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[OS] 2011-#125-Johnson's Russia List
Released on 2012-10-10 17:00 GMT
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Date | 2011-07-14 18:15:40 |
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Johnson's Russia List
14 July 2011
A World Security Institute Project
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Your source for news and analysis since 1996n0
In this issue
1. Reuters: Corruption, negligence plague former power Russia.
2. RFE/RL: Rash Of Russian Transport Accidents Raises Safety Issues, Highlights
Cost-Skimping And Corruption.
3. BBC Monitoring: Russian businessmen want consensus between Putin, Medvedev -
spokesman. (Igor Yurgens)
4. http://blogs.forbes.com: Mark Adomanis, Medvedev versus Putin on business,
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the World Trade Organization, Libya, and a whole lot more.
5. Vedomosti: CHALLENGING MEDVEDEV. The government suggests stiffer control over
political parties whereas Dmitry Medvedev stands for a simpler procedure of their
6. ITAR-TASS: Putin collects money for monument to Stolypin.
7. www.russiatoday.com: Mikhail Barshevsky, Turning Russian voters back on to
8. RIA Novosti: Popularity of civil service points to high corruption - Medvedev.
9. Trud: Slaying the dragon. How corruption is dealt with in China.
10. Christian Science Monitor: Fred Weir, Medvedev takes on Russia's outdated
military-industrial complex.
11. Kommersant: Poll Shows Most Russian Citizens Have Not Heard of Vice Premiers,
12. Russia Profile: Elective Renewal. Matviyenko's Move to the Federation Council
May Be the Latest in a Government Drive to Rid Russia of Long-Serving Regional
13. Nezavisimaya Gazeta: CPRF - RPF'S ENEMY. OR NOT? The Communists played into
the hands of the ruling party.
14. Yezhednevnyy Zhurnal: Presidential Prospects of Right Cause Leader Prokhorov
Assessed. (Mikhail Delyagin)
15. Moskovskiye Novosti: REPORT. Human rights activists: Situation in the
Caucasus is deteriorating.
16. Yezhednevnyy Zhurnal: Caucasus Problem Unsolvable with Current Ethnic,
Political Policies. (Yuliya Latynina)
17. Moskovskiy Komsomolets: Commentator Questions Wisdom of Keeping Kadyrov,
Chechnya, in Russia. (Stanislav Belkovskiy)
18. RIA Novosti: Rights group slams police over Russian activist's murder probe.
19. Moscow Times: Online State Registry to Monitor Extremism.
20. Interfax: Human Rights Council Hopes to Get Experts' Statement on Yukos
Second Case in Sept.
21. Russia: Other Points of View: Gordon Hahn, FREEING KHODORKOVSKII: WHY
22. ITAR-TASS: Moscow to enlarge twice in territory, developers rubbing hands.
23. www.opendemocracy.net: Clementine Cecil, Mayor Sobyanin and the defence of
Moscow's architecture.
24. http://valdaiclub.com: Igor Zevelev, Boris Yeltsin: Nation-builder.
25. RIA Novosti: Medvedev calls for self-regulation for small business.
26. Financial Times: Charles Clover, Russia: Medvedev privatisation plan evokes
shades of Boris Yeltsin.
27. Nezavisimaya Gazeta: VAST SUMS WITHDRAWN. Central Bank: 248,581 Russian
businesses paid no taxes in 2010.
28. http://valdaiclub.com: Neil Buckley, Value of the Russian IPOs.
29. www.russiatoday.com: Putin backs new ratings approach.
30. Moscow Times: Officials Lacking in Skills to Run Tenders.
31. ITAR-TASS: Obama, Lavrov discuss Libya, Nagorno Karabakh, Russia' s WTO bid.
32. Kommersant: FAR FROM MOSCOW. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov returned from the
United States with nothing to show for the trip.
33. Moscow Times: Green Light for Adoptions, Yellow Light for Visas.
34. www.russiatoday.com: Lavrov and Clinton iron out differences in Washington.
35. Russia Beyond the Headlines: The balance of threats. Alexander Gasyuk,
Washington, D.C. correspondent for Rossiyskaya Gazeta, interviews European
affairs and security expert Charles Kupchan on missile defense.
36. Moscow Times: Yevgeny Bazhanov, China Coming Full Circle as a Superpower.
37. Russia Profile: Unlikely Spies. While Moscow Chides Georgia for Its
"Anti-Russian Hysteria," Local Critics Call for Additional Transparency in the
Case against 3 Journalists.
38. BBC Monitoring US ambassador comments on case of Georgian journalists
arrested on spying charge.
39. New issue of RUSSIAN ANALYTICAL DIGEST: Russia and the Middle East Crises.
40. Russian Politics and Law - New Issue Alert.
Corruption, negligence plague former power Russia
By Thomas Grove and Alissa de Carbonnel
MOSCOW, July 13 (Reuters) - A sunken riverboat at the bottom of the Volga River
is a deadly illustration of Russia's failure to shake off its Soviet legacy of
corruption and systematic neglect.
The circumstances that led to the disaster that likely killed 129 people last
Sunday -- decrepit infrastructure, regulatory corner-cutting and an obsession
with turning a quick profit at the expense of human life -- are all too familiar
as the former superpower struggles to modernise.
"Our institutions basically don't work," said Mikhail Blinkin of the Moscow-based
Institute of Transport and Road Engineering. "It is a question of the absolute
ineffectiveness of the basic state institutions ensuring safety."
Listing to one side and experiencing engine trouble when it set out from a Volga
River port on Sunday overcrowded with passengers it had no licence to carry, the
56-year-old Bulgaria was a tragedy waiting to happen.
Corruption and negligence have killed nursing home residents clawing at locked
fire doors, coal miners in pits where owners flouted safety rules to maximise
profits, and passengers on airlanes brought down by bombers who bribed their way
through the gate.
It is also a problem the Kremlin has been unable to fix since the 1991 Soviet
collapse, despite an oil-fuelled boom that has transformed Russia's cities,
restored its pride and could make it the world's fifth-largest economy by 2016.
Early in his 2000-2008 presidency, current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said
Russia would be a "dictatorship of law" -- a country that runs smoothly and
safely because officials and ordinary citizens obey the rules.
Following the riverboat tragedy, President Dmitry Medvedev vowed "harsh measures"
against violators of safety rules, saying it was "completely obvious that we
cannot tolerate this any more."
The words of the leader who has based his legacy on promises to modernise society
and the economy rang hollow to many Russians.
Business daily Vedomosti criticised Medvedev's suggestion to ban certain types of
Soviet-era passenger jets and watercraft, calling his call "inadequate."
"Such a response is completely inadequate when we are faced with ... the
catastrophic scale of the deterioration of infrastructure and transport," the
paper wrote.
One-quarter of the cruise ships plying Russia's waterways are over 40 years old
and 9 percent over 50, Vedomosti said, citing official statistics. The Bulgaria
was built in 1955 in the former Czechoslovakia, then a Soviet satellite.
Anti-corruption campaigner Yelena Panfilova, who runs the Russian branch of
Transparency International, said licences for decrepit vessels were obtained
through bribes or nepotism.
The country's foremost religious leader, Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill,
lamented the frequency of disasters he suggested were caused by mechanical
problems and human greed.
"If only it was an exceptional event. But it isn't," Kirill said on Tuesday. "If
machinery has grown old, how can we use it, risking human lives only to get
On Monday, a vintage passenger jet caught fire and crashed in Siberia, killing
five people, weeks after a similar crash that killed 45 in northwestern Russia.
The riverboat sinking brought back memories of a disaster that struck months into
Putin's presidency when the nuclear submarine Kursk sank in the Barents Sea in
August 2000, killing all 118 aboard and prompting criticism of the sluggish
Lax enforcement of safety regulations contributes to 15,000 fire deaths a year in
Russia, almost five times more than in the United States, which has a far larger
Owners of a nightclub in the Urals city of Perm were accused of paying off safety
inspectors for an operating permit before a blaze set off by fireworks killed 156
people in December 2009, the highest fire death toll worldwide since 2004. A fire
exit was sealed shut.
Officials in Russia's North Caucasus region have repeatedly accused corrupt
police of taking bribes from Islamist militants to let them through checkpoints
in order to stage attacks.
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Rash Of Russian Transport Accidents Raises Safety Issues, Highlights
Cost-Skimping And Corruption
MOSCOW -- Grief-stricken relatives still waiting to identify the 129 tourists who
drowned on an overloaded tourist ferry that sank in the Volga are a harrowing
reminder of the price of a cavalier attitude toward safety.
President Dmitry Medvedev this week ordered sweeping safety inspections to be
carried out on all public transport after a recent spate of accidents involving
aircraft and boats.
The sinking of the "Bulgaria" double-decker cruiser on July 10 is the second
major Russian transport accidents in weeks, coming on the heels of the plane
crash of a 134 passenger Tupolev airplane that killed 47 in Russia's Karelia
region on June 20.
The spate of accidents, analysts say, is largely the result of cost-cutting that
results in skimping on upkeep and safety precautions as companies seek to
maximize profit margins. Corruption and a cavalier attitude toward safety
measures also play a role.
"We are getting the same basic picture everywhere with river vessels and
steamships and planes," says Yelena Sakhnova, a transportation analyst with VTB
Capital Bank. "These are essentially industries that require a lot of capital and
there has simply been underinvestment in them in the last thirty years."
Widespread Breaches Of Safety
Details emerging in local press reports point to widespread breaches of safety.
Prosecutors said the 56-year-old "Bulgaria" ferry was not even licensed to carry
passengers and had engine troubles when it left port in stormy weather. Moreover,
it was carrying over 200 people -- considerably more than its 140-person limit.
The ferry also had never undergone major repairs.
Medvedev appeared to hint that he was considering banning the use of old
Soviet-era cruise ships when he lamented Russia's use of "rusty old tubs."
Russia narrowly evaded another major catastrophe on July 11 when the left engine
of an Antonov-24 passenger plane burst into flames in mid-air. The pilot was able
to make a perilous crash-landing on Siberia's Ob River, although the rear
fuselage came apart on impact killing 6 passengers.
Sakhnova maintains that Russia's many small airline operators turn profits by
minimizing costs, which larger companies can handle, meaning that safety
regulations in the air industry are often pushed to the limit.
"Profitability in the aviation business is extremely low so small companies start
trying to economize on everything on enough servicing for planes, on spare parts
which can be faked, and on teaching qualifications for their pilots," she says.
Medvedev this week suggested the ageing Soviet-built Antonov airliner be taken
out of service echoing an earlier statement he made about the Tupolev-134
following last month's crash in Karelia. That model has been grounded until it
can be equipped with modern safety systems.
The Tu-134's patchy record has earned it considerable notoriety. Seventy-two out
of 852 of the short-haul Tupolev airliner built in the 1960s have been lost,
according to the RIA Novosti news agency. Production of the aircraft ceased in
Accidents Probably Not Caused By Design Flaws
Russia's record on air safety has actually improved since its lows in the 1990s.
According to the website airsafe.com, which tracks airline disasters, 333 people
died in air crashes in Russia between 1994-96.
Paul Hayes, the London-based director of air safety at the "Ascend" aviation
consultancy group, says the record has improved since, but it remains "poor" in
comparison with Western Europe and North America.
This year, there have been 63 fatalities in four separate airplane crashes,
according to the Flight Safety Foundation's Aviation Safety Network.
But Hayes emphasized that Russia's ageing airports, infrastructure, and "harsh
environment" must also be taken into consideration. According to a 2007
Renaissance Capital report, 40 percent of Russian airstrips are not even paved.
He adds that recent air disasters do not appear to have been caused by design
flaws in the Soviet-built planes.
"Obviously the accident investigation reports have not been published as they're
too recent, but looking at the press reports, there is nothing in either accident
to suggest an endemic problem with the aircraft design, or their structures,
systems etc," he says.
Corruption Also A Factor
Hayes suggests that the Tu-134 crash appears to have been a "normal operational
accident." The plane landed short of the runway in Petrozavodsk in northern
Russia during heavy fog. He also says the uncontained fire in the Antonov 24's
engine could have been caused by "missed maintenance" or "wear," rather than a
design fault.
Corruption also appears to be a factor in some of the disasters, particularly in
the case of the sinking of the "Bulgaria" riverboat.
The Investigative Committee said on July 12 that it has detained a regional
senior inspector of the Russian River Register. He is charged with offering a
service while neglecting security, which carries a possible sentence of ten years
in prison.
The head of Argorechtur, the ferry's operator, was arrested on the same day.
Question marks still remain as to how the boat passed legally-required
maintenance checks.
Investigators said the "Bulgaria" did not have professional contracts with the
boat's crew.
Moreover, the crew's relatively large survival rate against the passenger
survival rate has also come under scrutiny. Only 28 percent of passengers were
saved, while 69 percent of the crew survived.
An editorial in the daily "Nezavismaya gazeta" on July 12 predicted sackings and
convictions over the boat disaster similar to those that occurred as a result of
the Raspadskaya mining accident last year, as well as the deadly fire in the Lame
Horse night club in Perm.
The editorial, however, reached a bitter conclusion: "But nothing will change
even in time for the next drama."
[return to Contents]
BBC Monitoring
Russian businessmen want consensus between Putin, Medvedev - spokesman
Text of report by Gazprom-owned, editorially independent Russian news agency Ekho
Moscow, 13 July: Russian big business needs a consensus between the Russian Prime
Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitriy Medvedev over the presidential
election and an economic model which the future head of state will develop, vice
president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs Igor Yurgens
has told radio station Echo Moskvy.
He believes that the country's leaders will not try to "drag" representatives of
big business over to their sides. "For a stable transition period to a more
evolutionary model, aimed at real modernization, a consensus between Putin and
Medvedev is needed. However, the business community has to say which model it
wants to build: either state capitalism or a more liberal economy of the open
type, in which market rules dominate the interests of state corporations,"
Yurgens said.
From his point of view, in this sense, the conversation which took place
yesterday between the president and entrepreneurs was "very timely". "This will
determine the formation of the budget, and Medvedev's priority actions if he is
elected to a second term. He needs a signal from the Russian business community
how it sees itself in this world," Yurgens said in conclusion.
[return to Contents]
July 13, 2011
Medvedev versus Putin on business, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the World Trade
Organization, Libya, and a whole lot more
By MARK ADOMANIS
The Russian newspaper Vedemosti has a very entertaining feature today
[http://www.vedomosti.ru/special/medvedev-putin.shtml ]where they put a large
number of noteworthy quotes from Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev side by
side. I think this is an extremely worthwhile article, and my translation
muscles can always use a little bit of flexing, so I'm going to translate it and
provide it (mostly) without comment.
One note, I'm not doing a literal word for word translation but rather doing my
best to convey the meaning of what Putin and Medvedev are saying. Russian
political jargon is notorious for its repetitiveness and redundancy (i.e. rather
than saying "the process for the accession of customs union of Belarus,
Kazakhstan, and Russia as a single customs territory" I'll just put "for the
accession of a customs union of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia")
Power and business: to heal or give nightmares?
"Of course sickness is sickness but I think that Igor Vladimirovich [an oligarch
with large business holdings] should get better as soon as possible. Otherwise
we'll have to send a doctor to him to clear up all these problems" Vladimir
Putin, June 24, 2008
"In general it's necessary for the law-enforcement organs, and the organs of
state power, to stop "giving nightmares" to business" - Dmitry Medvedev, June
31, 2008
After the prime minister's speech the capitalization of Mechel, the primary
stakeholder of which was Igor Ziuzin, fell by a third. The words of the president
a week later were given at an address to representatives of small and
medium-sized businesses.
How to enter the WTO: together or separately?
"The heads of government of our countries, fulfilling a decision of the heads of
state about the priority of the formation of a customs union...decided...to
inform the WTO about the intention to start negotiations about a process for the
accession to the WTO of a unified customs union of the Republic of Belarus, the
Republic of Kazakhstan, and the Russian Federation" - Vladimir Putin, June 9,
"It is possible, having agreed on some common standards and positions within the
customs union, to enter separately. This, in my opinion, is simpler and more
realistic, but will take into account, of course, the rights and interest of the
other participants" Dmitry Medvedev June 10, 2009
Who won the War: the Russian people or Stalin?
"We won the Great Patriotic War. No matter who says what, victory was achieved.
Even if we return to the casualties, you know, no one can today throw a stone on
those who organized and stood at the head of this victory." Vladimir Putin
December 3, 2009
"The Russian people won the Great Patriotic War. Not Stalin and not the military
brass, for all the importance of what they did. Yes, their role, of course, was
very serious, but at the same time the war was won by people of incredible
strength, at an enormous cost in human life" Dmitry Medvedev May 7, 2010
How do you address the president: informally or formally?
When some important things come up, of course, it is necessary to have a common
position with president Medvedev. And I, exactly the same as before, don't think
it's shameful to pick up the phone and say to him "Listen, let's agree, let's
discuss this." We work out a unified position and it becomes even stronger and
more stable... It's exactly the same with him. There are times when he simply
calls and says "you know, we need to talk. Let's think about this. Here is this
problem, I want to hear your opinion." - Vladimir Putin, June 10, 2010
I work as the president, and he became the prime minister. And everyone's been
told this. We have friendly and comradely relations. We communicate, meet
regularly, and answer many different questions, and that's sufficient." Dmitry
Medvedev June 18, 2010
The liberal opposition: does it have the right to exist?
"Money and power, who doesn't want that? In their time they raged like
hurricanes, in the 1990's, they dragged with Berezovsky and those, who are now
in jail...many billions of dollars. They pulled them away from their troughs,
they overspent, and want to return and fill their pockets. If we allow them to do
this, they won't limit themselves to a few billion, they'll sell out Russia
wholesale." Vladimir Putin December 16, 2010
"These are public political figures. People relate to them differently. They each
have their own electoral base." Dmitry Medvedev December 24, 2010
Reform of the militia: people in service of the state, or charlatans?
"But carrying on the struggle with negative aspects of the law enforcement
organs, including the militia, here it is necessary to not smear everyone with
black paint. It is necessary to understand that all these organs of power fulfill
an important function in the state and that one should not put them lower than
the floorboards." - Vladimir Putin December 10, 2010
"An enormous number of questions have accumulated about the militia and the
ministry of internal affairs. And this is not because bad people work there.
There are all kinds of people there...including charlatans like everywhere...and
the militia should, in my view, get rid of a few people who do not put it in the
best light" Dmitry Medvedev December 24, 2010
Khodorkovsky: prisoner or criminal?
"I, like the noted singer Vladimir Vysotsky, think that a thief should stay in
jail. And in accordance with the decision of the court, Khodorkovsky has been
charged with embezzlement, a sufficiently serious case. We are talking about
non-payment of taxes and fraud, and this includes billions of rubles...We should
proceed with the understanding that Khodorkovsky's crimes have been proved in
court. Yes, and above all..I am not speaking about this personally, but I remind
everyone that Yukos' head of security is in jail for murder. He wasn't happy with
he mayor of Nefteyugansk Petukhov so they killed him. A woman here in Moscow
didn't give them a small location they wanted to take and they killed her. They
killed the killer they hired. They only found the brains in a garage. So, the
head of security committed all of these crimes on his own initiative? As is
known, we have some of the most humane courts in the world. And I'm proceeding
based on the fact that this has all been proven by a court." Vladimir Putin
December 16, 2010
"It is absolutely clear that neither the president, nor anyone else in
government service, has the right to state their position on this case, or any
other case, before sentencing or convocation, or acquittal" Dmitry Medvedev
December 24, 2010
Libya: to bomb or not to bomb?
"The security council resolution seems incomplete and flawed, it allows
everything and reminds one of the calls to the crusades from the middle ages. It
clearly allows the invasion of a sovereign country. It is obvious that this does
not mean that we are allowed to interfere in internal poltical, even armed,
conflicts from the outside, defending one of the two sides" Vladimir Putin March
21, 2011
"In no circumstance it is acceptable to use expressions which lead to a clash of
civilizations expressions like 'crusade' and others like it... I don't think
this resolution is wrong. More than anything else, I think that this resolution
in general reflects out understanding of what is taking place in Libya" - Dmitry
Medvedev March 21, 2011
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
The government suggests stiffer control over political parties whereas Dmitry
Medvedev stands for a simpler procedure of their registration
Author: Anastasia Kornya
Amendments to the law "On political parties" drawn by the
government circumstantiate mechanisms of their registration and
notification of the authorities whenever any significant change
occurs. One of the innovations stipulates regular reports to the
Justice Ministry on the current performance (as well as on the
membership, number of candidates nominated for elections, and so
on). What counts is that it is not central leadership of political
parties that will be providing these updates anymore. Regional
organizations of political parties will also be expected to
provide them on a regular basis.
As matters stand, regional organizations of political parties
are free from this particular chore. "It follows that territorial
divisions of the Justice Ministry are unable to control regional
organizations of political parties," explained a source within the
government. The amendments have been posted on the web site of the
Justice Ministry for several months now. The document was
submitted to the Duma the day following President Dmitry
Medvedev's meeting with leaders of parliamentary parties where he
told them to give a thought to simpler procedures of registration
of political parties in Russia.
"Sure, these innovations will make life harder for local
organizations of political parties," admitted Oleg Mikheyev of
Fair Russia's electoral center. "One does not have to be a genius
to guess what it all is about. With all this additional redtape,
chances are that a political party will make some minor mistake in
documents and thus enable the powers-that-be to remove it from
elections." According to Mikheyev, the ruling party never stops
designing mechanisms that will enable it to make use of the
administrative resource.
"Engineering of bureaucratic problems is the best efficient
way of establishing control over political adversaries," said
Vadim Soloviov of the CPRF. "Outlawing a political party on the
pretext that it is extremist might foment a scandal. Much easier
to kick it out of elections because it failed to do the necessary
Lawyer Vadim Prokhorov commented that control over political
parties was tightening despite what the president was saying on
the subject. "It does not really matter because there is no way
for genuine political opposition into politics in Russia," he
said. "It's like in Leonid Brezhnev's days. The system is taking
care of itself."
[return to Contents]
Putin collects money for monument to Stolypin
MOSCOW, July 14 (Itar-Tass) Premier Vladimir Putin participated on Wednesday in
a meeting of the organising committee on preparing for the 150th birth date of
prominent statesman of the Russian Empire Pyotr Stolypin. The cabinet head
suggested recalling undoubted services of the politician that were forgotten and
collecting money for his monument. Experts are convinced that speaking about
Stolypin, Putin outlined an analogy with his own activities.
Kommersant notes that the composition of the organising committee on preparing
the celebration of the 150th birth date of Stolypin turned to be more
representative than any intergovernmental commission. It has several governors,
including Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, cabinet members, their deputies,
university rectors, an archimandrite, State Duma deputies and even chairman of
the Union of Film Workers Nikita Mikhalkov. The newspaper notes that it was
possible to understand what importance Putin attaches to the upcoming anniversary
by the level of representation of the organising committee.
Nezavisimaya Gazeta writes that Putin called for collecting money for the
monument to Stolypin. Incidentally, he suggested doing this from salaries of
ministers and deputies. Speaking of Stolypin, Putin said that the premier had
headed the government "at a difficult and dramatic time of political and social
schism" when there were "real threats to territorial integrity of the country and
its sovereignty". "The cabinet head needed not only indomitable will, but also
personal bravery as well as readiness to shoulder the entire load of
responsibility for the situation in the country," Putin noted. "We should say
right away that he managed to do very much of what he conceived."
The premier noted that Russia had showed the highest growth rates of the economy
in the world in the years of Stolypin's rule: "He said: 'Give the state 20 years
of inside and outside peace, and you will not recognise the present-day Russia'."
Putin also quoted another extract from his famous colleague's speeches: "The
Russian government is the respondent for everything, even for what the country
does inside itself, inside its spiritual and economic life. Drunkenness,
hooliganism, idleness and debauchery are seen nearly at every step the
government is to blame for this. Either it has created such situation, or cannot
bridle and channel to the right road. When the government starts taking measures,
calling for work and order new screams: tyranny, deprivation of freedoms."
The newspaper notes that the number of Russians, discontented with the
government's operation, topped 53 percent.
In the meantime, experts polled by Nezavisimaya Gazeta, assure that speaking of
Stolypin, Putin had in mind, above all, himself. "Putin consistently enough
outlines his stance, and the link with Stolypin is not casual of course," head of
the centre on studying elites of the Sociology Institute Olga Kryzhtanovskaya
said with conviction. According to head of the regional research department of
the Centre of Political Technologies Rostislav Turovsky, the prime minister,
referring to "the much-spoken brand" of Pyotr Stolypin, wants to substantiate
this way his own political merits, intimating that the country needs stability,
and he wants to act as the guarantor of this stability. "Let alone any hints, he
speaks quite bluntly," notes director of the International Institute of Political
Expertise Yevgeny Mincheko.
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Turning Russian voters back on to politics
By Mikhail Barshevsky
Mikhail Barshevsky is the government representative in Constitutional, Supreme
and Arbitration Courts. In 1991, he founded the first law office in Russia,
Moscow Lawyers, which in 1993 was transformed into the firm Barshevsky and
Partners. For a year (from September 2007 until September 2008) Barshevsky
chaired the Supreme Council of the All-Russian Political Party, Civil Force. Mr.
Barshevsky is the author of three books and more than 100 publications on legal
Dmitry Medvedev's latest initiative to liberalize election laws by lowering the
voting threshold for the Russian parliament from 7 to 5 per cent is both a
positive and wholly justified step. This is one of many measures needed to
somehow invigorate the country's sluggish political life, as well as to help
resolve the most fundamental problem of the current legislative system in Russia
the people's extreme political apathy.
To get people interested in politics again in today's Russia, several steps,
which are admittedly not easy, but absolutely necessary, should be taken.
I am convinced that the country needs to consistently increase the number of
elected positions in the country all the way from sheriffs to governors. I admit
that the decision to cancel gubernatorial elections may have been justified back
in 2004, but it is also clear that it would a well-justified decision to
reinstate them today.
What Russia needs even more of is real political competition, and by "real", I
mean a full-blown alternative to the ruling party. The absence of such an
alternative is actually the main problem of both the country's political system
and the ruling party itself. It is definitely not United Russia's fault that it's
stronger than all the others. And it is definitely not its fault that the others
do not seek power, do not really want to attain it, fearing real political
responsibility like the plague. I think it is very convenient for the Communists,
the LDPR and Fair Russia to stay in the opposition, receiving political dividends
while ultimately being responsible for nothing. It's always much easier to
criticize, rather than actually do something. One particularly does not want to
assume responsibility in a country with no efficient infrastructure. It is yet to
be rebuilt since the Soviet Union collapsed, which regularly manifests itself in
the form of sinking boats, airplanes falling from the sky and explosions at
hydroelectric power stations. That's exactly why most political parties in the
country avoid real power.
However, there is an exception represented by Mikhail Prokhorov, who took the
helm of the Just Cause party last month. He seems to be the only one who is
really ready to make decisions and take on the responsibility. All the more so,
because the party has potential serious potential at that.
The idea that liberal ideologies are not popular in Russia is little more than a
widely spread misconception. In reality, if we break down liberalism into simple
and understandable questions, like whether people want to be wealthy, free,
possess property, have their rights protected by the government and so on, you'll
get positive answers to all of those questions from most Russians. The same
people wouldn't mind living in Western Europe or the US. In other words, this is
more a matter of presentation and political professionalism represented by
elected officials. As for the issue of an alternative to the ideology of the
ruling party, to a great extent it results from the lack of a more or less
attractive political agenda on the part of today's opposition, as well as the
lack of new political figures and fresh ideas.
That's exactly why the authorities today have to act in two directions
simultaneously. On the one hand, they have to bring down the electoral threshold
at the State Duma, actively calling for maximal political pluralism and
competition. On the other hand, they have to regenerate themselves from the
inside. For this end, Vladimir Putin has set up the Popular Front. Putin himself
does not conceal the goal of this step, which is to initiate competition within
the party, organize primaries and attract new political forces and constructive
ideas from the outside.
It is still unclear whether this step will really allow for the renewal of the
political elite or not. In the meantime, it is obvious that United Russia will
hardly be able to win the next parliamentary election (as opposed to the upcoming
election), as people's fatigue from its monopoly through the years has grown too
strong. It means that it is high time for a new political force to emerge, one
which will be able to formulate the country's new policy line within the next few
years while having the courage to shoulder the real but noble burden of
[return to Contents]
Popularity of civil service points to high corruption - Medvedev
MOSCOW, July 14 (RIA Novosti)-The popularity of employment in the civil service
is indicative of the high level of corruption in Russia, President Dmitry
Medvedev said on Thursday.
"I am greatly worried that young people want to become civil servants and this is
not because I dislike civil servants," he said.
"However, a number of questions arise when young people choose a career in the
civil service. Is it a prestigious position? Not very. Is it well paid? Very
badly," he continued.
"So this path is chosen as a way of getting rich quick."
Medvedev said it was essential to review some job descriptions and job titles,
but most importantly, provide adequate remuneration.
This is a task for the state and for the business sector," he said.
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Slaying the dragon
How corruption is dealt with in China.
by Savely Kashnitsky (Beijing Shanghai)
Recently, China "adjusted" its Criminal Code, abolishing execution by firing
squad as punishment for certain white-collar crimes. But it plans to continue
dealing with corrupt officials and bribe-takers by radical measures, including
capital punishment. The success level of these measures was examined by the
Trud-7 correspondent.
Onions are sold at the vendor stall to the right, and at the one to the left,
bananas. A man stands in the middle, issuing stamps. The nearby price tag reads:
one stamp one yuan. This caricature was printed by the Chinese communists' main
newspaper, Zhenmin Zhibao, in the early 1980s. Its appearance became a type of an
acknowledgement that China has been swept by corruption. The rapid economic
growth (today, China's growth is the world's most active: in the first six months
of the year China's GDP rose by 11%) is associated with rapidly growing
corruption. Up to 20,000 Chinese officials are annually sentenced to a jail term
for accepting bribes.
The deadly Olympic construction
The former vice mayor of Beijing, Liu Zhihua, who was responsible for the
construction of sporting and transport facilities in the capital, received a
two-year suspended death sentence. He had collected bribes totaling more than $1
million. Having collected a bribe for his allocation of land and refusing to
provide the "purchased" piece of land, Liu Zhihua was forced to respond to
complaints. In the course of the investigation, contractual preferences surfaced,
which he gave to his mistress for the construction of Olympic facilities, as well
as a "pleasure palace" with various mistresses in the city's suburbs.
High-profile cases that are covered by the Chinese media (including broadcasts of
the execution of capital punishment) do not frighten corrupt officials. In recent
years, China has risen by six points in the ranking of the world's most corrupt
countries, compiled by Transparency International.
In the city of Chongqing, a staff member of the prosecutor general's judicial
department stole 9 million yuan (more than $1.3 million). He was sentenced to
execution by shooting or lethal injection (the condemned decides). Having his
punishment deferred for two years saved the criminal. By improving his behavior
while working well in prison, he was able to replace the death sentence with life
in prison.
Meanwhile, there is no bribery at the very top level among Communist Party
secretaries and ministers.
There, corruption is expressed in form of clan relations. Members of various
families "with growth prospects" are intermarried. Mutual favors among
high-ranking officials have no cash value.
Sharing with the party's coffers
Meanwhile, at the everyday level, there is no obvious corruption. Oleg Gritsanov,
a professional orientalist and the CEO of a successful corporation in Shenzhen,
argues that if he was pulled over by a traffic police officer, slipping some
money along with the driver's license would be useless as the dispute would be
resolved without money. There is no need to offer bribes or gifts to an emergency
room doctor, a plumber, or a window clerk.
Incidentally, I was explained to me why China has such small banknotes: the
largest is the 100-yuan note, which is only 455 rubles. The reason is to make it
more difficult to give and take bribes as one can't carry a substantial sum in
his briefcase. Meanwhile, the middle ground between the everyday and the elite
levels is the space of corruption, for which, in China people are sentenced to a
life term in prison.
It remains unknown as to what verdict will be issued to Xu Zongheng, the arrested
mayor of Shenzhen and deputy secretary of the Shenzhen Municipal Party Committee.
He is suspected of unjust enrichment from the planned unification of Hong Kong
and the neighboring, rapidly-developing city of Shenzhen.
Perhaps, there would not have been a case filed against him if in addition to
filling his pockets from land allocation scams Xu Zongheng had also filled the
party coffers.
"If you are looking for a living corrupt official," my interlocutor squinted,
"here he is, right in front of you."
Not expecting such honesty, I was ready to hear the punchline. But he was not
joking: "The tax rate for my small business (about 3 million yuan per year) is
5%. Before complying with this obligation, I invite the tax inspection chief out
to a restaurant to the best one, of course and, of course, at my expense.
During the meal, we practically don't discuss business. The tax inspector is
already aware of my proposal. I'll pay the taxes, though not on the 3 million,
but on 2 million of profit in full, so he won't have to chase after me. My
condition, meanwhile, is no inspections. And he agrees as inspection officials
have the right to manipulate income tax brackets. He readily accepts the trips to
the restaurant as well as small holiday gifts that is not punishable. And I know
that he will not step over the reasonable limits by demanding 100,000 yuan, for
example. After all, in that case, I could complain to higher authorities, and he
would fall under suspicion. So, we both stop at the brink of corrupt relations.
Do we step over the line? That's debatable."
"In order to start a business," says Vladimir Marchenko, spokesman for a Russian
firm in China, "I need to pay 3,500 yuan and wait eight months. Or I can pay
5,000 and get results in four months. Pre-paying for expedited service is not
considered corruption, though the conditions are, of course, there."
Read about other forms of corruption in China and specific examples in the next
issue of Trud-7.
[return to Contents]
Christian Science Monitor
July 13, 2011
Medvedev takes on Russia's outdated military-industrial complex
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Tuesday that the Defense Ministry should
open its contracts to to bidding by foreign firms if Russian products didn't fit
the bill.
By Fred Weir, Correspondent
Moscow--Russia's ambitious $730-billion rearmament program appears to be stalling
amid skyrocketing prices, late deliveries and, in some cases, the sheer inability
of Russia's military industries to deliver the goods.
Experts say the increasingly frustrated tone of public statements by Russian
leaders, including President Dmitry Medvedev, suggests that they are only now
fully realizing that the once-mighty Soviet military-industrial complex, which
produced everything from bullets to intercontinental missiles, is irreparably
In a testy meeting with top military officials Tuesday, Mr. Medvedev voiced the
previously unthinkable idea that the Defense Ministry should open its contracts
to bidding by foreign firms if Russian products were too pricey or substandard.
Earlier this year, Medvedev sacked several top industry managers over unfulfilled
contracts, and last week he ordered a full investigation into claims by one of
the country's top weapons designers, Yury Solomonov, that the 2011 military
procurement program had been "botched."
"We're dealing with a systemic problem here, and nobody knows what to do about
it," says Vitaly Shlykov, a former Soviet war planner and ex-deputy defense
minister of Russia. "After 20 years of doing nothing about the decay of our
defense industries, they've just unexpectedly noticed it. If they go ahead and
spend the vast sums of money they're talking about (on new Russian military
equipment) it's obvious that much of it will just be wasted or stolen."
Modernizing the military
Russia's former president and current prime minister Vladimir Putin has announced
increasingly expensive plans to overhaul and re-equip Russia's armed forces,
beginning with a $200-billion 7-year program in 2007.
Following a brief summer war with Georgia in 2008, which laid bare a wide range
of Russian military shortcomings, the Defense Ministry launched a thorough
organizational reform that slashed manpower, abolished scores of Soviet-era
"phantom divisions" that existed mostly on paper, and set the stage for a modern
professional army.
Early this year, Mr. Putin said the government will spend 20-trillion roubles,
about $730 billion at current exchange rates, by 2020 to completely re-equip
Russia's armed forces with 1,000 new helicopters, 600 combat aircraft, 100
warships including aircraft carriers and 8 nuclear-powered ballistic missile
submarines and new generations of intercontinental missiles and advanced air
defense systems.
But experts say the ability of Russian defense industries to provide these items
doesn't come close to the armed forces' appetite for new weaponry.
"To fulfill this program we would have to rebuild our entire military industry,"
says Alexander Golts, military expert with the online newsmagazine Yezhednevny
Zhurnal. "It was a Soviet tradition to build everything at home, from shotguns to
fighter planes, but in the 1990's the whole infrastructure of subcontractors
disappeared," meaning this approach is no longer an option, he says.
"When the USSR collapsed there were 2,200 big defense industry enterprises, but
many were sold off or went bankrupt, and now there are about 1,200 in varying
states of health," says Viktor Baranets, a military expert with the Moscow daily
Komsomolskaya Pravda. "What we have left is mainly the result of Soviet-era
investments. About 90 percent of the equipment our armed forces use today is from
our fathers' era."
A few "islands" of military industry have survived and even thrived in
post-Soviet times and their products, which include T-90 tanks, Sukhoi fighter
planes, and S-300 anti-aircraft systems have propelled Russia to second place
among the world's top arms exporters.
Russia has even developed, jointly with India, a futuristic "fifth generation"
fighter plane that some experts hail as a worthy competitor for the US F-22
Raptor and F-35 Lightning II.
But Mr. Golts says the factories that produce these weapons need to manufacture
nearly all their components in-house, which leads to massive delays and cost
"Military industries in Russia are totally inefficient. They are mostly state
monopolies, and they dictate terms to the Defense Ministry, not the other way
around," he says. "The problem here is that they adopted a rearmament program
without a full reform of the defense industry sector, and that's why the whole
plan is running into a brick wall now."
In his meeting Tuesday with Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov and Deputy Prime
Minister Sergei Ivanov, Medvedev sounded stern and decisive about the need to
force defense contractors to meet production schedules, agreed prices and quality
"You must buy only quality goods, and at transparent prices, and not the prices
this or that company finds to its liking," he told them. "This is big money, and
so you cannot buy junk. Place the contracts with other companies. If all else
fails, import the needed goods."
Russia already does import a few things, including German sniper rifles and
Israeli drones. Last year it signed a multi-billion contract with France to buy
four Mistral-type helicopter assault ships at a price of about $750-million each.
But experts say that deal, personally clinched between Putin and French President
Nicolas Sarkozy, engendered fierce opposition within Russia's military-industrial
establishment and is unlikely to be repeated.
"It's not politically possible to let contracts out to foreign firms on any
scale," says former deputy defense minister Mr. Shlykov. "The defense ministry is
at the mercy of the industry, which decides on prices, quality, and timetables.
Things are coming to a head now, and the only optimistic thing about it is that
at last the leaders of the country have started talking about this problem in the
[return to Contents]
Poll Shows Most Russian Citizens Have Not Heard of Vice Premiers, Ministers
July 13, 2011
Report by Natalya Bashlykova: "Ministers Are Unknown and Unloved. Citizens Admit
as Much to VTsIOM"
Out of 25 Russian ministers, not one has 100% recognizability and support from
the population. Those who are least known to citizens are deputy chairmen of the
government Igor Sechin, Igor Shuvalov, and Vyacheslav Volodin. These are the
figures from a poll by the All-Russia Center for the Study of Public Opinion
(VTsIOM), which asked citizens their opinion about the government's activities.
Experts assessed this as a "curiosity" and the "delegitimization" of the
At the end of June VTsIOM asked Russian citizens whether they approve of the
government's activity. Residents of 138 population centers in 46 regions were
invited to assess the activity of 25 ministers (head of government Vladimir Putin
does not feature in the poll) by choosing from three options: approve,
disapprove, or have not heard of them. Those who received the most approval from
citizens were Sergey Shoygu, minister for civil defense affairs, emergencies, and
the elimination of the consequences of natural disasters (72%), Foreign Minister
Sergey Lavrov (47%), and Deputy Chairman of the Government Sergey Ivanov (32%).
Russian citizens disapprove most of all of the activity of Minister of Education
and Science Andrey Fursenko (50%), Minister of Social Development and Health
Tatyana Golikova (41%), and Finance Minister Aleksey Kudrin (34%). It should be
noted that out of 25 ministers the 30% bar for approval or disapproval was
reached by only the six officials mentioned above. The negative or positive
ratings of the other ministers varied between 10% and 30%.
The poll showed that not one minister is 100% recognizable. The greatest number
of citizens do not know who Deputy Chairman of the Government Igor Sechin is
(75%). In second place are Minister of Regional Development Viktor Basargin and
Deputy Chairman of the Government Vyacheslav Volodin (with 72% each). Not far
behind comes First Deputy Chairman of the Government Igor Shuvalov (71%). It
should be noted that in previous polls (March and January this year) no minister
had achieved such high percentages on the (un)recognizability scale.
In the opinion of experts, the poll results indicate that Russian citizens are
not very familiar with the government's activities. "The ministers who are most
approved are legends. For instance, Sergey Shoygu, the rescuer hero, but what do
we know about the state of affairs in civil defense, for which the ministry is
also responsible? How many people know where the bomb shelters are in their
cities?" -- Georgiy Chizhov, vice president of the Center for Political
Technologies, says. According to him, the respondents' failure to recognize the
vice premiers is a curiosity that would be impossible to imagine in European
countries. "The poll delegitimizes the government, it transpires that its only
legitimate member is Vladimir Putin," he says. Political expert Dmitriy Oreshkin
believes that the respondents' opinion is "a reflection of television and the
priorities of the Russian consciousness." "Apart from soccer and beer, Russians
are of course interested in international relations, war, and Batman, who does
good deeds," he told Kommersant. "When it comes to the negative side, the poll
reflects the problems that concern the population: Fursenko destroyed the
education system, Golikova is a stepmother and not a mother, and Kudrin is a
liberal miser pining over the gold." For his part Vladimir Yuzhakov, director of
the Department for Administrative Reform at the Center for Strategic
Developments, believes that the poll indicates that some of the ministers pay
great attention to PR and some do not. "I would like to say that the poll
indicates the professionalism of the ministers' work, but that is not the case,
and that is a very bad thing. It would be good if officials had an interest in
this assessment," the expert explained.
[return to Contents]
Russia Profile
July 14, 2011
Elective Renewal
Matviyenko's Move to the Federation Council May Be the Latest in a Government
Drive to Rid Russia of Long-Serving Regional Heads
By Justin Lyle
Although St. Petersburg governor Valentina Matviyenko eventually agreed to accept
President Dmitry Medvedev's "promotion" to head the Federation Council, she did
so after five days of deliberation. And two events this week indicate that she is
not going to relinquish her considerable influence in Russia's second city
without a fight.
Kommersant reported today that 90 percent of copies of its political weekly Vlast
were pulled from the shelves of stores in St. Petersburg. This week's issue
contains an unflattering article summarizing Matviyenko's time in office, using
her original campaign slogan "Our City is Tired" to describe locals' increasing
dissatisfaction with her own governorship.
Furthermore one of the issues that has come to define the later stages of
Matviyenko's governorship her unpopular decision to back construction of the 400
meter-tall Gazprom Tower also reared its ugly head again this week. In a rare
triumph for civic activism in Russia, St. Petersburg residents demonstrated
against construction of the skyscraper in the heart of the city's
UNESCO-protected center, and plans were scrapped in December 2010. However, local
authorities announced this week that they are now considering going ahead with
the project in a different part of the city.
Matviyenko will run for head of the Federation Council though, formally the
State's third highest post. But in a country where power resides in informal
networks, rather than in stable institutions, the move would mark a major
downshift for her. After eight years at the helm of Russia's second city, the
apparatus of the Federation Council must seem a limited purview.
"Although the governors are appointed, the leadership expects them to deliver the
desired election result," argued Maria Lipman of the Carnegie Moscow Center.
"Unlike Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, who refused to leave and had to be forced out,
Matviyenko was reluctant, but agreed to accept an appropriate position. The chair
of the Federation Council is that position."
This is nothing new for Matviyenko, whose career to date has been built on her
connections. Matviyenko's 2003 rise to the St. Petersburg governorship owed much
to Vladimir Putin's public intervention on her behalf, when he backed her bid on
state television. Meanwhile the position currently intended for her on the
Federation Council was cleared by the ousting of Just Russia Party Leader Sergei
Since Putin cut the direct election of governors in 2004, Matviyenko and her
counterparts have depended on approval from the central authorities rather than
the backing of local populations. State Duma representatives are still elected
however, and one explanation for Matviyenko's likely demotion centers on the
December State Duma elections. Matviyenko, a member of the ruling United Russia
party, has earned the overwhelming dislike of St. Petersburg residents, not least
through numerous corruption scandals tying her son Sergei's flourishing business
empire to lucrative city contracts. The governor also alienated locals by
shutting out small and medium-size enterprises immediately after her election in
2003. In the winter months, her administration's failure to deal with basic
problems like the deadly icicles that hang from the roofs of the city's buildings
led to the death of several residents, including children.
Matviyenko is not the only long-serving regional head to be encouraged to leave,
rather Medvedev's intervention in St. Petersburg seems to be the latest in a
series of removals of large regional chiefs, including the governors of
Sverdlovsk, Tatarstan, and Bashkortostan in the last two years. Pavel Salin of
think tank The Center for Political Assessments sees Putin as the man behind the
changes. "Putin wants to renew the elite, because he sees that some members of
the present cadre are not up to the task and don't expect to have to do anything
to retain their positions. Without a renewal of the elite, a period of stagnation
will be followed by instability."
But Matviyenko has not been elected to the Federation Council yet and considering
that Dmitry Medvedev positions himself as a politician committed to enforcing the
rule of law, it is surprising that he has stepped beyond his formal presidential
competence in quasi-appointing Matviyenko speaker. The proposal from the
president and regional chiefs overlooks a three-stage democratic process, which
the St. Petersburg governor will nonetheless have to go through to take up the
Before securing election to the Federation Council and then being voted its
chairperson, Matviyenko will have to win a seat as a deputy in one of the St.
Petersburg municipalities in elections scheduled for August. Unlike higher up,
where support from the leadership would ensure her free passage, victory at the
municipal level is far from certain.
Although 50 United Russia deputies have reportedly offered to give up their seats
to the St. Petersburg boss, her legitimacy will depend partly on progressing
through the democratic process, even if this is largely symbolic.
Opposition politicians, including Mironov's Just Russia party, have promised to
compete hard in this relatively politically-engaged region, where widespread
dissatisfaction with local conditions should provide ample ammunition for
anti-Matviyenko candidates. And given the small scale of the competition at
municipal level, opposition parties should manage to closely monitor the voting
in September's by-elections and later elections closely.
According to Pavel Salin, these very obstacles may play to Matviyenko's
advantage, and could lead to her retaining the governorship: "Having being
proposed publicly by Medvedev, her failure to win the necessary municipal-level
elections would be a serious blow to Medvedev's credibility. Her team will want
to exploit this risk to help her hold onto the governorship," Salin said.
But it seems unlikely that the local opposition can undermine the heavy weight
backing of other regional heads and the president himself. A transcript of a
meeting with Medvedev and Matviyenko published on the Kremlin Web site in late
June reflects this support. Having praised her work as governor of St.
Petersburg, Medvedev said it was precisely this work that led him to raise her
Federation Council candidacy at a meeting with regional governors at his Gorki
residence. "It has to be said that they spoke with enthusiasm about your
candidature. Firstly, they respect you simply as a colleague, as a governor, as a
person who has been successful in their position. Secondly and this is of no
small importance, there is a feeling among the governors that the potential of
the Federation Council, that is the federal potential, the potential of regional
chambers, is perhaps not being fully utilized."
[return to Contents]
Nezavisimaya Gazeta
July 14, 2011
The Communists played into the hands of the ruling party
Author: Ivan Rodin
CPRF leader Gennadi Zyuganov is expected in Nizhny Novgorod,
tomorrow. The impression is that the Communist Party's plans for
the parliamentary election are fairly modest. It has 11.6% seats
on the Duma at this point. The CPRF will be content with 13-15%
after the December election.
Zyuganov will visit the Sokol airplane factory on July 15,
give a press conference after that, and appear on a local TV
network. On July 16, he will attend a conference of the People's
Militia named after Minin and Pozharsky and its rally later on.
The impression is that the CPRF is out to establish a federal
counterweight to United Russia's Russian Popular Front (RPF).
"The RPF ought to thank us because it was meaningless without
us," said a CPRF apparatchik. "Until now, this RPF was like a
balloon, pointlessly hanging in the air... But now they know that
the CPRF is their number one enemy, an enemy that warrants a whole
front to cope with."
As a matter of fact, even CPRF functionaries themselves admit
that they are playing into the hands of the ruling party. Said
Sergei Obukhov, Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPRF,
"Sure, there is some kernel of the truth in it. On the other hand,
I do not think that we had a choice. People started demanding a
response to establishment of the RPF. Our web site cannot handle
all visitors, each and every one of them demanding exact
information on how they can join the People's Militia." According
to Obukhov, what Zyuganov did [establishment of the People's
Militia] was but an adequate response to these demands. "What
really counts is that people do not join [the People's Militia]
because they want to participate in primaries or sit on
legislatures. Far from it. They join in order to show United
Russia what they think about it and its RPF," said Obukhov.
Obukhov reckoned that the new structure was going to earn the
CPRF additional votes, those of the so called protest electorate.
Lots of experts are stone-cold confident that votes of the protest
electorate will play an instrumental role in the performance of
the parties of the opposition in the forthcoming election.
Communists aspire to a lion's share of these votes but obstinately
deny the necessity of changes within the CPRF itself. "No, I can't
say that we will introduce any innovations in the forthcoming
campaign. It will be quite traditional," said Obukhov. The
Communists are making a mistake. The majority within the so called
protest electorate has nothing to do with leftist political
forces. It is unlikely that these people will want to vote for the
cause of Lenin and Stalin. If the CPRF really aspires to their
votes, then it ought to change its rhetorics - at the very least -
or these people will vote someone like Yabloko or Right Cause.
It should be noted that the CPRF always deploys observers at
polling stations in the course of federal elections. These
activists get copies of protocols and forward them to the party
that calculates votes (using the software also used by the Central
Electoral Commission, for that matter). The Communists always file
lawsuits against foul play in the wake of every election... and
win the ensuing court battles but rarely.
Zyuganov said the other day that 500,000 observers would be
dispatched to polling stations come December. (Mostly youths, he
said.) This is not the first time the CPRF leader promises to
deploy so many observers. Or to have them at absolutely all
polling stations in Russia without exception.
Andrei Buzin of Voice Association told this newspaper that
the Communists had never covered more than 50% of all polling
stations yet.
[return to Contents]
Presidential Prospects of Right Cause Leader Prokhorov Assessed
Yezhednevnyy Zhurnal
July 13, 2011
Article by Mikhail Delyagin, director of the Institute for Problems of
Globalization, doctor of economic sciences: "'Yo-Mobile Stronger Than 'I-Phone'"
Some time ago, I played around with polls among the most varied audiences (up to
sincere conservators, inclusively) which showed that, in response to the
question, "Whom would you elect as President of Russia - Putin, Medvedev, or any
other third candidate?", from 40 to 65 percent of respondents replied "any
Moreover, judging by the commentaries, people understood that "any other" really
could turn out to be "anyone at all" - from Chikatilo to Novodvorskaya, and for
many, even Kadyrov and Nemtsov were certainly not unacceptable options.
The rigidly standing "power vertical" had touched the very innards of the "dear
And, it appears, skilled political technologists are ready to make use of this.
I was very much intrigued by the statement of Prokhorov, who was appointed leader
- or perhaps even owner - of Right Cause, about his readiness to become premier.
After all, in our country people do not like to announce their real plans aloud.
To boast means to "incur the wrath of God." And, like many other archetypical
traits, this one is incurable. By making a public announcement of his goals, the
bearer of Russian culture automatically lowers the bar: As if to say, I am not
doing anything here, I am just tinkering with the primus stove and fooling around
with a little Belarusian automobile...
Therefore, the statement about the readiness to become only the prime minister is
interesting. It may belie a hidden desire to become president: It is a bad
soldier who dreams of becoming merely a colonel. Especially when the country's
demand for "anyone at all, except these" is obvious.
In any case, Prokhorov is the only prominent person (a politician is something
that he has yet to become or not become), who has been "allowed to the table" of
federal politics since 2003. We will see whether he is suitable for the role of
"anyone at all," who is clearly more preferable in light of Putin and Medvedev.
His shortcomings are well known: Ranging from his affiliation with the
oligarchate and his inability to speak before his demob-happy "folly" in
Courchevel (reference to Prokhorov's arrest in French ski resort of Courchevel on
suspicion of involvement in prostitution ring. He was released and charges were
not filed - Translator's note).
His merits are no less obvious: His ability to manage, his strategic thinking,
brilliant memory, simple human good fortune and his ability to get revenge (his
receipt of the "Legion of Honor" medal after the Courchevel incident!).
And so, here is one more poll. It is in no way representative: The social
structure of its participants bears the same remote relation to the social
structure of the Runet, as the structure of the Runet bears to the structure of
Russia. But it is entirely suitable as a guideline.
In the social network, "GaydPark," which positions itself as an association of
well-to-do and independently thinking people, out of almost 1,500 people who
voted in less than 24 hours, 51 percent cast their votes for Putin, 34 percent
for Prokhorov, and only 15 percent for Medvedev. For the sake of fairness, we
should note that most users refused to vote, expressing indignation at such a
small choice.
In the personal Live Journal of the author of this note, there were around 200
people who cast votes, but in this entirely different audience, the votes were
also distributed in practically the same way: 52 percent for Putin, 33 percent
for Prokhorov, and 15 percent for Medvedev.
The slightly over half "for Putin" does not bear any substantial information:
Either it is the natural choice of "their own dragon," who is well known and at
least not frightening by virtue of being unknown.
It is something else that makes a deafening impression: The more than three-time
lag of Medvedev behind Putin, and the more than two-time lag behind Prokhorov. I
would like to write this off to the people's enmity (my blogs a re visited by few
liberals) of a "return to the 90's", which Medvedev embodies, but I cannot do so.
After all, the oligarch Prokhorov embodies exactly the same thing!
I believe that everything is much simpler: Putin and Prokhorov, each in his own
way, are perceived as independent people. They lived their lives independently,
they made decisions, they set goals and they achieved them. Themselves. This
cannot be denied, even with the worst attitude toward them.
But Medvedev, despite all of his administrative biography, does not give the
impression of independence. We are talking specifically about impressions: The
reality may be different, but the impression that he makes does not allow us to
view him seriously. Despite the work of skilled political technologists and
Thus, Medvedev, it seems, is guaranteed to lose out in the public consciousness
to both Putin and Prokhorov. His victory would be perceived simply as being
illegitimate, and he himself - as a usurper, a sort of "False Dmitriy the Third."
But Prokhorov, who began calmly dressing out Putin's successor on the liberal
field immediately after his appearance on the political arena, theoretically - if
he retains the pace he has set - may score a convincing "clean" victory even over
And ultimately, both Medvedev and Putin embody a return to the past - perhaps
even without meaning to do so. The former - a return to the 90's, and the latter
- to the 2000's. And a return to the past is guaranteed ruin for any society.
That is specifically why people always - and we recall this on our own experience
- choose even the worst future, preferring it to the most wonderful past.
Prokhorov - who for now is a thing in himself - may easily become a symbol of the
And receptive users of the Runet are sensing this prospect.
[return to Contents]
Moskovskiye Novosti
July 14, 2011
Human rights activists: Situation in the Caucasus is deteriorating
Author: Ivan Sukhov
The Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights
published the list of proposals made to Dmitry Medvedev at the
meeting in Nalchik a week ago. The Council suggests a complete
revision of Moscow's strategy in the Caucasus.
According to Emil Pain, Council member and Director of the
Center of Ethnic-Political and Regional Studies, the pace of
changes for the worst in the Caucasus is critical. Amelioration of
the situation requires a revision of the principles of federative
and ethnic-political structure of the Russian Federation and
specific measures in the Caucasus. For example, it is necessary to
conduct a systematic search for the people reported missing in the
course of counter-terrorism operations. (The data compiled by
Memorial estimates their number in Chechnya alone at nearly
3,000.) It is also necessary to establish rehabilitation centers
for the families of those who perished in these operations (not
necessarily gunmen), "reanimate" justice, and amend the social and
cultural policy. Also importantly, it is necessary to establish
permanent bodies to advise regional leaders, said bodies
comprising both local human rights activists and siloviki.
"It's time we abandoned the penchant for "rubbing them out"
and for basing performance reports on body-count," said Svetlana
Gannushkina, Council member and the head of Civil Assistance
Said Gannushkina, "All too frequently, counter-terrorism
operations actually benefit those who carry them out. The higher
the body-count, the better. Is it any wonder that people are
killed who have nothing to do with gunmen? Performance reports
ought to be based on reduction of crime. Gunmen ought to be
persuaded to mend their ways and abandon resistance. They ought to
be given jobs, preferably not on the police force."
Gannushkina said that the authorities of Ingushetia and
Dagestan were working on it and complimented their respective
governments on foresight. Unfortunately, some inexplicable and
bizarre episodes went on occurring in Dagestan. Some unidentified
persons kidnapped a young man in Kizil-Yurt on May 28. The man's
father immediately went to the police, prosecutor's office, and
local human rights organization. The Dagestani Interior Ministry
officially informed the father that the fact of abduction had been
logged on May 29 and that the abducted person had been killed in a
special operation in Gudermes (Chechnya) on June 3. The republican
prosecutor's office said a couple of days later that it knew of
the abduction and that an investigation was under way. "What
investigation were they speaking of when the Interior Ministry
already knew that the abducted person had been killed in
Gudermes?" said Gannushkina.
Pain said that performance of the authorities and security
structures in the Caucasus was so chaotic because several manual
control mechanisms at once had been installed in the Caucasus and,
once installed, started interfering with one another to the extent
where stability of the whole structure was in jeopardy. The
example of Chechnya suggested an alternative. Everything in this
republic was decided by a single person and federal power
structures and law enforcers wielded no clout with what was
happening. Pain actually questioned the presumed efficiency of the
permanent bodies comprising human rights activists and
representatives of security structures. "The human rights
community believes for some reason that the problem will be solved
the moment the authorities initiate a dialogue with society. I'm
not sure that it will. Society itself is in so chaotic a state
that there is no saying anymore what is better - this disorderly
society or the powers-that-be that refuse to initiate the
dialogue," he said. "In any event, isolated measures and efforts
will accomplish nothing worthwhile because resistance of the
system is so deeply entrenched that only a dramatic revision of
the strategy may help now... More than 50% Russians believe that
we should let go of the Caucasus. They say so just because it is a
problem and nobody knows how to solve it. Even worse, nobody is
even trying to solve it. Change this state of affairs, and people
will change their opinion too."
Said Gannushkina, "The situation is so bad that even those
who barely paid us lip service in the past do listen to us
nowadays. I mean leadership of the Investigative Committee and
prosecutor's office in Chechnya. There were special bodies
comprising representatives of security structures and human rights
organizations in Chechnya when the war was fought there. It seems
that we are back to square one, time to start interaction all over
again. This interaction was already established in Ingushetia and
Dagestan. Try as I might, I cannot imagine it in Kadyrov's
Chechnya but who knows?"
Medvedev promised to study the materials provided by the
Council. Before the Council meeting in Nalchik, another one had
taken place in Makhachkala in June. The president had met with
human rights activists from the Caucasus in Moscow on May 19,
The president himself suggested ways and means of a dramatic
amelioration of the situation in the Caucasus on at least two
occasions. A new Caucasus Federal Region was established in early
2010. Development of spas and resorts in the Caucasus began in
early 2011.
[return to Contents]
Caucasus Problem Unsolvable with Current Ethnic, Political Policies
Yezhednevnyy Zhurnal
July 12, 2011
Commentary by Yuliya Latynina, under the rubric "Among the People/Dear Russian
Citiziens": "A Hybrid of Kushchevka and the Manezh"
I actually already formulated this very simple rule once: where drivers are not
in the habit of obeying road markers, speed limits, and signs, traffic is
regulated by the lamp post. Which the especially lively ones crash into.
A typical example is Matvey Urin, the owner of a bunch of small money-laundering
banks, who ordered his bodyguards to beat up a Dutchman who had cut him off. It
is not known how many times Urin had done this, but on this occasion the Dutchman
turned out to be Putin's son-in-law. Urin went to jail.
Another example is the village of Kushchevka. The Tsapok gang lived there and
instilled fear in all the villagers. They murdered and raped and confiscated
land. Everyone knew it. Everyone was silenced. If someone complained, he wound up
in jail or in the cemetery. On his desk, they say, Tsapok had photographs of the
owner of the house embracing Tkachev; however, it was not the kray governor, but
his brother.
And then one day they sent out interns to kill a farmer that they were sick of.
But it turned out to be a whole company there. And this happened at the height of
the Khodorkovskiy trial. But Moscow, which urgently needed something to knock
down the subject of Khodorkovskiy, could not have cared less about the
connections of some guy named Tsapok. And Tsapok went to jail. (It is true that
the system is now taking its revenge -- the gang members are being let out one by
one: Tsepovyaz has already been released).
Attention, here is a question: imagine that Urin was a Caucasian and the victim
was not Putin's son-in-law but, say, a girl blogger. That would turn out to be
the lamp post, only already ideally suited for the slogan "F-ck the Caucasus,"
which is sounding louder and louder these days.
Or imagine that Tsapok had an Armenian, not a Slavic name, which can easily
happen in Krasnodar Kray. Do you picture it? The Manezh is resting.
Really, the same thing as in Kushchevka happened in the Ural town of Sagra. The
locals attacked a Gypsy who was selling drugs, and he sent 15 cars full of Azeris
to get even. (By the way, this is very typical for Azeris -- I think it would be
hard to find 15 cars of Chechens or Dagestanis to settle scores for the
drug-selling Gypsy.) Along the way the Azeris shot up a car full of
pensioner-gardeners and beat up a motorcyclist.
Well, maybe they would not have killed anyone in the town. Maybe they would only
have beaten them up, but the cops -- who, judging by their statements, consider
it a matter of honor to cover the drug dealer and the dead nephew of a thief in
the law -- would have shut the townspeople's mouths.
But the inhabitants of the town met the troublemakers with gunfire, and then ran
to the City without Drugs Foundation. And Yevgeniy Royzman, the director of the
Foundation, is one of the few people whose voice is listened to in Russia. And he
is a man who has earned the right to call scum scum. And what came about was a
hybrid of Kushchevka and the Manezh.
The ethnic question and the Caucasian question are more and more turning into a
systemic disaster. This is a matter of the survival of the Putin regime. The
regime understands this but it cannot do anything, like a gaping motorist cannot
get out of a snowdrift on ice.
It cannot do anything or three reasons. For one, the vegetative nervous system of
the contemporary government is organized in such a way that the precinct officer
or lieutenant in the local area reacts to just two stimuli: money and
administrative resources. The drug dealer, the thief in the law, and the big-time
Chechen in the big car with the license plate KRA (Kadyrov, Ramzan Akhmatovich)
have both the one and the other, but the ordinary patsies do not have either, so
every time the victim proves to be "non-Russian," the question arises in its full
For two, the government itself persistently encouraged fascism in its ugliest
forms. Already during the investigation of the murder of Markelov and Baburova
testimony was heard to the effect that the murderers' overseer had ties to the
president's staff. And judging by everything, these ties were not terminated
after the murders. The name of this same person surfaced again after the search
phase of the case of the assault on Kommersant journalist Oleg Kashin was
For three, a source of blind irritation to the Russian nationalists (and not just
the nationalists) is the ever-increasing might of the Chechen authorities. Ramzan
Kadyrov won the war between Russia and Chechnya. The existence of Kadyrov is the
only reason that acts of terrorism occur in Moscow once a year, not once a month.
Therefore Kadyrov is untouchable and irreplaceable. Both he and his entourage
know very well: the untouchable always becomes the all-powerful.
The Russian authorities have no way out of this impasse. They drove themselves
into it. They were driven there by the total collapse of the law enforcement
system. By the encouraging of fascists and other Seliger types, by the ceaseless
cries of "enemies surrounding us." They were driven there, finally, by their
Caucasus policy, which comes down to paying tribute to Chechnya in exchange for
tranquility in Moscow and it comes down to absolute chaos and growth of the
influence of extremists in all the other republics where Moscow cannot uphold the
law and fears the creation of a strong leader equal in greatness to Kadyrov.
The only medicine against fascism (and this means fascism from both sides, for
Caucasian fascism is just as much a problem as Russian fascism) is to create
normal silovoy (security) structures that work to protect citizens' rights and to
uphold the law.
Russia should fight drug trafficking and the Gypsy who was dealing in Sagra
should get 20 years, not summon his punitive detachments. Russia should have a
special service capable of fighting the terrorists, and it should not be
necessary to subcontract this to Ramzan Kadyrov. The country should have a normal
army that, if necessary, can be sent to the Caucasus to restore law and order,
not to cause a bloodbath.
In other words, Russia should have a state, not a gang of crooks who work to
secure the financial interests of the Gunvor Company and its ilk and allow their
minions to feed off everything else.
[return to Contents]
Commentator Questions Wisdom of Keeping Kadyrov, Chechnya, in Russia
Moskovskiy Komsomolets
July 13, 2011
Commentary by Stanislav Belkovskiy: "Do We Need a Kadyrov of All Russia? 60% of
Russians Want To Separate from the North Caucasus"
The polemic about whether Russia should admit its defeat in the Caucasus war that
began in 1817 and give Chechnya its freedom (or rather, separate from a
victorious Chechnya) has yielded its first fruits. Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechen
Republic's head, has unleashed a widescale PR campaign to explain urbi et orbi
that he is not going to let the losing Russia go and will continue to collect
tribute in the amount of 90% of the Chechen budget. Now and ever and into ages of
ages. (Amen, I think.)
Taking part in the PR campaign were such unique representatives of the Russian
nation as the leaders of banned nationalistic organizations: Aleksandr Belov
(Movement Against Illegal Immigration, known by the abbreviation DPNI), and
Dmitriy Demushkin (Slavonic Union). They have spent time in Chechnya, interacted
with virtually its entire leadership, and reached an unambiguous conclusion:
Kadyrov is our president. In the sense that life should be arranged throughout
Russia exactly the way it is presently in Chechnya. And with exactly the same
kind of leader at the head.
The visit basically bowled over the Russian nationalists. In summary, Aleksandr
Belov said, in particular, "I was planning to organize a committee on holding a
referendum to separate the republics of the North Caucasus from Russia, but I am
now going to refrain from this intention. Because the trip (. . .) changed my
views on what is happening. (. . .) I was convinced that the Kadyrov
administration is making very effective use of the money being allocated from the
center. Other Russian governors should be taken there to be taught in Chechnya
how to make good use of money, not steal it. (Imagine, if every governor of ours
started traveling in a motorcade of 50 cars, the dust that would rise up over all
of Eurasia! -- S.B.)
Mr. Demushkin was in complete ecstasy: ". . . there is virtually no criminal
activity in Chechnya. You can leave your keys in your car in downtown Groznyy.
When I'm walking around nighttime Groznyy, I don't see a single person with a
bottle of beer or a drink. When the chief of police personally admonishes someone
walking by with raggedy-looking, rolled up trousers, I do indeed like that.
"Many ask, and what about freedom? But this is freedom. I absolutely agree with
the policy here with respect to alcohol. Take a look at how Groznyy has been
built up. Look, everyone is saying that billions in subsidies are coming in. The
subsidies are coming in, but take a look at the cost of the ultramodern stadium
built in Chechnya and the cost of an analogous stadium in Petersburg. Take a look
at the cost of the sites being built here, the quality of the asphalt, and look
there. Everything costs 10 times more in Moscow and Petersburg, 80% kickbacks on
roads, on road construction."
Moreover, according to Belov-Demushkin, they were even able to raise with their
new idol the issue of paying compensation to Russian refugees forced to leave
Chechnya after 1991. And Kadyrov supposedly agreed to discuss the matter. This is
what the reluctance to lose a meticulous tributary -- Russia! -- means.
After the return of Belov-Demushkin to Moscow, a few more details were revealed.
For example, that the Chechen authorities, for PR purposes, had invited another
group of Russian nationalists. But all the others refused to go unless Groznyy
officially condemned the recent murder of Colonel Yuriy Budanov. Naturally,
Kadyrov and Ko had no intention of doing any such thing, and as a result only the
most worthy headed out. Who couldn't care less about anything.
But that is not even the most interesting part. For your information, dear
reader, the collaboration between Ramzan Kadyrov and the people who call
themselves Russian nationalists did not begin today or even yesterday. It began
at least as far back as 2006. Wise Ramzan set his sights long ago on a few
strictly Russian organization which, according to their strategic plan, are
supposed to ensure the safety of Chechen commu nities in the heart of Russia
should any interethnic conflicts arise. Remember Kondopoga? So, you see, there
are grounds for thinking that some nationalistic activists went there not to
raise a Russian mutiny, as we were told about it on television, but just the
opposite -- to rescue the Chechen criminal element from popular fury. On
instruction from you can guess who.
The master of Chechnya may well have need of a Russian "infantry" at the present
stage of historical development. He cannot assign all delicate matters to his
fellow tribesmen because then there would immediately be a "Chechen trail." It is
much more convenient to fight our enemies by the hand of our nationalistic guys.
So that there is a perfect Russian trail at the right time and right place. And
no one is the wiser.
In this light, we can take a new look at the high-profile murder of the
well-known lawyer Stanislav Markelov. The men who committed the crime were
Russian nationalists; the trial established that. But the clients? This is a
great mystery. However, omnipotent Ramzan had grounds for being a little angry at
Markelov. For instance, for the fact that the lawyer had tried very hard, but
been unable, to prevent the parole of that same Colonel Budanov.
So that the alliance between the Chechen leader and his stern Russian admirers
could go far beyond the framework of publicity and PR. Apparently, our siloviki,
if we have any left, should be on the alert today. Before it's too late.
Actually, it is far from only Belov-Demushkin who have rushed to defend the
magnanimous Caucasian hegemon. The largest system opposition force -- the Russian
Communist Party -- has joined the campaign. The entire might of its oppositionist
rhetoric has come crashing down on one single person: Belkovskiy, i.e., me. An
anonymous manifesto has appeared on the Communist Party's official website that
says, for example, "It never occurred to him (Belkovskiy -- S.B.) to think that
the political zoo that Russia's enemies in the North Caucasus are trying to erect
was (. . .) absurd in Soviet times. And that the North Caucasus should be bound
more tightly to our one homeland, Russia, not separated from it. This is possible
if other politicians start handling Russia's affairs, not thieving oligarchs and
officials but true representatives of our laboring nation. A step toward this
could be his victory in the upcoming elections."
Careful analysis of the passage cited shows that the pronoun "he" in the last
line can refer only to Belkovskiy. And to my victory in the upcoming elections.
True, it is unclear whether this is for the Duma or for president. But for now
the Communist Party truly is ascribing sacral-mystical significance to my person.
Thus, on 6 July 2011, Communist Party Secretary Sergey Obukhov, speaking in the
State Duma on the presidential bill to lower the electoral barrier back to 5%,
proclaimed: "Will this bill be implemented in 2016, as the presidential
initiative provides? You know I personally am greatly alarmed. Here is the
political analyst Belkovskiy announcing in the media that the North Caucasus
should be separated from Russia (. . .) therefore, of course, it is good that we
are looking so far ahead and planning reforms, even in 2016. But actually the
situation is such that forces are at work to destroy our statehood, and this
cannot fail to alarm and raise concerns that our good, future intentions might
not come to fruition."
Translated into traditional Russian, this means that Russia -- because of
Belkovskiy -- might not last until 2016, therefore let us pass all kinds of laws
now and put them into force right away. It's like the old joke: let's complete
the five-year plan in three days, before the world ends.
Seriously, though, with their hasty participation in Kadyrov's PR campaign the
Communists are risking scaring off their base electorate altogether. Perhaps that
is for the better. Ultimately, people have long since been s ick of the Communist
Party, as a pseudo-oppositionist force that is constantly and impotently making
promises to come to power and does not even try to keep its promises. Only
suicide by the present system opposition will clear the path to a new, strong,
worthy, and fresh opposition.
By all accounts, Groznyy's contractor has been Sergey Kurginyan, a veteran of
domestic political strategies and former theatrical director. Made famous back in
the era of Gorbachev's perestroyka, when, after duping Yuriy Prokofyev, the last
first secretary of the Moscow CPSU gorkom (city party committee), he was able to
get hold of a not-too-shabby complex of buildings in Moscow on Vspolnyy Lane. A
few days ago, Kurginyan proposed a truly revolutionary idea: create a
Chechen-Russian Court of Honor to try our soldiers and officers fighting in
Chechnya. Whoever the victors, i.e., the Chechen side, likes least will be
condemned and sentenced. The rest, amnestied. In other words, men in epaulets
have carried out the order of the command, risked their lives, and shed their
blood. And for this, Kurginyan is proposing -- to come down hard on them. This
makes it perfectly clear who won the war and who lost.
There is one consolation. The notorious Mr. Kurginyan gained a reputation long
ago as a professional who brings his clients grief and misfortune. According to
reliable rumors, he consulted for the Communist bonzes directly before the CPSU
collapsed, for Ruslan Khasbulatov, the former chairman of the Russian Supreme
Council, before the White House was fired upon in 1993, and for Yuriy Luzhkov in
the years 2009-2010. So that now, when he is suddenly helping Kadyrov . . . We're
going to hold our fists.
Right now, despite all the efforts of the freshly assembled Kadyrov propaganda
crew, 60% of Greater Russia's inhabitants are in favor of the North Caucasus
separating. This figure was cited nowhere else but in Nalchik, at the recent
session of the Russian president's Human Rights Council. Apparently, President
Medvedev was forced to hear it.
No matter what anyone says, Russia is a great European country. Not a third-rate
Asiatic colony. We must proceed from that. We do not need a Kadyrov of All
[return to Contents]
Rights group slams police over Russian activist's murder probe
MOSCOW, July 14 (RIA Novosti)-Police have "repeatedly refused" to allow the
sister of murdered Russian human rights activist Natalya Estemirova access to key
case materials, rights organization Memorial said in a report on Thursday.
Memorial's report, presented to President Dmitry Medvedev on July 5, said that
Estemirova had investigated a public execution in the Chechen village of
Akhinchu-Borzoi a week before she was found shot dead in neighboring Ingushetia
on July 15, 2009.
"Over the last year, Russian investigation bodies and the judicial system have
repeatedly refused to give the materials of the case to Svetlana Estemirova and
her representatives, especially those concerning the Akhinchu-Borzoi execution,"
the human rights group said in a statement.
Memorial's report said it believed that Estemirova's probe into the execution led
directly to her death. Activist Alexander Cherkasov said in 2009 the execution
had been carried out in front of the whole village to warn them against "helping
Memorial also said the man suspected of Estemirova's murder - killed in a
counterterrorist operation in November 2009 - was not guilty.
Svetlana Estemirova has filed a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights
in a bid to force Russian investigators to hand over the materials.
Memorial also said it believed an "effective investigation" was only possible
with the active participation of Svetlana Estemirova and her representatives.
It said the participation of the "aggrieved party" was sanctioned by "not only
Russia's Criminal Procedural Code, but also the norms of international law."
Natalya Estemirova's murder caused an international and domestic outcry and
highlighted the dangers faced by journalists and rights workers in Russia.
Memorial chief Oleg Orlov was cleared last month of slandering Chechen head
Ramzan Kadyrov in connection with the case. Orlov had said Kadyrov, a former
militant, was "guilty" of the activist's death.
[return to Contents]
Moscow Times
July 14, 2011
Online State Registry to Monitor Extremism
By Natalya Krainova
The government intends to create a web site by 2013 where vigilant Internet users
can report extremist comments left by other readers on media sites, the Federal
IT and Mass Media Inspection Service said Wednesday.
The initiative would compliment the work of the Federal IT and Mass Media
Inspection Service, which currently monitors the media without help from readers,
but it could raise new worries about media freedoms.
Agency spokesman Mikhail Vorobyov said by phone that readers can now contact the
agency about extremist content but in the future will be able to register their
complaints on the new web site.
He said it was "premature" to comment further on how the new web site would work.
Sergei Zheleznyak, head of the State Duma's Information Policy Committee, told
Kommersant that the web site, dubbed the State Information System, will include
an account for every media outlet, and readers would sent complaints to the
relevant account.
Zheleznyak told Rossiiskaya Gazeta that the measure is part of a raft of
legislation on the rights and responsibilities of online media that will be
drafted by Aug. 1.
The web site would also provide the federal agency with a way to inform online
media about extremist content and request its deletion, he said. The agency
currently has to inform media by e-mail or fax.
Media will have to delete the comments or challenge the "extremism" label in
court, Zheleznyak said.
It was unclear whether a reader's complaint would suffice to have a comment
flagged extremist, or whether the agency would have to review the complaints
first and then issue a decision.
The measure follows new legislation on media signed into law by President Dmitry
Medvedev in mid-June.
A state tender to develop the web site will be announced soon, Zheleznyak said,
without elaborating.
Repeated calls to Zheleznyak's cell phone went unanswered Wednesday.
The new media legislation will also spell out the responsibility of editors for
publishing extremist quotes from third parties, Zheleznyak said.
The Federal IT and Mass Media Inspection Service is currently in charge of
tracking down extremism and can issue warnings to media outlets. Two warnings
within a year allow the closure of a media outlet on a court order.
Before issuing a warning, the agency sends out an "appeal" to delete or edit an
extremist comment within 24 hours, Vorobyov said.
Since July 2010, the agency has issued more than 90 appeals, Vorobyov said. In
all cases, the media outlets complied.
No prominent media outlets have been closed after extremism warnings. Ura.ru, the
largest online news portal in the Urals Federal District, was slapped with two
warnings in 2008 over comments posted by users but successfully challenged them
in court the following year.
[return to Contents]
Human Rights Council Hopes to Get Experts' Statement on Yukos Second Case in Sept
MOSCOW. July 13 (Interfax) - The Kremlin Human Rights Council could submit a
report on an inquiry into the second Yukos case to the president after experts'
accounts, ordered for early September, have been summed up, said Human Rights
Council head Mikhail Fedotov.
"We turned to a couple of dozen renowned experts in criminal law and asked them
to provide their accounts by early September," Fedotov said at a press conference
at Interfax on Wednesday.
After the Council gets experts' accounts, it will draw up a final report and
submit it to the president, he said.
[return to Contents]
Russia: Other Points of View
July 5, 2011
By Gordon Hahn
Russia's gradual reform agenda, its integration into Western life and
institutions, and the reputations of President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister
Putin all demand a substantial change in the policy regarding imprisoning
oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovskii and his associate Platon Lebedev. In addition,
any state that contends to be a country ruled by laws and not by men requires
just and merciful execution of the law, and in this case both justice and mercy.
This is always part of a democratic legal system, and they have yet to be served
by Russia's politicized judicial process. Russian law provides measures that
would allow the political authorities to redress the injustice, while honoring
the procedural requirements of rule of law state.
President Medvedev himself sparked hope that a change in Kremlin policy might be
forthcoming during his first major press conference last month where he
acknowledged that Khodorkovskii presented no danger to society. Although
Medvedev's statement was prompted by a journalist's question, he appeared ready
for it, instantly issuing an uncharacteristically short and precise answer. It
was if he had been waiting for the question and the journalist had been put up to
posing it. The timing seemed significant, coming at a time when Khodorkovskii's
lawyers were preparing to apply for conditional early parole, about which
Medvedev certainly would have known.
Days later, the growing glasnost' on even state-run media, a general feature of
Medvedev's thaw, suddenly changed to state media coverage of Khodorkovskii and
his appeal for a pardon. Both NTV and Rossiya channels carried long and
surprisingly open coverage of Khodorkovskii on prime time news programs.
On NTV, "there is one truth -NOT the attitude toward the one whose name shouldn't
be mentioned has been changing," the 'Central Television' program's host Vadim
Takmenev noted in an eight-minute report on Khodorkovsky. "It's as if something
has changed," Takmenev added. (Alexandra Odynova, "Signaling Thaw, Khodorkovsky
Pops Up on State TV," Moscow Times, 31 May 2011). The Rossiya channel included
video of Khordorkovskii's statement to the court, including his account of the
absurdity of the charges brought against him. This was a first time this had
been done since 2003 (Yan Gordeev, "V sudbe Khodorkovskogo nastupili
teleperemeny," Nezavisimaya gazeta, 31 May 2011). All this looked to be
The media policy change came after more bad reports emerged that capital flight
from Russia was accelerating, despite Medvedev's steps to liberalize a number of
aspects of the regime, including many related to investors' perceptions that
Russia would be a safe place to do business. Russia's modernization and
integration with the West requires just the oppositie confidence in the rule of
law and massive foreign direct investment in its economy. Without a real policy
change, the tandem's reform process will lag and could be aborted. Further,
Russia's full rapprochement and integration with the West will be impossible, and
Medvedev's reputation as a reformer and Putin's bitter, but necessary, medicine
when Russia was spinning out of control in 1999, will be destroyed.
This is not to say the Khodorkovskii deserves the status of champion of democracy
and the veritable freedom fighter that Western, in particular U.S. mainstream
media, have laid upon him, or that he is innocent of any crimeshe is not.
Rather, the early release or at least a drastic reduction in Khodorkovskii's and
Lebedev's remaining prison terms is required both for Russia to move beyond the
legacy of the 1990s and to restore a balance in justice connected with this
tortured and drawn out case.
For Russia, such a step will increase investor confidence and signal that
investor and property rights as well as the rule of law will begin to be honored
and that the era of state predation and corrupt government-business links is
coming to an end. This, along with other measures the tandem has been taking,
and is planning to expand in the future, should be enough to give an immediate
boost to direct foreign investment and entrepreneurial risk-taking, which are
crucial for Russia's economic, social, and political modernization.
Also, there are several, objective or non-political reasons which justify an
early release for Khodorkovskii and Lebedev. First, they have served almost 8
years of their 13-year sentence already. Second, even as European Courts of
Human Rights refused to characterize their prosecutions as politically motivated,
it noted that the conditions of their detention, pre-trial review, and trial
violated their human rights. Thus, in addition to following through on President
Medvedev's promised to honor the findings of the international court in general,
these violations constitute legitimate mitigation for much of what remains of the
defendants' terms of deprivation of freedom. Third, Khodorkovskii and Lebedev
were two among tens of other major and lesser oligarchs, who obtained their
property illegally or engaged in other forms of criminal activity, almost all of
whom went unpunished. A general criminal amnesty with major fines and
confiscations of property for resale applied equally across the board would have
been a better way for Putin to have gone in reining in the oligarchs, but this is
hindsight. Finally, Medvedev's recent legal reforms decriminalizing white collar
crimes such as tax evasion, which Khodorkovskii and Lebedev were convicted for in
their first trial, further justifies a sentence reduction.
But most importantly perhaps, with the release from prison of Khodorkovskii and
Lebedev, the exceedingly sad and ugly chapter in modern Russian history
represented by the 1990s' nomenklatura privatization bacchanlia can be laid to
rest, and the job of building a truly free, constitutionally democratic and
prosperous Russia can be revitalized by greatly needed new vigor.
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July 13, 2011
Moscow to enlarge twice in territory, developers rubbing hands
By Itar-Tass World Service writer Lyudmila Alexandrova
Moscow, which is the biggest city in Russia and Europe, may enlarge by almost 150
percent in territory thanks to the expansion to the Moscow Region. The Moscow
authorities are developing an ambitious project of massive construction sites on
new Moscow lands and the move of federal authorities there from downtown Moscow.
These gigantic Moscow construction plans will take about 20 years and will cost
exorbitant funds.
On Monday, July 11, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin and Governor of the Moscow
Region Boris Gromov passed to President Dmitry Medvedev their proposals to change
the Moscow boundaries. The president made them public. The Moscow territory will
increase from 107,000 hectares to 251,000 hectares thanks to the expansion to the
Moscow Region. The Moscow City will be expanded primarily in the southern
direction limited by the Kievskoye and Varshavskoye highways and the Grand Circle
of the Moscow Railway.
Dmitry Medvedev stated for the first time that Moscow should be expanded at the
St. Petersburg Economic Forum last June. The president explained this decision by
an initiative that Moscow should turn in an International Financial Center that
is impossible without modernization of the city infrastructure and the settlement
to the transport problems.
Rublevo-Arkhangelskoye in the western Krasnogorsk district will be also
integrated in the Russian capital with an International Financial Center to be
built in the settlement. Major banks, financial organizations and stock exchanges
should be moved to the place, where a business tycoon Suleiman Kerimov had
planned to build "a city of millionaires" before. Skolkovo with its innovation
center, which is a Russian counterpart of the U.S. Silicon Valley, will be also
included in the Moscow City.
A new compound of federal authorities and the Moscow government will be built in
a future southernmost part of Moscow. A general layout of a new Moscow district,
which will be selected as the place to build a center of government agencies,
will be developed within this year.
The Moscow Region will be cut off about three percent of its territory. Some
250,000 people live now in the region and will turn in Muscovites.
The Moscow authorities intend to build 60 million square meters of housing and 45
million square meters of commercial real estate on new lands. About two million
Muscovites will develop new territories of the country's capital. One million
jobs and housing will be allocated to them outside the Moscow Ring Road, which
encircles the current territory of the city.
The Moscow expansion will be supported by a reform of the city transport network.
The Moscow City is to pass from the radial-circular principal to the orthogonal
one in the transport network in the region that will ease up a transit traffic
load in the Moscow historical center. Several metro lines will be extended to
"new lands" of the capital. The railway line between the Smolensky and Kievsky
trunk lines of the Moscow Railway, a high-speed tramway lines and the hubs form a
new transport infrastructure.
The development of the lands integrated in Moscow will take about 20 years and
the state authorities will be moved there within five years, the Moscow
government reported on Tuesday. The federal government and the presidential
executive office will be the first to be transferred beyond the Moscow Ring Road
with other state agencies to follow the suit. The future of countryside
settlements, which will turn out to be in the area of new construction projects,
should be settled. The state authorities should find some funds of the
remuneration to 250,000 newly registered Muscovites and should settle the problem
to sell the buildings, which house the ministries now.
Moscow Deputy Mayor Marat Khusnullin stated that the task to develop these lands
will be settled fully within 20 years, but Moscow general outlays will have to be
amended to set concrete deadlines.
For his part, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said at a meeting with the chief
editors of Russian media outlets that the state authorities will be moved outside
the Moscow Ring Road within five years with the presidential executive office and
the federal government to be the first in line. Thus, the mayor elaborated that
other state official agencies will have the only choice to move following the
government officials. The buildings of ministries and agencies will be sold after
their transfer from downtown Moscow outside the Moscow Ring Road, and future
revenues will be allocated to build government offices already on a new
metropolitan territory, the mayor said.
A total area of all buildings, where the central staff of 17 key ministries are
housed, reaches 200,000 square meters, and all of them are located inside the
Moscow Ring Road, the consultants of the real estate market said in a survey,
which the Kommersant daily conducted. The proceeds only from the sale of 200,000
square meters of the buildings, where all 17 ministries are housed, can reach
1.3-1.6 billion dollars. These funds will be enough to build 550,000-700,000
square meters of new compounds.
Most experts give positive assessments to the plans of the state authorities.
This mainstream plan is a great achievement, because Moscow will extend its
boundaries for the first time in the last 75 years and will give up its
radial-circular system, which is unsuitable for the development of the city any
longer, the Vedomosti cited the research chief of the Scientific Research
Institute of Transport and Road Construction Mikhail Blinkin as saying. He
considers the construction of "a second center", which will headquarter the state
authorities, as "an attractive political decision," which will require a huge
amount of work to be put into practice. This will be a very costly project,
Blinkin warned.
No concrete estimates, including those for funding, have been made yet. TRINFICO
Property Management Chief Project Manager Artyom Tsogoyev assumes that only the
construction of a future government compound will cost more than 100 billion
dollars (without the land cost).
The real estate developers will primarily gain from the extension of Moscow
boundaries, the experts believe. Some part of the Moscow regional lands
integrated in the capital may result in a land price growth and higher costs of
low-rise construction projects, which had already been launched in this district,
the RBC daily cited the president of the Incom real estate corporation Sergei
Kozlovsky as saying.
According to the preliminary results of the all-Russian population census in
2010, 11,514,300 people live in Moscow, a real number of Moscow residents is
reported to be much higher due to a high inflow of labour migrants. Various
estimates are made, including those based on the number of the SIM cards of
current mobile phones that showed the Moscow population could have reached 15
million people.
[return to Contents]
July 13, 2011
Mayor Sobyanin and the defence of Moscow's architecture
By Clementine Cecil
Clementine Cecil is a journalist and co-founder of MAPS, the Moscow Architectural
Preservation Society
When Sergei Sobyanin was appointed Mayor of Moscow in October last year, many
residents had come to loathe his predecessor Yuri Luzhkov's ability to trade
historic architecture for nepotistic building contracts. Sobyanin's early talk on
architectural preservation was tough, reports Clementine Cecil, but is he
delivering on his promises?
Moscow's rulers like to dictate its appearance. Under Stalin it became a
neo-classical socialist city; under Krushchev its outskirts became a jungle of
high-rises; under Mayor Yuri Luzhkov it became a Disneyland of sham replicas,
giant advertising hoardings and neon signs, with well over 1,000 historic
buildings estimated to have been destroyed, at least 200 of them architectural
monuments. Mayor Sergei Sobyanin is now at the helm: what is his building policy,
and what will Moscow come to look like under him?
In recent years, public support for preserving historic buildings has been
growing fast and Luzhkov's treatment of the historic city had become so unpopular
that during the last years of his rule, the grassroots movement campaigning to
preserve architectural heritage became a force to be reckoned with. Arkhnadzor,
or "Architectural Watchdog", which started in 2007 as a website and is now an
umbrella organisation for the preservation movement, is a strongly politicised
force whose opinions are influential.
Notoriously, Luzhkov's wife, Yelena Baturina, was a construction billionaire, and
members of his extended family were in the construction business. As traffic jams
worsened and life in Moscow became more expensive and uncomfortable, resentment
for Luzhkov's style of rule increased and found expression in the conservation
When the Kremlin wanted to depose Luzhkov last year, they harnessed this force,
giving members of Arkhnadzor and other campaigners unprecedented airtime and
press coverage. Suddenly it was possible to condemn the Mayor's cavalier
treatment of architectural monuments, mass demolitions, and corruption. During
the interregnum period, members of Arkhnadzor were invited to join commissions in
City Hall and the Moscow Heritage Committee. Acting Mayor Vladimir Resin promised
to stop the most controversial building projects in the city centre, which
involved the demolition of historic buildings. After years of abuse by a corrupt
administration, the city's appearance and the preservation of architectural
monuments were finally issues right at the top of the agenda. Or so it appeared.
At first, Sobyanin's approach was bold: first he announced a halt to construction
in the historic centre, and then a moratorium on all demolition. Both have since
proved to be unenforceable, unrealistic policies. More effectively, Sobyanin has
cleared away street kiosks that cluttered the pavements. Although this deprived
some Muscovites of their equivalent of the corner shop, it has vastly improved
the appearance of the city, as has his policy to reduce giant advertising
hoardings from the front of buildings, and advertising banners stretching over
streets. Both these moves have had the effect of returning some architectural
integrity and unity to the Moscow streetscape, something that was badly needed
after the unregulated growth under Mayor Luzhkov.
Confidence in the new administration began to be eroded in May, following the
demolition of Kolub House on Bolshaya Yakimanka. The conservation movement
forgave this demolition in the hope that the transgressors, construction company
Capital Group, would be taken to court as Sobyanin suggested. They also saw it as
a hangover from the previous regime.
However, any trust that the heritage campaigning community had in the new Mayor
has been undermined by the demolition of two nineteenth century-buildings in a
conservation zone in the centre of Moscow in June. These were the wing of the
Glebov-Streshnyev-Shakhovsky Mansion on Bolshaya Nikitskaya Ulitsa, not far from
the Moscow Conservatory, and the House of Feoktistov on Bolshaya Ordynka.
The June demolitions have been perceived as much more shocking than those that
took place in May. They had a distinctly clandestine character: they took place
overnight, and were hurried the streets were not even cordoned off to protect
passers-by. Arkhnadzor members swarmed over the bulldozers to no effect. Mayor
Sobyanin was in St. Petersburg when the demolitions happened, causing some to
believe that he had not been privy to the decision.
The demolition of the wing of the Glebov-Streshnyev-Shakhovsky Mansion was the
culmination of a struggle that has been going on for several years. The Helikon
Opera House, tenants of the mansion, wants to expand to create a new stage in the
courtyard of the building. But expansion would only be possible by means of
demolition, which is illegal because the building is situated in a conservation
zone. The work was halted by Acting Mayor Vladimir Resin in October 2010.
However, there was no official refusal to grant the demolition and the site
remained vulnerable, despite an intensive campaign to preserve the integrity of
the building. One of the main objections of Rustam Rakhmatullin of Arkhnadzor,
who is the chief spokesperson of this campaign, is that under the proposals the
courtyard would illegally be given a glass roof, a practice that is transforming
Moscow's courtyards into inside spaces. Any work demolition or construction is
illegal here.
Whether Sobyanin knew about the demolitions in advance or not, the conservation
community believes that it is proof that the construction lobby is still more
powerful than the Moscow authorities. It is yet to be seen whether this is
because the new Mayor is still in thrall to the power pyramid of his predecessor,
or because he is in fact indifferent to the architectural heritage of the city,
or because he does not have the power and means to implement his policies. In any
case, the restoration work carried out on the wing of the mansion was
commissioned and is being financed by the city adminstration, making them
Sobyanin himself has repeatedly stated that the system he inherited is riddled
with corruption, which makes any policy difficult to implement. Ultimately,
Sobyanin is not a builder. He may have publicly stated in his first television
interview in February that Moscow deserves better architecture than Luzhkov's
sham replicas, and that the General Plan for the city is to be revised, but he is
referring more to infrastructure than cultural legacy. Sobyanin is an executive
who is more interested in pulling the city out of debt, eradicating corruption
and easing traffic congestion than in preserving buildings. However, if he really
is able to cleanse the construction system of corruption, demolitions will become
less frequent, for most of them involve an infringement of the law.
The preservation movement has been forced once more to resort to
attention-grabbing gimmicks to get their point across, as dialogue with the
authorities nosedives following the demolitions. This week Arkhnadzor activists
have been handing out leaflets on the streets, in order to "directly inform
Muscovites about these events". These leaflets call on Sobyanin to "call on the
guilty to take responsibility for their actions representatives of construction
organisations as well as city bureaucrats who turn a blind eye to the destroyers.
We hope that the bureaucratic decisions of the Luzhkov period, arrived at through
manipulation of the law and in direct contravention of the law, will not
henceforth define the practices of the Moscow Government working under your
Meanwhile, the preservation movement continues to grow. Last week a new group of
professionals was formed. The "Historical-Cultural Expert Council" is a
non-commercial, non-governmental group of qualified professionals that has set
itself up to pass judgment on new building projects. While the new administration
may not be actively pro-preservation, it is clear that the Council believes its
views will be listened to in the new climate and that Sobyanin's regime will be
more sympathetic and less aggressive than Luzhkov's.
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July 14, 2011
Boris Yeltsin: Nation-builder
By Igor Zevelev
Igor Zevelev is the Director of the Moscow office of the John D. and Catherine
MacArthur Foundation.
Twenty years ago, on July 10, 1991, Boris Yeltsin was inaugurated as President of
the Russian Federation. His legacy is as controversial as his character. Many
Russians who were ready and willing to go to the barricades for him ended up
filled with a sense of bitter disappointment. Both his supporters and critics
agree that he was the man who forged a new nation: Russia. However, even today,
only three percent of Russians consider June 12, Russia Day, the most important
national holiday. According to a Levada Center poll, 60% of Russians still back
closer union with the other former Soviet states, including 15% who advocate the
restoration of the Soviet Union. Yeltsin was keenly attuned to these popular
attitudes and in 1995 claimed that "Russia never said a word against the Union."
In 1992-1993, political parties and movements were polarized between the two
extremes. Liberals or "democrats," as they tended to be called in Russia
advocated building a new, independent Russian state and denounced the old Soviet
empire. Their main political opponents, the Communists, sought the restoration of
the Soviet Union. The essence of Yeltsin's project lay in state-building through
the creation and stabilization of new state institutions within the borders of
RSFSR and the inviolability of the borders between the former Soviet states. The
problems of Russian ethnic identity and the new Russian diasporas were deemed
politically insignificant. The project stressed civic patriotism and
de-emphasized the allegedly artificial character of the Bolshevik-era borders of
the RSFSR which, in any case, in no way reflected the broader reach of Russian
culture, language, religion, and traditions.
This unarticulated Russian national consciousness is a key factor in explaining
why the Soviet Union broke up so peacefully, especially when compared with the
bloody disintegration of another communist federation Yugoslavia. There, most
Serbs had a much clearer concept of national identity. Perhaps, a Russia lacking
clear-cut historical and cultural boundaries was the only possible peaceful
solution to the "Russian question" after the Soviet Union collapsed. However
paradoxical it may sound, inconsistent, muddled relations between Yeltsin's
federal center and the republics constituting the Russian Federation combined
with policies toward ethnic Russians across the post-Soviet space that ranged
from modest to highly inefficient, helped guarantee security in Eurasia during
the early post-Soviet transition period. Attempts to establish a clear-cut
approach to building a nation-state could have resulted in catastrophe, as they
would inevitably have required a revision of Russia's political borders. After
the Soviet Union collapsed, Moscow's nation-building and interethnic relations
policies were often unintelligible but that does not mean they were futile.
These benefits emerged more by luck than by design, not because of Yeltsin's
wisdom, but thanks to his utter weakness and inability to clearly formulate the
country's national interests.
Shortly after the Soviet Union collapsed, it seemed that many factors existed
that created favorable conditions for a strengthening of Russians' own ethnic
identity, and their own understanding of their leading role in the formation of a
new Russian national identity. For the first time in the past two centuries,
Russians, who now make up about 80 % of the country's population (compared with
43 % in the late 19th century Russian Empire and 50 % in the Soviet Union), are
the dominant ethnic group in the country. Russian ethnic nationalism received a
strong intellectual impetus from the oeuvre of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who was
the first great thinker to challenge the supranational tradition in its imperial
form. The deep economic crisis of the 1990s and the difficulties faced by ethnic
Russians in neighboring nationalizing states created all the prerequisites for
political mobilization around this issue. The inflow of migrants to big Russian
cities over this last decade spurred on the spread of xenophobic attitudes and
extremist groups. However, Russian ethnic nationalism has not become a serious
political force in Russia yet, and it does not have any significant impact on the
country's policy toward neighboring states. Supranational aspects of Russian
identity in various forms (Imperial, Soviet, civilizational and universalist)
continue to play a role, in spite of the rising tide of xenophobia.
Yeltsin initiated the process of nation-building in Russia; it still remains
incomplete. The Russian nation within the present borders of the Russian
Federation is young, unstable and weak. To build a real civic identity, a nation
must have legitimate and, desirably, historically grounded borders, as well as
stable and effective state institutions. Regular elections, political parties,
common social and economic problems, and politics could gradually become a shell
for a new political nation. However, the absence of democratic institutions and
the host of unresolved issues between the different ethno-territorial entities of
the federation and the center are serious obstacles to this scenario. The North
Caucasus provides an extreme example of the difficulties that efforts to build a
common civic identity may face in Russia. This poses a serious potential threat
to the security of not only Russia but the whole world.
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RIA Novosti: Medvedev calls for self-regulation for small business.
MOSCOW, July 14 (RIA Novosti)-Self-regulation organizations must replace state
regulation of small business, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Thursday.
"We need to admit that agri-businesses have made large advances in this area.
Competing with each other, they have found common rules of the game. They told me
they needed this form of self-regulation because otherwise they would be torn
apart either by large domestic companies or by foreign firms," Medvedev said.
Although self-regulation is not applicable to all sectors of the economy, it
should be introduced wherever possible, in particular in the meat-processing
industry, he said.
In an interview with The Financial Times in late June Medvedev pledged to ease
the state's grip on business in the country and cut down on bureaucracy.
"State officials must realize that they cannot rule business. The economy must be
self-regulated," he said.
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Financial Times
July 14, 2011
Russia: Medvedev privatisation plan evokes shades of Boris Yeltsin
By Charles Clover
Is President Dmitry Medvedev using privatization to get a second term as
If so, he would not be the first Russian president to use that gambit to energize
a re-election campaign. In 1996, Boris Yeltsin, with a 3 per cent approval
rating, was seen as unlikely to win against communist challenger Gennady
Zyuganov. But Yeltsin's campaign manager, Anatoly Chubais, came up with a
brilliant strategy to assure victory sell off mountains of state property in the
infamous "loans for shares" programme, creating a new class of property owners
who would stand to lose everything if Yeltsin lost, and thus threw their
resources behind the president and secured victory.
The parallel has a ring of familiarity today. Three weeks ago, president
Medvedev, the underdog for re-election in 2012 against his mentor and prime
minister Vladimir Putin, announced at the St Petersburg economic forum that
majority stakes in up to 20 of Russia's richest state owned companies oil
companies, banks, airlines and mines would be sold off by 2015.
If implemented the plan would fundamentally changes the Russian economy, in which
over 50 percent of GDP is still produced by the state, 20 years after the fall of
communism. And it would also make some already very rich people even richer.
On Monday of this week came round two, in which Medvedev sought to tie the fate
of this large-scale privatisation programme to a second term as president. First
he invited 27 of Russia's richest businessmen to his residence in Gorky.
In preliminary remarks, he scolded the government for foot dragging in preparing
the large scale privatisation programme, which he called "too modest" reiterating
that by 2015 he wanted the state to be rid of "all this redundant state
Then, during the question and answer session, he got political. According to one
anonymous source quoted in Vedomosti newspaper, "the President delicately and
unambiguously made us understand, that the time had come for business to
determine who it wanted to see as the next president, Putin or Medvedev."
One Kremlin official who was there cautioned the FT that the president's remarks
were not that sensational. "He was asked the same question everyone is asking
about the 2012 election, and he answered the way he always answers, that people
will have to choose, his programme or Putin's programme. It was not
electioneering or advocacy. It was just an answer to the question."
Whatever the spin one puts on the remarks, they appear to indicate that Medvedev
is differentiating his programme from Putin's, and make clear that his programme,
first and foremost, consists of selling controlling stakes in some of the most
profitable companies in Russia to the people who were sitting around that table.
In dangling the carrot of large-scale privatization, Medvedev may be trying to
create a constituency which would have a lot to gain from his re-election, and
could use their considerable resources to help him win.
However, Russia's oligarchs have far less influence than they wielded under
Yeltsin, when they were permitted to run TV stations and fund political parties.
In any case, for Medvedev it would be unthinkable to enter into direct
confrontation with Putin over the nomination, expected to be announced by this
coming December.
But he may be hoping that a few highly placed officials and businessmen, who see
a personal interest in his programme, could privately convince Putin not to
stand. "Russia is an ecosystem of power" as one Moscow based banker to the
powerful put it "Putin is the strongest, but he has to preserve the balance, and
he there are people he has to pay attention to."
Putin's attitude to privatization is hard to guess. He insisted last month in a
Paris press conference that he is in favour of sell offs, but just how much in
favour and whether he is willing to go as far as selling majority stakes is
anyone's guess.
There are important clues which indicate the answer is no. Under his presidency,
some of Russia's largest private enterprises were re-nationalised, such as Yukos,
Avtovaz, and Sibneft. In addition, the cabinet of ministers, controlled by Putin,
has been dragging its feet in implementing Medvedev's order. In government
circles, according to newspaper Kommersant, "the main subject of discussion is
how to implement [Medvedev's] order, without losing control over the state
It s well known that Putin's powerful deputy Igor Sechin, in charge of the energy
sector, is a strong opponent of privatization, and of Medvedev. Sechin who had to
give up his seat as chairman of the board of Rosneft, the state oil company
earlier this year as part of another Medvedev initiative, but managed to name a
friendly replacement, thereby not surrendering any influence. His successor last
week dismissed the idea of private shareholders controlling Rosneft as "very
The economy ministry says that the goal of privatising majority stakes cannot be
carried out by 2015, and sees the deadline slipping to 2017. Meanwhile, other
suggestions are on the table which would allow the state to remain in control
despite privatizing a majority of shares, on the model of Gazprom, 40 per cent
owned by the state but for all intents and purposes still under state control.
One suggestion is to prevent the sales to strategic investors, who might have an
incentive to change present management, and also to retain "golden shares" in the
entities which would give the state veto power over mergers and acquisitions.
But whoever become president, one thing will always be constant: Russian
bureaucrats love a good behind the scenes scrap or "corridor intrigue" as it is
known in Russian.
Outside the meeting on Monday, German Gref, chairman of Sberbank, a strong
proponent of privatization, said cryptically about the future of the programme:
"There have always been arguments between bureaucrats and there always will be".
[return to Contents]
Nezavisimaya Gazeta
July 14, 2011
Central Bank: 248,581 Russian businesses paid no taxes in 2010
Author: Sergei Kulikov
According to the data compiled by the Information Center of
the Central Bank, turnover of the 248,581 companies that paid no
taxes to the budget in 2010 totalled 4.24 trillion rubles.
"Almost 66,000 companies among them had a turnover upwards of
1 million rubles in 2010; 123,000 non-profit organizations paid
taxes amounting to less than 0.1% of their respective turnovers,"
the Central Bank reported. Six major non-payers in the meantime
had the turnover in excess of 10 billion rubles each. All in all,
specialists examined data on more than 2,064,000 organizations. As
it turned out, 12% were non-payers. (These estimates are based on
the payments non-profit organizations transacted via the Central
Bank in 2010.)
Natalia Malofeyeva, auditor of the International Advisory-
Legal Center for Taxation, called the amount of non-payers
"shocking". "Some of them must be dummy corporations, ones
established in order to cash finances," she said. "As for ways and
means of amelioration of the situation... it's not a matter of
someone's decision or anything like that. Tax dodgers ought to be
fought of course, but that's something to be handled by the tax
service and the police. Regrettably, the so called reforms within
the latter reduced the economic crime divisions so that there is
practically nobody left there."
Oleg Malkin of Investcafe agency said in his turn that mass
tax dodging cost the Russian state up to 30% of everything its was
due. "This is no laughing matter since the heads of the Interior
Ministry's Investigative Committee announced in 2003 (!) that the
scope of tax dodging in Russia was compromising economic security
of the state. I do not think that the situation improved any," he
said. Malkin added that a solution to the problem required
political will in the upper echelons of state power. Even more
importantly, it required actions as opposed to mere declarations.
Ilya Balakirev of UFS Investment Company agreed that the
problem existed indeed but pointed out that the figures published
by the Central Bank must be misleading. "This figures allow for
but a rough estimate of the losses of the budget. They indicate
that losses must amount to anything between 200 and 400 billion
rubles a year, but even that must be wide off the mark. The actual
sums must be greater. The companies that to pay taxes probably do
their best to pay as little as possible," he said. "Needless to
say, the problem is more complicated than on might think. On the
one hand, tax dodging has a negative effect on the national
economy. On the other, increase of taxes and attempts to force
businesses to pay the budget are not a lesser evil."
All experts say that this problem has no simple solution and
that attempts to solve it recklessly and overnight will have
negative consequences. This is why the powers-that-be are unlikely
to try and do anything about it before the presidential election.
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Value of the Russian IPOs
By Neil Buckley, Eastern Europe Editor, Financial Times.
This year has fallen well short of the bonanza that had been expected from
Russian companies floating on international stock markets. Analysts originally
forecast private companies could raise more than $25bn in 2011 from so-called
initial public offerings of their shares, up from only $5.5bn last year. In fact,
only $3.9bn was raised in the first half of the year from a mere six deals.
Seven other planned issues by Russian companies, seeking to raise some $7bn, were
postponed in the same period. Even if some still manage to float in the second
half of the year, total 2011 issuance now looks unlikely to exceed $15bn at best.
That is prompting yet more soul-searching about Russia's lack of attractiveness
to international investors, even as president Dmitry Medvedev has announced
measures to try to improve the investment environment. It comes as domestic
investors also seem reluctant to invest in Russia ahead of parliamentary
elections in December and next March's presidential poll - leading to billions of
dollars of net capital outflows in recent months.
Russia's IPO experience is, in fairness, not unique. Globally, IPOs raised $102bn
in the first six months of this year, up 8 per cent from the first half of 2010.
But bankers say that headline figure masks what a difficult time it has been for
Financial markets have been extremely volatile, while many newly-listed companies
have performed badly. Events including Japan's tsunami, unrest in the Middle
East, and the eurozone debt crisis have made investors jittery and held back
appetite for new issues.
According to Credit Suisse, 17 deals together worth $15.5bn have been postponed
in Europe, Africa and the Middle East this year. Of those deals that have
completed, only 17 per cent were priced in the top half of the initial price
ranges announced by the companies.
Russia, however, has fared particularly poorly accounting for a large proportion
of the offerings that have been pulled. There are several reasons why.
One is that investors had their fingers burned by some past Russian IPOs.
According to UralSib, a Moscow brokerage, only 12 out of 34 IPOs or secondary
offerings (when a company already quoted on a market issues more stock) up to the
end of last year outperformed Russia's RTS index in the first 12 months after the
That makes investors look very carefully at how Russian companies are being
priced in IPOs compared with their international counterparts. Following on from
that, experience this year suggests investors are wary of paying the kind of
prices owners are seeking for companies in the "extractive" industries that
already dominate the Russian market oil and gas, metals and mining. They are
more willing to pay for businesses that give access to new areas, especially
high-growth sectors such as technology.
That seems clear simply from looking at which IPOs have been postponed, and which
went ahead. Among the former are Suek (a steam coal producer), KOKS (pig iron and
coking coal), ChelPipe (steel pipes) and Nord Gold (gold mining). Those that have
succeeded, on the other hand, include Nomos bank, Etalon (real estate), Rusagro
(agri-industry), and, most successful of all, the $1.43bn New York issue of
Yandex, the Russian search engine. That was the biggest internet IPO in the US
since Google.
Investors also favour offers where the proceeds are going to be invested back in
the business over those where owners are simply cashing out part of their stake.
Once again, several of this year's pulled Russian IPOs fell into the latter
But an issue that never lurks far away in Russian offerings is political risk.
That was starkly illustrated by the postponement at the end of May of the planned
$700m-$1bn listing of Domodedovo, Moscow's busiest airport. Denis Nuzhdin,
Domodedovo's chief executive, used a similar formula to other companies that
postponed issues, saying it was "not satisfied that a fair valuation could be
achieved in the current market valuations".
But analysts had other explanations. They suggested investors might have been
spooked by apparent tensions between the company and Russian authorities.
Russia's prosecutor-general later echoed by president Medvedev himself
criticised the company's complex offshore ownership structure. The ultimate
ownership was, in fact, revealed only during the IPO process itself.
Some market participants believe Domodedovo's owners may have come under pressure
to pull the float because Russian authorities favour a different plan: to merge
the airport with Moscow's other hubs of Sheremetyevo and Vnukovo. Indeed, some
saw the IPO itself as an attempt by management to avoid that fate. In what may
have been another sign of political pressure, Russian media reports during the
IPO process suggested the company's management might be forced to sell a stake to
a state-connected private investor.
Where an offer seems compelling enough, of course, investors will sometimes look
beyond political risk. Even Yandex, Russia's most successful IPO of recent years,
warned in its prospectus that "high-profile businesses in Russia, such as ours,
can be particularly vulnerable to politically motivated actions".
Yet it is difficult to achieve top valuations for Russian IPOs when its whole
market remains undervalued largely because of the political "discount" investors
apply to the country. Even stripping out lowly-valued oil and gas stocks, the
Moscow stock market is at its biggest discount, on a price/earnings basis, to the
MSCI Emerging Markets index for three years. On top of perennial concerns over
corruption and weak rule of law, that seems to reflect uncertainty over the
outcome of the presidential election, and whether Russia will be able to conduct
reforms needed to boost its flagging economic growth.
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Putin backs new ratings approach
Russian Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, has strongly back proposals to set up a
Eurasian Economic Community rating agency, telling economists from the Russian
Academy of Sciences the idea could help a more realistic appraisal of investing
in Russia.
Despite the support, key economic decision makers say the use of international
ratings is already embedded in market processes, and that being private they are
less likely to be subject to political interference, and potentially more
reliable than any alternative despite problems with ratings which came to light
during the global financial crisis.
The proposal had been forwarded by Sergei Glazyev, Director of the New
Economy Institute of the State University of Governance and executive
secretary of the Customs Union Commission of EurAsEC, who also called for
boosting Russian rating agencies.
Gleb Fetisov, the director of the state-run Council for Productivity Studies,
said that ratings from international agencies are often subject to bias, but
despite this are integral to national economic decision making processes.
"The Central Bank, in lending to Russian banks disregards ratings by our own
rating agencies, but demands ratings that are international though in actual fact
they have an American status."
Fetisov acknowledged that the ratings process incorporating the big 3
international ratings firms, Moody's, Fitch Ratings, and Standard & Poor's,
essentially provides a relatively standard ratings process, with reasonably overt
decision making processes, which is overtly focussed and dependent upon success
or failure in servicing investor needs, and didn't indicate how any alternative
could be better without addressing those factors in the same way.
Russian Finance Minister, Alexei Kudrin, noted that domestic ratings agencies
have a place in the system, but the greater conceptual integrity of the processes
used by the global agencies was often valuable.
"But the Central Bank holds the position not infrequently reasonable, in my
view, that foreign rating agencies are stricter whereas our agencies are often
puppet institutions, though this stereotype is disappearing"
Kudrin added that evaluations made by international agencies promoted more
effective and responsible business.
"But I can nevertheless assert that foreign agencies strictly control their image
and reputation and make more objective assessments of our companies."
Russian domestic rating agencies include RusRating, Expert RA, RBK.Rating and
AK&M. Richard Hainsworth, Head of RusRating, says Russian and American approach
and market awareness are different.
"Rankings by the Russian rating agencies and leading foreign agencies focused on
different customers. Russian rating agencies are designed for companies that are
already working or intend to work in Russia, requesting relevant knowledge and
understanding of the local market futures. Foreign agencies used implement a
common "American" approach and have to have a general view of the issuing
company, regardless of the host country market, as their customers want to focus
on the ratings assigned to the same standard."
Hainsworth added that the Russian rating market lacks established and
standardised procedure, and that the government needs to promote a similar
approach to the Chinese and Indian approaches to ratings.
"It is crucial for big emerging market like Russia to have a well developed and
coherent ratings market. China and India can be taken as a good example in terms
of the importance of their local rating agencies ratings and responsibility of
companies. In china and in India rating agencies are very big and reputed because
ratings are mandatory. They allocate huge funds from companies to provide
sufficient ratings. Russian companies pay around $20-30 million to three major
foreign rating agencies but ignore local. Another increasingly important issue is
that the Russian Government does not require ratings for bonds issued in Roubles
and that is another reason why Russian ratings are not considered for that
evaluation and why many failures occur. American rating agencies have mere
understanding of the Russian market and foreign investors do not know and
recognize Russian ratings because they are not considered as important by the
Hainsworth believes that a key step to making Russian ratings more useable is to
standardise their use, and that creating a new ratings agency isn't going to
address the underlying issue.
"The Russian government should first of all standardise Russian ratings by the
local rating agencies. They must request ratings for at least two bonds where one
has ratings by the local rating agency. The recent proposal looks as marketing
for a state backed company and has no real effect in solving the real problem.
The new rating agency no matter how powerful and reputed it is Russian companies
and investors will ignore and skip Russian ratings."
[return to Contents]
Moscow Times
July 14, 2011
Officials Lacking in Skills to Run Tenders
By Lena Smirnova
Buffets and excursions around Moscow won't make government workers better at
placing state orders.
Two-thirds of the tenders for state orders are made by unqualified workers,
according to an International Center of Financial-Economic Development study.
"People are spending government money without having any competency," said Irina
Sklyarova who participated in the study. "Maybe they don't purposefully put the
money in their own pockets, but they may not manage the money right because they
don't know how to do it."
The study found that the majority of state workers have only received short-term
training on placing state orders.
The market for private training centers that offer one-day courses on state
orders has burgeoned in recent years, said Irina Kuznetsova, director of the
Institute of Management of Purchases and Sales. She now receives two to three
offers for such courses in her inbox each day.
The Higher School of Economics sets the national standard for education in this
sphere. A state organization is required to have at least two people on its
tender committee who have completed courses at the school or its 60 accredited
But government workers prefer to take express courses whenever possible, rather
than the school's 120-hour of training. The course now draws half the students it
did in 2004 when state order education was mandatory.
"A client is attracted by the speed of the shorter courses. He goes in hoping to
read up on all the materials later on his own, but that, unfortunately, does not
happen and so the quality of orders falls," Kuznetsova said.
The shrinking demand for the longer courses is having the worst impact on
regional institutes, which find it hard to fill classes.
The lack of opportunities to increase regional and municipal worker
qualifications leads to more irregularities during the placement of state orders,
Sklyarova said.
But even state workers who have access to training courses don't necessarily get
all the benefits. Sklyarova said workers regularly skip parts of the 120-hour
Some state organizations also rent out diplomas, a practice in which the
organization lists the person with the diploma on its tender commission while the
person doesn't actually work there.
Staff turnover poses another problem. Kuznetsova said 75,000 students took the
course at the Higher School of Economics, but only 20 to 30 percent of them still
work with state orders.
The State Duma is expected to make changes to the law on state orders as early as
September. With these changes, state and municipal workers who have violations in
making state orders could be banned from managing budget money.
But experts say these measures are too harsh.
"The biggest share of purchasers don't violate the requirements on purpose, but
because they don't have enough knowledge," Sklyarova said.
[return to Contents]
Obama, Lavrov discuss Libya, Nagorno Karabakh, Russia' s WTO bid
WASHINGTON, July 14 (Itar-Tass) U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian Foreign
minister Sergei Lavrov discussed on Wednesday the situation in Libya, Syria and
Yemen, the Palestinian-Israeli peace process, the settlement of the conflict
around Nagorno Karabakh, Russia's WTO entry and other issues, a statement of the
White House's press secretary said.
"The President thanked the Foreign Minister for his efforts to complete a new
bilateral agreement on visa liberalization as well as a new agreement on
adoptions, both of which will touch many lives in Russia and the United States,"
the statement said.
Barack Obama expressed support for Russia's efforts to mediate a political
solution in Libya. The president stressed that the USA was ready "to support
negotiations that lead to a democratic transition in Libya as long as Qadhafi
steps aside".
Lavrov and Obama discussed the situation in Sudan and in South Sudan, the nuclear
problem of Iran, the role of the international community in preventing new
violence in Syria and Yemen, and next steps on Middle East Peace in the wake of
the Quartet meetings earlier in the week.
Besides, the president expressed gratitude to the Russian foreign minister for
his efforts towards the settlement in the mostly Armenian populated Azerbaijani
enclave of Nagorno Karabakh and "underscored the U.S. commitment to achieve a
framework agreement," the statement said.
As for bilateral relations, Barack Obama and Sergei Lavrov discussed
possibilities for cooperation on missile defence in Europe, Russia's WTO entry,
democracy and human rights in Russia.
The U.S. president "reaffirmed his strong support for Russia's efforts to
complete its WTO accession process this year, and discussed the necessity of
granting Russia Permanent Normalized Trade Relations," the statement emphasized.
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov returned from the United States with nothing to
show for the trip
Author: Kirill Belianinov, Vladimir Soloviov, Yelena Chernenko
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov returned from a visit to the United
States. Contrary to the expectations, the date of the U.S.
president's future visit to Moscow were never agreed on.
That Lavrov would probably fail to reach an agreement with
the Americans on the date of the visit to Moscow had been known
(or guessed) since before his meeting with U.S. President Barack
Obama. Addressing American political scientists invited to the
Embassy of the Russian Federation in Washington this Tuesday,
Lavrov called American plans to develop the European missile
shield "number one irritant in the relations between Russia and
the United States." The minister said that Moscow could not be
expected to swallow the traditional pitch about how the missile
shield was needed to secure Europe from Iranian and North Korean
missiles. Lavrov acknowledged that the Russian proposals regarding
a common ballistic missile defense framework were still dismissed
in Washington out of hand.
Lavrov said as well that potential cooperation between Russia
and the West necessitated the ability to reach an agreement on
joint evaluation of threats. "It's only after this that we will be
able to decide the geography of the missile shield and the means
necessary to intercept whatever is racing in the direction of
Europe." The minister recalled that agreement on joint analysis of
missile threats had been signed twice already, in 2009 and at the
NATO summit in Lisbon in 2010. Agreements or not, he shrugged, the
Western partners were in no hurry to begin the negotiations with
Moscow. "We are told that NATO has made its mind already, that
NATO knows where threats originate and why don't we stifle our
objections and start cooperating," said Lavrov. "We cannot begin
any actual cooperation unless we have an agreement on the
architecture of the future European missile shield."
Neither did Lavrov fare any better with another problem
Russia had expected a solution to. The matter concerned a
simplified visa regime between Russia and the United States. U.S.
Ambassador to Russia John Byerle had said on July 4 that Moscow
and Washington intended to sign the document during Lavrov's
visit. Lavrov himself said in Washington that the agreement to be
signed was but the first step and that establishment of a visa-
free regime was the ultimate objective. "Just like what we
established with Israel," he said.
Anyway, Lavrov went home without signing of the document. The
U.S. Department of State explained that the delay was technical
and said that the document would be signed in the nearest future.
The WTO-Russian talks were discussed in Washington as well.
Lavrov informed his hosts that Russia never considered Georgia's
objections an insurmountable obstacle. "If we refrain from
bringing in politics into the matter, then there will be no
problems at all," said Lavrov.
The minister pointed out that the Jackson-Vanick amendment
could become a worse obstacle because it kept American businesses
out of the Russian market. "Remaining in force, this amendment
will deprive American companies of the chance to make use of the
opportunities Russia will be able to offer them when it is finally
in the WTO," said Lavrov.
Abolition of the amendment in question is energetically
promoted by the U.S.-Russia Business Council that comprises over
300 major American businesses operating in Russia (Boeing,
Caterpillar, Coca-Cola, Exxon Mobil, Ford, Intel, etc.) and
Russian business structures with interests in the United States.
* * *
In mid-May, the U.S. Administration published the
international cyber-space strategy that granted the United States
the right to respond to computer attacks by all available means
even including nuclear weapons. Later that month the Pentagon
announced that the United States intended to equate cyber-attacks
with hostilities and treat them as acts of aggression.
Russian experts were disturbed by these documents. They
pointed out that tracing a cyber-attack to its source was always
extremely difficult and often plain impossible. Moscow announced
it would be wrong to retaliate "automatically" because some third
force remaining out of limelight might actually try and set two
world powers (Russia and the United States) against each other.
It must have finally occurred to Washington that cooperation
and interaction was as much a must in cyber-security as it was in
any other sphere. Russian and American experts in this sphere met
in Washington in late June. Certain major agreements had been made
there, judging by the information the U.S. Administration posted
on its web site this Tuesday.
The Russian delegation at the conference in Washington was
headed by Security Council Assistant Secretary General Nikolai
Klimashin. The American delegation was headed by Howard Schmidt,
Cyber-Security Coordinator of the U.S. Administration. Moscow and
Washington agreed to have their respective military regularly
update each other on cyber-operations under way and establish
reliable data exchange. It was even decided to set up a hot line
between the two capitals, one making sure that cyber-incidents
would be taken care of without a chance to deteriorate into a
fully fledged crisis.
A senior member of the Russian delegation told this newspaper
that all of that signified a bona fide breakthrough in the
Russian-American relations in cyber-security sphere. Schmidt said
that the U.S.-Russian reload was finally extending into a "new and
vital sphere".
The next round of the bilateral cyber-security talks will
take place in Moscow come November.
[return to Contents]
Moscow Times
July 14, 2011
Green Light for Adoptions, Yellow Light for Visas
By Alexandra Odynova
Russian children who are adopted by U.S. parents will be monitored by outside
agencies and remain Russian citizens until they reach 18 under a long-negotiated
child adoptions treaty between the two countries.
The deal, which Russia demanded after a series of cases of neglect and death at
the hands of adoptive parents, was signed by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington late Wednesday.
It will then have to be ratified by lawmakers in both countries, which, in
Russia's case, would not happen until the fall.
But Lavrov and Clinton delayed signing an agreement to ease visa rules after
negotiations could not be completed in time for Wednesday's meeting.
Child adoptions have been in and out of the spotlight in Russia in recent years,
regularly fueled by new reports of U.S. abuse even though some 13,000 cases of
child abuse are reported annually in Russia, according to official statistics
that get significantly less attention at home.
Lavrov threatened to ban adoptions in April 2010 after an American family sent
their 7-year-old boy back to Russia unaccompanied on a plane and with a note
complaining that he was psychologically unstable.
The treaty, which took seven rounds of talks to draft, establishes clearer and
tighter guidelines for the adoption process and the monitoring of children.
All U.S. adoption agencies will be obliged to meet the requirements of the 2008
Hague Adoption Convention in order to work in Russia. Unregistered independent
"mediators" will be banned from handling adoptions.
American families will be monitored by U.S. social services for three years after
adopting a child. After that, the agency that handled the adoption will monitor
the home until the child reaches 18, reporting to Russian authorities all
instances of abuse, as well as the termination of an adoption or re-adoption by
another family.
Another change will see the children keeping dual citizenship until they reach
18, whereas previously they were stripped of their Russian citizenship
immediately after adoption.
The issue itself is no trifle: Russia is second only to China in number of
children adopted by Americans, and the United States has been the top destination
for Russian children since the Soviet collapse, with some 60,000 crossing the
Atlantic Ocean over the past two decades, according to children's ombudsman Pavel
The number of adoptions, however, has been steadily declining, slipping from
3,966 in 2005 to 1,586 in 2009 and 1,079 last year.
Astakhov said in January that 17 Russian children have died in the United States
as a result of abuse by their parents since 1995. Most of them were adopted
through independent mediators, said children rights activist Boris Altshuler.
Altshuler praised the treaty Wednesday, saying it could help "regulate the
process" and "avoid corruption," but added that the treaty only addresses
problems of a small part of the country's army of orphans, most of whom remain
neglected by officials.
Stepan Artemyev, head of the Russian office of the U.S. adoption agency ABC
Adoption Services, said adoption agencies also welcomed the agreement. "Of
course, any change in legislature complicates the work of the agencies," Artemyev
said by telephone. "But in this particular case there is hope for a positive
Official databases list at least 130,000 children who can be adopted across
Russia, according to the Education and Science Ministry, which tracks adoption
The number is not decreasing. More than 7,600 children were placed in overcrowded
orphanages in 2009 when their parents were stripped of parental rights, the State
Statistics Service said.
A total of 13,537 cases of child abuse were reported in Russia in 2009, the
latest year for which statistics are available, Astakhov said.
Russia and the United States failed to finalize another crucial agreement, a deal
to liberalize their visa regimes, in time for Lavrov's trip despite earlier
promises, Rossiiskaya Gazeta reported Wednesday.
But the agreement might be signed at the meeting of the UN General Assembly in
September or a Moscow trip by President Barack Obama later this year, the report
The agreement will introduce three-year multiple-entry visas for business
travelers and tourists. It was announced by U.S. Ambassador John Beyrle last
[return to Contents]
July 14, 2011
Lavrov and Clinton iron out differences in Washington
By Robert Bridge
Following two days of talks in Washington, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov
and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton detailed new developments in the
bilateral relationship.
Clinton opened the conference by reciting a long list of mutual accomplishments
achieved by both Russia and the United States on various fronts.
"The past two-and-a-half years has been a time of great strides in the
relationship between our countries," the US Secretary of State noted. "We have
signed a historic arms control treaty, and opened a vital new land and air supply
route to Afghanistan. We are cooperating on addressing Iran's nuclear threat,
working to coordinate our diplomatic approach to Libya (and) consulting closely
on the changes unfolding in the Middle East."
"Across the world, we are not only working bilaterally, but multilaterally on so
many important issues, from counter-terrorism to non-proliferation. Our challenge
now is to continue and maintain the momentum in order to deliver more results for
both of our people."
Clinton then mentioned the hot button issue of European missile defense, which
has the potential of derailing the much-hyped reset between the two nations.
"To that end, Minister Lavrov and I discussed missile defense cooperation," she
said. "I believe we do have an opportunity to address common challenges in a way
that makes Russians, Europeans and American safer. And we are committed to
working with both Russia and our NATO allies to do so."
Lavrov mentioned that President Barack Obama had confirmed the United States'
readiness for talks with Russia on starting cooperation in missile defense.
"President Obama unequivocally confirmed his agreement with President Medvedev on
the importance of achieving understanding as soon as possible, which will create
a framework for starting cooperation in this sphere," he said.
Moscow has stated in the past that the construction of a missile defense system
near its borders and without its full cooperation would be viewed as a national
security threat, which could result in another arms race.
On the subject of the New Start Treaty, the nuclear arms reduction treaty signed
by President Dmitry Medvedev and Barack Obama in April 2010, Lavrov said that the
control mechanism for this treaty is "effectively working."
Concerning the burning question of Libya, where NATO forces have been engaged in
a military operation to protect Libyan civilians who are caught in the middle of
a civil war between Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi and the rebel opposition,
Lavrov stressed that Russia has "fewer misunderstandings with the United States
than we do with some European countries."
"The situation in Libya is a case where our position is a little different,"
Lavrov explained. "This is about the way the UN resolution of the Security
Council is being followed. But, in parenthesis, I would like to say that on this
topic we have fewer misunderstandings with the United States than we do with some
European countries."
Lavrov said it is vital to "start the political process as soon as possible" to
conclude the Libyan operation, adding that "we have different channels, official
and unofficial channels to work through in order to create conditions for this
NATO forces, which Russia has criticized in the past for "overstepping" its UN
mandate in Libya, have been conducting aerial missions over Libya since March 19.
Many of these have led to the death of innocent civilians.
Clinton said that the United States will continue to work with Russia and its
international partners to achieve a cease-fire.
"So, although neither of us can predictfor you the exact day or hour that Gaddafi
will leave power, we do understand and agree that his days are numbered," Clinton
predicted. "We will continue to work closely with our international partners,
including Russia, to increase the pressure on him and his regime and we will keep
looking for a way to achieve a cease fire, end the military action."
On the issue of Iran, its efforts to comply with the International Atomic
Energy Agency's requirements should go together with easing pressure on Tehran,
Lavrov advised.
"We have proposed drawing up a kind of roadmap on each of the IAEA requirements
which Iran must fulfill," Lavrov said. "We deem it possible, in response to
each concrete, non-declarative step taken by Iran, to take a reciprocal step,
freezing and cutting the volume of sanctions as progress continues," he said.
Beyond the issues of security and arms control, Clinton said Washington supports
Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization.
"We strongly support Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization," she
said. "Russia's membership would allow us to increase trade and deepen our
economic ties.
Russia's WTO membership is a "priority for President Obama and the
administration," Clinton said, while adding that (Russia's accession to the WTO)
is part of our "broader global effort to promote a rules-based system of economic
Lavrov mentioned that Elvira Nabiullina, the Minister of Economic Development and
Trade of Russia, had recently met with President Obama. During their meeting, the
two agreed on the necessity of concluding all of the "necessary formalities."
The Russian Minister also noted that "there seemed to be the political will from
the United States" to conclude the membership process, and now was the time to
translate this into practical reality.
Clinton and Lavrov signed an agreement on inter-country adoptions, which should
go a long way to alleviating Russia's concern over the wellbeing of its orphan
children who are adopted by American parents.
"We take very seriously the safety and security of children that our adopted by
American parents and this agreement provides new important safeguards to protect
them," the US Secretary of State stressed. "It also increases transparency for
all parties involved in the adoption process."
The agreement is a response to the furor sparked last year when an adoptive
mother from the United States put an unaccompanied 7-year-old boy on a plane
back to Moscow, saying she could no longer handle the stress of raising him.
"This (adoption agreement) will help us remove the irritants that have been
emerging quite rightfully in the realm of public opinion concerning the destiny
of Russian children who were adopted by Americans," Minister Lavrov added.
Meanwhile, Russia and the United States also signed a new visa agreement, which
will make travel between the two nations much easier for business people.
"Business men and women can travel multiple times between our two countries over
36 months on a single visa," Clinton said. "This is a big deal for those who are
doing business and we are laying the groundwork for even more trade and travel."
Lavrov was upbeat about the new visa regime, while saying that it represents
another step towards a visa free regime between the two countries.
In other notable developments, Clinton and Lavrov exchanged diplomatic notes on
the observance of domestic procedures required to enforce the Russian-American
agreement on the disposal of plutonium (that is not to be used for defensive
purposes), and the protocols to this agreement, signed in 2006 and 2010.
The agreement obliges both sides to destroy no less than 34 tons of
weapons-grade plutonium waste with the rigorous observance of the
nonproliferation regime, according to the U.S. Department of State.
Sixty-eight tons of plutonium is enough to produce about 17,000 pieces of nuclear
weapons. The agreement envisions the disposal of a large amount of weapons-grade
plutonium starting in 2018.
The agreement marks one more step in the two countries' joint goal to eliminate
weapons-grade nuclear materials, thereby reducing the nuclear threat, it said.
Finally, Lavrov also expressed his gratitude for the condolences offered by
Clinton on behalf of the American people for the loss of life that occurred when
a cruise ship sunk in the Volga River, which resulted in the deaths of over 100
[return to Contents]
Russia Beyond the Headlines
July 12, 2011
The balance of threats
Alexander Gasyuk, Washington, D.C. correspondent for Rossiyskaya Gazeta,
interviews European affairs and security expert Charles Kupchan on missile
By Alexander Gasyuk
The proposed placement of U.S. missile defense base in Europe has been a thorn in
the reset of relations. >From the Russia point of view, there has been a distinct
lack of progress in achieving agreement on missile defense plans, between Russia
on one hand and United States and NATO on the other. The last round of
negotiations in Brussels raised questions about the prospects for achieving a
mutually acceptable agreement on this pressing topic.
Are Russia's concerns being considered by the U.S. administration? What will
happen in the event that no middle ground is found between the two countries? And
what can we expect to hear about this burning issue in the upcoming election
seasons in both countries?
Charles Kupchan, senior fellow at the influential Washington-based Council on
Foreign Relations and Georgetown University Professor of International Relations,
who was responsible for European Affairs at The National Security Council during
the Clinton administration, took these questions from Alexander Gasyuk.
Russia Beyond the Headlines: There is a growing perception in Russia that,
despite all the talks about cooperation on missile defense in Europe between
Moscow and Washington, the United States is steadily moving toward deployment of
its antiballistic missiles in Europe regardless of what Russians think about it.
Is that perception correct?
Charles Kupchan: I think Barack Obama's administration is gradually moving
forward with its revised missile defense system plan. Initially, the focus will
be mainly on sea-based missiles interceptors in the south of Europe. Only in the
later stages will the deployments start in mainland Europe and, at this point,
they're talking about Romania as a potential missile site. But this is several
years down the road. I think the view in Washington is that now is the time to
try to work out a cooperative agreement with Russia and to deepen understanding
between NATO and Russia. So by the time the later stages of the deployment plan
come into effect, Russia will be a stakeholder in the system rather than feeling
threatened by it.
RBTH: You've mentioned previously in the press that you believe this issue could
potentially scuttle the progress already made in resetting Russian relations with
the West. To what extent could disagreements on missile defense possibly worsen
U.S.-Russian ties?
CK: If the plan is poorly handled and if NATO were to completely dismiss Russia's
concerns, then I do think relations could be set back. But I don't think this is
the case at the moment. Now we are in act one of a play that has three or four
acts. I would say that the progress that has already been made on improving
relations between Russia and the West has made understanding the more likely
outcome, because it has already helped to build more trust between Moscow,
Washington and Europe.
RBTH: Certainly Moscow has no power to veto U.S. plans for missile defense in
Europe, but in the event that no middle ground between Russia and America is
found, what would happen then?
CK: My guess is that in this event you would see the United States, NATO and
Russia continue to develop their plans for missile defense, but in ways that are
more independent from each other, which could have a negative effect on strategic
stability. But I don't believe that the likelihood of this outcome is high
because the number of interceptors that the United States is envisaging in its
plans would be purely operational and could in no way undermine Russia's nuclear
RBTH: Do you believe that Russian concerns over U.S. and NATO missile defense are
CK: I think that in many respects they are a hangover from the Cold War and the
strategic debate in Russia is stuck in the past, as it is also sometimes in the
United States. Is it conceivable that the technology developed for missile
defense could in the long run have an effect on Russia's deterrent? Yes, because
we never know what is around the corner. But we are talking about a system that
is aimed at protecting against one, two or three missile launches, and when
compared to Russia's nuclear arsenal, I think Russia's claim of discomfort is
RBTH: Given the upcoming election season in both countries do you foresee
politicians trying to capitalize on that issue?
CK: Because the United States and Russia are heading into their election seasons,
it would be wise for politicians on both sides to try to keep missile defense
issues from being politicized. There are certainly voices in both countries that
might see it as politically advantageous to try to exploit U.S.-Russian relations
at a time when the trend is positive. I think it is important to stress that.
However, the differences in opinion over missile defense have to be put in the
context of the two countries' broader relationship that is improving
[return to Contents]
Moscow Times
July 14, 2011
China Coming Full Circle as a Superpower
By Yevgeny Bazhanov
Yevgeny Bazhanov is vice chancellor of research and international relations at
the Foreign Ministry's Diplomatic Academy in Moscow.
In the fifth century B.C., Chinese philosopher Shan Yan developed a new form of
propaganda based on the following notion: When a powerful nation goes to war, it
unifies the people and makes the state even stronger. When a strong country is at
peace, the people become relaxed, and it loses its edge.
More than 2,000 years later, U.S. political scientist Samuel Huntington wrote in
his 2004 book, "Who We Are: The Challenges to America's National Identity," that
as long as Americans believe their country is at risk, national identity is
strong. But once this sense of danger dulls, so does the identity.
Modern politicians are often tempted to strengthen the state and personal power
by exploiting and manipulating the existence of external threats. This applies to
democracies as well as autocracies. In the United States, for example, some
Republicans have accused U.S. President Barack Obama of selling out the country's
national interests for the sake of resetting relations with Russia.
For military-industrial complexes, the more enemies, the better. During the Cold
War, it was easy for the United States to find an enemy in the Soviet Union. Now,
U.S. hawks look for enemies among so-called rogue states like North Korea and
Iran. When the U.S. military-industrial complex is in full force, it, along with
its allies in the White House and Pentagon, tries to provoke conflicts and then
sells weapons to solve these conflicts by force.
Hegemonic ambitions are a natural outgrowth of Shan Yan's theory. For example,
the Chinese have from time immemorial perceived their country as an empire that
has a "mandate from heaven" to control earthly affairs.
Ancient Rome also believed it had the right to rule the world. During the seventh
century, Arabs, united under the banner of Islam, believed that the wars they
started were sanctioned by Allah and would benefit mankind. The French, after
creating a strong centralized government, decided that they were the nation
chosen by God and fate to spread civilization around the world.
In the same spirit, Britain, Holland, Spain and Portugal justified their
colonization of Africa and the Americas. Until its defeat in World War II, Japan
spoke about its duty to free the people of Asia from the "white barbarians" and
to give them a better set of morals and culture. Sixty years after the Italians
created a unified government in 1870, fascist leader Benito Mussolini took
control of the country and proclaimed a new Roman Empire, acquiring new
territories in Europe and Africa. Tsarist Russia also sought expansion under the
banner of Slavophiles and Orthodoxy, and after the Bolsheviks removed the tsarist
regime from power, they led a global campaign to spread proletarian revolution.
After the Soviet collapse, it was the Americans' turn to practice a modern
version of Manifest Destiny if not on a global scale, then at least in the
greater Middle East. But Washington's failures in Afghanistan and Iraq as well as
the financial crisis cooled its appetite to spread Pax Americana to other
countries. But is this respite in U.S. expansionism only a temporary phenomenon?
Another question is whether China will pursue expansionism. For the past decade,
Beijing has insisted that it has too many internal problems to even think about
territorial expansion. But this has done little to calm global nerves,
particularly considering the fact that China's economic and military power seems
to be growing by the day.
Access to energy supplies and pipeline routes will continue to play an important
role in global affairs in the 21st century and will continue to shape the foreign
policies of the world's leading energy producers and consumers: Russia, the
United States and China.
In addition, the global economic crisis has turned many people in the West into
pessimists and has sparked an interest in re-evaulating Marxism as a serious
economic model for the post-crisis 21st century.
In the end, China can become a true global "game-changer." If it continues to
increase its military power while, at the same time, remaining socialist and
authoritarian, dozens of other governments will surely try to adopt the Chinese
formula in at attempt to achieve the same economic and political results.
[return to Contents]
Russia Profile
July 13, 2011
Unlikely Spies
While Moscow Chides Georgia for Its "Anti-Russian Hysteria," Local Critics Call
for Additional Transparency in the Case against 3 Journalists
By Andrew Roth
Some claim that "spymania" has hit Georgia recently, as several of the country's
most prominent photojournalists, including President Mikheil Saakashvili's
personal photographer have been arrested and accused of passing information to
Russian intelligence services. While the most recent case has kicked up the usual
interest in the strained Russian-Georgian relationship, it has also brought a
wave of anger from local and international journalists, who see the arrests as
evidence of a continuing crackdown on freedom of speech and the right to
Three prominent Georgian photojournalists arrested on July 7 are now being
charged with passing confidential information on Saakashvili's daily movements as
well as plans and pictures of the presidential building to Russian military
intelligence. Irakli Gedenidze, a personal photographer for Saakashvili, and
Giorgi Abdaladze, a foreign ministry photographer who freelanced for Associated
Press, have been accused of taking photographs of sensitive material and selling
them to Zurab Kurtsikidze, a photojournalist working for the European Pressphoto
Agency (EPA), who then sold the photos to Russian agents.
Georgian authorities are claiming that the sensitive photographs were unearthed
in searches at Gedenidze and Abdaladze's apartments, and the interior ministry
has further produced a video clip of Gedenidze admitting selling photos to
Kurtsikidze, who he said was blackmailing him. In an interview on Echo of Moscow
radio station last Friday, Saakashvili admitted that he was "very upset about the
photographer," but maintained that his personal feelings were secondary to the
danger of Russian espionage in Georgia. "I believe nobody has any doubts that we
are the first target for a giant country run by former KBG agents," he said.
Those sentiments have not been shared by many of the countries' reporters, who
have been protesting the arrests and the secrecy surrounding the evidence against
the photojournalists since they were detained. Protests in the capital on Tuesday
gathered a crowd of about 100 people, many leading journalists, demanding that
more evidence in the case be made public. "Of course I don't think that they're
guilty, because we haven't had any proof so far of their guilt," said Nino
Danelia from the Coalition for Media Advocacy, reported Reuters.
The discovery of another spy ring in Georgia immediately raised concerns among
international organizations that the cases are a pretext to curb media freedoms
in Georgia. "We have been concerned about this fear of spies since the war in
2008," said Johann Bihr, Head of the Eurasia and Central Asia Desk for Reporters
Without Borders. "This could become a major turning point for Georgia, which has
done slightly better in the region in the past in terms of journalistic freedoms
than many of the other countries in the region."
Thus far, Bihr noted, the case has not damaged the country's reputation as much
as the crackdown on an opposition protest on the eve of the country's
Independence Day in late May. During the unrest police and protestors traded
blows after the latter barricaded one of the main streets in the capital. Two
people were killed by a motorcade carrying opposition leader Nino Burdzhanadze.
Abdaladze has claimed in recent statements that the arrests were revenge from the
government for photographs that were taken by the accused at the May parade,
including a photograph of the killed protestor.
Russia responded mockingly to the allegations of an espionage ring, claiming that
"anti-Russian hysteria" was once again gaining ground in Georgia. "The
authorities are earnestly convincing the global community and its own population
that Georgia is flooded with Russian spies and infiltrators, who brave local
special forces are fighting tooth and nail," said Foreign Ministry spokesman
Alexander Lukashevich.
Yet Alexander Rondeli, president of the Tbilisi-based Georgian Foundation for
Strategic and International Studies, noted that proof of persistent Russian
interference in Georgia since the 2008 war is not difficult to find, and that
international interest over the case has been primarily kicked up by Georgia's
vocal journalistic community. "The only reason that we're seeing this kind of
response is because of who these people were journalists, and right now they're
trying to draw as much attention to the case as possible." Despite the "heavily
politicized" issues surrounding the case, he said, the judicial process should be
allowed to move forward. "You cannot fake proof of somebody being a spy. They'll
be condemned, or they'll be acquitted, which is a government matter," said
Georgia's international partners, including the United States, have been reserved
in their response to the case, being careful not to condemn Georgia. "With regard
to the treatment of these people, you know we believe in freedom of the media;
but if, in fact, there have been actions incompatible with that, then we would
want to see a transparent and accountable judicial process," said State
Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland. As for the relationship between Russia
and Georgia, Rondeli said, the accusation of a Russian spy ring is unlikely to
have any effect. "How can it get any worse than it is? There's nothing there at
all in the first place."
[return to Contents]
BBC Monitoring
US ambassador comments on case of Georgian journalists arrested on spying charge
Georgian TV1
July 13, 2011 (?)
(Presenter) The US ambassador today commented on the case of (four)
photojournalists detained on charges of cooperation with an organization, which
acted under the cover of a foreign country's secret services to the detriment of
Georgia's interests, and obtained and transferred various materials to them. In
response to a journalist's question John Bass said that spying charges is a
difficult and serious case and that it is difficult for the government to strike
a balance between information which is classified as secret and information which
should be in the public domain. The ambassador said that the government is
grappling with this dilemma. Bass said that the meeting between the interior
ministry and representatives of a media coalition will facilitate work in this
(John Bass, speaking in English with superimposed Georgian translation) We have
had public and private talks with members of the government. Private discussions
by definition are called private and I am not going to release details of these
talks. As for the public discussions, I have stated before and I will reiterate
that for me as a person, who observes from the outside, questions remain. There
is a degree of scepticism among the Georgian public which is caused by incomplete
picture the public have been provided with. If the Georgian public is given a
possibility to familiarize themselves with more details of the case and if fair
trial is provided, they will be able to make their own conclusions. Accusations
of spying is a difficult and serious case. It is difficult in our public to
strike a balance between classified information and information in the public
domain. Let me add that as far as I know, government members are now grappling
with the dilemma. The point at issue is how the prosecution should proceed with
the charges (as heard) and how public trust should be ensured to the process. I
know that the interior minister plans to meet representatives of a media
coalition. I hope work in this direction will continue and this dilemma will be
resolved; the public will receive more information and the government will fulfil
its work.
Date: Thu, 7 Jul 2011
From: "Russian Analytical Digest (RAD)" <email@example.com>
Subject: No.98: Russia and the Middle East Crises
RUSSIAN ANALYTICAL DIGEST Newsletter
6 July 2011/No. 98
Russia and the Middle East Crises
To download this issue please click here:
Russia and the Arab Revolutions, by Roland Dannreuther, London
Russia and the Arab Spring, by Mark N. Katz, Fairfax, Va.
Opinion Polls
Russian Public Opinion on the War in Libya
Russian Public Opinion on Unrest in the Arab World
We welcome feedback on RAD topics or any comments you may have on our
publication. To send your comments, please submit a Letter to the Editor.
The Russian Analytical Digest is a bi-weekly internet publication jointly
produced by the Research Centre for East European Studies [Forschungsstelle
Osteuropa] at the University of Bremen and the Center for Security Studies (CSS)
at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH Zurich), and the
Institute of History at the University of Basel. It is supported by the German
Association for East European Studies (DGO). The Digest draws on contributions
from the German-language Russland-Analysen, the CSS analytical network on Russia
and Eurasia, and the Russian Regional Report.
[return to Contents]
Date: Tue, 12 Jul 2011
From: Irina Burns <email@example.com>
Subject: Russian Politics and Law - New Issue Alert
Volume 49 Number 4 / July-August 2011 of Russian Politics and Law is now
available on the mesharpe.metapress.com web site at http://mesharpe.metapress.com
This issue contains:
Local and Regional Politics in Russia: Editor's Introduction p. 3
Dmitry Gorenburg
Russian Federalism as a "Dormant" Institution p. 8
Andrei Zakharov
Unattainable Symmetry: On the Results of the "Amalgamation" of Regions of the
Russian Federation p. 18
Aleksandr Kynev
Local Government in the Grip of the "Power Vertical" p. 32
Vasilii Skalon, Maksim Rubchenko
Local Regimes in Large Russian Cities: Introduction to the Theme p. 37
Vladimir Gelman, Sergei Ryzhenkov
State Power, Governance, and Local Regimes in Russia: A Framework for Analysis
p. 42
Vladimir Gelman
Local Regimes and the "Power Vertical" p. 53
Sergei Ryzhenkov
Economic Actors and Local Regimes in Russia's Large Cities p. 64
Olga Bychkova, Vladimir Gelman
Local Public Participation in Contemporary Russia p. 76
Elena Belokurova, Dmitrii Vorob'ev
Perm: A Local Regime in a Large Russian City p. 85
Nadezhda Borisova
[return to Contents]
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