Wednesday, April 14, 2010
RUSSIA: Officials Search HP Office In Russia
April 14, 2010, 08:35 pm ET
by The Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO - Russian authorities have searched a Hewlett-Packard Co. office in Moscow in what one news report said was a bribery investigation.
HP confirmed the search but wouldn't describe the reason for the investigation.
Russian prosecutors said in a statement the investigation was carried out at the request of German authorities but didn't elaborate.
The Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed sources, said the probe centers on whether HP representatives paid millions of dollars in bribes to win a contract to sell computer equipment through a German subsidiary to Russian prosecutors.
The newspaper said HP officials are believed to have paid $10.9 million in bribes to win a $47.8 million contract that was eventually signed in August of 2003.
"This is an investigation of alleged conduct that occurred almost seven years ago, largely by employees no longer with HP," HP said in a statement. "We are cooperating fully with the German and Russian authorities and will continue to conduct our own internal investigation."
HP, based in Palo Alto, Calif., is the world's No. 1 personal computer maker.
RUSSIA: 'The memory should stay alive'
4:46 PM PDT, April 14, 2010
By Megan K. Stack, Reporting from Warsaw
Polish director Andrzej Wajda finally sees his 2007 movie 'Katyn,' about the 1940 massacre of 20,000 Poles, shown in Russia. 'This is beyond my imagination, beyond my happiness,' he says.
When Andrzej Wajda, widely considered Poland's preeminent filmmaker, completed the film "Katyn," it carried a personal weight. Wajda's father was among the more than 20,000 Polish prisoners -- mostly military officers and other members of the elite -- massacred and buried in mass graves by Soviet secret police in 1940.
The fate of the officers was covered up for decades by Soviet propaganda, and has remained a touchy issue between Poland and Russia.
Wajda's stark, sorrowful 2007 film was the first serious treatment of the tragedy, and was largely ignored by Russia. But after the Saturday plane crash that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski and other leading figures as they headed to a commemoration of the Katyn massacre, Russian state television broke the taboo and broadcast the film to millions of Russians on Sunday evening.
Wajda, still making films at 84, sat down with the Los Angeles Times during a break this week at a film studio in Warsaw, the Polish capital. These are excerpts:
What was your motivation in making this film?
The Katyn massacre, despite the fact that so many years have passed, is still current. My purpose in making the film was that the massacre not be forgotten, that the memory should stay alive. My father died in [in the Katyn massacre], so I always felt a responsibility. But as long as Poland remained under Russian influence, it was impossible to make this film, because the Katyn lie existed. This lie also existed in the West -- that Germans were responsible.
But during Communist years, you did make several films that dealt with World War II. How did you do it?
Film is a visual art. Ideologies are generally expressed verbally. In those days I talked in pictures, not words, because if I had used words to say what I meant, it would have been censored. There was a certain understanding between us filmmakers and our viewers.
How did you develop the script for "Katyn"?
I was aware that I was making the first film about Katyn, so I knew it couldn't just be details and fragments. It had to be broader. It had to show the historical context and the crime, but it also had to show the lie. My mother was a victim of the Katyn lie. We didn't know what had happened to my father. My mother lived in hope that he would come back.
Mostly I used women's diaries. The mothers, sisters and daughters. But I also found writings from a Russian officer who had saved a life. How could I not show this? This is Stalin's crime, a crime of the system.
Did your mother ever come to accept what had happened to your father?
She died in 1950, 10 years after [the massacre]. She never accepted his death, especially because there was no official acknowledgment. The documents said he was lost at war. But if you died in Katyn, it could not be mentioned in documents.
When did you find out the truth?
We learned quite late, in 1942 when the war was already underway, that prisoners at other camps were also murdered. . . .
Stalin said they all ran away to Manchuria. It was completely absurd. But in 1943 the Germans found the mass graves and made a huge deal about it with propaganda.
This was the first time we knew it had happened . . . but my father still wasn't on the list of people who were identified.
Only when I went to the West and read all the information printed in Paris about the massacre did I learn the truth. I was a producer by then, it was the end of the 1950s.
You've called Katyn "an open, festering wound" for Poland. Do you still feel that way?
As long as this situation is not fully explained, this wound is still very much open. But recent events have opened a new chapter. I think now [after the Kaczynski crash] they [Russian authorities] will give us the full explanation of the Katyn murders.
I am also very thankful and glad that the film has now been shown on Russian TV. The first years, we never dreamed it would get to Russian screens. They showed it at the Polish Embassy and the Polish Institute of Culture [in Moscow], but outside of that, it didn't exist in Russia. So this is beyond my imagination, beyond my happiness.
CHINA & US: The Story of the Century
James Fallows and Damien Ma consider the future of the China-US relationship
(Part I in a Series)
CHINA: Earthquake In Western China Kills Hundreds
April 14, 2010
A strong earthquake struck a far western Tibetan area of China Wednesday. Hundreds of people were killed and thousands injured. Officials say many structures collapsed trapping victims. Rescue efforts are hampered by damaged roads and lack of power.
TRANSCRIPT
STEVE INSKEEP, host:
Here are some of the numbers we give you after every earthquake, numbers that really don't begin to give you an idea of the tragedy until you learn the details. The earthquake in western China, today, measured a magnitude 6.9 that's according to the U.S. Geological Survey. At least 400 people have been killed, at least, and thousands more are injured. Rescue efforts are being hampered by damaged roads and a lack of power.
NPR's Louisa Lim is following this story from Shanghai. She's on the line. Hi, Louisa.
LOUISA LIM: Good morning, Steve.
INSKEEP: And I've been looking at your Twitter feed at LimLouisa. You've sent us some images from the region of earthquake damage. It looks pretty devastating, at least in some places.
LIM: It certainly sounds very devastating. What we're hearing the latest official figures are that 400 people are dead, 10,000 people estimated to be injured, so far, in the quake. And you have to bear in mind, this happened in quite a sparsely populated area, a place called Yushu County in Shanghai province. It's also called Jakundo(ph) by Tibetans.
It has a population of around 100,000, so one in 10 could be injured, although people who I've been talking to say that estimate could actually be conservative. The quake itself was followed by a series of aftershocks. And we've been hearing that 85 percent of the buildings collapsed in Yushu Town. And we've also been hearing that a wall of a reservoir near the town has cracked and workers are racing to let out water to try to release the pressure on the dam wall to stop an even bigger disaster from occurring.
INSKEEP: This is bringing back memories of the earthquake of a couple of years ago in which there were terrible collapses. Schools collapsed killing many children at the time. Any indication that big public buildings have collapsed here?
LIM: Well, it's still very early and communications have been quite bad, so we're still trying to put together a picture of what's happening there. But it does appear that quite a few public buildings have collapsed, including schools. The boss of the local Red Cross said 70 percent of the schools there have collapsed. We know a primary school there collapsed with some deaths. We've also heard that a four-story teachers college collapsed with 30 to 40 students inside. And part of a vocational school also caved in.
So, it seems the scene is very grim. We're hearing that although rescuers are trying to save them, there's a shortage of excavators. So, people are digging through the rubble with their hands to try to save people. It's not yet clear whether the schools, the collapse of schools, will be a national issue like it was last time, given the fact that so many other buildings collapsed here in this particular quake.
INSKEEP: We're talking with NPR's Louisa Lim about today's earthquake in China. It happened in western China, which is a region, I understand, Louisa, that you traveled in not so long ago. What's it like?
LIM: Well, I was in that part of the world last year, and it is very remote. It's difficult to get to. The place where this quake has happened is 12 hours, over land, from the provincial capital of Xining. It's very high up - about 12,000 feet - and very poor. Most people there are subsistence farmers. The houses are wood, earthen walls, and so, of course, they collapse very easily.
People there are really living a subsistence existence. Life is very tough even at the best of times. And it, of course, will be much tougher still given today's earthquake. It's freezing up there right now. We're hearing that snow is falling. There's strong wind and sleet forecast in the days to come. And of course, these people are all homeless. So, it'll be a huge task keeping them warm and making shelter for all these people in the days to come.
INSKEEP: And I suppose any aid is going to have to go over those 12 hours of mountain roads that you saw.
LIM: That's right, and we're hearing those roads have been damaged by the quake. We know that there were soldiers, about 700 soldiers, clearing the rubble in the town; another 5,000 have been dispatched to the quake zone, but there are difficulties getting down there with roads damaged, electricity down, communications also were down for some time.
INSKEEP: Okay.
LIM: So, it will be a huge task.
INSKEEP: Okay. Thanks very much. That's NPR's Louisa Lim reporting on today's earthquake in China.
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