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Half of Governors Fail to Declare Incomes

Chechen Republic President Ramzan Kadyrov, center, was one of the many governors who did not release his income declaration by the April 30 deadline. D. Grishkin

The governors of Kaliningrad and Krasnoyarsk outearned the rest of the country's 83 governors last year — or at least the half who met a deadline to release their income declarations.

Governors were supposed to file income declarations with the Federal Tax Service and publish them on their official regional web sites by Friday.

But only about half of them met the deadline, Kommersant reported Tuesday.

The declarations, which all top officials were supposed to release for a second year running, are part of a campaign by President Dmitry Medvedev to crack down on corruption by requiring officials and their families to disclose their annual earnings and some assets.

The presidential decree on the declarations does not specify penalties for officials who fail to obey. A Kremlin spokeswoman could not say Tuesday how Medvedev might respond. Medvedev complained at a meeting with governors and other officials in March that his orders were not being obeyed.

Viktor Ilyukhin, a State Duma deputy with the Communist Party, said governors who failed to release their income declarations should face some form of punishment.

"They have failed to fulfill the president's command," Ilyukhin said.

"In addition," he added, "even the submitted declarations should be checked. I'm sure that there are some discrepancies."

Among the regional leaders who did not publish declarations on their web sites were Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, Tula Governor Vyacheslav Dudka and Yaroslavl Governor Sergei Vakhrukov.

The top earner among those who published their declarations was Krasnoyarsk Governor Lev Kuznetsov, who replaced Alexander Khloponin in February, with an income of 118.75 million rubles ($4.04 million). In Russia, he owns three apartments and a quarter share of a fourth apartment, a house and a land plot covering 14,510 square meters.

Kuznetsov also has an apartment in France, a Ferrari 599 GTB, a Mercedes-Benz A200, a Mercedes-Benz R500, a BMW M5, a ZAZ 965, a BMW K1200LT motorcycle and a Sealine-T47 cutter. Before being appointed governor, Kuznetsov headed the Kolmar coal company from 2008 to 2009.

Kaliningrad Governor Georgy Boos, the top-earning governor last year, just made the deadline by releasing his declaration Friday. He said his income fell to 86.4 million rubles ($3 million) last year from 122.37 million rubles ($3.8 million) in 2008. Most of his 2009 income, 85.5 million rubles, was earned through business activities, he said, while his official salary as governor was 852,000 rubles ($29,000).

Boos' property includes two plots of land, two houses, two Volga cars, three motorcycles, a Galleon 530 FLY cutter, a Zodiak Classic yacht, a Yamaha WaveRunner and a snowmobile.

Mayor Yury Luzhkov, who also holds the rank of governor, declared an income of 7.98 million rubles ($272,000) in 2009, about 1 million rubles more than the previous year.

He said his wife, construction mogul Yelena Baturina, earned 30.9 billion rubles ($1.05 billion) last year and owns a 445-square-meter apartment in Russia and a 321-square-meter home in Austria. She also rents houses in Russia, Spain and Britain and has six cars, including three Mercedes-Benzes and a Porsche.

Baturina is ranked as Russia's wealthiest woman by Forbes' Russian edition, which estimated her wealth at $2.9 billion last month.

Top federal officials earlier released their declarations. Medvedev said he made 3.3 million rubles ($113,774) in 2009, while Prime Minister Vladimir Putin put his income at 3.9 million rubles ($134,000).

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