Johnson’s Russia List :: JRL 2015-#154 :: Monday 10 August 2015

Johnson’s Russia List :: JRL 2015-#153
8 August 2015
A project sponsored through the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (IERES) at The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs
The contents do not necessarily represent the views of IERES or the George Washington University.
JRL homepage: russialist.org
JRL on Facebook: facebook.com/russialist
JRL on Twitter: twitter.com/JohnsonRussiaLi
Support JRL: russialist.org/funding.php
Support for JRL is provided in part by a grant from Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Open Society Foundations to the George Washington University and by voluntary contributions from readers.

RUSSIA

1. Paul Goble: Faced with Any Kremlin Action, Russians Want Explanations Not Change, Kirillova Says.
2. Russia Beyond the Headlines: More than just a pretty face: The secrets of the Russian matryoshka. When asked what to bring home from Russia as a souvenir, there’s one thing people are guaranteed to say: “A Russian doll, what else?” But the lacquered wooden “matryoshka” is not an exclusively Russian creation – and it is also a lot younger than many people believe. RBTH finds out a little about the history of the doll, a history which – like the toy itself – contains a few surprises.
3. Buzzfeed.com: Miriam Elder, 23 Signs You Were Raised By Russian Parents. Take off your shoes, grab a blanket, and read this (while sitting up).
4. New York Times: Kazan, a Russian Cultural Hub, Finds It’s Good at Sports.
5. Russia Beyond the Headlines: Russians fight to keep derelict church from sinking beneath the waters. Volunteers from all over Russia are working in the Vologda Region to save a unique monument of 18th-century architecture – the Church of the Nativity in the village of Krokhino – from destruction. For 50 years, it has been surrounded by water after the village was flooded during the construction of the Volga-Baltic Canal in 1964.
6. Bloomberg: Russia Takes On Louvre, Guggenheim as Putin Fights Pariah Status.
7. Russia Insider: Julian Henry Lowenfeld, Talk to Russia? Yes We Can! The US talks to many countries with which it disagrees. Why not to Russia?
8. BBC: How does Russia view the West? (re Lt Gen Evgeny Buzhinsky)
9. New York Times: A Moscow of Dancing Feet, Under an Iron Fist.
10. Moscow Times: Russian Opposition Cornered by Authorities in Regional Election Race.
11. Interfax: Main indicators of Russian banking system point to its stability – Nabiullina.
12. Wall Street Journal: Russian Authorities Step in to Avert Ruble Slide. Kremlin and the central bank dismiss concerns about the battered currency.
13. TASS: Putin: Russia’s would-be rating agency should be really independent.
14. Reuters: Russia’s Gazprom Defies Expectations With Profit Growth Despite Sanctions.
15. Moscow Times/Vedomosti: Nikolai Epple, Russia’s War on Food May Be Step Too Far.
16. Sputnik: Why Russia is Not Rising Up Against the Destruction of Parmesan.
17. Moscow Times: Western Experts Cry Foul Over Russian Books Published in Their Names.
18. Rossiyskaya Gazeta: Russian analyst plays down US, Russian mutual threats. (Leonid Radzikhovskiy)
19. www.rt.com: Duma chief blames US for instigating global instability through intrigue. (Sergey Naryshkin)
20. Russia Insider/Vineyard of the Saker: Complete Media Fail in Blaming Russia for Last Year’s US Bank Hacks.The Wall Street Journal,Bloomberg,the Daily Telegraph-they all piled on, trumpeting the news fed to them by the FBI and NSA that the Russians were behind it-suggesting it was a pseudo military attack in connection to war tensions over Ukraine.Now the perpetrators have been caught.Turns out they have no connection to Russia.Being a mainstream journalist means never having to apologize.
21. Defensenews.com: Analyst: Russian Industry Faces Challenges Unique to ‘Putin’s Russia.’ An Interview With Ruslan Pukhov, Director of CAST.
22. www.rt.com: Bryan MacDonald, As real as the Yeti – Western propaganda tries to invent Siberian Nationalism.
23. www.rt.com: Putin’s initiative to create ‘united front’ to fight ISIS intrigues US, allies – Lavrov.
24. www.rt.com: ‘Woman spent days near dead son’s body waiting for help’: RT reporter recalls 2008 war in S.Ossetia.
25. www.rt.com: Mikhail Saakashvili is lesson to US neoconservatives: Color revolutions can be reversed.
26. Civil Georgia (Tbilisi): On War Anniversary Georgian Leaders Speak of Peace, Reunification.
27. Russia Direct: How Soviet intelligence acquired the nuclear bomb. Alexander Bondarenko, author of a new book about former Soviet foreign intelligence head Pavel Fitin, shares the inside story of how the Soviet intelligence service acquired the plans to the nuclear bomb from the U.S.
28. http://us-russia.org: James Carden, Review of Gilbert Doctorow’s Does Russia Have a Future?
29. Moscow Times: Michele Berdy, Propaganda Lessons From an Old – a Very Old – Master.
30. Sputnik: US’ New Anti-Russian Strategy: Confront and Reassure?
31. Euromaidan Press: Robert van Voren, Is Putin normal?
32. Washington Post: Jim Hoagland, Vladimir Putin, failed spy.
33. Salon.com: Patrick Smith, The U.S.-Russia “phony war”: How Washington warmongers could bring us from stalemate to catastrophe. One of two outcomes is likely: Another long Cold War, or a great power conflict.
34. Richard Sakwa: New journal: Russian Politics.