Moscow Times: Georgians Recall Russian Ties After Rugby Victory

Moscow Times: Georgians Recall Russian Ties After Rugby Victory

Reuters

The teams met Saturday in a European Cup qualifier played in Trabzon, Turkey — neutral territory to limit security risks.

Georgia ran out 36-8 winners, but behind the chest beating before and after the game, the confrontation offered a glimpse into the ties that still bond the former Soviet neighbors.

"In a rugby game you can see brother playing against brother. Politics will always highlight those divisions, but you wait and you see that after the game they are still brothers," said the team's towering vice captain, Ilia Zedginidze, 33.

Tensions still simmer some 18 months after Russia crushed an assault by Georgia on the rebel region of South Ossetia in a five-day war that humiliated the Georgian army.

Georgians are suffering under a de facto trade embargo on their products, visa restrictions and closed travel links. Many say they simply want normality to return after generations of shared history between the Orthodox Christian nations. Many Georgians live and work in Russia; many Russians live in Georgia.

The country's political opposition, though split, is trying to gain traction by offering the hope of a renewal of relations with Moscow, something President Mikheil Saakashvili appears unable to do.

"We respect the Russians. They are no different from us," said Merab Khunjgurua, 36, who works for a copper exporting company. "Flowers are blooming now, and memories of the war will fade. Things are returning to normal. I can't understand why our relations cannot as well."

On Saturday, buses packed with Georgians flooded the Black Sea town of Trabzon, just across the frontier, after 5,800 tickets allocated to Georgia were sold out in a matter of hours. Rugby is popular in the country of 4.5 million people.

The Russian section of the stadium was practically empty.

Vladislav Korshunov, Russia's rugby team captain, saw no spirit of score settling on either side.

"Today's game had nothing to do with politics. … We played a more experienced team than we are. That's all," he said.

Spectators waved Georgian and NATO flags. Saakashvili's wife, Sandra, was among the fans.

If the 2008 war was a mismatch of David and Goliath proportions, the rugby confrontation was more evenly matched.

The victorious Georgians left the field dressing cut brows and knees. In the capital, Tbilisi, cars tore down streets honking horns and streaming flags from the windows.

But for some fans the game brought back anger.

"If the Georgians had even started to lose, I would have jumped down on the field myself and joined the scrum," said David Shvelidze, a Tbilisi banker. "After what they did to us, this is an important matter of pride."

Moscow Times: Russia Clears Oracle’s $7Bln Sun Takeover

Reuters

The anti-monopoly service said it would have grounds to go to court and demand invalidation of the deal, already approved unconditionally by the European Union, if Oracle does not comply with its requirements.

The regulator said Oracle must continue to create new versions of MySQL within the generally accessible license and should not oblige clients to buy its services if they want to get a commercial license for MySQL.

The condition would only apply for four years after the deal is formally completed, the service said in a statement.

In January, Oracle won European Union approval for the takeover after promising to keep the market open for others to make storage engine software for Sun's MySQL database and to boost investment in the unit.

It also pledged to set up a separate customer advisory board of MySQL users. Those concessions satisfied Europe's competition watchdog that the deal would not distort the market.

But Michael Widenius, creator of the MySQL database, who is strongly opposed to the merger plan, said the EU executive's decision was wrong and turned his vocal campaign against the deal to Russia and China.

Beijing has not yet issued a ruling on the plan.

21.03.2010, 07.14

MOSCOW, March 21 (Itar-Tass) -- The Russian space vehicle Proton-M launched from Baikonur on Saturday has successfully put the EchoStar-14 American communication satellite into the planned orbit.

EchoStar-14 separated from the Briz-M booster at 06:37 Moscow time, a Roskosmos Federal Space Agency source reported.

The satellite will take its place at a longitude of 119 degrees west in its geostationary orbit.

EchoStar based on the satellite platform LS-1300 was made by the Space Systems/Loral company for the American satellite operator EchoStar. It is designed for television signal transmission to 14 million TV spectators of the DISH Network American TV company.

The satellite is expected to work in orbit for 15 years. It weighs 6,384 kilogrammes. It is equipped with 103 Ku-band transponders.

The Proton-M rocket and the Briz-M booster are made by the Khrunichev state space scientific and production centre. The vehicle has three stages. Its launch weight is about 700 tonnes. The International Launch Services (ILS) company deals with marketing of Protons at the market of space services. The controlling stake in it belongs to the Khrunichev centre.

It was the fourth Proton-M launch this year, and the 355th in its history, a source at the scientific and production centre said.

For ILS it is the second in 2010 and the 58th since the beginning of the use of Protons in April 1996.