RUSSIA: Hundreds of Russians face eviction from their homes in central Moscow, so that firms controlled by the city mayor's and his wife can redevelop the property and hand over a swathe of it to the FSB security service once run by President Vladimir Putin, writes Daniel McLaughlin in Moscow
Residents of two areas close to the Lubyanka headquarters of the FSB and its predecessor the KGB are furious at a decree signed by Moscow Mayor Mr Yuri Luzhkov to relocate them and "provide for FSB members who are on a waiting list to improve their living conditions."
The decree grants permission to construction firms Inteko and Glavmosstroi to "redevelop the historic centre of Moscow" and build new housing, commercial space, recreation areas, underground parking and transport infrastructure just north of the Lubyanka.
Mr Luzhkov's city authorities control Glavmosstroi, and his wife, Ms Yelena Baturina, owns Inteko.
The plan, a copy of which was obtained by The Irish Times, says the work should be completed by 2007, when Inteko and Glavmosstroi will take ownership of 60 per cent of the redeveloped property in the sought-after area about a mile north of the Kremlin.
The Moscow city authorities will acquire the rest of the housing, "including 20 per cent for the provision of accommodation for FSB employees", and the remaining commercial and office space "including 15 per cent to be given to the FSB for its services and departments".
Mrs Dora Kazakevich, who has lived in the Meshansky district for 40 years, has helped form a residents' committee to fight the plan. "People have lived here for decades, some for their entire lives, and they can't believe they are going to be made to leave," she said.
"They will offer us flats elsewhere, probably miles away, but why should we go? This is one of the nicest parts of Moscow. The whole thing's scandalous."
Mr Luzhkov easily won re-election to City Hall last Sunday, the same day his pro-Kremlin United Russia party crushed its rivals in a national parliamentary vote.
"They were trying to keep things quiet before the elections, so there was no uproar," said Mrs Kazakevich. "But Luzhkov issued the decree back in August."
Critics of the plan accuse Mr Luzhkov and his wife of hatching a cynical get-rich plan before he steps down as mayor in 2007.
Inteko and the mayor's office declined to comment on the scheme, which suggests an improvement in the sometimes rocky relationship between the pugnacious Mr Luzhkov and the FSB, which Mr Putin ran in 1998-'99 before being appointed prime minister.
In 1999, the FSB investigated charges of money-laundering against Inteko, in a case that a furious Mr Luzhkov called a politically motivated attempt to discredit him. The security services have gained huge power since Mr Putin became president in 2000, and many of his old colleagues from the KGB now have key posts in the Kremlin.
They are considered the driving force behind a legal onslaught against Yukos, Russia's biggest oil firm, and the jailing on fraud and tax evasion charges of its former chief executive, Mikhail Khodorkovsky.