САНКТ-ПЕТЕРБУРГ-ТАЙМС
W E D N E SD AY, D E C E M B E R 1 7 , 2014
W W W. S P T I M E S . R U
NIKOLAI SHESTAKOV / FOR SPT
N O . 50 (1842)
NERVES OF STEEL
A local child takes the chance to greet RoboThespian, one of the world’s most modern robots and one designed specifically for human interaction. RoboThespian
opened up this year’s CeBIT technology fair in Hannover in March and is currently in St. Petersburg as part of an international robotics event that begins next year.
NEWS
NEWS
Lawmaker
Storms Local
Gay Club
Ruble Collapse
Anti-gay Milonov uses
OMON riot police to break
up event. Page 3.
Currency value continues to
drop. Page 5.
ARTS & CULTURE
Mastering a
New Beat
Famed local drummer trades
his drumsticks for a pen.
Page 9.
News
B R I E F
Hunger Strike
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — Ukrainian military pilot Nadia Savchenko has declared
a hunger strike after Russian jail officials refused to let a doctor treat her for
an ear infection, her lawyer said.
Savchenko announced her hunger
strike during a video call with a courthouse on Monday, lawyer Ilya Novikov
said in a Facebook message.
The 33-year-old pilot is suffering
from an ear inflammation and has lost
hearing in her right ear, according to
Novikov. But officials at the Moscow
jail where she is being held have declined to let a doctor see her, he said on
his Facebook page.
Moscow accuses Savchenko of involvement in the deaths of two Russian
journalists in eastern Ukraine earlier
this year. The 33-year-old pilot, who was
captured by pro-Moscow separatists and
sent to Russia, has since been elected in
absentia to Ukraine’s parliament.
Editor’s Attackers Held
By Olga Kalashnikova
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
The Sapsan, the fastest train in Russia,
is celebrating its fifth anniversary today. Although the high-speed train,
which covers the distance between
Moscow and St. Petersburg in 3 hours
and 45 minutes, has been operating for
just five years, it has already won various awards.
In 2009 the train broke a record
when it reached a speed of 281 kilometers per hour, but it can potentially go
even faster. According to its technical
Speeds of up to 250
kilometers are usual
for the Sapsan, which
also holds the record
for longest high-speed
train in the world.
specifications, the Sapsan can reach
speeds of up to 300 kilometers per
hour.
This high speed determined the
name for the train, which is derived
from one of the most powerful and
beautiful birds of prey. “Sapsan” is the
Russian word for the peregrine falcon,
which can fly at a speed of up to 300
kilometers per hour when hunting. For
centuries this bird has been a symbol of
courage, power and quickness.
Yet only five years ago, the high–
speed movement was a novelty in Russia and there was no well-equipped infrastructure suitable for such a train.
During the following years the railways
have become the most important
Appeal Denied
By Anna Dolgov
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — The Supreme
Court on Monday declined to review
the verdict handed down to anti-corruption campaigner and opposition leader
Alexei Navalny in a high-profile 2013
embezzlement case, RAPSI reported.
Navalny’s lawyer, Olga Mikhailova,
had appealed to the court to overturn
the verdict handed down to Navalny in
July 2013, when he was found guilty of
embezzling funds from the KirovLes
timber company and hit with a fiveyear suspended sentence.
The Supreme Court on Monday refused Mikhailova’s request, while Navalny appeared in court as part of another embezzlement case against him.
Investigators say Navalny and his
brother Oleg defrauded cosmetics company Yves Rocher of 26 million rubles
($457,000), and laundered an additional
21 million rubles.
While Russia’s administration embraces the freedom of artistic expression, it is not willing to support opposition-minded artists through state funding, the culture minister has said.
“The main thing is that we have no
censorship in the country, and everybody
is free to speak out as they like,” Culture
Minister Vladimir Medinsky told state-run
Rossiya television channel on Monday.
At the same time, those artists
whose work appears to speak out
against the administration should ex-
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — Russian astronomer Leonid Yelenin has discovered his third comet, Gazeta.ru reported Monday.
News of the comet was published on
the website of the Minor Planet Center,
which is part of the International Astronomical Union. The comet is currently
located at a distance of about 0.877 astronomical units from Earth, and about
1.837 astronomical units from the sun.
One astronomical unit is the average
distance from Earth to the sun, about
149,600,000 kilometers.
The comet’s orbit indicates that it
will probably not get any closer to
Earth, the report said. Yelenin gained
fame in 2010 after becoming the first
Russian to discover a comet in 20 years.
2
Russia’s Fastest Train Turns Five Today
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — Police have detained two suspects in connection with
an investigation into the brutal attack
earlier this month of the chief editor of
Novosibirsk news site Tayga.info.
Tayga.info, announced the development, stating that two men had been
detained in the case and assault
charges were filed. The Novosibirsk
Union of Journalists is also seeking to
have the charges re-classified to include “hindering professional activities,” which would carry a harsher sentence, Tayga.info reported.
The attack on Tayga.info’s offices in
Novosibirsk on Dec. 8 saw the editorin-chief, Yevgeny Mezdrikov, suffer a
broken nose and head injuries, and another employee thrown to the ground
after two unknown men barged in posing as couriers. They fled after striking
Mezdrikov several times, and gave no
indication of the reason for the attack.
Comet Discovered
❖
FOR SPT
I N
www.sptimes.ru | Wednesday, December 17, 2014
The Sapsan at the Leningrad station in Moscow. It can cover the distance to St. Petersburg in 3 hours and 45 minutes.
routes between St. Petersburg and
Moscow, Moscow and Kazan, and St.
Petersburg and Helsinki. Nowadays,
speeds of up to 250 kilometers per hour
are quite usual. However, the Sapsan
does not stop beating records.
In November 2014 the Sapsan set a
Guinness World Record when it became
the longest high-speed train in the
world. Two trains were joined together
and formed a new one. The length was
measured with special equipment.
“It takes into account even the influence of the weather or physical fea-
tures. When the Sapsan moves or stops,
its length changes as the coupling is
compressed or stretched. Moreover,
there is the influence of the environment. When it is warm, the metal expands, and when it is cold, it is compressed. By taking all these indicators
into account, we determined the length
of the train to be 500 meters, 77 centimeters and 6 millimeters,” said Sergey
Zemtsov, a specialist at a local center
of metrology.
Longer Sapsans first appeared in
August 2014. Over a month and a half
of regular trips, they transported 98,000
passengers. This is also a record in the
history of Russian railway transport.
Nowadays the production of socalled “rail buses” has begun. These are
small and fast local trains. High-speed
infrastructure is rapidly developing in
Russia. Railway tracks are being improved or even replaced in some cases.
The platforms, railway stations and territories close to the railway are also being reequipped as the high-speed movement demands increased requirements
for the security of passengers.
Culture Minister: No Funds for Opposition Artists
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
pect to fund their work through private
means, he said.
“I sincerely acknowledge talent and I
am a fan of many figures of opposition
culture, but this does not mean that we
will finance work that clearly unethically
criticizes the voters’ choice,” Medinsky
told Rossia television, in comments carried by Russian media reports.
Amid widespread calls by Kremlin
loyalists to restrict the number of Western movies playing in Russia’s theaters,
Medinsky said last week that domestic
films casting Russia in an unfavorable
light would not receive state funding.
“What I don’t see any sense in, is
making films through the Culture Ministry’s money that smear the elected
authorities,” he was quoted by Lenta.
ru as saying. “That would be some kind
of state masochism.”
Meeting with State Duma lawmakers on Monday, Medinsky said the government would like to fix the “problem” of Western films in Russia, the
Interfax news agency reported.
“If the State Duma began to seriously review the issue of restricting
Hollywood products for some reason,
it would be our pleasure [to support the
proposal],” he was quoted as telling the
legislature. “Let’s meet and discuss this.
This problem exists.”
In fall, Russian film director Yury
Kara said the government should “ban
all American films” in response to
Western sanctions against Russia for
its policies in Ukraine, RIA Novosti
reported.
His calls were echoed by director
Stanislav Govorukhin, who said it
would be “good to limit Hollywood
films on Russian screens,” but expand
the share of European and Asian movies, TASS reported.
ALL ABOUT TOWN
Wednesday, Dec. 17
Although the next trade event at
Lenexpo convention center isn’t until
January, the center is playing host to
“Monet to Cezanne: The French Impressionists,” an art show that brings
19th-century art classics to life. Using
state-of-the-art technology, the show
takes the work of the French masters
and adds another dimension to them
using light and shadow.
Thursday, Dec. 18
Improve your English and knowledge
of British culture during today’s
FORM lesson at the British Book
Center. These free English lessons
with a native speaker elaborate not
only on grammar particulars but cultural topics as well. Today’s event will
discuss the BBC Two documentary
“Victorian Farm Christmas.”
Friday, Dec. 19
Test your mastery of parlor games
during Game Evening at the Brit-
ish Book Center. Learn how to
play a variety of classic, mentally
challenging games and use your
newly acquired skills to crush
weaker opponents. The event beings at 5 p.m.
Saturday, Dec. 20
The city’s Babushkina Park on prospekt Obukhovskoy Oborony will be
invaded by dozens of rocking-androlling Santa Clauses during today’s
Santa Claus Parade. Not only will
they process through the park but
there will also be competitions
amongst the festively-clad participants and a musical master class.
There will also be a prize for the
best-dressed Santa Claus.
Stock up your record collection
during the Vinyl Christmas Sale at
the KL10TCH bar on Konyushennaya ploschad today. Spend the afternoon perusing the records for sale
while listening the classic, clean
sound of records spinning out hits
from a variety of musical genres and
time periods.
Sunday, Dec. 21
Basketball Club Zenit St. Petersburg
return to the northern capital this evening for a matchup with Krasny Oktyabr, a Volgograd-based basketball
club. Tickets for the game, which tips off
at 6 p.m. this evening, can be purchased
on the club’s website or at their arena,
Sibur Arena, on Krestovsky island.
Satisfy your sugar cravings during
Sweet New Year, an ongoing seasonal
festival at the Raduga shopping center.
Each weekend of December will welcome hungry visitors to taste hundreds
of different kinds of desserts made from
a plethora of sweet treats. Workshops
are open to visitors and seasonal gifts
can also be purchased for those rushing
to finish their New Year shopping.
Monday, Dec. 22
Pick out the latest fashions as holiday
gifts for loved ones or as early pres-
ents for yourself during the Christmas
Design Sale at Kraft on Obvodny Kanal, starting on Dec. 20 and continuing through Dec. 27. Designer clothes
will be on sale every day of the week
or you can buy something more festive to decorate the home while sipping on hot coffee and perusing the
various master classes.
Tuesday, Dec. 23
Meet Arctic explorers Fedor Konukhov and Viktor Simonov during SPIBA’s and Capital Legal Service’s
event “Arctic Expedition” this morning in the Mertens House business
center at 21 Nevsky Prospekt. The
meeting will discuss the explorers’
ongoing eco-social project and how
companies can use the project as a
unique marketing opportunity. Email
[email protected] by Dec. 22 if you
wish to attend.
To have your event included in
All About Town, email [email protected]
The St. Petersburg Times | www.sptimes.ru
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Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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Milonov Raids Gay Club With OMON
T H E S T PE T E R S BU RG T I M E S
Anti-gay lawmaker Vitaly Milonov,
backed by the OMON riot police,
raided a St Petersburg gay club late
Saturday evening. Milonov called the
police claiming that underage people
were present at a “freak party” in the
venue Central Station in violation of
Russian legislation after both he and
his supporters had been denied entrance by the club’s security guards.
When the OMON police arrived,
the officers and Milonov entered the
venue to check the identification of
those present. Fontanka.ru reported
that a “mass fight” between two dozen
of Milonov’s supporters, including
Krasnenkaya Rechka municipal deputy Konstantin Yerzin — also of United
Russia — and club visitors occurred
outside Central Station at the same
time. Three underage women, the
youngest being 15 years old, were allegedly found among club visitors and
taken to a police station.
According to Milonov, the teenagers were activists with United Russia’s
youth wing, Young Guard. In an interview with Fontanka.ru, he said that the
15-year-old girl went to the club deliberately to “expose debauchery.” “Such
children should be held up as an example to every school student,” Milonov said.
However, according to a later report, police said no teenagers were
present at Central Station.
Previously, Milonov used Young
Guard’s underage activists in an attempt to obstruct a screening during
the Side by Side LGBT rights film festival in November 2013. At least two
underage people sneaked into the nowdefunct Jam Hall movie house where
“Blue Is the Warmest Color” was
screened as part of the festival while
Milonov and his supporters were outside with the police, and went out demonstrating their identification papers
open on the page with their birthdates
to the press.
The festival screenings were intended for people aged 18 and over,
and IDs were checked at three subsequent control stands inside the film
theater.
“Milonov planted the two teenage
girls, who managed to sneak into the
room where the film was shown by deception,” Side by Side director Gulya
Sultanova told The St. Petersburg
Times on Tuesday.
“When they were in the room, Milonov found himself outside the movie
theater and started talking about being
called by minors, who were tied to their
chairs by ‘sodomites’ and unable to
According to
Milonov, the
teenagers were
activists with United
Russia’s youth wing.
Young Guard.
leave — this is his quote. Then they
stepped out with their papers to pose
for the cameras, saying ‘We’re 16 years
old.’ It’s still a mystery for me how they
managed to enter.”
Later, Milonov admitted that it was
his joint operation with Young Guard,
which he described as “sample purchase” (kontrolnaya zakupka).
“He admitted that it was a setup,
saying it was a ‘sample purchase’ to
check if we let minors enter,” Sultanova
said.
“When we checked it with lawyers,
it turned out that no public organizations or even officials have the legal
right to hold sample purchases. It
should be sanctioned by the Interior
Ministry as part of investigation, either
administrative or criminal. Everything
he invented with Young Guard regarding this ‘sample purchase’ was absolutely illegal.
British Tax Agents Raid
Museum for Putin’s Egg
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
The Faberge egg that President Vladimir Putin gave to the Hermitage Museum might have been bought in violation of EU tax regulations, according
to an investigation by the British authorities, a news report said.
British and German tax agents raided
a Russian-owned Faberge museum in
Germany’s Baden-Baden shortly before
Putin offered the Rothschild Faberge
clock egg at a ceremony this week, Britain’s The Times reported Thursday.
Baden-Baden museum director Sergei Avtonoshkin said investigators
were specifically looking for the Rothschild egg, The Times reported.
The founder of the Baden-Baden
museum, Russian billionaire and art
collector Alexander Ivanov, said there
was a “certain connection” between
the raid and the Hermitage ceremony
marking the 250th anniversary of the
St. Petersburg museum.
Ivanov accused Britain of having
staged the raid to thwart Putin’s plans
to present the egg to the Hermitage,
according to the report. But by the time
investigators arrived at Baden-Baden
on Dec. 1, the egg had apparently already left for Russia.
The Russian billionaire bought the
egg at a 2007 Christie’s auction in London for 8.9 million pounds ($800 million), The Times reported.
Ivanov has reportedly claimed he
then had the egg shipped to Russia —
which would exempt the purchase
from EU tax — but investigators suspect it was first transported to Ger-
many, according to the report. When
investigators raided the museum, Avtonoshkin, the director, told them that
the egg had been loaned to BadenBaden briefly for an exhibition and
then sent back to Moscow, The Times
quoted him as saying.
The raid comes on the heels of another allegation last month, linking
Russia to supposedly shady art deals.
Britain’s 2018 World Cup bid committee earlier accused Putin of having dispatched loyal oligarchs on “deniable”
missions to offer artworks in exchange
for votes in favor of Russia’s bid, the Sunday Times reported in late November.
The artworks in question supposedly included a Pablo Picasso painting
offered to UEFA president Michel Platini, and an additional landscape painting to FIFA voting member Michel
D’Hooghe of Belgium, according to
the report. The missions supposedly
took place before 2012, when Putin was
Russia’s prime minister.
Platini denied the claims as “total
fabrications,” according to the report.
But D’Hooghe — who is reportedly
under investigation along with four
others by world football body FIFA in
a new corruption probe related to the
World Cup bids, according to the
Washington Post — confirmed having
received the landscape painting.
D’Hooghe said he found the painting “absolutely ugly” and had expected
it to have no monetary value, the Sunday Times reported. He also said he did
not vote for Russia’s 2018 bid, according to the report.
SERGEY CHERNOV / SPT
By Sergey Chernov
A fight between two dozen Milonov supporters and visitors to the club broke out on Saturday.
“I think he used the same scheme
for Central Station, if any minors were
there at all, because the police stated
that no minors were found. So in this
case it looks like he probably invented
it, and there were no minors at all.”
When Milonov came with his bill
prohibiting the “promotion of sodomy,
lesbianism, bisexuality and transgenderness to minors” in 2011, he said gay
people were free to gather at gay clubs
out of sight of minors. The Central Station incident was the first time that the
group targeted a gay club.
“The social situation is worsening
again right now; there is inflation, it is
clear that a grave crisis is coming soon
due to Russia’s policy regarding
Ukraine and the sanctions, and by every sign it’s evident that they are anxious to start a wave of homophobia
again,” Sultanova said.
“It’s a very winning theme to distract the attention of masses, lest they
think that sausage gets more expensive
and that nothing is available from the
shops soon, but think about how gays
and lesbians deprave youth. Perhaps
Milonov will come up with more of his
initiatives to be in the spotlight. It’s
only to distract the attention from a
complex socio-political situation in the
country to some imaginary foes.
“This is a striking, exciting subject
that everybody has their opinion about.
And we know what opinion most Russians share after being fed for several
years with tabloid stuff and utter nonsense. Apart from that, Milonov has
lately lost some political capital because of the scandals over semi-criminal activities of his supporters.”
In late October, one of Milonov’s
aides was detained for allegedly robbing the clients of a chain of strip clubs,
the local media reported.
Apart from assisting Milonov, Nikita Yashkin was an activist with Parental Watch, a group formed to fight
pedophiles. Yashkin was detained
during a massive police raid on 13
strip clubs, whose staff reportedly
put “knock-out drops” in the drinks
of their clients before stealing money
from their credit cards. Yashkin was
a frequent sight among anti-gay
counter-protesters at LGBT right
rallies.
According to the media, Valentin
Vereshchagin, the chief of staff for
deputy governor Mikhail Mokretsov,
who was hospitalized in July when
spotted walking without any pants on
Bolshaya Morskaya Ulitsa in central
St. Petersburg, was one of the network’s victims. The Investigative Committee opened a criminal case into the
organization of a criminal community.
Yashkin, whose job was to use force
against the clients who attempted to
resist, reportedly assisted Milonov in
collecting humanitarian aid for the selfproclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic
in eastern Ukraine and was identified
as Milonov’s aide when detained.
The network’s owner, Yury Rakh,
was also linked to Milonov, the St. Petersburg edition of Novaya Gazeta reported on its website on Oct. 30. Rakh
reportedly assisted Milonov in collecting humanitarian aid for the Donetsk
People’s Republic and supported him
in debates on social networks. Milonov
admitted being a frequent visitor to
Rakh’s restaurant, Eleven.
Late last month, Federation Council member Konstantin Dobrynin
asked the chairman of the Investigative
Committee, Alexander Bastrykin, to
check photographs of Milonov for extremism, Fontanka.ru reported. In the
photographs, Milonov posed with firearms in a T-shirt with the inscription
“Orthodoxy or Death,” which had
been included in the Ministry of Justice’s register of extremist materials as
stirring up enmity between different
religious confessions and declaring the
superiority of Orthodoxy over other
beliefs. The photographs were allegedly taken in Donbass in Ukraine.
Dobrynin also requested that Milonov’s actions be checked for other offenses as well, such as terrorism and the
illegal acquisition and possession of
weapons. Apart from this, Dobrynin
asked Bastrykin to see if there was an
opportunity to have Milonov involuntarily committed for psychiatric evaluation. He wrote that the grounds for restriction of legal capacity could result
from such an assessment. Earlier, Dobrynin filed two complaints with the
Prosecutor General’s Office over Milonov’s interview with the Slon.ru website in March. Dobrynin asked the
agency to check Milonov’s statements
for extremism, but it said no signs of the
offense were found in the interview.
РЕКЛАМА
4 ❖ Wednesday, December 17, 2014
N
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www.sptimes.ru | The St. Petersburg Times
Zenit Draws
Dutch Giants in
Europa League
Grozny Arson Attack Provokes Outcry
By Allison Quinn
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
By Gus Peters
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
SERGEI BABINETS / FACEBOOK
The head of the Kremlin’s council on
human rights, Mikhail Fedotov, has
spoken to the Chechen government
about ensuring the safety of the republic’s human rights activists after a
group of masked men set fire to their
headquarters in Grozny on Dec. 13, as
at least two of the activists fled the republic on Sunday after briefly being
detained.
The arson attack, the latest in a string
of incidents as fallout from the Dec. 4 terrorist attack on the city continues, comes
days after another group of masked men
burned down at least six homes of the
relatives of suspected militants, according to Memorial rights activists.
Fedotov on Dec. 13 warned
Chechen officials that “if something
happens to the human rights activists, it
would be incredibly stupid,” Novaya
Gazeta reported. It was unclear which
officials he had spoken to.
Fedotov’s warning, apparently in
reference to the arson attack, came
shortly after a sanctioned rally in
Grozny against terrorism, reportedly
attended by 50,000 people. The ouster
of Igor Kalyapin, the head of the Committee Against Torture and a member
of the Kremlin’s human rights council,
was one of the demands made by demonstrators at that event.
After Kalyapin appealed to Russia’s
prosecutor general last week over
Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov’s
statements calling for relatives of militants to be held responsible — a statement that resulted in their homes being
burned down — Kadyrov accused him
of supporting terrorism, writing on Instagram on Dec. 12 that Chechen authorities had information “that Kalyapin had carried dollars from [deceased
terrorist leader] Doku Umarov’s
“There will be a new, better [office], and we will be able to help even more residents of Chechnya,” Babinets said.
brother to Chechnya and transferred
them here.”
Kadyrov later went further and said
Kalyapin’s entire organization was collaborating with terrorists.
The offices of Kalyapin’s group
were then set ablaze on the evening of
Dec. 13. Sergei Babinets, a lawyer for
the Committee Against Torture, posted
photos of the group’s building on fire to
Facebook and confirmed that employees had to be evacuated.
“It’s true that we were being monitored and were chased out by people in
masks,” Babinets wrote.
Kalyapin took to Facebook to describe three men with an object that ap-
peared to be a gun trying unsuccessfully
to break into the group’s office before it
was set alight later that evening.
Babinets and Dmitry Dmitriyev, another member of the group, were detained briefly on Sunday before being
let go. By Sunday evening, they had
left Chechnya and “would at least for
one night be staying outside the territory,” Dmitry Utukin, a lawyer for the
rights group, wrote on Twitter.
Kadyrov’s outspoken statements on
Instagram have seemed to serve as a
catalyst for much of the pandemonium
embroiling Chechnya since the Dec. 4
attack, with the homes of militants’ relatives burned to the ground just a day
after he urged that they be held liable
for failing to stop the terrorist attack.
The accusation that Kalyapin was
supporting terrorism, which Kalyapin
himself has refuted, may also have triggered an attack on Kalyapin’s press
conference on Dec. 11, which was
crashed by unknown men who threw
eggs at participants.
Babinets said in comments on Facebook on Dec. 13 that the group would
continue their activities despite the destruction of their headquarters.
“Well, our office burned down… no
big deal. There will be a new, better one,
and we will be able to help even more
residents of Chechnya,” he wrote.
Russian Arms Manufacturers’ Growth Bucks Global Trend
By Matthew Bodner
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
Despite a global arms market downturn, Russian firms’ sales shot up 20
percent between 2012 and 2013, raking
in $31 billion last year amid Moscow’s
rearmament campaign according to a
report released Monday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
“The remarkable increases in Russian companies’ arms sales in both 2012
and 2013 are in large part due to uninADVERTISING
terrupted investments in military procurement by the Russian government
during the 2000s,” SIPRI senior researcher Siemon Wezeman was quoted
as saying in a statement.
Russia’s success, with 10 Russian
companies making SIPRI’s top 100 list
of global arms makers for 2013, bucks
the weapon trade’s current slump. Although the global arms industry brought
in a total of $402 billion in 2013, sales
have been declining for the past three
years, falling 3.9 percent in 2012.
However, sales fell only 2 percent
in 2013, as Russian companies and
newcomers from other emerging markets pushed up sales significantly, the
report said.
SIPRI’s report credits Moscow’s 20
trillion ruble ($344 billion) rearmament
drive for insulating the industry, already
the world’s largest exporter after the
U.S., from the global downturn.
“These investments are explicitly intended to modernize national production
capabilities and weapons in order to bring
them on par with major U.S. and Western European arms producers’ capabilities and technologies,” Wezeman said.
The Tactical Missiles Corporation
saw an 118 percent increase in sales
over 2012. Almaz-Antey, a large producer of Russian tanks and other armored vehicles, saw sales increase by
34 percent. Meanwhile, the United
Aircraft Corporation, a conglomerate
of Russia’s most important aircraft
manufacturers, increased sales by 20
percent last year, the report said.
Declining oil prices have combined
with Western sanctions to drive the
ruble’s value down nearly 45 percent to
the dollar this year.
SIPRI’s Wezeman, one of the report’s
authors, told The St. Petersburg Times
that the state of Russia’s economy may
have a larger impact on its defense industry than Western sanctions.
“A substantial part of the increased output of the Russian companies is the result of growing deliveries
to the Russian armed forces. Plans
for more increases in spending on
new equipment have been announced, but that was before the current crisis and they may well be delayed or adjusted to lower levels of
deliveries,” Wezeman said.
According to the head of the State
Duma’s defense committee, Admiral
Vladimir Komoyedov, Russia spent
around 2.5 trillion rubles ($43 billion) on
defense in 2014, and will set a new record
for spending in 2015 with a 3.3 trillion
ruble ($58 billon) defense budget.
Meanwhile, Russia’s status as the
world’s second largest exporter appears to be shielded from domestic
economic woes, according to President
Vladimir Putin. In November, Putin
said that Russia in 2014 signed $7.5 billion worth of new export contracts,
with a portfolio of future orders reaching $50 billion — figures that closely
adhere to 2013’s performance.
Russian Premier League leaders Zenit
St. Petersburg learned on Monday that
they will face Dutch club PSV Eindhoven in the first knockout round of the
UEFA Europa League in February.
Zenit was relegated to Europe’s
second-tier club competition by losing
to French side AS Monaco 2-0 on Dec.
9 in the UEFA Champions League,
knocking them out of the continent’s
most prestigious tournament after
struggling in what was considered one
of the weakest groups.
Despite two wins over Portuguese
league leaders Benfica, they lost twice
to German club Bayer Leverkusen and
their loss to Monaco in the last game of
the group stage in a must-win match
was the final nail in the coffin.
It was a disappointing result for Zenit, who expected to do better under
the guidance of Portuguese manager
Andre Villas-Boas after cruising
through qualification to secure a spot
in the group stage.
But Villas-Boas does not plan for
his side to be complacent against their
upcoming opponents. “We drew a
tough opponent today with a strong
tradition in Dutch and European football,” he said in comments published
on the club’s English-language website.
“They have a very strong squad… only
excellent work will allow us to demonstrate our strength that was on display
throughout the course of the season.
“So we are already concentrating on
our work for training and studying our
opponent. We are going to be keeping a
close eye on how the situation develops.”
A disadvantage the club will face regardless of its preparation is that the
Dutch club will be in midseason form
while the St. Petersburg side will be
playing their first competitive game in
over two months when the two teams
meet. Zenit’s last league game was a 4-0
victory over visiting Krasnodar on Dec.
6 and they won’t play another Russian
Premier League game until March.
PSV, although currently leading
their domestic league, finished second
in their UEFA Europa League group
behind Zenit’s rivals Dinamo Moskva.
PSV lost both times 1-0 against Dinamo in their two meetings, eventually
finishing 10 points behind the grouptopping Muscovites.
The Dutch club’s current squad features 20-year-old forward Memphis
Depay, who played in four of the Netherlands’ World Cup matches this summer in Brazil during the nation’s thirdplace finish, veteran Mexican midfielder Andres Guardado and Dutch
forward Luuk de Jong.
While PSV’s struggles against Dinamo in the Europa League can be seen
as an encouraging sign for Zenit, who defeated the Muscovite club 3-2 in their
only meeting of the season so far, Zenit’s
Ukrainian midfielder Anatoly Timoshchuk warned against judging PSV by
these results. “Dutch teams traditionally
try and play open football,” he said in
comments posted on the club’s Englishlanguage website. “They are a perennial
favorite and the current leader in their
own league. They played against Dinamo
in the group stage, but we shouldn’t look
too much into this result. This is the playoff round, not the group stage, and we
are going to face a solid opponent against
whom we should demonstrate our own
strength and fight for the trophy.”
The first game of the home-andaway matchup between Zenit and PSV
will be on Feb. 19 in Eindhoven. Zenit
will then welcome the Dutchmen to St.
Petersburg’s Petrovsky Stadium for the
second match a week later on Feb. 26.
The aggregate winner over the two
matches will advance, but in the event
of a tie the team with the most away
goals goes through.
Business
B R I E F
TV Downplays Crisis
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — While the ruble collapsed 10 percent on Monday,
making headlines around the world,
some Russians may have been unaware
of the recent intensification of their
currency’s woes.
A prime-time news bulletin broadcast by state-owned Channel One at 9
p.m. on Monday only featured a short
segment on the currency drop — the
fifth item on the news program — after
reports about the terrorist attack in
Australia, the killing of a terrorist suspect by law enforcement authorities in
Russia and two announcements by
President Vladimir Putin on military
parades and construction targets.
When the report on the ruble was
shown it blamed the decline in value
on the falling price of oil.
The apparent unwillingness of Russian state-owned media to give airtime
to the ruble’s troubles — particularly
among television channels, which are
traditionally much more tightly controlled by the Kremlin — likely reflects
the political sensitivity of the issue, and
a desire to avoid fueling panic.
Most Russians get their news from
state television, which has closely mirrored Putin’s anti-American rhetoric
during the Ukraine crisis.
Property Sales Up
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — The elite property market in Moscow is booming this
year with more than $1 billion in sales as
new offerings and the ruble’s slide
against the dollar spur wealthy Russians
to safeguard their earnings in real estate, a report released Monday found.
February and March saw record demand for top class residential real estate, with over 67 deals closed in February, according to the report by real
estate consultancy IntermarkSavills.
The total number of deals declined
slightly from 518 in 2013 to an estimated 502 in 2014.
The strong demand is tied to the
falling ruble, which has lost more than
45 percent of its value under pressure
from sinking oil prices and Western
sanctions over Russia’s role in the
Ukraine crisis. Russians in all market
segments see real estate investments in
Moscow as a safe bet, and for a certain
wealthy upper class with income in
hard currency, ruble-priced apartments
now appear attractively cheap.
The average price of properties
listed in dollars is now $23,900 per
square meter, nearly three times the
average price of those listed in rubles,
which cost about 508,000 rubles per
square meter ($8,500).
New Crimean Note
■ MOSCOW (SPT) — Crimean winemakers have designed a 200-ruble banknote for circulation in Russia with images of the recently annexed peninsula
intended to channel the Crimean spirit,
inspire patriots — and sell more wine.
The mock-ups, which feature
Crimea’s Ayu-Dag mountain on one side
and picturesque vineyards on the other,
were sent to Russia’s Central Bank with
a request to release the note as tender,
the Izvestia newspaper reported on Dec.
12, citing a letter from the vice president
of the Russian winemakers union and
general director of Crimean wine company Legendy Kryma (Legends of
Crimea), Mikhail Shtyrlin.
Russia does not currently have a
200-ruble note in circulation.
Moscow’s annexation of Crimea
from Ukraine in March provoked outrage in the West, but caused a surge of
patriotism in Russia. Commemorative
10-ruble coins have already been released, and the Central Bank said this
week that it would circulate a Crimeathemed 100-ruble note next year.
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5
Ruble Falls Further as Rate Hike Fails
By Howard Amos
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
The ruble reversed a 10 percent surge
Tuesday, recording new lows amid falling oil prices and sparking fears that an
emergency rate hike from the Central
Bank would not be enough to support
the collapsing currency.
The Russian currency jumped
sharply Tuesday morning, strengthening to 58.1 rubles against the greenback
shortly after trading opened in Moscow
on an overnight announcement that the
Central Bank had increased interest
rates from 10.5 percent to 17 percent.
But the ruble then fell back, and
shortly before midday was down almost
1.5 percent against the dollar at 65.4.
“The Central Bank action is failing
— ruble weakening again as oil prices
weaken again,” said Timothy Ash, an
emerging markets analyst at Standard
Bank, in a Tuesday note to investors.
“The Central Bank cannot allow
this move to fail, they will now have to
come back with a big, big currency intervention, or yet more rate hikes.”
Oil prices continued their steady
slide Tuesday with global benchmark
Brent crude dropping below $60 a barrel for the first time since 2009.
The ruble volatility comes after
Russian currency recorded its largest
one-day fall for 15 years on Monday,
collapsing 10 percent against the greenback and bringing its decline since
January to more than 49 percent.
With its largest interest rate hike
since the 1990s, the Central Bank is
betting that a higher return on deposits
and savings will make the ruble more
attractive, easing the pressure exerted
by a declining oil price and Western
VLADIMIR FILONOV / SPT
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www.sptimes.ru | Wednesday, December 17, 2014
A display showing the rate at 58 rubles to the American dollar. The value of the currency has declined by 49 percent since January.
sanctions on Moscow imposed as a result of the Ukraine crisis.
But some analysts immediately
warned that the rate hike will not be
enough to stabilize the situation.
“This state of affairs required extraordinary measures from the Central Bank
— and such measures have now been
taken,” analysts from Sberbank CIB said
in a note to investors Tuesday morning.
“Nevertheless, we believe that even
these steps may prove insufficient.”
The rate increase significantly increases risks of Russia entering a severe recession next year.
The Central Bank said Monday —
before the announcement of rate rises
— that the economy could contract as
much as 4.5 percent in 2015 if oil prices
average at $60 a barrel through the year.
The ruble’s tumble in recent days has
sparked heavy criticism of Russia’s authorities from investors and lawmakers.
“The fall of the ruble and the equity
market is not only a reaction to the low
price of oil and sanctions but to a distrust of the government’s economic
measures,” former Finance Minister
Alexei Kudrin wrote on Twitter in the
early hours of Tuesday morning.
Oleg Nilov, a deputy in Russia’s State
Duma from the Just Russia party, called
for parliament to hold an emergency session with the government in the wake of
the Central Bank’s interest rate decision,
Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported Tuesday.
Others said that the Central Bank and
her chairwoman Elvira Nabiullina had
disastrously miscalculated the situation.
“Lack of action had left the stability
of the very financial system at stake. I
am not sure whether Nabiullina can
survive this,” analyst Ash said.“The
Central Bank’s credibility is in tatters.”
ADVERTISING
Conditional Currency
Making a Comeback
By Anna Dolgov
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
Along with the flashy cars of the new
rich and the garbage bin food scavenging
of the new poor, a distinctive sign of Russia in the 1990s were store price tags in a
non-official currency — “u.e.”
Amid the decade’s economic upheavals, when the ruble could bleed chunks
of value overnight, the u.e. — which
stands for the Russian words “uslovnaya
yedinitsa,” or “conditional unit” and is
pronounced “oo-yeh” — was a response
by storekeepers to soaring inflation and
a way to avoid having to replace price
tags on a daily basis. The u.e.-to-ruble
exchange rate was pegged to the U.S.
dollar.
As the economy stabilized, the conditional currency mostly disappeared,
replaced by the familiar ruble, and the
u.e. was relegated to a memory of a bygone turbulent era. Aside from a brief
comeback in the 2008-09 economic crisis, the conditional unit disappeared
from view.
Until now.
With the ruble down almost 50 percent against the dollar so far this year —
and over 14 percent just in the past three
trading days — the u.e was back in circulation this week, certainly as a rumor and
possibly as tender.
Moscow radio station Govorit
Moskva on Sunday reported spotting
prices at a hardware store in the capital’s
suburb of Khimki listed in the infamous
conditional units. The radio station also
posted photographs of the price tags on
its website.
The report prompted a flurry of speculation and reprints on Russian social
media and news websites.
The government’s official newspaper
Rossiiskaya Gazeta published an online
report late Sunday night suggesting that
the rumors were false — but stopping
just short of saying so outright.
“Rumors about a switch to conditional units have indeed appeared,” the
head of the online trade department at
Russia’s Association of Electronic Commerce, Ivan Kurguzov, was quoted as
saying. “A range of Internet stores are
thinking about switching to u.e. or intend to change their price tags several
times a day.”
Rossiiskaya Gazeta said it had
checked the websites of “popular Internet shops,” and found no trace of u.e.denominated prices.
The problem was that in some cases
there were no prices in rubles, either.
The website of a hardware store in
Khimki, ArtReality.ru, when checked by
The St. Petersburg Times early Monday,
offered dashes instead of prices for items
added to an online shopping cart, and a
note asking customers to leave their
phone number so that a “manager”
could contact them to “agree on the
price.”
But store owners considering listing
prices in u.e. are not allowed to ditch the
ruble entirely.
“Under the law, the customer must
be informed about prices in rubles,”
Rossiiskaya Gazeta quoted Dmitry Yanin, the head of an association of consumers’ groups, as saying. “That is, the
stamped price tag must be in rubles. But
nobody prohibits listing next to it the
price in dollars or euros. Or even in [Chinese] yuan! This would not be considered a violation of the law.”
By the early 2000s, the exchange rate
for the units stopped matching that of
the dollar, and began to correspond to
that of the euro. That meant higher
prices, as the euro was gaining in value.
Opinion
www.sptimes.ru | Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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6
Russia Is Preparing for a New Arms Race
By Alexander Golts
T
he Kremlin promised to give the world a
New Year’s gift this December: a new
version of Russia’s military doctrine. Last
fall, President Vladimir Putin ordered
changes to the country’s main unclassified document in response to the Ukrainian crisis and U.S.
plans to deploy a missile defense system. The
world froze in horrified anticipation: After Putin
justified the annexation of Crimea on the pretext
that the peninsula is “sacred ground” for Russia,
it seemed anything was possible in terms of military doctrine.
What’s more, frightening rumors emerged
from time to time suggesting that Russia might
introduce a provision to the document allowing
for a pre-emptive nuclear strike — that is, indicating Moscow’s readiness to start a world war. The
worst part is that, in the context of recent events,
that idea did not seem so implausible. In fact, four
years ago, Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev promised in an interview with Izvestia
that such changes would appear in the doctrine.
Now we can breathe a sigh of relief. A senior Security Council official told news agencies that “the
article concerning Russia’s use of nuclear weapons
remains unchanged in the new draft of the military
doctrine.” The voice of reason won out.
After all, had the military brass inserted a
clause permitting a pre-emptive strike, the United
States would definitely have reinstated the concept of a “launch on warning” retaliatory strike
whereby it launches its missiles immediately after
learning that the enemy has launched theirs. Recall that U.S. President Barack Obama instructed
the Pentagon 18 months ago to explore the possibility of eliminating the concept of a retaliatory
strike from U.S. military doctrine.
However, there is bad news along with the good.
According to that same source, or perhaps some
other, Russia’s military doctrine will now include
something called “non-nuclear deterrence.”
The source told journalists, “Objective reality
is now such that new threats and military challenges require a response. In particular, these include hybrid war, our potential enemy’s plans for
implementing the concept of a ‘geocentric theater
of operations,’ a ‘global strike’ and a ‘networkcentric space.’ A non-nuclear system of containment is one such response,” he said. He added
that the air force and navy would shoulder the
main burden of ensuring that “containment.”
The idea of nuclear deterrence based on the
threat of “mutually assured destruction” is clear.
The question here is how Russia can mount such
a threat without nuclear weapons. At the very
least it would have to achieve parity with NATO
in conventional weapons.
However, that is impossible at present. Even
after the Kremlin spends the colossal sums it has
allocated for modernizing the army, NATO forces
will still outnumber Russia’s several times over.
What’s more, Russia’s negative demographic
trend makes it physically impossible for the army
to field more than 800,000 men, with the result
that even if Russia were to miraculously produce
as many ships and airplanes as NATO has, it
would still lack the personnel to man them.
The experts I consulted cynically suggested
that “non-nuclear deterrence” refers to a conventional arms race — one that will completely ruin
the national economy but that will generate huge
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profits for a handful of officials overseeing the
various branches of the armed forces.
However, “non-nuclear deterrence” very possibly refers to the crusade the Kremlin has announced against “color revolutions,” which it believes Western intelligence services conspire to
unleash. An unnamed official involved in revising
Russia’s military doctrine stated: “Events in and
around Ukraine have added challenges and
threats with which everything before pales in
comparison.” This suggests that “non-nuclear deterrence” might refer to the very type of hybrid
war Russia is currently waging in Ukraine.
Part of this strategy might include making selfdeclared territories allies. The same unnamed
source told reporters: “The updated version of
the military doctrine will include an article on the
creation of a single defense space with Abkhazia
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and South Ossetia as military allies of Russia.”
That source stated very candidly that in the current geopolitical situation “it is an extremely important doctrinal statement … especially given
the fact that Russia has literally only one or two
military allies.” He added that the article in question is “probably only declarative in nature for
now. It has yet to be given concrete expression,
although that might not happen.”
Or will it? Perhaps Moscow will soon announce that it recognizes the independence of the
self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk republics
seized by pro-Russian separatists and officially list
them as allies. In that way Putin will form his
greater “Russian world.”
Alexander Golts is deputy editor of the online
newspaper Yezhednevny Zhurnal.
T
Caucasus Emirate Is a Growing Threat to Russia
By Gordon M. Hahn
S
ome Russian officials have suggested that
the Dec. 4 attack in Grozny, which killed
14 police and wounded 36, was orchestrated from abroad, specifically by the Islamic State. To be sure, Russians occasionally exaggerate the role of foreign jihadists in attacks
carried out by the notorious North Caucasusbased Caucasus Emirate. However, in this case,
the Russian claim could well be accurate.
The attackers themselves issued a video stating
they had been sent by amir Hamzat, the top amir of
the Caucasus Emirate’s Chechnya network. They
emphasized that they had taken the Islamic loyalty
oath to the Caucasus Emirate’s amir Ali Abu Muhammad al-Dagestani, previously amir of the Caucasus Emirate’s Dagestan network — the most
powerful of the four networks in the Caucasus.
The Caucasus Emirate has been part of the
global jihadi alliance for many years.
However, the Caucasus Emirate is deeply embedded in the global jihadi revolutionary movement which the Islamic State and al-Qaida are
fighting to lead. The Caucasus Emirate has been
part of the global jihadi alliance for many years and
its predecessor organization, the Chechen Republic
of Ichkeriya, had ties to it for nearly two decades,
though you would not know it from most Western
media and think tank coverage.
Since the Caucasus Emirate’s founding in October 2007 and the shift to a jihadist profile, group
operatives have been caught recruiting, acquiring
funds and plotting attacks. At home in the Caucasus and elsewhere in Russia, including Moscow,
Caucasus Emirate operatives have carried out 55
suicide bombings and nearly 3,000 attacks overall.
More recently, the Caucasus Emirate’s capacity
has been declining at home because since late 2011
its forces and recruiting pool have been drained by
an exodus to Syria and now Iraq. Former Caucasus
Emirate operatives are now amirs of numerous jihadi groups fighting under both the Islamic State
and al-Qaida banners in the Levant.
The most infamous of these amirs is Tarkhan
Batirashvili, nom de guerre Abu Umar al-Shishani.
The Caucasus Emirate’s previous amir, Dokku
Umarov — poisoned to death by Russian intelligence in September 2013 — dispatched Batirashvili
and several other members to the Levant in early
2012 and initially financed their activity there, hoping to gain some control over the Caucasus emigre
mujahedin there and ensure their return later.
All became amirs of Caucasus- or foreign-dominated brigades. Others they had commanded
would become amirs of other jihadi groups. For example, Umarov’s emissary to the Syrian mujahedin,
Salahuddin Shishani, broke with Batirashvili and
now heads a group often referred to as the Caucasus Emirate in the Levant.
In 2013 Batirashvili joined the Islamic State and
quickly rose up its ranks, becoming the military
amir of the group’s northern front in the same year.
He is said to have led the Islamic State’s conquest of
Anbar Province, which enabled amir Abu Bakr alBaghdadi to declare the Islamic State or Caliphate,
and reports indicate Batirashvili may have been
promoted be Islamic State’s overall military amir.
Here, analysts may have confused Tarkhan
with his elder brother Tamaz. Tarkhan has insisted repeatedly that he plans to return to the
Caucasus and energize the Caucasus Emirate’s jihad at some point.
Tamaz, according to their father, has always
been the leader of the two. He is reported to be running the Islamic State’s Syrian operations and to be
an extremely secretive operative even as far as Islamic State leaders go. He is very likely running and
funneling the funds that finance his brother’s operations. Other important operatives, such as former
amir Umarov’s brothers, operate out of Turkey and
reportedly help transport Caucasus Emirate fighters to and from Syria.
Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov — granted
not always the most reliable source — claimed that
Umarov’s brother Isa was involved in the Grozny
attack.
Moreover, given the involvement of hundreds
of Caucasus Emirate fighters in the Levant and
the deaths of many hundreds, even thousands by
now, Caucasus Emirate amir Dagestani has been
deeply involved in the politics surrounding the
conflict over control of the jihad in the Levant
and globally. He recently issued a statement along
with several of the global jihad’s most prominent
theo-ideologists, including Abu Muhammad
Asem al-Maqdisi, calling on the Islamic State to
use more moderate tactics and for a rapprochement between it and al-Qaida.
In sum, the Caucasus Emirate has deep ties
and dark networks in both the Islamic State and
al-Qaida in the Levant. Groups associated with
either jihadi side could have provided financing
and perhaps some fighters or other assistance for
the Grozny attack.
Indeed, the Caucasus Emirate’s Chechen network needs all the help it can get. Since 2011, the
Chechen network has been the weakest or one of
the weakest of the Caucasus Emirate’s four core
networks, depending on the year.
Last year it was the weakest, carrying out a
mere 30 attacks. Caucasus Emirate amir Dagestani called for more large-scale attacks involving greater numbers of mujahedin in one of his
first addresses as amir, but the Chechen network
likely would have needed assistance to carry out
an attack such as the one in Grozny.
It is certainly possible that the operation was
purely a Caucasus Emirate operation, supported
by the more robust Dagestani network. But make
no mistake about it: The Caucasus Emirate is now
a global jihadi group with networks in Russia, Europe, the Levant and elsewhere.
Gordon M. Hahn is the author of “Russia’s Islamic
Threat,” “Russia’s Revolution From Above, 19852000” and “The Caucasus Emirate Mujahedin:
Global Jihadism in Russia’s North Caucasus and
Beyond.” He has been a senior associate and visiting
fellow at the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, the Kennan Institute in Washington D.C.,
and the Hoover Institution.
O
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Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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7
Russia Doesn’t Need Luck, Just Better Policy
By Mark Adomanis
R
ussia is a mess right now. No, the current economic problems aren’t as bad
as the 2009 crisis, much less the crippling 1998 government debt default,
but they’re plenty bad on their own merits. Russian companies are almost totally isolated from
the Western markets where they were accustomed
to raising capital.
It’s not just that these companies cannot access
new loans: The plunging value of the ruble makes
servicing past borrowing substantially more expensive in real terms. There are some bills coming
due that simply cannot be met without substantial
assistance from the Central Bank.
Most analysis I’ve seen suggests that the Russian government has sufficient cash on hand to
prevent the mass default of Russian corporations
on their foreign currency denominated debt. At
‘Russia is integrated
enough into the global
economy that its trajectory
is deeply influenced by
forces totally outside of the
Kremlin’s control.’
an absolute minimum it is clear, though, that bailing out irresponsible borrowers is a very poor use
of taxpayer money that was intended to serve as a
welfare fund.
When you consider the inevitable growth in
pension obligations due to the aging of Russia’s
population, handing Rosneft a big pile of cash
doesn’t just look like a bad idea, it looks downright crazy.
So, yes, things are bad and they’re likely to get
worse, particularly now that the oil market is in
deep turmoil and prices are plunging at their most
rapid rate since the midst of the global financial
crisis.
But why have things suddenly taken such a
massive turn for the worse? What explains the
sharp downward plunge of an economy that, until
quite recently, was, if not dynamic, than at least
stable?
Among many analysts, the answer is simple:
“Putin’s luck ran out.” At Bloomberg View, for
example, Leonid Bershidsky wrote a column simply titled “Putin Can’t Handle Life Without
Luck.” Brian Whitmore, at RFE/RL, wrote a
broadly similar article which heavily emphasized
the point that Putin’s “luck” had finally turned.
Proponents of this hypothesis are largely in
agreement that, under Putin, Russia has always
been incompetent and shambolic but that these
deficiencies were totally papered over by an accidental increase in world commodity prices. The
recent downturn, then, is merely a regression to
the mean, Russia performing as poorly as it
“should” have for the past 15 years.
There is clearly some truth to this argument:
Not even the most ardent Putinist would claim
that he caused the world price of oil to increase
sharply in the years after he came to power. Russia is integrated enough into the global economy
that its trajectory is deeply influenced by forces
totally outside of the Kremlin’s control, particularly market prices for energy and metals.
And it is true that, on the whole, these forces
have been more positive than not, and that Russia
was well served by trends in the global commodities markets.
But anyone who thinks that a surge in oil prices
must automatically lead to material prosperity
should take a look at Iran, Venezuela or Nigeria,
massive energy exporters that never experienced
even a fraction of Russia’s economic dynamism.
An increase in oil prices gives a government
the opportunity to gets its financial house in order but it absolutely does not force it to do so.
The ranks of oil exporters have always been full
of places with chronic budget deficits, massive
piles of debt and totally out of control consumer
inflation.
By and large, Russia in the years before the
financial crisis followed the standard economic
textbook to the letter: It paid down its sovereign
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debt way ahead of schedule, it stocked away tens
of billions of dollars in various reserve funds and
it prevented the overly rapid appreciation of its
currency.
The financial crisis hit Russia harder than any
other large economy, but its prior prudence had
given it lots of “ammunition,” with which it could
respond. Russian economic policy since the crisis
was a bit less orthodox and stingy; when oil prices
rebounded in 2010 and 2011 the influx of funds
was not saved but was instead spent, but inflation
was coming down to an unexceptional level of
about 6 percent and the government continued to
run balanced budgets.
That is to say that Russia’s economic policy
was, on the whole, pretty reasonable: The government didn’t spend more money than it took in, it
had (mostly) brought inflation under control, and
it had committed to modest reductions in tariffs as
a condition of its World Trade Organization membership. People had enough faith in the system’s
stability that the ruble’s fluctuations were within
very narrow bounds.
As I hope the above overview makes clear,
Russia’s policies have changed rather drastically.
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Almost everything that I’ve mentioned above —
fiscal responsibility, a tentative openness to foreign goods, effective monetary policy — has
changed.
Much more than “luck,” the recent problems
are attributable to it doing stupid things like annexing part of its neighbor, banning the import
of foreign foodstuffs and attempting fiscally ruinous increases in defense spending. It’s not “bad
luck” that the ruble is crashing, it’s the easily
foreseeable consequence of a sharp anti-Western
turn in policy and a rapid deterioration in the
business environment — symbolized by the seizure of Bashneft.
“Luck” didn’t cause Russia’s prior economic
success, it isn’t causing the current problems and it
won’t do anything to rescue Putin. That is to say
that the good results were largely due to good
policy, and the bad results are largely due to terrible policy.
The path out of the crisis is as simple as it is
politically unlikely: Stop making terrible policy.
Mark Adomanis is an MA/MBA candidate at the
University of Pennsylvania’s Lauder Institute.
T
Forget Dollars, Start Buying Rubles
By L. Todd Wood
B
oth Russians and foreigners living in
Russia have been hurt recently by the
severe devaluation of the ruble as the
Russian currency has lost 50 percent
of its value over the last few years. The last few
days have been especially brutal as ruble fell
past 58 to the dollar on Friday. The free fall of
the price of crude oil globally has pressured the
Russian economy and is directly related to the
ruble’s fall.
Many Russians are worried that the ruble
could hit 100 or even higher to the dollar and are
changing their rubles to dollars or euros at every
opportunity as panic sets in.
However, I believe there are signs in the market that at this point, this could be exactly the
wrong strategy to save your wealth. Perhaps
now is the time to begin easing back into the
Russian currency.
First, we could be seeing a bottoming in
the price of crude oil on the international
market. Though the Brent oil global benchmark slid to $62 a barrel on Friday, many
remain optimistic. Early last week in Kuwait
City, Kuwait Petroleum Corporation’s CEO
Nizar Al-Adsani said: “I think oil prices will
stay around the level of $65 for six or seven
months until OPEC changes its production
policy, or recovery in world economic
growth become more clear, or a geopolitical
tension arises.”
In addition, this week the U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA) administrator Adam
Sieminski said that the decline in prices would
start to affect U.S. production next year.
The EIA also cut the estimated average price
for West Texas Intermediate, or WTI, to $62.75
in 2015.
Oil futures are obviously a forward looking
indicator so they will only start to rise when the
market sees production slowing and begin to
forecast tighter supply.
It will take a while for production to be taken
offline as many of the exploration projects already started will take some time to complete.
The point is that new drilling will slow. That is
what will cause oil to bottom. We may be at that
point or close to it for the U.S.
Although much of the shale oil projects in
the U.S. can be profitable below $50, many
weaker hands will be unprofitable and forced
out of production.
Saudi Arabia has a much cheaper production
cost and can wait out this pendulum swing in
price. U.S. production is the key to watch as the
Saudis are protecting market share.
Finally, Russia, as well as Europe, may both
be looking for a way out of this diplomatic crisis.
Europe is hurting economically.
The loss of the Russian market for many European goods obviously has not helped the fiscal
situation in an already fragile Europe. Even
Germany is starting to feel the pain of slowing
growth.
The European Central Bank is now looking
to start its own quantitative easing program to
kick-start Europe and prevent deflation. Further
sanctions or conflict are not in Russia’s or Europe’s interest. Perhaps there is a grand bargain
that can be achieved to prevent further economic damage in the east or the west.
The point is to try and perceive the inflection
point when the ruble will stop falling against
other global currencies.
With oil possibly bottoming and world leaders searching for a diplomatic solution, perhaps
we are near this shift. It could be time to start
buying rubles instead of selling.
L. Todd Wood, formerly an emerging market bond trader in New York, is the author
of “Currency.”
Arts&Culture
www.sptimes.ru | Wednesday, December 17, 2014
The Towers of Petrograd
A
t the intersection of
Bolshoi Prospekt and
Kamennoostrovsky
Prospekt on Petrograd
stands the Rosenstein
House, a building that stands out for its
remarkable architecture in a city full of
stunning buildings.
Today, if one is in the area of Ploschad Lva Tolstogo, it is impossible to
miss the building, with its Neo-Gothic
style and two towers that would look
more at home along the ramparts of a
Western European castle than in a
Russian residential area. The gatehouse of Maxstoke Castle, a privately
owned castle in Warwickshire, England, reportedly inspired the Rosenstein House’s twin hexagonal towers
rising above the square below.
The current building was not there
until the beginning of the 20th century,
although the location of it played a surprisingly important part in the history
of sports in Russia. Before the current
building was erected on the spot, this
particular corner of Petrograd played
host to the Kamennovsky Velodrome,
which could reportedly seat up to
10,000 spectators, and the Northern Ice
Rink. It was in this arena that the first
ever ice hockey game in Russia was
played in 1898, using a ball rather than
a puck. The first exhibition of boxing in
Russia was held in the arena as well
that same year.
The Prussian owner of the Dutch
Cocoa warehouse in St. Petersburg
originally owned the property itself but
in 1910, Konstantin Rosenstein, a
Ukrainian factory director and aspiring
architect, bought the land. He worked
with Andrey Belogrud, an architect
and artist, to create the distinctly European building that stands there today.
Belogrud was an avid enthusiast for all
things medieval, a passion that is evident from the building’s exterior. The
mixture of grey stone hugging the geometric corners and the large iron-cast
gate at street level, along with the towers protruding from the façade and
By Matthew Bodner
the City Railway Administration,
which oversaw the maintenance of the
tram lines that crisscrossed the center,
until 1917. After the revolution, the
“House with Towers,” as locals know
it, became the home of successive
movie theaters and later the main stage
for the Leningrad Television Studio.
During Stalin’s reign over the Soviet
Union, the building’s façade was covered up on public holidays by a gigantic
poster of Stalin himself, taking up the
entire space on the front of the building between the two towers. The studio
became a theater in 1985 and in 1996, it
became the Andrey Mironov Private
Theater.
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
W
ALEXANDER Y. POTEKHIN / WIKICOMMONS
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
stuccoed windows, give it an appearance distinct on an island full of buildings inspired by European counterparts. The two towers are reminiscent
of the fortifications of a town from the
Middle Ages, giving the building a
somewhat ominous presence as it lurks
over the modern-day square.
After construction began in 1913,
the current building was completed in
1915 and was equipped with all of the
latest innovations, including gas stoves,
fitted wardrobes and even heated closets for people to dry their clothes
quicker. Aside from being a home for
many, including its architect Belogrud,
it was also the main headquarters for
The Rosenstein House overlooking Ploschad Lva Tolstogo on Petrograd.
ith relations between
Russia and the West at
a post-Soviet low, it is
a good time to be reminded of the days
when the United States and Russia were
more friendly, when their citizens came
together to talk, to fall in love, and to decommission nuclear warheads with
enough firepower to destroy the world.
Justin Lifflander’s excellent comic
memoir, “How Not to Become a Spy: A
Memoir of Love at the End of the Cold
War,” does exactly that by telling the fascinating story of how he ended up in the
closed Soviet town of Votkinsk in the
Urals as a decommissioning inspector in
the late 1980s.
It was there that he met his future
wife, who was supposed to keep tabs on
him for the KGB. Almost three decades
later, he still lives in Russia and is a citizen of both countries.
Lifflander, a former executive at
Hewlett Packard and past business editor at The St. Petersburg Times, had
ended up in the Urals thanks to the landmark 1987 Intermediate Range Nuclear
Forces treaty signed by U.S. President
Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader
Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987.
In the foreword to the book, Lifflander writes that Reagan and Gorbachev
did great things in that time — but
haven’t we heard enough about them
frankly? His story is not a political history but “some entertainment and a bit
of real life drama.”
He does though make the serious
point about the problems between his
homeland and his adopted country.
“Intolerance, suspicion and sanctimoniousness run rife on both sides of
the ocean,” he writes, urging people
to “challenge everything you think
you know, take the time to dig deep,
to scratch well below the surface, …
and perhaps one day we can return to
a time of open minds and open
hearts.”
The book is a very personal account
of a pivotal moment at the end of the
Cold War when two sides, who had lived
in fear of mutually assured destruction
for decades, allowed the enemy in.
When Lifflander finished college in
the mid-1980s he went to meet what was
then the enemy as a mechanic in the
U.S. Embassy’s motor pool.
Any expat who complains about life
in Moscow in the 21st century can get a
nice reality check as Lifflander talks
about when ration cards were still used.
He recalls Muscovites constantly asking foreigners why they had come to the
country. A U.S. diplomat who was in the
Soviet Union in the 1980s had a pat answer ready, Lifflander notes.
“Well, I don’t wear a watch, and you
have these large street clocks everywhere — very convenient. The local
mustard is also good.”
He yearned for a different world as
any meaningful interaction with Soviet
citizens was strictly forbidden at the time
by both the Soviet authorities and embassy policy.
His chance came once Reagan and
Gorbachev signed the Intermediate
Range Nuclear Forces Treaty on Dec. 8,
1987, and he jumped at the opportunity
to become a weapons inspector.
That finally allowed him to interact
with Soviets over the course of a twoyear contract in the remote defense-industrial town of Votkinsk, the site of the
Soviet decommissioning efforts.
Lifflander shows how two nations
met each other for the first time realizing
that Russians and Americans are more
alike than they would prefer to admit.
An essential part of this is Lifflander’s
courtship with his future wife, Alla.
The two eventually married, but not
before politics and deeply rooted KGB
suspicions of the eccentric American
threatened to drive them apart.
The book should resonate with history buffs interested in a first-hand account of how the greatest arms-control
agreement was implemented, but it is
one that holds universal appeal to any
expat in Russia and anyone who wants
to “scratch beneath the surface” of Russians and Americans.
”How Not to Become a Spy: A Memoir of
Love at the End of the Cold War” by Justin
Lifflander can be bought on Amazon.com.
t he w o rd’s w o r t h
Looking Back on Russia’s ‘Annus Horribilis’
By Michele A. Berdy
Обратный отсчёт: countdown
H
allelujah! The year
2014 is drawing to a
close. Of course, that
doesn’t mean that all
the difficulties, trials
and tribulations of the year will end
magically on Dec. 31 when the clock
strikes midnight. But maybe something — anything! please! — will
change for the better.
Part of the ritual of seeing out
the old year is reviewing the top
words, expressions and neologisms
of the 12 months just gone by. As
various formal and informal organizations vote for their слова года
(words of the year), one group, Словарь года (the year’s dictionary) has
already posted the top hits for each
month. This is a kind of linguistic
walk down memory lane. Here are a
few high points:
January: Дары волхвов (Gifts of
the Magi), what more than half a million people stood in line for hours in
the cold to venerate when the relics
were brought from Mt. Athos in
Greece to Russia. This began the year
on a high, if somewhat unexpected,
religious note.
February: Трусы кружевные (lace
undies). While the eyes of the world
were on the Winter Olympics in Sochi
and Maidan in Kiev, Russian lawmakers had their eyes on something closer
to home. After what one presumes was
thorough research, they concluded that
lace underpants harmed the reproductive health of Russian women, and
banned their import. No research was
conducted on the subsequent reproductive health of Russian men.
March: Референдум (referendum),
a poll with only one possible answer
conducted among part of the population of Crimea after two months of
intense propaganda, no long-term
analysis, and the ubiquitous presence
of so-called вежливые люди (polite
men) in full military gear.
April: Крым наш (Crimea is ours).
What a surprise. I’m shocked,
shocked. Also this month: зелёные человечки (little green men), the Ukrai-
nian term for what the Russians call
вежливые люди.
May: Уконтрапупить (to destroy
thoroughly as one would destroy counter-revolutionaries — circa 1921, used
by President Vladimir Putin in 2014).
This is my personal word fave of the
year. Any word with пуп (belly button)
in it is a small ray of sunshine in an otherwise dark year. Also in May: Новороссия, a resurrected historical term
denoting some land that we are to believe was “всегда русская” (always Russian) even before there were Russians.
June: Псакнуть (derogative term
derived from the name of U.S. State
Department spokesperson Jen Psaki,
which means to say something stupid). A play on пискнуть (to squeal).
The hysterical propaganda campaign
against this person is the greatest
mystery of the year.
July: Бук (Buk missile system),
about which we tragically know more
than we ever wanted to know.
August: Пармезан (Parmesan
cheese), what we must give up to
counter the Western sanctions against
us. I am still trying to figure out how
8
Love, Friendship, Nuclear
Bombs: A Cold War Story
city tales
By Gus Peters
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our suffering more personally is a
good way of getting back at those
who do us wrong.
September: Перемирие (truce),
apparently a term used to describe a
period of quiet used to bring in more
weapons and armed forces from
abroad.
October: Спайс (spice), synthetic
marijuana outlawed by parliament. I
wish they’d banned this before they
considered the panty ban.
November: Свободное плавание
(free-floating), what the ruble is doing. Unfortunately, it wants to float
downstream.
December’s word and the winning
word of the year have not yet been
announced. But one group member
suggests a motto for the year: Война,
враньё и воровство (war, whoppers
and thievery).
I’m telling you: not Russia’s finest
year.
OOO Neva Media ì˜Â‰ËÚÂÎ¸ Ë ËÁ‰‡ÚÂÎ¸ – ééé “çÂ‚‡ åÂ‰Ë‡”
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Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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9
Local Rocker Turns Literary
Former Dva Samolyota drummer prepares to publish collection of ‘micro-stories’ based on his tours with the band.
By Sergey Chernov
on vocals, Anton Belyankin on bass,
Denis Medvedev on keyboards and
Alexei Lazovsky on saxophone. Extending their activities to club management, DJing, art and media, the band
was one of the main driving forces in
St. Petersburg’s post-Soviet music and
art scene. Musically, the band was inspired by ska, Afro-beat, reggae, disco,
hip-hop and Latin, to name a few.
Pokrovsky — who invented the band’s
trademark nonsensical language —
died of an apparent drug-related illness
at the age of 36 in 2003.
Sindalovsky said he disguised real
people by nicknames or introduced
some generalized characters after sending an early story to Alexander Titov,
Akvarium’s London-based bassist, who
was Dva Samolyota’s manager in the
band’s early years.
“I referred to him as ‘Kitov,’ rather
than Titov, and received a message from
him asking, ‘Did I really say this?’ After
that I decided not to send the stories to
their characters anymore.”
Other real people appear under fictitious names, most frequently Maximka
and Vasyutka.
But the stories relating to the band
get a response from the other members,
who occasionally supply their comments
to make them more accurate. “Once I
had a quarrel with Lazovsky about one
story. But then we made peace,” he
said.
However, Sindalovsky said his stories stand on their own rather than being mere recollections of the past.
“They are not so much memoirs but
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
TINA SINDALOVVSKAYA / FOR SPT
M
ikhail Sindalovsky,
famed as the drummer
of St. Petersburg skapop legends Dva
Samolyota, has turned
author since he moved to Israel in September 2010. Having completed more
than 500 of what he calls “mini-stories”
dealing with the band and his life in St.
Petersburg and Tel-Aviv, he is raising
funds for publishing an actual book on a
crowd-funding website.
“When I found myself in Israel, I
started writing down different stories
and I chose the genre of ‘micro-stories’
and invented a pseudonym for myself,”
Sindalovsky told The St. Petersburg
Times, speaking via Skype from TelAviv this week. Sindalovsky’s writing
pseudonym is M. Netriher.
“There is an Israeli author, Dina
Rubina, who has made a collection of
Jewish first and last names that sound
funny for the Russian ear,” he said.
“She said basically that any [Russian]
word or phrase could be made into a
Jewish last name. In her collection,
there was the last name Anakoikher
(What the heck do I need it for?), and I
came up with Netriher.”
Sindalovsky traces his writing back
to the mid-1990s when he wrote some
short stories for Pam Pers, a small magazine published by the bunker club Griboyedov that he art-directed alongside
other members of Dva Samolyota.
Many of the stories stemmed from Sin-
Mikhail Sindalovsky at his desk in Tel-Aviv, where he has lived since 2010.
dalovsky’s tours with the band, which
was at the height of popularity in the
1990s and at some point effectively relocated to Moscow, where Russia’s music
industry is concentrated. The subjects
range from the band’s drinking party
with their Moscow colleagues that
ended with arrests and a night at the police station, to being taken off the train
in Tikhvin, and from buying shoes in
Nantes, France, to drinking homebrewed beer around a bonfire in Pasvalys, Lithuania. However, the band as
featured in the stories is called Durny
(Blockheads), which Sindalovsky said is
Dva Samolyota’s alter ego.
“Rock musicians or any rock people
are blockheads by default,” Sindalovsky said.
“They are blockheads, dolts and
fools, because normal people don’t play
rock music. Normal people rather play
jazz or any other music for fat people.”
Dva Samolyota formed in 1990,
with its classic line-up featuring Sindalovsky on drums, Vadim Pokrovsky
independent stories about different
situations and about fictitious characters. Some situations are real, but essentially it’s all lies.”
Sindalovsky posted his first story on
Dec. 25, 2013. By Dec. 14 this year, 502
stories — each one is given a number as
well as a title — have been posted.
“I write a story, send it to my editor
in St. Petersburg and look for a picture
to go with it,” Sindalovsky said, describing his working process.
“Then I post the edited version on
Livejournal.com.”
The planned 300-page book —
which does not have a title yet — is intended as a collaboration between Sindalovsky and his two friends, Yulia
Monakhova and Mikhail Alexander,
who go by the pen names Dzhulyetta
Stepanova and Moishe Pinkhas. The
trio goes under the collective name of
Pen’ Club (Stump Club).
So far, 60,000 rubles (about $1,000)
have been raised of the 300,000 (about
$5,000) that he is aiming for, Sindalovsky said. If the sum raised by the
Jan. 1 deadline is less than 60 percent of
the expected sum, the donations will be
returned to the senders according to the
rules of the service.
If this happens, Sindalovsky may
start a new crowd-funding campaign, he
said, adding that his stories will still continue to be available on the Internet.
“I am not going to stop, and I’ll continue to write,” he said.
Check www.penb-club.com for more information.
By Ali Sar
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
“
Leviathan,” director Andrey
Zvyagintsev’s much-acclaimed Russian movie, has
been nominated for the
Golden Globe for the best
foreign language film of the year.
“We are thrilled with this recognition
by the members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association,” the film’s producer Alexander Rodnyansky told The
St. Petersburg Times, adding “I hope
viewers will understand that this story is
a truly universal one, with circumstances
that people face in all countries.”
“Leviathan” is a modern day drama
focusing on an ordinary family in an
economically depressed fishing village
by the Barents Sea, where a corrupt
mayor plans to confiscate their property. Zvyagintsev has a simple description of the plot: “Little guy taking on
big government.”
The film has been reviewed favorably in major international movie markets. Winner of best screenplay at the
Cannes Film Festival, it has been described by some critics as “a compelling Russian masterpiece.”
It was given a screening slot at the
American Film Institute’s festival in
Hollywood last month.
Both Rodnyansky and Zvyagintsev
personally took part in the festival, introducing the film to an enthusiastic audience and meeting with the foreign journalists covering the entertainment scene.
Rodnyansky, who shares the producer’s title with Sergey Melkumov,
has been visibly committed to the film’s
success as he has been globetrotting to
promote it.
“Director Andrey Zvangintsev has
been inspired to carry forward a tradition of great Russian storytelling, standing as he does on the shoulders of such
giants as Pushkin, Gogol, Dostoevsky,
Solzhenitsyn, Pasternak and Shalamov,”
he told The St. Petersburg Times as he
showered his director with praises.
In the Golden Globe competition,
“Leviathan” will be competing with
four other international productions
for the top award. Other nominees include Sweden’s “Force Majeure Turist,” Israel’s “Gett: The Trial of Viviane
Amsalem Gett,” the Poland/Denmark
entry of “Ida,” and Estonia’s “Tangerines Mandariinid.” It is interesting to
note that films from such European
countries as Italy, Germany and England did not make the cut this year.
Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s
“Winter Sleep,” which competed with
“Leviathan” and won the Palme d’Or
award in Cannes, was left out. The Russian animation film, “Snow Queen 2,”
also failed to capture a nomination.
For Russian filmmakers “Leviathan” represents the first nomination
since 2010 when Alexei Uchitel’s “The
Edge,” an action film taking place
shortly after the end of the Second
ALI SAR / FOR SPT
‘Leviathan’ Nominated for Golden Globe Award
Producer Alexander Rodnyansky and director Andrey Zvyagintsev.
World War in the Siberian hinterland,
was picked in the same category. It did
not win the Globe.
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA), which stages the
Golden Globes, will announce the
winners at its 72nd annual internationally televised show on Jan. 11. Rodnyansky said he plans to attend the
Globe ceremonies.
Education & JobOpportunities
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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job vacancies advertised
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Food&Drink
www.sptimes.ru | Wednesday, December 17, 2014
❖
10
Spanish Sausages Return to Russia
A Spanish company, along with a Finnish meat processor, has found a way to sell products on the Russian market.
By Irina Titova
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
W
hile a range of foreign
food products have
disappeared from
Russian grocery
shelves due to Russia’s recent economic sanctions against
a number of countries, local food producers and their foreign colleagues are
finding ways to bring some popular or
exclusive products back to the country’s market.
Atria Russia, the Russian branch of
the Finland-based food company Atria
Plc, which has two meat processing
plants located outside St. Petersburg
and manages such well-known Russian
meat product brands as Pit-Product
and Kampomos, announced last week
the launch of the production and sale
of the exclusive Spanish raw cured sausage Casademont.
“The joint project of Atria Russia
and Casademont proves that the import substitution that Russian authorities are promoting is really possible,”
Jarmo Lindholm, General Manager
and CEO of Atria Russia, said at the
news conference last week.
“Casademont is one of the leading
manufacturers of raw cured sausages in
Spain, and it sells its products to 70
countries around the world. We’re
thankful to our Spanish colleagues for
sharing their skills and we’re proud
that Casademont products manufactured in Leningrad Oblast since De-
cember do not differ from products
made in Spain in taste or quality,”
Lindholm said.
Adriana Casademont, one of the
owners of Casademont and the daughter of the company’s founder, who came
to the plant for the launch of production, said Atria Russia had the equipment and personnel to return Casademont sausages to the Russian market.
“We produce up to 20,000 tons of
meat products a year and half of that
amount is exported into 70 of the
world’s countries. Our exports to Russia
used to make up 10 percent of our total
‘Ever since Spanish
meat products were
banned... we’ve been
looking for a way to
come back.’
exports. Of course, we wanted to return
to the Russian market and ever since
Spanish meat products were banned for
import to Russia, we’ve been looking
for a way to come back. Fortunately, we
found Atria, who manages to make our
products using our technology as well as
we do,” Casademont said.
Jordi Bernardo, Casademont’s main
food technology specialist, who now
regularly travels to Russia to share his
knowledge with the local staff, said that
when he offered to distinguish the
Spanish and the Russian-made Casademont sausages back in Spain, people
could not tell which of the sausages was
originally from Spain.
The technology of the production
of the Spanish raw cured sausages requires special climate conditions for
curing meat and, in a number of cases,
includes special molds.
Lindholm said Casademont sausages were popular in Moscow but in
the past year there was no product of
this sort on the Russian market.
Atria Russia is starting its Casademont production line with three types
of sausages, including “Fuet Extra,”
“Salchichon Extra” and “Salchichon
Montana,” but is planning to expand
their range of offerings next year.
Although Casademont brand sausages are highly priced with a retail
price of over 1,500 rubles ($23) per kilogram, Lindholm said the product will
inevitably find customers in Russia.
LESS IMPORT, PRICES
HIGHER BUT ATRIA GOES ON
Lindholm said that Russia is the biggest retail market in Europe and Atria
Group is interested in developing its
business in this country despite the current economic situation.
During the past year the company
has faced at least two noticeable changes
that impacted the Russian market, including January’s ban on the import of
pork from Europe and the ban on the
import of food products from the EU,
U.S., Canada and Australia.
“However, our responsibility as a
manufacturer is to find solutions and to
adapt to the ongoing changes,” Lindholm said.
“We have been able to find meat in
Russia and also to switch to the allowed import from Brazil and Chile,”
he said.
Duncan Black, production and procurement director for Atria Russia,
said the changes in fact worked positively for Russia’s raw meat producers.
“Half a year ago we used only 15-20
percent of Russian raw meat for production, whereas today raw meat of
Russian origin already accounts for 40
percent of the raw meat that Atria
Russia’s plants use. We expect that next
year the share of Russian raw meat will
increase even more,” Black said.
However, Black said that Russian
raw meat mainly consists of pork and
poultry, because Russia doesn’t have
enough raw beef and it is mainly imported from Brazil and Chile.
Viktor Kobyakov, head of the food
industry and market infrastructure development department of the Agrarian
Committee of the Leningrad Oblast,
said in 2014 that the region increased
its production of milk, pork and poultry meat, eggs and vegetables in comparison to 2013, and that it was able to
supply itself with those products.
“We do have the task of import substitution now, and if we can’t replace
some products ourselves, we can buy
foreign technologies,” Kobyakov said.
Atria Russia is also planning to expand its local production grounds, particularly the plant located in the village
of Gorelovo, where the company is
opening a pizza line.
“This year we decided to invest
more into the Russian market,” Lindholm said.
At the same time the plant faced another complicated consequence of the
current situation on the Russian market
and the devaluation of the ruble when
the prices for many food products, including raw ones, skyrocketed.
Thus, compared to the beginning of
2014, the price for raw meat in Russia increased by 40 percent, Lindholm said.
In order to have its products accessible to the majority of the population,
Atria Russia have increased its sales
prices by only 15 percent so far and fixed
the price for at least six of its products
until the end of the year, Lindholm said.
“Our development department is
now developing new products of good
quality but reasonable prices. But we
hope that next year there will be a decrease in prices on raw materials. Currently the price is unreasonably high,”
he said.
THE DISH
ADVERTISING
Beer Haven
Farsh & Bochka
11 Ulitsa Belinskova
941 51 70
Open weekdays 12 a.m. to 12 p.m.,
weekends 12 a.m. to 2 a.m.
Meal for two with alcohol: 1,700 rubles
($25.82)
By Jonathan Melvin
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
A
short walk from
Nevsky Prospekt
along the banks of the
freezing Fontanka,
Farsh and Bochka is a
newly-opened establishment nestled
amongst the slew of bars and pubs
that dot Belinskovo street. The first
things that stands out is that the atmosphere is one that certainly appeals to a younger, more hip generation of Russians. The décor is modern, with a variety of seating options
from lengthy benches along the wall
to more traditional small tables. A
large bar dominates the entire length
of one wall in the main seating hall,
offering an assortment of nearly —
beer lovers rejoice! — 40 craft beers
on tap, while the rear of the pub offers an unhindered view of the
kitchen and its culinary servants.
Farsh and Bochka has created its
simple menu, ranging from soups and
salads to platters of gourmet meats
and sausages, with the goal of complimenting its large assortment of
craft beers, which are selected from
locations around the globe.
As far as the on-tap selection was
concerned, my companion settled
on the Vasilievstrovsky Cider (150
rubles, $2.28), a crisp, semi-sweet
apple cider, while I elected for the
caramel Grimbergen Dubbel (190
rubles, $2.89), a rich and malty caramel beer. To kick off the evening
food-wise, my companion and I selected the French fries with garlic
sauce (170 rubles, $2.58) and the
goulash soup (250 rubles, $3.80), respectively. The fries were crisp and
slightly salted, but just what one
would expect from such an establishment. The goulash, a soupy medley of dried beef morsels and vegetables, certainly didn’t taste as remarkable as it looked, though my
companion, visibly disturbed by the
fact that I had decided to first try the
dish without adding to it the small
bucket of sour cream, assured me
that the cream would bring out the
flavor a bit more.
Slowly sipping away at our delicious beverages, we decided to split
the classic mixed sausages platter
(590 rubles, $8.96) for the main
dish of the evening. The platter
turned out to be three lengthy sausages consisting of Weisswurst, a
white Bavarian and Austrian sausage, a simple pork-loin sausage,
and what was seemingly the typical
American hot-dog or traditional
Russian sosiski. Complimented by
a bowl of melted blue cheese and
ketchup, as well as two freshlybaked rolls, the sausages were delicious but certainly lacked any
unique flavor beyond what one
could conjure themself.
In the end, Farsh and Bochka isn’t
too shabby of an establishment. It is
a gastro pub which focuses on its
wide selection of brews from around
the globe, while the simple straightforward menu offers side-note dishes
to merely complement their craft
beverages. Service was friendly and
the prices were even friendlier, and
those adventurers who endlessly
struggle forward in the battle to find
that perfect beer will certainly want
to drop in to Farsh and Bochka.
HOW TO USE THE LISTINGS:
Dates and times are correct at the
time of publication, but last-minute changes are not infrequent,
so it’s best to check by contacting
the venue. COMPLETE LISTINGS can
be found at www.sptimes.ru.
Unless otherwise stated, stage
events start at 7 p.m. All stage
shows and films are in Russian
unless noted.
STAGES
DAILY SHOW! Folk Show
Feel Yourself Russian! Two hours of traditional
Russian songs and dance. Nikolayevsky
Palace, 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. www.folkshow.ru
of Sweden at a ball. Conductor Mikhail
Tatarnikov. Mikhailovsky Theater.
concert
Chamber Music Penella, Narro, Tchaikovsky,
Piazzolla, Mancini, Rachmaninoff and others.
Sakha Brass Quintet. Mariinsky II,
Mussorgsky Hall, 6:30 p.m.
Symphony Music Tchaikovsky,
Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev. The Mariinsky
Orchestra. Conductor Ignat Solzhenitsyn.
Mariinsky Concert Hall.
Chamber Music Strauss, Bottesini, Sarasate,
Weill and others. The Philharmonics Ensemble
(Austria). Shostakovich Philharmonic,
Main Hall, 8 p.m.
Choral Music Sviridov. Smolny Cathedral
Chamber Choir. Shostakovich Philharmonic,
Small Hall.
Choral Music Berlioz ‘Grande messe des
morts.’ Capella Symphony Orchestra and
Choir. Conductor Alexander Vakulsky. Capella.
saturday, december 20
ballet
wednesday, december 17
ballet
Cipollino Two-act ballet for children based on
the fairy-tale by Italian author Gianni Rodari.
Mikhailovsky Theater.
opera
Christmas Eve Rimsky-Korsakov’s opera
based on Gogol’s short story ‘Evenings on a
Farm Near Dikanka.’ Starring Gelena
Gaskarova, Gennady Bezzubenkov, Anna
Kiknadze. Conductor Pavel Petrenko.
Mariinsky Theater.
Un Ballo in Maschera Verdi’s opera based
on the assassination of King Gustav III of
Sweden at a ball. Starring Larisa
Diadkova. Conductor Karen Durgaryan.
Mariinsky II.
Pagliacci Ruggero Leoncavallo’s tragic opera
about a jealous husband in a troupe of
itinerant actors. St. Petersburg Opera.
concert
Symphony Music Mendelssohn, Rossini,
Grigorian. The Symphonica ARTica Orchestra
(Yakutia). Conductor Fabio Mastrangelo.
Mariinsky Concert Hall.
Early Music Stradella, Corelli, Handel,
Vivaldi, Bach. Quintet of Four and Save Tempo
ensembles. Jaani Kirik, 54A Ul. Dekabristov,
M: Sennaya Ploschad. Tel. 710 8446.
thursday, december 18
ballet
Swan Lake Tchaikovsky’s evergreen classic
about the fate of a swan princess,
choreographed by Marius Petipa. Starring
Yekaterina Kondaurova and Timur Askerov.
Mariinsky II.
The Nutcracker Choreographer Nacho
Duato’s humorous reimagining of
Tchaikovsky’s classic. Conductor Mikhail
Tatarnikov. Mikhailovsky Theater.
opera
Christmas Eve Rimsky-Korsakov’s opera
based on Gogol’s short story ‘Evenings on a
Farm Near Dikanka.’ Starring Gelena Gaskarova,
Gennady Bezzubenkov, Anna Kiknadze.
Conductor Pavel Petrenko. Mariinsky Theater.
Tosca A revisionist version of Puccini’s
passion-filled opera. Director Yury Alexandrov.
St. Petersburg Opera
concert
Chamber Music Rheinberger, Saint-Sains,
Martinu, Karmanov, Davies. Camerata
Yakutsk. Mariinsky II, Prokofiev Hall.
Choral Music Handel’s ‘Messiah.’ Mariinsky
Theater Soloists, Chorus and Symphony
Orchestra. Conductor Andrei Petrenko.
Mariinsky Concert Hall.
Chamber Music Purcell, Manotskov, Nyman.
Opus Posth Ensemble. Shostakovich
Philharmonic, Main Hall, 8 p.m.
Organ Music Bach, Buxtehude, Brahms, Reger,
Karg-Elert. Grigory Varshavsky (organ), Marina
Chernousova (soprano). Smolny Cathedral.
The Nutcracker Choreographer Nacho
Duato’s humorous reimagining of Tchaikovsky’s
classic. Conductor Mikhail Tatarnikov.
Mikhailovsky Theater, 1 a.m., 7 p.m.
opera
Der fliegende Hollaender Ian Judge stages
Wagner’s powerful opera about redemption
through love. Starring Mlada Khudoley and
Yevgeny Nikitin. Conductor Valery Gergiev.
Mariinsky Theater.
Il barbiere di Siviglia Alain Maratrat stages
a new version of Rossini’s opera-buffa.
Conductor Zaurbek Gugkaev. Mariinsky II.
concert
Violin Music Bach, Ysaye, Ernst, Krampe.
Christina Brabetz (South Africa). Mariinsky II,
Mussorgsky Hall, 6:30 p.m.
Symphony Music Bach, Kraft, Arensky, Suk.
The Mariinsky Youth Orchestra. Conductor
Anton Gakkel. Mariinsky Concert Hall.
Symphony Music Holst, Elgar. St. Petersburg
Philharmonic Orchestra. Alexander Rudin
(cello). Conductor Nikolai Alexeev.
Shostakovich Philharmonic, Main Hall, 8 p.m.
sunday, december 21
ballet
The Nutcracker Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet
based on the tale by Hoffmann. Vaganova
Academy of Russian Ballet. Conductor Gavriel
Heine. Mariinsky Theater, 2 p.m.
opera
Il barbiere di Siviglia Alain Maratrat stages
a new version of Rossini’s opera-buffa.
Conductor Zaurbek Gugkaev. Mariinsky II,
11:30 a.m.
Cinderella Boris Asafiev’s 1906 opera after
the screenplay by Yevgeny Schwarz and the
fairytale by Charles Perrault. Conductor Igor
Tomashevsky. Mikhailovsky Theater, 1 p.m.
Iolanta One of Tchaikovsky’s most lyrical and
poetic operas, based on the play ‘King Rene’s
Daughter’ by the Danish poet Henrik Hertz.
Mikhailovsky Theater.
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opera
The Tales of Hoffmann Vasily Barkhatov
reinterprets Jacques Offenbach’s opera based
on tales by E.T.A. Hoffman. Starring Tatiana
Pavlovskaya, Yulia Matochkina, Sergei
Semishkur. Conductor Christian Knapp.
Mariinsky Theater.
concert
Piano Music Rachmaninoff, Scriabin. Daniil
Trifonov (piano) and the Mariinsky Orchestra.
Conductor Valery Gergiev.
Mariinsky Concert Hall.
Violin Music Beethoven, Schumann, Mozart,
Prokofiev. Andrey Baranov. Shostakovich
Philharmonic, Small Hall.
tuesday, december 23
ballet
The Nutcracker Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet
based on the tale by Hoffmann. Performance
by the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet.
Conductor Gavriel Heine. Mariinsky Theater,
7:30 p.m.
opera
La Traviata Verdi’s classic about a courtesan
and her lover. Staged by Stanislav
Gaudasinsky. Mikhailovsky Theater.
concert
Piano Music Rimsky-Korsakov, Chopin.
Alexei Volodin (piano) and the Mariinsky
Orchestra. Conductor Valery Gergiev.
Mariinsky Concert Hall.
Piano Music Mozart, Schubert, Liszt.
Christian Blackshaw (U.K.). Shostakovich
Philharmonic, Small Hall.
Estonian-born, London-based lo-fi electronic singer Maria Minerva — now on
her first Russian tour in support of her new album “ Histrionic” — will perform
at The Place on Thursday, Dec. 18.
thursday, december 18
rock, etc.
GIGS
Kukryniksy Pop rock. A2, 3 Prospekt
Medikov. Tel. 309 9922. 8 p.m.
Emer / Veresk Folk rock. Backstage,
113 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel: 958 3888. 7 p.m.
Va.l Indie pop. Birja Bar, 4 Birzhevoi
Pereulok. Tel. 925 8806. 8 p.m.
Zimmerman Is Her/e / Pasha Graf /
Krayeved Singer-songwriter, drone folk,
electronica. Dada (new location), 109 korp. 3
Moskovsky Prospekt. Tel. +7 950 010 4320.
7 p.m.
Olga Albanova and Alexander Belousov
Pop rock. Fish Fabrique Nouvelle, 53 Ligovsky
Prospekt. Tel. 764 4857. 9 p.m.
Natry Alternative rock. Mod, 7 Nab. Kanala
Griboyedova. Tel. 712 0734. 7 p.m.
Maria Minerva Lo-fi, electronica.
The Place, 47 Ul. Marshala Govorova.
Tel. 331 9631. 7 p.m.
Shaptiboy / Rassol Pop rock. Yashchik
Club, 50 korp. 13 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 964 9637. 8 p.m.
Hidden Tribe / Redsquare Ethno punk.
Zoccolo 2.0, 50 korpus 3 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 945 4305. 7 p.m.
wednesday, december 17
rock, etc.
Seether Alternative rock. A2,
3 Prospekt Medikov. Tel. 309 9922. 8 p.m.
Jazz Up Trio Fusion, funk. Birja Bar,
4 Birzhevoi Pereulok. Tel. 925 8806. 8 p.m.
The Reverboards Surf. Birja Bar,
4 Birzhevoi Pereulok. Tel. 925 8806. 8 p.m.
The Springs / Ping-Pong / The Riot On
Indie rock. Mod, 7 Nab. Kanala Griboyedova.
Tel. 712 0734. 8 p.m.
Roman Chekhov Acoustic. Yashchik Club,
50 korp. 13 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 964 9637. 8 p.m.
Kusto / Altavista / Yammi Indie rock.
Zoccolo 2.0, 50 korpus 3 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 945 4305. 8 p.m.
jazz & blues
Valley of the Blessed Gennady Golshtein
and St. Petersburg’s Saxophones, David
Goloshchyokin, Vladimir Lytkin, et al. Jazz
Philharmonic Hall, 27 Zagorodny Prospekt.
Tel. 764 8565, 764 9843. 7 p.m.
Kondakovfestival Valery Ponomaryov and
Andrei Kodakov Band. JFC Jazz Club,
33 Shpalernaya Ul. Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
Elvira Trafova and Pyotr Kornev
Jazz classics. Jazz Philharmonic Hall,
27 Zagorodny Prospekt. Tel. 764 8565,
764 9843. 7 p.m.
Kondakovfestival Gaivoronsky Volkov
Kondakov. Art jazz. JFC Jazz Club,
33 Shpalernaya Ul. Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
friday, december 19
rock, etc.
ballet
Don Quixote Alexander Gorsky’s version of
the ballet based on Cervantes’ novel, set to a
Spanish-flavored score by Ludwig Minkus.
Mariinsky Theater, 7:30 p.m.
PICTURES OF TODAY
opera
Inga Copeland, formerly of the Berlin-London lo-fi experimental pop duo
Hype Williams, will premiere her debut solo album “Because I’m Worth It” at
The Place on Sunday, Dec. 21.
2A Voronezhskaya Ul. Tel. 764 4355,
973 7273. 9 p.m.
Argishty Armenian folk. Jaani Kirik,
54A Ul Dekabristov. Tel. 495 1878. 7 p.m.
Pompeya Pop rock. Kosmonavt, 24
Bronnitskaya Ul. Tel. 922 1300. 8 p.m.
Vasily K. Acoustic. Manhattan,
90 Nab. Reki Fontanki.
Tel. 713 1945. 7 p.m.
Bad Co. Project / Purgen Hardcore punk.
Mod, 7 Nab. Kanala Griboyedova.
Tel. 712 0734. 7 p.m.
Analog Attention Jazz funk. The Place,
47 Ul. Marshala Govorova. Tel. 331 9631.
8 p.m.
Igry Indie rock. VinyllaSky, 81 Ligovsky
Prospekt. Tel. 764 6344. 8 p.m.
Che Morale Disco, jazz, funk, Balkan folk,
Latin. Yashchik Club, 50 korp. 13 Ligovsky
Prospekt. Tel. 964 9637. 8 p.m.
jazz & blues
David Goloshchyokin and Nikolai Sizov
Piano night. Jazz Philharmonic Hall,
27 Zagorodny Prospekt. Tel. 764 8565,
764 9843. 7 p.m.
Kondakovfestival Andrei Kondakov Trio.
Fusion. JFC Jazz Club, 33 Shpalernaya Ul.
Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
jazz & blues
friday, december 19
Turandot Puccini’s opera based on Carlo
Gozzi’s drama about a Chinese princess and a
young man who is the first to answer her three
riddles, thereby escaping execution. Conductor
Oleg Caetani. Mariinsky II.
Un Ballo in Maschera Verdi’s opera
based on the assassination of King Gustav III
❖
monday, december 22
concert
Symphony Music Berlioz’s ‘Romeo et
Juliette.’ Starring Olga Borodina.
Chorus, Children’s Choir and Symphony
Orchestra of the Mariinsky Theater.
Conductor Valery Gergiev. Mariinsky Concert
Hall, 8 p.m.
Symphony Music Christmas music by
Tchaikovsky, Rebikov, Korngold, Blake.
St. Petersburg Symphony Orchestra.
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Conductor Simon Chalk (U.K.). Shostakovich
Philharmonic, Main Hall, 3 p.m.
Vocal Music Schubert’s ‘Winterreise.’ Ian
Bostridge (U.K.). Shostakovich Philharmonic,
Main Hall, 8 p.m.
Vocal Music Arias from Rossini operas.
Starring Nadezda Khadzheva, Pelageya
Kurennaya, Damir Zakirov. Shostakovich
Philharmonic, Small Hall, 3 p.m.
MARKO KRUNIC
L
www.sptimes.ru
Zimavsegda Indie rock. Backstage,
113 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel: 958 3888. 7 p.m.
Vukhu / Seansy Nezhnosti / Nikogo Net
Doma / Arttester Indie rock. Dada (new
location), 109 korp. 3 Moskovsky Prospekt.
Tel. +7 950 010 4320. 7 p.m.
Sny Bronsona / Hashtea Indie rock, postrock. Fish Fabrique, 53 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 764 4857. 9 p.m.
Videoterror Alternative rock. Fish Fabrique,
53 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel. 764 4857. 11 p.m.
Vnutrenneye Sgoraniye Indie rock.
Fish Fabrique Nouvelle, 53 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 764 4857. 8 p.m.
Oaoa Srapa / Boyeviye Tsikady
Experimental. GEZ-21, 53 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 764 5258. 8 p.m.
One Ok Rock Alternative rock. Glavclub
(new location), LDM, 47 Ul Professora
Popova. 8 p.m.
Assholes Syndicate / Hopes & Disasters
/ The Alcobastards / The Big Blocks
Punk, alternative rock. Griboyedov,
saturday, december 20
rock, etc.
Prognoz Rock. Backstage,
113 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel: 958 3888. 7 p.m.
A la Ru Art pop. Birja Bar, 4 Birzhevoi
Pereulok. Tel. 925 8806. 8 p.m.
Elektrokids / Yantarny Koprofil / Lepra /
Shokalsky Revenge Indie rock, alternative
rock. Dada (new location), 109 korp. 3
Moskovsky Prospekt. Tel. +7 950 010 4320.
8 p.m.
Skazy Folk rock. Erarta, 2 29-ya Liniya,
Vasilyevsky Ostrov. Tel: 324 08 09. 8 p.m.
Zarisovka Pop rock. Fish Fabrique Nouvelle,
53 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel. 764 4857. 9 p.m.
Rock Christmas Party Dmitry Spirin
featuring Dmitry Kezhvatov, Slot, Distemper,
PTVP, Plan Lomonosova, Teni Svobody, Port
812, Smekh, Dismay. Glavclub (new location),
LDM, 47 Ul Professora Popova. 6 p.m.
Valentin Strykalo Pop rock. Kosmonavt,
24 Bronnitskaya Ul. Tel. 922 1300. 8 p.m.
Segodnyanochyu / Multfilmy / Nas Net
Pop rock. Mod, 7 Nab. Kanala Griboyedova.
Tel. 712 0734. 8 p.m.
The Beatles Party VIA Nevskiye Zori, Gold
Fingers, Leonid Tikhomirov, Number Nine, et
al. Money Honey, 28 Sadovaya Ul.
Tel. 310 0549. 7 p.m.
Juniper Folk rock. More, 20 Malaya
Morskaya Ul. Tel: 957 0820. 8 p.m.
Branimir Dark folk. VinyllaSky, 81 Ligovsky
Prospekt. Tel. 764 6344. 7:30 p.m.
❖
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Monoliza Indie pop. Yashchik Club,
50 korp. 13 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 964 9637. 8 p.m.
Auctyon Art rock. Zal Ozhidaniya,
118 Nab. Obvodnogo Kanala.
Tel. 333 1069. 8 p.m.
Zoccolo 2.0 Birthday Party Tides
From Nebula, et al. Zoccolo 2.0, 50 korpus 3
Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel. 945 4305. 6 p.m.
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Kvadrat Jazz Club Jam session.
Jazz Philharmonic Hall (Ellington Hall),
27 Zagorodny Prospekt. Tel. 764 8565,
764 9843. 8 p.m.
Alexei Popov and Four & More Funk,
electric jazz. JFC Jazz Club, 33 Shpalernaya
Ul. Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
jazz & blues
Mikhail Kostyushkin and His Band
Saxophone night. Jazz Philharmonic Hall,
27 Zagorodny Prospekt. Tel. 764 8565,
764 9843. 7 p.m.
Kondakovfestival Andrei Kondakov Electric
Orchestra. Fusion. JFC Jazz Club,
33 Shpalernaya Ul. Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
monday, december 22
rock, etc.
I, The Breather / Main-De-Gloire /
Autoscan / Immaterialist Metal. Mod,
7 Nab. Kanala Griboyedova.
Tel. 712 0734. 6 p.m.
jazz & blues
Palmundo World music. JFC Jazz Club,
33 Shpalernaya Ul. Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
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Dramma / Kerry Force Hip-hop. Mod,
7 Nab. Kanala Griboyedova.
Tel. 712 0734. 6:30 p.m.
Porvata Fest Zudwa, Rezhim Ozhidaniya,
M4, Porvata. Zoccolo 2.0, 50 korpus
3 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel. 945 4305. 7 p.m.
jazz & blues
Napadeniye Kis Rock. Backstage,
113 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel: 958 3888.
7 p.m.
Neon Lights Electronica. Birja Bar,
4 Birzhevoi Pereulok. Tel. 925 8806. 8 p.m.
Eject / Smola / Electro Dub Company
Indie rock, alternative rock. Dada (new
location), 109 korp. 3 Moskovsky Prospekt.
Tel. +7 950 010 4320. 7 p.m.
Feodoq / Udubrenje Alternative rock.
Fish Fabrique Nouvelle, 53 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 764 4857. 8 p.m.
Haliastre World music. Griboyedov,
2A Voronezhskaya Ul. Tel. 764 4355,
973 7273. 8 p.m.
Piknik Pop rock. Kosmonavt,
24 Bronnitskaya Ul. Tel. 922 1300. 8 p.m.
Inga Copeland Indie electronica.
The Place, 47 Ul. Marshala Govorova.
Tel. 331 9631. 7 p.m.
Anastasia Abrutskaya and Just for You
Pop jazz. VinyllaSky, 81 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 764 6344. 7 p.m.
Bydlotsykl Pop. Yashchik Club, 50 korp. 13
Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel. 964 9637. 8 p.m.
Vadyara Blues Blues rap. Zoccolo 2.0,
50 korpus 3 Ligovsky Prospekt.
Tel. 945 4305. 7 p.m.
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rock, etc.
Leningrad Dixieland Band Jazz dancing.
Jazz Philharmonic Hall, 27 Zagorodny
Prospekt. Tel. 764 8565, 764 9843. 7 p.m.
Ivan Vasilyev Acoustic Band Jazz.
Jazz Philharmonic Hall (Ellington Hall),
27 Zagorodny Prospekt. Tel. 764 8565,
764 9843. 8 p.m.
Kondakovfestival Andrei Kondakov Quartet.
Jazz standards, original compositions.
JFC Jazz Club, 33 Shpalernaya Ul.
Tel. 272 9850. 8 p.m.
rock, etc.
S
tuesday, december 23
jazz & blues
sunday, december 21
I
MUSEUMS
HISTORY OF ST. PETERSBURG MUSEUM
PETER & PAUL FORTRESS
M: Gorkovskaya. Tel. 230 6431. Daily, 11 a.m.
to 7 p.m. (6 p.m. Tuesday). Closed Wednesday.
www.spbmuseum.ru.
NEW! Arno Maasik: Orthodox Churches
and Chapels in Estonia. More than 100
photographs show old, new, ruined and
restored Orthodox places of worship scattered
across Estonia made by the famous Estonian
photographer and architect Arno Maasik. Dec.
18 through Feb., 2015.
SHUVALOVSKY PALACE
21 Nab. Reki Fontanki, M: Mayakovskaya,
Gostiny Dvor. Tel. 314 7053
Faberge. Viktor Vekselberg’s private
collection.
STATE HERMITAGE MUSEUM
1 Palace Square. M: Nevsky Prospekt.
Tel. 571 3420, 571 3465. Daily, 10.30 a.m. to
6 p.m. (9 p.m. Wednesday). Closed Monday.
www.hermitagemuseum.org
Permanent Collection. Three million items
in six buildings along the Neva and around
Palace Square. Unless otherwise stated,
temporary exhibitions are displayed in the
Winter Palace, the museum’s main building.
Expeditions: Archaeology in the
Hermitage. Finds from recent archaeological
expeditions to different the regions of Russia,
Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan,
Kazakhstan and Italy, including Neolithic and
Medieval discoveries from Europe and Asia.
Through March 29, 2015.
Stone and Metal in Contemporary Art.
Local artists explore the use of precious and
semiprecious stones in different styles, from
those referencing classic 19th century
techniques to surprising contemporary styles.
Through March 8, 2015.
STATE HERMITAGE MUSEUM:
GENERAL STAFF BUILDING
6 Palace Square. M: Nevsky Prospekt,
Admiralteyskaya. Tel. 571 3420, 571 3465.
Daily, 10.30 a.m. to 6 p.m. (9 p.m.
Wednesday). Closed Monday.
www.hermitagemuseum.org
Francis Bacon and the Art of the Past.
Paintings by one of the 20th century’s
leading artists hang alongside masterpieces
from the museum collection in this
ADVERTISING
FOR SPT
12
NEW! Hector and the Search for Happiness (2014, U.K.-Germany-Canada- South Africa) Peter Chelsom’s adventure comedy starring
Simon Pegg, Rosamund Pike and Toni Collette. Angleterre (in English, French and German), Dom Kino.
landmark exhibition. Focusing on Bacon’s
known influences and inspirations, the
exhibition explores the painter’s fascination
with artists such as Rembrandt, Titian,
Michelangelo, Rodin, Van Gogh, Picasso,
Cezanne and Degas.
Through March 8, 2015.
STATE RUSSIAN MUSEUM
2 Inzhenernaya Ul. M: Nevsky Prospekt.
Tel. 314 3448, 595 4248. Open 10 a.m. to 6
p.m. (5 p.m. Monday). 1 p.m. to 9 p.m on
Thursdays. Closed Tuesday.
www.rusmuseum.ru/eng
Permanent Collection. The world’s finest
and most extensive collection of works by
Russian artists, from 12th-century icons to
some of the latest movements in
contemporary art exhibited in the Mikhailovsky
Palace and in associated buildings listed
below.
NEW! Monuments of Russian IconPainting and Ecclesiastical Art. About
600 works illustrate the key phases in the
building of the museum’s collection of
ecclesiastical between 1897 and 1914.
Through Feb. 2015.
STATE RUSSIAN MUSEUM: MARBLE
PALACE
5/1 Millionnaya Ul. M: Nevsky Prospekt.
Tel. 312 9196. Open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (5 p.m.
Monday). 1 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Thursdays.
Closed Tuesday.
NEW! Third Photobiennale of
Contemporary Photography.
Including 319 photographers — both
established and emerging — from 53 cities
and towns across Russia, the Photobiennale
offers a forum to discover and debate the
latest tendencies in photographic art.
Through Feb. 2015.
NEW! Eduard Gudzenko. Around 70
paintings and graphic works by Ukrainian
painter Eduard Gudzenko are grouped by
theme to show the artists key interests:
portraits, industrial landscapes, the world of
theater and folklore, landscapes and still lifes.
Dec. 18 through Jan., 2015.
STATE RUSSIAN MUSEUM: STROGANOV
PALACE
17 Nevsky Prospekt. Tel. 571 2360. Open
10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (5 p.m. Monday). 1 p.m. to
9 p.m on Thursdays. Closed Tuesday. A branch
of the State Russian Museum.
NEW! Vladimir Sevostyanov. This
exhibition includes more than 70 landscapes,
still lives and portraits by Sevostyanov drawn
from private collections, including the artist’s
own. Through Jan., 2015.
GALLERIES
ARTISTS UNION OF RUSSIA EXHIBITION
CENTER
38 Bolshaya Morskaya Ul. Tel. 314 3060.
12 p.m. to 7 p.m. Closed Monday.
www.spb-uniart.ru
NEW! Mikhail Devyatov. The paintings on
view by the renowned Soviet artist, professor
at the Art academy and restorer include his
famous “October Wind,’ for which he received
an award at the Brussels International Fair in
1957. Dec. 23 through Jan. 11, 2015.
BOREY
58 Liteiny Prospekt. M: Vladimirskaya,
Mayakovskaya. Tel. 275 3837. Tuesday –
Saturday 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. www.borey.ru
NEW! Wholesale Luxury Goods. Work by
important artists from St. Petersburg’s
underground art scene including Alexander
Arefiev, Vladlen Gavrilchik, Tatiana Kerner,
Valentin Livitin, Anatoly Basin and others.
Through Dec. 20.
ERARTA MUSEUM
2, 29th Line, V.O. M: Vasileostrovskaya.
Tel. 324 0809. 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Closed
Tuesday. www.erarta.com
Yugra Period. Paintings, sculptures, graphics,
photography and video art by contemporary
artists from Russia’s Yugra region (Western
Siberia and the Northern Urals) and other parts
of the country. Through Jan. 19, 2015.
Maria Agureeva: Garden of
Compromises. Featuring 17 works, many
exhibited for the first time, the exhibition also
includes work from the artist’s projects “Those
women that spoil our infinite” and “Faster!
Higher! Stronger! Commodification”. Through
Jan. 19, 2015.
Tove Jansson: To Live, to Dream, to Fly.
Photographs taken by Finnish author Tove
Jansson’s close friend, photographer Carl
Gustaf Hagstrom, and her brother, Per Olov
Jansson, document the life of the creator of
the beloved Moomin characters. Through Jan.
25, 2015.
NEW! Theo Frey. Swiss photographer Theo
Frey is among the definitive representatives of
straight photography who, with his incisive
social and political stance, created
documentary images that tread the line
between reportage and high art.
Dec. 19 through Feb. 15, 2015.
SCREENS
Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Him
(2014, U.S.) Ned Benson’s drama starring
Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy and Isabelle
Huppert. Angleterre (in English), Avrora,
Mirage Cinema.
NEW! Foreign Body (Obce cialo) (2014,
Italy-Russia-Poland) Krzysztof Zanussi’s drama
starring Riccardo Leonelli, Agnieszka
Grochowska and Agata Buzek. Angleterre (in
English, Italian, Polish and Russian with
Russian subtitles).
NEW! The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five
Armies (2014, New Zealand-U.S.) Peter
Jackson’s fantasy film starring Ian McKellen,
Martin Freeman and Orlando Bloom. Avrora,
Mirage Cinema, Velikan Park.
Interstellar (2014, U.S.) Christopher Nolan’s
sci-fi mystery adventure film starring Matthew
McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica
Chastain and Michael Caine. Mirage Cinema.
PUSHKINSKAYA 10 ART CENTER
53 Ligovsky Prospekt. Tel. 764 5371. Open
Wed to Sun, 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. www.p-10.ru
NEW! Drunken Trees in a Distorted
Landscape. The artistic duo of Carolina
Furque (Argentina) and Stephen Eastaugh
(Australia) show their black and white
landscapes, mixed media drawings and short
films from the farthest corners of the earth.
Through Dec. 18.
Museum of Non-Conformist Art.
The Door.
GEZ-21. Outbuilding B, 3rd floor.
Tel. 764 5258. Daily, 3 p.m. to midnight.
Kino-FOT-703. Office 703. Tel. 764 5353.
St. Petersburg Archive and Library of
Independent Art. Tel. 272 8222. Monday
and Saturday, 3 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Magic in the Moonlight (2014, U.S.) Woody
Allen’s romantic comedy starring Emma Stone,
Colin Firth and Marcia Gay Harden. Angleterre
(in English with Russian subtitles), Avrora.
RACHMANINOV GARDEN
5 Kazanskaya Ul. Tel. 312 9558. Tuesday –
Saturday 12 p.m. to 8 p.m.
www.fotorachmaninov.ru
Nice and Easy (Libre et assoupi) (2014,
France) Benjamin Guedj’s comedy starring
Baptiste Lecaplain, Charlotte Le Bon and Felix
Moati. Angleterre (in French), Dom Kino.
RACHMANINOV HOTEL
5 Kazanskaya Ul. Tel. 327 7466.
www.kazansky5.com
NEW! Predestination (2014, Australia)
Peter Spierig and Michael Spierig’s sci-fi
thriller starring Ethan Hawke, Sarah Snook
and Noah Taylor. Angleterre (in English).
Mommy (2014, Canada) Xavier Dolan’s
drama starring Anne Dorval, Suzanne Clement
and Alexandre Goyette. Dom Kino.
My Mistress (2014, Australia) Stephen
Lance’s drama starring Emmanuelle Beart,
Harrison Gilbertson and Rachael Blake.
Angleterre (in English), Dom Kino.
The New Girlfriend (Une nouvelle amie)
(2014, France) Francois Ozon’s drama starirng
Romain Duris, Anais Demoustier and Raphael
Personnaz. Dom Kino.
ADVERTISING
FOLK SHOW
AT THE NIKOLAEVSKY PALACE
4 Ploshchad Truda, St. Petersburg
Tel.: +7 (812) 312-55-00, 312-88-58
www.folkshow.ru
RIZZORDI ART FOUNDATION
49a Kurlyandskaya Ul. M: Baltiiskaya.
Tel. 702 9062. Tuesday through Friday 2 p.m.
to 8 p.m., Sunday 12 p.m. to 7 p.m. Closed
Monday. www.rizzordi.org.
NEW! Suck Me Shakespeer (Fack ju
Gohte) (2013, Germany) Bora Dagtekin’s
comedy starring Elyas M’Barek and Karoline
Herfurth. Angleterre (in German).
ROSPHOTO STATE CENTER OF
PHOTOGRAPHY
35 Bolshaya Morskaya Ul. Tel. 314 6184.
Daily 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. www.rosfoto.org
The Third Person (2013, U.K.-U.S.-GermanyBelgium) Paul Haggis’ drama starring Olivia
Wilde, Mila Kunis, Liam Neeson and Adrien
Brody. Avrora.
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Real Estate
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3-ROOM APARTMENT
4-ROOM APARTMENT
Apartments for rent. No commission. http://
arendaservice.ru/ Tel.: +7 (921) 943 38
28
22 Griboedova Emb. Water view 3-room
apartment, 126 sq. m. 2nd floor. 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, living-room, kitchen /
dining room 27 sq. m, balcony. Fully furnished and equipped. 110 000 RUB. a
month. +7 921 949-86-39
9 Furshtatskya Ul. 250 sq. m. apartment,
Western standard, 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, parking. For details contact Olga,
tel. +7 (921) 963 74 54; e-mail: olestate@
gmail.com, [email protected]
1-ROOM APARTMENT
6 Malaya Morskaya Ul. 50 sq. m., consists
of a bedroom and a living room combined
with a fully fitted kitchen, entrance with
intercom system. RENT 45000 rub. per
month. For details contact Olga, tel. +7
(921) 963 74 54; e-mail: olestate@gmail.
com, [email protected],
2-ROOM APARTMENT
6 Moika. Modern and quiet apartment of 90
sq. m., fully fitted kitchen, furnished and
fitted, secure entrance, parking, view of
Moika River. For details contact Olga, tel.
+7 (921) 963 74 54; e-mail: olestate@
gmail.com, [email protected]
40 Moika. European style, newly renovated
apartment of 100 sq. m. with 2 bedrooms, fully fitted kitchen, furnished,
secure entrance, parking. For details contact Olga, tel. +7 (921) 963 74 54;
e-mail: [email protected], [email protected]
Zhdanovskaya Embankment. Brand new
authorвАЩs design 2-room apartment in
an elite residential building, modern
design, furnished and equipped, independent heating system, ventilation, Internet,
satellite TV, 24/7 security, underground
parking. NIGHT SKY REALTY. Tel.: +7
(812) 333 15 15. E-mail: [email protected]
For additional information, call (812) 325-6080.
E-mail: [email protected]
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
APARTMENT FOR RENT
93 Moika. Newly renovated apartment of
180 sq. m. with 3 bedrooms, secure
entrance, parking, fully fitted kitchen, river
view. For details contact Olga, tel. +7 (921)
963 74 54; e-mail: [email protected],
[email protected]
6 Italianskaya Ul. 3-bedroom apartment,
cozy, European style, fitted, furnished,
parking, 130 sq. m. For details contact
Olga, tel. +7 (921) 963 74 54; e-mail:
[email protected], olga@ctinvestments.
ru
108 Nevsky Pr. 2-bedroom apartment of 65
sq.m., secure entrance, Internet, satellite
TV. For details contact Galina, +7 (921)
400 7664
Nevsky Prospect. Author's design, 3-room
apartment in an elite residential building in
the city center, fully furnished and
equipped, air conditioning, Internet, satellite TV, 24/7 security, underground parking.
NIGHT SKY REALTY. Tel.: +7 (812) 333 15
15. E-mail: [email protected]
Griboedova River Embankment. Bright
and stylish water view 3-room apartment
in the city center, Western-standard renovation, fully furnished and equipped,
Internet, satellite TV, video monitoring,
parking.
NIGHT
SKY
REALTY.
Tel.: +7 (812) 333 15 15. E-mail: info@
nightskyrealty.ru
Griboedova canal, 5 minutes from
Nevsky Pr. 200 sq. m. apartment, Western
standard, architect design, 4 bedrooms, 3
bathrooms, fire-place, view over the canal,
parking. For details contact Olga, tel.: +7
(921) 963 74 54; e-mail: olestate@gmail.
com, [email protected]
5-ROOM APARTMENT
9 Furshtatskya Ul. 4-bedroom apartment of
270 sq.m., secure entrance, fully furnished, Internet, satellite TV, parking. For
details contact Galina, +7 (921) 400 7664
16 Zakharievskaya Ul. Newly renovated
apartment of 230 sq. m. with 4 bedrooms,
3 bathrooms, fully fitted kitchen, 2 balconies, elevator, secure entrance, parking.
For details contact Olga ,tel. +7 (921) 963
74 54; e-mail: [email protected], olga@
ctinvestments.ru
22 Ul. Pravdy Ul. Representaive-class apartment in a solid building close to Zagorodny
prospect and green zone. Total area 256
sq.m. 2nd floor (lift). Comfortably divided
into 2 zones: entrance hall (31 sq.m.), sitting room (41 sq.m.), kitchen (14 sq.m.),
study (31 sq.m.), guest toilet, second zone:
gym hall (31 sq.m.), 2 bedrooms (24 + 16
sq.m.), 2 bathrooms, hall (27 sq.m.),
sauna. Windows overlook quiet street and
green courtyard. Fully furnished and perfectly equipped. Air conditioning. Freshly
online
advertising section
+7(812)325-3838
+7(921)992-1522
Prize-winner of prestigious
real estate contests
renovated. Respectable entrance. Garage
for 2 cars nearby. Low agency fee Photos
on www.spb-estate.com. Tel.: +7-921-9921522,
+7-812-325-3838
NEVSKY
PROSTOR AGENCY, E-mail: rent@spbestate, www.spb-estate.com
APARTMENT FOR SALE
12 Dvortsovaya Embankment. Unique
apartment in a solid building, constructed
in 1952. 3-minute walk to the Hermitage.
3rd floor. Total area 100 sq.m. Rooms:
18+20+26, 10,5 sq.m. kitchen, bathroom
and toilet. Balcony overlooks green courtyard. Ceiling height 3.5 m. Splendid view of
the Neva River, Spit of Vasilievsky Island,
Rostral columns and Peter and Paul
Fortress. Entrance from the street and very
beautiful courtyard. Photos on www.spbestate.com. Tel.: +7-921-992-1522,
+7-812-325-3838 NEVSKY PROSTOR
AGENCY, E-mail: rent@spb-estate, www.
spb-estate.com
PROPERTY
RENT & SALES
+7-812-493-23-40,
+7-921-963-74-54
www.ctinvestments.ru
28 Furshtatskaya Ul. Modern apartment,
120 sq.m. fully finished, historic center of
St. Petersburg. Richness Realty. Tel.: +7
(812) 340-00-48; E-mail: [email protected]
6 Tverskaya Ul. Penthouse. 214 sq.m.
city center with access to the roof. View of
the Smolny Cathedral. Security, underground parking. Richness Realty. Tel.: +7
(812) 340-00-48; E-mail: [email protected]
COMMERCIAL
REAL ESTATE
1 Tverskaya Ul. Commercial real estate.
Sale Business Centre, 1400 sq.m. with the
tenant. Profitable rental business. Richness
Realty.Tel.: +7 (812) 340-00-48; E-mail:
[email protected]
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Classifieds
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LANGUAGE LESSONS
ART GALLERY
E
M
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St. Petersburg Tourist
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Oil paintings (original work
by Russian modern artists
and copies made from the
famous masterpieces), dolls
Your choice for:
International, domestic,
local moving
1 p.m. to 7 p.m. every day
Project/office moving
paintmart-art.ru
Secure and heated storage
Relocation services
Want to study
overseas?
Former director, MSc in
Management program at a
UK business school, can help with
applications, personal statements,
& mock interviews.
English for business, academic
study, & military. Coaching
in English accents.
Also: strategic career coaching.
Online support.
Phone: +7 931 539 4586
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TRAVEL GUIDE
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E
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Experienced teacher, convenient schedule, individual
approach, for all ages
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WELCOME TO THE
WORLD OF RUSSIAN
LANGUAGE
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For additional information, call (812) 325-6080.
E-mail: [email protected]
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
VISAS
online
TAXI
DOMESTIC SERVICES
LIFE FACILITATOR. tel.: +7 (812) 970 73 16
LANGUAGE LESSONS
Russian lessons. Individual approach.
Flexible schedule. www.ruslearn.com +7
(961) 810 91 87
Qualified teacher of Russian and English.
8-911-231-36-41 stukun.ru
TOEFL and IELTS Preparation with Experienced
Native Speaker 7-961-807-44-34
http://angel-taxi.com/moscow-tour
MARRIAGE
AGENCIES
Triple–A, Attentive, Accurate,
(pro)-Active!!!!!
The mover that listens and
speaks your language.
Your contact person: Norbert
Marriage agency “Fortuna”. Best ladies.
Phone: +7-911-765-40-46, E-mail: [email protected], www.fortuna.spb.ru
Gooren, General manager
Tel.: +7-812-4319919
Email: [email protected]
MASSAGE
www.aaa-russia.com
Information pavilions:
• Pulkovo airports (1 and 2)
• Marine Facade (Seaport)
• Palace Square
• St Isaac’s Square
• Rastrelli Square
• Alexandrovsky Park
• Vosstaniya Square
Free tourist information service.
14/52 Sadovaya street,
St. Petersburg, Russia, 191023,
37 Sadovaya street,
St. Petersburg, Russia, 190031
Tel.: +7 (812) 310-28-22; 310-22-31;
+7 (931) 326-57-44;
Fax: +7 (812) 310-28-22
E-mail: [email protected]
www.ispb.info
www.visit-petersburg.ru
City Marketing Agency:
8 Shpalernaya street.
All kinds of massage. Liza. +7 (911) 720 99
19
PSYCHOTHERAPIST
GUIDES
Psychotherapy Skype Psychotherapy from
London. [email protected]
Private tour-guide. +7 (921) 942 78 02.
Welcome to my page on facebook Olga
Sartou
Different types of massage. Tel.: +7 (965)
787 56 09. Eva
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DiningGuide
MEDITERRANEAN
Côté Jardin
Hotel Novotel St. Petersburg Centre
3a Ulitsa Mayakovskogo
Tel.: +7 (812) 335-11-88,
fax: +7 (812) 335-11-80
www.accorhotels.com/5679
Celebrate New Year at the best
French address in town! Treat yourself
to our festive buffet spread of French
and International specialties. This year
we prepared a Great Entertainment
Program — during the New Year’s night
our guests will be entertained by show
ballet, Father Frost and his snowmen,
amazing wandering dolls of Monsieur
Pejo, guests from outer space. More
surprises to come: get fun with our
carnival battle with ﬁrecrackers and
confetti or make the best balloon gift at
our master class. An Italian fairytale
starring Princesse Brambilla will bring a
true magic to New Year’s Eve night. Our
DJ will be sure the guests get played
their favorite songs. The price of New
Year dinner is 8500 rubles, beverages
included. 50% discount for 3-12 years
old children. Paid-for tickets are nonrefundable.
We welcome you on our all-inclusive
Business Lunch Buffet in our
restaurant Côté Jardin — Monday to
Friday, midday to 4 pm. Enjoy our
mouthwatering salads bar, daily soup,
favorite appetizers, main dish
specialties, and indulgent homemade
desserts counter. The price is 790 RUB
per person inclusive of mineral water,
tea and coffee.
Besides cozy lobby bar and delicounter with homemade fresh pastries
Novotel offers our business guests 11
modern fully equipped meeting rooms
with bespoke catering and conference
solutions for any of your business
meetings and seminars — free parking
for our hotel guests.
Open daily for à la carte from 06:30—
22:45, breakfast 06:30—10:00, buffet
business lunch 12:00—16:00. Major
credit cards are accepted..
$$
ITALIAN
Restaurant Da Albertone
23 Millionnaya Ul.
Tel.: +7 (812) 315-86-73, 962-08-29.
A popular Italian restaurant, located
close to the Hermitage and with a
summer terrace. Its open kitchen, run
by head chef Luca Pellino and souschef Tiziano Valente, offers homemade
pasta, sausages, desserts and ice-
cream. A supervised kids’ playroom
and kids menu is also avaliable.
Japanese dishes can be ordered from
the adjacent “Sushi Lounge.”
Open Sun-Thurs 11 a.m. – 11 p.m., FriSat until 1 a.m.
Delivery service available.
$$
JAMIE’S ITALIAN
2 Konyushennaya Ploshchad
Tel.: +7 (812) 600-25-70
http://ginza.ru/
Jamie’s Italian is an international chain
of Italian family restaurants, where the
dishes are prepared according to
Jamie Oliver’s recipes, and the highest
standards of quality are observed.
It’s a lively family restaurant with the
typical Italian food that is served in
Italy every day. Little guests are always
welcome here. Kids’ room & menu.
On Thursdays and Wednesday there
are cooking classes for adults.
The average bill comes to 1,500
rubles. Wi-Fi.
Delivery service available.
$$
FRENCH / MOLECULAR
Old Customs House
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
advertising section
INTERNATIONAL
The haute cuisine restaurant “Old
Customs House” is located in the
center of St. Petersburg, on the spit of
Vasilievsky Island.
Perfection in every detail is the
foundation of the flawless service
and the feeling of comfort that we
create for all our guests.
The old brick arches, the fine wooden
furniture and the historic
engravings on the walls create the
unique style of the “Old Customs”
House haute cuisine restaurant.
Despite the roughness of the
interiors, there is an atmosphere of
intimacy and comfort at the
restaurant. And the dishes of French,
auteur and molecular cuisine
made from the highest-quality fresh
ingredients will amaze even the
fussiest gourmets.
Come and appreciate one of the oldest
haute cuisine restaurants in
Petersburg.
Palkin
Tequila-Boom
Corinthia Hotel St Petersburg
57 Nevsky Prospekt
Café Vienna is a daily dining restaurant
with international specialty dishes and
offers wine from around the world.
Also available is a wide selection of tea
blends and coffees along with
speciality cakes from the hotel’s pastry
chef.
Open daily from 10 a.m. to midnight.
$$
KARAOKE BAR
Jelsomino
5/29 Poltavskaya Ulitsa.
Tel: +7 (812) 703-57-96
VIP reservations: +7 (812) 999-96-96
Open from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m.
Amazing sound, modern visuals,
karaoke menu and professional vocal
equipment.
A fancy place to party for the famous
and beautiful. Appearances by
Russian stars and others in show
business. Everything here is in good
taste, fun and beautiful.
New menu! New interior, the latest
technology and a statement in
fashion.
New year night “Hot snow” - we are
waiting for you at 01.00!
1 Tamozhny per.
Tel: 327-89-80, 320-21-20
MEXICAN
Café Vienna
$$$
BRASSERIE
Palm
Belgian brasserie
Tel. (812) 571-81-51
29 B. Konyushennaya Ul.
vk.com/palmbrasserie
facebook.com/palmbrasserie
Palm brasserie is just 20 paces from
Nevsky Prospekt, right in the center of
Petersburg. We always offer our guests
fresh mussels, prepared according to
classic and original receipes, dishes of
European cuisine, freshly-baked
waffels, and over 80 types of Belgian
beer. Only at our restaurant can you
find exclusive beers from Palm
brewery. The brasserie accepts cash
and credit cards, and offers free
parking and business lunches.
47 Nevsky Prospekt.
Tel.: (812) 703-53-71,
www.palkin.ru
Open: noon to 11.30 p.m.
PALKIN restaurant is located in
the very heart of St. Petersburg.
Our constant search for new
flavors, by painstakingly
researching through old cook
books, and strict standards
regarding the use of
ingredients, make Palkin one of
the few places in the world
where diners can enjoy the
finest dishes of aristocratic
Russian cuisine in the elegant
atmosphere of an upscale
establishment. An extensive
wine collection is also on offer.
The opulent interiors include an
open fireplace. Smoking area
available.
57/127 Voznesensky Prospekt
Tel.: +7 (812) 310-15-34 or 050.
www.tequilaboom.ru
We invite you to visit TEQUILA-BOOM
restaurant — the finest Mexican
restaurant in Russia!
Our head chef will prepare a
delectable array of Mexican cuisine
for you: Fajitas Mixto, Burrito, Gringa,
flat cakes and steaks, while our
barman will mix cocktails, such as
Strawberry Margarita, Mexican flag,
Mojito and Caipriina. From noon to 4
p.m.
Monday to Friday a business lunch
(290 rubles) is available at the
restaurant.
Every evening we have live music, and
on Fridays and Saturdays there is a
show program featuring the city’s best
musicians and Latin American
dancers.
We will be pleased to see you!
$$$
Russian Empire
$$
RUSSIAN
Shokoladnitsa
Hotline +8 (800) 100 3360
www.shoko.ru
Shokoladnitsa is the largest chain of
coffee houses in Russia, and
embodies the unsurpassed hospitality
of the Russian soul.
In St. Petersburg, there are 30 cozy
cafés with individual design, but the
overall theme of warmth and
hospitality await you every day, and at
some of them, 24 hours a day. The
many Shokoladnitsa cafés are
located close to the main attractions
of the city and the culture of the
world - the Kazan Cathedral and the
Hermitage, Gostiny Dvor, and many
others.
With its convenient location and
extremely healthy cuisine using only
natural ingredients, Shokoladnitsa is
the best place for a delicious
breakfast with coffee or a hearty
lunch of three courses.
For breakfast and lunch there is a
special menu, with prices around 40%
lower than in the main menu!
We wait for you every day for a cup of
aromatic coffee and a slice of the most
delicious cake in Russia!
17 Nevsky Prospekt,
Stroganoff Palace.
Tel: 571-24-09
The restaurant palace “Russian
Empire” is one of the most convenient
places for holding business meetings
at the highest – imperial – level.
Russian Empire is located in the very
heart of Petersburg, the palace of
Count Stroganoff, and has convenient
and spacious parking. The Russian
haute cuisine served at the restaurant
and the luxurious atmosphere of the
palace will dazzle even the fussiest
gourmets.
You can always discuss the most
important issues in the secret rooms of
Count Stroganoff, where many
business agreements and decisions
have been made.
From 24 December 2014 to 15
January 2015, we invite you to
celebrate Christmas at Russian
Empire. An exquisite menu and
pleasant compliments from our chef
await you.
To advertise,
please call 325 6080
Find more information
on our website
WWW.SPTIMES.RU
$
– Banquet hall;
– Breakfast;
– Children’s room;
– Credit cards accepted;
– Dancefloor;
– Live music;
– Home delivery;
Average price of a two-course meal with an alcoholic beverage: $ – 500 to 1,000 rubles; $$ – 1,000 to 1,500 rubles; $$$ – more than 1,500 rubles
– Non-smoking area;
– Parking;
– Wi-Fi zone.
Feature
www.sptimes.ru | Wednesday, December 17, 2014
❖
16
Q&A: A Tale of Two Environmental Giants
By Alexey Eremenko
T H E S T. P E T E R S B U R G T I M E S
WWF RUSSIA
R
ussia is one of the few big
economies whose biological
resources are growing —
though no thanks to state
policies, environmentalists say.
Environmental problems are numerous and evident, starting with
global warming: Russia is warming up
2.5 times faster than the global average,
according to official figures.
Russian virgin forests have shrunk
between 8 and 10 percent since 2000,
thanks to manmade wildfires and logging, according to a study by the Russian
NGO Transparent World. The country
may run out of commercially harvestable
timber in 10 to 20 years, loggers warn.
Though Russia has signed up to international obligations to set aside 17
percent of its land for nature reserves
by 2020, it is unlikely to meet the goal,
experts say.
Moreover, the government is tapping
into existing reserves, slating them for
commercial or material use for geopolitical reasons. In the Altai Mountains, a gas
pipeline to China is set to pass through a
snow leopard habitat, and in the Arctic,
oil drilling has begun not far from nature
reserves, and military bases are going up
in the UNESCO-protected “polar bear
nursery” on Wrangel Island.
President Vladimir Putin’s government has an unimpressive track record
on environment, starting from his ascension to the Kremlin in 2000, when
one of his first decrees was to abolish
the State Environmental Protection
Committee, a powerful watchdog.
Environment protection is currently
handled by a ministry whose main mission is ensuring the maximum income
from the extraction of natural resources. That push-me-pull-you combination is not found anywhere else in
the world, said Ivan Blokov, program
director of Greenpeace Russia.
But the government is not the last
line of defense for the environment:
Russia has a strong tradition of grassroots — if state-endorsed — eco-activism dating back at least to the 1950s.
Homegrown groups have been
overshadowed in the post-Soviet era by
Russian branches of Greenpeace and
the World Wide Fund for Nature
(WWF), which make the biggest environmental waves in the country.
Life has not been easy for them, as
independent NGOs struggle in Russia,
and foreign affiliations only make
things worse.
USAID was expelled from Russia in
2012, and many domestic groups involved in “political activity” (defined
vaguely enough to have been applied to
a bird conservancy) and receiving donations from abroad are slapped with the
derogatory Soviet-era tag of “foreign
agents,” mired in crippling red tape and
occasionally vilified in state media.
But both Greenpeace and the WWF
are so far going strong (both dodged
the “foreign agent” tag), even though
they differ in approach and reputation
in Russia, as everywhere.
Greenpeace Russia, which only accepts private donations, has a reputation
as a troublemaker over its runs-in with authorities. Even their most innocent stunts,
such as an activist dressed up as a polar
bear sailing down the Moscow River on a
fake “chunk of ice,” do not go unnoticed:
The “bear” was briefly busted under the
Kremlin walls. And last year, the crew of
Greenpeace’s Arctic Sunrise icebreaker
spent months in Russian custody on criminal charges for picketing a Gazprom oil
rig in the northern Pechora Sea.
The WWF, on the other hand, accepts corporate funding, is promoted
Igor Chestin, head of WWF Russia, riding on horseback through the wilderness in 2005.
by Russian music stars, and its panda
logo appears on high-profile statebacked conservation projects.
They differ, too, in their estimate of
how bad the state of Russia’s environmental protection is, though not by much.
“[Environmental] legislation was
ruined, but now it is slowly being rebuilt,” says Igor Chestin, 52, head of
WWF Russia. Chestin is a big man with
a trimmed beard, and his size and taciturn concentration lend him a slightly
bearlike appearance.
“With a single exception — lead
concentration in the air — there’s no
improvement, things are either stable
or getting worse,” said Blokov, 53, a
much more outspoken and animated
man, who, however, is as careful with
words and also big (“that’s what quitting smoking does to you,” he reflects,
stroking his belly).
The St. Petersburg Times sat both
men down to chat about Putin, tigers and
wildfires. We did so in separate interviews, but the questions were the same,
giving Russia’s two topmost environmental champions a chance to show where
they really agree and differ on how best
to maintain Russia’s biocapacity.
Q: What are Russia’s main environmental problems?
WWF (Igor Chestin): Same as any
other socially important field such as
science or culture, I guess. To speak
systemically: Legislation, ruined over
the past 15 years, though it is slowly being rebuilt — with our active participation. Institutions: The environmental
control system we once had is disrupted, gone. And staff: We are critically short of people.
Legislation rebuilding has been going on for about five years. Putin’s economy ideologues have always posited
that environmental limitations hamper
the economy and must be removed. So
away they went, and by the end of the
2000s it became clear that they hadn’t
been the hampering factor — it was corruption, lack of judiciary independence,
etc. And when that became clear, why
not bring the legislation back?
Greenpeace (Ivan Blokov): That’s a
tricky question, because there are two
ways to approach it. One is, you look at
what could do the most harm. Put that
way, the main problem is the nuclear
industry. If a single nuclear station goes
up — I don’t think I need to elaborate.
Climate change would be in the same
category, but we can’t say we are the
only ones to blame: The U.S. and China
each contribute more to global warming than Russia.
But the other approach is, you look
at what cannot be restored. And that
means protected territories first of all.
Russian authorities have earned notoriety here — just take Wrangel Island.
Forests in general fall into this category,
they are problem No. 2, but a forest can
be restored to its natural state — it
would take 800-900 years, but it can do
it. A protected area cannot. Still, forests are a major problem because of
wildfires, which are getting worse because of climate change.
Q: And what are you doing about it?
WWF: We’ve got more than 100
projects, which can be grouped into six
main fields. The most expensive one is
nature reserves and conservation efforts. The second most expensive group
of projects is sustainable forest management; then sustainable fishing, in three
seas: the Okhotsk, Bering and Barents.
Then the climate change counteraction
program, focused mostly in Moscow,
largely an educational program. Then
the green economy, a broad concept:
Now we’re focusing on the financial
sector — we want the Central Bank to
put out guidelines for environmentally
conscious lending — and retail, mostly
big networks, whom we want to use certified timber. And the last one is environmental legislation: We have a list of
laws we’re lobbying that need passing
within the next five years.
Greenpeace: The main thing we do,
that we want to do, is to have people
know the truth. With the wildfires, the
problem was being kept under wraps,
people did not know about them. We
spent several years shouting about it
before people realized there was a
problem. The same thing with oil spills
— we spill 5 million to 10 million tons
of oil a year, with 500,000 tons of it carried by rivers into the Arctic ocean. But
the information is downplayed or
hushed up by the authorities.
Q: What is your relationship with the
authorities and corporations?
WWF: With the authorities, it’s a
working relationship. There are some
people we’re friends with, and others we
have to work with even if it’s not nice.
There are people in both business
and government that just don’t want to
work with environmentalists. They
only do so because they have to. With
what happened with the Arctic Sunrise,
now some people have an excuse to cut
Greenpeace out of any negotiations.
We get our donations from the middle
class: small businesses, employees of big
companies, officials, artists. We have our
own top-five companies we’re working
with, too: Alfa Bank, Coca-Cola,
MVideo, Tetrapak and Reso Garantiya.
We don’t take money from oil companies; we maintain relations with finance
and retail sectors, but we still have to see
where they make their money, to make
sure it isn’t the arms or nuclear industry.
Greenpeace: We’re trying to get onboard any councils, any events that facilitate a dialogue. But sadly, dialogue is
problematic with some companies, particularly [state-run oil giants] Rosneft
and Gazprom. They’re not at all open to
dialogue, though many others are.
But sadly, the majority of our work
has to do with protest, because much is
being done that’s not simply anti-environment, but plain illegal. The military
base on Wrangel Island is one example.
But we’re trying for a dialogue with the
authorities — for instance, on trash
separation. We hoped Moscow and St.
Petersburg would be the first to jump
on the recycling bandwagon, but in actual fact, it’s Petrozavodsk and Yekaterinburg [capitals of the northern republic of Karelia and Sverdlovsk region
in the Urals, respectively].
We often run counter to the interests of officials and commercial companies, which is why you could probably call us radicals. But we just want a
reasonable solution [to problems].
We’re ready for discussion, and we’re
perfectly aware that sometimes you
must compromise. And sometimes you
definitely should not.
Q: Has anyone accused you of being
“foreign agents?”
WWF: We think our lawmakers are
much worse “foreign agents” than we
are, because they have assets and accounts and children studying abroad,
and we don’t. The conflict with the
West has not affected us so far, and as
for money we raise in Russia [see box
for details — MT], our main donors are
individuals, so there’s not much change
there. Government funding was scarce
and is scarce, and that won’t change.
Greenpeace: We’re no foreign agents.
We’re a branch of an international organization. And as for problems, we’re
known throughout the country, and we
don’t have any explicit problems with being who we are.
Q: What do you think of your environmental counterpart?
WWF: It seems like Greenpeace’s
radical approach [with the Arctic Sunrise] made things worse in Russia. The
problem was not solved, and people
spent time in jail. This does not decrease
my personal admiration and respect for
the guys who pulled it off, but strategically speaking, it has made things worse.
I realize the Russian side was wrong too,
but if you’re talking about consequences,
they were negative. A year later, they’ve
started drilling anyway, while the Russian office [of Greenpeace] was out of
the loop for months because they had to
sit in Murmansk and help their detained
comrades. And astonishingly, while you
would expect mass protests in the West,
such as the Netherlands or Germany,
nothing happened, and that was a very
bad signal internationally.
Greenpeace: The WWF are not
“compromisers,” they just have a different approach: They don’t rule out
state or corporate money, and unlike
us, use it to fund nature reserves or forest ranger brigades. They’re basically
tracking the money so that it’s used efficiently, because I’m not sure that the
state is efficient when uses the money
directly.
Q: What needs to be done for environmental protection in Russia?
WWF: We have a document on environmental policy signed by [ex-President and now Prime Minister Dmitry]
Medvedev, for which we lobbied. This
is a foundation, something you can
work with; otherwise, as the saying
goes, all paths are wrong if you don’t
know where you’re going.
But the government thinks very
short-term, and focuses on concrete
things. They lack a long-term strategy,
the rules of the game change every
year, and they employ a project-driven
approach to legislation. As in, [Rosneft
head] Igor Sechin comes to the president and says: We want to drill, but we
need three laws to be canceled that currently prohibit me from doing so, and I
want money I’m not entitled to, and I
want to fire people but bypass the Labor Code. And they create a new code
tailored to Sechin’s project.
And management is getting de-professionalized nationwide: We’ve got
two professions: economist and lawyer,
and we believe people with those degrees can handle any kind of job.
But at least people are becoming
more active than in the 1990s, when everybody had to work hard just to feed
their families, and had no time for activism. And we’re working on concrete
things, too, with something to show for
it: New nature reserves are being created every year.
Greenpeace: We can’t do anything if
people don’t care. People need to start
caring about the environment, and that
will force the authorities to act.
As for the government, several firm
moves are needed. First, we need a separate, well-staffed state agency to protect
the environment. Second, we need adequate laws, and they need to be simple,
transparent and easy to check. And lastly,
you need to remove barriers to state
oversight. Currently, controllers always
need to be looking over their shoulder to
think, am I harming someone big here?
Regular people get busted if they park
on the grass, but when a big company is
polluting the environment, you’ll have to
sue them, and it’ll be a struggle.
It feels like it’s got tougher now. In the
late 1990s, they listened to us, just because they listened to all kinds of sensible
arguments before making decisions. Now
the arguments are not always considered,
and it’s harder to be heard. But it’s not all
pointless, we can still achieve something,
even compared to the 1990s or 2000s.
Q: What have been your worst and
best single impressions from the job?
WWF: The worst thing was the liquidation of the State Environmental Protection Committee in 2000. It was unexpected, and we couldn’t change it despite
collecting signatures etc. It was painful.
And the best is every time we can
create a new wildlife reserve. How we
are changing the world all together.
There were no aurochs [wild oxen],
and now we’ve got some 300 in central
Russia. We’ve preserved tigers, too,
and spent three years preserving a part
of the Far East for the leopards.
And also collecting signatures for a
bill to protect the seas from oil spills.
We’d never done it before, we didn’t
know how it would work out, and we
needed 100,000 signatures — but we
got 120,000 in three weeks. That was
important.
Greenpeace: The best were the
seven nature reserves and protected
areas created with our participation.
That’s more than 20 million hectares of
protected land!
And the worst was in 2002, when we
collected 2.5 million signatures for a
referendum on restoring a separate environmental agency, but the referendum was not allowed to take place.
Учредитель и издатель – ООО «Нева Медиа». Главный редактор – Турикова Т.В. Адрес учредителя, издателя и редакции: 190000, СПб, Конногвардейский бульвар, 4, 7 подъезд, 3-й этаж. Свидетельство о регистрации средства массовой информации ПИ № ФС2-8918 от 30 ноября 2007 года, выдано Управлением Федеральной
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