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CAMERON SINKS FOR BIRTHDAY

«Titanic» director James Cameron spent his birthday underwater. Cameron, who turned 56 on Monday, dived beneath the surface of the world’s deepest lake in a submersible he used to film the wreck of the Titanic, the Foundation for the Preservation of Lake Baikal said.

Cameron boarded the Mir-1 submersible and spent a few hours in Lake Baikal’s waters, the Russian-based group said. The Mir-1, less than 8 meters long, is one of two submersibles Cameron used to film the Titanic in preparation for the 1997 blockbuster.

Russia used the vessel in 2007 to plant a Russian flag on the sea floor near the North Pole. On Monday, it was piloted by Anatoly Sagalevich, director of the technical council of the preservation foundation, who invited Cameron on his first visit to Lake Baikal and gave him a hardy «hydronaut’s» watch. The sickle-shaped lake in Siberia, some 5,000 kilometers east of Moscow, is the world’s oldest and deepest lake, according to UNESCO, which lists it as a World Heritage Site. It holds one-fifth of the world’s unfrozen fresh water. Ecologists say the 25 million-year-old lake, which reaches a depth of 1,637 meters, harbors 1,500 plant and animal species, including a unique freshwater seal. 1

FSB Detains Romanian «Spy»

The Federal Security Service said a Romanian diplomat was caught spying Monday and given 48 hours to leave the country.

Gabriel Grecu, first secretary in the political department of the Romanian Embassy in Moscow, was detained while trying to obtain secret military information from a Russian citizen, the FSB said in a statement. «Espionage equipment seized from the agent fully reveals his hostile activities against Russia,» the statement said.

Russia has made a formal protest to the Romanian government about Grecu’s activities and declared him persona non grata, the FSB said.

The Romanian Embassy in Moscow and Romania’s Foreign Ministry in Bucharest both declined to comment on the matter. Relations between Russia and Romania are cool. Romania joined NATO in 2004, and it has annoyed Russia by supporting the pro-European government in Moldova, a former Soviet republic where two-thirds of the population speaks Romanian. In June, Moldova ordered Russia to withdraw 1,500 troops who have been stationed in a separatist region of the country since the Soviet Union collapsed nearly two decades ago. 2

Ship Carrying 111 Tourists Collides With Barge

More than 100 foreign tourists experienced a short-lived Titanic-like scare on the Volga River early Wednesday when their luxury cruise ship sailing from Moscow to St. Petersburg collided with a sand-laden barge. None of the 111 tourists from the United States, Germany and Italy were injured, while three of the 91 crew members sustained minor bruises during the incident on the Rybinskoye reservoir on the Volga River in the Yaroslavl region, emergency officials said. But the ship, the Sergei Kirov, suffered a 5-meter-long gash along its hull, and the crew prevented it from sinking, officials said.

«The crew listed the ship immediately and began bailing water out and removing property from [flooded] cabins. The water was pumped out, and a patch was improvised from inside,» said a spokesman for the local branch of the Emergency Situations Ministry, Interfax reported. News reports gave no information about damage to the barge, which was transporting 4,500 tons of sand to Rybinsk, the second-largest city in the Yaroslavl region. It was unclear Wednesday which ship was to blame for the accident. Two motor ships were sent to the site of the incident to pick up tourists and bring them to Rybinsk, from where they were to be transported back to Moscow by bus later Wednesday, the Emergency Situations Ministry said. Eighty-three tourists refused to travel on a lower-class ship than the Sergei Kirov, and a third motor ship had to be sent for them, Lifenews.ru reported.

The Sergei Kirov, owned by a St. Petersburg company, was booked by the U.S. firm Viking River Cruises for trips between Moscow and St. Petersburg, Interfax reported. River cruises are a popular tourist attraction in Russia. Viking River Cruises had no immediate comment on the accident.

Tickets for the Moscow-St. Petersburg cruise start at $2,396, according to the company’s web site. The cruise, called «Waterways of the Tsars,» promises a «monumental 13-day itinerary,» with stops in Moscow, St. Petersburg and «quaint riverside towns like Yaroslavl, Uglich and Goritzy that only a river cruise can provide.» «See opulent palaces, discover fortified monasteries and visit beautiful cathedrals,» the website says. «It is an unforgettable way to experience the history and culture of this unique and mysterious country.» 3

Interview with Robert De Niro

In 1976, Robert De Niro starred in the movie «The Last Tycoon.» Now De Niro is a tycoon himself, one so big that Crain’s New York Business has included him on its list of New York’s 100 most influential businesspeople. Of course, this did not happen because De Niro is a two-time Oscar winner and one of the highest-paid actors of our time. And it didn’t happen even because he is a co-owner of the famous restaurant chain Nobu. In addition to restaurants, De Niro also owns production company Tribeca Productions; Tribeca Enterprises, which conducts the Tribeca Film Festival; and a large real-estate business.

De Niro, a native New Yorker, turned the former port area of Tribeca into one of the most fashionable (and expensive) places in New York City. He got started by buying up and overhauling local real estate. Like any businessperson, De Niro knows both victory and defeat. Vedomosti interviewed the world-famous actor and businessman, and he told of the ups and downs of his long career. 4

Reputed Crime Boss Survives Shooting

Reputed crime boss Asian Usoyan, 73, and his bodyguard were hospitalized in stable condition after being shot by an unidentified assailant on Tverskaya Ulitsa late last week, police said.

Usoyan, who is thought to be the most influential crime boss on former Soviet soil and is known as Grandpa Khasan, and his bodyguard Artur Bagramyan were shot by a Kalashnikov assault rifle equipped with a silencer as they entered a building late Thursday, police said, according to national news agencies. Usoyan had been staying in his son’s apartment in the building, Lifenews.ru said. In order to prevent more attempts on Usoyan’s life, police intentionally reported Friday that both men were killed, while in fact they were only hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries, Interfax reported. The location was selected because it was one of the few places where Usoyan could be ambushed, Interfax said, citing a law enforcement source.

Usoyan lives in a Moscow region settlement closed to outsiders, avoids public places, travels in armored cars and employs former police officers as bodyguards, the source said. Police believe that the attacker lived in an apartment in a neighboring building and probably had accomplices who tracked Usoyan’s movements, the source said. The apartment cost 100,000 rubles ($3,230) a month and was rented by unidentified people in August, Lifenews.ru reported Sunday. The Interfax source said a search for the attacker was ongoing but he was probably killed by the people who ordered the hit. «First, he failed his task and, second, he knows his employers,» the source said. Usoyan said he did not know who might have ordered the attack, but police linked it to his alleged criminal activity, Interfax said. Kommersant speculated that the attack might have been organized by a rival, Tariel Oniani, who it said unsuccessfully competed with him for a contract to develop the territory vacated by the closed Cherkizovsky Market in eastern Moscow in 2009. 5

Court Marshals to Seize Puppies Over Debt

Court marshals have threatened to take what is most precious from a pensioner who has failed to pay a debt – her three Shar Pei pedigree puppies, they said Friday. The pensioner, whom court marshals did not identify, owes 350,000 rubles ($11,330) to an individual in her hometown in the Kamchatka region in the Far East. «If she does not fulfill her obligations within 10 days, the puppies will be sold by the Federal Agency for State Property Management,» the marshals said in a statement on their site, FSSPrus.ru.

In Kamchatka, Shar Pei puppies fetch 15,000 rubles ($485) each, news reports said. But the marshals said they would try sell them for 5,000 rubles to attract more potential buyers. They said the famously wrinkled Shar Pei puppies have been allowed for the time being to remain with the pensioner, who breeds them as her sole source of income because she has no property. 6

Foster Child Survives Flight Inside Landing Gear

A 17-year-old foster child survived a 50-minute flight hidden in a plane’s landing gear in Siberia, investigators said Tuesday.

The stowaway crawled into a space above the wheel of the An-24 turboprop operated by Angara Airlines at an airfield in the town of Kirensk on Saturday, the Investigative Committee said in a statement. Television reports said he survived the 50-minute flight to Irkutsk in just a light coat, despite temperatures of minus 30 degrees Celsius. Investigators said the stowaway had fled a center for foster children, and the TV reports said he had robbed a nearby store before climbing inside the plane.The teen, identified as Roman Sorokovikov by Komsomolskaya Pravda, was being treated for frostbite.

In 2007, the body of a man was found near the runway of Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport. Officials said he had fallen when the landing gear was deployed. Just before that incident a young man from Perm flew into Moscow in another plane’s landing gear niche. He survived the flight but was hospitalized with severe hypothermia. 7

Chernomyrdin Is Laid to Rest

President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin paid their respects to veteran politician Viktor Chernomyrdin, who was buried at Moscow’s Novodevichy Cemetery on Friday. The political tandem praised Chernomyrdin’s efforts to stabilize society during post-Soviet reforms.

The longest serving prime minister in post-Soviet Russia, Chernomyrdin died on Wednesday at the age of 72. «The sentiment in society was hard… He did everything he could to calm society and at the same time solve urgent economic problems,» Medvedev said during the state-organized funeral.

The ceremony was aired live on the state-owned Vesti 24 news channel. Chernomyrdin played a decisive role in supporting former President Boris Yeltsin during some of the darkest moments of the 1990s, negotiating for the lives of hundreds of hostages with a Chechen warlord and even holding the reins of power while Yeltsin underwent heart surgery in 1996. The former mechanic also will go down in history for his creation of Gazprom, which holds 17 percent of the world’s natural gas reserves. The gas behemoth is by far the Kremlin’s most powerful economic tool in its global political plays. At Novodevichy Cemetery, Chernomyrdin was buried next to his wife of nearly 50 years, who had died in March. Russian media, citing medical officials, reported that he had died from a heart attack. 8

Luzhkov Says His Family Not Safe in Moscow

Former Mayor Yury Luzhkov said he has sent his daughters to study in Britain because he feels unsafe in Russia. In an interview with Britain’s Sunday Telegraph, Luzhkov said he and his billionaire wife, Yelena Baturina, had «very serious grounds» to worry about their safety. «There is hatred out there. And if that hatred is all-consuming and the aim is to get at the family then the weakest link… is the children. We are afraid to leave them here in Russia,» he was quoted as saying. Luzhkov added that he and Baturina decided to send their daughters, Yelena, 18, and Olga, 16, to London «for four to six years,» first to study English and then to enroll in an undisclosed university. He said the two girls had already left Moscow State University and were living in a house that the family rents in West London.

Moscow police said Monday that they were unaware of any threats against Luzhkov’s children. «We ask Luzhkov to tell us if any such facts exist. We are ready to start a rigorous investigation,» police spokesman Viktor Biryukov told RIA-Novosti.

Luzhkov’s comments followed media speculation that he was planning to move abroad after President Dmitry Medvedev fired him on Sept. 28 for «loss of confidence.» Luzhkov said that while the decision to send his daughters abroad had been difficult, he had no plans to leave the country. «I am a Muscovite, I was born in Moscow, I am a patriot of my country, and it will be difficult to get rid of me. Why should I leave? Especially since it could be a gift for those in power who hate me,» he said.

«Luzhkov’s talk about threats probably reflected his wife’s business interests,» said Alexei Mukhin, director of the Center for Political Information. «Luzhkov has now become useful for Baturina by being seen as a democratic leader,» he said. Baturina, who has been accused of amassing a billion-dollar fortune by skimming the city’s lucrative real estate deals while her husband was mayor for 18 years, has vehemently denied media reports that she is selling her company, Inteko, or moving assets abroad. Luzhkov, however, accused «businessmen close to the Kremlin» of initiating a campaign to take away the company. «They have already been to my wife’s firm,» he said, adding that Inteko was «a tasty delicacy.» He did not name anybody. Inteko last week denied a report that Baturina and Luzhkov were negotiating with billionaire Senator Suleiman Kerimov to sell the firm. Kerimov is seen as close to the government. 9