(Government.ru – January 26, 2013) Sergei Brilyov: Mr Medvedev, I would like to come back to the Grand Hall meeting, where you took a seat in the audience. Why didn’t you go up on the stage straight away? Dmitry Medvedev: I wanted to see my colleagues present their scenarios. I enjoyed sitting in the audience. It’s better than being on […]
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(Government.ru – January 25, 2013) Correspondent: As the Prime Minister, you are known for supporting the need to make tough and honest assessments of the situation both domestically and internationally. The scenarios developed by the World Economic Forum (WEF) show that the time for simple reforms has passed already in Russia… The reform process needs a boost to overcome corruption […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Fyodor Lukyanov – January 28, 2013) Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of Russia in Global Affairs [http://eng.globalaffairs.ru/], is chairman of the presidium of the Moscow-based Council on Foreign and Defense Policy. U.S. President Barack Obama’s re-election in November generated hope for progress in U.S.-Russian relations. Only two months later, not a trace of that hope remains. What’s […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 25 (Interfax) – Major amendments have been made to the Russian legal system but accusatory bias and mistrust in judges inherited from “the dark years of history” are still to be overcome, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview with the Swiss newspaper Neue Zurcher Zeitung. “Concerning the adjustment of laws, the legal system and the […]
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(Voice of America – James Brooke – January 27, 2013) James Brooke is VOA Moscow bureau chief, covering Russia and the former USSR. Scenes from three weeks of watching US-Russia relations in New York, Washington and Moscow: Kate, an old high school classmate, tracks me down to ask it if will be safe for her to take her 17-year-old […]
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(Interfax – January 28, 2013) Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has described as an intentional legal mistake the adoption of the Magnitsky Act by the U.S. Congress. “I think that the whole situation is bad. It is not beneficial for either Russian-American relations or international law and order,” he said in an interview with CNN, the transcript of which is […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova – January 28, 2013) A total of 8,000 doctors in Russia became ruble millionaires over the last two years, as the government seeks to attract young specialists to rural areas to upgrade the quality of medical services, Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova said Friday. The government provided 1 million rubles ($33,300) in financial support […]
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(Interfax – January 26, 2013) The Russian government did not support the Liberal-Democratic Party’s (LDPR) idea to legalize the use of some types of short-barreled firearms for self-defense purposes. “Free circulation of rifled handguns would have a negative effect on public security in the country, would significantly complicate the law and order, and would cause growth in the number of […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 28 (Interfax) – The State Duma is ready to accept apologies from television journalist Vladimir Pozner, saying the draft “Pozner law” will be “put on hold.” Pozner apologized for his earlier criticism of the State Duma on his program on Sunday evening. After that criticism, parliamentarians drew up a bill prohibiting journalists who have another country’s citizenship in […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – January 28, 2013) With a United Russia deputy declaring that Russia is not Sodom and Gomorrah, the State Duma gave tentative approval to a bill that would ban “gay propaganda” to minors. But the measure, which mirrors similar legislation in place in St. Petersburg and several other areas, met with unusually strong […]
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Johnson’s Russia List 2013-#17 25 January 2013 davidjohnson@starpower.net JRL homepage: www.russialist.org JRL on Facebook: www.facebook.com/russialist JRL on Twitter: www.twitter.com/JohnsonRussiaLi Support JRL: http://russialist.org/funding.php Your source for news and analysis since 1996 POLITICS 1. Government.ru: Interview with Bloomberg TV. (Medvedev) 2. Government.ru: Plenary session of the World Economic Forum in Davos. Speech by Dmitry Medvedev. 3. Government.ru: A working breakfast with foreign […]
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MOSCOW, January 25 (RIA Novosti) The United States has no place in any dialog between Russia’s government and opposition movements opposed to President Vladimir Putin’s rule, Putin’s spokesman has told a US journal. “The dialog between the Russian government and the opposition cannot be a subject of the bilateral relationship between Moscow and Washington, and in no way can […]
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WASHINGTON, January 24 (RIA Novosti) US President Barack Obama’s nominee to be the next US Secretary of State, Sen. John Kerry, told a Senate panel on Thursday that the United States must find a way to work with Russia. “I would like to see if we can find some way to cooperate,” Kerry told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee […]
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MOSCOW, January 24 (RIA Novosti) Most Russians trust public opinion polls but are increasingly disinterested in their findings, a survey by the state-run pollster VTsIOM shows. “Most Russians (65 percent) are interested in the results of sociological surveys but their number has fallen compared to 2005 (77 per cent),” VTsIOM said. According to the pollster, 29 percent of Russians […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, January 24 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/01/window-on-eurasia-kirill-moving-russian.html) Patriarch Kirill over the last two years has been working to transform the administration of the Russian Orthodox Church from that of “the late Middle Ages” into another one resembling “enlightened absolutism,” according to a leading specialist on the Russian church. In an article in “Vedomosti” yesterday, Nikolay […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – January 25, 2013) The social-democratic Just Russia party issued an ultimatum Thursday to four members who are leaders in the anti-Kremlin protest movement, warning them to quit leadership roles in other organizations or face dismissal from the party. The demand threatens to further weaken and divide the already splintered opposition, which is […]
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(Government.ru – January 24, 2013) Question: Mr Medvedev, you were here in 2007, one year before you were elected President. The key point of your policy speech then (which we all remember) was “Freedom is better than unfreedom.” What phrase would you use now, six years on? What would you say to the West with the same succinctness or perhaps […]
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(Government.ru – January 24, 2013) Dmitry Medvedev: Good morning. I hope it is truly a good morning for you. Arkady Dvorkovich: It is. We have just managed to discuss a number of issues regarding global and Russian economic growth. And we have even held a vote on possible global and Russian economic growth rates. Dmitry Medvedev: And what did the […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 24 (Interfax) – Russia is implementing a program of modernizing its Armed Forces which it has not done for almost a quarter of a century, Vice Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said in commenting on an interview with former Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin to Der Spiegel. “Why play along with the West and repeat the fundamentally erroneous claims […]
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(Government.ru – January 24, 2013) Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to tell you about our view of the G20 and our plans. Last December Russia took up the baton of the G20 chairmanship, one of the most influential informal associations in the world. This is common knowledge, but I will repeat that the G20 countries account for about 90% of […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 25 (Interfax) – Igor Ivanov, Russia’s former foreign minister and former Security Council secretary, who is now president of the Russian International Affairs Council, said he expects U.S. foreign policy to be more energetic and even tough during Barack Obama’s second presidential term. Ivanov also said John Kerry, who was nominated for the post of secretary state in […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Michael Bohm – January 25, 2013) Michael Bohm is opinion page editor of The Moscow Times. The decades-old legal battle over the “Schneerson library” reached a new peak after a U.S. district court in Washington ruled last week that Russia must pay an unprecedented fine of $50,000 every day until it returns the 12,000 religious […]
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MOSCOW, January 24 (Dan Peleschuk, RIA Novosti) Pavel Samburov exudes confidence when he recalls the night in October, on International Coming Out Day, when a group of masked hoodlums stormed and ransacked a Moscow gay club. “They worked as a team,” Samburov says nonchalantly, taking a drag from a cigarette, then snuffing it out. “It was an organized attack.” […]
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(Government.ru – January 23, 2013) Mr Schwab (Klaus Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum in Davos), ladies and gentlemen. Apparently, my task is to refute all three of the scenarios in about 20 minutes and to explain what we are going to do. I will certainly do that, but first of all I would like to […]
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(Government.ru – January 23, 2013) Question (as translated): Good morning! We have Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev here today. Forty-five minutes from now, he will deliver a keynote speech here in Davos, at the World Economic Forum. Mr Prime Minister, thank you for coming. By the way, you are the first leader who agreed to be interviewed without wearing a […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Henry Meyer & Stepan Kravchenko – January 24, 2013) Russia weakened a proposed law aimed at cracking down on smoking in the world’s second-largest tobacco market before a key vote on the legislation tomorrow. While the bill keeps a ban on smoking in public places, it drops restrictions on cigarette sales and the right to set […]
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Date: Fri, 25 Jan 2013 From: James Beadle <jamesdbeadle@yahoo.co.uk> Subject: Re: 2013-#13-Johnson’s Russia List (re Robert Bridge on the Moscow Times) Robert Bridge may have a case complaining about the strength of Michael Bohm’s Anti-Americanism op-ed in the Moscow Times(#42 in JRL 2013-#13), but his blinded rapprochement of the entire Moscow Times publication is an affront to a high quality […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Jonas Parello-Plesner – January 24, 2013) Jonas is Senior Policy Fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. He served as Denmark’s Senior Advisor on China and North East Asia from 2005-2009. Russia-watchers have long been interested in her place on the international arena. Now, with China at the centre of the growing power game, the question […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Nikolaus von Twickel – January 25, 2013) A cocktail-party chat that lasted only minutes has triggered hopes that the country’s troubled relations with Georgia might be headed for substantial recovery. Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev had a conversation with his Georgian counterpart, Bidzina Ivanishvili, during a reception at the Davos World Economic Forum late Wednesday, Medvedev’s […]
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[RIA NOVOSTI] MOSCOW, January 24 (R-Sport) – Sport is a crucial weapon for Russia to fight its demographic crisis by keeping people healthy, President Vladimir Putin said Thursday. Russia’s population has fallen by more than five million since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 as a result of lower births rates and life expectancy, although recent government estimates […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines/Interfax – www.rbth.ru – Alexander Panov, based on Interfax – January 23, 2013) Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev made an appearance at the 2013 World Economic Forum in Davos to discuss Russia’s economic future in a global perspective. In his speech to the Forum audience Medvedev discusses the need for an increase in competitive power for Russian […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – January 24, 2013) State Duma deputies on Wednesday overwhelming passed in its first reading a bill that would give regional assemblies the right to abolish direct elections for governors, likely weakening a key pro-democracy reform signed last year by then-President Dmitry Medvedev. A total of 403 deputies voted in favor of the […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 23 (Interfax) – Introducing professional and independent directors to the boards of government companies has a positive impact and the authorities continue to work toward this, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said at a plenary session of the World Economic Forum in Davos called “Development Scenarios for Russia.” “The boards of public companies mostly have professional and independent […]
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VLADIVOSTOK, January 24 (RIA Novosti) Doctors are concerned about the rising number of Russians infected with tuberculosis (TB). This number has more than doubled over the past 15 years, a senior healthcare official said on Thursday. “Russia ranks 13th on the list of countries with the highest tuberculosis infection rate. There are over 240,000 patients with active forms of […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, January 23, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/01/window-on-eurasia-liquidating-non.html) There has been much talk about the possibility that Moscow will liquidate the non-Russian republics, but there has been almost none about exactly how the center would do that. That makes such talks “unserious” because it means the advocates of such a change do not understand just […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Alexander Winning – January 24, 2013) Suffocating bars, smoke-filled restaurants and ash-laden office stairwells could soon be a thing of the past if legislation aimed at banning smoking in public places passes the remaining few hurdles and gets signed into law. But not everyone is rejoicing at the prospect of a government-led crackdown on smoking. […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Ryan Chilcote, Anna Shiryaevskaya & Lyubov Pronina – January 23, 2013) OAO Gazprom (GAZP) may lose its monopoly on natural gas exports to domestic competitors as long as the move doesn’t cut prices and damage Russia’s economic interests, according to Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. “It is possible, because there are other, independent gas producers,” Medvedev said […]
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(Kennan Institute – www.wilsoncenter.org/program/kennan-institute – Mary Elizabeth Malinkin and Nataliya Rostova – November 29, 2012) An interview with Nataliya Rostova, Starovoitova Fellow, upon the completion of her grant “The Russian Mass Media of the Post-Perestroika Era.” Malinkin: What were some of your impressions from the American media? Rostova: I was surprised to watch some of the American methods of using […]
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MOSCOW, January 24 (Marc Bennetts, RIA Novosti) Prison officials in East Siberia are attempting to force a protest movement figure, charged with seeking to violently overthrow President Vladimir Putin, to implicate himself and others in the alleged plot, his lawyer told RIA Novosti on Thursday. Leonid Razvozzhayev, a leftist activist, was transferred from Moscow to a pre-trial detention center […]
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(Moscow News – themoscownews.com – Evgeniya Chaykovskaya – January 23, 2013) Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin promised to rid the city authorities of any potential corrupt officials. “I would like to stress a position of principle for the Moscow government that finding corruption and detaining bribe takers is a big help to city authorities,” Sobyanin said at an open meeting of […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova – January 24, 2013) Improving the work of the government and fighting corruption should be key priorities on Russia’s reform agenda for the next few years, participants in the World Economic Forum said Wednesday. Almost 78 percent of them chose ensuring “good governance” as the No. 1 step for the country’s progress during […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Roland Oliphant – January 24, 2013) The federal government will submit its final Arctic territorial claims with the United Nations by the end of the year, the country’s leading Arctic scientist said. Artur Chilingarov, the veteran explorer who led the expedition to plant a Russian flag on the seabed at the North Pole in 2007, […]
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(Interfax – January 24, 2013) The North Korean National Defense Commission said on Thursday that North Korea could carry on satellite launches and nuclear tests. This means to retaliate against the United States and indicates that Pyongyang intends to exchange nuclear program concessions for security guarantees from Washington, Russian State Duma International Affairs Committee First Deputy Chairman, political expert Vyacheslav […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anatoly Medetsky – January 23, 2013) How popular discontent will play out is one of the key uncertainties that the World Economic Forum identified for Russia’s long-term economic development in a report released Tuesday. Attendees of the annual forum in Davos, Switzerland, which opened Tuesday, are set to question Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev about this […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Olesya Gerasimenko – January 21, 2013) Primorsky Territory is seven time zones away from the capital and has the largest economy in the Russian Far East. There is justifiable irritation at Moscow’s insistence on a one-size-fits-all model of government oriented towards Europe and levels of frustration are forcing people to leave, says Olesya Gerasimenko. The Far Eastern Federal […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 22 (Interfax) – The Russian Foreign Ministry’s human rights commissioner, Konstantin Dolgov, has blamed U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul for crudely distorting facts by saying that by denouncing the Russian-American agreement on cooperation in child adoptions, Russia has lost the opportunity to monitor the lives of Russian children adopted in the United States. “We have read with […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Roland Oliphant – January 23, 2013) The government is preparing to allocate 100 billion rubles ($3.3 billion) to clean up pollution left over by Soviet-era industry. Natural Resources and Environment Minister Sergei Donskoi told President Vladimir Putin that a bill to allocate that sum as well as define responsibilities for cleaning up decades-old industrial waste […]
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DAVOS. Jan 23 (Interfax) – Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev believes Russia’s integration into the world economy, which remains unstable, requires an increase in the competitive power of Russian companies, but the main risks faced by Russia are internal, not external. “The global economy remains unstable. The attempts to come out of the crisis without resolving the accumulated financial and […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – January 23, 2013) The G20 countries’ failure to fulfill their obligations to achieve sustained economic growth and prevent financial instability may undermine confidence in the exclusive club of the 20 most developed industrial nations, the Audit Chamber said in a study, Interfax reported Wednesday. Russia, which holds the presidency of the group, will host a […]
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(Nikolaus von Twickel – Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – January 23, 2013) The suicide of activist Alexander Dolmatov in a Dutch extradition center has highlighted the challenges for Russian opposition members to get political asylum in Europe, but his tragic case does not mean that obtaining asylum has become impossible, experts said Tuesday. Dolmatov was found dead last Thursday in […]
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