6 THE JAPAN TIMES SATURDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2010 (4) world IN BRIEF Moscow’s new chief ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- U.K. nuclear sub runs aground London AFP-JIJI A British nuclear submarine ran aground off a Scottish island Siberia’s silent fixer Friday, the Defense Ministry said, adding that there were no immediate signs of any casualties or environmental damage. HMS Astute — which only entered service in August and is beria also make him an unusu- billed as the Royal Navy’s most powerful hunter-killer Putin loyalist al figure in a government submarine — got into trouble near the Isle of Skye. dominated by Putin’s cronies A Ministry of Defense spokesman said that the rudder of the shuns public, from St. Petersburg. £3.5 billion ($5.5 billion) submarine had become ‘‘grounded.’’ Having a mayor that has ‘‘Whilst conducting a personnel transfer, HMS Astute works behind never known any electoral grounded her rudder in the vicinity of the Isle of Skye. She was support will be a new experi- initially unable to free herself and we are waiting for the next ence for Muscovites. Although high tide,’’ the spokesman said. the scenes Luzhkov was appointed for his ‘‘No part of the Astute’s nuclear propulsion system is damaged last term, his legacy as a popu- or in danger of being damaged. We can confirm there are no Moscow larly elected official was still injuries to personnel and there is no environmental damage.’’ AFP-JIJI strong. The ministry added in a statement: ‘‘This is a not a nuclear ------------------------------------------ ‘‘He has a harsh, difficult incident.’’ In contrast to his populist pre- character and no ideas of his The accident comes just days after the government decessor, Yury Luzhkov, the own,’’ Russian Newsweek announced sweeping cuts to Britain’s armed forces, including man inaugurated Thursday as magazine wrote this week, the scrapping of its flagship aircraft carrier, HMS Ark Royal. Moscow’s new mayor is a low- quoting a White House official, profile fixer brought up in Si- ‘‘A great apparatchik, a func- beria and seen as reliably loy- tion-man,’’ polar opposite of Egypt’s Mubarak to seek sixth term al to the ruling elite. Sergei Sobyanin eccentric Moscow patriarch Cairo AFP-JIJI Sergei Sobyanin was until Luzhkov. Egypt’s octogenarian president, Hosni Mubarak, in power for 30 now chief of staff to Prime years, even leading to ru- In a 2000 interview with Ar- years and whose health has raised questions, is to run for Minister Vladimir Putin and mors he could be a surprise gumenty I Fakty newspaper, re-election in 2011, a high-ranking ruling party official said should present the federal au- candidate in the 2012 presi- Sobyanin said he was descend- Thursday. thorities with far fewer prob- dential election. ed from peasants who lived in ‘‘The candidate of the National Democratic Party will be lems than Luzhkov, who was Brought up in a small vil- the city of Nizhny Novgorod in President Mohammed Hosni Mubarak. At that moment, the fired by President Dmitry lage in the far northern region northwestern Russia and from candidate will be Mohammed Hosni Mubarak,’’ Ali El Din Hilal Medvedev. of Khanty-Mansiysk, Soby- Cossacks in the Ural region. said in an interview broadcast by Arabic-language U.S. satellite Luzhkov, who liked to pre- anin has served as a govern- In the same interview, he TV channel Alhurra. sent himself as the archetypal ment official for almost his en- boasted of his love of hunting Mubarak, 82, has never stated whether he will run for what Muscovite in a flat cap, built tire life, after a brief stint as a and outdoor pursuits. would be a sixth six-year term. up his own power base in Mos- metal worker. ‘‘I could ski before I took the Political observers question whether he is up to the task, cow, posing a worry for the au- He began his post-Soviet po- first step. And I went hunting particularly after he underwent surgery in March to have his thorities ahead of the 2012 litical career at the age of 33 as in the taiga with a double- gall bladder and a duodenal polyp removed. presidential election. mayor of Kogalym, a Siberian barreled gun when I was a 15- There has been widespread speculation that his son, Gamal, Sobyanin, 52, has the repu- town that is strongly tied to the year-old,’’ he said. will be put forward as his potential successor. tation of being a pragmatist Lukoil oil fields nearby. ‘‘Sometimes you need to re- and a Putin loyalist. A former He also held several parlia- move emotional pressure by governor of the Siberian re- mentary posts and was the being in extreme situations to- Cuba to free five more dissidents gion of Tyumen, he was unex- presidential envoy to the gether with nature.’’ Havana AFP-JIJI pectedly summoned to Mos- Urals before being elected Sobyanin’s love of the wil- From Russia with love: Anna Chapman poses with a gun on the front cover of the November Cuba has authorized the release of five extra dissidents who are cow by Putin in 2005 to head his governor of the key energy- derness gives him something issue of Maxim magazine’s Russian edition. AP not among the 52 already set for freedom under a landmark deal administration. rich Tyumen region in 2001, re- in common with Putin, who reached in May, the Catholic Church said Thursday. Putin recruited Sobyanin to maining in the post until sum- spent this summer in macho They ‘‘have accepted to leave prison and be transferred to replace his protege, Medved- moned to Moscow by Putin. encounters with wild ani- Chapman bares little in magazine Spain,’’ the Havana archbishopric said in a statement, naming ev, who at that time became He was the first Siberian mals, including a bear and a them as Juana Maria Nieves, Domingo Ozuna, Juan Francisco first deputy prime minister. governor to join ruling party whale, on the Kamchatka Marimon, Misael Mena and Jose Luis Ramil. Sobyanin later stayed on as United Russia and is one of the Peninsula. Moscow interview that accompanies is betrayal. It could be fatal to The development came hours after the European Parliament Putin’s chief of staff after party’s top officials. He has Sobyanin heads the board of AP the racy photos in Maxim. one’s career. awarded its prestigious Sakharov human rights prize to Cuban Medvedev was elected presi- held the position of deputy directors of Channel One, Rus- ------------------------------------------ ‘‘Charm, like love and As a spy, albeit a failed one, dissident Guillermo Farinas, who immediately called for an end dent in 2008. prime minister since 2008. sia’s largest government-con- Russian spy Anna Chapman friendship, is the same every- Chapman understands the to Cuba’s communist ‘‘dictatorship.’’ While relatively unknown Sobyanin is one of the least trolled television channel. He was revealed by others in June where,’’ she informs the mag- need for self-censorship better Farinas, who heads the outlawed online news agency to the masses, Sobyanin’s public figures in the govern- also headed the board of Rus- as a sleeper agent in the Unit- azine. than most. Better a revealing Cubanacan Press, held a 135-day hunger strike earlier this year weight in the government has ment, rarely giving inter- sian nuclear fuel producer ed States. Now she has decid- ‘‘Most men can be divided photo than a revealing inter- that nearly killed him. He refused to eat until it was clear the grown considerably in recent views. His years working in Si- TVEL for several years. ed to reveal more of herself. into three categories: the view. She brushed away ques- Cuban government would release dissidents. She has stripped down to primitive ones who only need tions from a reporter when she black lingerie for a photo sex, the smarter ones who made an appearance at the Ex-Chancellor Schmidt’s wife dies Court blasts Moscow’s ban on gay pride marches spread in the Russian edition want to be loved, and then the launching of a Russian rocket of Maxim, appearing on the last group, those who not only earlier this month. Berlin AFP-JIJI Strasbourg France AP Russia is a member of the Council of Europe. cover of the November issue want to be loved but also need ‘‘The most negative feeling I Hannelore Schmidt, wife and childhood sweetheart of former The European Court of Human Rights The case was launched by Nikolay Alekseyev, under the caption ‘‘For Your for that love to be the biggest am capable of having toward a German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, has died aged 91, his office condemned Russia on Thursday for letting an organizer of several Moscow marches, to Eyes Only.’’ That is the title of and most beautiful feeling in man is pity,’’ she tells Maxim. said Thursday. Moscow ban gay pride marches simply because a highlight discrimination against gays and lesbians. a 1981 James Bond movie. their lives. It’s hardest of all The cover shot shows her in Known affectionately by her husband and the wider public as former mayor — who compared gays to the devil Moscow’s mayor at the time, Yuri Luzhkov, Since Chapman, a red- with this last group, but that’s black lingerie, holding a gun ‘‘Loki,’’ the popular chain-smoking Schmidt passed away — and other officials disapproved of them. ensured that gay pride parades, which never got haired 28-year-old, was de- my favorite one.’’ aloft as huge diamond ear- overnight at her home in the northern city of Hamburg.