New Law on Local Administration Leaves Population with Almost No Way to Participate in Political Life, ‘Horizontal Russia’ Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 28 – The new law on local self-administration adopted earlier this month leaves the Russian population with “almost no levers to influence local policies,” the Horizontal Russia portal says, because it gives governors the power to disband existing rural districts and recombine them at will.
    Consequently, the portal says, people in the government of those districts are on an increasingly short leash; and the population can only “write the governor, appeal to Putin, or hope for good luck” (semnasem.org/articles/2025/03/26/samoupravlenie-bylo-s-novym-zakonom-u-rossiyan-pochti-ne-ostanetsya-sposobov-vliyat-na-lokalnuyu-politiku).
    Horizontal Russia details seven cases in which governors have already used their powers against local self-administration and then suggests that while the old system of self-administration often failed to work because of a lack of money, it at least gave citizens the ability to organize politically and act in concert to defend their rights and interests.
    That made a major contribution to the development of civic political culture, Yuliya Galyamina, a former deputy in a district in the Moscow suburbs says. But the Russian government’s “reform” means that “the authorities no longer have to be concerned about the participation of citizens in local politics.”
    Sixteen federal subjects including Moscow and St. Petersburg have already gone alone with the change the law calls for (vedomosti.ru/politics/articles/2025/03/04/1095775-18-regionov-ne-hotyat), and 26 more say they will do so in the near future. But this transition isn’t going smoothly, and there have been protests in several places (t.me/horizontal_russia/30444).  
    Seventeen federal subjects have announced that they want to retain the two levels of governance. The majority of these are the non-Russian republics, Horizontal Russia says. This reflects the fact that local communities there are stronger and that messing with existing arrangements could destabilize the situation.
    A less important but nonetheless significant factor is that in many non-Russian republics, particular local districts may be far from the capital and difficult for officials to reach, let alone manage on a regular basis without the help of local officials. Then they will be forced to behave in an even more authoritarian manner and work to further depoliticize the population.

Moscow Further Tilts the Scales Against Those Charged with Crimes to Ensure It Collects Fines and Exercises Greater Leverage over Businesses and Individuals

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 31 – The Russian government has tightened the courts as far as criminal charges are concerned to the point that the number of individuals and organizations exonerated after hearings has been reduced to the vanishing point. But those figures involve only those who actually go to trial or avoid having their cases dismissed on technicalities
.    Now, in order to ensure that the government collects massive fines against individuals and organizations who in the past were able to avoid convictions because of errors by investigators and prosecutors, the Russian justice ministry is planning to allow the government to correct any mistakes such officials make and allow trials to proceed.
    In the past, technical errors by officials were enough in many cases to have the cases tossed in court, not only giving the Russian government a loss but costing it income from fines and otherwise reducing the impact of its charges (moscowtimes.ru/2025/03/31/v-pravitelstve-potrebovali-sokratit-dolyu-opravdatelnih-prigovorov-rossiyanam-a159608).
    This latest move further tilts the scales against those charged with crimes and thus is consistent with the Putin regime’s efforts to make the courts function as reliably as other parts of the power vertical. But it seems to be driven in the first instance by a calculation that this will allow the government to convict businesses and thus collect more money in fines.
    At the very least, the threat of such collections will give the Kremlin additional leverage against businesses, other organizations and individuals as the regime moves from authoritarianism toward totalitarianism and does so not by improving administration but by protecting the regime from losing in court. .  

Kremlin’s New Demography Strategy Document Calls for Spending Enormous Sums but Not for Slowing Russia's Population Decline, Demographers Say

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 28 – With much pomp, the Kremlin has released a new strategy document on family and demographic policy for the next decade; but unfortunately, Moscow demographer Yury Krupnov says, it has “no relation to demography” and thus, even if followed to the letter, will have little impact on Russia’s demographic decline.
    The senior scholar at the Moscow Institute of Demography, Migration and Regional Development says that what goals the document talks about aren’t about increasing the birthrate. Rather, it is at best “a strategy of the withering away” of the Russian nation with the Kremlin serving as its funeral staff (nakanune.ru/articles/123323/).
    Other independent demographers queried by Nakanune journalist Yevgeny Chernyshov agree.  Inna Gorslavtseva, one who advises the Moscow Patriarchate, says that what the strategy demonstrates is that “the powers that be do not have any idea what to do” and thus have adopted “a strategy of inaction.”
    What that means, she continues, is that the Kremlin is clearly counting on “replacing” the existing Russian population with migrants from one part of the world or another, something Russians fear and that almost all of them oppose.  A view Yury Pronko of Tsargrad television shares.
    And Pavel Pohigaylo, deputy head of the Social Chamber’s commission on demography, says that what is truly horrific is how much the Kremlin says it will spend to get such a horrific result: 17 trillion rubles (170 billion US dollars) to preside over the decline of the Russian population over the next decade by five million people.

Moscow Plans to Restrict Ability of Russians to Seek Medical Treatment beyond Their Own Region of Residence

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 28 – Even as Putin’s closure of numerous medical facilities across the country to save money for his war in Ukraine has reduced access to care for many Russians, the Russian health ministry now is planning to restrict such access still further, a move that will mean ever more Russians who have the most serious diseases will suffer and die.
    Up to now, Russians who want to go to another part of the country for treatment of cancer or other serious diseases need get  only the recommendation of their local doctor. But as of September, if current plans hold, they will have to receive the approval of special medical boards (medvestnik.ru/content/news/V-Rossii-hotyat-ujestochit-usloviya-polucheniya-specializirovannoi-medpomoshi-v-drugom-regione.html).
    These bodies can be counted on to be less supportive of applications than the personal doctors of those suffering from various illnesses. Like Putin’s healthcare “optimization” program, that will save the Russian government money but only at the cost of increasing suffering in regions far from Moscow or other major centers.
    Because this suffering and deaths will take place far from the capital and thus can be obscured from an all-Russian audience, the Kremlin is likely to assume that it will get away with this latest “cost-saving” measure.  But it is entirely possible that this latest form of medical serfdom will spark a backlash especially among opposition political activists.
    If that happens, it will be only the latest example of the Putin regime shooting itself in the foot, a pattern that challenges the widely held view that the Kremlin incumbent is a master politician. He has succeeded against the West and at home up to now, but the chances he will be able to continue to do so, at least with regard to Russia itself are declining.  

Number of Russians Living in Poverty Really Falling but by Far Less than Moscow Claims, ‘To Be Precise’ Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 28 – In recent years, the number and share of Russians living in poverty has fallen, largely as a result of changes in the economy as a result of the covid pandemic and Putin’s war in Ukraine; but these figures have fallen by far less than Moscow claims, according to an investigation by the To Be Precise portal.
    Last year, Rosstat, the Russian government’s statistical arm, undercounted the poor in Russia by 2.4 million, an outcome that it achieved by changing the definition of poverty. Had the previous definitions and the statistics supporting them been used, the number of poor would have fallen but by far less than Moscow claims (tochno.st/materials/vypali-iz-statistiki-rosstata-v-2024-godu).
    To Be Precise provides a detailed discussion of this statistical sleight of hand that is important both for those concerned about the actual level of poverty in Russia and for those who use Russian statistics more generally, Quite often, the portal says, the figures Moscow provides are accurate in terms of the definitions used but these definitions keep changing.  
    Over the last four years alone, Rosstat has changed the definitions it uses and so is able to offer statistics which conform to the Kremlin’s desires, not by open falsification but by statistical sleight of hand – and this is something that with each passing year of the Putin regime, students of that country must take into increasing attention. 

Moscow to Expand Effort to Defend Rights of Russian Compatriots in Baltic Countries

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 28 – The Russian foreign ministry together with the Moscow Foundation for the Support and Defense of Compatriots Living Abroad has put together plans for improving the defense of citizens of the Russian Federation as well as other ethnic Russians living in the Baltic countries.
    That was the message delivered by various speakers at a conference in Kaliningrad this week on “The Status of Russian Compatriots in the Countries of the Baltic Region” (vedomosti.ru/politics/articles/2025/03/28/1100787-rossiya-namerena-uluchshit-zaschitu-sootechestvennikov-v-stranah-pribaltiki).
    Aleksandr Udaltsov, the head of the Foundation for the Support and Defense of Compatriots, said that such an effort was needed because pressure on such people by the Baltic governments was intensifying and existing means of seeking to defend these people via international human rights groups no longer work.
    Among the steps participants called for are the preparation of a list of violations of the rights of Russians in the Baltic countries, a more precise definition of compatriot so that people in that category will know what they can expect, and an expanded effort by official agencies and NGOs in Russia to defend compatriots abroad in general and in the Baltic region in particular.
    These moves are clearly in preparation for a larger Kremlin effort against the Baltic countries and thus merit attention even if the steps the Kaliningrad meeting outlined seem anodyne.

Ukrainian Government Calls on Nations of the World to Recognize Circassian Genocide

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 28 – In conformity with a January 2025 resolution passed by the Verkhhovna Rada and despite all the challenges Kyiv now faces, Denys Shmygal, Ukraine’s prime minister, has approved a message to all countries of the world to recognize what the Russian government did to the Circassians in the 19th century as an act of genocide.
    Shmygal signed an order specifying that such an appeal will “help raise awareness about the genocide of the Circassian (Adyghe) people, as well as other crimes committed by the Russian Empire, by disseminating knowledge about such crimes in educational and research programs” (kmu.gov.ua/npas/pro-zvernennia-do-uriadiv-derzhav-svitu-shchodo-spryiannia-pidvyshchenniu-rivnia-s270280325).
    His words represent a serious political victory by Circassian organizations who have sought such a declaration for more than a decade and equally important a reaffirmation of Kyiv’s commitment to support peoples within the current borders of the Russian Federation who have been and continue to be oppressed by Moscow.  
    For background on the Circassian effort and Ukrainian moves to support it and other national movements inside the Russian Federation, see  windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/01/ukrainian-parliament-declares-russian.htmlm windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/11/kyiv-now-reaching-out-to-circassian.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/08/ukraine-set-to-adopt-comprehensive.html.)

Putin hasn’t Attacked the Free Masons Despite Long History of Russian Hostility toward Them, Anonymous Writer Says in ‘The Moscow Times’

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 27 – Over the last several centuries, many prominent Russians have become free masons and then been attacked by both the state and society for their membership in that secret society. But today, they have somehow remained “in the Kremlin’s good books” and have escaped such attacks, according to an anonymous writer in The Moscow Times.
    Indeed, the writer says, “free masonry may be one of Russia’s safest independent civic groups.” According to Andrey Bogdanov, the grand master of the Russian lodge, his organization “has no issues” as far as operating in Russia (themoscowtimes.com/2025/03/27/how-the-secretive-freemasons-stayed-in-the-kremlins-good-books-a88501).
    Given the history of Russian nationalist and government attacks on Masons and their involvement in supposed “Jewish-Masonic conspiracy,” the absence of attacks on masons and their organization in Russia is striking especially given how ready the Kremlin is to attack other independent groups.
    A major reason for masonry’s immunity from attack appears to be its low profile and its declaration that none of its estimated 1300 members occupies a significant position in the government. Moreover, its public pronouncements are overwhelmingly patriotic and consistent with the Kremlin line.
The Moscow Patriarchate and various Russian nationalists don’t like the masons and occasionally issue pronouncements against them, but the Kremlin and the masons appear to “have reached a mutual understanding … happy to leave each other alone and to maintain a distant almost secret acquaintanceship.”
Neither has anything “to gain by rocking that boat,” the anonymous author says, adding that maybe some things are best kept secret.” But Russian history suggests that in the transition from Putin to a new ruler, the masons could become the object of attack by those seeking to mobilize Russian nationalists for or against the new regime.

Life Expectancy for Russians at Age 55 Jumped after Covid But Only Because Many of the Weakest Died, ‘To Be Precise’ Portal Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 24 – Most governments report on life expectancy from birth not only because it is the most widely understood and available measure but because the authorities can quickly boost that statistic with relatively small reductions in mortality rates among babies and infants.
    It is nonetheless a useful figure especially when making comparisons among countries, but one that says even more about the state of well-being of a society is life expectancy at older age groups, particularly at age 55 which is typically close to the end of the working life of individuals.
    As part of its broader study of the state of the older generation in the Russian Federation, the To Be Precise portal provides data on that not only among the federal subjects of the country now but over time (tochno.st/materials/kak-zivet-starsee-pokolenie-v-rossii-reiting-regionov-ot-esli-byt-tocnym).
    For the Russian Federation as a whole, life expectancy at age 55 rise from 17.8 additional years in 2019 to 20.2 additional ones in 2023. The reason for the large jump in that year reflected no dramatic increase in medical care or changes in life style but the fact that so many elderly who were ill died in the course of the covid pandemic the year before.
    This is just one of the statistics that To Be Precise offers about the condition of those over 55 in the Russian Federation that helps to explain why the number of elderly in that country has grown so slowly over the last decades (tochno.st/materials/za-poslednie-30-let-granica-starosti-v-rossii-sdvinulas-na-tri-goda-vpered-i-eto-xorosaia-novost-no-smertnost-liudei-starse-65-let-vse-eshhe-vysokaia).

Moscow Seeks New Northern Sea Route Partners as China Signals It May Play a Smaller Role

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 27 – For the last several years, Moscow has relied on China as its most important partner for the development of the Northern Sea Route despite Russiaqn fears that Beijing planned to push it aside eventually (jamestown.org/program/china-helping-russia-on-northern-sea-route-now-but-ready-to-push-moscow-aside-later/).  
    But now that China has signaled that it will likely play a smaller role on the NSR than it had planned because of changes in the international environment since US President Donald Trump came to office, Beijing has signaled that it is likely to reduce its role in the Arctic in the coming years (scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3302384/warming-us-russia-ties-could-put-chinas-arctic-ambitions-ice-experts-warn).
    Because Beijing has not made an official declaration on this point, some Russian analysts are skeptical about whether China will cut its role in the Arctic by as much as some fear (nakanune.ru/articles/123303/, svpressa.ru/politic/article/455667/ and apn-spb.ru/opinions/article39021.htm).
    But Russian officials, alarmed about what a Chinese exit might mean given Russia’s need for outside investment to develop this route, are already talking to other countries in Asia and the Middle East including Vietnam, India and Turkey about partnering with Russia there (fedpress.ru/news/77/economy/3371157).
    A major Chinese pullback and a significant increase in the role of such countries would dramatically change the geo-economics and geo-politics of the NSR and the Arctic more generally over the next decade and likely lead to the expansion of Russian influence in countries where, since the beginning of Putin’s expanded war in Ukraine, it had been on the wane.  

Non-Russian Republics Appear Likely to Lose Their Education Ministries

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 25 – There are many ways to destroy the non-Russian republics within the current borders of the Russian Federation: appointing as heads people who are not members of the titular nationality and amalgamating the republics with predominantly ethnic Russian oblasts and krays being two of the ones that regularly attract the most attention.
    But Vladimir Putin, who is clearly committed to the destruction of these institutions, has adopted a variety of other measures including pushing through laws that strip the republics of rights in important areas like language policy and economic relations with each other and with foreign countries.
    However, one of the most serious seldom gets much attention but may be one of the most important: eliminating ministries that handle key issues and transferring their responsibilities not to other bodies in the republics themselves but to agencies in the Russian capital from which one-size-fits-all policies will be imposed.
    The latest example of such a move is taking place in Mari El, a Finno-Ugric republic in the Middle Volga.  There, the republic head and his government are talking about dispensing with the republic’s ministry of public education, a step that would strip that federal subject of what in many ways is its most important function and hand that over to Moscow.
    Governor Yury Zaytsev is heading this effort which he says is needed to ensure “a unified approach” to education, something that can be achieved in his mind only by “a centralized decision at the federal level” (gtrkmariel.ru/news/news-list/glava-mariy-el-prokommentiroval-ideyu-uprazdneniya-ministerstva-obrazovaniya/ and idel-ural.org/archives/maryj-el-gotovyat-k-otmene-mynobrazovanyya/#more-25586).
    If this happens – and there is every reason to think that it will – then Moscow is likely to put pressure on the governments of the other non-Russian republics to follow suit, something that will reduce to almost nothing in one of the most important areas of defending the national languages and national identities of the peoples involved.

New Russian Film Explores How Last Speaker of Ossetian Copes Using AI Robot

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 25 – The approximately 500,000 Ossetians living in the Russian Federation have suffered the loss of their native language and identity at roughly the same rates as many other numerically small nationalities there, a trend that makes a new film about the adventures of the last Ossetian speaker who works with an AI robot of greater import.
    The film whose production was funded by a Presidential grant tells the story of Gappo, an elderly Ossetian who is said to be the last speaker of his people’s language and who lost his job as an astronomer with the arrival of an AI robot who speaks his language and helps him cope (nazaccent.ru/content/43724-v-rossii-snyali-fantasticheskij-film-o-poslednem-nositele-osetinskogo-yazyka-i-ego-borbe-s-iskusstvennym-intellektom/).
    The message of the film, which is scheduled to be released in June, appears to be that artificial intelligence will help those peoples who are losing their native languages to move smoothly into a world where they won’t have serious problems just because those around them are speaking another language, presumably Russian.
    But as in the case with Moscow’s films in the past, most classically in that of the late Soviet film “The Man from Fifth Avenue,” the message the Kremlin wants to send and the message the viewers of the film will take from the movie may be very different and at odds with one another.
    In the case of “The Man from Fifth Avenue,” Soviet producers clearly hoped that viewers would look at the homeless man walking along that New York street with expensive shops and conclude that American society was inequitable. In fact, what Soviet viewers saw was just how wealthy Americans were.
    Now, while the Kremlin may want viewers to think about how AI will ease their transition from their native languages, viewers may in fact focus on the fact that their languages are not just dying but being killed by Moscow policies and that a robot who can still speak their native tongues is a poor substitute for the survival of their native language and people.  

Russia Faces Collapse in Oil Prices like the One which Destroyed the USSR, Economist Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 25 – It is now widely accepted that the collapse in oil prices and hence in Moscow’s earnings from exporting petroleum at the end of the 1980s played a major role in the collapse of the Soviet Union. Now, Nikita Mitrofanov says, there is a real risk that the Russian Federation is on the brink of a similar collapse.
    Drawing on materials from a Russian Central Bank report to the Kremlin that was leaked to a Western news agency, the independent economist who writes the Chinese Threat telegram channel says that what happened in the 1980s could happen again if nothing changes (rosbalt.ru/news/2025-03-26/nikita-mitrofanov-rossiya-teryaet-dohody-ot-nefti-5353367).
    Because of Western sanctions and the changing relationship of supply and demand for oil, Russian exporters are now receiving approximately 15 billion US dollars a month, “one of the lowest figures for the last 10 to 15 years and an amount that could easily fall still further, according to Mitrofanov.
    At the end of the 1980s, the Soviet leadership “put all its eggs in one basket” and tried to make up for falling earnings as a result of falling prices by expanding production. “But the more effort it expended in that direction, the less profit each additional unit of production brought,” the economist says.
    And “as a result, all this became the precursor to the events of the 1990s.”
    The Russian economy now differs significantly from the Soviet economy of that time, Mitrofanov concedes, but the question remains: is it sufficiently different to preclude a disaster?  The answer to that is unfortunately far from clear.

Moscow’s Promotion of Abortion Bans and Early Births More about Pleasing Older Generation of Putin Voters than about Raising Birthrates, Economist Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 25 – Moscow’s support for restricting or banning abortions and its promotion of childbirth at ever earlier ages do little to increase the birthrate, Dmitry Prokofyev says; but they do please members of the older generation who vote for Putin and see such moves as giving them a better chance to have grandchildren.
    The author of the Money and the Fox telegram channel argues that pleasing that group of voters rather than actually increasing birthrates is the real reason Moscow is supporting these things because the Kremlin knows the numbers of additional children either will produce is small (rosbalt.ru/news/2025-03-25/dmitriy-prokofiev-vlast-posylaet-babushkam-signal-5354082).
    It may be that Prokofyev is overstating the political calculation behind what the Putin regime is doing, but the fact that neither abortion bans nor promotion of early first births is going to have a large impact is widely recognized. And so what this independent economist is saying is likely more significant than many have understood.
    If that is the case, then it is likely that Putin’s current “pro-natalist” policies are going to attract a lot of media attention and generate support for him among his base in the elderly but do little to help Russia reverse its demographic decline. (On that possibility, see club-rf.ru/57/detail/7630  rosbalt.ru/news/2025-03-25/ilya-graschenkov-kuda-mozhet-zavesti-pogonya-za-povysheniem-rozhdaemosti-5354326.)

Russian Community Should Avoid Becoming Too Close to Local Officials but Retain Ties to Kremlin, Kholmogorov Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – While the debate continues as to whether the Russian Community organization is simply an adjunct to the militia or is becoming an alternative force structure, Yegor Kholmogorov says it must remain independent of local officials but retain close ties to the Kremlin in order to do its job.
    Avoiding capture by local officials, the Moscow analyst and commentator says, is important because otherwise those officials will direct what the Russian Community organizations do and limit their ability to act in defense of the ethnic Russians (ura.news/articles/1036290909).
    And he suggests that the best way for the Russian Community to avoid such an outcome which would geld it is to develop and maintain close ties with the Kremlin which is far more committed to defending the Russian nation than are many of the governors of Russia’s more than 80 federal subjects.
    This is one of the clearest indications yet that the Russian Community is a Kremlin project rather than an independent one and that Putin intends to use it not only against unofficial opponents but as a check on local officials, much as Ivan the Terrible used the Oprichniki and Nicholas II the Black Hundreds.
For background on the increasingly important Russian Community organization, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/11/russian-community-organization-and-its.html,  windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/10/extremist-russian-community-now-active.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/10/another-black-hundreds-group-revived-in.html and jamestown.org/program/russian-community-extremists-becoming-the-black-hundreds-of-today. .

Gubernatorial Appointment in Nenets AD Points to Its Amalgamation with Arkhangelsk Oblast, ‘Mari Uver’ Portal Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 24 – Citing what it calls “insider sources,” the Estonia-based Mari Uver portal says that Putin’s appointment of Irina Gekht as the new governor of the Nenets Autonomous District points to the amalgamation of that federal subject with neighboring Arkhangelsk Oblast in the Russian North.
    Such a move would restart both the Kremlin leader’s longstanding desire to restart the amalgamation of regions and republics, specifically punish the Nenets AD for its independent- mindedness and simplify Moscow’s control of the western portion of the Arctic coast south of the Northern Sea Route (mariuver.com/2025/03/24/objedinenije-nao-s-arhangelskoj-oblastju/).
     (For background on regional amalgamation and Putin’s earlier efforts to promote it in the Russian North, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/01/moscow-sooner-or-later-will-restart.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/04/moscow-may-restart-regional.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/01/kremlin-now-planning-to-combine.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/11/some-in-arkhangelsk-by-hook-or-crook.html.)
    According to Mari Uver, “one of Gekht’s key tasks will be the renewal and successful carrying out of the project of unifying the regions. Experts expect,” it continues, “tt she has the necessary qualities for establishing constructive relations [with the head of Arkhangelsk Oblast], something her predecessor was not able to do.”
     Indeed, that was one of the reasons that Yury Bezdudny’s exit had become increasingly likely, the portal says. His removal was inevitable was Moscow’s unhappiness when the Nenets AD was the only federal subject to reject Putin’s 2020 constitutional amendments (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/07/being-nenets-or-nenets-resident-no.html).
    According to Mari Uver, “the process of unification will be complicated and require from Gekht decisiveness and firmness especially considering the possible resistance of local elites and the population of the Nenets AD. Nevertheless, experts think that she has all the necessary skills to successfully carry it out and possibly lead other unifications as well.”
    If the Nenets AD and Arkhangelsk Oblast are unified, they will form an enormous and heavily ethnic Russian region along the Arctic coast. At present, the Nenets AD, with only 44,000 residents is the federal subject with the fewest people, 70 percent of whom are ethnic Russians; and the Arkhangelsk Oblast has about one million, 82 percent of whom are Russian.

Russian Enterprises Now Discussing Whether They are Paying Workers Enough to Keep Them from Going to War, Buketov Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – Confronted by a situation in which Russian men are being offered enormous sums to join the army to fight in Putin’s war in Ukraine, numerous Russian enterprises are now discussing among themselves whether they are paying workers enough to keep them from doing do, according to Kirill Buketov.
    The longtime veteran of labor union activity in the last decades of the USSR and the first one of the Russian Federation who has lived in Switzerland for the last 20 years makes this and a number of other important observations about Russian labor unions and politics (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2025/03/23/sistema-profsoiuzov-perestroilas-pod-voennye-nuzhdy).
    Among the most notable of these are the following;
•    In the 1990s, the Russian labor movement failed to become a political forces not only because most workers thought politics a dirty business they didn’t want to get involved with but also and perhaps even more because those favoring the democratic development of the country failed to attend to the workers, leaving them to the KPRF and Stalinists.
•    There is a serious danger that those now talking about “the beautiful Russia of the future” are continuing this tradition. They need to change and start focusing on the Russian working class and the country’s traditions of unionism.
•    There are far more labor actions in Russia than Rosstat is reporting because it limits its strike count to actions taken by registered unions and ignores steps taken that involve less than an entire enterprise. In fact, the number of actions more broadly defined has remained far higher than Moscow acknowledges.

Indigenous Russia Portal Publishes Five Maps Showing where Native Peoples Live and 70 Places Where They are in Conflict with Russian Companies

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – The Indigenous Russia portal, which tracks developments among the numerically smallest nations within the current borders of the Russian Federation, has published a list of five maps showing where these people live and also the 70 places where they have come into conflict with Russian companies developing natural resources on their territories.
    The list (indigenous-russia.com/archives/42467) includes hypertext links to five maps, including a 2025 map of where the indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East live (indigenous-russia.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Indigenous-peoples-of-the-North-Siberia-and-Far-East-of-the-Russian-Federation.jpg).
    But perhaps most useful is a map from 2008 showing 70 places where efforts by Russian companies to extract the natural resources from the territories of the indigenous peoples and a listing of the issues involved (indigenous-russia.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/2013-1.jpg and indigenous-russia.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/2008-3.pdf).

Moscow has No Strategy for Developing Siberia and Far East – and the Results are Disastrous, Buryat Economist Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – Moscow talks a lot about developing Siberia and the Far East as part of its “turn to the east,” but it has no strategy, Aldar Badmayev says. And as a result, there aren’t enough railways and highways and those that exist often lead to ports that aren’t ready for the cargo they carry.
    That leads to an enormous amount of activity involving the spending of immense sums but not to development, Aldar Badmayev, a Buryat economist who earlier served as an advisor to the republic government, says (ulan.mk.ru/social/2025/03/19/povorot-na-vostok-bez-strategii-pochemu-sibir-i-dalniy-vostok-ostayutsya-bez-planov-razvitiya.html).
    In a withering critique, he says that at the present time, no one in Moscow has any strategic vision and unless something is done soon, the situation will deteriorate to the point that Russia will lack the funds to take actions necessary to develop the region and link it with Russia’s Asian neighbors.
    Moreover, he points out, the failure to think strategically means that a single terrorist attack on the Trans-Siberian railway could now cut that region off from Russia west of the Urals, an outrageous shortcoming from people who say they are constantly on the lookout to defend Russian territory and sovereignty.
    Badmayev’s proposal is to restore something like the Soviet-er Gosplan agency; but as independent Siberian economist Dmitry Verkhoturov points out in a response, Russia lacks the personnel and even the information needed to do that and an effort to recreate that aspect of the past would be disastrous (sibmix.com/?doc=15764).

Authoritarian Regimes Like Putin’s have Made Significant Progress in Resolving Feedback Problem, ‘Notes in the Margins’ Telegram Channel Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – One of the axioms of political analysis is that authoritarian regimes will fail because in their efforts to suppress media freedom, they will lose feedback from the population and thus, in ignorance, act in ways that will ultimately undermine their ability to remain in power.
    But the Notes in the Margins telegram channel argues that contemporary authoritarian regimes like Putin’s have made “significant” progress in overcoming this problem by means of their creation of nominally independent but in fact state controlled institutions (t.me/ZNP_edu and rosbalt.ru/news/2025-03-20/telegram-kanal-zametki-na-polyah-kak-rabotaet-monitoringovyy-avtoritarizm-5266916).
    While this arrangement is not a perfect replacement for a free and independent media, the telegram channel suggests, it does represent “significant progress” by such regimes “in solving the problem of feedback.” And thus, it means that talk about the need for balance between medi affiliated with the state and independent media “completely disappears.”

Kremlin Bracing for Chaos and Possible Systemic Collapse when Veterans Return in Large Numbers from Fighting in Ukraine, ‘Faridaily’ Telegram Channel Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – The Faridaily telegram channel says that the Kremlin is already prepping for the return of hundreds of thousands of veterans from Putin’s war in Ukraine, fearing that many will be suffering from PTSD, will bring with them chaos and even threaten the current regime with collapse.
    This report, based on the telegram channel’s sources in the upper reaches of the Putin regime and one of the most alarmist to date, can be found at t.me/faridaily24/1587. It has now been reproduced in English by the Meduza news agency at meduza.io/en/feature/2025/03/17/the-system-could-collapse.
    Among the problems that the Kremlin expects the veterans to bring home with them are widespread drug and alcohol abuse, unemployment, crime and debt, difficulties in reintegrating into the civilian economy,  and domestic abuse and a dramatic uptick in unplanned pregnancies followed by the collapse of many marriages.
    The telegram channel says that Moscow has taken a few steps to prepare, including the formation of the Defenders of the Fatherland Foundation under Putin’s niece, Anna Tsivilyeva. But it doesn’t have enough trained personnel to cope with such an explosion of problems and even has difficulties in publicly acknowledging that such problems exist.
    The Faridaily channel does not mention what may be the most important consequence of this Kremlin attention to the problems a mass return of veterans could pose for the country: pressure within the Putin leadership not to bring them home quickly but to continue to use them in Ukraine or elsewhere in furtherance of the Kremlin’s expansionist policies.  
    One thing is striking: some independent Russian experts appear less alarmed about the problems returning veterans will present than are their counterparts in the Kremlin, arguing that many of the veterans will have far fewer problems than those in power now fear (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/03/some-but-not-all-of-700000-russians.html).

Racism on the Rise in Russia as Moscow Includes Discriminatory Language in Government Contracts, ‘Systema’ Reports

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – Despite the provisions of the Russian constitution and law, racist discrimination against ethnic minorities and immigrants has long been a fact of life in the Russian Federation. But now it is getting worse because government contracts are including racist language and suggesting that such behavior now enjoys official backing, Systema reports.  
    Ads for rental properties in Russia have long featured language specifying that only Russians need apply, and companies have declared that any new hires “must look like Slavs,” according to the investigative arm of RFE/RL (t.me/systemasystema/149 discussed at meduza.io/en/feature/2025/03/21/must-have-slavic-appearance).
    The Russian government has periodically attacked such private actions, but now it is sending a very different signal, Systema reports, by including similar language in government contracts that intentionally or not gives Russians thinking about engaging in such discriminatory behavior that doing so is perfectly all right with the Putin regime.
    Among the cases Systema documents are a requirement that contractors for cleaning services at Moscow’s Center for Hygiene and Epidemiology “have a Slavic appearance” (zakupki.gov.ru/epz/order/notice/notice223/common-info.html?noticeInfoId=17547742) and a demand by the Moscow funeral corporation that only :Slavic nationalities” are allowed to enter (zakupki.gov.ru/epz/order/extendedsearch/results.html?searchString=31807167682&fz223=on)
    Particularly egregious was a declaration that those working for the Russian National Guard’s Military Canine Center cannot include “foreign nationals” or “persons of Caucasian nationality,” even though there is no such thing as the latter and this is code language for Muslim groups in Russia (zakupki.gov.ru/epz/order/notice/ea44/view/common-info.html?regNumber=0373100040418000023).
    Stefania Kulayeva of the Memorial Human Rights Center told Systema that “racism in Russia extends far beyond hiring practices” with officials in various institutions “fueling” such hatreds by declaring as one interior ministry employee did that Moscow needs to “lighten up” its population by excluding those with darker skins (kommersant.ru/doc/6862614)

Putin Now Promoting Ivan the Terrible and His Regime as Models for Russia, Khapayeva Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 18 – For most of the last four hundred years, Russians have been taught to view Ivan the Terrible and his violent and repressive regime as horrors to be avoided; but increasingly, Vladimir Putin and his regime have been promoting him and his regime as models for Russians to emulate, Russian historian Dina Khapayeva says.
    Now teaching at the Georgia Institute of Technology, she says that despite the evidence to the contrary, Ivan the Terrible is now being presented as “a pious stateman who was concerned about the wellbeing of Russia and the Russian people” (svoboda.org/a/oprichnyy-miroporyadok-dina-hapaeva-o-tsarebozhii-i-putinizme/33341449.html).
    The rehabilitation of Ivan the Terrible under Putin has assumed new prominence in recent weeks as the governor of Vologda has called for naming a youth group there the Oprichniki, the name Ivan gave to his armed thugs who attacked his opponents, calls for his canonization as a saint, and appeals for the erection of Ivan the Terrible statues in various regions of Russia.
    In response, there have been warnings by liberal writers, pushback by some officials and a wealth of media stories calling attention to the noxious actions of Ivan and the ways in which Putin and his regime have promoted an alternative positive image of his violent rule, radical stratification of society, and repression of women and minorities, Khapayeva continues.    
    According to the historian the groundwork for this upswelling of a revised image of Ivan was laid between 2011 and 2024, when Russian TV and movie viewers were offered about two films and series every month that offered a positive image of Ivan and dismissed the criticism that he had typically received earlier.
    The message of these films and series, along with the writing of people like Aleksandr Dugin, have as their primary message the following, Khapayeva says: “Russian medieval society with its terror, stratified hierarchy and slavery” is “a completely acceptable alternative to democracy.”
    She concludes that “this historical policy of the Kremlin,” one that she calls “neo-medievalism,” has “helped, alongside the cult of World War II, not only to militarize Russia but to normalize terror as a means of administering society,” trends that will be difficult if not impossible to change at least in the short term.

Moscow Launches Major Effort to Combat Ethnic Bullying, a Problem It has Only Rarely Acknowledged

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 21 – Supported by a Presidential grant and Russia’s Social Chamber, the Guild of Journalists Specializing on Ethnic Relations has started a pilot project in eight federal subjects to combat bullying long ethnic lines among young people in the Russian Federation, a problem that Moscow has only rarely acknowledged.
    But in the wake of the Crocus City Hall violence, Russian officials have begun talking about a widespread problem among the young of Russia, a problem that until this year, they have generally downplayed by insisting that factors other than ethnicity were the primary ones involved in such violence.
    That they have made this change suggests that the growth of xenophobia among Russians is now affecting younger ones to the point that Moscow no longer feels it can ignore this problem and that at least some in Russia fear could cast a dark shadow on that country’s future (nazaccent.ru/content/43714-v-rossii-startoval-proekt-stop-etnobulling-cherez-znanie-k-vzaimoponimaniyu/).

Siltification of Caspian and Volga-Don Waterway Threatens Not Only Transportation but People along Their Shores and Beyond

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – The impact of siltification and declining water levels on the Caspian and along the Volga-Don route on trade and Moscow’s ability to move ships from its Caspian Flotilla to the Sea of Azov as part of its war effort against Ukraine has attracted much attention (amestown.org/program/declining-caspian-water-levels-threaten-russian-and-chinese-corridor-plans/).
    But the impact of this trend on the population along these waterways has not. That is now changing because declining water levels are reducing agricultural and industrial production and even leading to shortages of potable water for residents (moscowtimes.ru/2025/03/20/rossiiskim-regionam-grozit-zasuha-iz-za-obmeleniya-volgi-i-dona-a158648).
    Russian environmental activists are expressing hopes that this is a short term development, the result of the unusually warm winter just passed; but they also warn that there are long term trends behind these shortages and argue that the Russian authorities must  address them or face serious economic and even demographic consequences (t.me/mash/62465).
    If Moscow does not do so, they suggest, there could be a humanitarian disaster of immense proportions, one that would spread over far more of Russia than just the littorals involved. That is because water shortages there could lead to a collapse of several kinds of food supplies.

By Including Ingushetia in New Grozny Bishopric, Moscow Patriarchate Weakens Dagestan and Ingushetia and Helps Chechnya’s Kadyrov

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 20 – Moscow Patriarch Kirill has significantly increased the number of bishoprics but typically either because of population changes or more often because he wants to insert his own men in these positions so as to control both the management of the ROC MP now and the election of his successor eventually.
    But now the Russian prelate has made a move that puts him and his church in the middle of politics in three predominantly Muslim republics of the North Caucasus and represents a serious tilt against Ingushetia and Dagestan and in favor of Chechnya whose leader, Ramzan Kadyrov aspires to expand his republic and power.
    What Kirill has done through the Holy Synod which because of his earlier expansion of bishoprics he completely controls is to take the small number of Orthodox parishes in Dagestan and Ingushetia, where there is only one, away from the Makhachkala bishopric, and give them to a new bishopric based in Grozny, the Chechen capital.
    These technical changes and the new names that will appear on the church map are described at fortanga.org/2025/03/v-ingushetii-i-chechne-osnovali-novuyu-pravoslavnuyu-eparhiyu/, rg.ru/2025/03/20/reg-skfo/v-russkoj-pravoslavnoj-cerkvi-sozdana-novaia-groznenskaia-eparhiia.html and vedomosti.ru/strana/north_caucasian/news/2025/03/20/1099227-uchrezhdena-groznenskaya-eparhiya.
    Those changes matter to the church itself, but far more important is the political message all this sends: Moscow both secular and now religious is backing Kadyrov and the Chechens against Ingushetia and Dagestan, something that will infuriate the latter and embolden the former, neither of which will contribute to stability in the North Caucasus. 

Despite Current Defeat, Russian Liberals have a Future if They Seek a Parliamentary System in which Regions are the Most Important Actors, Sorkin Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 16 – Repressed by the Putin regime at home and no longer with allies in the West that they had earlier, Russian liberalism is suffering an existential crisis, with many of its leading lights now in emigration suffering from a deep pessimism about the future, Moscow Times columnist Yefim Sorkin says in a new book.
    In a 256-page volume entitled After the Exodus published in Russian in Germany, he argues there are compelling reasons for this pessimism but that what has happened in both Russia and the West in recent decades may give Russian liberals a chance to recover, albeit one for which there are no guarantees (moscowtimes.ru/2025/03/16/opit-porazheniya-liberalizma-v-rossii-a158074).
    Unlike many Russian liberals, Sorkin suggests that many of the reasons for the defeat of liberalism lie not in some external force but in the liberals themselves.  “In their quest to ‘catch up with the West,’ Russian reformers saw democratic institutions as tools for more effective governance” rather than as means to protect people a recovered state.
    Those who consider themselves Russian liberals failed to understand that, failed to take into account the attitudes of the Russian people, and failed to recognize that they themselves would have to do the heavy lifting, assuming instead that the West would create a democratic Russia and hand it to its liberal allies.
    Now, however, it is clear that “the West no longer views such Russian Westernizers as allies in the struggle to involve Russia in the Western world.” Putin’s war in Ukraine and changes in the West itself have put paid to that. Indeed, Russian liberals “can no longer point to the West as an ideal of development.”
    But precisely because they have been thrown back on themselves, Russian liberals may be able to create a future Russia that is far better than the one they know now by operating on themselves and seeking to promote “a state constructed on the representation of the regions on the basis of parliamentarianism.”
    That is far from the vision of a beautiful Russia of the future that many Russian liberals still hold fast to, but it is far more likely to prove achievable and even more sustainable than their notions given that such an arrangement would put in place arrangements that would make the emergence of a new Putinism at some point in the future more difficult.

Putin’s War Leading Directly to More Fires in Ukraine and Indirectly to More in Russia, Lanshina Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 17 – Putin’s expanded war in Ukraine is leading directly to more fires in Ukraine as the exchange of fire sets forests ablaze and prevents these conflagrations from being extinguished and indirectly to more in Russia itself because the Kremlin leader has cut back the country’s fire-fighting capability in order to fund his aggression, Tatyana Lanshina says.
    The independent Russian environmental activist says that global warming has increased the risks of fires in many countries; but while most of them have increased funding for firefighting, Russia has done just the reverse. As a result, this year is likely to set a new record as far as forest fires are concerned (theins.ru/obshestvo/279556).
    The problems Russia is facing have been growing with each year of Putin’s aggression, something his government has tried to obscure by suggesting that the Ukrainians are setting these fires, a claim for which there is no evidence (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/05/putins-optimization-program-means.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/05/regional-officials-reported-to-be.html).
    Much less attention has been given to forest fires in Ukraine for which Moscow, not Kyiv bears responsibility, given that its forces fire into forests and prevent Ukrainian fire fighters from putting the flames out (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/07/russian-armys-actions-in-ukraine.html).
    Lanshina’s article in The Insider represents a rare and extremely valuable attempt to bring together what is known about forest fires in both country and to document that in Ukraine as in Russia, it is Moscow’s actions rather than those of any other actor or development that is to blame for this growing tragedy.

Since Putin Began His Expanded War in Ukraine, Torture in Russia has Become More Widespread and Vicious, Rights Activist Says

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar. 16 – Since February 2022 when Putin began his expanded war in Ukraine, the use of torture by militiamen and jailors has increased at least 2.5 times and taken on ever more horrific forms, according to a Russian rights activist speaking on condition of anonymity lest he be subject to official attack.
    Russian officials have denied that this is happening and have usually refused to open investigations into allegations of such abuse, he says. But when they have, those guilty have escaped punishment by volunteering to serve in Ukraine (okno.group/vsya-spina-ves-zhivot-v-ozhogah-ot-shokera-za-gody-voyny-pytat-v-rossii-stali-bolshe-i-zhestche/).
    That means such people are more likely to commit crimes against humanity in Ukraine and, on their return to Russia where at least some have or will take up their old jobs, torture more Russians as well, a danger that will increase Russian fears about what any drawdown in that conflict will mean for them. 

Vologda Governor Makes His Region a Test Case for Radical Conservative Ideas

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 15 – Georgy Filimonov, the governor of Vologda Oblast, wants his region to be the testing ground for radical conservative ideas such as banning abortions, significantly limiting the sale of alcohol, and preventing immigrants from working in key areas of the economy there.

    He has attracted attention as perhaps the most “outrageous” governor in the Russian Federation not only for his promotion of such ideas but also for the frequency with which his proposals have been shot down either by business interests in his region or by Moscow (nakanune.ru/articles/123265/).
    The attention Filimonov has received highlights three aspects of Russian political life that are all too often ignored. First, the existence of a federal system with more than 80 subjects not only allows those governors who want to take the risk to push new ideas but almost compels them to take radical stands if they want to be heard at all.
    Second, both the attention the Vologda governor has received and the ways in which he has been shot down for his ideas highlights why the existence even of this limited federalism is useful to the Kremlin: the Putin regime can see what works and what doesn’t without putting itself at risk.
    And third, by both his successes and his failures, Filimonov is participating in real politics, putting out ideas that some may accept while others may reject, in ways that may change the direction of the country on key issues, even if much of what he proposes is dismissed by the authorities.
    Labelling him “outrageous” as many outlets do obscures all this and keeps analysts from paying attention to governors who may adopt similar strategies to advance their own ideas and careers and the ideas and careers of their patrons in Moscow.

Number of Compatriots Returning to Russia Falls to Lowest Level in 14 Years

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 15 – The number of compatriots returning to Russia fell to 31,700 in 2024, less than half of the figure in 2022 and the lowest level in the last 14 years, Kommersant reports. Officials say that the decline reflects both the situation and new rules requiring those claiming that status to speak Russian more or less fluently.

    Most were from Kazakhstan or Tajikistan, but 1800 were from countries Moscow classifies as “unfriendly” including Germany, Moldova and Latvia (kommersant.ru/doc/7566175 and novayagazeta.eu/articles/2025/03/13/kommersant-v-2024-godu-po-programme-pereseleniia-sootechestvennikov-v-rossiiu-pereekhalo-rekordno-malenkoe-kolichestvo-liudei-news).

    While the paper did not say so, the introduction of more restrictive Russian language knowledge requirements will effectively keep non-Russians like the Circassians from returning to places within the current borders of the Russian Federation where Circassian is spoken as an official language – Adygeya, KBR and KChR.

Despite Law against Regional Parties, Komi’s Communists are Acting Like One, Showing Vitality of Forces They would Represent, Shtepa Says

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 15 – Before Vladimir Putin pushed through a law in 2001 banning regional parties, such organizations existed across the Russian Federation. But in the years since, even the possibility of their reemergence has generally been thought of as inconceivable, Vadim Shtepa says.

    Politicians in the federal subjects had to run either as members of all-Russian parties or independently, the editor of the Tallinn-based portal Region.Expert says; and only the case of Sergey Furgal in Krasnoyarsk seemed to be an exception to the ability of regional politicians to act on their own. 

    But Furgal has been ousted from office and imprisoned, and there have been no exactly analogous cases. However, the situation of the KPRF organization in the Komi Republic shows how a variant of regional parties might in fact return (moscowtimes.ru/2025/03/15/paradoks-kommunistov-komi-a158149 reposted at region.expert/paradoks-kommunistov-komi/).

    The story begins in 2014 when ecologist Oleg Mikhaylov, 27 and the head of the KPRF fraction in the Komi Republic parliament, took the lead in organizing the environmental protests at Shiyes, where the Kremlin planned to send Moscow trash to be buried in that northern republic.    

Mikhaylov denounced Moscow’s plans as “a colonial policy,” and his fraction organized protests from across the political system, putting him and itself at odds with the KPRF leaders in Moscow and with the Kremlin. But he became so popular that the KPRF was forced to nominate him as a candidate for the Duma – a position he then won in 2021. 

  When Mikhaylov was elected to the Duma, he was replaced as head of the KPRF fraction in the Komi Republic assembly by Viktor Vorobyov, 32, a lawyer and rights activist who wasn’t a member of the KPRF. He denounced the closure of Memorial and Putin’s war in Ukraine and backed more rights for the federal subjects and a new Scandinavian-style republic flag.

    For his outspokenness, Voroboyov was labeled a foreign agent by Moscow and then forced to resign from the Komi legislature after the Duma passed a law saying that no one identified as a foreign agent could serve.  He was then replaced by Nikolay Udoratin, 33, who had been part of the Shiyes protests and was equal in his radicalism to his predecessors

    In short, Shtepa suggests, what has happened with the KPRF fraction in Komi is the emergence of a kind of regionalist party without the name; and he suggests that such developments are possible elsewhere and would be a far better protection against a new round of neo-imperialism after Putin than the plans for Moscow Russian oppositionists now propose.

Trump Will Get Everything He Wants but Have to Pay in Rubles, Russians Now Joke

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 18 – Russian opposition leader in emigration Garry Kasparov has posted on social media a joke he says Russians are now telling about Donald Trump, and independent anthropologist Aleksandra Arkhipova says it revives a Soviet trope and reflects the feelings of many in Russia that the US president is acting in Putin’s interests.  

    In Kasparov’s telling, the joke goes as follows:

Trump, in the afterlife, is given permission to return to Earth for one hour. He walks into a bar in New York and asks the bartender how things are going in America. The amazed bartender replies:
-- Wow, sir, thanks to you, we now have a fantastic empire! Greenland, Panama and Canada are all ours!
-- Great! - Trump rejoices. - What about Europe?
-- Oh, Europe couldn't resist either! — says the bartender.
-- How wonderful, — sighs Trump. — Well, I have to go back. How much do I owe you?
The bartender replies:
-- A ruble fifty.

    As Arkhipova explains, this is an updated version of Soviet jokes such as one in which US President Jimmy Carter couldn’t tell Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev what an American super computer predicted for the future of Moscow because he couldn’t read Chinese or when Radio Armenia reported that in 2035, US media would report about collective farmers in Oklahoma (t.me/anthro_fun/3356 reposted at echofm.online/opinions/den-kogda-sovetskie-anekdoty-stali-vnov-populyarny).

    “This is how joke plots evolve,” she continues. “They surface when people feel that such succinct and witty stories are a great commentary on what is happening and not just about any situaitn but about an absurd one. The feeling that Trump is acting in Putin’s interests is so strong for some people that a joke becomes a great way to express these feelings.”

    As a result, jokes from the past “rise from the ashes as if they were new.”

Estonian Ethnologist who Studied Finno-Ugrics of RSFSR without Being Allowed to Visit Them Recalled, Criticized and Celebrated

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 17 – The third issue of the Estonian magazine Keel ja Kirjandus (“Language and Literature”) features a review by Art Leete of the late Ivar Paulson’s book Hinged, vaimud ja jumalud (“Souls, Spirits and Gods”) about the religious systems of the Finno-Ugric and other northern peoples.

    The book reviewed is remarkable testament to the work of an Estonian scholar who lived most of his life in Sweden but who was never allowed by Moscow to visit the places where the objects of his studies lived (keeljakirjandus.ee/ee/archives/38137 and mariuver.com/2025/03/18/ivar-paulson-hinged-vaimud-ja-jumalad/#more-81022).

    Leete both criticizes and celebrates Paulson’s achievement; but while the subject of the Swedish-Estonian scholar is one for a relatively narrow group of specialists, the situation he found himself in with his pursuit of that subject is becoming ever more common once again as Putin blocks Western scholars from visiting the objects of their study.

    During the Cold War, much of the best work done on the USSR in the West was carried out by investigators who never visited the Soviet Union either because they couldn’t or because in some cases they chose not to. Now this particular curtain is coming down again and evaluating the scholarship produced by those who can’t or won’t go to Russia is becoming more common.

    Researchers and those who rely on them need to be ready, and exposure to a careful review of the work of Paulson who produced masterworks about people he never met is a good place to familiarize oneself with both what can be done – and what can’t – by those the Kremlin blocks from engaging in more direct scholarship.

Lennart Meri’s ‘Silverwhite’ which Put Estonia in the Center of His Nation’s Mental Map Finally to Appear in English

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Mar.  17 – When I first visited Estonia, it was still under Soviet occupation; and the maps on the walls of Estonian officials showed Estonia at the extreme left edge of maps that put Russia at the center. When I returned to Estonia shortly after independence was recovered, there were new maps: Estonia was at the extreme right with Europe at the center.
    The idea that this numerically and geographically small nation was at the margins of history is one that many other such peoples have. But one man and one book more than anything else changed that sense of Estonia being at the margins of the map and of world geography and history: Lennart Meri and his Silver White which will appear in English in May.  
    Meri, an Estonian filmmaker and travel writer who served as his country’s foreign minister and president and whom I am proud to call my fried, published Silverwhite in 1976 which was later translated into Russian. It tells the story of the role of Estonians in trade between Scandinavia and the Middle East centuries ago.
    It has now been translated into English (with an introduction by Edward Lucas) and will be released in May. For background on that and to pre-order, see news.err.ee/1609547350/lennart-meri-s-silverwhite-to-be-published-in-english-in-2025 and hurstpublishers.com/book/silverwhite/).
    This event is leading Estonians to comment on how transformative Meri’s book has been. One commentator described it as “life-changing” (mariuver.com/2025/03/17/kak-kniga-pomogajet-ponjat-finnougorskij-mir/ and kultuur.err.ee/1609610162/minu-elu-muutnud-raamat-edith-sepp-ja-hobevalge).
    As someone who struggled through the Estonian original with a dictionary and read the Russian one more easily but with some doubts about how it rendered Meri’s ideas, I await this translation with bated breath and urge all those who have an interest in Estonia, Finno-Ugric peoples, and the role of mental maps to order a copy.
    In my opinion, which of course is in no way definitive, Silverwhite in its importance and power compares with the far better and much banned book Az i Ya by Kazakh writer Olzhas Suleymenov. On the influence of that remarkable volume and of Suleymenov more generally, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/12/olzhas-suleymenov-publishes-his-memoirs.html.

Population Decline Threatens Not Only Russia's Economic Development but Its Social Stability, Demographers Surveyed by 'Nakanune' News Agency Say

Paul Goble

Staunton, Mar. 17 - The Kremlin is concerned about the impact of the declining population of the Russian Federation on the economy and on the ability of society to produce enough young men to serve as soldiers, but it should also be worried about the impact of this on the country's stability, demographers and psychologists tell the Nakanune news agency.

That is because they say the decision of young people to have or not have children is the product not only of economic conditions but also assessments of the future, and many Russians now put off having children or don't have them at all because they have no confidence in where things will be in the future (nakanune.ru/articles/123203/).

Those assessments when they are negative have a negative impact on the attitudes of the population about a wide variety of issues and can lead to social instability and even challenges to the existing order. Consequently, addressing these concerns must involve not just improving the economy but improving how Russians view their society and its future.

The government is not doing much now to change such attitudes largely because it doesn't see this linkage, a psychologist with whom the news agency spoke suggests. But unless it understands this connection and works to address it, Russia will have not just economic problems but issues with social stability.

More than Half of Muscovites Back Matviyenko's Call to Block Those from Russia's Regions from Attending the Capital's Universities

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- Federation Council head Valentina Matviyenko says that Russia should block students from federal subejcts from studying in the universities of Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Kazan because these students so often fail or get degrees in subjects they want but that the country doesn't need. 

    According to one survey, a majority of Muscovites agree with her; but while in some in the regions are happy to keep their best students at home, many are outraged with some even now suggesting that Muscovite clearly see themselves as already being a separate country (nemoskva.net/2025/03/13/poka-odni-regiony-hotyat-chto-to-zapretit-drugie-ne-proch-na-etom-zarabotat/ and rosbalt.ru/news/2025-03-13/ilya-graschenkov-a-mozhet-u-rossiyan-na-periferii-voobsche-otobrat-pasporta-5345178).

    Matviyenko's outrageous suggestion reflects a broader pattern in which some regions are adopting restrictions on abortions or alchol sales while others are not, leading to the rise of abortion and alcohol tourism while transforming Russia into a crazy quilt of regulations (jamestown.org/program/abortion-tourism-on-the-rise-in-russia-as-regions-adopt-different-policies/ and t.me/kostromama/1187). 

    Mostly such developments are the subject of mirth or the occasion for anger, but more seriously, they highlight the ways in which the various federal subjects of the Russian Federation are pulling in separate directions despite all the efforts Putin has made to centralize power and homogenize the country.

    And that trend recalls what happened in the early 1990s when regions, often finding it impossible to get the things they needed from other regions, imposed controls on the expot of their own goods to other parts of the Russian Federation, a practice that contributed to fears at the time that this would lead to a "parade of sovereignties" within that country.

    That something analogous should be happenig now after almost 25 years of Putin's rule is striking. To be sure, the center is far stronger and the regions far weaker tan they were. But the fissiparousness of the earlier period is once again echoing through the Russian Federation, however effective Putin's moves against federalism have been. 

Rise and Fall of Batal-Haji Sufi Order Highlights Unwritten Rules of Putn's Russia, 'NeMoskva' and 'Fortanga' Say

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- The rise and fall of the powerful Batal-Haji Sufi order in the North Caucasus highlights the unwritten rules which govern Moscow's way of dealing with social forces it does not entirely control, according to the independent NeMoskva and Fortanga news agencies.

    They cite an anonymous expert who says that "the government can close its eyes to arms and drug trafficking, the stealing of cars and even murders if these do not touch the immediate interests of the force structures" ( nemoskva.net/2025/03/12/ot-vliyatelnogo-klana-do-spiska-terroristov/and fortanga.org/2025/03/ot-vliyatelnogo-klana-do-spiska-terroristov-istoriya-vzleta-i-padeniya-odnogo-iz-samyh-moshhnyh-klanov-severnogo-kavkaza-zakrytoj-sufijskoj-obshhiny-batalhadzhinczev/).

    But that if any group crosses the line and "attacks representatives of the powers that be," as Moscow claims the Batal-Haji order has, he continues, then the Russian authorities and its agents in teh republics can be counted on to "unleash a harsh campaign against [such organizations] for which there is no defense."

    What this shows, the expert speaking anonymously says, is that "the Russian authorities are systemically weakening the influential clans in the Caucasus in order not to allow the appearance of alternative centers of power and that even the most powerful of these will lose status if they violate the unwritten rules." 

    First and foremost among these unwritten rules, the expert concludes, is that "the siloviki maintain a monopoly on the use of force: anyone wo challenges the system will inevitably become its victim because such an attack will be equated by those in power as an attack on the state itself."

    In the final decades of the USSR, some scholars in the West argued that underground Sufi orders would play a key role in the overthrow of the Soviet system and the formation of post-Soviet regime, This new report on the fate of the Batal-Haji order unintentionally shows how right they were, how much regimes there now fear them, and how they are seeking to limit them as they can't eliminate them from the scene.

Fearing Environmental Protests are a Political Threat, Putin Creates New and Well-Funded Agency to Counter Them

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- Many of the national movements in the former Soviet Union began as environmental protests, and Vladimir Putin clearly fears that something similar  could happen again given the power of such protests in Shiyes and Bashkortostan to mobilize people against the policies of his regime.

    Already in 2022, the Kremlin leader created a small and poorly funded group, Compass, to try to isolate Russian environmentalists from international organizations like the World Wildlife Fund and Greenpeace. But that group has not had much success, and Putin has been casting about for an alternative. 

    In February 2024, he announced tat he wanted to form a more effective Russian environmental movement (kremlin.ru/events/president/news/73585), and now he has announced one, different in scale, operation and import tan anything he has tried before in this sector, an obvious reflection of his concerns (kedr.media/stories/obuzdat-protestnye-soobshhestva/)).

    Putin has created the Foundation of Ecological and Natural Resource Projects, an agency dominated by Kremlin officials and businessmen -- there is not a single ecologist or activist among them -- and one that will give out grants to give the impression that Moscow cares about ecology but that in fact shows its tilt toward business and exploitation of the natural environment.

    The Kremlin leader says that the government will give the new foundation a billion rubles (10 million US dollars) a year each  now and in the coming two years despite all the budgetary stringency brought on by his war in Ukraine. That is 50 times more each year than Compass was given and will allow the foundation to buy off at least some in the environmental movement.

    Putin clearly hopes that such "carrots" along with "the sticks" of his repressive moves will be sufficient to prevent environmental activism in Russia from continuing to grow and become a political challenge, according to Kedr.Media, a portal which tracks environmental issues. But it suggests that it is unlikely to succeed given how close to home environmental concerns are.   

Russia's Martial Arts Clubs Now Radicalizing Muslims, Mironov Says

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- At the end of Soviet times and in the beginning of post-Soviet ones, martial arts clubs played a key role in the formation of right-wing Russian nationalist gangs. Now, Sergey Mironov, head of the Just Russia-For Truth Party, says they are places where Muslims are being radicalized.  

    He says tat there are on the order of 500 such places in Moscow alone and that across Russia as a whole there are now "thousands" of such martial arts clubs doing just that ( ria.ru/20250312/mironov-2004440786.html and nazaccent.ru/content/43664-v-gosdume-prizvali-proverit-mma-kluby-na-predmet-podgotovki-radikalnyh-islamistov/). 

    Local officials in contrast often view these clubs in a positive way, Mironov says, because they are viewed as places which help to integrate Muslim migrants into the Russian milieu. But in fact, he insists, they are dangerous and must be investigated by prosecutors to protect Russia from being confronted by an Islamist revolt.

Russians Buying 2.5 Times as Many Anti-Depressants Now as They Did Before Putin Launched His Expanded War in Ukraine

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- New data show that Russians are buying 2.5 times as many anti-depressants now than they did before Putin launched his expanded war in Ukraine and, because of inflation and the impact of sanctions, are spending 3.4 times as much for them as they did in 2021. Moreover, both figures continue to be on the rise.

    In reporting the study by the DSM Group, Vedomosti notes that Russians since 2022 have turned to mental health experts more often and received prescriptions for such medications ( t.me/vedomosti/58459 and nemoskva.net/2025/03/12/posle-nachala-vojny-rossiyane-stali-pokupat-v-25-raza-bolshe-antidepressantov/).

    The paper also cited the findings of a study by the Agency for Strategic Initiatives which concluded that ten percent of Russia's population, some 15 million people, were depressed at the end of 2023. 

Excess Deaths in Russia Up by Almost Eight Percent Last Year over Expectations, in Part Reflecting Combat Losses, 'To Be Precise' Portal Says

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- The Russian government has reported that mortality rates in Russia rose 3.3 percent from 2023 to 2024, with deaths rising from 1.76 million to 1.82 million (fedstat.ru/indicator/33556), but the To Be Precise portal suggests that a better measure of the trend is between deaths expected on the basis of the stable 2013-2019 period and 2024.

    If that comparison is made, the portal says, Russia suffered 130,000 more deaths in 2024 than demographic models had projected, an increase of 7.8 percent from 2023. Many of these "excess" deaths may be combat losses in Putin's war in Ukraine, although the available data are insufficient to confirm that (t.me/tochno_st/448). 

    Death data arrayed by age and gender have not yet been released, but data for regions have. They show that five federal subjects last year had "excess mortality, 30 percent of more above projections -- Tyva, the Altai, the Nenets AD, the Yamalo-Nenets AD, and Ingushetia. Deaths in North Ossetia, Leningrad Oblast, Kaluga Oblast Moscow and Adygeya were below expectations.

Gaynutdin Says Russia's Justice Ministry has Declared Him 'Chief Mufti of Russia' But That Doesn't Mean What It Might Seem

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 13 -- Ravil Gaynutdin, head of the Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD) of Russia says that the Russian justice ministry has sent him a document declaring him to be "the chief mufti of Russia," a status that he has long sought and that this declaration doesn't mean he is now the Muslim counterpart of the Orthodox patriarch. 

    Since Gorbachev's time and especially after 1991, the number of muftiates in the Russian Federation has exploded. There were four in Soviet times, but today there are more than 80 in various regions of the country. Above them are four "super" MSDs to which most but far from all of the others are subordinate.

    Gaynutdin heads one of these four, the MSD of Russia; but there are three others, including most significantly the Central MSD under Talgat Tajuddin, the last surviving Soviet-era mufti and someone who has long aspired to become the Muslim counterpart to the Orthodox patriarchate.

    Last month, in pursuit of that goal, Tajuddin met with Vladimir Putin where the two discussed the need for such an official and such unity within Russian Islam (business-gazeta.ru/article/664743). But Tajuddin has the odious reputation as "the drunken mufti" because of his public drinking and is less able to compete for any preferment because he is based in Ufa rather than in Moscow where Gaynutdin has his headquarters.

    In claiming that the justice ministry has called him "the chief mufti of Russia," Gaynutdin clearly intends to advance his claim to being that in fact, although it is unlikely that the ministry in fact intended that and it is certain that not all other muftis will accept them as such (https://www.business-gazeta.ru/article/665874).

     The ministry likely meant that Gaynutdin could describe himself in that way in the course of his numerous diplomatic activities abroad rather than that he is now in charge of all Muslm sin Russia. Many Muslims, including people like Tajuddin, would not accept that, and Gaynutdin himself has admitted as much.     

    The fact that Putin met with Tajuddin so recently strongly suggests that at least for the time being, however much the Kremlin talks about the desirability of unity within the Russian umma, it isn't going to press for that lest it provoke a divisive explosion. A d it may even mean that the Putin regime prefers to have a divided Russian umma rather than a united one. 

Russian Regions Closer to Front Support Putin's War in Ukraine More than Do Those Farther Away, Survey Shows

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- Officials and populations in federal subjects closer tot he front line of Putin's war in Ukraine are more active in supporting Russian efforts there than are those farther away, according to a new survey of public activities in regions across the country that has been conducted by the Moscow Center for Political Information.  

        That survey which examined what officials are doing rather than what residents are actually thinking is available at  polit-info.ru/analytics/reports/125.htm and is discussed in detail at nemoskva.net/2025/03/10/chem-blizhe-k-frontu-tem-silnee-podderzhka-svo/ and kommersant.ru/doc/7563610.

    This pattern is in many ways no surprise. Regions closer to the front are more affected by refugee flows and troop movements than are regions father away, and their leaders ave a vested interest in mobilizing their populations to support these efforts lest problems arise and hte political futures of htese leaders be put at risk.

    But the findings of this survey are important because they show that the Russian Federation is hardly a unified space as far as reaction to the war is concerned and that much of this variation reflects not just combat losses but the actions of regional and republic leaders.

 

Moscow Doesn't See Any Prospects for Siberia and is Shifting Money to Far North, Verkhoturov Says

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- In order to fund Putin's war in Ukraine, Moscow has cut funds to most federal subjects of the Russian Federation, but it has not cut them eqally. Instead, it has shifted funds from some regions to others, giving new hope to the beneficiaries and prompting despair among those from whom funds have been taken.  

    The clearest and most dramatic example of this, Siberian commentator Dmitry Verkhoturov says, involves Russian regions east of the Urals where Moscow has redistributed funding from Siberia proper where most of the region's people live to the Far North where most of the natural resources and the Northern Sea Route are located. 

    According to the analyst who once called for Siberian independence and then attacked modest efforts to gain autonomy for that region (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2018/02/if-no-one-wants-siberian-independence.html), Moscow at present now "doesn't see any prospects" for Siberian development, a conclusion that if true will mean that ever more people from that increasingly depressed region will leave and ever more of those remaining will be radicalized (sibmix.com/?doc=14934).

    And that in turn may mean both the re-emergence of a more powerful Siberian regionalist movement and greater Chinese penetration of Siberia, whose people may come to view Moscow as a greater threat to their well-being than Beijing is and thus will constitute a new challenge to the Kremlin's control of an enormous swath of territory between the Urals and Lake Baikal

For Trump, NATO is about Business Not Security and Kremlin Need Not Pay Attention to Alliance's Article Five Guarantee, Russian Commentators Say

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- The Russian commentariat is currently spending more time discussing Donald Trump and the United States than it is talking about Vladimir Putin and the Russian Federation. Doing so is certainly safer and in many respects easier given the constant flow of statements from the American president.

    Among this flow, two comments this week certainly are worthy of more attention than they have yet received because they likely reflect opinions among the upper reaches of hte Kremlin elite, given that they come from writers close to the Putin regime and thus are likely to inform what Vladimir Putin may do in the coming weeks and months.  

    The first comes from Valentin Katasonov, an economist who graduated from the foreign ministry's MGIMO and who now is a frequent commentator on foreign policy, most closely associated with the Russian nationalist Strategic Culture Foundation (business-gazeta.ru/article/665852).

    In a lengthy comment for Kazan's Business-Gazeta portal about the current state of the world, he says bluntly that as far as US President Donald Trump is concerned, NATO is about business rather than security and that if one can give him what he thinks of as an economic advantage, he will ignore the security implications of what he does.

    The second is from Dmitry Rodionov, a Russian naitonalist commentator whose articles defending Putin and attacking the West appear most frequently on the Svobodnaya Pressa portal. He says that with Trump in office, Russia need not pay any attention to NATO's Article Five which specifies than an attack on any alliance member is an attack on all (svpressa.ru/politic/article/455101/).

      If in fact those in the Kremlin accept these arguments, that provides compelling evidence that Putin, however many problems he may face, is likely to become more rather than less aggressive than he has been and will seek to exploit the new American position to further undermine NATO and possibly even attack some of its members. 

Russia Remains Far More Dangerous than China, and West Should Work with Beijing Against It, Inozemtsev Says

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- For at least two decades, many in the West have argued that China is a greater threat to the West than Russia and worried about Beijing possibly annexing Taiwan, Vladislav Inozemtsev says; but during that same period, Russia has attacked both Georgia and Ukraine and done far more to undermine the international order than China has.

    Consequently, the US and Europe should be seeking not to "'detach' Russia from China" but "rather to 'isolate Russia with China's help' and working together with Beijing to force Russia to peace" in Ukraine and elsewhere and thus to "recreate a bipolar world" with the US and China as its centers (ridl.io/ru/geopoliticheskij-razvorot-pochemu-rossiya-opasnee-kitaya/).

    In such a world, Washington and Beijing would be "capable of maintaining order by influencing their satellites and junior partners" and thus prevent a major conflict between themselves in much the same way the US and the USSR did successfully during the Cold War, Inozemtsev argues. 

    Indeed, he suggests, they would likely be able to do so even more successfully given that "China is not an ideological proselytizer bent on transforming the world, has a market economy, and is tied to the West by far stronger economic relations than the Soviet Union ever was," all things that would give the West greater influence. 

    In his article, the Russian analyst provides the economic bases for his argument, including both that Russia is far weaker than China and that Chinese and Western globalism are far more complementary than was true of the West and the USSR, an fact that means their competition need not be zero sum.

    Inozemtsev acknowledges that "such a pivot may seem unrealistic: but suggests that "it is far more advantageous to the west than 'appeasing ' Russia and undermining the world order by openly acknowledging that altering international  border by force as Moscow continue to try to do is something that the world can and will accept.

 

Extreme Right Russian Community Militants Now Patrolling Murmansk Streets in Alliance with Local Government

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- The Russian Community, an extreme right Russian nationalist organization with close parallels to the Black Hundreds movement at the end of tsarist times, is now patrolling the streets of Murmansk, presenting itself as "a parallel structure" to local government for managing the situation there.

    Founded in 2020 by radical right members of the Russian Orthodox Church and business community, the Russian Community now has branches across the Russian Federation and is actively involved in crowd control and other police functions. (For backgrounds on this group and its ideas, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/01/todays-russian-community-differs-from.html  and the sources cited therein.) 

    The Russian Community has acted most often outside of Moscow and has attracted less attention than it deserves given the threat it poses to what remains of the rule of law in Putin's system. That makes a report by The Barents Observer especially important (thebarentsobserver.com/news/militant-nationalists-in-uniform-are-patrolling-the-streets-of-murmansk/426263).

    Since the start of this year, Russian Community militants have been serving as adjuncts to the police there both at major public gatherings and in the arrest of those the Putin regime deems its enemies and taking ever greater public pride in what the Community is doing.

    One reason why the Russian Community has risen so quickly is Russia's dramatically increasing shortage of police (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/03/russia-scrambling-to-cope-with-mounting.html). But another is the Putin's regime desire to have groups like this to do its dirty work so that it can intimidate more people while avoiding any direct responsibility.

    The Barents Observer points to both the actions the group has carried out in Murmansk since the start of this year and the pride the Russian Community has taken in doing so as worrisome indicatoins of the latest evolution of the Putin regime given that these developments recall both the Black Hundreds in the final years of tsarism and the bully boys during the rise of Nazism in Germany. 

Those Ready to Accept Russia's Occupation of Crimea as Legitimate Signing Death Warrant for Crimean Tatars, Chubarov Says

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- Eleven years ago this month, Putin militarily occupied and then annexed Crimea and revived the Stalinist policy of Russianizatin gthe peninsula by sending in more Russians and especially Russian forces and working to destroy the Crimean Tatars as a distinct nationality, Refat Chubarov says

    Now, in the rush to find an end to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, some in the West are ready to recognize Moscow's occupation and treatment of Crimea as legitimate, the head of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis says, and thereby are consciously or unconsciously signing the death warrant for his nation. 

    They will thus be assisting in the continuation of hte occupation of Crimea by Russia and helping Putin and his minions to achieve what even Stalin and his successors weren't able to do: "the final destruction of the Crimean Tatar people" (idelreal.org/a/rossiya-opredelila-krymskih-tatar-kak-obekt-kotoryy-podlezhit-vytesneniyu-refat-chubarov-o-vospriyatii-anneksii-krymskimi-tatarami/33338241.html).

    Chubarov says that he hopes and prays for a future in when Russian forces will have withdrawn from Crimea and allowed his people to return to a normal life. At that point, the approximately one million Russians who have been inserted by Moscow will have to leave because "they know that they have been settled on stolen land."

    Once that is achieved, then Crimea will be able to have "a normal democratic life in correspondence with Ukrainian laws" and will act according to international norms. "Ukraine will be a member of the EU and no one will e ver be able to restrict in any way the rights of indigenous peoples" like the Crimean Tatars.

    Because so many in the West are convinced that a ceasefire will be possible only if the West recognizes as legitimate Russian rule in Crimea, something Putin says is not subject to negotiation, few in the West now talk about he Crimean Tatars -- even though they would be among the chief victims if Putin gets his way.

    Chubarov's words aobut what will happen if hte international system does not require Russia to withdraw to its 1991 borders are a reminder of just what those prepared to give in to Putin on this issue are doing by their silent acquiescence and how they are thereby becoming acessories to the Kremlin leader's crimes. 

Comprehensive Bibliography of Online Guides to Tatar Books Published

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 11 -- The Milliard.Tatar portal has just published a comprehensive online guide to online indexes of books in Tatar and by Tatar literary and scholarly figures in both Tatar and Russian, an essential tool for those studying both Tatarstan and the non-Russian nations within the current borders of the Russian Federation more generally.

    The 1500-word index, which includes both brief descriptions of hte subjects each contains and URLs where they can be visited online, can be found at milliard.tatar/news/tatarskaya-kniga-v-cifre-gid-po-elektronnym-bibliotekam-7084. One hopes that it will not only be widely used but become a model for other nations in the region.

    The compilers themselves express the hope that their publication will encourage more Tatar publishing outlets to issue their books in electronic form, something they sugget is essentialy to the survival and flourishing of Tatar national culture now and in the future.

Caspian Sea's Declining Water Levels Threaten Both Russia's North-South Project and China's One Belt-One Road Plan, Experts Say

 Paul Goble

    Staunton, Mar. 7 -- Declining water levels in the Caspian are reducing the amount of cargo ships on that body of water can carry and threatening Kazakhstan's participation in both Russia's North-South corridor and hina's One Belt-One Road project, both of which rely on shipping there, according to experts in the region.

    The water level of the Caspian has been falling in recent decades and has already had an impac ton Moscow's ability to moves ships of the Caspitan flotilla via the Volga-Dona Canal to take part in Putin's war in Ukraine (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/03/water-level-of-caspian-sea-falling-at.html).

    But while the debate continues about whether the decline will continue or be  reversed (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/09/russian-experts-concede-caspian-water.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/08/putin-worried-about-falling-water.html), new data suggest that it is already having a broader and deleterious impact on trade routes. 

    Experts from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan are reporting that declining water levels on the Caspian have reduced the amount of cargo ships using that body of water can carry by 20 percent or more and restricting the capacity or even forcing the closure of some of their ports (casp-geo.ru/snizhenie-urovnya-kaspiya-negativno-vliyaet-na-paromnye-perevozki/).

    And thee developments have led Natalya Butyrina, a Kaspiisky Vestnik commentator, to conclude that Kazakhstan, which has been hit the hardest by the decline in Caspitan water levels -- portions of its coastline have receded more than 50 km in recent times -- may have to pull out of both Russia's and China's corridor projects.

    In that event, both Moscow and Beijing would have to turn to the region's railways and highway networks, neither of which currently carry the amount of cargo each hopes for and both of which would require years and perhaps decades to expand to the point where they could.

     Consequently, if the water level of the Caspian doe continue to fall -- and that appears to be the most likely course of events (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/09/russian-experts-concede-caspian-water.html)) -- these two major projects will be in trouble, restricted not by the actions of other countries but by the drying up of a sea few had ever thought possible until very recently.