Water Russia

The children of this town learn early not to smile. When they do, they show a ghastly array of blackened, splintered, rotting stumps where milk-white teeth might have been. An environmental plague has struck this northern land of lakes, no longer pristine, and thinning pine forests. The children of Nadvoitsy are its victims. Their disease is caused by a pollutant that the town's main employer, the Nadvoitsy Aluminum factory, dumped in its back yard for three decades.

Boris Fedorov, Russia's new chief tax collector, seems to enjoy making people nervous. He likes to talk of putting celebrities in handcuffs and of dragging rich people off to jail. Since taking the job in late May, he has ordered a prominent member of parliament to pay back taxes and has threatened to collect $1 billion more from foreign businesspeople. He has joined tax police on a raid of a vodka warehouse and lectured sidewalk vendors about keeping proper records of their sales.

Scientist Mikhail Grachev spent a decade studying the natural wonders of Siberia's Lake Baikal--so ancient and isolated, its water is acclaimed as among the purest in the world. Last year, riding Russia's capitalist tide, he helped open a factory to bottle the lake and sell it. For Grachev, the commercial venture is an attempt to merge Russia's economic transformation with environmental preservation: to save the world's oldest and deepest lake by making money from it.

Marina Yarovov was walking her two dogs in a field near her apartment when the earth opened up beneath her and she fell into a pit of muddy, boiling water. In agony, she tried to climb out of the hole as a friend ran for help. But within minutes, the 43-year-old mother of two was dead--boiled alive in the water that heats the homes and shops of her neighborhood through a vast subterranean network of pipes.

Marina Yarovov was walking her two dogs in a field near her apartment when the earth opened up beneath her and she fell into a pit of muddy, boiling water. In agony, she tried to climb out of the hole as a friend ran for help. But within minutes, the 43-year-old mother of two was dead--boiled alive in the water that heats the homes and shops of her neighborhood through a vast subterranean network of pipes.

President Boris Yeltsin looked decidedly unwell when he made a brief taped television appearance to confirm that he has heart disease and to tell the Russian people he will undergo surgery before the month is out.

Boris Fedorov, Russia's new chief tax collector, seems to enjoy making people nervous. He likes to talk of putting celebrities in handcuffs and of dragging rich people off to jail. Since taking the job in late May, he has ordered a prominent member of parliament to pay back taxes and has threatened to collect $1 billion more from foreign businesspeople. He has joined tax police on a raid of a vodka warehouse and lectured sidewalk vendors about keeping proper records of their sales.

Two Southland boxers were defeated in their gold-medal bouts at the Goodwill Games on Saturday. Super-heavyweight Lance Whitaker of Northridge lost by 17-0 to Russian Alexi Lezin, and flyweight Carlos Navarro of Los Angeles was defeated by Cuba's Waldemar Font, 18-14. Light-heavyweight Benjamin McDowell of Fort Bragg, N.C., gave the United States its only boxing gold medal by defeating Dihosvany Vega of Cuba, 9-7. Cuba finished with six gold medals and Russia won five in the 12 weight classes.

One day after radioactive steam spurted from a nuclear reactor, officials in St. Petersburg said Wednesday that there was no danger to people or the environment, but some said the accident revealed how vulnerable their city would be in a true emergency. "It is good that the danger has passed us, but if the accident had been more serious, the city would have demonstrated its total inability to cope," the chairman of St. Petersburg City Council's ecology committee, Igor Y.

In the men's 400-meter relay, Maurice Greene ran away from Donovan Bailey down the stretch for the second day in a row as the U.S. team beat Canada in 37.90 seconds, the fastest time in the world this year and a Goodwill record. For a change, the Americans did not botch the handoffs, as the passes were clean from Jon Drummond to Tim Harden to Dennis Mitchell to Greene.

Scientist Mikhail Grachev spent a decade studying the natural wonders of Siberia's Lake Baikal--so ancient and isolated, its water is acclaimed as among the purest in the world. Last year, riding Russia's capitalist tide, he helped open a factory to bottle the lake and sell it. For Grachev, the commercial venture is an attempt to merge Russia's economic transformation with environmental preservation: to save the world's oldest and deepest lake by making money from it.

President Boris Yeltsin looked decidedly unwell when he made a brief taped television appearance to confirm that he has heart disease and to tell the Russian people he will undergo surgery before the month is out.

The children of this town learn early not to smile. When they do, they show a ghastly array of blackened, splintered, rotting stumps where milk-white teeth might have been. An environmental plague has struck this northern land of lakes, no longer pristine, and thinning pine forests. The children of Nadvoitsy are its victims. Their disease is caused by a pollutant that the town's main employer, the Nadvoitsy Aluminum factory, dumped in its back yard for three decades.

We asked Southland universities to stake claim to their Olympics connections, and they responded with lists that totaled 106 names. The only qualifications: the participants competed there, coached there or, in two cases, simply attended school there. The list: Cal Poly Pomona Kim Rhode: skeet and trap shooting, USA Cal State Fullerton Karen Bardsley: women's soccer, Great Britain Cal State Northridge Keshia Baker: track and field 1,600-meter relay, USA Chapman *Kate Ziegler: swimming 800-meter freestyle, USA *Ariana Kukors: swimming 800-meter freestyle, USA Loyola Marymount Reid Priddy: men's volleyball, USA Pepperdine Yakhouba Diawara: men's basketball, France Miranda Ayim: women's basketball, Canada Roxanne Barker: women's soccer, South Africa Robert Lindstedt: men's tennis, Sweden Sarah Attar: track and field, Saudi Arabia Sean Rooney: men's volleyball, USA Merrill Moses: men's water polo, USA Jesse Smith: men's water polo, USA Terry Schroeder: men's water polo head coach, USA Marv Dunphy: women's volleyball consultant, USA Gary Sato: men's volleyball assistant coach, USA Marcio Sicoli: beach volleyball coach, USA UCLA Amy Acuff: track and field high jump, USA Brittany Borman: track and field javelin, USA Lauren Cheney: women's soccer, USA Jessica Cosby: track and field, hammer throw, USA Danusia Francis: gymnastics...

Crews battled harsh bouts of wind and lashing rain Tuesday as they struggled to clean miles of oil-blackened coastline after a fierce weekend storm tore a petroleum tanker into pieces. As much as 2,000 tons of oil poured into the sea Sunday, when a storm raked Russia's eastern coast with strong wind and high waves. Environmentalists called the spill an ecological disaster and accused the government of allowing careless shipping practices.