Paul Goble
Staunton, May 24 – Despite repeated promises by senior Moscow officials and the explicit provisions of several laws, Russian draftees are being sent to fight and die in the hotspots of the North Caucasus, a situation a major Moscow paper is calling attention to and one likely to spark both more resistance to the draft and more questions about Russia’s policies in that region.
The deaths of several draftees in Ingushetia have prompted “Moskovsky komsomolets” to declare in a headline that “The Russian Army is Outside the Law” because the defense ministry has declared that such personnel “must not be involved in counter-terrorist operations” (www.mk.ru/politics/article/2011/05/19/590609-rossiyskaya-armiya-vne-zakona.html).
Indeed, the widely published ministerial decree specifies that draftees are not even to be positioned “in the zone” of such counter-terrorist operations. Apparently, the paper continued, “the command of the military unit does not know anything about this order. Or how else can one explain the fact” that this set of deaths of draftees is not the first?
A source in the military procuracy told the paper that “such violations are taking place everywhere,” even though commanders know the order and investigators have addressed many of these situations, a process that is complicated because commanders often do what they can to hide the facts of these and other violations of the military code.
The major reason commanders want to use draftees is that such personnel cost less and are far more numerous than professional soldiers, but another experts say is that the latter are far more prepared to speak up for their rights than are the draftees. If the pay of the professionals is late, for example, they raise such a fuss that commanders hurry to address the problem.
Because the command is unwilling to investigate these violations, activists have appealed to the Counter-Terrorist Committee and also to the Federation Council, but they have either been ignored or “given to understand that about the Russian Army today one can speak only as about the dead – either something good or nothing at all.”
However, the numerous cases of the violation of the defense minstry’s own orders and of the rights of draftees almost certainly will increase calls for a shift to a professional military, something Russia would find hard to pay for unless it significantly reduced the size of its armed forces, or an increase in the amount of draft resistance.
And in the current environment, these two trends appear to be coming together. In St. Petersburg over the weekend, for example, some 150 people staged a demonstration under the banner “Say No to the Draft” during which speakers called for the creation of a purely professional military (ingria.info/lenta/347-2011-05-22-08-50-40).
This meeting is likely to lead to others, all the more so because it was organized by groups with sections elsewhere and by political parties, including Yabloko, which are likely to be interested in using this issue to attract attention and support in the run up to the 2011 and 2012 elections.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Middle Class ‘Fleeing’ Russia, Moscow Experts Say
Paul Goble
Staunton, May 24 – Members of the middle class, including both entrepreneurs and intellectuals on whom the future of democratic development in the Russian Federation depends, are now fleeting that country in ever-increasing numbers, a trend that both testifies to Russia’s current problems and casts a shadow over its future.
In the current issue of the Moscow weekly “New Times,” Natalya Alyarinskaya and Dmitry Dokuchayev report that according to Russian officials, 1.25 million Russians, “chiefly businessmen and representatives of the middle class,” have left the country over the last three years (http://newtimes.ru/articles/detail/39135).
Their departure, the two journalists say, is “almost as large as the first which took place after the October coup in 1917 when about two million people left” Russia. And the devote the remainder of their article to exploring the answers as to “why these people are leaving Russia and whether it is possible to stop this exodus?”
The findings of a recent poll by the Levada Center showing that 50 percent of Russians “dream of leaving the country,” including “two thirds [of those] under 35,” and that “63 percent of those questioned would like their children to study and work abroad” rather than in their homeland.
But those findings, which express interest and desire rather than action, have now been made even more a matter of concern by other data. Vladimir Gruzdyev, a Duma deputy of the ruling United Russia Party said that in 2010, “the number of individual entrepreneurs dropped from 4.61 to 4.11 million,” with most of the half million not only leaving business but Russia.
Igor Nikolayev, the head of strategic prognostications for FBK suggests that this statistic “should be increased by a factor of two if not three.” The reason? “Many people keep their citizenship and apartment in Russia, and although their entire family has been living in the West for a long time, they do not fall within the emigration statistics.”
And Vladislav Inozemtsev, the director of the Center for Research on Post-Industrial Society, says the situation may be even worse than those figures show. According to his research, “45 percent of [university] graduates do not exclude the possibility of leaving and almost half of them firmly intend to seek” work abroad.
According to Moscow experts, the two journalists say, there are now about four million Russians living in the European Union and the United States, distributing themselves according to ease of entry, cost of living and the existence of a Russian community with which they can find support at least at first.
No one knows for certain just how many more of Russia’s middle class are really waiting to join them, “sitting on their suitcases,” to use the Russian expression. But the number has certainly gone up in the last few years because, in the words of one expert, opportunities have declined while “administrative pressure has increased.”
According to Moscow political scientist Dmitry Oreshkin, “the main cause” pushing members of the Russian middle class to think about emigration is “the lack of a future,” the sense that for Russians now, unlike a decade ago, there is no light at the end of the tunnel but only more darkness.
Moreover, the members of this class increasingly feel the envy of those below them in the social pyramid and pressure from the political elite above. And they fear that the current situation may get even worse after the 2011 and 2012 elections which could set in train a new set of challenges they would rather avoid by moving out of Russia.
Most analysts fear the impact of these departures, especially since in many ways it is the best and the brightest who are leaving. Approximately 15 percent of all Russians have higher education, but among those leaving, “more than 40 percent do,” thus undermining the ability of the Russian economy to modernize or even keep up.
A few experts, like Olga Kryshtanovskaya, a specialist on elites at the Russian Academy of Sciences, suggest that no one should be upset by these trends because they show that Russia is becoming part of the global society and that Russians are “step by step becoming people of the world.”
But others take a gloomier view. Oreshkin says that “the sense of total corruption does not leave [these people].” Consequently, to improve matters and retain more of the Russian middle class, the country must “in the first instance destroy the power vertical, cleanse itself from corruption and conduct honest elections.”
However, he continues, even if Russia manages to do this, “a minimum of about five years will be required for people [now] abroad to believe that the situation for business in Russia has changed for the better” and decide that they should be working at home rather than living abroad.
Staunton, May 24 – Members of the middle class, including both entrepreneurs and intellectuals on whom the future of democratic development in the Russian Federation depends, are now fleeting that country in ever-increasing numbers, a trend that both testifies to Russia’s current problems and casts a shadow over its future.
In the current issue of the Moscow weekly “New Times,” Natalya Alyarinskaya and Dmitry Dokuchayev report that according to Russian officials, 1.25 million Russians, “chiefly businessmen and representatives of the middle class,” have left the country over the last three years (http://newtimes.ru/articles/detail/39135).
Their departure, the two journalists say, is “almost as large as the first which took place after the October coup in 1917 when about two million people left” Russia. And the devote the remainder of their article to exploring the answers as to “why these people are leaving Russia and whether it is possible to stop this exodus?”
The findings of a recent poll by the Levada Center showing that 50 percent of Russians “dream of leaving the country,” including “two thirds [of those] under 35,” and that “63 percent of those questioned would like their children to study and work abroad” rather than in their homeland.
But those findings, which express interest and desire rather than action, have now been made even more a matter of concern by other data. Vladimir Gruzdyev, a Duma deputy of the ruling United Russia Party said that in 2010, “the number of individual entrepreneurs dropped from 4.61 to 4.11 million,” with most of the half million not only leaving business but Russia.
Igor Nikolayev, the head of strategic prognostications for FBK suggests that this statistic “should be increased by a factor of two if not three.” The reason? “Many people keep their citizenship and apartment in Russia, and although their entire family has been living in the West for a long time, they do not fall within the emigration statistics.”
And Vladislav Inozemtsev, the director of the Center for Research on Post-Industrial Society, says the situation may be even worse than those figures show. According to his research, “45 percent of [university] graduates do not exclude the possibility of leaving and almost half of them firmly intend to seek” work abroad.
According to Moscow experts, the two journalists say, there are now about four million Russians living in the European Union and the United States, distributing themselves according to ease of entry, cost of living and the existence of a Russian community with which they can find support at least at first.
No one knows for certain just how many more of Russia’s middle class are really waiting to join them, “sitting on their suitcases,” to use the Russian expression. But the number has certainly gone up in the last few years because, in the words of one expert, opportunities have declined while “administrative pressure has increased.”
According to Moscow political scientist Dmitry Oreshkin, “the main cause” pushing members of the Russian middle class to think about emigration is “the lack of a future,” the sense that for Russians now, unlike a decade ago, there is no light at the end of the tunnel but only more darkness.
Moreover, the members of this class increasingly feel the envy of those below them in the social pyramid and pressure from the political elite above. And they fear that the current situation may get even worse after the 2011 and 2012 elections which could set in train a new set of challenges they would rather avoid by moving out of Russia.
Most analysts fear the impact of these departures, especially since in many ways it is the best and the brightest who are leaving. Approximately 15 percent of all Russians have higher education, but among those leaving, “more than 40 percent do,” thus undermining the ability of the Russian economy to modernize or even keep up.
A few experts, like Olga Kryshtanovskaya, a specialist on elites at the Russian Academy of Sciences, suggest that no one should be upset by these trends because they show that Russia is becoming part of the global society and that Russians are “step by step becoming people of the world.”
But others take a gloomier view. Oreshkin says that “the sense of total corruption does not leave [these people].” Consequently, to improve matters and retain more of the Russian middle class, the country must “in the first instance destroy the power vertical, cleanse itself from corruption and conduct honest elections.”
However, he continues, even if Russia manages to do this, “a minimum of about five years will be required for people [now] abroad to believe that the situation for business in Russia has changed for the better” and decide that they should be working at home rather than living abroad.
Window on Eurasia: Russia’s Northern Peoples Use UN to Press Moscow on Ethnic Rights
Paul Goble
Staunton, May 23 – Representatives of the numerically small and often widely dispersed peoples of Russia’s Arctic north have used a United Nations forum to press the Russian government to respect their collective rights, but President Dmitry Medvedev has indicated that he believes the regions in which they live rather than Moscow should bear the costs of doing so.
Last week, during the sessions in New York of the United Nations Forum on the Issues of Indigenous Peoples, representatives of the Russian Federation’s numerically small peoples of the North issued a series of demands to Moscow ranging from help in countering the effects of global warming to recognizing their right to self-determination.
Valentina Sovkina, the speaker of the Saami Parliament of the Kola Peninsula, issued the most sweeping demand. She called on Moscow to observe the right of all indigenous peoples of the Russian Federation to self-determination, something she pointed out the Russian government is committed to by treaty (finugor.ru/node/17742).
Vasily Nemechkin, a member of the governing board of the Youth Association of Finno-Ugric Peoples (MAFUN), made a more limited demand. He called on the Russian powers that be to establish a special ombudsman to ensure the rights of native peoples, including his own (mariuver.wordpress.com/2011/05/21/mafun-ombudsmen/).
And Tatyana Achirgina, the president of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference of Chukotka, called on Rusdsia to reaffirm its treaty support for the rights of indigenous people by approving the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and living up to its provisions (www.raipon.info/component/content/article/1-novosti/1974-arkticheskij-kokus-deklaraciju-oon-.html).
UN officials and especially representatives of UNESCO expressed their support for the Northern peoples and indicated that they are ready to address their problems, especially those arising from global warming and increased economic activity in the Arctic region (www.raipon.info/component/content/article/1-novosti/1973-junesko-usilit-rabotu-s-korennymi-narodami.html).
Over the last several decades, Russia’s Northern peoples have sought to advance their cause in Moscow by building alliances with other indigenous peoples in the Arctic through such institutions as the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, and they are now using such links to enlist the UN as well.
The strategy has worked at least up to a point: Russia’s Northern Peoples currently receive disproportionate subsidies from Moscow compared to the all-Russian per capita average. But leaders of these communities argue that environmental challenges, the activities of business groups, and their traditional cultures require greater support.
They received some encouragement last week from a comment by President Dmitry Medvedev at his press conference. He said that he now understands the problems of the Northern peoples, but he suggested that these problems should be addressed not by the central government but by regional officials (www.raipon.info/component/content/article/1-novosti/1971-prezident-rossii-znaet-o-problemah-severnyh-narodov.html).
From the point of view of the Northern peoples, Medvedev’s suggestion that regional officials rather than Moscow should focus on these issues and bear the cost of resolving them will not be welcome. And as a result, some of their leaders are likely to try to advance their interests in international forums like the UN, potentially adding to Moscow’s problems there.
Staunton, May 23 – Representatives of the numerically small and often widely dispersed peoples of Russia’s Arctic north have used a United Nations forum to press the Russian government to respect their collective rights, but President Dmitry Medvedev has indicated that he believes the regions in which they live rather than Moscow should bear the costs of doing so.
Last week, during the sessions in New York of the United Nations Forum on the Issues of Indigenous Peoples, representatives of the Russian Federation’s numerically small peoples of the North issued a series of demands to Moscow ranging from help in countering the effects of global warming to recognizing their right to self-determination.
Valentina Sovkina, the speaker of the Saami Parliament of the Kola Peninsula, issued the most sweeping demand. She called on Moscow to observe the right of all indigenous peoples of the Russian Federation to self-determination, something she pointed out the Russian government is committed to by treaty (finugor.ru/node/17742).
Vasily Nemechkin, a member of the governing board of the Youth Association of Finno-Ugric Peoples (MAFUN), made a more limited demand. He called on the Russian powers that be to establish a special ombudsman to ensure the rights of native peoples, including his own (mariuver.wordpress.com/2011/05/21/mafun-ombudsmen/).
And Tatyana Achirgina, the president of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference of Chukotka, called on Rusdsia to reaffirm its treaty support for the rights of indigenous people by approving the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and living up to its provisions (www.raipon.info/component/content/article/1-novosti/1974-arkticheskij-kokus-deklaraciju-oon-.html).
UN officials and especially representatives of UNESCO expressed their support for the Northern peoples and indicated that they are ready to address their problems, especially those arising from global warming and increased economic activity in the Arctic region (www.raipon.info/component/content/article/1-novosti/1973-junesko-usilit-rabotu-s-korennymi-narodami.html).
Over the last several decades, Russia’s Northern peoples have sought to advance their cause in Moscow by building alliances with other indigenous peoples in the Arctic through such institutions as the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, and they are now using such links to enlist the UN as well.
The strategy has worked at least up to a point: Russia’s Northern Peoples currently receive disproportionate subsidies from Moscow compared to the all-Russian per capita average. But leaders of these communities argue that environmental challenges, the activities of business groups, and their traditional cultures require greater support.
They received some encouragement last week from a comment by President Dmitry Medvedev at his press conference. He said that he now understands the problems of the Northern peoples, but he suggested that these problems should be addressed not by the central government but by regional officials (www.raipon.info/component/content/article/1-novosti/1971-prezident-rossii-znaet-o-problemah-severnyh-narodov.html).
From the point of view of the Northern peoples, Medvedev’s suggestion that regional officials rather than Moscow should focus on these issues and bear the cost of resolving them will not be welcome. And as a result, some of their leaders are likely to try to advance their interests in international forums like the UN, potentially adding to Moscow’s problems there.
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