CORRUPTION ELSEWHERE.

Moscow has been agog with allegations of corruption in recent days. In addition to General Rokhlin’s allegations about wrongdoing by the top brass, deputy prosecutor general Yuri Chaika has pointed the finger at Petr Mostovoi, first deputy chairman of the State Property Committee, which he identified as one of Russia’s main centers of corruption. Chaika said he is investigating Mostovoi who, he alleged, cost the state a huge sum of money when he allowed an Australian investor to buy shares in the Lena Goldfields Company at an artificially low price. (ORT, July 8)

Meanwhile, the independent television company NTV stirred up a hornets’ nest July 8 when it reported allegations published in Monday’s issue of Novaya gazeta. Journalist Aleksandr Minkin accused Russian minister of sport and tourism Shamil Tarpishchev, former head of the presidential security service Aleksandr Korzhakov, and former head of the Federal Security Service Mikhail Barsukov of plotting with a Mafioso named "Taivanchik" to extort $10 million from former Sports Fund head Boris Fedorov (no relation to the former finance minister of the same name) and even of apparent complicity in a plot to kill Fedorov. (NTV, July 8) This murky affair has major political implications: Tarpishchev is better known as President Yeltsin’s tennis coach; Korzhakov was Yeltsin’s most trusted aide until he lost his job recently. Kremlin insiders say Korzhakov and the president remain on close terms." (Interfax, July 9)

Yeltsin Names Domestic Security Chief.