Job Discussion Forums

[maruss]

There are two excellent articles about Russia,one by the not-so innocent Boris Berezovskiy and the other a very disturbing report about the apparent re-introduction of the abuse of psychiatry which was widely used-and internationally condemned in the Soviet era.
Although I am not by any means a supporter of any renegade oligarchs etc. what he has written about Putin and his regime is unfortunately true and raises serious questions about whether the outside world is prepared to support what opposition there is left in Russia before it is too late....
The other article raises a very contentious issue which is totally condemnable on human rights grounds alone-nowadays the reasons are apparently not to dispose of embarassing political opponents,but economic -i.e. have old people 'certified' so they can deprive them of normal citizens rights and grab their appartments!
I wonder if a Russian daily in Moscow would have dared to publish either of these articles...

[sebastienupper]

Hi there Maruss,

They had a special program on the "Russian Godfathers" here on SBS in Australia. The last program was on Yuri Luzhkov. The Mayor of Moscow says he's committed to protecting property rights in the new Russia.

What he means of course is 'the property rights of those who count', namely the billionaires, such as himself and his own wife, who is allegedly the richest woman in Russia.

Under Luzhkov, Moscow's City Hall apparently awards to his wife's company multi-billion dollar construction contracts. Yuri thinks a conflict of interest is when you can't choose between your favourite brands of beluga...

At the same time, and this is something you alluded to, Yuri and his mates are committed to evicting ordinary people from their flats in central parts of Moscow. The flats are demolished in order to be replaced by office buildings for which obscene rents will be charged. (Apparently accumulating billions is like smoking cigarettes, you just can't quit, even though you've had enough and any more might finish you.)

They interviewed an ordinary Russian lady who had just finished paying off her flat and having it renovated. They are evicting her. Many tenants are having to hire armed guards to secure the entrances to their buildings because they are terrified of being 'burned out'. When a building is burned out, the deeds reverts to the state you see.

As the Russian lady pointed out, Yuri and his mates have discovered that: "We [ordinary people] only own the air inside our apartments--this wall, that wall, the floor and the ceiling--this belongs to them!"

This is how Luzhkov and the elites have discovered the joys of property rights. They interviewed young Yuri at some length. I don't know his work very well, but he came across as a man, even given the circumstances, of quite stupendous arrogance. He and his wife go hand in hand with their colossal greed and elitism. The scary part is that some people see the guy (and his ilk) as a check on Putin's power, which I suppose he is, but only insofar as when one might be confronted by two man-eating beasts on the plain with nowhere to hide they might first fight each other momentarily for the privilege of being the one to rip your throat out and eat your better entrails...

[expatella_girl]

[maruss]

Of course I'm not happy because the truth is so bad but at least some other people can see the it as well and I only wish things were different.......
Perhaps what scares me even more than what is going on is that so many people in Russia either pretend that everything is 'normal' or even really believe nothing is wrong!

[maruss]

So 10 people were arrested yesterday for the murder of Anna Politkovskaya and apparently include a retired F.S.B. officer and a Chechen criminal gang- leader.Normally I would be congratulating the authorities in any democratic country,but as you can understand,I am very suspicious whether they are really guilty or just being used as scapegoats, especially when Putin notoriously remarked some time ago at an international press conference that she 'was not an important person in Russia!'.I cannot believe he has had a change of heart and is doing it out of respect for her and law and justice etc-.K.G.B. people do not base their actions on such principles...........
I really recommend Alex Goldfarbs book'Death of a dissident' which is not only about the Litvinenko case but also sheds some very interesting light into the personality of the President of Russia and what is going on there behind the scenes.But be warned, its implications are scary and it's not a novel either!
Yuri Luzhkov and his wife Elena Baturina are very lightweight by comparison!