Monthly Archives: April 2007

By Nikolay

On Monday Robert Gates met with President Putin and other officials in Moscow to discuss US plans to deploy the US ABM complex in Europe, and most importantly to offer cooperation on the issue: a potential linking of Russian and US systems and the ability for Russia to initiate inspection checks to the newly-built facilities. These plans were publicly rejected by Russia‘s newly-appointed Minister of Defense Anatoliy Serdyukov and Mr. Ivanov (Russia‘s first-vice-premier). Russia continues to remain skeptical that Iran possesses any type of threat to Russia and to Europe. Similarly, the US, in the face of Secretary of State Rice has called Russia’s concerns over plans to deploy the ABM systems “ludicrous”, the New York Times reported.

In his annual address to parliament, President Putin made it clear that Russia will respond immediately to US plans by withdrawing from the Adapted Conventional Armed Forces Treaty in Europe, which was ..read more

Of all the obits I’ve read on Yeltsin in the last few days, Mark Taibbi’s “Yeltsin: An Obit of a Drunken, Bloblike Train Wreck of a Revolutionary Leader” captures the man’s life and career best. I think he rightly sums up the Yeltsin period in this passage:

Yeltsin, in other words, single-handedly created a super-gangster class to defend his presidency against an electoral challenge. He had also restored a system of despotic government-by-tribute that had reigned in Russia for centuries, even throughout the worst years of Soviet rule. In Russia there survives a style of leadership dating back to the local Khans of the East in which the leader is a pathologically greedy strongman who takes everything for himself, and then rules by handing out “gifts” to an oligarchy of ruthless underlings devoted to his political survival. Stalin himself, an ethnic Georgian, used to physically re-enact this political ..read more

It is quite difficult to assess the influence, let alone the political impact of Russian youth organizations. The vast majority are rather small with memberships in the hundreds and, if they are lucky, the thousands. According to estimates from 2005, Nashi has around 100,000 to 300,000 members. The National Bolsheviks claim 15,000 to 20,000 members. Still these organizations, especially Nashi, are only in their infancy.

If a recent poll by the Public Opinion Foundation (FOM) is any indication, Russian youth organizations have a lot of PR work ahead of them. According to the poll, when respondents were shown a list of twelve youth organizations, “the majority of respondents (60%) said they had never heard of any one of them.” This was only a little better among the organizations’ constituency. 47 percent of respondents under the age of 35 claimed they never ..read more

Boris Yeltsin was laid to rest in the famed Novodevichy Cemetery. The funeral was attended by a number of dignitaries that included Putin, Bill Clinton, and George H. W. Bush. Yeltsin was buried about 200 yards from another famed reformer, Nikita Khrushchev. The evaluation of Yeltsin’s legacy in the West has been a mix of praise and regret. Praise for the political openness that flourished throughout the 1990s. Regret that Russian democracy didn’t and in many ways couldn’t hold against the onslaught of social and economic crisis, corruption, theft, and crime. In all I think Yeltsin was a tragic figure. He was at once the shaper of history as he was also trapped in its bondage. In this sense, to many especially in the West, Yeltsin’s death comes with another more symbolic loss. That loss is yet another chink in the ..read more

Fallout from the Dissenters’ March continues. First, the three MVD officers charged with ensuring “order” during the protest have all received promotions. Putin signed a decree yesterday that promoted Vyacheslav Kozlov to deputy chief of Moscow GUVD, Arkady Gostev as head of the Department for Securing Public Order at Moscow GUVD, and Vyacheslav Khaustov to command Moscow’s OMON. Kommersant adds, “Spokesmen for the authorities urged that the appointments are not linked to the successful crackdown on the Dissenters’ Marches” and that move was “scheduled.” Uh, yeah right.

That is not all. The Kremlin is also moving more aggressively to identify the financial backers of the Other Russia movement. Within the Kremlin and United Russia, Other Russia has long been suspected of receiving funds from Western NGOs and, possibly, governments. A task force has now been created comprised of United Russia’s Alexander ..read more

United Russia and Putin disagree? Sure it’s nothing major, but Putin shot down the proposal to eliminate the hammer and sickle from Russia’s WWII Victory Banner. As Kommersant reports:

Russian President Vladimir Putin met with the leaders of veteran organizations in the Kremlin on Friday to discuss the implementation of his decree on preparation to celebrating the 65th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War. State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov attended the meeting as well. After the meeting was over, he claimed that it was he who suggested that the president should send the notorious law “About the Victory Banner” to the State Duma to be revised.

The scandal was triggered by the law allowing to use the Victory Banner’s symbol during victory celebrations in May, instead of a copy of the real banner placed above Reichstag on May 1, 1945. The symbol differs ..read more