This supplement is sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta, which takes sole responsibility for its contents and is wholly independent of Nation Multimedia Group. November 28 - December 4, 2015
Thursday, November 26, 2015asia.rbth.com
P14
Costoms and traditions around the theatre’s illustrious costumes
Bolshoi superstitions
P6
A woman has been charged with terrorism for alleged links to the Islamic State
02 RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)
asia.rbth.comNews
The policies of Russian Pres-ident Vladimir Putin have more support in Vietnam, China and India than else-wher, according to a recent survey, conducted by PEW in 40 nations this March.
IN BRIEF
SOCIETY
Putin’s image in Asia-Pacific
MEPhI is ranked 36th for
Physics in the Times Higher
Education World Top 100
rankings.
MEPhI jumps 60 places to reach top 40 for physics
The National Research N u c l e a r U n iv e r s i t y (MEPhI) jumped almost 60 places to get the 36th rank in the Times Higher Edu-cation World Top 100 Rankings for Excellence in the Physical Sciences for 2015-16.
The university was in 95th place in the 2014-2015 rankings.
The Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU) and the Novosibirsk State University (NSU) also made it to the top 100 rankings this year.
MSU fell from 56th to 59th rank from last year, while NSU dropped one place to 86th.
“Russia has maintained its strong performance for the physical sciences sub-jects,” Phil Baty, Times Higher Education World University Rankings Edi-tor told RBTH.
He described MEPhI’s progress as “a remarkable achievement and some-thing to be celebrated”. Oxford and Cambridge universities were the only non-U.S. institutions ranked in the top 10.
Earlier this year, the Russian Ministry of Edu-cation said that Russian universities would aim to rise in international sub-ject-based rankings, rath-er than institutional ones.
Russian Vice Premier Olga Golodets told report-ers in October that this was due to “a different or-ganisation structure” of Russian institutions.
“You’ll hardly fi nd uni-versities in other countries that only teach medicine,” Golodets said.
“In Russia, most medi-cal institutes and univer-sities are standalone insti-tutions.”
Being highly specialised, many Russian universities fi nd it hard to rise in in-stitutional rankings, since they are competing with Western universities, which tend to have many facul-ties.
GLEB FEDOROVRBTH
Russian startup recognised in EU
Russian PM urges cooperation against terror
TECH
GLOBAL COOPERATION
Astro Digital, a startup cre-ated by Yekaterina Koten-ko-Lengold, won second place in the startup com-petition at Slush, which is a major event in northern Europe for innovators and developers interested in at-tracting international in-vestors. “I’ve always been interested in the space in-dustry and wanted to apply space technology to every-day life,” Katya told RBTH.
Astro Digital is a plat-form for accessing satellite data that provides easy, quick search and integra-tion of satellite photo-graphs into web and mo-b i l e a p p l i c a t i o n s . Developers believe there can be a demand for such technology, especially from farmers and forest owners.
Astro Digital is run by
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has called on APEC members to act to combat terrorism.
“We must fi ght terrorism together,”Medvedev said, at the APEC 2015 summit in Manila this month. “And combating terrorism will require joint, coordinated and truly concerted action,” he said.
“The terror act which brought down the plane [in Sinai] and the attack in
an international team of ex-perts from Russia and the US, and the startup’s head office is located at Nasa’s Ames Research Park in Cal-ifornia.
Traditionally, satellite im-
Paris have markedly sharp-ened the political agenda,” the Prime Minister contin-ued.
“War has been declared on the whole civilised world. The threat is global and, unfortunately, it’s real. In this context, the stance of some Western countries right now is difficult to un-derstand.”
Supporting multilateral trade
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev presents the Phillipines with a bronze bear sculpture.
The Russian prime minis-ter indirectly hit out at the Trans-Pacifi c Partnership agreement (TPP). “Trade rules should be universal,” he said, without naming the TPP.
Medvedev spoke in fa-vour of a multilateral trade system. “We believe that all preferential trade agree-ments within the frame-work of APEC… are very important but nevertheless they should not substitute
agery has been used by big corporations and govern-ments. Only recently new solutions have become widely available. Astro Dig-ital’s main competitive ad-vantage is simplicity; infor-
Astro Digital founder Yekaterina Kotenko-Lengold.
Moscow and Singapore are starting consultations to create a free trade zone between the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and Singapore, First Dep-uty Prime Minister of Rus-sia Igor Shuvalov told media after an intergov-ernmental commission meeting held in Moscow in mid November.
Russia and Indonesia are aiming to double their bi-lateral trade to $10 billion by 2018, Sergei Rossomak-hov, Russia’s Trade Rep-resentative in Indonesia told media. “We are aim-ing at high fi gures of the trade turnover,” Rosso-makhov told. Indonesian food producers are keen to export to Russia, while Russian companies would like to supply Indonesia with machinery, technical products, and also set up manufacturing facilities.
New plan for
trade zone
Indonesian ties
growing
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the multilateral trade sys-tem and they should not disrupt the already stable economic ties.”
Russian economy stableThe Russian prime minis-ter said the country’s econ-omy and the fi nancial sec-tor are quite stable despite falling oil prices, a weaker ruble and western sanc-tions.
“The weakening of the ruble allows foreign inves-tors to buy Russian assets at lower prices, and many take advantage of this,” Medvedev said, according to RT.com
Medvedev said the vol-ume of direct investment into the Russian economy from the Asia-Pacifi c re-gion was worth about $10 billion, according to the re-port. APEC countries are working to increase invest-ment, actively establishing funds, he said, citing China and South Korea.
Bear diplomacyMedvedev presented a 530-kilogram bronze sculpture of a bear to the Philippines, TASS report-ed.
The bear was placed in the park of sculptures in Manila, according to the report.
mation is taken from numerous sources and then adapted to customer needs.
“Our key clients are com-ing from agriculture and disaster management, but products can be used for many other purposes,’’ said Kotenko-Lengold. “For ex-ample, authorities could monitor waste on building roofs, which is a serious problem for many develop-ing counties.”
“Katya’s combines satel-lite photographs of the Earth with an IT compo-nent,” remarked Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (Skoltech) di-rector, Edward Crawley. “Skoltech’s space strategy is to use low Earth orbit possibilities to improve people’s lives and health, and the planet in general.”
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03RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)asia.rbth.com Politics
IN BRIEF
China has bought 24 Suk-hoi-35 (Flanker-E+) fi ght-er jets from Russia, Sergey Chemezov, the head of the Russian state-owned high-tech company Rostec, told media. The deal is believed to be worth than $2 bil-lion, with each jet being sold for $83 million.
Several countries have shown interest in the ad-vanced multipurpose air-craft, but China becomes the fi rst foreign buyer of the fi ghter jets. The Rus-sian Air Force has a fl eet of 36 Flanker-E+ jets at the moment.
China buys 24
Sukhoi-35 jets
On November 15-16, mem-bers of the We Remember and Take Pride interna-tional motor rally made a stop in Bangkok. The event is taking place within the annual Great Silk Road expedition project and is dedicated to the 70th Vic-tory Day Anniversary in the Great Patriotic War. Before coming to Thailand the motor rally had visit-ed Kazakhstan, Kyr-gyzstan, China, Laos, Cambodia, having trav-elled 17,000 kilometres, the main part of the route. The way back, which is planned by New Year’s, will take them through Nepal, India and Iran.
Victory Day
motor rally
visits Thailand
ALEXEY TIMOFEYCHEVRBTH
RBTH summarises the key
issues concerning Russia
that were discussed at the
2015 G20 summit in
Antalya, Turkey, this month.
Russia’s main concerns at G20
G20 summit What were the key conversations and announcements in Antalya involving Russia?
in the fi ght against terror-ism are very close, but dif-ferences remain on tactics.
2. Turkish Stream gas project still aliveGazprom chief Alexei Mill-er said in Antalya that the Turkish Stream project, in-volving the delivery of Rus-sian gas to Turkey via a pipeline beneath the Black Sea, could be implement-ed in a very short period once a corresponding in-tergovernmental agree-ment is signed.
However, in July, Russian media reported that the project had been frozen by Gazprom due to disagree-ments with the Turkish side over the cost of Russian gas. Ankara insists on a 10-percent discount.
The Russian authorities have denied reports the project has been scrapped. In Antalya, Miller attrib-uted the possibility of the prompt implementation of Turkish Stream to the fact
1. Meeting between Putin and ObamaRussian President Vladimir Putin and his US counter-part Barack Obama spoke about half an hour ahead of the G20 Leaders’ Ses-sions.
According to Putin’s aide Yury Ushakov, they discus-sed the situation in Syria and Ukraine, with more at-tention being given to the situation in Syria.
Responding to a question on whether the leaders of the Russian Federation and the United States had managed to make progress in reconciling their posi-tions on Syria, the Russian official pointed out that Russia and the United States’ strategic objectives
3. Ukraine-EU association agreementThe issue of the entry into force of the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement was discussed “quite extensive-ly” during talks between the leaders of Russia and Germany on the sidelines of the G20 summit, said Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov.
“Unfortunately, our con-tacts with the Europeans and the Ukrainians are not bringing the desired results and the consequences of the entry into force of this agreement still remain neg-ative. Attempts to discuss these issues have not been successful,” he said.
Moscow has repeatedly stated that in its present form the association agree-ment harms Russian eco-nomic interests.
On October 30, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said that in re-sponse to the agreement’s entry into force that the Russian Federation would increase “customs and tar-iff protection regarding Ukraine” from January 1, 2016.
The presidents of Russia and the US at the G20 summit.
that its route is 70 per cent identical to the route of the abandoned South Stream pipeline (intended to sup-ply Russian gas to Central Europe via the Balkans – RBTH), where the neces-sary research had already been carried out.
According to Energy
Minister Alexander Novak, the implementation of Turkish Stream was dis-cussed on the sidelines of the summit by Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Ac-cording to Novak, the work on an intergovernmental agreement will continue.
deaths of the 224 passen-gers has now become a mat-ter of national principle.
It is unlikely that this will become a reason to imme-diately cut air communica-tion with other countries (as was done with Egypt) that pose a signifi cant te-rrorist threat. This extreme measure will be implemen-ted only in the case of a more dangerous escalation
After recognising that a terrorist act was responsi-ble for bringing
down the Russian passen-ger airliner in Egypt, Rus-sian President Vladimir Putin affirmed that “What Russia is doing in Syria is right”. Revenge for the
of terrorism. Concerning Syria, the expected and al-ready announced increase in the number of strikes on terrorist targets will not lead to a Russian ground operation in the country. A single anti-terrorist front will also not be formed, for now. Yet coordination bet-ween Moscow and the West after the terrorist acts in Paris and the G20 summit
in Turkey, where the sub-ject matter was discussed in a new context, will dou-btlessly intensify.
Moscow is, therefore, bound to increase the num-ber of air strikes on the Is-lamic State (IS) positions but will refrain from stri-king forces belonging to the Free Syrian Army, which the West considers the “mode-rate opposition”. However, the West has still not given Moscow a list of sites con-trolled by the so-called “moderate” opposition so that Russia does not bomb them. This, unfortunately, demonstrates the extremely
low level of trust between the sides. However, closer coordination between the sides concerning those who certainly should be bombed has already begun.
The fact that immedia-tely after Putin’s statement the Russian air force laun-ched an attack on what is basically the Islamic State capital, Raqqa, is proof of this.
The author is a political analyst and member of the Council on Foreign and De-fence Policy, an independ-ent Moscow-based think tank.
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World Top 40 in Physics
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What might the aims have been of the terrorists behind the Sinai air disaster
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Russia to launch trading of new oil class in rubles.
rbth.com/539889
Economic crisis could send Russia’s labor migrants home
rbth.com/539515
The Romanovs in the eyes
of their closest attendants
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Russia’s national drink isn’t vodka — it’s tea.
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GEORGY
BOVTANALYST
EXPERT
No excuse for any disunity between Russia and West after terrorist attacks
REUTERS
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04 RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)
asia.rbth.comBusiness
ANNA KUCHMARBTH
Russia’s tourism industry
may lose more than $50
million as a result of a flight
ban imposed after the
plane downing in Sinai.
Flight ban to Egypt will deal a heavy blow to tour agencies
Tourism Flight ban will bring losses
Russia suspended all fl ights to Egypt on Novem-ber 6 amid rising interna-tional concern that the Kogalymavia fl ight from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheikh to St Petersburg, which crashed just 23 min-utes into the fl ight with the loss of all 224 on board, was brought down by a bomb placed in the hold, that a terror act caused the crash was confi rmed on Novem-ber 17 by the Russian gov-ernment.
The Russians who are still in Egypt are being brought home separately from their luggage, which is being
As Russian tourists are gradually transported home from Egypt following the deadly plane crash in the north of the Sinai Penin-sula on October 31, fears are growing that the sus-pension on all fl ights from Russia to Egypt could have disastrous consequences for the Russian tourist indus-try.
Egypt was one of the most popular holiday destinations for Russian tourists.
transported by Russian Emergencies Ministry air-craft.
According to Rosturism (the Russian Federal Tour-ism Agency), Egypt is the most popular foreign des-tination for Russian tour-ists. In 2014, it accounted for some 30 per cent of all trips, or about 3 million people, said the vice-pres-ident of the Russian asso-ciation of tour operators (ATOR), Dmitry Gorin.
Millions of lossesTour operators admit that they are already losing money on the fl ights that are now going to Egypt empty to bring Russian tourists back home.
According to Anna Podgornaya from Pegas Tu-ristik and Vladimir Voro-byev, president of Natali Tours, this means that they are losing half of the air-fare on each empty seat. In other words, at an average price of a return ticket of $250, tour operators stand to lose a total of nearly $10 million. The situation is being further exacerbated by the losses generated by cancelled fl ights. According to ATOR calculations, some 70,000 holidays in Egypt have already been sold for the period before New Year. At an average price of $800 per person, this will trans-late into losses of at least $56 million.
Other potential losses in-clude advance payments al-ready made to Egyptian ho-tels. After last year’s wave of bankruptcies in the Rus-sian tourist sector, advance payments were introduced by practically all hotels, said Podgornaya. Now tour op-erators will have to reach new deals with their local partners, promising the
same level of tourist traffic once fl ights are resumed.
Bankruptcy not for allThe mass cancellation of trips to the most popular destination for Russian hol-idaymakers may mean bankruptcy for many tour operators, according to Irina Tyurina, press secre-tary of the Russian Tourist Industry Union. The only way out for them is to offer another destination to cli-ents or persuade them to postpone their trips, she said.
Alternative destinations could be Turkey, Cyprus and Asian resort destinations like Thailand. Some 20-30 per cent of clients have agree to a change of desti-nation, Deputy Prime Min-ister Arkady Dvorkovich said on November 7.
Alongside an alternative destination, travel agents are inviting their clients to keep the money they have already paid for their holi-day as a deposit, as it were: to postpone their holiday and book another one in December or after the New Year break (if it turns out to be more expensive than Egypt, the client will have to pay the difference; if cheaper, the tour operator will return the difference).
It is not yet clear for how long the suspension of fl ights to Egypt will last. On November 7, Dvorkovich said the ban will remain in place for at least several weeks, until an audit of se-curity measures has been conducted and the neces-sary adjustments have been made. On November 8, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev instructed the government to develop a program aimed at support-ing tour operators.
YEKATERINA SINELSCHIKOVARBTH
The head of Russia’s
security service, the FSB,
has announced that the
cause of the plane crash in
Egypt on October 31 was a
terrorist attack.
Experts suspect airport staff
Plane crash Terror attack in Sinai
Experts told RBTH, that there were several ways the explosive device could have been brought on board of the aircraft.
Leonid Koshelyov, a board member of the Rus-sian Association of Pilots and Aircraft Owners, does not rule out that the bomb could have been placed in the luggage. But if so, it is most likely that it got there after the luggage had been X-rayed at the airport, and it could have been planted by one of the staff, for ins-tance, by a baggage hand-ler, he said.
After checking, the lug-gage from the belt reaches the baggage handlers, who put it on carts or in freight containers, deliver it to the airliner and unload it ma-nually into the luggage compartment. After it is un-loaded, no one re-examines it. “The plane has two lug-gage compartments – in front of the centre section and behind the centre sec-tion. The Airbus lost the tail, so it is most likely that the bomb was behind the cen-tre section,” said Vadim Lukashevich, an indepen-dent expert of the Skolko-
vo Foundation’s space clus-ter. It is also possible that a suicide bomber was res-ponsible, though it is the least likely option in this case, according to Lukas-hevich. “A suicide bomber can get on board, carrying explosives on the body or in a variety of ingredients, which he mixes during the fl ight. But in this case, it is much more likely that the bomb was in luggage or in the luggage compartment, somewhere in the structu-re of the aircraft,” Lukas-hevich said in an interview with RBTH.
However, if the terrorist had been a member of the airport personnel, they could have planted a bomb not only in the luggage compartment, but also in many other places on the airliner.
Experts are not certain yet
how the bomb was planted.
OPINION POLL
47 per cent of Russians think the crash will
not have consequences, according to the Russian Public Opinion Study Centre.
41 per cent expect the crash to have consequenc-
es, with 25 per cent thinking them to be serious.
15 per cent men-tioned stricter security checks
and controls of aircraft as po-tential consequences.
The new RD report takes a closer look at why Russia got involved in Syria, elaborates on the characteristics of a more proactive Russian foreign policy in the Middle East, and weighs the potential risks and rewards of Russian involvement in Syria.
‘Russia’s New Strategy in the Middle East’
Latest Report
An analytical publication that focuses exclusively on the
complex challenges and opportunities shaping the US-Russia
relationship
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05RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)asia.rbth.com Business
Sourat
RakhimbabaevTRCC
In the middle of Novem-ber, the Russian-Thai Business Council (RTBC) headed by
chairman Ivan Polyakov carried out its fi rst mis-sion after its reorganisa-tion. It presented 11 lead-ing Russian companies interested in increasing bilateral contacts to Thai business circles.
One of the most impor-tant events in the business mission was the consul-tation meeting at the Thai-Russian Chamber of Commerce (TRCC).
TRCC members noted the big potential in the de-velopment of trade-eco-nomic relations between the two countries and de-termined the most prom-ising areas in which the chamber of commerce plans to develop its activ-ity: the supplies of fruit and vegetables, pork, poul-try, seafood and rubber.
The increase in Thai in-vestment in Russian ag-riculture brings hope that if not in 2016 then in 2017 turnover between the two countries will double.
In 2015 alone the CP Group has brought $680 million to the turnover be-tween the countries by buying two leading poul-try farms in Russia’s Northwestern Federal Area, Severnaya and Voys-kovitsy. Moreover, CP Group’s Russian branch-es, which already own eight pig farms in six re-gions, are building anoth-er two large farms.
The Sutech Engineer-
EXPERT
Prospects looking good for Thai-Russian commerce
ing Company, another ac-tive member of the TRCC, is about to build a sugar factory in the Khabarovsk Territory that will process raw cane supplied from Thailand. This project will bring another $300 million to Thailand’s overall invest-ments in Russia.
In the course of the busi-ness meeting participants reviewed issues concerning trade and economy, invest-ment, science, logistics and tourism. Polyakov said that the council is actively deal-ing with the question of wheat exports from Russia, the reduction of coopera-tion barriers in the bank-ing sector, and the creation of joint enterprises in the energy and railway sectors, in which Russian compa-nies have accumulated sig-nifi cant experience and are ready to participate in all tenders, whether state or private.
The council also gives pri-ority to the tourism indus-try. Thailand has long been one of the main holiday des-tinations for Russian tour-ists. Unfortunately, due to the fall of the ruble at the end of 2014, the number of Russians who have visited Thailand this year has dras-tically declined.
In real terms, the num-ber of Russian tourists fell from 1.7 million last year to almost half of that in 2015. However, the situa-tion is gradually improving and there is hope that by the end of this year the number of Russian tourists will reach 1 million.
ALEXANDER KOROLKOVRBTH
Russia has announced plans
to restart production of its
Il-96 airliner amid fears of
possible US sanctions
against the Russian air
industry.
Mass production of long haul aircraft to be resumed
Aviation Russia doesn’t want to be caught off guard by US sanctions
Russia plans to resume mass production of the four-engine Ilyushin Il-96 aircraft, the Ilyushin Avia-tion Complex’s chief desig-ner Nikolai Talikov told re-porters in the central Russian city of Ulyanovsk on November 6.
A year ago, the resump-tion of mass production of Russian long haul aircraft was out of the question; on the contrary, Aerofl ot was removing the Il-96 from its fl eet. In all, the airline had six Il-96-300s, which had been used since 1995. The air carrier attributed the decision to the ageing pla-nes and their low economic efficiency.
The aircraft were to be replaced by the American Boeing 747 – the very plane that the Il-96-300 was ori-ginally created to compete with in the post-Soviet era.
However, in light of the political tensions between Russia and the US and the ongoing economic sanctions against Moscow over its role in the Ukraine confl ict, the current dependence of the Russian air industry on Boeing and Airbus is seen as a potential weakness.
The Il-96 was Russia’s fi rst long-range wide-body passenger aircraft. The test fl ight from Moscow to Pe-tropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and back without landing
in Petropavlovsk (a total of 9,200 miles) took 18 hours 9 minutes.
Much attention was paid to the safety of fl ight-con-trol systems. Its fl y-by-wi-re control system is dupli-cated by the mechanical system, where all the efforts of the wheel and the pedals are transferred to the han-dlebars through cable runs, so that the pilot should be able to land the plane ma-nually in case of failure of electronics.
Pilots who fl ew these air-craft note their reliability and simplicity. “I landed the Il-96 six times with a simu-lated failure of all engines. It was the task of the chief designer. I can tell you that nothing like this was done on any foreign aircraft of this type,” the Il-96’s test pilot Anatoly Knyshov told RBTH.
The Il-96 can carry 300 passengers, using only seven tonnes of fuel for four engines.
His son, Sergei Knyshov, the Il-96’s youngest com-mander and a former Ae-rofl ot pilot, agrees that the Il-96 is among the safest aircraft: “During all the years of its operation [since 1993], the Il-96 has never seen a plane crash,” he said.
Yet despite its advanta-ges, the plane became seen as inferior to its rivals from Boeing and Airbus and pro-duction was suspended in 2009. The move was largely seen in Russia as a result of efforts by the Western air-craft manufacturers’ lobb-yists, and according to Ana-toly Knyshov, made little economic sense: The Il-96’s per hour fl ight costs were $1,000 less than the Boeing 767-300ER’s.
Over the years, interest in purchasing Russian-ma-de long-haul aircraft was shown by Venezuela, Peru,
China and several countries in the Middle East. Some countries even signed the relevant agreements, but the Il-96 took off only in the Caribbean, including one Russian aircraft which was delivered to Cuba as a presidential plane.
Now the airline Cubana de Aviación operates fi ve of these planes, and its pas-sengers highly appreciate fl ying on the planes of this type.
“I had the opportunity to fl y on one of these giants,” said Venezuelan Elio Pena Ramirez. “It is a safe and comfortable plane, I did not even feel it landing.”
The Il-96 can carry 300 passengers, consuming only seven tonnes of fuel for four engines, while the Boeing carries 200 passengers and uses six tonnes for two en-gines.
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06 RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)
asia.rbth.comSociety
YEKATERINA SINELSCHIKOVARBTH
Varvara Karaulova, who was
caught at the border
between Turkey and Syria
this spring, has been
charged with terrorism.
How model student was seduced by IS
Terrorism Russian woman stayed in touch with IS after a failed attempt to reach Syria
ing to join IS. According to media reports, the reason was the discovery of Karau-lova’s correspondence with an IS militant, with whom she had allegedly fallen in love, and the suspicion that she might be a recruiter.
Back in July 2015, after Karaulova had already re-turned to Russia, investiga-tors said they had no case against her, questioned her as a witness, but did not de-tain her, arresting instead two Russians who had ac-companied her on her at-tempt to join IS.
Following the scandal, the student took a sabbatical and started a rehabilitation program. The incident caused widespread disbe-lief among the Russian pub-lic at the time, who strug-gled to understand how a straight-A student from a well-to-do family and an intellectual fluent in five languages become the vic-
The story of Moscow State University student Varvara Karaulova, who left home in an attempt to join the Is-lamic State (IS) radical mil-itant group this summer and was caught at the Turkish border, has returned to the Russian headlines following her arrest and the start of court proceedings against for terrorism charges.
A criminal case over the preparation for taking part in a terrorist organisation (punishable by up to 15 years in prison) was opened against the 19-year-old woman following her arrest in late October, and on No-vember 10 she was charged with terrorism for attempt-
Service alongside other Russians, it became clear that the trip had nothing to do with a holiday, though her father insists that her sole motive was “strong af-fection.”
“This was the only boy, she has never had any other. And only virtual communication. It is almost obvious for us now that this person is a synthetic image, and its creation involved several people.” However, RBTH managed to learn from her classmates that, in reality, Karaulova did have a boyfriend; they at-tended a special course in Arabic together “until she dumped him”.
After her failed escape, according to her father, Ka-raulova said, “Please, just take away everything from me. If necessary, I will ask.”
No one in the family knew that Karaulova was continuing to correspond with her IS lover, her par-ents say. Her father sees the arrest as a “tragic mistake”.
Based on his experience, the student’s former law-yer, Alexander Karabanov, admits that the young woman was probably the best candidate for the dis-semination of IS ideas among similarly well-ed-ucated young people.
That is why the appear-ance of the Koran in the house and her interest in Islam was not immediately noticed. In addition, along-side Islam she studied other religions. When Karaulova disappeared, “connections” helped – the trace led to Turkey. “When I was trav-elling there, one of the ver-sions I had was that she was going on holiday to Turkey, in order to plunge into the range of interests of the Is-lamic world,” said her fa-ther. After Karaulova was detained by the Migration
Varvara Karaulova attends a court hearing in Moscow on October 28.
tim of IS recruiters? None-theless, it appeared that the story had died down – until Karaulova’s arrest on Oc-tober 28.
Karaulova was returned to Russia almost immedi-ately: Her father Pavel Ka-raulov had good connec-tions in the FSB and the Russian Foreign Ministry.
“She has a very broad vi-sion, and the ability to learn languages has enabled her to explore primary sources, including in Arabic,” said Karaulov in an interview with RBTH.
Karaulova a
gifted student
Varvara Karaulova has an im-pressive academic record.She has won national com-petitions and graduated from high school with honours be-fore going on study at the Faculty of Philosophy’s De-partment of Cultural Studies at the prestigious MSU. Boys, fashionable clothing, cosmet-ics – none of this was for her.
OLEG YEGOROVRBTH
Like many European states,
Russia is encountering a
new threat: Its citizens are
travelling to the Middle East
to join radical Islamic
causes like Islamic State.
Many youth face existential crisis
Extremism Lack of meaning in their lives may explain why youth join the IS
Varvara Karaulova’s story is not an isolated case. Ac-cording to the FSB (Rus-sia’s security service), in the course of the last year re-cruiters from religious ex-tremist groups have been able to attract more than 1 700 Russian citizens into their ranks. Some experts say the number is much higher.
The majority of Russian citizens that join the ranks of the extremists are peo-ple from the country’s Mus-lim republics but sometimes they are ethnic Russians. This is not a new phenom-
enon: There have been cases in which Russians fought on the side of Wahhabists even before the appearance of IS.
For example, Said Bury-atsky, one of the ideologi-cal leaders of the Caucasian terrorist underground at the end of the 2000s, was a Rus-sian whose real name was Alexander Tikhomirov. Buryatsky was eliminated in 2010.
And even as far back as the Soviet campaign in Af-ghanistan during the early 1980s there were document-ed cases of ethnic Russians converting to Islam and going over to the side of the Mujahideen to fi ght against their former comrades-in-arms.
As Georgy Mirsky, an ex-pert on the Arab world and Doctor of Historical Scienc-es, pointed out to RBTH,
Russia is far from the only country whose young citi-zens are travelling to Syria and Iraq to join IS.
“In the last month 1 733 people alone left France to join IS, and statistically, one-fifth of them did not
come from Muslim families but were recruited,” said Mirsky, who pointed out that 30 per cent of the women joining IS were “still not Muslim until recently.” What is prompting young people, who grew up in sec-ular western families, to change their outlooks so radically and join terrorist
groups like IS? Russian psy-chologist Pavel Ponomary-ov is convinced that the problem lies in an existen-tial crisis that many young people are experiencing.
“If we speak about Ka-raulova, we will see that she tried to commit social sui-cide, that is, she attempted to completely delete herself from the society in which she lived and find a new identity in a different world,” said Ponomaryov.
“Students and other young people are going through a crisis: Society is not giving them a chance to express themselves, [and is] imposing harsh restric-tions. The intention to free oneself from this society and obtain everything and immediately in a different system is so great that peo-ple are ready to give their lives for it.”
Russia is not the only country whose young citizens are travelling to Syria and Iraq to join IS
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IGOR ROZINRBTH
Some internet users have
criticised those who have
activated the tricolour filter
on their avatars after the
terrorist attacks in Paris of
hypocrisy.
Social media Terrorism in Paris
Russian Internet users be-came engaged in a heated debate about the tricolour fi lter for profi le pictures set up by Facebook to show so-lidarity with France after the deadly terrorist attacks that rocked Paris late on Friday, November 13.
Some users have accu-sed Facebook of double standards: No similar fi l-ters were set up either after the crash of the Russian A321 passenger airliner over Egypt’s Sinai Penin-sula, almost certainly the work of terrorists affilia-ted with Islamic State or after the terrorist attack in Beirut that took place the day before the Paris attacks.
The air disaster in Egypt claimed 224 lives, while 44 were killed in the bombing in Beirut.
“I am looking at my Fa-cebook feed and cannot un-derstand why most of my friends are adding the French tricolour to their profi le pictures… They did not do the same with the flag colours of Romania, Russia, Syria, Ukraine…,” wrote user Andrei Grigor.
More cynical users saw the tricolour fi lter on pro-fi le pictures as more of a self-aggrandising act than a true gesture of support.
“To make a show of mourning for the killed
Many Russians enraged by FB’s tricolour filter
French nationals is just as disgusting and unnatural as to grieve at the funeral of someone else’s gran-dfather, presenting oneself as the person most distres-sed by his death and being met with bewilderment from the deceased’s friends and disgust from his rela-tives. To mourn intensely and openly is only appro-priate at the funeral of one’s nearest and dearest,” wrote user Vladimir Kozlovsky.
Some users have even added a Russian tricolour fi lter to their profi le pictu-res in protest “against Facebook’s double stan-dards”.
Meanwhile, others have replaced their profi le pic-tures with the photo of “the most important passenger” (a picture of the youngest child killed in the Sinai crash that has gone viral in Russia).
Users in the other camp insist that each person can decide for themselves how they want to show their support and grief and up-grading one’s profi le pic-ture is just one of the ways of doing so, and is no bet-ter or worse than many others.
“There are surprisingly many of those who want to contrast the sympathy for the victims of yesterday’s terror attacks and solida-rity with France on the one hand, with the grief for the A321 victims on the other. Tell me, is it not possible to combine both? Where is any contradiction here? Is it like two warring sides in a con-fl ict?” wrote fi lm producer Sam Klebanov.
IRINA VINOKUROVARBTH
The Thammasat University
has opened The Russian
and CIS Studies Centre to
unite the university’s
resources allocated for the
study of Russia.
Education Thammasat opens The Russian and CIS Studies Centre
The Russian and CIS [Com-monwealth of Independent States] Studies Centre, which opened in November, will unite the Russian stud-ies programs that have been offered at Thammasat Uni-versity for a long time, ac-cording to Assistant Profes-sor Dr Supreedee Rittironk.
The Thammasat Univer-sity has had a Russian Studies and Russian Lan-guage program for 40 years. After her visit to the USSR in 1975 Her Royal Highness Galyani Vadhana, elder sis-ter of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand, was left with a big impression of her jour-
relations between Russia and Thailand.
Adunyarittigun even ex-pressed his conviction that the centre will become one of the university’s “excel-lence centres”, which will conduct research and offer knowledge on Russia in var-ious fi elds, including histo-ry, politics, economy, social studies, language and cul-ture.
Russian Ambassador to Thailand Kirill Barsky said that what is important is that the centre will concen-trate not only on Russia but also on the CIS countries, which are closely tied to modern Russia in terms of history, culture and econo-my. In Barsky’s words, this will give future Thamma-sat graduates broader knowledge and broader op-portunities in their careers. “The opening of The Rus-sian and CIS Studies Cen-tre strengthens the Tham-masat University’s status as Thailand’s principal univer-sity in the preparation of experts on Russia and the Russian language,” noted the Ambassador.
A new dimension to Russian studies
ney and Russian culture in general and therefore de-cided that Thai students should have the opportu-nity to study the Russian language at home.
Today, the Thammasat University is Thailand’s principal university in terms of the number of Bachelor students study-ing Russia and the Russian language. The university has optional Russian lan-guage courses for students as well as anyone who wishes to learn the lan-guage. More than 50 per cent of the students who intend to continue their studies in Russia through a Russian Federation grant are graduates of the Tham-masat University.
Since 2003, the Centre for Russian Studies in the uni-versity has been offering a Russian language program on a mother-tongue level, as well as courses in Rus-
sian literature, history and culture. Recently the Rus-sian Department opened the Centre for Testing the Russian Language as a For-eign Language, the fi rst in Thailand.
All these resources will be united by The Russian and CIS Studies Centre, which, according to Ritti-ronk, has also become the uniting “physical place” that will make it “easier to work closer” for Thai stu-dents of Russian subjects.
On behalf of the univer-sity’s administration, Pro-fessor Somkit Lertpaithoon, Rector of Thammasat Uni-versity, and Associate Pro-fessor Dumrong Adunyarit-tigun, Dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts, participat-ed in the centre’s opening ceremony. In their welcom-ing remarks, they noted the importance that the centre will have, not only for the university itself but also for
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GLEB FEDOROVRBTH
Moscow recognises the
enormous problem that
climate change poses to
humanity, but it is not yet
prepared for the serious
threats it is bringing.
HEAT IS ON TO MEET CLIMATE CHALLENGE
The largest fl ood in the his-tory of Russia’s Black Sea coast killed 171 people in 2012. In just two days fi ve months’ worth of rainfall hit the mountainous regions of the Krasnodarsky Terri-tory, where rivers over-fl owed and mixed with mud fl ows to seriously damage settlements.
In Krymsk, the most af-fected city, the water levels reached seven metres above normal. The fl ooding start-ed in the early morning and took everyone by surprise.
After the fl oods, the au-thorities were criticised be-cause the city’s alarm sys-tem had failed in the disaster and the local storm sewer system and Adagum
Seven out of the 10 warmest years in Russia since 1936 occurred in the 21st century. The warmest year was in 2007, when the temperature was 2.07 degrees Celsius hig-her than the average. From 1985 to 2014 the average temperature in Russia increa-sed by 0.66C every 10 years.
According to the Russian Fe-deral Service for Hydrome-teorology and Environmen-tal Monitoring, the average number of dangerous meteo-rological phenomena in the Russian Federation over the past 15 years has increased by about two to three times: from 150 in 1997 to 369 to 2012. This is thought to be a direct result of the increase in ocean temperatures.
7/10
369
IN NUMBERS
POLLS
Climate change? What’s that?Awareness and understan-ding of the impending pro-blem of climate change is lower than you might expect in Russia. According to the results of a public survey carried out in 2013, at the initiative of a working group in the presi-dential administration, just 54 per cent of the Russian po-pulation are aware of climate change. Of those, only a third believe it is being caused by the activities of humankind.
riverbed were not prepared for such volumes.
Three years later Russian and German researchers proved that there was an-other culprit: Climate change.
In an article published in the July 2015 issue of Na-ture Geoscience, scientists linked the fl ood in Krymsk to the two-degree Celsius
increase in temperatures of the Black Sea since 1984.
This is an example of the scientifi c data showing the need for cities to prepare for the impact of climate change. But most Russian cities are not prepared. St Petersburg is the only city to date to have a plan for adapting to climate change.
St Petersburg’s strategy, adopted this year, took four years to develop and was based on plans from Fin-land, Denmark, the UK and India.
The strategy includes measures for mitigating risks and adapting to seri-ous threats, especially fl oods.
By 2100, sea levels in the Gulf of Finland may have risen by a metre and the city’s fl ood-protection sys-tems may not work.
Moscow, which suffered severe heat waves in 2010; the Far East, which in 2013 was struck by the heaviest fl ood in centuries; and the Arctic, which scientists say is losing territory at an alarming rate due to glob-al warming and erosion, are all without plans for adapt-ing to climate change.
According to Greenpeace Russia’s energy expert Vladimir Chuprov, the fed-eral plan for adapting to climate change which was adopted in 2011 exists only on paper. Its implementa-tion was handed to the Min-istry of Regional Develop-ment, which was later disbanded. Now the plan’s implementation is de facto in the hands of the regions themselves.
The main difference be-tween the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, which will most likely be signed at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference which starts on November 30 in Paris, is that the emphasis at the conference will not be on limiting emissions but on ways of adapting to the changing climate.
The conference will be particularly relevant for Russia because its adapta-tion plans are only in the early stages.
Alexei Kokorin, head of WWF Russia’s energy pro-gramme, thinks the confer-ence’s focus will be on how
THE 2015 PARIS CLIMATE CONFERENCE IS LIKELY TO BE PIVOTAL IN
SHAPING MOSCOW’S RESPONSE TO THE CLIMATE CRISIS
CLIMATE CHANGE COP21 SUMMIT
the world’s leading econo-mies will give more vulner-able countries resources for adapting to climate change, and the time frame for that to happen.
Experts believe that the sum of the resources re-quired will be about $100 billion by 2020. In other words, Kokorin thinks that Paris “is a 10 to 15-year pause in the real reduction of emissions, compensated by massive aid to weak countries”.
Developed countries will try to lay the burden for ad-aptation on its private cor-porations, while the coun-tries that are the most vulnerable to climate change will be given more resources.
Since Russia is part of an intermediate group of coun-tries (that is, developing countries that do not need financial aid but are not strong enough to be major donors themselves), the conference’s agenda will bypass Russia.
Meanwhile, Russia will try to fi gure out how it can become part of the low-car-bon global trend without damaging its economy, which is very dependent on traditional energy sources.
The obligations that Mos-cow is ready to assume seem impressive: Russia is prom-ising to cut emissions by 25-30 per cent by 2030 from levels in 1990. But Russia’s
emissions are already less than in 1990, so this com-mitment sounds more sig-nifi cant than it actually is. Russia may cut its emis-sions more substantially, but at this stage, i t is not making dramatic commitments.
Ecologists predict that Russia is likely to return to business as usual, although it may work harder at ad-aptation strategies and de-veloping green-energy in-dustries, which right now only produce one per cent of Russia’s power.
Still, it is important to note that the Russian gov-ernment has begun recog-nising the reality of climate change.
During a recent speech at the UN General Assem-bly, President Vladimir Putin said that climate change is one of the most important problems facing humanity.
According to the direc-tor of the ecology depart-ment at the Ministry of Eco-nomic Development, Vladimir Maximov, after Putin signed the decree On The Reduction Of Green-houses Gases Russia began to address its climate issues.
The results of the Paris Convention and the sign-ing (or not) of the Paris Agreement will determine how far Russia will go in developing its adaptation plans.
St Petersburg is the only city to date to have a plan for adapting to climate change
AMERICA’S MOON LANDINGEnthusiasts want to prove the veracity
of America’s Moon landing
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ARAM TER-GHAZARYANSPECIAL RBTH
For several weeks Russian
researchers on Vaygach
Island have been under
siege, blocked in their
homes. Polar bears won’t
let them leave.
Polar bears rule the Far NorthWildlife Because of climate change, bears approaching people
Five polar bears are laying siege to a Russian weather station on Vaygach Island in the Arctic Sea. The ani-mals set camp just several metres from the building, and two female meteorolo-gists and a male technician working at the station have no weapons of protection from the polar predator.
In the beginning of Sep-tember, Minister of Natu-ral Resources and Environ-ment, Sergei Donskoy, became involved in the mat-ter and called on his minis-try to save both the humans and the endangered polar bears. Meanwhile, the go-vernor of the Nenets Auto-nomous Okrug, Igor Kosh-kin, promised to distribute rubber bullets to the inha-bitants in all coastal sett-lements.
This is not the fi rst con-fl ict between humans and
these animals. In the last 10 years, the mass migra-tion south of polar bears from the ice floes to the coasts has turned the Rus-sian Far North into their kingdom. Local inhabitants and visitors will have to get accustomed to this and learn to live with the ani-mals, experts say.
The first cases of polar bears approaching human settlements were recorded about 10 years ago on Chukotka, then on the coasts of Yakutia, and fi na-lly close to the Yamal pe-ninsula. In 2012, at one weather station, a bear waylaid a scientist outside his home and attacked him.
The unexpected visits began with climate war-ming. Scientists say that the polar bears’ mass migration is due to their lack of desi-re to adapt to the new con-ditions, something the seals and other Arctic animals did.
The director of the World Wildlife Fund’s Climate Program, Alexei Kokorin, was also once a potential victim of a polar bear attack on Spitsbergen Island. “The
bears are not trying to adapt because they have found an easier way to ob-tain food — from people,” said Kokorin. “The polar bear species, however, is not in danger. We shouldn’t dra-matise the situation.”
Scientists are convinced that it’s not necessary to kill or wound bears to avoid attacks. “Nothing exceptio-nally frightening is happe-ning at the weather station,” said Nikita Ovsyannikov, deputy director of the Wrangel Island Reserve. “It’s just that the people who are there don’t know how to be-have. They are afraid of
being attacked. But no one attacks them! The bears have come to study the new and unfamiliar object.”
According to Ovsyan-nikov, the polar bear is an animal with a highly deve-loped psyche and cognitive abilities. Living in severe conditions, it makes great effort to fi nd food.
It approaches scientifi c stations looking for food. As soon as the bear feels the impact of rubber bullets, he will back off a few kilome-tres from the station and forget about the meteoro-logists, Ovsyannikov explai-ned.
A weather station on Vaygach Island in the Arctic Sea.
5WAYS TO AVOID A BEAR
1 Do not feed the bear, or at least don’t dis-perse garbage with
food remnants. In 2014, one Russian mining company moved a well-fed female bear 40 kilometres away from its premises but the bear re-turned.
2 Behind the tough ap-pearance of the po-lar bear hides a gen-
tle and timid heart. Do not frighten it with your shouts and inappropriate behavior – this will only provoke its ap-petite.
3 Be calm if you see a polar bear. Do not threaten it with any
gestures. Noise, flashes, the rumbling of firearms do not work in the conditions of the North.
4 The rubber bullet is the best solution if the polar bear at-
tacks you. The painful shock will scare it away. Try not to kill it. Don’t forget, the polar bear is a protected, endan-gered species.
5 If the bear does not leave you alone, then before shooting
to kill, try to negotiate and talk calmly with him. Sounds coming from a strange two-legged animal can confuse the polar bear.
To read an Arctic explorer’s diary, scan the code
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RUSSIAN SPACE PRODUCTSRussian space technology can help boost the
economic development of China, Mexico,
and Africa.
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Friday, November 13, 2015 will be consid-ered France’s 9/11. This is exactly what
ISIS terrorists have already declared. International ter-rorists have demonstrated their ability to carry out a whole series of simultane-ous terrorist attacks in sev-eral public places in a large city.
Some people recently pointed fi ngers at the Egyp-tian security services for failing to stop a bomb from being planted aboard a Russian passenger aircraft in Sharm el-Sheikh. Today they have to admit that a country with well-trained security services may turn out to be helpless when faced with such a large-scale attack. In order to pre-
Upon Russia’s insist-ence, a truly inclu-sive multilateral p r o c e s s w a s
launched in Vienna on Oc-tober 30 to help fi nd a com-promise solution to the Syr-ian crisis. Iran, a major player, took part for the fi rst time, as well as China. All agreed to the US, Russia and the UN co-chairing the meeting.
Heated exchanges took place on the issue of Pres-ident Bashar al-Assad’s fu-ture. As was the case three years ago, this could derail the entire process. But ul-timately it was agreed to disagree on that issue. Lack of agreement on this sub-ject resulted in three more years of bloody impasse. We should know better than that this time. All the more so that those are the differ-ences between the outside players. Why not leave it to the Syrians to decide?
A joint statement was adopted by consensus. The middle ground agreed in-cluded such major princi-ples of the outside world’s approach to the Syrian set-tlement as independence,
vent this from happening again, society itself needs to be changed, along with the political system. Mar-tial law should become a way of life. Although even this is unlikely to totally guarantee security.
Terrorist attacks are not just the price that human-ity pays for people being different. They are also the price we pay for the fact that the current interna-tional system of economic and political relations is sadly not conducive to root-ing out terrorism either in individual countries – most
often those that have fallen victim to “import of democ-racy” - or globally.
Now when the whole world is feeling sympathy and solidarity with the French, we are yet again re-peating the appeals to unite in the fi ght against the glob-al threat of terrorism. How many times have these ap-peals been heard since Sep-tember 11, 2001? Yet, where are the results? Al-Qaeda appeared to have been beat-en when its leader was killed. However, the fact is that the group has grown newer and even more fa-natical and barbaric cells. Stability in the Middle East has been undermined. We already see a whole terror-ist quasi-state on the terri-tory where, according to starry-eyed plans, the tyr-anny of dictators like Saddam Hussain and Bashar al-Assad should
have been replaced by elec-toral democracy. Except that “the electorate” in these countries is increasingly voting more in favour of terror against Western civ-ilisation, while at the same time, thousands of volun-teers leave Western coun-tries to fi ght for ISIS. They fi ght for a new world order, as designed by barbarians and murderers. It is their idea of “justice” against the backdrop of their rejection of the injustice of modern capitalism and the true “lib-erty, equality and fraterni-ty” that have never taken hold.
President Putin, in his address to the UN General Assembly, referring to the instability in the Middle East resulting in hundreds of thousands of refugees, asked Western leaders: “Do you realise what you have done?”
9/11 has happened again. All those who consider themselves to be a part of the civilised world should not only understand where we have gone wrong over the past 15 years in the fi ght against terror, but also cre-ate new forms of joint and coordinated action.
Russia and the West need to put all other disagree-ments aside. This includes Syria and even, however unacceptable some may think it, Ukraine, since it was largely the latter that has recently provoked the very same policy of double standards that has prompt-ed many to forget that we all belong to a single civi-lisation.
The author is a political sci-entist and a member of the Council for Foreign and Defence Policy, a Moscow-based independent think tank.
territorial integrity and sec-ular nature of the Syrian state; the preservation of state institutions, protec-tion of the rights of all the Syrians irrespective of eth-nicity and religion; human-itarian access and intensi-fication of diplomatic efforts to put an end to the armed confl ict. The extrem-ist approaches failed to win the support of the majority of the participants. The Ge-neva Communiqué of June 30 2012, backed by the UN Security Council, will serve as a basis for political pro-cess. It means the opposi-tion and the government will have to agree on Syr-ia’s future. Mutual agree-ment is key to any political settlement as opposed to a military solution and a so-lution that’s imposed from outside. As the examples of post-war Germany and Japan show, imposed solu-tions mean a military de-feat, a long foreign occupa-tion and a total commitment by major outside powers, including the provision of long-term economic and fi -nancial assistance. Short of that, a compromise looks the only viable option.
Alexander Yakovenko is Russia’s ambassador to the United Kingdom. He was previously Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Upon Russia’s insistence, a truly inclusive multilateral process was launched in Vienna
Russia and the West need to put all other disagreements aside
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ALEXANDER YAKOVENKODIPLOMAT
FRANCE: LESSONS NOT LEARNED
GEORGY
BOVTANALYST
KON
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11
Laser technologyThese weapons are based on the use of energy from electromagnetic radiation along the optical spectrum. Despite the fact that lasers have already been used for a long time in everyday life including in the military en-vironment, only recently have researchers started to work on creating effective combat systems based on this type of weapon. The first examples of laser weapons, which appeared in the 1960s, could not hit two targets within a short time interval due to their high consumption of ener-gy.
In 2015, American re-searchers tested a laser can-non stationed on an off-shore platform for the fi rst time. Russia is also work-ing on the development of laser weapons and accord-ing to the military it is not far behind the US in this area. From publicly avail-able sources it has become known that the military has restarted testing the A-60 aviation complex using a new laser gun capable of destroying aircraft, as well as targets located in outer space.
Microwave weaponsThe main damage that this type of weapon causes comes from super-power-ful microwave radiation in the frequency range from 3 to 30 GHz. These types of weapons are most effective against enemy’s electronics, abundantly used today in state and military com-mand and control devices, as well in the latest weap-ons systems of various types. In the summer of 2015 it became known that Russia had developed a new weapon capable of disa-bling enemy planes, drones and precision-guided weap-ons, such as cruise missiles. The new development was given the tentative name of “microwave gun”, since it works based on the micro-wave radiation principle.
The device has an opera-tional range of over 10 kil-ometres.
Genetic armsThese types of weapons, which are the direct heirs of biological weapons, are based on technologies with-in the sphere of heredity processes management and the variations found in liv-ing organisms. Genetic en-gineering makes it possible to deliberately create a combination of genes un-known in nature that could have a positive impact on living organisms, but also could destroy them. The main danger is posed by at-tempts to create “smart weapons” that selectively affect and destroy organ-isms that contain a specif-ic genetic code.
According to Russian sci-entists a signifi cant num-ber of aggressor genes have already been created, which can inherently be turned into deadly weapons. For example, the genes BAX and BCL-2 are capable of inducing apoptosis – the process of programmed cell death. Given the fact that the development of biolog-ical weapons is banned by international conventions, Russia is not working on genetic weapons develop-ment.
Particle beam devicesUsing a concentrated stream of charged or neu-tral particles containing high energy (electrons, pro-tons, or neutral hydrogen atoms), particle beam weapons can direct strong
thermal radiation, shock loads or X-rays against an object, which can result in death and destruction.
The main advantages of these types of weapons in-clude their stealth and the immediate effect they have on their target. The main problem in using this weap-on is the loss of energy over long distances, caused by the interaction of particles with atmospheric gases. Several scientifi c institu-tions actively worked on the development of beam weapons in the Soviet Union, but these never de-veloped into any real com-bat models.
Geophysical threatsThese types of weapons in-volve an attack using nat-ural processes, brought to
life by artifi cial means such as lightning, an earthquake a tsunami and so on. While it is known that a variety of experiments and tests were conducted by the US in such places as Vietnam, most experts doubt that it would be possible to cause an earthquake or a tsuna-mi in a specific region of the Earth. In 1993 Oleg Kal-ugin, a former major-gen-eral in the KGB who later emigrated to the United States, said that the Soviet Union was actively work-ing on the development of geophysical weapons. He was referring to the Sura Complex (located about 170 kilometres from Nizhny Novgorod), which is said to have been established to study the processes in the Earth’s atmosphere.
VADIM MATVEYEVSPECIAL TO RBTH
The Ministry of Emergency
Situations predicts the
appearance of new kinds
of weapons. RBTH tries
to get a handle on
which weapons.
Looming threat of new weaponsArmaments Scientific and technological developments have been utilised to create new arms
in the Armed by Russia Special Section
rbth.com/armed_by_russia
M A K E I T PA R T O F Y O U R S T R AT E G Y
Sino-Russian helicopter’s engine to be made in Russiarbth.com/538859
Who buys Russian weapons?rbth.com/537441
China buys 24 Sukhoi Su-35 fi ghter jets - reportrbth.com/542131
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asia.rbth.comScience12
SVETLANA ARKHANGELSKAYASPECIAL TO RBTH
There are only about 2000
Przewalski horses left in the
world, but in October six
endangered members of
this species arrived in
Russia.
Wild horse returns to RussiaAnimals Scientists plan to restore Przewalski horses in the wild, and say their help can restore the steppe ecosystem
Zoologists say very few wild horses remain on earth, with the Przewalski horse counting among them. Of the less than 2000 Przew-alski horses left, 300 live in the wild and about 1500 are in captive breeding pro-grams and zoos. Le Villaret in France is one of the larg-est natural reserves for these horses.
Recently, six Przewalski horses were brought by plane from France to the Russian city of Orenburg as part of a new program to return them to their origi-nal habitat.
China and Mongolia launched their own reintro-duction programmes in the early 1990s. Also, a few horses were released, as an experiment, into the exclu-sion zone near the Cherno-byl nuclear power plant in Ukraine. There, they began to actively proliferate de-spite the radiation. Now, ac-cording to scientists, the Przewalski horse popula-tion in the Chernobyl zone amounts to about 100.
Why they left the steppeAbout 100 years ago this wild horse was still found in the Eurasian steppes - in the expanses of Russia, China, Mongolia, and Ka-zakhstan. But the horse was driven from its original habitat by man’s develop-
ment of cattle-breeding. When the horse could no longer roam freely over the expanse of the steppe, the animal perished.
Today, this steppe beauty can be seen only in zoos. Captivity, however, affects these horses adversely be-cause in the wild they were in constant motion, cover-ing many kilometres each day.
As in the case of Euro-pean bison, when the num-ber of horses in captivity reached a critical mass the question arose of returning the species to the wild. The horses were presented to Orenburg by the French As-sociation for the Przewal-ski Horse (Association pour le cheval de Przewalski, or TAKH). At the Tour du Valat Biological Station, several
generations of horses are kept in a fenced-off area, similar to their natural en-vironment.
The steppe needs the horseThe reintroduction program was the brainchild of the Severtsov Institute of Ecol-ogy and Evolution at the Russian Academy of Sci-ences, and the Orenburg Re-serve. Its steppe territory is the historic home of the Przewalski horse, and the steppe needs this horse to survive, literally.
“In steppe ecosystems, these animals contribute to their recovery,” said Olga Pereladova, the head of the World Wildlife Fund’s Cen-tral Asian programme. “If horses are not grazing in the steppe it deteriorates because vegetation is not trampled; overabundance of grass can cause fi res.”
According to scientists, it is important not only that the horses adapted to the new conditions of the Ural steppes, but also that they did not mix with farm-raised horses when stallions expelled competitors from the group.
In this case, the unique gene pool would be lost. That is why the animals were initially placed in the fenced-off reserve, allowing for enough time until a sta-ble population capable of existing under natural se-lection could be formed. For this, it is necessary to have 1,000 horses, with half being of reproductive age.
About the Przewalski horse
The horse was first identi-fied in 1879 by Russian ex-plorer and naturalist, Nikolai Przhevalsky (spelled in Pol-ish as Przewalski), during his second expedition to Cen-tral Asia. Przewalski horses live in family groups, whose leader is a strong stallion with absolute power. He de-cides which direction the group takes, and which wa-tering places they visit. Dur-ing cold winters, these horses warm themselves by stand-
ing in a circle; they drive foals and sick horses in the middle and warm them with their breath. They have short, but strong and durable legs, and a strip of black hair runs along their back. The horse is listed in the Red Book of the Russian Federation, the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and in the Convention on In-ternational Trade in Endan-gered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
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RUSSIA’S URALS REGION
MIGHT HOLD THE KEY TO
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INSTITUTE HOPES TO
UNLOCK THE SUN’S
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THE FIRST 3D-PRINTED
THYROID GLAND
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13
SVETLANA ARKHANGELSKAYASPECIAL TO RBTH
Scientists monitoring
seismic activity in Russia’s
Far East expect
powerful earthquakes to
hit the region as soon as
next year.
Major quakes may hit the Far East, say researchers
Seismology Grim predictions
In recent years virtually no seismic activity has been recorded in parts of Rus-sia’s Far East, in the Kuril Islands and the Kamchat-ka Peninsula. For Russian seismologists, this lack of activity is a cause of seri-ous concern.
“The past year and the six preceding years have been very calm for seismic activity," Ivan Tikhonov told RBTH in an interview.
Tikhonov is the head of the seismology laboratory at the Institute of Marine Geology and Geophysics in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, the capital of Russia’s Far East-ern region of Sakhalin.
“A quiet period like this means that enormous amounts of energy have been accumulating below the surface,” he said. “And this pent-up energy could set off several powerful earthquakes.”
Tikhonov said he expect-ed large quakes in the re-gion in the next 18 months.
He believes an earth-quake of at least 8.0 on the Richter scale is likely to hit near Urup Island in the
Earthquakes have been forecast for the Kuril Islands and southern Sakhalin some time in the next 18 months.
Forecasts aid
rescue teams
The most unstable regions at risk
The Expert Board for Ear-thquake Prediction and Seismic Hazard Assessment sends its earthquake predic-tions to EMERCOM, the Russian state emergency services agency. In 2005, thanks to one such reliable fo-recast in the Kamchatka Pe-ninsula, EMERCOM deployed a rescue team that was prepa-red to act in the event of an earthquake in the region.
More than 8000 earthquakes of varying magnitude are detected in Russia each year. More than half occur near Kuril Islands and Kamcha-tka. The rest strike in the Ko-la Peninsula, the Kaliningrad region, Crimea, the Cauca-
sus, the Urals, Western Sibe-ria, the Altai and the Sayan mountains, the Pribaykals-ky and Zabaykalsky districts, Sakhalin Island, the Com-mander islands, the Repu-blic of Yakutia and the Arctic regions.
southern part of the Kuril Islands somewhere between January 2016 and Febru-ary 2017.
Urup was at the epicen-tre of the seismically quiet zone, Tikhonov said.
He also said that a 7.7-magnitude earthquake is expected to hit near the northern Kuril Islands be-fore 2018, and that a quake of 6.0 or 7.0 magnitude may hit the southern part of Sakhalin Island before the end of next spring.
These forecasts have been made using no fewer than eight earthquake-predic-tion methodologies.
One of them is the LURR theory (Load/Unload Re-sponse Ratio), developed by Chinese seismologists. The theory takes into account the impact of the gravita-tional forces of the sun and moon on the Earth’s crust.
Another method used is the Seismic Gaps Hypoth-esis, put forward by Japa-nese seismologist Kiyoo Mogi.
Mogi noted that the epi-centres of powerful earth-quakes have usually had no
efficient because the great-er the time frame, the lower the likelihood of errors.
“Research on short-term earthquake forecast meth-ods is also under way in the US, Japan, New Zealand and Switzerland in the framework of the Collabo-ratory for the Study of Earthquake Predictability,” said Vladimir Kosobokov, an expert at the European Advisory Committee on Earthquake Prediction. “But these methods have yet to prove their effective-ness.”
Kosobokov also doubts that the research by the Tik-honov team will yield any useful results.
The new method report-edly uses a mathematical algorithm based on a non-linear differential equation developed by Russian sci-entist Alexander Malyshev.
So far, it has only been used with earthquake data from Russia, Japan and Tur-key.
seismic activity leading up to the quake.
All the methods used to date confi rm the grim fore-casts, although the seismol-ogists admit that there is always the possibility of error.
“Earthquakes originate from deep beneath the Earth’s crust, and scientists only have surface observa-tions to work with,’’ said Mikhail Rodkin of Russia’s Institute of Earthquake Prediction Theory and Mathematical Geophysics.
“It’s a little bit as though meteorologists only had data collected from worm-holes.”
Over the past 20 years, a research group led by Tik-honov has been working on a fundamentally new meth-od of short-term earth-quake prediction, and their studies have yielded some interesting results.
“Our method allows for the detection of imminent earthquakes – ones that will
occur within several days,” Tikhonov said.
Although he said the method developed by his team yielded very few false alarms, he emphasised that it should be used in conjunc-tion with other medium-term prediction methods.
The method developed by Tikhonov’s team only takes into account seismic data from up to 24 hours before a quake, so there is not much time for authorities and residents to take ac-tion in response.
Long-term forecast meth-ods are considered the most
Tikhonov said he expected large quakes in the region in the next 18 months
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asia.rbth.comCulture14
Splurging on
clothes
The opera Boris Godunov is arguably the Bolshoi’s most “populous” performance in terms of clothes: A total of 900 costumes worth about $1.1 million were created for it. One of them is a sleeveless fur coat fit for a tsar. There is a label attached, saying “Bo-ris Godunov. Choir performer Dmitry Nekrasov.” The thing feels like it weighs about eight kilograms. This is par-ticularly important consider-ing most costumes for the latest staging are supposed to be adorned with numer-ous jewels.
Bolshoi
Theatre’s
art and
manufac-
turing
workshop.
Maya Pli-
setskaya
before a
perfor-
mance,
1965.
SVETLANA SAMODELOVAMOSKOVSKY KOMSOMOLETS
Costumes at the Bolshoi
Theatre are not only works
of art, but they are
surrounded by mysterious
theatrical traditions and
superstitions.
How to ‘juice up’ a tutuTheatre Visiting the Bolshoi’s prop workshops unlocks some of the mysteries and supersititions
How to ‘juice up’ a costume and why there is a ‘no pictures’ rule“Sometimes, a costume’s parts do not refl ect light in the right way and are thus barely visible to those sit-ting in the last few rows of the pit. So we have to ‘juice it up’ – that is, revise the initial, minimal details of the costume and add folds and shadows using special paint. This is a part of our operating procedure, so to speak,” says Natalya Al-doshina, head of the wom-en’s clothes department at the Bolshoi.
Each member of the the-atre staff knows taking pic-tures of costumes before the opening night is a no-no, since they are protected by copyright.
Furthermore, costume de-signers believe it to be bad luck to send the excess fab-ric left after the costumes are finished to the ware-house before the opening night.
And another superstition: When delivering the fin-ished costumes, tailors al-ways throw away all the pins that hold the clothes together – it is believed that this way they will not be sent back.
The tutu: An architectural wonder in its own rightTutus – the multi-layered short rigid skirts integral for a ballet performer’s cos-
tume – are another story.Tutus were originally
made of muslin and tarla-tan, and they had to be starched prior to a perfor-mance. The late Maya Pli-
setskaya, one of Russia’s greatest ballerinas, once said her fi rst tutu weighed several kilograms, and was “rough, extrusive, and smelling like kerosene.” Fur-
thermore, the hooks of the bodice were heavy and re-sembled fi shing sinkers.
Later, designers began using nylon for tutus, add-ing a thin steel wire rim to
make a fi rm hoop that sup-ported the layers and held them together. The fi rst tutu of this type was brought to Russia from the UK in 1957 by none other than Maya Plisetskaya. The design be-came standard in Russia for years to come.
This changed in 2007, the year tutu makers refer to as a “revolution.” A Bolshoi designer working on a re-vival of Le Corsaire by Mar-ius Petipa decided to use costume sketches from the late 19th century, and tutus were made longer and more “bell-shaped”.
And for a later staging of George Balanchine’s Jew-els, designers actually in-vented an entirely new technology to support tutus. In this way, tutu-making became a separate branch of design, not unlike archi-tecture.
New performances meant new costumes, and each dress cutter and tailor at the Bolshoi’s workshops mastered the fi ne art of tu-tu-making. Nowadays, the creation of a single multi-layered tutu takes about a day. Each tutu is a unique item made specifi cally for one ballerina.
“I create the layers, mak-ing a fold on each of them, and then I assemble them together around the basis – that is, the panties,” says Tatyana Romanenko, a Bolshoi tailor. “It takes 15 to 28 metres of fabric to make one tutu, even more if we’re talking about long-er designs, like in Le Cor-saire.”
Tailors say creating a bal-let costume is hard work, as it has to fi t perfectly lest it influence the dancer’s performance.
Read the full version
rbth.com/538067
ReadRussiaTreasures of Russian classic literature and its contemporary stars in articles and multimedia featuresrbth.com/literature
Metaphysical author Yuri Mamleev dies aged 83
rbth.com/534339
Ludmila Ulitskaya’s new novel explo-res human frailty with compassion
rbth.com/533187
Magical fl owers and space adventu-res: Bedtime stories the Soviet way
RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)asia.rbth.com Travel
15
LEONID MATVEYEVSPECIAL TO RBTH
RBTH presents a brief guide
to what to eat, see and do
this winter to get the most
out of your ski vacation in
Sochi — the Winter Olympic
2014 capital.
Top six places to experience mountainous Sochi
Sochi How to make the most of your skiing vacation at the place once enjoyed only by fortunate Russians
“If I had a fortune, I would live in Sochi.” This famous Russian saying is no longer up to date as Sochi has be-come a rather affordable re-sort with hotels built for the 2014 Winter Olympics fi ght-ing for clients and offering rooms for any budget. The devaluation of Russia’s cur-rency has only added to Sochi’s attractiveness among foreigners.
1 Solis Sochi Hotel & SuitesRemember Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel? Take a look at the Solis building hidden in forested mountains up in the Kras-naya Polyana resort and you’ll notice many similar-ities with the surreal Bu-dapest Hotel. Located at an
elevation of 960 metres above sea level, Solis fea-tures over 100 rooms with breathtaking views over-looking the Caucasus mountains. The hotel also offers cave, helicopter and backcountry tours with ex-perienced guides to satiate thrill-seekers.
2. Grand Hotel Polyana The hotel complex is divid-ed into two big parts: the main building with 413 rooms and a group of 16 separate wooden villas de-signed as traditional Alpine chalets. An open heated swimming pool makes Grand Hotel Polyana an ideal place for families with children. It’s conveniently located near the cableway and the recently opened Galaxy entertainment cen-tre.
3. Tulip Inn Rosa Khutor An ideal combination of price and value, Tulip Inn is located only a few min-utes’ walk from the main ski lifts and shopping gal-
4. Amshensky Dvor restaurantIt’s the only restaurant in Sochi boasting an ethnog-raphy museum. The muse-um half features over 1500 household items made of wood, clay, iron, bronze and other materials. The res-taurant serves Caucasian cuisine with a wide selec-tion of meat, wild fowl and vegetables.
5. Achishkho restaurantThis traditional restaurant featuring food from near-by Abkhazia received its unpronounceable name after an eponymous moun-tain in Krasnaya Polyana. If you want to experience the atmosphere of a tradi-tional guest house and take in genuine Caucasian hos-pitality, this is the place to be. The food is well regard-ed on all major travel re-view sites. Try the grilled fi sh, lavash (Caucasian pita bread) and khinkali (dumplings fi lled with meat and herbs).
6. Skypark AJ Hackett SochiWhen it comes to daredev-ils, Sochi can satisfy any thirst for adventure, wheth-er it’s skiing a steep slope or bungee jumping.
The latter is growing more popular after a Rus-sian-New Zealand partner-ship opened the all-season Skypark high in the moun-tains surrounding Sochi.
Located in the Sochi Na-tional Park above Ahshtyr-skaya Gorge, Skypark is surrounded by a forest fi lled with Colchis boxwood, jas-mine, rhododendron and other rare plants.
Here you can try one of the highest bungees in the world at 207 metres, or if that’s too high, there’s an-other at 69 metres.
The Sochi Swing, suppos-edly the world’s highest, can be found here at 170 me-tres high.
Finish up your day with MegaTroll, a trolley travel-ling 700 metres above the canyon at speeds up to 150 km/h.
Getting thereFrom Bangkok to Sochi, most direct flights are through
Aeroflot and Thai Airways International via Moscow or Istanbul.
Extreme Skypark in Sochi
The central place in the park is occupied by a 439-metre long Skybridge – the longest suspension walking bridge in the world. Apart from thrill-ing gigantic attractions, there are many other pleasant
places in Skypark, such as the Mowgli adventure park, an interactive museum of inter-national bungee jumping, an 18-metre high rock-climbing wall that is 1200 square me-tres in area.
Hotels built for the Winter Olympics are fighting for clients and offering rooms for any budget
leries, restaurants and nightlife of Rosa Khutor re-sort. A good budget option, the hotel’s restaurant is popular or its European cuisine - the carrot cake is highly recommended.
Read the full version
travel.rbth.com/1973
TRAVEL BEYOND YOUR IMAGINATION
travel.rbth.com
Gems:
• Kostroma: the home of Russia’s Snegurochka, the snow maiden
• Yakutia’s frozen heart: mammoths, chilled vodka and the lord of cold: • Paris, Berlin, Leipzig and other Russian villages
Capitals:
• Moscow by tram: see the city from a
diff erent point of view
• A holiday in St. Petersburg: get the most
out of winter in Russia’s cultural capital
• What to see in the Metro, Moscow’s
cheapest and most incredible museum
Destinations:• Five unbeatable locations to watch the sunset on Lake Baikal
• Siberia’s northern desert: hot sands, taiga and mosquitoes
• Russia’s most spectacular ski resorts
Tours:• Five unusual Moscow tours you can’t miss• Best winter package tours to Russia
RUSSIA BEYOND THE HEADLINESA global media project, sponsored by Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Russia)
asia.rbth.comCuisine16
ANNA KHARZEEVASPECIAL TO RBTH
Whenever my brother or I
were unwell as kids, Granny
would always appear with
an arsenal of homemade
remedies — cut up slices of
lemon with honey.
Soviet-era citrus treats still sweet today
Dessert A special treat for Soviet kids
Apart from medicinal sweet lemon, there were al-ways sugared “lemon slic-es” available. Granny re-cently shattered one of my childhood illusions by tell-ing me they were actually lemon -flavored gummy candies in the shape of lemons. I always thought they were actual lemons. Their shape played in our favour, as we were allowed to have a fair bit, as though
they were actually medic-inal. The Soviet Diet Cook-book has a recipe for “lemon and orange slices with sugar”, which caught Granny by surprise. “They have it? Ha! Interesting....!” she said, but it brought back nice memories for me.
As for oranges, while I don’t remember eating a lot of those, for as long as I can remember, Granny’s kitch-en always had long “snakes” of orange peel hanging down from cords spread across the kitchen ceiling. The cords hanging above the stove would also be used to hang and dry clothes over the heat of whatever it was we were having for lunch.
“We all used orange
RECIPE
Oranges or lemons in sugarIngredients:
1 kg fruit, 1.5 kg sugar.Wash oranges or lemons, then cut into thin slices. Re-move the seeds, lay in rows in a glass. Sprinkle each row
The sweet-and-sour combination is very popular in Russian cooking
with sugar. Leave in a warm room for three days to let the sugar dissolve and form a syrup. After this, keep your oranges or lemons in a cold place.
The country’s main
Christmas store. At this free
open-air skating rink, Swan Lake is performed on ice
every evening. A merry-go-round.
1
Inside the center of a fair shaped like a map of Russia is a 51-foot-high Christmas tree, all aglow with lights.
2
7
8
9
3
6
5
4
During the Christmas and New Year holidays, the center of the Russian capital turns into a huge magical kingdom. From Dec. 18 to Jan. 10, the fun never stops. This winter, visitors to Moscow can take part in the Journey to Christmas festival, which will take place in 36 sites throughout the capital. Guests will be treated to theatrical performances, gifts fairs and unforgettable gastronomic delights.
The main events will unfold on the edge of Red Square, near the Manezh and Revolution Square.
Moskva Hote
l
Ulitsa
Okhotn
y Ryad
Okhotny Ryad
Manezhnaya
Ploshchad
Ploshchad R
evolyuts
i i
Ploshchad Revolyutsii
This fair celebrates Russia’s regions
and off ers holiday gi� s, candy and souvenirs from
across the country. T RAV E L 2 MO S COW. COM
Central children’s
restaurant.
The rink is surrounded by a restaurant area
— with delicious treats for every
taste.
Come inside the country’s
main Christmas ornament and experience a multimedia
show within the walls of the 56-foot-wide
decoration. Take a ride down Russia’s
biggest ice mountain — 21
feet high, 300 feet long
peel,” Granny recalled. “It gives a nice aroma and re-pels moths. We would put it in our wardrobes and shoes, as well as hang it up in the fl at.”
She had very specifi c So-viet-era memories of citrus fruits. “There were import-ed red oranges in shops – beautiful and each packed in its own piece of paper.
Lemons were available in summer from the southern republics. Shops would also sell lemons and oranges with the parts of them that had gone bad cut off – they were 2/3 or half of the fruit, but that part was still good. These were very cheap and there was always a line to get some. I would always join the line, as I would make lemon and orange jam for the winter.”
So desired were these “obrezki” (scraps), that Granny’s friend was always
certain she wouldn’t get any due to her “bad luck” – but was always proven wrong much to Granny’s delight, and was able to get enough for kompot or jam.
The sweet-and-sour com-bination is very popular in Russian cooking. Another favourite dessert is cranber-ries coated in sugar. It tastes very sweet at fi rst, and then you get a blast of sour cran-berry.
Granny used to tell me that I needed sugar so that my brain would work well (so many jokes spring to mind, but I’ll resist them). Now, she says, the approach to sugar has changed in the minds of doctors – from “brain food” to “white poi-son.” That hasn’t changed its presence on the table and in the lemon jar, though.
As we got older, Granny started coming over with oranges sprinkled with sugar and a bit of Ver-mouth. She says it’s a good idea to add some wine into the sugared or honeyed lemons, too. I think I need some for my throat, brain or anything else that could go wrong – right about now!
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