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Rocking the union

An in-depth look at Russia's Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov P3

The politics of rock music in the USSR P 14

A special supplement produced and published by Rossiyskaya G azeta (Russia), which takes sole responsibility for the contents.

For each majority politician,

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For each Siberian winter,

For each of you

Wednesday, October 16, 2013 there is an opposition leader.

there is a tropical Moscow summer.

there is a Russia of your choice.

KAMCHATKA CALLING ECO-TOURISTS HEAR THE CALL OF THE WILD IN RUSSIA'S FAR EAST

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Spotlight on Lavrov

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ARMS

PICTURES AND NUMBERS

Defence focuses on robotics PHOTOSHOT/VOSTOCK-PHOTO

Robots will be used to replace soldiers in combat contexts.

FIGHT OF THE YEAR VLADIMIR KLITSCHKO BEATS ALEXANDER POVETKIN Ukrainian boxer Vladimir Klitschko beat Russia's reigning champion Alexander Povetkin at Moscow's Olympic Stadium earlier this month. All three judges scored the fight 119-104, giving Klitschko victory in all but one round. Klitschko, 37, defended his IBF, IBO, WBO and WBA championships.

ITAR-TASS

positioned at a distance, outside of the enemy’s firing range, and be able to destroy not just one but five [enemy soldiers],” Rogozin said. “The third objective is

“What's more, we want every Russian soldier to do the job of five. And this can be done only if he is not just a soldier but an operator of a weapons system. He will be

TENNIS

ACTIVISM

Little sympathy for Greenpeace protest

OPINION polls suggest that the majority of Russians support the actions of authorities against Greenpeace protesters from the Arctic

Sunrise, who, on September 18, attempted to board the Gazprom oil-drilling platform Prirazlomnaya. Polls by the Centre for the

Study of Public Opinion (VTSIOM) revealed that up to 60 per cent of respondents said Russia’s response was “adequate”, 15 per cent said it was “inadequate” and 11 per cent claimed it was “too soft”. Aleksandr Skaridov, Dean of the Department of Maritime Law at the Admiral Makarov University of Sea and River Fleet, emphasised that the incident took place in waters that are under Russian jurisdiction. A foreign ship can legally enter the territorial waters of the Russian Federation only in the case of innocent passage or if it is headed for a Russian port. So, if the Arctic Sunrise entered Russia’s territorial waters for other reasons, it violated the Russian law“on the state border of the Russian Federation”.

FILM

PRESS PHOTO

Aussie film takes prize in Moscow RUIN – an Australian film shot in Cambodia with local Khmer-speaking actors – was among the prizewinners at Moscow’s 2Morrow International Film Festival earlier this month. The romantic road movie tells the story of two social outcasts: Sang Malen (a prostitute) and Rous Mony (a factory worker). The film, directed by Amiel Courtin-Wilson and Michael

cross-media armament systems...and now modern weapons can better operate in various media: on water, under water, in the air and so on,” he said.

Ruin was shot in Cambodia

Cody, also won a special jury prize at the Venice Film Festival. Coming in first at the Moscow festival was Kazakh film Harmony Lessons, which examines gang violence, school bullying and police torture. The film is a debut for Kazakh director Emir Baigazin. The 2Morrow festival is dedicated to showcasing and encouraging independent films from around the world.

Rodionova takes Perth honours

Vladimir Klitschko will receive $US17 million for his victory and Alexander Povetkin will get $US6 million, in this lucrative heavy-weight competition.

This was Klitschko's 61st victory in his career, while it was Povetkin's first defeat after 26 consecutive wins. Povetkin started his career in 2005 in Germany.

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COMBAT robots will be part of the state armament program of 2016-2025, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin told Interfax-AVN. “A variety of robotic projects, airborne, ground-based, underwater and others, will be a specific feature of the prospective armament program,” Rogozin said. Robots were a focal point of the Russia Arms Expo, in Nizhny Tagil Rogozin said. “One of them, for example, was designed to extinguish fires inside burning arsenals, and another was made for patrolling missions. Any specialist can tell you that we can build any remote-controlled vehicle with relevant mechanisms if we can build a remote-controlled fire engine,” he said. “One of our tasks, for example, which is being set in the new state armament program, is to save the lives of our soldiers and officers and to keep them away from dangerous war zones,” he said.

Arina Rodionova is ranked world No.231 in singles.

ARINA Rodionova, a Russian-born Australian tennis player, won the Perth Tennis International ITF tournament at the beginning of October. In the final of the tournament in Western Australia, Arina beat Irina Falconi, from the US, 7-5 6-4, winning her seventh ITF singles title. Later this month, she plans to take part in the William Loud Bendigo Women’s International Tennis Tournament, which she has won previously. Rodionova, 23, who began playing tennis aged three under the guidance of her father, is currently ranked 231 in the world. She made her professional debut in 2004 at an ITF event in a small town near Moscow. A love of tennis must run in the family. Arina’s older sister, Anastasia, who lives with her and their parents in Melbourne, also represented Australia in tennis at the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

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Alexey Mikheev discusses unusual Russian words with double meanings RBTH.RU/DOUBLE_AGENTS

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MOST READ Syrian crisis: between unilateralism and collective effort rbth.ru/30097

PERSONAL PROFILE SERGEY LAVROV RUSSIA'S FOREIGN MINISTER SINCE 2004

YULIA PETROVSKAYA SPECIAL TO RBTH

Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s Foreign Minister since 2004, played a key role brokering the Syria agreement, and some commentators have gone so far as to say it will come to be known as the pinnacle of his diplomatic career. Lavrov’s friends describe him as someone who likes to sing, play the guitar, and drink whisky. Unlike many members of the Russian elite, he spends his holidays in the wilderness rather than at exotic foreign resorts. Lavrov likes rafting, football, skiing and spear fishing. He’s also the president of the Canoe Slalom Federation. “Mr Lavrov is fit and sporty,”his former classmate, journalist and retired intelligence officerYuri Kobaladze said. “He has a good appetite, but is always in good shape. It probably helps that

was born in 1950; his ethnicity – Russian. However, Lavrov’s father was actually an ethnic Armenian living in Tbilisi. During a meeting with students in Armenia in 2005, Lavrov had this to say on the matter:“Actually, I have some Georgian roots, because my father was from Tbilisi; but I do have Armenian blood." After finishing high school, Lavrov entered the Oriental faculty of the Moscow State Institute of International Affairs. In addition to his major, Sinhalese, he also studied English and French. After graduating in 1972 he became an intern at the Soviet embassy in Sri Lanka. Lavrov’s diplomatic career has not been atypical. From 1976 to 1981 he served at the Soviet Foreign Ministry’s Department for International Organisations. From 1981 to 1988 he was the first secretary, adviser and senior adviser at the Soviet mission to the United Nations. And from 1988 to 1990 he was deputy head of the Department for International Economic Relations at the Russian Foreign Ministry. In

he likes to split logs and chop wood. Even at the Russian ambassadorial country residence in NewYork, he would often ask the gardeners to leave a few round logs for him to split.” In the US, Lavrov has had not only to chop wood but also to cross swords at the United Nations Security Council. He had served as Russia’s permanent envoy to the UNSC for just as long as he has now spent serving as the Russian Foreign Minister. Did Lavrov foresee his longevity in the diplomatic arena? It seems unlikely; after all, up until now the only people who have managed to make successful predictions about appointments in the Russian government are the very people who make the appointments. Back in 2006 I was present at a conversation discussing plans for the following year, during which Lavrov said with a smile: “That’s if I am still a minister by then.” What, then, has Lavrov’s career path looked like so far? His official CV says that he

FORMER FOREIGN MINISTERS

Yevgeny Primakov

Russia's first foreign minister under former president Boris Yeltsin (1991-96), Kozyrev was criticised for his alleged failure to support the Bosnian Serbs. He was one of the politicians who personified the Kremlin that emerged after the collapse of the USSR at the end of the Cold War.

83-year-old Primakov, who served as Russian prime minister (1998–99) and chief of foreign intelligence (1991-96), was Putin's adviser and ally. He became famous for his decision to cancel a visit to the USA in 1999, after he was told that NATO started the bombing in the former Yugoslavia.

Igor Ivanov

PHOTOSHOT/VOSTOCK-PHOTO (3)

Andrey Kozyrev

Former foreign minister (19982004) and secretary of Russia's Security Council (2004-2007), Ivanov retired from politics in 2007. Now he chairs the investment strategy committee at Russia’s largest oil producer, Lukoil, and holds a doctorate in history and an honorary PhD in philosophy and philology.

REUTERS

Statesman ready to stand ground on foreign affairs The September 14 agreement about the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons has turned international attention to Russia’s Foreign Minister.

1992, he was appointed deputy foreign minister under then foreign minister Andrey Kozyrev. Two years later he left for a posting to NewYork as the permanent Russian envoy to the UN. This appointment was a turning point in his career. During his years with the UN, Lavrov took part in discussions on the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia, Iraq, the Middle East and Afghanistan and in meetings about the war against terrorism. Lavrov was first slated to replace Kozyrev in December

1995 – but the Kremlin appointed Yevgeny Primakov instead. And, in 1998, Primakov was succeeded by Igor Ivanov. Lavrov’s turn came in 2004, and since then he has covered considerable ground in his term. He has, for instance, defended Russia’s missile defence system against criticism from the US; he also signed a new agreement about Russia’s border with China; he discussed a peace treaty with Japan – in an effort to end a long-standing territorial dispute between the countries; and he

has been closely involved in negotiations about Iran’s nuclear program. Lavrov is also known for explaining to the world Russia’s position on its military operation against Georgia, which many feared would spiral into a conflict with the US, and he later led negotiations in the subsequent Caucasus peace settlement. In the Middle East he is known for his w o r k i n strengthening Russia’s position – a task which has been complicated by revolutions and armed conflicts. Lavrov is known for his decisive temperament, but also for his temper. In 2008, Britain’s Daily Telegraph wrote that he had become angry during a phone conversation with former British foreign secretary David Miliband. The paper claimed that Lavrov’s language was so colourful that it was difficult for officials to draft a memo about the contents of the conversation. Some international diplomats have labelled Lavrov "Mr No”.And former US secretaries of state Hillary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice have said Lavrov could be infuriating. Predictably, differences with the US have been at the forefront of Lavrov’s pronouncements and of Russia’s recent foreign policies in general. Lavrov will never say anything that runs counter to the official Russian position. “Regardless of what a great guy Lavrov might be personally, he is a minister and an official representative of Russia’s national policy,” says Sergey Markedonov, a visiting fellow at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “That policy must always be co-ordinated with the head of state...and Lavrov’s stance reflects the position of the Russian government.”

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MOST READ Kamaz drivers sweep the podium at Dakar rbth.ru/22291

Kamaz survived the difficult transition from the USSR's command economy and is now thriving in Russia's free market

Russia's most successful truck-maker goes global During the dark days of Russia's post-Soviet economic depression, a Soviet truck company surprised many by scoring an international victory. FEDOR KIKTA

ITAR-TASS

Kamaz’s “flying trucks” have had unprecedented success at the annual Dakar off-road rally. This year, they took first, second and third place in the truck category.

FACTS ABOUT KAMAZ

With an annual revenue of $US4 billion, Kamaz, the largest truck producer in the region of the former Soviet Union, sells 46,000 trucks every year to domestic and international buyers.

According to Kamaz, Russia’s market for trucks in its own 14-to-40-tonne segment grew by 17.1 per cent in 2012 to 117,000 units. Last year the company also exported 7400 trucks, mostly to countries that used to belong to the USSR, where it is the market leader. As Russian consumer preferences evolved from price to quality, Kamaz announced an ambitious $US2 billion modernisation program, in conjunction with Daimler, to develop a new line of pricier, upmarket trucks, scheduled to hit dealerships in 2015 or 2016. Kamaz will also launch production of Daimler cabins and, eventually, engines. “In the future, [Daimler and Kamaz] plan to manufacture axles in Russia through a joint venture,” Daimler announced recently.

A deal with Daimler allowed Kamaz to modernise its fleet, with its trucks now incorporating Cummins engines and car parts from ZF Friedrichshafen AG and Knorr-Bremze.

Kamaz has been operating shared factories with Mercedes-Benz Trucks Vostok (MBTV) and Fuso Kamaz Trucks Rus (FKTR) since 2010, producing thousands of Mercedes-Benz Actros, Axor, and Atego and Fu s o C a n t e r v e h i c l e s . “Through our technological expertise and skill, we're helping Kamaz expand its strong position in the Russian market,” said Daimler’s Stefan E. Buchner. Kamaz plans to increase total sales of its own trucks to 80,000 a year, with a quarter of them tagged for export within the next seven years. “Kamaz will have every chance to offer Americanquality trucks in a few years at a substantially cheaper price,” said Sergei Udalov, executive director of the Avtostat research agency.

The company plans to increase its total sales of Kamaz brand trucks to 80,000 a year, a quarter of which it plans to export. Annual earnings from these sales will be about $US12 billion.

DPA/VOSTOCK-PHOTO

It was 1996, and Kamaz, Russia’s best-known heavy-truck manufacturer, stormed the prestigious Dakar rally, beating both Mercedes and Ford. It then won the following year, and the year after that. Soon Kamaz became the Lance Armstrong of Dakar (without the doping charges), taking first place 11 times after 1996 – a world record. And again t h i s y e a r, Kamaz’s “flying trucks” – a nickname they earned for their 160km/h leaps through the air – took first, second and third place at the rally. Kamaz is a rare animal in Russia: a Soviet brand that survived the transition from a command economy to the free market and is now thriving on the international stage. “Kamaz is Russia’s mostsuccessful homegrown automobile story,”said Oleg Datskiv, general director of Russia’s leading online car store auto-dealer.ru. In 2008, Daimler bought a 10 per cent share of Kamaz (estimated at $US250 million) as Kamaz began exporting to new markets in Latin America and Asia. And the company has successfully positioned itself as a maker of more economical versions of classic fourwheelers in emerging economies. “The Kamaz brand is well known, not only in [the regions of the] former USSR, but in other dynamically growing markets, like India and Turkey,”said Nord Capital analyst Roman Tkachuk. “They have considerable potential to increase their market share in those countries, which they can do if this investment and technology from Daimler allows them to compete in quality against top heavy-truck producers.” The 2008 economic crisis had the knock-on effect of boosting the truck-maker’s share of the domestic market (the largest in Europe) to a peak of 38.4 per cent from 28.1 per cent, as local firms switched to cheaper trucks in an effort to cut costs.

PHOTOSHOT/VOSTOCK-PHOTO (2)

SPECIAL TO RBTH

Local car production shifts up a gear The manufacturing of car parts in Russia is booming, as global auto-giants invest in Russia’s growing market. ANDREI SHKOLIN SPECIAL TO RBTH

Every morning a giant cargo ship arrives in Kaliningrad harbour (Russia’s tiny enclave on the Baltic Sea), carrying hundreds of BMWs assembled in the US. The cars’ engines, mirrors, bumpers and wheels have been removed in Germany, and in Kaliningrad, the parts are put back on and the cars can then be stamped “made in Russia” and sold as nonimported goods, in Europe’s largest automobile market.

Yet the situation is set to change in ways that will make tactics like this obsolete. International car makers are bringing technology and manufacturing capabilities to Russia, attracted by its $US70 billion market and the country’s recent admission to the World Trade Organisation. “The current goal is to localise the full cycle of automobile production – from windshields to engines – entirely to Russia, and import the relevant technologies,” said Kirill Tachennikov, a Moscow-based UBS analyst. When Ford became the first international giant to set up a plant in Russia 11 years ago, it was making 25,000 cars a

year almost entirely out of assembly kits. According to its agreement with the Russian government, however, by 2018 the Ford factory will be making 600,000 vehicles a year – and sourcing 60 per cent of parts locally. Volkswagen and RenaultNissan followed Ford and are bound by similar agreements: 30 per cent of their Russianmade cars will be equipped with Russian engines by 2018. The car assemblers in Kaliningrad are not too worried: by 2020, the parts they are assembling for BMWs are likely to be locally made, and the finished products may even be destined for markets outside Russia.

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MOST READ Russia's economics minister says focus is shifting to the Asia-Pacific region rbth.asia/48911

Russia turns its focus to the Asia-Pacific, aiming for greater economic integration in the region

APEC summit consolidates priorities At this month’s APEC summit, held on October 7- 8 in Bali, Russia worked to promote its alreadyestablished priorities in the region.

Why Russian SMEs go to Asia Yaroslav Lissovolik, chief economist at Deutsche Bank Russia, says that the strong presence of Russian corporations in the Asia-Pacific region can be explained by the fact that the small-and-medium enterprises sector in Russia is in early development. Russia still has problems with administrative barriers as well as an unfavourable investment climate. Lissovolik says that the way the system operates and the economy is set up in Russia make it more favourable for large companies to do well. In contrast, Lissovolik says that Australia has a strong SME sector, thanks, in part, to efficient public policies, which have reduced infrastructure barriers for smaller businesses and made it easier for them to succeed.

YAROSLAVA KIRYUKHINA

Russian President Vladimir Putin at the recent Bali APEC summit. Russia has been a member of the APEC forum since 1998.

PHOTOSHOT/VOSTOCK-PHOTO

These priorities included trade and investment liberalisation and greater regional economic integration. But which of Russia’s initiatives can be considered successful, and what has Russia – a country with 60 per cent of its territory in the Asia-Pacific region – achieved during the year that it has presided over the APEC forum, for the first time since its accession to it in 1998? Some noteworthy agenda items included the APEC Model Chapter on Transparency for RTAs/FTAs (regional/free trade agreements), which were designed to increase the transparency of foreign investors, and the APEC List of Environmental Goods. The list, comprising 54 environmentally friendly goods that will receive tariff reductions of up to 5 per cent by 2015, became the first tariffcutting agreement in APEC in more than 15 years, said Arrow Augerot, deputy assistant US trade representative for APEC affairs. Another positive outcome has been the Policy Partnership on Food Security, which was created under Russian leadership, following several years of discussion. This initiative requires Russia to provide assistance to people in Asia. Trade and food security were not the only issues covered. Science has also been a priority. Last year, the Policy Partnership on Science, Technology and Innovation was established at APEC. And this year Dr Carissa Klein of Australia became the winner of the APEC Science Prize for Innovation, Research and Education (ASPIRE) for her research on sustainable ocean development. However, good beginnings don’t necessarily make for good endings. Another of Russia’s priorities – regional transport and logistical potential development – did not gain significant support from APEC members. At this year’s summit Russian PresidentVladimir Putin once again called for more investment in infrastructure in Russia’s far east and Siberia. He admitted that Russia was struggling to finance the task itself, despite pouring billions of dollars into last year’s APEC summit inVladivostok just for appearances. The Trans-Siberian Rail-

KONSTANTIN ZAVRAZHIN / RG

RBTH

Russian Vladivostok hosted the APEC summit last year.

way, for instance, needs billions of dollars of investment to increase its traffic capacity and fulfil Putin’s dream of it becoming a key artery, linking Europe and the AsiaPacific region, giving a powerful boost to the develop-

Russian trade with APEC-member economies has been on the rise since 2002. ment of Siberia and the Russian far east. This year, Russia became a full member of the APEC Business Travel Card system. Specifically set up to facilitate visa procedures, the system allows a greater number of business people to travel faster and more easily within the Asia-Pacific region. There are more than 120,000 active ABTC cardholders. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov praised this move, in his article called“Towards peace, stability and sustainable economic development in the APR”, which

expressed hope for the expansion of trade and Russia’s economic cooperation with other APEC member economies. Lavrov also stressed that ties with ASEAN states (including Australia, Japan, New Zealand and the US) are developing on a strong and mutually beneficial basis. According to Lavrov, Russia is gradually stepping up trade and economic cooperation with all its APEC partners. Russian trade with APEC member economies has been on the rise since 2002: in 2011, it accounted for 24 per cent of Russia’s foreign-trade turnover against 16 per just cent nine years earlier. Russian officials have announced even more ambitious goals. The first deputy prime minister, Igor Shuvalov, said that Russia wants its trade volume with APEC states to exceed that of trade with the European Union within the next 10 years. The EU currently accounts for about half of Russia’s foreign trade, valued at about $US320 billion.

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Society

MOST READ How October 1993 led to Vladimir Putin rbth.ru/30489

Flashpoint Media covering Russia's constitutional crisis of 1993 became embroiled in the events unfolding around them

Journalists caught in coup's firing line

AFP/EASTNEWS

ITAR-TASS (2)

When special forces units began firing on the crowds around Moscow's Ostankino television centre, many journalists, photographers and camera operators were also among the protesters.

at around 2am when I was leaving the White House to go to the BBC bureau to hand in a report about the fourth day of the confrontation between the Supreme Council of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) and Boris Yeltsin. Mobile phones were rare then, and landlines in the Supreme Council had been cut off. To hand in my stories, I had to leave the building every few hours and go to the nearest phone booth or bureau to quickly send information to the London office. There were no problems for the first four days. But on the evening of the 25th, hundreds of RNU armed fighters appeared in the corridors of parliament and began to enforce new rules. “Hey! A BBC correspondent,” said one of them, looking over the accreditation issued to me by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.“We’ll have to shoot him. You’re an enemy and, moreover, a dangerous one.” No one listened to my explanations. I was searched, they seized my bag, voice recorder and documents, and ordered me to sit against the wall within sight of the two soldiers. I sat there for more than an hour, under the dim light of the emergency bulbs since the electricity had been turned off. At about four in the morn-

3, the main action moved to the Ostankino television centre, which armed supporters of the Supreme Council tried to capture. More than a hundred journalists were in the crowd of attackers. Special forces units immediately began firing from the roof of the television centre. I remember how I saw, about 200 metres away from me, how Reuters stringer Zurab Kodalashvili and AFP correspondent Stephen Bentura tried to help AFP correspondent Pierre Celerier to his feet. I tried to make my way to them, but couldn’t get through the crowd.Then I learned that Celerier had been wounded – a bullet went under his body armour and into his back. Among the dead were Rory Peck, German stringer from ARD, andYvan Skopan, cameraman for France’s TF1 television station. Peck was a sociable guy, everyone knew him. He travelled to almost all the “hot spots”of the former Soviet Union with his camera. After a sleepless night, most of the journalists returned to the White House because we had heard there would be an assault at dawn. And indeed, at six o’clock tanks rolled in and the shelling began.

ing a soldier came back and said: “Rutskoi told us to let you go in the morning. Lucky! You will live a while longer.” He led me to an office where some soldiers were sleeping on tables among scattered parliamentary papers. I didn’t feel like sleeping. He then asked why I, a Russian, would work for the enemy: the English.“The British and Americans are Russia’s main enemies. They have been trying for many years to break the age-old communal way of life in Russia. They are trying to pervert us with porn and permissiveness. They’re afraid of

'The British and Americans are Russia's main enemies...they're trying to pervert us...' Russia’s great Orthodox mission. Do you watch TV? All they show on TV is porn.” I was scared and didn’t want to argue, so just said that I was a reporter and didn’t pose philosophical questions. This kind of intimidation of journalists, however, was happening all over. And as the tragic conclusion of events drew closer, aggression towards journalists escalated. Both sides saw us not as observers, but as active participants. On the evening of October

rbth.ru/30485

TIMELINE

Chronicles of Russia's 1993 constitutional crisis

March 20 • Russian President Boris Yeltsin gives a televised address, outlining the provisions of a decree introduced to end the political crisis.

NIKOLAY KOROLEV

SPECIAL TO RBTH

Kalashnikovs, were standing at makeshift military posts. They were soldiers from Alexander Barkashov’s Russkoe NatsionalnoeYedinstvo (Russian National Unity) – an ultra-nationalist paramilitary movement of the time. I had been captured by them

GREGORY NEKHOROSHEV

In late September 1993 (20 years ago last month), I was sitting on the floor, leaning against a corridor in Russia’s White House, waiting for fate to take its course. Fifty-odd feet from me, at either end of the corridor, young men, in camouflage and holding

ITAR-TASS

Gregory Nekhoroshev, Moscow correspondent for the BBC (1988-1995), describes his experiences in Russia's White House during the 1993 coup.

March 23 • The Constitutional Court, not yet in possession of the decree, declares Yeltsin's actions unconstitutional and advocates for his impeachment.

December 25 • The new Constitution of the Russian Federation is published in Rossiyskaya Gazeta and comes into force nationwide.

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Society

MOST READ Sex in the Soviet Union: myths and mores rbth.ru/30325

Attitudes about when women should have children are changing in Russia, with some putting their careers first

The traditional schooluniversity-work-marriagechildren system gave Soviet citizens a blueprint to follow for the course of their lives. Things are different now. OLGA GORSHKOVA RBTH

“In the USSR we always thought that a woman should give birth before she turned 25,” said retired birth attendant Militina Dolina, who has 52 years of experience.“If you gave birth after 25 it was said to be late.” No wonder that, with this outlook, the average marriage age in the USSR during the ’70s and ’80s was about 22 years and in 1990 21.9, according to the HSE Institute of Demography. However, as Russia’s statecontrolled economy gave way to a free-market model, people’s life plans gradually changed. According to online surveys by Russia’s employment website Superjob, in 2013 a third of economically active Russians over the age of 18 believed that raising children was incompatible with building a successful career. And most adults under 24 prioritised their careers over family. “I'm against settling down early,” said 25-year-old sales manager Ekaterina. “A man and woman must first find their purpose in life before they’re both ready to start a family. “As for early marriages – they don’t last! But of course, if you try to become an investment bank manager before you’re 35, and then start thinking about kids, that would also be wrong. “You should grow as an individual and as a professional till say 27 or 28, and after that, start a family”. This seems a popular view among young, educated, well travelled, urban Russians. However, even among this group there are some who still believe in early marriage. The average Russian marries at 22 for women and 24 for men - among the youngest in the world, according to 2012 data from the Levada Centre. In comparison, HSE Institute of Demography data says that the average marriage age in the US is 26, while in Japan it is 29 and in Germany 30.

Because of government policies, which increasingly promote the national birth rate, Russian maternity leave conditions are among the best in the world. New mothers can take leave for up to three years and still return to their previous jobs. For two-parent families this may not present financial problems, especially if the man earns enough to support the whole family. But women who want and depend on their careers find that in the modern world, with its hectic lifestyles and competitiveness, staying at home to raise a child for three years is an unaffordable luxury. Anastasia, a 27-year-old designer at a glossy magazine, is convinced of this. She gave birth at 23 and returned to work just two weeks later, leaving her daughter in the care of a babysitter. “You lose your skills and contacts,” she said. “It’s impossible to return to your profession at the same level that you left. Besides, when your child grows up, they will blame you for not giving him everything their peers have.” Socialisation and professional growth are the main reasons young Russians choose their career paths. According to Superjob survey results, 42 per cent of people under 24 dream about successful careers, in which children are only seen to be a hindrance. Thirty-eight percent of those between the ages 25-34 think that couples should focus on their careers until the birth of a child. However, only 27 per cent of 35-44 year-olds think this way, and among those over 45, only 26 per cent think that work is more important than family. Elena Bolashova, head research scientist in the psychology faculty at Moscow State University, agrees that there is a tendency today to put careers before family. “Today people think about their careers in completely different ways,”she said.“This is because there are a lot more possibilities for professional growth than say 30-40 years ago. Today there are possibilities of serious financial

ITAR-TASS (3)

Economics is changing the balance of work and children

Under the Soviet system, every stage of life was timetabled. There was an age for family and an age for work.

Poll on family vs career

42 % under 24 dream about successful careers

35 % aged 25-34

26%

Russian mothers can take maternity leave for up to three years and still return to their previous jobs.

over 45 think family is more important

seek a balance between family and work

In most parts of Russia, young children go to kindergarden – this helps support mothers in their return to the workforce.

growth, of work abroad and of travelling. We used to see career-driven men, but now there are many more careerdriven women.” Nevertheless, the significance of spending time with your children and developing special bonds with them from birth is paramount, according to Ekaterina.“If you can, it’s better to devote two to three years to your child, because otherwise the time will pass and you won’t be able to get it back,” she said. “Of course a child can spend some time at their grandparents’ houses, but it would still be better if children spent most of their time with their parents.” According to Dolina (the retired birth attendant), doctors are c o nv i n c e d that breastfeeding is extremely important to a child’s immune system and their future health. This is another reason why many mothers

don’t give their children to babysitters or grandmothers right after birth. “I breast-fed my older daughter till she was a year and seven months old, and my second daughter till a year and four months,” recalls housewife Anna.“The longer you breast-feed your child, the healthier he or she will be.” To spend more time with their children, but still bring in income, many young mothers find freelance work, start their own businesses or find jobs in which they can alternate hours with their spouses, so the husband and wife can take turns babysitting the child. Some people even lease a room in their apartment to bring in income so the mother doesn’t have to work. But the market sets its own rules. In Moscow and other big cities a family of three must earn at least 60,000 roubles (US$2000) a month if they own an apartment, or 100,000 roubles if they rent – and these are only the minimum amounts to cover basic necessities.

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EDUCATION REFORM A NEW LAW OVERHAULING RUSSIA'S EDUCATION SYSTEM WAS LAUNCHED LAST MONTH, WITH THE AIM OF MODERNISING AND STANDARDISING A SYSTEM THAT HAD CHANGED VERY LITTLE SINCE SOVIET TIMES.

SCHOOLS ARE FAILING TO KEEP UP The education system of the Soviet Union trained some of the leading scientific minds of the 20th century, but Russia is now facing up to 21st-century challenges. ALINA LOBZINA SPECIAL TO RBTH

Russia’s education system has had a variety of challenges since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and weak educational outcomes in some age groups have prompted educational reform in an attempt to deal with some of these challenges. Svetlana Levkovets, a 49year-old teacher from St Petersburg, has grown accustomed to “competing with mobile phones” in the classroom. Levkovets says she tries to come up with homework that forces her students to work without technology. “If you give the children assignments where they need to compare facts, the internet is of no help,” she said. But today’s teens have more up their sleeves than just

gadgets. In May, answers to Russia’s Unified State Exam, or YeGE, which was intended to revolutionise the country's secondary education system, were leaked to a social networking site, Vkontakte. ru, Russia’s version of Facebook. Irina Abankina, director of the Education Development Institute at the Higher School of Economics, believes that the scandal with theYeGE reflects a lack of values in contemporary Russian society. She thinks at this point education reform is crucial for Russia and that it is going in the right direction. According to data from Abankina’s institute, since the YeGE was introduced in 2009, the number of students who moved from one city to another for educational reasons increased by 16 per cent. She attributes this to the new exam. Under the old system, each university had its own individual entrance exam. As a result, many students went to

college in the same town they grew up in. Students living outside big cities“didn't dare to try”to get into the best tertiary institutions, Abankina said. In another step to standardise education and ensure that the best students are on track for university, starting

Russian students were not as capable as students in other countries at solving problems in real-life contexts or at reflecting on the meaning of written material. And although Russia has one of the world’s highest literacy rates, it ranked in the bottom half of 74 countries surveyed in

"The abilities to apply knowledge, think, conduct research and work on projects are still our weak spots."

There are concerns whether there will be enough qualified teachers to deliver the new curriculum.

this past spring all ninthgraders in Russia had to pass an exam called the State Final Certification, or GIA, to continue on to the last two years of high school. Students who do not pass instead go on to a vocational school. The Programme for International Student Assessment, carried out by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development in 2009, said that 15-year-old

reading, mathematics and science. The results were interesting because younger Russian students consistently appeared near the top of international rankings, unlike Russian teenagers. Research from 2011 put Russian fourth and eighth graders in the top 10 in every educational category in the 57 countries surveyed. Abankina said the reasons behind the results are clear.

“The abilities to apply knowledge, think, conduct research and work on projects are still our weak spots, and we didn’t have these skills in the Soviet era either.” The educational reforms that will make a clean break with the Soviet past have only just been launched, under the new Law on Education, which came into force on September 1. In the new system, which will be fully implemented across the Russian Federation by 2020, highschool students and their parents will be allowed to choose some subjects for in-depth study and take other subjects as electives. There are concerns whether there will be enough qualified teachers to deliver the new curriculum. In 2010, then Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced plans to cut the number of teachers, given that the country’s demographic crisis meant that there would be fewer students. Between 2000 and

2011, nearly 30 per cent of Russia’s schools were closed down, according to the Education in Numbers statistics book published by Russia’s Higher School of Economics in 2013. Before the start of the 20132014 academic year, Gennady Onishchenko, Russia’s chief sanitary inspector, announced that another 733 schools would soon be shut down. Another solution to this situation has been combining several small schools, with several buildings sharing a single administration. In the case of St Petersburg School 685, where Svetlana Levkovets teaches chemistry and biology, two schools have been combined into a single building. The new building is located near a busy highway instead of the leafy courtyard where her old school was. But she remains positive. “It will be interesting to see how the new standard works out,”she said.“If worse comes to worst everything will remain the same.”

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MOST READ Harvard versus Moscow State University rbth.ru/30289

Innovative new players see opportunities to lift education outcomes

New technologies seek to fix old problems ITAR-TASS

Paper is giving way to e-books, tablets and laptops in Russian schools, and more IT companies are emerging to offer technologies to better enable e-learning. ANDRII DEGELER

ITAR-TASS © ALEKSANDR KRYAZHEV / RIA NOVOSTI SERGEY MIKHEEV / RG

IN NUMBERS

100 per cent is Russia's literacy rate, according to the Global Education Digest 2012, published by UNESCO. This is higher than Russia's long-standing rate of 99 per cent.

733 schools will be closed in Russia this year because of a slump in the number of school students, a top Russian official announced in August.

20th in the developed world was the ranking Russia's education system received in a table published by the education company Pearson. The countries that came out on top were Finland, South Korea and Hong Kong.

FACTS ABOUT SCHOOLS

There are 1457 regular state schools in Moscow attended by 856,000 students from grades 1 to 11. In comparison, Greater London has 2228 state primary and secondary schools serving 1.2 million students.

The average school year in Russia is shorter than most, at 164 days. State schools in the UK must be open for at least 190 days each year, though many choose to have an even longer academic year.

Almost a third of Russian schools were closed between 2000 and 2011 because of a decline in Russia's birth rate. A short baby boom in the early noughties, however, resulted in a shortage of spaces last year.

Fifteen years ago computers in Russian schools were used primarily to teach children basic programming and common office applications, but in contemporary Russia, students are using a range of modern technologies on a daily basis. Over the past few years, companies specialising in elearning products have become a successful segment of Russia’s IT sector. Startups and established companies have seen huge potential for innovations supported by government and private venture capital. In 2012-13 alone, more than $US10 million was invested into education technology companies in Russia, according to data from trade publications. New technologies have found their way into all areas of Russia’s education sector, whether in schools, in private tutoring or in distance-learning contexts. And while this sector is not as developed as in some Western countries, it has many promising players. About half of the past year’s investment in education technologies went to the company Dnevnik.ru – a start-up launched in 2009. Dnevnik.ru provides an allround e-document management system for nearly 29,000 schools – that is, more than half of Russia’s schools. The system is hosted by the company, and all users need to do is log into their account at the website. Gavriil Levi says he started the project after he became aware of the lack of communication between his parents and his younger brother’s school. He says Dnevnik.ru has grown from a self-financed start-up to the biggest education initiative in the country. “We connected several schools ‘manually’ at first,” Levi said. “We went to meet principals, parents and teachers, presented the product and explained why it could be useful.” The startup was also boosted by a government decree that all Russian schools must introduce e-document flow systems by 2014. Levi recently told the newspaper Vedomosti that he expects Dnevnik.ru to be up and running in 35,000 schools by 2014, while the other

ITAR-TASS

SPECIAL TO RBTH

E-learning goes the distance Away from schools, distance learning is an emerging trend in Russia. While many Russian students enrol in courses with popular international services such as Coursera, Udacity and Khan Academy, there are domestic alternatives that are competing with their Western counterparts. One of the best-known examples is LinguaLeo, a web service that uses popular books and television series to teach English. The company is seen as one of the most successful Russian start-ups in the field of e-learning, especially after securing $US3 million investment from Runa Capital last year. Private tuition has also become very popular in the past 20 years. One of the biggest players in this field is Eruditor Group, a network of online marketplaces for finding and booking the most suitable teachers. It was launched in 2006 by a project called Vash Repetitor: Russian for "Your private tutor".

"Children today are used to copying their homework from the internet, and teachers have no way to prevent it," says Valery Nikitin, founder of YaKlass.

20,000 schools will use rival systems such as NetSchool or Paragraph. Dnevnik.ru expects to become profitable early next year. Levi says: “The basic functions are, and will always be, free while paid features, including text messaging, access-control and electronic vouchers for school canteens, can make the system even more useful.” Several other companies aim to help school students with their everyday tasks.The most obvious problem to solve is the fact that children have to carry heavy and bulky textbooks to school each day. Since December last year, Russia's Federal Institute of Education Development has been running a nationwide e-textbook distribution system in partnership with the bookshop company Azbuka, which developed a system that converted textbooks for digital use. Azbuka says that e-books accessible on a tablet or laptop are cheaper than paper ones, which allows schools to cut costs. It did not take long for this big market to attract new players. In August, Russia’s IT behemoth Lanit said it would start offering a solution, and it is a safe guess that schools will soon be able to choose from a variety of providers. But even when large, statesupported companies enter the market, there’s still space for start-ups to make an impact. YaKlass, valued in a recent investment round at $US2 million, claims to have found a solution to a problem that has challenged teachers since internet access became widely available. “Children today are used

to copying their homework from the internet and teachers have no way to prevent it,”saysValery Nikitin, founder and chief executive of YaKlass. Nikitin’s company offers a system that generates homework tasks that are unique for every school student, ensuring that they can’t just go online and find ready-made answers. The idea first came to a mathematics professor.YaKlass bought the idea and adjusted it to suit the needs of schools. It is certainly true that, thanks to the internet, education has become more accessible and convenient for those who want to learn, while new services bring a variety of subjects and sources that it would simply have been impossible to access 20 years ago. According to Levi, there have been experiments conducted that prove a correlation between the level of information technology development in a school and academic progress and school attendance. On the downside, plagiarism and general sloppiness are widely believed to be a result of internet use. Some critics prophesy that many children will soon be unable to write with a pen or pencil, but only type on a keyboard or touch screen. However, it is clear that many problems that have been caused by new technologies can also be solved using other technologies. What’s needed most in this area perhaps is passionate and innovative people willing to work to improve educational outcomes – and this is something which does not seem to be lacking.

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Comment

MOST READ Russia: surprising on the upside rbth.ru/30369

THE 'PIRATES' OF PRIRAZLOMNAYA Dr Chris Fleming SPECIAL TO RBTH

n September 18, Greenpeace activists in the Pechora Sea approached Russia’s first offshore Arctic oil platform, the Prirazlomnaya. Two activists then attempted to scale the rig. Alerted, the Russian coast guard rammed the rafts that surrounded the Greenpeace vessel, the Arctic Sunrise, firing warning shots over the boat and shooting the activists with water cannons. Two activists who attempted to scale the platform were immediately arrested. The following day the coast guard returned by helicopter, boarded the Greenpeace ship, detained the remaining 28 activists and towed the boat to Murmansk. On September 24, numerous media releases left little doubt that the activists would be charged with piracy. And by October 3, all of the crew had been so charged. Much of the international discussion about the incident so far has revolved around legal issues, particularly questions of jurisdiction. Much of it has focused on interpretations of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea – about the applicability of the charge of piracy and of the legality (or otherwise) of the Russian coast guard’s boarding and seizure of the Greenpeace vessel. Many, obviously, have contested the validity of the piracy charges. (To add to the

SERGEY YOLKIN

confusion, Russia refused to prosecute actual Somali pirates who seized a Russian oil rig in 2010 because, it said at the time, international law was too unclear about these matters.) Whatever their legal or moral status, these actions are not without precedent. In February this year, the US Court of Appeal upheld a conviction of piracy against anti-whaling activists, although

– it must be said – the tactics of these activists were substantially different from that employed by the crew of the Arctic Sunrise. And there have, of course, been more heavy-handed – even dire – “defences” against environmentalist activism, the most notorious of which was the sinking of Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior by the French intelligence agency, the DGSE, in 1985.

NEW MUSIC PIRACY LAWS UNPOPULAR IN RUSSIA Vasily Shumov SPECIAL TO RBTH

ver the past 15 years, every developed country has gone through the process of adopting internet anti-piracy laws. And now it is Russia’s turn. A few amendments were recently made to Russia’s expanded Anti-Piracy Law, and now rights-holders can file in court for the violation of intellectual property rights, if they have requested that a filesharing or torrent site remove illegal content and if they can provide proof that they hold exclusive rights to the content. Music piracy in Russia has

changed over the past 30 years. It started after the collapse of the Soviet Union, in 1991, as a wild free-market economy emerged in Russia. At this time, there was an underground industry producing, distributing and selling counterfeited CDs and DVDs. Now we are dealing with cyberspace pirates, and it is a far more controversial area. Many musicians and music critics do not consider musicsharing or torrent sites as piracy. In fact, some musicians use torrent sites as promotional tools, to link themselves with the millions of fans who visit the sites daily. Well-known music critic Artemy Troitsky of Moscow is a supporter of free internet

music sharing and the abolition of Russia’s existing copyright laws, which he considers obsolete in the 21st century.

Many musicians and music critics do not consider musicsharing or torrent sites as piracy. On Russian radio, he asked rhetorically: “Who is getting all the money [from official music sales]? Not the musicians – they only get a very small percentage. The money goes to the large corporations who own the rights... “So I am actually a pirate

But if there has been disagreement about the legal or ethical facts here – or their interpretation – there should be less debate about the incident in terms of public perception. The sight of unarmed activists on their knees, held at gunpoint, detained without charge and then charged with an offence that carries a possible 15-year prison sentence, might have the effect of drawing attention to what

in this sense. And if we had a Pirate party, I would join it.” Andrei Makarevich, whose band MashinaVremeni (Time Machine) has been popular in Russia since the late ’70s, is, however, a supporter of Russia’s current anti-piracy laws. In the August 2013 issue of the weekly magazine Afisha, he said:“Every industry needs money to function, and money has left the music business because musicians lost the opportunity to get paid for their recordings.” For more than a decade in Russia, music has been free for sharing and downloading online. But amendments to legislation on music piracy means that times are changing. As Mick Jagger sings, “old habits die hard.” MuscoviteVasily Shumov is a well-known musician, music producer and video and photographic artist.

many believe to be an issue of crucial public concern. There is ample indication to suggest that that is precisely what is happening. Outside Russia, there has been an uncharacteristic outpouring of support for the activists, with protests being held in 45 countries. A number of experts on maritime and international law have voiced criticisms both of procedural issues and the ver-

dict, a handful circulating a public statement of concern. Amnesty International has also registered its dissatisfaction with the charges and detentions, and the Dutch government has signalled its intent to launch arbitration proceedings against Russia under the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea. There have also been voices of concern within Russia (even if they do not represent the majority viewpoint), with protests outside Gazprom’s Moscow offices and statements by public figures. Even Russian President Vladimir Putin said of the protesters that it was “completely obvious that they are not pirates”. It is difficult to speculate on the long-term effects of these events, but it is worth remembering that in his march from Ahmedabad to Dandi in 1930, Ghandi’s desire was to be arrested. The same was true of the antisegregation sit-in participants in Nashville in 1960. It may not have been the Greenpeace protesters’ intent, but there is ample precedent to suggest that the arrest of unarmed civil disobedients who have galvanised the public’s attention rarely works in the interests of the arresting powers. Whether that turns out to be the case here remains uncertain. Dr Chris Fleming is a senior lecturer in Humanities and Communication Arts at the University of Western Sydney

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Environment

MOST READ How to keep Siberia's largest river clean rbth.ru/30497

Global warming in Russia is already affecting the climate and fauna in the far east and far northern areas

Flooding a taste of things to come? Recent floods in Russia's far east have been interpreted as indicators of climate change, in an area where temperature increases are likely to have far-reaching impacts.

Fauna changes in tundra The warming of Russia's tundra has seen low-growth plants gradually being displaced by taller plants with more developed roots. Several species of mosses and lichens have also become threatened, including the Aloina moss (Aloina brevirostris). Satellite imagery data has confirmed that tall shrubs – which usually thrive in higher temperatures – are growing where mosses dominated previously. And according to the latest estimates, about 10 to 15 per cent of the southern parts of the north-western Eurasian tundra, which stretches from Finland to west Siberia, have been taken over by shrubs standing at more than two metres tall. Until recently most plants in that area were no taller than a metre. These changes first drew the attention of scientists after nomadic Indigenous shepherds began complaining that the "new trees" were restricting their sight of their deer herds.

VSEVOLOD LAZUTIN

Floods which hit the Amur and Khabarovsk regions this summer caused considerable damage, with tens of thousands of residents losing their homes to surging waters. RomanVilfand, head of the Russian Hydrometeorological Centre, believes these floods were caused by climatic changes which brought about abnormal air circulation patterns over Russia’s far east. This summer, a hot and humid air mass hung over China, while in Yakutia (in north-eastern Siberia) air temperatures stayed relatively low. This temperature disparity caused a large lowpressure system to form, which triggered high rainfall over Russian far east largest rivers: the Amur, Zeya, Bureya, Sungari and the Ussuri. The unusual conditions are being interpreted as further signs of what meteorological data is confirming: that Russia’s climate is changing. During the ’90s, Russia’s mean annual temperature in the lower atmosphere increased by 0.4 degrees. And according to a long-term climate-change forecast, published by the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Monitoring of the Environment (Rosgidromet) in 2005, Russia can expect a sharp increase in the number of weather disasters across its territories. Natural disasters will mostly be caused by meteorological phenomena related to upward and downward movements of great air masses below the level of cumulonimbus clouds (these phenomena are difficult to predict). Yakutia, east Siberia, the north-eastern areas of the far east and Kamchatka, for example, are likely to see more floods from higher rainfall. According to a joint study by Princeton University and the University of Maryland, Russia’s far east is also likely to see the advent of tropical typhoons and hurricanes as the tropical zone shifts northward. Alexander Minin, senior researcher with Russia’s Institute of Global Climate and Ecology, believes the Earth’s climate changes constantly. “Our climate is forever changing, it’s just that these days, it has become less balanced,” he said.“There is indeed a warming trend, but it is confined to individual regions and it isn’t distributed equally throughout the year. “In some areas, we’re ac-

SERGEY SAVOSTIANOV / RG (3)

SPECIAL TO RBTH

tually observing a cooling process.” Minin argues that climate change is influenced by many factors and exacerbated by activities such as deforestation and reclamation of natural water reservoirs. “In some areas of Siberia and the far east, plant growth

Climate change is occurring twice as fast in the Arctic than anywhere else on Earth. cycles have been offset by several weeks and bird migration cycles have changed. And in the Arctic tundra, some plant species have found themselves on the brink of extinction due to increased temperatures.” He said that in some urban areas, the thawing of permafrost is affecting pipes and foundations of buildings. Minin then went on to describe what he saw as the positive consequences of climate change for Russia. “For example, according to some reports, the Arctic ice-cap is shrinking, which is opening up new opportunities for the use of the Northern Sea Route.” He also mentioned reduced heating costs. The “positives” of climate change have received considerable coverage in Russian media, indicating something about attitudes to the environment. In Russia’s transition econ-

omy, it seems that short-term economic gains are still considered significant, even in the face of forecast irreversible ecological damage and impending natural disasters. Climate change is occurring twice as fast in the Arctic than anywhere else on Earth.The melting of the Arctic ice-cap, which some argue is happening at far faster rates than previously forecast, is likely to cause large increases in water flows in some Russian rivers. There is also a small risk that as a result of these changes, there may be profound disruption to deepocean currents, which carry a significant amount of warmth to Europe. If this happens, Europe’s climate could cool dramatically. However, it is the thawing of permafrost in Russia’s Arctic regions which is attracting the most international

COMMENT

Possible reasons behind this summer's Amur floods Alexander Frolov CHIEF OF RUSSIA'S METEOROLOGICAL SERVICE

The Amur river in Russia's far east sees two flood peaks each year: in spring and in the period between July and September, as a result of monsoonal rains. The Asian monsoon cycle follows a pattern: a typhoon or storm comes off the Pacific Ocean on to the Chinese mainland, where it turns into cyclones that start moving up towards Russia. This process happens every year, but in 2013 the cycle was a bit different. The cyclones usually move around, but this year they re-

Government workers trying to stave off rising flood waters.

mained over the Amur region, where a high-pressure trough kept the cyclones in one area only. The floods over Amur were also caused by persistent heat from the Pacific Ocean. Precipitation in June was also 3.5 times higher than average in Amur, while in some places it even reached the average annual rainfall in just two summer months. Another contributing factor to the floods was a late spring, which did not give water from melted snow enough time to soak into the earth. This increased humidity on the Earth's surface, also affecting weather patterns.

scrutiny. Permafrost has been thawing from global warming for some years already, and this has been associated with the release of large amounts of the greenhouse gas methane – which is concentrated in the Arctic tundra. The international science journal Nature published a report in July called Climate science: vast costs of Arctic change. It said that the release of 50 gigatonnes of methane from melting permafrost, over a decade, would have such a significant impact on our climate that it would result in flooding, sealevel rise, agriculture damage and health effects amounting to $60 trillion – roughly the size of the entire global economy last year. The article’s authors argue that this issue and its likely impacts require urgent global attention, modelling and mitigation.

A man fishing on a flooded river in the Far East this summer.

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MOST READ The top seven most unusual getaways in Russia rbth.ru/28481

FIERY FORAYS IN KAMCHATKA A RUSSIAN PHOTOGRAPHER AND BLOGGER DESCRIBES HIS VISIT TO THE KAMCHATKA PENINSULA, ONE OF THE

LANDSCAPE FORGED BY EARTH, WIND AND FIRE

If you are an early riser in Kamchatka, you can be among the first in Russia to greet the dawn. The peninsula, in Russia’s far east, is a landmass 1250 kilometres long, lying between the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk. Its volcanic landscapes are among the most dramatic and striking natural wonders of Russia’s vast territories. The Kamchatka region includes the peninsula, the Commander Islands and Karaginsky Island, and has a population of only 320,000 – more than half of whom live in the capital city, Petropavlovsky-Kamchatsky. I visited Kamchatka to shoot a documentary about survival. It was raining when I landed in the capital and, with an eight-hour time difference from Moscow, my body was still asleep. I was soon advised that when visiting Kamchatka it is important to remember to bring hand flares – in case you encounter a bear. Locals cautioned that attempting to run from a bear “will not be helpful”. By evening, with the rain gone and the fog dispersed, sunset revealed the striking outline of volcanoes on a horizon that seemed like the very edge of the Earth.

Mutnovskii and Gorelii volcanoes

NATIONALITY: RUSSIAN WORK: PHOTOGRAPHER AND BLOGGER

Born in Nepal, Dementievsky has always been attracted to offbeat locations. He is also not afraid of heights and has climbed in the Himalayas and explored the ruins of ancient civilisations in Syria, Armenia and the Caucasus.

He also visited the former Kingdom of Mustang, in north-central Nepal, which was once closely tied to Tibet. Dementievsky started out as a photographer using a mediumformat film camera, after being inspired by the beauty of North Karelia – a region in eastern Finland. But he later switched to digital cameras because of demands for speed and efficiency. Currently working on a major photographic project of Russian landscapes, he also organises wildlife tours for aspiring photographers, showing them some of the most unusual beautiful spots on our planet. For more information about Dementievksy's tours, see his blog: www.dementievskiy. livejournal.com.

INFOBOX

Klyuchevskaya and the Tolbachik volcano

How to get there

Conquering the moon was an obsession of the Soviet space program in the late ’60s. Concluding that the properties of the moon’s surface were similar to the landscape created by scoria – basaltic lava ejected as fragments from volcanoes – Soviet space researchers, turned their attention to Kamchatka. Under tight security, in 1969 and 1970 the area of the Tolbachik volcano was used for testing technology for planned lunar expeditions. But in 1975, there was a big eruption and large cracks appeared across the area. The research had to stop. For more than a year, the area was alive with intense volcanic activity. Sizzling hot bombs flew through the air, reaching distances of up to

Flying is the easiest way to get to Kamchatka. (From Moscow it is eight to nine hours.) There are also flights from Vladivostok and Khabarovksk and ferries and cruise ships leave from Sakhalin and Vladivostok. There is no rail connection with Kamchatka though, because the large mountain ranges between the peninsula and the mainland prevented railways being laid.

The velocity of gases coming out of the ground at times exceeded the speed of sound.

two kilometres, and the velocity of the gases coming out of the ground at times exceeded the speed of sound. A column of ash and gas went five or six kilometres into the air, and the ash plume stretched to a distance of 1000 kilometres. Across an area of more than 400 square kilometres, all vegetation was destroyed, and only now, in some areas, new undergrowth is starting to appear. In the morning, scouting the road, we found out that a few kilometres away there was a campsite and even a small lake. We set off there on foot. When we arrived in the afternoon and set up camp, we could hear the nearby Klyuchevskaya volcano rumbling, at times so loudly and frequently that it sounded

like military exercises were being conducted nearby. Then we noticed a thin coating of ash on our tents, bowls, mugs and forks. The ash was in everything, our eyes, between our teeth and mixed into our food. Suddenly, up into the air rushed a huge white column. We wondered if before our eyes we were seeing a new phase of the eruption, and a little later, we could see a lava flow coming down the volcano and reaching the glacier.

Dead Wood On the other side of Tolbachik is an area called “Dead Wood”– remnants of a forest that was destroyed during the Tolbachik eruption. Dead wood refers to the tops of trees that are trapped under seven metres of ash.

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We had to drive a few hours along a bumpy gravel road before reaching Mutnovskii

Ivan Dementievsky IGOR SHPILENOK

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IGOR SHPILENOK

IVAN DEMENTIEVSKY

(Cloudy) and Gorelii (Burnt) volcanoes. After a short climb up a canyon, I could suddenly smell something like rotten eggs, as the wind brought with it sulphur dioxide from deep within the volcano’s core. The last 50 metres of the climb got steeper, before we arrived in a fumarolic area – a landscape that I can only describe as looking like hell on Earth. Under our feet were small bubbling geysers and hot steam whistled out of muddy holes scattered here and there. Unpredictable winds periodically pushed a dense cloud of toxic fumes in our direction. We didn’t have respirators with us – a mistake, so we used our hats to cover our noses and mouths as we breathed. If you get trapped in a large cloud of toxic fumes, there’s a danger of suffocation, so it’s important to observe the wind direction carefully. After visiting Mutnovskii, the climb to Gorelii volcano was easier, with excellent visibility, fresh air and sunshine. When we reached the edge of the crater, we peered down to see a lake at the bottom; it had chunks of ice floating in it. This freshwater lake is adjacent to another lake, which is full of acid. The two are separated by only a small rock wall. For a photographic experiment, we went up again in the evening, hoping to catch the volcano at sunset. But when a cold mist began to fall into a fiery hole and seemed to produce a whistle and a huge amount of noxious fumes, we quickly left, realising it was not such a good idea.

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The Kamchatka Peninsula is one of the few places in the world where you can literally feel the hot breath of the Earth, coming from the region's live volcanic activity.

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MOST REMOTE AND UNEXPLORED AREAS OF RUSSIA.

Kamchatka's dramatic landscape is dominated by large volcanic belts with an estimated 160 volcanoes: 29 of them are still active and 19 have been UNESCO World Heritage listed.

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Travel

MOST READ Ten must-see spots in Russia that you won't find in travel guides http://rbth.ru/28593

Here is how to have an enjoyable, action-packed adventure

Kamchatka's remoteness is both a curse and a blessing. Its lack of infrastructure means that the peninsula's natural beauty is largely undisturbed. It also means it takes time and an adventurous spirit to explore this vast wilderness.

Kamchatka peninsula has wildlife sanctuaries and tours on land and sea

Tourists hear the call of the wild In September and October, the changing leaves of autumn draw tourists and photographers to the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia’s far east.

FACTS ABOUT KAMCHATKA

In the territory of Kamchatka, there are 58 species of mammals, 232 kinds of birds, 93 types of fish and 763 varieties of plants (38 of which are rare).

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It is often sunny and mild this time of year in the far east. Although the weather is welcoming, it is not easy travelling around the peninsula independently, so there are tours with English-speaking guides. Some tours require courage from travellers though, since cunning wolverine and curious bears are not uncommon visitors to camp sites. Brown bears – the symbol of the Kamchatka region – are found throughout the peninsula; they sometimes even venture into the city. They are commonly encountered near rivers or lakes, particularly in the South Kamchatka Sanctuary, at the bottom tip of the peninsula around Lake Kuril – one of the world’s largest spawning areas for Pacific red salmon. Kamchatka also has abundant wildlife in the forests around the Zhupanova River, north-east of Petropavlovsky-Kamchatsky. In this area – only accessible by helicopter – you can see otter, wolverine, lynx, sable, mink and reindeer. Rare birds, including white-winged and whitetailed sea eagles, peregrine

Bears are even known to wander into the city in Kamchatka.

falcon and merlin also inhabit these forests. Another famous helicopter tour is to the Valley of Geysers, in Kronotsky Nature Re-

Brown bears – the symbol of the Kamchatka region – are found throughout the peninsula. serve. In the valley there are 26 volcanoes, 12 of them active, and the entire area pulsates with boiling springs, hot lakes, geysers, mud pots and small volcanoes, spewing thermal mud. The Kamchatka Kayaking Club in PetropavlovskyKamchatsky offers tours of the city’s harbour by kayak or catamaran, where you can see diverse animal and marine life. Amid the ships and tank-

ers, there are colonies of puffins, cormorants, guillemots and gulls. The huge seals easily spotted in the harbour waters are the city’s symbol. Steller sea lions live all along the coast of the peninsula, but the largest colonies are on the Aleutian and Kuril Islands. In September, on kayak and catamaran tours, you can see months-old sea lions making their first independent attempts to catch fish or squid. Kamchatka is also famous for its killer whales. There are a large number of them in the Russkaya and Zhirovaya bays, both of which can be reached by boat or catamaran. Killer whales are naturally cautious, and steer clear of large vessels, so many tourists then transfer to kayaks to get a closer look at them. When close to them in this way, it is possible to feel the power, beauty and vastness of the marine world.

Most flights to Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky go from Moscow. The trip takes a little more than eight hours. Autumn is the traditional time to travel on the peninsula, and the cost of a flight from Moscow in September is about $US1600. It is also possible to fly from Vladivostok and Khabarovsk, which is easier for tourists travelling via China or Japan.

In the indigenous Koryat language, "Kainyran" means "bear's corner". And the Kainyran cultural centre, on the banks of small Lake Kabalny, 40 kilometres from Kamchatka's capital, gives its visitors the chance to safely see bears in their natural habitat. The centre also shows visitors how traditional Indigenous people lived in Kamchatka: their homes, transport (dogpulled sleds), dance and cuisine. The centre also has spectacular views of the Koryaksky and Avachinsky volcanoes.

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Music

MOST READ Russian punks: ideology, music and lifestyle rbth.ru/28995

Perestroika's removal of limitations on cultural expression allowed rock music to flourish for the first time

How bands rocked USSR foundations Things changed suddenly for Soviet rock music in the mid1980s, when perestroika meant that previously banned underground bands went mainstream.

BIO

Vasily Shumov

VASILY SHUMOV

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NATIONALITY: RUSSIAN AGE: 53 WORK: MUSIC PRODUCER

CAREER: Vasily Shumov is a musician, producer, photographic and video artist. He founded Moscow's New Wave and Electronic Band Centre (Tsentr) in 1980. From 1990 to 2008, he lived in Los Angeles, California, where he graduated from the California Institute of the Arts in 1998.

practices or [internal] passport violations. This intense wave of persecution stopped, however, as the reforms of the Gorbachev period began. Rock music was legalised and previously underground

Some bands were accused of being ideological and moral saboteurs of Soviet society. Shifting from underground to mainstream wasn't an easy process for some musicians. bands could appear on television or have their music played on the radio. Favourable media coverage of Soviet rock flooded newspapers and magazines, and fans had the chance – for the first time in their lives – to buy official tickets to rock concerts. One of the first signs of

change was a NewYear’s Eve festival called Yolka (A Christmas Tree), which was held in a Moscow culture club located, ironically, under a nuclear energy research institute. An officially sanctioned music club called the Moscow Rock Laboratory was formed to promote musicians who did not belong to state concert organisations. Then, under the supervision of Moscow’s Communist Party headquarters and leaders of the Young Communists League, the club held a rock festival featuring more than 10 bands that had been blacklisted only a year before. What’s more, the musicians were able to perform without any censorship. News of the festival spread quickly in Moscow, and on the night of the concert, the culture club’s 500 seats were filled – and more people were trying to get in through roof windows, basement walkways and fire stairs. The crowds were drawn by an assortment of musicians which included Moscow bands Mashina Vremeni and REUTERS

Television played a key role in giving previously underground rock musicians enormous exposure to an audience of 250 million viewers across the Soviet Union.

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Perestroika is thought to have started in 1985, when Mikhail Gorbachev came to power as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR. From this point on, rock music flourished. Some historians consider it a key force in the collapse of the Soviet Union, in the everyday context of food shortages, lack of freedom and concerns about censorship, human rights and closed borders. Only a year before Gorbachev came to power, however, being a rock musician in the USSR had been a risky undertaking. In 1984 the Soviet government targeted rock musicians following a speech by then General Secretary Konstantin Chernenko, in which some bands were accused of being ideological and moral saboteurs of Soviet society. The Communist Party leadership issued blacklists, which were sent to cultural and youth departments across the USSR. These lists included underground bands who were prohibited from performing and whose songs were banned from being played in clubs and at public events. Rock musicians were victimised: some were forbidden to use their rehearsal halls, while others were unexpectedly called up for military service. It was very dangerous to record and perform protest songs, and musicians could end up in prison as enemies of the Soviet state. An unlucky few, such as Alexei Romanov, front-man for the bandVoskresenie, and Zhanna Aguzarova – a singer from the group Bravo – received jail terms. By the ’70s and ’80s, it was more common in the Soviet Union not to link jail sentences with ideologies but instead with illegal business

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Brigada S, Leningrad’s Kino, Aquarium and Alisa, and Nautilus Pompilius from Sverdlovsk. Following the concert, these groups and others became regular guests on late-night Soviet music television, on new post-perestroika programs such as Vision, Musical Ring and Program A. The exposure was massive. The USSR had just two television channels both broadcasting from Moscow, to an audience of about 250 million Soviet citizens. However, shifting from underground to mainstream was not an easy process for some musicians.

The perestroika reform period posed challenges for underground Soviet rock musicians and not all of them survived the transition. Some had no desire to interact with mainstream Soviet society. Most rock musicians then were poor, even by Soviet standards. And because, according to the Soviet laws, all citizens had to have an official job, musicians were often had less-than-prestigious day jobs. Some were students in institutes that had nothing to do with music. Student status also provided them with temporary protection from military service.

But some rock musicians, who just a few years before might have felt lucky to play in a club for 100 people, had turned into stadium rock stars and were suddenly earning big money. Probably, the most famous perestroika rock song was Peremen (We want changes!) by the band Kino. At the height of their popularity in 1990, Kino’s 28-year-old front man Viktor Tsoy was killed in a headon collision with a bus in Latvia. It is said he had fallen asleep at the wheel of his car (which he drove at speeds of up to 130km/h). Some Kino fans blamed Tsoy’s untimely death on the fact that he had become reckless after leaving his modest Soviet lifestyle and circle of friends in Leningrad. Before perestroika, he had worked night s h i ft s a s a stoker in a boiler plant shovelling coal. rbth.ru/29179

Soviet rock music developed in a tumultuous and energetic period, when the Berlin Wall came down and Soviet citizens could for the first time look beyond borders and traditional limitations.

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Literature

MOST READ Zombies, Russia, Stalingrad – a successful new project on Kickstarter rbth.ru/29959

Innovative nationwide program has been launched to encourage Russians to reconnect with their classical literature

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Ecologists sound the alarm: Developers threaten ancient forest Party-goer shoots friend over a passing flirtation Wife of high-ranking official kills herself after argument with lover Visiting caretaker proves to be ruthless dog hunter

To encourage Russians to reconnect with reading the classics, great Russian writers were enlisted into a communications campaign where they were portrayed as sports coaches: from left, Alexander Pushkin, Anton Chekhov and Leo Tolstoy.

to public attention year after year. This summer, the Public Opinion Foundation released data showing that 44 per cent of Russian respondents had not read a single book in the course of the previous year. Just as unsettling was data from the market research company TNS Russia, which reported that Russian

Screen gems: the rise of e-books

NATALIA MIKHAYLENKO

These and other headlines filtered across the Russian internet news landscape on September 2, the first day of school after the summer holidays – a day known in Russia as the“Day of Knowledge”. Encoded within these spurious news stories were the plots of classic Russian literary works: Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, Alexander Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin, Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, Ivan Turgenev’s Mumu and many more. Readers who couldn’t recognise the works themselves were not left in the dark: the headlines led to a specially created portal that connected the news copy to the corresponding literary work, which users could then read or download for free. “We are demonstrating to internet users who visit news sites that all the plots that can be found in modern news stories have already appeared in Russian literature in some form or another,” said Yuri Pulya, head of the periodicals, book publishing and printing division of the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications (Rospechat). The agency, together with the Russian Book Union and independent advertising agency Slava, is organising a campaign to encourage reading. The main goal is to attract attention to Russian literary classics, which for many Russians remain little more than a feature of the school curriculum. “The result has been an appealing, interesting and, most importantly, beneficial initiative,”says Pulya.“At the very least, people read these news

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items, post them on social networks and a conversation about literature takes place on several levels. “Also, this sparks creativity: the initiative makes readers want to find their own classic literary work and think up a news item based on its plot. And the information noise will make them interested: what is in these works that makes everyone talk about them?” Anyone who offered their ideas for news headlines based on classic Russian masterpieces to the portal of the project was entered into a contest with attractive prizes. Examples included“Envy prompts sisters to attempt double murder of a mother and baby”, and “Official’s daughter confessed she dated a lunatic”. Readers willingly joined in the game, though some visitors to the portal did not seem to realise it was a joke. They revealed their feelings about the fate of an opposition leader’s mother (a news headline based on Maxim Gorky’s novel The Mother read: “Mother of one opposition leader may be sentenced to long-term imprisonment”), or debated the ethics of experimentation on stray dogs. The movement to popularise literature is a response to a troubling decline in reading among Russians, which sociologists seemingly bring

A literature campaign has been turning themes from Russian classics into snappy online news stories, in an effort to hook more internet users into reading books.

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Online news flashes lure new readers for literary masterpieces

citizens use different media for a total of around eight hours per day, but that the amount of time they spend reading a book comes to just 1.8 per cent of that total – or only about nine minutes a day. It is not then surprising that attempts to popularise reading are being given plenty of attention, including at government level. Russia’s National Program for Reading Promotion and Development started in 2006 and includes several memorable initiatives. For example, in last year’s project by Rospechat, Read, which targeted teenagers, the organisers portrayed the powerhouse Russian writers Leo Tolstoy, Anton Chekhov and Alexander Pushkin in athletic uniforms, and had them rap soulfully along with Nikolai Gogol and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Besides Rospechat, publishers, social organisations and even the City of Moscow authorities are zealously promoting reading. And over the past few years, noteworthy initiatives have appeared quite regularly. Some have been rather traditional. For example, in A Word for the Book, a major

2008 campaign by the publisher ACT, famous Russian writers were pictured on posters describing the importance of reading. There were also projects by the Eksmo publishing house (Read books – be a character; and Read books!) in which popular figures and musicians, along with Russian footballers and coaches, discussed the benefits of reading. Other promotional campaigns have sought to immerse potential readers in the textual medium. Moscow’s subway system boasts colourful Reading Moscow and Poetry in the Metro trains, where train interiors are covered not with advertisements but with excerpts from literary works, authors’ biographies, illustrations of characters and original graphics. The exhibitions are thematic and change periodically. The Books in Parks campaign, which Rospechat launched in 2012, also turned five popular Moscow leisure venues into arenas for meeting with writers. In addition, the campaign equipped the venues with“Gogol modules” – kiosks where visitors could purchase books for the lowest price in Moscow.

QUOTES

Dmitry Medvedev PRIME MINISTER OF RUSSIA, KNOWN FOR BEING AN EARLY ADOPTER OF NEW MEDIA

With the aim of getting young peole to read, we need to support reading of various forms, including the most modern. Obviously nothing can replace books, but paper books and e-books are the same. We need to digitise them and make them available in that format, otherwise, we won't make any progress."

Vladimir Putin PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA AND THE INITIATOR OF NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL REFORM

Russia has long been one of the most "reading nations". But, to be honest, we're going to lose this status. According to sociologists, the number of non-readers in Russia is increasing, and this is something of concern."

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Sport

MOST READ Plans for Sochi after the Olympics rbth.ru/30423

Russian government promises to prevent price hikes

The lowdown on Olympic prices TIcket sales have already begun for individual events and “Olympic tour packages” for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics in Russia next February.

Nostalgia for a sporting peak

MARIA KARNAUKH SPECIAL TO RBTH

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Ticket prices for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics opening ceremony, to be held on February 7, start at $US200 but go as high as $US1500.

The Olympic tour packages do not come cheap. For example, watching the ice hockey in Sochi is priced at $US14,000 for two, including a four-night stay at a three-star hotel (excluding airfares). During the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, Dash Tours sold packages for $US22,000 apiece, including air tickets from any American or Canadian city and 18 nights at a four-star hotel – but admission to the competitions was extra. In Beijing, local operators offered an air ticket, hotel accommodation (the number of nights depending on the hotel category) and one admission ticket per day for $US16,000. Russian citizens are able to buy tickets online at the official 22nd Winter Olympics website (tickets.sochi2014. com). For instance, the opening ceremony costs between $US200 and $US1500, while the closing ceremony is cheaper at $US150 to $US1200. Event tickets cost in the range of $US16 for the Mountain Cluster and $US30 for the Coastal Cluster. Ice hockey is the most expensive

Thanks to footage from the 1980 Moscow Olympics being shown on state television in Russia, the lead-up to the Sochi Winter Games has been triggering nostalgia for the last time the Olympics were held on Russian soil. The 1980 Olympics probably represent the pinnacle of Soviet sporting prowess. Misha – the Soviet mascot bear from 1980 – has also been having a revival on Russian television and is appearing on Tshirts, so it is probably no coincidence that he resembles Bely Mishka, one of the mascots for the Sochi Games. rbth.ru/29749 read full version online

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event, with prices to the finals ranging from $US220 to $US1070. Figure skating (the Gala Exhibition) will cost $US150 and $US720. According to the organisers, more than 40 per cent of all tickets will be priced below $US100 and half of them below $US160. The list of official ticket distributors by country is available at tickets.sochi2014. com. For example, cosport. com, an international distributor, offers Mountain Cluster tickets at reasonable prices: bobsleigh for $US41 and the biathlon starting at $US145. Cosport.com’s opening ceremony tickets are sold out, and it is quoting $1379 for the closing ceremony. The ticket price range for the 2012 London Olympics was between $US32 and $US3120. Admission to some open-air events was free. The soccer final went for $US64 to $US296. Some 75 per cent of the tickets cost less than $US60. In Beijing 2008, the opening ($US650) and the closing ($US390) ceremonies were the most expensive events.

WHAT THE SOCHI OLYMPICS MEAN TO RUSSIA

Spectators did not have to pay more than $US20 for most others. Chinese citizens could take advantage of a special offer: $US1 per seat. The Russian government has promised hotel accommodation rate controls during the Olympics. Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree in December 2012 capping prices for the duration of the Olympics. Under the policy, a double room at a Sochi mini-hotel (one-two stars) cannot officially cost more than $US145. At a three-star hotel it is capped at $US180 and four-star at $US204. Premium hotels cannot charge more than $US332 a night. The lack of direct flights to the Olympic host city is one of the biggest inconveniences for visitors to Sochi. Only travellers from CIS capitals and Turkey can book direct flights. Everyone else will have to change planes in Moscow or St Petersburg. Russian airlines such as S7 and Aeroflot offer flights to Sochi from Moscow. According to the skyscanner.com booking system, prices for February flights have not risen yet, at $US130-180 each way. Travel by train is also possible, but if you enjoy your creature comforts, the least expensive option –“platzkart” (from $US80 each way) is probably not for you. An upgraded level of service in a “coupe” will cost $US160, with business class quoted at $US330. Those prices are for travel now, however. It remains to be seen by how much Russian Railways will decide to increase prices prior to the Olympics, and train tickets are available for sale no more than 45 days before departure. The Russian government has promised to prevent price hikes and to look for legal ways to control prices during the competitions.

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