(Business New Europe – bne.eu – Tim Ash, Standard Bank – October 15, 2014) Interesting poll reported by Interfax. Predictably President Poroshenko’s For Petro Poroshenko Bloc is still riding high in the polls with 33.5% – and emerging as the new party of power. Next up up is Liashko’s Radical Party with 12.8%, and seemingly on the rise. This is […]
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[Graphics and tweets here en.ria.ru/society/20141012/193990648/ Ukrainian-Teens-Tweet-Nazi-Propaganda-Boast-of-Burning-Russians.html] MOSCOW, October 12 (RIA Novosti), Ekaterina Blinova – Since the Euromaidan turmoil and events triggered by the Ukrainian coup of February 2014, Ukrainian youth has been used as the main propaganda force of the Ukrainian nationalist movement. Ukrainian right-wing nationalists attract young people by romanticized the image of OUN-UPA and Stepan Bandera, the famous […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 15, 2014) The majority of the Russian population supports a curb on Internet freedoms in theory, a new study showed Tuesday. Fifty-four percent of the respondents in a new poll by the independent Levada Center said the World Wide Web had enough dangerous websites to mandate censorship. Another 31 percent were against it, and […]
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MOSCOW, October 15 (RIA Novosti) – Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a law reducing the possible share of foreign stockholders in the Russian media to 20 percent, says the corresponding document published on the Russian government’s official legal information web portal Wednesday. “Unless otherwise stipulated by an international treaty … a Russian legal entity with a foreign participation share […]
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(Interfax – Moscow, October 14, 2014) There is no alternative to improving relations between Russia and the EU and Russia is ready to discuss the creation of a free trade zone with the EU, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said. “I believe that no clear-headed person in Europe will argue with the fact that there is no reasonable alternative […]
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(RIA Novosti – Moscow, October 14, 2014) Russian President Vladimir Putin does not agree with a widespread opinion that everything in Russia depends on him only; he believes that many simply want to find a person with whom the buck stops, and he does not resist this role. “This widespread belief that everything depends on the president only does not […]
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MOSCOW. Oct 15 (Interfax) – Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev believes that a unitary state in Ukraine has no future but says a decision must come from the Ukrainians themselves. “Ukraine is an independent country and Ukrainians should decide for themselves where to live,” he said in an interview with the channel CNBC, answering a question about the Kremlin’s expectations […]
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MOSCOW, October 15 (RIA Novosti) – The return of Russian troops, who took part in summer exercises in southern Russia, to their permanent bases is part of Russia’s domestic policy and not a signal to anyone, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Wednesday. “All sorts of decisions that Russia takes, including decisions on our armed forces, are the responsibility of […]
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MOSCOW. Oct 16 (Interfax) – Russian President Vladimir Putin believes that mutually beneficial relations may still be restored with Ukraine and that it is possible to end the armed conflict in Ukraine’s southeastern regions. “Despite the current complicated period in Russian-Ukrainian relations, we are interested in having consistent, equal and mutually beneficial cooperation with our Ukrainian partners. In practice, this […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Tony Czuczka, Kateryna Choursina- October 16, 2014) German Chancellor Angela Merkel blamed the Kremlin for continuing to stoke the Ukraine conflict as Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that he won’t be blackmailed over the crisis. “Russia must make the decisive contribution to de-escalation,” Merkel told parliament in Berlin today. “The situation in Ukraine remains extremely difficult […]
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[check back for updates, including more links; links also posted to facebook and twitter] Johnson’s Russia List JRL 2014-#216 :: Thursday 16 October 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 Ukraine 1. Wall Street Journal: Putin Trip to Europe Sparks Flurry […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 16, 2014) Russia’s national defense budget for 2015 will reach a record 3.3 trillion rubles ($81 billion), or 4.2 percent of its national GDP, the head of the State Duma’s defense committee, Admiral Vladimir Komoyedov, was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency on Thursday. The 2015 budget represents an 812 billion ruble […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Delphine d’Amora – October 16, 2014) Consumer confidence in Russia’s financial system is falling, with half of Russians saying they don’t trust banks and are using such services less, in a troubling signal for a system under pressure from Western sanctions and more sensitive than ever to outflows of depositors, a recent study showed. In […]
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(Voice of America – Andre de Nesnera – October 15, 2014) After several rounds of international sanctions against Russia for its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in March and support of pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, experts are divided over whether they are working. “It depends on what your understanding of the purpose of sanctions is,” said Matthew Rojansky with […]
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(Interfax – October 16, 2014) Ukraine’s new lustration law may lead to political persecution in the country, but Europe has approved of this document, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s human rights commissioner, Konstantin Dolgov, has said. “I totally agree with remarks concerning the lustration problem. Indeed, the West prefers not to comment on this law. Effectively, it is the legitimization of […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Ivan Nechepurenko – October 16, 2014) Most of Russia’s indicators of economic health have plummeted this year. Inflation last month was at its highest level in three years, capital outflow this year is expected to exceed $100 billion, the ruble has lost almost 20 percent of its value since January, and economic growth is anaemic, […]
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MOSCOW, October 16 (RIA Novosti) – Russia should make every effort to guarantee freedom of expression, support media pluralism, a Human Rights Watch (HRW) researcher told RIA Novosti, regarding the new law, which has reduced the possible share of foreign stockholders in Russian media. “An essential feature of freedom of expression in a democratic society is media pluralism, and Russia, […]
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VIENNA, October 16 (RIA Novosti) – Amid numerous US sanctions against Russia, Moscow has every right to begin introducing sanctions against the United States, but chooses not to follow this path, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister told RIA Novosti. “This is a reflexive, instincts-based reaction of Washington on what does not fit into the American idea of how, with whom, to […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Delphine d’Amora – October 16, 2014) Despite an economic slump and rising inflation, the majority of Russians believe that Western sanctions and Russia’s retaliatory ban on food imports will actually help the economy, a poll published Thursday showed. Only 25 percent of respondents expect sanctions to damage the Russian economy, and only 26 percent expect […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 16, 2014) The ruble dropped to another historic low on October 15, passing the RUB41 per dollar mark in morning trading, but analysts said Russia’s central bank is not panicking because ruble weakness is bolstering manufacturing growth and budget revenues. “The CBR is not panicking either in terms of the scale of its […]
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(Interfax – October 15, 2014) Kremlin chief of staff Sergey Ivanov has said that the house arrest of billionaire businessman Vladimir Yevtushenkov is damaging Russia’s investment climate. In an interview with popular pro-Kremlin tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda, which was quoted by Interfax news agency, Ivanov said that “I agree, this [the arrest of Yevtushenkov] is having a bad influence of the […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 16, 2014) The number of Russian officials has decreased slightly from 2009, but their collective earnings have grown 31 percent to 682 billion rubles ($16 billion), a new study showed Wednesday. Russia had 1.45 million officials in 2013, compared with 1.5 million five years ago, the study conducted by the RBC news website said. […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 16, 2014) Former Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev has called on Russia and the West to put an end to their war of words and retaliatory sanctions over Ukraine and discuss a practical solution to the crisis. “How can you conduct a dialogue if you ‘punish’ the people in power who influence politics?” Gorbachev said […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – October 15, 2014) It’s futile for the U.S. and its allies to “blackmail” Russia over the Ukraine crisis, President Vladimir Putin said in a newspaper interview. Russia’s partners should remember the risks involved in disputes between nuclear powers, Putin said. He accused Barack Obama of adopting a “hostile” approach in naming Russia as a threat to […]
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(Interfax – Moscow, October 15, 2014) Russians support the president of the Russian Federation and more and more often see their trust in Vladimir Putin as a reflection of his successful handling of the problems facing Russia, sociologists have told Interfax. A poll conducted by the [Russian independent polling organization] Levada Centre among 1,630 people in 143 population centres in […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Yana Polyanska, Claire Bigg – October 15, 2014) The standoff between Kyiv and Moscow has reached food stores in the Ukrainian capital, where Russian-imported goods are soon to be marked with special labels. The Kyiv city legislature has approved legislation ordering stores to enforce the new measure, which its initiator, lawmaker Ruslan Andriyko, says aims at warning […]
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[check back for updates, including more links; links also posted to facebook and twitter] Johnson’s Russia List JRL 2014-#215 :: Wednesday 15 October 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 1. Business New Europe: Ukraine’s lustration law bans up to a million […]
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(Interfax – October 15, 2014) Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev believes a reset for Russia-U.S. relations will be impossible while sanctions are still in place, at least until the sides “go back to square one.” “No, of course not. It’s absolutely impossible,” Medvedev said in an interview with the channel CNBS answering a question whether a reset could happen while […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 15, 2014) Ukraine’s new law on lustration came into force on October 15 on being published in government announcer Holos Ukrainy. According to Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, who backed the law, it bans up to 1m Ukrainians from holding office. The bill principally targets officials who served during the presidency of Viktor Yanukovych, […]
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(Interfax – Moscow, October 14, 2014) The USA was involved in the collapse of the Soviet Union and tried to destroy Russia; Washington’s current attitude to Moscow resembles a cold war, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev has said. “President Barack Obama’s new administration started sending signals about the need to resume a mutually beneficial dialogue with Russia on a […]
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WASHINGTON, October 14 (RIA Novosti) – Ukraine is not only facing a gas crisis this coming winter, but also a possible overall energy crisis due to disruptions in coal mining and transportation facilities, said Tatiana Mitrova, head of the Oil and Gas Department at the Russian Academy of Sciences Energy Research Institute (ERI RAS). “[It is] not just a potential […]
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(Eurasia Daily Monitor: Volume 11, Issue 181 – Pavel K. Baev – Jamestown Foundation – jamestown.org – October 14, 2014) Considering Russia’s shocking transformation in the course of just half a year, it is easy to forget that last February the country was united in the joy of hosting the Sochi Winter Olympic games. The issues that dominated the political […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – October 13, 2014 – Daisy Sindelar) Russia’s Justice Ministry has asked the country’s Supreme Court to liquidate Memorial, the country’s oldest and best-known human rights organization, which groups together more than 50 bodies nationwide. Founded in 1989 under the auspices of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Andrei Sakharov, Memorial has led efforts to uncover communist-era repressions and fight discrimination […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Neil Melvin – October 9, 2014) Neil Melvin is director of the Armed Conflict and Conflict Management Programme at SIPRI In recent months, the ‘frozen’ Karabakh conflict has been more fire than ice. With outside powers stoking the flames, what are the chances of finally securing peace? During the summer months, as international headlines were dominated by the […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Galiya Ibragimova, RBTH – October 14, 2014) Russia has announced its intention to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 70-75 percent from 1990 levels by 2030. However, specialists interviewed by RBTH are divided on whether the plans are realistic, with some arguing that the pledge is incompatible with Russia’s energy strategy through 2035. […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Alexey Eremenko – October 14, 2014) Russia is the only country among the world’s biggest economies whose biological resources not only exceed its environmental footprint but are continuing to grow, a new study said. WWF Russia on Monday presented a report on Russia’s biocapacity, or the capability of its ecosystems to produce resources useful for […]
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MOSCOW, October 14 (RIA Novosti) – Russia is not going to introduce new measures in response to Western economic sanctions, Russian Minister of Industry and Trade Denis Manturov told reporters on Tuesday. “We are not interested in responding [to Western sanctions] with some unreasonable measures. It’s our [Western] colleagues who should be thinking about when they will lift [the sanctions], […]
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MOSCOW. Oct 14 (Interfax) – The Central Bank of Russia’s ruble exchange rate policy is “optimal,” Sberbank of Russia (MOEX: SBER) President and CEO German Gref said. “The policy that the Central Bank is pursuing is, in my view, optimal from the standpoint of managing the exchange rate. The economy is self-tuning, because the processes underway are very complex. Over […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 14, 2014) On paper, Russian companies have huge foreign debts, and no way of refinancing them because sanctions effectively close Western capital markets to Russian borrowers. But with much of Russian corporate foreign debt in fact hidden equity investments from offshore zones, the figures seem much worse than they are. International headlines are […]
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(Interfax – October 14, 2014) Russia will use long-term measures to protect itself from Western sanctions, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said. “We will certainly adopt all the measures needed to protect ourselves from unlawful restrictions. You are aware of the resources that are being allocated for these purposes. Beyond any doubt, it will be a long-term program,” he […]
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(Interfax – October 14, 2014) A comparison of genomes of ancient Europeans and people living in contemporary countries has shown that a Siberian tribe is an ancestor of modern Europeans, said Olga Posukh, senior research fellow of the human molecular genetics laboratory of the Cytology and Genetics Institute of Russian Academy of Sciences’ Siberian branch. “A certain genetic component of […]
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MOSCOW, October 14 (RIA Novosti) – Ukraine’s parliament speaker Oleksandr Turchynov has inked a law on special status of parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions and sent it to President Petro Poroshenko for signing, the Verkhovna Rada said on its website on Tuesday. The parliament approved the law introducing self-administration in parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions on […]
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[Graphics here: en.ria.ru/analysis/20141014/ 194044957/Ukrainian-Nationalists-Long-Ascent-to-New-Heights-of-Power.html] MOSCOW, October 13 (RIA Novosti), Ekaterina Blinova – From the western Ukrainian city of Lviv to the front lines of the civil war, far-right neo-fascist groups have made their presence felt on and off the battlefield; these groups started to influence the country’s national consciousness following the country’s “Orange Revolution”, and gained an unprecedented level of political […]
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MOSCOW. Oct 14 (Interfax) – The European Union plans to review its sanctions against Russia at the end of October, the Head of the EU Delegation to Russia, Ambassador Vygaudas Usackas, said when answering a question from Interfax on the sidelines of the European Business Association forum in Moscow on Tuesday. The results of such a review will depend on […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 14, 2014) Russia’s statistics agency on Tuesday launched a sweeping census of the population in the Crimea region, which the country annexed from Ukraine in March. Residents will be asked to field 33 questions on their age, ethnicity, spouse and children, native language and housing and income, the regional branch of the State Statistics […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – Teneo – October 14, 2014) Signs of easing tensions will likely dominate the news this week, but progress on crisis resolution will likely be overstated and is unlikely to motivate a relaxation of EU/US sanctions against Russia.Signs of easing tensions will likely dominate the news this week, but progress on crisis resolution will likely […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Glenn Kates – October 13, 2014) With more than 3,500 people killed in ongoing fighting between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian troops, it is perhaps fitting that the position in Kyiv with the least job security appears to be post of defense minister. President Petro Poroshenko nominated National Guard commander Stepan Poltorak as his new defense minister on October […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 14, 2014) Soldiers from Ukraine’s National Guard have marched on the presidential administration in Kyiv demanding demobilisation, in the first sign of open unrest in Ukraine’s armed forces since the failure of the so-called “anti-terrorist operation” in the Donbass region of East Ukraine. Around 350 soldiers serving in Ukraine’s National Guard – which […]
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MOSCOW, October 14 (RIA Novosti) – The window of possibility for finding a solution to the civil conflict in Ukraine is now open, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday. “Today, the window of possibility to overcome the Ukrainian crisis is open. Practical measures are being agreed upon and implemented on the basis of ceasefire agreements reached on the initiative […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 14, 2014) Russia and China signed a raft of 40 agreements encompassing trade, energy, finance and technology, following a meeting between Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev and his Chinese counterpart, Li Keqiang, on October 14 in Moscow. The agreements demonstrate how Russia is looking for other options, after sanctions imposed on Russia in […]
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