#2
Interfax
April 26, 2016
Putin documentary: I have the common touch, I'm not from the elite

The personal touch and a sense of closeness to the people are things that greatly help me in the work that I do, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a documentary about him made by state-owned official TV Rossiya 1.

Scheduled for broadcast in Moscow at 1830 gmt on Sunday 26 April, it was aired earlier in the Far East.

"For a man doing the job that I do today, the connection with people and sense of closeness to them are hugely important and a great help to me in my work," Putin said in the film, as reported by Interfax news agency.

"I don't try to find any additional sources of information, I don't need to go looking because I have them already," Putin told his interviewer when asked about his contacts with ordinary people . "I'm not saying that to sound good, I simply feel that I am part of our country and of our people."

"When I meet with people I pick up the signals straight away," he continued. "I can sense when someone is unhappy or worried, and that kind of feedback is essential."

Putin attributed this to not having emerged from an elite. "It could have been water off a duck's back but for me, thank God, the sense is still there and I can feel it immediately. Because I've never been in any elite, which is a good thing in itself," he said.

[return to Contents] 

 #3
RIA Novosti
April 26, 2015
Putin outlines the achievements that make him happy in documentary

Keeping the country in one piece, a bigger economy and higher living standards are among the things that make me happy, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a documentary about him on 26 April.

Called simply "President", it was due for broadcast in Moscow at 1830 gmt but aired earlier in the Far East.

"I could say what we've managed to achieve overall, together, what has given me some satisfaction, when you realize where we've been and what we've done," he told his interviewer when asked whether he has moments of "absolute happiness", in a report by RIA Novosti news agency. "Let's start from the fact that we held the country together and saw GDP double."

State spending in 2014 was 22 times that of 1999 and living standards have trebled in real terms, Putin went on. "The number of people below the poverty threshold was nearly 42 million but it has shrunk by nearly three times, we now have 2.8 times fewer people in poverty."

Another achievement was to turn around the demographic trend, he said. "In 1999 and in 2000 our population declined through natural causes by 929,000, nearly a million. A million more people died than were born," he told his interviewer. "Losing a million a year would be disastrous for Russia. The country would have gradually ceased to exist. We've not only stabilized the situation but reversed it and we've had natural population growth for two years in a row."

Putin attributed this to child and maternity support measures, RIA Novosti reported. The outcome, he said, "is greater confidence among people that they can bear and raise their children and so on."

"Put all that together, when you think about it and analyse it all, and of course it is bound to bring me satisfaction," Putin said.

 [return to Contents] 

 #4
Putin says no regrets over actions in Crimea

VLADIVOSTOK, April 26. /TASS/. Destiny of the people living in Crimea was the main consideration in the process of decision-making on the region's future, President Vladimir Putin said in a documentary film that Rossiya One channel devoted to the 15th anniversary since his accession to the top state positions.

"I think we did the right things and I don't regret about anything," he said.

"The main thing for us was to understand what the people living in Crimea wanted," Putin said. "Did they want to stay in Ukraine or to be together with Russia?"

"If people wanted to return to Russia and not to be trampled on by the power of neo-Nazis, far-rightwing radicals or the Banderites, then we didn't have the right to abandon them and this was an absolutely principled position," he said.

"I told my counterparts about it at the time. I told them that people were the most crucial factor for us," Putin said. "I said, I don't know what interests you're going to defend but we'll go to the very end defending our own interests."

"That's a matter of paramount importance. Not because we want to grab or eat up something and not even because of Crimea's strategic significance for the Black Sea area," he said. "Simply, this is an element of historic fairness.".

 [return to Contents]

 
#5
Moscow Times
April 27, 2015
Putin Accuses U.S. of Supporting Separatists in Russia's North Caucasus

Intercepted calls showed that the United States helped separatists in Russia's North Caucasus in the 2000s, President Vladimir Putin claimed in a new documentary in which he underscored his suspicions of the West.

The two-hour documentary, which began airing Sunday afternoon on the state-owned Rossia-1 television channel, was dedicated to Putin's 15 years in office. It focused on Putin's achievements as well as challenges to his rule - which the producers and Putin blame on Western interference.

Putin was elected Russian president on March 26, 2000, after spending three months as acting president, and was sworn in on May 7, 2000.

At one of Putin's first meetings with the country's top businessmen after it was announced he would run for president, they told him he would not be the real ruler of the state, the president said in the documentary.

"Some of them came to me in the White House [government headquarters], sat opposite me and said: 'You understand that you will never be president here.' I said we would see," Putin said, without specifying the names of his interlocutors.

The documentary showed Putin interviewed at the Kremlin in the dimly-lit St. Alexander's Hall. In excerpts released shortly before the film's broadcast, Putin said Russian intelligence agencies had intercepted calls between separatists in the North Caucasus and the U.S. intelligence based in Azerbaijan during the early 2000s, proving that Washington was helping the insurgents.

Following a disastrous war in the 1990s, Russia fought Islamic insurgents in Chechnya and neighboring regions in the volatile North Caucasus.

"They were actually helping them, even with transportation," Putin said.

Putin said he raised the issue with then-U.S. President George W. Bush, who promised to "kick the ass" of the intelligence officers in question. But in the end, Putin said the Russian intelligence agency FSB received a letter from its "American counterparts" who asserted their right to "support all opposition forces in Russia," including the Islamic separatists in the Caucasus.

Putin also expressed his fears that the West wishes Russia harm as he recalled how some world leaders told him they would not mind Russia's possible disintegration.

"My counterparts, a lot of presidents and a prime minister told me later on that they had decided for themselves by then that Russia would cease to exist in its current form," he said, referring to the time period around the second conflict in the Caucasus. "The only question was when it would happen and what the consequences would be."

Putin's interview revealed the depth of his disappointment in the West.

The West, in Putin's words, is friendly to Russia only when it is on its knees.

"They like us when we need humanitarian aid, then everything is fine, they send us potatoes," Putin said, speaking about Western attitudes toward Russia.

Whenever Russia begins to grow economically and politically, the West, according to Putin, begins to punish it. Putin said that he does not view Western sanctions against Russia as a reaction to last year's annexation of the Crimean Peninsula, but rather "an attempt to hamper Russia's development.

"This is a policy we have been familiar with for centuries."

The president defended the annexation of Crimea as a response to the will of the people, which restored "historic justice."

Putin, who hasn't announced whether he will run for presidency in 2018, insisted that he still hasn't lost touch with ordinary Russians and that he "may very well imagine a life beyond this position."

The documentary also featured comments from members of Putin's inner circle.

Former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, who had worked with Putin since the 1990s in St. Petersburg, explained Putin's attitude to the mass protests in Moscow that followed the allegedly rigged State Duma elections at the end of 2011.

"Since these people [members of the middle class] were strongly mixed up with more radical elements and with nationalists, I saw later that Putin didn't want and didn't see any representatives for [starting] a dialogue," Kudrin said in the film.

Another longtime Putin ally, German Gref, who served in the government as economic development minister until 2007 and now heads the state-owned Sberbank, explained the much-discussed issue of why Putin is so often late for official engagements.

"He listens to everybody and lets everybody speak - sometimes even more than is needed. Sometimes meetings with him go on for hours, which affects his schedule," Gref said.

The latest poll by the independent Levada agency showed that the approval rating for Putin, whose third term in office ends in 2018, was a whopping 86 percent in April.
(AP, MT)

 6
Rossiya 1 TV (Moscow)
April 26, 2015
Russian TV heaps praise on Putin in 151-minute documentary

On 26 April, Russian official state TV channel Rossiya 1 broadcast "President", a two-and-a-half-hour film about Vladimir Putin's 15 years in power. It praised Putin for saving Russia from disintegration and making it a strong global player. The core of the film was an interview with Putin conducted by pro-Kremlin journalist Vladimir Solovyev.

The film started off with a few teasers from the interview, archive footage of armed North Caucasian rebels in 1999, and foreign journalists reporting on the difficult situation in Russia.

On 9 August 1999, the then Prime Minister Sergey Stepashin announced that he was stepping down and that Vladimir Putin was appointed the acting prime minister. At that time, a war was raging in the North Caucasus and elsewhere in Russia, State Duma's first deputy speaker Aleksandr Zhukov and St Petersburg governor Georgiy Poltavchenko were shown saying.

Putin said: "At that moment, I could not even make decisions. I had to work with this in reality, but there was no full range of powers. It was clear how great this responsibility was. Of course, this went without question. I had only one question - I will not even say this on camera now - that if I fail to finish the job, what I will do and how I will live. I decided for myself, as it were, that there was no other choice, one must to go all the way."

Comments by writer Zakhar Prilepin, archive footage of Putin calling for decisive actions against rebels, comments by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and late Chechen field commander Shamil Basayev were shown to prime viewers for the next excerpt from the president's interview. Putin said that it was impossible to negotiate with terrorists who were determined to separate the North Caucasus from Russia. At that time, many foreign politicians were convinced that Russia was finished, he noted.

The head of the presidential administration, Sergey Ivanov, and Defence Minister Sergey Shoygu recalled how Putin replaced Boris Yeltsin as president. Russian Security Council secretary Nikolay Patrushev said that the morale of the army was low. Patrushev and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov recalled Putin's visit to Chechnya and his meeting with military servicemen. Putin's spokesman Dmitriy Peskov praised Putin's role in winning the hearts of the local population.

Georgiy Poltavchenko said that Putin's parents went through tough times during WWII. Video showed photographs of Putin's father and mother. Nikolay Patrushev and Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev praised Putin's attitude to his parents.

Putin was elected president in 2000, when Russia was weak and disorganized, said Deputy Prime Minister Dmitriy Kozak, Sberbank head German Gref and Interros president Vladimir Potanin. Video showed comments by a pensioner and an excerpt from Putin's first inauguration speech.

Answering another question from Solovyev, Putin said that in 1999 some Russian oligarchs told him he would never become president. I had to use "various methods" to rein them in, he said.

Potanin recalled Putin's meeting with business leaders in the summer of 2000. Dmitriy Kozak, Sergey Ivanov, Gazprom CEO Aleksey Miller, former Finance Minister Aleksey Kudrin and Zakhar Prilepin said that the economic situation was very difficult.

Journalist Andrey Kolesnikov recalled Putin's emotional meeting with the wives of the sailors of the Kursk submarine that sank in the Barents Sea in August 2000. Video showed excerpts from the meeting. Sergey Ivanov said that the country was falling apart. Georgiy Poltavchenko, Mining Academy rector Vladimir Litvinenko, Dmitriy Kozak, former Tatarstan President Mintimer Shaymiyev, Sergey Shoygu, Dmitriy Peskov recalled the federal centre's problems with regional authorities.

George Bush's election as US President marked a new era in Russian-American relations. Dmitriy Peskov said that both Washington and Moscow were "increasing the temperature". Video showed George Bush talking about Putin's soul at a news conference. Sergey Ivanov and former Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said that Bush and Putin had excellent personal relations.

In the next excerpt from the interview, Putin said: "We all had our illusions. We thought back then that after the Soviet Union collapsed and after Russia voluntarily, I want to stress this, voluntarily and consciously accepted historic restrictions as it relinquished some of its own territory and industrial capacity and so on, we thought that with the end of the ideological component that separated the former Soviet Union and the entire civilized world, that all the barriers were down and 'liberty would greet us joyously at the entrance and our brothers would hand us the sword', but those 'brothers' were in no hurry to hand us any sword and in fact happily took away what was left of the former Soviet Union's military might".

One feels a sense of "very big disappointment" in your words, Solovyev remarked. Putin replied that yes, even after 20 years in  foreign intelligence, he still had illusions about being able to forge relations with western countries. "Even I thought that with the end of the ideological barrier in the form of the Communist Party's monopoly on power, that things would change radically. But no. They didn't change radically because as it turns out - these simple things do not occur immediately - but nevertheless there are also geopolitical interests that are not linked to any ideology at all."

The West had to understand that Russia also had its geopolitical interests and the two sides had to "treat each other with respect and seek mutually-acceptable outcomes", he said.

Solovyev said that respect is always based on strength and fairness. Putin agreed, noting that the priority was to restore the Russian economy. Aleksey Kudrin and German Gref recalled Putin's meetings with foreign economic experts and his support for reforms.

After the 11 September 2011 attacks on the United States, Putin was the first leader to call George Bush to offer support, and he even cancelled a planned exercise of the Russian Strategic Missile Troops, Sergey Ivanov and

Igor Ivanov recalled. However, at the same time, the United States described Chechen terrorists as freedom fighters, Sergey Ivanov said.

Putin said: "Our special services once detected simply direct contacts between militants from the North Caucasus and representatives from a US special service in Azerbaijan. They were actually simply helping even with transport. And when I told this to the incumbent president of the United States, he replied: 'Well, I,' forgive me but I'll be blunt, 'I'll kick their ass.' In 10 days' time, however, our people, my subordinates, the FSB leadership, got a letter from their counterparts in Washington: 'We have maintained and will continue to maintain relations with all the opposition forces in Russia, and we think that we have the right to do it and we will continue to do it in the future."

He continued: "Under no circumstances, never and nowhere. One must not even try to use terrorists in order to solve one's short-term political or even geopolitical objectives. Because if they are supported in one place, they will rear their heads in another, and will be bound to attack those who supported them yesterday."

"Someone thought there, apparently, especially the Western intelligence agencies, that if someone acts to destabilize the main geopolitical rival, and this is how, as we now understand, Russia has always remained in their minds, it is generally in their interests. It has turned out that it is not so," Putin said.

Video showed an excerpt from Putin's speech in the German parliament on 25 September 2001, and scenes of Putin's meetings with the then British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Igor Ivanov, former Russian Prime Minister Yevgeniy Primakov spoke about the Iraqi war and Putin's cooperation with his French and German counterparts.

This was followed by a series of thematic segments in which Putin was described as a very hard-working man, a good listener, always very busy, and a great patriot.

Putin said that the most tragic events for him were the Beslan siege and the Dubrovka theatre siege. Patrushev and Primakov recalled some details, Putin's emotions.

In the next segment, Ramzan Kadyrov recalled his father's assassination. Video showed archive footage of Putin praising Akhmat Kadyrov. Ramzan Kadyrov praised Putin's decision to amnesty some Chechen rebels.

Russian Patriarch Kirill, Mintimer Shaymiyev and other contributors praised Putin's attitude to different religions and ethnic groups, his role in the economic revival of regions and the doubling of Russia's GDP. Prime Minister Dmitriy Kozak, Vladimir Potanin and Aleksey Kudrin spoke about the Yukos affair.

In another series of thematic segments, Putin was portrayed as a law-abiding citizen, a compassionate and ethical person. Nazarbayev, Shoygu, Sergey Ivanov and Potanin spoke about Putin's ability to learn new things, such as ice-skating, skiing, the English language, and even how to play the piano. Putin was shown performing a song in English at a charity event.

Singer Nikolay Rastorguyev and other contributors described Putin as a champion of ordinary citizens.

Putin said he felt himself as part of the country rather than part of the elite. Film director Nikita Mikhalkov said that Putin understood the burden of power. Dmitriy Chernyshenko, the head of the Sochi Olympic Games Organizing Committee, and others praised Putin's role in securing the right to host the Sochi Olympics. German Gref and others praised Putin's attitude to his friends.

Dmitriy Peskov spoke about "desperate attempts by some countries" to preserve themselves as "the only centre of global control". Video showed an excerpt from Putin's speech in Munich in February 2007.

The film went on to describe Putin's decision not to run for a third term in 2008, his role in dealing with the economic crisis, the war in Georgia, forest fires and other challenges, Dmitriy Medvedev's announcement about Putin's nomination for president, Bolotnaya protests, Putin flying with cranes, Putin answering questions about Mikhail Khodorkovskiy and Boris Berezovskiy, his meeting with US President Barack Obama in St Petersburg in September 2013, and the Syrian chemical disarmament initiative. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Putin has a longer-term view than his Western counterparts.

Responding to a question about his idea of "fair world order", Putin replied that the West's "so-called ruling circles, elites - political and economic - of these counties, they love us when we are impoverished, poor, and when we come hat in hand. As soon as we start declaring some interests of our own, they feel that there is some element of geopolitical rivalry."

Later, he added: "I am profoundly convinced that we are not breaking any rules of the game. When I say the rules of the game, I mean, above all, international, public international law, the Charter of the United Nations, and everything connected with it. This concerns our relations with Ukraine. This concerns the situation in Crimea. This concerns the position we adopt in other regions of the world in the fight against international terrorism. This concerns our problems in the area of global security. What is meant is, for example, our attitude to the United States of America withdrawing from the fundamental treaty on the limitation of missile defences. So, when we start discussing all this, when we say that we are being threatened, for example, by the expansion of NATO to the east, by military infrastructure approaching our borders, then there appears a desire to confront us. And now this has acquired the form we are seeing. That is precisely what the so-called sanctions are."

"And we have been witnessing such attempts throughout Russian history, starting back in Tsarist times. This attempt to contain Russia, this policy has been known for a long time, for  hundreds of years. There is nothing new about it. So, we should not worry about it too much," he said.

Commenting on what happened in Crimea, Putin said that he has no regrets: "I told them that what matters to us most is people. I do not know what interests you will protect, but we, as we defend ours, will go all the way. And this is an extremely important thing."

"Not because we want to bite something off, to snatch it. And not even because Crimea is of strategic importance in the Black Sea region. But because it is an element of historical justice. I believe that we did the right thing, and I do not regret anything," he said. Video showed jubilant crowds in Crimea, an excerpt from Putin's speech on Crimea "returning to its native harbour", Dmitriy Peskov and others praising new, patriotic Russia, Putin visiting a monastery in Greece, and answering a question about Crimea at a news conference.

In response to Solovyev's question on the armed forces, Putin said: "Had we not had the military-industrial complex and the army, we could not have overcome all the problems to do with the fight against international terrorism. Even in the most difficult times, from the point of view of the economy, at the beginning of the first decade of this century we were struggling to get together an army and then, I already spoke about this, given the total headcount of 1,300,000 people, with difficulty I gathered together 50,000, pulled in troops from the Far East, naval infantry from the Northern Fleet and we got together 50,000 in combat capable units. Now the situation is completely different. Before that, the Armed Forces were simply in a sorry state financially. Both morally and financially. And, you know, in this connection, I would like to take the opportunity, as it were, and once again thank all our servicemen who at a very difficult time for the country, on their shoulders, in conditions where there was no money, and, I would say, when the Armed Forces were in a humiliating state, nevertheless saved the county. I bow before them."

Sergey Ivanov and others recalled a major battle in Chechnya in which 84 Russian soldiers were killed in 2000. Video showed archive footage of Putin meeting with their mothers.

In the final part, Putin listed his achievements and noted positive demographic changes in Russia. Patriarch Kirill said that Putin serves his country. In conclusion, Putin said that the possibility of serving his country and people far outweighed anything he had to give up.

 [return to Contents]

 #7
Izvestia
April 23, 2015
Russian state TV journalist interviewed on his film about Putin

Interview with TV journalist Vladimir Solovyev by Anastasiya Kashevarova; 'Putin has a caring attitude towards people and the country.' Journalist Vladimir Solovyev told Izvestiya about the movie 'The President'

On Sunday 26 April, the film The President [Prezident], devoted to the 15th anniversary of Vladimir Putin's election, will be shown on the Rossiya 1 TV channel. The film covers the period from 1999 to the present day. It includes the most significant and crucial events in recent history - the war in Chechnya, Beslan, the Dubrovka terrorist act, the [submarine] Kursk. In the film the head of state talks to TV journalist Vladimir Solovyev about these and many other moments. In an interview with Izvestiya correspondent Anastasiya Kashevarova, Vladimir Solovyev explained what goals the creators of the film set themselves.

[Kashevarova] [The president's] spokesman Dmitriy Peskov has described your interview with Vladimir Putin as brilliant and advised us to watch the film "The President". Is the interview the basis of the film?

[Solovyev] Yes and no. The interview lasted one hour and 52 minutes. The film will include a relatively small part of the interview. We issued one section [of the interview] on 23 February. The main bulk of it formed the basis of the film. That is to say, it supplemented the existing screenplay. The film's points of reference are excerpts from the interview.

[Kashevarova] You say "we." Is this your personal film or a team film?

[Solovyev] I worked with Saida Medvedeva - it was her team. Broadly speaking, I only made certain proposals for the screenplay. I took part in interviewing the people you see on the screen. But the most important thing was the interview with Vladimir Putin. On screen, I am present only with Vladimir Vladimirovich.

[Kashevarova] What important moments in history are in the film?

[Solovyev] The film grabs you from the first second and you are plunged into the atmosphere of history. We did not follow the path of re-enactment, we did not try to play at history. The team managed to dig out a crazy number of archive films that many people have forgotten by now. And when 15 years of history suddenly appears before your eyes, what strong emotions arise. After all, there were terrible upheavals - wars, terrorist acts, the Kursk - enough for the life of a generation.

And also, the participants talked in a very interesting way. They told us things that they had never said anywhere before. A crazy number of details. They were so emotional, for instance [head of the presidential administration] Sergey Ivanov, [Security Council secretary] Nikolay Patrushev. You can understand it if [novelist] Zakhar Prilepin catches fire, but when state officials or, say, [Sberbank head] German Gref or [former Finance Minister] Aleksey Kudrin say things you do not expect from them, the expression on their faces changes when they remember all this. Many things will be heard for the first time.

[Kashevarova] So we can expect some sensational exclusives?

[Solovyev] Yes, I think so. Depending on what you regard as exclusive. I do not think in terms of exclusives, but feelings and opinions - yes.

[Kashevarova] How were the participants selected?

[Solovyev] We took people who played a key role during those 15 years.

[Kashevarova] The president's Petersburg team?

[Solovyev] Partly the Petersburg team, but not only them. There is an excerpt that did not end up in the film. I said to Putin: "There is an impression that you would never surrender your team. That is good and bad. But at a certain point they start surrendering you." Putin said: "If they have committed some kind of crime, what are we talking about."

And talking about non-Petersburg members of the team, Putin tells a story about the mayor of Moscow: "For instance, Sergey Semenovich Sobyanin, I hardly knew him, but I saw how he worked as governor and I liked it, and later I took him on to head the Presidential Staff and I did not regret it. I look at people's professional qualities." But that did not go into the interview.

There will be people in the film who are known to the whole country as members of the Petersburg team but there will also be others from among the people, as they say nowadays.

In general, when Putin talks about the people his face changes. It is very interesting, because after all, I talk with a great many politicians. As it happens, I have interviewed the presidents of several countries. For Putin, it is very important to have a sense of the people. He cannot lie to them. He says himself that he does not like election campaigns: "I cannot promise what cannot be done." It is an interesting trait of Putin's that he would rather understate things than promise something that cannot be fulfilled. But if he has promised, he will keep an eye on it. Even if he ends up looking like Grandfather Frost [Russian equivalent of Santa Claus], the girl  must get the training equipment [referring to a disabled girl from Tolyatti who asked for some special equipment during Putin's phone-in; the equipment was quickly supplied by the local government]. It is very important to Putin, if he has promised something, it must be done.

There are elements that nobody knows about - when years have passed but he continues to observe, to help, aware of his responsibility and duty.

[Kashevarova] Will there be moments of contact with children in the film, for instance in phone-ins?

[Solovyev] There will be no cooing. We managed without sugariness, but there will be stories when Putin's intervention really... You know, it is easy to give a girl a bicycle, but it is difficult to visit the women whose husbands were on the submarine Kursk and talk with them. It is difficult to visit the mothers of kids who were killed during the Chechen campaign and talk with them. In the film you will see this Putin, the non-cooing Putin.

[Kashevarova] Did you coordinate the questions with Vladimir Putin?

[Solovyev] Vladimir Vladimirovich knew the subjects, more or less. Everyone knows that I am not going to coordinate questions with anyone. I am not reading questions, I am talking with a person. I know the subjects I want to discuss.

[Kashevarova] Did the president arrive on time?

[Solovyev] He did not arrive on time. And in the film there is an interesting explanation of why Putin, as a rule, does not arrive on time.

[Kashevarova] Like the boy from Dagestan, he likes to sleep?

[Solovyev] Not at all. He arrived after working practically a full working day. The point is that Putin gives everyone the opportunity to be heard, to have their say, he never hurries and he does not hurry anyone. It is not a case of I am the president and you have three seconds.

[Kashevarova] He once said that he has never been late for anything, because no event has ever started without him...

[Solovyev] He likes to make a joke, he is a person with a sense of humour and, incidentally, irony against himself. There was one point when we were sitting in the Aleksandrovskiy Hall [in the Kremlin], an enormous hall, an important place. I asked him: "Vladimir Vladimirovich, they say you have yachts, mansions, homes, you are a very rich man." He said: "But why, here we are at the moment sitting in my office. I have a residence - one, two, three, I use them regularly." That was absolutely sincere.

[Kashevarova] Do you think the president answered all the questions sincerely?

[Solovyev] Putin has a peculiarity: For him, there are different types of questions. There are questions in the category not of "sincerely - insincerely," but "I know - I do not know," when there are figures, statistics. And here Putin has this trick: He sighs before answering, he raises his eyes slightly, as if he is starting up the computer, and then he comes out with a crazy string of figures, and you realize that he remembers everything precisely. I think in some respects he answered very sincerely, because when he did not want to answer he would say openly - I am not going to answer, that is, he did not try to deceive. There was the following question. I asked him: "Are you a mystical person? What role does religion play in your life?" And he answered: "I have no mysticism. As for faith, that is a state of the soul, and I do not like to talk about this in public."

When you talk with Putin you sense that he is a charming person. The surprising thing, when you talk with him, is that unlike a great many Russian politicians he really listens to you. He looks at you, and he is interested in what you are saying. And he wants to answer in such a way that you understand what he means.

[Kashevarova] Spiritually, does he try to hide?

[Solovyev] This is a sphere that, to all appearances, is very important to him. In that job, you cannot help valuing the great bulk of Russian history. The exhibition "300 Years of the House of the Romanovs" made a great impression on Putin; it was clear that under one emperor the Russian land grew, but under another it did not. And that feeling is very important to Putin, this can be seen in the film.

But human lives are very important to him. When he starts talking about people, he...

[Kashevarova] Catches fire?

[Solovyev] Catches fire. For him, this subject is very important.

[Kashevarova] Are figures and economy boring to him?

[Solovyev] It is a lesson he has learned.

[Kashevarova] Politics and geopolitics?

[Solovyev] This belongs to him. In the interview we talked a lot about geopolitics and the enormous disappointment that Putin feels in his Western partners. After all, this is the disappointment of our entire generation - we thought the West was ideologically close to us, but it turns out that it is not.

[Kashevarova] In 2008 he gave an interview for the channel ARD in which he said that Crimea is not an end in itself, but in the end it turned out the other way  around...

[Solovyev] Putin regularly and constantly emphasizes that there were no plans. If the agreement had been observed, Crimea would now be Ukrainian and there would be no problems in the Donbass [Donetsk Basin]. The armed overthrow of Viktor Yanukovych plunged everyone into conditions where it was necessary to move quickly. It is obvious that there were no long-standing strategic plans on Ukraine. If there had been, the political and economic steps in relation to Ukraine since 1991 would not have been so incompetent.

I am sure there was no such idea. Chess players have the concept of "smart hand"; when a blitz is under way and your head cannot keep up, the hand does everything itself. If it had not been for the movement of the Crimean guys, if it had not been for the movement of the Donetsk guys, nothing would have happened. No special forces can occupy a peninsula where there are 2 million people and a 20,000-strong corps. This is a combat clash, a war.

[Kashevarova] Were there questions about his personal life?

[Solovyev] In general, that did not interest me. I asked him what he has to sacrifice, and Putin said that he has to sacrifice everything, renounce the life of normal people. I wanted to show Putin in a 15-year perspective. What came out was a film in which Putin recounts 15 years of recent history. I did not ask him how he chooses his necktie, I did not put questions that would be perfectly appropriate but in a different format. Many of the questions I asked were important, they were sensitive: About [opposition protests on] Bolotnaya, about the war...

[Kashevarova] You once, during a phone-in, asked Vladimir Putin about corruption. He replied that the main thing is not the harshness of the punishment but the inevitability of punishment. But at the moment there is no particular harshness or inevitability. There is a sense that he is deliberately shaking up various elite groups like spiders in a jar and looking to see who is strongest...

[Solovyev] This is a difficult question. I approached it in the interview but it did not get into the film. Everyone wants Stalinist methods, including in combating corruption. If we look at it, there are some obnoxious cases that everyone hears about, but there are a large number of less noteworthy ones, but they have reached a conclusion: Mayors, vice governors, and former governors are going to prison. Cases have been brought. I agree it is not enough. I spoke on the subject of corruption, he thinks there is progress, but here it is very important not to overstep the bounds of legality, not to go too far, this is a difficult moment in the development of the judicial system. If we press too hard in some places the consequences could be tragic.

There are moments in history that are somewhat parallel, but they give us some idea of Putin's methods. In the 1990s nobody paid taxes, and the oligarchs, de facto, did not pay taxes. Now the democratic oligarchs are beginning to say that the "Putin miracle" is linked to the high price of oil. Nothing of the kind. In Putin's first term the price of oil was 30 dollars. He made the oligarchs pay taxes.

Here too, making everyone live by the law without destroying the system, without ending up causing a bloodbath with a great many innocent people dying, is very difficult. And Putin is absolutely committed to the rule of law. For him, it is very important that the letter of the law be observed.

[Kashevarova] In that case, maybe the [law-enforcement] organs are not doing enough?

[Solovyev] But in order to do enough they must grow and be cleaned up.

[Kashevarova] Here the question is, can they be cleaned up under the oversight of the Kremlin?

[Solovyev] There is a misconception here. Theoretically the oversight can come from anywhere you like, but in practice that is not feasible.

[Kashevarova] The practice of issuing warnings to the localities also does not always work...

[Solovyev] These are different things. This indicates the direction of movement. The state wants people to pay attention to particular problems.

[Kashevarova] Or maybe you just call and say directly: "Vas, look here, all your people have been doing too much thieving"?

[Solovyev] He does not and cannot work that way. If they have been doing too much thieving, the materials are established for a criminal case. When the Kremlin calls and says: "Vas, you have done too much thieving, give it back," then you are an accomplice.

[Kashevarova] At a conference devoted to the 15th anniversary of Vladimir Putin's coming to power economist Igor Yurgens said that the authorities are now pursuing the ideology of prohibitive conservatism. Did Vladimir Putin talk to you about the ideological component during the interview?

[Solovyev] In general, he does not talk about ideology. Clearly he thinks about this subject, but he prefers not to formulate it himself but to wait for public opinion. Just imagine, what if the president lays the ideological foundations - then what is everyone else supposed to do, just follow? As if he came down from on high with tablets of stone? Putin does not see himself that way.

[Kashevarova] Did he tell you how he does see himself?

[Solovyev] He does not like that kind of conversation. When the time comes, he explains certain nuances. This happened during the phone-in on the question of nationalism. And for sure, Putin is not going to formulate the ideology of the state.

[Kashevarova] In what way does the president talk about his relationship with Prime Minister Dmitriy Medvedev?

[Solovyev] Very correctly, very calmly, there are no hints of problems of any kind. To a question about the dismissal of the government, he replied - no.

[Kashevarova] What is his personal assessment, in the film, of his 15 years in power? Were there serious mistakes and is he prepared to acknowledge his mistakes?

[Solovyev] There is something about that. He does not see them as mistakes. There are always options for how to achieve a specific objective. He talks about what was not successful, but hardly at all about what was successful and what he can be proud of. If you talk about the heights, it means you are coming down from the mountain. It means the road has ended. But for Putin this is just another challenge that must be accepted.

[Kashevarova] Was the question of the next [presidential] term raised?

[Solovyev] First, it is too soon. Second, it is obvious. I asked him why he ran in 2012. He said - responsibility.

[Kashevarova] Did you not ask about his successor?

[Solovyev] I am sure this is not currently in his field of vision. There are people doing their jobs. It is important for him to leave a guard of professionals who are getting on with the tasks they are set. To develop people, not to dissipate their efforts.

[Kashevarova] What main problems does the president see?

[Solovyev] Economy and geopolitics. For him, Russia's self-determination and its role in the world are the main topics. And this is by no means isolation, it is not a branch of Stalinism. This was not a country 15 years ago. We were facing the threat of real disintegration. Tatarstan was living its own life, and so was Bashkortostan. Many people have forgotten about that. Many people have forgotten that when the second Chechen war began, Tony Blair and others believed that the disintegration of Russia was a question of a few years. The trend was set. In the past 15 years we have become stronger. The authorities have begun to pay their debts to the people. Look how much fewer poor people there are. The average life expectancy has changed.

The film will show how Russia has changed. Our country was impoverished, people were not getting their wages or pensions. People had to be given the opportunity to draw breath. And therefore wages were increased at a faster pace than labour productivity was increasing. Because before that, people were not being paid for any kind of labour productivity. It was simply necessary to save people's lives, to make them believe that it was possible to have children. In 1999 they sat down as a team and analysed the situation in the country. And in the film there is a conclusion about the situation in the country. Everywhere in our country it was like Chechnya, in the shape it was in after the wars. Ruin, ungovernability. Corrupt and negligent officials, corrupt security agencies. Yes, of course there are always honest people, but all this needed to be set to rights. Out of an army of one and a half million, it was necessary to select 50,000 people capable of achieving the objective in the Caucasus. The state debt was 140 per cent of GDP. And what we have done in 15 years... We are a country now. Not Putin alone, but everyone in their place. Maybe some people did not always pull in the right direction. But this is our joint life. This is our recent history. How much has been done. And Putin talks about this honestly, frankly, without trying to conceal anything, saying what succeeded and what did not, why we took this path. And you start seeing everything  differently.

[Kashevarova] Why were you the one entrusted with interviewing Vladimir Putin?

[Solovyev] For a journalist, an interview with the president is the Olympics. I had been requesting an interview with the president since 2001. This is the most interesting interview there can be. There is a bizarre opinion that I am a pro-Kremlin journalist, but not many people even among the opposition criticize the authorities as much as I do. In contrast to the opposition, I do not shout out in the abstract, but always in very concrete terms - who, what, where, and how. So they know I am an awkward person, but all the same they agreed to it.

It is very interesting to talk with Putin, he listens to the question, he analyses it, he takes it apart, and he gives you an answer while being aware of all the risks. What anyone in the country can allow themselves to do, the president cannot allow himself. You can feel this in him. For instance, he says: I grew up in the  yard, I understand these people, I am one of them. In some respects I sometimes envy people who grew up among the elites. And you might think that now there is going to be a contrast. But no. And he goes on - I understand that in many ways they are better prepared in certain spheres. And so you get an analysis. Not a contrast, that I am good and they are bad. Putin has a caring attitude towards people and towards the country. He has nothing of Yeltsin's "take as much as you want." Putin has a very caring attitude towards human life.

Take war. During the second Chechen war, Putin flies out there - he lives there, actually risking his own life. He feels his responsibility. He must see everything with his own eyes.

When you see the film, this film fills you with a sense of pride in your country.

[Kashevarova] Good things are always soon forgotten.

[Solovyev] Maybe because we do not hear the voices of those who still remember. We often hear the voices of those who weep fashionably. And we think that is how it should be. That it is somehow awkward to say that everything is good. It has become established in our consciousness that a real intellectual must always be in opposition to the authorities. But opposition does not mean boorishness. Criticism of the authorities does not mean boorishness in the face of the authorities.

[Kashevarova] Has the president seen the film yet?

[Solovyev] I did not see the president watching the film. Of course, such works are examined from the standpoint that there should be no factual mistakes. Because some things could play a defining role. According to some reports, it seems everyone was happy.

[Kashevarova] What was the outstanding moment in the interview?

[Solovyev] I repeat: When he talks about people, the expression on his face changes. It is an entirely different face. He has very lively eyes. It very often surprises me when people talk about a double, or even three of them. I have been observing regularly since 2001 - it is the same person. The eyes and some other features that immediately distinguish a person. Particularly when he is in direct contact. You can always distinguish between a parody and the original.

I asked him a question about his attitude towards people. It was obvious that he was choosing his words, trying to find the right metaphors, so that I would understand what this means to him.

We have created material about a country and about a person who has been in the highest office for 15 years. He is absolutely without pomposity. Respect, yes. Both for himself and for his interlocutor. There is no arrogance - "Don't you know who you are talking to?" None of that. Sometimes it seems to me, although I have not asked him about this, that he is fulfilling the words of the best Roman emperor, Trajan, who said: I want to be the kind of ruler that I myself would want if I were a subject.

 [return to Contents]

 #8
Russia Beyond the Headlines
www.rbth.ru
April 23, 2015
Perestroika 30 years on: Analyzing the consequences for modern Russia
Andrei Grachev, Fyodor Lukyanov, special to RBTH
Two expert views on why Gorbachev's historic reforms still matter today.
Andrei Grachev and Fyodor Lukyanov, special to RBTH

30 years on, perestroika's revolution remains misunderstood in Russia
Andrei Grachev, special to RBTH
The author is a former spokesman for Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.

A full thirty years after Mikhail Gorbachev set the USSR on an irreversible trajectory toward a more open, humane society - and ultimately, toward the country's dissolution - many Russians continue to reject the idea that perestroika represented a step forward for the country, especially in terms of its geopolitical consequences. In an RBTH exclusive, Gorbachev's former press secretary Andrei Grachev asks why the perestroika era remains such a controversial part of the nation's history.
 
The attitude to perestroika, its outcomes and consequences in Russia remains controversial even now. The "Gorbachev paradox" is that both the opponents and many of the supporters of the Soviet Union's last leader believe the perestroika that he launched ended in a failure. Consequently, some damn Gorbachev for what he managed to achieve, while others blame him for the fact that he did not fulfill all his promises.

Most of all, the initiator of perestroika is accused of inconsistency, wavering and tactical zigzags. His cautiousness, his yearning to propel society forward by giving it the opportunity to ripen for change, to push it from behind, rather than to lead, were perceived by many as inconsistency and indecisiveness.

However, if one tries to connect at least the major changes that have taken place over those years in the former Soviet Union and throughout the world with a dotted line, the zigzags of the "indecisive" Gorbachev would stretch in almost a straight line... I will name the fact that, in my opinion, is perestroika's "insoluble residue": Russia took a bite from the "apple" of free elections and glasnost, having included the right to freedom of expression and information in its list of public priorities.
 
The price of reform

Having dropped its claims for an alternative civilization and global submission to its ideological doctrine, Moscow took the initiative to end the Cold War, which had almost led to a third world war. The result of these years was the actual reunification of world history, which split into two streams in the early 20th century, after the Russian Revolution.

However, in our mortal world, everything has its price. The price that, against his will, Gorbachev paid for the transformation of his own country and world politics was the collapse of the Soviet Union and his own resignation.

The Western world, in turn, could not resist the temptation to declare itself the absolute winner in the Cold War and the sole heir to history. As a result, Gorbachev's Western partners, on whose common sense, even more than financial assistance, he hoped, proved no more reliable allies than his former party colleagues who had betrayed him.
 
The legacy of perestroika

Today, Gorbachev blames the West not for the failure of its leaders to provide sufficient help to him (he knows that it was not them that on which the fate of perestroika depended), but for its inability to sensibly use the unique chance that his new policy opened to the world, for perceiving the move of Soviet society toward democracy only as a manifestation of inner weakness.

Neither the project of the "common European home," part of which the reformed Soviet Union was to become, nor the idea of creating new structures of collective security on the continent (including the possible Security Council), which would help to avoid the tragedy of the bloody war in Yugoslavia, and the drama of the current civil conflict in Ukraine, were implemented.

It turned out that it was easier to destroy the Berlin Wall itself than to do away with the logic that spawned it and the psychology of programmed enmity as an instrument of policy.
 
Returning ghosts

The preservation of old visible and invisible walls and barriers and the emergence of new ones shows that in the 21st century, politicians - both of the West and the East - are not ready to abandon their prejudices and stereotypes. It is clear that this is the reason the Cold War was replaced by numerous "hot" conflicts around the world.  

And the former, faded old Cold War that Gorbachev believed that he was burying for good during his meetings in Reykjavik, in Malta, in Washington or Moscow with past American presidents is rapidly returning to Russian-American relations.

If 30 years after the beginning of perestroika, it is seen in Russian society as a political failure or even as a subversive anti-national project, it means that the main motive of perestroika, actively supported at the time by the entire Soviet society - a project of the reunification of Russia with world history and the democratic renewal of the country - is either misunderstood or is being consciously rejected. As are pluralism of opinion, the rule of law, fair elections of leaders, the inviolability of the human person, real competition in politics and economics and government accountability to the public.
--

Why perestroika's legacy continues to shape the post-Soviet world
Fyodor Lukyanov, Rossiyskaya Gazeta
The author is the editor in chief of Russia in Global Affairs and chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, a non-governmental think tank.

Fyodor Lukyanov argues that the development of Russia's current anti-Western position and foreign policy was inevitable given the response of the West to the collapse of the USSR in the wake of perestroika - but that pursuing an ideology based upon suspicion and mistrust combined with efforts to reshape the historical narrative is ultimately a false course.

Thirty years ago, in 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev was unanimously elected as the new General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. No one could imagine then what radical changes were ahead for the country in the near future.

Perestroika and "new political thinking" became a unique phenomenon. Disputes about perestroika will never lead to a final verdict on what it was and why - the consequences were on too large a scale and clearly unintended. Today, amid a bitter conflict between Moscow and the West over Ukraine, what was believed to be perestroika's most important achievement - the end of the Cold War and the exit from a systemic confrontation - now also raises serious doubts.

Gorbachev's principle of "New Thought" was so idealistic that most observers could not believe in its seriousness for long. One can discuss the degree of professionalism wielded by the country's leadership, the impact of the economic crisis, the combination of circumstances, but this does not negate the main point. The Kremlin really believed that - on the basis of universal values and the advanced demonstration of goodwill - it was possible not only to stop the confrontation and eliminate ideological oppression, but also to agree to build a different world - a fair and equal one.
 
Swings and roundabouts

The political pendulum swings, and the farther it goes in one direction, the quicker it goes back. The atmosphere of today's Russia is the opposite of the one that prevailed during the Soviet perestroika. Instead of idealism, there is exceptional realism, sometimes in its extreme manifestations. Disbelief in any tools and mechanisms, except for one's own strength. Not merely an absence of trust in the West, but also the refusal to recognize any motives for their actions except hostile and selfish ones.

There is no reason to be surprised. Perestroika did not end as its authors intended. Consequently, attempts to overcome the collapse of one state and build another became the content of the next period in Russia. The opponents of the Soviet Union won. It is pointless to be indignant at the fact that they tried to make the most out of it - who would have acted differently in their place?

Had the USSR won the Cold War, it would hardly have hesitated whether to accept the Netherlands or Portugal into the Warsaw Pact. But moreover, it would have been strange to expect that, after this experience, the Russian authorities would retain any illusions about the desire of the powerful to limit themselves by their own will. And to believe sweet speeches that a "zero sum game" no longer exists. I won't even talk about the lessons of "humanitarian interventions..." The fruits of all these events are that Russia today, perhaps, is more wary of the outside world than the Soviet Union before perestroika.
 
The dangers of a failure to reflect

The rollback from the idealistic interpretation of the world is explainable. It is worrying that the "hyperrealism" of betrayed hopes is generating schematization and extreme simplification. Dissatisfaction with the result of perestroika forces the national consciousness to see it and its consequences not as a stage in the country's development, determined by the laws of nature and logic of preceding events, but as some aberration, something almost alien.

It is human nature to idealize the past, especially when a person is not happy about the present and the future is still swathed in mist. Russian society lacks reflection, which has nothing to do with either the comforting gloss placed on the path already trodden, or the masochistic spitting on it. The groping for a new national identity is currently leading to attempts to adapt history - especially recent history - to the needs of "historical optimism," that is to avoid an objective understanding of its tragic or multidimensional, ambiguous pages.

Perestroika ended dramatically. But this drama is worthy to be evaluated not only its geopolitical or socio-economic way, but as a very important moment for this country - of a human impulse, a desire for renewal and purification. Whatever mistakes were made, however they were used by anybody in their own interests, the role of such episodes in the history is invaluable. Perestroika showed what an overabundance of idealism and faith in human nature leads to.

Now we seem to be approaching the realization of another truth - that it is also impossible to build something sustainable on pragmatism and mistrust alone.

First published in Russian in Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

[return to Contents] 

 
#9
Russians still wonder if perestroika was a curse or a blessing
By Lyudmila Alexandrova

MOSCOW, April 24. /TASS/. Thirty years after the Soviet leadership under Mikhail Gorbachev embarked on a policy of reforms that would go down in history under a name sounding very oddly to a foreign ear - perestroika - Russians are discussing those events of their country's recent history again. Many voice conflicting judgements, but an impartial look back on history produces the unequivocal conclusion: yes, mistakes and shortcomings were many, but without perestroika the world would have never been what it is today.

On April 23, 1985 the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party gathered for its historic full-scale meeting to set course towards what was described as fundamental reorganization and acceleration of the Soviet Union's economic development after a long period of what was condemned as stagnation. The new course, originally expected to overhaul and invigorate the Soviet system, ended in 1991 with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

"The gist of what happened then was simple: at the very top a decision was a made the people are free to express their thought in public and for that they will neither risk losing their life or go to jail or even go jobless," says the founder of the Yabloko party, Grigory Yavlinsky. "There emerged the freedom of speech. The feeling of fear vanished. Full stop. All other processes that followed were nothing but consequences. The previous political system was built on falsehoods. The advent of truth caused a lethal effect on that system, and it fell apart."

"Perestroika's worst problem was there was no strategic planning. The reform plan and its end goal were very unclear all along," Sergey Filatov, the former chief of staff of Russia's first president Boris Yeltsin told TASS. "Without a plan the policy was doomed to fail."

And still, Filatov said, perestroika caused a tremendous impact: it triggered reforms and showed the people that changes were possible even under the old system.

"Perestroika was an intricate process," says Aleksei Makarkin, the first deputy president of the Political Technologies Centre. "It was first a belated attempt to reform the economy, then the ensuing chaos, and ultimately an attempt to defuse popular anger with political reform. The process eventually broke bounds. It all ended with the collapse of the country. Gorbachev merely tried to make that process controllable more or less," Makarkin told TASS.

Gorbachev was forced to launch economic reforms, because the main engine that kept the Soviet economy going was the export of oil. When oil prices slumped, something had to be done right away," Makarkin recalled. "His predecessors had drawn up no strategic plans. Nobody dared touch the system. Later, when some steps began to be taken at last, it turned out that no one had the slightest idea of how to go about that business. Conflicting decisions followed in quick succession. First, an attempt was made to speed up economic development and diversify the economy at a time when oil prices plummeted. In 1987 the attempt failed. Other remedies began to be tried. Some traces of a free market economy began to develop, such as cooperatives in the services and public catering. Some components of a controlled market economy cropped up."

The rapprochement with the West under Gorbachev was started with a far-reaching aim, Makarkin believes. In that situation the Soviet economy was no longer capable of carrying the burden of the Cold War and the arms race. "Without that no rapprochement might have ever happened. Also, there was the war in Afghanistan that had to be curtailed."

"In general, the Gorbachev era in home and foreign policies was that of haste, inconsistency, belated decisions and forced moves. In the meantime, the people's living standards slumped and protest sentiment soared. Attempts to woo the general public reached nowhere. In 1987-1988 social discontent soared and Boris Yeltsin emerged as its embodiment."

"Hoping to ease tensions in society political reforms were declared only to cause centrifugal processes," Makarkin recalls. "As a result, the Soviet republics began to drift ever farther apart - some before the August 1991 coup, and others after. A counter-attempt to create something like a federation or confederation drew strong objections from the hard-line conservatives, which led to the country's utter collapse.

But perestroika should not be painted only in dark colours, Makarkin said.

"One should remember that Gorbachev gave the people freedom - first, economic, and then political. For instance, the freedom to travel out of the country and back: something everybody takes for granted. It was under Gorbachev that the Church regained full legitimacy. Lastly, the freedom of speech, which has long become a fact of life."

"Also, Gorbachev largely takes the credit for avoiding a large-scale civil war and chaos and total chaos in a vast country, however tragic the unrest in Tbilisi, Vilnius and Nagorno-Karabakh of those days may still look these days. He decided against the extreme scenario implying the use of force, which many interpreted as a sign of weakness. It should be remembered: those who dared use force merely accelerated the country's collapse."

The policy of perestroika proclaimed in the Soviet Union in 1985 has caused more harm than good, say 55% of Russians, as follows from a Levada poll held in March. In contrast to this, ten years ago 70% said perestroika was a bad choice.

 [return to Contents] 

 #10
Moscow Times
April 27, 2015
More Russians Believe Sanctions Will Result in Economic Crisis, Poll Shows
By Anna Dolgov

Six out of 10 Russians believe that Western sanctions against their country over the crisis in Ukraine could lead to financial upheavals, while the number of those who think a crisis can be avoided has shrunk to 31 percent from 55 percent a year earlier, according to a recent poll.

About 25 percent of Russians think that sanctions would "definitely" affect their country's financial system and cause a crisis, and another 36 percent think problems related to sanctions are "likely," according to a survey by the National Financial Research Agency, business daily Kommersant reported Monday.

The number of those who think Russia will weather the sanctions without going into a crisis has dropped to 31 percent from 55 percent in May 2014, the report said, adding that expectations of a crisis were the highest among the residents of Moscow, with 80 percent thinking that a crisis was likely.

"Last spring, citizens had no grounds to suppose that sanctions would affect the economy, but in the fall they saw that prices were changing and [foreign] currency exchange rates were climbing," the head of the agency's banking research department, Irina Lobanova, was quoted as saying.

At the moment, however, Russians are taking the economic downturn calmly since the devastating consequences they expected after the initial scare last fall did not materialize, Lobanova was quoted as saying.

No margin of error or sampling size were provided for the poll.

A separate poll by the independent Levada Center released earlier this month indicated that the number of Russians reporting serious problems with buying food for their families amid growing prices reached 20 percent in March, up from 6 percent last August.

The Levada Center poll was conducted among 1,600 people in 46 Russian regions and gave a margin of error of no more than 3.4 percentage points.

 [return to Contents] 

 #11
Moscow Times
April 27, 2015
Russia-Focused Funds Get Most Investment in 8 Months

Investment funds focused on Russia saw their largest weekly influx of cash since September last week, showing that international investors are now returning to Russia after last year's torrential capital outflows, the Kommersant newspaper reported Friday.

Funds concentrating on Russia gained $182 million in investment in the week ending April 22, more than three times the amount attracted the week before, Kommersant reported, citing data from Emerging Portfolio Fund Research (EPFR). Russia-focused funds have gained $362 million in investment since the start of the year.

Increased interest in Russia came even as investors shied away from funds focusing on other parts of the developing world. Emerging markets funds lost a total of $4.1 billion last week, or three times as much as the week prior. This is the biggest loss for emerging markets funds since mid-December, when their weekly outflow hit $6.8 billion, according to EPFR.

Russia-focused funds have becomes more appealing to investors thanks to the rising price of oil, Russia's top export, and the concurrent strengthening of the ruble, which has appreciated more than 30 percent to the U.S. dollar since the start of February. Russia's benchmark 2030 eurobond was outperforming the dollar bonds of all other developing economies as of April 17, news agency Bloomberg reported.

Russia's long-term economic prospects are still uncertain, with low oil prices and Western sanctions over the Ukraine crisis expected to shrink the economy by up to 5 percent this year.

 [return to Contents] 

#12
Moscow Times
April 27, 2015
Russian Cabbage Prices Triple as Much-Loved Staple Falls Victim to Inflation
By Howard Amos

The cost of a cabbage in Russia has almost tripled in less than six months.

The Russian staple - and a key ingredient in traditional dishes such as the famous shchi soup - leads the field among foods suffering from inflation because of huge ruble devaluation in 2014 and a Kremlin ban on food imports from the United States and European Union.

Cabbages now cost over 40 rubles (80 cents) a kilogram in most stores. Some stores have marked up the vegetable as much as 400 percent, according to analysts.

"The further from the harvest season the more expensive they become," said Irina Kozy, the head of industry news agency FruitNews. "This year the price is much higher."

Inflation, currently running at its highest rate in over a decade, has provoked some social discontent, undermining the rising living standards that have been a hallmark of President Vladimir Putin's 15-year rule.

Import Achilles Heel

Cabbages, along with other staples like beets and potatoes, are historically central to the diet of Slavic people. Some claim the importance of cabbages for Russians is reflected in etymology: the Russian word for cabbage, according to some sources, comes from the Latin word for "head."

Despite the importance of cabbage for the Russian diet, experts said that Russia only produces 75 percent of the cabbages it consumes. The market shifts to imports after New Year - mainly from the EU - when winter means domestic supplies fall. Cabbages can only be stored for about four months before they spoil.

The seasonal price rise this year has been exacerbated by early frosts that reduced domestic harvests in November and the Kremlin's ban of EU food imports in August - a retaliatory move against Western sanctions over the Ukraine crisis. Cabbage price inflation has also been sped up by the fall of the ruble, which has dropped over 30 percent against the U.S. dollar since the start of 2014.

402% in Six Months

Cabbage prices have increased 166 percent since early October, according to data from Russia's State Statistics Service.

In the same period last year the rise was 75 percent, and two years ago the rise was just 18.4 percent.

Wholesale cabbage prices rose 66 percent in the first three months of this year, according to figures from the Agriculture Ministry.

The cost hike is even bigger in some stores.

In budget supermarket chain Pyatyorochka cabbage prices rose 402 percent in the last six months, according to consumer price tracker website tsenomer.ru, while in mid-range chains Perekryostok and Sedmoi Kontinent prices climbed 260 percent and 319 percent, respectively, over the same period.

New Iron Curtain

The bulk of Russia's imported cabbages came from the EU, particularly Poland. Russia has in the past been the top consumer of EU cabbages overall - 74 percent of the EU's 2013 exports of white cabbage went to Russia, according to data compiled by the Bloomberg news agency.

With this link now formally severed by the food embargo, Russian retailers have been scrambling to find alternative suppliers, mainly in North Africa.

But some Russian cabbage market insiders told The Moscow Times that old supply chains from Ukraine and Poland were still intact, having simply been illegally rerouted via Belarus and the Russian-controlled Black Sea region of Crimea.

"All suggestions about a new Iron Curtain descending are nonsense, we receive the same goods, just through former Soviet countries," said Pavel Grudinin, head of the Lenin Collective Farm that operates in the Moscow region and produces 3,000 tons of cabbage annually.

"Ukraine exports cabbages through Crimea, but it is an expensive pleasure," he said.

Carrots and Onions

While cabbage prices have led the way, prices for other vegetables have also risen steeply. Potatoes and beets have been less hit because they keep for longer and domestic production is greater - but the cost of onions and carrots has been shooting up.

"Cabbage, carrots and onions are getting more expensive at the fastest pace," according to Tatyana Getman, the head of fruit and vegetable market consultancy firm APK-Inform.

Carrots have increased in price by 78 percent since the beginning of October and onions have jumped 85 percent, according to the State Statistics Service.

End in Sight?

Russian officials, as well as experts, predict that the inflation rate is likely to fall back in the coming months.

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev told a government meeting Friday that Russia had passed through the most severe inflationary period, although negative tendencies would remain, news agency RIA Novosti reported.

If the weather conditions are favorable and the harvest is good, domestic production will soon remove the pressure on food prices, according to Natalya Kolupayeva, an equity research analyst at Raiffeisenbank in Moscow.

"If the exchange rate remains stable, and doesn't weaken noticeably, it will be possible to say that the peak of price inflation for food has passed," she said in written comments.


 

 [return to Contents] 

 #13
Business New Europe
www.bne.eu
April 23, 2015
COMMENT: Reasons to be cheerful - and despondent - over Russia
It being Russia, there are several good arguments in favour of being optimistic and pessimistic over the economy.
Mark Adomanis in Philadelphia

Russia has been giving everyone fits recently. The speed of the collapse in the ruble in late 2014 caught many experts by surprise. Its almost equally rapid rebound through the first four months of 2015 did too.

Professional prognosticators have been admirably honest about the limits of their insight and about the positively enormous uncertainty currently hanging over Russia's economy: many will openly admit that they genuinely have no idea what's going to happen next and that "wait and see" is the only responsible option.

Some predictions call for a modest recession (around a 1-2% loss in output) followed by a swift return to growth. Business as usual, in other words. Other predictions expect an economic downturn that will be far more harrowing than the one which struck Russia in the aftermath of the global financial crisis: a devastated and devalued currency, a bond market in ruins and an up to 10% loss in overall output.

It being Russia there are several good arguments in favour of both of these schools of thought, which, for simplicity and clarity's sake, I will call the optimistic and pessimistic. It's worth presenting them in as fair and balanced a manner as possible, and allowing readers to subscribe to whichever theory they find more plausible.  

Reasons for pessimism

Foreign trade is getting clobbered

According to the latest data from Rosstat, which cover January-February, Russian exports fell by 25.4%. Imports fared even worse, declining by a whopping 38% year over year. Altogether Russia's total foreign trade turnover decreased by a full 30.1% in comparison to 2014.

To place that -30% performance in comparative context, in 2009, the year during which Russia was most significantly impacted by the global financial crisis, international trade experienced a 35% decrease.

The ruble crisis, then, has initially exerted a negative impact on Russia's foreign trade that was of roughly equal magnitude. That, in turn, would suggest that the ultimate impact on Russian output will also be of a roughly equal order of magnitude. Since Russia's GDP declined by 7.2% in 2009, the 2015 performance should be in the same ballpark.

This oil price collapse is supply driven (and therefore longer in duration)

While the oil price declines of late 2008 and 2009 were of almost exactly the same magnitude as those of 2014-15 (and, inflation-adjusted terms were probably even more severe) the reasons underlying the collapses in prices were very different.

2008-09 was about the sudden popping of a commodities bubble that, by virtually any reckoning, had grown wildly out of step with global fundamentals. Supply hadn't suddenly changed, there weren't any noticeable changes to the global oil supply, but as the bottom fell out of the global financial system there was a sudden shock to demand. As this shock dissipated, prices rebounded reasonably quickly: the price of Brent crude more than doubled over the course of 2009.

The 2014-15 situation is very different. Even as prices marched relentlessly downward production of US crude has continued to grow. The world oil market is currently awash in excess oil. According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), world oil inventories have been exploding, growing by 1mn barrels a day (b/d) throughout 2014 and with projected average growth of more than 1.7mn b/d through the first half of 2015.

The EIA doesn't expect consumption to match supply until early 2016, and only at that point will prices start to grow.

The government has less "dry powder"

At the end of September 2008, as oil prices began to crash and the economy began first to decelerate and then lapse into crisis, Russia's total foreign reserves amounted to $557bn, of which $542bn were highly liquid foreign currency. In nominal dollar terms Russia's economy at the time was roughly $1.66 trillion, so its reserves were about 33% of its total GDP. This sizable financial cushion enabled the Russian government to defend the ruble and to engage in substantial anti-crisis measures.

This time around, Russia has substantially less room for maneuver. At the end of September 2014 Russia's foreign reserves amounted to $454bn of which $409bn were foreign currency: they were thus both smaller in absolute terms and marginally less liquid. However the most important fact is that the reserves now amounted to only about 20% of Russia's $2.2 trillion economy.

This suggests that, unlike in 2008-09, the Russian government won't be able to throw as much money at the problem: it will have to be a bit more careful about picking and choosing which industries get assistance.

Reasons for optimism

The initial hit to industrial production has been quite modest

Through the first two months of the year (the latest for which data is currently available) Russia's industrial production was a mere 0.4% lower than it had been during the same period in 2014. A 0.4% decrease is, to be sure, still a decrease, but it was more muted than many analysts had predicted and much less severe than the decline which took place during the worst of the 2008-09 financial crisis.

When you also consider the unexpected growth that the economy experienced in the fourth quarter of 2014, it's not even clear that Russia has technically entered a recession yet. Yes, a recession is at this point inevitable, but it's been late in coming and modest in its early impact. It suggests that the overall decline to total output will be on the lower end of the spectrum, or somewhere between 2.5% and 3.5%.

Inflation might have already peaked (and interest are starting to come down)

Due in large part to the extraordinary sensitivity of Russians to inflation, the Russian central bank keeps a very close eye on prices. Fears over excessive inflation in the aftermath of the ruble's collapse were what inspired the central Bank of Russia (CBR) to hike interest rates so massively: regulators were more afraid of run-away price growth than they were the downturn that would inevitably result from having credit become so ruinously expensive.

Well it took a while for the rate hike to really "bite," but recent data indicate that year-over-year inflation has finally started to decrease: between April 7 and April 13, inflation fell by a modest 0.1% to 16.8%. The CBR, then, seems likely to continue its modest ratcheting-down of interest rates.

Inflation is obviously still high, as are interest rates, but for the first time in many months they are heading in the right direction. This won't magically propel the Russian economy into rapid growth, but it will have a positive impact on output in the second half of 2015.

The ruble has leveled off (for the moment)

The ruble's sudden collapse (driven in large part by declines in the world price of oil) was what really kick-started Russia's crisis. As the ruble weakened, foreign borrowing became more expensive, as did imports of foreign goods. The ruble's swoon also spiked inflation, and, as noted previously, forced the Central Bank to engage in a potentially output-crushing hike in the interest rate. Currency crises have a way of spinning out of control, and so long as the ruble was nose-diving it was hard to see how Russia's economy was going to stabilize.

Well the ruble pulled off a rate feat, moving from "worst to first" in the blink of an eye and clawing back many (but by no means all) of its earlier losses. Could the ruble resume its downward slide?  Yes it very well could. Forecasting the ruble has been a dangerous game lately, and given the persistent supply gut in oil another tumble in prices is far from impossible.

But the more dire economic forecasts all had the ruble substantially cheaper than its current level of RUB53 per dollar, a level that would spark further inflation and prevent the CBR from cutting rates. If the ruble holds roughly at its current level, there will be a modest boost to exports (as Russian goods become more cost-competitive) and the central bank will have sufficient flexibility to gradually cut interest rates down to their previous level. A return to normalcy, in other words.

To conclude

At the present time I would argue that the preponderance of evidence supports a relatively optimistic view. But over the past year the situation has changed at such a rapid pace that the only responsible course of action is to constantly incorporate new information.

 [return to Contents] 

 #14
Putin sees growth of wages outrunning labor productivity as one of causes of economic crisis

ST. PETERSBURG. April 27 (Interfax) - The causes of the crisis in the Russian economy are not only external, but also internal, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.

"As to overcoming the crisis in the Russian economy, we need to understand the causes to decide what to do [...] There are, of course, external causes, but they are primarily internal," Putin said at the Legislators' Council in St. Petersburg on Monday.

The president said the state justly tried to prevent and resolve social issues, specifically, wages, bearing in mind that they were traditionally rather low.

"However, it eventually caused certain imbalance in the economy, which consisted in that labor productivity grew slower than did the wages, and that always causes imbalances," Putin said.

The president said in practice that means that consumption is increased due to imports. "Imports are increasing and we eventually cover it with our reserves received from selling hydrocarbons. That's one of the causes [of the crisis]. As soon as the prices on hydrocarbons were halved, it led to some problems, primarily, the budget costs," Putin said.

 [return to Contents] 

#15
Forbes.com
April 25, 2015
Russia's Economy: Not Just Natural Resources
By Mark Adomanis
[Charts here http://www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2015/04/25/russias-economy-not-just-natural-resources/]

Russia's economy doesn't get a lot of love. It's "Nigeria with snow," "Burkina Faso with rockets," or, in John McCain's oft-repeated quip, "a gas station masquerading as a country."

To be sure, natural resources genuinely play a large role. It would be foolish (and inaccurate!) to try to totally discount the huge influence of companies like Gazprom, Rosneft, and several other state-run resource extractors. The Russian state's finances really are based on the heavy taxation of energy producers, and the Kremlin would be in a world of trouble if the oil/gas spigot ever truly ran dry.

But Russia, despite what you often hear, is more than just a gas station. It's manufacturing and service sectors aren't particularly competitive by world standards (very few people in North America are buying Russian cars) but they do exist.

Using World Bank data on natural resource rents, officially defined as "the difference between the value of commodity production at world prices and total costs of production," it's instructive to compare Russia's level to those in the members of OPEC, the prototypical petro states.

As is clear from the chart, natural resource rents are a non-negligible percentage of Russian output. But these rents are nowhere near as high as in many of the world's largest oil producers. Russian resource rents aren't even particularly large compared to other post-Soviet states: Azerbaijan (36%), Kazakhstan (29%), and Uzbekistan (20.1%) all had proportionally larger rents.

It's also interesting to compare Russia's actual GDP per capita with what it would have been if all natural resource rents were eliminated. Here, again, Russia just doesn't appear to be particularly exceptional when compared to OPEC members.

Indeed after adjusting for resource rents, Russia's GDP per capita would be roughly $19,000, a level that is broadly similar to post-communist countries like Bulgaria ($15,600), Poland ($22,800), and Romania ($18,000). Russia's adjusted GDP per capita also compares reasonably  well with adjusted per capita incomes in other resource-dependent post-Soviet states like Azerbaijan ($10,500) and Kazakhstan ($15,500) or major oil producers to which it is often compared like Libya ($12,000), Venezuela ($13,500), or Iran ($9,000).

So what is the takeaway? Is it that Russia's economy is some kind of budding hegemon? No. The important thing to remember is that, when you compare it to those of other post-Soviet states or OPEC members, Russia's economy is not uniquely primitive or resource dependent. We need to keep this in mind not to bolster Russians' tender feelings but because if you formulate policy based on the assumption that Russia is a "gas station masquerading as a country" that policy won't work very well because Russia is much more than just a gas station.

Indeed, as shown above, Russia minus all of its income from oil, gas, timber, and minerals is basically a much larger version of Romania. Romania, of course, isn't exactly an economic miracle, but it is a democratic member in good standing of the European Union and NATO.

 [return to Contents] 

 #16
Moscow Times
April 27, 2015
Ruble Is in Good Shape, Russian Economy Isn't
By Richard Connolly
Richard Connolly is an associate fellow at Chatham House's Russia and Eurasia program. This comment originally appeared on Chatham House's website.

Over the course of the winter a combination of rapidly falling oil prices, heightened geopolitical uncertainty and enormous private capital outflows contrived to create a palpable sense of panic in the Russian economy.

A rebound for the ruble has now given Russia some respite and contributed to a more optimistic economic outlook, but it has also diverted attention away from the need to address the growing list of serious problems that face the country. These have not disappeared, whatever the ruble says.

When the ruble plunged late last year and unemployment began to rise, the Russian government was forced to hastily cobble together an anti-crisis plan to restore economic confidence. Spring has now brought with it a renewed sense of calm. Since the end of January, oil prices stabilized, then rose slightly to their current levels.

The Minsk II agreement, while fragile and only partially observed, at least appears to be preventing the conflict in southeast Ukraine from escalating any further.

Capital outflows, which reached $77 billion in the final quarter of 2014, slowed down to $32 billion in the first quarter of 2015. Perhaps most notably, the ruble has reversed its downward trajectory to become one of the best-performing emerging market currencies in 2015.

Such is the apparent turnaround in fortunes for the Russian economy that President Vladimir Putin was emboldened to declare in his recent annual call-in program that the economic crisis had been averted, and that the "peak of Russia's problems" were now in the past.

Looking at Russia's economic performance in 2015, it is clear that on some indicators there is room for optimism. Brent crude oil prices are currently hovering at around the $55 per barrel level. While this isn't high by recent standards, the fact that the relentless decline in prices over the second half of 2014 has been arrested has at least given policymakers welcome respite.

The ruble, which started the year trading at over 70 to the U.S. dollar, is now trading at around 50. Economic activity in the final quarter of 2014 was also better than expected, with gross domestic product expanding by a modest 0.3 percent when most analysts had forecast a contraction.

While oil prices are largely influenced by factors outside the control of Russian policymakers, the appreciation of the ruble owes much to their intervention. By raising short-term interest rates to 17 percent in December (subsequently cut to 14 per cent), the Central Bank made Russian assets much more attractive to foreign investors.

The imposition of informal capital controls in December, which required large exporters to exchange foreign currency balances for rubles, also helped stem the outward flow of capital.

With external debt repayments slowing down after peaking at the end of 2014, and tax payments causing exporters to repatriate funds, it is clear that good policy mixed with seasonal factors and a little luck help explain why the ruble has performed much better than movements in the oil price would suggest.

Scratch the surface, however, and it is clear that on other economic indicators the picture is less benign. Prices continue to rise, with annualized inflation reaching nearly 17 percent in March. Industrial production, although boosted by the weak ruble, remains anemic. Investment, which as a proportion of GDP is already comparatively low, is falling rapidly, with a year-on-year decline of 5.3 percent registered in March.

Taken together, these indicators of activity in the real economy suggest that GDP, which unexpectedly grew at the end of 2014, may have fallen by around 2 percent in the first quarter alone. These data hardly augur well for a sustained and broad-based return to growth.

The rally, to the extent that there is one, is focused largely on the ruble. But the wider economy is performing badly. More worryingly, even this narrowly focused strong performance is precarious. Should oil prices begin to decline again, perhaps as Iranian oil increases global supply, or if fighting in Ukraine intensifies, confidence could evaporate just as quickly as it returned in recent months.

The gyrations of Russia's short-term economic performance also divert attention from the fact that Russia is afflicted by a severe and prolonged slowdown in the rate of growth. The system of political economy that has existed for the past decade and a half is no longer delivering an acceptable rate of economic growth.

Most senior policymakers acknowledge this. But thus far, the Kremlin has showed no appetite for undertaking the type of reform needed to fix the severe problems that are holding the Russian economy back.

Unfortunately, the policy response to the economic downturn and Western economic sanctions threatens to increase state control and make the economy more introverted. Rather than strengthening property rights, boosting competition and creating the conditions for accelerated private investment, the leadership is instead considering a wide-ranging import substitution plan to insulate Russia from the global economy.

It is also allocating scarce public funds to help inefficient but politically well-connected enterprises. While these policies satisfy powerful constituencies close to the Kremlin, they do nothing to address the acute structural challenges facing the Russian economy.

 [return to Contents] 

 #17
Wall Street Journal
April 27, 2015
Moscow's Once-Bustling Airports Decline as Russia's Isolation Deepens
Fewer Russians are venturing outside the country, while foreign tourist and business visitors are staying away
By LAURA MILLS

MOSCOW-Travel to and from Russia's once-thriving airports is declining as fewer locals venture outside the country and foreign tourist and business visitors dry up.

Moscow's three airports spent hundreds of millions of dollars on expansions in the past decade to keep up with airline demand for terminals and runways. But now, air traffic is declining as recession hits consumers and Russia's isolation deepens.

During previous downturns in the Russian economy, and even during the 1998 financial collapse, international airlines "cut back the size of their planes, but they always kept the flights," said Alexis Rodzianko, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia and a longtime resident. "This is much more drastic than anything I've ever seen them do before."

Delta Air Lines Inc., the only U.S. carrier to Russia, said last week that it would suspend its New York to Moscow service for the winter for the first time since the Cold War. Delta, which had already reduced its flights for spring and summer, said it was reducing capacity to international destinations where "demand has been negatively impacted by the decline in oil prices," though Moscow was the only destination where flights will be suspended altogether.

EasyJet PLC, which trumpeted its success in accessing the lucrative market in 2012, reduced flights starting Jan. 26 and will almost halve the number by the summer, citing a lack of demand. Qatar Airways and Etihad Airways slashed flights to Moscow in recent months. Air India Ltd. said it would reduce trips from Delhi to Moscow to two a week, and Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd. said it would end service to Moscow in June. Austrian Airlines, a unit of Deutsche Lufthansa AG, and CSA Czech Airlines have cut flights to regional destinations within Russia.

Some Russian airlines are benefiting from the competitive pullbacks: Aeroflot Russian Airlines OJSC, the largest carrier in the country, said passengers on its international routes were up 7.2% in the first three months of the year. The airline said the ruble's decline gives it a "partial competitive advantage" that could help turn Moscow into a more affordable travel hub.

But the new traffic isn't enough to spare Aeroflot from cuts: The airline said it had cut four routes in the first months of the year, adding only one. Transaero Airlines, another major Russian carrier, canceled orders last year for Boeing 787 jetliners in response to market developments.

Moscow's airports expanded at a breakneck pace over the past decade, adding gleaming new terminals and express trains to the city, meant to showcase Russia's new standing to international visitors.

Moscow's Domodedovo International Airport said it had 1,442 fewer flights to and from the hub in March than during the same month last year-a drop of about 7%. The total number of passengers declined by 10%. Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport said that the number of passengers traveling on international airlines had decreased by 5.1% in the first three months of 2015 compared with 2014, with a 0.9% drop in the total number of passengers. In total, Sheremetyevo increased the number of flights in March 2015 compared with last year by 0.2%.

The ruble has lost about 40% of its value against the dollar since last year, making travel abroad increasingly prohibitive to average Russians.

"Airlines understand that people simply can't travel. They're losing salaries, losing their jobs-of course this is the first thing they say 'no' to," said Irina Tyurina, a spokeswoman for the Russian Tourism Union.

"In 2008-2009, the last crisis, we saw a drop in trips [organized by tour operators] of about 25-30%, and we thought that was a catastrophe," said Ms. Tyurina. "In 2014, we have up to 80% drops in demand for certain trips abroad-about 60-70% on average. This is totally unprecedented."

Declining demand within Russia has been the biggest reason for the sluggish air travel market, but fewer foreigners are traveling to Russia as well. In St. Petersburg, hotels have gone empty: occupancy in both luxury and "average segment" hotels dropped 7% in 2014 from the previous year, according to JLL Consulting.

Business opportunities have also declined as major western companies pulled out many of their expat employees, Mr. Rodzianko says, and new businesses are arriving in smaller numbers.

"In the last couple of years, growth slowed in Russia and added to that you had the geopolitical situation in Ukraine and the decline in oil prices," said Mr. Rodzianko. "That has reduced the number of new businesses opening, which typically have a larger expat contingency."

 [return to Contents] 

 #18
Carnegie Moscow Center/Vedomosti
April 24, 2015
Closing the Book on Russian Liberals
By Andrei Kolesnikov
Kolesnikov is a senior associate and the chair of the Russian Domestic Politics and Political Institutions Program at the Carnegie Moscow Center.

Nearly three years after President Vladimir Putin's return to the country's top post, and a year after the annexation of Crimea , Russian authorities seem to have solved their liberal problem once and for all. Up until relatively recently, liberals were useful for a number of reasons: to imitate democracy and political process; to help let off steam; to retain, as strange as it may sound, some element of feedback.

But after the new low in relations with the West-unprecedented in probably the past 30 years-there is no need to imitate anything, including the existence of liberal parties, like Mikhail Prokhorov's Civic Platform, which was recently abandoned by its founder. There is no need to pretend that whistleblower Alexei Navalny can exist as a legitimate political player; it's enough to block his activity almost completely, besetting him for good measure with a criminal sentence. There is no need to be embarrassed about anything: On the contrary, the prosecution of the Bolotnaya demonstrators will always remind those who favor street protests what consequences could lie in store for them. And if the West has anything to say, the reply will come from Russian television-"senseless and merciless," to borrow a quote from Pushkin. With the ranks now closed so tightly around a single person, the techniques for letting off steam have changed too: Say, the commuter trains have stopped running; out comes the nation's leader with the words "Have you lost your minds?" and the trains start rolling again. Magic tricks at the request of the laboring masses. Superhero to the rescue.

If liberals are insignificant, why then is all the current propaganda built on anti-liberalism? Because where there's a siege mentality, there has to be an enemy attacking the fortress. And he's not just at the gates, but within the walls as well. In order to keep the ranks closed and to sustain the Stockholm syndrome of the fortress's defenders (who also happen to be its hostages) there must be constant discoveries of "a fifth column" and "national traitors." That's the only sense in which the authorities need liberals. Well, also, there are some liberals fulfilling the important function of cleaning up messes after difficult political and geopolitical decisions; those are the liberals in the federal ministries and agencies. That's exactly why the only "freedom of speech" allowed in the otherwise fully controlled media landscape is criticism of the Cabinet.

Naturally, this situation will change. One reason is the need, in the medium term (or maybe the long term), for a genuinely liberal economic policy, not just, in the words of one insider, "a redistribution of the money that [civic activist and former Finance Minister Alexei] Kudrin socked away for them" in the Reserve Fund. A second reason is Russia's inevitable pattern of alternating reforms and counter-reforms. This was equally inevitable 30 years ago when Mikhail Gorbachev came to power after the death of Konstantin Chernenko, when nobody-not the administrative core of the Communist Party's Central Committee, not the regional party heads, not ordinary Soviet citizens-would have been able to bear another gerontocrat at the helm. Any contest has its limits, though, whether it be an arms race, a competition to see who can bury the most general secretaries the fastest, or a throwdown of "patriotic" foolishness. In line with this historical logic, here's a hypothesis to consider: After Stalin died, Nikita Khrushchev emerged victorious from the internal battle for power among him, Georgy Malenkov and Lavrentiy Beria. With all due respect to Khrushchev's achievements, it's plausible that, had Malenkov come out on top, the kudos for de-Stalinization would have gone to him, and even Beria, had he been the winner, might have traded in his status as bloodthirsty executioner for a reformer's mantle. That's how the laws of history are: ironclad, not liberal.

This publication originally appeared in Russian in Vedomosti.

 [return to Contents] 

#19
Putin didn't see partners for dialogue among opposition campaigners in December 2011 - Kudrin

VLADIVOSTOK. April 26 (Interfax) - Vladimir Putin did not see partners for dialogue among opposition activists who organized rallies "For Fair Elections" in December 2011, said ex-finance minister and leader of the Civil Initiatives Committee Alexei Kudrin.

"I talked with him, at length. And I said that I would probably go to the rally on Sakharov Avenue. I won't speak about what he said to me. But, at least, there were no bans whatsoever," Kudrin said in a documentary, titled "President," released on the Russia 1 television channel.

The rally "For Fair Elections," organized on Sakharov Avenue on December 24 2011, was expected to be joined - for the first time - by people from the middle class who had never taken part in protests before, he said.

"I was trying to urge the leadership and Putin to find forms of a dialogue with people who cared for what was going around. But since all people mixed up very strongly with more radical structures and with nationalists, I later realized that Putin did not want to see and did not see representatives fit for dialogue there," Kudrin said.

 [return to Contents] 

 #20
The Unz Review
www.unz.com
April 25, 2015
Daily Reminder Why the Russian "Opposition" Has Single Digit Approval Ratings
By Anatoly Karlin

Apostrophes around "opposition" because even something like the Communist Party is far more deserving of the label than the gaggle of discredited 1990s-throwbacks who constitute the Western-approved challengers to Putin's rule in RPR-PARNAS.

But I digress.

Anyhow, latest news: Mikhail Kasyonov (known as Misha 2 Percent for the percentage he took as kickbacks on government contracts when he was Prime Minister in the early 2000s) and his sidekick Vladimir Kara-Murza (essentially a political blogger funded by Khodorkovsky) traveled to the US to lobby Congress putting Russian journalists - that is, "propagandists" - on a no entry list. Their crimes? They did not speak well of Boris Nemtsov, the famous but politically impotent anti-Putin politician who was brazenly assassinated a month ago in the center of Moscow. Apparently that makes them "complicit."

In a time when Russia is in a geopolitical standoff with the West, in a time when pro-Russian journalists are getting killed with impunity under the Western-backed "democratic" Ukrainian regime, in a time when the Western media itself is fighting a full-fledged propaganda war against Russia (coverage of Nemtsov's murder exceeded all of the recent pro-Russian journalist and politician murders in Ukraine by more than a hundredfold) and is purging all those who don't its line exactly, the leaders of Russia's premier pro-Western liberal opposition party believe their most pressing political task is to slightly inconvenience journalists they disagree with by handing over denunciations of them to the Washington Obkom.

And then they will with clockwork predictably whine and rage about falsifications when elections next come rolling by and they get their typical, well, 2 Percent.

I would hazard that in the short-term, nothing will come out of this. Their lobbying influence is limited, Congress doesn't work fast, and in any case, there might even be something of an aversion to sanctioning journalists amongst some US politicians because of how culturally central the First Amendment is. But in the longer term, and perhaps even more so the EU and non-US Anglo countries, things might start becoming bureaucratically... difficult for Russian journalists and pundits who prefer to shill for Eurasia instead of the Atlantic. Arguably, the Rubicon was already crossed more than a year ago when Dmitry Kiselyov, the controversial head of the Rossiya Segodnya media holding that runs Sputnik News amongst other projects, was banned from entering the EU. In the UK, there are several ongoing Ofcom investigations against RT for alleged bias in its Ukraine coverage. The day may dawn when, like Press TV, it is forced off the air.

Tit-for-tat retaliation is pointless. While they might harp on and gloat about it, the Russian "liberals" are right on one thing: Influential Western opinionmakers don't exactly keep bank accounts in Moscow-City, or go skiing in Sochi. But there are asymmetrical responses. China, and I believe Israel, have both figured this out. Foreign journalists are free to report in their countries, but as soon as their coverage veers too far in an unfriendly direction, their welcome becomes overstayed and visa problems appear. They are expelled and effectively barred in short order. This results in a sort of "natural selection" of more positive media coverage as the most egregious Sinophobes are sent packing, while the rest are incentivized to exercise greater caution and editorial restraint.

Russia doesn't do this, with the result that even before the Ukrainian conflict, all that rhetoric about Putin's dictatorship actually resulted in Americans and Europeans being on average less favorably disposed to it than they were to China - even though it goes without saying that China is far more authoritarian. Sure, this kind of control/harassment of Western journalists that China practices isn't exactly "fair." But then again, neither is barring entry to Russian journalists on account of their opinions, or subjecting Russian media organizations to selective regulatory hurdles. If things become worse rather than better in the months and years ahead - as I suspect they will - and screws in the West tighten, then Russia will have to think hard about securing its own information space.

And if in consequence the results are bad for some Western journalists in Russia, presumably the most egregiously Russophobic ones, then that is just... too bad? After all, by the logic of their own friends in the Russian liberal opposition, they themselves are critical "accomplices" to this sad state of affairs, and as such, should lie in the bed of their own making.

 [return to Contents] 

 
#21
Politkom.ru
April 20, 2015
Russian pundit examines changing nature of Putin's social contract with public
Tatyana Stanovaya, Hotline: Presidential agenda crisis

On 16 April Russian President Vladimir Putin held the latest "hotline", for which more than three million questions were received. The president spoke for a little over four hours: this year interest in the event was linked to the qualitative change in the situation in Russia and its position in the world. Crimea, the Ukrainian conflict, sanctions, anti-sanctions, the devaluation of the rouble, and the fall in the pace of economic growth, together with the fall in the level of the population's income and the increase in inflation -all of this gave particular socio-political significance to the conversation.

The current "hotline" was not the most successful: the president was "cold" (according to the description of Kommersant journalist Andrey Kolesnikov), did not want to go into the details of complicated issues, and ventured to make harsh statements about his traditional reference groups.

The "hotline", as Vladimir Putin admitted at the very end, is important amongst other things for studying the needs of Russian citizens and understanding the sentiments in society. This time there were a few peculiarities. Firstly, the number of submissions increased drastically -by almost a third. This is probably linked both to the variety of modes of communication and to the rise in concern relating to the current socio-economic issues in everyone's lives. According to preliminary data from Putin's Press Secretary Dmitriy Peskov, Russians have traditionally been most interested in issues of social security and protection (23 per cent), in second place were housing issues and municipal services (16 per cent). The increase in the number of submissions testifies to the fact that the population see the head of state as the only person capable of solving the problems -general confidence in the state and officials remains very low.

Secondly, contradictory as it may seem, according to FOM [the Opinion Poll Foundation] data, Russians' interest in "hotline" formats is waning. A total of 46 per cent of those polled stated that they did not want to ask the president a question either because of a negative attitude towards him or because they do not consider this effective. The contradiction between the increase in submissions and the reduction in interest can easily be eliminated and made logical: the number of those who are in dire need of help from the regime has increased, just as there are a considerable number who no longer believe in the regime's ability to solve their problems.

Thirdly, the emotional temperature has increased a lot: in addition to the social issues raised during the transmission from the regions, many people noted the content of the questions in the scrolling text: Russians demanded Putin's resignation, spoke about the regime turning into a totalitarian one, complained about intolerable living conditions, and were outraged about the spending on Crimea. At the same time "direct" communication was ousted by dialogue with journalists and experts as well: the population seemed to have lost the exclusive right to "speak" to the president within the framework of such events.

The president had also changed: his optimism in describing the current socio-economic situation provoked a lack of understanding several times, including from the presenter Kirill Kleymenov. "Not everything is as good as you describe it," was said several times and the dissonance between the sentiments of the people and Putin seemed huge. Comparing the "hotlines" this time and in December 2009, it can be said that the president is behaving quite differently in a similar situation: six years ago when the country was also going through a crisis (at that time there was also the Nevskiy Ekspress bombing) he placed the emphasis much more distinctly on the problems, difficulties and "bad news". At that time, the word "crisis" was mentioned 28 times during the programme, this time just 11, and of these five times by Putin, two of which concerned Ukraine.

The current "hotline" very clearly revealed the waning in Putin's interest for a whole series of topics: this concerns the economy, finance, corruption, the regime's effectiveness, social indicators, and the population's living standards. At the same time, he retains a lively interest in foreign policy matters (Crimea, Ukraine, relations with the West, and, first and foremost, America), the social sphere (the provision of medicines, raising the retirement age), the risks of carrying out unpopular reforms caused an emotional reaction (he was offended by Aleksey Kudrin's question about reforms, which Putin thinks may reduce confidence in the regime). Putin indicated several times that he did not want to go into details or discuss the intricacies of various matters, considering that this was not interesting either for himself or for the audience.

Putin's attitude towards the elite has also been adjusted noticeably: until now criticism of the government, ministers, governors, or "officials" has to some extent been part of any significant communications event, whether a "hotline" or large news conference. This was perhaps the first time that the president had supported the actions of both the government and the Central Bank so unequivocally and unconditionally, avoiding even moderate criticism (apart from just a cautious remark that the cabinet of ministers could have acted more rapidly). Thus, Dmitriy Medvedev's government has a good chance of remaining in power in the foreseeable future -and this also applies to Central Bank head Elvira Nabiullina. His comments regarding the abolition of the obligation for the heads of state companies to publish their income declarations can also be included in this category. Putin defended this decision by the government although he strongly advised top managers to voluntarily disclose the information (which does not at all mean that they have to follow this advice).

In this regard, it can be noted that the West's sanctions, and all the recent events, have actually assisted in rallying not only the elite around the president but also the solidarity of Putin himself with the elite: the process has proved to be mutual. However, this is also making a qualitative change to the nature of the relationship between the president and society.

Vladimir Putin reiterated his position that it was very important to him to keep the confidence of the people. However, the social contract has been significantly re-written over the past year. While in 2003, for example, social cohesion was based on a strong anti-oligarchic trend and all-round positive motivation (an increase in salaries, pensions, political stability, the growth in geopolitical ambitions etc), a much more abstract agenda that is also remote from everyday life is now being proposed to society: that is geopolitics and patriotism alongside a relative meagre set of social benefits. Even the subject of Crimea was touched upon more from a technical point of view: no debates about historical justice, there were no more big words, and instead of this -the solution of technical problems, first and foremost for Crimean businesses. Putin also commented very coldly on the subject of "Novorossiya" in exactly the same way: in response to a question from Ukrainian refugees about the prospects for disconnecting from Ukraine ("there is no possibility of co-existing"), the president replied that Kyiv would decide this. There is nothing more to offer the adherents of the "Novorossiya" project -and this term itself is no longer used by Putin. A very powerful dissonance is forming on the subject of Ukraine between the propagandist rhetoric of the Russian media and the calm rhetoric of the president. However, after the "hotline" in the television programme Vesti v subbotu (News on Saturday), Putin did not rule out recognizing the DNR [Donetsk People's Republic] and the LNR [Luhansk People's Republic], although in an extremely vague form: "I would rather not talk about this now. Because whatever I say, it may all be counter-productive. We will look at the realities that arise in life."

The new content of the contract between the regime and society implies some reduction in the significance of the social agenda, which does not, however, mean in the least that society will agree with such terms. With regard to the social agenda, trust will be retained by keeping the basic social promises -not allowing public sector wages and pensions to fall, not increasing the retirement age. In terms of the rest, "patience" is being suggested, and this importantly means a reduction in the offer, which was being formulated for society up to 2014. Such an approach cannot help but have political consequences, even if they are delayed.

As has already been stated above, from the point of view of content social problems were the most acute in the "hotline", at the same time as Putin reacted to them sluggishly and the people asking the questions themselves did not always meet with understanding. Thus, in response to a question about why Putin's instructions to bring back electric trains were not being carried out, the president supported Russian Railways and admitted that a partial cancellation of routes (although Putin did actually promise to help the town of Balashov where the call came from) was necessary. Nor was he able to answer a question about how people could live on a pension of R14,000 when compulsory motor insurance cost R10,000, shifting the responsibility onto the Central Bank. Targeted assistance was promised to those most affected by the increase in tariffs, which "should perhaps be thought about", Putin said - it did not sound very convincing.

Putin also argued with workers from the Vostochnyy cosmodrome, who have not received salaries for several months now although the construction project is considered no less important than Crimea. The president called this project just one construction project, and he considered it incorrect to compare it to Crimea. But during the course of the dialogue it also became clear that Putin was not informed about what was happening: he did not know whether workers had received all their salary arrears, it turned out that they had not. Moreover, he did not know why the money was not reaching them. "This year alone, provision has been made for 40bn. Again 40bn, another 40bn. And the most important point is that all this money has been transferred to the general contractor. Why it is not reaching the sub-contractors, those doing the work, why salaries are not being paid is a big question," Putin said. This is a revealing statement indicating that since the destruction of the institutions of the machinery of government, the "manual steering" system that replaced it is also becoming unfit for purpose. Dmitriy Rogozin's statement that followed the "hotline" about how those guilty of abuses at Vostochnyy should be shot may be evidence not so much of PR as of despair.

Thus society's trust, as Putin understands it, should develop against a backdrop of the implementation of the policy that the Kremlin is conducting, and this largely depends on policies in the sphere of international relations and security. This is what Konstantin Remchukov spoke about when he expressed concern about "the search for enemies" to rally society around the regime. Putin did not agree with this but immediately made a number of harsh anti-Western attacks, basically aimed at America. On the whole, the main signal that came clearly from the regime this time concerned only one thing: persistence in relation to maintaining the anti-sanctions. There were an unusually large number of farmers who thanked Putin for introducing the restrictions. This means that Moscow will be very unwilling to lift them and the decisions themselves will be taken irrespective of the sanctions policies of the West. In this situation two completely new logical ideas have already emerged: firstly, trading with individual EU countries (Greece, for example), and secondly, the policy of import replacement, which has gained its own powerful lobbyists in the regime.

At the same time, the fact that Putin virtually did not touch on the subject of conservative values, in contrast to the 2014 "hotline" when he spoke a lot about "the Russian character", the family, sacrifices etc, is conspicuous. Nor was the subject of "Tannhauser" mentioned or other examples of activities by the "conservatives". The president's agenda did not in any way intersect with the actual conservative agenda formulated by the conservatives over the past year or two. Nor was there the traditional harsh anti-liberal criticism. Rather the opposite, this time the liberals, albeit the system-based liberals, came out strongly in favour of the regime. However, Boris Nemtsov's murder to a large extent defined the current dialogue. Answering a question first from Irina Khakamada and then reacting to an extremely sharp comment by Aleksey Venediktov, Putin de facto acknowledged the Chechens arrested in the case to be the real culprits, which confirms that the Chechen theory is correct. At the same time he did not comment on Venediktov's remark about why the witnesses could not question Ruslan Geremeyev, suspected by the media of organizing the crime. Putin pointed out that he did not know of any clients or organizers which, admittedly, did not sound too convincing. On the whole, it was evident that he was emotional about the murder: it is no coincidence that he supported Venediktov who asked that the Bolshoy Moskvoretskiy Bridge should not be cleared of flowers.

The "hotline" showed an emerging crisis in the presidential agenda. It is impossible to "work on" Crimea and Ukraine for ever: firstly the big expenditure on the peninsula is causing irritation and, secondly, a complicated dialogue is underway with Kiev and the West about eastern Ukraine, which rules out any possibility of an emphasis being placed on the other consolidating project - "Novorossiya" - or in a wider context, the "Russian world". And this means that the patriotic enthusiasm in connection with Crimea may dissolve faster than expected. There are not the funds for populism in the social sphere and too many problems have accumulated. The most that Putin can promise is that things will not be substantially worse and the crisis will end over the medium-term.

The pressure on the elite (the "bad boyars") does not stack up either: after all, many of them have suffered from the sanctions and in conditions where there is a policy of containment cracks within the elite cannot be permitted. Finally, the wave of conservatism has reached such heights that using it to renew the legitimacy of the regime may prove to be a dangerous destabilizing factor. The situation with the political agenda is reminiscent of the crisis with the economic agenda: after the political will to complete the reform of the first half of the 2000s proved to be lacking it was simpler not to formulate any policy at all. However, if this is not that critical in the economy when oil prices are not too low (that is, there is an alternative source of resources), in the political sphere there is no such source. And if the Kremlin is not able to find a coherent agenda, then the social erosion of the president's support may begin.

 [return to Contents] 

 
#22
Christian Science Monitor
April 23, 2015
'Pro-Russia' Chechen leader threatens to kill Russian cops on his turf
Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov has turned the nominally Russian region into a legal black hole where Russian law doesn't apply. On Wednesday, he told his forces to shoot any Russian federal officer in the territory without his permission.
By Fred Weir, Correspondent  

MOSCOW - Ramzan Kadyrov, the strongman placed in control of Chechnya to maintain Moscow's rule after two bloody conflicts to quell separatism, has thrown down a gauntlet - and in doing so, hinted Russia may have really lost those wars after all.

In televised comments to Chechen law enforcement officers, Mr. Kadyrov said that any federal officers who appear on Chechen territory without permission should be shot.

"I am officially stating, if any [security officer], whether from Moscow or Stavropol, appears on your territory without your knowledge, shoot to kill. They have to take us into account," he said.

Kadyrov's order makes explicit a reality that has long been discussed on the margins in Moscow. Despite the strongman's nominally pro-Kremlin stance, effectively he rules a legal black hole in which neither the Russian Constitution nor federal law enforcement holds any sway.

"Chechnya is a territory where Kadyrov is absolute ruler and no one can do anything without his say so," says Nikolai Petrov, a professor at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow. "It's long been known that Chechens acting under the protection of Kadyrov are able to operate even in Moscow with complete immunity."

The incident that prompted Kadyrov's outburst this week remains murky. Federal agents from the adjacent Stavropol region, bolstered by a police unit from Moscow, reportedly shot and killed a Chechen suspect, Dzhambulat Dadayev, on Chechen soil Sunday.

Whether a coincidence or not, the victim had the same (albeit common) family name as the prime suspect in the February murder of liberal politician Boris Nemtsov, near Red Square. Zaur Dadayev, a former top officer of Kadyrov's local armed forces, is regarded as the trigger man by Russian police. He is still in a Moscow prison although his lawyers say the confession he allegedly made was "coerced" and he has withdrawn it.

The Kremlin fought two wars to force Chechnya to remain part of Russia, and finally withdrew its forces in 2009, declaring the republic pacified. Under Kadyrov, the war-ravaged region has been almost entirely rebuilt, mainly thanks to generous subsidies from Moscow.

Kadyrov is a colorful personality, who has been known to discipline subordinates with a few rounds in a boxing ring, and keeps the world abreast of his antics with daily updates to his Instagram account.

But Kadyrov has imposed an iron-fisted personal rule that often defies basic Russian law, such as allowing polygamy, forcing Chechen women to adhere to an "Islamic" dress code, and destroying the family homes of suspected terrorists.

And his security forces are allowed to operate almost unchallenged by the Kremlin - to the chagrin of many in Russia's own law-enforcement agencies. The opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta reported an incident two years ago in which an elite unit of the Federal Security Service actually went on strike to protest the decision of higher-ups to release a group of Kadyrov-linked Chechens they had tracked down and arrested - in Moscow - on charges of kidnapping and extortion.

But Kadyrov's threat to kill federal officers who show up in Chechnya to enforce Russian law might be too much for even an indulgent Kremlin to swallow.

"The federal police created a precedent, by killing a criminal suspect in Chechnya while attempting to arrest him," says Alexei Makarkin, deputy director of the independent Center for Political Technologies in Moscow.

"Now both sides are turning to [President Vladimir] Putin to resolve this. Federal security forces want Chechnya to be returned to being a normal subject of Russian law. Kadyrov wants to make it clear that he's been offended, and he wants Putin to restore things to their former state. So far, there is no word on what Putin will decide," he says.

 [return to Contents] 

 
#23
Russia Direct
www.russia-direct.org
April 24, 2015
The real reason why a resurgence of conservatism in Russia is dangerous
As Russia gears up to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Victory Day, the recent censoring of Hollywood movie "Child 44" and the debates over "Leviathan" indicate that cultural conservatism in Russia is on the upswing.
By Eugene Bai
Eugene Bai, expert in USA, Latin America and international relations, contributor to Politcom.ru, The New Times, World and Politics magazine.

Russia's cultural life has recently witnessed a series of events indicating that conservative forces are in the ascendency, resurrecting in the minds of many the times of censorship and assault on freedom of thought that prevailed in the Soviet Union.

On the eve of the 70th anniversary of the victory over fascism, which is marked on a grand scale across Russia, the Hollywood movie "Child 44," based on the best-selling novel by Britain's Tom Rob Smith, has suddenly been pulled from cinema schedules. And it happened in a very unusual way: The distributor itself recalled the picture from movie theaters the day before the premiere.

The withdrawal of the movie was widely discussed on the RuNet (the Russian-language Internet). The decision was explained by Russian Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky as follows: "The film presents a distortion of historical facts, an original interpretation of the events before, during and after the Great Patriotic War, and a ridiculous and unauthentic depiction of the character of Soviet citizens of that era."

"The screening of this kind of film on the eve of the 70th anniversary of Victory Day is unacceptable," was the verdict of the Russian Ministry of Culture, with which most Russian critics disagree.

"The film portrays hardly any events 'before' and 'after' the war," writes Yuri Gladilschikov in The New Times. "It does not desecrate the 70th anniversary of Victory Day. The action takes place in 1953, the last year of Stalin's life, and tells the story of serial killer Andrei Chikatilo. A major theme is the machinations inside the Ministry of State Security (MGB), set to be renamed the KGB."

In the opinion of this renowned Russian film critic, "Child 44" is a conceptual picture - not about Stalin's Soviet Union, but about contemporary Russia, where state security agencies have also begun to play a dominant role. Quite possibly, the film was banned because it touches a raw nerve.

The rise of conservatism in Russia

The pulling of "Child 44" would probably not have drawn such a wide response were it not part of a chain of events in Russia over the past six months or so, including the hounding of Andrei Zvyagintsev and his movie "Leviathan," which won a Golden Globe and half a dozen other prestigious international awards.

The film was ostracized for depicting the less salubrious side of Russian bureaucracy, and its hand-in-glove relationship with the Russian Orthodox Church, which in recent years has become the leading spiritual guide for Russian society, acting in unison with the Kremlin.

Shortly thereafter, a production of "Tannhauser" was pulled from the stage of the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theater and its director Boris Mezdrich sacked - also by decree of Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky. Mezdrich was punished for refusing to scrap the production, which offended religious sensibilities, and for not trying to resolve the conflict.

"Tannhauser" receives an ambiguous reception wherever it goes. In Israel, for instance, any music by its creator Richard Wagner is banned. An interpretation of "Tannhauser" with "raunchy" dancing was staged by London's Royal Opera House in 2010, which likewise provoked criticism from British operagoers. And a German production set in a concentration camp ruffled a few feathers in Dusseldorf.

However, unlike in those countries, not only was the Russian version banned, but the theater director fired - and not for the production itself, but for offending Orthodox Christians with "ungodliness." As rightly observed by liberal-minded deacon Andrei Kuraev, if one traces that logic to its conclusion, the Bible could be banned for promoting atheism.

Renowned journalist and writer Dmitry Bykov aptly notes, "Many believers probably would be offended by some sayings from the Bible; the trouble is that they never open the Bible."

Lastly, a production of a different kind also found itself under the censor's microscope. The Russian Investigative Committee initiated criminal proceedings in connection with a video performance by the dance school Credo in Orenburg. In the video, posted on social networks, 15-17 year-old-girls perform a relatively risqué version of today's "twerking" dance trend.

As the investigation explained, the actions of those responsible - the management of the school and the administration of the House of Culture, where the performance took place - showed "unacceptable negligence," as well as the actions of officials for allowing such routines to take place on the stage. The school itself was closed down.

Aside from the moral overtones, the narrative acquired political resonance. Some media discerned the colors of the Ribbon of St George in the girls' costumes, which, at a stretch of the imagination, could be regarded as mocking the symbol of the victory over fascism.

Culture under censorship

This chain of censorship and prohibited cultural works in Russia has prompted heated debates in which the conclusion drawn is that the country is again under the watchful gaze of the censor.

Are the times of Soviet censorship, when the state's unblinking eye kept vigil over the cultural scene, on their way back? What are the new boundaries of expression in the social, political and cultural space? And where are the boundaries of outrage and experiment that the public is willing to tolerate?
Those are the questions being asked by journalists, political scientists and cultural figures in Russia.

But the conservative wave sweeping over Russia poses a threat not only to the public, but also the authorities. Their actions are giving rise to protests among the liberal-minded section of society, especially in the larger cities. Novosibirsk, where "Tannhauser" was pulled, saw numerous rallies demanding the resignation of Culture Minister Medinsky for his sacking of Mezdrich.

But the complexity of the situation is not limited to protests. The regional elections in the fall of this year to the Legislative Assembly of Novosibirsk Oblast and the City Council of Novosibirsk could be among the most difficult campaigns this year for the ruling party, United Russia. According to forecasts, the party will find it hard to remain in control, primarily in the municipal parliament.

Of course, there is no direct connection between the "Tannhauser" scandal and the elections, but the open intervention of the federal authorities in the affairs of the region and the city has irked residents of Novosibirsk, who at the best of times have never been the country's most active supporters of United Russia, to put it mildly.

The double-edged sword of rising conservatism

But the widespread conservative ideology harbors another, perhaps even more serious threat to the Russian authorities.

"Before 2012 conservatism was a kind of political vehicle for the active pro-Putin minority, which went mainstream in 2012 as a reaction to the threat from the liberals (this threat was felt acutely during the presidential term of Dmitry Medvedev, who at times even took the liberty of criticizing Putin). The protests at the end of 2011 came as a shock. The return of Crimea proved a powerful impetus," says political scientist Tatiana Stanovaya, head of analytics at the Center for Political Technologies.

She points out that although in Russia there is no official state ideology, there is a reality in which professors are fired for taking an unpatriotic stance, arrested for contacts with foreigners and victimized for "wrong" interpretations of historical events; theater directors are dismissed for blasphemy; artistic productions of classical works are proscribed, and a politically incorrect tweet or blog post can result in search and seizure.
The institution of moral condemnation has appeared and taken on the force of law, substituting the legal regulation of social and economic relations. This institution is based on the fear of authority, whereupon state enforcement through law is replaced by voluntary submission, making loyalty virtually unlimited.

However, such evolvement of state ideology, according to Stanovaya, imperceptibly limits political leaders' scope for maneuvering and delineates the boundaries of rhetoric, which were once theirs to determine freely. Ideology becomes a self-sufficient, ungovernable, elemental factor.
This development trend can cause the personality factor to dissolve, and ultimately it will not matter to the system who sits at the top. The notional "Putin" will exist as a function. Who implements this function will be replaceable and vulnerable. Hence, Putin himself poses the gravest threat to his own political future and the future of the country, warns Stanovaya.

This danger is picked up on by other experts, too. According to political analyst Svetlana Samoilova, the Kremlin would like to see the conservative wave regulate itself in targeting the liberals without touching the loyalists.
.
"The appearance of a semi-official conservative ideology creates fertile soil for numerous uncontrollable offshoots that are often far more radical than the government itself. Such a grass-roots reaction from ultra-conservative activists violates the Kremlin's monopoly on decision-making, which in itself poses an administrative and political risk," she writes in the online publication Politcom.ru.

During this year's regional elections and the 2016 State Duma campaign, the Russian authorities may well come face to face with the genie they themselves have let out of the bottle. In the struggle against "discontented citizens," the federal authorities bared their teeth at the mass rallies in Moscow and other cities in the fall of 2011, yet they may not have the bite to counter the new danger on the horizon.

 [return to Contents] 

 #24
Business New Europe
www.bne.eu
April 27, 2015
COMMENT: Europe's historic lack of economic engagement with Russia
The alienation felt between the EU and Russia has seemingly deepened to a post-Soviet Union low. This may in large part be due to the fact that Europe has never fully engaged with Russia economically in the first place.
Ousmène Mandeng in London
[Table here http://www.bne.eu/content/story/comment-europes-historic-lack-economic-engagement-russia]

At the third "East Forum Berlin" held on April 22 in Berlin, there was high praise and lofty talk of the need to engage more with the East and Russia in particular. The mayor of Berlin, Michael Müller, chimed in calling for a common economic area from "Lisbon to Vladivostok", echoing similar calls from German Chancellor Angela Merkel. At the same time, sanctions against Russia were lamented but grudgingly accepted as a necessary measure to "guide the country back onto the path of virtue." The alienation felt between Western Europe or the European Union and Russia has seemingly deepened to a post-Soviet Union low. This may in large part be due to the fact that Europe has never fully engaged with Russia economically in the first place.

The 1951 European Coal and Steel Community Treaty, later forming the basis for the Treaty on European Union to establish the bloc, offered in its preamble that the government signatories are "resolved to substitute for age-old rivalries the merging of their essential interests; to create, by establishing an economic community, the basis for a broader and deeper community among peoples long divided by bloody conflicts". This essential belief that economic integration would lay the foundations and be necessary for peace was at the heart of Europe's drive for co-existence. While it was administered to many former Eastern Bloc countries, it was seemingly largely absent in Europe's dealing with a post-Soviet Russia.

Europe has not fully engaged economically with Russia. Or it did so at a scale that indicated some tepid rapprochement rather than a willingness to merge essential interests. The stock of total foreign direct investment (outward), as proxy for genuine economic interests, in Russia of Eurozone countries (excluding financial offshore centres Cyprus and Luxembourg), to represent the leading EU countries, amounted to $158bn at end-2013. This puts Russia on 13th place behind Sweden (Russia is the 8th largest economy in the world). It amounted to a mere $1,100 per head. Former Eastern Bloc EU member countries Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland obtained foreign direct investment from Eurozone countries of $8,237, $7,790 and $3,094 per head, respectively. Eurozone foreign direct investments in Russia represent 8% of Russia's 2013 GDP compared with 62% in Hungary, 44% in Czech Republic and 24% in Poland (see table below).

Many would argue that conditions had not been right to invest in Russia (the Eurozone represents 23% of Russia's foreign direct investment received). This may indeed have been the case. Politics though could have made all the difference and promote, possibly at a high cost, conditions to make investments sufficiently attractive. There may just not have been the vision, in particular during the early period after the collapse of the Soviet Union, that massive economic engagement would have helped broker peace in Europe over the long term. The same logic that brought together age-old enemies like Germany and France was not applied to Russia. Whatever the stated intent, the outcome indicates that Europe left Russia economically largely in the cold.

The lack of economic engagement may today haunt Europe in the quest for peace over Ukraine and more widely. Russia, while depending economically on Europe through gas exports, could now seek alternative buyers. This would reduce Russia's interest in Europe even more. Russia only put 19% of its foreign direct investment in the Eurozone (39% of Russia's total foreign direct investment went to Cyprus).

In the age of sanctions against Russia, the question should be asked: has Europe engaged Russia sufficiently to tie its interests to Europe such that conflict would be self-defeating? The answer seems to be no. Could further sanctions incentivise Russia to move further away from Europe? The answer is probably yes. The remedy then seems to be to engage Russia much more. Europe needs to ensure that there are sufficient strong mutual interests that would encourage Russia to align its foreign interests with Europe. While this may sound naïve to some, it seems fair to say that the existing strategy has led to the most disconcerting and precarious security situation in Europe since World War II. Russia needs to have an economic stake in Europe. Europe needs to give Russia a bear hug.

 [return to Contents] 

 
#25
Washington Post
April 23, 2015
What's behind the Gazprom crisis?
By Henry Farrell
Henry Farrell is associate professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University. He works on a variety of topics, including trust, the politics of the Internet and international and comparative political economy.
 
The European Union has opened an initial antitrust case against Gazprom, the Russian government-owned gas and energy giant. It is accusing Gazprom of abusing its market power to jack up prices and punish E.U. member states for noncompliance with its demands. As always with such cases, there is plenty of politics. The E.U. delayed bringing the case for more than a year, in part because it feared that it would further damage the relationship between Russia and the West. Rawi Abdelal, a political scientist at Harvard Business School, has written a lot about Gazprom, including this article (ungated earlier version here) for the Review of International Political Economy. The following presents some of the arguments that Abdelal makes, and tries to apply them to the current crisis.

Gazprom is not a simple arm of the Russian government

Much of the commentary about Gazprom in the last few years has been driven by the fear that Gazprom is making Europe more and more dependent on its gas supplies, and thus more and more beholden to the Russian state's foreign policy goals. Abdelal argues that this is mistaken. For sure, a majority of Gazprom is owned by the Russian government. However, the Russian government desperately needs the money that Gazprom makes in rich foreign markets to subsidize a cheap gas policy for Russia's domestic market and favored satellite states. The result is, in Abdelal's words, that Gazprom is "desperately dependent on [the] European market. Consequently, the state's interests directed Gazprom, or at least its exporting business unit, to act as an efficient, profit-maximizing firm." Abdelal reports that Gazprom revenues made up 8 percent  of Russia's GDP, and Gazprom taxes and dividends accounted for 12 to 13 percent  of the Russian federal budget.

This doesn't mean that Gazprom necessarily behaves nicely toward Western European countries that import its gas. What it means is that its behavior is the kind of behavior one would expect from monopolists - price discrimination between different customers and the like - rather than the building of political empire. It is Gazprom's claimed market abuses that the European Union is trying to put an end to.

Gazprom's exports to Europe are a source of vulnerability, not strength

One of the implications of Abdelal's argument is that Gazprom (and Russia) may depend more on exporting gas to Western Europe than Western Europe depends on importing gas from Gazprom. Wealthy European customers are subsidizing Gazprom's business model - and if Gazprom doesn't have those customers, it doesn't, at the moment, have many other places it can turn to. It wants to start exporting gas to China  but won't be able to do this the 2020s, and may not expect high profits either; the Chinese are hard bargainers. This may help explain why Russia's reaction has been less vociferous than many feared - Russia has indicated that while it does not recognize the authority of the European Commission to make findings, and views the effort to change contracts as unacceptable, it hopes for an amicable settlement of the dispute.

Gazprom has nonetheless succeeded in reshaping European energy politics

Abdelal documents how Gazprom's relationship with its European customer firms has been built up over decades. Energy markets are always political and always risky. New technologies and shifting geopolitics can have enormous consequences. Gazprom has tried to deal with this by creating very long-term relationships with German, French and Italian firms. These relationships have reshaped energy markets and European politics, especially as new pipelines have been constructed, leaving Poland and Eastern European countries fearful that they were being cut out of a deal that was being made by Germany and Russia.

This points, as Abdelal argues, to more subtle patterns of influence. German, French and Italian understandings of their national interest have been reshaped by the relationships between their big firms and Gazprom. These firms want to preserve a stable relationship with Gazprom, and see Gazprom's 2006 dispute with Ukraine as an unfortunate disruption rather than, as many U.S.  commenters would have it, an example of Russia trying to extend its hegemony. They have created a constituency within Europe that prizes stability and predictability in relations with the East.

The E.U. action is in part a reaction to these dynamics

Abdelal notes that the willingness of big firms in powerful member states to cut individual deals with Gazprom has challenged European Union officials, who would prefer Europe to speak with a single voice, and to have a genuinely common energy policy. It is hard to have such a policy when the big firms in major states have cut individual deals that they prefer to common action.

Given this background, I (and not necessarily Abdelal) would interpret the European Commission's action against Gazprom as, in part, an effort to grab authority away from firms and decisionmakers in the big member states. The European Union has far more powerful competences in competition (antitrust) policy than in energy. It is using these competences to try to remake Gazprom's relationship with Europe in ways that both (a) make it tougher for Gazprom to cut special deals with individual countries, and (b) strengthen the authority of European Union officials vis-a-vis the member states. The commission's action is plausibly aimed at creating a common energy policy through the back door. To understand the Gazprom action, you need to understand the internal dynamics of European politics

The likely outcome will substantially reshape European energy politics

This report by the influential European think tank Breugel gives some very useful background. It notes that the very long-term contracts which have anchored relationships between Gazprom and its European customers are under challenge. Long-term contracts look less attractive when other energy sources are becoming cheaper. E.U. demand for gas fell by 10 percent between 2013 and 2014. It isn't clear that long-term stability will be as high a priority as in the past, especially if the European Commission is questioning the legality of these arrangements.

Furthermore, the European Commission is questioning Gazprom's requirements that its customers not sell gas across borders. This allows Gazprom to price discriminate betweenE.U. countries. However, it seems on its face hard to reconcile with the objectives of the E.U.'s single market, which is supposed to get rid of arrangements that weaken cross-border competition.

The most interesting question, however, is how this challenges some of the long-term patterns identified in Abdelal's work. Abdelal shows that Gazprom and its customers have created a set of long-term relationships that have in turn shaped European energy politics and the ways in which key E.U. member states think about their national interests. If, as seems likely, these relationships are about to be disrupted, it's interesting to speculate about whether the politics will change too, as conceptions of national interest shift from the fostering of long-term relationships at the national level to some other schema, whether it be relationships at the European level (if there is a wholescale reworking of energy markets), more short-term, market-based relationships, or something else altogether.

 [return to Contents] 

 #26
Moscow Times
April 27, 2015
West Must Compromise on Victory Day
By Josh Cohen
Josh Cohen is a former USAID project officer involved in managing economic reform projects in the former Soviet Union. He contributes to a number of foreign policy-focused media outlets.

During my time spent working and living in the former Soviet Union, one of the things that always made a powerful impression on me were the memorials and events from the Great Patriotic War. When I lived in Almaty, Kazakhstan, I always made sure to be in Panfilov Park on Victory Day to see the old veterans, with their medals and uniforms, still brimming with pride in the role they had played in history.

The truth is, I've long believed that most Americans have never understood the scale of suffering the Russian people endured. In the United States, the primary focus of the war in Europe has always been the Normandy landings and the slow progress forward to the Elbe River. All told, about 400,000 American soldiers died in World War II, a horrible tragedy in and of itself - yet nevertheless one that pales beside the losses suffered by the Soviets.

The numbers are simply stunning. Twenty-seven million Soviet citizens lost their lives. Meanwhile, of the approximately 9 million German soldiers killed in World War II, about 80 percent died at the hands of the Red Army. It is truly no exaggeration to say that it was the Soviets who broke the back of the Nazi war machine.

It is, therefore, with more than a touch of sadness that I've observed one Western leader after another declining to come to Moscow on May 9 for the 70th anniversary of Victory Day.

Certainly, Western leaders do face a dilemma. On the one hand, no one with even the slightest sense of history could fail to acknowledge the brutality endured by the people of the Soviet Union during World War II. On the other hand though, it is politically untenable for Western leaders to be seen as endorsing the way in which President Vladimir Putin frequently uses the historical memory of the fight against Nazism to justify Russia's proxy war in eastern Ukraine.

Luckily, there are a number of compromises Western leaders could take to honor the sacrifice of the Russian people during World War II without necessarily appearing onstage with Putin as the tanks roll by.

One step would be to follow the lead of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. In a recent conversation with Putin, the always rational Merkel told the Russian president that while she would be skipping the Victory Day parade on May 9, she would appear with Putin in Moscow on May 10 to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Kremlin wall.

Germany will always possess a special historical responsibility to acknowledge the crimes of Nazism, and Merkel's choice is the right one. It would be nice to see other Western leaders do the same thing.

The other point that Western leaders should consider is that the historical memory of the Great Patriotic War is still deeply ingrained in the psyches of the Russian people. While the West may find Putin's authoritarianism distasteful, it should still be possible to honor the sacrifices of the Russian people while still avoiding the appearance of endorsing the Russian position on Ukraine.

One way to do this is to skip the parade, but go to memorials or museums that honor the suffering of the Russian people instead. For example, visiting the Museum of the Great Patriotic War in Moscow would be a low-key but symbolic way to acknowledge what the residents of that city endured. The Russian people have long memories, and the West should acknowledge what their ancestors endured.

 [return to Contents] 

 #27
www.rt.com
April 24, 2015
Obama's absence from V-Day parade won't bother Russian public - poll

Russians view the upcoming Victory Day as an internal national holiday and won't be particularly bothered if it isn't attended by Western leaders such as US President Obama, says the latest research by the VTSIOM public opinion center.

The respondents said that, in their opinion, the authorities organize the May 9 parade first and foremost for veterans, secondly for the younger generation and the rest of the Russian people, and only to a lesser extent for the benefit of high-placed foreign guests.

Some 58 percent of respondents said they knew that some state leaders had officially refused to attend the May 9 parade in Moscow. Forty percent claimed they weren't aware of the snub. Of those knew about the situation, 52 percent said that it was unimportant, as opposed to 42 percent who thought that such a move by foreign leaders could be significant.

Most Russian citizens share the opinion that the main objective of the Victory Day parade is to preserve historical memory and traditions, not to demonstrate military might.

The results of the poll confirm that the Soviet Union's victory in WWII remains not only a key event in both Russian and world history, but also a "cornerstone of modern identity of the Russian Federation as a nation," Valery Fyodorov, the head of the VTSIOM polling center, said in press comments.

"The narrative describing a sharp increase in militaristic sentiments in Russia and asserting that we want to demonstrate our military might to the rest of the world finds absolutely no validation in our research," he added. "We have not recorded any surge in militarism. Any talk about this is simply wishful thinking."

Among foreign leaders who have refused to attend the May 9 celebrations are Obama, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister David Cameron, among others. Leaders from about two dozen other nations have accepted the invitation, however, and will be present at the celebrations.

 [return to Contents] 

 
#28
Russia Direct
www.russia-direct.org
April 24, 2015
70 years after link-up at Elbe River, Russia and US should start dialogue
Participants in a conference organized by the Carnegie Moscow Center to mark the historic link-up between Soviet and American soldiers at the Elbe River on April 25, 1945 have used the occasion to call for greater cooperation between Moscow and Washington.
By Pavel Koshkin

A group picture depicting soldiers, lining up in a row, posing before the camera and embracing each other, appeared on the screen in a conference hall: Those in the helmets were the Americans, while the men in field caps were the Soviets. The place where they came together on April 25, 1945, is called Torgau, and sits on the Elbe River in Germany.

While presenting this picture, Director of Carnegie Moscow Center Dmitry Trenin highlighted that the 70th anniversary of the historic meeting between Soviet and American allies in the war against Nazi Germany is a very important event in the context of the current U.S.-Russia confrontation over Ukraine, which some pundits are describing as "a new Cold War."

He was speaking at a conference organized by the Carnegie Moscow Center on the eve of the 70th anniversary of the Elbe River meeting to discuss the experience of Soviet-U.S. alliance during World War II, as well as the issues surrounding cooperation between Washington and Moscow since the end of the Cold War.

"Today's meeting is very important and, maybe more important than earlier, because the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Great Victory is taking place," he said during the April 23 conference, which brought together Russian and American high-profile officials, experts, retired militaries and diplomats such as U.S. Ambassador to Moscow John Tefft, former U.S. Ambassador and Director of U.S.-Russia Foundation John Beyrle.

"This is also very important because we are seeing a severe crisis between the U.S. and Russia, which has already thrown back our relations to the level of national and rhetorical hostility that was common in the Cold War," Trenin added.

He pointed out that the current U.S.-Russia confrontation might be "even more dangerous" than that of the Cold War period because of the increasing unpredictability of both sides' intentions, as well as the prevailing opinions in some expert circles that Moscow and Washington "are doomed" to be at loggerheads, which "is alarming."

Current relations cause for alarm

Likewise, other speakers are alarmed by the current situation. Russian federal politician and former Human Rights Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin, who took the floor at the conference, expressed the same regrets, but focused more on "the positive spirit" of the link-up between Soviet and American soldiers.

According to him, such events are emotionally encouraging in their nature, they "have a sort of positive and emotional effect on our souls," which can help to maintain a positive spirit even in the most difficult times, when there is a lack of understanding between countries.

"Somehow, this helps us to preserve a positive and emotional spirit, which allows us, if not to resolve problems, but to postpone them in the hope of resolving them in the future," he said.

Another venerable speaker at the conference, U.S. Ambassador Tefft, echoes Lukin's view. "The spirit of Torgau is a reminder for all of us of mutual hopes in the midst of grim realities," he said, remembering how the Soviet and American soldiers shared souvenir dollars and rubles, "smoked cigarettes together and toasted one another with liberated beer."

With tensions high between the White House and the Kremlin on a number of issues, "it is really valuable to discuss the legacy of Torgau," because it has "tremendous lasting and symbolic importance," he said. Regardless of the different political and economic systems of the U.S. and the Soviet Union, "we were still able to collaborate in those years to achieve a greater good, to defeat Nazi Germany," Tefft added.

A shining example

Former U.S. Ambassador John Beyrle, whose father Joseph Beyrle fought together with the Red Army against Hitler, agrees. He describes the joint efforts in the war against Hitler as a "great collaboration" that endured all the tests and challenges of that time, when the Allies had to find common ground despite mutual tensions.

The story of Beyrle's father offers encouragement for U.S.-Russia bilateral relations. After being captured by German forces and spending about six months in Nazi prison camps, he fled three times from captivity, finally finding shelter in a Soviet tank army. The story of this American soldier with a Soviet gun in a U.S.-produced Sherman tank, who had joined the Red Army to fight against the common enemy, remains today a powerful symbol of bilateral cooperation.

"Thank you to those Soviet warriors, men and women, who hosted my father when he was defenseless, who fed him when he was hungry, who treated him when he was seriously wounded and helped him reach the U.S. Embassy and return to his home country safe and sound," said Beyrle in excellent Russian.

In particular, he emphasized that few in the U.S. are aware about the exact number of victims among Soviets and Americans during World War II. Likewise, many in Russia underestimate or are even unaware of the 1941-1945 Lend-Lease program, under which the U.S. provided the UK and the Soviet Union with food, oil, provision, vehicles and materials to help them in the fight against Nazi Germany.

The threat of ignorance

Speaking at the conference, Beyrle expressed his regret of "how weakly and badly people understand the [importance] of this collaboration."

Trenin also admits the fact that "the mutual ignorance about each other is huge. Suspicion against a background of ignorance can lead to a catastrophe," he said.

Likewise, Alexei Arbatov, a scholar in residence of the Carnegie Moscow Center's Nonproliferation Program, highlighted that the contribution of the Allies and, particularly, the opening of a second front in Western Europe during World War II was "a crucial relief" for the Red Army, which saved millions of lives.

In the same way, Arbatov's colleague Vladimir Dvorkin from Carnegie Mosow Center's Nonproliferation Program pointed out that without the American trucks sent to the Soviet Union under the Lend-Lease agreement, it is unclear how the war would have ended up for the Allies and the Red Army, in particular.
 
When asked by a moderator about those skeptics who see the participation of the U.S. in the war as an attempt to contain the Soviet Union in Europe and relegate such a contribution as something insignificant or mercantile, Arbatov described such commentaries as "the re-writing of history," as the sign of "either ignorance, meanness or cynicism." Meanwhile, Beyrle said that this gloomy trend is the result of a lack of information.

The lessons from World War II

At the same time, Arbatov, his Russian and American counterparts focused more on the lessons Russia and the U.S. should take from the experience of World War II.  

The first lesson is that Russia and the U.S. should not sow mischief by using third parties as a proxy against each other, as is currently taking place in Ukraine and the Middle East, where Islamic radicalism and terrorism also poses such a threat.

After all, as Lukin said earlier, U.S.-Russia differences have been always based on the involvement of third forces, which have been a sort of game changer in Moscow-Washington relations, as in the case of Ukraine.

"But, on the other hand, we have many concurring schemes and interests," Lukin added, calling for a more reasonable and rational approach.

A second lesson is the detrimental effect of ideology, which brought the world to the brink of catastrophe. Lukin pointed out that both Moscow and Washington are responsible for the failure to create a safer world after World War II and the Cold War, a failure that resulted from an "outdated ideology," obsolete geopolitical models, perennial mutual finger-pointing and an inability to be more flexible.

"It is easier for us [Russia and the U.S.] to cast around fervently for arguments [accusing each other] than to try to find new approaches to resolve the current problems," he said, pointing out that previous attempts to reset U.S.-Russia relations had failed whenever undertaken. "If we look around a bit, count until 10 and think that if we can shy away from the old patterns of the zero-sum game and figure out what is to be done in the 21st century, any problems, including the European and Ukrainian crisis, can be resolved."

Another vital lesson is of the necessity to develop an ability to overcome differences no matter how difficult and challenging it may be. One of the examples of such collaboration was the post-war "partnership" between the Soviet Union and the United States, despite differences in ideology and interest.

"During the Cold War, Moscow and Washington were able to avoid direct conflict during a half century of geopolitical tension," said Tefft.

It is also vital to be aware of the danger of pegging foreign policy to the domestic policy agenda. As Lukin stressed, "the strongest impulse" for resolving the problem of U.S.-Russia confrontation should come from domestic policy, which according to him should not be allowed to become "a hostage" to the decline in U.S.-Russia relations.

A final, but key lesson is that personal chemistry between two leaders should not define and shape a country's foreign policy. There was no love lost between Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, but their mutual dislike didn't prevent them from close cooperation against Hitler, Arbatov pointed out.

Likewise, the relations between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his American counterpart Barack Obama should not be a factor that affects the relations between countries, but in reality, as numerous experts point out, this is not the case. Kevin Ryan, director of defense and intelligence projects at Harvard's Belfer Center, who also took the floor at the conference, admitted that there is there is a lack of trust between the two countries on an official level.

But he and his Russian peer Dvorkin, try to see a silver lining in the cloud: Despite there are less contacts between Russian and American authorities, there are trust and transparency on personal level among experts, academics and ordinary people. And such a kind of trust existed between the Soviet and American soldiers who 70 years ago became brothers-in-arms during their symbolic meeting at the Elbe River.     

"We have a good tradition," concluded Trenin. "When we feel bad, we remember history. And now it is useful to call for the spirit of Torgau, at least for the sake of dialogue."

 [return to Contents] 

 #29
Poll: ISIS more dangerous to U.S. than Iran, Russia
 
WASHINGTON, April 22 (Xinhua) -- The American people see ISIS ( Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) as a bigger threat to the U.S. than Iran, Russia or other countries, a new CNN/ORC poll showed Wednesday.

The poll showed that 68 percent interviewees think ISIS is a very serious threat, compared with just 39 percent who think so about Iran, 32 percent about North Korea, 25 percent about Russia. Nearly 9 in 10 see ISIS as at least a moderately serious threat.

The majorities across political and ideological lines say ISIS is a deeply serious threat to the U.S., including 68 percent of Democrats, 79 percent of Republican and 63 percent of independents.

Last Sunday, six Somali-Americans from the state of Minnesota have been arrested by U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation for trying to join ISIS, raising concerns that the threat posed by the group is growing and the military battle against ISIS could spread.

In a CNN/ORC March poll, the public remained mostly confident that the U.S. effort to combat ISIS would succeed, it also showed 79 percent of Americans were worried that the conflict would develop into a larger war that would spread throughout the region to other parts of the world.

 [return to Contents] 

 #30
What prevents Russia, US from fighting against Islamic State together?
By Lyudmila Alexandrova

MOSCOW, April 23. /TASS/. Russia's arch foe these days is the Islamic State. Washington claims that the worst threat to world peace is what it invariably refers to as Russia's 'aggression' in Europe and operations by terrorists in Syria and the United States itself. Both countries have had and still have different priorities all along, Russian experts say. As for the struggle against radical Islamism, the United States' attitude has always been rather dubious.

Russia's main enemy today is the Islamic State, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview broadcast live on three major radio stations on Wednesday. "We have suggested including the Islamic State in the UN Security Council's list of terrorist organizations. The Americans have refused to do so. They said that it is not a separate organization but the very same Al-Qaeda," Lavrov said, adding that Al-Qaeda was a brainchild of the United States.

As he addressed the 69TH UN General Assembly session on September 24, 2014, US President Barack Obama said the worst threats to peace were the Ebola virus disease, Russia's 'aggression' in Europe and terrorists in Syria and Iraq.

"The Americans wish to be global leaders, and this explains everything they have been doing," the president of the Centre for Current Politics, Sergey Mikheyev, has told TASS. "Everybody else is regarded by them as a competitor. They just don't feel they need any cooperation with others. Russia's attitude is fundamentally different: it does not want to influence the rest of the world. It just safeguards its interest. Russia would like to have an equitable, partnership-like dialogue, while the US tends to see us as potential vassals."

As far as the Islamic State is concerned, Mikheyev feels very strong doubts the United States really wants to struggle against it in earnest. "There have been suspicions that the United States played a role in its emergence and even supports it in sense. Had it really wished to do something about it, the US would have long done so."

A lecturer at the Russian presidential academy RANEPA, Kira Sazonova, points to another obvious spiral of geopolitical, strategic and military confrontation between Russia and the United States. "It is quite indicative that neither the departure from the socialist ideology in the 1990s, nor the resetting of relations in the 2000s have lifted the fundamental contradictions between the ways the two countries see the modern world order."

The gist of their controversies is clear, Sazonova says.

"Russia proceeds from the supremacy of international law and the principle of the non-use of force in international relations, while the United States firstly presses for world domination and the elimination of all those who may dare disagree with this strategy, and secondly, argues that its national interests and laws enjoy priority over the existing international law," she believes.

Sazonova recalls that the Islamic factor has traditionally evoked a great deal of controversy in world politics. The United States' role in the Middle East is quite ambiguous.

"On the one hand, it is the United States that keeps drawing the greatest attention to that region in the context of struggle with international terrorism, in particular, in the wake of 9/11. On the other, the United States played a major role in creating Al-Qaeda and in financing radical groups in Libya, Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan, which would eventually form the backbone of the Islamic State. That's an open secret. It is this duplicity of Washington's policies that impairs constructive cooperation in resistance to the IS," she said.

 [return to Contents] 

 #31
C2C Journal (Canada)
http://c2cjournal.ca
Aoril 16, 2015
The West's new 'Cold War' is with Dostoevsky's Russia, not Stalin's
By Paul Robinson
Paul Robinson is a professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. He is the author of numerous books and articles on Russian history, military history, military ethics, and international security, and he blogs at www.irrussianality.wordpress.com.

"All great nations," wrote Fyodor Dostoevsky in an 1873 letter to the future Emperor Alexander III, "have manifested themselves and their great powers...and have brought something, if only a single ray of light, into the world, precisely because they have remained themselves, proudly and undauntedly, always and presumptuously independent."

The West firmly disagrees. Despite their stated commitment to multiculturalism, most Western states in fact believe that the whole world should be like them - secular, democratic, and capitalist. Consequently, they tend to interpret any attempt by Russia to be "presumptuously independent" as an aggressive act. As Russian foreign policy has become more assertive in the past decade, the result has been a crescendo of accusations that Russia has started a "new Cold War".

Former U.S. National Security Agency spook John Schindler claims that Russia is aggressively promoting its agenda through "Orthodox jihad", which "bears more than a little resemblance to Holy War in a Russian and Orthodox variant." Schindler writes that Vladimir Putin, "has created and nurtured a virulent ideology, an explosive amalgam of xenophobia, Chekism and militant Orthodoxy which justifies the Kremlin's actions and explains why the West must be opposed at all costs."

New York Times columnist David Brooks agrees. Noting that in January 2014 the Kremlin distributed books by three late 19th/early 20th century Russian philosophers - Vladimir Solovyov, Nikolai Berdyaev, and Ivan Ilyin - to regional governors, Brooks argues that Russian foreign policy rests upon "a highly charged and assertive messianic ideology."

In Soviet times this was true, but not today. Marxist universalism is probably best seen as a product of the ideology's Western origins. In this sense it was something of an aberration in Russian history. Under Putin, Russia has turned back towards its native roots. It is true that Putin has become more conservative over the past decade, and his religious faith appears genuine. Nevertheless, the depiction of his ideology as aggressive and messianic is wide of the mark.

Dostoevsky's call for independence came not out of a desire for power, but rather out of the conviction that it was the only way in which a nation could bring anything of value into the world, "if only a single ray of light". The great novelist inherited much of the intellectual baggage of nineteenth century Slavophilism, which derived from German Romanticism, and took from Romanticism the idea that national diversity was desirable. Nations contributed to the universal good not by blindly copying others (in Russia's case by copying the West), but by nurturing what was unique and best about their own culture. National independence was seen as advantageous for the common international good.

Contemporary Russian nationalism shares this viewpoint. Given the multi-ethnic makeup of the Russian Federation, it is, as Nicolai Petro of the University of Rhode Island says, "polycultural". "Polyculturalism and polyethnicity are in our consciousness, our spirit, our historical DNA," Putin declared in 2013, castigating the West because its monolithic worldview led to "a rejection...of the natural diversity of the world granted by God."

Even the more extreme contemporary Russian nationalists, such as the philosopher Aleksandr Dugin, share this belief in the value of diversity. Thus, while Dugin insists that Russia must isolate itself from Western decadence, he does not call for Russia to impose its own way of life on the West. Indeed, his position is quite the opposite - that different cultures should not impose themselves upon each other. Dugin theorizes that the conflicts of the future will be between Atlanticists and Eurasianists; the former will seek to spread the Western way of life, while the latter will defend the right of nations to live their lives, each in their own way.

As for the philosophers mentioned by Brooks, neither Solovyov nor Berdyaev were militant nationalists. Solovyov, for instance, remarked in his book The Justification of the Good, that "We must love all nations as we love our own. ...Nations live and act not for their own sake...but for the sake of what can be of service to all." And as the author Gordon Hahn has noted, "Berdyaev explicitly rejected the political, imperial project of Moscow as the 'third Rome' isolated from Western culture and ideals, asserting that this 'imperial temptation' led Russia 'into a spiritual pit'."

Ilyin (who is reputedly Putin's favourite philosopher) could, by contrast, rightly be declared a nationalist, but even he toed the Slavophile line in maintaining forcefully that each nation should follow its own path. In Ilyin's eyes, Western models did not suit Russia, but equally Russian models did not suit the West. The fact that the Kremlin is recommending books by these authors hardly proves that it is driven by "a highly charged and messianic ideology".

Western ideology has always had universalistic tendencies, from the era of the medieval crusades onwards. It shares these tendencies with Islam, but less so with Orthodoxy, which has rarely shown any proselytizing zeal or given holy sanction to anything other than defensive war. Although some Byzantine rulers did attempt to harness religion to support their wars, their efforts were sporadic and generally met resistance from the Church authorities.

Schindler cites Putin's admiration of Ilyin as evidence for his thesis that Russia is engaged in "Orthodox jihad". Far from supporting holy war, Ilyin in fact wrote that "all my research proves that the sword is not 'holy' and not 'just'." This position is in line with Orthodox theology, which generally maintains that while war is sometimes necessary, it should never be seen as a positive good but only as the lesser of two evils. As Father Stanley Harakas, one of the leading experts on the subject, comments, "The Eastern Orthodox Patristic tradition rarely praised war and, to my knowledge, never called it 'just' or a moral good." Schindler's soundbite, "Orthodox jihad", is an oxymoron.

Some American conservatives actually view Putin's ideological stance with favour. Most notably, Patrick Buchanan has expressed admiration for the fact that Putin is "planting Russia's flag firmly on the side of traditional Christianity." But those who hope that Russia will lead an international conservative Christian revival are as mistaken as those who fear the same thing. Post-communist Russia is not seeking to export an alternative universal ideology to challenge that of the West; it is defending its own right to be "presumptuously independent."

Dostoevsky wrote that, "We contain in ourselves, as Russians, the capacity of bringing a new light to the world, on condition of our development being distinctive." Much of the conflict between Russia and the West springs from the incompatibility between liberalism's universalistic claims and Russian nationalism's assertion of a right to separate development.

 [return to Contents] 

 #32
Sputnik
April 25, 2015
Myth Busters: No, Russians Don't Want to Be Americans in Furry Hats

American author Natylie Baldwin has debunked the three most common myths about Russia, pointing to the country's strong philosophical and cultural tradition and its rich and complex history.

The first myth, highlighted by the author, states that "immigrants don't go to Russia and Russians can't wait to leave." However, this misconception falls apart under careful scrutiny: currently Russia is considered second only to the US in immigration, the author stressed.

"Further challenging the typical western narrative that Russia is the armpit of the world and no one in their right mind could possibly want to live there, it should also be noted that a recent poll conducted by the Levada Center found only 10% of Russians thought they might enjoy living abroad while only 5% regularly thought about leaving," Natylie Baldwin emphasized.

The second most common myth, according to the author, is that Russia is teetering on the brink of collapse. Although Russia is indeed facing financial hardships it, nevertheless, saw impressive agricultural and industrial growth in 2014, while its unemployment rates remained under 6 percent, Natylie Baldwin pointed out.

The author stressed that the mainstream US business media sources now admit that despite increasing inflation and low oil prices, Moscow has done better than anyone expected and that "the West's sanctions project to back Russia into a corner is largely a failure."

Meanwhile Russia has launched a series of ambitious infrastructural initiatives, including the Kerch Strait Bridge project which is aimed to connect the Crimean peninsula with the mainland, as well as a number of architectural projects in St. Petersburg, Tomsk and Moscow, to name but a few.

"Furthermore, China plans to invest $5 billion (RI, RBTH, China Banks to Finance New Russian Hi-Speed Railway) in the construction of a new high-speed rail system from Moscow to Kazan as part of the New Silk Road project of economic development and trade throughout Eurasia, a project that Russia will figure prominently in."

The third misconception is that "Russians just want to be Americans in furry hats," Natylie Baldwin noted with a touch of irony.

This idea is rather ludicrous, since Russia has a rich history and culture "that is four times older than that of the United States."

The roots of Russian statehood lie deep in medieval times. The country was largely influenced by the Byzantine culture after Prince Vladimir adopted Orthodox Christianity in the 10th century and declared it the official religion of the Russian state. Peter the Great strengthened Russia's connections with the West and initiated bold reforms in the 18th century. In the 20th century the Soviet Union broke the Nazi war machine.

Natylie Baldwin emphasized that currently Russia is "undergoing a gradual process of creating a post-Soviet national and cultural identity."

"Russia will also likely borrow some elements from the West, but they will never be a carbon copy of the United States which has a far different geographical, historical and cultural background," the author concluded.

 [return to Contents] 

 
#33
Russia Direct
www.russia-direct.org
April 23, 2015
What American Studies in Russia can teach about Russian Studies in the US
RD Interview: Victoria Zhuravleva, professor at the Russian State University for the Humanities (RSUH), discusses the new Russia Direct Ranking of Russian and Post-Soviet Studies Programs and the future of Russian Studies programs in the United States.
By Pavel Koshkin

After the release of its new Ranking of Russian and Post-Soviet Studies Programs in the U.S. in early April, Russia Direct sat down with Victoria Zhuravleva, professor of American History and International Relations and director of the American Studies Program at the Russian State University for the Humanities (RSUH), to discuss the results of the ranking and their broader significance for the field of Russian Studies.

In addition, Zhuravleva shared her own academic experiences of teaching American Studies in Russia in order to highlight the challenges facing Russian Studies programs in U.S. universities.

Russia Direct: What's your opinion of the new Russia Direct Ranking of Russian and Post-Soviet Studies programs in the United States?

Victoria Zhuravleva: I would like to emphasize that the Russia Direct discussion on Russian Studies is a very timely project because of the decline in expertise of Russia in the U.S. and because of the contemporary crisis in the Russian-American relations, the most serious one since the end of the Cold War. This crisis has very clearly demonstrated the negative consequences of misunderstandings caused by the decline in expertise.

Russia Direct's project covers very important issues, first of all, the transition from Soviet Studies to Russian Studies. Then, there's the matter of the professional identity crisis in the Russian Studies field and the bigger issue of how to improve the field of Russian Studies in the U.S.  All the experts share the idea that knowledge on Russia should be much more nuanced and multifaceted.

I suppose that mentioned problems are very important for the field of American Studies in Russia as well, because we are talking on how we are studying each other and how this knowledge correlates with the policy making process, with both the media discourse and the national identity discourse.  

RD: In your comments about Russia Direct's ranking, you pointed out that it lacks two criteria: an interdisciplinary approach and some way to quantify the number of visiting Russian academics in U.S. universities. How can we measure these criteria?

V.Z.: As for the interdisciplinary approach, this is necessity to put Russian Studies in the U.S. in different comparative contexts. As many experts argue, one of the urgent tasks is to create a deep knowledge on Russia based on political science, history, anthropology, religion, culture, and even on a knowledge of global economic and financial processes.

Visiting scholars from Russia need to receive an additional opportunity for teaching in the United States and vice versa. Grants and joint projects also will be very useful. For example, RSUH and the University of Kansas are planning to start project on the memory of World War II in representations of American and Russian students.

RD: What are the roots of the decline of Russia expertise in the U.S. and how would you propose to tackle the problem?

V.Z.: Of course, we can talk about the decline in expertise on Russia in the United States. And this is the consequences of different processes, and, first of all, the result of American triumphalism [after the end of the Cold War] and the lack of financial support [for Russian Studies programs] from the government.

As Georgetown University's Angela Stent [one of the authors of the RD report] emphasizes in her piece, the number of students has grown in direct proportion to the rise of Putin's Russia, but the U.S. government has not followed this academic trend and, in fact, has reduced available financial support. In her opinion the main problem is not with Master's degree programs, but with Ph.D. programs. In this situation, the question is whether there will be enough professors to teach and prepare the next generation of specialists.

And it is Stent's belief that there is a generational change, first of all in political science, because many of the best-known specialists on Russia, especially in political science, will retire over the next decade. And political science departments prefer to replace them with specialists not on Russian Studies, but on comparative politics or on theories of international relations.

But, in general, the United States still has a number of excellent programs on Russian Studies and the Russia Direct ranking demonstrates this very clearly.
The first way to tackle the problem of the decline in Russia expertise is to integrate Russian Studies into different comparative contexts, to discuss different points of views and interpretations of Russian life and politics and to broad the academic and student mobility.

RD: How does the current U.S.-Russia confrontation - which some experts are calling "a new Cold War" - re-shape or affect Russian Studies programs in the U.S.?

V.Z.: Jeffrey Mankoff [deputy director and fellow with the CSIS Russia and Eurasia Program and one of the authors of the RD report] talks about this problem. In particular, he deals with the negative consequences of the destruction of boundaries between academia and the policy making process, between academia and media discourse.

I suppose that the discussion on Russia Studies within the project of Russia Direct and on the pages of American newspapers and magazines is the best testimony that specialists on Russia Studies are thinking over this problem, discussing the new situation and the correlation between the study of Russia and the U.S. foreign policy.

RD: Could you share your own experiences?

V.Z.: Every semester 10-12 American students from Dickinson College, Middlebury College, and Beloit College study the Russian language, Russian history and Russian politics at RSUH. But I noticed an interesting trend among them. They focus on Russia, but they would like to take courses on American Studies as well. As a general rule three or four students attend my courses on U.S. history, on the political system of the United States and U.S. foreign policy.

RD: Why do they do it?

V.Z.: They answer: We would like to know what kind of image of the U.S. prevails in Russia's student consciousness, what kind of knowledge about our country they receive within these courses. And this is a very interesting experience for both American and Russian students, because they receive an opportunity for better understanding of mutual perceptions and promotion of their knowledge. So, I would like to emphasize that American students are talking in Russian with Russian students, but about the United States. This is a way of looking into a mirror in order to understand own and other country.

And an additional opportunity for academic communities is the participation in joint projects on Russian/American Studies. In this context, I would like to mention project that was initiated by me and my colleague Ivan Kurilla in 2008. The title of it is "Russian Studies in the United States / American Studies in Russia as academic projects: Mutual Representations." The first book [Russia and the United States in the Textbooks] has been already published in Russia with the support of the Kennan Institute. And the next book on this issue will be published in the United States at the Lexington Books.

Within such international projects experts and scholars from both countries discuss different problems for better understanding of where we are and where we should be in studying each other and how we can organize an effective dialogue between scholars and experts of two countries.

 [return to Contents] 

 #34
AFP
April 26, 2015
Kazakhstan strongman Nazarbayev heads for poll victory after record turnout
By Darya Boronilo, Dana Rysmuhamedova

Astana (Kazakhstan) (AFP) - Kazakhstan's Central Election Commission (CEC) claimed a record turnout of over 95 percent in Sunday presidential polls almost certain to re-elect 74-year-old strongman Nursultan Nazarbayev.

The country's Central Election Commission claimed a turnout rate of 95.11 percent after the last polling stations in the vast, steppe dominated republic closed at 1500 GMT.

The marginalised opposition has not put forward any candidates for the election and Nazarbayev is standing against two candidates widely seen as pro-government figures.

Nazarbayev has ruled the Central Asian country since before the breakup of the USSR in 1991. If he wins a new five-year term, he will be on course to reach three decades as leader.

He cast his ballot to loud applause in the capital Astana, saying he was confident Kazakhstan's people would back his campaign.

"I am sure Kazakhstan's people will vote primarily for the stable development of our state and the improvement of people's lives, as well as the stability of the state and in support of the policies the country has implemented under my leadership," Nazarbayev told journalists.

"I am confident of this."

- 'Civic duty' to vote -

Many citizens standing in long, snaking queues at polling stations in the capital Astana and second city Almaty cited a "civic duty" to vote.

Gulmira Bardygulova, a student in the country's largest city, Almaty, said she had voted for Nazarbayev to save the country from political turmoil.

"Young people themselves understand their duty - nobody is forcing us to vote. We have seen revolutions in Kyrgyzstan, war in Ukraine. Nobody wants this future for Kazakhstan."

Some, though, complained of having been pressured to turn out to vote by their employers.

In Astana, one voter who refused to give her name but said she worked as a clerk complained everybody in her office had been rung up by a line manager and asked to vote.

"Of course I voted for Nazarbayev," she said. "Who are the other two?"

One of the candidates standing against Nazarbayev, Turgun Syzdykov, is a 68-year-old former provincial official who has campaigned on an anti-globalisation platform, railing against Hollywood, hamburgers and computer games. He represents the Communist People's Party of Kazakhstan.

The other, Abelgazy Kusainov, 63, has held several important governmental positions and currently heads the national federation of trade unions. He is standing as an independent after running a campaign touching on Kazakhstan's environmental problems.

Nazarbayev said he respected the campaigns of both his opponents and was prepared to work with them when the election is over.

"This is not an election, it is a re-election," Dosym Saptaev, director of the Kazakhstan Risks Assessment Group, a think tank based in the largest city Almaty, told AFP.

"The significance of the event is no more than the fact that it may well be Nazarbayev's last."

- 'Institutional advantage' -

An Ipsos MORI poll released Tuesday showed 91 percent of Kazakhstan's citizens are satisfied with Nazarbayev's rule.

Economic issues have come to the forefront in recent months in Kazakhstan, which is the most prosperous of the five ex-Soviet Central Asian states.

Kazakhstan's domestic producers have been laying off workers as they struggle to compete with Russian imports made cheaper by the dramatic weakening of the sanctions-hit ruble.

Kazakhstan banned a number of Russian foodstuffs in March and April, citing standards violations, and has also restricted imports of Russian fuel. Moscow, traditionally viewed as a strong ally of the republic, implemented tit-for-tat measures this month.

Depressed prices for Kazakhstan's main export, crude oil, have created a headache for the government, with ratings agency Standard and Poor's downgrading the country's sovereign credit rating from BBB+ to BBB -- close to junk territory -- earlier this year.

The strategic country, which borders both Russia and China, has never held an election deemed free and fair by international monitors.

Nazarbayev claimed victory in the last presidential election, in 2011, with 95.5 percent of the vote. Sunday's ballot -- called a year ahead of schedule -- is the fifth he has contested.

In its interim report on the vote, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) raised concerns about Nazarbayev's "institutional advantage".

While Nazarbayev's posters and billboards were "visible throughout the country," the other two candidates have distributed "almost no campaign materials," the OSCE said.

The OSCE sent almost 300 observers to the vote and will deliver their verdict on the vote on Monday.

Over 9.5 million people in the ethnically diverse country were eligible to vote at over 9,000 polling stations across the country, according to the CEC.

 [return to Contents] 

 #35
Subject: From Igor Rotar (a Russian journalist)
Date:     Fri, 24 Apr 2015 13:46:00 -0700
From:     Igor Rotar <igorotar@gmail.com>

Dear colleagues,

My name is Igor Rotar. I am a veteran journalist and researcher who recently received a "green card" in the USA and currently lives in San Diego. I am the author of three books about  ethnic conflicts in the Soviet Union, and wrote an enormous number of articles in leading Russian and Western newspapers and journals. Now, I am also regularly contributing to the Jamestown Foundation (USA).

My major specialization concerns the ethnic and religious conflicts in the former Soviet Union and as a reporter for Nezavisimaya Gazeta and Izvestia, I repeatedly visited all the hot spots of the former Soviet Union.

Now, I have just come back from a three month trip in Ukraine where I visited following parts of this country.

1. The area of  the so called "antiterrorist  operation" in East Ukraine. I was exploring the  situation in the both side of the front line: that  controlled  by  the Ukraine government and  separatist regions.  I interviewed a great many of different people: Ukrainian  soldiers and pro-Russian separatist militants and Cossacks; common residents and  refuges; the leaders of the separatist government, militant units, and local governments in both sides, the leaders of different  non-government organizations; etc., etc. I visited specially the towns of  Slaviansk and  Kramatorsk where the separatist movement, organized by the Russian colonel Igor Strelkov(Girkin), had started.

2. I also visited the Kharkov province -a  mostly Russian-speaking region controlled by  Kiev's government, that may be considered a potential separatist enclave.  This visit also included many interviews with people of different status and political orientation.

3. The same concerns the visit to Lvov,  the «capital» of West Ukraine and the stronghold of the Ukrainian nationalist movement.

So,  I believe I got a comprehensive picture of  what is going on in different parts of country.  During my trip to Ukraine,  I published about  thirty  articles  in the Russian agency Rosbalt (http://www.rosbalt.ru/search/?q=%D0%98%D0%B3%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%8C%20%D0%A0%D0%BE%D1%82%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%8C&sort=date&offset=0)  and  a few in the Jamestown foundation(http://www.jamestown.org/articles-by-author/?no_cache=1&tx_cablanttnewsstaffrelation_pi1[author]=111)

At present, I am looking for universities and foundations that can be interested in my talks or lectures regarding  the  situation in Ukraine. I am also ready to consider suggestions regarding  writing articles  or providing research on the Ukraine conflict, or other types of collaboration.

My e-mail address is igorotar@gmail.com.

Igor Rotar

 [return to Contents]