Notebook

No on Referenda

The Duma voted to amend the law “On Referenda” in such a manner that may outlaw referenda altogether. The new amendments make it impossible to hold a referendum on “issues within the competency of the government.” Since the Duma can pass federal laws on any issue, this amendment makes all referenda illegal, according to Kommersant. The law was passed in the Duma by a margin of 306-54.

Tolstoy Turmoil

Two editions of Leo Tolstoy’s novel War and Peace are fighting for the attention of readers. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, the most famous and prolific modern translators of Russian literature, have published their version with Alfred A. Knopf to wide acclaim. The team’s version of Anna Karenina sold over 900,000 copies after becoming an Oprah Book Club recommendation. Meanwhile, an Andrew Bromfield translation published by Ecco is based on an earlier version of the novel that Tolstoy subsequently enlarged and improved on (according to most critics). It is about 400 pages shorter, “but no less authentic,” as Ecco’s Dan Halpern told the Wall Street Journal.

Gourmet splurge

Russian billionaire-turned-senator Sergei Pugachyov bought the French gourmet chain Hediard. Pugachyov paid an undisclosed sum to Michel Pastor, who has owned Hediard since 1995. Kommersant priced the deal at one billion euros, but Bloomberg quoted Pastor as saying the amount was “significantly less.” Pugachyov represents the Russian republic of Tyva, and is ranked by Forbes as the 50th richest man in Russia, with a fortune of about $1.3 billion. Hediard’s largest store is on Moscow’s Garden Ring.

Pocket Karamazov

The novel The Brothers Karamazov is setting records on the Japanese book market. The new translation of Dostoyevsky’s classic published by Kobunsha has sold over half a million copies. This is twice the quantity posted by the previous classics bestseller, a 2003 Haruki Murakami translation of The Catcher in the Rye, Itar-Tass reported. The Brothers Karamazov is a set of five pocketbook-size books, translated by Tokyo University professor Ikuo Kameyama.

Getting older

Experts at the World Bank have recommended that Russia raise its retirement age to 65. Today, the Russian retirement age is 55 for women and 60 for men. The annual World Bank report estimates that, by 2025, 20 percent of Russians will be over 65, while the total population will decrease by 17 million, or almost 12 percent.

Virtual communism

Estonians in Canada want to create a virtual museum of communism. In the fall of 2007, the Estonian government offered to fund such an undertaking with 56,500 krons, or $5,000 dollars. Canadian-Estonian Markus Kolga, author of the documentary Gulag 113 said that he is interested in creating such an online museum, to be launched in the summer of 2008. Estonia has previously funded a monument in Washington, D.C., commemorating the victims of communism.

War Opera

Alexander Sokurov, known for heady arthouse films, has written and directed a new movie about the war in Chechnya, Alexandra. The leading role is performed by Galina Vishnevskaya, opera singer and widow of the late composer Mstislav Rostropovich. She plays a simple old woman who visits her grandson at his military post in Chechnya. The film already has a Cannes nomination and is currently in theaters.

Chechen Democracy

Testing the absolute bounds of human credulity, Russia’s Central Election Commission reported that 99.21 percent of Chechnya’s eligible voters went to the polls on December 2, and that 99.36 percent of them voted for the United Russia ticket. Similar turnout figures were claimed by other Caucasian republics: Ingushetia (98%), Kabardino-Balkaria (97%) and Karachaevo-Cherkessia (94%).

Reading Russia

Literacy study puts Russian

children at the top

In the latest Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, which looks at reading and comprehension levels among ten year olds in 40 regions of the world, Russian children were ranked first, followed by Hong Kong and Singapore. The study is conducted every five years and seeks ways to improve reading instruction. Sweden topped the list in 2001, but fell to 10th place this year. The United States is 18th on the list. The overall conclusion was that children now show a greater preference for spending time with computers, versus books, especially in developed countries.

A total of 215,000 children participated in the study – including 4,955 Russians from 232 different schools – which was organized by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. In 2001, Russia was ranked 12th out of 35 participating countries.

Black Beast

Monument contest

yields unconventional winner

An abstract sculpture by artist Dmitry Kavarga was judged to be the best monument to commemorate Russia’s first president, Boris Yeltsin. The competition was organized by the museum Art4.ru, with sponsorship from the First President of Russia Foundation, after Moscow sculptor Zurab Tsereteli expressed interest in creating a Yeltsin monument soon after the president passed away in April of 2007. The museum wanted to protest the Georgian artist’s monopoly over the capital’s monument scene and called upon artists to submit their versions of the new statue.

Kavargin’s sculpture was judged best by the visitors of Art4.ru museum and website, Vzglyad magazine wrote. The artist called his work a “biomorphed black beast” that “symbolizes destruction and breakdown, and the triumph of chaos over order.”

Organizers said Kavarga’s creation was the most radical of the 70 entries. The organizers hoped to have the winning monument placed on Lubyanka square in central Moscow, where once stood a monument to Felix Dzerzhinsky, the founder of the Bolshevik secret police. It is not likely the museum’s plans will be realized. “I don’t know if Boris Nikolayevich would be okay with taking Dzerzhinsky’s place,” said Alexander Drozdov of the Yeltsin Foundation.

Luzhkov law

Rule Number 1: 

The mayor is always right

A recent legal spat between Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov and oppositional writer Eduard Limonov could have been ripped from a textbook on Logic. In an interview with Radio Svoboda, Limonov commented that Moscow’s courts have never made a decision that countered the mayor’s interests. “Moscow courts are under Luzhkov’s control,” said the leader of the banned National Bolshevik Party. Luzhkov proceeded to sue Limonov and the radio station for R500,000 each in punitive damages. Nikolai Rudensky of grani.ru compared the situation to the famous paradox by the Cretan Epimenides, which posits that “All Cretans are liars.”

“There is an insoluble contradiction here: if the Cretan is telling the truth, then the statement is false, but if he’s lying it means that Cretans are actually not liars. The Moscow judge is in an equally difficult situation,” he wrote. The Babushkinsky court examined the case and proceeded to charge the defendants. “The process was six days long, with six witnesses on our side and none on the plaintiff’s side,” Limonov told grani.ru, “yet the court sided with the mayor. The decision is totally baseless. I was right, the courts are in fact under the mayor’s control.”

Polonium Fiction

Litvinenko case

goes Hollywood

Michael Mann, the American filmmaker who produced Collateral and Heat will direct a movie about the life and death of Alexander Litvinenko, according to the Litvinenko Justice Fund, an organization set up after his murder.

The film will be based on the book Death of a Dissident: The Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko and the Return of the KGB, authored by Marina Litvinenko, wife of the former spy, who died in London of radioactive polonium poisoning in November 2006. Litvinenko was an outspoken critic of President Putin and from his deathbed accused him of involvement in his murder. British prosecutors pressed Russia to extradite Andrei Lugovoi, their top suspect in the case, but Russia refused, and the situation has cooled relations between the two countries.

Earlier this year, Variety reported that Johnny Depp will be producing a different movie about Litvinenko, based on Sasha’s Story: The Life and Death of a Russian Spy, a work in progress by Alan Cowell, head of New York Times London bureau. Depp followed the Litvinenko case very closely, the magazine reported. Sasha’s Story will be published by Doubleday, but a release date has not been set. Warner Brothers bought the rights to the unfinished book for Depp’s production company Infinitum Nihil. Under the terms of the deal, Depp can both produce and star in the film.

Shaky Peace

Azeri official says war

possible with Armenia

War between Azerbaijan and Armenia is more than likely, according to Safar Abiev, Azerbaijani Minister of Defense. “As Azerbaijan’s territory continues to be occupied on the Armenian side, the chance of war is almost 100 percent,” he said at a press conference in Astana.

Mikael Arutunyan, Armenian Defense Minister, countered that a state official should not make such a statement when the two countries’ leaders are in the middle of peace talks. “We don’t see any solution besides a peaceful one,” he said, according to RIA Novosti.

The dispute is over Nagorny Karabakh, a region controlled by Armenia that is officially in the south-west of Azerbaijan. A war broke out in the late 1980s and was followed by a cease-fire in 1994. The conflict killed 30,000 and displaced a total of about 1 million people. International mediators, such as the OSCE Minsk Group, have been supporting the peace talks, although regular clashes occur on the border between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Artistic Freedom

Love letter to

a departing president

The public desire for Vladimir Putin to remain president took a bizarre turn in an open letter from the Russian Art Academy last fall. Pleading on behalf of “the entire artistic community of Russia, numbering more than 65,000 painters, sculptors, folk and theater artists,” the letter asked the president to remain in power for another term. Yet despite the wide representational claim, the letter was signed only by sculptor Zurab Tsereteli, who is also the Russian Academy of Arts President, his deputy Tair Salakhov, film director Nikita Mikhalkov, and Repin Academy president Albert Charkin.

The letter caused a public outcry from the artistic community, some of whom called the Rossiyskaya Gazeta publication an anti-constitutional provocation. “As someone who is accustomed to speaking for myself and furthermore is respectful of current Russian laws, I find it necessary to say that I did not authorize these people to state anything in my name,” wrote author Lev Rubinstein in a public statement signed by more than 300 persons on the website stengazeta.net. Meanwhile, actor Oleg Basilashvili and a group of 62 other artists openly asked Putin to step down. “Why ask someone to stay and manage us? This is not the 18th, but the 21st century, with an election system in place,” he told Moskovsky Komsomolets.

Following the publication of the letter and the retort, Nikita Mikhalkov appeared on the popular television debate show K baryeru, versus writer Viktor Erofeyev, who was also angered by the original letter. Based on a call-in vote from TV viewers, Erofeyev won the debate, receiving 63 percent of votes.

Auction Fever

Russian art is

all the rage in London

The demand for Russian art continued to surge at auctions in London this fall. Record-breaking sums were pledged for paintings by Natalia Goncharova, Konstantin Makovsky and Nikolai Roerich, among others.

Alexander Ivanov, a Russian collector and ex-FSB officer who opened a private museum in the 1990s, purchased a Fabergé egg clock (pictured below) for $18.5 million.

The mind-boggling sums paid for Russian art of late are caused by a bubble in the market and the fact that people make emotional, rather than informed, decisions when they buy, art specialist Catherine Phillips told the BBC Russian Service. “Even a mediocre work by a Russian artist can be sold for a large sum,” she said. Experts say there is a political aspect to art patronage in Russia, although Ivanov stated that he doesn’t need “political dividends” to return the most expensive of the Fabergé eggs to its homeland.

Whatever the reason, prices and demand for Russian art are on the rise. Ivan Samarin, a Russian art consultant in London, said that, as prices increase, everyone becomes interested in Russian artists. “You could buy a Bryullov or Serov for £10-20 thousand in the late 1980s and nobody cared. But now, when they cost millions, several national museums contacted me about purchasing Russian paintings,” he said.

After three auctions during its “Russian Week,” Christie’s finished with $80.6 million in sales, and Sotheby’s with $79.9 million, including the Fabergé egg.

Shvartsmangate?

Obscure businessman exposes the real ‘Putin Plan’

A sensational interview with a little-known businessman has journalists, experts, and the public scratching their heads. Published two days before December’s Duma elections, it features Oleg Shvartsman, a venture fund manager, explaining how the government uses “various instruments” to knock down a “disloyal” enterprise’s value and then allows people close to the Administration to purchase the company at a minimal price through offshore companies. Shvartsman called it a “velvet re-privatization” and pointed to deputy chief of staff Igor Sechin as the grey cardinal behind the process.

Most people do not doubt that Shvartsman spoke the truth, but vastly different theories emerge as to why this particular person made the information public, supplying Kommersant journalist with juicy facts, names, and figures in an open and even boastful manner, and why he chose this particular time. Shvartsman signed every page of the article’s proof before the interview was published. Two days later, however, he publicly denied his statements.

Some linked the interview to the Kremlin’s internal power struggle. “Kommersant is owned by Alisher Usmanov, a figure close to presidential hopeful Dmitry Medvedev. And Medvedev is of a different clan than Igor Sechin,” said Oleg Kiselyov of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. Thus, the article may have been an attempt to disparage (or warn) Medvedev’s rivals for the presidency.

Nashi Mishki

Youth groups shut down

capital traffic

Pro-Kremlin youth groups have diversified and become increasingly vocal since the December 2 Duma elections. “Putin’s victory” (United Russia gleaned 64.1% of the votes) was celebrated with pomp by Nashi, Molodaya Gvardia, Mestnye, Rossiya Molodaya, and the latest group, Mishki.

On Monday, December 3, it was difficult to walk in central Moscow without running into a group of flag-waving teens sporting red raincoats with Putin’s face on the back. Ten thousand Nashi youth protected Muscovites from “orange provocations” and picketed the British Embassy, waiting for Ambassador Anthony Brenton to apologize for attending a conference organized by the opposition movement Other Russia. Nashi is also suing the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly, because its speaker, Goran Lennmarker, called the elections “unfree” and “not meeting many of the criteria used in Europe.” Nashi is demanding R353 million in compensation for tainting Russia’s image.

On December 6th, 30,000 red-clad Nashi youth (and 900 policeman standing guard) blocked traffic in the capital with a demonstration, as children aged 8 to 15 held up signs with slogans like, “Thank you Putin for stability in our future!” jarringly reminiscent of days gone by.

Sports Roundup

Volleyball: Russia qualified for the Beijing Olympics by defeating the U.S. at December’s World Cup in Tokyo.

Tennis: Russia fell 4-1 in the Davis Cup final, held in Oregon. It was a sad showing, with the team severely weakened by Marat Safin’s absence and Nikolai Davydenko’s poor preparation. Only Igor Andreyev managed to put a win on the Russian side, defeating Bob Bryan.

Soccer: Zenit won its first Russian Premier League title since 1984 in November when it defeated Saturn. Meanwhile, the national team qualified for EURO-2008 when Britain unexpectedly lost 3-2 at home to Croatia. The Russian team thought it was out of EURO-2008 after it lost to Israel, but the Croatian upset (primed by Lukoil vice-president Leonid Fedun’s promise of Mercedeses to  four key Croatian players if they beat England) knocked the UK out of the tourney and dropped Russia in.

Skating: 2006 Olympic Gold Medalist Yevgeny Plushenko said he was disappointed with recent Russian results on the ice and will skate next season and train for the 2010 Vancouver games. Plushenko long-time rival, Alexei Yagudin, also announced he will return to competition.

At $1,945 m2/year, office rents in Moscow are the third most expensive in the world. Prices increased by 65.4 percent last year. London is in first place, at $3,539 m2/year. ¶ 90% of news broadcasts between 6 pm and midnight cover the president, state and government bodies, and the United Russia party. In October, Channel 1 (ORT) devoted 16% of its news broadcasts to United Russia, with 1% to each other party except Just Russia, which received 1.2% of all time. ¶ Annual inflation on basic food products that are consumed by persons with low incomes was estimated at 11.5% by November 2007. For persons with average incomes, the rate was 10.1%. For those with high incomes it was 9%. ¶ There are currently 403,000 people in Russia who are registered as infected with AIDS. 44% of those who contracted the disease in 2007 are women. ¶ In an international survey of 6,000 people in the U.S., France, Germany, Britain, Spain, and Italy, the countries deemed as having the most influence in the world were the U.S. (95%), China (88.5%), and Russia (83.8%).¶ Salaries of Russian CEOs and top company managers grew much slower (3-4 percent) in 2007 than did those of all other workers (15.5%). Salary growth was highest for IT professionals, at 37.8%. The average for salary growth in the service sector was 27.8%. In sales, salaries were up 49.7%. ¶ 350 international observers were invited to Russia for the December State Duma elections – one-third the number of observer invitations sent during the 2003 Duma elections. ¶ According to the Central Election Committee, President Putin: owns a 77.7 m2 flat in St. Petersburg and a 150 m2 plot of land in the Moscow Region, has two Volgas registered in his name, made in 1960 and 1965; earned R2,011,611.28 in 2006; has savings accounts in Sberbank (3,083,219.34 rubles), Baltiysky bank (53,317.50 rubles), and VneshTorgBank (563,763.35 rubles); has 230 stock shares of Saint Petersburg Bank. However, according to one analyst, Putin owns 37% of Surgutneftegaz ($18 billion), 4.5% of Gazprom ($13 billion), and half of Gunvor (possibly $10 billion). His total fortune could amount to $41 billion ¶ Within 10 hours after the World Wildlife Fund posted volunteer positions to clean up the oil spill in the Crimea, 1,000 volunteers signed up.   

“Now, in terms of whether or not it’s possible to re-program the kind of basic Russian DNA, which is a centralized authority, that’s hard to do.”

President George W. Bush (White House Press Conference, October 17, 2007)

“The Kremlin is not opposed to voting in general. What it doesn’t like is when the voting serves as a type of referendum on its policies.”

Political analyst Nikolai Petrov (Moscow Times, 10/23/07)

“Accusing liberals of ‘westernism’ is as ludicrous as accusing Putin of being a Chinese spy.”

Boris Nemtsov, member of the political council of the Union of Rightist Forces (Itogi)

“It’s not like the Soviet days, of course, when one, including me, actually used to
look to see who was standing next to whom on Lenin’s mausoleum to determine
the next leadership.”

Condoleeza Rice on Kremlin successions (ABC News)

“Today, there is no need to be afraid of the Russian Armed Forces. However, I do not believe that the Russian military is obliged to defend the world from the evil Americans.”

General Yury Baluyevsky, Chief of Russia’s General Staff (Russia Today TV channel)

“Current domestic politics is only about creating mechanisms to hold on to political power… Nobody remembers any period, including during the Soviet years, when corruption reached present-day levels. Only tiny fragments of the market economy are untouched by state bureaucrats.”

Former Prime Minister and presidential hopeful Mikhail Kasyanov (Ekho Moskvy)

“I keep my savings in US dollars. That’s why I wear
an old suit.”

U.S. Ambassador to Russia William Burns (Novaya Gazeta)

“We are all looking for methods of fighting traffic. If we take drivers licenses away from people who don’t pay child support, we will make our social contribution to the war against traffic.”

Lyudmila Shvetsova, deputy mayor of Moscow (Moskovsky Komsomolets)

“They’re creating, quickly, a kind of Iran situation,
a new-old civilization, an Orthodox civilization.
The climate has totally changed. What was allowed the day before yesterday now is dangerous.
They don’t repress like the Soviets yet, but give
them two years, they will find the way.”

Writer Victor Erofeyev (New York Times)

“You turn onto a road and realize: a herd of cattle has just gone by. The road is slippery and gives off a clearly pronounced odor. So you have to cross it without slipping and falling. That is my mission.”

Alexander Sokolov, Minister of Culture (Itogi)