Johnson's Russia List
2015-#191
2 October 2015
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"We don't see things as they are, but as we are"

"Don't believe everything you think"

You see what you expect to see 

In this issue
 
#1
Moscow Times
October 2, 2015
Putin Promises to Rewrite 'Foreign Agents' Law
By Daria Litvinova

President Vladimir Putin met with the presidential Human Rights Council on Thursday and promised to rewrite the so-called "foreign agents" law requiring that all NGOs which receive funding from abroad and are engaged in political activity to register as "foreign agents," a term widely associated in Russia with espionage, the Kommersant newspaper reported.

The law has been broadly criticized for its loose definition of what constitutes "political activity," and Putin assured the council's members that within three months suggestions on how to refine this exact definition would be introduced.

"The definition of political activity shouldn't be loose, shouldn't be elastic, it should be unified for understanding," the president was cited by Kommersant as saying Thursday. "This definition, if formulated unclearly, shouldn't in any case be customized for authorities, the Justice Ministry or anyone who sees fit," he said.

Putin's promise followed the speech of Lyudmila Alexeyeva, the prominent human rights advocate and the founder of Moscow Helsinki Group. Alexeyeva asked him to abolish the law.

"You said many times that this law is executed incorrectly. It means it's written incorrectly, and it's unlikely it can be corrected. [You should] abolish this harmful law," she was cited by Kommersant as saying.

The law was adopted in 2012. Since then several prominent NGOs that had little to do with politics had to shut their doors, facing the prospect of either being labeled foreign agents or being stripped of their funding.

In July, Russian human rights organization the Committee Against Torture has formally decided to close its doors, citing its refusal to accept the label of "foreign agent."

Its closure came on the heels of another one - of prominent science foundation Dynasty that shut down after being ordered by the authorities to register as a "foreign agent," and was ordered to pay a fine of 300,000 rubles ($5,600) for failing to do so. 
 #2
Interfax
October 1, 2015
Putin urges Russian businessmen to support rights NGOs

Moscow, 1 October: Russian President Vladimir Putin has called on businessmen and entrepreneurs to render financial support to Russian human rights non-commercial organizations.

"I fully and completely join the call and believe that we all together and I personally must urge, here, right now, I'm urging our citizens, all our business structures to render support to non-commercial organizations, including the human rights ones," Putin said at a session of the presidential human rights council on Thursday [1 October].

He noted that it would undoubtedly be beneficial to the development of civil society.

The Russian president agreed that earlier NGOs had had practically no alternative sources of funding. "But one cannot say that there are no such sources today. We have allocated R5bn [around 76m dollars] for these purposes this year. Certainly, there is never enough money, perhaps, we could have [allocated] 10 and 20bn, but we do what we can," Putin s! aid.
 
 #3
http://gordonhahn.com
October 1, 2015
Russian Military Intervention in Syria (UPDATE): Attacks Against ISIS and Other Jihadists
By Gordon M. Hahn

Updating yesterday's missive "Russia's Military Intervention in Syria" exposing the Western governments' and media false spin on Russia's air strikes in Syria. As I noted, the reports emphasized Russian strikes were not hitting Islamic State (IS or ISIS, ISIL, Daesh) targets in order to give the impression that Putin had lied when he described his plans to fight jihadism. I also showed that Russian strikes likely were targeting other jihadi targets. The general public would not necessarily know that there are other jihadi groups in Syria besides IS; hence, the spin's focus on IS.

The second day of Russian air strikes, which are being ignored in Western government statements and media, show that among the new targets were both IS and other jihadi installations and forces.  Russian air strikes hit IS targets in Deir Ezzour and Raqqa provinces, including a Syrian Air Force base which fell to IS earlier this year. Raqqa city, it should be noted, is IS's capitol in Syria.

Russian targets also included  areas around Jabal al-Zawiya and Jisr al-Shughour, which are under the control of Jaish al-Fatah (JF, the Army of Conquest), which includes several Al Qa`ida-allied jihadi groups, including Jabhat al-Nusra (JN), Ahrar al-Sham (AS), Jeish al-Islam (JI) and other jihadi groups. Many of these groups include fighters from Russia's North Caucasus, Tatarstan, and the former USSR. An interactive map detailing Russian air strikes in Syria can be found here (https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=z4PF1SFiMPjQ.kFa_qMMdFl48).

Yesterday, the Obama Administration said the failure to discriminate between IS and other rebel groups was a "grave miscalculation." Really?! Ironically, when the KTJ announced took allegiance or bayat to JN on September 29, it noted that JN "operates as al Qaeda's wing in Syria" and that it is crucial to unite against the "Safavid [Iranian]-American-Russian alliance against Muslims."

An Uzbek group, Katibat al-Tawhid wal-Jihad (KTJ or the Battalion of Monotheism and Jihad), which joined JN and declared its allegiance to Al Qa`ida yesterday also undertook an attack on Syrian and Russian forces at the Hamim Air Base near Latakia. KTJ claimed to have inflicted unspecified losses on both Syrian and Russian forces (www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2015/09/al-qaeda-brigade-claims-attack-on-russian-forces.php).
 
 #4
Politico.com
September 28, 2015
Only Russia Can Bring Peace to Syria
By Vali Nasr
Vali Nasr is Dean of Johns Hopkins University' School of Advanced International Studies.

Russia's daring intervention in Syria is not just a rude shock for Washington, but could also be a strategic game-changer for the Middle East, especially if it helps end the Syrian civil war.

Putin's maneuver at first glance looks like a desperate gamble to save the Assad regime. Military intervention could stabilize Assad for a time, but critics think Russia ultimately risks a repetition of the Afghan debacle when jihadi fighters bested Russian military might. Those naysayers should keep in in mind that for Putin, as he made it clear in his speech before the United Nations, the alternative to involvement may be an embarrassing defeat for Assad that empowers Islamic extremism. And that Russia is much better positioned than America to stop the bloodshed Syria.

No matter how this ends, for now Russia has changed the dynamics of the Syria crisis and opened up new possibilities. The crisis is no longer about Iran, which was increasingly on its heels defending Assad while also fighting ISIL in Iraq. By stepping forward as Assad's principal prop and forging an axis against ISIL (consisting of Iran, Iraq and Syria), Russia has put fighting Islamic extremism rather than "Iranian mischief" center stage in regional politics. For many in the West, the preoccupation will be Russia's role in the Middle East, not the aftermath of the Iranian nuclear deal.

Russian intervention is also a direct challenge to Turkey's and Persian Gulf monarchies' support for Assad's opposition. Back in 2012 King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia showed his displeasure for Russian support of the Assad regime by purportedly hanging up the telephone on President Dmitri Medvedev. But it does not appear that Russia is too worried about how Turkey or the Arab world might react to its latest military endeavor. After the nuclear deal, Arab monarchies, unhappy with Washington, have deemed it necessary to build ties with Moscow. Unlike the United States, Russia does not have to choose between Iran and its Arab rivals; it has been able to stay close to Iran while strengthening ties with Persian Gulf monarchies.

The United States has from the outset been reluctant to get involved in the Syrian debacle. Its support for opposition to Assad has been ineffective and so have its attempts at finding a diplomatic solution. By contrast, or perhaps as a consequence, there is now recognition across the board that Russia is central to an end game in Syria.

Secretary Kerry is renewing his bid for a diplomatic solution to Syria, but it is Russia, not the United States, that is shaping the situation on the ground to compel diplomacy. In the four years of civil war, the United States has rebuffed calls to arm the rebels, establish a no fly zone or enforce its own red lines for use of chemical weapons. America's impact on the civil war has been minimal. Russia, by contrast, has rmed Assad's military and now taken charge of defending the regime. It is clear to all stakeholders that the key to the resolution of the war is Moscow.

Washington's ability to get regional actors to compromise on Syria is also hampered by domestic considerations. The political environments in both the United States and Iran preclude serious talks over regional issues, let alone the meaningful give and take that would make diplomacy possible. Iran's Supreme Leader has said that for now talks with the United States will go no further than the nuclear deal, and the Obama administration speaks of containment rather than engagement when it comes to Iran's regional role. The implementation of the nuclear deal will cast a shadow on all discussions over Syria, and even if Washington were to manage a breakthrough with Tehran, it is bound to face opposition from Israel, Persian Gulf monarchies and Congress.

Moscow is better situated to move Iran, Turkey and the Persian Gulf monarchies toward compromise. Secretary Kerry brought Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Adel Jubair together last month in Qatar to discuss Syria. But Russia has been pursuing more direct bilateral talks. The list of dignitaries who have visited Moscow in recent months is long: Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, Revolutionary Guards' Qods Force Commander Qasim Suleimani, Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Nayef, Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman, UAE's Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Zayed, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Turkish President Recep Tayip Erdogan. After Muhammad Bin Salman returned from Moscow, Putin arranged for him to meet Assad's intelligence chief, Ali Mamluk, in Jeddah. As Putin has ramped up his defense of Assad, Russia has been speaking to the biggest regional actors.

This diplomatic outreach has already had tangible effects. Just last week, after visiting Moscow, Erdogan changed his position and accepted that Assad could be part of a political solution to end the civil war. It must be clear to Erdogan and the Persian Gulf monarchies that Putin will not let Assad fall. These nations also run the risk of confrontation with Russia if they continue supporting anti-Assad forces. Nor do Turkey and Israel want to see prolonged Russian military presence next door. Israel would not be able to hit at Hezbollah and Iranian targets at will, and Turkey wouldn't be able to react to the Kurdish challenge as freely it has thus far. The best course of action, these states could conclude, is to agree to a diplomatic solution that would send Russian forces home.

This could create a path out of the current impasse in Syria, which would be welcome news in not just countries around Syria but also in Europe where the swelter of war-weary refugees is posing humanitarian and security challenges. But it raises fresh questions about Russia's challenge to the United States and the world order. The Obama administration's critics fear Russia's power play could establish Moscow's primacy in Middle Eastern affairs and embolden Russia elsewhere in the world. The vacuum Russia is filling, critics say, is the one left by American insouciance.

Syria certainly confirms worries about Russia's outsized ambitions in the Middle East and beyond. It should also give us pause when we hear that Moscow is chastened by international pressure and out of options or that Putin has no strategy. But for now the focus is whether Russia shows its mettle in ending the war in Syria. The long-term repercussions of Russia's aggression are a debate for another day.
 
 #4a
Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs
www.carnegiecouncil.org
October 1, 2015
Messrs. Obama and Putin: Put Syria and Syrians First
By David C. Speedie
Senior Fellow David Speedie is director of the Council's program on U.S. Global Engagement.

The chill of U.S.-Russia relations has intensified over the past week, with the curt exchanges between Presidents Obama and Putin at the United Nations (their first face-to-face meeting in more than a year) over contrasting and competing strategies for ameliorating the dire situation in Syria. As with so many aspects of the current standoff between the two leaders and nations, it need not be so.

What is evident is that while the United States and Russia disagree over one "elephant in the room" aspect of resolving the Syrian crisis-the fate of President Bashar al-Assad-they share an equally obvious, self-interested resolve to de-fang and defeat the ISIL forces that now control large swathes of eastern Syria. In this regard, it is, to say the least, frustrating to look on as two world leaders snipe at each other over how this is to be accomplished. It is rather like two Neros fiddling while Rome, or in this case Damascus, burns.

In the prevailing environment, the default option for both Russia and the United States is to treat the other's blueprints for action with skepticism. Under this heading comes the U.S. reaction to Russia's recent military buildup in Syria, which includes air-to-air and ground attack aircraft, attack helicopters, and ground-to-air missiles. At the time of writing, it is also reported that Russia has joined French air forces in bombing ISIL targets. This in turn has evoked the accusation from the West that the targets include other non-ISIL, anti-Assad forces. While a state of flux thus prevails, the fact that Russian, French, and U.S. war planes are in the air over a relatively small territory sharply underscores the need for coordination and information sharing. Russia's tart response is that the West's approach to the Syrian tragedy, with 300,000 deaths and 11 million displaced, has been feckless and inconsistent. To some degree, it is difficult to disagree with this: for example, at precisely the time of the UN General Assembly gathering in New York, the administration was forced to shut down a year-old, $500-million program of arming and training "moderate" opposition forces in Syria after it became clear that defections among these meant that arms and men were added to the ISIL ranks. And as for those who still call for the targeted arming of "responsible" anti-Assad elements: Who among them can separate the "moderates" from the Islamists, who together represent a motley and blurred array of rival groups at work against each other rather than in any concerted, coherent opposition? As Erika Solomon noted in the Financial Times on September 28:

"The biggest issue today is the division between moderates and hardline Islamists that have grown in power. Even among the Islamists there are many disputes. Salafist forces such as Ahrar al-Sham want to rehabilitate their image in the West, bringing them into conflict with Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda's powerful Syrian branch. Yet both are fighting Isis."

Again, this paralyzing friction between the United States and Russia and their respective allies need not be so, and may not be so, if we can bring a stop to the "blame game." For the Russians, this means stopping the finger-pointing at the United States and the West about actions in Iraq and Libya fueling the advance of ISIL in Syria-heaven knows, there are still challenges aplenty for stabilizing these problem states, post-Saddam and -Kaddafi. For the United States and its allies, it means recognizing that Russia has both historic interests in Syria and grave concerns that an extreme Islamist victory in Syria would pose a threat within Russian territory. On the first score, the naval base at Tartus in southwest Syria is Russia's only such facility outside the former Soviet space and the home of its critically strategic Mediterranean fleet. The "listening station" at Latakia in the northwest is Russia's main intelligence base in the region. In all, as U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has allowed, Russia's latest military muscle flexing may be seen to be as much about "self-protection" as aggression. On the matter of threat to Russia itself, let us consider geography: Syria's northern border is a mere 12-hour car ride from Grozny, and in this context a quote from Walid Jumblatt, the veteran Lebanese Druze leader who knows his Russia, is worth heeding: "...their [Russian] objectives are military coordination with the Syrian regime and to search out and kill Chechen leaders [of ISIL]...Putin's obsession is his own Sunnis; he has tens of millions of Sunnis." While Russian Sunni extremists are, as everywhere, a minority, having had more terrorist attacks than anywhere in the West since the Cold War's end, Russia is justifiably concerned about the specter of an ISIL presence in its north Caucasus enclaves.

Finally, there is the aforementioned "elephant in the room" issue: the fate of Assad and his coterie. Putin has repeatedly offered the mantra of "Syrian people deciding the future of Syria." This has been anathema for a West determined to see the Syrian dictator follow the fate of those of Iraq and Libya. Leaving aside, however, whether these regime changes went entirely according to plan, the fact remains that efforts of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and others to remove Assad have failed to accomplish anything so far other than an emboldening of ISIL. Furthermore, the U.S.-led "Assad must go" chorus would not seem to be the most compelling incentive for the Syrian leader to come to any negotiating table. With his mention of "managed transition" at the UN, it seems that Mr. Obama may be disposed to modify at least the timing of what seems to be the inevitable outcome. For the sake of 11 million refugee or displaced Syrians, one devoutly hopes that on this and on other points of division hitherto, the grim-faced encounter of the two presidents this week may yet bear some cooperative fruit.
 
#5
Fair.com
September 30, 2015
No ISIS Where Russia Is Bombing-Except Last Week, When ISIS Was Killing Gay Men There?
By Jim Naureckas

Photo allegedly showing ISIS killing a man in Homs, Syria, for homosexuality earlier this year (Daily Mail, 7/23/15)

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia suddenly escalated the stakes in his contest with the West over influence in the Middle East on Wednesday, as Russian pilots carried out their first airstrikes in Syria....

Russian officials and analysts portrayed the move as an attempt both to fight Islamic State militants and to try to ensure the survival of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, Russia's main ally in the Middle East. But Homs is not under the control of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.
-New York Times (9/30/15)

A Syrian opposition activist network, the Local Co-ordination Committees, said Russian warplanes hit five towns-Zafaraneh, Rastan, Talbiseh, Makarmia and Ghanto-resulting in the deaths of 36 people, including five children.

None of the areas targeted were controlled by IS, activists said.
-BBC (9/30/15)

The Islamic State jihadist group executed nine men and a boy it accused of being gay in central and northern Syria on Monday, a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the jihadists shot dead seven men in Rastan, a town in Homs province of central Syria, "after accusing them of being homosexual."
-AFP (9/21/15)


 
 #6
Russia Beyond the Headlines
www.rbth.ru
October 2, 2015
Russia goes up in global competitiveness ranking
Russia has climbed eight places in the rating calculated by the World Economic Forum.
Anna Kuchma, RBTH

Russia has climbed to 45th place in the global competitiveness ranking, which is compiled annually by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

In last year's report, Russia was in 53rd position, behind Mauritius, the Philippines, Turkey and several other countries.

"The current growth of Russia is connected with changes in the methodology of assessment of the internal market, the improvement of factors related to the efficiency of markets for goods and services that have occurred due to the reduction of administrative barriers in some areas, and in part to the deterioration of the situation in other countries, previously ahead of Russia, for example, Turkey," Alexei Prazdnichnykh, the coordinator of the WEF's competitiveness program in Russia, told Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

The report also noted improvements in the regulation of business and domestic competition. In addition, after Russia's WTO accession in 2012, it has reduced import tariffs, which also has a positive effect, in terms of the WEF.

The size of the market, fairly stable macroeconomic indicators, the available human resources and basic infrastructure are still the strengths of Russia's competitiveness, say WEF experts.

However, according to Prazdnichnykh, opportunities for further progress by Russia in the Davos Forum's flagship ranking are threatening to run out due to Moscow's geopolitical confrontation with the West and low commodity prices.

Switzerland ranks as the world's most competitive country according to the WEF - for the seventh year in a row. Second place went to Singapore, while the United States was in third. The top five leaders also include Germany and the Netherlands. China remained in 28th position, as in last year's ranking.

Based on reports by Rossiyskaya Gazeta and RBK Daily.
 #7
Reuters
October 1, 2015
Russian economic slump to be worse than expected: poll
By Jason Bush and Kira Zavyalova

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's economy will contract by 4 percent this year, a Reuters poll predicted on Thursday, with economists once again revising down their forecasts as evidence mounts of a protracted slump.

Forecasts have grown steadily gloomier for several months, as signs of a global chill caused by China's slowdown add to problems for Russia caused by low oil prices and Western sanctions imposed because of the Ukraine conflict.

The poll predicted the economy would eke out growth of 0.2 percent in 2016, also down from 0.5 percent forecast in August.

"The latest data about the Russian economy doesn't allow us to talk seriously about the start of a recovery," Bank St Petersburg economist Olga Lapshina said.

A previous Reuters poll at the end of August had predicted a 3.7 percent contraction in 2015, which was in turn more pessimistic than July's poll forecast of a 3.5 percent drop.

Economists are also growing gloomier about inflation, which they now expect will end the year at 12.8 percent, higher than the 11.9 percent forecast in the previous poll.

They expect the central bank to hold its policy rate at its next meeting on Oct. 30, reflecting concerns about the high inflation, although a further half-point cut to 10.5 percent is anticipated by year-end.

Forecasts for the rouble also reflected the generally more bearish global outlook.

The poll predicted that the rouble would be worth 65.00 against the dollar in 12 months, compared with last month's 12-month forecast of 61.35.

The rouble was trading around 65.15 to the dollar on Thursday, having slumped from less than 50 rubles per dollar in May.

"Looking ahead, we expect the rouble weakness to continue," said Danske Bank economist Vladimir Miklashevsky, "driven by a weak oil price and emerging market turmoil on the back of the imminent rate hike by the Fed."
 #8
Wall Street Journal
October 2, 2015
Russian Oil Output Rises to Post-Soviet High
Adds to global glut keeping crude oil prices lower
By GEORGI KANTCHEV

Russia pumped oil in September at levels not seen since the fall of the Soviet Union, adding to the global glut that is keeping crude prices lower.

Russia's oil output in September rose to an average of 10.74 million barrels a day, government data showed on Friday. Oil production increased 0.4% from August.

The record-high Russian output adds to an already oversupplied global oil market. It is also the latest indication that Russia, one of world's biggest oil producers along with Saudi Arabia and the U.S., isn't prepared to join the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries in trimming production to prop up prices. OPEC has indicated that it will only consider a cut if other big suppliers, like Russia, join it and several OPEC members have tried to woo the country.

The fall in oil prices, which are down around 50% since last year, has battered the Russian economy, where oil and natural gas sales account for more than two-thirds of export revenue. The oil price slump, coupled with Western sanctions and a weakening currency, has already pushed the country into a recession which the World Bank expects to wipe 3.8% off the Russian economy this year.

In September, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich ruled out any cuts, saying that output may only decline if prices remain low for a sustained period. Mr. Dvorkovich said even then, production wouldn't fall by much.

"Russia has a different approach to the major OPEC countries-it strives to produce as much oil as it can all of the time and then deals with the consequences of the price afterwards," said Christopher Weafer, founding partner of Moscow-based consultancy Macro-Advisory. "There is no possibility of Russia cooperating with OPEC to manage supply and there is zero possibility of Russia ever joining OPEC."

Last November, OPEC, the 12-nation oil cartel, embarked on a policy of defending market share by keeping its output targets unchanged despite the global glut of crude. That has battered prices, leaving countries dependent on oil revenue, from Venezuela to Nigeria, struggling to shore up their public finances.

On Friday, Anton Siluanov, Russia's finance minister, said oil prices won't recover as quickly as after the 2008-2009 financial crisis. His ministry sees oil averaging at $50 per barrel in 2016 and $52 in 2017. Brent crude, the global oil price benchmark, was trading at $48.60 a barrel on Friday.

Moscow has indicated that the country's budget will be based on the assumption that oil prices stay close to $50 a barrel. On Friday, Brent crude, the global oil price benchmark, was trading at $48.70 a barrel.

The government has said because of the geology and harsh climate, Russian companies can't adjust oil output as easily as in other producing nations. Also, the depreciation of the ruble makes it relatively cheaper to produce oil in Russia, helping to preserve oil-company margins.

"The low oil prices have not had any impact on the production plans" in Russia, said Pavel Kushnir, a Moscow-based oil and gas analyst at Deutsche Bank.
The bank estimates that Russian output this year will average around 10.6 million barrels of crude a day. That is above the 10.58 million barrels a day the country produced last year, a level of output not seen since the end of the Soviet Union.
 
 #9
www.rt.com
October 2, 2015
Good and bad news day for Gazprom

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times on Friday for Russia's Gazprom. After posting better than expected third quarter results, troubles with Ukraine's prepayment and an anti-monopoly lawsuit domestically may spoil the weekend for top executives.

The company reported its gas exports outside the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) were up 23 percent in the three month period of July to September, totaling 41.4 billion cubic meters (bcm). Exports for September were up 24 percent to 13.3 bcm, according to company CEO Aleksey Miller.

"Europe continues to buy Russian gas in higher volumes than last year," said Miller at the Sochi Investment Forum.

Exports to Gazprom's biggest foreign client, Germany, increased by 19 percent in September to 11.2 bcm, according to the company. Italy saw the biggest third quarter growth in import of Russian gas with a 69 percent increase over the same period last year, totaling 7 bcm.

But it wasn't all good news for Gazprom.

The company has still not received a $500 million prepayment from Ukraine for gas, Russian Energy Minister Aleksandr Novak told journalists on Friday. Gas shipments to Ukraine were agreed to resume in September, following months of misunderstandings over prices. It was decided Kiev could buy 2 billion cubic meters for the winter season with a $500 million loan from the EU. Gazprom agreed to a reduced price of $232 (€207) per thousand cubic meters of gas during the period covered by the agreement.

Another concern for Gazprom is holding on to its dominant position in the Russian energy market. Until recently, the company held a monopoly on Russian gas exports. However, other state and privately-owned energy firms began moving in.

Last summer, Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) opened a case against Gazprom over its refusal to allow Rosneft to export from the Sakhalin-2 project in Russia's Far East.  Energy companies, including Rosneft and Novatek, managed to convince the government of a need for a law that would allow them to export liquefied natural gas (LNG).

On Friday, FAS said that Gazprom should create a separate subsidiary for gas transportation with a "separate balance sheet", claiming the practice of backing monopolies should be ended.

"Then we'll know exactly how much exploration and transportation costs, and there will be no more obscure figures," said the head of FAS Igor Artemyev.
 
 #10
Sberbank CEO does not rule out even big banks going bankrupt in short-term in Russia

SOCHI, October 2. /TASS/. Chief Executive Officer of Russian top lender Sberbank does not rule out cases of small, medium and even big Russian banks going bankrupt in the short-term, he said in an interview aired by the Rossiya-24 TV news channel within International Investment Forum Sochi-2015 on Friday.

"All in all the banking sector is quite stable now and there are no problems with liquidity. There are some problems related to capital but they're not as acute as they were half a year ago. But we'll evidence a great number of bankruptcies of small and medium-sized banks, and maybe some big ones," he said, adding that this is a "healthy" process as short-lived banks will leave the market.

German Gref also said the situation in Russia's banking sector won't improve till the end of 2016. "We see that so far for 8 months of the current year the banking sector in total, excluding Sberbank, have negative profits, which is a serious problem. We don't see improvement for the first half of the next year either, though probably in the second half the situation will improve. But in general sustainability of the banking sector is not under threat," CEO added.


 
 #11
Reuters
October 1, 2015
Russia's import-substitution drive will take years - and may be misguided
By Jason Bush

Russia's drive to promote domestic products at the expense of imports is creating new opportunities for business, but it will take years for the benefits to show, participants at the Reuters Russia Investment Summit said.

They differed sharply on whether the strategy as a whole was beneficial or an example of misguided protectionist thinking.

So-called "import substitution" has become a central plank in Russia's response to an economic crisis resulting from the plunge in international oil prices and Western sanctions imposed because of the Ukraine crisis.

The trend is driven in part by the sharp decline in the rouble, which has the effect of making imports more expensive, helping the competitiveness of goods made locally.

It is also being actively promoted by the government. In its most drastic response to Western sanctions, Russia has introduced a ban on most food imports from the West.

Moscow is also promoting import substitution in numerous other areas, such as pharmaceuticals and electronics, favoring local producers through procurements and subsidies.

President Vladimir Putin said last month that there were 2,500 import-substitution projects already and the state planned to spend 2.5 trillion roubles ($38 billion) to support them.

"For us import substitution isn't a fetish. It concerns the most important technologies," Putin said. "One way or another we had to do it ... but now we will have to do it more quickly."

Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich told the Reuters Russia Investment Summit this week that it was only a matter of time before the panoply of projects brought tangible benefits, although it was too soon to expect large-scale results.

"Import substitution is absolutely real, but it is all investment projects. They have various stages," he said. "We will see a result somewhere in a year, elsewhere in two years, elsewhere in three."

Dvorkovich said that while international sanctions were always negative, there was a positive side to them.

"Sanctions force each country to think about internal sources (of development) and operate more energetically for using its own resources," he said.

DESIRED EFFECT

Russia's food ban is certainly having the desired effect of encouraging more investment in products that Russia typically imported.

Electricity and farming tycoon Dmitry Arzhanov told the Summit he plans to invest heavily in apples and potatoes to fill gaps caused by the food embargo.

"From the point of view of agriculture we see only positive factors," he said.

Before the food embargo, Russia largely imported apples from Poland - where apples have now been dubbed "putinki" (little Putins) in an ironic swipe at the Russian leader.

But Arzhanov said cheap Polish apples would probably flood back to Russia if the embargo were lifted soon.

In general Russia needed to keep import restrictions in place long enough for domestic producers to invest and turn a profit, which often required several years, he said.

"The process (of substitution) is a long one," he said.

"I'm not for counter-sanctions or against them. I'm for consistency. If they have been introduced then they will need to remain for a certain time."

Arzhanov's concerns illustrate the likelihood that import restrictions may ultimately prove hard to remove because of the domestic lobbies that benefit from them.

This was of concern to Pascal Lamy, a former head of the World Trade Organization.

He told the Summit that import-substitution policies rarely bring long-term economic benefits, because they contradict the principles of free trade.

"It's a tiny and shrinking part of the market of ideas," he said of import-substitution theories. "But blaming the foreigner has always been a fundamental trick of domestic politics: it has worked for centuries."

Import-substitution policies may well work in terms of boosting domestic production, he said. But they do so at the expense of consumers, who end up paying more, and erode overall economic performance by distorting the allocation of resources.

"In most of the cases I have known import substitution policies have failed," said Lamy. "They degrade the efficiency of their economy.

 
 #12
Business New Europe
October 1, 2015
Goldman Sachs finally trusts Russians to run its Moscow operations
Jason Corcoran in Moscow

Goldman Sachs, Wall Street's most profitable investment bank, has finally decided to trust Russian financiers to run its operation in Moscow.

After reshuffling the deck, the bank said its business in Russia will now be now by Sergei Arsenyev and Dmitri Sedov, along with Tim Talkington, an American who will act like a chaperon to the two Russians who have finally got the keys to the fast car.

Goldman Sachs, dubbed affectionately "a great vampire squid" by former Moscow journalist Matt Taibbi, hasn't had a Russian citizen as head or co-head of its Moscow office since Elena Titova left in 2006.

The existing double-act of Italian financier Paolo Zannoni and American Nicholas Jordan will step down as co-chief executive officers of the Russia/CIS business to make way for the three-headed eagle.

Goldman usually has two heads in Moscow but never three until now. Americans Chris Barter and David Schwimmer previously ran the business until Barter teamed up with Frenchman Jean Raby.

Barter told this journalist during his tenure about  four years ago that Goldman was preparing and molding Russians to take over one day.

The departure of Zannoni from Moscow means there is just one partner, namely Maxim Klimov, remaining in Russia. Oddly enough, Klimov wasn't in the running or wasn't interested in the top job even through he's raked in many millions from running the special situations unit in Russia.

The parachuting in of Nick Jordan from UBS just over two years ago shocked many local staffers, because Goldman typically promotes from its own benches for top roles. Jordan has jumped like an annuated Premiership football player from club to club  over the past 11 years since leaving Deutsche Bank. He was paid more than $7mn a year to join Lehman from the German lender until it blew up. After losing his bid to run the merged operation with Nomura Holdings, Jordan surfaced at UBS where he remained for less than three years until Goldman's chequebook came calling.

The bank, led by Lloyd Blankfein, has struggled after opening its first office in Moscow in 1994 because of its perceived lack of commitment. It scaled back soon after as part of a worldwide retrenchment, returned in 1998 weeks before Russia defaulted, withdrew almost entirely after the crisis and ramped up again in 2006.

Goldman banker Brett Olsher will chair a new Russia Executive Leadership Group aimed at expanding the group's local business in the face of shrinking margins, crippling sanctions and a wide investor aversion to Russian risk. Klimov is also a member along with the three-headed eagle.

The current outlook for investment bankers in Moscow looks grim. Deutsche Bank, the leading player for the past two decades, is shutting its operation following allegations its bankers laundered money on behalf of its clients. Other players have cut personnel and costs and shunted their best talent to London, where they can work on different emerging markets.
 
 #13
Moscow Times
October 2, 2015
Russians Start Filing for Bankruptcy as New Law Enters Force
By Anastasia Bazenkova

Russian courts received their first personal bankruptcy petitions on Thursday, as the country's first ever law allowing individuals to declare themselves bankrupt entered into force.

On the eve of the law's arrival, analysts warned that courts could be overwhelmed by a flood of applicants unable to pay debts accumulated during a recent lending boom.

Already by 11 a.m. on Thursday, 108 personal bankruptcy petitions had been filed with the Moscow Arbitration Court, the Vedomosti newspaper reported, citing a court spokesperson.

The first cases had also been filed with arbitration courts in the town of Tomsk, the Yakutia and Altai regions in Russia's Far East and a number of other regions across the country, according to court records.

"By midday we received 15 bankruptcy cases," the press spokesperson for the Altai Arbitration Court, Daria Kushvid, told local news portal altapress.ru.

The personal bankruptcy legislation allows Russians with a total debt of more than 500,000 rubles ($7,600) and over three months of missed payments to file for bankruptcy. Those with a total debt less than 500,000 rubles can also file if they are unable to repay their loans. Before Thursday, only legal entities could go bankrupt in Russia.

Petitions can be filed either by individuals or by their creditors. Early news reports suggested that most cases on Thursday had been filed by banks.

For instance, Russia's largest lender Sberbank took advantage of the law, initiating bankruptcy proceedings against Vladimir Kekhman, the former owner of Joint Fruit Company (JFC), the Interfax news agency reported. JFC was a major banana importer to Russia until it went bankrupt in 2012.

The bank estimated the debt owed by Kekhman, who is currently artistic director at the Mikhailovsky Theater in St. Petersburg, at 4.5 billion rubles ($69 million), Interfax reported, citing a Sberbank representative.

VTB 24, the retail arm of the country's second largest banking group, also said it would use the legislation, the RBC news agency reported Thursday.

The bank's deputy president, Anatoly Pechatnikov, told RBC it had 143,000 clients with loans of more than 500,000 rubles and at least three months of missed payments, with a combined debt of 87 billion rubles ($1.3 billion).

Russian banks currently hold around 1 trillion rubles ($15 billion) in overdue consumer loans, and the creditworthiness of clients is deteriorating amid a deep recession.

Earlier this week the Finance Ministry estimated that Moscow courts alone would have to deal with about 4 million personal bankruptcy cases over the next year, severely straining the court system, Vedomosti reported.
 
 #14
Interfax
October 1, 2015
Most Russians see food embargo as appropriate response to Western sanctions - poll

A growing number of Russians have noticed a change in food store merchandise under the impact of the food embargo enforced in August 2014, sociologists have said.

According to the Romir research holding, the percentage of Russians who have paid attention to the disappearance of some or many customary foods has grown from 21% in September 2014 to 43% now. Some 37% said only a few familiar brand names were gone, and 6% said they could not find most customary food products. The share of those who did not notice any change in brand names is down, from 79% in September 2014 to 58% now.

Thirty-nine percent of Russians regretted a decline in the quality of food over the same period. Fifty-two percent disagreed and said that quality had been unchanged, and 9% claimed an improvement.

The holding polled 1,500 respondents older than 18 in villages, towns and cities in all federal districts.

The alternation of merchandise was mostly mentioned by residents of big cities (60%) and well-to-do Russians (54%).

According to sociologists, 71% of respondents backed the food embargo one way or another as an appropriate response to the Western sanctions against Russia, and 21% raised objections.

Eleven percent of the food embargo opponents think that this embargo fosters corruption and criminal schemes which bring forbidden food to Russia, and 10% called the embargo harmful for average customers - prices are growing and quality is deteriorating.

As to the personal impact of the food embargo, 57% of respondents said they did not notice any, because they were not buying imported food and delicacies before. A third (35%) said that some of the customary brand names were gone but that they easily found a replacement.

Eight percent claimed substantial damage. Six percent of Russians found it difficult to substitute the missing brands, and two percent said they stopped eating some foods because they could not find a replacement.

Russia imposed the embargo on imports of agricultural products, raw materials and food from countries which had joined the anti-Russian sanctions on August 7, 2014. The ban applied to imports of beef, pork, fruit and vegetables, poultry, fish, cheese, milk and dairy products manufactured in EU member countries, the United States, Australia, Canada and Norway.

The food embargo was extended for one year on June 24, 2015, from August 6, 2015, till August 5, 2016.

The Russian authorities explained the food embargo via the EU and U.S. sanctions on a number of Russian banks providing loans to local farmers.
 
 #15
www.opendemocracy.net
September 29, 2015
Finding a place for Zhenya
Natalya's youngest son Zhenya will soon be six. He is a child with a difference, and Natalya needs to make a choice about where to send him to school.
By Natalya Yakovleva
Natalya Yakovleva is a journalist based in Novosibirsk, where she writes for the Literary Gazette and the Teachers' Newspaper.
 
Natalya's youngest son Zhenya will soon be six. He is a child with a difference. He has Down's syndrome, a genetic condition caused by the presence of an extra chromosome in the body's cells. When a child is born with it, all the doctors say is: 'Bad luck!'

But Natalya knows that her family, which lives in the village of Beryozovka near Omsk, is lucky: Zhenya is a bright young boy - affectionate, kind and gentle. He is a whole world in one small boy. He sings and dances all over the house, giving no one any peace and dragging them into his games. Zhenya draws colourful pictures full of light and gives them to his family.

Zhenya is interested in everything, from the sun suddenly hiding behind a cloud to a tiny caterpillar crawling inside a shoe. He goes to pre-school nursery, where he has friends and kind, wise teachers. His mother was doubtful about letting him go, but her fears were unfounded. He loves it there and so do all the other children who meet him: Zhenya's condition means he doesn't lie or cheat, and is very sensitive and sympathetic to other people's pain.

Zhenya likes technology: he'll sit in his dad's car for hours, playing with the steering wheel and imagining he's a real driver. He can work a computer and tablet and loves playing games and watching cartoons on line, or listening to the popular children's song 'We are just different' as though he knows it's about him. He is just different. He finds it harder to learn things that come easily to other kids.

Is there a school for Zhenya?

But next year Zhenya will have to go to school. Children with Down's syndrome usually learn and progress more slowly than most other children. In some western countries, the trend is to include them in mainstream schools, with extra support, but in Russia they attend specialised, usually residential, schools.

The problem for Zhenya's parents is that there are no such schools in the Omsk region. So it is left to them, ordinary agricultural workers (he is a driver, she a dairy worker), to take charge of his learning and development. They read him stories talk to him endlessly as they go about their daily activities, teaching him new words and concepts.

Natalya takes Zhenya to sessions with a speech and language therapist, a psychologist and an additional support needs teacher who makes clay models, cuts out paper and plays with a puppet theatre with him. Zhenya loves going to children's theatre shows and circuses, though he hates darkness and always needs to hold a parent's hand if the lights go out.

About 30 children are born with Down's syndrome in the Omsk region each year. Nearly 80% of them end up in orphanages or special residential schools that are not suitable for them.

The doctors tried to persuade Natalya to put Zhenya in one of these institutions, but she was lucky that in the area there was a parents' support organisation, Down's Syndrome Omsk, where they could meet up with other families at various events, find out more about the condition, and, most importantly, feel they were not alone.

'Bringing up a child with Down's syndrome isn't straightforward,' Natalya tells me. 'Everything's different, unusual. Of course, the main thing is to love them, like any child, but you also have to keep learning as you go along.'

She has no idea what to do next. Zhenya needs to go to school. She doesn't want to send him to the one special residential school in the area that takes children with Down's syndrome.

In 2011, Pavel Astakhov, the Children's Ombudsman, visited it and found a little girl tied to her bed with her own tights. But they do have specialist teachers and appropriate learning programmes there. And Natalya doesn't like the idea of just sending him to the local village school either.

The people at Down's Syndrome Omsk have explained to Natalya that Zhenya will need not just an ordinary class teacher, but one-to-one support from a tutor to help him learn and adapt to school life.

Given that, according to Education and Science Minister Dmitry Livanov, only 20% of mainstream schools in Russia are prepared to accept pupils with special educational needs, where is Zhenya from Beryozovka going to find a tutor?

Is inclusion possible, or right?

Four years ago, the nearby Novosibirsk region launched an inclusive education project involving 35 schools and 776 children, though it quickly became clear how difficult it would be to implement.

Tatyana Chepel, director of the regional diagnostic and consultancy centre for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), listed the extra resources needed to make such a project work: specialised professionals including a psychologist, a SEND teacher, a speech and language therapist, a paediatrician, a sympathetic school environment, a different system of assessment, separate study rooms. Not to mention physiotherapists, which schools don't have, and life skills teacher.

The experiment showed, however, that all children, both disabled and typically developing, learned better in an inclusive setting, and there was no bullying either. The problem lay with the inability of teachers to adapt to a more flexible teaching style, even though the children included in the experiment had only mild developmental delay.

'I can't imagine, for example, how to cater for a child with autism in a mainstream school,' says Svetlana Aleshchenko, director of the Tomsk Centre for Psychological, Medical and Social Management and Differential Teaching.

'These children have no intellectual impairment, in fact they may be very able, but they just live in a world of their own. How can we get through to them? How can we create conditions in a school what would allow them the solitude they sometimes need? In Russia we have very few autism specialists in general, and none at all in schools.'

Svetlana is a SEND specialist, one of only a few in Siberia. Very few Russian universities offer courses to train such teachers, and even in the days when graduates were assigned jobs rather than choosing them themselves, there was a distinct unwillingness to travel to the frozen north. Svetlana, a former primary teacher, admits that she found it difficult to engage with 'abnormal' children at first. She just felt pity for them and couldn't get past their impairment: they were 'sick', 'twisted'.

It was only later that Svetlana realised that this outward weakness hid an enormous inner strength: it isn't easy to learn to live with a disability, and even less easy to learn to enjoy life with one. Svetlana still finds it difficult to hold back the tears as she tells me about a pupil at the centre who knew she was living on borrowed time but still tried to take everything she could from life, including knowledge from her teachers. She was a straight A student, took part in academic Olympiads, and quietly celebrated life, thanking the people who helped her live.

A pearl of excellence...

The Tomsk centre has now moved to a former children's convalescent home with the charming name of Basandai's Pearl, named after a legendary ruler of the city.

The centre is now the regional SEND complex, providing distance learning to children with disabilities and a school for children with motor impairments. It also offers treatment and rehabilitation for children, support for parents and training for teachers in inclusive approaches to education.

There is a sports area, a gym and spaces for physiotherapy and other treatments and therapeutic activities, which include everything from injections to swimming and riding.The centre is located in the city's green belt, accessible by ordinary bus as well as a special one for children and staff. It sits among birch and pine trees, its buildings - an administrative-medical block, two boarding houses, a school and dining hall - are all equipped with ramps.

The centre also has a variety of specialists on its staff - a psychologist, a speech and language therapist, an SEND teacher, a remedial PE instructor, a counsellor and others.

There is a dedicated computer room and work space for teachers involved in distance learning, where educational modules are constantly updated to make learning easier and more fun.

The 'Pearl' name has somehow stuck to the complex. After all, its work involves taking disabled children, isolated from the world, and turning them into pearls by adding, drop by drop, not only knowledge, but love for the world.

... in a sea of problems

There are not many centres such as those in Novosibirsk and Tomsk. And there are plenty of barriers to inclusion.

Last year, for example, an Omsk school planned a Paralympic lesson, with a visit from Russia's paralympians who had brought six medals back from London in 2012. The children were ready and waiting, but the meeting had to happen elsewhere: the school wasn't wheelchair accessible. Very few schools in Omsk are. Schools need not only ramps, but also lifts and wider doors if they are to be inclusive. But there are only 12 schools in the city that can even be called 'newish' - built within the last 20 or so years. All the others are well past their prime.

There are schools in the region offering inclusive education, as well as resource centres and facilities for distance learning even for severely disabled children, but they are few and far between, and there is an urgent need to create an accessible educational environment, equip school buildings and train teachers.

And even if schools become accessible, that's not the end of the story. According to the regional ombudsman, 85% of the city's multi-storey residential blocks are too old to be adapted for disabled residents.

Regional education departments across Russia have now begun to create an infrastructure that would allow SEND children to go to mainstream schools. But even if they succeed, the problems don't stop there: there is little provision for these young people's transition to adult life afterwards.

'It's great that this is happening, but what happens afterwards?' sighs Svetlana Aleshchenko. 'Children grow up - in the Tomsk region they make up just 3,200 of the region's 64,000 disabled population, most of them out of work. Some of these children might go on to further or higher education university, but that's all they and their teachers can hope for. The authorities aren't even interested in improving their further choices.'

Back in the village of Beryozovka, Natalya has her own difficult choice to make: which school will be best for Zhenya?
 
 #16
www.rt.com
October 2, 2015
Gorbachev calls for Russia-Germany alliance 'for common European good'

Former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev has called for Russians and Germans to unite and called good relations between the two nations "priceless capital" in a newspaper interview.

"History teaches us that when Germans and Russians walk hand in hand both nations and all Europeans benefit. The more often Putin and Merkel talk to each other the better it is for everyone," Gorbachev told Bild daily.

The former Soviet leader also added that in his opinion both Russians and Germans could be proud of the accomplishments they achieved after the end of the WWII.

"Cooperation gave a forward momentum to both of our nations. Our good relations are priceless capital that should not be wasted. Moreover, we should do everything to add to that capital, especially in these difficult times."

Gorbachev's interview with Bild is connected with the Day of German Unity - a major holiday celebrated on October 3 to commemorate the reunification of East and West Germany in 1990.

As the president of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev played a major role in signing the treaty on the final settlement in Germany that paved the way to unification. He is still criticized at home for not pressing for enough compensation for Russia or for allowing it to happen at all.

In early 2015, Gorbachev lashed back at his critics who prepared a parliamentary resolution denouncing the German reunification as an act of aggression.

"You cannot evaluate the events that took place in a different epoch, in different times from today's positions," Gorbachev said. "The suggestion is simply rubbish. I will say this again - we cannot simplify the situation to the convenience of today's needs and our appraisal of the past should not be based on today's views."

In late 2014, Gorbachev urged all European leaders to help tone down the contradictions between Russia and the United States and thus help shape a new world order. "There are signs of Cold War" in the recent cooling down of relations between Moscow and Washington over Russia's accession of the Crimea and the turmoil in Ukraine, Gorbachev said. "We can and we must stop this whole process, as we did in the 1980s. We opted for de-escalation, for the unification [of Germany]. And back then it was a lot tougher than now. So why can't we do it again?" he said.
 
 #17
http://buchanan.org
October 2, 2015
The Mind of Mr. Putin
By Patrick J. Buchanan
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of the new book "The Greatest Comeback: How Richard Nixon Rose From Defeat to Create the New Majority."

"Do you realize now what you have done?"

So Vladimir Putin in his U.N. address summarized his indictment of a U.S. foreign policy that has produced a series of disasters in the Middle East that we did not need the Russian leader to describe for us.

Fourteen years after we invaded Afghanistan, Afghan troops are once again fighting Taliban forces for control of Kunduz. Only 10,000 U.S. troops still in that ravaged country prevent the Taliban's triumphal return to power.

A dozen years after George W. Bush invaded Iraq, ISIS occupies its second city, Mosul, controls its largest province, Anbar, and holds Anbar's capital, Ramadi, as Baghdad turns away from us - to Tehran.

The cost to Iraqis of their "liberation"? A hundred thousand dead, half a million widows and fatherless children, millions gone from the country and, still, unending war.

How has Libya fared since we "liberated" that land? A failed state, it is torn apart by a civil war between an Islamist "Libya Dawn" in Tripoli and a Tobruk regime backed by Egypt's dictator.

Then there is Yemen. Since March, when Houthi rebels chased a Saudi sock puppet from power, Riyadh, backed by U.S. ordinance and intel, has been bombing that poorest of nations in the Arab world.

Five thousand are dead and 25,000 wounded since March. And as the 25 million Yemeni depend on imports for food, which have been largely cut off, what is happening is described by one U.N. official as a "humanitarian catastrophe."

"Yemen after five months looks like Syria after five years," said the international head of the Red Cross on his return.

On Monday, the wedding party of a Houthi fighter was struck by air-launched missiles with 130 guests dead. Did we help to produce that?

What does Putin see as the ideological root of these disasters?

"After the end of the Cold War, a single center of domination emerged in the world, and then those who found themselves at the top of the pyramid were tempted to think they were strong and exceptional, they knew better."

Then, adopting policies "based on self-conceit and belief in one's exceptionality and impunity," this "single center of domination," the United States, began to export "so-called democratic" revolutions.

How did it all turn out? Says Putin:

"An aggressive foreign interference has resulted in a brazen destruction of national institutions. ... Instead of the triumph of democracy and progress, we got violence, poverty and social disaster.

Nobody cares a bit about human rights, including the right to life."

Is Putin wrong in his depiction of what happened to the Middle East after we plunged in? Or does his summary of what American interventions have wrought echo the warnings made against them for years by American dissenters?

Putin concept of "state sovereignty" is this: "We are all different, and we should respect that. No one has to conform to a single development model that someone has once and for all recognized as the right one."

The Soviet Union tried that way, said Putin, and failed. Now the Americans are trying the same thing, and they will reach the same end.

Unlike most U.N. speeches, Putin's merits study. For he not only identifies the U.S. mindset that helped to produce the new world disorder, he identifies a primary cause of the emerging second Cold War.

To Putin, the West's exploitation of its Cold War victory to move NATO onto Russia's doorstep caused the visceral Russian recoil. The U.S.-backed coup in Ukraine that overthrew the elected pro-Russian government led straight to the violent reaction in the pro-Russian Donbas.

What Putin seems to be saying to us is this:

If America's elites continue to assert their right to intervene in the internal affairs of nations, to make them conform to a U.S. ideal of what is a good society and legitimate government, then we are headed for endless conflict. And, one day, this will inevitably result in war, as more and more nations resist America's moral imperialism.

Nations have a right to be themselves, Putin is saying.

They have the right to reflect in their institutions their own histories, beliefs, values and traditions, even if that results in what Americans regard as illiberal democracies or authoritarian capitalism or even Muslim theocracies.

There was a time, not so long ago, when Americans had no problem with this, when Americans accepted a diversity of regimes abroad. Indeed, a belief in nonintervention abroad was once the very cornerstone of American foreign policy.

Wednesday and Thursday, Putin's forces in Syria bombed the camps of U.S.-backed rebels seeking to overthrow Assad. Putin is sending a signal: Russia is willing to ride the escalator up to a collision with the United States to prevent us and our Sunni Arab and Turkish allies from dumping over Assad, which could bring ISIS to power in Damascus.

Perhaps it is time to climb down off our ideological high horse and start respecting the vital interests of other sovereign nations, even as we protect and defend our own.
 
 #18
Russia Direct
www.russia-direct.org
October 1, 2015
What are the risks of Russian military involvement in Syria?
It remains to be seen if Russia will be able to contribute to fighting ISIS in Syria through a more intensive military involvement in the conflict. However, the risks from such operation remain high.
By Artem Kureev
Artem Kureev is an expert from the Moscow-based think tank "Helsinki+" that deals with protecting interests of Russians living in the Baltic countries. Kureev graduated from Saint Petersburg State University's School of International Relations.

On Sept. 30, the Russian government decided to provide military support to the legitimate Syrian government. That same day it was reported that the Russian Air Force had bombed Syrian rebel positions, sparking heated debate.

Moscow had apparently warned Washington about the "closure of Syrian airspace," and some media outlets reported civilian causalities in areas controlled by the Western-backed Syrian opposition as a result of the strikes.

Some political scientists were quick to proclaim that Syria would be the cradle of World War III. What is going on? What are Moscow's objectives in the Middle East and can Russian military aid reverse the situation in Syria? Even more significantly, will it lead to open conflict between Russia and the West?

Unlike the Western coalition, which operates in Syrian airspace without the consent of Damascus, Russia is there at the invitation of the lawful authorities. The decision to use force in the Middle East was taken by Russian President Vladimir Putin following a formal request made by Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad and a resolution passed by the Federation Council, the upper chamber of the Russian parliament.

Russia already had a military footprint in the country. According to some media reports, as of September 2015 there were approximately 1,700 service personnel at the port of Tartus. What's more, the Russian Defense Ministry in early September stationed aircraft at the Hmeimim airbase, which is being used by the Russian Air Force as its center of operations.

In the middle of last month, various Russian media reported an alleged clash between a guerilla group of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Greater Syria (ISIS) and Russian marines guarding the airbase.

It was against that background that immediately following the Russian government's decision to assist Assad, Russian aircraft went into action. Clearly, the operation had been on the drawing board for months in advance, and everything was in place for the first phase.

What military jets will Russia use to conduct airstrikes against ISIS?

Day One of the operation demonstrated that Russia is not planning to showcase its latest aviation hardware just yet. The raids on ISIS, according to Syrian media, were carried out by Su-24M "workhorses" - two-seater bombers capable of carrying a 7,500 kilogram (16,500 pound) payload, which are also in service with the Syrian Armed Forces.

In addition, the operation saw the use of SS-25 single-seat frontline bombers, which can carry a payload of up to 4,400 kilograms (9,700 pounds). Syria has no such aircraft in service, but other opponents of ISIS do, such as Iraq.

The most modern aircraft so far deployed in Syria are the Su-34 fighter-bomber and Su-30 SM heavy fighter (which postdate the collapse of the Soviet Union). Using data from Syrian intelligence, Russia's military operations will instead utilize high-tech weaponry, including the most advanced air-to-ground missiles to carry out "surgical strikes." Although most of this ordnance was developed in Soviet times, it has all been upgraded with satellite navigation and other tools of modern warfare.

In late 2012 the Russian Armed Forces took delivery of the Kh-38 missile, able to destroy a wide range of targets - from armored vehicles to surface ships. Admittedly, the weapon is designed to be used with the latest Russian aircraft, such as the Su-35, MiG-35 or T-50, of which only the SU-35 has entered service so far. Whether the latest developments of Russian aviation will be given a run in Syria, time will tell.

Fueling the hybrid war in Syria

In Syria's "war of all against all" (in the words of famous British political philosopher Thomas Hobbes), the Kremlin has stated that its operation is directed against terrorism. Nevertheless, it will be difficult to separate the "bad" rebels from the "good" ones.

Moreover, whereas Syrian government forces can wage military operations against all and sundry, the Russian military has to take into account the influential views of the West and Saudi Arabia, which are demanding that their sponsored National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces be left well alone during any air raids.

But no sooner had Russia's first missiles been fired than reports emerged that residential neighborhoods in areas controlled by the pro-Western opposition had been targeted. In the parallel information war, such statements will always be made regardless of where the truth lies.

That said, it lets the Russian military off the leash to a certain extent, since it can always say that the National Coalition failed to provide information about the placement of its forces, for which reason its positions were hit, since radical Islamists were believed to be operating in the region.

Of course, the pro-Western opposition is unlikely to convey information about its forces to a major ally of Damascus - not even through the Western coalition's information center in Baghdad. Meanwhile, it is clear that the National Coalition - unable to seize power during three years of civil war - is not the main goal for Russia, however much Moscow supports Damascus.

It is far more important to put an end to the ISIS expansion. However, ISIS has long been a transnational organization, controlling part of Iraqi territory, too. Without the option of destroying ISIS bases outside Syria, Russia's operation will be insufficient. At present, the Russian Air Force has no agreement to operate in Iraqi airspace.

Russia's military involvement in Syria: Repeating the West's mistakes

The Kremlin runs the risk of repeating the mistakes of the Western coalition, whose operation against ISIS has yet to deliver any tangible outcome. The fact is that the radical Islamists have long since adopted the tactics of sabotage and guerrilla warfare.

They have few bases and support centers. Operating in small groups, they "seep" into government-controlled territory. The group's Achilles' heel could be the illegal oil trade, but so far the West, Baghdad and Damascus have been powerless to stop it.

Another important factor is the grain trade, since ISIS controls most Iraqi and Syrian crop-growing regions. But will Russian planes really incinerate oil tanks and trucks loaded with grain, and strike large farms and oil fields?

It would no doubt hurt ISIS financially, but involve heavy casualties among the civilian population and provoke indignation in the West. However, Russia would indeed benefit if global prices for two of its major exports increased. The only snag is that such strategy would be ineffective.

A few destroyed caravans and cars will hardly prompt unscrupulous merchants in league with ISIS to think twice. Meanwhile, accurate information in respect of every illegal transport operation is virtually impossible to come by - especially when buyers of cheap oil are plenty and ISIS end customers (via intermediaries) include Damascus itself.

At the same time, a well-coordinated operation involving Syrian ground troops with Russian air support would facilitate the dispersal of rebel forces and the return of key areas to Damascus, which would in any case weaken ISIS and other radical Islamist groups. That would place Russian pilots in harm's way, but given the militants' lack of surface-to-air firepower, the risks are manageable.

Political implications of Russian military involvement

The political aspect of Russia's operation in Syria outweighs the military. Unlike the Western coalition, the Kremlin is operating in full accordance with international law. Its actions are sanctioned by the legitimate government of Syria and targeted against international terrorism, which the West is also fighting.

According to this logic, Washington and its allies can do nothing but recognize the wisdom of Russia's actions and agree to share intelligence. To that end, a meeting was promptly scheduled for Oct. 1 between U.S. and Russian military chiefs at the initiative of both sides.

Clearly the participants have to reach an agreement on zones of responsibility and the exchange of information. However, it is unlikely that the Kremlin has official permission to conduct strikes on Iraqi soil, which, as noted above, complicates operations in support of forces loyal to Assad, since the radical Islamists will simply redeploy across the border to regions they control in Iraq.

Yet Moscow has resolved one important issue regarding its support for Damascus. The Western coalition is now very unlikely to strike at government forces, since it could provoke a clash with the Russian Air Force, which is effectively serving as a kind of "umbrella" for the Assad regime.

In addition, the slowly crumbling National Coalition is clearly an ally in name only. During the course of the three-year war, the Syrian government has demonstrated remarkable resilience and vitality, and Russian support over the coming months will only strengthen its positions.

The West is essentially at a fork in the road: either it can admit to being wrong on Syria and grudgingly reconcile itself with Bashar al-Assad, or it can apply force to counter Russian support for Damascus. The latter scenario could see the start of an undeclared war in the Syrian sky, in which Russian planes are shot down by Western air defense systems knowingly supplied to anti-Assad rebels, and U.S. missiles are fired dangerously close to Russian troops.

It would be more advisable for the West to sit tight and see how the situation develops. Will Russia get bogged down in Syria, like the United States did in Iraq and Afghanistan? Are there clearly defined objectives on completion of which the operation will end? One thing is sure: Only through joint efforts can ISIS be stopped and regional stability restored.
 
 #19
Russia Beyond the Headlines
www.rbth.ru
October 1, 2015
Press Digest SPECIAL: What are the scenarios for Moscow's Syrian campaign?
RBTH presents a selection of views from leading Russian media on Russia's air campaign against targets in Syria, featuring analysis of the potential scenarios for further air strikes, as well as reports on the sites being targeted and the controversy over whether these sites are actually in areas held by Islamic State (ISIS) militants.
Alexey Timofeychev, RBTH
 
Options for air strikes

The bombing of ISIS positions in Syria by the Russian air force, which began on Wednesday, Sept. 30, could be held in two scenarios - defensive and offensive, reports the business daily Kommersant.

As the newspaper notes, the essence of the first scenario is to help the government forces of President Bashar al-Assad to maintain the Mediterranean coast and the surrounding area under their control.

"This is where the Alawites - President Bashar al-Assad's coreligionists, on whom his government mainly relies - live in close proximity. There are two very important port cities there - Latakia and Tartus (the latter hosts a logistical support base for the Russian Navy)," writes the newspaper.

The second, offensive scenario, the newspaper notes, could be carried out in parallel with the defensive one. It is clearly riskier for Russia, but at the same time - more advantageous in terms of its international image, says the article.

"The ideal option in terms of the propaganda effect would be the liberation of Palmyra, with its ancient ruins, from ISIS," the article says.
According to the experts interviewed by Kommersant, this would be well within the capabilities of the Russian special forces with the support of the air force and Syrian troops.

Citing a source in the operational control of the military, the newspaper also reports on the composition of the Russian air force group in Syria.

According to Kommersant, a full-fledged mixed air group was formed on the Hmeymim airfield near Latakia. It consists of Su-24M and Su-34 strike fighters, Su-25SM ground attack aircraft and Su-30SM multi-role fighters, as well as Mi-24 attack helicopters and Mi-8 multi-role helicopters, adopted by the Russian air and space forces.
 
Lavrov asks for evidence

The Russian daily RBK quotes Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who has asked Washington to provide evidence that Russia had not carried out air strikes on ISIS positions. Earlier, the Pentagon said that areas where there were no terrorists had been attacked.

"There is a concern on the part of our American partners that perhaps the targets were not the right ones, they expressed these concerns to us, they claimed that they had some evidence. We asked them to present [the evidence], because we answer for our targets," said Lavrov.

According to Lavrov, the Russian air force is carrying out airstrikes exclusively on targets related to ISIS.

"I drew the attention of my American colleague to the fact that the concern expressed by him that the targets of these attacks were not ISIS positions is groundless," he said.
 
Russian air force targets ISIS pipelines

The liberal newspaper Novaya Gazeta reports that one of the objectives of the Russian military action in Syria is the elimination of one of ISIS's most important financing channels via the bombing of oil pipelines used by the Islamists to sell oil illegally.

Earlier, the newspaper reported that "in the first place, the coordinates of pumping stations that maintain the pressure in the pipeline that carries the terrorist organization ISIS's oil were fed to the onboard computers of attack aircraft and bombers in Syria, not just the details of the places where the leaders of the terrorists were based."

Novaya Gazeta claims that it received information about consultations of the military with oil specialists.

"Representatives of the Ministry of Defense were primarily interested in the question which points of pumping stations, responsible for the pumping of oil through the pipeline, must be put out of action to prevent the possibility of pumping oil, and therefore illegal trade in raw materials," writes the newspaper.
 
Syria and Gazprom

The overthrow of Assad's regime in Syria threatens to change the balance of the European gas market, as in this case Qatar can build a direct pipeline through Syrian territory to Turkey, writes the news website Gazeta.ru.

In this regard, the newspaper points out, bolstering Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad may be advantageous to Russia in terms of competition on the European gas market.

It is Syria that is the best route for gas supplies from Qatar, which is already one of the largest suppliers to the EU market, to Turkey, and thence to Europe.

However, the political analysts interviewed by the newspaper say that the terrorists from ISIS fighting in Syria have become too independent of their "sponsors" and building a pipeline through Syria would be a very risky business, even if Assad loses.
 
 #20
Russia Direct
www.russia-direct.org
October 1, 2015
Syria 2015: Echoes of Afghanistan 1979?
In the aftermath of Russian airstrikes against ISIS, there have been increasing warnings that Syria could be to Russia what Afghanistan was to the Soviet Union. Is that really the case?
By Sergey Markedonov
Sergey Markedonov is an Associate Professor at Russian State University for the Humanities based in Moscow (Russia). From May 2010 to October 2013, he was a visiting fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (Washington, DC, USA). In April-May 2015 he was a visiting fellow at the Center for Russia and Central Asia Studies, Institute of International Studies (IIS), Fudan University (Shanghai, China).

On the last day in September, the upper house of the Russian parliament unanimously approved President Vladimir Putin's request to deploy Russian armed forces outside the country. Shortly thereafter, it was reported that the Russian Aerospace Forces (which include the Russian Air Force) had begun attacking the positions of the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS).

In the words of Putin, the fight against terrorists must be proactive - otherwise "they will surely come to Russia." That's open to debate, but not even the Russian leader's fiercest critics can deny that long before Russia's military intervention in the Syrian conflict, ISIS had already earmarked the North Caucasus - and Russia as a whole - as a target. That's something that Al-Qaeda and other jihadist groups have never done before.

The ISIS threat is not only about radical Islam spreading from the Middle East. In November and December last year, some North Caucasian jihadists swore allegiance to Islamic State's latter-day "caliph" Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

The "inner circle" of ISIS contains more than a few natives of the Greater Caucasus region (one of the most colorful characters, Tarkhan Batirashvili, hails from Georgia). Islamic State is by no means the only force opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad - and besides fighting him they are also fighting each other.

There are many anti-Assad groups (such as Jabhat Al-Nusra which is also fighting ISIS) with radical Islamist slogans on their banners. If Assad does indeed fall, do not expect the ideals of European democracy to spring forth in this particular part of the world.

Russian roulette: The risks are rising

Putin's seemingly impromptu initiative was evidently well-rehearsed and well-prepared. What is also clear is that Moscow's interventionist campaign in Syria is fraught with risks. In the standoff between Russia and ISIS, the once dominant rhetoric has given way to armed confrontation, adding fuel to the arguments of those who champion the "liberation of the Caucasus" from "Moscow's dictates" within and outside of Russia.

It is clearly a propaganda stunt, replete with intimidating statements as is customary for any terrorist organization. Nevertheless, the risks posed by opponents of Russian interventionism should not be underestimated.

But does it mean that Syria 2015 promises to be a repeat of Afghanistan 1979 for the Kremlin? As soon as news broke of the Federation Council's decision, the information space was overflowing with parallels between the two events.

Three reasons why comparisons with Afghanistan are premature

Such comparisons no doubt can attract online clicks, but they have little analytical value.

First, the extent of Russia's intervention in the Syrian conflict is not strictly defined. For the time being, the strategy is air raids without ground operations. Whether Moscow can stay on the right side of this "red line" is difficult to predict, since armed conflict creates its own logic with the power to wreck even the most carefully laid plans.

But as long as there is no army in Syria performing its "international duty," parallels with Afghanistan are inappropriate. At the very least, they are premature.

Second, Afghanistan in 1979 was a Cold War crucible, where not only different interests and coalitions clashed, but two socio-political ideologies. Russia is no longer in the business of spreading Communist and revolutionary ideals around the world.

Its approach today is more conservative and guarded - some might even say reactionary. But in any case the focus today is more on preserving the status quo and "freezing the conflict." Only if that fails (as happened in Georgia in 2008 and Crimea in 2014) will Moscow raise the political stakes and switch from being reactive to proactive.

Third, unlike the Soviet Union, modern Russia lacks the resources to compete with the United States on the global arena that stretches from Cuba and Nicaragua to Afghanistan - whatever anyone says. Its interests are limited mostly to the "near abroad" (i.e. the Commonwealth of Independent States). Any involvement further afield (Syria, for instance) is dictated primarily by security considerations, both internal and in the immediate vicinity.

Jihadism today poses a serious threat in Central Asia, particularly Tajikistan, which is heavily impacted by the turbulence in Afghanistan. Similar risks exist in the Greater Caucasus, including Russia's own North Caucasus regions.

The lesser evil?

Moscow's choice is not between two scenarios - one good, the other bad. The choice is between two different sets of problems. Russia can either passively wait for Damascus to fall, statehood in the Middle East to collapse and the jihadist threat (not necessarily the one that comes only from ISIS, but also from other radical movements) to encroach upon Russia's borders, or it can preventively intervene. Neither option is ideal. Both are saturated with risk.

Incidentally, Russia could become actively involved in the Central Asia, too, especially in the aforementioned Tajikistan. It was no accident that the text of the Federation Council's decision on the use of military force abroad set no geographical or chronological framework.

But searching for hidden "imperial" ambitions is futile. The growing instability of the situation, coupled with Moscow's complex relations with the West (and lack of mutual trust with Washington), is forcing risky and contradictory decisions to be made. Syria is seen as an opportunity if not to fully normalize relations with the West, then to at least return them to the realm of pragmatism.

The common threat posed by radical jihadists, along with the rising chaos in this strategically important region, could narrow the differences between the two sides. But for Washington and its allies, would a stronger Russia outweigh the benefits of a weaker ISIS? It may be a rhetorical question, but the key to international stability lies in the answer
 
#21
www.mcclatchydc.com
October 1, 2015
For Putin, fight in Syria also a struggle with bitter domestic enemies
By Mitchell Prothero
Prothero is a McClatchy special correspondent.

Thousands of Russian speakers from former Soviet republics now fight in Syria
Largest non-Arab group within the Islamic State, Russian speakers also fight with Nusra
Fighters include Chechens, Dagestanis seeking independence from Moscow

IRBIL, Iraq-Russian President Vladimir Putin's entry this week into the long-running Syrian civil war is driven as much by concerns over the number of Russian speakers among jihadist rebel groups as it is over worries about his country's place in the Middle East, analysts say.

Russian speakers - from Chechnya as well as other former Soviet Union republics - compose the single largest group of non-Arab foreign fighters in Syria, not just in the Islamic State but also in al Qaida's Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front.

On Thursday, according to a statement by a Syrian security official reported by the AFP news agency, Russian warplanes based in Syria targeted Nusra's facilities in Idlib province where Chechen fighters maintain a significant presence. Among the groups struck, according to the AFP report, was the Army of the Emigrants, a group composed largely of Russian speakers that was once headed by Georgian-Chechen jihadist Abu Omar al Shishani.

Shishani, a hero of Georgia's 2008 war with Russia whose real name is Tarkhan Batirashvili, swore allegiance to the Islamic State in November 2013 and is now one of its top military commanders. But the Army of the Emigrants, which is often referred to as JaM for its Arabic-language initials, continued, manned by many Chechen and other native Russian speakers who did not go over to the Islamic State.

The group is now headed by another ethnic Chechen, Muslim Shishani, who has sworn allegiance to the Nusra Front.

For Putin the situation is much worse because the Chechens, Dagestanis and Central Asians can come home and start actual insurgencies against Russian interests and rule. European intelligence official

Another group of Russian-speaking jihadists left the Army of the Emigrants last month and adopted the name Imrat Kavkaz, or Caucasus Emirate, a reference to the original Chechen fighting groups that battled the Russians throughout the 1990s.

Russian speakers from predominately Muslim areas in the Caucasus Mountains as well as from Central Asian states that once belonged to the former Soviet Union also are fighting with Ahrar al Sham, perhaps the largest of the Syrian groups that espouse a radical ideology and oppose replacing the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad with a democratic system.

How many Russian speakers are fighting with the radical groups is an unknown, but they number in the thousands. One European intelligence official, who is not authorized to speak on the record to journalists but is from a NATO country that has a significant number of citizens fighting in Iraq and Syria with the Islamic State, said the the Russian-speaking fighters pose a greater military threat to Russian interests than Western European fighters offer if they return home from the Middle Eastern battlefield.

"We have hundreds of citizens and residents fighting alongside ISIS and some European countries have thousands," he said. "Obviously this is of great concern from a national security standpoint, because we have already seen a sharp escalation in terrorist activity linked to the Syrian civil war. But for Putin the situation is much worse because the Chechens, Dagestanis and Central Asians can come home and start actual insurgencies against Russian interests and rule."

White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Thursday referenced the risks to Russia's internal security from Russian-speaking jihadis in comments criticizing the Russian bombing in Syria. He said the result of the airstrikes would be "exacerbating the extremist problem that Russia has inside of Russia."

Russia fought two bitter wars in Chechnya in the 1990s. Putin effectively established control over the area by installing a loyalist strongman, Ramzan Kadyrov, in power there. But Russian security forces and targets continue to come under occasional attack from Chechen and other rebels from the Muslim communities in the region.

One Chechen fighter who had fought with Abu Omar al Shishani as part of the Army of the Emigrants before leaving for Turkey after being wounded said in an interview earlier this year that the motivation for many Chechens to go to Syria was to establish a safe base along the nearby Turkey-Syrian border from which they could reconstitute the rebellion against Russia.

"I always understood that Tarkhan joined (the Islamic State) because they promised to re-establish an emirate in the Caucasus that could be used to restart the war for liberation by all the Muslim people in the region," said the Chechen fighter, who spoke anonymously because of security concerns. "Fighting Russians is the one thing that binds every Chechen warrior's will."
 
 #22
Gazeta.ru
September 30, 2015
Air strikes in Syria risk drawing Russia into "big Muslim war" - editorial
Editorial: In state of siege. Might Syrian campaign entail big Muslim war for Russia?

The Federation Council has given the president permission to use the Army outside Russia - this time to combat ISIL. It is a question for now only of Syria and only of air operations. But nobody knows or can know where, when, or how Russia's embarking on a military campaign in the Near East will end.

Formally, the vote in the Federation Council following Bashar al-Asad's request to Russia for military assistance appears a technical procedure. Rather, it is essentially the legalization of the military presence that Russia already has in Syria. Nobody conceals this: just a few hours after the senators' unanimous approval the first Russian air strike was carried out in Syria.

Against the background of this decision the rouble began to strengthen, not fall. Stock exchange indexes also grew. This is not surprising either. The financial markets perceived the official legalization of Russia's military presence in Syria as a consequence of an accord between Putin and Obama - which means greater cooperation between the two countries after a moratorium of virtually a year.

Maybe Obama and Putin really did arrive at some accords. There probably has been something of a rapprochement in the matter of Bashar al-Asad's personal destiny. It is no coincidence that movements have appeared in the American position and were aired by Secretary of State John Kerry. "Peace is impossible while Al-Asad is in power. Period," Kerry remarked. But he added that, although the United States continues to insist on the Syrian leader's resignation, it is not demanding now that he take this step without delay. Instead, Kerry pointed out, it is necessary to ensure a smooth transfer of power in the country, because Al-Asad's hasty removal from power can only exacerbate the situation in Syria and harm its population, provoking new casualties.

That is, the problem of ISIL (which is banned in Russia), with terrorism spreading throughout the region, has nonetheless been placed above the specific individual in power.

But the degree of rapprochement between Moscow and Washington over the Syrian problem should not be exaggerated either. This is, after all, not a general "anti-Hitler coalition" against ISIL, as Putin proposed from the UN rostrum, but independent actions by Russia in Syria by agreement with the US Administration.

Kerry supposed that, by getting involved in the Syrian conflict, Moscow is getting itself into a complex situation and will be forced, sooner or later, to change political course. "If he (Vladimir Putin) openly sides with Al-Asad, Iran, and Hezbollah, he will get very serious problems with Near Eastern countries, the majority of whose population are Sunnis. This means that he himself might become a target for Sunni jihadists," the secretary of state said.

To this can be added the fact that, if Russian weapons in Syria fall into Hezbollah's hands and are used against Israeli population centres, as has happened repeatedly before, Israel, for which Al-Asad is no less an enemy than ISIL, may also join in the war.

For the time being Russia does not intend to participate in ground operations. Putin declared this in an interview with the American journalist Charles Rose on the eve of the 70th UNGA session and once again after his meeting with Barack Obama. Sergey Ivanov, head of the Kremlin administration, also spoke of this on 30 September when explaining the president's request to senators in the Federation Council.

At the same time every war lives within its own logic, and no military chief can foresee it all at once. He can merely follow it or resist it when the time comes and he has understood that sufficient assistance has been given.

It is no coincidence that the permission to send in troops does not indicate the specific country. Events may develop in such a way that matters will not be confined to Syria alone. ISIL is already dug in in Iraq. The Iraqi authorities themselves have already voiced hope that the Russian bombing of ISIL on the border of Iraq and Syria will help to combat terrorists in their country as well. A few days ago radical Islamists of the Taleban movement sensationally used a lightning assault to capture Konduz, the largest city in the north of Afghanistan on the border with Tajikistan. The 201st Russian Military Base, the largest outside Russia, is located in Tajikistan. If the Afghan war spreads to Tajikistan - something that should not be ruled out - this will become the problem not of NATO but of Moscow, for Russia is obliged to defend Tajikistan under the Collective Security Treaty.

And yet, whereas the military chief follows the logic of war, the politician always remembers the price of this war. This means that, while war is not being waged on his own territory, any politician can say: Enough, we must not cross this line because we will pay too high a price. There is no reason to believe that the Russian leaders are not aware of this price.

There are even more objective ideological grounds for Russia's participation in the Syrian war than the Ukrainian one. The threat to the world and to Russia itself on the part of Islamic radicals is far more real than that from "Ukrainian fascists." However, whereas the Russian-speaking Donbass is close and understandable to the electorate, like the "Russian world" idea, the "Damascus People's Republic" idea is far less close to the man in the street. It is no coincidence that, according to recent Levada Centre poll data, just 18 per cent of Russians advocated direct military support for Al-Asad.

Russia's citizens seem, in general, to be tired of war. We have not yet got out of Ukraine, and now there is Syria. In addition, it is not very clear whether we have real allies in this war or whether the Americans, as well as other players in the region, want to use us to resolve some of their own problems in the Near East. After all, the already existing coalition against ISIL embraces more than 60 countries - more than participated in World War II. True, this coalition is ineffective. And Russia has no intention of joining it at present.

The military asseverate that only officers and contract servicemen who have themselves expressed a wish to volunteer will be mobilized in the operation against "Islamic State." According to one of the sources cited by Interfax, "General Staff and Air Force officers and military-technical personnel to service aviation hardware will mainly be involved in the operation to counter ISIL militarily."

Nevertheless, against a background of fears about the further escalation of the situation, about being drawn into the campaign, and about antiwar sentiments (with regard to distant Syria) prevailing in society, clear explanations are needed.

In that case Putin's words that "we do not intend to plunge headlong into this conflict," "we will support the Syrian Army only from the air, only for the duration of offensive operations, and only against terrorists," that the reason for our participation is "unceremonious interference from outside," will have to be backed up by specific steps.

First, we too are interfering from outside, albeit at the request of official Damascus. Second, any failure by Russia in this military campaign will undoubtedly be used by our political opponents both in the West and in the Islamic world. That is, Russia does not have the right to be defeated, and not even victory will guarantee our protection against revenge by radical Islamists or subsequent new grievances in the West.

Third, nobody knows how long these offensive operations will last or whether Al-Asad's army can quickly defeat ISIL even with Russian air support. Again, if Russia bombs not ISIL but the Syrian opposition (as Reuters, in particular, reported after the first bombing run in Homs Province, although everyone knows that there are territories in Syria about control over which even the coalition has no reliable information, not to mention Western media), this could give rise to new sanctions against Russia and even accidental direct clashes between Russian Federation and US forces because of poor coordination of actions.

The history of the 20th century suggests that it is best to enter a war when it has already been won and not try to win it by the sweat of one's brow: Remember Vietnam, for example. While the Americans themselves were fighting in the 2000s, we were skimming the cream from this in the form of rising oil prices. Now we have decided to be in the vanguard: Will we hack it?

The main point is that Russia, even against its will, is risking being drawn into a big Muslim war that is already, in fact, affecting many countries. If this war drags on, we may also get an upsurge of Islamic extremism inside Russia.

However cynical this sounds, there are advantages to Russia's participation in this war if it proves short and successful. These could be the de facto legitimization of Crimea as part of the Russian Federation in the eyes of the international community (they simply will not nag us about it at every opportunity) and - if the Minsk agreements are implemented and control of the border is returned to Ukraine - a possible easing of sanctions, particularly on the part of Europe. However, the States will actively assist this if it decides that it is possible to ease the pressure on Russia slightly. It will not undertake to lift them itself but will ask the Europeans to do so.

Finally, Western countries are speaking with Russia for the first time in 18 months and making plans together. Russia is coordinating its actions with them, and they are all exchanging information. War always means grief, for everyone. But maybe this will also give everyone the opportunity to restore relations and at least minimal trust in one another.
 
 #23
Irrussianality
https://irrussianality.wordpress.com
October 1, 2015
RUSSIA'S 'HOLY WAR' IN SYRIA
By Paul Robinson
University of Ottawa

Commenting on the Russian military campaign in Syria, Vsevolod Chaplin, the provocative head of the Russian Orthodox Church's department for church-society relations, remarked this week that, 'The struggle against terrorism ... is a very moral, if you like holy, struggle'. But one of Chaplin's former teachers, Andrei Zubov, has spoken very differently: 'We have the social concept of the Russian church, which the synod approved 15 years ago, in 2000, and of which I was one of the authors, and it clearly says that war is a very great tragedy.'

Russian philosophers have generally not paid much attention to what in the West is called 'just war theory'. The Soviet position was rather crude: in essence, any war fought by reactionary forces (i.e. capitalist states) was automatically unjust, while any war fought by progressive (i.e. communist) states was automatically just. For more sophisticated analysis, one has to go back in time to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Leo Tolstoy's 1894 book The Kingdom of God is Within You laid out the pacifist position, and earned a riposte in the form of Vladimir Solovyov's 1900 work Three Conversations. The latter is possibly the most entertaining book of just war theory anybody has ever written, but its format - essentially a play in three acts - means that it doesn't provide a very complex examination of the subject, and in any case it goes seriously off the rails at the end with a bizarre story about the Anti-Christ. And that is pretty much it for pre-revolutionary literature.

The First World War prompted a few philosophers such as Nikolai Berdyaev, as well as Metropolitan Anthony of Kiev and Galicia, to pen short articles on the ethics of war, but as far as I am aware, the only book-length examination of the ethics of violence by a Russian philosopher prior to the collapse of communism is Ivan Ilyin's 1925 work On Resistance to Evil by Force. Given the interest that my previous posts about Ilyin have generated, it is worth looking at this in some depth.

Ilyin's basic argument is that the moral demands of war are contradictory. In some circumstances, one may be morally obliged to wage war, but doing so involves carrying out actions which are usually considered unjust (killing, deceiving, etc). Consequently, the necessary use of force is an 'unsinful perpetration of injustice', which requires 'spiritual compromise'. This is a deliberately contradictory position: Ilyin's argument is that it is only by recognizing the inherently contradictory moral demands of force that one can avoid the moral pitfalls associated with it.

Ilyin reached this conclusion by arguing that the imperfection of the world creates situations in which one has no choice but to use force in order to prevent the triumph of evil. In such situations, the use of force is a moral obligation. But while it is necessary, it isn't 'just'. 'The way of the sword', Ilyin wrote, 'is an unjust path ... what the swordbearer does in the fight with evildoers is not perfect, not holy, not just'. The actions of your enemy which justify your actions are always at least partly your fault, as there is always something you could have done to prevent them. Even a war of self-defence isn't 'just' because everybody is in some way responsible for the external environment which has created the situation in which self-defence becomes necessary. Since everybody is thus at least partially responsible for any war they fight, 'every war without exception is a morally guilty act.'

Furthermore, the use of force only combats the external manifestations of evil. This is insufficient. One must also fight what nowadays we would call the 'root causes' of the evil. Otherwise, the evil will merely return once you defeat it.

Finally, Ilyin notes that force tends to excite the passions and undermine the moral senses of those who use it. To avoid this problem, people must, in line with the argument above, recognize that what they are doing, though necessary, is not just, and they must undergo continual 'penitential self-purification'. In other words, the only way to avoid the worst consequences of war is to rid yourself of the idea that because your enemies are the 'bad guys' that means that you are the 'good guy' and thus free to do as you choose.

So, what would Ilyin's logic tell us about Russia's war in Syria? I think roughly the following:

-The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is an evil which must be fought. Armed struggle against it is not only justifiable, but mandatory.

-Nevertheless, ISIS is just a symptom of a deeper problem. That deeper problem is ultimately a spiritual one. Fighting ISIS without fighting the root causes which produced ISIS is pointless. One cannot simply defeat ISIS and return to the status quo ante.

-Among the root causes of ISIS are the actions of those now fighting it - the repressive regimes in Iraq and Syria, and the failed interventions by Western states in the Middle East. Russia also has contributed to the situation by its previous support of those repressive regimes. It must acknowledge its share of responsibility for the problem and change its behaviour.

-While necessary, attacking ISIS is not a morally good action. It is at best a lesser evil. It will involve injustices - for instance, when innocent civilians are killed as 'collateral damage' in Russian air strikes. Those fighting can't just brush off the injustices as mistakes, unavoidable consequences of military action, and so on. They must acknowledge their guilt.

I don't accept all of Ilyin's reasoning. I am far more pacifistic. But his logic is undoubtedly original and poses significant challenges to the way people normally think of the ethics of violence. On the one hand it requires the use of force in some situations. On the other hand, it is extremely demanding of those who do use force. In line with Zubov, I have previously written on this blog that 'holy war' is not part of Orthodox tradition. From what I have read, it is not part of the wider Russian philosophical tradition either.
 
 #24
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
October 1, 2015
Russia goes to war in Syria
Putin takes action while Obama parses words
By Gwynne Dyer
Gwynne Dyer is an independent journalist and military historian based inLondon.

It all happened very fast. On Monday Russian President Vladimir Putin was at the United Nations saying the United States was making "an enormous mistake" in not backing Syria's President Bashar Assad in his war against Islamist rebels, notably including the so-called "Islamic State," once known as ISIS.

On Tuesday the upper chamber of the Russian parliament unanimously voted to let Mr. Putin use military force in Syria to fight "terrorism," in response to a request from the Syrian government.

And on Wednesday morning the Russian warplanes started bombing rebel targets in Syria. Moscow gave the U.S. embassy in Iraq one hour's notice, requesting that U.S. and "coalition" warplanes (which are also bombing Islamic State targets in Syria) avoid the airspace where the Russian bombers were in action.

And Donald Trump, bless his heart, said "You know, Russia wants to get ISIS, right? We want to get ISIS. Russia is in Syria - maybe we should let them do it? Let them do it."

And for once, Mr. Trump is right. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

If you want to stop the Islamic State, you have to do it with troops, and the only ground troops fighting the group in Syria are the Syrian army and the Kurds along the northern border with Turkey. But the United States has been duped by Turkey into betraying the Kurds, and the United States will not use its airpower to help the Syrian army, which is now on the ropes.

That's why Palmyra fell to the Islamic State in May. Despite all the other American airstrikes against Islamic State forces in Syria, it made not one to help the Syrian forces when they were desperately defending the historic city, and so they eventually had to retreat. It was more important to Washington not to be seen helping Mr. Assad than to save the city.

This is a fine moral position, as the Assad regime is a deeply unattractive dictatorship. Indeed, the great majority of the 4 million Syrians who have fled the country were fleeing the regime's violence, not that of the Islamic State people. But if you don't want the Islamist extremists to take over the country (and maybe Lebanon and Jordan as well), and you're not willing to put troops on the ground yourself, who else would you help?

Washington's fantasy solution to this problem has been to create a "third force" of rebels who will somehow defeat the Islamic State while diplomacy somehow removes Mr. Assad. But the other big rebel organizations in Syria, al-Nusra and Ahrar al-Sham, are also Islamists, little different from the Islamic State in their ideology and goals. In fact, al-Nusra is a breakaway faction of the Islamic State, now affiliated with al-Qaida. (Remember al-Qaida? Chaps who did the 9/11 attacks)?

If Mr. Assad goes down, it is Islamic State, al-Nusra and Ahrar al-Sham who will take over Syria, not the pathetic little band of fighters being trained by the United States in Turkey. In fact, the first group of them to cross back into Syria were immediately annihilated by Islamic State fighters, who had probably been tipped off by America's not very loyal ally, the Turkish government.

Mr. Putin does not make the same meaningless distinctions between Islamic State and the other Islamist groups that the United States insists on. The first Russian air strikes were on territory held by al-Nusra, not Islamic State. But the Russians will hit the Islamic State group, too. In fact, the first big operation will probably be an attack by a re-equipped Syrian army to retake Palmyra, heavily backed by Russian air power.

Mr. Putin has said he will not commit Russian ground forces to combat in Syria, for the Russian public doesn't want to see its soldiers involved in another war against Islamists after their miserable experience in Afghanistan in the 1980s. But the resolution in his parliament didn't make any promises about that, and we may yet see Russian ground troops fighting in Syria, too.

Whether Mr. Putin's intervention will be enough to save Mr. Assad remains to be seen. The carping comments in the Western media about how he wants to distract attention from Russia's involvement in the Ukrainian civil war and restore Russia's position as a great power are true enough - indeed, he is probably shutting down the fighting in Ukraine mainly to clear the decks for Syria - but that is not his primary motive.

He is just doing what needs to be done.
 
 #25
RIA Novosti
October 1, 2015
Russia's Lavrov speaks against "demonizing" Syrian president

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said that statements that the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group can only be defeated if Syrian President Bashar al-Asad leaves office are not serious, RIA Novosti (part of the state-owned International News Agency Rossiya Segodnya) reported on 1 October.

Speaking at a news conference at the UN, Lavrov said: "IS can be defeated only if Al-Asad goes - such statements do not sound serious to me."

He said the international community often wrongly demonises some leaders. "[Former Iraqi leader] Saddam Husayn was hanged. Has Iraq become better or safer? [Former Libyan leader Mu'ammar] Al-Qadhafi was killed in front of a crowd. Has Libya become better? Now we are demonizing Al-Asad. Maybe we should try to learn the lessons from the past?" Lavrov said.

"Yes, political changes are necessary in Syria, and the Geneva communique is is what we are committed to, and we are not changing this position," Lavrov said.

"We can not forget about the political process, but we can not make changes in the political system in Syria a condition of the fight against IS. We are convinced that, first of all, the fight against terrorism should be priority should be, but in parallel with this, not after but in parallel, - a lot of things could be done on the political front," Lavrov said.

The minister said that "all Syrians, as suggested by the Geneva communique, must come together and agree on the key parameters of the state".
 
 #26
New York Times
October 2, 2015
Editorial
Russia's Dangerous Escalation in Syria

Russia's airstrikes in Syria cross a dangerous line in the Middle East that escalates the bloody conflict and risks bringing Russia into direct confrontation with the United States. This move by President Vladimir Putin complicates an already chaotic battlefield and will certainly make a political settlement even harder to achieve.

Mr. Putin's claim that the primary motivation for the bombing is to fight and destroy terrorists, including the Islamic State, is dubious. It is more likely that the Russian leader's main objective is to rescue President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, whose hold on power has weakened as the Syrian Army has lost ground not only to the Islamic State, which is trying to establish a caliphate in Syria and Iraq, but also to a coalition of insurgent groups that is opposed to the Islamic State.

Syria is Russia's chief ally in the Middle East, and Mr. Putin has enabled Mr. Assad throughout the conflict. Mr. Putin could have prevented the turn to violence back in 2011 by persuading his ally not to attack peaceful antigovernment protesters.

Whether Russia will try to help Mr. Assad reclaim control over the entire country is unclear, but some American officials suspect the plans go beyond what Mr. Putin said on Wednesday would be "limited" airstrikes. In recent weeks, the Russians have poured tanks, aircraft and other heavy weapons into Syria. It makes sense to assume the worst, given Mr. Putin's behavior in Ukraine, where he initially denied moving weapons and troops into the country, then annexed Crimea and continues to destabilize the eastern region.

President Obama appears to have been caught off guard by the bold move to reassert Russian influence in the Middle East, as Mr. Putin no doubt intended. Despite American-led airstrikes, the administration has no real strategy for Syria. There is no obvious Russian strategy either, except for bolstering Mr. Assad, whom Mr. Putin considers the key to stability but most of his brutalized citizens detest.

Mr. Putin may have the initiative now, but the risks for Russia, whose economy is suffering from Ukraine-related sanctions and falling oil prices, are real. Before launching the operation, the Russians did not try to work out a plan with the Americans to ensure their respective warplanes would not come in contact.

Military experts say that the Russian planes are old and could crash and that Russian weapons may not be precise enough to avoid extensive civilian casualties. Mr. Putin has legitimate concerns about foreign fighters returning home to Russia from Syria, but his new military operation could backfire and make Russia an even greater target of extremists.

The Americans rightly rejected a Russian warning after the airstrikes started to avoid Syrian airspace and halt their attacks on the Islamic State. Mr. Obama will have to work with America's partners on a unified response to Russia's moves and seek a way to end the war.

On Wednesday, Mr. Putin said he hoped that after the Russian intervention Mr. Assad would be open to compromise. But with Russia willing to intervene directly on his behalf, Mr. Assad may conclude he can stay in power indefinitely.
 
 #27
Washington Post
October 2, 2015
Russia and the "facts on the ground" in Syria
By David Ignatius, Opinion writer

Russia's expanded role in the Middle East has been hiding in plain sight for months. And the Obama administration, eager for Moscow's diplomatic help, all but invited it. Now that Russian jets and tanks have arrived in Syria, this intervention doesn't look so benign.

"These are facts on the ground," warns John McLaughlin, former deputy director of the CIA, in an interview about the Russian military deployments. "Anything we do now will be conditioned by their presence and influence. This is a reality we now have to deal with."

To U.S. officials, Russian involvement in defusing the Syria mess seemed just a few months ago like a useful spinoff of the Iran nuclear deal. At the last negotiating session in Vienna, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is said to have turned to his "P5+1" colleagues and proposed similar cooperation in resolving other Middle East disputes.

President Obama and Secretary of State John F. Kerry were hopeful about working with the Russians on a "managed transition" away from a weakened President Bashar al-Assad. "I do think the window has opened a crack for us to get a political resolution in Syria, partly because both Russia and Iran, I think, recognize that the trend lines are not good for Assad," Obama told reporters at the White House on Aug. 5.

Back then, the enthusiasts for greater Russian involvement in the Middle East included many traditional U.S. allies who also seemed eager to play the Russian card. Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman traveled to Moscow; so did United Arab Emirates leader Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan. Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir met with Kerry and Lavrov in Qatar. An ominous sign of what was really ahead - a Russian-Iranian alliance to bolster Assad - came with the Moscow visit of Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran's Quds Force. But otherwise, this looked until a week ago like a diplomatic love boat.

Obama and his allies failed to anticipate that Russian President Vladimir Putin would come armed to the negotiating table - and prepared to use his weapons to gain military leverage. Putin embodies a kind of muscular diplomacy the United States disdained over the past three years of halfhearted attempts to train and equip the Syrian opposition. Obama's failure to develop a coherent strategy left the field open for Putin.

The speed and decisiveness of Russian action appear to have taken the administration by surprise, prompting Kerry to voice "grave concerns." A U.S. official said the intelligence community predicted that Russia would provide indirect support to Assad, such as training and advisers, but that "direct military intervention was not considered the most likely" response.

A source close to Assad's regime blasted what he claimed was chronic American misunderstanding of Syria. "The scandal is how amazingly incompetent American intelligence is," he wrote in an e-mail. "Not only were U.S. officials predicting until weeks ago that the Russians could abandon Assad...U.S. intelligence could not even pick up on what the Russians were doing, the logistical, technical, military and manpower preparations...[to] execute such an unprecedented mission."

Though Putin claimed Monday that Russia was intervening to fight the Islamic State, so far his targets have mostly been the anti-Assad rebels who were advancing in Homs and Hama in western Syria, threatening Assad's ancestral homeland of Latakia in the northwest. U.S. officials may protest, but they are "de-conflicting" military operations with the Russians, which many Syrians translate as cooperation.

Putin's air force may prop up Assad temporarily, but the Russians are playing a dangerous game in backing a leader despised by Sunni Muslims across the Arab world. A blunt warning comes from Maj. Issam al-Rayyes, a rebel spokesman: "Any power that stands with Assad in killing Syrians is an enemy of the Syrian people."

As the Russian military goes to war against jihadist fighters, 36 years after its ill-fated invasion of Afghanistan, Putin may imagine that he's banishing another ghost of the fallen Soviet Union. But he might review a 1991 study of lessons from Afghanistan, prepared by Russia's Frunze Military Academy and translated into English with the title "The Bear Went Over the Mountain." The Russian authors cite the mujahideen's "cunning," "surprise," "very broad agent reconnaissance network" and "intimate" knowledge of the battlefield. Russian citizens "did not understand why their sons were being conscripted for battle in a strange land," notes the translator.

Obama may have misjudged the danger of Russian military intervention in Syria. But the same may prove true of Putin himself.
 
 
#28
The Economist
October 3, 2015
Russia in Syria
A new spectacle for the masses
Vladimir Putin embarks on a risky campaign to prop up the Syrian regime and embarrass America

IF HIS intent was to draw attention to his military muscle, he certainly succeeded. Vladimir Putin, Russia's president, became the first leader in the Kremlin since Leonid Brezhnev, who invaded Afghanistan in 1979, to send military aircraft on bombing missions outside the territory of the former Soviet Union. On September 30th, Russian jets began a targeted campaign in parts of Syria held by rebels in order to prop up the beleaguered regime of Bashar al-Assad, a Russian client.

Not since the Boxer rebellion in 1900 have Russian forces fought in such proximity to American ones. In Kosovo they came close. In Syria they share the same skies: America is attacking the jihadists of Islamic State (IS); Russia says it wants to strike IS but has in fact started by attacking other Sunni rebels (including some who have received American weapons) who pose a more direct threat to Mr Assad.

Mr Putin has ruled out the use of ground forces in Syria, for fear of awakening painful memories of the Soviet debacle in Afghanistan. But by deploying jets and air-defence systems, Russia is complicating Western operations in Syria. France this month joined America in the increasingly crowded skies of the Levant.

Russia has prepared its air campaign for some time. Two weeks ago it held elaborate domestic war games in terrain closely resembling the Syrian desert. Russian war reporters who spent months on the eastern Ukrainian front lines have suddenly appeared in Syria, cameras rolling at the site of terrorist attacks.

The Russian Orthodox church has spoken of a holy war. But for the Kremlin it is just as important to be seen to be confronting America, which Mr Putin accuses of trying to dominate the world. Dmitry Kiselev, Russia's chief television propagandist, put it with wilful inaccuracy: "In Syria, America stands on the side of the terrorist caliphate. Together they are trying to destroy Syria as a secular state."   

Spade-work

Russia's bombing in Syria was preceded by a flurry of diplomatic activity. On September 28th Mr Putin spoke at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, comparing Russia's role to that of the Soviet Union in 1945 and blaming America for unsettling the Middle East. "I am urged to ask those who created this situation: 'Do you at least realise now what you've done?' But I'm afraid that this question will remain unanswered, because they have never abandoned their policy, which is based on arrogance, exceptionalism and impunity," Mr Putin declared from the podium.

Russian media portrayed him as a superman who has to clean up a mess. Ria Novosti, the state news agency, and other government propagandists flooded social-media networks with messages bearing the hashtag "#PutinPeacemaker".

The president has received some verbal support for his new campaign from the Italian prime minister and the German foreign minister, among others. But in America he is still viewed as a villain. A meeting with Barack Obama-the first long one since Russia's annexation of Crimea-ended with no result. Trust between the two leaders is the lowest it has been in decades, say close observers.

Mr Putin may be hoping that by claiming to fight IS he can force America into accepting him again as a partner in power, one too important to be isolated by sanctions imposed by the West in response to the war in Ukraine. Yet his gambit is laden with risks. Russia could get bogged down in what may be an unwinnable conflict. Its relationship with America could get worse rather than better, especially if the two military forces clashed, even inadvertently. Russian pilots might, given the lack of co-ordination in the skies, fall into the hands of knife-wielding executioners. "Putin miscalculated in Ukraine and he may miscalculate in Syria," warns Dmitry Trenin, the head of the Moscow Carnegie Centre, a think-tank. So why take such risks?

Russia's official-and not entirely unreasonable-response is that IS poses a threat to its national security, particularly in the north Caucasus, where many young fighters in Syria come from. The timing of the deployment was also partly prompted by the fact that Mr Assad's forces have been losing ground. While the Kremlin cares little about his personal fate, it needs him, or another ally, to stay in power long enough for Russia to have a say in any international negotiation on the future of Syria. There is also Russia's naval base in Tartus on the Syrian coast, its only foothold in the Middle East, which is a big market for Russian-made arms.

Even more important for Mr Putin is his hold on power at home, and here too Syria may be of use. The bombing provides a new and badly needed spectacle at a time when the war in Ukraine, which dominated the airwaves for a while, is starting to freeze and euphoria over the annexation of Crimea is fading. On top of that the Russian economy, hit by sanctions and falling oil prices, has been shrinking fast. During his first two presidential terms Mr Putin could boast about growing incomes. In his third term, he seems to rely more on the theatre of war and a manufactured sense of pride in challenging America.

"Syria provides a useful distraction from Ukraine, but strategically it is about America," says Mr Trenin. So far Mr Putin has avoided a direct clash with his great rival, but he has trapped Russia in a dangerous spiral of confrontation. As Georgy Mirsky, a venerable Middle East expert at Moscow's Higher School of Economics, says: "The rules of the confrontation dictate that you find your opponent's weak spot and hit, hit, hit."
 
 #29
www.rt.com
October 2, 2015
Insult to our intelligence: New information war against Russia
By Neil Clark
Neil Clark is a journalist, writer, broadcaster and blogger. He has written for many newspapers and magazines in the UK and other countries including The Guardian, Morning Star, Daily and Sunday Express, Mail on Sunday, Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph, New Statesman, The Spectator, The Week, and The American Conservative.
[Graphic elements here https://www.rt.com/op-edge/317300-syria-strikes-information-war/]

Talk about quick on the draw. No sooner had Russian planes taken off to bomb ISIS terrorists and their associates in Syria, claims made by the West's anti-Russia lobby started to flood in - only to be repeated in much of the western mainstream media.

Russia wasn't really targeting ISIS but "moderate rebels" and its strikes killed scores of innocent civilians (unlike US strikes during which we only get "collateral damage"). We've seen lots of tweets attacking Russia and pictures of injured children and people being pulled out of buildings posted online.

Now there's two possible explanations for the lightning fast way this new chapter in the "information war" against Russia has been launched.

The first is that the anti-Russian lobby have fantastic sources in Syria and know exactly who has been killed in air strikes moments after the bombs are dropped, or, in some cases possess clairvoyant powers and know who the victims will be even before the bombs fall. Also, that there are people on the ground with excellent high-speed Wi-Fi connections in a war zone who are able to post videos online of victims of Russian attacks with an alacrity that makes Usain Bolt look like a veritable slow coach.

The second alternative explanation is that the accusations and allegations that we've seen were already written up - filed and saved - and ready to be posted online as soon as Russia's parliament authorized the use of military force in Syria, in order to discredit the operation. Although air strikes, even if planned with surgical precision can kill civilians - which is of course the number one reason for opposing them - I know which explanation I find the more plausible.

Media monitoring group Media Lens warned us what to expect:

And as usual the Lensers, derided and denigrated by members of the elite journos' club - who have been proven wrong about just about everything (Iraqi WMDs anyone?) - were bang on the money.

The hypocrisy we've seen in the last day or so - even by the standards of the endless war lobby - has been truly breathtaking. "Those big bad Russians launching air strikes in a foreign country. Why, its outrageous! Only the US and its allies are allowed to do that!" People who were screeching for more 'intervention' against ISIS in Syria on Tuesday, found themselves all against 'intervention' against ISIS in Syria on Wednesday - when it was Russia doing the intervening.

Suddenly the 'moderate' rebels who had been so thin on the ground in Syria - are everywhere and Russian strikes are targeting them.

Conversely ISIS, which we were told was everywhere in Syria up to Tuesday, is nowhere - or at least not in the areas where the Russians are bombing.

Those who have been silent on civilians' deaths caused by the Saudi assault on Yemen, or on civilians' deaths caused by US-led bombing of Iraq and Syria, are, bursting with 'outrage' over alleged civilian deaths caused by Russian air-strikes - even before such deaths are confirmed.

Then there's the question of why Putin is intervening.

Russia, we are told is launching air strikes in Syria not because it genuinely wants to beat ISIS, but because it has "selfish interests" in the region. Of course, western motives for destabilizing Syria and backing violent 'rebels' to kill Syrian soldiers and overthrow the Syrian government are never selfish, but only benign and humanitarian. When the US and its allies bomb Syria, it's to be lauded, when Russia does it - then it's a sign of the Bear's sinister attempt to increase its influence in the region. Russia having an ally in the Middle East - why it's appalling! - only the US is allowed to have allies in an area where there is so much oil!

It shouldn't need to be said after the blatant lies we were told about Iraq, Libya and Syria up to now, but we need to take negative western claims about Russian actions in Syria, not with a pinch of salt, but with a huge barrow-load of the white stuff.

No ISIS in Al-Rastan in Homs province? Well, 'activists', cited by the BBC, told us that was the case after Russian air strikes. But, as Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) pointed out, that didn't appear to be the situation last week, when AFP, citing the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told us that seven men had been shot dead by ISIS in Al-Rastan after they had been accused of being homosexuals.

What this shows - and there are plenty of other examples - is that western news channels are happy to cite unnamed 'activists', without even the most cursory checks of whether the claims they make are correct if those claims show Russia, or indeed, any other "official enemy" in a bad light. Of course, it's a very different story if claims are made against the US or its allies. Remember that high profile coverage of claims made by unnamed 'activists' about civilian casualties caused by western air-strikes? No, me neither.

Channels which have shown no, or little interest in civilian casualties in Yemen, where it's been Saudi Arabia and its allies doing the bombing, are now, all of a sudden, keen to show pictures of people being taken to hospital allegedly after Russian air strikes.

Unsurprisingly, Interpreter Magazine, the "special project" of Khodorkovsky's Institute of Modern Russia, has been at the forefront of the propaganda campaign to discredit Russia's Syrian intervention.

"Today Russia launched airstrikes against multiple targets in Syria, but while it's clear that non-ISIS rebels and possibly civilians have been killed, it's unclear whether ISIS was even a target at all," the magazine wrote.

In fact the Russian Defense Ministry reported hitting 12 targets belonging to ISIS on Thursday.

What Putin has done - and this is the reason why the "Get Russia" brigade are so angry - is call the western elite's bluff on fighting ISIS. For all their condemnation of Islamic State atrocities, the US and its closest allies' number one aim has been to remove from power the secular Syrian government which has been fighting ISIS and other radical terrorist groups backed by the west.

We know, thanks to WikiLeaks, that the US plans for "regime change" in Syria predate the Arab Spring, and in fact goes back to at least 2006. And this "regime change" plan has nothing to do with 'democracy promotion', but everything to do with old-fashioned imperialism.

As the celebrated award-winning journalist and film-maker John Pilger puts it in his latest must-read article, entitled The Revolutionary Act of Telling the Truth:

"To the rulers of the world in Washington and Europe, Syria's true crime is not the oppressive nature of its government but its independence from American and Israeli power - just as Iran's true crime is its independence, and Russia's true crime is its independence ... In an American-owned world, independence is intolerable."

Russia's intervention in Syria, as my fellow RT OpEdge columnist John Wight has pointed out is likely to be game changer.

By tilting the balance against the serial regime changers, who have wreaked so much havoc around the world in recent years, there is an increased chance that Syria's secular government will be able to recapture chunks of its territory and that the country will retain its independence. That will please genuine anti-imperialists and anti-fascists, who believe that the Syrian people alone should decide who governs them and not the US, Britain or France, but anger those who have been hell-bent on bringing Syria to heel for its defiance - however much death and destruction such a neo-con inspired policy has caused.

The fact is that those who were clamoring for more western intervention in Syria - purportedly against ISIS - but in reality to get the Assad government removed, have been outmaneuvered. Having seen the western elite talk up the threat from ISIS, (whose rise, let's not forget was welcomed by the anti-Assad powers "in order to isolate the Syrian regime") citizens of western countries are now expected to regard the Russians as villains for taking action against an enemy we were told had to be defeated.

Clearly, for those behind the new information war, we're meant to forget what our leaders have been telling us about ISIS all year. We're meant to have brains the size of a pea and memories that don't go back for more than a few days. The latest propaganda assault to get us to hate Russia for fighting against terrorism in Syria is not only laughable, it's deeply insulting to our intelligence.
 
#30
Government.ru/Voprosy Ekonomiki
September 23, 2015
The new reality: Russia and global challenges
By Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev
[Voprosy Ekonomiki, No. 10, 2015
http://www.vopreco.ru/rus/redaction.files/10-15.pdf]

The structural crisis and the Russian agenda

The times we live in are defined by new priorities, new challenges and new approaches to problems facing Russia and other countries. This article is an attempt to analyse the large-scale changes in the world economy that are directly affecting the situation in this country. While creating opportunities for accelerated development, these changes are also imposing on us restrictions that we are forced to consider.

Therefore, this article will not unfold a detailed programme of action or describe specific economic instruments. There are other formats for this, above all, the decisions drafted and implemented by the President and the Government practically on a daily basis. Naturally, the Policy Priorities of  the Government of the Russian Federation to 2018 remains one of the most important policy documents. As for our everyday work, it is based on the plan of priority measures for ensuring sustainable economic development and social stability in 2015, which is often referred to as the Government's anti-crisis programme.

Numerous points of tension, as well as local, regional and other crises are keeping the world in an unstable position that cannot quickly be overcome. As for Russia, the situation is unlikely to deteriorate quickly (although precisely this was predicted not long ago). Likewise, Russia is also unlikely to reach the trajectory of growth that was typical for the past decade.

Geopolitics and sanctions are not the only issue; they can account for only part of the problems, because they are the result of more general and fundamental causes, stemming from a deep transformation of the system of world order.

What accounts for the particular complexity of the tasks facing Russia? It's not a matter of simply overcoming emerging difficulties or recurrent problems, crisis phenomena, shortages and disproportions. For all the importance of this work, and in the midst of fairly complex circumstances, it is important for us to formulate strategic goals that we would eventually like to reach, even if the goal seems remote and the road we have to travel to get there seems difficult. Meanwhile, the formulation of this goal is fairly simple: to join (it is tempting to say "break through into," but military terminology is out of place in this context) the group of countries with the highest living standards. Membership in this group is determined by the per capita GDP and the level of economic efficiency, where labour productivity is the main indicator.

Without a doubt, Russia is one of the most developed countries of the modern world according to many socio-economic parameters and the level of development of human resources and culture. However, the Russian economy remains largely ineffective, and its labour productivity is lagging behind the leading countries, not by some percentage but by several times. This problem did not just emerge in the last few years or even decades. Despite all the sacrifices that were made, neither the centralized-administrative economy, with the absolute domination of the state, nor the subsequent inertia-based raw material model, made it possible to bridge this gap, although the gap in living standards has been clearly narrowed in the past 10-15 years.

It is in this historical and economic context that the aforementioned strategic goals can be described as unprecedented. They are unlikely to be reached if the economy remains in the inertia-driven development model and continues merely to react, in one way or another, to external factors. Practice shows that no "catching-up development" is possible on this road, which is fraught with the risks of a growing gap.

These risks are bound to increase if we focus on explaining the existing problems only by considering objective circumstances, such as the length of our borders, climate, distances or low-populated areas. Global experience shows that these factors are not a final verdict. Canada and Australia have entered the ranks of highly developed countries, despite their low population and vast unpopulated areas. Japan, on the other hand, has a huge population but no free territories or substantial natural resources. It is possible to cite "objective circumstances" in any situation and with any resources: a lot of land is bad, because it is difficult to cultivate it; little land is bad because there is no place to live or sow; few natural resources is bad, because a country will be dependent on imports; abundant natural resources is also bad, because the rest of the economy will not develop; a small population is bad, because there is not enough labour; a large population is bad, because it's impossible to feed everyone...

Our goals require serious reforms. This is now obvious to everyone. We will have to switch to a development model that will allow us to compete more successfully than we did before. This is not at all the old paradigm of "catch up and overtake" in the production of meat, milk, tractors and cast iron. We must learn to be better and faster, and this is the only way of reaching our goals in the changing world of today.

Naturally, it is necessary to be balanced and careful in reforming an economy based on raw materials when their prices are so low. Above all, we must think about how these reforms will affect our people. The state should honestly and without any illusions assess its ability to help those for whom it is difficult to adapt to the new conditions.

The situation is changing very rapidly, and not everyone is ready to accept these changes quite so quickly, whether for psychological or objective reasons. Children, people with disabilities, elderly people and low-income families are those social groups, above all, against which we should measure our future decisions.

People are always sensitive to structural shifts in the economy, the social sphere and the labour market, but now we are facing additional difficulties linked with external factors. Therefore, the Government's task is now twice as difficult: to carry out strategic changes and prevent a serious drop in living standards, even in the midst of these difficult circumstances.

Russia's development is part and parcel of global processes. The global agenda cannot be formed without Russia's participation. And Russia cannot form the global agenda single-handedly, nor can it simply ignore it by focusing on its own interpretation of success and fairness.

The world we live in

The term "new normal" is being increasingly used in discussions of current and future problems in global development. It came about five years ago after an acute phase of the global crisis and quickly gained ground. New normal means a new normality and perhaps even a new reality. These are the key characteristics that will predetermine global economic development in the upcoming period - essentially, until the next major structural crisis. One can argue about this term's appropriateness, but in the past few years it has gained a foothold not only in the economic and political discourse. The concept is visibly expanding geographically and conceptually.

It is becoming increasingly obvious that the world's leading countries are entering a new growth trajectory. This not only concerns new growth rates but also the quality of this growth - the emergence of new production sectors and new geographical patterns for their location.

Developing countries are entering a new growth trajectory. They are bringing significant changes to the global economic architecture. Thus, whereas earlier, practically any US economic crisis impacted the global economy as a whole and the American market was therefore the only focus of attention, today, crisis phenomena can be observed even in a situation where the US economy is not in decline - for example, with the serious slowdown of the Chinese economy.

To all appearances, we are witnessing the first phase of such a crisis. Suffice it to consider what is happening in the Chinese and global economy in the past several months. All the world's stock markets, without exception, and national currencies in many countries reacted strongly to the situation on the Chinese stock exchange and the yuan's devaluation. Volatility on the world oil market is also a factor, even though it is in part related to the role of the Chinese factor in the global economy. It is already clear that attention to the Chinese economy will continue to grow. Its transition to a new stage of development is manifesting itself, in particular, in slower growth rates. The economic model as such is changing.

Structural crisis periods are marked not only by the growing danger of dramatically lagging behind, or increasing the existing lag. At the same time, there is also a chance to qualitatively improve one's situation on the world's economic and political map. Crisis is always a threat and an opportunity. Breakthroughs "from the third world into the first world" (to quote Lee Kuan Yew, the author of the Singapore miracle), as a general rule, happen amid structural crises, when the possibility arises to spot innovation and put it into practice; importantly, not only technological but also institutional innovation. This is corroborated by the practice and the experience of countries that have emerged from backwardness - Germany, Japan, the USSR, Finland, South Korea and Singapore.

The energy sector - a sensitive sector for us - shows how the global picture is changing.

What appeared to be exotic, an advertising campaign and a local event, is today changing the world economy, transforming global political balances.

Large-scale liquefied gas shipments have begun to unite hitherto isolated markets on different continents. The production of shale hydrocarbons has started to convert fuel importers into fuel exporters. Today, hundreds of small- and medium-sized innovative companies are making perhaps a greater impact on this market (and the economy of many countries in general) than the world's largest energy corporations. Moreover, these companies are showing a high level of stability: An almost two-thirds drop in oil prices has not led to mass bankruptcies. Of course, the situation can change if prices continue to fall. However, the effectiveness of new technology has proved significantly higher than many expected. And this is a serious lesson: One should not keep saying that the earth still stands on three elephants, while the outline of a fourth is already clearly visible.

It is also wrong to ignore the possibility of a sharp increase in the effectiveness of solar energy, whose prospects were viewed skeptically in the past, or the consistent development of electric, hybrid and hydrogen engines. If progress in these fields continues at the same pace, while oil and gas prices do not drop further, the world could encounter a revolution on a far greater scale than even the "shale" revolution.

Another important trend has emerged: Some well-known energy companies have begun to review their strategy, preferring to create relatively small capacities - cheaper and more flexible in market terms. Big and expensive energy projects take years to build and decades to recoup their costs: During this time, demand, energy prices and the policy of the state where a project is being implemented can change drastically. Previously, these parameters seemed to be more stable, but now the planning and forecasting horizon is far shorter. As energy strategists say, "the world has become faster."

Modernisation spans all spheres of society's life - technology, the economy and the humanitarian sphere. Within the limits of one article, it is only possible to enumerate these trends, but each merits independent discussion.

Among the technological innovation trends, the following should be singled out:

- greater technological unpredictability, which narrows opportunities for centralised technological (scientific and technical) forecasting;

- the spread of digital technology to all spheres of the material world (if you will, the virtualisation of the life of people, companies, and even states);

- new industrialisation, i.e., the emergence of industrial technology and sectors that prioritise the availability of quality R&D projects and clients over labour costs (high labour costs);

- increasing innovative technological transfers from the civil to the defence industry sectors, whereas in the past the process was in reverse (innovations first appeared in the military and industrial complex).

We should closely monitor development trends in the social sphere, as it is responsible for the quality of human capital and hence the country's competitiveness. These include:

-  global competition for human capital, which is becoming the main condition for achieving strategic goals in any country. This competition is getting tougher. We can assume that it will reach a new level in the near future, for example, when computer translation is improved and workforce mobility is boosted by the narrowing of the linguistic divide between countries;

-  the development of a new social welfare state that will satisfy the standards of modern industrialised countries. Its fundamental element will be the provision of personalised services, primarily in education and healthcare;

-  and lastly, growing inequality is becoming a major issue on the economic and political agenda, because it influences socio-political stability and could hinder economic growth.

The recent key economic innovations include:

-  the personification of goods and services is replacing standardised wholesale production. Of course, this personification differs from the pre-industrial craftwork. It is production geared to the requirements of an individual consumer;

-  the creation of new financial instruments that expand the limits of investment in new projects. To a degree, it is financial innovations that have provoked the global crisis, yet the world's nations will not abandon them for more primitive instruments or the practice of bans, but will continue to develop ever more sophisticated regulation instruments;

-  the creation of new industrial sectors, where capital turnover ratio is higher than in the sectors that use traditional technology, is narrowing the divide between operating expenses with capital expenses. This, in turn, dramatically increases the flexibility of response to market and technological changes, as evidenced by the creation of new shale oil and gas technology;

-  the development of a new globalisation model and the corresponding form of protectionism. Regional and interstate free trade associations, which can resolve issues that have been stuck at the WTO for decades, are gaining prominence. Exchange rates are becoming a much more powerful instrument for protecting the market than customs duties. Instead of trying to protect their customs territories, states are now working to protect added-value chains generated by national businesses.

We also need to highlight macroeconomic challenges, for uncertainty has been growing here, just as in the sphere of technology. I'm referring, in part, to the far from obvious solution to the following dilemma: How to prevent the antirecession policies, which many countries have adopted in the form of bailout packages since 2008, from sending inflation sky-high, even if some countries should fight inflation and others deflation ? The future of quantitative easing is dim, as it's unclear how to break this habit. Meanwhile, some countries offer money at extremely low interest rates, yet business is not eager to borrow. As for large multinational companies, they have accumulated huge reserves by avoiding investment projects.

In other words, this is a period of uncertainty, temporising and wariness of new realities. It is not company or bank debts, but sovereign debts that have become a problem. It's a moot question if reserve currency countries will or can repay their debts, but all the other countries will definitely be unable to do this. There is no honest and convincing answer on how the global economy and the global monetary system will react to this non-standard situation.

How should the state and society respond to these challenges? What should they do to keep up the pace or, better still, to surge ahead?

The main condition for finding an adequate response to current challenges, such as the growing level of uncertainty and the growing number of variants, is to encourage creativity, enterprise and lifelong learning. This is true for governments, businesses and individuals. People are creative animals, and it's a major duty of the state to encourage creativity in all areas of life.

These specific features of the current phase of technological progress that have given rise to the key trend for an all-round liberalisation of the economy and the reduction of red tape. There is no other way, considering that the "world is becoming faster."

Of course, there are many examples of a policy or decisions that are not consistent with, or even contradict these goals. Sanctions are one example of this. It's very difficult to provide examples of sanctions that are effective and achieve the stated goals. All sanctions are lifted, sooner or later, letting relations resume a natural course.

This equally applies to our relations with the West. Although our current relations are a manifestation of a crisis, we are certain to resume cooperation. Russia will not withdraw from Europe economically, politically or in terms of mentality. Nearly 250 years ago, Catherine the Great issued her famous Nakaz or Decree that stated, "Russia is a European power", and this remains true despite the major changes that have taken place in the world. It would be futile to try to break Russia away from the European civilisation and its cultural diversity. Relations can change, but the strategic goals must remain the same: cooperation, partnership and, in a favourable situation, a common economic space.

Considering Russia's geographic and geopolitical standing, we not only can but must develop the Eastern dimension of cooperation more energetically. I'm referring to such countries as China, Vietnam, Japan, the Republic of Korea and all other Asian-Pacific nations, as well as the SCO and BRICS countries that are located in other parts of the world. It would be wrong to interpret this activity as Russia's intention to change its course. When we highlight the importance of this cooperation vector, we don't only mean our historical ties, the history which Russia shares with many of these countries, or the current situation in the world. The global agenda, market dynamics and the direction of financial, trade and technological trends show that an incorrect assessment of the importance of relations with these countries and regions would have strategic consequences.

The quality of growth: strategy, directions and priorities

Most key parametres, guidelines and risks in Russia's social and economic development are named in the Policy Priorities of the Government of the Russian Federation to 2018. Long-term challenges and solutions will be reflected in the Strategy of Russia's Socio-Economic Development to 2030.

First of all, we are tasked with ensuring dynamic and sustainable economic growth in the medium and long term. And here we need to be aware of two risks.

On the one hand, there is the risk of artificial acceleration. We know from our own experience of 1986-1989 that an impulse to quickly warm up the economy can be disastrous - even if for some time, for a year or two, the growth rate actually spikes. But the Soviet Union paid for that short-term acceleration with an exponential growth of its external debt, which Russia had to take on after the disintegration of the USSR.

On the other hand, the psychological adaptation to low and even zero growth is also dangerous, and so is their acceptance as inevitable. This much is evident from the economic and political debate underway in recent years. If this kind of psychological setting becomes predominant in society, it opens the way to a prolonged recession. That's why the key task now is to ensure not only a faster pace, but a new quality of economic growth.

There has been much talk about the need for a new growth model. And this is actually true, as both external and internal conditions for Russia's development have changed seriously, even fundamentally. There is no need to mention the well-discussed depletion of opportunities for successful development based on the inflow of financial resources from foreign markets. I can only add that this growth is not very sensitive to the investment climate.

Now the conditions in which our industrial companies operate, their incentives to increase productivity are coming into focus. A comfortable environment for the economic actors pretty much describes the model that should provide the new quality of growth. This requires consolidation of our efforts in four areas that define the nature of the country's socio-economic development: macroeconomics, structural policies, human capital development and public administration.

Macroeconomic prerequisites for growth

Creating a comfortable environment begins with ensuring macroeconomic stability. Low inflation and a balanced budget remain a priority for the country's sustainable development.

In the next three years, inflation should be brought down to 4 percent. This is an important condition for prosperity growth, for access to credit for businesses, and for greater predictability of economic life in general.

We also need to keep the two most important macroeconomic achievements of the last fifteen years - a balanced budget and low government debt. And we should be talking not only about the federal budgets, but also about regional budgets that are burdened with debt.

The structure of the budget expenditures and their efficiency is no less important than a balanced budget. First, there is a need for clearer spending priorities in terms of their impact on long-term growth. Research and experience of many countries shows that investment in people, including healthcare, education, science and infrastructure should be the priority here. Of course, budget constraints prevent us from fully addressing these priorities today. But this does not make them less important. Therefore, it would be unacceptable to achieve a balanced budget at the cost of a substantial deterioration in its quality. Second, the problem of increasing the efficiency of budget spending, which is certainly nothing new, has now become even more urgent.

Given the current economic growth deceleration, budget problems should not be solved at the expense of increasing the fiscal burden. We have decided not to raise taxes in the coming years (a downward adjustment is possible, albeit selectively, which is already happening, or at least being discussed). We also need to contain the growth of fiscal charges of non-tax nature.

Priorities of structural reforms

Macroeconomic stability is essential but not sufficient for successful development. Low inflation and a healthy budget do not automatically lead to growth.

It is crucial to create modern mechanisms to finance economic growth and modernisation. This is important in any situation, but even more so now. Russia is struggling with the shutout of several external sources of financing at a time as well as with lower oil prices. It would be only reasonable to assume that at least the oil market will remain low or even extremely low for a long time. This clearly requires greater attention to domestic sources of financing and domestic savings, and a higher rate of accumulation in the economy.

Undoubtedly, state investment should play a role here, especially now, when they allow a certain degree of compensation for the low activity of private investors. We have taken this path, allocating additional resources, providing state guarantees, using specialised forms of financing (Industry Development Fund, project financing with the Central Bank support, and others). We resort to the National Wealth Fund, one of our last-resort funding sources and using such incentives as investment benefits and investment contracts.

But state investment cannot be the main source of growth for all time. Neither can the government be used as a printing press: the freedom of uncontrolled emission of money is one of the most dangerous freedoms. Any references to the Western experience of using money emission to stimulate growth are untenable. First, those were carried out during deflation (a direct opposite of our situation). Second, the results have not confirmed the effectiveness of that practice. And third, those measures have already led to more problems with solutions yet unknown (suffice it to mention the apocalyptic forecasts for the US dollar).

Moreover, the high share of government ownership in the economy in itself is becoming a cause of limited availability of investment resources. Companies co-owned by the state often face faster growth of costs than in the private sector, as well as a negative cash flow from some investment projects.

Attracting private investors should come to the spotlight in the government policy at all levels. This problem has gone out of focus in recent years, since there was a strong inflow of financial resources. Now the federal government, the regions and municipalities have to carefully analyse what they can do to make businesses want to invest, and to do so in their jurisdictions.

Domestic savings are a vitally important source of investment. Therefore, the pension system development needs to be considered from this perspective. It is one of the key problems of the economy we are discussing. After all, pension savings and life insurance can be an important source of long money. In this regard, we cannot ignore issues of private pension funds' reliability and efficiency. They still need to learn how to make pension savings work. Therefore, pension funds are the focus of the government's attention, and it is the financial regulator's job to effectively organise and oversee non-state pension funds' operation.

Despite the geopolitical complexity, sanctions and other constraints, we must not forget about the issue of attracting foreign investment. Underestimating its importance would mean that we accept the logic of isolation imposed on us.

Attracting foreign investment should help resolve a specific problem: to ensure technology transfer. Today Russia is not among the world's technological leaders in many important areas. High-tech exports account for no more than 1.5 percent of our total. Therefore, foreign investment should be viewed as more than just the financial resources involved (we attracted a lot of money, but did we use it wisely?). Technology and know-how are worth more than that.

Import substitution is another important element of the Government's work. But we must prevent it from becoming a short-term campaign. We should remember that in the 20th century several Latin American countries implemented this policy to close their markets to foreign competition and then subsidised domestic production with borrowed funds, which resulted in financial collapse. We should take this into account in order to understand that import substitution does not mean replacing foreign products with more expensive and lower quality domestic goods.

Of course, import substitution is unconditional for certain specific spheres and products, irrespective of the expense. But applying the same metric to the economy as a whole would be dangerous and even impossible. The best form of import substitution is the production of goods that would be competitive both on the domestic and foreign markets: exportability can be interpreted as the ability to compete with other goods, including imported ones. This import substitution could merit government support.
 
Another important task is to boost competition. A market economy that is uncompetitive has very low potential, if any. This has become a crucial issue, because the rouble's devaluation objectively reduced the amount of imports on the Russian market. Sanctions and import substitution are only strengthening the effect. Taken together, this can further reduce the competitiveness of the over-monopolised Russian economy. Another obstacle is the growing interference of the state in industries where its presence is completely unnecessary. The underdevelopment of small and medium-sized businesses is further aggravating the situation.

We should overhaul our regulatory authorities to boost competition. Seeking to comply with official/unofficial ticket quotas, regulatory employees tend to act contrary to common sense. These actions discredit the system of government oversight and clearly show that the agency's true goals have long been forgotten or are disregarded. The recent proposals to limit the number of small business inspections and the application of antimonopoly laws against small companies are evidence that we are changing our attitude toward regulation.

And lastly, competition can only develop with a system of alternative employment or re-training for dismissed personnel, a more flexible employment market and measures of small business assistance. We need to move towards this, including by creating a national vacancy database that will include information about a job's social benefits package and other conditions, and adopt regional workforce mobility programmes stipulating the recruitment of workforce from other regions. We have not yet done enough in this sphere, because we have little, or worse still, negative experience. The decreed and often forced movement of large groups of workforce certainly doesn't meet modern market conditions, and the necessary infrastructure, primarily social elements, is underdeveloped.

The absence or shortage of these conditions is a major socio-political obstacle hindering the development of a competitive economy, and can be used to justify retaining excessive workforce and ineffective companies.

Retention and development of human capital

The welfare state principles, which were developed over a century ago, are inconsistent with modern realities. Greater prosperity and new demographic trends call for major adjustments to existing approaches.

The competition for human capital, which has become more mobile, is exacerbating. It is not uncommon for people to live in one country and work, study and get medical treatment in another. We cannot remain on the sidelines of such competition. Moreover, people increasingly prefer to have a choice of different options in their own country. In general, we need to structurally upgrade respective industries.

In the sphere of education, we will need to overcome structural problems, which are becoming increasingly conspicuous. First, we are facing, to use the economic terminology, a surplus of university educated professionals, and a shortage of specialists with secondary technical training background. Second, higher education has become almost universal, which affects its quality. It is therefore necessary to improve its quality without making it less accessible.

Lifelong learning has become an important part of our life. Now the well-known adage, "to learn, to learn, to learn," will be true for people throughout their professional careers. There's also an issue of adult and senior education, such as acquiring computer literacy or training in different skill sets. Modern universities should be capable of attracting both high school graduates and investors, who are willing to put their money in education. It's an important criterion of their effectiveness. Universities and other institutions of higher learning that ignore the new reality or respond to it in a formal manner will lose in the toughening competition. Our universities, at least the leading ones, compete not only nationally, but also on the global market. This poses a major problem for our education and healthcare. If the demand for quality services concentrates outside the country, it will therefore decline inside the country, and the quality of such services will deteriorate.

Much will need to be done to meet these requirements, such as to create a mechanism of incentives for companies involved in developing the material base of educational institutions, including the formation of endowment funds, to support distance education modernisation projects, to create a national open education website, and to restructure and reorganise higher schools whose graduates are not in demand on the labour market.

Equally or even more complex problems will need to be addressed in the sphere of healthcare. Investments in medical equipment, the largest in Russia's history, and an increase in doctors' salaries are an essential but not sufficient condition for overcoming these challenges.

I can cite several paths in management and technology that the Russian healthcare industry will take in the future. They include the priority development of primary healthcare, the development of the so-called treatment protocols (clinical guidelines for providing medical aid), the development of telemedicine, the introduction of electronic medical records that can be accessed by any doctor or any hospital chosen by a patient.

In fact, the right to choose and competition between doctors and medical institutions is one of the important factors that make insurance-based healthcare attractive. I can't say that insurance medicine is a perfect solution in all countries. However, judgements about its results can be passed only if it was introduced more than just technically.

The introduction of insurance principles hasn't been a smooth process in our country. This has to do with the role of insurance companies, the impact on prices and the quality of medical services. However, we have made the choice and won't give up. A working insurance model will become a reality only if government guarantees for free medical care are clearly outlined.

The pension system and prospects for its development are one of our fundamental social and economic challenges. There's more to it than just discussing the retirement age or the amount of budget funds needed to cover the Pension Fund deficit. In fact, the issue can be formulated as "special treatment for each age group."

With an absolute decline in the working age population in Russia, it is critically important to focus on people who are willing to continue to work. Extending active employment period is now not only a social, but also an economic issue. There are very few countries that achieve economic growth with a reduced working population. This is another major challenge facing Russia.

Supporting senior citizens is a separate issue. They often need help that their relatives, even if they are there, are unable to provide. This help doesn't always have to do with money. Primarily, it's a matter of time and effort. They get help from volunteers and community organisations, but appropriate public services still must be available.

Just like demographic processes, pension systems are slow to change. In the future, we may be faced with a situation where the number of retired people will be equal to the number of employed people. Clearly, this will entail a sharp increase in the tax burden, reduction in the amount of retirement benefits, and other extremely undesirable consequences. To avoid this, our economy, finance, and social and pension systems must respond early to such prospects.

Non-economic modernisation factors

To ensure our successful development, it is imperative to sharply improve the quality of public services and the quality of governance.

First up, the issue is about providing personal and property security. Firm policy aimed at protecting property rights and limiting lawlessness in this sphere brings the most sustainable and lasting benefits for the economy, as does a smart system of checks and balances designed to protect businesses from undue administrative or law enforcement pressure.

It is extremely important to form a competitive jurisdiction in Russia, which requires an effective judicial system in place. This is a complex issue, since it involves institutional decisions and changes in the education system, and, most importantly, customs and practices.

Effective jurisdiction is a task no less daunting than economic efficiency. They go hand in hand, because the former is a prerequisite for the latter.

Forming a consolidated court system is an important step in modernising the judicial system. However, this is just the beginning, and organisational changes alone will not make a difference. Importantly, transformations in the judicial system should ensure an inflow of fresh, highly educated people. It is no less important to make use of modern information technology, which can improve transparency of the judicial system and its decisions.

Improving governance quality has been discussed extensively recently. This is also a complex issue, because it includes streamlining state administration bodies and forming decision-making mechanisms, including strategic planning, introducing modern management techniques and, finally, personnel training.

It is necessary to establish a system of accountability for authorities of all levels for their decisions. Of course, they must have access to relevant legal and financial resources. Funding and planning programmes, evaluating and promoting officials should depend on achieving quantifiable objectives (final results).

Today, one of the key government objectives is to stimulate investment activity. Success in this sphere largely depends on the willingness and the ability to work to improve the business climate and to persuade businesses to invest in the corresponding economic sectors and regions. This should be a basic criterion when it comes to evaluating the work of the executives at different levels of government.

The state decision-making system can hardly be considered truly comprehensive if it's not based on integrity and consistency. The law on strategic planning provides foundations for creating a goal-setting system. However, it's not about recreating Soviet-style bureaucratic planning. It's all about self-control, so that the strategic objectives aren't reduced to catchphrases at a time when current tactical decisions are in conflict with the long-term objectives.

To sum up, some important conclusions can be made regarding the ongoing changes in the world and at home, as well as the tasks that we are facing.

First, as a result of the global crisis, a "new reality" is emerging in the world, embracing not only the economy but also all significant aspects of life in modern society. The world's leading countries are entering a new growth trajectory. This applies to the rates, factors and quality of growth. Many of the criteria that were used to assess development trends in the late 20th-early 21st century need reviewing. New technology and innovations introduced by small companies, among others, are radically changing entire markets and sectors within short timeframes. This leads to changes in market behaviour, including approaches to the implementation of major long-term projects.

Second, according to many social and economic parameters, Russia is a developed country, and so its problems should be compared, above all, to [those of] other developed economies. At the same time, we also have certain advantages of a developing economy that we can and should utilise, both to overcome the present crisis and meet long-term challenges.

Needless to say, this is no reason for proud complacency: our place in the world creates additional challenges and difficulties for us. In fact, Russia's wish to be an organic part of the developed world arouses resistance from our potential competitors. The geopolitical tension of the recent period is to a large degree related to these circumstances.

Third, it is essential to form a new economic growth model responding to modern Russian and global realities. New, long-term "rules of the game" are being developed today in the midst of the global crisis. A new model is being designed, in the medium term, to ensure dynamic and sustained economic growth for Russia at a pace above the global average and accompanied by qualitative structural changes.

Fourth, human capital, which is the most important and at the same time the most dynamic factor of modern production, is emerging as a key field of international competition. This competition will be tough, as a clear understanding has evolved in the world, namely that leading positions will be taken by countries that are becoming the most attractive to well-educated and energetic people.

Fifth, the search for an effective response to the challenges of a rapidly changing world has created a key trend toward economic liberalisation. This is recognised not only by developed countries but also by many developing countries seeking to create appropriate conditions for innovation and transfers of both capital and technology.
 
All this points to the following priority tasks, the fulfilment of which is key to the country's sustained development.

First, ensuring macroeconomic stability, including a balanced budget and the consistent reduction of inflation to the set targets. This will enhance predictability and trust in the national economy. In addition, lower inflation should be accompanied by the reduction of market interest rates, i.e., increasing the availability of loans to businesses and individuals.

Second, increasing the effectiveness of budget spending. Investment in infrastructure and in people should be considered among the top priorities. At the same time, a balanced budget should be ensured on the assumption that the fiscal load must not be increased in the next several years.

Third, consistent implementation of a course towards securing investment and enhancing its role in ensuring economic growth. The state is already utilising and will propose new forms of support for investment activity. However, state stimulation should not be excessive, but most importantly, the state cannot replace private investors. The effectiveness of the relevant elements of the state apparatus, including regional administrations, should be assessed based on their ability to secure private investment.

Fourth, domestic savings should become a major source of investment. This is a strategic goal for years to come, but it is important to move towards it. In this context, we will also address the issue related to the effective use of pension savings. The pension and insurance system is the primary source of "long money" in the economy.

Fifth, the development of the small and medium-sized business sector as a prerequisite of sustainable economic growth and at the same time, as a factor of social stability. The dynamics of the small and medium-sized business sector is one of the most significant indicators of the country's economic and social health.

Sixth, stimulating competition. One of the primary causes of weak competition is concern about social stability in companies and the regions. This is why the development of a modern labour market is becoming both a social and economic problem. A formal approach towards it will impede the accelerated creation of highly productive jobs.

Seventh, stimulating the growth of sectors other than raw materials (in absolute figures and as a share of aggregate export volumes). Among other things, this would indicate that import substitution has really started working and bringing positive results.

Eighth, qualitative shifts in the effectiveness of state administration. A system of responsibility for the decisions that are made on various levels of government needs to be put in place. Assessment of officials' performance and programme funding should be tied to specific results. The decision-making system should become integrated and consistent, so that tactical decisions do not come into conflict with the declared long-term guidelines.

Practice shows it is not enough to plot the right course. It is equally important to bring it home to society as a whole, and most importantly, to ensure its implementation. This is, in fact, our primary task.
 

 #31
Business New Europe
October 2, 2015
Fragile calm holds in East Ukraine before four-way peace talks in Paris
Graham Stack in Kyiv

Hopes for an end to 18 months of fighting in eastern Ukraine hinged on a meeting of the leaders of France, Germany, Ukraine and Russia in Paris on October 2, with breakthrough prospects enhanced by a recent ceasefire and withdrawal of tanks and other weapons from the front lines.

In a telephone call between Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande, the leaders welcomed the signing of a new agreement to pull back weapons from the Donbas region, according to a statement posted to Poroshenko's website on October 1.

The Paris meeting is hoped to "push towards a durable and full ceasefire in Donbas" and provide "guaranteed access by OSCE monitors to the whole area, including the Russian-Ukrainian border", Interfax Ukraine quoted Kostiantyn Yeliseyev, deputy head of the Poroshenko's administration, as saying.

The return of control of the Russian-Ukraine border in the rebel-held territories to Kyiv is the ultimate step envisaged by the Minsk peace agreement updated in February. This would follow local elections held later in October under Ukrainian law in areas controlled by pro-Moscow separatists fighting the pro-Western government in Kyiv.

Overshadowed by Syria

A relatively effective month-long ceasefire has boosted hopes that the Paris summit with participation of Russian President Vladimir Putin can bring a permanent end to the fighting, which has claimed more than 8,000 lives since April 2014.

Putin has been heavily involved in the talks to resolve the conflict, which Western governments say is being deliberately stoked by Russia to hamper Ukraine's efforts to integrate with the EU and Nato. Russia denies it has supplied the separatist forces with troops and weapons. However, Russia's newly initiated air assault on Syrian opposition and rebel forces threatened to overshadow the Paris event.

As Russian warplanes bombed Syrian opposition and Islamic State (IS) targets on October 1, the Kremlin kept comments about its expectation from the Paris meeting to a minimum. "There's only one thing we expect, namely, that some kind of progress in terms of implementation of the Minsk accords will be made," Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

"Along with the agreements that give grounds for definite optimism, we're still stating a certain stalemate in the implementation of the Minsk accords," Peskov added.

A key point of Russian insistence will be the accordance of a special status of the separate territories in the Lugansk and Donetsk regions, as per a law already adopted by the Ukrainian parliament, as well as the region's right to hold its own polls later in October when the rest of Ukraine holds local elections.

Meanwhile, Merkel and Hollande will both take the opportunity to question Putin directly on his Syria strategy when they sit down separately ahead of the main summit.

On September 30, Putin received fast-track parliamentary approval to use military force abroad. Within hours, Russian military jets and helicopters that had been sent to Syria in recent weeks were pounding forces opposed to Syrian President and Russian ally Bashar al-Assad.

While Putin has called for an international coalition against terrorism and IS forces in Syria in particular, Western intelligence reports said the strikes targeted not the IS but other opposition forces. Also addressing the United Nations General Assembly in New York on September 29, US President Barack Obama said there could be no support for Assad's regime given its use of heavy weapons on the civilian population.

Inundated by a flood of refugees from the region, the French and German leaders will use the opportunity in Paris to probe Russia's intentions in Syria, and what the repercussions may be.

Poroshenko, in turn, will try to keep attentions at the four-way meeting focused on the civil war that has ravaged the eastern industrial heartland of his country

Quiet for now on the eastern front

The new ceasefire follows the rebels' signing of agreements on the removal of remaining weapons with calibre of less than 100mm from the demarcation line on September 30 and October 1. Observers from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) will monitor the process.

Heavier weaponry was withdrawn from the frontlines under the terms of the Minsk agreements signed in February 2015. But the agreement has been routinely violated by firing from mortars and tanks as well as automatic gunfire, causing frequent if low casualties.

The signing of the new agreements appeared to have had immediate effect. "No cases of opening fire were reported in the temporarily occupied territory of Donbas in the last twenty four hours," the Ukrainian military said in a statement in the evening of October 1.

On the same day, however, the leader of the breakaway self-styled Donetsk People's Republic, Oleksandr Zakharchenko, accused Kyiv's forces of firing on the city of Donetsk, and announced a temporary suspension of the withdrawal of weaponry. Drones flown by the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission confirmed a concentration of heavy weapons on DPR territory on September 29 and 30 "in violation of the respective withdrawal lines", as reported by Interfax Ukraine.

Recent progress in  ending the conflict also results from the passing of controversial legislation that provides for special status of the rebel-held territories, as required by the Minsk agreement.

The Russian-backed rebels subsequently announced they would hold local elections as set down in the Minsk agreements, albeit on different dates from Ukrainian local elections slated for October 25. Kyiv has said it will not recognise the elections unless they are held under Ukrainian law.
 
 #32
The Guardian (UK)
October 1, 2015
As Russia enters war in Syria, conflict in Ukraine begins to wind down
The conflict in Ukraine sees less shelling each week, while hawks and rebel leaders are being told by Moscow to pipe down and toe the line
By Shaun Walker in Donetsk

At a highly fortified separatist position near the village of Peski outside Donetsk, the pro-Russia fighters have been getting used to an unusual sound in recent weeks: silence.

Shelling and exchanges of fire have become so rare at this frontline position in eastern Ukraine that commander Alexei Novikov and his men even had time recently to kill, grill and eat Poroshenko, the pet pig they named after Ukraine's president (Merkel the sheep survives, for now).

"Both sides are moving towards partisan warfare, with small diversionary missions behind enemy lines," said Novikov. "It has become boring here."

As Russia ratchets up military action in Syria, the fighting in east Ukraine is winding down. The leaders of Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany will meet in Paris on Friday for talks on Ukraine, and while a lasting political solution still seems some way off, there is confidence on all sides that the military action could finally be over, a year after the first ill-fated, and largely ignored, ceasefire agreement was signed in Minsk, Belarus.

With all sides tired of military conflict, the most likely outcome appears to be Moscow pushing the territories back to Ukraine legally, with an ensuing period of uncertain peace as both Moscow and Kiev decide how far they are ready to compromise on their goals.

"The Russian side is trying to push the Minsk agreements as far as Ukraine is willing to go," said Vitaly Leybin, editor in chief of Russian Reporter magazine in Moscow. He said this will probably involve a Trans-Dniester-style solution, where the regions remain de jure part of Ukraine but de facto function as independent statelets backed up by Russia. However, he said if Ukraine agreed to a full range of concessions, the Russian side would be willing to return control of the Russia-Ukraine border to Kiev.

"If Ukraine gives the regions special status, a full amnesty, recognises the rebel forces as a 'people's militia' and gives the regions the right to its own cultural policy and special economic relations with Russian regions, then we would give the Ukrainians back control of the border."

These conditions will not be acceptable to Kiev, but there too officials have noticed a change of tone from the Russians.

"They are trying to push the territories back into Ukraine, and shift the focus from military aggression to political destabilisation inside Ukraine," said Dmytro Kuleba of the Ukrainian foreign ministry. "If our goal is reintegration and reconciliation we will have to look at all options," he said, when asked whether Ukraine was ready for a real political settlement that included rebel leaders.

Russia has propped up the separatist statelets financially and militarily, and many of the commanders have been trained at bases in Russia, as the forces gradually become more professional. Despite repeated denials, it is also clear that Russian regular forces were introduced at key intervals when the rebels faced defeat last year, and again in February this year to back up a rebel offensive. Moscow has made it clear to Kiev that this option is always on the table should the Ukrainians attempt to win the territories back militarily.

"Russia is behind us and there is the unambiguous hint that if you continue military aggression against us, then Russia will not refrain from supporting us in absolutely every way it can, and they understand that," said Alexander Khodakovsky, a top rebel leader, in a recent interview in Donetsk.

Meanwhile, those who disagree with the uneasy peace on all sides are being sidelined. Andrei Purgin, one of the original ideologues of the Donetsk People's Republic, who represented the territory at the Minsk negotiations, was sacked from his position in the leadership last month and spent four days under arrest.

In an interview in Donetsk, Purgin evaded a direct answer as to the reason behind his arrest, but said he disagreed with the ceasefire.

"To say let's stop shooting and then decide the political questions, that is nonsense. You can't stop shooting unless you've decided the political questions already," he said. Purgin said he believed a criminal case could be launched against him, and his movements were being tracked by the separatist authorities he led until recently.

In Moscow, too, there are rumblings that the "Novorossia project" to carve out a pro-Russian statelet in east Ukraine has been well and truly closed down. Egor Prosvirnin, editor of the nationalist blog Sputnik and Pogrom, has been called in for questioning in recent weeks over suspicions that his website may contain "extremist material".

The article in question, while advocating for Russia to take full control of eastern Ukraine, does not contain anything that could not have been heard regularly on Russian state television over the past year and a half, and Prosvirnin believes Russian authorities are now trying to stuff the genie back into the bottle.

"The conflict is being frozen and we are too strongly in support of the Novorossia project, we're too independent. This is a warning to us to stop what we're doing," he said.

Khodakovsky said while there are more hawkish elements inside the Kremlin who want to take a firmer line, for the time being they have been sidelined.

"Part of the Russian elite doesn't want to argue with the west and is ready for very serious compromises, another part of the elite is more tough and ready for real confrontation. The middle position seems to me to be that we should get out of the situation with as few political and economic losses as possible," said the rebel leader. "There is no ideal solution. All the options are fragile, and whichever is taken, none of them are not ideal by definition and will involve serious compromises from all sides. And this makes more radical people on all sides unhappy."

For most of the residents of east Ukraine, and the roughly 1.5 million refugees and internally displaced people who have fled their homes, the end of fighting will come as a huge relief.

For more than a year, locals have had to live with a war in which the main mode of military engagement has been both sides firing artillery at each other over the heads of civilians. In the village of Spartak, not far from Donetsk train station, there was still sporadic Ukrainian shelling as recently as last week, despite the fact that rebels said they were obeying a strict order since 1 September not to fire back under any circumstances.

"My knees hurt too much to go into the basement, now I just lie on the floor in the bathroom when the bangs start," said 80-year-old Ekaterina, who lost her daughter to shelling last year, in tears outside her apartment block in Spartak. "You can't do anything, you can't sleep, I just want to sleep. I just want this all to stop."

At the nearby separatist position, the 22-year old commander who gave his name only as White, said the Ukrainian army had stopped attacking, but that volunteer battalions based near the frontline would send mortars over "out of boredom" every few days. He claimed his men had nothing to fire back with and were respecting the order not to fire, but he was sceptical of a lasting ceasefire.

"Half of my men are from towns under Ukrainian control. What are they supposed to do? There can't be any real talk of peace until we have pushed the Ukrainians back. But at least people are not dying any more."

But while few people in Donetsk, Kiev or the west think the underlying issues are even close to being solved, the fatigue with military action on all sides means there is a growing consensus that the "hot" phase of the conflict has drawn to a close for now.

"This is the end of a stage," said Khodakovsky. "We will be de jure inside Ukraine but will live by our own laws and leaders. Depending on how the political situation inside Ukraine and Russia develops, the next stage will be either increased stability leading to some kind of lasting settlement, or renewed conflict."
 
 #33
Christian Science Monitor
October 1, 2015
As Russia enters Syria's war, Ukrainians ask what it means for theirs
Moscow has shifted its foreign policy gaze to the defense of Syria's regime amid a lull in the conflict in eastern Ukraine. Some worry that the US could downplay Ukraine's plight in order to cooperate with Russia in Syria.
By Fred Weir, Correspondent

MOSCOW - Russia's military involvement in Syria has generated great unease among Ukrainians who fear Western cooperation with Moscow could lead to a weakening in support for Ukraine. Others hope that a distracted Russia, fighting on two fronts, may be more inclined to compromise over the rebel-held regions in the country's east.

Many analysts in Kiev say Moscow's operation in Syria is a significant shift that has already been felt in Ukraine. As Russia began its Syria deployment a month ago the guns in eastern Ukraine, where Russia-backed rebels formed breakaway republics in spring 2014, suddenly fell silent. While many welcome the cease-fire, they are concerned about what could emerge from backroom talks between Russia and the West over Syria's war, given the high stakes in the Middle East.

"This truce, which seems to be accompanied by a more constructive Russian position, makes people here wonder whether the West isn't wavering in its support for Ukraine in order to obtain Russian cooperation in Syria," says Vadim Karasyov, director of the independent Institute of Global Strategies in Kiev. "There is still hope that this won't happen. But Ukrainians are very concerned."

When Russian President Vladimir Putin took to the podium on Monday at the United Nations General Assembly to make his pitch for a grand anti-terrorist alliance in Syria, the Ukrainian delegation walked out.

President Petro Poroshenko spoke the next day at the same podium. "Over the last few days we have heard conciliatory statements from the Russian side in which, in particular, it called for the establishment of anti-terrorist coalition," he said. "Cool story, but really hardly to believe! How can you urge an anti-terrorist coalition - if you inspire terrorism right in front of your door?"

Vladimir Panchenko, a political expert with the International Center for Policy Studies in Kiev, says that a lot of Ukrainians agree with the need for an alliance to counter the spread of jihadism in the Middle East, but differ over what Russia's involvement means for their country.

"Maybe the more Russia gets dragged into it, the more problems it will have," he says. "But everybody here thinks there is already cooperation happening between Russia and the West in Syria, and that this is not going to turn out in Ukraine's favor."

Peace talks continue

On Friday, leaders of the four powers that framed the Minsk-II peace accord for eastern Ukraine - Ukraine, Russia, Germany, and France - will meet in Paris to chart the accord's final implementation. The 12-point deal calls for military disengagement and steps to resolve the contested status of the rebel-controlled regions.

Russia has already indicated that it will prod its rebel allies to accept a new deal with Kiev based on regional autonomy in a decentralized Ukraine. Meanwhile, Western leaders seem more willing to urge Kiev to hold direct talks with rebel representatives, offer amnesty for separatist fighters, and restore economic links with the breakaway regions.

Earlier this week the two sides agreed on a comprehensive pull back of weaponry from the conflict's front line, a deal one rebel leader said "could mean the end of the war."

"There is certain progress in east Ukraine, but Russia still maintains all its levers of influence there," says Valery Ryabikh, an expert with Defense Express, a Kiev think tank. "Ukraine is a hostage to the situation as Russia moves into this new relationship with the West in Syria."

Dmitry Posrednikov, deputy dean of Donetsk University, which lies in the rebel-held east, says residents there are hopeful that the Russian incursion in Syria will yield a better result for them at the peace talks. There is also local pride in Russia's actions, he adds.

"It's clear that US policy has been a complete failure, both in Ukraine and in the Middle East, and now global leadership is passing to Russia," he says. "The West has to work with Russia in Syria, because they can't solve the problems alone."

Mr. Posrednikov says that the war in Ukraine has probably passed the point where either side can believe in victory, and that some kind of peace settlement is inevitable.
 
 #34
AP
October 2, 2015
Russian, Ukrainian leaders to hold talks in Paris
By Nataliya Vasilyeva and Sylvie Corbet

PARIS - Russian President Vladimir Putin is meeting the leaders of Ukraine, France and Germany on Friday in a revived European push to bring peace to eastern Ukraine.

The long-awaited summit in Paris on Friday is being overshadowed by international concerns about Russia's military intervention in Syria this week.

Still, a senior French diplomat expressed guarded optimism about the Ukraine talks, which are expected to address more autonomy for eastern regions, upcoming Ukrainian elections, possible amnesty for separatists, withdrawing weapons and securing the border.

Putin arrived in Paris on Friday for talks with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the first time since they worked out a peace deal in Minsk in February.

That accord has been troubled, but there have been signs of progress in recent weeks, including a breakthrough agreement this week on withdrawing tanks and many weapons.

The conflict between government forces and Russia-backed separatists has killed more than 8,000 and displaced 2 million since April 2014.

"It's a long way before the crisis is resolved, but there are indications that give hope that it can be dealt with," Putin said Thursday.

The Ukrainian delegation is hoping for progress on the status of the eastern Donbass region and progress on a dispute over regional elections planned Oct. 25 and other elections the rebels are proposing Oct. 18 and Nov. 1.

French President Francois Hollande, in proposing the meeting last month, praised recent progress around the Minsk plan. If that continues, he said, "then I will argue for lifting the sanctions." EU sanctions and a subsequent Russian embargo have hurt many European companies.
 
 #35
Valdai Discussion Club
http://valdaiclub.com
October 2, 2015
"NORMANDY FOUR": THE BEST POSSIBLE FORMAT
By Dmitry Suslov
Dmitry Suslov is Deputy Director for Studies at the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies of the School of World Economy and International Affairs, National Research University - High School of Economics, Research Fellow, Valdai Club Foundation.

The key political problem of the conflict - the political regime in Ukraine and its future - is far from resolution. The status quo established in the country does not suit the population of Donbass. The "bad peace" will be extended.

The "Normandy Four" consisting of the heads of state, government and Foreign Ministries of Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France has been in existence for one and a half years and has been the principal international mechanism for settlement of the Ukrainian crisis. It is the "Four" who made the key political decisions while the OSCE Contact Group that played the first violin in the political settlement process back in the summer of 2014 was repurposed into a technical executive. The main decision - basically the only document hammered out by the "Four" - is the so-called Minsk II Agreement, the Declaration of the "Four" passed on February 12 after 12-hour negotiations, buttressing the complex of measures for realization of the Minsk Agreements and containing the chief principle of political settlement of the Ukrainian conflict. It can be formulated as "peace in exchange for constitutional reform".

The current summit in Paris is the fourth full president-level face-to-face meeting of the "Four". Besides tete-a-tete meetings, it has been highlighted by six rounds of negotiations by phone. The "Four" assembled 11 times throughout the last 15 months at the level of foreign ministers.

However, despite the quite intensive nature of the "Four's" activities, the conflict is far from resolution. The inception of the format has not put an end to the war, its most active phase happened in late 2014. Then, although high-scale military operations ceased, skirmishes and gunfire have been ongoing practically day and night. The fact that the Minsk Agreements are violated is probably one of the few assertions all members of the "Four" agree on.

Finally, the key political problem of the conflict - the political regime in Ukraine and its future - is far from resolution. It is common knowledge that the political status quo established in the country after the coup d'etat of February 21, 2014, does not suit the population of Donbass, while the new Kiev government and its Western patrons are doing their utmost to preserve it and safeguard reintegration of Donbass on its basis. The constitutional reform - something that could have provided a new political status quo in Ukraine and, therefore, settled the conflict - is being crossed out in every possible way, and Kiev is openly refusing to launch the negotiations with the self-proclaimed DPR and LPR as was stipulated in the Minsk Agreements of February 2015. The parties interpret the Minsk commitments in a fundamentally different way. As a result, the transition of the border between the self-proclaimed republics of Donbass and Russia to Kiev's control is postponed indefinitely. Meanwhile, the DPR and LPR are switching to ruble payments, their economic and cultural ties with Ukraine are dwindling.

Thus, there is transnistrization of the conflict, its "freezing" instead of resolution based on a new All-Ukrainian political status quo. The DPR and LPR would most likely remain entities de facto independent from Ukraine but de jure part of its territory under Russia's subsistence and within approximately the current boundaries for an indefinite span of time. In the future, the situation will be able to transform either into reunification of the country on the ground of federalization and constitutional reform or into a new war.

Hence many people wonder: how effective is the Normandy format? Should it be replaced or adjusted? For instance, by complementing it with the US, who has one of the greatest influences on the conduct of the current Ukraine and development of common modalities in the dialogue with Russia both from the standpoint of the Ukrainian crisis and the prospects of its relations with the West as a whole. Or, perhaps, the format should be supplemented by the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy or the President of the European Council, or use them as representatives of EU institutions to replace the leaders of Germany and France.

Yet, such a reform would have been unnecessary and even harmful. Considering the acuteness and the nature of the Ukrainian conflict, intransigence of the parties' positions, factors of the current balance of forces in the EU and the spirit of Russia's relations with different players in the West, the "Normandy Four" in its current composition seems like the best format for settlement. Its efficiency should be assessed in terms of prevention of a "major war" in Europe and development of the key settlement principle, and not through the prism of the Ukrainian conflict resolution - in fact it is impossible at the moment.

When evaluating the efficiency of the "Normandy Four", one should remember that the Ukrainian conflict is less a clash for Ukraine, its national political regime and foreign policy orientation but more for the rules of the international order and relations between great powers in particular. It predetermines the acuteness and the depth of the confrontation, the prospects of overcoming which are vague, sadly. The positions of the parties are intransigent indeed.

For Russia, interference of the West in the political processes of Ukraine in late 2013 - early 2014, support of another "colour revolution" and the rapid consolidation of the outcomes of its foreign policy has become not only an infringement of vital interests but also a crude violation of game rules as a whole, an extravagation far beyond the permissible and the non-permissible in relations between great powers. In this context, for Moscow the change of the political and foreign policy status quo in Ukraine is not only a matter of protection of interests in a neighbouring state and in the post-Soviet space as a whole, it is, first and foremost, a matter of international status and position of Russia, a matter of international order.

In the eyes of the West, Moscow's response to the Ukrainian coup d'etat and to the role the West played in it has become one of the heaviest blows to the US- and Western European-backed project of the "liberal world order" based on Western rules, institutions and US leadership. Washington took Moscow's actions as a direct challenge to its global leadership and order, which, according to the United States' understanding, should have been established after America's "victory" in the Cold War. EU states (especially Germany) perceived it as a devastating blow to their nurtured idea of "Greater Europe" reaching the borders of China and fully oriented towards the European Union, idea of Europe where Ukraine and ultimately Russia are associated according to EU rules. Against this background, prevention of changes in the current status quo in Ukraine in 2014, its retention in the Western orbit is also a matter of position in the world and development of the world order as a whole for the US and the EU.

Taking into account the systemic nature of the conflict and the intransigence of the parties' positions, elaboration of the main political principle of settlement (peace in exchange for constitutional reform) by the "Four" is an enormous achievement. It is an achievement preeminently based on the Russian approach. Of course, the devil is in the details as always. Ukraine and the West are doing their best to interpret the commitment in a minimalistic and selective manner, simultaneously referring to reluctance of the DPR and LPR to resume the war due to the inevitability of harsher sanctions against Russia, who is already in a complicated economic situation. Nonetheless, the development of this principle outlines the settlement contours and gives way to debates that reintegration of the DPR and LPR into Ukraine is only possible after introduction of a change to the political status quo there. In other words, after a constitutional reform.

As soon as the principle gained approval in February 2015, active military operations in Donbass ceased. At the same time, the "Four" made a real contribution to prevention of hostilities: Berlin and Paris exert serious influence on Kiev both in averting military escalation and in its fulfillment of the political commitments stipulated by the Minsk Declaration. If no such work were conducted or if the "Four" were inexistent, a war would have erupted long ago. Or, more likely, it would have been ongoing since the summer of 2014. Even debates about extension of the deadline for implementation of the Minsk Declaration (originally set for late 2015) to the next year displays the "Four's" pivotal role in preventing a new bout of escalation. Indeed, the other side of the coin of such an extension is Transnistrization of the conflict. On the other hand, as they say, there never was a good war or a bad peace. And the principle of "peace in exchange for a constitutional reform" has never been scrapped.

The very existence and continuation of the negotiation process enables the "Four" to keep Obama's administration in a sort of a rearguard of the political settlement and prevents him from taking the process into his own hands. In addition, it stops him from sending "lethal" armaments and vehicles to Kiev that would have doubtlessly incited a new round of military escalation. Should the "Four" vanish or the negotiation process be put on hold, the current or the following US administration would have to withstand higher pressure from the Congress and warmongers demanding more decisive military aid for Ukraine. That would most likely spark not only new escalation of military operations in Donbass, but also pave the way for a real threat of direct Russia-NATO military confrontation.

In general, the format of the "Four" bears the lowest potential for escalation. Its formation in the summer of 2014 was motivated by unwillingness of Germany and France to allow further aggravation of the war in the Southeast of Ukraine and intensify confrontation between Russia and the West. Berlin and Paris are clearly trying to fix Ukraine in the orbit of the EU and the West as a whole, to preserve the status quo established in the country in February 2014 and to push the Russian policy back towards Eurocentrism. However, not at the cost of another Cold War or, worse, "heated" confrontation. They seriously fear direct Russia-NATO confrontation and appearance of a new deep longstanding borderline in Europe, understanding that it would weaken their security and greatly worsen the international position. The idea of "Greater Europe" ranging from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean and oriented towards the EU would be put out of mind for a long time.

That is why, seeing the obvious inability of the OSCE Contact Group or the Geneva Format (where the US takes part) to attain de-escalation, A. Merkel and F. Hollande decided to create the only format capable of at least preventing degeneration of the Ukrainian crisis into a full-scale cold or even hot war.

It is the only format because, on the one hand, it includes states with the most moderate and constructive alignment towards Russia. Germany and France are firm advocates of a strategic partnership with Russia and the idea that European security cannot be maintained without Russia or against it, Europe per se is incomplete without it. Participation of much harsher-aligned US, Poland or the UK in the negotiation process would have definitely blocked even the results the "Four" have achieved thus far.

On the other hand, the format clearly reflects the balance of forces created in the EU, namely, the build-up of the leader's power in the hands of one country, Germany. It is quite likely that the period of exclusive leadership of Berlin in the EU will be short and will kick-start processes, principally centrifugal and fragmentational which will change the countenance of the organization. They have already begun. However, Germany practically fully governs the policy of the European Union on the most essential domestic (debt crisis) and external (TTIP negotiations, Ukrainian crisis) vectors. Therefore, if there is anyone who should negotiate all the most crucial political issues with Russia, it is only Germany. High Representative F. Mogherini plays an important, albeit predominantly technical, role.

Yet, participation in negotiations with Russia and Ukraine unilaterally would be rather erroneous for Berlin, from the standpoint of relations with Moscow and Kiev and, more importantly, with other countries of the European Union. Participation of France (a permanent member of the UN Security Council among other things) adds weight and representativity to the format, guarantees wide support to agreements reached in the EU and the UN Security Council. Finally, Paris' involvement in the Normandy format is objectively beneficial for Moscow: France takes an even more moderate stance and makes it clear that cooperation with Moscow in combating the Islamic State is just as important as the Ukrainian crisis, while ISIS itself is a lot more topical for it than the situation in Ukraine. Moscow will definitely make use of it in the mean time in the context of potential direct involvement of Russia in the fight against the Islamic State as the leader of the second anti-ISIS coalition.

Therefore, the Normandy format is a compromise between the two pivotal goals of the peacekeeping process: de-escalation and representativity. It includes the leaders of the West, who can theoretically conduct dialogue with Russia in the current situation, yet still leaders. There is no substitution for the "Four". It handles the mission of preventing a "major war" well. The problems of greater achievements are essentially an outcome of the failure to solve the Ukrainian crisis at its current stage. That is the standpoint to view the meeting of V. Putin, A. Merkel, F. Hollande and P. Poroshenko in Paris on October 2. No bigger breakthrough is anticipated. However, the "bad peace" will be extended, just as the main principle of political settlement will be reaffirmed.
 
 #36
Donetsk republic hopes Kiev will change stance after Paris summit

MOSCOW, October 2. /TASS/. The self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic expects a significant change in Kiev's stance on resolving the conflict in Donbas after the Normandy format summit in Paris on Friday, the DPR's envoy to the Minsk peace talks, Denis Pushilin, has said.

"We hope there will be a conceptual change in Ukraine's approaches when implementing the Minsk agreements. Indeed, a lot depends on this meeting," Pushilin was quoted by the Donetsk news agency as saying ahead of the summit of the Normandy Four leaders.

Pushilin stressed that Kiev's policy has seriously hampered the efforts on peaceful settlement in Donbas so far and the situation is likely to deteriorate if the Ukrainian leadership fails to revise the course.

"It is much more difficult to solve political and economic issues than the security ones. You saw how much time it took [the sides] to sign an absolutely simple document on withdrawing weapons with the caliber under 100mm," he said.

The DPR envoy explained that this should have been done in March but due to Ukraine's stance the deal was signed only earlier this week. He expressed hope that the Normandy format summit will contribute towards solving issues faster.

The leaders of Russia, France, Germany and Ukraine are due to gather in Paris on Friday for the Normandy format talks. This will be the third such face-to-face meeting of the four leaders since the so-called Normandy format of negotiations on the conflict in Ukraine was introduced in June 2014.

The sides are due to discuss a range of issues on resolving the conflict in Donbas, including holding local elections and weapons withdrawal.

Kiev's refusal to withdraw weaponry simultaneously with DPR and LPR violates Minsk Agreements

Ukraine should start withdrawing its weaponry simultaneously with the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk republics (DPR and LPR), Denis Pushilin went on to say.

Not fulfilling this condition will constitute a violation of the Minsk Agreements, Pushilin said commenting on the statement by Ukraine's military operation headquarters. The headquarters said that LPR and DPR should start withdrawing the weaponry unilaterally, and then Ukrainian forces will start withdrawal on their side.

"Of course, the simultaneous withdrawal by DPR and LPR and Ukraine was outlined [in the Minsk Agreements]. So, this can be their wish or possible trick to provoke us. However, this is will a violation of the signed document," Donetsk News Agency quoted Pushilin as saying.

The agreement signed in Minsk by members of the Contact Group and its sub-group on security envisages withdrawal of weaponry of less than 100mm caliber and tanks to the distance of 15 kilometers from the contact line in Donbass. At first, tanks will be withdrawn, followed by artillery and mortars. The first stage should start two days after the complete ceasefire and finish in 15 days. The second stage will take 24 days to complete. The withdrawal will start in the "North" sector on the LPR territory and will continue in the "South" sector in DPR.

Minsk agreements on Ukraine

The Minsk accords were signed on February 12, after negotiations in the so-called "Normandy format" in the Belarusian capital Minsk, bringing together Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.

The Minsk accords envisage ceasefire, weaponry withdrawal, prisoner exchange, local election in Donbass, constitutional reform in Ukraine and establishing working sub-groups on security, political, economy and humanitarian components of the Minsk accords.

The Ukrainian forces and the self-defense forces of the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk republics have repeatedly accused each other of violating ceasefire and other points of the Minsk agreements.
 
 #37
RIA Novosti
October 1, 2015
Russia accepted refugees from Ukraine "quietly" - senior MP

Russian State Duma chairman Sergey Naryshkin has said Russia has accepted twice as much refugees from Ukraine as Europe is accepting from the Middle East and North Africa at the moment, RIA Novosti (part of the state-owned International News Agency Rossiya Segodnya) reported on 1 October.

"I would like to thank you and your colleagues and everyone who has taken part in this huge, noble and necessary work on taking in refugees from Ukraine in Russian regions. In addition, it has been done quietly, without political cries, noise or scandals. People are settled, people are working, children attend schools," Naryshkin said, addressing head of the Russian Federal Migration Service (FMS) Konstantin Romodanovskiy at the International Parliamentarian Forum. Naryshkin added that the number of the refugees who entered Russia was twice the number of the refugees who "flooded western and central Europe".

Romodanovskiy on his part said that Russia's experience in tackling the influx of refugees could be applied elsewhere. "Russia's experience of mass acceptance of refugees, which happened in the recent Russian history, could be studied and be in demand by the global community. We are ready for that," Romodanovskiy said, as quoted by RIA Novosti later on the same day. According to RIA Novosti, Russia has accepted over 1m of refugees from Ukraine.

At the same time, the influx of illegal migrants into Russia has decreased by 1m people over the past year, Romodanovskiy said, as quoted by Russian privately-owned news agency Interfax on 1 October. "The number of illegal workers has decreased by 800,000 people," he said, adding that the decrease came as a result of tighter migration laws.

Romodanovskiy also said that regional budgets had earned 1.7 times more funds from labour migrants than the previous year. "The change in the situation with migration has largely been influenced by the improvement of perception of migration by the Russians. The number of those who believe it is necessary to help migrants legalize [their status] and assimilate in the accepting country has increased," he said.
 
 #38
Russia Direct
www.russia-direct.org
September 30, 2015
The food blockade of Crimea only hurts Ukraine, not Russia
Attempts at a food blockade of Crimea appear to be nothing more than a stunt coordinated by the Kiev authorities that may actually end up hurting Ukraine more than it hurts Russia.
By Dmitry Polikanov
Dmitry Polikanov is Vice President of The PIR-Center and Chairman of Trialogue International Club. Author of more than 100 publications on conflict management, peacekeeping, arms control, international relations and foreign policy. Member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, the International Sociological Association, the All-Russian Public Opinion Research Center Research Council.

The ongoing food blockade of Crimea by activist groups seems to be one of the strangest steps yet in Ukrainian foreign policy and public diplomacy in the past 18 months. Closed roads, concrete blocks on the railways, hundreds of trucks stuck at the border for several days - all this combined with the permanent threats to shut down the electricity supplies to the peninsula puts Crimea further away from Ukraine and buries the last hopes for peaceful coexistence with its neighbors.

Some would argue that the campaign has nothing to do with the official line of Kiev and is nothing more than a civil society protest in favor of the rights of the Crimean Tartars. In fact, it does not appear to be so.

One may remember the early statements of those who began the campaign as well as supportive messages of the Ukrainian officials. It is difficult to imagine a situation where the authorities do not prevent chaos on the major transportation routes and allow, if not help, "civil activists" to impede the movement of cargoes.

Moreover, the protesters were soon joined by the militants from the radical wing - the Right Sector - and it seems that these groups have seized the powers of the police, border guards and customs in the areas bordering Crimea. Such circumstances mean that either Ukraine is a failed state with no central power and law enforcement agencies, or the administration in Kiev actually encourages this form of "popular justice."

However, the implications of this shortsighted policy will be rather grave. First of all, the blockade strengthens the population of the Crimea in proclaiming the rightfulness of their choice in the referendum 18 months ago. It adds arguments to the concept that, without joining Russia, Crimea would have fallen victim to the Ukrainian radicals who would not have stopped at bringing any sorts of sufferings to the Russian-speaking locals.

Secondly, the disruption of economic ties has the opposite effect - instead of convincing people to surrender, it simply broadens the gap between the peninsula and continental Ukraine, aggravating the hatred and eliminating meaningful ways of reasonable cooperation. Finally, the blockade may worsen the positions of the Tartars in the Crimea - under the current circumstances, people may start regarding them as the "fifth column" and, hence, suggest restrictions on their autonomy.

The economic impact of the blockade is negligible. It has already provoked mockery in the comments of the Crimean authorities, general public and Russian experts. The trucks simply stopped crossing the border and the checkpoints were moved 10 km (approximately 6 miles) further into Ukrainian territory.

Moreover, it is quite clear that there is no peril for the fate of the Tartars in Crimea either. They enjoy cultural autonomy and full protection of their rights as any other ethnic group within the Russian Federation. At the same time, any attempts to establish exclusiveness detrimental to the rights of other nationalities living in Crimea (including Russians and Ukrainians) is totally unacceptable - not only at the federal level in Russia, but also at the regional level by the people of the Crimea.

Many nations in Russia - from the Chechens and the Balkars to the ethnic Germans of the Volga region - suffered from the Stalin oppression and were sent in exile. However, their needs have been accommodated in modern Russia, the government has done a lot to correct the historical injustice and they gain political, administrative and financial backing in maintaining their culture, religion and traditions in fair sharing with other groups in the federation. Thus, it would be erroneous to claim that the fate of the Crimean Tartars is more unique and requires some totally different approach.

Meanwhile, despite the blockade, Moscow continues to act friendly and, as some argue, even inflicts damage to its own business interests. Gazprom is ready to supply gas to Ukraine at a significant discount ($230, slightly more expensive than the cost to the closest Russian ally - Belarus), to write off a part of the gas debt and undertake other rapprochement steps to end the "total war" with Ukraine, including the restoration of the purchase of coal.

Besides, Russia continues to take care of the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees on its territory and does not really apply pressure on Ukraine as far as $3 billion in debt payments are concerned. Let alone the fact that Russia neglects the improvised smuggling of Ukrainian goods onto the territory of the Crimea via cars and "private visits" instead of truck transportation.

It may happen that the current blockade is just a PR action to draw attention of the international community before and during President Putin's visit to the United Nations and his talks with President Obama. If so, this trolling of the Russian authorities will stop soon. Even if it does not, it is quite clear that such action will only widen the distance between Crimea and Ukraine and will hardly bring a constructive note to Russian-Ukrainian relations in both the short and long run.
 
 #39
www.rt.com
October 2, 2015
Russian bridge to Crimea going up at lightning speed
[Photos and video here https://www.rt.com/business/317368-russia-crimea-kerch-bridge/]

Mainland Russia is one step closer to a direct link to Crimea. Workers are building temporary bridges that will carry construction machinery and deliver materials to the Kerch bridge site. Eventually there will be three bridges, one is already working.

The Crimean Peninsula's only land border is with Ukraine, but currently regular passenger and cargo deliveries are organized by direct flights and ferries from ports in southern Russia.

The 19-kilometer long main bridge is expected to open in December 2018 and will connect Kerch in Crimea to mainland Russia and by-pass Ukraine.  

"The construction material for the temporary bridge is more than 3,500 tons. Bridge support piles were sunk to a depth of 35 to 56 meters. This is the first span. Soon there will be two more such bridges," said Leonid Ryzhenkin who oversees the building in an interview with Russian daily KP.ru.

October 1 also saw the beginning of the construction of a four-lane highway to link the new bridge with the Krasnodar region in the south of Russia. It will be 40 km long with five interchanges.

"A new road is designed for 120 km/h traffic. It will have a capacity of 36,000 cars a day," said Dmitry Gorb who heads the construction.

The second auxiliary bridge across the Kerch Strait and a temporary railway will be built this winter, said Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak, RIA Novosti reports.

This September, the Ukrainian far-right tried to implement a trade blockade of the Crimean Peninsula, which is still dependant on goods delivered from Ukraine. The Kerch Strait Bridge aims to end Crimea's reliance on Ukraine.
 
 #40
The Economist
October 1, 2015
Ukraine economic update
The patient awakes

UKRAINE has just released balance-of-payments data for August. In terms of Ukraine's recent past, at least, it makes for good reading. Exports are rising and the country is running both current-account and budget surpluses. The reserves of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) are rising, and the finance ministry has a record $2.2 billion in its Treasury account. Pretty impressive.

The NBU reckons that by the fourth quarter of this year, the Ukrainian economy will be growing again (in dollar terms the economy has more than halved in size over the last year or so). This may be an optimistic forecast; things still look pretty terrible. The following chart shows industrial production, retail sales and exports (in American dollars), all of which are shown as a year-on-year change. Ukraine has moved away from the depths of economic despair of a few months ago, but they hardly look great:

Also I am not sure that Ukraine should boast too much about its twin surpluses. As Timothy Ash of Nomura, a bank, argues,

"On the current-account side, the collapse in domestic demand and deep recession has slashed imports, more than making up for the collapse also in exports, particularly to Russia. So not sure how sustainable that is; as recovery grips, imports will rise again."

Then we have the budget surplus. Is it really sensible for a country in the middle of an economic crisis to be tightening its purse strings? It does suggest that some of Ukraine's structural reforms are going well. BVut the government is also depriving the economy of much-needed demand. It is largely being achieved by freezing civil-service salaries and pensions, which is not sustainable for long. As Mr Ash argues, "given strained domestic political stability not really sure how durable that will be."
 
 #41
Newsweek.com
September 29, 2015
Voters in Eastern Ukraine Must Be Given a Choice
BY SERHIY LYOVOCHKIN
Serhiy Lyovovchkin is a member of the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine's parliament, where he is a co-chairman of the Opposition Bloc. He has served as chief of staff to two Ukrainian presidents.

Some are quick to say that the war in my country is over and that Russia has won. But that has more to do with the virtual perception of the Ukrainian conflict than any facts on the ground.

As we prepare for our third wartime election next month, there is, however, a possibility that Ukraine still might lose. But that will happen only if our government adopts the tactics of our aggressor and denies the opposition the right to compete.

Whether or not Ukraine continues to be the diverse nation it once was is really at the heart of the debate over our future. Insurgents in Donetsk and Luhansk are demanding more autonomy, and already the die is cast-local elections cannot be held in the areas they control.

But writing off the opinion of the rest of eastern Ukraine with the broad stroke of a pen would be a terrible mistake, and it is one the current government is in the midst of making.

The Opposition Bloc, of which I am a leader, won more than 10 percent of the nation's parliament seats last October. Had voters in the self-declared autonomous zones been allowed to vote, and had people not been intimidated on election day, that figure would have been higher. Still, we are the largest group of representatives of those regions whose voice in Ukrainian public affairs is constantly diminished and in some cases silenced altogether.

Kharkiv is Ukraine's second largest city and a center of gravity for the badly shaken East. Acting on orders from Kiev, authorities there are refusing to register the Opposition Bloc in time for local elections.

In past years, nearly 1 in 2 Kharkiv voters cast their ballot for our candidates, which is why these tactics are particularly galling. It is like saying Republicans cannot be on the ballot in Iowa-technically it is only one state, but to many of your politicians it really seems to matter.

Regional authorities in Dnipropetrovsk, another key Eastern region, are following Kharkiv's example and making moves to stop us from fielding candidates there.

In Ukraine, where governors are appointed by the president, not elected, it defies credibility to suggest that regional authorities are acting of their own free will. Real decentralization is part of the solution for our country, but today Kiev wields near total political control.

Finally, and of greater symbolic importance to a country that is struggling to hold together, local elections should be held in those areas of Donetsk and Luhansk that are not controlled by insurgents. Last October, our electoral authorities managed to do this, but this year they are saying that this is impossible in cities and regions where elections have been held in the recent past.

Again, political expediency is more to blame than practicality. If we are one country, we should vote together to the maximum extent possible. No less important, the example of holding local officials accountable at the polls in these regions will not be lost on those who, under insurgent control, are denied the same choices.

We value the efforts of all global leaders committed to finding peace in Ukraine. We hope for progress in the Minsk peace process, and my political force is prepared to take part in the upcoming elections-even in those territories that are under control of the separatists.

When a radical hurled a grenade at the parliament in Kiev late last month, it was a violent protest against the president's proposal to grant more autonomy to the breakaway regions within Donetsk and Luhansk. Violence is always the wrong method for protest in a democratic society. But if more legitimate means of being heard-such as voting-are curtailed, I fear what might result.

By changing the constitution to allow for greater decision making at local levels in Ukraine, President Petro Poroshenko is saying the right thing. When he talks about uniting Ukraine, he is saying the right thing.

But his actions-allowing those officials currently loyal to him to deny opposition parties from campaigning, and foreclosing the option of elections to those in the troubled areas of the East where people deserve a voice-tell a different story.

Our best chance at surviving the war that has been inflicted on us as a single nation lies in aligning words and actions. Any daylight between the two now will lead to a darker night for Ukraine when the elections are done.


 
 #42
www.rt.com
October 2, 2015
'Ukraine's Petro Poroshenko is failing on all sides'

The situation in Donbass will stabilize and effectively Ukraine is going to be a federal state, says James Petras, Professor at Binghamton University. Efforts by Poroshenko to mobilize world opinion against Russia at the UN were a total fiasco, he added.

RT: The Donbass region has seen its calmest period since a rarely respected international ceasefire agreement was signed last February. How will the agreement's fate change tomorrow?

James Petras: It is very difficult to tell because at this moment the US is totally embroiled in the Middle East. And the government in Ukraine, especially in the Kiev region, is in a terrible economic quagmire at this time. And the Europeans are very much upset with the sanctions against Russia. So, the problem in Ukraine today is the strength that the right... is exercising on the government, and the attempts by Poroshenko to mobilize world opinion against Russia at the UN were a total fiasco. So, I think the situation in Donbass will stabilize. I think effectively we are going to get a federal state in the process. And I think the extremists in Kiev will have a difficult time mobilizing international support and any kind of major military operation.

RT: What do you think about President Poroshenko's position in the government right now, is it still sustainable?

JP: I think President Poroshenko is very vulnerable and weak... and discontent with the economic conditions for the majority of people in Kiev is increasingly hostile. I think that Poroshenko has no domestic foundations to sustain his rule. The question is who will replace him. And here there is so much in-fighting and jockeying for power that it is difficult to see any particular leader emerging in a strong position.

Poroshenko doesn't really know what he wants because he is failing on all sides: he is attacking Russia... he hasn't been able to put together a development strategy to get out of the recession; he doesn't have strong military support. I think Poroshenko will stay on by default, not because he is a strong president, not because he has a viable foreign policy, but because no one else is around that can actually implement an alternative program.

RT: The atmosphere at the United Nations General Assembly showed both Ukraine and Russia remain deeply divided on how to resolve the conflict in the Donbass. Why hasn't a solution been found after such a long time?

JP: I think the solution has been illusive because the US has been prompting Poroshenko to continue to put pressure on the Eastern provinces. And I think the efforts have failed. I think Russia is not going to abandon Donetsk and Lugansk. I think the experience thus far is that the situation has more or less stabilized, and I think people are beginning to return to their homes. And I think the refugee issue is less acute than it was one or two months ago. So I think the solution is by the status quo.

I think a solution would be accepting greater autonomy for the east [Ukraine] and less militarism in the west [Ukraine]. I think the basic issue that Poroshenko should be paying attention to is how to revive a moribund economy, rather than extending a bankrupt treasury by continuing to fund an unending war. Russia is not going to retreat; the Donetsk and Lugansk people are not going to surrender to the west. And I think the reality dictates the acceptance of a federal state.
 
 #43
Traffic police officer tells court former Ukrainian pilot Savchenko hitchhiked in Russia

DONETSK /Rostov Region/, October 1. /TASS/. Eyewitness in the case of former Ukrainian pilot Nadezhda Savchenko, Russian traffic police inspector Alexey Tertyshnikov confirmed in court that the defendant was hitchhiking in the central Russian Voronezh Region, a TASS correspondent reported from the courtroom Thursday.

Savchenko, accused of complicity in the murder of Russian journalists near the city of Luhansk in the Luhansk Region in east Ukraine, an attempt to kill and illegal border crossing, as well as her defense, claim she had not crossed the border illegally but had instead been abducted from Ukrainian territory and brought to Russia "with a bag on her head."

Earlier, eyewitness Sergey Bobro said he and his friend picked Savchenko who thumbed a lift at a road 30 kilometers from the village of Kantemirovka, and later the car was stopped by traffic police.

"She said she was a national of Ukraine and was in the border zone without an ID. She said she was going to a railway station. I reported that to a police station, and soon a Federal Security Service [FSB] officer arrived, and the citizen was handed to him," Tertyshnikov said.

He did not specify what the FSB investigator and Savchenko had been talking about as he had not focused attention on that and noted that it was not his competence. He said he had not detained Savchenko and learned about a criminal case against her later from TV news programs.

Consideration of Savchenko's case on merits started in Russia's Donetsk City Court September 22.

Nadezhda Savchenko's case

Savchenko is accused of involvement in the murder of two Russian journalists in the Luhansk Region, as well as illegal crossing of the border with Russia. The materials of her case were separated from the general case on Ukrainian servicemen committing genocide and using banned means and methods of war.

The period of investigation on her case has been extended until November 13. If found guilty, Savchenko faces up to 25 years in prison.

According to investigators, during combat operations near the eastern Ukrainian city of Luhansk on June 17, 2014, Savchenko, who was an officer of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, from the location of the Aidar battalion - a paramilitary group of Ukraine's Interior Ministry - in the vicinity of the village of Metallist secretly adjusted artillery fire on a section of the Lugansk People's Republic militia's roadblock with civilians, including three Russian journalists.

As a result, VGTRK journalists Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin were killed.

Savchenko does not admit her guilt.

The defense says the legal interests of its client in Russia are infringed upon, but Russian federal law enforcement structures flatly deny that.
 
 #44
Kyiv Post
October 1, 2015
Editorial
Bombs Away

One war is not enough for Vladimir Putin, the megalomanical dictator. Only two days after telling the United Nations General Assembly that he wanted to be part of an international coalition against terrorism in Syria, the Kremlin tough guy on Sept. 30 started bombing.

But according to numerous reports, his targets were not areas of Syria controlled by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, his claimed ambition, but rather areas controlled by rebels trying to overthrow Putin's pal, Bashar al-Assad.

In the meantime, Putin's goals haven't changed for Ukraine -- he wants to destroy its independence, as Josef Stalin tried to do during the Holodomor of 1932-33. But Putin's tactics have momentarily changed. He's called off the fighting, perhaps to lull the West, perhaps to hope that Ukraine implodes from its own corruption or perhaps because the Kremlin is rethinking its strategy.

Whatever the case, no one in Ukraine should relax. Putin showed two unpleasant truths to the world in the last week: He can start and stop the war against Ukraine at will. He also has no respect for the UN, international law or any world leaders who don't agree with him.

Fortunately, Ukraine's military is not letting down its guard. "I don't believe Russians will withdraw their troops, hand over control of the border, or allow free elections in Donbass, no, absolutely not," Colonel-General Viktor Muzhenko told Oliver Carroll of the Independent newspaper in London.

Some people see his foray in Syria as a sign that Putin has outfoxed the bumbling team of U.S. President Barack Obama and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry once more, as well as further confused the dysfunctional foreign policy team of the European Union.

It's true that the West has made many mistakes in Syria and should have united to take out Assad long ago. But the West's biggest mistake has been not to confront Putin more strongly after his annexation of Crimea and war against Ukraine. Having sized up the West as unlikely to take strong action against him now, Putin is emboldened to do as he pleases.

But he runs the risk of getting into a quagmire by defending Assad and of becoming a hated figure in the Sunni Muslim world. Maybe he'll get stuck there for 10 years as the U.S. did in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times columnist, wrote persuasively: "The Sunni Muslims are the vast majority in Syria. They are the dominant sect in the Arab world. Putin and Russia would be seen as going all-in to protect Assad, a pro-Iranian, Alawite/Shiite genocidal war criminal. Putin would alienate the entire Sunni Muslim world, including Russian Muslims."

What this all means for Ukraine may or may not become clearer on Oct. 2 after Putin, President Petro Poroshenko, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande meet in Paris. But whatever is discussed, the civilized world has ample reason to never believe anything Putin says, to bolster its defenses and to impose more sanctions against Russia.
 
 #45
Fort Russ
http://fortruss.blogspot.com
October 2, 2015
Ukrainian authorities assisted in violent seizures of thirty churches of Moscow Patriarchate by the radical nationalists

Politnavigator
http://www.politnavigator.net/veruyushhie-moskovskogo-patriarkhata-piketirovali-mvd-ukrainy-protestuya-protiv-zakhvatov-khramov.html
Translated by K. Rus

On Thursday, the parishioners of the Kiev orthodox churches [of Moscow Patriarchate] held a Cross procession and prayer vigil in front of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine. The participants protested against the police assisting in the seizure by the schismatic "Kiev Patriarchate" of churches of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Moscow Patriarchate (UOC).

During the prayer vigils believers presented Arsen Avakov with an appeal:

"For the second year in a row in different regions of Ukraine continue the criminal attacks of dissenters and nationalists for the purpose of seizures of temples and desecration of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church" - says the appeal. In particular, they cite the most recent example - the seizure by the "filaretovtsi" [followers of Filaret] of the Orthodox temple in the village of Ekaterinovka of Ternopil region, when the dissenters were traditionally helped not only by the Right Sector, but also the so-called "territorial battalion" "Ternopol" of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine": "The parishioners were beaten up in the yard so that about two dozen believers suffered serious injuries (including broken limbs and head injuries, - ed.).

"Together with the militants of the "Right Sector" there were representatives of the territorial battalion "Ternopol", which is a structural subdivision of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine", - continues the letter. "They also participated in the beating of defenseless believers of our Church, among whom were mostly women and the elderly. Meanwhile, the local police turned a blind eye".

"Even more disturbing was the fact that against the parishioners who suffered from the hooligan actions of the militants, criminal cases were started". - the letter states - In connection with this flagrant lawlessness the Primate of the UOC, Metropolitan Onufry sent to the President of Ukraine Poroshenko a letter with a request to stop the outrageous attacks on the churches of the UOC and the beatings of believers by militants, including in the village of Ekaterinovka and restore justice in relation to the events in this village".

The orthodox put forward the following demands for Avakov:

- to punish the guilty and, primarily, representatives of the Interior Ministry battalion "Ternopol", who, violating their professional duty, were on the side of the attackers on the innocent believers of our Church;

- to take all necessary measures to ensure that the rights of the faithful of the UOC are not violated in Ukraine - to stop attempts of church seizures of the UOC by the dissenters, which they regularly exercise together with the militants of the extremist organizations of Ukraine.

And the so-called "Kiev Patriarchate" was addressed by the director of the UOC, Metropolitan Anthony.

"It is impossible with one hand to promote stability, and with the second to ignite the flame of another confrontation in the Ukrainian society, - he writes. - As a result of illegal actions suffered the believers of our Church. Against women and unarmed men batons and tear gas were used, resulting in broken limbs and head injuries.

There have been more than thirty similar cases of church seizures. We hope that representatives of religious denomination, in favor of which the temples of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church are now seized, will come to their senses and put the interests of the Ukrainian people above the desire to expand their religious possessions illegally. You cannot speak about reconciliation only in words. They need to be backed by concrete action. For example, by the return of the occupied churches to the faithful of the UOC that will be a visual proof of the sincerity of the words of seeking peace in Ukraine".

KR: And you wonder why Crimea and Donbass left?
 
 #46
Russia Insider
www.russia-insider.com
October 2, 2015
US Satellites Work In Syria, But Not Ukraine
We have crystal clear color images of Russian equipment in Syria but only grainy black & white photos with little dots on them to prove "Russian aggression" in Ukraine
[Images here http://russia-insider.com/en/us-satellites-work-syria-not-ukraine/ri10106]

This article originally appeared in Neo Presse . Translated by Boris Jaruselski for Russia Insider.

The Ukraine crisis has been almost completely removed from the focus of the mainstream media. There are some contributions from time to time, like the one in connection with the UN General Assembly, where the Ukrainian Presidnet Petro Poroshenko, who was elected after the coup d'etat, delivered an expectedly Russophobic speech.

However, over the last few days, Syria is very big news in the western press. Russia has commenced massive weapons and humanitarian deliveries to the Syrian government, something that has become indisputable. On the one hand, even the Russian President Vladimir Putin has admitted to it repeatedly, most recently during the CBS interview. On the other, there is meaningful evidence from satellite images of the Syrian airport Basil al-Assad, located in the seashore town of Latakia.

The remarkable thing about that, especially when contrasted with 'reporting' of the Ukraine crisis by the western press, is how quickly tangible evidence became available, in the form of highly resolved satellite images of the Russian interventions in Syria. The first rumours surfaced at the end of August and beginning of September, seeded by the Israeli news papers Ynet and Haaretz. Proof was not available back then, and the intervention was dismissed by many commentators - even by the "Saker" for example, who regularly publishes geopolitical analyses regarding Russia.

Several sources published satellite images of the Basil al-Assad airport on the 20th of September, made by the GeoNorth company. The image from the 19th of September, showed four Russian multi-role Su- 30SM fighters, followed by later images, showing in great clarity in high resolution, Su-25 ground support bombers and the interceptor fighter Su-24. Besides those, there were also images of Russian infantry fighting vehicles of the type BTR-82 and the main battle tanks T-72 or T-90.

Nothing comparable was presented last year during the western media hysteria, which spoke in almost daily unison of a Russian invasion. Instead, only rough-grained, black-and-white images of supposed Russian positions were shown, from which it wasn't possible to recognize what was shown, or where the images were taken and to whom the equipment actually belonged.

One of the best images of "Russian equipment" in Ukraine...

And now in Syria...


 
 #47
http://ask.fm
October 1, 2015
Why do you say Ukraine is a Communist invention? It was created in 1917 by the February Revolution. Its precedent is the Kyivan Rus
By Anatoly Karlin

No, it's absolutely not. Ukraine (namely, "borderland," there being at various times multiple ukrainas to denote territories near the borders of the Russian world) has absolutely nothing to do with Kievan Rus. The term itself was a Tsarist-era literary invention that was hijacked in the 20th century to serve the cause of Ukrainian nationalism. In the days of "Kievan Rus" itself, the term people from Galicia to Vladimir-Suzdal used was just "Rus," or "the Russian Land" (Russkaya Zemlya).

This is what results in the very peculiar Ukrainian nationalist sort of schizophrenia in which they propose to prosecute and imprison people calling Russia (aka the modern state), "Russia", or "Rus": http://lenta.ru/news/2015/07/07/radavsrussia/ In a way, they're sort of proving the point that Ukraine is an unconvincing fiction. If it wasn't, they wouldn't care.
 
 #48
Dances With Bears
http://johnhelmer.net
September 29, 2015
MH17 - WHY THE INVESTIGATION WILL NEVER END, THE EVIDENCE NEVER SEEN
By John Helmer, Moscow
[Footnotes, links and photos here http://johnhelmer.net/?p=14240]

The Australian Government is sure the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) investigation of the downing of Malaysian Airlines MH17 will fail to identify the precise cause of the crash, and will be inconclusive on who and what were responsible. A report, termed final by the DSB, is scheduled for release on October 13.

So certain of the outcome are Australian officials that since May they have been negotiating with the Dutch Government to extend for another year until August 2016 a treaty agreement [1] for Australian police, intelligence agents and Defence Ministry officers to operate in The Netherlands. Without Australian bodies left to identify or repatriate, and only the debris of the MH17 aircraft in partial reconstruction in a hangar at the Hilversum Army Barracks, Dutch and Malaysian sources are questioning what purpose is served by the treaty extension.

In July the Australian and the Netherlands governments signed a protocol [2] for the extension of the Australian military operation on Dutch territory. The original pact of August 1, 2014 [1], and its protocol also provide that while they in The Netherlands, even inside the Hilversum base, the Australians will carry arms, and employ other weapons, including explosives; the pact also protects them from Dutch law if they hurt locals while using their arms. "Are the Australians armed to guard the evidence in The Netherlands," asks a Dutch source, "to prevent it from being disclosed publicly? Are the Australians arming themselves against the Dutch?"

Details of the published but unreported treaty papers, along with evidence gathered by Australian coroners and pathologists from the MH17 victims' bodies, reveal that suspicion a Russian-made ground-to-air missile did not cause, and could not have caused, the crash and the deaths had become a conviction among the investigators at Hilversum by November of 2014; that was just three months after the July 17 catastrophe.

It was this suspicion, growing certain, which was behind the exclusion of the Malaysian Government from the roster of the Joint Investigative Team (JIT), which was agreed by Ukraine, The Netherlands, Australia and Belgium on August 7, 2014. For background, read this [3].

Subsequent dissent among Dutch pathologists and prosecutors, surfacing guardedly but publicly in the Dutch media, was also causing problems for government ministers in The Hague. It triggered a flying visit by Prime Minister Mark Rutte to Malaysia and Australia between November 5 and 7, 2014. Rutte was then obliged to accept the Malaysian involvement in the JIT. But he was unable to conceal the underlying disagreement on what the evidence meant which the investigators had already gathered.

An Australian Government effort by then-Prime Minister Tony Abbott (below left) and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop (right) to keep the implications of the evidence from becoming public was frustrated by the release of a report by Victorian State Coroner Ian Gray in December. Click for the details [4].

The CT scan, X-ray and tissue evidence presented in the Gray report, which was circulated to local victims' families, ruled out the possibility that a Buk missile attack had caused the deaths of the Australian passengers. Unwittingly and unknown publicly for several months Gray and his report are now the focus of the international effort to pinpoint blame for the MH17 crime, and prosecute the perpetrators.

From the start, on July 17, Malaysian PM Najib Razak acknowledged the possibility that the prime suspect in the affair might be the government in Kiev. For more, read this [5]. The Malaysian Government refused to go along publicly with the US version presented by US Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, on July 19. Listen to her presentation [6].

A US lawyer who is well-known as an expert in aircraft crash investigations says it is not unusual for the country where the crash has occurred - Ukraine, in the MH17 case - to delegate to another country-The Netherlands - the job of leading the technical and forensic investigation. It is "exceptional", he notes, for the country of registration of the aircraft and airline - Malaysia - to be excluded from the investigation process.

Gabriele Gordon, a veteran German prosecutor who has analysed the MH17 records, says: "Ukraine delegated the leading role in the criminal investigation to The Netherlands because Ukraine belongs to the suspects. The delegation was just for the investigation. It was left open which of the countries [in the JIT] would lead the prosecution or would bring the case before its national court." The US lawyer agrees: "Delegation [to the Dutch] was not exactly unusual. Ukraine was a suspect, so [delegation] made sense."

On August 7, 2014, when the treaty forming the JIT was formalized, Malaysia was not a signatory. No reason was reported at the time, neither in Kuala Lumpur nor at The Hague. Rutte (below, right) and Najib (left) had met in The Hague on July 31, but they had been unable to come to terms.

As the JIT investigation progressed, however, the Malaysian pathologists who attended the identification process at Hilversum reported their concerns to their government. The sister of Captain Wan Amran, the pilot of MH17, who went to Hilversum to identify his body, said [7] she had seen a film of his body and had been told by investigators there were no shrapnel or bullet wounds.

The Malaysian Ambassador to the Netherlands, Fauziah Binti Nohd Taib (right), then issued a public complaint that Malaysian officials were "not sufficiently involved" in the Hilversum investigation. Press reports [8] of what she said exactly have been removed from the internet. They were reported [9] in Dutch several weeks later.

Rutte decided he should negotiate directly with Najib. On the way to their meeting, he passed to a Dutch reporter accompanying him, Xander van der Wulp, that the reason Malaysia had been excluded from the JIT was that in homicide cases Malaysia imposed the death penalty; The Netherlands did not. "That makes it difficult to work together legally with this country, though no one speaks loudly that this is the reason, " van der Wulp reported on November 5 [9]. This was a fabrication. The JIT agreement covered the investigation; it reserved to the signatory governments the right to prosecute under their own laws.

After Rutte and Najib had met on November 5, van der Wulp reported that the Malaysian Government's "criticism is completely gone. [Najib] Razak called the conversation with Rutte very useful and productive." Van der Wulp wasn't told what the Malaysian criticism had been. Nor was he told that Rutte and Najib had agreed Malaysia would be permitted to join the JIT on the condition that it abided by the non-disclosure rule covering the evidence gathered. Rutte then flew on to Australia to meet Abbott.

The problem for Rutte, Najib, and Abbott was that they couldn't go public with the evidence the Australian pathologists and Victorian Coroner already had begun to circulate. This was that the autopsy records ruled out one cause of death of the victims - the allegation that a Russian Buk missile had struck MH17.

Abbott almost let the cat out of the bag before Rutte arrived in Sydney from Kuala Lumpur. "I've become quite a good friend of Mark Rutte over the last few months," Abbott said [10]. "Obviously we have worked very closely together in responding effectively to the MH17 atrocity and the number one item in our discussions is the progress of the investigation, the progress of identification and repatriation and our shared determination to ensure this atrocity is full[y] investigated and if the perpetrators can reasonably be identified, they are brought to swift and exemplary justice."

Abbott was reported in a Sydney newspaper as saying this on November 5. From the Australian police, intelligence services, and Defence Ministry experts, and from Coroner Gray in Victoria, briefings for Abbott had indicated, either that the Dutch investigation would identify the Ukrainian government as perpetrating an air-to-air missile attack on MH17; or else the investigation would be inconclusive, save for one point: there had been no Buk missile attack. The Australian prime minister's "if" and "reasonably" said everything.

After Abbott (below, right) and Rutte (left) met in Canberra on November 6, Rutte stuck closer to the truth, but Abbott tried to keep the Buk story alive.

Here is the Dutch transcription of what the two men said [11]. Rutte: "I can guarantee you that we will do everything we can to bring those responsible to justice... I have no 100 per cent guarantee but I do have 100 per cent guarantee that we will do everything we can to bring them to justice." Abbott: "We were given very strong security advice in the days following the atrocity as to the type of weapon, as to the place from where the weapon was fired and as to the likely prominence [Abbott meant provenance] of the weapon and there's been nothing since then to question that original security advice." In the Australian state media reporting, the difference in meaning was missed [12].

The Dutch-Australian problem on November 5 became clearer a few days later, on November 14 in Melbourne, when two of the Australian pathologists and coronial court officers revealed publicly at an Asian coroners convention [13] that there were no shrapnel wounds in the bodies of the MH1 passengers. Their report can be read here [3]. Noone noticed the importance of the admission.

By the next month the evidence of the bodies was clearer. A Buk missile explosion, with release of more than 7,800 metal fragments raking the port (left) side of the aircraft, starting at the pilot's cockpit and going back to Row 12, was impossible. An 8-page report commissioned by Coroner Gray and drafted for him by David Ranson, a pathologist who had been working at Hilversum and who was head of the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, was sent to the Australian victims. Gray's purpose was to identify the cause of death and help the families understand how their loved ones had died, how swiftly, and if they had been conscious of what had befallen them.

That report was released to a reporter named Carolyn Ford. She read it, and then summarized for publication [4]. She didn't understand the significance of what Ranson had revealed. Ranson himself was still unclear on this last month when he freely chatted. He said he had had regular debriefings and discussions with the Australian Federal Police on his findings. He denied that his use of the term "missile" in his reports meant a Buk. "Don't confuse the meaning of the phrase, 'missile injuries'. It means flying objects that strike the body'." They were "rare", Ranson has reported.

Once international publication of the revelations was read, however, the problem Coroner Gray faced in revealing the December 2014 report was sharpened by communications from the Australian Federal Police and the Defence Department. Gray, constitutionally a member of the judiciary independent of the government, was requested not to release the report. So it was classified. A press request was stonewalled with a promise from Gray to respond; he didn't.

This week, on September 29, an Australian barrister, James O'Neill (below, left), launched a formal request for Gray (right) to release the December report. "There is a compelling case," O'Neill wrote in his submission to the coroner, "that the truth as to the actual causes of death of the MH17 passengers and crew, and the means by which these deaths were brought about, be known. The limited release of Dr Ranson's report thus far has not had that effect. More informed analysis and debate is contingent upon access to relevant data. Accordingly I seek the release of Professor Ranson's autopsy report to me."

O'Neill's application is a proceeding under the Victorian Coroners Act of 2008. This requires confidentiality for autopsy data except in cases when an applicant for disclosure has a "sufficient interest" in the evidence; or when there is public and media interest. The local courts have ruled in favour of disclosure by the coroner for media. According to a judgement in a federal Australian court case of 2011, "there is a need to balance the public interest in protecting living or deceased's persons personal or health information with the public interest in the legitimate use of that information."

This means that if Gray continues refusing to disclose the MH17 report, he will face a judicial review by a higher court in open session. That would be a magnet for the international media seeking the MH17 evidence.

O'Neill has already published [14] in the US an account of his attempts to open the MH17 investigation to public scrutiny. In this week's submission, O'Neill said: "There has also been much public comment, much of it ill-informed and at the least premature, attributing the cause of the crash (a BUK missile is alleged) and responsibility, directly or indirectly, for that missile. Responsibility, again much of it ill informed and certainly premature, has been attributed to Russia in general and Mr Putin in particular...There have been widespread geopolitical consequences of that event directly involving Australia, including for example singularly inept and inappropriate remarks directed at a foreign Head of State by the former Prime Minister."

The legal problem for Gray is one of his own making. There can be no doubt that the public interest is pressing and global. However, Australian Government officials have been making claims about the cause of the deaths, which Gray's report and Ransom's evidence undermine. Under Annex 13 [15] of the International Convention on Civil Aviation [16] - the Australian Government has publicly testified this sets the rules for the JIT - the disclosure of many kinds of evidence gathered in an air crash investigation can and must be withheld. There's an if. The evidence cannot lawfully be withheld and kept secret if the cause of crash and blame for deaths are made public by one of the investigating parties.

That is exactly what the US, Ukrainian, and Australian Governments, Abbott, and Bishop have done. They have publicly alleged that a Buk missile caused the crash and the deaths; and that when the incident occurred, the Novorussians, allegedly operating the Buk missile battery, were under Russian command, running all the way to the Kremlin. Annex 13 cannot legally be used to prevent disclosure in this circumstance. According to the US aviation accident litigator, "the MH17 case is much harder to explain than precedent cases of military shoot-downs of civilian airliners, like the Korean KAL007 [shot down by a Soviet Airforce fighter in 1983] or Iran Air Flight 655 [shot down by the USS Vincennes in 1988]. The [International Civil Aviation Organization, ICAO] rules allow a lot of discretion for disclosure and non-disclosure.There is much less [discretion] if there is relevance to findings or conclusions [of an Annex 13 report], when the evidence is directly, genuinely required [to substantiate] what is being made public."

"The MH17 investigation," the US lawyer adds, "is a very unique case. It is not as transparent as it should be."

The ICAO took ten days after MH17 had been downed to agree on the terms of its resolution [17] to investigate. The preamble of the July 29, 2014 [18], text starts by "welcoming the Netherlands initiative, as the lead investigator in accordance with Annex 13 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation, to send an international and independent team for the investigation of the loss of MH17, in coordination with the Ukrainian National Bureau of Incidents and Accidents Investigation of Civil Aircraft, following a request for assistance by Ukraine to ICAO and others." The text goes on to "stress... the need for a full, thorough and independent international investigation into the loss of MH17 in accordance with international civil aviation guidelines." It concludes by "Urg[ing] the Netherlands, supported by concerned States and organizations, to continue and finalize the independent international investigation."

For Annex 13 and other provisions of the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, read this [19].

The ICAO had announced almost immediately that Ukraine was the principal in the case under Article 26 and Annex 13 [16]. The delegation of investigating authority from Ukraine to The Netherlands was also lawful and compliant with the Annex [20], the ICAO decided. "The State of Occurrence shall institute an investigation into the circumstances of the accident and be responsible for the conduct of the investigation, but it may delegate the whole or any part of the conducting of such investigation to another State by mutual arrangement and consent. In any event the State of Occurrence shall use every means to facilitate the investigation...Note 2.- When the whole investigation is delegated to another State, such a State is expected to be responsible for the conduct of the investigation, including the issuance of the Final Report and the ADREP reporting. When a part of the investigation is delegated, the State of Occurrence usually retains the responsibility for the conduct of the investigation."

Annex 13 requires "complete autopsy examination of fatally injured flight crew and, subject to the particular circumstances, of fatally injured passengers and cabin attendants, by a pathologist, preferably experienced in accident investigation. These examinations shall be expeditious and complete."

Non-disclosure is provided in Sect. 5.12 of the Annex. "The State conducting the investigation of an accident or incident shall not make the following records available for purposes other than accident or incident investigation, unless the appropriate authority for the administration of justice in that State determines that their disclosure outweighs the adverse domestic and international impact such action may have on that or any future investigations." Ukrainian officials have relied on this provision to withhold from public disclosure "recordings and transcriptions of recordings from air traffic control units" - a provision added to the Annex in 2006 [21]. The Annex also requires that "these records shall be included in the final report or its appendices only when pertinent to the analysis of the accident or incident. Parts of the records not relevant to the analysis shall not be disclosed."

Read that last line again: press statements by Dutch officials participating in the DSB report, and in the JIT investigation, including remarks by chief Dutch investigator, Fred Westerbeke (below), are disallowed by the ICAO rules for being partial, fragmentary, prejudicial.

The Dutch magazine Elsevier, under Dutch Freedom of Information laws, has sought a copy of the JIT agreement of August 2014, its non-disclosure provisions, and 16 accompanying documents. Here they are:

On November 19, the Dutch Government refused [22], claiming disclosure to the press "could endanger the relations with other countries involved." This wording appeared to refer, not to Australia and Belgium, but to Ukraine. Dutch media reporting the blackout interpreted this as a Ukrainian Government veto over whatever evidence and report conclusions the JIT investigation produces.

Ard van der SleurArd van der Sleur (right), the Dutch Minister of Security and Justice, ruled: "I believe that this interest [international relations] should prevail over the interest of transparency as this is a unique study of a very serious event... it is foreseeable that the contacts between the relevant states and international organizations were going to run as smoothly and that they would be less inclined to share information."

In parallel in Australia, O'Neill filed a Freedom of Information Act request for release of the Australian Government's copy of the JIT agreement. The request was passed from Bishop's ministry, which had signed the treaty with the Dutch covering the operations of Australian troops during the Hilversum investigation, until it reached the Australian Federal Police. On December 23, 2014, the police agency refused [14] to release the agreement, citing, as had the Dutch Security Minister, the damage disclosure might have on "the international relations of the [Australian] Commonwealth." This was several weeks after the Victorian Coroner had begun releasing the evidence the JIT had gathered from the MH17 autopsies, proving the absence of missile shrapnel.

Foreign Minister Bishop's public statements on the MH17 investigation started by claiming on September 30, 2014 [23], that "an investigation into the cause of the crash, as required by the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, is underway. The investigation has broad international participation, drawing on experts from France, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Malaysia, Russia, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and the United States, as well as from the European Aviation Safety Agency and the International Civil Aviation Organisation."

At the United Nations (UN) on July 15, this year, Bishop claimed [24] the investigation by the Dutch-led group was neither as fast nor as transparent as a new, alternative tribunal might be. "Our resolution also demands a full, thorough and independent international investigation into this act. We must have answers. We must have justice. We owe it to the victims and their families to determine what happened and who was responsible... Justice delayed is justice denied. We owe it to the families and the loved ones of those who died on MH17 to pursue the criminal investigation as soon as possible...Any further delay sends a very bad message to the increasing number of non-state actors who are capable of such an atrocity. The international community needs to be utterly united in condemning any attack on civilian airlines in commercial airspace."

The Australian government radio broadcast [25] that Bishop "believed Russian-backed separatists were responsible for the disaster and may have mistook the commercial airliner for a Ukrainian jet." .

A letter to the UN signed on July 10 by the governments of Australia, Ukraine, The Netherlands, Belgium, and Malaysia claimed [26]: "We consider that a tribunal established by the Security Council would be the most effective mechanism to deliver justice for the families of all victims of the MH17 incident. It would also maximize international cooperation, which will be necessary for an effective prosecution." The official implication was that to be "effective"; to "maximize international cooperation", and to produce the evidence "for an effective prosecution", the DSB should be superseded and the JIT replaced.

Why Bishop's foreign ministry had signed an extension of treaty with the Dutch to keep armed Australian troops at the MH17 investigation at Hilversum for another year, when the evidence falls short of "effective prosecution", has not been explained.