RUSSIA & UKRAINE – Johnson’s Russia List table of contents & links :: JRL 2020-#29 :: Wednesday, 19 February 2020

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Johnson’s Russia List :: JRL 2020-#29 :: Wednesday, 19 February 2020
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1. TASS: Hearts of gold: Most Russians consider themselves ‘good people’, says poll.
2. Moscow Times: 4 in 5 Russians View West as a Friend – Poll.
3. Foreign Affairs: Michael Kimmage, REVIEW ESSAY. The Wily Country. Understanding Putin’s Russia. (re Joshua Yaffa’s “Between Two Fires: Truth, Ambition, and Compromise in Putin’s Russia”)
4. Carnegie Moscow Center: Tatiana Stanovaya, Unconsolidated: The Five Russian Elites Shaping Putin’s Transition. President Putin has embarked on a renewal of Russia’s ruling regime to make sure it weathers the political transition of 2024 and to preserve his personal power-base. The elite can be divided into five distinct groups, two of which, the “protectors” and “technocrats” may end up in a fierce ideological fight
5. Carnegie Moscow Center: Andrei Kolesnikov and Denis Volkov, Putin’s Children: The Russian Elite Prepares for 2024. Summary: The 2024 election will be one in which the generation of “Putin’s children,” those who have made their careers and profited from the twenty years of Putin’s presidency, face a serious challenge to keep the assets they have acquired
6. www.rt.com: Russia may grant ex-presidents immunity from prosecution & ban ministers from holding foreign bank accounts – rt.com/russia/481192-russia-constitution-amendments-presidents-immunity/
7. BMB Russia: Constitutional Reform.
8. TASS: Kremlin clarifies details on administration of cabinet.
9. Interfax: Russian constitutional amendments to clarify Security Council’s role.
10. PONARS Eurasia: Taking Russian Assertiveness Seriously: Letting the Data Speak. (excerpt)
11. RFE/RL: Public Pressure Mounting On Russian Authorities To Reconsider Harsh ‘Network’ Case Verdicts.
12. Paul Goble: Russia Spends Far Less than Other Countries on Scientific Research, Accounting Chamber Says.
13. Intellinews.com: Dutch court reinstates order for Russia to pay $50bn to Yukos shareholders.
14. Meduza: The Hague’s reinstated Yukos decision, explained . Is Russia actually going to pay $50 billion to Yukos shareholders? Is Khodorkovsky getting any money out of this?
15. TASS: Izvestia: Russian exports to China fall by almost 30% over coronavirus crisis.
16. Munich Security Report 2020 [PDF] Westlessness: Excerpt re “Russia: Putemkin’s State”
17. Asia Times: Pepe Escobar, Munich conference reveals East-West divide. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi stresses urgent need for international coordination ‘to build a shared future’
18. Russian International Affairs Council: Sergey Shein, Moving Towards a Conservative International? This might be the case, but there is no place for Russia in such a construct.
– russiancouncil.ru/en/analytics-and-comments/analytics/moving-towards-a-conservative-international/
19. Oilprice.com: Russia Is Defeating The U.S. In The Middle East Oil Game.
20. Defense One: Luke Griffith, The US Should Accept Russia’s Proposed Moratorium on Post-INF Missiles. The temporary measure has no near-term downside – and may jumpstart important arms-control talks.
21. www.strategic-culture.org: Brian Cloughley, Europe’s Nuclear Weapons and the Arms Reduction Treaty – strategic-culture.org/news/2020/02/18/europes-nuclear-weapons-and-the-arms-reduction-treaty/
22. AP: Ending Putin’s Support of Venezuela No Easy Feat for US.
23. Financial Times: Ukraine’s oligarchs jostle for influence with President Zelensky. Akhmetov edges closer to country’s leader while weakening rival Kolomoisky.
24. Reuters: Putin sacks prominent Kremlin ideologue, Ukraine hardliner.
25. Moscow Times: Mark Galeotti, Surkov’s End and the KPIocrats’ Triumph. What the exit of Kremlin’s ‘grey cardinal’ tells us about late Putinism.
26. Forbes.com: Kenneth Rapoza, Have Russia And Ukraine Hit A New Wall?
27. Irrussianality: Paul Robinson, SICK TRASH. (re Ukraine)
28. Twitter: Katharine Quinn-Judge, Minsk II Anniversary.
29. Facebook: Ivan Katchanovski, Maidan massacre.
30. Meduza: A real bonanza . The Kremlin touts a supposed bombshell in the Dutch investigation into MH17, but a closer look finds that it’s, yes you guessed it, bupkis.
31. www.rt.com: Bryan MacDonald, Chechen exile’s Berlin park killer linked to Russia’s FSB – Bellingcat, Der Spiegel, The Insider – rt.com/russia/481129-chechen-dead-in-berlin-fsb/
32. Awful Avalanche: Soviet Wartime Archives De-Classified – Part VI – awfulavalanche.wordpress.com/2020/02/19/soviet-wartime-archives-de-classified-part-vi/
33. Infobrics.org: Lucas Leiroz, Revising the history of WWII – infobrics.org/post/30380/