Moskovsky Komsomolets
Russian officials to be replaced by Brits
The Ministry of Economic Development is to unveil a breakthrough strategy, Innovative Russia – 2020, which the government will consider on September 6. It envisages that in 10 years’ time Russia will have become an innovative power accounting for 2% of global high-tech exports (up on 0.35% now). The transformation is to be driven by a savvy government bureaucracy capable of publishing laws and running official websites in English.
By 2020, Russia’s “analogue” government will be fully replaced by a “digital” version. If now people spend years going from office to office for papers, permits and stamps, in this brave new world these state functionaries will be shielded from the rest of the country by computer monitors. A corruption-free, efficient Government Services portal will be on-call to cater to whoever cares to use it. The federal government itself, along with the President’s Executive Office, if we are to believe Dmitry Medvedev, will move to some as yet unknown location in Moscow’s newly acquired territories.
As the new government technologies call for new skills, the Strategy suggests a retraining program. Civil servants will have to become IT proficient and will undergo training in soon-to-be-established private refresher centers. These centers will be staffed by highly trained specialists – the best the world has to offer.
On top of that, government ministries and agencies will launch in 2012 their full-blown English websites to publish bilingual (Russian and English) business regulation laws. This is part of a concerted attempt to woo foreign investors. Candidates for the positions of government section heads and higher must have a command of English “at a level enabling direct contacts with foreign colleagues.” Accordingly, the private sector and the expert community are seen as potential suppliers of new civil service recruits. Mikhail Kasyanov, former prime minister and currently an opposition leader, may well aspire to one of these key roles. According to Western negotiators, it was his knack for English that largely contributed in the late 1990, to a debt rescheduling arrangement benefitting the Paris and London club members.
No expense is being spared in this comprehensive retraining program. The Economic Development Ministry is ready to allocate up to 130 billion rubles annually to this end. As such it is the third biggest destination for state investment.
Nezavisimaya Gazeta
Tougher penalties for hunger strikes
Parliament’s security committee on Wednesday received a government draft law on amending the Penal Code. It proposes redesignating mass hunger strikes and self-inflicted injuries in prisons, often staged in protest against inhumane conditions, as gross violations of discipline. Human rights advocates argue that reforming the penitentiary system would be a more appropriate course of action.
Currently, the Penal Code stipulates punishment for violations of prison rules such as drinking, drug abuse, threats to prison staff and disobedience, homosexual relations, the production of illegal items and refusal to work, as well as “organization of and participation in strikes and other acts of mass disobedience.” The government thinks that those who organize and participate in mass hunger strikes and self-inflicted injuries should be punished.
Last week, 34 inmates in the Atlyan juvenile detention facility in the Chelyabinsk Region slit their veins in protest against new wardens and tougher prison rules. Even though they acted as hardened criminals and broke the law, Pavel Astakhov, the presidential commissioner for children’s rights, is investigating the matter. He said that “a revolt in a detention facility is always evidence of the inadequate organization of psychological and educational work with minor offenders.”
The Russian penitentiary system is even harsher on adult offenders. The Human Rights Committee posted a report on the pending penal reform on its website. Boris Panteleyev, chairman of its St. Petersburg branch, cites many officially approved but ineffective rules and practices used in detention facilities. Lev Ponomarev, who heads the For Human Rights group, said that prison authorities use them to humiliate inmates. “I have produced a number of reports on the situation in prisons, citing hundreds of concrete examples, but the authorities have not even admitted these facts let alone investigated them.”
Ponomarev said the bill is aimed above all at those inmates who try to uphold their rights and dignity, including through mass protests. He told Nezavisimaya Gazeta categorically that the overwhelming majority of such actions are staged to fight against oppression and inhumane prison conditions. “Our investigation of many prison revolts, which were initially blamed on hardened criminals, led to the recognition, including by the prosecutor’s office, of the fact that they were a reaction to humiliation by prison officials.” He said prison conditions need to be improved, rather than tightening the rules. “Revolts will be effectively prevented if the prison authorities stop using violence against inmates.”
Ponomarev said this situation is connected to the government’s policy of strengthening efforts to fight extremism. “They say there are 200,000 extremists in the country, mostly socially active people. Fearing possible mass protests in 2012-2013, the authorities are creating conditions under which people can be interned. The penitentiary system must be ready to break them.” He noted an alarming trend: a year ago, President Dmitry Medvedev spoke about humanizing the penal system, but it appears that the other member of the tandem, Vladimir Putin, “who is the stronger of the two, is pedaling back.”
Kommersant
FSB claims veteran planned mutiny on Paratroopers’ Day
A group of officers came out in defense of Col. (Ret.) Leonid Khabarov in Yekaterinburg on Wednesday. The former director of the Institute of Military Technical Education and Security at the Urals Federal University stands accused by the Federal Security Service (FSB) of organizing an armed uprising.
The FSB says that Khabarov, a former airborne assault battalion commander, planned an armed rebellion on August 2 – Paratroopers’ Day. Investigators also believe him to be one of the leaders of the Minin and Pozharsky People’s Militia, headed by Vladimir Kvachkov, a former Military Intelligence Directorate (GRU) colonel, arrested for trying to stage an armed rebellion in Moscow. Khabarov’s colleagues say the secret service “wants to score political points” on his arrest.
The operation, which landed the 63-year-old Khabarov in pre-trial detention cells, was carried out on July 19. The FSB only confirmed that it detained four suspects who all belong to the Minin and Pozharsky People’s Militia. The FSB charged them with preparing an armed rebellion and promoting terrorist activity. The FSB added that arms, explosives, ammunition and drugs were all found when their homes were searched.
Sources involved in the investigation later said Kvachkov’s supporters expected former servicemen to join them in their planned uprising on August 2. They wanted to eliminate local branch heads of the Interior Ministry, FSB and Emergencies Ministry, blow up power transmission lines, seize arms depots and expected neighboring regions to support them as they put up an armed defense.
The uprising, code-named “Rassvet” (Dawn), never got off the ground.
On Wednesday, Khabarov’s colleagues and son told a news conference in Yekaterinburg that Khabarov had no hand in the coup attempt.
“The arms and ammunition discovered in his home were collectibles, the drug proved to be promedol from his personal medicine chest, while the extremist literature turned out to be Kvachkov-authored books freely on sale,” the son, Dmitry Khabarov, said.
Khabarov’s colleagues also flatly denied his connection with Vladimir Kvachkov, a former colonel with the Main Intelligence Directorate, arrested last January on the same charges.
“Of course, we have all heard Kvachkov’s speeches and most of us agree with his analysis of the military and political situation in the country and are not satisfied with the top leadership’s attitude to the Army, but he would not find support among the military for these particular proposals,” said Gennady Kunyavsky, board member of the Russian Paratroopers’ Union regional branch.
On September 3, Khabarov’s former colleagues plan to hold a rally in Yekaterinburg to demand his release. His son Dmitry said they also plan to send a convoy of 30 cars to Moscow to take a petition to the Kremlin demanding his release.
Alexei Pershin, Col. Kvachkov’s lawyer, told Kommersant that there are distinct similarities between the two cases. “How can anyone even talk of a coup when three to four veterans, not large groups of people, plan to take on the army, the Interior Ministry and the FSB?” he added.
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