Paul
Goble
Staunton, January 13 -- 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 66th
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’s Potemkin
Crowds.
Most leaders have false information presented to them by subordinates who want
to make a good impression, something often referred to as the construction of
Potemkin villages, in honor of the work of a favorite of Catherine the Great.
But Vladimir Putin has transformed this practice, possibly in what some would
describe as a “hybrid” manner by coming up with Potemkin crowds surrounding
him. Over the last few weeks, close observers of the Kremlin leader’s
photographs with others have discovered that the same five or six people keep
showing up in pictures of Putin with fishermen and Putin with other groups (maxfux.livejournal.com/1208864.html). Meanwhile,
commentators keep trying to come up with a description of Putin himself. Some
now say that he is a mafia capo (svoboda.org/a/28218661.html) while
others suggest that he is “the last khan of the Golden Horde” (obozrevatel.com/abroad/95072-piontkovskij-opisal-logichnuyu-kontsovku-dlya-moskovii.htm). But perhaps the German weekly “Bild” captured
him best: it said that he now tops the list of the worst leaders of the world (https://newsland.com/community/politic/content/velikolepnaia-semiorka/5636325).
2.
With Trump, Some
Russians Say Washington is now ‘Nashington.”
Encouraged by the Kremlin media, Russians have long spent more time
focusing on other countries than on their own. In recent years, they obsessed
with Georgia, then Ukraine, then Syria, and now with the rise of Donald Trump
on the United States. Some Russians are even suggesting that with Trump in the
White House, Washington will become “ours” just as the Crimea did after the
Anschluss (facebook.com/thornike.gordadze/posts/1531038920257855).
But Russian reaction to Trump varies. The Moscow Times reported that Russians laughed
at Trump’s press conference (themoscowtimes.com/articles/you-thought-this-was-rock-bottom-america-but-the-russians-are-knocking-from-below-56789). But one group of Russians in addition to the
denizens of the Kremlin is certainly delighted: Russia’s oligarchs who have
seen their wealth rise with the US stock market by 29 billion US dollars since
November 8 (forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2017/01/09/russian-billionaires-including-some-tied-to-putin-have-gained-29-billion-since-trumps-election/).
The Russian media and especially more independent web portals have featured a
debate between those who think Putin will now control Trump to Russia’s benefit
and those who argue that Trump will behave more independently and in a more
fundamentally hostile way to Moscow than did Barack Obama (echo.msk.ru/blog/aillar/1907726-echo/
and facebook.com/iponomarev/posts/10154943222700802?pnref=story.unseen-section). One commentator has
even suggested that Trump’s election is America’s analogy to the February 1917
revolution in Russia and will be followed by even more radical changes (rubaltic.ru/article/politika-i-obshchestvo/090117-2017-god/,
nv.ua/opinion/berezovets/tramp-spetssluzhby-i-putin-kto-pobedit-452446.html, novayagazeta.ru/articles/2017/01/10/71083-trampu-hotyat-ustroit-uotergeyt
and echo.msk.ru/blog/shevtsova/1906594-echo/).
The latest reports that Moscow used a honey trap against Trump have sparked
enormous interest among Russians even though polls show that any talk of sex
remains among the most taboo subjects for most of them (snob.ru/selected/entry/119177, ruskline.ru/news_rl/2017/01/11/tabuirovannye_temy/,
nalin.ru/o-russkom-kompromate-na-d-trampa-tri-scenariya-dalnejshix-sobytij-4564,
and kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5875E4781E196).
3. KGB Officers Who Became ‘Biznesmeny’
Learned Some New Things But Forgot Nothing. Almost like the Bourbons
of whom it was said they learned nothing and forgot nothing, those Russians who
came out of the KGB to become the country’s “biznesmeny,’ its oligarchs and the
core of Putin’s regime did not forget much and continue to view operations in
much the same way that they viewed their earlier assignments as one commentator
points out (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5871E105DC259). Thus, despite the widespread assumption that
they are something new, they continue to act just like they did before,
different only in that their returns now involve enormous sums of money rather
than awards and promotions. Other developments in the state sector this week
included: oligarch Igor Sechin pushed the government to save the Moscow
Patriarchate’s bank (sobkorr.ru/news/58734A64BBA53.html),
it was discovered that officials had installed someone to oversee education in
a Urals city who lacked even a secondary education himself (politsovet.ru/54137-v-uralskom-gorode-nashli-chinovnika-bez-srednego-obrazovaniya.html),
and “Kommersant” reported that Russia will be only one of the top five
countries with cyberforces and not the predominant one its leaders think and
that others fear (kommersant.ru/doc/3187320).
And in yet another indication that things are only going to get worse, Vladimir
Zhirinovsky, the flamboyant LDPR leader who often has been a bellwether as to
where the Kremlin is heading, is calling for the reintroduction of exile as a
punishment (znak.com/2017-01-11/zhirinovskiy_predlozhil_vvesti_v_ugolovnyy_kodeks_novoe_nakazanie_ssylka).
4.
Monument
Wars Continue.
Either the weather or opposition groups knocked over a temporary
monument in Sochi to the victims of the recent military aircraft crash (echo.msk.ru/news/1907232-echo.html),
anger is spreading about the plans of officials in Kaliningrad to restore the
hunting lodge of Nazi leader Herman Goering, something that has only
intensified now that the governor there has been photographed in a jacket which
appears to have Nazi symbolism on it concerning Berlin’s protectorate of Moravia (https://regnum.ru/news/polit/2225281.html
and nazaccent.ru/content/22831-kaliningradskogo-gubernatora-zapodozrili-v-neonacizme-iz-za.html),
and the Russian Orthodox Church has declared that Red Square should not be a
place for burials, Lenin’s or anyone else’s (belrussia.ru/page-id-8962.html). But the big scandal in this area last week
concerned plans by officials in St. Petersburg to accede to the Moscow
Patriarchate’s demands and return St. Isaac’s cathedral to the church. More than
a hundred thousand people have signed a protest letter against such plans (newsland.com/community/129/content/petitsiiu-protiv-peredachi-isaakievskogo-sobora-rpts-podpisali-100-tys-chelovek/5635754). They are especially outraged by the church’s
demand that the government continue to subsidize the operation of St. Isaac’s
even after it is returned to the church, a demand that flies in the face of the
church’s obvious wealth and the fact that it is currently spending 150 billion
rubles (2.5 billion US dollars) on church construction and that it is trying to
hide what it is doing and how the state is providing much of this money (rossijane.mirtesen.ru/blog/43920713554/Tak-skolko-zhe-nuzhno-tserkvey,
mariuver.com/2017/01/09/cerk-taino/,
and meduza.io/news/2017/01/11/rpts-rasschityvaet-na-subsidii-na-soderzhanie-isaakievskogo-sobora).
5.
Putin’s Priorities:
Russia Now Spending More on Prisons than on Health Care. As the Russian economy continues to struggle –
for a listing of some of the indications of this, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2017/01/ten-pieces-of-bad-economic-news-from.html
– ever more disturbing news is emerging. Among the worst this week are the following:
Moscow is now spending more on prisons than on health care (novayagazeta.ru/articles/2017/01/09/71078-ni-slova-o-tyurmah),
leading to emergence of a black market in key drugs and a deterioration in the
nation’s health (republic.ru/posts/78296), Russian officials are now celebrating as a triumph
alcohol consumption figures that are higher than those which provoked Mikhail
Gorbachev to launch his ill-fated anti-alcohol campaign (forum-msk.org/material/news/12679985.html);
the government’s anti-smoking efforts are repeating in the words of one
commentator “all the mistakes of Gorbachev’s anti-alcohol effort” (apn.ru/index.php?newsid=35859); Russia’s cities are increasingly environmentally
filthy leading to protests in various parts of the country demanding that things be cleaned up (bellona.ru/2016/07/25/moscow-parks/,
afterempire.info/2017/01/10/ecology/
and newsland.com/community/5134/content/zhiteli-resursodobyvaiushchei-komi-prosiat-vernut-ministerstvo-ekologii/5635267); and according to experts, almost two-thirds of the new HIV infections in
Europe are now occurring in Russia (echo.msk.ru/news/1907862-echo.html).
6.
Repression Spreads
Across Russia. The Moscow Times reports that Moscow has
blocked 1200 Russian websites since 2014 and ordered other sites to remove some
20,000 items (themoscowtimes.com/news/1200-russian-websites-blocked-since-2014-56794),
and Yandex has announced that it is excluding all news sites not registered in
Russia from its new search function (agonia-ru.com/archives/3149). Some Duma members are now urging that the
definition of extremist crimes be broadened to include any attacks on Russians
and their history (ura.ru/news/1052272901).
Meanwhile, officials are prosecution a Yoga instructor for “illegal missionary
activity” (meduza.io/feature/2017/01/09/induist-iz-pitera-prochital-lektsiyu-o-yoge-teper-ego-sudyat-za-nezakonnoe-missionerstvo),
and some Russians picking up on the ugly messages from their leaders are taking
things into their own hands: In Novosibirsk, a group of thugs beat someone with
long hair they suspected of being gay (siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/n0841-horrific-video-of-anti-gay-beating-as-thugs-use-knife-to-crop-18-year-olds-too-long-hair/). There was
one piece of good news this week: a Vladivostok court, following criticism from
the Russian Orthodox hierarchy and human rights group, reversed itself and
declared that the Bible isn’t extremist and shouldn’t be burned (afterempire.info/2017/01/10/bible/).
7. More Pressure at Home and Abroad to
Strip Russia of 2018 World Cup. Nineteen national
anti-doping organizations have called for a ban on Russian participation in
international athletic competitions and for stripping Russia of the right to
hold such competitions until it cleans up its act (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5875DC4BB9B56
and usada.org/nado-leaders-advance-urgent-reforms-in-wake-of-second-mclaren-report/). Meanwhile, problems are mounting at home in Russia’s
preparations for the 2018 World Cup. Ever more people recognize that the St.
Petersburg stadium intended as one of the venues for that competition has
become a black hole into which money disappears without a trace (facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1207279672680971&set=gm.851342378338117&type=3&theater). Indeed, complaints about that have become so
loud and widespread that officials in the northern capital say they won’t shift
money from social needs to stadium construction despite Moscow’s insistence
that they do just that. If Moscow wants the stadium, they suggest, let it pay
for it (echo.msk.ru/news/1907858-echo.html).
8.
Economic
Problems Now Hitting Russia’s Defense Industry. One of the Soviet Union’s few successes was
that it was able to operate a highly successful military industrial complex
even when the rest of the economy was in trouble. Putin has not been able to
replicate that success, and problems in the broader economy are now hitting the
defense industry. Not only are there reports that that sector cannot deliver
the ballistic missile launchers Russia needs to deliver nuclear weapons, but
officials have been forced to recall 20 percent of a new line of Sukhoy jets,
an indication of problems in that closely-related area as well (themoscowtimes.com/news/russias-economic-woes-to-delay-delivery-of-ballistic-missile-launchers-56769
and meduza.io/news/2017/01/11/kazhdyy-pyatyy-sukhoi-superjet-vyveli-iz-ekspluatatsii-iz-za-defekta).
9.
Putin’s National
Guard Forced to Drop Plans to Disarm Russians. After detaining some 20,000
Russians over the long winter holiday, Putin’s new National Guard has been
forced to very publically to back down from its call for a ban on pneumatic
weapons, the latest indication that the group, which the Kremlin appears set to
use against its domestic opponents is generating anger among the Russian
population and that officials are having to back away from its more extravagant
projects (polit.ru/article/2017/01/12/rosguard/,
rufabula.com/news/2017/01/10/guns
and kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5874CC64C9C9C).
10. ‘Just Like Under Brezhnev,’ Russian PEN Center Expels
Opposition Journalist – and Others Resign in Solidarity. Yet another disturbing development in Moscow
that has not attracted the attention it deserves was a decision by the Russian
PEN Center to expel an opposition journalist, something that was a regular
feature of the late Soviet period. But this time around, other journalists and
writers not only protested the decision but have resigned in protest leaving
the body a shell of its former self (ixtc.org/2017/01/kak-pri-brezhneve-russkiy-pen-tsentr-isklyuchil-iz-svoih-ryadov-oppozitsionnogo-zhurnalista/).
11.
Chechens,
Russian Nationalists Attack Independent Journalists. While
Moscow has been orchestrating the expulsion of journalists from the PEN
organization, the Chechen regime of Ramzan Kadyrov has been attacking Gregory
Shvedov, chief editor of the Kavkazsky uzel news agency, and even threatening
to do violence to him and his colleagues (frontlinedefenders.org/en/case/threats-against-editor-chief-caucasian-knot-gregory-shvedov, cpj.org/2017/01/speaker-of-chechen-parliament-threatens-journalist.php and military-technologies.net/2017/01/09/urgent-action-journalist-threatened-by-chechen-official-russian-federation-ua-417/), and Russian nationalists have attacked a journalist
from the same organization (ixtc.org/2017/01/v-rostove-na-donu-soversheno-napadenie-na-zhurnalista-kavkazskogo-uzla/), an ugly
coming together of two groups hostile to media freedom.
12.
Like the Foolish
Man, Russia Building on Sand in Occupied Crimea. The Russian occupation authorities in Crimea
are building a road there that is likely to disintegrate quickly because they
are building it across artesian sands without putting down an adequate
foundation (ruskline.ru/news_rl/2017/01/06/federalnaya_trassa_tavrida_postroennaya_na_artezianskom_peske_neminuemo_obvalitsya/). That is not the only highly symbolic move they are
making: construction of the Kerch bridge, which Putin has declared a national
priority, is not going as well as Moscow claims and there are reports that it
too could collapse at any time (m.aftershock.news/?q=node%2F474128
and te khpg.org/en/index.php?id=1483412680).
13.
Soviet-Style ‘Internationalism’
Returns to Putin’s Russia. In Soviet times, it was often said that the clearest
example of the internationalism the regime promoted was when a Russian, a
Ukrainian and an Azerbaijani got together to beat up a Jew. Now, in Putin’s
times, there is this update: a group of people have beaten up a Tatar because
they thought he was a Ukrainian (fakeoff.org/events/kavkaztsy-izbili-tatarina-prinyav-ego-za-ukraintsa).
And six more from countries in Russia’s
neighborhood:
1.
Fewer Ukrainian
Soldiers Dying from Combat than from Accidents. A new report finds
that in 2016, 224 Ukrainian soldiers died in combat against the Russian
invaders, but 256 died from accidents of various kinds (kyivpost.com/ukraine-politics/kyiv-reports-460-ukrainian-servicemen-killed-donbas-2016-256-not-combat.html).
Meanwhile, two additional Ukrainian
demographic data points were released: demographers say that almost half of
Ukrainians will not live to their 65th birthday (dsnews.ua/economics/ella-libanova-evropa-v-tselom-i-ukraina-v-chastnosti-ischerpali-02112016100000),
and officials say that 23,000 people have fled from Russian occupied Crimea to
the rest of Ukraine since the Anschluss (qha.com.ua/ru/politika/opublikovani-ofitsialnie-dannie-o-pereselentsah-iz-krima/169724/).
2.
84 Percent of
Russian Emigres Going to Former Soviet Republics and Baltic Countries. A survey has
found that more than eight out of ten Russians choosing to emigrate from their
homeland are going to former Soviet republics and, especially, to the three
Baltic countries (rusnext.ru/recent_opinions/1483962702).
Another study found that alcohol tourism is leading Scandinavians to go to the
Baltic countries and Balts to Russia or Belarus (facebook.com/Unusualities/photos/a.1599162793431577.1073741828.1599010546780135/1601619489852574/?type=3&theater).
3.
Belarusians Choose
Patriotic Gifts over Soviet Ones. There are many ways to measure shifts of
opinion, but one of the most intriguing is to track whether people buy gifts
associated with their own country or those linked to another. This year, in
contrast to some earlier ones, Belarusians chose gifts that were Belarusian in
origin and subject rather than those explicitly Soviet, according to retailers
in that country (charter97.org/ru/news/2017/1/5/236657/).
4.
Bellona Says
Russian Atomic Power Plant Unbelievably Unsafe. The international
environmental watchdog group says that the atomic power plant Russia is
building in Belarus is setting new records for unsafe construction patterns and
warns of disaster ahead if these mistakes are not corrected (bellona.ru/2017/01/09/belaes-stolb/).
5.
By Lifting Visa
Requirements, Belarus has Created a New Problem for Russia. Because border
checks between Belarus and Russia are minimal, Minsk’s decision to cancel visa
requirements for residents of some 80 countries who want to visit Belarus for
five days or less is creating problems for Russia whose officials fear that
those who want to enter Russia but can’t get visas will come via Belarus (charter97.org/ru/news/2017/1/10/237194/
and news.tut.by/society/526859.html).
6. Rising Number of Kazakh Women Marrying Chinese Men
Sparks Anger in Kazakhstan. Ever more
ethnic Kazakh women are marrying Chinese men (asiarussia.ru/news/14782/), a
development that has sparked protest meetings and even calls for a legal ban on
such marriages (centrasia.ru/news.php?st=1484134320
and versia.ru/v-astane-potrebovali-zapretit-kazaxskim-devushkam-vyxodit-zamuzh-za-kitajcev).
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