(Interfax – January 31, 2013) Member of the Russian Public Chamber political analyst Sergey Markov has said that a report by the international human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW), which criticized Russia, was politically motivated, Russian Interfax news agency reported on 31 January. “Human Rights Watch is a very good organization on the whole. However, their observations about Russia […]
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(Moscow Times – moscowtimes.com – Nikolaus von Twickel – February 1, 2013) A leading rights group lashed out at President Vladimir Putin on Thursday by saying he had “unleashed the worst political crackdown” in the country’s post-Soviet history after returning to the Kremlin last year. Human Rights Watch’s annual report, released Thursday, says the string of restrictive laws enacted since […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – www.rbth.ru – Yulia Ponomareva, Combined report – January 31, 2013) Nine months after popular gubernatorial elections were re-introduced on the initiative of former President Dmitry Medvedev, a 90 percent majority in the Russian Duma votes “yes” on a bill that gives regional legislatures the right to scrap them. President Putin believes the measure could prevent […]
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(Kremlin.ru – January 31, 2013) Vladimir Putin chaired an expanded meeting of the Government of the Russian Federation. The meeting discussed the guidelines for the Government’s performance through 2018. * * * PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA VLADIMIR PUTIN: Good afternoon, colleagues, Last year we outlined a strategy for our activities in the long term. We identified our priorities and targets in […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 31 (Interfax) – Russia needs to develop democratic institutes and strengthen civil society, President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday to summarize results of the expanded government meeting. “We have to go beyond the government policy fundamentals until 2018, which have been presented today, so to solve all problems faced by the country and to keep all promises given […]
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(Eurasia Daily Monitor: Volume 10, Issue 18 – Pavel Felgenhauer – Jamestown Foundation – jamestown.org – January 31, 2013) Since the rebellion against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad began almost two years ago, many in the West and in the Arab World have eagerly awaited evidence of Moscow beginning to finally ditch the brutal and seemingly doomed Syrian […]
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[Russian state TV talk show discusses controversial State Duma bills – BBC Monitoring/Rossiya 1 – January 27, 2013] BBC Monitoring reports on the Rossiya 1 television program “Sunday Night with Vladimir Solovyev” and its January 27, 2013, broadcast covering Duma bills: The 27 January edition of the “Sunday Night with Vladimir Solovyev” talk show on state-owned Rossiya 1 TV featured […]
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[“Riot Police Stand By and Watch Attack on LGBT Activists” – Vedomosti – January 31, 2013] Vedomosti reports on a demonstration in front of the Duma featuring homosexual behavior in the form of same-sex kissing, broken up by “Orthodox fundamentalists,” with police reportedly then arresting only the homosexual demonstrators: … Russian authorities seem to have given up their monopoly on […]
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From: “HRW Press” <hrwpress@hrw.org> Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2013 Subject: Russia: Worst Crackdown Since Soviet Era For Immediate Release Russia: Worst Crackdown Since Soviet Era Government Should Stop Pressure, Reprisals on Civil Society (Moscow, January 31, 2013) The Kremlinn in 2012 unleashed the worst political crackdown in Russia’s post-Soviet history, Human Rights Watch said today in its World Report […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, January 30, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/01/window-on-eurasia-indifference-not.html) A majority of Russians today does not feel any sympathy for the Putin regime or is not prepared to show any “active support” or “active opposition” to it, according to Lev Gudkov, head of the Levada Center. Instead, they manifest a kind of “inert indifference” about those […]
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(Russian ex-finance minister tipped to be premier before long – BBC Monitoring/Ekho Moskvy Radio – January 30, 2013) BBC Monitoring reports on Ekho Moskvy and Argumenty Nedeli covered of alleged systematic down-grading of how state-controlled Russian television presents Dmitry Medvedev to the viewing public: Russia’s national TV channels have been told to reduce their coverage of Prime Minister Dmitriy Medvedev, […]
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(RIA Novosti – January 29, 2013) Veteran journalist Vladimir Pozner is one of the three best known and most trusted TV journalists in Russia, a poll conducted by the Public Opinion Foundation (FOM) has shown, as reported by RIA Novosti news agency on 29 January, citing the organization’s website (http://fom.ru/SMI-i-internet/10793). The poll was conducted on 27 January among 1,500 respondents […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 29 (Interfax) – A little more than half of Russians are against the hypothetical dissolution of the State Duma and early parliamentary elections – about twice as many as those who want new elections, an opinion poll suggests. Moreover, more than two-thirds of Russians don’t want to take part in protests such as those that have been rocking […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – www.rbth.ru – Yulia Ponomareva – January 29, 2013) The office of Kirov Governor Nikita Belykh was searched by investigators Tuesday in a probe into the privatization of a local vodka factory, which investigators claim was sold for a below-market price in 2010. Prominent opposition leader and anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny, who served as an adviser […]
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(Government.ru – January 27, 2013) Fareed Zakaria: Mr Prime Minister, thank you for agreeing to this meeting. In 2009, when you were President of Russia, you wrote a very interesting and important essay about Russia’s future. You said that the two major problems of the Russian economy were excessive dependence on oil and excessive corruption. A look at current statistics […]
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(Interfax – January 26, 2013) The Russian government did not support the Liberal-Democratic Party’s (LDPR) idea to legalize the use of some types of short-barreled firearms for self-defense purposes. “Free circulation of rifled handguns would have a negative effect on public security in the country, would significantly complicate the law and order, and would cause growth in the number of […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 28 (Interfax) – The State Duma is ready to accept apologies from television journalist Vladimir Pozner, saying the draft “Pozner law” will be “put on hold.” Pozner apologized for his earlier criticism of the State Duma on his program on Sunday evening. After that criticism, parliamentarians drew up a bill prohibiting journalists who have another country’s citizenship in […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – January 28, 2013) With a United Russia deputy declaring that Russia is not Sodom and Gomorrah, the State Duma gave tentative approval to a bill that would ban “gay propaganda” to minors. But the measure, which mirrors similar legislation in place in St. Petersburg and several other areas, met with unusually strong […]
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MOSCOW, January 25 (RIA Novosti) The United States has no place in any dialog between Russia’s government and opposition movements opposed to President Vladimir Putin’s rule, Putin’s spokesman has told a US journal. “The dialog between the Russian government and the opposition cannot be a subject of the bilateral relationship between Moscow and Washington, and in no way can […]
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MOSCOW, January 24 (RIA Novosti) Most Russians trust public opinion polls but are increasingly disinterested in their findings, a survey by the state-run pollster VTsIOM shows. “Most Russians (65 percent) are interested in the results of sociological surveys but their number has fallen compared to 2005 (77 per cent),” VTsIOM said. According to the pollster, 29 percent of Russians […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – January 25, 2013) The social-democratic Just Russia party issued an ultimatum Thursday to four members who are leaders in the anti-Kremlin protest movement, warning them to quit leadership roles in other organizations or face dismissal from the party. The demand threatens to further weaken and divide the already splintered opposition, which is […]
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(Government.ru – January 24, 2013) Question: Mr Medvedev, you were here in 2007, one year before you were elected President. The key point of your policy speech then (which we all remember) was “Freedom is better than unfreedom.” What phrase would you use now, six years on? What would you say to the West with the same succinctness or perhaps […]
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MOSCOW, January 24 (Dan Peleschuk, RIA Novosti) Pavel Samburov exudes confidence when he recalls the night in October, on International Coming Out Day, when a group of masked hoodlums stormed and ransacked a Moscow gay club. “They worked as a team,” Samburov says nonchalantly, taking a drag from a cigarette, then snuffing it out. “It was an organized attack.” […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – January 24, 2013) State Duma deputies on Wednesday overwhelming passed in its first reading a bill that would give regional assemblies the right to abolish direct elections for governors, likely weakening a key pro-democracy reform signed last year by then-President Dmitry Medvedev. A total of 403 deputies voted in favor of the […]
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MOSCOW, January 24 (Marc Bennetts, RIA Novosti) Prison officials in East Siberia are attempting to force a protest movement figure, charged with seeking to violently overthrow President Vladimir Putin, to implicate himself and others in the alleged plot, his lawyer told RIA Novosti on Thursday. Leonid Razvozzhayev, a leftist activist, was transferred from Moscow to a pre-trial detention center […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anatoly Medetsky – January 23, 2013) How popular discontent will play out is one of the key uncertainties that the World Economic Forum identified for Russia’s long-term economic development in a report released Tuesday. Attendees of the annual forum in Davos, Switzerland, which opened Tuesday, are set to question Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev about this […]
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(Nikolaus von Twickel – Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – January 23, 2013) The suicide of activist Alexander Dolmatov in a Dutch extradition center has highlighted the challenges for Russian opposition members to get political asylum in Europe, but his tragic case does not mean that obtaining asylum has become impossible, experts said Tuesday. Dolmatov was found dead last Thursday in […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – January 22, 2013) A presidential election in Russia isn’t scheduled for another five years, but the people who will run the polling stations and count the ballots are already being selected. Regional elections officials have until April 30 to form more than 90,000 local elections commissions nationwide one for every polling […]
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(RFE/RL – Tom Balmforth – January 22, 2013) Russian politics is so inclusive, pluralist, and teeming with new political parties that each party should adopt an animal as its insignia to make it easier for overwhelmed voters to remember which party is which. This is the solution put forward by Aleksandr Sidyakin, a 35-year old United Russia parliamentary deputy, to […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, January 19 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/01/window-on-eurasia-real-opposition-to.html) The “real opposition” to the powers that be is not in Moscow but in the provinces, a Lipetsk writer says, because in Moscow, opposition figures simply want to replace one ruler with another while in the provinces people want the authorities whoever they are to play an ever-smaller […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 21 (Interfax) – Alexander Dolmatov, a leading rocket designer and an activist of the unregistered leftist organization The Other Russia, committed suicide in the Netherlands after having been interrogated under torture by Western special services, says The Other Russia leader Eduard Limonov. “After Sasha Dolmatov’s suicide note was published, it is clear that he was interrogated by Dutch […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 18 (Interfax) – A lawyer has expressed suspicion that there are string indications that the release of one of the three convicted members of the Pussy Riot punk rock band was part of a “bargain” between her and the prosecution and represented “betrayal of common interests.” Correspondence between the two other convicts, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, which […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – January 21, 2013) State-controlled NTV television on Sunday aired its latest documentary-style film targeting prominent opposition figures, this time for allegedly being part of an organized information campaign to discredit the Russian Orthodox Church. The film, “I Don’t Believe It,” accuses popular blogger Rustam Adagamov a member of the opposition Coordination […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – David Edwards – January 21, 2013) David Edwards is chief copy editor at The Moscow Times. An obscure Washington state politician once said her votes on proposed legislation were based on conscience, constituency and caucus in that order. She may be on to something. United Russia deputies in the State Duma who voted for […]
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(RFE/RL – January 21, 2013) Despite claiming that he’s not a politician, Yury Shevchuk, frontman for the legendary Russian rock band DDT, is quite vocal when discussing political topics. Speaking recently at the Brooklyn Public Library, Shevchuk said he and his band are seeking to bring about democratic change in Russia through music. Nikola Krastev caught up with Shevchuk in […]
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(RIA Novosti – January 20, 2013) The opposition Coordination Council has decided to hold the next mass protest march in spring, Russian RIA Novosti news agency reported on 20 January. Twenty-six members of the Coordination Council voted for the proposal “to hold a nationwide mass protest in spring 2013, with the working title March against the Hangmen”. The exact date […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – January 21, 2013) Two opposition figures saw their legal troubles mount on Friday, as investigators pressed ahead with an embezzlement charge against protest leader Alexei Navalny and opened a criminal case into allegations that leftist activist Leonid Razvozzhayev falsely maligned them. Investigators presented the final version of a charge against Navalny that […]
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(Interfax – January 18, 2013) Russia’s Justice Ministry has said that it has so far found no NGOs headed by or financed by citizens of the USA whose activities could be suspended under the “anti-Magnitskiy” law (also known as the Dima Yakovlev law). The law, better known for its controversial Article 4, which bans US citizens from adopting Russian children, […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 18 (Interfax) – Opposition campaigner Alexei Navalny said his prosecution in the fraud case connected with the Kirovles logging company is part of the law enforcement services’ plan to obstruct his political activities and prevent him from running in elections. “The goal is to obstruct my political activities and to prevent my running in elections, all of which […]
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MOSCOW/IRKUTSK, January 18 (RIA Novosti) Investigators opened a new criminal case against opposition activist Leonid Razvozzhayev on Friday and denied media reports of his disappearance. Investigators accuse the activist of spreading false information, Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told RIA Novosti on Friday, stemming from Razvozzhayev’s continuing claims that he was tortured into confessing his role in organizing mass […]
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MOSCOW, January 18 (RIA Novosti) – Final charges in a grand embezzlement case have been brought against Russian opposition figurehead Alexei Navalny, the Investigative Committee said on Friday. Navalny has refused to testify, committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said, adding the investigation into the case “is nearing completion.” Navalny has been charged with “organizing embezzlement on a grand scale” and faces […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines/Ogoniok – Evgeny Kozichev, Ogoniok magazine – January 17, 2013 – http://rbth.ru/society/2013/01/17/ key_laws_to_come_into_force_in_2013_21969.html) This year, Russian citizens will enjoy some new rights, but lose some old ones. Ogonyok has compiled a list of the most important legal novelties of 2013. International relations On January 1, 2013, the Dima Yakovlev law (“On measures against persons involved in abuse […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Michael Bohm – January 18, 2013) Michael Bohm is opinion page editor of The Moscow Times. An increase in anti-Americanism stands out as one of the most dominant features of the Kremlin’s policy in 2012. Since the propaganda campaign worked so effectively on many Russians, we can expect even more state-sponsored anti-Americanism in 2013. The […]
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MOSCOW. Jan 16 (Interfax) – The political modernization course is unwavering, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said at the Gaidar Forum on Wednesday. “We need political modernization and qualitative broadening of political and economic freedoms,” he said. The other tasks are qualitative renovation, comprehensive modernization of various spheres of the country’s life, technological modernization, economic diversification, reduced dependence on fluctuations of […]
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(Eurasia Daily Monitor: Volume 10, Issue 7 – Jamestown Foundation – jamestown.org – Robert McDermott – January 15, 2013) Russia’s new defense minister, Army-General Sergei Shoigu, under the guise of pursuing “nuanced changes” to the Armed Forces’ reform managed by his predecessor Anatoly Serdyukov, is reportedly considering systemic revisions to the entire process. These range from revising the reformed military […]
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MOSCOW, January 15 (RIA Novosti) The State Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament, kicked off its spring session Tuesday with promises to consider, within weeks, a raft of bills on everything from the return of independent candidates in legislative elections to bans on smoking and the “propaganda” of homosexuality. The legislative body also gave preliminary approval to a bill […]
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NOVOZAPOLYARNY, Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District. Jan 15 (Interfax) – Evaluation of the government efficiency is an exclusive area of the Russian president, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev believes. “In the opinion of Medvedev, the only person eligible to evaluate the efficiency of certain ministers and the government is the president,” the prime minister’s press secretary Natalia Timakova said. She thus commented on […]
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[Failed Reforms: Political Reforms: Gubernatorial Elections Resemble Appointments, Competition Among Parties Remains Inadequate – Vedomosti – Maria Zheleznova – January 15, 2013 – no public link to English-language version] Vedomosti covers analysis by Alexei Kudrin’s Civil Initiatives Committee (CIC) that finds that gubernatorial elections resembled appointments, competition among political parties remained inadequate, and turnout continued to decline. Changes in party […]
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(www.opendemocracy.net – Andrei Zaostrovtsev – January 11, 2013) Andrei Zaostrovtsev is lecturer at the M-Centre at the European University, St. Petersburg and professor of the Higher School of Economics One way Vladimir Putin has retained his popularity among Russians has been by increasing retirement pensions and other social benefits, and as a result the state pension fund is deep in […]
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(Moscow News – themoscownews.com – Anna Arutunyan – January 14, 2013) Anna Arutunyan is the politics editor of The Moscow News “Children are [expletive] sacred,” one protester was overheard telling another at Sunday’s March against Scoundrels. That was one of the reasons that the march, widely expected to continue a trend of dwindling turnout for the spate of mass anti-government […]
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