Siberia is in need of decolonization. However, Moscow officials use it like one uses an exotic island: for rest, publicity and enrichment. Our correspondent has retraced the steps of Vladimir Putin who was interested in nothing but gas pipelines.
Even as Vladimir Putin was speaking in Irkutsk about the great role Siberia plays in Russia, the Kurzanka River which flows near Irkutsk burst its banks and flooded part of federal highway M-53 linking Siberia to Russia. The virtual separation of Russia from half of the country - Eastern Siberia and the Far East - in a place called Traktovo-Kurzan was as humdrum and trite as the hackneyed phrases about Russia's might increasing due to Siberia.
I tried to make my way from Lake Baikal to my native Krasnoyarsk. Shortly after I left Irkutsk the asphalt road ended. Emerging from another hole in the road and a cloud of dust I found myself on the edge of a huge puddle in which two cars had sunk and one trailer was overturned. There is only one road and vehicles with number plates from all across Siberia and many parts of European Russia (mainly huge vans) were stranded on the opposite banks of the Kurzanka River. There was not a single road maintenance worker or traffic cop in sight, and no activity aimed at shoring up the banks or draining the water. Besides, it would have been a useless effort: all the ribbon cutting and the speech giving notwithstanding, there are no paved roads leaving one to drift down the Kurzanka River or get stuck in the newly formed lake.
At that very moment the prime minister was holding fast on the subject of Far East and Eastern Siberia as larders of natural resources for Russia and key parts of the world economy which has been and will remain under Russia's sovereignty. The current situation, Putin was saying, was prompting us to develop the territory. Another reason is of course that the Asia Pacific Region is in for some big growth. This is the economic future of humankind, Putin stressed, and we are part of this region.
However, the solution of geopolitical issues in Siberia, just like four centuries ago, depends not on the Kremlin but on rain, snow, ice, rivers and streams. In expressing his wishes the prime minister forgot to ask for heaven's mercy. The rain, as often before, snapped the cord that holds the country together after cutting power supplies to the cities of Tulun and Nizhneudinsk that sit on the route linking Siberia to the rest of Russia. Not that this was an emergency. It is all in a day's work here. The River Iya has a way of flooding the highway in Tulun, torrential rains wash away the road near Ilanskoye (Krasnoyarsk Territory) paralysing all traffic.
Only people who live here temporarily can run the economy in this way: so much for geopolitics; so much for all the talk about the connection between Siberia and the rest of great Russia. If a person cannot reach home he will look for another home tempting others to come to his land, those who are able to develop it, those for whom it will be more than just a hole spouting oil.
"People are leaving in droves," Irkutsk Governor Dmitry Mezentsev repeated several times during Putin's visit.
During this latest visit, I noticed for the first time that something was wrong with the birch trees in the Baikal area. Many had their stems broken at the height of three-five metres, others drooped their crowns to the ground. This was not due to hurricanes or banya leaf production. Vast tracts of land are covered with such birch trees. As one approaches the River Yenisey the birch trees straighten up. The experts I approached could not offer any reasonable explanation except to confirm that the flora and fauna on both banks of Lake Baikal was changing.
An archeology professor in Krasnoyarsk confirmed my observations and said that birch trees had been advancing north along with the people who had come from Europe. If the birch trees are leaving, it is time for us to leave too.
As one approaches Krasnoyarsk one discovers another problem: there is great beauty on both sides of the road: pink and lilac meadows of rosebays. In former times it grew on ashes, burnt-out villages, now it covers fields which have been abandoned for years.
At the entrance of many cities and villages along the highway - Kansk, Nizhneudinsk, Kuitune - one sees huge crosses which loom over the wayfarers and towns. They stand etched against the sky.
Three years ago this paper wrote about the state of M-53 highway (see Novaya Gazeta, 07.08.2006 "We like other roads"). There was a glimmer of hope that sections of the road, which are up to a hundred years old, would finally be covered with asphalt: Vladimir Putin, concerned as usual about the building of a new oil pipeline - in this case the East Siberia-Pacific Pipeline - suddenly ordered his representatives in Siberia and the Far East to pay attention not only to oil, but also to "the development of a network of roads in both regions".
The instruction seemed reasonable. Back in February 2004 Vladimir Putin cut the ribbon on the bridge over the Amur River thus opening through traffic on the federal road which "finally provided an automobile link between the Pacific coast and the Baltic." The head of state said then: "This is a landmark event not only for the Far East but for the whole country. The Trans-Siberian Railway was opened in 1903. This is the second most important event. Now the East and West of the country are solidly linked by an overland road."
Officials were handing out promises right and left: some said they would complete the federal transport corridor between Moscow and Vladivostok in 2008. Others went even further: in 2008 the highway will become a full-fledged part of the Paris-Berlin-Moscow-Vladivostok transcontinental highway. Others again pledged to complete the pan-European highway by 2007 "advancing a modern European network to East Asia."
They were all speaking about a non-existent road.
As you drive into any dust-covered village the first thing you see, after the cemetery, are tyre shops. Local men survive by fixing cars. In this country roads are the same thing as fighting crime: it is not a goal but a process. Just like gangsters and law enforcement are partners who support each other (they couldn't survive without each other), just like forest fire prevention air bases are interested in forest fires, because they are paid to put them out, so everybody, from top officials to ordinary car mechanics has an interest in bad roads.
The amount of money earmarked annually to mend this road is known. Some work is evident; here and there you catch the smell of hot asphalt, the road is being patched and built (especially in Irkutsk Region). But if anything changes as a result, the change is only for the worse. Three years ago I covered more than a thousand kilometers between Krasnoyarsk and Irkutsk in one day. Now I can barely manage it in two days. The worst stretch is the 400 km from Nizhniy Ingash to Tulun. Three years ago there were 14 sections, a total of 96 km that were almost impossible to drive on. Now there are 140 km. If it is asphalt, it tends to break apart, and bubble up, if it's a gravel road it has deep potholes. Some sections of the road are covered with concrete slabs which were never intended to be covered with asphalt. The slabs have crumbled. Thousands of cars break suspension components here.
On the other hand, the death rate on M-53 is not very high: people get themselves killed on good roads where one can speed and where attention flags. Here you have to skirt portholes and cross ditches and always to be on the alert. The condition of the road surface has little in common with the concept of a motorway network but rather seems to be a way to keep the population employed.
Again, if a decent road were built, the conquerors of nature would intensify the pollution of Lake Baikal.
Not that a lack of roads is much of a deterrent for them. In the Selenga River delta there may be 1 trillion cubic metres of natural gas, officials claim. Chinese scientists have conducted geological exploration east and west of Lake Baikal identifying mineral deposits.
The Russian prime minister also showed an interest in subsoil resources in the Baikal Area by diving to the bottom of the lake in a Mir submersible. Two such submersibles have been studying Lake Baikal for more than a year, looking, among other things, for hydrocarbons. The programme is sponsored by the investment and financial company Metropol which paid to transport the submersibles and crew from Kaliningrad and for the entire research programme. The company includes a managing company of the same name, the company Eastern Siberian Metal and others. Metropol's owner, Mikhail Slepenchuk (also known as President of the Kyokushinkai and Karate-Do Federation and President of the Martial Arts Development Fund) has ambitious plans to develop polymetal reserves in Buryatia.
During his tour of Russia's Asian region Vladimir Putin visited Khabarovsk Territory before visiting Irkutsk. Praising the first weld seam to connect the Sakhalin-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok gas pipeline he stressed that Russia had almost 40 trillion cubic metres of gas in Eastern Siberia and the Far East, more than any other country.
The gas pipeline should be providing gas to Vladivostok and power generating facilities in the Primorye Territory by the time the 2012 APEC Summit takes place. Gazprom pins great hopes on the pipeline. Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller told the Russian-Japanese Economic Forum on May 12 that "the Sakhalin-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok gas pipeline project... creates conditions for the development and expansion of supplies of natural gas from Russia to the APR countries, including Japan." Another major potential consumer is China. One more remarkable quote: Director-General of Gazpromexport, Alexander Medvedev, told a press conference organised to promote "Gazprom in the east of Russia and entry into the APR markets" on July 24, 2008 that "the importance of the topic is highlighted by this simple fact: before coaching the Russian team, Gus Hiddink coached the Australian and Korean teams, two countries from this very region. I don't think anything more needs to be said to stress the importance of the theme... We hope to break into all the APR markets within 10 years."
For much of the route the gas pipeline will run parallel to the East Siberia-Pacific Oil Pipeline. Apparently the financing scheme will be similar. The Energy Minister Sergey Shmatko put the cost of the gas pipeline at $11 billion and proposed compensating for the huge expenditure by including the amount in general gas transportation tariffs, in other words, at the expense of the Russian consumer.
Along with Shmatko's proposal, government officials revealed two other pieces of news.
One involved the international rating of the best (most convenient) airports. It includes airports from all over the world, but not a single Russian airport is mentioned. The French set railway speed records, but in this country only the planes go fast, and then only on routes that link major cities with Moscow. The planes that fly between provinces are slow and outdated. The airfields in many villages and even towns are overgrown not just with brushwood but with trees. China has built 480,000 km of roads, 16 major airports and launched high-speed rail in the last five years.
We are building pipelines. Putin personally dedicates numerous pipeline projects. What are we going to pump through these pipes when the black liquid from the rotten bodies of ancient animals dries up? The country can be held together by roads. Pipelines are not fit for that. Local Siberians have little to gain from them.
The highest petrol prices are charged in Irkutsk Region near the ferry crossing to Olkhon Island. Standard petrol costs 29.2 roubles per litre. Last year the price was briefly 33 roubles. And yet the place is next door to the Angara Oil Refinery owned by Rosneft.
Building pipelines instead of roads makes even less sense than guns instead of butter. If you have guns you can hope for a conquest. Pipelines that suck away the country and its future leave no illusions.
Good roads, like computers, lead to decentralization of life. Roads mean freedom. The opportunity to move easily from one part of the globe to another, increased production facilities and all manner of chains of various length from one community to another, from one continent to another. But horizontal links are not for us. In the larger sense it is all about vertical links. It is a bogus vertical structure: for nearly a decade the country has been at the mercy of the authorities, yet it is unable to cope with the elementary theft of the money allocated for roads.
Eventually I managed to negotiate the water barrier that blocked my way. Drivers helped each other detour over a steep incline. My small car was almost lifted and carried. Luckily, the rickety bridge over the Kurzanka had not been washed away. Local old men were sitting on it observing the goings-on. It was certainly more exciting than watching TV soap operas, the only commodity faraway Moscow supplies in abundance.
The lack of a road to link the Asian and European parts of Russia shows the contempt of a mother country for its colony. Russia needs Siberia because of its oil and ore. That reflects a utilitarian attitude to the people whose lives do not revolve around the pipeline, those who do not pump oil or cater to the oilmen.
In the village with a literary name Byronovka the cows use pedestrian crossings to cross the federal highway while stupid dogs sleep on the road. The smell of pipelines is stronger here than anywhere else, immediately after Byronovka you enter Taishet, a system of Trans-Siberian oil pipelines, a huge industrial zone that leaves a scary impression. It is not uncommon for the railway crossing to be closed for the better part of a day. After waiting for a couple of hours and learning from the locals that the wait could never end (the kind aborigines suggested that we swap cars with those waiting on the other side of the railway crossing and each go our own respective ways) we set out in search of a detour in a huge column. We lost several hours, but eventually we did cross the road.
The authorities with their ambitious projects are unable and unwilling to pay attention to the people of Siberia. Indeed, it is hard to even notice people considering how large Siberia is and how great its natural riches are.
In Byronovka with its potholed road and wooden bridge on the federal highway I was surprised to see a gleaming white Mercedes emerging from a lop-sided gate. Siberia is full of such incongruities: I have seen Ferraris and Lamborginis on our dirt roads, luxury yachts in bodies of water formed by the dams of the world's largest hydropower stations. For the most part the yachts rot in hangars and the cars in garages. The puzzles brought from the outside world somehow don't come together.
The man at the wheel of the gleaming Mercedes is sure to leave Byronovka. Because, no matter how fond you may be of Byronovka, if you have bought a Mercedes and regularly polish it you begin to love yourself too. And if so, you do not want your life to be structured by pipelines and not roads, by the infrastructure for Urals and Siberian Tight, for gas and ore and not for the people.
Alexei Tarasov
