Russia: Other Points of View

WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE ABOUT PUTIN?

REPRINTS

by Peter Lavelle

The Voice of Russia Radio (VoR) 'Debating Russia' host Peter Lavelle takes us into the heart of Putin's conservatism and why it appeals to the vast majority of Russians.

When Vladimir Putin returned for his third term as Russian president in 2012, many people were expecting more of the same - a determined and ever-confident Putin, perhaps just a little older and more experienced. In fact, what we’ve seen is that Putin has finally fashioned his own particular political outlook and worldview.

Putin is a great Russian conservative in just about every way, reflecting the attitudes and aspirations of the vast majority of Russians. When one thinks about the world’s movers and shakers, Vladimir Putin always makes the list. Western mainstream media consistently describe him in the worst possible colours and compare him to some of the least flattering historical figures. Putin as a politician is often grossly misunderstood, as are his politics.

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Russia Inc. A growing nervousness about the economy: the Economics Ministry has substantially dropped its forecast of GDP growth to 2.4% from 3.6% and the Minister warns of a possible recession this autumn; the outgoing and incoming heads of the Central Bank of Russia are concerned and so is Putin. Russia is still too dependent on energy exports and, as Europe sags, so do they. Coming over the horizon is North American energy production; dominance, some predict – the USA is close on Russia’s gas output already and, together with Canada, exceeds it. Diversifying its economy will not be easy for Russia Inc – perhaps desperately, Medvedev has offered a state prize to anyone who can solve the conundrum. As one strategy, Russia is more and more looking to China as a customer for energy but, while that gives Russia a growing market, it doesn’t do much for diversification.

Corruption. And still more cases opened, arrests and sentences – too many to keep listing. The Prosecutor General told the Duma that recorded corruption crimes were up nearly 25% to 49,513 and that more than 13,500 individuals had been prosecuted. I imagine the number is up because the pace of investigation has stepped up. Fraud, misappropriation of budget funds (defence contracts especially) and embezzlement involving abuse of office predominate: in short, officials are the greatest thieves. There can be no doubt that an effort much bigger than anything we have seen in twenty years (ever in Russian history?) is under way. One may wonder, however, given the slowness with which these sorts of crimes are investigated and prosecuted, whether the prosecutors have bitten off more than they can digest.

REAGAN ENVOY SLAMS LECTURING RUSSIA ON HUMAN RIGHTS

REPRINTS

by Martin Sieff Moscow Times, March 14, 2013 One of America’s most respected, and experienced, veteran diplomats has seriously criticized the policy of publicly lecturing foreign governments, especially Russia, on the issue of human rights. Veteran arms negotiator Richard Burt, who served two Republican presidents, also warned that the controversial Magnitsky Bill, penalizing Russian nationals for their alleged involvement in the imprisonment and death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, had started a “spiral of response and counter-response” that would prove extremely harmful for both the United States and Russia. “I don’t think it’s very productive to publically castigate foreign governments,” Burt told a meeting in Washington, DC organized by the Center on Global Interests (CGI) on March 12. “It just embarrasses and humiliates the other party and it is counter-productive.” “A quiet strategy of working with foreign governments to reform in my judgment is far more effective than the public criticism that is so popular in Congress and indifferent parts of this town,” the ambassador said. Burt reminded his audience that in the 1980’s, U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz “convinced (President) Ronald Reagan that we had to engage with the Soviet government.” “The Magnitsky Bill was the price the Obama administration had to pay to get Jackson-Vanik lifted,” he said. The 1974 Jackson-Vanik Amendment linked U.S. trade relations with countries that had non-market (originally nations in the Communist bloc) and made free trade with such countries conditional on them permitting freedom of emigration and other human rights. It remained in force for 20 years after the disintegration of the Soviet Union (its primary target) and was only repealed on Dec. 14, 2012, the same day that President Obama signed the Magnitsky Bill into law.

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

BEREZOVSKIY. Suicide after the loss of the rest of his money seems the most likely theory although his “friends” are being as suggestive as possible (See Dunkerley on these nebulous suggestions). But I notice that this time, the Western MSM, ever ready in the past to uncritically re-type an anti-Putin handout, is holding back: maybe the judge’s opinion of Berezovskiy’s veracity has persuaded them not to be so credulous. And so the Western media has lost one of its favourite sources for anti-Putin stories. Perhaps we will now learn more about the many mysteries surrounding Berezovskiy. The murder of Paul Khlebnikov (the ur-source of the “journalists murdered in Russia” theme), connections with Chechen slavers and kidnappers between the wars, funding for Shamil Basayev, the apartment bombings, the shaping of the Litvinenko story (every character in it worked for, or had worked for, him), the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, the shaping of the Pussy Riot story. Then there’s the story that he wanted to go back to Russia. Lots of rumours, few facts. I am amused that this obit by Masha Lipman manages to avoid all these questions.

LITVINENKO INQUEST. Postponed until October – that will be about the seventh anniversary of his death and still no official finding on what happened! They say that MI6 was paying him. Not the open and shut story we were sold and getting less so by the moment.

PUTIN 2.0 - YEAR ONE

By Gordon M. Hahn

It has been just about a year since Vladimir Putin 2.0 was inaugurated in the Kremlin as Russian president.  He was succeeding his own interregnum successor Prime Minister Dmitrii Medvedev and the liberalization policy carried out under the Medvedev-Putin tandem, referred to be the present author first as a ‘thaw’ and then with deepening liberalization, ‘perestroika 2.0. 

Perestroika 2.0 left several tasks unresolved: democratization, market liberalization, and political instability characterized by opposition mobilization, splitting within the Putin elite, and a malaise among Putin’s constituency within the population.  With Putin’s return to the Kremlin, democratization and market liberalization were no longer near the top of the agenda; stabilizing politics moved unequically to the top.  This does not mean that democratization and marketization are off limits for the mid- to long-term, but rather that they will not be pursued as ends in and of themselves and without pressure from below exerted by the opposition or external circumstances.

With political stabilization at the top of the agenda, Putin needed to accomplish three tasks: weaken the street opposition, consolidate the elite, and re-mobilize his popular constituencies.         

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Electoral system. In the beginning, the Duma’s 450 seats were chosen half by party list and half by single mandate with a 5% threshold. Then Putin I changed it to all party list and 7% threshold. Putin II has just sent a bill to the Duma to change it back to the original. So what was the point of all that? The new law forbids electoral alliances – obviously another attempt to force like-minded people to unite. But we have 20 years of observational experience that Russian liberals refuse to sink their (small policy but large personality) differences. On a personal note, I was an observer in the 1995 election when 40-some parties ran. The party vote ballot was the size of a newspaper sheet and few voters had a clue. Are we going back to that?

Corruption. Investigations all over the place. Phoney academic degrees; embezzlement at RusHydro; two frauds in the Penitentiary Service; tax evasion at RUSAL; a former Duma Deputy. And not to forget OboronServis: Prosecutor General Chayka says 25 separate cases have been combined, the total cost of which is now said to be over US$400 million. The MoD is target-rich: a general is suspended, a former financial administrator jailed, a possible rotten rations scandal, and a supplier case. And the Olympics appear on the horizon: cost inflations. Sergey Ivanov has said that no one is immune. The Central Bank has weighed in with a statement that illegal money transfers amounted to US$49 billion in 2012 and that every tenth company making settlements through its payment system dodged tax payments in 2012. Obviously these cases have been in preparation for some time and investigators are digging. Definitely a serious campaign.

RUSSIA REPORT AND THE NATURE OF RUSSIAN DEMOCRACY ARTICLE

by Sharon Tennison

Hi y'all, from Georgia!

A six-day book tour within a 75 mile radius of Atlanta is winding down. Numbers of Kiwanis Clubs which hosted PEP delegations over the years also hosted me.  Other presentations included a Rotary luncheon, a library event, an article in the Newnan newspaper,  two TV spots that were taped, and an evening "book reading" for a house full of local residents interested in international affairs, and Russia in particular (after being part of the home hosting teams).

After sharing with you an analysis written this month, I'll touch on a bit of  exciting local color of Georgia.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 The following article answers a lot of the questions asked of me when traveling in middle America.  It is one of the best explanations of Russia's experience with growing a democracy (and America's frustration with it), that I've read.  Vlad Sobell, a highly respected Russia analyst who earlier fled Communism as a youth (google him),  provides insights we don't get in our US media.  Since leaving the USSR, Vlad has been obsessed with political systems around the world, what works, what doesn't, and what it would take to create a workable system.  Over the past 30 years he has followed Russia's bumpy efforts to try to democratize and become part of the free world after three and half generations of heavy Communist indoctrination. 

PUTIN'S POLITICAL PERESTROIKA: CONSTRUCTING A SYSTEM, OBSTRUCTING THE STREET

COMMENTARY

By Gordon M. Hahn

Amidst his ongoing crackdown on the more irreconcilable (in some cases, radical street opposition leaders, Russian President Vladimir Putin has continued some aspects of Dmitrii Medvedev’s political liberalization or ‘perestroika 2.0’.

         

Medevedev proposed a number of important liberalizing political reforms prior to the December 2011 Duma elections. Riots and subsequent mass demonstrations erupted which were led by a coalition of democratic, nationalist and socialist organizations.  Almost all of the reforms were implemented before Putin’s return to the Kremlin.  Of the two that were not, the most important was Medvedev’s proposal to return to the pre-Putin “Yeltsin era” electoral system for the State Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament.  Under that system Duma deputies were, and now will be elected again (in 2016), in two ways. First, 225 deputies are elected according to the percentage of votes given to political parties; the other 225 elected in single-mandate districts.

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Adoptions. Putin would have been wiser to have vetoed the adoption ban and forced parliament to overturn it (Art 107.3): it has become the latest leitmotif of anti-Russia propagandists and has taken attention away from the equally absurd Magnitskiy Bill. But here we are. Protests in Moscow, St Petersburg and some other cities against it on Sunday attracted maybe 20K in total and have given the opposition something new to object to. There is said to be a petition calling for its ban and some opposition deputies are going to attempt to have it overturned in the Duma. And, as always in Russia, it’s far from clear exactly what the ban affects. However it wasn’t just a reaction to the Magnitskiy Bill: 19 adopted Russian children (out of about 40,000) have been done to death by their adopters in the USA (here’s one, another and an abuse trial) and there have been misgivings in Russia for years. (The usual “news” sources pretend the 19 are the total number of adoptees who have died). Putin complained that existing treaties are useless for allowing access by consular officials (federal-state jurisdictions are apparently the problem). So there is some background here.

Malfeasance. The OboronServis case continues with another arrest of a senior official and probably another one to come. Meanwhile the former Defence Minister refused to testify to the Investigative Committee, giving a written response instead. So this case is neither over nor is it being swept under the rug and nor is Serdyukov out of it. The St Petersburg corruption case has seen another arrest. Defence Minister Shoygu dismissed a senior military doctor following the deaths of some soldiers from pneumonia. Another police crime.

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP

by Patrick Armstrong

Putin. On the 12^th Putin’s address to the Federal Assembly and on the 20^th his marathon press conference (not such bad health, after all). Nothing new – principal emphasis on domestic issues: corruption, qualitative growth, infrastructure and transparency. Foreign issues are what we’ve heard for years: Russia will pursue its own interests and resist being pushed around. An understandable pride in the Team’s achievements: from the press conference, in the last ten years “we have nearly doubled the country's GDP… We have increased the real incomes of the population by several fold…. The birth rate is the best in 20 years. We are taking the necessary steps, it is not enough so far, but progress is evident in healthcare, education and so on.” And, as always, slow and steady is what he wants in Russia and in the world. Perhaps it would not be too much of a stretch to say Putin I was about stopping the downward momentum; Medvedev was about loosening things up and starting towards qualitative growth; Putin II will be a continuation of that and, perhaps, (quite a lot in the Federation Council speech) a heavy attack on corruption. But, I say again: same program, same team.

Dima Yakovlev Bill. So named after a baby who died from negligence, the bill passed both houses with heavy support and Putin signed it into law. It’s retaliation for the US “Magnitskiy Bill” (and in my opinion a rather ineffective and misguided one. Although some amusing reactions: “callousness unusual even by Vladimir Putin’s standards” and the US Senate is offended.). There are a number of adoptions already in the pipeline; it’s not clear what will happen in these cases but Prokhorov says his Civic Platform party (ie he) will pay $50,000 to Russian families that adopt one of them.