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The Moscow Times Moscow Guide – Winter 2008

Since the middle of autumn one of the most important topics of discussion, could only be … no, not the financial crisis… New Year! The winter issue of The Moscow Times Moscow Guide is entirely devoted to New Years celebrations. Seven great ideas for celebrating the “Night of Nights” will help readers finalise their plans and choose how and where to party, give fresh ideas and lots of practical advice.

And don’t forget – problems will come by themselves, but happiness and luck need an invitation. That why the more cheerful and light-hearted your celebration of the coming holiday is, the happier and more successful 2009 will be for you.

The Crisis: Signs of a Kremlin Fearful Of Unrest
Sociologist Yevgeny Gontmakher has painted a disturbing picture of what might emerge from the financial crisis, forecasting continued unemployment, huge protests and spreading violence.

Market Matters: Huge Grain Harvest No Boon for Farmers
This year Russia is enjoying the biggest grain harvest it has ever seen -- and farmers couldn't be more worried.



Tuesday, January 06, 2009 Updated at 31 December 2008 22:36 Moscow Time.

The Moscow Times » Issue 4003 » News

Bill Returns Powers to Prosecutors

06 October 2008By Francesca Mereu / Staff WriterThe State Duma is considering a bill that would restore to the Prosecutor General's Office the right to open criminal cases against certain categories of senior government officials, a deputy said Friday.

According to the bill -- drawn up by the Supreme Court and sent to the Duma on Thursday -- the Prosecutor General's Office should regain the right to open criminal cases against investigators, judges, prosecutors and lawyers, said Viktor Ilyukhin, deputy chairman of the Constitution and State Affairs Committee, which is considering the bill.

"It would be a positive improvement, even if the prosecutors do not get back the right to open criminal cases against Duma deputies, senators and judges from the Constitutional Court," Ilyukhin said.

In May last year, a bill was approved to create the semiautonomous Investigative Committee to operate alongside the Prosecutor General's Office. As a result, criminal proceedings against senior government officials and State Duma deputies are now conducted not by the prosecutor general, but by the chief of the committee. The prosecutor general retained the authority to call for inquiries and to issue instructions on their execution.

"The Prosecutor General's Office role is now insignificant; it has lost its supervising powers. Now, we have investigators starting criminal cases against their former bosses. How can they be unbiased?" said Ilyukhin, a Communist deputy who once occupied a senior post in the Soviet Prosecutor General's Office.

Ilyukhin said the Duma is likely to consider the bill soon after his committee finishes reviewing it.

Ilyukhin said that even if the bill would not allow the Prosecutor General's Office to get all its power back, it would at least give the institution "some of its old prestige back."

Spokespeople for the Investigative Committee and Prosecutor General's Office refused to comment on the bill, while no one was available for comment at the Supreme Court on Friday.