MOSCOW, December 22 (RIA Novosti)
Dividing Russian Army along ethnic lines/Norilsk Nickel facing re-nationalization/Unemployment could double in Russia in 2009/ Aeroflot to become strategic partner of Hungarian airlines
RBC Daily
Dividing Russian Army along ethnic lines
Conscripts from Tatarstan, a Russian autonomous republic in the Volga Federal District, will serve in two army units in the nearby Orenburg and Samara regions.
Tatarstan leaders are therefore trying to protect their soldiers from brutal hazing. Analysts say the Russian Armed Forces could disintegrate into several ethnic armies, unless the high command stops inter-ethnic conflicts.
The government of Tatarstan and the Russian Defense Ministry decided to set up ethnic Tatar units in order to prevent clashes between various ethnic groups in the barracks.
Sergei Pogodin, head of the Tatarstan republican recruiting office, said the decision to set up the first two Tatar units had been made after human-rights activists and the parents of soldiers visited the Totsk garrison in the Orenburg Region. A conscript from Tatarstan who recently escaped from there said his fellow Tatars were being insulted, beaten and forced to do other soldiers' work.
"The army is creating an extremely negative precedent. Conscripts from Dagestan, as well as Lezgin, Avar and other ethnic groups, could eventually demand the creation of separate units for them," Leonid Ivashov, president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems, told the paper.
Under ambitious army reforms, 200,000 officers, warrant officers and generals will be discharged. Against the backdrop of increased discontent among officers, the Defense Ministry has decided to pay unprecedented compensation to the families of Russian soldiers killed and wounded during the August 2008 conflict with Georgia over the self-proclaimed Republic of South Ossetia.
Deputy Defense Minister General of the Army Nikolai Pankov said the families of those killed in action would receive $100,000, while $30,000 would be paid to the families of soldiers wounded in action.
"People react negatively to the Defense Ministry reforms when hundreds of thousands of officers and warrant officers are about to lose their posts. However, compensation to the families of KIAs downplays the reform's negative consequences," Anatoly Tsyganok, head of the Russian Military Forecasting Center, told the paper.
Vedomosti
Norilsk Nickel facing re-nationalization
Nearly 50% of Norilsk Nickel, the world's largest nickel miner, is back under government control now. In addition to the 25% stake pledged by UC RusAL with the state-run development bank VEB, another 20% owned by Vladimir Potanin, has been lodged as collateral with VTB.
However, the government is not planning to claim the stakes back right now - no political decision on the issue has been made, according to sources close to the government.
Several sources close to Norilsk Nickel said Vladimir Potanin's companies borrowed over $3 billion from VTB, Russia's second-largest bank, during last spring and summer, secured by a 20%-25% stake in the miner.
A Kremlin source said the stake in question was 18%, and the state bank could claim the collateral any moment. The reason it hasn't done so yet is that there is no political decision on the issue, the source added.
However, he did not rule out it might still happen within a year.
A high-ranking government official said VTB was not going to take Potanin's shares.
The government has already begun securing a foothold in Norilsk Nickel. UC RusAL's one-year loan agreement with VEB for $4.5 billion secured using 25% in the miner also envisages appointing a government representative on the company's board at an extraordinary shareholder meeting on December 26.
There are two candidates to represent the government on Norilsk Nickel's board, Russian Technologies head Sergei Chemezov and former RAO UES chairman Alexander Voloshin. One of them will chair the miner's board.
Another government representative became the miner's CEO in August - Vladimir Strzhalkovsky, the former head of Russia's Federal Agency for Tourism who also served alongside Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in the Leningrad KGB security department. Other state representatives will be put on Norilsk Nickel's management in compliance with the VEB loan agreement.
Marat Gabitov, analyst with Unicredit Aton, said the government was not interested in taking over the company from private shareholders, but is clearly seeking to control it.
Potanin knows the business inside out, while [Oleg] Deripaska [who controls RusAL] has a highly professional management team, and Norilsk Nickel will be better off if run by professionals during the [global economic] crisis, he added.
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Novye Izvestia
Unemployment could double in Russia in 2009
About 70,000 Russians lost their jobs in one week in December. According to the Health Care and Social Development Ministry, the average number of jobless in Russia may double in 2009.
Analysts say the rise in unemployment could cross the dangerous threshold of 10% of the employable population next year, inciting public protests.
The Economic Development Ministry says unemployment could grow to 5.6 million people in 2009, with about 2.8 million officially registered as unemployed.
Yevgeny Gontmakher, head of the Social Policy Center at the Russian Academy of Sciences' Economics Institute, said: "Average unemployment in the country may reach 12%-15% next year, soaring to 20%-30% of the employable population in some regions."
The Federal State Statistics Service has calculated that the number of employable Russians between 15 and 72 years of age totaled 76.6 million in August 2008.
Economists say the loss of 20% of one's salary and other sources of income is considered a danger.
"The loss of over 20% of one's income usually forces people to cut consumption and stop making obligatory payments, such as utility fees," Gontmakher said.
In his opinion, the expected decrease in income will not affect pensioners, who have been promised index-linked pension rises, but mainly employable people, who will suffer from unemployment and salary cuts.
Maxim Topilin, deputy minister of health care and social development, said employers planned to dismiss some 250,000 people working in 8,000 companies.
Pyotr Bizyukov, leading specialist for socio-economic programs at the Center for Social and Labor Rights, said the rise in unemployment had reached an explosive level.
"Russian businesses started laying off staff too early, dismissing people 'just in case,' although their problems are not catastrophic," Bizyukov said.
Kommersant
Aeroflot to become strategic partner of Hungarian airlines
Vnesheconombank (VEB) is due to take over 49% of the Malev Hungarian airlines belonging to the Russian businessman Boris Abramovich in the near future. The bank is currently engaged in negotiations to sell or pass control of the stake to Aeroflot.
Several sources familiar with the Malev situation said the talks with Aeroflot are being held at government level and an Aeroflot representative attended a Malev board meeting on Friday that discussed a rescue package for the company. Kommersant was told in the Russian government that the negotiations had been under way since the end of September.
A source on VEB's supervisory board confirmed the bank's intention to become a Malev shareholder and its talks with Aeroflot. Russian Technologies, which is establishing Rosavia airlines, was the first to show an interest in Malev, the source said. But the Hungarian side feared for the reputation of the state corporation set up on the basis of Rosoboronexport, against which the United States introduced international sanctions.
The VEB source added that the deadline for passing the stake and details of cooperation with Aeroflot are not clear. A source familiar with Aeroflot's plans said that the airline is reluctant to purchase a $150 million stake in Malev, which registered a net $82 million loss in 2007. According to the source, the idea is that after VEB re-registers the 49% stake in its name it will hire Aeroflot as a managing company. Currently, VEB is conducting due diligence on Malev, after which the partners will define the details of a possible cooperation deal.
Alexei Sinitsky, editor-in-chief of Aviatransportnoye Obozrenie (Air Transport Review), is sure that Malev is a problem company, but in the prevailing situation Aeroflot cannot renege on the deal. "Malev's main asset is maintenance and repair facilities which may be attractive to Aeroflot," Sinitsky said.
Oleg Panteleyev, head of analysis at the Aviaport agency, added that if in addition to Malev Aeroflot would be able to privatize the Czech Republic's CSA, it will have the potential to enter the European market.
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