By
The Associated Press
MOSCOW - As Russians mourned in churches, on Web sites and at home, a humble President Vladimir Putin said yesterday he felt responsible and guilty for a submarine disaster that killed 118 sailors and outraged the nation.
Russia's Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev and navy chief Adm. Vladimir Kuroyedov submitted their resignations over the loss of the Kursk, one of Russia's most advanced submarines before an explosion crumpled it Aug. 12, but Putin said he would not accept them. Seeking scapegoats, he said, would be "the most mistaken response."
"I take a full sense of responsibility and sense of blame for this tragedy," he said in an interview with Russia's RTR television.
In a country where a history of authoritarianism runs deep, Putin's comments demonstrated a sensitivity to public opinion and eagerness to regain the nation's confidence unprecedented for a Russian leader.
Russians assailed Putin and the government for their slow, contradictory reaction to the disaster and the botched rescue operation, and many observers expected Putin to respond by firing top brass - as his predecessor Boris Yeltsin had often done.
Putin's interview came as Russia held a day of mourning for the victims, and after he sat through a harrowing three-hour meeting with the sailors' families late Tuesday night at the submarine's home base of Vidyayevo.
"The conversation was very heartfelt. He admitted his guilt and inactivity, and he said the main thing is a lack of funds," said Oksana Dudko, whose husband Sergei was the ship's deputy commander.
Speaking firmly and somberly in the television interview, Putin defended his initial silence and the slow response to foreign rescue help, saying the navy acted as quickly as they could given how little they knew about the submarine's condition.
He also promised to restore the honor of the beleaguered military and the nation.
"It grieves me, the theory lately that together with the Kursk the honor of the navy also drowned, the honor of Russia," Putin said. "Our country has survived a lot."
"We will overcome it all and restore it all, the military and the navy and the state," he said.
The nation lowered flags to half staff and prayed in Orthodox churches yesterday. Television interrupted some programming, and Russia's most popular web site, anekdot.ru, displayed an empty black screen throughout the day.
Stunned, heartbroken relatives refused to join in the mourning, demanding that their sons and husbands be retrieved from the sea floor first.
Putin promised that the bodies would be recovered, and said the divers might cut a hole in the ship or lift it to shallower waters. He said talks were under way with Norwegian and Dutch divers.
But Mikhail Kuznetsov, commander of the Vidyayevo submarine garrison, said the work couldn't begin until after next spring's thaw.
The Kremlin promised compensation to the families, who had relied on the sailors' meager salaries for subsistence. The federal government promised a one-time payment averaging $7,000 per family - equal to 10 years of pay for a submarine officer, said Deputy Prime Minister Valentina Matviyenko.
Putin attacked interest groups that he said were trying to cash in on the tragedy, an apparent shot at tycoon Boris Berezovsky, who is backing the main fund collecting donations for the families. Berezovsky accused Putin of unjustified finger-pointing.
The Norwegian divers who reached the wrecked ship said yesterday their work at the site was technically simple but emotionally demanding. They took over from Russian teams who had struggled for a week without success, and immediately determined that the ship was flooded and all aboard were dead.
Concern has been growing about the ship's two nuclear reactors and other weaponry. The Norwegian Nuclear Protection Authority said yesterday it had found no sign of a radiation leak.
The cause of the explosion that mangled the ship was unclear.
The Russian high command says the most likely reason was a collision with a foreign submarine, though no concrete evidence has been provided. A likely scenario was an internal malfunction and explosion in the Kursk's torpedo compartment.
