LOCAL ELECTIONS. In Sunday’s local elections United Russia didn’t do as well as usual. No doubt, this will be analysed to death according to the writer’s preconceptions. I say there are three possibilities 1) a fluke; 2) United Russia, for some reason, didn’t amplify its results; 3) a level of dissatisfaction with local bosses. It is too soon to say which is which and whether this is a trend or not.

PUSHING ON A ROPE. In a meeting Medvedev emphasised that his instructions must be carried out. His complaint was indicative: “I regularly receive reports from the Cabinet, the regions, and other organisations, these reports are often not particularly meaningful.” A common problem in Russia and contrary to the assumption so many have that everything is Russia goes as planned by the cabal at the top. Shades of “We hear that Putin has promised it to you, so go and ask Putin”.

MVD REFORM. Medvedev dismissed a deputy justice minister; the individual, Yuriy Kalinin, had previously been in charge of the prison system and thus his dismissal may be connected with the shocking state of Russia’s prisons and more fallout from the death of Sergey Magnitskiy. Meanwhile a police officer in Samara Oblast been charged over the death of man in a detoxification centre.

CORRUPTION. RIA-Novosti has a video of a traffic policeman swallowing a bribe. The story is that the traffic policeman stopped a motorist and demanded a bribe; the motorist left promising to get the money but called the police; they set up the sting and arrested the traffic policemen. What is interesting is 1) that the motorist went to the police and 2) that they acted. Maybe Medvedev’s anti-corruption drive is gaining some traction.

BILLIONAIRES. Forbes has its latest list of Russian plutocrats, which people seem to take seriously. As for me, I’m still awaiting Forbes’ explanation of how Chernomyrdin’s US$1.1 billion in 2001 was all gone by 2004.

INDIA. Putin visited India and had a fruitful trip. Agreements covered nuclear power plants, GLONASS and exports (including weaponry). Delhi is playing a careful role with closer relations with Washington and Moscow as it gradually becomes a major player.

WHAT’S IN A NAME? On Monday a series of arrests across Europe, but especially in Spain, scooped up members of a criminal gang, although the boss himself escaped the roundup. Was it a Russian or Georgian gang? The BBC says Georgians. Some French media (but not all) say Russians. Euro News is on the fence. Russians, Georgians, Russians, Georgians. Whatever. The truth seems to be that it was a Georgian gang but it’s sometimes difficult for the MSM to get its clichés straight. Reminiscent of the sudden death of Badri Patarkatsishvili in 2008: some in the UK MSM saw it as another enemy of Putin suddenly dying; the story stopped fast when they learned he was Saakashvili’s enemy.

FAKE RUSSIAN INVASION. On Saturday Imedi TV broadcast a “simulation” of a Russian invasion of Georgia in June. As with the The War of the Worlds broadcast, the station was not over-careful to assure viewers that it wasn’t true. Watching it makes it clear that the real point of the broadcast, in addition to keeping the Russian scare going, was to smear Saakashvili’s opposition as a fifth column: the broadcast had them making a statement “declaring the authorities as illegal and announcing the establishment of a so called people’s government” and obviously collaborating with the invaders. This point was hammered home by Saakashvili. Saakashvili is, of course, pretending that he had nothing to do with it, but Imedi TV is under his control: it was forcibly taken over in November 2007. There is a purported phone intercept of Saakashvili approving the whole thing: chose your theory for its origin – the truth, Moscow or the Georgian Interior Minister. Perhaps the strangest thing about the scenario is how quickly Saakashvili’s regime falls – other than some, apparently, civilian resistance, no one fights back, the Army goes over. What is going on in Saakashvili’s mind? Does he want to be a martyr? Or, given that the only clear thing about this farrago is that Burjanadze and Noghaideli are portrayed as traitors, is he about to arrest the whole opposition? The broadcast has been roundly condemned: by the Catholicos-Patriarch; the OSCE and the EU Monitoring Mission; the British and French Ambassadors (whose faces were used with fake dialogue); the President of the EC (who advised Tbilisi “to refrain from any activities which could exacerbate local or regional tensions”; the US Ambassador (who took the opportunity to chide the regime for the “inconsistent application of the rule of law”).Certainly this curious episode has not improved Saakashvili’s standing in Europe.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

PEOPLE POWER. For years Russian big wheels have been whizzing down roads ignoring the rules confident that, should there be an accident, their connections will help the police to come to the correct conclusion. As it were. In Irkutsk in December, the daughter of the regional election committee chairwoman ploughed into two pedestrians. No charges were laid. A couple of weeks ago, the car of a LUKoil executive killed two people in a head-on collision; the victims were blamed. This was the last straw and a strong public opinion movement sprang up. Two observations (in addition to the obvious one) here. First, these protests are made possible by “new media” – YouTube, social networking, cellphone cameras. Second, an organisation of car owners called Freedom of Choice has mobilised in other cases and stands ready to go into action quickly. This is what is called civil society. For those who are immediately going to interpret this as signs of disquiet with Medvedev, the protesters are entirely in step with his pronouncements. But it is also a challenge for him to put his efforts where his mouth is; as a public appeal to him said: “If you take the case under your personal control and punish the person responsible for the crash, you will prove your commitment to the fight against corruption.” Yesterday Medvedev ordered an investigation. The Irkutsk campaign did force the police to re-consider.

NATO. Continues its journey towards reality. Several former German officials have said that the time has come for NATO to invite Russia to join. The NATO SACEUR is reported to have said Russia should become a “partner” in missile defence. Better late than never, I suppose, but it is rather late: as the Germans said: “One of the key bones of contention is that, for historical reasons, the new members of NATO define their security as being directed against Russia, while the imperative for Western Europe is that security in and for Europe can only be achieved with and not against Russia.” Meanwhile, Russia’s Ambassador to NATO, has offered a million dollars to “the person who will prove that NATO is not pursuing military planning against Russia”. Russian diplomats must be well paid! Of course, this is a stunt: militaries plan for all kinds of contingencies.

POLICE. The policeman who made the YouTube recording and was then arrested by his former colleagues, reports that he has been released from custody.

CORRUPTION. Investigators claim to have broken up a racket, involving a former Moscow Oblast finance minister, which made off with property and budget funds in 2007-2008.

OLYMPIC ANGST. Putin has called for a probe into use of funding for athletes (US$110 million says he). Meanwhile more nonsense on how the performance shows that “Russia is at a standstill”. Mind you, Russians can be just as silly about it. To paraphrase Freud: sometimes sport is just sport.

BURYATSKIY. In an important success for the authorities, Said Buryatskiy (aka Aleksandr Tikhomirov) was killed in Ingushetia last week. The FSB has linked him to the St Petersburg train bombing. This will be a heavy blow to the jihadists in the North Caucasus as Buryatskiiy may be said to have re-animated the jihad there both as a theoretician and recruiter of suicide bombers.

BUSHEHR. Foreign Minister Lavrov said that the Bushehr NPP would be launched this year. Ah! the years do roll by: here from a year ago.

RUSSIA-GEORGIA. Nino Burjanadze, one of the three “Rose Revolution” leaders and now opposition leader, has completed her visit to Moscow. Her take on the talks: “I participated in this meeting not to talk about the past, but to try to find solution for the future.” And another of Saakashvili’s former allies is there as well. Meanwhile Saakashvili continues to hire US PR companies.

RUSSIA-UKRAINE. Yanukovych had a fruitful trip to Moscow with much talk of improving relations. But, as expected, he laid down some markers, particularly that Moscow must find a new base when the Sevastopol lease runs out in 2017. I couldn’t agree more: Russian fleets should be based in Russia.

UKRAINE. Mykola Azarov is the new PM. He declared that “The country has been plundered, the coffers are empty, state debt has risen threefold …”. Parliament also dismissed the head of Ukraine’s National Security Service. Perhaps we will finally learn about the famous “poisoning” of Yushchenko.

THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN. Latvian Waffen-SS veterans want to hold a parade; the city says no; the ruling party says it will appeal. Last year they marched anyway, despite a city ban.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

RUSSIA AND FRANCE. I have been saying for some time that Paris has a better take on the reality of Georgian-Russian relations than other capitals and that this knowledge is gradually working its leaven. The first reason is Salome Zurabishvili who, as a former French Foreign Service employee, has a certain inside track in France. The second is that Foreign Minister Kouchner made the effort to visit the Ossetian refugees in Vladikavkaz and learned more about the actual situation than other capitals and the Western MSM who did little more than parrot Tbilisi’s press releases. Thus, Paris freed itself from much of the nonsense about the 2008 South Ossetia war and has come to realise how much Saakashvili was manipulating coverage and to better understand the real nature of his rule. Medvedev just visited Paris and meetings seem to have gone very well with Sarkozy’s address at the state dinner a concise statement of past relations and present common interests. Medvedev responded in kind. (Press conference. The talks seem to have covered a lot: visa-free regime, Georgia, Mistral sales, Middle East, new European security architecture. Both said much about trusting each other). Indeed, it seems to have been quite an important visit and should serve to further move the reflex reaction away from the binary position that whatever “we” do is good and whatever Moscow does is bad.

BUSINESS. On Friday Medvedev met with business leaders and promised to reduce the “administrative burden”. True to his word he then introduced a bill that would set bail limits for people accused of economic crimes. There is very little bail in Russia and the interminable pre-trial detentions in the terrible prisons can be fatal. It’s also a racket: as Medvedev said, “Corrupt officials get the word from an entrepreneur’s competitor, put the entrepreneur behind bars, and then let him out after he coughs up a certain sum”. So that is a step forward as was the coming into effect Tuesday of a law banning businesses from forming their own security departments (the 90s saw much fighting between biznessmen and their private armies – and their media outlets).

OLYMPICS. Russia’s relatively poor performance has been the cause of some angst. The Olympics, which long ago ceased to be about mere sport, serve as the peg for the silliest comment about Russia that I have ever seen: “but why not try to measure Russia’s greatness by its ability to build a free and prosperous country, a good global citizen at peace with its neighbors? This kind of Russia might also fare better at the Olympics. The four leading medals winners in Vancouver are free-market democracies.”

GLONASS. Despite the happy talk from Moscow, there appear to be problems with the system. Three more satellites were orbited yesterday but we are now informed that of the 22 up there only 16 are functioning. Thus, despite many promises of imminent world-wide coverage, the system can barely maintain coverage of Russia. I hope Putin doesn’t lose his dog.

RUSSIA AND EUROPE. The Constitutional Court has affirmed that Moscow should obey Strasbourg human rights court decisions. Given the fact that a very large proportion of the cases there are against Moscow, I’m not convinced that this was a wise ruling. But it does conform to Art 15.4 of the Constitution.

ZHIRINOVSKIY. Is in the business of staying in the public eye (more difficult these days because the Kremlin doesn’t need his votes). He has just proposed cloning himself “for the nation’s benefit”. He is a very clever clown figure and, in retrospect, it is very fortunate that he (and the Communist Party) absorbed many of the nasty super nationalists in the 1990s rather than much more dangerous figures prevalent then.

UKRAINE. Yesterday Tymoshenko’s government failed a no confidence vote. Yanukovych’s party has 30 days to put together a coalition and 60 a government.

GEORGIA. Readers will notice I have said little about Georgia lately. The reason is that one of my favourite sources (Civil Georgia) seems to carry nothing now but pro-Saakashvili entries. I believe that it is no longer a reliable source. Enthusiastic supporters of “democratic” Georgia ignore findings like this from the Committee to Protect Journalists that “press freedom in this small South Caucasus nation stagnated due to persistent state manipulation of news media”. I am left with Georgian Times (which sounds as if it’s been taken over too); this and this, of whose provenance I am not certain. (If any reader knows of an English-language source uncontaminated by the government, I would appreciate knowing). At any rate, the Kazbegi-Verkhniy Lars crossing point was opened after a long delay (for repairs said Moscow) on Monday and former Saakashvili ally Nino Burjanadze arrived in Moscow and talked to Putin today. But Washington remains in thrall.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

THE SOBCHAK INFLUENCE. Medvedev and Putin are disciples and admirers of Anatoliy Sobchak and both commemorated the tenth anniversary of his death on Saturday. Medvedev, who knew him as one of his students and later worked with him in St Petersburg, gave praise to “the man who first brought legitimacy to Soviet politics”. In an interview for a program on his life and work, Putin paid very high tribute to him. He described how he began working for him when he was Mayor of St Petersburg, how he quit the KGB in the August 1991 coup attempt (“I wrote a letter of resignation in the first hours after the coup began… The point is that I had made my choice and I could not change it. It was my duty to be there, defending our shared ideals and the concept of national development which Mr Sobchak and I had put into words and implemented together.”) and how much he learned from him in work habits and morality: “The time when I worked with Mr Sobchak was the most valuable part of my education. It was in that period that my basic principles of work and communication took shape. The fundamentals of my personal principles and behaviour probably began to develop much earlier, at home and later at the university, where I studied and he taught. However, my work with him had tremendous practical significance for me”. So we have both the present and previous Presidents telling us that they regard Sobchak as their mentor and example and regard their times working under him as formative. Perhaps, the Kommentariat should pay more attention to this relationship and less to the lazy assumption that all we need to know is that Putin was a KGB officer and Medvedev is his sock puppet.

POLICE REFORM. Reform of the Interior Ministry started with a bang as Medvedev dismissed 15 senior MVD generals, including 2 Deputy Ministers (they to be replaced by civilians). Some were dismissed because of violations of the law by them or their subordinates, some to clear the way for new people. As the Russians (and many others) say: “The fish rots from the head” (although the Minister himself appears to be safe. And in uniform as an Army General: surely it is time to stop giving Armed Forces ranks to policemen.)

ENERGY. Putin has signed a resolution setting out the principles of Russia’s long-term energy market, Details are not yet out but he promises clear and consistent regulations that companies will have to work within (and punishment if they do not). As has suddenly become fashionable, he proposes investment for new nuclear power plants.

LAW AND ORDER. Members of a racist skinhead gang the “White Wolves” (interestingly, one of them has a Georgian surname) have received heavy sentences for numerous murders. Investigators say they have identified a suspect in the murder of Natalia Estemirova.

NATO. Confusing messages out of NATO: US Secretary of State Clinton calls for cooperation: “While Russia faces challenges to its security, NATO is not among them”; Secretary General Rasmussen says NATO has not given up plans to accept Georgia and Ukraine. By the way, the new Russian military doctrine distinguishes between a “military danger” (военная опасность) and a “military threat” (военная угроза). NATO expansion is the former and clearly not as serious as the latter.

UKRAINE. Viktor Yanukovych was inaugurated today as President and made a speech to the Rada (with several Christian references, interestingly) in which he pledged that Ukraine sought good relations all round and would not join any military alliances (“We are ready to participate in such processes as a European non-aligned state”). Symbolising this, his first trips abroad will be to Brussels (1 March) and Moscow (5 March). Tymoshenko withdrew her court challenge but, as she did, claimed the court was biased and insisted that she did not recognise Yanukovych as President. Her party (modestly named the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc) boycotted Yanukovych’s address. So, the question for the Ukrainian political system is whether Yanukovych’s party can put together a coalition and oust her as PM or whether we will have another period of the (same) PM opposing everything a (different) President does. Amusingly, Berezovskiy has excoriated the Ukrainian people for their vote: many suspect that he was one of the people behind the “Orange Revolution”.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

MEDVEDEV PROGRAM. Medvedev’s (ie The Team’s) program for the first year was derailed by two unexpected events: the international financial crisis and Saakashvili’s invasion of South Ossetia. Nonetheless, we do have an idea of what he (ie The Team) has in mind. While not very much has happened, there is talk of selling off a number of state-owned companies and many speeches about the problem of corruption. Overtures to, if not the opposition, at least non-Kremlinocentric opinion and, many many references to modernisation: “perhaps the most important topic on our agenda, namely the modernisation of our economy. The modernisation of Russia’s economy must be based on new technologies, innovation and the radical restructuring of the country’s internal economic structure.” Medvedev spends a lot of his time exhorting people and talking about the big strategic picture (for example, to energy sector executives on Friday). Thus far, not that much legislation has hit the street, but it is coming (education, police, quality control, banking).

THE NEW BIG MIS-QUOTATION. So far Medvedev has been spared the selective and false quotations that were the foundation of so many think-pieces about Putin. But it’s happened at last. A breathless piece (JRL/2010/29/25) quotes Medvedev saying about Saakashvili “If you, as a president, did something that you must be held accountable for, you will, without a doubt, face consequences”; later author calls this an “ominous forecast” showing the “Kremlin’s malevolent plans for Georgia”. Here’s what Medvedev actually said:” So if you have done something, especially as President, for which you must answer, you have to take responsibility sooner or later. What kind of responsibility? I think that first and foremost Mr Saakashvili should answer to his own people, since he plunged them into war, condemned them to great suffering, and in the final analysis all this led to the collapse of his country.” Much the same opinion, in fact, as that of Saakashvili’s former Foreign and Defence Ministers (not that such propaganda pieces ever mention the opinions that so many people who worked with Saakashvili have of him). I wonder if this will go the rounds like Putin’s so-called remark to Bush that Ukraine wasn’t really a country; a “quotation” for which no one seems to have been able to find the original.

ANOTHER FOREIGN WEAPONS PURCHASE. Curved barrel small arms from Israel for special forces.

POKLONNAYA GORA. The war memorial complex in Moscow was supposed to have a memorial structure for each of Russia’s four “recognised” religions. The church, mosque and synagogue are complete and land has just been granted for a Buddhist temple.

DEMOGRAPHICS. The government programs continue to chew away at the problem with increases in the birth rate and reductions in the death rate, including improvement in infant mortality. (Figures as of 3rd quarter 2009). It is expected, taking immigration into account, that Russia’s population will have grown slightly in 2009.

NORTH CAUCASUS. More evidence for my hypothesis that the jihadists in the North Caucasus should have laid low this winter: in a battle in Ingushetia, security forces claim to have killed a number of them.

HISTORY WARS. The Polish government has joined a class action suit to sue Moscow for the Katyn Massacre. The cynic would say that Russia now has money and people want some of it. Sue Jughashvili and Beria I say.

UKRAINE. Tymoshenko continues to refuse to accept the election results (she is quoted as saying she will “never” accept Yanukovych as the winner) and her team has presented evidence to the Supreme Administrative Court claiming a million false votes were counted. The court has suspended the election results until it considers the evidence tomorrow. Given that practically everyone else has accepted the results as legitimate, it is unclear what she hopes to achieve. Her party has 30% of the seats in the Rada but she can’t be gaining support by her actions. More paralysis for Ukraine.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

MILITARY DOCTRINE. On Friday Medvedev signed off on the latest military doctrine (officially the third after 1993 and 2000). I don’t see anything very different from its predecessors: NATO expansion, terrorism, nuclear weapons will be used if we think we have to. (The last seems to be hailed as a new development whenever it appears: in 2010 or 1999; but it’s every nuclear power’s actual policy). Perhaps there’s a bit more emphasis on modernisation of the Armed Forces and their equipment as a consequence of deficiencies discovered in the Ossetia war. I must confess, I never understand what these documents are supposed to do: large sections are simply a list of the obvious. For example: “36. The main tasks of military planning are” a, b, c, d, e, f; all of which could be summarised as “to plan for eventualities”. But they must serve some planning or authorisation purpose in the Russian bureaucratic structure. A calm and thoughtful assessment here.

TROUBLE IN PARADISE. It’s a cliché in certain circles that Russia has “annexed” Abkhazia. Apart from the fact that this is not formally true, all my sources indicate that Abkhazia seriously believes it can be an independent country: it would not be the smallest in the world. But, grateful as Abkhazians may be for Russia’s protection against Georgia, and economically dependent on it as they now are, they are not an appendage of Moscow (see 2004 election, for example). As an example we have a problem over the alleged seizure of Russian-owned real estate in Abkhazia. This will no doubt be settled amicably but it is a small indication of divergent interests.

MISTRAL. It is reported that Paris has agreed to sell Moscow at least one Mistral-class amphibious assault ship and possibly three more. Moscow is reported to be still considering doing so. There is a considerable lobby in Russia that would insist that it can make everything itself. More of the post-Ossetia war wakeup in France.

CORRUPTION. On Monday it was announced that 19 traffic police had been arrested in Astrakhan on bribery charges. Of course, arresting traffic police on corruption charges is shooting fish in a barrel and has little to do with the real corruption problem but it’s at least a nibble at a tiny corner of it.

NATO. NATO continues its voyage of discovery of things it ought to have known before with the Secretary General intimating in Munich that Russia might join the NATO operation in Afghanistan (rather unlikely, it would seem). I remember some of our delegates, returning from the Munich conference of February 2001, mocking Ivanov’s assertion that “Russia, a front-line warrior fighting international terrorism in Chechnya and Central Asia is saving the civilized world of the terrorist plague”; melodramatic, perhaps, but not wrong.

NORTH CAUCASUS. In past years, fighters in the North Caucasus lay low during the winter; which, given the severity of conditions there, was understandable. This winter, however, they have carried out a number of attacks. This, however, does not appear to have been a wise thing: it appears to me that the security forces have had more successes than they have. Given the transport advantages – helicopters and so forth – of the security forces this is, perhaps, not surprising.

UKRAINE. The latest results show a slight Yanukovych win, high turnout and a regional division: in short, what opinion polls predicted. Tymoshenko has not conceded and it’s not clear just what she’s doing; some of her people are claiming fraud. With the approval of Western outside observers it will be politically difficult to challenge the results.

WHAT HAPPENED IN UKRAINE. To my mind it is rather easy to explain. There have been a lot of opinion polls in Ukraine over the past years and, while one can object to this or that poll result, the agreement among them has been very strong. And, one has to go with opinion polls, if they’re there and they’re good: otherwise it’s just opinion and blather. What the polls show is that there has never been more than 20-25% support for joining NATO and that 70-80% of Ukrainians want to have good relations with Russia. A policy – Yushchenko’s – that pandered to the 20-25% and ignored the 70-80% was certain to fail. And Yushchenko’s friends and supporters in the West were remarkably otiose not to realise that. On the other hand, for Yanukovych to play to the 70-80% and ignore the 20-25%, while not as politically suicidal as the reverse, will not succeed either. The only rational – and politically viable – course for a Ukrainian leader is a via media. Will Yanukovych be wise enough to behave accordingly? First indications – an interview with CNN – are promising. And, if all that is out of the way, he can try to tackle Ukraine’s real problems.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

OVER-CENTRALISATION. I have long thought that Putin, probably as a result of his fear that Russia would break up, over-centralised control (From his first phone-in in 2000: “The ‘power component’ in this country has become weakened and everything went tumbling down”.). One of Medvedev’s problems, therefore, is to reduce this centralisation: his goal of “modernisation” is impossible if all decisions are made at the centre. Yesterday, the Institute of Contemporary Development, with which Medvedev is associated, issued its report on what should be done. In brief, it calls for a general loosening of the political and command system of the country and a number of changes; many reverse decisions Putin made when he was President and mark somewhat of a return to the Yeltsin period. No doubt the Kommentariat will go into a frenzy of speculation about a struggle between the two Duumvirs, but I believe that this is all part of the next stage of the Team’s Plan. The report is probably to be seen as a contribution to the discussion. We will see what happens.

MCDONALDS. Some years ago I was asked at a conference what I thought to be the best thing that Canada had done for Russia: I answered McDonalds, to the surprise of the assembled policy wonks and academics. Not everyone is aware that it was the Canadian branch of the company, and the determination of its Chairman, George Cohon, which made it happen. Snooty people can sniff all they want, but food was in short supply then in Russia and the McDonalds restaurant on Pushkin Square never turned anyone away. And, important then: clean toilets. And everything was priced in rubles. Since then McDonalds has expanded all over Russia. It has stayed the course through crises; it invested its earnings back into Russia; it makes most of its product in Russia thereby forcing its standards on suppliers; it virtually introduced a real service culture to the country; it has been a school for management; it has inspired many Russian imitators. On Sunday it celebrated the twentieth anniversary of opening.

GDP. On Monday RosStat reported that Russia’s GDP had declined 7.9% in 2009; the good news was that a decline of 8.5% had been projected.

AEROFLOT. Apparently abandoning an idea to create a large regional air carrier, Putin announced that Aeroflot would take over a number of regional carriers. The stated reason is to improve service and safety as many of the “babyflots” that came into existence in the 1990s are in trouble. Reminiscent of the creation of the Canadian National Railway out of bankrupt lines in the 1920s.

PEOPLE POWER. There was a large protest by several thousand people in Kaliningrad on Sunday over some tax increases. This has stirred some alarm locally and at the centre as people scurry there. A number of things appear to have coalesced to cause the protest and, for once, all the opposition parties got together to organise it. Much of the anger seems to be aimed at the Governor, Georgiy Boos. It remains to be seen whether this is anything more than a local grievance (vide the protests in Vladivostok last year) or has wider implications.

“NORWAY SPIRAL”. Remember the lights over Norway last December? This analysis makes interesting reading. The author suggests that the Bulava failures may be a cover for the (successful) testing of something else.

NORTH CAUCASUS. Security forces claim to have killed one of the original jihadists who came to the North Caucasus in the first Chechen war. He is Mohamad Shaaban, an Egyptian, and is described as having arrived in Chechnya in 1992 and, together with Khattab, organised the “North Caucasus branch of al-Qaeda”.

OIL AND BELARUS. Moscow and Minsk signed an agreement last week on supplies and transit and the problem seems to be now over. By the way, those who think that Ukraine’s future is to be under the Russian boot might profit from studying Minsk-Moscow relations over the years.

UKRAINIAN ELECTION. A change has been made to the election rules which Tymoshenko claims could lead to cheating against her (mind you, the argument for making the change was to prevent her side from cheating). President Yushchenko has signed off on the change. Some pundits opine that there is a below-the-surface alliance between Yushchenko and Yanukovych. Meanwhile, Tymoshenko threatens to call her people onto the streets if she doesn’t like the result (bet they don’t show up). Polls indicate a narrow win by Yanukovych on Sunday. Unity seems as far away as ever.

IRAN. Is Teheran about to reverse its position on the uranium enrichment proposal? Who knows?

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

PUTIN’S VIEW. Occasionally we get a succinct indication of Putin’s thinking. Here’s one from a meeting with the State Council on Friday: “We must not allow our political culture to follow a Ukrainian scenario, and we must also prevent it from sliding into totalitarianism and despotism. Unfortunately, we know examples of this within the post-Soviet space”. A not unreasonable via media.

NATO. Relations proceed as NATO continues its self-educational process of realising Russia is more important than it used to think it was.

PREDICTION. A study by PricewaterhouseCoopers predicts that, by 2050, Russia’s economy will be the sixth-largest in the world and larger than any in Europe. There are too many future unknowns to put much stock in these kinds of predictions but it is interesting (amusing?) to juxtapose this with the commonplace predictions that Russia will collapse, sink into permanent poverty or that Russians will disappear from the earth.

VOTING. The Central Elections Committee has proposed the elimination of preliminary voting; it is widely regarded as the principal means of “improving” election results. (I refuse to say “fixing”: under no conceivable circumstances, with the government so supported and the opposition so irrelevant, would United Russia not dominate elections across the country).

SHAYMIYEV. I have long been intrigued by Mintimer Shaymiyev who has been more or less running Tatarstan since 1989 (and a major player there since 1983). I was impressed by the negotiation of the power-sharing treaty with Moscow in the 1990s (which still has legs: I love that “associated (объединенное) with the Russian Federation”) and the way in which Moscow was skilfully manipulated by Kazan. Indeed, at one point in the First Chechen War Shaymiyev’s website could not resist pointing out how much cleverer he had been than Dudayev had been in Chechnya. Dudayev threw away the power-sharing treaty that the Chechen parliament negotiated with Moscow in 1992: because freedom needed sacrifice. On the contrary, one of the Tatarstan negotiators told me, never did they make the mistake of breathing the word “independence”. On Friday he announced he would not seek another term as President and will retire in March. Age, presumably, he’s 73 (and maybe a gentle hint from Medvedev). Tatarstan seems to be one of the better-off and more peaceful parts of the Federation. Medvedev has nominated PM Rustam Minnikhanov. Who knows, maybe the Mayor of all the Moscows (who is 74) will hang up his hat next!

KARABAKH. On Monday the Presidents of Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan met in Sochi and agreed to a “preamble” to an agreement on Karabakh. For some years this issue seems to have been snatched back from solution at the last moment: often what happens is that the war veterans in all three participants (it’s important to remember there are three; it’s not just between Yerevan and Baku) protest any compromise.

IRAN. Foreign Minister Lavrov is quoted as saying that Moscow is disappointed with Tehran’s reaction to the proposal on nuclear fuels and added that “it is impossible to wait forever”. “Forever”, however, is a long time and doesn’t preclude more waiting.

GEORGIA. The Georgian government has issued a policy statement on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. It’s the usual stuff except for this: “Georgia seeks to achieve these objectives only through peaceful means and diplomatic efforts, and rejects the pursuit of a military solution”. For years Moscow tried to get Tbilisi to formally renounce force (and the ceasefire agreement does oblige it to do so) so this may mean something. But, on the other hand, there is no reason to believe anything that comes out of Saakashvili or his government. And, of course, the statement appears only now that the territories have been lost to Tbilisi for the foreseeable future and the Ukrainian election (in which Saakashvili seems to have tried to meddle) has removed one of Saakashvili’s most important friends (and weapons suppliers – will the new Ukrainian President will look into that murky story?). Finally, a strategy of “engagement through cooperation” might have been a winner in 1989, but it’s too late now: Tbilisi has attacked the two too many times.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

UKRAINE-RUSSIA RELATIONS. Will obviously be “better” as neither winner is running on an overtly anti-Russia platform. That having been said, a better word would be “rational relations”. The NATO obsession was a disaster for relations (and extremely divisive inside Ukraine, where an overwhelming majority want good relations with Russia) and that is now over. There will, however, still be disagreements but, with luck, they can be settled outside of an apocalyptic framework.

INTERNET. The latest numbers suggest about a fifth of Russian adults (24 million) use the Internet daily. This figure is said to be up about 20% since last year. (JRL/2010/11/5). As I have said many times before, the standard scare pieces about government control of Russian media omit to mention Internet access (probably because they are mostly written by Old Media types). The New Media is replacing the Old all over the world.

NORTH CAUCASUS. Medvedev’s latest idea is to create a new North Caucasus federal district, appointing Aleksandr Khloponin presidential envoy. What is interesting about the appointment is that he is not a security man but someone evidently intended to improve the desperate economic situation.

DWELLINGS. Many Russians privatised their dwellings for modest sums (about 80% in Moscow, for example), but many still have not. The Duma has extended the deadline for another 3 years.

CHICKEN WARS. In the 1990s chicken legs were an important US export to Russia – Americans apparently prefer white meat and Russians were then happy to eat any meat. But Russia has just, to quote Putin, adopted EU standards: “We simply took them for use in our own country”. This really has nothing to do with Russia: the Europeans also reject US imports for convincing reasons. Negotiations continue (and with Europe too).

Nukes. Medvedev has said that negotiations are progressing. The target seems to be 1500-1675 warheads and 500-1,000 delivery vehicles each. This would seem to leave each with an admirable sufficiency of destruction.

INTERIOR MINISTRY. The police force scores high in public perception of corruption and there is supposed to be a reform going on. Meanwhile, the policeman who blew the whistle about police corruption in Krasnodar has been charged by his former colleagues; make of that what you will. There’s supposed to be an investigation there too. Heads of Russia’s media outlets have sent a letter to the Minister requesting police protection for reporters; this after a reporter was arrested and fined for covering an unauthorised protest. The Public Chamber will take up the reporter’s case, so this may result in a precedent the police will be inclined to follow.

UKRAINE ELECTION. Two good things. Turnout was about two-thirds which shows that, however disgusted they may be with the “Orange stagnation”, Ukrainians have not lost faith in the process. And the election was reported by all foreign observers as being to an acceptable standard. The bad news is that the country’s division remains. Outsiders have – or should have – only one interest in the outcome of Ukrainian elections and that is security; the last being greatly affected by stability. Ukraine is much divided by its history and east and west have quite different interests on many subjects. The NATO membership question, injected by the “Orange Revolution”, is the single-most divisive issue that I can image: nothing could be better calculated to remind Ukrainians, every moment, of what divides them. The NATO obsession helped paralyse politics, turning every question into one between treason and patriotism. Ukraine’s genuine problems are the common post-communist ones greatly intensified by the financial crisis: for this Ukraine needs a government of national unity, or if that is not possible, a president who can claim to be president of all Ukraine and not just half of it. In this respect, a better result would have been to have had the winner of the first round score in the forties and cruise to a convincing victory in the sixties or seventies. Instead, the results follow what opinion polls have shown for years: Yanukovych’s support in the mid-thirties is based on the east and south; Tymoshenko, about ten points behind, has her support in the west and centre. Thus the expectation is that winner will only score in the low fifties and will, therefore, be president of half of Ukraine. Pundits are punditting away, but there are questions we simply do not know the answers to. Conventional wisdom seems to be developing that Yanukovych has never been able to score more than the low forties; this is true, but neither has Tymoshenko. Can losers move their votes to one or the other? (In any case, Tyhypko (13%) and Yaysenyuk (7%) are reported as saying they will support neither). Results here.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)

TEN YEARS. Putin became acting President on the last day of 1999 and was elected in March. When he came to power, judging from the essay he wrote, he set himself four tasks: 1) to reverse the economic decline; 2) to reverse the disintegration of Russia; 3) to increase Russia’s influence in the world; and 4) to introduce a rule of law or, as I prefer to put it, a rule of rules. Then economic indicators were trending down; Russia seemed to be literally breaking up (this fear often featured in his early speeches); most world capitals slighted it as a negligible and declining power; and the “rule” in Russia was that of corruption and incompetence. No one can deny that he has made great progress in these aims. The economy has turned around: here he had luck with high energy prices, but his policy did not squander the money. He has certainly restored central control – too much in my opinion – but no one now talks about the coming disintegration of Russia. Russia is taken much more seriously today although here the result is mixed. To those who will ever regard a weak Russia as a danger and a strong Russia as a threat, Putin’s effects have been wholly negative; but these people will never be pleased. Russia must now be taken more seriously (even though I think that Putin and his team sometimes overestimate its power and influence). But there has been little progress on the fourth aim. Nevertheless, few have been as successful at accomplishing their purpose as Putin and his team have. The team is still in place and is moving on the second half of the program. Putin stopped the decline and it is Medvedev’s task, as he ceaselessly says, to “modernise” Russia. The economy may be improving but it needs a new “modern” basis; the over centralisation of the Putin period should be relaxed; Russia has to improve its standing in the world so as to be seen as more of a problem-solver and less as a problem-causer (which, of course, requires a certain change of attitude in the rest of the world as well as a change in Russia’s behaviour); and finally the “rule of law” must replace “legal nihilism”. Medvedev will not see the resolution of these problems, but he will move them along. I am reminded of a remark made by Dr Leonid Abalkin about 15 years ago: reform will be in three stages, the first stage will take one year, the second five years and the third thirty years. The Putin team is popular in Russia today for a very good reason: it has delivered what governments are hired to do. Altogether, it has been quite a turnaround in the last ten years: no one would write “Russia is Finished” today; now conventional wisdom has moved to the “Russia resurgent” meme (but, note, Russia remains a problem!). The plain fact is that Russia is doing better than any of the final 12 members of the USSR and the ruling team has broad, real and persistent support firmly based on things that Russians can see happening around them. This, incidentally, is the principal reason why Russian elections are so unsurprising: Russians vote for more of the same and that means voting for the team’s pedestal party. In Ukraine, for example, this broad support does not exist: support there for the government is “the lowest in the world”.

ANTI-ALCOHOL CAMPAIGN. PM Putin has approved an anti-alcohol campaign. Certainly a major problem in Russia (and for a long time – English sailors in Murmansk in the 1500s are reported to have been pretty stunned by what they saw) and a major contributor to the death rate. But, Gorbachev’s efforts only resulted in the destruction of ancient vineyards in Georgia and Moldova and a sugar shortage when samogon production took off. We’ll see whether this campaign is more successful. Distilled alcohol consumption is a problem in northern countries generally and it is moderated by high prices.

HAITI EARTHQUAKE. The ever-efficient Russian Emergency Ministry has got its rescue teams off to Haiti.

NORTH CAUCASUS. The authorities claim more successes this week: perhaps the jihadists were ill-advised to keep their attacks up in winter.

RUSSIA INC. FOREX and gold actually grew last year by US$13.52 billion to US$440.6 billion and have gone up a bit so far this year.

UKRAINIAN ELECTION. For what it’s worth, a VTsIOM poll suggests that Serhey Tyhypko is catching up to Tymoshenko. The consensus of other polls is that Yanukovych will lead on the first round and he and Tymoshenko will go into the final round. But, maybe not. A possible decision by voters sick of the post-“Orange” stalemate might be that Tymoshenko and Yanukovych were part of it because each served a term as PM under Yushchenko. There may, therefore, be a chance for someone not involved. We’ll find out next week.

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Ottawa, Canada (see http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/)