T!__.. Rl: I : r hs:t.. I'1 A^^-T "R) NATIONIWOR DThe Michigan Daily - Thursday, October 2, 1997 Ioscow prosecutors to begin criminal proceedings - 7A The Washington Post MOSCOW - Moscow prosecutors announced yesterday they will begin criminal proceedings against former privatization chief Ifred Kokh, a close ally of economic reformer natoly Chubais. An investigator questioned whether a $100,000 payment to Kokh to write a book was an effort to influence a telecommuni- cations deal. Kokh, who resigned Aug. 13, has denied any wrongdoing and said he intends to deliv- er the book, which has not been published. But as privatizatior chief, he was at the cen- ter of the hotly contested auction of a tele- phone holding company last summer that has led to a widening schism between the * hubais reform team and several of Russia's wealthiest business tycoons. Media reports have raised questions about whether the $100,000 payment to Kokh played a role in the success of Uneximbank, a large financial industrial group headed by Vladimir Potanin, in the bidding for a stake in the state-owned telecommunications com- pany Svyazinvest. The $1.9 billion bid by Uneximbank stunned the losing bidders, another group of Russian bankers who bid $1.7 billion and thought they had the deal sewn up. Vladimir Gusinsky, the media magnate whose group was part of the losing consortium, has charged that there was "collusion" between the government and the winning bidders. The case has taken on special importance because Chubais and Boris Nemtsov, the deputy prime ministers appointed by President Boris Yeltsin, have cited it as an example of what they claim will be a new fairness in the sale of state companies. If it turns out that the telecommunications ten- der was just another case of insider dealing, and that a Chubais ally was involved, it would cast a shadow over the argument by Yeltsin and his young reform team that they are battling crony- ism and corruption in the distribution of state assets. Kokh first revealed the $100,000 payment last summer in his initial income declaration, required of many senior officials by Yeltsin for the first time this year. Subsequent reports in the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta and the London-based Financial Times said the money came from a little-known Swiss firm, Servina, and that an intermediary in the deal now works for a Swiss subsidiary of Uneximbank. Kokh has acknowledged taking a family vacation with Potanin last summer but said he did not know about the connection to the bank when he took the money. Yuri Syomin, the deputy prosecutor who announced yesterday's decision, told the Interfax news agency that the sum given Kokh was "quite unconventional" and "far outdistanced expected revenues." He said prosecutors have been told the deal was put together by a deputy chairperson of Uneximbank. In the years since the Soviet collapse, Russian prosecutors often have decried rampant corrup- tion but rarely have been able to make charges stick against high-ranking officials. After leaving the government, Kokh went to work for a private fund with links to Chubais, and Chubais came to his defense yesterday. "I have known Kokh for 10 years and know that he is a man of integrity," Chubais told reporters. "Lavishly paid lies are reprinted from one news- paper owned by a banker to a newspaper owvned by another, from a TV channel owned by one of them to a TV channel owned by another." "I know full well that the (Kokh) book does exist, that it has been written," Chubais said. "I also know that some will not find the reading exactly pleasurable." A spokesper- son for Uneximbank told Interfax the con- glomerate "has nothing to do with" the Kokh book. . But Alexander Minkin, an investigative jour- nalist who wrote about the deal in Novaya Gazeta, appeared on Gusinsky's television net- work Wednesday night and declared, "A hundred thousand dollars is not a fee, it's bribes." "He did not sell a manuscript, he sold some- thing different," Minkin said. Hamas founder released to hero's welcome in Jordan The Washington Post JERUSALEM - In a predawn heli- copter flight from a maximum security prison yesterday, Israel dispatched the ail- ing founder of the Hamas Islamic move- ment to a hero's welcome in Jordan. Jordanian and Palestinian officials, in comments met with silence in Israel, described the sudden pardon of Sheik Ahmed Yassin as an Israeli effort at dam- age control after a botched assassination attempt in the Jordanian capital last week. Israel's army put out a brief state- ment at 4 a.m. citing only Yassin's failing health and a request from Jordan's King Hussein for "positive steps which will help the peace process" Government officials declined to elaborate. The deliverance of one of Israel's .mortal enemies, who has renounced nei- ther the Palestinian claim to all of the land on which the Jewish state now stands nor the use of violence to obtain it, had more than a little mystery about it. The drama came at the meeting point of multiple political weaknesses among Palestinian, Israeli and Jordanian lead- ers, all of whom have relationships with Hamas that are troubled at best. Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, who has struggled with Hamas for political dominance but adopted the imprisoned Yassin as a national symbol, was embar- rassed at Israel's decision to bypass him and fly the Gaza-born cleric to Jordan. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, mere weeks after the last Hamas suicide bombing in Jerusalem, felt obliged for the second time this year to abandon a long-held Israeli criminal claim against a senior leader of the Islamic Resistance Movement, as Hamas is formally known. The greater political need, in Netanyahu's judgment, apparently belonged to King Hussein. What creat- ed it was a cloak-and-dagger episode last week in which, Jordanian officials and Hamas spokesperson said, Israeli agents, in Amman and carrying Canadian passports, used exotic tech- nology and tried to kill another Hamas leader, Khaled Meshal. That operation deeply embarrassed Hussein, already engaged in delicate political negotiations with his own mil- itant Islamic opposition. Without narning Israel, but hinting strongly that the Jewish state was responsible, Hussein said in a speech Tuesday that his government knows who was behind the attack, which left Meshal in intensive care at a military hospital outside Amman. Twice in the speech he called on Netanyahu to effect Yassin's immediate release, and semiofficial Jordanian newspapers reported that the monarch demanded Yassin in exchange for the two alleged Israeli agents. AP PHOTO The family of Shiekh Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of the Islamic resistance movement Hamas, watch television in their home yesterday in Gaza City after hearing reports about Yassin's release from prison. i Plutonium-powered Cassini poised for trip to Saturn The Washington Post WASHINGTON - Saturn has always been the most alluring of plan- ets, with its encircling rings and a gath- ering of 18 known moons with eupho- nious names such as Mimas, Enceladu, lapetus and Tethys. The Saturnian neighborhood is a ilniature solar system that was visited briefly in 1980 and 1981 by a pair of U.S. Voyager spacecraft during their grand tour of the outer planets. Now another American spacecraft, called Cassini, is poised to head to Saturn for a much longer visit aimed at giving scientists a better opportunity to study the ringed planet and its moons. The Cassini craft will carry along a European-built probe called Huygens, which will plunge through the opaque cloud tops of Titan, the largest and most interesting moon of Saturn. Titan is a frigid, forbidding place, but scientists believe it contains some of the same organic chemicals that existed on the early Earth just before primitive life arose. By studying the environment of Titan, the researchers hope to learn more about how Earth evolved into a life-bearing planet. "For all the superb research that has been done in laboratories, we don't yet know how life on Earth came to be,' says Jonathan Lunine, a Cassini inter- disciplinary scientist from the University of Arizona. So scientists are eager to look at a natural laboratory - Titan's atmos- phere - where some of the early chem- ical steps toward life may be occurring. But they quickly add that there is little chance that Titan harbors even the most rudimentary life. Because. of surface temperatures approaching 300 degrees below zero, "Titan is almost certainly not the home of life today," Lunine said. WEB DESIGNER: entry level position for person with good web design skills. Must have good knowledge of webpage composi- tion programs such as PageMill, HTML, animated GIFs, Photoshop, & JavaScript. Must understand web color pallets, web search engines, and have a working , owledge of intemet electronic commerce. 3-1677. WORK-STUDY STUDENTS: Looking for a variety of work experiences? Flexible hours. Computer skills (word processing, data entry) a plus. Will train. Positions avail- able in Web design, and general office work. Off-campus office. Own transportation necessary. Free Parking. Contact Heidi or Peg at: 998-7832 to schedule an interview. ~dCare ***1 STUDENT TICKET for Northwestern SPRING BREAK '98 - Sell Trips, Earn vs. UM. Sec. 26/Row 8. Call 761-8418. Cash & Go Free!i STS is now hiring campus **SPRING BREAK BAHAMAS Party reps. Lowest rates to Jamaica, Mexico & Cruiset 6 davs S279? Includes meals. free Florida. Call 800-648-4849. AFTER SCHOOL CARE for two kids, 6th &8th grade, NE Ann Arbor. 4-5 days/wk., somewhat flexible hours. Need reliable, fun, energetic, n-smkr., with car. Education majors nice. 662-6893. AFTER SCHOOL Childcare/transportation, light housekeeping needed. 996-0550. BABYSITTER NEEDED for our 2 little girls (7mo. & 3 1/2). Please call Andrea 327- 9457. .U1 0Uy5P47 1.UUl 1!<1, 1 parties, taxes! Get a group - go free! Prices increase soon - save $50! springbreaktravel.com 1-800-678-6386, **SPRING BREAK CANCUN & JAMAICA $379! Book early - save $50! Get a group - go free! Panama City $129! South Beach (bars close 5 am!) $1291 springbreaktravel.com 1-800-678-6386. **SPRING BREAK**..."take 2" Organize group! Sell 15...take 2 free. Jamaica, Cancun, Bahamas, Fla., Barbados, Padre. Free parties, eats, drinks. Sunsplash Tours 1-800-426- 7710 AAAHHH! Spring Break '98. Best Prices to Mexico, Jamaica, Bahamas, Florida. Group Discounts & Free Drink Parties! Sell Trips, Earn Cash & Go Free! 1-800-234-7007. www.endlesssummertours.com FLORIDA SPRING BREAK from $129/ person. Sandpipr Beach Resort. Panama City, FL. Tiki Bar, hot tub, world's longest keg party. Free info. 1-800-488-8828. www.sandpiperbeacon.com FOR SALE. Remaining games for pair of Michigan tickets. Separate games or entire package avail. Call 770-736-9273. IOWA VS. MICHIGAN football tickets wanted. Seating flexible. Call Dave at 764- 0550. LOW FARES WORLDWIDE Instant pur- chase Eurail passes issued. Regency Travel 209 S. State 665-6122. NORTHWESTERN 2 TICKETS sect. 9. Call Bob 763-6729 or boblewis@umich.edu ***EARNFREE TRIPS & CASH!** CLASS TFRAVEL needs tudents to promote Springb reak 199! Sell 15 trips & travel free! Highly motivated STUDENTS Purchase your tickets with Con- tinental vouchers & Amex card. Regency Travel 209S. State St. 665-6122. ZACH FROM CANADA needs tickets vs. OSU on Nov. 22. Call (613)521-7007. LESSONS-STRING-WIND-PIANO. You can play today - Herb David Guitar Studio 302 E. Liberty 665-8001. ' announcements !NAKED MILE footage/photos wantedi Can pay some $-contact: NMRIO@ HOTMAIL.com NO FUTURE no future no future for you!? Walls around our wisdom RC Auditorium Saturday October 25 10:45-12:15 All RC Community past and present. rte. Child Care Providers: * Full-time ~ * Part-time O ccasional babysitting 5ak s *$7/hr. and up CALL CHILD CARE SOLUTIONS (313) 668-6882 Positions in private homes. 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