March 11, 2000    
This Date's Issues: 4160 4161

Johnson's Russia List
#4161
11 March 2000
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
1. Reuters: Russians mourn death of investigative journalist.
2. Mark Katkov (CBS NEWS producer) on Artyom Borovik.
3. Moskovsky Komsomolets: The Candidates’ Reverse Side. YAVLINSKY KNOWS THREE LANGUAGES AND PODBEREZKIN HAS THREE CHILDREN.
4. Itar-Tass: Gorbachev-Led Social Democrats Hold Founding Congress.
5. Carnegie 3rd audio webcast announcement.
6. Reuters: Blair 'enjoys dialogue' with Russia's Putin.
7. Nezavisimaya Gazeta: Everything Will Be Transferred To St. Petersburg? PLANS FOR VALENTINA MATVIYENKO ARE BEING DESIGNED IN PUTIN'S CENTER OF STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT.
8. Los Angeles Times: Maura Reynolds, In Grozny, a Perilous Patrol for Commandos. A reporter gets a close-up look at Russia's elite police as they 'mop up' among ruins in the Chechen capital. 
9. RFE/RL: Michael Lelyveld, Chechnya: War May Have Long-Lasting Impact On U.S.-Russian Ties.
10. Peter Ekman: re: van de Coevering-education and corruption.
11. Albert Weeks: Russian General Staff journal partially OK's missile defense.]

******

#1
Russians mourn death of investigative journalist

MOSCOW, March 11 (Reuters) - Hundreds of Russians gathered at a Moscow 
cemetery on Saturday to pay their last respects to a well-known investigative 
journalist killed along with eight other people in a plane crash earlier this 
week. 

Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, former Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov and liberal 
leader Grigory Yavlinsky joined Muscovites to mourn the death of Artyom 
Borovik, head of media group Sovershenno Sekretno (Top Secret). 

Borovik's holding company owned mainly investigative newspapers. He was 
killed along with an oil company executive when the plane bound for Ukraine's 
capital Kiev crashed during take-off on Thursday. 

A show called ``Sovershenno Sekretno'' was dropped from state-owned RTR 
television in June 1999 and Borovik said the decision was linked to coming 
elections. A government official said the programme was axed because it dealt 
with ``kompromat'' -- comprising material used to smear politicians. 

``Artyom Borovik, a famous journalist across the country, had a calling, his 
own projects and his dreams, his favourite work. Readers impatiently waited 
for his publication,'' Acting President Vladimir Putin, in Russia's second 
city of St Petersburg for talks with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, said 
in a telegram. 

Luzhkov said Borovik ``fought for truth'' in his work. 

His investigative work has prompted some commentators to suggest that the 
crash was not accidental. Attempts on the lives of businessmen are common in 
Russia, where organised crime has infected virtually all areas of the 
economy. 

Officials have ruled out foul play but said an investigation would reveal 
what caused the Yak-40 short-range passenger jet to tilt to one side while 
picking up speed along the runway. Its wing then scraped the ground, causing 
it to twist round 180 degrees and break apart. 

A pilot interviewed on private NTV television said he believed the wing had 
been tampered with because he had survived a similar accident in 1968 that 
had been caused by foul play. 

******

#2
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000
From: Jonathan Sanders <room101@interport.net> 
Subject: Borovik by Mark Katkov CBS NEWS Producer

Borovik/from cbsnews web site/by Mark Katkov CBS NEWS Producer
By Mark Katkov

I had not expected that one of my first duties upon returning to Moscow 
after an absence of four years would be to attend a funeral. But Russia 
has a way of confounding expectations, and tomorrow I will join thousands 
of others paying their respects to Artyom Borovik, who died this week in a 
plane crash at the age of 37.

In the Gorbachev years when the Soviet Union was spinning apart, Artyom was 
one of a handful of young newsmen and women remaking Russian journalism. 
He was the son of a famous Soviet journalist, but unlike so many of 
Moscow*s *golden youth* -- as the children of privilege were called -- he 
used his position to push the boundaries, first by reporting from the front 
in the Afghan war. He wrote about Soviet GIs, only a few years younger 
than he, in a gritty, clear and profoundly moving way that was a revelation 
in a country accustomed to gray propaganda.

Artyom moved on to television, co-hosting the country*s first real 
experiment in alternative journalism. The weekly program was called 
Vzglyad, one of those wonderful Russian words which has no equivalent in 
English but encompasses the meaning of *look, glance, gaze, stare, view, 
opinion.*

In the American kaleidoscope of 100 cable channels it*s difficult to 
appreciate the impact of Vzglyad, which was carried by state television and 
watched by perhaps 90 percent of the country. Imagine a Super Bowl 
audience times two, weekly, and the subject is politics. As Artyom and his 
colleagues debated perestroika, interviewed government officials on live 
television, exposed scandals, they literally heaved Soviet journalism into 
a new era. And the country was riveted.

CBS News and Artyom got together during the coup in August 1991, when he 
telephoned Dan Rather from inside the besieged Russian White House with 
live, almost hour-by-hour reports. (Artyom came to speak idiomatic 
American English when living in the United States with his father, who was 
a Soviet correspondent.) It was a boffo combination: an English-speaking, 
telegenic Russian journalist who was his own man, prepared to explain his 
tortured country to the West.

60 Minutes grabbed him next, and Artyom did a series of reports as a 
special correspondent: inside the KGB; nuclear missile launch facilities; a 
secret lab devoted to studying the physiognomy of the preserved brains of 
the communist pantheon. That story won him and his producer, George Crile, 
an Overseas Press Club award.

Artyom and I were thrown together in December 1991. Several days before 
his resignation Mikhail Gorbachev chose to grant his last interview as 
leader of the Soviet Union to Artyom and CBS News. It was a wholly surreal 
experience. We were led to his offices along dim corridors once home to 
Lenin and Stalin, the building deserted except for security and one or two 
aides. I told Artyom it reminded me of Nixon*s last days in the White 
House, a comparison he used to describe the scene for Russian television.

Gorbachev was self-possessed and gracious * even though at the very hour we 
were meeting with him, the leaders of the Soviet republics were gathering 

in Alma-Ata to dissolve the Soviet Union, effectively removing him from 
power. Artyom asked questions first in English (for American television), 
then in Russian (for Gorbachev). He was a little nervous * as were we all 
* and I liked him for that. Celebrity had not destroyed his sense of 
wonder.

I sat in my apartment last night watching the tributes to Artyom on Russian 
television, and occasionally watching myself, as excerpts of the Gorbachev 
interview were replayed. So much has changed since then, not least Russian 
television itself. The coverage of the crash has been impressive in every 
way: interviews with investigators seeking the cause; with officials of the 
charter company that owned the plane; with the plane*s manufacturer; with 
Artyom*s family and colleagues; live reports from the scene. Ten years ago 
the report would have been a short report, likely read by the anchor, with 
little elaboration. But it is a different world, and Artyom was 
responsible for so much of it.

In the last few years Artyom continued to expose scandal and corruption 
with his TV program and eponymous newspaper, Top Secret, and as Russia is 
given to viewing the world darkly, many speculate the crash was not an 
accident, though there is as yet no evidence that that is the case. I 
prefer to think it was an accident, if only because it is too painful to 
believe that this champion of a reborn Russia would be one of its victims.

He will be buried in Moscow*s Novodievichy Cemetery, where Gogol, Khruschev 
and other historical figures lie. Artyom probably would have been a little 
abashed about it, this TV star who spoke American slang with the best of 
them, at home in both his world and ours, but in the end, a son of Russia.

******

#3
Russia Today press summaries
Moskovsky Komsomolets
10 March 2000
The Candidates’ Reverse Side
YAVLINSKY KNOWS THREE LANGUAGES AND PODBEREZKIN HAS THREE CHILDREN
Summary

After Moskovsky Komsomolets published the presidential candidates’ ratings 
according to their income and property declarations, the readers asked for 
another kind of rating – according to the candidates’ “human side” – their 
age, education, etc. So here goes nothing:

The ages. Govorukhin is the oldest at 63 years old; Zyuganov is 56, Tuleev is 
55, Titov is 54, Zhirinovsky is 53, Savostyanov is 48, Yavlinsky, Skuratov, 
Podberezkin and Putin are all the same age – 47, Pamfilova is 46 and 
Jabrailov is 41 years old. This makes the average age of the presidential 
candidates 51. As for their roots, three of the candidates – Titov, 
Savostyanov and Podberezkin – were born and raised in Moscow; Putin is from 
St. Petersburg, Jabrailov is from Grozny, Skuratov is from Buryatia, 
Govorukhin is from the Perm region and Zyuganov is from the Orel region. The 
others were born in different republics of the former USSR – Zhirinovsky in 
Kazakhstan, Tuleev in Turkmenistan, Yavlinsky in Ukraine and Pamfilova in 
Uzbekistan.

Education. All of the candidates have higher education. The most “titled” is 
Skuratov. In 1987, he became the youngest professor and Doctor of Law in the 
USSR. Alexey Podberezkin has a doctorate in history, specializing in U.S. 
military politics. Zyuganov is a Doctor of Philosophy, as well as 
Zhirinovsky, who became a Doctor in 1998. Putin and Yavlinsky are Candidates 
of Economics, and Savostyanov is a Candidate of Technical Sciences. Pamfilova 
is an electronic engineer; Titov and Tuleev are transport engineers. 
Govorukhin graduated from the faculty of geology and later entered the 
Institute of Cinematography to become a movie director. Umar Jabrailov is a 
specialist in international economic relations.

Despite all the higher education, not many candidates know foreign languages. 
The leaders here are Zhirinovsky and Yavlinsky. Zhirinovsky knows English, 
French, German and Turkish. Yavlinsky knows three languages, including 
English. Podberezkin also knows English, while Govorukhin prefers French and 
German. Putin worked in Germany for more than 5 years and knows German very 
well. It is said that he is also good in English. The other seven candidates 
either don’t know any foreign languages or just don’t say anything about it. 
Although Jabrailov probably knows Chechen.

Children. All of the candidates have children. The leader is Alexey 
Podberezkin – he has three daughters. Skuratov has a son and a daughter, like 
Zyuganov. Putin has two daughters, as does Jabrailov. Savostyanov and 
Yavlinsky each have two sons. Titov has only one son, as do Zhirinovsky, 
Tuleev and Govorukhin. Pamfilova has one daughter. And, according to official 
documents, Pamfilova and Jabrailov are single parents.

******

#4
Gorbachev-Led Social Democrats Hold Founding Congress.

MOSCOW, March 11 (Itar-Tass) - A founding congress of the Russian United 
Social Democratic Party works outside Moscow on Saturday. 

It is attended by about 200 delegates from 70 regions of Russia. Former 
Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev said in his address to the congress that 
interest to social democratic ideas had significantly increased recently. 

He said almost all of candidates running in the upcoming presidential 
elections appeal to social democratic concepts in their campaigns and this 
indicates that the hour for unification of social democratic forces is right. 

Gorbachev called for cooperation of "all decent people of Russia, all healthy 
forces of society which do not accept the slogans of political revanche, 
return to past ways, reject the course, the basis of which is a stake on 
liberal fundamentalism". 

He said Russia's Social Democrats stand for a new reform policy that would be 
in interests of all people and not only of the bureaucracy and capitalised 
groups. 

Russia needs a breakthrough into the post-industrial society and only social 
democratic ideas can become Russia's ideology in the 21st century, Gorvbachev 
said. 

He said he opposed foisting ideas of dictatorship on society. Gorbachev said 
appointment rather than election of Russia's regional governors would mean a 
further slideback from democracy. He said "the president should be a head of 
state and not a head of executive power". 

The congress was expected to make a decision on whom of presidential 
candidates to support, but Gorbachev said the Social Democrats should wait 
for candidates' publishing their porgrammes. 

Meanwhile, it is certain that "we are against attempts to wreck the turnout 
at the elections", as botched voting could "push Russia out of the boundaries 
of the constitutional field". The congress is to pass a policy statement, 
adopt a charter and elect the party leadership. 

An Itar-Tass correspondent asked Gorbachev at a news conference to comment on 
acting President Vladimir Putin's statement in his recent interview that 
direct presidential rule could be appropriate for Chechnya. 

"The introduction of a state of emergency is more adequate to the present 
situation" in Chechnya, Gorbachev said. 

He said the state of emergency would be within a constitutional norm relying 
on constitutional structures. 

The state of emergency is needed in Chechnya, otherwise rebels will 
sporadically wreck the normalisation process, Gorbachev said. 

"I am for making an accent on the political process," he added. 

*******

#5
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 
From: Liz Reisch <lreisch@ceip.org>
Subject: Carnegie 3rd audio webcast announcement

The third in the Carnegie Endowment's series of of audio webcasts,
"Prospects for a Putin Presidency," is now available. In this week's
program, Carnegie Senior Associate Michael McFaul and Alan Rousso,
Director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, discuss the policies that
Vladimir Putin may pursue after Russia's March 26th presidential
election.

"Campaign 2000: The Russian Elections" can be heard by visiting the
website of the Russian and Eurasian Program
(http://www.ceip.org/ruseuras).

******

#6
Blair 'enjoys dialogue' with Russia's Putin
By Dominic Evans

ST PETERSBURG, Russia, March 11 (Reuters) - Russian Acting President Vladimir 
Putin yielded little ground over his military campaign in Chechnya on 
Saturday but won a display of bonhomie from visiting British Prime Minister 
Tony Blair. 

``I'd like to say how much I enjoyed the dialogue, which was a very good omen 
for the future,'' Blair told reporters, a statement that appeared to accept 
as a foregone conclusion Putin's victory in a presidential election in two 
weeks. 

Blair became the first Western leader to meet Putin since the former KGB spy 
took office in the Kremlin at the New Year, holding talks at the baroque 
seaside Petrodvorets palace outside Russia's imperial capital St Petersburg. 

The West says Russia is using disproportionate force and killing civilians in 
its five-month-old campaign against Chechen separatists. But Western leaders 
have been careful to temper their criticism to avoid alienating the new 
Russian leader. 

``I explained the concerns of Great Britain and other parts of the 
international community that any response be proportionate and that 
allegations of human rights violations be properly investigated,'' Blair 
said. 

Putin, who has easily sidestepped such criticism in the past, said he would 
take steps to increase access to the war zone for international 
organisations, but gave no ground on the issue of holding peace talks with 
Chechen rebels. 

He also stressed Russia's continuing differences with the West over Kosovo. 
Russia strongly opposed NATO's air strikes on Yugoslavia last year. Although 
Russian troops now patrol Kosovo alongside those of the Western alliance, 
Moscow says the West has failed to guarantee the rights of Serbs in the 
province. 

``Democracy and human rights that we speak of should be extended to this part 
of the world as well,'' Putin said. 

BONHOMIE DROWNS OUT DIFFERENCES 

But the policy differences were drowned out by a general atmosphere of 
camaraderie, as a smiling Blair and his wife Cherie were escorted through the 
city by Mr and Mrs Putin. 

The Blairs were later to tour the Hermitage Museum and attend the premiere of 
a new production of the opera ``War and Peace'' before returning to Britain 
on Saturday evening. 

Putin, 47, said the two leaders were both lawyers and both of the same 
generation, which made Blair a fine partner. 

The care taken by Western governments not to offend the new Russian leader -- 
led by the Clinton administration in the United States -- has drawn criticism 
from international human rights groups, U.S. Republicans and some Russian 
liberals. 

Putin has built his popularity on a wave of militarist rhetoric and 
uncompromising conduct of the Chechnya war. Some in Russia say they fear a 
return to authoritarianism. 

About 100 demonstrators gathered near St Petersburg's Kazansky cathedral on 
Saturday to protest against Blair's visit. One orator shouted: ``Putin is a 
dictator!'' 

Before his departure for Russia, Blair defended his trip, saying it was vital 
to maintain dialogue with Russia. 

``I believe we and the European Union should never forget that a closer 
partnership between the European Union and Russia is in the interest of all 
our people and in the interests of the continent we share,'' he said. 

``The way to conduct ethical foreign policy in these circumstances is to 
complain about abuses that occur and make sure action is taken,'' he told BBC 
television. ``But it is still right that Britain has a strong relationship 
with Russia.'' 

******

#7
Russia Today press summaries
Nezavisimaya Gazeta
10 March 2000
Everything Will Be Transferred To St. Petersburg?
PLANS FOR VALENTINA MATVIYENKO ARE BEING DESIGNED IN PUTIN'S CENTER OF 
STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT
Summary

St. Petersburg is more and more acquiring the status of the private political 
capital of Russia.

It was in St. Petersburg where Vladimir Putin announced his plans to fight 
for the presidency of Russia. And Deputy Prime Minister Valentina Matviyenko 
will announce her plans to run for Petersburg governor there today.

After Matviyenko gives her consent to stand in St. Petersburg, the tradition 
of the election without any alternative will be broadened. Matviyenko has the 
title of "the Kremlin's candidate", which makes her practically invincible.

Some media reported that Valentina Matviyenko proposed a plan of action to 
Vladimir Putin, according to which some state structures currently located in 
Moscow would be transferred to St. Petersburg. They want to start with the 
transfer of the Russia-Belarus Union executive bodies. This plan has a good 
chance of being adopted because it doesn’t seriously affect the interests of 
any politician, like Moscow Mayor Luzhkov or Belarussian President 
Lukashenko. On the other hand, it will enable Matviyenko to demonstrate that 
she is willing to return to St. Petersburg its capital status and has great 
opportunities to provide realization of her will.

******

#8
Los Angeles Times
11 March 2000
[for personal use only]
In Grozny, a Perilous Patrol for Commandos 
A reporter gets a close-up look at Russia's elite police as they 'mop up' 
among ruins in the Chechen capital. 
By MAURA REYNOLDS, Times Staff Writer

GROZNY, Russia--The day we arrive is the day the boys have decided to 
shave. 
The atmosphere is festive. At the end of a chilly hallway, the 
designated barber strokes a whirring shaver up the back of a comrade's head. 
Curls of blond and brown hair drift along the floor. Men in camouflage amble 
by, carrying automatic weapons and damp towels, rubbing rediscovered chins. 
For these troops--a detachment of Russia's most elite and most feared 
police commandos, the OMON--the shaving of heads and faces is an important 
ritual. Soon after starting a tour of duty, they stop shaving. When it nears 
the end, they shed their hair. 
The 30 men in the squad left their home city of Pskov, near the border 
with Estonia, in mid-December--just before Russia launched a blistering 
assault on Grozny, capital of the separatist republic of Chechnya. They took 
part in the battle, which ended just a week before our arrival and barely 
left a wall standing, let alone a house. They have spent the past four days 
turning a damaged two-story building into a temporary barracks. Today they 
built a banya, or bathhouse, and are giddy at the prospect of being clean and 
cleanshaven. 
Besides, they have visitors. There are three of us: me, photographer 
Yuri Kozyrev and my colleague from The Times' Moscow Bureau, Alexei V. 
Kuznetsov. We have been in Grozny for three days but have been told to vacate 
our bunks in the city's new field hospital to make room for incoming doctors. 
Yuri has become friendly with commanders of the Pskov regiment, and they have 
invited us to move in. The troops are desperate for company. We are desperate 
for a safe place to sleep. 
The OMON is a secretive paramilitary force with a reputation for 
brutality. Its units are among the troops accused of executing civilians and 
committing other atrocities as Russia has battled slowly and bloodily to 
reclaim this breakaway republic. OMON officers from other detachments have 
told us of beating Chechen men and raping Chechen women. The OMON are among 
the last people most Russians would approach for lodging. 
But the Pskov regiment has a reputation for moderation. And we are eager 
to observe the OMON's "mopping up" operations, which are when many abuses 
allegedly occur. We want to know what they do in these operations and, maybe 
more important, how they think. 
Our understanding with our OMON hosts is simple: They will safeguard us 
and let us observe how they live and work. In return, we will use only their 
first names. 
"This is a hard time for us," the commander, Edik, explains as I set up 
my laptop in the officers' quarters where I will bunk. "We were supposed to 
be going home now but were told a few days ago that they've extended our tour 
for another few weeks." 
Without the frenzy of battle, the men are feeling fatigue. The war is 
growing tedious, though no less dangerous. There are still snipers in the 
area, along with mines and other explosives. The more weary they grow, the 
more likely deadly mistakes might occur. To keep their guard up, they need to 
keep their spirits up. So they have gone through the shaving ritual despite 
the extension. 
Edik is lying on his cot holding a photograph. "My daughter," he says. 
"She's seven." He pauses. "It is a good thing you're here. It will mean a lot 
to the boys." 
The detachment's deputy commander, Dima, takes charge of my welfare and 
brings me supper: buckwheat boiled with tinned beef, pickles and raw garlic. 
The Omonovtsy, as OMON troops are called, eat garlic in prodigious quantities 
to ward off illness. 
It takes a long time for all the men to shave, bathe and be shorn. Those 
who have finished gather in the main bunk room with a guitar and bottles of 
grain alcohol. 
"I prefer it," Sasha, a baby-faced 24-year-old who joined the force just 
a month before leaving for Chechnya, says of the grain alcohol. "By now, 
vodka tastes like water to me." 
Most of the men take a turn with the guitar. They loll on the metal 
cots, arms draped over each other, shorn heads shining. Many wear the striped 
undershirts favored in the military, and for the moment they look more like 
prison inmates than soldiers. 
We are introduced to another ritual--the third toast, which is always 
silent, in honor of OMON comrades who have fallen in the line of duty. 
The men pull themselves onto their feet without saying a word. There is 
no clinking of glasses. After a pause, they down the liquor. The only sound 
is the exhalation of two dozen men as raw alcohol seizes the throat and plows 
into the stomach. 
Edik tells me this is the 11th time the Pskov regiment has sent a 
detachment to fight in two Chechen wars, and the first during the current 
conflict. 
"In 11 tours, we've never lost a man," he says. "We've had some serious 
injuries but not a single death." 
The next morning, Dima has guard duty. Over a green track suit he pulls 
on baggy camouflage pants. He secures them with a heavy belt that includes a 
sheath for his knife, a wicked-looking 8-inch blade. He pulls on a gray knit 
sweater, padded jacket, camouflage shirt and puffy vest bristling with 
grenades, ammunition cartridges and flares. Finally, he takes out a slick 
black head scarf, places the long side across his forehead, and ties the ends 
tightly at the back of his head. 
The effect is fearsome. The head scarf emphasizes his cheekbones, sharp 
as razor blades, and his eyes, pale as the Arctic sky. He hoists his 
Kalashnikov and leaves. 
A couple of hours later, he's back and bringing me breakfast: bread, 
cheese and sausage. The scarf is off; so is the camouflage. He bustles like a 
housewife, sweeping the floor in his slippers. 
"Eat. Eat." Dima scolds. "In Russia, we like our women plump." 

Handling Dirty Work 
There is nothing analogous to the OMON in the U.S. military or law 
enforcement. The men are commandos, trained in combat like Green Berets, but 
part of the police. Half the time they refer to themselves as "military men," 
the other half as "cops." 
At home, the OMON conducts special operations such as riot control and 
busts of organized crime rings. In Chechnya, it handles some of the dirtiest 
work of the war: After the army seizes territory, the OMON comes in and 
"cleanses" the area of remaining rebels, flushing them from hiding places and 
weeding them from the civilian population. 
Human rights groups have charged that Russian forces wantonly toss 
grenades into basements, killing civilians. But the Omonovtsy describe the 
basement grenades as a defensive tactic. 
"We approach the basement and check the door," explains "Granny," a 
33-year-old nicknamed for his tendency to nag. "If it's locked, we kick it in 
and call out to see if someone is hiding inside. If no one answers, we throw 
in a couple of grenades. It's only after the smoke clears that we enter and 
do a visual search. That's the only way to do it and keep yourself safe. 
"Maybe it's brutal," Granny says. "But you have to take care of yourself 
first. No one has come up with anything better." 
By the time we arrive, the OMON forces are concentrating on cleaning up 
the mines, shells and other explosives scattered throughout the city, 
especially in the area near the central stadium, one of the rebels' last 
strongholds. 
We set out at midday, with Dima in command. Baby-faced Sasha is coming, 
along with a sniper called Fil and a dark-haired soldier appropriately 
nicknamed "Cheerful." There are two sappers, or explosives experts: Andrei, 
known as Ksyukha, a short form of his surname, and Sergei, called Dzhokar, 
whose bushy mustache and elongated nose give him more than a passing 
resemblance to the former president of Chechnya, Dzhokar M. Dudayev. 
Dzhokar has tucked baggy camouflage pants into basketball high tops. 
"It's because I don't have boots," he says, though Dima later explains that 
it's to step more carefully through hazardous houses. Dzhokar is short, and 
even though he's 30, without the mustache he could pass for an American 
teenage hip-hop fan. 
Ksyukha and Dzhokar do the hard work. They wander in and out of 
destroyed cottages, eyes to the ground, poking at wires and discarded 
clothing. The others stroll behind in the street, keeping a casual lookout. 
After nearly an hour tracing a particularly elusive wire around a 
booby-trapped house, Dzhokar reports back. 
"I'm giving up," he says. "I'm not going to push my luck. A friend did 
that in the last war, and he went home in a zinc box." He carefully lifts a 
heavy, defused artillery shell and hauls it off for detonation. 
We move down the road as the sappers set up the blasts. We encounter a 
corpse--the second of the day. The first was a woman the squad discovered a 
week earlier, and they coolly discuss how much the stray dogs had fed on her 
in the interim. The second is a man who, on closer inspection, is missing his 
head. They decide the rebels beheaded him. 
I ask whose job it is to collect the corpses. Dima says he doesn't know. 
The blasts, when they come, are loud, but it's the shock wave that's 
surprising. The slow rain of debris feels almost as if the air itself has 
shattered and is falling to Earth. 
On the way back, I contemplate the squad's familiarity with death and 
destruction. Corpses are just another bit of battlefield litter to be checked 
for booby traps. Guns and mines are no more mysterious to them than notebooks 
and pens are to me. 

Use of Looted Goods 
When we reach the barracks, the officers' bunk room is cold. 
"Do you want to see how we light the stove with plastic explosives?" 
Dima asks. 
He leaves and comes back kneading a fist-sized gray lump. "It looks like 
Plasticine, doesn't it? It even comes in different colors." He forms a knob 
on one side, holds a match to it, and the lump starts to sizzle. He places it 
inside the stove, and before he shuts the door, the fire is cackling merrily. 
Semtex fire starter, I think. 
I am becoming more aware of my surroundings, and it slowly sinks in that 
the barracks' small comforts--rugs on the walls and floor, clocks, slippers, 
teacups--were not shipped down from Pskov. They were looted. 
I have begun to respect these troops' expertise, and I'm disturbed at 
the thought of them carrying off booty. I make a mental inventory of what was 
likely stolen: the TVs in the bunk room, the stove in the banya, the sheets 
on my cot, the videotapes in the radio room. Maybe even the barber's shaver. 
Later, I sit up on overnight duty with Dima and Mel, a 23-year-old 
sniper who decorates his rifle with pornographic stickers. They monitor radio 
traffic and keep tabs on comrades at two checkpoints. There are shooting 
incidents almost nightly. But tonight is quiet, and the two men talk nonstop. 
Mel wants me to understand what makes the OMON different from the army. 
"We're a real team, a company," he says. "We use the familiar form when 
we talk to each other, even the officers. The army is much more rigid, more 
formal. For us, every single person matters. We're almost like a family. 
"What really sets us apart is our commander," Mel continues. "He doesn't 
send us into bad situations." 
He's not the first to sing Edik's praises. I have been told many times 
that the leadership and standards set by Edik and Dima explain why their men 
are loyal, disciplined and avoid the excesses for which the OMON is infamous. 
I ask Dima about the looting. He is uncomfortable with the question but 
has a ready answer. 
"People think we take this stuff for ourselves, that we'll take it 
home," he says. "But we couldn't even if we wanted to. We pass through a kind 
of customs on the way home; they will let us through only with what we have 
in our backpacks. 
"The problem is that we have so little to begin with," he continues. 
"The government gives us a rifle and a sleeping bag. That's it. So we take 
what we need from the population to create the kind of living conditions that 
make it possible to do our job. And when we're done, we give it back to the 
population." 
When I head for bed, I think about his explanation. Most occupying 
armies feed off the occupied population. Even if the Omonovtsy leave the loot 
behind, it won't get returned to the original owners; it will be looted a 
second time. I'm sure the original owners wouldn't call it borrowing. 
Then I think about all the valuables that would easily fit in a 
backpack. The Omonovtsy make less than $40 a month. A few pieces of jewelry 
could make a nice contribution to the family income. 

OMON Eyed Warily 
The next day, we set out again with the sappers. Dima is leading and has 
picked Cheerful, Mel, Granny and Yura, a wiry 34-year-old veteran of the war 
in Afghanistan, for the patrol. We pass a line of civilians waiting for 
humanitarian relief, and they watch the OMON warily. I ask Dima about 
relations with the locals. 
"What, do you think they look at us as saviors?" he replies. "I 
understand how they see us. As far as they're concerned, we're the ones who 
came and burned their homes. They blame us for it all." 
Does he consider himself at all to blame? "To a certain degree, yes. 
What happened here is not good. But the rebels weren't doing them any good 
either." 
This is a common line of reasoning among Russians. The first Chechen war 
of 1994-96 ended in a stalemate and, until Russian forces returned last fall, 
Chechnya enjoyed three years of de facto independence. But Chechen leaders 
squandered their chance. They let warlords run rampant, kidnapping thousands, 
trafficking in drugs and hooking up with merciless international terrorists. 
Meanwhile, the elected government failed to provide even basic services, and 
civilians who supported independence in the abstract grew disillusioned with 
it in practice. 
In other words, they say, Russia had to destroy Chechnya to save it. 
Today, we head deep into the neighborhood behind the stadium, climbing a 
hill to an old factory. The rebels turned the administration building, a 
two-story structure overlooking most of western Grozny, into a highly 
fortified snipers' aerie. 
Just walking around the yard, we find dozens of live grenades, boxes of 
unused cartridges, gas masks and grenade launchers. Something crunches 
underfoot, and I look down to see grenade pins and spent cartridges coating 
the ground as thickly as gravel. 
While Dzhokar and Ksyukha pile munitions in the yard, Dima inspects the 
inside of the building. It's littered top to bottom with the garbage of war: 
not just spent cartridges but empty tins of buckwheat, boiled beef, 
half-eaten jars of pickles. All the rooms have sandbagged windows, with small 
openings for snipers' rifles, and human feces speckles the floors. A tiny 
sleeping room is strewn with fetid mattresses. 
We walk around the side of the building and find another heap of 
abandoned gas masks, canteens and boxes of cartridges. If the rebels 
discarded this much ammunition, I wonder, how much did they hide? 
A rusted gate carries a message scrawled in chalk: "Allah is behind us, 
Russia is beneath us, Victory is before us." 
Suddenly, I hear the sharp rattle of safety catches releasing and 
ammunition cartridges sliding into place. Yura and Granny are kneeling in 
combat position. Someone has fired at us. 
"Take cover," Dima says, and I sink against the wall. "No, the 
basement." I feel like a character in a cheap action film as I clamber down 
the steps. My colleagues Alexei and Yuri are already there, looking anxious. 
Ksyukha is still doing his job, collecting bullets off the floor. 
We listen to Dima on the radio, trying to figure out what's going on. 
Minutes pass and no new shots are fired. "There's another sapper patrol in 
the area," he says finally. They seem to have spotted us and considered us a 
threat. 
We leave Dzhokar to set up the detonation and move to another area on 
the hill. Outside the former offices of a construction company, we find an 
even bigger haul: not just boxes but crates of bullets, pointy antitank 
grenades and antipersonnel grenades called "pencils." Dima radios to say 
we'll need a vehicle to transport it all. 
A few minutes later, an armored personnel carrier trundles up the hill 
and three grubby youngsters in soldier uniforms get out. The soldiers are 
conscripts, 18 to 20 years old, still learning the basics of war. They seem 
in awe of the Omonovtsy. 
The men pile munitions onto the APC, and I sit on the crates during the 
short ride back to the first building. In the basement, Dzhokar has prepared 
to explode the grenades and shells that are too damaged to transport. After 
piling more crates and boxes onto the APC, the men say it's time to take 
cover. 
Dima, Yuri and I ride the APC downhill away from the blast site; the 
others trail behind on foot. We've traveled just 200 yards when we hear the 
explosion--too soon. 
As the shock wave ebbs, I see Alexei, Mel and the other walkers running 
back uphill toward the cloud of smoke. But I don't realize something's wrong 
until Dima jumps down and tears off at top speed. Yuri and I follow. 
The smoke is clearing. We see a tight group of men kneeling on the 
ground, then spot Dzhokar lying flat on his back in the middle, basketball 
shoes sticking out. Blood is flowing from his head, trickling into his eyes 
and ears. 
Dima is on the radio. "Urgent, urgent. We have wounded. Yes, serious, 
serious." Dzhokar is inert. Yura is giving him an injection. Cheerful is 
holding up his head, cradled in the bloody scarf. Ksyukha and Yura start 
wrapping bandages around his head and neck. 
The young men in the APC try to back it up the hill; but the vehicle, 
clumsy in forward, is nearly uncontrollable in reverse. They plow into the 
side of a house, then a fence, before getting close enough. The men lift 
Dzhokar onto the APC and arrange him awkwardly on a thin mattress. 
The ride is swift and surreal. We pass places that have become landmarks 
in my mind: the headless corpse, the booby-trapped house, the stadium. We 
tear past the barracks, through checkpoints, and pull up to the field 
hospital where I was staying until a few days ago. Medics carry Dzhokar 
inside. 
The hospital staff is not happy about a bunch of Omonovtsy prowling the 
grounds, bristling with weapons. The director tells us to leave. "He might be 
a friend of yours," he says, "but we get 400 sick people here a day." The 
Omonovtsy only stare in reply; they are going nowhere. 
They stack their rifles against a table and sit on the ground on wooden 
boards. I take a seat next to Dima, and he gives me a wan smile. We stare at 
the ground. A minute later, he begins shaking softly, and I realize he's 
crying. 
Granny takes Dima in his arms. The two men crouch together, weeping into 
each other's camouflage. I wonder what it looks like to see OMON officers in 
full battle dress cry. Then I decide it's none of my business and keep my 
eyes on the ground. 
A call goes out for blood. Dima radios the barracks, and half a dozen 
men arrive within minutes, along with Edik and my colleague Alexei. 
Alexei describes what he saw of the accident. Dzhokar seems to have made 
the fuse too short, and the cache detonated before he could take cover. He 
flew into the air--Alexei saw him somersault several times--and was hit in 
the back of the head by a flying sheet of metal fencing. A brick landed on 
his forehead as he hit the ground. 
The doctors tell us Dzhokar's condition is not good. They are removing a 
section of his skull to relieve the pressure. They hope he can be stabilized 
and helicoptered to the military hospital in Mozdok, 60 miles northwest of 
Grozny. 
The wait goes on and on, long enough that dusk threatens, which would 
ground the chopper. Finally, the chief doctor calls on the Omonovtsy to carry 
Dzhokar to the ambulance. His head is wrapped in gauze, a monitor is balanced 
on his knees, IV drips sway. They move slowly across the yard, looking 
unnervingly like a funeral procession. 
Edik and Ksyukha, who will accompany Dzhokar to Mozdok, squeeze into the 
ambulance. The rest of us hike back to the barracks as night falls. 
Supper is buckwheat and beef. The boys want to drink, but there's 
nothing left. Someone bought a bottle of vodka from a peddler, but everyone 
is skeptical; they shake it, swirl it, dissolve sugar in it and, finally, 
taste it before deciding it's fake. Dima has a small bottle of grain alcohol 
someone gave him at the hospital. He pours it into a large orange teacup, 
which the men pass around like a communion chalice. Then it's gone. 
Everyone heads for bed. They settle for the stupefaction of sleep. 
The morning dawns inappropriately sunny and cheerful. It's a scheduled 
rest day, which is fortunate because the men don't feel like working. A few 
hand-wash clothes in the backyard. The squad's fitness champ, a ranked boxer 
also named Yura, strings up a sandbag and practices punches. 
We're sitting outside when Dima brings us the news. "Dzhokar's dead," he 
says simply. "We got a radio message from Mozdok. They said, 'Regarding the 
300 you sent yesterday, it's now a 200.' " In military slang, 300 is code for 
wounded, 200 for dead. 
The Pskov regiment has just lost its first man to Chechnya. 
I walk inside and see Yura the boxer. His face is stricken. "Sergei's 
dead," is all he says, and he wanders off. That's what most of the men seem 
to be doing, going off to be alone. 

As Tensions Rise, a Decision to Leave 
Yuri, Alexei and I confer. Our hosts have treated us with nothing but 
kindness. They say they still want us to stay. But the atmosphere in the 
barracks is raw and tense. How do men armed with guns and trained in violence 
deal with grief? 
We decide it would be prudent not to find out. We have begun to fear 
that war can make even good people vulnerable to bad impulses. 
It's time for us to go. 
Grozny is still a closed city, and leaving is complicated. Dima has 
picked two men to travel to Mozdok and escort Dzhokar's body home, and he 
agrees to try to send us out with them. 
It takes several hours to find a jeep and collect the series of military 
passes needed to drive across Grozny to the air base. It's only seven miles, 
but the trip takes nearly two hours; the number of checkpoints has doubled in 
the four days we have spent with the OMON, and documents are checked 
meticulously at each. 
At the air base, it becomes clear that Dzhokar's death is a priority for 
no one but us. We watch several helicopters come and go without gaining 
permission to board. The guys chain-smoke. One of the escorts, a 38-year-old 
former sailor named Kolya, grinds a butt into the dirt. 
"Two extra weeks," he says. "Two extra weeks and it killed him." 
Eventually, Dima convinces a group of army generals to squeeze us onto 
its chopper. They are going to survey an airfield in northern Grozny where 
they plan to hold a victory parade. Then they will head for Mozdok. 
As the helicopter lifts off, I watch Dima's jeep speeding toward Grozny. 
I doze off, and when I awake, lights are burning in the houses below. I 
realize we have reached a place where electricity works. We have left 
Chechnya. 
Sergei N. Vasiliyev, aka Dzhokar, was buried in Pskov on Feb. 20. 
A day earlier, the detachment learned that its tour of duty in Chechnya 
had been extended to March 15--yet another two weeks. 
Yura, a ranked boxer, top left, Dima, on guitar, and Granny, far right, 
celebrate a fellow soldier's birthday in their bunk room in Grozny, the 
Chechen capital. The men are members of Russia's elite OMON police force. 
Left, an OMON group from the Pskov regiment patrols the central stadium in 
Grozny. Below, a soldier tends to Dzhokar, a sapper who was severely wounded 
in a munitions accident during "mopping up" operations. 

******

#9
Chechnya: War May Have Long-Lasting Impact On U.S.-Russian Ties
By Michael Lelyveld

Some Russia experts see long-lasting effects of Chechnya war on relations 
with the United States. RFE/RL correspondent Michael Lelyveld reports on a 
debate on the issues that took place this week among Russian and American 
scholars at a business school in Massachusetts. 

Boston, 10 March 2000 (RFE/RL) -- A leading American analyst and expert on 
Russian affairs says the war in Chechnya may have an effect on U.S.-Russian 
relations long after it is over.

The question of Russia's future after Chechnya was debated this week by 
American and Russian scholars at a program organized by Babson College, an 
American business school in Wellesley, in the eastern state of Massachusetts.

Marshall Goldman, associate director of Harvard University's Davis Center for 
Russian Studies, addressed the topic of whether Russia will survive through 
its difficult period of economic crises and war.

"The first question is not whether Russia will survive. It will survive. The 
question is, will it survive in a way that will be healthy? Chechnya to me 
illustrates the fact that it won't be healthy, that it will have a different 
standard," Goldman said. 

Goldman, who has written numerous books on Russia, believes that U.S.-Russian 
relations will continue despite differences over the war and the direction 
taken by Acting President Vladimir Putin. But the effects may be felt in 
subtle ways, including the impact on Russia's ability to integrate its 
economy and do business with the West.

"There will always be in the back of our minds, I'm afraid -- and in the back 
of Russian minds -- that they're different, that their standards are 
different," said Goldman.

A recent poll in Russia found that public support for the war remains strong 
and may actually be growing, despite negative images and protests in the 
West. But Chechnya may be only one reason for divergence with the United 
States.

Speaking to an audience at Babson's Glavin Center for Global Entrepreneurial 
Leadership, Goldman pointed to rising U.S. concern that the Putin era may be 
one of fewer freedoms and less dissent. New limits may accompany a crackdown 
on corruption. Goldman noted the withdrawal of some candidates from Russia's 
presidential race and Putin's recent comment that "democracy is the 
dictatorship of law."

"I can tell you now there is indeed an atmosphere in Moscow that is very 
threatening," said Goldman, a frequent visitor to Russia. "There's a greater 
sense of fear and intimidation in Russia than any time I've felt since early 
Gorbachev."

Balancing Goldman's admitted pessimism was Dmitry Evstafiev, an associate 
professor of St. Petersburg State University, who also teaches at Babson. 
Evstafiev pointed to the growing entrepreneurship among the new generation in 
Russia. He compared the country's reform progress to the process of educating 
the young people themselves. Russia is learning, he said, and education takes 
time.

Evstafiev believes that in five years, Russian companies will begin to be 
seen as potential competitors to their counterparts in the United States. He 
said Russian potential will continue to grow. "In 2025, we will be the 
principle competitors to you on the global markets," Evstafiev predicted.

But a third panelist was less hopeful. Michael Bruner, an associate professor 
of history and society at Babson, traced Russia's recent course to former 
President Boris Yeltsin and his constitutional confrontation with the State 
Duma in 1993.

Western nations were willing to back Yeltsin when he disbanded the elected 
parliament and attacked the parliament building, believing that a new 
constitution would guarantee economic reforms. But Yeltsin used the process 
to rule by decree, fostering disrespect for law, Bruner said. Violence has 
only led to more violence. The result now is the popularity of Putin and his 
call for order and a strong state, he said.

Neither Russia nor the United States are happy with the current state of 
affairs. "In a country where lawlessness generally prevails, the market 
economy tends to become a fairly ugly thing," Bruner said. But he questioned 
whether more authoritarianism would solve Russia's problems or win U.S. 
support. 

******

#10
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 
From: "Peter D. Ekman" <pdek@co.ru> 
Subject: re: van de Coevering-education and corruption 

Mr. van de Coevering in JRL 4159 "education and corruption " seems to
misinterpret my use of the words "side payments" in describing the 
combined tutor/admission system that is used in Russia. "Side payment" 
is meant to be as neutral a word as possible in
describing a non-official payment. Once you use the emotional word 
"bribe," you've pretty well cut off any objective analysis
of the situation. 

I do not condone bribes in any educational system. The fact that it is
very common in Russia for entering students to pay tutors to prepare 
them for admission exams that are conducted by these same tutors is a 
real problem in Russian education. This system would certainly give
rise to charges of conflict of interest (if nothing else) in the West.

On the other hand, without these side-payments much of the Russian higher
education system would collapse even further. State university 
instructors simply cannot live on their official
salaries of $100 per month or so. Since the state doesn't put any money
into a system that has the obligation to give free higher education to 
all qualified applicants, it seems that the educators have
simply "semi-privatized" the system.

This is obviously not a healthy state of affairs. But attacking the
"bribes" without attacking the underlying cause - state imposed 
obligations without adequate resources - is a moral exercise that, 
at best, would lead to a policy that is bound to fail.

For the record, I expect that the fledgling private higher education
system is immune from the combined tutor/admissions system. There is 
simply no reason for it to exist in a private
university. As for AIBEc, the student and instructor involved in anything
like this would be tossed out of the school immediately.

As always,
Peter D .Ekman
Dean, AIBEc
The American Institute of Business and Economics
www.aibec.org

******

#11
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 
From: Albert Weeks <AWeeks1@compuserve.com> 
Subject: Russian General Staff journal partially OK's missile defense

An unusual article has appeared in the latest
issue (#1, Jan.-Feb.,2000) of the authoritative 
General Staff journal, Voyenna Mysl' (VM) 
(Military Thought), which is rarely translated into 
English or, sadly, covered by Western correspondents 
in Moscow. The article was approved for publication, 
22 Dec., 1999. 
The writers, V. N. Tsygichko and A. A. Piontkovsky,
civilian scholars, the latter with the Russian
Academy of Sciences, endorse the concept of
anti-missile defense as applied to both the U.S.
and the RF. The authors rebuke those who oppose such
a defense characterizing the opposition's stand
as an example of "relics in political thinking,"
an epithet that, some might agree, likewise applies to States-side
critics of what the latter have long pilloried as "Star Wars."
The Russian authors suggest that MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) 
applies to an era that has passed, that it is time to move on
to a new concept of Russian security against a variety
of threats, including rogue-state terrorism. 
In a second VM article, same issue and following the above 
lead-article on the ABM theme, Col. S. V. Kreiden, though
less ready to accept anti-missile defense at present,
nevertheless juxtaposes MAD to what the colonel calls,
preferentially, "Mutual Assured Survival." He advises 
Russian authorities to consider an "amendment" (korrektsiya) 
to the antiquated 1972 ABM Treaty.
One must wonder if Acting President Vladimir Putin, who
was appointed Secretary of the Russian Security Council near the
time and who apparently still holds that post, approved 
these controversial articles, via intermediaries, when they were 
submitted to the General Staff journal, perhaps endorsing the 
"new thinking" displayed in these two articles. We may 
find that out some time after Mar. 26th.

******

Web page for CDI Russia Weekly: 
http://www.cdi.org/russia