Dmitriy Medvedev’s former classmate tells all

Zhanna Eylinen (formerly Popova) was born and raised in Leningrad where she went to school with Dmitriy Medvedev. Today Eylinen resides in Estonia

“Dima had integrity from childhood”

KP: Zhanna, we noticed that you and another girl were closest to Dmitriy Medvedev on this school photo. Did you two have a special or maybe even romantic relationship when you were growing up?

Zhanna: Oh no, that’s just a coincidence. The photo is actually a montage. There were more girls than boys in our class. So when they made the class album they usually put two girls next to each boy. Irina Ostratova and I wound up next to Dima Medvedev. Let me stress it’s only a coincidence.

KP: Could you tell us what school you graduated from? We’d also like to know what Dima Medvedev was like in his school years. How well did he study and what were his hobbies?

Zhanna: I only studied with Dima two years — in 9th and 10th grade at School 305 in the Fruzensk district in Leningrad. It was the only school that taught French in the district. So I can only speak about the years when we were together in one class. Dima Medvedev was a very independent young man. He was disciplined and orderly. He took his studies seriously and was a wonderful student. He was also an athlete. You could tell that he knew what he wanted from life. I mean, all of us knew Dima was going to study at the law faculty at the university. His family also had a strong influence on him. His mother was Russian language and literature teacher and his father taught at the university. As far as I know Dima wanted to be a teacher or lawyer ever since he was a kid.

KP: What kind of friend was he?

Zhanna: First I’d like to say that we just had a wonderful class. We talked a lot after our lessons, met up and went on hikes and excursions. Our class director Irina Ivanovna paid for everyone. Dima was always a kindhearted person. He always helped you out when you needed him to. Generally speaking, he was just easy to talk to…

KP: A lot of girls probably had their eye on him…

Zhanna: Yes, that’s true. A lot of girls wanted to date him. But Dima dated a girl named Sveta in another class. They had been friends since first grade. Svetlana later became his wife. We all saw them walking together and going home after school hand-in-hand.

KP: We’re getting a painfully positive picture here. You have to agree that at any school kids will be kids. In addition to studies you also have a lot of free time, personal relationships, beer outings and even fights…

Zhanna: Well, I studied with Dima during out last years at school. And we were all already fairly adult people. We never ever drank beer together. I don’t know. Maybe the boys drank when they were together, but never with us. We all knew that we needed to continue on with our studies, so no one did anything stupid out of idleness. And there were never any fights. And in terms of Dima, he was always so good-looking in his leather jacket with his folder under his arm. He was calm, cultured and reserved.

KP: What about love stories?

Zhanna: I already said that he dated Sveta. And that’s why Dima Medvedev wasn’t involved in any romantic dramas in our class. He spent his free time playing sports. Dima was also serious about music. He loved listening to rock and roll and jazz. He actually still collects original disks and is proud of his musical library.

KP: When some people leave school they hardly remember their classmates later in life. Especially those who go on to lead rich, busy lives. What is Dmitriy Medvedev like in this regard?

Zhanna: Very worthy. Dima never forgot about his school even when he held high positions. Not long ago I was at the school and saw how much everything has changed. I know that the school now has a great gym and modern computer lab thanks to his assistance. And there’s also a great stadium now right by the school. When our class met last year, Dima said it’s an immense pleasure to be with us.

Genuine friendship

KP: So your classmates still find the chance to meet like before?

Zhanna: Of course. But we don’t all meet that often. We last met in 2007 when we celebrated our 25th reunion. And before that we met for our 20th reunion. Dima Medvedev was actually the impetus for our meeting last year. His wife Svetlana organized the evening. A lot of people — 24 of 30 invitees. What’s really interesting is that almost all our class stayed to live and work in Saint Petersburg. Only one of our girls went to the U.S. and I went to Estonia. Surprisingly, nearly everyone became successful — Medvedev aside. He was spectacular and always knew what he wanted. But who would of thought that even our poorest students would have tremendous success later in life.

KP: Could you give us some examples about what your classmates accomplished?

Zhanna: One of our boys is the director of a large company in Saint Petersburg. Another owns a bread factory. Oleg Ivanov has his own photo gallery. He was always interested in photography. From a very young age he just loved photos. One of our girls has a restaurant. And everyone still helps each other out. If someone needs something, we always have people to turn to… Take Adelina, for example, who has the restaurant. She really wanted to get involved in the restaurant business, but she didn’t have the money or business connections. So our Saint Petersburg boys, some of whom have become businessmen, helped her out. Most of our classmates became successful later in life. I think I was quite successful, too.

KP: Does anyone maintain contact with Medvedev or work on his team?

Zhanna: Yes. Evgeniy Arkhipov, for instance, who was Dima’s friend at school. Today they even work together. It’s really great to see Dima hasn’t put on airs. When we met last year, I was so surprised by how relaxed he handled himself even though he was vice prime minister at the time. READ MORE

Yulia starves to death after winning beauty contest

The mother of a 20-year-old beauty queen is sure contemporary fashion killed her daughter

Vika knew something was wrong when she walked up the stairs to her apartment and heard the long intercity ring. The key was shaking in her hand. “Something’s wrong with Yulia,” she said to herself before picking up the phone. She was right. Her daughter’s roommate in Moscow was on the line.

“Are you Yulia’s mother? Please come immediately. Yulia’s been taken to the hospital,” she said.

“What’s wrong with her?” Vika asked.

“I don’t know. But she came back from a trip and she was just lying there… The ambulance took her. They told me to call you.” she said.

Vika didn’t have any money to go to Moscow. And her neighbors didn’t either. So she had no other choice but to call Yulia’s ex-husband. His secretary answered, listened and promised to pass the message to Yakov. Five minutes later she called back saying a roundtrip ticket had been purchased and was waiting for her, but “Yakov Mikhalych can’t talk at the moment as he’s at a very important meeting.”

Vika knew that Yakov wasn’t at a meeting. He just didn’t want to speak with her. He was too embarrassed to talk to “that mentally ill girl’s” mother. That’s what he called Yulia ever since the divorce. Of course, he would never say such a thing to Vika’s face. But it was a small town like many others in the Komi Republic — and any other region in Russia for that matter. A sneeze on one end is greeted by a “Bless you!” on the other. Vika’s coworkers had told her on more than one occasion with feigned sympathy how Yakov spoke about his ex-wife: “That anorexic idiot… You go to a restaurant with her, she swallows a salad shamefully and then she’s off to the toilet. Her hands smell like throw up and her mouth like dead mice.” But there had been a time when Yakov was proud to be marrying the most beautiful girl in town.

Gazelle among village cows

Yulia was always the most beautiful girl in town. The boys fought over who would dance with her in daycare or give her bike rides in first grade. In third grade each morning someone wrote on the chalk board: “I love you, Yulia.” In fourth grade she brought her first crown home from summer camp — “Miss Camomile.” In fifth grade her backpack was already full of angry anonymous messages from other girls who envied her. And in sixth grade Yulia entered the local modelling agency.

Vika’s mother laughed at her daughter’s friends at the time. They all wanted to be models. Yulia’s pimpled neighbor and even her plump schoolmate Valya. But Yulia looked like a gazelle among village cows in their company.

“I was so proud then,” Vika’s mom said. “I forgave her the occasional poor grades. I was so happy seeing her in the fashion shows at the local Cultural Center. The entire audience burst into applause when Yulia came on stage. I hung all her awards from the summer camps on our walls. I thought that I had raised a future star.”

Yulia first entered the adult competition at 15, but the judges, who come to the region only once a year, refused to accept her candidacy due to her age. At 16 she was disqualified because of her height. Yulia ran home in tears, crying: “The assistent said that I’m fat for 170 centimeters!” Vika’s initial response was to go complain to the casting director. But her reasoning got the best of her.

“You’re not fat at all!” she said calming her daughter. “That old witch was just jealous.”

“No, I’m fat. I have cellulite and I’m shaking like jello!” Yulia said, pinching her stomach and bottom hatefully.

“I should have started worrying when Yulia went on that diet,” Vika said. “But aren’t all girls on diets these days? I didn’t worry until I saw her hip bones protruding through her jeans and her ribs showing through her shirt. I started to force her to eat, but she just threw everything away. I even threatened to keep her inside until she ate. But she’d eat and then throw it all up in the toilet. Once I caught her on her knees making those horrible sounds and she told me: ‘Mom, you’re like a little kid. All the girls do it!’ And once again the judges came to that cursed beauty contest… And the worst of it is that they accepted her!”

Death by fritters

Yulia was crowned the town beauty and the most enviable bachelor in the area made her a proposal at the same time.

The next stage was the regional competition. But the girls still had several months left. Yulia decided to enroll at the law faculty at a local institute and married the son of the general director of a large local enterprise. She stopped losing weight and finally began to blossom.

But she lost the regional competition, although barely. Yulia received the special “Miss Charming” award. However, that night, Yulia got drunk, fought with her husband and went to her mother’s where she raised a scandal.

“You wanted my death with those fritters!” she screamed so loudly the neighbors started tapping their heaters loudly. “‘Yulia, eat, Yulia, eat. I lost a contract with a leading modelling agency because of my fat ass. I won the last competition because I didn’t listen to you and lost weight. And now what?”

From that day in 2005 onwards, Yulia simply stopped eating. She drank coffee and energetic drinks, smoked constantly, ate medicine that quelled her hunger and threw up in the toilet.

“She became irritable and was always cold,” Vika said. “Her blood pressure wasn’t over 90. She’d come to see me so thin… Her hands would be ice cold and she’d be crying. But she wouldn’t know why. ‘Depression,’ she’d say. And then she’d go to sleep. Yakov would call me and ask: ‘Is Yulia with you? Why isn’t she at home?’ What could I tell him?”

Finally, her son-in-law came to see her. Vika noticed something was wrong immediately. He wasn’t himself. Yakov was always such a cheerful man, but now he was gloomy and gray.

“Vika, please talk with Yulia,” he said. “I can’t take this anymore. I want a normal family — a wife and children. She’s nervous all the time and doesn’t want anything. She secretly bought a pregnancy test and I found the package in the garbage. I’m waiting for her to tell me about the baby, but she’s keeping quiet. I ask her and she says, ‘No,’ and she’s pale from head to toe. I think she has had an abortion.”

Vika spoke with Yulia that day and learned that she wasn’t pregnant. Yulia had just stopped menstruating four months earlier. Vika didn’t have time to get a grasp of the situation before Yulia argued with her husband and left for Moscow without even saying goodbye.

Yakov thought that she had a lover in Moscow and filed for divorce. Vika didn’t know what to think. Yulia only told her that she had found work in Moscow as a model and didn’t want to hear anything about returning home.

Modern beauty: Skin and bones?

Yulia called home and said that she participated in fashion shows periodically, but couldn’t lose the extra weight. Her boss at the agency was always calling her a fat-ass cow and Yulia was always on a diet. She told her mother about her friend Katya who was thinner than she was and two centimeters taller. But finally the long-awaited moment arrived when the prodigal daughter was to return home to take her exams.

“She took her clothes off and she was like a skeleton wrapped in skin,” Vika said. “I cried when she handed me her portfolio and said: ‘Mom, you don’t know anything about modern-day beauty.’” Then her friends came over, neighboring twins, and they flipped through the portfolio jealously. They listened to Yulia’s stories and I just started to doubt my own saneness.

Three years passed.

Yulia came home again, passed her exams and then left for Moscow. Word about her success in the modelling industry spread quickly throughout town. Soon Vika learned the twins were also on a diet. They wanted to be like Yulia. They just didn’t know much about the hidden life of the local supermodel. Only Vika knew and she kept silent.

I met Vika in winter 2007 when she came to Moscow to see her daughter. Yulia had suffered from anemia and oesophagus burns due to a vinegar diet. She was being treated at the Sklifosovskiy Institute. The doctor who registered Yulia called Vika and said that she had been brought in unconscious straight off the street.

“Come quickly or your daughter will kill herself,” the doctor said. “I’m telling you this as a mother and a psychiatrist.” She added that Yulia weighed 35 kilograms at 171 centimeters. Vika repeated the numbers to herself painfully, boarded a train and left for Moscow. He cried the entire trip.

Vika stayed with her friends in Moscow. She transferred her daughter to a psychiatric hospital with the diagnosis “anorexia” and appealed to me as a journalist to help her find finances so that Yulia could received treatment at a commercial clinic.

“They don’t cure anyone here, understand?!” Vika told me crying. “She hasn’t had her menstruation three years! They’re just giving her an IV, making her eat mashed potatoes and prohibiting her from closing the door to the toilet so she can’t throw up. But I know it won’t help. We’ve gone through this before. I paid them so they wouldn’t let her go until she started to gain weight. I brought her protein cocktails. She gained three kilograms and then they let her go. But she refused to come back home because Moscow is where the ‘work and fashion shows are.’ She stayed, promising me that she would eat and everything would be okay. But she then she started starving herself again.”

Yulia greeted us coldly at the hospital. She had bad skin and bruises under her intelligent brown eyes. The patient’s robe hung on her like a hanger.

“Mom, calm down,” she said. “Everything’s fine. I don’t need to go to any clinic. I’m just tired. They’ll let me go soon. I have a normal model’s appearance. Isn’t that right,” she asked, looking at me. “You write about Hollywood stars in the paper. They’re far thinner than I am.”

Gay boss doesn’t like women

At the time, I refused to print Vika’s request for funds in the section of the paper where we gather money for children sick with diseases.

“It’s one thing when people are dying, but Yulia’s just an idiot,” I said.

And in early summer, Yulia passed away. Vika called me several days ago out of the blue. READ MORE

Americans are allergic to Russia’s Topol missiles

Military technology starred in the Victory Day parade on Red Square for the first time in ages. The Russian Army’s mightiest weaponry was also on display — nuclear arms.

Various statements have been made by politicians, generals and military experts describing the state of nuclear arms in Russia. Some specialists say that Russia’s strategic nuclear arsenal is being renewed and growing stronger. Others say that that’s just cheap PR. As a result, the average Russian doesn’t know much about how the situation actually stands.

KP decided to shed some light on the issue and spoke with candidate of Military Sciences Colonel Mikhail Polezhaev. Polezhaev worked for many years at elite design bureaus and scientific research institutes. He also served in the top secret Central Directorate of the Joint Staff. On numerous occasions, Polezhaev prepared reports for Russia’s leaders and the Defense Ministry. KP military columnist Viktor Baranets spoke with Polezhaev.

One hit and Russia is gone?

KP: An article appeared recently in a U.S. publication stating that the U.S. could wipe Russia off the face of the Earth with one strike. The authors also said that Russia’s nuclear arms wouldn’t have time to respond.

Polezhaev: I actually read that article by Lieber and Press. Both are university teachers. Here it is: “The U.S. Nuclear Primacy.” I even underlined a bit: “Today, for the first time in almost 50 years, the U.S. stands on the verge of attaining nuclear primacy. It will probably soon be possible for the U.S. to destroy the long-range nuclear arsenals of Russia or China with a first strike.” What can I say? It’s a nice article. The U.S. is just confident that its nuclear arms are superior.

KP: And so this confidence has tempted the U.S. to “choke” Russia morally via its increasing missile power?

Polezhaev: Of course. They’re also trying to depreciate our missile potential with their anti-missile shield. Have any doubts? Former U.S. Defense Minister Casper Weinburg said: “If we establish an effective anti-missile shield, we’ll render Soviet arms useless and return to a situation similar to post-1945 when we were the only country with nuclear arms.”

KP: Could this American dream really see fruition in our lifetime?

Polezhaev: Yes. If Russia’s missile arsenal continues to decrease until only 200 missiles can be launched in a counter attack.

Polezhaev: That’s the number of missile the U.S. continental anti-missile shield can repulse at one time. The full-scale four-country anti-missile shield (Alaska, California, England, Czech Republic, Poland) that composes not only missiles, radars and ships, but also satellites and lasers, should protect the U.S. from 500 attacking warheads.

KP: But we have TMA missiles…

Polezhaev: Yes. Over 500 at the moment.

KP: How many exactly if it’s not a secret?

Polezhaev: We have 702 strategic missiles in our arsenal that can carry 3,155 nuclear warheads.

Gaping holes as big as France

KP: Is it really possible that all our armada wouldn’t be able to squash the U.S. in the event of a war?

Polezhaev: According to their current defense minister, “unacceptable damage” to the U.S. is the destruction of 20 cities with a population of over half a million. Our Voevod missiles can handle that task. But the goal of the U.S. is to prevent these missiles from taking off.

KP: How could this be possible?

Polezhaev: Strategic U.S. facilities forsee the sudden use of military power. Preference is given to applying non-nuclear force. The U.S. has 48 ship carriers with 1,484 cruise missiles and 92 bombers with 736 guided air missiles.

KP: But we have anti-aircraft defense…

Polezhaev: The country’s anti-aircraft defense has long been superfluous. It has gaping holes that a European country the size of France could fly through let alone a bomber. Not all the missile divisions of the Strategic Rocket Forces of Russia (RVSN) are covered, and many cities aren’t protected from air strikes.

KP: But regardless, what’s the guarantee that all the U.S. missiles will hit their targets?

Polezhaev: Today, the precision of U.S. cruise and guided missiles is about 1-2 meters. The diameter of the blast doors on our missile silos is 6 meters. So it’s difficult to say how many of our 255 Topol missiles will be able to launch — 100, 50, 10?

Russia and the U.S. have the might to destroy the world

KP: Is it really possible that nothing will be able to reach the U.S.?

Polezhaev: Let’s talk about the worst-case scenario — an unexpected nuclear attack by the U.S. Of course, this is theoretical. Let’s say the attack leads to the destruction of 90 percent of our silo-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM). Our lightly sheltered Topol missiles and the long-range jets and atomic submarines at our bases may also be destroyed. So we’ll have 15-25 silo-based ICBMs, up to 20 missiles on our submarines and no more than 80 air-based cruise missiles. This may suffice to ensure that unacceptable damage is done to the aggressor. Of course, these are only calculations. But a nuclear war isn’t a computer game. The figures may come out differently.

KP: How precise do out ICBMs fall?

Polezhaev: The maximum accuracy of the Sotka is 920 meters; the Voevod — 500 meters; and the Topol-M — 200 meters.

KP: And our strategic nuclear land-attack arms? How do they differ from their Soviet analogues?

Polezhaev: In the Soviet era, the RVSN had 5 missile armies. Today only three remain. We had 1,398 ICBMs with 6,612 warheads. Today, we have 430 and 1,605, respectively. This decrease is continuing. In 2010, we will have two armies consisting of 10-12 divisions in the RVSN. That’s approximately 350 missiles and 1,200 warheads.

KP: What’s the reason for the constant decrease in our nuclear potential?

Polezhaev: It seems like a lack of desire to spend money — 1,200 warheads are enough for mutual containment. The issue at hand is observing circumstances backed by agreements. Today, Russia and the U.S. have enough force to destroy the world.

We’re destroying our missiles. They’re hiding theirs in storage

KP: What’s the current situation in terms of U.S. nuclear power?

Polezhaev: The U.S. has 500 Minutemen ICBMs, 18 atomic submarines with 432 missiles and over 240 heavy strategic bombers. Overall, they have 1,200 nuclear-arms carriers and almost 6,000 warheads. The U.S. believes that by 2015 they will have 1,700-2,200 nuclear warheads on strategic carriers. These are the figures set forth in the Treaty Between the U.S. and Russian Federation on Strategic Offensive Reductions (SORT). But the U.S. is being tricky. They aren’t destroying their warheads like we are. Instead they’re sending them to storage. They could recall them any second. It’s called “recall potential.”

KP: So why isn’t this considered an infringement of the agreement?

Polezhaev: What can I say if former U.S. Defense Minister Donald Rumsfield stated openly that the U.S. doesn’t intend to discuss any procedures for inspecting how the agreement is being executed with their Russian partners. READ MORE

Russian and Austrian sex maniacs share shocking similarities. Part 2

In our previous installment, KP learned that the Austrian and Russian maniacs who hid their sex slaves in homemade bunkers share shocking similarities. One key characteristic is that psychiatrists consider them to be completely sane. If this is the case, then how can society protect potential victims? How can maniacs be found before they build their underground prisons?

After Viktor Mokhov’s arrest, Skopin residents broke all the windows of his home. His mother, Alisa Valentinovna, boarded them up and locked herself in the darkness, just as her son had done to the girls from Ryzansk. Mokhov received 17 years in prison for his crimes.

“They give you less for murder!” Mokhov writes in his letters. Instead of compensating for the damage caused to his former sex slaves, Mokhov lovingly sends his monthly pension checks to his mother. He asks her to write to the president and sends her ready made texts: “Honorable president! I sincerely request your help in re-examining my son’s case. His sentence is illegal. The accusations are built on the victims’ testimonies without any evidence. My son was always involved in socially useful work and has a 37-year work history.”

“Nonsense!” Valentinovna said. “He doesn’t really think I’ll write that, does he?” she asked. Valentinovna can’t explain what happened to her son shortly before retirement. He had once been such a quiet, modest boy who didn’t drink or smoke. There seems to be only one explanation, as banal as it may seem. Mokhov got mixed up with the wrong crowd.

It’s a complicated story. Mokhov had a girlfriend named Inka, who was sent to prison for killing her lover. He waited for her faithfully. But when Inka was released from prison, she left Mokhov for her lesbian girlfriend Lena. It was Lena who helped Mokhov poison the two girls and lure them into his vault as a form of compensation. Lena was later sentenced to 5 years for her crimes. She’ll be released soon. Sadly, no one will meet her. Last month Inka got drunk and drowned in a cesspool. So it seems life isn’t boring in Skopin. I guess that’s why the cafe menus often start with the price of broken dishes and seats.

“Man is an animal by nature. Dissatisfaction is the foundation of his behavior,” said Dmitriy Plotkin, former special affairs investigator at the Ryazansk Regional Prosecutor’s Office, who took part in the case. “When the beard starts to gray, some people see they lived their entire lives with little to no sexual development. So Mokhov went out and dug a hole three years just to sleep with a woman! One wise quote like we found at Mokhov’s place is enough to trigger the crime: ‘If an elderly creature reproduces with a young one, then the former will grow younger.’”

Only two questions remain. How many men have a similar dream? And how many bunkers are already filled with prisoners?

They and It

Freud referred to the animal that controls a man’s decisions and forces him to hunt for prey as the “It.” Modern society takes this issue all too lightly. And this is unfortunate. Many scholars attribute the gruesome path taken by Hitler’s Third Reich to his sexual problems.

Most “wardens” of home prisons, including Fritzl, Komin, the Belgian rapist and killer Dyutru and the French Furnire, have served time for rape. What they did later — digging bunkers and forcing girls inside — is a repeat manifestation of this “It.”

Many parents lose their children because no one keeps an eye on sexual offenders after they are released from prison. Although Fritzl served time in 1967 for raping a nurse, Austrian archives only store information on sex offenders for 5 years. Thus, he faced little difficulty in becoming the father and grandfather to his daughter’s children. No one was regularly checking up on him. After Fritzl was released from prison, he had three children in his official family and 7 kids in his unofficial one.

Police have put together psychological portraits of potential rapists who are prone to keeping sex slaves. But hundreds of thousands of men fall into the category — 40 and older, technical education, sexual problems, authoritarian mother, fights in childhood, greed and exceptional professional characteristics.

Who can help weed out the perpetrators?

If rapists can’t be castrated, then we need to look for the bunkers that they’ve built. What advice should be given to those searching for these bunkers? I headed back to Ryzan to talk with Katya, who escaped four years ago. She once offered her advice to people in similar situations in KP (March 2004). I thought that she may have some insight.

Witnesses must have suspected something was going in in the cases of Mokhov, Fritzl, Komin and Priklopil. So who can the police rely on for reliable information? I asked Katya.

The neighbors? Katya says that this is unlikely.

Mokhov’s neighbors must have seen him climbing into his vault from his garage. But they kept silent.

Komin’s neighbors once asked him what he was digging. But they were satisfied with the answer: “Growing cucumbers.”

Maybe family members? That’s doubtful.

All Skopin residents are sure that Mokhov’s mother knew what was going on. And Valentinovna herself doesn’t hide this fact.

“Who’s in there?” Valentinovna once asked her son. “Just a refugee,” he answered and she calmed down.

Theoretically, Rosemary should have suspected her husband was up to something. She would have found the basement lair if she had checked the water or electric meter just once in 24 years. But her husband insisted that he would look after the electricity and heating as is customary in many small towns. So she never asked any questions.

How about local shop owners? Probably not.

Fritzl drove hundreds of kilometers to large supermarkets to avoid suspicion when purchasing children’s underwear and women’s hygienic goods.

How about the police then? That’s also not a fail-safe option.

Kampush’s lawyer said that the police conducted the most wide-scale searches in Austria’s history.

Russian police also searched for Lena and Katya in the Rzyansk region, but for some reason skipped over Skopin entirely.

The police did not react at all to Elizabeth’s disappearance in 1984. Instead they took Fritzl’s word that she had run off and joined a sect.

Tatyana Melnikova was held captive by a maniac in Vyatskie Polyany. She died in poverty before receiving any assistance from the state.

“We would have found these criminals more quickly back in the Soviet days,” said a retired Ryzansk police officer who I bumped into in Rzyansk. In the Soviet days, he said, someone would have told the police that Mokhov kept a prostitute in his cellar for one week and let her go long before he captured Katya and Lena.

Desensitized from the horror

The Russian and Austrian stories are similar. But they have different endings. Austrian citizens donated so much money to the Natasha Kampush Fund that she began sharing the money with other victims. She could even buy an apartment with all the money she received for interviews. The situation is more complicated for Fritzl’s family, but Austria certainly won’t leave them impoverished either. At the moment they are receiving state-sponsored medical treatment.

What about Russia?

In spring 2004, KP published Lena’s and Katya’s bank details and wrote: “Readers! We need your help! These girls have returned home to see the light of day, but not life itself. They need time and money to heal. Please help them forget the awful nightmare they were forced to live through.”

Four years later, I called them to find out if they had received much money as a result of the ad. Only 1,000 rubles a piece.

“So many horrible things are happening in Russia that people have become desensitized,” Lena said laughingly.

But money isn’t the only important thing. Everything turned out just fine for Katya and Lena. They both rehabilitated and got married. Of course, instead of receiving help from the state, they ended up having to prolong their torment by undergoing medical examinations and driving up to 150 kilometers a day to attend 18 court proceedings shortly after their escape.

Eventually Lena received a diploma as a guide and translator without attending any courses. She studied English while imprisoned to keep from going mad. Katya became a wonderful artist during her 3.5 years of captivity. Unfortunately, she wasn’t allowed to enroll at the professional art school as they required her to attend paid courses. So Katya stopped drawing and writing poetry.

After publishing one of her poems four years ago, KP was sure publishing houses would be knocking at her door. Strange. How could they have passed up such a story? A young girl who wrote 321 poems as a sex slave in captivity?!

Today, Katya is trying to write again. But this time she’s writing prose. READ MORE

Russian and Austrian sex maniacs share shocking similarities. Part 1

Such coincidences usually only happen in the movies. All these Russian and Austrian sex maniacs were electricians who built nearly identical bunkers for their victims. What’s the root cause behind the growing trend in sex slavery?

One cannot help but wonder how the drama went unnoticed for so long.

Just imagine the small town of Amstetten, Austria. On a quiet road rests a light blue home with ornate paintings decorating the rooms inside. Here lived Joseph Fritzl, 73 years old, his wife Rosemary and their many children.

But beneath the property’s loving facade lies a concrete labyrinth that once housed Fritzl’s numerous victims.

Newspapers worldwide recently reported how Fritzl held his daughter Elizabeth captive in his basement for 24 years. Each year she bore him more children. Fritzl brought the three loudest infants upstairs. He told his wife that their daughter had joined a religious sect and left the newborns on their doorstep in the night. In the evenings, Fritzl went downstairs via a secret passage in the garage to see the other children. One died in infancy and Fritzl burned the child’s body in the same gas furnace where Rosemary baked biscuits on holidays.

Given the recent trend in such crimes, the main shock factor of Fritzl’s story is how long Elizabeth was held captive. Austria witnessed a similar crime only several years ago. Natasha Kampush, who was then 18, ran away from her captor Wolfgang Priklopil after 8 years of confinement. Russia wasn’t shocked at the crime itself either. In 2004, Lena and Katya, two girls from Rzyansk, were freed from a vault beneath a garage owned by Viktor Mokhov, a factory worker in Skopin. Back then, their story was beyond comprehension. But today, they seem lucky. Three and a half years of abuse is insignificant compared to Elizabeth’s quarter-century of captivity.

Despite several differences, the horrible tales of captivity are nearly identical. The Austrian bunker was in fact much more comfortable than its Russian analogue at 55 square meters with two rooms, a kitchen, a tiled shower and a washing machine. (The Russian bunker was primitive — a 5-square-meter hovel with an electric oven and bucket instead of a toilet.) But Amstetten and Skopin both have a population of 25,000 and seem peaceful rural towns to outsiders. What else ties together the fate of Mokhov, an unmarried Russian who lived with his mother and had no personal life, and Fritzl, an Austrian family man and father to numerous children living near the Alps?

“He did what many people think about doing…”

It would be wrong to say that Skopin and Amstetten are backwards in some way. News reports about similar incidents in France, Belgium, Hungary and Italy have hit kiosks in recent weeks. What unites these criminals who imprison and sexually abuse their victims?

Psychologists say that they crave absolute power. This forces them to build a world that they alone can rule. With one press of a button, Mokhov was able to cut off the ventilation in the small bunker if his victims refused to fulfill his sexual fantasies. Meanwhile, psychologists called Fritzl an egoist after stating that he liked to feel like God. But such an illness falls outside the realm of psychiatric pathologies. Fritzl is more a victim of psychological licentiousness than anything else.

“Fritzl did what many people think about doing,” Director of the Sigmund Freud Fund Inga Shultz-Strasser told KP.

But thinking is not doing. Fortunately, few people manifest their sexual fetishes by oppressing others.

Mokhov learned how to build bunkers while watching a documentary film about the criminal Aleksandr Komin. Ten years ago, Komin built a vault where he forcibly kept two slaves. He tattooed the word “SLAVE” on their foreheads and made them stitch robes for his makeshift enterprise. After Mokhov was captured, he confessed that he plagiarized Komin. When Mokhov saw him describing how he built the cell on television, he said to himself: “I can do better than that!”

Nightmare on Fritzl’s Street

“We just live far too well. And we’re all going mad from the fat,” said the salesgirl at the flower shop near Fritzl’s home when I asked her if Amstetten was to blame for what happened.

No journalist would have ever stepped foot in the tranquil Amstetten if it wasn’t for Fritzl. The town is boring and clean, and the people are beaming and bursting at the seams like overfed tomatoes. Many are willing to give their two cents about the incidents.

“I won’t tell you if Fritzl was my client,” said a hairdresser in the neighboring building. “Because that would be unethical. And also because my uncle raped me when I was 13 years old.”

“When I rented an apartment from Fritzl, I often heard strange sounds coming from the cellar,” Elizabeth’s schoolmate Alfred Dubanovskiy told journalists.

But it isn’t easy to get an inside look into how the investigation is unfolding. The police monitor Fritzl’s home 24/7. When people get too close to the property, the police run over and say that they can’t proceed any further and have been told not to comment on the incident. Trying to interrogate the neighbors to get details is also pointless. Austrians don’t like poking their noses in others’ affairs.

Interestingly, it seems that no one knew anything about Fritzl’s crime during Elizabeth’s captivity. This includes the whole Fritzl family (6 children besides Elizabeth) and all the tenants living in their home. One reason why is that they used the front door of the premises to enter and leave the house. Fritzl, however, pulled his vehicle into the covered garage where he had access to a secret, locked entrance to the basement. As a result, no one saw him taking the washing machine downstairs or regularly bringing up garbage.

Viktor Mokhov wasn’t at all concerned with the design. His prisoners had to decorate the walls themselves with gouache.

But there are doubts about the involvement of Fritzl’s wife. Did Rosemary really not know what was going on all that time? Oddly enough the entire street says, “No.”

“She’s such a kind, generous woman!” they say. “She takes her kids to study music and play sports. And her husband is a fop. So spic and span… He acted more like a minister than an electrician!”

Fritzl’s neighbors Ingrid and Gertruda, two elderly women, defended Rosemary on camera.

“He was such a tyrant!” they said. “But Rosemary is a good woman who got married at 17!”

The question about what to do with the unfortunate home weighs heavy on the minds of Amstetten residents. The basement can be turned into a museum of horrors, or the past can simply be laid to rest.

“You’ll see. Soon something worse will happen and they’ll forget all about us!” a pharmacist told us near Fritzl’s home.

“This is private property,” said Hermann Hruber, an employee at the local mayor’s office. “The home has an owner. That individual needs to decide what will happen to the property.” So it seems that Fritzl will keep control of the situation even in prison. In Austria, breaching rights to personal property is just as severe an offense as infringing someone’s personal freedom. READ MORE

Will Russia’s population drop one-third by the mid-2000s?

Fewer than 100 million Russians will remain. That’s what the UN stats say anyway

In 2050, Russia will be inhabited by at most 98 million people, down from today’s 142 million. Moreover, every third Russian will be older than 60. These are the UN stats announced recently by the Russian Demographic Research Institute. So is the future really that bleak? Does Russia have any hope?

Population is dropping (less) slowly

In the past 15 years, Russia’s population decreased by 6 million people — roughly the number of inhabitants in the two populous regions Chelyabinsk and Kemerovsk. Some years Russia lost 600,000-700,000, or almost the whole population of a regional capital.

But has Russia seen the light at the end of the tunnel? In 2007, the population decreased by only 237,000, or 2-3 times less than prior years. Why? Because of a demographic boom. Russians gave birth to 1.6 million babies, or 122,000 more than in 2006. The death rate also dropped, as fewer Russians die from heart disease and alcohol poisoning. There are also fewer murders and suicides.

Migrants will save us

Yep. The awful stats leave little room for hope. Russia’s baby boom may have helped a bit, but far less than the increasing wave of migrants. New immigration laws led to 287,000 migrants arriving to Russia in 2007, or 1.5 times more than in 2006. These Uzbeks, Tajiks and Azeris are working to pump up Russia’s population. But the number of Russians is continuing to decrease, especially in the Far East, eastern Siberia and northwest.

Not long ago, Saint Petersburg’s North-West Strategic Development Center announced their demographic prognosis for 2025. The projections are shocking. The number of residents in the Kaliningrad region, which is relatively financially secure, will decrease 10 percent. The population of Russia’s northern capital Saint Petersburg will decrease 30 percent. The population of the Murmansk region will also drop to half the 1990 figure.

Demographic scientists say that Russia’s ethnic makeup will continue to change steadily. The country’s highest birth rates are in Chechnya, Ingushetiya and Dagestan. And there are more migrants to Russia each year. In 2007, nearly one-third of the 101,000 babies born in Moscow were of Central Asian or Caucasus descent.

Could these migrants be a blessing for Russia? Even the world’s top power, the U.S., is a melting pot of migrants.

“The U.S. is a rich country and doesn’t let everyone in. So primarily highly qualified specialists are allowed to emigrate,” said Anatoliy Antonov, deputy chair of Family Sociology and Demographics at Moscow State University’s Sociology Faculty. “But the least qualified individuals from the most poorly developing countries migrate to Russia.”

These are the people who are forming the new Russia. In the best-case scenario they are the leaders of the “Our Russia” movement. In the worst-case scenario they are simply criminals. Take Moscow for example. The capital is rife with almost a dozen ethnic criminal groups.

Baby boom about to bust

“Today the populous generation of the mid- and late-1980s has started to reproducing,” said Oksana Kuchmaeva, deputy laboratory head of Family Policy Issues at the Family and Upbringing Institute. “The birth rate sharply increased in the period following the anti-alcohol order.”

In the next 3-4 years, demographic scientists say, the birth rate will continue to increase.

“But soon the generation that was born in the new Russia, and not the Soviet Union, in the 1990s, will get married,” said Valeriy Elizarov, director of the Center for Population Issues Studies at Moscow State University’s Economic Faculty. “And it’s a small generation! This means that there will be fewer marriages and children. Even now I’ll refrain to comment on the increased birth rate. We’ve really only mined another demographic pit. Our demographic crisis is continuing.”

Here’s one comparison. In 1989, 2.1 million babies were born in Russia. After the economic crisis in 1999, only 1.2 million babies were born. By 2020, this “crisis generation” will hit the stage and deal another blow to the birth rate as the number of potential mothers and fathers is few. The demographic boom will be replaced by a lull as in the 1990s.

So maybe the new generation will give birth more? What if they have not one, but two or three children?

There is little hope for that unfortunately…

The family is gone

Today 65 percent of Russian families have only one child. Sociologists report that only one-third of them want a second child. Twenty-eight percent of families have two or more children and only 7 percent of them want a third. Today, the average Russian woman gives birth to 1.3 children during her lifetime. But this number must increase to 2.2 to keep the population from dying out. Sadly, sociologists say that Russia has assumed Europe’s tradition of having too few children. Life’s priorities are career, buying an apartment and car and then children. Materialism, to say the least.

“Modern-day youth wait for a stable career and home and only then begin to finely plan a child. It’s the Western way,” said renowned author Mariya Arbatova. “But these children start developing from the get-go and receive the very best. Today’s children, even in young families, undoubtedly have a better quality life than in the Soviet Union.”

Aha, so that is the trick, then?! Dialectics. The rule of quality as opposed to quantity. In Europe, people live much better than in China. But Europe is dying and Russia is following closely behind. Russia is simply having too few children.

“The family lifestyle is disappearing,” said Antonov. “Russia’s families are more like families in Sweden. Only 40 percent of all couples living together register their marriages. Of course those families cannot have many children.”

The fewer we are, the more we have?

Maybe there is a positive side to Russia’s decreasing population? Maybe the fewer we are, the more we will have? Maybe it is better for the remaining 90 million Russians to live well, than 200 million to live poorly.

“We won’t be able to live that well,” said Professor Nataliya Rimashevskaya, an advisor to the director of the Institute of Socio-Economic Problems of the Population at the Russian Academy of Sciences. “A nation’s population is its strength. Why are the Indians continuing to grow in number even though they are already over one billion? To protect themselves from their neighbors. We mustn’t fall in number either.”

The population density in Russia is 1.2 people per square meters. In China, there are 124 people. Even today, Russia’s southeastern neighbors are actively moving into Siberia and the Far East. They are trading, cutting down the forests and getting involved in agricultural activity. So what will happen when Siberia is completely devoid of inhabitants? There is no such thing as emptiness in the wilderness.

The aging population is also a burden, said Rimashevskaya. By 2050, Russia will have one-two retirees for every working individual. They need to be fed and cared after and receive pensions paid for by able-bodied citizens. So will we only work to feed our fathers?

“The situation is quite complex,” said Rimashevskaya, “but we can prepare for what’s coming. In the West, the number of retirees is already higher than in Russia. But regardless everyone is happy. We need to increase labor productivity and we’ll have enough for everyone. And we’ll be able to raise the birth rate. First we need to increase our standard of living, and also propagandize the value of the family, so youth don’t only think about having material possessions and careers. Second we need to feed pregnant women. Today, 40 percent suffer from anemia and give birth to sick children.” READ MORE

Sex recruiters hit Russia’s towns. Part 4

KP journalists decided to find out just how strictly the law treats the adult-services industry

Short summary

KP journalists Aleksandr Meshkov and Oleg Rukavitsyn headed to Ivanovo in the thick of Russia to hold a casting session for girls interested in earning money via sex services. One applicant realized a video camera was recording our conversation and she got angry and ran off to get her friends. They came to the apartment and stood outside the front door hoping to destroy the compromising material and smash Meshkov’s and Rukavitsyn’s faces in!

Run, Rabbit, Run!

From behind the door, they threatened to beat us to a pulp. It was dark and we thought the chances they would leave were few. We looked out the window gloomily at the black Audi parked in the yard. Its headlights were off and a thug in a leather jacket stood nearby smoking nervously. We thought we heard someone manning the corridor. And we could smell cigarette smoke from under the door.

We could not sleep. And so we waited until late. When we finally saw the car take off, we opened the window, climbed out and ran. We spent the remainder of the night at an automobile sales lot and hopped on a bus to Moscow in the morning.

Pretty woman

Meshkov tore off the flash drive that had been taped to his groin and shook his hands in victory. Then we sat down to watch the show.

Everything would have been funny if it had not been so sad. The girls were sullen, even though they pretended not to be. And their lives were sad and empty, although to some outsiders they probably seemed full of life, orgasms and tenderness.

We had nearly fulfilled our mission and made a bordello. If we were real pimps, we would have needed only to rent an apartment in the capital and pay a cut to the police for protection.

We hoped that the police would stop us during the initial stages of our investigation when we placed our advertisement in the papers. Almost all the girls knew what services they would have to offer if they ended up working with our company. But the police did nothing.

What’s worse is that we had almost given ourselves away up by taping our advertisements all over the main square. It’s not important where the whole story happened — in Pskov, Bryansk or Uglich… Regardless, we were in Russia.

We did not actually open a bordello afterwards, thank God. But we learned a great deal. There were no women among our applicants with a higher education. They were almost all factory workers — sewers, cooks, janitors and painters, who changed their profession often. One reason why they constantly shifted between jobs was their immense boredom. And the negative influence of fictional stories about oligarchs thirsting for young girls and fairytale blockbusters like “Pretty Woman” and “Glossy” should not be forgotten.

Many poor village girls are tired of dancing around in their thick rubber boots and homemade clothes with drunken slobs at square dances. They long for more fashionable love affairs. And while our country is pretending to wage war against prostitution, the phenomenon is growing and gaining pace like a locomotive. READ MORE

Sex recruiters hit Russia’s towns. Part 3

KP journalists decided to find out just how strictly the law treats the adult-services industry

It’s Candid Camera

Everything start off just fine. We spoke to the girls and pretended to enter their information into the computer. Meshkov briefly inspected their bodies as any army recruitment officer would and wrote “Fit For Use” in their application forms. One day, though, our mobile phone connection suddenly went dead and we had no way to contact the outside world. Our potential applicants could no longer reach us. After cursing our mobile operator, we hurried to the main square and started gluing job advertisements all over with our apartment’s landline. We also approached good-looking women on the street and offered them a contract for VIP work in the capital. Needless to say we were turned away time and again.

We headed home discontented hoping for a miracle. And then it happened. In an hour, several applicants called our landline and the recruitment recommenced.

Ludmila was a colorful, sexy blond in a tempting short skirt with short legs, and short fingers covered in gold. She was confident and even a bit rude. She was also the only intellectual among the applicants. She had read “The Da Vinci Code.” She asked most of the questions.

“What’s the police situation like in Moscow? I saw on TV there are raids everyday. It won’t happen like that. I’ll quit everything, go to the capital and then get caught?!” she said.

“You mean no one gets caught here?” we asked.

“Here? Never!” she said proudly. “We have a lot of policemen among our regular clients.”

“Freebies at the station on Saturdays?” we asked.

“Why free?” she asked insulted. “They pay like everyone else. Hey, what’s that over there? A video camera?” She froze. “Are you taping this?”

“Where?” we asked puzzled, trying unsuccessfully to disguise the camera in a plastic bag. “No, it’s nothing…”

“Do you take me for an idiot?” she said. “I see it! Delete everything you taped!” she added threateningly.

“There’s nothing there!” we said stubbornly.

“Okay,” she said, jumping up from the chair. “If you don’t want to do it the easy way, then we’ll do it the hard way. They’ll delete you in a second then…” And she bolted out the apartment.

A knock in the night

We rushed around the apartment in panic. Victims of our own carelessness, we did not want to be burned at the stake at such a young age. It was a bit aggravating. We had tried so hard to mask the camera. We thought we would have made James Bond proud. We looked for a place to hide the flash drive with the scandalous video. And after a lengthy search, Meshkov decided to tape it to the inside of his groin. Gathering our things, we headed to the metal door that separated us from our freedom. And just when we were about to open it, when we heard a loud knocking.

When the telephone is the enemy

We stopped.

“Open up the door, you jerks, or I’ll bust it down!” someone screamed from under the door. Judging from the noise there were at least three or four guys standing outside. They rang the bell, cursed loudly and tried to pry their way in. We hoped the neighbors would call the police after hearing all the commotion.

We stood still for 10 minutes hoping they would think no one was home. Then we could hear them talking about something. And just when it seemed that they were ready to leave, justice had won and we were saved, the mobile phone in Meshkov’s pocket began to ring. Startled, Meshkov stumbled backwards and loudly knocked over the stool behind him. READ MORE

Sex recruiters hit Russia’s towns. Part 2

KP journalists decided to find out just how strictly the law treats the adult-services industry

Girl from the North

We met a girl from chilly Yakutsk named Katerina. She had a sly look a bit reminiscent of Lenin. She smelled like a perfume stall that had been ransacked by hooligans. She was open, clean and tall with long legs and a C-cup.

I fed Katerina a Snickers, gave her a Martini and started to ask her questions. She answered them all without hesitation — even the most intimate. She had left Yakutsk after a misfortune love affair. She arrived in Ivanovo hoping to enroll at the Textile University. But she failed the entrance examinations and began working as a dishwasher instead. She only made 2,000 rubles per month. And all her money was spent on food and renting a room at the dormitory. Like many young female factory workers, Katerina wanted a full pretty life. She was forced to enter the growing sex-services industry to support herself. Now some days she can spend 3,000 rubles on her loved ones.

One and the same women

Our applicants varied in size and shape. But their personal histories were similar. Nearly all of them were from rural towns and broken families. They all had experience in the sex trade. They started selling their bodies when they had financial difficulty. They were cautious about our proposed move to Moscow.

The 20-year-old Svetlana is a blond from Ryazhsk with big breasts. Some days she earns 2,000-3,000 rubles. She used to work 6 months sewing and made a salary of 10,000 rubles per month. Today, though, she sells her body for 1,600 rubles per hour. She gives her boss half the amount. Girls in good shape handle 4-5 clients per day. Some months Svetlana makes 30,000 rubles, although her clientèle is unsteady.

Spending cash money

“Isn’t that a lot — 5 clients per day?” we asked Svetlana.

“If they aren’t drunk it’s okay. And if they aren’t black,” she said. “And if it’s one at a time and not a whole bunch at once.”

“Does that happen, too?” I asked in disbelief.

“With me it hasn’t,” Svetlana said after a moment. “But my girlfriend had to do 15 at one time. They didn’t even warn her. Bastards.”

We sat smoking despondently.

“What do you buy yourself for 30,000 rubles per month?” I asked.

“I buy sweets and expensive clothing,” she said. “Chanel perfume… I bought a cardigan yesterday for 1,500 rubles.” She touched the transparent top delicately. “I also buy toys for my younger sister,” she added. “I sent her a plush teddy bear Friday. The package weighed three kilograms. She’s 11 years old. I’m planning on buying her a mobile phone soon.”

“Do you have any hobbies? What books do you read? What films do you watch?” I asked.

“My girlfriend and I usually watch ‘Clone.’ And someone stole my book… It was about love. The husband kept cheating on his wife and she cried.”

“That sounds familiar,” I said. “Who is the author? George Sand?”

“Who the hell knows?” she said exhaling loudly. “My hobby is going shopping.”

“But you don’t really like doing this… business?” I asked.

“Well it’s better than sitting behind a piece of machinery all day like an idiot,” she said. “And today everyone’s doing it.”

“How much money do you need to be happy?” I asked.

“$100,000,” she said without a moment’s thought.

“Why?” I asked.

“To buy an apartment and have a child,” she said.

“Without a husband?” I asked.

“What the hell would I need him for? I lived in a common law marriage with one jerk. We only had problems,” she said. “He came home drunk everyday.”

“Okay, well, let’s go have a look at you in all your beauty, so to speak,” Meshkov said like a old gynecologist.

“Should I wash first?” she asked livening up. READ MORE

Sex recruiters hit Russia’s towns. Part 1

KP journalists decided to find out just how strictly the law treats the adult-services industry

Russia’s evening news programs occasionally report how the police uncovered the latest bordello after a series of detailed investigations. However, advertisements for adult services are on the rise. Dens of debauchery tempting grown men to spend unforgettable evenings with young blonds close down only to reappear in seeming franchise. Who opens these establishments? And why? Russian legislation envisages prison time for luring individuals into prostitution. So is the law negligible? KP decided to take an inside look at Russia’s prostitution ring to find out. Police statistics show that most prostitutes arrive to the capital from the regions, so KP headed to small cities and towns.

Work or play? Leisure or employment?

Ivanovo is a small austere city that is fairly clean and devoid of outward signs of moral decay. After a look around, our first step was to rent a two-room apartment near Lenin Square. The price: 2,000 rubles per day.

After settling in, we studied the local sex-services industry by flipping through the newspapers. Adult advertisements are usually printed in the “Leisure” section in most Russian cities, but here we found them in the “Seeking Employment” section. Although the easy explanation is that Ivanovo residents consider prostitution to be more work than play, we learned that advertising sex services is prohibited in the city. The loophole is to place an advertisement as an individual looking for employment. For some reason the city finds this method easier to swallow. The city avoids getting a poor reputation and women in the industry are not left without a job.

“Young lady, 18 years old, neat and attractive. Thin without complexes. Looking for highly paid work in the services sector at a time suitable for you.” And adjacent to that advertisement: “Chief engineer looking for highly paid work,” “Driver without bad habits and a new vehicle looking for work,” “Female, aged 35, real estate agent, tidy, looking for work. Will consider all proposals.” It is not hard to guess who is offering real skills outside the bedroom and who is mattress bound.

“We’d like to offer you some highly paid work,” said KP journalist Aleksandr Meshkov in his soft velvety baritone.

“We’ve got a brunette for 1,600 rubles per hour. Height 180 centimeters. B-cup,” the managers told us over the phone yawning intermittently.

“But is she attractive at least?” we asked hopefully.

“She’s ordinary, but keeps clean. If you’re looking for beauties straight off magazine covers then you’re knocking on the wrong door,” they said.

Understood. So we placed an advertisement in the local papers that said the Moscow firm “Etual” was inviting young women for VIP work in the leisure sector in Moscow. And all we had to do was sit back and wait for the calls.

Mandates for deputies

We should mention that we took a huge risk in placing that advertisement. Legislation foresees administrative punishment for prostitution and criminal punishment for luring an individual into the trade. So we sat watching the clock, waiting for the cops to send in a tall-legged undercover agent. The phone did not ring all Saturday morning until lunchtime. It was not long, though, before the calls started coming in.

“What type of VIP work is this?” the interested female applicants asked us feigning naivety.

“Are you fit? We have very high standards,” we asked.

“We’re in great shape,” they giggled.

We told them that they would service the higher echelons of the power structures, leaders of political parties, social movements, public prosecutors and deputies. Although some girls lost interest when they found out they would have to provide sex services, others were curious to learn more details about where they would work and how much they would make. We listed the women interested in attending our casting session and allocated them one hour apiece.

By the evening, our apartment had transformed into a little jubilant political headquarters with a spot of eroticism. The girls differed in color, size and temperament. Some sat gloomily and stared at us suspiciously with their heads down and answered “yes” or “no.” Others grabbed a glass of Martini, told us about themselves and were in no rush to leave our humble seraglio. The majority refused to be photographed and said that they were secretive about their work. READ MORE