Leader of the Nationalist-Bolshevist Party (NBP) Eduard Limonov will be serving for tycoons. This is evident from his statement: he promised to ‘arrange a political crisis’ and support opposition candidate Mikhail Kasyanov.
During the yesterday’s round table titled Lottery 2007: Who Will Remain in Politics? NBP leader Limonov made two shrill statements.
Firstly, he promised to impede the general elections in 2007. “Protest forces will not let authorities carry out these senseless elections - he said. – We will provoke a political crisis.” Secondly, Limonov suggested that politicians unite around Mikhail Kasyanov. According to him, support for the former premier by all opposition forces is “the only way out.”
This statement from the chief nationalist-Bolshevik was a surprise for many political scientists. NBP is an extremist organization, whose main slogans are struggle against oligarchs, officialdom, the West. It is known that Mikhail Kasyanov - formerly a top official, is involved in several corruption scandals, close to several tycoon groups and is supported by western forces.
No wonder that Limonov’s statement shocked and confused his party members. To support Kasyanov for NBP members means to support an enemy.
Many activities that have authority inside the party have been leaving NBP to protest Limonov’s close-up with tycoons. Experts note that this is a natural process and that the open close-up of Limonov with tycoons will repel many other followers. Meanwhile, experts believe that support for Kasyanov is also natural: NBP will likely become a similar force to Ukrainian’s Pora that played a significant role during the ‘orange revolution’.
Election to the Ukrainian parliament was held yesterday. From now on, the Supreme Rada will have the right to form the government independently.
According to the survey carried out by the International Institute of Sociology in Kiev, Viktor Yanukovich’s party should collect the majority of votes – over 28%; the second-best party will probably be the pro-president bloc Nasha Ukraina – around 20%; the third place will be taken by Blok Yulii Timoshenko with 11-12%. Rada will likely include the Socialistic Party of Ukraine – with around 5%, and the communist party, but only if it manages to overcome the 3% barrier. The rest 39 participants in the parliament campaign want to pass to Rada but will likely fail to get enough votes. Official results of the general elections, in which over 37 million electors took part yesterday, should be announced by Central Election Commission of Ukraine before April 10.
Chief of the analytical office at the Center for Current Politics Alexander Shatilov believes that “the trinity of Swan, Crawfish, and Pike that the Rada will be gives Russia a perfect opportunity to benefit from the future controversies, which will likely appear both inside the Supreme Rada and between the parliament and the President of Ukraine.”
This has got to a purposeful policy. Official Russian agency RIA News cites director of the Center for Current Politics in Russia Konstantin Simonov, who believes that Russia ‘has to advance negotiations on export of Siberian gas with all the potential clients in the East,” considering that recently, Europe has been considering to replace Russian gas for other sources of energy.” Simonov believes that European countries even used ‘blackmailing’ against Russia, threatening to “launch several alternative projects” which was in fact bluff. As a result, European energy security was undermined. ”While Europe is pressing on Russia and makes it clear that increase of Russian presence in the European energy market is unwelcome, it is logical to demonstrate that Gazprom has alternative markets interested to receive Russia gas” – underlined Simonov.
The Energy Strategy of Russia announced at Putin’s initiative in 2003 demonstrated that Russia aimed to distance from the European market of natural gas. “Russia is too dependent on the European consumers, while diversification of supply will allow it to win new and promising markets and fortify Gazprom’s positions in the future negotiations with the Western partners” – commented Troika-Dialogue analyst Valery Nesterov two days before Miller’s trip to Rome.
Russian economy is still a battlefield for various political groups fighting for influence, and the state-owned companies run by the Center are often used to attain finances for political activities – is stated in the book titled ‘Russia 2005. Transformation Report’.
The snapshot presented in this work is ambiguous. Economy is developing rapidly but the growth is attributed to the soaring energy market.
The country with gas and oil
The forecasts presented by Economic Development and Trade Ministry (or MERT) prove how important for Russia this is. With the average price of Urals brand oil at $55 a barrel, economic growth in 2006 will amount 6.2%. However, if prices fall to $27 a barrel, the growth will drop to 3.9%.
Another problem is in the lack of a strategic idea of how to make use of the propitious situation in the world bourses. – Russian economy is floating, - claim the authors of the work. According to them, the past year was ‘another year of missed opportunities to modernize the country’s economy.”
Some time in the future, subsoil reserves will be exhausted. Specialists believe that this can take place soon because authorities do not plan investments into development of new reserves. “Russian Academy of Natural Sciences forecasts that by 2025 practically all reserves of oil, gas, coal, and lead will have depleted. Reserves of diamonds and gold can exhaust by 2015” – reports the work on the Russian transformation.
“There are many economic dangers. These definitely include depletion of infrastructure and poor state of affairs in the key industries, oil and gas in the first place” – believes Konstantin Simonov from the Center of Current Politics in Russia (CPKR).
“Russia at glance seems to be beautiful. In fact, it is rich with interior issues. Poland has to have a say on what role in European Union Russia should play in the future” – noted the participants of the round table held Monday by Rzeczpospolita’s editors. The today’s issue of the newspaper contains materials devoted to this discussion and to Russia in general.
During the discussion that gathered political scientists, journalists and economic experts from Poland and Russia, it was marked that the economic situation in Russian can even cause jealousy of other states. All showings demonstrate progress, financial markets have become stable. Vladimir Putin’s rating as president is improving. “Russia is becoming more democratic. The country has made its civilized choice” – noted former Poland ambassador to Moscow, acting president advisor on eastern policy Stanislav Ciosek.
“If western mass media are drawing a negative image of Russia, this is owing to the existing stereotypes in the first place. Russia is depicted as a bear that brandishes gas scarecrow” – commented director General of the Center for Current Politics in Russia Konstantin Simonov, author of ‘Russia 2005. Transformation Report’, during the discussions organized by Rzeczpospolita.
Federal budget will “lose” 221 mln. rubles to increase the status of the northern capital.
On Wednesday at a plenary session of the State Duma a bill on transfer of the Constitutional Court to St.-Petersburg will be discussed. Most likely, the document will be approved: the Government and a profile committee of the Chamber told “yes”. But the judges of the Court do not want to move: in the name of the apparatus of the Court sent a letter to the Committee on constitutional legislation, assuming that the move of the Court would be useless for justice. Experts think that the expensive move is an “image” project of natives of Petersburg, which will not be developed further. Move of other federal bodies to the northern capital, in opinion of political scientists, is unlikely.
The move of the Constitutional Court to St.-Petersburg was certainly initiated by Petersburgers – the Legislative Assembly of the city. Its speaker Vadim Tulpanov will present the document before the deputies of the lower chamber of the Parliament. The offer concerning the move of the Court to the northern capital was approved beforehand in December, when Petersburg’s governor Valentina Matvienko came to the State Duma to lobby it. The head of the state put the discussion on this topic to the end. “I think the move of the Constitutional Court is quit reasonable, I mean super-centralization of the federal power in Moscow”, Putin said at the January press conference in the Kremlin. He stressed that it “ doesn’t undermine Moscow’s status as a capital”, which was, is and will be the capital of the Russian Federation. “Such small decentralization of power is only in favour», added the President.
Agreements on gas deliveries to China will let Russia eliminate dependency on European markets. This opinion was given to RIA News by experts commenting on the memorandum on deliveries of Russian natural gas to China.
On Tuesday Director general of the Chinese National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) Chen Gen and Chairman of the Board of Gazprom Alexey Miller signed the memorandum.
At the first stage Russian gas will be exported from Western Siberia, and then from Eastern Siberia. And at every stage the volume of export can reach 30-40 bln. cubic meters a year. As a source in the Russian delegation informed in a conversation with Russian journalists in Beijing, a gas pipeline from Russia to China can be placed in operation in 2011.
Director general of the Center for Current Politics in Russia Konstantin Simonov told RIA News that the western variant of gas deliveries from Russia to China was reasonable in the current situation. According to him, taking into account that a vast majority of terminals for liquefied natural gas are built at the eastern shore of China, the western variant is more preferable.
Human rights violations, dirty political technologies – all of that we can meet in the USA.
Discussions on democracy in Russia take place regularly. We often hear criticism for immaturity of our democratic institutes. Recently the US State Department again voiced its concern about the absence of democracy in Russia. The research structures close to the US Presidential Administration continue frighten us with the wrong way we go. Undoubtedly it is rather difficult to say that Russia is a true democratic society. But not only our country follows this, as it was appeared, false way.
It became clear long ago that democratic society is Weber’s ideal type that can be reached in practice even in Western developed countries. We can see a lot of deviations in the countries that teach us. Human rights violations, dirty political technologies of decision-making – all of that we can meet in the USA. Several recent episodes can be mentioned. The scandal with phone interception sanctioned by US President George Bush. The case of lobbyist Abramoff who recognized that he gave bribes to representatives of the US political elite, even though by trickier ways than in Russia. (Besides, he got money for organizing meetings with the President for foreign politicians. The rumors about the practice of paid meetings are permanently spread in Russia, but in the USA this practice takes place as well. ) New powers of intelligence service under the pretence of the struggle against terrorism. The scenario of force coup d’etat in Russia under pretence of the struggle against nationalism is often discussed at the West, but strengthening of their intelligence service does not worry it. Criticizing Russia for violation of the freedom of speech, the US Administration invents new forms of control over communicative space. The Justice Ministry tries by judicial means to oblige Google to present statistics of search results. The reason for this case is the struggle against pornography. Stories about active work of the US Presidential Administration with private channels, including the cases related to disposition of b-rolls necessary for the government, are not a rare thing. Or, for example, video cameras are set up in London and other Western cities; doesn’t it like “Big Brother”, with whom the democrats of the first wave like to frighten people in Russia? It is unnecessary, I believe, to mention secrete prisons of the CIA. As it is said, and these people prohibit us to pick nose!
Ramzan Kadyrov threatened to shut down one of the dominating mobile communications operator in Chechnya. The premier of the republic is discontent with the high prices and low quality communications. “Even I cannot get through” – chafes the premier, noting that the mobile communications fines in his region are the highest in the Northern Caucuses.
Now, the fate of the businessmen, just as in their commercials, depends on themselves. At that, the issue should be resolved in the nearest future. They have only a fortnight to improve quality, and increase the covering territory. If there is no improvement after two weeks, authorities plan to recall the license. Kadyrov tasked chief of Electrosvyaz to report the ultimatum to the company’s administration. “There are dozens of other operators that are ready and want to work in Chechnya” – continued the premier, underlying that his threats were real.
The rigid, near totalitarian, style of Kadyrov’s rule is justified by Moscow by the traditions of Caucuses and Crisis state of Chechnya after the ten years of wars. However, the whole Russia is facing the problem of surviving now too, whereas democracy and liberalism are not typical for it as well. So, on the federal level, authorities should stop timid discussions on rights and liberties, and start what it is expected – tackle issues.
The initial steps of the Chechnya premier after his promise to achieve cardinal improvement of the situation in the republic pledged in an interview to KM.RU was commented by expert of the analytical office at the Center for Current Politics Ivan Fedyakin.
Yesterday, the preliminary results of the Sunday elections of mayors to three regional capitals were announced: Makhachkala campaign was won by the acting head of the city; in Perm, acting as mayor entered the second tour; in Orel, the candidate of the power lost. Yesterday, the by-election to Kazan City Duma was won by the future mayor of the city. The first national mayor election in Orel were won by the opposition. The new mayor will be communists-backed top manager in StroiInvestDevelopment Alexander Kasyanov. With 29% of votes he outstripped Governor Egor Stroyev, senior vice governor and leader of the local United Russia Pavel Merkulov (25.8%).
The polls were followed by numerous reports on violations. Opposition complained about the attempts to dispose of polling papers: regional prosecutor office instituted two criminal proceedings under polls falsification article. The atmosphere escalated when yesterday morning election commission failed to complete the calculations due to the absence of 21 polling papers. Communists saw a falsification attempt in this and picketed by the city administration building. Chief of the city election commission Tatyana Andrianova had to come out to the protestors and explain that all 130 commissions had been sending the polling papers to the commission: “Over the night we were not able to accept all documents, and some chairmen refused to wait any further and went to bed.”
Leading expert at the Center for Current Politics in Russia Alexander Pavlyuk noted that the main reason for the defeat of the governor’s protégé was the protracted presence of Stroyev at power: “A counter-elite has formed in Orel region, which is mainly composed of medium business representatives and fights against the governor’s circle for the power and new opportunities for the business.”
The main result of the election for Perm was the record high protest voting. The winning acting as city chief Igor Shubin (30.3%) won by a small margin over the ‘against all’ candidate (25.2%), while State Duma deputy Pavel Anokhin passed over to the second tour with only 14%. Such results in Perm are attributed to the disqualification of regional parliament deputy Vladimir Plotnikov. The second tour will most likely take place on March 26. Experts believe that the candidates will find agreements on who’s going to be the winner, and Plotnikov’s positions will play a major role in that. Meanwhile, he claimed that he had not yet decided whether to continue agitating for the ‘against all’ candidate or support one of the other two.
