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THURSDAY MARCH 23 rd
Live Music w/
Only Show this Semester!!!
Doors open at 8pm
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*1 bar drinks 41110 p m -
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for details
Party Safe and Designate a Driver
Are you concerned about balancing
your job and your personal life?
Are you afraid (bat your career
and social life may collide?
Iben join us for this panel discussion
to learn bow three companies are
helping their employees balance these
integral aspects of their lives.
Wednesday, Nmti 19,10m
5:30-7*0 pm
301 Rudder
PANEL PARTICIPANTS
ftoi Mtmn
Business Partner Program Manager
IBM
1 Marina Poza-Grise
Director of Human Resources for
Chemical Solutions Enterprise
DuPont
Karo Pelecky
Manager
Ernst& Young
WORLD
Page 12
THE BATTALION
Thursday, ManM
Election apathy runs high in Russi: Pit
irsday, March
Putin, politics viewed as having little impact on daily lk ase \
CPIELYABINSK, Russia (AP) -
Tractors arc the key to how Valery
Pozdeyev will vote in Russia’s presi
dential eleclion on Sunday.
Look at the output at the Chelyabin
sk Tractor Factory, a mini-metropolis of
tin-roofed warehouses, grease puddles
and conveyor belts that dominates the
skyline and economy ofthe Siberian city
where Pozdeyev is deputy director.
In 1989, during the communist era,
the factory made 2,580 tractors a month.
By 1998, output had plummeted to just
eight tractors a month; now, 250 tractors
a month roll off factory assembly lines.
Pozdeyev credits acting President
Vladimir Putin with the recent growth
and plans to vote for him.
In industrial regions across Russia,
Putin is reaping political benefits from
an improved economy that has con
vinced many that, as Pozdeyev puts it,
“returning to the Soviet era is not the
only path to prosperity.’'
Not that Chelyabinsk, 950 miles east
of Moscow, is prosperous now; it’s just
not as poor as a few years ago, during the
worst of Russia’s post-Soviet recession.
The region’s renowned nuclear re
search facilities sit idle. Residents
who contracted cancer living down
stream from nuclear test sites cannot
afford treatment. Major highways are
slalom courses of months-old snow
and ice because most snowplows are
broken. Organized crime and corrup
tion are rampant, as are deals for
barter instead of cash.
Bus stops are plastered with posters
offering jobs at metallurgy and ma
chine-building factories, a welcome
sign after
terland say whoever heads the govern
ment won’t make any difference. Around
Russia’s regions, many voters feel be
trayed and alienated by Kremlin politics
after a decade in which a small elite
amassed fortunes while their salaries and
savings shriveled.
“Moscow has nothing to do w ith us.
The politicians there are corrupt and
don’t care
years of
layoffs.
Shoppers
swarm an
outdoor
market of
fering
cheap
Chinese
radios.
Putin
has almost
nothing to
do with
//
People are no longer
waiting for salvation
from Moscow. ... That
is
a key step away from
communism.
— Oleg Kozmin
Chelyabinsk environmental activist
what happens
to us,” Nina
Fazeyeva
said, tucking
her white hair
into her fuzzy
headscarf and
watching over
her wares:
homegrown
beets and car
rots piled on
an overturned
cardboard box
Chelyabinsk environmental active;
Regional leaders are wary of]
suggestions that he would streoslfej
central government.
“Moscow is an islandthatis
farther and farther from its sufe]
said Pyotr Sumin, the ChelyaW
gion’s centrist governor.
Chelyabinsk has seen
paigning for the presidential vat
only election billboards downtot
for a minor candidate,
D/habrailov, who most local votol
never heard of.
Even without campaign poster,
port for Putin in Russia's regki
strong. Much of that is thanks to
what’s happening in Russia’s economy.
Analysts tie the boost in domestic pro
duction to the 1998 ruble crash, which
forced most consumers to abandon ex
pensive imports and reach for long-for
gotten homegrown brands.
While Putin is widely expected to
win, some people in Russia’s vast hin-
at an outdoor market.
Reformers say that frustration might
not be such a bad thing for democracy.
“People are no longer waiting for sal
vation from Moscow. They realize they
have to take more responsibility for
themselves. That is a key step away from
communism,” said Oleg Kozmin, a
_ . . Jisturmiu
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It is also thanks to Putm’simfl j (imc |n |- n
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ol upheavals. jcYankees’
no longer think about SoinH j n ^ j- rst s
production levels,” Pozdeyev sail
just want stability.”
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The questio
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Australia offended by NRA video
SYDNEY, Australia (AP)
Australian officials demanded to
day that the National Rifle Associ
ation pull a video airing on its Web
site claiming that the nation’s gun
reform laws had backfired.
The video, presented as a tele
vision news story, claims that
crimes involving guns have in
creased in Australia since the laws,
which ban all semi-automatic rifles,
semi-automatic shotguns and pump
action shotguns, were introduced.
Federal Attorney (Jeneral Daryl
Williams said the NRA was using
inaccurate statistics and urged the
group to remove “any reference to
Australia” from its Web site.
“1 find it quite offensive that the
NRA is using the very successful
gun reform laws introduced in
1996 as the basis for promoting
ownership of firearms in the Unit
ed States,” he said.
Williams sent a letter today to
NRA president Charlton Heston,
asking for the immediate with
drawal of misleading information.
Australia’s gun-related homi
cide rate was 0.28 per 100,000 peo
ple in 1998 compared to 4 per
100,000 in the United States,
Williams wrote in the letter, which
w as distributed to reporters.
“There are many things that
Australia can learn from the Unit
ed States,” he w-rote. “How to
manage firearm ownership is not
one of them.”
Australia adopted the gun laws
after an April 1996 rampage by
Martin Bryant, who opened fire
with military-style rifles at the Port
Arthur historic site in the state of
Tasmania. Bryant, who killed 35
people and injured 19, is serv ing a
life sentence.
More than 640,000 firearms
were removed from the Australian
community under a buyback pro
gram. The NRA video shows
footage of guns being sawed to
pieces, and thousands of destroyed
guns piled on scrap heaps.
South Australia’s Attorney
General Trevor Griffin said he
was not interviewed by the NRA
and a quote from him was taken
from a previous interview and
used out of context.
The video claims that after the
gun laws took effect, armed rob
bery in Australia w'ent up 69 per
cent, assaults involving guns rose
28 percent, gun murders increased
19 percent and home invasions
rose 21 percent. It does not give a
source for the data.
Dr. Adam Graycar, director of
the Australian Institute of Crimi
nology, said the statistics were
misleading.
He said the latest annual crime
figures, for 1998, showed that as
saults had increased but that most
attacks did not involve guns. He
said homicides decreased and were
only rarely committed with guns.
Because there were so many
other factors involved, such as pop
ulation change, it was “enormous
ly difficult” to draw conclusions
about what effect the gun laws
have had on the level of crime,
Graycarsaid.
“ft is a very long bow to draw,”
to claim the ban led to an increase
in crime, he told Australian Broad
casting Corp. radio.
“What we’ve got here is an
American group with a heavy gun
culture — guns figure very signif- ;
icantly in crime in the United
States — trying to transpose that
into Australia. There is no compar
ison,” Graycar said.
Flood risk in
Mozambique
:ently publisl
Tcotmng cai
overing Lif
gger was a s
uncil on Ale
cejust one;
larent intere:
citizen i:
his actions s
S' TANZANIA
MOZAMBIQU
Harare
O
%
ZIMBAB
150 miles
Sa
vc- K-
150 km
Indian Ocean
SOUTH
AFRICA
•Chokwe
• Xai-Xai
/ OMaputo
iWAZILAND
| Low-lying southern
Mozambican towns
are at risk of being
flooded for the
second time in
than a month
Source: Compiled from AP wire reports
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Neeson declines hometown award due to controversi
BALLY
MENA, Northern
Ireland (AP) —
Actor Liam Nee
son has turned
down an award
from his home
town, saying it
would be “inap
propriate” to ac-
NEESON
cept given the rancor the honor has
generated between local Catholics and
Protestants.
Neeson, 48, was offered the Free
dom ofthe Borough of Ballymena ear
lier this month. On Tuesday, he turned
down the award because some local
politicians from the Democratic
Unionist Party, a hardline Protestant
party, had voted against it.
Party members claimed Neeson
made derogatory remarks about grow
ing up in the predominantly Protestant
town northwest of Belfast. Neeson was
quoted in a U.S. magazine last year as
saying he felt “second class” as a
Catholic.
Neeson, best-known for his starring
roles in “Schindler’s List” and “Star
Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Men
ace,” denied the accusations and said
he was proud of Ballymena.
“Although I very much appreciate,
and am greatly honored by, the major
ity decision of Ballymena council to
offer me the Freedom ofthe Borough,
I nonetheless believe that it would be
inappropriate for me to accept in view
of the stated opposition of some mem
bers and the resultant controversy,”
Neeson wrote in a statement.
In a letter to the city council, he
added: “I will always remain very
proud of my upbringing.”
“I regard the enduring support
i of 4
which I have received over®
years from all sections of the coi
munity in Ballymena as
than sufficient recognition
success which I may have achie^
as an actor.”
James Currie, mayor of Ihe Cot®!
Antrim borough, called the
“desperately sad.”
“Ballymena and NorthernIreN
have lost out,” Currie said,
have been a golden opportunity® 11
a terrific boost for tourism. IW
the people who voted against him®
alize that.”
n 1 I ,e
"In# |
Help a Kid Smife
Stand for a White
k
March 25-2610am to 10am
Archery Room NEC Center
H IS NOT TOO LATE TO (JET INVOLVED
fok mode mmi'itiiov CAM; ninriii: uviiy at
111)301120 OK EMAIL AT CSACII.'l! VAIIOO.COSI
ARE YOU LOOKING FOR 4
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