Paul Goble
Vienna, September 1 – Another piece of fallout from the rise in tensions between Moscow and the West over Russia’s invasion of Georgia is Moscow’s announcement that it will help Iran complete the construction of the nuclear plant in Bushehr, a project that had been delayed by U.S. objections that Tehran would use that facility to build a nuclear weapon.
Last Thursday, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said that Moscow was prepared to do complete construction there whatever the Americans say, a statement both intended to put pressure on Washington to back down over Georgia and highlighting the reality, seldom admitted by the West, that Moscow has been behind the Iranian project for more than a decade.
Two reports in the last 24 hours have heightened concerns in this regard. Yesterday, the London “Telegraph” reported that Washington is “concerned” that Moscow will provide Iran with its S-300 anti-aircraft missile system, a development that would make it vastly more costly for the U.S. or Israel to attack the facility.
Russia’s S-300 system, the paper said, is “one of the most advanced multi-target anti-aircraft systems in the world, with a reported ability to track up to 100 targets simultaneously while engaging up to 12 at the same time. It has a range of about 200 kilometers and can hit targets at altitudes of 27,000 meters.”
And the “Telegraph” quoted Dan Goure, who advises the Pentagon as saying that “if Tehran obtained the S-300, it would be a game-changer in military thinking for tackling Iran,” thus raising the possibility of “Israeli air attacks before [that system is] operational” (www.defence.pk/forums/world-affairs/13905-telegraph-us-fears-russia-sell-s-300-iran.html).
Then today, the “Jerusalem Post” said that officials from Russia’s atomic construction firm, Atomstroyexport, will arrive in Iran tomorrow to “discuss the completion of the 1,000-megawatt power plant” in Bushehr,” a project Moscow has been working on since 1995 (www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1220186492375&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull).
Russia’s ambassador to Iran, the Israeli paper said, has “given assurances” to Tehran that “Bushehr will be supplying nuclear energy by early next year.” But many in Israel, the United States and Europe are concerned that Iran will use the plant less to provide power for its economy than to process uranium for the construction of nuclear weapons.
That is why the United States and Europe have sought both directly and through the IAEA to force Iran to give up its nuclear program, even though both Tehran and Moscow insist that it is for peaceful purposes only. Now, by its announcement, Russia has significantly raised the stakes in this standoff.
But in evaluating these reports, two things need to be kept in mind. On the one hand, Moscow’s actions certainly are clearly designed to pressure the West to back down from sanctions against Russia by reminding everyone of Moscow’s capacity to create problems elsewhere. After all, few Russians would be pleased to see Iran become a nuclear power.
And on the other hand, the two new articles follow reports last week there and in the United States that Israel may launch an airstrike against Bushehr. Consequently, at least some in the Israeli capital and Washington may have an interest in playing up reports of Russian actions to justify just such a strike.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Window on Eurasia: Tbilisi’s Decision to Break with Moscow Leaves Georgians in Russia with Fewer Defenders
Paul Goble
Vienna, September 1 – Tbilisi’s decision to break diplomatic relations with Moscow following the Russian invasion has left ethnic Georgians living in the Russian Federation with fewer defenders, created new complications for Georgians with dual citizenship, and set up new obstacles for Russian citizens who may want to travel to Georgia.
The Georgian government’s action has not led to the closure of its consulate in Moscow – Under diplomatic rules, consulates can continue to function even after a diplomatic break – but it remains unclear which third country embassy will house a Georgian interest section – those of Ukraine and Azerbaijan are most often mentioned (www.izvestia.ru/politic/article3120013/).
After the diplomats of Georgia and Russia who are in the process of returning home, the people most immediately affected by this decision are the estimated half million ethnic Georgians living in the Russian Federation and their families at home who often depend on transfer payments from their relatives working abroad.
Given the rising hostility to Georgians that the Russian media have whipped up over the conflict, many of these people are at risk of being attacked by xenophobic groups like the Movement Against Illegal Immigration (DPNI) and skinheads and now they face these threats without the protection that embassies can give.
Not surprisingly, given its earlier call during the course of the Russian invasion for Moscow to intern all Georgians living in the Russian Federation, DPNI’s website yesterday celebrated reports that the Russian militia is stepping up its fight against “the Georgian mafia” in Russia (www.dpni.org/articles/lenta_novo/9860/).
But as commentaries in the Moscow media have pointed out, the Georgians in Russia face other problems: First, it is unclear how the Georgian consulate in Moscow will be able to intervene on behalf of Georgians who live far from the Russian capital. Second, it is uncertain how they will be able to send transfer payments home.
And third, given that some of them now have married Russians or have taken Russian citizenship, it is unclear how they will arrange to travel to Georgia, a problem that may be especially acute in the case of Georgians living in the southern portions of the Russian Federation and in border areas there.
That is because Tbilisi has changed the rules for getting a visa, something that affects both Georgians in that category and Russian citizens more generally. In the past, such visitors could obtain a visa at border crossing points by paying a little more than 40 U.S. dollars, but now Russian citizens must obtain one in a third country.
At the very least, that will complicate the lives of those Russian citizens who had wanted to travel to Georgia, and more likely, it will lead to a significant decline in the number doing so, depressing investment in the Georgian economy and making it more difficult for Tbilisi to rebuild after the devastation visited upon that country by Russian forces.
Not surprisingly, Russians and Russian officials are outspokenly angry about all this, but so too are at least some ethnic Georgians in Russia. A Moscow priest whose church houses the parish of the Georgian Orthodox Church there said today that Tbilisi’s decision “will create difficulties” for innocent people (www.blagovest-info.ru/index.php?ss=2&s=3&id=22457).
No one can blame Tbilisi for breaking diplomatic relations with Moscow. That is the normal course of action for a government whose territory has been invaded by the armed forces of another state. But given the interrelationships of these two countries, this move will have serious human consequences, which tragically some in each capital are quite ready to exploit.
Vienna, September 1 – Tbilisi’s decision to break diplomatic relations with Moscow following the Russian invasion has left ethnic Georgians living in the Russian Federation with fewer defenders, created new complications for Georgians with dual citizenship, and set up new obstacles for Russian citizens who may want to travel to Georgia.
The Georgian government’s action has not led to the closure of its consulate in Moscow – Under diplomatic rules, consulates can continue to function even after a diplomatic break – but it remains unclear which third country embassy will house a Georgian interest section – those of Ukraine and Azerbaijan are most often mentioned (www.izvestia.ru/politic/article3120013/).
After the diplomats of Georgia and Russia who are in the process of returning home, the people most immediately affected by this decision are the estimated half million ethnic Georgians living in the Russian Federation and their families at home who often depend on transfer payments from their relatives working abroad.
Given the rising hostility to Georgians that the Russian media have whipped up over the conflict, many of these people are at risk of being attacked by xenophobic groups like the Movement Against Illegal Immigration (DPNI) and skinheads and now they face these threats without the protection that embassies can give.
Not surprisingly, given its earlier call during the course of the Russian invasion for Moscow to intern all Georgians living in the Russian Federation, DPNI’s website yesterday celebrated reports that the Russian militia is stepping up its fight against “the Georgian mafia” in Russia (www.dpni.org/articles/lenta_novo/9860/).
But as commentaries in the Moscow media have pointed out, the Georgians in Russia face other problems: First, it is unclear how the Georgian consulate in Moscow will be able to intervene on behalf of Georgians who live far from the Russian capital. Second, it is uncertain how they will be able to send transfer payments home.
And third, given that some of them now have married Russians or have taken Russian citizenship, it is unclear how they will arrange to travel to Georgia, a problem that may be especially acute in the case of Georgians living in the southern portions of the Russian Federation and in border areas there.
That is because Tbilisi has changed the rules for getting a visa, something that affects both Georgians in that category and Russian citizens more generally. In the past, such visitors could obtain a visa at border crossing points by paying a little more than 40 U.S. dollars, but now Russian citizens must obtain one in a third country.
At the very least, that will complicate the lives of those Russian citizens who had wanted to travel to Georgia, and more likely, it will lead to a significant decline in the number doing so, depressing investment in the Georgian economy and making it more difficult for Tbilisi to rebuild after the devastation visited upon that country by Russian forces.
Not surprisingly, Russians and Russian officials are outspokenly angry about all this, but so too are at least some ethnic Georgians in Russia. A Moscow priest whose church houses the parish of the Georgian Orthodox Church there said today that Tbilisi’s decision “will create difficulties” for innocent people (www.blagovest-info.ru/index.php?ss=2&s=3&id=22457).
No one can blame Tbilisi for breaking diplomatic relations with Moscow. That is the normal course of action for a government whose territory has been invaded by the armed forces of another state. But given the interrelationships of these two countries, this move will have serious human consequences, which tragically some in each capital are quite ready to exploit.
Window on Eurasia: Ingush Opposition to Pursue Independence after Police Murder Website Owner
Paul Goble
Vienna, September 1 – The opposition in Ingushetia has tried to work within the Russian political system to replace republic head Murat Zyazikov, but now, following the death of a website owner there yesterday from wounds he suffered while detained by Zyazikov’s militia, it has decided that it has no choice but to consider pursing independence for that republic.
Even though it has become one of the hottest of the Russian Federation’s “hot spots” in recent months, with disappearances and killings an increasing feature of public life, that North Caucasus republic had been notable for its lack of a serious opposition group interested in pursuing independence.
But now over the last few days, one has begun to crystallize. On Saturday, Ingushetiya.ru reported that the unrecognized People’s Parliament of Ingushetiya Mekhk-Kkhel would meet to discuss beginning to collect signatures calling for independence, after which the site was attacked and has been inaccessible (www.caucasustimes.com/article.asp?id=16347).
And on Sunday, after Magomed Yevloyev, the owner of that Internet news portal which Zyazikov has sought to close, died from wounds he received at the hands of the local militia, even the more moderate Ingush opposition leaders have decided to pursue independence, and both the Kremlin and Zyazikov, the Kremlin’s man there, have no one to blame but themselves.
Magomed Khazbiyev, the head of the committee that collected more than 80,000 signatures demanding that Moscow replace Zyazikov, said on Ekho Moskvy yesterday that the killing of Yevloyev had radicalized public opinion and was leading ever more Ingush to demand an investigation and think about independence (newsru.com/russia/31aug2008/haz.html).
“We must ask Europe or America to separate us from Russia. If we don’t fit in here, we do not know what else to do,” he said, adding that those who killed Yevloyev must be brought to justice and that “the genocide of the Ingush people” being conducted by the Kremlin must be stopped.”
He said that the Ingush opposition would call a meeting to decide what to do next, adding that some Ingush living in Europe plan to hold a demonstration in front of the building where European leaders are discussing sanctions against the Russian Federation for its aggression in Georgia.
Khazbiyev and his fellow Ingush opposition figures are clearly reluctant to cross this Rubicon. Indeed, Kavkazcenter.com, a website that supports independence for the entire North Caucasus, reported the reaction of the Ingush opposition to the murder of one of its active leaders almost with scorn (kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2008/08/31/60674.shtml).
In his concluding remarks on Ekho Moskvy, that site said, “the anti-Zyazikov opposition figure could not find anything better to say than to ask the Kremlin again “to finally turn its attention to that lie about the flourishing Ingushetia which Murat Zyazikov has been dishing out to the entire world.”
But however that may be, the death of Yevloyev after he was taken into custody on his return to Ingushetia from Moscow is so transparently the result of official actions and the explanations Zyazikov’s officials have offered are so transparently false that even more Ingush are certain to be radicalized in the coming days.
Yevloyev was in perfect health when he was seized by the militia as he deplaned, something he had warned of only last week, and he was so severely wounded in the head when Zyazikov’s interior ministry officers dropped him off at a hospital that there was no possibility that he could recover.
And the official explanations, which include suggestions that there was a struggle between militia officers and Yevloyev over a gun which went off accidentally, are so patently absurd that there are reports that prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation. But few Ingush expect it to be an honest one (www.echo.msk.ru/news/537600-echo.html).
Instead, it is widely assumed that prosecutors will seek to limit blame to the officers directly involved rather than investigate the possibility, even likelihood that more senior figures including republic Interior Minister Musa Medov and Zyazikov himself were behind what many are already calling “a political murder.”
The Ingush human rights organization Mashr has already carried out its own investigation, and its leaders told the Regnum news agency that if the testimony of witnesses with whom they spoke was true, then there was every real to suspect that Zyazikov and Medov were directly involved (www.regnum.ru/news/fd-south/ingush/1048564.html).
And Mashr’s conclusions have been seconded by Russian-wide human rights organizations like the Moscow Helsinki Group, Memorial, Human Rights Watch, and AGORA, something that should help keep the pressure on officials to do something and to raise the political temperature in Ingushetia (www.sobkorr.ru/news/48BAC3E87106D.html).
This case creates a real problem for Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. If they sacrifice Zyazikov who is close to both men, they would certainly calm the situation in Ingushetia but could trigger demonstrations elsewhere among those unhappy with the Moscow appointees who run their republics and regions.
But if they do not, Ingushetia almost certainly explode, creating a vastly more serious security problem for the Russian authorities not only across the North Caucasus but behind what is now Moscow’s new front line in Georgia and the breakaway republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Vienna, September 1 – The opposition in Ingushetia has tried to work within the Russian political system to replace republic head Murat Zyazikov, but now, following the death of a website owner there yesterday from wounds he suffered while detained by Zyazikov’s militia, it has decided that it has no choice but to consider pursing independence for that republic.
Even though it has become one of the hottest of the Russian Federation’s “hot spots” in recent months, with disappearances and killings an increasing feature of public life, that North Caucasus republic had been notable for its lack of a serious opposition group interested in pursuing independence.
But now over the last few days, one has begun to crystallize. On Saturday, Ingushetiya.ru reported that the unrecognized People’s Parliament of Ingushetiya Mekhk-Kkhel would meet to discuss beginning to collect signatures calling for independence, after which the site was attacked and has been inaccessible (www.caucasustimes.com/article.asp?id=16347).
And on Sunday, after Magomed Yevloyev, the owner of that Internet news portal which Zyazikov has sought to close, died from wounds he received at the hands of the local militia, even the more moderate Ingush opposition leaders have decided to pursue independence, and both the Kremlin and Zyazikov, the Kremlin’s man there, have no one to blame but themselves.
Magomed Khazbiyev, the head of the committee that collected more than 80,000 signatures demanding that Moscow replace Zyazikov, said on Ekho Moskvy yesterday that the killing of Yevloyev had radicalized public opinion and was leading ever more Ingush to demand an investigation and think about independence (newsru.com/russia/31aug2008/haz.html).
“We must ask Europe or America to separate us from Russia. If we don’t fit in here, we do not know what else to do,” he said, adding that those who killed Yevloyev must be brought to justice and that “the genocide of the Ingush people” being conducted by the Kremlin must be stopped.”
He said that the Ingush opposition would call a meeting to decide what to do next, adding that some Ingush living in Europe plan to hold a demonstration in front of the building where European leaders are discussing sanctions against the Russian Federation for its aggression in Georgia.
Khazbiyev and his fellow Ingush opposition figures are clearly reluctant to cross this Rubicon. Indeed, Kavkazcenter.com, a website that supports independence for the entire North Caucasus, reported the reaction of the Ingush opposition to the murder of one of its active leaders almost with scorn (kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2008/08/31/60674.shtml).
In his concluding remarks on Ekho Moskvy, that site said, “the anti-Zyazikov opposition figure could not find anything better to say than to ask the Kremlin again “to finally turn its attention to that lie about the flourishing Ingushetia which Murat Zyazikov has been dishing out to the entire world.”
But however that may be, the death of Yevloyev after he was taken into custody on his return to Ingushetia from Moscow is so transparently the result of official actions and the explanations Zyazikov’s officials have offered are so transparently false that even more Ingush are certain to be radicalized in the coming days.
Yevloyev was in perfect health when he was seized by the militia as he deplaned, something he had warned of only last week, and he was so severely wounded in the head when Zyazikov’s interior ministry officers dropped him off at a hospital that there was no possibility that he could recover.
And the official explanations, which include suggestions that there was a struggle between militia officers and Yevloyev over a gun which went off accidentally, are so patently absurd that there are reports that prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation. But few Ingush expect it to be an honest one (www.echo.msk.ru/news/537600-echo.html).
Instead, it is widely assumed that prosecutors will seek to limit blame to the officers directly involved rather than investigate the possibility, even likelihood that more senior figures including republic Interior Minister Musa Medov and Zyazikov himself were behind what many are already calling “a political murder.”
The Ingush human rights organization Mashr has already carried out its own investigation, and its leaders told the Regnum news agency that if the testimony of witnesses with whom they spoke was true, then there was every real to suspect that Zyazikov and Medov were directly involved (www.regnum.ru/news/fd-south/ingush/1048564.html).
And Mashr’s conclusions have been seconded by Russian-wide human rights organizations like the Moscow Helsinki Group, Memorial, Human Rights Watch, and AGORA, something that should help keep the pressure on officials to do something and to raise the political temperature in Ingushetia (www.sobkorr.ru/news/48BAC3E87106D.html).
This case creates a real problem for Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. If they sacrifice Zyazikov who is close to both men, they would certainly calm the situation in Ingushetia but could trigger demonstrations elsewhere among those unhappy with the Moscow appointees who run their republics and regions.
But if they do not, Ingushetia almost certainly explode, creating a vastly more serious security problem for the Russian authorities not only across the North Caucasus but behind what is now Moscow’s new front line in Georgia and the breakaway republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Window on Eurasia: The Third Cold War Has Begun, Karaganov Says
Paul Goble
Vienna, August 31 – Most commentators who talk about a new cold war emerging after the events in Georgia are referring only to the geopolitical contest between the Soviet bloc and the Western alliance after World War II, but one of Moscow’s most interesting commentators says that any new cold war will not be the second but the third the two sides have engaged in.
By pointing out that there were two earlier such competitions – one prior to the second world war which the USSR ultimately won in the course of that military conflict and the second, better-known one, which Moscow lost decisively, Sergei Karaganov provides some important insights into what the new conflict is likely to look like from Moscow’s perspective.
In a lengthy article in “Rossiiskaya gazeta,” the head of Moscow’s Council on Foreign and Defense Policy says that he is convinced that the world is once again being divided between “ours and theirs,” in which “ours” will be defended regardless of what they do and “theirs” will be condemned no matter how they act (www.rg.ru/2008/08/29/karaganov.html).
According to Karaganov, the new era of conflict reflects both the redistribution of resources in the world following the end of the second cold war, a development that he suggests will be long term, and the rise of authoritarian and semi-authoritarian states after the 1991 settlement, a temporary phenomenon but “for those who are losing – a matter of here and now.”
After gaining economically in the immediate wake of the end of the second cold war, the “old” West started to lose out rapidly because increases in the price of oil and gas led to a massive transfer of resources away from the United States and Europe to those states, including Russia, where these critical energy resources came from.
Many of these energy suppliers, again including Russia, were authoritarian or semi-authoritarian, the Moscow analyst says, and this led to the rise of “authoritarian capitalism” as “the ideological system of the new ‘enemy.’” The West needed an enemy to unite, he insists, but its effort to create “’a union of democracies’” against the authoritarian states was “tragicomic.”
Other changes in the world – including the proliferation of nuclear weapons and America’s loss of prestige around the world because of its actions in Iraq – simply reinforced this development, and effort after September 11th to use counter-terrorism as a unifying force proved a failure.
Thus, Karaganov continues, a new cold war became likely. The West is promoting it as a means to recover the positions it has lost. And Moscow has assisted this effort not only because Russia “has become a symbol and incarnation” of the changes the West opposes but also because Moscow has behaved in ways in Georgia and elsewhere that have only added to that image.
Both in the cold wars of the past and in the one starting now, the Moscow specialist on international relations says, geopolitics is more significant than ideology, and that reality, one often overlooked in recent commentaries, is likely to define the course of the international divide now opening.
Russia has certain advantages and certain disadvantages in this renewed struggle, Karaganov argues. On the one hand, it has a freer society and a richer one than in the past, making it more attractive to many. But on the other, it lacks the resources in terms of space, population and GDP that the Soviet Union had, making it less able to compete.
At the same time, however, Russia’s “corrupt state capitalism” is something “hardly any of the thinking and patriotically inclined Russians” are happy about, he says, but the West has not focused on that political and economic elite in this new “cold war” but rather on Russia itself and thus on all Russians.
And it is worth remembering that what he calls “the old West” is now weaker than it was as well. The standing of the U.S. in the world has fallen precipitously because of its actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and this group of states controls a much smaller portion of the world’s population and GDP than it did 30 years ago.
That helps to explain what has happened in Georgia. According to Karaganov, “Russia had no other way out” except to respond militarily to “the aggression of Tbilisi and of the forces standing behind” it and then to seal its gains on the ground by extending diplomatic recognition to South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
While many are still focusing on those developments alone, “the main goal” of the current rise in tensions involves not Georgia but the potential entry of Ukraine into NATO. “That is absolutely unacceptable for Russia. And even if we were to suddenly agree to this, the logic of events would all the same lead to a confrontation and possibly a military one.”
In order to block this, Moscow must denounce the Russia-NATO Council that when set up ten years ago opened the way to the expansion eastward of the Western alliance and was denounced at the time by some as “’a second Brest peace,’” a reference to the treaty Lenin signed with the Germans in 1918 that sacrificed Russian territory to win time for the Bolsheviks.
“It is time to recognize that this union is not only a relic of ‘the cold war,’ but that it is one of the basic instruments of its rebirth,” Karaganov says.
Two other reports from Moscow about the possibility of a new cold war are worthy of note. First of all, Aleksandr Prokhanov, the editor of the nationalist newspaper “Zavtra,” said on Ekho Moskvy that he welcomed such a conflict because “for Russia, a cold war today represents salvation” (www.echo.msk.ru/programs/personalno/536528-echo/).
Without one, he said, Russia would degenerate and die, whereas with one, its citizens will not only bring their money home but focus on developing their country so that it will not lose this latest episode of what he sees as the longstanding and inevitable conflict between Russia and the West.
And for those who are frightened that a new cold war will lead to a hot one, Prokhanov had this to day: “A third world war is not beginning [because] the Americans are not in a position to conduct [it]. They have a terrible crisis, their civilization is collapsing … and they have” incurred huge debts at home and abroad.
And second, Aleksandr Dugin’s nationalist Eurasian website reported today that sources in the Russian ministry of education say that they are preparing a new required course for Russian schools on geopolitics, a course that they suggest may displace current courses in geography (evrazia.org/n.php?id=3893).
The officials reportedly said that the course will explain to students “how to build an empire” as well as “who its enemies and friends are,” content that almost certainly would lead many Russian students to conclude that they and their parents have no option but to restore an empire and to engage in a cold war with the West.
Vienna, August 31 – Most commentators who talk about a new cold war emerging after the events in Georgia are referring only to the geopolitical contest between the Soviet bloc and the Western alliance after World War II, but one of Moscow’s most interesting commentators says that any new cold war will not be the second but the third the two sides have engaged in.
By pointing out that there were two earlier such competitions – one prior to the second world war which the USSR ultimately won in the course of that military conflict and the second, better-known one, which Moscow lost decisively, Sergei Karaganov provides some important insights into what the new conflict is likely to look like from Moscow’s perspective.
In a lengthy article in “Rossiiskaya gazeta,” the head of Moscow’s Council on Foreign and Defense Policy says that he is convinced that the world is once again being divided between “ours and theirs,” in which “ours” will be defended regardless of what they do and “theirs” will be condemned no matter how they act (www.rg.ru/2008/08/29/karaganov.html).
According to Karaganov, the new era of conflict reflects both the redistribution of resources in the world following the end of the second cold war, a development that he suggests will be long term, and the rise of authoritarian and semi-authoritarian states after the 1991 settlement, a temporary phenomenon but “for those who are losing – a matter of here and now.”
After gaining economically in the immediate wake of the end of the second cold war, the “old” West started to lose out rapidly because increases in the price of oil and gas led to a massive transfer of resources away from the United States and Europe to those states, including Russia, where these critical energy resources came from.
Many of these energy suppliers, again including Russia, were authoritarian or semi-authoritarian, the Moscow analyst says, and this led to the rise of “authoritarian capitalism” as “the ideological system of the new ‘enemy.’” The West needed an enemy to unite, he insists, but its effort to create “’a union of democracies’” against the authoritarian states was “tragicomic.”
Other changes in the world – including the proliferation of nuclear weapons and America’s loss of prestige around the world because of its actions in Iraq – simply reinforced this development, and effort after September 11th to use counter-terrorism as a unifying force proved a failure.
Thus, Karaganov continues, a new cold war became likely. The West is promoting it as a means to recover the positions it has lost. And Moscow has assisted this effort not only because Russia “has become a symbol and incarnation” of the changes the West opposes but also because Moscow has behaved in ways in Georgia and elsewhere that have only added to that image.
Both in the cold wars of the past and in the one starting now, the Moscow specialist on international relations says, geopolitics is more significant than ideology, and that reality, one often overlooked in recent commentaries, is likely to define the course of the international divide now opening.
Russia has certain advantages and certain disadvantages in this renewed struggle, Karaganov argues. On the one hand, it has a freer society and a richer one than in the past, making it more attractive to many. But on the other, it lacks the resources in terms of space, population and GDP that the Soviet Union had, making it less able to compete.
At the same time, however, Russia’s “corrupt state capitalism” is something “hardly any of the thinking and patriotically inclined Russians” are happy about, he says, but the West has not focused on that political and economic elite in this new “cold war” but rather on Russia itself and thus on all Russians.
And it is worth remembering that what he calls “the old West” is now weaker than it was as well. The standing of the U.S. in the world has fallen precipitously because of its actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and this group of states controls a much smaller portion of the world’s population and GDP than it did 30 years ago.
That helps to explain what has happened in Georgia. According to Karaganov, “Russia had no other way out” except to respond militarily to “the aggression of Tbilisi and of the forces standing behind” it and then to seal its gains on the ground by extending diplomatic recognition to South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
While many are still focusing on those developments alone, “the main goal” of the current rise in tensions involves not Georgia but the potential entry of Ukraine into NATO. “That is absolutely unacceptable for Russia. And even if we were to suddenly agree to this, the logic of events would all the same lead to a confrontation and possibly a military one.”
In order to block this, Moscow must denounce the Russia-NATO Council that when set up ten years ago opened the way to the expansion eastward of the Western alliance and was denounced at the time by some as “’a second Brest peace,’” a reference to the treaty Lenin signed with the Germans in 1918 that sacrificed Russian territory to win time for the Bolsheviks.
“It is time to recognize that this union is not only a relic of ‘the cold war,’ but that it is one of the basic instruments of its rebirth,” Karaganov says.
Two other reports from Moscow about the possibility of a new cold war are worthy of note. First of all, Aleksandr Prokhanov, the editor of the nationalist newspaper “Zavtra,” said on Ekho Moskvy that he welcomed such a conflict because “for Russia, a cold war today represents salvation” (www.echo.msk.ru/programs/personalno/536528-echo/).
Without one, he said, Russia would degenerate and die, whereas with one, its citizens will not only bring their money home but focus on developing their country so that it will not lose this latest episode of what he sees as the longstanding and inevitable conflict between Russia and the West.
And for those who are frightened that a new cold war will lead to a hot one, Prokhanov had this to day: “A third world war is not beginning [because] the Americans are not in a position to conduct [it]. They have a terrible crisis, their civilization is collapsing … and they have” incurred huge debts at home and abroad.
And second, Aleksandr Dugin’s nationalist Eurasian website reported today that sources in the Russian ministry of education say that they are preparing a new required course for Russian schools on geopolitics, a course that they suggest may displace current courses in geography (evrazia.org/n.php?id=3893).
The officials reportedly said that the course will explain to students “how to build an empire” as well as “who its enemies and friends are,” content that almost certainly would lead many Russian students to conclude that they and their parents have no option but to restore an empire and to engage in a cold war with the West.
Window on Eurasia: Moscow’s Recognition of Breakaway Republics Encourages Tatar Activists
Paul Goble
Vienna, August 31 – The arguments the Kremlin invoked first for intervening in Georgia and then for extending diplomatic recognition to Abkhazia and South Ossetia combine to create a precedent that supporters of independence for the Republic of Tatarstan say they plan to use against Moscow.
In a declaration timed to coincide with the 18th anniversary of the adoption of Tatarstan’s declaration of state sovereignty, the All-Tatar Social Center (TOTs) issued over the signature of its president Talgat Bareyev an appeal explaining why Moscow’s moves in Georgia give supporters of Tatar independence new hope (www.novayagazeta.ru/news/312431.html).
“The latest Caucasus war of August 2008,” the appeal says, “led Russia to recognizing the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Whatever goals Moscow was pursuing in taking this step, it is important to stress that for the first time in modern history, Russia has recognized the state independence of its own citizens.”
Prior to its introduction of forces into South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the declaration points out, the Russian government invoked the fact that many people in these two breakaway republics had Russian passports and as Russian citizens must be able to count on Moscow to defend them against oppression.
“Consequently,” the appeal continues, “Tatars too, whose Russian citizenship was forcibly imposed as a result of the colonial conquest of their state in the 16th century also have the right to count on rapid liberation and recognition [by Moscow and other states] of their independence.”
In reporting on this appeal, which has been posted on a number of Tatar websites but published so far only in “Novaya gazeta,” that Moscow paper’s reporter Boris Bronshteyn points out that official Kazan has not made any comment about Moscow’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, adding that “the word ‘sovereignty’ disappeared long ago from its lexicon.”
And it is certainly the case that relatively few Tatars at present are actively following TOTs in its pursuit of full independence for Tatarstan. But the legal theory that the TOTs declaration makes is an interesting example of the unintended consequences of Moscow’s actions and may have an impact on the thinking of Tatars and others as well.
An example of the kind of support the ideas contained in this declaration are receiving is provided by a Tatar blogger. In a LiveJournal posting, he writes that “after the leadership of Russia showed on August 27th its attitude toward the principle of territorial integrity, then it is possible to forget about such a state formation as the Russian Federation.”
“In front of our eyes,” he continues, “the last empire on earth – the evil empire – is rapidly coming apart” (http://www.margian.livejournal.com/36886.html).
Tatarstan does not need to issue any further declarations on this point, the Tatar blogger says. On August 30, 1990, it declared that it was “not a subject of the Soviet Union or the Russian Empire.” And consequently, all Kazan needs to do now is “to remind the international community about this document and ask for recognition.”
And he predicted that “there will be no small number of countries who will want to do so – a large part of the Islamic world and the countries of the West as well.” Tatarstan was the first in the parade of sovereignties 17 years ago, and now it will finally enjoy the fruits of that effort, one that will mean, the Tatar blogger says, that “the empire must burn!”
Vienna, August 31 – The arguments the Kremlin invoked first for intervening in Georgia and then for extending diplomatic recognition to Abkhazia and South Ossetia combine to create a precedent that supporters of independence for the Republic of Tatarstan say they plan to use against Moscow.
In a declaration timed to coincide with the 18th anniversary of the adoption of Tatarstan’s declaration of state sovereignty, the All-Tatar Social Center (TOTs) issued over the signature of its president Talgat Bareyev an appeal explaining why Moscow’s moves in Georgia give supporters of Tatar independence new hope (www.novayagazeta.ru/news/312431.html).
“The latest Caucasus war of August 2008,” the appeal says, “led Russia to recognizing the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Whatever goals Moscow was pursuing in taking this step, it is important to stress that for the first time in modern history, Russia has recognized the state independence of its own citizens.”
Prior to its introduction of forces into South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the declaration points out, the Russian government invoked the fact that many people in these two breakaway republics had Russian passports and as Russian citizens must be able to count on Moscow to defend them against oppression.
“Consequently,” the appeal continues, “Tatars too, whose Russian citizenship was forcibly imposed as a result of the colonial conquest of their state in the 16th century also have the right to count on rapid liberation and recognition [by Moscow and other states] of their independence.”
In reporting on this appeal, which has been posted on a number of Tatar websites but published so far only in “Novaya gazeta,” that Moscow paper’s reporter Boris Bronshteyn points out that official Kazan has not made any comment about Moscow’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, adding that “the word ‘sovereignty’ disappeared long ago from its lexicon.”
And it is certainly the case that relatively few Tatars at present are actively following TOTs in its pursuit of full independence for Tatarstan. But the legal theory that the TOTs declaration makes is an interesting example of the unintended consequences of Moscow’s actions and may have an impact on the thinking of Tatars and others as well.
An example of the kind of support the ideas contained in this declaration are receiving is provided by a Tatar blogger. In a LiveJournal posting, he writes that “after the leadership of Russia showed on August 27th its attitude toward the principle of territorial integrity, then it is possible to forget about such a state formation as the Russian Federation.”
“In front of our eyes,” he continues, “the last empire on earth – the evil empire – is rapidly coming apart” (http://www.margian.livejournal.com/36886.html).
Tatarstan does not need to issue any further declarations on this point, the Tatar blogger says. On August 30, 1990, it declared that it was “not a subject of the Soviet Union or the Russian Empire.” And consequently, all Kazan needs to do now is “to remind the international community about this document and ask for recognition.”
And he predicted that “there will be no small number of countries who will want to do so – a large part of the Islamic world and the countries of the West as well.” Tatarstan was the first in the parade of sovereignties 17 years ago, and now it will finally enjoy the fruits of that effort, one that will mean, the Tatar blogger says, that “the empire must burn!”
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Window on Eurasia: Will Iran Become the Route Out for Caspian Oil – And How Will That Transform the Geopolitics of the Region?
Paul Goble
Vienna, August 30 – The disruption of oil flows via Georgia during the recent violence has made that route significantly less attractive for Caspian oil exporting countries, with some concluding they have no choice but to go via Russia given Iran’s international isolation but at least a few thinking about using Iran to gain greater freedom of maneuver relative to Moscow.
If the governments of the region do decide to ship some or all of their oil via Iran, that would have three serious geopolitical consequences that may rival some of the already enormous geopolitical fallout from Russia’s decision to invade Georgia and to recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia (www.nr2.ru/economy/193763.html).
First, given the enormous appetite for oil in the West and Pacific rim, such a shift in Caspian exports would likely put enormous pressure on Washington to soften its approach to Tehran, especially if the United States wants to support the effective independence of the post-Soviet states and thus has no desire to see the oil flow through the Russian Federation.
Second, Iran’s willingness to serve as the route out for Caspian basin oil (or as a market for some of it) would likely set it on a collision course with Moscow, which has made it very clear that it wants to control all oil coming out of the former Soviet space and which would view any change in Iran’s approach or Western hostility to Tehran as not in Russia’s interest.
And third, such a shift would almost certainly affect Turkey and its relations not only with the post-Soviet Turkic states but also with Russia. Ankara’s ties with the former would likely become less important given that oil would be flowing via Iran, and it ties with Moscow would likely strengthen by means of some kind of condominium in the Southern Caucasus.
Beyond doubt, many countries, including both the United States and Russia, albeit for very different reasons, will do what they can to prevent such a shift, but the changes in Georgia and in the international system after Georgia mean that the use of such a route with all the consequences it would entail is no longer as unthinkable as it was a month ago.
The Georgian government and many commentators have suggested that blocking the east-west flow of oil from the Caspian via Georgia, a route that bypasses Russia, was one of the most important reasons behind Moscow’s decision to introduce troops there, an argument both Moscow and other analysts have heatedly denied.
But however that may be, Natalya Kharitonova, a regional analyst at Moscow State University, argues that it is important to focus on “the concrete facts” including both the way in which Russia’s action made Georgia less attractive as a transit corridor and Iran potentially a much more interesting one (www.ia-centr.ru/expert/2067/).
Among the “facts” she lists are the following: “the use of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan and Baku-Supsa oil pipeline, of the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline and of a number of other transportation units as well as the cessation of rail deliveries of oil to the Georgian port of Batumi was stopped” because of the conflict.
That in turn, she notes, forced Baku not only to reduce the amount of oil it pumped but also “to search for alternative routes for the transportation of this resource. As a result, Azerbaijani oil has been flowing through the Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline. [And] Turkey intends to purchase additional gas from Russia and Iran to compensate.”
At the same time, the Moscow scholar says, “Iran for example has decided to build the Neka-Jask pipeline as a competitor to Baku-Tbilisi-Jeyhan.” Earlier this week, Iranian sources reported that Azerbaijan had begun exporting some of its oil exports via Iran, although some in Baku denied this (www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=67534§ionid=351020103).
A commentary in the Baku newspaper “Echo” today, indicates that Azerbaijan hopes to develop the east-west pipelines in Georgia but points out that analysts there and in other regional oil-exporting countries are looking at the Iranian route in the hopes of avoiding the consequences of using the Russian one (www.echo-az.com/economica01.shtml, August 30).
Ilham Shaban, the president of the Baku Center of Oil Research, told the paper that “all Western oil companies would like to work in Iran” but can’t easily because of American opposition. But now “invoking the situation in Georgia, they are beginning to advise official Washington to review its relations with Iranian so as to allow them to begin work there.”
He and other experts noted that because of the events in Georgia, “Azerbaijan began to export its oil to international markets through Iran,” even as it sent some of its oil northward via Russia – an example of Badu’s “balanced” foreign policy. But Azerbaijan was not the only regional country to use Iran during this crisis: Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan did so as well.
And another Azerbaijani expert, Gubad Ibadoglu, the head of the Center for Economic Research, pointed to three other reasons the Caspian basin states are now likely to reconsider Iran as a route: First, it is common practice for exporters to want to have multiple pipelines rather than be at the mercy from disruptions of a single one.
Second, exporting oil through Iran to the Gulf is significantly less expensive than sending it through Georgia and Turkey or through Russia. And third – and this may be especially significant in the case of Azerbaijan – oil from the Caspian going via Iran could help meet the fuel needs of the northern part of that country, a section populated by ethnic Azerbaijanis.
Vienna, August 30 – The disruption of oil flows via Georgia during the recent violence has made that route significantly less attractive for Caspian oil exporting countries, with some concluding they have no choice but to go via Russia given Iran’s international isolation but at least a few thinking about using Iran to gain greater freedom of maneuver relative to Moscow.
If the governments of the region do decide to ship some or all of their oil via Iran, that would have three serious geopolitical consequences that may rival some of the already enormous geopolitical fallout from Russia’s decision to invade Georgia and to recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia (www.nr2.ru/economy/193763.html).
First, given the enormous appetite for oil in the West and Pacific rim, such a shift in Caspian exports would likely put enormous pressure on Washington to soften its approach to Tehran, especially if the United States wants to support the effective independence of the post-Soviet states and thus has no desire to see the oil flow through the Russian Federation.
Second, Iran’s willingness to serve as the route out for Caspian basin oil (or as a market for some of it) would likely set it on a collision course with Moscow, which has made it very clear that it wants to control all oil coming out of the former Soviet space and which would view any change in Iran’s approach or Western hostility to Tehran as not in Russia’s interest.
And third, such a shift would almost certainly affect Turkey and its relations not only with the post-Soviet Turkic states but also with Russia. Ankara’s ties with the former would likely become less important given that oil would be flowing via Iran, and it ties with Moscow would likely strengthen by means of some kind of condominium in the Southern Caucasus.
Beyond doubt, many countries, including both the United States and Russia, albeit for very different reasons, will do what they can to prevent such a shift, but the changes in Georgia and in the international system after Georgia mean that the use of such a route with all the consequences it would entail is no longer as unthinkable as it was a month ago.
The Georgian government and many commentators have suggested that blocking the east-west flow of oil from the Caspian via Georgia, a route that bypasses Russia, was one of the most important reasons behind Moscow’s decision to introduce troops there, an argument both Moscow and other analysts have heatedly denied.
But however that may be, Natalya Kharitonova, a regional analyst at Moscow State University, argues that it is important to focus on “the concrete facts” including both the way in which Russia’s action made Georgia less attractive as a transit corridor and Iran potentially a much more interesting one (www.ia-centr.ru/expert/2067/).
Among the “facts” she lists are the following: “the use of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan and Baku-Supsa oil pipeline, of the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline and of a number of other transportation units as well as the cessation of rail deliveries of oil to the Georgian port of Batumi was stopped” because of the conflict.
That in turn, she notes, forced Baku not only to reduce the amount of oil it pumped but also “to search for alternative routes for the transportation of this resource. As a result, Azerbaijani oil has been flowing through the Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline. [And] Turkey intends to purchase additional gas from Russia and Iran to compensate.”
At the same time, the Moscow scholar says, “Iran for example has decided to build the Neka-Jask pipeline as a competitor to Baku-Tbilisi-Jeyhan.” Earlier this week, Iranian sources reported that Azerbaijan had begun exporting some of its oil exports via Iran, although some in Baku denied this (www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=67534§ionid=351020103).
A commentary in the Baku newspaper “Echo” today, indicates that Azerbaijan hopes to develop the east-west pipelines in Georgia but points out that analysts there and in other regional oil-exporting countries are looking at the Iranian route in the hopes of avoiding the consequences of using the Russian one (www.echo-az.com/economica01.shtml, August 30).
Ilham Shaban, the president of the Baku Center of Oil Research, told the paper that “all Western oil companies would like to work in Iran” but can’t easily because of American opposition. But now “invoking the situation in Georgia, they are beginning to advise official Washington to review its relations with Iranian so as to allow them to begin work there.”
He and other experts noted that because of the events in Georgia, “Azerbaijan began to export its oil to international markets through Iran,” even as it sent some of its oil northward via Russia – an example of Badu’s “balanced” foreign policy. But Azerbaijan was not the only regional country to use Iran during this crisis: Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan did so as well.
And another Azerbaijani expert, Gubad Ibadoglu, the head of the Center for Economic Research, pointed to three other reasons the Caspian basin states are now likely to reconsider Iran as a route: First, it is common practice for exporters to want to have multiple pipelines rather than be at the mercy from disruptions of a single one.
Second, exporting oil through Iran to the Gulf is significantly less expensive than sending it through Georgia and Turkey or through Russia. And third – and this may be especially significant in the case of Azerbaijan – oil from the Caspian going via Iran could help meet the fuel needs of the northern part of that country, a section populated by ethnic Azerbaijanis.
Window on Eurasia Shorts for August 30 – Georgian Events
Some news items about events in and around Georgia during the last week which have attracted less attention than they deserve:
NOT ALL RUSSIAN ANALYSTS AGREE WITH PUTIN ON AMERICAN ELECTIONS. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s suggestion that the Bush White House pushed Tbilisi to provoke Russia as part of an effort to boost the electoral chances of Republic candidate John McCain has received widespread coverage not only in the Russian media but in American outlets as well (www.mignews.ru/news/politic/cis/280808_171244_69112.html). But many
Russian analysts do not agree with him either on the existence of a White House plot or on what the outcome of the US election is likely to be (www.nr2.ru/policy/192867.html).
HAMAS WANTS TO HELP MOSCOW BUILD ‘A NEW WORLD ORDER.’ Hamas, which welcomed Moscow’s extension of diplomatic recognition to the two breakaway republics in Georgia, has announced that it is ready to help the Kremlin build “a new world order” directed against Israel and the United States (zavtra.ru/cgi//veil//data/zavtra/08/771/41.html). The Georgian foreign ministry on August 29 congratulated Moscow on its new alliance with this terrorist group. Meanwhile, however, Moscow’s effort to get other countries to follow its lead on Abkhazia and South Ossetia has fallen flat. Venezuela’s Ugo Chavez has expressed sympathy but neither Caracas nor Mensk has moved (grani.ru/Politics/Russia/m.140732.html). Given that Moscow routinely compares what it has done to the West’s support for Kosovo, it is perhaps worth noting that 46 countries have now recognized that Balkan republic (http://www.nm.md/daily/article/2008/08/29/0101.html/).
RUSSIAN NATIONALISTS STEP UP CAMPAIGN TO LINK JEWS TO GEORGIA. Russia’s extreme right continues its effort to blame Israel and the Jews for their support of Georgia against Russia, an effort that could lead those attacking “persons from the Caucasus” to attack Jews (www.za-nauku.ru//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=917&Itemid=36).
RUSSIAN JEWS IN ISRAEL URGE DIASPORA NOT TO BUY ANYTHING GEORGIAN. A group of Russian Jews living in Israel have urged their compatriots not to buy anything Georgian in order to demonstrate their support for South Ossetia and to weaken the regime in Tbilisi, a call that some Russian nationalists welcome (www.homeru.com/news/content/view/6059/174/).
RUSSIANS DEBATE THE IMPACT OF MOSCOW’S ACTIONS IN GEORGIA ON RUSSIA. A few Russian analysts argue that Moscow’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia will lead to demands for independence by at least some of the non-Russian republics within the Russian Federation (www.regnum.ru/news/1046955.html). But far more Russian analysts and officials insist that there is no danger of “a domino effect” inside their country (www.ia-centr.ru/expert/2119/).
WESTERN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS ACTIVE IN CAUCASUS DENOUNCED AS ‘BANDITS’ … Russian commentators have been stepping up their attacks on human rights groups either based in Western countries or funded from abroad over the last several weeks. A particularly blatant and vicious example called these groups “bandits” because of their work in the Caucasus region (www.fondsk.ru/article.php?id=1584).
… AS HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH RELEASES SATELLITE PHOTOS SHOWING ETHNIC CLEANSING SOUTH OSSETIA. Human Rights Watch, one of the groups Russian media have been attacking, has used satellite photography to show that Russian and South Ossetian forces have engaged in the ethnic cleansing of Georgian villages in that breakaway republic (abkhazeti.info/news/1220052197.php).
LIBERAL COMMENTATOR SAYS RUSSIA AS ‘A PIRATE STATE’ SHOULD HAVE A PIRATE FLAG… Valeriya Novodvorskaya, a liberal Russian commentator, says that as Moscow’s actions in Georgia have shown, Russia has become “a pirate state” and should be flying a pirate flag rather than a tricolor one intended to stress its links to the countries of Europe (grani.ru/Politics/Russia/p.140673.html).
… WHILE ONE RUSSIAN SAYS HE NO LONGER RECOGNIZES ‘SELF-PROCLAIMED’ RUSSIAN FEDERATION. One Russian at least is taking an even more radical step to protest Moscow’s actions in Georgia. He has posted online a declaration saying that “effective immediately” he no longer recognizes “the self-proclaimed Russian Federation” as a state or himself as its citizen (yun.complife.ru/miscell/norussia.htm).
MOSCOW OFFICIALS SAY U.S. ‘REVIEWING CANDIDATES’ TO REPLACE SAAKASHVILI. In a transparent effort to sow discord in Tbilisi and to raise new questions in Europe about the Georgian government, Russian officials and commentators are suggesting that Georgian opposition figures are now travelling to Washington or meeting with American officials elsewhere as part of a supposed vetting process in which the United States will choose who will succeed Mihkiel Saakashvili (http://www.nr2.ru/inworld/192936.html).
RUSSIA’S MUSLIMS BACK MOSCOW ON RECOGNIZING ABKHAZIA, SOUTH OSSETIA. Russia’s Muslim establishment – including the Union of Muftis of Russia (SMR), the Central Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD), and almost all other MSD heads – have backed Moscow’s moves in Georgia and called on Muslim countries to follow Russia’s lead and extend diplomatic recognition to Abkhazia and South Ossetia (www.islam.ru/rus/2008-08-25/#22385 and www.islam.ru/rus/2008-08-28/#22458).
CRITICISM OF QUALITY OF RUSSIAN MILITARY ACTION IN GEORGIA INTENSIFIES. As more information comes out about Russian military actions in Georgia, an increasing number of Russian analysts are suggesting that Russian forces were not only poorly equipped but did not perform all that well in Georgia, winning as Soviet forces typically did only by their overwhelming numbers (www.polit.ru/analytics/2008/08/27/vol.html). And several have openly complained that this is an especially unfortunate situation because Russia has been spending more on defense but appears from the events in the Caucasus to be getting less for it (http://www.newizv.ru/news/2008-08-27/96780/).
NOT ALL RUSSIAN ANALYSTS AGREE WITH PUTIN ON AMERICAN ELECTIONS. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s suggestion that the Bush White House pushed Tbilisi to provoke Russia as part of an effort to boost the electoral chances of Republic candidate John McCain has received widespread coverage not only in the Russian media but in American outlets as well (www.mignews.ru/news/politic/cis/280808_171244_69112.html). But many
Russian analysts do not agree with him either on the existence of a White House plot or on what the outcome of the US election is likely to be (www.nr2.ru/policy/192867.html).
HAMAS WANTS TO HELP MOSCOW BUILD ‘A NEW WORLD ORDER.’ Hamas, which welcomed Moscow’s extension of diplomatic recognition to the two breakaway republics in Georgia, has announced that it is ready to help the Kremlin build “a new world order” directed against Israel and the United States (zavtra.ru/cgi//veil//data/zavtra/08/771/41.html). The Georgian foreign ministry on August 29 congratulated Moscow on its new alliance with this terrorist group. Meanwhile, however, Moscow’s effort to get other countries to follow its lead on Abkhazia and South Ossetia has fallen flat. Venezuela’s Ugo Chavez has expressed sympathy but neither Caracas nor Mensk has moved (grani.ru/Politics/Russia/m.140732.html). Given that Moscow routinely compares what it has done to the West’s support for Kosovo, it is perhaps worth noting that 46 countries have now recognized that Balkan republic (http://www.nm.md/daily/article/2008/08/29/0101.html/).
RUSSIAN NATIONALISTS STEP UP CAMPAIGN TO LINK JEWS TO GEORGIA. Russia’s extreme right continues its effort to blame Israel and the Jews for their support of Georgia against Russia, an effort that could lead those attacking “persons from the Caucasus” to attack Jews (www.za-nauku.ru//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=917&Itemid=36).
RUSSIAN JEWS IN ISRAEL URGE DIASPORA NOT TO BUY ANYTHING GEORGIAN. A group of Russian Jews living in Israel have urged their compatriots not to buy anything Georgian in order to demonstrate their support for South Ossetia and to weaken the regime in Tbilisi, a call that some Russian nationalists welcome (www.homeru.com/news/content/view/6059/174/).
RUSSIANS DEBATE THE IMPACT OF MOSCOW’S ACTIONS IN GEORGIA ON RUSSIA. A few Russian analysts argue that Moscow’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia will lead to demands for independence by at least some of the non-Russian republics within the Russian Federation (www.regnum.ru/news/1046955.html). But far more Russian analysts and officials insist that there is no danger of “a domino effect” inside their country (www.ia-centr.ru/expert/2119/).
WESTERN HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS ACTIVE IN CAUCASUS DENOUNCED AS ‘BANDITS’ … Russian commentators have been stepping up their attacks on human rights groups either based in Western countries or funded from abroad over the last several weeks. A particularly blatant and vicious example called these groups “bandits” because of their work in the Caucasus region (www.fondsk.ru/article.php?id=1584).
… AS HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH RELEASES SATELLITE PHOTOS SHOWING ETHNIC CLEANSING SOUTH OSSETIA. Human Rights Watch, one of the groups Russian media have been attacking, has used satellite photography to show that Russian and South Ossetian forces have engaged in the ethnic cleansing of Georgian villages in that breakaway republic (abkhazeti.info/news/1220052197.php).
LIBERAL COMMENTATOR SAYS RUSSIA AS ‘A PIRATE STATE’ SHOULD HAVE A PIRATE FLAG… Valeriya Novodvorskaya, a liberal Russian commentator, says that as Moscow’s actions in Georgia have shown, Russia has become “a pirate state” and should be flying a pirate flag rather than a tricolor one intended to stress its links to the countries of Europe (grani.ru/Politics/Russia/p.140673.html).
… WHILE ONE RUSSIAN SAYS HE NO LONGER RECOGNIZES ‘SELF-PROCLAIMED’ RUSSIAN FEDERATION. One Russian at least is taking an even more radical step to protest Moscow’s actions in Georgia. He has posted online a declaration saying that “effective immediately” he no longer recognizes “the self-proclaimed Russian Federation” as a state or himself as its citizen (yun.complife.ru/miscell/norussia.htm).
MOSCOW OFFICIALS SAY U.S. ‘REVIEWING CANDIDATES’ TO REPLACE SAAKASHVILI. In a transparent effort to sow discord in Tbilisi and to raise new questions in Europe about the Georgian government, Russian officials and commentators are suggesting that Georgian opposition figures are now travelling to Washington or meeting with American officials elsewhere as part of a supposed vetting process in which the United States will choose who will succeed Mihkiel Saakashvili (http://www.nr2.ru/inworld/192936.html).
RUSSIA’S MUSLIMS BACK MOSCOW ON RECOGNIZING ABKHAZIA, SOUTH OSSETIA. Russia’s Muslim establishment – including the Union of Muftis of Russia (SMR), the Central Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD), and almost all other MSD heads – have backed Moscow’s moves in Georgia and called on Muslim countries to follow Russia’s lead and extend diplomatic recognition to Abkhazia and South Ossetia (www.islam.ru/rus/2008-08-25/#22385 and www.islam.ru/rus/2008-08-28/#22458).
CRITICISM OF QUALITY OF RUSSIAN MILITARY ACTION IN GEORGIA INTENSIFIES. As more information comes out about Russian military actions in Georgia, an increasing number of Russian analysts are suggesting that Russian forces were not only poorly equipped but did not perform all that well in Georgia, winning as Soviet forces typically did only by their overwhelming numbers (www.polit.ru/analytics/2008/08/27/vol.html). And several have openly complained that this is an especially unfortunate situation because Russia has been spending more on defense but appears from the events in the Caucasus to be getting less for it (http://www.newizv.ru/news/2008-08-27/96780/).
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