Jun
25
Stalin not Welcome in Voronezh
June 25, 2009
 |
|
| увеличить фото … |
On June 22 residents of Voronezh found their local billboards featuring an ominous, but familiar face: Comrade Stalin “Victory will be ours!” reads a slogan in large white letters below a large picture of the vozhd. The question, curious residents asked, was why Comrade Stalin’s visage was once again taking such a prominent public space, and more importantly, who put it there?
According to Kommersant, the Stalin billboards are part of a campaign by the Communist Party to commemorate the 130th birthday of the generalissimo. Sergei Rudakov, a KPRF regional deputy, told the daily that his party wanted “to remind every resident about the great person and his achievements. The billboards, which were designed by three advertising companies, cost 8,000 rubles apiece.
Not everyone was happy to see Stalin dotting the skyline. Most of all, Voronezh’s city administration, which ordered that the billboards be taken down because, according to the law, “the contents of posters are not regarded as either commercial or social advertisements, are not directed toward a charitable or a socially useful purpose, maintain the interests of the state, and there are not objects of advertisement on the billboard.”
“In my opinion,” KPRF regional secretary Andrei Rogatnev told Kommersant, “If you follow the principle of the lack of objects of advertisement on billboards, then it is necessary to remove the posters where Vladimir Putin is presenting [Voronezh] mayor Sergei Koliukh with a certificate conferring Voronezh as the “City of Military Glory.”
Well, double standards hold in Voronezh. The city administration has demanded that the billboards be taken down, and if they aren’t, it will revoke the licenses of billboard companies who put them up.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Jun
25
Politkovskaya Defendents Go Back to Court
June 25, 2009
It’s back to court for Pavel Ryaguzov, Sergei Khadzhikurbanov and brothers Dzhabrail and Ibragim Makhmudov. Today, the Russian Supreme Court overturned their acquittal in the Anna Politkovskaya murder case. Reports the NY Times:
The court said the four men, who were accused of assisting the killer of Ms. Politkovskaya, should be tried on the same charges in the same military court in Moscow. In ordering the retrial, the court sided with the prosecution, which argued that there had been procedural violations by the judges and the defense during the original trial, a court spokesman, Pavel Odintsov, said. Other critics, however, including President Dmitri A. Medvedev, cited the prosecution’s errors and unfamiliarity with the jury system, which is relatively new in Russia, in the acquittal.
A statement issued by the Politkovskaya family on Novaya gazeta’s website said the following the about the Court’s ruling:
We recognize that the trial of every one of the accused was a fiasco. A fiasco from the standpoint of the evidence which was presented to the court.
But we think they are accessories in the case because we have yet to received an answer about what [they] were doing near the building at the time of the murder.
Therefore, the verdict, which the jury decided was just because there not enough evidence was presented.
We, as before, think that there is one possible option in the progress of the case–its transfer to a supplementary examination. We, as before, are sure that the case was not investigated and not transparent, and our main demand to the investigation which has yet to clarify who ordered the murder and the rest of the participants in the crime.
We only want the case to be investigated as it should be, and hold accountable all those persons responsible including the [murder's] client.
For an excellent article on the first trials proceedings, I highly recommend Keith Gessen’s ‘The Accused“ Hopefully this time the prosecution will present a better case.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Jun
24
Russia Today: Iran is all a CIA plot
June 24, 2009
There is nothing more hilarious when people give wondrous powers to the United States. It’s no surprise that Russia Today would feast on a the idea that the “Green Revolution” is a US orchestrated plot. Russia already convinced itself that every colored revolution was cooked up in Langley.
And this makes Craig Roberts a perfect guest (I know nothing about Wayne Madsen, but his wiki entry suggests that he’s a crank). He argued that the Iranian protests are “classic CIA destabilization” in an article on Counterpunch. What a sad convergence of opinion between some in the American Left, Russia’s conservatives, and the theocrats in Iran.
The idea among some Leftists that every uprising they don’t like is the work of the CIA (or Mossad) always strikes me as orientalist.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Jun
22
The Ballads of Mikhail Gorbachev
June 22, 2009
Mikhail Gorbachev has had many roles in his seventy-eight years. He’s been a Party aktiv, a First Party Kraikom Secretary, Politburo member, General Secretary of the Communist Party, Louis Vuitton model, and global philanthropist. Gorbachev, of course, is best known for concocting perestroika and glasnost, two reforms which aided the collapse of the Soviet Union. Now Gorby can add another role to his long CV: recording artist.
Yes, Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev has recorded an album (with Russian rock star Andrei Makarevich) of romantic songs titled Songs to Raisa in dedication to his wife. The album, of which only one copy exists, has already sold out. An unknown British philanthropist bought it for a whopping $169,940 at an auction to raise money for the Raisa Gorbachev Foundation. Reports Sean Michaels in the Guardian:
An “anonymous British philanthropist” bought what we suppose is Mikhail Gorbachev’s “debut album”, Songs for Raisa, in London this week, bidding $164,940 (about £100,000) at an auction to benefit the Raisa Gorbachev Foundation. Nearly 350 luminaries were present at the private event, including Gordon Bown’s wife, Sarah, London mayor Boris Johnson, Harry Potter author JK Rowling, actor Vanessa Redgrave and Russian ambassador Yuri Fedotov, according to the newspaper Pravda.
Gorbachev was there too, and he brought his singing voice. The former Soviet leader warbled a song called Old Letters. “The performance … was greeted with delight and a storm of applause,” said Pavel Palazhchenko, chairman of the Foundation’s press service. You can judge for yourself by listening to Old Letters.
Like the rest of the tracks on Songs for Raisa, “Old Letters” is an old Russian romantic ballad. Gorbachev’s wife, Raisa, died 10 years ago. The foundation established in her name is dedicated to fighting childhood cancer.
Two songs are available for download :
Old Letters
Dark Night
And they aren’t that bad! Who knew?
Popularity: 1% [?]
Jun
21
Ahmadinejad Theorizes Colored Revolution
June 21, 2009
Robert Fisk, who has been reporting daily from the Tehran, provides Ahmadinejad’s contribution to the theory of colored revolution:
In the aftermath of the Ahmadinejad “success” at the polls, his supporters were handing out leaflets condemning the secular revolutions of Eastern Europe, and their content says much about the anxieties of Iran’s clerical leadership. One of them was entitled: “The system of trying to topple an Islamic Republic in a ‘velvet revolution’.” It then described how it believes Poland, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine and other nations won their freedom.
“‘Velvet’ or ‘colourful’ revolutions… are methods of exchanging power for social unrest. Colourful and ‘velvet’ revolutions occurred in post-communist societies of central and Eastern Europe and central Asia. Colourful revolutions have always been initiated during an election and its methods are as follows:
“1. Complete despair in the attitude of people when they are certain to lose an election…
“2. Choosing one particular colour which is selected solely for the Western media to identify (for their readers or viewers).” Mousavi used green as his campaign colour and his supporters still wear this colour on wristbands, scarves and bandannas.
“3) Announcing that there has been advance cheating before an election and repeating it non-stop afterwards… allowing exaggeration by the Western media, especially in the US.
“4) Writing letters to officials in the government, claiming vote-rigging in the election. It’s interesting to note that in all such ‘colourful’ projects – for example, in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan – the Western-backed movements have warned of fraud before elections by writing to the incumbent governments. In Islamic Iran, these letters had already been written to the Supreme Leader.”
Another leaflet maintained that a study – which Khamenei’s advisers have obviously undertaken, however inaccurately – demonstrated that vote-rigging will be alleged on the very day of the election and that victory will be claimed by the opposition hours before the counting is finished and before their own defeat is announced. The results, says the document, will therefore already have a “background” of fraud. “In the final stages… supporters gather in front of the regime’s official offices, holding colourful banners and protesting against vote-rigging.” This part of the demonstration, the leaflet says, “is run by the foreign media who are the opposition movement’s supporters so that they make good pictures and mislead the international community”.
Popularity: 1% [?]
