The Real Russia. Today. How a Siberian city prosecutes Russian Internet users for ‘criminal’ memes, Yandex's coming smartphone, and Putin's wedding plans

Thursday, August 16, 2018

This day in history. On August 16, 1941, Joseph Stalin issued Order No. 270, instructing Red Army personnel to “fight to the last,” essentially banning commanders from surrendering. This order later served as the basis for subsequent, often controversial Soviet policies on prisoners of war.

• Meduza reports from Barnaul, where local officials are prosecuting Internet users for ‘illegal memes’
• Amid allegations of prisoner torture, Russian Federal Penitentiary Service official has plan to cut recidivism
• Another former Moscow investigator named in the ‘Young Shakro’ mobster bribery scandal is sentenced to prison
• Kirill Serebrennikov's house arrest is extended to September 19
• Yandex is reportedly in talks with Russian retail stores about the sale of its rumored smartphone
• Forbes Russia has finally paid most of its staff their August salaries
• Putin is attending the wedding of Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl, but his gift remains a secret
• Oleg Deripaska’s En+ conglomerate agrees to move subsidiary to Russia's new ‘domestic offshores’
• Ahead of September 9, Russian election commissions ask local tourist agencies for voters' travel plans

“A [criminal] record to be proud of” 🚨

On August 15, judges in Barnaul heard arguments in the criminal cases against 19-year-old Daniil Markin and 23-year-old Maria Motuznaya, two locals charged with inciting extremism and insulting religious sensitivities because they shared satirical Internet content. At Meduza’s request, Batenka.ru special correspondent Petr Manyakhin visited Barnaul to find out how the city prosecutes people for sharing “criminal” memes.

Read the story: “How a Siberian city prosecutes Russian Internet users for ‘criminal’ memes”

A plan to cut recidivism 📉

Russia’s prison system has been having a rough time lately. In late July, a video leaked to the press showing more than a dozen guards torturing an inmate in Yaroslavl, and the footage has precipitated a long, hard look at the dozens of other prisoner-abuse reports from facilities across the country. Fyodor Ushkov, the Federal Penitentiary Service’s acting head of educational, social, and psychological work, has proposed a new initiative for Russia’s prison system: the creation of a new service to support convicts once they reenter society with help from psychologists, lawyers, social workers, and “many other specialists.”

Where would this new agency fit within Russia’s existing bureaucracy? Ushkov isn’t sure. In his interview with the state news agency TASS (which doesn’t mention a word about torture allegations), the federal official says those details need to be determined in future discussions.

The mobster case continues 👮

Another former top official from the Moscow branch of Russia’s Investigative Committee has been sentenced to prison for his role in a bribery scandal involving the mobster Zakhariy Kalashov (known as “Young Shakro”). Denis Nikandrov is being sent away for five and a half years and stripped of his major-general rank. Once he goes free, he’ll also be barred from working in Russian law enforcement for another three years. Nikandrov’s case was expedited after he accepted a plea bargain and confessed to the charges. The trial was held in closed court because some of the case materials are classified. Despite the deal, Nikandrov’s lawyer says he intends to challenge the verdict.

At a cafe in Moscow in December 2015, several of Zakhariy Kalashov’s associates got into a shootout with former police officer, resulting in the deaths of two of Kalashov’s men. The following summer, federal agents arrested three high-ranking Moscow investigators on charges that they accepted $500,000 to facilitate the release of Andrey “The Italian” Kochuikov, one of the cafe gunmen. The bribe didn’t pay off: In March 2018, Kalashov and Kochuikov were sentenced to nine years and 10 months in prison and eight years and 10 months in prison, respectively.

In July 2018, federal agents arrested Moscow Investigative Committee head Alexander Drymanov, not long after he reportedly stepped down from his post. Denis Nikandrov previously testified that he paid Drymanov 9,850 euros (about $11,200) “as thanks for a promotion and for his general support.”

Still house arrested 🎭

The Moscow City Court has again extended the house arrest of film and stage director Kirill Serebrennikov, who’s accused of embezzling federal money allocated to “Seventh Studio.” His arrest will now continue until at least September 19. At Thursday’s hearing, Serebrennikov’s lawyer accused state prosecutors of falsifying witness testimony, arguing that it is illegal to keep him under house arrest on forged documents. The judge did not agree.

Police detained Kirill Serebrennikov on August 22, 2017, in St. Petersburg. His defense team has until September 1, 2018, to finish reviewing the evidence against him.

The Yandex phone is coming 📱

The Russian tech company Yandex is reportedly in talks with Russian retail stores about the sale of its rumored smartphone, according to the newspaper Vedomosti. Yandex hasn’t yet revealed the device’s technical specifications or its price, but sources say it’s expected to sell for between 17,000 and 20,000 rubles ($255 to $300). The company is reportedly insisting that stores impose a minimal markup on the product, which has apparently stalled negotiations.

In July, a device called “Yandex.Telephone,” model YNDX-000SB, appeared on Russia’s registry of cryptographic tools, where Yandex needs to register its smartphone, in order to sell it within the Eurasian Economic Union.

In 2011, Yandex acquired the company SPB Software, which designs computing shells for the Android mobile operating system. A year later, Yandex released “Yandex.Shell,” a free shell for Android mobile devices. In 2014, the first smartphones pre-installed with Yandex.Shell started hitting the market. That same year, Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service opened a case against Google for restricting users’ ability to install apps from other developers. In August 2016, the agency fined Google 438 million rubles ($6.5 million) for violating Russian antitrust laws.

Sweet payment at last 💰

Most of the staff at Forbes Russia has finally received their salaries for July, joint editorial board chief Nikolai Mazurin told Interfax on Wednesday, meaning that the newsroom (made up of 35 employees) will once again be buzzing with the labor of 20 people who stayed home on August 15 to protest a two-week delay in their paychecks.

In late July, the Forbes Russia editorial board appealed to state prosecutors about the disappearance of an article from their August issue about the family business of Ziyavudin and Magomed Magomedov. Afterwards, owner Alexander Fedotov promptly fired the magazine’s acting chief editor, Nikolai Uskov, and put Andrey Zolotov in his place, and Forbes Russia editors were temporarily locked out of the website’s content management system. The magazine’s editorial board is calling on Forbes Media to reject Zolotov’s appointment.

Fedotov’s ACMG holding company acquired Forbes Russia from Axel Springer in 2015. After the ownership change, the outlet refused to publish information about VTB Bank president Andrey Kostin’s income in its 2016 rankings of the highest-paid Russian executives. A year later, it stopped publishing these rankings altogether.

Putin the Wedding Guest 👰

Where would you seat Vladimir Putin, if he came to your wedding? That is precisely what Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl is asking herself ahead of her August 18 nuptials, which the Russian president has “happily agreed” to attend. Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Kneissl invited Putin when he visited Vienna in June. After the ceremony, Putin will fly to Berlin, where he has a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Journalists won’t be present at Kneissl’s wedding, as it is a private event. It’s still a mystery what Putin will bring as a gift, but Peskov promised to reveal the present later on.

Into the offshore 💱

The board of directors at Oleg Deripaska’s En+ energy and metallurgical conglomerate has approved the transfer of its En+ Holding Limited subsidiary from the jurisdiction of Cyprus to Russia’s new domestic tax havens. The decision follows the implementation of a new law establishing “special administrative districts” on the islands of Oktyabrsky in Kaliningrad and Russky in Primorye. According to the newspaper Vedomosti, En+ is reportedly considering moving other assets to these special districts. Deripaska’s aluminum producer, UC Rusal, is apparently thinking about a similar move.

Residents of Russia’s new “domestic offshores” retain their status as international companies, enjoy various tax benefits, and are exempt from currency controls. Corporate information about these businesses, moreover, is available only to Russian regulatory agencies and courts.

In early April, the U.S. Treasury Department placed Oleg Deripaska under sanctions in response to “a range of malign activity around the globe” conducted by the Russian government, which operates “for the disproportionate benefit of oligarchs and government elites.” Washington also sanctioned Deripaska’s assets, including En+ and UC Rusal, whose international market values promptly collapsed. In late May, En+ reportedly asked the Russian government for special privileges, including permission to raise utilities and housing fees in the Irkutsk region.

I need your clothes, your boots, and your travel itinerary 🕶️

Election commissions in regions across Russia have reportedly mailed letters to local travel agencies asking for information about clients planning to be away from their home cities on September 9, when 22 different regions hold elections. Irina Tyurina, the press secretary for the Russian Travel Industry Union told the news agency Interfax that election commissions want to know clients’ names, birthdates, and addresses before September 1. Tyurina says the commissions lack the authority to request this information, and she points out that travel agencies would be breaking the law if they handed over personal data without their clients’ consent.

On September 9, voters in 22 regions across Russia will elect mayors and local legislative assembly deputies. Seven regions are also holding special elections for seats in the State Duma.