Paul Goble
Vienna, September 2 – The widespread assumption that the Russian Federation will ultimately incorporate South Ossetia into its territory has led a Georgian parliamentarian to suggest Tbilisi should be making its own territorial demands on Russia, a proposal that calls attention to the ways in which border changes have taken place in Eurasia in recent times.
Yesterday, Georgian agencies reported that Koba Habazi, a member of the Georgian parliament’s foreign affairs committee, has urged Tbilisi to lodge a territorial claim against Russia with the United Nations for Sochi in order to make it more difficult for Moscow to hold the Olympics there in 2014 (www.sobkorr.ru/news/48BBB62F5364D.html).
“I am not saying that this is achievable at the present stage,” Habazi said, “but when a territory becomes disputed [as this action would make Sochi], then the chances for holding the Olympiad there are reduced” – especially since the world is now dividing up between those who back Moscow and those who are its opponents.
In making this proposal, Habazi was adding his voice to those in the United States Congress who have introduced a resolution calling on the International Olympic Committee not to hold the games in Sochi because of Moscow’s military actions in Georgia, a resolution that is slated to be voted on later this month.
Commenting on this Georgian parliamentarian’s suggestion, Sobkorr.ru’s Igor Gladysh says that “one can certainly understand the logic” behind it and even find certain “historical justifications” for Georgia’s claim as well as for a variety of other claims that countries might lodge against the Russian Federation – or other states.
“In almost the entire territory of the present-day Russian Federation there lived in former times peoples who did not have any relationship to the Slavs,” he writes. And “even the basin of the Moscow river was a place where Finno-Ugric tribes lived,” something which Gladysh noted, he himself “had more than once had the occasion” to comment upon.
And he noted that others have picked up this theme as well. On this week’s “Vesti nedeli” television program, Dmitry Kiselyev went so far as to cite communism’s founding father, Karl Marx, as having “expressed doubt in the very fact of the existence of the Russian nation as such.”
But -- and this is Gladysh’s main point -- “the majority of major powers of the world find themselves in an analogous situation,” on in which many other countries or peoples “might advance similar claims,” something most do not do because they know similar claims could be advanced against them and because they can be confident that almost no one will support them.
Nonetheless, Russia’s recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and widespread predictions that it will ultimately absorb the latter if not the former call attention to three things that the international community has largely ignored or even flatly denied. First, border changes among the Soviet republics before 1991 were not rare – there were more than 200 of them.
Second, there have been territorial changes among the post-Soviet states since that time, most recently between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, which sparked protests in the latter, and between Kazakhstan and the Russian Federation, which has been managed relatively calmly over the last month (www.easttime.ru/news/1/3/708.html).
And third, because of this history and because of its implications for the future of the former Soviet republics and even their survival, Russia’s latest moves have renewed discussions in many of them about the way in which tsarist and Soviet officials changed borders in order to control them. (See, for example, www.ethnoglobus.com/?page=full&id=355).
There is a fourth aspect of this situation but it is not truly political: That is the shifting of the borders of economic or religious groups as the result of political border changes. Among the most contentious of these at present are possible changes in the borders of the canonical territory of various Orthodox churches (www.vremya.ru/2008/159/51/211564.html).
Russia’s actions in Georgia thus entail yet another threat to stability: By suggesting that borders are in play and that they can be changed by military action rather than negotiation, Moscow has exacerbated national feelings among both Russians who see this as a step toward rebuilding the empire and non-Russians who fear that is exactly what Moscow intends.
And those feelings are going to play a significant role in the lives of all the countries of Eurasia, even if at the end of the day, the borders remain where they have been, because by casting doubt on that, the Russian government has not only snubbed its nose at the international system but raised a question the answer to which always cuts more than one way.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Window on Eurasia: Moscow’s Moves in Georgia Reinforcing Authoritarianism in Russia
Paul Goble
Vienna, September 2 – Moscow’s moves in Georgia are having a profound impact on Russian domestic politics and policies, not only tightening the relationship between Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Putin but sparking the kind of witch hunts for “a fifth column” that presage even more repression at least in the short term.
The interrelationship between Russia’s foreign and domestic politics and policies has always been closer than many either there or in the West have assumed. And as the fallout from the Georgian events shows, this linkage is now closer than ever before, according to an article in today’s “Nezavizimaya gazeta” (www.ng.ru/ng_politics/2008-09-02/13_echo.html).
Surveying the opinion of the expert community in Moscow, the paper’s Vladimir Razumov argues that many are convinced that Medvedev and Putin responded to the Georgian moves in South Ossetia in the way that they did because the Russian people, increasingly affected by the nationalist rhetoric of the Kremlin, was more than prepared to go along.
Initially, he points out, some commentators suggested that Moscow would not respond to Georgia’s action because South Ossetia was not central to the Russian government’s interest in pocketing the profits from the export of oil and gas. Indeed, many felt, there was a sense that any action could put those profits at risk.
But both the Medvedev-Putin tandem and the Russian people more generally viewed Tbilisi’s actions as a challenge to Russia’s standing in the world, and so the actions of the former were supported by the latter with enthusiasm in most cases, a pattern that convinced the Russian leadership that the people would support its moves even beyond South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Thus, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist continues, “the behavior of the Russian ruling elite in the last weeks is a demonstration that it does not fear anyone or anything anymore – not only domestic but foreign opponents – and that it intends to establish the rules of the game both in internal and in foreign policy.”
And he adds, “the quiet reaction of the [Russian population] without any outburst of hurrah-patriotic and revanchist attitudes, shows that society accepts what has taken place as a given,” a set of inclinations that is already having consequences for Russian politics and Russian policies at home.
Among the most important of these, only some of which are enumerated by Razumov, are the following: First, Moscow’s actions in Georgia have cemented the relationship between Medvedev and Putin, with the former now closer to Putin than ever before, willing to sacrifice many of his reforms and not the harbinger of liberalism many had expected.
Second, the conflict in Georgia has sparked both new Russian actions to clamp down hard on those few remaining media outlets, including Internet blogs, which are not controlled by the regime and calls for going after what many nationalists calls “the fifth column” within Russia, a group for most that includes both non-Russians and Russian opposition figures.
And third, Moscow’s actions in Georgia have had an impact on two domestic groups – economic elites and non-Russian republics – that seem certain to play a role in Russian political life in the coming days. On the one hand, however patriotic they may be, Russian businessmen can hardly be pleased with the collapse of their portfolios and investment possibilities.
And on the other, increasing restiveness in Ingushetia as well as in other parts of the North Caucasus and the Middle Volga suggests that Moscow will be confronted with new ethnic challenges that both the elite’s own inclinations and the population’s current attitudes are likely to want to respond to with force.
In both cases, the Russian government will undoubtedly take a hard line, not because it is forced to by the population as it might be if that country were a democracy but rather because the regime can count on support from the majority of Russians if it portrays all such actions as standing up to threats from abroad and especially from the United States.
That interaction between Russian domestic and foreign policy does not point to any softening in either sphere at least in the short term. In foreign affairs, this is likely to make it increasingly difficult for Western governments to find a common language with Russian leaders either now or in the coming months, however hard the former try and the latter demand.
And in domestic affairs, it suggests that Russia will move in an increasingly authoritarian direction, striking out at domestic “enemies” in the name of fighting foreign ones and thus threatening many of the freedoms which the Russian people acquired after 1991 and making a popular explosion there eventually if not immediately all the more likely.
Vienna, September 2 – Moscow’s moves in Georgia are having a profound impact on Russian domestic politics and policies, not only tightening the relationship between Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Putin but sparking the kind of witch hunts for “a fifth column” that presage even more repression at least in the short term.
The interrelationship between Russia’s foreign and domestic politics and policies has always been closer than many either there or in the West have assumed. And as the fallout from the Georgian events shows, this linkage is now closer than ever before, according to an article in today’s “Nezavizimaya gazeta” (www.ng.ru/ng_politics/2008-09-02/13_echo.html).
Surveying the opinion of the expert community in Moscow, the paper’s Vladimir Razumov argues that many are convinced that Medvedev and Putin responded to the Georgian moves in South Ossetia in the way that they did because the Russian people, increasingly affected by the nationalist rhetoric of the Kremlin, was more than prepared to go along.
Initially, he points out, some commentators suggested that Moscow would not respond to Georgia’s action because South Ossetia was not central to the Russian government’s interest in pocketing the profits from the export of oil and gas. Indeed, many felt, there was a sense that any action could put those profits at risk.
But both the Medvedev-Putin tandem and the Russian people more generally viewed Tbilisi’s actions as a challenge to Russia’s standing in the world, and so the actions of the former were supported by the latter with enthusiasm in most cases, a pattern that convinced the Russian leadership that the people would support its moves even beyond South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Thus, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist continues, “the behavior of the Russian ruling elite in the last weeks is a demonstration that it does not fear anyone or anything anymore – not only domestic but foreign opponents – and that it intends to establish the rules of the game both in internal and in foreign policy.”
And he adds, “the quiet reaction of the [Russian population] without any outburst of hurrah-patriotic and revanchist attitudes, shows that society accepts what has taken place as a given,” a set of inclinations that is already having consequences for Russian politics and Russian policies at home.
Among the most important of these, only some of which are enumerated by Razumov, are the following: First, Moscow’s actions in Georgia have cemented the relationship between Medvedev and Putin, with the former now closer to Putin than ever before, willing to sacrifice many of his reforms and not the harbinger of liberalism many had expected.
Second, the conflict in Georgia has sparked both new Russian actions to clamp down hard on those few remaining media outlets, including Internet blogs, which are not controlled by the regime and calls for going after what many nationalists calls “the fifth column” within Russia, a group for most that includes both non-Russians and Russian opposition figures.
And third, Moscow’s actions in Georgia have had an impact on two domestic groups – economic elites and non-Russian republics – that seem certain to play a role in Russian political life in the coming days. On the one hand, however patriotic they may be, Russian businessmen can hardly be pleased with the collapse of their portfolios and investment possibilities.
And on the other, increasing restiveness in Ingushetia as well as in other parts of the North Caucasus and the Middle Volga suggests that Moscow will be confronted with new ethnic challenges that both the elite’s own inclinations and the population’s current attitudes are likely to want to respond to with force.
In both cases, the Russian government will undoubtedly take a hard line, not because it is forced to by the population as it might be if that country were a democracy but rather because the regime can count on support from the majority of Russians if it portrays all such actions as standing up to threats from abroad and especially from the United States.
That interaction between Russian domestic and foreign policy does not point to any softening in either sphere at least in the short term. In foreign affairs, this is likely to make it increasingly difficult for Western governments to find a common language with Russian leaders either now or in the coming months, however hard the former try and the latter demand.
And in domestic affairs, it suggests that Russia will move in an increasingly authoritarian direction, striking out at domestic “enemies” in the name of fighting foreign ones and thus threatening many of the freedoms which the Russian people acquired after 1991 and making a popular explosion there eventually if not immediately all the more likely.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Window on Eurasia: Moscow to Help Iran Complete Bushehr Atomic Plant
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.
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.
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!”
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