The Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation The State Duma

November 30, 2000

Deputy of the State Duma of the RF Igor Artemyev (Yabloko) is convinced that the subpoena for Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin to the Public Prosecutor’s Office of St. Petersburg is related to the struggle for power in the present Russian government. Artemyev made this declaration on November 29 at a press conference in St. Petersburg.

On November 28, 2000, the Bureau of the Central Council of the Yabloko Association proposed that the President of the RF and the Chairman of the Government introduce federal controls over preparations for the heating season.

On November 24, 2000 the Court of the Central district of Krasnoyarsk satisfied the complaint of the “Union of Right-Wing Forces – Yabloko” bloc about illegal removal of the bloc from the elections, declared leader of the Krasnoyarsk branch of Yabloko, Valeri Kirilits.

Deputy Head of the Defence Committee of the State Duma, Alexei Arbatov, agrees with the assessment of the situation of the Armed Force of the RF provided by the Head of the General Headquarters, army General Anatoli Kvashnin, who filed a report on the condition of the armed forces and strategic plans on army reform at a closed meeting of the State Duma on November 24, 2000.

The leader of the Yabloko Association, Grigory Yavlinsky, will participate in the European Forum, to be held in Berlin on November 24-25, 2000.

On November 23, 2000 the representatives of Yabloko and the SPS officially submitted to the State Duma a draft Civil Procedural Code of the Russian Federation.

The legislative initiative was written by Igor Artemyev, Sergei Popov (both from the Yabloko faction) and Viktor Pokhmelkin (the SPS faction). The draft code was developed by a group of experts under the Yabloko faction under the guidance of the Deputy Head for Legislative Work of the Yabloko faction Igor Artemyev.

The Yabloko and the SPS factions of the State Duma will not support the draft law to restore the music by Alexandrov as the new Hymn for the Russian Federation.

Press conference of the First Deputy Heads of Yabloko and the SPS factions Sergei Ivanenko and Viktor Pokhmelkin.

“Today in Russia, under the cover of theoretical discussions about army reforms, which do not reveal anything to anyone, virtually two military doctrines exist, and correspondingly two competing programmes for the purchase of weapons, military equipment, research and pilot projects, and two reform programmes in the armed forces. This is an absolutely abnormal situation,” said Alexei Arbatov, Deputy Head of the Defence Committee for the State Duma, deputy of the Yabloko faction, in an interview with journalists on November 21.

The Yabloko and the SPS factions of the State Duma decided not to support the proposal to legally approve the music by Alexandrov as the new Hymn for Russia.

The Yabloko faction has developed and plans to submit on November 22, 2000 to the Government of Russia four ways out of the energy crisis in Maritime Territory, announced deputy of the State Duma, Secretary on Ideology of the Yabloko Association, Sergei Mitrokhin.

«The federative reform started by Vladimir Putin is on the verge of collapse,” said Deputy of the State Duma, Deputy Chairman of the Duma Committee on Local Self-Government Issues, Sergei Mitrokhin (the Yabloko faction) in an interview with journalists on November 16, 2000.

This information was provided by one of the leaders of the SPS and Deputy Speaker of the State Duma Irina Khakamada after the meeting of the Political Council of the two political organisations on November 15, 2000.

She also expressed her view that if such a situation occurred in Russia and the two candidates were separated by only several hundreds votes and the

contenders were the communists and the party of power, we “would already be facing a civil war”.

In an interview with journalists on November 15, Sergei Ivanenko expressed his belief that it was impossible to legally include in the draft law on the political parties under preparation today the provision stipulating that

only political organisations, and not political blocs, should be allowed to participate in future elections, based on the proposal of some political

forces.

The Yabloko and the Union of Right-Wing Forces (SPS) factions of the State Duma condemned as anti-semitic the statements of the deputy of the State Duma from the CPRF Alexander Mikhailov, who was elected Governor of Kursk region in October.

Educational reform is an urgent issue for the ”whole of society” and reform methods “will determine the future of the country for a long time to come”, stated the leader of the Yabloko faction in the State Duma Grigory Yavlinsky in a speech during parliamentary hearings (November 14, 2000) on the governmental draft on educational reform.

The main goal of the Labour Code drafted by the Yabloko faction is to create a mechanism for regulating labour relationships.

The draft describes in detail the subjects of labour relations in Russia

today, forms a system for realising their rights, mechanisms for settling labour disputes both in court and prior to court proceedings

The educational programme of the Yabloko association was published a year ago in November 1999. The present programme of educational reform proposed by the government coincides with the former programme in many areas.

“The prospects of court investigations of inquiries filed by a number of

Federation Council members to the Constitutional Court are slight,” said the First Deputy Head of the Yabloko faction in the State Duma, Sergei Ivanenko, in an interview with journalists on November 13, 2000, regarding requests by some governors that the laws - initiated by the President and aimed at consolidating the hierarchy of power, that were adopted by the Duma in summer 2000 - be investigated for their compliance with the Constitution of the RF.

The Yabloko faction in the State Duma thinks that participation of the state in the creation of political parties should be reduced to a minimum, and at best should not participate at all.”

This opinion was expressed by Alexander Shishlov, member of the Yabloko faction, at parliamentary hearings on the draft law “On Political Parties and Party Activities” held on Thursday. Shishlov is a co-author of a corresponding draft law prepared by the Yabloko faction.

After the parliamentary elections in 1999, Yabloko launched discussions of party reforms, aimed at increasing the party’s efficiency at elections. The first stage of the reform involved a restructuring of the party’s governing bodies to resolve the following problems:

• Make the management of some directions of work more effective;
• Increase the representation of the regional organisations in the Central Council, the governing body of Yabloko between its congress

The Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Vladimir Lukin (Yabloko) is convinced that the federal authorities are bound to play a role in the elections of the heads of federation subjects of the RF, schedule for November-December 2000 in many Russian regions.

Deputy Head of the Yabloko faction in the State Duma and Secretary for Election Policies of the Yabloko Association, Igor Artemyev thinks that at the next Duma elections Yabloko and the Union of Right-Wing Forces (SPS)

A well-known doctor, member of the North Pole expedition, 37 year old Mikhail Malakhov does not rule out the possibility of a second round of gubernatorial elections in the Ryazan region, but has declared his determination to “seize” power in the region from the CPRF.

Yabloko is going to submit to the Duma its version of the draft law “On Parties”. This information was provided to journalists by Sergei Mitrokhin (Yabloko faction) on October 30, 2000