Paul Goble
Staunton, September 28 – Unlike the European Union which has successfully transformed most separatist movements into regionalist ones, Moscow is transforming the regionalist movements in the Russian Federation into separatist ones, according to a leading Russian theorist on regionalism.
In a speech earlier this month in St. Petersburg on the future of northwest Russia, Vadim Shtepa argued, drawing on the work of Britain’s Roland Robertson, that “globalization, however paradoxical it may seen is connected with the growth of regionalism” in a “dialectical” process known as “glocalization” (www.ingria.info/?biblio&news_action=show_news&news_id=5059).
That places new challenges on governments and on larger political unions. In both the European Union and in the Pacific region, regions within one country are establishing direct contact with regions in others, a process that some have said will lead to “the end of the nation state” but that in fact may help keep regionalism from becoming separatism.
Unfortunately, Shtepa says, “in Russia, the world ‘regionalism’ is taboo because it is conflated with separatism. But regionalism is transformed into separatism only when this or that region is deprived of political and economic self-administration.” Europe understands this and gives regions self-government; Russia doesn’t, and the result is separatist movements.
Indeed, he continues, “Russia today is evolving not according to a federal model like that of the European Union as a whole but is trying to build a centralized ‘national state’ with ‘a titular nation.” That requires depriving the regions of any control over their affairs, and that in turn helps to promote what Moscow most opposes.
In short, Shtepa argues, the powers that be at the center are breeding their own nemesis by their approach to the regions, both predominantly ethnic Russian and non-Russian.
Regionalism movements in the Russian Federation today, he continues, combine within themselves another dialectic, that between the right and left of the political system. Therefore it is impossible to consider them” one or the other, and it is a measure of Moscow’s problems that its analysts are struggling to define regionalism or combat it.
Shtepa focuses on one interesting detail of the regionalist agenda in the Russian Federation today: hostility to the existing metropolitan centers of control so strong that many regionalists want some other center established for their regions. Thus, some Ingermanlanders want another city to be the capital, like Ottawa in Canada, and St. Petersburg to be a Montreal.
That most Moscow commentators and Moscow officials have little or no understanding of the dialectical nature of regionalism and hence are behaving in ways that undermine their own goals is shown in two other analyses published this week, one concerning Moscow’s anger about regional identities and the other containing the latest Russian attack on national republics.
In an article on “Svobodnaya pressa” yesterday, Dmitry Treshchanin details both the increasing proclivity of people Moscow considers ethnic Russian to identify as something else, including Siberians, and the angry response of most Muscovites to such declarations and their presumed meaning (svpressa.ru/society/article/31063/).
And in the other, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the LDPR head who is vice speaker of the Duma, called, as he has before, for redrawing the borders of the federal subjects and ignoring ethnicity as a factor in the formation of such units, a call that is infuriating not only non-Russians but increasingly Russian regionalists as well (116.ru/news/323188.html).
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Window on Eurasia: Proposed Caspian-Black Sea Canal Would Have Enormous Geopolitical Impact
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 28 – A Russian-Kazakhstan working group will present a plan for the construction of building a canal between the Caspian and Azov seas, an enormously expensive “gigantist” project with roots in the Stalinist 1930s and one that, if realized, would have enormous geopolitical consequences.
“In today’s “Izvestiya,” journalist Konstantin Volkov says that what his Moscow paper has been able to learn so far this “new mega-project,” one that Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has supported since at least 2007, “promises to become the most expensive in the entire history of contemporary Russia” (www.izvestia.ru/obshestvo/article3146612/)
In 2009, Volkov says, the European Development Bank provided 2.7 million US dollars to study two possible routes – a “Eurasian” canal just north of the North Caucasus mountain range and a second branch of the existing Volga-Don canal which would pass somewhat further north.
According to the newspaper, the results of the study of the two, although still classified “secret,” are in fact “ready” for a “final” decision by the leaders of the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan, the two countries most immediately affected but hardly the only ones given the other Caspian and Black Sea littoral state and their neighbors.
But as Volkov puts it, “the question immediately arises: why in fact is it necessary to spend billions of dollars for a new link between the Caspian and the Azov?” The existing Volga-Don canal works more or less well for almost all purposes, including those that the backers of the new canal say it would fulfill.
However, as Putin put it, “the appearance of a new canal “would not simply give the Caspian littoral states a way out to the Black and Mediterranean, that is to the world ocean, but also qualitatively change their geopolitical position and allow them to become sea powers” as a result of this link.
Eurasianist Aleksandr Dugin told the paper that “the question here is geopolitical: In exchange for the establishment of the Eurasia canal, Russia will increase its influence in Kazakhstan. And if to these two countries joint also Azerbaijan and Iran, who are also on the Caspian littoral, this will create a new oil cartel that won’t be overawed by OPEC.”
If this canal is built, Russia will gain some immediate economic benefits from transit fees, given that between six and ten percent of the world’s oil is in the Caspian basin. But more important, it will be able to challenge those promoting other pipeline routes such as Baku-Jehan because ships will be able to carry the oil further and less expensively.
Moreover, Volkov continues, “if alongside will be established a transcontinental route connecting the industrial regions of China with the Caspian, then the new artery will become a channel for shipping Chinese goods” and that path could become a competitor to the sea route through the Suez canal.
The projected cost of each of the possible roots is roughly 500 billion rubles (16 billion US dollars), although as Volkov points out, those projections do not include many of the ancillary construction projects that will be needed or take into consideration the possible social costs or likely overruns.
According to the “Izvestiya” journalist, Moscow hopes to get the countries of the region who will be the direct beneficiaries, including not only Kazakhstan, but Azerbaijan, Iran and Turkmenistan, as well as China to help pay for the construction of this canal, a plan that means such a canal will trigger geopolitical tensions even before it goes into operation.
But the possibility this project is already generating controversy inside the Russian Federation, with ecologists questioning its impact and others the opportunity costs of spending money on such a canal at a time when Russia needs to invest in other infrastructure projects, including roads and public health facilities. See, among others the discussions at www.stoletie.ru/lenta/azov_s_kaspijem_sojedinat_2010-09-28.htm and http://www.fondsk.ru/news/2010/09/28/kaspij-soedinjat-s-azovskim-morem.html.)
Staunton, September 28 – A Russian-Kazakhstan working group will present a plan for the construction of building a canal between the Caspian and Azov seas, an enormously expensive “gigantist” project with roots in the Stalinist 1930s and one that, if realized, would have enormous geopolitical consequences.
“In today’s “Izvestiya,” journalist Konstantin Volkov says that what his Moscow paper has been able to learn so far this “new mega-project,” one that Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has supported since at least 2007, “promises to become the most expensive in the entire history of contemporary Russia” (www.izvestia.ru/obshestvo/article3146612/)
In 2009, Volkov says, the European Development Bank provided 2.7 million US dollars to study two possible routes – a “Eurasian” canal just north of the North Caucasus mountain range and a second branch of the existing Volga-Don canal which would pass somewhat further north.
According to the newspaper, the results of the study of the two, although still classified “secret,” are in fact “ready” for a “final” decision by the leaders of the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan, the two countries most immediately affected but hardly the only ones given the other Caspian and Black Sea littoral state and their neighbors.
But as Volkov puts it, “the question immediately arises: why in fact is it necessary to spend billions of dollars for a new link between the Caspian and the Azov?” The existing Volga-Don canal works more or less well for almost all purposes, including those that the backers of the new canal say it would fulfill.
However, as Putin put it, “the appearance of a new canal “would not simply give the Caspian littoral states a way out to the Black and Mediterranean, that is to the world ocean, but also qualitatively change their geopolitical position and allow them to become sea powers” as a result of this link.
Eurasianist Aleksandr Dugin told the paper that “the question here is geopolitical: In exchange for the establishment of the Eurasia canal, Russia will increase its influence in Kazakhstan. And if to these two countries joint also Azerbaijan and Iran, who are also on the Caspian littoral, this will create a new oil cartel that won’t be overawed by OPEC.”
If this canal is built, Russia will gain some immediate economic benefits from transit fees, given that between six and ten percent of the world’s oil is in the Caspian basin. But more important, it will be able to challenge those promoting other pipeline routes such as Baku-Jehan because ships will be able to carry the oil further and less expensively.
Moreover, Volkov continues, “if alongside will be established a transcontinental route connecting the industrial regions of China with the Caspian, then the new artery will become a channel for shipping Chinese goods” and that path could become a competitor to the sea route through the Suez canal.
The projected cost of each of the possible roots is roughly 500 billion rubles (16 billion US dollars), although as Volkov points out, those projections do not include many of the ancillary construction projects that will be needed or take into consideration the possible social costs or likely overruns.
According to the “Izvestiya” journalist, Moscow hopes to get the countries of the region who will be the direct beneficiaries, including not only Kazakhstan, but Azerbaijan, Iran and Turkmenistan, as well as China to help pay for the construction of this canal, a plan that means such a canal will trigger geopolitical tensions even before it goes into operation.
But the possibility this project is already generating controversy inside the Russian Federation, with ecologists questioning its impact and others the opportunity costs of spending money on such a canal at a time when Russia needs to invest in other infrastructure projects, including roads and public health facilities. See, among others the discussions at www.stoletie.ru/lenta/azov_s_kaspijem_sojedinat_2010-09-28.htm and http://www.fondsk.ru/news/2010/09/28/kaspij-soedinjat-s-azovskim-morem.html.)
Window on Eurasia: Luzhkov’s Ouster Said a Defeat for Moscow Patriarchate, Setback for Russia’s Imperial Nationalists
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 28 – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s ouster of longtime Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov is a stinging defeat for the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church which enjoyed close ties to the mayor and actively supported him even when the Kremlin sent clear signals that he was on his way out, according to one analyst.
And at the same time, Luzhkov’s departure removes from the scene one of the most consistent advocates of a neo-imperial policy for the Russian Federation, as another Moscow commentator points out, as well as forcing from office the author of the notorious October 1993 decree expelling from the Russian capital “persons of Caucasus nationality.”
While neither religion nor nationality issues probably played a major role in Luzhkov’s fall from grace, both are certainly going to be affected given Luzhkov’s prominence and the likelihood that any successor will adopt a different or at least lower profile role on such issues especially beyond the ring road.
Commenting on Luzhkov’s ouster today for the Portal-Credo.ru site, Aleksandr Soldatov, the editor of Agentura.ru, argues that as a result, the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church has lost a champion and a friend whom the senior hierarchs did everything they could to lobby for right up to the end (www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=comment&id=1787).
Among the Orthodox hierarchs, Soldatov notes, Luzhkov was known as the man who arranged for rebuilding Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, currently de facto the main church of the Russian Orthodox Church and a place where Patriarch Kirill routinely conducts services.
The Moscow Patriarch, long part of “the Putin command,” behaved “much more actively” in support of Luzhkov “than the National Leader” when the Moscow mayor was being attacked. Last week, for example, Patriarch Kirill sent birthday greetings to Luzhkov in which he praised his services to the Church and to the country.
“If the lines of this letter” are compared with the Kremlin attacks, Soldatov continues, they might have appeared as “direct compromat” on the Patriarch. But the Church “did not limit itself” to this letter. It even offered “a special prayer” for Luzhkov on his birthday and succeeded in having that reported by Kremlin-controlled news agencies on September 21.
In Soldatov’s view, “the Moscow Patriarchate really owes a great deal to [Luzhkov],” not only for his support in building the cathedral in which Kirill is so pleased, unlike his predecessor Aleksii II who found it somehow not that “comfortable” but also for his support of the Church’s extensive economic and construction activities.
Many Orthodox Christians have been furious at Luzhkov for his destruction of the historic face of Moscow, Soldatov continues. “But the Church [as an organization] is … not a society of amateur architects or aesthetes.” Instead, it is “a completely pragmatic organization,” always looking after its own interests.
In short, the Moscow Patriarchate, if not the Russian Orthodox Church as a body of believers was “completely happy with Luzhkov. They understood the values and principles of each other,” even though Luzhkov himself was not that religious: The now ex-mayor was baptized only when the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was built.
That concord was reflected in Luzhkov’s farewell gift to the Church, a promise to build over the next year 200 new Orthodox churches, bringing the total number of Orthodox facilities in the Russian capital to more than 800. But now there is a question over this construction project, all the more so given the Muslim push for opening a fifth mosque there.
“It is obvious,” Soldatov concludes, “that in struggling for his position, Yuri Luzhkov attempted to make use of the Church as a resource. And he got it. Perhaps not so clearly ad demonstrably as he might have liked but completely clearly and unambiguously. And it is not Luzhkov’s fault that under present conditions this resource proved too small to save him.”
Meanwhile, in another commentary, Aleksandr Baunov discusses the role that Luzhkov played in promoting a particular neo-imperial policy by the Russian government in large measure because he ensured that Moscow had “its own foreign policy,” one sometimes at odds with that of the foreign ministry (slon.ru/blogs/baunov/post/466312/).
As Baunov says, Luzhkov routinely maintained official and unofficial ties with people across the former Soviet space, and he advocated positions which the commentator who clearly approves them said showed that he “thought with the scope of a Winston Churchill, a Metternich or a Prince Gorchakov.”
Luzhkov was perhaps best known for his consistent support of the idea that Crimea should belong not to Ukraine but to the Russian Federation and his active promotion of the idea of the construction of a bridge from Krasnodar kray to Kerch in order to link those two territories closer together.
But that was far from the only example of Luzhkov’s line in this area. As early as 2006, he said that Moscow “would construct its relations with Abkhazia as with an independent state” and as early as 2004, he supported Adjaria and its leader Aslan Abashidze against Tbilisi’s blockade.
The now ex-mayor also maintained close relations with Belarus President Alyaksandr Lukashenka even when the Minsk leader was on the outs with the Russian Federation, and Luzhkov backed the idea of diverting Siberian rivers to the south in order to “economically and politically attach to Russia its former Central Asian colonies.”
Baunov provides other examples of Luzhkov’s personal policies, often dismissed as populist but in fact having an impact on Russia’s approach, including in Central Asia and the Caucasus, opposition to the World Trade Organization, and support for ethnic Russian communities outside of the Russian Federation.
When Luzhkov dealt with officials in Western countries, Baunov says, he was treated as the mayor of a capital city. “But in the former union republics and satellites, Luzhkov conducted a relatively independent post-imperial and neo-colonial policy,” something that gained him support from many in these places, even as it generated criticism closer to home.
Staunton, September 28 – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s ouster of longtime Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov is a stinging defeat for the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church which enjoyed close ties to the mayor and actively supported him even when the Kremlin sent clear signals that he was on his way out, according to one analyst.
And at the same time, Luzhkov’s departure removes from the scene one of the most consistent advocates of a neo-imperial policy for the Russian Federation, as another Moscow commentator points out, as well as forcing from office the author of the notorious October 1993 decree expelling from the Russian capital “persons of Caucasus nationality.”
While neither religion nor nationality issues probably played a major role in Luzhkov’s fall from grace, both are certainly going to be affected given Luzhkov’s prominence and the likelihood that any successor will adopt a different or at least lower profile role on such issues especially beyond the ring road.
Commenting on Luzhkov’s ouster today for the Portal-Credo.ru site, Aleksandr Soldatov, the editor of Agentura.ru, argues that as a result, the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church has lost a champion and a friend whom the senior hierarchs did everything they could to lobby for right up to the end (www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=comment&id=1787).
Among the Orthodox hierarchs, Soldatov notes, Luzhkov was known as the man who arranged for rebuilding Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, currently de facto the main church of the Russian Orthodox Church and a place where Patriarch Kirill routinely conducts services.
The Moscow Patriarch, long part of “the Putin command,” behaved “much more actively” in support of Luzhkov “than the National Leader” when the Moscow mayor was being attacked. Last week, for example, Patriarch Kirill sent birthday greetings to Luzhkov in which he praised his services to the Church and to the country.
“If the lines of this letter” are compared with the Kremlin attacks, Soldatov continues, they might have appeared as “direct compromat” on the Patriarch. But the Church “did not limit itself” to this letter. It even offered “a special prayer” for Luzhkov on his birthday and succeeded in having that reported by Kremlin-controlled news agencies on September 21.
In Soldatov’s view, “the Moscow Patriarchate really owes a great deal to [Luzhkov],” not only for his support in building the cathedral in which Kirill is so pleased, unlike his predecessor Aleksii II who found it somehow not that “comfortable” but also for his support of the Church’s extensive economic and construction activities.
Many Orthodox Christians have been furious at Luzhkov for his destruction of the historic face of Moscow, Soldatov continues. “But the Church [as an organization] is … not a society of amateur architects or aesthetes.” Instead, it is “a completely pragmatic organization,” always looking after its own interests.
In short, the Moscow Patriarchate, if not the Russian Orthodox Church as a body of believers was “completely happy with Luzhkov. They understood the values and principles of each other,” even though Luzhkov himself was not that religious: The now ex-mayor was baptized only when the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was built.
That concord was reflected in Luzhkov’s farewell gift to the Church, a promise to build over the next year 200 new Orthodox churches, bringing the total number of Orthodox facilities in the Russian capital to more than 800. But now there is a question over this construction project, all the more so given the Muslim push for opening a fifth mosque there.
“It is obvious,” Soldatov concludes, “that in struggling for his position, Yuri Luzhkov attempted to make use of the Church as a resource. And he got it. Perhaps not so clearly ad demonstrably as he might have liked but completely clearly and unambiguously. And it is not Luzhkov’s fault that under present conditions this resource proved too small to save him.”
Meanwhile, in another commentary, Aleksandr Baunov discusses the role that Luzhkov played in promoting a particular neo-imperial policy by the Russian government in large measure because he ensured that Moscow had “its own foreign policy,” one sometimes at odds with that of the foreign ministry (slon.ru/blogs/baunov/post/466312/).
As Baunov says, Luzhkov routinely maintained official and unofficial ties with people across the former Soviet space, and he advocated positions which the commentator who clearly approves them said showed that he “thought with the scope of a Winston Churchill, a Metternich or a Prince Gorchakov.”
Luzhkov was perhaps best known for his consistent support of the idea that Crimea should belong not to Ukraine but to the Russian Federation and his active promotion of the idea of the construction of a bridge from Krasnodar kray to Kerch in order to link those two territories closer together.
But that was far from the only example of Luzhkov’s line in this area. As early as 2006, he said that Moscow “would construct its relations with Abkhazia as with an independent state” and as early as 2004, he supported Adjaria and its leader Aslan Abashidze against Tbilisi’s blockade.
The now ex-mayor also maintained close relations with Belarus President Alyaksandr Lukashenka even when the Minsk leader was on the outs with the Russian Federation, and Luzhkov backed the idea of diverting Siberian rivers to the south in order to “economically and politically attach to Russia its former Central Asian colonies.”
Baunov provides other examples of Luzhkov’s personal policies, often dismissed as populist but in fact having an impact on Russia’s approach, including in Central Asia and the Caucasus, opposition to the World Trade Organization, and support for ethnic Russian communities outside of the Russian Federation.
When Luzhkov dealt with officials in Western countries, Baunov says, he was treated as the mayor of a capital city. “But in the former union republics and satellites, Luzhkov conducted a relatively independent post-imperial and neo-colonial policy,” something that gained him support from many in these places, even as it generated criticism closer to home.
Window on Eurasia: Luzhkov’s Ouster Said a Defeat for Moscow Patriarchate, Setback for Russia’s Imperial Nationalists
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 28 – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s ouster of longtime Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov is a stinging defeat for the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church which enjoyed close ties to the mayor and actively supported him even when the Kremlin sent clear signals that he was on his way out, according to one analyst.
And at the same time, Luzhkov’s departure removes from the scene one of the most consistent advocates of a neo-imperial policy for the Russian Federation, as another Moscow commentator points out, as well as forcing from office the author of the notorious October 1993 decree expelling from the Russian capital “persons of Caucasus nationality.”
While neither religion nor nationality issues probably played a major role in Luzhkov’s fall from grace, both are certainly going to be affected given Luzhkov’s prominence and the likelihood that any successor will adopt a different or at least lower profile role on such issues especially beyond the ring road.
Commenting on Luzhkov’s ouster today for the Portal-Credo.ru site, Aleksandr Soldatov, the editor of Agentura.ru, argues that as a result, the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church has lost a champion and a friend whom the senior hierarchs did everything they could to lobby for right up to the end (www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=comment&id=1787).
Among the Orthodox hierarchs, Soldatov notes, Luzhkov was known as the man who arranged for rebuilding Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, currently de facto the main church of the Russian Orthodox Church and a place where Patriarch Kirill routinely conducts services.
The Moscow Patriarch, long part of “the Putin command,” behaved “much more actively” in support of Luzhkov “than the National Leader” when the Moscow mayor was being attacked. Last week, for example, Patriarch Kirill sent birthday greetings to Luzhkov in which he praised his services to the Church and to the country.
“If the lines of this letter” are compared with the Kremlin attacks, Soldatov continues, they might have appeared as “direct compromat” on the Patriarch. But the Church “did not limit itself” to this letter. It even offered “a special prayer” for Luzhkov on his birthday and succeeded in having that reported by Kremlin-controlled news agencies on September 21.
In Soldatov’s view, “the Moscow Patriarchate really owes a great deal to [Luzhkov],” not only for his support in building the cathedral in which Kirill is so pleased, unlike his predecessor Aleksii II who found it somehow not that “comfortable” but also for his support of the Church’s extensive economic and construction activities.
Many Orthodox Christians have been furious at Luzhkov for his destruction of the historic face of Moscow, Soldatov continues. “But the Church [as an organization] is … not a society of amateur architects or aesthetes.” Instead, it is “a completely pragmatic organization,” always looking after its own interests.
In short, the Moscow Patriarchate, if not the Russian Orthodox Church as a body of believers was “completely happy with Luzhkov. They understood the values and principles of each other,” even though Luzhkov himself was not that religious: The now ex-mayor was baptized only when the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was built.
That concord was reflected in Luzhkov’s farewell gift to the Church, a promise to build over the next year 200 new Orthodox churches, bringing the total number of Orthodox facilities in the Russian capital to more than 800. But now there is a question over this construction project, all the more so given the Muslim push for opening a fifth mosque there.
“It is obvious,” Soldatov concludes, “that in struggling for his position, Yuri Luzhkov attempted to make use of the Church as a resource. And he got it. Perhaps not so clearly ad demonstrably as he might have liked but completely clearly and unambiguously. And it is not Luzhkov’s fault that under present conditions this resource proved too small to save him.”
Meanwhile, in another commentary, Aleksandr Baunov discusses the role that Luzhkov played in promoting a particular neo-imperial policy by the Russian government in large measure because he ensured that Moscow had “its own foreign policy,” one sometimes at odds with that of the foreign ministry (slon.ru/blogs/baunov/post/466312/).
As Baunov says, Luzhkov routinely maintained official and unofficial ties with people across the former Soviet space, and he advocated positions which the commentator who clearly approves them said showed that he “thought with the scope of a Winston Churchill, a Metternich or a Prince Gorchakov.”
Luzhkov was perhaps best known for his consistent support of the idea that Crimea should belong not to Ukraine but to the Russian Federation and his active promotion of the idea of the construction of a bridge from Krasnodar kray to Kerch in order to link those two territories closer together.
But that was far from the only example of Luzhkov’s line in this area. As early as 2006, he said that Moscow “would construct its relations with Abkhazia as with an independent state” and as early as 2004, he supported Adjaria and its leader Aslan Abashidze against Tbilisi’s blockade.
The now ex-mayor also maintained close relations with Belarus President Alyaksandr Lukashenka even when the Minsk leader was on the outs with the Russian Federation, and Luzhkov backed the idea of diverting Siberian rivers to the south in order to “economically and politically attach to Russia its former Central Asian colonies.”
Baunov provides other examples of Luzhkov’s personal policies, often dismissed as populist but in fact having an impact on Russia’s approach, including in Central Asia and the Caucasus, opposition to the World Trade Organization, and support for ethnic Russian communities outside of the Russian Federation.
When Luzhkov dealt with officials in Western countries, Baunov says, he was treated as the mayor of a capital city. “But in the former union republics and satellites, Luzhkov conducted a relatively independent post-imperial and neo-colonial policy,” something that gained him support from many in these places, even as it generated criticism closer to home.
Staunton, September 28 – Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s ouster of longtime Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov is a stinging defeat for the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church which enjoyed close ties to the mayor and actively supported him even when the Kremlin sent clear signals that he was on his way out, according to one analyst.
And at the same time, Luzhkov’s departure removes from the scene one of the most consistent advocates of a neo-imperial policy for the Russian Federation, as another Moscow commentator points out, as well as forcing from office the author of the notorious October 1993 decree expelling from the Russian capital “persons of Caucasus nationality.”
While neither religion nor nationality issues probably played a major role in Luzhkov’s fall from grace, both are certainly going to be affected given Luzhkov’s prominence and the likelihood that any successor will adopt a different or at least lower profile role on such issues especially beyond the ring road.
Commenting on Luzhkov’s ouster today for the Portal-Credo.ru site, Aleksandr Soldatov, the editor of Agentura.ru, argues that as a result, the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church has lost a champion and a friend whom the senior hierarchs did everything they could to lobby for right up to the end (www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=comment&id=1787).
Among the Orthodox hierarchs, Soldatov notes, Luzhkov was known as the man who arranged for rebuilding Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, currently de facto the main church of the Russian Orthodox Church and a place where Patriarch Kirill routinely conducts services.
The Moscow Patriarch, long part of “the Putin command,” behaved “much more actively” in support of Luzhkov “than the National Leader” when the Moscow mayor was being attacked. Last week, for example, Patriarch Kirill sent birthday greetings to Luzhkov in which he praised his services to the Church and to the country.
“If the lines of this letter” are compared with the Kremlin attacks, Soldatov continues, they might have appeared as “direct compromat” on the Patriarch. But the Church “did not limit itself” to this letter. It even offered “a special prayer” for Luzhkov on his birthday and succeeded in having that reported by Kremlin-controlled news agencies on September 21.
In Soldatov’s view, “the Moscow Patriarchate really owes a great deal to [Luzhkov],” not only for his support in building the cathedral in which Kirill is so pleased, unlike his predecessor Aleksii II who found it somehow not that “comfortable” but also for his support of the Church’s extensive economic and construction activities.
Many Orthodox Christians have been furious at Luzhkov for his destruction of the historic face of Moscow, Soldatov continues. “But the Church [as an organization] is … not a society of amateur architects or aesthetes.” Instead, it is “a completely pragmatic organization,” always looking after its own interests.
In short, the Moscow Patriarchate, if not the Russian Orthodox Church as a body of believers was “completely happy with Luzhkov. They understood the values and principles of each other,” even though Luzhkov himself was not that religious: The now ex-mayor was baptized only when the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was built.
That concord was reflected in Luzhkov’s farewell gift to the Church, a promise to build over the next year 200 new Orthodox churches, bringing the total number of Orthodox facilities in the Russian capital to more than 800. But now there is a question over this construction project, all the more so given the Muslim push for opening a fifth mosque there.
“It is obvious,” Soldatov concludes, “that in struggling for his position, Yuri Luzhkov attempted to make use of the Church as a resource. And he got it. Perhaps not so clearly ad demonstrably as he might have liked but completely clearly and unambiguously. And it is not Luzhkov’s fault that under present conditions this resource proved too small to save him.”
Meanwhile, in another commentary, Aleksandr Baunov discusses the role that Luzhkov played in promoting a particular neo-imperial policy by the Russian government in large measure because he ensured that Moscow had “its own foreign policy,” one sometimes at odds with that of the foreign ministry (slon.ru/blogs/baunov/post/466312/).
As Baunov says, Luzhkov routinely maintained official and unofficial ties with people across the former Soviet space, and he advocated positions which the commentator who clearly approves them said showed that he “thought with the scope of a Winston Churchill, a Metternich or a Prince Gorchakov.”
Luzhkov was perhaps best known for his consistent support of the idea that Crimea should belong not to Ukraine but to the Russian Federation and his active promotion of the idea of the construction of a bridge from Krasnodar kray to Kerch in order to link those two territories closer together.
But that was far from the only example of Luzhkov’s line in this area. As early as 2006, he said that Moscow “would construct its relations with Abkhazia as with an independent state” and as early as 2004, he supported Adjaria and its leader Aslan Abashidze against Tbilisi’s blockade.
The now ex-mayor also maintained close relations with Belarus President Alyaksandr Lukashenka even when the Minsk leader was on the outs with the Russian Federation, and Luzhkov backed the idea of diverting Siberian rivers to the south in order to “economically and politically attach to Russia its former Central Asian colonies.”
Baunov provides other examples of Luzhkov’s personal policies, often dismissed as populist but in fact having an impact on Russia’s approach, including in Central Asia and the Caucasus, opposition to the World Trade Organization, and support for ethnic Russian communities outside of the Russian Federation.
When Luzhkov dealt with officials in Western countries, Baunov says, he was treated as the mayor of a capital city. “But in the former union republics and satellites, Luzhkov conducted a relatively independent post-imperial and neo-colonial policy,” something that gained him support from many in these places, even as it generated criticism closer to home.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Window on Eurasia: North Caucasian Militants Want Russia to Want Independence of North Caucasus, Mamsurov Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 27 – Militants in the North Caucasus republics want to create a situation in which residents there will decide that they would be better off outside of the Russian Federation, but even more, the head of the Republic of North Ossetia says, they seek by their actions to get Russians to want precisely that.
To that end, Taymuraz Mamsurov says in an interview published in today’s “Kommersant,” the militants try to do everything so that Russians will view North Caucasians as “wild men whom it is impossible to education but only possible to destroy” so that eventually Russians will say enough (kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?DocsID=1511641&NodesID=6).
And in pursuit of that goal, he continues, they are prepared to engage in the most horrific act of terrorism like the September 9th explosion in Vladikavkaz and to fight on for perhaps as many as ten years more, something they hope to be able to achieve by keeping the population of the region in a condition of constant fear.
To defeat them, Mamsurov argues, “we must learn to live in conditions of war. Now, we must quickly learn from our mistakes. In blood, unfortunately. But the most terrible thing is if our people will live in horror and fear.” People cannot and must not live that way. “Therefore one must learn how to counter these threats and wait until all this will end.”
After the Vladikavkaz attack, Mamsurov acknowledges that many Ossetians and especially the young were inclined to blame the Ingush, not only because an entire generation has grown up among the Ossetians blaming the Ingush and vice versa but because young people tend to be especially emotional on such subjects. If they were otherwise, it would be “strange.”
The North Ossetian leader said that Ingush President Yevkurov had called him immediately after the events to express his sympathies but that it was very difficult for him to say anything publically, given the passions in both republics. That is something, Mamsurov says he fully understands.
In other comments, Mamsurov says that he made contacts with the Israelis after the Beslan terrorist act because “one must teach people” not only that “each day is a gift but also to be able to live with the threat of terrorism, and not become immobilized by fear of that possibility even as one minimizes the threat. That is something the Israelis have done.
The North Ossetian leader also says that his relations with the law enforcement organs in his republic are good, even though “by federal law, [he] does not have the right to appoint or remove them and they have the right not to tell me all that I want to know.” But he suggests that he gets information “about everything.”
Mamsurov argues that Islam is not to blame for all the problems in the North Caucasus as many seem to think – even those responsible for Beslan were from other faiths. And he adds that despite his own ethnic heritage, he had “never in [his] life” gone to a mosque, and believed that “faith without knowledge is fanaticism.
But Mamsurov’s most important comments concern how he would conduct the struggle against the militants. On the one hand, he stresses that it is an ideological fight, one in which current leaders like himself must make sure that another generation does not grow up hating people of other groups and blaming them for all their own problems.
And on the other, he calls for draconian punishments. Those who engage in the killing of innocents must be killed. There is no other “medicine” for them. Moreover, the families of the militants and those who stand behind the one and the other must bear full responsibility for what the terrorists do.
Mamsurov dismisses as impossible the idea suicide bombers do not care about their lives. Such an individual is simply specially prepared, just like some dogs are in the military. Such an individual “does not sacrifice himself. He is not alive. [Instead,] this is an individual who does not know religion or the value of life or the mother who bore and nursed him.”
In fact, such an individual is simply “a thing in human form that is chosen because of his psychological problems.” No ideas are behind his action, Mamsurov continues, and certainly no religion supports this kind of behavior. That is a hard lesson to learn, but it is a necessary one if such phenomena are to be defeated.
What the peoples of the North Caucasus are involved in is “a war. This is not some kind of petty banditism. And when one is involved in a war one must act accordingly. If I take you prisoner, I read out law. If I am required to keep you in prison and feed you and so on, I must do that. If I am required in military time to shoot you, then I must do so.”
More to the point, “you must know about this. When you leave your home, you must know what you are getting involved in. And if you go along this path, then you must know that even if you die, this is what will happen with your family and close friends. This is not some kind of Caucasian wildness; it must be based on law and on the decision of a court.”
If the peoples of the North Caucasus are to defeat the militants, Mamsurov concludes, everyone must understand that, both the militants and those they seek to destroy or enslave.
Staunton, September 27 – Militants in the North Caucasus republics want to create a situation in which residents there will decide that they would be better off outside of the Russian Federation, but even more, the head of the Republic of North Ossetia says, they seek by their actions to get Russians to want precisely that.
To that end, Taymuraz Mamsurov says in an interview published in today’s “Kommersant,” the militants try to do everything so that Russians will view North Caucasians as “wild men whom it is impossible to education but only possible to destroy” so that eventually Russians will say enough (kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?DocsID=1511641&NodesID=6).
And in pursuit of that goal, he continues, they are prepared to engage in the most horrific act of terrorism like the September 9th explosion in Vladikavkaz and to fight on for perhaps as many as ten years more, something they hope to be able to achieve by keeping the population of the region in a condition of constant fear.
To defeat them, Mamsurov argues, “we must learn to live in conditions of war. Now, we must quickly learn from our mistakes. In blood, unfortunately. But the most terrible thing is if our people will live in horror and fear.” People cannot and must not live that way. “Therefore one must learn how to counter these threats and wait until all this will end.”
After the Vladikavkaz attack, Mamsurov acknowledges that many Ossetians and especially the young were inclined to blame the Ingush, not only because an entire generation has grown up among the Ossetians blaming the Ingush and vice versa but because young people tend to be especially emotional on such subjects. If they were otherwise, it would be “strange.”
The North Ossetian leader said that Ingush President Yevkurov had called him immediately after the events to express his sympathies but that it was very difficult for him to say anything publically, given the passions in both republics. That is something, Mamsurov says he fully understands.
In other comments, Mamsurov says that he made contacts with the Israelis after the Beslan terrorist act because “one must teach people” not only that “each day is a gift but also to be able to live with the threat of terrorism, and not become immobilized by fear of that possibility even as one minimizes the threat. That is something the Israelis have done.
The North Ossetian leader also says that his relations with the law enforcement organs in his republic are good, even though “by federal law, [he] does not have the right to appoint or remove them and they have the right not to tell me all that I want to know.” But he suggests that he gets information “about everything.”
Mamsurov argues that Islam is not to blame for all the problems in the North Caucasus as many seem to think – even those responsible for Beslan were from other faiths. And he adds that despite his own ethnic heritage, he had “never in [his] life” gone to a mosque, and believed that “faith without knowledge is fanaticism.
But Mamsurov’s most important comments concern how he would conduct the struggle against the militants. On the one hand, he stresses that it is an ideological fight, one in which current leaders like himself must make sure that another generation does not grow up hating people of other groups and blaming them for all their own problems.
And on the other, he calls for draconian punishments. Those who engage in the killing of innocents must be killed. There is no other “medicine” for them. Moreover, the families of the militants and those who stand behind the one and the other must bear full responsibility for what the terrorists do.
Mamsurov dismisses as impossible the idea suicide bombers do not care about their lives. Such an individual is simply specially prepared, just like some dogs are in the military. Such an individual “does not sacrifice himself. He is not alive. [Instead,] this is an individual who does not know religion or the value of life or the mother who bore and nursed him.”
In fact, such an individual is simply “a thing in human form that is chosen because of his psychological problems.” No ideas are behind his action, Mamsurov continues, and certainly no religion supports this kind of behavior. That is a hard lesson to learn, but it is a necessary one if such phenomena are to be defeated.
What the peoples of the North Caucasus are involved in is “a war. This is not some kind of petty banditism. And when one is involved in a war one must act accordingly. If I take you prisoner, I read out law. If I am required to keep you in prison and feed you and so on, I must do that. If I am required in military time to shoot you, then I must do so.”
More to the point, “you must know about this. When you leave your home, you must know what you are getting involved in. And if you go along this path, then you must know that even if you die, this is what will happen with your family and close friends. This is not some kind of Caucasian wildness; it must be based on law and on the decision of a court.”
If the peoples of the North Caucasus are to defeat the militants, Mamsurov concludes, everyone must understand that, both the militants and those they seek to destroy or enslave.
Window on Eurasia: Kamchatka Draftees Can’t Show Up for Military Service Because of Costly Air Fares
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 27 – For four years, a Kamchatka journalist says, draftees from Koryak district have not been able to show up for military service because there has been no money from the government to pay for the air fares needed to bring them to central dispatch places, one measure of the difficulties involved in connecting parts of Russia not linked by roads.
But as Vyacheslav Skalatsky shows, the combination of cutbacks in air service to distant locations within the Russian Federation and rapidly increasing prices for air fares has broader consequences, both preventing young men from getting better jobs that military experience can open for them and meaning that people who are ill cannot get medical attention.
When he first reported this, the Kamchatka journalist says, he and his colleagues “understood that the bureaucrats might have not been able to deal with this problem just as with others. But we were not prepared to plumb the depths of their unprofessionalism. Now that has happened (www.raipon.info/index.php/component/content/article/1-novosti/1196-im-ne-doehat),
Skalatsky notes that “the task of bringing draftees to the kray center is only part of a large social problem of the entire Koryak district. Young people [from there] cannot be called to military service as is guaranteed by the Constitution. And then they cannot find more or less attractive work because of the lack of such service.”
But instead of addressing this problem, regional officials have sought to shift responsibility for and place blame on anyone but themselves. And when Koryak residents have complained, the bureaucrats have often routed their letters to the wrong officials who in turn have either ignored them or answered with “empty” promises.
One appeal, he said, complained that the situation had deteriorated since the Koryak district was amalgamated into the Kamchatka kray as part of then-President Vladimir Putin’s push to reduce the number of federal subjects by combining in the first instance, small, so-called “matryoshka” non-Russian districts with larger and predominantly Russian ones.
And another letter that Skalatsky read out on television pointed out to officials that many young men can’t find jobs because of this situation. Those “without a military ticket,” she pointed out, “are not hired on a permanent basis,” something that leaves them with few prospects and little hope for the future.
One official told her that the military commissar of Kamchatka kray says that the kray government cannot pay for the flights because Moscow has not provided the necessary funds “to the full extent.” He promised to see what could be done, but since that time, the people and draftees of Koryakia have not received any help.
What they and others have received are proud and entirely “empty” boasts by kray officials. Oskana Gerasimova, the kray development minister, told a session of the Russian-American Pacific Ocean Partnership Group that Kamchatka has all that it needs to be a leader in the development of trade ties between Russia and Pacific Rim and European countries.
Skalatsky says that it would be “interesting” to learn how Gerasimova squares this claim with the situation of “those draftees who FOR YEARS have not been able to reach the draft assembly point because of the absence of money and air communications” and feels comfortable in asserting that Kamchatka is able to respond “adequately to ‘the challenges of the times.’”
Some might be tempted to view this situation as exceptional, but another report today, this time in “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” suggests that similar problems are intensifying in the roughly one-third of the Russian Federation that lies in the north and whose residents are not linked to the rest of the country by any roads, let alone good ones.
According to the Moscow paper’s Krasnoyarsk correspondent, Aleksandr Chernyavsky, 11 days ago, officials closed the civilian airport in Dixon, the northernmost such facility in the Russian Federation, ending regular air service between that location and the south and stranding some 60 passengers waiting on the tarmac(www.ng.ru/regions/2010-09-27/100_dixon.html).
“The air bridge for residents of Dixon” – more than 600 people – “is vitally necessary, Chernyavsky continues. By plane are delivered not only the residents of the local settlement but also doctors, mail, and fresh products like milk and vegetables.” Official promises to establish “helicopter communication” do not appear likely to make up for the loss of plane service.
Vasily Nechayev, the head of the education commission of the regional legislature, says that this failure of the industry and energy ministry and the Taymyr district authorities is generating “serious concerns among the kray parliamentarians. But the local executive responds that that the closure was not his fault but that of aviation safety officials.
To bring the airport up to Russian safety standards will require 250 million rubles (8 million US dollars), an amount local legislatures promise to try to find in next year’s budget. In the meantime, residents of that northern settlement will have to make do without fresh milk and vegetables and perhaps, like the Koryaks, won’t be able to send their sons south to the army.
Staunton, September 27 – For four years, a Kamchatka journalist says, draftees from Koryak district have not been able to show up for military service because there has been no money from the government to pay for the air fares needed to bring them to central dispatch places, one measure of the difficulties involved in connecting parts of Russia not linked by roads.
But as Vyacheslav Skalatsky shows, the combination of cutbacks in air service to distant locations within the Russian Federation and rapidly increasing prices for air fares has broader consequences, both preventing young men from getting better jobs that military experience can open for them and meaning that people who are ill cannot get medical attention.
When he first reported this, the Kamchatka journalist says, he and his colleagues “understood that the bureaucrats might have not been able to deal with this problem just as with others. But we were not prepared to plumb the depths of their unprofessionalism. Now that has happened (www.raipon.info/index.php/component/content/article/1-novosti/1196-im-ne-doehat),
Skalatsky notes that “the task of bringing draftees to the kray center is only part of a large social problem of the entire Koryak district. Young people [from there] cannot be called to military service as is guaranteed by the Constitution. And then they cannot find more or less attractive work because of the lack of such service.”
But instead of addressing this problem, regional officials have sought to shift responsibility for and place blame on anyone but themselves. And when Koryak residents have complained, the bureaucrats have often routed their letters to the wrong officials who in turn have either ignored them or answered with “empty” promises.
One appeal, he said, complained that the situation had deteriorated since the Koryak district was amalgamated into the Kamchatka kray as part of then-President Vladimir Putin’s push to reduce the number of federal subjects by combining in the first instance, small, so-called “matryoshka” non-Russian districts with larger and predominantly Russian ones.
And another letter that Skalatsky read out on television pointed out to officials that many young men can’t find jobs because of this situation. Those “without a military ticket,” she pointed out, “are not hired on a permanent basis,” something that leaves them with few prospects and little hope for the future.
One official told her that the military commissar of Kamchatka kray says that the kray government cannot pay for the flights because Moscow has not provided the necessary funds “to the full extent.” He promised to see what could be done, but since that time, the people and draftees of Koryakia have not received any help.
What they and others have received are proud and entirely “empty” boasts by kray officials. Oskana Gerasimova, the kray development minister, told a session of the Russian-American Pacific Ocean Partnership Group that Kamchatka has all that it needs to be a leader in the development of trade ties between Russia and Pacific Rim and European countries.
Skalatsky says that it would be “interesting” to learn how Gerasimova squares this claim with the situation of “those draftees who FOR YEARS have not been able to reach the draft assembly point because of the absence of money and air communications” and feels comfortable in asserting that Kamchatka is able to respond “adequately to ‘the challenges of the times.’”
Some might be tempted to view this situation as exceptional, but another report today, this time in “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” suggests that similar problems are intensifying in the roughly one-third of the Russian Federation that lies in the north and whose residents are not linked to the rest of the country by any roads, let alone good ones.
According to the Moscow paper’s Krasnoyarsk correspondent, Aleksandr Chernyavsky, 11 days ago, officials closed the civilian airport in Dixon, the northernmost such facility in the Russian Federation, ending regular air service between that location and the south and stranding some 60 passengers waiting on the tarmac(www.ng.ru/regions/2010-09-27/100_dixon.html).
“The air bridge for residents of Dixon” – more than 600 people – “is vitally necessary, Chernyavsky continues. By plane are delivered not only the residents of the local settlement but also doctors, mail, and fresh products like milk and vegetables.” Official promises to establish “helicopter communication” do not appear likely to make up for the loss of plane service.
Vasily Nechayev, the head of the education commission of the regional legislature, says that this failure of the industry and energy ministry and the Taymyr district authorities is generating “serious concerns among the kray parliamentarians. But the local executive responds that that the closure was not his fault but that of aviation safety officials.
To bring the airport up to Russian safety standards will require 250 million rubles (8 million US dollars), an amount local legislatures promise to try to find in next year’s budget. In the meantime, residents of that northern settlement will have to make do without fresh milk and vegetables and perhaps, like the Koryaks, won’t be able to send their sons south to the army.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Window on Eurasia: Moscow Patriarchate Backs Novel by Widow of Martyred Orthodox Missionary about Islamist Extremists
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 26 – The widow of Father Daniel Sysoyev, a young Russian Orthodox pastor missionary who in the view of the Moscow Patriarchate, was “martyred” in November 2009 by Islamist extremists, has written a novel about a young woman who out of her love for her husband finds herself in a camp where Islamists prepare suicide bombers.
The subject is explosive enough in today’s Russia, but the impact of this novel is certain to be far greater than would otherwise be the case because the book is to be published with the imprimatur of the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church and thus will be seen by many as a statement of its views (www.interfax-religion.ru/islam/?act=news&div=37507).
At the very least, the appearance of this book by Yulia Sysoyeva will again focus attention not only on her late husband’s murder and the fate of the many suspected of killing him but also and far more importantly on his push for missionary work by the Russian Orthodox Church not only about the non-traditional faiths but also and especially among Muslims.
Sysoyev, born in 1974, was at the time of his death the pastor of Moscow’s Church of the Apostle Thomas. But more important, he had attracted attention both for his active missionary work among Muslims and Protestants and his willingness to debate the leaders of these faiths and the opponents among the Orthodox of such missionary activity.
(Most Orthodox hierarchs have no objection to missionary work among those they call the non-traditional faiths in that country, but these leaders generally follow the line laid down a decade ago by the churchman who is now patriarch that the Orthodox should not proselytize among the other “traditional” faiths – Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism.)
Sysoyev argued that the Orthodox faith requires its adherents to spread the Good News of
Christianity to others. And during the last decade of his life, he gained the reputation of being an active missionary among the rapidly growing Muslim community of the Russian capital, a reputation that may have cost him his life.
On November 19, 2009, he was shot in his own church. Officials moved quickly and arrested a Kyrgyz national on suspicion. That individual, however, died while in detention, an outcome that led some to believe there was a cover up and others, including radical Islamists in the North Caucasus, to declare that they rather than the man arrested had killed Sysoyev.
At the time of his death, Patriarch Kirill called Father Daniel Sysoyev “a martyr” for the cause of missionary work, and many Orthodox priests and hierarchs have routinely invoked his name and his ideas since then, arguing that the Church must not be afraid, as Sysoyev was not afraid, of seeking to convert Muslims now living in Moscow and other Russian cities.
By giving its support to the novel Sysoyev’s widow has written, one that judging by the brief Interfax account will portray Muslims in a negative way by suggesting they want to recruit Russians as suicide bombers, the Moscow Patriarchate is encouraging anti-Muslim attitudes among the Orthodox, thus exacerbating inter-religious and inter-ethnic tensions in Russia.
Staunton, September 26 – The widow of Father Daniel Sysoyev, a young Russian Orthodox pastor missionary who in the view of the Moscow Patriarchate, was “martyred” in November 2009 by Islamist extremists, has written a novel about a young woman who out of her love for her husband finds herself in a camp where Islamists prepare suicide bombers.
The subject is explosive enough in today’s Russia, but the impact of this novel is certain to be far greater than would otherwise be the case because the book is to be published with the imprimatur of the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church and thus will be seen by many as a statement of its views (www.interfax-religion.ru/islam/?act=news&div=37507).
At the very least, the appearance of this book by Yulia Sysoyeva will again focus attention not only on her late husband’s murder and the fate of the many suspected of killing him but also and far more importantly on his push for missionary work by the Russian Orthodox Church not only about the non-traditional faiths but also and especially among Muslims.
Sysoyev, born in 1974, was at the time of his death the pastor of Moscow’s Church of the Apostle Thomas. But more important, he had attracted attention both for his active missionary work among Muslims and Protestants and his willingness to debate the leaders of these faiths and the opponents among the Orthodox of such missionary activity.
(Most Orthodox hierarchs have no objection to missionary work among those they call the non-traditional faiths in that country, but these leaders generally follow the line laid down a decade ago by the churchman who is now patriarch that the Orthodox should not proselytize among the other “traditional” faiths – Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism.)
Sysoyev argued that the Orthodox faith requires its adherents to spread the Good News of
Christianity to others. And during the last decade of his life, he gained the reputation of being an active missionary among the rapidly growing Muslim community of the Russian capital, a reputation that may have cost him his life.
On November 19, 2009, he was shot in his own church. Officials moved quickly and arrested a Kyrgyz national on suspicion. That individual, however, died while in detention, an outcome that led some to believe there was a cover up and others, including radical Islamists in the North Caucasus, to declare that they rather than the man arrested had killed Sysoyev.
At the time of his death, Patriarch Kirill called Father Daniel Sysoyev “a martyr” for the cause of missionary work, and many Orthodox priests and hierarchs have routinely invoked his name and his ideas since then, arguing that the Church must not be afraid, as Sysoyev was not afraid, of seeking to convert Muslims now living in Moscow and other Russian cities.
By giving its support to the novel Sysoyev’s widow has written, one that judging by the brief Interfax account will portray Muslims in a negative way by suggesting they want to recruit Russians as suicide bombers, the Moscow Patriarchate is encouraging anti-Muslim attitudes among the Orthodox, thus exacerbating inter-religious and inter-ethnic tensions in Russia.
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