troops, the Chechen commander said. Chechen forces had repulsed the Russians
largely through the use of rocket-propelled grenades.
According to the American-backed Radio Liberty, up to 50 Chechen rebels were
also killed. Chechen commanders, who expect each of their men to kill at
least 20 Russians, consider even singlefigure losses to be very serious.
The losses on both sides, even taking into account possible exaggeration, are
tremendous and mark the beginning of a new phase in the war. According to the
Chechen field commander, rebel forces had retaken the Staraya Sunzha region
by the time fighting ended yesterday morning.
Russian forces controlled only the 6th micro-region in northern Grozny, he
said. In the northwest, Russian troops still controlled the village of
Katayama, in the Staropromyslovsky suburbs, but had not reached far beyond.
In the southeast, Russian troops had reached the tuberculosis hospital in the
Oktyabrskoye region in the suburbs of Grozny.
Moscow sent 300 extra troops into Grozny on Thursday, according to news
agency reports, and now has more than 120,000 troops in the tiny republic.
Meanwhile, in the Russiancontrolled territory of Chechnya outside Grozny,
Moscow's forces are living up to their reputation for rudeness, intimidation
and violence. Bella, 46, escaped from Grozny a fortnight ago and now lives in
a dark, crowded hostel with 1,700 other refugees in the village of
Sernovodsk, west of Grozny.
In Grozny, she said, she saw Russian troops eating dogs and cats because they
had trouble maintaining their food supplies. She said that there was a
filtration camp where Chechen men were tortured at the 6th Polyclinic in the
Staropromyskovsky region in Grozny's northwestern outskirts.
Bella said that Russian planes were bombing Grozny regularly, but she had not
seen any troops in the street.
In her street, there were only two homes that had not been abandoned. Both
housed elderly Russians. Their only source of water was puddles of melted
snow.
Bella reported that soldiers visited the village of Zakan Yurt, near
Sernovodsk, on December 13 and killed a doctor and his wife for no apparent
reason.
Rashid Dadayev, 50, the head doctor at a psychiatric hospital there, and his
wife Tamara, 42, were driving to the hospital when masked troops shot at them
from an APC. Both were killed instantly.
******
#4
Aushev Accuses Russia Of Cutting Refugees Off From Aid
MOSCOW, Jan 28, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) Ingush President Ruslan Aushev
on Friday accused Russia of cutting off assistance from Chechen refugees in
his republic in a bid to forcibly repatriate them into the "liberated" areas
of Chechnya.
"Yesterday I visited the refugee camps, and there I received information that
(Deputy Prime Minister Nikolai) Koshman has issued an order to concentrate
all aid to portions of Chechnya now under Russian control," Aushev said in an
interview with AFP.
"I will not allow anyone to force them back into Chechnya -- the people are
afraid of going back," Aushev said.
The office of Koshman, the Russian government pointman on Chechnya, was not
immediately available for comment.
However the Russian emergencies ministry, while refusing to comment on
Aushev's claim, said that 15 trucks with humanitarian supplies destined for
Ingushetia had just arrived in the near-by city of Vladikavkaz.
Aushev, whose republic is housing more than 200,000 refugees who have fled
the fighting in Chechnya, frequently accuses Russian authorities of failing
to help out with the humanitarian cost of the war.
Some refugees interviewed in Ingush camps last month had complained that the
Russians had received orders to stop issuing food to anyone who refused to
return to Chechnya. Those orders were later repealed.
Russia is trying to forge a "model" Chechen republic out of the devastated
areas currently under its military control. However few are willing to return
because of the fighting.
*******
#5
Newsweek International
January 31, 2000
The Trouble With the U.S: It's Just Too Darn Big
Russians dislike the administration but not Americans.
By Sergei Karaganov
Karaganov is chairman of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy.
There are three main reasons for Russian anti-Americanism. One is jealousy of
a failing power. One is more serious: the bitter aftertaste of unfulfilled
hopes and promises of the earlier era, when Americans took an almost intimate
interest in the way Russia reformed and developed after the fall of
communism. "American" recipes for reforms failed. The third is the U.S.
government's support of elements of the Russian ruling elite, despite some
abhorrent deeds and misdeeds: the bombing of Parliament, the first war in
Chechnya, rampant corruption.
In the days of Gorbachev's perestroika, and at the start of Yeltsin's
reforms, most Russians liked the United States. But at times, America's firm
support for even the most ill-considered initiatives of Russian reformers
seemed so reckless that some Russians actually began to fear that the true
purpose of U.S. policy was to ruin the economy and even to destroy Russia
itself. The two noticeable eruptions of the Russian public's sharp rejection
of U.S. policies—the expansion of NATO and the bombing of
Yugoslavia—have so
far not led to a real hardening of an anti-American public mood. But the
Balkan crisis made a certain part of Russian society fear the possibility
that a similar scenario might be repeated in Russia. Whether that perception
will gain ground will depend on how Russian-U.S. and Russian-Western
relations develop, on whether NATO will expand further and on internal
transformations within Russia.
After NATO's use of force against Yugoslavia, anti-American sentiments grew
stronger in the legislative and executive branches, as well as in the
academic community and in the media. This in turn eroded the Russian
political elite's support for a policy of strategic cooperation with the
United States. And it swelled the ranks of those inside Russia who support a
reliance on strength in international relations and the intensification of
national weapons-modernization programs. Against the background of events in
Chechnya -- and the West's reaction to them, which is seen as unfair --an
overwhelming majority of the Russian political community sees such a course
of action as the sole effective guarantee against the "Yugoslavia scenario's"
ever being applied to Russia.
The critical attitude of Russian political elites toward specific political
moves by the United States and the West does not signify a rejection of
democratic values. In the final analysis most Russians do not particularly
like the American government, but rather like America. Because of this,
Russian-American relations could proceed on a relatively healthy basis unless
Russia develops into a post-Weimar republic. The United States could hardly
do much to better its image. It is simply too big to be liked. Even Russia,
big and relatively powerful in its part of the world, feels that. The only
advice we can give: do not try to give everyone else advice. Even if it is
wise, it will become grist for yet more anti-American slogans.
*******
#6
Russia Today press summaries
Trud
January 28, 2000
No Apathy
Summary
The analysis of VCIOM (All-Russian Center for Public Opinion Studies) poll
data shows some interesting tendencies. The question "Which politician you
would vote for if the presidential elections were held this Sunday?" has been
asked regularly since August 1999; the last poll took place on January 21-24.
The question "Are questions connected with the upcoming presidential
elections discussed among your household members, neighbors and colleagues;
if so, do you participate in these discussions?" was asked on January 21-24.
As for the second question, 60% of respondents say that they take part in
discussions of political (election) questions; 18% say that these questions
are discussed, but they don't participate; 21% say that the questions are not
discussed.
People who will definitely vote responded as follows (only the percentage of
votes that would be given to Vladimir Putin is shown): in August 2%, in
December 50%, on January 6-10 56%, on January 14-17 62%, and on
January 21-24 58%. The same tendencies are characteristic for all
respondents including those that are not planning to vote. But in this case
the percentage is a little lower for the first time since August 1999 it
has gone from 55 to 49%.
49% of citizens who are ready to support a political leader show a very
serious level of trust. But what can explain the decline of Putin's rating?
The reasons are most probably the complications in Chechnya, the growth of
casualties, and, to some degree, the Duma conflict. The question of whether
Putin is an independent political figure is very important for Russians.
The fact that 60% of respondents are very interested in the presidential
elections and actively discuss this topic at home, at work, with friends and
neighbors shows that there is no political apathy. And this is very good.
*******
#7
RUSSIAN CHIEF BANKER WORRIED ABOUT CAPITAL FLIGHT
Interfax
Moscow, 27th January: Central Bank of Russia Chairman Viktor Gerashchenko
considers the drain of capital abroad to be the worst problem facing the
Russian economy. He argued this in a speech he gave to a conference of heads
of chief departments and Central Bank subsidiaries, which was published in
the `Vestnik Banka Rossii', or the `Bank of Russia Record'.
According to Gerashchenko, the volume of capital moved out of Russia in 1999
was estimated at 1bn dollars a month. Capital flight "remains a very acute
problem", even though, as a result of making currency control measures more
effective, capital leakage through foreign trade channels has significantly
decreased since 1998, he said.
The chairman also reported that the share of nonresidents in the corporate
charter capital of operational Russian credit organizations [increased] by
5.1 per cent over [the first] nine months of last year, from 6.4 per cent by
the start of 1999 to 11.5 per cent by 1st October.
*******
#8
Moscow Times
January 28, 2000
MEDIA WATCH: Russia Wages War of Words
By Robert Coalson
Acting President Vladimir Putin needs two things in order to triumph in
March's presidential elections: a successful military campaign in Chechnya
and widespread applause and acclaim for his resolute leadership during this
crisis. His generals, it would seem, can give him the former, while the media
and the multitude of state organs that hold the media's leash in Russia are
charged with drumming up the latter.
Observers of the media here have been shocked at the intense level of
attention that the "information war" has garnered from Putin during his brief
tenure at the helm. The level of activity on this front clearly demonstrates
that winning this war is as essential to the Russian government as destroying
the resistance in Chechnya itself. What is more, the scorched-earth tactics
that Putin has adopted will almost certainly leave Russian civil society
looking little better than Grozny does.
So far, Putin's most successful gambit in the information war has been to
label any material critical of the Chechen policy or even skeptical of
official accounts of events as the intervention of hostile foreign security
forces bent on undermining Russia's national interests. Xenophobia, sadly,
always plays well in the Russian regions and even those who are not taken in
by such nonsense find themselves bogged down refuting such charges instead of
constructively debating the real issues.
Incidentally, the "foreign secret service" gambit has the convenient
additional benefit of distracting attention from the fact that Putin himself
is the only candidate for the Russian presidency who has acknowledged
receiving a decoration from a foreign security service (the East German
secret police). In any normal democracy, it seems to me, the fact that a
candidate earned such a decoration and refuses to explain how would
automatically disqualify him.
Claims that anything the Russian government doesn't like is bad for Russia
not only have the effect of casting doubt over foreign media reports that
filter into Russia. They also undermine any attempts by Russian journalists
to take an independent line and, most dangerously of all, generally erode the
public's already tattered confidence in the media. Regional politicians of
all political stripes are eagerly waiting to follow Putin's lead and assault
the patriotism of any local media outlet or civic organization that they
happen to dislike.
Kremlin spokesman Sergei Yastrzhembsky told Kommersant last week, "When the
nation mobilizes its forces to achieve some task, that imposes obligations on
everyone, including the media." That Kremlin politicians continue to insist
that journalists are "obliged" to support the state and agitate for whatever
the regime desires is frightening enough. However, the echoes of this
attitude in the even more politically primitive regions will be truly
terrifying.
While Yastrzhembsky, Putin and other officials were impugning the patriotism
of anyone who questions them, the usually reticent FSB was holding a press
conference this week to warn the nation of - surprise, surprise - the
increased activity of foreign spies and their local sympathizers in Russia.
Civic activists of all types - especially environmentalists - are
increasingly under suspicion. The FSB's dogged pursuit of environmentalist
Alexander Nikitin is just the most visible example. Needless to say, those
few journalists out there who have managed to wean themselves from official
sources of information and who have begun covering the work of such civic
groups are also under suspicion.
The pro-Putin Unity party won big in December with the slogan, "Unity Is Our
Strength." The unsubtle implication is that "pluralism is weakness." How can
such an attitude spell anything less than disaster for the media, for civic
society and for open participation in civic life in Russia? The Glasnost
Defense Fund has issued repeated statements over the last three months
warning of the consequences of Putin's "information war" and the onset of
"creeping totalitarianism." The Russian state is waging war against its own
citizens not just in Chechnya but throughout the country.
"Russia has no friends but its army and navy," said Tsar Alexander III more
than a century ago. It would be more accurate to say that Russian politicians
have no friends but the military and the state's extensive security
apparatus. In the absence of a reliable independent media, Russian citizens
have no friends at all.
Robert Coalson is a program director for the National Press Institute. The
views expressed here are not necessarily those of NPI.
*******
#9
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000
From: "andrew miller" <andrewmiller@mail.ru>
Subject: Alexander Nikitin
Topic: Alexander Nikitin
Title: Now You See It
If you visit Moscow and decide to have a peek at Grampa Lenin a-slumbering
Pharoh-like in his marble pyramid in the middle of Red Square, you will
stand in line and even if you read Russian you will not notice the sign.
The line forms about fifty yards from the sign, which stands near the
entrance to the Square, and the sign is never closer than about twenty feet
from the line, so you'd have to step out of line to read it.
Bt you won't do that, because it's just a nondescript paragraph of text in
small black print on a white background, no red or exclamation points or
flashing lights. And it's only in Russian, which after all if you're a
foreign tourist you probably haven't mastered yet.
The line will move slowly. This is because each person entering the Square
when the mausoleum is open must be searched (physically) and scrutinized by
a phalanx of heavily-armed soldiers who have otherwise sealed off entry to
the giant promenade. Blowing up Lenin is frowned upon, you see, even now -
and more troubling, the powers that be still think somebody would want to
bother.
But searching you won't be enough. The sign says that no backpacks or any
other baggage are allowed in the great man's sactum sanctorum even if
they've been searched. Oh, and by the way the sign says, no cameras either.
What if you've got these things? Well then, you've got to give up your
place in line and walk for 15 minutes around the Kremlin until you reach
the Red Square Coat Check Room, where you must wait in another line and
then pay 15 rubles per item (at minimum wage, that's 16 hour's work for a
Russian) to store your belongings whilst you view Mr. Ulyanov with due
respect. Then 15 minutes back. Then back to the back of the line. And so on.
Where you then sit and watch the dejected faces of those who couldn't, or
simply didn't, read the sign and who are then searched fruitfully,
apprehended bearing contraband photographic devices (spies!?) and therefore
turned away. Families are separated! Hapless husbands are left holding
the bag(s) for patriotic spouses! Hopeless demented children wail
plaintively. You know the drill.
Then, you'll see Lenin.
After which, you'll be forced to exit Red Square at its opposite end, and
you'll then have to trek 15 minutes throught he wilds of the GUM mall (if
you're a normal Russian you can't even afford to buy gum in GUM) in order
to be yet again where you started. Then off to claim your belongings, and
so on.
If you're visiting Russia in winter, you'll realize during this time that
Russia is (1) quite pretty when covered with snow (2) quite cold and (3)
quite big. In any case, you'll find yourself asking yourself a question
(nobody else will listen): Do they want me to see Lenin, or not? If so,
why so? If not, why not?
Which brings me to Alexander Nikitin.
He is a former Russian Navy officer who blew a blown whistle on the Navy's
annoying habit of dumping highly dangerous radioactive wastes in the open
ocean, repeatedly and on purpose as a matter of official policy. Everyone
already knew about this, but some people paid more attention after Nikitin
confirmed it.
Namely, Vladimir Putin's KGB, which arrested Nikitin and began persecuting
- that is, prosecuting - him for espionage and treason. The law making
what Nikitin did illegal wasn't "passed" until after he did it (that's what
the U.S. Constitution calls an illegal "ex poste facto" law) and Nikitin
wasn't allowed (for that matter, nobody but the KGB was allowed, including
the trial judge) to read the law, because it was classified secret. That's
what the U.S. Constitution calls "bananna republic."
Human rights activists, predictably, went slightly berzerk as Nikitin was
then unsuccessfully (viewed from the KGB vantage point) tried and re-tried
for the same offense (the "do-over" afforded the KGB by Russian courts is
what the U.S. Constitution calls illegal "double jeopardy").
Finally, on January 5 of this year, Nikitin was acquitted on all counts,
and he is now trying to sue Vladimir Putin's KGB for malicious prosecution.
Human rights activists hailed these developments as wonderful, perhaps
even precedent setting (although in Russia there's no such thing as actual
precedent).
But was it?
Do they really want you to see Lenin?
Riddle. Mystery. Enigma.
I say the score is: Vladimir Putin's KGB, 2; rest of us, goose egg.
I say that Putin never ever intended, or desired, jailing Nikitin - only
nailing him, to a nice big public cross, and lettting him bleed there a
while, screaming his head off if possible (and if some nice helpful foreign
press and human rights activists want to oblige by holding up a megaphone
to his lips, so much the better, icing on the totalitarian cake) until the
broad public and the narrow heroes got the message concerning the lengths
the Vladimir Putin's KGB is prepared to go to in order to make the world
safe for truth, justice and the Russian way. Then take him down, nice and
gentle like, and stitch up his wounds. The incidental benefit would be,
perhaps, that Nikitin himself wouldn't get up to much more mischief, at
least not as long as things were proceeding - which, incidentally, he didn't.
You see, our Mr. Putin is no dummy. There's only so much space even in
neo-Soviet prisons and Putin knows he can't go around jailing every Tom
Dick and Alexander who steals a pack of radioactive chewing gum. What's
more, he's learned a thing or three from that whole nasty
Obi-Wan-Kenobi-kill-me-and-I-become-ten-times-more-powerful-Solzhenitsin-Sak
harov fiasco of the past. Indeed, he holds the buffoons responsible in
more contempt that their victims did, because of how they embarrassed his
country and brought it to its knees. Fool me twice, shame on me! In other
words, Putin got game.
Now it may well be, of course, that the human rights activists well know
that Nikitin was a dead loss for the "cause" and certainly not a victory,
but are spinning it a win in order to give some glimmer of hope to their
disillusioned and frightened troops. But in my humble opinion this is a
cardinal error, because what the Russian needs now is truth, sweet truth,
and plenty of it, heaping helpings. Nothing less will do.
As for Lenin? Well, they're still lining up, aren't they?
Epilogue. On his way from the signing of the U.S. Constitution,
Pennsylvania delegate Benjamin Franklin was stopped by an elderly lady who
grabbed his sleeve and whispered: "What kind of government have you given
us, Mr. Franklin?" He answered: "A republic, my dear woman - if you can
keep it." His trademark twinkle in his eye.
On his way to a meeting a week ago, a wide-eyed young reporter aksed acting
President Putin if he would bring dictatorship to Russia once elected
president for real. He replied that it was premature to discuss his
electoral success and walked away. His trademark twinkle in his eye. I
don't know that anybody's yet asked him about Nikitin. But I'd pay to see it.
Andrew Miller
St. Petersburg
*******
#10
The Guardian (UK)
28 January 2000
[for personal use only]
Swiss investigators order arrest of top Yeltsin aide
Ian Traynor in Moscow and Peter Capella in Geneva
The alleged corruption scandal at the heart of the Kremlin lapped closer to
the former president Boris Yeltsin and his successor, Vladimir Putin,
yesterday when Swiss authorities announced they had issued an international
arrest warrant for Pavel Borodin, the official who managed the Kremlin's vast
property empire until earlier this month.
Mr Borodin is a close colleague of Mr Yeltsin and his influential daughter
Tatyana, as well as being Mr Putin's former boss.
He is suspected of laundering Russian budget funds and oil privatisation
proceeds through Swiss banks. The funds financed prestige projects to
refurbish the Kremlin, contracts that were awarded to a Swiss-based Kosovan
Albanian businessman, Beghjet Pacolli.
For the past year Mr Pacolli, head of the Mabetex firm, based in Lugano,
Switzerland, has been repeatedly linked to allegations that he underwrote
credit cards for the Yeltsin family as part of bribes given to secure the
lavish contracts, said to be worth £305m.
Admitting that bribery was usual business practice in Russia, Mr Pacolli
confirmed last week that he had guaranteed five credit cards for Mr Yeltsin's
wife, Naina, and two daughters, Tatyana Dyachenko and Yelena Okulova, for a
period of two months. His bank, the Banca del Gotardo in Lugano, has also
disclosed that it guaranteed credit cards for the Yeltsin family, also for a
two-month period.
Mr Borodin is a key figure in the alleged scandal. In the first personnel
changes he made as acting president after Mr Yeltsin's resignation on New
Year's Eve, Mr Putin removed Mrs Dyachenko from her post as image adviser to
the president and Mr Borodin from his position as Kremlin property manager.
In 1996-97 Mr Putin had worked as Mr Borodin's deputy in the Kremlin,
managing the Kremlin's vast property assets abroad.
Swiss magistrates said yesterday that the arrest warrant for Mr Borodin was
issued in secret last month. As a former KGB spy and Russian intelligence
chief, Mr Putin may well have known of the Borodin warrant before he removed
him from the Kremlin on January 10.
Immediately after becoming acting president, Mr Putin signed an amnesty for
Mr Yeltsin and his family, guaranteeing his predecessor and mentor immunity
from prosecution.
On Wednesday Mr Borodin was appointed to the senior post of state secretary
of the new union of Russia and Belarus.
Last night Mr Borodin denied all knowledge of the warrants. "I can't
understand what's being talked about when they speak about a warrant for my
arrest," he told the Interfax news agency.
"Not once in my life have I seen an employee from the Swiss prosecutor's
office, and I haven't received any documents whatsoever from this agency."
He claimed that the reports of an international arrest warrant were part of a
conspiracy. "The roots of this provocation are to be found in Russia," he
said - although the news of the warrant was leaked to a Swiss weekly magazine
by the investigating magistrate in Geneva, Daniel Devaud.
The "provocation", Mr Borodin added, was aimed at undermining the
Russia-Belarus union sealed on Wednesday. Last year the Kremlin repeatedly
said the Mabetex scandal was aimed at discrediting Mr Yeltsin.
Swiss prosecutors have been investigating the case for the past year after
being asked for help by Russia's prosecutor general, Yuri Skuratov. Millions
of dollars in assets have been frozen in Switzerland as a result, including
bank accounts in Mr Borodin's name, though he denies having any Swiss bank
accounts.
Mr Skuratov fell foul of the Yeltsin coterie and was dismissed by the Russian
president last year. But he has since gained parliamentary support for
reinstatement and seen the Moscow courts rule in his favour.
He was shown on state television last year cavorting in bed with prostitutes,
a video widely assumed to have been filmed and distributed by the KGB's
successor, the FSB, which was then headed by Mr Putin.
Mr Putin expects to be elected president in March and Mr Skuratov,
proclaiming an "anti-corruption crusade", is running against him.
"Putin is trying to cover the former president of Russia and the closest
members of his entourage," Mr Skuratov ssaid, declaring the Yeltsin immunity
deal illegal.
"A warrant for the arrest of Borodin suggests that the Swiss investigators
have found signs of criminal action in Borodin's doings, involving punishment
for money laundering through the Swiss banking system," he said.
Mabetex carried out a series of lucrative building projects in Russia
throughout the 1990s, starting in Yakutsk at the beginning of the decade,
when Mr Borodin was the town's mayor.
Mr Borodin, 53, who last month failed in his attempt to become mayor of
Moscow, was trained as an agricultural engineer.
He made his early career in the Siberian towns of Tuva and Yakutsk, serving
as mayor of Yakutsk in 1991-93. It was here that Mr Pacolli obtained the
first of many lucrative building contracts in Russia. It was also in Yakutsk
that in 1990 Mr Borodin first got to know Mr Yeltsin.
Mr Borodin joined Mr Yeltsin's staff in the Kremlin at the beginning of 1993
and by the end of the year had risen to become the Kremlin's property
manager, overseeing billions of pounds worth of property at home and abroad.
*******
#11
Kremlin, Mabetex Affair Examined
Obshchaya Gazeta
January 20, 2000
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
Article by Yelena Skvortsova: "A Common Arrangement"
One of the main characters in
the Kremlin renovation scandal has stayed in the shadows for a long time.
The famous names that have been cited in the notorious
"Mabetex affair" have obscured an important
question: What was the exact source of the money for the
Kremlin renovation project? There is no separate expenditure
item in the budget in connection with this, after all.
Obshchaya Gazeta began its own investigation last spring.
That is when Carla Del Ponte's people in Switzerland were seizing the
records of Mabetex and other companies. What were the names
of these "other companies"?
When we called the Swiss Attorney General's Office, we
were told that the information the investigators had gathered was still
confidential. We then asked our colleagues at Le Temps for
help. They learned that records had also been seized in the
offices of AO MES, the International Economic Cooperation Joint-Stock
Company. According to those journalists, that firm had
special oil export permits for the Kremlin renovation, and Mabetex built
a set of luxurious offices for the firm....The money for the
construction, however, was supposedly never paid.
Oddly enough, no one in Moscow knows anything about AO
MES. Only Petr Yanchev, one of the people involved in the
Balkar Trading debacle and an "accomplice" of acting Prosecutor
General Ilyushenko, remembered that this company was among the top 10 in
the oil market in the middle of the 1990s.
[Boxed item: The AO MES was founded in
1990 by Feniks, a limited liability partnership (60 percent), the
administrative offices of the Moscow Patriarchy (20 percent), and the
Slobodskoy Livestock Breeding Plant, a closed joint-stock company in the
Moscow suburbs (20 percent). Company President Vitaliy
Kirillov, a candidate of technical sciences, was on the faculty of the
Moscow Agricultural Institute until 1988.]
There is no question that the list of founders sounds
peculiar, but there is nothing criminal about this: There are
no laws prohibiting the Patriarchy's alliance with a livestock breeding
sovkhoz and a cooperative. We decided to check all of the
separate links of the joint-stock company in the hope of finding a
connection between the mysterious firm and the occupants of the
Kremlin. We began at the sovkhoz, asking the people there
what kind of benefits they were deriving from their participation in the
AO MES. After numerous conversations, they gave us a number
to call for further information. It turned out to be the
telephone number...of the receptionist in the offices of Mr. Chistyakov,
the chairman of the AO MES board. These talks were also
fruitless. Dmitriy Yuryevich was always busy and had no time
to discuss the company....
Why would the executive of a solid and respectable
firm go to so much trouble to avoiding answering some simple questions?
It is a solid firm. We looked into reports
for previous years and learned that the AO MES has been a special
exporter of strategic resources (crude oil, petroleum products, and
nonferrous and ferrous metals) since 1993. The volume of its
oil operations increased from 200,000 tonnes to 10 million tonnes a year
in 1992-1994. Kirillov acknowledges that the AO MES exported
8.5 percent of all Russian oil and petroleum products in 1995, and the
company's annual turnover was equivalent to a billion dollars.
We did not learn the answer to this question,
however: Who helped the former VUZ [higher academic
institution] instructor get into the oil market, which has always been
closed to "outsiders"?
Here are the high points of the AO MES history in
1992-1997:
--The AO MES delivered the first half-million tonnes
of oil to Cuba as part of the intergovernmental "Oil for Sugar"
agreement.
--The AO MES was instructed to handle the debts of
developing countries (China, Turkey, Indonesia, Pakistan, Vietnam...).
--Represented by the Hungaro-MES firm, the AO MES
attempted to acquire the controlling interest in Hungarian agroindustrial
enterprises. Kirillov even had a meeting with the republic
president.
--In 1994 the AO MES was one of the founders of the
Russian Union of Oil Exporters (RF Minister of Foreign Economic Relations
Oleg Davydov, who was later suspected of corruption by the Procuracy
General, was the guiding light behind the creation of the union and its
first president).
--In 1995 the AO MES, which had been one of the minor
cofounders of the faltering Russian Bank for Reconstruction and
Development (RBRR), became its owner. A year later the RBRR
became the authorized bank of the State Customs Committee.
--In 1995 Chernomyrdin signed a directive granting the
MES 2 million tonnes of oil "for the Kremlin renovation
project," and in 1996 the quota was raised to 4.5 million tonnes
(more than $700 million).
In March 1999 Pavel Borodin said that part of the
proceeds from the sale of oil had been lost. "Mr.
Kirillov owes the Administration of Presidential Affairs $40
million. The money is in Switzerland," he told foreign
journalists, and added that he had turned the matter over to the courts.
Borodin never said a single word in Russia about the
mysterious firm, however. Does this mean that Kirillov has
some strong backers? Two names are usually mentioned in this
context: Oleg Davydov, the former Minister of Foreign
Economic Relations, and Viktor Chernomyrdin. Western
journalists refer to the AO MES President as a close friend of
both. Actually, Kirillov never tried to conceal his
friendship with Davydov, but his ties to Chernomyrdin are not as
clear. The lavish privileges and multimillion-dollar quotas
are not the only indirect evidence of their friendship.
Vice-President Valeriy Ageyev of the AO MES let this information slip in
one interview: Viktor Stepanovich once tried to help Vitaliy
Vladimirovich buy 48.9 percent of the stock in the second largest bank in
Italy, Banco di Roma. The matter was discussed at a special
meeting of the Italian Parliament because Italian law prohibits the
acquisition of more than 15 percent of the stock by
foreigners. The transaction never took place, even though
Kirillov requested an appointment with the Italian Prime Minister.
What is the connection between all of this and the
Mabetex affair? We addressed this question to the Procuracy
General last summer--to Georgiy Chuglazov, who was then in charge of the
investigation of the Swiss firm. Georgiy Timofeyevich looked
shocked and assured us that there was no mention of the AO MES or of its
President Vitaliy Kirillov in the case files.
Meanwhile, we received a response from Switzerland,
where the Le Temps journalists were looking into the connection between
the AO MES and Mabetex at our request. In 1995 the Moscow
company had opened the offices of the "Russian Cultural Fund"
in the most expensive neighborhood in Geneva. Law enforcement
agencies in Geneva had been keeping an eye on this organization since
March 1998 and had even frozen the fund's bank accounts--200 million
French francs. Investigators in Geneva apparently had reason
to believe that the money had been laundered with the help of Swiss
middlemen.
The report that investigators in Russia had their eye
on the AO MES was confirmed when Yuriy Skuratov made this statement to
reporters from France's Le Monde:
"The government did not have enough money for the
Kremlin renovation project. It decided to grant oil quotas to
the AO MES for sales abroad and then use the proceeds to pay the firms
doing the renovations. This arrangement, which is common in
Russia, creates opportunities for profiteering. Bahgjet
Pacolli insists that the Russian side still owes him money.
If so, then where did the 'oil money' go? We know that two
firms were doing the renovations--Mabetex (headed by Pacolli) and Mercata
Trading and Engineering (founded by former Mabetex staffer and adviser to
Chernomyrdin Viktor Stolpov). Andrey Siletskiy, Pavel
Borodin's son-in-law, is another Mercata executive. The funds
were transferred from Russia through the AO MES, headed by Vitaliy
Kirillov, a close friend of Chernomyrdin." Skuratov
believes that the Mabetex scandal revealed several illegal channels for
the export of oil, which enabled some Russian leaders to amass large
fortunes abroad. The frozen Swiss accounts of the
"Russian Cultural Fund," according to Western journalists, are
another link of the Mabetex chain. This scandal probably will
affect several Russian politicians in the future.
******
#12
St. Petersburg Times
January 28, 2000
Journalist in Hiding From Psychiatric Test
By Simon Saradzhyan
STAFF WRITER
MOSCOW - When gun-toting police showed up at investigative reporter Alexander
Khinshtein's apartment last week with an order to take him to a psychiatric
clinic for testing, he got out of it by producing a doctor's note saying he
was too sick to go.
Since then, Khinshtein has gone into hiding, and the bizarre case - which
hearkens back to Soviet days when dissidents were silenced by being sent to
the loony bin - has alarmed his fellow journalists and even drawn the
attention of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or OSCE.
His lawyer and colleagues at Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper say the case was
fabricated to intimidate Khinshtein, who has exposed alleged misdeeds by
Kremlin power broker Boris Berezovsky and accused Interior Minister Vladimir
Rushailo of protecting Berezovsky.
More than 100 of his colleagues and supporters plan to picket the Interior
Ministry's headquarters on Ulitsa Zhitnaya on Friday in protest, said MK's
political news editor, Yekaterina Deyeva.
The Interior Ministry said it is pursuing the case against Khinshtein. "He
will undergo the psychiatric test" sooner or later, said Vladimir Martynov,
spokesman for the Interior Ministry's investigative committee.
Khinshtein, 25, hid a record of psychiatric disorders to "illegally" obtain a
driver's license in 1997 and has already been charged with the "use of an
illegally obtained document," Martynov said.
If tried in court and convicted, Khinshtein could be sentenced to six months
in jail or up to two years of correctional labor. A comprehensive test at the
psychiatric clinic will help to determine whether Khinshtein was mentally
sound enough to have been given a driver's license and whether he is fit
enough to be tried in court, Martynov said.
As Khinshtein has gone into hiding, he could not be reached for comment.
His mother, Inna Regerer, accused investigators of trying to punish her son
for his unfavorable coverage of their boss and his attempts to expose
corruption.
"This is a fabricated case ... which resembles Stalinist-era repression,"
Regerer said in a telephone interview this week.
In addition to his reports in MK, Khinshtein hosts an investigative program,
"Secret Materials," on TV Tsentr. The popular daily and television channel
are allied with Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov, a bitter Berezovsky foe.
In his MK and TV Tsentr exposés Khinshtein has blasted the Interior Ministry
for failing to crack down on Berezovsky, who he claims has maintained close
ties with Chechen separatists. Khinshtein ran excerpts from Berezovsky's
alleged telephone negotiations with Chechnya's propaganda guru Movladi Udugov
and other Chechen separatists suggesting that Berezovsky was to have
transferred hundreds of thousands of dollars to these men who are wanted by
Russia's security service for terrorism.
Khinshtein also alleged that Berezovsky had a private security company tap
conversations of former president Boris Yeltsin's retinue. These tapes were
confiscated in a police raid, but Rushailo hushed up the whole case,
Khinshtein wrote in one of his MK stories last year.
Martynov said the Interior Ministry is not trying to intimidate Khinshtein
into ending his exposés, but "it doesn't mean we should not determine whether
he got his driver's license illegally."
The license was found on Khinshtein when he was stopped by traffic police
after running a red light in May. Khinshtein produced several documents,
including the identification card of Moscow police Major Alexander Matveyev
with Khinshtein's photo. He was briefly detained.
It later turned out that Khinshtein received the ID from the Moscow branch of
the State Customs Committee, supposedly so he could work as an agent for them.
The case was not dropped, however, and was transferred from the Moscow police
to the Interior Ministry's investigative committee. Khinshtein has accused
Rushailo of ordering the fabrication of a case against him.
Last week, investigator Vladimir Gordienko personally tried to take
Khinshtein to a clinic in Vladimir and showed up at his apartment Jan. 17
flanked by Kalashnikov-toting police officers. Khinshtein, according to his
mother, produced a doctor's note that said he had a sore throat and could not
be taken anywhere.
Khinshtein's lawyer Andrei Muratov said Khinshtein will agree only to an
interrogation at the Interior Ministry, with his lawyer present.
The OSCE's representative on press freedom, Freimut Duve, sent a letter
Monday to Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov to protest attempts to prosecute
Khinshtein.
According to an OSCE statement, Duve said he "found it extremely difficult to
believe ... Mr. Khinshtein needed a psychiatric examination because of ... a
driver's license offense ... especially in light of the many threats that Mr.
Khinshtein had received regarding his anti-corruption stories."
"Khinshtein should be allowed to work without hindrance," the letter said.
Russia's respected PEN center also issued a statement saying Khinshtein "has
the right to express his opinion freely" and noted that attempts to take him
to a clinic could be a "comeback of punishing psychiatry."
Oleg Panfilov of the Glasnost Defense Foundation, Russia's chief watchdog of
media freedom, said Khinshtein's case "has nothing to do with journalism."
Khinshtein, he said, has fallen victim to the "eternal" battle between the
Interior Ministry and Federal Security Service, or FSB.
Panfilov said the tapes of Berezovsky's phone conversations were most likely
supplied by the FSB, and the Interior Ministry is simply trying to punish the
reporter since Berezovsky is closely allied with Rushailo.
*******
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