News From the Soviet Union
In a story by Marcus Warren in Moscow, titled "Stalingrad statue hit by vandalism", she writes:
On of Russia’s
(Soviet) most distinctive war memorial, the huge female figure towering over the
site of the Battle of Stalingrad, due to neglect of the authorities is riven
with dangerous cracks and is being plagued by thieves and vandals. This statue
of Mother Russia, is more than 230 feet tall and is set amid mass graves
containing tens of thousands of Red Army soldiers, is in need of urgent repairs
to stop its reinforced concrete from braking open.
Other statues and complex of buildings in this vast memorial complex are also falling apart. "It’s a disgrace that such a monument is so devastated", said Valentina Klyushina, its deputy director, told the Moscow Times. Besides all this, with a blind eye of the authorities, thieves have been stealing copper cable and manhole covers for scrap metal from this complex, while vandals have smashed lights. Its sewage pipes are rusting away while Mother Russia statue herself is cracking because of disrepair and upkeep.
The Soviet Union’s defeat of Nazi Germany is still celebrated each May 9th and the complex on the Mamayev Hill, overlooking the river Volga, attracts thousands of visitors. The 1942-3 Battle of Stalingrad (now Volgograd), in which up to 800,000 Soviet and German soldiers died, halted Hitler’s advance to the East and was one of the Second Word War’s great turning points.
Russia’s central bank has for the first time circulated coins bearing Stalin’s face, but, it appeared with depictions of Winston Churchill and President Truman.
COMMENT:
Is this part of the Russian Orthodox Church’s campaign to let this complex fall apart because they want to build an Orthodox Cathedral on this spot? Is this part of Putin’s scheme to erase and leave no trace of this world-renowned complex? Is this done by the present Russian bourgeoisie in order to obliterate the colossal cost of human life defending the world from Nazism? Is the issue of a coin that has Stalin together with the biggest warmongers of the world, meant to soften the blow of their crimes? Even while the Soviet and Allied soldiers were dying during the last months of the war, Churchill and Truman were already planning to use the remnants of the German army, together with US and Britain’s forces to attack the Soviet Union!
Is not Putin aware of all this, since he was in the KGB supposedly? So, is he sleeping?
Where is the CPRF in Volgograd, which has the majority of its members in the City Council? Do they not care?
Editor
By INTERFAX-RUSSIA
ASTANA- The United States will increase its military aid to Kazakhstan by over 20% next year, a senior Kazakh Defense Ministry source said last month.
"The Pentagon will use nearly $4.5 millions just for the purchase of ammunition, equipment for the army and training for our military personnel. US military aid is playing an important role for Kazakhstan."
The Defense Ministry spokesman said: " Since 2001, the budget of the Kazakh Defense Ministry has practically doubled and this year alone it amounts to $270 million dollars. Mobile forces and four military districts have been set up and are functioning successfully as planned. As perceived by USA, there is a move towards a systematic transition of the armed forces to the contractual principle of enrollment, and by 2010, Kazakh servicemen will make up over 50% of its personnel."
The present strength of this US trained Kazakh armed forces stands at 60,000.
From THE HINDU
The first post-Soviet national census that began in Russia last year ran into a host of political and social controversies that threatened to undermine its results. The present Russian government needs the information about the demographic, social and ethnic situation, since the last census. It is believed realistically that the population of Russia has shrunk from 151 million to 146 million… because of the falling birth rate, economic hardships for the elderly and unbelievable immigration in order to find work all over the world.
In capitalist Russia the census taking runs into problems wth the local governors inflating their population figures in order to pursue local interests and win bigger social funds from the Federal Budget.
Another danger is that the angry residents threatened to boycott the census takers since they’re afraid that this information will get into the hands of organized criminals that have contacts and cooperate with some government agencies. Their fears are very justified, since the government sells this information on the open market.
Academics worry that even a ten percent flawed census could make the census useless.
It seems that everything is for sale in Putin’s Russia!
From KOMINFORM
The individual partnership with NATO was discussed and agreed upon when the NATO General Secretary George Robertson met in Tbilisi, Georgia and Yerevan, Armenia, with the heads of state last month. Robertson told Georgians that this pact and co-operation, will fully protect Georgia from attacks by its close neighbors! He also said that economic integration is the order of the day for Georgia. Georgia must meet all of NATO’s 29 clauses as requested by USA and NATO.
While he was in Armenia, George Robertson said that: "Until recently many people did not realize the importance of the Caucasus region for world security. This region is of outmost strategic importance for NATO."
Meanwhile, NATO and the Armenian Government have agreed that Armenia is a very important part of NATO’s strategy in the Caucasus and that NATO war games will be held this month of June in Armenia.
While kidney selling in Moldova is a deeply stigmatized act, it has become a routine event in capitalist Moldova (former Moldavia in USSR). After the demise of the Soviet Union, Moldavia with its great agricultural economy, it has now become the victim of globalization, which has seen over 40% of the population of Moldova having to leave and go abroad in search for work. Today, Moldova is one of the poorest countries in Europe, while before it was considered the flower of the Soviet socialist economy.
Here you see Vladimir, a skinny young man who had never been
outside Moldova, but he was lured by private business people, to go to Turkey
and work in a dry cleaning factory. Nina, a local Mafiosi organized kidney
hunter arranged for his passport, visa and bus ticket to Istanbul. Once there,
Vladimir was housed in a filthy basement. He shared the space with other
Moldovan teenagers, both girls and boys.
One by one the girls were told that their jobs at the dry cleaning factory was terminated, they have to work in bars as waitresses and prostitutes. Their passports were taken away.
Vladimir and other boys were told that their jobs were over and they would need to sell their blood to earn money and then sell their kidney, once a match was found. He would get $3,000 US less the cost of room and board and transportation. When Vladimir refused, Nina and her Mafiosi boyfriends came in and threatened to kill him.
Vladimir agreed, because he said later that he would probably lose both kidneys and be murdered. Now, he is as cripple, sent back to Moldova to beg on the streets, since he cannot work after the kidney removal.
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