RUSSIA NEWS & INFORMATION – Johnson’s Russia List contents & links :: JRL 2020-#194 :: Friday, 30 October 2020

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Johnson’s Russia List :: JRL 2020-#194 :: Friday, 30 October 2020
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.
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1. Ecowatch: Sea Ice Still Hasn’t Formed off of Siberia and Scientists Are Worried. For the first time on record, the main nursery of Arctic sea ice in Siberia has yet to start freezing by late October.
2. Christian Science Monitor: Fred Weir, In Azerbaijan and Armenia, a brave few call for end to fighting. The conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh and the divide it represents seem intractable. But that hasn’t stopped some in both Azerbaijan and Armenia from defying public sentiments to issue calls for peace.
3. Reuters: ‘Take Biden and Trump down!’ In Moscow, neither U.S. candidate appeals.
4. Meduza: Russia is learning to cut back on ‘stupid shit’ (Vladimir Frolov)
5. Meduza: Russia’s post-Soviet weakness is really an opportunity. (Dmitri Trenin)
6. Meduza: Don’t waste your breath, Moscow. (Fyodor Lukyanov)
7. rt.com: Putin rules out another strict Covid-19 lockdown in Russia, citing economic concerns, says ‘we don’t have a kind Aunt to help us’ – rt.com/russia/504961-putin-covid19-economic-situation/
8. Meduza: Cautiously, but with understanding . Putin compares Russia’s attitude towards unconventional monetary policy to its stance on same-sex marriage.
9. rt.com: Russian economy doing better than most countries amid pandemic – Putin.
10. RFE/RL: Putin Says Russia Ready To Work With Anyone Who Wins U.S. Presidency.
11. Moscow Times: Russia ‘Open’ to Return of Armenia-Held Land to Azerbaijan – Putin.
12. Kremlin.ru: Russia Calling! Investment Forum. (excerpt) – en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/64296
13. Moscow Times: Putin Orders Government to Improve Abortion Prevention Efforts.
14. Moscow Times: Russian Ruble Ends Painful Week in Red, All Eyes on U.S. Vote.
15. Interfax: Navalny pledges to return to Russia as soon as he recovers.
16. RFE/RL: Russia’s Annual Commemoration Of Victims Of Stalin’s Great Purge Held Online.
17. Chatham House: Rebooting the State Council Increases Putin’s Power.
18. rt.com: Paul Robinson, Western attempts to rewrite history of WW2 & turn conflict into political football have incensed Russians, now Moscow strikes back – rt.com/russia/504889-nazism-communism-history-rewrite/
19. Irrussianality: Paul Robinson, Criminalizing History – irrussianality.wordpress.com/2020/10/29/criminalizing-history/
20. Moscow Times: Nagorno-Karabakh Briefing | Oct. 30.
21. Reuters: Analysis: Stick or twist? Azerbaijan looks to drive home Nagorno-Karabakh gains.
22. Asia Times: Richard Giragosian, Azerbaijan’s ‘five day’ war turns uphill battle. President Ilham Aliyev becoming a prisoner of his own rhetoric after pledging to take back Nagorno-Karabakh.
23. Intellinews: Ben Aris, Lukashenko closes borders, sends top aides to western regions to face down faux NATO threat.
24. Washington Post editorial: Belarus’s movement will hopefully prevail. A U.S. president more sympathetic to democracy could help.
25. rt.com: Ukraine’s Zelensky accused of mounting ‘coup’ in seeking to dissolve Constitutional Court that struck down corruption law.
26. New Cold War: Dmitriy Kovalevich, October update: Ukraine’s oligarchic local elections and US media censorship – newcoldwar.org/october-update-ukraines-oligarchic-local-elections-and-us-media-censorship/
27. Washington Times: Edward Lozansky and Matthew Ehret, The roots of US-Russia crisis that could lead us to WWIII. Can the Doomsday be avoided?
28. Carnegie Moscow Center: Eugene Rumer, Will a New U.S. Administration Mean Change on Ukraine and Belarus? To anyone who has followed U.S. domestic politics and foreign policy for the past four years-and especially the last two years-of the Trump administration, the answer will be unambiguously “yes.”
29. Carnegie Moscow Center: Andrey Kortunov, How U.S. Elections Could Impact EU-Russia Relations. Even a partial restoration of transatlantic unity under a President Biden will be a blow to the official Kremlin narrative about the inexorable movement of the international system toward a polycentric world order.
30. Interfax: IMEMO, Interfax online event discusses expectations of governments for U.S. presidential election.
31. International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS): Nigel Gould-Davies, Russia policy priorities for a Biden presidency.
32. Paul Goble: Putin’s Foreign Policy has United West against Russia and Some Russians Against Him, Shevtsova Says.
33. New York Times: Tim Wu, So, Russia, You Want to Mess With Our Voting Machines? The United States should threaten to retaliate – and I’m not talking about economic sanctions or legal indictments.
34. Washington Post: Hospitals being hit in coordinated, targeted ransomware attack from Russian-speaking criminals.
35. Washington Post editorial: Russian labs are caught making illegal chemical weapons. Will Trump finally respond?
35. Washington Post Editorial: Russian labs are caught making illegal chemical weapons. Will Trump finally respond?
36. Meduza: 2020 Pushkin House Book Prize goes to Sergei Medvedev’s ‘Return of the Russian Leviathan’
37. Wall Street Journal: Joshua Rubenstein, ‘Stalin’ Review: From Periphery to Power. Traits of suspicion and intrigue were evident early on, and a capacity for violence. Stalin’s mother had hoped he would become a priest. (Re Stalin: Passage to Revolution by Ronald Grigor Suny)
38. Opednews.com: Natalie Baldwin, A Hot Mess of Innuendo: A Closer Look at Catherine Belton’s “Putin’s People” (excerpt) – opednews.com/articles/A-Hot-Mess-of-Innuendo–A-by-Natylie-Baldwin-Kremlin_Media_Propaganda_Putin-201028-187.html

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