Posted on 09/17/2004 7:15:58 AM PDT by dead
A $49 bribe paved the way for suspected suicide bomber to get a seat on one of two Russian airliners that crashed last month, Russia's leading prosecutor said.
The Prosecutor-General, Vladimir Ustinov, also revealed on Wednesday that both suspected bombers had been considered suspicious before boarding the aircraft, but the police officer responsible for searching them had failed to do so.
General Ustinov also stressed that corruption was a nationwide problem. "We have checked how the anti-corruption law is enforced in regional government bodies. The picture is assuming a dangerous shape," he said.
"The inspection uncovered 22,000 such violations, including bribery, in half a year alone."
His comments could be seen as lending support to a plan announced by President Vladimir Putin on Monday to change electoral laws to enhance his power and the Kremlin's control of the country by replacing the elected heads of Russia's 89 regions with his own appointees.
The plan has met with statements of concern from the European Union's External Relations Commissioner, Chris Patten, and US officials, including the Secretary of State, Colin Powell, and President George Bush, who urged Mr Putin to uphold the "principles of democracy".
The US reaction drew a strong reaction from Russia's Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, who said on Wednesday that the US had no right to try to impose its model of democracy on others.
Referring to Mr Powell's comments, he retorted: "First of all, the processes that are under way in Russia are our internal affair ... And it is at least strange that, while talking about pulling back, as he put it, on some of the democratic reforms in the Russian Federation, he tried to assert one more time the thought that democracy can only be copied from someone's model. We, for our part, do not comment on the US system of presidential elections."
General Ustinov said that a go-between paid $49 to a Sibir Airlines official to help get the suspected terrorist on the flight that she allegedly blew up.
Russian media had previously reported on the arrest of the go-between, Armen Arutyunov, who apparently earned his living by reselling flight tickets, on suspicion of aiding the two woman terrorist suspects by selling them tickets and helping them clear customs.
This is a holdover from the Soviet system in which there were always huge shortages and questionable quality. For example, if you were sick and needed to go to the hospital, you made sure to take baskets of goodies for the staff that would be taking care of you so that you would be cared for instead of left to rot.
*Truth Alert*
Oh my!
Gee, eeven though the Mob runs theft rings among the unionized rampers at JFK, that would never (cough, AA587, cough) happen here...
Stop bringing reality into these threads!
Putin will never, never, *never* be able to choke off terrorism in Russia with this kind of corruption going on.
If he thinks that getting control of the appointment of regional governors will keep this sort of thing from happening, it's understandable why he's asking for it - but I don't see how that will work. It seems to me that what is needed is some public executions of the collaborators - no matter how high in the government they are.
The black market was just the capitalist system in countries where capitalism was outlawed.
Socialism and tyranny begets corruption.
if capitalism is outlawed, all capitalists are outlaws.
I would agree with that.
That's a horrible judge but I am glad taht your sister did adopt the little girl.
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