Access code

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LATEST ISSUE

Saturday, October 16, 2004

Y. LATYNINA - Good afternoon, Yulia Latynina is on the air, the program “Access Code”. First, as always, questions on the Internet, I have a lot of questions about Abkhazia, about Yuganskneftegaz, about the terrorist attack in Taba, even about the loss of the Russian national football team, which I will try to answer. But first, I would like to say very briefly about one interesting thing that passed through Russian newspapers almost unnoticed and Western newspapers became very interested. This is the report of the Iraqi governing council, which found that Russian politicians and officials received quite a lot of money from Saddam Hussein. Companies associated with the Communist Party of the Russian Federation received approximately 142 million barrels under the Oil for Food program, which is approximately $16 million in profit. Zhirinovsky received more than 8 million dollars, the trading company of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, Mirkom, i.e., let me remind you that then this trading company, that the Ministry of Emergency Situations was headed by the then leader of Unity Shoigu, all this happened when the question of who would be supported by Russia was being decided , Iraq or America. Shoigu received 7.6 million dollars; Alexander Voloshin, the then head of the presidential administration, received the most modest amount, only 638 thousand dollars, according to the governing council of Iraq. As I said, this news aroused very little curiosity in Russian circles. Firstly, because rumors about this have been circulating for a long time, but, in general, we have not heard anything terrible for Russia. Yes, in general, we know how our Russian officials are, for some reason the West is terribly alarmed. Why am I talking about this, because this is a very important thing, this story with Iraqi dollars, in fact with Iraqi bribes, which explains the mechanism for making our foreign policy decisions. To be honest, it has always been unclear to me why Russia took the side of Europe and not America on the Iraq issue. I repeat once again, I am not going to discuss the Iraq war here, I do not consider it fair, I do not consider President Bush an intelligent person, that he started it, this is a lie, stupidity, this is a lie. Like any lie, it ended badly; with the help of the Iraq war, Bush wanted to defeat terrorism, but he strengthened it. He wanted to lower gas prices for his constituents, but he raised them. And most importantly, the war in Iraq, it turned the United States from a power that ruled the world through some mechanisms, some economic, financial and, as caricatured as it sounds in relation to the United States, cultural mechanisms, there as much as Hollywood or McDonald's can to be, to be called culture. So, this war turned the United States from America into an empire. To be America and become an empire is kind of like 16th century Spain, what a fall. But now we are not talking about this, but about the fact that for Russia, the war in Iraq, in principle, could have been a gift of fate, because we became natural allies with America in the war against Islam. Those. We are fighting with him in Chechnya, after all, the United States is in Iraq. Secondly, because the United States was willing to pay to support this war. They were ready to pay not only with trade concessions, not only with the repeal of the Jackson-Vanik amendment, they were ready to pay with a change in the geopolitical status of Russia. Namely, they were ready to make Russian oil instead of Arab oil one of the main sources of fulfillment of the American state reserve. Forgive me for such a very pro-Russian phrase, but, in general, such a chance for a country that has left the rank of superpowers comes once every century. And we did not support the United States in this story, we supported Iraq, we supported the EU, which, let me remind you, is a half-Islamic state. Suffice it to say that this year the most common name among boys born in Holland was the name Mohammed. And now it is clear, in fact, from the report of the Iraqi governing council, why, because the United States offered trade benefits to all of Russia, geopolitical status, Jackson-Vanik, etc. Saddam Hussein offered specific money to specific people. Those. Saddam Hussein understood better than the Americans how Russia works, because it turned out that in order to gain support, there was no need to lure us to the Americans with some sort of Jackson-Vanik. It was enough to pay the officials more than Hussein. This is a terrible decision-making mechanism. We literally have 50 seconds before commercial, so say you're on air.

LISTENER ALEXEY (MOSCOW) – Yulia, you find a lot of interesting stories in the surrounding reality and provide them with very interesting comments. How do you comment on the following story? It turns out interesting that some liberals are shouting at all the crossroads - they have clamped down on democracy, they have clamped down on freedom of speech. And other liberals, including the leaders of the Union of Right Forces, Gaidar and Chubais, are implementing this same clampdown on democracy and clampdown on freedom of speech. How does this happen?

Y. LATYNINA - Thank you, of course, for the question, I am completely shocked that, it turns out, our Russia is ruled by Gaidar and Chubais, they are the ones who are suppressing freedom of speech and democracy. I have no words, I can finish my comments here and move on to advertising. But, in principle, this is a brilliant text, I advise you to send it to the Financial Times, that some liberals, as you put it, some individual liberals, very characteristic vocabulary, some individual liberals are clamping down on democracy. It turns out that Gaidar rules the country. Advertising.
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Y. LATYNINA - Good evening, Yulia Latynina again, a question on the pager - when you listed our oil bribe takers, why did you forget about Nikolai Ryzhkov and our high-ranking priests, Tatyana? Tatyana, according to the report of the Iraqi governing council, the priests, oddly enough, were allocated oil quotas, but they did not receive them. But you see, in fact, the report of the governing council does not cover everyone, but it covers only those who left a legacy right on the table.

LISTENER IRINA - Yulechka, how do you feel about the way Aushev is being striped? It seems to me that so much dirt is being poured on him now, he always has to make excuses and prove that he is not a camel. Thank you.

Y. LATYNINA – Thank you very much for your question. By the way, here I will take this opportunity, I had a question on the Internet, by the way, Mazonin from Perm asked - what do you think about the fact that the Russian leadership is trying to pin the Beslan tragedy on the hero Ruslan Aushev? After all, by this act they make it clear that they will not allow anyone who tries to really save Russia, although the cowards themselves cannot do anything or do not want to, thank you. And from Vladikavkaz, Alexander also asks, a statement from Mr. Torshin, the head of the commission to investigate the terrorist attack in Beslan, dear Yulia, please comment on this situation, there are people who elect deputies, these deputies, acting on behalf of the people, create a commission to investigate the circumstances of the Beslan tragedy, because people want to know in detail. As a result, it all ends with the commission declaring to these very people: “What the hell are we going to tell you, because if you find out, you’ll, like, fight each other.” Please voice your opinion about the true reasons for such a statement. You know, I think that the statement of Alexander Torshin, the head of the commission, is, to put it mildly, an irresponsible statement, simply aimed at inciting hostility between Ossetians and Ingush. In fact, the person said that we will not tell you the truth about the organizers of the terrorist attack, this means pushing the Ossetians just to take revenge on the Ingush, it is better to kill the Ingush than to hate the Kremlin. What is happening both with regard to the entire commission that is being created in Beslan, and with regard to what is happening with Aushev. This is a thing unthinkable in any country, not just a democratic one, but closely related to democracy, because the main task of the commission that we see is, apparently, not to ask the questions that any sane person would ask the commission Human. These questions are as follows. First, all known terrorist attacks with hostage-taking took place according to a well-known pattern: the terrorists took hostages, put forward their demands, entered into negotiations with them, this made it possible to free some of the hostages, improve the fate of the rest, and also made it possible to prepare for the assault. During the seizure of the school in Beslan, all the officials whom the terrorists demanded for negotiations refused these negotiations. Regarding the demands submitted by the terrorists, it was officially reported that the terrorists were not putting forward any demands. Let me remind you of anecdotal reports that terrorists seized a school and threw a cassette with demands out of the window. It turned out to be empty. True, later part of this tape was shown on NTV. The first question that the commission should ask is who imposed the ban on negotiations with terrorists, was it an order from the President of the Russian Federation or did the high officials who arrived at the scene of the tragedy fall into a stupor on their own? The second question, an obvious one, for the commission, what did the President of North Ossetia, Alexander Dzasokhov, do to save the hostages? If he did nothing, then who did he obey during the terrorist attack, the Kremlin or his people? The second question is, were Patrushev and Nurgaliev in Beslan and what did they do there? If they did at least something, then what was it? If they didn't do anything, why aren't they fired for it? Fourth question, how did you come up with the figure of 350 hostages? Let me remind you that after this figure was announced, the terrorists went completely crazy, they started screaming - you were told that there are 350 hostages here, so there will remain 350 of you. After this figure, after the announcement, they stopped giving water to the hostages. How did it happen that state television channels declared that terrorists had no demands? Because it was this statement and this figure that led the terrorists into panic, which ultimately became an integral part of the tragedy. Those. state channels violated the main requirement for the media during the terrorist attack - not to harm the hostages with their information. Those. What did the officials do? Did they rescue hostages or talk loudly about the insane terrorists they encountered? Finally, how did the terrorists penetrate into Beslan, why were among them people who had previously been convicted as Chechen militants, and people who served in the ranks of the police? How did it happen that the terrorist Vladimir Khodov, while wanted for a terrorist attack, lived in his own village not far from a police post? And even, in general, he committed terrorist attacks without leaving his home, launched the next train from Moscow to Vladikavkaz? A village is not a city, everyone knows everyone. Khodov went to the terrorist attacks as if he were going to work, passing by the “The police are looking for them” stand. Policeman Ali Taziev, allegedly kidnapped and killed along with his hostage, turned out to be terrorist Magomed Yavloev. Perhaps the commission should ask, how did this happen? How did a kidnapped policeman make such a quick career among militants? And if he participated in the kidnapping of the hostage from the very beginning, how did it happen that the authorities gave Ali Taziev such a heroic description? Did his superiors kidnap hostages with him or not? There is little sign that the parliamentary commission set up to investigate the causes of the attack is answering these questions. There is one more question, a very scary one, by the way, many people ask themselves, I answer this question a little differently than the people who ask it, how did the assault actually happen? How did it happen, was the detonation, after which everyone scattered, accidental, or was it deliberately provoked by someone who decided, even if there is a flood after us, it would be better for them to die than for us to give in to the terrorists? We do not see that these questions are being asked, we see that one single question is being asked, Mr. Torshin voiced it, why we have questions for Mr. Aushev, who came to the school. Those. they have no questions for the President of Ingushetia Zyazikov, who turned off his mobile phone, they have questions for Aushev, who came to the school and brought out 15 infants and 11 of their mothers. And according to incriminating evidence, there are a lot of stories reported on the Internet that Aushev is almost an accomplice of the terrorists, that Aushev took his own people out of school, i.e. 15 infants – and all are Aushev’s children. And even officials are already asking this question. Those. they are so traumatized by the behavior of the only person who tried to take responsibility for the fate of the hostages, who made all these bosses look idiotic, who turned off their cell phones, who, for example, put demands on Putin’s desk, the official existence of which was denied, that instead of to find out how the terrorist attack really happened, they a) blame the only person who behaved courageously, b) they are really trying to incite the Ossetians against the Ingush instead of the Ossetians studying, answering questions, the most terrible questions about Beslan. And it seems to me that there is only one way out of this, because if our society has civic consciousness, then the Beslan residents themselves should create a commission to investigate the causes and circumstances of the terrorist attack. The only indispensable condition for the work of this commission should be that you yourself or your relatives were among the hostages, because among the huge number of hostages and their relatives there will be professional investigators, military personnel, and officials, and these people will be competent enough to know what to ask and how to ask. If they are not answered, in any case, they cannot be less competent than the current commission, if they are not answered, I want to look into the eyes of those officials who will not answer them. This is really a matter of simply the survival of our society. What is happening in Beslan, what is happening in general in our fight against terrorism, this, you know, is such an anecdote. Do your pigs smoke? No. So your pigsty is on fire. What is happening in Beslan is an attempt to explain that our pigs smoke. And everyone who said that the pigsty is on fire are enemies of the people and accomplices of terrorists. So, the problem is that the pigsty will burn down and all of us along with it.

LISTENER OLGA - You probably know that Russian officials give interviews abroad, in particular, Illarionov and Gref. And you read, probably read the entire interview with Gref, who said that Khodorkovsky, in general, he did not speak very flatteringly about him in terms of the fact that the liberal Gref spoke very unflatteringly about Khodorkovsky.

Y. LATYNINA - Thank you, I understand your question, but I assure you that both Gref and Kudrin, these people have long ceased to be liberals, they are officials. In addition, let me just remind you that Gref was for some time the chairman of the board of directors of Rosneft, he was the chairman of the board of directors of Rosneft precisely at that very dramatic moment when, at a meeting with President Putin, Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky said that you know, Rosneft » bought the Severnaya Neft company at a greatly inflated price. She paid 600 million dollars, but, in general, this case cost at most 300. And not only did Khodorkovsky say this, but such a delicate thing that after Khodorkovsky said this, he also approached Putin, this was already after the end of the meeting and, in fact, presented calculations, from which it followed who received how much and where for “Northern Oil”. It must be said that, basically, it was, of course, not Gref; then the name of the future chairman of the board of directors of Rosneft, Mr. Igor Sechin, was named. But you know, it’s a funny question, how did Gref feel at that moment? How did the other interested parties to the deal feel at that moment, because, of course, they reported to Putin that they had overpaid. They, of course, said that you understand, this is to strengthen the vertical power structure. But the fact is that according to Khodorkovsky’s calculations, it turned out that they paid twice as much as was reported to Putin. In general, Khodorkovsky did not do well. He got into people's private pockets. After that, naturally, people began to hate him with wild hatred, how can this be, you imagine, this Khodorkovsky, who himself privatized this YUKOS at no great cost, and suddenly he is trying to take away the last hundred million dollars from a person. It is, in fact, for this that Mikhail Borisovich was imprisoned. Don't report on the new boss. By the way, a very interesting point, Mikhail Borisovich was not forgiven for this story with Severnaya Neft, I really believe and many people believe that this was one of the key moments because of which Sechin simply hated Khodorkovsky. But now there is a squabble over the merger of Gazprom and Rosneft, and in return they are butting heads with compromising material. And this story was suddenly calmly published in Kompromat.Ru, apparently by Gazprom people, because I can’t imagine it any other way. And it is just described that Rosneft is resisting takeover by Gazprom, Rosneft is so-and-so, bad, it bought Severnaya Neft for 600 million dollars, it was 200-300 million dollars more than it is necessary, the money went there, such and such a person received shares in Severnaya Neft. The most interesting thing is that this time the establishment and President Putin have no reaction. This is possible, Gazprom is possible, Khodorkovsky was not allowed. This is a nice pick, Gazprom reproaches Rosneft, Rosneft reproaches Gazprom, but Khodorkovsky is not allowed, he is a stranger, don’t inform. Break for news.
NEWS

Y. LATYNINA – “Access Code” program, questions on the Internet and by pager. The question with which I would like to start the second half of the program is Alexandra Svetlova, this came over the Internet. Yulia, why, after the terrorist attack in Taba, where mainly Russians and Israelis were killed, did President Putin express sympathy for the president of Egypt and not express sympathy for the head of Israel? There are more surprising facts regarding the actions of President Putin and the authorities regarding terrorist attacks. For example, it is amazing that we did not accept Israeli help after Beslan. Moreover, I would say, in a particularly cynical form, because when the Israelis started calling the Russian embassy on Friday evening, they were told that it was Friday evening, that I would go to work? We don't need your help. Apparently, the embassy workers who answered had Shabbat, but the Israelis did not have Shabbat. It is terrible disgust that help was refused. The Israelis offered to send several planes with medical equipment and doctors to Beslan; I remind you that, firstly, these are doctors who speak Russian. With all due respect to the dedication of the Beslan doctors, the level of Israeli medicine is much higher. And it was simply a question about human lives, about the lives of children. Maybe if this was sent to Moscow... and, of course, psychological assistance was also offered there, this is important because the Israelis, unfortunately, have a lot of experience in providing such assistance during terrorist attacks. So, I think that if the terrorist attack had occurred in Moscow, maybe they would have allowed to send a plane to the Israelis, because here they probably decided - well, the Ossetians, Georgians, black-assed people, will kill themselves. It seems to me that what is happening in relations between Russia and Israel can be explained, in general, only by the brutal anti-Semitism of the people who came to power. Moreover, this is quite funny, because this anti-Semitism, in general, of course, dates back to the late 70s, but the anti-Semitism of the late 70s was a derivative of the fact that we fought against Israel. Those. To be honest, during the 70-80s. The Russian army, Russia made huge supplies of weapons to both Egypt and Syria, and, in fact, in the 6-day war, Israel destroyed not Egyptian, but Russian tanks, Russian-made tanks. The supply of our weapons to Syria, in my opinion, amounted to 26 billion dollars, strange, yes, it was better to bring sausage to Voronezh with this money. And the most important thing is that there were a huge number of Russian military advisers in Syria, in my opinion, even the initial group was 15 thousand people. We supplied artillery and Grad installations to the Palestine Liberation Organization. How did Operation Peace in Galilee begin? Because the Palestine Liberation Organization fired at Israeli settlements from Lebanese territory than with Grad launchers. For a moment, imagine a Grad installation maintained by a terrorist organization. Where did she come from? Naturally, this is a Russian installation. It is clear that it was very unpleasant for Israel, because Israel is small, one Grad installation, in general, can seriously damage the whole of Israel. To be fair, it must be said that the anti-aircraft missile launcher, the S75 complex, our newest one, which prevented Israeli planes in 1982 from destroying this same Grad launcher located on the territory of Lebanon, it did not belong to the Palestine Liberation Organization, it belonged to the Syrian troops. Actually, it didn’t even belong to the Syrian troops, it just belonged, there were Russian crews there, because the Syrians were not able to operate this rather complex equipment. And I’m saying all this for what, it could be understood, imagine, June 9, 82. Beka Valley, an air battle, one of the largest in the history of the world, and judging by the cost of aircraft, it is simply probably the largest, because there were 200 aircraft in the air, 100 of them were Syrian MIGs, as is clear, 100 – Israeli “Phantoms” and “Mirages”. And naturally, it was not Syrian, but Russian pilots who were at the controls of the Syrian MIGs. 29 of these 200 aircraft were shot down, and all of them were MIGs. It is clear that after this, those surviving Russian pilots who landed and remained alive found it difficult to experience warm feelings towards Israel. Israel could still allow itself, after this battle, which was a monstrous defeat of Russian weapons, to write that, in general, you know, MIGs are good planes and the Russians are excellent pilots, but the Syrian generals are simply complete assholes for the task they gave them put. But the Russian pilots, when landing, did not think about such subtleties. They thought - oh, Jew, if he gets caught, I’ll kill him. Because a comrade died, i.e. it was a kind of functional anti-Semitism associated with the fact that Russia turned the Middle East into a testing ground for its own weapons. Naturally, she always occupied the position of the Arabs. She supported the Arabs when they said no, we will destroy Israel. She supported the Arabs, when the Arabs became ill, Israel began to beat them. But now a completely incomprehensible thing is happening there, because now, firstly, it is too late for us to support the Arabs after Afghanistan and Chechnya. And secondly, there is a certain coherence of thought that should be present among officials. After all, we know from official propaganda that we have a peace process in Chechnya, and Beslan was organized by Arabs and blacks. ORT did not yet know that there were not 350 people in the school, but it already knew that the Beslan terrorists there were Arabs. True, then the Arabs and the blacks described above disappeared somewhere, but in Chechnya they began to regularly catch Arab mercenaries. And President Putin explained to us that international terrorism was to blame for the tragedy, and stated that he would launch preventive strikes against it. It must be said that a preemptive strike was immediately launched against the Arab terrorists. True, not by the Russians, but by the Israelis, who launched Operation Days of Reckoning in the Gaza Strip after the Palestinians fired rockets at Israeli territory and killed two small children. And after this, Russia votes at the UN for a resolution introduced by Arab countries condemning Israel. The United States is vetoing the resolution due to its obvious unilateral nature. But it would seem that I am not talking about moral considerations; it would seem that a state system that is doing its best to distract the people from what is happening in Chechnya, showing Arab mercenaries on TV, it should have minimal memory, it should remember not only the previous point - irritant, the entire path that has been taken. But it seems that this system does not have a brain, it has a peripheral nervous system that reacts to each individual stimulus. Those. It turns out that Arab terrorists are operating in the mountains of Chechnya, and Palestinian freedom fighters are operating in the Gaza Strip. We are against double standards in the fight against terrorism, as Putin said. So, against this background, the fact that they did not call and express sympathy to the Israeli Prime Minister regarding the death of the Israelis, who, in fact, were the main victims of the terrorist attack, is even a small thing.

Just two more questions. Question from Alexander Gorenshtein, Moscow - how do you feel about the loss of the Russian national football team? The answer is obvious, that after that we heard that Mr. Yartsev wants to resign, Gryzlov said that this is a nightmare, you just have to get over it. I am very glad, because at least something seems like a nightmare to Gryzlov, because hundreds of children were killed in Beslan and neither these words of Gryzlov nor demands for resignation were heard. By the way, when I talked about layoffs after Beslan, that no layoffs occurred, not counting the dismissal of Raf Shakirov, ch. editor of Izvestia, this is also a very interesting thing that probably needs to be said. Because everyone thinks that Raf Shakirov was fired for Beslan, they say, he printed the wrong photographs, he printed photographs of the burned corpses of children. The fact is that the story is much more interesting. Shakirov, because “Izvestia” is usually not put on the president’s desk, the entire Russian press, they put extracts and “Süd Deutsche Zeitung”, which the president regularly reads. Actually, from the fact that the president reads German newspapers, there is even such a comical thing there, if you noticed that the only official from Fradkov’s cabinet who was fired was Mr. Nasonov, the head of the federal road service. He was fired precisely because Süd Deutsche Zeitung published an article about him being a corrupt official. What a piece of news, everything in Russia, one might say, the whole government is the same, but one poor official was published in Süd Deutsche Zeitung, and Putin reads Süd Deutsche Zeitung, so it was him who was fired. So, returning to the situation with Izvestia, the president comes on Saturday morning, the Izvestia newspaper was the first one he saw, why? My assumption and the assumption of many in the business elite is related to the fact that, as is known, the Izvestia newspaper belongs to Potanin, Potanin owns Norilsk Nickel, and Norilsk Nickel is the next takeover candidate after YUKOS. Those. If Khodorkovsky was a candidate for takeover because he behaved badly and resisted, then Potanin, on the contrary, behaves very softly, he constantly makes compromises, they constantly bite something off of him under the carpet. Such a paradox, if you behave like a victim, then sooner or later you will be eaten. And obviously, it was assumed that the president, clearly, it was easy to predict the president’s reaction, to the people manipulating him, that the president would now see the Izvestia newspaper, start saying what it was, Potanin would refuse to dismiss Shakirov quickly, Potanin would be punished for this It will be strong to attack him about Norilsk Nickel. But Potanin very quickly dismissed Shakirov, he realized that Norilsk Nickel was more important. But this is about the question of what - this is about the question of what people around the president thought from Friday to Saturday after Beslan. Some are talking about what, and some are talking about the main thing, about how to divide Norilsk Nickel.

AUDIENCE: I have two questions for you. First, I don’t understand what is the basis for your assumption, or rather, the assertion that our government, obviously, and Putin too, are rabid anti-Semites? If we look at the composition of the government, then it is impossible to draw such a conclusion about this. And the second one is from a slightly different area, why does Israel categorically not negotiate with terrorists? You don't condemn this? Israel allows itself preventive strikes against terrorist bases and individual terrorists, their leaders, you approve of this. And when our people talk only about supposed preventive strikes, perhaps this will not happen yet and whether they will succeed, unfortunately, we are not very good at this, you condemn it accordingly.

Y. LATYNINA - Thank you, I understood your question. My assumption that there are zoological anti-Semites in our government is connected with the actions of Russia, which adopted the Arabic version of the resolution regarding the events in Gaza, with the fact that Russia did not accept Israeli assistance after Beslan, although it was about saving people; with the fact that the Russian ambassador allowed himself, so to speak, to answer on Friday evening, that - I, that, for this reason, I will come to work. As for Israel, which does not negotiate with terrorists, I emphasize once again that we are talking about technical negotiations. If you ask any Israeli or any other security specialist, specialist in terrorist attacks, you will always find out that there is such a special position - negotiator. Don’t confuse God’s gift with scrambled eggs, don’t confuse global concessions to terrorists, when you agree with their demands, and technical negotiations that allow you to gain time, free some of the hostages, transfer food to the hostages, and, most importantly, calm down the terrorists. Because every person wants to live, the entire strategy of anti-terrorist units is based on the fact that every person, even a terrorist, wants to live, hopes for the success of his action and hesitates to press the button because he has softened from negotiations. A few more questions on the Internet that I can’t help but answer. Sergei Gorodilov from Rostov asks - Yulia, why do we in Abkhazia support Khadzhimba, because Bagapsh is a Russian employee, if I’m not mistaken, being the head of Chernomorenergo, he is a subordinate of Chubais, is he really anti-Russian? You know, Abkhazia is exactly the same series as our oil epic in Iraq, because I already said last time that we could not technically lose the Abkhaz elections, but we managed to do it. Because for Russia it didn’t matter who would win in Abkhazia, Bagapsh or Khadzhimba. Of course, it was more pleasant that Khadzhimba would win, because they said, they say that he is a KGB agent, they say that he is accepted among the Russian elite. For my part, I was told an absolutely wonderful story about the birthday of the then Plenipotentiary Representative, Mr. Kazantsev, on which Kazantsev stood, already well received, an eyewitness told him, supported on both sides by orderlies, all the Russian governors came up to him in turn and hugged him. And there were two people who did not hug Mr. Kazantsev, the Plenipotentiary Representative for the South, but kissed his hand. It was Mr. Kokoite from South Ossetia and Mr. Khadzhimba. It is clear that it is much more pleasant to see a person who kisses Kazantsev’s hand as the president of Abkhazia than a person who is simply the head of Chernomorenergo there. It's interesting, it's clear what happened. It was all the same for Russia. But it was not all the same to the people who agreed with Khadzhimba on specific projects. Actually, it's not about the pen. This is a matter of serious money, so Khadzhimba was introduced to Putin, so they knocked money out of the budget for Khadzhimba’s PR campaign. But the funniest thing started later, because if there is money, then there will be PR people; there are two types of PR people in Russia. There are PR people who believe that their main goal is to make money with the customer, i.e. yes, they steal 90% of the money, divide it with the customer, and pretend to be something for the remaining 10%. As a rule, they run ten campaigns, two out of 10 campaigns are successful. This can be presented purely statistically, they turn out to be successful, this can be presented for further promotions. And other PR people also save money, but they save at least 50% and think about the result. If someone was pushing Khajimba for the sake of his personal interests, it would be logical for him to hire PR people of the second type. But, apparently, the distant economic benefit in the form of Khajimba’s future victory could not compensate for the delight at the sight of real money, i.e. there was budget money, and the rocket that was chasing the plane spotted a sparrow in the air, and the sparrow was closer. Khadzhimba, even when he gives it, and then there’s the PR budget, it’s already on the table, the spoon is stuck in the soup. The result was what happened, as a result the PR was mediocre, the PR was like in Ivano-Frankivsk. Bagapsh won, and only thanks, in general, to Russian PR, or rather, anti-PR. Now we are introducing militants from the Confederation of Peoples of the Caucasus into Abkhazia to correct the sins of PR people. It is known that the most famous representative of this confederation, Shamil Basayev, then fought in Abkhazia, now no longer fights on the side of the Russians. Those. strangely, within just a few weeks, we found ourselves in Abkhazia in almost the same situation in which Georgia found itself at the beginning of the Georgian-Abkhaz war. We brought some strange guys into Abkhazia to protect our own candidate, who, in general, are mostly only accustomed to cutting off heads, because - what Shamil Basayev’s militants did, they played football with the heads of Georgian soldiers. Now whose heads will they play with? The heads of Bagapsh’s supporters with the words - no, Russia wants Khajimba? Those. Why did we put ourselves in the same position that Gamsakhurdia put us in 91? Not even because people wanted Bagapsh, but because people who wanted Bagapsh couldn’t resist cutting through the PR budget. An amazing country, just in time for the question.

A few more questions on the same Internet, excuse me, for God’s sake, one second, here’s a question that seemed important to me, a question from Sergei from St. Petersburg - a Vietnamese was killed in St. Petersburg again, don’t you think that Russia is becoming a Nazi country? You know, you understand, the point is not that we have a lot of Nazis; by the way, we don’t have many of them, but in our country they simply go unpunished. In Russia you can calmly kill a person, no one will raise their head. This concerns not only the Vietnamese, this concerns, first of all, the Russians. A man says to an FSB general he knows, “You know, Chechens rented an apartment in the house next to me, there are 8 of them, there is no furniture, they change all the time. The FSB general speaks to his department, the relevant department, says - sort it out. They tell him - no, we won’t look into it, this is someone settling scores, he doesn’t want blacks renting an apartment. But check, he settles scores - unscrew his head. Another story, a woman finds a corpse, just a simple woman finds a corpse on the threshold of her own house. He calls the police and says thank you. A week later the woman calls again, again asking what happened to the corpse. They tell her what a corpse, there was no corpse. The woman becomes interested, she calls again, receives threatening calls in response - leave me alone, shut up. Those. some police major, in order not to worry, did not register the corpse, he did not hesitate not to register the corpse, but he did not hesitate to call the woman with threats who discovered it. In fact, it is not the slightest difficulty to identify the Nazi who killed this unfortunate Vietnamese. The crime looks Nazi not because Russia is a Nazi country, but because it is simply not being investigated, and no one is interested in it. Moreover, there is a certain paradox. When a Vietnamese or an Azerbaijani is killed, the Azerbaijani community at least stands up for him. When, say, a drunken cop runs over a Russian, no one will rise up and say that the Russian was run over based on his nationality. Although, in general, he was suppressed on ethnic grounds, because he lives in Russia. As stated in the police report, which I once saw in the glorious city of Krasnoyarsk, the victim is a citizen of Russia, no other injuries were found on the corpse.

LISTENER GEORGY VASILIEVICH – First of all, a small clarification. The fact is that anti-burn medications from Israel arrived both in Beslan and in hospitals in Vladikavkaz. This was the official press release. Now this is a question, there was information that YUKOS seems to be going to let BP conduct an independent assessment of the value of Yuganskneftegaz. In this case, after all the upheavals, can the YUKOS shareholders, for example, apply to international arbitration? And one more thing, explain to me, an old fool, how much we must disrespect our history, our country, if our delegations regularly travel to China and not one of them laid wreaths at the Port Arthur cemetery, at the mass graves of 1905, to those who were buried in 45-46 and subsequent ones, to those who took part in the Korean War? I don’t know how many years there have been no reports of anyone visiting these cemeteries. I'm not even talking about the fact that at least once, except for what was in Izvestia, no one raised the question of restoring the Russian monument in Qingdao to our sailors. Thank you.

Y. LATYNINA - Georgy Vasilyevich, thank you very much for Port Arthur, as they say, I’m ashamed. I’m probably ashamed of the authorities, although, on the other hand, if we are unveiling a memorial plaque to Akhmad Kadyrov, who turned out to be our only hero of the first Chechen war, then why else should we honor the monument in Port Arthur with our presence? As for the independent assessment of YUKOS, in any case YUKOS will appeal, I think, to the international court. If, of course, the condition of the hostages who are sitting here allows it. But by the way, again, I had a lot of questions on the Internet, Mikhail Mishkin writes to me - Yulia, so how much did Dresdner Bank value Yuganskneftegaz, at 10 billion dollars or 15? If at 15-17, then why did the Ministry of Justice say at 10? And if it’s 10, why does the Ministry of Justice sell it for 4? Why do you want to get as little money as possible into the budget for YUKOS? Let me remind you that, indeed, this week there was a completely comical story, the Ministry of Justice came out and said that a foreign bank had assessed YUKOS, that YUKOS was worth 10 billion dollars, after which the foreign bank, Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, found itself in a very difficult situation . The fact is that, firstly, the assessment of YUKOS is strictly confidential, i.e. There is no precedent for the appraisal to be made public by the appraiser. The assessment will be made public by the customer. And the estimate said 15-17 billion, but the customer said 10. What to do? If you violate confidentiality, you will find yourself in a bad position in front of the customer, if you don’t violate it, you will lose tens of millions of dollars in international contracts because you will lose your reputation. And secondly, the assessment of 10 billion, in fact, really was, it is connected with the fact that this is such a purely technical thing, which is that when an appraiser evaluates a company, he gives normal, average valuation figures, in this case, 15- 17, he also gives estimates in case of force majeure, and what will happen if a nuclear bomb falls on Yuganskneftegaz. These 10 billion, it was an assessment of force majeure, like everything happened, complete crap, then 10 billion. And accordingly, the Ministry of Justice acted very funny, it only caught its eye on the last assessment. Naturally, on purpose, because I have already talked about the situation with the valuation of the YUKOS company and the situation with the valuation of the Yuganskneftegaz asset, because the very idea of privatization, the very idea of taking away YUKOS, I think, is a bad idea, it has served the authorities a disservice . But well, they decided to take it away, they drew up a plan, the key part of the plan was precisely the assessment of YUKOS. The appraisal was entrusted to a German bank, and everyone was perplexed why a German bank would do it, because they would appreciate it expensively, but they needed it cheaply. A month ago, at a meeting in the presidential administration, “Dresdner” announced this estimate, 15-17 billion, Sechin became hysterical, they hit the table, shouted, we need 6, in extreme cases 8. And an amazing thing turns out, because it turns out that the estimate “Dresdner” was assigned because they thought of reaching an agreement. Those. people who planned to seize a transparent oil company through its valuation and sale did not suspect that the Western bank, even if friendly to the Kremlin, has excellent relations there, the head of the Russian representative office of Dresdner is known to Putin from Germany, not from St. Petersburg, but in Germany, we served together, this bank will not lose hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign contracts for the sake of two or three contracts in Russia. And this amazes me. The question is, gentlemen, is it really difficult to plan the most basic thing in this capture when planning the takeover of a transparent oil company? Because the agony of YUKOS, the seizure of YUKOS, it, you know, now surprisingly resembles the assault on Grozny, because the generals who brought tanks into the city did not suspect that the Chechens knew how to shoot. And the people who planned to capture a transparent oil company do not suspect that it is not as easy to capture it as a beer stall, i.e. what excellent hitting mechanisms. And of course, YUKOS will be taken, because the forces are too disparate, as they took Grozny, but it is already obvious that the capture of YUKOS, like the capture of Grozny, cannot be called a victory. What is happening in Russia, I would call it the house manager effect. Remember the house manager Ivan Vasilyevich from the film “Ivan Vasilyevich Changes His Profession”? The house manager, finding himself in the royal place, understands that Kazan can be given to the Tatars, Livonia to anyone, the main thing is to put a silver spoon in his pocket. People think at the level of a silver spoon, with the only difference being that their hands twitch all the time; even a silver spoon, for example, YUKOS or Abkhazia, they carry past their pocket. The house manager effect. Best wishes.

Presenters:

Yulia Latynina

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