Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – MOSCOW, September 6, 2013) The six Moscow mayoral candidates entered their final 48 hours of campaigning on Thursday ahead of Sunday’s election, meeting with journalists, voters and competitors in order to press home their campaign messages and attempt to discredit their opponents. Anti-Kremlin protest leader Alexei Navalny and the Communists lashed out at President Vladimir […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, September 6, 2013) A number of high-ranking Russian officials have provided false information in their income declarations, the head of the presidential administration said Friday. “I would like to avoid naming names, but we have some concrete results concerning exposed facts of officials providing false information,” Sergei Ivanov said on the sidelines of the G20 […]
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(Kremlin.ru – Novo-Ogaryovo, Moscow Region – September 4, 2013) On the eve of the G20 Summit, Vladimir Putin gave an interview to Channel One and the Associated Press news agency. The interview was recorded in Novo-Ogaryovo on September 3. JOHN DANISZEWSKI: Thank you for inviting us into your home and for answering questions for the AP’s worldwide audience. I know […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Vladimir Goryachev and Oleg Sukhov – September 3, 2013) Mayoral candidate Alexei Navalny has voiced support for an economic amnesty and a windfall tax on some privatized assets at a high-profile meeting with businessmen and top executives, Vedomosti reported. The event was the first public meeting with entrepreneurs during Navalny’s campaign, with the previous ones […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – September 5, 2013) A leader of the independent election watchdog Golos has left Russia to continue her work abroad due to a lack of financial support from the state, a news report said Thursday. Lilia Shibanova said she saw no point in remaining in Russia after Golos was barred from observing nationwide elections in June […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, September 3, 2013) Driven by their hatred of Vladimir Putin as a personality and their lack of a place in today’s Russia, the liberal intelligentsia has been willing to overlook xenophobic, nationalist and even anti-Semitic remarks by Aleksey Navalny, even though such ugly comments would have ended the careers of Western politicians […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, September 5, 2013) The Moscow authorities have donated an office to a Russian human rights NGO, a source in the city administration told RIA Novosti Thursday, after it was evicted from its previous home in July. The For Human Rights movement’s new downtown office will be free of charge to the organization for 49 years, […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Aleksandr Chuikov – September 3, 2013) In September Russia’s parliament votes on a highly controversial law to reform the Russian Academy of Sciences. As Aleksandr Chuikov reports, its supporters call it a bitter pill for the 21st century; its opponents, the kiss of death, and an attempt to curb academic freedoms. The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) was […]
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Date: Thu, 15 Aug 2013 Subject: New book: Why Communism Did Not Collapse From: Martin Dimitrov <martin.k.dimitrov@gmail.com> Martin Dimitrov Associate Professor of Political Science Tulane University New Orleans, LA TITLE: Why Communism Did Not Collapse: Understanding Authoritarian Regime Resilience in Asia and Europe EDITOR: Martin K Dimitrov PUBLISHER: Cambridge University Press (2013) ABSTRACT: This volume brings together a distinguished group […]
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Date: Fri, 23 Aug 2013 From: Vladimir Shlapentokh <shlapent@msu.edu> Subject: New book: Freedom, Repression, and Private Property in Russia. Hardcover,Cambridge University Press, 2013 Freedom, Repression, and Private Property in Russia Hardcover, Cambridge University Press, 2013 by Vladimir Shlapentokh (Author), Anna Arutunyan (Author) This study demonstrates how the emergence of private property and a market economy after the Soviet Union’s collapse […]
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(RFE/RL – August 27, 2013) More than two decades ago, at a time when the world was witnessing the collapse of the Soviet Union and its socialist economy, as well as the triumph of the free market and democracy, American political scientist Francis Fukuyama predicted that liberalism would sweep away competing ideologies. But in an exclusive interview with RFE/RL’s Belarus […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Emil Pain – August 27, 2013) Emil Pain is a professor at the National Research UniversityHigher School of Economics, Moscow, and the General Director of the Center for Ethno-Political Studies. As the level of inter-ethnic violence reaches disturbing proportions, Emil Pain asks if Russia’s protest moment has turned nasty. In the middle of 2012, Russia’s influential Centre […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Makar Butkov, special to RBTH – August 27, 2013) The protests in the winter of 2011-2012 used “For Fair Elections” as a slogan. Subsequently, many politically active citizens became observers at the presidential elections that March. This year, the Election Commission is being formed five years early. What is the Russian Election Commission, […]
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(Kremlin.ru – August 28, 2013) [The official website of the Russian G20 presidency http://en.g20russia.ru/] PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA VLADIMIR PUTIN: This year marks the G20’s 5th anniversary. At the peak of the crisis the G20 members agreed on coordinated measures to support the global economy. We made the commitment to curb trade protectionism, developed new principles of financial regulation, and defined […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Evgenia Pismennaya and Irina Reznik – August 27, 2013) Vladimir Putin was lonely and homesick after moving to Moscow to work in the Kremlin in 1996 and planned to return to St. Petersburg within a year, according to a friend, documentary filmmaker Igor Shadkhan. “But then things began to happen very fast and suddenly Putin became […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, August 28, 2013) The statement by Vyacheslav Volodin, first deputy chief of Presidential Administration, that Moscow won’t block opposition candidates is just for show, Russian analysts say, but it does indicate that the Kremlin has sufficient confidence in its ability to manage the process in ways that will distract and divide […]
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(RIA Novosti – Natalia Antonova, Acting Editor-in-Chief, The Moscow News – August 27, 2013) Earlier this month, Russian-American journalist Diana Bruk shocked the delicate sensibilities of the American reading public by writing a no-holds-barred account of why she loves (and hates!) dating Russian men. [http://www.salon.com/2013/08/12/i_love_and_hate_dating_russian_men/] In her essay, published by Salon.com, Bruk talked about how her feminist sensibilities came up […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova – August 27, 2013) The Kremlin’s move to revive ambitious Luzhkov-era plan to build a gigantic circular highway 50 kilometers beyond the Moscow Ring Road is bringing to life the dreams of developers and nightmares of owners of property in its path. Construction of the Central Ring Road was first approved by federal […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 26, 2013) Non-governmental organizations that received funding from abroad are on the lift of recipients of grants from the state, Maria Slobodskaya, president of the Institute of Civil Society Issues and a member of the Russian Public Chamber, said. “The issue of who received foreign funding or did not receive foreign funding was not even considered. […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, August 27, 2013) What Vladislav Surkov described as “sovereign democracy” now lacks a single “sovereign” because the power vertical Vladimir Putin so carefully constructed no longer has one but rather several decision-making centers, a new situation that inevitably calls the entire edifice into question, according to a Moscow commentator. In an essay […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 26, 2013) Acting Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin has slammed candidates for mayor of the Russian capital who “say that, generally speaking, Moscow is just a stage for them in trying to seize power in the country, to storm the Kremlin.” “I don’t think this trick will work. Neither you and I nor the Muscovites would put […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Oleg Sukhov – August 27, 2013) Civil Platform leader Mikhail Prokhorov’s future seemed uncertain Monday as he denied a report that he would leave politics, while analysts said the billionaire may have indeed scaled down his political ambitions even as his party establishes itself ahead of regional elections. Some commentators argued that the tycoon’s refusal […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, August 26, 2013) The Kremlin will give grants to the Memorial human rights organization and several other opposition-minded NGOs that prosecutors earlier this year accused of being “foreign agents,” the Russian business newspaper Vedomosti reported Monday. Two regional branches of Memorial will receive a combined 800,000 rubles ($24,000) from the 2.3 billion rubles ($700 million) […]
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(Moscow News – themoscownews.com – August 26, 2013) Paying or coercing participants to come to rallies is an ongoing issue in the capital’s political sphere It’s a warm summer morning, and I’m standing with a disjointed cluster of about fifteen people outside Tretyakovskaya metro station. A young blonde woman dressed in grey sweatpants and a hoodie with dangling rabbit […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Yulia Ponomareva, RBTH – August 26, 2013) Kremlin ally faces convicted opposition leader Navalny after a date change rules out Prokhorov. A political contest for control of Europe’s largest city has become a fight between Kremlin-backed Mayor Sergei Sobyanin and opposition activist Alexei Navalny. The Sept. 8 election for mayor of Moscow will […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Lena Smirnova – August 26, 2013) Public protests in heightened security zones in Sochi will be prohibited during the Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games next year, according to a presidential order published Friday. Some activists have denounced the order as unconstitutional, though Human Rights Watch representatives said that protests might still be possible since the […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Alexander Kolesnichenko, special to RBTH – August 23, 2013) The collapse of the Soviet Union, the transition to a market economy, the ban on the Communist Party, the complete transformation of the public and the economic structure of the country all of these followed the coup attempt on Aug. 19-21, 1991. The […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova and Ezekiel Pfeifer – August 23, 2013) The mayoral campaign of opposition leader Alexei Navalny faced a new wave of pressure by authorities Thursday as the Moscow Elections Commission warned he could be struck from the ballot and police raided a printer of his campaign materials. With just over two weeks left before […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, August 23, 2013) Lawyers of the two jailed members of the Russian feminist punk protest group Pussy Riot are filing a petition to have their clients’ remaining jail time replaced with community service, a Russian daily reported Friday. Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina were sentenced to two years in jail last August for their February […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Alexander Panin – August 22, 2013) All illegal street markets will be closed in the Moscow region by the end of this year, acting Moscow region governor Andrei Vorobyov said Wednesday as the campaign against illegal immigrants amid two key elections was gaining momentum. During debates on regional television on Tuesday, Vorobyov boasted a 15 […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, August 22, 2013) Like Americans, most Russians view nationalism in a negative way, according to a Russian Jewish émigré living in New York, but they will not be able to integrate their society and escape from the Soviet past unless they take nationalism away from those who call themselves Russian nationalists and […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – August 22, 2013) Mass searches of NGOs across the country have helped to detect 22 “foreign agents,” a top official from the Prosecutor General’s Office said Thursday. The law, which requires non-governmental organizations that receive funding from abroad and engage in “political activity” to register as “foreign agents,” came into effect in November. In March, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Guennadi Moukine – August 22, 2013) Small business representatives called for equality before the law and less interference from the government, sharing their concerns with Moscow mayoral candidate teams at a round-table discussion organized by the For an Honest Market movement Wednesday. The meeting was attended by mayoral candidate Sergei Mitrokhin of the liberal Yabloko […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – August 22, 2013) Standing on a soapbox, mayoral hopeful Alexei Navalny asks the people who’ve gathered to listen to his campaign speech near Timiryazevskaya railway station: “What do you know about me?” After a brief silence, someone in the crowd hesitatingly replies: “Corruption.” “What do you mean corruption? You mean I stole […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 21, 2013) The Foundation for the Development of Civil Society (FoRGO) predicts that United Russia candidates may win all gubernatorial elections on September 8 but the opposition can offer strong rivalry in mayoral elections in Voronezh and Yekaterinburg. “We assume that that candidates nominated by United Russia or supported by United Russia will win in all […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, August 21, 2013) The Russian government’s failure to maintain the infrastructure that existed at the end of Soviet times is one of the primary reasons why this year’s flooding in the Russian Far East has inflicted so much damage and suffering on the population there, according to Moscow experts. Many Moscow commentators […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – August 20, 2013) The Kremlin has held back a proposed program to give financial support to the most talented Russian students undertaking postgraduate degrees in top foreign universities, because there is no guarantee that the economy will benefit from the outlay, a news report said Tuesday. The program was aimed at raising the standard of […]
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(Interfax – Moscow, August 20, 2013) The opinion poll data published by Moscow mayoral candidate (from the opposition RPR-Parnas party) Aleksey Navalnyy, which indicate that a second round is possible in the mayoral election on 8 September, do not reflect the real balance of forces and are dictated by the wish to influence voters, VTsIOM (Russian Public Opinion Research Centre) […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – August 21, 2013) Sitting in a tiny room that serves as a temporary office for elections watchdog Golos, Grigory Melkonyants, a senior member of the now defunct organization, is full of enthusiasm. Despite the roller-coaster ride the organization has been through in recent months caused by sanctions placed on it by the […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – August 21, 2013) With Moscow about to vote for a new mayor this September, opposition blogger and candidate for the job Alexei Navalny is doing what he does best: exposing the sweet little earners that come from being well connected. In this case it is Anna Sobyanina, the daughter of Moscow’s incumbent mayor, Sergei […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 20, 2013) A serious change has occurred in the Russian mentality and political system since the breakdown of the Soviet Union, Levada Center sociologists told Interfax. Seventy-four percent of 1,600 respondents polled in 130 towns and cities in 45 regions in July said fellow citizens had changed a lot or entirely in the past two decades […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 20, 2013) Pussy Riot punk band member Yekaterina Samutsevich, convicted to two years of a suspended sentence, has filed a lawsuit against her former lawyers Violetta Volkova, Nikolai Polozov and Mark Feigin. Samutsevich said she demanded to award her non-pecuniary damages for insulting statements regarding her. “The lawsuit has been filed against three lawyers: against Feigin, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova – August 20, 2013) Groups of workers squatting on their haunches surrounded by piles of sand and broken tarmac is a common picture for downtown Moscow these days. But Muscovites can keep calm: this is not another 2 billion ruble effort by acting Mayor Sergei Sobyanin to replace asphalt with tiles on pavements […]
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(RIA Novosti – Moscow, August 18, 2013) The decision of Moscow mayoral candidate Aleksey Navalnyy to not take part in debates on the Moskva Doveriye TV channel and the Moskva FM radio station can be described as a certain mistake, however he can use the time he saves to maximize contacts with voters on subjects that suit him, political analysts […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 19, 2013) Moscow mayor candidate Alexei Navalny said that he had spent 47 million rubles on the election campaign and that he asked his supporters to keep transferring money. “Over five weeks passed since the fundraising campaign began. You have given us over 49 million rubles during this time. Over 8,000 people donated to our election […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 19, 2013) The campaign staff of opposition activist, Moscow mayoral candidate Alexei Navalny has denied fund raising violations insinuated by the Interior Ministry. “Apparently, everything we have done is absolutely legal. They can do nothing but post a press release with scary words every Monday,” Navalny campaign staff head Leonid Volkov told Interfax on Monday. “The […]
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(RIA Novosti – Moscow, August 19, 2013) Moscow mayoral candidate Sergey Sobyanin has provided the full set of documents for registration in the election of Moscow city chief and was registered in total accordance with the law, a spokesperson for the Moscow city electoral commission told RIA Novosti on Monday (19 August). Moscow mayoral nominee from the RPR-Parnas party Aleksey […]
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(Interfax – PYATIGORSK, August 19, 2013) People, who are constantly working in the information technology sphere, bloggers included, should be involved in developments in the sphere of information security, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said. “We must be ready to protect ourselves in case of any attack against our country or our interests. In my point of view, it is […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Lyudmila Nazdracheva, special to RBTH – August 19, 2013) Bloggers have become a fixture on Russia’s political scene. Almost every governor, mayor or party official has a blog these days, though few have more than a thousand followers. RBTH takes a look at successful virtual political diaries and the real people behind them. […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, August 19, 2013) The Russian Federation Council has no more senators with foreign accounts and assets, Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko said. “Members of the Federation Council have complied with the demands of the federal law banning certain categories of citizens to have foreign accounts and assets. The limitations imposed by the law apply to senators as […]
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