Steve LeVine covers foreign affairs for BusinessWeek. He previously was correspondent for Central Asia and the Caucasus for The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times for 11 years. His first book, The Oil and the Glory, a history of the former Soviet Union through the lens of oil, was published in October 2007. Putin’s Labyrinth, his new book, profiles Russia through the lives and deaths of six Russians. It was released this week.

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A Blog on Russia, Central Asia and
the Caucasus

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

Putin: Koni, Koni! Here Koni! Put on this GPS Collar!

Vladimir Putin is challenging the West in as many spheres as he can. And one beneficiary will be his adventurous dog, Koni.

This black labrador apparently has a habit of loping away a bit too far for the Russian president's comfort. So Putin has asked his deputy prime minister, Sergei Ivanov, to make sure he gets a special collar fitted with a satellite tracker, Ivanov told a reporter today.

Russia is putting up more satellites to compete with America's Global Positioning System and Europe's Galileo. It's called the Global Navigation System, or GLONASS, and it traces back to the 1980s. It went moribund in the post-Soviet collapse, but the country is firing up three satellites today using a Proton-K rocket -- bringing the total to 18 -- and by 2009 plans to have 24 in place.

``When can I buy the necessary equipment for my dog, Koni, so that she won't run away too far?'' Putin asked Ivanov. Ivanov replied that such collars will be available for sale by July, Bloomberg reports, quoting Russia's First Channel.

Ivanov said the commercialization will not be biased. Cat collars will be available, too.

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