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Грызлов Б. В. Мониторинг сми 13 апреля 2007 г

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GOVERNORS ARE THINKING ABOUT BUYING SPACE TRIP The Moscow Times, 13.04.2007, №3336, Стр. 3
POLICE VOW TO PREVENT MARCH The Moscow Times, 13.04.2007, №3336, Стр. 3
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GOVERNORS ARE THINKING ABOUT BUYING SPACE TRIP

The Moscow Times, 13.04.2007, №3336, Стр. 3


The next space tourist to blast off for the international space station might be a Russian governor, the Federal Space Agency said.

No seats will be available on a Soyuz-TMA crew capsule until 2009, but several governors are already expressing interest in making the 10-day trip, agency chief Anatoly Perminov said.

"I am not going to name names for now. Let's see how it goes," Perminov said on the eve of Thursday's Cosmonauts Day holiday, Interfax reported.

If they relied only on their government salaries, governors and other civil servants would have to save up for centuries to afford the $25 million ticket to space. The highest-paid civil servant is Vladimir Putin, who collected $90,000 as president last year, according to Kommersant-Vlast.

Several governors have been investigated on suspicion of corruption recently, including on how their trips to foreign countries were financed.

Perminov complained that none of the country's richest people, including the 53 billionaires on the Forbes 2007 list, had expressed interest in visiting space. "Perhaps they are afraid of leaving their fortunes unattended," he said.

Eric Anderson, head of U.S.-based Space Adventures, which arranges trips to the space station, said Thursday that he hoped a Russian would book a seat one day, Interfax reported. He said the name of the next space tourist would be disclosed in a few months.

The latest space tourist, U.S. billionaire Charles Simonyi, spoke Thursday with First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov from the international space station, where he and five astronauts were gearing up for a gourmet meal that Simonyi brought with him when he arrived Monday. Simonyi's friend, U.S. lifestyle maven Martha Stewart, picked out the menu, which includes quail marinated in wine.

Ivanov, visiting Mission Control in Korolyov outside Moscow, asked the crew members via a video linkup how they felt, and Simonyi replied in Russian, "I'm feeling pleasant," Itar-Tass reported.

Ivanov promised that Russia would "beef up" its segment of the station, which is a joint project of more than a dozen of nations.

Simonyi is to return to Earth along with U.S. astronaut Miguel Lopez-Alegria and cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin on April 20 aboard a Soyuz-TMA. Cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin and Oleg Kotov, who arrived with Simonyi this week, will remain on the outpost with U.S. astronaut Sunita Williams.

Ivanov jokingly told Yurchikhin and Kotov "to cherish Sunita."

People across the country, meanwhile, laid flowers at monuments dedicated to Yury Gagarin's first manned spaceflight, 46 years ago.

State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov went to Kaluga, the hometown of Russian rocket science father Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. After visiting Mission Control, Ivanov stopped by the Yury Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, also in the Moscow region.

POLICE VOW TO PREVENT MARCH

The Moscow Times, 13.04.2007, №3336, Стр. 3


Moscow police vowed Thursday to prevent opposition activists from staging a march from Pushkin Square this weekend.

"I am officially announcing that police and OMON [riot police] will move hard and fast to head off any provocations by demonstrators, and the organizers will be held accountable," city police spokesman Viktor Biryukov said, Interfax reported.

A coalition of opposition groups known as The Other Russia predicted that 5,000 supporters would turn out for the Saturday protest, despite a ruling by Moscow authorities that it was illegal.

One of the organizers, former world chess champion Garry Kasparov, warned that OMON riot police could violently disperse the protest as they did at two previous Dissenters' Marches in St. Petersburg and Nizhny Novgorod in March.

"We don't know how far the Kremlin will go," Kasparov, who is a staunch critic of President Vladimir Putin, said at a news conference Thursday.

The marchers plan to gather at Pushkin Square at noon Saturday and then walk along the Boulevard Ring to Turgenev Square.

City Hall has authorized a rally at Turgenev Square but refused permission for the march and the gathering at Pushkin Square. City officials said the pro-Kremlin Young Guard youth group earlier lodged an application to rally on Pushkin Square at noon Saturday.

Young Guard has promised to bring out around 15,000 people and is planning an additional rally on Vorobyovy Gory near Moscow State University.

On Thursday, the Moscow Helsinki Group, a human rights organization, sent an open letter to Mayor Yury Luzhkov urging him to prevent an OMON police crackdown on the Dissenters' March. Leaders of The Other Russia sent a similar letter to President Vladimir Putin and Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev earlier this week.

Two other Moscow rallies are also planned for Saturday. Union of Right Forces activists will protest purported falsifications in regional elections on Slavyanskaya Ploshchad at 1 p.m., while two nationalist groups will gather on Bolotnaya Ploshchad at 2 p.m.

Kasparov said there was potential for clashes between Other Russia protesters and the other groups.

State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov also warned potential marchers on Thursday that they could be "sucked into provocation" and swept up into violence, Interfax reported.

Gryzlov also said mass public gatherings should not be used to "create political instability."

"I believe they should be festive in nature, when people take to the street and celebrate certain events," Gryzlov said, Ekho Moskvy radio reported.

Yabloko's St. Petersburg branch received a letter this week from city prosecutors accusing several members of the liberal party of violating the law on rallies and marches during the Dissenters' March that was dispersed by police there on March 3, Kommersant reported Thursday. Prosecutors urged the party not to allow similar violations in the future -- an appeal that Yabloko activists said was an attempt to deter them from participating in a Dissenters' March scheduled to take place in St. Petersburg on Sunday.

The Other Russia's main members are the unregistered National Bolshevik Party, led by Eduard Limonov; Kasparov's United Civil Front; the Popular Democratic Union, headed by former Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov; and Sergei Udaltsov's Red Youth Vanguard.