Paul
Goble
Staunton, October 28 -- The flood of news stories from a country as large,
diverse and strange as the Russian Federation often appears to be is far too
large for anyone to keep up with. But there needs to be a way to mark those
which can’t be discussed in detail but which are too indicative of broader
developments to ignore.
Consequently, Windows on Eurasia presents a selection of 13 of these
other and typically neglected stories at the end of each week. This is the 55th
such compilation. It is only suggestive and far from complete – indeed, once
again, one could have put out such a listing every day -- but perhaps one or
more of these stories will prove of broader interest.
1.
Putin, Russia’s ‘Biggest
Teller of Tales,’ Said Like Tsars Vasily III and Aleksey Mikhailovich. Russian commentator German Obukhov says that
Putin’s problems with the truth mean that he is “the biggest teller of tales”
in Russian history (svoboda.org/a/28070040.html). Meanwhile, Patriarch Kirill added his voice
to those trying to fix Putin’s place in the pantheon of Russian leaders. He
suggested that Putin is very much like Vasily III and Aleksey Mikhailovich (ruskline.ru/news_rl/2016/10/27/patriarh_kirill_putin_preemnik_vasiliya_iii_i_alekseya_mihajlovicha/). But at least one event this week likely
brought a smile to Putin’s face, if he was informed of it. An Italian woman
visiting Moscow stripped in Red Square and said she was ready to marry the
Kremlin leader (forum-msk.org/material/news/12388534.html).
2.
Russia Risks
Disintegration if It Engages in New Arms Race, Expert Says. As Moscow has
announced that it will boost defense spending over the next three years, a
Russian expert has warned that the country can’t afford a new arms race and
that if it gets into one, it is likely to suffer the fate of the USSR which
couldn’t keep up with the West and the American Star Wars program (rbc.ru/politics/23/10/2016/580a526d9a7947cb56546df8?from=main
and ura.ru/articles/1036269329).
3.
Bring Back Stalin’s
Five Year Plans, St. Petersburg Vice Governor Urges. In yet another
indication that many in the Russian elite can come up with proposals for the
future only by looking to the past, the vice governor of the city of St.
Petersburg has said that Moscow should reintroduce the five year plan system
Stalin employed in order to address critical economic problems (tvrain.ru/news/pyatiletka-419650/).
4.
Young Russians No
More Liberal than Their Parents but May be More Brutal. According to the editors of “Nezavisimaya
gazeta,” surveys show that younger Russians are no more liberal or inclined to protest
in defense of their rights than are their parents (ng.ru/editorial/2016-10-27/2_6845_red.html). But another study suggests that they may be
more brutal, at least online with cyberbullying having become a serious problem
among Russians on social networks (meduza.io/cards/rossiya-lider-po-kiberbullingu-eto-serieznaya-problema).
5.
Can Moscow Hold
the North Caucasus If It Cuts Spending There by Half? Moscow has kept control of the North Caucasus
only by massive spending and the use of equally massive force. Now, because of
budgetary problems, the central Russian government says it will reduce spending
in the region by 50 percent (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/291317/).
That could cost it the loyalty of regional elites and lead to more violence,
especially if Moscow decides that it has to use more force to keep order given that
many were pointing to a new threat of popular risings across North Caucasus
even before the latest announcement was made (kavkazr.com/a/severny-kavkaz-podtalkivayut-k-buntu/28058284.html,
kavpolit.com/articles/kavkaz_lidiruet_po_kolichestvu_prolitoj_krovi-28868/ and
apn.ru/index.php?newsid=35585).
Adding to this danger is that Vladimir Putin has intimated that he plans to
reduce aid to those nations which were deported in the past (rg.ru/2016/10/26/reg-ufo/vladimira-putina-priglasili-na-krymsko-tatarskij-prazdnik.html).
6.
An Expanding Flood
of Bad Economic News in Russia. The economic situation in Russia is
becoming ever more dire, except in the eyes of the state media and Russian
apologists. Among the stories this week:
Ever more women and now men are being driven into prostitution to make
ends meet (yug.svpressa.ru/society/article/141168/).
Most Russian women having abortions cite poverty as the cause (rusk.ru/newsdata.php?idar=76267).
The number of suicides is high and rising, experts say (tech24news.ru/kuda-uxodit-detstvo/). Duma members declare cars a “luxury” good
rather than a real need http://regions.ru/news/2593938/).
International air travel on Russian carriers down by 25 percent over the last
year (regnum.ru/news/economy/2198099.html).
Russian meet consumption down to one kilogram of meat per person per month (svpressa.ru/economy/article/159042/).
And the government is pressing to impose a tax on those without work (club-rf.ru/news/43696). But the Russian
state statistics administration says life is becoming better at least in Moscow
(profile.ru/obsch/item/111879-dostupnee-bystree-udobnee),
and Muscovites say that stagnation will help Russia develop (youtube.com/watch?v=uml6Db6rUjc). Meanwhile, there was a report that may help
explain why the refrigerator is losing to the television: Russian refrigerator
manufacturers are having problems converting to more environmentally friendly
methods of cooling (regnum.ru/news/innovatio/2196933.html).
7.
Statue Wars Said
Transforming Russia into a Cemetery without a Future. One commentator has suggested that Russia’s
current obsession with putting up statues to despots of the past is
transforming Russia into a cemetery without a future (dw.com/ru/комментарий-памятники-в-россии-прошлое-вместо-будущего/a-36133120). The latest statue to go up is one of Moscow’s
first atomic bomb, something whose original really could have achieved that end
(uvao.mos.ru/presscenter/news/detail/3725698.html). Meanwhile, controversies continue across Russia
over statues to Motorola, Mannerheim, Kolchak, Stalin and Ivan the Terrible,
prompting one Russian to propose that the only suitable historical figure on
whom most Russians could agree is General Brusilov who fought for the tsars, the
Provisional Government, and the Soviets (russkiy-malchik.livejournal.com/784717.html). But perhaps the most odious monument to attract attention
this week was one in the Komi Republic which honors those who built the GULAG
camps of Stalin’s times (svoboda.org/a/28078547.html).
8. Three More
Russian Demographic Disasters. First, a Moscow demographer says that despite
all the changes of the last two decades, abortion remains the chief means of
family planning in Russia just as it was in Soviet times (izvestia.ru/news/640899). Second,
the Putin regime’s efforts two save money by closing down orphanages means that
the number of homeless orphans has gone way up, analysts report (ng.ru/economics/2016-10-28/1_6847_siroty.html). And
third, in its efforts to fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic, Moscow is focusing almost
entirely on drug users and immigrants even though the disease has spread into
the general population (ruskline.ru/news_rl/2016/10/27/narkomany_i_migranty_kak_glavnye_faktory_riska_epidemii_spida/).
9.
Three
More Reasons Why Russia Shouldn’t Be Allowed to Host the 2018 World Cup. As
if Vladimir Putin’s aggression, repression, and support for unruly fans and
illegal use of drugs by athletes weren’t enough, three more reasons emerged
this week for stripping Moscow of the right to host the world football
championship. First, Moscow’s choice of
a wolf as the symbol of the games not only offends good sense but highlights
how aggressive Russia has become, Russian commentators say (novayagazeta.ru/articles/2016/10/22/70272-50-ottenkov-serogo).
Second, in an indication of just what any foreign visitors could expect in
Russia if the competition does take place there, Moscow has announced that it
will re-introduce the ubiquitous and notorious drunk tanks of Soviet times to
deal with fans (themoscowtimes.com/news/russia-to-re-introduce-drunk-tanks-for-2018-world-cup-55820).
And third, in an indication of just what will be left behind after the
competition, it was reported this week that Sochi, the site of Putin’s 2014
Olympiad, has now become a major center of sex tourism in Russia (yug.svpressa.ru/society/article/140841/?cbt=1).
10.
Russia’s Cities
Become ‘Enclaves of the Rich and Ghettoes for the Poor.’ The radical income differentiation of Russian
cities has transformed them into “enclaves of the rich and ghettoes for the
poor,” Forbes reports (forbes.ru/mneniya-column/tsennosti/331053-gorod-dlya-burzhua-v-moskve-stroyat-vnutrennyuyu-zagranitsu-v-predel),
with the two living increasingly apart because of the way in which the Russian
authorities have failed to develop public transport in a way that would
integrate them (iq.hse.ru/news/195000545.html).
But the cities aren’t the only places where the failure to develop transportation
nets and roads is hurting Russians. In many rural areas, there are no roads or
any public transit for school children to get to school without walking long
distances often through snow and cold (regnum.ru/news/society/2196321.html).
11.
What If an Oblast
Doesn’t Have a Capital City? Despite
Moscow’s efforts to homogenize the landscape of Russia, there are some
anomalies. One of them is that Leningrad oblast doesn’t have a capital city,
and that creates problems for its managers, however “effective” they may be
otherwise. This issue has periodically been raised by those who want to combine
the oblast and the city of St. Petersburg. That it has come up now suggests
there may be a new push in that direction undoubtedly in the name of efficiency
and cost savings (svpressa.ru/society/news/159219/).
12.
Grayness of
Russian Life Said Driving Young Russians to Look for Heroes like Motorola. Especially outside the major cities, Russian
life under Vladimir Putin is becoming grayer, a trend that some say is pushing
young Russians out of boredom if nothing else to look for “bright” heroes like
Motorola and even to seek to emulate them (ura.ru/articles/1036269321 and ixtc.org/2016/10/viktor-davydov-ivan-motorolovich-groznyy/).
13.
If It isn’t
Reported, It Didn’t Happen, Russian Police Say. In the ever more Orwellian world of Putin’s
Russia, the police have now declared that if no one reports a clash or other
problem, that clash or problem didn’t happen (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=580DBAC8AF373).
And six more from countries in
Russia’s neighborhood:
1.
Poroshenko to
Putin: ‘You Should Just Stop Shooting.” In
what may come to be viewed as an echo of Ronald Reagan’s call for Mikhail
Gorbachev to “tear down” the Berlin wall, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko
told Vladimir Putin to his face that the problems in Ukraine would be on their
way to solution if “you would just stop shooting,” a reminder that what is
happening in Ukraine is not a Ukrainian problem as many say but rather Russian
aggression against Ukraine (newsweek.com/poroshenko-told-putin-halt-fire-ukraine-513049?rx=us).
Meanwhile, another regional leader, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius
came up with a remark that is almost as significant. He said that today “Russia
isn’t a super power; it’s a super problem” (belaruspartisan.org/politic/360101/).
2.
Last Lenin Statue
Comes Down in Ukraine.
At a time when Russians are putting up statues to Ivan the Terrible and Joseph
Stalin, Ukraine has demonstrated that it is not Russia and this week took down
the last statue of the founder of the Soviet state on its territory (meduza.io/news/2016/10/24/na-ukraine-snesli-posledniy-pamyatnik-leninu).
3.
People in Russian
Occupied Donbass Compelled to Attend Motorola’s Future. Russians in Russia may be enthusiastic about
terrorists like Motorola and thus saddened by his demise, but residents of the
Moscow-occupied Donbass aren’t. They had to be compelled to attend his funeral
with threats of job losses or worse if they didn’t (apostrophe.ua/article/society/2016-10-23/donetsku-veleli-skorbet-na-pohoronyi-motorolyi-lyudey-sgonyali-pod-strahom-uvolneniya/7921).
4. Barbed Wire Painted into Hair of Belarusian on Poster
with Russian. A Belarusian artist has modified a billboard
in Minsk celebrating Russian-Belarusian “friendship” to show the Belarusian
girl portrayed on it in a happy walk with a Russian boy having barbed wire in
her hair, perhaps the clearest indication of how many Belarusians see the fate
of their country in the era of Vladimir Putin (meduza.io/short/2016/10/24/v-graffiti-o-druzhbe-minska-i-moskvy-dobavili-kolyuchuyu-provoloku-fotografiya).
5.
Belarus
Rated Higher on Rule of Law than Russia.
Many are so accustomed to bleating that Belarus is the last dictatorship in
Europe, they fail to see that Vladimir Putin has taken that dubious award away
from Alyaksandr Lukashenka. The latest
indication? The World Justice Project
rates Belarus as displaying greater respect for the rule of law than Russia
does (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=580A37A7911EC).
6.
Far Fewer
Armenians View Russia as a Friend than a Year Ago. Seventeen percent
fewer Armenians think that Russia is a friend of their country than did a year
ago, an indication that ever more Armenians recognize that Moscow is happy to
make use of Armenia’s often desperate situation but only for its own ends and
that the Russian government will betray Armenia whenever it thinks that will do
it more good (regnum.ru/news/polit/2197651.html).
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