BRUSSELS. April 10 (Interfax) – Russia’s permanent envoy to the European Union Vladimir Chizhov believes the evaluations given by the West to the events taking place in the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine clearly indicate double standards in the approach to the crisis in Ukraine. “We see what is going on in the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine. […]
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[check back for updates, including more links; links also posted to facebook and twitter] Johnson’s Russia List :: 2014-#81 :: 11 April 2014 E-Mail: davidjohnson@starpower.net A project of the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (IERES) at The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs: www.ieres.org JRL homepage: russialist.org JRL on Facebook: facebook.com/russialist JRL on Twitter: twitter.com/JohnsonRussiaLi Support JRL: russialist.org/funding.php To subscribe to the JRL email version, email David Johnson at davidjohnson@starpower.net 1. RIA Novosti: […]
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ANKARA, Turkey, April 11 (RIA Novosti) – The US guided-missile destroyer Donald Cook and French intelligence warship Dupuy de Lôme have entered the Black Sea, the Turkish newspaper Sabah reported Friday. According to the US military command, the dispatch of the Donald Cook destroyer was a move to reassure the country’s NATO allies in the region amid heightened tensions due […]
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MOSCOW. April 11 (Interfax) – The U.S. Department of Energy has barred Russian scientists from its leading physics laboratories, Kommersant wrote on Friday. “Visits of Russian citizens to Department of Energy facilities, including the Brookhaven National Laboratory, have been suspended indefinitely,” the newspaper quoted a letter sent to scientists collaborating with the U.S. leading research center on April 7. U.S. […]
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(Interfax – April 10, 2014) Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said that he believes that US congressmen, who uphold an anti-Russian position, for example over events in Ukraine, are thus trying to undermine US President Barack Obama’s positions, privately-owned Russian news agency Interfax reported on 10 April. “A huge number of facts point to the idea that those who […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – April 11, 2014) Burger King Worldwide reached out Thursday to quash reports that the fast food chain’s Russian franchise operator would expand to Crimea, which Russia recently annexed from Ukraine. On Wednesday, Burger King Russia CEO Dmitry Medovy told news agency Itar Tass: “We are planning to open in Crimea, but I cannot say […]
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MOSCOW, April 11 (RIA Novosti), Luidmila Chernova – Russia’s exclusion from the G8 is a knee-jerk reaction provoked by short-sighted interests, which will ultimately lead to economic problems, according to Andrew McKillop, a former chief policy analyst at the European Commission Directorate General for Energy. “It’s a purely political stance, provoked by only political short-term interest, and has nothing to […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Tatyana Zykova, special to RBTH – April 10, 2014) Despite talk in Europe of reducing dependence on Russian fuel and promises of help from the U.S., for the foreseeable future Russia remains the only country that can supply the EU with an increasing supply of cheap gas. The European Commission in Brussels is again […]
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MOSCOW, April 11 (RIA Novosti) – US and EU energy companies would not tolerate the delays in payment by Ukraine that Russia has faced, an economist at the London Vanguard investment firm told the Voice of Russia radio station Friday. “Historically, since the end of the USSR, Ukraine has repeatedly failed to pay for its Russian gas. This is an […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Valery Kalnysh – April 10, 2014) Valery Kalnysh is editor of the Kommersant Ukraina newspaper Ukraine has never seen such an unusual election campaign; part of it – Crimea – is no longer Ukrainian; there are Russian tanks on its eastern frontiers, and separatism is rampant in the eastern regions In such a complicated situation the number of […]
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VLADIVOSTOK, April 11 (RIA Novosti) – Russia has not been involved in recent protests in southeastern Ukraine and always respects its neighbor’s territorial integrity, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Friday. “We are being accused that we have some kind of special agents there. There aren’t any. We don’t have any troops there either. We have no military personnel there […]
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MOSCOW. April 10 (Interfax) – A member of the Human Rights Council, a Kremlin advisory body, has defended Moscow’s decision not to renew a contract to broadcast Voice of America in Russia. “Russian officials were not proactive in this situation. In this information war, which hasn’t been unleashed by Russia, it’s Moscow that’s been behaving in a gentlemanly way, and […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Viktor Litovkin, special to RBTH – April 10, 2014) The START III Treaty on arms reduction came into force in 2011 and is not due to expire until 2021. How effective is the agreement as a measure to limit the strategic offensive capabilities of Russia and the U.S., and do recent political differences threaten […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Alexander Panin – April 11, 2014) Russian Armed Forces may replace the SS-18 Satan, the world’s heaviest intercontinental ballistic missile, earlier than planned due to a standoff with Ukraine, where the missile was initially assembled and is serviced, defense experts said Thursday. But while scrapping the missile and other joint projects mean “minor inconveniences” for […]
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DONETSK. April 11 (Interfax) – Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has said that the country’s new authorities have no plans to abolish the July 3, 2012 law that regulates Ukraine’s language policy. “No one is going to abolish the Kolesnychenko-Kyvalov law,” Yatsenyuk said during a visit to the Donetsk region on Friday. “It is a law that advocates the interests […]
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MOSCOW, April 11 (RIA Novosti) – The de-escalation of the crisis in Ukraine is completely possible, but attempts to legitimize the country’s new leadership must stop first, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Friday. “We believe that the de-escalation of the Ukrainian crisis is completely possible, but to do so it is necessary to stop imposing facts and stop the […]
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… 10. Washington Post editorial: Russia will respond only to increased sanctions over Ukraine.
11. The Heritage Foundation: Author of Russian Reset Admits Policy Is Dead.
12. Forbes.com: Mark Adomanis, The West Can ‘Win’ Ukraine, But It’s Going To Cost A Lot Of Money.
13. www.thenation.com: Alec Luhn, Will the IMF Bailout Turn Ukraine Into Another Greece? …
(RFE/RL – April 9, 2014) A top U.S. diplomat says the United States is helping Ukraine comb through a “treasure trove” of documents recovered from the government of ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych in order to prosecute corrupt officials. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland said Department of Justice officials were helping to “exploit” […]
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(US Department of State – April 9, 2014) Testimony Victoria Nuland Assistant Secretary, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs Statement Before the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (Helsinki Commission) Washington, DC April 9, 2014 As prepared Thank you, Chairman Cardin and Co-Chairman Smith, for inviting me to testify before you today on the situation in Ukraine. It is […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Peter Hobson – April 10, 2014) U.S. fast food giant Burger King plans to expand its chain into Crimea, filling the vacuum left when McDonald’s pulled out of the peninsula last Friday, citing unspecified supply issues. Burger King currently has no outlets in Crimea, which has been at the center of tensions between Russia and […]
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MOSCOW, April 10 (RIA Novosti) – The creation of a Ukrainian Federation could help the country preserve its current borders, Oleg Tsarov, a Ukrainian member of parliament and presidential candidate, told RIA Novosti on Thursday. “Look what happened in the parliament yesterday. They beat up the head of the Communist faction right before my eyes. It is a blatant example […]
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MOSCOW, April 10 (RIA Novosti) – Recent statements by NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen on the situation in Ukraine as well as the alliance’s double standard on Crimea have hindered a de-escalation of tensions in the country, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Thursday. “Several times over the last few months we have heard nothing constructive in comments by the […]
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MOSCOW, April 10 (RIA Novosti) – Right Sector, a Ukrainian ultra-nationalist movement and illegally armed militia, now has a smartphone application which allows it to organize its tactics, according to the Vocativ news website. The Right Sector app can be downloaded on the Google Play market for Android devices and was released last week, according to the Google Play store. […]
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(RIA Novosti – Novo-Ogarevo, April 9, 2014) Russia has not yet received a clear explanation from the USA about the activities of employees of the Greystone company in Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told journalists on Wednesday [9 April]. Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry expressed concern over the fact that additional forces of the Ukrainian army, which include representatives […]
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(The Heritage Foundation – heritage.org – Daniel Kochis – April 9, 2014) President Obama’s former Ambassador to Russia and self-described author of the Russian reset policy Michael McFaul today admitted the obvious: the reset is dead. In a radio interview with the Flint Report in Montana, McFaul stated, “The reset ended, the reset ended a long time ago.” McFaul is […]
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BRUSSELS. April 9 (Interfax) – The Ukrainian crisis is caused by two factors – internal and foreign, Russian ambassador to the European Union Vladimir Chizhov believes. “Unfortunately, during the relatively short history of Ukrainian independence – 23 years – the Ukrainian people did not have leaders that it deserved. Actually all four presidents that were in power one after the […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Daria Marchak and Jake Rudnitsky – April 10, 2014) Ukraine is reducing gas imports and halting payments for natural gas imports from Russia over price “aggression” before the world’s biggest exporter of the fuel cuts supplies, raising the risk of disrupted flows to Europe. Ukraine won’t buy gas to pump into underground storage for the heating […]
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BERLIN, April 10 (RIA Novosti) – The outflow of capital from Russia is not tied to events in Ukraine, but to fluctuations in the exchange rate of the ruble, Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said Thursday. “The outflow of capital is not mainly tied to Crimea, the outflow, of course, is connected with the events that happened in […]
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NOVO-OGARYOVO. April 9 (Interfax) – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said that Russia is ready to join four-sided talks on Ukraine, if they are meant to urge those who are in charge in Kyiv to take care of the country but not demand cheap gas from Russia. “This is our position: we want to see clear purposes for the […]
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(RIA Novosti – Beijing, April 0, 2014) Russia does not intend to switch energy exports from the western to the eastern direction because of an escalation of tension over Ukraine, Deputy Prime Minister Arkadiy Dvorkovich said on Wednesday [9 April] after a meeting with the co-chairs of the Russia-China energy cooperation committee . “At the moment we have no intention […]
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Re: Response to Roy (JRL #79) Date: Wednesday April 9 From: Stephen D. Shenfield (sshenfield@verizon.net) I am responding to Sergei Roy’s riposte in JRL #79 to my comments in JRL #77 on his essay in JRL #76. I should say first that it was not my purpose to review Roy’s article as a whole, but only to make a few […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Gleb Fedorov, RBTH – April 9, 2014) The series of unusual climatic events that has affected Russia over the past few years has continued into the beginning of 2014. With dramatic global changes predicted as a result of rising temperatures, what awaits the country’s geography and economy? The series of unusual climatic events […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Oleg Sukhov – April 10, 2014) The Constitutional Court has upheld the controversial law requiring some nongovernmental organizations with foreign funding to register as “foreign agents,” while an affiliate of the prominent Memorial human rights group faces closure after being labeled a foreign agent by a St. Petersburg court. The Kremlin has argued that the […]
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(Interfax – Moscow, April 9, 2014) Secretary of the Union of Journalists of Russia [UJR] Pavel Gutionov has described the current state of affairs in Russian journalism as the most serious crisis in its entire history. “Our profession is experiencing the most serious crisis in its entire history. It has even been suggested that journalism will not survive at all,” […]
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… 44. Wall Street Journal: Russian Capital Outflow Highest Since 2008.
45. Interfax: Russian law on NGOs as “foreign agents” ruled constitutional.
46. Moscow Times: Culture Ministry Affirms ‘Russia is not Europe’
47. Reuters: Russia says Gazprom, China close to gas agreement, hope to sign in May. …
MOSCOW. April 9 (Interfax) – Russia’s Economic Development Ministry has increased its capital outflow forecast for this year to $100 billion from the previous $25 billion, Deputy Economic Development Minister Andrei Klepach said at a Tuesday evening briefing in Moscow. The outflow forecast for next year in the conservative scenario is increased to $50, in the base scenario to $40 […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Benedict Coleridge – April 8, 2014) Benedict Coleridge is a graduate student in the Department of Politics and International Relations, the University of Oxford. Since the 19th century the Caucasus has been Russian’s ‘window on the East,’ its access to another, often very romanticised world. The Sochi Winter Olympics took place in the Caucasus, but they presented a […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – D. Garrison Golubock – April 8, 2014) A state commission working on a much-discussed report titled “Foundations of State Cultural Politics” will release their findings in two weeks, presidential advisor Vladimir Tolstoi announced last week, adding that the basic formula of the report could be summarized as “Russia is not Europe.” “Russia should be examined […]
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KYIV. April 8 (Interfax) – Ukraine’s acting chief of the presidential administration Serhiy Pashynsky has denied claims that foreign mercenaries are involved in the Interior Ministry’s operations in east Ukraine. “I responsibly declare: there is no Right Sector, let alone U.S. security forces, in Kharkiv, Donetsk or Luhansk,” Pashynsky said. He joked, pointing at himself and Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen […]
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KYIV. April 9 (Interfax) – A person who took part in the winter protests in Kyiv’s Independence Square (Maidan) was hospitalized and died in the past 24 hours, the Ukrainian Health Ministry press service reported on Wednesday. “As of 6:00 a.m. on April 9, 2014, 11 people sought medical assistance in the past 24 hours. Six of those people were […]
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(Interfax – April 8, 2014) The Russian Constitutional Court has ruled that the controversial law that requires all non-government organizations to register as “foreign agents” if they receive funding from abroad and are involved in political activities is constitutional. However, the court said that the provision that lists fines for violating the law is unconstitutional because it says that the […]
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MOSCOW. April 9 (Interfax) – Russia’s Economic Development Ministry has lowered its 2014 GDP growth forecast in the base scenario from 2.5% to 1.1% and in the conservative scenario to 0.5%, Deputy Economic Development Minister Andrei Klepach said during a Tuesday evening briefing in Moscow. The main difference between the two scenarios, Klepach said, is the possibility in the base […]
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Subject: Response to Shenfield (JRL#77) Date: Tue, 08 Apr 2014 From: Sergei Roy <sergeiroy@yandex.ru> First, I would like to thank all the nice people who have written to me to say all those nice words about my tour d’horizon “Ukraine: Triumph, Tragedy, or Farce?” – a comparison of certain features of the anti-Communist, anti-Soviet, democratic revolution of 1991 and of […]
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Subject: Ukraine: a change of view on the change of regime Date: Tue, 08 Apr 2014 From: Stephen D. Shenfield <sshenfield@verizon.net> In my paper ‘Ukraine: popular uprising or fascist coup?’ (JRL 2014-#75-76, April 4-5) I concluded that right radicals played a ‘crucial role’ in the change of regime in Kiev. Since then I have reconsidered this view in light of […]
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MOSCOW. April 9 (Interfax) – Russia is not conducting any unusual or unplanned military activities on its territory in the area of the Ukrainian border, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. “The U.S. and Ukraine have no reasons for concerns. Russia has said many times that it is not conducting any unusual or unplanned activities significant in terms of military issues […]
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NOVO-OGARYOVO. April 9 (Interfax) – It is hoped that the current Ukrainian authorities will not take any irreparable actions, Russian President Vladimir Putin said. “I hope that those temporarily carrying out the duties [of Ukrainian authorities] will not do anything that can not be corrected,” Putin said at a meeting on energy dialog with Ukraine.
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(Interfax – April 9, 2014) Andrey Klimov, deputy head of the international affairs committee of the Federation Council, has said the US State Department statements about unrest in eastern Ukraine being sponsored by Russia are absurd, Russian privately-owned news agency Interfax reported on 8 April. “Such statements are absolutely groundless and absurd. If Americans use these methods in their work […]
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KYIV. April 9 (Interfax) – Serhiy Tihipko, a Ukrainian presidential candidate, said he has managed to get into the building of the Ukrainian Security Service’s department in the Luhansk region and talk to the people who have occupied it. “All information that there are some Russians there is false,” Tihipko told a briefing in the Ukrainian parliament on Wednesday. Tihipko […]
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MOSCOW, April 9 (RIA Novosti) – Russia is not conducting any unusual or unplanned military activities near its border with Ukraine, the country’s foreign ministry said Wednesday, adding that attempts to accuse Moscow of building up troops in the region are unfounded. “The US and Ukraine have no reason to worry. Russia has said several times that it is not […]
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MOSCOW, April 9 (RIA Novosti) – Russia does not recognize the legitimacy of Ukraine’s new authorities but continues its economic assistance to its crisis-hit neighbor, a situation that will not last forever, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday. “As you know, our partners in Europe recognize the legitimacy of the current Kiev authorities, but are doing nothing in order to […]
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